hanging out with Nia DaCosta, writer/director of the wildly entertaining, deeply moving Hedda, after last night's LACMA screening at the DGA...the film does an amazing job in externalizing Hedda's rage, complexity, and messiness, especially with the use of breath sounds in its magnificent score, as I also hope to do in adapting my debut memoir Killing Justice for the screen... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3lgD59KrTw

hanging out with Shai Carmeli-Pollak, writer/director of the powerful, deeply moving The Sea, after this morning's screening at Soho House...The Sea isn't just another drama-it's a film that stays with you long after the credits roll. What makes it special is its courage to tell a deeply human story set against one of the most complex backdrops in the world. The film flows like the sea itself-sometimes calm, sometimes stormy-but always pulling you in. The performances are raw

Guillermo Del Toro at a Q&A following a screening of his truly transcendent masterpiece, which immerses us in a gothic universe where beauty, horror, and fantasy coexist on a single plane, as the theme of finding humanity in that which many find monstrous is one that del Toro seems drawn to, so watching him tackle Frankenstein is quite thrilling, and he does it masterfully, even going for an emotional and spiritual catharsis, and miraculously pulling it off, while the father/

hanging out with jt mollner , screenwriter for The Long Walk, which he adapted from a Stephen King novel he wrote when he was just 19 years old, and which goes beyond being a good adaptation : it's an emotional journey that blends physical horror with poetic sensitivity , with its central theme of generational trauma parallelling that central theme in my debut memoir killing justice

hanging out with Tarik Saleh, after Tuesday's 11 am screening of his darkly comic thriller about the role of the artist in authoritarian times, (which is also a theme of my debut memoir Killing Justice), Eagles of The Republic, Sweden's Oscar submission for best international feature, at Soho House West Hollywood

D A T E S From To Naively Needy Humbly Hopeful Ecstatically Enmeshed Entwined Ecstatically Escaping Emptiness Acknowledging Abandonments Listening Lovingly Deliverer of the Damaged Tenderly Truthful

hanging out with my fellow Canadian AliReza Khatami , writer/director of the raw, provocative, visionary, Lynchian truly transcendent masterpiece The Things You Kill, which opens THIS WEDNESDAY, 11/19, in LA...GO SEE IT!!!...as it's a darkly comic, haunting psychological thriller involving generational trauma, as is my debut memoir & upcoming film Killing Justice/Orphan Rising... here's a link to the official trailer ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A71FXSFggs0 Alireza

hanging out with my fellow Canadian Steven Grayhm, writer/director of the powerful, deeply moving Sheepdog, a powerful portrayal of military PTSD, just as Killing Justice/Orphan Rising features a powerful portrayal of non-military PTSD, after last night's screening & Q&A at AMC The Grove

hanging out w/my film composer friend Esin Aydingoz at The Night Temple house concert , as she got my debut memoir Killing Justice, to see what inspiration she might find 4 a possible film score 4 the Killing Justice/Orphan Rising film project

hanging out with lawrenceshou , who co-stars with lucyliu in the powerful , deeply moving new film Rosemead , which, like Killing Justice, grapples with themes of mental health, the effects of stress on our health, and immigration, after last night's filmindependent screening at The London West Hollywood

Q&A with producer/star Jennifer Lawrence & producer Justine Ciarrocchi of the strange, haunting, real & confrontational Die My Love after last night's Film Independent screening at The London West Hollywood)/Lynne Ramsay does an amazing job of externalizing the source material, which is almost entirely internal, just as we hope to in adapting my debut memoir Killing Justice for the screen

Date is next week's (11/18/25) topic for AIM4TheHeArt Heart Sessions urban poetry workshop. Hope u can join us ! Every Tuesday Night, 7-9 pm at Homeland Cultural Center/Manazar Gamboa Community Theater, 1323 Gundry Avenue, Long Beach. CA 90813.

R H Y T H M FROM TO Religiously Rigid Spiritually Supple & Artistically Agile Obedient Orphan Cra zily Colo rful Brutalized by Bullies Rebelliously Rising Obscured Oddness Emphasizing Ecc entr icity Terrorized by Tyrants...

Love this powerful, deeply moving film, now playing at the Lumiere Musical Hall Cinema, about a clash between indigenous ideals and AI, with a subplot about a mother/daughter relationship with some parallels to the mother/son relationship at the heart of my debut memoir Killing Justice...

hanging out with Tom Pelphrey who shines opposite Mark Ruffalo in the powerful, deeply moving show Task, & does an amazing job of humanizing Robbie, who commits some pretty brutal acts in the opening episode, but who then begins to slowly reveal his soul so that we come to care about his pain as deeply as that of Mark Ruffalo's character Tom, (just as I had to try to better understand my adoptive mom's wound in order to better understand my own in my debut memoir Killing Just

poster for Hamnet, Chloe Zhao's truly transcendent masterpiece, which reveals that Shakespeare, like Kafka, also had an abusive father, much like my adoptive mom, but which also shines a spotlight on the healing power of art, as does my debut memoir Killing Justice

hanging out with Bishara Haroni, the amazing Palestinian pianist featured, along with his musical partner the amazing Israeli pianist, Yaron Kohlberg, (who couldn't make it to the event as his wife is having a baby), in the award-winning, inspiring short film Amal/Hope, after yesterday's screening & performance by Bishara at the Steinway Piano Gallery in Pasadena..."make music not war"... https://mubi.com/en/films/amal-hope/trailer

hanging out with renowned director Agnieszka Holland after a screening of her latest surreal masterpiece Franz, which features a father/son relationship which mirrors the mother/son relationship at the heart of my debut memoir Killing Justice, at Soho House yesterday

hanging out with my new friend Stephen Nesmeth & my other new friend Idan Weiss, who does an extraordinary job playing Kafka in Agnieszka Holland's new surreal masterpiece Franz, which features a father/son relationship which mirrors the mother/son relationship at the heart of my debut memoir Killing Justice, at Soho House yesterda

hanging out with Sepideh Farsi, director of the urgent, heart-wrenching, and deeply personal Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk, after last night's screening at the Laemmle Monica