Great!

A couple weeks ago I met Francis for drinks at The Golden West in Hampden--he's taking his Yale PhD away from TU and is off to teach French at Mt. Holyoke in MASS. During our wide-ranging discussion of politics, history, academia, and film, he mentioned Millennium Actress and praised it lavishly.

I can see why. This is perhaps the best animated film I've ever seen (no, not the best animated film I've seen, but the best animated film). A magical journey through a thousand years of Japanese history and the history of Japanese cinema, a film about regret and guilt and memory and art. Lovely.

Francis turned me on to many cool things the last two years; the advanced French lit classes I took with him were most excellent. There are simply not enough students in the program at TU to keep three full-time faculty going. He'll be missed.