The paradox of plenty.

Sometimes it's hard living in a culturally rich and diverse city.  Here are the film-related events that are competing for my finite time and money over the next week or so:

The W.C. Fields retrospective at Film Forum.  The late films of Indian master Satyajit Ray at Lincoln Center.  The retrospective of Japanese director Kaneto Shindo at BAM Rose Cinemas, including his never-before-seen-in-the-U.S. classic Children of Hiroshima.  The retrospective of pioneering Soviet master Dziga Vertov at Anthology Film Archives.  And of course the Tribeca Film Festival, with dozens of every kind of movie, including the latest blockbuster starring the great Hong Kong star Chow Yun-fat.  This is to say nothing of the new movies in general release that I actually want to get around to seeing, including Insidious, Hanna, Incendies, Meek's Cutoff, Blank City, Certified Copy, and I can't even remember what else.  Plus there's all those other things that aren't movies.  Yes, I do some of those things.  And only one of them is work.

So if you haven't seen anything in this space lately, that's my excuse: my brain is melting and I'm sinking into a slough of despair over all the things I have to abandon seeing in order to see any of the other things.  Expressions of heartfelt sympathy are hereby solicited.

(image courtesy of TVRecappersAnonymous)