GET BACK IN LINE!

I haven't been feeling very well this week. I have a terrible cough (which I suspect is due to allergies) and creeping feelings of terror, related both to the upcoming months of no income and the final papers I procrastinate on.

I thought about recommending "better shuffle algorithms for CD players," because my 3rd-hand 300 disc changer seems to favor the crappiest stuff in there, and it annoys me.

But I'm not even sure if they actually work on an algorithm.

I was going to recommend a short Russian film I really liked, but I can't find it on the Internet anymore, so that's out for today.

Therefore, instead, today I am going to recommend...

Holiday from Rules.

I am recommending a film called Holiday from Rules, from 1959, not an actual holiday from rules. Sorry, anarchists!



Ken Smith, in his brilliant 1999 book Mental Hygiene (which you can buy here; i should really formally Recommend this to you someday), says this about it:

"An omniscient narrator with magical powers grants the wishes of four bratty kids by teleporting them to a tropical island where there are no rules. [...] As in Lord of the Flies -- which this film suspiciously resembles -- the little children quickly become dirty, hungry, and physically battered, and their anarchist Eden falls apart. Holiday from Rules conflates happiness and conformity (as do many films from the 1950s), but after the kids have been slapped around a little, they're more than willing to see things the narrator's way.

(pp. 158-159)

Well, sort of. In this short film, things fall apart and centers do not hold. On one hand, it's a critique of anarchist theory. On the other, it is a very effective form of birth control; seeing these whiny kids will make you want to abandon any children you do have* and spit in a corner, vowing to never have any more.

But - seriously. NO RULES? Then why don't they just fly off the island? Unbreak the kid's arm? Isn't saying there are no rules a rule in and of itself? I just don't get it.

But it's okay. Watch the film and have fun and remember, rules exist to keep us safe.

*FACETIOUS STATEMENT. WE EMPHATICALLY DISRECOMMEND AND HEARTILY UNENDORSE CHILD NEGLECT! THAT WAS HUMOR! I MEAN THE PART WHERE I SAID THIS FILM MAKES YOU WANT TO ABANDON CHILDREN, NOT THE PART WHERE I SAID WE UNENDORSE CHILD NEGLECT. ALTHOUGH I COULD SEE HOW YOU WOULD MIX THEM UP.