I Am Trying to Break Your Heart


01. "Say You Will"

JOSH: As an opener, this is a good indicator that Kanye's up to something different this time out. There's no hook--or the whole thing's one lean, cold hook. Technically speaking, Kanye's not a good singer, granted (even going it T-Pain style), but neither are Joanna Newsom or Tom Waits; he really gets the most out of his artificially adjusted falsetto's idiosyncratic appeal. [8]

TERESA: You don't have to have studied psychology to see, from lyrics to public appearances/outbursts, that Kanye West does not deal well with rejection. Though he's usually throwing a tantrum or trying to convince us he's too good for this girl or that award. On "Say You Will," he's longing for someone, he's vulnerable, and it sets the tone for the entire outing. You realize that, wow, he really is gonna pull this off. He's voluntarily peeling away every coat of Louis Vuitton-emblazoned armor and exposing himself in a very audibly pleasing healing process. By the end of the CD, I'll be completely won over, and this great song won't even be in the top 5. [8]

02. "Welcome to Heartbreak"

JOSH: This is where 'Ye unambiguously establishes the theme of his latest opus. Where his first three proper records centered loosely around the idea of education, 808s focuses on the discontents of the working world, or a multi-millionaire professional entertainer's experience of it anyway. Musicially, it's largely unlike anything he's released before--a comment that rings true for much of what's to follow. (It's worth noting that the leaked version is a much more forceful and grandiose production, where the final cut is more melancholy and spare. I initially preferred the former, but as I type this, the latter is nosing steadily ahead.) [9]

TERESA: Though the leaked version is superior--the foreboding synth left raw and not layered with piano--this may still be the best track on 808s. The heartbreaks he laments here don't sound all that bad (so you had to leave your Godsister's wedding early, boo hoo), but they're given tangible emotion by Kanye's delivery and the fact that we all know he's suffered real tragedies this year, and we can hear them in every syllable. [leak: 10; album: 9]

03. "Heartless"

JOSH: This might be the only track on the new album that wouldn't sound at least a little out of place on his previous releases, and as such, it might be his best shot from the new batch at a "Golddigger"/"Stronger"-level radio hit. The best part's when 'Ye goes "and we just gon' be en-e-mies." [8]

TERESA: Now to lighten things up a bit! Or, wait...no. Despite the misleading beat, Kanye is still astonishingly sad and angry. He's just being considerate and giving us something to bob our heads to and chuckle at ("how could you be so Dr. Evil?") while we dry our eyes. Listen a little closer though, and the tears might come welling back up. [9]

04. "Amazing"

JOSH:808s could be the first hip-hop record (a classification I'm applying pretty liberally, natch) that's grounded almost entirely in existential anxiety; it's certainly among the most pervasively pessimistic albums of any stripe released in recent memory, and not from Thom Yorke or Trent Reznor but from the man responsible for freaking "Touch the Sky." He's clearly, desperately reaching--for meaning, for love, for memories made in the coldest winter--and maybe the high-performance automobiles and closets full of designer swag just aren't cutting it anymore. To be sure, the specter of his mother's sudden death looms large over his first recorded statement since. "Amazing" is one of the new album's high (or perhaps low, given the spirit of the thing) points--meditative and menacing, ambivalent about the cultural and financial status he's achieved yet backed by a beat that's absolutely insistent on drone-like forward movement. Jeezy, for his part, sounds, in this unusual aural context, like a growling, rapping incarnation of that demon atop Bad Mountain in Fantasia [10]

TERESA: I seem to recall Jeezy having a verse that ended up being cut out somewhere on Graduation. I suppose this makes up for it, with a dramatic music drop-out and everything before he kicks in. When Kanye refers to himself as a "maven" immediately after a "monster," it's defensive in place of his usual stance of cocky. I remember seeing him on Ellen, and he was saying something about how he used Patrick Bateman of American Psycho as inspiration for 808s. That was quite awhile ago, and I would have to guess that most of that fell away as the tracks were mastered and changed, and more Kanye came out. "Amazing" is probably the closest thing to that vision that remains. [8]

05. "Love Lockdown"

JOSH: Hmm,...what's really left to say about this one? [10]

TERESA: I still feel that this studio version doesn't come close to the jaw-dropping passion on display when Kanye debuted this at the MVA's. However, it's still a serviceable version when one doesn't want to bother Youtubing the other. The jungle sounds, also featured on "Amazing," are appropriately eerie and unhinged, and the "you lose...you lose" is among the more haunting moments on the album. [7.5]

06. "Paranoid"

JOSH: 808s is arguably the best Prince record since Sign 'o' the Times--or at least since Basement Jaxx's Rooty--as ambitious as its pleasurable, and all the more indelible for its imperfections and limitations. Kanye's latest is too across-the-board inspired to use the word "filler," so let's just say this is his "Housequake" or something, happily minor but no less enjoyable for it. [7]

TERESA: "Paranoid," a playful jaunt nestled between tracks ranging from mournful to seething, would be a disposable piece of fluffy fun on any other album of his; here it's a triumphant demonstration of strength and humanity. If that sounds a bit hyperbolic, take for example the contrast of something like Beck's Sea Change (a good album in its own right, don't get me wrong) and countless other white dude break-up discs. There's no room for a shake-it-off moment and they're all gloom all the time. Kanye, on the other hand, isn't gonna mope around forever. You know, he's like that Daft Punk song he sampled. [7]

07. "Robocop"

JOSH: The leaked version of this sounded like a Robyn B-side (which is a compliment). The Herbie Hancock-tweaked album cut is something significantly richer. Lyrically, it's a pretty standard issue "no-good dame" dis track (the sort of territory Kanye's worked more wittily numerous times before), but enveloped by Hancock's lush, soaring symphonics, it's an ebullient contradiction. The final minute and a half here is the loveliest such stretch I've heard all year. [10]

TERESA: I'm starting to sound like a whiny elitist hipster mp3 blogger snob, but I also prefer the previously leaked version of this. The finalized offering is a handful of loops too messy. That being said, it's still admittedly loads of fun, and along with "Paranoid," provides a refreshing, if brief, hiatus from...well, heartbreak. It's kinda like taking a smoke break and checking your text messages at the intermission for King Lear. [leak: 8.5; album: 8]

08. "Street Lights"

JOSH: This is as intimate, and as vulnerable, as anything Kanye's put to record to date--a promising possibility suggested by his heartrending "Hey Mama" at last year's Grammys ceremony. It's probably still early to start tossing around the 'm'-word--his next effort could very well be a concept album devoted to Louis Vuitton 's new luggage line--but some vague Rubicon feels crossed here. [8]

TERESA: West has always been ace at incorporating female vocals into his songs ingeniously (the computerized cold snap chant of "Flashing Lights," or the ethereal "ooh oooh oooh ooh" of "Good Morning") and the simple inclusion of one helps "Street Lights" immeasurably. He more or less repeats the sentiment of "Welcome to Heartbreak," but it's also just a common thread of the album, and thus forgivable. This one, however, as we near closer to the end of the album, shimmers with some hope. [8.5]

09. "Bad News"

JOSH: Upon repeat listens, this is a grower, but I haven't quite reached a final verdict yet since the leaked version of this was unlistenable. It's probably not a highlight, but it holds its own on the album of the year, which should count for something. [7]

TERESA: "Bad News" is simple and straightforward enough that it could have been an interlude, and still kind of is. The sparse piano/squelch combination bobs along as Kanye croons as if he's in a cozy jazz bar from the future. Then said crooning stops entirely and gives way into a crescendo of strings and ivories. Nothing I'd go back and listen to as often as some of the others, but it fleshes out the whole piece quite nicely. [8]

10. "See You in My Nightmares"

JOSH: This is some Les Mis shit--overproduced, for sure, yet irresistibly baroque, and better, at any rate, than the surprisingly so-so "Barry Bonds," Graduation's 'Ye/Weezy teaming. Here, Kanye is the noble outlaw Jean Valjean, while Wayne plays the sinister Inspector Javert (with a liberal dose of Freddy Krueger thrown in for good measure). [8]

TERESA: Okay. I'm not going to complain about Lil Wayne here. I know I do that too much, and it ends up detracting from whatever else a song has to offer. Even though that song could be great in production, composition, execution and idea and Lil Wayne's presence could still ruin it...I won't mention that. Or the way his insufferable voice could probably remove paint from walls and his idiotic "rhymes" could numb one's brain enough that they wouldn't need anesthetic to have a lobotomy. Nope, not gonna. [6]

11. "Coldest Winter"

JOSH: Not as stunning as "Gone" so far as Kanye closers go, but plenty poignant nevertheless. Kanye the Autotune Soul Man triumphs! (Totally off-topic, the drums on this remind me of Hole's "Northern Star," one of my favoritest songs in the whole wide world.) [9]

TERESA: And any hope built up on "Street Lights" is dashed with the absolutely defeated exhale of "Coldest Winter." Few songs so short and minimalistic can wring out this kind of aching regret--and certainly not in pop or hip hop. Kanye, can I give you a hug? [10]

12. "Pinocchio Story" [live freestyle bonus track]

JOSH: Chapter V: Kanye as Bob Marley for the Obama Era? Bring it on. [9]

TERESA: If the state our (anti)hero is in, or the intention of his masterpiece wasn't clear enough to you by now, he's included this live freestyle that spells it out in a heartfelt, if clumsy fairy tale metaphor. Or maybe he included it because it's really freaking good, and it really makes you want to catch him on his next tour stop near you. I already checked for possible future Vancouver appearances. [7.5]

A Woman in Trouble


Connecting the dots between Renee Maria Falconetti and Angelina Jolie may seem like a fool's quest or, at best, a strictly theoretical academic exercise, but if there's any active filmmaker up to plumbing real meaning from such a task, it's Clint Eastwood. Where in the past, Jolie had always struck me as a fairly limited actress, good at what she does but seemingly incapable of doing much else well besides, under Eastwood's direction, she offers the performance of a lifetime, and of the year.

Certainly, Eastwood's compositions (some of them among the most extraordinarily beautiful in American cinema) and DP Tom Stern's infatuated camera lend Jolie's proto-feminist Changeling protagonist, Christine Collins, an iconic weight that's closer to Falconetti's Joan of Arc than, say, Sally Field's Norma Rae. Particularly in the film's more austere and ostensibly single-minded first half, the points of comparison with Dreyer's 1928 (coincidentally, the year Changeling's mind-boggling true story opens) masterpiece are down-right eerie. In lieu of monstrous clergymen interrogating Dreyer's suffering saint is a rabidly corrupt Los Angeles Police Department and various medical and media professionals under their influence. When a police captain orders Christine to be "escorted" to a city mental hospital for questioning his department's official report, the sinister white walls of the asylum instantly call to mind the intimidatingly labyrinthine church facility where Dreyer's Joan was imprisoned.

Or, if you prefer, consider Changeling as an opposite-coast take on The House of Mirth transplanted ahead by a quarter-century or so. In the decades between Lily Bart and Christine Collins, American women were granted the right to vote, yet their voices were often still stifled, ignored entirely, or subjected to misogynistic double-standards. Jolie's central performance is every bit as heartbreaking and exquisitely nuanced as Gillian Anderson's much-lauded turn in Terence Davies' Wharton filmization. Remarkably, her finest scenes aren't the uber-dramatic, plate-smashing Oscar-ready clips. They're instead the more restrained moments, where Christine seems to be mustering every ounce of effort to try and remain sane, and especially several series of devastating reaction shots: one while being condescended to and dressed down with loaded questions by a bought-off doctor at the mental hospital; another in response to dirty looks from the officer who had her committed, during his day in court; and, finally, being told by a helpful pastor that Christine and her missing son would meet again--in Heaven--a thought that appears to provide her little comfort or reassurance.

This is also, to be sure, classic Clint territory. At this point in his career, Eastwood is such a sure-handed master that the considerable structural complexity of Changeling registers as rich, old-fashioned storytelling, engrossing genre moviemaking in the best Hollywood tradition. Along with The Bridges of Madison County and Million Dollar Baby, it's further evidence that he's as sensitive a director of women as of men. The parallel narrative track, involving the kidnapping and murder of young boys, is reminiscent of his very underrated A Perfect World, yet when the disturbed man ruled responsible for those crimes is hanged, the impact of his execution is as empty and wholly unsatisfying (for Christine, whose son he may have killed, and for us as an audience) as the vigilante misjustice of Mystic River. Unlike that film's Shakespearen-level tragedy, however, Changeling is marked more by its mournful tone and by a sustained sense of loss, even as its latter half expands the story's scope and accommodates significant triumphs.

My dear wife--with whom I tend to more or less agree roughly 90% of the time (at least regarding movies)--didn't much care for this one. Teresa complained that the film was "cheesy" and too melodramatic. Again, I turn to Dreyer, cinema's patron saint of full-throttle, irony-free personal/spiritual drama. Like The Passion of Joan of Arc, Changeling is a work about a true believer for true believers (in Clint Eastwood, if not some higher power), absolutely riveting for those willing or able of full investment. Even without the happy ending that Old Hollywood (as opposed to Real Life, the film's source versus its stylized form) would seemingly dictate, it's a tribute to--to borrow a much more recent cultural catch-phrase--the audacity of hope.

And it's the best film of the year.

Gave Proof Through the Night


Barack Hussein Obama will be the 44th President of the United States of America.

Take it all in. Celebrate it. Savor it. Exhale. (Grin like you're crazy.) Inhale.

This fact alone feels like something close to a miracle, and through the sheer adrenaline and joy of this wonderful historical moment, it's almost enough to make one temporarily forget both how awful the past eight years have been and how staggering the problems facing the next commander-in-chief will be.

It's a fact, and a moment, that makes me tremendously proud to be an American (even though I now reside in Canada) and more specifically an Illinoisan (even though I'm now an adopted British Columbian)--and on so many different, significant levels.

It's the promise of a fresh start after nearly a decade of domestic and international disasters; the hope that America may once again represent a positive, ethical force in the world, admired and looked to for leadership and integrity by the global community; and, of course, it's a powerful rebuke to--though by no means an end to--centuries of repugnant prejudices and institutional glass ceilings.

And yet...and yet, this is, naturally, just the beginning--or January 20th will be anyway. As ridiculous as it sounds, overcoming such daunting obstacles and giving real, palpable hope to hundreds of millions of people (not just in the United States, mind you, but indeed around the world) in decidedly grey times, was actually the easy part. Which is to say, there's clearly plenty of history yet to be made.

If anyone is capable of righting this sinking ship and fulfilling these greatest of expectations, it's Barack Obama, the--go ahead, say it again out loud, keep the party going through the end of the year!--next Preisident of the United States. As he takes this time to profusely thank his supporters and campaign workers, he, in turn, deserves nothing less than our most sincere gratitude and our staunchest confidence.

Hail to the new chief!

The Bush Doctrine


The Man Who Wasn't There: Wrestling with Oliver Stone's W. and the Enigma of George W. Bush

Stay Tuned


Top Five Reasons to Watch TV:

05. SNL The last two episodes have been close to classic--and not just for Tina Fey's much-ballyhooed Sarah Palin impression or McCain's campaign-spoofing cameo. The sketch with Josh Brolin about "fall foliage" was some kind of comic genius. And Ben Affleck's Keith Olbermann riff had me pretty well in stitches. But yeah: election year, Tina Fey, election year, etc. (Which reminds me: I should try and get around to actually watching 30 Rock sometime, huh?)

04. The Late Show with David Letterman Like good wine and very few other things in life, Dave's getting even better with age. His edge is actually more pronounced and acidic, and yet he's sort of inadvertently endearing the way smart-ass, grumpy old men can occasionally be. Ditto Paul Shaffer. They're still funnier than Colbert and Stewart, not to mention their major network time-slot competition.

03. Dexter It's the anti-CSI, if you will, treading somewhat similar territory but with the focus on fascinating, multi-faceted characters and engrossing, breathlessly sustained season-long arcs. Michael C. Hall is the best actor on TV right now, period--good enough, in fact, to suspend rolled eyeballs at another popcult portrait of a charming, articulate serial killer.

02. Friday Night Lights Sure, the second season was a tad dramatically uneven and, at times, tended regrettably toward soap opera histrionics. This is still television's most uniformly superb cast, and after two seasons, any individual performer retains the ability to completely surprise you on any given night (kinda like football). The writing feels wholly genuine, even when certain plot twists seem dubious, making for a deeply affectionate (yet sharply critical, when necessary) look at a very specific American milieu.

01. Mad Men Yup, it's that good. To call former Sopranos writer Matthew Weiner's flawlessly realized brainchild the best show to hit the air since David Chase's masterwork isn't hyperbole. Like The Sopranos, Mad Men not only towers over its tube competition--it's markedly superior to any big screen drama Hollywood's produced in recent memory. Let's cross our fingers and hope that AMC follows HBO's admirable lead and gives this one the long, expansive life it so richly deserves.

Rough Times, Good Movies


Not Fade Away: Notes on the 27th Vancouver International Film Festival

People Are Strange


When Barton Fink won the Palm d'Or at Cannes back in 1991, the advance word declared that it was a Coen brothers movie for people who ordinarily can't stand Coen brothers movies (even though, in retrospect, that film introduced numerous stylistic flourishes and thematic concerns that remain major elements in their arsenal). The same can be argued, much more effectively, about their Oscar-winning No Country for Old Men--it's serious, and literary to boot! Which explains both why the anticipation for their follow-up effort was particularly feverish and why many of the critical reactions it's elicited have been lukewarm and rather befuddled.

It's a Coen brothers movie, stupid. Or, rather, it's a "stupid" Coen brothers movie--in the best sense, much like Fargo, their most generally well-regarded film prior to tackling Cormac McCarthy. In fact, Burn After Reading is, in a nutshell, Fargo relocated and re-imagined with real life movie stars, substituting the Greater D.C. area for the Upper Midwest, John Malkovich for William H. Macy, George Clooney and Brad Pitt for Steve Buscemi and Peter Stormare, Tilda Swinton for whoever that lady was that played Macy's wife, and Frances McDormand in a blonde wig for Frances McDormand in a pregnant suit. In both instances, the casts are uniformly terrific, but here the Coen's pull off a neat trick that wasn't necessarily available to them a dozen years ago: they've convinced A-listers to play hysterically exaggerated versions of themselves--George Clooney's the say-anything womanizer, Malkovich is the uber-effete intellectual with an explosive temper, Swinton's the chilliest of ice queens--and, arguably, the most famous (and famously handsome) actor in the world to play a full-on dork.

Those who've accused Burn After Reading of being a film about nothing may have a point, but it's clearly not one that eludes its creators. This one is nothing if not ingeniously self-reflexive. J.K. Simmons' CIA boss is an audience surrogate of sorts, sighing and rolling his eyes at the increasingly convoluted and seemingly pointless narrative developments (which play more as digressions, natch). And when Frances McDormand's Linda catches a comedy on a date with a humorless government employee, his stone-faced lack of amusement suggests viewers expecting a more "mature" follow-up to No Country. You might say, then, this a Coen brothers movie for people who love Coen brothers movies, aimed less at folks who Tivo the Oscar ceremony than at the cultists organizing Big Lebowski-themed meet-ups and rewatching Raising Arizona on basic cable for the umpteenth time.

As new territory goes, Burn After Reading is a clever riff on JFK-style conspiracy thrillers, but all their signature touches and concepts are here: desperate people in way over their heads (the film's oft-echoed refrain is "What the fuck?!"), eccentric types congregating in highly specific locations (this time, a chain gym called Harbodies in lieu of a bowling alley), and, above all, Murphy's Law as an omnipotent force of nature.

As in Burn, the narrative momentum in Kim Ki-duk's stunning Time is propelled by an overwhelming sense of you-can't-undo-what's-done anxiety and (incidentally) by a desire for the fresh start promised by major cosmetic surgery. Kim's film centers on Seh-hee, a young woman so jealous of her boyfriend's supposed flirting with other women that she has her face completely surgically altered. From there, things (as in the Coenverse) spin dramatically out of control, as love, sex, fear, and (self-) loathing blur into a nightmare mosaic of modern life.

Kim tosses so much out there idea-wise, and leaves enough of it on the table, tantalizingly unresolved, that Time's lingering effect is ambiguous. In a film defined by the extremes of human nature (if this is ever remade by Hollywood, some game actress just might snag herself an Oscar), the final scene is a harsh stroke of organic poetry. It's also representative of a purposeful formal playfulness that Kim balances deftly with his story's tragic dimensions. The film's most haunting scene, however, comes just before the operation that sets the plot in motion: Seh-hee touches her face--lovingly, wistfully--for the last time before getting a new one, as if she's telling a loved one goodbye for a very long while. For a moment that goes (presumably) someplace most of us have never been before, it feels painfully familiar.

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LAPT/LAPT


Um, did I mention, our baby is, like, so cute it's ridiculous?

How My Heart Behaves


Brief notes on some stuff that I've been meaning to write about.

Feist, live in Victoria, 8/4/08 It's pretty cool that the province and the feds enlisted Leslie Feist to close out the festivities for B.C.'s 150th birthday; her appeal is seemingly as broad as any performer in her price range and her music is inoffensive yet seldom bland. It's cooler still that Miss F. played for a solid, inspired hour-forty when she was slotted for just sixty minutes. Reminder cuts like "I Feel It All" and "Sea Lion" rocked more convincingly than I would've suspected, and with 40,000-plus singing along, her Apple jingle sounded borderline anthemic.

Rihanna, "Disturbia"; Pink, "So What"; Lady GaGa, "Just Dance" So summer '08 lacked a single, unifying monster hit--everybody just opted to attend separate parties, that's all. "Disturbia"'s no "Umbrella," but it's nearly as sleek and well-suited to Rihanna's vocal strengths. (Plus, it's nice to see that she's not gonna pull a Fergie and release every damn track off Good Girl Gone Bad as a single before heading back in the studio.) Likewise, "So What" is precisely the sort of thing Pink should be putting out, at this point in her career. Where her edge and attitude appeared calculated a decade ago, they feel fresh here, a little bit cathartic even, as she's seemed to have grown into that pissed-off, grown-up-all-wrong persona. Best of all is Lady GaGa, whom we may well never hear from again but whose invaluable contribution to Western culture may be helping us transition away from "I Kissed a Fucking Girl." "Just Dance" is generic dance-pop in the best sense. As in, "I love this record, baby, but I can't see straight anymore"--and then you take her advice, whoever the hell she is.

Pineapple Express It's my least favorite product of the Apatow assembly line and my least favorite David Gordon Green movie, but it still has its charms. Chief among them are Seth Rogen and James Franco, who are never less than likable while the same can only sometimes be said of the film in general. It's also fun (at least for a while) to hear Green's signature quirky non-sequitirs delivered as stoner speak rather than awkward poetry. Things get increasingly muddled (and needlessly violent) as this one progresses, though it might've cohered better if I smoked weed.

Drive-by Truckers, Brighter Than Creation's Dark Nineteen songs--not one of them a dud (including the wrongly maligned "Bob"), more than half of them pretty great. "Home Field Advantage" is my favorite, for now. But "That Man I Shot" is close. Ditto "Checkout Time in Vegas" and "I'm Sorry, Huston." Heck, if it weren't for Tha Carter III, this would be my album of the year candidate, thus far.

2008 VMA's First off, congrats to Britney--not just for bagging a few Moonmen, but for seemingly making in-roads toward professional stability. Performance-wise, this was probably the best VMA's in years, especially with regards to Weezy and T-Pain, T.I. and Rihanna ("Numa Numa," seriously?!), even Xtina, who must've remembered that "Genie in a Bottle" was the best song she ever sang, so why not dust it off and mime over a real good remix? Kanye's show closer was on another level entirely--intense and hypnotic and completely game-changing. In fact, it might just be the most exciting thing I've heard all year.

2008 DNC Speaking of rock stars, the Dems' convention was something to get genuinely charged up about, from Ted Kennedy's surprise appearance and Michelle Obama's poignant speech on night one to the Clintons' gracious big-upping of Barack. For his part, the next President of the United States (fingers tightly crossed) answered in compelling fashion the question of whether a politician could pack, and totally work, an NFL stadium. The man's the real deal. (Maybe if the Canadian left had a figure with half his magnetism and immediacy, well-meaning voters up in these parts would actually get mobilized enough to vote Stephen "Bush of the North" Harper out of Ottawa...)

And, finally (if you live outside of British Columbia, feel free to stop reading now), a big nasty thumbs-down to CityTV for axing (or failing to renew the contracts of) Breakfast TV co-hosts Simi Sara and Dave Gerry, the most consistently appealing tube personalities in the Greater Vancouver viewing area. Hopefully, some smarter local network will give them new jobs soon. (If Simi and Dave are willing to cross the Georgia Straight, A-Channel should so get on that! BT live from Broad Street!)

Logan Arthur Paul Timmermann


Was Born on Saturday, August 9th, at 1:44 AM at Victoria General Hospital.

Birth Weight: 8 lbs, 9 oz
Birth Height: 57 cm
Likes: being fed, being held, demonstrating exaggerated hand movmements
Dislikes: bright sunlight, waking up alone, poop in his diaper

Dark Days: Murky Moral Relativity from Guantanamo Bay to Gotham City


When I typed this piece (a couple weeks ago), the name most dominating the news reports here in Canada was that of 21 year-old Omar Khadr, the Toronto-born “boy soldier” accused of killing a U.S. soldier in Afghanistan. Khadr’s return to the headlines, now six years into his stay at Guantanamo Bay, was prompted by newly released video footage of a visiting Canadian official interrogating a sporadically hysterical, then 16 year-old Khadr.

The tapes have re-energized the cries for Khadr’s extradition to Canada on the grounds that he was essentially still a child at the time of the incident in question, that he’s being held in custody as much for his family’s relationship with Osama bin Laden’s as for the grenade he supposedly threw, and that, as a Canadian citizen, he shouldn’t be forced to endure the well-documented rigors of the notorious detention camp. Others argue that Khadr is, regardless of his age and nationality, a war criminal and opponent of Western democracy, who deserves to be dealt with accordingly.

Somewhat surprisingly, the usually right-of-center Canadian daily news-media has mostly advocated the former position, while Primer Minister Stephen Harper, a willful George W. Bush clone, and his minority Conservative Party seem more than content to let Gitmo “justice” run its course. The Khadr case, and its fractious reception, seem especially emblematic of the times we’re living in – an era in which innocence and guilt and such distinctions as “soldier” and “terrorist” are as increasingly blurry as national borders and codes of diplomacy and war-time conduct.

The next-most prominent story of the moment? Why The Dark Knight, of course, which grossed over $155 million in its record-breaking opening weekend and is now on pace to possibly overtake the box-office’s all-time top spot or finish somewhere close. In Christopher Nolan’s second Batman effort, Christian Bale’s Bruce Wayne snores through important shareholders’ meetings and arrives at fundraiser events in a private plane with a trio of supermodel types. In costumed, crime-fighting mode, he taps every cell phone in Gotham City and (presumably) exerts unnecessary force in questioning and coercing the bad guys. And he’s the picture’s hero.

The unsubtle overlap between the extra-legal lengths the Caped Crusader goes to, to save the day, and those of the U.S. government and military in waging their War on Terror, must be chalked up largely to coincidence since the roots of this decidedly darker Batman yarn stretch back nearly 70 years – just before America entered another lengthy “war on terror”. What feels less coincidental is the unflinching emphasis Nolan places on his protagonist’s sometimes dubious ethical decisions. If desperate times indeed call for desperate measures, then things in Gotham are, to be sure, looking direr than ever.

Bale plays Batman as a gruff, growling, all-business military officer – not a General calling the shots from a safe distance away from the battlefield, but the top grunt, who doesn’t have to salute anyone within his realm of contact and who doesn’t take orders well, or at all. More than ever before, you believe that Bruce Wayne does what he does by night solely because he’s a man possessed by bottom-line moral imperatives; when we see that he derives no discernable pleasure or satisfaction from all the sound and fury of his action-packed escapades, and also seems to harbor virtually no interest in fame or glory or flattery by way of imitation, that leaves single-minded determination as the only valid explanation left on the board.

For his part, Heath Ledger’s deservedly lauded take on the Joker, above all, calls particular attention to the near-absence of humor in this biggest of summer blockbusters. Where Jack Nicholson proved a black-comic riot in the same villainous role in Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman, the late Ledger uses the part as a disturbing example of just how soberingly un-funny such a hypothetical super-sociopath would be in something like reality. In one telling scene, a fellow criminal accuses Ledger’s Joker of being crazy. “I’m not…I’m not”, he counters emphatically, without offering any actual evidence to the contrary.

If Nolan’s grim and thrilling film feels eerily in-step with the zeitgeist, it’s no less so than the other best studio release of 2008: the J.J. Abrams-hatched Cloverfield, which eschewed the jam-packed summer season for a January release. Hopefully, it’s not too distant a cultural memory by now, after Iron Man and Indiana Jones and The Incredible Hulk and now The Dark Knight (and, of course, the mountains of hype preceding each).

The “Blair Witch of monster movies”, in fact, might ultimately remain the year’s defining pop-cult statement, once the dust has settled, not least because it’s so many more things besides a faux-verite creature feature. For starters, it’s a minor masterpiece of New Media mastery, from the ingenious, peerless viral marketing campaign to the finished product’s ostensibly amateur video record. The Blair Witch comparison is, at once, spot-on (another essential movie of its time) and altogether too short-sighted, suggesting Cloverfield’s formal inventiveness, but none of the myriad ideas it brings to the table—about premature affluence and America’s distinct brand of arrogance and histories of violence played out both on and off-screen--nor its nasty polemical streak.

Where The Dark Knight searingly captures the troubling moral relativity of a post-9/11 America and world, Cloverfield nails the moment of attack – a mess of bodies alive and dead, the former scrambling in a confused panic across the freshly devastated cityscape. It evokes, at least as effectively and as painfully as Paul Greengrass’s superb United 93, the utter helplessness of the day, that lingering, quasi-apocalyptic sense that the wisest thing to do (maybe the only thing to do, in the frenzied moment) would just be to run and hide – in a corner shop or subway tunnel or department store, which is exactly what Cloverfield’s band of young urban professionals opts to do.

What both of these films lack is developed characterizations and evidence of hearts beating beneath their stylized surfaces. As strong as the performances are across the board in The Dark Knight, there’s hardly a likeable character on screen, save maybe those played by Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine (who don’t really count since they’re likeable in everything). Cloverfield’s solipsistic, privileged sub-“Mumblecore” twentysomethings are less sympathetic yet. Subsequently, the most impressive trick both films pull off is that, almost in spite of themselves, they are finally quite moving, haunting even as collections of indelible images, cold spaces, and colder souls in serious peril.

The same can effectively be said of the interrogation footage of Khadr, who is inevitably sympathetic, despite the brutality of his accused crimes. He is, by turns, eager to cooperate with his questioner, who tempts Omar with sandwiches from McDonald’s and Subway, and emotionally raw, calling out for his mother and removing his shirt to clearly display what he alleges is proof of physical mistreatment by his Guantanamo captors. Skeptics counter that the latter actions were, at least in part, calculated moves to drum up support on Khadr’s part -- and they might not be wrong.

Either way, his behavior is unmistakably that of an overwhelmed boy, and – let’s face it – six years spent in a military prison isn’t likely to have produced a mature, well-adjusted 21 year-old young adult. Still, to let Khadr off the hook on the grounds that he’s just a confused, impressionable kid or unfortunate product of his environment would be far too simple-minded. And if these times are anything, they’re certainly not simple, as evidenced by both the news reports and (remarkably) the multiplex. The brightest hope in these dark days might just be that it’s an election year in Gotham.

No Country for Old Mennonites


After catching Silent Light earlier this week at Cinecenta, it's not hard to see why Carlos Reygadas's third feature has been since such a magnet for extravagant, near-universal critical praise since it debuted at Cannes last year. Not only is it a powerful, exquisitely realized drama, it's also chock-full of purposeful allusions to some of cinema's most significant (and critically worshipped) figures. Dreyer's magnificent Ordet is the most direct and obvious point of reference, but there's also healthy doses of Bergman's spiritual turmoil, Tarkovsky's glacial pacing, Ozu's intuitive handling of family dynamics, Malick's ethereal eye toward nature, and--as a sort of Breaking the Waves in reverse--Von Trier's stone-faced, uneasy combination of religion with sex (specifically adultery) in the mix here.

But what's most remarkable about Silent Light is that, despite Reygadas' clear mastery of transcendental film language, his film feels neither studied nor stiff. Instead, it's impressively graceful under the weight of the spiritual/social ideas that Reygadas is deftly attempting to juggle; and, more impressive yet, its power stems from a slow build of real, palpable human feeling--of guilt, of fleeting pleasures, of fidelity, of, above all, profound ambivalence.

The film's protagonist, Johan, a Mennonite farmer living in Mexico with his large family and engaging in an affair that his wife seemingly accepts, is urgently at odds with his conscience, and with his faith, from the film's first scene: after his sons and daughters have left the breakfast table, he drops the stoic patriarch front, weeping and swearing to his wife, Esther, that he loves her. "I know...and I love you, too," she responds, her tone marked, too, with regret and a discernible sense of inner conflict.

From there, Reygadas plunges us deep into the hearts and minds of these "simple" people grappling with issues that are, of course, anything but. Johan's father relates that, some years ago, he also developed feelings for another woman, promises that he and Johan's mother will support him no matter what his decisions, and, finally, confides that while wouldn't necessarily like to trade shoes with his son, he's nevertheless a bit envious. Marianne, Johan's lover, can't continue playing the role of the "other woman," as she informs him after one particularly passionate meeting. Johan suspects, or at least wants to believe, that his attraction to Marianne may be part of some higher plan, while recognizing that Esther is a very good wife, mother, and soap-maker.

In perhaps the film's ultimate mark of ambivalence, Johan's soul-searching is played out against the lush forests and shimmering fields that he depends on for his livelihood. Silent Light is composed largely as a series of visual, thematic, and semiotic rhymes--including the spectacular opening shot of a sunrise and its natural opposite as the denouement--suggesting a deliberate order to the universe that its characters would most certainly affirm. Reygadas, like most of the Great Names mentioned earlier, doesn't seem quite so sure. His faith is in cinema, which is exactly where it should be.

The Last Time I Freaked Out


On Miley Cyrus's Breakout.

Days of Being Wild


Paranoid Park is the best movie Gus Van Sant's ever made--and by a pretty comfortable distance, at that. I offer this assessment as something less than a fervent Van Sant fan: I can admire Elephant with considerable reservations and without necessarily liking it; more or less detest Last Days, which trades on complex, culturally and personally loaded memories of Kurt Cobain for empty fashion ad martyrdom; couldn't manage to stay awake through two tries at Gerry; only half-buy the spirited defenses I've read of his shot-for-shot Psycho remake (which, regardless, I'd be more than happy to never sit through again, thank you very much); and let's not even bother discussing Finding Good Will Forrester, 'kay? Drugstore Cowboy and My Own Private Idaho, though, represent the Sundance school of Amerindie filmmaking at its most estimable, and prior to now, I'd happily cite the acidic, inexhaustible To Die For as my favorite Van Sant flick.

I should add, too, that--aside from his regrettable detour into the middlebrow wasteland around the close of the last century--I'd be hard-pressed to accuse any Van Sant work of being less than interesting and ambitious; they've just tended to leave me with as many caveats as compliments to offer once the credits start to roll. Paranoid Park combines everything Van Sant's done right technically since ditching the crappy Oscar bait back in '02, with the real emotional resonance and strong characterizations of his early work (virtues his Kubrick/Tarr homages of late have sorely lacked). It's a work of bold formal expression and tremendous lyrical beauty that feels organically achieved where Elephant felt stiff and studied, graceful where Last Days just registered as lifeless.

Critics who've name-checked Bresson aren't off the mark either; from the "doubling" effect of narrating an event via voice-over and later actually showing it occur, which Van Sant skillfully employs several times here, to the loneliness and solitary guilt of the story's central character, Paranoid Park could credibly be re-titled Diary of an Urban Skater Kid. And as a skater kid who grew up into a Bresson buff, this film is all the more compelling. Elephant, I felt, basically failed as an honest study of youth culture, due mostly to Van Sant's artsy photo shoot calculations and over-fetishization of skinny, shaggy-haired teenagers. Paranoid Park also lingers long and hard at lithe, limber frames and delicate features but--thanks in large part to master DP Christopher Doyle--this approach feels more wistful than voyeuristic here. (It also doesn't hurt that Van Sant and his uniformly strong cast endow these characters with genuine, distinct personalities, rather than just coaching them to hold pouty expressions and sulk stylishly through pristine wide-angled compositions.)

The skateboarding sequences are hypnotic, forging a sort of physical poetry out of the convergence of concrete, metal, wood, and bodies that won't always be able to endure rough falls and scrapes so easily. The latter fact ties closely into Van Sant's relentless pursuit of ephemeral pleasures and pains, a preoccupation that achieves its haunting apotheosis with Paranoid Park. Like Atom Egoyan's best films, Exotica and The Sweet Hereafter, Van Sant's masterpiece centers ostensibly on a tragic event so disturbing for those involved that it can only be approached--and eventually realized on-screen--elliptically. It's a structural device that's akin to a kind of cinematic circumnavigation, mirroring the way memory works when it comes to serious trauma, and unlike, say, Pulp Fiction and Memento, it's functionally absent of cheap gimmickry.

The key difference between Paranoid Park and Egoyan's films is that the narrative sequencing in the latter pair seems determined by some silent but all-knowing author, while in Van Sant's, it feels disquietingly confessional, inching us ever closer to not just the scene of the crime but the increasingly troubled psyche of our young protagonist. The unexpected denouement, consisting of video footage of skateboarding tricks, might as well have been copped from some good skate tape, yet in the context of what's preceded, it suggests the possibility of release or redemption or at least defiant perseverance, without guaranteeing anything save for its own singular excellence.

If Van Sant and longtime Wong Kar-wai collaborator Doyle get just about everything right with Paranoid Park, Wong, working entirely apart from Doyle for the first time in his feature filmography, gets just about everything wrong in My Blueberry Nights. While this is almost certainly no coincidence, especially where Blueberry's awful camerawork is concerned, even Doyle's superlative lensing couldn't have saved this legitimately awful film.

Teresa already did a fine job trashing it, but I think I may have liked it even less than she did. The "America" that Wong stumbles across here bares only the vaguest resemblance to any place I've ever visited, which isn't a dis and could've potentially been a fascinating element at work here, but the whole thing is just so muddled and ungainly that this alien quality proves particularly off-putting, and at times, even insulting. Wong's caricatures of restless American souls are as dubiously under-developed as, say, the Tokyo locals in Lost in Translation, except that in My Blueberry Nights, they're all there is to focus on, from Natalie Portman's clingy card shark (a cross between Mae West, Jodie Foster in Maverick, and, uh, Natalie Portman in Closer) to Rachel Weisz's would-be femme fatale with a wretched fake Southern accent to Norah Jones' staggeringly boring heroine.

Trust me, I'd have jumped for joy (and breathed a sigh of relief) had Tony Leung and Maggie Cheung suddenly appeared in lieu of Jones and a no less out-of-place Jude Law, and had Wong's America subsequently receded to the role of picturesque back-drop (ala Argentina in the immeasurably superior Happy Together). Instead, the best we get is David Strathairn bending over backwards to minimize the awkwardness and embarrassment that inevitably comes with such putrid scripting and paper-thin characterizations. He's good in everything, though--like Steve Buscemi. Think: Con-Air. Then, skip this turd and re-watch In the Mood for Love. Or Paranoid Park.

The Words Are Gonna Come Out Slow


Loved the folk move lots; love the 'love songs' best, natch. This, at any rate, is just plain lovely.

Too bad we couldn't make it over to Brooklyn tonight. Oh, well: late to the party, as usual--except, in this instance, three time zones.

Even Gwen Stefani Said She Couldn't Doubt Me


Brief notes, solid-to-exceptional singles, some new, some not-so-new:

01. Lil Wayne, "A Milli" Some hundred-plus spins in, this sounds increasingly like it might be the high point of Tha Carter III proper. It might also be the single of the year, and, most tellingly, it might be the Single Of The Year in that decidedly rarer, formally reinvigorating sense that those early '00's Missy/Timbo smashes were. It's gibberish gone genius--or vice versa--delivered over a beat so sick-thick that Wayne could be rapping about menstrual bleeds and loose bowels and it would still split your earbuds like nobody's business. Oh wait--Wayne is rapping about menstrual bleeds and loose bowels...and, yep--quick reminder, Wayniacs-- Carter III's the first long-player to sell a milli in its opening sales week since 50's sophomore set.

02. T.I., "No Matter What" T.I. is so damned good at sounding simultaneously wistful and triumphant, rendering his upward mobility yarns poignant where other rappers' rags-to-Benzes narratives feel merely boastful and ring more or less hollow. This is one of his best such tracks yet--a promising marker for the upcoming Paper Trail.

03. Estelle, "No Substitute Love" It's not just summer, but a summer in which music headlines have been momentarily dominated by news of George Michael's North American farewell tour-cum-belated comeback. Which is just plain good timing for this deserving hit, which would sound every bit as nice if it were November and George Michael had opted to stay in England.

04. Hercules & Love Affair, "Blind" Why, three years ago, didn't Antony 'I am a Bird Now' Hegarty's blog-pop disco diva move seem inevitable? Maybe because the closest thing to a "dance" track he'd heretofore contributed to was a CocoRosie song that was decidedly more blog than pop. This one shimmers.

05. Nas, "Hero" This is forceful, cinematic rap music executed impeccably--not Illmatic good, natch, but really as high quality a product as we have any right to expect from Nas in 2008.

06. Kerli, "Walking on Air" Teresa turns up her nose to this Estonian goth-pop up-and-comer; I'm intrigued. But I also like Amy Evanescence, who, appearances aside, Kerli (where's Larry and Moe? Sorry.) reminds me less of than, say, fellow East-European provocateurs T.a.t.u. Or, hell, some of those J-Pop idols Teresa likes so much. That is to say, she's bringing the Otherness--some stuff we aren't getting, or aren't getting enough of, or maybe just aren't getting from reliable enough sources. Either way, if this contributes in some way to Katy Perry being over, I'm even more for it.

07. Taylor Swift - "Teardrops on My Guitar" If it lacks the unstoppable ebullience of "Our Song" and the real intimacy and tossed-off poetry of "Tim McGraw," it nevertheless demonstrates that Swift is still worth keeping an ear out for even when she's not rewriting the New Country playbook. A major talent working minor is preferable to plenty of things, including, usually, that same equation assembled the other way around.

08. Leona Lewis - "Bleeding Love" This is old news by now, granted, but it's a grower, for me. Initially, I was rubbed wrong by the blatant Early Mariah/Wanna-Be Alicia histrionics, but this one gets by on beat and on a sincerity that feels less feigned than it might have--given the generic drama of the material--if Lewis wasn't, in fact, some sort of legit talent. It's no "No One"--not by a long stretch--but beat and sure-footed sincerity are enough for me, and glancing at Lewis's Trans-Atlantic sales figures, it's clearly more than enough for people who still pay for music.

09. Lloyd f/ Lil Wayne - "Girls Around the World" This would be wholly pleasant yet wholly forgettable hot weather fare if not for--surprise, surprise, right?--Mr. Weezy F. Baby, who uses his guest verse to pay homage to "Paid in Full," unsubtly advancing the case for his name's mention alongside Rakim's.

10. Kid Rock - "All Summer Long" Following Nickelback's "Rock Star" last year, this is my big guilty pleasure of '08. I don't like Kid Rock, and--having grown up in a small Southern Illinois town under the mistaken impression that it's nestled somewhere in the Deep South--I'd be perfectly content to never hear "Sweet Home Alabama" or "Freebird" again in my life. And yet...I sort of can't help but sing and nod along when it comes on. Teresa noted a little while back that George Bush would be a pretty amusing buffoon if he wasn't in a position to, say, start wars and deny basic rights. That's sort of where this one's guilty appeal lies (if that makes any sense at all).

Infinity and Beyond (Almost)


The first half or so of WALL*E is utterly superlative, more stunning in its images and more resonant in its ideas than anything Pixar (or any other contemporary animator, for that matter) has previously put to celluloid. Its almost total lack of dialogue and loose, leisurely pace are daringly achieved. Its vision of a lonely "waste allocater" robot patrolling the deserted cityscape of a planet carbon-emitted and big-boxed to near-death is haunting and indelible. Its seamless, rapid-fire nods toward cinema history--from City Lights to 2001 to E.T. to I Am Legend--are legitimately moving, as if our mechanical protagonist and the filmmakers are simultaneously attempting to salvage the profundities and curiosities forged from mankind's moment in the sun.

Had director Andrew Stanton and Co. managed to sustain such brilliance over the course of the film's 98-minute runtime, this would probably be the movie of the year--which, sorry Pixar diehards, it isn't.

Instead, the film's second half (from WALL*E boarding the Death Star-cum-Carnival Cruise spaceship Axiom on) is merely fine and occassionally dazzling (see: the fire-extinguisher-aided, gravity-free dance sequence). The environmental message--delivered with effective grace in the first half--is hammered home too heavy-handedly for those of us past pre-school, while the by-the-numbers narrative that ensues says nothing particularly new from what the superior earlier stretch had already suggested much more poignantly. Which leaves the film as a whole feeling like slightly less than the sum of its parts.

This is understandable, of course, since this is still finally a family film we're talking about--that's still the business that Pixar is in, critical hosannas or no. It's a format that aims to please not just Mom and Dad and cranky Uncle Cinephile, but also (especially) the little tykes, who, in our screening, were beginning to look and sound just a little restless by about the half-hour mark. (Guess they weren't that wowed by those witty Kubrick homages.) As a compromise between ambitious art and popcorn entertainment, WALL*E is as thorough and admirable a success as its box-office receipts and Rotten Tomatoes tally would together indicate.

Perhaps it's too much to wish that it was as good as it might've been.