Long day, so I’m Sirking again

I read books because…I like to read books, but if you’re someone who needs more incentive than that, or needs it to feel like you’re doing something good for your brain/health, well here you go…

I’m squeamish as hell and rarely watch pure horror. I still have a tremendous amount of respect for it. We can watch other movies.

"The moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in the shadows of life, the sick, the needy and the handicapped." - Hubert Humphrey

As someone who grew up watching Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure at pretty much every birthday party I went to for like 5 years (including my own), this support means so much to me, always

If the Finals is even half as good as this conference finals, what a goddamn treat for fans of great basketball. Also very glad that the fabled “dynasty” of OKC lasted one year & one championship. As a lifelong Sonics fan who was at their championship parade as baby: don’t steal another city’s team

once again agreeing with paul rudd

i wrote about all the president’s men for @brightwalldarkroom.com — i get into how the film’s texture and tactility gives literal weight to the reporting onscreen, and lament the loss of physical news mediums as a sensory connection to the reality of politics and power.

I feel like this series alone should prove that SGA is not, and never will be, in Jordan’s league

Best film magazine in the United States, IMO. Not a single decision is made for commercial reasons. Every piece exists because somebody was excited about it.

i would like to start a petition to make it mandatory for this Spurs-OKC series to be 21 games. highest level of basketball i’ve seen this century, may it last forever also: wemby isn’t human

Love it: the night after he was kicked off of CBS for good, Stephen Colbert hosted a public access show in southeast Michigan.

A truly wonderful, joyous, happysad way to end a thing that shouldn’t be ending. And by my count, they never said a certain guy’s name even once the entire show. Always go out dancing

I think Colbert has been using music in one of the most personal ways to engage with art, which is to allow it to reflect back your own feelings in a way that clarifies them. Your circumstances are new, but—in this case—your defiant frustration mixed with exuberance is legible to other people.

happy 10th birthday to The Nice Guys, one of the best movies ever made

ICYMI! For @brightwalldarkroom.com I went long on Kong - but not the Kong you’re (probably) thinking of. “it’s only in the 1976 film that we locate the true beauty and the beast story, love blooming in the wake of revulsion and horror.” www.brightwalldarkroom.com/2026/05/18/s...

here you go! happy (mini) Independence Day 🎊 www.idownloadblog.com/2026/01/30/t...

My 1999 self would weep at how totally broken the internet has become. AI slop, social media walled gardens that rot the brain, surveillance pricing and advertising, every single goddamn website has an endless cloudflare captcha loop before you get to read anything. Burn it all down.

Angels Appearing before the Shepherds, by Henry Ossawa Tanner, 1910

We watched Tootsie tonight—still great!—which always reminds me of all the VHS tapes we had growing up of movies my parents would tape off HBO’s free preview weekends (3 movies per tape!) and it’s impossible to explain to anyone under 35 but life was so much simpler then, and this was our streaming

"One of the deepest truths I’ve come to realize over my nine million years of living is this: other people are just as real as I am. They really are, even though it doesn’t always feel that way." - George Saunders, A Sentence is a Way of Being in the World

Rewatching The Leftovers for the third time since 2020—and it somehow makes even more sense as the strange timeline we’ve been on since 2020 gets near the 7 year point, but anyway I just got to this episode and can never not post this

People will be like ‘Bluesky is all academics & historians’ & I’ll be like, ‘You mean the people who enthusiastically tell me the coolest shit I ever heard?????’

Feeling overwhelmed with all of this. LISTEN. Another Louisiana resident (Marshawn is the only name we have) testifies against the state’s racial gerrymander, speaking truth to power up and down the hearing room and predicts how this story will end. Speak your truth, fight and believe.

Franz Liszt's "Liebestraum No. 3" - John Williams & Val Doonican

Students, if you’re thinking about dropping a note to that teacher or professor about what their class/project/mentorship has meant to you, but you worry it will be cringe or cheesy, let me just tell you they will coast on the fuzzy feelings prompted by that note for months, if not years

Chopin: Ballade No. 1 in G minor, op. 23 - Lang Lang

i don't think i can possibly or adequately explain how qualitatively different it's felt to be a therapist the last 10 years—especially since 2020—than it's ever really felt before.

Nobody Told You To Suffer: On Martin Scorsese's BRINGING OUT THE DEAD

I stayed up late last night trying to put together something to honor Tony Stella’s passing, what it meant to work with him, and all he meant to so many of us in the broader film community. A true legend, and an absolutely heartbreaking loss.

Tony Stella has died. He was a brilliant artist & kind friend. When I began writing for @brightwalldarkroom.com, he was my 1st artistic collaborator, & his art--vivid, dreamy, evocative--made my scribblings seem professional. Intense, passionate, & dedicated to his craft like few I've ever known.

Art by Tony Stella

Tony Stella was one of the most incredible artists I've ever worked with, and an even better human, full of integrity & passion & life, and it's impossible to process the news that he's gone. It was truly an honor to work with him, every time, and my heart goes out to all his family and friends.

happy my team won, sure, but really, goddamn that was just a good basketball game to watch, start to finish. anthony edwards being back already makes no sense to my brain but i will absolutely take it

i guess i could have just posted this, instead of all those words

Finally finished DTF ST. LOUIS and it was fantastic, really never seen anything quite like it, and the way it was able to capture the crushing weight of loneliness, for just about every single character, and still able to be so many other things too, including deeply vulnerable, was astounding.

"As an artist I want to waste my time in my own way, in the kinds of ways that, for me, lead to making something. Everything in our culture is supposed to save time, to give us more time, but nothing does, everything only robs us of time." - Mary Ruefle

Editing is a skill, being well-edited is a gift, having to choose between one's voice or palatability is a scam (ask me how I know). You deserve to grow as an artist with the support of genuine mentors, and your work deserves to exist beyond a closed newsletter ecosystem that leaves us all poorer.

I wrote for @brightwalldarkroom.com about the satirical softcore of WILD THINGS, an orgy of knotty/naughty camp noirotica that both satirizes the Cinemaxxxing of '90s erotic thrillers AND delivers a true erotic thriller that’s genuinely, toxically sexy. www.brightwalldarkroom.com/2026/05/01/w...

So so so so true, and such an enormous loss. For what it’s worth, BWDR has always put a strong emphasis on doing this—it’s why we still allow anyone to pitch us—because helping new writers develop their voice and move on to bigger pastures is a vital, important, human (and fulfilling) thing!

Wemby: “I refuse to carry the burden of having to hide my emotions.” This is amazing.

We present the spectacular new 4K restoration of BARRY LYNDON on May 19th at the epic & iconic @siffnews.bsky.social Downtown! grandillusioncinema.org/film/barry-l...

Justice Kagan: "I dissent. The Voting Rights Act is—or, now more accurately, was—'one of the most consequential, efficacious, and amply justified exercises of federal legislative power in our Nation's history.'

Wrote about TROOP BEVERLY HILLS, a film for which Shelley Long should have 8 million awards, for @brightwalldarkroom.com lol!!!!!

This one is straight from the heart. I hope you'll read it! www.rogerebert.com/ebertfest/lo...

The absolute very best thing about running @brightwalldarkroom.com since 2009 is working with wonderful human beings trying to figure out how best to craft things that touch other human beings & then seeing those you’ve worked with go on to do such incredible things in even bigger ways on their own

Always a good idea to show THE THIN MAN to someone who thinks they don’t like old movies. Success rate right near 100%—plus it often opens them up to other movies from that era too!

Sorry to be overly sincere for a second, but here's why we decided to persevere through all of the bullshit and take over InfoWars. There's just gotta be a line somewhere. Thank you @pablo.show for letting me talk so openly about this.

Absolutely incredible. NASA Astronaut Reid Wiseman, who commanded Artemis II, took this footage from the far side of the Moon with his iPhone. Watch with sound on.

Trump continues to crater. New NBC poll has his approval down to 37-63, which is 26 points underwater. Crucially, 50% disapprove *strongly.* Has any other president had half the country strongly disapproving? www.nbcnews.com/politics/don...