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ALBUQUERQUE — As many cash-short states reduce financing for their film offices, New Mexico is headed defiantly in the opposite direction. Blessed with a budget surplus, the state has started one of the nation's most aggressive film incentive programs, resulting in a flurry of projects like the somber 21 Grams from Alejandro González Iñárritu and The Missing, a violent tale of abduction, from Ron Howard. The New Mexico Film Office estimates that filmmaking in the state—counting salaries, lodging, food and transportation—generated $80 million in spending in 2003, up from $8 million a year earlier. Several more projects [are] planned this year. … The force behind New Mexico's film boom was the creation of an $85 million fund that invests directly in film projects through no-interest loans. The money comes from New Mexico's $3.5 billion Severance Tax Permanent Fund, financed by royalties from natural gas, oil, coal and timber extraction.
JANUARY BOOK BLOG- Prosperous and unhappy: America's "progress paradox" profiled by Gregg Easterbrook, from the Washington Post.
- Religion and Tolkien's Rings, from First Things.
- Lance Morrow's essays on evil, from the New York Times (also see third item here).
- Cambridge U.P. releases encyclopedia of twentieth century ideas, from The Economist.
- The making of 'Mexifornia,' from First Things.
- Siena, Florence's forgotten rival in art history, from The Economist.
- 'The finest in modern Galileo scholarship,' from First Things.
- Myth and fact about The Pony Express, from the Las Vegas Review Journal.
- President Coolidge's depression after the death of his son, from the Atlantic Monthly Unbound.
- New biography of Carl Jung, from the New York Times .
- Remembering Book Row, haven for book lovers, from the Washington Post.
- John Updike on the slipperiness of consciousness in two new novels, from the New Yorker.
- Anne Tyler's most 'ambitious' novel, from the New York Times .
- Why we review what we do, by Benjamin Schwarz in the Atlantic Monthly.
- More book reviews: ALD / Atl.Mly / BBC / B.Glb / CSMtr / Chi.Trb/ Dal.MN / DPst / Ecmst/ G&M / LAT / LGdn / LRB / N.Ykr / NYRB / NYT / Ph.Inq / Sln / SFC / TLS / WP
- Previous/Archive/About/Feedback/Links/CT blog
Nathan Bierma is editorial assistant at Books & Culture.
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