The Southland Tales and The Brown Bunny

I’m watching this (The Southland Tales) movie whilst packing to move flat and let me tell you, watching this movie whilst doing something else really isn’t how it should be watched. Even now that I’m watching it with my full attention it’s still very disjointed and hard to follow.

The Southland Tales is by the director of one of the worst movies that has become cult ever, in my opinion of course. That movie is Donnie Darko and the director Richard Kelly and gets to be called terrible because of it’s, in my opinion, lack of originality. It seemingly attained cult status because it was quirky in comparison to most popular movies but retained enough ’sanity’ to entice your average Tom, Dick and Harry.

Either way, I did not realise that Kelly was the director when I started watching, however, after becoming suitably confused I became suitably interested and really wanted to enjoy The Southland Tales. It has a brilliant cast mixed amongst a terrible cast which confused me as brilliantly funny comic actors go toe to toe with babysitting wrestlers and half beat singers.

The film got an amusing reception at the Cannes Film Festival and got given one of the most amusing reviews I think ever by Jason Solomon in The Observer saying.

“Southland Tales was so bad it made me wonder if [Kelly] had ever met a human being”

and

“sprawling, plot-less, post-apocalyptic farrago”

which gave him the

“sinking feeling that this may be one of the worst films ever presented in [Cannes] competition.”

Reading the wiki article and you see the following quote:

“The most disastrous since, yes, The Brown Bunny.”

from Roger Ebert about it’s performance at the Film Festival. This got me on to The Brown Bunny (imdb) wikipedia page which brings such amusement it’s unbelievable, to think that everyone is a critic, and that they are all right about such an atrocious movie, I really do have to watch this movie sometime soon. When Ebert commented on the worst movie in Cannes history he was called a fat pig, which can’t be seen as being the best retort (a short note, if your skill is attacked it’s best to either defend your skill or attack the other persons skill. Attacking their weight or look amounts to saying “I’ll get my dad on you”, or just plain defeat). As a parry to this scathing insult to Ebert’s physique he came out with my favourite paraphrasing of Winston Churchill to date.

“one day I will be thin, but Vincent Gallo will always be the director of The Brown Bunny.”

I leave you with this, watch the movie, enjoy it, if you can, and then watch The Brown Bunny, but afterwards, watch something a little more lighthearted that you can laugh at for being funny, like, The Benchwarmers. You could always watch something seriously good like The Man From Earth.

Watchmen

I’ve been waiting for Watchmen to be released for quite some time. For those who don’t know, as most of you probably don’t, Watchmen is an adaptation of the brilliant (an understatement) graphic novel by Alan Moore. As with most adaptations, it’s not completely true to the original text. In fact, there are quite a lot of changes, but having said that, and having thought about it long and hard, I have to admit that the movie is very close to the original text. Far closer than most movies ever get and the movie is a good two and three quarter hours long.

For the movie to be completely true it would probably have to be released as a series of movies, maybe 6 or so, each being about 2 hours at least. This is because there are so many side plots, time jumps and things that are explained so well through the medium of comic but which are nigh on impossible to translate on to the big screen without creating a mammoth. An example of this is the psychologist who, in the movie, appears very briefly but in the comic the psychologist passes Rorschach daily. His plotline interacts with many of the other complex plotlines which eventually all come together at the end.

The psychologist goes through trials and tribulations in his marriage because of his apparent kindness and need to help other people.The movie introduces this character very briefly as a means to show you things about Rorschach, but then he’s gone. It’s almost as if he’s only there so as to make the movie feel more complete to fans of the comic book, which is something that annoyed me. There’s no real way of putting all of this into the movie without giving the psychologist character his own movie, or a large chunk of a movie and if you think that there are at least five of these characters you get to a story of about six hours or more. I don’t want this to become a rant on why I disliked the movie.

It’s obvious I’m a seething fanboy who wanted the completeness and quirkiness of the comic to come across in explicit detail and it’s just not something that’s ever going to happen. Either way, finally, I can say I’m pleased with the result, with things to be desired of course. However, something that was brought up with me was what your regular John Smith would think of it. They’re probably not going to get any of the references to the psychologist, or the journalists. They won’t see Rorschach pottering about because they just don’t know that they’re meant to be looking for a creepy fellow with a sign. It also, unfortunately, seems that they don’t get very much of anything else from the movie, or the people I have heard about don’t.

I’d love to hear what other people thought of it who had not read the comic book as, at a guess, I think everyone who has reviewed it would probably have done a bit of research on it and read the comic book.

WIRED – Wall Street Netbooks and the Music Industry

I bought a copy of Wired, the American issue a few days ago and I must say I’m really rather impressed by it. I bought it because of an article it has called The Secret Formula that destroyed Wall Street. It’s all about a formula called the Gaussian copula formula which was, as far as I can make out, used to calculate risk on different kinds of loans from the high end loans only banks deal with to, and more importantly, your regular mortgage. However, I’m really loving my latest purchase of this magazine, it’s got quite a few really interesting articles in it, including one on Watchmen that I have yet to read.

Included in the articles are an article on music games like Rock Band and how the music industry in all its wisdom is pulling support from these games because they don’t give enough in the form of licensing fees and returns. What they’re doing I see as essentially opening up the market for independent music distribution and licensing, giving more variety and freedom to those who want to get their music out there. Think about creating a tune for a game like Rock Band specifically as a band and getting it known through the console, then, when popularity has increased, or even before, sell it over iTunes or some other internet distributer.

Recently I bought a netbook, a Samsung NC10 to be precise, it’s an absolutely fabulous piece of hardware, it runs everything I could really want on the move and I can even code some Assembly on it. I write most of my blog entries on it on my way too and from work and I feel quite proud of it when I pull it out on the tube on the way too or from work. However, there is a point to this, the WIRED issue has an article on Netbooks that really makes you think about the direction the hardware industry for computers is really going. Here, is a netbook, a low cost, low powered, device that can really do anything you want to do on it. If you have an internet connection you don’t even need to worry about installing a word processor on it. There really is no real need for most people to have high performance computers when you can just sit down snug on a char in Starbucks with a netbook and get on with whatever facebooking-myspacing-shenanigans you want. For ages coders have been taking advantage of high powered pcs by coding bloatware, sloware, bulkware, etc and now you have these low powered netbooks that are what we had maybe four years ago in high end laptops and if software developers really want to stay atop of the market they’re going to have to start shaping up and coding better. That’s just my personal opinion on how bad a lot of programs are coded these days though.

Finally, we have the article on the Gaussian Copula Function which I’ll probably write an article on as well as Watchmen. At the moment I’m so impressed with WIRED US that I want to subscribe but I’m going to be waiting to see if the next issue is any good.

Singled Out

Singled Out – Bella DePaulo

This book so far has been nothing but a spewing-forth of unreliable evidence, over-exaggerated to the extent of not just inducing boredom but annoyance. Generally it’s clear that single people seem to have less rights than married people, no tax breaks, etc, but to fill a whole chapter with the ripping apart of a book in a careless and neither witty nor constructive way isn’t good reading.

I can see this book being for bitter, cynical singles who want to affirm their hatred of couples without actually delving in and looking at life and how they want to live theirs. The author comes across as bitter and angry, not ‘elegant’ or ‘witty’ as E. Kay Trimberger of The New Single Woman claims. In fact, I think it says a lot that the back cover has a snippet from The New Single Woman and not something more prestigious. Why not even have a quote from something a little less sexist like Single People (if such a thing even exists?). The book does have a quote from The Christian Science Magazine which makes one wonder how stretched they were to find quotes.

The book claims to debunk all the myths about marriage and being single and yet I haven’t seen one myth about single or married people be debunked. I’ve seen them be refuted, argued against, bitterly slammed, but certainly no kind of constructive debunking has occured. The first chapter is given to a detailed analysis of a study done called “The case of marriage: why married people are happier, healthier and better of financially” by Waite and Gallagher. They claim that married people live longer, are happier and, obviously, are better off financially than single people. The author’s opinion of the report can be summed up in one sentence: “The report was done using bad analysis and didn’t take into account the fact that Widowers and divorcees were also married at one point”. This for the most part is true. The report is based on bad statistics which completely ignore the fact that widowers and divercees were once married. Yet a whole chapter is taken up with what appears to be a vile vengeance against anything that might support people who are married. The very next chapter, after slating the report because it used bad statistics, comes up with some equally vague and mind-blowingly bad statistics on single people, percentages thereof being happy, sad, etc. All the while completely missing the point that the greater percentage is married/coupled and that there will be a percentage of singles who want to be married because they do feel alone.

The book should be given the catch-line “You’re single, you’re going to be miserable, these are the reasons why, deal with it.” And as you can probably see, it makes me quite angry reading it.

The Bridge – Movie

I’ve been wanting to see this documentary called The Bridge for a while, and my lovely lovely girlfriend bought it for me for Valentine’s day. Not really the type of thing you’d buy someone for valentine’s day, but for me, it was wonderful. It has always really intrigued me that people commit suicide as I love life so much (if not outwardly then inwardly) and feel it’s a deep shame when people give up their life for whatever reason.

The documentary could easily have gone wrong, and it’s not the type of thing you’d pick up, read the back of and say ‘oh, that’s interesting and sounds tactful’. I’d actually wager that you’d probably go the different route and comment ‘that’s tactless and a bit vulgar, why would these people film people committing suicide and not help them’. It is however very tactful, interesting and even quite eye opening, for me at least.

The Golden Gate Bridge is apparently considered one of the seven wonders of the modern world and it’s not wonder why, from the way this documentary shows it it’s a beautiful sight and in the mist is incredible. Although I prefer the suspension bridge in Clifton, Bristol the Golden Gate Bridge is a lot larger and considered the number one place in the world to commit suicide. The Bridge says that in 2004 24 people committed suicide off the bridge, though the number is more likely to be larger due to people jumping during fog or at night time. Though currently the bridge is shut to pedestrians at night time.

The movie follows one suicide primarily building a character around the person and revealing the most dramatic footage of this one jumper. It’s not surprising that the majority have great depression but what’s interesting is that a few people being saved are caught on camera. One mad, a photographer, takes photos of a woman climbing over the edge, and only as she’s about to jump does he realise what he’s doing, grabbing her by her collar and pulling her to safety. One of his comments being that afterwards when she was being taken away by police, she looked back at him and he thought she was angry for him having saved her (how do you deal with that, you feel like you’ve done a good thing and yet you’re hated by the person you think you’ve ’saved’).

It’s a documentary that is interesting to watch and I’d recommend to anyone with an interest in psychology or depression.

Biblical No2

It seems that there are very few who follow religion to the letter and maybe that’s either the point or just a good thing. I certainly wouldn’t like today’s society if we all followed a literal translation of the Torah, be it an ‘Eye for an Eye’ or that you’re not meant to touch someone who is unclean. It would be a very frustrating way to live.

The thing about not touching someone who is unclean applies to both men and women and has to do with menstruation and shedding ones seed (male ejaculation). You’re not meant to touch a woman for seven days after she has menstruated which makes daily work a hard task. Just think about the last time you touched a woman in any way (hug, handshake, handing them something) and the chances of them having menstruated in the last seven days. Further, a male who has ejaculated in the last day is considered unclean, making touching most men probably a risky business. The punishment for this is that you are then unclean, presumably a sinner untill your next prayer when you are cleansed.

The Samaritans, the kind loving guys who appear in the parable of the good Samaritan, still live in Israel although there are only about 700 of them. They hold very strict literalist views on cleanliness and the female menstruation cycle. For seven days each month the females of the household have what is endearingly referred to as a ‘holiday from housework’. They have their own room with tv and refrigerator, they are not allowed really to interact with the men of the house except to help them prepare meals. This brings up another point actually, that men aren’t allowed to sit or touch anything that an unclean person has touched. So if the women of the Samaritans touch something, the men are not allowed to touch it. This is why they are not allowed to come out of their room and the men have to do everything.

What really intrigues me here, other than the fact that they have these bizarre rituals, is that the Samaritans of today put emphasis on this being a holiday for the women. It isn’t repression, even if it was at some point. It is now liberation.

The most powerful part of the story of the good Samaritan is that the Samaritan helps a Judean and the two hated each other. It tells us that even if you hate your neighbour for one thing, if he’s hurt and alone, you should help. The Samaritans have their own Bible and in fact their own Ten Commandments with just one difference: one of the commandments is to build an altar on Mount Garizim. It’s facinating to think that if we were all Samaritans then instead of having hundreds of people at the Wailing Wall every day you’d have hundreds of people not so far away at Mount Garizim. Every Passover the head male of each household of the Samaritans sacrifices a goat. Again, if we were all Samaritans then there would, every Passover, be hundreds maybe thousands of goat sacrifices but at Mount Garizim.

There’s a facinating thing about Jewish people and sacrifice which I will talk about in more depth next post.

Biblically No.1

I’m currently reading A.J.Jacobs, The Year of Living Biblically and I’m also trying to improve my memory. The latter of the two is inspiried by the very sad and unfortunate situation that Terry Pratchett is currently in. For those who don’t know, and I’m pretty sure that everyone does know, but Terry Pratchett recently found out that he has Alzheimers and if you’re interested there’s a really rather good show he’s doing about his search for a cure. Go check it out on iPlayer.

Anyway, I want to write down some stuff about the bible thing I’m reading, interesting stuff, useless facts that you will no doubt never need, but if you find yourself in the odd situation of being on the crystal maze maybe you’ll thank me.

Fact One:
There are 613 Commandments in the bible and that doesn’t include all of the suggestions and parables that are written. These 613 were all given to Moses on top of the mountain which is why he was up there for forty days. Most of these are the Oral Laws which were given by Moses to the Israelites who gave them to their sons and daughters, etcetera. Not all Jews believe in these Oral laws, there is a sect of Jewdaism who call themselves the Karaites who do not believe in the Oral law and only what is written in the bible. Whereas other jewish people follow the Rabbis interpretations of these Oral Laws.

Examples of this are laws like not mixing Wool and Linen, which is very specific and easy to follow, however there are other laws like ‘an Eye for an Eye’ which is where Jewish people need interpretation from the Rabbis. It’s said that it doesn’t actually mean to take and Eye for and Eye, but instead ‘cash for an eye’, typically the attacker pays the victim the monetary value of an eye. Then there are weird laws like ‘You are not to boil a young goat in the milk of it’s mother’ which if you take literally seems very hard to break and almost stupid to state. However, the interpretation of this by Rabbis gives the Jewish people the law whereby they can’t mix milk and meat, thus, no cheeseburgers.

It’s an interesting area and one which is trackled a lot in this book. One of my favourite parts so far is where the author tries to follow the law about not making a graven image of anything on the earth or in the sea. Taken literally it means that when his son askes him to create a Car out of play-doe he instead creates a circle, when asked to create Nemo (becuase his son is a good little protoconsumer) he creates an oval.

It does however get him into trouble now and again, there are a few pages dedicated to how he reacts to touching women. It says in the bible that you are not to touch a woman who is going through her cycle for a week afterwards. This means that he can refrain and pull back from shaking hands and hugging women with the excuse that he might be committing a sin.

More to come, when I remember perhaps.

Daily Routines

Daily Routines is a blog “how writers, artists, and other interesting people organize their days”. I really enjoy it as it gives me inspiration for how I should be spending my day, how much time I waste and gives me insight into what real people do with their day when they’re not at work (or in some of the cases, whilst they are working).

It inspires me to formulate a rigid attitude to creativity but at the same time I’m of the feeling that disorder creates creativity. Inspiration comes from clutter and randomness (trinkets on the desk, photos on the walls, models and paintings scattered about) and minimalism is what I imagine firms use to make sure their employees work every single minute of the day.

In the book Queuing for Beginners there’s a whole chapter on the Englishman’s working day, and it goes into length about different attitudes brought over from America. The small desks, clean/blank desks, crammed workspace and firms trying to get rid of watercoolers because of ‘watercooler talk’ (an actual myth, there is no such thing according to the book). What it came down to was that firms wanted minimalism so their employees didn’t get distracted, but this kind of behaviour lowers moral and enjoyment in work. If you instead let workers make their desk their own little home then moral boosts and people enjoy their work more, you never know, they might even stay at work longer.

Cormac McCarthy – The Road

I finished The Road last night and I must say I really really enjoyed it. It’s full of hope, toil, strife, love, pain and it’s written in a gripping and engaging way. By the end I really did feel like I couldn’t put it down till I had finished it, ending up sitting up till well past midnight reading, something I don’t think I’ve ever done.

It’s been made into a movie and should be out later this year and I’d recommend it to anyone. I always find it’s best not to know much about a book/film before you see it, so I’m not going to give anything away, just be warned, it’ll have a rollercoaster of a ride with your emotions.

The English

There are two books about the English that I really love, one I have just finished and the other I read quite a while ago. The was Watching the English by Kate Fox and I’d suggest anyone English reads it to get a sense of how obsurd we really are, a feeling of dread from some of the obsurd things we do and to just laugh at it all. I’d also suggest anyone foreign reads it as it’s going to shed a lot of light on why we’re such a bizarre set of peoples. From how and why we queue, to how and why we say sorry if someone else bumps into us. These are small things I’ve always wondered and was too English to ask (not really, but it goes :). The second is the one I’ve just finished and is called Queing for Beginners, it’s less for the foreigner looking to find out about the bizarre species known as the English and more for and English person who just wants to find out a bit more about our past and what makes us English. What’s the history of commuting, why do we give up our seats, when was the first time someone got into a fight because a youngster didn’t give up their seat (this last one is far earlier (early 20th century) than one would have imagined, what with us all complaining that the country is going to the dogs because the youth won’t give up their seats anymore). I don’t have any other books about the English on my list to read, but I look forward to finding some, at the moment my love is for books about Music, recently having bought Musicophilia and seeing lots of books like This is your brain on Music (I think it’s called).