Re: [Marxism] The Best Films of 2020 (So Far), and They’re All Streaming - The New York Times

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

  POSTING RULES & NOTES  
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*

On 5/24/20 10:24 PM, Erik Toren wrote:
Behind a capitalist paywall. Which films are they? Asking for us 
proletariats. 


Erik




(Sorry, I can't forward the links but there should be enough info to 
track them down.)


The Best Films of 2020 (So Far), and They’re All Streaming
Yes, it’s been a weird year for movies, but our chief critics have still 
found plenty of gems. Here are their top picks.



Leah Lewis in “The Half of It.”
Leah Lewis in “The Half of It.”Credit...KC Bailey/Netflix
Stephanie Goodman
By Stephanie Goodman
May 22, 2020

Theaters closed in March because of the pandemic, and studios delayed 
the release of several much-anticipated films till the fall or even 
2021. So you’d think there might not be much to recommend so far this 
year. But our chief critics, Manohla Dargis and A.O. Scott, are having 
none of that: they are championing several movies that hit theaters 
before the shutdown or were released online afterward. If you’re looking 
for new movies that will challenge you, here are their picks.


Both critics recommend …
‘Beanpole’

The story: Set in Leningrad just after World War II, the freakishly tall 
nurse of the title tends to wounded soldiers in a hospital. But Beanpole 
fought in the war as well, and struggles, alongside her friend Masha, to 
overcome traumas of her own.


What we said: “This is only the second feature from the sensationally 
talented Russian director Kantemir Balagov (who was born in 1991), and 
it’s a gut punch,” Manohla Dargis wrote. “It’s also a brilliantly told, 
deeply moving story about love — in all its manifestations, perversity 
and obstinacy.”


ADVERTISEMENT

Continue reading the main story

Read: The full review.

Watch the movie: Stream it on Mubi; rent or buy it on Amazon, Google 
Play, iTunes or Vudu.


A.O. Scott recommends …
1. ‘The Half of It’

The story: A riff on “Cyrano de Bergerac,” the movie stars Leah Lewis as 
high schooler Ellie Chu, an outsider several times over in her small 
town: she’s an Asian-American lesbian who’s also a gifted writer. She 
unexpectedly bonds with a star football player (Daniel Diemer) who has a 
crush on the same girl she does.


What we said: The film, directed by Alice Wu, “transcends the 
limitations that frequently serve as obstacles to ingenuity in young 
adult movies,” Kyle Turner wrote. “By exploring issues of race and 
queerness with emotional complexity, it treats teenagers with the 
sophistication they deserve.”


ADVERTISEMENT

Continue reading the main story

Read: The full review.

Stream it: On Netflix.

2. ‘Beyond the Visible: Hilma af Klint’

The story: The Swedish abstract painter Hilma af Klint (1862-1944) was a 
trailblazer whose reputation was eclipsed by that of male artists. But 
in 2018 a career survey that stopped at museums including the Guggenheim 
tried to rectify that, and so does this documentary by Halina Dyrschka.


What we said: “‘Beyond the Visible’ bristles with the excitement of 
discovery and also with the impatience that recognition has taken so 
long,” A.O. Scott wrote. “It refreshes the eyes and the mind.”


Read: The full review.

Watch the movie: Via Kino Marquee, a video on demand service that 
benefits local theaters.


3. ‘The Traitor'

The story: Tommaso Buscetta was a real-life member of the Sicilian Cosa 
Nostra who turned on his partners in crime in the 1980s, ultimately 
testifying in open court. In Marco Bellocchio’s feature, he’s played by 
Pierfrancesco Favino as a not entirely admirable figure out for revenge.


What we said: “Bellocchio’s approach to the story is at once coolly 
objective — the movie is part biopic, part courtroom procedural — and 
almost feverishly intense,” Scott wrote. “He has a historian’s 
analytical detachment, a novelist’s compassion for his characters and a 
citizen’s outrage at the cruelty and corruption that have festered in 
his country for so long.”


ADVERTISEMENT

Continue reading the main story

Read: The full review.

Watch the movie: Rent or buy it on Amazon, FandangoNow, Google Play, 
iTunes or Vudu.


4. ‘Beastie Boys Story’

The story: Spike Jonze directs a cinematic version of the 2018 “Beastie 
Boys Book,” the tale of how Ad-Rock, Mike D and MCA morphed from punk 
rockers into best-selling rappers.


Would you like recommendations for more stories like this?

Yes
What we said: The film “has its own kind of beauty, even if the 
aesthetic is more dad rock than hip-hop,” Scott wrote, adding, “It’s a 
jaunt down memory lane and also a moving and generous elegy.”


Read: The full review.

Stream it: On Apple TV Plus.

Manohla Dargis recommends …
1. ‘Bacurau’

The story: In near-future Brazil, a small 

Re: [Marxism] The Best Films of 2020 (So Far), and They’re All Streaming - The New York Times

[Erik Toren via Marxism]

  POSTING RULES & NOTES  
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*

Behind a capitalist paywall. Which films are they? Asking for us
proletariats. 

Erik
_
Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
Set your options at: 
https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com

[Marxism] The Best Films of 2020 (So Far), and They’re All Streaming - The New York Times

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

  POSTING RULES & NOTES  
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/22/movies/best-films-of-2020.html

_
Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
Set your options at: 
https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com

Re: [Marxism] Syria: From National Independence to Proxy War | Louis Proyect: The Unrepentant Marxist

[A.R. G via Marxism]

  POSTING RULES & NOTES  
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*

>It is a shame that those without such connections will likely never be
able to afford books that are essential in developing a class rather than a
geopolitical understanding of what took place in Syria.

FYI both books are available for free on LibGen.is

Amith R. Gupta


On Fri, May 15, 2020 at 11:10 AM Louis Proyect via Marxism <
marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu> wrote:

>   POSTING RULES & NOTES  
> #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
> #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
> #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
> *
>
> Ever since the civil war began in Syria in early 2011, the left has
> largely ignored the social and economic circumstances that led to a
> conflict costing over a half-million deaths and the migration—internal
> and external—of half the population. The tendency was to see Syria as a
> piece on a global chessboard with “the axis of resistance” fending off
> attacks from the West. There was lip-service to the idea that Syrians
> had legitimate grievances against the government early on, but by the
> end of 2011, the “anti-imperialist” consensus was that the rebels were
> jihadists interested more in fighting unbelievers than inequality.
>
> To my knowledge, the first attempt at an analysis of the internal class
> contradictions appeared in 2015. Long-time Syria scholar Raymond
> Hinnebusch and Tina Zintl edited a collection titled “Syria from Reform
> to Revolt: Volume 1: Political Economy and International Relations”. (A
> second volume never appeared.) I found this book invaluable in writing
> an article titled “The Economic Roots of the Syrian Revolution”. My goal
> was to demonstrate that a rural agrarian crisis provided the fuel for an
> uprising. An article by Myrian Ababsa provided statistics that revealed
> the depths of misery that led to the revolt. In 2009, 42 percent of
> Raqqa governorate suffered from anemia owing to a shortage of dairy
> products, vegetables, and fruit. Malnutrition among pregnant women and
> children under five doubled between 2007 and 2009. That was the cause of
> the conflict, not Saudi desire to impose shariah law on the country.
>
> full:
>
> https://louisproyect.org/2020/05/15/syria-from-national-independence-to-proxy-war/
>
> _
> Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
> Set your options at:
> https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/amithrgupta%40gmail.com
>
_
Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
Set your options at: 
https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com

[Marxism] Water for Rojava (Green Left)

[Chris Slee via Marxism]

  POSTING RULES & NOTES  
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*

https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/water-rojava

"While the world battles the COVID-19 pandemic, Turkish president Recep Tayyip 
Erdogan's right-wing government continues to attack the Kurdish-led Rojava 
Revolution, which has liberated north and east Syria. One of its weapons of war 
is water".

_
Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
Set your options at: 
https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com

[Marxism] St. Mark’s Place | Louis Proyect: The Unrepentant Marxist

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

  POSTING RULES & NOTES  
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*

Film about St. Mark's Place from long ago, before the city became a 
hedge-fund manager's playground.


https://louisproyect.org/2020/05/24/st-marks-place/

_
Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
Set your options at: 
https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com

[Marxism] anti-vaxxers, far right, in Europe

[John Reimann via Marxism]

  POSTING RULES & NOTES  
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*

As in the US, so in Europe. The red brown alliance enters anti-science. A
report on a movement in Europe similar to the back-to-work far right here.

"In the first half of the 20th century, anti-vaxxer views converged with
anti-semitism: the Third Reich was rife with conspiracy theories presenting
vaccination programmes as a Jewish plot to either poison the German nation
or “submit humanity to Jewish mammonism”."
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/23/europes-covid-predicament-how-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-the-anti-vaxxers?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

John Reimann
-- 
*“Science and socialism go hand-in-hand.” *Felicity Dowling
Check out:https:http://oaklandsocialist.com also on Facebook
_
Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
Set your options at: 
https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com

[Marxism] Harvard's Reinhart and Rogoff Say This Time Really Is Different

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

  POSTING RULES & NOTES  
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*

Bloomberg News, May 18, 2020
Harvard's Reinhart and Rogoff Say This Time Really Is Different.

(Bloomberg Markets) -- When Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff published 
their heavyweight history of financial crises in late 2009, the title 
was ironic. This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly 
reminded readers that the catastrophic 2008-09 credit crisis was far 
from unique. The authors became the go-to experts on the history of 
government defaults, recessions, bank runs, currency sell-offs, and 
inflationary spikes. Everything seemed to be part of a predictable pattern.


And yet a little more than a decade later, we're experiencing what 
appears to be a one-of-a-kind crisis. The Covid-19 pandemic has 
catapulted the world into its deepest recession since the Great 
Depression, provoking an unprecedented fiscal and monetary response. The 
International Monetary Fund is already warning that the outlook has 
deteriorated since it predicted in April that the world economy would 
shrink 3% this year. To figure out what might be next, Bloomberg Markets 
spoke to Reinhart, a former deputy director at the IMF who's now a 
professor at the Harvard Kennedy School, and Rogoff, a former IMF chief 
economist who's now a professor at Harvard. It turns out this time 
really is different.


BLOOMBERG MARKETS: How are you faring during the lockdown?

CARMEN REINHART: My husband and I are among the lucky ones because we 
can work from home. We came to Florida, where we've had a house for a 
decade. Our son lives in this area. Vincent's brother lives in this 
area. So we wanted to be close to family. It's a very busy period even 
though you're always at home.


KENNETH ROGOFF: I'm with my wife and 21-year-old daughter in our house 
in Cambridge, quarantining, so to speak. It's been a very intense period 
partly because I was teaching a lot. And there was the shift to Zoom, 
which created more work because you're trying to prepare differently and 
do your lectures differently. It's obviously a surreal experience overall.


BM: I will start with the clichéd question. Is this time different?

CR: Yes. Obviously there are a lot of references to the influenza 
pandemic of 1918, which, of course, was the deadliest with estimated 
worldwide deaths around 50 million—maybe, by some estimates, as many as 
100 million. So pandemics are not new. But the policy response to 
pandemics that we're seeing is definitely new. If you look at the year 
1918, when deaths in the U.S. during the Spanish influenza pandemic 
peaked, that's 675,000. Real GDP that year grew 9%. So the dominant 
economic model at the time was war production. You really can't use that 
experience as any template for this. That's one difference.


It's certainly different from prior pandemics in terms of the economy, 
the policy response, the shutdown. The other thing that I like to 
highlight that is very different is how sudden this has been. If you 
look at U.S. unemployment claims in six weeks, we've had [job losses 
that] took 60 weeks in terms of the run-up. If you look at capital flows 
to emerging markets, the same story. The reversal in capital flows in 
the four weeks ending in March matched the decline during the [2008-09] 
global financial crisis, which took a year. So the abruptness and the 
widespread shutdowns we had not seen before.


KR: Certainly the global nature of it is different and this highlights 
the speed. We have the first global recession crisis really since the 
Great Depression. In 2008 it was the rich countries and not the emerging 
markets. They [the emerging markets] had a "good" crisis in 2008, but 
they're not going to this time, regardless of how the virus hits them.


The policy response is also different. Think about China. Can you 
imagine if this had hit 50 years ago? Can you imagine the Chinese state 
having the capacity to shut down Hubei province? To feed nearly 60 
million people, give them food and water and concentrate medical 
attention? So there is a policy option that we have and I think most 
countries have. It's the choice that had to be taken to try to protect 
ourselves. Obviously, this has been done to differing degrees of 
effectiveness in different countries, with Asia reacting much quicker 
and with much better near-term outcomes than Europe and the U.S.


BM: How do you regard the economic policy response?

KR: It's a little bit as if you were in a war and saying, "I'm not going 
to grade how you're doing on the battlefield. I'm just going to grade 
how you're hiring extra workers at home." Obviously how you're doing on 
the battlefield is driving everything.


The economic 

[Marxism] Red International and Black Caribbea

[Ken Hiebert via Marxism]

  POSTING RULES & NOTES  
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*

Dreams Deferred: Book Review of “Red International and Black Caribbean”

https://socialistaction.org/2020/05/23/dreams-deferred-book-review-of-red-international-and-black-caribbean/
 


Margaret Stevens is one of the few writers to examine the fascinating 
revolutionary history of the Caribbean and Mexico as a partisan of revolution. 
Her book is a detailed look at the struggles and betrayals between the two 
World Wars at the hands of U.S. and British racism and imperialism. Stevens 
deserves praise for her pioneering work, which is surely a revelation to many 
North Americans, ignorant of past struggles in the Caribbean.
_
Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
Set your options at: 
https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com

[Marxism] Covid-19, the rise of new zoonotic diseases and the capitalist disaster

[John Reimann via Marxism]

  POSTING RULES & NOTES  
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*

Here is the transcript of a presentation I made yesterday on this title. It
draws on Engels, Rob Wallace... and Thomas Friedman. As my friend and
comrade, Felicity Dowling said, "Science and socialism go hand-in-hand."
Note: For those who like to listen, there is also a link at the bottom of
this article to a podcast of this article.
https://oaklandsocialist.com/2020/05/24/covid-19-the-rise-of-new-zoonotic-diseases-and-the-capitalist-disaster/
John Reimann
-- 
*“Science and socialism go hand-in-hand” *Felicity Dowling
Check out:https:http://oaklandsocialist.com also on Facebook
_
Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
Set your options at: 
https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com

Re: [Marxism] Personal #Coronavirus Update 03 May 23rd 2020 | Prof Steve Keen on Patreon

[David Duport via Marxism]

  POSTING RULES & NOTES  
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*

So Professor Keen is making almost $10k a month on Patreon, so he can
"reform economics", so capitalism can be saved and managed by Keenean
economics. Brilliant.

On Sat, May 23, 2020, 5:17 PM Louis Proyect via Marxism <
marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu> wrote:

>   POSTING RULES & NOTES  
> #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
> #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
> #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
> *
>
>  From economist Steve Keen, best known for his obsessional opposition to
> the Marxist labor theory of value. This is far more interesting and
> relevant, about Thailand's way of overcoming the pandemic.
>
>
> https://www.patreon.com/posts/personal-update-37433490?utm_medium=post_notification_email
>
> _
> Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
> Set your options at:
> https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/dfduport%40gmail.com
>
_
Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
Set your options at: 
https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com

[Marxism] Humans are not resources. Coronavirus shows why we must democratise work | Thomas Piketty and others | Opinion | The Guardian

[Louis Proyect via Marxism]

  POSTING RULES & NOTES  
#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.
#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern.
*

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/may/15/humans-resources-coronavirus-democratise-work-health-lives-market

_
Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm
Set your options at: 
https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com