More movie stuff

I’m not a list-maker by temperament, so you’ll have to bear with me a bit. Every December (or January, for procrastinators), most self-respecting movie freaks compile “best-of” lists as a means of summing up the year that was. I try not to do it, myself, but every year, I also have friends who request such things. And so, here is my completely random take on this year’s movies, in no particular order:

The Cream of the Crop:
A History of Violence (David Cronenberg)
King Kong (Peter Jackson)
Sin City (Frank Miller and Robert Rodriquez)
2046 (Wong Kar Wai)
A Bittersweet Life (Ji-Woon Kim)
Murderball (Henry Rubin and Dana Shapiro)
Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (Chanwook Park)
The Presidents Last Bang (Im Sang-soo)
Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (Nick Park)
Downfall (Oliver Hirschbeigel)

Disappointments:
Batman Begins (Christopher Nolan)
War of the Worlds (Steven Spielberg)
Star Wars: The Revenge of the Sith (George Lucas)
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Mike Newell)
Land of the Dead (George A. Romero)

Better than Expected:
Kingdom of Heaven (Ridley Scott)
The Upside of Anger (Mike Binder)
The 40 Year-Old Virgin (Judd Apatow)
Assault on Precinct 13 (Jean-François Richet)
Lord of War (Andrew Niccol)
The Weatherman (Gore Verbinski)
Red Eye (Wes Craven)

Dogshit:
The Fog (Rupert Wainright)
High Tension (Alexander Aja)
Hide and Seek (John Polson)
The Amityville Horror (John Douglas)
Cursed (Wes Craven)

Tranny Movie of the year:
With all due respect to Felicity Huffman’s wonderful performance, I couldn’t shake the feeling that Transamerica was an afterschool special. That being the case, the tranny movie of the year is Neil Jordan’s Breakfast on Pluto.

Comments: You may notice a preponderance of Asian movies among my favorites this year. Korea, in particular, had a strong year. I would have liked to have seen Johnny To’s new film, Election, but it didn’t come anywhere near me and is only now appearing on DVD. Ah, well. It was a pretty good year, all told, and that doesn’t even count all the limited-release Oscar-bait that I haven’t seen yet. This is amazing to me, because at the halfway point of the year, I thought it sucked. Amazing turnaround. In the “Dogshit” category…I don’t mean to pick on horror movies. I don’t. Horror movies are my first love, so it pains me to do it. But I’m likelier to actually see a bad horror movie than a bad movie of any other type. And the bad horror movies this year were particularly ripe.

I saw about 90 movies this year, which is a low ebb for me. Be that as it may, the best experience I had in a theater this year was seeing The Creature from the Black Lagoon in 3-D. Now THAT’s entertainment.

Gloom and Doom from the Tomb

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Is there a more frustrating musician in the world than Richard Thompson? Thompson is, hands down, one of the best guitar players in the world, writes songs with a wit so dry it can be considered nasty, and left to his own devices, plays absolutely astonishing solos in front of live audiences. But he hasn\’t produced a \”great\” album in twenty-five years. The last legitimately great album Thompson cut was Shoot Out the Lights, with former wife Linda. Since then, as a solo act, his albums have often been good, but have never been better than good.

But here\’s the thing. Unlike some artist who go into a funk–Bob Dylan, for example–Thompson doesn\’t go years without anything interesting. He consistently produces a great song or two even when the albums surrounding them are mediocre. Enough great stuff to whet the whistle, to keep a devoted fan following from wandering off even if it doesn\’t exactly attract a new audience. The poster child for this trend is his 1991 album, Rumor and Sigh. Some of the songs on this album are solid, if unremarkable. A couple are bad. But one song is absolutely transcendant. This would be \”1952 Vincent Black Lightning,\” a story song that seems like it could have come from the folk tradition of his old band, Fairport Convention, were it not for the images of motorcycles and black leather that populate it (favorite line: \”Red hair and black leather, my favorite color scheme\”). This song is an amazement, especially if you ever get the chance to see it performed live. Dropped into the sequence of the album, it\’s like grabbing a live electrical wire while fishing around in a wall of bad drywall. It jolts the album to brief, intense life.

\”Oh ho!\” you might be saying, \”why not just wait for the inevitable \”best of\” collection to gather all the good stuff together, then?\” Well, here\’s where things turn even uglier. Thompson\’s \”best of\” collections are singularly odd creatures. \”1952 Vincent Black Lightning,\” one of the best songs of his career, is inexplicably absent from Watching the Dark: A History of Richard Thompson, a big retrospective that is sequenced in such a way as to confuse the hell out of new listeners. It does show up on Action Packed: The Capitol Years, but this collection is an odd duck, too. Somewhere along the line, Capitol decided to provide equal time to the albums in its catalogue rather than weighting the material to quality (and whoever compiled it had a tin ear). As a result, some genuinely great stuff gets left off, while filler from other albums is included. For example: there are three killer cuts on Mirror Blue: the achingly lovely \”Beeswing,\”  the murderous \”Mascara Tears,\” and the bitter \”Taking My Business Elsewhere.\” Only \”Beeswing\” shows up on the Capitol collection.

Framing these thoughts makes me wonder if this patern isn\’t deliberate. Thompson\’s albums (as opposed to his individual songs) seem like the musical equivalent of methadone treatment. The real stuff gives a powerful kick, but the substitute keeps the monkey on the back without the thrill. Thompson\’s live performances–and I\’ve seen four or five of these–are a completely different animal. Live, Thompson leaves the bad stuff at home, and even the dicey new material has a life of its own when taken off of the album and onto a stage. If you don\’t believe me on this point, I would direct you to the live version of \”Tear Stained Letter\” on Watching the Dark, which is pleasant enough in the studio version, but which scorches live.

Like I say. Frustrating.

Gloom and Doom from the Tomb

src=\”http://dunyazad.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/1135581822-sc-174.jpg\”

Is there a more frustrating musician in the world than Richard Thompson? Thompson is, hands down, one of the best guitar players in the world, writes songs with a wit so dry it can be considered nasty, and left to his own devices, plays absolutely astonishing solos in front of live audiences. But he hasn\’t produced a \”great\” album in twenty-five years. The last legitimately great album Thompson cut was Shoot Out the Lights, with former wife Linda. Since then, as a solo act, his albums have often been good, but have never been better than good.

But here\’s the thing. Unlike some artist who go into a funk–Bob Dylan, for example–Thompson doesn\’t go years without anything interesting. He consistently produces a great song or two even when the albums surrounding them are mediocre. Enough great stuff to whet the whistle, to keep a devoted fan following from wandering off even if it doesn\’t exactly attract a new audience. The poster child for this trend is his 1991 album, Rumor and Sigh. Some of the songs on this album are solid, if unremarkable. A couple are bad. But one song is absolutely transcendant. This would be \”1952 Vincent Black Lightning,\” a story song that seems like it could have come from the folk tradition of his old band, Fairport Convention, were it not for the images of motorcycles and black leather that populate it (favorite line: \”Red hair and black leather, my favorite color scheme\”). This song is an amazement, especially if you ever get the chance to see it performed live. Dropped into the sequence of the album, it\’s like grabbing a live electrical wire while fishing around in a wall of bad drywall. It jolts the album to brief, intense life.

\”Oh ho!\” you might be saying, \”why not just wait for the inevitable \”best of\” collection to gather all the good stuff together, then?\” Well, here\’s where things turn even uglier. Thompson\’s \”best of\” collections are singularly odd creatures. \”1952 Vincent Black Lightning,\” one of the best songs of his career, is inexplicably absent from Watching the Dark: A History of Richard Thompson, a big retrospective that is sequenced in such a way as to confuse the hell out of new listeners. It does show up on Action Packed: The Capitol Years, but this collection is an odd duck, too. Somewhere along the line, Capitol decided to provide equal time to the albums in its catalogue rather than weighting the material to quality (and whoever compiled it had a tin ear). As a result, some genuinely great stuff gets left off, while filler from other albums is included. For example: there are three killer cuts on Mirror Blue: the achingly lovely \”Beeswing,\”  the murderous \”Mascara Tears,\” and the bitter \”Taking My Business Elsewhere.\” Only \”Beeswing\” shows up on the Capitol collection.

Framing these thoughts makes me wonder if this patern isn\’t deliberate. Thompson\’s albums (as opposed to his individual songs) seem like the musical equivalent of methadone treatment. The real stuff gives a powerful kick, but the substitute keeps the monkey on the back without the thrill. Thompson\’s live performances–and I\’ve seen four or five of these–are a completely different animal. Live, Thompson leaves the bad stuff at home, and even the dicey new material has a life of its own when taken off of the album and onto a stage. If you don\’t believe me on this point, I would direct you to the live version of \”Tear Stained Letter\” on Watching the Dark, which is pleasant enough in the studio version, but which scorches live.

Like I say. Frustrating.

Holiday shuffle.

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As my friend Ronnie has pointed out, Fox News has begun a campaign to put Christ back in Christmas. You can read about it here .

I have to admit a certain amount of amazement at the brazen hypocrisy of the whole campaign. Here\’s a little history lesson: Christianity is a syncretic religion. If you actually think that Christ was born on the 25th of December, you are deluded. No one knows when Christ was born. That date was chosen by the early Catholic church for its propaganda value. It corresponds to the Saturnalia, an old Roman holiday, but more to the point, it has symbolic value on the calendar. Christmas is the first day after the solstice when the day is noticably longer without relying on a timekeeping device to verify the fact. The symbolism wasn\’t lost on the early church: to them, Christmas announced the return of the light of the world. Curiously enough, OTHER religions have based their religious festivals on the same fact. Yule–a holiday the early Christians ALSO co-opted into Christmas–was a druidic holiday that ran for 12 days (the so-called twelve days of Christmas). Sounds a bit like the Jewish festival of lights, doesn\’t it (coincidentally positioned on the same area of the calendar ).? Let\’s face it, Christianity positioned its holidays to muscle in on pagan holidays. It\’s easier to attract new church members if you don\’t screw with their routine.

But Bill O\’Reilly is shocked, SHOCKED that other religions and secular institutions might want to use the date for their own ends. How dare OTHER syncretic entities tear a page out of the Christian playbook. I swear, right wing Christianity attracts more and more conspiracy theorists by the day. I weep for my country.

Incidentally, the illustration that accompanies this entry is a drawing by the great political cartoonist, Thomas Nast. Nast is more responsible than any other individual for the popular conception of Santa Claus (including Clement Moore, who wrote \”T\’was The Night Before Christmas\”). 

Happy Holidays.

Holiday shuffle.

src=\”http://dunyazad.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/1134677084-hr-167.jpg\”

As my friend Ronnie has pointed out, Fox News has begun a campaign to put Christ back in Christmas. You can read about it here .

I have to admit a certain amount of amazement at the brazen hypocrisy of the whole campaign. Here\’s a little history lesson: Christianity is a syncretic religion. If you actually think that Christ was born on the 25th of December, you are deluded. No one knows when Christ was born. That date was chosen by the early Catholic church for its propaganda value. It corresponds to the Saturnalia, an old Roman holiday, but more to the point, it has symbolic value on the calendar. Christmas is the first day after the solstice when the day is noticably longer without relying on a timekeeping device to verify the fact. The symbolism wasn\’t lost on the early church: to them, Christmas announced the return of the light of the world. Curiously enough, OTHER religions have based their religious festivals on the same fact. Yule–a holiday the early Christians ALSO co-opted into Christmas–was a druidic holiday that ran for 12 days (the so-called twelve days of Christmas). Sounds a bit like the Jewish festival of lights, doesn\’t it (coincidentally positioned on the same area of the calendar ).? Let\’s face it, Christianity positioned its holidays to muscle in on pagan holidays. It\’s easier to attract new church members if you don\’t screw with their routine.

But Bill O\’Reilly is shocked, SHOCKED that other religions and secular institutions might want to use the date for their own ends. How dare OTHER syncretic entities tear a page out of the Christian playbook. I swear, right wing Christianity attracts more and more conspiracy theorists by the day. I weep for my country.

Incidentally, the illustration that accompanies this entry is a drawing by the great political cartoonist, Thomas Nast. Nast is more responsible than any other individual for the popular conception of Santa Claus (including Clement Moore, who wrote \”T\’was The Night Before Christmas\”). 

Happy Holidays.

Discretion is the Better Part of Valor…

I was looking at someone’s 360 page a little while ago–I won’t embarass that person by naming names–and I was thinking to myself: “This person has listed every place they have worked since they were in high school.” That, in itself, gave me pause, but this page, further, had very explicit photos of the page’s owner engaged in very kinky sex acts. My next thought was: “Are you insane?”

I’m out at work. My workplace knows I like to get dolled up in my off hours. One or two of my co-workers even knows I like to have kinky sex with cute men from time to time. But these are people I trust. These are people I interact with on a day to day basis. I can gauge their personalities before I let them in on my private peccadilloes. I’m not particularly afraid of being outed at work (which has made my life SO much easier). But I work for an institution with diversity programs. Jane Doe being double-teamed works for a company that probably DOESN’T have diversity programs. In fact, her economic well-being could be shattered with a few discreet inquiries by a malicious person she doesn’t even know.

Back up a minute here. If I were to tell you where I live and where I work, there’s a good chance that, with a little internet savvy, you could find out who I am in “real life” and, perhaps, enough personal data to make you a threat to me (birthday, mother’s maiden name, etc.). If I know you, that’s fine, but by broadcasting this information, I am opening myself up to all sorts of trouble. Blackmail or identity theft are only the least of possible evils. Your employer may not have an enlightened view of your activities. Your family may not have an enlightened view. The predators lurking in cyberspace will CERTAINLY view you as meat. I don’t mean to be an alarmist, but I had a stalker even before I was on the internet, so I can only imagine how much easier life is for one WITH online access. And it doesn’t take much to set a nutjob off. Just ask Jodie Foster.

Information on the internet may have a life of its own, regardless of your intentions. If you decided that you want a sex change and that you want to live a life in deep stealth once you get it, your online life may come back to haunt you. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t participate in online discussions or online communities, but for crying out loud! Be responsible about it.

For TGs concerned about internet safety and the integrity of their identities, I recommend the page at TS Roadmap  about these issues.

In the words of the sergeant on Hill Street Blues: Let’s be careful out there.

It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Some holiday jeer from Charles Dickens:

“If I could work my will,’ said Scrooge indignantly, `every idiot who goes about with “Merry Christmas” on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart. He should!’”

And:

`At this festive season of the year, Mr. Scrooge,’ said the gentleman, taking up a pen, `it is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for the Poor and Destitute, who suffer greatly at the present time. Many thousands are in want of common necessaries; hundreds of thousands are in want of common comforts, sir.’

`Are there no prisons?’ asked Scrooge.

`Plenty of prisons,’ said the gentleman, laying down the pen again `And the Union workhouses?’ demanded Scrooge. `Are they still in operation?’

`They are. Still,’ returned the gentleman, `I wish I could say they were not.’

`The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigour, then?’ said Scrooge.

`Both very busy, sir.’

`Oh! I was afraid, from what you said at first, that something had occurred to stop them in their useful course,’ said Scrooge. `I’m very glad to hear it.’

`Under the impression that they scarcely furnish Christian cheer of mind or body to the multitude,’ returned the gentleman, `a few of us are endeavouring to raise a fund to buy the Poor some meat and drink. and means of warmth. We choose this time, because it is a time, of all others, when Want is keenly felt, and Abundance rejoices. What shall I put you down for?’

`Nothing!’ Scrooge replied.

`You wish to be anonymous?’

`I wish to be left alone,’ said Scrooge. `Since you ask me what I wish, gentlemen, that is my answer. I don’t make merry myself at Christmas and I can’t afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the establishments I have mentioned — they cost enough; and those who are badly off must go there.’

`Many can’t go there; and many would rather die.’

`If they would rather die,’ said Scrooge, `they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.

I derive the mostest pleasure from that last bit. Bless Ebeneezer Scrooge’s black little heart.

I keep an old-fashioned Christmas. Come Christmas Eve, I’ll gather with some like-minded friends and we’ll read ghost stories aloud to each other. Many of the greatest ghost stories in the English language were composed for Christmas (M. R. James composed virtually all of his ghost stories for readings to his students at Christmas).

My favorite Christmas movie is a movie called You Better Watch Out (alternately titled Christmas Evil). I won’t claim that it’s any good, but I love the premise. A psycho decides that Santa is falling down on the job by not sufficiently punishing the bad kids–and there are plenty of bad kids around that need it. So he takes on the job himself. This is NOT a warm fuzzy family movie, and thank heaven for that. Don’t get me wrong, I love It’s A Wonderful Life and Miracle on 34th Street as much as the next person, but a little of those movies goes a long way (my favorite time of the year for either of them is some time in July, actually). I’m one of those people that likes to import a little of the spirit of Halloween into Christmas. It’s a way of subverting the commercialism.

I imagine that I’ll be putting up a tree this weekend. Our tree has that “Christmas in Vegas” look to it. It’s gaudy and vulgar, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. At least we don’t do gaudy and vulgar on the outside of the house. Would that our neighbors were similarly discreet. Alas…

Happy Holidays.

Top of the Shuffle

This is the top of my iTunes random shuffle right now:

1. “The Wedge” by Dick Dale
2. “Louisiana Blues” by Muddy Waters
3. “Save the Last Dance for Me” by the Drifters
4. “Bob Dylan’s Dream” by Bob Dylan
5. “If You Really Want to be My Friend” by The Rolling Stones
6. “Raised on Robbery” by Joni Mitchell
7. “Small Town Romance” by Richard Thompson
8. “Fine Little Mama” by Elmore James
9. “Neat, Neat, Neat” by Elvis Costello
10. “Hard Headed Woman” by Elvis Presley
11. “Turtle Dovin’” by The Coasters
12. “Stop Using Me” by Howling Wolf
13. “Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off” by Billie Holiday
14. ” Love Train” by The O’Jays
15. “The Body” by The Raincoats
16. “Let Me Go My Merry Way” by Charlie Rich
17. “Take It Off” by The Donnas
18. “Dead” by The Pixies
19. “Why Can’t I Touch It?” by The Buzzcocks
20. “Some Days are Better than Others” by U2
21. “Unchain My Heart” by Ray Charles
22. “West of the Fields” by R.E.M.
23. “Good, Good Lovin’” by James Brown
24. “Memphis, Egypt” by The Mekons
25. “Freight Train Boogie” by The Dellmore Brothers

What this says about me–if anything–I’ll leave up to you. I’m surprised that there’s no Johnny Cash. Cash has been percolating towards the top of the shuffle with fair regularity in recent months, in part because theres so damned much of it in my iTunes library. Elvis and Elvis following one after the other amuses me; it’s the sort of random pairing that makes the random function so much fun.  There’s some surf rock, punk, rockabilly, rock and roll, garage rock, alt rock, soul, blues, funk, country, and whatever the hell you want to call The Raincoats (your guess is as good as mine). Interesting. You might get the idea that I’ll listen to just about anything. And you’d be right.

Cheers.

How Not to Get a Date With Me.

I’ve been getting a lot of e-mail lately from people who want to date me. Well…that’s not what they REALLY want from me, but we’ll assume the best intentions. I realize that a lot of these people don’t know how to read, so this will probably be lost on them anyway.  Here’s to tilting at windmills. In any event, here’s a quick guide for anyone who really doesn’t want to meet me at all:

First, if you REALLY don’t want to get a date with me, send me a picture of your penis. You can decrease your chances even further by wearing a pair of your wife’s panties, and make sure you don’t shave anything. You definitely don’t want to send me a picture of your face. Nude photos of yourself that show your face might get you a date with me if you happen to look like a Greek god descended from Mount Olympos, so if you send me one of those, you should be bald, fat, older than middle-aged, and hung like a 5 year old boy.

Second, make sure that you’re married and that your wife doesn’t know anything about your “adventures.” That works a charm. I DEFINITELY won’t date you then. Better still, tell me that you’re single but neglect to remove your wedding ring in any photographs of yourself that you send to me (particularly any photograph in which you are grasping your penis).

Next, sprinkle a bunch of incomprehensible text-speak in your emails. Use “U” for “You,” “4″ for “for,”  and so on.  Mangle your grammar wherever you spell things out.

Further: tell me that you’re in town for the weekend from some far off place and that you’d like to “hook-up.” Tell me this on a Friday afternoon so I won’t have any chance to change my plans (or beautify myself). Attach “penis” picture as above, or attach no picture at all. This works best if I’ve never heard from you before.

Ask me “how” bisexual I am. What this usually means is “will you want me to  perform homosexual acts?” Or, rather, will I want to have you perform acts that are usually thought of as “bottom” acts. You’re looking to have sex with someone who is biologically male, so any “sexual” act you engage in with me is going to be a homosexual act. Get over it.  (Note: I almost NEVER get requests for dates from women, but if you’re a woman who wants to date me, you can probably ignore this, unless you want to ask me how “straight” I am).

Make sure that you don’t ask me anything about my interests outside the bedroom. Make sure that you don’t engage in any kind of meaningful, intelligent dialogue on any other subject. Definitely don’t send me flowers.

That should do it. Follow this advice and I can assure you, you will never get a single date from me.

Cheers.