Convergence for your smile room (2/16/11)

by Ryland Walker Knight

Last Lost: "Lighthouse"

by Ryland Walker Knight

After seeing four by Dorsky (more later, non-Lost fans), helping my bud Brian haul some keyboards, and fixing a supremely late dinner sandwich, I settled into the couch with the DVR for what amounted to a pretty basic episode with very few answers. But I guess I can't expect the show to live up to the promos, cuz that's what promos do: they whet the whistle. In any case, this lighthouse was cool, but hardly a revelation. Just another component in Jacob's all seeing all knowing apparent benevolence. Okay, so Jacob's been watching these "losties"—in particular Jack—for a while now; not too big a surprise given we've seen Jacob alive (and seemingly well) in the days of man'o'wars and unstylish smocks. Nor should it surprise that Jacob wanted the lighthouse inoperable after all. No, the biggest scare was: Is Jack going to fuck up Hurley?

Of course Jack wouldn't hurt Hurley. Lindlelof and Cuse don't want to lose even more good will with their audience. Besides, Hurley's got to stick around to talk to Jacob's ghost or spirit or whatever. What made the scene shake, though, was how uncool Matthew Fox was: he really got wild eyed. He really sold Jack at the end of his rope. But you'd like to think a dude who was willing to admit he came back to the island because he was broken and was wrong about just about everything since that return (and knows it) had already hit rock bottom. But no. The pile-on continues. Jack's almost a Job. (I don't want to admit the links between Shepherd and who in the bible was a shepherd, or simply what a shepherd is, just yet—but, there, I gave the thought a thought.) And don't get me started on the off island junk of this episode, though there were wrinkles in the otherwise cornball "dad issues" plot. —The main wrinkle, of course, being not Jack's memory problems, and that mysterious scar on his torso, but Dogen showing up at the recital hall; but that was too vague to draw any conclusions from at this point.

Another bit of obvious was that Claire's really and truly off her rocker, now friends with Dark Locke, and convinced (poisoned against) the others, or the temple people, as those responsible for Aaron's disappearance from the island. The best thing about that reveal was the line reading of, "Oh, that's not John, that's my friend," while Terry O'Quinn just smiled. Otherwise, those few scenes were just Emilie De Raven doing her usual thing, you know, and coming off as the least believable murderer around. Put otherwise, I was bored by her reversal. More interesting was Jin telling a lie about the truth only to lie some more in order to save his skin. It's easy to forget, now that he's so sweet and altruistic about finding Sun, that Jin spent a lot of his adult life before the island as a henchman, as a killer, as somebody who knows how people are manipulated and manipulable. But those were flashes inside a pretty predictable bit.

Sorry if this bit of blogging seems too blasé, but, well, the episode didn't wow me. Part of this is because I was tired, and I'm tired now as I type this; part of this is because I had all kinds of angles on light and shadow and color and different registers of gravities still piling in my head; and part of this is because the episode lacked any real urgency. What made seasons 4 and 5 so great was their hurtling through plot. Each episode made a claim on a character. There's nothing new here that needed a full episode to unravel. The really daring thing to do would've been to get the lighthouse broken and Dark Locke's appearance into this week well before half-time; after all, all I did seeing these things happen was wait for what would come next. In that, it's great television, designed to addict. And Lost has always gotten the medium: in a lot of ways, ways that I know very little of, the show is about, or at least seems interested, in various television histories as part of its own mythology. I can sense this, and I've never seen an episode of Gilligan's Island, or very much Star Trek (in any iteration), let alone any other adventure shows I'm sure it references, like cartoons. Ed Howard mentioned comics in the comments on the season premiere, and that seems apt, too, of course, though I don't know which comics, exactly, would come into play here (I read Batman and Sin City and then-newly-formed Image comics almost exclusively in middle school). Basically, though, it's about the broader "sci fi" or "adventure" genres (and their sometimes overlap) as media in themselves, how they appropriate and redeploy certain tropes or myths to prove, among other things, that good and evil exist to fight.

So, yeah, here's hoping that when these bad people we once thought pure raid the temple in next week's "Sundown" we get a few more dead bodies that matter. That's basically what I want to see at this point: who do they have the balls to kill off? And will Sayid's infection swing him into line with Claire and Dark Locke after all? Or can Dogen speak enough Japanese to confuse everybody? And, really, is Jack that important? Is he really going to take over? Are he and Kate truly destined to rule the island, away from the world, while Sawyer finds his way back to it? Maybe, though, we'll just be lucky enough to get a few more great compositions like those around the mirrors. Those shots, and that scene, showed what they get right on Lost sometimes: marrying outsized structure to a few images, and this season seems all about reflections and refractions, so what better way than beaming back into the world? And what other reaction can you expect from a broken dude who breaks everything? He doesn't see straight anyways, much less in a mirror, and we saw that in the first episode of the season on the alternate plane.


Also, I kinda just want to stop talking about Jack every week.

Convergence for your banshee leach (1/25/10)

by Ryland Walker Knight

— my wipe

Ray at night.

by Ryland Walker Knight

It occurred to me about 4:00 PM Wednesday the 22nd, that I have been in a continuous blackout from sometime between 1957 or earlier until now. I misplaced my soul and I don’t know where I left it.
- Nicholas Ray, 1976

This essay that I link to above, by Carloss James Chamberlin, from the way back machine at Senses of Cinema (which has a good new issue if you haven't looked at it), is something special. Thanks to Zach for turning me on to its smarts and its beauties. I think it's a good reminder for today. That the reason we have to pick ourselves up and dust ourselves off is because, perpetually, we fail. It's a nice reminder that tomorrow I'll be the same guy with the same stink and the same bank account and the same unhealthy patterns as much as some new and vital routines built this fall; that we gotta fight. The thing that may get lost in the hoopla today is that inside that complicated and fiercely intelligent speech our first black President delivered with great passion there was a note struck to signal that, yes, we have to work hard every singly day we step forward. The world does not always stand arms open to meet you. Sometimes, the ones you love and depend on will hurt you. All the time, there's this life. So live. You will lose things. You will misplace passions. You will fall on your face. You may lose an eye. But you may also find some kind of grace pushing up and pulling up and dusting up and building up—even if you're throwing up. Own your peapods. Stuff them full and let them bud, let them flower; let light spill everywhere. Look around you. Forget the weights, or push up past them, and know: this is good.

Two thousand weight? #8: Hella eyes

by Ryland Walker Knight

Ok, I lied. I do have some more things to say about my year with the movies. I said some of those things, rather haphazardly, in a contribution to Brian Darr's second annual I Only Have Two Eyes poll. That link will open the whole series of posts—starting with Brian's introduction and his own list, and continuing through the alphabetically arranged considerations of (former) fellow bay cinephiles I will most definitely miss seeing around town. One glaring, idiotic omission from my list: The San Francisco Silent Film Festival. I don't know how I could forget! (Well, I do: I rushed through composing my notes.) In any case, that weekend was a true highlight not just for the films I got to see but for where I got to see them (in that cathedral of cathedrals, The Castro) and who I got to see them with (including Brian, and our lovely czar Michael, and the cosmopolitan Shahn, and the flown-in Darren & Girish). Another forgotten treasure was the SFIFF screening of En la cuidad de Sylvia, which spawned three thoughtful letters between yours truly and our friends Jen Stewart and Kevin B. Lee. So, please go look around at some of these links. For all my two thousand weight dumpy dirt piles, there were beams of light cutting through the clouds to glint across my horizon.

Two thousand weight #7: More reminiscence, more lessons, more laughs. A big leap.

by Ryland Walker Knight

A bizarre year full of bizarre films and worse turns outside the cinematheque, my 2008 saw our flux drift down into waste for far too long, with far too much fear, before our fall season reminded that we may find flight possible (again) as we recycle another calendar set and cabinet. Events and actions have a history before they happen—and accountability is tricky.

Scoot on over to The House Next Door [click text above] to read my final words on my past year with films. Since I already skimmed the surface, sorta, with my Auteurs' poll (here), I tried to delve a little deeper and offer something a little more, hmn, investigative of my self in this companion piece since, when it comes down to it, as much as we argue for lasting worth in these arbitrary markers, our efforts are perhaps more akin to lock-box diary notes than sea scrolls. Let's push forward with a smile. Let's build homes. Let's love this muck. Let's find facts. Let's get big. Fuggit: let's lift-off.

The Coens as passionate witnesses.

by Ryland Walker Knight

After seeing No Country For Old Men I did some thinking. I talked to friends. I read reviews. I was reminded of an almost tossed off reference to their work by Stanley Cavell in his book, Cities of Words. It comes in the 16th chapter, which focuses on Preston Sturges' The Lady Eve, in the first three paragraphs. I decided I would quote the passage here as a kind of placeholder while my thoughts continue to develop in regards to the Coens' work, and how we may best evaluate it beyond "Is it good? Is it bad?" Also, I want to interrogate my previous stance on their films that I remember dismissing as "bad." I've already been proven wise to rethink their rather astounding The Man Who Wasn't There, which I now am thinking of as a possible flip side companion to The Hudsucker Proxy: fate literally fights for Tim Robbins' Norville Barnes; nobody, not even Tony Shaloub, really, fights for Billy Bob Thornton's Ed Crane.

A summary of a film comedy written and directed by Preston Sturges suffers most in missing the continuous, virtuosic precision and intelligence of his dialogue, in no case more than in that of The Lady Eve. Sturges is one of the most remarkable mids to have found expression in Hollywood. Not until after the end of the Second World War, with the reception in America of the outburst of filmmaking in Europe -- including films of Truffaut, Godard, Fellini, Antonioni, Ingmar Bergman -- did an American audience become accustomed to finding a film written and directed by the same person. And Sturges' tight corpus of comparatively small-scale films occupies a treasure place in the hearts of those who care about the world and art of film; for example, beyond The Lady Eve, there are Sullivan's Travels and The Palm Beach Story and Hail the Conquering Hero. An instance of this esteem is recorded in the title of the Coen brothers' recent film, O Brother Where Art Thou? (with George Clooney and John Turturro), one of the most notable films of the past few years. It is worth taking a minute to say how that title inscribes a Sturges film.

The hero of Sullivan's Travels (played by Joel McRea, who is also the male lead in the remarriage comedy The Palm Beach Story, an interesting actor of considerable range, but less well known than the male stars, his natural competitors, of the remarriage comedies of the period discussed in this book) is a filmmaker whose great success is based on making thrillers with little intellectual or political content, and who wishes to make a film about something true and important, about suffering. The travels of the film's title are those taken by this director, who escapes the world of Hollywood escape in order to experiece the suffering of, after all, most people in the world, in preparation for making his important film of witness. The narrative takes him to the bottom of the world, in the form of being falsely convicted of murder and sentenced to a southern chain gang, where he discovers that the laughter provided by a Hollywood cartoon may provide the only rare moments of respite in a stretch of fully desperate existence. He contrives to be recognized in this place of anonymity, and returns to Hollywood to apply his hard-won insight, which means leaving unrealized his film of suffering.

The title of his projected work was to be O Brother, Where Art Thou? The Coen film, which opens in a southern chain gang, realizes this unrealized work by, as it announces, adapting (or more accurately, silently remembering names, and imaging sequences to realize them, from) episodes of the Odyssey (the Sirens, the Cyclops), taking as the overall adventure the return of an extraordinarily resourceful, or resilient, man to his native town to reclaim his sought-after wife (and children). The challenge the Coens take up, or depart from, in Sturges' fantasy of witnessing suffering, and which they seem to declare as part of their film (indeed of their corpus of fascinating films), is neither to record nor to distract from suffering. It is rather to witness, on the part of people who recognize, despite all, that life may still hold adventure, say hold out a perfectionist aspiration, but that to sustain a desire to meet the fantastic, unpredictable episodes of everyday modern existence, one must, and one can, rationally and practically, imagine that one will, at need, discover in oneself, in the register of passion, the resourceful persistence of Odysseus, and the mixed, but preponderant, favor of the Gods, call it fortune.

Perhaps we can use this as a kind of springboard into the Coens' pictures to investigate their particular expression of the American experience. I will return to this, along with my fellows here at VINYL, at a later date, perhaps as soon as December 1st, perhaps as late as December 25th. The point is: December will see some Coens writing from at least a few of us here, taking in, as best as time and space and ability will allow, the scope of their work through this notion of witnessing.

Close-Up catch up for the day.

by Ryland Walker Knight

When Matt announced his idea for "The Close-Up Blog-a-thon" I got excited. I thought I would contribute a whole bunch of posts like Odie. School, alas, takes a lot of time away from blogging since my schooling is a bunch of reading and a bunch of writing. Combine that with a renewed Netflix account and you've got a lot of time filling up. But I'm trying to slow my roll on the Netflix Q, and move from near-constant consumption to more respective production via reflection. That is, I want to write more about more of the movies I watch.

For instance, I'm taking a course called "The Action Film." It's a ton of fun. The filmography is packed with cool movies and we get to watch them in a big room on campus complete with powerful surround sound that was built in honor of the man who started UC Berkeley's Film department. Last week we watched John Woo's Hard Boiled. It was perhaps the most riotous screening yet, which is saying something a week after jailbird McTiernan's Predator. I thought I might try to write about that close-up at the end of the first firefight, where Chow Yun Fat gets blood splattered all over his flour-covered white face after he shoots a dude in the face at close range. It's a shocking moment and my classmates sure did jump. What's cool about it, though, is it's just another moment for Woo to color his melodrama. It's really no different from how Pedro Almodovar shoots a lot of Matador, which is also after the melodrama of classic Hollywood (like Sirk, like Duel in the Sun). But a whole essay seemed too much.

In the end I wrote up a music video. When they work, music videos can be really alive and beautiful, not just shill tactics. And it's really weird (cool?) to me that Juvenile's first hit single, "Ha," was even chosen as a marketable single. Sure, it's got a killer hook, but the fact that you can't hear/understand fuck-all he's saying around the hook (at least at first) is pretty odd for a lead single. On top of that, the video is a kind of minor masterpiece blending the artificial performances with this queasy-distanced "documentary" footage. So I fumbled around with it and came up with this piece.

Another thing that flashed in my head when thinking about close-ups were past posts here that focused on screenshots of close-ups (or any striking compositions) as a visual kind of criticism. I'll let the images do the talking, so I grouped some links to those here, in chronological order:

A Happy New World New Year looks at some rhyming images from Terrence Malick's masterpiece.

Born Under Punches: Véronique's hands offers some key images of Irène Jacob's tactile performance.

Evergreen syrup screenshot/s for the day peeks at a delicious moment in Claire Denis' Trouble Every Day that seems to get forgotten amongst all the bloodletting.

On A Dime Screenshots for the day delights in Zhang Ziyi's multifaceted facial expressions in one sequence from Wong Kar Wai's 2046.

CINCO DE VINYL: Negotiating Battle in Heaven looks at Carlos Reygadas' second feature as more than just a bad-boy routine.

Fake screenshot for the day, or evening is a quote from The Life Aquatic.

Claude Rains for the day is a brief reflection on a key moment in Hitchcock's Notorious.

Exploding heads, and hearts: 28 Weeks Later is thick with blood. tries its best to convey the weight of said film's brilliant opening sequence by grabbing key frames of blood, and eyes.

You can also simply click the tag "screenshot" below and see all these posts simultaneously, plus some others. But this looks pretty good, right? Oh yeah, here's the Juvenile video:

Maurice Merleau-Ponty = ballin out of control.

RWK says: Phenomenology late at night might not make much sense (you need some lamps) but it still tickles the brain. I read an essay by Maurice Merleau-Ponty over the weekend called "The Intertwining -- The Chiasm" and it rocked me silly. I decided I would make myself a little crazy and type in a foundational paragraph. It's long, as you will see. And, as you will see, the words are images as much as any jpg would be in here so sit up close and read closer still. But I won't blame you for tuning out and scrolling (or clicking) away real quick: it's not easy. But it sure is beautiful.

If we turn now to the seer, we will find that this is no analogy or vague comparison and must be taken literally. The look, we said, envelops, palates, espouses the visible things. As though it were in a relation of pre-established harmony with them, as thought it knew them before knowing them, it moves in its own way with its abrupt and imperious style, and yet the views taken are not desultory—I do not look at a chaos, but at things—so that finally one cannot say if it is the look or if it is the things that command. What is this prepossession of the visible, this art of interrogating it according to its own wishes, this inspired exegesis? We would perhaps find the answer in the tactile palpation where the questioner and the questioned are closer, and of which, after all, the palpation of the eye is a remarkable variant. How does it happen that I give to my hands, in particular, that degree, that rate, and that direction of movement that are capable of making me feel the textures of the sleek and the rough? Between the exploration and what it will teach me, between my movements and what I touch, there must exist some relationship by principle, some kinship, according to which they are not only, like the pseudopods of the amoeba, vague and ephemeral deformations of the corporeal space, but the initiation to and the opening upon a tactile world. This can happen only if my hand, while it is felt from within, is also accessible from without, itself tangible, for my other hand, for example, if it takes its place among the things it touches, is in a sense one of them, opens finally upon a tangible being of which it is also a part. Through this crisscrossing within it of the touching and the tangible, its own movements incorporate themselves into the universe they interrogate, are recorded on the same map as it; the two systems are applied upon one another, as the two halves of an orange. It is no different for the vision—except, it is said, that here the exploration and the information it gathers do not belong “to the same sense.” But this delimitation of the senses is crude. Already in the “touch” we have just found three distinct experiences which subtend one another, three dimensions which overlap but are distinct: a touching of the sleek and of the rough, a touching of the things—a passive sentiment of the body and its space—and finally a veritable touching of the touch, when my right hand touches my left hand while it is palpating the things, where the “touching subject” passes over to the rank of the touched, descends into the things, such that the touch is formed in the midst of the world and as it were in the things. Between the massive sentiment I have of the sack in which I am enclosed, and the control from without that my hand exercises over my hand, there is as much difference as between the movements of my eyes and the changes they produce in the visible. And as, conversely, every experience of the visible has always been given to me within the context of the movements of the look, the visible spectacle belongs to the touch neither more nor less than do the “tactile qualities.” We must habituate ourselves to thinking that every visible is cut out in the tangible, every tactile being in some manner promised to visibility, and that there is encroachment, infringement, not only between the touched and the touching but also between the tangible and the visible, which is encrusted in it, as, conversely, the tangible itself is not a nothingness of visibility, is not without visual existence. Since the same body sees and touches, visible and tangible belong to the same world. It is a marvel too little noticed that every movement of my eyes—even more, every displacement of my body—has its place in the same visible universe that I itemize and explore with them, as, conversely, every vision takes place somewhere in the tactile space. There is double and crossed situating of the visible in the tangible and of the tangible in the visible; the two maps are complete, and yet they do not merge into one. The two parts are total parts and yet are not superposable.

The joy we're left with here and now.

I MEAN IT:

Loan your friend a wrench, see a movie on a big fucking screen, kiss your lover for an hour, eat a tunafish sandwich, or some hummus and pita, do a bedroom dance, maybe cry a bit, listen to this song, read your favorite poem a few times, slouch a little towards Bethlehem, give The White Album a spin, tread that thin red line of ______________, wrap me in your marrow, stuff me in your bones, take off the iPod, run to the park and toss a baby in the air, smile, drink a beer, cut your hair, cuss like a goddamned cocksucking sailor, chips and salsa, remember Ingmar Bergman and Michelangelo Antonioni, read my silly tribute at The Daily Cal, delight in Dan Callahan's at The House Next Door, swim in a river, throw stones and baseballs and break sticks across your knee, gather yourself up and meet the sunshine. But once the sun has set, go inside and watch a great film on as big a screen as possible.

BIG SCREEN LOVE, BIG SCREEN LIFE
[RWK]

Weekend exegesis, of sorts, in flashes, with some linkage.

by Ryland Walker Knight

Tonight I thought I was going to the PFA, yet again, to see a pair of Barbara Stanwyck films: Baby Face (1933), directed by Alred E Green, and Remember The Night (1940), directed by Mitchell Leisen from a screenplay by Preston Sturges. Instead, after walking up past the theatre and seeing a line across the lobby for tickets, a mysterious force (sometimes called "conscience") pulled me away. That, and I thought about my bank account. From there I thought I would find a place to sit and read in the fading sun as Austin's How To Do Things With Words fits my back pocket precisely. However, sensing the drop in temperature and feeling no sun to soak, a mysterious force (sometimes called "the internet") drew my inside Moffitt. And here I am, with the book in front of me and an empty computer lab around me. I told two upstanding young fellows I would "definitely" be going to the movies tonight and I feel a tad awkward about that but perhaps I simply felt like I'd seen too many movies over the weekend without fully processing any of them.

Thursday saw me travel into San Francisco to see Cassavetes' late, masterful work Love Streams at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts' Screening Room. Brian Darr was in attendance and we shared some tired words on our walk to public transportation but really I was elated. I couldn't have expected to have seen such a joyful film. My expectations were to have my heart pummeled, not caressed. Which isn't to say the film is one jolly scene after another. No, it's still tough. But it's also hilarious, and tender. It spurred me on to write this text message, waiting on the BART platform: "U must see some Casavettes [sic]. Talk about joy and the affirmative life. I'm floating, drinking life here, in clouds." The amount of love on display, streaming, in this film is staggering. It made me think I would be willing to risk seeing all of the rest of his oeuvre ASAP, even the ones I have seen, since I think they will all play new, as if viewed for the first time, with different eyes, and a different heart. Then I remembered how I felt after Woman Under The Influence and the project went (rightly) on a back burner. I would like to see Love Streams again before I write any more about it. Suffice it to say, it warrants the praise it has earned, as has its maker.

Friday saw me take in a pair of new-Asian films at the PFA. More on that over at The House. [I can also say Friday also saw me accept a job offer, but that's about it for now.]

Saturday started with a matinée of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in downtown Berkeley. Overall I was impressed. Not as much as Walter Chaw, I don't think, but his review is pretty great. The girl who plays Luna, Evanna Lynch, is remarkable, and oddly adorable. The chemistry she and Harry (a much-improved and only improving Daniel Radcliffe) share is enough to make one wish they would end up together, despite all the obvious foreshadowing that Ginny is The Girl For The Boy Who Lived. Plus, it's always a delight to see all the famous British actors pop up for some fun. I think the set pieces will only be better in the sixth movie since director David Yates will be more familiar with the process. However, the FX still probably won't match those of Cuarón's third film because those were all there to serve the story. The FX here, while mostly stellar, are mostly window dressing. But more on that later, after the seventh book at week's end. [Saturday ended with a ton of dancing, which was fun.]

Sunday was mild, and highlighted by an encore showing of Syndromes and a Century. I would watch that movie again right now.

Monday was a writing day, but it had enough spare time for me to watch this week's episode of John From Cincinnati, which slayed me (as it did Keith). The simultaneity of the final ten minutes was breathtaking. So far, so good: the payoff here was well worth the previous weeks. Austin Nichols has the thankless title role and he's superb but it's really all about how Emily Rose pouts her way through hers that touches me. But, when you hear such a speech as this, it's hard not to go slack-jawed and, in the end, say with certainty, "Well. This was time well spent."

"If my words are yours, can you hear my Father? Can Bill know my Father, keeping his eye on me? Can I bone Kai and Butchie know my Father instead?

"My Father's shy doing his business. Kai helps my Father dump out. Bill takes a shot. Shaunie is much improved.

"Joe is a Doubting Thomas. Joe will save Not-Aleman. Joe will bring his buddies home. This is how Freddy relaxes. Cup-o'joe, and Winchell's variety dozen.

"Mitch catches a good wave. Mitch wipes out. Mitch wipes out Cissy. Cissy shows Butchie how to do that. Cissy wipes Butchie out. Butchie hurts Barry's head. Mister Rollins comes in Barry's face. My Father runs the Mega-Millions.

"Fur is big. Mud is big. The stick is big. The word is big. Fire is huge. The wheel is huge. The line and circle are big. On the wall, the line and circle are huge. On the wall, the man at the wall makes a man from the circle and line. The man at the wall makes a Word on the wall from the circle and line. The Word on the wall hears my Father.

"The zeroes and ones make the Word in Cass's camera. In the Word on the wall that hears my-Father-in-Cass's-camera, the good one Mitch catches doesn't wipe Cissy out. In the-Word-that-hears-my-Father, Cissy shows Butchie something else. In-my-Father's-Word, Cissy shows Butchie in Shaun. In-my-Father's-Word, Tina raises Shaun at lunch. In Cass's-camera, Butchie lays the court out for Barry, and Mister Rollins watches, and he doesn't come on Barry's face. In Cass's-camera, Butchie knows Kai kept the faith. In-my-Father's-Word, the Wave lifts them up.

"In Cass's camera, Bill doesn't bump his head on the stairs. In Cass's-camera, as long as he's being stupid, Bill gives Lois a kiss.

"In His-Word-in-Cass's-camera, the Internet is big. Nine-Eleven is big, but not every towel-head is eradicated. In His-Word, We are coming Nine-Eleven-Fourteen.

"In my-Father's-Word, Bill sees how Freddy relaxes. In Cass's-camera, Ramon wants to know who's hungry, in the courtyard and Room Forty-Five.

"In my-Father's-Word-to-come-in-Cass's-camera, Doctor Smith calls Ocean Properties. In Cass's-camera-to-come, my Father stares Not Aleman down, and Freddy sees Bill much-improved.

"You will not note my-Father's-Word, nor remember Cass's-camera, but you will not forget what we did here."

Tuesday, today, has been pretty good. I want to end it even better. So I'm going to go read, and maybe drink a beer or three. Then tomorrow I may finally write up my real reaction to Deadwood's second season. For now, enjoy that delovely opening credit sequence from Milch's new baby while I skeedaddle on out of here and catch my own point break.

Generosity for the day

But as to commitment in a general sense ... You know, I can't believe in the general ideas, really I can't believe in them at all. I try too hard to respect human personality not to feel that, at bottom, there must be a grain of truth in every idea. I can even believe that all the ideas are true in themselves, and that it's the application of them which gives them value or not in particular circumstances. ... No, I don't believe there are such things as absolute truths, but I do believe in absolute human qualities — generosity for instance. [Jean Renoir]

Yo La Tengo: Live in Prospect Park, and a 'Painful' morning.

by Ryland Walker Knight

I was unable to attend the premiere of Yo La Tengo's live accompaniment to Jean Painlevé's "legendary but rarely-seen" series of underwater documentaries back when I was a freshman at UC Santa Cruz in 2001. Within that school year I had become a devoted fan, finally discovering the Matador catalog outside of Pavement, buying up all the used records I could find and downloading the others. I ached to go but on top of the expensive tickets, my car was at home in Berkeley and--worst of all--being the silly introvert I was that year, I had no friends to drive me. When Sounds of Science was released on CD I was eager to buy it but YLT were only selling it through their website and I was too lazy to send away an order. I was able to download the album a few months later and was pleased when it didn't wow me; it was groovy but I could tell something was missing. After last night, I know what it was:




Yeah.

Coupled with James McNew's fuzzy, rolling bass & Georgia Hubley's perfect, odd rhythms & Ira Kaplan's controlled chaos guitar solos, I felt lucky. I kept hoping they'd end the set and come back for a Beach Boys cover but was happy with what they gave me. (If you want to hear brief samples click here.)

The best marriage was probably LIQUID CRYSTALS, with its fluorescent visuals that recall the finale of 2001, which could have been rote psychedelia scored by Pink Floyd nonsense but this trio has more in common with Ligeti than Roger Waters. Their score is punctuated by noise shards from Kaplan over steady jazz kit work from Hubley and McNew's meandering bass. And like good improvisers, they know when to peak and when to lay back; but we know the crescendo is always building. Another favorite was the melodic-cute SEA URCHINS where Painlevé's quixotic narration makes interesting parallels: "the stems, at high magnification, resemble temple pillars." I won't soon forget the final rushing camera move across an urchin's stiff stems: the move could be no longer than two inches but with the macro zoom lens it felt like a helicopter (or space ship) flying over a forrest of alien trees. Then, mid-flight, it cuts to the eponymous creatures assembling into the word "FIN". I hadn't felt that stirred by a film's editing since certain juxtaposing cutaways in THE NEW WORLD; for instance, the shot of a ship's main sail unfurling inside the scene of Smith's first interrogation at the Powhatan village. But it would not have worked were it not for the live musical element.

For a while I listened a lot of "noise" music and bought a few too many imported albums. But after I saw Merzbow live at the first stateside All Tomorrow's Parties I swore off recorded noise, no matter how much I loved that first Fennesz album I bought. The impossible force of a live noise show (and that Merzbow set in particular) will never be matched by my headphones no matter how loud I crank the volume; you have to feel it in your chest. Our view of the screen last night was often blocked and people kept shuffling up and down the isles but I will, in all likelihood, not revisit the recorded versions of these soundtracks. The marriage of live music and film was just fine by me and, as such, no bedroom séance will conjure that feeling I had zooming over that field of urchin stems.

That's why I listened to Painful this morning on my 45 minute commute to Queens. Most fans will point you to I Can Hear the Hear Beating as One as the group's magnum opus, the perfect expansion of Painful's themes to operatic heights that transcends the college/indie rock genre YLT helped define. I disagree. ICHTHBAO has broader aims that it bullseyes, sure, but Painful didn't need expansion; it's perfect as it is.

With James McNew firmly in place on bass, Painful shows off what has become their now-definitive sound: a waterbed of bass and organs colored fuzzy by drivers, spare yet energetic drumming, and diverse guitar work that careens from syrup sheen to siren squall. Sometimes Kaplan’s noisy solos counterpoint his ethereal, sweeping pads of delayed melody from song to song and sometimes at the same time in the same song. He’s given this freedom by the steady and reliable rhythm duo of Hubley and McNew, who are never showy but always effective. It’s a wonder to hear each player work off one another.

What makes this band still more intriguing is the marriage at its core between Ira and Georgia. Ira sings more often than his wife (and his guitars often background her stellar stick work) but he concedes to Georgia’s poignant, tender vocals on a few stand out songs like the centerpiece ‘Nowhere Near’. They often back one another but on ‘The Whole of the Law’ they duet until Mr tells Mrs “Found out I was in love with you” in a moment so naked you might blush.

But they wake you up right away with the next song, a re-imagined reprisal of the opener ‘Big Day Coming’ that replaces ambient synthesizers with meaty bass guitar propulsion. Often we are lulled into forgetting this band can turn up the gain and wail. Even if they are middle aged and domesticated and married. After a year of 9-5 work weeks, early evenings and weekend daytrips, maybe this will be the band that defines the angst New York has plagued me with and detached me from my loved ones. Yo La Tengo! may not only be the Cuban outfielder’s cry but mine: I finally get this thing called growing up in love. You get what you give and I am eternally grateful for this band and the young lady in my life. I hope to attend a Maxwell’s Hannuka concert one of these days but for now I can’t wait to taste Grand Canyon rainfall.

Berkeley keeps getting more appealing (vs NYC)

by Ryland Walker Knight

Anybody in the bay who loves movies should go to PFA all summer long. Forget Pirates of the Carribean, forget Superman, go see some good movies.

Like Seven Mizoguchi Classics. Only one is available on Region 1 (Ugetsu, Criterion) so go and tell me all about Sansho the Bailiff.

Or, check out the double bill on July 1st: PERFECT. I don't know anything about this director's cut but man, Woman in the Dunes deserves more props outside the hardcore film junkies. And paired with the Malick movie that keeps getting ignored--I'll say it again: perfect.

And I know you love Isabelle Huppert. Tomorrow they're showing a rare early entry in her filmography that is completely unavailable in any format except maybe some rare VHS copies that are sure to be in poor quality.

Also, you don't have to take showers twice a day to keep cool in the Bay--only after you play frisbee on campus. Can't wait. Gonna make it work for all the right reasons this time. Yeah, outside as well as in the dark of a movie theatre.

I'd rather eat an avocado.

by Ryland Walker Knight

I can count the number of fist fights I've found myself a part of on one open hand. I don't like pain and try to avoid it; yet I can deal if it slaps me, pins me, kicks me. I am meek and I imagine strangers can read my introversion when I squint and bite my lips as I zig zag across the sidewalk. I have love to give and offer more forgiveness than I should, probably: its just my optimistic philosophy of humanity's capability for greatness, for compassion, for peace.

With all that I took my seat in the bleachers at Yankee Stadium next to Nathan, a friend from high school, ready to cheer our hometown Oakland Athletics. I expected to be yelled at when we stood up to clap but I never expected the violence of that Sunday. We had attended the finale of the A's previous visit to the Bronx and were called "Homos!" and "Fags!" and "Cock Suckers!" but that was all. It was less crowded in May on Mother's Day--it was overcast & windy--and there were five or six large Mexican A's fans sitting in our section, which I will admit made me feel safer.

Yet in June, a week from Father's Day, the sky was blue, the temperature was comfy and the Bleacher Creatures were boiling over after two losses to open the series. Their venom was immediate and palpable. If they still served alcohol out in the cheap seats we would have been tormented even more, I am positive. But their policy is lenient, apparently, and some drunken guests are let through the turnstiles despite slurred speech and bowed legs. So after two carefree innings with a few expected taunts, things turned ugly.

He came up the stairs with a friend in tow. His shirt was black with red-orange letters telling everybody, "I KNOW JACK". At first I thought it was a cheeky reference to that computer game we all knew and loved in middle school but when he turned to ask his friend a question I saw the back was silk screened with the infamous Jack Daniels label. Oh. They entered the row behind us and asked a fat man what row J was. The fat man said, "That row, with the A's fans." Great. I could feel the evil smile before I saw it.

The A's were up to bat in the top of the third. After an infield pop up and a lazy fly to right, Nick Swisher stepped to the plate with the Yankees ahead 2-1. Swisher is a Super Sophomore, far outplaying any pundit's predictions: as of this writing he ranks in the top ten of Runs, Home Runs, Slugging Percentage and OPS (On Base Percentage Plus Slugging Percentage). He is a fan favorite not only because of his on-field skills but his place in Oakland Athletics history as a key player in the "Moneyball" draft, as profiled in Michael Lewis' bestseller of the same name. He is the future of the Athletics franchise. And in his second at bat of this game, he hit an inside the park home run. The whole stadium was standing, mostly sighing, shoulders slumped, groaning. Except me and Nathan, all four of our arms raised, exchanging high fives, yelling "Oh Yeah!"

From behind: "Sit down, faggots!" I smiled over my shoulder.

Then from my left: "You root for the fucking A's?" It was him, He Who Knows Jack. Now I could smell his familiarity with Mr Daniels as he stepped closer.

"Yeah, so? I was born there."

"Well you can go the fuck back there, kid." He was at the least three inches taller and carried thirty to forty pounds of gym-toned or jobsite-strong muscle more than me. He held an empty Gatorade bottle.

"Whatever, dude."

He hit me with the plastic bottle not once but twice, three, four times in rapid succession on the arm. "Go back, go back, go back, fucking faggot."

"What the fuck is your problem?"

"You, gay boy. You're in my bleachers rooting for the wrong team." He had maybe a year or two (three tops) on me. His face was flushing fast, the red spreading from his nose across his cheeks and forehead, now brighter than his carrot colored hair. His buddy, decked out in grey jersey and blue NY hat was laughing, "HaHA-tell him, boy."

"Are you serious?"

"I will seriously fuck you up."

I turned away. I remembered Nathan was there next to me when he asked me, "You alright? You want to move?" Then to make me smile, "These guys sure have a fascination with homosexuality." I shook my head, thinking it couldn't last much longer. I told him if it got too horrible I'd move with him.

"You hear me?" He was talking at me again, then to his friend. "This fag wont even respond." He hit me on the arm again. I turned to face him, face twisted in confusion, anger, futility. He continued: "You don't understand, asshole. I'll put my elbow through your glasses." My face showed disgust. "You dont get it, dick licker. I am so willing to get thrown out just to fuck you up."

"Okay. Clearly you could." I lifted my hands, almost inviting, and his face blanched. His eyes focused, somehow, and then the anger came again, the red flushing across his face with a fierce speed. His buddy asked him what I said and he replied with gibberish; he couldnt comprehend my retort. For about ten seconds I felt empowered and turned to the field again. At this point the A's had ended the inning after Swisher's amazing feat, the Yankees had come up and gone down three in a row and now the A's had a man on first (Eric Chavez, the $66million third base star). Jay Payton hit the next pitch into deep center and we all stood up again. It flew over Johnny Damon's head and Payton made it to second with a double, Chavez on third. They would go on to score, but first:

"I fucking dare you to talk shit."

I decided I wouldnt respond to anything. I may be called a pussy but I wasn't going to let him feed off my anger, I wasn't going to afford him an opportunity to put his elbow through my glasses--I can't afford new ones right now, I need to save my money. Then the peanuts started hitting my back.

It continued. The A's took the lead that inning, 4-2, and more crap hit us from behind. My neighbor rushed over to lean down in front of us and punch the air; two blows landed without much pain on my upper lip; I tasted a little blood briefly but it didn't hurt, it was more shocking; and after, while I put pressure on my face, he kept assuring me he would fuck me up outside. He started throwing cardboard cup holders. Innings passed, the Yankees took the lead again for half an inning and our biggest fan thought he should show me he could eat nachos by standing on the bench in front of us, kneeling down to chew in our faces. I had the idea to shove him back on his ass into the people below but knew that meant I'd have to throw down for real and probably buy new glasses, so I bit my tongue and lips some more, kept my hands up as a brace and shook my head. When the A's tied it during the next half inning he hit me some more, this time with his fists, but kept it to my left bicep. Nathan asked me if I wanted to move but my pride made me say, No, not really, I'd rather leave the stadium than give him the pleasure of moving seats. It was a test of wills at this point and I was determined to outlast him, regardless how nervous and degraded I felt. During the tied innings he went to get more snacks and I had tomatoes thrown at me (Im pretty sure the stain will come out) on top of the peanuts. But in the bottom of the 6^th, during a counsel on the mound after one of Barry Zito's 7 walks, we were rescued.

I sat with both feet up, hugging my knees, rocking a bit and tearing away my dead dry lip skin with my teeth. I did my best to ignore my bladder begging to be voided. A young guy, our age, sat down next to me and said, "Hey guys. I just wanted to apologize for that asshole." I turned in disbelief. Who would do this? Who is this guy? "I want you guys to know not all Yankee fans are like him. He's just sloshed." I had a hard time believing this but I appreciated the gesture. Nathan seemed to appreciate it more and immediately asked a question about the Yankees' pitching staff. The three of us talked baseball with ease and pleasure through the next uneventful inning before I felt comfortable enough to go relieve myself. We were yet more comfortable when A-1 Irish Asshole decided to leave and gave us the thumbs up crossing in front of us. But we kept our composure and didn't yell for joy when Dan Johnson hit his second home run of the game to put the A's up for good in the top of the 8^th.

Our new buddy Kevin (I caught his friend calling him by name) was a little more reserved for the rest of the game but he lit up when the Yankees' closer, Mariano Rivera, came in to Metallica's "Enter Sandman"--his favorite thing ever at a Yankee game. The game fell into its expected rhythm of bullpen dominance after Robinson Cano stole second base the next inning and neither team had another baserunner. Huston Street retired the side in the bottom of the ninth and the A's won. I shook Kevin's hand as he left and we smiled. I said, "Thank you," and he nodded with a slow blink. Nathan shook Kevin's hand. Kevin's friends said, "Good game, boys, take it easy," and I felt reassured that there is good in the world. But my body was still knotted nerves.

We filed out with the rest of the crowd and I scanned for the Jack Daniels t-shirt against my will. My eyes flitted everywhere and I gravitated towards an Indian 20-something wearing a brilliant green and gold Eric Chavez jersey with Nathan in tow. Nathan told me about the tomato stains and picked one off my collar.

Somebody yelled "Terrorist Faggots!" The Chavez fan laughed and shook his head. I noticed he and his friend were walking with two stunning young white ladies and thought, Good for them.

Of course the train was packed and smelly, yet subdued--whipped, I thought. Nathan said, "Weird day." I nodded and smiled and shook my head to say, "What can you do?" before I said out loud, "Well, they won. Now I can go drink a cold beer in a hot shower and curl in a cocoon." I think he only heard the words shower and cocoon. He laughed, "Well I'm glad you came." We were silent for a stop and then Nathan said again, "That's the last time you have to endure that this season."

"Thank God." We shook hands awkwardly in the cramped space of the train before he departed at 125^th Street. I thought about the beer & shower idea and decided against it. I would get off at 86^th Street and go see my girlfriend at work. She might help me loosen the knots in my chest.

The station was packed with the Puerto Rican Day Parade crowd. I saw the friend of the Chavez fan and he saw my tomato stains. "They can be rough. But I guess you got it worse." We talked about the Bay Area. We laughed at the ignorance of the Bleacher Creatures. We parted on Lexington: he went south as I turned north.

My girlfriend listened to me complain while I drank bottled water. She hugged me once, out of view of her coworkers. She let me vent most of the ride home. She vented about a co-worker, a Staten Island native, who has never left New York and poses far too often behind claims like, "I'm never going to watch Requiem for a Dream because so many people like it." I said that's the shit that annoys me--that typical New Yorker pride. After a block of silence I said, "Fucking deadly sin," and we smirked.

When we stepped inside the stuffy apartment I started to strip and said, "Maybe I'll take a shower to help me calm down." My limbs were still a little shaky.

"You want a cigarette?"

"That never worked for me. Once, in high school, after a fight with my dad--I think--I stole one from Gail and smoked it in the park behind our house. It just tasted gross so I never did it again. Yeah, except for when I'm plastered and dont know any better." I dropped my underwear on the toilet. "But anyways, I'd rather eat an avocado." Then I closed the door and got in the shower.

I met Jonathan Lethem, briefly

by Ryland Walker Knight

Yes, I did talk with Mr Lethem. He told me my name was cool and liked those 70s records by Mr Cooder, as well. We also talked about Edward Norton and his 'Motherless Brooklyn' adaptation:
me - So is Edward Norton ever gonna make that movie?
jl - Who knows? Your guess is as good as mine. I think the problem is he keeps taking acting jobs.
me - Oh well.
jl - Yeah, but I feel, well, lucky, because the project is kinda out of my hands at this point; it's at a stage where I don't have to worry about it. But I have to say it would be fun to see up there on the big screen.
me - Yeah, he'd probably be a great Lionel.
jl - For sure.
me - Are there any of your other novels you would like, or, uh, have a desire to see on the big screen?
jl - Well, I always thought 'As She Climbed Across The Table' would be a fun movie and it was actually just optioned by some people at DreamWorks so maybe we'll see that in the near future.
me - Oh, great. That was the second book of yours I read, and I really enjoyed it. It was fun to see that 'Pure Fiction' strain at work with how you cast Berkeley because I went there, for a time.
jl - Yeah, it's funny. I never went to Berkeley--I lived there, but never attended--so the exteriors are all pretty much Sather Gate, you know, but the interiors are Bennington.
me - I was wondering if they were Lawrence Berkeley Labs or what because I never went into the science buildings. Anyways, I think those blind men are hilarious and could be funny in a film.
jl - [while I'm finishing] Uh-huh. Sure. Well, thanks.
me - Yeah, well, I don't want to bother you any more. Thanks again.
jl - Sure, have a great night.
me - Thanks, you too.

I didn't foist a short story on him, just my copy of 'The Disappointment Artist' which he scribbled 'For Ryland - All best wishes - Jonathan Lethem' in which looks more like 'For Ryland - All belt wirl- *mountain top* *swoop up, looped-t, troublesome fizzling out EKG*'

It was still cool. Maybe if I come across him again I can engage him for longer than that brief exchange. I'd love to talk movies in general with him. See what he thought of 'Syriana' or if he's a Criterion junkie, too. Hope so.