Emerging from a late screening of Alejandro Iñárritu’s recent film, The Revenant, I was struck by the indomitable power of the spirit of man. The Revenant tells the story of Hugh Glass, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, an early-1800s fur-trader, blazing the uncharted Western Territory of the United States. In 1823, Glass was mauled by a...
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Sometimes there are tender tears. On my flight across America a few days ago, I watched the film, “Coming Home,” born of the genius of Zhang Yimou, the celebrated director whose work over the last generation has changed the nature of Chinese cinema. One more time he has told a tale about being human amidst...
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“Never say that a soldier does not know the cost of war.” As the story comes to its sober conclusion, this is the response of the British army officer to the cabinet secretary who is bitterly critical of the decision-making at the heart of the film, “Eye in the Sky.” Protesting loudly, she is sure...
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“You must live in the place that is the station of your labor and your love. Down there in the swaying forests, the dark sleeping fields, the cold barren lands, and the cities of man, where the indestructible, the faithful, the true are needed.” Several weeks ago when I began packing for Central Europe, I...
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“What’s the good of a street that doesn’t lead to a church?” As the 1980s became the 1990s, and the world was watching the Soviet Union implode, its first indication that something was changing was what they themselves called “glasnost.” Russian for “openness,” it was the Soviet policy of open discussion of political and social...
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For a few years I lived my life in light of the mountain men, imagining my very ordinary days enlarged by the companionship of Kit Carson, William Sublette, Jim Beckwourth, Jedidiah Smith and Jim Bridger. Their adventures became my adventures. Long a lover of stories, and these tales told of brave men, unusual men, visionary...
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