Read for the first time in October 2012.
Nathaneal West is in my opinion one of the greatest American writers of the twentieth century based on the strength of “Dear Miss Lonelyhearts” and “The Day of the Locust.” “A Cool Million” is a lesser work. A sometimes clever and occasionally funny satire, it is of its time. It’s part “Candide” spoof and part Horatio Alger spoof that works to indict the American dream. It retains some resonance today, particularly in these times of economic woe, but the humor and the politics are unfortunately dated. The phrase, “International Jewish Bankers,” for example, is funny only for its quaintness as an opinion to ridicule. That paranoia has been replaced by different paranoias.
But how good might this have been in its own day? Probably not as good as Sinclair Lewis’s “Babbitt,” but nonetheless certainly darker. This is filled with straight up black comedy that makes Sinclair Lewis’s anti-Americanisms seem downright wholesome. Rape, forced prostitution, racism and mutilation are played for jokes here. And that might be something I would frown upon in a different context, but here ambition and reputation meet the method of ironic distance in an equilibrium that does not trouble me.
There’s one very good line where the main character’s mentor tells him “My boy, I believe I once told you that you had an almost certain chance to succeed because you were born poor and on a farm. Let me now tell you that your chance is even better because you have been to prison.” Another is the exchange where the main character expresses his innocence to a crime and the prosecutor responds “So was Christ and they nailed him.” Those were probably the two memorable laugh out loud moments for me.
All in all, this is an entertaining novella, if a bit slight, but nonetheless indicative of the potential West would later reveal. The darkness of some of the content is probably the most notable thing about it though.
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
The Seventh Seal - Ingmar Bergman
This may very well be - and by head and shoulders at that - the very best film I have ever seen in my life. I can think of no other movie which attempts this amount of philosophical weight, and yet is also this good, and also this beautifully shot. Or to paraphrase someone else, what either movie has attempted this depth, and not been destroyed by these same attempts at depth?
Beyond the obvious heft of its ideas, like all great art and not mere treatise, it depicts the human experience without resort to sensationalism or sentimentality, or any other dodge. Bergman “paints things as they are,” and people can do as they like. The word amazing is oft abused. I do not abuse it here. It is an amazing accomplishment and filled with resonance. Grade A.
Monday, October 29, 2012
Absalom, Absalom! - William Faulkner
Read for the second time in October 2012.
I’ve long held this, along with “The Sound and the Fury” as my two favorite Faulkner novels, though “The Sound and the Fury” is the one which I have found myself re-reading with periodic frequency. This is possibly because so much of the first half of the “The Sound and the Fury” is difficult to comprehend. I still don’t quite know where Benji gets castrated for example, and I’ve read the book probably five times.
“Absalom, Absalom!” is just as difficult it turns out. Faulkner’s prose, which has no equal that I am aware of, frequently ascends into some kind of exalted gibberish, more difficult to parse than anything in “The Sound and The Fury.” I don’t try to parse it all. I somehow absorb the story and relish in the beauty of his writing and let my incomprehension evaporate into the ether.
But what I love about Faulkner, at his best, is the way real human suffering is imposed from real human character’s attempts to assert control over a universe in which they have none. There is, from the onset, a palpable sense of fated doom. This is Shakespeare brought to the South. One parallel between “Absalom, Absalom!” and “The Sound and the Fury” which may account for the reverence for which I hold each, is the ineffectual internal indecisiveness of Henry Sutpen and Quentin Compson (in “The Sound and The Fury” specifically though he appears in both). Faulkner does an exceedingly good job of depicting internal struggle and anguish in his novels, of characters torn by internal conflict.
I’m also impressed by Faulkner’s mockery of manifestations of human vanity, things like honor and glory. He writes a nice soap opera, and the richness of the southern background. Of pride mixed with the humiliation of defeat. Of a way of life that he criticizes bitterly and yet still will not fully repudiate. Faulkner’s depiction of the human condition is so focused and honest, it’s jaw-dropping. He’s never swayed by sentimentality or misplaced anguish, but seems to always be endeavoring for the truth despite the futility involved.
With a keen eye, Faulkner grapples with and depicts the truth as honestly as he possibly can, and yet despite that truth, human emotion and suffering are still treated with importance. He does not take the god’s eye view of humanity where nihilism is taken to its most logical end and suffering is a source of lighthearted diversion. He gives us the world as it is, lack of meaning and futility and all, and allows us to feel the self-created anguish of real characters without ironic distance, and thus all the more poignant because we know just how futile it is.
This is why Faulkner is the best to me, and why the post-modernists with their educated references and empty intellectualism and comic-book tones are only entertainment. I distinguish between literature for intellectuals and literature as art. And, to me, Faulkner is literature as art, and the very best of it at that.
I’ve long held this, along with “The Sound and the Fury” as my two favorite Faulkner novels, though “The Sound and the Fury” is the one which I have found myself re-reading with periodic frequency. This is possibly because so much of the first half of the “The Sound and the Fury” is difficult to comprehend. I still don’t quite know where Benji gets castrated for example, and I’ve read the book probably five times.
“Absalom, Absalom!” is just as difficult it turns out. Faulkner’s prose, which has no equal that I am aware of, frequently ascends into some kind of exalted gibberish, more difficult to parse than anything in “The Sound and The Fury.” I don’t try to parse it all. I somehow absorb the story and relish in the beauty of his writing and let my incomprehension evaporate into the ether.
But what I love about Faulkner, at his best, is the way real human suffering is imposed from real human character’s attempts to assert control over a universe in which they have none. There is, from the onset, a palpable sense of fated doom. This is Shakespeare brought to the South. One parallel between “Absalom, Absalom!” and “The Sound and the Fury” which may account for the reverence for which I hold each, is the ineffectual internal indecisiveness of Henry Sutpen and Quentin Compson (in “The Sound and The Fury” specifically though he appears in both). Faulkner does an exceedingly good job of depicting internal struggle and anguish in his novels, of characters torn by internal conflict.
I’m also impressed by Faulkner’s mockery of manifestations of human vanity, things like honor and glory. He writes a nice soap opera, and the richness of the southern background. Of pride mixed with the humiliation of defeat. Of a way of life that he criticizes bitterly and yet still will not fully repudiate. Faulkner’s depiction of the human condition is so focused and honest, it’s jaw-dropping. He’s never swayed by sentimentality or misplaced anguish, but seems to always be endeavoring for the truth despite the futility involved.
With a keen eye, Faulkner grapples with and depicts the truth as honestly as he possibly can, and yet despite that truth, human emotion and suffering are still treated with importance. He does not take the god’s eye view of humanity where nihilism is taken to its most logical end and suffering is a source of lighthearted diversion. He gives us the world as it is, lack of meaning and futility and all, and allows us to feel the self-created anguish of real characters without ironic distance, and thus all the more poignant because we know just how futile it is.
This is why Faulkner is the best to me, and why the post-modernists with their educated references and empty intellectualism and comic-book tones are only entertainment. I distinguish between literature for intellectuals and literature as art. And, to me, Faulkner is literature as art, and the very best of it at that.
Sunday, October 28, 2012
Pink Flamingos - John Waters
For a long time I never watched this movie because I had assumed that I had already seen it, recalling it as sort of mid-period glossier John Waters, in the vein of “Hairspray” or “Cry Baby” which were the sort of films I watched with my parents growing up. But no this is much different. It’s great, and at times appalling, but nonetheless always engaging.
Essentially this movie is a mix of a parody of sensationalism (both artistic and media driven), a mockery of bourgeoise outrage, and with unrelenting gratuitous grossness. There are at least three scenes in this movie in which something is depicted which I would honestly prefer that I had never seen: that anus trick, Divine explicitly going down on that dude, and that coda for which this film is so infamous.
Nevertheless I loved it. I can understand why this is regarded as John Waters’s masterpiece, though I still prefer “Desperate Living.” They have the same energy and the same sensibility, but “Desperate Living” lacks the disgustingness, though is just as committed to the same assault on bourgeoise attitudes, and with the same vivid dialogue.
An important point to make about Waters in general, and Pink Flamingos, in particular; what sets him apart is not the shocking and offensive material in and of itself, but the fact that it is not delivered with the grim seriousness of his contemporaries and so many others who have made movies in bad taste over the years. John Waters makes these films with an impish glee that somehow makes being disgusted almost delightful. It’s like Kurt Vonnegut drawing a picture of his own asshole with childish glee, but Waters shows you a real asshole and then he makes it do things you would never want to watch someone’s asshole do. Not as bad as goatse.cx but still. The dialogue, by the way, is amazing. Grade A.
Saturday, October 27, 2012
Le Corbeau - Henri-Georges Clouzot
For most of this film, I was convinced the teenage girl was the one behind the letters. So convinced that I thought it was flaw not to make it explicit, elsewise people might think it a weak mystery rather than fairly strong suspense. I was wrong though. In fairness the mystery aspect is still not a strength of this movie in my opinion. Who is Le Corbeau doesn’t really matter. Especially since it seems as though everyone in the town probably wrote at least a letter or two as Le Corbeau.
Its strengths, I suppose, lie in its damning of typical human pettiness and its opposition to bourgeois morality. But it’s not all urbane moralizing either. It’s an engaging movie, that while not thrilling, is engrossing. It is suspenseful. It’s also very dialogue driven. I would call it theatrical. A little bit of Agatha Christie. A little bit of Hitchcock.
I can’t say I understand why the Gestapo would care about this film one way or the other. Don’t care to find out either. I don’t think it’s relevant to my engagement with this film. Just a good suspenseful film filled with small-town folks being provincial. Grade B.
Moontide
I had to force myself to watch this film. I don’t really know why I thought it was so important to watch it. I knew early on it was unexceptional, and I don’t believe anyone on the planet thinks its in any way essential or that there would ever be a moment in any person’s life, much less my own, where a failure to see this particular movie would ever be noticed much less regretted. Yet I forced myself to watch it anyway, past the point where I wanted to stop. For very little reward.
Jean Gabin reminds me of Tommy Wiseau at times in this. It’s the accent plus a certain carefree elan. Maybe the unrealistic love and romance is a part of it too. Merely reminiscent though, not as crude.
There are some holes in the plot. Ida Lupino goes from suicide to half of a happy couple with no transition or explanation. Also this turns out to be a total bummer of a movie. Sometimes that’s a good thing, but this movie seems too trivial to justify its grim moments. At best, this movie is watchable, but nothing more. Grade C-.
Friday, October 26, 2012
Where The Sidewalk Ends - Otto Preminger
This movie begins in an unassuming manner. It’s straight underwhelming and then it gets kind of good. The last ten minutes are great. But otherwise it’s sort of like watching an old tv show on the boring channel for 90 minutes. Dana Andrews plays his role really well throughout. Gene Tierney, on the other hand, doesn’t have anything interesting to do. The main villain has a good moment toward the end, but he otherwise doesn’t have anything interesting to do either. The supporting cast was probably huffing carbon monoxide between takes. At it’s top level best, this uninspired film is still sort of noir-by-the-numbers. I love the ending because I love noir, but this thing almost never has any sort of pulse. Grade C+
Thursday, October 25, 2012
Maid Droid
Seen for the first time in October 2012.
An unrelenting hatred of women underlies every aspect of this movie, from the sympathetic portrayal of male otakus’ sexual relationships with dolls to the reductionist and misogynistic portrayal of all real life women (cock-hungry, cold and cruel) to the otaku’s apparent idea of the ideal woman (servile, without will or intelligence, and innocently sexual). In this dystopian world 10% of all men (aggressive, promiscuous, and virile) satisfy 100% of all women, while the remaining 90% of men (meek, caring and loving) have loving sexual relationships with robot lolitas.A scene of retributive violence by one such otaku against two taunting women is especially disturbing and damning. Even the existence of rape machines and a plausible (accepting certain basic premises of the movie) story explaining their existence provides no redemption for this simplistic and underthought, un-erotic pornography. Grade F.
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
Beat The Devil - John Huston
This is a surprisingly run-of-the-mill movie, considering the names involved: John Huston, Humphrey Bogart, Peter Lorre, and Truman Capote worked on the script. Bogart plays Bogart here, which should be good, but if his oeuvre were filled with films like this, he never would have become a star. In a strange way his character is the weak part of this film. Better than the British broad, but together, she and Bogart’s rote romantic gestures taste like milk a couple days past its expiration.
Lorre and the guy from “The African Queen” and the British bounder and even Lollobrigida all put in great secondary performances. Really, all of the secondary performances are pretty great. They should have been put to use in a great movie. But Bogart is kind of stale in this. This is a stale Bogart performance in a stale Bogart movie, and while the rest of the cast is great, you can’t make a great dish with freezer burnt meat. The romance with the British woman, especially, was distinctly lacking in chemistry.
You could point to a line or two and argue that Bogart pulls his weight here. But that’s rather missing the point. Overall, the whole Bogart thing just feels tired in this movie, and all these years later there’s no particular reason for that to be the case. Hollywood and the star system were just really attracted to formulas in those days I suppose. Sometimes it worked better than others. This one not so much. Movie does get stronger as it goes, and I liked the ending. Grade C+.
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Love Exposure
This film was a revelation. It’s a four hour epic movie with a mish-mash of styles and a stunning display of craft. In this regard it’s reminiscent of a seamless viewing of the “Kill Bill” movies. And though it delivers the same rare, once in a decade cinematic experiences, thematically it’s completely different. It’s about love, religion, and perversion. Everything comes together perfectly in this amazing movie that’s an equal blend of seriousness and sillyness; of high brow concept, pop-culture entertainment, and cheap thrills.
It’d be a cliche to say this film could only have come from Japan, but it’s true. It has that unique mix of the good, the violent, the silly and the pervy, but also with an ambition and a depth that is essential to the most serious movies. This film is about love at its most powerful as a concept. It is about religion. It is about family. It’s about sin. It’s about peeking at Japanese girls in their panties. It’s about being human. There are tonal shifts throughout. A serious movie turns into a silly movie, turns into a disturbing and sad movie, turns into a triumph.
Jaw-dropping. Spectacular. This movie cannot be praised hyperbolically. It delivers and delivers and delivers. The depth cannot be neatly summarized. One scene of particular note is the recitation of Corinthians 13. Holy Shit. Holy Shit. That scene… I’ve heard those verses before, whatever… I never realized before that it was such poetry. Such beautiful language. Such beautiful thoughts. What a powerful fucking scene. And that such a scene can fit so seamlessly (and seemlessly) and relevantly in a movie about a guy who’s the master of upskirt photography… Only in Japan? Words fail me. Grade A.
Monday, October 22, 2012
Seven Psychopaths
I liked this better than “In Bruges,” but then I really didn’t like “In Bruges” as much as every other person I’ve ever met did. I thought “In Bruges” was -shrug- okay, but not as good as, say, “Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels.” For some reason, though, “In Bruges” was a movie for people to say ridiculous things like “It was more substance than style,” or “it’s deeper than a Tarantino film.” I think people who say things like this are deeply, unsympathetically stupid.
I think the conceit that we’re getting anything more than stylishly entertaining thrills from Seven Psychopaths is so much harder to maintain when the nods at deepness are so transparently superficial that they themselves become little more than a stylish thrill in and of themselves. It’s like turning the idea of being thoughtful and spiritual into just another bright and shiny object for mesmerizing the apes. This shit is as deep as the deepness of nazi-hating in “Inglorious Basterds,” but Tarantino’s not oblivious to what he’s doing.
You know what would have been ballsy? If instead of the Vietnamese psychopath, he had been an Iraqi psychopath. Too political? Too distracting? Why get hung up on fresh horrors of our own complicity when we wanna be safe in the womb enjoying some cool violence and humorous dialogue amongst hoodlums. Maybe in 30 years, your children will be able to watch that movie without reflexively triggering some sort of Manichean hallucination.
This was “Adaptations”-esque. There are funny parts. Christopher Walken and Sam Rockwell are great. There’s some good violence too. This is more entertaining than “In Bruges.” Yes, it does try to comment on its own genre. It does try to give us a parody of sorts. It thinks its smarter by doing so. It’s okay. It’s okay that its too proud of itself. It’s entertaining for exactly the same reasons as “Snatch,” or whatever. Those reasons are good enough for me. Grade B-.
Sunday, October 21, 2012
New Year's Day
This is not the sort of movie I usually like to spend my time watching. Little (as in slight) indie projects, particularly those that are British or New Zealand or Australian, which are like little personal, emotional statements are pretty much not for me, generally speaking. Or more accurately, as I said before, not really how I like to spend my time. So much chaff, and when you do find the wheat, it’s not really that good. And I could be watching a loud movie with obvious entertainment value. Judge if ye will, but I’m not embarrassed by not being entertained by other people’s narcissism.
I ended up really liking this one though. Granted, in the beginning, I was rolling my eyes, and really asking myself how I allowed myself to get stuck watching one of these movies. It starts off maudlin. And there’s a real lack of needed charisma among the two main characters. And the humor is terrible. This is not funny. I found myself craving a little Hollywood pizzazz, whatever that means. I thought of all kinds of little ways to tweak this thing. To juice it up. But you know, somewhere in there, it turns into this really moving, understated, realistic film about two kids who are having a hard time coping with their mourning. And I really wouldn’t tweak a thing, except maybe make the two main characters have fewer moments where you think they might start making out. I’m glad I watched this, but not so glad that I’m gonna try hard to see more like it. Grade A.
Saturday, October 20, 2012
A Cat in Paris
I enjoyed maybe 10 minutes of this 60 minute film, basically from the moment the criminals discover and start chasing the girl until the moment that Nico gets arrested. Otherwise this is pretty dull, with too much expository dialogue, and a mother who’s every emotion about her dead husband, her daughter, and her husband’s killer is irritating. The kid is silent throughout the film, but at the end pointlessly summarizes the whole plot reminding us just how irritating most of this movie was. Just in case anyone had forgotten. The gangsters were menacing briefly during the high point of this movie, but otherwise were as shoddily written and irritating as everything else. Some “Goodfellas” and “Reservoir Dogs” riffs completely fall flat. Grade D.
Friday, October 19, 2012
Sukeban Boy
“Sukeban Boy” is a strange movie, and it’s strange in a way that is uniquely Japanese. There is something extremely infantile about the humor of this movie that is markedly Japanese. In a lot of ways this feels like a PG-13 movie, but for all of the tits and perversions. And that’s the other thing that is strange about this movie in a particularly Japanese way. It’s not just full of nudity. It’s full of pervert Japanese style perversions. The kink is out in the open in that culture in a way that it isn’t in America. Like it’s not just nudity. There’s a lot of European nudo (this is some slang I just made up) movies. But the Japanese often make a nudo movie to a much more twisted result. It’s like they go ahead and publicly indulge the fantasies that most of us would be embarrassed for other people to find out about. Though it may not be tasteful, I kind of admire it.
I don’t even think titillation is the raison d’etre of this thing. That’s part of what makes this movie so strange, even by Japanese standards. I was sort of put off by most of the movie. There’s too much androgyny in the main character for my taste for half-clad whimsically violent frolics. But there’s a pretty feel good ending. It’s kind of sappy, but it’s a strange Japanese sap that’s really enthusiastic and reminds you of little kids and their irrational joys for simple things and it just kind of makes you happy. All in all, it turns into this weird transgender love-story, made more weird because the lovers not just a minute before were engaged in a Darth Vader/Luke Skywalker style fight to the death. Like the hero and the villain decide to stop fighting and become lovers instead. And both of them having accidentally taken hormones are rendered permanently transgendered. Also, the main character’s father is accidentally killed in their melee, and while that’s sad, no one really cares, because… shrug, it’s otherwise just such a gushingly cute happy ending.
I honestly don’t know how to rate this thing though. I’m not really even sure if I think it’s good or bad. Like the plot is paper-thin. And they just keep throwing up comic book style sects of villains for no discernible reason. It really is just all about topless women, goofy often scatological jokes, and silly violence until it’s all wrapped up with a silly moral about gender. Like this movie is the equivalent of just dangling shiny objects before an idiot for about sixty minutes, and most of those shiny objects aren’t really even that shiny. The violence in this movie for example, is actually really poor. There’s never any tension or thrill either, and it’s more appalling than it is funny. And some of the women in this movie might benefit from doing some extra squats at the gym. But still, I pretty much enjoyed watching this. And if someone with the right sensibility was looking to enjoy a “bad movie” night, they could do a lot worse than to pick this one. I’m emptying my mind and looking into my heart, and I find myself giving this a grade B.
Thursday, October 18, 2012
The Revenger
This movie is terrible. But it’s terrible in a good way. It’s marvelous 80’s cheese. With cheesy 80’s saxophones and cheesy 80’s soundtrack. There is not a single good performance in this movie, though there were some funny ones. And it was incompetently made. Also the script is bad. Probably too the editing. Even the sound editing is bad. I know it’s bad, because I don’t even normally notice the sound editing of a movie.
All that said, there is also never a dull moment. Albeit, that may be because any particular not dull moment was not dull only because it was either poorly conceived, or poorly executed, or just otherwise so noticeably bad that you wonder how it wasn’t cut from the film in the first place. There is also some action to this “action-thriller,” which theoretically is not dull, but the action is often undercut by the incompetent directing. If this movie had a better commitment to exploiting its tits and ass opportunities it would be a perfect grade A cheesy ass 80’s movie. As it is, I have to score it an A-.
That Uncertain Feeling - Ernst Lubitsch
That Uncertain Feeling is a frustrating comedy in the screwball tradition. It begins promising enough, reminiscent of Ibsen’s “The Doll House,” with promise of a story where a man is forced to confront the idea that his wife is an adult human being, rather than a cute little ball of exuberant naivety to be wholesomely condescended to. As it turns out though, that women deserves all of the condescension that any man, even the most primitive, could muster. And then some.
She allegedly falls in love with the most ridiculous fucking two-bit piano player and seeks a divorce from her husband, who as it turns out is a decent enough guy, with some unflappable charm, who’s a good provider. This piano player is played by Burgess Meredith. I didn’t know exactly who that was, but I knew the name. I thought maybe he was Archie Bunker. He’s actually Mickey from the Rocky movies.
Anyway, this piano player, who in the 21st Century we recognize as having a bit of a homosexual persona, is pretty much an unfathomable jerk. And the fact that the wife in this stays on the line for so long stretches belief to the point where we either have to conclude that this unconvincing “romance” is complete bullshit or we pretty much have to start hating women a little bit, just on principle.
Nonetheless, if we suspend our disbelief, there’s some wit to this. Some fast talking verbal humor. Burgess Meredith plays the clown well enough. It’s not laugh out loud or anything. And the dramatic tension is undone by the lack of plausibility. There’s no way, in a 1940’s movie, does this broad not get back with her husband, when the good-guy/boorish shithead distinction becomes so clearly drawn.
Meredith does at one point say to the woman, upon her first meeting him and telling him he’s funny, something like “I’m funny? I’m a clown?” Which you know, Joe Pesci in “Goodfellas” and all, caught my attention. Also in this era of no fault divorce, I was momentarily confused by their discussion of a correspondent in the divorce proceedings, until I gleaned they were actually talking about a co-respondent, someone they needed to drag into the proceedings for fake affair purposes, cause they didn’t have no fault divorces in those days. Then I chuckled at my confusion. Grade C.
Wednesday, October 17, 2012
Somewhere in The Night
This is really high quality film noir. The only thing it’s lacking is any kind of star power, but it’s every bit as good as something like “the Maltese Falcon,” though less celebrated all of these years later, and maybe on the verge of being forgotten. This makes me wonder what it’s reception was like upon release. Did it seem like just another noir amongst a surfeit of noir, overlooked amidst the gluttony, requiring the passage of time and the change of fashions for its quality to emerge from the background? Maybe similar to the 70’s funk of Betty Davis rediscovered early in this century?
If so, I hope it’s re-discovered before it’s completely forgotten. It’s hard though, because only noir fans tend to watch old nor, even good old noir, and our numbers dwindle, I feel. It’s hard to imagine this movie receiving the fanfare it deserves at this point. It deserves better than to be relegated to genre-specificists, though that’s probably where its fate lies.
What makes it good? A good mystery. A good twist. Nothing is telegraphed. Some of the hard-boiled dialogue seems like it was lifted straight from the novel, as of course it was, but you can just picture the words on the page and that’s a bit detrimental. Though maybe if Bogart were delivering the lines he would have pulled it off. It’s hard to say. This nonetheless holds your attention and we’re riveted by the mystery. I don’t really buy the romance and the movie could do without it, but all of the suspense pays off, and that’s what matters. Grade A.
Tuesday, October 16, 2012
The Dwarf - Par Lagerkvist
Read for the first time in September/October 2012.
It took me over 4 weeks to read the first hundred or so pages of this book, not because they were difficult to read, but because the book failed to engage or interest me in that time. I then, finally, just knocked out the last hundred or so pages late last night in a couple of hours.
My thoughts on the book are a lot different upon finishing it than what I was thinking during the first hundred pages or so, where I was bored by this evil little dwarf ‘s thoughts. He was at times funny in an over the top way, but the book felt more like an exercise than a work of literature. The downside was that I felt like George R.R. Martin, of all people, had created a more interesting character. The upshot was that I ruminated a little bit about what it even means to be evil.
What does “evil” mean in the real world? Or is this only a concept that exists in comic books and cartoons? Can we appropriate it into a real life concept in a more nuanced fashion? If we do, is it basically, practically speaking, a word we use to describe people who are not like we are and who are a threat to us in some material way?
This is an idiosyncratic response I suppose. There is nothing in this book intended to take you on this route. Instead, the dwarf is evil in a comic book way, but also in a realistic human way. If you took every negative human impulse and refused to balance it with any sense of human empathy or charity, then you would get the dwarf. There’s a quote on the cover that says “The evil in the dwarf’s nature is in ours, too-is universal.” And that is true. I think it does a good job of giving us that half of our own story.
The last hundred or so pages are far better than the first hundred or so though. Things start to actually happen. There is war and intrigue and murder. The dwarf is a lot funnier as well. Also, was no longer quite so convinced that Tyrion Lannister was a more complicated and engaging character. There are some scenes where the dwarf paints human beings as misanthropically as anything Swift did. Especially his revulsion at watching them indulge their appetites. The novel is justified on the back end, but it’s weakness remains the fact it seems to have been conceived as a writing exercise.
It took me over 4 weeks to read the first hundred or so pages of this book, not because they were difficult to read, but because the book failed to engage or interest me in that time. I then, finally, just knocked out the last hundred or so pages late last night in a couple of hours.
My thoughts on the book are a lot different upon finishing it than what I was thinking during the first hundred pages or so, where I was bored by this evil little dwarf ‘s thoughts. He was at times funny in an over the top way, but the book felt more like an exercise than a work of literature. The downside was that I felt like George R.R. Martin, of all people, had created a more interesting character. The upshot was that I ruminated a little bit about what it even means to be evil.
What does “evil” mean in the real world? Or is this only a concept that exists in comic books and cartoons? Can we appropriate it into a real life concept in a more nuanced fashion? If we do, is it basically, practically speaking, a word we use to describe people who are not like we are and who are a threat to us in some material way?
This is an idiosyncratic response I suppose. There is nothing in this book intended to take you on this route. Instead, the dwarf is evil in a comic book way, but also in a realistic human way. If you took every negative human impulse and refused to balance it with any sense of human empathy or charity, then you would get the dwarf. There’s a quote on the cover that says “The evil in the dwarf’s nature is in ours, too-is universal.” And that is true. I think it does a good job of giving us that half of our own story.
The last hundred or so pages are far better than the first hundred or so though. Things start to actually happen. There is war and intrigue and murder. The dwarf is a lot funnier as well. Also, was no longer quite so convinced that Tyrion Lannister was a more complicated and engaging character. There are some scenes where the dwarf paints human beings as misanthropically as anything Swift did. Especially his revulsion at watching them indulge their appetites. The novel is justified on the back end, but it’s weakness remains the fact it seems to have been conceived as a writing exercise.
Monday, October 15, 2012
Loaded Guns - Ursula Andress
The primary appeal of this Italian comedy/crime movie is Ursula Andress’s body in various stages of undress. It’s nice enough, but then it seems as if the film makers should have made a bigger commitment to sensuality. The camera never ogles the way we would want it to. Instead we get a commitment to comedic action and the paint-by-numbers plot of a drug war between feuding gangsters.
The best bit is maybe the lecherous, homicidal priest, who’s with the good guys, and also the head villain who has the only funny line: “You outsmarted us all you dirty bitch.” It seems the film-makers know well enough that this sort of movie is often laughed at, so they did their best to produce deliberate laughs. A lot of silly chases and a funny carnival soundtrack. This is at the cost of whatever menace the heavies might have produced. As is, it’s too light to be a suspenseful crime thriller, not funny enough to be a comedy, and not sexy enough to be erotic. Made in the 70’s in Italy and overdubbed in English, maybe it just hasn’t held up well. Grade C.
Sunday, October 14, 2012
Girl Boss Revenge: Sukeban
Seen for the first time in October 2012.
This is a pretty good 70’s exploitation revenge movie from Japan. There’s a rivalry between two girl gangs in a city run by a ruthless male gang. There’s a love interest, and some betrayal and intrigue. The two girl gangs settle their differences and avenge themselves on the male gang. Some okay-ish 70’s asian flesh in here, and good violence. Grade B.
This is a pretty good 70’s exploitation revenge movie from Japan. There’s a rivalry between two girl gangs in a city run by a ruthless male gang. There’s a love interest, and some betrayal and intrigue. The two girl gangs settle their differences and avenge themselves on the male gang. Some okay-ish 70’s asian flesh in here, and good violence. Grade B.
Girl Boss Revenge: Sukeban
This is a pretty good 70’s exploitation revenge movie from Japan. There’s a rivalry between two girl gangs in a city run by a ruthless male gang. There’s a love interest, and some betrayal and intrigue. The two girl gangs settle their differences and avenge themselves on the male gang. Some okay-ish 70’s asian flesh in here, and good violence. Grade B.
Saturday, October 13, 2012
Looper - Rian Johnson
Seen for the first time in the theater in October 2012.
I liked this a lot. I loved “Brick,” and so greatly anticipated another film with Rian Johnson and Joseph Gordon-Levitt working together. It’s not quite as unrelentingly great as “Brick,” but it has moments a few moments of style and cool that nearly match it. The dude who played Dode in “Brick” is great in this as well.
I’m not saying I didn’t like the cute little kid in this, but I feel like maybe there has never been a great movie with a cute little kid in it, unless the Cohen’s “True Grit,” counts. Cute little kids as movie elements are sappy and pandering in a bad way. And so when they appear in even a good movie, one can’t help having a reflexive eye-roll. We feel a bit nudged into the movie-for-parents category despite the otherwise stylish sci-fi thuggery.
That is for sure the closest thing this movie has for a weakness though, and not the flimsiness of the premise about loopers closing their loops, or of course time-travel headaches. It’s troubling at first, but once the film kicks into gear, we look past it easy enough and enjoy the thrills. The ending doesn’t completely make sense to me either. I mean, how did the events on that farm change the future to the extent that Bruce Willis gets sent back in time with a bag over his head and is shot by Joseph Gordon-Levitt (this happens about 20 mins into the film)?
Well the thing is, I don’t really care We get a happy ending. And we can feel sappy about a little kid and his mom. And we don’t have to be brought down by Joseph Gordon-Levitt/Bruce Willis’s resulting anguish in this version of the future, unless we want to. I just don’t know how Bruce Willis knows to go gently into that good night this time around.
I think it’s that ending though which keeps me from loving this movie. The little kid element is too much for me. The ending feels James Cameron, which is not a good thing. Also I like Joseph Gordon-Levitt a lot as an actor. I somewhat wish they made Bruce Willis look like him instead of the other way around. There’s something about that dude made up to look like Bruce Willis that seems vaguely mongoloidal.
Nonetheless this is a very good and entertaining movie. It’s an action film where I don’t actually care about the action, except for the kid’s telekinetic powers. But instead its strengths lie in the way characters interact. Rian Johnson has a very real talent for what I will call stylized thug interaction in these incredibly contrived worlds he creates. It does not matter that, even by time travel movie standards, the gaps in logic are gaping and the incoherence is enormous. Grade B+.
I liked this a lot. I loved “Brick,” and so greatly anticipated another film with Rian Johnson and Joseph Gordon-Levitt working together. It’s not quite as unrelentingly great as “Brick,” but it has moments a few moments of style and cool that nearly match it. The dude who played Dode in “Brick” is great in this as well.
I’m not saying I didn’t like the cute little kid in this, but I feel like maybe there has never been a great movie with a cute little kid in it, unless the Cohen’s “True Grit,” counts. Cute little kids as movie elements are sappy and pandering in a bad way. And so when they appear in even a good movie, one can’t help having a reflexive eye-roll. We feel a bit nudged into the movie-for-parents category despite the otherwise stylish sci-fi thuggery.
That is for sure the closest thing this movie has for a weakness though, and not the flimsiness of the premise about loopers closing their loops, or of course time-travel headaches. It’s troubling at first, but once the film kicks into gear, we look past it easy enough and enjoy the thrills. The ending doesn’t completely make sense to me either. I mean, how did the events on that farm change the future to the extent that Bruce Willis gets sent back in time with a bag over his head and is shot by Joseph Gordon-Levitt (this happens about 20 mins into the film)?
Well the thing is, I don’t really care We get a happy ending. And we can feel sappy about a little kid and his mom. And we don’t have to be brought down by Joseph Gordon-Levitt/Bruce Willis’s resulting anguish in this version of the future, unless we want to. I just don’t know how Bruce Willis knows to go gently into that good night this time around.
I think it’s that ending though which keeps me from loving this movie. The little kid element is too much for me. The ending feels James Cameron, which is not a good thing. Also I like Joseph Gordon-Levitt a lot as an actor. I somewhat wish they made Bruce Willis look like him instead of the other way around. There’s something about that dude made up to look like Bruce Willis that seems vaguely mongoloidal.
Nonetheless this is a very good and entertaining movie. It’s an action film where I don’t actually care about the action, except for the kid’s telekinetic powers. But instead its strengths lie in the way characters interact. Rian Johnson has a very real talent for what I will call stylized thug interaction in these incredibly contrived worlds he creates. It does not matter that, even by time travel movie standards, the gaps in logic are gaping and the incoherence is enormous. Grade B+.
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