3D is basically just one more tool in the filmmakers' toolbox. Stephanie is absolutely right to point out that, in the end, good story-telling and story-telling alone is what will make or break a film.

Case in point: the 1981 flick "My Dinner with Andre," in which an almost entirely static camera films a dinner conversation between characters played by Andre Gregory and Wallace Shawn for nearly two hours. Boring, right? Not at all -- their conversation brings more scenes to vivid, 3-D life than the fanciest CGI ever could. To be honest, "Andre" could have been a radio play and would have remained just as fascinating (and as paradoxically visual).

A contrary example: I watched "Journey to the Center of the Earth" on DVD recently, and very soon found myself wondering why the film kept on focusing on weird details that were completely irrelevant to the story, like birds that flew perilously close to the camera or sharp objects pointing in the camera's direction. After about the fourth time this happened, I grabbed the dvd box to check and, yep, there it was: filmed in 3-D. That explained it! The temptation to use the 3-D tool as a simple gimmick will always be there (that is, unless or until the technology becomes so ubiquitous that everyone, even the director, is bored of the pointing spear trick).

Final example: "Coraline" did use the tool as a tool, not a gimmick, and in my experience it enhanced an already engrossing story.

A new WayLay! I enjoy the old stuff, but I really appreciate the lighter, airier lines of Carol's new style. "Uncertainty" is a winner.

A great man, Camus, wrote at the end of his marvelous novel, The Plague: "After all," he said, "after the tragedy, never the rest...there is more in the human being to celebrate than to denigrate."

The quotation should read:

"After all," he said, "after the tragedy, nevertheless...there is more in the human being to celebrate than to denigrate."

Andrew:

The majority of your letter-writers so far seem to be holding onto hope. Well, we all hope for the best, but I'm afraid your assessment of the situation is a lot closer to reality.

For those who focus (hopefully) on the differences between Beijing '89 and Tehran '09, here are a couple more parallels: the Soviet bloc countries from 1945 to 1989; Burma since the quashed election of Aung San Suu Kyi in 1990; Zimbabwe since the denied election of Tsvangari last year; virtually every country in Central America up to about the past decade. Each is a different, unique case; what all have in common is the use of force against people who want their rights.

Look around the history of the world and you will find many more examples of regimes that will stop at nothing to repress the will of the people. On the other side, how many examples does all of world history hold out of repressive regimes with the means and the will to kill their own people that voluntarily give up power? Not too many. Arguably the Soviet Union under Gorbachev, and what else?

1. Who gives a s**t? (Just noticed that someone else already had this thought, but it still stands.)

2. How sad that nobody who is even a tiny bit in the public eye (governor of South Carolina?? See thought #1) can escape from said public eye for just a week without some minor branch of the media going insane trying to track him/her down. I don't know and don't care anything about this Sanford guy, but even if he's the next GWB (G-d save us) he still deserves a week of privacy if he wants it.

My advice: lay off the "story" for a month and see if it still seems like news then.

Funny, I thought "brutal!" was so 1974. Or maybe the potheads on the first floor of Clark Hall (Wes U) were miraculously 34 years ahead of their time...

Thanks as always for the belly laughs!

If you add the "center" to the "right," then of course the country is center-right. By the same token, adding "center" to "left" makes it center-left.

Wingnut quickly skims past this point by claiming, without the slightest shred of evidence, that the "center" breaks 2-1 to the conservative side. His only argument for this entirely unsubstantiated claim is that, in one Gallup poll, those who do not call themselves moderates skew conservative by 40 to 21 percentage points.

It would be just as logical to assume that, after decades of vilification of liberals in the media, a substantial number of de facto liberals call themselves "moderates" and therefore that self-identified moderates truly skew 3-1 liberal.

Or to assume anything else, for that matter. Once you start down the path of just making stuff up, where's the stopping point?

Oh, and to answer Mr. Wingnut's question, "Is it conservatives or liberals who are engaged in an effort to expand or even rewrite the definition of what constitutes a family?" -- It is the social conservatives. They are the ones who, in violation of logic as well as morality and justice, are trying to redefine families headed by gay couples as non-families. Fortunately the public is, at last, catching onto them. The right's reliance on bigotry and intolerance to pander for votes isn't working as well as it used to.

The city of New Haven made a big mistake in arguing on the basis of racial equity to this Supreme Court. Instead, they should have argued that, as employers, they had the right to use whatever metrics they dam' well pleased to promote or demote their minions.

If there is any group for which the "conservative justices" have more empathy than the downtrodden white male, it is employers.