The Checkout Counter #44
July 2026

The Man Without a Past

Dead Man’s Wire

Look Back

whew my july was packed! sports, wildfire smoke, good eats, torrential rainfall—truly a month of the epic highs and lows of summer.

thanks for reading! until next time 🙋‍

Film

  • The Man Without a Past (Mies vailla menneisyyttä), 2002aki kaurismäki does it again! i like when directors have a clear throughline of favorite actors and themes.

    i don't remember anyone ever smiling in this movie but i certainly had one on my face as i watched. the cruelty of strangers is, in turn, remedied by the kindness of strangers. so it goes.
    Drama, comedy, romance. After being severely beaten, a man loses his memory and starts life anew in a Helsinki harbor.
  • The Match Factory Girl (Tulitikkutehtaan tyttö), 1990
    Drama. Iris dreams of finding love at dance halls as she works her assembly line job.
  • Dead Man’s Wire, 2025you know those posts about actors in period pieces who are styled so they "look like they know what an iphone is"—this is the complete opposite of that. the art direction here is fantastic and everyone looks like they stepped out from a portal to the 70s. what a wild thing to have actually happened.
    Crime, thriller, drama. Tony Kiritsis takes the son of a wealthy mortgage banker hostage and demands to be broadcast on national television.
  • Look Back (ルックバック), 2024love this art style! the score is a bit overwhelming and intentionally tearjerk-y in a way i dislike but that didn't detract from the whole thing.

    there is a certain sense of magic and power you get when you're a kid who can draw—which, as this movie conveys so succinctly, vanishes as you age. i haven't drawn in a while, i should get back to that soon.
    Animation, drama. Jealousy gives way to friendship as two artists for a class newspaper meet and begin to collaborate on original comics.

Music

Games

  • Oblivious Melodies (Volume 1)
    Interactive fiction, historical. Follows two siblings in a Regency-inspired world ruled by class, religious authority, and ambitions of empire.

Books

  • The Safekeep, Yael van der Woudensome mixed feelings but i'm overall positive. the writing is lush and some sentences will stick with me forever. the twist got me good.

    isabel is so off-putting and prickly and while i enjoy reading about mean women, she often seemed cartoonish in a way that clashed with the tone. i don't quite buy her eventual turn by the end, or that eva would fall for her—but how their attraction to each other is described is sumptuous. some real lavishly written sex scenes. very much in tune with anti cottagecore...
    Historical fiction, literary. Isabel's life of solitude, routine, and meticulous care of her countryside home is interrupted by the arrival of her brother's new partner, Eva.

Articles & essays

  • High Density Living, 2000 Years Ago, Stefan Al
  • Twilight of the Velocipede, Alex Wright
  • Your Cookware Got Worse On Purpose, Keyana Sapp
  • Eider Cake: impossible lives & possible worlds, Lucas SouzaA tale as old as time: history is gentle with a few and, in each age, crushes so many others. As any form of remembrance is absent, any attempt to represent these lives becomes almost impossible and all that remains is to use the contours left by these people as footprints to imagine a possible world.

    i was so pleasantly surprised to see this essay from indiepocalypse. people playing my games and making connections that would never occur to me in a million years is so enriching and gratifying. yay :) indiepocalypse rules.

Around the web

← June 2026

August 2026 →

Comment Form is loading comments...