I Love Movies and Here's Why

I normally pride myself on being an even tempered and exceedingly rational person.  That said, graduating college a few months ago kicked up a bunch on emotions for me both positive and negative.  Feeling all these mixed emotions really threw me for a loop as I am so used to wandering the Earth with a rather mellow and unaffected state of mind.  In fact, so confident I was in my unwavering emotional stability that I thought I'd graduate college angst free and painlessly transition into a productive adulthood.  But that was not to be the case.  Instead I have experienced the whole gamut of emotions post graduating.  From a sense of accomplishment and elation at having finally finished my stint as an undergrad to a sense of aimlessness and hopelessness after having lost the identity I lived with for the past few years, I have cycled through a dozen or so various mental states since this past May.

And now don't get me wrong, I'm not necessarily complaining.  I feel like the media loves to portray the post grad experience as one of angst plied on top of angst, but I haven't necessarily felt this way.  No, no, my experience has been more comprised of highs and lows.  In the high points I feel a sense of freedom and possibility that I never had when I was still toiling away in the confined hallways of academia.  The lows come from a sense of directionless.  While the promise of freedom is great, I can't help but sometimes feel overwhelmed by the sheer number of options and opportunities out there.  And truthfully I am often frustrated that there are so many opportunities out there and yet I'm still rotting away in the dungeon known as suburban America.  I often feel like Luke in A New Hope, wistfully watching the two suns set over Tatooine as the rest of the galaxy passes me by.  Now I know it is childish to think that everyone else in the world is out having a blast whilst I'm stuck rotting away in the hills of PA, but it's how I feel sometimes, y'know?

So with that last paragraph taken into account, it will surprise no one when I say that one of the things I have struggled with the most post-college is fighting that overwhelming and crushing sense of boredom that comes from having a lot of energy and no idea of what I should be funneling this energy into.  There is one thing that I have found that can sooth this chronic existential boredom that I feel on a daily basis and this magical cure all is film.  My friend El Lobo (whom has been a great resource and sounding board for me as I've attempted to navigate through the emotional minefield of post-graduate life), recently wrote a post about how Madonna songs have helped him to experience a sense of joy and pure happiness.  Well, I know what he means, but my personal media drug of choice is more The Texas Chainsaw Massacre than "Like A Virgin".

Movies mean a lot of things to me beyond mere entertainment.  One of the purposes the medium has taken on in my life recently is that of a wonderful escape from the blandness that surrounds me and exacerbates my crushing sense of boredom.  But "escape" isn't really the right word as I feel like a good movie doesn't let me escape my feelings and senses, but rather heightens them.  I look to film for a glimpse of situations, characters, and images that make me open my eyes and expand my imagination. For example, I love movies like Tokyo Gore Police, The Machine Girl, and Meatball Machine, not just because these three films happen to posses exquisite senses of humor (though they do each contain a truly unique blend of satire, slapstick, and black comedy that makes me laugh every time), but because beyond their humor they exhibit genuine flashes of true imaginative genius and creativity.  No really, as weird as it may sound I feel like a better person for having watched these Japanese splatter flicks as they each contain images that blew my mind open and alerted me to how truly wild and wonderfully unhinged the human imagination could be.  Over a year ago I wrote a post on my blog about an uber-bloody and weird Japanese short film, Meatball Machine: Reject of Death.  In this post I called watching the short a "transcendent" experience and I totally and unironically believe in that idea.  Watching a movie that shows you something you could have never possibly seen or even mentally conceived of prior to a viewing is a truly life-altering experience.  When you experience something like this you are basically taking a stroll through someone else's imagination, and what form of human communication could be more moving and life-enriching than this?

I have only touched upon all of the stuff that I wanted to cover in this post, but I'm tired and have written enough for the night.  I want to continue expanding upon the ideas I began to form in this post in future writings on this blog, so stay tuned if this kind of stuff appeals to you.  But for now...I'm out.

I'm Back in the Game

I don't remember when and I don't really even remember why, but some time ago I told my friend El Lobo that I would abandon my Zombie Baby Nursery blog and move on to greener pastures.  Okay I lied.  I'm back.  The truth is that I just hated to see something I sunk so much time into rot away all abandoned and alone.  I hated to watch my people suffer and die while I discussed this invasion in a committee (did I just reference The Phantom Menace?...yuck).

The Scar of Remembrance!!

So here's what's going on right now: I still totally want to keep my blog up and running because it is a fun outlet for me and a great way to communicate and stay in touch with my friend Juan del Lobo.  But you know how back in the day I would structure posts so that I was writing about a particular topic or theme (example, one post might be a review of a specific movie or another might be about my favorite movies of the previous year)?  Yeah, well, I'm throwing all that shit out the window and instead I'm going to focus on just writing for the sake of it and to have fun.  Way back when when I started this blog I harbored faint dreams of it achieving an audience, however small and cultish that potential audience might have been.  I'm pretty much over that now, to be totally honest.  Now, I just want to sit and write whatever happens to pour out of my brain.  I want to throw word vomit up onto the wall and see what sticks (and what slowly slides off onto the floor).

What changed my approach?  Well, as a recently minted adult I have become more particular about my online image, but I still wanted to have my own little Internet corner where I could kick off my shoes and have fun and just do write whatever without having to worry about proofreading or how my stuff sounds, or whatever.  I wanted a virtual pasture where I could frolic among nature and shit like that.

So here I am.

Star Wars: The Manga

Over the weekend I had the pleasure of revisiting the four part manga series retelling the story of Star Wars: A New Hope.  While the manga was originally published in 1998, I first discovered the series around the mid-2000's when I was still a snot-nosed teen.  The premise of the series alone was enough to pique my interest.  After all, Star Wars and manga are both staples of geek culture and to put the two together seemed like a perfect blend of ingredients (a la peanut butter and chocolate).

And to be fair, a lot of the lasting appeal you'll get from reading the Star Wars manga comes simply from seeing such beloved characters as Han, Luke, and Threepio represented in a whole new light.  Sure, the Star Wars manga sticks pretty closely to the film's original script and doesn't provide the reader with any new story material.  But, c'mon it's anime Princess Leia!  And while one would expect the novelty of the series to wear thin pretty fast, it actually never feels stale or tired.  Part of the credit for this has to go to the artist Hisao Tamaki.  While I am completely unfamiliar with the artist's work outside of this Star Wars adaptation, here he does a commendable job both with capturing the characters and environments of the Star Wars universe, but also with lending a sense of movement and life to the imagery of the comic.  The latter is where the book really shines.  Since it's an adaptation of a special effects and action heavy film, it is essential that the climactic scenes of the film are represented here with the same sense of excitement and movement that they had in their original presentation.  Thankfully the book's artist and editors were up to the task of adaptation, and the story's action sequences retain their fluidity and excitement in the transition from screen to page.

The strongest volume in the series would have to be #3, in which the duel between Darth Vader and Obi-Wan is given spectacular treatment.  Vader's character design makes the transition to manga surprisingly well, and he has never looked more badass and imposing than he does here between the pages of the Star Wars manga.  The showdown between Vader and Obi-Wan also seems to have drawn some inspiration from samurai lore (an inspiration that works to wonderful effect).

If I had to add a caveat to my recommendation of this title it would have to be that this is a book for a very niche market.  And if you have to ask whether or not you're in that niche market, then chances are these really aren't the books for you.  The only other aspect of this book that makes me slightly hesitant to recommend it would be the fact that the book's contents were "flipped" for its American audience.  Meaning that the book publisher assumed that Americans would be resistant to reading the book right to left in the Japanese fashion, so they created a mirror image of the original artwork.  Unfortunately in this case this means that images from the film are reversed (ex- if Threepio was on the left in a scene in the film he would now appear on the right).  From a purist's standpoint this is a significant faux pas on the part of the publisher.

If you can handle the minor flaws that I just mentioned, by all means give this one a shot.  If nothing else it makes for a great curiosity piece for Star Wars enthusiasts.

Japanese Movies in the Year 2012

In my friend El Lobo's post on New Year's Resolutions back in January he mentioned wanting to watch more weird Japanese films.  I myself had already decided to embark upon a quest this year to watch an absurd amount of movies (read about that here) before El Lobo posted his New Year's thing, but I still found something worth emulating in his suggestion.  So heeding the advice (well, I was not technically "advised", but I took it that way), I made a decision awhile back to watch more Japanese movies this year.  Unlike Juan I am not limiting myself to the "weird" variety of Japanese film, but I'm not going to stay away from the offbeat stuff either.  OK, so truthfully most of my Japanese film consumption for this year has been of movies of the bloody/campy/horrific variety, but I wouldn't necessarily turn down an Asian rom-com if it crossed my path.  Get it?

So far my quest has led me to discover some true gems.  I've already talked about my experience with the 1990's horror film Splatter: Naked Blood a few posts back, but some other notable Japanese films I've watched this year would include Horrors of Malformed Men, an exquisite cult film from the 1960's that was banned in its native country, and Jigoku, a classic Japanese horror film about Hell and those who suffer in it.  There are more movies I could highlight of course, but I am sensing that such a list would be best left to a separate and longer blog post.  Seeing that my last few posts have been a bit bloated I'm trying to keep things brief tonight so I'll save that content for another day.

Horrors of Malformed Men

So perhaps then it's best that I end this post from a clip of a Japanese film that I watched recently, Takashi Miike's Dead or Alive.  Dead or Alive is essentially a yakuza film taken to absurdest heights and jam-packed with shock value and black comedy.  When I watched the movie the other day I was particularly floored by its opening sequence.  Seriously, that's how you grab a viewer's attention!  Watch what I'm talking about here.

Overexposure: Three Things That Have Grown Tiresome

Okay, so I would consider myself to be a pretty positive person and I generally think that the content of this blog reflects this worldview.  That said, I do go on petty rants once in awhile (as evidenced by posts such as this one and that one).  So as you could probably guess I have decided to eschew rationality and fairness  tonight in favor of a good old-fashioned Internet bitch fest in which I complain about things that I am really in no way whatsoever qualified to have an opinion about.  And the objects of my ire tonight are any pop cultural objects which I personally deem to be overexposed.  This is the stuff that might have had some value at one point, but has simply sat in the limelight for so long that it has lost its novelty and its ability to thrill.  There's a lot of stuff out there that could fall into this category, but I've narrowed it down to three things (some of which I used to love, some that I've always had a distaste for).  Join me in counting down the tedium of these expired artifacts:

1.  Zombie Related Humor: There was a point in time when I devoured anything zombie related.  Hell, this blog's very name stems from my zombie-philia.  So you can know for certain that when I say that I'm sick of zombie related media and merch that zombie stuff has truly oversaturated the marketplace.  And is there anything out there that has become more stale and uninspired than the zombie comedy?  Whether it's in film, print, or on the vast plane of crap known as the Internet, the zombie comedy has definitely run its course.  I think that the year 2009 was the last time that I had any interest in consuming any new "comedic" zombie stories. For me it was Pride and Prejudice and Zombies that was the last straw.  I was so totally behind that book just from the title alone when I heard about it on a zombie related podcast that I was listening to at the time (yes, I used to listen to 2+ hours of zombie talk a week, that's how into the genre I used to be), but when I read it I was disappointed.  The book read like a sloppily written cash grab (which is what it was) and the disappointment I experienced while reading it turned me into the humorless and cynical husk of a human being that I am today.  Okay so I exaggerate, but my point is still clear.  There have been so many shitty contemporary zombie comedies attempting to capitalize on the current interest in zombie fiction that I have become burned by the subgenre.  Sure I'll treasure Dead Alive to my dying day, but right now I'm ready to move on.  It's time for the genre to go into hibernation, only to be dug up again when enough distance has been placed between the public at large and crimes like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

2.  The Hunger Games: Alright.  Where do I even start on this one?  I am fully aware that as someone who has never read and/or seen The Hunger Games that I really have no place to be talking about it.  And I'd totally be cool with just leaving well enough alone and letting the tweens have their fun.  And yet the media is so oversaturated with Hunger Games crap right now that I have been drawn into talking about it against my will.  I think what bothers me the most about all the Hunger Games hype is that it's really just another symptom of America's obsession with the young.  Seriously, how else can you explain the fact that the hit media property at the moment in America is something that was written for 12-year olds (and whose central characters are primarily children or teenagers)?  It's cool if you're a kid who is into this stuff, but it kind freaks me out to watch adults obsess over things like this.  The Hunger Games film is 2 hours and 22 minutes.  In that time you could watch Citizen Kane and still have over twenty minutes to spare.  Actually there's a whole lot that you could do with those 2+ hours that would be a more fruitful use of your time as a full-grown human being.  And I hate to be the stereotypical nerd, but Battle Royale totally did this first and it's inevitably better than this Primrose Everdeen shit.  Now again I don't want to seem overly venomous against the property in and of itself (I've never read or watched it after all), I just want the media at large to stop bombarding the marketplace with Hunger Games hype.

3.  "Nerd" culture/pride: This one might seem weird.  First off, it's the most abstract of my three grievances.  Second off, I myself am rather geeky in the capacity that (a) I adore Star Wars and (b) I'm actually dorky enough to blog regularly about books and movies and the like.  But this is one (like zom-coms) that I actually like in small doses, but has grown tiresome and overexposed.  Since it's gotten to the point that people like Megan Fox are declaring themselves to be nerds, I think we can safely say that the term has become distorted and virtually devoid of meaning.  Therefore I have a problem with people calling themselves "nerds" simply because I find it to be an empty and incredibly unproductive term.  After all we live in a media saturated environment so it makes sense that most people would be enthralled by storytelling of some kind.  And as I stated in my last post, the Internet has made it incredibly easy for people with niche interests to follow their passions.  So basically its easier than ever to be obsessively interested in the minutia of a media property or segment of culture, so of course we're all nerds nowadays!  Therefore it is no longer really informative to describe yourself as a nerd.  Let's all move on.

Whew.  Glad I got all that off my chest.  Next time around will surely be a post detailing my favorite things, such as snowflakes that stay on my nose and eyelashes and Japanese films that involve auto-cannibalism.

Hooray for the Modern Age!

What's up, my friends?  Today's post has been a long time coming.  Not for any good reason, mind you.  It's not that this post took a long time for me to crank out because it's some kind of masterpiece, but rather because I've been lazy and occupied with other things.  C'est la vie.  Anyway, today I was thinking about writing a response to my good friend Juan del Lobo's old post about the Victorian Age.  I had been wanting to post a rebuttal for a while now, but I was too lazy to do so.  But here I am now.

It should be no surprise to people who know me that I (respectfully) disagree with El Lobo's viewpoints.  I honestly believe that there has never been a better a time to be alive than the here and now.  I could explain my viewpoint by citing benefits of the modern age such as advanced scientific knowledge or civil rights, but since this is a pop culture blog first and foremost I'd like to make my case that there has never before been a time when it was easier or more pleasurable to pursue one's geeky passions to the nth degree.  And yes, this is a good thing.

The Internet has clearly been instrumental in breaking down the barriers that previously prevented people from achieving geeky bliss.  I remember as a child in the nineties dreaming of the far off day when I could watch the original Gojira in its original uncut Japanese-language glory.  Actually at that time the idea of watching any Godzilla film subtitled in its original language seemed pretty far off (granted I was 11 at the time and lacked imagination, but still) and now you can pick up both the Japanese and American cuts of the film on DVD in one package.  I bring up this story not to simply illustrate the joys of being a Godzilla fan in the 2000's and beyond, but as a symbol of how accessible the Internet has made various forms of culture.  With the vast information available on the Internet it has now become easier than ever to immerse oneself in whatever niche catches one's fancy.  Now that a plethora of music, videos, texts, and lectures have become available on the Web, the only real excuse for long term intellectual boredom is an inability to access a computer.

Some might argue that the our access to this unprecedented crap-load of media goodness can be paralyzing.  The consumer, they might argue, becomes overwhelmed by the sheer amount of choices on display and simply shuts down.  While I agree that this can be an issue, and while I have previously grappled with the idea of "wasting time on the Internet" (see my last post for more on this), I ultimately believe that the vast quantity of choices available to the modern geek is a good thing as it allows him/her to be exposed to a greater quantity of stuff, thereby increasing the likelihood that they are exposed to really niche stuff that they love, but wouldn't have otherwise discovered through a more limited or conventional media diet.  Another example from my life: when I first got Netflix I would paw through the DVD listings at random and add stuff to my queue that simply sounded cool.  Sure, such a method increases my likelihood of being exposed to irredeemable cinematic shit, but it also simultaneously means that I have a greater chance of finding that diamond in the rough.  As it happened I was able to use this method to discover the awesome Japanese zombie comedy Wild Zero as well as some "so bad they're good" gems such as The Apple and Blood Freak.  Now I'm not saying I couldn't have made these discoveries outside of the Internet, online retailers do have an undeniable advantage in that they can simply carry a bigger stock than the brick and mortar stores of yore (I wrote about this on my Tumblr awhile back).

Oh, and one last thing that we have that the Victorians did not is TAB.  You of all people Juan should appreciate the significance of this.

Guilty Pleasures of the Web

"A guilty pleasure is something one enjoys and considers pleasurable despite feeling guilt for enjoying it. The 'guilt' involved is sometimes simply fear of others discovering one's lowbrow or otherwise embarrassing tastes. Fashion, video games, music, movies, and junk food can be examples of guilty pleasures." -From the Wikipedia entry

Isn't it really lame when people have no idea how to start off an essay so they just stick a quote at the top of the page?  I mean, it's such a cliche.  And even worse, starting off an essay with a source as dubious as Wikipedia should practically be punishable by death.  I'll just say it right now so you don't have to - I'm a horrible person. But as I outlined very clearly in my last post, I'm going through a writer's block at the moment and I'm trying to push past it so please cut me some slack.

All potential criticisms of my writing aside (which I have already addressed in a self-deprecating and humorous manner in an attempt to knock the wind out of the sails of any would-be haters), my use of the Wikipedia entry in the opening makes up for what it lacks in elegance by simply being useful.  And that, by the way, is why so many people continue to use Wikipedia, because for all its sloppiness and lack of depth, it also happens to be pretty damn accessible and useful.  I often hate myself for going straight to Wikipedia for answers to my questions because going to Wiki feels like such the stereotypical lazy college student thing to do.  And yet I still visit the site all the fucking time simply because it's easy and offers accessible (if not shallow) information on a myriad of subjects.  So what I'm getting at here kids is that I often use Wikipedia and often feel simultaneously pleasure and despair in doing so.  And in case you're totally dense and not following where I'm going with this I'll drive my point home now by explicitly stating that use of Wikipedia as a source of information is in itself a guilty pleasure for me.  I disparage people for using Wikipedia.  I have heard people speak of reading entries on the site for fun and this boils my blood because I find it to be such a shallow use of time.  Why read an online encyclopedia entry when you can read a book for once in your life, you uneducated cretin?  And yet while I'm may talk shit about the reading habits of others, the truth of the matter is that I visit Wikipedia often, and have even gotten entertainment and worthwhile information from perusing the contents of the site.  So yeah, it's totally a guilty pleasure for me.

Actually when it comes down to it, when I was thinking about writing a post about my guilty pleasures a lot of the examples I came up with were of Internet stuff [insert obligatory joke about tentacle rape porn here].  No, but seriously stuff like watching endless Youtube videos, or viewing mediocre Hollywood fare on Netflix instant, or reading blogs about Godzilla movies are all things I would consider guilty pleasures.  For example, even though it can be fun in a shallow way, there is something particularly pathetic about watching Judge Judy clips on Youtube.  It makes you go, "What has become of my life, that it has been reduced to this?"  And yet on the other end of the spectrum there is a definite pleasure I get out of such activities or else I wouldn't keep doing them.  I think part of the joy that comes from these activities is that they offer shallow fun.  This is pretty obvious.

I watch a lot of random crap on Youtube.  Some examples of the random crap I've watched recently would include a clip of Jaws winning an Oscar for special effects, a trailer for a Japanese comedy entitled Big Tits Zombie, and a nineties Celine Dion video.  While these three videos are all seemingly random works, they are all entertaining in similar ways.  For example, they're all immediately accessible.  You don't need a PhD in literature to understand why Big Tits Zombie is funny or to let the dated '90's pop of "That's the Way It Is" wash over you.  But in a more abstract way I also find these videos entertaining in the fact that killing time in itself can be an amusing activity.  Let me explain this point further.  What I mean is that by watching a seemingly endless stream of pop culture waste product on the Internet I am communicating to myself that I have the free time to waste.  And how luxurious it is to be young and feel confident enough in the time I have left on this earth to be OK with watching a slew of shitty 1990's pop music videos instead of, y'know, doing something worthwhile with my time.  It is a luxury to be able to afford to waste time and it is a privilege I treasure.  Am I proud to waste my time on Youtube watching crap?  Not necessarily, but it's something I'm not going to give up anytime soon.  I'm a sucker for the luxurious frivolity of the whole Youtube thing.

Ramblings on Writer's Block

Hi how's it going?  Actually don't answer that, let me tell you how life is working out for me instead.  Remember back a few months ago when I did that post entitled New Year's Resolutions which was about (obviously) my goals for the year?  Well I figured it was time to update y'all on how that stuff was working out for me.  To make a long story short what you need to know is that I'm on pace with everything except for my blog postings.  In regards to my blog I must say that I am dreadfully behind on my posting quota.  And now to reiterate that point with a needless amount of extraneous details: I'm 20% done consuming my book and film quota for this year (I've watched 101 films and read 10 books this year so far), yet I am only an abysmal 10% through with my goal of posting 100 blog entries in 2012.  Which means I've got to put the pedal to the metal, so to speak, if I want to finish my blog posting goal for the year.

Why should this concern you, my reader(s)?  Well, if I'm gonna keep posting and getting my count up then that means I'm going to have to become less particular about what kind of stuff I post to my blog.  Truth be told I felt for my friend El Lobo when he described going through a writer's block on his blog in his latest post.  In the immortal words of Juan del Lobo, "Hey, sorry I haven't been posting. I was distracted by a new Tumblr account, which didn't turn out to be as fun as I thought it would be. Also, I was suffering the consequences of a mild mental disturbance, to quote Middlemarch, in that I had a bad bout of writer's block."  Yes, my friend, I am with you one hundred percent.  I too have been neglecting my precious Zombie Baby in favor of other pursuits, some of which are rather legitimate (such as writing my midterms, launching Zombie Baby's sister Tumblr blog, reading a motherfucking book or two), and others which are possibly less legit (for example, consuming copious amounts of TAB and watching Danity Kane videos from back in the day).  And yet what all this comes down to is that I just haven't been posting recently.  And when I get out of the posting groove I tend to get rusty and develop a writer's block a la Guido Contini in Nine.

Nine

And being that I've established quotas for myself I'm just going to need to push past this block and start throwing stuff against the wall to see if anything sticks.  Which means that I might start posting more weird, pseudo-posts like this one about how I can't think of anything to write about (yes, I really have just spent 400+ words to communicate that I have nothing to say...see what I did there?)  But don't get me wrong now I do have a handful of ideas for future posts, it's just that a lot of my ideas are kind of lame.  I mean, I'm not gonna start posting some irredeemably vapid shit about award season fashion don'ts or what have you, but I will let you know that I may be posting some more conceptually tepid material.  But it's for my own good.  I feel that it's all too easy to avoid writing by simply telling myself that I have nothing to say, but that's not true. Again to refute this claim I'd like to direct your attention to this post, in which I have devoted a hefty block of text to a virtually non-existent subject.

Forgive me for rambling.  What I mean to say is simple: in the future I would like to take an active stand against writer's block and to be a more productive blogger.  And let's start here.  BANG, another post to add to the finished pile.  See?  Who says writing needs coherence and purpose?

I Got a Tumblr

Hey.  A quick post is in order to update thee on what I'm doing.  I have decided to make another blog via Tumblr, click here to check it out.  I am writing/posting this update here because I want both that site and this one to sort of feed off of and into each other.  I want to use my Tumblr blog (which is titled "Zombie's Baby", get it?) to be sort of the less organized, more stream of conscious and spontaneous outlet, while Zombie Baby Nursery, my blogger blog, will be the less frequently updated, yet more polished and organized of the two.  Zombie's Baby will have shorter posts and be more geared toward posting snippets of stuff that I find interesting (posts might perhaps be as minimal as just photos, video clips, or short phrases that I found online).  The advantage to this shorter format means that I can update more frequently.  So far I'm at a pace of a minimum of one post per day, with it not being unusual for me to post three or four things in a day.  Having the ability to crank stuff out like this is awesome and I love being able to update quickly and with ease.

However for the more in depth, lengthy writing you're going to have to come to this site.  Sure, Nursery will be updated less frequently, but the updates will be filled with more substance and more of my own personal voice. I think that's a reasonable trade off.

So feel free to read one, or both, or none of the above.  I will try not to repeat myself amongst the two platforms, yet I want to make sure that one does not have to read one to fully appreciate the other.  They will be two free standing entities that just happen to enhance each other and to each offer a portal into my thoughts. So I will reiterate that it's all up to you what you want or don't want to read.  Have fun and let me know what your opinions are on this pseudo-expansion, my dear readers.

With the Light Volume 6

Back in the day, when I was a freshman in college, I began reading the With the Light series on a whim. I first became aware of the title on a trip to Borders (R.I.P), as they had the placed the first volume of the series on display in the manga section. I was immediately intrigued by the cover ("Is this a parenting book that was shelved incorrectly, or what?") so I picked it up and started thumbing through it. As soon as I flipped through this first volume I was immediately struck by the heart-wrenching cuteness of the art so I just knew I'd have to read it. Hey, I never denied being shallow.

The With the Light: Raising an Autistic Child series, true to its name, follows the trials and minor victories of the Azuma family as they grapple with their son's autism. Dutiful mother Sachiko serves as the series protagonist, and it is through her interactions with others that we are given lessons about the issues surrounding autism. While With the Light is a work of fiction, it has been heavily researched. In the process of creating the work, the series author Keiko Tobe profiled a variety of real life families of autistic children. From what I understand, Sachiko's autistic child Hikaru was created as a sort of amalgamation of a handful of various real life kids that the author observed. This lends the story a familiar edge. Nothing that occurs in With the Light seems beyond the realm of possibility, and one can easily imagine the events of the story playing out in everyday life.

Volume 6 of With the Light sees Hikaru as a junior high school student on the cusp of puberty. Aging is a major theme in this volume. As Hikaru visibly ages, the world at large begins to react to his behavior differently, which creates new problems for Sachiko. Behavior that strangers would find cute and endearing in a prepubescent child begins to seem threatening or inappropriate in an older boy. This issue is brought to the forefront of the story when, on a public bus trip, Hikaru touches a female passenger's hair. While Hikaru's intentions were innocent, the woman assumes he's a perv and screams. This situation foreshadows the new and unique issues that Hikaru's parents will have to deal with as he ages.

But Hikaru's not the only one growing up and dealing with the unique challenges that come with entering a new stage of life. In one part of the story, Sachiko ruminates on aging in an internal dialogue that opens one of the chapters, "My children are growing up right before my eyes...and this means that I too am getting older. And so are my own father and mother..." And fittingly many of the pages after this are dedicated to events in the lives of Hikaru's grandparents. Sachiko's mother deals with health issues as Hikaru's paternal grandmother struggles to accept her grandchildren for who they are. Hikaru's little sister Kanon is also growing up and learning to deal with the popularity contests of primary school. As the sister of a disabled child, Kanon faces her own unique challenges and much of this volume was also focused on the experience of being a sibling to an autistic individual.

There are a number of reasons why I enjoy the With the Light series. I enjoy its gentle plotting and grounded characters. I like that there are no villains in the story. Characters might act out and hurt each other emotionally in the process, yet such actions are often the result of ignorance or good intentions gone bad rather than maliciousness. There's also a novelty to the story. While I've heard that in Japan there exists a plethora of manga for every taste and interest, in the U.S. it's still rather rare to see a mainstream comics title aimed at an older female crowd. So that's undeniably a factor in my interest as well.

If With the Light doesn't sound appealing to you then you surely won't get into it. But if you read this post and experienced even a glimmer of interest then the title's worth checking out. It's a sweet light read that might even teach you a thing or two about autism.

My Top Ten Movies of 2011: The Finale

Previously on my blog I counted down the bottom half of my list of favorite movies of the year.  Check that post out here, if you please.  As I wrote in yesterday's post, I had originally intended to do just one massive post detailing my favorite movies of the year, but truthfully that task seemed way too daunting.  Plus I figured the ensuing mass of text that would result from such a post would be rather ugly and intimidating to thee, my dear reader.  Anyway, that's enough chatter from me.  Let's finish this.

4.  The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
There were an unusually high number of female performances that I loved this year, many of which I've already written about in my last post.  And yet, even out of this year's crop of stellar leading ladies, Rooney Mara's Lisbeth Salander stands out as being the baddest in the land.  More than just a black-clad super-heroine, Lisbeth possesses an intriguing mix of both aggressive competence and fragile vulnerability.  But don't get the wrong idea, Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is not a one woman show.  The film also displays a stylish coolness (epitomized by the stellar opening credits sequence) and unforgettable moments of trauma (including one awesomely brutal revenge sequence).  And for my money any one who can find a way to make Enya palatable deserves a flurry of praise just for that feat alone.

3.  The Artist

The Artist might be the most adorable and heartwarming movie of the year.  But don't let that fool you.  Below the film's adorable, puppy dog-ridden surface lies a razor sharp wit and an impressive intelligence.  By the time the film was through, my perception of sound in film had been altered in a slight, but significant way.  Add on top of all this two charismatic leads, whose ensuing romance will tug at the heartstrings and you've got a stellar, A+ theatrical experience on your hands.

2.  The Skin I Live In

Okay, I want to make clear now that I had a hard time deciding what order to put these last three movies in.  Honestly, The Skin I Live In in particular is pretty much tied for my number one movie this year.  It really is that awesome.  And I can say that out of all the films profiled in this post, Skin offers the most emotionally complex experience.  At times it is thrilling and shocking.  And yet it is also incredibly stylish with a bold color palate, and chock full of absurd moments and characters.  Like a lot of director Pedro Almodovar's other films, The Skin I Live In's plot cleverly weaves together a group of characters who initially appear distant and distinctly separate.  If I am being vague about the plot that is intentional, for I wouldn't dare give away the wonderfully extreme twist that the film is built upon.  I will say, however, that this movie is also commendable for its unique look at sexuality, morality, and gender identity.  It's also just straight-up awesome.

1.  Hugo

Yup, Hugo.  No surprise, right?  Hugo oozed cuteness and sweetness, yet never ignored the trials that all people go through, kids included.  In other words, it managed to be heart-warming without sugar-coating things.  The film also made for a wonderful tribute to the medium of film, the technology that has allowed the public's dreams to seep out into the daylight and invade our waking hours.  Plus the automaton was kawaii.

Great movies that I loved but couldn't include on my list due to lack of space: Midnight in Paris, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Bridesmaids, and Jane Eyre.  The Darkest Hour takes the cake for the worst movie I saw in theaters last year.

My Top Ten Movies of 2011: Part One

Note: I originally planned to do one post detailing my picks for my favorite movies of 2011, but as I was writing the first part of the post it began to get bloated and long-winded, plus it was taking awhile to write.  In order to produce a more manageable and readable post that I could publish in a reasonable time frame, I decided to chop my list in half and split it into two parts.  This is the bottom half.  Enjoy.

Hey.  It is that time of year again when we take a moment to pause, look back on the previous year, and evaluate.  For many people, including me, this year-end evaluation often gives leads to the creation of self-indulgent lists of faves which we then post online for the world to see.  It's fun.

I meant to post my top ten list of favorite films from the past year a while back, but I was distracted by various things.  But I'm here now and I'm ready to unveil my picks.  That being said, a few disclaimers/comments are necessary before we proceed.  First thing is that you should check out my friend El Lobo's top ten list on his blog before, after, and/or while reading my list.  Between our two blogs El Lobo was the pioneer in end of the year list making, so I need to give him credit where credit is due.  I probably wouldn't have thought to do this post without him, so props to thee Senor Lobo.  Next thing I want to address is the rather obvious fact that I didn't see every movie I wanted to see this year.  This is unfortunate, but with so much to see and limited release schedules and the like it's pretty much inevitable.  Some notable high profile titles that I missed out on include Drive and Hanna.  I also skipped out on seeing some of this year's most critically acclaimed films simply out of a lack of interest (the most notable examples of this are The Tree of Life and The Descendants).  So yeah, there's that.  Also before we start I just wanted to emphasize how shitty I thought this year was.  So many new entries to franchises that nobody in the right mind actually gives a shit about (examples include the new entries in the Twilight, Transformers, Happy Feet, Alvin and the Chipmunks, and Cars franchises).  And yet, when I look over my list I think I was able to assemble a pretty solid top ten.  I even had to cut some stuff I loved out of my list simply because there wasn't enough space.  Now don't get me wrong I'm not a 2011 apologist, I just want to emphasize that while this year was bad, it wasn't all bad.

Anyway, I've rambled on way more than I intended to, so let's start this.  In reverse order my picks are:

10.  Love in Space

You might assume from my ardent love of Japanese gore movies that I'd be opposed to romantic comedies, but that wouldn't be completely accurate.  Yes I'm often quick to talk shit about Hollywood's contemporary romcom output (with the vast majority of my ire being directed toward Katherine Heigl's filmography), but I'm not fundamentally against silly, cutesy, popcorn movies.  Which is why I adored Love in Space.  It's a straight-up slice of romantic cuteness with all the boring extraneous drama cut out.  Love in Space is a Chinese romcom that tells the story of a widow and her three single daughters as they all enter into and progress through unlikely romances.  One of the things I loved most about Love in Space was how its sense of whimsy influenced everything from the plot to the costume design (see image).  The film's candy-colored visuals and fantastic elements (for example, a romance that blossoms between astronauts in space) add a strong sense of fantasy to the film and lower your defenses against the movie's saccharine cuteness.  Love in Space is this year's most delightful bit of romantic comedy.

9.  My Week With Marilyn

Despite my aversion to the film's male lead (who was given a rather dull, shallow characterization), I still thoroughly loved this movie.  It's hard not to fall for Michelle Williams' portrayal of Monroe as a charismatic enigma plagued by insecurities.  Add to this a rock solid cast (including Judi Dench and Hermione Granger) and gentle comic moments and you've got a charming film worthy of its admission price.

8.  Project Nim

I am no documentary aficionado, but I found this documentation of the life of a chimpanzee to be a rather gripping, and oftentimes tragic, tale.  Nim was the chimp selected for a 1970's experiment which sought to discover if a chimpanzee would be capable of communicating with humans via sign language if it was given the proper training.  Like a train wreck, this experiment would prove disastrous and damaging, yet it's still fascinating to watch the story of ineptitude play out.  Project Nim is also notable for the uncanny ways in which its story mirrors that of the summer blockbuster Rise of the Planet of the Apes.  Sometimes truth is stranger, and infinitely more tragic, than fiction.

7.  Young Adult

This Diablo Cody penned film probably won't be for everybody, but I loved it for its strong characterization and exquisite moments of dark humor.  The film stars Charlize Theron as an ex-high school it girl, now living out an emotionally stunted life in Minneapolis as a ghostwriter for a popular series of teen novels.  I liked the movie for its sympathetic approach to its characters.  I loved that the film allowed us to both laugh at and sympathize with both the high school prom queen and the class outcast (Patton Oswalt).  We all have emotional baggage, and the most interesting stories recognize this.  The film is also commendable for the way in which it so perfectly captures the intricacies of humdrum suburban life (the girl at the hotel desk was a hilarious, spot-on characterization).

6.  Rango

In a year in which Pixar's only output was another entry in the abysmal Cars series, Rango did an excellent job of filling the void.  With stunning character design, intelligent and mature dialogue, loving shout outs to the westerns of old, and some eye-popping action sequences, Rango was easily the highest quality computer animated film to hit theaters this year. To characterize this as a children's film would be almost unfair, as it feels way too visually accomplished to be reduced to strictly children's fare.  Though that isn't to say that it holds no appeal to kids, because I feel like I would have gotten a huge kick out of the film's vivid visuals and eccentric characters if I had seen it as a child.

5.  Winnie the Pooh
Another immensely entertaining animated film, albeit in an entirely different vein that Rango.  Whereas Rango possessed thrills and a bottomless wellspring of coolness, Pooh delights its audience with gentle humor and quiet odes to the imagination of childhood.  Again, while this film is sure to entertain the pre-school set, its appeal is not limited to this demographic.  Any adult possessing any sort of nostalgia for the Hundred Acre Wood posse will surely find much to celebrate here.  For more on my opinion of this title, you can check out the post I wrote last summer.

And there you have it.  Stick around for Part Two, in which I reveal my absolute faves, the creme de la creme of last year's output.

Splatter: Naked Blood

I promise not to dwell on the topic of weird depictions of self-mutilation in films for too long, but since we're on the subject let's talk about Splatter: Naked Blood.  As I was reading the previously mentioned Asian Horror book (see the my last post if you don't know what I'm talking about), I came across the description of a title that just sounded too weird to pass up.  The title in question is one Splatter: Naked Blood, a bizarre Japanese horror film from 1996.  Splatter concerns the scientific misadventures of a bright but misguided young man named Eiji who develops a painkiller that transforms pain into pleasure.  At this same time, Eiji's mom, a scientist in her own right, is testing a new contraceptive on three young female test subjects.  Unbeknownst to mom, Eiji injects his newly invented painkiller into these three ladies to gratuitously nasty results.

Reading about the absurd and gratuitous subject matter alone convinced me that Splatter was just too bizarre to pass up.  The film's pedigree, as described by writer Andy Richards in Asian Horror, also promised exquisite weirdness and perversity.  Richards describes Hisayasu Sato, the film's director, as follows, "Sato was one of the major players in the Japanese sex film industry of the eighties and nineties, with over 50 movies under his belt...Splatter: Naked Blood is, in part, a remake of his pinku eiga from 1987, Genuine Rape, which also explored the boundaries between hallucination and reality."  Now I realize that a headline like "From the director of Genuine Rape..." would not normally be a selling point, but I was intrigued by the idea of seeing what kind of depraved horror film that somebody with such a storied and sketchy filmography would be capable of creating.  Plus, in Asian Horror the author later goes on to casually mention that Sato also directed the 2005 zombie comedy Tokyo Zombie.  Tokyo Zombie was a movie I watched a few years back and found to be generally enjoyable (albeit in a rather innocent and decidedly non-sleazy/sketchy way).  So there was the name recognition factor as well.

So my long winded story aside, I received Splatter a handful of days ago and had the opportunity to watch it today.  I have to say that it wasn't quite what I expected.  For a film called Splatter: Naked Blood, the beginning is surprisingly rather dull and utterly devoid of gore.  Not that this is necessarily a bad thing.  Even a movie that sells itself on its extremity and depravity doesn't necessarily need to feature non-stop blood and guts for me to enjoy it.  But even with that in mind I can say in honesty that even with its slim 75 minute runtime there are parts of Splatter that tend toward the dry and the dull.  And yet, when the film picks up and the blood starts to flow you are in for some of the most inventive, bizarre, and just plain fucked up horror movie moments you will ever see.  Which means that if you're a person who's into that sort of thing, then you gotta pick this title up, even if for just one watch.  If, on the other hand, you're the type to shy away from blood and guts, this will be an irredeemable piece of entertainment for you (but, then again, what did you expect?)

The most mind blowing moment of depravity in the film comes in the form of a moment of autocannibalism.  You see, one of the girls who was injected with the painkiller is a total glutton who relishes in the consumption of food in vast quantities (all of the personalities and character flaws of the three female leads are established succinctly in an early scene in which the three dine out at a restaurant).  Whilst cooking up some tasty tempura, her hand gets covered in batter.  She then proceeds to the next logical step of dunking her hand into burning oil, frying it, and then taking a delicious bite.  Watch a clip of that scene here.  The gal's cannibalistic frenzy continues later in the film as she slices off and nibbles on a nipple, until finally plucking out her eyeball and chowing down.  The special effects in these sequences are not necessarily the most convincing.  The eating of her tempura hand is especially rather fake looking.  And yet, in a case like this, the scenarios on display are just so outlandish and fucked up that you just kind of have to step back and (a) admire that someone's brain actually came up with these scenarios and (b) they had the guts to capture their weird ideas on film for posterity's sake.

The scene of autocannibalism in Splatter represents an instance of the human imagination gone wild and it's hard not to love it for that very reason.

P.S.- It would be tragic if I concluded this post without giving a shout out to the awesome Japanese action/comedy/revenge movie The Machine Girl, which did its own take on the tempura arm.  It was predictably hilarious.

Reliving a Brilliant Moment From Mirrors (2008)

I recently read a book about Asian horror films entitled, appropriately enough, Asian Horror.  Written by one Andy Richards, Asian Horror is a slim but serviceable volume that details the history of the horror film in Eastern Asia.  After reading the book I jotted down my opinions of it.  As my opinion still stands I shall simply cannibalize my old writing and quote my initial reactions to the book here, "An informative (albeit brief) primer on Asian horror movies, with an emphasis on Japan's horror output. While some of the chapters could have used some beefing up, I generally enjoyed this title and found it to be a useful summary of the history of the horror film in East Asia. And hey, it nudged me into checking out some movies I wouldn't have otherwise, which is always a plus. So in summary it's not a definitive guide, but this book serves as a decent starting point to those looking to learn about the genre."

With my opinions on the book out of the way let me explain the real reason why I'm posting today.  I am posting because one of the latter chapters in Asian Horror, the one about Hollywood remakes of Asian horror films, reminded me of a sublime moment of gore from an otherwise mediocre film.  My friends, I am speaking of the jaw dislocation scene from the 2008 film Mirrors.  

Mirrors is an American remake of the Korean film Into the Mirror.  I've never seen Into the Mirror, but in this case that's alright as it is tangential to the point I want to make.  While I can't comment on the original film I can say with confidence that Mirrors was a mediocre movie at best.  It did however contain one death so outrageous and bloody that the price of admission was (almost) justified.  Those who have seen the film will already know of which scene I speak, but for those in the dark I will explain the outrageous brilliance of the moment.  As  mirrors contain supernatural and malevolent powers in the world of this film, in this scene a woman's reflection rips its own jaw off, causing the flesh and blood victim's lower jaw to dislocate from her face and hang limply in the blood soaked bathwater.  But a picture's worth a thousand words, so rather than just read my description of the death watch it here (those with a weak constitution need not apply, obviously).  

I'm sorry, but this scene is just too brilliant.  There are so many reasons why I love it, but its primary appeal lies in the absurdity of its premise and the unflinching way in which the bloody aftermath is shown in all its glory.  You gotta love that limp tongue dangling from the wreckage.  That's a classic touch.  Also how about those crunchy sound effects that emanate from our victim's shattered jaw?  It's all wonderfully grisly, bloody and explicit, yet the outrageous premise that the kill is based upon lends the scene a dark sense of humor and absurdity.

In conclusion, thank you to Asian Horror for reminding me of this wonderfully random and gratuitous moment from an otherwise forgettable film.

Quality Programming: My Strange Addiction

I am normally not a fan of the crap that gets broadcast on TLC.  I despise their non-traditional family shows such as the Duggars with their multitude of children and the creepiness of the Sister Wives.  And I think plenty of people will agree with me when I say that I'd rather gouge out my eyes with a rusty nail than watch that Toddlers and Tiaras shit.  My problem with these shows is two-fold.  First off, they're boring.  Most of the time there's not really a whole lot of driving conflict and everything's just kind of...whatever.  And secondly, and perhaps most egregiously, they are massively sleazy and exploitative.  Now to be honest I don't necessarily have a problem with sleaze in entertainment, but the combo of boring and exploitative is just too much.  At best I just tune out and at worst I find such lowbrow TLC fare to be actively annoying.

But as always there is an exception to the rule and its name is My Strange Addiction.  Over the winter break I had the pleasure of hanging out with my friend El Lobo, who introduced me to the cringe-worthy, yet oh so awesome ride that is My Strange Addiction.  Now full disclosure, I've only watched one full episode of the show (season 2, episode 3, "Adult Baby/Eats Dryer Sheets"), yet I feel that the plethora of clips I watched on TLC's site gives me full authority to comment on the show.  Plus, if the episode I watched is any indication, the conflict resolution at the end of each episode is rather minimal and unsatisfying.  So really the perverse joy of Addiction comes from the set-up.  Everything after this is more or less filler.

But the set-ups are pretty spectacular, so it's all good.  Just browsing a list of the episode titles is a feast for the mind as each description sounds more sick than the next.  Here are some sample show titles to whet your appetite: "Rampant Rats", "Carrying Her Husbands Urn", "Married to a Doll".  My Strange Addiction is almost Daily Mail-esque in its sensationalized presentation and relentless pandering to gossipy gawkers.  But that's why we love it so.  It's definitely sleazy, but there's some undeniable entertainment value here.

My favorite moments from show come from the clips I've watched online. One of my favorite segments is the one in which a woman carries the ashes of her dead husband everywhere with her, even humorously taking him out to the movies and asking him what he'd like to watch on TV.  Her behavior quickly crosses the line as she begins to dip her hands into the urn and lick her hubby's ashes off her fingers.  Taking the urn to the movies is vaguely acceptable as quirky indie dramedy behavior, but eating the poor fellow is rather fucked up and I hope she was able to break the habit.  My other favorite segment of the show was from the aforementioned "Married to a Doll" episode.  In this show a character by the name of "Davecat" chats about his close relationship with his life-like sex doll named Sidore (whom he's affectionately nicknamed Si-chan).  While clearly eccentric, Davecat is considerably more articulate and self-aware than the show's other subjects.  In fact I actually found Davecat to have a decent presence in front of the camera and I'd love to see a show chronicling the adventures of Davecat and Si-chan.

Have I sunk to a new low by blogging about a TLC show?  Perhaps, but it was totally worth it.

Links I Loved Part 2: Enya, Torture, Etc.

Okay so a little less than a month ago I wrote a post highlighting various articles that I had found and enjoyed along my Internet travels. Click here to revisit that stellar piece of writing. Anyway, in that article I decided to send a shout-out to my audience to comment if they would be willing to see more articles in the same vein latter on in my blog writing. And since my loyal reader El Lobo was cool with seeing more link based posts, I think I'm going to run with the idea and make such posts a regular part of the blog. So without further ado, here's a miscellaneous collection of Internet based stuff that I have enjoyed:

Daniel Craig on Enya and Torture:  Hands down one of my favorite moments from the David Fincher remake of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo was the use of Enya's "Orinoco Flow" in the background as Daniel Craig's Mikael Blomkvist is being tortured by the film's killer.  It was such an excellent, unexpected juxtaposition.  Curious as to what others thought of this scene I did a quick search online to find more information.  As a result I found this short article that explains how the vintage Enya track was selected to accompany the crucial scene. I'm not going to summarize the article here as you can read it for yourself in like five seconds, and you should as it's a rather entertaining tidbit on one of my favorite movie moments of the last year.  Now can somebody get Enya herself to comment on the scene, 'cause I'd love to read that.

On a related note, check out this New York Times article from the mid-1990's which chronicles the trend in film of juxtaposing scenes of brutality with innocuous pop tunes.  This article is made all the more interesting by the fact that it was written well over a decade before The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.  It's thus a testament to the film that the Enya torture scene felt as fresh and effective as it did.  Or maybe I'm just a sucker for these types of juxtapositions.

The Grey trailer:  Okay, I realize that a dude vs. wolves movie would normally sound pretty idiotic, but you stick Liam Neeson in the lead and suddenly it seems worthy of a watch.  I'm not saying it'll be a cinematic masterpiece, but I personally can't wait to see Liam Neeson continue to develop his badass action persona of Taken fame.  Humorously, there was at one point even Oscar buzz for Neeson's role in The Grey.  Check out this article about the film's release date which writes, "...most of the buyers who previewed some 30 minutes of footage from The Grey are describing Neeson's lead turn as pure 'Oscar bait'".  Personally I couldn't care less about acting chops.  I just want to see some wolves get their asses kicked in the most outrageous way possible.

Retro Polish and Czech posters for kaiju movies:  As the title says, here's a collection of posters for Japanese monsters movies from Poland and Czechoslovakia.  The posters date back from the late 1950's to the early 1980's and they are obscenely cool.  The Polish Godzilla vs. Hedorah poster from 1971 is particularly awesome with Hedorah's eyes and body pattern in the shape of Godzilla's distinctive silhouette.  It's very cool and iconic looking.

The Seventh Seal

I recently had the opportunity to see the 1957 Swedish film The Seventh Seal in theaters.  I jumped at the chance to see the film as I had heard great things about it, especially from my trusted friend El Lobo who has mentioned the movie a few times in his blog.  The Seventh Seal was written and directed by the acclaimed filmmaker Ingmar Bergman.  Truthfully, my knowledge of Bergman's career and life history is rather lacking.  The only previous movie I'd watched from the man was The Virgin Spring, and I gave that one a go simply because of its well-documented influence on the 1970's horror film The Last House on the Left.  But this was part of the reason I wanted to see The Seventh Seal, to broaden my knowledge and to experience a classic for the first time in a theatrical setting (rather than watching it alone on my grungy laptop screen, for example).

The Seventh Seal is in the medieval Europe during the plague, where the ever-present threat of sickness and death loom large.  The film begins with Death approaching a knight (played by Max von Sydow) on a shoreline.  Death has come to take the knight's life, but in a clever effort to delay his inevitable death, challenges Death to a game of chess.  Death agrees, choosing to play the black pieces ("It becomes me well", he says).  I loved the imagery of the hooded and robed figure of Death standing against the shore.  At the risk of sounding like a 15 year-old goth, I have always found personifications of death to be both incredibly interesting and appealing.  The representation of Death on display in The Seventh Seal appealed to me through its clean, iconic look as well as its playful characterization (the idea that Death would acquiesce to a game of chess with a mortal is innately intriguing).

The character of the knight, dubbed Antonius Block, is also an intriguing personality.  Disillusioned by the events around him, Block desperately wants to believe in a god, but is continuously frustrated by the lack of evidence supporting the existence of a higher power.  The knight's crisis of faith is well illustrated in the confessional scene in which Block laments, "What will become of us who want to believe, but cannot?  And what of those who neither will nor can believe?", to the figure of Death who Block mistakes for a priest.  The knight's struggles for certainty in his beliefs raise interesting questions about the nature of faith.

And it's easy for the audience to sympathize with Block's crisis of faith as the harsh realities of life during the Black Death leave many people vulnerable to manipulation.  This is hauntingly illustrated in the film during a scene in which a young girl, accused of causing the plague through her relationship with the devil, is burned at the stake.  Unable to face the up to their bleak reality, it is all too easy to displace one's problems onto a scapegoat.  But this is one of the things that makes the film's medieval setting so fascinating.  It is interesting to watch what happens to people's beliefs and convictions when disease and death become a major part of the reality of everyday life.

Thanks again to El Lobo for recommending The Seventh Seal.  I thoroughly enjoyed the film, and found that the images and themes presented in the story gave me plenty to mull over and think about for hours afterward.  I look forward to reading more about the film, and discovering more about the environment in which it was written, filmed, and released.

New Year's Resolutions

With the inevitable passing of 2011 now behind us, I took some time to reflect on my life in the past year and scheme on how I want the upcoming year to play out. But I refuse to participate in those cliche New Year's resolutions relating to exercise and finance and the like. Instead I have composed a list of goals for the upcoming year which are considerably more nerdy, obsessive, and trivial in variety. I thought these goals would make for some great Zombie Baby fodder as they place undue seriousness on matters of trivial minutia. But what could be a greater way to plan out your life, you know?

Let me start out by describing what I'm going for here. As a mortal, I am aware of how finite time is, and I'm all about having maximum fun in the inevitably limited time I have on this earth. And being a being a human of the geeky persuasion, maximum fun means watching as many movies and reading as many books as possible. I don't want to be lying on my deathbed thinking, "Damn, I wish I'd watched Tokyo Gore Police more often". So with that in mind I'm always up for maximizing my free time and making the most of it. It is all too easy to waste hours on the Internet. Such activity provides some basic entertainment, sure, but the emotional and intellectual payoff of web surfing is minimal at best.

Tokyo Gore Police

So I try to be conscious of my free time and to wield it with care and caution as any responsible slacker ought to do. So with that in mind, I've calculated the number of books and movies I would like to consume in the upcoming year, as well as the number of blog posts I'd like to produce. The numbers are as follows: I would like to watch 500 movies, read 50 books, and write 100 blog posts in 2012. I came up with these numbers by examining how I spent my free time in 2011 and by calculating roughly how much more I could feasibly cram into my leisure time. Those interested in 2011's numbers can look at the lists I kept online of what I watched and read. Click here to see what I watched and click here to see what I read in the past year. Naturally you can simply look at the blog archives to see what I previously wrote (and why wouldn't you want to revisit my old posts? That shit is gold!).

I should probably add that I won't be posting regular updates on my progress on these goals on this blog, but those interested in such things can track what I watch here and what I read here.  I always find it fun to peek at what other people read and watch, so here's me giving back.

So how about you guys, what are your plans for the upcoming year?