Total spoilers.
Geoff says
I have to really apologize to Mitch here, who I treated very shabbily. He asked if he could review the film, and I had not seen it yet, but I said yes, and then I saw it before he got his review to me and I hammered all this stuff out, stealing a bit of his thunder. That was not nice of me, but I don't blog that much anymore and I got very excited that I actually had a strong opinion on this one. He fit his commentary into mine, and the result is uneven maybe, but the unevenness is my fault, and it is also my fault that Mitch comes off as too negative -- because he did not want to repeat the compliments I gave the movie. I am sorry Mitch.
Here is the conversation:
Though fanboys are going to claim all three, Inception is not a good sci-fi movie, and it is not a smart or original movie -- and yet somehow it is a good movie. I think like Blade Runner it is a very good movie, but not for the reason people say. Spoilers.
Mitch says
(For all of Nolan’s movies, actually. Sorry.)
When the credits for Inception rolled, my immediate thought was that it suffered from the exact opposite problem you hear screenwriting guru guys like Robert McKee talking about all the time. Here is an imaginatively structured, certainly well made movie that doesn’t suffer from a saggy middle, but a flawed opening and ending, with an absolutely satisfying middle.
Geoff Says
A list of precursors is very important here: City of Lost Children (stealing dreams), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (rewriting memory, especially the memory of a lover), Dark City (the ability to manipulate a cityscape with godlike power), the Matrix (invading a dream-world with big guns), ExistenZ (getting lost in a series of artificial worlds within in artificial worlds), Soderbergh's Solaris (the guilty confrontation with a mental reconstruction of a dead lover, one our hero may be responsible for killing).
Showing posts with label Mitch. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mitch. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Iron Man 2
Spoilers. People have been asking for an Iron Man 2 review. I totally liked it, but also find myself without that much to really say. The same people who asked me to review it also provided some thoughts of their own. So I thought I would chuck a bunch of stuff in this post written by different people and see what happens.
The main thing I had to say about it was that it felt to me like a new kind of blockbuster. The Dark Knight did too to a certain extent -- but the Dark Knight was a BAD new kind of blockbuster, one that tried to make SERIOUS, DOWNER points, one that lectured the audience (It was not the first, but it was big about it). That is not good summer blockbuster material.
Iron Man 2 was new in a good way. The scene in the diner with Samuel L Jackson was what made it clear to me. The logo of the diner is in the window and it is all yellow and orange. Like something from the 70s, but not exactly the 70s. And I realized two things. 1. The nebulous time superhero comics are set in is very like the nebulous time Tarantino movies are set in (People are texting in Death Proof but everything else about the setting seems 70s; in the comics in what war does Iron Man's origin take place?).
2. Iron Man 2 is good for the same reason Pulp Fiction is good -- and watching Samuel L Jackson in the diner is the overlap, the scene in both movies. Pulp Fiction is an irreverent, randomly and gratuitously violent film, but even though those were all things the audience, including my high-school-self, valued, this was not why we watched the movie. We watched for the dialogue, for the conversations. The revolution of having such a successful cool picture, a movie (along with Reservoir Dogs) it felt like my whole high school was obsessed with be about PEOPLE TALKING is kind of amazing, especially when people think high school kids are just idiots who want to see violence (and we were, and we did, but the talking trumped all).
The main thing I had to say about it was that it felt to me like a new kind of blockbuster. The Dark Knight did too to a certain extent -- but the Dark Knight was a BAD new kind of blockbuster, one that tried to make SERIOUS, DOWNER points, one that lectured the audience (It was not the first, but it was big about it). That is not good summer blockbuster material.
Iron Man 2 was new in a good way. The scene in the diner with Samuel L Jackson was what made it clear to me. The logo of the diner is in the window and it is all yellow and orange. Like something from the 70s, but not exactly the 70s. And I realized two things. 1. The nebulous time superhero comics are set in is very like the nebulous time Tarantino movies are set in (People are texting in Death Proof but everything else about the setting seems 70s; in the comics in what war does Iron Man's origin take place?).
2. Iron Man 2 is good for the same reason Pulp Fiction is good -- and watching Samuel L Jackson in the diner is the overlap, the scene in both movies. Pulp Fiction is an irreverent, randomly and gratuitously violent film, but even though those were all things the audience, including my high-school-self, valued, this was not why we watched the movie. We watched for the dialogue, for the conversations. The revolution of having such a successful cool picture, a movie (along with Reservoir Dogs) it felt like my whole high school was obsessed with be about PEOPLE TALKING is kind of amazing, especially when people think high school kids are just idiots who want to see violence (and we were, and we did, but the talking trumped all).
Monday, August 24, 2009
Buffy the Vampire Slayer – Season 4
by Mitch [I make a brief comment below]
Despite the Buffy meme’s persistent infiltration of nearly every aspect of my life, I managed to avoid watching it until now, nearly ten years after it began. Thus far – I am currently four discs into Season Five – it is largely just as good as, sometimes much better than, and intermittently not as good as the common opinion suggests. The first thing I said to everyone is that I feel like I missed a good opportunity by not watching the show when it was on the air and when I was synchronously going through high school and college. The equation of adolescent melodrama with the supernatural usually fits perfectly, because most teenagers feel things on a supernatural level. Recall how many times you said outlandish things like, “I will love you forever and ever until the end of time” or “Go to Hell” as a teenager and suddenly you realize what creator Joss Whedon is up to. Here Buffy Summers gets a boyfriend who is actually immortal. Here, Buffy can actually send people to Hell. It’s under the library in her high school. The collision of genre and theme brings out the best in both aspects of the show – the paranormal material and the high school melodrama. However, in the midst of the Fourth Season, the show’s mission statement seems to change.
Most people cite Season Four as the beginning of the end for Buffy, but THIS is my favorite season so far, huge glaring flaws and all. Geoff once said to me that the fourth season lacks a strong villain. I agree and disagree. The Initiative is introduced during Buffy’s first year at college – a fraternity that is actually a cover for a military demon hunting assault force. Buffy’s bitchy psychology teacher, Professor Walsh, heads up the program and is willing to make moral compromises for the greater good, like purposely sending Buffy on a suicide mission. Eventually, we learn that the Initiative has built this Frankenstein super-soldier named Adam, who unfortunately becomes the main villain. Geoff is right; this guy and his “What is my purpose?” shtick is totally lame. Really, he should have only been a powerful henchman for the more human, more interesting villain the Season missed out on – Professor Walsh – who was regrettably done away with pretty quickly. Whedon says in commentaries that the overarching Initiative story of Season Four is meant to seem like a long crossover with another TV show. This is a perfect summing up for this season, because instead of playing with genre, like the first three seasons, Season Four plays with the television medium. In the Season Three episode “The Zeppo,” we see – or rather, don’t see – a typical Buffy adventure from Xander’s perspective, and as a result we miss the climactic battle. “The Zeppo” foretells Whendon’s new interest in form over subject matter, perhaps feeling that the high school/supernatural metaphor has run its course. “Pangs,” for instance, was marketed as the first crossover with the Angel show, but in it Buffy and Angel never actually interact – as Jane Espenson says in the special features, it’s a crossover Buffy isn’t even aware of. And of course there is the surreal, nightmarish and brilliant “Hush,” which is eighty percent silent. You see what I mean here, a silent episode is only fun if you think about what normal TV tools – like dialogue – Whedon must give up to make that work. And it’s hard to enjoy the “Pangs” non-crossover concept, without considering what normally happens in a typical crossover. Even minor plot elements or throwaway episodes in the season mirror stick with this, like in “Something Blue,” where two characters who normally hate each other are made to fall deeply in love for one episode, or “A New Man,” where a character turns into a demon. “This Year’s Girl” and “Who am I?” are totally rife with stock TV plot points and devices. Buffy and Faith switch bodies a la “Freaky Friday,” allegedly for character development purposes, but really, I surmise, to let the actresses have fun playing each other. (The way Sarah Michelle Gellar lampoons Eliza Dushku’s shoulder roll thing is hysterical.) As if that’s not enough, the whole cliffhanger hinges on Faith’s “catchphrase,” for which she is ridiculed earlier in the episode. It’s hard not to love the audacious “Superstar” the most, though, for suddenly upgrading a minor character from previous seasons to a major character. Jonathan from “Earshot” all of a sudden appears in the opening credit sequence, seems to have been close friends with everybody forever, and is a total badass – all without any explanation. Of course, it all unravels later, but that initial disorientation lampoons when characters are actually added or removed from a show like this… I’m thinking of the uncle in “Land of the Lost” or Darren in “Bewitched.” “Restless,” the season’s last episode, is a formally abstract and quiet epilogue that foreshadows the Fifth Season, but not in a “Picard has become a Borg and what will they do” way. So overall, Season Four was conceptually awesome, even if the Initiative story was a little bungled.
Season Five, however, has missed just about every mark, starting with the unimaginative Dracula appearance (Really? No reinvention at all?). I don’t even know what to say about Buffy’s sudden sister Dawn, who is at best a retread of the “Superstar” idea, and at worst exactly what “Superstar” was making fun of. Part of the problem, I think, is illustrated by the fact that four discs into Season Five, Whedon has only written/directed one episode. I’m definitely in for the long haul though and I know that there are fun things like Dark Willow and the musical episode (which I have already seen out of context) in the future. For now, I maintain a cautious sense of optimism about where everything is going.
[It is interesting to think that the Buffy/Angel crossover seems like a precursor to Grant Morrison's Seven Soldiers, another crossover where the characters do not meet. I have already mentioned on this blog (though I cannot find where) about Morrison's Silent Issue owing to Hush, and his Vimanarama being very Whedon-esque, right after Whedon took over his X-Men run.]
[I will also defend Buffy vs Dracula (and also Dawn, who grows on me). Just like the Zeppo, Pangs, and Superstar, Buffy vs Dracula involves a total reversal of expectations, a radical shift in focus. Dracula, in the hands of a lesser writer, would have been the final villain in season 7 or something and the whole thing would have played out a lot more like the unfortunate Blade: Trinity. At the bare minimum you expect some kind of ramp up, or serious consequence to his appearance (like, say, he kills a lot of people)-- but no, Dracula just SHOWS UP. You have to admire Whedon for turning his source material into a pretty sly joke, just as he did in the Zeppo.]
Despite the Buffy meme’s persistent infiltration of nearly every aspect of my life, I managed to avoid watching it until now, nearly ten years after it began. Thus far – I am currently four discs into Season Five – it is largely just as good as, sometimes much better than, and intermittently not as good as the common opinion suggests. The first thing I said to everyone is that I feel like I missed a good opportunity by not watching the show when it was on the air and when I was synchronously going through high school and college. The equation of adolescent melodrama with the supernatural usually fits perfectly, because most teenagers feel things on a supernatural level. Recall how many times you said outlandish things like, “I will love you forever and ever until the end of time” or “Go to Hell” as a teenager and suddenly you realize what creator Joss Whedon is up to. Here Buffy Summers gets a boyfriend who is actually immortal. Here, Buffy can actually send people to Hell. It’s under the library in her high school. The collision of genre and theme brings out the best in both aspects of the show – the paranormal material and the high school melodrama. However, in the midst of the Fourth Season, the show’s mission statement seems to change.
Most people cite Season Four as the beginning of the end for Buffy, but THIS is my favorite season so far, huge glaring flaws and all. Geoff once said to me that the fourth season lacks a strong villain. I agree and disagree. The Initiative is introduced during Buffy’s first year at college – a fraternity that is actually a cover for a military demon hunting assault force. Buffy’s bitchy psychology teacher, Professor Walsh, heads up the program and is willing to make moral compromises for the greater good, like purposely sending Buffy on a suicide mission. Eventually, we learn that the Initiative has built this Frankenstein super-soldier named Adam, who unfortunately becomes the main villain. Geoff is right; this guy and his “What is my purpose?” shtick is totally lame. Really, he should have only been a powerful henchman for the more human, more interesting villain the Season missed out on – Professor Walsh – who was regrettably done away with pretty quickly. Whedon says in commentaries that the overarching Initiative story of Season Four is meant to seem like a long crossover with another TV show. This is a perfect summing up for this season, because instead of playing with genre, like the first three seasons, Season Four plays with the television medium. In the Season Three episode “The Zeppo,” we see – or rather, don’t see – a typical Buffy adventure from Xander’s perspective, and as a result we miss the climactic battle. “The Zeppo” foretells Whendon’s new interest in form over subject matter, perhaps feeling that the high school/supernatural metaphor has run its course. “Pangs,” for instance, was marketed as the first crossover with the Angel show, but in it Buffy and Angel never actually interact – as Jane Espenson says in the special features, it’s a crossover Buffy isn’t even aware of. And of course there is the surreal, nightmarish and brilliant “Hush,” which is eighty percent silent. You see what I mean here, a silent episode is only fun if you think about what normal TV tools – like dialogue – Whedon must give up to make that work. And it’s hard to enjoy the “Pangs” non-crossover concept, without considering what normally happens in a typical crossover. Even minor plot elements or throwaway episodes in the season mirror stick with this, like in “Something Blue,” where two characters who normally hate each other are made to fall deeply in love for one episode, or “A New Man,” where a character turns into a demon. “This Year’s Girl” and “Who am I?” are totally rife with stock TV plot points and devices. Buffy and Faith switch bodies a la “Freaky Friday,” allegedly for character development purposes, but really, I surmise, to let the actresses have fun playing each other. (The way Sarah Michelle Gellar lampoons Eliza Dushku’s shoulder roll thing is hysterical.) As if that’s not enough, the whole cliffhanger hinges on Faith’s “catchphrase,” for which she is ridiculed earlier in the episode. It’s hard not to love the audacious “Superstar” the most, though, for suddenly upgrading a minor character from previous seasons to a major character. Jonathan from “Earshot” all of a sudden appears in the opening credit sequence, seems to have been close friends with everybody forever, and is a total badass – all without any explanation. Of course, it all unravels later, but that initial disorientation lampoons when characters are actually added or removed from a show like this… I’m thinking of the uncle in “Land of the Lost” or Darren in “Bewitched.” “Restless,” the season’s last episode, is a formally abstract and quiet epilogue that foreshadows the Fifth Season, but not in a “Picard has become a Borg and what will they do” way. So overall, Season Four was conceptually awesome, even if the Initiative story was a little bungled.
Season Five, however, has missed just about every mark, starting with the unimaginative Dracula appearance (Really? No reinvention at all?). I don’t even know what to say about Buffy’s sudden sister Dawn, who is at best a retread of the “Superstar” idea, and at worst exactly what “Superstar” was making fun of. Part of the problem, I think, is illustrated by the fact that four discs into Season Five, Whedon has only written/directed one episode. I’m definitely in for the long haul though and I know that there are fun things like Dark Willow and the musical episode (which I have already seen out of context) in the future. For now, I maintain a cautious sense of optimism about where everything is going.
[It is interesting to think that the Buffy/Angel crossover seems like a precursor to Grant Morrison's Seven Soldiers, another crossover where the characters do not meet. I have already mentioned on this blog (though I cannot find where) about Morrison's Silent Issue owing to Hush, and his Vimanarama being very Whedon-esque, right after Whedon took over his X-Men run.]
[I will also defend Buffy vs Dracula (and also Dawn, who grows on me). Just like the Zeppo, Pangs, and Superstar, Buffy vs Dracula involves a total reversal of expectations, a radical shift in focus. Dracula, in the hands of a lesser writer, would have been the final villain in season 7 or something and the whole thing would have played out a lot more like the unfortunate Blade: Trinity. At the bare minimum you expect some kind of ramp up, or serious consequence to his appearance (like, say, he kills a lot of people)-- but no, Dracula just SHOWS UP. You have to admire Whedon for turning his source material into a pretty sly joke, just as he did in the Zeppo.]
Friday, July 31, 2009
The Fantastic Mr. Fox
[Guest Blogger Mitch has a few things to say about the new Wes Anderson trailer.]
I'm always trying to tell people precisely what it is I like about Wes Anderson's movies and my friend Carla hit the nail on the head earlier today, when I posted the trailer for his new (stop-motion!) movie The Fantastic Mr. Fox on Facebook. There is a little scene where the Jason Schwartzman fox is getting ready for the caper and says, "I don't have a bandit hat, but I modified this tube sock."
The vocabulary of that one line alone perfectly sums Anderson up. First, there's the purposely-banal choice of "bandit hat" over the more exciting, but overused term "mask." To say he "modified" it implies a much funnier, more methodical process than simply cutting eye and mouth holes. This over-sophisticated phraseology, when paired with the image of the actually crudely cut sock tells us a lot of about how seriously Schwartman's character takes himself. (A fair criticism of Anderson would be that most of his characters speak in the same self-important jargon.) The joke obviously hangs on it being a "tube sock," because "sock" alone wouldn't be enough to hammer this dichotomy home.
The Meryl Streep fox also has a great, overly verbose line: "If what I think is happening is happening... it better not be." This is one of Anderson's favorite tricks -- telegraphing a familiar, cliche line structure and then sabotaging it with something far more potent. Another example of this is Dennis the Menace's line in Rushmore: "With friends like you, Max... who needs friends?"
I'm still looking for the perfect phrase to characterize Anderson's style, though. "Surprising Banality?" "Poetic Banality?" Any ideas?
[And as someone commenting on your facebook pointed out, the tube sock line is followed by "You look good" -- "Yeah. I do." That is kind of wonderful because it is delivered with a childlike unconsciousness of ego, just a statement of fact, which is adorable.]
I'm always trying to tell people precisely what it is I like about Wes Anderson's movies and my friend Carla hit the nail on the head earlier today, when I posted the trailer for his new (stop-motion!) movie The Fantastic Mr. Fox on Facebook. There is a little scene where the Jason Schwartzman fox is getting ready for the caper and says, "I don't have a bandit hat, but I modified this tube sock."
The vocabulary of that one line alone perfectly sums Anderson up. First, there's the purposely-banal choice of "bandit hat" over the more exciting, but overused term "mask." To say he "modified" it implies a much funnier, more methodical process than simply cutting eye and mouth holes. This over-sophisticated phraseology, when paired with the image of the actually crudely cut sock tells us a lot of about how seriously Schwartman's character takes himself. (A fair criticism of Anderson would be that most of his characters speak in the same self-important jargon.) The joke obviously hangs on it being a "tube sock," because "sock" alone wouldn't be enough to hammer this dichotomy home.
The Meryl Streep fox also has a great, overly verbose line: "If what I think is happening is happening... it better not be." This is one of Anderson's favorite tricks -- telegraphing a familiar, cliche line structure and then sabotaging it with something far more potent. Another example of this is Dennis the Menace's line in Rushmore: "With friends like you, Max... who needs friends?"
I'm still looking for the perfect phrase to characterize Anderson's style, though. "Surprising Banality?" "Poetic Banality?" Any ideas?
[And as someone commenting on your facebook pointed out, the tube sock line is followed by "You look good" -- "Yeah. I do." That is kind of wonderful because it is delivered with a childlike unconsciousness of ego, just a statement of fact, which is adorable.]
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Mitch: Triumph of the Underdog pt 1
Mitch's Triumph of the Underdog is going up, in parts, on the YouTube. I am going to syndicate it here, with comments from Mitch below. Here is part one.
Triumph of the Underdog Part 1 – Prologue
For Casanova fans, think of this as Triumph’s “Back Matter.” I figured I would use this first commentary to bring everyone up to speed on what Triumph is and why you are watching it on YouTube.
The “undergraduate thesis” for my college theater program was a self-written, self-produced one-person show. I decided to make my one person show a seminar-style lecture. Mostly because I HATE one-person shows where a character talks to themselves for an hour and a half for no reason. That drives me apeshit. See if this sounds familiar:
(Lights up. A single performer stands on stage, in a spotlight.)
PERFORMER: Well, here I am again at the old creek. By myself. I’ve had some good times at this old creek. I come here every year on my birthday. It’s my favorite place to talk about what’s happened in my life recently… OUT LOUD.
Anyway, I was glad that I wouldn’t have to worry about that – I would be addressing the audience directly and even interacting with them. They wouldn’t have to pretend they were in Medieval Camelot or on Tempest Island or at a 1950’s soc hop. They were in theater for a lecture, watching a guy who is, in fact, delivering a lecture. It’s all right there in front of them.
I decided the lecture would be on “The History of Science Fiction,” which was broad enough for me to slide in lots of things I liked (Gilgamesh, Aristotle, Carl Sagan, NASA, X-Men) and would give me a chance to comment on them. But it couldn’t just be that – my senior project professor, Barbara (who would later direct this Fringe Festival production), hammered home that our characters needed an exciting, concrete objective to really make these things interesting. In a solo show these goals are usually more intimate things like “working up the nerve to ask your girlfriend to marry you” or “coming to terms with your father’s death.”
For whatever crazy reason, I settled on “save the world from fiery cosmic doom.” I thought it would be a fun challenge to “sell” the asteroid collisions and stuff with only a guy doing a PowerPoint on stage. This is funny because I specifically picked the lecture format so the audience wouldn’t have to suspend their disbelief about what they were seeing in front of them, and now they have to suspend their disbelief about ALL KINDS of crazy things they AREN’T seeing. Way to think it through, Mitch.
So that’s my general intro. This first part is mostly set up – the guy shows up and starts his lecture. Along the way we are introduced to the radio, which all of us (me, the co-writer, director and actors) tried our damnedest to make more than an “exposition box.” I do an inadvertent and funny sleep paralysis jump at time code 02:07. I’ve tried to jazz up the single angle video by cutting in the PowerPoint slides. As a result there are a few slight clicks in the audio. I’m still getting a hang of the editing software, so hopefully it will get better as we go. Finally, I’ve inserted subtitles for lines that are inaudible if they are integral to the plot or else ones that I find funny.
For more info and reviews and stuff, check out the show’s website www.triumphoftheunderdog.blogspot.com
Triumph of the Underdog Part 1 – Prologue
For Casanova fans, think of this as Triumph’s “Back Matter.” I figured I would use this first commentary to bring everyone up to speed on what Triumph is and why you are watching it on YouTube.
The “undergraduate thesis” for my college theater program was a self-written, self-produced one-person show. I decided to make my one person show a seminar-style lecture. Mostly because I HATE one-person shows where a character talks to themselves for an hour and a half for no reason. That drives me apeshit. See if this sounds familiar:
(Lights up. A single performer stands on stage, in a spotlight.)
PERFORMER: Well, here I am again at the old creek. By myself. I’ve had some good times at this old creek. I come here every year on my birthday. It’s my favorite place to talk about what’s happened in my life recently… OUT LOUD.
Anyway, I was glad that I wouldn’t have to worry about that – I would be addressing the audience directly and even interacting with them. They wouldn’t have to pretend they were in Medieval Camelot or on Tempest Island or at a 1950’s soc hop. They were in theater for a lecture, watching a guy who is, in fact, delivering a lecture. It’s all right there in front of them.
I decided the lecture would be on “The History of Science Fiction,” which was broad enough for me to slide in lots of things I liked (Gilgamesh, Aristotle, Carl Sagan, NASA, X-Men) and would give me a chance to comment on them. But it couldn’t just be that – my senior project professor, Barbara (who would later direct this Fringe Festival production), hammered home that our characters needed an exciting, concrete objective to really make these things interesting. In a solo show these goals are usually more intimate things like “working up the nerve to ask your girlfriend to marry you” or “coming to terms with your father’s death.”
For whatever crazy reason, I settled on “save the world from fiery cosmic doom.” I thought it would be a fun challenge to “sell” the asteroid collisions and stuff with only a guy doing a PowerPoint on stage. This is funny because I specifically picked the lecture format so the audience wouldn’t have to suspend their disbelief about what they were seeing in front of them, and now they have to suspend their disbelief about ALL KINDS of crazy things they AREN’T seeing. Way to think it through, Mitch.
So that’s my general intro. This first part is mostly set up – the guy shows up and starts his lecture. Along the way we are introduced to the radio, which all of us (me, the co-writer, director and actors) tried our damnedest to make more than an “exposition box.” I do an inadvertent and funny sleep paralysis jump at time code 02:07. I’ve tried to jazz up the single angle video by cutting in the PowerPoint slides. As a result there are a few slight clicks in the audio. I’m still getting a hang of the editing software, so hopefully it will get better as we go. Finally, I’ve inserted subtitles for lines that are inaudible if they are integral to the plot or else ones that I find funny.
For more info and reviews and stuff, check out the show’s website www.triumphoftheunderdog.blogspot.com
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Triumph of the Underdog
Mitch's one man show at the Fringe festival got rave reviews from lots of folks including the New York Times. I enjoyed it a lot myself, and now it will be on the YouTube. Here is the trailer.
www.triumphoftheunderdog.blogspot.com
www.triumphoftheunderdog.blogspot.com
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Mitch: Triumph of the Underdog
[Our very own Mitch has this little project you all should know about. The Fringe Festival is often home to terrible surreal "outsider" nonsense, but this thing -- this thing looks good. It is a play whose format is a lecture from a science fiction professor (complete with PowerPoint), which I think is an ingenious way to deal with budget restrictions, and a great way to think about the place of the monologue in contemporary culture (cause monologues are usually not at home in a movie theatre). Plus check out these pictures. I have met Mitch and he looks like this, but he is kind of dramatically in character here. Just his facial expressions and body language make him look 10 years older, which is really something.]
[He is a talented guy. I am genuinely excited about this, and Sara and I will be there with bells on. You should be too, but don't go with bells on because then when Sara and I bump into you we will have that awkward moment where we realize we are wearing the same thing.]
Here is the Press Release
[He is a talented guy. I am genuinely excited about this, and Sara and I will be there with bells on. You should be too, but don't go with bells on because then when Sara and I bump into you we will have that awkward moment where we realize we are wearing the same thing.]
Triumph Team is proud to present the New York Premiere of
TRIUMPH OF THE UNDERDOG
as part of the 11th Annual New York International Fringe Festival.
The New York International Fringe Festival – FringeNYC
A production of the Present Company
August 8th-24th
Tickets: $15. For tickets visit www.FringeNYC.org
Geeks! Dorks! Fanboys! Lend your pointed ears! Peter Howell's mind-bending lecture on the history of Science Fiction might save your life... literally. Can the washed-up author really prevent an astronomical catastrophe threatening to annihilate the entire solar system?
TRIUMPH OF THE UNDERDOG is a one-person show written by Mitch Montgomery and Morgan Allen. Disillusioned Science Fiction author Peter Howell frantically speeds through the history of Science Fiction — from Mesopotamia to NASA and Star Trek in twenty minutes — pausing only long enough to lament his failed career and his recent unemployment. In lieu of a more traditional structure, TRIUMPH OF THE UNDERDOG is presented with all the usual trappings of an actual lecture – PowerPoint slides, anecdotal stories and, you know, suddenly having to save the world from fiery cosmic destruction!
TRIUMPH OF THE UNDERDOG has been in development for five years, since it was originally mounted in a workshop production at the Savannah College of Art and Design in 2003. Triumph Team's production will be directed by Barbara Williams and reunites theatre artists who collaborated on the original workshop at SCAD. The play stars Mitch Montgomery and features the voice talents of Belinda Hodler and Forrest Simmons.
Mitch Montgomery is a co-founder of Body Politic Theater and was instrumental in mounting their maiden production of Catherine Filloux's Lemkin's House in 2006. Since moving to New York, Mitch has worked for The Shubert Organization, The Summer Play Festival and as a theatre critic for the website www.OffOffOnline.com. Mitch is a Creative Coordinator at Marvel Entertainment, where he maintains brand standards on licensed products that feature characters from Marvel's thousand-plus character library and writes copy for Marvel's many licensing programs. As an actor, Mitch was twice nominated for the Kennedy Center/American College Theater Festival's Irene Ryan Acting Scholarship Award. This is his first play.
Morgan Allen is an arts administrator, producer and writer living in New York City. Morgan has produced award-winning playwright Catherine Filloux's plays Lemkin's House (78th Street Theater Lab and Body Politic Theater) and Killing the Boss (Cherry Lane Theatre). With Body Politic Theater, which he co-founded and is a board member for, he will develop and produce a new commission by playwright Carlyle Brown throughout 2009. He continues his work with American playwrights at New Dramatists where this fall he will begin his third season as General Manager. Morgan spent the 2005-06 season as a Producing Associate for Prospect Theater Company and has worked in Manhattan with New Georges, National Asian American Theater Company and La Mama e.t.c, among others. His plays Precious Stone, Judas Pigeon and Leap have been work-shopped and produced in Savannah, GA and New York City.
Barbara Williams is an actor, director and educator from Pittsburgh Pennsylvania. As a professor at the Savannah College of Art & Design, she has directed such shows as Lord of the Flies, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Romeo and Juliet, Metamorphoses and Antigone. She served as the Faculty Advisor for the original workshop production of TRIUMPH OF THE UNDERDOG.
TRIUMPH OF THE UNDERDOG will run at FringeNYC Venue #2: The Schaeberle Studio Theatre, 41 Park Row, New York, NY 10038.
For more information please visit www.triumphoftheunderdog.blogspot.com
TRIUMPH OF THE UNDERDOG
as part of the 11th Annual New York International Fringe Festival.
The New York International Fringe Festival – FringeNYC
A production of the Present Company
August 8th-24th
Tickets: $15. For tickets visit www.FringeNYC.org
Geeks! Dorks! Fanboys! Lend your pointed ears! Peter Howell's mind-bending lecture on the history of Science Fiction might save your life... literally. Can the washed-up author really prevent an astronomical catastrophe threatening to annihilate the entire solar system?
TRIUMPH OF THE UNDERDOG is a one-person show written by Mitch Montgomery and Morgan Allen. Disillusioned Science Fiction author Peter Howell frantically speeds through the history of Science Fiction — from Mesopotamia to NASA and Star Trek in twenty minutes — pausing only long enough to lament his failed career and his recent unemployment. In lieu of a more traditional structure, TRIUMPH OF THE UNDERDOG is presented with all the usual trappings of an actual lecture – PowerPoint slides, anecdotal stories and, you know, suddenly having to save the world from fiery cosmic destruction!
TRIUMPH OF THE UNDERDOG has been in development for five years, since it was originally mounted in a workshop production at the Savannah College of Art and Design in 2003. Triumph Team's production will be directed by Barbara Williams and reunites theatre artists who collaborated on the original workshop at SCAD. The play stars Mitch Montgomery and features the voice talents of Belinda Hodler and Forrest Simmons.
Mitch Montgomery is a co-founder of Body Politic Theater and was instrumental in mounting their maiden production of Catherine Filloux's Lemkin's House in 2006. Since moving to New York, Mitch has worked for The Shubert Organization, The Summer Play Festival and as a theatre critic for the website www.OffOffOnline.com. Mitch is a Creative Coordinator at Marvel Entertainment, where he maintains brand standards on licensed products that feature characters from Marvel's thousand-plus character library and writes copy for Marvel's many licensing programs. As an actor, Mitch was twice nominated for the Kennedy Center/American College Theater Festival's Irene Ryan Acting Scholarship Award. This is his first play.
Morgan Allen is an arts administrator, producer and writer living in New York City. Morgan has produced award-winning playwright Catherine Filloux's plays Lemkin's House (78th Street Theater Lab and Body Politic Theater) and Killing the Boss (Cherry Lane Theatre). With Body Politic Theater, which he co-founded and is a board member for, he will develop and produce a new commission by playwright Carlyle Brown throughout 2009. He continues his work with American playwrights at New Dramatists where this fall he will begin his third season as General Manager. Morgan spent the 2005-06 season as a Producing Associate for Prospect Theater Company and has worked in Manhattan with New Georges, National Asian American Theater Company and La Mama e.t.c, among others. His plays Precious Stone, Judas Pigeon and Leap have been work-shopped and produced in Savannah, GA and New York City.
Barbara Williams is an actor, director and educator from Pittsburgh Pennsylvania. As a professor at the Savannah College of Art & Design, she has directed such shows as Lord of the Flies, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Romeo and Juliet, Metamorphoses and Antigone. She served as the Faculty Advisor for the original workshop production of TRIUMPH OF THE UNDERDOG.
TRIUMPH OF THE UNDERDOG will run at FringeNYC Venue #2: The Schaeberle Studio Theatre, 41 Park Row, New York, NY 10038.
For more information please visit www.triumphoftheunderdog.blogspot.com
Wednesday, April 02, 2008
Mitch on Hook
[Guest blogger Mitch reviews Hook, and claims it is good. I am clearly going to have to watch it again and pay more attention.]
Hook was on TV on Easter Sunday – I'm sure some programmer at TNT is patting himself on the back for his own cleverness in playing a movie about Peter Pan's return to Neverland on a Christian holiday that celebrates Christ's resurrection. Congratulations on your ironic commentary dude. Guess what? You're still a programmer at TNT.
Here's what Roger Ebert had to say about the Steven Spielberg directed film when it came out in 1991:
"The crucial failure in Hook is its inability to re-imagine the material, to find something new, fresh or urgent to do with the Peter Pan myth. Lacking that, Spielberg should simply have remade the original story, straight, for this generation. The lack of creativity in the screenplay is dramatized in the sword fighting sequences between Hook and Peter, which are endless and not particularly well-choreographed. They do not convince me that either Williams or Hoffman is much of a fencer. Has any Hollywood director ever given thought to bringing in a Hong Kong expert like King Hu to do second-unit work on the swordfights? The cheapest Asian martial arts movie has infinitely more excitement in its sword sequences than the repetitive lunge-and-shuffle that goes on here."
Movies like The Matrix and Kill Bill would of course prove Ebert right about implanting the kung-fu sword fighting, but his request for it here, in a Peter Pan movie, proves that he is missing at least part of the point. I like parts of Hook very much and I disagree with Ebert on the re-imaging thing. I could go the rest of my life without seeing another tepid stage production of the Peter Pan musical, with its always fake-looking wire flying, singing, etc. There are hiccups in this film, sure, but there is merit.
It's a compelling idea: that Peter Pan has grown up and must embrace his inner child to be a better father. His relationship with Tinkerbell is revised – we learn that she has always been in love with him – and in one really interesting scene she kind of seduces him. I remember this scene freaking me out as a kid, because the situation felt so wrong and adult for two such innocent characters, which was the point. Also, the scene where Hook wins over Peter's son by having him smashing clocks seemed to express Barrie's whole point of Neverland. The Lost Boys and pirates there are people frozen in time, who would rather live in a fantasy world than deal with real world problems.
Then there is Dustin Hoffman – one of my favorite actors – in an unusually hammy role. Captain Hook's eccentric self-esteem issues and his interactions with Bob Hoskins intelligently update a one-note villain into a strangely compelling character. Hook's mood shift during his suicide monologue displays Hoffman's strong comic timing: "I'm going to kill myself Smee. Don't try to stop me. Seriously, Smee. Don't try to stop me. Try to stop me, Smee. Please, try to stop me."
I also think this movie is the perfect use of Robin Williams' abilities. His silliness is restrained at the beginning and, once he rediscovers himself, he gets to go nuts at the end. Unlike his patented "crazy" roles, like in Aladdin and The Fisher King, or his overly solemn roles, Good Will Hunting and Insomnia, Williams plays a straight man for much of the movie. I've always thought his matter-of-fact manner when he whips out the checkbook on the pirate ship was very funny.
Unfortunately, Williams plays straight man to dozens of untalented kids, who Spielberg often employs as heartstring-tuggers. These kids live in what appears to be the Ewok village, eat blue and yellow Play-Doh and play basketball on skateboards, which must be what Spielberg thinks every kid wants more than anything. Also weird is how Peter doesn't remember his past, even after seeing a stage play about it and even though his adopted mother is named Wendy, who lives in a house that looks EXACTLY LIKE the scenic design of the play. Also, as one review pointed out, Captain Hook's magnificent pirate ship NEVER LEAVES THE DOCK.
Anyway — it was nice to celebrate the not-so-miraculous return of the almighty Pan last Sunday. Amen.
Hook was on TV on Easter Sunday – I'm sure some programmer at TNT is patting himself on the back for his own cleverness in playing a movie about Peter Pan's return to Neverland on a Christian holiday that celebrates Christ's resurrection. Congratulations on your ironic commentary dude. Guess what? You're still a programmer at TNT.
Here's what Roger Ebert had to say about the Steven Spielberg directed film when it came out in 1991:
"The crucial failure in Hook is its inability to re-imagine the material, to find something new, fresh or urgent to do with the Peter Pan myth. Lacking that, Spielberg should simply have remade the original story, straight, for this generation. The lack of creativity in the screenplay is dramatized in the sword fighting sequences between Hook and Peter, which are endless and not particularly well-choreographed. They do not convince me that either Williams or Hoffman is much of a fencer. Has any Hollywood director ever given thought to bringing in a Hong Kong expert like King Hu to do second-unit work on the swordfights? The cheapest Asian martial arts movie has infinitely more excitement in its sword sequences than the repetitive lunge-and-shuffle that goes on here."
Movies like The Matrix and Kill Bill would of course prove Ebert right about implanting the kung-fu sword fighting, but his request for it here, in a Peter Pan movie, proves that he is missing at least part of the point. I like parts of Hook very much and I disagree with Ebert on the re-imaging thing. I could go the rest of my life without seeing another tepid stage production of the Peter Pan musical, with its always fake-looking wire flying, singing, etc. There are hiccups in this film, sure, but there is merit.
It's a compelling idea: that Peter Pan has grown up and must embrace his inner child to be a better father. His relationship with Tinkerbell is revised – we learn that she has always been in love with him – and in one really interesting scene she kind of seduces him. I remember this scene freaking me out as a kid, because the situation felt so wrong and adult for two such innocent characters, which was the point. Also, the scene where Hook wins over Peter's son by having him smashing clocks seemed to express Barrie's whole point of Neverland. The Lost Boys and pirates there are people frozen in time, who would rather live in a fantasy world than deal with real world problems.
Then there is Dustin Hoffman – one of my favorite actors – in an unusually hammy role. Captain Hook's eccentric self-esteem issues and his interactions with Bob Hoskins intelligently update a one-note villain into a strangely compelling character. Hook's mood shift during his suicide monologue displays Hoffman's strong comic timing: "I'm going to kill myself Smee. Don't try to stop me. Seriously, Smee. Don't try to stop me. Try to stop me, Smee. Please, try to stop me."
I also think this movie is the perfect use of Robin Williams' abilities. His silliness is restrained at the beginning and, once he rediscovers himself, he gets to go nuts at the end. Unlike his patented "crazy" roles, like in Aladdin and The Fisher King, or his overly solemn roles, Good Will Hunting and Insomnia, Williams plays a straight man for much of the movie. I've always thought his matter-of-fact manner when he whips out the checkbook on the pirate ship was very funny.
Unfortunately, Williams plays straight man to dozens of untalented kids, who Spielberg often employs as heartstring-tuggers. These kids live in what appears to be the Ewok village, eat blue and yellow Play-Doh and play basketball on skateboards, which must be what Spielberg thinks every kid wants more than anything. Also weird is how Peter doesn't remember his past, even after seeing a stage play about it and even though his adopted mother is named Wendy, who lives in a house that looks EXACTLY LIKE the scenic design of the play. Also, as one review pointed out, Captain Hook's magnificent pirate ship NEVER LEAVES THE DOCK.
Anyway — it was nice to celebrate the not-so-miraculous return of the almighty Pan last Sunday. Amen.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Mitch -- OZYMANDIAS HAS BAT-NIPPLES!
[A guest post by Mitch on the new Watchmen movie pics.]
I'm not thrilled about the Watchmen movie. Right off the bat it feels like someone making a Citizen Kane video game or getting a Mona Lisa tattoo — that is to say, it misses the point to take a work that so perfectly highlights the advantages one medium and adapt it into another. With Alan Moore’s stuff, you can’t get lucky like Spider-Man 2: an iconic character + a popular villain + a popular story from the comics + a love interest sub-plot, shaken and baked = $$. With Moore, the methodical plotting and the juxtaposition of words and pictures — the craft — is more essential than the characters.
With that clear, I have to admit that I have been morbidly curious to see all the development info and photos from the movie. The cast is a little wompy-jawed— the child molester from Little Children is perfect for Rorschach and I’ve always liked Patrick Wilson, but can’t say I would have ever thought of always casual and charming Billy Cruddup as the stoic Dr. Manhattan. The production stills confirm that director Zach Snyder is going for a literal panel by panel adaptation, like he did with 300. Everything certainly looks straight out of the comics, but again... I just don’t know. This sort of thing sort of made sense for 300; first because there was an established audience for “epic classical war movies” and second, because it was a short graphic novel adapted into a 90 minute computer fight sequence/Nine Inch Nails video. There is a lot more material to cover with Watchmen, and how they could even BEGIN to cover it in two hours is beyond me.
In the face of all this negativity, I found myself surprisingly tickled by the recently released promo photos on the movie’s website. Some of the designs are totally faithful and some are black rubber, like all movie super hero costumes. (PS: Is this really Hollywood’s best answer to super hero costumes? Black rubber? They can go fug themselves. ) But right in the middle is Ozymandias’ black rubber costume, with two glorious Bat-Nipples on his chest. Certainly, Snyder is making a reference to the costumes in Batman and Robin, but for what purpose? Is the Watchmen movie attempting to address comic book movies in the same way the Watchmen comic addressed other comics? Or is he just feel that Bat-Nipples never really got a fair shake and deserve a second chance? I’ve yet to decide if I hate them or love them, but their presence amuses me at least.
I'm not thrilled about the Watchmen movie. Right off the bat it feels like someone making a Citizen Kane video game or getting a Mona Lisa tattoo — that is to say, it misses the point to take a work that so perfectly highlights the advantages one medium and adapt it into another. With Alan Moore’s stuff, you can’t get lucky like Spider-Man 2: an iconic character + a popular villain + a popular story from the comics + a love interest sub-plot, shaken and baked = $$. With Moore, the methodical plotting and the juxtaposition of words and pictures — the craft — is more essential than the characters.
With that clear, I have to admit that I have been morbidly curious to see all the development info and photos from the movie. The cast is a little wompy-jawed— the child molester from Little Children is perfect for Rorschach and I’ve always liked Patrick Wilson, but can’t say I would have ever thought of always casual and charming Billy Cruddup as the stoic Dr. Manhattan. The production stills confirm that director Zach Snyder is going for a literal panel by panel adaptation, like he did with 300. Everything certainly looks straight out of the comics, but again... I just don’t know. This sort of thing sort of made sense for 300; first because there was an established audience for “epic classical war movies” and second, because it was a short graphic novel adapted into a 90 minute computer fight sequence/Nine Inch Nails video. There is a lot more material to cover with Watchmen, and how they could even BEGIN to cover it in two hours is beyond me.
In the face of all this negativity, I found myself surprisingly tickled by the recently released promo photos on the movie’s website. Some of the designs are totally faithful and some are black rubber, like all movie super hero costumes. (PS: Is this really Hollywood’s best answer to super hero costumes? Black rubber? They can go fug themselves. ) But right in the middle is Ozymandias’ black rubber costume, with two glorious Bat-Nipples on his chest. Certainly, Snyder is making a reference to the costumes in Batman and Robin, but for what purpose? Is the Watchmen movie attempting to address comic book movies in the same way the Watchmen comic addressed other comics? Or is he just feel that Bat-Nipples never really got a fair shake and deserve a second chance? I’ve yet to decide if I hate them or love them, but their presence amuses me at least.
Friday, February 08, 2008
Mitch on "In Search of Steve Ditko"
This is another for the "late-to-the-game" file.
Last night, I finally tracked down the BBC's terrific documentary "In Search of Steve Ditko" online. You can find it in seven parts here
Try to take a look at it soon, because the BBC never lets it stay online too long. The film follows a journalist named Jonathan Ross [cq], as tries to track down the still living and legendarily reclusive Spider-Man co-creator Steve Ditko. Along the way he interviews Alan Moore, Mark Millar, Joe Q, Neil Gaiman, and ultimately Stan Lee; who is, for the first time I've ever seen, not his chipper, carnival-barking self. Ross puts Lee on the defensive about whether he was the "true" creator of Spider-Man, and the usually unflappable Lee is... well… very visibly flapped.
You'll find a lot of bona fide treasures in here—like Moore performing a "dramatic reading" of a song he wrote about Ditko (!!), and some interesting studies into the creation of Ditko’s more paranoid characters like The Question (and by extension, Moore's Rorschach). But what I really walked away from this documentary with is a true sense of the raw deal Ditko got. He's renting an office in midtown Manhattan, so he must be doing okay. But still. Alan Moore once said that he’ll never go back writing the big comic companies' characters; not because of his own contractual issues with them, but because he can see a long line of disenfranchised old men lingering around every one of those trademarked characters like ghosts.
Last night, I finally tracked down the BBC's terrific documentary "In Search of Steve Ditko" online. You can find it in seven parts here
Try to take a look at it soon, because the BBC never lets it stay online too long. The film follows a journalist named Jonathan Ross [cq], as tries to track down the still living and legendarily reclusive Spider-Man co-creator Steve Ditko. Along the way he interviews Alan Moore, Mark Millar, Joe Q, Neil Gaiman, and ultimately Stan Lee; who is, for the first time I've ever seen, not his chipper, carnival-barking self. Ross puts Lee on the defensive about whether he was the "true" creator of Spider-Man, and the usually unflappable Lee is... well… very visibly flapped.
You'll find a lot of bona fide treasures in here—like Moore performing a "dramatic reading" of a song he wrote about Ditko (!!), and some interesting studies into the creation of Ditko’s more paranoid characters like The Question (and by extension, Moore's Rorschach). But what I really walked away from this documentary with is a true sense of the raw deal Ditko got. He's renting an office in midtown Manhattan, so he must be doing okay. But still. Alan Moore once said that he’ll never go back writing the big comic companies' characters; not because of his own contractual issues with them, but because he can see a long line of disenfranchised old men lingering around every one of those trademarked characters like ghosts.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Mitch: Beirut’s “Nantes” and Phantom Brains in Space
[Guest blogger Mitch with a music review. I want to see more stuff on here about music, using youtube clips. Get to work, all of you.]
My new favorite band is Beirut, a pretty much one-man show put on by 22-year-old Zach Condon. This is the video for the song “Nantes” off the new(ish) album The Flying Cup Club:
The video makes magic an all-too common feeling New Yorkers get every morning — putting on your iPod, going down the stairs and heading off to work. I like that the music is obviously recorded live and I’m AMAZED that the acoustics are as good as they are with all those instruments.
The song itself exhibits all the best elements of Condon’s textured, peculiar sound. Attitude-wise “Nantes” manages to exude both jubilance and melancholy, but never wholly elects one over the other. There are only 70 words in the song and most of them are warbled incoherently. All the instrumentation seems to be on loan from the coast of France (where the city Nantes is located) and my enjoyment Condon’s music in general probably comes from that. (Since the movie Amelie I think everyone has grown a soft spot for vampy, romantic accordions.) Though it’s lost in this live recording, the music has this terrific tinny quality on the album, as if it’s being played through a gramophone in a steel supply closet.
The pile up of these straightforward, amateurish components produces a mysteriously euphoric digression that is equal parts folk music, French New-Wave film score and high school marching band. Maybe it’s not music for Fraction to “load his guns to by the early light of dawn,” but it could certainly underscore him chasing a red balloon through the streets of Paris. If there is muzak playing in the waiting room of Heaven, it probably sounds a lot like Beirut.
On a completely unrelated yet-still-somehow-related note, there was a fantastic article called “Big Brain Theory: Have Cosmologists Lost Theirs?” in the Science section of the New York Times today. Briefly, the article explores the “Boltzmann Brain Problem,” which is a bizarre extension of the notion that anything that can happen in an infinite Universe IS happening. In this case, that an exact living copy of your brain can (and according to science as we know it, must) materialize into empty space trillions of light years away.
I only mention this because the Beirut song and this article were both rattling around in head today and I’m fascinated by how my mind managed to link two completely isolated pieces of information. Now when I hear the lyrics “well it's been a long time, long time now/ since I've seen you smile” I will only ever be able to picture a lovesick brain floating somewhere in the middle of the Universe.
My new favorite band is Beirut, a pretty much one-man show put on by 22-year-old Zach Condon. This is the video for the song “Nantes” off the new(ish) album The Flying Cup Club:
The video makes magic an all-too common feeling New Yorkers get every morning — putting on your iPod, going down the stairs and heading off to work. I like that the music is obviously recorded live and I’m AMAZED that the acoustics are as good as they are with all those instruments.
The song itself exhibits all the best elements of Condon’s textured, peculiar sound. Attitude-wise “Nantes” manages to exude both jubilance and melancholy, but never wholly elects one over the other. There are only 70 words in the song and most of them are warbled incoherently. All the instrumentation seems to be on loan from the coast of France (where the city Nantes is located) and my enjoyment Condon’s music in general probably comes from that. (Since the movie Amelie I think everyone has grown a soft spot for vampy, romantic accordions.) Though it’s lost in this live recording, the music has this terrific tinny quality on the album, as if it’s being played through a gramophone in a steel supply closet.
The pile up of these straightforward, amateurish components produces a mysteriously euphoric digression that is equal parts folk music, French New-Wave film score and high school marching band. Maybe it’s not music for Fraction to “load his guns to by the early light of dawn,” but it could certainly underscore him chasing a red balloon through the streets of Paris. If there is muzak playing in the waiting room of Heaven, it probably sounds a lot like Beirut.
On a completely unrelated yet-still-somehow-related note, there was a fantastic article called “Big Brain Theory: Have Cosmologists Lost Theirs?” in the Science section of the New York Times today. Briefly, the article explores the “Boltzmann Brain Problem,” which is a bizarre extension of the notion that anything that can happen in an infinite Universe IS happening. In this case, that an exact living copy of your brain can (and according to science as we know it, must) materialize into empty space trillions of light years away.
I only mention this because the Beirut song and this article were both rattling around in head today and I’m fascinated by how my mind managed to link two completely isolated pieces of information. Now when I hear the lyrics “well it's been a long time, long time now/ since I've seen you smile” I will only ever be able to picture a lovesick brain floating somewhere in the middle of the Universe.
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Mitch Reviews Sorkin's The Farnsworth Invention
[Guest blogger Mitch reviews Aaron Sorkin's The Farnsworth Invention. I make some comments at the bottom.]
Aaron Sorkin's new play The Farnsworth Invention is on Broadway now and in general it's a very brisk, entertaining historical drama. But in the most important ways, it seems, it is the textbook definition of a bad historical drama, in that much of the narrative is completely, utterly untrue. Sorkin is always a hotly debated figure on this blog, so I thought I’d pose the question: if the play is good, does it matter if Sorkin tweaked history to improve the dramatic flow of the story?
Spoilers follow.
When I worked for my old job, one of my tasks was carting scripts around from one Broadway executive’s office to another. Just to make it as surreal as possible, this task was carried out in the company limo. Most of this was painfully uninteresting and anyone who has spent time in a cab in midtown Manhattan at lunchtime can probably imagine how annoying it was. Every once and a while, though, something really neat found it’s way into my lap. One day I was in the limo and I found myself with the manuscript of Sorkin’s new play, The Farnsworth Invention—a historical drama that illustrates the complications Philo Farnsworth endured while inventing and securing the patent for television. Immediately I thought it was a great idea. Here is Broadway playwright cum television producer Sorkin returning to Broadway with a play about television. When Hank Azaria was cast, I knew that I would definitely go see it.
The play is rapid in the best sense of the word—there are over 60 characters in just as many locations. Farnsworth (played by very well by Jimmi Simpson) and RCA mogul David Sarnoff (played by Azaria) counter-narrate the action of the play through five decades. Occasionally Sorkin stumbles into cheesy scenes between two characters where one character starts to leave, but then stops and says “for whatever it’s worth…etc;” but mostly his reverence for the history and potential of television is inspiring. The climactic court case where RCA swiped the patent for television from Farnsworth and left him drunk and depressed left my fiancée and I captivated.
There’s only problem. Farnsworth DIDN’T lose the patent to RCA. While Sorkin’s play makes a brief mention to the fact that there were numerous appeals in the case, the rights were, in fact, eventually sold to RCA. The play is audaciously cut and dry about the matter—Sorkin didn’t trust the audience to grasp the complexity of years of both won and un-won legal battles that would, yes, eventually sink Farnswoth into drunken depression.
I guess I wondered if such a simplification is insulting to the memory of Farnsworth or merely economical storytelling. Fortunately, I didn’t have to wonder long. Pressed by members of Farnsworth’s family, the New York Post (of all places) printed this article.
Not to be undone, Sorkin sent a defensive email to the Farnsworth family member, which the family member posted here. There is also a great review of the play, which compares it to other revisionary historical dramas.
With respect to the members of Farnsworth’s family, I find myself strangely siding with Sorkin on this. Granted, he is quite defensive and in denial in that post, but even so—his ending is KIND OF a better ending for the stage version of Farnsworth. Remember, in real life Farnsworth the underdog won a lot of money and still became a lay-about alcoholic. Dramatically, it was better to me to see Farnsworth definitively defeated in one case, rather than worn down over a couple of decades.
The reaction of Farnsworth’s family reminded me eerily of the fan outcry at the ending to Star Trek: Enterprise, which was almost universally reviled as being untrue to the series. (Look it up on Wikipedia if you are interested: It’s called “These are the Voyages”) All of this led me to wonder about endings in general. In this case, can an ending still be true to the story if it isn’t actually true to the source material?
[I think folks around here will already guess I think it CAN, and also that to a certain extent IT MUST. Oscar Wilde famously complained that the problem with life is that it has not sense of dramatic structure, or proportion, or timing. Art, said Wilde, was our chance to teach life its proper place. That being said, it still may be the case that in Sorkin may have gone too far in simplifying the ending -- not because it is false, but because it suggests that the audience is too dumb to understand complexity. Changing the ending of such a recent piece of history, he should also have been prepared for the backlash -- it is not like he is making 300.]
Aaron Sorkin's new play The Farnsworth Invention is on Broadway now and in general it's a very brisk, entertaining historical drama. But in the most important ways, it seems, it is the textbook definition of a bad historical drama, in that much of the narrative is completely, utterly untrue. Sorkin is always a hotly debated figure on this blog, so I thought I’d pose the question: if the play is good, does it matter if Sorkin tweaked history to improve the dramatic flow of the story?
Spoilers follow.
When I worked for my old job, one of my tasks was carting scripts around from one Broadway executive’s office to another. Just to make it as surreal as possible, this task was carried out in the company limo. Most of this was painfully uninteresting and anyone who has spent time in a cab in midtown Manhattan at lunchtime can probably imagine how annoying it was. Every once and a while, though, something really neat found it’s way into my lap. One day I was in the limo and I found myself with the manuscript of Sorkin’s new play, The Farnsworth Invention—a historical drama that illustrates the complications Philo Farnsworth endured while inventing and securing the patent for television. Immediately I thought it was a great idea. Here is Broadway playwright cum television producer Sorkin returning to Broadway with a play about television. When Hank Azaria was cast, I knew that I would definitely go see it.
The play is rapid in the best sense of the word—there are over 60 characters in just as many locations. Farnsworth (played by very well by Jimmi Simpson) and RCA mogul David Sarnoff (played by Azaria) counter-narrate the action of the play through five decades. Occasionally Sorkin stumbles into cheesy scenes between two characters where one character starts to leave, but then stops and says “for whatever it’s worth…etc;” but mostly his reverence for the history and potential of television is inspiring. The climactic court case where RCA swiped the patent for television from Farnsworth and left him drunk and depressed left my fiancée and I captivated.
There’s only problem. Farnsworth DIDN’T lose the patent to RCA. While Sorkin’s play makes a brief mention to the fact that there were numerous appeals in the case, the rights were, in fact, eventually sold to RCA. The play is audaciously cut and dry about the matter—Sorkin didn’t trust the audience to grasp the complexity of years of both won and un-won legal battles that would, yes, eventually sink Farnswoth into drunken depression.
I guess I wondered if such a simplification is insulting to the memory of Farnsworth or merely economical storytelling. Fortunately, I didn’t have to wonder long. Pressed by members of Farnsworth’s family, the New York Post (of all places) printed this article.
Not to be undone, Sorkin sent a defensive email to the Farnsworth family member, which the family member posted here. There is also a great review of the play, which compares it to other revisionary historical dramas.
With respect to the members of Farnsworth’s family, I find myself strangely siding with Sorkin on this. Granted, he is quite defensive and in denial in that post, but even so—his ending is KIND OF a better ending for the stage version of Farnsworth. Remember, in real life Farnsworth the underdog won a lot of money and still became a lay-about alcoholic. Dramatically, it was better to me to see Farnsworth definitively defeated in one case, rather than worn down over a couple of decades.
The reaction of Farnsworth’s family reminded me eerily of the fan outcry at the ending to Star Trek: Enterprise, which was almost universally reviled as being untrue to the series. (Look it up on Wikipedia if you are interested: It’s called “These are the Voyages”) All of this led me to wonder about endings in general. In this case, can an ending still be true to the story if it isn’t actually true to the source material?
[I think folks around here will already guess I think it CAN, and also that to a certain extent IT MUST. Oscar Wilde famously complained that the problem with life is that it has not sense of dramatic structure, or proportion, or timing. Art, said Wilde, was our chance to teach life its proper place. That being said, it still may be the case that in Sorkin may have gone too far in simplifying the ending -- not because it is false, but because it suggests that the audience is too dumb to understand complexity. Changing the ending of such a recent piece of history, he should also have been prepared for the backlash -- it is not like he is making 300.]
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Mitch Reviews The Screwtape Letters
[Guest Blogger Mitch did a review of a theatrical production of The Screwtape Letters for another site. To prevent this from being just linkage, he was nice enough to give this site some extra words. Theater reviews is a new idea, but I say let's try it.]
The (Devilish) Assault of Reason at Off-Off-Online
I had never read The Screwtape Letters before I saw this production—in fact I don’t think I’ve even read any of C. S. Lewis’ Narnia books. But I have always been very interested in him, because he’s always been so unapologetic about the amount of influence Christianity has on his work. Appropriately, most of the people involved in this staged version listed work for religious organizations or in religious theater in their bios.
So here is a biting satire about religion written by a devout Christian in the forties and put on by Christians now… and it’s FUNNY! What is the world slowly coming to?
One part that I didn’t talk about in the review is the beginning, in which the demon Screwtape gives a commencement speech-type toast to a new crop of graduates from the Tempters Training College. This little section wasn’t actually based on anything in the novel The Screwtape Letters; it is based on a short story Lewis wrote for The Saturday Evening Post years later called Screwtape Proposes a Toast. (Note: Why isn’t there a Saturday Evening Post anymore? Everything I hear about it is awesome.) Lewis introduces a great concept in this toast—that the Devil and all of his demons actually devour the souls that they bring to Hell. In fact there is a weird hierarchy in the structure of a demon’s diet. Particularly corrupt souls—like Hitler—are considered gourmet delicacies in Hell, while those who are only a little misguided would be considered humdrum. I guess Atheists would taste like… flan? Tofu? The not-so-subtle distinctions in the demonic palette are among the more amusing aspects of Screwtape.
Oh, and yeah the review title is a reference to Al Gore’s book.
You can read my full review at Off-Off-Online.com here
And if you are interested to read my other reviews at Off-Off, you can find them all here:
I’ve been writing at Off-Off for about a year and a half now—it’s a fun gig. Free theatre that ranges from excellent to weird to abysmal (check out my review of Vermillion Wine if you are curious to explore the depths of slap-shodary). Oh and they pay a little too, which is nice.
The (Devilish) Assault of Reason at Off-Off-Online
I had never read The Screwtape Letters before I saw this production—in fact I don’t think I’ve even read any of C. S. Lewis’ Narnia books. But I have always been very interested in him, because he’s always been so unapologetic about the amount of influence Christianity has on his work. Appropriately, most of the people involved in this staged version listed work for religious organizations or in religious theater in their bios.
So here is a biting satire about religion written by a devout Christian in the forties and put on by Christians now… and it’s FUNNY! What is the world slowly coming to?
One part that I didn’t talk about in the review is the beginning, in which the demon Screwtape gives a commencement speech-type toast to a new crop of graduates from the Tempters Training College. This little section wasn’t actually based on anything in the novel The Screwtape Letters; it is based on a short story Lewis wrote for The Saturday Evening Post years later called Screwtape Proposes a Toast. (Note: Why isn’t there a Saturday Evening Post anymore? Everything I hear about it is awesome.) Lewis introduces a great concept in this toast—that the Devil and all of his demons actually devour the souls that they bring to Hell. In fact there is a weird hierarchy in the structure of a demon’s diet. Particularly corrupt souls—like Hitler—are considered gourmet delicacies in Hell, while those who are only a little misguided would be considered humdrum. I guess Atheists would taste like… flan? Tofu? The not-so-subtle distinctions in the demonic palette are among the more amusing aspects of Screwtape.
Oh, and yeah the review title is a reference to Al Gore’s book.
You can read my full review at Off-Off-Online.com here
And if you are interested to read my other reviews at Off-Off, you can find them all here:
I’ve been writing at Off-Off for about a year and a half now—it’s a fun gig. Free theatre that ranges from excellent to weird to abysmal (check out my review of Vermillion Wine if you are curious to explore the depths of slap-shodary). Oh and they pay a little too, which is nice.
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Mitch Reviews Radiohead's In Rainbows
[Guest blogger Mitch, with his second official review for this site].
How much is Radiohead worth to you?
When Kurt Vonnegut died, PBS replayed an older interview with Charlie Rose where Vonnegut mockingly admitted that the book he was supposed to be promoting was probably deserved a “C” rating relative to Slaughterhouse Five. It was a funny thing to hear coming from an artist, because one of the most natural acts in actively consuming any form of media is the assigning of value. Radiohead’s seventh album seems to be playing a capitalistic joke on this idea of determining worth. The monetary cost of In Rainbows —much like any rating of the music’s artistic value— is entirely up to you.
My enjoyment of Radiohead puzzles me. Their music nestled its way into my life by way of an ex-girlfriend with unimpeachable taste. Since our relationship took place at a time when Radiohead was firing on all cylinders (Kid A, Amnesiac and Hail to the Thief all came out while we were together), our enjoyment of Radiohead developed into something significant in the fabric of the relationship. When the relationship ended, here I was with all of these CD’s that had become unbearable artifacts of a now finished period in my life. It’s been years now and thanks to this new album, it seems at last that my personal enjoyment of Radiohead can exist independently of the relationship.
The new album, In Rainbows, is refreshing in its exemplification of everything Radiohead stands for. Like Kid A and Amnesiac, ambiguously romantic and philosophical lyrics peak out from behind drum-machine beats that seem to be played through constantly peaking speakers. Meanwhile, there is also a strong presence of Pablo Honey and The Bends-era guitar work in the album's ten tracks. Imagine that Radiohead's two periods (Brit Rock and Trippy Electronics) are two nations looking at each other across a great ravine. For years, the album OK Computer served as an sensible and obvious bridge to unite those two countries of sound. Now imagine that there is a horrible storm that blows the OK Computer bridge away—gone forever. As the people of Radiohead-land begin the rebuilding process, they decide to use the latest technology to build a new bridge between the two countries. That new bridge is In Rainbows. It might not have the magic newness of its predecessor, but it sounds like they were a whole lot happier while they were making it.
This is the thing that nails me every time I listen to In Rainbows. Radiohead have always been the masters of mellow melancholy. But this album is a new kind mellow for the group. It's a contented mellow. There are these unapologetically sunny snatches of guitar in every song, coupled with such appreciative lyrics like "you're all I need" or "I'm in the middle of your picture"—as if this person's picture is SO striking, that you can take a break from evaluating its aesthetic qualities and finish doing so at a later sitting. This newfound optimism even manifests itself in the line "No matter what happens now I won't be afraid, because I know today has been, the most perfect day I've ever seen," a jarringly unflappable end to the most somber track on the album, "Videotape".
So there is the unbridled optimism and there are the two music styles, but there are also the usual inspired quirks that turn each song into a half-story: the joyful surrender in a song about zombies, the sensation of drifting in a song about bizarre marine life and a song where the dead protagonist is confronted by videotapes from his life. The band has to be careful here, because if you make a commitment to being charismatically “weird” on every album, each album must contain “new weird”. Unfortunately, some of this weird is “old weird.” As I understand, Radiohead has been touring with a number of these songs for years now, so it isn't surprising that sometimes the tone is a little out of sync. Ultimately, Radiohead knows from out of sync and I’ll trust them to take me there anytime. I keep buying their albums as long as they keep recording songs like "The Reckoner," the tempo and fluid texture of which largely make me feel like the Silver fucking Surfer—shiny, invincible and moving at light speed.
This album has been a great tool for reacquainting myself with Radiohead. Maybe for some of you, it'll just be "more of the same old weird" or a "C" effort relative to OK Computer, but to me it's worth a lot.
Thursday, October 04, 2007
Mitch Reviews Wes Anderson's The Darjeeling Limited
[A second guest blogger joins us, with a review of Wes Anderson's new movie. I asked Mitch to keep it to 500 words, but now I think that may have been unnecessarily harsh. Point being, if you think this is too short, that is my fault, not Mitch's. He may have more to say in the comments. A spoiler follows, but I do not care much about spoilers for a movie like this , whose virtues are elsewhere.]
I want to live in the world inside Wes Anderson’s head, where everything is immaculately framed by revealing nick-knacks and is perfectly choreographed to ambivalent folk music. Anderson’s worthy new film, The Darjeeling Limited, reinforces this desire.
The film’s title refers to a powder blue passenger train transporting three estranged brothers through India on a self-imposed “spiritual journey.” Anderson also continues to study the human response to death – in The Royal Tenebaums Gene Hackman’s pending death (counterfeit or otherwise) motivates his reconciliation with his family, in The Life Aquatic Steve Zissou vows to avenge a dead friend and in Darjeeling the three Whitman brothers must finally make sense of their father’s death after a year. One wonders if Anderson is secretly working on a five-part box set of films about the stages of grief.
As with the director’s other films, the aesthetic is impeccable. The messy red Sanskrit on the exterior of the train, the Julian Davies song on Jason Schwartzman’s iPod player, the set of monogrammed luggage designed for the film by Marc Jacobs of Louis Vuitton – there is an inimitable magic in Anderson’s arrangement of this stuff. These elements, like good song lyrics, might seem trite or needlessly random when taken out of context, but sequenced correctly they crackle with a sudden and brief harmony.
The screenplay (written by Anderson, Schwartzman and Roman Coppola) characterizes the backstabbing brothers with much glee. If one character leaves a scene, the other two instantly form an alliance against him, until he returns and the process repeats. In one very entertaining scene, each brother attempts to one-up the strength others’ illegal painkillers. Owen Wilson, Adrian Brody and Schwartzman navigate the subtleties of the material charmingly. Wilson is particularly good as the bandaged, overbearing Francis; but the synchronicity of the actor’s recent suicide attempt and his beaten-up demeanor in this movie absolutely boggles my mind.
Viewers (like me) who were put off by the abrupt character death towards the end of The Life Aquatic might be frustrated by a similar plot swerve in this film. Granted, the execution here isn’t as hasty as in Aquatic, but its occurrence and necessity to the plot still troubles me, like the old screenwriting adage against suddenly “burning the barn down” in the third act.
Then again, it seems unfair to chastise a film for a sudden death, when the whole premise of the story hangs on the reaction to sudden, unexpected death? If I really want to live in Wes Anderson’s idiosyncratic head, I suppose I have to accept that the same ideas are bound to whiz by a couple of times.
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