Worth seeing: This.

Talk about your Baudrilliardian conceptions of reality.

Probably my new favorite video on the internet. Philosphically interesting (for the reality-layerings) visually complex and interesting, strangely rhythmic.

Enjoy!

Something to look forward to

I've often thought that getting old is underrated.

It's a vicious cycle - people think getting old makes one boring, so they don't prepare for it, so when they are old they are boring.

Me? I think one of the things to look forward to when I get old is looking even more badass.

As evidence, I submit this photo shoot from empire magazine.

Who would you rather have holding that gun on you? Edward the emopire, or Clint Eastwood?

I'd be more scared of Morgan Freeman holding that axe than Christian Bale.

Mel Gibson looks crazier now than he did when he played Wallace.

Also, for anyone interested in older people being badass, I suggest the film "Bad Day at Black Rock"

Guidelines for any writer

So, I was reading a story sent to me by a friend, in strange horizons magazine. Browsing for a place to submit my own fiction to the fairly impressive magazine, I happened across this list, and thought that you might want to pass it to your friends who think they can write stories, and/or use it for your own reference:

http://www.strangehorizons.com/guidelines/fiction-common.shtml

Enjoy!

World Cinema and Framing Narrative

Toward a Neuroscientific Literary Criticism

I have always felt somewhat ill at ease with the films of Joel and Ethan Cohen. While they have been lauded with accolades from literally every court, I have found myself, with a few friends, consistently feeling that their movies ring false. While there were always elements I recognized as false in their scripts, these elements never did fully explained the way their films unnerved me. It was only recently, as their short “World Cinema” (available here) made its rounds of the internet, that I came to realize one of the major failings of their storytelling.
(begin traditional plot rehash, skip this part if you’ve seen it)
In World Cinema we are presented, at first, with two men, standing in a small theater, in what could really be anytown, USA. The two men are the classic dichotomy of America – one, the intellectual, the anglophile, the goateed, the small man, who is showing only two films in what is probably his theater, both in a foreign language, and both on the, well, artistic side of film making, shall we say. The other man, standing across the counter, is the classic American cowboy. Tan straw cowboy hat, plaid cowboy shirt, mustache, the works. We are obviously witnessing the meeting of two stereotypes.
After some deliberation and descriptions, the “cowboy” chooses Climates, the complex, difficult Hungarian film, presented in Turkic. When the cowboy emerges from the theater, he surprises the audience by leaving a message with the person at the desk (our short man has left) to tell the original man that he really enjoyed Climates. The “cowboy” comments that “there’s a hell of a lot of truth in that movie, in my opinion.”
(end traditional plot rehash, pick up here.)
On the surface level, the characters play out well – as wary of each other as they should be, their language and knowledge appropriate to their situations. The point that rings false is the cowboy’s acceptance of Climates. Now, of course, one could critique my criticism at this point by saying that it only rings false to me because I have my own expectations which I approach the people with – that I am too easily drawn into stereotypes. Yet, there is a good, academic reason for my finding this falsehood. To put a lot of deep, complex academic work simply: Neuroscience has discovered that we interpret our experiences, especially our experiences of art, through formerly constructed framing narratives. In short, then, the cowboy would not have the framing structure present to recognize and accept the truth in Climates. In essence, the cowboy has lived out the enlightenment, rationalist thinking George Lakoff tells of, as the attitude, “if we present the truth, people will think themselves to the right conclusion.”
Now, could this simply be a surprising cowboy? Could he have been pondering these things in his inevitable pickup? Could his latent sexual desire for the short man have opened his framing? It is possible, certainly, but let us now think of the Cohen brother’s films as a whole. Each of them seems to have the same basic elements on some level – someone lacking the framing narrative necessary to deal with some philosophical issue enters into that issue experientially, and emerges with a changed perspective, with no clear change of the framing narrative. This is most clearly present in No Country for Old Men where the “Old Man” makes his clear, even philosophical change despite the fact that his framing clearly has no way of assimilating these philosophical thoughts.
Perhaps I am tainted by the time I spent living in Montana. It is true that there are some people who do have more beneath their surfaces than meets the eye. These people, however, seem all too common to me in Cohen brothers films. I have the feeling the Cohen brothers write about these people without ever having really met them, and I likewise have the feeling that, someday, when the two haves of this country meet, their bitter battle will only be exacerbated by a misunderstanding on the “intellectual” side of the ability and the conditions of the change of the other party. To some extent, this is already happening, and my own framing makes me quite likely to grow tired of it.

Thoughts on two films

Excuse the long absence - other projects have taken much of my time. Hopefully, I will be able to link to them here sometime...

In any case, I just finished watching The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - I watched Slumdog Millionaire a couple weeks ago (for the record, I very much preferred Button, for reasons I will not go into now).

What I did want to mention, though, is the interesting theme of time - and film - running backwards in both, and the opposite way in which this motif is handled by the movies - in one, it is the successful private reversal of past pain, gained at the end of a long journey, the other is the hope for a reversal of a very public and shared pain, at the beginning of the film's journey, and treated with a very public reverence.

It is a curious exercise to relate these moments, and why we are drawn to them in film - perhaps they are simply an expression of our hopes for a more innocent time, or for the work of mercy, forgiveness, and an ultimate redemption. Perhaps they are a misunderstanding of redemption, which must come, rather than against time, through time - which reminds me of something in Eliot's Four Quartets. It does seem, whatever the case, that two major movies coming out with such scenes in the same year may be a little more than coincidence.

In any case, I hope this has given you food for thought.

Common Discourse

"Life is a dreary monotonous scheme
I do not enjoy it except when I dream."

My wife said that to me the other day. She is not a professional or, really, an amatuer poet. It reinforces to me the joys that can often be found in common discourse. I suppose I should call it normal talking.

Notes on Learning, part 6 (beta version ./appendix -[burst])

As an appendix (there's a lovely English metaphorical word) to yesterday's post, I present a couple of the synonyms I'm studying now:

Who needs two words for:

Oneself: can be Jibun or Watashi

to close: Shimeru (to close a book) Tojiru (to close a door) and no, they don't include the idea of "door" or "book" you just have to use the different ones in different contexts.

Rice: Kome is raw, uncooked rice. Gohan is cooked rice, or, by extension, a meal.

I love you, Japan, but seriously, WTF?

Notes on Learning, part 5 (beta version .0001)

I've read several places (most notably in the wonderful "Book of Common Ignorance") that the longer a language is around, the more it looses grammatical complexity and gains vocabulary size and density.

One good measure of this is the number and complexity of synonyms, since many of our words focus around the same thoughts (side-note, if any of you tell me the popular lie about certain Eskimos having many words for snow, I'll hit you over the head with a dictionary).

Japanese is a good example, it's been around a long, long time, and I wouldn't say it's a grammatically complex language at all, however, its vocabulary is pretty big, and it has lots and lots of synonyms, enough to garner its own wiki, here: Japanese Synonym Wiki

Some shining examples include:

The fact that there is actually a specific word (maitsuda) that one would only use to verbally tell an uncle something is not good, and this is only one note of aggravation in a symphony. Self-disappointed missing out gets its own word, as in "I slept late and missed out on ______" as does a word (haibaku) specifically for loosing a game or war.

other good examples from the website:

Many words for annoying.

Many words for investigating.

I am also fascinated by the fact that "image" has several different words, moving image (reflection, mirror, tv screen,cartoon), still image (picture), painted still image, and a sculpture. This would make art criticism rather interesting in some ways, and could make parts of the philosophy of semiotics very different. Please note that these aren't just equivalent to our words "painting" and "drawing" as these refer specifically to their operation as images, not just as their presence as works of art.

Also interesting from this philosophical perspective is a difference of borders.

Notes on learning, part 4 (1001 apologies, or not)

Yea, so coming up with insightful, non-generalized, researched things to say about a whole language is difficult. Who knew?

For those of you politically minded...

Through my subscription to the often enjoyable very short list service (veryshortlist.com) I found http://www.nixontapes.org/ this morning. It's certainly an interesting resource for those of us that like to peek behind the curtain of political history, and see just how political our history is.

One particular moment of note, for example, is a tape of Nixon, Kissinger and Reagan. The highlight of the tape is really the awkwardness that comes of Regan inquiring into the Vietnam war, but listening to them plan the shipyards in San Diego smells highly of guilt by association, and makes one suspect that the true evil of pork-barrel projects is the way they serve the ends of whoever is in power.

Video Game Gets Banking License! Eruptions in the Blogosphere!

Some are frightened, some are angry. Some, like me, are just amused.

BBC story here

Thinking about the Auto Companies

It seems like every time I turn around someone is saying that the problem with car companies is that they haven't been building cars people want to buy. Has it occurred to anyone that they're maybe just pumping out too many cars - that we may have reached and even exceeded the saturation point. I speak as someone who lives near LA, doesn't have a car, and doesn't want to have a car. If I had my way, I'd never own a car. If I was wealthy enough, I might, however, buy into a car pool, because cars can be a lot of fun, but not every day, and not the sort you (probably) drive to work.

Notes on Learning, part 3 (beta version .0101)

A less happy thought on Japanese:

What mad, topsy-turvy people come up with three different systems of writing, and then use them all? For that matter, what sort of mad exclusivists create a whole system of writing just for foreign words - who needs to know every time they use a foreign word in writing? At that, why do that when so much of their "original" language is "borrowed" from Chinese to begin with?

I like learning Japanese, but honestly...

Notes on Learning, part 2 (beta version .011)

The Japanese word for "good" or "pleasure" is literally just "ii."

This reminds me of the Kiki and Bouba experiements, and makes me think about the possibilities of vocal representation and automatic exclamation at the roots of language.

Notes on Learning, part 1 (beta version .001)

Okay, to try to give this dying blog a shot of whatever it is they give those people who are dying with a whimper, I'm going to try out a new series. As some of you may know I've been working on learning Japanese. Sometimes, learning Japanese allows some interesting insights into a completely foreign culture and language, some wonderful, some strangely familiar, and some incredibly distant. A friend suggested I write about them. So, without further ado, two ponderings on learning Japanese for today follow above, and hopefully, there are more to come.

Thoughts on Lars and the Real Girl

Sometimes, the uncanny valley is more like the uncanny catacombs.

Sometimes we forget that mountaintops with snow, and sun, and vast backgrounds can be uncanny too.

Red, color perception, and amorism: a random thought

It is said that red is an aphrodisiac.

It is rarely observed that a fat woman in red rarely is.

Odysseus at the dentist: A freeform outline

I went to the dentist this morning. It wasn't a terrible visit, but it did put certain things to mind about heroism and bravery. I wanted to get these thoughts down before they were lost in the muddle that is a modern life. Hopefully, they will be refined later, and possibly even submitted, in refined form, to Literary Latte, but I wanted to invite any comments now, and get something out, so that there is record of the growth of the essay.

Odysseus never went to the Dentist
Meditations from the Chair
1. Odysseus never went to the Dentist. It is certain he faced horrors, but never the horrors which the modern man is forced to daily face, the horrors of science, the horrors of authority, the horrors of art, and the horrors of time. Odysseus never suffered quietly the million small indignities forced upon the modern, so called, man.
2. Odysseus never went to the dentist. He never felt the splatter of paste with a badly imitated grape flavor upon his gums. He never submitted himself to the teachings of the school of dentists. It is odd to me, perhaps, that we suffer dentists – that we have so long suffered dentists, and react so strongly against other teachings of so-called science. There are studies, even, some might say, scientific studies, which would indicate that dentists are unnecessary to those who live properly, but we suffer their prices, indignities, and pains – demonstratible and obvious pains – pains with which no one could argue – yet will not suffer the distant and uncertain mythos of evolution, and argue against by saying it drives the young to atheism and adultery, and yet, still, we will not consider that more teenagers may have been driven to atheism and even adultery by the dentist than ever by the teacher.
3. Odyesseus never trusted himself into the hands of a remote and uncertain science, merely to maintain what his culture called a normal life. Each of these modern indignities has its twin in other fields. From what we can tell, there never was much distant from Odysseus’ life – his religion was a close one, even a local one, and he never seems to have worshiped another land’s god through a strange expert priest or pastor. What Gods he did worship were close and local, or he was passing through their lands and seas. In each of these cases, too, he did not worship them so much as they touched him, and he was not interested so much in learning the particulars of their theology as how to play their game, or at least to survive. He did not worship Gods who had made some questionable sacrifice two thousand years ago. From what we can know too, Odysseus’ science was not far from his life, nor were his authorities, nor even the makers of his cheese. He probably made his cheese himself more than once or twice, and when his cheese was made ill, he could likely reach out and touch the one who made it. He could likely reach out and kill the one who made it, if he so desired. When his cheese was expensive, he could ask why, and when it was delicious, he could praise the cheesemaker to his face.
4. We must also remember that Odysseus was born into power, as were so many of the heroes of Western literature. They were not set apart by their skill, at least, if they were, that was a post-mortem evaluation. Let us not forget that while the vast majorities of humanities have toiled away quietly, their leaders have waged wars, upon which they had a part in deciding. Today, the modern man, as he is pictured here, toils away under the authority of powers he does not understand, and over which he has the minimal amount of control afforded by democracy, even by republic. Distance has something to do with this too – the closeness of the cheesemaker, along with Odysseus’ priority of birth, allowed him to move against the cheesemaker. The closeness of the God even allowed Odysseus to strike out against him, if he so choose.
5. You will rarely hear, I think, a lit-head admit that the heroes of literature are indeed, in Churchill’s phrase, “not only distant, but prosaic;” Though the sentiment is respected from one so eminent as that great speaker and leader of men, speaking at so momentous a time, it is so often despised reflected, in even truer form, in the mouths of the teenagers who can barely tell you what they mean, but who have no interest in reading the Odyssey. They complain that these things share no relationship to modern life, and I think they are quite right. The courage Odysseus had is quite a different sort than the modern man must have. I am not attempting to argue against any of the distances we face today – save this one. In some cases, the distances must be argued against, in some cases defended. In some cases they are incredibly good, in some cases, terribly dangerous. There can be arguments for each. But it seems to me, perhaps our most strange distance today is our distance from our heroes. Odysseus never was told by his culture that his heroes were, or should be, men who lived in strange histories and myths so distant from him. His literature was often songs of his friends. Even Hamlet, who displays some of the suffering of indignities, some of the arrogance, the academia, and the impotence of the modern man, was still born into power, and could still compare himself, however sadly, to Hercules. But now that comparison is meaningless to most who can read – it is not that either falls short, it is that the comparison is so distant, and so different. We are, no doubt, in need of heroes today, of examples every day, and we cannot afford to continue to produce and revere heroes with whom we share so little relationship, be they Odysseus, Arthur, Hamlet, or any one of the myriad of action heroes who, while closer, face adrenaline we do not in our moments most needful of heroism. The dentists’ chair does not allow for adrenaline. The absence of God does not allow for action. We are in desperate need of heroes who live modern life, and do so with modern heroism, facing the distances of science, of power, of art, and of time, with dignity, with creativity, and with good will. Come to think of it, we need Chaplin. His little tramp is often exactly the man who I speak of, and who we need to replicate again.

Review: The Dark Knight

Okay, so I just saw the Dark Knight, for the first time. I didn't see it in theaters for a number of reasons, and I'm glad I didn't. I'm glad I didn't give in to the hype, I'm glad I stood by my now-more-solid-than-ever convictions that it wouldn't be the end of the world if I didn't see this movie in theaters, despite what certain friends said. Partially because very few movies are that important – and the ones that are are very, very, very rarely accorded all this hype.
A few disclaimers before I launch my all-out assault. I did not like Batman Begins. Though I have a tremendous respect for Christopher Nolan, that was by no means his best work – ever, at all, in any way. That film had a number of problems which inform my problems with this film, both in character and action. Fortunately, a number of them are repaired in this film, unfortunately, many others are not, and some are compounded. Let me also say, as the harshest critic of this film I know, that even I have to admit Heath Leger's performance was impressive – perhaps even astounding. I have long approached Joker with a very different mental picture. Despite this, Leger remains relentlessly convincing. My inability to critique his performance is quite honestly, a vague annoyance to me, as I would have loved to, given all the hyperbole gushed in that area. Still, I find it delightfully ironic that the one character in the movie who doubts human nature most is the only one that seems able to restore my faith in the human ability to act. This also leads into the fact that in many respects, the best parts of this movie were the parts that were not the way I pictured they should be, but which still remained convincing – still seemed to get at the heart of this story, still seemed to exploit all the rich emotional, psychological, and philosophical material with which any such story is imbued, though it is so rarely exploited. Though I was over all expectedly disappointed with the Dark Knight, it did some things right – and it had what every movie of its kind should have – an excellent beginning and ending. It was almost a full hour into the movie before I began to notice the edges fraying, which is far longer than many other movies last for me.
The edges, however, did fray, and then they began to run out as fast as that beautiful little thread from the back of Joker's coat in the opening. And so, without further ado, the angry, grouchy part of the review where I tell you what I thought was wrong with the movie, and challenge you with Arizona stone eyes to have any explanation which would make it all right. I warn you, I'm a little angry. I'm partially angry because parts of the movie were so damnably good, and so convincing, and I wanted to like it, I really did, at times. I wanted to believe someone out there could give me a convincing, alternative version of a Batman story, and still let me believe in it. So, yes, I will be passionate. I hope it entertains - and please do take it as entertainment – don't be upset that I didn't like your favorite movie.
First, and most important (the rest are really just physical incontinuities – yes that was an intentional pun on incontinence -, this first issue is psychological, and therefore far more important to the story and the characters). Okay. Let's set this straight. Bruce Wayne is not a struggle! Batman does not want to be Bruce Wayne! He does not want a normal life! Get it right! Bruce Wayne died (spiritually) the night of his parent's murder, and he has been OBSESSED ever since with “justice” or “vengeance” depending upon which side of the law you sit on, and which label you prefer. Yes, he will not kill, but that is Batman – that is because of his parent's death – that is not Bruce Wayne. Bruce Wayne is as much of a front as Clark Kent is – even more so, in fact, because in some sense, Superman does seem to want to be Clark Kent – he does seem to at times envy the normal man, though even he knows he can never be one. Batman however, not only knows he could never be one, he does not want to be one. What is ironic about this is that in creating this “conflicted” Bruce Wayne/Batman, the screenwriters actually shot themselves in the foot because in the scene DIRECTLY AFTER he's saying he can not risk the lives of “innocent people” Batman is risking their lives by blowing up cars, plowing through a mall in a supercar (shooting in its windows with no way of seeing what's beyond) and generally being an innocent-life-risking bastard. The Dark Knight cleared this up for me. I always knew there was something wrong with portrayals of Batman in which he wants to be a normal man, but this film, like Batman Begins, reveals to me negatively where these sad attempts at character conflict spring from. Batman can not be an ordinary man – a man does not put on a bat suit and nightly risk his life just because he is rich, or even because his parents were killed – many people have to suffered that, and not been so afflicted. What is unique about Batman is that he is so struck by it, so psychologically changed, or even damaged, that he must take up this mantle himself, alone, and to do that leaves no room for hopes of a normal life, and to see that tangential, sappy hope levered into so many superhero plots annoys me. Superheroes are superheroes because something hugely unique happened – this is inescapable – they are born of alien intervention, strange experiments, or, in this case, and really only in this case, the death of loved ones. It is one of the most beautiful ironies of Batman that he who begins most human becomes, through a human action, the least human-like superhero of them all, and that is so much the foundation of his strange comparisons with his villains, especially Joker. So much for the psychological.
Now, to the other legion of swarming annoying little mosquito problems. In no particular order., beginning with something I am unsure of, but which still bugs me. Most of the time, from what I know, when facial trauma of Dent's degree is suffered, facial reconstructive surgery is undertaken as soon after the event as possible – so probably when he would be unconscious – to save further damage to the muscles, skin, etc. The longer they wait, the more scar tissue develops, the harder it is to deal with. Not a big deal, but annoying nonetheless. Like I said, mosquitos. A bigger problem (okay, this is more like a mosquito the size of an elephant) is how the heck did Joker get out of the interrogation room – sure, he's got glass to the guy's neck, but the room can only be opened FROM THE OUTSIDE, that is the POINT of a secure interrogation room. The writers even make this obvious earlier. Why the guy was in there in the first place is a whole other question. What took Batman so stoinking long in coming to rescue Harvey Dent from Joker's assaults? There's just long enough that the Joker can succeed in so much of his plan, and just short enough that Batman couldn't have come from his penthouse. Brilliant. Speaking of the penthouse, how is it that the penthouse which was, may I remind you, successfully breached by so few as five gangsters during a wine and dine fundraiser, when one would think security would be tight, why is this penthouse suddenly the safest place in the city? Why does Harvey Dent not bleeding insist on this being true, especially given that he himself was endangered there not three nights ago? Furthermore, since when is a cheap RPG (and trust me, the Joker had only a cheap RPG) enough to punch a hole in the new and improved Batmobile? And not only punch a hole, but put the thing completely out of service? An upgraded Hummer easily survives an RPG, and it is built by the lowest bidder, not by the personal servants of a multi-billionaire who cares about nothing more than his personal safety during his midnight vigilantianism. I would scour Batman Begins for film of it surviving worse, but, alas, I have neither the time nor inclination – and to those who would say “well, all it had to do was take out the tires” Watch the film! The tires are fine! The system says “massive damage” or some crump like that, and the tires aren't even deflated!
Okay, on to Batman's personal physical problems – he survives a fall from a penthouse onto a car, is landed on by a girl (who, by the way, seems entirely too uninjured – I was so glad she died) and still has breath to chat her up in a growly, breathy he-man tone, and then, woopiddy do, he's knocked out of commission for a number of seconds by a slowed crash, tires beneath him, into a yielding semi, a crash he never should have been in, because the batbike could obviously stop faster than that – he didn't have to lay it down to turn around, and besides, it was built to be able to go sideways if it needed to. Are we not paying attention to what happened when we said cut five minutes ago? The fall at the end is even better – he falls a maximum of three stories – MAXIMUM, probably less (after that wonderful “oh look, fingers loosing grip, at least he saved the kid” shot) and he's out of it enough to still be lying there, and then to be limping, when Gordon comes down, all because he didn't have anything as soft and yielding as a CAR to break his fall.
Right, onto problems with the villains and their plots. First off, wonderful job on the face for Harvey Dent – nice makeup. The voice, however, sounds EXACTLY like it did before. Let me remind you of a little anatomy – the sound of a voice is projected and formed partially by the movement of the cheek and lips. Hold onto your cheek – just hold onto it from the outside, and pull it for a second, and then try to talk – sounds different, doesn't it? And Harvey Dent, with half his face, lips, cheek, you name it, gone, sounds exactly the same. How could they miss that – making a multiple quatillion dollar movie, with so many other great, wonderfully done details, and no one says – wait a second, that doesn't sound right. Hold on just one gold picking, lambbasting, carrot and celery minute. Let's at least get this freakishly obvious piece of sound engineering right. Okay, enough of that one. What of the Joker? How does he get into the Hospital? They have cops crawling all over, and there he is, the nurses' uniform fools them? Besides that, they're evacuating, and no one takes the trouble to actually look around for the bombs? What? Gotham has no bomb squad? They don't check Harvey Dent's room? He's not even prepped to go in the evac? Furthermore, TV SHOWS SCREEN CALLS! Yet there's Joker, on the TV, at a dial's command, right away. There are hundreds of people watching that show, (if you don't remember, I'm talking about the part where Mr. Accountant (because we've never seen an evil accountant before) says he's going to betray Batman's identity) trying to call in, it's obviously almost the only thing on TV, and he gets right on? Hunh. On to the ferrys- it's the army, and they don't think to check the engine rooms before they leave AT ALL? On top of that, since when do they evacuate prisoners because of a terror threat? Okay, so I believe it could happen in a system as messed up as ours, but really, doesn't it seem just a little bit levered in, so that the movie isn't quite so dark, and so that a few people who believe in the goodness of the ordinary man, not to mention the goodness of the tattooed and physically disabled, but frighteningly strong prisoner? The worst part is there are more convincing ways of talking about the “goodness of man” there are better arguments, and there could have been better scenes, but that seemed far too much like a cop-out. And the guy (the non-criminal) who offers to do it, then can't? Entirely unconvincing, if you want my opinion, though I'm sure you must be sick of that by now. Okay, more stuff, they wouldn't let that prisoner get that close, bye the way, anyway, the “hostage” clowns could have LAID DOWN (they're hospital patients, and they don't think of this? They must have been wanting to lie down!) I know, maybe not earlier, but at least when the swat teams burst in? That's a more minor point, and I could have let them get away with it, but no, not when they're messing up like this. Even worse- perhaps the worst of all these is the interrogation room with the Joker in it - and on top of that, why didn't the cops take his makeup off? You know the first thing they'd want to do – the first step in interrogation – would easily be to deprive him of his face – to wash it off, which could have been so good, because his face could have been almost creepier without the makeup, but no, they didn't think of that, because they get paid obscene amounts of money to make mistakes.
Okay, all that said, like I said, there were parts I really liked. There were bits and pieces I thought fantastic. I wanted to love the movie – which in itself is impressive, because usually I love to hate hyped action flicks, especially ones about superheroes. I love that Batman predicted- absolutely predicted Lucius' behavior about the sonar – and I love that he thought of it, that was really, really good. The ending was great – Gordon's conclusion that Batman has to be chased is right on the money of the character and tone of the movie. If the whole movie could have been like parts of the movie, I would have been so happy, really, I would have. But it wasn't. And I'm not. So consider yourself warned, if you ask me about this movie, if you try to tell me it was oh so good, if you try to convince me that I'm wrong, I'll go down fighting. Not that it isn't possible for me to be convinced – you've seen my weapons, now, you'd better have answers if you're going to try to tell me I should like it anyway, you'd better have your own.
All this to say – the Dark Knight is not a bad movie. It is much better than the majority of movies of its type – but there are movies of another type, and it is to movies of the greater type that I often hear Dark Knight compared – but those movies are made more carefully, and with a greater thought for continuity, and it is annoying to me that these films are not recognized for being great in how they are great. If there were that recognition, maybe both action movies and the “dramatic” movies could begin to care about everything, because it is only in caring about everything – caring that every little bit of the movie is at least interesting, or helpful, or meaningful, caring that every bit works – that any movie can be, in my book, truly great, and that is why not caring enough about the details – every type of detail – is the great sin of so many works of so-called art, be they films or books or poetry or paintings or music or anything else. Oh, and if you agree with me, and want to pass along your ideas without doing your own writing, please do pass on this link to anyone else, I won't complain about free publicity.

P.S. I would be remiss if I did not thank a friend for loaning the movie to me – his action was very gracious, despite my not liking the movie.

Postcards from a time-traveling punk bunny: an opportunity for collaboration

So, I was lying in bed tonight, and I had an idea...
Well, that's not quite true. I was helping a friend move today, and I happened across a little orange book "The Book of Bunny Suicides" it proclaimed, in large and cheerful font. What a fortuitous meeting, I thought, just my sort of dark humor. So I read, and was inspired. (here's the amazon page, if anyone is interested: http://www.amazon.com/Book-Bunny-Suicides-Andy-Riley/dp/0452285186/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1230461339&sr=8-1)

So, tonight, I was pondering a few of my favorite illustrations (a bunny peppering the eye of Sauron, a bunny V-signing in a row of Nazi troops.) and pondering just how for-crying-out-loud-a-zucchini-in-a-zebra lucky that Andy Riley is, sitting around, getting paid for those odd thoughts. And I had an idea. Surely there must be room in this market for two darkly humorous bunny people.

And so, a dream was born. Unfortunately, I have neither the time nor the inclination for drawing my idea out, so, for an artist who is interested enough to collaborate, I'll split any profit 50-50. My idea is of a new world's hero, suitable for internet distribution and newspaper syndication alike (and God knows we need some better comics in the paper) My idea is simply this:

Postcards from a time-traveling punk bunny. A series of brief, sometimes one-image comics, of a raffish bunny causing trouble in different time periods, for example:

Bunny posed to strike the nose off the Sphynx
Bunny riding the head of a stampede through a McDonalds
Bunny giving Hitler the finger.
Bunny giving (insert political figure here) the finger.
Bunny rubbing himself with rosemary and garlic in front of Ghandi

We could, of course, include a number of story-telling multiple-frame comics, for example:

Bunny gets in remote-conrol plane, remote in hand. Bunny flies. Bunny waves at astonished Wright brothers, trying to get their plane off the ground.

We could also include stories from bunny's normal life:

Background noise: Brapp brapp brapp! Bunny's wife: Pesky kids on motorbikes. (next frame) Bunny: Don't worry, I installed a raised speedbump. Wife has quizzical look. (next phrase) Wife opens window, sees kid on motorbike headed toward speed bump, which is literally raised by poles at either end - to about neck level.

So, that's the idea. Any interested illustrators, please contact me: rascalyboy [at] gmail [dot] com. Inclusion of work samples, or possible mock-ups, especially of bunny-face expressions would be greatly appreciated.