Spam of the Day

Give squish mittens DUE attention


In other news, I watched Beyond the Valley of the Dolls last night, which is like an unholy mashing of Scooby Doo, Josie and the Pussycats, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show. They totally played the Evil Tranny card.

Because it was requested...

The table of contents of that book I got, annotated by a previous owner. Underlines marked by _underscore_

Brain Wave, by Poul Anderson [no!]
Bullard Reflects, by Malcolm Jameson
The Lost Years, by Oscar Lewis [no! What might have happened had Lincoln lived--_poor_]
Dead Center, by Judith Merril [_Possibly_]
Lost Art, by George O. Smith [_yes_]
The Other Side of the Sky, by Arthur C. Clarke [no!]
The Man Who Sold the Moon [no!]
Magic City, by Nelson S. Bond [yes]*
The Morning of the Day They Did It, by E.B. White [_yes_]
Piggy Bank, by Henry Kuttner [Only Fair!]
Letters from Laura, by Mildred Clingerman [ok-]
The Stars My Destination, by Alfred Bester [_no_]


*This title and author were also handwritten on the inside cover.

Izo

I just watched Izo. It's about the ghost of a killer hacking and slashing his way through the afterlife. Super surreal, super symbolic, but not in an obvious, Hero's Journey way.
In the special features, the creator (I missed if it was the writer or the director.) said that he was trying to show "the spirit of the Japanese man." I could definitely see that, though to look at some of the reviews out there, I'm one of the few who can. The movie's like a visual poem, especially at the beginning, where it's interspersed with flashes of stock footage which adds to the emotional content, sometimes in clashing ways. A one-eyed cat, a flower, a naked woman.
Time overlaps, and we get samurai fighting on a bridge while trucks swerve around them. Vacation home salesmen turn into demons. Flashbacks to his life. He's got a tyrannical boss. Throughout the film, Izo is called the very spirit of irrationality, and you really have to keep that in mind if you want to experience this film. It's not a rational, linear plot. It's a peeling back of the facade of the modern world to expose the neurotic blood and guts beneath. (lots and lots of blood!) As with poetry, you have to let each image spark an emotion, and just marvel at the tapestry of sparks that's created.
Crazy, awesome movie. Definitely not for everyone.