I think of Dean Moriarty...
I've finally read those final touching words from Kerouac's contextual masterpiece On The Road. Holy molasses, was it a long, persevering endurance test to get there. From when I first cracked the book to when I finished, I read two Saramagos (Seeing, Gospel According to Jesus Christ) & went a couple chapters deep into Last Unicorn & a Ho Chi Minh biography. Capote called On The Road typing. Not necessarily a harsh reduction, but an creative innovation missed & misunderstood on Capote's part.
On The Road & The Beats revolutionized, or rather socialized, the expressive form of writing, helping to channel the Self, loosening it from the grips of privileged, hierarchical modes & systems.
It was visceral, immediate, unabashedly autobiographical. It was wide-eyed, sloppy, fervent, had a devouring curiosity & tragedy, it saw us as eternal brothers, had the search of empathy at its core. It was also a precursor & the opening in which postmodern semantic deconstruction of rhetoric and semiotics slithered through to find us at superfluous dribbles & purposelessly excessive word counts; It was fast, loose & instant. It trampled concisely meditated prose, but was necessary to the movement. This is also to say, I will probably never read another Kerouac novel again, but that doesn't mean his contribution was any less admirable.
The thing is, like a hyper-explosion, The Beats in literature blew communication into smithereens, and we've only gotten faster, more brusquely so, since. But it's about moderation, compromise. In this case, slow down but sustain those big-wondering eyes, be cool but be intimate & engaged, loosen up form but don't lose form, be autobiographical but deliberate it a bit. The Beats were one of our prophets, one of our direct mystic providers, they asked us, their future nephews to find equanimity, to fill that emptiness that ached them & embody sincerity, to become, to arrive. And like the eternal Law of the Universe, they delivered us the tools to blunt something they themself helped create & diminish all at the same Time.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Saturday, October 18, 2008
marvel universe
Just finished watching Incredible Hulk, or rather Beauty & the Beast...wait...King Kong...wait...the eternal battle between the physical & harnessing one's innermost, taming the beast within. So unpredictable & unoriginal, not complex at all -
No, you academic, you big thinker, it's not complex. It's a universal narrative. As a culture, this is something we need to get through our thick, instant-coffee meta barrier - that originality's an illusion, works-in-progress are never failures & innovations are linked to the infinite predecessor. So, if you didn't like Children of Men because it was predictable, good man, you missed its benefit & you need to broaden your holism. I got sidetracked...this blog is supposed to be about Marvel Studios.
Ahem, Marvel Studios, as you know have become its own independent studio & has already made under its banner two blockbuster superhero flicks, Iron Man & Incredible Hulk. Despite the critical & overwhelming commercial success of Iron Man, I preferred Incredible Hulk; Leterrier despite his hyper-machismo still pulled off that particular French flow, which is to say, the French have a certain narrative seamlessness, a gift for that grand, romantic storytelling. Iron Man, on the other hand, was the epitome of an American symptom infecting the world, empty flash, rock star mentality. Listen, Downey Jr. was spot-on wit & Paltrow was smokin', but that's all it was - it was choppy, it was aesthetic-driven, it was an array of setup scenes only there to cap off with a catchy punch-line or something instantly cool, it was hyper-postmodern.
But for Favreau, as a director, that's his weakness, fluidity. For all the solid comedy skits strung together & a decent aesthetic eye, Iron Man, Zathura, Elf & Made all lack that essential distinction between artist & technician: heart, soul. But, again, this blog is not a roast of Favreau because in this case it's not just Favreau, it's symbolic. We need to semantically take back Art, the word, give it meaning again. That's all on that, I'll move on. Marvel Studios, whom in the past licensed off their characters & plots only to sadly see horrible cinematic adaptations, many b-movie level, movies made as stand-alone productions, for reasons of financial safe-guarding & also due to contextual cultural perspective. Moving on to today, we're yearning for that sense of cohesiveness, for that unanimity, for that Great Work, for universality. What's simply brilliant, financially & metaphysically, about Marvel is that they're consciously building a community, a universe, intertwining their blockbusters the same way they did comic books, characters revolving & appearing in one another's stories, the ever-expansive web of life being reflected in commercial cinema the same way great authors like Salinger or auteurs like Almodovar have glimpsed at. I for one, will always have these degrees of transconnection in my works - it's reality.
No, you academic, you big thinker, it's not complex. It's a universal narrative. As a culture, this is something we need to get through our thick, instant-coffee meta barrier - that originality's an illusion, works-in-progress are never failures & innovations are linked to the infinite predecessor. So, if you didn't like Children of Men because it was predictable, good man, you missed its benefit & you need to broaden your holism. I got sidetracked...this blog is supposed to be about Marvel Studios.
Ahem, Marvel Studios, as you know have become its own independent studio & has already made under its banner two blockbuster superhero flicks, Iron Man & Incredible Hulk. Despite the critical & overwhelming commercial success of Iron Man, I preferred Incredible Hulk; Leterrier despite his hyper-machismo still pulled off that particular French flow, which is to say, the French have a certain narrative seamlessness, a gift for that grand, romantic storytelling. Iron Man, on the other hand, was the epitome of an American symptom infecting the world, empty flash, rock star mentality. Listen, Downey Jr. was spot-on wit & Paltrow was smokin', but that's all it was - it was choppy, it was aesthetic-driven, it was an array of setup scenes only there to cap off with a catchy punch-line or something instantly cool, it was hyper-postmodern.
But for Favreau, as a director, that's his weakness, fluidity. For all the solid comedy skits strung together & a decent aesthetic eye, Iron Man, Zathura, Elf & Made all lack that essential distinction between artist & technician: heart, soul. But, again, this blog is not a roast of Favreau because in this case it's not just Favreau, it's symbolic. We need to semantically take back Art, the word, give it meaning again. That's all on that, I'll move on. Marvel Studios, whom in the past licensed off their characters & plots only to sadly see horrible cinematic adaptations, many b-movie level, movies made as stand-alone productions, for reasons of financial safe-guarding & also due to contextual cultural perspective. Moving on to today, we're yearning for that sense of cohesiveness, for that unanimity, for that Great Work, for universality. What's simply brilliant, financially & metaphysically, about Marvel is that they're consciously building a community, a universe, intertwining their blockbusters the same way they did comic books, characters revolving & appearing in one another's stories, the ever-expansive web of life being reflected in commercial cinema the same way great authors like Salinger or auteurs like Almodovar have glimpsed at. I for one, will always have these degrees of transconnection in my works - it's reality.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
purposed irony is our way to sincerity
When New Sincerity emerged in the early scatters of the millennium, as has been well-espoused in this blog, the pundits all unverifiably claimed irony itself finito. dunndada. see ya later innovator. We, the culture of our collective esteem, were on an exacting track toward a struggle of extremes - a struggle we're still in the midst of & trying to find compromise & consummation in.
Did you catch my rhetorical wink-nod using unverifiably? wah wah wah.
Thing is, Life, our very root existence itself as gamed by Godhead, is an inherent contradiction. We are of the most dynamic romantic dramedy. But, you know what God wants of Us... extraordinary me and you, to finally become God. The elder statesman, the mama-papa bear's getting old (somewhere in Time), and the Will's been signed. But before we can inherit the diaspora of splendor, cool things of great worth & superfly magic vision, as only a well-meaning, somewhat masochistic parent would, God has given his children a series of obstacles, or rather holistically speaking, one very labyrinthine obstacle. A divinely assembled coalescing of temptations, vanities & intellectual smut to test our emotional reasoning, also known as our soul power. Judgment Day, or those last filial nudges a parent gives to their son or daughter whom is transitioning from the immaturity & apathy of adolescence to the actionable, focused resolve of young adulthood.
...From young adulthood, it'll be up to us to become sage, but first thing's first, let's work on presence and now.
In this struggle, irony has become a surgeon's knife, albeit sometimes blunted & not always disinfected. First out of a young generation seeped in sarcasm's yearning for something real, or more real, instead of the contrived hypercapitalist gloss they were born & cultivated in. Not to say, we're not contrived & mirror-adoring, we are, but we understand it, we self-mock it. Therein lies the intervention of our self-involvement, our supreme sense of self-authorship.
Rather than the closeted, nose-thumbing & wrap-around perverse exploitation of it, the impossible blockbuster action movie with meta-erectile dysfunction or the male hegemonic packaged rom-coms with meta-silicone sandbags pawning themselves off as this is how it should be. We embrace it. We were raised, innocents, in the pinnacle of postmodernity's takeover & took with us the sardonic sword & have learned the fullest grasp of aesthetic. We have all the tools of the hegemony to use against it. And we're more skilled & less self-deceiving about it. We've used self-effacing kitsch & irony to deconstruct every gloss-lipstick of former cultures, pop & otherwise, integrating them tongue-in-cheek into our hyper-mash-up style. Now the final piece of the puzzle, the consummation: Can we find focus of our potential? Because irony without purpose is a dead end. Rather, irony, ultimately speaking, that deconstructs without the intention of reconstructing is ironic, tragically so. So, can we get our tongues off outta our cheeks & smile sincere?
The above trailer, Van Damme's newest, is an exemplar of this deconstruction, this perceptive & economical shift that promises one step closer to sincerity, or as I like to see it, our kingdom of heaven.
Did you catch my rhetorical wink-nod using unverifiably? wah wah wah.
Thing is, Life, our very root existence itself as gamed by Godhead, is an inherent contradiction. We are of the most dynamic romantic dramedy. But, you know what God wants of Us... extraordinary me and you, to finally become God. The elder statesman, the mama-papa bear's getting old (somewhere in Time), and the Will's been signed. But before we can inherit the diaspora of splendor, cool things of great worth & superfly magic vision, as only a well-meaning, somewhat masochistic parent would, God has given his children a series of obstacles, or rather holistically speaking, one very labyrinthine obstacle. A divinely assembled coalescing of temptations, vanities & intellectual smut to test our emotional reasoning, also known as our soul power. Judgment Day, or those last filial nudges a parent gives to their son or daughter whom is transitioning from the immaturity & apathy of adolescence to the actionable, focused resolve of young adulthood.
...From young adulthood, it'll be up to us to become sage, but first thing's first, let's work on presence and now.
In this struggle, irony has become a surgeon's knife, albeit sometimes blunted & not always disinfected. First out of a young generation seeped in sarcasm's yearning for something real, or more real, instead of the contrived hypercapitalist gloss they were born & cultivated in. Not to say, we're not contrived & mirror-adoring, we are, but we understand it, we self-mock it. Therein lies the intervention of our self-involvement, our supreme sense of self-authorship.
Rather than the closeted, nose-thumbing & wrap-around perverse exploitation of it, the impossible blockbuster action movie with meta-erectile dysfunction or the male hegemonic packaged rom-coms with meta-silicone sandbags pawning themselves off as this is how it should be. We embrace it. We were raised, innocents, in the pinnacle of postmodernity's takeover & took with us the sardonic sword & have learned the fullest grasp of aesthetic. We have all the tools of the hegemony to use against it. And we're more skilled & less self-deceiving about it. We've used self-effacing kitsch & irony to deconstruct every gloss-lipstick of former cultures, pop & otherwise, integrating them tongue-in-cheek into our hyper-mash-up style. Now the final piece of the puzzle, the consummation: Can we find focus of our potential? Because irony without purpose is a dead end. Rather, irony, ultimately speaking, that deconstructs without the intention of reconstructing is ironic, tragically so. So, can we get our tongues off outta our cheeks & smile sincere?
The above trailer, Van Damme's newest, is an exemplar of this deconstruction, this perceptive & economical shift that promises one step closer to sincerity, or as I like to see it, our kingdom of heaven.
Monday, September 29, 2008
shymalan's the happening
Gee whiz, M. Night Shymalan, what a fall from grace you've had. Not only commercially, but cinematically, the once-heralded Spielberg-Hitchcock popcorn successor, has plunged into the darkest of artistic recessions, that quite frankly, sees almost insurmountable odds of reprisal. I've never been a bandwagoner (jumping on or off it) of Shymalan, though I've always respected his commercially-adroit & manufactured craftsmanship. With The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable & Signs (his masterpiece), he established himself as a solid, even premier, commercial genre auteur, one adeptly attuned to genre conventions & appeals. He's a prime exemplar of critic fickleness, they took him in & praised him & just as swiftly pounced on him like hyenas. The pouncing began with his 4th feature, The Village, which despite the overwhelmingly negative reaction still generated $100m-plus box office, & I must say up until his patented-twist ending turned on him, was a solid, if not impressive, outing. Then, Disney lost faith in him, jumped the boat, & he went from prize-winning horse to a limping, woebegone gamble.
In 2006, with much anticipation of a bounce back from the disappointment of The Village (or for industry insiders, the affirming failure) came Lady in the Water, again starring a fantastic ensemble cast headlined by Giamatti & Bryce Dallas Howard. No critical punches were pulled for this one, it was almost in snickering glee nationally panned & generated only a notch above $40m domestic. Again, I disagree with the reception, which seems to me blatantly fueled not by critical objectiveness but by prebiased emotion. I found Lady in the Water to be a well-directed, well-intentioned children's high-fantasy in which Shymalan matured as an artist in his dwellings on the inner workings of "fate" & "destiny". He found a dab of sincerity in Lady in the Water, which can easily be said Shymalan lacks in his generally contrived & conventional directorial manner. This was all lost in the shuffle, & the critics focused on Shymalan's role in his own film as a struggling artist who becomes a future prophet. It was egotistical, megalomaniacal, they said. In a sense, yes, they were right, & considering Shymalan's artistic vision, he's somewhat disillusioned of his own ability, but it was also audacious & if not that, honest. Because in all truthfulness, he simply embodied what all artists, great or think such, see themselves as: prophets.
Okay, The Happening. This, is perhaps, the case of an auteur who's lost almost entirely, the belief in himself & his personal vision. An artist who tried to please everybody, work outside of his own capability & in the end, made thus far, his very worst film. To see such a solid director fall & dissipate so tremendously, even from one film to the next, is remarkable & horrific. Everything was off in The Happening. The casting, which Mark Wahlberg & Zooey Deschanel, two very specific role actors, completely stunk up the joint. The usually taut, sure-handed tension, which was replaced by merely the absurdly grotesque. & the humor & satire which was without balance & came in excessive amounts & at moments completely out of wack with the flow of the film. In his past efforts, Shymalan's manufactured sincerity was well-enough glossed over by the entertainment of its package, but with The Happening everything has completely unraveled, making one of the most wooden, contrived films probably in cinematic history. Shymalan, was perhaps, just that last postmodern blockbuster director that came in the flicker of the right pre-millenium dawn & now in our cultural yearn for sincerity, has faded just as fast.
In 2006, with much anticipation of a bounce back from the disappointment of The Village (or for industry insiders, the affirming failure) came Lady in the Water, again starring a fantastic ensemble cast headlined by Giamatti & Bryce Dallas Howard. No critical punches were pulled for this one, it was almost in snickering glee nationally panned & generated only a notch above $40m domestic. Again, I disagree with the reception, which seems to me blatantly fueled not by critical objectiveness but by prebiased emotion. I found Lady in the Water to be a well-directed, well-intentioned children's high-fantasy in which Shymalan matured as an artist in his dwellings on the inner workings of "fate" & "destiny". He found a dab of sincerity in Lady in the Water, which can easily be said Shymalan lacks in his generally contrived & conventional directorial manner. This was all lost in the shuffle, & the critics focused on Shymalan's role in his own film as a struggling artist who becomes a future prophet. It was egotistical, megalomaniacal, they said. In a sense, yes, they were right, & considering Shymalan's artistic vision, he's somewhat disillusioned of his own ability, but it was also audacious & if not that, honest. Because in all truthfulness, he simply embodied what all artists, great or think such, see themselves as: prophets.
Okay, The Happening. This, is perhaps, the case of an auteur who's lost almost entirely, the belief in himself & his personal vision. An artist who tried to please everybody, work outside of his own capability & in the end, made thus far, his very worst film. To see such a solid director fall & dissipate so tremendously, even from one film to the next, is remarkable & horrific. Everything was off in The Happening. The casting, which Mark Wahlberg & Zooey Deschanel, two very specific role actors, completely stunk up the joint. The usually taut, sure-handed tension, which was replaced by merely the absurdly grotesque. & the humor & satire which was without balance & came in excessive amounts & at moments completely out of wack with the flow of the film. In his past efforts, Shymalan's manufactured sincerity was well-enough glossed over by the entertainment of its package, but with The Happening everything has completely unraveled, making one of the most wooden, contrived films probably in cinematic history. Shymalan, was perhaps, just that last postmodern blockbuster director that came in the flicker of the right pre-millenium dawn & now in our cultural yearn for sincerity, has faded just as fast.
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
speed racer
I rented & watched it yesterday. I enjoyed it, but I understand why the critical forum gave it a lukewarm reception. There's an expectation coming into a Wachowski flick, audiences want raw, subversive & for all intensive purposes "adult". The sibling auteurs this time around chose to honor the source-material & tame their trademark subterranean political commentary. In time, this integration & compromise the Wachowskis made in the stylization of Speed Racer will be imitated & improved on the same way The Matrix Trilogy trickled into popular cinema stylings. But, again, this brings to light the selfish double-standard that the critical circle suffers from. They've lost the ability to empathize with cinema made for a youth's eye's perspective.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
midnight meat train
Saw this contemporary horror classic a few weeks ago at the Fantasia Fest in MTL. The word on the street's that due to some internal studio politics the movie got only a very limited release, a fuck-all shame in my opinion. This one garnered much buzz being a Clive Barker bullet, and with sure-handed direction from Asian import Ryuhei Kitamura it didn't disappoint - and actually surpassed my expectations. Kitamura's one of the rare Asian horror imports that didn't implode under the anxiety of cultural turn-over. Though, he did have some issues with capture and pace with the few domestic-related scenes, but gets a mulligan. Midnight Meat Train was a kitsch, moody, gory, technically-adept crowd-pleaser, all the components of a solid post-millennium horror flick. The separation from its inept, manufactured contemporaries lies in its meta.
Firstly, the fact alone that it had exegesis should be applauded in a film. You could say MMT was a riff on Blow-Up, but cultivated from one of the premier exemplars of postmodern manifest, Clive Barker. He asks us: Who is the killer, the actionable party or the voyeur capturing the action? Who is the grander perpetuator, the media who feeds us or us who feed the culture of the media? Who's more perverse, who's the pervert, the criminal? The line's atom-thin between perpetrator and perpetuator. The voyeur becomes what he shoots. His perception of reality suffers and turns into depraved disillusionment.
Though, my only dissatisfaction of MMT was the concluding anti-hero nihilism: that you, in fact, become in the flesh what you shoot, embody it and redemption turns a way of succumbing. I mention "anti-hero" because in a grander postmodern sentiment, Bradley Cooper's character's a guardian of sorts, maintaining the equilibrium of two disjunctive realities from colliding. This, though quintessential artifact of the last whimpers of postmodernity, works as a sterling reminder to our moment that cuts the glossy crust away from manufactured sincerity and aesthetic dismemberment that still pervades.
Firstly, the fact alone that it had exegesis should be applauded in a film. You could say MMT was a riff on Blow-Up, but cultivated from one of the premier exemplars of postmodern manifest, Clive Barker. He asks us: Who is the killer, the actionable party or the voyeur capturing the action? Who is the grander perpetuator, the media who feeds us or us who feed the culture of the media? Who's more perverse, who's the pervert, the criminal? The line's atom-thin between perpetrator and perpetuator. The voyeur becomes what he shoots. His perception of reality suffers and turns into depraved disillusionment.
Though, my only dissatisfaction of MMT was the concluding anti-hero nihilism: that you, in fact, become in the flesh what you shoot, embody it and redemption turns a way of succumbing. I mention "anti-hero" because in a grander postmodern sentiment, Bradley Cooper's character's a guardian of sorts, maintaining the equilibrium of two disjunctive realities from colliding. This, though quintessential artifact of the last whimpers of postmodernity, works as a sterling reminder to our moment that cuts the glossy crust away from manufactured sincerity and aesthetic dismemberment that still pervades.
Saturday, July 26, 2008
artist log: zach helm
Stranger Than Fiction (writer)
Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium (auteur)
Zach Helm is real. With his latest, Wonder Emporium, he's shown us something we maybe lost, a move away from the productized, insincerely sentimentalized gloss of the contemporary children movie -- each contrived moment merely building up to the next shamelessly saccharine scene. Helm has concocted a glimpse into what "cinema childhood" can be -- something greater, something that relates the universe to us, no matter age. Refreshingly classic like children's literature of the past, before commerce got its imposing paws on it, before this hyper-capitalistic beast spotted and removed that last remnant of sincerity - The moral journey being too controversial for blockbusters and mass appeal. Like horror, children fare has the ability to project our carnalities, to polarize us. In horror, we see our true fragility, that paper-thin line separating us from barbarianism and absolute perversion. In children fare, beauty, innocence, fulfillment. Capitalism knows this, reducing both to inanimateness, degrading them to genres of guilty pleasure. Both avenues made into pornos. Respect to Eli Roth and Harry Potter 3, 4 and 5 -- Cuaron, Newell, and Yates.
Wonder Emporium is a rough draft, still raw. From the tone, to the composition, to the acting, cinematic flaws abound. The film is many times dull, the whimsy underrealized. Helm, though, has a depth of storytelling and wordplay more refined than his counterpart auteurs. He is first a marvelous rhetorical mind, and second a visualist. The latter still needing polishing. He's a pop Ashby, except flipped -- Ashby foremost an instinctive visualizer, a channeler. But let's not confuse space and time, Wonder Emporium is Helm's directorial debut. He's a first-round draft pick from paper-whiz university, give him some more p.t. and he'll be a complete dream-teamer. At 32, Helm's just barely getting his wiggle room professionally, but down to his knack for costume/production design coloration, the potential is apparent. He may be one of the most encouraging signs to come -
The man has cross-over appeal. His pieces so far, Stranger Than Fiction & Wonder Emporium, have been peeks into the next evolution of pop: existential, profoundly simple, and most importantly, entertaining. Look at this prototypically, not as a faulty singular work by an individual. Zach Helm is real. He's a romantist. He's Pop New Wave. He's magic. Chauncey Gardener tips his hat.
Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium (auteur)
Zach Helm is real. With his latest, Wonder Emporium, he's shown us something we maybe lost, a move away from the productized, insincerely sentimentalized gloss of the contemporary children movie -- each contrived moment merely building up to the next shamelessly saccharine scene. Helm has concocted a glimpse into what "cinema childhood" can be -- something greater, something that relates the universe to us, no matter age. Refreshingly classic like children's literature of the past, before commerce got its imposing paws on it, before this hyper-capitalistic beast spotted and removed that last remnant of sincerity - The moral journey being too controversial for blockbusters and mass appeal. Like horror, children fare has the ability to project our carnalities, to polarize us. In horror, we see our true fragility, that paper-thin line separating us from barbarianism and absolute perversion. In children fare, beauty, innocence, fulfillment. Capitalism knows this, reducing both to inanimateness, degrading them to genres of guilty pleasure. Both avenues made into pornos. Respect to Eli Roth and Harry Potter 3, 4 and 5 -- Cuaron, Newell, and Yates.
Wonder Emporium is a rough draft, still raw. From the tone, to the composition, to the acting, cinematic flaws abound. The film is many times dull, the whimsy underrealized. Helm, though, has a depth of storytelling and wordplay more refined than his counterpart auteurs. He is first a marvelous rhetorical mind, and second a visualist. The latter still needing polishing. He's a pop Ashby, except flipped -- Ashby foremost an instinctive visualizer, a channeler. But let's not confuse space and time, Wonder Emporium is Helm's directorial debut. He's a first-round draft pick from paper-whiz university, give him some more p.t. and he'll be a complete dream-teamer. At 32, Helm's just barely getting his wiggle room professionally, but down to his knack for costume/production design coloration, the potential is apparent. He may be one of the most encouraging signs to come -
The man has cross-over appeal. His pieces so far, Stranger Than Fiction & Wonder Emporium, have been peeks into the next evolution of pop: existential, profoundly simple, and most importantly, entertaining. Look at this prototypically, not as a faulty singular work by an individual. Zach Helm is real. He's a romantist. He's Pop New Wave. He's magic. Chauncey Gardener tips his hat.
i am legend
This is a blog from December when I Am Legend released, and a comment posted on it.
I Am Legend
Starring Will Smith
Directed by Francis Lawrence
We live in a detached hyper-reality. The blockbuster reaffirms this detachment, this problematic disconnect from cinema, the primary constructor of aforementioned hyper-reality. We look for titillation, cheap thrills, and commerce acting as it only knows how, treats us to such. The blockbuster, especially I Am Legend with its post-apocalyptic topicality, can be so much more. It can be real. It can be inspiring. It can be a MANIFESTO.
It doesn't have to cheat essence to be entertaining. But we let it do so, and thus it stays on the surface, never exploring what we truly need it to. In these fragile moments, I Am Legend could've shown us, taught us, inspired us, had meaning. Blockbusters like I Am Legend can be more, they can be projects for humanity. Cinema of this magnitude has the potential to enable the most visceral message. It gives us the opportunity to embody, to empathize with the context, the situation, our mistakes. Imagine the beauty of a visual manifesto. Entertaining, but uncompromising to its sincerity.
Socialized cinema in America would be a beautiful revelation. I kept thinking what if Malick did this or Aronofsky. What if we funded films like this for the best American auteurs to create together? Collaborations of the most profound, of the most timely, of the greatest purpose. Perhaps, better in theory, than practice.
Yet, we can embody this hyper-reality we have constructed. Art imitating Life. Life imitating Art. Life becoming Art. Such is the cycle. Such is the most universal, revelatory human narrative: Redemption.
Comment by Syd:
Since the end of tribalism, cannibalism and the formation of civilization, evolution seems to manifest culturally before physically. And since civilization, or at least Herodotus’ time, the world has been divided into EAST and WEST. And since the edification of civilization and thus, society as an evolutionary petri dish, the greatest strides in human evolution seem to come as a result of interactions between east and west... (for example, the Renaissance and Mercantilism in Venice, then Impressionism later, up until the turn of the 20th Century where two World Wars brought people from all walks of life into the Pacific theater, the beginning of socialized globalization rather than colonialism.) The science fiction writers of the 1960s and 1970s were continuing this story of humanity, east and west. Coming off of the trend of earlier 20th Century Western philosophers writing in the 1880's to 1950's(Ouspensky, Gurdjieff, Charles MaCkay and infamously Aleister Crowley) who at the turn of the Century traveled to the East, and then came back West to open schools and publish books mixing Philosophies, histories, psychology, ontology, epistemology and a tad of the occult, delivering it all in the Eastern style of education: teaching their “worldly” knowledge, recruiting monks rather than students and focusing on personal growth rather than group performance— the scifi-authors of the seventies were a mixture of novelty and prophecy... This association somewhat discredited them over the years in Academia. Just as their aforementioned predecessors from the 1880's-1950s, the 1970s scifi gurus represented the most recent cultural interaction between east and west, and thus, a stride in evolution.
They all saw something, a glimpse into a possible future. Authors such as Philllip K. Dick, H.P. Lovecraft, Robert Anton Wilson, Thomas Pyncheon, Asimov and of course Hubbard where all given access to privy knowledge— whether through legit insanity and dreams, LSD and drug use, or backgrounds in government and military that exposed them to information, they all saw and knew something. Reacting to the previous generations of authors who were the brilliant products of East and West interactions under post-colonial Modernity, the scifi gurus of the 1970s wrote their own philosophies. Some, like Hubbard, were able to convince masses. But since the trend of establishing schools in the Eastern-style of education faded, (due to elitism), these neo-philosophers lost their academic audiences. When I AM LEGED by Richard Matheson was written the world was changing. 1977, the year it was written, was the year of Aquarius and the beginning of that age. The Earth’s poles began to shift. Hip Hop and Rock were emerging as eternal as our bodies learned to move anew. The art scene was bursting while socially, the Bronx was Burning. It was the Summer of Sam and the beginning of the end for most. For the first time, we had no prophets telling us what was going to happen…enter the era of great scifi guru. Unlike the previous era (1880’s-1950s) where metaphysical philosophies were abundant and often accepted as commonplace even having not read them, those who read scifi knew it was more, but those who didn’t had no idea. So if you really want to know what is going to happen, just read it. They all say the same thing through different stories. The end began back in 1977 and has been going on since. In 2009 something bad will happen as it all comes to a head. In 2012 a resolution will happen. As for translating these works into cinema, I think we need to evaluate “cinema prophecy”— how can cinema, like the other art forms, be used to signify the future? In order to do this, we must find a visual language that cinematically accomplishes this. The last film to accomplish cinematic prophecy was Star Wars— the last film to have truly changed the world. My friend Ana just saw Kurosawa’s RAN. She remarked how she knew Lucas had looked to Kurosawa and his films for inspiration, but she had no idea that he had made a shot for shot remake of RAN. Lucas relied on Kurosawa’s visual language to tell his prophecy and as Ana pointed out, the last film to truly change the world is clearly an interaction between East and West. Upon watching recent Asian films, particularly horror, it is obvious that this is the solution to creating cinema prophecy in our time.
I Am Legend
Starring Will Smith
Directed by Francis Lawrence
We live in a detached hyper-reality. The blockbuster reaffirms this detachment, this problematic disconnect from cinema, the primary constructor of aforementioned hyper-reality. We look for titillation, cheap thrills, and commerce acting as it only knows how, treats us to such. The blockbuster, especially I Am Legend with its post-apocalyptic topicality, can be so much more. It can be real. It can be inspiring. It can be a MANIFESTO.
It doesn't have to cheat essence to be entertaining. But we let it do so, and thus it stays on the surface, never exploring what we truly need it to. In these fragile moments, I Am Legend could've shown us, taught us, inspired us, had meaning. Blockbusters like I Am Legend can be more, they can be projects for humanity. Cinema of this magnitude has the potential to enable the most visceral message. It gives us the opportunity to embody, to empathize with the context, the situation, our mistakes. Imagine the beauty of a visual manifesto. Entertaining, but uncompromising to its sincerity.
Socialized cinema in America would be a beautiful revelation. I kept thinking what if Malick did this or Aronofsky. What if we funded films like this for the best American auteurs to create together? Collaborations of the most profound, of the most timely, of the greatest purpose. Perhaps, better in theory, than practice.
Yet, we can embody this hyper-reality we have constructed. Art imitating Life. Life imitating Art. Life becoming Art. Such is the cycle. Such is the most universal, revelatory human narrative: Redemption.
Comment by Syd:
Since the end of tribalism, cannibalism and the formation of civilization, evolution seems to manifest culturally before physically. And since civilization, or at least Herodotus’ time, the world has been divided into EAST and WEST. And since the edification of civilization and thus, society as an evolutionary petri dish, the greatest strides in human evolution seem to come as a result of interactions between east and west... (for example, the Renaissance and Mercantilism in Venice, then Impressionism later, up until the turn of the 20th Century where two World Wars brought people from all walks of life into the Pacific theater, the beginning of socialized globalization rather than colonialism.) The science fiction writers of the 1960s and 1970s were continuing this story of humanity, east and west. Coming off of the trend of earlier 20th Century Western philosophers writing in the 1880's to 1950's(Ouspensky, Gurdjieff, Charles MaCkay and infamously Aleister Crowley) who at the turn of the Century traveled to the East, and then came back West to open schools and publish books mixing Philosophies, histories, psychology, ontology, epistemology and a tad of the occult, delivering it all in the Eastern style of education: teaching their “worldly” knowledge, recruiting monks rather than students and focusing on personal growth rather than group performance— the scifi-authors of the seventies were a mixture of novelty and prophecy... This association somewhat discredited them over the years in Academia. Just as their aforementioned predecessors from the 1880's-1950s, the 1970s scifi gurus represented the most recent cultural interaction between east and west, and thus, a stride in evolution.
They all saw something, a glimpse into a possible future. Authors such as Philllip K. Dick, H.P. Lovecraft, Robert Anton Wilson, Thomas Pyncheon, Asimov and of course Hubbard where all given access to privy knowledge— whether through legit insanity and dreams, LSD and drug use, or backgrounds in government and military that exposed them to information, they all saw and knew something. Reacting to the previous generations of authors who were the brilliant products of East and West interactions under post-colonial Modernity, the scifi gurus of the 1970s wrote their own philosophies. Some, like Hubbard, were able to convince masses. But since the trend of establishing schools in the Eastern-style of education faded, (due to elitism), these neo-philosophers lost their academic audiences. When I AM LEGED by Richard Matheson was written the world was changing. 1977, the year it was written, was the year of Aquarius and the beginning of that age. The Earth’s poles began to shift. Hip Hop and Rock were emerging as eternal as our bodies learned to move anew. The art scene was bursting while socially, the Bronx was Burning. It was the Summer of Sam and the beginning of the end for most. For the first time, we had no prophets telling us what was going to happen…enter the era of great scifi guru. Unlike the previous era (1880’s-1950s) where metaphysical philosophies were abundant and often accepted as commonplace even having not read them, those who read scifi knew it was more, but those who didn’t had no idea. So if you really want to know what is going to happen, just read it. They all say the same thing through different stories. The end began back in 1977 and has been going on since. In 2009 something bad will happen as it all comes to a head. In 2012 a resolution will happen. As for translating these works into cinema, I think we need to evaluate “cinema prophecy”— how can cinema, like the other art forms, be used to signify the future? In order to do this, we must find a visual language that cinematically accomplishes this. The last film to accomplish cinematic prophecy was Star Wars— the last film to have truly changed the world. My friend Ana just saw Kurosawa’s RAN. She remarked how she knew Lucas had looked to Kurosawa and his films for inspiration, but she had no idea that he had made a shot for shot remake of RAN. Lucas relied on Kurosawa’s visual language to tell his prophecy and as Ana pointed out, the last film to truly change the world is clearly an interaction between East and West. Upon watching recent Asian films, particularly horror, it is obvious that this is the solution to creating cinema prophecy in our time.
Monday, July 21, 2008
the collaborative
Contextually and semantically the collective, although with the most virtuous intention is a bygone byproduct. The conflict lies not as much in its naive romantic idealism, but in its inherent oppressive property - that in a collective, there remains no individual. In theory, like anarchy, this sentimental anthropological homogenization courses unblemished. But not in application, not in the manifest esteem post-capitalism, not in nature.
Within collective, there remains an aimlessness, minds saturating into one, succinct mind - the misplaced glorification of the collective can be traced to the universal allure of Eastern spiritualism. Yet, don't be prejudiced in the longview alms of Western thinking because both are needed, necessary: dark and light, ying and yang. The collective may be the romantic end we're struggling and striving toward, but not the means to arrive. The collective forms as one without resolve, only contentment, to be. Beautiful in itself, the poetic, uniform mind being as one, but in the ultimate struggle, incorporeal and selflessly selfish. Surely, the East holds the gift of sage universalism, but the West holds equal parts - this baby a whole not a half. Collaboration is compromise, individual minds coming together, and although not submitting to oneness of mind, coming together as individuals with purpose - to birth, to conceive a design of oneness.
Within collective, there remains an aimlessness, minds saturating into one, succinct mind - the misplaced glorification of the collective can be traced to the universal allure of Eastern spiritualism. Yet, don't be prejudiced in the longview alms of Western thinking because both are needed, necessary: dark and light, ying and yang. The collective may be the romantic end we're struggling and striving toward, but not the means to arrive. The collective forms as one without resolve, only contentment, to be. Beautiful in itself, the poetic, uniform mind being as one, but in the ultimate struggle, incorporeal and selflessly selfish. Surely, the East holds the gift of sage universalism, but the West holds equal parts - this baby a whole not a half. Collaboration is compromise, individual minds coming together, and although not submitting to oneness of mind, coming together as individuals with purpose - to birth, to conceive a design of oneness.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
We are not born sinner, we are made such. We are spurred into arrest. Yet, we can - and this is the journey to embodiment - strive to become creator, to be released from detention and imposition, understand the grand pattern and come to be our own author. And if this struggle, long and trying, is consummated, we have found the kingdom - our innermost self, the self whom bears wings.
manifesto of the new
Aesthetics are dead. More concisely, they're on life support. The New will be the consummating movement. What a graced vision, what a fantasy realized when like previous eras all the great artists were chums, were sentient penners and painters in their intended innovation and motion. The Beats, The Dadaists, The Surrealists, Italian Neorealists, French New Wave, New Hollywood, Pop New Wave... man, my heart churns just grasping a conception of it, being in the company of peers, out to enable transition, like minds with like force.
But, with our movement it will not be distinguished by a radical or reactionary shift in aesthetic, or to be more precise, in aesthetic as device for expressing intent, subversively or idealistically. So, that is to say, with this movement the aesthetic, that pertaining to the sensory of visual prettiness (and to a lesser degree sentimentality), will not be the driving impetus for revolution. In our state of empty flash and hyper-sensory, where aesthetic has overtaken and disillusioned meaning, becoming meaningless unto itself, there is nothing left to counteract or reflex. Thus, the revelation of The New will provide absolutely nothing new at all. Why?
We are at a fusing nexus of motley, multiform, re-appropriating retro-cool where aesthetic has reached its stylistic climax - from conceptual black and white to the last remnants of postmodern marquee neon, to The New: humanity, incandescent. The New has all forms and isms at our disposal, we will be a movement conducted of any style and any form to enable and consummate our purpose. And therein lies the revelation of The New, the reinsertion of purpose, of meaning, of the answer and re-construction of "what is art?" What a fluid, potent combination: image and intent. What compelling call when the prettiness finds Truth and becomes Beauty! The New is compromise, collaboration and destiny manifest. Best believe.
But, with our movement it will not be distinguished by a radical or reactionary shift in aesthetic, or to be more precise, in aesthetic as device for expressing intent, subversively or idealistically. So, that is to say, with this movement the aesthetic, that pertaining to the sensory of visual prettiness (and to a lesser degree sentimentality), will not be the driving impetus for revolution. In our state of empty flash and hyper-sensory, where aesthetic has overtaken and disillusioned meaning, becoming meaningless unto itself, there is nothing left to counteract or reflex. Thus, the revelation of The New will provide absolutely nothing new at all. Why?
We are at a fusing nexus of motley, multiform, re-appropriating retro-cool where aesthetic has reached its stylistic climax - from conceptual black and white to the last remnants of postmodern marquee neon, to The New: humanity, incandescent. The New has all forms and isms at our disposal, we will be a movement conducted of any style and any form to enable and consummate our purpose. And therein lies the revelation of The New, the reinsertion of purpose, of meaning, of the answer and re-construction of "what is art?" What a fluid, potent combination: image and intent. What compelling call when the prettiness finds Truth and becomes Beauty! The New is compromise, collaboration and destiny manifest. Best believe.
elementary zen
Siddharta will one day be the bedtime book I read to my children, Gotama Freeman and Franny Afrika Ta. The simple prose, that writing given to sage hymn and to be recited and shared aloud, has been lost in contemporary literature with the postmodern deconstruction of semantics - the cleverness and glutted prose killing the simple profundity, the ambitions for intellectual caste outshining universality. So, I divine that day when I will fatherly tuck my little bundles into bed, and settle beside them to read Siddharta.
dream log: one big family
Incidentally, this dream log suffers from potential unrealized - that being because like a lazy bones I insouciantly put off jotting them down, and like a fugitive, the clarity of those dreams were paroled by the fleetings of memory. There were 3, all incandescently brilliant, and strangely with each transmission into the next dream, the intonations became more dark and severe - dark in the sense of how my dream realm draws: sheer, overwhelming resolve in apocalyptic tumult. I wish I could've indulged you in the latter 2, but we'll have to suffice with the one I recall, a domestic heart-warmer:
I'm throwing a house party, an enchanting, winning house party. The corridors and hallways of the house are infinite, they go on forever like sprawling portals. Everyone is here, and I can't recount most of the names or faces, but let's simply say everyone who has ever stamped himself in my memory, from Allen Ginsberg to my best bud in 3rd grade. And, of course, that one romantic meta-charmer whom always seems to pop here beautiful expression around even when she's far removed from my thoughts. She was there too, and we shared company, flirted, became close, and I felt we were meant to be coupled as one. As the night roared on, then lulled down to an end and my friends dispersed, the house became barren of what was just moments ago an infectious vitality. The portals receded and became immediate, the house dimmed and felt closeted. This manifestation most positively one derived from my current apartment situation, a vagabond living alone in a 4 bedroom.
As I drifted the emptied hallways, struck by a case of abandonment, a noise coming from downstairs rattles me. I hesitantly set out, arming myself with closest metal object, tip-toeing hesitantly to find out what the sound might be, milieu or menace. Standing in front of the glass sliding door, the noise declares itself, and as my attention turns toward it, a man emerges from the shadow of the computer room. I pounce back, startled, and reflex defensively. But, then, I notice behind him are also women and other men, and realize the tenderness exuding from all their eyes, and release my defenses.
Cluttered in that small space are about 25 of them, of various ages and backgrounds.
- How'd you get in?
- We were working the party and discreetly stuck around. We're part of the Painters' Union. We'll leave if you want. We're just looking for shelter.
- No! Stay until Friday. I have the place for 2 more weeks. Maybe if all goes splendid you can stay until then.
And so they stay. My only requisite is that they don't disturb my bathroom situation, meaning I ain't sharing my bathroom space. Their presence invigorates me, transforms the house into a home, and we become a family, a circus juggling one another's distinctions and learning to love them. And me, I am the guiding patriarch: warm, gentle, empathetic.
I'm throwing a house party, an enchanting, winning house party. The corridors and hallways of the house are infinite, they go on forever like sprawling portals. Everyone is here, and I can't recount most of the names or faces, but let's simply say everyone who has ever stamped himself in my memory, from Allen Ginsberg to my best bud in 3rd grade. And, of course, that one romantic meta-charmer whom always seems to pop here beautiful expression around even when she's far removed from my thoughts. She was there too, and we shared company, flirted, became close, and I felt we were meant to be coupled as one. As the night roared on, then lulled down to an end and my friends dispersed, the house became barren of what was just moments ago an infectious vitality. The portals receded and became immediate, the house dimmed and felt closeted. This manifestation most positively one derived from my current apartment situation, a vagabond living alone in a 4 bedroom.
As I drifted the emptied hallways, struck by a case of abandonment, a noise coming from downstairs rattles me. I hesitantly set out, arming myself with closest metal object, tip-toeing hesitantly to find out what the sound might be, milieu or menace. Standing in front of the glass sliding door, the noise declares itself, and as my attention turns toward it, a man emerges from the shadow of the computer room. I pounce back, startled, and reflex defensively. But, then, I notice behind him are also women and other men, and realize the tenderness exuding from all their eyes, and release my defenses.
Cluttered in that small space are about 25 of them, of various ages and backgrounds.
- How'd you get in?
- We were working the party and discreetly stuck around. We're part of the Painters' Union. We'll leave if you want. We're just looking for shelter.
- No! Stay until Friday. I have the place for 2 more weeks. Maybe if all goes splendid you can stay until then.
And so they stay. My only requisite is that they don't disturb my bathroom situation, meaning I ain't sharing my bathroom space. Their presence invigorates me, transforms the house into a home, and we become a family, a circus juggling one another's distinctions and learning to love them. And me, I am the guiding patriarch: warm, gentle, empathetic.
the dark light
And people clapped beautifully. And we all understood, believed the same, even if for a spellbound moment. A glimmer of truth arose and spread its iridescent wings and encompassed us all in the dark auditorium, reminding us of sincere beauty, reclaiming it from the cryptic night - of what can be, what we will consummate. I thank from the bottom of my timeworn soul the Nolan brethren and all whom collaborated for The Dark Knight.It is not too bold to declare this film, this exemplar of compromise, the most all-encompassing cinematic achievement of our history - so comely a message blazoned for the most embracing medium: the masses. The Dark Knight is "pitched at the divide between art and industry, poetry and entertainment", as Manohla Dargis (who has become to me the beacon of critical sanctity) annotates. This compromise, this consummation of the theatrical and sincere and of art and commodification encapsulates New Sincerity. Such the potential of Pop that it can enthrall and evoke, amuse and muse.
Furthermore, though tragic, I discover resplendent, purifying symbolism in the death of Heath Ledger, an artist lost before we were able to receive fully his alms. Beyond the exploration of primal moral complexities, The Dark Knight is the reflection, the symptomatic mirror, of an existence yearning to transition from the postmodern nihilism which broodingly afflicts it. The Joker, that projective figure of all damned postmodern indulgence, devices to triumphantly express to us, those seethed in caustic recklessness, that we are better than that, we are sheer potential ready to be noble. And more emphatically, revealing what we are not: chaotic, depraved, manufactured - this impediment something we were contrived and deceived into thinking. But, magnificently and humanly so, never believing.
As Batman himself espouses, and this not verbatim, Gotham needs a hero with a face, not a mask. Heath Ledger as The Joker embodies that last fancy of the antihero, of the masquerading figure which only desires glorification. In his last role, he became a martyr. For us, he died incarnating postmodernity, he died so that we could awaken truth in the symbolic manifest destiny of the film. As in art is in life, Heath's Joker symbolized the receding dark waves of postmodern excess and the coming tides of solace of New Sincerity. It was destined and it is to be willed!
The new artist will no longer be a veil, a face of many revolving mysteries. No, he will simply be - embracing his commodification, but not indulging it, endowing his real namesake, signifying wisdom over tact, purpose over advancement of personal celebrity.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
weezy: dr. carter
Intro (Lil Wayne & Nurse)]
Where's my coffee?
Good Morning Doctor Carter (Hey Sweetie)
Looks like its going to be a long day. (Ahh another one what we got?)
Your first patient (Yeah)
Is suffering from a lack of concept (Uh-Huh)
Originality (Ugh)
His flow is weak (Another one)
And he has no style (Ugh)
Whatcha got for um?
[Verse 1 (Lil Wayne)]
Ok.Let me put my gloves on and my scrubs on.
Dr.Carter to the rescue. Excuse me if I'm late,
But like a thief it takes time to be this great.
Ha! so just wait. Your style is a disgrace,
Your rhymes are fifth place and im just grace.
One, Uno, Ace and im tryin to make your heart beat like bass,
But your sweet like cake and i come to fix
Whatever you shall break. Where is your originality?
You are so fake so picture me like a gallery.
Capture What i say. All i need is one mic. All i need is one take.
Like hey, brighter then the sun ray got a pistols on the playground.
Watch the gunplay like.No kidding. No kids in the way,
But the kids do watch. Gotta Watch what we say. Gotta work everyday.
Gotta not be Cliche.
Gotta stand out like Andre 3K.
Gotta kick it kick it like the sensai.
You gotta have faith you gotta gotta wait wait..
[Verse 2 (Lil Wayne)]
Okay.
Respect is in the heart.
So thats where i'ma start.
And a lot of heart patients don't make it.
Now hey kids
Plural I graduated
Cause you could get through anything if Magic made it.
And that was called recycling
Or rereciting
Something cause you just like it
So you say it just like it.
Some say its biting
But i say its enlightning
Besides Dr. Kanye West is one of the brightest.
And Dr. Swizz can stitch your track up the tightest.
And Dr. Jeezy can fix your back up the nicest.
Authritist in my hand from writing.
But i'ma docter they don't understand my writing.
So i stop writing.
Now i'm like lighting.
And you ain't Fish Young so don't clash with the Titans.
Fast and exciting.
My Passion is Frighting.
Now let me put some more Vocab in your I.V.
Here take this Vicatin
Like it and love it
And confidence has no budget so pay me no mind i don't walk like i talk it cause i'm running
I don't do it cause i done it and i'm in the emergency punnet.
[Verse 3 (Lil Wayne)]
Swagger Tighter Then A Yeast Infection.
Fly Go Hard Like Geast Erection.
Fashion Patrol Police Detection.
I Stay Tight Like Chinese Connection.
I Stay Tight Like Pussy At Night.
Baby Don't Get Me Wrong I Could Do That Pussy Right.
But I'm Too Wrong To Write.
Too Fresh To Fight.
Too Paid To Freestyle.
Too Paid To Freestyle.
I Had To Say It Twice
Swagger So Nice.
And Don't Ask Me Shit Unless It Concern A Price.
And I Don't Rap Fast I Rap Slow.
Cause I Mean Every Letter In The Words In The Setence Of My Quotes.
Swagger Just Flow Sweeter Then Honey Oats.
That Swagger I Got It I Wear It Like A Coat.
Wait, As I Put The Light Down His Throat.
I Can Only See Flow.
His Blood Starting To Flow.
His Lungs Starting To Grow.
This One Starting To Show.
Strong Signs Of Life.
Wheres The Stiches Heres The Knife.
Smack His Face His Eyes Open.
I Reply With A Nice Welcome Back.
Hip Hop I Saved Your Life.
Where's my coffee?
Good Morning Doctor Carter (Hey Sweetie)
Looks like its going to be a long day. (Ahh another one what we got?)
Your first patient (Yeah)
Is suffering from a lack of concept (Uh-Huh)
Originality (Ugh)
His flow is weak (Another one)
And he has no style (Ugh)
Whatcha got for um?
[Verse 1 (Lil Wayne)]
Ok.Let me put my gloves on and my scrubs on.
Dr.Carter to the rescue. Excuse me if I'm late,
But like a thief it takes time to be this great.
Ha! so just wait. Your style is a disgrace,
Your rhymes are fifth place and im just grace.
One, Uno, Ace and im tryin to make your heart beat like bass,
But your sweet like cake and i come to fix
Whatever you shall break. Where is your originality?
You are so fake so picture me like a gallery.
Capture What i say. All i need is one mic. All i need is one take.
Like hey, brighter then the sun ray got a pistols on the playground.
Watch the gunplay like.No kidding. No kids in the way,
But the kids do watch. Gotta Watch what we say. Gotta work everyday.
Gotta not be Cliche.
Gotta stand out like Andre 3K.
Gotta kick it kick it like the sensai.
You gotta have faith you gotta gotta wait wait..
[Verse 2 (Lil Wayne)]
Okay.
Respect is in the heart.
So thats where i'ma start.
And a lot of heart patients don't make it.
Now hey kids
Plural I graduated
Cause you could get through anything if Magic made it.
And that was called recycling
Or rereciting
Something cause you just like it
So you say it just like it.
Some say its biting
But i say its enlightning
Besides Dr. Kanye West is one of the brightest.
And Dr. Swizz can stitch your track up the tightest.
And Dr. Jeezy can fix your back up the nicest.
Authritist in my hand from writing.
But i'ma docter they don't understand my writing.
So i stop writing.
Now i'm like lighting.
And you ain't Fish Young so don't clash with the Titans.
Fast and exciting.
My Passion is Frighting.
Now let me put some more Vocab in your I.V.
Here take this Vicatin
Like it and love it
And confidence has no budget so pay me no mind i don't walk like i talk it cause i'm running
I don't do it cause i done it and i'm in the emergency punnet.
[Verse 3 (Lil Wayne)]
Swagger Tighter Then A Yeast Infection.
Fly Go Hard Like Geast Erection.
Fashion Patrol Police Detection.
I Stay Tight Like Chinese Connection.
I Stay Tight Like Pussy At Night.
Baby Don't Get Me Wrong I Could Do That Pussy Right.
But I'm Too Wrong To Write.
Too Fresh To Fight.
Too Paid To Freestyle.
Too Paid To Freestyle.
I Had To Say It Twice
Swagger So Nice.
And Don't Ask Me Shit Unless It Concern A Price.
And I Don't Rap Fast I Rap Slow.
Cause I Mean Every Letter In The Words In The Setence Of My Quotes.
Swagger Just Flow Sweeter Then Honey Oats.
That Swagger I Got It I Wear It Like A Coat.
Wait, As I Put The Light Down His Throat.
I Can Only See Flow.
His Blood Starting To Flow.
His Lungs Starting To Grow.
This One Starting To Show.
Strong Signs Of Life.
Wheres The Stiches Heres The Knife.
Smack His Face His Eyes Open.
I Reply With A Nice Welcome Back.
Hip Hop I Saved Your Life.
Sunday, July 13, 2008
lynchian
First off, man the 80s were full of nightmares. Such depravation, such deconstruction of the dream, such perversion of the romantic must have been daggers. And I can understand how the esteem suffered, how our breath of life was sucked from us during this tragically nihilistic era. But, you know, it was necessary, we effectually hardened. The naivete corrupted soon becomes sage learned.
Principally, I believe it's most opportune to avoid the cynical, culturally-debilitating habit of 'who's better, who's best'. This approach detrimental not only to the artisans in discussion, but to the audiences in reception. Of course, such subjectivity falls prey to fragility, but ambigiously or not, let's restrain such old-school debunking techniques to artist whom are not artist at all: manufactured empty flashers, meaningless aestheticians, and above all, work which does not inspire and evoke change in the human heart.
So, that being said, let's roll. Cronenberg and Lynch. Wait, another precursor before we trailblaze ahead: This may be a hurried observation seeing as I've experienced the entire Cronenberg catalogue, and have only experienced Lynch (during sporadic, sometimes unintelligible moments of my personal maturation where upon true understanding might've been hindered) through Elephant Man, Wild At Heart, Lost Highway, and Mulholland Drive. But, the following thesis accounts primarily using his seminal work, Blue Velvet, and in an effort for objectivity, I'll try keenly to compare early work with early work.
I prefer Cronenberg to Lynch. Until today, I've never been into Lynch, or the trendy, pretentious aura that surrounds him, not as much him as an artist, but the film-school pseudos that adore him - those that are titillated by attaching themself to any artifact seemingly abstract merely as compensation, to be snarky. This a generalization obviously not intended for all because I have a couple buddies that are up on Lynch whom are not at all this way. In actuality, they're similar to me: kinda perverse, kinda depraved. But, now, since watching Blue Velvet, although my preference hasn't wavered in regards to these auteurs, I now understand the Lynchian appeal.
I find Lynch and Cronenberg counterparts, almost in the same manner I see Almodovar and Cronenberg counterparts (except, Almodovar and Cronenberg are equivalents). On the metasurface, Cronenberg deals in the arena of body politics, the struggle between the flesh and the according evolution and perversion of higher intellect. But, more imperatively, his work, early and present, observe prophetically the perversion of the dream of reality, of a treacherous hyperreality unescaped, unconsummated.
Contrastly, in Lynch, we find emotion, a sprawling, romantic vision corrupted. In the Lynchian world, the reality has become the dream, and the dream has gone astray. His subversion expresses itself in the manufactured sentimentality of his tone, of the brooding satirical kitsch, of emotional paralysis. His brand of satirical kistch taking cinema over 20 years to transition pass. It's quite simple, Cronenberg is the intellect, the thinker. Lynch is the romantic, the feeler, and his childlike dreamery is one battling the perversion of his fantasy. Indeed, the artist is a product of their context, of their cultivation, and thus, Lynch is that of the American heart, of the naive poetry corrupted. Cronenberg is the more traditional European intellect, that naivete perhaps gone long ago. In technique and tone, Cronenberg's aesthetics are cold, voyeuristic, unpoetic. Both are necessary and both are appreciated, but I still prefer Cronenberg in this case, not only because of his elaboration of cause and effect, but bluntly for the reason he's more adept.
Principally, I believe it's most opportune to avoid the cynical, culturally-debilitating habit of 'who's better, who's best'. This approach detrimental not only to the artisans in discussion, but to the audiences in reception. Of course, such subjectivity falls prey to fragility, but ambigiously or not, let's restrain such old-school debunking techniques to artist whom are not artist at all: manufactured empty flashers, meaningless aestheticians, and above all, work which does not inspire and evoke change in the human heart.
So, that being said, let's roll. Cronenberg and Lynch. Wait, another precursor before we trailblaze ahead: This may be a hurried observation seeing as I've experienced the entire Cronenberg catalogue, and have only experienced Lynch (during sporadic, sometimes unintelligible moments of my personal maturation where upon true understanding might've been hindered) through Elephant Man, Wild At Heart, Lost Highway, and Mulholland Drive. But, the following thesis accounts primarily using his seminal work, Blue Velvet, and in an effort for objectivity, I'll try keenly to compare early work with early work.
I prefer Cronenberg to Lynch. Until today, I've never been into Lynch, or the trendy, pretentious aura that surrounds him, not as much him as an artist, but the film-school pseudos that adore him - those that are titillated by attaching themself to any artifact seemingly abstract merely as compensation, to be snarky. This a generalization obviously not intended for all because I have a couple buddies that are up on Lynch whom are not at all this way. In actuality, they're similar to me: kinda perverse, kinda depraved. But, now, since watching Blue Velvet, although my preference hasn't wavered in regards to these auteurs, I now understand the Lynchian appeal.
I find Lynch and Cronenberg counterparts, almost in the same manner I see Almodovar and Cronenberg counterparts (except, Almodovar and Cronenberg are equivalents). On the metasurface, Cronenberg deals in the arena of body politics, the struggle between the flesh and the according evolution and perversion of higher intellect. But, more imperatively, his work, early and present, observe prophetically the perversion of the dream of reality, of a treacherous hyperreality unescaped, unconsummated.
Contrastly, in Lynch, we find emotion, a sprawling, romantic vision corrupted. In the Lynchian world, the reality has become the dream, and the dream has gone astray. His subversion expresses itself in the manufactured sentimentality of his tone, of the brooding satirical kitsch, of emotional paralysis. His brand of satirical kistch taking cinema over 20 years to transition pass. It's quite simple, Cronenberg is the intellect, the thinker. Lynch is the romantic, the feeler, and his childlike dreamery is one battling the perversion of his fantasy. Indeed, the artist is a product of their context, of their cultivation, and thus, Lynch is that of the American heart, of the naive poetry corrupted. Cronenberg is the more traditional European intellect, that naivete perhaps gone long ago. In technique and tone, Cronenberg's aesthetics are cold, voyeuristic, unpoetic. Both are necessary and both are appreciated, but I still prefer Cronenberg in this case, not only because of his elaboration of cause and effect, but bluntly for the reason he's more adept.
Monday, July 7, 2008
interpol: pace is the trick
You can't hold it to tight
These matters of security
You don't have to be wound so tight
Smoking on the balcony
But it's that sleaze in a park
You women you have no self-control,
The angels remark outside
You were known for insatiable means
I don't know a thing
I've seen love, and I followed the speeding of starlight
I've seen love, and I followed the speeding of starswept night
Yeah pace is the trick
And to all the destruction in men
Well I see you as you take your pride
My lioness your defenses seem wise I cannot press
And detentions are demised, my lioness
Can't you hurt it some, think I hurt it
I've seen love, and I followed the speeding of starlight
I've seen love and I followed the speeding of starswept night
And now I select you, slow down I let you
See how I stun, see how I stun
And now I select you, slow down I let you
See how I stun, see how I stun
And to all the destruction in men
And to all the corruption in my hand
And now I select you, slow down I let you
See how I stun see how I stun [3x]
And now I select you, slow down I let you
I always follow the speeding of starswept night
You don't hold... candle. [x4]
These matters of security
You don't have to be wound so tight
Smoking on the balcony
But it's that sleaze in a park
You women you have no self-control,
The angels remark outside
You were known for insatiable means
I don't know a thing
I've seen love, and I followed the speeding of starlight
I've seen love, and I followed the speeding of starswept night
Yeah pace is the trick
And to all the destruction in men
Well I see you as you take your pride
My lioness your defenses seem wise I cannot press
And detentions are demised, my lioness
Can't you hurt it some, think I hurt it
I've seen love, and I followed the speeding of starlight
I've seen love and I followed the speeding of starswept night
And now I select you, slow down I let you
See how I stun, see how I stun
And now I select you, slow down I let you
See how I stun, see how I stun
And to all the destruction in men
And to all the corruption in my hand
And now I select you, slow down I let you
See how I stun see how I stun [3x]
And now I select you, slow down I let you
I always follow the speeding of starswept night
You don't hold... candle. [x4]
Sunday, July 6, 2008
agent zero promotes sustainability
Agent Zero recently accepted a contract extension from the Washington Wizards for $111 milli, the team which he's spent the last 5 years, the place where's he's blossomed into one of franchise faces of the NBA. Initially, the Wiz offered Gilbert $127m. A few other suitors looking to lure him away from DC also offered up max contracts. But, in the end, the man took the the $111m. Why? Gilbert: "What can I do for my family with $127 million that I can't do with $111 million? This is in line with what I've been saying the whole time. You see players take max deals and they financially bind their teams. I don't wanna be one of those players and three years down the road your team is strapped and can't do anything about it."
Skeptics, I know you're hovering. The professional athlete makes too much... Here's what you would say, and as a precursor, I'm not saying I disagree, but here's your rebuttal:
A) Well, shit, when you're making that much money, what's $16 mill to him? Why not $50 mill?
B) The man's just doing this for publicity, for the promotion of his public image, for more ad space.
I say, so what?! His motives, who knows, except Agent Zero himself. But, Gil's not being insincere. Not saying he's being all sacrificial, either. The key is that the man did it, no matter what his motives, whether sincere, partially sincere, or outright phony. He said he'd return once Antawn Jamison was resigned, and carried out his word to the team. Sure, you could debate that he could've taken even more of a discount, but regardless, that $16 milli will help his team pursue a couple more valuable components. This existence of ours, one that has been dragged in the dirt by the predatory insatiability of hypercapitalism, is an existence that needs to find compromise between commercial demands and humanity. That's the bottom-line. And this, what Gilbert did, extraordinary or disingenious, is a step in the right direction, toward sustainability. Really, Gil has made the most business savvy decision of all - one that was forgotten in the get-rich-quick irony of hypercapitalism - investing in the future, building a sustainable presence. That in which you invest in will ultimately reward its benefactor threefold. The longview is simple: he knows that little discount will give management more opportunity to build a better team around him, keep his teammates, his friends, and in effect, from having a stronger unit, win more games, and thus, expand his own celebrity. Duh. Whether it's $16 mill or $5 g's or $1, it's enough. Make steps and soon they'll become strides.
Drop the gospel, Gil: "Your whole city is depending on you, wondering if you're going to make the right decision. I'm a franchise player and sometimes franchise players need to make franchise decisions."
Skeptics, I know you're hovering. The professional athlete makes too much... Here's what you would say, and as a precursor, I'm not saying I disagree, but here's your rebuttal:
A) Well, shit, when you're making that much money, what's $16 mill to him? Why not $50 mill?
B) The man's just doing this for publicity, for the promotion of his public image, for more ad space.
I say, so what?! His motives, who knows, except Agent Zero himself. But, Gil's not being insincere. Not saying he's being all sacrificial, either. The key is that the man did it, no matter what his motives, whether sincere, partially sincere, or outright phony. He said he'd return once Antawn Jamison was resigned, and carried out his word to the team. Sure, you could debate that he could've taken even more of a discount, but regardless, that $16 milli will help his team pursue a couple more valuable components. This existence of ours, one that has been dragged in the dirt by the predatory insatiability of hypercapitalism, is an existence that needs to find compromise between commercial demands and humanity. That's the bottom-line. And this, what Gilbert did, extraordinary or disingenious, is a step in the right direction, toward sustainability. Really, Gil has made the most business savvy decision of all - one that was forgotten in the get-rich-quick irony of hypercapitalism - investing in the future, building a sustainable presence. That in which you invest in will ultimately reward its benefactor threefold. The longview is simple: he knows that little discount will give management more opportunity to build a better team around him, keep his teammates, his friends, and in effect, from having a stronger unit, win more games, and thus, expand his own celebrity. Duh. Whether it's $16 mill or $5 g's or $1, it's enough. Make steps and soon they'll become strides.
Drop the gospel, Gil: "Your whole city is depending on you, wondering if you're going to make the right decision. I'm a franchise player and sometimes franchise players need to make franchise decisions."
Sunday, June 29, 2008
horror for your soul power
I proclaim this without exagerration: The Signal possesses (semantically deliberate, it POSSESSES) one of the most intensely and triumphantly frightening introductions in horror cinema history. In every cinematic facet, the first 30 minutes, or Transmission 1, are near flawless evocation of carnal horror.
The flick is segmented into 3 sections, or Transmissions, and each is composed and directed with variant and purposeful tone by three singular minds, with extraordinary results. The Signal, thus far, is the nearest to New Sincerity horror, in execution and purpose, I've yet to see. An apocalyptic narrative set in a city aptly named Terminus, The narrative follows a man searching for his love as the existence around him crumbles into primordial violence and irrationability stemming from a seductively-mysterious transmission coming from all forms of airwaves. Transmission 1 may be the hallmark of the 3 transmissions, filmed in a unsettlingly realist style, and works in the broader conceptual theme as Modernity - linear and at-your-door.
Transmission 2, however, derails the momentum that its predecessor builds by escaping into a satirical, sitcomesque tone. Though, in itself a letup, this segment is equally deliberate and vital to the film. It's not only necessary, but a sacrifice on the part of the craftsmen in favor of the greater meaning of their work. I applaud their nobbility even if the results sour the film's entertainment value. The surrealism of Transmission 2 is that of postmodernity - the detachment and satirization of the present danger, one of which we all know very well and one that still lingers in our collective consciousness.
In Transmission 3, the conflict of the film is fully realized: the abstraction of reality by aforementioned transmission, the perversion that has led us to unravel and in the process, lose our self-identity, our soul. This last trasmission an exemplary artifact in examining the artistic tenets of New Sincerity. Throughout, it weaves seamlessly, even deceivingly (but relative to postmodernity, with purposeful aim), between linearity and perceptional disorientation. Compositionally and tonally, it flows with naturalistic style, like the natural world, unsentimentalized, but at the same time, grounded and romantic.
The degrading transmission is not just that of media. No, it is that of meaningless aesthetics and nothingness. These are such perversions of our reality that corrupt our identity and the potential of our current reality. Before the film comes to a close, we are thrown a last deception, one that flashes forward and shows the two main characters successfully escaping from Terminus, alive and lovingly in each other's warm embrace. But we are jolted back into the blunt reality, that this was only a daydream. The woman lies still, numb, comatose, and the man desperately scrambles to save her from the sickeningly-convuluted transmission. The prior would be a cop-out, a submission to the transmission itself. For the ending would be sentimentalized and void of true repercussion, and thus, true redemption. Because in our current juncture, we may be there, but we are not yet. This struggle of ours is still fragilely open-ended. Will we find again our identity, muddled and masked behind all the hollow currents of transmission? Will we find our purpose, the art that is us?
The Signal ends, or rather begins, with the man sliding headphones onto the woman, seated, wrestled and suffocated by the transmission into a state of empty stagnation, and as a cover of Joy Division's "Atmosphere" fills her ears, a tear falls. Feeling, emotion, if even only a glimpse. Through all the barriers of transmission that have cheapend and robbed us of emotion and sincerity, she rediscovers such with the help of meaningful art.
The flick is segmented into 3 sections, or Transmissions, and each is composed and directed with variant and purposeful tone by three singular minds, with extraordinary results. The Signal, thus far, is the nearest to New Sincerity horror, in execution and purpose, I've yet to see. An apocalyptic narrative set in a city aptly named Terminus, The narrative follows a man searching for his love as the existence around him crumbles into primordial violence and irrationability stemming from a seductively-mysterious transmission coming from all forms of airwaves. Transmission 1 may be the hallmark of the 3 transmissions, filmed in a unsettlingly realist style, and works in the broader conceptual theme as Modernity - linear and at-your-door.
Transmission 2, however, derails the momentum that its predecessor builds by escaping into a satirical, sitcomesque tone. Though, in itself a letup, this segment is equally deliberate and vital to the film. It's not only necessary, but a sacrifice on the part of the craftsmen in favor of the greater meaning of their work. I applaud their nobbility even if the results sour the film's entertainment value. The surrealism of Transmission 2 is that of postmodernity - the detachment and satirization of the present danger, one of which we all know very well and one that still lingers in our collective consciousness.
In Transmission 3, the conflict of the film is fully realized: the abstraction of reality by aforementioned transmission, the perversion that has led us to unravel and in the process, lose our self-identity, our soul. This last trasmission an exemplary artifact in examining the artistic tenets of New Sincerity. Throughout, it weaves seamlessly, even deceivingly (but relative to postmodernity, with purposeful aim), between linearity and perceptional disorientation. Compositionally and tonally, it flows with naturalistic style, like the natural world, unsentimentalized, but at the same time, grounded and romantic.
The degrading transmission is not just that of media. No, it is that of meaningless aesthetics and nothingness. These are such perversions of our reality that corrupt our identity and the potential of our current reality. Before the film comes to a close, we are thrown a last deception, one that flashes forward and shows the two main characters successfully escaping from Terminus, alive and lovingly in each other's warm embrace. But we are jolted back into the blunt reality, that this was only a daydream. The woman lies still, numb, comatose, and the man desperately scrambles to save her from the sickeningly-convuluted transmission. The prior would be a cop-out, a submission to the transmission itself. For the ending would be sentimentalized and void of true repercussion, and thus, true redemption. Because in our current juncture, we may be there, but we are not yet. This struggle of ours is still fragilely open-ended. Will we find again our identity, muddled and masked behind all the hollow currents of transmission? Will we find our purpose, the art that is us?
The Signal ends, or rather begins, with the man sliding headphones onto the woman, seated, wrestled and suffocated by the transmission into a state of empty stagnation, and as a cover of Joy Division's "Atmosphere" fills her ears, a tear falls. Feeling, emotion, if even only a glimpse. Through all the barriers of transmission that have cheapend and robbed us of emotion and sincerity, she rediscovers such with the help of meaningful art.
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