Sunshine on an Open Tomb. Tim Kinsella

are visible sans telescope and weren’t rediscovered until 1781, 1846, and 1930, respectively.

      Sumerian civilization lasted 2,000 years, 100 times longer than The Homelan has currently existed.

      And then it disappeared all at once.

      And though their culture lasted 2,000 years, they observed and recorded a cosmic cycle that takes 25,920 years to complete.

      Sumerians described beings that came from the sky to enlighten them and establish civilization, but they didn’t use the word “gods.”

      “Gods” was a later translation by The Romans and The Greeks, like how Lot’s Wife “vaporized,” and The Family teaches that Jesus wasn’t a Red.

      These beings are very similar to The Nephilim in The Book of Genesis.

      When Genesis says: “Let us make man in our image,” that’s a heavily redacted version of The Sumerian creation story.

      Those first Barbarians Adam and Eve needed to remain ignorant, lest ye shall become gods, you know?

      One Nephilim was named Nazi.

      The British took Baghdad from The Ottomans in WWI and made it the capital of The British Mandate of Mesopotamia.

      WWI ended The Ottoman Empire after 600-something years.

      Six hundred years is ten times longer ago than the end of WWI until now.

      Six hundred years is three times longer than The Homelan has officially existed.

      In The ’20s, 40% of Baghdad’s population was Jewish; it was the city’s largest single community, with a 2,600-year history there.

      In ’32 The British granted Iraq formal independence.

      And in ’41 a pro-German and pro-Italian “Government” replaced the pro-British “Government.”

      They surrendered power back to British forces less than eight weeks later, but in the chaos, there was an organized massacre of Iraqi Jews: 175 killed, 1,000 injured, 900 homes destroyed.

      Over 80% of Iraqi Jews emigrated in the next decade, mostly to Israel.

      Throughout The ’50s The UK promoted Baghdad as The Crossroads between East and West.

      It moved at a modern clip with the bustle of young people, its cafes crowded with ambitious men pontificating big ideas.

      Late in his career, Frank Lloyd Wright developed his grandiose Plan for Greater Baghdad, which included a cultural center, a university, an opera house, and museums on an island in the middle of The Tigris.

      But due to yet another political fluctuation—Qasim dethroning The Hashemite monarchy—the project never got realized.

      In Feb ’63 a CIA-authorized, six-man squad assassinated Qasim in a Ba'ath Party coup.

      The CIA also provided The Ba'ath Party with a list of suspected Reds to round up and kill.

      One young thug, Saddam, made especially frequent visits to our embassies.

      The CIA supported and trained him in Beirut in ’59.

      He was our man, appointed leader, overseeing the construction of The Baghdad Zoo in ’71, the largest and most beautiful zoo in The Middle East.

       CHAPTER 23 The Cinema and Me

      Back when I first arrived, still struggling to fit in, I tried to be a Realist with The Barbarians, but doing so was Idealistic.

      “Duh, unga-bunga!”

      The Barbarians so deeply believe the easy dreams of their programmings:

       Nerd wins beautiful girl’s heart!

       The bully is defeated!

       See A-List Celebrity boobs!

       Small town guy goes big time!

       Eat all you want and lose weight fast!

       Parent and child switch bodies and learn lessons walking a mile in each other’s shoes!

       Positive Male Role Models!

       The underdog wins the game!

      O’Malley and The Greek would draw out a one-minute dialogue from The Treasure of The Sierra Madre into an hour of hyperventilating chuckles.

      When they took turns out-doing each other the way Paul Newman says “Mendacity” in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof—“The mendacity.” “No, no, no—the mendacity.”—I knew better than to invest my one good ear too attentively for fear of being appointed referee.

      If their collaborative synopsis of a movie began at noon, we’d be lucky to approach its climax by the time we moved over to The Other Greek Place for supper.

      Top Gun, Crocodile Dundee, Platoon, Inchon, The Karate Kid Part II, Star Trek IV, Back to School, Heaven’s Gate, Aliens, Eddie Murphy in The Golden Child, Cafe Flesh, Ruthless People, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Dead Zone, New Wave Hookers, Down and Out in Beverly Hills, Plan 9 from Outer Space, The Color of Money, Stand by Me, all the Emmanuelle movies, Legal Eagles, Cobra, Police Academy 3, Peggy Sue Got Married: We loved them all!

      But consistent with The Family’s fetish for secret knowledge, I loved obscure movies most of all: Monte Hellman, Bad Timing, Weekend.

      You ever seen The Great Gatsby, Bob Redford and everything pastel?

      Or Fahrenheit 451?

      The Man of La Mancha with Peter O’ Toole as Quixote and Sophia Loren as Dulcinea del Toboso?

      A Catcher in the Rye starring Leo DiCaprio?

      Obviously as a body of work, Kubrick speaks to me like no other filmmaker.

      2001 not only made me smarter, it taught me how time passes.

      He goofed The Family in Strangelove and The Barbarians in A Clockwork Orange.

      And The Shining, that is the movie I would’ve made.

      But my favourite Kubrick film has always been the moon landing, obviously.

      Diana means moon.

      And above all others, my single favourite movie ever is River’s Edge.

      A teen melodrama like Rebel Without a Cause but with thrash music, it had a limited release 18 months ago.

      You know it, Principled Reader?

      Keanu, Ione, Crispin, Dennis Hopper.

      I never won’t watch it when it’s on.

      As much as I loved seeing movies, and I loved O’Malley and The Greek’s role-playing and context unravellings, most of all I loved making up movies.

      I always thought—or felt—I should’ve been a director.

      That’s the chips down, final curtain, ultimate disappointment of my life, at the root of my identity.

      Any time a small crack of quiet arose as O’Malley and The Greek transitioned from their real-time synopsis of one film to the next, they were always happy to hear out my next ideas for a movie.

      “Duh, unga-bunga. Duh, unga-bunga. Duh, unga-bunga. Duh, unga-bunga,” I’d say.

      And they steadfastly encouraged me, nodding, very interesting, very interesting. Good idea, good idea.

      But The Family made it clear: by no means would they accept me putting my name on movies.

      With