The Fry Side

I know my mom is a big fan of Kevin Kline, so when I saw this I just had to share:

It’s amazing to read things from a decade or two ago and still have it be completely relevant.

It’s like that boring old history stuff is, like, worth learning or we’re doomed to something. Or whatever.

You betcha.

Just because I finished up the 3rd season of Mad Men this week:

Hamm.

I can’t help but listen to the Erik Satie piece that I posted this weekend over and over. Something about that music haunts.

I hear a memory. Of course, being of the age that I live in, it plays back in my mind as a movie soundtrack. It is not a movie I’ve seen before, though. And in it, I’m the one remembering.

There is more to it than that. It feels like a future memory. I first heard it on the radio, and it was a different musician playing. That performer drew out time a little more slowly and softly, as if there was a haze around it. I barely heard half of it while driving kids to school and I was hooked.

There is love in that piece of music. Part of it is sentimental. Most of it is simple fondness. A life lived together, remembered at the end? Something that happened over a Spring as a young man that disappeared as quickly as it came? Childhood friends goofing around the neighborhood?

To anyone else, they may hear more of a circus in their mind. Or just a piano. Or nothing and change the station. Art strikes us all in different ways. That is what is amazing, and what I try to teach my kids. I ask my son what he sees when he hears things. Sometimes he sees something, sometimes he doesn’t.

With any art, you are not obliged to feel anything at all. It should mean something to at least a few, otherwise it is meaningless and therefore not art. I don’t get much out of paintings or sculptures. Music and movies, though, can hit me hard.

To each his own, as long as something is conveyed to your soul somehow.

What I’ve had stuck in my head since Arizona lost its damn mind.

Namely it’s Moe’s line I keep hearing: “Immigants! I knew it was them. Even when it was the bears, I knew it was them!” I find that hilarious.

But this is The Simpsons circa 1996. Yet it has quite a bit to say about the politics of ignorance and fear that we’ve lived under for a while now. This brilliant piece of satire almost makes me sad that we’ve only gotten worse in the past fourteen years.

No matter what side of a discussion I fall on, I will always love a good, intelligent, respectful disagreement.

As someone who adamantly prefers to call themselves a “game critic” rather than a “game reviewer,” I’ve been asked by several parties to make some counter-comment to film critic Roger Ebert’s recent post. Presumably they were all hoping for some expletive-laden takedown of all Ebert’s arguments broken up by comparisons between the man and various historical dictators and farm animals. But the thing is, I like Ebert. I think he’s an intelligent guy and well worth listening to, especially when he’s got a particularly terrible film in his sights. In my more egotistical moments, I might one day aspire to being his videogaming equivalent.

My immediate question is, is everyone really that bothered by his article? I don’t agree with Ebert’s position, but I respect it. I wouldn’t in a million years attempt to make him change his opinion, nor would I express any patronizing expectation to the effect of “oh, one day he’ll understand.”

Read both articles in full, they’re well worth your time.

Two weekends ago, Gram was in town and opted to look after her granddaughter so M and I could take the lad to see a movie. We went to How To Train Your Dragon in 3D.

It should probably be said that I went in with low expectations. Not only are a great deal of kids movies today just plain crap, but as I have revisited a bunch of movies I liked as a kid, those were also just plain crap.

That said, I really was pleasantly surprised. One thing I noticed was a distinct lack of fart jokes and injuries to the crotch. There was also no overt bad guy. There were lots of falsely-placed presumptions by nearly all characters, but none were overtly evil (well, aside from the boss dragon.)

I’m trying not to spoil anything. Obviously the story revolves around a boy who befriends a dragon. He comes from a fictional island Viking village that regularly gets raided by dragons. He’s a dweeby, scrawny kid, son of the village chief, and he doesn’t fit into the standard of the burly dragon-fighter of the rest of the people.

Dragon had a lot of relatable elements and great moments to it. The geeky protagonist (I won’t say his name, because that’s a fun surprise) has a crush on the tough, future dragon hunter girl. The son and father have trouble communicating. The father and his friend are fight together before doom, no matter what.

The main dragon has a cool combination of Stitch and my cat. The efforts to learn to understand one another were fun. The compassion for the injured and overcoming it was in the light of being helpful and friendly, not heavy-handed at all.

It took me a bit to get to this point in my thinking, though. When the movie started, I couldn’t stand the protagonist’s voice. It sounded like a cool kid trying to do a fake nerd’s voice. I don’t know if it changed later, or if I just stopped noticing because I got so into the movie.

It also bugged me that the Vikings wound up with more Scottish-sounding accents, some more than others. Now, I’m an immigrant to Minnesota, so maybe I don’t know this very well. But shouldn’t Vikings sound just a touch more, um, Minnesotan? Or North Dakotan? Some slight Norwegian? But seriously, if you’re going to nail a stereotype, then get horns on your helm, not a kilt on your bum.

Still, it was a great flick and the three of us enjoyed it thoroughly. I still two weeks later get inundated with questions and musings about the nature of dragons. We’re looking forward to sharing it with others once we own it.

I do have one last beef, and it’s not with the movie. It is with 3D. The whole 3D experience felt tacked on. It’s as though they ran the movie files through a 3D generator program and it spit out a movie with a few layers of depth. It added nothing to the movie, and in some parts detracted from it.

There were some active scenes which, in a normal movie setting, a person could look around the screen at the various elements happening. In 3D, it has a predetermined focal depth. So I could only focus on one section, even though there were other things going on. I’ve seen now both Dragon and Bolt with this pricy 3D add-on. I’ve also seen a proper 3D movie at an IMAX a couple years ago focused on dinosaurs, and it was much cooler and more impressive.

All in all, don’t waste your cash on 3D. But do go catch a matinee of How To Train Your Dragon if you have a couple hours and five bucks to burn. And if you get a big tub of popcorn, pack a flosser in your wallet.

I wonder how many C-suckers think this may actually be a decent idea:

[The C stands for "Conservative". Why, what did you think?]

(Found via The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan.)

Today’s Cul de Sac is just lovely.

Proof that it’s all in the editing and music.

Epic Box