Gee, I wonder if the cops on the TV show Chicago P.D. like working under Mayor Brandon Johnson. Doubt it. I don’t think Johnson is as sweatily concerned about Chicago crime as Sgt. Hank Voight is.

In an interview on his morning program, Joe Scarborough never got Johnson to admit that Chicago crime would or might drop if there were more police officers on the streets. Say, 5,000 more, Scarborough said. Johnson replied that he doesn’t believe in “arbitrary” numbers. Is this arbitrary leadership?

The Robert Zemeckis movie, Used Cars (1980) is a raw and foul-mouthed satirical comedy. Of course it satirizes the deceit and unscrupulousness of car salesmen and plenty of others. An obvious but often funny item, it stars Kurt Russell, Jack Warden, Gerrit Graham and Deborah Harmon—all of them rich in personality and never overacting. I don’t know how good an actor Cheryl Rixon is, but—her character undergoes a wardrobe malfunction, and Rixon is truly gorgeous in both her face and her bare bosom. No malfunctioning in Used Cars.

Matt Dillon, Lili Taylor and Marisa Tomei are all savvy, amusing and sensual—indeed, wonderfully memorable—in Bent Hamer‘s Factotum, a 2005 picture based on writings by Charles Bukowski. Dillon’s Hank Chinaski is a would-be writer who cannot adapt to ordinary life and is sometimes a feckless jerk. In one instance, he slaps to the floor of a bar his “loser” girlfriend (Taylor), who nevertheless needles him. She often drolly thinks Hank is too big for his britches.

Hank needs the odd jobs he gets fired from. A heavy drinker inept at manual labor, like the pitiable Laura (Tomei), he is finally homeless. These people are oddities in a dull milieu confusing or disappointing to them. And what comic oddities they can be. Factotum—directorially and photographically impressive—is never depressing. Good show.