Mike O'Connell

There are two greatly-hyped movies on Amazon Prime right now celebrating Black culture in the 1950s and ’60s. One I have mentioned before. That would be Sylvie’s Love, and it is one of the best films I’ve seen, big screen or not, in the past several years.

One Night in Miami? A movie I’ve looked forward to seeing for however many months it’s been since I first heard its premise? One of the worst.

That’s it. Just the worst. A movie about four of my favorite people (Muhammad Ali, Sam Cooke, Jim Brown, and Malcolm X) and it’s terrible? Wow, that almost takes effort. And the less said about it the better. My only question watching was, Is this film more offensive to Black people or to white people? Cliched and stereotypical in the most insulting ways, the “movie” is about as clever as a fart. You’re better off reading the Wikipedia articles about those four men and saving two hours of your life.

Actually, just watch Sylvie’s Love again and pretend some of it’s about boxing.

You’ll thank me later.

I’m in the middle of two new documentaries airing on “TV” right now. Tiger, of course, from HBO, the two-part story of Eldrick Tont “Tiger” Woods, as though no one has heard anything about the man who’s been world famous since he was two years old and has been one of the most well-known people on the planet for the past quarter century. Yeah, it’s more Dateline NBC than golf tournament but hey, what was I expecting? There’s enough golf to keep the purists entertained. So far.

I’m also halfway through a seven-part series on Netflix called Pretend It’s a City. Two of my favorite people collaborate on that one: Martin Scorsese and the incomparable Fran Lebowitz. If I could trade lives with anyone in the world, Fran Lebowitz is definitely in the top five.

But for a few years in the middle there I probably would have traded places with Tiger Woods too. Just not, you know, for a few things. If you’re not sure why just watch the documentary. It’ll probably come up.

Wednesday evening was the first time this season I’d seen my local college basketball team, the Patriots of George Mason, play a home game on TV. Playing down the road from me in Fairfax, Virginia, the Patriots dropped their in-state battle with VCU, but I delighted in seeing the game on the small screen with my boy. I thoroughly enjoyed listening to color commentary from my favorite living author, John Feinstein, though the highlight for my son and me was examining the crowd shots for our cardboard selves at EagleBank Arena (nee Patriot Center).

Some day we take the cutouts home.

And sit there ourselves!

Yes, Virginia, the Washington Football Team is headed to the playoffs.

The new year is looking better already.

I was nervous about watching Amazon’s heavily-touted new film, Sylvie’s Love. Looked kinda like people trying to win Oscars and a musical version of The Help. I figured it would be patronizing and shallow and full of cliches.

Yup, it is. And somehow it’s still fantastic.

Forget Soul, forget Wonder Woman 1984, Sylvie’s Love is the movie you want to watch this holiday season.

Usually billed as a Black Mad Men, it’s actually more of a Black Diner, a subject that’s about 40 years overdue. Add to this premise an awesome soundtrack of jazz and “good” R&B, like if you shifted the songs from American Graffiti back 5-10 years but kept the quality constant.

There really are only three aspects to any movie: the picture, the sound, and the story. Sylvie’s Love, like Mad Men I suppose, is just visually appealing, there’s no other way to say it, and the sound is pure artistry, whether taken from old 45s or music composed new for the film. The story is a bit cliched, yes, but not, as I’d feared, in a patronizing Black way. That the main characters are Black actually has little to do with with the plot, and damn that’s refreshing. The story is boy-meets-girl. So are 99% of all movies.

Do yourself a favor and watch Sylvie’s Love. I probably will again before Winter Break is out. In the mean time I’ll be dusting off some old LPs and suiting up for old times’ sake.