Welcome to this week’s edition of Seen and Heard, in which I catalog the most interesting things I’ve seen, heard and read over the previous seven days:

Movie: One Battle After Another – When this year’s Academy Award nominations were announced, Sinners, which I reviewed last week, broke a record for the most nominations by a single movie, but One Battle After Another was right behind it. I watched One Battle this week and thought it was terrific. It was funny, tense, and well-acted. The movie begins 15 years ago with a 1970s-style revolutionary group freeing immigrants from detention centers, blowing up powerlines, and robbing banks. But the group was compromised with some being killed by the authorities, others imprisoned, and a handful more evading capture. Fast forward to the present, and a fanatical paramilitary commander who pursued the group back then resumes his search. He mobilizes the government border protection force he commands to plunge into the interior of the country ostensibly to round up immigrants for deportation but that’s just a cover for carrying out the wishes of a wealthy and powerful group of white supremacists who have recruited the border control commander. Given current events, it felt like the screenplay was written last weekend but the movie was produced long before our current predicament. The movie features Leonardo Decaprio, Sean Penn, Benicio del Toro, Regina Hall, Teyana Taylor and Chase Infiniti (in her movie debut). I hope to see more of the Best Picture nominees before the awards are announced in mid-March, but for now, I feel this film is the front runner in that category.

Television: Grammy Awards on CBS – As I navigate today’s attention economy, I too often omit music from the consumption menu. I sought a cram course in the latest musical stars and hits by watching the Grammy Awards this week. I was not disappointed. Since there is always a Lowell connection, I’ll point out that the show’s host, Trevor Noah, did a live show at Lowell’s Tsongas Arena in October 2018. After six years, this was his final Grammy gig since the show will move from CBS to ABC/Hulu/Disney next year. As for the musicians, some I really liked, some were good, and others were OK, but mostly what I saw left me wanting more so in that way, the show was a success. I was especially happy to see a lot of Bad Bunny, the singer from Puerto Rico who will star in Sunday’s Super Bowl halftime show. I was not familiar with his music and still am not since his Super Bowl contract prohibited him from performing at the Grammys, but everything I saw of him increased my interest. He also made history by winning the Album of the Year award which was the first album entirely in Spanish to win that prize. 

Email Newsletter: MASSterList – MASSterList is a free daily email newsletter covering Massachusetts politics and state house news. It’s edited by Gintautas Dumcius, who has covered politics on Beacon Hill for more than 20 years. The headline in yesterday’s edition, “Epstein files ripple through Mass politics,” certainly caught my attention. The primary actor was Patriots owner Bob Kraft, but the exchanges in the files released last week were about Kraft, not with him. In the aftermath of Kraft’s 2019 Florida charges of paying for sex acts. Jeffrey Epstein emailed his former attorney, Jack Goldberger, to say he – Epstein – was urging Kraft to hire Goldberger to defend him in the case. Kraft ultimately did that and Goldberger got the charges against Kraft dismissed. Also of note in the same newsletter in the “events today” section was this: “Gov. Maura Healey hosts a delegation from Denmark to sign a new agreement to strengthen scientific, technological and commercial ties between Massachusetts and Denmark. Healey is joined by Denmark ambassador Jesper Møller Sørensen.” In the face of President Trump’s threats to invade and seize Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark, it’s good to see that our governor is doing her part to reinforce good relations between the Commonwealth and one of our oldest and most reliable allies. You can subscribe to the daily MASSterList email here. 

Newspaper Article: “For years, he never did interviews. Now Ernie Adams is telling stories from the first Patriots-Seahawks Super Bowl” by Ben Volin, Boston Globe – I’ve long been fascinated by Ernie Adams who served as “Football Research Director” for the New England Patriots from 2000 to 2021. Adams was a secretive figure, rarely seen or heard from in public, but he’s been more forthcoming since his retirement. He’s made several lengthy appearances on Julian Edelman’s podcast, “Games with Names” which I watch on YouTube. In one of them, Adams explained that he first met Bill Belichick in 1970 when both played offensive line for the Phillips Andover football team. Neither was a great player, but both were obsessed with the history and strategy of football which sparked a lifelong friendship. In this Globe article, Adams breaks down the famous “Malcolm Butler interception” that allowed the Patriots to win their fourth Super Bowl eleven years ago. Adams said Seattle’s decision to throw a pass on that play was dictated by the personnel the Patriots had placed on the field. Seattle had three wide receivers split out from the line, while the Patriots had their biggest players massed on the line. That gave the Patriots an extra linemen who would have tackled a Seattle runner in the backfield if a running play had been called. Seattle knew that and was obliged to risk a pass. Seattle also had a certain pass play they ran repeatedly in goal line situations and so the Patriots had thoroughly prepared to defend that play. Sure enough, Seattle called the exact same pass play and Butler made the interception. That wasn’t preordained – Butler might have dropped the ball or fallen down or failed to cover his man properly, but he didn’t and the Patriots hung on to win the game. The insight offered by Adams is a lesson in the importance of preparation, whether it’s in football or any other part of life. 

Newspaper Article: “In Hostile Times, Cherishing Traditions” by Michaela Towfighi in New York Times – Over the weekend, I noticed a large photo of traditional Cambodian dancers illustrating a story in the New York Times. Assuming it was about Lowell, I clicked on the story and was surprised to see it was from Portland, Maine. It features a woman who learned traditional dance in Cambodia who now seeks to preserve and pass along that skill to a generation of younger Cambodian-Americans “who can find TikTok more compelling than traditional art forms.” In the past year, however, that challenge has been surpassed by obstacles imposed by the federal government, namely, cuts to National Endowment for the Arts grants that helped fund the organization, and the recent surge of ICE agents into Maine targeting the state’s immigrant population. Weekly dance classes, for example, have moved to a more remote location that might provide a better degree of safety to the dance students and their families. While the article tries to be an upbeat story of persevering in the face of adversity, it still shows the extent of the fear and disruption to diverse communities caused by these policies and in doing so, gives more insight into the situation here in Lowell.