Showing posts with label film. Show all posts
Showing posts with label film. Show all posts
And yet… I have a confession to make: I’ve been watching American Idol the past few weeks, and I like it. A lot. So much so that it’s set on my DVR as a season pass, along with more easily defendable choices. And while I recognize that it’s mindless reality television, I’m beginning to understand its place in my lazy-weekend television line-up.
We artistic/educated types tend to be more critical of how we spend our time because we’re all incredibly busy people with personal missions to continually improve ourselves and the world around us. Time vegging out in front of the TV is usually equated to time wasted, one of the most unforgivable of transgressions.
However, if you let go of those inhibitions and just accept that what you’re about to watch serves no other purpose than pure enjoyment, watching “fluff” entertainment can be a truly fulfilling experience. One recent afternoon when I was home sick with a horrible case of strep throat, I watched the first episode of American Idol Season 10, which I had recorded merely out of curiosity. It turns out both Jennifer Lopez and Steven Tyler refreshing additions to the judges’ table, and I caught myself halfway through the program with a big smile on my pale face – a fact that surprised me greatly. I was enjoying this stupid show, even while acknowledging how fruitless and over-processed it truly is. Some of the contestants made me smile, some of Tyler’s more ridiculous critiques made me laugh, and Ryan Seacrest’s perfectly white teeth made me feel a sense of calm whenever he smiled. Granted, I was forced into this mindless position by my 103 degree fever, but I couldn’t seem to come up with an acceptable explanation of why I had ever stopped allowing myself to cease thinking for an hour or two and just be.
In a way, I felt like a kid again; after all, don’t children play just for the thrill of it? Kids have yet to absorb the societal expectations of maturity such as responsibility and “success” as defined by professional advancements. They don’t evaluate how they spend their time; they just act on their basic impulses. If they feel like playing make-believe, they do it. If they feel like running around and screaming, they do it. If they feel like lying in front of the TV for hours at a time, they do it. Why shouldn’t we adults be allowed these same privileges of freedom every once in a while, as well?
Now, it is also true that many Americans who have not yet achieved “Idol” status indulge themselves in these privileges far too often, contributing to a large population of Couch Potatoes; this article is not for them. No, this is a call to all my fellow overachievers: as a wise parrot in the book Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates (by one of my favorite authors, Tom Robbins) proclaims, “People of zee wurl, relax!”
It’s okay to be mindless once in a while. It’s okay to let go and have some fun. It’s okay to be selfish once in a while. It’s okay to spend a day without being “productive.” It’s okay to absolutely nothing. It’s okay to watch America’s Next Top Model if it makes you happy. There are too many daily stressors in our lives that threaten our sense of sanity; if bad television can help restore our sense of wholeness and wellbeing, then by all means let’s allow ourselves to appreciate it!
In short, I am going to stand by my affection for watching American Idol, Cupcake Wars on the Food Network, or whatever happens to be on E! at 10:00 at night. I’m going to turn on the television and escape once in a while without feeling guilty, because I know I’m actually doing my spirit a favor.
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| "Zinnia" |
Last week I sat down for an interview with Chicago/Dallas based visual artist Alfredo Salazar-Caro. I initially became intrigued with his work after viewing his blog and a video of his interactive piece "Sensory Deprivation Suit". I never thought I would find an artist who's collections are so in tune with some of the biggest cultural phenomena of my generation, after discovering the inspiration of Alfredo's work and the message he conveys to society, I was sure I had found my artistic soul mate. A true Art Star.
Mexico City
Art Star: Do you practice meditation? Religion?
Alfredo Salazar: I meditate. I try to do it every day; I think it's important especially living in a place like Chicago, but I am not religious at all. I believe that morality can be achieved without divinity or organized religion.
Art Star: So you draw your inspiration from your environment and meditation...any major experiences in life? Life changing?
Alfredo Salazar: I'd say that my work streams from my experiences in society mostly. I grew up in Mexico City which is very different from America, Dallas or Chicago. So a lot of my work from last year was about my experiences in Dallas as a foreigner...Home is a very interesting place for me. Mexico City is like a beautiful woman that is clutching a knife behind her back, you have to approach it very carefully to truly enjoy it. It's a very stressful place, there is always movement...I love it, even if I know it may shorten my life expectancy to live in the city, I always need that place.
The colors in [Mexico City] are bright...pinks, yellows, greens. The food is amazing, the streets always smell like food or smog...whatever. My favorite part is the culture, there is a place I used to love to go to called Plaza De Las Tres Culturas. It's this spot in Mexico City where you can see a pyramid, next to a colonial church, next to a modern building and it really showcases that richness of the culture. I'd say that all my work ultimately has a base on culture.
Pop Art
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| Stormalong Album Cover |
Art Star: Tell me about the album cover you just did.
Alfredo Salazar: Well this cover is for my buddies solo project, Stormalong, he is from dallas. He's got this surf/tribal/tropical style.
Art Star: So did you draw some inspiration from his music or just his personality?
Alfredo Salazar: Well, I definitely drew inspiration from his music, it really makes me want to go out and sail around. Also, the name stormalong comes from the show flapjack. It's a show about this kid that wants to be an adventuring pirate, Captain Knuckles.
Art Star: Do you work from both ends of the spectrum, creating from more modern culture art or experimenting with heavier elements?
Alfredo Salazar: Yeah, I like pop because it's easy, and it's immortal. Pop will never die. No matter how far we go in the future, culture will continue and hence pop will continue. It's also an escape from the more cerebral work that I do. I put a ton of thought into my main body of work and it can get exhausting, so I vent by making silly album covers, prints, and street art.
100% Machine Separated from Alfredo Salazar-Caro on Vimeo.
As Fake as it gets
Art Star: You also make models of processed food.
Alfredo Salazar: They are casts actually, Big Macs.
Art Star: What message are you trying to send to the people about what we ingest?
Alfredo Salazar: Well, to say that processed is bad for you is kind of an overstatement, so I wanted to take it a step further…silicone hamburgers. It's as fake as it gets.
Alfredo Salazar: It's really about superficiality, when we eat at McDonalds the experience is extremely superficial there is no intimate relationship with our food anymore, you just get in line, get your food, eat your food, and walk out. The patties have been frozen for months, packed with chemicals and stuff, and we don't even think about it.
Art Star: So do you try to stay away from stuff like this? Processed foods, Jersey Shore, things that basically microwave deep experiences?
Alfredo Salazar: Absolutley, I hate the Jersey Shore, I don't understand how people can find that entertaining, I'm also a vegetarian so no burgers for me. No burgers and No Snookies.
The Shock Doctrine
Alfredo Salazar: The Sensory Depravation Suit was more rooted in my interest for psychology
Art Star: Have you worn the suit yourself?
Alfredo Salazar: Never actually, wouldn't want to go through that.
Art Star: Why? Are you afraid of the experience?
Alfredo Salazar: Not afraid, I just prefer the observer role for this kind of work, it's really an extremely experimental piece for me in a very literal sense.
Art Star: What are the typical reactions made after wearing it?
Alfredo Salazar: It's very constrictive; the way it works is that your touch becomes translated into sound which in turn substitutes your vision, so it's a very frustrating experience…from what I’ve heard. The suit is also padded, so it's dark and warm and there is no way of unzipping it from within, so once you are in, you are in.
Art Star: That's deep, were there any particular psychological studies you turned to, experiences or stories that prompted you to create this suit?
Alfredo Salazar: yes, I've always been interested in 'mind altering' experiences so I focused on the study of perception for about a year and then about 3 months ago I came across a book called The Shock Doctrine. It talks about the experiments that the CIA conducted [still conducts] during the 60's and 70's to try to erase a person's mind. Sensory deprivation chambers were used, the idea is that after a period of 72 hours of sleep/sensory deprivation, the subject experiences vivid hallucinations. At this point the experimenter would be able to introduce thoughts that would become embedded in the subjects mind, some inception shit.
Sensory Depravation/ Synesthesia Suit 1 from Alfredo Salazar-Caro on Vimeo.
Future Projects
To learn more about Alfredo Salazar and view his entire body of work visit his website and his blog.
8<3Track Honey
Future Projects
Art Star: What projects are you working on now? Any artists you admire that you'd like to work with? Any mediums you'd like to experiment with in the future?
Alfredo Salazar: I'm working with my friend David Cox ( a grad student at SAIC) on a little project about white trash, it's going to be a robotic kiddie pool basically. He grew up in Kansas; I lived in Dallas so venting about the south's trash culture was bound to happen. The pool will be mounted on a robotic base and it will react to people's presence in the gallery, you'll see it later this year.
Alfredo Salazar: I admire…Olafur Elliason who offers a residency program in Berlin, I'm going to apply to it after school, and also Luis Gispert. Luis Gispert is a guy that I'm keeping track of right now; he's based out of NY. I met him earlier last year and I might be working for him this summer.
See it for yourself
Art Star: Where are you showing right now? Where can we find you and your past collections?
Alfredo Salazar: I have a couple of shows lined up here in Chicago, one at a gallery called Cat Cave and one at Happy Dog…that will be later this year, march-april. I have some stuff at Maxwell-Collette gallery here in Chicago also, some burgers, I showed them alongside Banksy's and Shepard Fairey. It was rad.
My collections are mostly in Dallas, there's a piece of mine at Brookhaven College and there is a piece on Commerce street at a town home across from 500X.
To learn more about Alfredo Salazar and view his entire body of work visit his website and his blog.
8<3Track Honey
In this modern world of quick downloads and Netflix Instant Streaming, it’s becoming less and less frequent that I’ll go out and see a movie in the theaters. I have found my attention span growing noticeably shorter and shorter over the past year, requiring now that I have my trusty cell phone in one hand and my well-used laptop in the other as I sit down in front of my television to watch something, whether it be a rerun of Friends (guilty) or Pulp Fiction (as was the most recent case.)
So that’s why it was so surprising that, two nights ago, I was able to sit through two hours of the yet-to-be-released comedy film Take Me Home Tonight, complete with an in-person introduction from the film’s star Topher Grace, of That 70’s Show fame, and actually enjoy it (albeit the much-touted intro was only two minutes long and ended with a now very-grown-up Eric Forman screaming to the audience, “NOW MAKE SOME NOISE IF YOU JUST LIKE TO PARTY YOUR F***ING FACE OFF!”)
In any case, Take Me Home Tonight takes place, for the most part, during a crazy Labor Day party in 1988, and follows the story of recent MIT grad Matt Franklin (played by Mr. Grace) and his best friend Barry (played by Fanboys star and personal favorite Dan Fogler) as they deal with life decisions, love, high school relationships, and gratuitous amounts of hard drugs. Yeah.
Along the way, and as blatantly set up in the film’s trailer above, Matt lies to Tori, his high school crush, about where he is in life (hint: not working at Suncoast Video), which leads him to a Beverly Hills stock broker’s house party and on “the adventure of a lifetime” yada yada yada. Matt’s sister and her boyfriend have a sort of separate subplot running through the film, acting as a kind of foil to the burgeoning relationship of Matt and Tori.
Despite it’s predictability, Take Me Home Tonight is a surprisingly very entertaining movie. The jokes and physical comedy actually work well, for the most part, and the supporting cast is very strong, headed by Anna Faris, who is Matt’s twin sister, and a wheelchair-bound Demetri Martin, who steals all three of the scenes he is in. Plus, it has a soundtrack filled to the brim of legendary 80’s songs (except, inexplicably, the title Eddie Money track), which bring an automatic smile to my face and making me want to sing along in the seat (as the grizzled lady sitting next to me was gracious enough to do throughout the screening.)
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| Grace and Fogler as they appear in Take Me Home Tonight, after stealing a car. Of course. |
And amid its raunchiness and f-bombs, Take Me Home Tonight has a heart…somewhere. In his brief intro, Topher Grace compared the flick to a John Hughes fare (director of classics such as The Breakfast Club and Sixteen Candles.) And, while it is impossible to put it on that high of a pedestal, it easily runs in the well-defined footsteps of Ferris Bueller, detailing the underdog story that we are all so familiar with through modern cinema.
If I have any complaints about the movie, it is just two, very minor flaws.
1.) SPOILER ALERT: it is set in the 1980’s. And, again, another SPOILER ALERT: I was not alive during the 1980’s. It seems to me, though, that this movie could have been set in 2011 or 1977 without any major disturbance to the plot. The only things in this movie that define it as “an eighties film” are skinny ties and Guns ‘N Roses albums in the background. Costumes and soundtracks do not an eighties movie make. I guess you could argue that it was supposed to be as if the film was actually produced during that time period. But I’m not buying it.
2.) And the other, as I’ve mentioned previously, is the absence of the sweet strains of “Take Me Home Tonight” by Eddie Money blasting over the credits or a well-cut montage. I was ready to bust out the trusty old air guitar at a moment’s notice throughout the film, to no avail.
So do I recommend this movie? Yes I really do. When it comes out in two months (ah, the wonders of an advanced screening) definitely go see it to have a very good time at the movie theater. Prepare to laugh and watch some of Hollywood’s “Next Big Things” (specifically Fogler and Martin) work their magic on the screen, all set to the sweet melodies of some eighties power ballads. You can’t really ask for anything more.
-Brandon Wainerdi, don't stop me now
-Brandon Wainerdi, don't stop me now
“For my ally is the Force, and a powerful ally it is. Life creates it, makes it grow. Its energy surrounds us and binds us. Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter. You must feel the Force around you; here, between you, me, the tree, the rock, everywhere...”
-Yoda
I am a director. Or, at least, I like to think of me as a director, small time in the corner of my dorm room, splicing together low definition cuts with cheap software.
I’ve been technically making movies since I was four years old, roughly moving the plastic limbs of my stormtroopers, jerkily stopping the camera to create a strange illusion of motion. And as I would attach thin threads of floss to heavy starships (to make them fly on film), I discovered very early in my life that there is something graceful about being “behind the scenes,” that there is nothing more frustrating or humbling than sitting at a computer, trying to edit down a sequence of scenes to utter exactness.
You lose track of all time as you try to breathe life and believability into frames of digital captures. I’ve learned about patience and humility from these quiet hours, slowly mastering the art of OCD-fueled cutting, editing, perfecting.
When other kids were growing up, they idolized quarterbacks and goalies, hung up posters of Michael Jordan and Troy Aikman in their rooms, living vicariously through their hard-court buzzer-beaters, their game-winning touchdown passes. But I was that one weird little kid, who enjoyed the bonus features at the end of the movies, who read every single “Making Of” book that the small public library had to offer, who wanted to someday be like George Lucas or Steven Spielberg or Peter Jackson, my idols.
And today one of my idols died: Irvin Kershner. This name is probably not familiar to most, filed out of the saga history books by the media mogol of his supervisor, Mr. George Beard Lucas. But Mr. Kershner was the director of, not only my favorite Star Wars movie, but easily my favorite film of all time: The Empire Strikes Back. This was the movie, with its snow battles and duels, that ignited my love for storytelling, my love for creating new somethings. (And it even happened on the very day I was about to mail him a replica clapboard from to autograph, which will now sit in front of me forever, unsigned, acting as a motivator for my future: my future writing, my future directing, my future being.
I had the honor of hearing him giving a talk a few years ago, hearing him gently remembering how he created the latex puppets and steaming vents, hearing him making the audience laugh and reminiscence with him, taking them on one final journey back down the film strip.
He was speaking about the importance of inquisitiveness to a child, another four-year-old stop-motion-God-in-the-making when he said:
"Good. You keep asking those questions. Don't ever think that something isn't important enough to ask your dad about, son. That's how you learn. That's how we all learn. Maybe your dad won't have all the answers, but those questions you can figure out together."
So today I will watch his movie as a bittersweet homage , mouthing the words to every memorized line with a pathetically teary grin, answering some of these questions with him, and sending him off to the all-surrounding, all-binding Force with some style.
Rest In Peace, Kersh.
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[Written originally for this website and then transposed using some fancy time-stamp-cheating onto my own blog, which needs to be updated and updated and updated: http://dontstopmedontstopme.blogspot.com]
Evening television has basically gone to hell.
William-Adolphe Bouguereau - Dante And Virgil In Hell
It disturbs me to turn on the TV, and be forced into the same sad scene on each network: Two or more individuals screaming "fake bitch", flailing their arms against each other, proudly displaying negative behavior, all of this possibly topped off by something along the lines of a strategically coordinated nipple slip, while an audience watches, cheering at the entire debacle until commercial break. It's disheartening to know that scenes such as this are considered “entertainment” but what's more disturbing is to see traits of this behavior being emulated in real life.
Jersey Shore - "Reality" TV
We’ve all encountered and observed the praises of absurd actions.
I remember sitting with a few individuals who were dishing on the wild night they had recently experienced, hoping to get kudos from some of the others who were listening on standby in between facebook status updates. As a few of them began to delve deeper into the details of their night it became apparent that they believed it was hilariously attractive to get drunk and flop over inanimate objects, only to awake the next day and sloppily have no recollection of the occurrences from the night before. A couple of them were even bold enough to take to the streets while intoxicated, blaring some pop song from the speakers of their car, failing to think twice about how they may be endangering the lives of those around them by driving drunk.
Or real life scenarios that seem to be drawn from the scripts of shows like Gossip Girl, a program where young adults put on an elaborate display of rumor, jealousy, and betrayal, all wrapped up in a bow fashioned out of a shitload of pretend money and the social life that appears to be everyone's dream. There isn't anything wrong with a good tv drama, but there used to be a time when you could say that such shows were merely fictitious, failing to resemble reality in the least bit, but in a society that adheres to no sense of privacy, it's plasticized shows like Gossip Girl and the ever growing parasite known as reality television that has lead to never-ending pageantry. Theatrics that leave nothing as a mystery, and it seems as if everyone is working aimlessly to impress each other and secure their ostentatious appearances.
Gossip Girl
Although this quote left William Shakespeare's pen almost 400 years ago his words ring truer than ever:
“All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts…”
Time never changes, people do.
We live in a society where it's not only good to be bad but “villains” are often rewarded for their mistakes.
In the world of the Dragon Ball good always prevails over evil, and nice guys finish first, but not for a lack of challenges.Its shows like Dragon Ball Z that have become out of the ordinary.Although DBZ is animation it promotes a sense of truth and loyalty amidst battles between good and evil. I've never been one of those A-Con type fanatics, but I grew up watching Dragon Ball-Z on Toonami and the raw action filled plot in its early sagas never failed to deliver a level of integrity and sportsmanship that is no longer portrayed in many popular scripted and unscripted series.My friends always think it's weird that I compare an animated show to real life, but the fight for honesty in a universe preoccupied with self interest reminds me all too much of the world we live in today.
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| Goku and his son Gohan |
In the world of the Dragon Ball good always prevails over evil, and nice guys finish first, but not for a lack of challenges.Its shows like Dragon Ball Z that have become out of the ordinary.Although DBZ is animation it promotes a sense of truth and loyalty amidst battles between good and evil. I've never been one of those A-Con type fanatics, but I grew up watching Dragon Ball-Z on Toonami and the raw action filled plot in its early sagas never failed to deliver a level of integrity and sportsmanship that is no longer portrayed in many popular scripted and unscripted series.My friends always think it's weird that I compare an animated show to real life, but the fight for honesty in a universe preoccupied with self interest reminds me all too much of the world we live in today.
Goku doesn't give up when facing a challenge
In the Vegeta Saga, Saiyans are the baddest fighters in the universe known for their merciless bestiality, inflated egos and the ability to become twice as strong after surviving defeat. This warrior race is equipped for pure destruction and in The Vegeta Saga, Super Saiyan Vegeta (one of the last known survivors of the Saiyan race) and his small squad of stereotypical jocks tear through multiple galaxies taking down every planet within the Z-sphere in order to claim titles as rulers of the universe.
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| Vegeta |
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| Goku |
Remaining undefeated until they reach the Milky Way and stumble upon planet earth they are introduced to a force of heroes willing to do anything it takes to preserve what good is left in the galaxy. The Earth defenders are the underdogs, they aren't the strongest, but they are led by a Saiyan named Goku, and backed up by his halfbreed son Gohan and Piccolo, a lost survivor from planet Namek.
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| Picollo! |
Piccolo was always one of my favorite characters. The evil half of the greatest living good in the Universe (Kami), Piccolo struggles with his desires to engage in evil in order to connect with the spirit of his better half . Kami possesses the ability to create Dragon Balls, a key to any individual’s second chance in the universe, a chance to try again and make things right despite the past.
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| Goku protecting Gohan from evil Saiyan fighters |
Dragon Ball Z- The Vegeta Saga is an allegory of the victories and challenges that one may face in their journey on earth.Discovering who you are as an individual while learning to embrace and modify circumstances of your environment in an effort towards greater good. Each episode never failed to leave me hanging on suspense, entranced by a theme which ensures that good always supersedes evil. No matter how discouraged, weak, and torn the Earth Defenders may have ended up in battle, despite how bleak their chances of taking down Vegeta became, they continued to strive for their values, and the passions in their hearts combined with the courage to stand up for others.
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| Goku catching up on some rest while in heaven |
I've had my fair share of shame, but I believe as humans part of our purpose on earth is to learn from our faults and work towards good when we are forced to choose between positive and negative (no matter how small the feat). We’ve all made mistakes in life, but with each second we are given the chance to rewrite the script. When Goku died, he came back even stronger than before, he was a better fighter, and even ended up joining forces with Vegeta in the fight against evil (well, after he kicked his ass of course)!
"A person who is too nice an observer of the business of the crowd, like one who is too curious in observing the labor of bees, will often be stung for his curiosity."
"A person who is too nice an observer of the business of the crowd, like one who is too curious in observing the labor of bees, will often be stung for his curiosity."
Firstly, I dig your point on how bringing a physical camera to an otherwise animated world adds an element of realness to the fantasy. Knowing that at some point the sets and characters were solid objects that you could shape or take home sounds like the underpinning of every fantasy, be it by a child or adult.
That said, exactly what defines "breathtaking" in cinema is too porous to make valuable sense of, because what makes Mary and Max so appealing to one person may be the exact thing that made me turn the movie off three times before finishing it. It's an ugly-ass movie, inside and out. They've created a consistently-realized world, yes, but one where nothing is pleasant to look at. Everyone has the same distended paunch, the same Peanuts-style squiggle of a frown, and the same ill-fitting clothes. I've personally understood that grotesque art direction speaks more to the director's desire to create a world reflective of the "ugliness" he sees within real life, versus a want to create something breathtaking. Then again, maybe the inner-beauty depiction is breathtaking, to which I'd counter that there's other claymation fare even more capable at portraying the off-kilter and "unpretty" without the crutch of slimy world-building: see Coraline, and The Nightmare Before Christmas as two examples of such.
Really, I take issue with this idea:
As one Web reviewer has already noted, nothing Pixar or Dreamworks could create can touch this painstaking attention to detail, as "the computers couldn't render it, or only ass slow." What's more, these details ooze with character and fascinating imperfection, adding quirk and charm to the film.
I'll concede that CGI is a time-consuming process, but let's not forget that claymation is equally tedious, since -- as pointed out last week -- each object must be built and shot on a reasonable enough scale for the filmmakers to get maximum use from it. Yet while the inherent crudeness integral to claymation is central to said charm, animating three million individual hairs for one CGI creature defines painstaking. Then, once an audience grows accustomed to the baseline level of spectacle, they can look beyond the glitz to parse out the heavier elements of a story. Because of this, I'd argue that it's precisely the level of detail good CG brings that can make for a more emotionally grounded, more "real," experience. The animators paradoxically create something so incredible that it becomes effectively invisible -- something Mary and Max's blunt clay doesn't here achieve.
The books defined a generation. Not just any generation, either: OURS. We are the group of 20-somethings who grew up with the wondrous Boy Who Lived. We adopted the orphan protagonist into our homes and into our hearts, and year by year, book by book, we grew up with him. Harry Potter was the best friend we all longed for, consciously or not; he taught us about courage, love, and how to overcome the many heartbreaks that speckle the twisty path to becoming an adult. He also provided comfort and encouragement when our days seemed most dark – after all, no matter how difficult our journey through adolescence may have been, at least we weren’t being hunted by a murderous evil Dark Lord, as well.
The seventh and final book in J.K. Rowling’s ubiquitous series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, was released on July 21, 2007. I was 19 years old. As I sobbed my way through the final pages, I felt the dawning realization that my childhood was ending, with the resolution of an epic story I had been following faithfully for almost a decade. It was time for Harry to move on and begin a new journey; it was time for him to accept his new role in society as an adult. It was also my turn to do the same, even though I was certain I was not yet fully prepared. But if Harry could do it, well, damnit, so could I, though I certainly lacked his talent in broomstick flying.
Three and a half years later, Harry has returned to check in on us. At least, that’s how it feels. Of course, the latest installment in the Harry Potter movie franchise is really just the next stage in Warner Bros.’ multi-million dollar plan to milk our country’s HP-fever for all it’s worth, but while the previous films seemed to suck out most of the magical wonder of Harry’s world as if they were made by Dementors (I’m looking at you, Chris Columbus), I would define Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 as the Potter film we superfans have all been waiting for.
The books grew darker as Harry grew older, and Part 1 is definitely aimed at a mature movie-going audience. It’s raw, gritty, and painfully beautiful. This is the first Harry Potter movie I would describe as an excellent film, Potterness aside, because all the elements of filmmaking come together in a unique combination that keeps viewers on the edge of simultaneously experiencing ten different varieties of emotions for a well-paced 2 1/2 hours. The searing cinematography and more fully realized acting performances pay their due homage to the sanctity of Harry’s world, and the film follows the book's plot closely, a luxury afforded by the fact that the movie was rightfully split into two parts. The movie seems to look out at the eager faces of the audience and bow to them, humbly, while gesturing grandly at the intangible, esteemed force that is Harry Potter. It’s a force that’s detectable from the very opening of the film, when the theater inevitably erupts in a round of rousing cheers as the Harry Potter logo floats to the center of the screen.
Harry Potter has come to symbolize so much more than just a handful of well-crafted young adult novels and some rather erratic films about a boy wizard. Harry Potter is now an indisputable part of our culture, and, more specifically, he embodies the spirit of Generation Y. Our generation is independent, fearless, intelligent, demanding, and restless, reflecting the mannerisms of Rowling’s unsettled but brave protagonist.
While most members of Gen Y aren’t quite certain where our lives are going to take us, it helps to keep in mind this quote from Harry’s ever-wise and faithful mentor, Albus Dumbledore:
“It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.”
Harry, I would like you to know that while I am still frequently frightened by the perilous unknowns that await me in the Land of Adulthood, I am making it through just fine, even without a wand. Thank you for being such a big part of my life. I appreciate you stopping by.
-- Amy Kristen
Writer/director Adam Elliot's 2009 film "Mary and Max" is proof that animation (claymation, in this case) is not always for children. Here, we have a film that deals with some very dark and adult issues, but looks at these issues through Mary, a very lonely young Australian girl, and her pen pal Max, an obese Jewish New Yorker suffering from Asperger's Syndrome. As Mary asks Max some of the most poignant questions in life, we see her adorable ignorance held up against Max's highly analytical and literal outlook on life.
Mary and Max are quite a pair, and through their 20 year-long correspondence, they face the world together--from the despair of isolation and loss to the joy of having everything they'd always wanted. There is much to say about the plot of "Mary and Max," and a number of reviewers I've run across have gone that route, but what really interests me about this film is the choice of claymation as a medium and what Elliot has done with it.
Firstly, I should mention that I have a soft spot for claymation, especially the classic strange, dry British wit found in Wallace and Gromit, for example. Regardless, "Mary and Max" is a breathtaking example of what can be done visually with clay. Though the film has a largely monochromatic color palette, save a bright orange-red that pops up here and there, the level of detail and pragmatism in dealing with "real-world" settings is fantastic. For example:
If you really give this image a close look at full resolution, you will begin to get a sense for the sheer quantity of detail in every scene of the film, both in the foreground and the background. As one Web reviewer has already noted, nothing Pixar or Dreamworks could create can touch this painstaking attention to detail, as "the computers couldn't render it, or only ass slow." What's more, these details ooze with character and fascinating imperfection, adding quirk and charm to the film.
But I think the choice of clay as a medium has deeper implications than the level and quality of detail for which it allows. Traditional animation (and computer animation, for that matter) is characterized by allowing the animator to create an imaginary world in which to set their story. This allows for the animation of anything that can be imagined, because even the most implausible characters, settings, and situations can be represented visually on screen. Contrast this with traditional live action filming, sans CGI or special effects, which requires real people in real places to create the illusion of the fictional characters and their fictional situations.
With clay, however, you are indeed creating your own fantasy world, but by introducing the use of the real camera to photograph your real clay models, a certain degree of tangibility or "realness" is injected into the product. The clay artist is free to create whatever they can imagine, as with animation, but in the end, a real model must be photographed by a real camera, as with live action filming.
Therefore, I'd say that "Mary and Max" does not take place in THE real world so much as it takes place in A real world--one in which the Statue of Liberty is a fat man and houseflies have strangely large, blinking eyes rather than creepy tiny segmented eyes.
Still, one does not need to know that this film is based on a true story to feel resonate it as such. Further, this is a film whose plot is based on a true story and whose setting is based on the real world, and that sort of symmetry is difficult to attain outside of the claymation medium.
"Mary and Max" may be a dark and even disturbing film at times, but the way in which it is executed is hilarious and absolutely charming, adding just the right amount of lightness for an enjoyable viewing experience. In my mind, a live action version of this film would be mostly without this humor and charm and therefore a much bigger pill to swallow, but a traditionally animated version of the film would lose that tangibility and resonance introduced by real clay and real cameras.
So, track this film down, give it a watch, post your comments and opinions, and as always, stay tuned for next week's follow up articles.
How much can you stand to see someone put-upon? More specifically, when it comes to movies, what's your misery threshold?
"Dark." "Edgy." "Haunting." "Gritty." "Subversive." Industry buzz words tailored to describe the illusion that the film you're watching is somehow made all the better through subjecting its characters to random and heartbreaking misery simply for misery's sake. It's a practice no less superficial than giving a comic-book heroine a rape backstory, and is one Adam Elliot's Mary and Max dives wholeheartedly into. Inspired by the director's 20+ year pen-friendship, the story follows lonely 8 year old Mary Daisy Dinkle through 20 years of her own correspondence with her spiritual kin, Max Jerry Horowitz, age 44.
Their world is wholly unpleasant. That picture? That's Mary's alcoholic mother, Vera. Her father works at a tea bag factory, her nose is big and unwanted like the birthmark marring her forehead, and her only pleasures in life are cartoons and condensed milk. Obese, neurotic Max isn't much better. All this nastiness gets enhanced, mind you, through depicting Mary's life in sepia tones, while Max get's black and white. The color red holds some undefined symbolic place in Mary's aesthetic stew, but we aren't missing much by leaving the connection unexplained; whatever Elliot explained would likely be as ham-fisted as every other statement the film tries.
If you guessed that the moral of the story was "we can't choose our lives, but can choose our friends," well done. It was telegraphed from the moment the narrator first described Mary's birthmark as "the color of poo." A lonely misfit who finds some form of joy in the world? Novel, indeed. I will give the movie credit, though. The array of flaming hoops they make our heroes dance through was well-imagined: Mary's parents die, her childhood crush-cum-husband leaves her for another man (he made her wedding dress, if you needed some foreshadowing), and some of her letters open up Max's repressed childhood memories, sending him to a mental institution for eight months. Life is war, and war is hell.
I'll give Elliot further props for choosing claymation. Embedding a serious story in the skin of something benign is a proven tactic for subverting audience expectations, but when you introduce your primary protagonist a having a birthmark "the color of poo" (can you tell how much that annoyed me?), you create a counter-expectation that the rest of the film won't pack too heavy an emotional punch. This very problem forms a through-line for the rest of the film: what exactly am I supposed to take seriously here?
Sure, your story may be about the resillience of friendship in the sake of nearly impossible hardship, but what good is the message if everything else drives people away before they realize it? The reason audiences cherish Pixar movies is because they're clever about their philosophies. If you lose the subtlety that could really let a message simmer within an audience in favor of beating them over the head with it, if you skip even implied rationale for certain aesthetic (and definitely for plot) choices, you come across preciously earnest -- "look at this gritty magical realism! Such suffering!" -- and thus push the audience away from your desired effect.. Dark for dark's sake doesn't work, but Mary and Max does give it a good try.
That is why Skyping people is so great, I guess. I love seeing friends that are millions of miles away, in other cities, in other worlds, through the time-and-space-traveling DeLorean of my MacBook Pro. And it’s slightly sad, watch them living new lives, making and replacing friends, moving slowly away from memories of me and times spent together. But we're all on the same journey, the same road to a new life.
“Roads? Where we’re going we don’t need roads.”
Prophetically uttered by Christopher Lloyd at the end of the first Back to the Future movie, his time-machine blasting into the blue sky, this classic line has become more than just a quote from a cult eighties sci-fi movie for me. It’s become a sense of purpose, of how to conduct myself in my everyday actions, of how to force myself to be the best person I could be.
But, perhaps, I’m reading too much into it. Thanks Robert Zemeckis.
When I was seven years old, my dad brought home a torn-up VHS copy of the movie from Blockbuster, put it into our grainy old television, and made me and my little brother sit down and watch it. By the end of the movie, I was at a loss for words: I had never seen something so imaginative and fun, a quick joyride that my seven-year-old brain could barely understand. And that last line of the movie stuck with me, inviting me to spread my imagination past the physical familiarities of the world around me. It taught me to pretend wildly and carelessly, letting myself explore new worlds and new adventures.
And then, it slowly evolved to teach me to try to run from this fast-approaching hold of a sense of vastly-overrated maturity. Recently, I composed a list of ways to escape these binds of maturity, which should be helpful in the future to explain personal reasonings:
· 1. Walking around a Science Fiction convention is a surefire way to appear more mature than you actually are. Maturity may seem inevitable but the key to avoiding maturity is to never be in a situation where you are the most mature. You have nothing on the obese thirty-year-old man painted in all green dragging a stroller around with a baby in a Klingon costume.
· 2. Continue to play with toys. Or, at least, buy toys in mint condition and never open them, storing them in your closet back home where they slowly collect dust in a sad state of semi-existence.
· 2.1. Internet shopping with the plastic debit card your parents gave you is a good way to get back at them for not getting the toys you wanted as a kid. Not surprisingly, eBay is a seeming treasure trove of late 90’s memorabilia.
· 3. Do not be afraid to live out childhood fantasies, like piloting the Millennium Falcon with a Wookiee co-pilot. Feel free to substitute a mini-stuffed animal version of Chewbacca and your dad’s 2005 Toyota Avalon, going twenty-over at 1:30 in the morning in a homemade, albeit very screen-accurate, costume for the desired results.
· 4. Girls are still hard to figure out. That never changes, no matter how mature you think you are.
But as I grew older, and with each yearly repeat of the movie, the end quote slowly evolved from this beckoning towards imagination and immaturity into something else completely. It became a reminder that there will be a time, far from now, when none of these cement pavements, none of these physical realities, physical things, Darth Vader action figures from eBay or otherwise, will matter because, one day, we will not be here in this world of responsibilities, repressions, and roads.
So now the quote serves, not as an call towards a life of make-believe, immaturity, and naïve joy, but rather as a reminder to focus on the important, existential things in life like relationships, familial and spiritual, because, one day that I cannot and will not be able to predict, Doc Brown is going to show up at my front door in his time-traveling DeLorean and take me away from all that I know, forever.
I’m pretty sure that’s how this whole “life” thing works, anyway. But, don’t worry, I’m only a Skype call (and a recently-purchased Christopher-Lloyd-autographed Back to the Future poster) away.
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[This post has been culled, combined, and edited together from two different, and mostly unrelated, blog entries: liii and c from my personal site http://dontstopmedontstopme.blogspot.com. But it still should make a decent amount of sense.]
