Song Of The Day: A Kiss With A Fist

Florence + the Machines

A Kiss With A Fist

Definitely a wierd one, I'm curious as to reactions. I've heard that female violence has gotten a lot worse lately-as if somehow females have felt empowered to

be more mean and vicious than males; we've become the abusers.

Is it that?

Or is Florence reacting to some jerk who threw her over?

I'm not sure, but I find it quite an interesting song (listen to the lyrics!) and I kinda sorta love her outfit here.

Uh, if you hate it....sorry! I'm getting stranger and stranger....

Movie Review: What's Eating Gilbert Grape

What's Eating Gilbert Grape

Starring: Johnny Depp, Leonardo DiCaprio, Juliette Lewis

My movie favorite list has been pretty permanent for some time...the last time i changed was several months ago when I added East Of Eden. Since then, most of the happy-ending movies were pithy, and the artistic movies were depressing. I need both.

YES!

What's Eating Gilbert, I will disclaim right at the front, is not a happy movie. It tells the story of a messy family. The film centralizes on Gilbert, on whom all the burdens of the family rest. The father is no longer with them; his story is slowly revealed throughout the film. Since the loss of her husband, Gilbert's Momma simply sits on the sofa and eats, frozen in her hurt. Her youngest son is extremely mentally disabled. On top of caring for both mother and brother, Gilbert is the only capable son and is responsible for providing for the family, including two other sisters. Obviously, its a story full of ache.

But its so compelling, because every character is perfectly acted. They are beautiful, broken humans. I felt them! Maybe that's just little miss Taken Internally, but I was so involved. Every character is intricate and detailed, and at the same time so very understated and mild. Johnny Depp is a master, flat out. And Leo...well, he's unbelievable. Really, its inconceivable how phenomenally he plays Arnie, the handicapped boy. I was enthralled.

Only watch it if you're prepared to handle messy characters and lots of lost beauty. But maybe that's why I loved it...they were lost beauties, but they were trying, and wanting, so badly to regain what they had lost.

Surviving On Musicals

I know I haven't been posting much lately...I'm sorry, I can't think of anything to say. In fact, I can barely get myself through each day. I've never had days that took so long to get over! They just stretch on and on, with no purpose in them.

If you knew me, you'd laugh. I'm the girl on a mission. Who is always stressed because there isn't enough minutes to do all that MUST be done that day, all the school and paintings and novels and pieces of fabric all waiting for me to get into them and create something. You wouldn't recognize me now, I'm afraid.

I feel embarrassed to cry, so I've created a new outlet for my girlish emotion: musicals and old films. I must watch one every night or I absolutely lose it and can't carry on. I've gone through them voraciously, Sabrina, High Noon, Gone With The Wind, and Fiddler On The Roof have been my latest conquests. I eat them whole, consuming the luscious, intricate costuming, clever and thoughtful dialogue, uplifting force-you-to-sing scores, or epic wide-screen scenery shots.

I'm waiting for a rescue, or at least for school to start, but until then, thank God for old movies! Anyone have reccomendations for any more? I don't care how grainy the black and white is, or predictable every line is, I just need food for survival!

Oh, and if my posts are all about old people for the next...say, 10 posts, I'm sorry. I can't help it, its all I'm living off.

Tale of an Early Ancient

can you be too old at eighteen? it doesn't seem like it should be possible, but i feel just old. so old. an old body, old eyes, old ideas, old friends, old conversation...everything...decrepit.

i spend so much time not moving...sluggardly sitting on my bed, or on my sofa, or at my desk, or at the dining room table, or in front of the fire...always, always sitting. i'm so sick of sitting. its all making me sort of sick and disgusted.

worse of all, i'm so old that i don't even feel like i can get up and do soemthing about it...like i'm just going to be this crumbling elderly all my life. and the whole time i'm screaming at myself, "how can you be so foul!?" but my muscles have already atrophied and melted, and my bones are brittle, and to top it all off my head is so weary that it can't even command attention from my ancient body.

I watched Bend It Like Beckham...horrible movie, never watch it...but i sat with drooling envy of the lithe, lean, tan and healthy bodies of the soccer players. they were alive with energy, alive with compeition and eagerness and action. I wanted to be them so badly!

but its cold outside and my head just hurts if i think of doing something active. and so i sit. years passing as hours. waiting for something to aliven me. something that will probably never come unless i bring it myself...but alas, i am that fool.

Song Of The Day: Lullaby

Lullaby By Priscilla Ahn

Song for closing your eyes and smiling.

She grew up in both Pennsylvania and Korea, since her mother is Korean. She has a simplistic, elegant style to her music. Priscilla plays both guitar and piano, which I'm utterly jealous of. She was waitressing, depressed, and just about to quit music when she made friends with Joshua Radin, a beginning-blooming indie artist, who introduced her to other indie artists, and....viola! a hit EP and a bit of a name. I think she'll only get bigger.

She just started a blog,

girlinatree.blogspot.com

it's really girly and young and...well, just some girl!

Lullaby

Just Plain Hair Girls

When me and my sister were little, we used to get along beautifully.

We had our own world, that was very sensible and steady to us. I think I'm about forgotten about that world, now. But once in awhile I think of something that reminds me of it.

Me and sissy had "Just Plain Hair" girls. They were the girls who we couldn't think of anything to say or do with them-they were just there, with the hair on their heads. And that was all. The Just Plain Hair girls were a branching from the "Just Plain Nice" girls. The Just Plain Nice girls were those that were nice and pleasant, but not much else. It was better to be a Just Plain Nice girl than a Just Plain Hair girl.

We thought of them both when we went out to dinner with Amber and her roommate Colleen. Amber was my mother's God-child, about fifteen years older than us, and in college. Mom loved Amber, and was attempting nicety to Colleen. We went to some Rancho tex-mex place, where Sissy silently listened to the conversation at the table. In our ow room at night, we made our observations: Amber, who was very sweet but never took any interest in us, was Just Plain Nice. As for the roommate, we could think of nothing about her but her huge, curly, streaky mane. She was our first Just Plain Hair girl. We spent the night giggling about it, and randomly added other people in the categories as when time went on. Nobody else ever knew about it.

Funny, I haven't thought about that for years. But come to think about it, they were great categories. Lots of people fit in them. Then, we didn't like the people in those categories very much, but now, there are so many worse categories, I've come to appreciate the Just Plain Nice girl.

Movie Review: Burn After Reading

Burn After Reading

Starring: Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Tilda Swinton, John Malkovich, Frances McDormand

I had pretty simple reasons for wanting to see this film; I love Brad Pitt and I'd always wanted to see a Cohen brothers film. I've been reading reviews on their movies for years, but never actually watched one, because they were all so dark! I almost always hate dark films.

Burn After Reading, though also dark, was also supposed to be a bit of a comedy, and starred my beloved Brad, so I decided to give it a try.

Bad plan.

I laughed a total of three times-solely when Brad was shown in a brilliant performance as a gym-instructor simpleton.

The rest of the film misery. It told an involved story intertwining 6 middle-aged people, all going through some kind of crisis.

George Clooney's character is a cowardly philanderer trying to keep all his middle-aged women pleased with him at once.

Tilda Swinton's character is a snappy, sour woman who despises her husband and actually believe's Clooney's character will eventually marry her.

John Malkovich's character, Tilda's husband, has been recently fired and is furious with the world.

Frances McDormand's character is a pathetic single woman also working at the gym, and also one of Clooney's lovers, hoping to get plastic surgery and reinvent herself.

Somehow, when Frances and Brad find what they think is a CD containing high-security CIA information (Tilda stole the information from her husband's computer in an attempt to get a divorce, and accidentally left it at the gym), they try to use their find to sell it for money. Through a series of stupid confusions, half of the characters end up dead by the end of the movie, in a frantic chase for what is really nothing but Malkovich's bitter memiors of his job.

The movie ends with two CIA agents, trying to understand the whole mess and put it behind them permanently, sitting in an empty office.

"And what have we learned from all this?" one asks. The other shakes his head, replying

"Jesus Fucking Christ. I have no idea."

Which pretty sums up the whole movie. 1 2/3 hours of selfish, shallow, foul-mouthed idiots.

I will admit I loved Brad's character in it, and almost found it worth it for him. He plays a quirky, loveably loser with such believable facial expressions and manner of talking I swear everybody will think of someone they know. Just him constantly chewing gum made me laugh.

I have no idea what Ethan and Joel Cohen were thinking, I suppose to expose the darkness and gloom of middle-aged bitterness. I'm sorry for them.

Song Of The Day: Oh Love

Oh Love

by

Brad Paisley

and Carrie Underwood

Brad wrote this gorgeous song, and since he's become friends with the gorgeous Carrie Underwood, he invited her to sing along!

Its a sweet, gentle little song, I personally love it.

Both Brad and Carrie are very gracious people, and are starting out the new year happily:

Brad is at home with his lovely wife Kimberly Williams-Paisley and his two children, and Carrie just got engaged!!

Oh Love

Ode To Ice Cream: The Lesson

I was so excited, you know,

when I discovered the Edy's 2 for $6.00

I scanned the flavors eagerly,

determined to find the two very most

absolutely delicious.

Finally, I found them,

in their icecreamy glory,

Pink Peppermint

and

Mocha Chip Espresso

and with my treasured loot, i checked out

and rushed home to delight.

But home, with my two ice cream cartons,

a glass sundae dish,

and a spoon,

i suddenly ran into a dilemma:

In my haste to choose my two very favorite flavors,

i had completely forgotten,

to chose flavors that matched!

No one in their right mind would eat mocha espresso and pink peppermint at the same time.

well, i wasn't in my right mind,

I wanted them both,

and so both i consumed.

So first I ate the espresso,

and without even stopping to savor the fresh, snappy flavor,

I dove into the peppermint.

until I discovered-

i couldn't taste the peppermint!

my taste buds had been ruined by espresso,

and now the peppermint was muted and nothing.

I was absolutely distraught,

but i kept eating it,

sure that somehow this tastebud trauma would wear off.

My friend, it never did.

So the moral of this story is twofold:

one, don't try two mismatching ice cream flavors at the same time,

and

two, don't grab for everything wonderful at once- you might get nothing!

Song Of The Day:

Run

by

Benton

Paul

I'm sorry I've been so few and far between with my Song Of The Day choices, I thought I'd do more...hopefully i will in 2010!!

Benton Paul is a newbie on the music circle. He's been touring with American Idol alum, especially David Archuletta and Michael Johns. He's from Utah, and has a lovely, friendly personality. Happily for me, he signs off his blog posts "God is love. Music is in the trees and the air you breathe." Which I think is quite a cheerful way to say goodbye.

This was a free download on itunes a month or so ago, so maybe some of you got to enjoy it then.

Take a listen!

watch Run

Movie Review: Becoming Jane

Movie Review: Becoming Jane

Starring: Anne Hathaway and James McAvoy

If you don't love Jane Austen, there really is no point to seeing this movie, I don't think. Some may say that the story is fascinating and valuable without any interest in Jane Austen, but I think if you don't love Jane, you'll just be angry at this sad story.

I think its fair to warn everybody that Becoming Jane doesn't end like you want it to; any Austen fan would know this from the beginning, anyway.
Jane never found her Mr. Darcy. But what was it, then, that led her to write such clever, beautiful, and happy novels? Becoming Jane shows exactly how her writing developed, what led her to write what she did, and all she went through and sacrificed.

I loved the film for Jane's snappy dialogue, so cleverly showing Jane's talent for words in her conversation. Its a prim, stylized speech, much like Pride and Prejudice, where the audience has to pay close attention to understand the underlying meanings of the spoken words.

I also loved the way the director had of weaving in scenes and moments that later showed up in her books: a smarting conversation during a country ball, Darcy's run through the rain, etc. Watch carefully!

The movie is well done, with talented actors and actresses bringing these people of the past to life. The settings and costuming is fascinating of course, with all the old fashioned trimmings.

If you can take the sadness, do watch and enjoy. Otherwise, save your movie time for something easier on the heart.
Personally, I find the happy ending in the loveliness of her novels, that have lasted all the way into this new decade.

To the kid who wrote "Paul Newman as Butch Cassidy" as his favorite movie character

To the kid who actually does color inside the lines with a new coloring book, because they want to make it look pretty:

To the person who has put the lines to an obscure Sulfjan Stevens song, instead of a Hannah Montana poster or "I <3>