News of the World

Trump finally signed the bill he threatened to veto, but I think the Democrats will still try to vote for $2000 checks. I think the national defense bill is still vetoed, but I thought Congress passed that with a veto-proof majority? It's all confusing to me. Just want this chaos administration over with so he can stop wreaking havoc on everything for petty reasons. The Georgia senate runoffs are January 5, but I believe that early voting has already started.

Weirdly, my local radio station is still playing Christmas music. Are they going to keep doing it through New Year's, like some people wait to take their Christmas lights down?

Anyway I watched Tom Hanks in News of the World, but found it quite slow going and just liked hearing a lot of place names from Texas that I knew. Apparently the movie cut out some stuff from the book, such as Captain Kidd already having daughters in another state, and it makes the dramatic choice to have Johanna's original escort be lynched, rather than alive and able to hand her off to Kidd voluntarily. There's not much political nuance; much of the conflict is implied by locals complaining about the Union Blues not helping them with floods and Indians. And they rail against federal news about 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments to the Constitution, but it's like they're any generic deep South racists. The Kiowa don't have any speaking parts, just floating in and out of some scenes in the distance or during a sandstorm. Johanna speaks Kiowa, subtitled, but no one understands her until a white boarding house woman translates for her, then Johanna starts learning English from Kidd. So again a Western marginalizes Native Americans and doesn't let them have a say. Kidd just seems weary of all war and all killing, and wishes other people would stop being violent. When he mourns his dead wife, he confesses to his childhood friend that he thinks God has cursed him for his actions in the Civil war. The character John Calley has a few scenes and then leaves, with no hint of him returning to the story later. It's a bit muddled.