Girl Detective

TV critic Alan Sepinwall, via Mo Ryan of the ChiTrib, confirms that HBO has given the greenlight to a series based on George R.R. Martin’s fantasy novel A Game of Thrones.

The cast includes some impressive names, like Mark Addy of Shaun of the Dead, Jennifer Ehle of Pride and Prejudice, and Lena Headey of 300 and the Terminator tv series, but I was most surprised and delighted to see that David Benioff, whose City of Thieves I just finished and loved, is the Exec Producer and screenwriter.

A Game of Thrones was recommended to me in 1997 by two of my co-worker friends at a comic shop in Bryn Mawr, PA. I devoured it and passed it on to my then-boyfriend G. Grod, who also devoured it. We liked the 2nd book, but were disappointed that the third wasn’t the conclusion, and I never made it through. I wished for far less description of what people were wearing (sumptuous velvets embroidered with sigils) and what people were eating (savory meat in delicious sauce, and no vegetables; how did these people not get scurvy?) and more of the story and characters. I’ve been thinking for a while I’d like to revisit the series if Martin ever finishes the fifth book, so I don’t end up a victim of waaaant! because of the series’ IWantToReadItosity like Jo Walton at Tor.com. Now I’ve got even more incentive.

Big Machine by Victor LaValle is one of those sleeper contenders in The Morning News 2010 Tournament of Books. Good reviews, but very few copies in my library system, and a huge queue. Lured with a coupon, I bought a copy. And don’t regret it one jot.

Don’t look for dignity in public bathrooms. The most you’ll find is privacy and sticky floors. But when my boss gave me the glossy envelope, the bathroom was the first place I ran. What can I say? Lurking in toilets was my job.

Ricky Ray is a bus-station janitor in upstate New York when he receives an envelope that moves his life in a new direction. He’s been a junkie, a thief, even part of a cult, but none of these have prepared him for the strangeness he’s about to encounter when he’s invited to a place called The Washburn Library.

The details of this book are so lovely and strange I don’t want to spoil them. This is a surprising book that includes elements of horror, spirituality, mystery, even a kind of coming-of-age. The central characters are all black, and the story’s blend of mystical realism reminded me, in a good way, of Colson Whitehead’s The Intuitionist. It is by turns funny, tragic, horrifying, and wondrous. Throughout, though, it made me want to turn its pages. When I wasn’t reading it, I was thinking about it, or wanting to get back to reading it. This book, like Lowboy, is one I probably wouldn’t have discovered or sought out on my own, if not for the ToB. But I’m very glad to have made its acquaintance.

Duplicity has Clive Owen, Julia Roberts, the director of Michael Clayton, and a heist-type caper. Yet it doesn’t quite come together; it’s not nearly as fun, sexy, cool, or clever as it thinks it is. I wish I could have that time back. I had better things to do with it. Like laundry.

I, Girl Detective, rested, and let other people do the cooking.

Friday night, supper at Cheeky Monkey. I greatly enjoyed the muffuletta sandwich and grits with bacon. Until they had their Reflux Revenge.

Saturday morning, breakfast at Red Stag. Crab cake, 2 poached eggs, tarragon aioli and mixed greens.

Still full at lunchtime.

Saturday supper, Solera, with JP Samuelson and 2 awesome grill guys whipping up the tapas: Chorizo Stuffed Dates with Smoked Bacon; Octopus Ceviche with Citrus, Pepper and Cumin; Tempura Squash with Pumpkin Seed Romesco; Grilled Short Ribs with Sunchokes and Baby Carrot; Roasted Beets with Duck, Walnuts and Palhais; Sherry Glazed Pork Belly with Morcilla and Lentils; Scallops ‘a la Plancha’ with Serrano Ham and Saffron; Grilled Asparagus with Lomo and Mahon; Braised Rabbit and Artichokes with Lemon and Egg. And that’s not all, oh no, that’s not all! While the rabbit was rich enough to be dessert, I couldn’t forego the ice cream trio: coffee, butterscotch and tangy cream cheese.

Apres supper, a Sprite at Mayslack’s while listening to Guns N Roses loud, louder and loudest, in a failed attempt to meet up with friends.

Sunday morning, breakfast in bed. The boys finally got the memo! For the first time on a birthday or Mother’s Day, 4yo Guppy and 6yo Drake weren’t sick, didn’t wake in the night, didn’t wake before I did! They brought in home made cards, then went to help G. Grod fix me breakfast in bed, though they were very confused as to why I would want such a thing. (To read more of my book, of course.)

Sunday afternoon. A global lunch at Midtown Global Market. G had a ham and cheese croissant, the boys had corn dogs, and I had a huarachazo. Then we picked up the chocolate-orange cake that Salty Tart chef Michelle Gayer and I had brainstormed on and which she brought into being. It’s coming to room temperature now, and should be perfect after a simple supper tonight. For which I _might_ wash some lettuce.

And did I mention the lovely well wishes and cool prezzies? I’ve had scores of emails, in the face of which it’s impossible not to feel loved and appreciated. A lime-green pair of high-heeled sandals with matching tank from sister Sydney, the bundt pan I’VE WANTED FOR FOREVER and the Lou Barlow cd I’ve wanted since Duff noted it was one of her faves of ‘05 from my sister Ruthie, an awesome Minnesota dish towel from my friend The Hoff, an electric kettle (since I’ve ruined countless stovetop ones), a mini Bodum, and a CD from G that he really was excited about. A copy of Baked of my own from G’s grandma. Plus lingering happy memories and waves of wellness from the yoga retreat my mother-in-law sent me on.

Thus far, a tremendous day. Last year was rather difficult. This year will be better. I’m feeling fortified for it.

When I looked through Baked: New Frontiers in Baking by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito, one of the first recipes to draw me in was for their Sweet and Salty Chocolate Cake. I asked my husband G. Grod if he’d like it for his birthday. (OK, I may have said, “This is the cake I’m making for your birthday, OK?”) He graciously humored me, and the plan was on.

I began on Sunday morning; the morning and I were both bright and full of promise. First were the three cake layers:

That took about an hour and a half to make and bake. I took a break for lunch and nap, then returned to the fray once they’d cooled.

Next step was the salted caramel filling for the biannual airing of my candy thermometer, finished around 4pm:

Immediately after, a SECOND batch of caramel, which I added to a chocolate ganache frosting (1 pound of dark chocolate, 1 pound of butter, 1 1/2 cups of heavy cream…) around 5 pm and whipped into frosting on my trusty Kitchenaid:

Next was cake assembly. On my cake stand (a wedding gift from friend LAP) I topped a cake layer with the salted caramel, left it to sink in, then added a layer of frosting, a sprinkle of fleur de sel, another cake layer, another dousing of caramel:

and lather rinse, repeat. Once assembled, I frosted with a crumb coat, refrigerated and went to town with the rest of the frosting, and topped with a final sprinkle of fleur de sel, finishing about 6 p.m.:

Served, it was a little squashed, so hardly the picture-perfect slice from the book, but it was nonetheless a striking specimen:

And, if I do say so, pretty tasty. Seven hours from start to finish, but worth it for a special event.

I’m trying to cram in as many of The Morning News Tournament of Books contenders as I can before it begins on 3/8, but David Benioff’s City of Thieves jumped the queue by coming into the library about a month ahead of when I needed it for next month’s Books and Bars discussion. While I’m now woefully behind on my ToB OCD (brackets!), I don’t begrudge City of Thieves. It was fabulous.

There are two beginnings. One is by the author, named David who is a screenwriter of superhero mutant movies in Hollywood. He’s asked to write something autobiographical, and instead wants to know what happened to his grandfather during WWII.

David begins:

My grandfather, the knife fighter, killed two Germans before he was eighteen.

And continues in Chapter One with Lev, the grandfather’s story:

You have never been so hungry; you have never been so cold. When we slept, if we slept, we dreamed of the feasts we had carelessly eaten seven months earlier–all that buttered bread, the potato dumplings, the sausages–eaten with disregard, swallowing without tasting, leaving great crumbs on our plates, scraps of fat. In June of 1941, before the Germans came, we thought we were poor. But June seemed like paradise by winter.

Lev is 17 during the siege of Leningrad. His mother and sister have left the city. His father, a poet, was taken by secret police and never returned. With his friends, he watches the night skies for German planes; one evening he sees a paratrooper. What follows leads to his arrest and imminent execution. In a bizarre circumstance, he and another young man, Kolya, are spared and put on a singular mission: find a dozen eggs for the wedding cake of a secret police colonel’s daughter. As Lev and Kolya’s adventure spins out, it becomes many things: a Nazi story, horror tale, buddy journey, tragedy, even romance. Once it gets to a bitter twist of a denouement, City of Thieves has taken on the trappings of a folk story. This is a grand tale, well written and peopled with characters I hope will linger with me. There are many books I like, and admire. This one, I flat-out loved.

I saw Avatar in regular 3D rather than schlepping to an IMAX 360, or paying extra to see it in IMAX on a flat screen, which friends warned was a waste of the upcharge. I went in expecting a trite story, and Cameron didn’t disappoint. This is one of the oldest, most-told tales ever:

Dumb young guy comes into strange situation, and is educated by hot, ass-kicking chick. (Matrix) He doesn’t speak her language, but she’s a princess, and he wins her though she was promised to another. (Pocahontas, and the guy even has the same initials as John Smith.) He’s sent in as a spy, but switches allegiances when he recognizes the nobility of the “savages” and organizes them to fight back.

One of my favorite movie reviews ever was of Moulin Rouge, in which the critic said something like, if the story is cake then it’s stale as can be, but, oh, how divine is the frosting! The same holds true, here. Even Cameron has made some of this movie before, like Giovanni Ribisi in the corporate tool role that Paul Reiser played in Aliens. The story is stale, but Cameron’s visuals and the 3D are fresh and exciting. Initially I was sitting in the center of the theater till the rude people behind me wouldn’t stop talking. I moved closer to the screen, and the 3D effect and immersion was intensified. The 2 hours and 40 minutes passed quickly. There was a long scene near the end with Sigourney Weaver that should have been cut, but the rest didn’t feel bloated. Worthington, with his Russell Crowe-ish hidden-Aussie accented growl, is compelling as the messiah figure, and Zoe Saldana makes a terrific warrior princess.

Go, expecting a bad movie that looks good. But go, because it won’t be nearly as cool if you’re not in the theater seeing it in 3D.

From the Guardian, a collection of Top Ten lists by authors on writing, inspired by Elmore Leonard’s soon-to-be published 10 Rules of Writing. There’s a lot of the usual: trust your instinct, read more, write consistently, blah, blah, blah.

But there are also some gems, such as:

Take a pencil to write with on aeroplanes. Pens leak. But if the pencil breaks, you can’t sharpen it on the plane, because you can’t take knives with you. Therefore: take two pencils. (Margaret Atwood)

Keep a light, hopeful heart. But ­expect the worst. (Joyce Carol Oates)

Work on a computer that is disconnected from the ­internet. (Zadie Smith)

I found this linked to at Lit Life, The Morning News, and Arts & Letters Daily.

Brighton Rock was one of the final entries in Take Up Productions’ excellent Brit Noir series. Based on a Graham Greene novel, it’s about a small group of gangsters in vacation destination Brighton, England. The gang is led by cold-eyed, smooth-faced Pinkie, played chillingly by Richard Attenborough, whose age belies his capacity for cruelty. (And who bore a distracting resemblance to my brother-in-law.) When he kills a man, two women remain who know more than he’d like. One is innocent girl Rose, a waitress. The other is sharp-voiced and initially boozy Ida, who the dead man had tried to use an an escape. She doesn’t believe he died of a heart attack, as the police report states, so she begins to investigate, which leads her to Rose:

Ida: Now listen, dear. I’m human, I’ve loved a boy or two in my time. It’s natural, like breathin’. Not one of them’s worth it, let alone this fellow you’ve got hold of.

This was an exciting twist on the more classically American noir. While some broad strokes are the same, I enjoyed puzzling out a few of the particulars. Attenborough is chilling, and the ending tense as he tries to drag Rose down a path she refuses to see coming. The ending is fittingly ironic. Some see it as happy. While it’s less dark than the one IMDB says was intended, there’s more bitterness than hope. Lesser known than The Third Man, Brighton Rock is very good and worth seeking out, especially as a remake is due later this year.

I was in the mood for a good romantic comedy, and It’s Complicated at the cheap theater with real-butter popcorn fit the bill. Meryl Streep has been divorced from Alec Baldwin for 10 years after being married for 20. They have 3 grown kids, and he has a lissome trophy wife and her strange 5yo son. Streep is a very successful bakery owner, and has a really swank home that she’s inexplicably getting an addition for, so she can build the kitchen of her dreams. (The current kitchen is more than enough for most people’s dreams.) Steve Martin, admirably toned down, plays her recently divorced architect and tentative love interest.

The complications of the title occur when Streep and Baldwin get drunk and have a one-night stand while attending their son’s graduation. He’s unhappy in his marriage, so he thinks it’s great. She’s enjoying herself, but is more hesitant, especially as she gets to know the architect.

Streep is charming, Baldwin is hilarious, and John Krasinski is both as their future son-in-law. I found Martin immensely likable, which I almost never do. The theater where I saw it was packed on a Saturday night, and I missed many of the lines because of all the laughter. At the end, the audience burst into spontaneous applause. By no means perfect, it was enjoyable and a crowd pleaser. I’ll definitely rent it when it comes out on DVD. And kudos for casting Baldwin, 9 years Streep’s junior, as her love interest! How often does that happen?

Volume 13 of the comic-book series Fables, The Great Fables Crossover, is a welcome respite from the near-unrelenting darkness and violence of the last few volumes. This compilation includes issues from Fables, Jack of Fables, and The Literals miniseries.

How thoroughly you enjoy this book may depend on how well you like the character of Jack. You know, Jack: Frost, Horner, the Giant Killer, Be-Nimble, and the Bean Stalk, etc. I stopped reading the Jack of Fables series when I found him more insufferable than funny. And while he has some good bits in this volume, especially his meta-textual intos and outros, anytime he was on page I couldn’t wait for him to get off.

More entertaining, I thought, was learning more about The Literals, characters like Gary the Pathetic Fallacy, Mr. Revise who can edit stories permanently (ever heard of the four little pigs? He’s why not.), and the Page sisters, who are kick-ass librarians with magic powers.

The villain this time is not the bad guy from The Dark Ages. Apparently he’s taking a back seat during this romp. No less evil, though, is Kevin Thorn, who is able to write worlds in and out of existence. He’s struggling for the words to unmake the world, which has gone on so long without his intervention that he’s appalled by how things have turned out: The Big Bad Wolf is in human form, married to Snow White, and a father? Gepetto became so much more than a puppet maker? As he struggles against his twin Writer’s Block, the Fables and Literals race to eliminate Kevin before he does the same to them.

Pink elephants! Theocratic badgers! Girls with glasses and really big guns! Babe the blue ox, insane and funny! Plus a little girl who’s not as sweet as she looks. This is a fun, clever diversion, too heavy on Jack, but a nice break until we get back to the good and grim stuff, which I’m sure will happen soon.

Even though I know the difference, I made this grammar mistake recently, and thought it merited re-posting.

Use the word less for uncountable items: I ate less Jell-o than he did.

Use fewer for items you can count: I ate fewer French fries than she did.

This means that every single sign in stores that reads “x items or less” is incorrect. Instead it should read “x items or fewer,” as Mrs. Incandenza campaigned for in David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest.

Related: the same rule holds for amount and number. Use amount for things that can’t be counted, like water, and number for things that can, like people.

I’m now also writing on food at Simple Good and Tasty, a Twin Cities group that celebrates local food, and is dedicated to bridging the gap from farmer to consumer. I’ll be writing about every other week, but go check out the site, especially if you’re a foodie in the Twin Cities. There are some great events coming up.

My first post is about one of the most consumed food items in our house: yogurt.

Here’s the variation I’m making right now, adapted because 6yo Drake and 4yo Guppy complained the one from the article wasn’t sweet enough.

Greek-style Honey Yogurt, makes about 3 cups, or 4 3/4-cup servings.

1 quart whole, local milk
2 tablespoons Organic Valley yogurt, vanilla or plain
1/4 cup Ames Farm honey

Heat milk in top of double boiler over simmering water to just past 180 degrees F.

Cool pan in ice bath to just below 120 degrees F. Thin yogurt with a bit of the warm milk, then add yogurt and honey. Whisk to incorporate.

Keep mixture in pan or transfer to glass bowl. (I use my 1-quart Pyrex.) Wrap in dish towels and place in oven with light on. (Light will warm oven to about 100 degrees.) Do not place towels near open flame or too close to light. Leave for 4 to 8 hours.

Line a quart-size sieve with thin cloth dish towel or layers of cheese cloth. Place over bowl to let whey drain, and refrigerate at least four hours, or overnight. Save whey to put in smoothies instead of juice.

Serve as you would store-bought yogurt, with granola, cereal, or a splotch of jam. It’s rich and thick, so I use less than a cup per person. Place remainder in covered container in refrigerator. It will keep for several days.

ETA: I added a line about using the drained whey in smoothies. This has been really useful.

I love nicknames, and use them frequently with my sons 6yo Drake and 4yo Guppy. (See? I just did.) Guppy, however, is not a fan. Whenever I call him by his full name or deploy a nickname for him, such as Goose, Mr. Guppy-pants, Mr. Cranky-pants, Captain Huggy-Face, Grumpster Demon, Punkin, Punka, Punk, Pookie, Pookie Pants, You, Hey You, Boy, etc. You get the picture.

When he began to protest this past year, his vocabulary wasn’t quite up to the challenge.

“Mom!” he’d shout. “I keep promising you! Only call me Guppy!” More recently, though, he’s become more precise.

“Mom! Call me Guppy!”

To which I respond, “Please, say please.”

What do I do when I’m feeling low from a cold? Cook a three-course supper, apparently, as I did last night. In my defense, the cauliflower and lettuces were going bad, and had to be used, and all three dishes together took less than an hour to put on the table.

First was the spaghetti with cheese and black pepper, which I had to make once I saw it at Smitten Kitchen. Funny, I often have that reaction to Deb’s recipes.

Then the roasted cauliflower with kalamata vinaigrette, from one of Gourmet’s last issues. 6yo Drake and 4yo Guppy had to be coaxed, but only a bit to eat theirs, and my husband G. Grod had seconds, and said this is the only cauliflower he’s ever liked.

I topped a mix of green and red leaf lettuce with Romano cheese from the pasta, and the kalamata vinaigrette from the cauliflower, and added some ripe slices of peeled Bosc pear.

Even sniffly, this was not a hard meal for me to make, and all three guys liked at least one of the items. Guppy snarfed down the noodles. This was a winner.

I’d read about and been interested in Logicomix, a comic-book fictional history of Bertrand Russell and his struggles to clarify the foundations of logic and mathematics. My husband G. Grod is a math geek, and a fan of Russell and Kurt Godel, who is instrumental in the history, as well as Alan Turing, who plays an important role in framing the end of the narrative. I’ve become a fan by association of these great thinkers, so the subject interested me. Then when it was added to The Morning News 2010 Tournament of Books I decided to buy it for G. Grod for Christmas, as a not unselfish gift that still wasn’t exactly a bowling ball with “Homer” on it.

Doxiadis seems to be the instigator for the book, but it is certainly a team effort, both in production and in narrative, since all the creators are also included in and commenting on the work, a clever method of self-reference, a logic term that Russell’s Paradox is an example of. Christos Papadimitriou is a professor of computer science and author of a book on Turing. He was consulted and involved both to confirm the broad strokes of Russell’s story and legacy, and to engage the creative team in an effort to better the book. Art and color were done by husband/wife team of Alecos Papadatos and Annie di Donna. Interchanges among the creators frame most chapters, and offer commentary on the ambiguities in the story. Russell mostly narrates his own story through a frame of a lecture, starting with his childhood as an orphan in the severely regulated house of his grandmother and his introduction to mathematics by a charismatic tutor.e

The authors do an admirable job of portraying both the characters involved in the evolution of logic and mathematics, and in the explication of some complex examples of both, which could easily have bogged down the narrative, which instead proceeds at a lively clip. Russell is a typical hero in the classic mode: orphaned, struggling in childhood with overbearing adults, moving on to his quest (for the foundations in logic), struggling with monsters (a streak of mental illness in his family, also found frequently in his colleagues), and, as in the real world, coming to an end that is both happy and sad, depending on how one views it, but certainly complex. It’s because of Russell and his colleague’s heroic narrative that Doxiadis thought to make the story in comic-book form, which works well. The art is clear and easy to read. while also embodying at times more than one level of meaning.

In the end, though, I didn’t find this to rise as high as some exemplars of the comic-book format, like Fun Home by Alison Bechdel, Persepolis/Persepolis II by Marjane Satrapi, and Maus/Maus II by Art Spiegelman. The story is good, the art is good, both together are better than either alone, yet somehow it never became far more than the sum of its parts, as the above titles did for me. Logicomix is entertaining, provocative, educational and very good, even as I felt it didn’t quite achieve the true greatness of its subjects.

The 1940 version of Gaslight, released in America under the title Angel Street, almost ceased to exist. When George Cukor remade it in 1946, MGM tried to have all copies of the earlier film destroyed. The remake, which starred Ingrid Bergman and Joseph Cotten, was good, but I think I like the original more. It’s less stylized, which adds to its aura of menace. The film starts with the murder of an old woman, then years later a newly married couple move in. The husband, Anton Walbrook, is exasperated by his wife, played with trembling exactitude by Diana Wynyard. She fears she’s going mad, yet it’s he who is manufacturing evidence for it, as well as flirting with a manipulating housemaid and disappearing each night. This is a well-crafted suspense film, worth seeing especially if you enjoyed the remake.

I watched my first Disney princess movie with the boys when I took them to see The Princess and the Frog this weekend. But surprise–the heroine isn’t a princess! Tiana–the first African-American princess, about time!–is a hard-working girl from a poor family who is saving to open her own restaurant in New Orleans. The prince is a handsome twit, and some voodoo magic turns him into a frog. While some of the broad strokes are predictable (boy ends up with girl, bad guys are punished, etc.) several of the details are not, and those are what make it charming. My boys, 6yo Drake and 4yo Guppy, loved it, and laughed throughout. They didn’t find the scary parts too scary, though my husband G. Grod and I had a hard time explaining where the bad guy went (he got dragged to hell by demons.)

Wondering: is Prince Naveen the hottest Disney prince? I think so.

It is fitting I haven’t gotten around to writing about my younger son, Guppy, turning 4 until more than a week after the fact. The celebration of his birthday stretched out over almost a week, starting with a play date. He’d told some of his preschool classmates they were invited to his party, but I wasn’t sure which ones. Then I couldn’t find a date or time that worked for a typical party, so I invited them all to join him at an open gym. I covered admission and bought a few dozen donut holes for this no-present, no-cake non-party, and it worked out pretty well. The kids who could come had fun, and (I hope) no one’s feelings were hurt.

We had a proper family dinner a few days before his birthday, with pizza and a bakery cake I customized with a toy monster truck and tire tracks. We had to have a quick dinner the day of, since G. Grod had a meeting that evening. Guppy asked for hot dogs, so I heated those, melted cheddar on the buns, cooked bacon to put on the buns, then served them alongside edamame and frozen tater tots, with ketchup, mustard, mayo, relish and Sriracha on the side. I put the plate in front of 6yo Drake and he said, “Wow, this is a fancy dinner, Mom!”

Finally, Guppy celebrated at his preschool, taking four turns around a pretend sun. All in all a good series of celebrations.

At four, Guppy is mostly past the very trying insanity of 3 1/2, where he would insist on impossible things then melt down when he didn’t get them. He still tries to exercise control over things he can, but he’s become a little more flexible and can almost grasp what a compromise is. He continues to drop the beginning ’s’ from words, so he’ll say he needs a “”poon” for ice cream, or that the chili is too “‘picy.” He calls a fox a “fots” as I did when a girl, and still has some trouble with letters G, K, R and L. Nonetheless, he makes himself understood.

We recently made the switch to a booster seat, so he’s now able to unbuckle himself, which is much more convenient than his 5-point toddler harness was. He has several friends, both in and out of preschool. His interests tend to follow those of 6yo brother Drake: race cars, comic books, and Ruff Ruffman. Guppy is quick with puzzles, and talented with those tiny Lego pieces; he’s very good at building and putting things together. He also likes to help me bake and cook, so he’s coming along nicely as my sous chef. His favorite book is Monkey with a Toolbelt and the Noisy Problem; I got him a signed copy for his birthday.

Mostly, he’s a good-natured, affectionate little boy with a ready smile who’s fun to be around. And when he’s not, I just have to wait a bit till he comes ’round again.

Like Jason Reitman’s last movie, Juno, Up in the Air manages to be both a big and little movie at the same time. It’s neither an indie nor a big-budget star vehicle, but rather a character-driven investigation of personal dreams, despair, and interpersonal connection. It draws no conclusions and provides no easy answers, or easily understood characters. Clooney is sexy and charming, but no more so than is the captivating Vera Farmiga. Kendrick does a fine job in the role of the snippy newbie, and J.K. Simmons stands out, as always, even in a small role. This is more superbly crafted and acted than the average indie, and is more thoughtful than the average big-budget film. It’s not perfect; in the end it can’t quite balance its themes of bitter and sweet. But its attempt to do so is admirable, and worth seeing.