by John C. Snider © 2008

Yes, I blew $20 at the Creation Museum, brainchild of Answers in Genesis frontman Ken Ham.  It’s located in northern Kentucky, across the river from Cincinnati, Ohio.  On the drive up along I-75 I didn’t see any billboards advertising it, but there was one of those brown attraction signs on I-275 just before the Museum’s exit.  I’m not sure who pays for those signs, but I’m sure it’s either the Commonwealth of Kentucky or some branch of the federal government - maybe the Department of Transportation?  At any rate, you could probably make a case that that sign is unconstitutional, since the courts have already ruled that creationism is religion and not science.

Picture #1: So…here we are at the main gate.  They’re big on stegasaurases-es-es at the Creation Museum.  Note the remnants of Noah’s Flood at the bottom of the picture.

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I drink your milkshake!  Paul Thomas Anderson’s masterpiece is now on DVD.

Review by John C. Snider © 2008

As I reported back in January, There Will Be Blood is a movie that every thinking person should see.  In a cinematic world dominated by remakes, rip-offs and path-of-least-resistance filmmaking, Paul Thomas Anderson’s masterpiece is both refreshing and challenging.

There Will Be Blood only saw limited release; therefore, a great many cinephiles did not have an opportunity to see it.  But now Paramount has released this film on DVD.

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Review by John C. Snider © 2008

Walter Isaacson’s celebrated biography Einstein: His Life and Universe proves one thing: while Albert Einstein was not the greatest scientist who ever lived, but he’s one of the greatest thinkers who ever lived.  He wasn’t a scientist in the sense we might think, overseeing experiments and pouring meticulously over data; rather, Einstein was a master of creative thought, his preternatural intuition opening doorways into realms that the experimenters could exploit.
 
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Allison and I were lucky enough to attend a lecture by the Hon. Celia Sandys (pronounced “Sands”), granddaughter of Winston Churchill and an expert on his life, having written several books about her “grandpapa”.  Her talk was part of a larger celebration of the 75th anniversary of Churchill’s visit to Atlanta in February 1932.  The event was hosted by the Winston Churchill Society of Georgia (yes, there is such a thing, and no one was more surprised than me), and took place on the beautiful campus of Oglethorpe University.  Thanks to organizer Bill Fisher of Churchill Georgia for the photo. 

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by John C. Snider © 2008

One of the most talked-about movies of 2007 is writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson’s There Will Be Blood.   Anderson has a reputation as a bold filmmaker unafraid to tackle strange and disturbing subjects:  Boogie Nights, with its 70s porno backdrop; Magnolia, a mesmerizing three-hour-long epic in which half a dozen ill-fated characters meet their respective Waterloos; and Punch-Drunk Love, while probably the least of Anderson’s films, stars Adam Sandler in an unexpected non-comedy role.  An eclectic body of work, to be sure; still, it would have been interesting to see how many critics would have picked There Will Be Blood as a P.T. Anderson flick without the man’s name appearing in the credits.

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