Applewhite Paley?

It might seem that I'm becoming critical of films in which I am distracted by actors who inappropriately remind me of people other than the character they are playing (see "Dark Water" post, Feb.10, 2005). However, Frank Langella, as William S. Paley in "Good Night, and Good Luck.", didn't remind me of anyone particularly as I was watching the movie.

The problem for me was that he just had the wrong look. After seeing him running around as Clare Quilty in the 1997 version of "Lolita", he'll always give me the creeps, but I don't hold it against him. Frank Langella just doesn't look anything like William S. Paley, especially with that extremely close-cropped haircut. Fortunately it didn't affect the movie negatively for me. Yet I kept thinking to myself, "He doesn't look like William S. Paley, but he does look like somebody. Hmm..."

This morning it struck me, Frank Langella looked like a dead ringer for Marshall Applewhite of the Heaven's Gate cult. Unlike William S. Paley, neither Frank Langella nor Marshall Applewhite strikes me as the type of guy who would be able to get Louise Brooks to be their girlfriend. Both of these guys are too erratic and lack the dynamic resolve of a telecommunications giant like Paley.

See It Now

N. and I went to see "Good Night, and Good Luck." on Saturday and it was very good. It's about Edward R. Murrow and his t.v. show "See It Now" on which he criticized Joe McCarthy and the Communist witch hunts of the early 1950s.

When I saw the trailer, I was concerned that David Strathairn didn't look like Edward R. Murrow and, worse, that he didn't sound like Edward R. Murrow. Too nasally and not grim-looking enough. And yet, I thought he did a great job, I don't think anyone could do a better job.

The music and performances by Diane Reeves were also great and the look of the movie was perfect. Although the Nosferatu Pix don't feature overall winners in any nominee categories, I think "Good Night, and Good Luck." was my favorite movie of the year.

Excedrin = Love

Happy Valentine's Day!

I've made the jump from fluid caffeine to ingesting my caffeine in pill form. I'd recommend it to anyone, I feel like a thousand dollars, and it's so much simpler than drinking a cup of coffee. I really feel like I'm living in the 21st century now. It takes a special person to go on indefinitely drinking a cup of Mountain Dew every morning instead of coffee. Yet normal people everywhere eat Excedrin every day, and now I'm one of them too!

The "caffeine warning" on the box says, "The recommended dose of this product contains about as much caffeine as a cup of coffee...too much caffeine may cause nervousness, irritability, sleeplessness, and, occasionally, rapid heart beat." Yes, but are there any negative effects?

Dark Water

A week ago I watched the movie "Dark Water" and I liked it. It wasn't as great as I was expecting (after what I'd read), but it was very good. The only serious criticism I had of it is that the actress who played the little girl looked (to me) a little too much like Grandpa (Al Lewis) from "The Munsters". Maybe it was supposed to be an additional nod to the macabre, but it was distracting. To give you a sense of my disorientation, I'm including a photo so you'll know what it's like to be distracted by the image of Grandpa while you're trying to pay attention to something else.

Another spooky note about Al Lewis - as I was looking for this photo I learned that this very same Al Lewis died the day I watched "Dark Water". Doubtlessly he died that very night while I was watching this movie.

This isn't a horror movie, it falls under the TV Guide category of "Thriller" or maybe "Suspense". If you're afraid to watch horror movies, but wish that you could, then this is a good movie for you. In addition, it's a good movie, I'd recommend it to anyone. Tim Roth, John C. Reilly, and Pete Postlethwaite have small roles and the movie makes an effort to give them interesting secondary characters. I was appreciative. Also, there are a number of vague subplots that aren't explained, like Jennifer Connelly's childhood relationship with her spooky mother. I appreciated the vagueness, I was glad that everything wasn't tied up neatly.

But if you're hoping to see Jennifer Connelly splashing around in a provocative manner, forget it.

angry russian student

(taken from an e-mail to N.)

...Russian class got a little freaky yesterday. I have this...well, I wouldn't call any of these classmates "friends", but I have an acquaintance who I've been acquainted with since my first Russian class a year ago. He's a divorced guy, works for the military, has two adult kids, his son is in Iraq. He's easily hot and bothered by junior college girls, spends too much time meeting Russian women on the internet. His eye was roving around the classroom yesterday and he sort of nudges me saying, "Hey, look at her! All these girls in here - you gonna go for anybody?! You ought to go for one of these chicks!"

I don't actively dislike him, but my emotional life is nowhere near to being any of his business. Says I something like, "Oh, I couldn't", but trying not to sound like I don't like girls at all. "Come on!!" he hisses, "Why not?!" Says I, "Why, it would be wrong!" Somehow I managed to change the subject to grammar, but I don't care if he thinks I'm a geek.

So anyway, as the class goes on he really starts sweatin' it with the grammar. I've seen him with the slow burn before, but never like this. He don't understand genitive singular possessive pronouns. I don't understand genitive singular possessive pronouns either, but I'm going to figure it out with the textbook later, there's no reason to make a scene. Our teacher Maya sits down with us to help him and he just keeps getting angrier and still can't seem to get it.

I suggested that he look this example in the textbook and he shouts, "Where?! Where?!" So I show him the book and he shouts, "Well then write out the explanation! Write out the explanation!" I'm thinking this guy is going crackers! So I ask "You mean a different explanation than the one on the page?" and he starts jabbing his finger at my poor little textbook shouting "Write it out the explanation for that one! FOR THAT ONE!" - he be like to rip the page out! So I say, well, it's printed there on the page, you can read it there.

By this point Maya is saying to him in her Russian accent, "You are tired, and it's difficult for you. If you weren't tired you'd understand it." He says, "I'm not tired! That's not the problem! It doesn't make any sense!" By now the class had been over for a while and I had to go to bible study, so I'm thinking screw this guy, I gotta split. As I was packing up Maya asked me about the genitive singular possessive pronouns. "So is it clear to you?" she says, "Do you understand it?" I didn't understand it, but I was mad at the guy, so I said "Yes, I understand!" and left.

man black sock

If you're like most people, you've heard me gripe about the lack of style amongst the UCSD denizens. Shorts and flip flops wherever you look; too many women wearing the low-rise, butt-crack-exposing jeans when they ought not to; far, far too many boy-men wearing baseball caps turned every which way on their heads ("let's meet at the cafeteria - you'll recognize me because I'll be the dude wearing the baseball cap!").

At the beginning of this school year, however, I was amused to see an aberration. A tall, skinny guy wearing what looked like a black full-body suit, like a cotton scuba suit. I was glad to see a spike in the typically flat fashion topography around here. Cynic that I am, I figured that this was just a momentary anomaly characteristic of the new school year. Surely this freak would fall in step with his surroundings a little later in the Fall quarter. Surely within two weeks he would buy himself a baseball cap advertising Corona beer.

Imagine my surprise when I saw this character again today, in the middle of Spring, walking by in the very same outfit. This time I noted more detail; he is weirder than I thought. (I tried to find a picture of that suit he wears but I made myself more than a little ill researching pictures of "specialty clothing for men" on the internet. A lotta sickness out there; the best I can do is that photo.)
To begin with, this tall, crank-thin man reminds me of a cross between Sprockets and The Sisters of Mercy. He's got a shaved head and he's wearing just aviator sunglasses and that long, black sock. Imagine a pair of black gloves (made of some kind of cotton and nylon combination) that start at your fingertips and continue all the way down to your toes. Except for the hole for his neck he's completely sealed up in a black membrane. Must have some kind of pads for the bottom of his feet. How does he get inside of it? Through the neck hole?

It's not a fashion design that I'd choose to express my unique personality, I'm doing just fine with the cowboy vest. Yet who isn't tired of seeing these flocks of kids with the same shiny, little metal ball studs sticking out under their bottom lips. What do those little rod piercings mean (where there are two studs sticking out of a person's body at the entry and exit points of a little metal rod that's going through the skin, often seen at the bottom of a girl's back above her tattoo)? Is that saying "I'm in pain, but I'm weird and brave"? To me, seeing a man wearing that black sock is more unusual and disturbing. That's a man who's making an emotional investment in not fitting in, and nothing is more upsetting to see than that.

UCSD Trees

Just because I watched a wildlife movie - about the Alaskan wilderness, a couple of animal preservationationists, and the bear who ate them -doesn't make me call myself an environmentalist. But I'm not against the environment. What I am against is UCSD cutting down more of the last twenty or so trees that they have left on campus.

I'm exagerrating, but one of the major reasons why this campus appealed to me when I was in high school was because it seemed like the students here went to college in the woods. Unfortunately the insectlike scientists and gladhanders who run this place aren't concerned about the looks of the place. As long as they can clear more land for another windowless structure to run experiments in, these badly dressed geeks are pleased as junebugs. In addition, their piles of chopped-up trees are obstructing my shuttle from transporting me with its usual punctuality. History will judge us.

But I've got to keep an eye on myself in the Mr. Natural department; last night I spent an exorbitant amount of time preparing lentils for stewing and to the detriment of other activities. I even used soy bacon into the crock pot with the lentils for flavoring. Intervention session ahoy.