Latest Articles by Sarah Canice Funke
By waiting around for the cheap seats, I finally got the chance to see 21, the film about MIT geniuses who try to take Las Vegas for a cool seven figures: a victory of brain against bouncers.
I was expecting this film to be along the lines of Ocean's 11, but instead I saw a somewhat disjointed battle between Mind and Body, complete with a moral message about not forgetting who your true friends are. Only limited success awaited these card counters, as apparently we aren't supposed to believe that anyone can truly get away with beating the house.
I suppose it is a comment on my own condition to note that successful cleverness interests me more than cleverness that has learned its lesson.
Have tickets to see this on Friday:
Returning in all its campy, self-deprecating, escapist glory!!
Thanks to Evan's roommate, I've become the proud new owner of a second-hand television that gets a total of two stations: ABC and NBC. After I stuck the TV on my dresser, I added PBS and bumped the total to three networks. Yippee!
All that to say that I have been following Dancing with the Stars this season. One of the contestants is Kristi Yamaguchi and I have suddenly been transported back an entire decade of nostalgic Olympian fervor. Monday nights I relieve the middle school wonder, excitement and thrill of seeing this amazing women sweep all competition aside. Whether it's a stately foxtrot or saucy mambo, this woman can do it all.
The men's division is a bit of a yawn. Out of six, there was only one I particularly cared for (Jason Taylor, the Miami Dolphins' defensive end and a man who seems to have some impressive family values). But the women are a solid and diverse group: Priscilla Presley has to be the oldest competitor ever on the show and is also showing those younger women a thing or two about the death spiral. Actress Marlee Matin is deaf--and nails every beat of the music. Actress Shannon Elizabeth has the advantage of being incredibly hott. And Broadway star Marissa Jaret Winokur could be nominated for some sort of Quality Morale Control award.
This is my most popular video at almost 3,000 views and six comments. It was favorited 16 times. Apparently the Velvet Underground's After Hours is a good choice of background music....
Hugh Laurie advertises Kestrel, the Thinking Man's Lager:
Hugh Laurie advertises Polaroid, the Non-Thinking Man's Camera:
I am currently enjoying the FREE wireless at the Colorado Springs airport. I am also enjoying the new battery I received for Christmas. My old battery would die if you even thought about unplugging the computer.
I'm not quite ready to return to the working world yet, having had an eventful break filled with good times and feminist conversations. And my parents assure me that I won't get kicked out of the PCA if I believe in women's ordination (but I would have to switch denominations if I ever decided to take up orders). So I'll stay in for now, although mostly I am just confused over the whole issue.
Thanks to Ginny, I have a Suduko keychain to keep me occupied during the down times of traveling (such as when I arrive at the Denver airport and have to pay for the internet juice).
I think I watched enough films to be caught up for the year (perhaps overly so). I didn't get to see The Kite Runner, but perhaps I can sweet talk some Bostonians into seeing it with me.
I saw the Golden Compass and agreed with Linnea. CGI just doesn't work well with fantasy because the whole point of fantasy (imho) is to be just realistic enough to be fathomable but then to remain *unrealistic* so that your imagination must kick into high gear. Evan says CGI works better for sci-fi, but then sci-fi is trying to be as realistic as possible; hence, the "science" part of the genre. So, as Linnea said, the CGI sucked all the soul from the film. And you were left with eye candy. Delightful to look at, but hardly engaging.
I also saw Juno. I would highly recommend the film to anyone who enjoys quirkiness. The CBC review claims that Juno hates pretentiousness, but I claim that Juno was just as pretentious as everyone else. She just happened to be my kind of pretentious, and so I forgave her.
The Great Debaters was also satisfying, especially when we saw footage of the interior of Sanders Theatre, a venue I had frequented myself. I remembered as I watched the film that my roommate (who used to work at the Harvard Law Coop) had come home one day to state: "Everything was blocked off because Denzel Washington was there!" Just as watching Amazing Grace made me want to join Parliament, this film made me want to become a debater, and we all know how much I hate public speaking. The debating methods were more of the blood and rhetoric school than of the avoid-informal-fallacies technique, but blood and rhetoric make more stirring films.
My sisters and I saw Bella in the dollar theater that now costs $1.50. The film is extremely confusing in that sorting out the "real life" scenes from Jose's imagination is difficult. I am still not sure whether the closing scene occurs in real time. I would argue there is a strong case to be made that it happens in heaven. The whole film has this sort of nebulous "encountering angels unaware" feel to it. But I do recommend the film to everyone who enjoys Spanish language and/or Latino culture.
PS Writing this entry nearly caused me to miss my flight to Denver. But I looked up in time to realize they had changed gates. Some poor soul was running late on the last call to Denver. Wait? Denver?? Throwing laptop into carrying tote, I dashed on board and traversed safely to my destination.
I just saw my new favorite romantic comedy today. I mean, with Lou Reed, Sonic Youth, and Belle and Sebastian in the soundtrack, the film could have been about grass growing and I'd still love it. And I've decided that, unlike John Heder whose lack of social graces eventually got kind of annoying in subsequent films, Michael Cera is the new social misfit whom you'd actually really want to know in real life.
I couldn't help but laugh at the film--some of the music arguments are recycled straight from the fabric of music history. I mean, will every Iggy fan ALWAYS argue with lovers of Thurston and Lee (and Kurt, for that matter)? The old punk vs. art rock dichotomy lives on....
And I've decided if I am ever pregnant (in the far off distant future), I'm gonna wear little band t-shirts over my belly...it's, like, so cool.
There are too many films I want to see these days. I'll consider it a good break if I can see the first two, possibly three. I've half a mind just to hit the theater first thing every day and save myself half the ticket price.
Sweeney Todd
Juno
The Golden Compass
The Kite Runner
The Great Debaters
I'm Not There (not playing in CoSpgs, so I would have to wait till I got back to Boston anyway)
I came into the Christmas break wanting to see The Golden Compass and the Kite Runner, but then realized that there was another Jason Bateman/Michael Cera flick out. Plus, how could I seriously miss Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Alan Rickman and Sasha Baron Conen all singing together and making meat pies?
Sarah Funke wrote at 2:12pm yesterday |
The best part about being home is the silly videos. We made this one on Facebook. Oh, how I love the Colorado sky in the fading afternoon light.
I am going to see this play, but sadly without Tim Roth (not that I've ever seen a play with Tim Roth before...need to work on my networking skills...):
My roommate watches the most amazing shows in the morning. Right now I get to view Dustin Hoffman cooking.
*I* want to cook with Dustin Hoffman....we could flourish (yes, flourish) the spinach together...
And I am about to leave for my first ever business trip. Gotta love the US government. Please read back later to see your tax dollars at work... :)
And at some point, I would like to blog about the wedding, but for now, I will just say the weekend was beautiful, I saw many friends, and my cup overflows with mercy and goodness.
Peace, my friends.
In light of the upcoming film based on Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials series, there is new concern over Philip Pullman's devout atheism and antagonism towards C.S. Lewis. Will children be blindsided into ditching Aslan for Dust? I'm actually a decent fan of Pullman's literary style and books, whatever can be said for the man himself, and so here are a few of my thoughts on the series:
Organized religion bears a good deal of power. Pullman's books illustrate rather profoundly what happens when such power grows corrupt.
As much as Pullman dislikes Lewis, interestingly enough, he structures his book as an answer to Paradise Lost rather than as a response to the Chronicles of Narnia. (There is still some connection, as Lewis loved Paradise Lost, but he obviously didn't write it.) Pullman's books are also meant to counter the gnosticism (inferiority of the body, physical world) that inflects Lewis' work to some degree and Milton's work rather blatantly. And yet apparently really compelling fantasy involves conflict between the seen and unseen, because a certain measure of gnosticism remains even in Pullman's books. [On a related note, if we want to keep our kids from having their imaginations corrupted, I think we need to ban Paradise Lost ( the theology in it is hardly orthodox--so have at bashing it, is my conclusion).]
The most offensive part of the book is the figure of God that Pullman paints. And yet to me, that figure is really just the picture of anyone who usurps what is not rightfully theirs, burdened down by a power that does not belong to them. (Pullman calls "god" the first angel--anyone else remember an angel trying to set themselves up as "god"?--in Pullman's world, this angel really did succeed.) So the real Power of the universe remains mysteriously unknowable. This lack of personal interaction with God puts Pullman in the same camp as Tolkien, and I don't think kids will suffer if there is no Aslan figure explicitly laid out in their novels.
I have a second note of caution about the books, which would make me hesitant to give them to kids until they were probably freshman in high school: there is one episode of very vaguely described sexuality. However, I believe this moment is rather crucial to the whole (intended) project of the book, Pullman's final assault on Milton: in Paradise Lost, sex comes after the fall, sealing its "dirtiness" and subsequently the inferiority and uncleanness of the body and the physical world. In Pullman's universe, sex "saves" the world, signifying the act's sanctified goodness. In a culture of oversaturation and desensitization regarding sex, it was refreshing to find an author who treated it as holy and "set apart" (not set apart in the context of marriage, since Pullman is decidedly not a Christian, but set apart in the sense of having profoundly universal significance).
All that said, I would not throw the books at kids without discussion, but I believe that there are some good issues that Pullman raises. Maybe a family could read the Narnia chronicles and His Dark Materials in tandem, because I believe that they have different, albeit complementary, things to say.
*********************
Update: Hm. Over on another thread, someone argued that Milton includes some descriptions of sexuality *pre* Fall...my statements here may have to wait while I go digging up some Milton.
Update #2: Please read some updated remarks here.
In Episode 19, Season 2 ("House vs. God"), Dr. Wilson sports a McGill sweatshirt at Dr. House's poker game. Is our dear oncologist a Canuck?
So I'm watching the Colbert Report, still grieving over the recent tragedy that we call the Emmys. And guess who the guest star is? ("Let's see who wins the Stevies...here's the man who beat me at the Emmys...Tony Bennett...")
Apparently Tony Bennett paints portraits. And he marched with Dr. King. "Why do you have to break the laws to change them. Why not just wait till they change and then say--I agree with that."
And now Colbert is crooning with Bennett. This man is amazing.
I am currently watching the premiere. First shot of House shows him wearing a Live Eight shirt and jamming on a Flying V.
"Man! House just got hotter!" said my roommate.
Also, the Darjeerling Limited comes out this Friday. This makes me happy.
David Eggers is speaking at the Berklee Performance Center tomorrow, but I may or may not be going.
The Emmys, I've decided, are not up to par with the Oscars. One would think with so many funny shows, comic actors, and good writers out there that they would manage to find someone who could deliver a witty joke. But most of the presenters seemed preoccupied with the anatomy of their fellow presenters. And so it goes. But Colbert came through, with an eco-friendly leaf blower powered by the ever renewable resource, Al Gore's tears. He chided comrade Jon Stewart of the Daily Show for arriving at the Emmys in a Jet Sandwich, a mode of transportation that involves not one, but several gas-guzzling private planes stacked a-top each other.
Then when Ricky Gervais failed to claim his prize for Best Guest Actor (I think??), Colbert and Stewart shuffled the award on to the next likely candidate. "Well, we'd like to give this to our good friend Steve Carell!" At least they are up front about cronyism at the Emmys....
And Tony Bennett kept stealing awards from the Colbert Report. Just how can hit parade pop reviews even compare to four-necked guitars and WristStrong bracelets?
And why did Hugh Laurie not win anything? My only consolation is that the next season of House premieres Sept. 25.
Meg White wears a beret! Also demonstrating that Meg White is my alter-ego is the fact that I, too, have a black coat and long straight hair. My true calling in life must be to wear red, black, and white.
I was listening to my Simon and Garfunkel again and caught the phrase "freedom writer" in He Was My Brother. Then I started thinking: did the recent movie by that title reference S & G at all? (I haven't seen it yet, but want to). Or was the similarity merely a coincidence?
Ruth and I hit up the theatre for a little Harry Potter last night. I must publicly admit that my experience with the novels is limited to about one half of the first book, but I have watched every movie. Call me the product of a visual age, etc. & etc. Needless to say, any conversation comparing the movies to the books leaves me somewhat baffled, but I do have a few things to say about the films themselves, most notably how much this particular episode reminded me of the (older) Star Wars films.
I. A triplet of protagonists: 1) a tortured, somewhat priggish, and generally whiny male character upon whom the fate of the universe depends; 2) a smart, sometimes impossibly bossy female character who, after suggested but unvoiced romantic attachment to first character, banters with and eventually falls for the 3) generally easy-going and much more likable male sidekick.
2. Good and evil are linked as inseparable sides of the same coin. The protagonist must choose which path to follow, knowing he is but a hairsbreadth away from the alternative. For Luke, this abstract relationship materialized as a father-son dynamic: the blood bond tied him to Darth Vader. For Harry, the relationship materializes as a mind-meld thingy: though not physically related, he and Voldemort could share each other's minds. If one believes that the mind is the essence of the person, Harry and Voldemort were dangerously close to being the same person.
3. Death of father figure frees/forces protagonist to triumph over demons (How Freudian of them!). After Sirius kicked the bucket, Harry made his choice between good and evil (although Dumbledore was still around to offer a helping hand).
PS I just want Carrie to know that this movie clearly demonstrates that pink is evil! :P
Charley's Aunt is one of my favorite plays...and Jack Benny one of my favorite comedians...
...somehow came out when I wasn't watching. Now to get my hands on a copy...
I also got myself a card for the Douglas County Library system, because life is better when you have more library cards.
It has been tradition for the past several years to watch an epic fantasy every Christmas (Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, Return of the King, Narnia, Eragon). Some of these were better than others, and I believe that one year I may have missed a fantasy epic, but this year, I shall not be disappointed. Go out and read Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials series immediately.
Since Abbie is a cool science teacher, she has been attending the Space Symposium being held this week at the Broadmoor Hotel. So she invited me to see a private screening of The Shadow of the Moon, which is a documentary of the US space race, with tons of original footage and interviews from the nine men who have walked on the moon.
The film was in the Broadmoor's little cinema. And...wait for it....Buzz Aldrin introduced the film! He was the second person to walk on the moon, after Neil Armstrong. In the documentary, he explains why footage of his descent shows him pausing on the ladder before he hops down onto the moon's surface: "I was relieving myself."
So, Abbie and I laughed afterwards, we just saw the first person to pee on the moon. I have to say that everything exciting in my life has happened because of Abbie. Because of her, I have a picture of me and Matt Friedberger. Because of her, I shook Lee Ranaldo's hand. And now, because of Abbie, I have seen the first man to pee on the moon. What excitement.
I also have to say that I find coffee shops that play music to be horribly distracting. Especially when I get the distinct impression that Neil Young is singing Knives Out, but I don't want to tune out the person I am talking to so I am left in a daze of confusion, punctuated intermittently by vague snatches of Postal Service and The New Pornographers. I just don't multi-task very well.
We saw DreamGirls in the dollar theatre. My dad summarized the experience: "Joan loved it. Sarah liked it. And I stayed awake." Although it was touch-and-go there towards the end when my dad was in mortal fear that someone, anyone was going to break into another introspective what-went-wrong song at any given minute. But the film, while starting to drag a bit towards the end, managed to keep the pace limping towards a decent finish. Not exactly Chicago I suppose, but then, nothing is exactly Chicago and that's probably a good thing.
My mom loved it, especially for the costumes (largely for nostalgia reasons, and the fact that one flashy extravaganza followed after another). I thought the film did a pretty good job of hitting the issues surrounding the music industry in the late 50s/early 60s and through the 70s (including all the racial tensions such as the "whitening" of "black" music). And I was impressed with Jennifer Hudson, but then so were the Academy Award judges. And Eddie Murphy--almost didn't recognize him, and that's a compliment.
And of course, the age-old theme of business versus art--lowest common denominator versus artistic integrity.
And Beyonce is still getting roles with, say, three lines of spoken speech. No one wants to hear her talk, I guess. What do you do when you are bootylicious?
This video, in which Effie White's version of One Night Only gets "made-over" into mainstream disco glitz, pretty much sums up all the tensions running through the film.
You can also see the video here.
I went to the best Oscar party I have ever been to since Roberto Benigni jumped over auditorium chairs when he discovered La Vita è Bella won best foreign film. Yes, that was the last Oscar award ceremony I had the privilege to watch. Considering that IMDB informs me that ten years have elapsed since this occurrence, I've needed to get back in touch with pop celebrity culture and the pastimes of greater America. But I digress.
I do have to say that I was happy Pan's Labyrinth and Little Miss Sunshine got a decent amount of awards, but I was disappointed that the awards Pan's Labyrinth picked up were mostly techie. Not that techie awards are bad, but come on, it was a good fairy tale, too.
What is the deal with honorary awards? Why didn't they realize Ennio Morricone wrote one of the most memorable film scores for The Good, the Bad, the Ugly (and don't forget to throw in the The Mission while we are at it) the first time around? I wonder what his competition was at the time. It was rather sad that Clint Eastwood doesn't even know the term for film composer. It's such an under-appreciated job, unless you are John Williams. [Film scorer really is a term, but a film scorer doesn't necessarily have to create original music. A film scorer just has to create a score, which could include any number of pre-existing songs.]
We all agreed that we HAVE to hunt down The Danish Poet (best animated short film) and WestBank Story (best short film).
The tragic moment of the award ceremony was when An Inconvenient Truth won best original song. I guess they don't care that the song be good any more, only green.
Another disappointment: I want to see Johnny Depp when I watch the Oscars. We did not.
Blackadder: I spy with my bored little eye something that begins with "T."
Balrick: Breakfast!
Blackadder: No, Balrick, breakfast does not begin with "T."
Balrick: My breakfast always begins with tea. Then I have a little sausage. And then some eggs.
Blackadder: No, Balrick. I was talking about a letter.
Balrick: Oh no, sir. It never begins with a letter. The postman don't come until 10:30.
Blackadder: Oh, I can't go on with this anymore. George, take over.
George: All right. I spy with my little eye something beginning with "R."
Balrick: Army!
Blackadder: No, army starts with an "A." He's looking for something that starts with an "R!" R-r-r-r-r-r-r.
Balrick: Motorbike!
Blackadder: Arg..all right. Mine turn again. What starts with "Come here" and ends with "ow!"
Balrick: I don't know. What?
Blackadder: Come here. Balrick walks over. Blackadder pokes him in the eye.
Balrick: Ow!
**********
Of course, this all has to be done with British accents, complete with comedic intonation.
I was inspired to hunt up this television series from the library because 1) Linnea recommended it and 2) it's got Hugh Laurie, who is my back-up plan if ever Lord Peter Wimsey gives me the throw-over.
All five seasons happen to be in the library, but I obtained the first and the fourth.
Being prone to chronological methodology, I naturally started with the first season. And was somewhat confused. First because there was no sign of Hugh Laurie anywhere, and secondly the humor belongs to the madcap variety found only in Monty Python sketches, which much as I may enjoy it, takes some warming up to. But season four is making me happy. First, because Hugh Laurie has a prominent role and secondly because the humor has suddenly upscaled to the Jeeves and Wooster standards, the overstuffy, facetious, and pompous. Since the seasons progress through various historical time periods, perhaps the shift in humor also traces a "progression" of British humor. Or at least a genealogy of humor. Blackadder also gets progressively smarter though out the ages, too.
Blackadder (when he finds that he and his sidekick have landed behind enemy lines during WWI): Yes, Baldrick. The Teutonic reputation for brutality is well-founded. Their operas last three or four days. Prepare to die like a man.
Monologuing in a German prison: for us the Great War is finito, a war that would be a damn sight simpler if we simply stayed in England and shot 50,000 of our men a week. No more mud, rats, bombs, shrapnel, barbed wire, and those bloody awful songs that have the word "whoops!" in the title.
I just submitted my application for the IHS Journalism Internship. I always experience a sense of mild relief after submitting something, whether it be an application or a final paper. During the preparation process I feel so hyper-Arminian: everything depends on my work and efforts in making myself look good. But once I hit the "submit application" button, I destress into hyper-Calvinist mode: there is nothing I can do about anything anymore, so I might as well do something else, like watch Slings and Arrows, which Laura recommended. And while I am blaming my friends for things, I just want to say that I have become completely engrossed in Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, despite the fact that the volume is some 784 pages long and threatens to surpass my thesis in terms of academic priorities. Linnea really ought to warn people about those sorts of things. I wish I wrote like Susanna Clarke, or any English author for that matter. Such facetiousness.
I just finished watching the first part of Kill Bill, but due to great negligence on my part, I forgot to get the second half at the library while I was at it, and while I have subsequently put the second half on hold, I am nevertheless in a great deal of suspense.
I have to say that I have mixed feelings about the film. I mean, there aren't many directors that can touch a Tarantino in terms of aesthetic filming, but the recurring blood fountain motif was a little much. Until I realized that the drama I was watching was actually really cheesy. Come on, all martial arts films are inherently cheesy. But I'll give Tarantino the benefit of the doubt and attribute him a level of ever-so-subtle self-mocking tongue-in-cheekiness. Maybe even some melodramatic humor.
All in all, it was somewhat better than Once Upon a Time in Mexico, which I honestly never finished. It wasn't for lack of trying and motivation. I mean, Antonio Banderas and Johnny Depp, how could I abandon you mid-screen? But I was unable to sludge through to the bitter end. I mean, poor Johnny had lost both his eyes. I couldn't handle that anymore. Except I really didn't even care anymore by that point.
This is probably why I watch so much BBC. It's more my cup of tea.
EDIT: I was talking with Luke (a Mel Gibson fan) a little more about different uses of violence in film. Luke's theory (and I agree) is that Gibson's violence is much more emotionally based: the gore and blood are intimately attached to real evil/real, struggling good. In the case of a director like Tarantino, the violence is aestheticized almost to numbness. You really don't care whether the characters live or die, or whether good triumphs over evil (as if there really IS good or evil in a Tarentino film). You are just morbidly fascinated by the pretty contrast that red blood makes against white snow, etc. After a while, one stops feeling all together and goes into a coma of aesthetically-induced anaesthesia....
EDIT [AGAIN]: So I watched the second volume. I liked it so much better. Perhaps because there was less gore? Or maybe it was just more developed in terms of story. Whatever the case, it made the whole experience not a loss.
So my family is watching the second season of Lost and I was all into it until they started killing main characters off again. I really don't appreciate TV shows that kill main characters off. It's like, you get all attached and then they leave you. Fine. I'll still watch your stupid show, but don't expect me to be emotionally involved anymore. Blah.
Please someone tell me this isn't a cross between Trumpet of the Swan and some 1940s musical....
And the fact that the parents are named Memphis and Norma Jean...seems suspicious...gentlemen prefer blondes that step on their blue suede shoes??
It would be kind of morbidly strange to hear the crocodile man still "living on"...
I saw the preview for DreamGirls and thought it was a film about Diana Ross and the Supremes. It seems the group is fictitious, but in a way, I think the film really IS about the whole Mo-Town phenomenon, and black/white relations in the music industry.
Shut Up and Sing looks as if it might be interesting from a musical point of view, but looks incredibly pretentious. You poor persecuted artists...how much did your career really suffer from your anti-Bush remarks?
The funny thing is that if they had been in ANY other genre (except maybe perhaps CCM) they would have been loudly applauded and canonized. Perhaps that is the Dixie Chicks' point. Maybe they want to steer country music away from the "God, Country, and Mom's Apple Pie" connotations it currently possesses. But would country still be country? Or radical folk hippie music? :)
...Vigilantes of Love is severely distracting me from doing a response paper on global hip-hop...
Read about Aaron Copland and the American Western. I'll just note here that there are actually two alternative models for the "American West" sound.
One is the Magnificent Seven/Bonanza, optimistic, idealistic, heroic kind of sound (I mean, come on, Magnificent Seven's got Steve McQueen). There is actually a melodic theme to this kind of sound...but all heros need themes, right?
The other is the "anti-hero," Good, Bad, and the Ugly kind of Western, that draws on the electric guitar, whistling, and the plaintive "panpipes" (not sure what the technical term is...I am guessing the instrument might be Native American, but I don't really know for sure). Melodically, the music is fragmentary: there IS a melody, but it is quite often broken up by interfering instruments. And so I call it the "post-modern" West.
Because it's the one film that EVERYONE keeps bringing up. Fortunately I've seen the TV version (where Borat segments are interspersed with Ali G clips) and fortunately I've talked to Laura K. Thus, I was able to say something reasonably intelligent about Borat in class today.
..and my two cents to the discussion is this: I think Borat makes audiences uncomfortable because he blurs the distinction between script and reality. We've had Christopher Guest mockumentaries. We've had TV newsreporter "interviews with idiots in the park." But the former are clearly operating under the "it's all a script" code and the latter fall neatly under "it's reality, and these people are just dumb" code. But Borat and Ali G are characters (scripted) while their interviewees are not (reality). The behind-the-scenes manufacture is not as evident to the audience. Conflicting codes are at operation.
At least, this is how I first reacted. I couldn't tell if these people were dumb and sincere. Or scriptedly dumb. There is a different way to react to either interpretation (the laughing at/laughing with syndrome). And so I didn't know how to react. And I could feel how uncomfortable some of the interviewees were because they didn't know how to react. Their uncomfortableness further fed mine. What the heck was going on? I wondered. When I found out more about Borat, I suddenly found it more funny, because it suddenly seemed more manageable. I finally knew what I was laughing at.
Borat...is like a club. Because when Borat laughs...it is like when a club laughs. And when Borat crys....it is like when a club, how do you say it, cries. And when Borat is hungry....it is like when the club is hungry....
....and when Borat is sleepy, it is like when the club is sleepy...
.....and when Borat needs a lift, it is like when a club needs a lift...
...and when Borat is exclusive, it is like when a club is exclusive...
....and when Borat buys expensive jewelry, it is like....when a club buys expensive jewelry...
...and so that is why in Sarah's mind, we say that Borat is like a club.
And that whole parody will be funny to no one but those who have seen the particular "a man is like a horse" episode.
My parents and I went to see it tonight. Hmm. Have lots to say, but am afraid of spoilers. I will say that it was much better than watching The Sixth Sense with my mom, in which after the first five minutes she said "He's dead!" which of course ruins the rest of the film. The Prestige kept me guessing a lot longer, though I did start picking up on the darker threads fairly earlier on.
The key to a good mystery thriller is to provide clues to the audience that are subtle but memorable. That way the audience can be surprised but not feel cheated. That is, they can trace everything backwards and say, "Well, I could have seen that coming...I almost did." If there is no foreshadowing, no groundwork prepared, then the audience feels that the director is having a joke at their expense. It's a fine line between deception and initiation. Things must make sense, but only if you think about it....
Oh...and David Bowie is still acting. Yes. He is.
I am about 2/3s of the way through the 2nd Season of Arrested Development (my coveted snatches of diversion from graduate studies/work). I am still a fan, but feeling increasingly more guilty about this fact. One minute I am dying of laughter and the next, I am asking myself "Why did I laugh at that?" I think I am drawn to ArrDev in part because of the random, absurd, bizarre humor. But I think what sets ArrDev apart from the mere bizarre is that they take rather mundane situations and make them bizarre. Normal neighbor disputes and rivalries turn into impossible renovation schemes involving moved walls and disappearing shelf space within the world of ArrDev. And then there is the build-up of the Comedy of Errors: so much word-play and mistaken meaning, I'm surprised Derrida didn't write the screenplay. But there is so much innuendo that I would never feel justified in recommending it to anyone (at least, not without a caveat) and so I remain more of a closet fan. (Well, not anymore, at any rate.)
And I suppose I should just admit my greatest sense of growing disappointment: I really just want Michael to [finally] end up with a nice girl. Ah! Such a hopeless romantic.
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Michael (trying to get his son's take on various names the family has suggested for the new Bluth Company housing development. He's obviously angling for his own idea to win George-Michael's approval): What do you think of when you hear Sudden Valley?
George-Michael: Salad Dressing. And not a very good one, either.
Michael: Yeah....well, what about Paradise Garden?
George-Michael: Well, I'd definitely considering marinading a chicken with that one, but hey.....
As Laura K. knows, grad school is great because you can talk about whatever you want to. And since my Celebrity Culture class talked about Oprah extensively in class, and I had never seen an Oprah episode before, I borrowed the prof's 20th anniversary special collection.
Oprah is one of those people you can't lose with: you make a lot of money (or friends) if you like her, you make a lot of money (or friends) if you hate her. Her book club has made many authors rich. Her book club has even made authors who turned her down rich.
What I find fascinating is the parallels betwen Oprah and Andy Warhol: this quest to surround oneself with celebrity, to create celebrity. Of course, they had different aesthetics on how to do this. And while Oprah constantly pulls the "authenticity" card (she does what she loves because she loves it; she shows celebrities as "real" people; she shares "real" emotions), Andy Warhol was unabashedly mercenary ("when asked as an exercise to paint what I loved, I painted money"). And yet they weren't so different: Andy Warhol claims to have left commercial advertising because he wasn't allowed to be "creative." Oprah teaches (or has taught, at least) business classes. And she's filthy stinking rich.
If anyone has read Bourdieau, they will know what I will say next: "We have an interest in being disinterested." For some reason, Money and Passion are split across a huge divide. If you are known for loving one, you will be disqualified for having the other. And yet, those who can successfully negotiate themselves as "into it for the love of it" will gain enormous "street cred" that will eventually pay off in huge dividends....but only if they are "into it for the money," too. We live in a world of ironies, my friends.
Oprah is one of those people that (to me anyway) looks much more beautiful at 50 than at 30. Maybe it's because big hair and Goodwill kind of tacky clothes, which apparently were huge in the 80s, just do not appeal to any sort of aesthetic in me (and there was one episode with Mel Gibson--yikes! His hairstyle and tapered jeans may have looked good on Michael J. Fox in Back to the Future, but on a 30 year old???? And girls were swooning over him. I was appalled. He too looks so much more handsome post-50). Now her hair is tamed, her clothes simple, but elegant, and she carries herself more calmly. I watched footage of her "Heartprints" show from both the 80s and the 00s. Heartprints is a series in which Oprah invites someone who has made an impact in her life to appear on her show as a thank-you. In the 80s, Oprah was a bawling, nearly hysterical mess. By the 00s, the tears merely glistened, along with a stifled little snuffle. I wonder if it was because she was accused of so much emotionalism and touchy-feeliness. The subtle gestures show she still has a heart, but is mature and capable of keeping herself together.
A classmate in my Celebrity class asked that question last week. And honestly, none of us could think of any examples. Unless of course, you want to go with James Bond's flings with the "locals" of various regions he's been. But that's hardly a real relationship. And so it makes me wonder how far we've really come since Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?
And speaking of Guess Who's Coming to Dinner? and racial relations, I went to the library today and found Patch of Blue on the shelves. Sidney Poitier is perhaps one of my favorite actors (although, when I say "favorite," this does not mean that I have seen every single one of his films or read biographies of his life or watched documentaries, etc. or etc. I just happen to like what I've seen him do). His ground-breaking films are always idealistic: what the world should be like, perhaps what we wish it could be. Polished, educated, honorable, middle class: Sidney Poitier blurred the colour line (even as he starred in films that explored it--is it any wonder that several of them are shot in black-and-white?) and demonstrated that African Americans* were just human. Or did he?
Some might argue that the only thing human about Sidney Poitier's characters was their skin. "Humanity" does not equal white middle class culture, yet these films seem to suggest that such is the case. Instead of supporting the achievements of the "race," Poitier's characters seem to have left it behind. Instead of listening to Ellington, Coltrane, or Davis on his phonograph, the character Gordon Ralfe in Patch of Blue keeps records of Strauss and knows how to sing in French (signs of white culture and education). You could accuse Poitier of selling out.
But I like the disconnect. It keeps the lines between what counts as "black" and "white" fuzzy. I don't know. These are just thoughts kicking around in my head before I attend the African Drum Summit concert for my world music concert. I guess I've also been thinking more about it because I'm hoping to present a paper on Porgy and Bess (if my abstract is accepted) which explores the same issues regarding what "counts" as "black" and what "counts" as "white." Porgy and Bess gets dragged over the coals for being "too white" or "too Jewish" (Gershwin was Jewish) but definitely not "real" black. And though Anne Brown (the original Bess) was a classically trained singer, people wanted her to sing spirituals. She wanted to sing Schubert. How "authentic" is that? To say, you're only doing black music if you've got the gravel in your voice?
*Interestingly enough, while whites can (and have in the past) played blacks, blacks are almost always cast racially: Not that Zoolander is the fount of all social knowledge, but the following clips from the extended features (which includes a "fake" interview between Derek Zoolander and Ben Stiller as the actor) does say something:
Zoolander: My second choice for the role [of Zoolander] was Will Smith.
Stiller: Um, Derek. Will Smith is black.
Zoolander: What? You got a problem with that??
I finally watched Airplane, which is the most hilarious thing since hilarious was invented. (Note: It's also raunchy in parts. Like Zoolander. And Monty Python.)
"Surely you can't be serious!"
"I am perfectly serious. And don't call me Shirley."
**********
"These passengers are very ill. We must get them to a hospital."
"A hospital! What is it????"
"A largish building with lots of patients. But that's not important now."
***************
"Is there a doctor on this plane?"
"Stewardess, I do think that the man sitting next to me might be a doctor..." Camera pans to passenger with stethescope sticking out of his ears....
*****************
Reporters at the airport: "All right gentlemen, that's a wrap for the interview. Let's take some pictures." Everyone grabs a picture off the wall and walks out of the room...
**************
Intense control tower officer: "Johnny, what do you make of this!?" Hands Johnny a sheet of data.
Johnny: "Well, I can make a hat. A brooch. An origami crane."
****************
"I speak jive."
And so many subtle gags and other sorts of sight puns. And self-parody. I loved the fake blue screen. And the wildly random things that happen without anyone noticing.
And the love scenes from all the great classics (Casablanca, From Here to Eternity, etc.). And the Elmer Bernstein score. Elmer (not to be confused with Lenny) studied with Aaron Copland, and is responsible for the soundtrack to Magnificent Seven. Anyway, back to work now.
