Author: greg

Yet Another NYMDb

Ms. (Katherine) Milkman (Princeton ’04), who has a minor in American studies, read 442 stories printed in The New Yorker from Oct. 5, 1992, to Sept. 17, 2001, and built a substantial database. She then constructed a series of rococo mathematical tests to discern, among other things, whether certain fiction editors at the magazine had a specific impact on the type of fiction that was published, the sex of authors and the race of characters…
Among Ms. Milkman’s least shocking findings was that characters in New Yorker fiction tend to live in the same places New Yorker readers do, not the United States as a whole…
Ms. Milkman is by all accounts, including her own, a normal college student.

– David Carr, reporting on Ms Milkman’s senior thesis in the NY Times

Geezers, Screenwriters & Directors

It’s my guess that we cling to the harsher bits of the past not just as a warning system to remind us that the next Indian raid or suddenly veering, tower-bound 757 is always waiting but as a passport to connect us to the rest of the world, whose horrors are available each morning and evening on television or in the Times. And the cold moment that returns to mind and sticks there, unbidden, may be preferable to the alternative and much longer blank spaces, whole months and years wiped clear of color or conversation. Like it or not, we geezers are not the curators of this unstable repository of trifling or tragic days but only the screenwriters and directors of the latest revival.

-Roger Angell, “Life in rerun, now playing near you.” >The New Yorker, Issue of 2004-06-07

Bloghdad.com/Neighborhood_Thai

Apparently, Paul Wolfowitz and I have something in common: our neighborhood Thai restaurant. We’re in DC for the weekend, eating at Sala Thai, and he walks in alone, with a newspaper under his arm. Makes a beeline for the bar, where he orders, reads his paper–in far more peace than he’s brought on the world–gets his takeout, and leaves.
Related: Al Gore calls for wholesale resignations of the dangerous architects of disgraceful Iraq and terrorism fiascos, including our neighbor, Paul Wolfowitz. Read the transcript, or watch the video.

Bloghdad.com/Neighborhood_Thai

Apparently, Paul Wolfowitz and I have something in common: our neighborhood Thai restaurant. We’re in DC for the weekend, eating at Sala Thai, and he walks in alone, with a newspaper under his arm. Makes a beeline for the bar, where he orders, reads his paper–in far more peace than he’s brought on the world–gets his takeout, and leaves.
Related: Al Gore calls for wholesale resignations of the dangerous architects of disgraceful Iraq and terrorism fiascos, including our neighbor, Paul Wolfowitz. Read the transcript, or watch the video.

The Making of Michael Moore’s Passion

The similarities between Michael Moore and Mel Gibson, and Farenheit 9/11 and The Passion are worth noting. Let’s see: zealots with messiah complexes? Yep. Threat of damnation if film’s message isn’t heeded? Check. Sensationalistic cineporn tactics to reach beyond true believers? Yep. Special guest star: Satan? Uh-huh. Out to make so much money their directors’ll have an easier time passing a camel through the eye of a needle? Check and checkmate.
At The Hot Button, David Poland gets all New York Review of Books on Moore’s ass, pointing out, with cool and logic, the inconsistencies and contradictions in the creation myth that’s being preached about Farenheit 9/11 and its marketing. It’s a great read, and he’s right–Moore’s inaccurate depiction of the Disney Sanhedrin is distorted and inflammatory.
Likewise, Gibson claimed of biblical accuracy for his film, when in fact, it drew heavily from the ecstatic visions of one 19th century German nuncase. That scholars and serious theologians–and experienced religion reporters pointed those discrepancies out had approximately zero impact on the film’s reception.
The Passion looms over F911 in another way: Weinstein and Moore are demanding a King of the Jews’ ransom for the right to distribute a film that could hit the box office like The Second Coming.
[via Greencine]

The Making of Michael Moore’s Passion

The similarities between Michael Moore and Mel Gibson, and Farenheit 9/11 and The Passion are worth noting. Let’s see: zealots with messiah complexes? Yep. Threat of damnation if film’s message isn’t heeded? Check. Sensationalistic cineporn tactics to reach beyond true believers? Yep. Special guest star: Satan? Uh-huh. Out to make so much money their directors’ll have an easier time passing a camel through the eye of a needle? Check and checkmate.
At The Hot Button, David Poland gets all New York Review of Books on Moore’s ass, pointing out, with cool and logic, the inconsistencies and contradictions in the creation myth that’s being preached about Farenheit 9/11 and its marketing. It’s a great read, and he’s right–Moore’s inaccurate depiction of the Disney Sanhedrin is distorted and inflammatory.
Likewise, Gibson claimed of biblical accuracy for his film, when in fact, it drew heavily from the ecstatic visions of one 19th century German nuncase. That scholars and serious theologians–and experienced religion reporters pointed those discrepancies out had approximately zero impact on the film’s reception.
The Passion looms over F911 in another way: Weinstein and Moore are demanding a King of the Jews’ ransom for the right to distribute a film that could hit the box office like The Second Coming.
[via Greencine]

Imagine there is no Hell

Jake and Dinos Chapman's Hell, detail, image: guardian.co.ukOuch. a 10,000sf warehouse of Momart, the leading art handler/storage company in the UK, burned to the ground yesterday, taking an as-yet unknown number of major Brit Art works with it. The Guardian has some speculative details on what burned, including Jake and Dinos Chapman’s massive installation, Hell, but there’s still a lot that’s not known.
If Charles Saatchi believed in karma, this would be devastating to him right now. But unless he’s actively trying to come back as a worm, he doesn’t so, never mind. [via MAN]
Update: I’ve rewritten the title for this post half a dozen times. My initial impulse of shock still stands, but the close second–schadenfreude over Saatchi’s misfortune–is untenable. It really is–sorry, Charlie–not about you. Jonathan Jones visits the site an reflects on the ashes of Hell.

Imagine there is no Hell

Jake and Dinos Chapman's Hell, detail, image: guardian.co.ukOuch. a 10,000sf warehouse of Momart, the leading art handler/storage company in the UK, burned to the ground yesterday, taking an as-yet unknown number of major Brit Art works with it. The Guardian has some speculative details on what burned, including Jake and Dinos Chapman’s massive installation, Hell, but there’s still a lot that’s not known.
If Charles Saatchi believed in karma, this would be devastating to him right now. But unless he’s actively trying to come back as a worm, he doesn’t so, never mind. [via MAN]
Update: I’ve rewritten the title for this post half a dozen times. My initial impulse of shock still stands, but the close second–schadenfreude over Saatchi’s misfortune–is untenable. It really is–sorry, Charlie–not about you. Jonathan Jones visits the site an reflects on the ashes of Hell.

When Assistants Can’t Help You

Sometimes the part of me that wants to right wins out over the part of me that wants to be loved. It’s at times like this when I want people to confirm to me that my movie/script/editing/whatever is not just cheese, but government cheese.
The rest of the time, though, I want what everyone else wants: to be fawned over by people who don’t mean what they say. At Hollywoodlog, Shane has compiled an interpretive guide for just such occasions, when you’re face-to-face, stripped of the protective layer of politesse offered by a new assistant, poor cell coverage, or that email-gobbling spam filter. [via Defamer]

When Assistants Can’t Help You

Sometimes the part of me that wants to right wins out over the part of me that wants to be loved. It’s at times like this when I want people to confirm to me that my movie/script/editing/whatever is not just cheese, but government cheese.
The rest of the time, though, I want what everyone else wants: to be fawned over by people who don’t mean what they say. At Hollywoodlog, Shane has compiled an interpretive guide for just such occasions, when you’re face-to-face, stripped of the protective layer of politesse offered by a new assistant, poor cell coverage, or that email-gobbling spam filter. [via Defamer]

Love the Cin, Hate the Cinner

And Kiarostami said editing was irrelevant. The Observer’s Andrew Anthony calls Michael Moore “arguably the most ideological and emotive editor since Sergei Eisenstein,” about as high as praise can get for a maker of agitprop. He points to Farenheit 9/11‘s powerful juxtaposition of criticism and humor, raw and manufactured images and predicts it could make an unprecedented “historic difference.”
But Moore, it seems, not only exaggerates or sometimes ignores inconvenient facts, he’s insufferably self-aggrandizing and unpopular with more refined movie folk; he has bodyguards and a limo, and sends his kid to private school. To the ideologically pure–the armchair Marxist readership of the Observer, presumably–he’s a hypocrite whose buzz-making and popularity are to be barely tolerated.
Hey, I hate Moore as much as the next guy, but it is exactly the unfettered pursuit of unadulterated dogma that got us in this mess (pick your mess; this isn’t a bloghdad post). And besides, how seriously can Anthony’s Man of The People criticism be taken when it’s being made in the lobby of the Majestic?
[via greencine, who’s got an excellent collection of Cannes wrapup coverage. ]

Love the Cin, Hate the Cinner

And Kiarostami said editing was irrelevant. The Observer’s Andrew Anthony calls Michael Moore “arguably the most ideological and emotive editor since Sergei Eisenstein,” about as high as praise can get for a maker of agitprop. He points to Farenheit 9/11‘s powerful juxtaposition of criticism and humor, raw and manufactured images and predicts it could make an unprecedented “historic difference.”
But Moore, it seems, not only exaggerates or sometimes ignores inconvenient facts, he’s insufferably self-aggrandizing and unpopular with more refined movie folk; he has bodyguards and a limo, and sends his kid to private school. To the ideologically pure–the armchair Marxist readership of the Observer, presumably–he’s a hypocrite whose buzz-making and popularity are to be barely tolerated.
Hey, I hate Moore as much as the next guy, but it is exactly the unfettered pursuit of unadulterated dogma that got us in this mess (pick your mess; this isn’t a bloghdad post). And besides, how seriously can Anthony’s Man of The People criticism be taken when it’s being made in the lobby of the Majestic?
[via greencine, who’s got an excellent collection of Cannes wrapup coverage. ]