Leo and Kate are at it again. I found the “tell the story through flashbacks, but don’t actually have any flashbacks” approach to be a bit difficult to follow at first, but eventually the characters came together and the story built to a nice satisfying emotional punch in the gut. I also loved the crazy mathematician.

Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman are amazing and Doubt is a good movie. The sophistication of the plot betrays its origins as a play, but nothing felt sacrificed on the altar of filmification. Indeed unlike most neat and tidy films, this one leaves you with a healthy mouthful of moral ambiguity to chew on as you make your way out of the theater.

I have to admit to liking Jim Carrey, in spite of his occasional forays into the realm of the inanely absurd. That coupled with my own tendencies toward the almighty yes made this an enjoyable moviegoing experience. Your mileage may vary.

I don’t like Yoshimoto as much as I like Murakami, but she has a charming quirkiness and her characters are no less wacky. This book is actually two novelettes. I preferred the surreal mysticism of the latter, Moonlight Story, to the emotional angst of the former, from which the book draws its title.

Wrapped this one up just in time to hear Obama give his inaugural address. I was impressed with the consistency of his message, especially given the lack of stated presidential ambition in Audacity. I’ll admit to the probably naive impression that his ideals survived the rough road to presidency rather than the more cynical assessment that they were calculated to take him there from the start.

Not his most gripping work, but interesting for the tangential forays into math history and the bird’s eye view of math academia.

Ross has such an encyclopedic knowledge of music that I can’t imagine what it’s like for her to listen to a new piece. It must be a constant parade of quotations and reminders. Fortunately for the reader, this gives her the ability to point out subtle connections and influences and combines with her incredible talent for describing music via written analogy to deliver an experience that is in some cases possibly better than listening to the music firsthand. I would love to someday read as thorough and well researched an account of the history of electronic music, though perhaps like most everything else in the late 20th century, that has exploded to such a size as to be impractical to accurately chronicle.

Occasionally it was charming and more frequently the scenery was nice, but the plot was all over the place and the characters never really cohered. Nothing about the film ever offended, but it was very schticky. The whole sliding doors sequence was totally gratuitous. The strangest thing about the film was that they did a better job making Brad Pitt look young than Cate Blanchett look old.