Yesterday, I was thinking about how I've only been updating this with serious stuff (American Sniper, gun violence, etc.) and thought "hey, let's lighten the mood a bit. So I humbly present to you my list of various pop-culture things that I'm guessing I'll never really be into. Because, well, it beats talking about Bill Belichick's deflated balls.
Harry Potter: Let me preface this by saying that, many years ago, I checked out Finnegan's Wake from my local library because 1.) I was shocked that they had something by any author not named "James Patterson" in the fiction section and 2.) I was under the impression that James Joyce might be an author I need to read if I want to understand the "human condition" and Modernism. I got a page and a half into that unholy mess before throwing up my hands in defeat. Similarly, I went with my aunt to the movie theater, she wanted to see whichever Harry Potter movie was out at the time (the one where Dumbledore dies at the end, if you're wondering) and I wanted to see something else that actually wasn't starting anytime soon, so I ended up watching Harry and his friends alongside her. I couldn't tell you what the hell happened in that movie. I am aware of this Harry Potter fellow, of course, and I know basic things about him (he looks like me when I was twelve and first got glasses, he's into magic, there are scarves involved) but that's about it. I feel at a loss when people a little younger (okay, a lot younger) than me in the MAE program start talking about him like an old friend who helped them get through childhood. I'm never going to read the books, probably. I appreciate that it's better overall than the sick and twisted crap that is Twilight in terms of "things geared towards younger audiences," but I feel like I was too old to get into HP when the books first started coming out. Razz-ma-tazz all you want, I ain't getting on the train to that magic school.
The Godfather Trilogy: I've seen all three of these movies, so my "getting into" them is purely a choice I made after considering all that there was to each film. Truthfully, Goodfellas is better, I feel like Michael Corleone is a glorified heel. Much like Peter Griffin, I did not care for these films. That being said, I understand their importance in the history of American cinema (well, the first two anyway), and I acknowledge that, filmmaking-wise, they're beatifully crafted. But emotionally engaging? Not for me. Coppola made the all-time best movie about the Vietnam War (through the lens of Heart of Darkness). Apocalypse Now is an unholy mess of a film, but then Vietnam was an unholy mess of a war. Good guys and bad guys? Shit, they've all got something that they're running towards or from. But the Corleones are cardboard compared to Willard and Kurtz. I've seen all three films (I saw the third one first, which might have ruined me on the previous two installments), and I'm left with nothing but a hollow "appreciation" of the films as art but no connection to them whatsoever.
Modern Country Music: Also known as "post-Garth Brooks populist clap-trap that has nothing of value to say and is as empty and soul-less as modern post-Tupac rap." So of course every girl I know loves this crap. I'll take Johnny Cash any day over Florida-Georgia Line.
Dr. Who: Now, this is one that, by all rights, I should be into. I have a grudging accpetance of sci-fi as a legitmate avenue for cultural expression, albeit one that often falls into the "hey, look at this cool effect" school of film-making (or literature). There's over fifty years of mythology to sort through and I can't say that I am up for the challenge. I may eventually get on board with this, but for the time being I'm content to keep confusing Dr. Who with The Who (the greatest rock band of all time).
Modern-day video games: I used to be a "gamer," back when those games involved an Italian plumber navigating a series of ladders while an angry gorilla threw barrels at him. I understand that gaming is now much more intensive than that, and I respect those for whom such ideas as an all-weekend-binge of role-playing games sounds like a fun time. But I don't feel like investing in any modern gaming systems myself. Just passed me by, I guess (though I'm always down for a multi-player round of GoldenEye in the various locales and with rocket launchers).
Vampire/Zombie/Vampire-Zombie Cinema/Literature/Games: Every few years, there's a horror-inspired craze that takes over the entertainment world (to whit: not only did someone write a book about Honest Abe killing vampires, they made a movie about that book as well). I respect that the marketplace is driven by ideas, even if those ideas are done to death (notable bright side to all the zombie nonsense: Shaun Of the Dead). I remember seeing bookshelves littered with variations of the Pride & Prejudice & Zombies template a few years back, none of them enticing (come to think of it, P&P&Z was kinda awful). No thank you.
Soccer: It may be the most popular game in the world, but every time I've watched it (on TV, or when some of my young cousins were playing on soccer teams), I've been bored stiff. Sorry.
Hockey: Ditto.
My favorite bands getting back together for a reunion tour: This is not always a bad idea, but it rarely does more than remind me how much better a lead singer was in his twenties or thirties (now that he's pushing AARP age and I'm wincing as he tries to make a song that was relevant back in the Eighties or whenever "come alive" in the modern day). I saw the best bands of generations previous to my own destroyed by nostalgia, and madness.
The NFL, after all the crap this past season: I'm done with watching the games all the way through anymore, or giving a damn. Roger Goodell being disembowled on live TV after the Super Bowl couldn't get me back into my pre-Ray Rice level of excitement for the sport. I'm not a complete automaton; I'll still tune in from time to time (especially if it's the Giants). But as far as giving a crap, I think I'm done with that.
Golf: Whether playing it (which I did once) or watching it on TV (only on summer afternoons when there was nothing else on), I've never been bowled over by golf. It's not a sport; it's an excuse for white dudes to get away from the wife for an afternoon (but not involving something like strippers or drugs, so less fun).
Sunday, January 25, 2015
Friday, January 23, 2015
American Sniping
When I went with a buddy to go see Inherent Vice recently, there was a trailer for the new Clint Eastwood film American Sniper. I'd seen it before, and seen the countless commercials in which Bradley Cooper has a terrible, godawful Southern/Texas accent. I can honestly say that my level of interest in seeing the film has remained at the "wait for it on cable one night when there's nothing else on" level (like with most of Eastwood's directorial projects; I acknowledge that he's a master of the form without necessarily liking his stuff enough to seek it out. I mean, Gran Torino was good but not great). So I guess that makes me a Commie pinko homosexual liberal elite who wants to destroy this country and take a shit on the bald eagle while wiping my private parts with the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.
Because, of course, people had to make this political. First on the left, with Seth Rogen saying the film reminded him of the film-within-a-film Nation's Pride (from Tarantino's masterpiece Inglourious Basterds) and then Michael Moore weighing in that snipers were "cowards." This caused the predictable Fox News attacks and Breitbart exposes that basically revealed what you already knew: Moore is fat and Rogen is un-American (literally: he's Canadian). Shit storm of shit storms, do your worst! Now it's almost considered a patriotic duty not just to see the film (again, with Bradley Cooper's atrocious accent) but to also dump on those who don't like it as much as you do.
Fact is, I acknowledge there's plenty of bullshit on both sides of the debate, but I'm more inclined to highlight it when it's on the far, far, far right of the spectrum. I'm a liberal, after all, or what passes for one in South Carolina (i.e., I don't mind that Obama's in charge of the country). I've read Marx (Richard Marx, Hold On to the Night: My Life In and Out of Lite-Rock Radio...I kid, but how awesome would that be?), I have never voted for a Republican since I was old enough to vote for the important stuff like "president" or "dog catcher," and I can't be blamed for the fact that Lindsey Graham is somehow still in office when everyone knows that he's...well...just so masculine (sorry, I don't want to upset that drama queen). So yeah, I'm not in the target audience for American Sniper, at least not in terms of unquestioningly accepting that Chris Kyle (the real-life guy, whose accent, I assume, is far more accurate than Cooper's) was an American hero with no shades of grey to upset the dominant narrative of his sacrifice for us.
But that's just it: I can't dismiss out of hand that Kyle, whatever his faults, was an important figure in the Iraq War, just not in the way that Sean Hannity would have you think. Kyle served in Afghanistan and Iraq, racked up over 150 kills as a sniper in both theaters, and came home only to be gunned down by a fellow veteran on a shooting range in 2013/2014 (can't remember which). His is a story of tragedy, of a life cut short due to an act of kindness on his part. That part I don't dispute. What I have a problem with is the notion that Kyle, or anyone else in the military who served in Iraq, was "protecting our freedoms."
Someone on my Facebook page said "freedom isn't free," and he's right. But it doesn't always have to be purchased at the end of a gun barrel. In fact, the more often it's gained through other more peaceful means, the better it is for everyone involved. But you'd expect me to say that, right? Godless America-hating liberal that I am, I am the son of a military veteran, a man who saw action in Vietnam. He came back home, hooked up with my mom, and never came around when I was growing up. I am the son of someone like Chris Kyle, someone who fought in a war and who never could come back to who he was before. I love this country, and I would gladly die to protect its freedoms. But nothing about Iraq was about defending our freedoms, or those of the Iraqi people. We went in under false pretenses, with no exit strategy, and a pie-in-the-sky understanding of just what the conflict would involve. Countless soldiers went over and died, and none of them got a fucking movie made about their life (by Clint Eastwood, nonetheless). None of them have been wrapped up in the flag, apple pie, and America by the shit-headed gutless cowards on Fox News, the pompous arrogant SOBs who helped Bush promote that war and looked the other way when the facts didn't line up with what they wanted. Freedom isn't free, yes, but it also isn't subject to abuse by those very people we put in charge of making sure we get to keep it.
But far be it from me to try and suggest that we shouldn't try and have a debate about the Iraq War, or the legacy of George W. Bush. Because then someone with a Twitter handle and a position of "celebrity" might attack me and call me names. Blake Shelton did that, to the Rogen/Moore crowd (and for the record: I find Rogen okay if not compelling as an actor, and Moore may be an overinflated gasbag of liberal/paranoid invective, but Fahrenheit 9/11 is one of the most important documents ever filmed). I guess hearing about that (and his using the old chestnut of "defending our freedoms") is what triggered this on my part. I couldn't give two fucks about Blake Shelton, or any of the other folks attacking Rogen and Moore (again, I'm a pinko liberal Commie-Nazi), but resorting to attacks when the facts aren't in your corner, when the idea of being subtle gets outweighed by the need to have the loudest megaphone in a sea of sound-bites, really pisses me off.
All of this is not to say that American Sniper is a bad film, or a good film; I haven't seen it, I don't plan on seeing it anytime soon, and I reserve the right to be wrong about everything I've said about it (except Cooper's accent; seriously, dude isn't even trying). But Chris Kyle didn't die to protect my freedoms anymore than he died to protect yours, or Sean Hannity's or Michael Moore's. He died because a crazy person shot him. Out soldiers died in Iraq because a president who was too busy worrying about his legacy to care about the consequences launched a war on a former enemy who had no ties whatsoever to 9/11 simply because the climate was ripe for such lying and chicanery. Freedom isn't free, but that doesn't mean it can't be destroyed with the very guns that a lot of people claim help uphold that very principle. And also, people should really see Inherent Vice, it's fucking amazing.
Now if you'll excuse me, the soapbox I'm on is getting awfully crowded.
Because, of course, people had to make this political. First on the left, with Seth Rogen saying the film reminded him of the film-within-a-film Nation's Pride (from Tarantino's masterpiece Inglourious Basterds) and then Michael Moore weighing in that snipers were "cowards." This caused the predictable Fox News attacks and Breitbart exposes that basically revealed what you already knew: Moore is fat and Rogen is un-American (literally: he's Canadian). Shit storm of shit storms, do your worst! Now it's almost considered a patriotic duty not just to see the film (again, with Bradley Cooper's atrocious accent) but to also dump on those who don't like it as much as you do.
Fact is, I acknowledge there's plenty of bullshit on both sides of the debate, but I'm more inclined to highlight it when it's on the far, far, far right of the spectrum. I'm a liberal, after all, or what passes for one in South Carolina (i.e., I don't mind that Obama's in charge of the country). I've read Marx (Richard Marx, Hold On to the Night: My Life In and Out of Lite-Rock Radio...I kid, but how awesome would that be?), I have never voted for a Republican since I was old enough to vote for the important stuff like "president" or "dog catcher," and I can't be blamed for the fact that Lindsey Graham is somehow still in office when everyone knows that he's...well...just so masculine (sorry, I don't want to upset that drama queen). So yeah, I'm not in the target audience for American Sniper, at least not in terms of unquestioningly accepting that Chris Kyle (the real-life guy, whose accent, I assume, is far more accurate than Cooper's) was an American hero with no shades of grey to upset the dominant narrative of his sacrifice for us.
But that's just it: I can't dismiss out of hand that Kyle, whatever his faults, was an important figure in the Iraq War, just not in the way that Sean Hannity would have you think. Kyle served in Afghanistan and Iraq, racked up over 150 kills as a sniper in both theaters, and came home only to be gunned down by a fellow veteran on a shooting range in 2013/2014 (can't remember which). His is a story of tragedy, of a life cut short due to an act of kindness on his part. That part I don't dispute. What I have a problem with is the notion that Kyle, or anyone else in the military who served in Iraq, was "protecting our freedoms."
Someone on my Facebook page said "freedom isn't free," and he's right. But it doesn't always have to be purchased at the end of a gun barrel. In fact, the more often it's gained through other more peaceful means, the better it is for everyone involved. But you'd expect me to say that, right? Godless America-hating liberal that I am, I am the son of a military veteran, a man who saw action in Vietnam. He came back home, hooked up with my mom, and never came around when I was growing up. I am the son of someone like Chris Kyle, someone who fought in a war and who never could come back to who he was before. I love this country, and I would gladly die to protect its freedoms. But nothing about Iraq was about defending our freedoms, or those of the Iraqi people. We went in under false pretenses, with no exit strategy, and a pie-in-the-sky understanding of just what the conflict would involve. Countless soldiers went over and died, and none of them got a fucking movie made about their life (by Clint Eastwood, nonetheless). None of them have been wrapped up in the flag, apple pie, and America by the shit-headed gutless cowards on Fox News, the pompous arrogant SOBs who helped Bush promote that war and looked the other way when the facts didn't line up with what they wanted. Freedom isn't free, yes, but it also isn't subject to abuse by those very people we put in charge of making sure we get to keep it.
But far be it from me to try and suggest that we shouldn't try and have a debate about the Iraq War, or the legacy of George W. Bush. Because then someone with a Twitter handle and a position of "celebrity" might attack me and call me names. Blake Shelton did that, to the Rogen/Moore crowd (and for the record: I find Rogen okay if not compelling as an actor, and Moore may be an overinflated gasbag of liberal/paranoid invective, but Fahrenheit 9/11 is one of the most important documents ever filmed). I guess hearing about that (and his using the old chestnut of "defending our freedoms") is what triggered this on my part. I couldn't give two fucks about Blake Shelton, or any of the other folks attacking Rogen and Moore (again, I'm a pinko liberal Commie-Nazi), but resorting to attacks when the facts aren't in your corner, when the idea of being subtle gets outweighed by the need to have the loudest megaphone in a sea of sound-bites, really pisses me off.
All of this is not to say that American Sniper is a bad film, or a good film; I haven't seen it, I don't plan on seeing it anytime soon, and I reserve the right to be wrong about everything I've said about it (except Cooper's accent; seriously, dude isn't even trying). But Chris Kyle didn't die to protect my freedoms anymore than he died to protect yours, or Sean Hannity's or Michael Moore's. He died because a crazy person shot him. Out soldiers died in Iraq because a president who was too busy worrying about his legacy to care about the consequences launched a war on a former enemy who had no ties whatsoever to 9/11 simply because the climate was ripe for such lying and chicanery. Freedom isn't free, but that doesn't mean it can't be destroyed with the very guns that a lot of people claim help uphold that very principle. And also, people should really see Inherent Vice, it's fucking amazing.
Now if you'll excuse me, the soapbox I'm on is getting awfully crowded.
Tuesday, January 13, 2015
Je Suis Charlie? Well, Yeah, But...
I realize that a lot of people make a lot of noise about the supposed imposition of stricter controls upon our rights to own guns in this country, but freedom of speech trumps freedom to bear arms every day and twice on Sunday as far as I'm concerned. Granted, we free-speech-ers don't have a ready-made slogan like the gun nuts ("you can take my freedom of speech when you pry it from my cold, dead hands" doesn't have the same ring to it), but I have never owned a gun, I don't plan on owning a gun, and if the government ever did come after me to take my gun, they'd be disappointed. Freedom of speech, even when you disagree with it, isn't just an American right. It's a human-being right, no matter where you are. The people who worry so much about protecting their penis-substitutes won't say a thing if someone's right to speak out (especially if the right to speak out is against gun violence) is taken from them.
The attacks on Charlie Hebdo have done what often occurs when issues of free speech come up in the past: they've made an unlikely martyr out of something that probably doesn't deserve it. What I've seen of the magazine's cartoons is pretty awful, content-wise. But here's the thing: you can think that, but that doesn't give you license to walk into the place and shoot it up. "Je Suis Charlie" is trending now on social media, and like a lot of things that "trend," the subtle arguments one could make about the tastefulness of the magazine's cartoons don't fit well under a hashtag. I may not like what I've seen of Charlie Hebdo, but I don't think anyone deserved to lose their lives over it.
Freedom of speech, the freedom to form your own thought and not have it imposed from you on high, is taken for granted in this country. We simply don't give a damn about protecting it, especially when someone says something that we don't agree with. Vile and hateful speech has been a particular victim of social media, which is a good thing: if someone's stupid enough to post something derogatory, they deserve the scorn that is usually unleashed upon them. But what the attackers (who claimed to be Islamic warriors, though I think that they cloaked their actions in the idea of Muslim beliefs to "justify" it, just as Crusaders dressed themselves up in the Christian Church to explain away their campaigns of bloodshed and plunder in the Holy Land) did is never, ever, ever okay. If anything, they defeated the claimed purpose of their own endeavor with their very actions: those cartoons that they sought to suppress will probably be seen, and by millions more eyeballs than the magazine frankly probably deserves. It is a victory for freedom of speech, even if that speech is disagreeable.
Consider someone who comes from an oppressive regime, where basic freedoms aren't available; you think they give a damn about getting their choice of firearms at the local WalMart if they've escaped years, decades of torture and terror elsewhere? Speech, and writing, are far more powerful than any bullet can ever hope to be. Words convey ideas, illustrations, revolutions. So while I question the logic behind the "offensive cartoons" in the first place, while I find much of what else the magazine has done to be tasteless and vulgar, I defend Charlie Hebdo's right to do what they do without the fear of violent reprisal. Because, goddam it, that doesn't fly with me. "Je suis Charlie"? If that's what you mean, than yeah, Je Suis Charlie.
The attacks on Charlie Hebdo have done what often occurs when issues of free speech come up in the past: they've made an unlikely martyr out of something that probably doesn't deserve it. What I've seen of the magazine's cartoons is pretty awful, content-wise. But here's the thing: you can think that, but that doesn't give you license to walk into the place and shoot it up. "Je Suis Charlie" is trending now on social media, and like a lot of things that "trend," the subtle arguments one could make about the tastefulness of the magazine's cartoons don't fit well under a hashtag. I may not like what I've seen of Charlie Hebdo, but I don't think anyone deserved to lose their lives over it.
Freedom of speech, the freedom to form your own thought and not have it imposed from you on high, is taken for granted in this country. We simply don't give a damn about protecting it, especially when someone says something that we don't agree with. Vile and hateful speech has been a particular victim of social media, which is a good thing: if someone's stupid enough to post something derogatory, they deserve the scorn that is usually unleashed upon them. But what the attackers (who claimed to be Islamic warriors, though I think that they cloaked their actions in the idea of Muslim beliefs to "justify" it, just as Crusaders dressed themselves up in the Christian Church to explain away their campaigns of bloodshed and plunder in the Holy Land) did is never, ever, ever okay. If anything, they defeated the claimed purpose of their own endeavor with their very actions: those cartoons that they sought to suppress will probably be seen, and by millions more eyeballs than the magazine frankly probably deserves. It is a victory for freedom of speech, even if that speech is disagreeable.
Consider someone who comes from an oppressive regime, where basic freedoms aren't available; you think they give a damn about getting their choice of firearms at the local WalMart if they've escaped years, decades of torture and terror elsewhere? Speech, and writing, are far more powerful than any bullet can ever hope to be. Words convey ideas, illustrations, revolutions. So while I question the logic behind the "offensive cartoons" in the first place, while I find much of what else the magazine has done to be tasteless and vulgar, I defend Charlie Hebdo's right to do what they do without the fear of violent reprisal. Because, goddam it, that doesn't fly with me. "Je suis Charlie"? If that's what you mean, than yeah, Je Suis Charlie.
Monday, December 29, 2014
Been Away for A While
I spent most of last week wishing I had an internet connection, because I had some frigging awesome Facebook update statuses planned. Now they're lost to the ether...
Actually, in our always-connected world, I think it's healthy to take some time off from social media, un-social media, anti-social media, and MySpace (I've been taking a break from that one since at least 2011. Seriously, I have no idea how to get into MySpace anymore, but I don't really care). Granted, that break is easier to manage when libraries are shut down and you're not too keen on the idea of bringing your laptop to the library parking lot and accessing the free WiFi. Also, the other people who usually loiter in said parking lot doing that scare the bejesus out of you (it's like all the pill-heads of Oconee County congregate in the parking lot...but I digress). But I have opinions on current events that must be shared!
First off: cops getting killed is always a tragedy, but it doesn't mean that the police union reps get to use that as an excuse to settle a personal beef with the mayor. I thought it was classless what the patrolmen did to de Blasio, turning their backs on him. Real good look for you guys, especially considering that you're not exactly living up to the "protect" part of "to protect and serve." Cops are like anyone else, there are good ones and there are bad ones. It just seems like the bad ones are hellbent on not being held accountable for it, and their feelings are hurt because the mayor of New York sided with the protestors. To equate peaceable demonstrations with the madman who gunned down two cops because he happened to say that's why he was doing it is pretty shitty.
Anyway, I spent a good chunk of last week working my way thru The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami. I realize that, as Murakami writes in Japanese and has to be translated into English in order for me to read him (because I don't even know where to begin to learn Japanese), I probably miss something in the translation. But what I get in return is a very exciting, challenging, and beautiful novel. I have to think most of what Murakami does gets translated into the works, so if I did miss anything I still got to have a wonderful experience with the book. I highly recommend it, or really anything he's done (which can be iffy because I've only read four of his books, but based on those four I can recommend him highly).
I also drove to my "new favorite bookstore" in Greenville last week, though I didn't end up buying anything that day. I did go to another bookstore just a short drive back in the direction I'd come, and there I found a biography of Lester Bangs. Rock critics in general don't seem like the kind of guys whose lives are interesting enough to merit a full-scale biography, but Bangs was the exception to that rule. He paid the price for that, in a sense, but I've been a fan of his since receiving a copy of the posthumous collection Psychotic Reaction and Carburator Dung. One of the things Bangs stressed in his work was to not automatically worship someone just because they happened to be a talented singer or whatever; it's a lesson that we should all take to heart, really. The book (Let It Blurt, by Jim DeRogatis) was awesome.
Anyway, I have a cold now, so my New Year's plans include hopefully recovering in time to welcome in 2015 healthier than I am right at this moment. I might also want to look into getting WiFi at my house...or not. Like I said, taking breaks from this online crap is probably healthy, from time to time. Just so long as North Korea doesn't hack me, I'll be fine.
Actually, in our always-connected world, I think it's healthy to take some time off from social media, un-social media, anti-social media, and MySpace (I've been taking a break from that one since at least 2011. Seriously, I have no idea how to get into MySpace anymore, but I don't really care). Granted, that break is easier to manage when libraries are shut down and you're not too keen on the idea of bringing your laptop to the library parking lot and accessing the free WiFi. Also, the other people who usually loiter in said parking lot doing that scare the bejesus out of you (it's like all the pill-heads of Oconee County congregate in the parking lot...but I digress). But I have opinions on current events that must be shared!
First off: cops getting killed is always a tragedy, but it doesn't mean that the police union reps get to use that as an excuse to settle a personal beef with the mayor. I thought it was classless what the patrolmen did to de Blasio, turning their backs on him. Real good look for you guys, especially considering that you're not exactly living up to the "protect" part of "to protect and serve." Cops are like anyone else, there are good ones and there are bad ones. It just seems like the bad ones are hellbent on not being held accountable for it, and their feelings are hurt because the mayor of New York sided with the protestors. To equate peaceable demonstrations with the madman who gunned down two cops because he happened to say that's why he was doing it is pretty shitty.
Anyway, I spent a good chunk of last week working my way thru The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami. I realize that, as Murakami writes in Japanese and has to be translated into English in order for me to read him (because I don't even know where to begin to learn Japanese), I probably miss something in the translation. But what I get in return is a very exciting, challenging, and beautiful novel. I have to think most of what Murakami does gets translated into the works, so if I did miss anything I still got to have a wonderful experience with the book. I highly recommend it, or really anything he's done (which can be iffy because I've only read four of his books, but based on those four I can recommend him highly).
I also drove to my "new favorite bookstore" in Greenville last week, though I didn't end up buying anything that day. I did go to another bookstore just a short drive back in the direction I'd come, and there I found a biography of Lester Bangs. Rock critics in general don't seem like the kind of guys whose lives are interesting enough to merit a full-scale biography, but Bangs was the exception to that rule. He paid the price for that, in a sense, but I've been a fan of his since receiving a copy of the posthumous collection Psychotic Reaction and Carburator Dung. One of the things Bangs stressed in his work was to not automatically worship someone just because they happened to be a talented singer or whatever; it's a lesson that we should all take to heart, really. The book (Let It Blurt, by Jim DeRogatis) was awesome.
Anyway, I have a cold now, so my New Year's plans include hopefully recovering in time to welcome in 2015 healthier than I am right at this moment. I might also want to look into getting WiFi at my house...or not. Like I said, taking breaks from this online crap is probably healthy, from time to time. Just so long as North Korea doesn't hack me, I'll be fine.
Sunday, December 21, 2014
Battle Beyond the Stars
How Star Wars Conquered the Universe is the book that conquered my attention span this past week (well really, the last three or four days), it's an insightful, illuminating, and just plain fun book about everyone's favorite space fantasy (well, those of us with good taste anyway), no matter how many times George Lucas has tried to screw it up. I kid, but really...the prequel trilogy is like a Litmus test for whether I really want to be friends with someone.
I think the sense of letdown that I and many of my ilk (i.e., long-term Star Wars fans) felt at the time of the first prequel (and which in no way was assuaged by the two follow-ups) is born in some ways of our own failure to see the original trilogy for what it was (a kid's movie). Anyone born between 1977 and 1983 who grew up with Luke, Leia, Han and Chewie, didn't know what to make of Anakin, Boring Obi-Wan, and Padme (really, "Padme?" What the hell, George...what the hell?), much less that freak Jar-Jar Binks. I remember when my friends and I left the theater way back in 1999, we tried to console ourselves that it was somehow better than we'd thought. It was cool, I guess, to see "that son of a bitch split in half" (as my cousin Brandon says some esteemed film critic behind him exclaiming when Darth Maul was sliced in two), but two and a half hours of Trade Federation and blockade talk does not a space epic make. I think it's why I responded far more favorably to the recent Star Trek reboot than I ever did to the original series of films: that one had action and whiz-bang special effects (and a pretty decent story, to boot).
And you know who directed that one? J.J. Abrams, who is behind the helm of the new planned Star Wars trilogy. In a time when Peter Jackson might as well call his Hobbit trilogy "The Quest for More Cash," Lucasfilm is now under the banner of the All-Mighty Mouse and being revisited in an attempt to...well, I don't know what (unless you count "nearly killing beloved American treasure Harrison Ford in a freak doorway accident" as motivation for revisiting the galaxy a long time ago and far, far away). I have the uneasy mixture of dread and "please god, don't let it suck" that a lot of my fellow fans surely must feel since 1999 (or 2002, or 2005). I'll probably go see the new Star Wars movies; I'd be a fool not to. But right now, I'm not sure how I'll feel about it.
The prequels have a reputation (justly in some cases, unjustly in others) of being awful. Just plain crap, really, and a lot about the prequel trilogy falls under that label. But for better or worse, Star Wars helped birth the recent trend of multi-movie epics with comic-book heroes or Hobbits from Middle Earth....and I don't mean the classic trilogy, either. As the book points out, the prequels made money; they were virtually critic-proof, and they proved that a story presented in multiple entries didn't need to worry about losing audiences (even if those audiences came to hate the very thing they were seeing). You wouldn't have Lord of the Rings without the prequels, nor would you have Twilight (if you know me, you know which of the two aforementioned properties I favor and which one makes my skin crawl). The prequel trilogy, shoddy and ineffectual as it was in furthering the story of Anakin Skywalker, did a lot for making studios aware of how profitable multi-part epics were.
I'm also less inclined, after reading the book, to think of George Lucas as the Evil Emperor. The book confirmed, for one thing, my theory that the Ewoks were the Viet-Cong (okay, maybe it wasn't my theory alone, but I'd like to think I was one of the first to see shades of Vietnam in the trilogy's depiction of a primitive rebellion standing up to a major technological enterprise). It also reminded me that, at heart, Lucas might never get around to making the small, independent films he set out to do, but he did start out wanting to make movies outside of the Hollywood system, and as much as Star Wars has helped to further that, it was never his intention. He was an artists first and foremost, looking to stay true to his vision. In the wake of Sony caving to North Korea, we need more artists like Lucas (even if they have the annoying habit of going back and adding digital effects that add nothing to the story).
I will always be a Star Wars nerd; it's just part of who I am, ladies. But I do think that some of the aspects of the "Expanded Universe" are just plain silly or not worth my time. I read the Timothy Zahn trilogy back in the day, but subsequent encounters with lesser Star Wars novels reminded me that the movies were great. The books, not so much. Star Wars fandom has certainly gained more cultural cache in recent years; it's okay to be a dork who wants to dress up as Boba Fett, I guess. And I celebrate that, I do. But I hope that J.J. Abrams doesn't screw it up. I really hope so. Because the last thing anyone wants is another Jar-Jar Binks roaming around doing stupid shit.
I think the sense of letdown that I and many of my ilk (i.e., long-term Star Wars fans) felt at the time of the first prequel (and which in no way was assuaged by the two follow-ups) is born in some ways of our own failure to see the original trilogy for what it was (a kid's movie). Anyone born between 1977 and 1983 who grew up with Luke, Leia, Han and Chewie, didn't know what to make of Anakin, Boring Obi-Wan, and Padme (really, "Padme?" What the hell, George...what the hell?), much less that freak Jar-Jar Binks. I remember when my friends and I left the theater way back in 1999, we tried to console ourselves that it was somehow better than we'd thought. It was cool, I guess, to see "that son of a bitch split in half" (as my cousin Brandon says some esteemed film critic behind him exclaiming when Darth Maul was sliced in two), but two and a half hours of Trade Federation and blockade talk does not a space epic make. I think it's why I responded far more favorably to the recent Star Trek reboot than I ever did to the original series of films: that one had action and whiz-bang special effects (and a pretty decent story, to boot).
And you know who directed that one? J.J. Abrams, who is behind the helm of the new planned Star Wars trilogy. In a time when Peter Jackson might as well call his Hobbit trilogy "The Quest for More Cash," Lucasfilm is now under the banner of the All-Mighty Mouse and being revisited in an attempt to...well, I don't know what (unless you count "nearly killing beloved American treasure Harrison Ford in a freak doorway accident" as motivation for revisiting the galaxy a long time ago and far, far away). I have the uneasy mixture of dread and "please god, don't let it suck" that a lot of my fellow fans surely must feel since 1999 (or 2002, or 2005). I'll probably go see the new Star Wars movies; I'd be a fool not to. But right now, I'm not sure how I'll feel about it.
The prequels have a reputation (justly in some cases, unjustly in others) of being awful. Just plain crap, really, and a lot about the prequel trilogy falls under that label. But for better or worse, Star Wars helped birth the recent trend of multi-movie epics with comic-book heroes or Hobbits from Middle Earth....and I don't mean the classic trilogy, either. As the book points out, the prequels made money; they were virtually critic-proof, and they proved that a story presented in multiple entries didn't need to worry about losing audiences (even if those audiences came to hate the very thing they were seeing). You wouldn't have Lord of the Rings without the prequels, nor would you have Twilight (if you know me, you know which of the two aforementioned properties I favor and which one makes my skin crawl). The prequel trilogy, shoddy and ineffectual as it was in furthering the story of Anakin Skywalker, did a lot for making studios aware of how profitable multi-part epics were.
I'm also less inclined, after reading the book, to think of George Lucas as the Evil Emperor. The book confirmed, for one thing, my theory that the Ewoks were the Viet-Cong (okay, maybe it wasn't my theory alone, but I'd like to think I was one of the first to see shades of Vietnam in the trilogy's depiction of a primitive rebellion standing up to a major technological enterprise). It also reminded me that, at heart, Lucas might never get around to making the small, independent films he set out to do, but he did start out wanting to make movies outside of the Hollywood system, and as much as Star Wars has helped to further that, it was never his intention. He was an artists first and foremost, looking to stay true to his vision. In the wake of Sony caving to North Korea, we need more artists like Lucas (even if they have the annoying habit of going back and adding digital effects that add nothing to the story).
I will always be a Star Wars nerd; it's just part of who I am, ladies. But I do think that some of the aspects of the "Expanded Universe" are just plain silly or not worth my time. I read the Timothy Zahn trilogy back in the day, but subsequent encounters with lesser Star Wars novels reminded me that the movies were great. The books, not so much. Star Wars fandom has certainly gained more cultural cache in recent years; it's okay to be a dork who wants to dress up as Boba Fett, I guess. And I celebrate that, I do. But I hope that J.J. Abrams doesn't screw it up. I really hope so. Because the last thing anyone wants is another Jar-Jar Binks roaming around doing stupid shit.
Friday, December 19, 2014
Well, I *Was* Going to See If Anyone Wanted to Go See "The Interview"
This week saw a triumph of totalitarian fear-mongering over the most sacred right that we as Americans enjoy with such abandon here in the States. Brought to its knees by a ruthless clan of hell-spawned mouth-breathing tyrants, a major entertainment facility bowed to pressure and decided to let said tyrants run rampant on them.
But enough about the Keeping Up with the Kardashians marathons on the E! network. This is more important.
The internet can be an amazing and disgusting thing. It's amazing in that you can connect with people the world over, eschewing the traditional boundaries of borders and geopolitical conflicts to really get to know people a world away. But then they hack one of your country's major movie studios, at the behest of the world's most obvious candidate for "asshole thuggery as form of government," and suddenly you're reminded that the internet is full of trolls. And sometimes these trolls work for North Korea.
Let me say this up front: chances are, The Interview wasn't going to sweep the Oscars next time around. Rogen/Franco productions rarely aspire beyond the level of stoner comedy that is best exemplified by Pineapple Express (a film which, as the years go by, I wonder about: suppose the second half of the movie, after Dale takes a hit of the title weed and then witnesses a real-life hit, was a fever dream of pothead paranoia? It would certainly explain the ratcheting up of violence and cartoonish situations that the film becomes). They're funny in parts (not always all the way through, but likeable enough), and while I still find Seth Rogen's laugh grating I do have a fondness for his persona onscreen. I was likely going to wait for the DVD release, to be honest.
But then...in case you've been living under a rock, The Interview concerns the fictional assassination of a very real figure in global politics (the spoiled fat rich kid from Pee-Wee's Big Adventure...I'm sorry, I mean Kim Jong Un). And perhaps understandably, the North Korean government (based on a "cult of personality" system that contains stories perhaps apocryphal but none the less amusing/horrifying such as the suggestion that state media told the people that their team had won the recent World Cup) was a little upset about this. Not understandably, a group of hackers (widely reported as having been enabled by North Korea to do so) hacked into the system of The Interview's parent studio Sony and had a field day releasing private emails that painted the executives in petty, unflattering lights. But then shit got real: these same hackers (whose choice of acronym as "Guardians of Peace," GOP, couldn't help but make this Obama Liberal chuckle a little) threatened "9/11 style attacks" on movie theaters that showed the movie. And so Sony, who didn't negotiate with terrorists, backed down.
The movie is in limbo as of this writing.
As someone who fancies himself an artist (or perhaps more accurately, an appreciator of other's art), I can't help but think that this chilling effect on the film industry doesn't do much for the idea of America being a land of free speech. After all, campaigns mounted in opposition of something usually have the opposite of the desired effect. And chances are that, had Sony not backed down, The Interview would be judged as a movie, not as a political statement (albeit one that hasn't been made yet). The merits of the movie will forever be lost to time, because even if it does get a wide release it won't be seen just on its own terms. Chaplin made The Great Dictator about Hitler, but he wisely chose to name his Hitler something different (and perhaps in a lesson that the filmmakers behind The Interview could have chosen to heed, didn't kill him off). The film has certain iconic moments that merit its inclusion in any discussion of film history, and it's a brave film for its time and ours. But Chaplin made the film in 1939 and 1940, when the true horrors of the Holocaust weren't known or even enacted yet. He said that if he'd known such facts at the time he wouldn't have made the film, which would be history's loss. It's not a completely successful film (the "Jewish ghetto" screams Hollywood backlot), but enough of it works and enough of it is still relevant to make it something that deserves to be seen.
I thought of Chaplin when the news about The Interview came down, but it's not the only film to have that kind of impact (and safe to say, a movie critical of Hitler while the USA was still on the sidelines didn't escape unscathed from criticism, though I don't think the Nazis ever tried to blow up theaters showing it). Monty Python's Life of Brian and The Last Temptation of Christ both tackled religion, and while I can't speak to the latter film I have seen the former. It's actually a critique of religion's ability to warp the human psyche, to make us all followers of people who often don't merit our devotion. Think of all the charismatic TV preachers in the Eighties who were exposed as money-grubbing sex fiends and you see how prophetic Life of Brian was. Controversy is often a boost to a film or album or book's profile: if you haven't offended anyone, the thinking goes, you're not doing your job.
I don't know if The Interview will ever be fully released. Kim Jong Un has to die sometime, though not likely at the hands of James Franco and Seth Rogen. I don't unilaterally condemn Sony for deciding to do what they did, they had to think about the threat and take it much more seriously than they might have, had the magic phrase "9/11" not entered the mix. It's just a damn shame, is all. Even if the movie was terrible, the marketplace needed to be the decider of that, not some big baby with his chubby finger on the nuclear trigger (oh great, now I've pissed off the North Koreans; I fully expect to be hacked now). Kim Jong Un can go fuck himself, for all I care. Yeah, I said it...please don't hack me!
I wonder what this means for my screenplay in development, Chokin' the Putin (in which a Canadian comedian goes to Russia to strangle Vladimir Putin)
But enough about the Keeping Up with the Kardashians marathons on the E! network. This is more important.
The internet can be an amazing and disgusting thing. It's amazing in that you can connect with people the world over, eschewing the traditional boundaries of borders and geopolitical conflicts to really get to know people a world away. But then they hack one of your country's major movie studios, at the behest of the world's most obvious candidate for "asshole thuggery as form of government," and suddenly you're reminded that the internet is full of trolls. And sometimes these trolls work for North Korea.
Let me say this up front: chances are, The Interview wasn't going to sweep the Oscars next time around. Rogen/Franco productions rarely aspire beyond the level of stoner comedy that is best exemplified by Pineapple Express (a film which, as the years go by, I wonder about: suppose the second half of the movie, after Dale takes a hit of the title weed and then witnesses a real-life hit, was a fever dream of pothead paranoia? It would certainly explain the ratcheting up of violence and cartoonish situations that the film becomes). They're funny in parts (not always all the way through, but likeable enough), and while I still find Seth Rogen's laugh grating I do have a fondness for his persona onscreen. I was likely going to wait for the DVD release, to be honest.
But then...in case you've been living under a rock, The Interview concerns the fictional assassination of a very real figure in global politics (the spoiled fat rich kid from Pee-Wee's Big Adventure...I'm sorry, I mean Kim Jong Un). And perhaps understandably, the North Korean government (based on a "cult of personality" system that contains stories perhaps apocryphal but none the less amusing/horrifying such as the suggestion that state media told the people that their team had won the recent World Cup) was a little upset about this. Not understandably, a group of hackers (widely reported as having been enabled by North Korea to do so) hacked into the system of The Interview's parent studio Sony and had a field day releasing private emails that painted the executives in petty, unflattering lights. But then shit got real: these same hackers (whose choice of acronym as "Guardians of Peace," GOP, couldn't help but make this Obama Liberal chuckle a little) threatened "9/11 style attacks" on movie theaters that showed the movie. And so Sony, who didn't negotiate with terrorists, backed down.
The movie is in limbo as of this writing.
As someone who fancies himself an artist (or perhaps more accurately, an appreciator of other's art), I can't help but think that this chilling effect on the film industry doesn't do much for the idea of America being a land of free speech. After all, campaigns mounted in opposition of something usually have the opposite of the desired effect. And chances are that, had Sony not backed down, The Interview would be judged as a movie, not as a political statement (albeit one that hasn't been made yet). The merits of the movie will forever be lost to time, because even if it does get a wide release it won't be seen just on its own terms. Chaplin made The Great Dictator about Hitler, but he wisely chose to name his Hitler something different (and perhaps in a lesson that the filmmakers behind The Interview could have chosen to heed, didn't kill him off). The film has certain iconic moments that merit its inclusion in any discussion of film history, and it's a brave film for its time and ours. But Chaplin made the film in 1939 and 1940, when the true horrors of the Holocaust weren't known or even enacted yet. He said that if he'd known such facts at the time he wouldn't have made the film, which would be history's loss. It's not a completely successful film (the "Jewish ghetto" screams Hollywood backlot), but enough of it works and enough of it is still relevant to make it something that deserves to be seen.
I thought of Chaplin when the news about The Interview came down, but it's not the only film to have that kind of impact (and safe to say, a movie critical of Hitler while the USA was still on the sidelines didn't escape unscathed from criticism, though I don't think the Nazis ever tried to blow up theaters showing it). Monty Python's Life of Brian and The Last Temptation of Christ both tackled religion, and while I can't speak to the latter film I have seen the former. It's actually a critique of religion's ability to warp the human psyche, to make us all followers of people who often don't merit our devotion. Think of all the charismatic TV preachers in the Eighties who were exposed as money-grubbing sex fiends and you see how prophetic Life of Brian was. Controversy is often a boost to a film or album or book's profile: if you haven't offended anyone, the thinking goes, you're not doing your job.
I don't know if The Interview will ever be fully released. Kim Jong Un has to die sometime, though not likely at the hands of James Franco and Seth Rogen. I don't unilaterally condemn Sony for deciding to do what they did, they had to think about the threat and take it much more seriously than they might have, had the magic phrase "9/11" not entered the mix. It's just a damn shame, is all. Even if the movie was terrible, the marketplace needed to be the decider of that, not some big baby with his chubby finger on the nuclear trigger (oh great, now I've pissed off the North Koreans; I fully expect to be hacked now). Kim Jong Un can go fuck himself, for all I care. Yeah, I said it...please don't hack me!
I wonder what this means for my screenplay in development, Chokin' the Putin (in which a Canadian comedian goes to Russia to strangle Vladimir Putin)
Tuesday, December 9, 2014
What To Read (When You're Between Semesters) for Fun
You may have noticed that a certain Southern US university has been in the news lately for what can best be described as "the stupidest fucking thing I've personally ever seen privilaged white kids do with too much time on their hands, as well as a frankly offensive view that the African-American community in this country can be reduced to crude stereotypes and it's okay because it's a tradition to do so, and also let's face it these self-involved brats probably think it's hilarious and won't learn a goddam thing about how to be senstive to others because they're programmed from the outset to be jerks what with their 'fraternal' organization which codifies gay panic as 'hey, bros just gotta hang out, dude, who knows what could happen am I right?' and which cover their ass with 'service commitments' which in no way excuse their borderline asinine behavior." But I'm not going to talk about that, because it's Christmas. And Christmas is the season of ignoring idiots who will be running used-car dealerships in twenty years.
No, I'd like to take the time to exult in the fact that, after this week is over, I and my fellow grad students can go back to something I'm sure we've all missed (even those of us who snuck in an occasional George Saunders short-story collection or a critical look at Derrida through cartoons): reading for fun. I already have a few things picked out, but allow me to highlight some works that I think some of my peers should check out, assuming that they have similar reading tastes as I (or they just have time on their hands and nothing in particular picked out). At any rate:
Civilwarland In Bad Decline (George Saunders): Read this when I was supposed to be reading other things, it's absolutely batshit crazy and hilarious and moving all at once.
The Financial Lives of the Poets (Jess Walter): Just finished this one over the weekend, it's the story of a guy down on his luck who tries to become a drug dealer so that he can support his family. I've never seen Breaking Bad, so I don't know if this is "Breaking Bad as comedy" per se, but it's pretty good.
A Fan's Notes (Frederick Exley): Actually, this is one that I read way, way back, I mentioned it in a paper for one of my classes and thought "damn, I'd like to read that again." Hard to describe, really.
The Fortress of Solitude/Dissident Gardens/Motherless Brooklyn (Jonathan Lethem): This was "The Year of Reading Lethem" for me, and these three titles did not disappoint. I ran into the dreaded "wall of self-imposed indifference towards my original topic" when I tried to make a paper topic about the use of music in Fortress, but it's still worth the trip. The other two are similarly beautiful.
The Man in the High Castle (Philip K. Dick): Lethem's always talking about this guy, I found a copy with a hilariously misleading "old timey science-fiction" cover, but it's fantastic overall. Think Pynchon/Vonnegut, minus the sense of humor.
Vineland (Thomas Pynchon): This feels like a dry run for the much more awesome (and soon to be a major motion picture) Inherent Vice, but that's not a bad thing.
True Grit/The Dog of the South/Masters of Atlantis/Norwood/Gringoes (Charles Portis): Really, you can't go wrong (even his "not that great" books are good in parts).
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World (Haruki Murakami): Mind-bending as always, this is a fantastic treasure of a book.
I would list more, but I'm running low on what else I've read or re-read over the past year that could bear mention here. All as a way of talking about those certain idiots who did some stupid shit and put a certain university in the news. But really, these books are all fantastic ways to kill time during the Christmas break, if you're so inclined.
No, I'd like to take the time to exult in the fact that, after this week is over, I and my fellow grad students can go back to something I'm sure we've all missed (even those of us who snuck in an occasional George Saunders short-story collection or a critical look at Derrida through cartoons): reading for fun. I already have a few things picked out, but allow me to highlight some works that I think some of my peers should check out, assuming that they have similar reading tastes as I (or they just have time on their hands and nothing in particular picked out). At any rate:
Civilwarland In Bad Decline (George Saunders): Read this when I was supposed to be reading other things, it's absolutely batshit crazy and hilarious and moving all at once.
The Financial Lives of the Poets (Jess Walter): Just finished this one over the weekend, it's the story of a guy down on his luck who tries to become a drug dealer so that he can support his family. I've never seen Breaking Bad, so I don't know if this is "Breaking Bad as comedy" per se, but it's pretty good.
A Fan's Notes (Frederick Exley): Actually, this is one that I read way, way back, I mentioned it in a paper for one of my classes and thought "damn, I'd like to read that again." Hard to describe, really.
The Fortress of Solitude/Dissident Gardens/Motherless Brooklyn (Jonathan Lethem): This was "The Year of Reading Lethem" for me, and these three titles did not disappoint. I ran into the dreaded "wall of self-imposed indifference towards my original topic" when I tried to make a paper topic about the use of music in Fortress, but it's still worth the trip. The other two are similarly beautiful.
The Man in the High Castle (Philip K. Dick): Lethem's always talking about this guy, I found a copy with a hilariously misleading "old timey science-fiction" cover, but it's fantastic overall. Think Pynchon/Vonnegut, minus the sense of humor.
Vineland (Thomas Pynchon): This feels like a dry run for the much more awesome (and soon to be a major motion picture) Inherent Vice, but that's not a bad thing.
True Grit/The Dog of the South/Masters of Atlantis/Norwood/Gringoes (Charles Portis): Really, you can't go wrong (even his "not that great" books are good in parts).
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World (Haruki Murakami): Mind-bending as always, this is a fantastic treasure of a book.
I would list more, but I'm running low on what else I've read or re-read over the past year that could bear mention here. All as a way of talking about those certain idiots who did some stupid shit and put a certain university in the news. But really, these books are all fantastic ways to kill time during the Christmas break, if you're so inclined.
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