The Nose on Jane Campion’s ‘The Power of the Dog’ and intermissions at movies

This week, The Nose might mind if you come to the table without a washup.

The 1970s are back. Again. For the nth time. But maybe it’s different this time? That said, the ’70s weren’t all that bad.

And, the age-old question: Should movies have intermissions?

And finally: The Power of the Dog is a Western written and directed by Jane Campion and based on the 1967 novel. It’s Campion’s first movie in 12 years, and it won the Silver Lion for Best Direction at the Venice Film Festival. The movie is an early Oscar favorite, with special notice going to performances by Kodi Smit-McPhee and Benedict Cumberbatch. The Power of the Dog is available to stream worldwide on Netflix.

Some other stuff that happened this week, give or take:

• Michael Nesmith, Monkees Singer-Songwriter, Dead at 78 “With Infinite Love we announce that Michael Nesmith has passed away this morning in his home, surrounded by family, peacefully and of natural causes,” his family said in a statement
• Greg Tate, Groundbreaking Cultural Critic and Black Rock Coalition Co-Founder, Has Died Tate was a challenging and authoritative voice on everything from hip-hop to hardcore, and also made his own significant musical impact with projects like Burnt Sugar
• Robbie Shakespeare, ‘Wickedest Bass’ in Reggae, Dead at 68 Alongside his Riddim Twins counterpart Sly Dunbar, the bassist played with everyone from Black Uhuru to Bob Dylan across more than four decades
• Making of ‘Dune’: How Denis Villeneuve’s Sci-Fi Epic Is the Culmination of a Childhood Dream The filmmaker mined his boyhood obsession with Frank Herbert’s classic novel to create the big-screen adaptation he always wanted to see: “I said to myself, ‘I would love if I could make a movie for the teenager I was back then.’”
• Inside Wheel of Time, Amazon’s Huge Gamble on the Next Game of Thrones As legend has it, a few years back, Jeff Bezos demanded that his team at Amazon Studios create a fantasy epic that would put Game of Thrones to shame. Turns out, that kind of thing is even harder to do than it sounds. And more expensive than you can imagine. Inside the epic quest to bring Wheel of Time to life—and maybe change the face of global television forever.
• On “Succession,” Jeremy Strong Doesn’t Get the Joke “I take him as seriously as I take my own life,” he says of his character, Kendall Roy.
• 2021 Is the Year of Adam Driver
• It’s a Great Time To Start a Show That Aired 10 Years Ago The key to happiness is embracing something at the absolute nadir of its cultural relevance
• We Still Love 30 Rock, but Its Foundation Is Shaky The author of a new book about Tina Fey’s magnum opus on celebrating 30 Rock’s triumphs without skirting over the troubling way it handled race.
• Longreads Best of 2021 Our year-end collection includes staff and community picks for the best essays, features, profiles, and investigations published in 2021.
• The 20 Best TV Shows of 2021 From dark social satires to quirky comedies, twisty superhero tales, uplifting sci-fi, and more, this year’s small-screen gems were bold, surprising, and 100 percent satisfying
• The Best Books of 2021 The 10 I most enjoyed this year.
• The Best Movies of 2021 It was a year of octogenarian high jinks, long yet revealing documentaries, and masters reasserting themselves
• The best movie trailers of 2021 Our list of the year’s best movie advertising campaigns includes Licorice Pizza, Last Night In Soho, and Titane
• Debt collectors can now text, email and DM you on social media
• Why Biopics Are Bad For Acting
• Why the Year’s Most Popular Song Never Went to No. 1 Dua Lipa’s “Levitating” is Billboard’s top song of 2021, even though it never topped the Hot 100.
• Stephen Sondheim Didn’t Just Change Musicals. He Changed Crosswords. The musical genius also helped introduce the U.S. to a tricky new kind of puzzle.
• A Charlie Brown Christmas’ soundtrack captures the holiday spirit by not defining it The classic special is one of the last perennial strongholds for two very American art forms: the comic strip and jazz
• An Exhaustive List of Directors Who Swear They Won’t Make a Superhero Movie There’s no more reliable way to elicit clicks and outrage in Hollywood.
• The Joy Of Hating Stuff For No Good Reason It’s okay, you don’t always need one
• The Rebrand Trend of 2021? Acting Your Age This year, heritage brands looked to their pasts to create visual identities for the multi-platform era
• Bros., Lecce: We Eat at The Worst Michelin Starred Restaurant, Ever
• Saudi camel beauty pageant cracks down on cosmetic enhancements
• Oscar’s Penis Problem: Why Does the Academy Ignore Actors Doing Full Frontal?

GUESTS:

• James Hanley - Co-founder of Cinestudio at Trinity College
• Tracy Wu Fastenberg - Development officer at Connecticut Children’s

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Colin McEnroe, Cat Pastor, and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show.

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