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“Every good novel requires a treason of sorts to be appreciated. We must abandon that which we know enter into a strange land that somehow resonates. We must go where the writer leads us and we do so willingly, we burn our flag, so hungry to be transported are we.” — -
To the Wonder is an ode to that wonder. It’s a film for people who will never tire of watching blades of grass wave against the sun. It’s for those of us who doubt and still strive to have faith in something. It’s for those of us who might still believe in a truth. It’s for those of us who lie in beds in motel rooms on the sides of highways, wondering what it means to want to wed yourself, to weld yourself to something beautiful, forever.
Anisse Gross writes an ode to the wonder that is Terrence Malick’s To The Wonder. Under discussion: cockroaches, weddings, twirling, Javier Bardem.
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The Rumpus Review Of Trance by Tom Meek
Like all of Boyle’s films, it’s handsome to behold, driven by a heavy blue composition that radiates with a noir-ish ambiance, but at its core, Trance feels a bit like forced sleight of hand, where the audience can see behind the curtain yet still appreciates the showmanship of a master who may have played on too long.
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BOYFRIENDS: SLACKS BY SHELAGH POWER-CHOPRA AND KARA JANSSON
I met Slacks at film school. He was a visiting professor from Hamburg who hung around the halls smoking his pipe and talking theory to the girls. After lectures, he’d sunbathe shirtless in the quad while reviewing student scripts; a red pencil in one hand, the other rubbing his polyester slacks. I have no empathy for character, he’d tell us students, running his hands through his wiry, red hair, sentiment’s lost on me. I had a bit part in one his films, Stages, he called it and I played “Adolescence”. I lay on a Chenille bedspread swearing at a haggard mother character chain-smoking in the corner. When he read my poetry, he said girls my age shouldn’t write about lust: It’s just ugly love rustling on the bottom, Liebesgetränk, he called it,love poison. After that he proposed a drive and we went to Twin Peaks in his old Pacer and he kissed my knees in the fog.
Breaking Point: His wife in Hamburg and his increasingly dull films.
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“This section stands out because of Gosling, of course. He does his Gosling thing—the brooding, the easy charm, the torso—but he manages, in his minimalist way, to give Luke nuances that are almost too good for such a sloppily written film… We think of him as the coolest guy in any movie, but he’s still willing to exploit the essential strangeness he first showed playing a sociopath in the otherwise forgettable Sandra Bullock thriller Murder By Numbers. The script of Pines is not his equal.” -
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“I think that film at large has this intensely versatile index of visual cues and techniques that can’t be overestimated as an asset to writers of fiction. The two mediums have a tremendous amount in common, which you see not only in the contemporary work of someone like Jonathan Lethem, but also in books that were written pre-cinema, like Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, for instance. For my money, that scene early in the novel where Victor catches sight of the monster illuminated, briefly, by the lightning encircling the Alps, is one of the most cinematic pre-cinematic scenes in literary history. If it’s even possible to say something like that.” -
In the end Spring Breakers is much like having sex with a praying mantis—an experience that seduces at first then spits you out headless, and thus brainless. Which is not to say that the film is dumb, but rather that it’s mind-numbing. It’s a testament to the fact that we’re easily seduced by bright lights and hypnotic base lines.
-Anisse Gross pondering Harmony Korine’s smorgasbord of neon, flesh, and James Franco’s Floridian drawl in Reelings #4: Spring Breakers. -
Contributor Yuvi Zalkow was so inspired by his recent interview with Thaisa Frank, he made a fantastic little short about it. We’re always happy to see art beget art, and we couldn’t be more thrilled about this.
Watch Yuvi’s film “The Failure of the Intended Story” (#3 in his “Scribbling Bucket” series)!
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“Refusing to learn how to pronounce Quvenzhané’s name says, pointedly, you are not worth the effort. The problem is not that she has an unpronounceable name, because she doesn’t. The problem is that white Hollywood, from Ryan Seacrest and his homies to the AP reporter who decided to call her “Annie” rather than her real name, doesn’t deem her as important as, say, Renee Zellwegger, or Zach Galifinakis, or Arnold Schwarzenegger, all of whom have names that are difficult to pronounce–but they manage. The message sent is this: you, young, black, female child, are not worth the time and energy it will take me to learn to spell and pronounce your name. You will be who and what I want you to be; you be be who and what makes me more comfortable. I will allow you to exist and acknowledge that existence, but only on my terms.” —Brokey McPoverty, “What’s In A Name? Kind Of A Lot,” PostBourgie 2/26/13 (via racialicious)
One of my elementary school friends at PS8 in Brooklyn was named Olaboomi, but she liked to go by Boomi. Our 2nd grade teacher said she “couldn’t pronounce” Boomi and would call Boomi Elizabeth instead. I remember thinking she must be the stupidest person in the world. I told her “Boo like what a ghost says and Me like what you can yourself” but it didn’t seem to help. I didn’t think I was standing up for equality or anything, I just thought I could help this idiot woman learn to pronounce words. This article just reminded me to be retroactively appalled.
(via rachelfershleiser)
(via rachelfershleiser)
