What is The Confessions of X (2016), a novel by Suzanne M. Wolfe, about?  Its narrative is about the concubine, unnamed, of St. Augustine before he became a Christian.  Thematically it is about the unbreakable tie between former lovers who have lived without any other lover (or spouse).  It is about unexpected conversion and sudden change (a minor example:  a saved woman, Perpetua, becomes like a sister to “X” after initially snapping at her for her concubinage).  It is about love.

The book is almost always finely, astutely written, even if the characterization lacks admirable depth.  Also, I found certain parts of it a bit of a slog, and yet Wolfe’s details are very often memorable.  If The Confessions of X is a Christian novel—it was published by Thomas Nelson, and Wolfe possesses a Christian sensibility—it’s probably the best Christian novel of 2016.  It’s not the kind of book that comes out frequently.

Cover of The Sugarland Express

Is The Sugarland Express (1974) a stupid movie, or is it just that the people in it are stupid?  Well, a ton of human stupidity obtains, but when it comes down to brass tacks, it’s The Sugarland Express that’s stupid.  The lower class woman played by Goldie Hawn is nothing but a cretin about whom we care very little if at all.  It’s an underwritten role and Hawn, withal, fails to make her sympathetic.

Steven Spielberg has a full supply of moviemaking talent, but his film, though based on a true story, has no good reason to exist.  At least Duel and the finally unsatisfactory Jaws are entertaining.  Sugarland can be entertaining too, but is so trivial the entertainment value seems as though it’s always on the periphery.

The 1972 film Dirty Little Billy tries to be honest about the Old West and about life.  Here, Billy the Kid (Michael J. Pollard) is mistreated by certain people, such as his tyrannical stepfather, before he ever becomes a violent ne’er-do-well.  Several wastrels, primarily a prostitute (Lee Purcell) and her beau (Richard Evans), accept him, however, and force him to engage in gunfire against scurvy adversaries.  No small amount of loss and debacle breaks out for the drifting boy.

The movie was made by two ad men, Stan Dragoti (who directed) and Charles Moss, and although it is plainly a fledgling’s achievement, it can be gripping and even fascinating.  The writing is sometimes a letdown, but very little of  the drama is predictable: the violent reactions, for example.  And there is a nice touch whereby an American flag waving over Billy and the dingy new town he walks through bespeaks something about the country’s future: that many ignorant young ne’er-do-wells will be a fixture in the U.S. population.

(Available on YouTube)

Dirty Little Billy (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A 1970 Robert Altman film, M*A*S*H is a war comedy too desultory and frivolous, not to mention unrevealing about character.  We learn very little, really, about Hawkeye Pierce (Donald Sutherland) and nothing about Trapper John (Elliott Gould).  It has some of the most casually presented material I’ve seen in a movie.

Further, the film is mockingly sacrilegious and—any feminists who dislike it are right to do so—flatly degrading of women.  Sally Kellerman’s Hot Lips doesn’t stand a chance.

As far as I’m concerned, no one should give this movie a chance.

Cover of M*A*S*H (Widescreen Edition)

Flirting with Disaster (2010) is a likable Christian novel for young people written by Sandra Byrd, the author of The Secret Keeper, which I reviewed on this site.  Keeper is mainly for adults, Disaster can be enjoyed by adults as it chronicles the actions of Savvy Smith, an American girl in London who is 15 years old and fits right in among her English peers.

Ordinary in many ways, Savvy is also devoted to Christ, facing the challenge of paying no mind to what others believe about luck and horoscopes, even when something good happens after a chain-text message is passed on.  Sending such a message is “flirting with disaster”—a hackneyed title for this book—since God is forever sovereign over “fortune.”  Savvy need not believe in an impersonal force like fortune when she is always surrounded by personal ones, of whom God, the object of her faith, is the most prominent.

Hackneyed title or not, Byrd’s novel is clever and genial.  It belongs to a series called London Confidential and, although I likely will not read the other three books in the series, that in no way means the reader of this review should not.

English: mobile phone text message (Photo credit: Wikipedia)