Oscar Polishing

I've now seen all of the Best Picture nominations I can "legally" see before February 22nd. Benjamin Button, Frost / Nixon, Slumdog Millionaire and Milk down; just The Reader to go. Unfortunately due to the fools who schedule release dates in New Zealand, I'll have to wait until the end of April to see The Reader. Grrr.

The verdict so far: of the 4 I've seen, Milk is the better film , with Frost/Nixon a distant second. So many of Gus van Sant's projects have been hit and miss in the past, but here he delivers with a biopic of the 1970s Gay Rights activist, Harvey Milk. Not only is Sean Penn a joy to watch but his co-stars James Franco and Josh Brolin also deserve a mention, and the film - and Milk's passion - effectively does for San Fransisco what Woody Allen did for New York.

In Ron Howard's Frost/Nixon, Michael Sheen and Frank Langella dazzle in front of a stellar cast. Not to everybody's taste (a 2-hour film about an interview), the only criticism I have of the film is that the talking-head sections - where the supporting characters explain away their motives - feels as unnecessary as Harrison Ford's voiceover in Blade Runner.

Although Benjamin Button is a great film, it is in no-way Oscar-material and not a patch on Fincher's previous film, Zodiac - completely ignored by the Oscars last year (probably due to an early release more than anything else). I still find it difficult to accept that Benjamin Button and David Fincher received Best Picture and Best Directing nominations whilst The Dark Knight and Christopher Nolan were snubbed.

Slumdog Millionaire - while as visually stunning as all Danny Boyle's work - is the victim of a forced, childlike narrative. It's worth watching just to see the transition between Boyle's previous film and this. The very fact that this director can effortlessly go from Sunshine, one of the finest British science-fiction films ever, to a feelgood knockabout drama set in Mumbai should see him earn the directing award at the very least.

I found it amusing that Indians apparently don't pronounce the penultimate syllable in the word 'millionaire', so when the guy playing the presenter of the game show kept saying the word, it sounded like a Frenchman saying the word 'milliner'. Bizarrely, this made the game show sound like "Who wants to be a Hat Maker".

All of this is in sharp contrast to a film I watched last week - Wanted, starring James McAvoy, Morgan Freeeman and Angelina Jolie. Although it's always nice to see Terence Stamp, even his appearance couldn't save this film - a mixture of Matrix-style sci-fi, Star Wars-style mythology and LOUD MUSIC. Bad? It plumbed new depths of shit. Can we please have no more films - ever - where the lead character is 'the one', 'the chosen one', or some other such calling? I'll take the shot of Angelina Jolie in a state of undress though. Always.

Miniature snow drift

Tampere, 23 January 2009

Adventures In Millinery

I've just done something I thought I have never done before in my adult life, and thought I would never ever do.

I have bought myself a hat.

Now for most people this isn't a big thing, but for me it's akin to taking up religion or giving up porn: it goes totally against my grain. I've opted for one of those black military-style hats a Cuban revolutionary might wear. Which means if New Zealand's society ever crumbles, and I have to lead a band of freedom fighters across the land, at least I'll look the part.

For many years, I've hated the sight of anyboy wearing a hat (which is completely at odds with my love of Hitchcock films, where hat-wearing is key). However, girls can get away with wearing hats. Especially if said hat comprises 50% - or more - of their total clothing. Here's a good example:

Here's another example, just in case I didn't get my point across the first time:





















I still hate those fashionable trilbys that they sell to pubescent males in clothes shops. It should be a law that if a guy ever puts one of those on his head duing the 21st century, the nearest bystander should be obliged to flip it off his head as though it was a wild animal ready to attack. If you do, for some reason, choose to wear one of those, you're in danger of being mistaken for that cunt from the band Orson:

Now this guy has forged a career, not out of the music his band has written, but because of the fact he wears a hat whilst performing. Take a look at him above - it's almost as if one of the mannequins in the show window of Top Man has magically come alive and started taking over the world through the might of kareoke. At least The Edge had the decency to wait for a couple of albums - and a rapidly receding hairline - before he started wearing stetsons.

Which brings me to question why I have bought a hat. Is it because the southern hemisphere summer is heating up my head more than usual? Is it to cover up my own receding hairline (which I like to refer, hopingly, as my "receded" hairline)? Is it the start of a mid-life crisis?

Who knows.

Maybe I should just write to this guy and ask him:

Guitar Hero

To pass the time on the train to and from work I read a book or sleep. Other people that don’t like to read or sleep make pointless loud phone calls to prevent being alone with their own thoughts. Obsessively sending text messages to everyone they know is another common way they can do that. The people that have expensive gadgets can check the weather on and some people catch up on their favorite sitcoms or watch action films on their laptops.
Yesterday the middle aged man that sat next to me was watching his laptop and tapping his foot. At first I thought he was watching some bad country music video, as there was a bland looking man on screen with a cowboy hat playing the guitar. When I looked back 20 minutes later it was still the same man playing guitar on screen and it appeared the man sitting next to me was either playing with himself or trying to figure out the fingering for guitar chords on his left hand and randomly strumming with his right hand. Either way it was mildly disturbing and made me wonder what thing that I did not accomplish when I was younger that I’ll be attempting while commuting in middle age.
I’ll probably be one of those old people that goes back to school and asks annoying questions in lectures. Riding the train I’ll be able to whip my text books out and highlight things. I can’t wait.

Hank Williams in the snow

I'm starting my work practise next week. The Finnish course I'm on is run by the Job Centre here and the idea is to get me ready for work. As such we're all to be sent out to work in the real world. I'm going to be working in a nursery school, which is sure to be a new experience for me. I'm not sure that I've even ever been inside a nursery except for when I was one of the nursery inmates myself.

I will be bringing some 1970s UK nursery school wisdom to the Finnish children. No pudding unless you eat all the greens on the plate, leading to a lifetime hating anything green on a dinner plate. Not that the pudding will be worth the punishment. It will just be a cube of spongecake drowned in pink goo. If anybody knows what the pink stuff was, I'd be happy to learn. Water, sugar, gelatine and pink colouring is my guess.

Building up to the start of the work practise though, we've been learning about Finnish work culture and the process of getting work. It's essentially a good old fashioned Job Club. It isn't as much fun as I've heard the Job Club to be in the UK - they treat us like adults and they do seem to expect us to be a success. Those who have been to the Job Clubs in the UK tell me that the League of Gentleman is documentary not comedy.



Anyway, today we've been told such important things as this:
- Be on time to work and don't leave early
- Remember your boss's name
- Don't ask when the break is the second you arrive on your first day
- If you're sick, remember to call your work place
- When you're there, work hard

Now, I would be pretty offended to be told these things normally except that there are people on my course who seem to be being told this for the first time. We haven't done anything that has seemed pointless on this course, so they must know that they have to go through all this every time. The only problem was that the people who need this information most were all either not there or having a conversation when they were being told. The result is that the only people who get reminded to do the right thing are those of who would have done the right thing anyway.

This has ended up in a what-is-wrong style rant at the world of immigrant intergration Finnish language courses but I don't want you to think that I'm in a bad place. True, I'm currently so tired that I have a different understanding of reality than I normally do. But I'm otherwise feeling pretty good about the world and about Finland. It isn't so face peelingly cold at the moment and the whole of Tampere is under a blanket of snow which means that the city is suddenly much lighter - besides, who doesn't like snow? Especially when it hides the frozen vomit puddles leftover from the weekend.

I had Hank Williams on the iPod on my way home and was secret-dancing to Why Don't You Love Me (Like You Used to Do) on my way through the city centre. I was going to attach a Hank Williams video to this so you could all share my joy, but I couldn't find one. So then I was then going to put Rock and Roll Doctor by Little Feat on instead, but you're not allowed to imbed it for some reason (you can watch it here if you like though and I recommend you do). So instead, here is a Kinks song. My friend Mikko inspired me to listen to the Kinks after saying that hearing them on the radio had turned a bad day into a good one. Better than Beatles in my mind...

"Hey, how did you learn to speak Norse?"

For some inexplicable reason I've managed to catch quite a few films starring Antonio Banderas recently. I've never really noticed him before. I don't know why. Latino men just mustn't do it for me, or something.

I've started to notice how terrible he is - not because he's a poor actor - but because he seems to have made some bad, bad choices in terms of the films he's chosen to make. At least if he was a bad actor, it might not be his fault, but if you're one of the most famous actors in the world and you star in a bad film, that's just plain lazy.

Last week I caught him as the bad guy assassin in Richard Donner Kebab's Assassins. He stars opposite Sylvester Stallone - also playing an assassin. I don't really know how they came up with the title of the film. So poor Antonio is cast as the bad guy, against Sly's good guy - although quite why this is so is beyond me - both play hitmen after the same targets. Sly is just a bit more dopey looking so I think he becomes the protagonist out of pure pity. To play his role, slightly unhinged, Antonio delivers all of his lines with a mad glint in his eye. He comes off sounding gay, and therefore not very menacing at all.

The other night I caught the beginning of Take The Lead. In one of the most forced exposition scenes I've ever witnessed we find Antonio sitting in a busy high-school office, waiting to see the headmistress.





















Antonio stands up and opens the door next to him for any females that happen to walk past. Of course, this being Hollywood everybody seems to think he is admirable because of this. Whenever I hold the door open for women, I'm either being creepy or sexist.

Back to Antonio, he's called in to see the headmistress and following conversation takes place (and I'm paraphrasing here):

Headmistress: What can I do for you?

Effeminate Latino Businessman: One of your students broke into my apartment.

Headmistress: Then call the police.

ELB: Do you not care about your -

Headmistress: (interrupting) - Listen, Sir, if my students commit crimes during school hours, I'll get involved. Out of school - I can't help them.

Effeminate Latino Businessman looks around the office, and gestures to a series of framed student photos on the wall.

ELB: Is this the way you reward good work in your school?

Headmistress: Those students are all dead. I have them up there as a reminder of how bad our kids have it today.

Effeminate Latino Businessman looks instantly regretfull.

Pause.

ELB: I would like to teach your students to dance...

*

Unfortunately I didn't watch the rest of the film, although I'm betting he managed - against all odds - to successfully teach a gang off innercity youths how to tango - and to find themselves - in the face of great adversity.

This excellent - and LAZY - example of scriptwriting reminds me of an exchange from one of his earlier films, The 13th Warrior. Antonio thrills us with his role as an exiled Arab warrior, sent to help out a load of vikings. However, there's a spot of trouble: he only speaks Arabic, they only speak Norse. Hmm.

After a few scenes where - with the assistance of some handy subtitles - Antonio is the subject of some ripe Nordic insults, our hero is sat with his fellow warriors around a campfire. Remaining silent as the jipes continue, Antonio eventually responds to a comment one of them has made, something along the lines of...

Arab Warrior: Your Mother!

Nordic Warrior: Hey, how did you learn to speak Norse?

Arab Warrior: By listening.

Can't Buy Me Love

Last night I had an extremely disturbing evening, I watched “Can’t Buy Me Love” starring Patrick Dempsey. This used to be a favorite of my sister and I when we were kids so when I saw it was on tube I immediately changed the station to it.

The fact that it was terrible came as a shock to me. The hammy music that would start whenever Dempsey’s character would make some kind of deep statement how tough it was to be a nerd made is nearly unbearable.
I also had no idea there was any sort of sex in the film.

Shocking...

I think it highly possible that my sister and I were in possession of an edited version of the film. We also had an edited version of “Temple of Doom” where the whole Mola Ram ripping out the beating heart of that dude scene was removed and replaced with snow. I hadn’t seen the unedited version of that one until 2 years ago and was disappointed with how not scary it was. We were also not allowed to watch “Dirty Dancing” and had to go to the neighbor’s house to watch the infamous half of Patrick Suase butt scene. That I saw a few years back as well, I wasn’t too impressed but the half a butt cheek was just as I remembered it.
After the horror of last night, I can only wonder what other pleasant childhood film memories will be destroyed in the future.