Hi, hello, how are you? If you’re reading this, we both survived a cold, dark winter — may this missive kindle the smallest flame in your inbox. Re-introductions are in order, not least of all because this newsletter has a new title. My name is Adam Wood, and at some point — for reasons all your own — you signed up to get occasional dispatches from me, concerning whatever has been occupying my time and attention. Shoelaces, chess drama, Joan Didion, bibimbap... we’ve run a gamut together. This newsletter used to be called Tendrils — a name I gave it without much consideration, and which I never really loved. It also used to be weekly, which now seems quite insane to me, but I thank you for your continued readership.
Whilst I was a little more unplugged over the winter, I did some thinking about what the shape of a future newsletter might be. The decision I came to was to bite Robin Sloan’s style wholesale. In case you’re not familiar, Robin is an olive oil producer, code tinkerer, annual winter chivalric romance live-streamer, and the author of a couple of great novels — my favourite being the really pretty wonderful Sourdough(2017), which I recommend to anyone who enjoys reading words (including you). He also has two (2) newsletters, the main one of which he publishes once per full moon. That always struck me as an eminently sensible timescale for a newsletter, and so I’ve stolen it.
The newly re-titled Syzygy Business will arrive in your email client every ~29 days, when the moon is at its brightest.
Since I last wrote to you, I’ve been busy. The long-planned trip to Japan was everything that I hoped it would be and more. It was a truly special experience, but demanding in terms of energy and focus. As soon as we were back in the UK, my special lady friend and I found ourselves travelling cross-country to a milestone family birthday, then I started a new job with a new employer, then we completed the purchase of our first home, we moved into that home, and then we celebrated Christmas (surrounded by boxes and bubble wrap)! Things have calmed down a bit over the first few weeks of 2024. I’m feeling a little more settled, starting to build a routine, and I’m excited to get back to writing these dispatches to tell you about it all.
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I started my year in film by making my way through all of Kelly Reichardt’s output to date. Partly this was inspired by the fact that her latest film, Showing Up (2022), is finally widely accessible in the UK. And but also, I was missing a few things from earlier in her career and it felt like a good excuse to catch up. If you’ll indulge me, some notes on each piece:
River of Grass (1994)
I watched a version of this on YouTube, which had obviously been digitised from a VHS recording, taped off German TV. Even so, barring some performances by obvious non / beginning actors, this is totally watchable. There are lines of dialogue and even images that felt very inspired by the hype around early Tarantino, and it’s particularly interesting in this context that Reichardt’s work only takes a trajectory of becoming more tender and less postured from here.
Ode (1999), Then a Year (2002) & Travis (2004)
These experimental shorts (made when Reichardt was struggling to find any funding for longer work) are certainly appealing as curiosities, though the first two — which are only a hop and a skip away from sound collage — are quite slight. Travisis interesting in that Reichardt finds a way to use collage and repetition to unfold the piece in an interesting way, gradually cluing the viewer in to additional pieces of information that re-characterise the rest of the short.
Old Joy (2006)
I freaking loved this, and it’s quite a striking evolution of the director’s sensibility from one feature film to the next, but over more than a decade. It’s the first film to showcase some of Reichardt’s signature patience as a filmmaker, and it also wears its heart on the outside, as much of her work has since. These are the first truly strong performances Reichardt commits to film, and it’s interesting to consider this nuanced portrait of male friendship in parallel with her later First Cow.
River of Grass I would recommend only to the really curious, and the shorts probably only to completionists. For anyone casually interested, however, I think you could do well to start with Old Joy, or...
Wendy and Lucy (2008)
Reichardt’s first collaboration with Michelle Williams is also a movie about persistence and mundane struggle. Like the majority of Reichardt’s cinema, it’s simple and meditative, unafraid for its plot to move slowly outwards in circles instead of straight lines. Williams is superb, and the cinematography evolves Reichardt’s eye for showcasing Oregon from various vantages and points of view.
If your heart remains intact through the end of the movie, you’re less of a sap than the author of this newsletter.
Meek’s Cutoff (2010)
Can I level with you? I enjoyed this well enough on first watch, but it didn’t immediately live up to its reputation. I’m all for the contemplativeness of Reichardt’s filmmaking, and her camera enjoys the fresh scenery in her first period piece, but — not knowing quite what to expect — I found the narrative through-line a little too slight. In particular, by the time the third act arrived, I had hopes for more resolution than the film ultimately affords. Perhaps that shouldn’t have been a surprise, and there’s a very good chance that I’ll find this more fulfilling when I return to it in the future.
Night Moves (2013)
In some respects this story of sabotage as eco-conscious protest is the most conventional of Reichardt’s work. It benefits from three strong central performances, and is engaging throughout, though never spectacular. I felt that the front half of the film did a superb job of building character, stakes, and suspense, but the latter half felt a little formulaic in paying those things off. Again, it's likely worth revisiting at some point.
Certain Women (2016)
This was the film that made me a fan of Reichardt's work when I first saw it. Comprising three narratives, lightly intertwined, it's an admirably subtle portrait of everyday, quiet persistence. Whilst not quite an ensemble – because of how infrequently they are on screen together – the film showcases a superb cast: Laura Dern, as a harried lawyer forced to endure her clients; Michelle Williams, suffering the slights and iniquities of men who treat her male partner as the only one with agency; and Kristen Stewart, working a taxing second job to make ends meet. But it's Lily Gladstone who breaks my heart every time I watch Certain Women. Her performance is so quiet and full of palpable yearning that it's simultaneously impossible to look away from and hard to watch.
First Cow (2019)
Reichardt's second period piece, and the second of her investigations into relationships between men, is a bona fide masterpiece of quiet filmmaking. Every detail of its pioneer setting feels beautifully considered and solid, but it's the delicate, compassionate friendship between the two leads that gives First Cow its magical warmth. Like several of her more recent films it is suffused with a charming sense of humour, and an appreciation for human perseverance and ingenuity. Few films in recent memory have this lightness of touch, the mark of a filmmaker entirely confident in the inherent beauty of what she's composing.
Owl (2019)
Little more than a single long shot from the making of First Cow, but owls are incredible! 🦉
Bronx, New York, November 2019 (2021) & Cal State, Long Beach CA, January 2020 (2021)
A pair of short, slice-of-life documentaries made for Centre Pompidou. Both of these are fascinating glimpses into artistic practices, and both pay off anew when you watch...
Showing Up (2022)
I'd waited a long while for this to finally get a UK release, and it did not disappoint. The funniest of Reichardt's work, and also perhaps the finest leading performance of Michelle Williams' career to date. Many of the themes familiar from the director's earlier work are here, though perhaps also a deeper insight into the degrees to which we sometimes stand in our own way. There is a poetry and symbolism in Showing Up which, handled less carefully, might have felt mawkish. Instead, this story of an artist's struggles with her work, her family, her friends, and her self, is a triumph and perhaps Reichardt's best yet.
Honestly, as I sit and write this, Certain Women, First Cow, & Showing Up might just be my current favourite string of three movies by a working director.
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I'd also like to recommend Caitlin Quinlan’s excellent piece for Little White Lies, 'Kelly Reichardt's Animal Kingdom'. The only caveat being that it contains what I consider to be substantial spoilers for many of the films. Maybe one to bookmark and return to once you've watched any and all of the above that you intend to. For now, a couple of quotes will suffice:
A Kelly Reichardt human protagonist usually finds oneself in a precarious situation, caught in the middle of an arduous journey like the frontier pioneers in Meek’s Cutoff and the young and jobless Wendy on her way to Alaska in Wendy and Lucy. They are often at odds with the world, being the female other or the marginalised other – they are outcasts, renegades and nonconformists. “My films are about people who don’t have a safety net,” notes Reichardt.
And also,
Reichardt tries to limit the element of artifice. She does not run lines but rather asks her actors to learn to live, to be, like their characters. For Meek’s Cutoff, the actors learned how to pitch a tent and make fire without matches. For Certain Women, Lily Gladstone learnt how to tend horses and do the ranch chores. For First Cow, the actors went camping for three days and learned how to skin a squirrel. Filming chores, routines, and ‘non-eventful’ episodes, the filmmaker ultimately trades the artificiality of the carefully constructed genres for the interstices, in-betweens, and thresholds where something close to the mystery of life materialises.
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A few bullet points to leave you with:
• ICYMI, I published the 2023 edition of my annual favourite albums list;
• I’ve been intrigued by the experimental apps made by Rafał Pastuszak;
• I loved this weird, Lynchian short on YouTube so much that I almost don’t want to know more about it: The Jennifer Myers Story;
• My favourite record of the first couple of months of 2024 has been The Last Dinner Party’s Prelude to Ecstasy.
Yesterday the Chicago Cubs played their first game of baseball as part of 2024 Spring Training, and that was my cue to fire things back up over on the online notebook — stop by if you simply cannot wait a lunar month to hear from me again. Also, now that it has opened sign-ups to everyone, and has federated, I’m going to be experimenting with Bluesky for a while. Say hi if you’re over there.
I hope that you're spectacularly well and excited for spring. Just hold tight, we're almost there – I can feel it! I’ll send another issue of Syzygy Business your way on Mon 25 Mar.
✌🏻
— Adam
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