Monster Post
I never post, so here is a monster post to make up for that. I will try to post more often in the future. I'm getting back into the mix of things, and regularity and schedule are good for me. I've been pretty guarded about revealing much about myself on here, figuring it best to leave any clues for friend's of mine who might stumble across this. Fuck that. For one thing, it overestimates their online adventurousness, and for a second, fuck em anyway. If they find it, I'll just shut it down and start a new blog away from their prying eyes, one with no readers at all to really ensure my privacy. Anyway...
Saw a couple of really good movies this weekend. Brokeback Mountain might be the movie of the year. I've yet to see A History of Violence or Syriana, so it's possible that one of those is better, but Brokeback is definitely much better than almost everything else I saw last year. A slow and tough movie, the brutal humanity of it makes it truly fun to watch. Heath Ledger finally proves himself an actor, going all Brando on us with a full scale transformation of the way he talked, walked, basically existed within the movie. It was actually pretty distracting in the first twenty minutes or so. The thing about performances like that though is that if done well, you stop noticing it so much and fall into the plot and story as things move along and I think they pretty much succeeded in that. Gyllenhaal didn't have as great a transformation, essentially playing a variation on himself, and I wasn't so enthralled with his performance until later in the movie, when he plays older and has my very favorite scene in the movie. "You sit down! This is my house! This is my child! And you are my guest! So sit the hell down or I'll knock your ignorant ass into next week!" That's old Jack Twist finally demanding respect and doing it in style. The old man sits down and Jack wins our respect as well. I'm sick of and will no longer be sympathizing with wimpy fucking characters in movies, novels, whatever no matter how they much represent the geeky, reserved, hesitant aspect of my own character. I read Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man last week and I was so fucking cheesed at the character the entire time. No matter how much I identify with his fears and issues, I really can't deal with characters who refuse to act, or to think, or to question. I can't live life like that and I can't stand it in anyone, fictional or otherwise anymore. Send word to Jim Carrey's Eternal Sunshine character about this as well. Back to Brokeback though, I'm still marveling at the fact that this movie was directed by the guy who royally screwed up the Hulk movie. Good going, Ang. Oh, and my other favorite moment in the movie is watching Alma Del Mar (Ledger's wife) when she sees Jack Twist (is that a great name or what?) driving up. If the devil himself had ridden up, hallowed in spikes and riding a red hot poker, that woman would not have been more fearful. It was great.
Now if I could just have disposed of the weird dude sitting beside me, who started breathing really hard at the very first sex scene and then wouldn't stop all the way till the end of the movie. Dude came with two women too. I truly hope neither of them is sleeping with him, or life may come to imitate art a little too much for their comfort. The other movie I saw yesterday was The Warriors, which was totally transcendent. I love finding all this stuff, movies, music, books that has been there and wonderful for years, but I'm just discovering. I read Ralph Ellison for the first time in 2006, listened to the Clash and the Beatles for the first time in 2004 and only came to truly appreciate Bogart in 2005. I'm glad to see that there is much else for me to discover in the world. Art makes existence worth it. It's impossible for me to watch The Warriors or anything like it and remain completely disillusioned with life and living it. This is no way means that I relinquish any nihilism I may possess though. Anyway, at this point, I'm going to end this post and move the other things I want to talk about into a separate one.
Saw a couple of really good movies this weekend. Brokeback Mountain might be the movie of the year. I've yet to see A History of Violence or Syriana, so it's possible that one of those is better, but Brokeback is definitely much better than almost everything else I saw last year. A slow and tough movie, the brutal humanity of it makes it truly fun to watch. Heath Ledger finally proves himself an actor, going all Brando on us with a full scale transformation of the way he talked, walked, basically existed within the movie. It was actually pretty distracting in the first twenty minutes or so. The thing about performances like that though is that if done well, you stop noticing it so much and fall into the plot and story as things move along and I think they pretty much succeeded in that. Gyllenhaal didn't have as great a transformation, essentially playing a variation on himself, and I wasn't so enthralled with his performance until later in the movie, when he plays older and has my very favorite scene in the movie. "You sit down! This is my house! This is my child! And you are my guest! So sit the hell down or I'll knock your ignorant ass into next week!" That's old Jack Twist finally demanding respect and doing it in style. The old man sits down and Jack wins our respect as well. I'm sick of and will no longer be sympathizing with wimpy fucking characters in movies, novels, whatever no matter how they much represent the geeky, reserved, hesitant aspect of my own character. I read Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man last week and I was so fucking cheesed at the character the entire time. No matter how much I identify with his fears and issues, I really can't deal with characters who refuse to act, or to think, or to question. I can't live life like that and I can't stand it in anyone, fictional or otherwise anymore. Send word to Jim Carrey's Eternal Sunshine character about this as well. Back to Brokeback though, I'm still marveling at the fact that this movie was directed by the guy who royally screwed up the Hulk movie. Good going, Ang. Oh, and my other favorite moment in the movie is watching Alma Del Mar (Ledger's wife) when she sees Jack Twist (is that a great name or what?) driving up. If the devil himself had ridden up, hallowed in spikes and riding a red hot poker, that woman would not have been more fearful. It was great.
Now if I could just have disposed of the weird dude sitting beside me, who started breathing really hard at the very first sex scene and then wouldn't stop all the way till the end of the movie. Dude came with two women too. I truly hope neither of them is sleeping with him, or life may come to imitate art a little too much for their comfort. The other movie I saw yesterday was The Warriors, which was totally transcendent. I love finding all this stuff, movies, music, books that has been there and wonderful for years, but I'm just discovering. I read Ralph Ellison for the first time in 2006, listened to the Clash and the Beatles for the first time in 2004 and only came to truly appreciate Bogart in 2005. I'm glad to see that there is much else for me to discover in the world. Art makes existence worth it. It's impossible for me to watch The Warriors or anything like it and remain completely disillusioned with life and living it. This is no way means that I relinquish any nihilism I may possess though. Anyway, at this point, I'm going to end this post and move the other things I want to talk about into a separate one.
posted by Flint at 5:00 PM
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