eleven syrupy treats
Everything is shipshape for purchase on the other end of that Pacific Theater link: I'll put up a couple more mp3s soon.
I was asked to write about movies some time ago, and then got distracted, because I'm not always good for much. I don't see that many films, maybe thirty a year, and often don't know what to say about them. I get handicapped in that my face-recognition software is just terrible; as soon as an actor puts on sunglasses or changes their clothes, I often fail to recognize them as the same character, and if the movie decides to show the passage of time by giving the actor a wig or something, it's all over.
The last film I saw in a theater was the Batman movie, because people were going to see the Batman movie. It cost about as much as a meal at a chain diner, with a drink included, and delivered about the same amount of satisfaction; you basically know what's going to arrive on your plate, and only a curmudgeon would complain about being unable to order what's not on the menu. My genial indifference gave way to admiration for the Scarecrow visuals and ridicule for the microwave generator that vaporizes all water within miles, except for the water comprising 65 percent of the characters. Possibly the film is set on Putnam's Twin Earth? At home I've been working through some lists of recommended thirties comedies (here and here). The last one was The Good Fairy, which was thoroughly endearing, not least because it only occasionally remembers that it's supposed to be set in Budapest.
It's been a while since I saw a film I actively hated, since most bad movies are like heavy traffic; there's no actual thing there to hate. You just grit your teeth and endure, and eventually you sell your car. I suppose the ones that make me angry are those that demonstrate obvious talent, then proceed to fuck it up through gross misunderstandings of our reasons for telling stories, cinematic or otherwise. I think The Saddest Music in the World was the last time I saw that happen; before that, Kill Bill.
Never saw any of the Godfather movies, due to general boredom with the Mob. That's probably a mistake.
Three films that mean a lot to me would be La Règle du Jeu, Le Charme Discret de la Bourgeoisie, and The Big Lebowski: all comedies of one sort or another. Around the local blog neighborhood, people much more informed than I routinely discuss film comedy; I don't feel equipped to say much. I do think it's easier to believe in the ludicrous when you see and hear it acted out before you; these are simulacra of our world, but brighter and faster, thus joyful, and unsteady at the edges, thus alarming. When a crack appears in the world, pretty often it's death that leaks through, whether it's the skeleton dance at Marquis's château or Walter biting off an ear as Donnie goes down with a heart attack. I would like to talk about Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious, but I, er, haven't read Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious. This whole site should be titled "Notes For Discussions I Might One Day Be Qualified to Have." Cheers!
(P.S.: Iowablog, you don't do anything no more; why not take this "meme" and run with it?)
