From: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org (loud-fans-digest) To: loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Subject: loud-fans-digest V7 #144 Reply-To: loud-fans@smoe.org Sender: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk loud-fans-digest Tuesday, June 19 2007 Volume 07 : Number 144 Today's Subjects: ----------------- [loud-fans] Re: nothing better to do at 4:30 in the morning.... [Russ Lew] Re: [loud-fans] Nancy Drew tunes [zoom@muppetlabs.com] [loud-fans] SIFF 2007's a wrap [zoom@muppetlabs.com] Re: [loud-fans] SIFF 2007's a wrap ["Stewart Mason" ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2007 01:44:56 -0700 From: Russ Lewis Subject: [loud-fans] Re: nothing better to do at 4:30 in the morning.... Mark sez... <<> Thanks, Mark. I'd been wondering about Madness and _Here Come the Brides._ Then again, if anything equals _Here Come the Brides,_ I'd say it's Bobby Sherman. He was a pop singer too, so this is more like Monkees = Monkees or Partridge Family = Partridge Family. << Lamb of God = Sesame Street (music for children with vocals channeled by Satan through Cookie Monster) >> What about GWAR? _Fraggle Rock,_ maybe? Or _WWF?_ By the way, all these equivalencies are approximate, and I don't think Chuck Klosterman ever pretended it was anything more than a fun way for a few stoners to amuse themselves. No one should take it too seriously. Randy Newman = Mark Russell. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2007 15:48:08 -0700 (PDT) From: zoom@muppetlabs.com Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Nancy Drew tunes > Well, I had an MG in high school, and I know the Nash Metropolitan and MG > were brothers mechanically. Mine was brown--called it "the turd." One of my college friends had an MG. It ran, but since we usually traveled in packs of three or more, whoever lost at rock-scissors-paper had to jump into the back seat. What's that, you say? The MG has no back seat? Exactly. Eric, owner of the MG, liked our friend Brian's back seat form the best: "It was like watching an octopus hide itself behind some rocks..." I've offered to fly out to this infernal machine, on my own dime, pour gasoline over it, and light a match. Eric keeps refusing me, though, Andy "I had $2,000 set aside to buy myself a really nice guitar, but I thought, you know, I'd rather support something that's really mind-boggling and cool." - --scientist Denny Gmur, on his decision to donate funds to Dr. John Cramer's time-travel research; read more at http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/319367_timeguy12.html ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2007 16:16:43 -0700 (PDT) From: zoom@muppetlabs.com Subject: [loud-fans] SIFF 2007's a wrap The Seattle International Film Festival just concluded, and I'd like to pass on my recommendations to all (any?) movie lovers out there. Best of Fest: James Lee's BEFORE WE FALL IN LOVE AGAIN Definitely watch (some of these have wide distribution, others don't): CRAZY LOVE, IN THE SHADOW OF THE MOON, RUNNING ON EMPTY, MANUFACTURED LANDSCAPES, A WALK INTO THE SEA: DANNY WILLIAMS AND THE WARHOL FACTORY, EAGLE VS. SHARK, OUT OF TIME, LA VIE EN ROSE, PAPRIKA, THE BET COLLECTOR, RESCUE DAWN, RED WITHOUT BLUE, SCOTT WALKER: 30 CENTURY MAN, MONKEY WARFARE, DR. BRONNER'S MAGIC SOAPBOX For some of my reviews, see below, Andy Crossing The Line UK 9:15 pm, May 28, Neptune Theatre; 4 pm, May 31, Lincoln Square James Joseph "Joe" Dresnok, former Private, U.S. Army, walked into the mine-laden Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea on August 15, 1962. He has never seen the West since that day. Taken prisoner by the North Koreans at first, he eventually blossomed into a bright kernel for that country's propaganda popcorn machine. English director Daniel Gordon sluices through stock footage of the North Korea we're supposed to knowlock-stepping soldiers and a garish bevy of painted signs and walls all depicting "US" forces timid, tiny, and strangled. Dresnok holds our interest through provocation. Tall, heavy, and somber at first, his mouth turns down to narrate his orphaned childhood, the wife who cuckholded him, the asphyxiation of military regiment. After his narrative crosses the DMZ he grins, showboating shiny front teeth that belong on a Mack truck grille. A fight between himself and an officer deserter? "There were two blows. I hit him, and he hit the ground." Dresnok's low voice drags, with squeaks into delight, the foot-end of a casket dragged short-handed across an undertaker's oak floor. In the land of repression, he's found room for himself. Andrew Hamlin Gypsy Caravan USA 4pm, May 25, SIFF Cinema; 6:30 pm, May 26, SIFF Cinema Early in this movie a young boy, somewhere in India, picks up a bowed instrument of some kind. We've watched the instrument's carving, its makers blowing dust from the peg holes. The boy's eyes click back and forth, never settling on any person or object, but he works the bow back and forth and begins to sing, and all the other children join in with him. This animus fuels the wide world of Rom, or Gypsy, music as expressed in the rest of Jasmine Dellal's documentary on a jaw-dropping amalgamation of such musicians as they travel North America between tour dates learning each other songs, each other's languages, and riffing on each other's pomposities. Indian raga, Spanish flamenco, horns, guitars, a whirling young man's "knee" dance done in full drag, and more fill out the astounding scope of Rom music. The tour manager, heard mostly through the long-distance crackle of his headset, both loves and hates his charges. But love and hate are only two things this playing contains. No one will be nearly so narrow as before, after boarding this bus. --Andrew Hamlin Paprika Japan 9:30 pm, May 25, Neptune Theatre; 1:15 pm, May 28, Neptune Theatre Some anime offers no rationale why, say, a man's head should, at the (or a) climax of the film, burst into scores of translucent blue butterflies. "Paprika"'s genius lies in delivering that cranial butterfly explosion but grounding it in rationale. Even if I couldn't quite follow said rationale from "A" to "Z" I can comfortably say it leadsafter a bevy of giant robots, giant dolls, leaps into and out of billboards, TV screensinto two quieter, more realistic scenes. In one, a female scientist breaks down and gives her love to a hugely overweight fellow scientist. In another a man whose professed his hatred of film sits down, quietly, to enjoy a show. The mad parades and symbol systems repeat themselves a bit, but doubly satisfy, as they serve love, acceptance, and the shredding of shiny but shallow personas. Andrew Hamlin Vanaja India 9:30 pm, May 26, SIFF Cinema; 1:45 pm, May 27, Harvard Exit A bonus to that talent scout who plucked sixteen year-old Mamatha Bhukya from a roiling sea of aspiring youth talent, and gave her a second chance after judging her hair too short. Bhukya embodies Vanaja with bright, shimmering, conniving eyes, suddenly hooded when she tries, haltingly, to prevaricate. Even as the beleaguered child of a hard-drinking fisherman, apprenticed to the old lady of the manor, Vanaja knows enough sass to cock a hip provocatively at her uptight supervisor. She wants to learn Kuchipudi dance, though, and only the old lady can guide her. You can see the film's plot twistsmistress' hunky son, illicit love, ruin, redemptionapproaching like a lighting-storm from over the ocean. Director Rajnesh Domalpalli frames the dancing in sensible medium shots allowing Bhukya (who spent a year learning dance, and acting) her dazzle, but dramatic action in unstable two-shots, always sliding to encompass one person and let the other one down with a plop. Vanaja doesn't suffer long from such solitude, though. She refines herself, and emerges exponentially larger than the sum of what she's learned. --Andrew Hamlin Andrew "Confession of Pain" Hong Kong 4 pm, June 13, Lincoln Square; 10 pm, June 15, Neptune Theatre Quoth Oscar handicapper Paul H. Henry on last year's Academy Awards: "The Departed [Best Picture of 2006] is a remake of a 2002 Hong Kong film, 'Infernal Affairs,' which some people claim was better. I haven't seen 'Infernal Affairs,' but I can nonetheless say with a great deal of confidence that the people who say that are wrong, because 'The Departed' was directed by Martin Scorsese and Infernal Affairs was not. QED." Having watched both "Internal Affairs" and "The Departed," I can testify that directors Andrew Lau and Alan Mak deliver sleeker power, plus a tense showdown between the cops and mob bosses, wrapping the whole thing up in a tad under an hour less than Scorsese took. Where "Infernal Affairs" displayed an odd couple (one cop undercover as a hood, one hood undercover as a cop) trying to avoid each other's nets, their latest film together, "Confession of Pain," gives us two cops broken apart, then glued back together for a case that can't be solved any other way. Watch before the Leonardo DiCaprio remake blots it up. Andrew Hamlin "Made In China" United States 7:30 pm, June 10, Neptune Theatre Film editor and Seattle resident John Helde starts his first feature-length documentary with a mystery: why did his father never speak of growing up in China, as part of an American Christian outreach to the country? He never gets a straight answer to his question, though part of one emerges when his father discusses not having many friends after his re-settlement Stateside. Was it China, or his own quiet nature? Probably some of both, the father figures equably. Tom Helde, Sr., dies of lung cancer halfway through "Made In China"'s running time, but haunts the second half as a warm-hearted ghost, guiding John Helde to find his father's birthplace on a Chinese mountaintop. Whole lives live in matter-of-fact summaries, as an elderly Chinese gentleman relates the job he left for "re-education" and came right back to. Or an old white woman, gone from China many decades, says she learned "there's no place like home." One small shift in emphasis, and home is no place. Andrew Hamlin "Mushishi" Japan 9:30 pm, June 8, Lincoln Square; 6:45 pm June 10, Egyptian Theatre As an anime doyen, Ttomo Katsuhiro masterminded "Akria"'s destructive devotion, the impunity of a giant child banging his wooden blocks; and the visually intricate retro-futurism of "Steamboy." His second live-action film presents a metaphysical healer taking arms against a sea of malevolent black ink and horns sprouting from innocent foreheads. Sadly he forgot to light the gas ring under his zingy tea. "Mushishi" lopes, and then lopes some more, losing the viewer in thickets of pursed lips, furrowed brows, and reaction shots reacting to no action. Andrew Hamlin "My Friend & His Wife" South Korea 4 pm, June 16, Pacific Place Cinema; 7 pm, June 17, Pacific Place Cinema Shin Dong-il's first feature film "Host & Guest" showed his affinity for emotional reactions, and identities, in slow, mesmerizing builds. This time out he doesn't disappoint in individual shots, where his actors still think and grow. A plot involving grisly death and rippling vengeance, though, shoves his people through necessitated Big Action, shredding that hard-won delicacy. A left turn back to realism, please. Andrew Hamlin RED ROAD--shifts abruptly in tone once the CCTV cop decides to get out the office, away from the banks of monitors, and muck around directly in the life of her target. But suspense and the menace stay strong, and the matter-of-fact cheerful, dead-end wastrels linger. THE FERRYMAN--grim, and gory, so not for those who don't care for grim and gory. Marred also by some woodenly shrill acting, even as the characters' reactions to the consult gore onslaught feels, at the core, realistic to me. I give it credit for unexpected directions after the first half-hour, though (I'm always chastising my friend Sam for turning off films around the first half-hour), and more specifically posing this conundrum: what if you found yourself transported from your young, ripped, hunky young body into a corpulent, grizzled, swollen-livered body; and furthermore marooned on a derelict watercraft one long stretch from your old boat, your sweetheart, and the murderous demon inhabiting your rightful shell...? PROTAGONIST--Jessica Yu's back after her controversial IN THE REALMS OF THE UNREAL. Her four interview subjects--an ex-"ex-gay" minister, a German terrorist, a bankrobber-turned-journalist, and (Yu's husband) a martial-arts obsessive--each lay out a life story from early damage to righteous true believer to doubt, destruction, and re-creation. Yu interpolates puppets performing Euripides. Probably due to the boldness, the puppets performing Euripides come across only slightly pretentious. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2007 19:45:47 -0400 From: "Stewart Mason" Subject: Re: [loud-fans] SIFF 2007's a wrap Did MONKEY WARFARE have the instructional video en francais at the end? S ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2007 22:34:01 EDT From: Scout82667@aol.com Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Re: nothing better to do at 4:30 in the morning.... In a message dated 6/18/2007 6:52:27 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time, rlewis@nethere.com writes: Then again, if anything equals _Here Come the Brides,_ I'd say it's Bobby Sherman. He was a pop singer too Yeah, I know. When I was about 5 years old my parents ran a record store, that only sold 8-track tapes--very successful for them. We had stacks of 8-tracks in the house all the time and I remember one of his--WITH LOVE, BOBBY. Even though 5-year-olds aren't sexual, it struck me at that age that he was different from the other musicians--Cream, Iron Butterfly, what have you., because I thought he looked very kind in the eyes, and he was looking into the camera like a puppy on the cover. Pushing 40, I think now how somebody like that could easily molest children, and nobody would ever know. I guess the world has hardened me, or I'm seeing things from a teacher protecting children kind of way. Schultz on "Hogan's Heroes" would be the prototype of the "Don't ask, don't tell" philosophy--with his trademark "I know nothing!" The band Oh-Ok--I was thinking "Too Close for Comfort." This would mean Jim J. Bullock (formerly Jm--currently the voice of Queer Duck) is Matthew Sweet. I loved that show, especially that rock chicky girl with the scratchy voice that was a friend of the girls--the one who liked Romeo Void. I think this thread has reached it's time expiration (rather quickly--like a chicken salad in the sun) and I'll retire it. - --Mark ************************************** See what's free at http://www.aol.com. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2007 23:52:51 EDT From: Scout82667@aol.com Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Nancy Drew tunes In a message dated 6/18/2007 7:07:53 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, zoom@muppetlabs.com writes: One of my college friends had an MG. It ran, but since we usually traveled in packs of three or more, whoever lost at rock-scissors-paper had to jump into the back seat. What's that, you say? The MG has no back seat? Exactly. lol--I know that too well. My brother drove me to high school band practice once in 9th grade (grudgingly instead of mom--he was a Senior and just couldn't be seen with the likes of ME), and my snare drum case went through his plastic back window on his MG. Never mind my snare case fell onto Wade Hampton Blvd. in afternoon traffic--I had harmed his pristine baby (he had an older and much cooler one than mine I that I got later--and smaller--he had a Midget in a cool blue color with chrome bumpers, and I had one of the last ones, the MGB, with those horribly ugly rubber "cow catcher" bumpers and pollution controls that made it run like a Vega with a melted block--complete with 8-track player--but it was a hand-me-down from my mom, and I didn't have to pay my insurance on it, just gas, so I shouldn't bitch--it WAS a convertible, and I had wheels, so I should be thankful in retrospect). My God, he was pissed about that window. But, you made me remember something funny: When my dad died, I used part of the money I received to buy a new car to drive to college--The Turd couldn't be trusted, and it sucked gas (and just sucked), and I bought a used Rabbit convertible. My dad, before he died, had bought me a fixer upper '65 Beetle for 300 dollars as a birthday present (as I'd always dreamed of having a '65 or '66 beetle), but the tranny went out in it (a failed attempt at "speed shifting" when the tranny cable snapped), and I have the mechanical ability of a toddler, so it wasn't practical (though I did learn how to change my oil from having the Beetle--a great repair book, now a classic called HOW TO KEEP YOUR VOLKSWAGEN ALIVE, written by this hippie guy, taught me how. But, before I go off on another tangent, I lived in a dormitory at College of Charleston that was monitored carefully by this guy called "Billy Badass"--the type of guy my friend Shireen would have called in her memoir "fat Southern cop: Stupidus Dickus." He resembled Hunter Thompson in a rednecky way, and was ALWAYS on duty, and a real stickler for the rules. You couldn't have people in your room as a guest unless it was authorized, and Steve (my Jenny Piccoloish clotheshorse best friend who got me to drive the MG to Atlanta in high school) wanted to come down for the weekend from USC in Columbia (he realized he made a dreadful mistake and went to COC the following year--then got accepted at F.I.T. in New York from his portfolio--I was so proud!--we split an apartment in downtown Charleston sophomore year--the most fun year of my life). Anyway, Steve snuck in my dorm by, and to this day it causes me pain to think of it--getting in my trunk. Keep in mind this is the trunk of a VW Rabbit convertible, which is a little Houdini torture chamber of a space, and he was about 6 ft. tall, but, he did it. He was into Yoga at the time, and he managed to get in there and get through the gate of the dorm and back to my room in the back of the dorm's parking lot in about two minutes. He held his breath. God, it's amazing he'd wrinkle his Henry Grethel shirt like that! Thanks for bringing that memory back to me, - --Mark ************************************** See what's free at http://www.aol.com. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2007 23:21:53 -0600 From: Roger Winston Subject: Re: [loud-fans] Nancy Drew tunes No offense, Mark, but my days of recreational drug use have been over for quite some time, and I don't think I can score anything tonight that will enable me to decipher this. I believe the average brain can only handle seven levels of digression. I hereby declare this thread closed. Latre. --Rog - -- FlasshePoint, yet another blog among millions: http://www.flasshe.com At Monday 6/18/2007 09:52 PM, Scout82667@aol.com wrote: >In a message dated 6/18/2007 7:07:53 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, >zoom@muppetlabs.com writes: > >One of my college friends had an MG. It ran, but since we usually >traveled in packs of three or more, whoever lost at rock-scissors-paper >had to jump into the back seat. What's that, you say? The MG has no back >seat? Exactly. >lol--I know that too well. My brother drove me to high school band practice >once in 9th grade (grudgingly instead of mom--he was a Senior and just >couldn't be seen with the likes of ME), and my snare drum case went >through his >plastic back window on his MG. Never mind my snare case fell onto Wade >Hampton >Blvd. in afternoon traffic--I had harmed his pristine baby (he had an older >and much cooler one than mine I that I got later--and smaller--he had a >Midget in a cool blue color with chrome bumpers, and I had one of the >last ones, >the MGB, with those horribly ugly rubber "cow catcher" bumpers and pollution >controls that made it run like a Vega with a melted block--complete with >8-track player--but it was a hand-me-down from my mom, and I didn't have >to pay my >insurance on it, just gas, so I shouldn't bitch--it WAS a convertible, and I >had wheels, so I should be thankful in retrospect). My God, he was pissed >about that window. But, you made me remember something funny: > >When my dad died, I used part of the money I received to buy a new car to >drive to college--The Turd couldn't be trusted, and it sucked gas (and just >sucked), and I bought a used Rabbit convertible. My dad, before he died, >had >bought me a fixer upper '65 Beetle for 300 dollars as a birthday present (as >I'd always dreamed of having a '65 or '66 beetle), but the tranny went >out in >it (a failed attempt at "speed shifting" when the tranny cable snapped), >and I >have the mechanical ability of a toddler, so it wasn't practical (though I >did learn how to change my oil from having the Beetle--a great repair book, >now a classic called HOW TO KEEP YOUR VOLKSWAGEN ALIVE, written by this >hippie >guy, taught me how. But, before I go off on another tangent, I lived in a >dormitory at College of Charleston that was monitored carefully by this guy >called "Billy Badass"--the type of guy my friend Shireen would have >called in >her memoir "fat Southern cop: Stupidus Dickus." He resembled Hunter >Thompson >in a rednecky way, and was ALWAYS on duty, and a real stickler for the >rules. >You couldn't have people in your room as a guest unless it was authorized, >and Steve (my Jenny Piccoloish clotheshorse best friend who got me to drive >the MG to Atlanta in high school) wanted to come down for the weekend >from USC >in Columbia (he realized he made a dreadful mistake and went to COC the >following year--then got accepted at F.I.T. in New York from his >portfolio--I was >so proud!--we split an apartment in downtown Charleston sophomore year--the >most fun year of my life). Anyway, Steve snuck in my dorm by, and to this >day it causes me pain to think of it--getting in my trunk. > >Keep in mind this is the trunk of a VW Rabbit convertible, which is a little >Houdini torture chamber of a space, and he was about 6 ft. tall, but, he did >it. He was into Yoga at the time, and he managed to get in there and get >through the gate of the dorm and back to my room in the back of the dorm's >parking lot in about two minutes. He held his breath. God, it's amazing >he'd >wrinkle his Henry Grethel shirt like that! > >Thanks for bringing that memory back to me, >--Mark ------------------------------ End of loud-fans-digest V7 #144 *******************************