On April 9th, 1999, two things happened in Sacramento: I turned twenty years old, and The Matrix opened. The Matrix was a monumental film for me as it made me receptive and open for specific philosophical ideas and sent me on the way to pour soi from en soi. It would have been something, I suppose, that started me off on the road to being a philosopher, or philosophically inclined, but in this instance, I can easily credit it to watching The Matrix.
Back then, when I first talked with my dad about the film, something he said signaled to me that I was the one affected, and not someone mature enough to have already gone through a Cartesian epistemological trial by fire. He said, "That was a pretty cool idea for an action film." For him, a fancy action movie, using never before seen technological innovations, with an underlying theme of Cartesian existence problems, was novel.
Walking out of Inception the other day, after the last credit rolled and the house lights came up (saw it on IMAX, no 3D: really the best way to view cinema), that's pretty much what I said, "That was a pretty cool idea for an action film." When I really want to see a movie, I tend to read as many reviews as I can stomach, which isn't too many, but I've noticed that: 1) local liberal alt-newspapers tend to be harsh, but not as harsh as the AV Club in The Onion, which has quite good reviews; and 2) my opinion tends to be close to either reviewer in The New Yorker, which is generally snobby, uppity, and above all, a fan of cinema. With Inception, I didn't quite agree with Denby (one of The New Yorker's two reviewers).
I enjoyed the film. I thought some of the action sequences were awesome, especially the free-falling and weightlessness problem the characters deal with near the end. I did think the only real human aspect of the film is Leonardo di Caprio's character Cobb's relationship with his wife, Mal, played by Marion Cotilliard. I didn't find the storyline too ridiculously hard to follow, but that doesn't mean that simpler would have been bad. I was curious as to why I was rooting for one energy empire over another, and how exactly the world would be under the kid Fischer's domination had he not broken up his father's companies, supposedly of course.
And then there's the ending, which I suspected in the first few minutes, paid attention for throughout, and was not really shocked about when it happened. I can say that it bothers me that it bothered me at all. I more upset with myself for being annoyed at the ending, than I am actually annoyed at the ending. Does that make sense? My reason being for that is that I'm a huge fan of Thomas Pynchon's masterpiece Gravity's Rainbow, and one of the themes that he explores is one of the tenets of Post-Modern literature: the unreliability of a narrator. Whether a narrator is a first person "I" or simply the voice that tells the story, it wasn't really until GR that the reliability of said storyteller was ever in question. That's one of the annoying thing for readers who don't like Thomas Pynchon; sometimes his narrators are unreliable. This is not an oversight by a crappy writer; this is a deliberate way of messing with the reader and the art-form.
The questions I had leaving Inception were far more broad that Corrie's, but I attribute that to my comfort level with Pynchonian ideas about storytelling. I'll relay some of them here after some time, when the movie isn't so new, and I won't be spoiling anything. The ending annoyed me because I felt it was an easy cop-out, and I hope that didn't ruin anything. Maybe a few readers having not seen the film might, and after having read this, figured out the same thing.
But, I think I ran the train off the tracks...I definitely enjoyed the hell out of the movie. I think any film that makes me write so boringly about it, about it's themes and ideas--dreams and their importance--has got to be either great or atrocious.
I mentioned a while back that I'd been busy with jobs and apartment searches and writing a weird piece for Corrie's family reunion auction. Well, I finished that weird piece for the auction, and I could say there is a connection, absolutely accidental, between it and Inception, but I don't want to get into details. I want to let it explain itself. I call it The Big Weirdness.
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Sunday Cinema Notes 1: Women Directors and Missouri Filming
When I was a kid, one of those crappy nineties action movies that my brother and I loved was Point Break. If you're around my age and a guy, you probably remember it fondly; if you're older that me, you probably remember it as trash...Keanu Reeves plays an FBI agent out to catch bank-robber Patrick Swayze, Lori Petty plays the girl, even Anthony Kiedis gets in the act, playing an asshole-surfer-drug dealer. The director of the film was Kathryn Bigelow.
Kathryn Bigelow also directed the most recent Best Picture Oscar award winner, The Hurt Locker, which also won her the Best Director award, making her the first woman to win it. I finally got around to watching it...I'd wanted to, but didn't make it in New York as other movies caught our attention better. One of the roommates rented it, and we watched it on the big tv. I posted a few minutes ago about the intense incinerator scene in Toy Story 3, but this film is nearly nonstop intensity. Not quite a downer, not a political statement, just a portrait of an adrenaline junkie with a deathwish surfing the thrill of heat and hostility, The Hurt Locker barrels through crises both large and small, almost all of which are life threatening. Hard to believe that a simple scene with the main character and his wife and toddler at the grocery store could be so affective. For anybody who doesn't know, it was bothering me, so I looked it up: the name is slang dating back to Vietnam and means "the infirmary", like, "he's banged up, he's in the hurt locker getting mended."
Another amazing film I've been wanting to discuss here has been called "country noir", one of the best films of 2010, and soon to be in the canon of best feminist films ever made. It was written and directed by Debra Granik, and goes by the nearly pornographic title of Winter's Bone. It's a mix of hillbillies and Goodfellas, country folk turned gangster by way of meth-amphetamine, and one seventeen-year-old girl trying to save the house. Jennifer Lawrence plays Ree Dolly, the young heroine who needs to track down her crystal-meth cooking father before the sheriff takes the house and land as payment for skipping bond, all while also raises her two siblings and taking care of her mostly invalid mother. Most gangster films tend toward the predictable side, but this tale of searching the Ozarks during a cold spell is anything but predictable. Another very intense film made by a lady. If, or maybe when, any of my dear readers may get around to seeing Winter's Bone, tell me you didn't shudder when the chainsaw comes out of the trunk.
One interesting thing about Winter's Bone was that it was made using grants from the state of Missouri's newly created film board. The story is based in Missouri, based on a novel written by a gentleman from Missouri, and also, entirely filmed in Missouri, thanks to the film board and their grants. Many of the extras are actual people who live in the places Ree visits, and most of the few actors were local to the area. The characters, like the woods and homes, all feel lived in and real, and rightfully so.
I mention Missouri so much in that last paragraph that I felt it necessary to discuss here another film I've been meaning to get to on this blog. It takes place almost entirely in Missouri, but was filmed mostly in Alberta, Canada. This film came out in 2007, didn't do so well at the box office, was reviewed extremely well, I'd wanted to see it but didn't have the time, and was nominated for Best Picture. I'm referring to The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. I found this movie an achievement in film, a moody thinky cowboy movie, not a shoot-em-up western, a psychological tease throughout, and thoroughly enjoyable and suspenseful, even though the climax of the story is in the title. Every scene is deliberate and tense, and the director had the courage to slow things down and let scenes play out naturally. The fact that Jesse James is a brutal bastard is never shied away from, and Casey Affleck's portrayal of Bob Ford really captures the awkwardness of wanting to belong. Played as the psychological conflict between the two leads, the story has been generally called the most likely film rendition to be historically accurate.
Kathryn Bigelow also directed the most recent Best Picture Oscar award winner, The Hurt Locker, which also won her the Best Director award, making her the first woman to win it. I finally got around to watching it...I'd wanted to, but didn't make it in New York as other movies caught our attention better. One of the roommates rented it, and we watched it on the big tv. I posted a few minutes ago about the intense incinerator scene in Toy Story 3, but this film is nearly nonstop intensity. Not quite a downer, not a political statement, just a portrait of an adrenaline junkie with a deathwish surfing the thrill of heat and hostility, The Hurt Locker barrels through crises both large and small, almost all of which are life threatening. Hard to believe that a simple scene with the main character and his wife and toddler at the grocery store could be so affective. For anybody who doesn't know, it was bothering me, so I looked it up: the name is slang dating back to Vietnam and means "the infirmary", like, "he's banged up, he's in the hurt locker getting mended."
Another amazing film I've been wanting to discuss here has been called "country noir", one of the best films of 2010, and soon to be in the canon of best feminist films ever made. It was written and directed by Debra Granik, and goes by the nearly pornographic title of Winter's Bone. It's a mix of hillbillies and Goodfellas, country folk turned gangster by way of meth-amphetamine, and one seventeen-year-old girl trying to save the house. Jennifer Lawrence plays Ree Dolly, the young heroine who needs to track down her crystal-meth cooking father before the sheriff takes the house and land as payment for skipping bond, all while also raises her two siblings and taking care of her mostly invalid mother. Most gangster films tend toward the predictable side, but this tale of searching the Ozarks during a cold spell is anything but predictable. Another very intense film made by a lady. If, or maybe when, any of my dear readers may get around to seeing Winter's Bone, tell me you didn't shudder when the chainsaw comes out of the trunk.
One interesting thing about Winter's Bone was that it was made using grants from the state of Missouri's newly created film board. The story is based in Missouri, based on a novel written by a gentleman from Missouri, and also, entirely filmed in Missouri, thanks to the film board and their grants. Many of the extras are actual people who live in the places Ree visits, and most of the few actors were local to the area. The characters, like the woods and homes, all feel lived in and real, and rightfully so.
I mention Missouri so much in that last paragraph that I felt it necessary to discuss here another film I've been meaning to get to on this blog. It takes place almost entirely in Missouri, but was filmed mostly in Alberta, Canada. This film came out in 2007, didn't do so well at the box office, was reviewed extremely well, I'd wanted to see it but didn't have the time, and was nominated for Best Picture. I'm referring to The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. I found this movie an achievement in film, a moody thinky cowboy movie, not a shoot-em-up western, a psychological tease throughout, and thoroughly enjoyable and suspenseful, even though the climax of the story is in the title. Every scene is deliberate and tense, and the director had the courage to slow things down and let scenes play out naturally. The fact that Jesse James is a brutal bastard is never shied away from, and Casey Affleck's portrayal of Bob Ford really captures the awkwardness of wanting to belong. Played as the psychological conflict between the two leads, the story has been generally called the most likely film rendition to be historically accurate.
Notes: Random Historical; Random Film
This post will eventually be below a few longer posts about cinema that I've been thinking about for a while, but I've been having two totally unrelated thoughts that I haven't been able to figure out how I wanted to post about, so I thought I'd just throw them out there.
The first is a historical clarification that I read about and learned about only recently. I've definitely heard the term Scots-Irish and Scotch-Irish before in reference to immigrants to the States, heard about their descendants' successes (many presidents have been Scots-Irish descent), about where they settled, and about how over time they've come to help build what we know as an "American Identity". The clarification that I learned about was that they were neither Scottish nor Irish. They were political and religious dissenters from the north of England, disparate backgrounds as far as clan affiliation or possible emigrant status from places like Denmark, but who shared a single thing: Calvinist beliefs. The ol' C. of E. wasn't for them (that is, as I've read it referred to before, the Church of England). Since the people were from the north, they were derisively called Scots, and sent in exile in the north of Ireland. Northern Ireland was populated by these dissenters, which is why today there is more than just a line carving the island of Ireland up; there is a political and cultural difference in the backgrounds of people from Ireland and Northern Ireland. In any case, those same folks who were booted from England were given opportunities for cheap land in the great big new colony across the sea, and many took them.
The second note is is three fold and was discovered by watching Toy Story 3 at the IMAX in 3D. Fold One: the IMAX screen is too large for 3D movies; if the center is in 3D, then the sides are blurry, and if the sides are in 3D, the center's blurry...Fold Two: Toy Story 3, while being the best entry in the canon in my opinion, didn't need the 3D thing, and wasn't benefitted incredibly by it.
Fold Three: the incinerator scene near the end was one of the most mature and intense scenes ever committed to film, in any media.
The first is a historical clarification that I read about and learned about only recently. I've definitely heard the term Scots-Irish and Scotch-Irish before in reference to immigrants to the States, heard about their descendants' successes (many presidents have been Scots-Irish descent), about where they settled, and about how over time they've come to help build what we know as an "American Identity". The clarification that I learned about was that they were neither Scottish nor Irish. They were political and religious dissenters from the north of England, disparate backgrounds as far as clan affiliation or possible emigrant status from places like Denmark, but who shared a single thing: Calvinist beliefs. The ol' C. of E. wasn't for them (that is, as I've read it referred to before, the Church of England). Since the people were from the north, they were derisively called Scots, and sent in exile in the north of Ireland. Northern Ireland was populated by these dissenters, which is why today there is more than just a line carving the island of Ireland up; there is a political and cultural difference in the backgrounds of people from Ireland and Northern Ireland. In any case, those same folks who were booted from England were given opportunities for cheap land in the great big new colony across the sea, and many took them.
The second note is is three fold and was discovered by watching Toy Story 3 at the IMAX in 3D. Fold One: the IMAX screen is too large for 3D movies; if the center is in 3D, then the sides are blurry, and if the sides are in 3D, the center's blurry...Fold Two: Toy Story 3, while being the best entry in the canon in my opinion, didn't need the 3D thing, and wasn't benefitted incredibly by it.
Fold Three: the incinerator scene near the end was one of the most mature and intense scenes ever committed to film, in any media.
Congratulations Elena Kagan
Elena Kagan has been confirmed as Obama's second pick for Justice on the Supreme Court, making her the first Jewish woman on the nation's highest court.
The remarkable thing I think about all this, and one of the reasons I decided to put this post up about Mrs. Kagan, is that there have only been four women Supreme Court Justices (Ruth, Sandra, Sonia, and now Elena), and Barack Obama has nominated two of them.
The remarkable thing I think about all this, and one of the reasons I decided to put this post up about Mrs. Kagan, is that there have only been four women Supreme Court Justices (Ruth, Sandra, Sonia, and now Elena), and Barack Obama has nominated two of them.
Slow Death of a Local Mall
In cities all across America I'd wager that older malls are struggling. The Internet has been taking bites out of the retail model for at least a decade now, and if a mall isn't glittery and new, I'd imagine it would be hurting. Teenagers hanging out won't keep a mall open...do teens hang out at malls anymore?
Well, friends and family might remember Citrus Heights' own Birdcage Mall in the eighties. I'm not sure how it's doing now, but even then, twenty-five years ago, being across the street from the bigger and newer Sunrise Mall which had decimated the consumer base, it was a near ghost town. I also have a memory of rival gangs claiming it, maybe "fighting" over it, but that may just be a false memory.
In Austin, near where we live, there's a tract of large buildings and asphalt called Highland Mall. Before I ever visited this mall was described to me as being "ghetto", full of lame stores or vacancies, or invariably as a dying mall. When I did visit, I can't remember what prompted us to go there, I was surprised. It didn't look like it was a ghetto-dying-mall from the inside. It looked like a normal, well attended, almost busy collection of establishments. I was half expecting to see tiles crumbling off of walls and shops shuttered with literal boards.
One day I was driving home from my day job, and after exiting the freeway and getting on the access road (I've got a whole damn post about access roads and on ramps in Texas, don't get me started) I noticed traffic congestion due to road work. I took a quick right up a side street, and in my own way of getting around the pocket of congestion, I ended up going through the back end of Highland Mall. The street I was on for a few feet had me driving directly towards a poetic image:
I got lost a little staring at it. I rode back on the house bicycle to take some pictures. I'm not totally sure I can represent in words what this image means to me; it's being defined for me in the metaphor part of my brain. The empty parking lot, the ghostly "Dillard's" missing but still visible on the giant building's facade (which you may have to enlarge the photo to see). The Dying Mall.
I've heard that ACC, Austin Community College, has purchased the full acreage of that side of Highland Mall, the parking lot and the anchor department store building, and have plans on bringing another campus to another section of town. Which is pretty cool.
Well, friends and family might remember Citrus Heights' own Birdcage Mall in the eighties. I'm not sure how it's doing now, but even then, twenty-five years ago, being across the street from the bigger and newer Sunrise Mall which had decimated the consumer base, it was a near ghost town. I also have a memory of rival gangs claiming it, maybe "fighting" over it, but that may just be a false memory.
In Austin, near where we live, there's a tract of large buildings and asphalt called Highland Mall. Before I ever visited this mall was described to me as being "ghetto", full of lame stores or vacancies, or invariably as a dying mall. When I did visit, I can't remember what prompted us to go there, I was surprised. It didn't look like it was a ghetto-dying-mall from the inside. It looked like a normal, well attended, almost busy collection of establishments. I was half expecting to see tiles crumbling off of walls and shops shuttered with literal boards.
One day I was driving home from my day job, and after exiting the freeway and getting on the access road (I've got a whole damn post about access roads and on ramps in Texas, don't get me started) I noticed traffic congestion due to road work. I took a quick right up a side street, and in my own way of getting around the pocket of congestion, I ended up going through the back end of Highland Mall. The street I was on for a few feet had me driving directly towards a poetic image:
I got lost a little staring at it. I rode back on the house bicycle to take some pictures. I'm not totally sure I can represent in words what this image means to me; it's being defined for me in the metaphor part of my brain. The empty parking lot, the ghostly "Dillard's" missing but still visible on the giant building's facade (which you may have to enlarge the photo to see). The Dying Mall.
I've heard that ACC, Austin Community College, has purchased the full acreage of that side of Highland Mall, the parking lot and the anchor department store building, and have plans on bringing another campus to another section of town. Which is pretty cool.
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
California's Prop 8 Repealed!
On November 4th, 2008, I saw some cool things, and I heard some news that made me sad, that my home state of California had passed a proposition that was to ban same-sex marriage. I wasn't totally devastated, though, and not just because I wasn't gay or living in California, but because to me it seemed that the exact nature of such a law, to ban people from getting married, was patently unconstitutional. Not shocked that it passed, I was excited for the time when such a ban would struck down as, surprise surprise, unconstitutional.
Proposition 8, as it's known in California, was one of those moments in American history when the conservative squares put up a fight about something they firmly believed in, and something that is frankly against that which the the foundation of America is firmly built: respect for, and consideration of, minority views and opinions.
You know you've got a tough journey against something as strong as the tide of history changing (Argentina and Mexico City are ahead of us on this) when even Dick Cheney is against you. Yes, folks, even Dick Cheney supports same-sex marriage.
To paraphrase syndicated columnist Dan Savage: civil rights related issues shouldn't be left up to popular vote.
Here's a quote from the decision, a 136 page rebuke written by federal Judge Vaughn Walker: "Although Proposition 8 fails to possess even a rational basis, the evidence presented at trial shows that gays and lesbians are the type of minority strict scrutiny was designed to protect."
Same-sex marriage opponents are going to appeal, and this case might make it to the Supreme Court, which might not be a bad thing. Not letting two folks--consenting adults--be recognized as a legal union because they have the same anatomy is always destined to fail in a country like ours.
Here's one of many links about the topic.
Last month in Massachusetts the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) (the main tenet being that marriage is strictly between a man and a woman) was struck down by a federal judge as being unconstitutional.
Proposition 8, as it's known in California, was one of those moments in American history when the conservative squares put up a fight about something they firmly believed in, and something that is frankly against that which the the foundation of America is firmly built: respect for, and consideration of, minority views and opinions.
You know you've got a tough journey against something as strong as the tide of history changing (Argentina and Mexico City are ahead of us on this) when even Dick Cheney is against you. Yes, folks, even Dick Cheney supports same-sex marriage.
To paraphrase syndicated columnist Dan Savage: civil rights related issues shouldn't be left up to popular vote.
Here's a quote from the decision, a 136 page rebuke written by federal Judge Vaughn Walker: "Although Proposition 8 fails to possess even a rational basis, the evidence presented at trial shows that gays and lesbians are the type of minority strict scrutiny was designed to protect."
Same-sex marriage opponents are going to appeal, and this case might make it to the Supreme Court, which might not be a bad thing. Not letting two folks--consenting adults--be recognized as a legal union because they have the same anatomy is always destined to fail in a country like ours.
Here's one of many links about the topic.
Last month in Massachusetts the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) (the main tenet being that marriage is strictly between a man and a woman) was struck down by a federal judge as being unconstitutional.
Monday, August 2, 2010
Bringing Down the Balcony?
A bit of news here in Austin occurred over the weekend, Saturday night/Sunday morning around 4 am, a balcony collapsed at a party, injuring some two dozen of the revelers at that party.
It appears that a condo owner added a "cool" balcony with it's own spiral staircase to the apex. It's still under investigation whether or not everything was up to code, but upon examining the photographs, Corrie said she'd be shocked to hear if it was all properly constructed.
Normally something like this might not rank in on this blog, but one of the revelers, one of the unfortunate people underneath the balcony when it collapsed was our very own Rachel, my wife's cousin and our current roommate. The morning after when she called from the hospital and told us the good news, that her hip wasn't broken, you kind of wince and grit your teeth. It seemed like the majority of her injuries were obtained by way of trampling, as the stampede of party goers exited the place en masse. A stiletto puncture in her jeans a few centimeters from her birth canal is another sign of luck. She does have a nice gash on her torso and a lacerated liver.
She wanted me to give a shout out to Omar and Ronald Flemming, the two heroes that ran back and carried her out of the stampede, moments before total disaster, saving her life in her view, which is most likely accurate.
It appears that a condo owner added a "cool" balcony with it's own spiral staircase to the apex. It's still under investigation whether or not everything was up to code, but upon examining the photographs, Corrie said she'd be shocked to hear if it was all properly constructed.
Normally something like this might not rank in on this blog, but one of the revelers, one of the unfortunate people underneath the balcony when it collapsed was our very own Rachel, my wife's cousin and our current roommate. The morning after when she called from the hospital and told us the good news, that her hip wasn't broken, you kind of wince and grit your teeth. It seemed like the majority of her injuries were obtained by way of trampling, as the stampede of party goers exited the place en masse. A stiletto puncture in her jeans a few centimeters from her birth canal is another sign of luck. She does have a nice gash on her torso and a lacerated liver.
She wanted me to give a shout out to Omar and Ronald Flemming, the two heroes that ran back and carried her out of the stampede, moments before total disaster, saving her life in her view, which is most likely accurate.
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