Forgetting Sarah Marshall is funny, often painfully so. Like other Apatow movies, the female characters are a little thin, but the males are so deliciously flawed that I’m a bit forgiving on that point.
Wondering: why is it that male actors who show their less than perfect bodies are called out as “brave”?
Favorite moments: “pump the brakes”, Paul Rudd’s surfer, Jonah Hill’s groupie, Jason Segal’s music, and the scene with the chess pieces.
“Miss Austen Regrets” was probably my favorite new film of the recent PBS series, The Complete Jane Austen. It’s just now showing in England, and Austenblog has a good roundup of the reviews, which seem more negative than the ones stateside.
It also has a link to the Jane Austen Society of North America’s details on the men in the film, which I found illuminating.
After a disappointing season 3, I’ve been enjoying season 4 of Battlestar Galactica, and dread the break that I know will come all too soon. I fantasize that I’ll rewatch all the episodes in the break, but I know myself, and my time, and my need for sleep, so I doubt it’ll happen. Lots happened on last night’s episode, but a few things stuck out for me–so spoilers for this ep below.
Tigh was the one to respond to Nicky’s crying and change his diaper. I pointed this out to my husband, G. Grod, who shrugged and said, “He’s Tigh. He’s the XO. He gets things done.” Interesting that neither Tory nor Galen responded to care for the kids.
Tigh’s visions of Ellen are similar to the ones that Baltar and Six have of each other.
I did NOT like how Tyrol looked at Nicky late in the episode; will he try to pull a Cally, even though he doesn’t know what happened? Aaron Douglas has always been one of the best actors on the show, and that’s saying a lot.
And Lee’s hair has gotten longer. It’s poofily civilian.
Italo Calvino’s If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler has been on my shelves over ten years, and through three or four different domiciles. I purchased it because Neil Gaiman used it as a reference for his Sandman collection, World’s End. I finally committed to reading the Calvino. While very good, and important, it was a tough, and not often enjoyable, read.
The conceit is fascinating. A man and woman reader begin a book, then are interrupted at a point of suspense. In numbered chapters, they try to find out more about the book, and it leads them on a less-than-merry chase. Alternating with chapters of their quest are first chapters of the books they find that are supposed to be the same, but instead have a different set of male female characters, different title, different setting, different country of origin, and different style. Each introduces you to a situation, then pauses at a conflict. The overall affect is deliberately frustrating. Further, many of the number chapters are told in second person, addressing the reader. This was sometimes unnerving, as Calvino seemed to be looking out of the book and into my life:
The kitchen is the part of the house that can tell the most things about you: whether you cook or not (one would say yes, if not every day, at least fairly regularly)….whether you tend toward the bare minimum or toward gastronomy (your purchases and gadgets suggest elaborate and fanciful recipes, at least in your intentions; you may not necessarily be greedy, but the idea of a couple of fried eggs for supper would probably depress you)
The first sensation this book should convey is what I feel when I hear the telephone ring; I say “should” because I doubt that written words can give even a partial idea of it…my reaction is one of flight from this aggressive and threatening summons, as it is also a feeling of urgency, intolerableness, coercion that impels me…rushing to answer even though I am certain that nothing will come of it save suffering and discomfort.
I enjoyed the ten beginnings of the stories. Like the readers in the book, I was loathe to quit them just as I was going deep. With both the stories and the characters of readers, Calvino frustrated my desire for a story, as well as my attempts to like the characters, since he took pains to make them all different, yet the same, and all readers, just like me.
This is a book about how we read, why we read, and our desire for stories and character. It’s brilliant stuff, but too often purposely dissatisfying–intellectual with a dearth of emotional attachment.
Snow showers, that is. Seriously, can we get a break in the weather? The last batch of snow finally melted, and it was starting to feel like spring. Then today it’s in the 30’s, and snowing.
I know; I know. Griping about weather is a lowest common denominator of discourse. My apologies. But it’s been getting to me for a while. I have trouble dealing with my own mood swings. Balancing them with Mother Nature’s is a drag.
I’ve been thinking in despair that nothing in the house is safe anymore. Yesterday I went into 4yo Drake’s room and found a pocket knife in his bed. I whisked it away, but didn’t notice the toothpick and tweezers missing–I found those at two different times later in the day.
Last night, when I went up to bed, I found my jewelry box on my bed. I went into Drake’s room. He was asleep, and beside his bed were two pair of earrings, a pendant and a zirconia stud. I feel like I’m back in middle school, and living with my pesky little sister. (Written with all due affection, since she now is a generous lender of her own stuff, rather than just a “borrower” of mine.)
Top Chef season 4, episode 7: Improv. Last night’s Top Chef contestants got a night out at Second City. Strangely, no one was suspicious that there was a hidden agenda.
Spoilers from here:
Only Nikki seemed to twig quickly to the upcoming challenge, three-word non-sequiteurs dishes invented Mad Lib style by the audience. I loved Richard’s idea of cooking tofu in rendered beef fat. Was anyone else reminded of the Buffy fast-food episode? But I find Richard a bit too aware of how clever he is. I think he’d do well to remember how he caved under pressure to produce a dish for 80. He’s a talented, innovative chef, but he doesn’t work in a restaurant like most of the others. Spike, also smug, redeemed himself by producing a perfect soup; he and Andrew did not get the onscreen kudos they deserved for making a pureed squash soup with just a food mill and no processor. As for those at the bottom, I found it discouraging to see only women on the chopping block. There’s a pathetic joke to be made about the lesbian not being able to pull off a phallic presentation of “orange turned-on asparagus,” but I won’t be the one to make it. I think Antonia and Lisa deserved their dressing down–doing a fish dish garnished with chorizo and a tequila sauce for “magenta drunk polish sausage” was extremely lame. Antonia did the same thing she did on the team challenge two weeks ago–refused to open her mind to something because it wasn’t to her standards. Jen did the same thing, sneering both at the polish sausage and the beer. I do think it’s fair that the quality of the food be the standard, I don’t think Stephanie and Jen got enough kudos for being more game to the challenge than Antonia/Lisa.
My guess is that Nikki and Mark, who held the middle ground, won’t be long for this show.
More commentary at The Kitchn but none yet at ALoTT5Ma.
I thought The Jane Austen Book Club was a very good film, and faithful to the spirit, if not the letter of the book, which I also thought was very good. I found it so well done that I not only watched all the extras, but stayed up late to do so.
Austen completed six novels, and the book club has six characters, whose joys and troubles overlap as they work their way through Jane’s oeuvre. The movie is very well cast. Each actor does a good job of embodying their character’s charms and quirk. Hugh Dancy is Grigg, the only male in the group. He wears spandex better than he adopts an American accent. Emily Blunt is smoldering as the repressed Prudie. Maria Bello is intimidating as a control-freak dog breeder and matchmaker; she went a little nuts with the Botox though. Her forehead hardly moves. Kathy Baker has appropriately wacky hair and outfits for the spacy Bernadette. Amy Brenneman is sympathetic as a recently divorced parent, and Maggie Grace is charming as the reckless Alexis. Jimmy Smits and Marc Blucas do a great job in supporting roles as well. It’s a wonderful ensemble, and the movie clips along at a satisfying pace through a year of their lives.
Aside from the performances, what I loved about this movie was its obvious love for reading in general, and Jane’s books in particular. Each segment focuses on one character, and one book. Each character is shown reading each book. With one notable exception, most of the editions are different, and obviously cherished; they look lived in. Penguin, Oxford, softcover, hardcover, they reminded me fondly of my shelves, where I have different editions of works by Austen and the Brontes.
The extras did a good job of rounding out the film. One on Austen interviewed two scholars to give details on her life. For example, one of the things known about Tom Lefroy is that he ran out the back door one day when Austen came to visit, and returned the visit days later in the company of his 13yo cousin. “Hardly the stuff of passion,” one of the commentators notes, wryly, in what may be a small dig at Becoming Jane, which imagined a torrid romance between Austen and Lefroy. I skipped the extras in Becoming Jane; that film took so many liberties with fact that it hardly seemed a reliable reference. Extras on The Jane Austen Book Club included an analysis of which character reflected which novel, as well as a brief but entertaining glimpse of the red-carpet opening of the film. A behind-the-scenes featurette wasn’t the usual puff piece; it included interesting background for how the charactes were cast, and how the film received financing. For example, Maggie Grace is an Austen geek; she’s read all the novels, short stories and letters.
If you like reading Austen, and enjoyed Fowler’s book, you’ll likely appreciate the movie. It’s done skillfully and with care. If you’re lukewarm or unfamiliar with either, it might just prompt you, as the book did with me, to seek out all of Austen’s novels.
All the kid-sleep books note that children may have trouble sleeping when they’re going through a development stage. Last Sunday, I was up with 2yo Guppy at 1 and 4; he was crying for water. Then at 4:40 am, my husband and I heard 4yo Drake talking in his room; Drake rarely wakes in the night. G. Grod went to investigate.
G: Drake, it’s not morning yet. What’s up?
D: (Holding dinosaur book) I wanted to say the names of the dinosaurs, so I could hear my voice.
I’m not sure what stage it is, but it sure sounds like one to me.
Born Yesterday has been languishing on my Tivo for ages. I recorded it during one of TCM’s month of Oscars, so I think it’s been there over two years. When I finally watched it, I was pleased that I had kept it around.
A junk tycoon, Harry Brock, decides his girlfriend, Billie (Judy Holliday) needs to improve her manners. He hires a reporter, played by William Holden, to tutor her. Holliday is a delight as Billie, and the movie is worth seeing for her performance alone. She’s so good she even upstages Holden.
Holliday won the best actress Oscar that year, over Bette Davis in All About Eve, and Gloria Swanson in Sunset Boulevard. Some griped that Holliday had an unfair advantage; she’d played the role of Billie on stage for four years. And in spite of that, she was far from the first pick for the role!
For Battlestar Galactica geeks (redundant?), I did a little googling of the significance of the number seven, which is the number of the last unknown Cylon model. From Religious Tolerance:
The Greek Phythagoreans believed that the number seven pointed symbolically to the union of the Deity with the universe. This association was picked up by the Christian church, especially during the Middle Ages. Seven was regarded as having sacred power, as in the seven cardinal virtues, seven deadly sins, seven sacraments, seven churches mentioned in the last book in the Bible, Revelation, etc.
More, from Wikipedia and Bible Wheel.
My guess is Baltar, not Starbuck or Adama.
Continuing my way through Bryan K. Vaughan’s widely acclaimed post-apocalyptic comic-book series Y the Last Man, I finished Volume 5, Ring of Truth. Several important things take place, most notably the explanation for why Yorick Brown and his monkey Ampersand were the only male mammals to survive the plague. Between a murderous ninja (redundant?), and a hallucinating Hero (capitalization intended), Vaughan throws some backstory and red herrings into the mix. It’s a fast-paced story that caused me to switch after book 5 to the monthly individual issues, since I couldn’t wait the many months for the next collected volume to come out. Now that the series is done, however, I recommend you seek out the volumes, not the individual issues. They’re filled with distracting ads; the collections are concentrated story.
I read on in individual issues to the end putting off both a nap and bedtime; I value sleep so much, given its lack in my life because of small kids, that this is a high compliment. I cried at the last issue, yet found it hopeful and satisfying. Y is a good story, with strong characters, and lots of savory subplots that support that strong overarching narrative.
As we set off, late again, for music class this morning, I lamented, “Drake, if you listened, we’d be on time. You didn’t, and we’re late. How can I help you learn to listen?”
Drake replied immediately, and matter of factly, “Go to the Learn to Listen Shop, Mom.”
The Bank Job is a good, old-fashioned heist movie. Jason Statham is surprisingly effective and restrained as Terry Southern a decent family man with a vague past who’s in trouble with the local goons. Out of the past pops Saffron Burrows, who was their Jenny from the Block before rising then crashing as a model. She pitches Terry a “one more time” crime that he and his friends know is too good to be true, but they do it anyway. A complicated mishmash ensues that includes corrupt police, MI-5, an angry madame, a porn king, a ham radio enthusiast, a black radical, an undercover agent, and a public figure who got caught, literally, with her pants down. Set in the 70’s, it’s reminded me of movies from that era, like The French Connection. There’s no excess of hand-held camera, tongue-in-cheek humor, or flashy jump cuts. This is a solid, enjoyable crime flick.
Quibbles and bits: Saffron Burrows has a distractingly chiseled and symmetrical face. I can’t find any mention online that she’s had plastic surgery, but her cleft chin and protuberant cheekbones looked suspicious to me. She also reminded me a lot of Padma Lakshmi, a judge on Top Chef. I kept waiting for her to tell recalcitrant gang members to pack their knives and go. Keeley Hawes, formerly of MI-5, does a sympathetic turn as Terry’s wife.
I took 4yo Drake and 2yo Guppy bowling this morning. A local alley is very kid friendly–they put up bumpers in the gutters, have a ramp to roll the ball down, and serve lunch at the lane.
Guppy won. And not by a little, either. He had 92 to my 74 to Drake’s 60. Was it beginner’s luck? Who knows? But I think I’ll stick to bowling with little kids if I can only manage a 74 WITH BUMPERS.
Sheesh.
My husband G. Grod and I finally started to rein in our household spending, and one of the first things we did was establish a grocery budget. As I’ve worked with the budget, I’ve changed my shopping habits, and with practice I’ve reduced our grocery bill with better planning and fewer impulse buys.
One of the key cost saving measures is buying items from the bulk aisle. Our grocery coop has an impressive selection of items. And if I plan ahead, I can bring my own containers to fill, so I’m reducing waste and not paying for packaging. I now buy a huge number of our staples in bulk: eggs, peanut butter, honey, olive oil, vanilla, pasta, flour, sugar, granola, popcorn, dried fruit and other baking supplies like oats and nuts.
Not only has our weekly grocery bill gone down, but this helps with inventory control, as I’m able to buy just a little at a time, and our recycling has been reduced, because we’re buying much less packaging.
Our coop is having a sale on bulk till the end of April; if you live nearby, give it a try. Bring your own bags, bring your own bulk containers, and save money, space, and waste.
On Monday, I took 4yo Drake and 2yo Guppy to our grocery coop. I sent Drake off to get a dozen bulk eggs. He returned, proud of himself, with an intact carton. Unfortunately, he put them in the cart within Guppy’s reach, so when I turned around, Guppy quickly emptied five of them into the cart, where they broke. The other woman shopping in produce thought laughed, not unkindly, as I hustled to scoop up the dripping eggs and see if they could be used in the deli. (The manager said she’d take them home for her dogs.)
In the bulk aisle, Guppy asked for a chocolate chip. I gave him one. ONE. The next time I turned around, he had chocolate all over his face, his hands, his jacket, and the plush mouse I’d borrowed from the cheese case to distract him. The woman at the register laughed, and said he’d used it like a crayon.
At checkout, Drake insisted on taking his little cart of some of our items to the next register, while Guppy began to scream when I told him he couldn’t have chocolate milk, since we had some at home. The nice woman behind me and her 7yo daughter distracted Guppy till he stopped screaming, and assured me that things get easier. A friend distracted Drake so I could sneak over to the next register and scoop up our items that he’d “helpfully” placed on the conveyer. Amazingly, he didn’t scream at my interference.
It was actually very nice that people were kind enough to see the humor, even as I was struggling with damage control. It’s much better than those “whose kid is THIS?” look that I dread.
A new episode of Bones aired this week, and I was glad for its return.
Did anyone else recognize the actress who played Sweets’ girlfriend April as Delia Fisher from My So Called Life, the nice girl who had a crush on Ricky? Her name is Senta Moses.
The trademark Bones banter was in the forefront, the snoozy murder in the background, and there were some excellent scenes featuring all the main characters.
There was no mention of this season’s big bad, Gormogon, but a recent blurb in EW said the identity would be revealed this season. When asked if it was Sweets, the creator laughed. I hope that meant it’s absurd, because he’s a great recurring character. Why do I think it’s not absurd? He obsessed over the file in an ep earlier this season, and as a psychologist has access to impressionable and possibly criminal young boys.
To Terra is a manga graphic novel that’s been on my shelf since last year; I got it after seeing this rec from Entertainment Weekly:
In Keiko Takemiya’s To Terra: Vol. 1, a computer developed to produce children accidentally creates mutants with telepathic abilities. This exiled race, the Mu, turns to impetuous young Jomy to lead them back to their home planet, Terra, which was nearly destroyed by generations of wasteful humans.
For Fans of…
Classic manga minus the blood and gore; Star Wars.Does It Deliver?
With sharp illustrations and a fast-paced, cerebral plot, Terra is good, clean fun. B+
I’d add that it might also be for fans of Lord of the Rings; there’s a Frodo/Sam relationship going on with two of the characters, and a blind psychic who’s reminiscent of Galadriel. I didn’t have much fun; this wasn’t my cuppa. I did enjoy reading back to front and right to left, but I didn’t always find the illustrations sharp enough to read quickly, or the word bubbles placed in a clear order. In the end, I think this might be best for younger readers and manga fans.
I took a breather in my bender of 2007 books for my book group’s pick, Jill Ker Conway’s Road from Coorain. It’s a memoir of her girlhood on a sheep farm in outback Australia, her education through university, and her difficult and changing relationships with her family, especially her mother.
Conway is a skilled writer. The beginning of the book is a eulogy to her childhood and the few happy years her family lived on a successful sheep farm, prior to a five year drought.
When my father left in the morning to work on the fences, or on one of the three bores that watered the sheep and cattle, my mother heard no human voice save the two children. There was no contact with another human being and the silence was so profound it pressed upon the eardrums. My father, being a westerner, born into that profound peace and silence, felt the need for it like an addiction to a powerful drug. Here, pressed into the earth by the weight of that enormous sky, there is real peace. To those who know it, the annihilation of the self, subsumed into the vast emptiness of nature, is akin to a religious experience. We children grew up to know it and seek it as our father before us. What was social and sensory deprivation for the stranger was the earth and sky that made us what we were. For my mother, the emptiness was disorienting, and the loneliness and silence a daily torment of existential dread.
After she leaves the outback, she begins to recognize Australia as a country unto itself. She was raised and schooled with England, the great colonizer, as the ideal in all things. She carefully chronicles her developing consciousness of Australia’s social and historical tensions. On visiting England for the first time:
My landscape was sparer, more brilliant in color, stronger in its contrast, majestic in its scale,and bathed in shimmering light.
Conway went on to become a noted historian of women’s history in America, and the president of Smith College. This memoir of her early years is an engaging look into one woman’s struggle for intellectual independence from the constraints of Australian education, and emotional independence from her mother.
Interestingly, there were a few things in this book that reminded me of Marianne Wiggins’ Shadow Catcher, written last year. The description of the self-crushing isolation above is similar to how Wiggins writes of the drive from California to Las Vegas. And both books feature fathers who die early, and somewhat mysteriously, and the children’s subsequent troubled relationship with the mother. I was surprised and pleased to find common threads in these two seemingly random books from my reading pile.