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fear and loathing in las vegas March 21, 2009
I re-watched Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas last weekend, in anticipation of my spring break in the titular city. It was as funny as I’d remembered, and did its purpose in restoking the fires of my obsession with Las Vegas. I went with a couple of my suitemates/adopted suitemates, flew hip hip hip Virgin America, stayed at the Stratosphere for $30/night (that’s BEFORE dividing it between the four of us), cruised the Strip, hung by the pool, rented a Sebring convertible, and drove to Death Valley. Generally a good time for all, even with no Johnny Depp.
Anyway, now that I’ve caught up on all the Gossip Girl and 30 Rock I missed while I was gone, I also uploaded my photos from the week! You can find them on my photo sharing site, or directly here (Las Vegas) and here (Death Valley).
big john, do you think this boy is a hustler? February 22, 2009
I just finished up The Hustler (still on my Paul Newman kick), but of course it is pretty much on no lists whatsoever. But WOW, is all I can say in regards to the climax. I did not even a little bit think it was going to go there, but then it did. I can’t even say anymore, because I don’t want to take away even an ounce of enjoyment for anyone else. But if you’ve seen it, I think you know what I am talking about.
Anyway… I have added a new batch of photos to the new photo sharing site, here. I am slowly working my way through all of my abroad photos, which is made more difficult that the “selects” I chose for facebook no longer exist separately, so I have to do all the choosing over again. Ah well. It is good procrastination for my psych test on Tuesday.
I also wrote an article for Spec, which you can find here. It was a movie by an alum about a competition at summer camp. The full interview is also on the blog, but I’m not going to link to it because then I think everyone will see the incoming link at the bottom. But the name of their blog is “Spectacle” and if you search for that + my name, you should be able to find it. I’m so sketchy!
All right, I think I’m going to leave it at that. I have been cooking pretty well lately; for lunch I made the breaded dijon chicken (so easy!) and tomorrow I’ll have my salmon, assuming it is still good. So classy.
new things and stuff January 27, 2009
Well, HELLO. It’s been more than two months since I last wrote! That is nothing new in my bloglife though, so I’ll get over it. I will also honestly say that I haven’t seen any AFI Top 100 OR Bravo Scariest Movie Moments movies since my last entry, which actually wasn’t even about either of those at all. I did see some movies while I was home, but mostly newer and of the Oscar-nominated sort. Speaking of checking things off of lists, I feel like I’ve done better in past years in terms of Oscar percentages, having seen:
- The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
- Frost/Nixon
- Milk
- Slumdog Millionaire
- Revolutionary Road
- Tropic Thunder (RDJ was nominated)
- The Dark Knight
- WALL-E
- Man on Wire
- Iron Man (Best Sound Editing–it counts, totally counts)
I would still like to see The Reader and The Wrestler at some point, but those are the only ones I feel I’ve really missed out on.
Classes are going well so far, even though we’re only in to week two. I’m taking: Abnormal Behavior (psych) [I mean, "psychology," not that I'm pranking you], American Literature since 1945, Man in the Crowd/Woman in the Streets (my senior seminar, which is part of the English dept. because Barnard doesn’t have a real film dept.), Film Production, and Film Criticism. The last class is taught by Andrew Sarris, who is the main critic for the New York Observer, used to write for the Village Voice, and is so cool that he has his own wikipedia page, from which I learned that the evil alien monster character in Galaxy Quest was called “Sarris” after him! So awesome.
I set up a new photo album website to host my pictures instead of facebook, which means that people without facebooks can comment easily. You can find it here: http://xoxogg.shutterfly.com/. I mostly only set it up because you got 30 free prints out of the deal if you did, so we’ll see if I keep up with it. But if, for WHATEVER reason, you ever wanted to order prints of my photos for yourself, you could do so from the website. The upload time is pretty fast, so I’ll try to put up some older/newer ones in the coming days.
[Ok, EDIT: I just checked and you apparently have to be a member of shutterfly to comment there, too. So you can sign up if you want, or just look at the photos, or not. Up to you guys.)
That’s it for now–Mr. Newman (or should I say Fast Eddie) is waiting for me very patiently. I won’t go on another why-does-AFI-hate-Paul-Newman tirade, but if I’m watching all these movies I feel like I should be getting some sort of credit for them. Maybe the new 20 year list will reflect more of his influence…
someday #1: iron man November 23, 2008
I saw Iron Man for the sixth-and-a-half time the other night. It is still awesome. Pretty much the only thing that has gotten less awesome is knowing that Terrence Howard (precious little Rhodey) won’t be in the sequel, so it’s sad to hear his little sequel throw-ins now. I think RDJ increases with awesomeness every time I watch it, though, so that makes it better.
1) Prague. I saw it the day it came out–in the Czech Republic–which was a THURSDAY, aka a day earlier than everybody in America, plus time difference. I was with a big group of people, laughing hysterically and unexpectedly at all the jokes that the Czechs were just not getting at all due to the translation. I think this positive experience really colored my future viewings.
2) Prague. When I got home that night, I found a pirated version of the movie online and kind of half-watched it while I was doing other things. I had heard that there was an extra scene at the end, so I told myself I was just watching for that, but I also played the entire thing. Of course, this version cut out as soon as the credits STARTED, so I was left with nothing. (I should note that Prague was the first and only time I’ve watched pirated movies online, and I justified it then because I didn’t have access to Netflix, video rental, or library, and only had about 10% of my own movie collection with me.)
3) Prague. At the end of a night, a couple of my friends and I were looking for something to do, and just happened to end up in a mall that just happened to be playing Iron Man! (We had all been part of the original group that saw it the first time.) We again justified it by saying we wanted to see the after-credit sequence. Before hand, we got cheeseburgers at McDonald’s, because, well, because.
4) Prague. My mom had come to town, and in trying to figure out things to do, I just had to recommend Iron Man. Later, when we were in Vienna we saw a Burger King! And I got cheeseburgers and at least one kid’s meal, such that we could procure an Iron Man toy.
5) Paris. I was alone here, and had already had a very long day of sightseeing (walked to Eiffel Tower, then Notre Dame, La Sorbonne, Jardin du Luxembourg, and wandering through the catacombs), so when I happened upon a theater playing Iron Man, I figured I deserved two hours of sitting in air-conditioned, cushy comfort. Since French, unlike Czech, is apparently a real language, it was dubbed instead of subtitled. When I was getting the tickets, the lady was somewhat skeptical and asked me if I knew it was in French (she asked me this IN FRENCH), and I said “oui” and went in anyway. I pretty much knew the whole thing line for line, anyway, and added some pretty good translations to my memory. (“Oh, oui, est super-cool,” “Je suis Iron Man.”)
6) NYC. Oh, the longest, painful stretch. Waiting so patiently for it to come out on DVD. I sort of watched bits and pieces of it when I first got it, but I didn’t watch it all the way through until my Prague-friend came to visit. Since one of our main bonding moments had been Iron Man (she was at #1 and #3), we watched with one of my suitemates, who hadn’t seen it before. Still amazing, even tiny and in English!
7) NYC. And this was just the other day–like a week after my last DVD viewing. Another one of my suitemates hadn’t seen it either, and I’m now the designated Iron Man patron, so people know where to come. About halfway through, another one of my suitemates came in–she had already seen it, but she was trying to watch Life is Beautiful for class and needed a pick-me-up movie to get her spirits up. And Tony Stark is nothing if not inspiring.
And that’s it! So far. I give it my screenwriting class stamp of approval too–it’s very smart, and I think that’s one of the reasons people responded to it so well. Also RDJ can basically do no wrong, moviewise.
not listed: quantum of solace, the wicker man November 17, 2008
Hello from the middle of what (I hope) is the most hellacious period of my semester–I knew it was coming, but after a lovely fall break, I’ve had a nonstop schedule of visitors, tests, papers, and so on. It should ease a little bit after tomorrow’s midterm–assuming I get a decent amount of work done on my final papers next weekend.
I have managed to partake in a few distractions of the cinematic sort lately though–last Thursday, I went to a midnight showing of the new James Bond movie, Quantum of Solace. It was pretty shallow construction-wise, and it seemed to pretty much be a compilation of chase scenes, often parallel-edited with some sort of other performance to enhance the metaphor. I can’t say for sure I ever had a handle on the plot, but I really like Daniel Craig as Bond and I’ve had a fondness for Mathieu Amalric since spending two hours inside his head. At the very least, I think Craig provides equal-opportunity superficiality for the Bond movies (not just the Bond girls anymore), so I enjoy that.
As a response to watching the old-school Wicker Man earlier, I just watched the new version with Nicolas Cage. I thought I had prepared myself, but it was actually worse than I imagined. Everything that was charming or eccentric or interesting about the old one had been removed, and everyone was just kind of going through the motions of it. It was like everyone involved had seen the movie 30 years ago, then decided to recreate it without bothering to watch it again. Plus there was a pretty blatant Misery ripoff, which I did not appreciate. There were lots of ridiculous lines (“What’s in that bag? A shark?”/”How’d it get burned? How’d it get BURNED?”/”Step away from the bicycle”), although it did have a couple of creepy moments.
Anywho. Photos from my fall break to Miami are here, here, and here. A gorgeous (and tasty) city, indeed. It was only my second time to Florida, but ultimately much more successful and pleasant than the middle school Epcot (BLEH) adventure. Also I can still kind of speak/understand Spanish! A pleasant surprise.
#45: the wicker man October 26, 2008
Aside from already having seen the big, climatic moment of the movie on the Bravo special (one of the problems with now seeing all the movies on the list), I’d also seen bits of this in my psychoanalysis class last semester. Our professor played the part where the boys are outside dancing around a maypole, then the teacher asks the girls what the maypole represents, and they all gleefully shout, “the phallic symbol!”
All in all, it’s actually a pretty awesome movie, although I can’t imagine how on earth they could think a remake would be a good idea (clearly, it wasn’t). The main struggle–between a man who seems to be the most pious Chrisitan ever and this “evil” pagan community–is pretty outdated by any terms. For the majority of the movie, he seems more outraged that they don’t teach their children about Jesus than the fact that they may or may not be sacrificing people to their “heathen” gods. The boy needs to take a chill pill and let these people live their lives, seriously.
Maybe it’s because I had already seen the Big Ending on Bravo, but to me, the far scarier moments were the little casual creepiness that popped up throughout the movie. A body part next to the bed. A hare in a coffin. A line of people in animal masks silently watching the hero and then disappearing. That’s not to say that big burning things aren’t fun to watch, I just don’t find them very scary.
I’ll be in Florida next week for fall break, so I’m not sure if I’ll have time to watch more movies before then… we can hope, though.
newman party October 24, 2008
Oh, I did successfully have a Newman Party last weekend! It was pretty special. We watched Hud and I made a dozen perfect hardboiled eggs (unfortunately I couldn’t convince people that we could indeed eat 50 between us), lots of delicious Newman cookies, lemonade, and of course a salad with lots of Newman dressing. All in all a very good night. More pictures after the cut.
#88: easy rider October 23, 2008
This was kind of exciting, because it was the first movie that I’ve seen in a pretty long while that I actually DIDN’T like! Lately I’ve been handing out four-star Netflix reviews like candy, so it was kind of satisfying to know that I still have a critical bone in my body.
That being said, I’m sure I was born of the wrong time to appreciate a movie like this, because so much of it seemed to be about rebelliousness and innovation and disregard for The Man. But watching it now, we were just sitting there waiting for a plot to show up (it didn’t), trying to figure out when Jack Nicholson would get there because he was the only person we knew was in it beforehand, and in general laughing at the hippies/mimes. I also think that conflict between the square townfolk and the biker guys seemed kind of silly in today’s world–because I really don’t think biker guys are the main scorn of small town America anymore, and the fact that they ever were seems kind of quaint in a way. Plus when I think about bikers, I think of Hell’s Angels, so these guys were just kind of some lame hippies in comparison.
I really liked Jack Nicholson, though his part was way too short. Plus, to make things worse, none of these actors, even in their prime, had anything on Pacino or Brando or Newman or… well, I think those are the only hunky gentlemen I’ve mentioned here, but there was definitely nobody of that aesthetic caliber in the movie. And that can definitely be a redeeming quality in trying times.
Oh, and I also didn’t understand why they bothered to make Nicholson’s character a lawyer for the ACLU…? Not that there was really ever a point in the film where I understood what was happening, but it seemed like an oddly specific detail, especially to include on the short plot summary on the disc case.
Luckily, I had gotten my ACLU fix earlier in the week, as we had watched both Operation Abolition (produced by HUAC) and Operation Correction (produced by ACLU) in my documentary class. The HUAC one was this “documentary” about a protest in the Bay Area, and they were trying to justify the police’s actions (mass arrests, fire hoses, etc.) by using footage from the event. But then the ACLU made this reponse video, which took the exact same footage, but had their own voiceover with entirely different facts than the ones HUAC had presented. It was pretty interesting to see how much your opinion could be changed just based on a voiceover… although I think as a modern audience, we were all pretty skeptical of HUAC’s initial claims of “communist agitators” and protestors beating police over the heads with their nightsticks.
I also watched Hud (Paul Newman) the other day, but I am trying to get back on the theme here. So if AFI ever recognizes it on a list, I’ll talk about it then.
#??: cat on a hot tin roof October 18, 2008
Ok, ok, I get it AFI: just because Paul Newman is in it, doesn’t make it a classic, right? Well, I’m just going to continue blatantly disregarding the rules I laid out at the start here and keep watching and writing about them.
Actually, I think I was more surprised that Cat on a Hot Tin Roof wasn’t on this other list I’ve been using, “The 1001 Movies to See Before You Die.” Because 1001 movies seem like an awful lot! But really, it’s not at all–I’ve been keeping yet another list, which is, to the best of my memory and ability, a list of all the movies I’ve ever seen (I probably sound like I’m obsessed with lists, probably because I am). And according to that, I’ve seen 1083 movies. And yet, on this “1001″ list, I’ve only seen 234! I think that is a pretty significant lack of overlap, given that it’s not like I’m sitting here watching the entire series of Ernest Goes to…. movies or anything.
Anyway, I really liked Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. It was much funnier than I was expecting, especially Big Daddy’s utter hatred of his little no-neck monster grandkids (Big Mama: “Don’t you want to ride home with the children, Big Daddy?” Big Daddy: “NO!”). Everyone was great: simmering and steamy, just like a Tennesse Williams should be. He’s great at introducing the dramatic question very early on, and then just slowly building things up, waiting until the very last minute to wrap everything up. And I, of course, liked that my birthday buddy, Liz Taylor, was at her very sauciest.
Hud is somewhere between the Netflix shipping facility and my mailbox–supposed to have arrived yesterday, but our mail room usually takes an extra day to process things, and are, obviously, closed on weekends. So it’ll have to wait until next weekend… but it’s been so long! I’m having my Newman party today or tomorrow, if I’m on top of things I’ll post pics.
