awards are for terrorists

Martin Scorcese didn’t win an Oscar for direction until last year. Think of all the times he was nominated in the past and what he was nominated for – Raging Bull, Gangs of New York, The Aviator, to name a few. He finally won his Oscar last year for The Departed. I never saw The Departed, and I don’t think I could name one movie from all of last year that was nominated for major awards, but this had to have been the most anti-climactic honor in the history of the Oscars. The only other case I can think of that comes close to this is when Bob Dylan won his Grammy for Modern Times. You’re going to sit here and tell me that Blonde on Blonde and Blood on the Tracks weren’t worthy of awards? Apparently the Grammy’s thought so. You’re going to sit here and tell me Crash was a better movie than The Aviator and that Scorcese needed to wait until The Departed to win his Oscar? You’re out of your mind.

Joel and Ethan Coen finally won a directing Oscar tonight for No Country For Old Men, taking home Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay at the same time. I have written plenty in this blog and at myspace about my opinion of No Country For Old Men, so I will continue here by saying, to me, this feels more like an achievement award than anything else. No Country For Old Men is the most overrated movie I have seen in a long time. It had me. Believe me. It had me for well over two hours. It was brilliantly directed, brilliantly performed (Javier Bardem deserved his award), and the speed of the movie was like chocolate syrup – so sweet and slow you can’t wait for more. All of that said, you can’t introduce characters who are supposedly essential to the plot, not explain who these characters are, and then kill these characters off as though their deaths directly affect the outcome of the plot. On top of that, you can’t just end the movie. I want to rip my hair out every time I think of how that movie ended. I’m not looking for something clichéd or Hollywood. I’m not looking for a happy ending. I’m looking for something relevant. We didn’t even get relevant. We got the introduction of another character from out of the blue who disappears without a trace. Tommy Lee Jones waxed poetic about a dream. Then the screen went black and the credits rolled. It wasn’t complete. For a movie to grab me the way it did, to end the way it did is infuriating. I’m not complaining because it’s not what I expected. I’m complaining because it misfired. It’s like you’re having sex and it blows its load just a moment too soon. It’s still early enough to ruin the experience.

There Will Be Blood did everything right that No Country For Old Men did wrong, but that’s the subject of another previous blog. Obviously, I believe There Will Be Blood should have won and Paul Thomas Anderson should have won the direction Oscar. This year felt more like Martin Scorcese and Bob Dylan. We’ll award two artists who are very deserving of this honor, but we’ll award them for work that doesn’t measure up. This is why I don’t take awards ceremonies seriously. They’re more of a lifetime achievement honor than a fair assessment of the material on hand.

Maybe I should have expected this. 2007 was the year for overrating and extreme hype. Boxer, by the National, is a boring record, but everyone picked it as album of the year. Like with No Country For Old Men, I’m left pulling out my hair wondering why.

a momentary lapse of optimism

“The Times They Are A’Changing” popped up on my iTunes this morning as I was brushing my teeth. Is there a more perfect song for capturing the spirit of revolution and change than “The Times They Are A’Changing?” Dylan doesn’t just express the sentiment of political and social revolution. He’s talking about the evolution of generations. “Your old road is rapidly aging. Please get out of the new one if you can’t lend your hand, for the times they are a’changing.” The wheel of fortune is constantly spinning. One day we will not recognize the world around us. Don’t fight it. Don’t fear it. Just know that your time is gone. Don’t criticize what you can’t understand. Younger generations have found knew ways to express themselves. Keep your own, but let them keep theirs, as well. Youth will always rebel against what is to make something of their own.

This got me thinking. “The Times They Are A’Changing” is a pure revolution song. The 60’s was a time of social upheaval that those of us who were not alive to see will never understand. How perfect that a song like this that identifies exactly what rebellion is should express natural revolution so vividly? At the same time, though, talking about natural revolution and the evolution of culture, how much has our world changed? Think of this in terms of the mass of men leading lives of quiet desperation. Yes, culture has changed. If it weren’t for the onslaught of rock and roll there would have been no incarnation of punk, no advent of indie rock, and music as we know it would be vastly different. We would be making our lives more bearable in different ways. That’s the crux of the issue. Times have changed, but they’re still the same. All that’s really changed is the way we cope with desperation. We’re all going to die someday. Each generation creates its own way of forgetting. In the end, natural revolution creates change, but all that really changes is the natural coping mechanisms of human beings.

Is this depressing? Only if you’re afraid. The mass of men really do lead lives of quiet desperation. It’s just how things play out in this world. On the same token, being alive, we are naturally afraid of death. We constantly search for ways to forget that we are going to die. We want to forget that for the most part our lives have no meaning, so we develop creative ways to distract ourselves. When one generation’s coping mechanism becomes worn and obsolete, the next generation creates a new one, and so on. It’s a constant state of artistic revolution, but the more things change, the more they stay the same. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. Wait. Wasn’t that the Who?

who's to say i don't have wings?

Everyone who knows me knows that I’m a huge Sleater-Kinney fan. What’s so funny about my love for Sleater-Kinney is that I was a latecomer. I didn’t start listening to them until I bought The Woods, and even then I bought The Woods five months after it was released. I saw them open for Belle and Sebastian a week or two after my junior year of college, and their set was quite good. The music went over my head, and I put off diving in for a few years. Much like with the Rolling Stones, I wonder what the hell made me put off diving in.

The Woods was a record that I knew I liked from the first listen. It wasn’t a TNT blast, but the opening feedback of “The Fox” told me this was exactly what I was looking for, and the first time I heard “Modern Girl” I knew I had my hands on something special. I listened to The Woods a lot that fall. It won a place in my rotation of car CD’s, and whenever I waited for laundry or a power steering fix it accompanied me along with Wolf Parade’s Apologies To the Queen Mary and Sufjan Stevens’s Come On Feel the Illinoise. I knew The Woods was a favorite. Five months passed before my love blossomed into what it is.

I can pinpoint the exact moment. I was driving back to Martinsburg for my grandmother’s funeral in March of 2006. I was in that stretch of I81 that goes through Harrisonburg, and I was listening to The Woods. “Let’s Call It Love” had just entered that long improvisational bit, and I thought to myself, “This is some serious shit.” I looked at the time on the CD player and it was right around the 6:10 mark. Honestly, I’ve never been the same since then. Moments like those are few and far between in the lives of human beings, but we all have them. They’re what make us who we are. It doesn’t have to be a record or a work of art. It could simply be an experience. Something happens to us that changes us forever. I wouldn’t call it scarring. It’s more like an impression that lasts the rest of our lives. It’s as though we are lumps of clay, and for a brief instant the hand of the Divine touches us and molds us into something different. We are the same as we were before, and yet we are not. Our way of seeing has been affected. Our perception is altered. Maybe something inside us is opened and who we truly are comes out. Moments like these are unnamable and indefinable, but it’s the air you breathe.

I’m not trying to explain myself. I just spent all day driving around town with The Woods in my car, and tonight as I was driving home I made it into “Let’s Call It Love” again. I thought of that day nearly two years ago where I realized how much I loved Sleater-Kinney. I knew I had to write down the third paragraph of this blog entry. We live for moments like these. The sights and sounds of this world have their way with you, and sometimes when they’re done you’re just not the same. I’m trying to think of the shortest possible phrase to define it. Peculiar and lovely?

Currently listening to: Born To Run, Bruce Springsteen. You’ll be hard-pressed to find a more genuinely American record. “Thunder Road” gets me every time and it’s like, “You are mine for the next forty-five minutes.”

all signs point to maybe

One thing I enjoy doing when I’m out driving is to read all the church signs that I pass. Living in Southwest Virginia you see plenty, and they’re usually Baptist or some mutated sect of Protestantism that rests its foundation on ideas that would make Jerry Falwell’s skin crawl. I’m not particularly sure why I read these signs. Many of them are amusing. Some of them are downright offensive. I guess I want to see how the other side thinks.

There’s a Seventh Day Adventist church on the corner down the street from me. The other week their sign read, “Stand and He will deliver.” All I could think of was Carl from Aqua Teen Hunger Force. “Come here, bitch. Stand and deliver!” “Stand and He will deliver” sounds like it involves standing and bending over. I don’t enjoy taking my religion up the ass.

I want to say it was around the 2004 election, although it might have been the 2006 election when the Democrats reclaimed Congress. The sign in front of one of the Baptist churches in town read, “God is what’s right, not what’s left.” Don’t make puns in your sermonizing. It’s all too easy to twist the message of God. Let’s not get into a moral discussion where I reveal my thoughts on the nature of good and evil, and forget the fact that I think the Mike Huckabee’s of the world are doing the work of the devil. Don’t tell me that just because I consider myself more liberal than conservative makes me a Godless heathen who practices witchcraft and forcibly aborts every baby from every pregnant mother he sees. My religious views molded my political views. I happened to use common sense and logic to draw my conclusions. Am I saying I’m better than certain people? Yes. Deal with it. Your church sign is full of shit. Change it.

I think I became interested in church signs thanks to the Simpsons. Whenever we see a shot of the church in Springfield we have another sign gag. One of my favorites is, “No synagogue parking.” This implies some elaborate back story where there’s a synagogue across the street, and the members of each religious establishment use the other’s parking lot on Saturdays and Sundays. Another favorite of mine is a spelling error. The “R” in “friend” has fallen off the sign, making it read, “What a fiend we have in Jesus.” It always makes me smile. Maybe I search church signs here in town to find something amusing. I will keep looking.

The funniest church sign I’ve ever seen is actually from a photograph on a friend’s myspace page. It’s a Catholic church somewhere in Texas, and it reads, “Staying in bed Sunday morning and shouting ‘Oh, God!’ does not constitute going to church.” ‘Nuff said.

i don't think it means what you think it means, part 2

Let me quote the second verse of “Dead Flowers” by the Rolling Stones.

Well, when you’re sitting back In your rose pink Cadillac Making bets on Kentucky derby day I’ll be in my basement room With a needle and a spoon And another girl to take my pain away

The Cohen brothers use a version of this song at the end of The Big Lebowski. The first few lines of the song are quite touching: “When you’re sitting there in you’re silk upholstered chair…I hope you won’t see me and my ragged company.” It goes well with what the movie has created. Two Jeffrey Lebowskis – one an upper class business mogul and the other a baby boomer bum – cross paths and butt heads because of their contrasting backgrounds. The common man stands defiant, and the use of this song at the end of the movie looks well warranted at first glance – even though I don’t have the money you do, my friends and I have fun in our own way. Listening further to the second verse, though, we see what this song is really about. It’s a down on his luck drug addict dying in the underground and numbing his pain while life goes on overhead. I wonder if the Cohen brothers knew what they were doing. I never saw Mr. Lebowski as a heroin addict.

This is a trend I’ve seen for years in popular culture. People use songs to add emotional impact to a movie or a commercial. In ninety-nine percent of all cases, the songs people use are taken entirely out of context and botched beyond belief. Think of Microsoft back in the 90’s using “Who Are You” to advertise Windows. This is a song about a man waking up in the drunk tank. Listen closely. It’s not about a computer operating system. Taking songs out of context really bugs me.

Wes Anderson is guilty of this to a certain degree, as well. Rushmore is a very good movie, and the last scene is the clincher for a lot of people. Jason Schwartzman and Bill Murray spend the movie fighting for the affection of the same lady. In the end everything works out, and we close on the chorus of “Ooh La La” by Ronnie Wood. “I wish that I knew what I know now when I was younger.” It’s a wonderful song, but it’s taken out of context again. This song is a grandfather warning his grandson about women. “They’ll trap you then they’ll use you before you even know.” This is exactly the opposite of what just happened in the movie. Jason Schwartzman and Bill Murray just spent two hours acting like assholes to win the right to get in a woman’s pants. She was a bystander. I think that if she had the choice she would have rather been left alone. She didn’t particularly trap anyone. Using it out of context leaves a nice impression on the end of Rushmore. Only listen to the chorus and it works.

Cameron Crowe did something like this in one of the most famous movie scenes of all time. In Almost Famous there is a scene where the lead guitarist in the band walks out one night and finds his way to a Topeka party. He gets wasted and stoned and makes an ass of himself, and he staggers onto the bus a humiliated and ashamed mess. As the band drives away they listen to “Tiny Dancer” on the radio. Slowly, one by one, each band member begins singing along. One by one, their respective groupies begin singing alone. Soon the entire bus is erupting in song. All the ill deeds are forgiven and the band is back on its feet. It’s really a great scene. The difference between this and something like The Big Lebowski is that this song has everything to do with Almost Famous is about. “Tiny Dancer” was inspired by Bernie Taupin’s wife, who on one of Elton John’s tours was indeed “seamstress for the band.” She was indeed a dancer. Whenever I listen to that song I think of Bernie Taupin’s wife watching each show in the wings, singing along with the words and humming the tunes. She wasn’t a band-aid, but Penny Lane does all of those things in Almost Famous. Cameron Crowe knew exactly what he was doing when he chose “Tiny Dancer” for that scene. It fits perfectly because it isn’t taken out of context. It’s exactly what Cameron Crowe is going for. That sort of attention to detail takes a lot of effort to get it right. That’s the sort of thing I love, because it’s the most powerful.

I’m “that guy” when it comes to song lyrics. I’ve ruined plenty of songs for my friends when I tell them what they’re actually about. Nine times out of ten the true intent of a song’s lyrics is far more powerful and thought-provoking than how it may sound based on one or two lines picked out in a moment’s worth of listening. “Dead Flowers” is a great song, and “Ooh La La” is one that I’m going to learn on guitar as soon as I figure out how to play an E Minor 7. “Tiny Dancer” is no more powerful on its own than either of those songs, but it works the best in its movie context because Cameron Crowe took the time to find a song that actually fits. Every great song is about something. You can really wrap your head around great songs when you understand what they’re about. This means listening to lyrics. I know it’s hard, but listen closely and someday you’ll be able to point out contextual errors to people who may or may not be reading your blog.

manningly terrific

I was in second grade when the San Francisco 49ers beat the Cincinnati Bengals in Super Bowl 23. Joe Montana had already made a name for himself as quarterback of one of the greatest football teams in history. The Niners already had two championships under their belt, and in Super Bowl 24 they beat the shit out of the Denver Broncos to win a fourth. It was Super Bowl 23 where Joe Montana became the ultimate clutch quarterback. Trailing 16-13 with only a few minutes to go, Montana led the Niners on an 11 play 92 yard drive that he capped with a touchdown pass to John Taylor with 34 seconds left. San Francisco won the game 20-16. It was the beginning of “Joe Cool,” Joe Montana calming his teammates before embarking on the game winning drive by pointing to the stands and saying, “Isn’t that John Candy?” Joe Montana became the ultimate NFL quarterback in so many minds.

What happened Sunday night was special. Eli Manning rose above his checkered, inconsistent past and entered the ranks of NFL elite. Tom Brady, Randy Moss, and the Patriots took a 14-10 lead with a few minutes to go in Super Bowl 42. History repeated itself when Manning spearheaded an 80 yard drive and hit Plaxico Burress with 35 seconds left to win the game 17-14. I’ve been racking my brain all day to try and remember anything at all from Super Bowl 23, and all I can honestly remember is the opening introduction of the starting rosters. Maybe if I could remember any more of Super Bowl 23 I could say it was the greatest Super Bowl game ever played. Maybe if I were alive to watch Super Bowl 3 and see the New York Jets beat the Baltimore Colts 16-7 I could say Joe Namath won the greatest Super Bowl ever. I can’t remember any of those games. Super Bowl 42 was the best Super Bowl I have ever seen. As an all around game, it was riveting from start to finish. I refused to leave the couch and use the bathroom because I was afraid I would miss the big play that broke everything open. I waited and waited, and finally everyone watching that game was rewarded with the big play late in the fourth quarter. Eli Manning is driving the Giants as they trail 14-10 with an expiring clock. It’s third down and a long way to go, and he drops back to pass. The Patriots wrap him up quickly, hands grasping from everywhere and grabbing handfuls of jersey, slowing him down enough for the linebacker cavalry to arrive and seal the deal, but then somehow Eli Manning breaks free. He runs far enough away that you know he has enough time to find his receiver, and he launches the ball. The pass is just over the head of David Tyree as he crosses the field, but he doesn’t give up on it. Tyree jumps and catches the ball with his fingertips. As he falls to the field it looks as though the ball is going to come loose, but he maintains his grip. He uses his helmet to maintain his grip. He lands on his back, on top of a Patriots defensive back, and he holds the ball to his helmet. It’s a catch, and it’s good enough for a first down. It’s a play that lets Eli Manning cap the drive with the touchdown pass. It’s the sort of play that will be talked about for years to come, and that final Giants drive let Eli Manning join the likes of Joe Montana as an all-time great NFL quarterback. Super Bowl 42 was the greatest game I have ever seen.

I could sit here and wax poetic about the Super Bowl being an iconic American event. I could drone on and on about the Patriots chasing perfection and the Giants donning the role of the lovable underdog. That’s going for the obvious. There’s a thread to this game that not very many people are talking about.

Think of all the possible storylines we could have had with the two conference championship games. Many people were cheering for a New England/Green Bay Super Bowl to have Tom Brady versus Brett Favre, two great quarterbacks going head to head. Had the Chargers beaten the Patriots we would have had Eli Manning and Phillip Rivers going at it, the two quarterbacks who were involved in the controversial draft-day trade that saw Eli go from San Diego to New York and Rivers go from New York to San Diego. New York versus New England gave us the hottest two teams in the league, but it also gave us a storyline that no one is talking about. Sunday’s Super Bowl was New York versus Boston, yet another chapter between the two cities and their heated rivalry. Essentially on Sunday, the Yankees beat the Red Sox in the World Series. Not only did the Yankees beat the Sox, but the Yankees beat the snot out of the Sox. Not only did they do that, but the Yankees spoiled a Red Sox bid for a perfect season. It’s only fitting that a Boston team makes a bid for an undefeated record only to have it ruined by a New York team. Personally I hate the Red Sox and most Boston teams, but I’ll admit I was cheering for perfection on Sunday. I wanted to see history. I saw history. I saw a heavily unfavored New York Giants team rise above their critics and bring an offensive juggernaut to its knees. I saw a New York team embarrass a Boston team once again. Part of me jumped for joy. So what if the Red Sox won the World Series in November? The Giants beat the Patriots in the Super Bowl. Football is America’s pastime now. Didn’t you know that? The Super Bowl is all that matters anymore. New York beat Boston on the world’s biggest stage. That’s bragging rights. Tom Brady and Boston step aside. Let Eli Manning and New York regain their rightful place at the top.

there will be a bloody tirade

I saw There Will Be Blood last night. If this doesn’t win Best Movie at the Oscars they are out of their minds. There Will Be Blood does everything right that No Country For Old Men does wrong, i.e., end the movie with adequate resolution. There Will Be Blood is a long, slow, densely mesmerizing movie. I’m a fan of silence. The first scene is Daniel Day Lewis mining in a California desert, hacking at the walls of his cavern as a single ray of sunlight drizzles through the shaft. The first time he makes a sound is when he regains consciousness after his ladder breaks a rung and he gasps loudly for breath. Daniel Day Lewis plays Daniel Plainview, an oil man at the turn of the century, and the first lines in the movie don’t come for fifteen minutes until Plainview tries to lease his drilling enterprise to a small town. Eventually Plainview finds his way to a small town called Little Boston where an ocean of oil rests underground. He buys the town, and all the greed you can ask for unfolds for the rest of the movie. It’s a disgusting life, what people will do to make money. To make a connection with what No Country For Old Men did right, Daniel Plainview is an Anton. He knows what he wants – money – and he will do whatever is necessary to get it. There Will Be Blood is based on an Upton Sinclair story called Oil!. Sinclair peeks through every crack. Oh, Upton Sinclair. You crazy communist.

There Will Be Blood reminds me of another long and densely mesmerizing movie called Dogville. It’s an all right movie, and I recommend everyone watch it. Nicole Kidman plays a mysterious woman who stumbles into a small Depression-era American town. She does small jobs for the townspeople and is at first beloved. As time goes on, the people abuse her, and things go from bad to worse to disastrous for poor Nicole Kidman. Two things piss me off about Dogville. First, I can’t sit and watch Nicole Kidman get raped for three hours. I want to go to the bathroom and maybe get something to eat. Second, I’ve heard that Dogville is a take on how the rest of the world views America. David Bowie’s “Young American” plays over the credits while we see black-and-white pictures of Great Depression Americans. Let me get radically American here and show my national pride for the first time ever. What right does anyone have telling me what it’s like to be an American? You’re telling me that Americans are the only people on the planet who abuse power? Abusing power is part of being a human being, pal. It’s what we do. We are a greedy species that wants to dominate everyone and everything. I don’t care of you’re from America, France, Germany, China, India, or Zimbabwe. Human beings are naturally sadistic. We are particularly sadistic to each other. Don’t give me this “holier than thou” shit just because it’s chic to bash Americans. You’re just as prone to greed and hatred and power abuse as I am. Do you want to know how I see the rest of the world? The rest of the world is a bunch of third-world cesspools where it’s perfectly reasonable to execute a Westerner because she offended God by naming a stuffed bunny rabbit Muhammad. The rest of the world has a rebellious chip on its shoulder because their version of Islam is slightly different from the other two forms of Islam in their homeland, and if a young girl from their Islamic sect is caught dating someone from another Islamic sect, it’s well within the law for dozens, hundreds of angry men to strip her naked in the street and stone her to death. The rest of the world is oil rich but bordering on barbarism, and they will rape women who are caught alone in cars with men who are not their husbands, and if the women complain they will be sentenced to jail terms for complaining. The rest of the world resorts to ethnic cleansing when an election doesn’t turn out the way they wanted. Yeah, the rest of the world is fucked. Take a good look in the mirror before you tell me what it’s like to be an American. That pisses me right off.

monk and mary

Working nights at the coffee shop gives me absolutely no time to watch television. My knowledge of the latest shows is nonexistent. I used to watch the Simpsons on a regular basis. Then I started working every Sunday night, and I can honestly say I haven’t watched a new episode of the Simpsons on Sunday night in three or four years. You Tube has given me a Halloween show or two, but my knowledge of my favorite show is lagging.

Needless to say, I haven’t picked up a new favorite show in quite a while. The last show I tried was Lost when it premiered four years ago, but I couldn’t get into it. My favorite shows now are Sports Center and whatever is on the Military Channel at two or three in the morning. Encore movies round out my viewing pleasures, but I can only watch Mystery Men so many times before I want something different.

Monday afternoon last week I had a rare opportunity. As I thawed my dinner around four in the afternoon I made my usual rounds – what’s on ESPN, what’s on Military Channel, what movies are on Encore – and I noticed Monk was on USA. I’ve heard a lot about Monk. Apparently it’s a popular show and quite funny. I gave it a shot. I suppose I caught the first episode, because it was like the introduction of Monk. Watch the OCD guy and laugh at him because he’s not like you. The funny parts were funny. I’ll give it that. When you make a mystery show, though, it’s best not to solve the mystery in the first five minutes and then spend the rest of the hour having your characters fumbling to assemble the pieces the audience already has. I can’t sit for an hour wondering why the main characters are so stupid when the solution is maddeningly obvious. I guess Monk was the best detective in the city because all the others were worthlessly incompetent. I won’t be watching Monk again. It’s probably better that I don’t watch television anymore if Monk is the best they can do.

I will say that it was good to see Ted Levine in a role that got him away from Buffalo Bill. Anyone who has seen Silence of the Lambs will remember Ted Levine as Buffalo Bill. He plays the head detective on Monk. I kept expecting him to say, “You don’t know what pain is,” and, “Put the fucking lotion in the basket!” Actors like that have a rough time throwing off the one character that first brought them into the spotlight. Michael Richards will always be Kramer (and he will always be known as a crazy racist). Thomas Hayden Church had a rough time getting away from the shadow of Lowell on Wings. Skilled actors are able to play different roles and slide away from their typecast past. I think Ted Levine was in Heat, also. That’s a good movie.

Currently listening to: The Shapes We Make, by Mary Timony Band. All of my new music heroes are women. Sleater-Kinney, Kathleen Hannah, Mary Timony – they show these whiney indie boys how to do it. Just write some fucking music and stop emoting. Check out Helium, a band Mary Timony fronted in the 90’s. The Dirt of Luck is one of the best records you will ever buy.