Friday, May 28, 2004
Despite being a Farrelly Brothers' production, "Stuck On You" was a pretty nice show about sibling-love. No distasteful dumb-and-dumber-ish gags, thankfully, though a bit of the humour was still a bit... erm. Matt Damon was very aww-inducing as the shy and homey Bob, but what was with that haircut? And how do identical twins end up one brunette and one blond, and neither resembling each other?
"Mona Lisa�s Smile" was dreadfully boring. Only so many times you can rehash "Dead Poets Society" after all. Lovely cast, but the plot had nothing new to offer, and wasn�t even inspiring. And it all reminded me of that stupid Barbara Bush's speech we had to study for Speech class *makes face*
Shan�t start on "Peter Pan", because I�ll be gushing and incredibly paedophilic.
"Dancer In The Dark"... a year 2000 movie I somehow never got around to watching. I spent a lot of the movie feeling slightly nauseous from the jerky camera movement, my head aching from the discordant pounding of the touching yet very avant garde music that was the quintessence of Bj�rk. Every emotion was just there, raw, painful and bleeding, no fancy camera work or computer graphics to soften the impact of Selma(Bj�rk)�s very really pain or the harshness of her reality. Neither was there anything to shield the audience from the baseness of humankind � greed, guilt, superiority, fake charity, selfishness � all there, in full uncensored unembellished �glory�.
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Saturday, May 22, 2004
It was a very enjoyable 5 and a half hours, but the movie that really made an impression was "Punch-Drunk Love". It�s one of those precious few movies that Adam Sandler makes that I actually find watchable. It was a rather accurate take on the mixed up gender roles of today, and stylistically it was an unusual and refreshing movie. I loved the way the discordant soundtrack, kinda quirky and awkward, suited Adam Sandler�s character Barry. And when he started to feel the pressure from all the demands made upon him this annoying drum rift would start up, the rhythm matching his bursts of violent bathroom/glass smashing, and you could really feel that frustration. There are some very amateurish camera shots in this one which I found gave a very home-video view from the shoulder kind of feeling, and I thought the jarring multicoloured transitions � so starkly out of place � conveyed the sense of unconformity and discordance of the switched gender roles really well.
It was the story of a man getting bombarded right left and centre with expectations of how he, as a man, was supposed to behave, and feeling so terribly inadequate trying live up to what others demanded and living down what others assumed of him. Barry wasn�t an everyman kind of character � he was a subnormal downtrodden oddball one. A toilet plumbing equipment salesman with seven sisters who enjoyed telling embarrassing stories about their ickle baby brother and not realising the embarrassment they brought (don�t you just hate these stupid relatives?) and strange reasons for doing things. A man finding himself starting a relationship with a woman more suited to the so-called "male" role in their relationship, and being harassed by a pushy con-woman who sent some thugs on his heels. I may not be able to empathise with him and in fact I would in all likelihood be one of the women that frustrate men like him. But he was definitely pitiable.
And well, the modern man has it really tough. Ok, so women have to be the career woman and the mother. But the men have to be the provider-protector, the macho cool (and therefore irresponsible?) �one-of-the-guys�, the sensitive and understanding partner; they have to be aggressive, tough and strong, yet they�ve gotta be feeling, perceptive, transparent and compromising � practically mutually exclusive roles. And they have to do all that without having the excuses like PMS and mood swings and "I�m the weaker sex" to give them avenues to whine and cry and bitch and vent their frustrations. When Barry really lost it and started smashing things up and yelling expletives at his sister, I was totally cheering him on. I think he was better for it, for letting loose. And the ending was one sweet happy ending that I agreed with � him accepting that that was that, and being himself.
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Wednesday, May 19, 2004
Yar I'm a Harry Potter nut. So sue me.
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Yay! Happens to be my favourite colour of the moment. (It's dark red, in case you can't really see it on my background.) *beams* Pretty interesting thing to think up... someone was definitely bored. Heh.
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Tuesday, May 18, 2004
She's got far too many things! Ok, I understand that she's all alone away from her home country, but she's perfectly entitled to have things as long as they don't end up all in my side of the room as well - and frankly, right now I have about enough space to sit in my chair and that's it. She moved my stuff away from where it was originally, so she could put her shelf and her fridge. She's got stinking shoes (at about nose level) on the shelves my roomie used to put her soap and bathing stuff, and she's taken up my shelves as well to put her dustpan and other cleaning things. I can't open my cupboard doors without having to shove luggage out of the way. She dries her wet clothes on a portable rack thingy instead of behind the bathroom like everyone else, and the whole room now has that musty stuffy smell of wet clothes. And she insists on shutting the blinds for goodness knows what reason, so the room is all dark and stuffy.
ARGH!!!!!!!!
Came back from choir practice last night at like, 10pm or so, and she was already asleep, so couldn't do much 'cause I didn't want to wake her. This morning she woke at about 7 and started shifting stuff around, turned on the lights (and closed the blinds - like, duh! Why not just leave the blinds open and get some good clean fresh air as well as natural light?) and started studying. Glory good sakes and lords above it's the freaking holidays! And she's so quiet that when I greet her she looks at me strangely and gives a barely audible answer, and doesn't look up from her books when I said bye. Hmph.
Now my one refuge away from home has been desecrated by the presence of a mugger with too many worldly possessions *growl* Can I have my real roomie back, please?
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Saturday, May 15, 2004
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Friday, May 14, 2004
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Monday, May 10, 2004
A Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
A Midsummer Night�s Dream by William Shakespeare
Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger
Dracula by Bram Stoker
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
Fight Club by Chuck Palahnuik
Greenwitch by Susan Cooper
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J. K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J. K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Philosopher�s Stone by J. K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J. K. Rowling
History of Amnesia by Alfian bin Sa�at
Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice
It by Stephen King
King Lear by William Shakespeare
Les Liaisons Dangereuses by Choderlos de Laclos
Lost Hearts by M. R. James
Morning Glory by Lavyrle Spenser
Needful Things by Stephen King
Nineteen-Eighty-Four by George Orwell
One Fierce Hour by Alfian bin Sa�at
Private Lives by N�el Coward
Regeneration by Pat Barker
Ripley�s Game by Patricia Highsmith
Ripley Underground by Patricia Highsmith
Ripley Under Water by Patricia Highsmith
Salem�s Lot by Stephen King
Silver on the Tree by Susan Cooper
Sprinting Through the Graveyard by Goran Simic
Taltos by Anne Rice
The Boy Who Followed Ripley by Patricia Highsmith
The Brown Hand by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
The Dark Is Rising by Susan Cooper
The Dead Girl by Guy de Maupassant
The Dead Zone by Stephen King
The Drawing of the Three by Stephen King
The Gamble by Lavyrle Spenser
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
The Gray King by Susan Cooper
The Gunslinger by Stephen King
The Handmaid�s Tale by Margaret Atwood
The Long Walk by Stephen King
The Mystery of the Two-Toed Pigeon by M. V. Carey
The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux
The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith
The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice
The Waste Lands by Stephen King
The Whitsun Weddings by Philip Larkin
The Witching Hour by Anne Rice
The Wizard and the Glass by Stephen King
The Winter Guest by Sharman MacDonald
To Kill A Mocking Bird by Harper Lee
Tommyknockers by Stephen King
Walking Into the River by Lorian Hemingway
White Fang by Jack London
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
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Sunday, May 09, 2004
The island was almost sunk, and Love decided to ask for help.
Richness was passing by Love in a grand boat. Love said, "Richness, can you take me with you?" Richness answered, "No, I can't. There is a lot of gold and silver in my boat. There is no place here for you."
Love decided to ask Vanity who was also passing by in a beautiful vessel, "Vanity, please help me!" "I can't help you Love. You are all wet and might damage my boat," Vanity answered.
Sadness was close by so Love asked for help, "Sadness, let me go with you." "Oh...Love, I am so sad that I need to be by myself!"
Happiness passed by Love too; Happiness did not hear the cry for help; for Happiness was so happy.
Suddenly, there was a voice, "Come Love, I will take you." It was an elder. Love felt so blessed and overjoyed that Love forgot to ask the elder' s name.
When they arrived at dry land, the elder went on its way. Love, realizing how much it owed the elder asked Knowledge, another elder, "Who helped me?"
"It was Time," Knowledge answered. "Time?" asked Love, "But why did Time help me?" Knowledge smiled with deep Wisdom and answered, "Because only Time is capable of understanding how great Love is."
Unfortunately, what I really see from this little story is that:
a) Love is a damnable fool
b) Love is flighty and ditzy and blind
c) even Time got miffed and left Love alone in the end
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Saturday, May 08, 2004
(Got this thing from here... this one is with my own embellishments :P)
1. He had only one major publication.
2. It was in Hebrew.
3. It had no references, and wasn't in the correct research paper format
4. It wasn't published in a refereed journal.
5. Some even doubt that he wrote it himself. Plagarism!
6. It may be true that he created the world, but what other major contribution has he done since then?
7. His cooperative efforts have been quite limited.
8. The scientific commitee had a hard time replicating his results.
9. He never applied to the ethics board to get permission to use human subjects.
10. When one experiment went awry he tried to cover it up by drowning the subjects.
11. When subjects didn't behave as predicted, he deleted them from the sample.
12. He rarely came to class, just told the students to read the books.
13. Some say he had his son teach the class.
14. He expelled his first two students for learning.
15. Although there were only ten requirements, most students failed his tests.
16. His office hours were infrequent and usually held on a mountain top, in the desert, or in a burning bush.
17. If his students question his methods, he grades them rather harshly (and corporal punishment is largely frowned upon).
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Wednesday, May 05, 2004
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Monday, May 03, 2004
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Sunday, May 02, 2004
I am a soldier, convinced that I am acting on behalf of soldiers. I believe that this war, upon which I entered as a war of defence and liberation has now become a war of aggression and conquest. I believe that the purposes for which I and my fellow soldiers entered upon this war should have been so clearly stated as to have made it impossible to change them, and that, had this been done, the objects witch actuated us would now be attainable by negotiation.
I have seen and endured the suffering of the troops, and I can no longer be a party to prolong these sufferings for ends which I believe to be evil and unjust. I am not protesting against the conduct of the war, but against the political errors and insincerity's for which the fighting men are being sacrificed.
On behalf of those who are suffering now I make this protest against the deception which is being practised on them; also I believe that I may help to destroy the callous complacence with which the majority of those at home regard the continuance of agonies which they do not share, and which they have not sufficient imagination to realise.
Second Lieutenant S. Sassoon
31 July 1917
A letter written during the first World War it may be, but it is a letter that has a growing significance in the times we live in... *sigh* You know something sucky is going on when even cartoon strips start taking a stand... for more information, check out the series about Rob's cousin in Get Fuzzy.
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