A Sunday in July

As is my usual excuse, I've been devoting my time to other, more time consuming tasks than writing, so far·ra·go sits on a back burner, barely simmering, with a slimy skin forming on the top....

Well, Shoot!
I worked last week in my chosen career, that of video production guy. I went to Omaha on Sunday July 11 for two nights. It was kind of weird doing that after not having done it for nearly a full year. Some things came to me like I had last done them yesterday, while others took some thought. Most frustrating was my intermittent inability to find certain non-essential-yet-still-crucial little buttons on the camera. But, in all, it was like getting on a bike again. I walked away kinda sweaty with a sore ass.

Don't go there.


P90Xtasy? Uh, no....
I've completed week number three of twelve in the P90X Extreme Home Fitness program. I'm still alive. I think my belly is slimming down a bit, but it's hard to tell. My pants are loose again. I think that's a good sign. Feel free to follow my progress, bitching, and moaning at my P90X blog, P90Xperiment



My Eye Queue
I've been squeezing in a few movies lately, chipping away slowly at my Netflix queue. Recent movies have been The Simpsons Movie, which I swear I had never seen before, but so much of it was familiar I doubt myself (but when did I see it?!); Million Dollar Baby; Ratatouille; and, just today, 3:10 to Yuma.

Million Dollar Baby
I have always taken Clint Eastwood — as a director — with a grain of salt. I come under the gun (to make a pun) with friends and film nuts alike whenever I give them my opinion of Eastwood's Unforgiven which was hailed as an instant classic in an era when the Western is all but dead. I saw it as pointless, a violent soapbox diatribe claiming to be against violence. I must be the only one.

So it was with a similar attitude that I watched my Blu-Ray player swallow the Million Dollar Baby disc. It was a likeable story about a determined young woman, played by Hillary Swank, whose dream was only to be trained as a fighter by her vision of the greatest trainer that ever lived, the old, worn-out boxing trainer portrayed by Eastwood, who thinks a woman training in his gym is bad for business. Of course, he's finally convinced, thanks to her tenacity, to take her on. Of course, he's dealing with the emotional loss of his daughter, estranged from him years ago and who refuses to communicate with him, and he feels a paternal tug toward this young woman who is otherwise alone.

So I expected a boxing movie, only with a woman in the ring kicking ass and making her way to the champeenship, which she of course wins.

Not.

This movie hits you with a surprise haymaker from your blind side, and redefines "unpredictable." I won't spoil it for anyone who has a worse record of movie-going than I do (this film was released in 2005!), But I will say that I'm not supposed to cry like that over a boxing film!

Mr. Eastwood, I bow to you and your directing prowess, and I give your film four Netflix stars. Million Dollar Baby deserves all the Academy Awards it received (Best Director, Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor (Morgan Freeman), and Best Actress (Swank)).

Unforgiven still blows, though. Thanks.

Ratatouille
Set aside the ridiculous proposition that a rat could be a culinary genius, communicating to an inept human the movements necessary to create impossibly delicious dishes. Okay... done?

This film was FANTASTIC! With each progression of digitally animated storytelling, Pixar Studios further hones the craft and sets the new standard for it. The detail in Ratatouille is mind-boggling, both in attention to character movement, as well as scenic background elements. There are several scenes of Paris exteriors that I had to pause the film to study, almost convinced that the background was at best a mix of actual photos/film of Paris street scenes. But no. It's all art work of unbelievable meticulousness and realism.

And the story. Aside from its preposterous premise (but how else to get the kids in the theater seats?), the story was sweet, dealing with relationships at both the human level and the rat, through conflict and motives, needs and desires. And the best part? No musical numbers! There's a good bit of slapstick — necessary for the ADHD set — and a nice balance of shtick and witty banter for the parents they dragged with them. There's also a bit of a surprise, as the usual happy ending isn't quite what you expect it to be. Great vocalizations carry the story comfortably, despite an inexplicable inconsistency of French accents (some have them, some don't; none of the rats do).

I thoroughly enjoyed Ratatouille, laughing out loud many times while watching it. If you like animated films, I highly recommend this one. If you don't like animated films, then screw you. Go watch Million Dollar Baby again.

3:10 to Yuma (spoiler alert!!)
Based on a 1957 film of the same title, and an Elmore Leonard short story, it's about a poor rancher who agrees to house a captured gang leader, and then assist with transporting him on a two-day ride to the town of Contention in order to put the prisoner on a train to Yuma.

Starring Russell Crowe and Christian Bale, this film is billed as a psychological drama against an Old West backdrop, but as such it falls short. This is an action-adventure film, with very little suspense or psychological intrigue, if any. If it doesn't act like a duck, don't call it a duck.

The film certainly lives up to its correctly identified genre, but that's about it. If you like shoot-em-ups with lots of exploding blood-packs and guys falling off horses, then you won't be disappointed. If you want a story that makes sense, look elsewhere. Crowe is cast as the fearsome bad guy, Ben Wade, who earns his gang's respect through terror and swift repercussions for less than exceptional work. He has made his fortune by repeatedly robbing the stagecoach that carries the railroad's payroll, haplessly guarded by Pinkerton's Security Services. Bale portrays the rancher, Dan Evans, who the land-hungry railroad agent has on the ropes by damming up a creek that would otherwise bring water to his cattle and his grassland.

Evans facilitates Wade's capture by stalling him in a saloon while the law and railroad men move in on him, and then he accepts their offer of money if he'll assist them in first housing Wade and then in transporting him to the nearest railroad town, a couple days' ride away.

Wade then commences a confusing dance of murdering some of his escorts while submitting to others. By the end, it's just Wade, Evans, Evans's son, and the weasely railroad agent waiting nervously in the town of Contention for the train to Yuma to arrive, as Wade's ruthless gang descend on the town to free him. Inexplicably, Wade assists Evans in getting him to the train through the gauntlet of lead sprayed around the town by Wade's men, despite several opportunities to either kill Evans or simply escape. And does Evans really do all this because his boy thinks he's a wuss? Apparently so. And all for naught, as Evans is finally gunned down by Wade's men just as Wade willingly gets into the cell-car of the train. And Wade's show of gratitude to his men? He kills them all. And then he gets back on the train to go to jail.

WTF?

Maybe Elmore Leonard's 4500 word short story explains it better. Maybe the original 1957 film does a better job of outlining why Wade doesn't kill Evans with the many opportunities the 2007 film offers him.

Maybe, if you've been wanting to see this film after missing its theatrical release (like I did), you'll just change your mind. The Simpsons Movie is more intellectually gratifying.



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Random Successes

I can't seem to put two thoughts together lately for a meaningful post. The taxi driving still provides fodder I think would make for great stories, but I think I'm suffering from sensory overload; they all just dissolve to a blurry background beyond the field of focus.

Instead, I'll just post pretty pictures. All mine, of course.



I finally completed a successful flip! Not 100% successful, as you can see upon close scrutiny, but the breaks "healed" almost instantaneously on the heat, and I had two "dunky" eggs for breakfast. The above photo was taken on July 6, 2010. I haven't had a successful one again since.



Crepuscular Rays. I got the term "Jacob's Ladder" from a Rush song of that name, off their Permanent Waves album. Kind of a neat song if you can find it and give it a listen (hint: YouTube). Sitting at the Arlington Heights train station, I was treated to this sight one late afternoon after a day of rain. Carrying my camera in the taxi finally paid off somewhat.



Tonight's dinner. And tomorrow's lunch. And meals for a good chunk of the week! Rubbed with olive oil, sprinkled with "Italian Seasoning," and roasted over indirect, 350° heat on my Weber gas grill, alternately turned 180° and flipped over every 15 minutes for an hour and a half, and the meat practically fell off the bone at my mere suggestion! It's the one culinary thing I'm actually good at! Can you say "Mmmmmmmmmmmm?"



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In re: Thematic Photographic #104 - Dotty

Carmi's theme this week was dotty things.


Exposed aggregate concrete • Hoffman Estates, Illinois
July 2, 2010



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Anthem

Oh! Say, can you see by the dawn's early light
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight
O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming!

And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there!

Oh! Say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave!


We Americans, I say with much hope, memorize the words to our national anthem, but I feel that seldom does anyone really pause to analyze the words and grasp their meaning.

The oft-maligned choice for our national anthem is criticized for its wide vocal range that the average citizen can’t cover and for its anachronistic poetic structure. But rather than wax eloquent about the beauty and bounty of our nation, as so many nations’ anthems do; or strut with musically arrogant pride about our power and might above all others, as so many other nations’ anthems do, ours highlights a mere moment in our history that typifies our collective resolve: we always come through in the clutch.

Written as a poem by Francis Scott Key, it was adopted as our National Anthem in 1931.

Key, sent as part of a party to a flotilla of British ships off of Baltimore harbor during the war of 1812 to secure the safe return of American prisoners of war, was then detained on the ship as plans were laid to bombard Fort McHenry. The bombardment lasted through the night and was so fierce that Key could only imagine total destruction of the fort. But, through the night the light from “the rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air, gave proof” that the American flag seen flying over the fort in “the twilight’s last gleaming” the evening before, was still there.

"Oh! Look there, in the light of the sunrise! You can see it, what we looked on so proudly last night — the brightly colored stars and stripes we saw flying over the ramparts during the battle as the sun went down!

"We could see in the red light of the rockets, and the bombs exploding around it all night, that our flag was still there!

"And now, as the battle is ended, we see that our flag still flies over the land of the free and the home of the brave!"

When I think of the song in terms of the story it tells, I’m filled with the pride Francis Scott Key must have felt that morning when he saw that flag flying “by the dawn’s early light.”

And yes, I cry.

Happy Birthday, USA!

(parts of this post lifted from a May 6, 2007 Farrago post)