“But here in the clinic, sucking an oxygen balloon, eyes hardly able to roll, the tongue keeps on arguing, “I’m not going to die! I haven’t got cancer!”
Just like chickens. A knife was ready and waiting for them, but they all carried on cackling and scratching for food. One was taken away to have its head chopped off, but the rest just carried on scratching.”
Alexsandr Solzhenitsyn, “The Cancer Ward”, 1968
Some movies require your complete attention and if losing your train of thought you may spin out of control on the film freeway. Do we call these “thinking person’s movies”?
In this American horror- mystery-thriller please pay attention very closely to the film as it has a trail of breadcrumbs that most likely will lead to a big aha moment for the viewer. There is nothing wasted in the script for “Lyvia’s House”. Writer Patricia V. Davis has done a splendid writing job. Very tight!
Tara (Tara Nichol Caldwell) a young whippersnapper journalist and Johnny Beers (Joshua Malekos) are in a quick steaming relationship. A bit too quick you may think. Tara moves from mommy’s very upper-class house to a beautiful house in Californian rural and farming territory. The house is “formerly owned” by the famous Italian artist Lyvia who has rushed off to Italy leaving Johnny in charge.
A beautiful house with a portrait of Lyvia in the living room surveying all. There are all manner of creepy people slinking about in the woods in the neighborhood. As the film opened with a huge brooding and white bearded man man Ed digging a grave in 1998 think Susan Monica. The townsfolk seem very tight lipped on the history of the town but Tara discovers its orchards are the “killing fields” for some 25 migrant workers done in by Ed who was convicted of his serial killer murders and imprisoned dying in prison two years prior to the arrival of Tara and Johnny.
A series of strange events transpire once Tara and Johnny move into their new love nest. That damn rat scurrying about terrifying Tara, the local village mentally handicapped voyeur, the disappearing bar fly, strange dreams haunting Tara and of course two more Ed style murders after Ed is long gone in the World Beyond all are clues. And that strange eye movement by Johnny.
The killer family is finally exposed at the end of the film and halfway through the film I had an inkling who it might be and indeed I was correct. The bloodline of Tara and Johnny is shocking and that was a huge surprise.
Clocking in at close to two hours the film is hampered by slowness but patient viewers will be rewarded by a satisfying conclusion. The acting is adequate but fails to impress.
Directed by Niko Volonakis.
It will be released on satellite and VOD on 1 and 15October2024.
You can see a screener here https://vimeo.com/950937438/fcd41b7a07
RKS 2024 Film Rating 84/100.
“But then, ten, fifteen or eighteen years ago, when the term “radiation sickness” did not exist, X-ray radiation had seemed such a straightforward, reliable and foolproof method, such a magnificent achievement of modern medical technique, that it was considered retrograde, almost a sabotage of public health, to refuse to use it and to look to other, parallel or roundabout methods. They were afraid only of acute immediate damage to tissue and bone, but even in those days they rapidly learned to avoid that. They irradiated with wild enthusiasm. Even benign tumors. Even small children.”
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, “The Cancer Ward”, 1968
This Sicilia DOC Rosso is a blend where Nero d’Avola, Syrah and Cabernet Sauvignon comprise most of the blend. The wine has seen no oak.
The flamboyant label is dedicated to Claudia Cardinale who portrayed the character of Angelica Sedàra in the 1963 film Il Gattopardo (“The Leopard”).
Aroma: The wine has a very clean aroma one often encounters with organic wine. Donnafugata is not an organic winery but a sustainable one. A plentitude of black cherry and blackberry.
Palate: Moderately infused with tannins. The black cherry and blackberry have migrated here from the aromatics department. Smooth initially with a mini fruit explosion and a long finish where the fruit has a sudden flare. With residual sugar of 5.2 g/l it is somewhat less than with a single varietal Nero D’Avola and drier. Well disciplined acidity.
Personality: Very clean I am and may give you a pause to think about unoaked wines. Drink me and experience the purity of the wine.
Food Match: The wine can be consumed without food but it is built for food. Lasagna, roast chicken with a slight Merquen spicy rub.
Movie Pairing: Il Gattopardo (“The Leopard”).
Cellarbility: While the winery suggests it will age for 4-5 years I would cut down that to two so consume by the end of 2026.
Price: $22 CDN.
RKS 2024 Wine Rating: 92/100. Jamessuckling.com 92. Wine Align 87.
(La Bella Sedàra 2021, Sicilia DOC, Donnafugata, Marsala, Italy, 13.26 %, 750 Ml).
Just in time for Halloween “Night of the Harvest” is available digitally.
I never understood the penchant some movie goers have for slasher films. What fun is there with blood, guts and body parts flying all over the screen. As far as slasher films go this is true to the genre with a tad of humour thrown in thank goodness as humour and slasher films are awkward bedfellows.
There is more than one slasher here. One slashes to appease the spirits and the other is a revenge slasher.
And you’ll be surprised to find out who the first slasher is! Same with the revenge slasher.
I find little horror in slasher films perhaps more disgust and when I tell you the most horrifying movie I have seen would be a Mexican film about a coffee table!
Slasher aficionados will find a true genre film here with axes and knives doing their work. Blood and body parts abound particularly the pile of bloody intestines.
And what a sizzling hot conclusion! The carnage is complete. No good or bad guys left.
Watch to ease you into the Halloween spirit. I will be watching “Rocky Horror Picture Show” and having a chuckle. The plot in the film is hardly complicated but it does not deteriorate into namy pamby ridiculousness as for example “The Omicron Killer” did.
The trailer is here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2v-qlKNxf0
Directed by Jessica Morgan and Christopher M. Carter.
RKS 2024 Film Rating: 75/100.
The documentary “The Pitch: Patient Safety’s Next Generation” presents a picture of the United States’ hospital network as predominately archaic from a technological perspective but reveals change is beginning to arrive hopefully improving patient safety much of the change attributable based in artificial intelligence and virtual reality.
For example, 25% of patients admitted to hospitals in the United States contract an infection that the present system has difficulty in tracking the source of which may be minimized through AI by using each patient’s medical records and DNA sequencing to track the source and cause of those infections. The cost of hospital contracted infections in the United States costs the health care system some 28 billion USD a year.
Similarly, some 300 hospitals globally have “command centres” fueled by AI technology using the patient’s full medical records enabling them to react quickly to medical issues such as sepsis. Put another way you know that expression not playing with a full deck of cards is bound to result in poor outcomes but acting on full information contained in a patient’s medical records can be equated to playing with a full deck of cards. Imagine that AI can scour 30 years of medical records in seconds. How long would that take a human being? Patient data is valuable but how much can be reviewed by medical practitioners effectively?
The point is made by several of the physicians, academics and computer scientists featured in the documentary that AI will never replace the essential patient physician relationship but improve it as both patient and doctor are better and more quickly informed about past history and how it effects future outcomes.
There has been a huge development of virtual reality in simulation and user interaction as a training tool for both practicing physicians and medical students.
So where is all the new technology emanating from? Well, being the United States the profit motive by some is thought to be a driver for the improvement of medical care. If hospitals follow the same administrative and outmoded patient treatment practices and protocols and they still receive payment for it what is the incentive to “modernize”? It may be a cost reduction through efficiency that new technologies introduce into the system. And a good part of the documentary, perhaps too much of it, is focused on 22-year-old Reetam Ganguli the founder and CEO of Elythea who has developed software that reduces the risk to pregnant women. He pitches his products in “competitions” for cash to fund his research. Yes medicine in the United States is a business which explains the overprescribing of poorly tested pharmaceuticals. OXY is but a flagrant example. Can one rely on the Shark Tank profit motive and hedge funds to improve the United State’s medical system? Do you remember that 1970’s British band “Blind Faith”?
You can watch the trailer here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptXEj22HVhQ
The doc is available on VOD now.
The director, writer and editor of the doc is Mike Eisenberg.
RKS 2024 Film Rating; 73/100.
“You, see, you start from a completely false position. No sooner does a patient come to you than you begin to do all his thinking for him. After that, the thinking’s done by your standing orders, your five-minute conferences, your program, your plan and the honor of your medical department. And once again I become a grain of sand just as I was in the camp. Once again nothing depends on me”.
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, “The Cancer Ward”, 1968.
Ontario struggles with a reasonably priced Merlot. Good Merlots are not easy finds in Ontario. My favourite is the Merlot from Two Sisters in Niagara-on-the-Lake but at $60 a bottle few are willing to pony up at that price.
So we look to Italy for a reasonably priced Merlot. We find an Italian Merlot from Azienda Agricola Marina Danieli from Friuli at $21.
The Merlot was hand harvested and destemmed and aged in part in stainless steel and French oak for at least two years before bottling.
Aroma: Black cherry, blueberry, cassis, root beer and a hint of cloves. No suggestion here leading to a conclusion of lushness and plushness.
Palate: Chalky tannins. Raspberry, straw, cocoa and thoroughly and lightly intertwined with spice. Moderately long finish. The acid is in the background but its detectability is worrisome.
Personality: I deserve some of your attention as my quality is not readily apparent. Much of my quality is not flashing bright on your taste buds or on the nose. You’ll have to concentrate to pick up my subtleties. I am far removed from my Cali relatives and strangely my muted approach may make a comparison to Ontario Merlots somewhat possible but at this price point and quality I leave Ontario far behind and this has nothing to do with being Italian.
Food Match: Eggplant Bolognese.
Cellarbility: Drink up to 2025-year end.
Price: $21 CDN.
RKS 2024 Wine Rating: 87/100. 91 Eric Guido at vinous.com
(Marina Danieli Friuli Colli Orientali 2018 Merlot, DOC Fruili Colli Orientali, 750 mL, 13%).
“The sternest and most solemn of all was that of the nurse Olympiada Vladislanova. For her the morning rounds were like a divine service for a deacon. She was a nurse for whom the doctors were of a higher order. She knew that doctors understood everything, never made mistakes and never gave wrong instructions. She jotted down every instruction in her notebook with a sensation almost of joy-something the young nurses no longer had.”
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, “The Cancer Ward”, 1968.
“This autumn I Iearned from experience that a man can cross the threshold of death even when his body is still not dead. Your blood still circulates and your stomach digests, while you yourself have gone through the whole psychological preparation for death-and lived through death itself. Everything around you, you see as if in the grave. And although you have never counted yourself a Christian, indeed the very opposite sometimes, all of a sudden you’ve forgiven all those that trespassed against you and bear no ill-will towards those that persecuted you.”
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, “The Cancer Ward”, 1968.
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