Mark

Cerebus the Aardvark

The Man Behind the Aardvark: Dave Sim created an influential and prolific comic book series called Cerebus the Aardvark. “When I started Cerebus in 1977, uppermost in my mind was the thought that i wanted to produce 300 issues if a comic book series the way i thought it should be done; as one continuous story documenting the ups and downs of a character’s life.” Few comic book series ever reach the 300-issue mark, and those that do are usually backed by big publishers, star big-name superheroes, and are written and drawn by scores of different artists over the years. Cerebus, a black & white comic, is written, penciled and inked by Sim (with some help from a friend named Gerhard). Its also self-published, giving him complete control over his creation. In the past few decades, the character of Cerebus has gone from being a barbarian to a politician to a pope. During one story arc, Cerebus became a supporting character; in fact, nearly a year went by in which the title character didn’t appear in his own comic book! These are the sort of things you can do when you have publishing freedom and 300 issues with which to tell a story.

Say what you will about the man’s thoughts or philosophy (he’s regarded as somewhat of an infamous misogynist), but you have to admire the man’s initiative, dedication and resolve. He hasn’t reached the crucial 300th issue just yet (the series is planned to end sometime in 2004), but the final story arc has begun and shows no signs of slowing down.

Subjective Objectivity

There’s No Such Thing as a Bad Movie. “While the title of this piece mentions movies, it really applies to any medium of expression. Artworks are not good or bad. They simply are what they are, and you have a personal, subjective reaction when exposed to them.” The author makes some interesting points, many of which parallel my views on criticism. However, I also think there is a certain degree of objectivity one can achieve when reviewing a film; ironically, this is achieved through subjectivity. Much like the Reflexive school of documentary filmmaking, a critic exposes their own bias, thus making the reader aware of the review’s subjective nature. This makes it easier for a reader to judge whether or not they will like the movie. After all, as the author points out, disliking a film doesn’t necessarily make it an invalid experience. Still, it is a subjective process, but keeping that in mind helps a lot (after all, is it even possible to be completely objective?). Regardless, I think I may be revisiting some of my reviews in the future…

Meesa No Watch

The Man Who Knew Too Much About Jar Jar, a videofilm by Chris Mich : Directing and starring in the feature is Chris Mich (director of another good short, Bathroom Boardroom) alongside Josh Taback (writer for The Simpsons). The film is a bit slow at first, but it moves towards an unexpected, unforgettable and moving climax (make sure you watch the whole thing!) An avid Star Wars fan irritates his friend with excessive knowledge and love of Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace. Drastic measures are taken to silence him. A hilarious and brilliant homage to both Star Wars and Francis Ford Coppola, this videofilm illustrates some of the points in the below post (namely, the poor conditions under which it must be viewed: a tiny, realplayer screen).

Blurred boundaries

Beyond Miramax by Jesse Walker : Due to the ease with which one can now edit their own videos, the boundaries between the home movie and the independent film have blurred.

Many articles have been written about one sort of indie-film success story: the “young,” “scrappy” “maverick” whose Internet short or ultra-low-budget tape gets viewed by the right Hollywood exec, allowing the fresh-faced filmmaker to vault over those barriers and land a job assembling dream-widgets. This is not such a piece. This is about the moviemakers who don�t want Hollywood jobs, or at least don�t want them on Hollywood terms — about people trying to find ways around the distribution bottleneck, and the audiences that are tentatively coalescing around them.

Not suprisingly, the internet contains a vibrant virtual community of filmmakers and a horde of online movies. The most successful filmmakers are pornographers, but if alternative cinema consisted only of porn, it wouldn�t be worth writing about. Some net flicks even star well-known actors or are helmed by well-known directors. (Tim Burton, for example, has made a series of online animated shorts called Stainboy.) There are also a huge volume of fan communities devoted to Star Wars, Doctor Who, and other movies and TV series that put out spoofs, sequels, and tributes (not to mention infamous edits). The biggest problem with these internet films is the quality of the picture and the conditions under which it must be viewed (a tiny screen within a screen, huge bandwith requirements, etc…) Other available avenues are equally problematic, but these filmmakers have little or no interest in reaching a mass market, so its limited distribution isn’t as big a deal…

The Dune You’ll Never See

Dune: The Movie You Will Never See by Alejandro Jodorowsky : The cult filmmaker’s personal recollection of the failed production. The circumstances of Jodorowsky’s planned 1970s production of Frank Herbert’s novel Dune are inherently fascinating, if only because of the sheer creative power of the collaborators Jodorowsky was able to assemble. Pink Floyd offered to write the score at the peak of their creativity. Salvador Dali, Gloria Swanson, and Orson Welles were cast. Dan O’Bannon (fresh off of Dark Star) was hired to supervize special effects; illustrator Chris Foss to design spacecraft; H.R. Giger to design the world of Geidi Prime and the Harkonnens; artist Jean ‘Moebius’ Giraud drew thousands of sketches. The project eventually collapsed in 1977, subsequently being passed onto Ridley Scott, and then to David Lynch, whose 1984 film was panned by audience and critics alike.

Interestingly enough, this failed production has been suprisingly influential. “…the visual aspect of Star Wars strangely resembled our style. To make Alien, they called Moebius, Foss, Giger, O’Bannon, etc. The project signalled to Americans the possibility of making a big show of science-fiction films, outside of the scientific rigour of 2001: A Space Odyssey.”

In reading his account of the failed production, it becomes readily apparent that Jodorowsky’s Dune would only bear a slight resemblance to Herbert’s novel. “I feel fervent admiration towards Herbert and at the same time conflict […] I did everything to keep him away from the project… I had received a version of Dune and I wanted to transit it: the myth had to abandon the literary form and become image…” In all fairness, this is not necessarily a bad thing, especially in the case of Dune, which many considered to be unfilmable (Lynch, it is said, tried to keep his story as close to the novel as possible – and look what happened there). Film and literature are two very different forms, and, as such, they use different tools to accomplish the same tasks. Movies must use a different “language” to express the same ideas.

I find the prospect of Jodorowsky’s Dune to be fascinationg, but I must also admit that I, like many others, would have also been aprehensive about his vision. Would Jodorowsky’s Dune have been able to live up to his ambition? Some think not:

Theory and retrospect are fine and in theory Jodorowsky’s DUNE sounds too good to be true. But then again, anyone that reads his desrription and explanation of El Topo and then actually watches the thing is going to feel slightly conned. They might then come to the conclusion that Jodorowsky says lots, but means little.

Having seen El Topo, I can understand where this guy’s coming from. I lack the ability to adequately describe the oddity; the disturbing phenomenon that is El Topo. I can only say that it is the wierdest movie that I have ever seen (nay, experienced). But for all its disquieting peculiarity, I think it contains a certain raw power that really affects the viewer. Its that sort of thing, I think, that might have made Dune great.

In case you couldn’t tell, Alejandro Jodorowsky is a strange, if fascinating, fellow. He wrote the script and soundtrack, handled direction, and starred in the previously mentioned El Topo, which was hailed by John Lennon as a masterpiece (thus securing his cult status). His followup, The Holy Mountain, continued along the same lines of thought. It was at this point that the director took the oportunity to work on Dune, which, as we have already found out, was a failure. Nevertheless, Jodorowsky plunges on, still making his own brand of bizzare films. As he says at the end of his account of the Dune debacle, “I have triumphed because I have learned to fail.”

Aspiring Sparrows

A note to aspiring novelists by Mary Doria Russell : Mrs. Russell is amazed that so many aspiring writers are encouraged by the fact that her modern sci-fi classic, The Sparrow, was turned down by 31 literary agents. She relates that asking her for advice is like asking someone who’s been in 31 car wrecks to teach you how to drive. Nevertheless, she give a few helpful hints which basically amount to not paying to have your manuscript read, among other publishing scams (they reminded me of the scams pulled in Foucault’s Pendulum).

I just finished reading The Sparrow, and I must admit, I’m not suprised that it was turned down 31 times. A book that can be summed up “Jesuits in Space” has got to be a hard sell. And no, it is not a comedy; it’s actually a very disturbing experience (making it that much harder to sell). James describes it better than I ever could:

“It’s a wild idea, sending off a Jesuit mission as humanity’s first (secretively-sent) ambassadors to see what they make of the experience, and Russell pulls off this odd choice, makes it necessary to the deeper workings of her plot. She drives at cross-cultural misunderstandings without demonizing any particularly short-sighted view, sets up a terrible theological and personal conundrum, and is absolutely, utterly, completely and totally merciless in driving her unsuspecting characters into it. The conclusion is quite literally terrible, unswavering in its stripping down of that word to the terror at its core.”

Its a fantastic book with excellent character depth, good plotting, and thought-provoking content, but, as you may have guessed, its certainly not for the faint of heart. The Sparrow ruthlessly challenges faith and ones sense of purpose in the universe. It’s emotionally grueling, to say the least.

Goodbye Sober Day

In this interview with Mike Patton, the frontman for the now-defunct Faith No More talks about his other band (Mr. Bungle), his fans, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and more. At one point, Patton proclaims that “we make music for ourselves first, then record it onto a record, and then hope it makes sense to other people,” which is the sort of thing that usually makes me cringe. However, given Mr. Bungle’s last album, California, which I liken it to a musical representation of schizophrenia (and this is downright peachy compared to their last album, Disco Volante), I think I can safely say that Patton really doesn’t care what anyone thinks. Not to mention some of his… less accessible work (he refers to them as “operettas or jazz improvs or, you know, noise pieces–whatever the hell you want to call them”). I still miss his glorious days with FNM, though. I stumbled upon this list of songs they played live; I find the covers they chose to be fascinating. They actually performed “barbie girl” 7 times, and FNM had the range to pull it off, too. When I saw them in Philly, they played the Rocky theme. Damn, I miss those guys…

Customer “Support”

Everyone has had a terrible customer support experience at least once in their life. Those who are cursed into having to deal with customer service often would do well to learn The Art of Turboing. Turboing, essentially, refers to the actions of a customer who goes around the normal technical support process by contacting a senior person in the chain of command. The article does a great job describing the process and how to go about it. The idea of Turboing sounds worse than it is, but it is also made clear that you should turbo only when you’ve exhausted all other avenues of support and hit a dead end. So go forth, my service-maligned readers, and Turbo your way to victory. Or something. [via memepool]

Some good stuff being discussed over at DyREnet’s message board. First, it seems that Drifter has revealed the great secrets of Man.com (the mystery that started with a cryptic and utterly annoying Tandem Story entry on this page). Also, check out the discussion on Coke, including my own moronic exploits with cola.

Searching for Bobby Fischer

A Mystery Wrapped in an Enigma by William Lombardy : A 1974 Sports Illustrated article providing a detailed account of Bobby Fischer’s struggle and eventual victory in the 1972 World Chess Championship. I’ve never been much good at Chess, but I have a certain fascination and respect for those who are. Fischer comes off as emotionally unstable in the article, but I have this sneaking sort of suspicion that every little move (or complaint) he made was calculated. Sometimes he won before he even entered the arena. But then, he is definitely an odd person as well, so who really knows?

Probable Monopoly

Probabilities in the Game of Monopoly has all the numbers you could ever possibly need to play Monopoly more efficiently; most probable squares, how long it takes for investments to pay off, which properties are better to mortgage, where to build hotels, which squares get landed on first.

The railroads are excellent investments, particularly when owned together, although in absolute income terms they don’t keep up with heavily built on properties later in the game. The best return on investment to be found is from putting a third house on New York Avenue. In fact, the third house has the fastest payoff of any building on almost all of the properties. The square most landed on other than Jail is Illinois Avenue, and in fact a hotel there will bring the most income other than a hotel on Boardwalk. By far the worst individual investment is to buy Medeterranean Avenue without first owning Baltic. That’s not to say that you shouldn’t buy it, but it’s not going to make you much money without quite a bit of construction. The properties between the Jail square and the Go To Jail square are landed on the most, because of the jump caused by landing on Go To Jail. The Orange ones have the biggest bang for the buck as far as building goes.

All the probabilities were conducted with a long term computer simulation. I suppose this whole thing may seem excessive, but it is quite interesting and nice to know that the orange properties are the best to own and build on. The simulations do not, however, take into account all the shady dealings between players (I’ll trade you St. Charles Place, which will give you a monopoly, for Baltic Ave. and 5 free passes on any of your properties) that can be ever-so-crucial to the outcome of the game. [via Bifurcated Rivets]