My Blueberry Nights and Beyond

Movies? I like movies.

Dude, I thought I heard/read that My Blueberry Nights was supposed to be not very good? Well, I'm happy to report that it's actually a great little flick. Sure, it's not as emotionally gutting as In the Mood for Love or as intricate and perplexing as 2046, but as a reminder of the whimsical, romantic melancholy of the rightly beloved-by-all Chungking Express, it's totally satisfying. Norah Jones is an utter blank, but that's clearly part of the point. The three vignettes that she travels through center around a series of losses that escalate in intensity as they simultaneously diminish in personal importance to her character, a tantalizing conceptual framework that helps make up for the way iffy beginning when Jude Law's cafe-owner character explains how he doesn't remember people by their names as much as he remembers them by the food they eat (eye roll) and Ms. Jones does the most 'acting' she's required to do in the whole piece after she discovers that her boyfriend has been cheating on her and she smashes a glass bottle on the sidewalk (big eye roll). As the movie travels across the country from New York to Memphis to Reno and opens up geographically, it also starts to shimmer a little bit, in that lovely Wong Kar-wai way, where the edges of the characters bleed and drip into each other (much like the sexy macro photography of the blueberry pie a la mode behind the opening credit sequence), as odd traits and circumstances and even physical resemblances echo and rhyme from one storyline to the next, and the next. (The bleed even goes meta when Chan Marshall, another husky voiced singer-turned-actress with a great head of hair, shows up as Jude Law's pined-for ex. They've got such great chemistry in their brief scene together, I would without a doubt pay cash money to see the prequel version of that love affair.) David Strathairn gives a typically incredible performance, and Natalie Portman proves once again that she can pretty much do anything as she nails her blowsy Western cardsharp character, complete with a ton of bad turquoise jewelry and even worse frosted hair. The movie's not going to change your life or anything, but it feels really good.

Caught up with The Long Goodbye for the first time in about nine years (thank you, Music Box weekend matinee series!), and while the anti-Altman bias I subconsciously inherited from my favorite college film professor way back when has mostly waned by now, I still do have to take issue with the final "Hooray for Hollywood" musical tag here. The film's formal snarkiness about the noir genre makes its point well, especially given where it falls in the context of both the American New Wave and Altman's emergence as one of the defining directors of that era, but that little twist of the knife at the end strikes me as just a bit too too. That being said, though, I absolutely enjoyed the hell out of the movie this time around. Elliott Gould could not have been more wonderful as the anti-Philip Marlowe, and the casting of Sterling Hayden just gives me chills it's so perfect.

The Visitor was definitely enjoyable, if a bit maudlin. I suppose I'm being kind of harsh, and I suppose, politically, I'm not exactly part of the demographic that needs to have the U.S.'s insane and draconian immigration laws dramatized for me. But I also feel like, anytime you're going to make a movie that revolves around some gorgeous Syrian man who just wants to play his djembe, his gorgeous girlfriend who just wants to sell her hand-beaded jewelry, and his gorgeous mother who just wants to know her gorgeous son is safe and happy in his adopted homeland, there's going to necessarily be a bit of deck-stacking involved in making sure that we, the audience, feel rilly bad about the unpleasant stuff that happens to these attractive and artsy people who are filled to the brim with a lusty embrace of life and all its sensual pleasures that the uptight white people are too square or too repressed to experience. Seriously, I grant that I'm being too harsh here. The movie is filled with a lot of fine and subtle acting and doesn't at all scream this subtext like the sort of issue-of-the-week TV movie that I'm making it out to be, and the story doesn't necessarily need, or could even have sustained, a more complex version of the Tarek character. But...I just get the nagging feeling that there's a way of reading the message here, however well intentioned, that the only "foreigners" worth caring about are the ones who are attractive and emotionally useful in some way to the lives of the white Americans they encounter, while eliding the more complex and perhaps boring truth that the system is deeply fucked, regardless of the personal charisma of the people it has imprisoned and deported. I dunno; how would one make an emotionally affecting film about deportation without (unintentionally?) sainting its racially profiled characters? I think it's also illustrative of how incredibly broken, and wide-ranging in its brokenness, the system is that I can't even get behind a film as generally well-made and enjoyable as this without twisting myself into knots over it.

I also weirdly, and almost accidentally, saw Enchanted this weekend. I laughed out loud a bunch of times--both at stuff like the intentionally funny "Happy Working Song" and the unintentionally funny nuevo-Disney ethos that all happily-ever-afters must now also come certified with a successful transition into entrepreneurship for at least one of the main characters. I'm not a Grey's Anatomy watcher, so I don't really get the whole Patrick Dempsey thing, but he does a completely serviceable job here, no real complaints. But, there's the part of me that thinks that, until further notice, in these kinds of romantic comedies that are primarily vehicles for their lead actresses, these otherwise bland leading men roles should perpetually be played by Mark Ruffalo, just to see how much seething rage and illicit, up-against-the-wall sex appeal he can sneak into the mainstream.

Do yourself a favor and be sure to check out the recent White Denim Daytrotter session. I'm just totally enamored of this young band and have been consistently thrilled by everything I've heard from them so far.

There's a fantastic Q&A with Dan Bejar up on eMusic right now. I pity any of these poor bastards who were honestly expecting straightforwards As to their Qs. The "'Summer Babe.' Just kidding. No, 'Summer Babe'" one liner got one of those rolling thunderclap laughs out of me, where the humor didn't hit me for a few seconds, then I sort of chuckled curtly, then really started cackling out loud, sitting alone at my desk. Big love.

Deadwood, Destroyer, Record Store Day

Finally finished watching the third season of Deadwood this weekend. Holy hell. That show absolutely makes me quiver with glee. It's an incredible work of art, surely one of the best things on television ever (and you all know what a huge Buffy fan I am). I'm seriously going to be mourning the loss of these characters from my life for a little while. Highly, highly, highly recommended for those of you who haven't indulged yet. I guess it's finally time for me to get into The Wire now.

The Destroyer show on Thursday night at the Logan Square Auditorium was much fun. I just stood there grinning the entire time. Dan Bejar is one crazy bastard, and the drummer is a monster. Seriously. This guy was doing some of the most sensitively aggro shit I've heard in recent memory. (Mr. Perpetua has already geeked out about the drums on "The State," and, as usual, he's right on the money.) I'm sure part of it was the very muddy sound mix in the room, but the beats were just exploding all over the place, but tightly, precisely, each one a little prison yard with spider's web barbed wire wrapped around it. Incredible. They played a good chunk of songs from the wonderful new Trouble in Dreams and generally kept riding that tension that I so adore about them that leaves me constantly wondering, "wait, are they for real about this?" Plus, on the train platform on the way home, I had the pleasure of running into the inimitable Jeff Harms, who shared with me a copy of his second CD, The Myth of Heroics, which drops soon. It's got kind of a Willy Mason thing going on, or maybe Matt Berninger fronting a less ecstatic Okkervil River. The songs are sweet, smart, and quirky and convey an abundance of warmth and gentleness. Be sure to put May 26 on your calendar, Chicago kittens, and get yourself to Rainbo for his CD release party.

Speaking of CDs, did anyone make the effort to observe the Record Store Day holiday on Saturday? I was running errands anyway so it was relatively convenient for me to stop into Laurie's Planet of Sound and pick up a copy of the new Man Man album. I would've grabbed a copy of the new Cadence Weapon too, but they didn't have it currently in stock. (Say what you will about iTunes and its DRM, but it does allow me to legally get my instant gratification rocks off when I decide I need some specific music at that very moment, especially when eMusic doesn't carry the album I want.) I usually try not to let record store snobbery bother me too much, and Laurie's usually isn't as bad about it as some, but as one of the clerks was running my credit card, I heard another clerk ask the dude in line behind me if he owned a turntable and then mentioned the stack of Record Store Day 7"s they had available. Now, admittedly, I don't happen to have a turntable right now, but I totally resented the somewhat sexist assumption that I wouldn't. I mean, maybe the clerk and the guy were friends or casual social acquaintances already, but still, not cool. Gripe, gripe--support your local record store anyway.

Compare Your Genitals to Musicians! (My faves are Frank Zappa and Leonard Cohen, though Television has a certain foul charm to it as well.)

"PETA declares truce with Beyonce: Under the terms of the agreement, PETA will admit she was 'pretty good' in Dreamgirls and Beyonce will stop whaling." --Entertainment Weekly "Hit List" for April 25/May 2, 2008.

Caribou, Live at the Empty Bottle

The Caribou/Fuck Buttons show at the Empty Bottle last night was roundly excellent. Totally one of those "I was meant to be here and nowhere else but here at this very time and place" shows. There was a lot of extraneous bullshit swirling around my attempt to get myself there--a severely annoying combination of the fact that I'd gotten a ticket for the 10 pm show when my crabby-old-lady-ness has pretty much been dictating an early bedtime most nights recently and the fact that, between waiting for the bus and then riding on the bus, it took me a bloody hour to go those four miles south on Western to Division--but as soon as I got there and heard the bleary-eyed ecstatic noise of the Fuck Buttons rumbling through the wall, all my stress completely melted away.

I've totally been loving Street Horrrsing. Seemingly contrary to everything I think I know about my musical tastes, listening habits, and preferences, I've come to realize that every so often I get in the mood to submerge myself in some high quality, well-made noise. I got semi-obsessed with Tim Hecker's Harmony in Ultraviolet early last winter and was delighted to surprise the crap out of RTW a little while back by mentioning how much I like Oval. And it seems Street Horrrsing has come to me at a time when its loud, gorgeous, monotonous chaos is perfectly mirroring the current state of my own inner life: a simultaneous combination of anger and peace and frustration and confusion and brattiness and stripped-down urgency and all-consuming focus and spaced-out expansiveness and constantly recurring, seemingly unresolvable motifs. Plus, those adorable, skinny Brit boys work the whole "yeah, we're just standing here on stage fiddling with knobs" thing with a vigor that never tips over into trying too hard. Even though I missed more of their set than I would have liked (see above re: public transportation can suck on it), I was thrilled with what I did manage to catch.

And Caribou just completely blew my mind. Going in, I had no idea what to expect but knew I was in for something special based on the discerning Kirstiecat's assertion from last fall that their set at the Metro with Born Ruffians was the best show she saw all year. (Kirstie was taking more lovely pics at both shows last night, too, and afterward said the band was every bit as good as last time, even if Dan's vocals seemed a little tired/rough from so much touring.) I really (regrettably) only know Andorra, but based on the sweetness of that album's melodies, I kind of wasn't expecting so much ferocity in performance. I guess I knew to expect some fierce drumming, which their pinch hitter certainly provided, but I lamely and stupidly didn't expect the epically dorky Dan Snaith to bring so much intensity. (Srsly, I love this video [via] to bits, but it probably unfairly skewed my initial impressions on this matter.) But, when in the space of the first song and a half, he'd already sang (with that lovely, lilty voice of his that somehow evokes both Elliott Smith and Ben Folds), played guitar, recorder, and keyboards, and then sat down at a second drum kit for a mind-blowing simultaneous rhythm attack with the other drummer, there was just no doubt in my mind that this guy is made of music. Not in any kind of grandiose, personal-mission-to-the-masses, Prince-esque kind of way (he's entirely too Canadian for that) but with a calm, reasonable confidence that he's most himself when his edges are blurring a bit as he dissolves into a vehicle for these gorgeous sonic layer cakes he so painstakingly assembles, which, paradoxically, then allows him to shine almost violently brightly with a nearly beatific fire on stage. No wonder he doesn't wear his glasses while he's performing; he'd start burning holes into shit all over the place. So yes. It was a fantastic and much-needed night of music.

The Bank Job, The Dodos, and Stuff

Caught up with The Bank Job on Friday night. Ah, how I do love a good little British heist film. The stakes got a bit higher at the end than I was expecting, which was oddly disconcerting for such a bit of piffle, but I think that's just my own filter at work and no fault of the film's for being manipulative or anything. Plus, the five-o'clock shadow on Jason Statham ("possibly the greatest B-movie leading man of this era") is worth the price of admission in itself. The thing's perpetually like half an hour away from just being a full-on beard.

So, not only did the little boy in me get a bang out of the caper flick, he also started getting majorly jonesed, after a second viewing of the preview, for The Forbidden Kingdom, aka "Jackie Chan & Jet Li: Finally Together: Before One of Us Gets Too Old and Breaks Something." Ohhhh kittens, you have no idea the glee that the idea of this film brings me. It might even be worth cramming myself into a theater on opening night to see this with a crowd, just to be part of the adrenaline of the assembled mob. That can occasionally make for such a satisfying movie experience. Also, wtf, my new favorite young actor, Michael Angarano, looks to be playing one of the main characters. Good for him. Let's hope he steers his career the way of Ryan Gosling and not so much Hayden Christensen.

RIP Charlton Heston. This is probably disrespectful, but here's a link (fast forward to about 2:27) to Eddie Izzard's Circle bit wherein he proposes giving a gun to a monkey and locking it in Mr. Heston's house to test the viability of his proposed NRA slogan "guns don't kill people, people kill people, and monkeys do too (if they've got a gun)."

I promise I'm not getting blogger payola or whatever to keep linking to Saturday Night Live sketches, but this is just such genius character comedy, I can't even handle how funny it is. Viva Fred Armisen.

The Dodos' new album Visiter (yeahyeahyeah, best new music, whatevs) was the perfect soundtrack to the two long walks I took this weekend in the first of Chicago's springtime warmth and sunshine. All sort of melancholy and hopeful and dreamy and earthy. It didn't quite pull me out of my own skin the way a similar walking-and-listening experience with Animal Collective's Sung Tongs did a couple years ago--an experience that rearranged my molecules so thoroughly I didn't even feel like I was in my own city anymore--but it kept me good company, as I hope it might continue to do as the season progresses.

I Feel Good!

I think everyone needs to take a moment to enjoy this wonderful piece of Post-It art I found at work today. Happy Friday, my kittens!

This Week's Reader

Hey, Chicagoans. If you happen to pick up a copy of the Chicago Reader this week, be sure to check out the cover story, "As Del Lay Dying." It's actually a huge excerpt from one of our books, The Funniest One in the Room, which is the first full-length biography of improv comedy guru Del Close. We're all super, super proud of it.