Mike Pilewski writes about life, politics and culture in the United States
We all knew this day would come. Last Friday, the Münchener Filmpassage shut its doors. This wasn’t just any video-rental place. It had the largest selection of English-language films anywhere in Germany, including numerous titles released directly to video that no one would have known about otherwise. I’d go in looking for one film and come out with four or … >>
Suppose your country were offered unlimited energy for the rest of your lifetime (and beyond). What would it be worth to you? The recent discovery of a way to extract natural gas trapped within layers of rock has the energy industry and the politicians excited. In just the past five years, thousands of gas wells have sprung up above shale … >>
If you tried to read the English-language Wikipedia last Wednesday, you couldn’t. Every page was replaced with a black screen explaining that, as part of a protest, the content of the free online encyclopedia was being hidden for 24 hours. (A banner appeared at the top of Wikipedia’s Spanish- and German-language pages, but this was hardly more distracting than the … >>
These are crazy times. On one TV channel, mobs are destroying cities in England. On another channel, mobs are destroying San Francisco. The first is presented as news, and I’m supposed to be shocked by it. The second is presented as entertainment, and I’m supposed to enjoy it. Is this sick or what? Obviously the makers of Rise of the … >>
Suppose you have a persistent admirer. It doesn’t matter that you live in a different city. Nor does the fact that you don’t know her. She finds out where you live, which university you’re going to and which courses you’re taking, then signs up for the same ones. She travels across the country to live near you. She is driven … >>
In politics, if you want to make a point, it’s best to do it in a way that gets as much attention as possible. In the US, this is easiest to do in three places. The first is the roof of the White House. In 1979, Jimmy Carter showed America he was serious about renewable energy when he had solar … >>
From November 1966 to December 1967, a number of people in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, claimed to have been frightened by a large, man-like creature with glowing red eyes and wings. As they drove near it, it rose up and followed them in the air. A reporter called it Mothman. No one knows exactly what Mothman looked like, since the … >>
The film took three and a half years to make. It involved dozens of interviews, contributions from thousands of individuals, 44 terabytes’ worth of digital footage and filming on at least three continents. And it asked the question that has haunted a generation: Who owns Star Wars? For those who haven’t seen them — and, strangely, I keep meeting people … >>
I grew up during the golden age of science fiction. Every day, my friends and I would turn on the TV and see what the world would look like in the far-off 21st century, when we’d be in the prime of our lives. There would be colonies in space, encounters with aliens (both friendly and unfriendly), robots either doing our … >>
First grade started as the world was about to end. A siren went off at the school, and hundreds of us kids were led down to the basement. We were stunned to find ourselves in a vast concrete cavern lined with barrels of water and big boxes of crackers. This fallout shelter would keep us alive if Pittsburgh were destroyed. … >>