Ataraxia

  The Lucky Years – How to Thrive in The Brave New World of Health by Doctor David Agus, author of the brilliant, life changing A Short Guide to A Long Life, which could help make you do this… http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/unique-in-world.html?q=unique+in+the+world 10 out of 10     I have been so thrilled, elated, optimistic after reading A Short Guide to A Long Life that I have posted five (5) notes on my blog, impressed with the advice that we could use and the positive feelings generated by that lifesaving, phenomenal book that we should all read, to help us reach healthy, Long Lives – for instance, David Agus, in his excellent A short Guide to A Long Life and other experts recommend a dog, which will: ‘Condition his master and force him to respect a schedule, with fixed hours, which are also good for our well being Because a dog needs exercise it will make the owner walk or even jog with his pet and therefore help his health’   Doctor David Agus is one of t...

  The Other Boleyn Girl, based on the novel by Philippa Gregory “It’s good to be the king” is a line in the hilarious, if often outrageous comedy History of the World by the witty Mel Brooks. Only in the age of #MeToo, King Henry Tudor is the epitome of the bully, sexual predator, killer and rapist. Evidently, standards were so different centuries ago, but one could argue that even in 2017, in Hollywood, they had a modern day equivalent called Weinstein, and then after he was brought to the stage, others showed up, from Spacey to ex-president Bush. The saga of Henry VIII and his wives is familiar, it has been adapted for the small and big screen multiple times and what this feature brings forward is different, if criticized and ultimately rejected by many critics, given the Metascore of only 50 on IMDB and chronicles that dismiss the novelty as inaccurate and exaggerated. The cast of this film is resplendent, with Natalie Portman in the leading role of Anne, The Other Boleyn Girl, ...

  The Color of Money based on novel by Walter Tevis, directed by Martin Scorsese, with Paul Newman, Tom Cruise, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio Resilience, talent, money and values Paul Newman has won the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role for his performance in this excellent motion picture He was not only a mesmerizing actor, but a wonderful man, as we learn from a classic about the movie industry: -            Adventures in the Screen Trade by William Goldman, winner of two Oscars for his scripts:   Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and All the President’s Men Paul Newman is Eddie Nelson, a role he has played before, in the movie called The Hustler, and for which he was also nominated for an Academy Award. In The Color of Money, Eddie Nelson is retired, he is not so young any more, but still interested in the pool game. He discovers Vincent Lauria, a talented young man portrayed by the very good Tom Cruise, who is f...

  The Octopus Marooned by O’Henry Hilarious- 10 out of 10   The author O’Henry is extremely funny. And this is obvious as soon as you start reading one of his stories. The humor may be dry at times, or dark but I find it fantastic- Take this Octopus and the first lines: -            "A trust is its weakest point," said Jeff Peters. "That," said I, "sounds like one of those unintelligible remarks such as, 'Why is a policeman?'" "It is not," said Jeff. "There are no relations between a trust and a policeman.” And the continuation is much along the same lines -            Trust is like an egg, and it is not like an egg” At times, the humor is accidental and due to the way things change with the passing of time, which creates some absurd humor. When O’Henry writes about a republican as candidate for the position of governor of Texas made me smile. There can be no Democrat governor o...

  The Mousetrap by Agatha Christie Who dunnit? You will never guess   Agatha Christie is one of the most popular writers in the world. At one point, I think she held the record for the number of books sold, translations – one or both, I do not remember exactly. And for good reason, because no matter if the reader is keen on detective stories one has to give Caesar what belongs to him. She is the queen of the crime story genre, albeit some may favor Conan Doyle, Philip Marlowe and perhaps other writers. I have seen a movie about a period in Agatha Christie’s life in which she was confused and went into retreat in a spa. It is amazing how the writer could read so well into the mind of characters and especially the criminal type. The plots are amazing and the Mousetrap is no exception. In fact, the public has been in such awe that the play has been running continuously since it opened and this is yet another record. It is the longest running show of any type in modern history, ev...

  Uncut Gems, written –with Ronald Bronstein – and directed by Benny Safdie and Josh Safdie Eight out of 10 Perhaps because the undersigned is not a fan of Adam Sandler – actually, the opposite is true – he disagrees with the astounding Metascore of 90 assigned to this motion picture, which means that most relevant critics see it as almost perfect and although that seems somewhat or completely farfetched, we could probably all agree that this is more than remarkable and that may be due in large part to the sensational, original script and the role that the leading actor has to play, dramatic as against his usual, over the top comedy performances that could be so annoying… The description of the movie has Howard Ratner aka Adam Sandler as a ‘charismatic jeweler’, but if you ask this cinephile, the main character is anything but charismatic, except for his lover – his wife, who is separating and divorcing from him declares at one point that she cannot stand him and she wishes she wou...

  Literature y comunicacion by Various “The person who doesn't read lives only one life…The reader lives 5,000…Reading is immortality backwards” ― Umberto Eco     What is the role of Literature in a period of war, and if this conflict was not enough, yesterday we have had an update on Climate Change and the diagnosis and prognosis was more than severe, it looked apocalyptic and unless we change how we live, eat, move, warm, get electricity, it would be Game Over soon, for all of us, and as Yuval Harari showed in a recent essay in The Economist – he is the author of divine books, such as Home Deus, A Brief History of Tomorrow  http://realini.blogspot.com/2015/01/50-shades-of-grey-by-e-l-james.html  - the war will be a paradigm shift on a few levels, one, states will spend more on defense – and his prediction already proves accurate –because they now fear that what happened in Europe, can be replicated from Taiwan to other places – and then the acute crisis will p...

  Extinction by Thomas Bernhardt is supposed to be one of The 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read  https://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/jan/23/bestbooks-fiction  only for the undersigned, it only makes it on the 10,000 Books to consider if You will have reached Immortality aka Realini’s 10,000 list 8 out of 10     On many levels, this work is clearly impressive and one should consider a few criteria, first of all, to consult professionals, critics that know what they are talking about and avoid sites where amateurs that have failed in their hopes to write something significant and rant against or for other people’s productions, in other words, spoiler alert – do not read this, it is not worthwhile, it is just a reflection of a personal failure, the incomprehension of the reader is translated as shortcomings in the novel, and there are other points to watch for…   ‘German words hang like weights on the German language ,  That is why their philosophy and t...

  Great Classic Stories read by Derek Jacobi, Hugh Laurie, and Stephen Fry   Most of the stories included here have been reviewed separately and they are great: Mad, The Sphinx without a Secret, The Monkey’s Paw, the Girl from Arles and more. The great discovery I made some years ago was the audio book. It was in the British Library that I could enjoy books on tape for the first time: Shakespeare, Arthur Conan Doyle and C. S. Lewis: The Screwtape Letters, read by John Cleese, of Monty Python fame. In fact you can now listen to almost any comedy, or show: Little Britain, Monty Python’s Life of Brian. It used to be audio tapes, now it is mp3, wma, etc. I got the habit of recording the plays broadcast on the radio and even now I have some of those in the attic, even though they are obsolete. Because there is little chance that they will ever be played again, in the absence, years from now, of the means (tape recorder, player) to play it, I decided to give those precious memories ...