Last night, I watched There Will Be Blood, starring Daniel Day Lewis. As you may know, Lewis was an Academy Award winner for Best Actor and Rober Elswit, ASC for Best Cinematography. The movie is based (or perhaps inspired by) Upton Sinclair’s novel, Oil! Sinclair is most famous for his novel, The Jungle, one that I’ve taught in school. Sinclair is a great author to use to introduce students to the Muckrakers and to literature that can change society and how that is accomplished. With the news constantly reminding us of rising oil and gasoline prices and the high profits of oil companies, this movie may be more relevant than we may think. Sinclair saw something in the oil business, some demon that drove and controlled men. Though the oil business setting has changed somewhat and much of it shifted to the Middle East, there are still some obvious parallels that could be made and themes that could be formed.

I found Lewis to be an extraordinary actor in this film, but the physical action was slow. Much conflict was internal, and the complex conflict between people was brooding and full of intensity. The conflict was not between man and nature, so it was not a green film, though I thought the film had a naturalistic feel to it.

BOOK SIGNING AND TRAVEL NEWS:

Tonight, I’ll be leaving Monroe for my lodging in Tyler, Texas. Tomorrow, I’ll be at Bullard Intermediate at Bullard, Texas. Tomorrow night, I’ll be signing books at the BAM in Longview. Thursday, I’ll be in Brownsboro, TX again, then in Chandler in the afternoon. Thursday night, I’ll be performing at Auntie Skinner’s in Jefferson, TX 6:00-9:00 p.m.

Northeast Louisiana Celtic Society:

The Web page for the Northeast Louisiana Celtic Society is up and has a great look! Visit it and learn a little bit about us. I’m the program director.  Here is the link:

Bellmead, Texas

In yesterday’s post I spoke of Bellmead, Texas and the Civil War reenactment there. You can see tons of pictures here: