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The wolves are being kept at bay courtesy of a volatile scene in Noah Baumbach’s Marriage Story. According to reports, the US Department of Agriculture is using the emotional shouting match between Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson’s characters in the 2019 film as a deterrent “to scare off wolves from killing cattle and scaring livestock on farms across America.”
Here is how it works, per the WSJ: “Riding to the rescue are drone cowhands, whose quadcopters have thermal cameras that can reveal any wolf lurking in the darkness and bathe it in a spotlight. A loudspeaker broadcasts alarming sounds like fireworks, gunshots and people arguing. One recording is of the fight between Scarlett Johansson and Adam Driver in the movie Marriage Story.”
Volatility seems to be the prevailing state in today’s cultural discourse. A generalization to contend with: everything seems to be shouting at us from every possible angle. This is, perhaps, just one of the reasons why many are gravitating towards culture from the past, seeking out a comfortability that was arguably more present in previous decades. Case in point, The Atlantic’s Ted Gioia wrote, “old songs now represent 70 percent of the U.S. music market.”
The hottest asset class in the music industry is old songs. Investment firms are duking it out in bidding wars over the publishing rights of aging rock and pop legends, as if nostalgia now yields the highest return. Concurrently, there has been endless talk about the lack of a “song of the summer” in today’s discourse.
Serviette has no horse in this race. However, when everything new feels disposable, the act of revisiting—an album, a film, a book—is a kind of resistance. Not just comfort, but deep, directed pleasure. Listening to the back catalog of an artist that you thought you knew from start to finish can expose one to new favorites, more story, a different angle. English alternative dance supergroup Electronic, formed in 1989 by Bernard Sumner (of New Order) and Johnny Marr (of The Smiths), has only three available albums. Why not try them out?
The best scents don’t just smell good, they conjure a mood. Like putting on a forgotten record and catching an entirely new lyric. Or watching a film you loved at 20 and realizing the villain was right all along.
In a moment obsessed with novelty, there’s something thrilling about sinking into depth instead. Keep the cultural wolves at bay by watching the films of your favorite director in chronological order.