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Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
Club Notice - 07/20/90 -- Vol. 9, No. 3
MEETINGS UPCOMING:
Unless otherwise stated, all meetings are on Wednesdays at noon.
LZ meetings are in LZ 2R-158. MT meetings are in the cafeteria.
_D_A_T_E _T_O_P_I_C
08/01 LZ: A FIRE IN THE SUN by George Alec Effinger (Hugo Nominee)
08/22 LZ: RENDEZVOUS WITH RAMA by Arthur C. Clarke
09/12 LZ: STAR MAKER by Olaf Stapledon (Formative Influences)
10/03 LZ: MICROMEGAS by Voltaire (Philosophy)
10/24 LZ: THE WORM OUROBOROS by E. R. Eddison (Classic Horror)
11/14 LZ: WAR WITH THE NEWTS by Karel Capek (Foreign SF)
_D_A_T_E _E_X_T_E_R_N_A_L _M_E_E_T_I_N_G_S/_C_O_N_V_E_N_T_I_O_N_S/_E_T_C.
08/11 NJSFS: New Jersey Science Fiction Society: Susan Shwartz
(phone 201-432-5965 for details) (Saturday)
08/18 SFABC: Science Fiction Association of Bergen County: TBA
(phone 201-933-2724 for details) (Saturday)
HO Chair: John Jetzt HO 1E-525 834-1563 hocpa!jetzt
LZ Chair: Rob Mitchell LZ 1B-306 576-6106 mtuxo!jrrt
MT Chair: Mark Leeper MT 3D-441 957-5619 mtgzx!leeper
HO Librarian: Tim Schroeder HO 3E-301 949-4488 hotld!tps
LZ Librarian: Lance Larsen LZ 3L-312 576-3346 mtunq!lfl
MT Librarian: Evelyn Leeper MT 1F-329 957-2070 mtgzy!ecl
Factotum: Evelyn Leeper MT 1F-329 957-2070 mtgzy!ecl
All material copyright by author unless otherwise noted.
1. Somehow I seem to hear news stories and pick up facts that
nobody else seems to be aware of. I don't know why that is. When
I was growing up I used to pop some strange fact I had heard at the
dinner table, like that somebody had created a musical tone that
sounded as if it was always descending but when it was done it
sounded higher than when it started. That was how it was described
on the radio. I brought that sort of thing up at the table and
nobody particularly commented on it. Years later I found out that
my father, at least, thought I had made them all up. Well, ...
maybe one in five I did make up but what can you expect--I was just
a kid and was not really worried about high standards of truth of
THE MT VOID Page 2
the sort that I have today, but still nobody believes me.
Incidentally, I eventually heard this tone played on the radio and
it didn't really sound to me as if it were descending.
Anyway, I was listening to the radio this morning, and in among the
stories of people squabbling over how to spend the "Peace
Dividend," which high Pentagon officials now estimate to be over
$3.17, was one of those stories such as I would bring up at the
dinner table. A very important person in New York (sorry, I would
have listened closer if I had known what was coming up) has said
that inmates in the state's prison system should not be allowed to
watch cable television and should have to read instead. People on
the street would be less likely to commit crimes if they knew they
would be going someplace where they would have to read. That's
what she said. I wouldn't have thought it possible. How can one
person make a statement about a controversy I didn't know existed
and at the same time make both sides sound as if they have a total
IQ of 87?
What I learn from this is that our prison system considers a
fitting punishment for violent crime that people be forced to watch
movies such as _R_a_m_b_o and _D_e_a_t_h _W_i_s_h _I_I_I and some crusader is
popping up and saying, "No, it is a worse punishment to make
hardened criminals read." I guess if I were to take sides (and I
feel like a jerk for doing it), I agree with our crusader. This
could start a whole revolution in our penal system. I think
hardened criminals should be forced to read Dickens and Shakespeare
and then be tested on what they have read. Parole hearings can
change from asking stupid questions such as "Have you rehabilitated
yourself?"--and what criminal ever says "No" to that one?--and ask
instead that the prisoner explain the symbolism of the whale in
_M_o_b_y _D_i_c_k.
I personally think that Manuel Noriega should be punished by ten
years of wearing thick glasses with paper clips in the hinges, a
pocket protector full of pens, and white socks, and carrying a
Depression-era briefcase full of books. Let's see if it will scare
lawbreakers to know that if caught they will be sentenced to long
terms of being nerds.
Mark Leeper
MT 3D-441 957-5619
...mtgzx!leeper
Understanding does not cure evil, but it is a definite
help, inasmuch as one can cope with a comprehensible
darkness.
-- Carl Gustav Jung
GHOST
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1990 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: Patrick Swayze as a yuppie sort of
ghost trying to save the life of his girlfriend (Demi
Moore) with the help of a not-so-fake medium (Whoopi
Goldberg). This is a slick film with a few nice moments,
but not a great ghost story. Rating: +1.
Things were going really well for Sam Wheat (played by Patrick
Swayze). He had a great new yuppie apartment reclaimed from a really
ugly building. He had a live-in roommate who would have looked like
Demi Moore if she would only have let her hair grow a little. She is
Molly Jensen (played by Demi Moore). He had a high-paying job as some
sort of funds executive at a major bank. His only problem was that he
had a stupid name like "Sam Wheat." Then it all sours when he is killed
by a hood on the street and has to get used to being dead. You know, it
is not all pranks and chains being a ghost. First of all, there are
very few people who can hear ghosts and who want to admit they can hear
ghosts. Then you have a really hard time interacting with matter.
Generally you go right through matter: walls, tables, doors, subway
trains ... it makes no difference. Floors seem to stop you but, hey,
who wants to invest in a film about a dead bank executive falling to the
center of the earth, right? Anyway, there is more to Wheat's killing
than meets the eye and his ghost wants to find out what it is. His
first big break is finding a kooky spiritualist medium who thinks she is
a fake until she starts hearing the voice of one real ghost. Oda Mae
Brown (played by Whoopi Goldberg) wants nothing to do with Sam and her
newly found powers.
Bruce Joel Rubin's script in the hands of Jerry Zucker (who co-
wrote _K_e_n_t_u_c_k_y _F_r_i_e_d _M_o_v_i_e and co-directed _A_i_r_p_l_a_n_e! and _T_h_e _N_a_k_e_d _G_u_n)
has some nice shifts in mood. These shifts from somber to funny have
been criticized by some critics, but given the subject matter are not
unbelievable until the last five minutes or so. The ending is
saccharine, not unexpectedly, but up to that point the film's tone
follows Wheat's emotions at being dead and, let's face it, finding
yourself dead is one of life's more difficult moments. Zucker did not
have many somber moments in his previous films but he handles them well.
There is also a nice erotic scene with clay sculpture. There is another
love scene that might have broken new ground for a major release film
had Zucker not copped out (much to the indignation of the audience).
There is also a rather unexpected and nice scene involving a grungy
subway rider.
_G_h_o_s_t is not really very good as a ghost story. There is maybe one
decent chilling scene in the film. Next to _L_a_d_y _i_n _W_h_i_t_e or _T_h_e
_U_n_i_n_v_i_t_e_d it pales considerably. But it is reasonable as a slick
Hollywood production with (of course) effects by Industrial Light and
Magic. I rate it a +1 on the -4 to +4 scale.
NO ENEMY BUT TIME by Michael Bishop
Timescape, 1983 (c1982), ISBN 0-671-83576-9, $3.50.
A book review by Evelyn C. Leeper
Copyright 1990 Evelyn C. Leeper
John Monegal has dreams of roaming prehistoric Africa, so a
scientific research group decides to send him back in time (somehow
using his dreams) to determine which of two theories of the origins of
humanity is accurate. And right away, I have a problem with this. If
they are dreams, why do they have any validity as far as science goes?
To the best of my knowledge, "racial memory" is not considered
supporting evidence for scientific theories. Even if they are
precognitive dreams of Monegal's future when he travels to the past,
they aren't more valid as dreams, so why does Bishop spend so much time
presenting them as memories rather than precognition?
So Monegal finds himself in the past, but how can he prove it's the
past rather than a dream? Well, Bishop pulls a bit of a deus ex machina
out of the hat for this, just the sort of thing that the planners
couldn't have predicted. Because of this, I found the whole concept of
the scientific effort unconvincing. And because the reader spends so
much time trying to figure out if they are seeing something real, or
just Monegal's dream of what he thinks prehistory is like, I would have
to say this book seems to have inspired the "holodeck syndrome" of _S_t_a_r
_T_r_e_k: _T_h_e _N_e_x_t _G_e_n_e_r_a_t_i_o_n.
Maybe I'm being too picky as far as the science goes. It's true
that the childhood of Monegal is interesting, and even the period spent
in the past has some interest value, but still I have to say that as an
overall history of the character it is not enthralling.
[This book has recently been re-issued in the Bantam Spectra Special
Edition series.]