I know I know, I made a big deal about switching from the last blog to this one. Sorry to do this again so soon, but please check out The Ashcan. Me and a few of my fellow un/under-employed journalist friends decided to pool our resources and do the group blog thang.
Five Deadly Everythings will keep going, both as a portfolio and a blog – my nerdier posts will find a home here so as to not drag down the Ashcan, as well you’ll liekly see a return to some personal real-life posts. If you’ve been with me since the OKP days, you know what’s up. Afterall, what is a blogger without an existential crisis (as a colleauge once wrote on her own site)? I’ll be back soon. I think I might post some pics to fill in the gaps since my last Facebook album, which feels like eons ago. Till then.
Thirst: Not bad, but not badass.
Thirst is not a vampire flick, is not a horror film, is sort of a really funny black comedy and ultimately is, certainly, a lunatic love story. In it a Catholic priest named Sang-Hyun travels to Africa and volunteers for a medical experiment, accepting a blood transfusion that infects him with a deadly virus in the hopes of facilitating the discovery of a cure. The rest of the test subjects die, but Sang-Hyun survives as a sort of vampire, hungry for blood and vulnerable to sunlight.
His vampirism circumvents his apparent martyr-complex–he’s now unable to die, much less for a cause, and instead of martydom he achieves status as a miracle, sought after as a faith-healer. His vampirism comes with superpowers including heightened senses (fanged teeth sold separately), senses that drive his infatuation with Tae-Ju, a friend’s mistreated wife, to new and uncontrollably lustful territory.
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Paul Pope is a a comic book artist with alt-tendencies and a freaky-deaky sense of composition who combines elements of Euro strips and Japanese manga. He once did a story about a German Batman on the cusp of World War II who fights to keep an Austrian engineer’s valuable work from being co-opted by the Nazis. And that’s some of his mainstream work.
Anyway, Pope’s work is featured in a recent fashion spread in Complex Magazine combining his art with live models, and the result is pop trash goodness. Complex’s design director is a dude named Tim Leong, who comic heads will remember as editor-in-chief of the now defunct Comic Foundry magazine. Leong’s CF mag was a breath of fresh air for the comics community that combined mainstream and indie coverage and wrapped it all in a lifestyle package. It was a comic mag with fashion spreads, fer crissakes, and it was all actually quite dope while it lasted.
Anyway, I’m sure Leong had everything to do with Pope doing a fashion spread for Complex, and I hope the spirit of CF continues to pop up in Complex as it has in the past (they had a special comics issue awhile back as well). A mag that covers hip-hop and comics and has a multi-culti vision of sexy will always be close to my heart. Even if the writing isn’t that great. (Hint hint, call me.)
Thematically, many post-apocalyptic stories look backwards and ‘the future’ becomes a slippery concept rather than a narrative eventuality. This is true for Love and Human Extinction, which looks at the last three survivors of an unexplainable phenomenon that killed off the rest of humanity. As a former businessman-turned-grave robber and a former factory worker-turned-religious sentry spar with each other over the affections of the last woman on earth, it becomes clear that they are mostly play-acting, holding on to a semblance of society.
The wardrobes are a wonderfully playful mish-mash of vintage pieces, the weapons are plastic toys and a toy wagon sits in the corner. The childish dynamic between the three survivors is the play’s most intriguing aspect, and Jennifer Neals is especially captivating as Bertie, who lost her pregnancy during the disaster and now slips in and out of lucidity. Unfortunately ‘the past’ ends up hindering the play as the struggle between the characters takes a backseat to long bouts of exposition, one character recalling events as the other two stay frozen in the background.
The expository segments detail several setups that sound intriguing enough you want to see them occur rather than just hear about them, especially one story of a failed group suicide attempt which to this day scars one of the characters. Somewhere in the poetic exchanges between Love and Human Extinction’s characters and their exposition lies a much better, more interesting character study. And although the play starts wonderfully, its half-paced buildup and lack of a concrete ending or nod to the characters’ futures seems less thematic than it does unfocused.
Taking a week or so off to clean house behind the scenes and get right on other fronts beside the blog. And to finally watch Lost. All of it. In the meantime, you can find me on twitter (@jeflee). Big thanks for checking in during this testing-the-waters phase; to those who sent messages, all the feedback was much appreciated and you’ll likely see your suggestions take form in one way or another in the weeks to come. Back in seven days!
Frustrated you ain’t progressin’ in a recession? Hop onto the spaceship and ride. After years in the vault, the video for Kanye’s “Spaceship” (featuring GLC and Consequence) finally sees the light of day.
[After the jump]
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When Spec Boogie first announced plans for “Summer Movie Season” – a project where he would record tracks based on his favourite films, using samples from their soundtracks for the beats and scene clips for the videos – I assumed it would be one of those things that sounds cooler than it actually is. You know, like rapping over Nintendo beats.
I felt his first installment was uninspired, based on Walter Hill’s The Warriors, and I assumed Spec would continue down the road of obvious choices. I was wrong, of course. Surprisingly, he followed up with an ode to Tim Burton’s Edward Scissorhands. I didn’t think the song worked as a whole, but it definitely was interesting, especially the use of scissor-snaps as high hats.
Now, with his most recent entry, Spec nails it. Based on Darren Aronofsky’s Requiem for a Dream, Spec’s latest is well-written and paired perfectly with the film’s agitated score. The track works on its own but sounds even better when laid over Aronofsky’s visuals. Extra points for mirroring the film’s devastating downward spiral ending.
I’ll be following this project either way, but here’s to hoping Spec continues to play off more left-field choices. By using films that don’t lend themselves so obviously to hip-hop, he could have something really cool and inventive on his hands.
[Spec Boogie's "Requiem for a Dream" after the jump:]
I saw Up on opening night but hadn’t gotten around to thinking about it until now, hence the late review. That delay got me thinking though – why hadn’t I thought at all about a movie I was so impressed with as I walked out of the theatre?
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Last week’s episode of Batman: the Brave and the Bold was both a subtle kick in the nuts to militant fanboys who decry the cartoon’s playfulness and want a return to the tortured-soul Batman and also a dead-on tribute to classic Warners Brother’s animation. There’s a bunch of in-jokes for animation heads, comics fanboys and general casual cartoon watchers and, depending on where you’re coming from, the episode works on several different levels. Mainly though it’s great fun and it really shows how far cartoons have fallen off in recent years. Watch along after the jump.
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