Skeletons in the Pool

Teenagers from Outer Space is a beautiful and moving film. Also, it is impossible to watch it and not fall in love with Betty.  You can't blame her wayward spaceman for wanting to stay on Earth.

Shannon & The Clams "Sleep Talk" Video! Glitter Tears!

Speaking of Shannon and the Clams and other things that are actually fun. I really like the new video for "Sleep Talk." Shot on a new super 8 film stock!? Read all about it at The Bay Bridged!


Shannon and the Clams - "Sleep Talk" from The Bay Bridged on Vimeo.

You can also read the lengthy result of a phone conversation I had with the band at Stomp and Stammer's website. We mostly talked about their new album and Roy Orbison. Sleep Talk is even better than their first album and they were great when I saw them with Hunx and His Punx at Cake Shop just now, but the show was kind of housed in much the same way that Nobunny's Cake Shop engagement was last year.

You can stream all of Sleep Talk at Punknews.org

Until the Light Takes Us

I finally got to see this black metal documentary, Until the Light Takes Us,which came out on DVD recently. I enjoyed it in a way that I'm not really comfortable with.

The subjects are the surviving members of the Norwegian black metal scene in the '90s, a scene that imploded in the wake of a series of church burnings, a murder or two, and the subsequent media circus. The filmmakers chose to provide a more or less blank backdrop against which their completely batshit subjects could tell their own story. And then the movie is paced and edited and shot in such a way that you feel reflective, even meditative while watching it, and the filmmakers are very much invisible in the whole process. You don't hear the questions, only the answers, which are mainly culled from a series of very intimate interviews with Gylve Nagell of Darkthrone and Varg Vikernes of Burzum. Some of the figures in the movie are charming, or at least unforgettable, and each of them is also completely out of his mind to this day. So, you have this kind of freakishly peaceful and elegant encounter with some genuinely dangerous artists.

I loved it because it was such an aestheticized treatment of the characters and events, but I was also uncomfortable with it for the same reason. It featured a few visual artists, including Harmony Korine, who have been inspired by black metal to create paintings/installations/performance art for galleries. In fact, there are more visual artists who have been inspired by black metal than were included in the documentary. It's easy to see how the scene appeals to them, but their interest is also almost more unsettling than the reality of the scene itself. In the wake of the DVD release I've been seeing enthusiastic posts about black metal cropping up on hip blogs, which is similarly weird and creepy.

In the end, the subjects relate just enough of their story that a few misconceptions about Norwegian black metal are corrected (They're not satanists, okay?) and an intelligent viewer can pick up where Until the Light Takes Us leaves off and fill in a few blanks for themselves. I was happy to mull things over on my own as the credits rolled and it definitely leaves you with plenty to mull over. So, fine, it was kind of amazing and easily the weirdest movie I've watched in awhile.

On a related note, Varg Vikernes is coming out with a new Burzum album, because he's not in jail anymore. I'm not endorsing this. I'm just telling you. I'm also just telling you about these black metal greeting cards on Etsy. I'm kind of in love with Etsy's dark side lately.

Trailer:

Mock Up On Mu

So this movie has been out for a sec, but I just watched it and it rules. The characters are fascinating and real; as in they are based on real characters who really knew each other. I want to do piles of esoteric research and see all of Craig Baldwin's movies now.

Baldwin describes the movie very well himself in this video. Don't bother looking for the trailer. It will only confuse you. Just get your hands on a copy and settle in for the ride.

Also, for Las Vegans: It's set partly in Las Vegas and you may recognize some of the settings. For instance, UNLV. It's like a scavenger hunt. Or, potentially, a drinking game.

Void Where Prohibited: The Second Annual Bad Idea Potluck Essay Contest

Yes! We totally did this last year! This year there is only one prize and there will be only one proper winner, but this year's prize is better than all of last year's prizes put together.

The Essay: Tell us about something you did because you saw it in a movie or on television. Then tell us why you aren't sorry. You can send your entries in by email, put them in the comments section, or even leave them on our Facebook page.We'll find them.

Winner will receive the following skateboard:

 Runners up in the tri-state area may receive beers.

Surfacing

I have not had my head in the Internet game lately and, frankly, I think I like it. I did see The Endless Summer and I encourage anyone who hasn't seen it to see it. Strikingly culturally insensitive in places, in particular that narration during the boys' visit to a remote tribal village in Africa, but seeing them surfing there and knowing that the year was 1966 is still pretty amazing.

The Endless Summer

Only Fake Twitters are Fun

Nick Nolte


Mickey Rourke


Gary Busey

BIG NEWS, GUYS:

Hi. I'm Joie. I have plenty of bad ideas. I look forward to sharing them with you here! Let's start it up right, huh?

ATTENTION ALL SCRABBLE PLAYERS:

Proper Nouns Come Into Play in Scrabble Rule Change

So basically, this means I will be able to own most of you at scrabble now. Horrible vocabulary? Check. Wonderful knowledge of names and places? Check. BRING IT.

Also, if you are in NYC, SF, or LA, this movie should be playing near you now:



Blah blah blah, you hate hipsters, yadda yadda yadda. I get it. You're really cool. Just shut up and give it a whirl. I saw this preview when I went to IFC Manhattan last month to see The Art of Stealing (which I hella vouch for btw). I like when someone talks about how monogamy is retarded and it isn't me.

Go Ask Alice

The first film version of Alice in Wonderland has been restored and you can watch it at The Auteurs. It was made in 1903, just 37 years after Alice first appeared in print. It seems she has was meant for the silver screen from the very start.

Dear Onion

There is nothing funny about Lars Von Trier.

Denmark Introduces Harrowing New Tourism Ads Directed By Lars Von Trier

No One Knows About Persian Cats

No One Knows About Persian Cats is the most exciting music movie I've seen since Wild Zero. Directed by Bahman Ghobadi (Turtles Can Fly) and co-written with his fiance, the journalist Roxana Saberi, it is not a documentary but a fictionalized portrait of Iran's hidden musicians, who must record and perform illegally. The film finds a unique way of blending fact and fiction, however, because the the actors are musicians playing themselves. This way, Ghobadi allows them to tell their own stories while also smuggling their music out to a wider audience.

In the film, real-life indie rockers Negar Shaghaghi and Ashkan Koshanejad want to get a band together for a gig in London. But, because of the restrictions placed on musicians by the Iranian government, they're forced to go about it like two drug runners. They cautiously feel out other musicians and struggle to secure false passports. As their enterprise leads them through alleys and across the rooftops of Tehran, they introduce the viewer to a cross-section of Iran's truly underground music scenes. Transcendent performances are showcased in living rooms, open fields, and even cow sheds. So that no moment is wasted, each musical interlude is cut with dizzying scenes of life in the city.

The soundtrack includes songs in both English and Farsi and gives voice to emcees, indie rockers, traditional musicians, and one metal band. The driving "Human Jungle" by Take It Easy Hospital becomes the film's haunting theme and a fitting rallying cry for repressed artists. The soundtrack is already a bestseller in Europe. (The film itself won the Un Certain Regard Prize at Cannes.)

Watching the movie, I rooted for the both characters in the story and the actors whose real lives were being portrayed.  It is exhilarating and disturbing to watch a film about events that are in fact present tense. And then, well, the whole idea of a film shot in secret, starring secret rock stars just makes my hipster bone tingle. I mean, talk about dangerous art. Obviously, filming the movie wasn't exactly cleared with the authorities.
But, apart from being dangerous, it is great art too. Ghobadi creates genuine suspense, even as he inspires genuine outrage.

Most of all, No One Knows About Persian Cats left me hungry to hear more about indie music from beyond American shores. So far, SPIN Earth has been my best online resource. There is a page for Tehran, but much of the posting there, understandably, is more about political turmoil than rock 'n' roll. Does anyone have more resources for me? Zines? Blogs? Maximum Rocknroll hooks it up once in awhile, but their scope is obviously limited to punk and hardcore.

The soundtrack is out April 16th, the same day the film opens in New York.

I heard you like vampires ...

I highly recommend Vampyros Lesbos. It's no Let the Right One In, and it is basically a poorly done exploitation film from the 70s, but that somehow makes this retelling of Dracula even more captivating. Despite the serious, arty face the film puts on, it's really a clever burlesque of the original tale, plus lesbianism. All the players are there, but transformed. Dracula is replaced by his protege and sole heiress the countess Carody, Renfield's stand-in is the beautiful young Agra, driven mad by her love for the infernally magnetic vampiress, and Van Helsing is portrayed as a corrupt and supercilious psychologist.

The best of these subversions is the heroine Linda Westinghouse, a lawyer summoned to the countess's private island to assist in some ill-defined way with her inheritance. Once there, she is drawn into a dangerous shadow world of awkwardly edited undead-lesbian passion, effectively merging the roles of Jonathan Harker and Wilhelmina Murray from Bram Stoker's story. Westinghouse is both the object of the (ridiculously hot) vampire's lust and the one who must ultimately destroy the bloodsucking monster. I liked that part, but I was a little bummed out that even an obscenely wealthy and powerful vampire's sexual preference had to be explained by a rape she survived in childhood. (Dracula saved her.)

Also, I was rooting for predator and prey to wind up in an eternal unholy union and get married under the cherry trees in D.C., but I'll take this for now. (Maybe Quentin Tarantino will answer my remake prayers.)

Now that I've ruined the entire story for you, go Netflix that sucker. I'm going to get my hands on the soundtrack. It's really all about the soundtrack.

Queens of Noise

I saw it first at Bust.com. Of course, I'm going to see it the second it comes out but that's not at all because I think it's going to be the greatest film ever made.

Cut with Care

 

 

I usually tell people that outfits and scenery are the only thing I care about in movies. I'm lying. Beautiful surfaces are the bare minimum, after which I start to make other demands, or perhaps only in the case of  a carefully cropped biopic like Coco Before Chanel. It's an uncomplicated movie about the early life of the very complicated Coco Chanel. I was taken in by the beauty of the film, and the engaging acting, and all the dresses (even the ones Coco hated) but it was hard not to feel uncomfortable with a movie that focused so heavily on the men in her life.

The movie is a bit of a fairytale romance where rich men fight (politely) over a plucky orphan. She has her millionaire lover Etienne Balsan, and her other lover Boy Capel, English friend and business associate of Balsan, who gives Chanel the money she needs to go into the garment business. Capel is presented as the love of her life, and I don't know if he was or not, but Chanel was famous for being a ruthless hard ass, so seeing her portrayed as a quivering romantic heroine is weird, though I can almost buy it. Doesn't everyone have a heart? Audrey Tautou plays her with real emotional layering, but I was looking for moral layers.

And more clothes. My friend Carrie and I both definitely wanted to see more of the designer's celebrated fashions. You really only catch a glimpse of them at the end. It is Coco Before Chanel, but they could have thrown us a scrap or two. In the end, this an airbrushed image best suited for people who are already familiar with Chanel's life of fraternizing with Nazis and paying her employees starvation wages, but willing to forget the details for a couple of hours. This picture of a life of disappointment and bittersweet triumph does make it easier to understand her well-known bad behavior. In fact, it succeeds in making me want to read more about her and see all her other biopics.

But I have written more than I meant to. It would have been better just to post a bunch of pictures of Audrey Tautou (So many outfits!) along with this Village Voice review by Melissa Anderson, which mentions Judith Thurman's great writing about Chanel.

Chatterbox

This laser disc case was found hanging above my friend Emily's stove. It encases a film about a woman with a talking, singing vagina. Holy mother of cow. It's on DVD. I have to see it. This was a neat blog post about it at Moon in the Gutter. I need a job so I can indiscriminately consume pop culture. This is all Youtube had for me:

Where The Wild Things Are

You know what happens. It's awesome. Go see it. Only one thing was weird though. All the Wild Things were from Los Angeles.

Put down the lip gloss. Step away from the mirror.

I don't know why, but I wasn't expecting much from Whip It. What I got was a great funny sports movie with coming-of-age themes that didn't make me grit my teeth and cringe. The roller derby action made me cringe and grind my teeth. But that was in a fun "I can't watch" kind of way that I enjoyed. And it's set in Austin, Texas. You could almost call it a star vehicle for the city. No one appraises me of these things.

I'm a real soft touch for "be your own hero" sentiments so I should have realized I'd get sucked in directly. I was getting misty eyed moments into the film but once the real derby action started I got my head in the game. The fine soundtrack featuring gems from The Ettes and Jens Lekman helped with that. So did the breakneck camera work and accurate portrayals of both roller derby and Austin. All the people in the movie looked, or were cleverly made to look, like real Austinites who had been binging on Lone Star beer since middle school. I especially appreciated the way they got the derby girl look down for the likes of Drew Barrymore, Eve and Juliette Lewis: kinda busted but murderously glamorous.

It's too early to tell, but Whip It might meet my criteria for a favorite movie. I have to be able to watch the film over and over again at any time no matter how cranky or cynical I'm feeling. This might be one of those. It has corny/hilarious dialog, lots of thrills and eye snacks and a (subtly presented) moral I can't remind myself of often enough: It's totally okay to get hurt.

Get yourself a college girl

I want to see this movie. Mostly, I've just been watching parts of it on Youtube. Nancy Sinatra is in it, plus the Dave Clark Five, the Animals and the Standells. And, of course, lot's of great '60s hair.