by turns

Cinematics

Amia's been consistently skipping her nap in the afternoon so she goes to bed around 7 every night. That leaves Suzanne and I with evenings free, which hasn't happened in about, oh, 2 1/2 years. It's been great. That coupled with Blockbuster Online and that translates into a lot of movies. We've seen some good ones lately, only some of which I can remember:

• Babel-I can't wait to see what this director, Innaritu, does next! I loved the whole trilogy. With each one I've found myself saying, this guy understands life. I think he's had great scripts to work with, but he's translated them so well into film it's really amazing.
• Marie Antoinette-I love Coppola's films too! They're so meditative and...ponderative. I really liked the unorthodox musical choices she made.
• The Proposition-An Australian western written by Nick Cave. In terms of brutality and graphicness (I think I'm tired and making up words), it's up there with Deadwood. The reason being is that they both explore what happens in a place and time where there's no authority, where order comes from the barrel of a gun and people are struggling to wrestle civilization from the ground with both hands. This movie has stuck with me for weeks now.
• American Hardcore-A documentary about the hardcore movement in the US. The footage was so intense. Hardcore was the US response to punk music, with short, energetic blasts of music, often political, from bands like the historic Black Flag to the subtle Millions of Dead Cops. Little disappointed with the actual interviews though. You can only take so many people saying, "It was just intense, man, it was in your face, it was &*$% you, man!" before you're desperate for some deeper understanding, which did come through (not sure if it was what the filmmakers had to work with or just what they chose to include). One guy put it all in perspective, which helped me understand why I liked it so much. He said that in the 80s there was no Left, there was no social movement besides hardcore punks. This was how young people responded to the sublimation of the suburbs and the Reagans of the world. That's pretty fascinating.
• Borat-I think that's the only time I've said to Suzanne, He just had a nice moment with that hooker.
• Left of the Dial-Documentary about the early days of Air America, the progressive talk radio station. Captured a really interesting moment in time.

"Tia Anya Has A Movie for You To Watch"

Anya gave me permission to post this video. It's a project for one of her classes. She had to string together into a movie a bunch of random video clips and beats. We decided it'd be great to have Amia watch the clips and just record her talking about. So here is Amia talking about these video clips, with Anya's expert sound and video editing.

I Was Ready

I really liked Brokeback Mountain. I was a little nervous going in 'cause I'd heard how intense it is. And reading the book I had some idea. For me the most intense part was emotional, seeing these two people that loved each other so much, two men, struggle to live both with these emotions and with how to express it. I only lived for a short time in the west (I feel like South Dakota is more west than midwest in  a lot of places), but I feel like Lee really captured it. As he seems to do with whatever setting his stories take place in. But I can only imagine how hard it would have been for a man to express love and tenderness in a time and place like that. It's hard now, so how much harder must it have been then?

It also rung true with my own experiences, living in a culture, or working within a system, that values a certain kind of relationship or expression with others. Most strongly when I was a teacher, and the school and classroom I was in brought out all these negative patterns of behavior that the students and I couldn't help but fall in to. That's why I really appreciated being a teaching assistant in grad school and I felt so able to express love for my students. I think true education is fundamentally a loving relationship, one that demands tenderness, understanding, discipline, purity, and humility.

I also really appreciated the pacing of the movie. It can feel a bit slow, but I realized that when you're out in the country, especially country like that, time moves differently. Here you always have some sense of how fast or slow you're going. You can always compare yourself to how fast others are walking, driving, talking, eating...getting money out of the ATM. But in rural western areas, your sense of time is largely based on the sky and the land. Or a cow grazing. It's a completely different concept. And I feel like the movie got it exactly right.

I've also realized that Ang Lee could make a movie based on a phonebook and it would be beautiful, moving, and poetic.

Am I Ready?

I just got Brokeback Mountain in the mail. I'm excited and a little nervous. I read the short story and it was INTENSE.

An Act of Civil Obedience

This is one of the most amazing and beautiful things I've seen in a long time. Check it out. No, seriously. Check it out.

Meditation on the Speed Limit

It reminds me of the stuff Saul Alinsky used to do in Chicago back in the day. I read one of his books, Rules for Radicals. He was really involved in working with communities to demand equitable hiring practices by companies. The stuff they did, the power that they leveraged was just so creative. Some examples. A major department store had no African Americans in management positions, even though a lot of the lower level staff were black and had worked there for years. So one day they got a huge number of people, almost all black, to shop at the store. A lot of white people wouldn't even enter the store. Then, 5 minutes before closing, all the people that had been standing around browsing showed up at the cashiers wanting to pay with credit cards. Hundreds of people were organized to do this. They only had to do that once. Another time a company wasn't budging on treating their employees fairly, so they threatened them where it hurt. Everyone ate a lot of beans. Then they got tickets to the opera. To a show where most of the company's executives were going. Again, they only had to do that once.

Seen

Mean Girls- Surprisingly funny and insightful.

And Starring Pancho Villa as Himself- Story of how Pancho Villa got support for his revolution by getting a movie made about it. Antonio Banderas is great in it. The movie that was made was the first hour long movie ("no one will want to sit through an hour long movie!"), and the most expensive to see ("how are we going to pay for this?", "we'll charge double!", "who's going to pay a nickel to see a movie!?").

American Splendor- Very...postmodern. They'll have a scene, then they'll go to behind the scenes to show us the actual people being portrayed. Really interesting.

OutFoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism- Enraging documentary about how the "news" is presented on Fox News. They show how Fox News has become essentially an arm of the current White House, how reporters are coerced into showing the conservative viewpoint, and how they try to mask it all as "Fair and Balanced".

SLC Punk- Really energetic movie about punks in Salt Lake City and the changes the main character is going through as he matures.

The Sopranos- I've watched the whole thing again. Seeing it again I realized how you kind of have to see the whole thing to get the full rewards--issues of racism, marital relationships, parenting, crime.

Da Ali G Show- Nuff said.

Mission Impossible 2- I won't get those 2 hours back.

Saved!- Funny but not that funny.

I think that's it.

Notes on an American Movie

I just got back from seeing Return of the King. I thought it was a great movie. I could go on and on about it, but I think that one of the most touching elements of the whole series was the relationship between Frodo and Sam. It's rare that in a movie you see a relationship between two men that is tender, affectionate, appreciative, loving, and platonic. As I was sitting in the theater I was wondering what the men around me thought of it. Whether it made them uncomfortable, dismissive, or kind of wishing for something similar. Anywho...
I realized while watching The Two Towers recently that the battle for Helm's Deep was almost identical in numbers to the battle at Shaykh Tabarsi (a place in Iran where several followers of the Bab withstood repeated attempts at elimination by the Persian army). At one point they say there are 10,000 Uruk-Hai, and 300 men soldiers. In the Dawnbreakers we see that there are 313 Babis and 10,000 Persian soldiers (I think I have the numbers right). The main difference was that the Babis, who were not soldiers but mostly students of theology, repeatedly repulsed the army and actually scattered them several times. If there's ever a movie about that event it would seem impossible. But it really happened...