I have never been a fan of violence in film. I try to avoid war films for that reason – there are many that I haven’t seen that you might expect I would have. But some time ago (I actually remember when), I realized that I only disliked watching realistic violence. Give me surrealistic or over-the-top violence and I was fine with it. I realized that watching a Sam Peckinpah film “Straw Dogs”, with Dustin Hoffman, which came out back in 1971, and which I probably watched that long ago. Protecting his sanctuary house from invaders, as I recall, Hoffman was a one man army who destroyed anyone who dared to advance towards his property. Clearly surrealistic. Clearly over the top. I thought it was fun.

Saturday night, after attending a cousin’s Zoom birthday party, we decided to watch a film. We had cut out a newspaper article a few days before which (like so many we cut out and then ignore) listed the 5 little known films on Netflix that must be streamed. We decided to go with no. 1, titled “I Don’t Feel at Home in This World Anymore” from 2017. The description was a bit intriguing.

It started off as a film about a young woman whose house was robbed, the article said, and when she found out that the police would do nothing, she decided to track down the thieves herself. Then, the reviewer noted, this simple film turned into a complex thriller. That sounded OK, so we searched it and turned it on.

Our hero, or anti-hero, was a young nursing assistant who lived by herself in a rented house. She came home one evening to find her house ransacked and her laptop and her grandmother’s silver missing. The police came, took notes, and said “we’ll call you if anything shows up.” Realizing that reliance on the police was useless, she scoured the neighborhood, found an odd loner who was willing to help her (“help” being a relative term), took a plaster cast of a shoe print she found in her back yard, and wondered what to do next.

She had a tracking device on her phone to tell her where her laptop was, but only when the laptop was turned on. And within a day or so it was. So she and her new accomplice friend tracked the laptop to a house filled with stoners – after the first hint of violence, she learned they were not the burglars, but had bought the laptop at a massively large junk store. They went to the store, found the silver chest and took it, but not without a little more violence.

While at the store, she recognized the shoe of someone pawning some jewelry as her thief. This started a series of chases and unlikely adventures that ended with five dead people, and her good friend seriously wounded (i.e., seriously enough wounded that he could have only survived in the film). And the event leading to their death was worthy of the late Peckinpah.

It’s not a great film by any means. And the “thriller” film, turned out to be a “slasher” film. But – as I said – it was so over the top that it was fun.

And I also have to thank the film for introducing me to my new favorite song. Here is one rendition:

I did have some more to say today, but I will make it brief. We went to two Asian restaurants last week. One gets and A, and one gets a C.

The A restaurant, in Adams Morgan, is Izumi, on Columbia Road, a new Japanese restaurant. I had stepped in for a quick sushi lunch about two weeks ago. I think it had just opened then. And we went back for dinner – I had a salmon poke bowl (I know, Hawaiian), and Edie had a delicious (her word) avocado, shredded cabbage and sesame sauce dish and a raw flounder dish that had a strange name. We have decided it is our official Japanese restaurant in Adams Morgan and think everyone should try it. As of this morning, on Google, it has 16 reviews. Its average review: 5.0.

The other restaurant is Malaysian and is in Columbia Heights on 11th Street NW. It’s called Makan and has been there for a while and received good reviews. We went for brunch (having seen it was good for brunch), but the menu looked like it was the same menu they use for lunch and for dinner. We had kare dalca and nasi ganja.

Makan is on a three block part of 11th street that is filled with restaurants. Most, on a beautiful weekend day, were doing a thriving business. There were only two other tables filled at Makan when we arrived, and it was empty when we left. The food was all right, not exceptional, but the atmosphere was pretty depressing. Not only because of the sparse crowd, but because their large staff was so sullen. I looked carefully. During the hour we were there, I saw no one smile or laugh. At all. I’d stay away from Makan, even if you are attempted to try an unusual (for here) cuisine.

Now, time to start my day