Movies in August

I caught a lot of movies on cable this month; I'm not sure how that worked out. I saw the original Jane Fonda version of Fun with Dick and Jane, which made me wonder how badly the Jim Carrey/Tea Leone version would screw up its lowkey vibe. I'm afraid to find out. Dickie Roberts, Former Child Star was amusing, although not in the way that would be worth seeing twice. We Were Soldiers could have been the Vietnam War version of Band of Brothers, only it wasn't. I found it oddly not emotionally engaging at all.

Cop Out was directed by Kevin Smith, but not written by him. It's very obvious; it does not have any of his wit. I found the characters likeable, but there just weren't any jokes (unless you count the tagline on the DVD cover: "Rock out with your Glock out", which gave me a chuckle). Rope was our latest Alfred Hitchcock movie, and we enjoyed it. We always play Find Alfred, but for this one we also go to play Find the Hidden Cuts. It was seamlessly done, something all too easy to pull off with computers these days. There was a point when the camera followed the actors down the hall to the kitchen when it became clear that SteadiCams hadn't been invented yet, and yet it was no where near as jarring as that keeping-it-real hurky-jerky handheld camera stuff which got so popular a few years back (we hates it; it's distracting as hell). I liked his use of color too, and the cityscape looming out the window. Lastly in the category of films in English, Cold Souls, which stars Paul Giamatti as Paul Giamatti. It did feel like Being John Malkovich in a lot of ways, but it was a quieter story. Paul is working in a production of Uncle Vanya, but the angst of the play is getting to him, so he decides to let a new company remove his soul just until he's done with the play. But that has side effects and he quickly wants it back, only to find it's been stolen. He follows the trail to Russia, which has a burgeoning trade in taking the souls of Russian workers and selling them to Americans. The moment when he finds out who has his soul and what she's been using it for is priceless. A small but interesting film.

On to Bollywood then. New York is about the fallout of 09/11. John Abraham is an architecture student who is picked up for having pictures of the WTC on his camera after 9/11 and spends weeks or months held in an undisclosed location. When he's finally released, he vows revenge. Which to me, speaking in terms of story not legal definitions, doesn't exactly make him a terrorist; he's getting back at the people who specifically harmed him, the same as Mel Gibson would if you hurt his daughter, you know? The element of the story which I found most interesting, when he tries and then fails to reintegrate in society before deciding on revenge, is glossed over in a musical montage, and Katerina Kaif's character is criminally underused (there is a scene where she and Abraham are walking in Central Park and pass two randowm policemen and he starts to panic, but she holds his hand and walks him past the cops with such a fierce look in her eye; why couldn't the movie have had more of that?). Also the happy ending that comes out of nowhere feels really false; it relied on the three remaining characters having no real emotions about everything that just happened in the climactic scene and I felt a bit betrayed. This could have been a really good film but I'm afraid they flubbed it.

I had better luck with Wanted, another Salman Khan film which I had heard nothing but negative things about. Yes, it's a bit silly, another story of a cop undercover, the loose canon type who gets the job done never mind the risks or rules (Hollywood has plenty of those as well). I will agree that while the female lead is charming enough in her acting scenes, she can clearly just barely dance. I say this with great love, but it's an odd film where Salman Khan is your best dancer. But then this is not that film; Govinda turns up just long enough...




Aladin had Amitabh Bachchan as the genie of the lamp and Sanjay Dutt as a magician called the Ringmaster (he seemed to call himself that largely for one joke at the expense of a Chinese man). It was fun but not awesome. Kisna was an epic story set in the last days of British rule. It involved an Indian boy in love with a white girl, with the theme that duty comes before love. I felt bad for the Indian girl Kisna eventually married out of duty. I bet she had a fun life. Mehbooba was gorgeous with extravagant sets and the really big kind of song and dance numbers. I didn't really care for the ending here either, but at least the first three hours were entertaining.

Better was Lajja, a story about women and how society treats them. Which sounds preachy as hell, but this movie pulls all the tricks out of the bag (great dances, spot-on comic relief, a few really heroic male characters who get into fights but not ones which drag on forever) to make for a highly watchable movie which just also happens to have a message. Having seen Sita sings the Blues, the scene where Madhuri Dixit takes Sita to task for letting herself be tested by fire while performing her part in a play was awesome (it's a bit like someone playing Jesus in a passion play deciding to go off script and not get up on the cross, telling the audience they can all handle their own sins, thank you very much, and stop looking for scapegoats). This was from the same director as the very first Bollywood movie I saw: Andaz Apna Apna. I'd be hard pressed to come up with two more different films...

Movies in July

In July I got myself another big box of Bollywood movies. But first the non-Bolly.

Ocean's 11, the original Frank Sinatra version. The first half was aimless, the actual heist was better, but the ending was just depressing. The boys enjoyed this mostly as a glimpse to what Vegas used to look like (four casinos on a stretch of road, never out of sight of the desert, basically).

Speaking of George Clooney (well, we were inferring him above, yeah?), Confessions of a Dangerous Mind pretty much clinched my opinion that Clooney directs some great stories. Also, Sam Rockwell is awesome in everything. This movie was very strange but very interesting.

I finally saw Treasure of the Sierra Madre, and it has not been overpraised. Humphrey Bogart slowly losing it over a couple of sacks of gold dust is completely mesmerising.

The Warlords is a Jet Li movie that reminded me a bit of Scarface in that it involves a bunch of guys acting all gangsta until their entire world collapses around them. A cautionary tale. It also has Takeshi Kaneshiro, whom I saw recently in Red Cliff. Then I looked him up on Wikipedia and realized I'd seen him in all sorts of things from House of Flying Daggers to Chunking Express, so I'm a bit embarrassed it took me this long to really notice him. I like him; he's one of those actors who listens really well (giving speeches is easy; reacting to another actor giving a speech is much tougher to do in a captivating way, I'm thinking).

When the boys were at camp I went out to the movie theater twice, to see Inception and Salt. Inception is just as cool as everyone but the haters says it is. I also quite liked Salt, too. What a perfect name for a popcorn movie. Liev Schreiber seems to finally be getting lots of interesting work, which is cool.

One of the blogs I followed was on about Aguirre: The Wrath of God, only I can't remember which one. (Jerry Coyne?) At any rate, it's a strange movie that reminded me of a lot of other movies, only when I looked it up later it turns out it's actually a strange movie that inspired a lot of other movies. An interesting film, although not one I'm likely to watch again.

And then comes Bollywood: God Tussi Great Ho was just as bad as I had heard. It's the Bollywood version of Bruce Almighty starring Amitabh Bachchan as god, which sounds like it could be cool. Oliver watched this one with me, and when Salman Khan's character meets god for the first time, Oliver wondered how he knew which god it was. One of many potentially interesting questions the movie doesn't ask. The special effects were unbelievably hokey, but apparently ate the whole budget, as it looked like it'd been shot on video and not film. Plus, the songs weren't even any good.

Kambakkht Ishq is set in Hollywood and has appearances by Sylvester Stallone and Denise Richards plus that guy who's Justin Long's boyfriend in Zack and Miri Make a Porno. Sadly, it was one of those movies where the script was writing itself while they filmed, I'm guessing - silly and nonsensical and not very good. But Akshay Kumar is likeable even in crap films, and the title song is groovy:

Paa was interesting, with Amitabh Bachchan as a 12-year-old with progeria and his son Abhishek Bachchan playing his father. Abhishek's character is a politician trying to make a point about how politics doesn't have to equal corruption. Sadly, his whole plot line was dumped in the end, and I really wanted to see how all that came out.

Drona also stars Abhishek Bachchan playing a superhero who's really a mythological figure (think Thor, only he has a really shiny magic sword). He's also more laconic than Batman. The Big Bad in this one would have been creepier without the Ed Grimley hair-do. This wasn't really a great film, but I liked their story.

Veer I had heard was a bad film, and I went into it with low expectations, so low I was actually working on something else when I put it in and wasn't really reading the subtitles, just getting by on what little I could pick up by listening. By the end of the first dance number, I was completely sucked in and left my work undone to watch the next two hours. This movie is probably just as lovingly researched and historically accurate as, say, Troy. It's also as bombastic and fun as Troy, with one on one combat with swords and shields in front of massive city walls. It might be too lowbrow for the critics, but I loved it. Here's the first number which got my attention; check out all the little elements that make this so almost a Viking scene (like the big vat they keep filling their beer mugs from, and that carved pillar in the middle of the room):

Books in July

In my head, July was a month where I did nothing but write, write, write until I finished the rewrite on the novel. But apparently I was reading quite a bit as well. I remember the books, but I don't remember finding the time to read them. Writing warps my mind that way, I think.

In the world of, um, sequential art (OK, manga and comic books), I read volumes 7-12 of Full Metal Alchemist, which I love more and more the less it's like the anime series I've already watched three times. This story is so seriously cool. Perhaps I love it so much because as soon as I finish a volume I hand it off to Oliver and he devours it and then we geek out about it together. Good times.

I also finally picked up the Alan Moore I got with my Christmas money, volumes 3-5 of Promethea, which I think is my favorite of his. I can qualify that, it might not be my favorite story of his, but it's definitely my favorite art. It's just gorgeous (although the story and themes rock too). I also read two The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, namely The Black Dossier and Century:1910. It's like the coolest fan fiction ever, weaving in all the great fictional characters. But I've been getting less of that vibe as I go and the story moves more into modern times, and I'm beginning to wonder where he's going with all this.

I read one nonfiction book, the very interesting Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely. The book came out just as the subprime shit was going down, and the edition I read had some appendices where he discusses just how much what he was saying in the first place was borne out by everything that happened. It's just a shame he didn't get heard sooner. Apparently economics is driven by economists who believe that everyone behaves rationally when it comes to money, and that's something we can depend on, can take as a constant when doing the math, so to speak. This book is about how that is sadly just not true, with lots of examples from experiments he's done, although once he's stated his point it feels so intuitive it's hard to believe anyone could think otherwise.

I happened to read that book after it came up on Boing Boing, which is as good a segue as I'm going to get to Cory Doctorow. I've previously read Little Brother, which was teh awesome. In July I read his first two novels Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom is set in a far off future where there is no reason to work since no one needs anything, but the economy is based on reputation so everyone is always looking to do something cool, like super-geek-out Disney World rides. A fun read, especially if you love Disney World (I do). Eastern Standard Tribe was darker, twisted and funny. Having since read a few more Doctorow, I would say his themes are generally variations of the conflict between those who make, and those who want to control what is made. Which I find terribly interesting, if at times almost depressing when it seems like a losing battle (more on that in Books in August).

Lots of Backspacers with new books out, which is always cool. Only the Good Spy Young by Ally Carter is a great next volume in the series. The plot thickens, the stakes get higher, new facets of some characters are revealed. I love this series.

Shades of Gray by Jackie Kessler and Caitlin Kittredge is also a sequel, although this to me feels more like the middle volume of a trilogy than another of a long series. It had that The Empire Strike Back kind of feel to it, anyway. The world building goes deeper, the characters form the sort of strange of-necessity alliances that are always the coolest thing in comics. I've waited forever for a cool novel about superheroes, and this and its predecessor are exactly what I longed for.

Moving out of genre to literary, I read Kings of the Earth by Jon Clinch. If Amazon.com wants to pull a 1984 a pull this back off my reader, I'm pretty well covered since I underlined almost all of it anyway. Yes, the language is that perfect. Every sentence demands to be read aloud. But I particularly loved the nonlinear sequence spread over multiple characters. First we're in 1990 and then we're in 1931. We're in Audie's head, then we're in his brother's, or his nephew's. There's not a thread that's being followed, at first it seems all over the place. It reminded me of when I was a kid doing one of those pictures you paint with water. I used to like to get the brush as wet as possible, then hold it over the page and let big, fat drops fall on a few different points of the picture. Then I'd watch as the drops spread, making the blues, reds and greens come to life, bringing out more and more of the picture until they started to spread into each other, to connect and eventually cover the page. The plot of this reveals itself like that. It was hypnotic, I couldn't stop reading it. Remember what I said above, about not remembering reading these books? Well this one I do remember, because I devoured it all in a day, accidentally clocking extra miles on the treadmill because I wasn't paying attention, serving dinner late because I was cooking with one hand and holding the Kindle in the other (and I need two hands to underline - sorry, dinner!).

Now I'm not sure what happened but some of the books seemed to have lost their underlining on my Kindle. Not sure how that happened (Kings of Earth is happily unaffected), so my closing quotes are a bit skimpy this go around:

Wouldn't economics make a lot more sense if it were based on how people actually behave, instead of how they should behave? - Dan Ariery

The side of the refigerator was mossy. The man from Syrcuse said his Boy Scout training must be failing him because he'd been given to understand that moss grew on the north sides of trees and this was the east. One of the troopers suggested that maybe the conventional wisodm didn't apply to iceboxes. - Jon Clinch

It is very hot, and I am turning the color of the Barbie aisle at FAO Schwartz, a kind of labial pink that is both painful and perversely cheerful. - Cory Doctorow (Eastern Standard Tribe)

Movies in June

Not much seen in June. Novel writing will do that to you. At any rate, I caught Quills, starring Geoffrey Rush as the Marquis de Sade. I've met writers who insist that they have to write, that if they don't write they will go mad. In this movie, de Sade is the extreme of that sort of writer. (I'm not that sort of writer. I love to write, but when life gets too busy and I don't do it, I don't go mad.) I liked the movie up until the final scene. There was no part of the conclusion that I was buying; it was like every single character did a complete 180.

Good Night, and Good Luck I've been meaning to see for a while. It was interesting, and visually gorgeous. Smoking in black and white movies just looks so moody and cool. As far as movies about the McCarthy era go, I would put this just after Woody Allen in The Front. Good movie, but without the rewatchability that The Front has.

Easy Virtue was amusing in parts, but a little too much a movie version of a play. Some of the dialogue sounded awfully artificial, particularly Jennifer Biel's dialogue. Not her fault, I think the playwright was using her character as the speaker of his philosophical ideas. I did like the use of music, music from the 20s but also modern songs redone as if they were from the 20s, and it's hard to go wrong with anything with Colin Firth.

And in the world of Cary Grant, we caught The Philadelphia Story, which is just marvellous. James Stewart makes the world's cutest drunk, and he and Grant and Katherine Hepburn are perfect together (sharply written dialogue helps).

Matador was another movie I wasn't sure what to make of from Pedro Almodovar. I do believe this is Antonio Banderas' first movie; he certainly looks puppy-young. There were a lot of likeable moments, but also a lot of disturbing ones and I'm not sure they sat together happily in my mind. I might have been too tired to watch this the night I put it in, though.

Lastly I watched the DVD Doctor Who, the Specials, filling in the gaps between the last series I caught on DVD and the one I've been watching on BBC America. The boys watched these too. "The Waters of Mars" in particular had a big impact on them (Oliver watched large chunks of it from between his fingers).

Books in June

I finally got around to reading the Full Metal Alchemist manga (by Hiromu Arakawa) I bought after watching the anime show. I read volumes 1-6 in June, and so far the show follows the manga pretty closely. I understand it's when Greed enters the picture that the two stories diverge.

After having read The Gangs of New York, I picked up another collection of New York anecdotes by Herbert Asbury, All Around the Town. These are not strictly about gangs and gangsters and some of the stories are quite amusing, like the breakdown in what it took to be a fashionable lady in the post Civil War period. Expensive, and a little on the ouch side.

Another nonfiction book I read was the latest from Ayaan Hirisi Ali, Nomad. I was sucked in with her life story in her last book, and here she has more reflections, about what everything she went through taught her, and how the western world should handle immigrants from the Muslim world in particular. A very thought-provoking read.

It sort of worked out that I ended up reading two books dealing with female genital mutilation. It's something that Ali went through, and it appears as a major plot point in Nnedi Okorafor's Who Fears Death. I loved this book, it deals with a lot of dark material but in the end has a feeling of pragmatic optimism about the future. There is wonderful worldbuilding here, and complex characters. I'd highly recommend this one, a great read.

Lastly, another book I finally got around to is the English translation of Saratchandra Chattopadhyay's Devdas. Having seen two film versions (of the dozens in various languages made), I can now say that the Dilip Kumar version does follow the book (novella, really) more closely, but nothing can match the visual splendor of Sanjay Leela Bhansali's version. He may have deviated from some details, but I think he got the soul of the book up on the screen. It's one beautiful bummer of a story.

And now back to my so nearly done novel. I'll leave you with a few of my favorite quotes:



He said first that since he resembled Queen Anne to such a remarkable degree, he occasionally donned skirts and paraded the streets solely that he might acquaint the colonists with the appearance of their sovereign, whom none of them would probably ever see. This explanation didn't seem to satisfy anybody, so His High Mightiness said that he sometimes dressed as a woman simply because he was the New World representative of the Queen, and he though that the people should be reminded from time to time that they were ruled by a woman. Colonial eyebrows were still lifted, so Lord Cornbury finally announced with considerable dignity that he had made a vow which compelled him to wear dresses one month each year. And if that wasn't sufficient for the citizens, he implied, they could concoct a few explanations of their own. - Herbert Asbury

To be something abnormal meant that you were to serve the normal. And if you refused, they hated you... and often the normal hated you even when you did serve them. - Nnedi Okorafor

It is the custom of the wise and the cautious not to pronounce judgment on anything hastily, or to jump to conclusions without considering the full implications of the matter. But there are human beings who are the exact opposite. They do not have the patience to reflect over anything or follow a matter through to its logical end. On the spur of the moment they decide that a thing is either good or bad. They make faith do the work of thorough soul searching. It isn't that such people aren't cut out for the world - in fact they often work out very well. If luck is with them, they can often be found at the pinnacle of success. But if luck doesn't favour them, they can be found in the deepest dregs of misery, wallowing in its murky depths, unable to get up, to rise above their circumstances. There they lie like lifeless, inanimate objects. Devdas belonged to this class of men. - Saratchandra Chattopdhyay

All human beings are equal, but all cultures and religions are not. - Ayaan Hirisi Ali

Movies in May

First off, a slew of Charlie Chaplin shorts: Sunnyside I don't really remember. Hot Finish had car racing and Chapin in a villain role. Pretty cool. The Immigrant was wonderful, starting on a rolling ship at sea and ending in New York in an awkward money situation in a restaurant. The Adventurer had some fun chases and a repeated gag of jumping from a second floor balcony. The Cure had the best drunk :run up the stairs always almost but not quite falling" I've ever seen, followed by a few "I feel like I'm still in the revolving door" spins. The man was a physical genius, no doubt about it. Easy Street about life in the slums was a good one as well.

One Bollywood movie: Izzat ki Roti. I'm only remembering flashes of it now, and I'm fairly certain I fell asleep before the end. I think it was another one of those where the whiplash changes from zany comedy to bloody violence just lost me.

All About my Mother by Pedro Álmodovar I really loved. It has such a big heart and shows so many complex but ultimately accepting family relationships. It was very sweet, in a good way.

The Imaganarium of Dr. Parnassus was The Awesome. Colin Farrel, Jude Law and especially Johnny Depp stepped in for Heath Ledger so wonderfully the film was almost an homage to him. But even outside of Heath, the wagon that transforms into a stage, the strange world behind that stage, everything was so cool. And every film I see Verne Troyer in, I love him just a little bit more. He makes a great foil for Dr. Parnassus here.

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang I've been meaning to see, oh, since it came out in theaters. It was fun, with lots of great lines. Kilmer and Downey should totally do another buddy film together; they have great chemistry. (Now I'm wondering who Downey doesn't have great chemistry with...)

And a few biopics with lots of song and dance numbers: Beyond the Sea about Bobby Darin and De-Lovely about Cole Porter. They were both good. I'm going to score Beyond the Sea a touch higher for its use of music, but De-Lovely tops for story. Of course Darin died young, and Porter lived at least three lifetime's worth. Another version of Cole Porter's story was Night and Day with Cary Grant. A little less edgy (or true to life) than De-Lovely, but it's hard to beat anything when it has Cary Grant in it.

One more biopic I caught on cable, Valentino. This thing started at 11:30 at night and I stayed up to see it all the way to the end, and that's saying something. It had a strange quality to the directing, almost Gilliam-esque in places, but was interesting. Which reminded me that I've never really seen a Valentino movie all the way through...

Books in May

In May I wrapped up the last of the Bronte novels. Villette by Charlotte Bronte dragged a lot in the beginning, then got very engrossing near the end. I'm going to have to tackle all of her books again some day after I've learned a little French; she puts entire paragraphs in French and doesn't translate. A sentence or two I can guess the gist, but whole paragraphs? Emily Bronte only ever wrote Wuthering Heights, which I read back in my teens. It's a tickle to read it again post-Jasper Fforde. Anne Bronte was apparently the religious one of the three; Agnes Grey comes across to me as very moralizing. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall I liked better. You'd think a novel about the long-suffering wife of a narcissist alcoholic (and possible heroin fiend) would have even more heavy-handed moralizing than the story of a governess in charge of a bunch of ingrates, but I actually found it very human and with a still-contemporary feel.

After all that reading of books more than a century old, I gorged on new releases from some of my faves. The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ by Philip Pullman... well, what can I say? My Kindle version is underlined like crazy now, this book had so much wonderful writing in it. Victory of Eagles by Naomi Novik is the latest Tremeraire novel. I liked it better than the last, which I felt wandered too much. This one has a stronger, more relentless plot: Napoleon invades England and the British army is driven back to Scotland. And the next book is set in Australia: I'm geeked already.

Helpless by MJ Pearson was all kinds of awesome. Oscar Wilde's trial makes the perfect backdrop for this story about the love that dares not speak its name, in this case a love triangle where someone is not to be trusted, but which one? And since this is Pearson, the historical details are delightful and perfect, and the secondary characters are rich and often laugh out loud funny. I had to wait awhile for this one to come out, but it was worth it.

Still reading about writing: Word Work by Bruce Holland Rogers was a fun read, more about process and lifestyle than about the mechanics. Rogers is one of my favorite short fiction writers, and the only short-short writer I consistently like; getting a little glimpse into how he approaches writing was enlightening. More work, but worth it, was The Rhetoric of Fiction by Wayne C. Booth. It took me a few months to get throught it, but mostly because there were so much here I needed to stop and let it soak in, really think about it. Anyone interested in the old show vs. tell debate, particularly if you like me are a bit cynical about rules cut in stone, I highly recommend this book to you.

And lastly, Hindi: An Essential Grammar by Rama Kant Agnihotri. A nice overview. Grammar, like math, I find I understand best if I have multiple people explain it from their own unique perspective (in case you're wondering why this seems like the fourth or fifth Hindi grammar I've read in the last year). This is thorough and points are clearly explained, but it's meant to be used in a classroom with a teacher; hence, none of the exercises have answers. So for the self-taught, I'm afraid RS McGregor is still the best bet.

And now for a few of my favorite quotes from the month:



No mockery in this world ever sounds to me so hollow as that of being told to cultivate happiness. What does such advice mean? Happiness is not a potato, to be planted in mould, and tilled with manure. - Charlotte Bronte, Villette

I'm part of the world, and I love every grain of sand and blade of grass and drop of blood in it. There might as well not be anything else, because these things are enough to gladden the heart and calm the spirit; and we know they delight the body. - Philip Pullman

And here am I, my hands red with blood and shame and wet with tears, longing to begin telling the story of Jesus, and not just for the sake of making a record of what happened: I want to play with it; I want to give it a better shape; I want to knot the details together neatly to make patterns and show correspondences, and if they weren't there in life, I want to put them there in the story, for no other reason than to make a better story. - Philip Pullman

"...he just doesn't talk much. He can, of course, he's not dumb or dumb, if you get my meaning, he just doesn't say much. But when he does-"
Douglas was amused. "It's bound to be wise and profound?"
"Oh no, absolute drivel, usually."
Donnie rolled his eyes and spoke at last. "Orange," he said. - MJ Pearson

He seldom deigned to notice me; and, when he did, it was with a certain supercilious insolence of tone and manner that convinced me he was no gentleman; though it was intended to have the contrary effect. - Anne Bronte, Agnes Grey

"It is I who left them," was the smiling rejoinder. "I was wearied to death with small talk - nothing wears me out like that. I cannot imagine how they can go on as they do." - Anne Bronte, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

What meaning would it have to say to Joyce that he has asked for "too much" cryptoanalysis in Finnegans Wake? Too much for you and me, perhaps, and we may find ourselves ultimately repudiating, on moral grounds, an author who excludes practically everyone. But not too much for Finnegans Wake. Who would bother about Finnegans Wake at all if it were not packed with Finneganswakism? - Wayne C. Booth

"Where does he live?" Temeraire asked, interrupting; he felt that anyone who did not have time for politics must be rather sensible. - Naomi Novik

Fantastical Visions V Update

My second short story sale was to Fantastical Visions V, an anthology from Fantasist Enterprises. They are currently doing a fundraiser to raise the money to get the publishing process started (damn you, economic downturn!). It works like public television: the more you contribute, the nicer the thank-you gift. All the details are on the Kickstarter page. I've also added a widget to this blog page to track how we're doing towards the goal.

The story I have in this anthology is one of my favorites of my early works, a sword and sorcery type fantasy tale where the magic is based on string theory. I intended it to be the first of three stories, with the second set in the present and the third in the future. Of course that's the thing, there are always more ideas than there is time to write. At any rate, I hope you will check out the link. Thanks!

Movies in April

Very busy, lots of writing getting done around these parts. Got a little sidetracked from the WIP by a flash fiction competition at SFFEditors, but I got a pretty cool little story out of it (and got to read some even cooler ones). I'm still on track to wrap this thing up by the end of June, provided I work very, very hard.

At any rate, I'm a bit late recapping the movies from April, but there weren't too many. In the Charlie Chaplin category, A King in New York was perhaps too didactic. Being written after he had left the US, it is a bit too much about how one can read and think about communist theories without being a communist, and reading and thinking about lots of things is good. There is a funny bit when the title character goes out to the movies and then to a dinner club. A Woman in Paris is another late Chaplin, one he wrote and directed but didn't appear in. It has a very Russian literary sort of feel. So, yeah, a bit of a downer. Limelight was wonderful. I do believe this is the last film he made before leaving the US; it's a story of a young panic-prone dancer and an old alcoholic comic. It also features a cameo by Buster Keaton. If only they'd done a whole film together, a buddy film. That would have been something to see. We also watched three shorts: The Good for Nothing, Charlie's Recreation and Work. Very much minor works, and one of them had been given a descriptive narration that just pissed me off. I can see what's happening here and can tell the characters apart all on my own, thank you very much. Not sure who's idea that was.

One more Hitchcock: Notorious. A film which up until now I only knew as the source for one of the scenes in Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid. (Also, I think the little girl in The Lake House is watching it in her hospital room). You can't go wrong with Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant. We actually watched this twice; the first time through none of us spotted Hitchcock's cameo. So of course we had to watch it again to find him.

This is It, the Michael Jackson documentary of the tour that never was. It was like the special features for a really awesome concert DVD that never was. I felt bad for those young dancers, who came so close to sharing a stage with their idol and then had it snatched away.

Red Cliff is a Chinese film by John Woo, or rather two films that tell one story. And what a story it is, an epic battle in the three kingdoms period with gorgeous sets and costumes and one slow reveal of an enormous armada of ships that felt like John Woo one-upping Troy. More like ten-upping; it's an awesome shot. I also loved the fight scenes that just flirted with the beginnings of wu xia moves. No one did anything too unbelievable, but you could see where the soldiers watching the heroes fight would imbelish their feats in the telling. This is long but so worth seeing.

The Men Who Stare at Goats was delightful but strange. At the end of it I wasn't sure exactly what I had just seen, but I liked it. It has a Coen Brothers vibe but a lot more unanswered questions than the Coen Brothers usually leave.

Just one Hindi film, Pyaasa, from Guru Dutt, the director of Sahib, Bibi aur Ghulam. This shares that films gorgeous melancholy. It's like Southern gothic, only Indian, if that makes sense. Guru Dutt was the Orson Welles of India, writing, directing and starring in his films. It's a shame he died so young, he told some achingly lovely stories.

OK, wrapping up this month with a number from Swades, a movie I saw back in February, but this number has hung with me. Here's Shah Rukh Khan, teaching a village about astronomy and breaking down the segregation that divides them, all in one song and dance to an AR Rahman song:

Books in April

Still on the books on writing kick, in April I read About Writing by Samuel R. Delany. Boy, did I love this book. But then Delany and I have something in common, a shared love of literary as well as genre works. There is a lot in this book about how to pursue writing as a career (and whether you should), and writing as a lifestyle. Those topics in particular I'm really keen on at the moment. This is a rich book. I've not read any Delany fiction, but I've added him to my must read list. If he's fiction is half as good as these essays, I'm going to love him.

Speaking of literary works, still working on the Bronte sisters. Having re-read Jane Eyre I went on to one I haven't read before, Shirley. Apparently this book is what popularized this name for girls; prior to it, Shirley was a rarely used boys name. There is a lot to like in Shirley, I loved the characters and the story, and particularly the backdrop of a town struggling through the industrial revolution, with the machinery leaving so many workers without work, and the Luddites that hope to turn back time. It also continues Charlotte's themes not just of feminism but her deep respect for anyone who works for a leaving.

Since in April I spent two days in airports, I loaded up my Kindle with YA. Because I'm a nervous flier, I need something that has me so hooked I don't look up enough to panic. I read three: Heist Society by Ally Carter, Eleventh Grade Burns by Heather Brewer and The Dust of 100 Dogs by A. S. King. It's a toss-up for which I liked the best between Carter and King, but that's just because I love heists and pirates pretty much equally (I don't have that deep in the marrow love of vampires that some have; my delving into vampire fiction tends not to be as passionate for me as it is for some).

Now I'm getting back to my own novel, which I'm desperately hoping to have done before the end of June. Wish me luck. In the meantime, some quotes and a kick-ass video of Bronte Sisters action figures (Ooh! I want all three! And the evil publisher!).

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We love a sentence only partially because of what it means, but even more for the manner and intensity through which it makes its meaning vivid. - Samuel R. Delany

Paraliterature is also hundred of people who have said to me, on finding out that I'm a sciene fiction writer, "oh, I don't really like science fiction," as though a) I had asked them, b) I cared, or c) I should somehow be pleased by their honesty. - Samuel R. Delany

...but I perceive that certain sets of human beings are very apt to maintain that other sets should give up their lives to them and their service, and then they requite them by praise; they call them devoted and virtuous. Is that enough? Is it to live? Is there not a terrible hollowness, mockery, want, craving in that existence which is given away to others, for want of something of your own to bestow it on? - Charlotte Bronte

Her thoughts blended together until they were like an Impressionist painting, and Kat knew she was too close to see anything plainly. - Ally Carter

A drug-addicted loser having to write his smart little sister a letter about how she should get her shit together was exactly how my mother communicated. - A.S. King

Movies in March

Still working hard to polish off the WIP so I can move on to other things. Hoping to be done sometime in June. In the meantime, let's do this last March post, shall we?

In the world of Charlie Chaplin: The Circus feels like a minor work, but still engaging. City Lights was wonderful. Chaplin knows just where to end a movie. Monsieur Verdoux was strange, a talkie and a dark comedy. I didn't think Chaplin did dark. It's interesting to see this after reading his autobiography; some of what he talks about regarding the stock market becomes a plot element here, and I think a rather well done one.

In the world of Hitchcock: Rear Window and To Catch a Thief. I particularly liked the ballsy female character in the former, who's willing to show just how useful she can be and willing to do the dirty work to help out the photographer she wants to marry, but that doesn't mean she isn't still interested in fashion all the same.

Some modern films: Couples Retreat I liked better than I had expected, Up in the Air I found disappointing. I kept wishing it were a Cameron Crowe movie. Crowe wouldn't have let so many opportunities go unexplored. A Serious Man was awesome. It was shot locally in a suburb that had just had a tree-uprooting wind storm (and I think a tornado) whip through, so with new little trees in the yards it was very convincing for decades-past St. Louis Park. Extra props for the clever use of Schrodinger's cat. Yep, awesome. Last Chance Harvey isn't a great movie - it's a rather generic one - but it's worth a see just for the improv feel between Emma Thompson and Dustin Hoffman. Sherlock Holmes? Everyone already knows that was awesome; I eagerly await the sequel.

Cinematic Titanic released another live DVD, The Alien Factor. Very funny. I rather like the live DVDs, with the split screen so you can see all their faces while they do the commentary.

Animated films: The Fantastic Mr. Fox has a title that says it all. The Princess and the Frog has one of the best Disney villains in a long time. Alas, I wished I had liked this more. To me, every Randy Newman song sounds like a Randy Newman song; the New Orleans jazz elements were secondary to the Randy Newman elements. Quin says that every Danny Elfman song also sounds like a Danny Elfman song; I guess the difference is I like Danny Elfman.

Saw in theaters: Alice in Wonderland. Another movie I wanted to like more. It was visually cool but story-wise didn't blow me away as much as I would've liked.

Bollywood: Jeans has a very young Aishwarya Rai. I have a soft spot for movie plots involving twins, and this movie has every twin cliche, plus some cool dance numbers. Kyun Ho Gaya Na was horrid. I think the success of the movie depended on finding the male lead charming. I didn't. Armaan was interesting for Preity Zinta playing a no-holds-barred psycho woman. Gumnaam and Teesri Manzil are both films from the 60s with lots of bright colors, high energy dance numbers, and Helen. Helen rocks.

Lastly in TV was Doctor Who, season 4, which left me with a raging hunger to see season 5. Alas, that's not out yet. And as I'm halfway through the rewriting process, I watched season 4 of Lost. When I'm completely done I get to watch season 5. I'm working as fast as I can.

I think this month in lieu of a Bollywood number, I'll leave you with this Russian TV sketch of Charlie Chapin in The Matrix:

Books in March

In March I finished a lot of books that had been stacked up around here, half-read for ages. In nonfiction I've been delving into Herbert Asbury's Gangs of New York in small doses for weeks now. It's a good book to read that way; it's a series of anecdotes from the history of New York, some of which Martin Scorsese took to weave together into a single narrative for his film of the same name. I quite like the movie, and the book is entertaining as well, although of a larger scope, as it covers quite a stretch of time. Comparing this to books from London of the same time frame makes for an interesting compare and contrast; same same but different.

I also finished Revising Fiction by David Madden, another book I've been reading bit by bit, mostly because everytime I read a bit, I immediately want to get back to work revising my WIP. This book has played a big part in getting me back to productive work by getting me excited about it all over again. Which is awesome. (Hoping to be done by the end of May and on to the next book, which I'm already gestating).

Which brings us to Harry Houdini's A Magician Among the Spirits, his account of several prominent spiritualists and how they bilk people. If he had ever met Carl Sagan, he would have heartily approved of Mr. Sagan's Baloney Detector. A very readable and interesting work and sadly still pretty relevant today.

One last nonfiction, My Autobiography by Charlie Chaplin. He wrote this after leaving the US to settle in Switzerland. He's telling his life story, but has no compunction against wandering off the narrative thread to wax eloquent on all sorts of topics. I think those ruminations were my favorite bits.

I read somewhat less fiction in March, especially considering First Spanish Reader by Angel Flores was a collection of very short stories (although, in my defense, in Spanish. Of course every facing page is in English, but I hardly ever looked over, I swear!). Some fun stories, and I found my Spanish much less rusty than I'd expected. Also on the short end of things, The Poems of Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell, the noms de plume of the Bronte sisters. I liked Charlotte's works the best; very evocative.

I'm following up Jane Austen with all the Bronte sisters, and after the Poems I jumped into Charlotte's prose, namely The Professor, her first novel (written; I think it was the last published). Bronte is pretty much the anti-Austen; she has no interest in people who don't work for a living. She's also quite the feminist (more in Shirley than here, but it starts here and grows in Jane Eyre). There is a passage in The Professor that explains a blackboard, chalk and eraser with such extreme detail, I'm wondering if this was a new invention at this point?

And in new fiction, I read In Ashes Lie by Marie Brennan. I loved the structure, and the historical details are rich. Again I'm sure if I ever went to London I could open this novel and find all these places, or stand where they once stood. Lovely.

OK, now I'm back at my own WIP again. In the meantime, the quotes I loved the best from March:

He could taste his own pulse, so strongly was his heart pounding. - Marie Brennan, In Ashes Lie

There came a time in every man's life when he had to wonder what he was doing, kneeling in a faerie court, swearing to carry out a strange double existence on behalf of creatures for whom the entirety of his lifespan would be no more than an eyeblink. - Marie Brennan, In Ashes Lie

I found poverty neither attractive nor edifying. It taught me nothing but a distortion of values, an overrating of the virtues and graces of the rich and the so-called better classes. Wealth and celebrity, on the contrary, taught me to view the world in proper perspective, to discover
that men of eminence, when I came close to them, were as deficient in their way as the rest of us... to know that intelligence is not necessarily the result of education or a knowledge of the classics. - Charlie Chaplin

Passive, at home, I will not pine.
Thy toils, thy perils shall
be mine. - Charlotte Bronte, Poems

I said to myself that my hero should work his way through life as I had seen real living men work theirs--that he should never get a shillinghe had not earned--that no sudden turns should lift him in a moment towealth and high station; that whatever small competency he might ain,should be won by the sweat of his brow; that, before he could find somuch as an arbour to sit down in, he should master at least half theascent of "the Hill of Difficulty;" that he
should not even marry abeautiful girl or a lady of rank. As Adam's son he should share Adam's doom, and drain throughout life a mixed and moderate cup of enjoyment. - Charlotte Bronte, The Professor

"... the three reliable (?) witnesses agree that the windows through which he [Daniel Dunglas Home] floated were in the third story and either sixty or eighty feet from the ground. This would make the height of each story from twenty to twenty-seven feet, but tall stories appear to have been a speciality with these remarkably observant gentlemen." - Harry Houdini

Barrels of fiery spirits stood on shelves behind the bar, and poured out their contents through lines of slender rubber hose. The customer, having deposited his money on the bar, took an end of the hose in his mouth, and was entitled to all he could drink without breathing. - Herbert Asbury, Gangs of New York

The tongs are as American as chop suey. - Herbert Asbury, Gangs of New York

Does your style lack subtlety? Blatancy will enable your reader to move from sentence to sentence, but the dominant experience will be one of blatancy. Subtlety engages your reader's own faculties - emotions, imagination, intellect. Readers who must participate through subtlety and other devices have a deeper, more intense, more lasting experience. Subtlety is not the province of the sophisticated, refined, or snobbish reader. A subtle phrase or sentence may in
actuality stimulate a violent response. - David Madden, Revising Fiction

Movies in February

Having finished off Buster Keaton, or as much as the library had, we've moved on to Charlie Chaplin. Now back when the Robert Downey Jr. biopic came out, I grabbed every Chaplin movie they had at Mr. Movies. Which wasn't much. So if I'm not mentioning The Kid or The Gold Rush etc. it's because I'm only blogging on movies I'm seeing for the first time. (Man, if I blogged every movie that I watch in a month for a second or tenth or hundredth time... Actually, if I kept track of that I'd probably be pretty ashamed. I watch movies the way normal people listen to music; there's always something in the background).

At any rate, I watched Modern Times for the first time. A silent film made after the advent of talkies. OK, there is some sound here, even some speech, but the Tramp and his girl don't speak, and that's the key thing. I found it interesting that Oliver thought this ending, with the Tramp and his girl thrown out of their latest attempt at work and heading off west together to try again, was much better than the ending to The Gold Rush, which ended with the Tramp a millionaire.

The Great Dictator is a Tramp-less talkie. Chaplin had quite a melodious voice (although I'm giving Keaton an edge here; I like his timbre). There is a lot of Chaplin's heart in this one, sympathisizing with the plight of the Jews in the Nazi-mandated gettos. Even that much of it, the being set apart and labelled, is horribly dehumanizing and must be spoke out against, loudly and often, is the movie's message. He says in his autobiography that if he had known what was really going on, how much worse it all was, he never could have attempted a movie about it at all.

A few Bollywood movies: I finally saw Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge with Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol. I think I heard too many good things about it, though. It was fun, but a bit underwhelming, and it was far too rushed in the end (a common complaint I have with Bollywood movies). Swades was much better, but then from the director of Lagaan and Jodha-Akbar (namely Ashutosh Gowariker) it would have to be. I was expecting a period piece, so to see in the opening that SRK is playing a NRI who works at NASA was a jolt, but a pleasant one. And I liked how his character used his skills to build the power generator for the village in India, a combination of solid math and some guess work since it's not the sort of engineering he's ever attempted before; it felt real to me. Plus this was gorgeously shot, with great A.R. Rahman songs. Lastly I watched the 1955 version of Devdas. I'm told it follows the book more closely than Sanjay Leela Bhansali's version (I'll let you know when I've read the book myself), and I did think that Dilip Kumar was a much better Devdas than SRK, who quite frequently in his movies comes across as a sanctimonious prick. However, the Bhansali version has much better songs, and I assume it's gorgeous. (Have I complained lately about the bad, bad DVD version of this? There's not a month goes by that I don't Google to see if anyone's put it out on BluRay yet. Someone must have it somewhere; I've seen HD versions of the songs up on YouTube and they are gorgeous. I want to see that movie!).

In the category of Spanish films, I saw átame, a Pedro Almodavar film. I've liked the others of his I've seen, but this one I found upsetting and baffling. I'm not sure what point he was trying to make, or what some things meant. They must have meant something. It was frustrating.

Moon I liked, but with some reservations. Sam Rockwell is awesome in it, as multiple versions of the same guy, and Kevin Spacey was the perfect choice for the AI's voice (because of his previous films, I'm always disinclined to trust any character protrayed by Kevin Spacey; I think this works to Moon's advantage). My only gripe: why set it on the moon? I can see why attempting to recreate lunar gravity would be a pain, but if you weren't going to do it, set the story somewhere else. There is nothing here storywise that necessitates the moon and not a planet in another solar system or a space station with 1G spin. I know, I'm nitpicky, but I found it distracting.

I have no such reservations with my admiration for The Hurt Locker. Wow. War films are so prone to the hurky-jerky camera and quick-cut editing; the long, slow scenes in this movie really built the tension to a fever pitch over and over again. Especially the sniper scene, the agonizing wait. It was brilliant.

Also pretty good: The Jane Austen Book Club. Having read the novel second, I after the fact questioned some of the casting choices, and the waywardness of Prudie's plotline, but the best lines of the book made it over to the movie intact, and it was a pleasure to watch people talk about Austen.

Mr. and Mrs. Smith I've been meaning to catch for a long time. I mostly like Angelina Jolie's choices on what roles she plays (I know, I'm the only one who liked the Tomb Raider movies), and I can see what attracted her to this one. She and Brad Pitt play off each other well, a nice no-holds-barred battle between equals. My only gripe would be why does he get to be part of a co-ed organization, while she is part of an all-girl assassin group that specializes in death by pretending to be a hooker, and the only man is the boss? Ick. If she can snap a man's neck with her two hands, I don't think she needs the dominatrix outfit to pull it off.

A movie I expected to find disturbing and would not really like was Tideland, and boy was I surprised. I thought this movie was wonderful, completely inside the head of a tween girl emerging from a very tough childhood which she of course thinks is all perfectly normal. It's classic Terry Gilliam with the visual flair. I would still hesitate to actually recommend this one to anyone I didn't know really well; it is disturbing even if I found it storywise justifiably so.

Now, with TV on DVD this is stuff I finished in the month of February, not watched start to end all in the shortest month of the year. Just sayin'. So, Caprica the miniseries setting up the prequel to Battlestar Galactica I liked, although the ads for the series to follow with Eve naked and holding an apple I'm not thrilled with. Yes, I get the metaphor (it's an obvious, overdone one), but in the miniseries she's a girl who owns her sexuality, and now her she's one who's selling it. I don't like.

Tru Calling was a show that took a long time to find its voice (getting rid of the gratuitous boyfriend was a step in the right direction, and how cool is quasi-evil Jason Priestley?), and then it got axed just when it was getting interesting. *Sigh.* This is why I don't watch TV on TV anymore.

Also cancelled before its time: The Adventures for Brisco County Jr. To be fair, the show never did hit its stride, but it felt like it was about to. And who wouldn't love a steampunk/scifi/western/comedy type deal? Well my boys sure loved it, especially Oliver, and especially Lord Bowler. Just what the boy needs, another curmudgeon to idolize...

Not yet cancelled, and not likely to be soon I hope: The Big Bang Theory. I admit I was sceptical when I heard the premise, it seemed to play too hard on stereotypes (that scientists are nerds, that hot girls don't get science, etc., etc.), but after watching two seasons I'm giving the show a little salute, to show my respect. How they manage to squeeze in so many jokes that must only be funny to a select few is admirable. (I particularly liked when Sheldon called Aishwariya Rai the poor man's Madhuri Dixit. Boo yah!)

This month I'm going to leave you with a trailer which I've watched many, many times, and am already dying to see this movie. Please let it be the awesome...

Books in February

I started February by polishing off Jane Austen. Northanger Abbey I liked better than I expected to; I'd heard it was her most minor work and it's clearly the work of a young writer just finding her own voice, but I liked it because of that, I think. I similarly liked Love and Freindship (there were some other things, shorter things; from looking at Wikipedia I'd guess you'd really call this her Juvenilia, Volume 2). Persuasion is a lovely last book. It feels like a last book, it has a wintry, end of a cycle quality to it. I also read Lady Susan, which was dark and interesting. All of her other books are about women up to the wedding; here is a book about a woman long after her wedding. I wished she had had a chance to write more of those.

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Austen-related, I read Flirting with Pride and Prejudice, a collection edited by Jennifer Crusie full of essays, critiques, historical backgrounds, and even fan-fic all centered around Pride and Prejudice. It's a fun read from a wide variety of writers (all who love Colin Firth. But then who doesn't?)

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Then I picked up The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler. More accurately, I watched the movie, which I liked but hoped that the book would have more Austen discussion in it, and before the credits were done rolling I had downloaded it to my Kindle and dug in. I like it better than the movie (but when isn't that true?), it was deeper and had more of an edge. The women, for one, were older than they were in the movie. And I thought Grigg's recommendations on what books an Austenite should read to get into sci-fi were spot on (although I'd add a few, like Lois McMaster Bujold (particularly A Civil Campaign) and Naomi Novik; although she's more fantasy/alt history than sci-fi she's very Austen-y).

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I've long wondered why no one was really writing superhero novels. Oh sure, there have been a few in the romance genre which were fun, and of course there's Michael Chabon using superhero elements in The Adventures of Kavalier and Klay, but I long for more. So I went into Black and White by Jackie Kessler and Caitlin Kittredge with some pretty high hopes. It didn't disappoint; two ex-classmates from a superpowered school are now nemeses in a big, bad city. Every element of this book works; I loved it. The powers are awesome, and the mechanics of how they work and why are well thought-out. And the characters are wonderful and complex. And in the irony department, the sequel is going to be called Shades of Grey. Which is such an awesome title...
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...that Jasper Fforde has also used it. Although the book itself is filled with all sorts of colors, an entire world built around colors, and who can see them, and who can't. Remember what I loved about Niven, how he took a concept like tranfer booths and really worked through all the implications? Fforde does that here. It starts out as a simple concept, that people only see one color, and some see it better than others, and creates a vast, complex world out of it (with a caste system based on what color you can see, and how well you can see it). This isn't straight up funny like his former books, but his wit is still there, always there. I already can't wait for the next book in the series.

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Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld also featured meticulous world building, and nice details with its alternate history. My only complaint was that I wished it had been longer, but then it's a lushly illustrated YA, so it's probably just the perfect length and it's really the next book I'm longing for.

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Tenth Grade Bleeds by Heather Brewer I didn't like as well as Ninth Grade Slays, but it's still a fun, fast-paced read that really gets interesting at about the midpoint. It has middle of a series syndrome, I think; too much series plot business and not enough unique-to-this-novel plot. Still, here again I'm looking forward to the next installment.

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Lastly was a nonfic,

Literary Women by Ellen Moers, the book that Joanna Russ led me to (and there's a writer that Grigg recommends!). It's a celebration of women writers more than anything. It ends with a rather detailed list of women writers and their novels which I copied out. It's going to take me years to get through all of it, maybe a lifetime, but that's cool.

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You know, with the movies I always find something on You Tube to take onto the end, and I've been wanting to do something similar with books but wasn't sure what to do (book trailers - not my kind of thing). One of the cool things about the Kindle is that I can underline things without marking up an actual book that someone else might want to read someday. So I've been highlighting all over the place. As much as I love characters, and dig good plots, what I really love is a cool line, a thought I particularly like or an artful turn of phrase. I came up with this idea late in the month, though, so this first time out I only have a couple, but next month on I'll have more, maybe more than one from a book. In the meantime:

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"Doubt is good. It's an emotion we can build on. Perhaps if we feed it with curiosity it will blossom into something useful, like suspicion - and action." Shades of Grey

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"Her eyes darted back and forth between the rolled-up yellow cloth and the approaching storm, wondering what a boy would do." Leviathan

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"Not five minutes earlier her mother's death had been painted acros her face like one of those shattered women Picasso was so fond of. Now she looked dangerous. Now Picasso would be excusing himself, recollecting a previous engagement, backing away, leaving the building." The Jane Austen Book Club

Movies in January

Still finishing up on some Woody Allen I've been missing. Don't Drink the Water was originally a play, but this version with Julie Kavner, Michael J. Fox and Mayim Bialik was done for TV. That cast probably dates it a bit. The story of a couple travelling behind the iron curtain with their daughter and inadvertently getting into trouble while taking pictures, forcing them to seek sanctuary in the US embassy for an extended stay, feels even more out of the past (although taking pictures anywhere can get you into trouble these days). I do like when Allen does the old married thing, and Julie Kavner is great. It does make me wish he'd do another film with Diane Keaton, though; she's the best of all his costars.

We also watched the last of the three James Dean films, East of Eden, based on the Steinbeck novel, which I haven't read. I ought to; I think this movie probably changed some things and I'm betting I'd like the book better.

I also used my birthday and Christmas money to pick up the last two Ang Lee movies, Lust Caution and Taking Woodstock. Both excellent films, but so very different from each other. Lust Caution is an NC-17 film with very graphic sex, and yet I've never seen a film where the sex was less gratuitous. There is so much going on with those two characters in those scenes, and the two actors do such marvellous work conveying what's not being spoken. I can't even imagine what it must be like as an actor to go to those places, but they both really nail it (ooh, bad choice of words. Perhaps I should go with the Olympic: they stick the landing. Better?). The movie made me acutely uncomfortable, but then it was supposed to. Good job, Ang Lee. Taking Woodstock is more lighthearted fare, starring a favorite in my family: Demtri Martin. I don't think I've seen a movie about the 60s as cynicism-free as this one. And Liev Schreiber is fabulous.

Hangover. Let's just say I'm not the target demographic for this one and let it go at that. (Adding, I've seen enough movies, TV shows and good god commercials that divide the world into slacker underachieving men and shrewish women. It misrepresents both genders, and it stopped being funny long ago, surely.) (But the baby was cute.)

District 9 I didn't like as well as Quin did. I thought the "message" was simplistic, and the movie itself way too splatter-gore. Conversely, I liked Cloverfield much more than Quin did. It was like a cooler, more thought-out The Blair Witch Project. In any case, it's nice to see more sci-fi movies being made that aren't big blockbuster popcorn flicks. Hopefully with special effects being cheaper and easier to do, we'll see more.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Given that my favorite Harry Potter book, The Order of the Phoenix, was made into my least favorite movie, and they let that director have another go, my expectations were low. So low we didn't bother seeing this in the theater. There were still things that bothered me, and I don't think this director has any storytelling instincts at all, but the cast is top notch and make the best of it. Daniel Radcliffe in particular, playing Harry under the influence of the luck potion, was surprisingly fun. I wonder what he'll tackle after the last movie, what sorts of characters he'll play. Harry Potter is a great part, but it's still a lot of being earnest and brave and not much else.

The Transporter 3. Jason Statham, not in Crank. 'nuff said.

Finally, one Hindi movie, not really a Bollywood move: Ek Ruka Hua Faisla. It's the Indian Twelve Angry Men, and it's a very faithful retelling, just a few India-specific details thrown in for flavor. It's a great story in any language, and the actors in this, not one of which was familiar to me (and I suspect they might be more stage than film actors, they have that vibe), were all wonderful.

Alas, no song and dance numbers in that one (I said it wasn't really Bollywood). But you saw these two skating to a great Bollywood medley in the Olympics, didn't you?

What I did on my week's vacation

1. Had three not-really-moles removed with liquid nitrogen by a dermatologist who actually explained what these things are, why I always get them, and more importantly that they are always benign (and how to tell when I'm looking at something else). New dermatologist, he's a little bit the bomb, you know?

2. Did taxes, first year with writing income. I think without the internet and some very specifically worded Googling TurboTax would have kept me running in circles forever.

3. Reinstalled the operating system and all the software on the upstairs computer, found it still acting wonky in suspicious ways and did it all over again four days later. Man, that makes two long, long days of watching progress bars move so I can be there to click the OK button. Seems fine now, but it's starting to show its age. New computer, pretty low on the list of things I can afford to spring for at the moment, though.

4. Cleaned the house in the moving all the heavy furniture way. Including the boys' rooms. Mom goes through and pulls everything apart, digging detritus out of every nook and cranny, then they get to sort through the resulting pile in the center of the room and figure out what's going to be kept, what's going to charity, and what's just garbage.

5. I also got to watch a few more of my birthday movies (although I still have a few left to go), and I got to go out to an Indian restaurant and talk to grown ups for nearly three hours. Ah, bliss!

What I didn't do on my week's vacation:

Write. Because random notes of what I want to change don't count (even if there are pages and pages of them. Thinking and writing are related, but not the same thing).

And now it's back to work.

Books in January

Starting with the sci-fi: I read two books by John Scalzi. Well, sort of. Judge Sn Goes Golfing is really a short story done up as a chapbook with illustrations. It's a fun story and the green-based illustrations make for a handsome little book. Even cooler (and longer, although still on the short end, I'm guessing novella length) is The God Engines. Loved the premise.

I also read Destroyer of Worlds, the third in the series written by Larry Niven and Edward M. Lerner. Very readable. I like the puppeteers and the Pak, but the Gw'oth, little fellows that look like starfish, are seriously cool. Their entire culture is very thoroughly thought through (although again we have an entire alien species that doesn't seem to have any women. Perhaps they're meant to be asexual, neither male nor female, but they come across as male. And I don't think that's just because of the pronouns).

Booklife by Jeff Vandermeer isn't a how to write book, it's a book about how to live the writing life. I found it completely awesome, full of great information about marketing and publicity, all the things a professional writer has to do besides just write.

He also had a few pages recommending books that truly were about writing, but not on the basics, on the more advanced aspects of the craft. I've been working my way through his list and with one exception (which I shan't name) I've really enjoyed those books as well. The Art of Subtext by Charles Baxter, aside from some wrongheaded thinking about genre fiction which seems based on the only two genre books he's read (and they aren't even the same genre), was interesting, full of examples of the techniques being described from various novels. More and more books these days, genre or not, read too much like written down movies to me and a lot of that is the lack of subtext. I like a book that requires me as a reader to actually do something, to notice things and reach conclusions that aren't completely spelled out. Of course I like movies that do that as well...

How to Suppress Women's Writing by Joanna Russ is no where near as strident as it sounds, and led me to another book I never would have found on my own (see Books in February). Having had such a tough time lately even finding time to write, the stories of other women writers struggling to do the same thing, only doing it centuries ago in a much less woman-friendly world, was particularly heartbreaking. But this book read to me more like a celebration of what women have managed to do despite it all than anything.

But even before reading Russ's book I had decided that this year rather than tackling another science fiction writer's entire catalogue as I've done in the past two years that I would make a point to read more of the "big" books by women. You know, the literary ones. I decided to start with Austen, re-reading Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice before tackling all the rest which I've not read before. Mansfield Park had some wonderful observations and secondary characters (by which I mean, Ms. Austen always gives good snark), but the main character was so reactive rather than proactive, so different from Austen's other women, I found her hard to bond with. Emma, on the other hand, is perhaps my favorite Austen woman. She is more master of her own fate than the others, but she also is the one that goes through the most growth over the course of the story.

More Austen to come in February...

Books in December

Clearly, my New Year's resolution wasn't to keep up on my blog. (I actually don't make resolutions, just like I never start diets on Mondays. The time for change, you know, is always NOW).

At any rate, apparently I read some books in December...

Building Harlequin's Moon by Larry Niven and Brenda Cooper. I loved the worldbuilding in this, and the characters were engaging, but I'm afraid I found it overly long. I remember it being sporadic; for several chapters I'd be completely sucked in, and then there'd be a few chapters that dragged. It could just be me, though; December is a suck month of the year for me workwise and I really should stick to more upbeat reading.

Like Groucho Marx. I picked up Memoirs of a Mangy Lover, parts of which were in some of the other Groucho books I've been reading, but other parts were new. Groucho and I have a lot in common, it seems. He prefers the company of his children to most grown ups, so his social life is largely hanging out with them. They were more interesting companions than the grown ups, especially in Hollywood. But then it naturally follows that they were bright and engaging; if they were adorable little morons I don't think he would have bothered. I have my own feelings on the cause and effect there; even a five-year-old will bring their game up if it's Groucho their matching words with. Some great stories in here, some of which I think are almost true. (I'm quite partial to when he tells the same story from his childhood two different ways, or how his version and Harpo's version of the same story don't really resemble each other. There's truth and then there's Truth).

Clearly I'm in a weird mood.

I also read Groucho, Chico, Harpo and Sometimes Zeppo by Joe Adamson. It's sort of the bible of Marx Brothers movies, loaded with facts and anecdotes and pictures. I, of course, adored it.

Now, when I first started watching all these Marx Brothers movies, I was always struck with how much Groucho reminded me of Woody Allen, and particularly early Woody Allen. Again, the cause and effect is clearly backwards here. But I thought the time was ripe to rewatch all my Woody Allen movies, and dig into those books that have been lying around for years, waiting to be read. Woody Allen and Philosophy by Mark T. Conrad and Aeon J. Skoble is part of the Popular Culture and Philosophy Series. I have several of these and love the concept. Philosophy, it's not just for eggheads. As Allen well knows. I think part of me likes Woody Allen best because he like me never quite made it through the whole college thing. Doesn't stop us from being well read, and widely read.

I also dug into books written by Woody Allen: Without Feathers, Getting Even, Sides Effects, and Mere Anarchy. There are some really great stories in here. My personal favorite is the one where a (clearly very bad but very pretentious) literary writer is hired to write the novelization of a Three Stooges movie. What he comes up with... man, it floored me. But there's lots of good stuff here, like the man that gets written into Madame Bovary, the trials of dealing with building contractors, how scholars can go overboard to the point of finding deep meaning in laundry lists. If you like Woody Allen movies, you should check out his prose. 'Nuff said.

Now having moved on in the movie realm to Buster Keaton, it seemed appropriate to pick up his own autobiography: My Wonderful World of Slapstick. Mostly because he rather famously didn't get along with the Marx Brothers. It's not hard to see why; they work in completely different ways. His stories of his childhood are wonderful, but I think he's being a bit dishonest or at least reticent about his adult life. But then one can hardly blame him. Someone needs to make an Oscar-worthy biopic of his life, though. I'd love to see it. His wife and the studio system double-whammied the hell out of him. And then there was the alcohol. Johnny Depp already nailed his look and mannerism in Benny and Joon, so he's my pick.

Rounding off with a little YA, and namely Justine Larbalestier. How to Ditch Your Fairy was fun, set in a cool world where everyone has their own fairy with one particular skill. Some cool, like a shopping fairy so you always find the perfect outfit at ridiculously low prices, and some not, like the main character's parking fairy, so she always findings the perfect parking space even though she can't yet drive. So other people always want her in their cars. I get the sense this was just a oner, which is a shame. It's a cool world I'd like to see more of. I also picked up Liar, which is my favorite sort of book, the sort where you think what's going on, but then everything turns, but in a way where you really feel like you should have seen it coming, only you didn't. That moment of turning is absolutely delicious; I live (or rather read) for those moments. Saying all that is probably spoiler enough, though; I shall say no more.

Movies in December

Still on the old films kick: in December we all watched On the Waterfront with Marlon Brando and two of the three James Dean films: Rebel Without A Cause and Giant. On the Waterfront was interesting; apparently Elias Kazan's apologia for naming names. He doesn't make a particularly compelling argument for himself, but Marlon Brando is worth a watch in anything. The boys particularly liked Rebel Without A Cause, and Oliver observed "I'd rather be a chicken than a corpse", which is heartening. That's one less conversation to have in his teen years, anyway. Giant is an epic story set in Texas. I'm betting this was a doorstop of a novel; it felt like a lot of details were left out, and the movie still ran over two discs. James Dean was quite good in both of these; it's a shame he died so young, he really had something.

Quin and I watched Inglourious Basterds (do you have any idea how hard I have to concentrate to type the words that way?). Not my favorite Tarantino, but it had some moments. Brad Pitt and the fellow playing the Nazi were particularly good. But there was one point at the very end where I covered my eyes. Because there are some things I just don't need to see.

Which makes the next bit ironic. I perhaps waited too long to see Scarface for the first time. After Inglourious Basterds (which I watched the night before), both the violence and the language seemed really understated. I'm puzzled why the gangster-types love this movie so much; it's a pretty clear picture of the cost for their particular lifestyle. I don't think they're seeing the same movie as I am.

I caught up on seasons 2 and 3 of Doctor Who. I liked Christopher Eccleston and was disappointed when he only did one season, but it seems like I'm not alone in finding David Tennant quickly became my favorite Doctor. I much prefer the oner episodes, though. It seems everytime he meets a Dalek or a Cyberman or any of the old villians, the story will be resolved by the Doctor pulling some technobabble solution out of no where to save the day. I like to have some clue where a story is going, or at least a sense that I should have a clue. Things that come out of the blue, the tech-the-tech solutions I find very unsatisfying.

Having rewatched my Woody Allen films recently I found some gaps at the early and late ends of his canon which I used my birthday money to fill in. Cassandra's Dream came out just before Vicky Cristina Barcelona but I never heard a thing about it. Which is a shame; it's a tight story (although one of Allen's downer stories, with Match Point and Crimes and Misdemeanors). I've never really seen Colin Firth in anything; I've burned DareDevil from my memory except a few Jon Favreau bits, and although I remember liking Minority Report I can't recall more than a scene with a car driving up skyscraper. I thought he was just the latest pretty boy, but he's genuinely moving in this movie. When his character gets upset I want to stop the movie, step into the screen, and give him a big hug and maybe make him some tea.

Whatever Works is Allen's most recent, and it stars Larry David. Two comics with very distinctive voices; it's cool how they mesh together. This was a fun one. I distinctly remember how much lighter my outlook on life was after seeing this movie (have I ever mentioned how grindingly hard the month of December is? I needed this movie).

On the other end were a few of Allen's early films which I missed, things he wrote and appeared in but didn't direct himself. Play It Again, Sam has Diane Keaton in it, always a plus. Woody Allen is a schlemp who starts getting life advice from Humphrey Bogart (or more properly an amalgam of Bogart characters), but eventually grows beyond the need for such advice. Lots of cool touches for movie buffs, although the fact they were all in San Francisco never ceased to catch my attention in a "look at that view; they're so not in New York" kind of way.

What's New Pussycat? didn't do it for me at all. It stars Peter Sellers, a comic I've never grokked. Outside of the Pink Panther movies, that is. His multiple roles in Lolita ruined the movie for me (so distracting), and quite often for a funny man he just comes across as mean. Maybe I haven't seen his great films, I don't know. At any rate, this isn't one of them. I do rather wonder what Woody's script looked like originally, and how badly it was mangled in production. There is very little about the final product that feels like Woody Allen.

Finishing off the smaller appearances by the Marx Brothers, or at least Harpo, I watched Stage Door Canteen, a multi-starrer about troops about to ship out for WWII and the entertainers that, well, entertain them. It doesn't really hold together as a movie, but all of the musical acts are fun to watch, and Harpo shows up for about a minute and a half. (Harpo talking about WWII is one of the touching bits of his autobiography; having briefly passed through Germany in the early days of Hitler's rule and seeing the fear in the eyes of the Jews living there he was struck very deeply and while too old when America entered the war to enlist he did devote the next few years to doing everything he could do, performing for troops about to ship out or for the ones in the hospitals. Hence the several-year gap between his first son and the rest of his kids).

Less entertaining was The Story of Mankind, an extremely preachy film about the dangers of the atom bomb, with mankind on trial, blah blah blah. Each of the Marx Brothers appears for a scene, Harpo as a harp-playing Isaac Newton, Chico very briefly talking to Christopher Columbus, and Groucho - clearly having tossed the dreck script they handed him and writing his own actually funny lines - as the European who bought Manhattan for a handful of beads. Well, it was cool to see them all in color. And Vincent Price as the devil was clearly having a ball chewing the scenery.

Is this a good place to mention Cinematic Titanic's latest? Actually, I think yes. Like the Marx Brothers, they like to try their jokes out before a live audience or two by taking their act on the road before committing things to film. East Meets Watts is a taste of one of those live shows, with some pretty effective split screen work. If only I ever had a chance to get out of the house for a night, I'd love to go to one of their shows.

I'll finish off with a little Buster Keaton. I have a soft spot for Buster; the man worked hard and sincerely thought if you worked hard enough, the powers that be would recognize and reward it. Sadly, in his case he just got deeply screwed by a movie studio that had no ability to recognize what made a Buster Keaton movie actually work. Bunch of meddlers. Buster, at least in his autobiography, didn't have too much ill will about this; he kept on working, helping other acts with Keatonesque stunts (which is how he ran up against the Marx Brothers, who pretty much had the reverse work ethic: you'll only ever get what you can demand and take for yourself). I can see why Keaton felt the way he says he felt; he did always have a steady paycheck doing something he enjoyed. But man! The rest of us got screwed out of all the other things he could have done if they'd just left him alone to do it.

So in December we watched Go West with the shorts The Scarecrow and The Paleface, Our Hospitality (which features his wife; interesting to see what she looked like), Sherlock Jr. and the truly awesome Steamboat Bill, Jr. with the shorts Convict 13 and Daydreams. Buster's dad wasn't keen on movies; he thought they were a flash in the pan. Why would anyone pay to see performers on film when you could see them live in a theater?

But Buster knew why, clearly. The stunts he constructed could scarecely be pulled off in a live theater. Man, the things he could do with trains alone. His dad did eventually come around, appearing in a lot of Buster's films. Buster's mainly remembered these days for his physicality, and the man really did do some impressive stunts (I suspect Jackie Chan is a fan). But what I like best about him is his engineering. The stunts he sets up; I'm envious of that mechanical mind. Like I said, the things the man could do with trains. But on a smaller scale, I'll close with this little bit from The Scarecrow, of a bachelor pad that is all rooms in one room. Take a look, after they pull out Buster's tooth, to how they transform every thing in the house, and how they set the table.

That's so awesome.