1. i knew this would be a film of special effects and crap acting. however, i *thought* the effects would be enough to destract from what i *hoped* would only be quasi bad acting. i was wrong on both counts.
2. i couldn't stand sitting through another movie of archaic, ridiculous archetypes:
a. channing tatum: tasty, brooding white hero. caged tiger. waiting to be pissed off yet effortlessly in control of the sensitive, justice-weilding beast inside of him. (i.e. "this team you guys are on? i don't know what it is or what you do but i want in." THIS AFTER THEY'D JUST KIDNAPPED HIM.)
b. one of the wayans: semi less involved black sidekick character who's singular, one-dimensional role is to crack "comical" one-liners about brooding white hero. and dream about flying jets which undoubtedly came in handy at the end somewhere. he has neither the drive, nor the skills of brooding white hero but is always around to deliver a starstruck remark (i.e. regarding BWH: "he has issues! he's got so many issues, his ISSUES have issues!" really mystery wayan? that was a good one.)
c. sienna miller: playing femme fatal nemesis, rather cleverly disguised as--A BRUNETTE. with SEXY LIBRARIAN GLASSES. and a SKIN-TIGHT CATSUIT. that shows CLEAVSIES. she and BWH have a run-in early on in which it becomes clear that they were once LOVERS. and she is now in bed with the ARCHNEMESIS, who knows that her heart of coal will secretly ALWAYS belong to BWH as demonstrated by a line she delivered to archnem. that fell to the ground out of her sneering lips faster than gravity could pull it, "It had NOTHING. to DO. with HIM."). they walk around as holograms a la anderson cooper and the Ridiculous Election News Coverage Technology Orgy of 2008, drop eachother a couple of naughty lines and stalk off.
d. dennis quaid: in what might be the worst role of his life, plays Army Leader of Secret Awesome Team. he first appears to Secret Awesome Team, Mystery Wayan and Brooding White Hero via holgram, where he attempts and fails to act his way out of the paper bag that invisibly surrounds him. he is surrounded by Secret Awesome Team with contingent of Women Members with modified army uniforms that Enhance Cleavsies. It goes without saying they do not get speaking roles.
3. i do not have a third, although to round out the list i could offer the fake fart noises some jokesters in the back half of the theatre were making. which were all at the same time retarded, funny and indicative of the demographic targeted by this michael baysian turdfest.
in summation, sorry channing. not even your good looks were enough to keep a straight girl and a gay guy around til the end. although...perhaps a gay girl and a straight guy? maybe we're just the wrong audience...
Friday, August 14, 2009
And now...something truly boring.
Hello strangers. It is with great regret that I realize it's been an eon and an era, both, in succession, since I've last written. I've been a busy bee and I will now reward the great void with an art paper I had to do for a class last term. Why this desire to post what will surely be unrequited information? No reason. Maybe there's someone out there that needs to have a paper written, by tomorrow, comparing and contrasting da Vinci's Renaissance mastership with Artemisia Gentileschi's brilliant Baroque skillz. Here be-eth your paper.
<3
The Idle Receptionist
Renaissance Art History
SELECTED WORKS OF THE EUROPEAN RENAISSANCE AND BEYOND
The Renaissance was a fruitful period in the historical progression of European art. Painters and sculptors embraced the sciences and their own senses to more accurately portray the world around them. Beyond rediscovering “the authority of the antique,” the painters of the time moved from rediscovering accurate portrayal, to playing with dramatic lighting, to experimenting with exaggerated style and non-religious points of view. This paper will examine two prolific artists from two different art movements; Leonardo da Vinci in the Renaissance period and Artemisia Gentileschi of the Baroque period. Artemisia—a woman—was of course lesser known that the great da Vinci, but her work was just as beautiful. While da Vinci brought his subjects to life with heavenly expressions and delicate sfumato, Gentileschi posessed a rarity in the male-dominated art world. As a woman, she was able to capture something about the feminine body and mind set that male artists of the day couldn’t seem to get quite right. Regardless, both painters are significant. Each mastered the style of their respective art periods and brought an ease and richness to their works.
Leonardo da Vinci was one of the first real examples of a “renaissance man” in the sense we know today: captivating painter, accomplished sculptor, mind blowing inventor and relentless explorer of the natural sciences, physics and mechanics. Da Vinci wasn’t afraid to get his hands proverbially dirty in thought and postulation. His fascinating sketchbooks are filled with descriptive drawings detailing gears, levers, human tissue, appendages in motion, facial expressions, human positioning studies, animal mannerisms and behavior and all manner of visual stimuli. Most famously known in lay circles for his portrayal of a mysterious, anonymous woman known only as the Mona Lisa—experts and amateurs alike devoting hours to the debate of who she was and why, exactly, she boasts such an aloof, wry smile—da Vinci has left us with so much more than just beautiful portraiture. Leonardo da Vinci was a visionary in mechanical engineering, a student of botany and all around scientific explorer (Vollmer).
One of da Vinci’s most renowned paintings, beyond his brilliant sketches and even the Mona Lisa herself, is the Last Supper. “It is the Last Supper that gives us the fullest idea of Leonardo’s expressive power. (Vollmer, 66)” His studies of the natural world are said to have aided him in mapping out the many expressions and feelings present in this piece and perhaps even to justify his own religious experience and personal grasp of faith (Vollmer, 67).
Vollmer speculates that work began on the painting after 1495, around the time Montorfano completed his work, the Crucifixion. Leonardo’s patrons seemed anxious. An old register for the church of Santa Maria delle Grazie, the location for the creation of Last Supper, shows da Vinci getting visits from Raymond Pérault, Bishop of Gurk and Marchesino Stagna respectively, to hasten the master at his work (Vollmer, 68). However, da Vinci didn’t seem to let the deadline affect his work at all!
The disciples at the famous table are divided into four clusters surrounding Chrsit, the placement of which Leonardo had given great thought to previously in works including St. John (Vollmer, 68). Leonardo took great thought about captivating the emotional resonance of the moment depicted in the painting, considering at one point to depict the moment of the origin of the holy rite of Communion, another red letter moment in the history of Christ and his followers (Vollmer, 69). However, the Last Supper provides us with more than enough emotional meat to deconstruct, that is, “the moment...in which Christ enters upon his martyrdom, setting himself apart from the humanity that has betrayed him in the person of Judas, accepting agony and offering his forgiveness. (Vollmer, 69)” That seems like a job fit for the capable da Vinci, ever so skilled at capturing a world of emotions and subtext in just one face. However, Christ is still the undeniable center of the painting. He is set apart from the disciple clusters, a singular pyramidal construction. His head appears to be the convergence point for the perspective lines, forcing the eye to gaze at him.
And what of the physical characteristics of the painting itself? The Last Supper was set, not in fresco, but on dry plaster with an oil and varnish mix (Vollmer, 69). The defined perspective in the work is classic renaissance. The figures are pointing in separate directions, huddled around each other in pyramidal constructions and all presenting expressions appropriate to the subject matter presented. This is, of course, a departure from the Byzantine and proto-Renaissance depictions of personality. Figures at that time were stuck onto the picture plane merely to surround the figure of honor (generally Christ or another holy figure) and possessed little physical merit on their own rights. Leonardo, conversely, packs expression into each fabric wrinkle and sideways glance in every character in his works, especially in the Last Supper. The myriad of responses in each figure gives the narrative great voice. The painting isn’t only about Christ’s image, but the reactions and trepidations of his disciples as they hear the ominous news, “unus vestrum me traditurus est,” meaning, “one among you will betray me (Vollmer, 68).”
Da Vinci depicts the tablecloth as a bright, pure white to separate the colorful and complex imagery of the painting and give the eye a nice horizontal to rest on. This also provides a nice frame for the cast of characters to exist. Perhaps the white table cloth also hints at Christ’s pure nature. In true renaissance form, da Vinci does not skimp on the background landscape. Beautiful, rolling hills recede to the horizon line behind spacious windows aided with some delicate atmospheric perspective.
Da Vinci was so wonderful at portraying expression, but dramatic painting of the time of the Renaissance had yet to see anything as visually contrasted and gripping as the Baroque period. Artemisia Gentileschi was a part of the Baroque movement. Baroque is a term that can be used in a general sense when describing art pieces that possess a significant degree of drama, diagonals, action, etc. But the movement was a specific period in roughly the 17th century. “In general...the desire to evoke emotional states by appealing to the senses, often in dramatic ways, underlies its [the Baroque period’s] manifestations(Pioch).” Baroque painting captured the drama of the moment the artist was portraying. Artistic portrayal included dramatic lighting, cinematic positioning, multiple convergence points, diagonal and perpendicular lines. Anything increasing movement, action, drama; these were all Baroque components.
Gentileschi was unique in that her art (featuring women as was not uncommon among artists regardless of gender) gave women a voice beyond the common themes of the serene madonna or delicate nude goddess. Her women are strong, but not in the stocky, bulky sense that perhaps Michelangelo’s were. Male artists of that time, of course, still didn’t have access to a gaggle of art groupies that would love to model nude for them, it wasn’t proper. (And I’m pretty sure the Odalisque hadn’t yet gripped the art scene.) But Artemisia being a woman herself, gave her subjects a realism and power that was often lost in the hands of male painters. Mary Garrard writes, “There are many Caravaggisti, but only one Caravaggista (Garrard, 3).” Gentileschi was the only known female follower of Caravaggio’s dramatic style and adapted “the bold and dramatic style of Caravaggesque realism to expressive purposes that differed categorically from those of her male contemporaries (Garrard, 3).”
Gentileschi’s great work, Judith Slaying Holofernes was created around 1620. Judith and Holofernes occupy a great portion of the artist’s work. “The theme is likely to have held personal importance for the artist, for all of the female characters that she painted, Judith was the most positive and active figure, whose heroic deed held for Artemisia the greatest potential for self-identification (Garrard, 278).” As a true Carravaggista, Gentileschi naturally had to try her hand at the intense scene that her mentor had already created in 1598 (Garrard, 290). Carravaggio’s version shows Judith as a beautiful yet delicate schoolgirl, wearing a puzzled look on her face as her aged aide looks on with a cleanup towel. The focus is on Holofernes and his ghastly face as it is severed from his body. Holofernes looks fantastically grotesque, yet little Judith looks no more disturbed than if she’s cutting a pizza or cake and is mentally counting how many guests to serve to. Caravaggio was masterful at the lighting and human forms in this painting, but Gentileschi surpassed him in emotional realism, while still preserving the Baroque cinematic flair.
Gentileschi moves the figures closer together in her version, erasing Caravaggio’s visual lag time between the gargling, dying Holofernes and the oddly composed Judith. By pressing the three figures together, we have instant heightened drama. The arms of all three are mangling together to create fantastic diagonals. Judith’s arms extend to Holofernes, Holofernes’ arm juts up into the aides chin in a desparate attempt at fending off his female attackers. Judith’s aide in Gentileschi’s version is a little closer in age to her and Judith herself seems a bit past the virginal age of a minor. Naturally, Gentileschi shifts the focus in her painting off of Holofernes and onto Judith. The lighting on her face is the highest contrast of all three faces. Holofernes seems lost in his own cast shadow and blood stream. His face is more in the dying stage than the gasping for life stage and therefore his expression doesn’t take precedence over Judith’s. Her face, on the other hand, shows a much more realistic expression than that of Caravaggio’s portrayal. She wears the grimace of someone that is dragging a sword through another person’s neck. Even her body is active in the scene. Her outstretched arms twist her torso and her neck and breasts change shape realistically as her chest twists. Her sleeves are rolled up and ready to do some retribution killing. Gentileschi shades this all quite exquisitely. She continues the drama of her art period by not skimping on the fabric folds, shadows and bloodshed. The fire and passion of the Baroque period is preserved while still presenting a rare and realistic portrayal of a brave woman and her companion. All incredibly impressive considering Artemisia was only about 27 when this painting was created (Garrard, 184).
Both da Vinci and Gentileschi were talented revolutionaries in their respective lifetimes. Da Vinci’s explorative nature led to innovations in the sciences and mechanics which served to improve his artistic eye and painterly offerings. Gentileschi thrived in a world dominated by men and religious politics, giving a strong voice to her female subjects and in a sense, reflecting herself through them. Both artists soared above the status quo of their contemporaries and secured their respective places in the museums, art history tomes, creative minds and hearts of art appreciators even to the present day.
WORKS CITED
Garrard, Mary D. Artemisia Gentileschi. Princeton, New Jersey. Princeton University Press, 1989.
Pioch, Nicolas. Baroque. http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/glo/baroque/. Accessed 5 June, 2009.
Vollmer, Emil. Leonardo Da Vinci. New York: Renal & Company, 1956.
<3
The Idle Receptionist
Renaissance Art History
SELECTED WORKS OF THE EUROPEAN RENAISSANCE AND BEYOND
The Renaissance was a fruitful period in the historical progression of European art. Painters and sculptors embraced the sciences and their own senses to more accurately portray the world around them. Beyond rediscovering “the authority of the antique,” the painters of the time moved from rediscovering accurate portrayal, to playing with dramatic lighting, to experimenting with exaggerated style and non-religious points of view. This paper will examine two prolific artists from two different art movements; Leonardo da Vinci in the Renaissance period and Artemisia Gentileschi of the Baroque period. Artemisia—a woman—was of course lesser known that the great da Vinci, but her work was just as beautiful. While da Vinci brought his subjects to life with heavenly expressions and delicate sfumato, Gentileschi posessed a rarity in the male-dominated art world. As a woman, she was able to capture something about the feminine body and mind set that male artists of the day couldn’t seem to get quite right. Regardless, both painters are significant. Each mastered the style of their respective art periods and brought an ease and richness to their works.
Leonardo da Vinci was one of the first real examples of a “renaissance man” in the sense we know today: captivating painter, accomplished sculptor, mind blowing inventor and relentless explorer of the natural sciences, physics and mechanics. Da Vinci wasn’t afraid to get his hands proverbially dirty in thought and postulation. His fascinating sketchbooks are filled with descriptive drawings detailing gears, levers, human tissue, appendages in motion, facial expressions, human positioning studies, animal mannerisms and behavior and all manner of visual stimuli. Most famously known in lay circles for his portrayal of a mysterious, anonymous woman known only as the Mona Lisa—experts and amateurs alike devoting hours to the debate of who she was and why, exactly, she boasts such an aloof, wry smile—da Vinci has left us with so much more than just beautiful portraiture. Leonardo da Vinci was a visionary in mechanical engineering, a student of botany and all around scientific explorer (Vollmer).
One of da Vinci’s most renowned paintings, beyond his brilliant sketches and even the Mona Lisa herself, is the Last Supper. “It is the Last Supper that gives us the fullest idea of Leonardo’s expressive power. (Vollmer, 66)” His studies of the natural world are said to have aided him in mapping out the many expressions and feelings present in this piece and perhaps even to justify his own religious experience and personal grasp of faith (Vollmer, 67).
Vollmer speculates that work began on the painting after 1495, around the time Montorfano completed his work, the Crucifixion. Leonardo’s patrons seemed anxious. An old register for the church of Santa Maria delle Grazie, the location for the creation of Last Supper, shows da Vinci getting visits from Raymond Pérault, Bishop of Gurk and Marchesino Stagna respectively, to hasten the master at his work (Vollmer, 68). However, da Vinci didn’t seem to let the deadline affect his work at all!
The disciples at the famous table are divided into four clusters surrounding Chrsit, the placement of which Leonardo had given great thought to previously in works including St. John (Vollmer, 68). Leonardo took great thought about captivating the emotional resonance of the moment depicted in the painting, considering at one point to depict the moment of the origin of the holy rite of Communion, another red letter moment in the history of Christ and his followers (Vollmer, 69). However, the Last Supper provides us with more than enough emotional meat to deconstruct, that is, “the moment...in which Christ enters upon his martyrdom, setting himself apart from the humanity that has betrayed him in the person of Judas, accepting agony and offering his forgiveness. (Vollmer, 69)” That seems like a job fit for the capable da Vinci, ever so skilled at capturing a world of emotions and subtext in just one face. However, Christ is still the undeniable center of the painting. He is set apart from the disciple clusters, a singular pyramidal construction. His head appears to be the convergence point for the perspective lines, forcing the eye to gaze at him.
And what of the physical characteristics of the painting itself? The Last Supper was set, not in fresco, but on dry plaster with an oil and varnish mix (Vollmer, 69). The defined perspective in the work is classic renaissance. The figures are pointing in separate directions, huddled around each other in pyramidal constructions and all presenting expressions appropriate to the subject matter presented. This is, of course, a departure from the Byzantine and proto-Renaissance depictions of personality. Figures at that time were stuck onto the picture plane merely to surround the figure of honor (generally Christ or another holy figure) and possessed little physical merit on their own rights. Leonardo, conversely, packs expression into each fabric wrinkle and sideways glance in every character in his works, especially in the Last Supper. The myriad of responses in each figure gives the narrative great voice. The painting isn’t only about Christ’s image, but the reactions and trepidations of his disciples as they hear the ominous news, “unus vestrum me traditurus est,” meaning, “one among you will betray me (Vollmer, 68).”
Da Vinci depicts the tablecloth as a bright, pure white to separate the colorful and complex imagery of the painting and give the eye a nice horizontal to rest on. This also provides a nice frame for the cast of characters to exist. Perhaps the white table cloth also hints at Christ’s pure nature. In true renaissance form, da Vinci does not skimp on the background landscape. Beautiful, rolling hills recede to the horizon line behind spacious windows aided with some delicate atmospheric perspective.
Da Vinci was so wonderful at portraying expression, but dramatic painting of the time of the Renaissance had yet to see anything as visually contrasted and gripping as the Baroque period. Artemisia Gentileschi was a part of the Baroque movement. Baroque is a term that can be used in a general sense when describing art pieces that possess a significant degree of drama, diagonals, action, etc. But the movement was a specific period in roughly the 17th century. “In general...the desire to evoke emotional states by appealing to the senses, often in dramatic ways, underlies its [the Baroque period’s] manifestations(Pioch).” Baroque painting captured the drama of the moment the artist was portraying. Artistic portrayal included dramatic lighting, cinematic positioning, multiple convergence points, diagonal and perpendicular lines. Anything increasing movement, action, drama; these were all Baroque components.
Gentileschi was unique in that her art (featuring women as was not uncommon among artists regardless of gender) gave women a voice beyond the common themes of the serene madonna or delicate nude goddess. Her women are strong, but not in the stocky, bulky sense that perhaps Michelangelo’s were. Male artists of that time, of course, still didn’t have access to a gaggle of art groupies that would love to model nude for them, it wasn’t proper. (And I’m pretty sure the Odalisque hadn’t yet gripped the art scene.) But Artemisia being a woman herself, gave her subjects a realism and power that was often lost in the hands of male painters. Mary Garrard writes, “There are many Caravaggisti, but only one Caravaggista (Garrard, 3).” Gentileschi was the only known female follower of Caravaggio’s dramatic style and adapted “the bold and dramatic style of Caravaggesque realism to expressive purposes that differed categorically from those of her male contemporaries (Garrard, 3).”
Gentileschi’s great work, Judith Slaying Holofernes was created around 1620. Judith and Holofernes occupy a great portion of the artist’s work. “The theme is likely to have held personal importance for the artist, for all of the female characters that she painted, Judith was the most positive and active figure, whose heroic deed held for Artemisia the greatest potential for self-identification (Garrard, 278).” As a true Carravaggista, Gentileschi naturally had to try her hand at the intense scene that her mentor had already created in 1598 (Garrard, 290). Carravaggio’s version shows Judith as a beautiful yet delicate schoolgirl, wearing a puzzled look on her face as her aged aide looks on with a cleanup towel. The focus is on Holofernes and his ghastly face as it is severed from his body. Holofernes looks fantastically grotesque, yet little Judith looks no more disturbed than if she’s cutting a pizza or cake and is mentally counting how many guests to serve to. Caravaggio was masterful at the lighting and human forms in this painting, but Gentileschi surpassed him in emotional realism, while still preserving the Baroque cinematic flair.
Gentileschi moves the figures closer together in her version, erasing Caravaggio’s visual lag time between the gargling, dying Holofernes and the oddly composed Judith. By pressing the three figures together, we have instant heightened drama. The arms of all three are mangling together to create fantastic diagonals. Judith’s arms extend to Holofernes, Holofernes’ arm juts up into the aides chin in a desparate attempt at fending off his female attackers. Judith’s aide in Gentileschi’s version is a little closer in age to her and Judith herself seems a bit past the virginal age of a minor. Naturally, Gentileschi shifts the focus in her painting off of Holofernes and onto Judith. The lighting on her face is the highest contrast of all three faces. Holofernes seems lost in his own cast shadow and blood stream. His face is more in the dying stage than the gasping for life stage and therefore his expression doesn’t take precedence over Judith’s. Her face, on the other hand, shows a much more realistic expression than that of Caravaggio’s portrayal. She wears the grimace of someone that is dragging a sword through another person’s neck. Even her body is active in the scene. Her outstretched arms twist her torso and her neck and breasts change shape realistically as her chest twists. Her sleeves are rolled up and ready to do some retribution killing. Gentileschi shades this all quite exquisitely. She continues the drama of her art period by not skimping on the fabric folds, shadows and bloodshed. The fire and passion of the Baroque period is preserved while still presenting a rare and realistic portrayal of a brave woman and her companion. All incredibly impressive considering Artemisia was only about 27 when this painting was created (Garrard, 184).
Both da Vinci and Gentileschi were talented revolutionaries in their respective lifetimes. Da Vinci’s explorative nature led to innovations in the sciences and mechanics which served to improve his artistic eye and painterly offerings. Gentileschi thrived in a world dominated by men and religious politics, giving a strong voice to her female subjects and in a sense, reflecting herself through them. Both artists soared above the status quo of their contemporaries and secured their respective places in the museums, art history tomes, creative minds and hearts of art appreciators even to the present day.
WORKS CITED
Garrard, Mary D. Artemisia Gentileschi. Princeton, New Jersey. Princeton University Press, 1989.
Pioch, Nicolas. Baroque. http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/glo/baroque/. Accessed 5 June, 2009.
Vollmer, Emil. Leonardo Da Vinci. New York: Renal & Company, 1956.
Monday, April 13, 2009
whooping crane contingency plan
that's my new favorite phrase, alongside "pelenque sarcophagus." watch the history channel, dear readers, it's gold. but the bit about whooping cranes is not from the history channel to my knowledge. it's from the Division of Migratory Bird Management website. don't judge, it's for an informational design project.
festooned around the site are delicious phrases like "resident canada goose nest egg registration" and "adaptive harvest management" and "Bald Eagle Post-Delisting Management" and the aforementioned title of this post.
festooned around the site are delicious phrases like "resident canada goose nest egg registration" and "adaptive harvest management" and "Bald Eagle Post-Delisting Management" and the aforementioned title of this post.
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
twattering
what is le deal with twittering all of a sudden? in my realm of awareness--and clearly i speak as a representative for all the citizens of earth--twitter was something i'd vaguely heard about but stayed away from (not unlike my treatment of facebook*) until every talking head, pundit and congressman has been heard babbling about it on the talky box. i just wanna be all, "YO. WASHINGTON PEOPLE. WE'VE ALL BEEN INSTANT MESSAGING FOR YEARS. IT'S NOT THAT COOL."
*hello, over-monitoring! on one of my limited forays in facebookery (i limit myself to two or three minute stints to preserve sanity) i was alerted that someone on the fringy periphery of my facebook circle had changed their cell phone number. and then it displayed the number! kinda makes me rethink the shady characters i've accepted just because i was too much of a pussy to click no. on a related note, i have an irrational fear that people will be alerted when you ignore a cause or invite they give you. i can just see that damn facebook alert, "anna has IGNORED your cause! she thinks you are a douche!"
*hello, over-monitoring! on one of my limited forays in facebookery (i limit myself to two or three minute stints to preserve sanity) i was alerted that someone on the fringy periphery of my facebook circle had changed their cell phone number. and then it displayed the number! kinda makes me rethink the shady characters i've accepted just because i was too much of a pussy to click no. on a related note, i have an irrational fear that people will be alerted when you ignore a cause or invite they give you. i can just see that damn facebook alert, "anna has IGNORED your cause! she thinks you are a douche!"
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
tenderloin haiku
i travel through a particularly colorful section of town on my way to school. these are my thoughts. naturally in the form of haiku.
empty crack baggy
you denote transactions that
i'd rather not know.
of all the strip clubs
wonder why this one has a
lone stroller in front
is that poop from the
ass of a dog or a man?
wait--please don't tell me
i did not know that
starbucks was the new place to
smoke crack in front of
bum, please don't push me
to get to that cigarette
butt, i'll gladly move.
empty crack baggy
you denote transactions that
i'd rather not know.
of all the strip clubs
wonder why this one has a
lone stroller in front
is that poop from the
ass of a dog or a man?
wait--please don't tell me
i did not know that
starbucks was the new place to
smoke crack in front of
bum, please don't push me
to get to that cigarette
butt, i'll gladly move.
Monday, December 15, 2008
cities of the WONDERworld
cities of the underworld is a newish show on the history channel in which host don wildman takes the viewer to historic, underground (and subsequently rarely seen) sites (and sights!) in various cities, always led by a local knowledgeable docent. secret subterranean free mason meeting rooms and underground mafia consortia are typical examples. it's really a fascinating show for anyone with a modicum of interest in history and i find myself watching it whenever i see it on.
but i think the real reason i view it is to watch don's relish as he describes the scenery. "so this TUNNEL leads us to LENNIN'S secret WAR room?" he earnestly asks his guide.
"yes. it does."
the guides are clearly chosen for their static qualities and play nice, subdued foils to don's sensational statements. don continues, "it's POSSIBLE, that the ENTRANCE to the SECRET TUNNEL connecting the gladiator training school to the coliseum can be FOUND in this SEWER."
you have to appreciate how much he tries to take the viewer along for the ride. when touring the holding rooms for gladiators that sat below the coliseum, he opines, "down here is where i LIVE. up there [dramatically gesturing to the arena] is where i DIE."
i sometimes imagine the conversations he has with the producers in between takes.
"so should i be turning the corner of the tunnel leading to the gaelic sacrificial edifice and THEN give my opening line? or say it before?"
"you know, that's really up for debate, but i would love to hear you pant more, as if you've just spelunked your way down by your boot strings."
"oh, brilliant, brilliant."
it's awesome.
watch it.
fin.
but i think the real reason i view it is to watch don's relish as he describes the scenery. "so this TUNNEL leads us to LENNIN'S secret WAR room?" he earnestly asks his guide.
"yes. it does."
the guides are clearly chosen for their static qualities and play nice, subdued foils to don's sensational statements. don continues, "it's POSSIBLE, that the ENTRANCE to the SECRET TUNNEL connecting the gladiator training school to the coliseum can be FOUND in this SEWER."
you have to appreciate how much he tries to take the viewer along for the ride. when touring the holding rooms for gladiators that sat below the coliseum, he opines, "down here is where i LIVE. up there [dramatically gesturing to the arena] is where i DIE."
i sometimes imagine the conversations he has with the producers in between takes.
"so should i be turning the corner of the tunnel leading to the gaelic sacrificial edifice and THEN give my opening line? or say it before?"
"you know, that's really up for debate, but i would love to hear you pant more, as if you've just spelunked your way down by your boot strings."
"oh, brilliant, brilliant."
it's awesome.
watch it.
fin.
Saturday, December 06, 2008
for joolz
so i signed onto one of my regular trusty timewaster websites yesterday and almost vomited in my mouth. there, plastered as a wallpaper behind the content of the page, was a reclining heather locklear's smug grin, boring holes into my face. oh...i'm sorry...i think smug is a little too indicative and generous. i suppose "vacant" or "blank" or "plastered" would be more appropriate, because, in reality, YOU CAN'T DECIPHER THE EXPRESSION ON HER BOTOX-ADDLED FACE. hay-SOOS, heather. lay off the frigging injections. tell me, when was the last time you were physically able to furrow your brow at the joke your career has become? sigh. it turns out heather is busy promoting her new rom-com series, "flirting with 40" that seems to be spawned out of the recent cougar epidemic that's sweeping american consciousness. "oh, i'm so old," she demurely croons at her beefcake co-star through frozen lips and cheeks. the plot, shockingly, being that some young hottie falls head over heels for heather and she, presumably through the power of love, learns to FEEL again. so i guess the other eight-fillion canceled shows with similar premise didn't sway the executives at--that's right--lifetime. buuuut in retrospect, i suppose you can't expect anything less from the same people that are serving the public shows called "diet-tribe" and "wife swap" each week.
Monday, June 30, 2008
unwanted, aka, "why angelina jolie's bum bum isn't enough to save a crappy movie"
seeing Wanted last night was like buying a nice, delicious brownie at a bakery only to bite into it and discover that it was really just the baker's square-shaped shit. morgan freeman, angelina jolie, james mcavoy and common were merely the pearls thrust at this sprawling, self-loving cinematic swine.
my first clue should have been the bit of info at the opening of the film, words on the screen telling a brief history of a band of--yes--weavers turned ASSASSINS living 1000 years ago. what it really should have said was, "long, long ago in a galaxy far, far away was a premise so stupid, you wouldn't realize its ridiculous, bloated point until it was too late to walk out of the movie and get your money back.
"
i'm going to throw a few spoilers out here, although i prefer to call them 'savers,' as i am writing this in hopes that you will be saved the hour and 38 minutes i wasted and do something more worthwhile with your time, like watch paint peel or knit a cozy for your dvd player or stab yourself in the face with a rusty fork.
the film opens with a pretty cool action scene detailing some baddie getting offed in a Matrixian, gravity defying way. some other people are shot, too. cut to mcavoy, playing an anxiety-riddled doormat accountant. of course he gets introduced to jolie and her band of killers known as 'the fraternity.' because the screenwriter couldn't think of a name with any iota of originality. i mean, what else would medieval textile manufacturers call themselves when they discover--i shit you not--a magic loom that weaves random targets' names in a hidden code in the fabric. THAT'S WHERE THEY GET THEIR NEXT HITS.
lets pause and let that sink in.
eventually mcavoy is convinced that his absentee father was really a member of the fraternity and was just betrayed and assassinated merely days ago. (he was the victim of the opening death scene.) mcavoy's job is now to become a trained killer so he can off the guy that double-crossed his pops. "my name is james mcavoy. you keel my father. prepare to die. i have a-six fingers." ad nauseum. we then get slapped in the face with some cliche meet-the-impossibly-cool-and-unaffected-members-of-our-killing-club scenes in which we discover they really do still operate out of a functional textile factory. mcavoy's character is convinced this is a front and charmingly asks freeman's character, head honcho Sloan, "so, wait.
do you guys make sweaters or kill people?"
they kill, james, but not necessarily people. the only murder going on is the death of the cinematic tradition.
in the film's defense, the action scenes are exciting; however, they get carried away with themselves. ok...so the bullet bending is cool and all, but this movie is trying to e an overt exaggeration a la Kill Bill or Shoot Em Up, yet comes off as a twelve year old boy's fantasy escape during fifth period math class, not a filmmaker's fun and fantastical vision. you can almost hear a little kid making engine noises and explosion sounds during the chase scenes.
every character is an exaggeration of ridiculous proportion. mcavoy's morbidly obese boss is a foul-mouthed dead ringer for drew carey's tranny-like sidekick. his best friend/co-worker is literally fucking james' girlfriend on their own kitchen table every morning on his break from work and even manages to finagle james' character to buy condoms for him. angelina's character, Fox, (yeah) coolly eats a hamburger with all the emotional disassociation of an autistic savant as mcavoy gets the living shit kicked out of him during one of his many training sessions in which his countenance is being broken for the 87th time. it all ends up being really sloppy and obtuse. i haven't even mentioned the musical training montage in which he hones his skills in the textile factory's meat locker with the resident guido/knife expert.
the end of the film reveals that the man mcavoy was trained to kill (and just did in a drawn-out train crash scene set in...i don't know...slovakia or something) really IS his father, not his father's killer like we were all led to believe. it turns out that he was pursuing mcavoy with a gun the whole goddamn movie to "protect him" from the fraternity. not to kill him as the fired bullets implied. riiiight.
the ending is so unfathomably retarded, a multi-layered, preposterous turd-cake, if you will that i don't even have the energy to describe it. i'll just say that it involved, i'm not kidding, exploding rats and a single bullet that kills a large number of people that are standing in a circle. it's like a merry-go-round of incredulous crap.
if you're going to see this film, i understand angie's draw, just know that despite the amazing talents of the headlining actors, this is one festering pile of poo that is best left untouched...nay...UNWANTED
my first clue should have been the bit of info at the opening of the film, words on the screen telling a brief history of a band of--yes--weavers turned ASSASSINS living 1000 years ago. what it really should have said was, "long, long ago in a galaxy far, far away was a premise so stupid, you wouldn't realize its ridiculous, bloated point until it was too late to walk out of the movie and get your money back.
"
i'm going to throw a few spoilers out here, although i prefer to call them 'savers,' as i am writing this in hopes that you will be saved the hour and 38 minutes i wasted and do something more worthwhile with your time, like watch paint peel or knit a cozy for your dvd player or stab yourself in the face with a rusty fork.
the film opens with a pretty cool action scene detailing some baddie getting offed in a Matrixian, gravity defying way. some other people are shot, too. cut to mcavoy, playing an anxiety-riddled doormat accountant. of course he gets introduced to jolie and her band of killers known as 'the fraternity.' because the screenwriter couldn't think of a name with any iota of originality. i mean, what else would medieval textile manufacturers call themselves when they discover--i shit you not--a magic loom that weaves random targets' names in a hidden code in the fabric. THAT'S WHERE THEY GET THEIR NEXT HITS.
lets pause and let that sink in.
eventually mcavoy is convinced that his absentee father was really a member of the fraternity and was just betrayed and assassinated merely days ago. (he was the victim of the opening death scene.) mcavoy's job is now to become a trained killer so he can off the guy that double-crossed his pops. "my name is james mcavoy. you keel my father. prepare to die. i have a-six fingers." ad nauseum. we then get slapped in the face with some cliche meet-the-impossibly-cool-and-unaffected-members-of-our-killing-club scenes in which we discover they really do still operate out of a functional textile factory. mcavoy's character is convinced this is a front and charmingly asks freeman's character, head honcho Sloan, "so, wait.
do you guys make sweaters or kill people?"
they kill, james, but not necessarily people. the only murder going on is the death of the cinematic tradition.
in the film's defense, the action scenes are exciting; however, they get carried away with themselves. ok...so the bullet bending is cool and all, but this movie is trying to e an overt exaggeration a la Kill Bill or Shoot Em Up, yet comes off as a twelve year old boy's fantasy escape during fifth period math class, not a filmmaker's fun and fantastical vision. you can almost hear a little kid making engine noises and explosion sounds during the chase scenes.
every character is an exaggeration of ridiculous proportion. mcavoy's morbidly obese boss is a foul-mouthed dead ringer for drew carey's tranny-like sidekick. his best friend/co-worker is literally fucking james' girlfriend on their own kitchen table every morning on his break from work and even manages to finagle james' character to buy condoms for him. angelina's character, Fox, (yeah) coolly eats a hamburger with all the emotional disassociation of an autistic savant as mcavoy gets the living shit kicked out of him during one of his many training sessions in which his countenance is being broken for the 87th time. it all ends up being really sloppy and obtuse. i haven't even mentioned the musical training montage in which he hones his skills in the textile factory's meat locker with the resident guido/knife expert.
the end of the film reveals that the man mcavoy was trained to kill (and just did in a drawn-out train crash scene set in...i don't know...slovakia or something) really IS his father, not his father's killer like we were all led to believe. it turns out that he was pursuing mcavoy with a gun the whole goddamn movie to "protect him" from the fraternity. not to kill him as the fired bullets implied. riiiight.
the ending is so unfathomably retarded, a multi-layered, preposterous turd-cake, if you will that i don't even have the energy to describe it. i'll just say that it involved, i'm not kidding, exploding rats and a single bullet that kills a large number of people that are standing in a circle. it's like a merry-go-round of incredulous crap.
if you're going to see this film, i understand angie's draw, just know that despite the amazing talents of the headlining actors, this is one festering pile of poo that is best left untouched...nay...UNWANTED
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