100 Movies Every Catholic Should See

100 Movies Every Catholic Should See

Deep Dives

Why You Should Watch 'The Pencil' (2019)

Amid the Bleakness of the Taiga - Poetic Beauty, Danger - & Hope

An Observer (Teresa L)'s avatar
An Observer (Teresa L)
May 12, 2025
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The Film "The Pencil" and Putin's Russia - Hollywood Progressive

The industrial town where The Pencil takes place has a pencil factory and a big prison facility nearby. The skies are dark; the small roadside ‘lakes’ are actually large, slate-grey water puddles of uncertain innocuousness; and in the distance, thick, white clouds billow from factory smoke stacks. Grim-faced arrivals disembark from a boat and trod along a road that runs between imposing walls of variously-sized wooden logs piled tight and high.

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An Observer (Teresa L)'s avatar
A guest post by
An Observer (Teresa L)
Just a temporary traveler in this earthly plane, thinking about my Catholic faith. movies. music. history. writing. politics (too often now!). [AKA "Teresa L" in my previous life here. Origins: a SEAsian archipelago, a transplant to US shores.]
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