The Civilian
@tajiisawol.bsky.social
“Truth uncompromisingly told will always have its ragged edges…“
They weren't in the dark; they were the dark.
January 14, 2026 at 5:46 AM
They weren't in the dark; they were the dark.
Reposted by The Civilian
I spent the last 45 minutes or so of 2023 caught up in the culminating scenes of Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master, watching them drift by in silence, with close captioning, my wife & young daughter already asleep beside me in the hotel room's king-sized bed. It’s a movie I've seen a few times, … 1/
January 4, 2024 at 4:46 PM
I spent the last 45 minutes or so of 2023 caught up in the culminating scenes of Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master, watching them drift by in silence, with close captioning, my wife & young daughter already asleep beside me in the hotel room's king-sized bed. It’s a movie I've seen a few times, … 1/
My recent rewatch of Grizzly Man (2005) has morphed into a my own philosophical meditation upon the dichotomy between ego and awe. As a character study and comparison, Into the Wild's (2007) Christopher McCandless has been invited to take a seat in my head next to Timothy Treadwell.
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December 31, 2025 at 5:40 AM
My recent rewatch of Grizzly Man (2005) has morphed into a my own philosophical meditation upon the dichotomy between ego and awe. As a character study and comparison, Into the Wild's (2007) Christopher McCandless has been invited to take a seat in my head next to Timothy Treadwell.
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So very potent and probing. About 300 pages in and utterly riveted & affected. But because it’s a library copy I feel restrained in my intensity. I can’t mark it up like I typically do with something that both inspires & moves me. As soon as I can I’m going to buy my own copy and chew it to pieces.
1998: “Man, I gotta read Thin Red Line, Malick’s returning with it.”
2025: “Man, Malick’s Thin Red Line is forever lyrical, I‘m finally going to find out how much of it is from the novel.”
2025: “Man, Malick’s Thin Red Line is forever lyrical, I‘m finally going to find out how much of it is from the novel.”
December 30, 2025 at 9:18 PM
So very potent and probing. About 300 pages in and utterly riveted & affected. But because it’s a library copy I feel restrained in my intensity. I can’t mark it up like I typically do with something that both inspires & moves me. As soon as I can I’m going to buy my own copy and chew it to pieces.
Agnes Varda’s Le Bonheur (1965) and Claire Denis’ Beau Travail (1999) are among my first-watches from the past seven years or so which left the most indelible of impressions. I need to make a conscious effort to go further into both of their filmographies.
December 29, 2025 at 12:21 AM
Agnes Varda’s Le Bonheur (1965) and Claire Denis’ Beau Travail (1999) are among my first-watches from the past seven years or so which left the most indelible of impressions. I need to make a conscious effort to go further into both of their filmographies.
Post a perfect album from the 90's that isn't Nirvana, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, or Alice In Chains.
December 29, 2025 at 12:10 AM
Post a perfect album from the 90's that isn't Nirvana, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, or Alice In Chains.
“What power was it which decided one man should be hit, be killed, instead of another man? … If this were a movie, this would be the end of the show and something would be decided. In a movie or a novel they would dramatize and build to the climax of the attack. When the attack came in the film
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December 28, 2025 at 5:37 AM
“What power was it which decided one man should be hit, be killed, instead of another man? … If this were a movie, this would be the end of the show and something would be decided. In a movie or a novel they would dramatize and build to the climax of the attack. When the attack came in the film
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I’ve seen Werner Herzog’s Grizzly Man (2005) a couple of times but last night I watched it, as I find myself increasingly doing more and more with any rewatch, with the intent of trying to discern, through such tools as framing, tone, and editing, what Herzog was up to. He seems to
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December 28, 2025 at 2:14 AM
I’ve seen Werner Herzog’s Grizzly Man (2005) a couple of times but last night I watched it, as I find myself increasingly doing more and more with any rewatch, with the intent of trying to discern, through such tools as framing, tone, and editing, what Herzog was up to. He seems to
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Herzogian Madness in the Face of Nature's Indifference
December 27, 2025 at 7:32 PM
Herzogian Madness in the Face of Nature's Indifference
About 7 years ago, I decided I needed to go beyond New Hollywood & open up my film world. Since then here are my filmmaker(s) of the year—
2019: R. Bresson
2020: J.P. Melville
2021: Tarkovsky/Herzog
2022: Ozu/Kurosawa
2023: S. Ray/Rossellini
2024: Glazer/ Miyazaki
2025: A. Mann/ K. Reichardt
2019: R. Bresson
2020: J.P. Melville
2021: Tarkovsky/Herzog
2022: Ozu/Kurosawa
2023: S. Ray/Rossellini
2024: Glazer/ Miyazaki
2025: A. Mann/ K. Reichardt
December 26, 2025 at 5:13 PM
About 7 years ago, I decided I needed to go beyond New Hollywood & open up my film world. Since then here are my filmmaker(s) of the year—
2019: R. Bresson
2020: J.P. Melville
2021: Tarkovsky/Herzog
2022: Ozu/Kurosawa
2023: S. Ray/Rossellini
2024: Glazer/ Miyazaki
2025: A. Mann/ K. Reichardt
2019: R. Bresson
2020: J.P. Melville
2021: Tarkovsky/Herzog
2022: Ozu/Kurosawa
2023: S. Ray/Rossellini
2024: Glazer/ Miyazaki
2025: A. Mann/ K. Reichardt
Film friends, any of you aware of this from Martin Scorsese?
“Due to some dirty politics played by unknown quarters, Ray’s Hollywood dream had to be shelved. I have no qualms in admitting that Spielberg’s E.T. was influenced by Ray’s Alien. Even Sir Richard Attenborough pointed this out to me.”
“Due to some dirty politics played by unknown quarters, Ray’s Hollywood dream had to be shelved. I have no qualms in admitting that Spielberg’s E.T. was influenced by Ray’s Alien. Even Sir Richard Attenborough pointed this out to me.”
December 24, 2025 at 10:59 PM
Film friends, any of you aware of this from Martin Scorsese?
“Due to some dirty politics played by unknown quarters, Ray’s Hollywood dream had to be shelved. I have no qualms in admitting that Spielberg’s E.T. was influenced by Ray’s Alien. Even Sir Richard Attenborough pointed this out to me.”
“Due to some dirty politics played by unknown quarters, Ray’s Hollywood dream had to be shelved. I have no qualms in admitting that Spielberg’s E.T. was influenced by Ray’s Alien. Even Sir Richard Attenborough pointed this out to me.”
As I was reading The Thin Red Line, I began to compare it to Stephen Crane's Red Badge of Courage and then my mind jumped to John Huston. Was there any other director as prolific when it came to adapting authors from the literary canon? Hammett, Crane, Melville, Williams, McCullers, Kipling,
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December 24, 2025 at 6:47 AM
As I was reading The Thin Red Line, I began to compare it to Stephen Crane's Red Badge of Courage and then my mind jumped to John Huston. Was there any other director as prolific when it came to adapting authors from the literary canon? Hammett, Crane, Melville, Williams, McCullers, Kipling,
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WILFRED OWEN LIVES!!!!
Pro Futuro Mori: The old lie was that it is sweet and fitting to die for one's country; the new lie is that it is sweet and fitting to shed your humanity for one's planet.
Pro Futuro Mori: The old lie was that it is sweet and fitting to die for one's country; the new lie is that it is sweet and fitting to shed your humanity for one's planet.
The narrative lies & propaganda that Big Tech is pushing to get society to embrace AI & space colonization are akin to those that the government & the military pushed to get society to embrace war and its expenditures.
Within every body cell I know that pukes like Altman and Musk are not my people.
Within every body cell I know that pukes like Altman and Musk are not my people.
December 24, 2025 at 2:23 AM
WILFRED OWEN LIVES!!!!
Pro Futuro Mori: The old lie was that it is sweet and fitting to die for one's country; the new lie is that it is sweet and fitting to shed your humanity for one's planet.
Pro Futuro Mori: The old lie was that it is sweet and fitting to die for one's country; the new lie is that it is sweet and fitting to shed your humanity for one's planet.
In the words of my late father:
"Jesus, you like depressing shit like that? ... What the fuck's wrong with you?"
"Jesus, you like depressing shit like that? ... What the fuck's wrong with you?"
December 24, 2025 at 2:20 AM
In the words of my late father:
"Jesus, you like depressing shit like that? ... What the fuck's wrong with you?"
"Jesus, you like depressing shit like that? ... What the fuck's wrong with you?"
The narrative lies & propaganda that Big Tech is pushing to get society to embrace AI & space colonization are akin to those that the government & the military pushed to get society to embrace war and its expenditures.
Within every body cell I know that pukes like Altman and Musk are not my people.
Within every body cell I know that pukes like Altman and Musk are not my people.
December 23, 2025 at 11:46 PM
The narrative lies & propaganda that Big Tech is pushing to get society to embrace AI & space colonization are akin to those that the government & the military pushed to get society to embrace war and its expenditures.
Within every body cell I know that pukes like Altman and Musk are not my people.
Within every body cell I know that pukes like Altman and Musk are not my people.
On this theme of performative masculinity, Jones was adroitly nimble in capturing and expressing the interior thoughts of select men from C-for-Charlie Company and their struggles to wear their fictions as armor.
Here is Pfc Doll (Dash Mihok in the film) early on in the novel:
Here is Pfc Doll (Dash Mihok in the film) early on in the novel:
December 23, 2025 at 7:02 PM
On this theme of performative masculinity, Jones was adroitly nimble in capturing and expressing the interior thoughts of select men from C-for-Charlie Company and their struggles to wear their fictions as armor.
Here is Pfc Doll (Dash Mihok in the film) early on in the novel:
Here is Pfc Doll (Dash Mihok in the film) early on in the novel:
My buddy and I, two young, twenty-somethings slightly adrift in LA, both gutted from the death of Cobain, caught the live performance of Pearl Jam's "Not for You" on SNL in '94, leaving us stirring in a well of emotion. He went to found Vagrant Records; I stayed the vagrant.
Pearl Jam - Not For You (SNL Rehearsals April 1994 Show)
YouTube video by BadPennyFilms
www.youtube.com
December 23, 2025 at 3:58 AM
My buddy and I, two young, twenty-somethings slightly adrift in LA, both gutted from the death of Cobain, caught the live performance of Pearl Jam's "Not for You" on SNL in '94, leaving us stirring in a well of emotion. He went to found Vagrant Records; I stayed the vagrant.
What comes across acutely, and relentlessly, in James Jones’ The Thin Red Line is that men do not fight, and endure the horrors of war, for God or country or democracy or liberty or freedom but to avoid being thought a coward.
Performative masculinity is a major theme.
Performative masculinity is a major theme.
December 23, 2025 at 2:01 AM
What comes across acutely, and relentlessly, in James Jones’ The Thin Red Line is that men do not fight, and endure the horrors of war, for God or country or democracy or liberty or freedom but to avoid being thought a coward.
Performative masculinity is a major theme.
Performative masculinity is a major theme.
Pynchon/Anderson heroes taking out the bad guy while shackled —
December 23, 2025 at 12:25 AM
Pynchon/Anderson heroes taking out the bad guy while shackled —
Just a gentle reminder that Doc solved the case, personally took out some really dangerous dudes, AND reunited a father with his daughter.
Bob, not so much.
Bob, not so much.
December 22, 2025 at 7:59 PM
Just a gentle reminder that Doc solved the case, personally took out some really dangerous dudes, AND reunited a father with his daughter.
Bob, not so much.
Bob, not so much.
First thing on the first day of her holiday break, my 4-year-old got me out of bed to do take after take after take after take of a scene she had sketched out based on her interpretation of Elf.
Around Take 35, I was this-close to walking off the set like Keitel in Eyes Wide Shut.
Around Take 35, I was this-close to walking off the set like Keitel in Eyes Wide Shut.
December 22, 2025 at 4:02 PM
First thing on the first day of her holiday break, my 4-year-old got me out of bed to do take after take after take after take of a scene she had sketched out based on her interpretation of Elf.
Around Take 35, I was this-close to walking off the set like Keitel in Eyes Wide Shut.
Around Take 35, I was this-close to walking off the set like Keitel in Eyes Wide Shut.
“I’m not saying you have to be a Christian to be an American; I'm saying something simple and truer: Christianity is America’s dream," says the guy who demonizes groups of people at every turn for political expediency.
December 22, 2025 at 2:13 AM
“I’m not saying you have to be a Christian to be an American; I'm saying something simple and truer: Christianity is America’s dream," says the guy who demonizes groups of people at every turn for political expediency.
That not one reporter ever asked Vance directly how he could square his comments about Ohioan Haitians eating their neighbors’ cats & dogs w/ what he wrote about on the influence of philosopher Rene Girard and his conversion to Catholicism in his essay, "How I Joined the Resistance" was inexcusable.
December 22, 2025 at 12:03 AM
That not one reporter ever asked Vance directly how he could square his comments about Ohioan Haitians eating their neighbors’ cats & dogs w/ what he wrote about on the influence of philosopher Rene Girard and his conversion to Catholicism in his essay, "How I Joined the Resistance" was inexcusable.
JD Vance, like his mentor, Peter Thiel, weaponizes his knowledge and understanding of Rene Girard’s philosophy of the scapegoating mechanism and mimetic rivalry. That Thiel, himself, once studied at the feet of Girard is treachery. That Vance wraps himself in Catholicism while doing it is heinous.
December 21, 2025 at 11:43 PM
JD Vance, like his mentor, Peter Thiel, weaponizes his knowledge and understanding of Rene Girard’s philosophy of the scapegoating mechanism and mimetic rivalry. That Thiel, himself, once studied at the feet of Girard is treachery. That Vance wraps himself in Catholicism while doing it is heinous.
JD Vance is 10x more dangerous than Trump and if allowed to stay in power will wreak thousand-fold the damage.
December 21, 2025 at 9:29 PM
JD Vance is 10x more dangerous than Trump and if allowed to stay in power will wreak thousand-fold the damage.