Hard Eight a.k.a Sydney

Yesterday I watched PT Anderson's film Hard Eight for the second time. He ran into a lot of studio trouble when making the film, most notably with the title, he wanted the film to be called Sydney, but the studio insisted on Hard Eight. But at this point, Anderson had only done some PA work, so he didn't have the clout to control his own film. Now, he had done some shorts before, but for someone who'd never done a feature, Hard Eight is a really well made, restrained debut, though watching it at the time, I seriously doubt most people would see the potential for something like Magnolia coming from this guy.

But, to the film itself. The most striking thing in Hard Eight is how slow paced the film is, I don't think it's boring at all. but it's a film that's much more about getting you into an emotional space than conveying a narrative. Befitting its lead character, the film is almost tired, and any action seems to require a lot of exertion. Most of the film consists of dialogue scenes, and there's not that much music, though what music there is, is great. The film's aspect ratio is 2.35:1 and Anderson uses the full frame, frequently playing dialogue scenes in single take long shots that distance you from the characters, and reduce the tension that could be present in some scenes.

The reason for this is because the film's main character is someone who almost never expresses his emotions. Sydney just appears at the beginning of the film, and for the vast majority of its run time, his motives are unclear. We see his relationship with John, but don't get a real sense of what the man himself is like. The only things we know about him are the way he treats people, specifically the respect he gives Clementine and the disdain he has for Jimmy. So, rather than try to tell us who this guy is and what he's really feeling through filmmaking techniques, Anderson maintains the ambiguity by playing things very low key and just allowing the events to play themselves out.

That's not to say this is a film where the technique is invisible. Anderson's eye for a great frame is evident right from the start, and I was frequently struck by how he uses framing to create suspense, as in the scene where Sydney drops his keys in the car, and is hunched down looking for him, but the camera stays looking out the window, making us think that Jimmy is going to attack him there. However, he subverts this expectation by cutting and having Jimmy smash through the other window. Anderson makes great use of the lights in Las Vegas and Reno, their garishness a contrast to the low key human characters. He also has some great tracking shots, foreshadowing the astonishing stuff he would do in later films.

Anderson is one of the very rare filmmakers who I would consider equally brilliant as a writer and a director. Most people are either directors who write, like Wong Kar-Wai or David Lynch, or writers who direct, like Kevin Smith. Anderson is so good at both aspects of the process that you can't imagine anyone else directing his script, or him directing a film he didn't write. Hard Eight is like this as well, the film consists of mostly dialogue scenes, with very little overt stylization or action, and yet through the filmmaking, he creates a mood that really defines the film, and makes it completely different from the countless other neo-noirs that emerged in the late 90s.

The film's greatest failing is ultimately its lack of scope, especially in comparison to Anderson's subsequent films. It's an expertly made film that does everything it sets out to do, but what it sets out to do isn't that unique or ambitious. That's why I wouldn't put the movie on the same par as a Magnolia or Boogie Nights.

Looking at the film in the context of Anderson's later work, there's a few things that stand out. One is the cast. Philip Baker Hall gets the spotlight here and gives a phenomenal performance. His acting is all in the way he carries himself, watching him you know he's been through so much. John C. Reilly also does his first work with Anderson here, and he's not quite as good as in his later roles. He's solid overall, but there's a few lines that just felt unrealistic to me, he really comes into his own with Magnolia. Philip Seymour Hoffman does a one scene cameo and he's pretty solid, though I seriously have to question the mullet. And Melora Walters turns up very briefly at the end, her performance with only a couple of lines was apparently good enough to inspire Anderson to bring her back for Boogie Nights, and subsequently to the best role in Magnolia.

Other than Anderson regulars, I loved Gwyneth Paltrow in this movie. This is the only movie I've seen her in that's set in the present, and it was nice to see her divorced from mannered styles of acting and instead do something more grounded in reality. She's great here, nicely conveying the false persona she puts on to attract clients, and then subtly letting her guard down around Sydney.

In that respect, this film touches on a core Anderson theme, and that's how lonely people can turn themselves into new families, families that are frequently more loving than their 'real' families.. Here, Sydney acts as a father to John and Clementine, helping these two struggling people become self sufficient. This family clearly means more to him than his biological family, who he hasn't seen in a long time. That same dynamic turns up in Boogie Nights, when Jack brings together a collection of loner misfits and turns them into an extended family that works on the films. When Dirk bottoms out at the end of the film, he doesn't go back to his mother and father, he goes back to Jack and Amber, and they take him in again.

Magnolia is the ultimate extension of this theme, as people struggle to form new bonds as a result of the awful families they had in the past. Claudia ultimately finds solace in a reconstructed family with her mother and Jim, and Frank and Linda become more family than they'd ever been, united by the loss of Earl.

And in Punch Drunk Love, we see Barry struggling to live with his family. Though, you'll notice I haven't referred to that film much. I only saw it once, about two years ago, so I bought it off Ebay, it should be here in a couple of days, and I'll review it once I see it, having become an expert on Anderson. Though both PDL and Hard Eight lack the outrageous ambition that made Boogie Nights and Magnolia landmarks in cinematic history, at least for me.

So, Hard Eight stands as a wonderful mood piece, that captures the lives of a few people passing through Sydney's world. And at the end, he finds himself back where he began, with blood on his hands, and the knowledge that no matter what he does, he can never completely atone for what he'd done.

Song of the Week: David Wrench 'Sodium Lights'

Welcome to the first addition of an exciting new feature on Thoughts on Stuff, and that's the song of the week. Here, following the lead of MP3 blogs like Fluxblog, I will be presenting a song that I've been liking this week, with a link to download it. So, out of respect for my ancestors, this week's song is actually one that was featured on Fluxblog.

David Wrench - Sodium Lights

I don't know much about this artist, but I'm looking to find out more having heard this brilliant track. It reminds me a bit of Moby, but he is both more rock and more far reaching in the scope of instrumentation than Moby's stuff. I love the instrumental crescendo at the beginning, leading to the subdued first verse. Then the song slowly builds, adding layers of keyboard stuff, and increased emotion to the vocal, until it explodes into dance mode at the chorus, the peak of the song until the insane keyboard instrumental part that hits around 3:20.

The song combines two of my favorite genres, orchestral rock and dance, with liberal use of odd synth effects. It's the rare electronica song that has this emoitonal a vocal and that fusion is what makes the song so effective.

So download this and check it out for yourself. It hit me on the first listen, but definitely give it a couple of tries if it doesn't take on the first listen. And I'll be looking for more Wrench, because this is the sort of song that hits so many of the things I love about music.

Joss Whedon Q&A

So, today here at Wesleyan alum Joss Whedon was appearing to screen his new film, Serenity and do a Q&A afterwards. So, this event is at 7:30, most of your Wesleyan films events don't start until fifteen minutes or so after the listed time, and it was nowhere near full at the last event they did with Joss, but I figured I'd get there early just to be sure. So, I have dinner and get there at 7:10 and there's a massive line, stretching around the building. Apparently freshmen have not gotten the memo on the whole fashionably late thing, so I'm a bit nervous, but figure I should get in. And the line winds it way along and I'm getting close when one of the workers comes out and says "You're probably not going to get in, you can wait if you want, but it's not looking good," but I've heard that one before, and I figure they're just trying to weed out the people who don't really want to be there anyway. However, we don't move forward much more, and eventually the guy comes out and says that they are filled to capacity, and we would not get in.

So, I was quite annoyed at this point, and I sort of lingered around the door, talking to one of the people I know who works there, but he said that they were completely full. However, he did say I could come back in two hours and see the Q&A. This was not the best turn of events, I did want to see the film, but if I had to miss one thing, the film itself or the Q&A, I'd rather miss the film, because I can see that in a month, while this Q&A is a once in a lifetime thing, or twice I guess, since I already saw Joss when he appeared here back in Spring of 2004.

That Q&A was one of the best events I've ever been to, coming right as I was finishing my first viewing of Angel, becoming caught up as they prepared to air the final four episodes of the series. I was so into Joss' work at that point, it was amazing to hear him speak about Buffy and Angel and the worlds he had created. Hearing him talk about the process of creating a story was inspiring and relatable, I really understood his claim that the stories you end up telling are the ones that just won't shut up, they force themselves to be told somehow.

And I guess for him, Firefly is one of those stories, but I think the series was just starting to get good when it was cancelled. And because they had shown Serenity right before, the vast majority of questions here were about that world, and the film. Unfortunately I got a couple of spoilers for what happens in the movie, but most of the questions people asked were equally true for the series as they were for the film.

I'll commend the fact that people didn't ask really obvious, boring questions, but I think there was a bit too much of a focus on the Western elements of the film, four people must have asked which Western movies and tropes were a major influence on him. I feel like if you have someone who has created so much original stuff, it would be more interesting to hear about his process than just to go over what influenced him again and again. I'd imagine these were people who'd just seen the film, not any of his series, and as a result didn't have a big picture view of his work. Side note, it's very annoying that these people got to see the film instead of me who has seen all three series, but I guess this means I've got to show up earlier next time Interestingly, there were virtually no Buffy questions, I guess people felt that would have been looked at as sort of backtracking.

During the big Q&A there were a few interesting questions. One person asked about the reason for Joss' fixation on adolescent female heroes who commit violent acts and even he seemed at a bit of a loss, claiming that "my therapist and I are working on that." Even in the limited stuff I've done, I can see a lot of connected character types that come up almost subconsciously. When you're a writer, there's a way you see the world, and Joss clearly sees these type of female characters as important, something that's reflected in the work.

But the really interesting stuff came up after the big Q&A when Joss was signing stuff and fielding individual questions. Just as in the last time he was here, the crowd of people gradually diminished until only people who really knew his work were left. One really interesting thing he said was that when he came here to Wes, he made a conscious decision to focus on film and devote all his energy to that. He stopped doing anything that wasn't related to either watching or making movies. That's something I'm really happy to hear, because while I haven't done the total cut off, I can't think of the last really fun thing I did that wasn't somehow related to a work of fiction. I think he felt like you need to completely know film if you're going to make it, and wiht each new film you see, it's easier to understand what works and what doesn't work in cinematic storytelling. Martin Scorsese said the same thing, he used to watch two or three movies a day, so did Richard Linklater, so clearly this is the sort of devotion that one needs to become a filmmaker, or at least it doesn't hurt on the journey to making films.

I asked him the much rumored Spike movie. And he said that it required so many creative people to make, it was difficult to line up, and that they needed to make "a few more connections" before it would happen. He did say that it would take place after the end of Angel and would clear up some of the issues that people still had. I guess the biggest issue would be, do they live or die, and if there's a movie, that would imply that at least some of them survive. So, it is still in the works, but it's a matter of finding the time and bringing people together to make it happen.

The other really fun thing was when he was talking with someone about Runaways, the comic. He said that he still goes to the comic store every Wednesday and buys more books than he should, including Runaways, Powers and a whole bunch of Ultimate Marvel stuff. But, he was talking with someone else about Runaways and was just so enthused about it, talking about how great issue eighteen was, and how he and Bendis fought at Marvel to save it. I haven't read the comic, but it was so cool to see that a creator of so much phenomenal stuff was still a really passionate fan of fiction, and able to talk like someone you might run into at any local comic shop. The other thing he spoke about really passionately was Veronica Mars, saying it was the only show where he felt honored that it was called "the next Buffy." That's a show I need to check out, because everyone who watches it seems to completely fall in love with it.

Another interesting bit was when he talked about how people had criticized Firefly for ripping off Cowboy Bebop, but he had never seen the series. That's something that stood out to me when I saw it, Firefly definitely feels like it could be set in the same universe as Bebop. I'm sure there's a bunch of fanfic crossovers available on the internet. And as a fan of both series, it was cool to hear Joss mention the criticism.

He talked about a bunch of other interesting stuff, but that's what stood out the most to me. I get the feeling that Joss has so many great stories to tell and I wish he had more time to tell them all. I'd love to see him getting a TV series going, preferably on somewhere like HBO, without the constrains of network TV, or to just do some quick movies based on original stories, or an original comics work, just something to get more of his ideas out there.

So, it was an enjoyable time, he did about two hours of Q&A, and was always really entertaining to listen to. I don't think it was quite as mind blowing as the first time, because I knew more what to expect, but I could still listen to him talk for as long as he's willing to.

Scope in Story

I think one of the biggest problems in film criticism, and other media criticism, is the fact that most critics evaluate something more on the bad things about it than on what it does right. So, the best reviewed films are frequently the ones with the least bad things about them, rather than the most good.

This may sound like an arbitrary distinction, but it actually has a huge impact. If you evaluate a film based on what it does wrong, you're more likely to give a review to a safe film, one that doesn't take that many risks, so it doesn't have anything particularly wrong with it. Mystic River is one of the best examples of this, there's nothing really wrong with the film, but it's not a good film, because it doesn't do anything particularly good either. The film's problems lie mainly in just how safe it plays things, never doing anything interesting with the medium. People talk about Clint's films as harking back to old Hollywood, in their invisible editing and filmmaking techniques, and simple well told stories. However, as much as I enjoy some old Hollywood stuff, it's the fact that these films are so safe that makes them good films, but very rarely great.

If Mystic River is a prime example of a film that benefits from this critical approach, I think the Star Wars prequels, Revenge of the Sith in particular, were films that were hurt by it. Take a look at Revenge of the Sith next to virtually any other movie ever made and you'll see that in terms of story and visual scope, almost no other film can touch it. The film does so much, and the vast majority of it is successful, however, I don't think everything works. Natalie Portman was awful, some of the dialogue was weak, and there were a couple of awkward effects moments. However, in reviewing the film, people seize on these moments and use it to justify a negative review, while completely ignoring the fact that the film does so much that's phenomenal. Let's say the ambition of Mystic River is at a 3, and it acheives that, while Sith is aiming for a 10 and lands at around an 8. So, Sith may have more grating flaws, but it also has so much more that's good than Mystic River does, and that's why I think it's a better film.

I'd rather see a movie that attempts to do as much as possible and fails on a few counts than something that is completely safe and accomplishes everything it sets out to, but is trying to do something so small, it's not really worth doing in the first place. Now, Mystic River isn't a film I hated, but it's the fact that such a safe, routine film was considered one of the best films of 2003 and is still in the top 200 on IMDB. Sideways is another example, that was a film I did enjoy, but it was by no means one of the five best movies of 2004, it's this perceived shortage of quality films that makes critics shower praise on films that are solid, but unremarkable.

This is a huge thing in comics too. I read the first trade of Gotham Central, a book that got a lot of critical acclaim. The basic premise is a police procedural in Gotham City, and it's a servicable book, solid stories, but nothing you couldn't find an episode of Law and Order, and that's free, while you've got to pay ten bucks for the comic. That's part of the attitude in comics that TV and movies are superior mediums, so if we could just make something as good as CSI, people will read it.

The thing is, as a medium, comics can do things that no one else can, however, the industry is inferior to TV or movies, in the sense that if people want a story, they're not going to look to comics first. I know in my case, I got into comics because I saw the X-Men movie, and wanted more, and that led me to comics. However, most people are satisfied by seeing one X-Men movie every couple of years, the fans of the comics are the ones who need a bit more. That's why comics have such a burden, people don't look to them first, so they have to be good enough to make you pass on the DVD and pick up the trade.

What this means is that it's not enough for a comic story to be just good, it's got to be great. I don't want to read something I could watch on TV, I want to read something great that could only be done in comics. That's what Grant Morrison does, he's the best creative person in the world today, and his stories all take full advantage of what the medium can do. Alan Moore's another great example, it's no surprise that the movies based on his work have been awful, his books are so tied into the medium, and use it in a totally unique way that the medium and the story are inextricably linked. Someone like Warren Ellis may tell good stories, but you can tell he really wants to be making a movie, but couldn't, so he made his story for comics. That's what the whole widescreen action thing was about, trying to make comics into movies, instead of taking advantage of the medium's actual strengths. Most people get enough story from movies, they don't need more movies in their comics.

But getting back to the point about the scope of stories. All too often I'll leave a film saying that was good, but completely disposable. As an artist myself, I don't understand how someone could put in all the time it takes to make a film, and then make something like Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo. I think of making films as a higher calling, like being a doctor, you're not going to become a filmmaker just by coincidence, it's something that should dominate your life, it's not a job where you just go into the office, do 9-5 and then go home, it's got to be an all consuming passion. So, I wonder how people could make a film and create something impersonal and just there. Reading reviews for Red Eye, I saw a lot of three star reviews, to the effect that it's a solid B-movie, a nice disposable entertainment. The thing is, is that why you become a filmmaker, to make disposable entertainment?

Now, I guess I just assume that if you want to be a filmmaker, you'd have the 'evolved' taste to love auteur films and look down on Hollywood product. But I guess some people go into movies to make just fun things, but I find that odd. I wouldn't want someone to make a film just because it's a good script, each film should have some personal resonance and be an expression of the artist's personal passion. When you hear Wong Kar-Wai talk about 2046, it's clear that this was a story he needed to tell, a story that dominated his life for five years while making the film. Similarly, with David Lynch, each film seems to be an expression of something deeply personal, it's not like David just decided, it's been a while since I made a movie, why don't I throw something together?

What WKW and Lynch do is make films that do so much and leave you with a lot to ponder. Watching the film is really just the first step on the journey to fully understading the work. They create films that are visually dazzling and use the medium in extraordinary ways, and in that sense, these films aim incredibly high. So, if WKW fails on some levels, as a lot of his projects do, they attempt so much that they're much more rewarding to watch than the staid, unexciting filmmaking of Eastwood.

If you're looking at films that aim high, no one can match PT Anderson in the late 90s, with his two epics, Boogie Nights and Magnolia. These are films with at least ten main characters in each, and that are a virtual textbook on how to use film techniques to enhance the emotional dynamic of a story. In Magnolia, the subject matter is small from an objective point of view, but for each of the characters, it's the biggest day of their lives, and the film's finale is an emotional apocalypse before the rebirth at the finale. Boogie Nights tells the story of this entire family of characters, the history of porn in the 70s and 80s, and at the same time can be read as an allegory for the failure of auteur filmmaking in the 70s. That's ambition.

Now, the thing is, there's no reason why every film shouldn't aim as high as Anderson's work, in its own way. Directors need to try to tell stories that aim high and make full use of what the medium can do. This means not making a script that at its best is just going to be good, it means aiming for great with every project.

But here's the problem, we live in a society where films that aim for greatness are criticized as overambitious or pretentious, criticisms that Magnolia received. 2046 also was criticized for trying to do too much. Here's the thing, critics only see a film once when they review it, I won't give my final opinion on a film until two viewings, and particularly with WKW, his films are often ok on the first viewing, then stunning on the second, once you don't have to worry about plot mechanics and can just enjoy the visuals and emotion.

It's the same in music, where 'back to basics' groups are lauded, while the Gorillaz are criticized for using a choir in their songs, claiming it tries to bring the song a false grandeur. False or not, I'd rather hear a song that aims for grandeur than something that just is trying to match the dynamic of something from the 70s. It all goes back to the fall of auteur cinema and prog rock, when personal expression became linked with pretentious excess. And unfortunately, the age of 'lean' and 'efficient' being synonymous with good is still upon us, while the people who aim a bit higher are criticized when small pieces of their work fail, even if the rest of the work puts to shame the vast majority of so called art.

The Big Picture

A few days ago I finished reading a book called The Big Picture: The New Logic of Money and Power in Hollywood, a book that examines the ways that Hollywood changed since the 80s as a result of the fact that all the majors are now owned by absurdly huge media conglomerates who see films as media commodities that can support their television channels and consumer electronics products. The book lambasts the present Hollywood studio system, dwelling on the way that mainstream films have ceased to be art and instead are loss leaders for ancillary products.

Now, the reason I read this book was because I read an article by the author on why there's less nudity and sex in movies recently. The reason for this is because of all purpose twenty-first century villian, Wal Mart, who consign films with nudity or sex to the 'adult' area of their video section, and refuse to give them prominent placement at the front of the store. Wal Mart is even reluctant to stock R rated films, which means that studios will lose a major revenue source if they put out films with the sort of content that runs contrary to Wal Mart's values.

Now, in the book he goes on to talk about how marketing campaigns are geared entirely to the opening weekend, which means they want a film that will make most of its money in the opening weekend, then get out of the theater so they can ride the coat tails of the theatrical campaign for the DVD release. So, they want films that don't rely on building an audience, they want presold properties, hence the huge amount of TV remakes this summer. You don't have to explain the premise to people, they already know it. The thing that vexes me is the fact that I seriously doubt most people under 20 have heard of Dukes of Hazzard, yet the film is targetted at them, so the brand name won't even appeal to your target audience. Why not make an original film then?

The book makes me feel very bad about the state of mainstream cinema in America, I've seen enough bad films to know that they really are churning out product, not art, and the thing that has me so annoyed is the fact that people continue to see these shitty films and buy them on DVD, while ignoring the stuff that is really great. It's reached the point where I've seen only one American film this year that I'd consider a truly great movie, and that's Revenge of the Sith, a film that despite being a prime example of the commodification of movies, also works as a stunning piece of art.

That's the crucial thing to keep in mind, just because your movie doubles as a toy commercial, that doesn't mean it can't be a phenomenal movie. Sure, your Star Wars or Lord of the Rings generates a ton of money through licensing, but they are also great films, whereas so many blockbuster movies don't even try to do something original, they just synthesize things that had been successful in the past into a 'new' film.

The book does give you a good idea of why most Hollywood product is so awful, there's so many stages a film has to go through to get made, it's inevitable that the auterial spark will be diminished along the way. It's a tough thing, as a writer, I'm sure there's a ton of great writers out there who refused to compromise, and ended up not having their movies made, as many as the number of writers who did write a great script, but ended up having it lost on the journey to the screen.

A while back, I did a blog comparing the current American film scene to that of the 70s, ending on the hopeful note that this summer of bombs would lead Hollywood to become more experimental and get back to the more challenging cinema that was dominant in the 70s. However, this book would lead you to believe that's never going to happen.

The reason for this is because of the Wal Mart thing I talked about before, and the fact that those more challenging films don't translate well overseas. Stars and effects are apparently universal, while more subtle stuff doesn't play as well. The other reason is that while the box office may be slumping, the DVD market is keeping the studios quite wealthy, which means there's not really a dire threat. Studios don't make that much money from theatrical distribution, and since they have no financial stake in theaters, there's not a huge need to try to help them out.

While the studios are churning out increasingly less artistic films, they still do keep indie studios under their wing, things like Focus Features and Warner Independent. These subdivisions usually do lose money, but they also churn out the best American films that are made, usually supporting auteur filmmakers with more challening projects. Looking at my top ten films of 2004, there were five American movies on the list, all of them from these mini-majors. So, that's where we're seeing continued support for more challenging films in America.

The only problem is this means that most of the best filmmakers in the country don't have access to big budgets, or big audiences for that matter. The sad thing is that even though I really wish that studios would make more challenging films, people are so conditioned to expect a certain type of story that they really couldn't handle more challenging films.

I showed Irreversible at my film series and a woman asked me, "Why would you watch this movie," and I talked about how it uses cinema to depict the way a single act of violence can destroy people's lives, as well as showing the futility of revenge. She responded to this by saying "Ok, but that's not an evening's entertainment." People just expect a movie to tell a story, to entertain you, and I suppose that's valid. The thing is, I find being challenged by a film much more entertaining than just watching a disposable comedy, laughing while it's on, but leaving barely remembering what happened. But, I view film as art and most people don't.

That said, the upside of America is that TV has become a medium very friendly to auteurs. Look at the story of Joss Whedon, struggling screenwriter, doctoring scripts, but unable to express his true vision. He makes a show and is given basically carte blanche to do what he wants, and as a result, he's able to tell a story with more scope and fully developed characters than any film I've ever seen. In the new highbrow serial type show, we see the mature subject matter and challenging characters that were the hallmarks of 70s Hollywood, but now with the added bonus of added time to develop much larger and more complex storylines. This season of Six Feet Under was better than any film I've seen this year, with the exception of Sith, and The Sopranos puts to shame even the brilliant Godfather and Goodfellas. TV is still looked down upon, but the work being done there is really phenomenal, and if I could do anything, it wouldn't be to make a film, it would be to be able to do a long form series on HBO.

My Film Projects

Today I set up a little site to showcase the films that I've made over the past couple of years. I finished editing Ricky Frost yesterday and finally figured out how to make a managable file to post on the net, so that went up and I also put on Extracurricular Activities. You can get to the site here.

I'm quite happy with the way Ricky Frost came out, it's a fully realized story, and very stylish. I think it touches on issues that are actually quite relevant to a lot of people my age that haven't been discussed in movies before. It's definitely the most personal film I've done, most of the stuff I write incorporates stuff from my life, but only to build characters, not as the central plot elements, but with this movie, I tell a story that could happen in the world I live in, to the people I know. It's something that's worth doing occasionally.

Creative Projects

I haven't posted here in a while, and the main reason for that is that I haven't had the chance to watch that many movies or read anything lately, and that's because I've been spending almost all my time working on my own creative projects.

Last week I was spending all day editing Extracurricular Activities, the film I made with the summer workshop I ran for LMC. So, I had an odd relationship to this film, because I didn't have much to do with the creation of the story, or the physical shooting of it, that was done by the kids in the workshop. But at the same time, I was in charge of the whole thing directing how things were going and helping the kids get good shots. And then Jordan and I edited the whole film and put it to music, so I did a lot on the film.

So we finished that movie Monday and screened it twice, first for the parents of the kids in the workshop and then later in Jordan's backyard for our friends. It went over quite well, and a lot of people were calling it the best movie we've ever done. I'm not sure about that, but I found it interesting that people responded so well to a film that I really like, but find a bit impersonal. There are some artistic bits, but it's much less artsy than the movie we made last year in the workshop, A Cold Summer. Extracurricular actually has a pretty tight narrative, and with a few exceptions, sticks pretty strongly to the Hollywood rules, about goal-oriented characters driving the plot forward.

I'm not necessarily opposed to this, but I guess I'm unsure how I feel about making something so conventional. But, the important thing to keep in mind is that this workshop was about showing kids how to make a movie, not my personal expression, so getting paid a lot of money to make a film that turned out well isn't bad at all.

Once this was finished, I started editing Ricky Frost, the film Jordan and I shot over winter break back in January. It had lain dormant for a long time, but I'm glad to bring it back. The thing about Ricky Frost is we never quite finished shooting, we ran out of time, so some scenes were never filmed. This leaves me with some holes in the story I have to fill in during editing. And then we've got these massive dialogue scenes with no cutaways, which are very tough to make sense of and to make interesting. However, I was on camera for the vast majority of this movie, and it looks great. So, I'm trying to sculpt the raw material into a unified film. It's not so much narrative as just a look into some characters' lives at a point in time. I don't think people are going to respond to this film in the same way as they did 'Extracurricular Activities,' because its primary concern isn't telling a story.

As I mentioned a while back, this summer I came to realize that the mainstream moviegoer really does look for the traditional Hollywood narrative. They view film exclusively as a storytelling medium, and taking time to show things that are just beautiful is considered a waste of time. And in that case, this film will have some wasted moments, but I think they're beautiful, and it's my movie so I'm editing it in a way that pleases me first, and the viewer second. But, at the same time, there's some very relatable dilemmas in there, so people may respond, especially people my age. I know both Jordan and I wrote a lot from what we'd experienced, so it should be pretty real.

That editing goes on, and at the same time the first issue of my comic, Division Shadow is almost finished. We've got 21 of 24 pages drawn, about 12 inked, and I'm still working on securing a letterer, but once he's in place, the thing will be basically good to go. I've set up a site for the comic over at www.divisionshadow.com, definitely check out the gallery section, where you can see some finished pages.

This project is something I'm really proud of. It's been dominating my thoughts ever since the artists started on it, and my greatest problem is I keep coming up with new scenes for an already bloated project. And each new page costs me more money, but if it helps the work, it's worth it. I've been so busy with this film stuff, I haven't had a chance to work on new material in a while, which means that the artists are almost catching up with me. For a long time, I'd just had three scripts sitting there, and no rush to finish things, so now having to hurry is a bit annoying in the short run, but good in the long term. I'd really like to get at least a rough version of everything finished, so I know how long the book will be.

So, that's what's up with me now. Once I finish Ricky Frost, I'll have a lot more time, hopefully by Monday that project will be in the bag, and I'll have some time to do some writing on the comic before I go back to school.

Six Feet Under: More Final Thoughts

If you haven't seen these yet, the HBO site has obituaries for all the characters who died in the last episode, and that's basically all the characters, so it's definitely worth checking out. They basically tell us what we can figure out from the future sequences, but there are some interesting bits, like the last name of Brenda's new husband, Nathanson. She just can't get away from the name.

One really great sequence I forgot to mention was the "I Just Want to Celebrate" sequence, with Nate singing against a white background. It recalled the ads for funeral products from back in the pilot and gave a really nice jumpstart to the end of the episode. That was the first part of the finale that really had me excited.

The other thing I realized was how important it was for Nate to die before the finale. In this last episode, we see a new family being born out of what was left of the Fisher and Cheniworth families, both in turmoil since the death of their patriarchs. In the end, the families are brought together, and as we see at Willa's first birthday party, they become a functioning unit.

Thing is, Nate was never one for family life. He ran from home as soon as he could, and always resented being pulled back in to the funeral business, forced to abandon the life he had built for himself in Seattle. Over the first two seasons, Nate entertains the idea of marriage and kids, of finally growing up. However, he always has Brenda's problems as a crutch, it's not his fault that they're not functional, it's hers.

Then, in year three he finally is in a family, married to Lisa. He has a daughter he loves and everything seems to be going well, but he can't help but think of other ways that things could have went, perhaps because of the visions he has in 'Perfect Circles,' the life with Lisa is one of many he could have had, but is it the best? He becomes increasingly discontent with his life during that season, and always uses Brenda as the excuse, he married Lisa out of necessity, but he really loved Brenda, and she becomes this figure of the exciting life he could have had, instead of the dulling existence he has. So, Nate distances himself from the family unit, not unlike his own father had.

At the end of the third season, Nate gets exactly what he'd wished for, Lisa vanishing, but guilt torments him through the fourth season, and it takes that long for him to recommit. When he goes to Brenda at the end of the fourth season, it would seem that Nate can now have the life he wanted, and a family with the person he really loved all along.

However, what the fifth season shows us is that Nate isn't someone who's willing to sacrifice, he always has to do what's in the best interest of himself, and he gets bored very easily. Now that he has Brenda, there's no one else he can use as a fantasy figure, a what if, but then Maggie comes along, and in her he sees everything that Brenda isn't, much like Brenda was everything that Lisa wasn't. Nate once again abandons his family for another woman, and with this we can see that Nate just isn't someone cut out for family life. Claire is willing to give up her trip to New York to care for her mother, David chooses his responsibility to his family over the money selling the funeral home would provide, but in the end, Nate isn't prepared to sacrifice anything, and he sleeps with Maggie, justifying it to himself by saying that things between him and Brenda would never work.

And that's true, but what it really comes down to is that Nate is too selfish to ever have a successful lasting relationship. He's more about himself than others, and that's why the family can only re-form after his death. From the way Ruth talks about Nathaniel, there are clear parallels, both of them retreat from family responsibility to do their own thing. And now that they're both gone, there's the chance to form a successful family, and that seems to be what happens, to the point that when David dies, the family is at a picnic playing touch football.

I don't mean to be harsh on Nate. He's just not built for the life he tried to fit himself into. When he was in Seattle, living on his own, he was probably very happy, he's the kind of person who needs to be able to do what he wants to do. And with a family, that's just not possible. I guess Nate's tragedy is that he thought he could change and fit himself into this role, even though it became apparent at the end that he could not.

So, it's a tragic arc for Nate, but the ending shows why the dark times with Lisa were necessary, contrary to what a lot of reviewers will tell you. I think the third season was the best, but I do have an odd attachment to seeing characters suffer, and Nate certainly suffered. Still, he was my favorite character on the show, I think his problems were the most compelling, and even with his flaws, he was the most charismatic character in the series.

And once Nate's out of the way, the characters are able to put aside their differences and form a family unit. Ruth and Brenda finally reconcile, David faces his demons and Claire finds purpose, and at the end the Fisher family is reformed and stronger than what it had been before.

Six Feet Under: 'Everyone's Waiting'

After five seasons, the show is over, and it went out with the best sequence in the entire series. The episode as a whole was solid, but not up to the series' best, however the final five minutes was completely astounding, going far beyond anything the series has done in the past.

But back to the beginning. The first forty minutes or so of the show actually didn't feel that finale-like, the plots moved along, the characters had problems and life seemed fairly normal. I guess the most notable thing was seeing all three of the surviving Fishers at a crossroads. Ruth was completely alone for the first time in forty years, David was thrown out of his house and Claire had to decide if going to New York was the right thing to do.

It was interesting to see Ruth breaking down because she'd spent the whole series putting on this false mask of control and here we finally see her lose it and admit that she is unhappy, notably in the phone call to George where she could even muster the effort to sincerely lie and say she's fine.

My favorite scene in the early going was Claire taking pictures of Ted. It was really sweet and made the character even more likable. The crucial moment here was when he tells Claire that being hip is an adolescent concern, so he's glad to be beyond it. Claire, and a number of other characters on the show, most notably Brenda, were always so concerned with not being cliched to the point that they rejected sincerity, and here Ted basically punctures that, allowing Claire to be emotionally open with her mother and her whole family at the end.

The other really great bit was seeing the Cheniworths together as a family. This episode's main theme seemed to be about the rebuilding of family, a counterpoint to the shattering of the Fisher family back in the first episode. So, we get to see Brenda's family rebuilt, and for the first time, she actually seems happy to be with them.

So, then there's the question of rebuilding the Fisher family. As the episode progressed, it seemed that David would sell the home, the family's base. There is a certain justice in this, but I like the way things played out better, and the dinner scene where the new incarnation of the Fisher family is assembled was one of the highlights of the episode. The warmth and love in that scene was such a contrast to almost all the dinner scenes in the past, where drug induced awkwardness was the norm. Even though it was a bit sappy, I did really enjoy the toast to Nate.

Up until the point where Claire leaves, I was liking the episode but was a bit underwhelmed. After the incredible intensity of the last few weeks, this episode felt like a bit of a letdown, as plots were resolved and the conflict disappeared. It felt like a fairly conventional series finale, one character leaves and this provides a chance to say goodbye to all the characters, with the obvious implication that we are saying goodbye along with Claire.

However, once she starts driving away, the episode ascended and presented us with one of the greatest sequences ever shown on television. There's a ton to talk about, and I guess I'll start with the aesthetics. I really like the odd way everything was filmed, the all white interiors and oddly tinted exterior shots. Some of the aging makeup wasn't exactly convincing, but I'll forgive that. But most of all I loved the way it was integrated with Claire driving along. The song, also used in the season five trailer, is great and perfectly fit with what was going on here. I liked the way the future scenes were presented exclusively as visual moments, with no attempt to explain exactly what's going on.

After all the problems they've been through over the course of the series, it seems like most of the characters get a pretty happy ending. Ruth and George are apparently together until her death and judging from his reaction to her passing, they have deep feelings for each other.

David and Keith's story was one of the best flash forwards. Their wedding scene was very cool looking, with the two white tuxes. Keith's death was the most shocking, but at the same time, we get to know that he sets up his own successful business. One of the things that confused me was why it seemed like one of their children grew up to look exactly like Keith. In David's death scene, I figured it was David hallucinating that Keith was there, but there was another scene where that didn't seem to be the casae. I guess that's something that we'll never know.

Brenda seems to marry someone else, though what happens in her long term future is unclear. Maya and Willa don't appear after the wedding scene, and her husband only appears that once. Though I guess it's fitting that in the end it's just her and Billy. It seems that despite her temporary happiness, Brenda really is destined to be with Billy, and it's the bond between the two of them that outlasts everything else she has. I would have liked to see how Billy died, but I guess he didn't qualify for a death scene.

The best part of this flash forward was knowing that after all her problems Claire finally did find happiness. Even though he stands for a lot of things I don't like, I couldn't help but like Ted more and more with each passing episode, and I'm really happy that in the end he and Claire end up together. In the previous seasons, Claire had always taken on men who were needy and unstable, like Gabe and Russell, so it's fitting that in the end she gets to be the needy and unstable one because there's someone to support her. The good thing that this episode did was make getting together with Ted compatible with being an artist and being herself.

I guess that Claire and Ted don't meet up until her mother's funeral in 2025, so we can infer that in the interim Claire lives the independent lifestyle that her mother never got to have. Ruth clearly sees Claire as a chance to make up for her mistakes, and it seems that Claire has achieved the dream of independence and love that eluded Ruth.

The final future vision, of Claire's death, was sublime, seeing the photos on the wall, the face sculptures from year four, the photo of Ted from this episode, it was a really powerful moment, and to see Claire dying intercut with the beginning of a new phase of her life worked really well.

The final move up to the clouds reminded me of another one of my favorite series finales, Cowboy Bebop's 'The Real Folk Blues: Part II.' In looking at past series finales, I'd divide them into three catergories. There's those that leave you wanting more in a way that's unsatisfying. I would put Buffy's there because I just needed some more time with the characters to see where they were going. The plot was resolved, but the character issues were not.

There's those that leave you wanting more, but in a good way. This would include Angel and Twin Peaks, shows that end on what seem like cliffhangers, but in fact serve as great final statements.

Then there's the elusive catergory of those where you're completely satisfied and don't want any more, but not because the show has run too long, because all the issues have been resolved and the story has been told. The Office and Cowboy Bebop were the only shows I'd place in this catergory, but I think I'd add Six Feet Under. The present portion of the episode left everything tied up nicely, but it was missing something.

However, with the jump into the future, I got the literally final moments with the characters that I needed. I think this device was phenomenal and the perfect way to in five minutes show everything we need to know about what happens after the show ends. It's a really bold device and I consider it a complete success. It gives each character their turn in the spotlight and we can infer what we need to know about the background characters as well.

Is there anything I'd like to have seen that didn't occur? I'd like to know more about where Maggie ended up. Why was she at the doctor's office? I was thinking maybe she was pregnant with Nate's child, but it would be a bit ridiculous to have Nate just churning out kids from beyond the grave. Was it a psychiatrist, to talk about her problems, or I think her job was selling medical supplies, so that could be it. We can infer that Rico is a success from the fact that he's taking a cruise as he dies, but I'd have like to have seen some of his family life running the home and also more of Vanessa in the role of funeral director. Also, more of what happened to Billy. But, on the whole, these issues are not that important, it's up to the viewer to come up with a story that will connect the dots.

That's really what the whole future story is, a guideline that the viewer can use to see where things end for the characters and give us a frame in which we can build the rest of their lives after the show. I love the device and I'm extremely happy that Alan Ball did this. It's so good that I wish every series would end this way, I know I'd have loved to see something like this at the end of Buffy or Angel. Or even not this specific device, just a really bold stylistic departure that conveys the essence of the series and takes full advantage of what we already know about the characters. I've always contended that the episodic TV series is the best vehicle for really avant garde stuff because you have a huge base of knowledge to work off of. So, you can do an episode like Buffy's 'Restless, the Twin Peaks finale or the opening twenty of minutes of 'Perfect Circles' and it works because we know the world and the characters, so we can accept the abstract purely visual storytelling. And the longer the show's on, the more craziness we can take. This future scene takes full advantage of the fact that we know the characters to in five minutes show us the rest of their lives, it's something that could only be achieved after so thoroughly building a universe over the course of five seasons.

So, at the end I have to say I'd consider the show a total success and its final moments the high point of the series. The thing that made the show more than just a soap was the undercurrent of metaphysics, the gravity that death gave to the events on the series, and never was this better used than here at the end.

I went into the episode thinking that I'd absolutely dread the final fade to white, and it turns out there wasn't one. But, even if there had been, I got everything I needed, I feel completely satisfied by what happened and am content to let go of the show. Those final five minutes were basically the viewing for Six Feet Under, giving us the opportunity to say goodbye before the show was lowered into the ground. And with this blog, I throw some dirt on the casket and stand back as it is lowered into the ground beneath a grave that reads:

Six Feet Under
2001-2005
'Beloved Show'

And with that cheesiness, so concludes the thirteen blogs about the show that I did over the course of the season. I'd never written about every individual episode of a series before, but there was enough in each for a lot of words on every episode, and that's the sign of a good show.

Running a Film Series

This summer, Jordan and I ran a film series at the local library. We used the projector from LMC-TV, and back at the beginning of the summer chose eight films to show people. I was expecting to get a twenty or thirty year old demographic, and chose the films accordingly. Also, one of the points of the thing was that there was a discussion afterwards, so we chose films that would be conducive to discussion.

Once the screenings started it became apparent that we were not getting the younger demographic. At the vast majority of screenings, we had people who were basically fifty and up. And in a lot of cases, the films we had programmed were not in line with their tastes.

The screening that went the worst was when we showed Safe, the 1995 Todd Haynes film. This was a film I loved, and hadn't heard about until this year, so I figured it was the perfect film to show and get more exposure for. However, the film is apparently glacially paced. It's not fast, but I didn't really notice any dragging, however at this screening, we had four old people in attendance and apparently they felt watching the film was not a good use of the time they had left on this Earth and an hour and a half into the film, one of them said "I can't take it anymore" and walked out. So, this was a low point.

However, the next week we were screening Oldboy. I was anticipating a lot of awkwardness, but this one went really well. We actually got a younger audience for this film, about ten people, and it hit the audience exactly as intended, getting a huge gasp at the revelatory moment at the end of the film, as well as a lot of "Augh"s during the nastier moments.

At Waking Life we got an older audience who were bored by the film, so we stopped it halfway through. They claimed it was too 'college' and left then. But, we did have an interesting discussion, so it was a success on the whole.

Then we screened Fallen Angels, the Wong Kar-Wai film. We had a big audience for this and the movie went over pretty well. People might not have loved it, but there were no walkouts and we had a solid discussion afterwards.'

The last film we were set to show was Irreversible. At the beginning of doing this, I was thinking that we could challenge the audience, show them this really challenging film and push the boundaries of the way people think.

I'd always wondered why TV networks didn't show more challenging program, and why movie studios pushed to make movies more likable. Now I can understand that mentality. Doing these screenings I saw slow paced arty movies fail to connect with an audience, who always seemed bored and on the edge of leaving. As time went on, I was wishing we had shorter films that would go over better with the crowd. I moved away from more challening stuff, and rather than thinking about showing the best film, I wanted to show stuff that would appeal to the audience. It's so easy to say in theory you want to challenge the audience, but when you actually have to sit there with them, it's not so easy.

So, Jordan and I had basically decided we couldn't show Irreversible. It was too graphic and intense for people. But, we arrived there and three people said they were there to see it and wanted us to show it. Unfortunately we also had three old women who thought we were going to show American Beauty. So, we decided to go through with Irreversible, after warning them that it was incredibly intense and that they could feel free to walk out if they needed to. I was expecting the old women to go sometime between the start of the Rectum scene and the scene where Pierre bangs the man's head in with a fire extinguisher. However, they stuck around, and I figured the rape scene would end it for them, but they sat through that.

We reached the end of the film, throughout which there was such palpable awkwardness in the air I couldn't even really enjoy it. I was stunned that the old women had made it through the movie, but they had and the three people who had requested the film liked it. So, it was a success and I had achieved my original goal of challenging people's ideas of film.

We may not have gotten that many people, but at the end of most of the screenings I felt pretty good about how it went, and if we bring it back next year, I think we will program a little differently, some more accessible, quicker paced films that can still challenge the audience. I guess you do sometimes have to make concessions to how the audience feels and not just show what you like.

Tomorrow: Look for my reaction to the final episode of Six Feet Under!

TV Status Report

Six Feet Under comes to an end next week, by far the best show on TV right now, at least until The Sopranos comes back. So, with the end of Six Feet Under, there's only a few shows left that I'm still watching.

This fall, I'll be watching 24, Arrested Development, Gilmore Girls and probably Lost, though that show has been so poorly run, I very well might end up dropping it. 24 had its strongest season last year, the show constantly makes me say they can't top what they've done before, and then somehow they do. So, that's a must watch. Arrested Development is one of the funniest series ever, certainly the best American comedy since the glory days of Seinfeld, and I'm really psyched to see where they go with the new season.

Then there's Gilmore Girls. I watched the first five seasons in the spring, and it's a smart, rather addictive show, probably the one I'm most looking forward to seeing new stuff from. Even though 24 is probably a 'better' show in terms of scope and content, Gilmore Girls has me hooked because I need to see what happens to the characters next. That's another show where the most recent season was the best one by far, so it's going to be interesting to see where it goes from here. I always like when shows mess with the status quo and that seems to be what they're doing.

March of next year will bring my most anticipated series, and that's The Sopranos, which finally returns with new episodes. It's been a long break since season five ended, yet another case where the most recent season was the best. The Sopranos gets so much hype, but it deserves it because it's the best made TV series ever. I prefer Buffy or Twin Peaks, but in terms of constructing a layered narrative that builds with each season, no show can top The Sopranos. In each episode of the last season, they did more than most shows can do in a season.

I think I'm different from a lot of TV viewers in that I tend to prefer the later seasons of a show to the early ones. If you look at reviews of the most recent season of Six Feet Under, it's almost a given that the show's first two seasons were the best, and that's the case with a lot of other shows, like Buffy or The Sopranos. In the case of all those series, I would consider the first season the weakest, and the best time of the series falls somewhere near the end.

I will admit that in the case of Six Feet Under, the plotting is definitely better at the beginning of the series. The revelation of Brenda's past, with the Charlotte Light and Dark book is phenomenal stuff, and would seem to be more interesting than the later years, when the plot is scaled back. However, if you go back and watch an episode from the first season, then watch a current episode, there's a huge difference and that's in the history, what the characters have been through. In the current season, each event has so much more impact because it ties in with what the characters have already been through, so, even if nothing's happening, we know so much about the characters that just having them interact is enough to create incredible tension.

Buffy season six is a great example of this. They scaled back the overall threat and let the character arcs play themselves out. It's my favorite season of the series, there's much higher emotional conflict than in the early years because we know so much about what everyone has already been through.

Basically what I'm saying is, in the later years, when you know the characters better, the show is inevitably more interesting, because every interaction has history behind it, and seeing characters you know go through stuff is more interesting than seeing new people go through stuff. The only time a show goes bad in the later years is if it ignores the character arcs, as Buffy season seven did, or more notably the abhorrent X-Files season 8 and 9.

So, I checked out the first episode of the new Showtime series Weeds, about a widowed mother who sells marijuana to support her children. It stars Mary Louise Parker, who's one of my favorite actresses. She was great on The West Wing, and was the highlight of the great miniseries Angels in America. So, I was expecting good things.

Unfortunately, the show just felt a bit too much like an ordinary sitcom. It's dressed up with attitude, and the characters all go a lot further than people on your average family sitcom would, but at its core, it's got the same beats. I guess I was expecting something a bit darker, more of a The Office style very dark comedy, and this just isn't that.

That said, I enjoyed the episode, Mary Louise Parker was great, and I certainly don't mind spending a half hour watching her, but the rest of the cast were overacting and didn't seem that real. I guess I'm so used to the Arrested Development/The Office documentary style comedy it's tough to adjust to this. But, I'll give it another couple of episodes, because the premise is great and has a lot of potential.

Six Feet Under: 'Static'

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Y: The Last Man

Over the past few weeks I've been reading the comic book series, Y: The Last Man. I just finished the fifth volume, and will have to wait a few months until the next trade comes out. The series has a great premise, a plague wipes out all the men on Earth except for one, our main character, Yorick Brown. So, he has to go around and figure out why he survived, and also try to get back to his girlfriend, Beth, who's over in Australia, and doesn't know he's alive.

First off, I really liked the book, it's been a while since I had a good longform comics series, and like Preacher, this book goes down smooth, and you don't want to stop reading it. I don't think it reaches the insane heights of Preacher, but it's a thoroughly enjoyable book that tells intelligent stories. I really do want to see where things are going.

So, the five volumes follow Yorick on his journey across the country to get to a lab in San Francisco, where Dr. Mann can test Yorick and see why he survived. They decide to go there at the end of book one and it takes until the end of volume five to actually make it there. This book definitely follows the new trend in comics of decompression, i.e. pacing the story slowly. Decompression came about as a reaction to older comics where there's nothing but plot, and no time to relax and get to know the characters.

However, in reacting against this, a lot of creators have taken this to mean pacing stories so slowly that the book moves at a glacial pace. Warren Ellis was a big offender during the end of Transmetropolitan, when it took nearly twenty issues to tell a story that would have probably taken five issues at the beginning of the book.

The whole point of decompression is that it gives you a chance to spend time with the characters and get to know them, because they're not always dealing with plot. The problem with this book is that there's not much character development, so the plots just drag on and things move forward very slowly. Books 2-4 are basically a series of distractions on the way to San Francisco, where nothing really happens.

I suppose the point is to show us a bunch of people in this world, to give us an idea of what it's like. The problem is Vaughan gives us some isolated pieces of the world, but we have no feeling of what things are like on the whole. Especially as things move forward, we don't learn more about the world. Considering the premise of the book, it's absurd to spend all our time on this road story, and get no sense of what it's like for ordinary people in this world. There's so many issues and we never really get the sense of how things have changed, outside of what's necessary for the story.

For example, there are no men, so what are families like. Are women moving in with each other and forming sort of nonsexual couplings, how people feel about lesbianism now, are people realizing that lesbian couplings are the only option available, or are people still clinging to the hope that men will return? I'm not just saying this from the heterosexual male point of view, but it's absolutely ridiculous that this book hasn't dealt with lesbian sexuality in 31 issues. As a writer, the potential for drama there is huge, and I have no clue how Vaughan could not touch on the issue.

Vaughan has very different priorities in writing than most of the fiction I like. People like Joss Whedon or Alan Ball always have the plot come out of character problems, to the point that the show basically writes itself. Vaughan doesn't write particularly strong characters, so he's constantly imposing new random threats on the characters. In a long form series like this, I'd rather see a focus on character development and growth than just have them run into another bunch of crazy women. That's why it feels like the book isn't going anywhere, Yorick has this one desire to get to Beth, but nothing else, so it feels like most of the events that occur are pointless. The plots play out, but in most cases, they don't change the characters, and if the characters don't change, why am I reading the book?

The best storyline in the run of the book is 'Safeword' because it's about examining a character, rather than just having another arbitrary random encounter. In this story, Yorick encounters a dominatrix, who imprisons him and forces him to examine his attitudes toward sexuality, and find out why he's not taking advantage of his status as the last man on earth to have lots of sex. It explains one of the major character issues from earlier in the book and is also an interesting storyline in and of itself, however this storyline is the exception, and we get no similar insights into the lives of Dr. Mann and 355.

There's another major plothole in the book and that's the fact that there's no indication of what's going on with artificial insemination, and if that's worked to help give birth to any new men. It's been over two years of book time, so someone's definitely tried it. There's one pregnant woman who we hear gave birth to a son, and he's treated like mankind's last hope, but someone must have tried the sperm bank.

And if the sperm bank doesn't work, isn't it Yorick's obligation to impregnate as many women as he can? He's so concerned with being faithful to Beth, they don't seem to have considered what he'd need to do to continue the human race. There's some references to these issues early on, but this should really be the dramatic meat of the book. How would Yorick feel about having the entire next generation of humanity be his children? This is the stuff that great drama is made of, and Vaughan never even touches on it.

I guess my biggest problem with the book is that the premise offers so much drama, but Vaughan uses it merely as a gateway to a road trip story that only marginally takes advantage of the premise. So, it's one of those books where a lot of stuff seems to happen, but looking back, there's been a ton of stories that don't contribute anything to the characters or our knowledge of the world, so the stories are entertaining, but don't really go anywhere.

And, despite all these problems, I was still hooked on the book. It is entertaining moment to moment, but once you step back, it becomes apparent that it was thirty issues of going nowhere. Still, I probably will pick up the next collection.

Why are all the good concerts when I'm away?

Looking at the news from the music world, I'm increasingly annoyed because after a summer with basically no concerts I want to go to, it seems like in September and October, nearly every band I'd want to see live is playing in New York City, but I can't get there because I'm up at school.

These are just a few of the concerts I'd love to go to, but I have to miss.

Arcade Fire
David Bowie
Sigur Ros
Annie/Royksopp
The Polyphonic Spree
Belle and Sebastian
Oasis
Doves
U2

So, I've got to decide if it's worth coming back for some of these. U2 I have tickets to two of their shows, one is on the weekend before I go on break, and one is on the weekend of break. So, I'm thinking of selling the tickets to the first show and buying tickets to the Across the Narrows festival in Brooklyn, where The Polyphonic Spree and Belle and Sebastian are playing, not to mention Beck also. Basically, if the Spree are playing, I need to be there. Their concert last year was one of the best events I've ever been to.

It's just annoying that these concerts couldn't be one month earlier, because I would have loved to gone to them all. Because there's really been nothing going on concert wise here this summer.

Six Feet Under: 'All Alone'

When a major character dies on a show, it's sort of a double edged sword for the writers. Do you want to spend a whole bunch of time dealing with grief, or do you want to try to move things along and get back to moving the plot forward. One of the greatest TV episodes ever made, Buffy's 'The Body,' was devoted entirely to dealing with the aftermath of a major character's death, and was the most realistic depiction of the grieving process I've ever seen in any piece of fiction. This episode doesn't reach the heights that 'The Body' did, it's much more of a standard TV eulogy, giving us an overview of the process, and at the end, there is a feeling of if not resolution, at least closure.

I think this was a really well done episode, with some phenomenal moments, but on the whole, it felt like too little content, considering we only have two episodes left after this one. Obviously Nate was a huge character and I don't think he should have went unmourned, but there's a lot of unresolved character stuff and I was more interested in seeing that than just seeing people mourn. I did love the funeral scene, particularly Rico's speech, as well as Claire's drive around town with Ted.

Bringing back David's attacker just felt like too much of a plot device, a way to give a narrative arc to David's grief, plus I never like when crucial information to a story is introduced in the episode it's used. Maybe I just forgot it, but I don't remember any of that stuff with bullying from the past. That said, I was feeling really sad as David struggled to get through his speech, so the device did serve its purpose.

The best scene of the episode was the only one where there was really lasting character conflict, and that was when Maggie goes to Brenda's house. Brenda's in such an awkward position now, having been dumped by Nate, however, I don't think anyone else actually knows this, and I'm not sure if Brenda is ever going to tell someone else. Maggie is also in an incredibly awkward position, I love the shot at the burial when Maggie is crying and Brenda is looking at her, hating the fact that she's crying for him.

The other really standout scene was Brenda's confrontation with Nate's spirit. If you look at this scene and the scene with Lisa in the premier, Brenda clearly still has a lot of issues with self esteem, particularly in regards to her relationship with Maya. I think that she should keep Maya, to abandon Maya now, the third parent to do so, would do horrible damage to her. I don't think any of her blood relatives have the right to be Maya's parent that Brenda does. Though there would be a certain justice in Ruth having to raise Maya, because it would give her the purpose she's been seeking since losing George. Maybe Ruth is the sort of person who can only function when taking care of others, and even though she resents it, she seems to be unsure what to do when she's not in the role of caretaker.

Over with Keith and David, we're finally getting to the dark side of the deal with Roger. I don't want to see Keith and David broken up when their family seems to be so together right now, but Roger doesn't seem like the kind of guy you want to have against you. It would be odd to just include mention of the 'blowjob video' and then not have it come back as a plot point, but I really don't see how you could play out a major storyline with it in only two episodes.

I guess that's my major problem with the episode, I loved all that was going on, and it was good to see the characters mourn, but with so little time left, each scene needs to be great to justify its presence. If you look at the end of Buffy, 'Chosen' is a great episode, but spending half the episode finding the demon army felt like a waste of time when we had so few moments left with these characters, and to some extent that's how I feel here. There's so much unresolved stuff, and even if the ending is pretty ambiguous, it's going to be tough to find closure in just two hours.

But, this is a show set at a funeral home, and when Nate dies, his funeral is certainly worthy of screentime. Part of it is the fact that I had already processed Nate's death and come to terms with it, so watching the characters do that felt a bit odd. This is definitely one that should be watched in succession with Ecotone, though coming after that brilliant episode, nearly anything was going to be a bit of a let down.

Six Feet Under: 'The Silence,' 'Singing for Our Lives' and 'Ecotone'

I already did an extensive writeup on Nate's fate yesterday, and what happens to him makes almost everything else that happened in the previous episodes seem utterly insignificant, but that doesn't mean there's not a lot of cool stuff going on.

Other than Nate's story, Claire's stuff in these three episodes was the most interesting. We get to see her pushed out of the art world bubble she had been in for the past two seasons and have to deal with 'common people,' who perhaps aren't as attuned to the fine points of culture, or particularly worried about being hip, something that's most notably evident in the fact that they're still using a seven year old catch phrase to answer nearly every question. So, it's fun to see Claire totally dismissive of going to the corporate chain mall bar, Doc Hannigan's. I love the fact that Claire first looks down on these people, then finds herself watching TV alone at home and realizes that maybe doing something, even something lame, is better than doing nothing. This is a storyline I found really relatable, and it's the sort of conflict you're not going to usually see on TV, the conflict that occurs when high standards prevent someone from engaging with common people.

So, the next episode brings back some characters from Claire's art school days for what I'd suspect will be, a final farewell. I liked the way they compared the brutally normal frat boys with the self consciously out there art school kids and concluded that both of them are living in constructed worlds, unable to think of any life outside what they had. Claire was fully into this world, but looking back on it now, it seems ridiculous, and all the stuff they went through seems painfully insignificant. This episode goes a long way towards showing how much Claire has gone. Is it good that she's moved away from the art life, that's difficult to say, but she's gained some perspective. I'm really not sure how to feel about the Claire storyline, it seems like she's happier now than she was early this season, but I don't like the idea that she finds happiness by giving up her art and working in an office. Considering what's already happened to Nate, it'd be tough to give another character a rather down ending and have Claire become a lifer at the office.

The inherent conflict between her and that lifestyle is apparent in the first scene of 'Ecotone,' where Claire and Ted argue about the Iraq war, Claire once again is having her assumptions challenged. She figured that no intelligent person could be pro-Bush, and yet here's someone she likes who she finds out is an Iraq War supporter, and who actually presents a decent argument in favor of it. Obviously, I don't agree with what he says, but his argument does a good job of puncturing liberal views about the war, and doesn't make him a less sympathetic character. I like the scenes of them together in the waiting room, and though I doubt Ted's going to be the 'one' for Claire, he's put her character in an interesting place.

Off elsewhere, Brenda did much of the same. My favorite scene with her was when Jackie finally tells her to stop talking about her problems with Nate. This year, Jackie and Ruth's knitting friends were set up as basically sounding boards for the characters' problems, so to have one finally react against this was great, and this leads Brenda to reach out to Nate, in the tragic image of her sitting alone in the Quaker church.

The best material for Ruth came in episode nine, when she's shooting down all the men in her life and we get some nice cameos from years past. The basic point seems to be she doesn't know what she wants, it's the same conflict she's had from the beginning of the series, when she was left single with Nathaniel's death. She's sort of been written into a box, because to give her a new guy at this point would seem trite, while we know things wouldn't work out with George. Add in having to deal with Nate's death, and I'm not really sure if she can get a happy ending. If I had to guess I'd say she'll end up leaving the house to live a lifestyle more like Sarah's, and maybe David will move his family in.

Speaking of David, he has more adventures in parenting which are entertaining, but his story doesn't have the overarching grandeur of the best stories on this show. It's fairly conventional soap opera material and we can imagine their lives will go on in much the same way until the kids are grown. With Nate, I always felt there was some greater purpose to his life, and all his traumas along the way were leading somewhere, and ultimately they were. Not so with David, who's never had an experience like Nate had during 'Perfect Circles.' Maybe the surfer vision will lead to something, but I doubt it.

One choice I'm really happy with is that Ruth wasn't there for Nate's death. By taking her out, there's no one who can really take control, Brenda feels left out because of Nate's infidelity, Maggie can't take charge because of Brenda and David has problems dealing with it because he knows what Nate did.

I'm still not sure of the decision to make Nate go out like he did, as someone who didn't regret at all what he did. I think it's in character, but still sad. Nate may wander out into the sea and leave it all behind, but he leaves no peace on earth with his passing. Brenda must be devestated that the love of her life, the person she changed everything for rejected her in the moments before he died. All she'll remember is that he would rather have been with Maggie then her, and she'll see that in Maya, who she will presumably have to take care of now, raising two kids as a single mother.

This string of episodes is a testament to what television can do, in telling huge stories that span over many, many hours. Very few films reach the emotional power these episodes had for me, to go through such a long journey with this character and then lose him, it's tough. And I can't wait to see what we get in the next string of episodes, will Nate be a ghost like Nathaniel, and will the characters get any sort of happy ending, or will they all pay for the bad things they've done, as Nate did?

Six Feet Under: Goodbye...

Goddamnit. Fuck. Shit. I was not expecting that to happen. I wasn't planning to watch all the episodes I had tonight, but this was one of those runs where it was not possible to stop, and I'm glad I didn't because this was one of those multi-episode runs that just builds as it goes and by the end, I was completely furious, first by what Nate says to Brenda and then by what ultimately happens to him.

DON'T READ ON IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN ECOTONE


In all my previous reviews I was saying how Nate was the character whose storyline I was most interested in, and also the person I was most unsure how things would turn out for, and I was not expecting this. I'd heard some things that suggested Nate may have been in some sort of already dead state, like in Mulholland Dr., but this turned out to be totally false, and while it's a cool idea, the way things turned out now was so dramatically impressive, I'm glad they went down the path that was chosen. I guess it's a bad sign when a character starts reflecting on how things began for them on the show, and that's what Nate did when he met with Maggie.

The whole season I'd been saying that something was going on with Maggie, and that she was being set up for a big role at the end of things. I wasn't sure that they would end up sleeping together, but the way it happened had me at once really excited to see them together, since I liked them as a couple, and angry because it's such a betrayal of Brenda. I'm not sure about the direct correlation they create between sleeping with Maggie and Nate's death, but I think it ties into what Nate and Brenda were talking about a few episodes ago, with regards to the idea of a higher being speaking to the Quakers. She wrote this off as ridiculous, but Nate seemed entranced by the idea that a higher being could speak to him, and even concluded that when Maggie made something up, what she made up was in fact that message God wanted to send her.

So, by giving him the second AVM, Nate receives a message from a higher power, namely you can't keep behaving like you are. He heals quickly, and is given a second chance, and maybe he finally does the right thing and tells Brenda they shouldn't be together. The problem is, he's using that as an excuse, a justification for why he could leave her. He just wants to be with Maggie, because he thinks she can give him what neither Lisa nor Brenda could. Back at the start of the show, Nate was someone totally unable to keep a stable relationship going, Brenda seemed to have changed that, but now that they were finally together without any obstacles, he goes out and finds obstacles and destroys what was working. It's so sad that the last thing she heard him say was that they can't be together. Maybe the saddest image from this entire arc of episodes was Brenda sitting alone in the Quaker church, finally having reached out to Nate, and he's not there.

Perhaps what frightens Nate about committing to Brenda is the fact that she was able to pull her life together and create a stable situation at home. She'd been through a whole bunch of shit in the past, but she was there now, and Nate could no longer use Brenda's problems as an excuse. He was ultimately left with his own fantasies, constructing other lives for himself in his head, never able to live with the reality he had.

So, Nate's a tragic figure, and here at the end, his character flaws are magnified, and essentially an act of God strikes him down. This is the same storyline we saw back in year three, and the same character conflict present in year one.

But despite all that, I still love him as a character. He's the heart of the show, the flawed center around which all else revolved, and now he's gone. I'm not sure what's going to happen in these next three episodes, but it's going to be a very different show.

His final moment on screen was absolutely phenomenal. I always love dream sequences and this one was really surreal and perplexing. First, the song, 'Strawberry Letter 23' is a really great song. Nate seems to take another trip to an alternate reality, much like he did in the series' best episode, the season three opener 'Perfect Circles.' Surfer David was great and for a moment I was thinking that maybe the entire series would move to this alternate reality. But, we soon wind up at the beach where real David returns and Nate runs out the water, bidding farewell to the mortal world, even as David calls out to stop him. I'm really glad they went for this sort of symbolic storytelling and it's really fitting for the end of Nate's life. This is an echo of a previous episode I don't remember exactly, but it ended with Nate walking out into the water.

Then that final fade to the title was brutal. I was affected by this more than almost any TV series moment I can remember. I'm not saying Ecotone was the greatest episode ever made, but the only comprable moment I can remember is the last scene of Twin Peaks. Going in unspoiled and seeing that title come up, I'd been following this character for five years, through so much, and to see him die, I can't think of another series that offed its main character in such an ignoble manner. But, Nate is dead, it's astonishing that a fictional world can have so much power. That's why we create art, to tell stories that move people and that's what this story did to me.

I'm going to go back in tomorrow and do a bit more general review of these three episodes, since there's a lot going on with the other characters, and more to talk about the construction of the episodes themsevles, but I'm too in the emotional moment now to really analyze, it's just got to sink in.

Six Feet Under: 'The Rainbow of her Reasons'

So, I've seen another episode. This one was a big improvement over episode five, and really has the plots moving forward in an interesting direction. As the episode opened, I was wondering if this was going to be Sarah's finale, but I figured that they wouldn't bring her back only to have her die in the first scene.

First, the most notable thing about this episode was the 'Calling all Angels,' which brought back some memories of the 'Wise Up' singalong scene in Magnolia. Here, they didn't go as far as to have the other characters actually sing, but we had that same feeling of seeing them all connected, and I really liked that. One of the problems with these ensemble shows is that it sometimes feels like the characters live in worlds all their own and there's no overarching connection in the narrative. So, a scene like the party two episodes ago, or the singing here, goes a long way towards making it feel like a more coherent universe.

David and Keith finally got some good material to work with, as they have to deal with the difficult reality of raising kids. Both of their views on how to treat the kids are relatable, and I liked the way they didn't make Keith out to be the bad guy. We see that there's a need for moderation, to find a path that isn't just letting them do whatever they want, but at the same time not walking the line of near violent behavior. I liked the fact that the kids were very challenging for them, and seeing how it broke up the life they had been living. If they were to adopt those kids, things would never be the same. I'm waiting now to see what Nate and Ruth think of David's decision.

The best storyline here was Claire's time in the office. After living in a sort of fantasy world, she now finds herself brought into the crushing mundanity of an office, where art and creativity are seen as hindrances to doing work. I loved the guy imitating Austin Powers, there is no more played out imitation. I loved the way they had Claire's clothes become a physical prison for her, echoing her feeling of being mentally trapped in a pointless endeavor. I don't think Claire will become a 'lifer' at the office, but it's the sort of thing that could help her, by giving her some perspective, and perhaps even inspire some new pieces of art.

I liked the scene where Claire catches Ruth trying to take some weed from her, and the moment they share. They basically switched roles here, Claire was the calm one, while Ruth was rather unhinged. All of Ruth's storyline in this episode was great, her enthusiasm as she talked with the women, and ultimately her confusion when George finally tells her she can leave. This is exactly what she wants, but now that she has it, she feels guilty about ever wanting him to leave.

So, I'm not sure where this leaves George and Maggie on the show. There's definitely something building with Maggie and Nate, I liked the way he slipped in "Brenda's at mom's, it's just me and Maya here." I'm not sure what's going to happen with her, but there's been a lot of buildup and I feel like it's going to be something big.

And now Rico is back with Vanessa too. I don't find them too interesting this season, they're fun to watch, but there's nothing particularly worth writing about. There's none of the layers in the relationship that you have between people like Nate and Brenda.

So, moving on, there's a major crossroads. I'd like to see Sarah stick around for another episode, so Ruth could talk to her about her newfound freedom from George. At this point, it's Nate and Claire I'm most interested in, largely because I'm really not sure where they're going to end up. David and Keith I think will probably end up adopting these kids and working out as a family. I'm not sure what's going to happen with Ruth, but if I had to guess, I'd say something bad's going to happen to George and she'll feel really guilty about abandoning him. And Billy's definitely going to factor into things somehow. But, I think we'll ultimately get an up ending, with all the families together and Nathaniel phasing out of this realm, his mission done because his sons have now become fathers like him.

But, I may be totally wrong. There's only six more episodes in which to find out.