Taking a little social media break. I haven't been keeping up my newsletter or website much over the past few months, but I'm thinking of getting back to both so you can keep an eye out there if you are so inclined: jenmyers.net In the meantime, be excellent to each other. 🖤

The list is just ROAD HOUSE five times in a row

This past year I saw both YOJIMBO and HIGH AND LOW in the theater and it was astonishing to think about how that we still had a living link to that filmmaking era. No longer. But what a run.

Never has there been a case of more "good fucking riddance," but it's not unamusing that they're hightailing it right after the first snow storm hit. Chicago has a built-in defense against unserious jagoffs and it's called winter.

I am 99.999% sure that every single one of these photos is from the Instagram account "hotdudesreading" which is literally nothing but photos of hot guys reading books in public (captioned with filthy puns). That is objectively the most hilarious way to illustrate this headline.

I have a whole Letterboxd list for this, because of course I do. I'm going to go with the first one on it, Bergman's CRIES AND WHISPERS. A color-saturated, claustrophobic feminine nightmare. (Complimentary, obviously.)

I made a “how do you do, fellow kids?” joke to someone in their mid 20s who, it turns out, was too young to have heard of that meme. So “how do you do, fellow kids?” is now an example of “how do you do, fellow kids?”

The new Luc Besson Dracula looks like literally everything I hate about evolved Dracula lore but it also stars Caleb Landry Jones so you see the conundrum.

All the love in the world to the people of Chicago

Have we discussed how four incredibly accomplished film directors emerged from two nearby high schools on Chicago's far north side? Fosse and Mann from Amundsen and Harold Ramis and William Friedkin from Senn. Encourage your young filmmakers in the neighborhood, friends. The odds are in their favor.

This is a pretty impressive list, but I believe that we can and should do more, be the ruination of uptight weirdos that you want to see in the world

10/10, would follow into battle

Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Columbo

I think this hits us all in cycles, but over the past week I've really been struggling with the emotional dissonance of going to work meetings, keeping up with tasks and spending time with my kid while also patrolling to try to prevent people from being grabbed and disappeared from the place I live.

Congratulations to Mira Nair and I suppose the rest of you but mostly Mira Nair

A reasonable and correct stance—but I also think it's not enough to ask men the same work/life balance questions; we should explicitly be asking them why they aren't doing more to change expectations and improve opportunities.

Good election news AND the announcement of a new Mummy movie with Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz on the same day, how does one even handle it

Tom Humphrey www.flickr.com/tomhumphrey/

I just checked and turns out Chicago is still the best city.

If you’re in the Edgewater/Rogers Park area, we need people with their whistles on visibly out on patrol. Even if it’s just a walk on your lunch break or while you walk your dog, it matters. This is an all hands on deck day. Whatever you can do. ICE is heavily present in the area. Hope I see you.

We lost something as a culture when kids stopped doing weird as fuck Universal Monsters puzzles. #FilmSky #Halloween

Japan's "Mundane Halloween" costume contest is back! Each year website DailyPortalZ holds a contest where people dress up as something super duper ordinary. Here's a thread of some of my favorites from the 2025 contest! #MundaneHalloween

Annual reminder, for an easy Halloween craft, stack your candy corn to resemble a vagina dentata.

Nick Offerman's delighted giggles in the Criterion Closet are almost as great as him rhapsodizing about A ROOM WITH A VIEW and the beauty of young Julian Sands. 10/10 closet video.

My log has something to tell you.

Halloween in Chicago 2025: Doing my ICE school patrol shift this afternoon and then getting ready to hand out candy to trick-or-treaters with an extra bowl full of whistles and ICE watch zines. Get out there and take care of each other, friends.

The correct answer to this is Melody. Although, personally, if I had to pick a way to go, I'd go with death by evil mattresses à la Sweet.

The offspring and I have ritually mutilated this year's gourd sacrifices, set them aflame and displayed their grinning visages to the neighborhood (this post works best if you read it in the voice of the Ghost Host from the Haunted Mansion, sorry probably should have mentioned that first).

Happy Halloween! We made a new episode for you about a demonic toy monkey who kills people, you're welcome. quietlittlehorrors.com/episode-06-1...

One of my favorite podcasts, American Hysteria, just released a seasonal banger of an episode on Bloody Mary, covering everything from ghost stories, witchcraft moral panic, the cultural terror of mirrors, why teenage girls love doing divination—strongly recommended listening.

Sadako crawling out of your tv, turning motion smoothing off, then crawling back in

Past me, who has evidently never met actual me, thought it would be a good idea to buy Halloween candy several days ahead of time and now here we are at the beginning of Halloween week digging to the bottom of the candy bowl for the last peanut butter cup, who could have possibly foreseen this.

Autumn Morning https://www.wikiart.org/en/john-atkinson-grimshaw/autumn-morning

Late October in Graceland Cemetery

As a someone with an "I Will" Maiden tattoo, I would be remiss if I did not share this far and wide

I have also always prefered the German-language version of Herzog's NOSFERATU and for the precise reasons outlined here. I also love the extremely Herzog move to handle the issue of language accessibility by just making the entire film twice in a different language. Subtitles are for cowards.

Nine north side families are at risk of not being able to meet their rents because ICE terror is forcing them to miss work. I’m tapped out for what I can donate this month, but wanted to share in case someone else can! ♥️ www.gofundme.com/f/emergency-...

Update: this podcast is a delight and I endorse it wholeheartedly

I filled your house with gourds, please respond

I’m now being connected with other neighbors who want to do whistle nights, so please continue sending me whistle donations! Message emidly.08 on signal for a shipping address or Venmo link

“I don’t hate hardly ever, and when I love, I love for miles and miles. A love so big it should either be outlawed or it should have a capital and its own currency.” HBD Carrie Fisher, sorely missed ... 📷 Harry Benson, 1978

Dude at the lakefront with a keyboard playing the HALLOWEEN theme at twilight, my neighborhood remains undefeated

Six words every woman wants to hear.

the Muppets have been real quiet since the Louvre heist

This has been on my watchlist for a while because I guessed it would be very much my thing, but for unknown reasons I just got around to watching it recently and hey turns out it is extremely very much my thing. Who could have guessed. Watch it, weirdos.

I cannot believe I am just now learning that Bill Nighy has an advice podcast, whoever failed to inform me about this is fired

The weekend is here!

First opera of the season (MEDEA at Lyric)