BANG BANG: Jenny Stewart

[BANG BANG is our week-long look back at 20!!, or "Twenty-bang-bang," or 2011, with contributions from all over aiming to cover all sorts of enthusiasms from film to music to words and beyond.]

Breaking by Jennifer K Stewart

Even though television serials are the right medium with which to tell immersive character stories, it is still a pretty rare thing to see a show that isn’t primarily plot-driven.  What I mean is that our usual (pedestrian mainstream) experience in front of the screen is to be very quickly clued into certain archetypical/idealized characters, so that we may watch said characters react to a series of events (loosely, ‘plot’).  Nothing explains this better than the Hangover movies, where the whole point is to watch oh-so-subtly differentiated dudes responding to outrageous events.  Note that Hangover’s reverse chronology is just the ideal cinematic contrivance for getting the audience to salivate in anticipation of immanent character reactions.  We want to see that guy being that guy, etc.

And really, I shouldn’t be smug or cynical, because at the very least, all these structural conventions (i.e. beginning the film at its chronological end) are interesting, if only insofar as they get allied to other generic conventions (the dude movie, etc.)  Film itself mentors us into reading character and personality as popular film conventions have conceived them.  A show begins by showing us just enough characterization to clarify precisely what the character will experience and exactly how s/he will and will not change (ex: The Godfather trilogy), so that we may watch a certain stability of who they truly are prevail through all happenstance/fantastical events.  This film shorthand for characterization is itself highly formulaic, though it can still be interesting or even original – think of how There Will Be Blood showed you who Daniel Plainview is through his incredibly tense and impatient dealings with Paul/Eli Sunday.  The innovation being that Plainview was too horrifying to be legibly revealed all at once, and his character so graphically linked with the confusion of blood and oil (insights for another essay never written, alas). 

Anyhow, that this kind of storytelling continues to prevail – namely, 1. introduction of characters  2. embroil characters in plot machine so we can see them being themselves OR turning inevitably into who we suspect they are to be – is easily explained by how much we enjoy watching eccentric, essentialized, and/or idealized personalities undergo life and its passions. 

The past couple years, I’ve been thinking about how the advent of great serial television series has allowed groundbreaks from this tradition.  Pretty simply, serials have the requisite time in which to do so.  Even a film trilogy has such limited space within which to upset the normal character/plot formula.  This is because most of the disruptive work requires defamiliarizing who it was you thought was on screen, and a two-hour film simply hasn’t the time to lay groundwork.  Imagine trying to make a Breaking Bad movie capable of showing any of the central characters (Skyler, Jessie, Gus, Walt Jr, Marie, and Hank, let alone Walter).  Disastrous. 

Breaking Bad is doing something subtle and thrilling.  Think of how cursory the ‘plot’ is – nothing just happens, all events are a precipitated by complex backmoves and antecedents between combinations of characters, and virtually all of these on-the-fly miracles of impulse in the face of struggle and resistance from others.  Even Walt’s vainglorious inability to let Hank mistake Gale for Heisenberg owes to the same uncertainty principle (right?) as rashly swerving into traffic to keep Hank from Gus’ laundry.  If there is anything predictable about Walt, it is that he finds himself – much to his own horror – capable of unpredictability.  It is neither characteristic nor uncharacteristic, and this is what the show has been demonstrating from the start.  Consider Walt’s tortured and circumambulating dispensing of Krazy-8 in the early episodes of Season One.  Attempting to, oh, rationally persuade himself to murder the drug dealer bike-locked by the neck in Jessie’s basement, Walt composes a pro versus con list whilst sitting on the toilet.  But it took a sandwhich, a fall down the stairs, and a shattered plate shard in Walt’s leg; committed decision not being enough, he needed a chance for reactive adrenaline.  

Note how Skyler’s resolve against Walt was at first backed by steadfast principle, only to then just wear away.  She seizes upon the delusion that good (paying for Hank’s rehabilitation) justifies the means.  Welcomes it even, so that the war of attrition is over and she need no longer resist.  On any other show, once established that her character stood for any principled stance, there’d be no need to show any more of her.  Instead, she breaks, just like everyone else on Breaking Bad. 

By the end of 2011’s fourth season, we can see Walt’s now refined ability to premeditate complex manipulations on equal par with Gus.  Yet recall the heartbreaking scene between Walt and his son in S04E10, “Salud.”  It’s the morning after Walt and Jessie’s physical fight.  Junior’s calling and buzzing as Walt, disorientated, medicated, beaten, pulls back a sheet stuck to his face with dried blood.  The shroud comes away for a few precious minutes and Junior sees his dad unguarded.  At first Walt sticks to the story – “don’t tell your mother, I was gambling, can we just keep this between us?” – but when Junior asks who did you get into a fight with that’s the end of Walt’s posturing.  Walt sees Jessie where Junior is; the possibility of relief, forgiveness.  But as sobriety dawns Walt takes it all back and the layers of blood-caked cover go back on.  Now Walt asks Junior not for connection and forgiveness, but to promise to not take that unshrouded image as defining; the way the “empty spray-paint can” imagine of his rasping father dying of Huntington’s disease, is Walt’s only “real memory” of his father. 

W:  “I don’t want that to be your memory of me when I’m gone.” 

Jr:  “Remembering you that way wouldn’t be so bad.  The bad way to remember you would be the way you’ve been this whole last year.  At least last night, you were real.  Y’know?”

Walt is confusing the revelation of nothing beneath the shroud with emptiness.  RJ Mitte kinda steals this scene, and Walt junior is now the character to watch in Season Five…

p.s. Jessie.  No one’s been broken more than Jessie, in ways he has yet to fully discover.

________________________________

Jennifer K Stewart is a philosopher and yoga instructor living in Canada. She believes in the body.

Viewing Log #85: When you are the cancer

by Ryland Walker Knght

[Amidst a few other films I watched and writing projects I kept chipping away at in August, I finished the second season of AMC's Breaking Bad.]

Right off the bat: Skyler is the worst. Anna Gunn is brave, but Skyler is as unsympathetic a character as I've ever seen. So much so that I had to stop watching the episodes back to back, as is the common desire with instant/on-demand viewing. However, I quickly fell back into plowing through one episode then another, in part because I'm attracted to how condensed the story is compared to, say, Mad Men, where time's certainly not of the essence unless by dint of the television medium's format (seems there's a lot of "something's gotta happen eventually" in MM). It's not as condensed and rigorous as either Milch HBO show (to date) but then even Deadwood feels like years given all the time that passes in between its season arcs. Breaking Bad, on the other hand, though it plays with time some, is mostly driven by a consequential logic. In other words, I was surprised to see this season start precisely where the last one ended. But it makes sense.

The genius of the show, if I can use that word, is how much attention is paid to every step Walter takes towards villainy. We get to watch a basically good brain go, yes, bad. We see all the rationale behind his choices, sometimes without words. I told a friend it was like Dostoevsky and I meant it. But the delusion of doing wrong in the name of good isn't just a trope of the great Russian depressive; it's really rather common. The idea of "white lies" comes from somewhere not related to white nights. I think it comes from everyday life. One must contend, all the time, with too many compromising choices to remain moral. However, this show, unlike those Milch masterpieces, isn't concerned with the ethical life. No, this is just the wrong way to do things. Remember the title: it's forgoing the righteous path.

And if Mad Men is about television as advertising, Breaking Bad is certainly about television as a drug: a perfectly calibrated bit of magic that keeps you coming back for more, designed to hit you where it hurts and where it feels the best. (Why else watch more than one episode at a time, right? It becomes a compulsion, if not outright addiction.) This show, like The Sopranos, makes you complicit, designs a rooting interest in Walter, and dares you to not get excited with him and for him. Until, of course, he explodes and, as his brow lowers, all that venom bubbles up. The most obvious and scary instance of this is when he beats up that towel dispenser (see evidence above). Unlike The Sopranos, nothing is glamorous here. There's nothing sexy about two men making meth in a desert, or anything related to meth. Hell, the meth cooking passages are my least favorite parts of the show. Krysten Ritter may be sexy, but the show goes out of its way to make her unsexy by the end of her character's sad, pathetic, idiotic life. Her death, after all, is just another instance of Walter's growing selfishness as the root of his growing evil. For Walter's whole trajectory is about taking control of his life. But he's pretty lousy at that, too, since he's only ever looking for shortcuts. And, again, the show shows us that these are all myopic moves from a novice. That's maybe my favorite part: these people are idiots.

Walter is a chemistry genius, I suppose, but he's a child compared to Pollos Gus. (Giancarlo Esposito is so awesome at his two face it's incredible; yet another movie-quality actor brought to television and instantly upping the ante.) I suspect he will change the game going forward quite a bit more than Saul Goodman, though Bob Odenkirk is about as crucial an element as can be. After all, he's the only one expressly keeping the comedy going. He has his moments of clarity and seriousness but he's mainly there to act the fool, to play dumb—though he's not dumb, at least not as dumb as Walter—to show the other dummies how dumb they are. This vision of comedy is quite close to condescension. I get that. But nothing's so simple in this show. It's a black comedy, after all, where everything farcical is tied to horror. The horrific is often papered over by laughter in order to diffuse tension, but sometimes horrible things are just horrible. Like letting a girl choke to death on smack-induced vomiting. Other times, horrible things can be hilarious—because they're so stupid—like Saul's whole wardrobe.

Not sure what to do with the framing device of the season, but the tidy color coding of the teddy and Walter's sweater seems obvious. Walter is adrift, charred by wrong. And all that build up to that collision seems like a ploy, not plotting. I cannot imagine how that's going to actually effect the trajectory of Season Three other than Jesse's already rock bottom self-esteem flatlining a little longer. But maybe we're (I'm) in for another rise. Maybe Jesse will seize sobriety and do some things right. Worst case, which it usually is, he'll be a marginally better criminal because he'll be clean. Best case, it'll complicate how Walter sees him, because Jesse is certainly something in his life that Walter can and has controlled. I doubt Jesse will learn how to interpret his way out of manipulative moves by Walter, but he'll likely get better at staking a claim for himself in kind. Then again, Jesse's kind of the show's test dummy par excellence, a raggedy ann at the mercy of bigger and stronger and meaner people. His best episodes in the season were all about his sensitivity. Hope he doesn't get beat up so much that he loses it. Walt sure is trying to lose his.

—You are not okay here at all

Viewing Log #72: Plinywurst [2/1/11 - 2/6/11]

by Ryland Walker Knight

• The Super Bowl. My favorite ads were the Transformers 3 ad because a teaser is supposed to blare and dazzle, the new bug teaser animation because the punchline made me look at Cam, and the Motor City paean from Chrysler because, as Barry said, it's about how we make things in America (or how we used to, at that). The game was fun, too, even though I lost money.
  
  
• Scrapertown [Drea Cooper & Zackary Canepari, 2010] Part of California is a place, via Haz. Just great. The exactly perfect tone that's never cute but simply positive and charming.
  
  
• Cry For Bobo [David Cairns, 2001] See it here. Conceptually pretty perfect, and you know I love jokes. Wish there were more goofy little gems, not all those sad sack lunch pails about Big Ideas. Gags are great! And I'm not just saying this to be "blog polite" (is that a term?); I really dug this little thing.
  
  
• True Grit [Henry Hathaway, 1969] # I put the seen-this-before tag just left of these words, but, really, I didn't remember how cheesy and clunky and kinda-sorta bad this movie is. The Coens certainly improved on it, and clearly had more of the book in mind than any ideas of remaking this thing. Kim Darby sure was cute, though.
  
  
• A lot of Larry Sanders on Instant, selected mostly at random. This week's NBC shows: I fear 30 Rock's veering away from its sweet spot again, but it's always nice to see Elizabeth Banks, and Community was all the clever things I don't like about it rolled up into a bottle episode that can't compete with the earlier one this season because this one was so damned sweet; that is, I like acerbity more than lobbed-on poignancy when it comes to my weekly sitcoms. Oh, and, Season Seven of Peep Show is, in the first episode at least, a marvel of hilariousness and exactly what I want. Then again, I also love this video below by Jaime Harley, for a song called "Suicide Dream" by How To Dress Well, so my criteria certainly shift all the time like anybody else.

>
Pure affect

Viewing Log #63: You stab yourself [12/8/10 - 12/13/10]

by Ryland Walker Knight

—Though I did see some movies this week and though it was not ideal to battle insomnia with seven straight episodes last night, I barreled through Season Four in the past few days. So that's what I'll talk at below. But I did want to note that I saw that stupid ballerina movie, and I actually tried to like it, but I don't know how I could like it. I also watched some of Domino again, and it's wholly stupid, too, but it's not really aiming for anything profound; its main fault is its sentimentality; but that's almost an endearing through-line for Tony Scott now. In any case, they make a funny pair and it should be no surprise that the one that commits 100% to its lunacy (that is, doesn't try it on like a costume at arbitrary lengths) is the one that wins. But enough. There's bigger idiot winds to brave against.

Suffice to say, I was compelled. At this stage, I am drinking some kind of kool aid. However, compulsively entertaining as this season was, I must air some complaints. My major complaint, in the wake of what I wrote last week, is that the show simplified Betty a little too tidily. Sally was complicated almost to replace (rather than refract) what seemed to go on in her mom, but that's a different kind of relationship to a television character than I was looking for; and I was perhaps too easily skeezed out by the idea of people making that scene/those images of Sally's, um, transgression at the sleep over. Which is another way of saying that there was a lot more about work and about Don's sex life in this season than I'd anticipated. Yet, all that fed one of the best things about watching Don's trajectory: the tension in him between acting and being*.

Don is tired of acting. But Don's impulses at being, at responding to himself, are the most confused actions he takes. It's what got him into the pickle of a relationship with Anna Draper, before all, even though that was the first bit of acting he had to do. But even that sentence gets at what a mess it can be to delineate these two strains of behavior. That is, they're always woven.

Recognizing what idea feeds another idea and how we have responded or will respond or are responding is about as difficult an element of becoming a person as I know of. And that's all this show's about at bottom. That's part of the joke, of course: advertising is selling ideas to people, and the show does a great job to feed certain fantasies, as all mass media entertainment can (and more often does, duh). That's why I want to see Betty's complications instead of her press-button immaturity. I want to know there's more to that creature. It makes me feel shallow. I think that may be the point.

Even more fascinating, however, was Peggy's role in this season. She's really given a lot to do, for a lot of reasons, including sex and power and both at the same time and telling a lot of boys to shove it, even Don in a way; and the fantasy that this little lady lived and thrived back then in the mid-60s is one I want to believe as well. This one makes me feel something close to proud, some might say inspired, and I dont doubt that's the point.

—That's bullshit
Just as Joan's continued abasement at the hands of the writers continues to baffle me. Not that she can't stand on her own. Not that she doesn't have plans and dreams and boobs worth dying for. But one phone call to Vietnam in the finale is nothing compared to that whole birthday episode Peggy gets. Don't get me wrong: Joan gets to turn down Roger, she gets to flare up at Lane, she gets to do all kinds of Strong and Powerful acts. But they're forever undercut by what motivated them or what is consequent to them. There's got to be another avenue for her than another sign post that says sexuality was still circumscribed (and chastised, as highlighted by the Sally masturbation fallout), as well as circumscription for certain kinds of sexy ladies, in this era.

Which is why Don's choice of Megan over Faye is so sad, I suppose. We're reminded of his limits, of his inability to separate trains of thought; or, we see his rationalizations play out. We see she was right: she failed "the kids test" and Megan passed it better than should be expected. Faye was so appealing precisely because of the compliments Peggy gives her the same way Megan is so appealing precisely because she's allowed wrinkles and background the way Jane was not. (And because she never gives off that ugly gold digger pony bride vibe.) All these confusions in Don of course make me question my romantic confusions but I also have the luxury of some truly valuable time spent with professional that have helped me better understand all the strands woven through my life. Naturally, I'm still not an expert on myself, nor living, but I do take pride in how much attention I pay to differences that make a difference. I can see that California is a safe place for Don, a place where none of the expectations of New York matter; I see how he sees "a fresh start" not unlike his ex-wife; and I see how he conflates certain forms of happiness into a ball of expectations nobody will be able to make good on in the long run. When he figures out how to return to himself, once and for all, we might not have a show to watch anymore. But we also may not get there at this rate.

* = This construction is Martha's, I feel compelled to note, and it also describes some of the fun of the show where Weiner got his start, the irreplaceable Sopranos, which I feel compelled to mention in part because I can see how I've drawn a parallel between Betty and Carmella because I realize that my attraction to both of these characters is just that they are so complicated at times, just like anybody, though they can also be obtuse imbeciles with no grip on how to behave as adults.

Viewing Log #62: Indivisible has a lot of "I"s [11/29/10 - 12/7/10]

by Ryland Walker Knight

—Though I did watch Broken Embraces again with Martha (ahem), and Prisoner of Azkaban again with Haz, I didn't watch much else last week besides the third season of Mad Men. So that's all I'm going to talk about here.

On my first night in Brooklyn last week, after an unexpected and unwelcome tour of the west side, I went to dinner with some friends. Talk turned to movies and TV, as should be expected with this crowd, and I brought up my recent plunge into Mad Men in part because I watched an episode on the flight and in part because I wanted to talk to one of these four people in particular about my reactions and assessments so far. Unfortunately, we two were the only people familiar with the show and the talk was short. Fortunately, it afforded us a private set of words to gush with: when I said, "What about that dance Pete and Trudy do at Roger's wedding?" we both lit up and shook our heads with delight. And we both agreed, out loud, turning to our friends, that it's one of the rare shows that gets markedly better as it goes along.

This is not a result of simple familiarity. Sure, we know these characters more/better by the time this third season gets started. But there's a tone, a dynamic between expectation and action, that sets this set of thirteen apart. The biggest factor is the show's sense of humor. The ridiculous is an easy target but when you mix horror into that you get a messier laughter. Disbelief is a basic reaction to absurdity and laughter's an easy way to paper over uncomfortable social interactions but I don't think that's the only thing that motivates the jokes and laughs in this show. (And yet, what else can you do but throw up your hands and laugh when somebody beautiful and smarmy gets his foot cut off and his foot blood sprays across a crowd of slack-jawed drunks?) I'm fairly certain there's some poking fun at certain characters going on in some of the jokes—and it's mostly these men the show makes fun of; you see Pete, above, eating cereal and watching cartoons while Trudy's gone—but there's also a dry wit and there's also a righteous "aha!" every now and again, like when Joan smashes that vase on her self-pitying dolt of a gorgeous husband.

Put another way: for all the damage done, this season was fun. Especially the finale. (Save, of course, that late-night scene when drunk Don calls Betty "a whore" and means it.) If this show's really about television as advertising—that is, how television's medium advertises fantasies and sets up expectations of a world you want to join—the same way The Sopranos is about television as therapy—as a perfect arena to get advice on how not to live—then this season finale did the best job selling me my American dream: to build something successful of my own, using talents I'm proud of, in a world beset by vultures.

Yet it's also telling that one success is met with another failure, as happens with Don's home, though that nuclear dissolution could hardly be a surprise to anybody with a brain. The show remains replete with tidy plot points. The surprises aren't the arcs, though Duck's new role in Peggy's life is a wrinkle I didn't expect until "Seven Twenty Three" (3x7) started with all those "awakenings" (again, the bluntness!). This is the most curious aspect of Weiner's world, I'm finding: one step forward is always meted by another step back. It's hard to say who's ever getting ahead—to the point that you think that isn't the point here. Then again, when "happiness" is the point, and when the show's selling us a world where happiness is a fantasy or at least fleeting, getting ahead may only be as simple as dealing with unhappiness better than the next guy or gal. And maybe that's the American they're selling so well at this moment: we deal with things, sometimes better than other times, and we find ways to live. Living, here, isn't just meeting an image of yourself or what's expected of that image (ie, buying something or fucking somebody); living is balancing on your own two feet in the role you've chosen.

A different friend said, "Don wants his children to be children," when I said, "This Grandpa character's a trip." And I think he was correct. Don wants everybody to fall in line, really. It'd read more autocratic and asshole if it weren't tempered by the love he so clearly holds for every single person he has a relationship with, even that senile Grandpa; however, lies rot bonds and/or lies sever ties. Proof positive that love is never enough, and money certainly is not. When Ruby shoots Oswald on live television and Don tells Sally that "nothing" happened, Sally knows it's a lie. It's those lies than doom Don. Because it's admirable in some ways to want your children to be children and nothing else but it's ignorant to ignore (look at the root!) your daughter's burgeoning brain powers. One can hope Don learned this when he groveled for Peggy, in a truly affecting scene thanks to some wet eyes and smart dialog, but I'm not holding my breath. In fact, I'd be surprised if Sally and Bobby and Lil Gene are anywhere near as big a part of Season Four as they were in Three. (Am I wrong? Don't tell me?) At any rate, the kids are hardly as interesting as their mother.

Betty Draper, soon to be Betty Francis I suppose, is probably the most interesting character of all. But I am forever at a loss at how to articulate why since I'm just so damned involved in finding out what she'll do next in her myopia-mirrored-mired life. Makes me think another shoe will drop soon. For all of Don's lies, he's pretty dependable. Betty, on the other hand, seems stuck inside her competing emotions, playing a role she doesn't know the stage directions for, counting all her chickens before they hatch (which last season made literal, which continued this season with her dad's arrival). So I'm quick to hold back judgment. And I'll withhold it yet longer still because Betty's mostly a child and the charitable person would have you believe children can learn things, like how to grow up, as they attempt to rudder their pursuits of happiness.

After all, we are a young country.

Viewing Log #61: Nothing's arrears [11/22/10 - 11/28/10]

by Ryland Walker Knight

• The second season of Mad Men [2008]. Compromise is the name of the game in this season. Life's full of it, or so it would appear in Matthew Weiner's world of tropes, and the joy to be had here isn't flight; it's here, if anywhere. The schematism of the writing in this show is really something. It often works, really. But it's also so tidy in the structure that characters, however well drawn, are reduced to ideas. I think it has to do with the period setting as much as the actual writing. Something about signifiers that I'm too lazy to read closer here beyond a favorite damning word of many so-called intellectuals like myself: over-determination. The allure of the show may be its sheen and its ludicrously gorgeous cast (television's a medium of faces at its best and at its worst), but I keep watching because of those moments when things fudge and because there's way less exposition in this season than last. For instance, the low-light of the season, which I lead with above: Joan's rape. It's a terrifying scene in part because it's about competing perceptions, and because of its final dissolve, which is easily the most striking image so far in the show. Joan's looking at her future in that shot: an idle man waiting for his mess to be cleaned. And I don't think my sympathies for Joan and her continued belittlement over the course of these thirteen episodes stems from Christina Hendricks' beauty but her talent at quivering, and my amazement at what these writers want to put her character through in order to counterpoint Peggy's ascension. It's no secret that Peggy's the biggest success (so far) because she's self reliant. What's doubly amazing is that she is, in fact, our model for America in the show, which may be its home run trot in the end. She loves popsicles, she asks for what she wants, she believes in a loving God, she's great at her job, she continues to out-do herself, and she's open to life for all her tight-lipped interactions with the world. Don's fascinating and Hamm's beautiful, too, but his "arc" is the hanger the suit drapes from, as that line in San Pedro attests; no, this show belongs to its ladies, including both Mrs. Drapers. Can't wait to see how Betty—that dingbat—fords the future.
  
  
• Inglourious Basterds [QT, 2009] # I do love this movie, lumpy though it may be, and the BluRay looks pretty incredible. The colors aren't quite celluloid rich but they still impress the eye at interesting wavelengths. Plus, the editing in this movie tickles synapses so well. (And not just bc RIP S.M.) Awful close to a masterpiece.
  
  
• Shadow of a Doubt [Alfred Hitchcock, 1943] # Well, the first half hour. Then we went to dinner, to give thanks. (Chloe wasn't impressed, by the way, though she did find Cotten's drawl creepy.)
  
  
• The second half of the first season of Mad Men [2007]. Seems like an unavoidable set-up season, with plenty to play out, but there were some moments I really dug: Betty shouldering the BB gun without a shred of affect save the smoke from her cigarette, that way John Slattery can be a total asshole but still charming, Joan's/C.Hendrick's eye brimming, Peggy's rise, Harry Crane, and the first glimpses of Duck Phillips' brand of creep. Not to mention Don's ability to, well, be a man despite also being another brand of louse prone to self-delusion and good old fashioned alcoholism.

—Come on back from way out west

Viewing Log #60: Vitalism dialectics [11/15/10 - 11/21/10]

by Ryland Walker Knight

—On your way up to poetry

• The first half of the first season of Mad Men [2007]. When we all lived in Berkeley, we watched the pilot and I was beside myself with (obtuse and undue) disbelief at how on-the-nose all the anachronisms were, how the jokes felt forced. And I kept bad mouthing it, wrote it off. And I still hate its weird cultural cache. But because of a certain someone I decided to go for a second try. And it's not bad. But I still don't get why people, including so-and-so, think it's so great. Jon Hamm's something, sure, but it's not all that cinematic (slick art direction isn't image-making, really) nor is it written all that well. Yet I am entertained. I cannot front on that front. It's easy to gobble up on rainy days. I'll have more to say, maybe, when I finish the season. I'll have even more to say, I imagine, once I get a few talking points (or just plain pointers) from that goof who goosed me onto this path. For now? It makes perfect sense why Christina Hendricks got famous. (Hamm, too, duh.)
  
  
• 30 Rock "College" [wr: Josh Siegal & Dylan Morgan, 2010] I thought she was saying, "Lizzard." Was she saying, "Lizzard"?
  
  
• Sauve qui peut (la vie) [JLG, 1979] Love the aesthetic, as ever, and wish I could make a feature with this much freeze-frame "animation," but I just don't think it's all that interesting; nor do I think it's any great leap beyond, say, Vivre Sa Vie in terms of ideas. The real treat, as I can tell, is Nathalie Baye's fits and fights and her tank top at the breakfast table. Also, her first appearance on the bike is one of the more beautiful things I've ever seen in moving images precisely because he (JLG) arrests it so.
  
  
• Unstoppable [Tony Scott, 2010] Yet "purer" than Pelham, as Danny said, because of its focus; yet obviously more mobile as well. But at bottom this thing wins due to its actors and their charisma as much as the all-over always-moving cover-everything Scott style I adore. It's a good time, Chris Pine's got a good career ahead, and Denzel's getting fat. See it in a theatre while you can. But don't think too hard on it ya loons.

—We go where?

Vinyl is heavy and Vitti is forever #44

by Ryland Walker Knight

—Never aloof, just floating

Last Lost: "The End"

by Ryland Walker Knight

Granted, a six-season series premised on mystery could never deliver a satisfying "solution" to its "riddles." Hell, a lot of Chandler stories make you feel hollow. But the difference there, I suppose, isn't the investment versus reward thing but the kind of nuance and general philosophical arguments made by such endings, and such style. The MacGuffin as a way to get around mystery's meaning and all that. Which is why a lot of the riffing on Lost seemed excusable: in the interest of entertainment and tickling your brain, and dollars in the bank. However, artistically, you can't ask for dumber. Tug-o-war is, as most people will learn at one point, only fun for one group of people in the end.

The only excusable rationale behind the ending of Lost puts that whole "sideways" story—or "primed" as I've called it through this run—inside Jack's skull as a real flash before his eyes, before they close for good. However, everything about that story line aimed to show these characters as the characters they were on the island. This presumes a few stupid things we're supposed to simply believe in because the second-to-last scene was set in a church. For example, given the waves of relief after those flashes, it would appear that these characters are all just waiting to die while Jack hugs his dad; by extension, everything does revolve around Jack in the way he believed. That's not exactly bad writing, but here it's unchecked hubris. In fact, it's celebrated as finding some faith. And, then, all the other people are only there because the only thing that mattered in their lives was the island or what happened on the island. That is, instead of making the final escape matter the most—Kate and Sawyer and Claire can shack up in an unholy trio of bad vibes and worse life choices!—and where the fuck does Richard go from here?!—we're supposed to find Jack's "full circle" endgame poignant. Put otherwise, it's cynical and narrow-minded and not about living life.

I don't care about the implausibilities of everything. In fact, I dig the fantastic the most. The imagination is what drove the show on, and kept its fans hooked; the tease of the possible. We've all written our own branching fan fiction already with our guesses and our gchats and our weekly recaps. Lost's lasting legacy won't be that it united a record amount of viewers but that it knew how to play the television medium perfectly. It maximized sentimentality, action and wallets with a few decent jokes and a ton of bad ones. And I'd be fine with it as a goof if it didn't take itself so seriously. All this talk about "letting go" in the final season is clearly aimed at the audience, that they'll/we'll be okay without these characters, but basically it's the bullshit way out of the same predicament any great show faces. This is what makes The Sopranos so brilliant, still, because I can remember that confusion and then thrill when the screen went black and we thought Cuyler's cable had gone out but in a minute realized we'd just gotten duped into expecting a resolution we'd never feel satisfied with. I don't care if Tony was killed or not, which is why giving these characters tidy death fantasies on Lost is such an affront. Some of the best moments of Lost were the unexpected deaths. That death was never fair, even when it was expected.

Call me morbid, but I'm terrified of dying. But I think about it a lot. I heard Stanley Cavell say once that any philosopher takes up philosophy because his or her life has been shattered in some way and s/he wants to reckon how, not why. If you take a look at Lost as you should any text that matters (it clearly struck a chord with plenty, evaluations of quality aside), you'll see a lot of avenues for thoughtful engagement. But, as the finale proved, all roads converge again (likely in a pile-up). The branches I got so jazzed about at the start of this season were more like tributaries. And we know that water runs down hill, toward the ocean. Unless, of course, you're on a crazy island full of magnets and mystic shit and clackety smoke. There, the water runs to a source, a light source, a source of light—and that light's absolving in the right circumstances. That's what I'll take away: that they made it about light, and opening your eyes. I'm not exactly satisfied, but I'm also done. I'll take my flight from this fancy free dream machine. I'm sure I'll talk about it a bit more here and there but, really, I don't need to think about Lost again. Hell, I'd rather watch a Sopranos, or a Seinfeld, and laugh my butts off. Those were shows that knew how to quit and keep a carrot dangling. The secret, I'm certain, is in the comedy. Picking up pieces or sweeping junk away, you gotta love this life. Or at least laugh at it.

Viewing Log #42: What's broken's broken but glue's going around [4/19/10 - 4/25/10]

by Ryland Walker Knight

• Treme "Right Place, Wrong Time" [S1E3, Ernest Dickerson, 2010] A marked, knowing improvement that casts a shadow on a lot of bad behavior and surprises with some real evil behavior and a genuine apology. Also, a beautiful final shot capping a beautiful final scene. Still don't like the scraggly keyboardist dude.
  
  
• Marwencol [Jeff Malmberg, 2010] Watched it in pieces over the week. It plays next week at the festival. I recommend it. I'll try to write something a little longer in a bit. Here's the film's website.
  
  
• Party Down "Steve Guttenberg's Birthday" [S2E5, Bryan Gordon, 2010] Not sure why Starz is showing this one now on demand, but of course I'll watch it. Guttenberg's great, really commits, and Ryan Hansen is perfect as that bleached idiot. And this one had not just a McLovin cameo but also Lizzy Caplan in a hot tub and jokes about people in AA having "real" drinking problems that Ron doesn't have; funniest is that you kind of believe him, that AA's just a put-on for him.
  
• Party Down "Jackal Onassis Backstage Party" [S2E1, Bryan Gordon, 2010] Everything I loved about the first season, minus Jane Lynch. Except Megan Mullally is an apt substitute in a different (ok: shorter, stupider) way. Still love Lizzy Caplan's insecurity and her smile (like a lot of boys, I trust), and Adam Scott is pretty underrated for his tight-wad act. I'm sure it'll unravel, though, as tensions and jokes mount.
  
  
• 36 vues du Pic St. Loup [Jacques Rivette, 2009] # Big surprise, I know: on film it's even better. The colors mean a ton, as does the graceful slide of most camera set ups. Even the static ones aren't static—they likely push somewhere, or open another space through simple framing or an edit. My favorite edit is the one along that wall when Birkin's getting ready to leave; she walks across the pipe dividing her and Sergio Castellitto and then past him off camera; he turns, smirks, and follows; there's an edit to five more, different feet of wall adjacent; a new tact of conversation begins, however hesitant, until Sergio disagrees and exits in the opposite direction (the way he came in). My favorite camera move is the one from outside the tent, watching Sergio walk over wires to stay in the frame as he approaches André Marcon in the foreground, then their little dance plays out in medium, then Sergio moves into the tent with the camera to find Birkin alone on a riser surrounded by blue. That's the other joy of this little, dense film: Sergio Castellitto dances through it, enters every scene as an interloper from the background and then stirs things up or plays a bit in a messy way. It reaches its apogee when he takes the stage. I should try to write some more about why I love this thing, but all the regulars are there: acting, physical comedy, some wordplay (in secondary languages), a cohesive mise-en-scene that makes jokes out of every scene's structure, sadness mixed with hilarity, and brevity. Also, just my luck that got to see it with Danny. Then I made this from materials at home.
  
  
• Lost "The Last Recruit" [S6E13, Stephen Semel, 2010] Certainly entertaining, but still table setting. We watched it with a lot of noise, so that might also explain why I only did some images in this post.
  
• The Holy Girl [Lucrecia Martel, 2002] # Looking at a certain scene for a certain piece of writing that should have been done ages ago.
  
  
• Treme "Meet De Boys on the Battlefront" [S1E2, Jim McKay, 2010] The first half had me not just let down but actively pissed off at its narrow ideas; but the murder and a few other things in the second half made me think twice about writing it off. Clarke Peters sure is something.

Last Lost: "Everybody Loves Hugo"

by Ryland Walker Knight

—I see people
This episode was worth my time, I'll tell you what. Consistently hilarious, somewhat surprising, an all around good time with three beers in my belly. Things started out great with that goofy (but not quite goofy enough) video celebrating Hurley for his generosity, but things got kicked up a notch when he said he had an event the next night at "The Human Fund," nodding at Constanza's fake charity, and signaling just how "false" these sideline stories may in fact be. Or, perhaps, that this idea of charity, this vision of a more perfect universe, is in fact a lie. No surprise there, I suppose. But funny to think it's a nod to the best sitcom ever that does this for us (for me!) here.

And that was just the beginning. That was before Ilana got blowed up, before Dark Locke threw Desmond down a well, before Desmond RAN OVER LOCKE WITH HIS CAR! Seems like we could go around these interwebs talking in all caps about Lost for the rest of its run. It holds that much promise—to spin wacky events and characters into one another—in my heart. Things just keep getting sillier, and funnier, and that's never a bad thing on a show this convoluted and, by most lights, all too self-serious. So good for them for making fun of themselves so much this episode. (Also, Ben's little reflection on what the island will do to them, the remaining principles, once its done with them, smacks of last week's winks at the audience.)

This episode also had a few great actor moments, too, though. First of all, Harrold Perrineau makes the most of his cameo, as if that wouldn't happen. He sells not only a terrible explanation of how he's not Dark Locke (he's the voices of those who cannot move on?) but also that cheesy apology he wants Hugo to deliver. Next, Henry Ian Cusick has been typically calm and winsome since his return to the island and the show; his line reading of "what's the point in being afraid?" was superb. As was Terry O'Quinn's puzzled reaction before the throwing of the Desmond down the well. I guess we see a little more of why Desmond was brought back after all: if he can scare Dark Locke, there's a good chance he can stop him, too, somehow. However, especially after his own "big moment," which had some pretty terrible spell-it-out dialog, it's hard not to think that Jack will be the one to grab tighter reigns on this beast of an island.

Jack said he's trying to let go, but I can't see that lasting very long. There's the "worry" that Dark Locke will prey on Jack the same way he preyed on Ben (or any in his crew), but I'm guessing Kate's skepticism will likely win out and convince Jack to "do the right thing." Which, once again, makes this a table-setter despite the incidents both fantastic and hilarious. And, with that weird sample of "The Rowers" over the promo for next week, I'm guessing we can expect a few more surprise deaths, or at the least a few more injuries in the sideways story.

—Ouch!

Last Lost: "Happily Ever After"

by Ryland Walker Knight

Well, I suppose the last two episodes have raised the stakes some as we wind down the series, but I cannot quite stomach all the overt, to say wall-to-wall, sentimentality that drives a lot of these twists and turns. Or, as my friend Eric put it, Jeremy Davies is the last person you want playing sentimental. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for the Desmond-Penny connection. But, good grief, give me more people in electric chairs, or chambers, or between two coils of light.

There was plenty of fun to be had in the 2004' plot given its fits of stupidity and the literal plunge into a new future it takes midway through. It was great to have it framed as a way of seeing, too, with that damned Eloise Hawking-Widmore-Whatever (why can't we get more Alexandra Krosney?) getting all haughty as usual and telling us, through Desmond, that we're not ready to see why things are the way things are in this primed world because, well, there are more episodes to come. It's kind of great just how much Cuse and Lindelof talk at the audience, but it's equally forever infuriating. Nobody likes a tease unless things really cut loose later. And there's millions of us hoping, some probably praying, that we get a great consummation in the end, a real happy ending.


Which brings me to the episode's title. "Happily Ever After." In true Lost fashion, it's a flip: this supposed idyll of an alternate 2004 will not, in fact, be a simple and tidy and happy all over place. In fact, it may well be a dream or a fantasy or some kind of projection as much as an end. And Desmond's new purpose, to show the other passengers something, screams oracular ambition. It also ties into that other show on ABC, "Flash Forward," which I've never seen but understand enough to form a funny hypothesis about, just as last season spoke to another sister series on the same network, "Life on Mars." Lost, as far as I can tell, is easily about the medium of television and its history, incorporating all kinds of shows (as well as "physics" and "religion") into its mythos, and it only makes sense that Season Five incorporated time traveling to the 1970s in a way to talk to "Mars" (or rhyme with it) as Season Six talks about seeing the future, or the past, and how to maybe change it, in a way to talk to "Flash Forward." Also, there's that word "flash," which everybody uses to describe the alternations between timelines on Lost. In any case, it could be simple happenstance, but it makes it more fun for me to imagine these dudes playing with these kinds of resonances.

Because what's a television spectator but unstuck in time, vacillating between stories based on electronic pulses formed by human technology? Put otherwise, Desmond is the ultimate audience surrogate. No wonder he's so popular. So, yes, I was thrilled to see him follow Sayid, and excited for what he might see and do; and, yes, I was excited by his choice to embrace the visions of his other life. I haven't read enough physics to know just how these dudes are going to rationalize this crossing of the streams, nor do I know if they'll rely on it as they seemingly have in the past, but I do know that these Widmores will play a part, and that more signs point to a satisfying ending for everything.

Look at the titles of the final episodes, for one, and tell me you aren't giddy to know who "The Last Recruit" and "The Candidate" are (I'm guessing Desmond and Hurley, for what it's worth), or, for that matter, "What They Died For." And don't forget the probably-will-explain-it-all "Across the Sea," which is purportedly about Jacob and The Man in Black, nor "The End," which I'm hoping is as much a physical location as a marker-answer to Jacob's line at the beginning of "The Incident" that "it only ends once."

Last Lost: "Dr. Linus"

by Ryland Walker Knight

This week's episode would be nothing but cheese were it not for Michael Emerson as Ben, or Dr. Linus, and his skills to invest every little gesture with character. I'm sure our history with the character plays a part in his performance (we know how his face has changed, or what happens when we watch it change), but there's a lot going on in Ben in this episode. Emerson gets to flex all kinds of adjectives: plain sad, indignant, obsequious, desperate, dismay, righteous, sorrowful, ashamed, and sheepish. It's just the right amount of showy to get all kinds of attention. And it's deserved. After all, it's a redemption episode that hinges on a confession.

Again, you couldn't believe the promos' hint that Ben would actually meet his demise. Or did they say face his demise? Either way, it didn't shock me that he got his redemption both on the island and off. In fact, it pleased me. Aside from Locke, Ben's the most interesting character on the show by far. A lot of it is due to Emerson, yes, but it's also because he's one of the few whose trajectory has been yanked around in compelling ways. Not all signs pointed to an episode like this one, though, again, it doesn't surprise me. Ben's gone from plain evil to halfway sympathetic to full on audience surrogate at different moments. In this episode, though he tries to lie as is his wont, he's mostly on the right side of things.

What's troubling about all this, and the overall tone of this episode, is just how sweet the show can get. I don't want everything to turn out okay. That's why last week's mayhem was so exhilarating. Lindelof and Cuse seem to really believe in evil as much as in goodness. The stakes, here, really do matter. Which is why Charles Widmore appearing in a submarine off the coast is so cool. (Also, hilarious. The music underneath that periscope's surfacing was great.) Now we'll see if Widmore really is on the side of evil, or if he only saw the evil in Ben that Jacob had hoped would abate, or prove wrong. There are plenty of reasons why Widmore would side with The Man In Black (such as the interest in Locke, among others, as the perfect surrogate) but, as far as I remember, it has yet to be made explicit.

So I'm hoping, given the tone of the promos this week and that this episode was more ground work than actual plot, things get sadder before they get sweeter. It'll be refreshing, almost, to see what this band of Dark Locke followers will do, or be bullied/inspired to do. For that matter, it'll be interesting to see just how Claire versus Kate plays out given that Kate's not a candidate and Claire's clearly off the dark deep end of things. (Does the show have the balls to kill of Kate? Or, if not now, ever?) But back in the camp we were just in, it'll also be interesting to see if they all embrace this new, humble Ben—if he's let into the circle or not. Because he was certainly left out of the requisite slow motion hug and hand shake festival. (Which also gave us the biggest laugh of the season: seeing Hurley and Sun run at one another.) In fact, it was nice to see Jack size up Ben from a distance. Perhaps there will be a few more bad choices between them. And who in the hell knows what's up with Richard at this point. Did Jack make a new believer of him? I kind of hope so, and I hope to see more of his story aboard the Black Rock.


The point is, as with all the set-up episodes (funny that this is reflected in the beach camp setting up camp, starting over again), I'm left with more speculation than concrete evidence. Which is why we keep watching, of course: the beyond brilliant baiting that these dudes have devised.

Here's a few other talking points:

• Tania Raymonde is beautiful and I'm sad we likely won't see her as Alex again.
  
• Ken Leung has been underutilized until this episode, in which he had two great moments. The first being his vision of Jacob's death; the second his confrontation of Ben under Ilana's eye. He's a prime target to get offed but I'm pulling for him to stick it out, to not Faraday his way out of things and stick to Hugo like glue.
  
• Cuz Hurley can't die, can he?
  
• Sawyer's talking to Kate in the promo, right? Do you think they're gonna wind up together after all? I'd prefer that to her standing by Jack, but I still want her to die most of all. And I sure as shit don't want Sawyer to stay on the island any longer.
  
• Touching. I think Jacob physically touched all the Oceanic Six, but maybe he didn't touch Kate? Does this mean they're all immortal like Richard? Didn't Jacob touch Ben right before Ben stabbed him?
  
• All this and more, ahead. Adios.

Last Lost: "Sundown"

by Ryland Walker Knight

Well, cool. There were some risks taken, some serious crazy, and some killings. Brutal fucking murders, even. A ruthless episode that started slow and crescendoed somewhere beyond Apocalypse Now with this new Kurtz I'm calling Dark Locke not a raving nobody stuck in his temple of doom but heading out into the jungle, ready, smiling at his good fortune to gather a crowd and, it seems, pull the wool a little over a lot of eyes. That is, this week was a big step forward towards real consequence and conclusion. Not only that, we got to see the end of that goofy odd couple, Dogen and Lennon, and we didn't have to really deal with Jack. Bonus: Kate's looking a fool, and useless, a sheep forever and hardly clothed wolf-like.

But Locke's that reversed, and easy, or more: not just a wolf wrapped in a smile but a smoke monster aching to wreak havoc. And, like a good chess player, he parried and fell back and then struck from a new angle to topple the other side. Of course he chose the arrival of darkness as his deadline.

This was the first week since the opener that the sideways, 2004-prime story-line held much interest for me, even if it was later in the episode as things lead to a different (and decidedly smaller) execution. Sayid's new story seems the most like his old one, which sets him apart again, though to be fair we haven't had much of Jin and Sun in 2004 yet—and you just know they'll play a major role in the pathetic appeal of the finale. (A finale, the promos remind us, only 10 episodes away. Time flies indeed. Not that I'm really counting down things.) After all, when Sun appeared by surprise late in the episode, it was easy to get a jolt of "almost!" when she asked Kate if Jin was present at the temple. I'm ready for this reunion to be cornball but I also wouldn't be surprised if, like with Sayid, it to turn on dark histories.

Most of the show was about Sayid trying and failing to prove his worth as "good" in situations set up by "evil" men. His whole storyline hinges on that declaration to his lost love, who is now his brother's wife, that he spends his days trying to wash his hands of his past actions. Of course, when he's asked to forget some wrong doing, he answers, "But I can't," and kills the man who asked. (Funny to see the tables turned on that smarmy Martin Keamy who, in his time before on the show, was just as ruthless.) On the island, Sayid flips his relationship with Dogen around, no longer at his mercy; after allowing Hiroyuki Sanada a monologue about his not-fateful arrival on the island (Jacob beckoned him, too, after a tragedy he caused), Sayid says he elects to stay in the temple, which we clearly see wasn't in Dogen's mind. Further, it suggests all good is gone, as predicted, and Dark Locke has recruited another all-too-willing bruised soul.

Lost has always loved its dichotomies. But what's fun is that the show always fudges those lines. Nothing's so arbitrary as a strict either/or on the show. Somebody's transgressing something, making "sides" look closer (or more mirrored) than they appear. Also, it's clearer all the time just how little agency's afforded in this show. Most people are manipulable; especially our "Losties." In fact, when was there a time when one of these dudes acted completely on his or her own? Has it happened? Or was Dark Locke right in that cave? Has everything been orchestrated until now? Was Charlie supposed to die by making that choice? His hand sure seemed forced if he was to protect the girl and the baby he loved. And look where that got them. The baby's an orphan, practically, though he's living with some relative, and the girl (the mom) is a lunatic hell bent on killing anybody who may or may not have had a hand in disappearing her baby boy.

I'll say this: Emilie de Ravin was much better this episode. She ate the walls around her, but at least she looked like she was having fun hamming it up as Cooky Claire. Maybe acting opposite Terry O'Quinn opened her up a bit. She's only got about one move, or maybe two, but she really went for the one note of nutso this week. The way she looks up at Kate says "calculation" as much as "sheer enmity." And that was followed up by "cookoo" when she beckoned Kate with a promise of safety away from the onrush of the smoke monster's hurtling trail of electric clicks and, well, slaughter.


It's amazing how much of the show has been setting up massacres, building an association only to rob you of it so you leave it, lost. (Yep.) Everybody's blanched now. I dig it.