Those Black Skinned Blue-Eyed Boys Ain't Gonna Fight No Wars

Fresh off some kind of liquid Tylenol daze I'm not sure I entirely fathom, Holly just had to go and cap off the recounting of her Vegas trip with mention of hearing Adam Freeland's new set.

Go Here to download. Right Click. Save As.

Check this fucking set list:


Billy Nayer - Ship Alarm (BSG Records)
Siriusmo - Girls Rock (Bungalow)
Unkle – Restless [loop] (Surrender All)
Evil Nine – They Live(unmixed demo) (Marine Parade)
Rogerseventytwo – Imagination (Tiger Trax)
Grinderman - No Pussy Blues [Adam Freeland Edit] (CDR)
Adam Freeland – Glowstix (Marine Parade)
Boys Noize - Let's Buy Happiness (Boys Noize Records)
Autolux – Blanket [Adam Freeland Mix] (Full Time Hobby)
Junkie XL - Cities in Dust [Glimmers Mix] (Artwerk)
Hot Chip - Ready For The Floor [Soulwax Mix (EMI)
Shadow Dancer - End Hit (Boys Noize Records)
Alan Braxe – Addicted (Vulture)
U.N.K.L.E. – Restless (Surrender All)
Blake Baxter/Mark Romboy - House Ya [Bootleg] (CDR)
Alex Metric – Pins (Marine Parade)
Crookers - Love To Edit (Crack Crack Records)
Bloody Beetroots – Butter (Crack Crack Records)
DJ Shadow - Right thing/Ztrip - Set off the party (Island)
Freeland – Do Ya(unmixed demo) (Marine Parade)
Map Of Africa - Black Skin Blue Eyed Boys (Whatever We Want)
Black Strobe - Shining Brightstar [Phones Mix] (Playlouder / Beggars France)
Sebasien Tellier - Sexual Sportswear [SebastiAn Mix] (Record Makers)
Breakbot – Happy Rabbit (Moshi Moshi)
Tepr - Midniut Jacuzzi [Data Mix] (Wall of Sound)
Soulwax – Krack [Nite Version] (Play It Again Sam)
Midnight Juggernaughts - Road to Discovery (Siberia Records)
Adam Freeland – Hate (Marine Parade)
Freeland - How To Fake Your Life(unmixed demo) (Marine Parade)
Splitter - All Alone [Alex Metric Mix] (Eye Industries)
Can – Mothersky (United Artists Records)
Swayzak - Smile & Receive [Apparat Mix] (K7!)
Simple Minds - Theme for Great Cities (Sanctuary)
Caribou – Niobe [Adam Freeland Edit] (CDR)

Just reading that caused to stand on end the numerous hairs on my body.


I am Up All Night.

Addendum: Never much used drugs. I don't have to. I have music like this. I thought last year was a peak. Thank God these people got the madness.

I Used To Be Much Older

First: See In Bruges. I'm not at all the first to sing about it, but I haven't seen anything quite so zany that wasn't also drowned in whimsy. It pulls no punches, it takes unbelievable chances, and to top it all off, most of it is hysterical.

Second: Two movies I'm developing a larger appetite for:



and

Hope Floats

Yes. Like the rest of you, heard the Obama speech in all its Obamity. His speech was easily the best campaign speech on race the world has ever heard. This is not a small thing.

And then this shows up.

Neither one of them is giving us much but from the mouths of babes, here. I've never understood how Hillary could play the experience card. She hasn't got that much on Obama at all.

Then there's this:

A little disenchantment with Obama could turn out to be a good thing. Too much idealism can blind a leader to reality as surely as too much ideology can.

-From Cozy Curmudgeonly Dowd's response column today.

Obama was forced to examine his alliance with extreme characters, and responded to controversy, trying to confront his shortcomings.

To be forthright is a breath of fresh air after the past eight years, hell, after the past several decades.

Elect him. If he isn't up to the job, we'll replace him in four years. So long as we're making choices bravely, no matter what we're offered, the choices so offered might get better.

He'll still be better suited than Bush, or perhaps, so will she.

Besides, all of the experience in the world isn't alone going to put this place back together again. Experience gave us the atom bomb as well the New Deal.

Obama has the power to move us, and he may very well have the power to lead us. What the hell, let's find out.

Eucharist of this Our Age

the object in its Journey, comes nigh, among the excursions of Chance, the sins of ministers, the inscriptions upon walls of Gate-posts, -- the birth of the 'Sandwhich' at this exact moment in Christianity,-- one of the Noble and Fallen for its Angel! Disks of secular Bread, --enclosing whilst concealing slices of real Flesh, yet a-sop with Blood, under the earthly guise of British Beef, all,-- but for the Species of course,--Consubstantiate, thus...the Sandwhich, Eucharist of this our Age.

- From Mason and Dixon - Thomas Pynchon

The above was a summer spent reading when I should have been tending to more important things, but either way, I get easily distracted by dense, very possibly crackpot writing, and I had this strange, elusive piece as a part of my FB profile for the longest time, unable to take it down due to a fascination with it that I can't quite put my finger on.

I'm intrigued by theology, by belief systems as they affect society, both the good and bad effects those may be (I find it more enlightening to focus on the good things, since we've been dealing too heavily with the results of bad theology in recent years). I find as much good in Religious belief as most Agnostics find bad, which is a turnaround from the cranky Atheist I left behind from my teen years.

Most of all, I kept the quote up for two years because I love language that can find meter, humor and a wily confusion in anything religious, and seriously, have you picked up a copy of Mason & Dixon? It's like 7,000 pages the fuck long and I'll never find that quote again. Yeesh. Gotta save it somewhere.

Auteur Poseur?

"I started out by calling Mr. Haneke a sadist, but it seems to me that he may be too naïve, too delicate, to merit that designation, which should be reserved only for the greatest filmmakers."

- A.O. Scott, reviewing Michael Haneke's remake of his 1998 film Funny Games


I'd hate to do this, but I already agree with A.O. Scott, and must link his Funny Games review. Have I seen Haneke's update? No, I've seen the original German version, and the new one is a shot-by-shot American version, the director's first film in English.

I'll do without. I was propelled, by a fascination with The Piano Teacher and Caché, to see another Haneke feature, Netflixed the original Funny Games (unaware, at the time, of its impending remake), and was thoroughly unhappy for a few days after watching it.

I don't care that that is partly his intention. I don't care that he's deconstructing 'our' predilection for or 'enjoyment' of violence. Nor am I impressed that he lets us know it's all only a movie.

If you want to see acting on a level you've rarely seen, rent the original version. I don't doubt that Naomi Watts, Tim Roth, Michael Pitt and others give performances that are equally powerful, but I know all the twists and turns, and don't wish to return to Hell.

The horror we witness on the screen during your film is borne so realistically and painfully by your actors that it's most certainly hypocritical to deride us for the natural, primal attention we give it in return. But deride us you do. You mock us for wanting them to survive it all, as if you're taking us to task for rubber-necking.

Doddering, curmudgeonly, pomo nonsense like that cheapens both the humanity of your film's suffering actors and the accomplishment of their performances, which, in your original version are considerably brave ones.

Michael Haneke, you make Lars Von Trier look like Marc Forster.

Just Wait for Seagal....

My Favorites

Are winning.

Tilda Swinton

Coens

Robert Elswit


Fuckin' Glen and Marketa repr'zent!

This never happens.

Call It

Song

Winner: Falling Slowly (Once)

My Fav: Falling Slowly (Once)


Editing

Winner: No Country For Old Men

My Fav: No Country For Old Men


Cinematography

Winner: Atonement

My Fav: There Will Be Blood


Art Direction

Winner: Atonement

My Fav: There Will Be Blood


Original Screenplay

Winner: Juno

My Fav: Juno


Adapted Screenplay

Winner: No Country For Old Men

My Fav: No Country For Old Men


Foreign Film

Haven't seen any of this category, but will mention it because Romania's 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days is a chilling, superbly acted and directed film that should've been at least nominated.


Best Director

Winner: Joel and Ethan Coen (No Country For Old Men)

My Fav: Joel-Paul Thomas Coen Ethan-Anderson Fuck


Supporting Actress

Winner: Ruby Dee (American Gangster)

My Fav: Tilda Swinton (Michael Clayton)


Supporting Actor

Winner: Javier Bardem (No Country For Old Men)

My Fav: Javier Bardem (No Country For Old Men)


Actress

Winner: Julie Christie (Away From Her)

My Fav: Ellen Page (Juno)


Actor

Winner: Daniel DAY Lewis (There Will Be Blood)

My Fav: Daniel DAY Lewis (There Will Be Blood)


Best Picture

Winner: No Country For Old Men

My Fav: There Will Be Blood

I Say Thee Write Your Own Original Content...

Because I have to post a section of this article verbatim here, in anticipation of the most significant Oscar Night I've ever seen (in my short life):

From The Carpetbagger:

A Critic’s Critic

Paul Thomas Anderson, apart from being the holy vessel of hope and aspiration for critics and cineastes, is known in the industry as both a straight shooter and a barrel of monkeys — someone who takes the work seriously, but not himself. On Thursday night at STK, he did not disappoint.

He was in full cry with his mates, staying late and talking with all comers. The Bagger, who has admitted here that he finds “There Will Be Blood” more admirable than convincing, introduced himself. Mr. Anderson laughed for a while. And then he laughed a bunch more.

“You know you don’t know a thing about movies,” he said.

Um, gee, the Bagger thought, maybe this is the point where he should change the topic to “Punch-Drunk Love,” another movie by Mr. Anderson, one of his favorite films of all time? But the filmmaker just kept laughing.

“ ‘There Will Be Blood’ was the best movie of the year,” Mr. Anderson said. “Except for maybe ‘Juno.’ And ‘Clayton.’ And ‘Atonement.’ Other than that, it was the best movie of the year.”

Um, there seems to be one omission in that gracious tick-tock, the Bagger noted. The one that sent the Bagger into fan-boy convulsions. The Coen brothers’ “No Country for Old Men.”

“You really think that movie was better than ours!” Mr. Anderson said, scoffing. “C’mon, do you really believe that?” Mr. Anderson laughed one more time, clapped the Bagger on his back and wished him on his merry, misguided way.


My original content for the day? Why, if I encounter one more article reminding us of the "obscurity" of this year's noms, I'm going to just drink the editor's fuckin' milkshake. Seriously, I know you have stuff to do, people, but you've gotta be kidding me. Y'all went to see Hayden Christensen refuse to use a damned car door this weekend, right?!! C'mon, eejits.

Of Course...

...none of the previous post means for a second that Terry Gilliam's solution isn't worth noting.

Your Mother Should Know

These past few months have been the most chemical imbalancy, abject, crazy-town, gut-wrenchingful months of a life full of 'em, and I figure culminating stress found fulmination finally in a fight or flight response that squarely found itself in column "flight".

Not, mind you, the kind of flight that makes me reparations for being a twenty five year old with a B.A. in Theatre and no discernible future on the horizon, save for the obvious future of time. Consequently, that flight was the kind which shuts you down and cold cocks your system but good. I ran out of "fight" for the first time in my life, and am just left with the angry.

So we're in recuperation land, have been shuffling there in all possible ways since early November, and who knows what bright patch or dark patch we might land into? Keep fastened your seatbelts, because around the corner it's the end of delayed adolescence land, that white elephantine part of yourself that you've concocted with the help of a Protestant-like devotion to films, breakbeats, literature, intense and worthy friendships, theatre, and other forms of worship that were a part of an ego-involved attempt to be a good boy.

I didn't want to be the next disaster in my family. I spent the next eleven years more or less exceeding that expectation. There are many, many things I'd desperately like to keep from those years, least of which are my dreams. My Protestantism, however, needs to make peace with a personal life of some kind.

This should be interesting.

I'm Your Goddamned Partner

It's got a ridiculous title. It's been nearly twenty years since the last one. George Lucas rejected Frank "ShawFuckinShank Redemption" Darabont's screenplay and gave the reins to David "Copout/Undercooked" Koepp. Last but not least, apparently this one's a full on slapstick comedy... And I officially CAN'T FUCKING WAIT.



Not after seeing that. I'm totally excited.

Another Something...That Rhymes With June.....

Since Something Awful photo-trolls create exempla of the best of our wretchedest holidays far better than we can:



Happy Valentine's Day.

Intermezzo...

...you know, between now and when they call the Dem's race next week...

Whackity Schmackity Doo

Patton Oswalt discusses a crazy alternate universe on one of his albums, one in which "Arnold Schwarzenegger runs California, torture is legal, and spinach is poison."

Aside from whomever you think should win today or whomever you think shouldn't, would it not just be fundamentally weird to know that Bill Clinton is the (first) First Husband/Gentleman/Hound Dog, and back in the White House? Well, we'd finally have a woman in the office, only it's, you know, her?

To top it all off, Al Gore has a Nobel Prize (Imagine that in 1994), an Oscar, frequently guest appears on brilliant tv shows, and generally saves humanity when he's not ensconced along with Ed Begley Jr. in his sciencey lair.

Most of all, it's going to be weird for Chelsea Clinton, though I'm sure she won't complain, she's used to it.

It might be too weird for me, though. I don't know, aside from an infinite number of actual reasons to not vote for the Clintons, in favor of unwhackifying the Universe as much as possible, I don't want to give some girl I've never met in my life two freakin' Presidents for parents.

Imminently Utterable

..And quite frankly should be repeated, there has been much talk of Juno dissenters dissenting on the grounds that the dialogue is unrealistic. The logical response has been that movies and books, though a mirror to the world, shouldn't produce an image unaltered by imagination.

Do we look like we come out of a Picasso painting, or do we sound like Ray Charles? No, but we find ourselves depicted by those artists whether we want to or not. We see ourselves as we are or as we could be, depending.

No wonder people are so unhappy. There are apparently large sections of the public that have abandoned any sort of fantasy life, whether it be their own, or the one vicariously supplied to them by the movies.

Surely, at large, this isn't true, right? I mean, considering what makes big bugs at the box-office, that just can't be so.

So, maybe the problem is simply a bad habit of compartmentalising. We can accept a pregnant teenager movie, but it better be earnest and depict a Maria Full of Grace-type reality. Fantasy films mustn't, by the way, have any reflection of the real world. Bah.

On a basic level, though, a Death Star doesn't exist to be blown away any more than the President is likely to fight terrorists with his bare hands, any more than it's right to expect people to talk like they're walking out of Raymond Chandler, Quentin Tarantino or Aaron Sorkin. What fun these things are, though.

To indulge in certain illusions will keep you young, people. The good kind of young.

There's good cholesterol and bad cholesterol, just as there're good illusions vs. bad ones. Consult the experts, in either case.

When Your Mind's Made Up

From The Onion AV Club's Film Poll, about the movie Once:

"I hate musicals. I hate earnest singer-songwriters with guitars. I hate indie-movies where nothing much happens but people have profoundly understated experiences. I loved this movie."

—John Shelton, Prague, Czech Republic

Cesspool of Imbecility

Having posted on Facebook, strangely enough, my reaction to John Gibson's unbelievably shameless and incsrutably mean-spirited mocking of Heath Ledger's death (not to mention Ledger's portrayal of a certain laconic cowboy), I stopped for a second.

I won't un-post the note, but to write one so topically is uncharacteristic of me. It occurred to me that I've hated the very fact of Gibson's career for many years.

He would be on in the living room on a daily basis, and my loving Mom and Granny seemed to agree with him. He lost me upon sight, but I remember being sold on the need for a good tar-application to him when he listed Star Wars as a possible cause of Columbine-style violence, because they use laser guns in those movies.

Before, I felt he should've been fired for relentless mediocrity. Now, since Imus got fired (deservedly) for his racial slur, Gibson should be fired for his homophobic mockery. Which is what it was. As one article I read helpfully points out, this guy was mocking a straight man (well, two, including Gyllenhaal) for even playing gay.

We really should use mediocrity as grounds for dismissal, but if what it takes is stuff like this, maybe they'll all be dumb enough to weed themselves out.

But if this isn't enough of a slur on behalf of the minority I'm a part of, then Imus might as well get his job back.

Tak, tady jsme v Another Dimension

So, I'm gonna remind you to go here and keep up with Andrew's unspooling translation of good Karel's work (with, apparently, an editorially imposed transition from encroaching death to sudden whimsy? I think I missed a day, but am going back now).

Seriously, Andrew's Fable Farming is some mighty good work. Good for the humours, the blood pressure, and all that ails you.

Muzak Make You Lose Control: Once soundtrack

I'll Die With Monsters From Hell: There Will Be Blood, Dexter - Season One, Ace In The Hole, The Good Shepherd, Atonement

Finally Reading It All: The Stand

Obligatory Oscar Prognosticatin'

The Oscars mean something this year, but only because it's this year.

Yeah, it's been an arty year, but everything I've seen's been pretty damn good art, so far. I mean, if it turns people onto seein' stuff from this list that they might otherwise not be compelled to see, then maybe their darkness will be alleviated by some light (or darkened by headier darkness).

Go ahead and give it to Daniel DAY Lewis, please. He's more than just his left foot, in case you didn't know.

Can't speak for the leading women, and haven't seen enough from the littler women.

Javier Bardem got here the same way the coin did, and you'll give 'em up to two real boogeymen if you know what's good for you.

The directing category just made me pee a little. Give it to PTA. No, the Coens! Nuh uh, Jason Reitman, stay out, you're pretty, but they'll EAT YOU UP with their toothy fists.

Cinematography goes to Robert Elswit for There Will Be Blood.

But Atonement could win for its Dunkirk segment alone, whether I want Elswit to win or not. Elswit should win for all his work with PTA, but that Dunkirk scene, on its own, is better than the rest of Atonement and many, many films I've seen. I'm exceedingly torn on that.

The Coens win the Editing award. The Coens WIN THE EDITING AWARD. Do not pull an Emmanuel Lubezki on us this year like you did the last.

Original Song better be the one from Once. Seriously.

All the Best Picture Noms are good. Well, I haven't seen Michael Clayton, but I will pretty soon. I've heard it's good from all the right sources.

Juno? I loved it dearly. It lives up to its Little Miss Sunshine hype the way LMS didn't.

It won't beat No Country or Blood. It can't.

Unfortunately, that's because those two movies are too unconventional, violent and trippy for the Academy, and will be beaten by Atonement, which is also more, you know, Academy than any of the others.

Well, maybe not, but who cares. Great year. Great.

Also, to the Googlers and the Askjeevesers and the Yahoos, if you want to know whether or not Christopher Plummer is gay, go upstairs, because I'm in percussion down here, and can't answer your question. He's probably crying because he didn't get nominated again, so I better not ask.

Ok, Roger

What's up for grabs is whether or not There Will Be Blood is a great movie. I say it is, in spite of certain imperfections. Repeated viewing will reveal the movie more.

However, to take issue with your three parenthetical complaints, i.e:

1) Unbending characters, 2) Lack of women or any reflection of normal society, and 3) its relentlessness.

Well, ok.

1) Horror's horror. We've had an unbending president, haven't we? Topicality does not make one great, but monsters such as Plainview (and Eli Sunday) have existed and still do, and are worth studying.

2) The Godfather

3) There's something to be said for burning even longer than you have the fuel for. The last 20 minutes of this movie are more surprising (and in retrospect inevitable) than any rain of frogs, a twist which I loved, you loved, and was ten times more of a reach.


It's still a pretty accurate description of the movie, Ebes.
And yeah, it's certainly up for grabs whether or not this kind of thing is enjoyable to watch.

But I've never seen anything like it, and that's been happening more often lately.

R.U.R.

I've stumbled upon some workins from a lab. I sneaked in clandestinely (fine, I was alerted).

Before the inevitable explosions and village terrorizings begin, I figure I can sneak you in and let you decide whether or not you'll want to be brandishing pitchforks or boards with nails in them.

It's likely, however, that after the creature reaches unity, you'll want to thank Andrew, and have him send you a hard copy.

Whatever you decide, it'll be a pleasure for me and you alike to get daily or so doses of an unfolding translation of Bajky a podpovídky (Fables and Understories by Karel Capek)

It tasty.

Movies are My God Now (Again): Margot at the Wedding, Eastern Promises, Charlie Wilson's War, Once, The River, Bonnie and Clyde

About To Choke a Bitch Unless: There Will Be Blood

Probably Perfect: In Rainbows - Radiohead

Thank You For Smoking

Dear Nicotine Withdrawal Symptoms,

Hi! You may remember me as that guy that caused your existence, both by smoking in the first place, and then by removing my precious 10-15 nails of a coffin a day from my body, fairly soon after.

I did some research, guided mostly by the unparalleled fatigue I've been enduring on your behalf for the past month, and have discovered, unless I miss my guess, that your existence is prolonged by industry insistence on keeping you alive, a fiend to so succumb to, as would indicate this Boston Globe Article.

Apparently, the first time I endured you would've been the best time to have been the last time to endure you, but no matter now.

Don't worry. Your time is short. Trust me. I'm infinitely bitchier than you are. You really know not the genes with which you fuck.

Sincerely,

Jesse and His Dynamic Genetic Material.

Apropos of Nothing, but if I don't get a chance to see There Will Be Blood fucking but soon, I'm going to get really, really ENVIOUS.

I Need To Get Paid To Write About the Damn Movies

Or, I need a car, because I haven't seen enough current movies this year.

But, here's my official Top Ten of 2007. All other 2007 entries eligible for next year, including Juno, Sweeney Todd, Control, Charlie Wilson's War, There Will Be Blood, etc.

Dekalog still makes the list.

10. Grindhouse
9. Superbad
8. Across The Universe
7. Bug
6. The Darjeeling Limited
5. Eastern Promises
4. The Lives of Others
3. American Gangster
2. Dekalog
1. No Country For Old Men

Had to remind myself what I'd seen this year, and I'd left off a few notables. I've been out of my gourd lately, because I completely forgot to mention American Gangster, which is no small oversight, seeing as how it's Ridley Scott's best film since Blade Runner.

Honorable mention must go to the makers of Shoot 'Em Up, the fuckinest fuckin' fucker of a movie I've ever seen. We were right, Smoke Frog, we were right.

Thanks also to that one guy who screamed "Holy Shit!" during Spider Man 3 when Pete b-slapped MJ.

Wanna Be Writin' Somethin' Got to Be Writin' Somethin'

Early, I know, but here's my Top Ten. Read 'em and weep, making exceptions of course for the as of now unseen by me Charlie Wilson's War, Sweeney Todd, and There Will Be Blood (The very latter may well top the list retroactively once I've seen it.)

There are others I've missed, but in a feat of laziness (and fiduciary apoplexy, resulting in increased Netflix turnover later on) I'll just take a cue from years past and put them on my 2008 list when I finally see them (again, the caveat here being that Paul Thomas Anderson's movie, if the standey I saw for it and the early reviews I've read of it are any indication, will fuck me long and my socks will still be on).

10. Grindhouse - I was one of the lucky handful of the faithful who sprawled out in a sparsely populated theater to see this one on Easter Weekend. It was one of the filthiest, silliest, bloodiest, most ridiculously over-the-top exercises in self-indulgent movie making nonsense I've ever seen. And I laughed my ass off for the first half and was truly knocked out by Tarantino's.

9. Superbad - Fuckin' McLovin' amazing.


8. Babel - Metaphysically and artistically, this is the movie Crash could never have even thought to hope to be.

7. Pan's Labyrinth - Bitch knows how to cut a bitch in the mouth.

6. Children of Men - Gets better every time you watch it. These are all 2006ers, but I saw 'em this year, and I doubt they'll be topped any time soon. When it happens, you'll know.

5. Dekalog - Saw all 10 of these this year. It's from about 20 years ago. Recommended viewing for anyone who thinks about right and wrong. Also recommended viewing for anyone who will someday die.

4. The Darjeeling Limited - In all fairness, this is higher on the list than the Meso-American Triad and the freakin' Kieslowski because it's an honest-to-god 2007er. This one's more direct, more simple, and less quixotic than The Life Aquatic, and it really only rivals Tenenbaums. For those who simply can't be pleased by Wes Anderson making the same film about the aloof, dry types he's consumed with, well, look elsewhere. Unless, you're one of the straights, and you wanna see Natalie Portman naked, of course (What's that? You've already gone to Fandango?). Me, I'm fine if he keeps playin' this ditty for as long as we're both here.

3. The Lives of Others - Tightly constructed and unflinching, this is an unexpected German companion piece to The Conversation and Blow Up, in its own way.

2. No Country For Old Men - Even for the Coens, this is a bizarre and cold film. It's also one of the best I have ever seen, and that beats a lot of competition, including some from the Coen Boys themselves. I'm not sure I find it as nihilistic as some have (particularly Andrew Sarris, who is not a bitch, not really. His review was cordial.)
I don't remember being affected so suddenly and powerfully by an ending. At least not since Magnolia.

1. Speak of the devil, I really don't know what the number one will be. Is it gonna be Sweeney Todd? I love Burton, Depp, Bonzo Bonham Carter and Co, but never enough for them to top my year-end best. Aaron Sorkin? You comin' back to us? Well, the good Congressman's story, even in your un-coke stained (and reportedly splendid this time around) hands, is going to be hard-pressed to beat my adoration for what the Coens accomplished with No Country.

It's more than likely going to be a showdown between No Country and There Will Be Blood, unless Juno really is as good as they say, and by that, I mean Citizen Pregnant Fucking Kane.

I'm the Hated Milk Machine

And the Award...

...For most perfect Google search to yield a result for this site goes to:

"Christopher Plummer Fanfiction"

Yeah. Fanfiction. That's half right.

Andrew Sarris is a Bitch

He's the only reason the Tomatometer(tm) is scoring a 96% for No Country For Old Men.

Didn't Pauline Kael debunk your ass in the late sixties?

Whatevs, Mr. Auteur Theory.

That movie [insert wild wobbly Jesse-style praise here]

Mind you, no large gesture of praise would amount to hyperbole. Not even from 'round these parts, or even, gasp, from 'round them parts.

80

Feliz Cumpleaños


Or so sang sonorously Señor Wattenbarger, to my Granny today, at the surprise birthday party we threw for her.

Incidentally, Obi Wan and Señor send their love to us, be we on the west coast or in the far east, or anywhere in between.

Blip Bootwa Blip Wop Let's Make 'em Bounce

No he escrito últimamente, pero...

Fine, sure I'll post a bit, since I had to wait 'til asked, and have a very hungry second.

My recent adventures, mind, will pale in comparison to Jef's. (Read up, and be afraid, while laughing.)

Same's true for the westward perigrinations of our very own More Human Than Human Slavicist. Good luck on the Sorbian. We here thought it was dying. Shows what we here know.

Also, I never see you anymore, Cara, and I find it often cause for concern. I know you've been busy, but I miss your prose every time I get a little bit of it. Your post taste good. Like, in the mouth.

As fer me? Well, I'm pretty sure I'm either a picaro or a one's own garden cultivator, but I can't be both. This past month has been wild, rockstar, full of mistakes, blunders, miracles, and mostly laced with placid-sense-of-calm. All for good reason, but the sooner that mellowness passes, the better.

Addendum: I've missed this happening ever since I moved sites, but, I suppose inevitably, the google searches are coming back, including weekly searches for "Chateau Neuf Du Pap", thanks to this post.

Also, the number of searches for "Christopher Plummer Gay" are making me giddy.

Addendum II: Storm From the East: Rhys, you should call me. Been too long.

Elektro: Santos

Truth of the Matter is, He Said, She is: No Country For Old Men - McCarthy

Waiting Impatiently For: No Country For Old Men

Let's Get High: The Darjeeling Limited, Water, American Gangster

Ass-Weasels

Oh dear. We're renting Dreamcatcher. Words I never thought I'd hear myself saying, but we must. Someone. Anyone. I must see this.

Next Sunday, A.D.

So, I'm an especial doofus, jackhole and nincompoop for having not called, on Halloween, Holly, my dear friend and partner in humanitarian music delivery this week at Janie's.

Holly manages a feat of editing panache while maintaining verbal (and emotional) devotion to the show that formed us, and I was along for the ride, quipping and laughing my ass off at jokes and songs I've heard a million times and still love with uproarity.

Go there. Be filled with mirth.

Getting a Reaction from the Geiger Counter...

This Halloween, make sure you take a stroll down to Barstoolio Lane, 'cause she's doin' a Countdown-to-All-Hallow's-Music-A-Thon, where you'll find kickin' remixes of Danny Elfman and other assorted goodies. She's also revealed my most sinister mix, maybe ever, right here.

Her copy is FTW! (Also FTW, her photoshopping, see below)

Here's a link to my set, right click as per usual.

1. Roxiller - Fear

2. Yelle - A Cause De Garcons (Sta mix)

3. Justice vs Simian - We Are Your Friends (Scottie B, King Tutt, and Samir mix)

4. Mr. Oizo - Nazis

5. Santos - Elektro

6. Lostep - Because We Can

7. Chris Carter - Creature Feature

8. Mr. Oizo - Nazis (Justice mix)

9. Armand Van Helden - I Want Your Soul (Fake Blood mix)

10. Klaxons - Gravity's Rainbow (Soulwax mix)

You'll Never Be Alone Again

Well come on.



Still not sure where I stand on Justice's regalia, memorable as it is....

The Only Poetry I've Ever Written That I'm Proud Of....

...is about Star Wars. So, I'll give this over to a finer hand:



Fuck You, mister,

Fuck your sister,

Fuck your brother,

Fuck your mother,

Fuck your pop--

Hey! I'm a cop!

- I'm a Cop, by Thomas Pynchon

Sign (one of many) that he's postmodern: He left out "Fuck your uncle".

That little ditty's not directed at anyone. I'm not rattling off aggression. It just makes me smile.

That's all I got fer right now, folks, and the Camino browser recognises neither the spelling of Pynchon or Camino. It also, tellingly, doesn't recognise postmodern.

I will say this, I'm rumblin' some funnies deep down somewhere. I sense it when my trick knee starts achin'. Kinda like when there's a hard rain comin'. Hard rain's comin', and that always leads to some funny. Watch this space.

Lend Me Your Ears and I'll Sing You a Song: Across the Universe, The Lives of Others, Out of the Past

Dance, Too Much Smarty in the Pants: Gore Vidal - United States: Essays

Oh My God, That's the Funky Shit: Alex Metric

Worst. Whorehouse. Ever.

Why, yes, I do exist as a mere expediter of your movie larnin'. I like funnelling links to Ebert's reviews into you as if you were a right viscous cinematographic feedhole. Ignore that, if you can.

Don't, however, ignore this.


And I can't help it that he just reviewed COM on Friday. I haven't got much to write about at the moment, bloggily, so until I can bargle nargle zouse, well, you know the rest.

Im in ur mnd's I

Mkin Metfors. Kfusedthxbai!

I've Got You, Babe

!!!


"Along the way, they are pursued by Homeland Security troops, and there is a chase scene with one of the most sudden and violent moments I have ever seen in a film. Not all of the chases in all of the Bournes equal this one, shot in a single take by one camera, for impact."

He Was Never Once Paid by the Word: Bleak House

All the President's Stab: Zodiac

Are You a Replican or a Replicant?

Ridley Scott, you will never make sense to me. Knowing when to quit? Not you. I hope I can see this in a theater, what with the 8000 Lines per Frame F/X restoration. I like my eyes, and I want to like, even more, the way they see.













Ambiguity, however, seems to find itself only in your post-post-post production mentality, and not, sadly, where it belongs.

Dubbed

Even knowing full well that Ebert has marked his return with heaps of praise upon numerous films the likes of which might just indicate his elation to be back at work rather than indicating their own actual greatness (time will tell, but many will disagree with his assessment of Shoot 'Em Up. Not me, though), I'm still thrilled that his trumpeting of the Meso-American Triad is in full-swing.

After this, we must still wait impatiently for his review of Children of Men.

Now, Iñárritu is my least favorite of the three. Del Toro and Cuarón don't constrain themselves with a "hyperlink" narrative structure, and yet, I think Iñárritu probably achieved as much as he could with the plot(s) of Babel, a film I loved much more than 21 Grams. There's a palpable, yet undeniably mystical connection between the different threads comprising the third of his trilogy, a giant strength this time around. Babel builds on the possibilities of this structure instead of relying on it. Few recent films have achieved this kind of metaphysics. It's tempting to believe that Iñárritu has found what he was searching for.

Ebert's review of Babel lends ink to almost everything I was unable to articulate about it. Even if you weren't blown away by the film, you should read the above review, solely because it's an example of criticism achieving power all on its own. It evokes a movie that either you still haven't seen, or possibly, you saw but still haven't seen. It's the best thing Ebert's written since his illness. Don't believe me? Wait until the last sentence.

Didn't He/She Forget 'Pansexual'?

I'm all postin' with the computer on my belly. This is unusual for me, but readers, my belly is a tad less buoyant than it was a few months after I purchased my computer, pretty little gateway into a pretty little sedentary lifestyle that my Macintosh was. For now, I know of nothing more to report, save that I must find a better job (full-time would be good), base of operations, car, set of prospects (of all the type you'd imagine me looking for), a little energon, and a lot of luck.

There would be more to post, blast it, were it not for my one foot in the doldrums and one foot lord knows elsewhere, but that's the extent of the poetry in it, for now.

Switch Bitch: The Kingdom (Riget) - Series II

Closer before Closer was Closer: The Passion of Anna

Wow. Just. Wow.

My Life With the Thrill Kill Kult

Here's a link to my latest set, The Derridiculous Ghettoblaster.

Janie asked me to rattle off some copy for her whenever the fancy bit me, so I chose to do a track-by-track commentary at her bitchin' Noise pad, upon the unveiling of the set.

Big thanks to her for hosting me and servicing my DJ Ego, and big thanks to Holly for evangelizing the sounds to a new and sophisticated crowd.

The Adam Freeland influence (his DJ work more than his production work, really) has always weighed heavily on my choices, and I'm glad to say that where the proper music goes, I can only follow. It's really the most fun I can have without taking my clothes off. Most of you are luckier for that, eh?

Good News, Everyone!

Non-Post, but it's been ten years, and the man's back.

Heads or Tails

Toronto's shiny right now, and the more I read these, the more apoplectic I become, for I am very, very far from there.

Oh, to be credentialed, throttled from theater to theater, borne back ceaselessly into the raisinettes, and heedlessly transformed by what is all very much happening right now. This is a strong year.

When the time comes, I follow the Cannes Festival and Telluride (it would be fun to go, but no biggie if that never happens). I generally could care less about Sundance's Little-Indie-Shitfit-of-Sexually-Confused-Adolescents-and-Semi
-Adolescents-Discovering-Themselves-And/Or
-Learning-A-Valuable-Lesson-Doggerollcall. (Or LISOSCASADTAOLAVLD, as it's otherwise known), though I know for a fact I'm being unfair to many good films that have premiered there.

None of these festivals urge me towards the light quite like Toronto. Telluride's a close second. Either way, what I'm getting at here, is any one of 'em would be a great beat to cover. Great beat.

Mighty Fine Pickin' an' a Dingin': Spoon - Gimme Fiction

Everything's Gonna Be Just Fine: Burner of Corpses - Fuks

Love, Blood and Rhetoric: Hamlet (Branagh)

Have You Ever Seen a Human Heart?

To A Dreaming Experiment:

Good Show. Wish I Could Be There.

Thumb Wars

Linky Post:

Couldn't be more right.

Also, here's the silliest litigation of all time, this hour.

This Was Fun For Me

Earlier this week, at the campus bookstore:

[mundane]

Me: So, yes, I've found your section number. You'll need--

Customer: Hold on, I'ma write this down

Me: Alright, you'll need Timaeus and Critias, by Plato.

Customer: Timbus and Crimunn. Who's that by?

Me: Plato. Next you'll need--

Customer: That's Plato, by Timbus and Crimunn.

Me: Yep...You'll also need The Analects of Confucius.

Customer: Who's that one by?

Me: Scatman Crothers. Thanks for comin' in.

[/mundane]

Ok, well that last bit's apocryphal, as the customer was somebody's dad, sweetly gathering book info for his daughter.

Ah, cowwage.

Philatelite: The Decalogue

Coming Soon: A new flyin' bassline in your face(line?)

Hideous Control Now

This is my graduation video:

Breakcast

Not sure about the sound quality here, but I tested out the first random free podcasting host I found.

You can find it here.

That's a little set I did last summer, and I mostly wanted to share it for the first three tracks.

I've got some killer stuff lying in wait for the lot of you to taste, coming soon, if this was a success.

So, gimme some feedback on the sound quality and let me know if there's any consensus on my needing to try this elsewhere.

Also, the name of that podcast site is probably going to change, as it's very late and I lack clear judgment.

The Newest in New

This here label's the quirkiest of recent memory.

It's French, Bitches

You Call Your Musical Minimal...

To this crew of people I've never even met (I imagine you all as muppets), who've given me such rising accolades over here, I'm humbled.

Thanks to Holly for fighting the true fight this week. We got our own fortune and glory, now and later.

For my part, it's been good for me to aide in exposing people to the music (and hopefully not too much to myself!), because the plight of breaks has often been that it's either too dark or too bizarre in some ways to be main-floor material, which I've been yet again reminded recently, at a much different locale.

Breaks at large are not necessarily all of that piece, but I tend to skew my sets towards the ruff and ragged, and at other points towards the brainy or the head-scratchy. I can't change this. There are parts of the world, and the scene, that have figured this out as funky, but most either want pretty or hard, and nary the twain shall meet between the feet. Apparently.

BT once said he was in to music that took a few listens to absorb, grasp, and yes, finally love. I guess I'm like that too, though I can't write music like he does (or at all).

If everyone were as opened minded as this week's cast, crew and audience, we preachers, Holly, PB, myself and others, would be on top.


Addendum: Also, though it might've turned the sky crimson(er) this past week, whither Charlie in this deba(t)(cl)e? Gathering ye a new set, I hope?

And Behold, the Void Opens Up Beneath Your Feet

I've just finished my schoolin'.

No, I don't know what the fuck I'm going to do. That's settling in. Sinking in. Percolating. Fearorizing. But. I'm going to let that go for now, because my little b-bwoy mix that could is Holly's pop-rocks/soda pop explosion over at Janie's.

Means the world to me, Little Petal. Thanks.

Phew. Seven year plan. When you consider I didn't know what the fuck to do away from home, didn't pick a major until 2002, and then sojourned to Moravia for a full year sometime after that, seven years is just fine, and I needed the extra two. I'm a slow builder, right. Yes.

Love you, my friends, betters and compatriots.

Here's hoping for that elusive American Second Act.

Well,

Ok, I thought I was done, but Ebert had to go bitchslap silly 'ol Jonathan Rosenbaum, and well, here I am, tub of popcorn and big frightening Jack Napier grin on ma face.

I Have an Ego

And it's being validated this week.

So, I've decided to compile all my setlists from mixtapes and otherwise, right here.

The germ of this is that I'm being validated by fellow Kid 606 Lover (and boy could that mean something more than it used to...).

...Anyway, she's doing so with Charlie's favorite set of mine ever!

You'll be able to viddy that link on a regular basis at the bottom of my Top Ten Chart, which, y'all should check up on once in awhile and then meander around to sites like these:

Beatport

DJDownload

Addictech


Phew. Enough Links. Go. Play. I have one more final, for maybe the rest of my life, and it's tomorrow.

Like a Bottle of Chateau Neuf Du Pap

Third Round, and you two have had a cigarette, I gather?

Come On, Feel the Noize.

Cage Match:

Round Two.

Fight!

I Will Attack, and You Don't Want That

Oh, hilarious.

So, Holly vs. Longhorn Book Deal in a cage match at The Great Barstoolio's (that place with all the funny sex music talk):

The musical mise-en-scène?

Why, if it isn't house vs. breaks, the original Abel and Cain.

Only, we're totally Cain. When you see that forehead mark, you know the funky trouble's comin'.

Fly, you fools.

Though, lately, I have been talking up the death of the genre boundary, I must still insist that that's less to do with being frustrated with breaks at all (quite the opposite), and more to do with the whole tired lot of house, d'n'b and otherwise genre-strangled formulations vegetabalizing me at most intervals of their being played out.

More trash talk is by all means accepted here.

Whatever. You Liked Carnosaur!

Wow!

Neat!

No more scouting on the TubeYous for that clip of that review of Blade Runner or that recovered footage of them....apparently bitch-slapping each other, and then Protestants.

If I Could Be Paid To DJ

That'd be the ultimate steal.

Thanks to the few who came out to hear the music tonight. I was just a passenger on this one, and hopefully on many, many more rides in the future.

By that I mean that there is simply so much amazing, groundbreaking, interesting, funky, heady, rich, truly futuristic, dazzling and sky-bound music coming our way right now that it's virtually impossible to sprint ahead of it all.

Good.

A likely result of this will thankfully be the decimation of all genre boundaries, which is great, right, like, I know, because this allows for contrasts and stuff.

I would call this kind of talk self-indulgent were I anything but a star-struck funk-rider.

Check These:

1. Chris Carter - Xing
2. Si Begg - Non-Stop-Cut-Paste
3. Lostep - Little Peaking
4. Tipper - Open the Jowles
5. DJ Icey - Under Construction (General Midi mix)
6. Chris Lake - Release
7. Justice - Waters of Nazareth
8. Mr. Oizo - Transsexual
9. No Hands - Clap Your (JHZ Mix)
10.Si Begg - Hard Like Funk
11.Phones - Sharpen the Knives
12.Chris Carter & Dopamine - Dolodub
13.Uberzone - Satisfaction (Trop mix)

So...

This is just getting too fucking weird.

For those of of you who haven't seen it, since the article doesn't clarify this, the above was the star of Antonioni's Blow-Up.

Umm....Anybody keeping watch on Godard?

Dear Universe

Can you space out the killings of the ones you sent here to shape our collective consciousness just a little bit? Seriously? What the fuck?

Ah, well.

I can handle Jefferson and Adams dying on the same day, but not this!

Waddaya Think?

In lighter news, I went and Simpsonized myself. I was terrified, and almost clicked away, shaking, with terror sweat (and disgust rickets), upon realizing that the promotional Burger King/Red Haired Nazi-Clown-Crossover was the vector for this. It was, however, worth it, because we should all be yellow. Lord's work, embiggening the smallest man, just like the movie.



More Cromulent than Any Episode in Seven Years: The Simpsons Movie

1918-2007

Ingmar Bergman

Well...

Sure, Altman could always use new drinking buddies, even with the repletion already in front of him.



Addendum: I've mentioned this before, and I hope Netflix makes it available again for those still yet to experience it, but Fanny and Alexander, the long version, is everything a movie can be, and once you've seen it, a bare minimum of what every movie ought to be.

You owe it to yourselves, whether you're "serious" about films or not.

And Finally: Woody Allen's review of The Magic Lantern

Music Takes You

This here's Chris Carter's Myspace page. No. Not the X-Files guy, but the guy what soundfucks you into a stuttering break-daze.

The only reason I linked his Myspace profile will be revealed to you when you scroll down and ponder his friend list. Go on.

The Future, Folks, is Openin' Like the Ark of The Covenant: Justice, SebastiAn, Uberzone, Phones, Blim, Carter

Seriously, Marion, You'll Want to Keep Your Eyes Shut: Transsexual EP - Mr. Oizo

Not Like Fergie

Forgot to mention this earlier this summer.

Freeland's back, but this time, he's in for it. Judging by the smattering of negative (extremely negative) reviews from some loyal Global Underground fans around those parts, this one might be a bit too weird for 'em.

I've heard people not in the negative/GU camp knock him for lookin' the ponce on the cover, and I guess I agree with them there.

I urge them, regardless, to check this one out. I got the promo for the comp this spring and it was full of some of the weirder songs in the set, and I for one, welcomed that with open arms.

We need to go the outskirts of the weird. There's nothing wrong with that. I'll take, interspersed with noise, sections of strange, rock inspired house and a slight two-step any day. And you folks can expect to hear Sharpen the Knives by Phones the next time you hear me DJ. It's nerve-rattling, noisy, shamanistic cacophony, and it pokeys just on this side of the line of going-too-far. Too much of that's not a good thing, but just a little is brilliant.

Seriously, GU people. You listen to techno. Have a sense of adventure.

That track by Sebastian you're complainin' so much about? Too many notes?

BUMP: Adam Freeland: GU Mexico City

Thanks to Freeland, and Jess: Justice

A Series of Low Concussions

Another day, another trailer. The Coens? Yeah. They're back.

I don't prefer this to actual content, but...

Ahem.

OH MY HOLY JASPER JOHNS BLOOD SIMPLE AIN'T GOT NOTHIN' ON THAT THEY CAN MILLER MY CROSSING ANY DAY OF THE WEEK FREAKIN' MY PROWLER NEEDS A JUMP!




I'm Calm. Fuck, who am I kidding, I just watched it AGAIN.

This One's Not Very Plotty

From Ebert's new Answerman:

Re: Jodorowsky vs. Allen Klein

They finally made peace in 2004. When I interviewed Jodorowsky at Cannes in 1990, he told a bitter but hilarious story about their feud, which I'll tell again when "El Topo" becomes a Great Movie in the near future, joining Jodorowsky's "Santa Sangre" on my GM list.

Ok. I loved El Topo, but you really think gentle filmgoers should be subjected to this?

Also [elation], six, count 'em six reviews this week! [/elation].

Muzakle Discovery of the Month: Phones

Smarty Pants Thing: Sophie's World

Yes, but Also Check Out Ginsberg

From the upcoming:

What? Do I Have to Pay Extra?

If you would like to add this item to your queue, you must first remove an item.

Apparently, I've reached the limit as per number of films I can have in a row on Netflix. Do I need to add a kid's queue?

Ways I see it, those movies are gonna exist whether or not I've ordered 'em.

Hello, Computer.

Apologies to anyone who has left me a voice message or called me over the last few days only to subsequently wait by the phone in a puddle of your own sad. I shut down and restarted my phone this afternoon to discover nearly a dozen unplayed messages had been hidden within, with no record or indication of their previous existence.

That should explain those first few lines of admonishment here. My bad, though your message, when I finally did get it, was well worth the mixup.

And what about them erstwhile Houseys playin' the battle breaks?

Until we saw the above's show in Georgia all those years ago, we'd never imagined that you could put people to sleep in the middle of their ecstasy trips.

Pertinent, Salutary and Vewy Pretty

Words that need to be removed from commentary/criticism, right now and forever after: visceral and resonant

Word that was never a word and should be removed from English speaking mouths, followed by an addendum prescribing that further utterance yields a minimum punishment (though not to be limited to) of death by Foreskin Monster from the recent King Kong movie: ginormous

Also, as I'm on the Aronofsky Advisory Committee, everyone should see The Fountain. If nothing else, it's proof-positive that he's a painter in skiffi form.

Skiffi. As Harlan Ellison put it years ago, that's how you pronounce the neologism Sci-Fi. That's one I never hated, and in light of the overused and the never-real, it really ain't so bad is it?

Flannel Libre

I've just finished two years of Spanish, and of course, that means I'm either going to find ways to keep studying it, or lose the chance I have to ever even scratch conversational.

Either way, three credit hours away from graduation, and it's on to my scheduled September panic attack, followed by the one I have penciled in for the winter.

Way Better in the Original Gaelic: Transfomers

Parp!: Deadwood Season 3

Frente Sandinista: Phones - Sharpen the Knives

Out of the Way, Lad. This is Prime's Fight.

Baypist, I haven't given you my money (or my parents') since Armageddon.

A childhood fixation, however, is a childhood fixation, and for what it's worth, you and your DP were pretty good at pointing the camera at almost nothing and letting Digital Domain wow us with fucking wow oh my god in heaven wow indeed.

And Shia LaBeouf, I think I'll call you Pluckspaz.

So, yes, gentle readers, I liked a Michael Bay movie. We were all eight years old once, and speaking of that, there's really no way that Bay's supercharged retread (G4?) could possibly have dealt me the same eye-popping, heart-stopping, heroic badassery and Manichaeism tutorial that this right here, in my youth, dealt to me, I swear to Hasbro.



Ain't that right, Minda, and can I get a "'Til All Are One"?

Back From the Set...

Dear, Sweet, Sinus-Pressure Inducing Thunderstorm...

Just get fuckin' already.

Yes, you're beautiful. Yes, we've missed you.

*Heart Glow* *Forest Rustle*

Jiminy Jillickers, he did an Answerman column!.

Not to mention this.

Are You in Possession of a Circulatory System?

Then you needs to put into it an Icky Thump

Goddamn.

Small World Pimpin'

A wee gmail chat between myself and Jef V. Johnson:

Me: Brace yourself, for Marshall Miller has moved to Baltimore.

Jef: You've got to be fucking kidding me.


And though I've heard the town is miserable to drive in, I'm going to have to make my way up there, seeing how I'll have three stops to make.


Rolling the dice to see if I'm getting drunk, in a completely unrelated boondoggle (or would be boondoggle were it actually my doing), I received an email from Battle.net/Blizzard Entertainment claiming that my email address was used to sign up for what must've been a World of Warcraft account. Though it's possible, it bein' gmail and all, that somebody of the same name (and far more spare time) possessing the same email address, has signed on for it, I can't help but wonder if there's somebody familiar behind this.

There was a free-trial upgrade to the new Geekier and More Life-Consuming version in the mail last week, so...

In the corner of my ear, I just heard Felicity Huffman spout the phrase "he's wearing tiny acetate man-panties", and away I go.

Frank Langella's Hide Will Spake Zarathustra Thusly in My Basement...

Got your message this morning in my inbox.

Better luck next year, Plummy. We were really rootin' for you down here.

Would That I Were Paid To Write Daily Panegyrics Deux: Dead Heat in a Zeppelin Race

In all seriousness, I love Christopher Plummer. Just so there're no doubts on that one.

More importing from The Darkness today, right'cheer.

This one's a little coming-home present for Sojourner Booth, and serves to commemorate the time when she said, "Hey, you're gay, now it's ok for you to look at my rack (it was ok before)."

And then I joined with: "Hey, now that I'm gay, I can write a praise-filled piece on my blog about them boobs!"

And then, as with the Sestina, it was all over but the doin' because she held me to that promise.

Sticky Flicky: Lawrence of Arabia, The Weather Man

Who's Wave? Tip's Wave: Tip Hop - Tipper

Contractual Obligation

It's my sworn and signed duty to show my undivided support to the proprietor of this site, Toronto's very own Christopher Plummer.

Wishes-to-be-Sir Plummer was just nominated for a Tony Award for his performance in Inherit the Wind, and, stipulated in no uncertain terms in the fine print of my polish/tune/maintenance of tympanies contract with Mr. Plummer, I must make celebratory mention of it. I earn sub-minimum wage.

The Tympani Room recently spoke with Plummer over the phone, to celebrate his nomination.

Tympani Room: So, congratulations on your nomination. Of course, we're all rooting for you downstairs.

Christopher Plummer: Thank you. Thank you. I thought playing Mike Wallace would do it, but if the Academy won't recognize me, this blasted thing will have to do.

TR: So, what do you regret more, your lack of Oscars after all of these years, your otherwise paltry award set, or the fact of your Canadian faux Knighthood? I mean, Companion of the Order of Canada just doesn't ring like 'Sir' does it?

CP: ...I'm sorry, just who the hell are you, again? Don't I pay you for something?

TR: Yes, I'm in percussion. So, you don't in fact wish you were actually British? And not some faker?

CP: Sonny, I am Great Britain. I'm the greatest Shakespearean actor of my generation!

TR: Fine, Mr. Von Trapp, but are we going to make it out of Austria tonight or what?

CP: QUIET, YOU! CONFOUNDED ROBERT WISE! The New York Times has said that I milk every inch of tension out of the dichotomy of my Atheism/Faith/Suspender straps. And I've won a slew of Emmies. If you knew the importance of your job, by the way, you would know that the Tympanist is the King of his own Province, and plies his trade on the calfskin from parabolic bowl to the mighty hemispheric! We tune slowly and own the entire orchestra--

TR: --I'm sorry, are you just reading from a Wikipedia article?

CP: End of interview. *Click*

TR: Oh. Ok, I'll just lock up for tonight. Vanity percussion rooms are a real chore to maintain. We'll have our fingers crossed for you down here!

You're a Buns-hole

Fantastic.

Take that, F.C.C. A few things:

The Court: “In recent times even the top leaders of our government have used variants of these expletives in a manner that no reasonable person would believe referenced sexual or excretory organs or activities.”

According to the F.C.C. Chairman, if the Commission is unable to curtail profanities as they see fit, then "Hollywood will be able to say anything they want, whenever they want.”

Yes. Yes they will.

Here's my question: Will they be allowed to smoke while doing so?

All Grown Up Now

Cute.

....and Release

Pirates review right there, not on the main page, to respect those whom haven't seen it yet.

How many events are there this summer? Yes, I mean cinematically. What else is the tympani room for?

Anyway, we've had a lachrymose, emo Spidey, I haven't yet seen the zombies, and the previews before the new Pirates movie tonight reminded me that there's more big name product being peddled around in consecutive order this time than I can ever remember. I'm psyched about Ocean's 13 (and I will hear none of that guff about why I shouldn't be; Soderbergh's out Godard-ing Godard, and he's doing so right under the noses of so many critics)

Dude! They made a Simpsons movie. Sold.

Live Free or Die Hard had me at its title.

And I will grudgingly see the Transformers movie, if only because, no matter how much I hate the new designs, I heard the transform sound in the trailer, and they got me with that hard rock I haven't tasted since grade-school (who am I kidding?).

But, seriously, though, and you know me, I bloviate a serious fo-shizzle 'round these parts:
Does it seem like the more fucked up things get out there, the more Hollywood has the most absolute, mind-sifting escapism back-to-back-to-back for us in the queue?

I mean, this summer is defined by big, loud, uber-violent, utterly unlikely, and totally set-piece driven fare, more I think, than we've seen before. Not like we haven't been heading this way, but still, to get bigger has been the ultimate goal, if this is any indication. How can there be a winner, and how is it all to be sorted out for world-wide audiences?

On a technical level, the contenders are fierce. Massive. They're intimidating. They'll pummel you right into your seats and two things will be solved for you:

One: You won't be allowed to imagine any facet of the film in question for yourself. Frankly, the film's budget makes your imaginination look bankrupt anyway.

Two: It just ain't gonna matter much, all said and done. By the end, most of you kids will think that this is all a movie is. We've got you young, and we're taking you with us from here on in.

MMM: Awesome, I Fuckin' Shot That, Extras, Daguerréotypes, The Gospel According to St. Matthew

El Libro de Smarty Pantalones: The Plot Against America - Roth

Muzak: See My Charts Down Thar

No Fucking. Only Fuck Once. A Little.

The Ongoing Pussification of American Culture

Uh-huh.

Sure. Go ahead. Great idea.

Retroactively, that would make Casablanca a good hard R. Not to mention that Good Night and Good Luck would become Youth Restricted Viewing at Blockbusters in SoftandMalleable, Nebraska and TieyourShoesforYou, California.

Plus, you'll only be able to find copies of Coffee and Cigarettes off this continent and people will still start smoking early anyway, here, there and everywhere.

One last plus, Demolition Man becomes a PG-13 and is slowly reconsidered to be a prophetic masterwork.

Addendum: The quote in the linked article is attributed to that guiding light of western redemption, decency, and morality, Joe Eszterhas. He also wrote Showgirls.

And finally, I know it's an evil industry. I don't dispute that. Unfortunately, we either outlaw cigarettes entirely, or we simply, at long last, quit our nagging and our overprotective whining over it. Don't want someone you know to die from cigarettes? Me neither. But we make our own beds.

Epistomawhonow?

From the NYTimes this morning:

"The covers of the glossy magazines cluttering newsstands are divided between Nicolas Sarkozy, the newly elected president, and Cannes, and it is not always clear which — affairs of state or affairs of cinema — are more important."

....Am..am I French?

Jerry Falwell 1934-2007

To steal (for a good cause) from Tony Kushner:

Jerry: What's it like? After?

Belize: After...?

Jerry: This misery ends?

Belize:...everyone in Balenciaga gowns with red corsages, and big dance palaces full of music and lights and racial impurity and gender confusion. And all the deities are creole, mulatto, brown as the mouths of rivers. Race, taste and history finally overcome. And you ain't there.

Jerry: And Heaven?

Belize: That was Heaven, Jerry.

Plankton Plankton Plankton

I wish things were that maniacal, but in plain fact it's just Spanish Spanish Spanish right now. In other news, I've become addicted to a rare movie site and am currently squandering my future by glueing myself to it at every turn (and this is precisely the point at which I should be studying Preterite vs. the Imperfect: the Imperfecting). This could get ugly. Oh boy. This could get very very sexyugly. Chimes at Midnight people, fer chrissakes Chimes at Midnight! Berlin Alexanderplatz!

If you need me, I'll be in the sacristy. Delicious delicious delicious.

Frumious: Great Expectations

Bander: Riget II, Rome

Snatch: The Road - McCarthy

Thunder

For all who've gone a ponderin' my online reticence since I met-cute with the sweet yonder-years of decade number three, being those few I haven't conversed with very directly or at all, well, this'll cease that particular ponder:

Mom got Granny into the hospital two weeks ago, and on Tuesday she was transferred to UT Medical Center to receive the services of a doctor who could perform a stint on an artery leading to her stomach.

The second procedure (after a failed Wednesday attempt) was performed just five and half hours ago, and was a decided success. We're in a good place now. She'll be monitored as she digests food(without pain) and gets her circulation in check, and for now it seems the hard part's over. Thanks to this, she's avoided bypass surgery, or at least made the possibility of going through that less frightening. She'll be home soon.

There's just too much lightning and nicotine, compounded with the kinetic energy of a Mynatt/Francis firing through that woman, for her to be kept down. We saw her in the ICU and she was just beaming. Wanted to dance a tarantella and cook a pot roast, concurrently or consecutively (some of this is her words).

We're all heaving relief sighs and thanking our luck (like this is new) we've got that very same DNA.

And it's summer time in the Shire. Far as I'm concerned.

Would That I Were Paid to Write Daily Panegyrics

My first thought at having turned twenty-five:

If A Prairie Home Companion were nine hours long, it would be too short.

One of the last exiting thoughts during my gig as a smoldering twenty-four year old:

Thanks and many a wow to Jef Johnson for sending me this!

That's exceedingly wicked and I miss you and your tattered sweater. Glad to see you've got a rockin' near future.

Here's to the next quarter of a century, all.

No. No. No.

This can't be right. My oft repeated, nausea inducing love of Poland notwithstanding....Ugh. You see what you do to me, Poland? You reduce me to this, this tangled mess of bleh. Bleh. I guess I'll just have to take your awesome young people and leave you out of it.

Hee

Even Though You Liked Cop and a Half....

I wish I could be there.

*beep* You Wanna Hear that New Fatboy Song?: Bloc Party, Groove Armada
Readin': My Ass Off
Because You're Different: The Science of Sleep, Solo Con Tu Pareja, Rome, Grindhouse

I Think He Took His Wallet

And just like that, all of my undergraduate writing was done. Weird.
I swear this place'll be more than just a sporadic writin' hole. I'll get back in the game when I'm finally permitted to take my burnt-out mind back from the grasp of this collegiosity.
Also, more mojo. Much more. Stay tuned, America.

Chance.

By chance, you and I are all right. Others aren't. I wasn't going to say anything, but then I looked about and felt that there was a chain going, so here's my link to it.

I'll bet even the numb among us touched the ground to see if it was still there yesterday. Some of us lost that ground, and my thoughts are with them.

On My Birthday!

Yep

He's up in Heaven now

Well...

Existentialist? I Hardly Even Know H-Glarbblech *Sock Stuffed In Mouth by Overhearing Passerby*

Oof...That was not a fresh sock.

Ok, but I deserved that.

Yes, it'll be one of those.

And by that I mean a vaguely variable post to be glossed by the readership as it likes.

Things are coming to a head ever sooner than one would like, and I'm beset on all sides by those farther advanced.

Exemplum: To be emulated.

(N)ever fear.

Soon, I'll be graduated. If I have the wherewithal in me to move soon thereafter, I'll do it, but no promises on the horizon (much less concrete destinations to attach to promises unformed). Until then, I have three papers to write, and dozens more things to pen in the future.

I have good exempla, in forms both terrestrial and otherwise. And more experience (though noon auctoritee) than I'll typically admit myself to. Good Start.


Enditynge!: Great Expectations, The Wyf of Bath, The Reve, The Franklin, The Pardoner, The Physician
Pretty Good, and So Far, Meh: The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, Rome
Aural: Transmissions from the Satellite Heart
Oral: Claritin

...With His Giant, Hammy Fists

Ok, I'll admit it, I've been lazy. See, I (kinda) watched the pilot for the Haggisly retread of all things gangster.*

Then, realizing that the show was too much of a chore to actually sit through, I just left the job of evisceration entirely up to Holly (who was being employed to write up the hit either way).

See, I even had an opportunity last week to watch it live with her and co-eviscerate. Unfortunately, I've been too meh and lazy about the whole blarney-less fiasco to summon the will. She, on the other hand...

She did us all a service on that front.

And she won the war.

Bravo, on all recent counts, Devotchka.

And to all other mediocrities, be forewarned: World's gettin' smaller for you. All Hell's A Comin'


*Did they actually think they could get away with cribbing Gordon Willis's cinematography? Don't they know that you simply don't try that unless you are in fact Gordon Willis?