31 Days of Horror Movies: The Fog

Director John Carpenter has certainly left his mark in horror cinema. Halloween grabs all of the attention, but I'm rather partial to his follow-up...

The Fog

Made in 1980, and once again seeing a marriage of Carpenter with Jamie Lee Curtis, The Fog tells the story of, well, some fog rolling into a seaside town, on the 100th anniversary of when some mariners shipwrecked nearby. The film also stars the incomparable Adrienne Barbeau as the local radio disc jockey.

The Fog isn't particularly gory. It's a slow-paced build-up of terror. It's Halloween's less show-offy cousin. As time marches on, and I re-watch both Halloween and The Fog, it is clear that the latter is better-aged, and more gripping, than the former. They're both great, but if you haven't done so already, give this movie a look. Choose a night when it's foggy out.

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Yesterday's Restaurants

The local newspaper has a feature from one of Champaign-Urbana's most legendary restaurateur's, John Katsinas, on what his favorite area restaurants were that have now since closed (or will soon be closing). It's a nice little read, and has made me stop and think about the restaurants that have come and gone that have left an indelible (and edible) impression on me throughout the years. Here we go....

To the beat of his own Drum

Tonight I learned that Kevin Drum has died. He passed away on Friday, March 7th, from Multiple Myeloma (the same illness that took my uncle Paul several years ago). Drum's diagnosis came in 2014, and he talked about it openly on his blog , up to and including just a few days before his death. I knew of Kevin Drum through his blogging. During the early aughts, when I started to become more politically aware and involved, I began reading certain online musings by folks -- Andrew Sullivan and, on a local level, IlliniPundit, to name a couple. Drum's blog at that time was Calpundit . Eventually, he began blogging at Mother Jones . When they parted ways, he started what would be his final online venture. So, yeah, I've been reading Kevin's musings for over twenty years.

Watching The Hours

A Twitter friend named Paula has asked for folks to submit ideas for a blog-a-thon about what we think will be the classic films of the future. In other words, what relatively recent movies (namely, from the 21st century), do we think will be considered classics in the decades to come, possibly airing on such venerable stations as Turner Classic Movies ? While a number of films come to mind for such a category, one in particular stood out from the rest, and thus is my entry for Paula's blog-a-thon.

Left to my own devices

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