Living in Los Angeles it is impossible to avoid the city’s symbiotic relationship with Hollywood. As a young Hollywoodent I lived in a town where confederate flags still fly from the back of lifted pick-up trucks. Now I study in the country’s most illustrious film program and rather than lube me up for the thrill ride that is Tinsel Town it has instead led me to develop a serious distaste for the hyperpackaged crap-fests that Hollywood has grown content with serving up. They are “ignorizing” the masses and rather than commit myself to that world, I plan to investigate possibilities for creative minds wishing to work in film or video outside of the typical industry path.
With the digital revolution in full swing, filmmakers are no longer required to be slaves to the whims of a studio producer. Sites like Youtube and Revver provide excellent forums for the up and comings who have nothing save dreams and webcams. And what with internet piracy at an all time high, people from all walks of life can steal their favorite animation program and produce works of art instantaneously downloadable anywhere across the world. Systems of copyright are undergoing serious reformation as the lines between content consumer and content provider grow thinner and thinner.
Filmmaker and theorist Julio Garcia Espinosa called this shift of power mass cinema, or imperfect cinema. A movement where access to basic equipment is common to society and every inspiration can be followed through. Eventually this will lead to a general understanding of the film making process and the manipulation inherent to cinema will be exposed. On-the-rise generations are filtering art in a whole new way and it is important that we acknowledge these fundamental changes occurring.
Gallery works, concert animations, nomadic film making are just a few examples of the ideas I will explore and there’s no doubt that looking into these worlds will lead me to additional stories, interesting and unique, which I will gladly share with you. Expect artist profiles (or if I get really brave: interviews) from time to time. I can’t promise it will all be cinematic, as I’ve got some other ideas, so here’s hoping that I’m a person with interesting things to say and that you may want to take the time to read them.
“Damn the man, save the empire”
end.
(2) Blood Sweat and Tedium, Tedium, Tedium
“Blog Review:
The full title is: Blood, Sweat, and Tedium: Confessions of a Hollywood Juicer. So this is to be a blog about a hard working, crying, boring, juicer.
Blog Re-Review: The full title is Blood, Sweat, and Tedium, Tedium, Tedium and it is dripping with an irreverent sarcasm typical of the chestfeather puffing amateur. Lungs of hot air, I confused entertainment and quality. I let my likes and dislikes eclipse my goal and posted a scathing ‘review’ steeped in personal preference, objectivity on the shelf.
That was the old Hollywoodent. I’m 21 now and adulthood has changed me.
Michael Taylor’s blog doesn’t have much in the way of juice, figurative nor literal, but Michael Taylor does. He makes it clear that he is not here to dish the juicy Hollywood details that readers have come to love (or loathe). But rather he chooses to focus on the dirty side of an ugly industry in a nasty city: set lighting.
He’s got lights to hang, lights to power, lights to focus, bbq lights, lights scampi…
Taylor’s a Hollywood insider in the purest form. He’s been working in the biz for 30! plus years and if the header of his page doesn’t turn your collar blue, you’re from the moon.
Often times reading Taylor’s posts is like reading letters from the trenches, only you’ve never met this soldier before, but the letters pour in. His writing is steady and honest, insightful and yes even at times tedious but this is his job and this is his life.
Michael’s first post is titled Welcome to the Dream Factory and in it he proves his talent as a writer and a philosopher. Here he laments his West Coast American Dream; it began in San Fransisco, paused for the ponderous central state mountains, and found “fulfillment” at last in the City of Angels.
“There are three kinds of people who come to Hollywood: dreamers, drifters, and the driven. Each has his/her own reasons for coming to Tinsel Town, the Dream Factory, and in the end, every path followed or blazed has a way of ending in a complex stew of disappointment, regret, and resignation. Good times are here to be had, careers and money to be made, but nothing good seems to last very long on this thin strip of sun-baked earth trapped hard between the desert and the sea. Time passes in a blur, melting into the haze of smog under the relentless Southern California sun. Then one day you wake up to find thirty years have slipped through your fingers, and where the hell did they go… “
Taylor’s observations are mindful and tragic; a writer gracefully acquiescing to this, his American Life. He speaks at length of “surviving” in the industry and, while never openly admitting to liking LA, he is seemingly content that it has “seeped into his system”.
::cough::smog::cough::
I couldn’t help but be a little put off by many of Taylor’s talks about idealism and compromise, the latter which played a big role in his career. At this point I am unable to stomach making any concessions for a town draped in 5 million dollar tinsel without a penny in its moral piggy bank.
“So get out.”
I will, but I’m taking you with me.
end.
P.S. Michael responded to my post, honorably defending his honor, and teaching me a lesson or two.
Here are two.
(1) There’s no such thing as “scenic lighting” – it’s called “set lighting” whether on a sound stage or location set. Set painters are sometimes called “scenics,” but I haven’t come across that word used in any other way.
(2) The hardest thing to learn at your age is patience. I know this probably sounds ridiculous (as it did to me, once), but if you keep moving in the right direction, putting one foot in front of the other while keeping your eyes open for opportunity — good things will happen. Just remember, it always takes longer than you want or think it should. Always.
Thanks, Michael.
End. End.
(3) Bankin’ On It
I want to read about movies, but I hate industry gossip. I’d enjoy interesting updates about the cinematic sphere, but I’m not willing to be a “mailing list consumer”.
I found a place.
Burbanked .com sounds like the brain child of a wears-a-suit to work (bank?) kinda guy, smart enough to get his day’s work done by lunchtime and spend the next 5 hours working on his blog.
Let’s see. Top toolbar. From the left. Home. About.
“Burbanked is my blog. I’m Alan Lopuszynski, a copywriter, former Hollywood D-guy and corporate drone based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.”
Heh.
Burbanked (Bb) centers on making the fool of Hollywood and Lopuszynski (Alan) certainly pulls no punches. The graphic heading the site is a sign
Ironic, since Burbank is just next door (19 miles or about 21 minutes) to the Hollywood Sign and our writer lives in Pittsburgh. Perhaps Pittsburg has a ‘burb called Burbanked?
It doesn’t.
It does however have a little blurb of description about Bb on Pittsburgh bloggers, a site functioning as a directory for local bloggers.
“Burbanked is your home away from Hollywood hype. Show business is brimming with hype, spin and even hoopla. Burbanked is a frank, regular-guy look at movies, celebrities, TV – and the culture that inspires them. A view of Hollywood without the view. “
A less snarky, more accurate, description of this blog. Alan doesn’t present himself as any sort of pretentious critic. In fact he doesn’t give film reviews at all. Rather he is just an Average Joe who knows better than the people calling the shots and whose only power to change things lies his production of this site. The weapon he wields is common sense, something the “other team” is missing, and although he is a smarty-pants, Alan takes care never to patronize or pander (that’s the job of 20th Century Fox. see: Meet the Spartans)
Alan speaks in a direct tone, careful not to insult his audience’s intelligence. In this “about” section he is Alan the professional. Alan the suit-wearing banker (he claims he’s a copywriter, but I doubt it). He is cordial and accommodating, offering to email help to any browsers who “get lost” (undoubtedly these people have difficultly with their email, too).
But it’s the actual blog posts are where Alan trades in his abacus for something less mathy and starts to rag (maybe he trades his abacus for a rag) on Hollywood and the people who like it. Strait as an arrow he calls out H.Wood on all its B.S., something he is certainly qualified to assess having spent nearly a decade as a development lackey. He addresses multi-million dollar mistakes (see: Death Proof> ) as if the tragedy of their creation were common knowledge, which to his readers it is. Simple and sarcastic. He refrains from using fragments or colloquialisms, sticking with the correct version of the English language. Obviously knowledgeable of film language, smatterings of biz speech can be found throughout, but he mashes together his own cleverer than that phrases to keep the sincerity low. There are no asides or interjections as all of the blogs incorporate his character as the commenter. In the aforementioned post he knocks peace supporting grease ball Quentin Tarantino
not because he made a film that he didn’t care for, but because he made a film that simply doesn’t make sense assuming you trust a director to have any artistic consistency within a single work. The critique is mildly scathing but assuredly truthful. This is a conversation I imagine Mr. Burbanked would love to have face to face with that face
or that one.
He wouldn’t be intimidated, there’s no reason. He’s right.
Continuing through the tabs. Left to right. Assumable order of importance.
Methinks some basics are in order. So we’ll skip all that middle stuff and head to Burbanked Basics where he breaks down the site and all its quirks.
If you haven’t, out of curiosity, clicked any of the above links to his site and noticed how chock-full of stuff the home page is, do so now. You’ll be confused, for every which way you look numerous widgets with continuously changing content bludgeon your peripherals with quippy info. A quick breakdown:
Featured Article (self explanatory)
Action Figure Mood Indicatory (star quotes from action figure versions of stars)
Flickers (Newsiest news)
Randomly Burbanked (haphazard links to his former posts)
From the Brains of other Bloggers (links to other blogs of similar subject matter)
Terrible Twos (indicative of a tantrum)
Each time I visit the site I have to brush up on the basics because all those little boxes have a tendency to overwhelm. IMO the box of highest function is From the Brains of Other Bloggers. Not only are there links to company he keeps such as the insightful Antagony & Ecstasy or the blatant contradiction that is What Would Tyler Durden Do? (it’s all gossip about celebs. I prefer to think he’d set them on fire) Mr. Burbanked actually takes the time to post his responses to some of his favorite posts. This solidifies him a genuine blogger who understands the nature of the conversation being had.
He’s a smart guy who longs for a more peaceful age, where things didn’t suck as much.
The outer limits anarchist who knows his ideas are innovative and humorous and rests quietly on those laurels.
“News, insight and snark from a former Hollywood insider” he says.
Bitter? Perhaps. But never regretful of getting the hell out.
This is a 4 star blog post. I give it an A , and two thumbs up!
A star, a thumb, a grade: this is the state of cinema.
So we’re doomed.
Again.
Maybe.
“‘When you can’t fully cover a presidential campaign, a movie critic might seem like a luxury,” says Carrie Rickey, film critic, 22 years, Philadelphia Inquirer
That’s right, if you haven’t heard, film critics working in newspapers are finding themselves outsourced, bought out, or straight up fired as publications no longer have the funds, or desire, to keep them on board (check out this manifest of the unemployed and over-informed).
Instead studios and news publications are finding that internet review sources are the current go-to’s, where the opinion pool may be wider, but not necessarily deeper. Moviegoers use metacritic.com and rottentomatoes.com: sites that scores films by averaging the ratings of critics and users alike.
This begs the question(s): What is the role of the critic anyhow? Is it their job to promote films, as trailers, tv spots, and billboards seem quite adept at doing? Or is it the job of a critic to dissect a film and to bring to light its subtexts and implications? And through all this, how are audiences, and their corporate puppet masters, dealing with (and shaping) the context and content?
So let’s go back to the first time we were doomed.
Dooming #1: Academic Pandemic
Actually, let’s go back to The First Time.
It used to be a moving picture. It was a train pulling into the station. It was a magic photograph, like one of those moving waterfall plaques in the mall.
But then some filmmakers wished to push this new form beyond, to make it an art, to have a political identity. In 1928 Sergei Eisenstein vocalized montage. This was not only a tool but also a philosophical approach- if image = idea, then two images = new idea.
“We have discovered how to force the spectator to think in a certain direction. By mounting our films in a way scientifically calculated to create a given impression on an audience, we have developed a powerful weapon for the propagation of the ideas upon which our new social system is based” Eisenstein
Then it was over. The train was a runaway one, and on it the architects of cinema: formalism, D.W. Griffith, realism, Bazin, Kracauer, semiotics, depth of field, mis-en-scene etc. etc. etc.
However important these theorists were, they were publishing for each other, not for the popular public sphere. Film’s presence in newspaper was minimal: a short blurb of who was in the film, who directed it, and a brief expression of the plot. The author could have been (and often was) a sports writer.
It was not until the 60’s and 70’s that film writing really got hot. This was the New Hollywood, the 3 quarter century renaissance. Marx and Freud had inspired interest in the psychoanalytic society and the arts were now being filtered through these lenses.
“They introduced such fresh considerations as the way that films reveal the underlying social attitudes and ideologies of the cultures that produce them, the ways films manipulate audience beliefs, and the ways they raise, exploit, and seek to satisfy audience desires” Marsha Cohen Film Theory and Criticism (xvi)
The country’s most popular critics, Pauline Kael of The New Yorker and Andrew Sarris (?) were engaging in this level of discussion in a national scale in the form of an infamous feud, which started over France’s auteur theory and extended outward.
Essentially Kael was arguing that to give credence to such a theory actually dulled down film, because if a director’s “stamp” was noticeable, then his work was trite and predictable. And Sarris believed American criticism to be anti-theoretical, and “saddled with moral obligations”; that style should be considered more heavily, stylistically, as film is an art form.
Sarris- For purposes of discussion, early American film-reviewing leaves a great deal to be desired. American criticism, like American cinema, is eminently pragmatic and anti-theoretical. Almost from the beginning, the cinema was saddled with transcendent moral obligations that converted critiques into sermons. It was as if movies had been born to serve society and cure its ills. Stylistic analysis was often neglected for the sake of presumed realism and social significance. Too often the road to bad movies was paved with good intentions. Consequently, the paradoxes and contradictions of the medium were developed more fully abroad where film-making and film-watching were intellectually fashionable at an earlier stage of the cinema’s evolution.
Their feud brings up two very important distinctions that still lurk and are important to the Hollywoodent quest. Are movies entertainment? or Art? Either? or Neither? Both? Are movies meant to be felt? or thought? Screened through Past, present, or future? Instinct or intellect?
Pauline wrote from her gut, she used the words of the people and wasn’t afraid to offend anyone. Sarris, on the other hand, wrote with his highly educated intellect that tried to place films within the “Pantheon”. Films were about immortality. She wrote about films the weekend of release, and only watched each one only once. She was immediate and visceral.
Perhaps he was a critic, and she a reviewer. Marxist? Capitalist? Regardless, their legends are forever intertwined and the fact is that the public was asked to choose sides.
So did they?
Dooming #2: My Blood, My Brain, My Money
This leads me to the next step in the evolution of maybe-doom, and it comes with a rather personal revelation . And that is:
The piece of art that brought me to the cinema, destroyed the medium with its success.
Dooming #3: Bruce the Shark, Boob Tube & Ebert the Weatherman
I speak of Jaws, my favorite film of all time, and I speak of it as the postmodern cherry popper. That is to say that for all its good intentions, it left our society with a flock of retarded babies and a battered uterus.
The hyper saturated mass marketing approach to film advertisement began back in 1975 and has been relentlessly bombarding our information stations since. Spielberg wasn’t acting alone here, he had the help of media conglomerates to ensure that the film would reach as many screens as possible. This has since translated to the ancillary markets, including magazines, newspapers, tv stations and internet.
Is it likely that Entertainment Weekly is going to trash a film that is produced by its baby daddy Time Warner? No. But EW gives grades, not any real commentary.
Speaking of simplistic reviews and television, let’s address Chicago’s world famous duo of Siskel and Ebert. For two thumbs up, you only have to impress two dopey little dudes, which seems easy enough, except that these two dudes are really smart, and well informed. And with a television show hosted by such cineastes, dense and intelligent (but accessible) film commentary should be their M.O. To bring the commoner to a place of awe and understanding of this the art form of the masses. Check it: (note: Roger Ebert=Ed, Good Burger=Hollywood)
Jean Siskel and Roger Ebert spend 3 of the 5 minutes per segment showing clips and explaining the plot of the film which seems counterintuitive to the experience of movies. Why would a viewer want to know the whole plot before going in? Why bother then?
In my searches I discovered that the questioning of the role of, and likewise the responsibility imbued to, the popular critic is nothing new. Inspired by criticism’s move to television, Roger Ebert and Richard Corliss went at it publicly. Corliss wrote for magazine publications Time and Film Comment and Ebert was of Siskel and Ebert & The Movies and also the Chicago Sun Times. Ebert’s book Awake in the Dark (2006) has the essays these giants exchanged (1990-1991) and what follows is their talking.
I’d like to thank Roger Ebert and Richard Corliss for coming on the program. Welcome. Richard let’s begin with you. Originally you were excited for the move to tv criticism. You were quoted as saying, “The next step would be to analyze films on TV. Then you could literally see what we were talking about. And we could finally make good on auteurism’s unfulfilled promise of mise-en-scene analysis. No more reliance on fault, fractured memory–you could study a film as you would a painter’s oeuvre, frame by frame.” How do you define the current situation?
Richard Corliss- …in less-is-all TV, the reviewer hardly has any time for the basics: synopsize the plot, introduce an excerpt, and then (if he hates the movie) make a joke or (if he likes it) invoke the five W’s—warm, winning, wise, wacky, wonderful. Traditional considerations of directorial style, social import, and the film’s place in film history are luxuries unobtainable in a no-frills review. (395)
Roger Ebert- Let’s face it. The sad fact is that film criticism, serious or popular, good or bad, printed or on TV, has precious little power in the face of a powerful national campaign for a clever mass-market entertainment. (415) Are the movie critics on TV preempting the audience for such writing? No. They serve a different function, for a different audience…(Ebert 414)
Corliss- Isn’t everyone in a hurry? Tv certainly is, and tv sets the pace we live and think by. The nightly newscasts are offering more but briefer stories: not news in depth- news in shallow.(396)
Ebert- This is not deep criticism–it is informed and sincere opinion. (408) The program’s purpose is to provide exactly what Corliss says it provides: information on what’s new at the movies, who’s in it, and whether the critics think it’s any good or not. (408)
And how would you compare the analysis you do on the television and the ones you do in print?
Ebert- No art form is covered more completely and at greater length in today’s newspapers than the movies. All of this film criticism has not resulted in a more selective North American moviegoing public, nor has it created larger audiences for foreign or independent films or documentaries, it exists in a time when alternative films, theaters, and audiences are in disrepair. (407)
Corliss- The long view of cinema aesthetics is irrelevant to a moviegoer for whom history began with Star Wars. (396)
Ebert- The bottom line is that mass-produced Hollywood entertainments dominate American movie exhibition, and most moviegoers seem to like it that way. (405) Reviewers, after all, can only offer their opinions on a new movie. Some like it, some don’t, and together they do not have the impact of a well-coordinated national campaign that lands a popular star simultaneously on the covers of a People-type magazine, a newsweekly, several glossy monthlies, and the talk shows. Hollywood has never been more star-drive than it is at this moment, and publishers and producers have never been more eager to get their piece of the star of the week. (411)First the star sells the medium, and then the medium sells the star and his movie. Around and around. (414)
Corliss- The only solution, if a critic is both to speak his own mind and act as a bellwether of audience whim, is to write about a film, “It stinks. You’ll love it” (417)
Ebert- What is happening here seems to be endemic in a lot of American journalism: people read the papers not in the hopes of learning something new, but in the expectation of being told what they already know. (432) Writing daily film criticism is a balancing act between the bottom line and the higher reaches, between the answers to the questions (I) Is this movie worth my money? and (2) Does this movie expand or devalue my information about human nature? (431)
Corliss- I hope there are still readers with the vigor, curiosity, and intelligence demanded of filmmakers and critics. We’re in this fight together. To understand pictures, we still need words.
Ebert- The best movies are usually made because one person or small group have a story they believe must be told, because it strikes a chord in their hearts. It can be a comedy, a musical, a drama, a polemic–the important thing is that they feel it. The worst movies are made out of calculation, to reach a large audience. There is nothing wrong with a large audience, nothing wrong with making money (some of the best films have been the most profitable), but there is something wrong with the calculation (436)
Corliss- “My job isn’t to predict what movies are going to be popular; that’s what studio executives are paid for. And it isn’t primarily, meant as a consumer service. It’s to enlighten the reader through my knowledge of movies and entertain him with my play of language. (417)
So whose opinion can we trust? One of these men regards us, the audience, as subjects with whom to intellectually engage, to the other we are consumers, hobbiests, fellow enthusiasts. One seeks to challenge or confirm our brains, the other seeks to ease the burn of wasted money and time.
Dooming #5: Ebert the Weatherman
But the names Siskel and Ebert still pack a punch, so when Ebert gives Transformers 3 stars, this a great selling point for an ad. What’s odd though is that his written review for the film painted it dour and at times incoherent.
I saw the movie on the largest screen in our nearest multiplex. It was standing room only, and hundreds were turned away. Even the name of Hasbro, maker of the Transformers toys, was cheered during the titles, and the audience laughed and applauded and loved all the human parts and the opening comedy. But when the battle of the titans began, a curious thing happened. The theater fell dead silent. No cheers. No reaction whether Optimus Prime or Megatron was on top. No nothing. I looked around and saw only passive faces looking at the screen.
So what is it about an audience’s overwhelming indifference to a film’s climax that earns it 3 stars? Mixed messages such as these are commonplace with the tightly packaged opinions of review indexes like metacritic. Transformers received a 61 of 100, but it is coded green, saying the film has “Generally favorable reviews”.
Generally, a 61% is hardly favorable.
But where is the meat to support any of these numbers? On metacritic the votes are divided into two categories, Critics (a 61 by 35 critics) and Users (a 7.0 by 552 votes)
The metacritic staffers take care to explain their scoring, but it is so complex, I would doubt that anyone (including myself) has the commitment to filter though 5 sections of math. Curiously, some critics are weighted more than others, which confuses the democracy/equality of the system.
When selecting our source publications, we noticed that some critics consistently write better (more detailed, more insightful, more articulate) reviews than others. In addition, some critics and/or publications typically have more prestige and weight in the industry than others. To reflect these factors, we have assigned weights to each publication (and, in the case of film, to individual critics as well), thus making some publications count more in the METASCORE calculations than others.
Rotten Tomatoes does a better job of eliminating the hierarchy by polling all the votes together (57% on 200 votes) but this number is still empty.
Or do voices even matter in an age when media blitzkriegs make people susceptible to impulse buys and group mind?
Studios like the “critics” who blast words like “SUPERRADULAR!”for films like Big Mama’s House 2. (I believe that was Dolores C. Tucker of the Philadelphia High Submariner)
One of the draws of the newspaper is the sense of community they promote. This may be a local community, like the Spokane Gazette, or a national community, like USA Today, or even international, like the International Herald Tribune.
But it would be entirely unfair not to actually laud some of the blessings that internet reviews have brought to us.
The community is way bigger
And dumberer (this is a good thing, because it shows critics that the majority of people out there have no idea what they are talking about, and perhaps, this will inspire them to reach their now jobless hands into the pool of dumbitity and give a little yank up.)
So is the conversation being lowered and niched the intentions of raising itself up to an intellectual and socially relevant status? Maybe, that’s up to the real critics to decide. Or have films simply lost credibility in the eyes of the public? Reliable Sarris thinks that we are in something called popcamptrivia.
Audiences assume a guise of sniggering superiority to anything that appears on the screen. Movies that are unambitiously bad are preferred to movies that are ambitiously good. It has made us demand more fun in our art and more art in our fun. It has inhibited critics from making fine distinctions between marginal movies for fear of condescending cackles of the “in” crowd.
At the opening of this post I thought I would be disgusted by such blatant disregard for the sovereignty of such a powerful art form, but then I thought about something.
Salvation: Al Gore and his love child
The medium has finally come full circle. The internet has freed cinema, and sure, it’s simple, and maybe a little cruel, (think America’s Funniest Home videos cruel) but EVERYBODY IS DOING IT. And some of these people are bound to go deeper, to fall in love with the process of making films, and maybe having little knowledge of their predecessors will allow for a creative and artistic freedom that comes from an average dude. The youtube rise of the middle class? hahaha
The catch is that it is going to be much more difficult for people to make money off of these things, to make a career from their work. But isn’t that what got us into this mess. Maybe our aesthetic standards will be lowered to such a degree that a scenic can be an electrician
With no need for distributors, there’s no need for critics. The comments on youtube are hardly worth spending time on, why read it, when you just watched it, and can watch 50,0000000000000,000 more?
Theories of postmodernism dictate a return to the familiar in a time of uncertainty. And while this is comforting immediately, it creates a gap between the progressing members of society and those presently reliving a past they never lived. While one furthers towards death, the other remains stagnant, begatting stagnance, begatting stagnance.
Heavy and detailed film criticism will always be available to those who wish to engage in it and even for those that don’t. Just in doing research for this essay I was linked to at least 30 blogs discussing this issue.
If being in film school has one perk (and it might not), it’s that it teaches that the road to enlightenment begins in black and white: that by understanding the history of a medium, its present and future grow richer. This is why I find this article by USC cinema Prof. Anne Thompson to be so hilarious. She (to the Daily Variety!) admitted that none of her students knew the name of a single film critic beyond Roger Ebert. (I don’t know anyone who has taken a class with this)
My USC film criticism students — who are film-obsessed and hardly representative of their non-cinephile peers — can’t name a working critic other than Ebert, and that’s thanks to his TV fame. Anne Thompson
The point is that we, the “educated elite” have no clue, or interest, in our academic approved, we’d rather be engaged Apparently we have less use for opinions codified by highbrow elitests than we used to, we’d rather listen to our friends.
This morning my roommates and I shared a picnic breakfast, munching on eggs and juice, and passing around pages from the Times (none the film review section). But all I could think about was the blinding glare of a laptop in the sun.
So, 4 stars? I’d settle for a chuckle. And maybe a C+.
P.S.- If you, too, need reassurance that people can live for 100 years and be sane, humorous, and good looking as ever, watch these two Reel Geezers talk about penises and period blood. You can trust them, they get it, they gave Hollywoodent two penises up!
I have been prompted to write a short blurb about politics as it relates to my field of study. I study movies. And movies are dreams. Dreams dreamt loud.
The wedding ground of all the other arts. The screen is the stage where photographers dance to the poets song, and actors, painted and polished, play pretend before a crowd of phantoms. For me, the beauty of a film is in the steadfast resolve which shields it from the wither of time. Burned to its reel, a film is destined to outlast its creators. The creation of something
I hate to get serious for a minute, but other than the filibuster, nothing I have witnessed in our political system comes anywhere close to inspiring words humorous.
All this prose and nothing has been said. My question is: where is the revolution? Where are the people willing to stand up to a broken system? Where is our Easy Rider? Mr. Smith Goes To Washington? Remakes like Guess Who pervert the controversy of the original. Laughing at racism is easier than talking about it just as watching Transformers explore is more fun than being in a car wreck.
I think of the 60’s, Flower Power and all that, and I don’t know whether it is more trite to admire them or to deem them over-sentimentalized. Romanticized. I do know that art was bold. Bold as love. Bolder than today. Poets were confrontational, not tepid and simple troubadors inspired great masses.
I wonder what the masses are being inspired by today. Of this week’s Billboard top 10 albums, 2 are from Miley Cyrus, the nation’s favorite skizophrenic tweenager, numbers 10 and 6.
“Girl’s you can be famous, twice! (If your dad kinda was).”
Number 2 is Now 27! compiled by Sony BMG Strategic Marketing Group (too honest) And let’s not forget number 1 P. Diddy/MTV’s hyper-packaged Danity Kane, whose single begs a new boyfriend to fix the “damages” left by the previous.
The closest the top 10 comes to social awareness is Jack Johnson’s solar panels. It seems the only artists that have earned permission to attempt to inspire positive change are in their 40’s. (R.E.M. has a new record out, which I think will be awesome.)
Apparently I just want “Blowin’ In The Wind”. Any version. Joni Mitchell. Bob Dylan. Dolly Parton. Bobby Darin. Neil Young. Stevie Wonder. Give me covers of “What’s Goin’ On?” without cramming 50 singers in there. If they believe in the message so much, let them each record it. That would be a loud sound. Copyrights, though.
I hear a lot of guff about protests and protesters. The argument is that protesters are only pissing people off, not changing any minds. Troubling to me is that I hear this resentment too often. What are we supposed to do? Just sit back and let them fuck us? Everyone is mad. The polls are low. But no one is listening.
In France, they burn cars and things change.
Just saying.
In my 3 years at college I’ve seen only three protests on campus, all done by SCALE. According to them our school uses sweat shops and they think this is wrong. The administration says “Go away. Oh, by the way, keep arguing and you’ll be homeless tomorrow.”
(That is not a direct quote)
1,000,000 men marched on Washington in 1995, 130 years after slavery ended.
Just saying.
What are we going to be remembered for? Who is going to make this change? We stand on the edge of a very steep cliff. Violins are being ripped from the hands of 3rd graders. Our history, and national identity, lies buried deep beneath a pile of stuff growing monumentally. Exponentially.
So while I think that the upcomming election has nothing to do with film, it has everything to do with it, if the country is waiting on a leader to change its attitude.
It all comes down to money. Look what films make the most money. Look which cost the most money. I go by the numbers and the numbers tell me that in 61 days of release $38 million worth of people saw Meet The Spartans, one of Hollywood’s most transparent fundraisers.
This film = a bunch of other films you’ve already seen, with worse actors everything + boobs and “jokes”.
We long to escape from the overwhelming reality that is real life so we dip our spoons into the same jar again and again expecting something different. This, I am informed, is the definition of insanity.
Or maybe, we just looooooooooove the Christmasy taste of Nicholas Cage being a chump explorer in an irrational sequel to an irrational original.
Well, what is it? Supply or demand? Have we found our favorite taste? Do we enjoy all this slash and rehash? Or are we victims to mass media? Vegetarians are told, “Just because you don’t eat meat doesn’t mean the cows don’t die.” Neither will the sequel machine simply crumble at our feet for not seeing Rush Hour 3.
Supply. Supply. Supply. Supply. Supply the sequel. Supply the toy. Supply the soundtrack. Supply the most. “If you build it, they will buy.”
Hollywood is our mistress, and we are enjoying the beating.
Look at me, naive and idealistic, with a laundry list of complaints and no solutions. Things suck, blah blah. I’m not even sure any of this makes sense.
Perhaps this drama is overplayed. Maybe I’m not jaded enough yet. Or. Maybe nobody is jaded and I’m only being contrary, lashing out against the popular kid.
Either way I wonder why it feels like it’s up to us? I guess part of the reason is that I don’t trust the instigators of disco, hair metal, and the pop revolution with my future (they’ve done a fine enough job mucking up my past). Apparently the people at NASA who actually know how to do things are all dying and there isn’t anyone smart enough to replace them. Maybe this is what happened in film. And furthermore, the political arena.
Surely those long in the lash no longer marvel at the slight-of-hand swiping billions from the youth. So long has it been since Eve melted under the silver tongue. So far forgotten is Adam’s shame. As a crown tarnishes so too does a man’s regard for his government. After all, any stomach would harden to years of spoiled milk.
I think I was tricked into entering the world of online dating. Again.
Before I defend myself, watch the video below. (It’s 50 seconds long, I’ll understand if you can’t spare the time, here is one 26 seconds, less convincing, though)
It was a dark night.
Ok, let me break this down for a minute (keep in mind every speaking role in this clip is male):
“The key to eHarmony is that you don’t have to do any heavy lifting”. Has me from hello. I’m in.
“I don’t have to feel the pressure to go out and search for people” Well at this point, I’d rather not put my pants back on, so. Still in.
“Dating sites give you a picture and a paragraph, at eHarmony we do the matching for you, based on who you are at the deepest levels” This is like, so easy.
Insert: diagonally swirling text. 29 Dimensions
Now listen up! this is who you are. (If you’d really like to know the full you, visit each of the wiki sites attached to these words. They’re long. We are, after all, allegedly complex creatures)
Well it isn’t 29 but that’s all I can see. Seems fair enough, Though I thought I was bypassing sociability by using this site. I also apparently don’t have the industry, or the ambition to link you to all of those. But if you really care, you’ll set aside the afternoon and brush up on you.
“Somewhere in all those questions, they’ve deciphered that she’s the right girl for me”
This dude isn’t even looking at his ‘girlfriend’. “She loves me for who I am”. You=kind of googly eyed.
“You don’t have to sacrifice anything.” Not even considering looking at his ‘girlfriend’.
” And it does work, I’m not sure I care how it works, it just does.”
I always was under the impression that these types of sites were for people who simply lacked the social skills required to court someone but were quite skilled at the whole typing thing. I was right.
by visiting this site used for “social bookmarking”
when I visited eharmony I had no matches. This is much easier. Though I saw a commercial saying that millions of others get rejected from that site as well. I am not alone. Well I might be, but so are millions of others. That site really doesn’t allow someone to feel good about themselves. Unless it works, which apparently it does. What more is there to dating and identity than likes and dislikes? Obviously a questionaire has the foresight to include such habits as “sometimes accidentally burps the stinkiest burps imaginable very quietly in public”.
All that nonsense aside, it appears that my perfect match is the username wadh0007. Unlike digg, delicious doesn’t allow users to post photos of themselves, which is lucky, as I would hate for this person that I could certainly enjoy a substantially long dinner, well balanced, healthy, I’m guessing there would be meat it in.
I must warn you that this is about to get a little creepy. The place where I go ahead and imagine what this person looks like. Maybe I shouldn’t do this. I wont. I should, in fact, delete this.
I have no idea if this is a man or a woman.
I don’t know if any of you will care about this stuff as it refers very little to this blog about entertainment, or rather at this point, claims to refer to entertainment but is thus far full of commentary on blogger stuff. But if you agreed with me on any of those things it’s possible that you’ll agree about some generally interesting stuff. Am I supposed to be writing this blog like people are reading it? I don’t have any readers yet, who the hell am I talking to?
Punk Musician, Ex-Alcoholic, Parent, Yogic,
Lisa Ling, it’s very likely a man with good taste. Cutest one on The View. By far. Also has been on Channel One when I was in 6th grade. I guess I’ll have to settle for a best friend.
In fact I’m going to paint her. Oh God, is this one of those things where the image I have of this girl is going to adhere to some conventions trained into me by girls like Kelly Kapowski and Buffy Summers. oh, and Jennifer Love Hewitt. And Alicia Silverstone.
This is all of course if you equate common interests to compatibility. Or maybe this is like is two people love oreos and one likes the cookie part and one like the cream. but the one who likes the cookie also likes a little bit of spit on one side. or only one of the halves. whatever.
Wadh has 102 tags. 2 about a 9/11 conspiracy. Health was the most tagged at 12.
http://www.sfwa.org/writing/chadvce.htm is a good resource for my readers, who are just my class at this point.
Political for sure.
The only mention of movies is a link to a site of videos taken in Iraq by soldiers and reporters alike.
