Will we ever recapture the magic that was 1984?

The Adventures Of Buckaroo Banzai, Beverly Hills Cop, Blood Simple, Ghostbusters, The Killing Fields, Repo Man, Stranger Than Paradise, The Terminator, Amadeus, The Karate Kid, A Nightmare On Elm Street, once Upon A Time In America, Romancing The Stone, Starman, Birdy, All of Me, The Brother From Another Planet, Gremlins, The Muppets Take Manhattan, Splash, Top Secret!, The Ice Pirates, Night Of The Comet, The Ewok Adventure, The Last Starfighter, Police Academy, Revenge Of The Nerds, Sixteen Candles, Star Trek III: The Search For Spock, Swing Shift, Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo, Dune, The Flamingo Kid, Footloose, Red Dawn, Bachelor Party, C.H.U.D., Hardbodies, Purple Rain, Stop Making Sense

BE MORE FUNNY!

That last post was just sad and self-indulgent and reeked of self-pity.

Listening to NPR yesterday and learned that in Papau New Guinea one of the biggest sex filled day is the celebration of the Yam Festival. I guess it is okay to have sex with anyone, regardless of martial status. That is how they celebrate the yam. How do we American's celebrate the yam? We don't! It MAYBE gets sideshow billin' on Thanksgiving. Do we have any tubers that we celebrate with sex with strangers? NO!

On the other hand, the radio report was about the rampant spread of AIDS in Papau New Guinea. Win some, lose some.

What else have I learned recently? Red Envelope is selling leather beer holsters. However they're all sold out.

I had something up on Overheard in New York, and of course I had a typo.

Saw X-Men 3 (oops. Sorry. X-Men: The Last Stand). Heh. It was loud, poorly written, but servicible. But explain to me this: If you are just planning on killing the kid, and can lift the Golden Gate Bridge, why not just drop it on him? Or at least ram in into his room?

Ghost Rider trailer. I enjoy watching Nicky Cage hit his head or catch on fire... but beyond that it sure looks like Spawn on a Motorcycle. And that is no Snakes on a Plane.

I went to Trader Joe's in Manhattan. It was wrong. Not the same as on the West Coast. Not at all. It looks right... but it feels just wrong. It's like Zaibar's on Mel Rose. It made me very sad.

But I bought same very tasty rice crackers. Love their rice crackers.

TV season is in hiatus and the summer movies are looking bleak. Lookin'forward to Superman Returns and Pirates 2. And I am sure I will relish The Break Up. Unless it has a happy ending. No happy ending for you!

Causing damage

Sigh.

Even when one tries your best to not continue to damage those close to you, the littlest thing can do it. It's very frusterating. My very existance stretches across the internetawebthingy and I either have to become invisible or just stop worrying about it.

I like to share my interests with people, I want to have them share them with me. I want to build a circle of friends that is based off of:
•A Shared Joy of the Ridiculous
•An Appreciation of Pop-Culture and High-Culture
•Humor
•Not Sex
•Food
•Respect
•Creativity in all it's forms

I spend all day calling myself out for crap, it is tiring being called out for something silly.

Okay, rant over. Sunday is the first taping of Project Improviser. The book is being edited in a frenzy (although I have a mid-chapter that I'm holding off on until June 24th and the Mermaid Day Parade). I am slowly building a community... but I am getting tired of drama.

Project Improviser!

PROJECT IMPROVISER is a new internet video show that is a reality competition for long form improv. A group of eight performers will be chosen and each week they will work on a different form, which they will perform at School Night. They will then get evaluated by a panel of judges and each week one person will be eliminated. And along the way, they will have various other fun challenges that they will participate in.

I just found out I will one of the eight. I have a feeling I will be the greenhorn, the diamond in the rough, the darkhorse, the outsider, the unknown. I am very excited and just a tad scared.

I don't know when the webisodes will be going up (but our first taping is Sunday the 4th). The first live performances/contests will be Wednesdays at 11pm at The Upright Citizens Brigade starting June 7th.

Here is the site: PROJECT IMPROVISER. (Yes, nothing is there yet.)

Sita Sings the Blues

As you know I just love mash ups. This isn't really a mash up. More of a great mixing of genres. I find this extremely charming. So I present to you...

Sita Sings the Blue

How I spend my evenings

I started taking improv classes recently. It's been eons since I have flexed my performance muscles and it feels so frackin' fantastic to get up infront of people again. I remember that one of the reasons I stopped performing was that I spoke too quickly and slurred my words. But it seems that I am getting slower in my old age.

So part of the deal with the classes is that we're supposed to see as much improv as we can. Well, I can see a lot. And I have seen a lot. Tons and tons of improv. What is enjoyable about seeing shows at UCB is that a lot of the erformers are on different teams. You can get to know their personal styles and then watcvh how it fies into different groups. What it does do is make me want to play. Man, do i ever want to play.

So many evenings go like this for me. Head to the Tea Lounge with the computer and the novel and work on editing for a couple of hours. Then I head to UCB and continue editing between shows. Then I come home. Not thrilling, I realize. But it gets me out of the house.

Last night I got to see Lonesome Jack, which was of course fantastic and to short, but that mattered little since I had to get to UCB to see Death By RooRoo. But something occured to me while watching the show. I'm not even sure I want to discuss it as it brings up thorny issues. But I am working realy hard with being honest with myself and others.

Anyway, here's the deal: Why do I find myself attracted to almost every woman I see on stage? Okay, that's a big exaggeration, but there is truth to it. I am absolutely at a point in my life where I cannot be involved with anyone. It is such a firm belief of mine right now that I tend not to respond to anyone. But then I see a someone on stage, in the moment, and it just gets me. Deep in the stomach. Most often it is women who play unusual instruments. Seriously, I have no idea why this is the case. It has happened at UCB a couple of times, but it is less consistent. At UCB, I get turned on (for lack of a better word) when a woman does tha perfect scene, when see is absolutely in the moment and hits just the right tone. And then, when she steps out of the scene, when she steps to the back wall, and I watch that grin, that joy, of what she just created... seriously, I am pretty sure there is nothing hotter.

Now, what bugs me is that this low level/short term infutation is based on nothing but a performance that they are givingthe entire audience. It's not for me, but there is that back part of my brain that reads it as such. Without trying to creep out anyone who might read this, I see that playful glimmer in a certain flutist's eyes as she is singing, and my stomache goes all a flitter as if it were directed at me. I realize that this is the power of perfortmance/fame. I just like to think I am immune to that sort of thing. But, lately...

I suppose that right now it is a safe way for me to feel physicial and emotional attraction without having to get anywhere near the actually having a relationship. Which of course makes me sad. I wish I could just turn that off and just not feel the desire for companionship. But of course I can't.

The only other potential news right now is that I have applied to be in "Project: Improviser." It will be a weekly America's Next Top Model Chief Idol thing at UCB starting in June. 8 performers, each week one will get cut. There will also be web episodes. Very very slim chance I'll get picked, but I sent in my info and my old Survivor Application video and we'll see. I should hear next weekend. send good thoughts my way.

Lazy Ramadi

This is just a beautiful sign of the world we live in.

Background if you don't spend as much timew on the internet as I do:
SNL had a video called "Lazy Sunday" that founds its way to the internet and became a huge success. Then some folks did a west coast version called "Lazy Monday," which in turn spawned "Lazy Muncie," with in turn spawn this:


Oh, what a beautiful world.

The flip side of United 93

To me, this appears exploitive. (requires quicktime)

It looks like Pearl Harbor. But I have never been an Oliver Stone fan.

United 93

Watching the movie United 93 in an empty theater at 5pm on a Monday was perhaps the best way to see it. It is movie that you should make up your own mind about, more than any film I've seen in good long while. It is not a movie that you should be comparing notes about, sharing your 'favorite scenes,' talking about which actor you though was great or which was terrible. It's a movie that you need to take into yourself and reflect on your own feelings...both about the movie and the true event on which it is based.

First the things that matter less. It is well made, well written and well performed. No one performance stands out, because no one character is given prominence. There is no fancy writing, no fancy lighting, no fancy editing. And that is how it should be. It takes you through the events of that morning and ends where it should with minimal exposition. It is both unflinching and heavy handed. As far as I can tell it has no agenda besides presenting the story as well as it can. A story that we will never no the real truth of.

Stories are important. Bed time stories, fictional stories, stories of our past, stories of history. September 11th gave each of us on particular story to tell: where you were. No event since the sixties shootings of Kennedy, Kennedy and King has the same weight of being able to crystallize a single moment in so many minds. Telling stories of that day is a right of passage particularly for New Yorkers. I don't mean this to lessen anyone else's stories, but New York was especially affected by 9/11. These stories are important. They help us remember such a pivotal event, and event that is so shaping the world right now. There is the before-and-after feeling of that day. Right now think about how the world has changed. Think about not your daily life, but EVERYTHING. It is the fulcrum on which the next decade, perhaps century will be balanced on.

That's why United 93 is an important movie and why now was the time to make it. We need to remember that moment of realization that everything had changed. And, if anything, that what this movie is about. Many have said it is about heroes. Perhaps for some, but for me it is about desperation. It is about that singular moment in time when you suddenly realize that nothing will be the same again. It is about that sudden shift from one reality to the next. It is about the airtraffic controllers and administrators suddenly faced with a world that made no sense, information that made no sense. It is about not having a plan for something seemingly inconceivable and attempting the parse it into a plan of action. It is particularly about the passengers and crew on United Flight 93 being faced with certain death and no time and doing something. They didn't have the luxury of absorbing the images from CNN or Fox News. This movies is about that moment. It's not about choices. It's about the lack of choices.

There of course has been much talk that to even make this movie is exploitation, that it is too soon, that it is the filmmakers trying to make money off tragedy.

Bullshit.

Let's first consider a studio head or a producer being presented with this movie. Do you honestly think that any of them would say, "Hey, sounds like a summer block buster!"?

Secondly, people have become so jaded by Hollywood, any movie, that they forget that film can be Art (yes, capital 'A'). The vast vast majority of films are entertainment. From the Mission Impossible 3s to the artiest of art films, they are still, on some level, entertainment.

United 93 is not entertainment. It is Art. It is an attempt to capture a moment of time that defies journalism. Yes, it is not the real event. It is an interpretation of those events, as is all history, as is all art. But it is important (but not Important) because this is the story of how our world became to be. And, like all great Art, if you allow it to penetrate you, it will bring up emotions from your depth. It will make your remember and reflect.

Should you see it? I can't say. It will not be for everyone right now. Everyone needs to come to it when they are ready. If you have any reservations about bringing those emotions back up, don't see it. Don't see it because someone tells you that it is 'great.' You need top approach a film like this on your own accord,on your own terms. And it has flaws. (There is one European character, perhaps German, that is given a role, that while it fits into the scheme of possible reactions to the hijacking, is still disappointing. Why the one non-American passenger, not counting the hijackers? If I ever get director/writer Peter Greengrass in a locked room, I have some harsh questions for him.) All I can say is that it is the one movie I had no desire to pick apart. Those that know me know I love to pick things apart, so that is saying a lot.


One final note: I spend way too much time on the internet. I have watched the Loose Change video. I can play conspiracy with the best of them. I know the theories that supposedly no plain crash in that Pennsylvania field. That all the events of 9/11 were manufactured. That flight 93 was created to make martyred heroes for that day. My response?

Fuck you. Yes, that's right. Fuck. You. I'm far left liberal who believes in questioning the every story and 'truth' you are presented with. Yes, question everything. Think hard about the event of that day. Think about all of the people, at all levels that it touched. Occam's razor.

Philp K. Dick: What a frackin' genius

I was re-reading some Philip K. Dick short stories in anticipation of the upcoming A Scanner Darkly movie and amused by the story Autofac. Written in 1955, it tells the tale of automated factories that, when faced with the possibility of being destroyed, shot tiny microscopic robots to build more factories.

1955. Dangers of nanotech.

Brilliant.

Lonesome Jack, Friday, May 19th

So my favorite bluegrass punk band is playin' Friday, May 19th. 8pm (maybe 9... some confusion on that point). Lit Lounge. 93 2nd Ave. (btwn E. 5th and E. 6th). With Johnny Cage is Fake, Know Your Enemy and Man Without Plan. 6 bucks. Look. Grab some dinner and see them. Plenty of time for the rest of your night. Low commitment.

Showgirls: The Best Movie Ever Made. Ever.

Went to UCB last to see some improv (homework for my improv class) and saw the show before hand — Showgirls: The Best Movie Ever Made. Ever.

Brilliant. Glorious. Loved the John Reynold's portrayal of Joe Eszerhas. Also the woman who plays Nomi (whose name I can't seem to track down online), captures is exquisitet. She dances with the grace of agazellel... that has been hyped on uppers and perhaps shot. No script book is safe from her solutionn to everything: a swift slap and a scream.

It's like the Actors Studio from Hell. Vegas showgirls number as the story of Christ. Rape scene as interpretive dance. The word "topless" repeated over and over. A beautiful tribute to an American Masterpiece.

Lost speculation

WARNING: This will be of very little interest to anyone. But it started as a forum post and grew a bit large. I'm not even going to waste time making links to all of the references. This is just for the tiny portion of the population that watches ABC's Lost. More specifically those are playing The Lost Experience ARG.

ADDITIONAL WARNING: If you are from outside of North America, I reference things from episodes you may not have seen yet.

Okay, now that I may be down to one reader...



In 1980, Alvar really wants to bring his brother into the fold. He knows his brother is brilliant and would be perfect for his new Dharma Initiative. Werner has extensive treatments, recreating himself as the young Thomas Werner Mittelwerk (twistedly taking his last name from a Nazi concentration camp and the first name is the Greek form of the Aramaic name Te'oma which meant "twin"). Alvar is overjoyed to be working with his brother again (poor Alvar, always seeing the best in people and looking past the evil scientist thing). Thomas of course has other long term plans for Dharma. Evil plans.

Thomas bides his time for years, building trust and building is powerbase. Secretly he begins to twist the controlled environment the Dharma. He turns it into his own Lord of the Flies, seeing how a strife and conflict can push evolution. Genetic experiments, twist psychological experiments, etc.. He pulls in other people to expand his base of experimental subjects. For example, a French research ship has a large collection of high I.Q's. He also needs children, fresh untainted minds. (see Skinner's Box). All the while he keeps Alvar in the dark.

In 2000/2001, Alvar begins to figure out that something isn't all god with Dharma. And confronts his brother. But Mittelwerk is ready to make his move. "Hey, Alvar, let's take a trip to the Island. You can see for yourself." Bad move, Alvar. You are now going to be spending a long time there (see Blast Door Map... poor Magnus).

Mittelwerk continues his work, expanding his power, using Dharma to push evolution. In outside world he has collected broad range of people to push the Dharma experiment to the final stages. He has manipulated their lives, their mental states. He also has a handful of people who are getting too close to the truth. The writer Gary Troup knows way to much of the Valenezetti equation, the very base of Mittelwek's experiments and has just written a book that not only touches on Mittelwerk's evil, but seems to allude to Alvar and his actual relationship. And then their is Liddy Wales. She was a member of the Hanso Foundation's board of directors and seemed not to buy Mittelwerk's excuses for Alvar's absence. He had her committed to a mental institution but somehow she got out and changed her name (sliughtly). She could blow the whole thing.

All Mittelwerk needs is to get them all on one flight....

The Skeletor Show

I'm a fan of repurposing one's childhood. My childhood was filled with badly animated tv shows so, like reclaiming garbage and turning it to art (lower case 'a'), I enjoy all of the SpaceGhost/Sealab/Birdman/G.I. Joe stuff. Makes me feel warm and fuzzy. Especially well the voice work is good.

There are more episodes.

Moussaoui: Wait, can I take that back?

Zacarias Moussaoui has asked if he can change his plea to not guilty.

Mmmm. Regardless of anything else about the case, it has been fascinating to watch him react to the U.S. justice system. No, it appears he has developed a certain amount of respect for the jury system.

Explaining his latest reversal, Moussaoui said in an affidavit: "I was extremely surprised" by the life sentence.

"I had thought I would be sentenced to death based on the emotions and anger toward me for the deaths on Sept. 11, but after reviewing the jury verdict and reading how the jurors set aside their emotions and disgust for me and focused on the law and the evidence ... I now see that it is possible that I can receive a fair trial even with Americans as jurors."

No, I understand that some of his twists and turns are because (1) he has/had little understanding of the justice system, (2) part of him wanted to be martyred, and (3) he's a bit crazy. But his statements also make me wonder how his sentence is playing in the rest of the world.

Four Eyed Monsters: This is how it changes

After months of watching their amazing vidcast, I finally saw the actual movie. Wonderful film. I don't want to use the term unflinching, because that isn't quite right. It is full of flinching. It makes you, the viewer, cringe in the best possible way. Capturing that struggle of finding that "other," how language doesn't come close to conveying your true thoughts, how you don't even know your own true thoughts, how art can seem so distant and unachievable but yet is the only way to speak.

To paraphrase: "I am going to say something... and I am going to film it."

For such a simple film, it work so beautifully on so many levels. Especially on the issue of art... and truth. Which makes the film seem mindboggingly pretentious, which it is not. It is slyly aware of it's place, yet manages to exceed that place. In spirit it reminded me of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

Combine it with their vidcasts and you have a piece of meta (yes, I hate that term too) that is excruciating true. And for all it's flinch worth cringy excruciating pain, it never drops to melodrama.

Yes, I liked Four Eyed Monsters.

Afterwards, I walked home and thought of just going to sleep. But the urge to talk to the film makers overtook me, and I headed off to Soda Bar to see if they were there. They were. Let me say that Susan Bruice and Arin Crumley are just plain nice. Friendly, nice, open folks. Rambling conversations about truth, autobiography, the future of the internet, open source, art, financing, the future of film distribution, etc. These are amazingly real people.

So, go to their website. Watch the vidcast. Fill out a request for a screening in your neck of the woods.

Also, a note on the generosity of people: I have been frozen by the world, by pain, by this city. Recently, tonight in particular, I was reminded about how good people can be. It saddens me GREATLY that I am unable to either receive or return this. I hope it is temporary. But the fact is that I have destroyed so much good, have rejected it. If I was whole, if I was able to process the good that is passed towards me... Wow. I want to, and I am trying to, but I haven't yet. I pains me and to watch it pain others... Oh, hell. I can feel love, feel it embrace me, desperate to comfort me, yet I am still unable to accept it.

Sigh.

Mission: Impossible 3 - Goes Bang Good, But Still Not A Spy Film

Short review: Good flick. Fast, exciting, fairly plotless. "Goes bang good," as we used to say. Won't linger with me, but still just generally fun.

(Warning: I may have some minor spoilers, so be warned.)

First of all, I am not going to discuss Tom Cruise. Even with my unhealthy fascination with Scientology and cults in general, I could careless about TomKat or BabyTomKat (although just the fact I was about to make a choke about calling the child Suri or maybe Sluri says that I know more than I should). His performance is fine. Solid, but this isn't Chekhov. One thing you can say for Tom is that he runs really well. But I do enjoy him as an actor. He has great tiny moments, tiny little things that read both has real and has highly entertaining. At one point he gives a great delivery of the line, "Okay."

What makes this Mission Impossible better than the other two is that it attempts to get back to The Team. The television show was about the team, each person doing their part to achieve the whole. While M:I3 doesn't do it full out, it makes baby step back to that point. Baby steps. And this is my problem with the movie also. A team spy movie should be like a con movie and a heist movie mixed all up. With guns and cool gadgets. M:I3 gets the heist and the guns and the gadgets, but misses the con.

I have been watch the television show Hustle on A&E lately. It has wonderfully complex plans, lies within lies, to achieve their goals. The M:I movies mainly revolve around a tiny misdirection and a lot of running around and shooting things. This mainly revolves around Ethan Hunt (Mr. Cruise) doing the running (Run, Tom! Run!) and shooting (Shoot, Tom! Shoot!). The rest of the team has their support rolls, but for the most part they are tiny. But it is step over M:I1, where the entire team is killed in the first ten minutes, only to be replaced by another team (one of whom is evil). Or M:I2, which to be honest I can't even really remember. Ethan drove a motorcycle, that's all that stuck. M:I3 makes tiny tiny steps towards bring back the team concept.

My other issue is why is there always someone in the organization who is a mole? Why? This is also my issue with the show 24. Every season, CTU is rife with moles. Yes, yes, this allows our hero to "go rogue" and have "the whole world against them," but it is getting real real old. M:I should be about the fact that the government can't have any connection to mission but it needs to get done just the same. "If you get caught, we will disavow our involvement." That's enough. The tv show The Unit is attempting to do this. M:I3 doesn't.

But it goes bang good.

Good stunts, good action. There is a feeling of danger in it, a sense that things can fall apart and fail. I appreciate that. This has always been my problem with Bond films. Every action and plan of Bond works. Well, not every, but darn close. M:I3 allows the action to be risky.

This is what J.J. Abrams brings to the film. Alias always felt like at any moment things could fail. Abrams bring a lot of Alias to this film. Like Alias, the central conflict of the character is trying to balance "normal" life with "spy life." To me it works, if not wholly true to the original series. But it does make our central character more than just a running/shooting/jumping-off-buildings machine. The movie is even framed like the original episode of Alias, starting with our main character tied to a chair with us not having any idea what's goin' on.

There is also a wonderful cameo by Kerri Russell who played the title role in Abrams' show Felicity. Russell was originally considered for the part of Sydney in Alias, but they passed, in part because they were worried about audiences confusing Felicity with Sydney. Here we get to see Russell play the action hero, and even in her short part (and in a short "training flashback montage") we get to see her in that role. It actually, as they say in the business, kicks ass.

The entire cast is fine, but the cream is definite Philip Seymour Hoffman. He plays the villain wonderfully, seething without being cartoony (well, overly cartoony). It's been quite awhile since we've gotten a good villain. Heck, I can't think of the last villain I've really enjoyed watching. Where have all the villains gone?

One last thing, I love the music from Alias and Abrams' Lost. Michael Giacchino also does the music here. It's still good, but he needs to breakaway from his fluttering violins. I know it's his trademark, but having heard it in the final moments on Wednesday's episode of Lost, it just bugged me.


(Okay, one final thing. I love Brooklyn and all, but I have to stop seeing night movies here. Turning off cell phones seems to be beyond them. Only two rang during the movie, but FOUR folks near me had to have short conversations on them. And flipping your phone open to check who just called you when it vibrates is still a disruption. Those screens are like a flashlight in a dark theater. Also, if you are confused in the first two minutes of the movie, give the filmmakers some time to explain it. Don't asked the person sitting next to you. Perhaps if you listened you wouldn't miss so much. AND I don't particularly need to hear your predictions of what will happen next. Especially the next line. If a character is counting to ten and they've just said "Six," you aren't a genius if you guess the next line will be "Seven." I'm not exaggerating on any of these. It was a particularly obnoxious crowd tonight.

I should go. I have some kids to chase of my lawn.)

Four Eyed Monsters

This is old...sort of.

Four Eyed Monsters is a little independent film that is trying really to break the mold how films get distributed. Actually there are tons of wonderful things about this film/project. I say this without having ever seen the movie. But they also have a podcast. Watch it. Go to episode one first and watch them all.

Anyway the point of all this is that there will be free screening at the Brooklyn Museum on Saturday, May 6th (yes, tomorrow) at 8:30. Tickets will be available at the visitor center starting at 7:30. Afterwards, you can hang out at the museum until 11pm (free first Saturday stuff). And then go hang at Soda Bar up an Vanderbilt.

OR...

You can go see the start of the Gotham Girls Roller Derby second season. Also in Brooklyn (at least for now), it will be at The Schwartz Athletic Center (1 University Plaza, on Long Island University's Brooklyn Campus), doors at 7:30 and the bout starts at 8:30. It will be the Manhattan Mayhem vs. the new Bronx Gridlock.

I know. Tough choices.

Mission Best Buy & the Pantsless 8

ImprovEverywhere struck again this weekend. Approx. 80 folks, clad in Best Buy Blue shirts, entered the Chelsea Best Buy and just hung out. It went well. Customers were confused, employees flustered and the managementhad no idea what to do.

Their website is taking a lot of hits so you might not get in today, but it's well worth the read.

Also, hadn't heard that their had be a decision in the Pantsless courtcase. God to see that not wearing pants of the subway isn't counted as terrorism. The decision here.

The Oozinator - Extra Pumping Required

Just in time for summer.

There are certain things that should just not be. Someone, somewhere should have caught this before it went into production. But of course they didn't.

So Hasbro has created the bukkake simulator.

(And in case you doubt that this is a real ad or a real toy... The Oozinator.