The Dubious Monk
chinese curses since twenty aught twoArchive for movies
chun jie kuai le
I went out to buy cat food around noon today, and walking down Cumberland it smelled like China (except cold). It took me a few seconds to realize the smell was incense from the Huasing temple. There were tonnes of cars parked on the surrounding streets and people were coming out the front doors putting their sticks of incense in the cauldronnish thing out front. Happy new year.
I also went out to McNally Robinson to spend the gift certificate I received from my fellow cheese factorians, and then watched some Flames of War gaming down at Imagine before heading to the Towne for The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus. I liked the movie but was also glad I didn’t spend $12 to see it at Silver City.
oh spineless administrations, aren’t you cute and ubiquitous?
Did you hear about the gutless public library administration that didn’t tell the corporate sponsors of a non-library event in their city to fuck right off? I shared it on Vagabondscrawl already today, but it always takes a while to show up there from Google Reader. It also made me mad enough to talk about here. So here you go:
Bookninja says: Libraries in Vancouver should tell Olympics, and spineless bosses, to “fuck off”The corporate assholes at the Vancouver Olympics, through the spineless leadership of the Vancouver library system, have instructed city librarians to not only not use products and services by competitors of official Olympic sponsors for Olympic-themed events, but also to cover with cloth or tape any existing infrastructure with offending brand names or logos. I’d say I’m speechless but, given the headline, I think I’ve got my response down.
Libraries should not be beholden to that kind of shit. Did you hear about the Sam Katz sponsored idiocy they’re planning to try in Winnipeg? Corporate naming rights to anything and everything, including library books. Maybe if someone wasn’t so fucking horny for a helicopter, the library would be able to get books that qualified librarians chose rather than whatever someone wanted their name in. I don’t know if that will actually affect any sort of buying decisions. How would I possibly know? But I don’t want to see libraries quietly fold and become part of the corporate bullshit pervading our society. That’s why I’m going to library school next year, inshallah.
A while back I read a book (which it appears I didn’t review here) called Revolting Librarians Redux. It’s about how librarians are supposed to change fucking systems. To make things better. Better cataloguing, better service, just betterness, often in spite of administrations. Because really, the idea of having information provided for free, and with people to help you sort through it, is a pretty great idea. Not everyone can afford broadband internet at home and not everyone can get through all the shit that’s out there. I hate the idea that these administrations try to turn libraries into corporate-sponsored zones. Pepsi doesn’t give a shit about giving the citizens a means to be informed, unless it is being informed about Pepsi. Libraries are supposed to be better than that.
Shut up and let me be an idealist.
These stupid policies get in the way of what competent librarian folk do. And these Vancouver Olympic policies were written by a City communications flack on her own initiative. Nobody said the Olympics weren’t going to happen unless a Wendy’s logo got covered up. There is nothing at stake beyond the freedom of information to be represented at the library. She was just worried about offending the money and wanted to tell her offensive colleagues down at the library to tone it down while the adults were in town. Rolling over preemptively in case of trouble. Just in case someone might be offended by the “wrong” symbol. Which is exactly what libraries shouldn’t be doing. Moral of the story: people in offices suck.
Unrelated to anything, I heard people talking about the movie The Warriors yesterday, and I (not being involved directly in the conversation) got to say “Caaan youuu diggiiiiit?” and only one of the people involved look at me like I was insane. The other was all over that shit, and we chatted about the movie and the videogame that brought the movie to my attention. Which was pretty satisfying.
that was a long goddamned day
I’ve been reading 2666 but because it’s divided into five parts, I’ve been breaking it up with other (lighter) books in between. (I owe you teeming handfuls a review of American Gods; it’s coming.) Right now I’m reading The City and the City and I just love it. It’s about a crime that happens in a city where there’s another city right there sharing the same streets but they’re in different countries and in each city you aren’t allowed to see (or interact with) the things that are happening in the other. Things aren’t invisible; you are not allowed to see them. If you look at someone/thing in the other city too closely you’ve broken the rules and the all-powerful group that deals with Breaches comes and takes you away. Possibly to kill you, but I’m not done the book yet (I’ll review it for reals when I am).
This organization, Breach, is so powerful they could act with utter impunity, but if it’s not an emergency they have to follow the rules and be asked to handle things. I like this common idea of powerful entities having rules to follow. Vampires can’t cross running water. Police need a warrant. Breach must be asked. But. I don’t care about the little guy breaking the rules. In fact, I expect it, and get sort of sad when the powerless person doesn’t try doing something other than follow the rules. I’m having a weird time with how few people agitate against Breach in The City and the City. There are some, but I keep on wanting to shout at everyone, “You can see things! You shouldn’t have to unsee them!” But it’s a book and the characters (thus far) are well enmeshed in their setting.
A lot of fiction I read deals with the individual and celebrates the individual, especially in the face of power. For example, there’s an article I linked to a long time back about Murakami always wanting to be on the side of the egg not the wall, and you know how I feel about Murakami stories. Yesterday I watched a National Film Board movie from the 60’s called “Ladies and Gentlemen, Mr. Leonard Cohen.” He was all young and bright-eyed. In one bit Pierre Berton is trying to get young Leonard Cohen to say what he stands for, what great idea drives him, what issue burns in his soul. And Leonard Cohen says, “No idea; I just check if I’m in a state of grace.” His companion explains that Leonard Cohen is talking about the task of the individual to live one’s own life, but Leonard Cohen is sort of dismissive. I like that.
Of course, it’s easy to “identify” with the powerless when you’re a white guy with a beard and a Mac.
minimized
I enjoyed my condensed little Folk Fest on Friday. While it was cold at mainstage I managed to shiver through the sets by Iron & Wine and Neko Case which were my reasons for going. I knew that Iron & Wine was just one guy, but that didn’t stop me from being really happy seeing Sam Beam stand there with his guitar a speck in the middle of that big old stage. He laughed at the notion of these thousands of people being outside to listen to “quiet folk music” and played nothing to dance to. I loved it. His voice was less whispery than on the albums and he opened with the Trapeze Swinger, my favourite of all his songs. Neko Case was good too, though her set started a little roughly. I wasn’t disappointed and I’m glad she sang.
I saw the Deep Dark Woods, who I like and saw C.R. Avery at a covers workshop. He did a Neil Young song beatboxing with a harmonica. After that was over I floated to a bunch of stages. Because I was only there for a day I didn’t hang around workshops that didn’t grab me hard. Until the Songs of the Contemporary Cynic show with the Dust Poets and Mark Berube and Vance Gilbert, which was everything you want out of a folk festival workshop. The bands were bantering, had interesting instrumentation and they all joined in on each other’s songs. It was great. I took a bunch of pictures but in a fit of Luddism I only took my old film SLR so I don’t have them digitized (or developed) yet.
What else happened in the last week? I was dogsitting and Rudy didn’t end up dead from the cancer so that’s good. I read a couple of books (reviews will be up shortly) and saw Moon last night with Sean (who graciously accompanied me to a science fiction film). We discussed science fiction and issues afterwards and I was my usual articulate self. I should learn some day not to speak things I haven’t already worked out in writing. Discussions that come through my mouth never work, and I either blather to or patronize my listener. Sorry to everyone who ever tries to listen to me speak.
Today I broke down and got the MLB At Bat program for my iPod so I can listen to baseball games now that my free cable is gone. I can watch a couple each day too, but I’m not a huge fan of watching TV on the palm of my hand. I’m listening to the Mariners game right now. Ichiro was up and was called out on strikes. I tend to do other stuff while baseball is on anyway so listening to the games isn’t too shabby. Plus it gives you video highlights and condensed games and stuff.
movie review: away we go
One of the things about only getting your information from the internet (plus whatever commercials are shown during baseball games before your free cable disappears) is that you can tailor your knowledge very well. So well you eliminate a pile of serendipity. I mean, I get to ignore all the shitty movies I’d never want to see, and don’t get hit by a million commercials for them because of my net habits. (I also learn far more than I’d like about a certain subset of movies I might be tempted to see and now have no desire to, like Terminator Salvation, but this is not the point.) For the most part this is good. But then something shows up on my radar (actually me looking at the listings for the Towne 8) that I had no idea existed, like Away We Go, directed by Sam Mendes who I remember from directing American Beauty.
It’s about a couple in their early thirties deciding where they should live. Verona is six months pregnant. They’re looking for a place. Their jobs can be done anywhere and they want to be close to some sort of friends or family. It’s kind of a “what people do with their lives” road trip movie. That’s it. I loved loved loved it.
Of course it’s pretty much pointed straight at people my age. People who kind of suspect they’re fuckups but don’t want to just live completely by default. Maybe there’s a lot of analysis that would prove why I shouldn’t like the film. Maybe it’s actually horrible. I don’t know. I liked it a lot, even though it made me sad.
movie review: into the wild
This afternoon I watched Into the Wild (2007) and thought long and hard about my lack of balls. Now, I’d never be able to do what the main character of the movie does in the end, heading up into Alaska to live off the land. Nope. You’ve seen me complain about living in a heated insulated place over a winter. And the movie bothered me with all the beautiful blue skies he had up there. Granted it was an Alaskan summer not winter, but still. That there was only one day of horrible weather shown put the lie to the whole enterprise.
But the rest of the travelling he does, well, I probably wouldn’t be able to do any of that either. Sad really. When so much of what I think of myself and try to project has to do with that wanderfooted image. Gah. This was a movie I shouldn’t have watched right now. Stirs up too much guilt and hope. I blame Aileen.
What day was it today? Tuesday I guess. Must be. In two days I’ll be getting ready to hit the road in my own meagre way. Paying for the wheels conveying me. Like a wannabe chump.
movie and book review: watchmen
So I saw Watchmen this afternoon, and am happy to report that it didn’t make me want to claw my eyes out, but it’s really not as good as the comic. I don’t know that I ever expected it to be and I was kind of relieved it wasn’t.
SPOILERS FOLLOW
While it was neat to see a bunch of the stuff on screen, it felt like it was a lot of eye candy but with like a salmon flavour (possibly tunafish). Just off somehow. Like Veidt is trying to get society off fossil fuels, when in the book he’d already done that and it hadn’t really helped the world. And Rorshach kills the kidnapper/killer with a cleaver instead of letting the guy make his own compromise to save his life or not. There wasn’t really a reason to care about anyone in the movie apart from the fact that it was a great book (which might have been the metatextual point).
The pace of the thing was wrong. I mean wrong for a movie and wrong for the book. In the book the simultaneity of the arrangement of panels on a page means that the whole Dr. Manhattan episode is actually happening all at once. It’s all right there and you can go with it back and forth, instead of being pulled through flashbacks. A movie goes forward even when it doesn’t really. But the structure of the thing needed to be handled differently. Movie flashbacks aren’t the same as comic book flashbacks. I know I’m probably just parroting a bunch of Alan Moore stuff here (it seems I a lot of my “views on comics” are the most easily understandable bits of his interviews), but I think in the end I do agree that it was unfilmable. (I do stand by my previous assertion that the best possible adaptation would have been as a 12-episode HBO miniseries.)
That’s not to say it was horrible. They did a good job with what they could do. There are lots of bits I missed seeing but they’re all still in the book. I just checked. No pages were erased by the existence of the film.
movie review: brand upon the brain
We have the Criterion Collection DVD of Brand Upon the Brain in the system and somehow it made its way out to Intrepid the other day for me to grab up. I felt bad for missing it when it was playing in the city but watching a Guy Maddin with other people around would seem to be a recipe for hearing people be self-important douches as they leave the theatre. Here it was just me and I could like it without having to sound like a douche to anyone. Except you, I guess. I think I’ll watch it again tomorrow with a different narrator.
movie review: coraline
I did my part and went to see Henry Selick-directed Coraline (2009) last night. If it had just been Selick’s stop-motion movie I probably wouldn’t have seen it opening night, but it’s also a Neil Gaiman book, so adding my dollars to the opening weekend pool felt worthwhile. Apparently it does make a difference when you see a movie. Not when it’s Dark Knight or something big, but when it’s just a little one. I guess it matters for the big guys too, just not as much individually.
Anyway, the movie was good. I saw it at Grant Park in 3D. John Hodgman and whoever did the cat were my favourite voices, and the stop-motion was beautiful. The whole actual quest part of the story felt like it went too quickly. I mean, it looked good and all, but sitting in the theatre it felt like there was tonnes and tonnes of buildup and then boom! it was all over. In a nice neat package. I should know better than to expect the same kind of introspection you get from a book. And maybe I brought all that slow pacing to the book myself. Who knows?
movie review: the sun also rises
The Sun Also Rises (2007) is not a version of the Hemingway novel. It’s a Chinese movie directed by (and starring) Wen Jiang. Todd gave me this DVD (and a bunch more) the last time I was in China but I hadn’t watched it until last night. I don’t know why. There’s a son with a fengde mother. Well, she’s only fengde after she loses her fish shoes to a CGI bird. There’s a house in the woods made up of artifacts of her madness and after her son has a sneezing fit inside she’s back to normal before disappearing.
Then there’s the story of Teacher Liang who’s accused of groping five women at his school. He’s caught and beaten by a horde with flashlights. The flashlight chase scene was so pretty. There are a couple of shots I would frame a frame of and hang it on my wall. Eventually he is exonerated and then kills himself.
Then we jump back to the boy in the village and the teacher’s friend Tang and his wife are out there for him to be re-educated (it’s 1976). The boy’s mother has just disappeared and Tang goes out hunting with the peasant kids, leaving his wife in the shack to have an affair with the boy (who’s like 20) with the fengde mother. Tang finds out and says he’ll kill the boy when he learns what velvet is.
Finally there’s a flashback to 20 years before and Tang’s wife and the boy’s (soon to be since she’s a million months pregnant) mom are riding camels through the desert, one to a wedding and one to claim the body of her dead lover. The boy’s mom gives birth to him in the toilet on the train and she stops the train so she can run back along the tracks to find him. And the sun rises. The end.
The whole thing was kind of crazy and dreamlike and good. It was shot beautifully except for that damned CGI bird. The main thing that bugged me was how many clothes the peasant boy had. He never wore the same thing twice.
