MOVIE REVIEW: BIG FISH (2003) * * 1/2 (2 and a half stars out of 4).
Tim Burton is probably my favorite living director, but his latest movie, about a man who tells hard-to-believe “fish stories,” is not one of his best. Big Fish tries to walk a line that keeps it both outlandishly creative and also straightforwardly charming. But it ends up missing both targets. And while it is often very visually creative, it lacks much of the creepy-cool imagery that characterizes Burton’s best films, such as Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, Batman, and even Pee-wee’s Big Adventure. I think that if Big Fish had been more outrageous and over the top, it would have been more satisfying on that level, and also more charming and touching at the same time. Also, at two hours and five minutes, the movie definitely felt a little too long. It would have been very easy to take 20 minutes out of that movie, and the result would have been a better, more entertaining film.
ATTACKING DEAN.
Why are all the Democratic presidential candidates piling on Howard Dean? Does, say, Joe Lieberman think that if he can erode Dean’s support a little bit, then all those people will vote for Lieberman instead? Does Al Sharpton think that? I just don’t get that strategy at all.
RAPE ROOMS?
Bush keeps going on about how the Iraqi military had “rape rooms.” What’s a rape room? Don’t get me wrong– I am totally against rape, okay? And I don’t mean to be in any way dismissive or disrespectful toward anybody who’s been raped, whether or not that happened in a rape room. But I just don’t understand what a rape room is supposed to be. Is it just any room where a rape occurs? Is it any room that is specifically dedicated to the purpose of raping people in that particular room? Or is it a special room with special features (such as soundproofing, for example) that make it especially suited to the task of raping someone?
More to the point, is “rape room” a real term, or is it a term that the Bush administration just made up to justify invading Iraq? I’m not saying that nobody in Iraq ever raped anybody– I’m sure that they did, and I’m sure that it sometimes happened in some room or other. But what is a “rape room” exactly? I can’t find anything about it on the Internet, except for quotes from Bush, other people with the same question I have, and (from what I can tell from reading the little google description) lots and lots of pornographers selling rape-fetish pornography.
LAST WEEKEND.
On Thursday, I went to Beauty Bar with Steve K. and Heidi H. and Evan. Then Steve and I had a late dinner at Coffee Bar in Union Square.
On Friday, I had Spanish food with Manny F. and Mai X., and then we all saw The Revolution Will Not be Televised.
On Saturday, I went to La Mela with Jessica D. and her uncle and her sister and her sister’s boyfriend in Little Italy. We talked about doing something else afterwards, but the single digit temperatures put everyone in the mood to just go home and curl up under the sheets.
I’M BACK.
I got back from Florida last week, where I grew up. I had a great time with my family and my old friends who still live there, or who have moved around the country, and came back to visit for the holidays, too. We threw a huge New Year’s party, and played a lot of family games of poker.
NYC RESTAURANT REVIEW: LA MELA * * * (3 stars out of 4).
La Mela is in Little Italy on 167 Mulberry Street, between Broome and Grand. The food, which is served family style on huge platters for the table to share, were very good, even by the high standards to which I hold Little Italy. The atmosphere on Saturday Night was festive, without being intrusive, and I think it speaks well of the place that there were four different tables in the dining room I was in (one of 3) celebrating birthdays there that night. My only complaint is that the room was quite cramped, and I was pressed against the table with no room to move my chair, and I had to keep stepping aside while putting on my coat.
MOVIE REVIEW: THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT BE TELEVISED (2003) * * * (3 stars out of 4).
This pro-Hugo Chavez documentary would have been a very boring and one-sided look at the leader of Venezuela, except that there was a coup while the filmmakers were making the film, which turned the documentary into something absolutely extraordinary. While it is clear that the filmmakers are unabashed in their pro-Chavez bias, it is equally clear that what occurred was a violent coup overthrowing a democratically elected leader, which coup was endorsed (if not assisted) by the Bush administration and which was deliberately and knowingly lied about by the oil company-owned Venezuelan television stations. The inside look at the other side of the story is an invaluable historical resource, as well as a helpful reminder that our own media in the US, which is mostly owned by giant corporations, some of which are or were owned by defense contractors, might not always be telling the whole story about American events, either.
MOVIE REVIEW: THE HAUNTED MANSION (2003) * 1/2 (1 and a half stars out of 4).
This mindless Eddie Murphy comedy, passes the time well enough, but there’s not much to it. It gives the backstory to the wonderful Disney ride of the same name. But the two-dimensional characters and thin story make for a very unmemorable movie.
WELL, UH, DON’T PANIC, I GUESS?
DEBKAfile (which I never heard of before) reports that the Italian newspaper Il Giornale (which I never heard of before) reports that an Internet Web site that DEBKA doesn’t even say the name of, and which is said to be associated with al Qaeda, says that al Qaeda threatens to detonate a nuclear device in New York on February 2.
A google search finds several other news organizations and Web sites picking up this story, but none that I’ve ever heard of.
I’m a little troubled that the major news organizations are ignoring this story. I’ll grant you it’s not the most credible thing I’ve ever heard, but it’s absurd to suggest that it isn’t newsworthy. I assume that the primary reason for ignoring the story is the desire not to create a panic. But it seems to me that this desire, which essentially amounts to a desire to make it seem that the war on terrorism is perceived as successful, intentionally or not comes to yet another example of conservative, pro-Bush-administration bias in the news, possibly at the cost of people’s lives.
LAST WEEKEND.
(Not this weekend that ends today, but the last one.)
On Thursday, I had tea with Joclyn G. and later went out for drinks with Steve K. and Heidi, and a couple of their friends. I got to see Steve’s brand new apartment in Soho. It’s right on Canal Street, but it’s on the Soho side of the street. Yet, he keeps referring to it as being in Tribeca. Soho is more accurate, and I think it sounds better, too. But whatever makes him happy.
On Friday, I went to a lovely dinner party at Manny F.‘s place. I maybe spent a little too much time conversing in Chinese with Manny’s girlfriend, Mai X. I’ve been studying Chinese for a couple months. I’m still not very good, but I’m starting to come along a little. It was kind of neat to gossip about people in the room right in front of them.
On Saturday, I went to a TV show taping of the new season of Chappelle’s Show up in Harlem, with Diana A. It was totally outrageous, but it was also really funny. The new season is going to be great. While we were up in Harlem, we had soul food for dinner, but I forgot the name of the place where we went.
I can’t remember what, if anything, I did of interest on Sunday.
FOUND IN TRANSLATION.
Here is an excerpt from the article “UNIVERSAL TRANSLATOR” that appeared here, in “The Official Record” more than a year ago, on November 12, 2002:
We have the following four things already:
1) Voice recognition software that converts speech to text.
2) Translation software that translates from English to almost any language or vice-versa.
3) Speech software that converts text to speech.
4) Small hand-held computers that can run all those programs.
So, hey, let’s put all those things together, and create a hand-held device that I can talk into in English, and which will translate what I just said into another language, and which I then can have someone else talk into in their language, and hear what they just said in English. I’m sure that I would pay $10,000.00 for a device that could do all that. But there isn’t any reason why it should cost more than a couple hundred, and even less than that if millions of us started buying them. Somebody just needs to put all the pieces together.
Here is an excerpt from the current (December 2003/January 2004) issue of MIT Technology Review, from the article “7 Hot Projects“:
Automatic speech translator
Company: IBM
Status: Could appear in laptops or personal digital assistants by mid-2004
Some social pundits claim that communication via computer has hampered personal connections. But researchers at IBM are on the verge of using computers to bring people closer together with a system that translates spoken language on the fly. The speech-to-speech effort started a couple of years ago “as an adventurous research project,” says David Nahamoo, manager of the human-language technologies group at IBM’s T. J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, NY. The group has now built a working prototype: a laptop computer uses speech recognition software to process spoken words into text; sophisticated translation algorithms convert the text into a second language; and then the computer uses text-to-speech technology to “speak” the translated phrase.
LAST WEEKEND.
On Thursday, I went to the Simon and Garfunkel concert at Madison Square Garden. With Manny F. It was really great, and really special, I thought. I’ve always been a really big S&G; fan, and I’d really thoght that I would never get the chance to see them perform together.
On Friday, Manny F. and I saw Bad Santa, which was pretty funny, and had dinner at Marlowe’s on Restaurant Row.
On Saturday, Jess and I went to a book release party for the new book “Xero“. It’s a fun, flighty art book that is occasionally profound. My favorite part, from the reading, is the (pretend?) religion of “is-what-it-ism,” and the line “My ass isn’t everything that it’s cracked up to be”. We left before the end, and we went to dinner at some hoity toity French place in the Lower East Side, and then to Deep Dish Cabaret.
On Sunday, I had dinner in the East Village at Acme, with Jin K. Then we saw The Cooler, which was pretty good.
MOVIE REVIEW: THE COOLER (2003) * * * (3 stars out of 4).
I had a little trouble accepting the premise of this independent film, that the William H. Macy character is incredibly unlucky, and has the power to infect others with his bad luck by being around them, so he is given a job at a Las Vegas casino making sure that high rollers don’t win. But once you accept that, the rest of the movie is funny and very dark, and ultimately very sweet in a satisfying way.
MOVIE REVIEW: BAD SANTA (2003) * * * (3 stars out of 4).
This anti-Christmas black comedy is very funny, and definitely worth seeing. It is outrageous and over the top, yet somehow real and believable. My only complaint is that by the end, the it turns into a boring, old feel-good Christmas movie, with no irony in the happy ending.
LAST WEEKEND.
This was a busy weekend.
Thursday morning, I had a bunch of friends over to watch the Macy’s parade from my balcony, which overlooks Broadway. Then, I went to Helen Z.‘s parents’ house for a delicious Greek Thanksgiving dinner with her cousins Joe F. and Manny F., Joe’s wonderful wife Carol H., and Manny’s charming girlfriend Mai X.
Friday, I had to go back to serving on the Grand Jury for my last day. Friday night, I saw my very dear friends Bryan C. and Ami C., who are husband and wife, and came to visit me from Boston. We had dinner at Noche and saw Taboo which was pretty good.
Saturday, Ami, Bryan, and I had brunch at the Redeye Grill on 7th Avenue and 56th street, which was very good. Saturday night, I went to Chicago City Limits with Suzanne S.
Sunday, Suzanne picked me up and we drove up to Harlem for brunch at Copeland’s. Sunday night, I had dinner with Manny F. and Mai X. at Jackson Hole.
THEATER REVIEW: TABOO * * * (3 stars out of 4).
It seems to me that this show, the new Boy George musical produced by Rosie O’Donnell has been very unfairly maligned in the press for reasons that have nothing to do with the show itself. In fact, the show is a lot of fun and very engaging with a very good score.
AIN’T IT GRAND?
I just completed a two week term as a New York Grand Juror. It was full time every day, and we heard dozens of cases. Unlike a trial jury that decides whether a defendant is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, we merely decided whether each suspect was probably guilty or not, and therefore should be formally accused of a crime. I’d really love to talk more about it, but it’s a felony to violate Grand Jury secrecy. I can say that the experience was very interesting, and that I was very impressed with everyone involved.
LAST WEEKEND.
Friday, I went out with Jessica D. and Christopher B. for a drink and some Mexican food on the Lower East Side. It was fun until somebody drank too much.
Saturday, I had Sushi with Debbie W. We walked around the city and looked at some holiday decorations. Then we watched some TV. I made her watch last week’s South Park, where they made fun of the Mormon religion. It was so offensively funny.
Sunday, I had brunch with Lauren P. and saw ASSSSCAT at the UCB Theater with Manny F. and Mai.
LAST WEEKEND.
Thursday, I saw Automatic Vaudeville at the Ars Nova Theater with Joclyn G.
Friday, I had dinner at Supper and saw Martin and Orloff with Manny F. and May (sp?).
Saturday, I had brunch in Brooklyn with Joclyn G. and went to the New York Transit Museum. Then we came back to Manhattan and had dinner and an Indian restaurant, and watched ER on Tivo.
Sunday, I had brunch at Copeland’s in Harlem with Steve K. Then, we walked around and had coffee at Cafe Mozart. Then I went to bed early for Jury duty on Monday.
THIS ROCKS.
Like many of you, I heard the hit song “So Damn Lucky” by the Dave Matthews Band for the first time on last weekend’s Saturday Night Live. It’s the first song I’ve really liked in at least six months, and it completely blew me away. The melody is haunting and sweet, but the lyrics are incredibly vicious and dark, all taking place in the split second after the singer has lost control of his car, and is about to be in a horrible, horrible car accident. Take a look at the lyrics here, but it’s just not the same without the music. In over a year of existence, The Official Record has never recommended a single piece of music. I very strongly recommend this one. Here’s a link to a too-brief sample from Amazon.com.
TWO OF A KIND.
I read this article in the New York times yesterday, which stated that Defense Secretary Rumsfeld met with “his Vietnamese counterpart, Pham Van Tra.”
And my first thought was, Do I have a Vietnamese counterpart?
BUILD A BETTER BLOG.
I use Blogger and I use enetation.co.uk for my commenting. When I get my email notification of a comment, it tells me the item number for the article that the comment is for, but that was not very helpful in finding the article, especially if it was very old. But I’ve started including the full link to each article after that article in my blog. See down below after this one (and every one) where it says “External link:”. Now, when I get a comment notification, I put the item number (e.g., 106856521028138808 for this article) and “official record” in a google search, and google brings up the page where the article appears. I go to that page and do a control-F search for the number, and I’m there. I don’t know how I would deal with this otherwise.
Another nice thing about this is that you and others can copy the link to the item without having to click on it.
Here’s the code to add to Blogger to add this feature. Make sure it appears between the
External link:
THE TWO MILLION DOLLAR MEN.
Everybody is making such a fuss over the new report of 126,000 new jobs created in the last quarter. They should, but not for the reason they have been.
When Bush proposed his 250 billion dollar tax cut for the wealthy, he promised it would create one million jobs. In fact, even with these new jobs, the total number of jobs has fallen substantially since those tax cuts were enacted. But let’s even put that aside, for the moment, and (ridiculously) give the tax cuts full credit for all 126,000 jobs, without charging it for the net loss in jobs, nor the fact that even this growth is less than it was when Bush took office.
So, even if Bush’s tax cut got 126,000 NET new jobs (which it didn’t), that still would be almost two million dollars per new job. Is that a good deal? Just putting two million dollars in the bank at 5% interest gets you a hundred thousand dollars a year, even after you retire, and even after you die. Instead, these people are working for a year, and only getting, say, twenty, thirty, forty thousand dollars. Maybe a few of those new jobs will get up to over a hundred thousand dollars eventually, but I think it’s safe to say that most of them will stay at $50,000 or below.
And I know, I know, we didn’t just throw the 250 billion dollars away. The rich people have that money, and these people have these jobs, too. But the rich have gotten this gift from the Bush administration at your expense. That’s money that you now owe some big corporation or foreign government, because the treasury borrowed it in your name, instead of collecting it in taxes. The average family’s share of the Federal debt is now over seventy thousand dollars, and it’s getting worse. And for what? A net loss of jobs, that includes one quarter of anemic growth.
MOVIE REVIEW: THE MATRIX: REVOLUTIONS (2003) * * * (3 stars out of 4).
The third Matrix movie is better than the second one. Of course, like almost every movie ever made, it’s not as good as the original Matrix movie. As action movies go, it’s better than most. It did feel a little long, especially at the beginning. I find that almost every movie, except the truly great ones (e.g., Star Wars, the Godfather, The Matrix), could be improved if they were 20 minutes shorter.
THEATER REVIEW: THOROUGHLY MODERN MILLIE (2001) * * 1/2 (2 and a half stars out of 4).
I enjoyed this show and it really reminded me of the Broadway shows I saw as a kid, before the dark, haunting tragedy of Les Miserables transformed everybody’s expectations about what a musical was supposed to be, more than fifteen years ago, in 1987. Thoroughly Modern Millie was both refreshingly and disappointingly straightforward, lacking any of the clever, dark twists that dominate so many new musicals. It’s definitely “big budget,” but they don’t just throw mindless amounts of money at the sets like so many new shows do. It’s cute, but not often laugh-out-loud funny. And do people still like to watch tap dancing? That’s surely a dying art form, you may want to catch here while you can if it’s up your alley.
It was enjoyable, but I expected more from a Tony award winner for Best Musical– a category that has brought to our collective attention, such plays as Les Miserables, The Phantom of the Opera, Rent, The Lion King, The Producers, and Hairspray. It was a really nice fun time at the theater, but there was nothing very new or breakthrough or very original or very memorable about it. I don’t get how it beat Urinetown for the Tony.
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