I went and saw the movie "Superbad" this afternoon. It had its funny moments but overall I'd say it was just okay. I think the funniest part about this movie was watching the people in the theater with me! First off, this movie is raunchy. Really raunchy. And there was this pervert sitting in the aisle with me that would say, "yeah baby" every time the movie showed a pair of tits. And I mean, EVERY TIME. And there were a lot of tits in this movie. Unbelievable. I wanted to punch the guy in the head. It would have been more endearing if he had tourettes.
And I'm so self-conscious that I kept worrying people were going to think I was saying it. Or that he was with me or something. So I totally booked out of the theater the moment it ended. What a perv.
It always disturbs me though when adults have young children at a movie like that. I saw at least two families there with children under the age of 10. Now I'm not naive, I know kids are going to encounter this stuff at some point anyhow but I can't imagine it's healthy to introduce it to them early. Likewise it wouldn't necessarily be healthy to shelter someone from it until the age of 40 either. But if I ever have a daughter I might try my best to do just that!
Showing posts with label movies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label movies. Show all posts
Monday, August 20, 2007
Thursday, February 15, 2007
"I NEVER GOT OVER THOSE BLUE EYES"
Last night I watched the film, "Walk the Line" about Johnny Cash. I absolutely loved this movie. Next to "Sin City" I think it was the best film from last year. I know a lot of people that watched "Walk the Line" and said it was, "okay" but wasn't very enthusiastic about it. Maybe the fact that I didn't know anything about Johnny Cash had something to do with it. I found it an incredibly romantic film and I really took to the characters. It was almost personal even though I have very little, maybe nothing, in common with Johnny's life. For whatever reason, this film hit me.
I spent the rest of the night writing and listening to Johnny Cash. Yes, it is my new obsession. I previously spoke of a lack of emotion within today's art. Johnny Cash is a perfect example of emotionally naked art. The lyrics are incredible and you can hear the pain within him. I can't believe I've never listened to Johnny Cash before?! He is quickly moving up my favorite of all time list. Luckily I have a roommate that owns all his CD's so I'll be happily busy listening. I'm 31 years old and have always consider myself a music freak (as in "major fan") but I have been big time humbled by the revelation that Johnny Cash absolutely rocks. I know I'm only talking about one artist here but, as small as it may seem, it really puts in perspective how rich life is with beauty - in so many forms. Next up...Waylon Jennings???
I spent the rest of the night writing and listening to Johnny Cash. Yes, it is my new obsession. I previously spoke of a lack of emotion within today's art. Johnny Cash is a perfect example of emotionally naked art. The lyrics are incredible and you can hear the pain within him. I can't believe I've never listened to Johnny Cash before?! He is quickly moving up my favorite of all time list. Luckily I have a roommate that owns all his CD's so I'll be happily busy listening. I'm 31 years old and have always consider myself a music freak (as in "major fan") but I have been big time humbled by the revelation that Johnny Cash absolutely rocks. I know I'm only talking about one artist here but, as small as it may seem, it really puts in perspective how rich life is with beauty - in so many forms. Next up...Waylon Jennings???
Monday, February 12, 2007
OF COURSE I WANT TO GO TO A TOPLESS BAR. OH, YOU SAID "TAPAS."
This weekend I booked a flight to Spain for 25 days in March. Although I was born in Naples, Italy (Navy brat), I have never traveled overseas since returning to the United States when I was one year old. I have three friends who are currently living in Spain that are generously helping me out with my itinerary. So far the itinerary looks something like this:
Madrid
Bilbao
Barcelona (with a one-day excursion to Figueres to see the Salvador Dali museum)
Valencia
Granada
Malaga
Morocco (A 2 hour boat ride to the tip of Africa from the South of Spain)
Seville
Cordoba
Back to Madrid
Traveling like this has always been a dream of mine. In fact, I've wanted to do this so badly that even though I've booked my flight I still feel like it might not happen - I've wanted to do this for SO long!
I can't imagine a better way to understand life than to travel the world. I am in awe of the history and progress of the world and so visiting a castle built in 1420 blows my mind. One of the reasons I chose to move to New York City was the old world feel of it all. Something simple like going to a fruit stand when you need fruit, or going to a butcher shop when you need meat was attractive to me for whatever reason. It was certainly different than going to a superstore for anything and everything.
I went to see the movie "Letters From Iwo Jima" this past weekend. I also rented the movies Judgement at Nuremberg and The Americanization of Emily. All three of these movies were very good and I recommend seeing each them. There was an overriding theme to these films - war, honor and humanity. One of the themes however, which is relevant to this post, is how we are essentially all the same...we are human. So although we have divided ourselves by skin color, religious beliefs, and bordered nationalism, the fact remains that under it all, we are human. I don't know if this would necessarily be the best thing for the world or not, I'm sure it would have it's downfalls, but what if our ultimate loyalty wasn't to our families or friends or religion or country? What if our ultimate loyalty was to humanity?
I suppose at its core, religion attempts to do this. It basically asks us to honor a higher power that reveres human life and humankind without exception. I want to emphasise "at its core" because I am very disappointed with what I believe is the corruption of religious values that has been hijacked by power mongers within the church. But I'll save that for another post...
The point being, I am going to travel to Europe and Africa for almost 4 weeks and I am so excited to witness the versatility of humanity and to gain a deeper appreciation of our history and life itself. I'm also extremely nervous to be doing this trip alone! I'm sure my stops in cities where I have friends will be a sight for sore eyes. None the less, I wish I was leaving tomorrow.
Madrid
Bilbao
Barcelona (with a one-day excursion to Figueres to see the Salvador Dali museum)
Valencia
Granada
Malaga
Morocco (A 2 hour boat ride to the tip of Africa from the South of Spain)
Seville
Cordoba
Back to Madrid
Traveling like this has always been a dream of mine. In fact, I've wanted to do this so badly that even though I've booked my flight I still feel like it might not happen - I've wanted to do this for SO long!
I can't imagine a better way to understand life than to travel the world. I am in awe of the history and progress of the world and so visiting a castle built in 1420 blows my mind. One of the reasons I chose to move to New York City was the old world feel of it all. Something simple like going to a fruit stand when you need fruit, or going to a butcher shop when you need meat was attractive to me for whatever reason. It was certainly different than going to a superstore for anything and everything.
I went to see the movie "Letters From Iwo Jima" this past weekend. I also rented the movies Judgement at Nuremberg and The Americanization of Emily. All three of these movies were very good and I recommend seeing each them. There was an overriding theme to these films - war, honor and humanity. One of the themes however, which is relevant to this post, is how we are essentially all the same...we are human. So although we have divided ourselves by skin color, religious beliefs, and bordered nationalism, the fact remains that under it all, we are human. I don't know if this would necessarily be the best thing for the world or not, I'm sure it would have it's downfalls, but what if our ultimate loyalty wasn't to our families or friends or religion or country? What if our ultimate loyalty was to humanity?
I suppose at its core, religion attempts to do this. It basically asks us to honor a higher power that reveres human life and humankind without exception. I want to emphasise "at its core" because I am very disappointed with what I believe is the corruption of religious values that has been hijacked by power mongers within the church. But I'll save that for another post...
The point being, I am going to travel to Europe and Africa for almost 4 weeks and I am so excited to witness the versatility of humanity and to gain a deeper appreciation of our history and life itself. I'm also extremely nervous to be doing this trip alone! I'm sure my stops in cities where I have friends will be a sight for sore eyes. None the less, I wish I was leaving tomorrow.
Thursday, February 1, 2007
THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY
By now you've probably realized that I am obsessed with the topic of emotion. I don't understand them and I don't know what to do with them. But there is one place where I absolutely MUST have emotion - the arts.
I'm going to reserve this post for music and movies in particular which are two of my real passions in life. What in the world has happened?! Don't we have anything meaningful to say anymore? It's like we have become a bad combination of the 60's and 80's. On one hand we have plenty of issues to talk about but in the end "we just wanna have fun." Where is the passion?
Grunge died with Kurt Cobain, which I have to say was rather appropriate. But I'm still waiting for something to take its place. Pop music doesn't do it. Half these sissies don't even play their own instruments. Cobain used the stage as his personal asylum. It was like when you were a teenager and you'd push your face deep into your pillow and scream out all the aggression, hoping your parents wouldn't hear. Only in his case there was no pillow and he didn't give a fuck who heard. Actually, that's not true, he did give a fuck who heard. The problem was that all the lunatics jumping around in front of him stopped listening at some point and it killed him. Kurt needed people to listen and understand, but when they stopped understanding - or at least caring - he didn't see a point in it anymore.
After Cobain died everybody started screaming into the microphone like a crazed monkey. Like that was what made Cobain so powerful. What they didn't understand was that Cobain HAD to scream. It wasn't a marketing scheme. There was no other way for him to communicate his pain. It was a reflex. Try listening to a song by Nirvana and not FEELING it. You can't. Now try listening to today's popular music and see if you can feel anything other than your hips gyrating slightly to an electronic backbeat.
Even rap music which at one point was dripping in emotion became stale. After 2Pac died the posers came out. Was EVERY rapper a street thug looking to murder anyone in their way? Hell no! But they thought that was the secret to rap success (some still do). Truth is when 2Pac delivered his lyrics you could hear them bursting out of every pore in his body. He had to speak his truth or he would die. Which he did. It wasn't until the great white hope named Eminem came along that there was a revival in real rap emotion. Many argue that Eminem was only popular because he was white but, again, listen to any song from Eminem's first few albums and see if you can't FEEL his message. Eminem's last album was so lame that he decided to hang it up for a bit. He had run out of meaningful things to say and he knew it. He knew he couldn't fake it. Because he never had before.
I could make a list right now of artists in the 60's, 70's (skip the 80's) and early 90's that used music as their soul's medication. It would be a pretty lengthy list altogether. If I tried to make the same list with today's artists, I'm not sure I'd get very far.
We are living in some of the most interesting times in the history of the world. Seriously. And no one has anything they HAVE to say or they feel like they might die? Do we have it THAT good? Are we afraid of something? Are we content with the money, the sex, the fame? Does that trump our heart and turn our eyes blind to everything else? I know the answer to that, I just don't want to believe it.
Movies have always been another expressive art form provoking an emotion that laid hidden between scenes. Many movies are good at creating an emotion in the audience but very few tell you why that emotion was important. I've read several reviews about this years Sundance film festival which have called it, "an unusually boring and dull year for Sundance." I would argue that the past handful of years at Sundance have been boring and dull. The movies today seem more preoccupied with looking cool or being unique rather than its content. I'm all for being unique but if your goal is to be unique you will never make a good film. Ever. It's not about the process. It always comes back to the message. Clint Eastwood is one of the few directors today making movies because he HAS to say something. If he doesn't say it he will die. Or at least want to. I can't think of one other director today that makes movies because the message means everything to him. Unfortunately Eastwood isn't a 24 year old prodigy. He is an old man trying to remind us of what being an artist means. I hope some talented individual is listening.
I'm going to reserve this post for music and movies in particular which are two of my real passions in life. What in the world has happened?! Don't we have anything meaningful to say anymore? It's like we have become a bad combination of the 60's and 80's. On one hand we have plenty of issues to talk about but in the end "we just wanna have fun." Where is the passion?
Grunge died with Kurt Cobain, which I have to say was rather appropriate. But I'm still waiting for something to take its place. Pop music doesn't do it. Half these sissies don't even play their own instruments. Cobain used the stage as his personal asylum. It was like when you were a teenager and you'd push your face deep into your pillow and scream out all the aggression, hoping your parents wouldn't hear. Only in his case there was no pillow and he didn't give a fuck who heard. Actually, that's not true, he did give a fuck who heard. The problem was that all the lunatics jumping around in front of him stopped listening at some point and it killed him. Kurt needed people to listen and understand, but when they stopped understanding - or at least caring - he didn't see a point in it anymore.
After Cobain died everybody started screaming into the microphone like a crazed monkey. Like that was what made Cobain so powerful. What they didn't understand was that Cobain HAD to scream. It wasn't a marketing scheme. There was no other way for him to communicate his pain. It was a reflex. Try listening to a song by Nirvana and not FEELING it. You can't. Now try listening to today's popular music and see if you can feel anything other than your hips gyrating slightly to an electronic backbeat.
Even rap music which at one point was dripping in emotion became stale. After 2Pac died the posers came out. Was EVERY rapper a street thug looking to murder anyone in their way? Hell no! But they thought that was the secret to rap success (some still do). Truth is when 2Pac delivered his lyrics you could hear them bursting out of every pore in his body. He had to speak his truth or he would die. Which he did. It wasn't until the great white hope named Eminem came along that there was a revival in real rap emotion. Many argue that Eminem was only popular because he was white but, again, listen to any song from Eminem's first few albums and see if you can't FEEL his message. Eminem's last album was so lame that he decided to hang it up for a bit. He had run out of meaningful things to say and he knew it. He knew he couldn't fake it. Because he never had before.
I could make a list right now of artists in the 60's, 70's (skip the 80's) and early 90's that used music as their soul's medication. It would be a pretty lengthy list altogether. If I tried to make the same list with today's artists, I'm not sure I'd get very far.
We are living in some of the most interesting times in the history of the world. Seriously. And no one has anything they HAVE to say or they feel like they might die? Do we have it THAT good? Are we afraid of something? Are we content with the money, the sex, the fame? Does that trump our heart and turn our eyes blind to everything else? I know the answer to that, I just don't want to believe it.
Movies have always been another expressive art form provoking an emotion that laid hidden between scenes. Many movies are good at creating an emotion in the audience but very few tell you why that emotion was important. I've read several reviews about this years Sundance film festival which have called it, "an unusually boring and dull year for Sundance." I would argue that the past handful of years at Sundance have been boring and dull. The movies today seem more preoccupied with looking cool or being unique rather than its content. I'm all for being unique but if your goal is to be unique you will never make a good film. Ever. It's not about the process. It always comes back to the message. Clint Eastwood is one of the few directors today making movies because he HAS to say something. If he doesn't say it he will die. Or at least want to. I can't think of one other director today that makes movies because the message means everything to him. Unfortunately Eastwood isn't a 24 year old prodigy. He is an old man trying to remind us of what being an artist means. I hope some talented individual is listening.
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