Entrekin

Everyone’s doing decade-end top-ten lists, and I keep reading them and not seeing anything I thought was awesome, so I decided to do my own, one each for movies, music, and books. I’ve decided to post them in that order, if only because the book one will probably be the most difficult. Always is. Love books, after all.

Rolling Stone named There Will Be Blood as its number-one movie of the first decade of the millennium, which I think disqualifies the rest of the list (which, in addition, ends with the mind-numbingly endless Lord of the Rings trilogy, or, as I like to refer to it, “That Fucking Day I’ll Never Get Back”). It’s filled with the usual suspects, No Country for Old Men and A History of Violence and Mulholland Drive; lots of, you know, arty sort of movies people always mistake the boringness of for things like subtlety and craft.

Gag me with a spork.

This past decade was pretty awesome for movies, though you wouldn’t know it from most top ten lists. There was a lot of stuff blowing up in ways we’d never seen shit blown up before. There was a whole lot of being really, really ridiculously good looking (spoiler spot!). We didn’t just believe a man could fly; we believed a man could build a suit that would enable him to fly.

Which was totally rad.

So I started to think about a top-ten list. I started to make up a top-ten list, in fact. And then it got long, when I realized how many absolutely awesome movies had been made in the last decade, and how many were going to go ignored. So I’m going with two top-ten movies of the past decade list: the absolute top ten, and then the top ten movies that didn’t make the top-ten list itself. I figured I’d start with the latter, all of which you can call number eleven.

Read the rest of this entry »

Not long ago, I went to a Philly bar called Eulogy with my best friend. This bar is a Belgian sort of pub one feature of which is a private room with a table like a coffin, and this best friend is a guy earning his master’s in literature but who also moonlights as a keyboardist in one band and a lead guitarist in another, which I hope will intimate the overall atmosphere. If only because my buddy and I have the conversation where we discuss Derrida but totally admit to neither ever reading or understanding the guy.

Over the course of (several) fine Belgian beers (Rochefort 10 ftw!), we started talking about Heath Ledger and The Dark Knight. Now, what you have to know, straight off, is that while we’re good buddies, he and I rarely agree on anything related to either music or movies. We both like music in general and good music in particular, but we have very different definitions as to what that exactly means.

So, Heath Ledger. The Dark Knight.
Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve read a bit over the past week about the Orange Prize, which is a literary prize awarded to a woman and judged by a panel comprised exclusively of women, as a response to the literary subjugation of women in the literary world. There’s been a bit of a kerfuffle; A.S. Byatt (author of Possession) denounced it as a sexist prize, with which Tim Lott agrees. So one side of the camp (and the award’s organization) claims that it needs a prize because women have not received their proper due, whereas the other side of the camp argues it’s unnecessary. Various heated arguments have ensued, if by ‘heated’ we mean ‘various bloggers have contributed their free two cents.’

Lott makes a few good points, opening with:

Here is a selection of groups that have been consistently under-represented among the winners of the UK’s two major book prizes, the Booker and the Costa/Whitbread: the white working class (0); West Indians (1); black Africans (0); disabled writers (0).

No one has funded a prize for these groups. However the Orange Prize was set up in 1996 to give women their own prize – because of perceived under-representation in the Booker. Despite 12 years of consciousness-raising by the Orange, the Booker still doesn’t give women their just mathematical due – a 3:10 ratio remains. But given that women have won five out of the last six Whitbread/Costas, does the level of injustice remain enough to justify the Orange?

Although the idea of applying ‘mathematical dues’ and ‘ratios’ to anything concerning writing hurts my head.

It’s a post both The Girl Detective and We are in debt took umbrage with and argued with, to various degrees of efficacy. My students would be quick to point out that calling anyone “Neanderthals” outside of an anthropoligical/taxonomical context is immediately ad hominem (a phrase meaning “against the man,” which may be particularly appropriate in this context).

Which also probably describes my own thoughts on this, as well as the probable argument that I am not entitled to them. I should not think about such issues because, as an average white male, I have no right. That Debt blog notes that “there’s no such thing as a reverse -ism,” but I’d disagree with that, especially in consideration of a phrase later used: “Leave it to a man.” Right. Because all we white males believe precisely the same thing and act precisely the same way, and we’ve all subjugated and oppressed every woman we’ve ever met because to do otherwise threatens our alpha-supremacy in the world.

The author later notes “The author of this silly piece seems to think that women are a “dominant” group, like “whites” (wrong)” but I wonder if that’s truly the case. First, a quibble: technically, women are more numerous, as a gender, than men–isn’t the population split still, like, 52% to 55% (versus, wait, I can do this–48% and 45%, respectively) in favor of women? I get that the trouble spot is in the definition of “dominant,” and that to be more populous does not necessarily equate to dominance, but still it isn’t technically wrong to state that women are a dominant group, for most definitions of the term. Not to mention that simply calling an argument ‘silly,’ or ‘wrong-headed’ or whatever doesn’t actually forward any real argument, and, indeed, if nothing else, brings the debate down.

The argument seems to be whether the Orange prize is necessary, but I have to admit I have trouble believing any literary prize is actually necessary. I don’t really get them, any more than I really get the whole Oscars thing; what, exactly, is a best picture, and on what level was No Country for Old Men better than Zodiac (I can think of many ways it was worse, but few better)? Given a real ballot with nominees (of any medium or genre) of any actual merit, terms like “better” actually cease to exist, I think. And does it really denote anything? Looking over Wikipedia’s list of nominees and winners, the only book on it I’ve ever read is Yann Martel’s Life of Pi, which I thought was overrated. I’ve picked up books by the usual suspects (Zadie Smith, Margaret Atwood, Ian McEwan, etc.), but have felt the same way toward theirs; nothing to inspire me to read beyond the first ten pages.

Maybe bad writers need awards to get recognition in a marketplace of books by people who know how to tell stories? Who’s Booker, and why does their list matter so much? There was a recent blogbate over Zadie’s Smith’s decision, as judge and jury for the Willesden (sp?) Herald’s award, to not award anything because it wasn’t good enough; who, besides WH, decided Zadie Smith is some arbiter of quality? More important, one of the members of the Orange jury is Lily Allen. Of MySpace fame.

Has Lily Allen ever even read a book? Her comments on Radiohead’s ‘devaluation of art’ seem to demonstrate she is perfectly content to argue based on superficial preconception with neither basis nor experience to bear them up.

One of Girl Detective’s arguments is:

I’d love to see a society in which women’s needs are catered to in the marketplace – where, say, every billboard has a picture of a naked man on it – and products for men just don’t exist. I wouldn’t want to live there – I’d just like to poke around a bit.

Does this mean that products for women, in the current marketplace, “just don’t exist,” whereas men’s every need is catered to? Also, I wonder where GD lives; I live in Hollywood, and there are plenty of naked men on billboards. Plenty of giant images of sharply chiseled jaws like none of us really have, washboard abs like none of us will ever really manage to get… etc. What female needs aren’t catered to, exactly?

No, really, I’d love to know, because as I’ve learned in my marketing class, built-in need-based target markets are a fucking gold mine, and I’d love to not be a broke-ass grad student anymore.

Speaking of mines, I’m sure this is probably one, and I expect debate/discussion (though not all together much, because who really reads this blog yet?), but if we can refrain from calling me a whiny Neanderthal, that’d be awesome.

Because, I mean, come on, it’s kind of the obvious strategy, isn’t it?

Really, Oscar? Really?

I just watched the Coen brothers’ No Country for Old Men. It was ostensibly a Western based on the book of the same name by Cormac McCarthy, starring Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin, and Tommy Lee Jones, about a man who happens across a drug-running deal gone awry and finds a satchel full of money. How much, you ask? Not sure, but it was a small satchel full of hundreds, so probably a million, tops. Not much more, certainly.

I’m very proud of myself for having written the above paragraph without saying anything actually negative about the film. My mother always said if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything, but I managed to say something without its being not-so-nice.

Though I could. Oh, boy how I could.

I’ve not seen A Simple Plan, with Billy Bob Thornton and Bill Paxton, but I’d wager the movies (and their books) had similar themes; you happen across money procured via ill-gotten ways, and you try to keep it, and Bad Stuff Happens. ™

Javier Bardem seems to have gotten a lot of press and respect for a bad haircut, but John Cusack played a much better, more layered hitman in Grosse Point Blank. I realize the movies are pretty much on opposite ends, but the only thing Bardem’s character lacked was a mustache he could twirl as the sociopathic villain sans sense of humor. Monomaniacal in his single-minded pursuit of the money. Hired by someone? I never caught that. He just shoots a lot of people, sometimes with a little attachment dohickey on the end of an oxygen tank. Which Tommy Lee Jones mentions completely non sequitur in a completely unrelated scene, because, as you know, Bob, this is how cattle ranches work.

Tommy Lee Jones was certainly the best part of the movie. There really weren’t any characters to care about. Josh Brolin, while certainly not unlikable, wasn’t all together sympathetic, either, and he wanted only one thing clearly; to survive with money. As motivations go, certainly, it’s what we all hope, but he does some fairly stupid things several times along the way (like chucking the briefcase over a border fence it’s not clear why he’s crossing, anyway).

I think what most disappoints me is the movies ignored. I mentioned both Zodiac and Gone Baby Gone in a post the the other day; as crime movies go (and No Country was, pretty much, a crime movie set in the Southwest), both were far superior in their own ways. Casey Affleck’s troubled detective fought hard to save the life of a young girl despite that her mother was not the most responsible person in the world; a definite motivational dilemma that sought but never found an easy answer. Even the den–denou–climax/resolution was layered and nuanced.

Zodiac was even better, and was the sort of movie Fincher should have been recognized for. Fincher is an easily recognized director, stylistically; watch Fight Club and Panic Room and there are telltale signs it was the same guy. In a good way. Even his lesser appreciated fare (Sean Penn: better in The Game than in anything since he was Spicoli? Discuss) has his fingerprints all over it.

Until Zodiac. He was completely invisible, like Scorsese was finally invisible in The Departed. Fincher finally gave his utmost attention to simply telling the story well, without tricks or gimmicks, and man did it ever work. Even Gyllenhaal gave the sort of performance that makes you forget your watching Gyllenhaal.

Zodiac was not my favorite movie, but it was certainly one of the most perfectly conceived and executed films I’ve ever had the distinct pleasure of watching.

And it should whooped No Country all over the place last night.

Which ultimately means that the only thing the Academy actually got right last night was the award it gave Once.

I won’t be watching the show. I think it might be tomorrow night, though I’ve been hearing about it for ages. Between speculation about whether the WGA strike would allow it to be held in the first place to feverish coverage of Juno‘s screenwriter and Javier Bardem’s pageboy hairdo in No Country for Old Men, it’s been pretty impossible to miss.

I won’t be watching them because I have no real desire to see any of the nominations. I think Juno is really only this year’s version of Little Miss Sunshine, and the only reason I saw that one was because I went with my best buddy. I enjoyed the latter, certainly, and it was certainly well crafted, well written, and well structured, and it certainly had a lot of heart

–but.

(you knew there would be a ‘but’, of course). I don’t know; it was technically good, and enjoyable, but mostly– well, let’s just come right out and let me admit I like blowing shit up. My favorite movie is Shakespeare in Love, but my top ten is filled with the likes of V for Vendetta, Casino Royale, and Mission: Impossible III (also: The Sixth Sense). I’ve never been a huge fan of smaller indie movies (that last I mentioned because it comes about as close as I get). Grosse Point Blank is, I think, the closest I come to indie, and while it doesn’t blow anything up, there are silencers around.

So the full disclosure is that I’m not sure I’ve seen anything nominated, but when has lack of knowledge ever prevented anyone from writing about something, especially on the Internet? Tha Interwebs were invented for unfounded opinions from people who don’t know what they’re talking about, weren’t they?

In keeping with blowing shit up, how about some bullets?

-I’m tired of hearing about Diablo Cody, although I’ve begun to consider renaming myself The Jesus Casidy. With one ‘s’, because it’s cooler.

-The Coen brothers are interesting enough that I want to see No Country despite everything good I’ve read about it, but that’s because I like they’re stuff. I’ve always liked their stuff (though I think it’s a little too quirky just for the sake of being so). Intolerable Cruelty might be George Clooney’s best movie, and this from a guy who loves the entire Ocean’sfranchise (dear Mr. Soderbergh: you’re going backward. What we want is Ocean’s Five, with Damon, Pitt, Clooney, Cheadle, and Izzard, pulling off a low-tech heist of a low-tech casino, shot like Full Frontal. Get right on it, please).

-I’m more impressed that Daniel Day Lewis has cobbled shoes by any of his performances I’ve ever seen. Not that they were bad, mind, but he seems a poster child for the whole “Life’s too serious to be taken seriously,” as are work and craft. Dear Mr. Day Lewis: you’re an actor. Lighten up. Unless you want to do more cobbling of shoes, in which case, I wear an 8. Thank you.

***

I think one of the reasons I’m so disappointed is that two movies I loved were completely ignored. Zodiac is very nearly as close to perfect a movie as I’ve ever seen; it’s a lot like The Shawshank Redemption in that it manages to tell precisely the story it set out to in precisely the way it needed to, without gimmick or spectacle. A perfect example of a director really letting the story do the work. It’s the sort of movie someone who knows about how movies are made watches and thinks, wow, that’s well done, because the craft of it is just about invisible. It’s so subtle.

Also: Gone Baby Gone was robbed in just about every category. Best picture, best director, best actor, best supporting actor, best adapted screenplay . . . in a truly awesome world, Affleck would have won his second, third, and fourth Oscars for this movie, though it would have been a damned close race with Fincher.

But congratulations, Oscar, for nominating Casey. Just a shame you got the wrong movie.