Monday, June 29, 2009

'Transforming' a Good Story Into a Bad Movie

It seems to be the theme for this summer's comic book adaptation-spin-off films. X-Men: Origins achieved a simliar feat by attempting to cram twelve hours worth of story, action, and characters into a mere two. Michael Bay's Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen defines this unfortunate cheap trick - an unfortunate cheap trick that has worked. Thus far it has been a wild success at the box office and at IMDB, despite being widely panned by critics. It was designed for a huge audience aged maybe 12-19, an audience that is not looking for cinematic achievement, originality, complex storytelling, or characters with more than one layer. Transformers is simple and bright, and simple and bright is what makes money in this world.

To Mr. Bay: we get that you were trying to get by on nothing but flash and pomp...AKA Megan Fox and huge explosions. But the sad thing is, you didn't even have to. You had a compelling storyline with the Transformers saga, and you had, with your kind of budget, whichever writer(s) you desired. Why, then? Why:

did the film never stop to take a breath?
did it feel forced every time it actually did pause, for the sake of character development?
was everything about the depiction of college wildly unrealistic?
were Sam's parents ever brought back into the final scene?
were his parents even major characters in the movie?
was so much energy spent on eliciting cheap laughs?
have the film narrated by Optimus Prime?
allow the robots to talk so damn much?

The last one really hits home for me, because it makes the film seem cartoonish and childish. Every time Optimus launches on one of his introducting or concluding segments, I cringe because I think I'm watching a poor Japanese anime on Cartoon Network. Maybe the overdone mechanical voice works for kindergarten daytime T.V. watchers, but for a film in the theatres, it is incredibly trite and unneccessary. Aside from Optimus, having the Decepticons (evil robots of the film) talk takes away all of their mystery. I would have been happy not to hear the evil leader say he was psyched for revenge, because it's already pretty obvious, seeing as he's trying to blot out the sun and all. The voices of the smaller robots aren't quite as bad, and can actually be amusing because they are significantly more believable and actually original. The scene where Bumblebee plays clips from Forrest Gump and other events in cultural history to encourage Sam is (shockingly) pretty well done. Whereas the generic evil leader has his generic evil voice with his generic evil plans, and you want him dead not because he's the bad guy, but because he's a walking, clanking, stereotype.

From that list of questions, the other major point seriously effecting this movie's ever being classified as 'good' is character development. From the beginning, every line of serious dialogue between any two characters feels rushed. You feel uncomfortable with the obvious impatience of the story to move quickly on to get to the next shot, with the nervous camera that can never stop moving, circling far too often in 360 degree circles just for the hell of it. No, it's not artistic flair. It's a cheap directorial trick designed for an American culture with self-inflicted A.D.D. If the camera stays still for too long, if one shot threatens much beyond the Hollywood average of five to seven seconds, Bay and co. are there to snap you out of whatever deeper appreciation you may have dared glean from the subtlety of a still shot and are ready to refocus your numbed brain on further aspects of the shallow entertainment being dispalyed.

That's a bit harsh. There are much worse movies than Transformers 2. Namely, with Bay in mind, Bad Boys 2 and a slew of other action flicks that have no upsides. On upside of this film, the special effects were incredibly done, the storyline was, for the most part, enough to keep you entertained, and the final battle scene (though far too drawn out) was impressively shot and quite exciting. The scene where Sam and Mikaela are crossing the desert, hiding from the Decepticons, is very good. Moreover, the acting is far from bad. Shia LeBouf is not a bad actor at all - he has just been in some not so great films (Eagle Eye, the Transformers saga, but more specifically Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of This Title Should Have Told You Just How Bad the Movie Was Going to Be). However, he's also in Disturbia, a great cross between The Shining and The Girl Next Door, and hopefully he is given better scripts in the future.

I haven't looked up the rumor sheets, but I'd say it's pretty likely that a Transformers 3 will come out to complete the trilogy. This franchise is not so far lost that with a serious director intent on making a serious film, it could be resurrected from the critical grave which this sequel has now dug.

Song of the Day: Supergroup indie band The New Pornographers' "Challengers", off of their most recent 2007 album of the same name. Normally I look for live clips to show artists without any auto-tuning or digital enhancement, but there are not any good quality videos of this song live out there.

The music video, however, suggests several possible meanings for the song. The world is shown as black and white, Pleasantville-style, at the start of the scene. Only small things have color, small aspects of life: the color of the hair and beards of the band members, a plastic horse, a cup of red juice. But the explosion of color comes when the couple sitting on the couch touch their hands together. Before their touch, everything is plain and and colorless and easily organized. As their hands fold into each other the colors multiply in a gooey liquid stream, and their skin and clothes suddenly have color. The rest of the world of the video begins to bleed colors as the couple grows closer, and it is not exactly a graceful transformation. The colors run like paint, are sticky, messy, drip everywhere unevenly, seemingly suggesting that the transition to greater feeling and real emotion is powerful but not controllable, and certainly not neat and organized. The refrain, we are the challengers of/the unknown seems to support this idea of emotion experienced and not yet experienced - as they melt together, the two on the couch are challenging the unknown that they do not know from their colorless world.

Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49, widely hailed as one of the greatest novels of the 20th century, deals explicitly with the human fear of natural chaos. In the novel, characters choose simple, strange lives to give themselves the illusion of order and control, bypassing the dangerous uncertainties of the real world. Characters that are bored with society's banal attempts at order and control, such as one aptly named Mucho Maas (meaning "much more" in Spanish), attempt to seek out something more deep and meaningful - only to find that things are so complicated, such a search is almost impossible. Later in the story, the main character, Mucho's wife Miss Oedipa Maas (who has been charged with organizing the estate of Pierce Inverarity, a mysterious man of wealth), comes across a group in San Francisco called 'Inamorati Anonymous.' One of the group's members explains: "An inamorato is somebody in love. That's the worst addiction of all...the whole idea (of the group) is to get to where you don't need it." The whole point of the group is to bring its members to the point where they no longer 'require the services' of love. Strangely similar to Margaret Atwood's dystopia in The Handmaid's Tale, or perhaps more famously, Aldous Huxley's A Brave New World, Pynchon's society is obstensibly 1960's USA with nothing more than a slightly absurdist slant. The suggestion, is, of course, that a comfy, simple world without messy things like pain or love is better than the chaotic alternative.

From Brave New World:

"But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin."

"In fact," said Mustapha Mond, "You're claiming the right to be unhappy."

"All right then," said the Savage defiantly, "I'm claiming the right to be unhappy."

Song cannot convey ideas and philosophies as effectively or as broadly as literature can, but at its best, good music subtely captures the emotion behind a feeling of some depth and meaning:

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Four Stories to Watch at the USA Track and Field Championships

1. Jenny Barringer and the Women's 5000

The University of Colorado senior is coming off a second consecutive year that could be termed 'breakthrough', and will be a threat in both races she is declared to enter, the 3000 meter steeplechase and the 5,000. It will be interesting to see how she fares in the longer distance race against Olympic and World Championship bronze medallists like Shalane Flanagan and Kara Goucher. Also in the 5k will be 2008 Trials 1500 champ Shannon Rowbury, and 2008 Olympian Jen Rhines. At the Pre Classic, Barringer easily handled Flanagan over 5,000 meters, but I wouldn't expect a repeat of that over three times the distance. The race will be tight - Barringer has already run 15:00 this year, Flanagan 14:59, and Goucher 15:02 - and Goucher is the defending champ. Without Barringer in the 15, Rowbury will likely take the title, but it will be difficult for her to stay up here.

2. Tyson Gay and the Men's 100

The American sprint champion is back for revenge in 2009, and may just be the man that can stop Usain Bolt. Aside from Bolt's wildly off the charts performances at the Olympics last summer, Gay's times are almost identical. So far this season Gay has run huge PR's in overdistance races, including a 45.6 400 meter and a number three all time 19.56 200 meter (faster than anything Bolt has ever done aside from his world record at the Olympics). Bolt has silenced critics of his post-Olympic celebratory period with a world record in the 150, during which he came through the 100 in 9.8. The USA championships will be the first time we get to see Gay run a 100 this year, and his performance should give the world a good preview of just how closely he will be able to challenge Bolt at the World Championships this coming August.

Aside from Gay, the American sprint corps are not exactly lacking. Olympic medallist Walter Dix will certainly be a factor, and a slew of world class talent will be challenging him for the final two spots on the team.

3. Lagat and the Dream Race: the Men's 800

Bernard Lagat will be running the half mile for the first time in recent memory - for that reason, if no other, this is a race worth watching. As mentioned in my previews earlier, the men's 800 is already a packed race, including half a dozen former World or Olympic team members. Up front there shouldn't be anyone that can run with Symmonds, but it's impossible to know what Lagat is capable of. He puts himself in the hunt in every race - but at 34 years of age, I think he knows that a sprint like the 800 is just something done for the hell of it. Still, I can't wait to see how this race plays out. Will Khadevus Robinson find his form again? Has Wheating made the step up as the future of American middle distance, and is he the best already? Can Symmonds repeat against such a quality field, on the tail of his present momentum? Will dark horses Tevan Everett, Duane Solomon, Christian Smith, and Jonathon Johnson play a role in the final 100?

4. Evan Jager and the Schumacher Sweep of the Men's 5000

When legendary Iona distance coach Mick Byrne took over the reigns from Jerry Schumacher at Wisconsin, a slew of top Badgers abandoned the program. To go easy on them, they may have been too naive to know how good a coach Byrne truly is. Evan Jager was one of those runners - a freshman at the time, he left college to turn professional and train with the two best active, American-born 5k runners on the planet right now: Chris Solinsky and Matt Tegenkamp. The trio, along with fellow 3.1 miler Jonathon Riley, followed Schumacher out to Eugene, Oregon, where they established base camp and renewed their assault on the African predominance in distance running. Jager, a 4:08? high school miler, has shown incredible improvement after his freshman year as a Badger. The 20 year old has already run a 3:54 mile and clocked in a 13:29 for 5,000 meters. With that kind of speed, expect him to be in the hunt as a dark horse for that third spot behind obvious favorites Solinsky and Tegenkamp.

Final Predictions
The start lists are finally in - http://www.usatf.org/events/2009/USAOutdoorTFChampionships/startLists/seniorAll.asp - and there are several noticeable changes. Sean Quigley (10k last year) and Anthony Familigetti ('08 steeple champ) are only running the 5k. Jenny Barringer is running the 5k and the steeple, not the 1500. Shannon Rowbury is entered in the 5k as well as the 1500. Kara Goucher is only running the 5k. Andrew Wheating is entered in both the 800 and the 1500. Evan Jager is only in the 5k, German Fernandez is only in the 1500, and Matt Centrowitz is not entered in anything at all.

The World Team
(Lagat won't run the 800 at worlds, only the 15 and the 5, thus letting Wheating on the 800 team, Fernandez will train for NCAA XC instead of running the 1500, getting Will Leer on the team).

Men
800: Symmonds, (Lagat), Robinson, Wheating
1500: Manzano, Lomong, (Fernandez), Leer
5000: Solinsky, Tegenkamp, Jager
10,000: Abdiriham, Rupp, Nelson

Women
1500: Rowbury, Willard, Donohue
5000: Barringer, Goucher, Flanagan
10,000: Flanagan, Begley, Lewy-Boulet
Steeple: Willard, Barringer, Lawrence

Monday, June 22, 2009

The Death of Happiness, or Why We Should Change Our Vocabulary Now

I've always been sort of a paranoiac in reverse. I constantly suspect other people of plotting to make me happy.
-Franny from J.D. Salinger's Franny and Zooey

If you see a man approaching you with the obvious intent of doing you good, you should run for your life.
-Henry David Thoreau, Walden



Good adjectives aren't good. Words like "adult." "Responsible." "Efficient." "Economic." "Prompt." These are considered complements in today's world. "Out there" in the "real world" where "things" are "getting rough." I can't imagine someone calling me a worse name than a responsible adult.

It all begins with the most elemental change which every human being undergoes: loss of innocence. All too often, innocence in our culture symbolizes life-blood. Innocence is the last thing keeping us rooted to who we really are. Inevitably, loss of innocence is concurrent with, in varying stages and degrees of severity: cursing, sex, and drugs. Yet in a way, those changes are unavoidable. Even drugs. Everyone takes drugs at some point. Alcohol is a drug. So are Tylenol and NyQuil. Yet these things don't have to irrevocably change our life. Today, when most people "grow up", they lose much more than just naivety. They lose the will to be free, genuine, truthful to themselves. They slip into the roles which have been prepared for them effortlessly, without a struggle.

I watch it happen now. I watch it happen to people I know, who in younger years used to be an endless source of amusement and merriment. Now they make comments about the weather. They joke about gas mileage. They want to know about the traffic. Yeah, it's just common courtesy, yeah, their interests are just changing. Fine. I'm not asking for the world to not know what an SUV or a storm-front is. I'm asking for them not to care.

And it's not that they particularly care. Everyone seems to be so...neutral, to everything. Care implies passion, when this a world of apathy and indifference. If you find the rare "responsible adult" with passion, he or she is either very lucky, or that passion is an empty one. By empty I mean directed towards some irrelevancy or another, like car models or gutter design or building infrastructure. How about something that you, as a child, cared about? Before you had to start lying to yourself so that you march in tune with the "real" world? That's harsh, but unfortunately true. Children don't lie about important things like that because they don't know any better - the world hasn't taught them the art of dishonesty yet. Once a person slips into that age and stage that can be considered "adult", they have to start lying. To not lie would be to face the truth: that the things they deeply and genuinely want out of life as a human being are largely impossible. It bothers me. It bothers me that they are proud to now be one of the many, to be part of the whole, to be moving in the same direction at the same slow-as-shit speed as almost everyone else has ever moved in the history of the industrial world.

With the older generation I am accustomed to this. I've grown up with it, been around it my entire life - everyone has. That's the way their world is. It doesn't have to be the way our world is. If you're anywhere close to twenty, think back five years. Since when did you start saying "it's just been lovely seeing you again" or "we'll have to do lunch and catch up again sometime" (since when does anyone do lunch?) in that voice, that horrible voice of a scheduling bot, rushing about daily life from place to place, assigning empty words to empty occassions, never living for the happiness of now, never stopping to work for a real experience, real emotion.

Alcohol is the answer for everybody. With alcohol they can forget that they don't feel anything else the rest of the day. That their body has been numbed for the past ten hours is meaningless once they toss down a frosty (fittingly named) "adult" beverage. They live life from drink to drink, occupying the mean time a few spare diversions which they probably don't truly care about that much, spending their days having what soul is remaining inside of them slowly pulled away by all the forces in the world that have encouraged them to be a responsible adult. I wonder if their "mentors" knew what else they were encouraging, when they encouraged a job, a career, an-insert much-nastier word here (the English language has not yet created a word nasty enough to capture the nastiness of what people do to themselves to earn a paycheck).

I'll be the first to say it: there are a thousand reasons why a drinking age law of 21 is absurd, but to me the most obvious reason has yet to be unleashed. The truth is alcohol can be, for the most part, better trusted in the hands of teenagers. And I DON'T mean younger people as in twenty-somethings that blow half their paycheck on Old Joe's Watering Hole - I mean teenagers who still have a love for life, who aren't yet "responsible" enough to revert to the point where alcohol is their chief and primary means of recreation and entertainment, who haven't yet forgotten what it means to be breathing living creatures who really and truly can do exactly whatever they want to do - and that includes the entire spectrum of human experience.

"Career oriented" adults often forget what it's like to look at the world through eyes of wonder, as they did in their childhood. They forget all that is open to them, because the "real" world seems to close so much of it off. Society prizes efficiency and responsibility - but not true efficiency and responsibility. They aren't judging your mental and physical prowess - literary merit and footspeed won't earn you a job - they're judging the degree of your conformity to what they say is the good life. It shocks me that intelligent people, who know full and well the preciously short amount of time they've been given to live, buy into these false definitions.

Everyone should be free to live exactly the life they desire, and no one can ever presume to say what that is for anyone else other than themselves. But what I can say, without feeling guilty, is that you should look a little deeper. Don't think about what will make everybody else around you happy when it comes to your own life. You can't help anybody else until you help yourself by pressing the pause button on the whole growing up experience for just one moment, and thinking back to the pure joy of childhood. Whatever you felt then should not be the peak of your life - there's no reason for it to be. That doesn't mean you can't have a job, it doesn't mean you can't make money - it does mean that you should think long and hard to imagine your wildest dream...and live it without a second's hesitation.


Song of the Day: 'Long May You Run', originally by Neil Young is covered below by an artist I found on youtube called 'thebrooke'. I would have never said the original was one of Neil Young's best songs - not bad, but not in the league of his classics. The unique version below is a reworking of the song that comes from a different perspective and gives it almost a different meaning. Even though the song is about the perserverance of his car, and how it became a friend to him over the years, listening to this version of the song you feel that it could be about a person, or something more than just a car. This is another example of a song with great lyrics that would work well on their own with minimal instumentals - and that's exactly what this girl did. Her website, with dozens of other excellent covers (including an interpretation of 'Little Red Riding Hood' that blows the original away):
http://www.supernaturalthings.net/music/
http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=thebrooke&view=videos


Friday, June 19, 2009

2009 USA Track and Field Championships PREVIEW: Men's 5000 and Women's 1500

Men's 5000 - Minus the 2007 world champion Bernard Lagat, this is an open race. The best look we had at the major players in this race came in the Prefontaine Classic 3,000 meter. Chris Solinsky and Matt Tegenkamp ran very competitive races against Lagat, kicking home with some big names in what became quite a tactical race. In that race, Solinsky had the upper hand over his training partner Tegenkamp.

Aside from the Eugene training group of Solinsky and Tegenkamp, along with perennial contender Jonathon Riley, there has not been much action on the 5k front this year, and it is very hard to tell who is in great shape. Steeplechaser Anthony Familigetti ran 13:17 earlier in the season, but will he run the 5k next weekend? It seems unlikely - he chose the steeple in the Olympics last year - but it's certainly possible. Also to be considered are the former Colorado standouts, Stephen Pifer and Brent Vaughn. Though neither has turned in a performance of serious note yet this season, they were both contenders for a spot on the team last year, and it is likely they are just coming around to peaking at the right time.

And how about Bobby Curtis? The 2008 Villanova grad finished just behind Solinsky at the Trials 5k final last year, and looked strong doing it after a tough outdoor campaign. His running style and accomplishments mirror Solinsky's in many ways, and it is clear he has only begun to tap into a wealthy reserve of talent. Curtis is definitely a darkhorse pick to make the world team and place in the top four. However, as of today he is not entered in the meet, nor is he on the start list.

If he runs, Sean Quigley should not be counted out. Nor should Scotty Baughs. But both small school standouts will most likely run the 10,000 instead. If they run, college-age superstars Evan Jager and Andrew Bumbalough could also be threats. Jager has run a 3:54 mile already, and seems to be a top competitor in that event. Bumbalough is a current Georgetown Hoya taking a year from collegiate competition so that he can return to dominate the NCAA ranks next year. Their decision between 1500 and 5k could determine how the middle of the pack shapes up in the final.

While it is impossible to know who will run, it seems that without Lagat in the picture, this is Tegenkamp's and Solinsky's title to lose. Look for them to make a huge move with a mile to go and break the field by working together. Without Lagat, they are easily the class of the field, as there is no other American running today with the possible exception of Familigetti that could hope to stay with the field that they competed closely with at Pre. Bolota Asmeron, like Jonathan Riley, is another perennial contender, who just narrowly missed out on an Olympic berth last year. We can also not forget collegian Brandon Bethke, a Wisconsin transfer to Arizona State who ran 13:27 earlier in the year, and recently placed fourth in a very competitive NCAA 5k final.

The battle will then be on for third place. Vaughn is very unpredictable and it will just depend on the day. When Pifer is on, he has the 1500 speed to hang with anyone in the field. The dark horses of the field, youngsters Bethke, Jager, and Bumbalough, could play spoiler to veterans Riley and Asmeron. Assuming Jager is in the race, which seems likely, ex-Wisconsin coach Jerry Schumacher could pull off a sweep.

Predictions
1. Chris Solinsky - 13:34
2. Matt Tegenkamp 13:34
3. Stephen Pifer 13:41
4. Evan Jager 13:41
5. Bolota Asmeron 13:44
6. Jonathan Riley 13:44
7. Thomas Morgan 13:46
8. Brent Vaughn 13:51



Women's 1500 - This will be THE race to watch at the meet this coming weekend. Expect a replay of the Prefontaine Classic battle (an incredible race, which saw the 2008 USA Champion Shannon Rowbury soundly defeated by a pair of steeplechasers), minus the African leader and African pacemaker. The emergence of water-hurdlers Jenny Barringer and Anna Willard as legitimate middle distance threats has completely overhauled the layout of this race.

After her performance at Pre, University of Colorado senior Barringer has to be the favorite. In that race, she shattered the American collegiate record by an unthinkable 7 seconds with an ungodly kick (see below) over the final 150 and nearly outleaned leading 1500 runner in the world Gelete Burka at the line.

However, never count out Shannon Rowbury. Pre was her first race of the year, and as many have pointed out, 4:03 is a pretty damn good time for a season opener. Rowbury was the '08 Trials champion in the event, and the American leader in the middle-distances after her breakout year last season.

Another major force to watch for is former Wolverine Willard. Along with Barringer, Willard has been engaged in a duel to lower the American steeplechase record over the past two years, culminating last year with battles at both the Trials and in Bejiing for the top spot. Willard also sports a 1:59 800 meter clocking, making her not only the fastest half miler in the field, but the fastest half miler in America in 2009 - and she's not even running that event!

Barringer will inevitably be tired from a long NCAA season - but she was tired from a long NCAA season last summer too, when she and Willard snapped the steeplechase record multiple times. Ultimately Barringer will not be a better 1500 meter runner than Rowbury, and should they both run the race at the World Championships in August, I do not doubt that Rowbury will come out on top. But while Rowbury's entire training focus for the past year has been on this August, Barringer has peaked for several races, including three NCAA championships, a regional race, and Pre. She will get the upper hand again at USA's.

Willard did not look entirely comfortable in the early stages of the 1500 at Pre, but came on with the strongest kick in the field to place as the second American. Don't expect her to beat Rowbury again, but do expect her to be battling over the final 200 to catch the leading duo. It is almost unthinkable that in arears of this lead pack will be 2008 Olympians Erin Donohue and Christen Wurth-Thomas, fighting for a spot in the top five. U.S. women's distance running is turning a corner, and there is no better playground to watch that change progress than the 1500 meters. Donohue is a very smart runner who will know when to go and when not to go - but at this point it seems unlikely she will have the raw wheels to reel in Willard over the final quarter mile. Wurth-Thomas has turned a corner this season, clocking an impressive 4:03 showing at Pre.

Expect these two not to be far off the leaders. Donohue's race at Pre was nearly her personal best, and it was a season opener - a clear indicator, just like Rowbury's race was, that there is more in the tank.

Prediction
1. Jenny Barringer 4:04.5
2. Shannon Rowbury 4:04.7
3. Anna Willard 4:05.4
4. Erin Donohue 4:06.0
5. Christin Wurth-Thomas 4:06.0
6. Lindsey Gallo 4:09.5

2009 Prefontaine Classic Women's 1500 Meters







Song of the Day: 'Rockin the Suburbs' by Ben Folds Five is a hilarious send up of everything that subpar, made-for-money, unartistic modern rock music tries to be. The irony is, that in parodying that kind of music, he's made a rock and roll hit of his own. If you haven't seen proof Ben Folds' talent before, check out his piano work on songs like 'Philosophy' or 'Brick', and you'll know that he's a seriously underrated artist with a great sound - except that no one really seems to bother to listen to his lyrics. I don't think very many people who listen to him realize that his music is directly making fun of the 'artists' they listen to and the false 'real' lives they lead. Lines like "all alone in my white boy pain" and "you don't know what it's like, being male, middle-class and white" are vicious attacks on the absurd popularity of untalented, shallow musicians. For further lambasting of other music genres, check out his absurd cover of Dr. Dre's absurd "Bitches Ain't Shit."



Thursday, June 18, 2009

A Bloody Mess of Films: "Låt den rätte komma in" and the Vampire Revolution

MODERN MOVIEGOERS HAVE BEEN ASSAULTED by a slew of offensively bad vampire flicks over the years, but none of them can quite take the cake from 2008's Twilight. The writing was so poor, it was if the actors realized it, and attempted to actually create their own form of understated dialogue to avoid saying the lines they'd been scripted.

Twilight also inevitably suffered from the "adaptation syndrome", also known as the "Harry Potter illness", which causes its victims to pursue a career in writing strictly embarassing dialouge and rushed, random action sequences that have about a 50% probability of being related to the overall plot of the film. Considering the writing, the acting actually was not that bad, and certainly could have been much worse. Several scenes needed to be cut, and a focus rediscovered. The 'climax' of the film was a moment in the dance hall of mirrors where the viewer had maybe three seconds of anticipation, where he wondered what was going to happen. After that the movie literally could not have been any more predictable.

I've never read the Twilight books, but just from knowing the general story, you can almost tell that it has to be good (not to mention it's Potter-like popularity). It's probably a lot like The Golden Compass - you see all the cool twists and turns that recieve two or three seconds worth of attention in the film, but which comprise some of the most unique and intriguing sequences of the book.

Then, on the other side of the vampire-fiction spectrum, take something like HBO's popular show True Blood, which tries it's damndest to compensate for a lack of depth and meaning by showing over the top scenes of pornographic violence and sex. Other than the opening credit roll and Sookie Stackhouse herself, there's nothing outstanding about the show, as long as you're not counting the fact that they are very good at making you feel like there is some deeper undercurrent to the story. There is some suggestion of vampires serving as a metaphor for homosexuals - the opening credits show a roadsign saying "God Hates Fangs" (the premise of the show is that vampires have recently 'come out of the coffin', and gone public with their immortal existence in a mixed-intention attempt to fit in to human society), and stereotyped, unctuous religious preachers with unfailing Texas accents wailing and whining to the masses regarding the ungodliness of their toothed friends. There may be an idea of social criticism hidden in creator Alan Ball's (American Beauty scriptwriter) mind, but it's having trouble really coming out. The focus is largely on the often romantic, almost always immature drama between the main characters. Their is nothing special about the romance between a shapeshifter and some other denizen when the same thing happens every episode. It's entertaining to a point, but it falls into a bloody soap opera fairly quickly.

Into this world of wildly popular, questionably valuable vampire film and fiction, comes Låt den rätte komma in (Let the Right One In), a Swedish romantic-vampire film that breaks all conventions of the genre and surprises you in ways which its American counterparts have forgotten how to do. Don't worry - an American, Disnified, English-language adaptation is on the way, so none of that weird foreign stuff will get in the way of your ordinary viewing experience. In the meanwhile, though, you may actually have to settle for a seriously good film - what is, in my view, one of the best movies released in 2008 (and I've seen way more than I care to admit). The basic plot of the movie involves a 12 year old boy, an outcast in his school who is frequently bullied by his classmates, who meets a 12 year old 'girl' that moves into the flat next to him. Unlike the vampires in Twilight or True Blood, Eli has very little control over her bloodlust. There is no convenient bottled blood, like Bill Compton dines on to prevent him from snapping Sookie's neck. Eli is always hungry, and does not seem content with only sucking some of the blood from her victims - she must 'exanguinate' and kill them too.

We soon discover that she regrets deeply what she must do to survive - and also that she has been 12 "for a very long time" (vampires, of course, are immortal). Eli becomes the boy's, Oskar's, only real friend. The movie is not good because it is heartwarming, or sweet, or touching - which it can be - but rather because it is so starkly realistic, honest, and beautifully filmed, written, and acted. It does not rely on flashy crossovers to move from scene to scene, but shows the harsh Swedish landscape (a somewhat rural, snow-covered suburb of Stockholm) in long, panning takes, often following characters from behind as they move through the scene (I was reminded very much, at points, of Good Will Hunting director Gus Van Sant's film The Elephant). Ultimately, this superb directing by Tomas Alfredson contributes to the bleak reality of an quietly emotionally wrecked adolescent.

Aside from being friendless, Oskar's parents have split, and by and large, Oskar is always alone. Although this has helped shape him into the kind, but secretly vengeful boy he is, it also makes him a very sad character, and thus his relationship with Eli is all the more potent. The film is ultimately not only about the power of human relationships, but also about different forms of acceptance. Screenwriter, and writer of the novel that inspired the film, John Ajvide Lindqvist does an excellent job of subtley conveying these emotions, without relying on pointlessly graphic visuals or painfully average dialogue to do so. We know that Eli is twelve years old by the way she acts, so her relationship with Oskar is not strange. But we also are given - gently - the feeling that she has an almost otherworldy wisdom, regarding even the simplest things, that truly brings her character to life. It is this innocent wisdom, coupled with the background of not-overdone sporadic acts of horrific violence, that makes the story a truly unique one.

Let the Right One In is everything that a vampire film could be, and more. It is incredibly different, and that is why American audiences aren't as acquainted with it as they are with other recent foreign films, like, say, El Labertino del Fauno (Pan's Labyrinth) or Cuidad de Deus (City of God). Maybe that is a good thing, though - not having popularity on its side might just give the forthcoming American adaptation a shot at being something more distracting bloody puff.




Song of the Day: 'Guarenteed' by Eddie Vedder is truly one of the most remarkable songs he has ever composed. I never had an appreciation for the Pearl Jam frontman until he released the Grammy and Golden Globe nominated Into the Wild soundtrack, from which I instantly took a liking to his solo work. Until recently I had always favored 'Hard Sun' and 'Rise' off of that album, but after watching this live performance here below I had to change my mind. Aside from a hauntingly inspiring tune, the poetic lyrics somehow come as to close to capturing the spirit of Chris McCandless as any other medium has done thus far. The film and novel both did a fairly good job, but this soundtrack should be viewed as a separate entity, aside from being a major contributing force to the strength of Sean Penn's film.

Knowing the story of Chris McCandless well (he graduated college and embarked on a Emersonian journey into the wildnernesses of America in search of "raw, transcendent experience" unavailable in city, corporate, career-oriented society) the lyrics make a kind of spiritual sense even on first listening. Circles they grow and they swallow people whole/Half their lives they say goodnight to wives they'll never know." We are swallowed whole by the circles of society, the endless repetition of it all, the mind-numbing tasks and schedules and irrelevancies that we fill our days with. We never pause to stop and look within ourselves, to our true yearnings and callings and desires, to the person that we really are, that we really were before 'responsibility' struck. We easily forget the purer, more genuine joy of childhood as we fall off the precipice of a cliff at the edge of a field of rye. We no longer listen to Ralph Waldo Emerson, the most influential American poet of the 19th century, and widely considered a vital figure in the American transcendetalist movement:

Live no longer to the expectation of these decieved and decieving people with whom we converse. Say to them, O father, O mother, O wife, O brother, O friend, I have lived with you after appearances hitherto. Henceforth I am the truth's. Be it known unto you that henceforward I obey no law less than the eternal law. I will have no covenants but proximities. I shall endeavor to nourish my parents, to support my family, to be the chaste husband of one wife, - but these relations I must fill after a new unprecendented way. I appeal from your customs. I must be myself. I cannot break myself any longer for you, or you. If you can love for what I am, we shall be the happier. If you cannot, I will still seek to deserve that you should.

McCandless listened to himself before all institutional pressures and experienced a kind of freedom and adventure which most human beings only dream about, and endlessly pursue through other socially accepted avenues. The lyrics of Vedder's song match McCandless' contempt for these artificial replacements for reality: Everyone I come across, in cages they bought expresses his anti-materialistic leaning. In regards to his peers, his critics:

They think of me and my wandering, but I'm never what they thought/I've got my indignation, but I'm pure in all my thoughts/I'm alive...

People accustomed to lives of luxury, living a world they dare to call real, when it is anything but, manufacturing false definitions of responsibility - these people will have a very hard time ever understanding Chris when they think of him and all of his wandering. "To be great is to be misunderstood," Emerson wrote. McCandless has his individuality, but he also has a Thoreau-like purity, an almost holy aura that Penn did an excellent job of conveying in the film. To live a life of nonconformity and self-reliance in 2009 America ("in actual and in intellectual life"), as advocated by Thoreau and Emerson, as lived by McCandless, seems nearly impossible within society - but Chris struggled in tune to the heartbeat of Emerson's words:

What I must do, is all that concerns me, not what the people think. This rule, equally arduous in actual and in intellectual life, may serve for the whole distinction between greatness and meanness (average). It is the harder, because you will always find those who think they know what is your duty better than you know it. It is easy in the world to live after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.

Vedder dedicates the song in the video below to someone in the audience named Carinne - and since the show takes place at Virginia Beach, and the McCandless family lives in Alexandria, VA, I'm fairly certain he's referring to Carinne McCandless, Chris' sister - and more explicity with the line - If ever there was someone to keep me at home...It would be you...

...and Chris' final words, scrawled on a bus in the mountains of Denali National Park in Alaska: HAPPINESS ONLY REAL WHEN SHARED.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

USA Track and Field Championships PREVIEW: Men's Middle Distance

Men's 800 - Up front this field looks almost identical to last year's magical Olympic Trials race, which saw three Oregonians come from behind to win in a mad dash to the finish over the final 150 meters. The returning champ, Nick Symmonds, is undefeated this year and has to be the favorite. He won the Prefontaine Classic handily, almost toying with the world class field to burst away to victory with 300 remaining. This is Symmonds', a Division 3 product out of Williamette, race to lose.

Prime competition will come from perennial 800 powerhouse Khadevius Robinson, who was shockingly leaned out at the line by Christian Smith for the final spot on Olympic team last summer. "KD" is one of the classiest guys in the game, and one of the greatest competitors in American track today. He is getting up there in years, but he would not have decided to come back for another year if he was not sure he would be at the top of his game. The rest of the field should be very aware of him.

While he is certainly a favorite for a top 3 place and thus a position on the World team, University of Oregon junior phenom Andrew Wheating should also be considered a dark horse for the victory. Symmonds beat him handily in the Trials last year, but Wheating has been progressing well throughout the collegiate season, and is fresh off of two NCAA individual crowns in the 800 (indoor and outdoor) and two team titles (cross country and indoor). He ran 1:46.low last week to win NCAA's over a very quality field, but supposedly had stomach issues and a hamstring injury caused by dehydration. To me, these claims are usually not believable, but in this case it is, seeing as how easily Wheating made running 1:47 look in the preliminaries. When the final 100 comes, Symmonds better have a few steps on him at least, or Wheating could steal the title.

Battling Wheating down to the wire last week in Fayatteville was Texas standout Tevan Everett, also running a 1:46.low en-route to a second place finish. Everett is the real deal - teammate of 2008 NCAA 800 champion Jacob Hernandez, he has impeccable form and is able to go out in 23 seconds looking very contained and within himself.

Everett runs very much in the style of Robinson himself - hard out front from the gun, with a huge positive split. Symmonds and Wheating, on the other hand, start off more conservatively, and run closer to even splits, saving powerfully devastating kicks for the final 150 meters. In the video below, notice how 200 meters into the race, the three runners who wound up making the Olympic team by finishing 1-2-3 are in the last three places. That race was the ultimate demonstration of smart running - although Symmonds had to make an incredibly dangerous maneuver heading into the final turn to pull it off.

Of course you can never count out runners like Christian Smith, second to Symmonds at the Pre Classic and the surprise bronze medallist at the Trials last year (the one who dives to the finish with KD below); Jonathan Johnson and Duane Solomon, perennial contenders; Jacob Hernandez (if healthy); 2007 5k and 1500 world champ Bernard Lagat, who is entered in the 800; and perhaps most potently, the lost boy of Sudan-turned USA citizen, Lopez Lomong, who has potent speed. Tyler Mulder, the third place finisher at the NCAA meet, will also be in the mix.

I predict Everett taking the race out very hard, and giving KD a chance to draft a bit for once. KD will take over at 600, Symmonds will catch him with 50 to go and hold on for the narrow win. Wheating's move will be too late to catch Robinson but will get him the third place slot.

Predictions
1. Nick Symmonds 1:44.7
2. Khadevis Robinson 1:45.0
3. Andrew Wheating 1:45.2
4. Christian Smith 1:46.0
5. Tevan Everett 1:46.2
6. Lopez Lomong 1:46.2
7. Duane Solomon 1:46.4
8. Jonathan Johnson 1:46.8

2008 Olympic Trials Men's 800 Meter Final


Men's 1500 - The layout of the final will be largely determined by two college freshmen who have posted the best times in the NCAA this season. A healthy Matt Centrowitz (Oregon) and a competing German Fernandez (Okie State) could make this a very interesting race. Centrowitz, an 8:40 high school 2 miler, ran a 3:36 1500 earlier this season. Fernandez won the 1500 at the NCAA championships, and soloed a 3:55.0 mile (converts to 3:37-:38 for 1500) in the indoor season to set a national junior record. According to a flotrack.com interview, Fernandez and his coach Dave Smith were going to "talk it over" and decide how German felt before making a final decision. Likewise, Oregon coach Vin Lannana said he would see how Centrowitz's injury (caused him to jog in the last lap of the preliminary round at NCAA's) was progressing before making a decision.

Bernard Lagat, the 2007 world champion, has a recieved a bye into the world championships, so he will most likely not be racing. The favorite among the rest of the field then must be returning runner up from the Olympic Trials last year, U. of Texas graduate Leonel Manzano. Manzano has had an inconsistent year highlighted with a few great performances indicating his talent. The 2008 Olympian and two time NCAA outdoor 1500 champ ran 3:34 to win over a quality field at the Reebok NYC meet a few weeks ago at Randall's Island. Though the Prefontaine Classic did not go well for him, look for him to be on top of his form for nationals.

Another serious threat is Evan Jager, product of Jerry Schumacher and Alberto Salazar's Oregon group which includes many of the top distance runners in the nation, including Matt Tegenkamp, Chris Solinsky, Jonathan Riley, Kara Goucher, and Shalane Flanagan. Jager, a 20 year old who left the University of Wisconsin with Schumacher, has run 13:29 and 3:54 so far this year, and Schumacher knows a thing or two about peaking his runners at the right time.

Although the American record holder in the mile, Alan Webb, is also competing, he has been off form all season, not coming close to his 3:46 mark in 2007, managing only a 3:55 at the Prefontaine Classic.

If Fernandez runs, and makes it to the final, I predict he will keep it an honest race, and run out front from the gun, as he has done his whole career. Against a field of this caliber, however, that may not be the smartest move. In the end, I don't think Fernandez will run, but I do think Centrowitz will run, just based on the attitudes of their coaches.

Look for this race to play out a little faster than the 2008 Trials race. It's not the Olympics on the line this time around, only Worlds, and minus Lagat, the field will not be so conservative. The pace will be relatively slow for the first half, but it will not be 2:01, like it was at the Trials. Expect Manzano to have definitive control of this race with 300 remaining. The battle will then be on for the kick. Lomong may be tired from the 800. Webb does not have the wheels this year. Centro and Jager and young and fresh and coming off outstanding outdoor seasons. Look for them to drive past the field over the final lap to capture the other podium spots.

Predictions
1. Leonel Manzano 3:36.80
2. Matt Centrowitz 3:38.00
3. Evan Jager 3:38.00
4. Lopez Lomong 3:39.10
5. Alan Webb 3:39.20
6. Jon Rankin 3:39.30
7. Will Leer 3:39.60
8. Garrett Heath 3:43.50

2008 Olympic Trials Men's 1500 Meter Final



Song of the Day: A really neat video from Fleet Foxes, a Seattle based 'nature-rock' band that blends melodies and sounds from sources as diverse as The Beach Boys, Simon and Garfunkel, and The Mamas and the Papas. This video has two songs on it, the first 'Sun Giant', the second 'Blue Ridge Mountains'. It is hard to say what exactly Fleet Foxes has that is so unique, that no other band around today has - their sound is clearly evocative of a streamside bed of rocks in the enforested mountains, their lyrics as poetic as anything since Dylan. 'Blue Ridge Mountains' in particular bespeaks an adventure borne of the earth, recalls to mind the purity of nature on a snow day. The lyrics seem to tell of a man who is leaving his home to go traveling into the countryside, assuring his brother not to worry about him - and it is almost as if through the descriptions of his time in nature, all concern and preoccupation seems to float away. The 'answer' to the concerns of his brother seems to be the simple choral melody:

In the quivering forest,
Where the shivering dog rests,
I will do it grandfather,
Wilt to wood and end.
And the river got frozen,
And the hole got snowed in,
And near the moon glow ride,
Till the morning light.

The Fleet Foxes, in the words of Che Guevara from The Motorcycle Diaries, make you wonder: how is it possible to feel nostalgia for a world you never knew? Music can accomplish, just like the beautiful South American landscape accomplished for Guevara, a feat of deja vu, of memory, of creation, of reincarnation. Jack Kerouac wrote in The Dharma Bums:

But it seemed that I had seen the ancient afternoon of that trail, from meadow rocks and lupine posies, to sudden revisits with the roaring stream with its splashed snag bridges and undersea greennesses, there was something inexpressibly broken in my heart as though I'd lived before and walked this trail, under similar circumstances with a fellow Bodhisattva, but maybe on a more important journey, I felt like lying down by the side of the trail and remembering it all. The woods do that to you, they always look familiar, long lost, like the face of a long-dead relative, like an old dream, like a piece of forgotten song drifting across water, most of all like golden eternities of past childhood or past manhood and all the living and the dying and the heartbreak that went on a million years ago and the clouds as they pass overhead seem to testify (by their own lonesome familiarity) to this feeling.

That is what the Fleet Foxes attempt to capture, and at the very least, it is certainly what they have tapped into: the idea of nature as a spiritual reserve, holding mysteries as ancient as the universe, simple truths so fundamental and essential to our existence that we often forget they are even there, lying right before our eyes in the wild, untamed world. To recognize that emotion is one thing - to channel it is another:

Monday, June 15, 2009

What Looks Good: The Second Half of 09 at the Cinema

While the first half of 2009 has seen a taste of the great - Greg Mottola's Adventureland; a bit of the slightly above average - J.J. Abrams' Star Trek; and a decent slavering of the bad - the rushed for production X-Men, Origins; the second half of the year holds a few promising possibilities for movies that may manage to break the Hollywood mold. I'm not holding my breath on all of these - in particular the last two - but we can always hope. Some of these films have already been released, but if they have, they have not recieved very much attention, and thus probably have a somewhat limited audience, therefore justifying this 'preview'.

Away We Go - directed by Sam Mendes, written by Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida, starring John Krasinski and Maya Rudolph

You almost don't need to look beyond the credit line to see that this should be a quality movie - at the very least, it will be worth seeing. Sam Mendes, the British director of the stunning American Beauty (1999), which won five Academy Awards including best picture, doesn't usually dissapoint. His past also includes 2008's Revolutionary Road, which wasn't that bad, and Jarhead, which was pretty good. Dave Eggers, the co-writer, is one of America's preeminent nonfiction authors, his book A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius earning him a position on the final round of consideration for the Pulitzer Prize. Vendela Vida is his wife and is also a writer. Considering this movie is a romantic comedy, that seems like a great idea.

John Krasinski is, in my opinion, one of the best young actors of his generation, but has unfortunately only been given one good script: the American version of The Office. In the hands of a writer like Eggers and a director like Mendes, it seems like the perfect chance for him to shine. His co-star is Maya Rudolph, who married film genius Paul Thomas Anderson (director of There Will Be Blood, Magnolia, and Punch-Drunk Love), and is best known for her career at Saturday Night Live. Though technically unproven in film, there has been a recent streak of performers translating very well from other mediums to the silver screen, most notably Justin Timberlake in Alpha Dog. Who saw that coming?

It has thus far garnered a 7.7 rating on imbd.com, which on the whole tends to be a decently fair judge of general critical response to most movies. I'm guessing it will surpass expectations. It has already been released, but I have yet to see it. Plot-wise it is billed as a soul searching movie of an offbeat couple searching for the right place to start a family. The previews evoke hints of movies like Juno and Garden State but with a distinctly Mendes-like influence of anti-capitalist themed films American Beauty and Revolutionary Road.

The Informers - directed by Gregor Jordan, written by Bret Easton Ellis and Nicholas Jarecki, starring an ensemble cast including Mickey Rourke, Winona Ryder, Billy Bob Thornton, and Kim Basinger

This is an adaptation of Easton Ellis' short story collection of the same name. Ellis is the same mind that brought the world American Psycho. Although little has been released regarding plot detail, the story collection is widely respected in literary circles. It follows the lives of seven different people in Los Angeles who are all, in one way or another, "morally challenged." Easton is a known for his brilliant parody, dark humor, and thinly veiled distaste regarding contempory American urban life. The lines from the trailer: "You can't really make it in this town unless you're really willing to do some awful things", and "You can do anything, be anything...but happy" seem to capture the more serious, Sun Also Rises-side of the film. It seems like it will deal with the consequences of a depraved world, focused on one of the filthiest (literally and morally) cities in the world - L.A.

It has earned a 7.5 thus far on imdb.com, and was featured at the Sundance Film Festival. Certainly worth seeing. I have high expectations. Jordan doesn't have any outstanding experience as a director, but certainly has potential. Mickey Rourke is in the midst of a career turnaround after an Oscar-nominated performance in The Wrestler last year. Winona Ryder performs well even in movies that she should have never agreed to perform in - and is one of the most unnoticed and underrated actresses around today. Not to mention she likes to read J.D. Salinger in her spare time and makes small appearances in movies like Star Trek for what seems like nothing more than the experience. Not sure how you can't be a fan. Old Billy Bob has his ups and downs but with a good script he is excellent. This could be really good or it could be really bad. I think it will be really good.

The Soloist - directed by Joe Wright, written by Susannah Grant, starring Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey Jr.

The second recent movie inspired by a newspaper column - the other being last year's suprisingly entertaining Marley and Me - The Soloist is the more serious counterpart. It seems to have all the ingredients to produce excellent performances, but may not have the narrative focus to back it up into something of true greatness. Joe Wright is best known for his work on somber, sobering Keira Knightley vehicles Atonement and Pride and Prejudice, and that seems to be the exact aura which this film will attempt to convey.

The plotline follows a cello musician who becomes schizophrenic and homeless, and is befriended by a journalist who writes about him for his column. The movie bills itself as evocative of the transformative and reformative powers of music.

The Education of Charlie Banks - directed by Fred Durst, starring Jesse Eisenberg

This movie first caught my eye when I was searching for what Adventureland star Jesse Eisenberg was up to after his first big hit. Although this film only recieved a limited release back in March, I suspect that it was because of lack of funds, not lack of interest or lack of critical praise. It's earning of a 7.1 off of 440 votes on IMDB indicates that Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst's directorial debut is certainly something worth seeing.

The plotline follows college student Eisenberg, who encounters on his college campus his high school bully with whom he shared a particularly gruesome encounter. The previews and reviews indicate that this could be something of a cross between Alpha Dog and Finding Forrester, at least from what I have been able to glean.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince - directed by David Yates, written by Steve Kloves, starring Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, Alan Rickman, Helena Bonham Carter

The sixth installment in the Harry Potter series is packed with potential - but then again so were the five that came before it.

My hope for this movie is that finally starts breaking the conventions that have made the rest of the series so mind-numbingly ordinary. The good thing about pentultimate films in a saga are that they are dark by neccesity - and I say that as a good thing because by and large, dark films tend to be more honest, and honesty is one trait that the Harry Potter films have failed to pick up on thus far. The first five movies had a few moments of clarity, most of which came in third installment, but by and large they sacrificed quality for popularity. They refused to be daring, refused to create anything new, for the sake of making the feel-good family flick. They followed portions of the novels to a 'T', and when they expanded, it was never anything unique.

The movie creators never seemed to realize that adaptation of a book to a film is never as simple as following plotline and conversation. Like Charlie Kauffman experienced when trying to adapt Susan Orleans' The Orchard Thief, and later dramatized in the Academy Award nominated Adaptation, the process is an art form in and of itself. I'm not saying it's easy, nor am I trying to trash the Potter filmmakers for failing. Turning something as great as the Potter book series into an equally compelling film will inevitably be difficult. It is not that the writing was so bad - Steve Kloves is a talented screenwriter - it just was not nearly on par with Rowling's books, certainly not in the way Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy did for J.R.R. Tolkien. Nor is it a case of the acting being bad - in fact the acting is quite good. The actors which the producers found for Harry, Ron, and Hermione fill their roles effortlessly. When I go back and re-read the books, I find that the faces of the actors have come to replace the rough sketch created by own mind.

But still there is that x-factor, that fire of true creativity, that indefinable something which separates truly great films, like Lord of the Rings, from truly average films, like the entire Harry Potter series with the exception of Alfonso Cuaron's Prisoner of Azaban (which showed surprising originality) missing from the equation. Don't you ever wonder what the Potter saga would look like under the direction of a Guillermo del Toro (Pan's Labyrinth director)?

With Half Blood Prince, however, you have the pentultimate, and accordingly, darkest chapter of the Potter tale. In a best case scenario, the heartbreaking events of the book will propel a more honest, realistic, and therefore emotionally moving script, that better conveys the power of the novels. Empire Strikes Back, the pentultimate episode in the Star Wars saga, is widely recognized as the greatest science fiction movie of all time - it was also by far the darkest of the original trilogy. It saved the Star Wars franchise name from later calamaties such as the Attack of the Clones, and if we really want to get high and mighty, the entire prequel trilogy itself. My hope is that Half Blood Prince can do the same for the Potter universe - by avoiding a Disnified ending and writing dangerously for the sake of the story, not for the sake of the money it is guarenteed to make.

Taking Woodstock - directed by Ang Lee, written by James Schamus, starring Demetri Martin, Liev Schrieber, Emile Hirsche

From the makers of Academy Award winning films Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Brokeback Mountain comes the tale behind the creation of the world's most infamous music festival - the free concert that inspired a generation and reflected the enormous uniting power of the art of music. It has enormous potential, to both fit into the mold of typical artsy 'rebellious' films that try to be deeply moving and funny at the same time, or to artistically capture a crucial moment in American cultural history, with a human backstory at its heart. I lean towards somewhere in the middle - Lee and Schamus are a proven team, and this script is in good hands. They have compiled a group of beyond competent actors, and Comedy Central's Demetri Martin seems perfect for the role of the manager of the farm property where the concert itself is held. Also starring is Eugene Levy. This does not seem to be so much a movie about the actual music of the concert, as it is about how the concert happened and what Woodstock meant to people at the time. From the trailer, I see it as a cross between Old School and I'm Not There - and that's really pushing it. Whatever comes out of this, it will be unique. 7.9 rating on IMDB, will be released August 14th.


Song of the Day - 'Black Sand', with a video just released by Jenny Lewis, is the first song on her 2008 album Acid Tongue and the second single from the album. The video itself is just as noteworthy as the song - a very interesting ghost-like visage of Lewis floats across the screen amidst shots of seaside cliffs and a broiling Pacific Ocean. The song is starkly evocative of the Pacific Coast. While the song has drew much criticism for it's repetition of the line "on the black sand", I see this as a device to enforce the idea that the black sand which she refers to is something more than just darkly colored loose dirt, but rather the larger world around us, slowly being turned into ashes by some kind of natural disaster. I imagine the song presupposing a postapocalyptic scene - a world ruined by perhaps environmental neglect, or some unnamed phenomona as in Cormac McCarthy's The Road - and turned to ash. This is backed up by shots in the music video of a weather map of the country, and a green and red storm moving across it. She asks: "Who is going to mind, when the end is nigh?" Though there is no buildup to this line to explain it, it seems to be a subtle reference to the comparative unimportance of what many consider to be vital, in the wake of disaster. When the world is covered by black sand, the love of the song's characters fades away - a lost love made even more poignant by Lewis' high pitched, mournful voice throughout. A beautiful song and a beautiful music video, very evocative regardless how it is interpreted.

Black Sand

Monday, June 8, 2009

I Was Born Secular and Inconsolable

THE YOUNG WOMAN that brought three thousand people together in a hot and sticky theatre is only smiling goodnaturedly when she struts out on stage. She carries a definitive swagger, a southern charm with attitude, a sadness in her smile betraying some sorrow from a time passed but not quite gone. In her step there is a hop and a swagger but it feels authentic, real, real like her prescence on stage feels authentic and real. From behind a curtain of red bangs she peers out at the crowd: effortlessly sweet, excitable, gingerspicy. She's not the bad girl, never was - she sports a Dylan t-shirt and tight blue jeans like it was the outfit she was born in, pays homage to the city and her opening act without a hint haughty Hollywood in her voice.

"Hello ya'll," she'll say, with a highpitched tang of the South.

How this California girl can sing and strut like a homegrown Dixie honey - no one knows. What they know is this: she can make them feel.

You can plug yourself into an iPod or set yourself down in front of a television set and be properly moved and have a worthwhile musical experience. It will be evocative, sublime, transcendent. It will be everything that art can be and you will be happy. It will not even come close to approximating a live performance.

The woman on stage may suspect this. She may understand, in however rudimentary a form, that she has an effect on her audience that moves beyond the realm of audio stimulation. But if she has this understanding she betrays none of it. You can look into her eyes from twenty feet away and see nothing but a plain honesty, a kind of genuine attitude that has more to do with her success than lyrics or sound arrangements ever could. It is the ultimate demonstration of the power of style over content - except that her content's not exactly slouching, either.

She does not try to be anything or anyone. She just is. She exudes an air so genuine that you have difficulty avoiding awe of her. Perhaps it would not be so striking, so heartbreaking, if you were not surrounded day in and day out by men and women, tasks and assignments, pasttimes and pursuits, of a supremely less honest demeanor. But when she sings, when she takes the microphone playfully in her hand and launches into a ballad born of the land, it is as if none of that ever existed.


When the main event of the show comes, the rest of the band retreats into the shadows and the theatre grows quiet. It is as if they knew that this moment had been coming and respectfully fall into silence. The opening chords of 'Silver Lining' hush the remaining voices. Around her, the rest of the theatre is slowly melting away - the ancient chipped-stone arches, the red and green strobes, the torn wainscoting on the far walls, the massive cross-sected throb of homo-sapien - and when she begins to sing, it is truly gone. She stands at the end of a tunnel of black, like in a dream, singing across space and time to you and only you. In an instant, with everything boiled down to its simplest quality, with all trivialities of what those sad little people like to call the 'real' world long forgotten, you can feel the meaning of her words without any conjuring on your own behalf. Have you ever felt so wicked, as when you willed your love to die? Her music is infinitely applicable - anyone who's ever yearned for something deeper, ever been in love, ever been homesick, ever wondered where there place in the world was, has a line in her song.

That, there, is music at its best, at its most powerful. When it functions on a level just as deep as a moving work of literature, just as effective and immediate as a psychadelic. But with music you don't do anything, you give yourself over, you're in the hands of your performer. The more you give up the more you will experience. It's not about letting your body go in dance, but about letting your soul go, about trusting the Great Nowhere to take you to a Great Somewhere. Jenny Lewis is but a guide through those desert places, if only you trust yourself enough to take the trip.


ON THE PRACTICAL SIDE her set ran roughly something like this:

See Fernando

You are What You Love

Pretty Bird

Silver Lining

Carpetbagger

Bad Man's World

Happy

Rise Up With Fists

Handle With Care (Traveling Wilburys cover)

Acid Tongue

The Next Messiah

Born Secular



The best of which was easily 'Silver Lining' - an absolutley stunning performance. When she sang the rest of the stage around her really did seem to melt away until there was nothing left but just her and her voice and her words and her feelings and you knew what she said to be true by something almost primal deep inside of you. I took no drugs or alcohol before heading over to the Trocadero, by the way, and did not even go down to South Street (Dixie) to drop acid on my tongue. My mind was completely clear - as clear as it's going to be after a hard thirteen mile run.

'Born Secular' was also outstanding and very noteworthy, as were 'Happy' and 'Bad Man's World'. Not that the others were not outstanding (she didn't sing a single song that I didn't thoroughly enjoy except for maybe 'The Next Messiah' - I don't think i could say that about any other artist today), but these four were transcendent.

Song of the Day: Sorry, but you can't have a review of a Jenny Lewis concert without having a Jenny Lewis number as the song of the day (I do apologize for two straight posts with two straight JL songs of the day). This particular song I was not a huge fan of at first - I just didn't think it sounded very good. But I wasn't appreciating it. The backing vocals are expertly used - perhaps better than in any other song penned by her with the exception of 'Acid Tongue' itself.


Friday, June 5, 2009

Why I Love Jenny Lewis

Because in a world of cold exactness, she is a welcome breath of fresh air;

Because everytime I hear her voice, the blank passionlessness of average life fades away;

Because in a day and age paralyzed by quiet desperation, her white lies are a gentle reassurance;

Because her voice alone is poetry with sound;

Because when I see how dishonest our society is, how false our intentions, how fleeting our promises, I can turn to her music for a moment of truth;

Because when I hear her I can close my eyes and put myself beside a little waterfall in the middle of a great nowhere, where all of the irrelevancies of the city are far behind;

Because my creative imagination is gagged and bound by the cumbersome duty of a smog-filled, soul-zapping industrial economy, and she sets it free;

Because when all the contrivancies of the 'real' world - all the beer-soaked promises, all the patriotic reassurances, all the professed dreams and opportunities - fail to make me happier than I was as a child, I find solace in knowing there is something better.

Song of the Day: Fittingly, Jenny Lewis' 'Silver Lining'. This is a slowed down version of her most popular song. Somehow I think this solo, acoustic version is even better than the original released with Rilo Kiley. If you're wondering why the song is so poignant, maybe it's because of how much emotion she's putting into it: she's almost crying by the end. I'm not afraid to call her one of the greatest living American artists.

Thursday, June 4, 2009

Franklyn: A Cult Classic in the Making

Taking elements from movies as diverse as Crash, Tideland, Donnie Darko, and Pan's Labyrinth, Franklyn manages a uniqueness all its own that really does not belong in Hollywood - thus it is but a little suprise that it has not yet seen (nor is there yet scheduled) a North American release. New York film school graduate Gerald McMorrow's debut feature film opened at the London Film Festival last October, and has recieved almost unanimous good considering, but-type reviews from critics thus far. It has been criticized for not delivering an emotional climax, for taking subtlety to a level beyond simple confusion, and for losing its audience before they can reap the reward for their attention. All of which is of course beyond the point. The same critics universally praised - with the exception of Donnie - far more confusing films (including all four mentioned above!), which came from experienced, well-established directors. Crash won Best Picture in 2004, Tideland was Terry Gilliam's arthouse masterpiece, and I don't think I've ever heard a bad critical word regarding the Spanish-language underworld of Pan's Labyrinth. The bottom line being: if you managed to follow those movies, you can't complain of feeling lost by Franklyn.

Ultimately, it just seems very unlikely that many critics truly did follow every aspect of a movie like Tideland from start to finish - I sure as hell don't claim to have done so. But the problem is that they write reviews like they have. True art should move you without you completely understanding why. Mystery, ambiguity, and subtelty are crucial benchmarks of good film, literature and music. The infamous Ernest Hemingway, master of subtelty, of conveying complex emotions through devastatingly simple, terse, 'athletic' prose, adressed the issue when responding to critics of Old Man and the Sea, which ultimately earned him the Nobel Prize for Literature.


Then there is the other secret. There isn't any symbolism. The sea is the sea. The old man is an old man. The boy is a boy and the fish is a fish. The shark are all sharks no better and no worse. All the symbolism that people say is shit. What goes beyond is what you see beyond when you know.


to Bernard Betenson, 1952, Selected Letters, p. 780


'What goes beyond is what you see beyond when you know.' What a perfect window into understanding how the viewer should approach a movie such as McMorrow's Franklyn. This is not to say that movies should be ambigious for the sake of being ambigious. Hemingway explains again:




In truly good writing no matter how many times you read it you do not know
how it is done. That is because there is a mystery in all great writing and
that mystery does not dissect out. It continues and it is always valid. Each
time you re-read you see or learn something new.
to Harvey Breit, 1952, Selected Letters, p. 770


One of the film's strongest points is that it does not broadcast its
intentions from the beginning. It is this unpredictability that has sparked
many of the 'negative' reviews it has recieved thus far; it is this
unpredictablity that separates it into the 99th percentile of Hollywood
films. Much like Donnie Darko or Tideland, the audience does not know why certain things are happening, but the film manages to convey the unshakeable emotion that it is important. In watching the movie I did not attempt to dissect every detail, certainly not on a first viewing, but rather let the film surprise me, using my feelings,
rather than the critical, mathematical part of my mind (admittedly a very
small part), to understand. I think if you let your feelings follow a work
of true art, you will come away with a greater emotional reward and more
thorough comprehension than you would from a hard-boiled analytical analysis. For me, this was certainly true for a movie like I'm Not There - and it proved true on a lesser scale (for Franklyn is just not that confusing) in this case.

What Franklyn reveals is not only the importance of imagination, but its neccesity. The four main characters each are searching for something outside of the realms of
conventional reality. McMorrow uses elements of science fiction twists to strengthen his plot and accentuate the imaginations of his characters. Margaret Atwood, an excellent writer of prose, has adamantly opposed her work being called science fiction because she thinks it lacks academic credibility - but movies like Franklyn, books like Atwood's own The Handmaid's Tale, and McCarthy's The Road, are all very much science fiction with a very serious reputation as significant works of art. Atwood
should take note of this, and realize that her resistance is a moot point, and not an argument she wants to make. Without moving into the surreal and the fantastical, Franklyn would be just another film. With expert use of these elements, imagination comes to play a vital role. Each character is searching for something that everyday life can no longer provide. J.D. Salinger's Catcher in the Rye offers some perspective here, from the voice of Holden's "queer" former teacher, Mr. Antolini:

This fall I think you're riding for - it's a special kind of fall, a horrible
kind. The man falling isn't permitted to feel or hear himself hit bottom. He just keeps falling and falling. The whole arrangement's designed for men who, at some time or other in their lives, were looking for something their own environment couldn't supply them with. Or they thought their own environment couldn't supply them with. So they gave up looking. They gave it up before they ever really even got started.


Instead of giving up the search, the focus characters of Franklyn create their own realities, fantasy realms that replace a world too cold and unforgiving for their spirits to manage. They are all falling, they are all looking for something their own environment cannot supply them with. The concluding confluence is rewarding and surprising, if a bit difficult to follow. But we're not talking about reading Ulysses here - it's a good movie, with great performances by both Eva Green (Casino Royale) and newcomer Sam Riley, with editing and directing beyond the scope of the rookie director's experience. Overall a thoroughly worthwhile experience, and I expect it to be one of the top films of 2009 - should it ever be given a North American release date, that is.


Song of the Day: "Romeo and Juliet" by The Killers (cover of the Dire Straits). A great cover of a great song. After hearing this my respect for The Killers has blossomed. They have managed to convey the simplicity and raw emotion of one of the greatest songs of the 20th century. It's hard to say exactly what makes this song so great - mostly likely it's lyrics, as they stand on their own as a poem in a way that music hasn't done since the Dylan era. The more limited the intrusion on the lyrics, the better this song is. With simple, basic harmonics and a good, clear voice this song could not be bad in any hands. With The Killers, one of the best bands of the 21st century, it is near genius.

Skip in to 1:00 if you don't want to hear Brandon Flowers' and co. give a brief introduction. For all the various controversies over the years revolving around Flowers himself, he actually seems like a pretty good guy, very genuine. (I think my favorite quote of his came when he was talking about Green Day's live performance in England, where thousands of Europeans are singing along to 'American Idiot': "I just thought it was really cheap. To go to a place like England or Germany and sing that song — those kids aren't taking it the same way that he meant it." Which is a damn good point.

Live at Abbey Road:


Tuesday, June 2, 2009

The Top 25 Science Fiction Movies Of All Time

A few notes about the list: I won't claim that it is entirely comprehensive. I of course have not seen every science fiction movie ever created. I know there are a few notable exceptions that have been left off of this list, you'll know what they are when you are finished. Most clearly missing in my mind, is Blade Runner, which I've only seen bits and pieces of, and which could be a serious candidate for this list. Other than that, there are certainly omissions that will make many angry, but that is inevitable with any exclusive list. I tried to judge the top 25 not only by outstanding directing and acting, but by cultural significance, popularity, originality, artistic achievement, social relevancy and commentary, and thematic elements with a clear grounding in the science fiction genre. More than all of those elements, I was looking for artistically compelling narratives that were both entertaining and deep, critical, and moving.


Dr. Strangelove
A Clockwork Orange
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
V for Vendetta

25. Enemy Mine
Released in 1985 - Director Wolfgang Petersen
Timeless, socially relevant tale of two survivors from opposite species at war who survive a crash on an uninhabited moon and learn friendship despite incredible cultural differences.

24. The Butterfly Effect
2004 - Eric Bress and J. Mackye Gruber
Ashton Kutcher's best role to date comes in this time travel story based upon the premise of the ancient chaos theory, that should something as minute as the flapping of a butterfly's wings occur in Japan, it will change the course of events in New York City. As such the main character is sent on a journey through time to 'correct' the universe, ultimately discovering that a perfect world is impossible and that self-sacrifice is the only way to save those he loves. Though the dialogue can be trite and the acting, aside from Kutcher, only passable, the story is well presented - and there is nothing else quite like it out there.

23. E.T.
1982 - Steven Spielberg
Obviously a classic. Doesn't quite fit into the genre of the other movies on this list, but it seems impossible to make a top sci-fi movies list and not include E.T. I don't particularly like this "softer" version of science fiction - the version which sacrifices theme for the sake of making a family movie - but E.T. is so good that it doesn't matter. The idea of the friendly alien, sparked in part by Chewbacca, would have never been completely possible had E.T. never shown up.

22. Dark City
1998 - Alex Proyas
Dark and forboding story which many say inspired The Matrix. A dying race of aliens has taken total control over a small city floating through space. They perform experiments through the endless nights on the humans by manipulating their memories and surroundings, the ultimate goal being to learn from humanity what it takes to 'survive'. Of course, one man manages to resist their experiments, takes on their unique powers, and does not sleep when commanded. The final fifteen minutes are drawn out and unoriginal and almost completely mirror, in less graphic form, the final battle between Neo and the Agents in Matrix Revolutions. However, the beauty of the film is in its powerful representation of the meaninglessness of human society side by side with the tremendous strength of the individual alone - fighting for the right to be something that he never was in the best of human cities: free.

21. Close Encounters of the Third Kind
1977 - Steven Spielberg
Posed the scenario of aliens coming to Earth in a realistic form for the first time in modern cinema. Paved the way for The X-Files and other Earth-bound dramas.

20. Aliens
1986 - James Cameron

19. Serenity
2005 - Joss Whedon

18. Equalibrium
2002 - Kurt Wimmer
Ninja-like fight scenes that exceed The Matrix, Christian Bale instead of Keanu Reeves, and featuring a far more relevant and realistic dystopia - it is difficult indeed to understand why this movie has an 'underground' following at all. It is tough to swallow, not flashy, unforgivingly morbid by nature. No element of the story has been included for the sake of a crowd-pleasing plot twist or diversion. It does move slow at points, and lacks the dramatic flair of the Wachowski Brothers' original flick. Yet it is hard to say anything bad. This dystopia has outlawed feeling and emotion outright, replacing a war-torn society with a strictly military-industrial complex that comes out to something of a cross between 1984 and Children of Men.

17. 28 Days Later
2002 - Danny Boyle
From the director of Slumdog Millionaire comes the starter for the best zombie franchise in business. The simplicity of the story-line is the strongest point: England is being overwhelmed by a virus inducing mania amidst all infected. It completely avoids cliche, and has reinvented the subgenre by making the zombies fast. Since the original Dawn of the Dead, the infected have been slow, quick to bite creatures whom you just had to be careful of. In the wake of 28 Days Later, zombies have become superhuman infectious vampires; witness just in the past seven years how things have changed: I am Legend, the remake of Dawn of the Dead, the sequal 28 Weeks Later, and the soon to be cult classic Doomsday are just a few examples of movies which owe a debt to Boyle. The cinematography, as in Slumdog, is beautiful. It is primarily a horror movie, but contains poignant elements of survival and a Cormac McCarthy-like starkness that I doubt the film version of The Road itself is going to be able to capture.

16. Jurassic Park
1993 - Steven Spielberg
A brilliantly entertaining and timeless tale that has become the staple dinosaur story of our generation.

15. Gattaca
1997- Andrew Niccol
Instead of outlawing emotion as in Equalibrium, Niccol's take on the future outlaws normalcy. Genetic studies have progressed to the point where the health of newborn babies are not left to chance - they are engineered to be perfect, and the top jobs in society are held strictly by those who have had their genes modified for perfection - free of disease and susceptibility to all various conditions and illnesses. It is a classic take on the ancient debate of nature versus nurture, of talent versus hard work.

14. Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
1986 - Leonard Nimoy

13. Sunshine
2007 - Danny Boyle

12. Men in Black
1997 - Barry Sonnefeld

11. Terminator
1984 - James Cameron

10. 2001: A Space Odyssey

1968 - Stanely Kubrick

9. Independence Day
1996 - Roland Emmerich

8. Dr. Strangelove

7. Alien
1979 - Ridley Scott

6. The Matrix
1999 - The Wachowski Brothers

5. Terminator 2
1991 - James Cameron

4. 12 Monkeys
1995 - Terry Gilliam

3. Donnie Darko
2001 - Richard Kelly

2. Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope
1978 - George Lucas

1. Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
1981 - Irvin Kershner



No I did not forget about Ghostbusters, Back to the Future, or Planet of the Apes. I have never seen Blade Runner, and that makes many top lists as well.


Song of the Day: "Pistachio" by Lisa Hannigan
Off of her debut album Sea Sew (she stitched the cover design herself).This here is quite a good live performance. Her music has a distinctively Irish flair, in a way that no one since Bono or Dolores O'Riordan has managed to convey. I favor her over both U2 and The Cranberries - the latter tried too hard to be pop, the former tried too hard not to be pop. Hannigan and her band are effortlessly themselves in a way that is very unique in today's commericialized music industry. I first heard "I Don't Know" when Lisa appeared on the Colbert Report (that was a good idea, by the way - she actually did seem to get the Colbert 'bump'), and then I bought her new album. Aside from "Pistachio", both "Teeth" and "Lille" stick out as highlights of an album that doesn't really have a weak point.