Uncovering Writing

I watched this episode (season 3, episode 2) while I was at the gym this morning. It's one of my favorite of the entire series. Several interesting story lines, some neat shots of new (and, of course, old fire equipment), and one of my huge crushes from the 70s, Laurette Spang. She was in a lots of mid 70s TV before she was cast in her most memorable role, Cassiopeia on the original Battlestar Galactica. She had a great 1970s look and often stole a scene. In this episode, her deadpan delivery of her lines was funny and offset the situation with her roommate's overdose on acid.

I loved the old fire engine and how it was tied into the history of the area, including a big earthquake in 1933. The passion that Roy and John had for the old truck was cool, and you even saw Captain Hank Stanley showing how important it would be to restore it.

All around, a fun episode to (re)watch.

I usually hate reboots, prequels, and rehashes, but I think this Thing movie really captures the mood of John Carpenter’s version, paying it homage but still carving out a new niche for its telling.

I recently purchased the entire series of the 1970s TV series Emergency! I loved that show, watching it in reruns as I grew up. I just finished the season 2 opener and was just blown away with Dixie McCall (played by Julie London). She just nailed the scenes with the arrogant personal physician and his antagonistic and hateful comments about the paramedics and their program.

I found this online (on pinterest, I think) and it's just too awesome. If you are a Columbo fan, you will love this, especially since repeat guest star villains show up for each of their episodes!

A very cool article and like the author, I hope that it turns out that it’s an affordable option. The piece is entitled Developing A New Digital Super 8 Cartridge.

Here is the second film from Creation Productions, Star Battles:

vimeo.com/76097942

Creation Productions was a project than my friend Rob and I came up with when we were in 8th grade and high school. We used his excellent Super 8 film camera to make movies. We wrote the stories, designed the sets, acted and directed. Rob even added the special effects to the developed film.

These super 8 films sat locked away in a vault (probably a drawer or box) until Rob and I started talking about it. He transferred the film to VHS and sent me a copy of the archive. I ripped the transfer to my Mac and then let both the tape and the data sit around for many more years.

Finally, looking for a creative spark for my writing, I took a day to edit and make our original ideas into some digital video that I could share. These two films (see next post for other one) are the results of some great times with one of my best and oldest friends. This first one is called Sabotage 4.

vimeo.com/76097943

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I was so looking forward to reading this when I found out Peter Falk had written a memoir. I loved his acting in movies and most especially his role of Lieutenant Columbo. Reading the book I realized that he was a good actor and a not-so-good writer. The book is more like a bunch of 3x5 index cards of ideas for chapters or themes. The book doesn’t feel cohesive nor does it flow in anything other than rambling about one’s life late at night over a few drinks.

There are fun snippets here and there and I learned a few things about Mr. Falk and about Columbo. However, some of the stuff I learned about Falk wasn’t what I expected. He’s kind of egotistical and self-centered. Maybe that’s expected from someone who writes a memoir, but I kind of got turned off by his self-promotion after awhile.

If you like Peter Falk (or just Columbo), I recommend watching his performances to enjoy him rather than reading this book. But that’s just my opinion.

This fantastic film out of Hong Kong features two friends with a passion for photography. After witnessing and photographing the tragic aftermath of a traffic accident, Jiney begins seeking out death in life and reflecting it in her art. It’s an almost erotic attraction that frightens her friend and potential lover Jas. The inevitable downward spiral of Jiney’s obsession pulls in those around her and shines light on a past experience of rape and disbelief by the one person Jiney trusted as a child. Making this film even more charged is the fact that Jiney and Jas are real-life sisters, Race Wong (Jiney) and Rosanne Wong (Jas). This film can be hard to watch at times but I have to say it’s one of the best films of this genre I’ve ever seen. It’s up there with Acacia, Dark Water and Wishing Stairs.

I recently caught Croupier, a 1998 film staring Clive Owen, Gina McKee, Alex Kingston (who also played Dr. Elizabeth Corday on ER), Kate Hardie and Paul Reynolds. I stumbled across this film after watching Mr. Owen’s latest flick, Shoot ‘Em Up, which left a lot to be desired. The actor who plays a dark but 2-dimensional character in Shoot ‘Em Up is a fully-sketched, 3-dimensional character in Croupier.

The film focuses on Jack, a struggling writer who picks up a night job as a croupier in a local casino. A croupier is a dealer, not a term I was familiar, nor was Jack’s girlfriend Marion. She wanted to live with a writer not what Jack’s become. Pieces of Jack’s history pop up over the course of the movie as he interacts with his girlfriend, coworkers, “punters” (the gamblers in the casino), and his father in South Africa. Is Jack reinventing himself, coming home, or something entirely different?

The movie feels like a piece of film noir, from its lighting and dark tone, as well as its use of voiceover by the main character Jack. One film that came to mind was The Maltese Falcon. However, Jack’s inner monologue strangely reminded me of the same technique in A Clockwork Orange. This is a film definitely worth watching. I’ve seen it twice and would definitely consider buying it for repeat viewings.

Over the past two nights, we watched Michael Moore’s stark documentary Bowling for Columbine. This film delves into the disastrous results when America’s culture of guns is coupled with its media-and-politically-driven culture of fear. If you haven’t seen this film, give it a chance. The images of NRA poster boy Charlton Heston praising guns in Littleton, Colorado, just over a week after Columbine, and in Flint, Michigan, just days after one six-year-old shot and killed one of his classmates with a gun, will make your blood boil.

The film isn’t all negative and shows how two survivors of Columbine go with Moore to K-Mart headquarters to ask them why they sell ammunition, the same ammunition whose spent bullets are still in their bodies. After staying in the corporate headquarters lobby and demanding to speak to someone with answers, they are poorly handled by a communications hack. The next day, they return with two things: the local media and shopping bags full of all the ammunition they could buy at a local K-Mart store. A VP comes out to talk with the crowd and reads a statement that says K-Mart will eliminate the sale of all ammunition from all its stores within 90 days. Wow! Now that’s activism. And, according to Moore and the two students, they were looking for answers and didn’t expect (though certainly embraced) this corporate policy change.

So, after last night, I was depressed but had a glimmer of hope. This morning, while scanning the wires, I ran across this amazing story. Cincinnati set a record last year in number of homicides. Just recently, a student was shot and killed at an event that was promoting nonviolence. In response, Cincinnati’s Democratic Mayor Mark Mallory has decided to not use a starter pistol to begin a 5K race this weekend. Instead of firing blanks from a pistol, he’ll use a whistle. The mayor said, “I think the symbolism is just bad. It’s just something I don’t do.”

Hats off to you Mayor Mallory. You’ve given this blogger a jolt of hope.

Famed Swedish film director Ingmar Bergman passed away today in his home country of Sweden. This cinematic genius directed more than 50 films, including three of my favorite movies of all time: Persona, Wild Strawberries and The Seventh Seal.

The Seventh Seal is quite possibly my favorite film, especially with its beautifully shot story of a knight returning home after one of the crusades. Questioning his faith and his actions, he crosses path with various figures as he tries to complete an emotional return trip to match his physical one. Famously remembered for its scenes where the knight plays a game of chess with the devil, this spectacle was parodied most excellently by Bill & Ted in their second movie, Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey.

Eerily enough, we just watched one of his films this past weekend, The Hour of the Wolf. The title refers to the hour just before dawn when most people die and most children are born. It is a time of ghosts and demons, where sleep comes fleetingly and the mind spins at top speed. Setting aside the potentially disconcerting timing of watching this film, I thought once again that if Bergman’s talent was shared by all directors, all films could be shot in black & white. Never have I seen a movie or setting look so beautiful. His camera’s eye saw past color and through it; and we are lucky to have been spectators to his vision.

The Associated Press has an article on his passing and the Guardian produced a wonderful section on Bergman’s life.

Pump up the Volume is a thought-provoking film from 1990. Premised as teenage angst channeled through pirate radio and ever rising stakes, this film explores the fundamental rights of freedom of speech and a right to education. It effortless melds a love story, political commentary and a killer soundtrack full of late 80s (real) alternative and punk music, including Concrete Blonde, the Pixies, Bad Brains, Above the Law, Sound Garden, Sonic Youth, and Cowboy Junkies.

The chemistry between the two lead actors, Christian Slater and Samantha Mathis, burns up the celluloid. Their first kiss actually looks like a first kiss. Some of the dialogue of the rest of the cast is a bit corny, but more due to acting ability rather than only poor writing.

This movie particularly resonates today with the impeding sale of large swaths of the broadcast spectrum from the government to private industry. These bands are ours. We should not be selling them to private bidders who then will exploit them and wring every drop of capital out of them. Some of the spectrum will be for first responders, and that’s a good thing. But, not all of it. And why should the government continue to auction off what belongs to the people not to the board rooms. As Harry says, talk hard!

Remember that urban legend about getting drugged in a bar and then waking up in a tub of ice with one of your kidneys missing? Well, Hong Kong’s Lo Chi-Leung has made it into an intense, twisted horror film. Ching, the lead woman character, has a bum kidney, she’s in renal failure which causes her to be underweight and frequently and unexpectedly throw up (and often on someone). Her boyfriend Wai appears to be having an affair with the other woman character, Ling. Tying all three together, besides the affair, is a spooky guy who appears to be the one stealing kidneys from unsuspecting women.

While at times the tension is stressed and obvious, the creepiness of the symbiotic and parasitic psychological ménage à trois is well worth the price of entry, especially if it comes back on the Sundance Channel and you can just tape it. It’s part of the Asia Extreme series that airs late Sunday evening (12 AM Monday morning).

Forest Whitaker starred as Ida Amin in one of my absolute favorite films, The Last King of Scotland. And tonight, he won his first Oscar (I think it’s his first). I’m so happy! Here’s what I wrote about that film back in December.

I’ll admit it, I have immersed myself in the Asia Extreme films being run on the Sundance channel. Ever since seeing Oldboy last year, I’ve become enamored with hard-boiled Korean flicks. Then I saw Phone late last year, and Korean horror become the new standard against which all horror films would have to be compared. Since then, I’ve also enjoyed Japanese films that fall into this extreme and new take on horror. This post will cover three films I recently watched, though more are sure to come. [I just purchased the final film in Park Chan-wook’s vengeance trilogy. Stay tuned for some thoughts on that in the future!]

Two of the films in this entry’s title are Korean: Acacia and Wishing Stairs, while Dark Water is from Japan. Wishing Stairs is the most recent one we watched, so let me start there. Directed by Yun Jae-yeon, the story covers a girls art boarding school, filled with teenage girls studying dance and sculpture. The title of the film refers to a set of stairs that lead up to the dormitory. There are 28 steps, but legend has it that if you start at the bottom and count each stair, if you reach a mystical 29th step, you can ask the “Wolf” to grant you a wish, no matter how selfish or macabre it may be. Well, in order to keep things exciting, several of the students reach this 29th step and the horror that unfolds is exciting. The story focuses on three of the girls, two dancers and one overweight/svelte sculptor. One dancer, So-hee, is the belle of the ball, as it were, popular, pretty and talented beyond belief. The other, Jin-sung works hard but always comes in second to her friend. The 29th step opens up the possibility of Jin-sung to surpass So-hee, but there’s a cost, and it’s deadly. Of the three films in this post, this is the weakest. But, there’s some good scares that happen, so it’s worth a watch.

Acacia, directed by Park Ki-Hyung, is a twisted take on the adopted child that turns out to be a little less angelic and a tad bit satanic. A Korean couple adopts six year old Jin-seong, a quiet boy attracted to the leafless acacia tree in the back yard. The boy gradually comes out of his shell, just in time for his parents to become pregnant with a son of their own. Jin-seong senses the stress of not being a biological child in this familial unit and disappears. While we wait to see if the police will find the boy, strange things begin happening, including the slow degradation of the bond between the husband and wife and more curiously, the acacia tree has come into full bloom. What lurks behind these developments is resolved in the final section of the film. In a truly innovative flashback/flash-forward technique, the story’s dark spaces become illuminated. And it’s not an easy light to look into.

Finally, let me turn to my favorite film of these three, Dark Water. Japanese director Hideo Nakata, of The Ring fame, tells a dark story of a separated mother and her six year old daughter moving into an apartment complex. Shot in a haunting, grayish, washed-out color, mother and daughter learn of the residents who lived above them, a single father and his daughter who disappeared and is presumed dead. The vacant apartment doesn’t seem to be totally vacant, and a theme of water permeates the film, from outside rain, to baths, to the sink, to an ominous water stain in the ceiling that just won’t go away. The films is eerie on a visceral level and at each turning point in the film, you feel as though your head might go under the water and you might not be able to get back to the surface. Stylistically, this film was the best of the three, and its storytelling was the most enchanting and frightening.

I had to think a little to decide if I also wanted to “code” this blog entry as “Movies - Horror,” since I was quite frankly repulsed by a variety of scenes in this South Korean film by Park Chanwook. Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance is the first film in Park’s revenge trilogy, the second of which is Oldboy that I mentioned in a previous posting. This film won the Fant-Asia Film Festival Best Asian film and the jury award at the Philadelphia Film Fest, both in 2003.

This film is not for the squeamish, but it is an interesting story. A deaf young man lives with his sister who needs a new kidney. She’d gotten sick working at a factory and her brother schemes ways to find a new kidney and the money to pay for the operation. He tries to buy a kidney but that fails. A kidney becomes available via the health service but they need money to pay for it and they don’t have it. Ryu, the young man, and his anarchist girlfriend plot to kidnap the daughter of Ryu’s mean boss. The ransom would be enough to pay for his sister’s operation.

The kidnaping and exchange of ransom goes well, but things spiral ridiculously out of control after that. Suicide, then accidental deaths, then torture, murder, and more murder. It made Reservoir Dogs look like a Disney Film at times, both in the graphic and emotional nature of the violence. But, you still feel for Ryu and his boss. I’d love to give out more details, but the film does have some twisted closure at the end. By this, I mean, if you sit down to watch this film, hang on through the end.

Another Sundance Film, another case of terror, chills up and down my spine, and a little twisted after watching Kim Ki-duk’s Samaritan Girl. Wow, what a flipping intense film. The story starts off with two teenage schoolgirls who have gotten into the roles of prostitute and pimp. The premise for this situation has something to do with getting plane tickets for the two of them to travel from Seoul to Europe, but it’s never fully fleshed out. The seemingly younger girl is having sex with adult men and charging them for it. Her friend is making the calls, setting the price and location, and waiting for her friend. Such waiting includes watching for the cops who (a) bust prostitution and (b) especially go after underage girls having sex with adult men.

Okay, if you’re not creeped out yet, the film gets creepier as the “pimp” girl confronts her conscience and feels like she’s doing a bad thing and making her best friend have to do horrible things. Her friend, however, seems to take joy in living life right here and right now, without any thoughts to the consequences or future. This carefree attitude because a major crux of the plot and involves themes of mourning, reconciliation, and ties that bind family and friends and strangers.