The best way to see this film is accompanied by an omakase dinner of world-class sushi.
If that’s impossible, as it was with me, who watched it while trying to choke down a deeply unsatisfying microwaved frozen burrito, you’ll find “Jiro Dreams of Sushi,” directed and shot by David Gelb, to be sumptuous torture. As you might expect, Gelb packs the film with one image after another of glistening morsels of raw fish photographed artfully on black lacquer plates; it edges on the pornographic in the best possible way. Continue reading ‘Indie Roundup: ‘Jiro Dreams of Sushi’’
Hayao Miyazaki might very well be the best regarded filmmaker working today. He is worshipped by animators everywhere; John Lasseter, the head of Pixar and director of “Toy Story,” called him “one of the great filmmakers of our time.” He is by far the highest-grossing filmmaker in Japan; in his home country, his 2003 Oscar-winning masterpiece “Spirited Away” proved to be a bigger box-office draw than “Titanic.” Miyazaki-themed merchandise has filled toy boxes of Japanese children for a generation. And a few years ago, he even opened the Disneyland-like Ghibli Museum on the outskirts of Tokyo. Yet in the States, he remains a relatively obscure name.
This week that might start to change as Miyazaki’s latest movie, “Ponyo,” is finally getting its American release. Boasting the voice talent of Liam Neeson, Matt Damon, Tina Fey along with Miley Cyrus’ little sister Noah and the Jonas Brothers’ younger sibling Frankie, “Ponyo” is an exceedingly loose adaptation from Hans Christian Andersons’s “The Little Mermaid.” Continue reading ‘Hayao Miyazaki: The Greatest Director You’ve (Probably) Never Heard Of’
The entire cast from The Wire is campaigning for Obama in North Carolina.
New sexy Halloween costumes for women, including the ever popular Sexy Elephant man costume.
The freakish, apparently true tale of BrianPeppers — internet meme, pedophile, Toledo native.
Christian loonies worship before the golden bull of Wall Street. Literally. Isn’t this the sort of thing that brought plagues of locust in the Bible? [h/t Ted]
Did you know that some Christian dingbat has dubbed today the “Day of Prayer for the World’s Economies?” Well here they are, at the Wall Street bull statue thing, praying to Jesus for money. The dingbat has explained, “We are going to intercede at the site of the statue of the bull on Wall Street to ask God to begin a shift from the bull and bear markets to what we feel will be the ‘Lion’s Market,’ or God’s control over the economic systems.” Don’t they know that God taking over the economic systems would be SOCIALISM from SPACE?
This independently produced pink eiga has all the hallmarks of a Koji Wakamatsu movie, like Go, Go Be a Virgin A Second Time — namely radical politics and naked women — but little of its poetry. The plot, as such, is a 60s radical sees a girl on the beach, he tries to rape her, and — after a whole lot of flailing around on the sand — she escapes missing a couple articles of clothing. Repeat until naked. Throw in some news footage of student protests and the Vietnam war and that’s pretty much the movie. It’s a pretty thin plot to be stretched for 73 minutes, and though the director, Toshio Okuwaki, does his best to pad it out with trippy sound effects, excessive use of slow motion, and bizarre unmotivated zooms. At it’s moments, it has a unhinged dream-like quality that reminded me a bit of Woman of the Dunes (perhaps it was all that sand) but for the most part it’s a dull, poseurish flick that pretensions of art, but in reality is flaccid crap.
An article about how most traditional Japanese hotels refuse to let gaijin stay there. And here why those motel’s might be right in having such a policy.
A collection of links found while trolling the interweb, trying to not freak out about the polls:
I’m getting mighty sick of Sarah Palin. Look at the news, look at the blogs, looks at the freakin’ tabloids and it’s Palin, Palin, Palin. No discussion of the economy, various wars, healthcare etc etc. Yesterday Palin faceplanted with she struggled to explain what the Bush doctrine is. Here’s another clip.
A 22 year-old woman auctions off her virginity to pay for her Master’s Degree. She graduated with a BA in Women’s Studies, which is kinda funny.
A 27-year old writer takes one for the team and personally tests different brands of adult diapers.
A cool collection of jam comics from Flickr. [h/t Ted]
An interesting article about the psychology of creative folks.
And here’s a nice bit of animation about Japanese artist Hokusai.
MODESTO, Calif. – Police say a man tried to cut off his own arm at a restaurant in Modesto, Calif., because he thought he had injected air into a vein while shooting cocaine and feared he would die unless he took drastic action.
Authorities say 33-year-old Michael Lasiter rushed into the Denny’s restaurant late Friday and started stabbing himself in one arm with a butter knife he grabbed from a table.
They say that when that knife didn’t work Lasiter took a butcher knife from the kitchen and dug it into his arm.
Police Sgt. Brian Findlen says Lasiter told officers he thought he needed to amputate his arm to keep himself from dying from the cocaine injection.
Lasiter was taken to a hospital for treatment of severe cuts.
The Denny’s closed for the night.
That last line is the clincher for me.
Finally, a youtube clip that’s been posted a lot but deserves to be seen more.
Darwin reportedly spent much of his later life investigating whether or not blonde did indeed have more fun. Or at least that’s what he was telling his wife.
And then there’s American Carol, a remarkably dissociative screed against Michael Moore, liberals, critical thought, intelligence in general. Watching this gave me a migraine. More on the flick here.
Another soulless creation squeezed out from the plastic asshole of American culture.
Just in case you were confused by the whole battle between God and Satan, this graphic nicely keeps score.
And here’s a great quote from Hunter S. Thompson I ran across:
Breakfast is the only meal of the day that I tend to view with the same kind of traditionalized reverence that most people associate with Lunch and Dinner. I like to eat breakfast alone, and almost never before noon; anybody with a terminally jangled lifestyle needs at least one psychic anchor every twenty-four hours, and mine is breakfast. In Hong Kong, Dallas or at home — and regardless of whether or not I have been to bed — breakfast is a personal ritual that can only be properly observed alone, and in a spirit of genuine excess. The food factor should always be massive: four Bloody Marys, two grapefruits, a pot of coffee, Rangoon crepes, a half-pound of either sausage, bacon, or corned beef hash with diced chiles, a Spanish omelette or eggs Benedict, a quart of milk, a chopped lemon for random seasoning, and something like a slice of Key lime pie, two margaritas, and six lines of the best cocaine for dessert…. Right, and there should also be two or three newspapers, all mail and messages, a telephone, a notebook for planning the next twenty-four hours and at least one source of good music…. All of which should be dealt with outside, in the warmth of a hot sun, and preferably stone naked.
And finally, a trailer from the infamously awful Mighty Peking Man. It has it all — tiger attacks, blonde she-tarzans, and guys in rubber suits trashing a cardboard Hong Kong.
Hayao Miyazaki
