journal features

movie review - Murder on The Orient Express

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

Toronto, 2019.11.15

This is a retelling of the classic Agatha Christie movie. Featuring probably the greatest cast ever assembled, it is a faithful retelling and it borders on the out-dated in so doing. But that's one of the things I like about it. Today we get a lot of spandex crotches rammed in our collective face with all these superhero movies, and it's downright pleasure to see something done with this degree of care. The direction is flawless, the setting is amazing, and the photography gives everything life. God, just having characters that can feel so real with so few words of exposition! Masterful.

Strongly recommended.

rand()m quote

Meaning is not something you stumble across, like the answer to a riddle or the prize in a treasure hunt. Meaning is something you build into your life. You build it out of your own past, out of your affections and loyalties, out of the experience of humankind as it is passed on to you, out of your own talent and understanding, out of the things you believe in, out of the things and people you love, out of the values for which you are willing to sacrifice something. The ingredients are there. You are the only one who can put them together into that unique pattern that will be your life. Let it be a life that has dignity and meaning for you. If it does, then the particular balance of success or failure is of less account.

—John Gardner