Newish Story

I forgot to say, I wrote this last week, about the short-lived showing of the Atlas Shrugged movie in Park Slope.  It was fun, though the hour and 42 minutes I was in the movie were definitely the weak link in the evening.

Some random thoughts that didn't make it into the story:

-- Aside from the obvious issues with the culture of the neighborhood, the movie faced some obstacles in Park Slope.  It had scored an 8 out of 100 on Rotten Tomatoes (that's down to a 6 now, by the way), and then there's the theater.  The Park Slope Pavilion has had what you would have to call some challenges recently.  There was a bedbug rumor (which the owners denied) and general disrepair so bad that the theater's 23-year-old manager wrote a heart-rending letter of apology to the Park Slope Parents internet group.

(Digression: Literally every single time I think of the Park Slope Parents internet group, which is an even more bizarre slice of the neighborhood than the Co-op, I laugh to myself about the saga of the "lost boy's hat."  It will be very old news to many of you, but if you're from Mars or something and haven't heard about that brouhaha, do yourself a favor and read up.)

-- I thought Tea Partiers hated high speed trains?  In the dystopian year 2016, they love them.  Who knew.

-- It's a movie about the glory of rich people, more or less, but one with a relatively limited budget.  This produces some unintentional comedy in the wardrobe and set design departments.  Lotta rich guys shopping at Men's Wearhouse in the year 2016, apparently.

-- I've googled around and I may have been the only person in the world who noticed this one.  Much of the film is set in Manhattan, albeit a Manhattan without an Empire State Building or basically any iconic skyscrapers, and one that in fact is pretty transparently downtown L.A. or Vancouver or something.  But there is a very quick glimpse of the heroine outside a subway station, and the stop is marked something like "Second Avenue/Seventh Street."  That's right: They've got a Second Avenue subway in 2016!  How dystopian can the future be if they've got the Second Avenue subway built?  Maybe union workers aren't so bad after all?