January 2011
23 posts
December 2010
19 posts
“The art I make is similar to film - my paintings are essentially freeze frames from movies that are playing in my head. I think its pretty clear that film is the pre-eminent art form of our age. If Michaelangelo or Leonardo Da Vinci were alive today they’d be making Avatar, not painting a chapel. Film is incredibly democratic and accessible, it’s probably the best option if you actually want to change the world, not just re-decorate it.”
—Banksy (and no, I never saw Avatar)
Jorm!!!
Lonely Island’s latest I Just Had Sex has been going viral since it aired this past weekend on SNL. I think it sounds like “Jizz in My Pants” (content) and “I’m on A Boat” (beat) had a baby, but it certainly packs some lols. Regardless, I heart Jorma Taccone like whoah, so I’m always happy when he gets lots of screen time.
One Step Forward, One Step Back
The Senate repealed Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, but failed to pass The Dream Act.
“There’s a difference between being in a bra and underpants as an object on a men’s-magazine cover and playing yourself—a woman with desires and needs who loves and laughs with her friends—in a bra and underpants. You become an object if you simply put it out there. Most movies are made by men, it’s totally natural that they’re going to present their worldview, so we’re trying to find more women who are writers and directors who are expressing their worldview. Did you see Tiny Furniture? Lena Dunham wrote, directed, and starred in it; she’s 23, and it is just amazing. She walks around in her underwear for the whole movie; it’s harsh. She’s the subject, she’s not the object, and it’s beautiful—that’s the kind of thing we need more of.”
—Natalie Portman, beautiful actress, total badass.
Thankfulness not just for Thanksgiving Anymore
Yes, that’s a reference to Beer, It’s not just for Breakfast Anymore. Yes, if you have to explain your references you probably shouldn’t use them, but that’s why this is my blog, not yours.
I’ve had kind of a bad week, for reasons that I won’t go into here because while I am a huge fan of the personal essay/memoir, there’s a huge difference between writing to gain insight and to access a lit bit of universality than the blatant over-share. If I go into these events later, I will rationalize it because I can rationalize almost anything. At the least, I will have distance. Did anyone ever say that wisdom is also distance from things? They said something about age and wisdom, I know that.
I am flying home tomorrow and my apartment is a mess. If I had to return to it after Christmas, I wouldn’t, plain and simple. I would stay in South Carolina and refuse to come back to Brooklyn. Tom and Jane (my awesome parents) would be THRILLED. If they tried to kick me out, I’d hide under the covers at the foot of my bed and no one would be able to find me like the time I was four and neighbors had to search for me up and down Smith Street. And the whole time I was napping at the foot of the bed because I bet I thought it would be wacky to take a nap at the wrong side. That’s me, always been challenging the the status-quo.
But back to the point because I really do have to get back to cleaning, which I am doing in a thong (overshare cognitive dissonance?). I can clean in a thong because I live alone. And I love living alone, and I am oh so thankful that I live alone. It was laundry day at least a week ago, if not more. Honestly, I started to get dressed and hit an impasse. I do hope I find something to wear to drop off my giant laundry bag. Hmmm…
Also, as I was cleaning, I was working out the flow of an essay I’m working on. It’s about dating in New York, the Internet age etc, and maybe some of why this week went to sh**t will be in there because there’s a great metaphor. And then something hit me. I’m so glad that I write.
I’m not sure I’ve ever really framed it in such straightforward manner, strange since I recently wrote an essay about why I’m a filmmaker/storyteller, but while I mentioned I consider it a privilege to work in the film medium, the nail head of it is really that I am thankful. I’m thankful I started this blog, that some people read it and that I’ve had amazing opportunities because of it.
So if you’re reading this. Thanks.
photo from noveau queer. Her cleaning attire looks way more deliberate than mine though…
The Kids (feat. Janelle Monae)
B.o.B
The Kids -B.O.B. featuring Janelle Monae
Sometimes, if not usually, I’m very optimistic. Today is not one of those days. At least this song is cynical and pretty damn amazing.
Nabbed the mp3 from my friend’s tumblr. She is one of those people who is upfront about knowing music before you do, but she really does, so the bragging rights are all hers. Check out her Top 55 of 2010. Some you know, some you love, some will be new favorites.
Movies I Watched This Week
I’ve been meaning to debut this feature on my blog for a while now. Even if I don’t write formal reviews, I can post a little bit about what I’ve been watching, so without further ado…
I’d never seen Jane Campion’s masterpiece, The Piano. The photography and compositions in this film are breathtaking. This film is stunning and has a dreamlike tone that runs the gamut from otherworldly to nightmarish. However, it is ultimately a beautiful, brilliantly acted film with it’s own sense of grace. And Anna Paquin? I see now why she is the youngest Oscar winner ever. She doesn’t just give one hell of a performance for a child, she gives a better performance than many adult actors can. Get this woman off the vampire show and into complex roles, not that frolicking naked and covered in blood with your lover is a bad way to spend time…
The King’s Speech is generating A LOT of Oscar buzz for Colin Firth, and for good reason. Firth’s King George VI is incredibly complex, nuanced and conflicted, likable and relatable, yet with the air of a royal far removed from the day to day of the comman man. Geoffrey Rush also delivers a delightful and layered performance, though not as complex as Firth’s. Tom Hooper, who also directed The Damn United, which I adored and watched following the World Cup in order to help my withdrawal, is really cornering the market on dramatic British, period piece, character studies, which is great as he does a damn fine job of it. I’d be remiss not to mention the always delightful Helena Bonham Carter; this is really an actor’s film. The performances are spectacular and captivating.
I finally saw the film that has been generating massive buzz since it won best narrative feature at SXSW last year. Lena Dunham perfectly captures that 20-something post-college ennui that is so easy to feel, but not as easy to articulate. It’s a very, very smart film with comedic and strong performances from the whole cast, which includes Lena’s family. The cinematography is also very good, giving the film, shot on a 7D (a Canon SLR), quite a bit of atmosphere. I actually saw Tiny Furniture on a date, and I couldn’t stop laughing and empathizing to the point where (*spoiler alert*), my date asked me if I’d ever fucked a guy in a pipe. No, no I have not. But when I had a chance to briefly discuss this film with the amazing J. Courtney Sullivan, she articulated what we both found so fascinating about Aura: the disconnect between this smart, articulate young woman, what she wants and what she does/what she will settle for. And the thing is, we’ve all been there. So yes, metaphorically speaking, I’ve fucked a guy in a pipe. Most of us have.
I don’t know why I waited so long to see the this 1985 film from Stephen Frears, a brilliant director, though I have yet to see his latest (I love LOVED Dirty, Pretty Things for many of the same reasons I loved My Beautiful Laundrette). You don’t have to say much more than a young Daniel Day Lewis shirtless and being splashed with water, but that might risk diminishing how really beautiful this film is. It doesn’t have a social conscience, so much as the script from Hanif Kareshi has a finely tuned eye to race, class, and gender in 1980s London. This fascinating movie about the intersection between Pakistani immigrants and Cockney punks, and the intersection amongst family members, is heartwarming, funny, and also serious. I was completely charmed by Gordon Warnecke’s performance, though it’s truly lovely to watch a young DDL at the beginning of his career and see exactly why it’s taken the fantastic trajectory that it has. Great acting, an excellent script, and Frears’ captivating visual style make for remarkable, enjoyable cinema.
I watched maybe 30-45 minutes of Leap Year because it was on HBO. And honestly, I thought my love for Matthew Goode knew no bounds, but it does, oh it does. How did this movie get made? Did the director, crew, and actors just want to hang out in Ireland? Take a vacation next time, and spare us the trite script, one-dimensional characters, and painful score that tells you how to feel if the plot’s not obvious enough. The premise, that a woman can propose in Ireland on Leap Year, should have been enough to keep me at bay. And look at Goode’s face in the movie poster! He totally knows it’s shit.
And that’s it for this week, folks! I think. I might squeez in one more film before bed, but the Parks and Recreation marathon I started while I was sick is also calling my name. I can guarantee you that next week’s Movies I Watch will include something with Paul Schneider. Maybe a re-watch of Lars and The Real Girl and get some Gosling in there too?
I’m headed to the Brooklyn Museum because I’ve never seen The Dinner Party by Judy Chicago, and Courtney Martin, editor of Click: When We Knew We Were Feminists is leading a panel discussion at 2pm in Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art in the Forum on the 4th Floor. Huzzah!
If any of you fabulous tumblrs will be there, say hi!
“Women never have young minds. They are born three thousand years old.”
—Shelagh Delaney
That's Not It (Instrumental Edit)
That’s Not It- Instrumental Remix by Obey City
This remix from my friend Obey City will make whatever you are doing while you listen to it feel very very important. I haven’t had the occasion to feel this epic (he even sampled fireworks) since the last time I listened to the Top Gun Theme Song.
Did you hear that, music supervisors?
“As the vagina is the primary port of transmission from men to women of the Aids virus, how women and men perceive vaginas, talk about or don’t talk about vaginas, how women know their vaginas, feel agency over their vaginas, determines everything about their future. Many women, even in so-called progressive countries, are still not comfortable asking a man out, acting directly on their own desire, be it for a man or a woman. Many women who are sexually active and educated about the virus are still, because of insecurity and embarrassment, having unsafe sex. Many women in the year 2010 do not know how their clitoris functions or how to give themselves pleasure, nor do they feel safe telling a partner or a husband what they need or that it hurts when they are entered without preparation or that it would all work much better if it happened slower.”
—Eve Ensler, “Nothing Short of a Revolution.” Read the whole essay, published today for World AIDS Day, here.
“You have to question a cinematic culture which preaches artistic expression, and yet would support a decision that is clearly a product of a patriarchy-dominant society, which tries to control how women are depicted on screen. The MPAA is okay supporting scenes that portray women in scenarios of sexual torture and violence for entertainment purposes, but they are trying to force us to look away from a scene that shows a woman in a sexual scenario, which is both complicit and complex. It’s misogynistic in nature to try and control a woman’s sexual presentation of self. I consider this an issue that is bigger than this film.”
—Ryan Gosling on Blue Valentine’s NC-17 rating. Sign the Petition for the MPAA to re-evaluate it’s rating of the film here. Watch the trailer for the film here. Bonus: I totally own the shirt Michelle Williams’ is wearing in the intense scene around the :55 mark.
