Weblog 184
August 16, 2009~ 12:00am
When things are lousy on the ground, people look to space. They dream about space travel and extra-terrestrials. They want to sail far above the clamorous ground and their troubling lives...they think about being abducted or spirited away, having their minds expand or even blown by the unimaginable.
Just to drift off, higher than the moon. Lots of people seem to have an interest in this - some more seriously than others, but the only one I knew who was truly serious about it is my Uncle Russ...and he was crazy as a coot. But I do understand the longing to see such things - or to blast off
and soar. It's the 'escape artist' that lives in all of us. Some folks drink or take drugs to alter reality, and the trouble is that reality stays just as it is, and it's only the mind twists funny for a while. Then there are the true believers of escapist alternatives, such as alien abductions, and believing the world is but a small crack in a far more expansive universe. Science fiction lovers are that sort-
and you can tell by the cover of that magazine, folks loved that sort of thing long before there was real space travel. They wanted to believe in visitations, and beings not of this planet being able to make contact with us in provable, real ways.
Today I came across a site with some amazing pictures. They look real enough, and from the comments, it appears that lots of people share their interests, and have experiences of their own. (My uncle, rest his troubled soul, would have LOVED to have shared something like that! As it was, he merely took a lawn chair to the highest, cleared hill he could find in South Park, and watched the skies at night. He also thought he was an Indian - but that's another story.)
If you'd like to see these astonishing pictures, go to UFO Casebook and you'll see exactly what I mean. I guess it could be faked, but it sure is somethin'.
Although it was hot and humid Saturday (and usually Wayne and I put off movie-viewing on nights like that because it's just too uncomfortable in my un-air-conditioned downstairs) we've been wanting to see 'The Wrestler', and it finally arrived via Netflix. Let me say that it's a good movie, but far from a great one: the story is predictable from beginning to end. It's a movie without one surprise in the entire one hour and 45 minutes. Marissa Tomei is wonderful (she always is)-but Mickey Rourke has sadly lost the one thing that made his acting stand out. He used to have a very expressive face, but one has to have a face that moves to use that, and his no longer does. It's stretched and Botoxed into stone. Everyone ages. Look at Michael Caine, who was a 'pretty boy' as well, but his acting hasn't suffered a bit, because he's allowed nature to take its course.
Mickey Rourke's vanity has been the death of his ability to show that wonderful, liquid emotion he's always been capable of. It was the very softness in the musculature of his face that allowed deep, changing emotions to be so visible, but you can't read plastic- and you can't get beyond the rigidity of that flesh to see the man.
What you see is not an 'aging' man.....but an 'altered' one. So sad. You'd think that in this film that might have been the very thing that could have worked (I know I did) --but its too much of a handicap. Even playing a beaten up, washed-out old wrestler, it's just plain eerie to look at, and damn near immovable.
The story is seriously flawed in that the sub-plots of both his failed relationships do not work, and both for the same reason: they're hokey. Schmaltzy. Tomei should NOT have come to see his last fight..that threw things over the top and changed the movie from drama to melodrama.
The young actress who plays his estranged daughter was excellent, but in a very flawed role. The whole 'making up scene' with father and daughter walking along the beach and then dancing together in the paint-pealed, stripped down old palisade ball room should have been cut. Period. A simple phone call would have sufficed to set the audience up for her last disappointment with a father who always ducked out the back door when it was important he show up...that scene just would not have happened in real life. Melodrama again.
I'm glad I saw it, but it's a film that could have stood some serious editing and rewriting. Scenes with actual wrestlers were the best parts of the film...very natural, totally fascinating. I think a better cinematographer could have found his way around Mickey's stoneface somehow. Shadows, lighting....something else should have been tried. He's a good actor, but movies- no. Not at this point...(unless we're talking about 'Sin City', from 2005, which was based on a graphic novel, so strange-looking characters play perfectly in those.)
Mr. Rourke should try the stage at this point in his career --where there is not the same intimacy with the camera, nor the horror it brings now in close-ups. (Sadly, the cameraman for 'The Wrestler' decided to zoom right in, fixed on that unmoving mask.) Why do people always go too far?? Is it our reaching beyond our grasp? Maybe that's it. Chasing that which cannot be reclaimed, or hoping for something entirely new.
And hey, now that I think of it.....maybe that's why so many stare at the night sky, waiting for ships...holding their cameras at the ready. They want to make fiction real.
August 16, 2009~ 1:45pm
Sometimes in talking to children the mind does a little skip/dance because what comes out of their mouths is so surprising and funny. It's puzzling until the meaning clicks into place despite the words.
On Friday's pizza night, I was sitting at the picnic table with 6 year old Bill and 4 year old Kay, and we were laughing and thinking up 'stinky things' to put into a story. Each suggestion was met with gales of laughter: things like 'a monkey's butt' and 'old socks soaked in vinegar', and 'throw up'. (Kids LOVE such verbal exercises.) Suddenly Kay, eyes big, announced "I hate bikinis.
I threw up a bikini once!" Consternation flooded my face. "I hate 'em too, Kay. Mostly because I can't wear 'em anymore." "No, Gram." Bill said, "she means zucchini. Kay threw up zucchini. She HATES IT."
Well that made me howl. It pays to have a good interpreter when you venture into Toddlerland, and Bill's the BEST. Never even thinks things are funny- they just need a little help in translation is all. There he is, looking through his GIANT emerald and ruby stones, happy as Daddy Warbucks with 20 carats. Bill loves his gems. (Or is it gums? LOL!!)
August 19, 2009~ 7:00am
First, let me say that I just now realized I've been typing '2008' everywhere this year. LOL!!! Gonna correct that pronto, but here's today's gift.
That goofy thing is from one of my favorite sites. Wanna' be delighted? Go to Just Weird - you'll LOVE IT!
***
(Return To Weekly Archives)
When things are lousy on the ground, people look to space. They dream about space travel and extra-terrestrials. They want to sail far above the clamorous ground and their troubling lives...they think about being abducted or spirited away, having their minds expand or even blown by the unimaginable.
Just to drift off, higher than the moon. Lots of people seem to have an interest in this - some more seriously than others, but the only one I knew who was truly serious about it is my Uncle Russ...and he was crazy as a coot. But I do understand the longing to see such things - or to blast off
and soar. It's the 'escape artist' that lives in all of us. Some folks drink or take drugs to alter reality, and the trouble is that reality stays just as it is, and it's only the mind twists funny for a while. Then there are the true believers of escapist alternatives, such as alien abductions, and believing the world is but a small crack in a far more expansive universe. Science fiction lovers are that sort-
and you can tell by the cover of that magazine, folks loved that sort of thing long before there was real space travel. They wanted to believe in visitations, and beings not of this planet being able to make contact with us in provable, real ways.
Today I came across a site with some amazing pictures. They look real enough, and from the comments, it appears that lots of people share their interests, and have experiences of their own. (My uncle, rest his troubled soul, would have LOVED to have shared something like that! As it was, he merely took a lawn chair to the highest, cleared hill he could find in South Park, and watched the skies at night. He also thought he was an Indian - but that's another story.)
If you'd like to see these astonishing pictures, go to UFO Casebook and you'll see exactly what I mean. I guess it could be faked, but it sure is somethin'.
Although it was hot and humid Saturday (and usually Wayne and I put off movie-viewing on nights like that because it's just too uncomfortable in my un-air-conditioned downstairs) we've been wanting to see 'The Wrestler', and it finally arrived via Netflix. Let me say that it's a good movie, but far from a great one: the story is predictable from beginning to end. It's a movie without one surprise in the entire one hour and 45 minutes. Marissa Tomei is wonderful (she always is)-but Mickey Rourke has sadly lost the one thing that made his acting stand out. He used to have a very expressive face, but one has to have a face that moves to use that, and his no longer does. It's stretched and Botoxed into stone. Everyone ages. Look at Michael Caine, who was a 'pretty boy' as well, but his acting hasn't suffered a bit, because he's allowed nature to take its course.
Mickey Rourke's vanity has been the death of his ability to show that wonderful, liquid emotion he's always been capable of. It was the very softness in the musculature of his face that allowed deep, changing emotions to be so visible, but you can't read plastic- and you can't get beyond the rigidity of that flesh to see the man.
What you see is not an 'aging' man.....but an 'altered' one. So sad. You'd think that in this film that might have been the very thing that could have worked (I know I did) --but its too much of a handicap. Even playing a beaten up, washed-out old wrestler, it's just plain eerie to look at, and damn near immovable.
The story is seriously flawed in that the sub-plots of both his failed relationships do not work, and both for the same reason: they're hokey. Schmaltzy. Tomei should NOT have come to see his last fight..that threw things over the top and changed the movie from drama to melodrama.
The young actress who plays his estranged daughter was excellent, but in a very flawed role. The whole 'making up scene' with father and daughter walking along the beach and then dancing together in the paint-pealed, stripped down old palisade ball room should have been cut. Period. A simple phone call would have sufficed to set the audience up for her last disappointment with a father who always ducked out the back door when it was important he show up...that scene just would not have happened in real life. Melodrama again.
I'm glad I saw it, but it's a film that could have stood some serious editing and rewriting. Scenes with actual wrestlers were the best parts of the film...very natural, totally fascinating. I think a better cinematographer could have found his way around Mickey's stoneface somehow. Shadows, lighting....something else should have been tried. He's a good actor, but movies- no. Not at this point...(unless we're talking about 'Sin City', from 2005, which was based on a graphic novel, so strange-looking characters play perfectly in those.)
Mr. Rourke should try the stage at this point in his career --where there is not the same intimacy with the camera, nor the horror it brings now in close-ups. (Sadly, the cameraman for 'The Wrestler' decided to zoom right in, fixed on that unmoving mask.) Why do people always go too far?? Is it our reaching beyond our grasp? Maybe that's it. Chasing that which cannot be reclaimed, or hoping for something entirely new.
And hey, now that I think of it.....maybe that's why so many stare at the night sky, waiting for ships...holding their cameras at the ready. They want to make fiction real.
August 16, 2009~ 1:45pm
Sometimes in talking to children the mind does a little skip/dance because what comes out of their mouths is so surprising and funny. It's puzzling until the meaning clicks into place despite the words.
On Friday's pizza night, I was sitting at the picnic table with 6 year old Bill and 4 year old Kay, and we were laughing and thinking up 'stinky things' to put into a story. Each suggestion was met with gales of laughter: things like 'a monkey's butt' and 'old socks soaked in vinegar', and 'throw up'. (Kids LOVE such verbal exercises.) Suddenly Kay, eyes big, announced "I hate bikinis.
I threw up a bikini once!" Consternation flooded my face. "I hate 'em too, Kay. Mostly because I can't wear 'em anymore." "No, Gram." Bill said, "she means zucchini. Kay threw up zucchini. She HATES IT."
Well that made me howl. It pays to have a good interpreter when you venture into Toddlerland, and Bill's the BEST. Never even thinks things are funny- they just need a little help in translation is all. There he is, looking through his GIANT emerald and ruby stones, happy as Daddy Warbucks with 20 carats. Bill loves his gems. (Or is it gums? LOL!!)
August 19, 2009~ 7:00am
First, let me say that I just now realized I've been typing '2008' everywhere this year. LOL!!! Gonna correct that pronto, but here's today's gift.
That goofy thing is from one of my favorite sites. Wanna' be delighted? Go to Just Weird - you'll LOVE IT!
(Return To Weekly Archives)
...
. or pay a visit to my Audio site to hear things
I've written- 
Some are just 'jotters', thoughts as they fly- going
nowhere but where they are. If you stop and read a few~ or post a
few~ thanks for
the perusal. Last of all, if you've a hankering for rants and raging,
try making a stop at my other blog- 
