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I am still quite behind in my reading of the classics and have not read Pickwick yet, so I figured watching a DVD would give me a good bird's eye view.

The first 6 or 7 episodes were ok, but felt like an aimless rambling through the countryside, with Mr. Pickwick running into more and more troubles. At points, I was truly worried for Mr. Pickwick's well-being, since he didn't seem swift enough to protect himself from those who would take advantage of him.

But the last quarter of the series is where it really picks up. The apparent bumbling takes on new meaning as just the backdrop of normal life for a man who takes an interesting turn. His stubbornness yet kindhearted character are revealed in a stronger contrast than anyone expects, and a purpose to the man's life is shown, which was hidden in plain sight all along.

It also shows that even though the need may be huge, and the desire to help may be there, the resources to produce massive change may not be. But that is no excuse to stop giving. It merely constrains one's giving to those you have immediate access to.

It's a story of fun, foolishness, friendship, forgiveness, and family. If you have the time, grab it at your local library.

That's not to say that I lack entertainment. Oh no. Even without a TV, I can easily manage to waste plenty of time via computer and the internet. It started with a lot of theatre going and much buying of DVD movies and DVD boxed sets of old TV shows. Once that got too expensive, I started visiting the local library. Once that got too tedious, I started downloading TV shows via bittorrent. Once that got too time consuming, predictable, and legally fuzzy for my tastes, I limited myself to free internet TV shows such as those at revision3.com. But there's only so much internet geek TV that one person can stand, and so I've now turned to archive.org.

There are nearly 2000 feature films available for free at archive.org. These are either old films that have no copyright anymore (public domain), or freely licensed works available for public download.

And so I've started at "A" and am going through the archive whenever I decide I feel like watching a movie.

Tonight I stumbled across a beauty from 1936 called A Man Betrayed. The plot just makes you smile the more it unfolds. It is the story of a man who works as a salesman for an oil company, who starts to suspect that the company may not be as honest as he has been telling everyone. He is rather naive, but he has a brother who's in his corner with a bit more street smarts. Which is a bit surprising since the brother is a missionary.

As the salesman gets framed for murder, his future appears to be going straight downhill. Yet hope comes from the strangest places.

I'm sure I'll find more gems as I slowly work my way through the archive. So far, the experience is better than the iTunes movie store. But remember: this opinion comes from a unique individual...