October media diet

A relatively tame month, which can be blamed both on my busier-than-usual work schedule and the fact that October is probably the best sports month on the calendar, with the baseball playoffs, the NFL in mid-season, and the NBA starting up.

Movies

"The Covenant" looked and sounded great in 4K!

Guy Ritchie’s The Covenant - Amazon Prime | While I can’t get behind directors inserting their names as possessives into movie titles, this one made for an enjoyable rainy Sunday afternoon. Jake Gyllenhaal stars as an Army sergeant charged with rooting out bomb makers in Afghanistan. When his squad is ambushed and he’s severely wounded, it’s up to his interpreter, an Afghan named Ahmed, to smuggle him 100+ miles back to base, an act of valor that the U.S. repays by pulling out of the country in 2021 and thus reneging on promises to provide the thousands of Afghan interpreters contracted with the military during the 20-year occupation a new life in America. Unless you worked for Jake Gyllenhaal, that is.

Streaming

Sex Education, S4 — Netflix | This British dramedy finished its run with guns blazing, tackling every sexual topic under the sun. Pretty groundbreaking stuff, told with heart and a lot of empathy. Something for everyone to learn about sexuality — from teens to grandparents.

The Diplomat, S1 - Netflix | Finally got around to watching this Keri Russell foreign affairs drama set in London. It’s like a Shonda Rhymes show, without the silk sheets. Or maybe an Aaron Sorkin joint, but with slower-talking Brits. Very compelling and fun to imagine our daughter perhaps working at an embassy someday.

Invasion, S1 & S2 — Apple TV | Enjoyed season one of this show more than the second, which got a little bogged down in personal stories instead of what I found more interesting, which is why have aliens invaded us and what are we doing about it? They did not spend a lot of budget on the aliens though. Reminded me a little too much of that “Attack the Block” movie I watched in July!

Books

Julia by Sandra Newman | The estate of George Orwell blessed this feminist retelling of “1984,” which is just as terrifying as the original, published in 1949. Maybe moreso, given how perilously close the world feels to Orwell’s totalitarian nightmare. Orwellian scholars — yes, I think there are such people — will really enjoy it. Readers even get to meet Big Brother! My AP review.

A Brief History of Intelligence: Evolution, AI, and the Five Breakthroughs that Made Our Brains by Max Bennett | Sometimes it’s fun to pick a book off the AP review stack way outside my usual interests. Chose this one because I am actually interested in AI, but turns out the book is more about the evolution of the human brain and how understanding that process may help engineers develop true AI. Interesting stuff, but at times it felt like I was reading my Introduction to Sociology/Anthropology textbook at Middlebury in 1991. My AP review.

The Little Liar by Mitch Albom | The guy behind the bestselling memoir of all time (“Tuesdays with Morrie”) and some of the bestselling modern-day parables (“The Stranger in the Lifeboat,” “For One More Day,” “The Five People You Meet in Heaven”) of all time is back with what he calls a novel, but is really more a combo memoir/parable. It’s not about his family, per se, but he knows plenty of Greek Jews who were slaughtered by the Nazis and has crafted a touching story about four interconnected characters and their fates before, during and after the Holocaust. My AP review.

Live Entertainment

Avi Avital and Hanzhi Wang - Spa Little Theater | Some live music this month at a small venue associated with the Saratoga Performing Arts Center. Avital is a Grammy-winning mandolinist, while Wang plays classical music on an accordion. A weird combo, but they made it work. Best part? Ninety minutes and we felt cultured.