** "The only tool I have as an actress is being me - how it's informed me as a human being..."

Claire Foy Talks 'H is For Hawk,' Ink - A Tale Of Two Media: The UK actress in a conversation about her memoir based portrayal of Helen Macdonald, who confronted her overwhelming grief following the passing of her renowned father Alisdair Macdonald, eminent press photographer counting memorable photos of The Beatles and Rolling Stones, by adopting a wild, untamed hawk - and Foy's stage to screen portrait of tabloid scandal sheet editor Joyce Hopkirk in the upcoming satirical Rupert Murdoch biopic, Ink. Starring Guy Pearce as Murdoch.

** "I think a lot of us saw this coming - so here we are...

Pacifica Host Garland Nixon on Minnesota and Murder. With connections to billionaires, meat grinders and proxy wars; cults, dementia and civil war - and a disintegrating empire...

** "He sees birds everywhere - beaches, parks, cemeteries, even garbage landfills - and discovers how birds help tell the social, cultural and even political story of the city..."

Bird City: A Conversation With Author Ryan Goldberg. Adventures in urban wilds, and hanging out for 'an unusual tour of winged creatures coexisting with humans...'

** "We'll look at the sins of omission and commission of today's print, television and digital media..."

Blackrock, Ukraine, Beavis And Butt-Head...Arts Express Paris Correspondent Professor Dennis Broe debuts his new online show. Referencing Trump, Merz, Nazis, and the scrap heap of history; Mark Twain and his criticism of 19th century America - and 'The NY Times globalist imagination...'

'Just put some oil in my frying pan and look what has happened...'

Plus...No Laughing Matter Interlude...Venezuela, Trump and Oil... 

Closer to Home: Looking For America Review - Class And Culture Conflict Revisited

On this 30th Anniversary revisiting of the Joseph Nobile directed cross-cultural dramatic feature Closer To Home, there is rare welcome insight into diverse global perspectives beyond the usual Euro-centric world view that despite its three decades, sustains a scarce class conscious contemporary relevance. And owing in great part to the collaboration of screenwriting credits and bracing cultural clash points of view, between Nobile and Filipino scripter Ruben Arhtus Nicdao, who on this anniversary passed away in Pampango, Philippines in April.

Filmed in part with a profound sense of genuinely conceived poverty and exploitation in the Philippines, the narrative follows Dalisay (16 year old Madeline Ortaliz when filming began) - a rural young woman who applies through a corrupt local agency to be selected as a US bound mail order bride, with the intent of being able to send money back to her impoverished family, and a sister in dire need of a operation they cannot afford.

But expectations crumble at both ends - for Dalisay who imagines the US as a country ripe with financial opportunity - and Dean (John Michael Bolger), the middle aged American who has essentially purchased her, and is himself barely making ends meet as a New York City cab driver. And with Dean idealizing Dalisay as a fantasy he cannot essentially satisfy, because he as well ironically buys into the national delusion that there is no such thing as class, in that false socio-economic notion of America.

Though there is an unspoken element potentially at play here. The filming of Closer To Home began in 1992, which would have made Dean, formerly of the Merchant Marines, likely a Vietnam soldier - hence his familiarity with the Philippines, the staging ground for the US assault and invasion of Vietnam. And which might have imparted insightful psychological depth to his potentially dangerous impulsive behavior as a sign of PTSD.

And though the film presents an uncompromising, determined realistic portrait of the past crafted with unusual depth and stinging social complexity, a clash offscreen with the currently reality in this country is unavoidable - namely with this horrendous moment of US government propagated ICE violence against immigrants, that Dalisay's lack of papers would have more likely kept her under the protection of Dean merely for survival, however horrible and even perilous such an ultimately desperate decision might be.

Prairie Miller