Movie Festival Part Two

It's been a long week so I have not returned to the blog as promised. However, it's been a lovely week -- 60-70 degree weather. I can't believe this is still February! Usually I'm hating my life in Connecticut.

After attending the documentary, Southern Belle, which I wrote about in my last post, I wanted to see a couple shorts, including one called sexting by Neil LaBute -- the only name I recognized in this festival. Due to scheduling issues, which happened throughout the festival, I saw Mississippi Innocence, an hour-long documentary about the Innocence Project that freed two men (one from death row and one from life in prison) based on DNA evidence.

Not a great film, but one I acknowledge as very important. The style reminded me of Errol Morris's The Thin Blue Line, though without the Philip Glass soundtrack. In fact, I seem to remember that the music in Mississippi Innocence was annoying. (One may say the same about Glass but I didn't mind it). Plus, it's always difficult in a crime documentary to treat the victim in a way that does not abuse her twice. I was alarmed, but understood, why they had to show part of the little girl's body -- in order to reveal serious problems with the forensic process.

After this documentary, which by the way, won as "audience favorite," I sat through the aforementioned sexting. I know that some of you may have very strong feelings about LaBute's films because he portrays devastating pictures about the relationships between men and women. Well, one could even accuse him of depicting/normalizing misogyny. One does not walk out of his films usually feel pretty good about humanity.

The short, however, was a comedy, featuring Julia Stiles who is such a strange actress -- with her very young face and husky voice. The camera focused on her as she delivered a monologue. The premise is that she received a sexy text message from her lover, but she realized that the text was meant for his wife, not for her. So, she calls the wife and meets her for lunch. Acting as the "wounded party" in this exchange, she did have some great lines and I laughed out loud at points. After this, I didn't stick around for the second short, Pillow, although I wish I had seen it.

Instead, I went to see two more shorts -- God's Square Mile and Mozambique. The first was an interesting history about a camp meeting that created a small town in New Jersey. For those not familiar with that term, though Willimantic, CT has one as well, the camp meeting was a Christian movement in America where people would go on a religious holiday, focusing on spiritual renewal, etc. I thought this history was interesting because this town was an important example of urban planning and part of America's religious history because it basically was a theocracy, with their own stringent blue laws and a court that enforced them. The controversy depicted in the film was the fact an older lesbian couple wanted to use the camp meeting's pavilion for their civil service. The film tried to make it out as a big deal but everybody was just so nice and reasonable, wanting to make the town a nice place, it really wasn't that interesting to watch. In other words, all sides made it clear that this was a legal matter, not a personal one.

Not that I need to have some kind of red meat controversy to make a good film, but this one definitely waned. I think an interesting film could have been made but I was bored.

The second short film in this set was Mozambique, a story about AIDS orphans. I liked this one very much, mostly because it wasn't one of those films where people from other countries come in and make "art" out of other people's miseries. Instead, this was a direct result of donating cameras and other equipment to AIDS orphans (those who lost both parents due to the disease) and this was the story of one young man who shot the film and told his story. It is fascinating how my view changes when looking at pictures the kids themselves took of each other. Rather than seeing the kids through a developed country's eye, I did feel like I was seeing their point of view. I may be kidding myself because obviously, the people who donated the equipment helped to edit the film.

The young man, Alcides Soares, who had been adopted by an elderly woman (a nice woman, but it appeared an example of forced eldercare), seeks his younger brother who moved with his father when the parents separated. I admit I wept a lot in this film, and I felt it was genuinely earned.

Okay, I'm on a roll, so let's finish off the Friday viewings!

Despite the fact I had been up since before dawn, I stuck around for the late night showings -- the horror movie block. Of course I had to! How could I look my friends in the eye if I did not report back on these films!

First up, Shock, tried to do something fun but I thought the film was poorly acted and boring. The twist was not "shocking."

Monster Hunt with James and Kevin took the premise if those ghosthunter shows (or other reality shows) actually found a monster. Reminded me a little of Mythbusters. I admit that this one cracked me up. A fun movie for what it was.

Blood Therapy was a very short piece about a young man talking to a doctor. The guy who played the doctor was terrible! Overall silly little film about someone trying to make a serious horror short. That's hard to do and I saw the end coming a mile away.

Happy Face, on the other hand, focusing on a young starlet, getting out of a mental institution on Long Island, was able to be a bit more serious and creepy. The actress, as the director tries to point out, does have one of those silent film star faces, and the guy playing her publicist was freaking hilarious. The sets and the dialogue were overall good. However, I do take issue with the long clip from Eyes Without a Face, including the gruesome surgery that removes a woman's face. That was a little too much of a heavy borrow which just signaled in an uninteresting way to the audience "isn't this cool? This is what I was thinking about in making my film!" But when your clip is more powerful than anything else in your film, you got a problem.

Night of the Punks was the must-see on my list because I knew that my horror loving, punk music friends would want a report. It did not disappoint. Snappy dialogue, high-grade B special effect (look at all that goo!), tight editing, many, many references to punk music. Shaun of the Dead has been very, very good to the comedy horror movie. My only question is why does the girl have to get the long scene with green gunk spraying in her face?.......Let's be a little subtle people.

Murderabilia is the must-see I recommend to you. Here, it focused on a guy who collects memorabilia from murder scenes (hence, Murderabilia which is an actual term). In the long opening scene, he is visiting a killer in jail to "collect" his story. The convict relates the night he killed a young girl. Very nice dialogue and very good acting. I actually found the collector WAY more creepy than the killer though his acting was well-done too. I thought the short was fantastic. My only complaint is that it placed the credits midway in the film, making us think that the film was over, when really it was just poor choice to go to the next scene. The film lost its momentum. The film turns to the collector visiting a murderabilia dealer. The dealer had some good lines, but he talked way too long. The director was obviously reluctant to cut some of the "good lines" which was a shame. Move it along. Still, best film of the night. They said after the viewing that they were trying to turn it into a feature film and based on what I saw, I think they have a good chance to make a decent film.

Last was River City Dead, a locally-shot b-grade camp horror film complete with Nazis (the character, Patricia Hitler, was funny), a noirish detective, sexy vampires, pimps, zombies, etc. Didn't work but it looked like they were having fun.

Okay, that was Friday. Admittedly, I didn't go to as many in the next days but since I saw collections of shorts, the posts may be just as long!

Snow, Egypt, Oxford Film Festival Part One

So far my New Year's resolution to blog more has fallen on deaf fingers. They don't seem to want to take the time to let all my good friends know what's going on. However, the last couple days have been really exciting so I am making myself share.

First, we had another snow storm in Mississippi.
(Image from the local paper, The Oxford Eagle). Classes were canceled Wednesday at noon and then all day Thursday. I spent that day watching events unfold in Egypt, waiting for Murbarak to say he was going to resign. I was very worried that he hadn't but it appears that he is gone. I was so stuck to the TV and to the media that I actually signed up for Christiane Amanpour's Twitter feed (just love her). Now, I'm on Twitter but it remains to be seen if I do more than read what's up with others. Kate, you are the second person I'm following.

Now that world and weather events have settled for now, I also had the fantastic opportunity to attend Oxford's premier winter event -- the 8th annual Film Festival. I had to teach all day, but once I got to my first screening at 5:15, I stayed until 12:30am. Note to self -- popcorn makes a very poor dinner.

The festival is still going on, and I'm planning on attending a few more events before the end. But, here is the beginning of my review.

The first film I saw was a documentary feature called, Southern Belle, by filmmakers Kathy Conkwright and Mary Makley (both of whom were in attendance). Though I saw the late night fright fest shorts later, I think this was the far scarier movie. It's a look at the Tennessee Athenaeum Rectory's "summer camp" for young women to play "southern belle" the eve of the Civil War. This place was a Girl's School beginning in 1852 and lasted for fifty years. As was typical of such schools, it taught the girls how to be a lady -- dancing, deportment, etiquette, and the "finer" skills.

(Promotional image from the film)

This summer camp aims to recreate that experience, complete with dress (hoops and all) and manners (you want to be like Melanie, not Scarlett, ladies). The sidestepping of the issue (or more accurately "whitewashing") that slavery allowed these women to live in this manner dives at the heart of "southern-ness." It's contradictory and tension-filled -- hey, Faulkner struggled with it a lot. The filmmakers decided to let the images "speak" for themselves but I think I would have liked some more critical perspective (maybe, I'm divided). I fear that some southerners will look at this as a preservation of values that are good to keep and that they will look at it uncritically (case in point, the young women behind me in the theater, starting singing Dixie and said "we never get to sing this anymore").

The earnest teachers who want to preserve this Southern viewpoint were probably the most scary. They were very nice, but completely deluded. For example, the leader of the camp who played the pastor, could not answer why they never talked about race (or why black girls would not want to attend). As part of a "history" lesson, he addressed the girls in character, informing them that Tennessee had just seceded from the Union and told them all the "good" reasons that the state had done so. (Tennessee was actually the last state to secede and there was a good deal of resistance about whether or not they should). The long speech he makes reminded me immediately about current debates about State's Rights and the far, far right's call that they are being unfairly pushed around by the Federal Government.

My dear Northern friends, this scene will in many ways confirm to you what you think about the South and that makes me a little sad.

Anyway, back to the film, the girls were fascinating characters and the filmmakers focused on compelling stories. But where there's race issues, there are also gender issues. And what happens to one girl in particular who returns the next year is a tragedy in my opinion.

The filmmakers said that the film will be shown on PBS this July. I'll let you know when it does.

More on the festival later....

Film Glut

Here is a list of all the shows and movies Kate and I watched while she was visiting. Yes, we did get out of the house now and then.

Korean horror/family drama/comedy: The Host
Korean horror/family drama: A Tale of Two Sisters
Korean horror/revenge drama/comedy: Lady Vengeance

Lifetime movie (Kate's request which I thought was weird): The Craigslist Killer
Three episodes of Black Adder
Two episodes of British Comedy The IT Crowd
Two episodes of Better Off Ted

Twisted French fairy tale: Blue Beard
Odd Orson Welles "documentary" F is for Fake
British comedy Withnail and I

And, in order of watching, starting New Year's Eve:

Doctor Who: The End of Time (g'bye David Tennant)
All About Eve
Superman II
Die Hard

What connects the last three? "Is there no one on this planet to even challenge me?" which I can totally hear Bette Davis and Alan Rickman say.

Belated Birthday wishes to Jill and movie reviews

I dedicate this post to my dear friend, Jill, who is currently residing about three time zones away in California. In honor of your birthday, I wish I could serve you some chocolate mousse and watch two of your favorite movies -- Legally Blonde and Dune. I miss the fact that I don't know what your current favs are! But I like the juxtaposition of the romantic comedy and the Lynch sci-fi epic. I wonder what order we should watch them in.

Speaking of movies, since Oscar season is upon us and since there are TEN nominated best picture films and that most of them are currently available on DVD, I've been lining them up on my Netflix queue. So here goes a couple months of what I've been watching.

Inglourious Basterds, directed by Quentin Tarantino. Couldn't get this from Netflix because it was so popular and I'm just a movie-watching chump that they wish they could throttle. So I rented it from redbox which was pretty easy. A very silly piece of film-making which surprises me that it received such acclaim because I saw nothing really that innovative or moving in this revisionist, fantastic WWII story. Perhaps because it was so surprising that Tarantino could create a film that did not explicitly rely on pop culture references -- unless you call war films and German film-makers part of that culture. Still, I will admit that Tarantino is a master of the scene. He can tease an event out with great tension and flair even though we might have seen them before. I mean, can the standoff in the bar really compare with what he did in Reservoir Dogs? I delight in his dialogue and revel in the post-modern approach of "this is and isn't how people talk" -- see more below when I talk about Mamet and the Coens. And the guy who got the juiciest lines, Christoph Waltz much deserves his supporting Oscar nomination because it's always so much fun when he's onscreen and not at all what I was expecting. I didn't even mind Brad Pitt playing around in the film because Waltz would pop up again. I won't spoil for those who have not seen the film and still want to, but I was disappointed that the two plotlines did not dovetail better except through casual and brutal violence.

A Serious Man -- directed by the Coen brothers. Brutally funny in a way that Tarantino can't even near because the heart of the humor and the agony is the existential crisis. Tarantino's characters are always confident in what they know about the world, but not so in Coen brothers films. These characters get swept up by larger than life events and struggle to stay in that life, much less understand it (I think that was my problem with Burn After Reading because these people were so transparent in their motives and their struggles seemed very petty and mean) . How can a movie so deadly hilarious be so painful at the same time? The ending just made me cry. I very much see it as a companion to No Country for Old Men, where you know where the characters are heading, and it's a very bleak world. No one is rewarded for being decent. I rather long for the sweetness of the dream at the end of Raising Arizona but the brothers seems to have moved past that.

The Hurt Locker -- directed by Kathryn Bigelow (both film and director are nominated for an Oscar). Haven't watched it yet but it's sitting on my coffee table at the moment. I'm looking forward to it.

Avatar -- directed by James Cameron (who is, ironically Bigelow's ex-husband). Blah, blah, blah, so much has been written on it so I'll boil it down to the basics. Visually amazing. It was the first time I was watching a CG film and thought it looked real. Imaginative design. It's, what, like three hours? and I wasn't squirming in my seat. Negatives: Sigourney Weaver very underused. Didn't understand her character at all. Heavy-handed, cliched ridden message. Yeah, we know that corporations are the evil lurking behind the military-industrial complex. And yet another tribute to the noble savage and white guy's guilt. And, I don't know about you, but maybe I've been institutionalized but I was a little disturbed at seeing Marines getting blown up. I just kept imagining some poor soldier, who had nothing to do with the policies that Cameron is critiquing, back from hell sitting through this -- and hearing the crowd cheer at the big explosions. My students did point out to me that the marines were supposed to be "ex" but I seemed to miss that.

District 9 -- directed by Neill Blomkamp. I highly recommend that you see this if you haven't already. Much more thoughtful than Cameron's romp, but still a satisfying action film. Very gory -- I didn't realize how so until someone had pointed it out to me and then I recalled that I had planned to eat dinner in the middle of watching it and thought "yeah, I'll just wait a bit." The politics are also more interesting given its setting in South Africa with nods both to apartheid and current events of Zimbabwean refugees in that country. You'd never know from my review that it's a science fiction tale about a giant space ship with a bunch of aliens stranded? The special effects also made everything realistic like Cameron's film. But where his is squeaky clean, District 9, is muddy, dirty, and violent. You don't always get the answers for how and why, but the villains in this film are exactly how I would think humans would act in this situation. And the hero is not a squeaky clean, All-American guy fallen on hard time. This protagonist is the bane of the universe -- an incompetent bureaucrat (for the horror of competent bureaucrat see any Nazi film or read any Kafka). Not a perfect film but takes more chances than many that I have seen. I wish had seen it in the theater.

Up -- directed by Pete Docter and Bob Peterson. Aren't we in the middle of dire times? Recessions and job losses and wars and the like? What is it with these really sad films? Where are the silly musicals? That being said, within the first ten minutes of Up, I was already crying. The opening sequence was just too wonderful and, while it bordered on sentimentality, it was saved by the fact that it happened in the beginning. If it had been at the end, way too much weight would have been put on it. I don't think it was as good as Wall-E, a charming film with likable characters and enough laughs.

The Lovely Bones -- directed by Peter Jackson (although someone should have slapped him while he was making it). I read the original book a few years ago by Alice Sebold since it had been so popular. The book was fine, but the movie was something else. I saw it with Faye who could barely contain herself during the film. The story, in a nutshell, is the murder of a young girl whose ghost watches as her family copes with her death. In the book, she provided a running commentary and was an interesting exercise in character development. In the film, Jackson has turned it into a ghost story where we spend just as much time in her magical world and in how she tries to affect events in her family life. I thought some of the parts were interesting but - and I have to agree with Faye -- most became really absurd. Jackson could also have benefited from some tighter editing and someone with the guts to rein him in a bit (see above slapping comment). Stanley Tucci is nominated for playing the skeezy serial killer but I think the Academy really wanted to nominate him for his fine turn in Julie & Julia but you know how it goes, if it bleeds, it leads. How many actors playing serial killers have won Oscars -- hmm Charlize Theron and Anthony Hopkins. Anybody else I'm missing?

Okay, I'm going on way too long here but I'll just sum up some of the other things I've been watching in the months I've been not-blogging.

Redbelt -- directed by David Mamet. I just recently watched this 2008 film and I wanted to write a meditation on movie dialogue with Tarantino, the Coens, and Mamet being the holy trinity but I'll have to put that off for now. Again, I don't always enjoy Mamet but his dialogue is hypnotic.

and the obligatory anime series:

Darker than Black (seasons one and two) -- interesting premise and characters which had potential but fell victim to the Evangelion story arc where all stories have to end in a big mystical nothing (talk about your Bloom's Anxiety of Influence). In Japan and in Brazil, two mysterious gates pop up which causes all sorts of havoc. One, the sky is gone and replaced with a false sky with false stars. Two, certain people develop superpowers and cease to have human emotions. They are called "contractors" because after they use their power, they have to "pay a price" -- and this has been a rather amusing part of the show. It can be as simple as pulling out hairs or smoking a cigarette to being forced to spill secrets, kiss someone, arrange pebbles in a particular order, and breaking fingers. Conspiracies abound as various government and NG organizations vie for the power in these Gates, and they hire these contractors to go around and do various nefarious deeds. It's a short series in mostly two episode blocks but we follow a group of characters who work for the "Syndicate." Then it settles into an end-of-the-world arc which did have me watching, waiting for the big pay-off. Not all the questions are answered, and neither will you find them in Season 2 which was dreck for a variety of reasons.

All right, got that out of my system. Will try to post more often so as not to inundate you with my insane rambling chatter, dear friends.

Who Watched the Watchmen?

My back was finally feeling better so I made a date with a friend to go to Watchmen. We went to a 4:30 matinee yesterday and we were one of half a dozen people there (does not bode well for the film, I suppose). I'm of mixed feelings of it so I'm going to list what I liked and what I didn't like. There are lots of spoilers ahead (even if you have read the comic) so don't read on.

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What I liked:
--The way they animated Rorschach's mask (must have been agonizing for the director and special effects people to decide how it should look at every moment -- the best part was when Rorschach was punched)
--The floating dust motes in Dr. Manhattan's aura
--The way Dr. Manhattan looked, even his blue genitals
--The casting for the Comedian, Rorschach, and Nite Owl were all good. I was dubious that Patrick Wilson could pull it off because he's too good-looking and in great shape. I wonder if they used special effects to make him look dumpy? Or did he just have permission to eat all the pasta he wanted? His "reunion" with Jackie Earle Haley (from Little Children) was also neat. Haley got the voice, the look, the shortness, and I liked his "hurm."
--though the pop culture references that tried to position the film in time were tireseome for the most part (esp. the montage at the beginning), the John McLaughlin, Pat Buchanan, and Eleanor Clift group were hilarious. Who knew that an actress could get a role based on this ability to mimic Clift?
--Sally Jupiter getting a punch in on the Comedian. I liked it better than the girly scratch in the book and the ensuing fight was interesting theoretically about women superheroes. It was a brutal scene and I have more to say about it below in what I didn't like.
--the eighties clothing and earrings (!)
--the way they shot the famous "bathroom" murder scene
--the owlship looked awesome
--Matt Frewer as Moloch.
--the way the film really showed Nite Owl's fetish and impotence problems
--Laurie's breakdown on Mars was moving
--the ending. I thought the ending of the film actually worked. I never really liked the giant alien squid and showing Nite Owl having a few moral qualms about it made sense (he was such a weenie in the book). After all, he's the schlub in the film without a grand ideology about humanity (Dr. Manhattan, Ozymandias, Rorschach, the Comedian, etc all have bleak outlooks but he's the one guy just trying to get by).
--that it was a rated R film. They didn't try to make it PG-13 even though it's going to hurt the film financially.

What I didn't like:
--The casting of Ozymandias was completely wrong. He did a horrible job or was given horrible direction. I think you are supposed to think that at the beginning he's an earnest do-gooder and then the twist is more surprising because he's the most cynical of all. In the film, his performance screams "I'm a Villain!" His line delivery was wooden and terrible.
-- the soundtrack was HORRIBLE. The mixture of different times and songs as well as using songs to push an emotion. That was lazy. If you notice the song and not the performance, you aren't doing it right.
-- the comedian as Kennedy's assassin (c'mon!)
-- Lee Iacocca getting a bullet between the eyes
--the excessive and graphic violence that was not necessary and went against characterizations: e.g., Nite Owl and Laurie killing those guys in the alley; Rorscach plunging the meat cleaver over and over again in the pedophile's head, watching the guy who had fryer oil dumped on him
-- some dramatic slow mode for pointless situations (like Nite Owl jumping out of the ship which was a prelude to talking not ass-kicking. The director did this a lot with Laurie too)
-- too much Nixon
-- I think the Comedian scene with Moloch could have been shot better
-- I wished they had done the Watchmaker scene on Mars a little closer to the original but I understand that that might have messed with the tone of the film even more
--that I still think it made no sense to those who haven't read the book

What I'm mixed about:
-- Billy Crudup's voice as Dr. Manhattan. It seemed too soft for me but I'm not sure
--I liked the opening fight scene but I wonder if it would have been better to leave it out.
-- I liked the fact that the director left references to all these other superheroes but it did bog down the film a big -- opening montage

Okay, there is more but I'll have to save that for another day. I have to sign off now.

I Fall to Pieces

So, here I sit, not-having-seen-Watchmen-yet, and I am reeling in pain. I twinged something in my shoulder on Saturday that makes a couple positions (reclining or lying down) utterly excruciating. I wish I had some of those muscle relaxers that my mother took when she had her hip replacement surgery. When I was visiting her during this time, I also threw out my back. She gave me one of her pills, and I'm pretty sensitive to such narcotics. I could still feel the pain but I so did not care. Probably best I don't have them.... And oh yeah, my right foot has been hurting for a while (I blame all that walking at the Comiccon!) but it doesn't hurt that bad what with my back.

Looking on the bright side, probably best that here-I-sit-not-having-seen-Watchmen-yet because I don't think I could make through the three hour noirish-wannabe slugfest.

Looking further into the sun, one could also say that here-I-sit-not-grading-papers (which is a usual position) or here-I-sit-not-reading-Kafka or here-I-sit-not-having-a-stick-poked-in-my-eye.

Here-I-sit-and-I-fall-to-pieces (cue Patsy Cline)

Feeling chilly?

Yeah, we know it's cold enough for us. Stop asking. This is one of those weather systems where one could be wearing every piece of clothing in one's closet and feel like one would be just as cold, standing naked and doused with water in the middle of the street.

In the spirit of the QOE's movie reviews, here are some movies that you should watch when you are feeling cold.

Stray Dog (1949) by Akira Kurosawa, starring a very young Toshiro Mifune. Why for a cold day? Well, Mifune plays a cop who has lost his gun and spends the moving tracking it down. It happens in the middle of a heatwave. Everybody is sweating bullets and looking miserable.

Sunshine (2007) by Danny Boyle (he of Slumdog Millionaire fame), starring Cillian Murphy, Michelle Yeoh, and other familiar faces one often sees as second-tier actors. It's a science fiction story about some astronauts going to "jumpstart" the sun, which is dying. They have to get very close to the sun and it gets very hot. Fun film. Not the best but different from the usual science fiction fare. You get a sense that all of the astronauts are a bunch of nerds -- which I appreciate over the manliness of say, Armageddon, etc. The twist is a little silly and I admit that I watched this on a dying TV so I had a very difficult time discerning some of the arty action.

The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994), an Aussie film by Stephan Elliot. Lots of sweatydrag queens as their bus breaks down in the desert. Great roles by Terance Stamp, Hugo Weaving, and Guy Pearce.

Lawrence of Arabia (1962) by (of course) David Lean. Just watch the scene when Peter O'Toole crosses the desert and demands a drink at the bar. He's sunburned and his lips are cracking.

Well, those gems should keep you warm for the moment.

Time is getting shorter

Well, literally, the days are getting shorter but it does feel like all that I wanted to get done this year is not getting done. One of my goals was to keep up with this blog and I have, in fact, started a post a couple times since my last one. But inspiration proved elusive. So, I decided to just plow through -- which is advice I give my students.

I'm also inspired by a visit of a writer in my residence -- Miss Kate. She will most likely blog about this as well but I met up with her on Friday after a long couple days of conferencing with students. I was hurriedly cleaning up my place when I heard a knock on the door. It was not Miss Kate but my downstairs neighbor's daughter who was rather panicked. She had locked herself out and what with the short days, it was dark and her mother was not home yet. I sat her down and she used my phone. Eventually, she got a hold of her mother and everything turned out fine. The girl was clinging to the little black cat who now completely believes that my home is also her home (the cat, not the girl). Kate also showed up about the same time as the mother.

After a little chit-chat, it was off to services at the synagogue because today is the anniversary (Hebrew calendar) of my father's death. I had to say Kaddish for him. There was also a bar mitzvah going on so Kate got to meet a lot of people.

After services (and homemade cookies at the kiddush), we headed over to the Queen's place for martinis and snacks and music and gossip. We were a bit startled at the possums in the Queen's backyard who froze in the headlights and then slunk under the fence. I guess they were looking for some of the fancy cheeses that Kate had brought. I'm afraid that after a few hours I pooped out so we returned early-ish to mi casa. After a few more drinks and some chat, we headed to bed. I apologize to Miss Kate for having to sleep in my "junk" room but I guess it was bearable because she said she slept well.

The next morning, after tea and coffee and fried egg sandwiches, we watched Black Books and then the film Paprika. Then, since it was a rainy Saturday afternoon, we did the only thing one should do -- besides nap and read books -- watch more bad television. I'm so glad that we not only caught the "no more wire hangers" scene from Mommie Dearest but we also watched Alien versus Predator. Now, life is, indeed complete. Finally, we finished our visit with a pizza. All in all, a very relaxing and uneventful day. I enjoyed the visit!!

Other mild diversions besides TV

Thanks everybody for the well wishes. I have yet to purchase a new set but I have been looking around. In the meantime, I have found it rather relaxing. I mean, I do have Netflix which I can watch on my computer -- not ideal, but okay for now. I called up the cable company to reduce my channels, which I had been thinking of doing anyway but never had the nerve, and I was mildly shocked that they would charge me thirty-five bucks to go back to basic cable. Ridiculous! But she lowered what I pay for cable and for internet so it's okay for now. (That's a good tip, btw, call you cable company because they always have some deal going on and they will lower your bill if you show any inkling that you want to have fewer services).

Students worked on a paper this week so I was pretty busy with conferencing and now I have a stack of papers. I even stayed late on Tuesday evening just so I could meet with them during their study hall. I had three hours between meetings so I did something I used to do all the time -- I went to the movies. The Old Mystic Village Art Cinemas is only ten minutes away and I made it just in time to catch Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona. It was exactly what I needed -- a funny, sexy story set in luscious Spain. I had a good time, even though that blonde girl who can't act was in it. On the other hand, after watching No Country for Old Men, I was surprised that I could find Javier Bardem sexy again (god, he was creepy in the Coen brothers movie). Penelope Cruz was also very good. The funny thing was when I spontaneously decided to catch the film, I was low on cash and this little theater doesn't take plastic. But the guy behind the counter said "go on in. The movie's started. You can pay afterwards." Can you believe that? He wasn't even there when I came out and I had to explain it to the other guy why I was returning to give him money.

I told him "perhaps people who catch the matinee of a Woody Allen film are far too neurotic to skip paying." Yeah, it would have bothered me. I would have had time to go to the ATM because only the previews were rolling (though I love the previews).

Finally, I have a new favorite website, thanks to a colleague who keeps me from working: www.failblog.com It just lists stupid pictures with the word "Fail" written across it. Here's the one that made me laugh out loud in my office. It's titled "French Lesson Fail"

Shoot Me Now -- Or Wait Until We Get Home?

I've been stressing out all week over the logistics of something I thought I should have been able to do and then I just found out that it's not going to happen (nope, still flying home this weekend for a different situation). I'm sorry to be so vague but I have to keep names out of it for obvious reasons. I have to say that my reaction to the news surprised me because I felt so defeated.

Fortunately, to raise my spirits, I have been thinking about the film I saw last night in Santa Monica -- Mongol, the sensitive coming-of-age story of a future world raider. It's the first of a trilogy so I'm on the edge of my seat to find out what happens next. Cinematography was great and the costumes were tres cool. Plot a little thin although I liked his foil in the movie. I went with Kate's pal who has been the most awesome hostess. On Sunday we went tourist, by going to Hollywood and down the walk of fame and the Chinese Theatre and plenty of buildings dedicated to Scientology. I know you, too, would have been tempted by the exhibit on the life of L. Ron Hubbard. I successfully resisted. We also went to Amoeba records and there, too, I resisted purchasing anything (given that my luggage already almost weighed the limit at 48 lbs, I didn't want to tempt fate. Plus I have been in the "let's give things away" mode for the last month.

Class has been going extremely well and I say this not even because I confided in my students that I had a blog because I don't think it will hold their interest long enough to find it. The true blog confession was in theme with our subject for today -- public, private, and virtual space. I had given them an essay about how truly evil (no, really) DisneyLand and DisneyWorld is and they were quite up in arms. By the end of the session, I got a few "the author's right but does she have to be so mean about it?" I think I'll show them Simpsons in Itchy and ScratchyLand:

Marge: what are you doing in jail?
Homer: I'm a political prisoner!
Marge: How are you a political prisoner?
Homer: I kicked a giant mouse in the butt, do I have to draw you a diagram?

Anyway, took the kids on a "field trip" where we examined public spaces on campus. Though it had been cool in the morning (and then cool in the evening), we seemed to have selected an hour in the afternoon where the sun was especially bright and there was no shade. I got doubly sunburned. By the time we had to head back across campus, it was like the Bataan death march. Poor kids!

Speaking of weather, I think I actually felt a few sprinkles of rain as it quickly evaporated in the air. It does rain in LA!

Then I had a delightful dinner where I talked to someone who must have read every Faulkner novel a couple times. (he could place all the obscenely funny scenes that I could remember). Then we then diverted to discussing Werner Herzog films which made me very happy.

And since I don't have TV to distract me, I have had many songs stuck in my head during the day. For a few mornings straight, I had the theme from Working Girl (that Melanie Griffith/Harrison Ford flick) which I have no idea where it came from. I also had some contemporary rap music and finally, blissfully, the Ramone's Blitzkrieg Bop and the theme from the Banana Splits. I feel comforted by the juxtaposition of these last two.