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Archive for the 'Art' Category

The Soloist

I finally finished “The Soloist” with Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey Jr.  I started to watch this movie while on a business trip.  The Airbus had a video server and individual players in each head rest.  I saw this film and thought it would be the typical Hollywood pap.  About 40 minutes out of Seattle, [...]

Cold Souls

Paul Giamatti is an actor in a play, “Uncle Vanya” and he is have a hard time getting the character.  His agent points him toward an article in The New Yorker about a company that removes a person’s soul and puts it in storage.  The rationale is that it won’t get in the way of [...]

I do not like the cone of shame

Pixar’s latest animated movie, Up, is pretty good.  Most Pixar movies focus on relationships that do not have a nuclear family dynamic.  The Incredibles was an exception. The protagonist is a man who is waiting to die.  He has lived his life and now there is nothing left.  He is old, he feels broken.  His [...]

Meet Dave

If he is saying ‘yes’ to this pile of crap, what is Eddie Murphy saying ‘no’ to?

The Departed

Scorcese makes a Tarrentino movie.  Big deal.

The worst music critic in the world

( Art andPersonal )

I didn’t really understand what contempt was until it was explained to me in this piece on Slate.  Now that I understand it, I have contempt only for Ron Rosenbaum. Which brings me to Billy Joel—the Andrew Wyeth of contemporary pop music—and the continuing irritation I feel whenever I hear his tunes, whether in the [...]

24

I wanted to like “24″.  It has the potential to be a great story medium, incessant, pressure driving real time narrative. But it is shite. I was going to watch it on the Tivo, but I got about 10 minutes in and had to hit delete.  The President, a woman, started screeching subtext.  There was [...]

Yup

I’ve never been a Tom Cruise fan.  I don’t think he is a good actor.  I don’t like the parts of him that I can see.  Don’t get me wrong.  Acting well is a harrowing proposition.  Living the part, letting go of every thing you are,  is scary and most people can’t do it.  I [...]

In the Valley of Elah

I’m watching this movie on DVD and it is damned good.  Paul Haggis directs minimally.  He uses deep focus when it works.  His shot selection is set up, set up, 2 shot, 2 shot, 1 shot, 1 shot.  Tommy Lee Jones wears his pain like it is being painted on him, not like a set [...]

The year 2008 in photographs

( Art andPersonal )

This is one of the most remarkable collections of pictures I have ever seen.  The Big Picture – Boston.com Of all of the pictures, this the one I like the most. The drip of blood, wet, expectant, on the old man’s hand captures me.  What is the story?  I don’t know.  It is a confrontation [...]