nominations from the other side

This goes out to anyone who likes a little hot Asian action...

This week's Oscar nominations included two Asian entries: House Of Flying Daggers received a nod for Cinematography (and runs a tight race against aforementioned The Aviator as well as A Very Long Engagement and The Passion Of The Christ, which, despite your opinions of those films, are all unquestionably gorgeous works), and The Story Of The Weeping Camel, a German-Mongolian production, garnered a nomination for Best Documentary Feature.

Across the waves, the 11th Annual Hong Kong Film Critics Society Awards were presented, and the animated sad-pig sequel McDull, Prince de la Bun was named Best Picture. Tony Leung and Ziyi Zhang were named Best Actor and Actress for their very effective portrayals in Wong Kar-Wai’s 2046 (which were the best parts of an otherwise overlong, overly-dreamlike film that felt more like a task than a pleasure to watch). Derek Yee received Best Director for his thriller One Nite In Mongkok, and Best Screenplay went to A-1 Headline’s writers, Gordon Chan and Rico Chung. The HKFCS also provides a list of recommended films which, in addition to the above, included: Johnnie To’s Breaking News and Throwdown (and if you haven't seen a To film, start with The Mission, probably his best...then see PTU and Running On Karma...then for grins, watch The Heroic Trio); Yon Fan’s Colour Blossoms; the “Dumplings” episode of Three: Extremes, directed by Fruit Chan (you may recall I found this particularly nasty...I give it credit for at least being different and well-acted); Stephen Chow’s latest blockbuster and follow-up to the instant-classic Shaolin Soccer, Kung Fu Hustle; Soi Cheang’s tense action-drama Love Battlefield, which looks like an awesome film.

Naturally, unless you have access to a specialized film festival or a retail outlet that deals in foreign goods, you'll probably never see these films. So search them out and give them a try (some can be found on Netflix, the preferred DVD-by-mail service of Controlled Burning).

all over again

I hate not being a film critic, because when I see a great film after I've already posted a best-of list, I have to go back and separately state that this or that was wonderful and deserving and oh, I should have put it on my list, and all that back-peddling crap. If I were a film critic, I could see these things in advance and work around that annoyance.

However, last night I watched The Aviator, Scorsese's Howard Hughes film, and it exceeded my feeble expectations. By a lot.

First off, Leonardo DiCaprio is great. If you have never liked him before, you might just be impressed this time. And if you think he's all about being really dreamy in that Titanic kind of way, you may be in for a surprise. Scorsese doesn't mind letting his film go dark, and DiCaprio isn't a stranger to that sort of thing (this is the Leonardo DiCaprio of films like The Basketball Diaries and Total Eclipse, not Catch Me If You Can or The Beach). And the director captures that Old Hollywood style and glamour without getting too caught up in it. He also surrounds his star with a lot of terrific supporting players, most notably John C. Reilly, Cate Blanchett, Alan Alda, and Matt Ross.

Fact is, The Aviator was one of those films I figured couldn't possibly be as good as I'd heard; couldn't possibly be worthy of 11 Oscar nominations; would suffer because its director has made far superior films in the past. After last night, however, I hope it wins several of the big categories, and maybe this year Scorsese himself will get the recognition he's deserved for so long. It's that good.

old school - poetry from a different day

helen could waste away

if you were oenone
I would never have left you,
and troy could have fallen,
and helen could waste away,
and my ships would rot
in the salt of angry seas,
and my men would conspire
against me,
but nothing would matter
except for you, oenone -
drink in my voice
every time I call your name
and say I love you.

© scn 11-7-97

the man

Lee Marvin deserves a t-shirt just as much as, if not more so than, Che Guevara.

I just felt that needed to be said.

sucker emcee

I do not buy DVDs, 99% of the time, unless there is something wildly spectacular about them. And by wildly spectacular I mean that completely subjective thing that you cannot appropriately describe to those closest to you without sounding like a cineaste snob. Like Roger Ebert's annoying third cousin. Like a boring asshole, or worse, just an asshole. Some call it passion; others tell you to get outside more.

For anyone who's watched the films of Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Paul Thomas Anderson, David Fincher or Park Chan-Wook, you know what I'm getting at. Anyone who has an equally giddy response to Singing In The Rain, The Dirty Dozen and Goodfellas knows what it's about. If you find yourself seeking hard to find Kitano films or David Cross' Let America Laugh or Satoshi Kon's animated series Paranoia Agent, you understand. I find all of the above to be brilliant stuff, each in their own way.

Which brings me, alternately, to the cinematic abortion I witnessed the other night. The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou, starring Bill Murray and directed by Wes Anderson, is a film so deadpan in its delivery that it almost seems inert. And I say this as someone who thinks Rushmore (and to a lesser degree, The Royal Tenenbaums) is one of the, oh, 100 best American films of the past decade. That's meant as high praise. And it's because of how good those films are that I anticipate with great fervor the next film by Anderson, just as I do Scorsese, Miike, Jeunot, Tarantino, a handful of directors whose films always leave you wanting more. But Aquatic just doesn't cut it; in retrospect it is the biggest disappointment of all the films in 2004. If it weren't for Seu Jorge's terrific renderings of Bowie songs in Portugese and Anderson's knack for both terrific casting and photography, it would have been a pretty painful waste of time.

Schindler's List is no fun, Sexy Beast is not deep, and The Good, The Bad and The Ugly is not terribly graceful, but they are all brilliant films I am proud to own. Sometimes fun, depth, grace and artfulness - or sheer craftsmanship - cut pretty deeply into that subjective thing, and you just have to admit something's great, whether it's your cup of tea or not. Sometimes you just know what's what. After watching The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou, I know that Wes Anderson's next film will be better, because it can't be much worse without him becoming Mike Figgis or Uwe Boll.

Ouch. Forgive me. Figgis still has Leaving Las Vegas to save him. Boll is just a 21st century Ed Wood with a John Carpenter complex. And Wes Anderson is far better than all of that.

there's funny, and then there's just cruel

A new season of gawking, uncomfortable silences, anyone? Of average Joes and Josephines who are neither Cockers nor Bakers? And a few scant individuals with some discernable talent...welcome to the fourth go-round of American Idol.

Fact is, in the last year the few reality TV shows I have watched have worn thin on me, and I'm pretty disgusted with the direction of the business...and let's be clear, it's nothing more than a reason to sell Nyquil and Oreos, for there is no artistic value to be found in these countless iterations of embarrassing question marks (Who Is My Daddy? Which Midget Will I Marry? Why Are All My Friends Assholes?). Yet American Idol starts off as one of those mostly-trainwreck shows where I cannot pull myself away for those first weeks when the worst are as celebrated as the best, if not more so. However, the lesser entrants into this ongoing triviality can frequently be divided into two categories: those who cannot sing worth a whit but whose self-image grandly exceeds their limitations, and those who not only cannot sing but have such a seething inability to take criticisms that they come off as potential stalker material.

I'll say it this way: if I were Mark McGrath (of Sugar Ray fame), who had the dubious honor of being the first in a string of guest judges on Tuesday night's kickoff show, I would have turned to Simon Cowell and asked, "Hey, you ever worry about any of these mothers?" There were at least four individuals Tuesday night who should have garnered more security-induced concerns than Ryan Seacrest-level cleverness.

And when you come right down to it, there's funny, and then there's that queasy, unpleasant cruelty to be found when someone just doesn't get that they've failed miserably, and the judges just sort of stare, or worse, get so caught up in their own giggling asides about how bad someone is that the "singer" slinks away almost unnoticed (this happened on Wednesday night's follow-up). In some cases you want to pat these poor kids on the shoulder and say, "It probably wasn't meant to be, but hey, at least you don't have to miss anymore classes." And in some cases, you want to take them (and more often their parents) by the shoulders and shake them like a shabby doll in the jaws of a doberman.

Don't get me wrong, I'll be watching next week. It's that kind of trainwreck.

why thumbs do not mislead us

I came across an ad for the film Kinsey that used the quote "Sexy fun", attributed to Thelma Adams of Us Weekly. I was very confused by this, as the film (despite its plusses) is neither sexy nor fun. Well-acted, Oscarly, maybe even one of the top 50 films of the year...but "sexy fun"? No.

Now, to me, this either means that Adams didn't see the movie but guessed from its potentially titillating material that it was sexy and/or fun, or she misinterpreted the film's cold, clinical displays as sexy and/or fun, or she has some serious issues about what is sexy and fun in life. Of course, the culprit could be (and more likely was) that those wonderfully adept folks in the Fox Searchlight Marketing team decided to extract whatever catchy words and phrases they could from a possibly mediocre review to punch up interest in the film just before award season plays itself out. They may have seen a sentence like "This film makes tedious drama look like sexy fun," and felt that maybe that last part would be best for selling movies to practically every demographic...which it probably would have been, had the photo beside it not been of a cuddling Liam Neeson and Laura Linney, who, aside from their terrific talents as actors, are not the poster children for the word "hot". I would opt that it was probably Marketing and not Thelma Adams who made this error.

But then I stray down the same page and see, in the ad for White Noise, that David Edelstein of www.slate.com has been quoted as saying "I screamed louder than I've ever screamed in my life." I like Edelstein's reviews, both on Slate and on NPR, but the quote doesn't really tell me anything other than: David Edelstein is really a little girl. And he screams in movie theaters. And while that is amusing to me, it really tells me nothing about the film, whether it's so good that one might scream like a girl, or that it's so bad one would scream to make it stop.

Quotes are really best if they are of one of two camps: there are the factual ones that you cannot dispute, like Devon Wooster's reliable "National Treasure was number one 3 weeks in a row, and is bland enough not to frighten the children." Then there are the quality exclamations, which can include lists ("One of the year's ten best!"), genres ("One of the best talking animal features this decade!") and comparisons ("Like The Usual Suspects, Fight Club and Amelie, Spanglish has end credits!").

All of this to say: I think that Roger Ebert should be applauded for the brilliance in his thumbs. An up- or down-directed opposable digit is the height of sheer rating simplicity. You can take it as an absolute ("Must see!" / "Must not!") or a more casual recommendation ("Hey, this was pretty good...give it a try."). You can't really misread, misconstrue or more importantly, misrepresent a thumb.

Even if you're the very best the Marketing department has to offer.

real prizes

Two items I found after Christmas are absolute gems, and I'd never have found them if not for that vast, drooling maw of capitalism known as the Amazon search engine. One is the CD version of Caedmon Audio's recording of "Charles Bukowski Uncensored (from the Run With the Hunted sessions)". It's a nicely packaged two-CD set that has some very good readings down, along with some conversation, and it's just a joy to listen to. If you have the old cassette version and want to trade up, or have always wanted a good CD of Bukowski's stuff, try this one. It's right up there with "Hostage" as primo suggested listening.

Also, I came across Gregory Corso's "Die On Me" recordings. This CD is mostly Corso reading his work a mere week before his death, with a few earlier taped readings in there as well. In the newer material, he was 70 years old, ailing, and spoke in a faint crackle of a voice. It's terrific stuff, though, and well worth the trouble if you're interested in such things. I will assume as hard to find as those rare Bukowski CDs that crop up here and there on eBay and in dingy, back-alley book stores. Give these poor mothers a look and don't tell me you aren't moved by the work.

...and where the hell is fiona apple, anyway?

Look, I know they can't all be Nina Simone or Patti Smith.

My son (15 years old...and yes, I was allowed to breed) wanted a Jewel CD for Christmas, and despite my better judgement and musical tastes, I got it for him. His request was based on a single song he'd heard on the radio ("Intuition", which I also had heard on the radio, but didn't know who it was singing, and would never have guessed Jewel) and I figured this was as good as any criteria I've established for CDs I wanted. I frequently suffer from the 3-song syndrome. That's where you purchase a CD based on between one and 3 singles, and when you get home and play it, you realize that's all there is...the rest of the songs are just awful. Anyway...I buy him the Jewel CD. Life is good.

Now, I was under the impression that Jewel was some kind of critically acclaimed folkie who only went wrong when she tried to publish a volume of poetry, only to be coldly, roundly parodied by NY slam poet Beau Sia (btw, I've read Beau Sia while in the bathroom...that doesn't make me gay, does it?). So when I popped my son's CD into the car player yesterday and heard this over-synthesized pop music come out at me, I figured either I'd been wrong all this time, or Jewel had tried to change her image a bit, ala That Other Female Singer Who Wasn't Getting Enough Press And Changed Her Chosen Oeuvre To Reflect A More Marketable Thing. Then her voice came out. Or I should say, the breaths of air that misrepresented a voice, particularly a singing voice, to no good effect. Perhaps Jewel and her six-string guitar at the local Hallowed Grounds Open Mic night worked, the feeble plucking of almost-in-tune strings not overpowering her breezy, lighter-than-fractured-angel-wings voice. But this was really bad. And shame on the producer who thought piping in even more electronic backbeat and synthetic mummer would make her singing build in some way. Again, I thought Jewel was supposed to be something relatively well-received. But this was a voice that couldn't have outlasted the sugary pop vocals of Britney or Jessica, and certainly nowhere near the likes of an Aguilera, a young woman who may not make the best fashion choices, but most assuredly can belt out a tune with great zeal and aplomb (I envision a much older Christina Aguilera, and I mean Ethel Merman older, belting out tunes to a rapt audience that has stayed with her over the decades...or at least to successive generations of fans of whatever type music she decides to sing as she matures).

No, this was a child, whimpering down a noisy telephone line, on a long distance call she had no right to be on. I was really shocked that some executive felt this was a worthy business decision, to spend all the money and resources needed to press a CD and do appropriate marketing.

But my son loves it. And that's where the railing ends.

Except that the whole topic makes me sadly reminiscent of the ages we've waltzed through, music that has slipped past us save for the occasional radio station or CD re-release of a singer's entire history in a single box set. So much great music has been forgotten and isn't in the realm of what our kids might listen to...it's up to us to play things surreptitiously so our kids can hear them, and hope that every now and then one of them may speak up and ask, "So, who's that? I kind of like this song..."

And finally, yes, I need to know: where is Fiona Apple? Where is the new CD? Apple, who always sounded to me like the bluesiest, sultriest, most psychotic and sexual underaged girlfriend you never had, but saw and heard and wanted, had two great CDs but then dropped off the planet amidst tales of stage breakdowns. I'm sure it's her age, that she simply wasn't emotionally prepared to have such a great voice, moderate success and to date the likes of Paul Thomas Anderson. It was probably all too much, and she did probably break down, just a little.

But I need that next CD. Really, I do. I don't care if she fails miserably, I just need to see what she's prepared to do next.

That little minx. How dare she hold back on us.

I blame Magnolia.

bring on the chuckles

If you have not discovered Patton Oswalt, David Cross or Dave Attell, have never watched The Office (with subtitles, please), Mr. Show, Best Of Saturday Night Live: Will Ferrell (#1, not the evil and duplicitous #2) or Family Guy, have never seen an episode from the first two seasons of Sealab 2021, or have never listened to Bill Hicks' Arizona Bay, then you are missing out.

In the same way I would recommend Bukowski, Corso or Gunn to someone in dire need of poetry, I highly suggest you run out and try any or all of the above if you suffer from some kind of giggle anemia.

Yeah, that's pretty much it.

a year of revenge, sadness and humanity

2004 Films – The Good, The Bad, and Dogville Van Chou-Chou

There is so much to say about films I saw in 2004, I hate to waste a lot of text on excessive talk and idle analysis. Let’s just jump right into the many, varied lists below, and I’ll try to address the highs and lows as I go.


The Absolute Best

1 – Old Boy (South Korea, 2003*)

Park Chan-Wook’s third film is a truly gnarly experience, in every sense of the word. Old Boy follows the story of a man who is locked in a room for fifteen years by an unknown foe for reasons he can't comprehend. Once released, he attempts to track down his captor and understand the mystery behind his imprisonment. Things spiral badly out of control. Unlike Park’s previous film, the equally grim-and-dire exercise Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance, Old Boy has a slippery emotional core that binds its story in place. It also sports moments of flinty humor and a streak of violence that would make Tarantino** envious.

Even after having viewed the film several times, I'm not certain that what has happened has actually happened. It's one of those films. But it is glorious and harsh, and as wily and mad as its protagonist's eyes.

*After its release in South Korea in November of 2003, the film next appeared at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival, where it won the second-highest honors following Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11. It went on to appear in almost every other country in the world, yet won’t see a U.S. premiere until the 2005 Sundance festival later this month. I was lucky enough to find a video copy of the film at a local retailer. All of that, and the fact that it’s of South Korean origin, should say a lot about every American film released in 2004. This was the best thing I saw all year.

**Quentin Tarantino was, coincidentally, on the Cannes judges panel this year.


2 – Kill Bill, Vol. 2 (U.S.)

Speaking of Tarantino…

The closing half of the director’s revenge epic had a bit more heart and soul than the flashier, cooler Vol. 1, and the reason for most of its success was Uma Thurman, who will probably go unnoticed again at this year’s various awards ceremonies. I anxiously await a full-blown DVD set of both halves.


3 - The Incredibles (U.S.)

Director Brad Bird made a terrific film a few years back called The Iron Giant, a terrific ode to fifties nostalgia and atomic age cautionary tales. Where that film was sweet, gentle and had an inhuman character that was terribly humane, The Incredibles is swift, raucous and filled with super-human characters that are terribly human. The everyday moments experienced by the Parr family, when they aren’t saving the world, are what makes this film a true gem. Don’t make the mistake of ignoring it as just a kid’s movie.


4 – The Five Obstructions (International*, 2003)

In 1967, director Jorgen Leth made a short film called The Perfect Human. Almost 40 years later, acquaintance and Danish troublemaker Lars Von Trier makes a wager that Leth cannot re-make his film five different ways, each bound by criteria to be established by Von Trier. The first, for example, must have no edit longer than a few seconds. One must be animated. And when Leth doesn’t provide Von Trier precisely what he wants, there are penalties.

Viewing it as a curiosity, I found The Five Obstructions to be one of the most compelling films I’ve seen in a long time. For anyone who loves film and filmmaking, this should be required viewing.

*The film was a combined Danish, Swiss, Belgian and French production.


5 – Sideways (U.S.)

Without a doubt, the absolute funniest film I saw all year. That it had characters who were touching and flawed and smart made it even more terrific. Paul Giamatti again proves himself to be one of the best American actors currently working.


6/7 (tie) – A Very Long Engagement (French) and House of Flying Daggers (Hong Kong)

Both are period dramas set in turbulent times. Both feature mournfully sad characters with deeply personal mysteries to resolve. Both are genuinely stunning films, visually sumptuous and epic in both physical and emotional scope. Jean-Pierre Jeunot’s World War II landscapes and Parisian backdrops are textured and vast. Zhang Yimou’s Chinese brothels and bamboo forests vibrate with color and light. I could not honestly say that either one was more deserving than the other.


8 – The Motorcycle Diaries (Brazil)

Walter Salles’ tale of two young friends journeying through South America is simultaneously epic and intimate. Starting of as a sort of extended joyride, the two quickly find themselves in a series of life-affirming excursions that define them as men, and expose to the viewer all the simple glories of the lands and people they encounter. A wonderful film.


9 – Baadasssss! (U.S.)

Mario Van Peebles’ portrayal of pioneering film director (and father) Melvin is lovingly made if harshly accurate. During the production of the 1971 seminal film Sweet Sweetback’s Baad Asssss Song, the elder Van Peebles was determined to make his work a reality, even if at the expense of everyone around him, including his children. Like several other films on this list, this was probably not seen by many people. Unlike the others, it was made in America and had no reason not to be. Seek it out on DVD and see how independent film really got its start, 18 years before Sex, Lies and Videotape was a hit.


10 – Dawn of the Dead (U.S.)

Zack Snyder’s remake of George Romero’s second zombie film is a classic in its own right. Urgently frightening and frequently funny, it tells of a handful of people holed up in a mall while the dead jaunt about outside, snacking on the living. To give you a bit of perspective: this film has all the relentlessness and immediacy of The Passion of the Christ. But it’s a hell of a lot more fun to watch.


Highly Honorable Mentions (Film/TV), Short Version

Shaun of the Dead…Primer…Collateral…Ray…Spartan…Spiderman 2…The Office Special (BBC TV series)…Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind…I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead…Paranoia Agent (Japanese TV series)…Claude Lelouch’s segment of 11’09’1…the Cate Blanchett, Iggy Pop/Tom Waits, Alfred Molina/Steve Coogan and Bill Rice/Taylor Mead segments of Jim Jarmusch’s Coffee and Cigarettes…Closer…The Saddest Music in the World…The Passion of the Christ


Just Discovered

City of God (2002)…California Split (1973)…Running on Karma (2003)…Hero (2003)…A Tale of Two Sisters (2003)…Joint Security Area (2001)…The Most Terrible Time In My Life (1994)


Solid Films You Should See (For One Reason or Another)

Big Fish (sentimentality without the messy residue)…Kinsey (a string of great performances)…Team America: World Police (for the songs)…The Chronicles of Riddick (the visuals)…The Grudge (a perfect, if unnecessary, adaptation)…The Manchurian Candidate (a terrific, if completely unnecessary, remake)…Alien vs. Predator (for the geek-boy in each of us)


Great Expectations - Biggest Disappointments

In almost every case listed below, fun or charming films were re-made without those qualities, or very talented people failed to show off previously established talent. In other cases, interesting ideas and solid source material were squandered.

Anchorman…Blade: Trinity…Broken Lizard’s Club Dread…My Wife Is A Gangster 2…Ocean’s Twelve…Resident Evil: Apocalypse…Saw…Secret Window…The Eye 2…The Punisher…The Reckoning…Tokyo Godfathers…Wonderful Days…2046*

*Don’t get me wrong, the latest Wong Kar-Wai had lots going for it. But ultimately, it seemed spread to thin and so slowly paced that 2 hours felt like 7.


Time Wasters – In This Or Any Year

Tomie sequels…Ginger Snaps sequels…Beyond Hypothermia…Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid…Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason…Catwoman…Kaena: The Prophecy…Koma…Phone…Robot Stories…So Close…St. John’s Wort…Starsky & Hutch…Suspect Zero…Taking Lives


Special, Just For You: A Few Filthy, Reprehensible Acts

Hotel…Paparazzi…King of the Ants


The Absolute Worst

The Village/The Forgotten – Stupid films made worse by ridiculous endings.

Van Helsing – The ultimate in bad Hollywood action blockbusters.

Battle Royale 2 – The bastard son of a controversial and thrilling original.

Gozu – A sprawling, empty mess that has none of its creator’s controversial charms.

Taxi – Unfunny, unexciting, unfunny and unfunny.

The Butterfly Effect – A grimy little excuse for time travel with Ashton Kutcher.

Three: Extremes – No subtleties here: extremely nasty, extremely awful and extremely predictable.

All About Lily Chou-Chou – The prettiest film ever made about troubled kids; also the most depressing, bleak, long-winded and annoying.

…and the all-time worst film of 2004:

Dogville – Lars Von Trier, previously mentioned near the top of this page, directed this cruel and hateful film where only the last 10 minutes – when everyone is killed – ring true. Don’t believe all the anti-American disparagement from the film’s detractors…it’s simply an unpleasant film without merit.

Alright, kiddoes. That’s it.

this is just a test

New venue, same old poet.

Up to now, I've blogged briefly on www.1up.com (as "gamepoet", with a varied mix of topics but always circling back to the gamer-centric stuff) and www.affd.org (Asian Film Festival of Dallas - limited movie material). But when I stumbled across this site, I felt a bit more free about the direction I could take; I could write whatever I want, make it as personal as I please, get back to some topics you can't fit in just anywhere else, and since my own website is currently unavailable (due to - ahem - financial matters), it makes a nice replacement site.

All that to say: it's a pleasure to be here. Thanks for having me.

Now, let's get down to it.