Movie Review: We Are Marshall (2006)

We Are Marshall (2006) directed by McG

A plane crash kills almost the entire football team of Marshall University, including most of the coaches. Assistant Coach Dawson (Matthew Fox) was supposed to be on the plane but switched to driving back to school at the last minute. The town and the university are devastated. University President Dedmon (David Strathairn) has the unenviable task of finding a new head coach. The only one to accept is an upstart from out of state, Jack Lengyel (Matthew McConaughey), who has the drive and ambition to put a new team together and back on the field. Not to win, but to come back from the loss, to heal from the pain, to respect the past, and to build a new future. He and the rest of the town go through a lot of hard moments of grief and growth.

The movie is surprisingly honest and hard-hitting. I was shocked to see that McG was the director, considering his other work that has been less than stellar (Terminator Salvation and the Charlie's Angels movies). The actors give solid performances and nothing looks over-dramatized. The story's natural drama is more than enough to keep viewers engaged and hoping for a better outcome for everyone. The movie is a sincere look at dealing with grief, and a moving one.

Recommended.

Book Review: Utilitarianism by John Stuart Mill

Utilitarianism by John Stuart Mill

This classic text gives a fairly succinct (a little more than sixty pages) presentation and defense of the Utilitarian view of morality. The basic principle of utility is the greatest happiness principle, the idea that an action is morally good if it promotes the most happiness. Mill describes what Utilitarianism is, what the principle is based on, and Utilitarianism's relationship with justice.

Mill identifies the "greatest happiness principle" as that whereby "actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness; wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended pleasure and the absence of pain; by unhappiness, pain and the privation of pleasure." [p. 7] Every moral theory is based on some greatest good that is good in itself. For utilitarians, that good is happiness (as it is for most other philosophies). Mill immediately argues (as do serious Epicureans) that man's greatest happiness lies not in base pleasures. Humans have higher faculties that need satisfaction. These greater abilities give more desirable pleasures. Virtuous action is a greater pleasure than fine dining. Thus "Utilitarianism, therefore, could only attain its end by the general cultivation of nobleness of character." [p. 11] Mill also clarifies that the "greatest good" is not a selfish good, where the moral agent only acts in his or her own interest. The greatest happiness has a more global scope.

Mill bases the principle of utility on two sources of happiness: external sanctions and internal sanctions. External sanctions are simple--happiness comes from the approval of others and pain from disapproval ("others" including both our fellow men and God). Internal sanctions are a bit trickier, but not too much--happiness comes from "a feeling in our own mind." [p. 27] By following duty, we feel pleasure; by contradicting duty, we feel pain. While Mill does acknowledge that some individuals have malformed consciences, he accepts the general feeling of the public about what is right and wrong, what is dutiful and not dutiful. If most people consider something right, than it is right. For Mill, "the sole evidence it is possible to produce that anything is desirable is that people do actually desire it." [p. 34] He goes on to argue that wealth, fame, power, and virtue are all parts of happiness because these are desired as ends in themselves (though they might be used as means to other ends). So the internal sanction is the feeling that results from choosing something desired for itself.

Mill moves on to the relation between Utilitarianism and justice. Justice seems to originate from a separate principle than utility. After looking at some popular opinions and some etymology, Mill comes to his own formulation of what founds the notion of justice. It has two parts: a rule of conduct and a feeling that sanctions that rule. Rules and laws are supposed to be conducive to general happiness (or at least the prevention of pain). The sentiment that gives force to those rules is the desire that those who break the rules be punished. Notions of rights and equality are built from this foundation. Justice can be seen as promoting greater happiness by preventing others from doing harm.

While Mill does a good job arguing, I did find a lot of unpersuasive points. The "greatest happiness" principle sounds good in theory but is fraught with peril and ambiguity in actual reality. People often desire contrary things and it is difficult if not impossible to "math out" which of the contrary things will bring about the most happiness. Just because people desire a certain thing does not mean that thing will bring about happiness, even if they desire that thing as an end in itself. Surely the desire for vengeance against wrongdoers is a universal human experience, but can't a more thorough analysis be done to find why we have that feeling? A deeper understanding of human nature and human society is required but not found in Mill.

Slightly recommended--this is a good primer on Utilitarianism.

Advice for Surviving the Corona Virus

Here's some of the stuff I've been doing to survive the maddening effects of being trapped at home during the Corona virus lockdown.

A group of guys get together online to play the deck-builder card game Dominion online. We'd have a Zoom meeting on one screen and the game on another. After an initial discussion and some prayer time, we played the game and chatted. The large variety of cards means the game has a different set-up every time. It doesn't require too much focus either, though sometimes at the end we get more focused (i.e., more quiet). The mental health benefit of a weekly social night is very big during a lockdown.

A friend tipped me off to the beer-home-delivery service at biermi.com. The web site serves local breweries across the United States, providing the brewers a way to sell their product. Most breweries offer pick up service and/or delivery to their local area. We put an order in at Black Flag Brewing Company in the next town over. We've been meaning to visit the brewery but you never visit tourist sites in your own home town, do you? I ordered in the morning and they delivered in the afternoon.

Brew haul

The web page had "crowlers" on offer, so I thought I'd try them. Growlers are large, resealable glass bottles that are filled off of taps in bars and breweries. Crowlers are 32-ounce cans that serve the same purpose. They are only one-use but they are also recyclable.

A crowler

In healthier consumer news, a local food packing plant started selling boxes of vegetables or fruit or dairy products. The sales happen in the parking lot with a simple drive-thru system. The refrigerated trucks they use for delivery work just as well in their parking lot.

The set-up

Approaching the loading area

My load

For Cinco de Mayo, they had a special box with peppers, red onions, salsa, tortillas, and other thematic items. That inspired me to go and get that box and another one full of fruit.

Cinco de Mayo box

Box of fruit

Fruit salad!

Our local library has lots of digital resources--ebooks, audio ebooks, streaming music lessons, and even movies and TV shows. My daughter has been listening to the audio-book versions of the sequels to Alcatraz and the Evil Librarians since we can't get the physical books from the library. I'm taking ukelele lessons and borrowing graphic novels in digital format. We've worked our way through a lot of the items we borrowed before they closed, hopefully they will open again soon. Having another option to borrow items is great.

The spring baseball season has been cancelled, so we've played a lot of tee-ball and catch in the backyard. Filling in the sports gap has been hard. We've gone for lots of walks and bike rides in the neighborhood.

Weirdly enough, we've spent more time with the cousins on the west coast. They've gotten the Minecraft bug and we have a dedicated server so that the kids can all play together in the same world without other people.

Daughter with cousin on screen and on the phone in the lower right

Yes, a five-year old can do Minecraft!

Another pair of cousins

Hopefully the lockdown won't last long enough for another post like this, but only time will tell.

Book Review: Hellboy 20th Anniversary Sampler by M. Mignola et al.

Hellboy 20th Anniversary Sampler stories by Mike Mignola and R. Sikoryak, art by Fabio Moon, R. Sikoryak, Mike Mignola, and Cameron Stewart

Hellboy's twentieth anniversary was in 2014; I'm only reading this now because it was available as a free digital copy to read during the Corona Virus pandemic. Check here to see if it's still available! Here's what's inside:

1. The Coffin Man--During Hellboy's drunken blur in Mexico, he helps out a young girl whose uncle has just died. The uncle is buried but the niece is worried that a local witch, the Coffin Man, will disturb his eternal rest. Hellboy naturally has to investigate, with the usual weird and wonderful results ("usual" in the sense of what usually happens in Mexico with Hellboy).

2. B.P.R.D. Color Comics Fun!--This re-imagines the Sunday color comics with Hellboy universe characters (like Broom-Hilda is replaced with the Baba Yaga; the Jumble is all Chthulu monster names!). These are as funny as the Sunday funnies, but you'd need to be familiar with the Hellboy stories to appreciate them (so this probably isn't good for a sampler, come to think of it).

3. The Ghoul--Hellboy pursues a husband who goes out a lot at night. The security camera of a graveyard shows the husband having a "picnic." Hellboy investigates and finds a much longer history the guy has...a history that's about to end.

4. Another Day at the Office--A European zombie outbreak draws the attention of the B.P.R.D. They trace it back to a creepy castle where a monomaniacal aristocrat planned to take over the world hundreds of years ago. A treasure hunter came to the castle and got possessed by the old spirit, causing the mayhem. For the B.P.R.D. agents, this is, as the title suggests, an all to familiar scenario.

I enjoyed this volume a lot, though I have read The Coffin Man and the comics before. I don't remember the other two stories. They had the typical blend of creepy atmosphere and pulp action that is characteristic of the Hellboy stories.

Recommended, especially if it's still free!

Cute Kid Pix April 2020

Here are some pictures that didn't make their own blog post...

Our kids have been practicing social distancing with their cousins (who are in California, so more than six feet away) and some more local friends by hanging out together in Minecraft. They are a lot more proficient than before we got locked in and the only way to "go outside" was to "go virtual." We bought an account to have our own private server.

My daughter online with a cousin

Showing off her castle

Checking his inventory

School started up again with distance/on-line learning. So I've gone back to Kindergarten. Here we are doing the Physical Education lesson which included a GoPro run through the paths near the teacher's house. We even had to jump some logs.

Running "outdoors"

Jumping a log

For art class, my littlest one had to make a color wheel from objects at home.

A home-made color wheel

Most of the school work is finished in the morning, leaving the afternoons free for other activities. The kids made banana muffins, dividing up the tasks among them. The youngest put the muffin papers in the pans. The older kids did two jobs: mixing the dry ingredients and mixing the wet ingredients. They took turns stirring the two mixtures into each other. Then they each filled one pan (our recipe makes twenty-four muffins!) and I put them (the pans, not the kids) in the oven.

Mixing ingredients before mixing mixtures

They turned out really well. We had enough left over so we could have "coffee and donuts" after our online church on Sunday. Nothing like tea and muffins after Mass!

Movie Review: The Mikado (1939)

The Mikado (1939) directed by Victor Schertzinger

The D'Oyly Carte Opera Company was the home of Gilbert and Sullivan's comic operas like The Pirates of Penzance (1880) and H.M.S. Pinafore (1878). Their long tradition continued into the twentieth century. In 1939, they collaborated with Hollywood for this movie production of the opera that originally debuted in 1885. The lavish setting and costumes were shown off in full Technicolor. This production captures the spirit and joy of The Mikado.

The movie starts off slowly with title cards explaining the set-up and then a wordless pantomime of the action. The Japanese emperor's son Nanki-Poo (Kenny Baker) flees the royal palace because he's been betrothed to Katisha (Constance Willis), a shrewish older woman. Nanki-Poo disguises himself as a second trombonist and hides in the town of Titipu. He falls in love with Yum-Yum (Jean Colin) who is betrothed to her mentor Ko-Ko (Martyn Green). Ko-Ko was a tailor but he fell under a death sentence when he disobeyed the Mikado's law against flirting (yes, it's a capital crime). The town, in an attempt to stay the executions, hired Ko-Ko as The Lord High Executioner. Ko-Ko clearly couldn't cut off his own head, so things are peaceful. The only problem is that the Mikado is coming to town. Ko-Ko assumes it's because there's been no executions in over a year. He needs to find someone to off. And he has to deal with Nanki-Poo's wooing of Yum-Yum. A lot of delightful comic nonsense ensues.

The show is full of a lot of great and delightful songs like "A Wand'ring Minstrel I," "Three Little Maids from School," "Tit-Willow," and many others. Sullivan's light and airy music occasionally imitates Japanese music (the original opera was made during a Japan craze in England). Gilbert's lyrics and plotting are witty and enjoyable. The production suffers a little bit from the mimed opening and the stage-like sets. It's almost as if viewers were seeing an elaborate stage production. The ninety minute running time means a lot of cuts to and rearranging of the story (and the occasional song).

Recommended--if you haven't seen any Gilbert and Sullivan productions, you owe it to yourself to watch this or the 1980's Pirates of Penzance film with Kevin Kline and Linda Ronstadt. Or go visit a theater where they are putting on a production.

Book Review: My Hero Academia Vol. 15 by Kohei Horikoshi

My Hero Academia Volume 15 by Kohei Horikoshi

The Yakuza's plan to work with the League of Villains moves forward. The heroes realize something is going on and begin to investigate. Midoriya happens onto a key element of the Yakuza's plan when he encounters a young girl. She is the daughter of one of the organized crime bosses. She has lots of bandages on her arms. The situation looks like abuse but the investigation uncovers a more disturbing possibility.

The story is moving along nicely and the creators have even introduced a character created by a fan. With a world full of super-powered people, it's easy to run a contest to add some other super-powered character. I read this as a digital edition on loan from my library. I was lucky they had it and am looking forward to Volume 16.

Recommended.