Tag: Steve Coogan

If I Were More Sanctified, Would Wife Like My Music?

Published on by D. G. Hart50 Comments

How far does sanctity go? How extensive is w-w? All of me belongs to Jesus and I am a new man in Christ, but what does this mean for taste? Can holiness account for taste?

Last night I was listening to a sequence of Klangkarussell mixes on Youtube. Who the Hades are Klangkarussell, you ask? I’m not sure but ever since I started listening to Rob da Bank I’ve become aware of contemporary dub step, dance and electronic performers that take me back to the days of Mike Oldfield and Klaus Schulze (and yes, Brian Eno). Since Rob has not yet started is weekly show on BBC Radio 6 (moving from Radio 1), I have had to look for alternatives. Pandora and Spotify have their moments. But at some points their musical memes become repetitive (even though so much better than Taylor Swift).

But that is exactly what the missus thought last night as I became energized by one of the mixes by Klangkarussell. “Turn that racket down,” was the kind charge I heard coming from the kitchen.

And here I thought we were on the same cultural plane. We grew up with the same television shows, cut our teeth cinematically on Woody Allen and Ingmar Bergman, and identified as Preppy’s in early adulthood. We just finished Happy Valley, a terrific BBC/Netflix production that puts the drama in dramatic, and we both had similar assessments — four thumbs up (so much better than Season Three of The Killing). (Cordelia missed most of the series while snoozing upstairs.) We also recently traveled to Ann Arbor to see The Trip to Italy, the Steve Coogan, Rob Bryden sequel to The Trip. The wife and I thoroughly enjoyed this movie as much as the first, and thought that maybe even the second was better.

So if we can be so close on the same page of television series and cinema, why can’t we be closer on music. Her tastes run to Motown and sentimental (in my estimate) crooners. Mine run to minimalism whether coming from Philip Glass or Moderat.

If everything deep down is religious or spiritual, then what accounts for the difference? Or if lots of life is merely creaturely and natural, maybe even the Obedience Boys and the cultural transformationalists can’t explain our cultural (and other spheres) lives.

In A Framean State of Mind (which does not involve a w— v—)

Published on by D. G. Hart11 Comments

‘Tis the season of staying in by the fire and watching movies to recover from piles of blue books. And since John Frame has written a steady stream of movie reviews (which I found recently while gearing up for some e-sparring), I figure I might as well weigh in with my own (all about me) holiday recommendations. I should add that Frame’s application of w— v— to movies hardly does justice to the creativity of character development, narrative, cinematography, and editing. Chalk up another demerit to neo-Calvinism.

The better half and I recently saw two contemporary films, with lots of British ingenuity, that are remarkably pro-family even without ever bringing up God. One is the Hart family yuletide favorite, “About A Boy,” starring Hugh Grant at his comedic best, in the role of a single wealthy man in London who discovers that love and marriage is more fitting to human existence than living alone and being self-absorbed.

The other film, a surprisingly funny and poignant treat in a very understated manner, is “The Trip.” It follows two British actors — Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon, as they drive, flirt, and eat their way through the beautiful Lake District. A bonus is the actors’ rival impersonations of Sean Connery, Michael Cain, and even Woody Allen, over dinner. Again, the implicit message is that single life (Steve Coogan) has few of the benefits of marriage and family (Rob Brydon). The film’s finale is even moving.

Neither movie is going to win any skirmishes in the culture wars — in fact, I bet Focus on the Family would mark these films down for lots of sexual themes, foul language, and familial dysfunction. Still, if you want some reassurance that sanity still speaks in the wider culture of celebrity and mass entertainment, you could do worse than to rent “About A Boy” and “The Trip.”