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ARCHIVES | DECEMBER 2000 |
Friday, December 1st, 2000 | 3:29 PM EST | link this post
I've been a very truant little boy lately... skipped out on my math lab today and went down to Virgin to do some "Christmas shopping" -- but really to get the new Moby singles. Finding myself very enchanted by the version of "Honey" he did with Kelis; took me quite off-guard at first but I'm now being charmed by its absurd funkiness.
Friday, December 1st, 2000 | 3:45 PM EST | link this post
Today is World AIDS Day. I've opted not to take part in the "Day Without Weblogs" event -- maybe it's just ego, but I don't see how ceasing to blog for a day is helping -- but I do strongly urge you to go out, learn something, and think about all this.
Some links:
Friday, December 1, 2000 | 11:31 PM EST | link this post
It's a lot more fun to review this kind of movie when everyone you know hasn't already seen it, but anyway:
I caught Unbreakable tonight. It could've been brilliant, really it could have. While I'm biased, I thought it had pretty much the most compelling storyline of any film this year. Where did it go wrong? M. Night Shyamalan took it far too seriously. That's not a criticism you can launch at too many movies, especially at dramas. But elements of this movie were so intentionally farcical, so absurd, that in order for them to be treated realistically -- the ultimate goal of the film -- they had to be laughed at, they had to be mocked. And Shyamalan was too self-obsessed to do it; so the audience does it for him.
His tendency towards "Oh my GOD, look how BRILLIANT this shot is" cinematography was also distracting and a turn-off, especially during scenes which needed no such display. He had strong actors and characters but he was never content to let them play off of each other instead of artfully placing them in a frame dominated by a train seat, or moving inexorably past them with a slow horizontal pan. His overall visual aesthetic -- still, lifeless, deadpan -- generally serves the storyline but occasionally sucks the life out of the scenes that COULD have used some special visual attention to dress them up. I'm wary of citing specifics for those who haven't seen the film, and I should probably see it again to get my complaints absolutely straight, but the point remains.
In short: It could have been so brilliant. And I wanted to so badly to like it. But it's riddled with flaws that suck all the fun and life out of it.
Saturday, December 2nd, 2000 | 3:55 PM EST | link this post
A phenomenal article on comics in the media (which, not coincidentally, expresses quite well one of my misgivings about Unbreakable that I completely forgot to mention here), via linkmachinego.
I've decided that this will be my Great Movie Consumption Weekend. I watched The Graduate for the first time last night after returning from the theatre, and I plan to take in Wonder Boys (for a second time; I'm realy not sure what I thought of it the first time way back in February) and Brazil (on DVD, also for the first time) tonight. Then I'll watch more tomorrow. It's time to plug some of the gaping holes in my cultural awareness. Wish me luck, and pray for the continued structural integrity of my brain.
Saturday, December 2, 2000 | 10:42 PM EST | link this post
I don't know what stick I had up my ass that led me to dislike it the first time I saw it, but Wonder Boys is a pretty damn good movie. Get out and see it if you can; I'm not sure how limited this new release is but if you live near a major metropolitan area you've probably got it.
Also watched William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet, the 1996 Baz Luhrmann-directed Leo & Claire version. Liked it a lot, really. I've always had a problem with the story logic of the play itself, which I know is heresy or whatever, and that continued to irk me here, but on the whole I thought Luhrmann's vision and directorial choices were largely very appropriate and also extremely entertaining. I did notice in it the symptom found throughout "reinterpretations" of Shakespeare, both in cinema and on stage: if you don't know what the lines are supposed to mean, or how they should be delivered, just have the actor scream 'em at the top of his or her lungs and it'll sound dramatic. Saw it here, saw it in Julie Taymor's Titus (a film very similar in execution to R&J that I don't think was as successful, though it was even more visually astonishing), saw it in a recent production of King Lear that I attended. More than a little bit annoying.
I was originally intending to watch Brazil tonight, but instead I think I'm going to put that off until tomorrow and watch something lighter tonight instead -- possibly Shakespeare In Love. You'll know once I've done it, I suppose.
Tuesday, December 5, 2000 | 8:27 PM EST | link this post
--Just a brief update, because she told me to (Dig the new design, by the way).
The Great Movie Consumption Weekend is over; the only addition was Almost Famous. Which I liked. Maybe. I don't know. There were little things about it that I didn't like and that somehow warped my whole conception of the film to the negative. And I just wrote an essay about Virginia Woolf and critical theory and it's got me ransacking my brain about what I mean when I critique movies and such and really I'm just all out of sorts right now. Argh. So don't trust my opinion on anything until I tell you it's OK to do so again.
While you're waiting for my brain to function, go listen to the hour-long U2 show from Irving Plaza NYC, tonight at 10:00 PM EST. A Windows Media Player stream is available at www.edge102.com, so get your rockin' on.
Wednesday, December 6, 2000 | 5:33 PM EST | link this post
Comic book time.
Look: Steven T. Seagle is brilliant. He's great. He writes fantastic comics. Everyone needs to own a copy of House Of Secrets: Foundation, because it's the best (if not only) grunge-rock psychological horror story ever, and also because the remaining 20 issues need badly to be collected and sales on the first volume might just do it. But anyway, Seagle's a genius, and it is with great longing and need that I anticipate the release of his newest ongoing series, CRUSADES, in March through DC/Vertigo. Comics scribe Joe Casey (soon to be Grant Morrison's partner in crime on X-MEN, so you know, maybe you should be watching him) interviews Seagle this week in his column Crash Comments at Comics Newsarama.
Also, it is your solemn duty to check out this illuminating interview with Daniel Clowes, the author of such books as the unbearably excellent GHOST WORLD (soon to be a movie with Thora Birch and Steve Buscemi, directed by Terry Zwigoff of Crumb infamy) and DAVID BORING, which I have not read yet but most definitely intend to. Big-ups to linkmachinego, as usual, for the bodacious link.
Wednesday, December 6, 2000 | 9:28 PM EST | link this post
Um... I alphabetized it...? Sowwy. :-)
Of course, I noticed after this post that I'd alphabetized it wrong. NotSoSoft was being listed after you instead of before you. So I fixed that. You've been demoted. Sorry, hon.
(9:28 PM EST)
Thursday, December 7, 2000 | 1:07 PM EST | link this post
Oh yes... it's another one of those damn surveys. This one's got interesting questions, though. And I answered it, so you can snoop all the nasty things I've done.
Monday, December 11, 2000 | 4:12 PM EST | link this post
Between Requiem For A Dream and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, this year's movies have just done a 180 in quality. Both phenomenal. See them as soon as humanly possible.
Sorry about the lack of blogs lately, but I was too busy being strangely transifixed by this (I want the 'Famous Men's Jacket'). Final exams commence Wednesday, so blogs'll probably slow down considerably then too, but what can be done?
Monday, December 11, 2000 | 4:33 PM EST | link this post
You may recall that I mentioned him last week -- Joe Casey, Grant Morrison's new X-MEN partner, gets interviewed at The Slush Factory. ZOOROPA is his favorite U2 album. Therefore, I love him.
I interviewed Casey waaaaay back when, back during his first monthly writing gig -- CABLE -- for my first 'zine, YADDA YADDA YADDA. A fun experience. I haven't loved everything he's done since then but he's a ballsy kind of guy, which is keen in my book. Plus, like I said, ZOOROPA is his favorite U2 album. So.
Ahem. *BUY ZOOROPA AT AMAZON.COM* Oh my, I must've dropped that link when I coughed. Excuse me.
Monday, December 11, 2000 | 5:26 PM EST | link this post
Rejoice!
Saturday, December 16, 2000 | 2:12 AM EST | link this post
Hi. Sorry. Finals and end-of-semester madness. Life goes on.
I have added an index of my CD collection to the About Me area. View it, won't you, and take me to task for my tastes.
I anticipate blogging tomorrow/today (damn this vampiric lifestyle), so you may officially wait with bated breath.
Tuesday, December 19, 2000 | 8:25 PM EST | link this post
Note the presence of three new CDs over on the right. Somebody take away my credit card.
Contemplating a redesign. Not sure if I'll go for it or not. Do you like this design so much you couldn't bear to see it go? Or do you really, really want it dead and buried? Vote your conscience! And I promise I'll count the damn things properly.
I return to Florida on Thursday, there to remain until mid-January. How will this affect the blog? Not entirely sure. In all probability everything will continue as normal (sadly), meaning infrequent and unsatisfying updates. But maybe the muse will strike me. Or maybe I'll rip this whole mofo down. I'm crazy mad unpredictable like that, you know.
Wednesday, December 20, 2000 | 7:39 PM EST | link this post
I've done something phenomenally stupid that might make the next five months of my life hellish. More news later. And I've also just spent a disturbingly long time writing a disturbingly long blog about the X-Men. And it wasn't that good. I'll try to come up with something readable on the plane and post it when I get home to Florida... pray it doesn't snow in NYC tomorrow, by the way. I'd really like to not be delayed on the way to the warm place.
Wednesday, December 27, 2000 | 9:37 PM EST | link this post
I hope the semireligious holiday of your choice went well for you; mine was lovely, and you can note some of the spoils over there in the sidebar.
The "phenomenally stupid" thing -- which was, for the record, missing my math final (I thought it was at a different time; I didn't oversleep or anything that horrid) -- looks like it might have a peaceful resolution. Which would be nice.
I have yet to compose that X-Men blog -- very little downtime on my flight in which to do it -- and I don't know if I ever will. I know that the tears are flowing freely out there in reader-land.
Florida is treating me very well. I have seen many friends, seen some crappy films (and some mediocre theatre), eaten a whole lot of good food, gone kayaking, and started reading for pleasure again, and I am planning to go iceskating (I only skate in the tropics, apparently, instead of a place where ice naturally occurs -- go figure) soon. I've just been generally living it up. Hope the vacation you're engaged in, or already passed, has been just as excellent.
Since I seem to be terribly inconsistent lately, I'm going to go ahead and wish you a happy new year -- no promises of a blog before then. I'm wondering just how cut out for this schtick I really am...
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