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Paul Levinson
Bio
Novels The Silk Code, The Plot To Save Socrates, It's Real Life: An Alternate History of The Beatles; LPs Twice Upon A Rhyme & Welcome Up; nonfiction The Soft Edge & Digital McLuhan, translated into 15 languages. Prof, Fordham Univ.
Stories (705/0)
It's the Debate that Failed Last Night, Not Biden
It's been two days since the Presidential debate on CNN. Biden tried to say decent, ethical things but delivered most of his words poorly; Trump spoke much more clearly but said vile things and lied just about every time he opened his mouth (lies which the CNN moderators failed to call out).
By Paul Levinson3 days ago in The Swamp
Review of 'The Lazarus Project' 2.1-2.3
When I saw and reviewed the first season of The Lazarus Project on TNT last November, I said it was "the best time-travel series I've ever seen on television, bar none." Having just seen the first three episodes of the second season on TNT last night, I feel exactly the same.
By Paul Levinson8 days ago in Futurism
Review of 'Presumed Innocent' 1.1-1.3
I saw Presumed Innocent -- the movie with Harrison Ford in the lead role -- in 1990. I shortly after read the Scott Turow 1987 novel from which the movie was adapted. That was a long time ago, no blogging, and I was a devoted possessor of a Radio Shack M100. I thought the movie and book were brilliant, with one of the cleverest endings, one of the most unexpected twists, I'd ever come across in a fictitious murder story. I still feel that way right now.
By Paul Levinson10 days ago in Criminal
Review of 'Dark Matter' 1.1-1.4
Dark Matter, the first two episodes of which debuted on Apple TV+ two week ago, is the third alternate reality narrative I've seen on the screen in the past month (see my reviews of Quantum Suicide, a film created by Gerrit Van Woudenberg which should be streaming on some major place by the Fall, and Constellation, another series on Apple TV+). All three bounce off the at-once famous and infamous Schrödinger's cat. Quantum Suicide has the feel of Primer and the work-at-home scientist. Dark Matter has a similar feel. And I'm beginning to think I don't want to think about these matters too hard, because the more I think about them, the more I think it's possible that I could be in an alternate reality myself, right now. But, hey, I'm so dedicated to doing this review, I think I'll risk it, anyway.
By Paul Levinsonabout a month ago in Futurism
Review of 'The Singer Sisters'
There's a meta-genre of fiction epitomized in different but overlapping ways by Eddie and the Cruisers, Rob Reiner's This Is Spinal Tap, and Daisy Jones and the Six -- the first and the third adapted to the screen from novels -- that helps us understand what those who make music that lights up our nights are doing, feeling, and thinking when they're off-stage and not in the studio. Sarah Seltzer's The Singer Singers, a debut novel to be published this August, not only fits well in that narrative family, but in some ways exceeds it. I'd expect to see it adapted on some kind of screen before too long.
By Paul Levinson2 months ago in Beat
Review of 'Constellation'
I've read and seen many alternate reality stories. Some are caused by quantum entanglement -- the mega version of two subatomic particles colliding and then moving in opposite directions but still intimately and instantly connected -- and some just happen or are already there. I just reviewed a movie here on Vocal with that schema, and have written a few double realities stories and a novel with that premise myself. But none explore the existence and impact of that on families the way that Constellation does. Indeed, none do much of that at all in the at once deep and startling way that this new series on Apple TV+ does.
By Paul Levinson3 months ago in Futurism
Review of 'Quantum Suicide'
Gerrit Van Woudenberg's Quantum Suicide movie (which he wrote, directed, and -- with Shane Morgan - co-produced) won the Best Sci-Fi Dramatic Feature award at the Philip K. Dick Film Festival last week in New York City. I was at the Festival, and moderated a panel with Van Woudenberg, but I had another appointment when the movie was shown at the Festival. Van Woudenberg (who directed a few short films a decade ago) was good enough to give me the URL for a screener, which I just saw and greatly enjoyed. Herewith a non-spoiler review.
By Paul Levinson3 months ago in Futurism
Review of '3 Body Problem' Season One
I haven't read the novel by Liu Cixin and its sequels, and I didn't read much about the series because I wanted to be surprised. I'd say the first season of 3 Body Problem was superb -- a powerful mix of thought-provoking, stunning action, and heartbreaking human stories, all in support of a story of a life-threatening interstellar intelligent species, the San-Ti, who have been in contact with our planet for more than 50 years and now are approaching us, some 400 years away from arriving, which may mean the end of our species. And there was a wise and funny joke about Einstein and God which I hadn't heard before.
By Paul Levinson3 months ago in Geeks
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