I never was much for New Year’s Resolutions. Like, sure, I understand the appeal -- the drive ever-towards self-improvement is an admirable one even if the stereotype is that these things never make it past the thirty-day mark -- but I’ve slowly developed a “Why wait for the new year when you could do it now?” sort of mentality. It doesn’t always work -- I still procrastinate more than I probably should -- and maybe it takes the fun out of some traditions, but it has served me well enough.
What I do do sometimes, then, is use the turning of the calendar to institute challenges to myself. Four years or so ago, I made this whole plan for cutting soda out of my diet, basically daring myself to not drink it. And yeah, the mechanics of that are remarkably similar to, you know, normal resolutions, but I find the slight mentality difference works better for what I try to use these for.
This year, the dare was to have a pair of brother-blogs, this one and Secret Asian Man, each one posting weekly. And for the most part? I think it worked! It definitely helped keep both of us honest, and I did learn a lot about what I do like to write about: spreading the word on things I like and complaining a whole lot about things (read: work) that I don’t, with a hint of writing about writing and maybe an honest-to-god story in there somewhere too. Overall, I thought it was a lot of fun!
So what’s next? Well, I guess I have a week to think over and finalize what next year’s challenge to myself should be. And maybe I won’t manage it. I can already see how parts of next year might pose a challenge. Hopefully, it’ll be the type of challenge I enjoy doing.
In the meantime, Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and I’ll see you next week.
-F
Tuesday, December 25, 2018
Tuesday, December 18, 2018
Tin Can Space Machines
Airplanes are bunk.
Like, I don’t mean to disparage the concept of aviation as a whole, especially when my sister’s going into aerospace engineering, and I especially don’t want this to come off as a “dumb millennials don’t know what older generations had to put up with” kind of piece (at least, without acknowledging early on that that’s the kind of piece it’s going to end up being). I really do enjoy being able to go to places at speeds people less than 100 years ago would consider impossible. But that doesn’t mean that new technology doesn’t come with a host of new-technology problems.
I just boarded a plane. It’s a small one, only forty-eight passenger seats and maybe two attendants at best. We’ve all boarded and the captain rings the intercom. Apparently, our destination has some low visibility issues, so if we could all just get off for, well, they don’t know how long but if we could leave the plane for now, that would be great…
There’s a reason comedians have made entire routines starting with the simple phrase, “What’s the deal with airplane food?” And sure, huge strides have been made to make sure that those specific jokes are a thing of the past. But jokes about airplane food are a symptom of a larger problem about how these companies aim to make money, and just because this particular symptom has been downplayed does not mean the sickness overall has been quelled (#eattherich).
Besides, comedians will move on to other things to poke at in the airport system. John Mulaney, for example, has an entire bit where he imagines himself dealing with a fictional airline service he calls “Delta Airlines” and their perhaps excessively malicious customer service. It’s kind of their job to do things like that.
I’m at 36,000 feet. Flight attendants are handing out little sandwiches -- turkey or veggie -- to all the passengers, but they seem to be paying more attention to each other as they bicker about who needs to get what for later (maybe someone in First Class needs more coffee? Probably, it’s always someone from up front…). When they get to me, I get the same question this woman has asked everybody: “Turkey or veggie?” she says.
“Veggie,” I say.
I get a sandwich. I take a bite. It’s turkey.
I write all this with the, if not the memory of, the awareness that things were probably different back when flying was a luxury or at the very least something of note to do. Again, it’s mundane now. Flying is boring, and Icarus wouldn’t have flown like he did if it was boring, so maybe there’s something to that idea. That’s why comedians get so much mileage out of it; because so many people have had similar experiences.
But that doesn’t mean I can’t want them to be better, right? Like, until we make that technological leap to teleportation (and get over the related ethical problems), this is what we’re stuck with. The least we could do would be making it the best hours of our life.
As I make my way past customs, one bag in my hand and the other on my back, I see her face, and I remember why I came all this way in the first place. All these petty grievances, from that kid two rows up who would occasionally bawl his lungs out to how frequently they seemed to cycle the cabin lights on and off, that’s all washed away. I smile. She smiles back.
“How was the flight?” she says.
“Fine.”
-F
Like, I don’t mean to disparage the concept of aviation as a whole, especially when my sister’s going into aerospace engineering, and I especially don’t want this to come off as a “dumb millennials don’t know what older generations had to put up with” kind of piece (at least, without acknowledging early on that that’s the kind of piece it’s going to end up being). I really do enjoy being able to go to places at speeds people less than 100 years ago would consider impossible. But that doesn’t mean that new technology doesn’t come with a host of new-technology problems.
• • •
I just boarded a plane. It’s a small one, only forty-eight passenger seats and maybe two attendants at best. We’ve all boarded and the captain rings the intercom. Apparently, our destination has some low visibility issues, so if we could all just get off for, well, they don’t know how long but if we could leave the plane for now, that would be great…
• • •
There’s a reason comedians have made entire routines starting with the simple phrase, “What’s the deal with airplane food?” And sure, huge strides have been made to make sure that those specific jokes are a thing of the past. But jokes about airplane food are a symptom of a larger problem about how these companies aim to make money, and just because this particular symptom has been downplayed does not mean the sickness overall has been quelled (#eattherich).
Besides, comedians will move on to other things to poke at in the airport system. John Mulaney, for example, has an entire bit where he imagines himself dealing with a fictional airline service he calls “Delta Airlines” and their perhaps excessively malicious customer service. It’s kind of their job to do things like that.
• • •
I’m at 36,000 feet. Flight attendants are handing out little sandwiches -- turkey or veggie -- to all the passengers, but they seem to be paying more attention to each other as they bicker about who needs to get what for later (maybe someone in First Class needs more coffee? Probably, it’s always someone from up front…). When they get to me, I get the same question this woman has asked everybody: “Turkey or veggie?” she says.
“Veggie,” I say.
I get a sandwich. I take a bite. It’s turkey.
• • •
But that doesn’t mean I can’t want them to be better, right? Like, until we make that technological leap to teleportation (and get over the related ethical problems), this is what we’re stuck with. The least we could do would be making it the best hours of our life.
• • •
As I make my way past customs, one bag in my hand and the other on my back, I see her face, and I remember why I came all this way in the first place. All these petty grievances, from that kid two rows up who would occasionally bawl his lungs out to how frequently they seemed to cycle the cabin lights on and off, that’s all washed away. I smile. She smiles back.
“How was the flight?” she says.
“Fine.”
-F
Tuesday, December 11, 2018
A Premature Countdown But A Countdown Nonetheless
It feels weird making a “Top Five” list before the year is quite over yet. Like, as I’m writing this, movies like The House That Jack Built, Roma, The Favourite (yes, with the “u”), or If Beale Street Could Talk haven’t quite come out yet, which means that some of these could easily get bumped off or shifted around if I get around to seeing them. But this list has been on my mind since somebody asked about it at work, and I’m not sure where else this would fit into the schedule, so I thought I’d give at least a go at explaining myself here as well.
So without further ado, here are my five favorite films from 2018:
5) Thunder Road / Eighth Grade
(Thunder Road trailer) (Eighth Grade trailer)
Okay, I lied, it’s six films. But I liked these two for similar enough reasons that I couldn’t bear cutting one and not the other. It’s true that neither of these films is especially well shot (though Thunder Road does start with a reprise of the short film it is based on (which you can find here) which is a particularly impressive ten-minute long one take), but the writing very much makes up for it.
It’s actually interesting how these two films complement each other. Eighth Grade is about a girl’s final days in Junior High, dealing with the classic struggles of adolescence like not relating at all to her father or wondering why she’s not popular, but with a little bit of writer/director Bo Burnham’s wit mixed in there. On the other side of the coin, Thunder Road is about a father separated from his wife, sharing custody of a daughter the father has trouble relating to. But then he realizes he didn’t really know his mom that well either, and a large portion of the movie is him reconciling all that.
Anyway, they’re both really good with especially strong lead performances, so check them out if you can.
4) Thoroughbreds
(trailer)
It’s really easy to not care about what happens in Thoroughbreds, and I say that even as I put it on this list. There are simply no likable characters in the film, with even the two closest to sympathetic being a drug dealer and a literal sociopath. But the film (written and directed by Cory Finley), understands this and is shot in such a way to always keep the audience at a distance. The experience turns into a kind of helplessness, as you watch a series of events that was doomed to happen from the start.
And again, some people won’t like that. To those people, Thoroughbreds is a bunch of Rich, White People Problems with spoiled brats for characters, and that really is an acceptable reaction to this film. But once you get past that, the film just pulls you the rest of the way in.
3) Les Garçons Sauvages (The Wild Boys)
(trailer)
Oh, you thought the characters in Thoroughbreds were unlikeable, rich brats? Well, I’m one of two minds recommending this movie then. On one, some of the things not shown, only implied, in Thoroughbreds take center stage here, which means that the first third of this movie is just showing five terrible, terrible people doing horrible, uncomfortable to watch things. Thoroughbreds would just be a boring film without its audience’s engagement. The Wild Boys would have those same people leaving in disgust.
It also doesn’t do as much to draw people in, though that’s perhaps to be expected of a literal French art-house movie. It’s going to be pretentious and if you’re not into that, this probably won’t be an enjoyable watch. What the film does offer, though, is striking imagery and a Lord of the Flies-like energy that will leave those still in the theater with a peculiar sense of awe.
2) The Other Side of the Wind
(trailer)
I actually wrote a lot about this one already in my Blue Curtains post, but to summarize here, it’s fascinating how this film was made, it’s fascinating how it finally got all put together, and there’s enough of Orson Welles’ spirit to shine through, even if all the jokes and references land forty years too late.
Shot in a documentary style (almost ten years before Cannibal Holocaust and This is Spinal Tap popularized the mockumentary genre), The Other Side of the Wind describes to us the character of Jake Hannaford, a once-big-time film director who may be desperately clawing at relevance? It’s all unclear, of course, as Jake won’t let anybody into his private life without a fight, but on his seventieth birthday, there are cameras everywhere. I think some of the pieces are out of place, sure (the opening monolog practically begs to be respected for even releasing the film at all), but as I said in that post, I still can’t get this film out of my head.
1) Madeline’s Madeline
(trailer)
It was the trailer that first attracted me to this film, its cutout montage and constant “Hey Na Na” evoking that perfect sense of weirdness that I just had to see play out. And in that regard, I got what I was expecting. But what I wasn’t expecting was, to put it bluntly, the entire rest of it? Everyone’s performance is great, especially Helena Howard’s; it looks great, with a special commendation to make the images actually more focused as the film hits its weirdness stride; and its story slowly evolves in a sort of stream-of-consciousness way that perfectly models the perspective of its main character (and, if you watch a couple of interviews, also the creation of itself).
It’s weird. I mean, I knew I was pretentious (or at least enjoyed art people tend to call pretentious), but having it listed out like this made me realize it just a bit more. Like, the most accessible films are at the lower end of this list. Not that they’re bad, mind you, just that they’re listed lower than the more experimental fare. But at the same time, I do want most people to see most of these movies (The Wild Boys being the exception, again, you really do need to know what you’re getting into with that one), if only to help them find something new to enjoy.
-F
So without further ado, here are my five favorite films from 2018:
5) Thunder Road / Eighth Grade
(Thunder Road trailer) (Eighth Grade trailer)
Okay, I lied, it’s six films. But I liked these two for similar enough reasons that I couldn’t bear cutting one and not the other. It’s true that neither of these films is especially well shot (though Thunder Road does start with a reprise of the short film it is based on (which you can find here) which is a particularly impressive ten-minute long one take), but the writing very much makes up for it.
It’s actually interesting how these two films complement each other. Eighth Grade is about a girl’s final days in Junior High, dealing with the classic struggles of adolescence like not relating at all to her father or wondering why she’s not popular, but with a little bit of writer/director Bo Burnham’s wit mixed in there. On the other side of the coin, Thunder Road is about a father separated from his wife, sharing custody of a daughter the father has trouble relating to. But then he realizes he didn’t really know his mom that well either, and a large portion of the movie is him reconciling all that.
Anyway, they’re both really good with especially strong lead performances, so check them out if you can.
4) Thoroughbreds
(trailer)
It’s really easy to not care about what happens in Thoroughbreds, and I say that even as I put it on this list. There are simply no likable characters in the film, with even the two closest to sympathetic being a drug dealer and a literal sociopath. But the film (written and directed by Cory Finley), understands this and is shot in such a way to always keep the audience at a distance. The experience turns into a kind of helplessness, as you watch a series of events that was doomed to happen from the start.
And again, some people won’t like that. To those people, Thoroughbreds is a bunch of Rich, White People Problems with spoiled brats for characters, and that really is an acceptable reaction to this film. But once you get past that, the film just pulls you the rest of the way in.
3) Les Garçons Sauvages (The Wild Boys)
(trailer)
Oh, you thought the characters in Thoroughbreds were unlikeable, rich brats? Well, I’m one of two minds recommending this movie then. On one, some of the things not shown, only implied, in Thoroughbreds take center stage here, which means that the first third of this movie is just showing five terrible, terrible people doing horrible, uncomfortable to watch things. Thoroughbreds would just be a boring film without its audience’s engagement. The Wild Boys would have those same people leaving in disgust.
It also doesn’t do as much to draw people in, though that’s perhaps to be expected of a literal French art-house movie. It’s going to be pretentious and if you’re not into that, this probably won’t be an enjoyable watch. What the film does offer, though, is striking imagery and a Lord of the Flies-like energy that will leave those still in the theater with a peculiar sense of awe.
2) The Other Side of the Wind
(trailer)
I actually wrote a lot about this one already in my Blue Curtains post, but to summarize here, it’s fascinating how this film was made, it’s fascinating how it finally got all put together, and there’s enough of Orson Welles’ spirit to shine through, even if all the jokes and references land forty years too late.
Shot in a documentary style (almost ten years before Cannibal Holocaust and This is Spinal Tap popularized the mockumentary genre), The Other Side of the Wind describes to us the character of Jake Hannaford, a once-big-time film director who may be desperately clawing at relevance? It’s all unclear, of course, as Jake won’t let anybody into his private life without a fight, but on his seventieth birthday, there are cameras everywhere. I think some of the pieces are out of place, sure (the opening monolog practically begs to be respected for even releasing the film at all), but as I said in that post, I still can’t get this film out of my head.
1) Madeline’s Madeline
(trailer)
It was the trailer that first attracted me to this film, its cutout montage and constant “Hey Na Na” evoking that perfect sense of weirdness that I just had to see play out. And in that regard, I got what I was expecting. But what I wasn’t expecting was, to put it bluntly, the entire rest of it? Everyone’s performance is great, especially Helena Howard’s; it looks great, with a special commendation to make the images actually more focused as the film hits its weirdness stride; and its story slowly evolves in a sort of stream-of-consciousness way that perfectly models the perspective of its main character (and, if you watch a couple of interviews, also the creation of itself).
It’s weird. I mean, I knew I was pretentious (or at least enjoyed art people tend to call pretentious), but having it listed out like this made me realize it just a bit more. Like, the most accessible films are at the lower end of this list. Not that they’re bad, mind you, just that they’re listed lower than the more experimental fare. But at the same time, I do want most people to see most of these movies (The Wild Boys being the exception, again, you really do need to know what you’re getting into with that one), if only to help them find something new to enjoy.
-F
Tuesday, December 4, 2018
The Long And Short Of It
One of the lesser weaknesses I have in my writing is how I put titles on things. Now, I call it a “lesser weakness” because I know it doesn’t really matter and could probably be perennially ignored or put off until the rest of the work is finished, like, I didn’t have a good title for Write What You Know until I had nearly finished the thing. But there are other times where I flounder -- without a title to attach a central theme to, I sometimes lose track of what I was writing about.
One way I’ve found to get around this is to use longer titles. Generally, they’re just more detailed versions of what I would already use, often with an “or” stuck in there somewhere. For example, this post could easily have been titled: The Long And Short Of It (Or: How To Keep Focus When Every Other Method Fails You (And Yes, I’m Aware Of The Irony)).
That’s another thing that I like doing, actually. I like how titling things can add a little bit of humor to the proceedings. I don’t do it to things I need to seriously show other people. I don’t snark when writing a college paper on it but I did at one point have a paper with the concise title: Moving The Goalposts: Clarke’s Third Law Shows Its Age.
The closest I can think of for where I got the inspiration to do this is Kurt Vonnegut, with such classic either/or titles like Slaughterhouse Five Or: The Children’s Crusade and God Bless You Mr. Rosewater Or: Pearls Before Swine. Or maybe my inspiration is closer to Philip K. Dick who graced us with such titles as Doctor Bloodmoney, Or How We Got Along After The Bomb and Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said. Obviously, I’m not trying to compare myself to these authors in any more than a superficial level, but that is where I got the idea. Probably.
I don’t know if there’s a conclusion here. Like, this post was more of a reflection on a thing I do, and I’m not going to keep doing it (or the other way, doing it more) just because I wrote 404 words about it. But I did want to write it in case longer titles do start showing up in these posts. So I guess be on the lookout for that? No promises, though.
-F
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