The To-Smite List

Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Tue, 28 Jun 2011 03:31:00 +0000

Once in a while, a film stirs you. It cuts right through the daily charade and reopens your heart to a sense of human goodness. I have just sat paralyzed through the entire credit reel of Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles, trying to process the beauty of it. So much of how I gauge what I watch comes from aesthetics and technique, but the beauty of this piece is in its humanity.

I'll try to summarize without making it too technical. Mr. Takata's son, who has been estranged for ten years, is dying. All that's left to learn about him is in a tape of a masked opera in China. At the end, the son promises the singer to return in a year to film Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles. Mr. Takata makes the sudden decision to fulfill his son's promise.

This is truly a film of masks beyond just what is on stage. Mr. Takata is in an extraordinary amount of pain throughout, but he is too afraid to show it. He hides his tears when they show and envies the singer he has sought for breaking down in tears on stage and admitting he misses his own son. Though he is convinced this journey is the only thing that can heal his relationship with his son, he discovers that all he had to do was exactly that which he fears: taking off his stoic mask and showing his son how he feels.

To describe the ending would dull its poignancy. The feelings of love and loyalty are overwhelming and not in a disingenuous way. It is a film designed for feeling, for reassessing values, and for remembering how much we are blessed with the people in our lives. I give it five stars. To say more in print would cheapen it. It should be experienced before being read.

Movin' right along!

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 03:18:00 +0000

Oy! What a month it's been! Not much goin' on the To-Smite List for a while, mostly because 99% of my free time has been spent looking for a new apartment. The other 1% has been editing my 423 pictures from China. So the good news is that this huge To Acquire project has been a success. I am moving to Glendale on Friday. Slowly, I've been taking steps from room to apartment to own half of apartment to full apartment, so I am really excited about this.

Why Glendale? Location, location, location. I'm within a mile of Trader Joe's, 24 Hour Fitness, two malls, two movie theaters, a stage theatre, and my temp agency, and within two miles of Griffith Park, three major freeways, and Costco. I've been packing early in anticipation. I still have to figure out how my finances will hold up as Disney keeps hinting at extending me even longer than I'd expected. The uncertainty is a bugger, but for now, things are looking swell. Ka-ching! Now back to business as usual.

Y Tu Mamá También

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 03:11:00 +0000

There is a joke called "The Aristocrats." It reminds me of this film.

At the core of Y Tu Mamá También is the theme of freedom: sexual freedom, marital freedom, financial freedom, freedom to do with one's body whatever the hell one wants with whatever the hell one can find. It is the sexual odyssey of two privileged, crass, and hormonal teens, who see themselves as utterly free, yet know nothing of true freedom.

Tenoch and Julio come from wealthy families and have no problem affording all the women and marijuana they can consume. Their worlds are defined by their testosterone-laden bullshit. It allows them to drive right past the poverty, the corruption, and the culture surrounding them, keeping quiet about the truly important things. It required narration to interrupt their shallow prattle at unexpected moments to inform us of the truly important things happening in the lives of all involved (e.g. the doom of Chuy's home and career as a fisherman, the stories behind the crosses on the side of the road, etc.). The two friends do not connect on this sort of level, nor do they want to, having based their entire friendship on a mondegreen manifesto while screwing each other's girlfriends. They are the sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll, the bread and circuses that the average moviegoer craves. They believe they are free, but they are hamstrung by their inability to connect over anything but sex, which is the lesson Luisa tries, with debatable success, to teach them.

I loved the mystery of Luisa's character. Already a fan of Maribel Verdú's performance in Pan's Labyrinth, I was engrossed by her role as the woman searching for her final freedom. She is the one who can appreciate the unmentionable, who can connect with the quiet. She sees herself in the little stuffed mice and the vast ocean where we finally lose her. These are the things she tries to share with her two young companions and her adulterous husband por teléfono, but her words seem to fall on earless heads, her experiences lost among the sheets.

By the end, we are left with the question of whether their journey with Luisa has changed Tenoch and Julio. They remain crass and appear to have continued their conquests, but they are subdued, turning ever so hesitantly toward their futures in Economics and Biology, Julio's small beard growth even indicating a certain visual maturity. However, without their former sexual energy, they no longer have anything to say. They admit their hollowness, and thus their bonds are broken.

To look at this film shallowly is to be offended by the human body itself. There are few mysteries to the character's bodies by the end, yet the sexual exchanges are done tastefully, even elegantly. That's all that really matters, right? Four stars for inciting wonder and reminding me that freedom is in expression, in interest, in celebration of life. It reminds me what is to be missed with eyes down and in rather than out and up.

Antigone

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Thu, 12 May 2011 00:55:00 +0000

In order to attain any heights in what one does, one must stand on the shoulders of giants. Considering many of the great writers became great by studying their predecessors, I figure it's about time to delve into some of the ol' Greek classics to see what all the hubbub is about.

I started with Antigone by Sophocles, equipped with masks, gods, and a chorus. The plot embodied simplicity itself. The heroine, Antigone, wanted to perform burial rites for her brother, while the villain, Creon, wanted his body left out to be eaten by dogs. Of course, simple plots have a tendency to resolve quickly, so the majority of the play consisted of individual characters, chiefly nameless messengers, interacting episodically with the chorus while reflecting on the ways of gods and men, well, mostly the gods. In terms of stage time, Creon has the most visibility while the gods get the most lip service. Antigone, and pretty much every other character who appears in the duration, are basically foils for Creon's downfall. The messengers, Haemon, Eurydice, and Tiresias all have a little reminder for Creon that he's offended the gods with his actions and he will be punished. In modern culture, it would be the equivalent of a street protest where the participants yell at passersby for their godlessness.

On reading, I felt compelled for about half the duration and came to appreciate its merciful shortness. While I appreciate writing in verse and admire the numerous flowery tangents into myth and glory, in terms of storytelling, my modern tastes were simply not satisfied. However, it wasn't until after I read it that I realized Antigone was the last of Sophocles' Theban plays. Perhaps if I read Oedipus Rex and Oedipus at Colonus, I may come to appreciate this classic much more.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Wed, 11 May 2011 03:49:00 +0000

About a year and a half ago, I adopted two zebra finches named George and Martha. I did not really understand why they were so named other than a vague recollection of a play by Edward Albee with characters sharing nomenclature. It wasn't until I brought them home that first, Martha went after George, flying at him, pushing him out of their gourd home, pecking him, and generally being a harridan. They fought like cockerels and screwed like field mice, yet they never did produce an egg. One day, the tables turned, and George took ownership of the bird house. George began to rip out Martha's feathers. George banished Martha to the floor to pick her sustenance from among the shit-encrusted scraps on the cage floor. Then, one day, while I was away, Martha died of mysterious circumstances. I buried her under a cactus; within two days, something had dug her up and eaten her.

My only exposure to Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? came from mentions and a high school performance of Martha's opening monologue: I thought it was a pure comedy. What I got were two hours of pure, inhuman nastiness, goaded on by razor-sharp tongues dripping with venom. True, there were laughs to be had, but as in the life of finches, the story of a crumbled and fruitless marriage is rife with tragedy and delusion that permeates every character. There is little room for sympathy with these characters, who fluctuate so readily from fondness to loathing and back again. Nonetheless, their exchanges, much wittier and allowing more time than most modern films (owing to the theatrical source material), keep the viewer engrossed and cringing.

The late, great Elizabeth Taylor very much deserved her Oscar for her role as Martha, a performance unlike any I'd expected from the queen of class, so elegant in her horridness, yet overflowing with emotional layers that may or may not have been real to the character. Martha is a truly sick woman who has built up an entire world of illusion that George has somehow tolerated for years. Yet, they feed off each other, enable each other, and are clearly meant for each other, as dysfunctional as their alcohol- and revenge-driven relationship is. Their example offers a warning to anyone on the brink of marriage: choose wisely, not for money or out of panic, or else become the monster or the monster's bitch.

I give Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? four stars for sheer cringe factor. Whether I would watch it again on screen or choose to see it on stage instead remains to be determined. In any case, it is an excellent film for any (would-be) actor looking to see how the pros can make the most of long conversations in few, select settings, as well as how to effectively make the audience squirm at every turn.

Avatar (The Screenplay)

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Tue, 10 May 2011 04:02:00 +0000

For someone constantly striving to hone world building skills, there are certain resources that tower above the others in terms of usefulness. Up near the top, with a respectful nod to Tolkien of course, is Avatar, the highest grossing film in cinematic history and the stimulus of a 3D renaissance. It has been praised for its visual genius and mocked as a cheesy version of "Dances with Smurfs," but its success and the fact that it has spawned so much dialogue is extraordinary, especially as a science fiction film taking place in a world that is not our own, a genre that traditionally caters to a niche market. The true magic of Avatar rises from its visual elements, but in order to spawn such breathtaking cinematography, the foundation had to first be laid in print. Examining this foundation has been very enlightening, and even inspiring, on the following levels.

The world of Pandora shares much in common with Earth in that there are plants and animals, which interact with each other in a systematic and occasionally predatory way. However, on a cinematic level, these worlds differ fundamentally, starting with lighting. Unlike the planet, Earth, Pandora is a moon, orbiting around a gas giant, which provides most of the planet's lighting through reflection. Pandora's ecosystem then compensates for the lack of light through ubiquitous bioluminescence, the element which contributes most successfully to the dreamlike nature of the world. Additionally, the lower gravity of this moon and the presence of "unobtanium" in the soil, have permitted massive growth among the fauna and flora, further diminishing the importance of puny humanity and thus turning the dream world into a nightmare.

A note on unobtanium: the film doesn't really clarify what "unobtanium" really does or why it's worth so much to humanity. The name "unobtanium" sounds ridiculous, and so it seems a haphazardly planted element in an otherwise elegant world. The screenplay describes it as a magnetic material producing a maglev (magnetic levitation) effect, designating it as an important raw material for anti-gravity technology, something understandably useful to space-age humanity. However, there is one brilliant aspect to this omission in the film, which is all but impossible to see on screen. On page 30, Grace picks up a copy of Dr. Seuss' The Lorax from a school desk, an act of little to no significance in a quick camera shot. However, the central conflict of The Lorax, which was initially banned from television, comes from the destruction of the Truffula trees to produce Thneeds, which have no function at all but are in high demand. Thus, by omitting the use of unobtanium, the filmmakers have created a useless MacGuffin, for which the greedy are willing to destroy anything, making their actions even more barbaric to the viewer.

Conversely, there were quite a few thematic elements to the screenplay that enriched the reading experience but felt sadly lost in the viewing. The first instance comes from the distinction between the human connection to machines, one of distance and utility (e.g. Quaritch's controlled Wushu kata while hooked up to an ampsuit), and the Na'vi connection to the creatures they ride, one of intimacy and brotherhood (e.g. linking up to the banshees, which then bond to their riders for life). The contrast between these two relationship styles serves to highlight a rapid social retreat from personal intimacy in favor of the mechanical, which is easier to discard. We can see this in the futuristic Earth, all but destroyed and littered with what has been discarded (like Jake), a way of life that the colonists of Pandora believe will serve them well on all worlds. Therefore, we have the cultural conflicts of destruction/disdain and life/respect, a theme addressed in the film but more succinctly described in the script.

The allure of the Na'vi culture and the negative effects of the conquering human worldview on Jake's psyche come across much more clearly in the screenplay than in the film. Jake comes from this cold, hostile world of machines and people, but it is on Pandora, among an alien culture of respect and intimacy, that he is able to find his humanity. It is literally drawn out of him and absorbed into a new body to the point that he is more human as an alien than he ever was among other humans. His transformation thus invites the viewer to question the limits of his or her own humanity, though it's doubtful how many viewers left the theater questioning their human natures.

Thematic elements can be dreadfully difficult to visualize without inserting bad lines of exposition, so I make no judgment there. However, the creation of this world with its vast zoological population required a lot of exposition, the technique of which I badly want to learn. James Cameron (who, for some reason, just can't fit into one name like "Spielberg") introduces his menagerie of alien creatures in a dual manner: in the scene descriptions, they are known by Mendelian Greek names (e.g. leonopteryx), while the characters in the film refer to them exclusively by their Na'vi nomenclature (e.g. toruk). This makes it easier for the reader to keep track of creatures without spending unnecessary time trying to pronounce the names, while on screen, the viewer has a visual guide to the creature and thus does not care what it's called anyway. The writing sets up this visual guide simply, focusing on one or two specific traits: teeth, leg count, colors, crests, horns, what Earth animal it might represent, and what Earth animal it could rip apart. The characters then add details of the creatures' ecological importance (human) or cultural importance (Na'vi). In the end, it only takes us a few lines to understand each creature's role in the world and to let it be absorbed into the backdrop without forgetting what it is when it returns later.

The combined script and film are rich in detail, though the latter unfortunately takes a turn toward the cliché through ad libbing. Nonetheless, the details of this world drive the whopping 152-page screenplay and three-hour film in the form of smaller adventures and simple moments of awe at the bioluminescence, the floating mountains, or the wonders of flight. The world provides conflicts and lessons aplenty, leaving us no chance to be bored and only a little opportunity to be confused. The Avatar screenplay is a great reference for creating a world that is not only spectacular and innovative but also relatable.

In the Loop (The Screenplay)

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Tue, 03 May 2011 04:23:00 +0000

I'm going to forget my reference here. I can't remember who it was exactly who told me they were tired of pretentious, cinema-nut screenplays with rapid-fire dialogue, bad attitudes, and a heap of swearing and pop culture references to cover up their confusing plotlines being nominated for Academy Awards. In any case, those are the criteria that I would use to classify In the Loop.

That is not to say, of course, that I did not enjoy the read for the most part. Of course, without character introductions of any kind or really any lay-person/British-novice explanations, it took a while to figure out what exactly was going on, who these people were, and that this was actually meant to be a comedy. Right? For the most part, I enjoyed a some of the lines and trivial conversations - I really appreciated the fact that Karen Clark had dental problems, and I got a kick out of Toby and Simon resorting to shark documentaries in order to get off without having to hold a press conference - but good lord, apart from these few moments, the repetition of humor styles became unbearable! By the end, there were two to four movie titles or character puns thrown at us per page! I got tuckered out after about forty pages of Malcolm's viciously caustic put-downs of everyone within hearing range, and I became annoyed with Simon and Toby's utter spinelessness. In fact, most everyone in this script except for Malcolm and Jamie had no backbone at all, which leaves us with a really uncomfortable message: that our governments are run by bullies.

I suppose the film could provide a useful lesson for standing up to bullies, no matter how old or how powerful they may be. The bad guys get their way in this one, and the good guys bend over and take it, but perhaps the viewer's frustration at their utter uselessness could serve as a motivator to do more to resist this kind of system. Then again, they'd actually have to be able to pick out the message amid the barrage of government titles and threats of a war against an unknown enemy that's been brewing for who knows how long and is somehow threatened by a lower-ranking politician who really seems to have no real clout to begin with. Considering the Oscar nominees I've read thus far, I can't quite understand why this was nominated, except for its portrayal of our world as a screwed up place, but it's serving as a very useful learning tool for tailoring a script to the high-testosterone crowd.

Man Bites Dog

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Tue, 03 May 2011 01:08:00 +0000

I had a bit of trouble watching this film, and unfortunately, my only reason was technical. My internet sputtered and died about twenty minutes from the end of it, following the film's main motif of sputtering death. I have a problem with the Netflix classification of all genres of film made outside the country as "Foreign." When I think "Foreign," I think artsy, cultural, and tragic. In many ways, Man Bites Dog (or more appropriately, C'est Arrivé a Chez Vous) has elements of art, culture, and tragedy, considering it's shot documentary-style long before that became the hip thing to do for action movies. The premise is that a documentary film crew, having decided to film the life of a serial killer, gradually gets pulled into the murders themselves, but I would argue, they were more than willing participants from the beginning.

After watching this film, I'm reminded of a story my television instructor told the class during Sophomore year of high school, how when she worked at a local news station, there was an incident of a child drowning in the river. She recounted that the cameras arrived on scene and began thrusting their microphones into the face of the mother who was weeping over the body of her child. It was too much for her, and she recalled her crew. The crew featured in Man Bites Dog takes this kind of inhumanity a whole step further. They smile and congratulate the killer, Benoit, for his kills, and when one of their own goes down, they pick up his gear and keep filming. There is no love here. There is no humanity. That which is seen on the camera, even if it's happening inches away, is unreal and therefore entertaining.

I came into this film with a bias toward a very different serial killer, Dexter, who has a code of punishing much worse offenders who have slipped through the clutches of the law. I could attempt to understand a film crew being sympathetic toward someone with a code like that, but Benoit Patard is no Dexter Morgan. He kills for the pleasure of it and for the money. He is creative in his killings, rewatching them like a football coach reviews plays to see how he could improve it. What's especially shocking is how careless he is, murdering in public places in broad daylight, yelling, shooting, and making a scene. Yet, because he has a television crew following him everywhere, all the people he meets and murders trust him completely, letting him into their homes, letting him lead them away. He kills lots of people, elderly and children included, but the crew just keeps on following him, no matter how much he insults or berates them, doing everything he asks with big, goofy grins on their faces. It is the effect of stardom, of losing oneself in one's craft.

While I did wonder about the pervasive lack of suspicion or police presence, even the idea that a serial killer would want the kind of liability a film crew would present, my greater wonder came from what Man Bites Dog had to say about the rest of us. Do the horrible murders we witness affect us? Maybe, maybe not. Would they affect us more if we were there filming? Is life slowly becoming indistinguishable from the lens, or is there hope that if we should find ourselves witnessing real atrocity, that we would feel, question, resist? At what point do we go from being apathetic to condoning the actions we see on the tube, if not externally, then internally? Do we need violence to hold our attention anymore?

In terms of watchability, this was not as gruesome as I half expected, considering the last French crime film I started to watch (and did not get past five minutes) was Irreversible. Benoit started as a charming, humorous person, then decayed very quickly, really bringing the viewer's awareness to the ugliness that is now so ubiquitously entertaining. I have to give it four stars for innovation, entertainment, and the provocation of thought. It's worth a look.

Dr. Strangelove

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Sun, 01 May 2011 15:21:00 +0000

As a huge Peter Sellers fan, I came into this movie with high expectations. I grew up on the Pink Panther movies, and even to this day, they continue to prompt uproarious laughter. The man was a genius, and combined with the genius of Stanley Kubrick, I figured the genius would be overflowing, the laughs unstoppable. In short, there was a lot of genius, and plenty of tongue-in-cheek content, but almost no laughs at all.

Make no mistake, the acting was brilliant. I had to do a triple take to realize that Sellers was playing all three main characters, a set of performances pulled off so well as to rightfully deserve the nods of the Academy, especially as the president, whose straightforward approach contrasted heavily with Sellers' more flamboyant roles (see A Shot in the Dark or Murder by Death), yet was actually one of the funniest in the film. Nonetheless, considering his mad, titular character only showed up in two scenes, I felt a lot like I did watching the original Pink Panther, the first in the Clouseau series, a bit bored and let down.

Humor aside, the brilliance of the film resides in its critique of the military chain of command, especially the question of what happens when a link in that chain gets rusty. The theme also appears in another of Kubrick's more famous works, Paths of Glory, which deals with the need for a scapegoat and the inability of the lower echelons to prevent their superiors from executing innocent men. These themes serve as reminders that joining the military is not a foolproof path to glory, as the scenes of Americans following orders to shoot other Americans demonstrate.

All in all, in terms of whether I would watch Dr. Strangelove again, I have to give it three stars. It dragged at times, and I was underwhelmed by the brand of humor, which may have been too consistently subtle for my taste or perhaps, dated.

Watchmen

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 04:06:00 +0000

In pondering Watchmen, I think I will have the same problem as the directors in adapting Alan Moore's masterpiece to the screen: there is so much to talk about that it simply cannot fit. I entered it with the bias that Moore refused to be affiliated with the film, that the film was long and at times, boring. Nonetheless, it is a fragment of the world of superheroes that must be explored if one is to show any sophistication in the subject, because sophistication, or more appropriately, reflection, is the essence of the Watchmen.

The story demands that the audience look at the grander picture, which explains the nearly three-hour run time and the seemingly endless exposition. I enjoyed the character development, the stories that gave us depth without forcing us into thrills and spills. I enjoyed Dr. Manhattan's existential battles (Is anything really worth saving?). My enjoyment lasted until around midpoint, where the script woke up and realized it hadn't given us a plot to follow. It was a slice of life script for superheroes, which, in the end, wasn't satisfying. There were great moments, to be sure: Rorschach's stint in prison, the flashbacks to the awfulness of the Comedian, and Dr. Manhattan's fortress on Mars.

However, as befitting Ozymandias, the smartest man in the world, the film was 90% intellect and 10% the filmmakers trying to fill the rest of the space. That ninety percent encompasses how much the question of why humanity should be saved was actually answered. The ten percent encompasses the swiftly fading elegance of the last half. In short, when we cut to the many screens of news coverage with no tears, no reactions, just a sea of calm, practical faces, when the final scene is of a bored newspaper company only worried about finding new material, I was left to wonder whether anyone truly believed that the death of millions of people would be a calamity. The Silk Spectre's circular argument on the matter (humanity should be saved because millions of people will die) did not help.

Despite my quarrels with the balance of intellect versus heart in the film, I thoroughly enjoyed a good portion of it. It presented superheroes stripped down and (minus Dr. Manhattan) without the distractions of high-powered battles. The conclusion reminds us that we humans now make our own gods, and they, in the form of atomic energy, keep us from tearing each other apart on the greater scale. If only this film could affect us as significantly on the smaller scale, it would be a masterpiece of cinema to rival the masterpiece of graphic literature. For now, three stars.

A Single Man (The Screenplay)

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 05:04:00 +0000

I'm going to abandon technical analysis for a moment and talk about how I'm feeling. Yeah. Whoa. Reading A Single Man left me feeling sad and sentimental. How did it do that? I couldn't see any of the characters' faces. I couldn't hear their voices or their sniffles as they cried. How, then, were these written words able to produce such distinct emotions without these visible and audible stimuli? There is much to be learned from an Oscar-nominated screenplay.

We'll start with the basics. Lost love is universally relatable, whether directly or vicariously, and the death of a loved one is the epitome of this sort of loss. In this case, we enter the grieving process of a man, George, who has recently lost his partner of 16 years, Jim, to a car accident. We get this through flashbacks played in reverse from Jim's death to their first meeting, the increasing happiness of the memories a parallel to George's own improving mood, but this parallel is irrelevant here. It is the contrast of the happiness of these flashbacks to the quiet, somber world that George now inhabits that stirs the emotion inside as we realize the extent of what George has lost. Through this contrast, the reader cannot help but reflect on or speculate about one's own losses. Relating = feeling.

While loss of love can be experienced oneself or through others, the pain of alienation is something that attacks the very core of the social animal. Right off the bat, George gets a call from Jim's cousin, with news about the car accident and the upcoming funeral. The loss hurts, but the reiteration that the funeral is for "family only," is a much sharper sting. Throughout the story, George reflects on how he and Jim were invisible, cut off from the increasingly savage world embodied by his beastly neighbors. He teaches a class that does not care, watches a world of mediocrity sprouting around him, feels so out of place and out of touch. The drowning motif, while a bit heavy-handed, is fitting. It is only when he befriends his student, Kenny, that he is allowed to surface.

Finally, George's doom touches our hearts. We know from the beginning that he will ultimately die: he buys bullets for a gun, withdraws his possessions from the bank, and leaves his will out on the table for someone to find. We envision someone whose heart has been deeply cracked, who lacks the means or the understanding to repair it. Our sadness comes from seeing how his attempts have failed and how he has slipped into complete isolation and anonymity. It is when we trip in the pursuit of happiness that we fall into the character's sadness.

Through this wave of melancholy, we catch breaths of air in the memories and the happy moments. George recollects in his final words that he has "lived [his] life on these moments" even though they fade. Yet, it is his acknowledgment that everything must fade that ultimately sets him free. He is able to look at what has been and what can be. He can acknowledge that there may be more moments to anticipate. He has a few friends and at least one who understands him. It is a quiet way to end, satisfying without yelling or sobbing but a quiet gasp.

Metropolis

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Sun, 17 Apr 2011 04:43:00 +0000

I'm not going to lie. It's really difficult for me to get into German expressionism, especially after a long day at the beach. When Metropolis opened with the disclaimer that large chunks of the film had been lost to the ages, I was afraid this was going to be one erratic, haphazard two hours of movie. There were two things that I felt specifically kept it from becoming so: the artistry and the performances. While I enjoyed parts of the score, there were times where even it became a bit too repetitive; therefore, I'll keep my focus on the other two.

The city design of Metropolis, though largely limited to artists' sketches and miniatures, encompassed a grandeur, the likes of which modern civilization has yet to attain. The comparison of the city to the Tower of Babel was a tight fit. The buildings towered above the streets below, each one seeking to outdo its neighbor in height and diameter. No space was spared between them and walkways connected them; in all actuality, in this world, there was no reason for any human to set foot outdoors at all, which lent itself to the closed-minded world of the characters.

Starting out, I really did not want to like our protagonist, Freder (played by Gustav Fröhlich), whose heavy makeup and hyperbolic reactions to everything contrasted gratingly with his father's more subtle appearance. However, our love interest, Maria (Brigitte Helm) and mad inventor, Rotwang (Rudolf Klein-Rogge), both managed to outdo Freder in over-the-top expression. However, when she wasn't flailing her arms and crashing blindly into walls, Maria as the robot was a lot of fun to watch. Her bizarre erotic dance, her spiderlike hand gestures, and her sneering glances, all done with a mechanical rhythm, somehow managed to grasp perfectly the image of that which is twisted and evil in the world.

Metropolis comes from the days when a message could be hammered down the throats of the audience without receiving great scorn, but despite its continuous restating of its message, I really enjoyed the analogy of the head and hand needing to meet at the heart; it is an excellent message to take into account when working with dreamers and workers, because compassion and empathy, or at least the attempt at it, are essential to a working society, as demonstrated by the mob of workers racing from their city to destroy the machine that kept them alive, leaving their children to die. Thus, as befits truly classic science fiction, Metropolis leaves us with both a happy ending and a stern warning for the future: side with neither the hand nor the mind exclusively, but walk that delicate line between mobs or else become the problem. I give Metropolis three stars for artistry and the provoking of thought.

What Every Body Is Saying (Chapter 8)

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 03:07:00 +0000

It all comes to a head here in Chapter 8, and no, that wasn't intended to be a pun this time. This section is on detecting deception, and considering the quantity of references to everything that has been discussed thus far in the book, the fact remains that no nonverbal action is a conclusive indicator that someone is lying. Nonverbals indicate comfort or discomfort; it is up to the investigator and his/her carefully selected questions to determine the cause of that discomfort.

Working in loss prevention, I really appreciated Navarro's steps to observing. The key to a successful read is to ease the subject into a feeling of comfort, an observable baseline. This makes any changes presented by future questions more easily observable. This came to mind particularly when I heard at work that the best way to get a confession from someone is not to play the good cop/bad cop intimidation game, but to be empathetic, patient, compassionate and ultimately kill them with kindness. This is something that, if I am to learn how to read people, I have to adopt pronto. I have this inner urge to leap at someone for something I suspect them of doing. This, of course, is pointless, as it is clearly pointed out in this chapter that innocent people can be coerced into confession.

In the end, though, since starting this book ages ago, I have noticed my observations of people are becoming easier. Just the other day, we had a safety seminar, and I was able to watch, as the explanations wore on, the behaviors of discomfort displayed in my coworkers: the arms between the legs, the rocking, the eyes on the exit routes, the checking of the watches. I even caught one of the firemen in the act of genital framing. I wasn't sure whether it was a dominance display (since he was not the one talking, or a subconscious show for the ladies sitting directly across from him. I'm sure it was not his conscious intent, which is why this book has made life so much more fun.

As I continue to practice the observations I learned in this book, I would like to find out how to act on them. For instance, when someone averts his/her eyes or suddenly turns quiet or displays any number of discomfort gestures, I would love to know how to bring them up on the verbal level without turning into an interrogator. I'll keep hunting for such a lesson. In any case, What Every Body Is Saying has been an extraordinary read, easy to follow, moderately easy to start applying, and a fantastic tool for understanding the inner workings of the people around us.

What Every Body Is Saying (Chapter 7)

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 19:19:00 +0000

The face... One of the most variable and perplexing parts of the body. I admit I struggle with reading it, and it can be a great tool for deception. Nonetheless, this chapter gives some useful tips on how to detect those facial behaviors that are not quite as easy to control..

One of the things I did not expect to find out was that averting the eyes doesn't necessarily indicate deception or discomfort. I often used to wonder about this in conversing with my friends who would let their eyes wander here and there, but according to Navarro, this is a sign of comfort, that the person feels no imminent threat from the other sitting across the table. Eye aversion can also be used to clarify a thought. However, it is specified that roving eyes during an interview (and probably on a date) leave a bad first impression. I would also have to argue that eye aversion during an important conversation is exceedingly rude, and it should not be assumed that the other person has understood what was just said.

There is also a lot to be gleaned from the motions of the mouth, the thinning of the lips, the sticking out of the tongue... My favorite was the lip purse, an indicator that a person internally disagrees. Being aware of this may certainly be useful whenever I make a presentation/pitch in the distant future.

Finally, I was fascinated by the observation that wrinkles in old age may indicate the type of life the person has led: laugh lines indicate happiness, whereas a wrinkled forehead can indicate a life of deep discomfort. This really brings to the forefront the ways that one's attitude toward the world can shape one's life and body.

There is a lot more information in this 40-page chapter on how to read the face, much of which ties in with pacifying behaviors and defensive displays already discussed with other body parts. For more information, check out the book.

Minion

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 19:28:00 +0000

Wow, it's been a while since I posted here last. Still, there's a perfectly logical explanation, and it is that I really buckled down and wrote two drafts of this script in the last month. So yes, Minion is now done after two years, registered, submitted, and now I actually have some time available to catch up with the rest of projects.

I learned several really important lessons about writing during this time that would be useful to detail below:

Writer's block is a good indicator that you've gone astray. Despite a deadline, it can be a good thing to go back and find that moment.
If a detail takes so long to research that it takes away from your creative time, it's probably not worth keeping.
Over-thinking is the death of creativity (and a lot of dating scenarios, but I digress).
You don't need to detail every time the characters turn their heads or smile or sigh.
A lot can be accomplished in only three hours.
Get through a full draft. Then worry about page count.

So, with these in mind, I'm going to take maybe a week off from scripts to catch up on reading and my website, and then it's off to the next project. With one actually completed, it's really encouraging. Write on!

The Deadline

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Sat, 12 Mar 2011 06:26:00 +0000

I received a follow-up E-mail from the script list. Someone still really wants to read M. That's friggin' cool, but I still have sixty pages to go and only twenty days to write 'em. *Does the math* Three pages a day? Bring it on!

A Serious Man (The Screenplay)

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 20:28:00 +0000

I'm playing a little catch-up here. This is one of last year's Oscar noms, but I still feel I should get through last year's before I can get on to this year's. In any case, A Serious Man definitely fits in with the Coen Brothers' style of really strange comedies (see Burn after Reading). It isn't so much laugh-out-loud funny, but it is so bizarre that it can't help but be charming.

Having not yet seen the movie, I'm going to stay technical here. The first thing that struck me stylistically about this screenplay (and in fact, all of the Oscar noms I've read so far) is a complete divergence from the standard code of formatting. There were no INTs or EXTs, no DAYs or NIGHTs, no CONTINUOUSes, no (V.O.)s, and above all, no (CONT'D)s. The latter intrigued me most. When a character spoke over half a page, interspersed with action, there were no additional character headers to announce the return of dialogue. It was just a steady flow throughout. On one hand, this improved flow dramatically, and I can only imagine how much space this saved (despite the script being 133 pages long). On the other hand, there were moments when I found this a bit confusing in rooms of multiple characters. Still, the technique is worth considering. To paraphrase my roommate, "Write a good script. Then worry about formatting."

I enjoyed the patterns of humorous repetition (e.g. Uncle Arthur's "Out in a minute," Sarah's "I'm going to the Hole," and Danny's endless whining about the picture quality for F Troop). These completely apathetic, self-obsessed meshuggenehs built up a delightfully awful, apathetic, self-obsessed world... and it was funny!

As with many of their films, the Coen Brothers are masters of ambiguous, unfulfilling, and debatable endings. They take, in the purest sense, a slice of life with no beginnings or conclusions, and present it for the audience to speculate on its meaning (see No Country for Old Men or aforementioned Burn after Reading). Is ambiguity the key to being nominated for an Oscar? I have as yet to see the new True Grit, but if it ends as ambiguously, there may be the answer. Good read. Check it out.

What Every Body Is Saying (Chapters 5 and 6)

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Sun, 06 Mar 2011 17:51:00 +0000

The content of these two chapters is so similar that it can easily be combined into one blog post. The point I would especially like to address is that of hiding the arms and hands, based on an experience I had last night.

I went on a dinner date, nothing serious, more of a "Hi, what sort of person are you?" kind of thing. The discomfort cues were instant and consistent, starting with the eyes, which met mine maybe ten short times over two hours of decent (to the ears) conversation. But on the topic of hands, for the duration, he kept his hands completely out of sight the entire evening, tucked down between his legs, as if he were cold. I even asked if he were cold, and he denied it. When I spoke, I expressed everything with my hands to the point I thought I was going a little overboard. When he spoke, the hands never appeared. The only time I ever saw his hands at the table were when he was lifting his sangria or his cell phone. It was clearly uncomfortable for everyone.

In the background, he had totaled his car a few days before and was seriously reconsidering his drinking habits. Though he apologized for seeming depressing at the end of the night, the contrast between his typed enthusiasm for meeting up and his physical aversion to lingering was worth noting. I've felt this level of discomfort before, but only now, having read these chapters, am I able to explain why. It's worth checking out. What do people's arms tell you?

Side note: Going to make a concentrated effort to keep my thumbs out of my pockets when I do chance to pocket my hands.

Being John Malkovich

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 20:30:00 +0000

Alright, so I didn't have a full two and a half hours last night for one of the movies on my immediate To-Watch List, so I reached out to my 2011 To-Smite List for this one. It all counts, I promise.

In any case, I'm still trying to wrap my head around this one, no puns intended. What a strange, existential and utterly surprising movie! Frankly, I haven't seen anything this strange since the Coen Brothers' Burn after Reading. It's a very dark dramedy, utterly absurd at times and at others, just disturbing (locking your wife in a cage so you can have sex with another woman in another man's body?) Again, I'm still wrapping my head around it.

Coming from a world design perspective, I adored the system of the Malkovich portal. Throughout, I kept expecting the same old routine:

Person A finds magic thing
Person B doesn't believe in magic thing
Person A has adventures with magic thing and tries to bring Person B into it
Magic thing stops working when Person B sees it
Person B is condescending asshole
Person A keeps having adventures with magic thing
Person A saves magic thing from greedy corporation
Magic thing saves Person A's family, unites A and B, and helps an old lady cross the street before disappearing into the mists of metaphysical vaguery.

The beautiful thing about this system, however, is that the portal always works. Persons B, C, D, ad Zed believe in this portal without question. It's the manner in which the script (masterfully composed by Charlie Kaufman) literally turns attention inward from the world to focus on the psychology of self. It works very well.

There were other little twists I enjoyed throughout, the Lotti's sex-identity crisis (totally had to do a triple take to recognize Cameron Diaz in this role), Maxine's crazy trip of sex and manipulation, and Craig's descent into utter villainy. Then, of course, there is the titular star, Mr. Malkovich, who proves his extraordinary versatility as an actor as he shifts from identity to identity to the spectacular restaurant of Malkovich, a place so terrifying that one hopes no such place could ever exist.

This is a great film to watch for a late-night fix of weirdness. I give it four stars for inventiveness and just being mind-bending. I honestly hope there is no portal into my brain somewhere, for the sake of the traveler.

What Every Body Is Saying (Chapter 4)

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 20:27:00 +0000

Is it odd that this chapter confirms a lot of past paranoia? Take all those high school dances, for instance, when I'd start dancing with someone, then their friends would join, then they'd turn their torsos inward to form a circle that I was not meant to re-enter. Ah, those were the days...

The torso seems like the most easily readable part of the body discussed so far. If it leans away. it it turns away, if it's covered, if it's puffed or pulsing, the other person is probably uncomfortable. If he or she is doing all of the above, well, you may want to seek an exorcist. Still, this fascinates me. Like the turtle, the porcupine, or the cane toad, great care must be taken to protect that vulnerable underside from harm. There are barriers to be placed or removed to indicate a person's level of comfort in a given situation, and fortunately, these barriers, like arms crossed or a whole ton of clothing, are easy to see in civil conversation.

Since the beginning of the book, I've started to notice mirroring more when I'm in a conversation with someone else. Foot brushing has become clearer, eye contact/aversion as well. What I wish would be discussed in this or a later book, however, is how to go about addressing perceived signs of discomfort. When someone is leaning away with arms crossed, what then? How does one diffuse the bomb? It's entirely possible that this will be discussed in a future chapter, so I'll wait and see.

What Every Body Is Saying (Chapter 3)

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 20:18:00 +0000

This chapter makes an extraordinary point: that legs are the most honest parts of our bodies, that they hold our tensions, emotions, and interests in their motion, position, and direction. There are a lot of neat tidbits to glean from this chapter with one slight problem. How on earth can a person tactfully observe another's legs in order to learn about their current conditions?

Navarro suggests that, in some cases, the action of the legs can influence the remainder of the body (e.g. bouncing legs lead to bouncing shoulders), and therefore, one does not need to take a furtive glance downward and risk a slap in the face, a very explicit indicator of a person's current emotional state.

I've realized, having read this chapter, that I am not only very expressive with my legs (especially at expressing impatience) but I am also completely incapable of getting this across to others. The bouncing legs, the lean away, the pointing toward the escape route... None of these, even when intentional, have any manner of effect on my roommate, for instance, who (bless her) can talk. Two hours of leaning away tends to lead to less bouncy legs; that much is certain.

On the opposite side of things, Navarro mentions that foot touching can be a sign of intimacy, in addition to leaning toward each other, which explains why so many people apologize to me if one of their feet so much as brushes one of mine at a table. Heaven forbid there be some form of footsies going down at lunch! This is, nonetheless, a fascinating idea, that the legs contain the honesty. If I can get away with it, I may spend more time leg watching. Of course, I may need to learn from my lunchtime friends and master the apology before attempting it.

Kung Fu Panda

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Sun, 13 Feb 2011 00:42:00 +0000

I could watch this movie again and again. I haven't had so much nonstop fun watching a movie in a long while. Jack Black has a tendency to get a little extreme in some of his roles, but in this case, he really brought Po, the fanboy panda, to life.

The set design in Kung Fu Panda is strikingly beautiful. The monastery, high in the hills (a la the karsts of the Li River) is surrounded by peach trees, which can magically blossom and bear fruit at the same time. The moments that the characters share near these trees are not only poetically beautiful (Master Oogway vanishing into the petals), but they are also inspiring. "...no matter what you do, that seed will grow to be a peach tree. You may wish for an apple or an orange, but you will get a peach."

Actually, lessons such as this provided the backbone of my enjoyment of this movie. Even though "the past is history, the future is a mystery, but today is a gift; that is why it is called the present," is hardly innovative, I am considering putting a big banner across my wall that reads "The Scroll Is Blank."

Kung Fu Panda gets a solid four stars, maybe four and a half. It's a lot of fun, and I'm actually looking forward to the sequel, due out this summer.

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 20:36:00 +0000

My comic geek buddy told me this was one disappointing movie. Not having read the comic, I took his word for it, but on recommendation from my brother, I decided, what the hey, I'll give it a shot. What I discovered was a much richer experience than I could have anticipated.

I should address, first and foremost, the 8-bit video game style that pervades the entire film. I mentioned in my response to Coraline that I wasn't too keen how it devolved into a video game and would rather play the game than watch a movie try to be a video game. The difference with Scott Pilgrim vs. The World is that the style fits the genre. It is a comedy geared toward the comic book and video game fan base. That allowed me to forego the question of how the characters got their superhuman combat moves and focus instead on what the story had to tell me.

I expected this to be a fairly brainless tale of a band geek and some fights, and for the most part, I didn't really relate to Scott until the tail end of Act 2 struck a chord. The plot of the story, that Scott has to face the seven evil exes of the girl of his dreams in order to win her heart, is beautifully told. Yes, I said beautifully. This isn't just a story about Scott having to fight off a bunch of goons so a girl will like him. This is an account of how a young man must conquer a young woman's past hurt and her future doubts. In so doing, he learns to overcome himself and his own. In understanding Ramona's scars, how she sees him as another potential evil ex, Scott discovers how to take responsibility for himself. He confesses to his own jilted ex, Knives, that he cheated on her and is thus able to work with her to defeat the final ex.

***SPOILER ALERT***
Still, I consider the most poignant moment to be when Scott faces himself, literally: NEGA SCOTT. The great surprise, which doesn't work for a lot of people expecting a glorious final clash, is that he and his negative just "shoot the shit." They get along. They are at peace. This really resonated with me as I work on making peace with my own NEGA KYLE, and it demonstrated a profound sense of maturity, cleverly disguised in a film marketed toward more (with all due respect) immature audiences.

I give Scott Pilgrim vs. The World four stars, because it was difficult to really connect until the end, but it was a great ride and surprisingly meaningful. I can only hope someone in the future will have the guts to handle my own list of evil exes. I'm honing my skills to reciprocate.

Writing Update

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Sat, 22 Jan 2011 06:51:00 +0000

I've finally found a New Year's Resolution that's working: write for two hours per day. By telling myself "Oh, it's just two hours and you'll be productive," I'm much more likely to sit down and do it than if I freak out and say "Ah! You have to get 15/30 pages done today! Eight hours in front of the screen! Now! Now! Now!" I'm finally adding new pages after nearly four months on Act 1. The feeling is glorious. I'm looking forward to pressing on again tomorrow.

Coraline

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Sat, 22 Jan 2011 05:00:00 +0000

Everything I had to say about thematics, I've already said here. Instead, I'd like to present the following for the reader's consideration:

The soundtrack is a gorgeous mix of haunting chorals and toe-tapping jazz beats that I will be adding to my collection to hear again. It really is reason enough to explore this story beyond the script.

Otherwise, in terms of the adaptation, it did sort of strike me strangely how old the characters were. I realize the script had them in their early teens, but the written story made it easier to envision the characters much younger. I didn't mesh with the voice acting at all, though I do have to give Teri Hatcher credit for shedding most of her flustered Desperate Housewives whine during her transformation into the Beldam. The ghost dialogue bothered me because it felt like video game dialogue; if I'm going to hear video game dialogue, I'd rather it be in a video game.

In terms of the visuals, I think I expected a little too much Nightmare before Christmas in terms of bright, ghostly lighting and eerie shadows, compared to the surprisingly "realistic" fantasy design of this film. Some choices I could have seen differently, but nonetheless, this was an engaging film made remarkable by its sound design. I'm sure it would have been spectacular in 3D as well. I'll give it four stars, because I'm still logged onto Youtube, listening to clips from the soundtrack.