Miscellaneous Wins; The Walking Dead, Turn of the Screw, Spartacus

Poor horse. . . 

The Walking Dead, created by Frank Darabont.

So Zombies, finally! I hesitated for a very long time in taking on this show, partly because I'm already committed to so fricking many, but partly also because I knew it would scare me (I won't watch 28 Days Later ever again, nor its sequel because I'm chicken). But, This. Was. Amazing. I'm gonna gush now:

1. One of my favorite sort of characters is an able, attractive policeman (coming in just behind an able, attractive firefighter). This show has one, and damn. There is something ridiculously thrilling about a man with authority having to kick ass or prove himself (Clint Eastwood and Sylvester Stallone choose these roles often and play them skillfully)---and here, Sheriff's Deputy Rick Grimes succeeds. Every time he takes a gun out I get giddy. Bonus for the patriotic theme that peppered the first episode----framed artwork (not Jasper Johns, but a cleaner, more Oprah version of something of his) in the Grimes house on the wall, and American flags throughout the police station. Zombies (Godless, flesh-eating, maniacs with no souls) are very un-American, after all, so what better to unite the country than a tribe of Americans taking them out with rifles? I LOVE IT.

2. The first episode opens with a crazy car chase/shootout, and then has Rick regaining consciousness in a hospital apparently long after the zombie apocalypse happens, stumbling around in a mostly empty town. This is like The Twilight Zone's "Where Is Everybody?" but, much more terrifying since instead of the military doing experiments on him, zombies want to eat him and his wife and son are missing. Whether these hell-creatures are off on their own shuffling around or in groups, they're horrid. Thanks for the nightmares.




3. Morgan and Duane, a father/son pair, have to not only hide out from the zombies casing their house but deal with the fact that one of them is their recently departed wife/mother. Duane's crying into a pillow after seeing her through a window was bad enough, but when Morgan plans to take her out from an upstairs window (with a photograph of her in her smiling, human form hung on the ledge as motivation) and sobs as he can't bring himself to pull the trigger . . . Jeez. There always has to be a parent/child aspect in zombie stories, doesn't there? I could be selfish and wish there wouldn't be, but those closeups, those human connections, and all that emotion just wouldn't be there, then, and a lot of the urgency would be lost. Ask a parent what their worst fear is and it will be some variation of losing his or her child(ren); I'd say losing a child and then dealing with the zombie version of them (or becoming a zombie oneself while a child is in one's care) blows that one right out of the water. Yuck.

What a show.

yikes!

Turn of the Screw (and other short stories), 1898, by Henry James.

I don't know exactly how to describe these stories as "winning," exactly, as I believe it took me nearly an entire year to finish them and it felt like physical labor every step of the way---but they were very much worth the trouble. But make no mistake----he's treacherously difficult to read, this man, and sometimes my head would hurt with all the effort. For instance:

"My perambulations had given me, meanwhile, no glimpse of him, but they had tended to make more public the change taking place in our relation as a consequence of his having at the piano, the day before, kept me, in Flora's interest, so beguiled and befooled."

And it's literally all like that, every story, 90% of the sentences, the entire book. The fucking commas were out of control. But after probably the fourth story (there were eight) I kind of got used to it and could enjoy whatever the Christ he was blathering about, mostly. The Turn of the Screw is clearly the best in the collection, and genius for what it implies (but never actually confirms), which is most likely child abuse or pedophile behavior. The story scared me very much, mostly in how it had its two enemies hovering around here and there, in all sorts of creepy, disquieting ways. This too, felt to me very much like The Twilight Zone, and how sometimes those enemies would be subtle in their threats, just sort of waiting or lingering, but obviously much, much darker in theme.

I recommend the story highly, but you'll need a lot of patience.

My husband has been strangely giddy and optimistic
since Illythia's triumphant return . . . 

3. Spartacus, Vengeance.

The new Spartacus (Liam McIntyre) is a good one, though every fan of the show's thoughts were obviously on Andy Whitfield and being conflicted about accepting the new guy . . . he's going to be just fine. What better way to come back with a bang than to TEAR UP A WHOREHOUSE, uh, during business hours, as it were. Jeez.

Ilythia is pregs; Lucretia is no longer pregs but alive; Oenomaus is hunted with the rest of the gladiators (where is Ashur?) and Crixus wants his girl back. Spartacus and Mira are now a confirmed item (boo!). Aurellia is out (good riddance, I couldn't stand her). Who were those fools in the arena, and how much longer until Gannicus comes back?

Fridays just got hot again.

The Princess Bride

I distinctly remember my best friend's mother championing this film, more than once. She suggested we watch it one day we were over there (probably being annoying, probably wanting nothing other than to make a mess in the kitchen and then watch Clue for twelve hours straight), so we did. And loved it. Down the road some years, during a heated discussion between our mothers and us over the unsightly makeup I'd chosen to wear lately, Lorene asked us if we thought "that actress from The Princess Bride" would ever consider wearing teal or blue mascara . . . and this is turning into another story entirely, but you get the picture.

The Princess Bride, 1987. Directed by Rob Reiner.
Starring: Cary Elwes, Robin Wright, Mandy Patinkin, Chris Sarandon.

"A classic fairy tale, with swordplay, giants, an evil prince, a beautiful princess, and yes, some kissing (as read by a kindly grandfather)." (IMDB)

This film never gets old, never. I love Fred Savage in it, love the way his room is decorated, and always loved that he got to eat lunch in bed while he listened to the story. Also, the action is great, the characters are endearing, and I love the way everything looks, especially Buttercup's princess-y dresses. There are obviously some nice effects (fire swamp), good action scenes (sword fight, torture) and the dialogues are witty and timeless: "You seem a decent fellow; I hate to kill you!"/"You seem a decent fellow; I hate to die!" or "Sleep well, and dream of large women." Or "There's a shortage of perfect breasts in the world, it'd be a pity for you to damage yours . . . "

It's fun. And for the record, my very favorite scene (s) are all about the drunken swordsman, Inigo Montoya. Here's a link to the sword fight, since embedding was disabled by request.

http://youtu.be/k7zvffHu_wo

The Crow

Am I going to lose all credibility by admitting this was my first viewing of this film? I didn't shun it or anything, I guess I just never checked it out (which is a pity). And this really won't be an official review so much as my general reaction to the film---I almost want to watch it again before I even try to summarize and pontificate as right now I don't even feel the least bit qualified because I'm still reeling from it all.

Yes.

The Crow, 1994. Directed by Alex Proyas.
Starring: Brandon Lee, Michael Wincott.

"A man brutally murdered comes back to life as an undead avenger of his and his fiancée's murder." (IMDB).

This was a rare sort of film experience in that instead of forming the shit I think/want to say about it while watching, like I normally do, I was 100% in the moment. I had no idea what was going to happen or when, nor did I have the narrative figured out (I seldom do this anyway) so I really just was doing this zen film-spectating that really only happens to me in the theater. The only moments I did really stop to think anything were during:

1. Crow shots (either close ups of the bird, avian-cam as it flew around, or perched on Lee's shoulder).
2. Shots of Lee walking menacingly through a threshold, also, bonus thoughts when there were
3. Heavy-reverb guitar accompaniments during Lee's presence on camera.
4. Lee's little metal guitar jam session that ends in his destroying everything. Had to be the coolest thing I've seen all week.





---and the thoughts of course were, "Jesus Christ this is awesome," and "Why the hell am I just now seeing this?" Another film I need to own. Oh, and this line?

GOD IS THE WORD FOR MOTHER ON THE LIPS AND HEARTS OF ALL CHILDREN.

(you said it, man). The clip below was my favorite fan-vid, although there were quite a few decent ones.

Rosemary's Baby

This is hands-down one of my very favorite films ever made, and unlike some of the others, has real credibility, too. Roman Polanski definitely gets the job done, as does Ruth Gordon (as Minnie Castavet) who won the Oscar for best supporting actress in 1969. This isn't just a horror film, but an all-around brilliant piece of work. If you haven't seen the film and eventually plan to, this will be full of spoilers, just FYI.

Rosemary's Baby, 1968. Directed by Roman Polanski.
Starring: Mia Farrow, John Cassavettes, and Ruth Gordon.

"A young couple move into a new apartment, only to be surrounded by peculiar neighbors and occurrences. When the wife becomes mysteriously pregnant, paranoia over the safety of her unborn child begins controlling her life." (IMDB). 

Clearly the Satanists get all the press in this story, and don't get me wrong---you'll never see the elderly in a more unfavorable light, chanting, scurrying about, cheering "HAIL SATAN!", etc.---but the real enemy in this story has nothing to do with them. . . . it's Guy Woodhouse, y'all, the husband, the actor, the basic slime of humanity. In this film, he:

I dreamed someone was raping me. . .

1. Lies, constantly. "Are you a doctor?" "YES." Rosemary breaks in---"He's an actor." Later, after Rosemary's pregnancy is announced, he lies to her original obstetrician about moving to California. "You know me, I'll tell him something." Say nothing of the royal lie he feeds to Rosemary herself about what really went down during "baby night." Which is worse, admitting (as a husband) you've just rented out your wife's business to Satan for the evening (while an apartment full of creepy old people watched and chanted, *naked,*) or covering it up with a story about how you basically raped her while she was unconscious ("it was kinda fun, in a necrophile sort of way,")---she's just supposed to be all right with that? Nice moral fiber there, Guy.

2. Slaps ass, a lot, and not in a cute or, ugh, sexual way, either because it just makes him come off as an even bigger dick each time he does it. After the night in question, Rosemary, raped and scratched, struggles to awaken and suggests that Guy get his own breakfast . . . "LIKE HELL, I WILL!" he snaps back, smacking her hard on the ass. Insult to injury, much? What a fucker.

3. Agrees to allow his wife to become impregnated by Satan to further his acting career, and then basically resents her for it, refusing to really look at her after the pregnancy is confirmed, belittling her decisions (haircut, relationships with friends, suspicion that the old creeps are after her baby, etc.), ultimately treating her like a child or a crazy person. After the baby is born and taken from her (her doctor lies and tells her it died), Guy expects Rosemary to simply shrug it off as he's done, and focus on the many acting roles that have suddenly popped up . . . in perhaps the most dismissive moment in the entire film, he tells her, "You can have more, Ro, as soon as you're better," and later, after it's revealed that she was correct all along about the Satanists, "They promised you wouldn't be hurt, and you haven't been. It would have been the same if you had the baby and lost it." Then he adds something about how much they're getting in return; Rosemary responds by spitting in his face.

Two of the most meaningful scenes (that deal directly with Guy's not only malleability but shady character) are the dinner scene with Minnie and Roman where the deal is made, as it were, and the collection of scenes where Rosemary decides to have the party against everyone's advice.

Um. Yikes! 

The dinner scene, which seems at first nothing but utter comedy at the codgers' expense is really quite important. Minnie and Roman are presented almost ridiculously----he bumbling around, "I seem to have over-filled the glasses!" spilling vodka blushes on the carpet and jovially going on about his world-wide travels, and she just a witchy, yammering nag (with table manners just slightly better than a two-year-old----check out her cake-eating bit, if you don't believe me) but they're totally playing. As soon as dinner gets going, Roman tests the religious waters by criticizing the pope; Guy agrees, Rosemary hesitates. Next, he flatters Guy's acting work ("I remember being struck by a gesture you did and checking in the program to see who you were . . . ") and sees that Guy immediately takes the bait. After dinner is finished, Minnie gets the goods on Rosemary's fertility background while Roman presumably lays out the plan to Guy in the next room. Apparently he needed next to no time to think over their proposal, as he assures Minnie that Roman's stories are "very interesting," (to which Roman slyly responds to Minnie, "You see?") and agrees to come back and hear more the next evening, inevitably planning what would soon become "baby night," and perhaps perusing chocolate mouse recipes.

When Rosemary decides to throw a party for the couple's younger friends, she stands up to Guy and Minnie as she never had before, which is crucial in showing that despite their manipulation of her, they still have to let her have her way since she's obviously the most important player in their little game. After Rosemary's friends advise her to change doctors, Guy criticizes them and begins a tirade but is interrupted by Rosemary's sudden excitement over first, a stop to her ongoing pain, and second the movement of the baby. Guy hesitantly allows her to place his hand on her abdomen but then yanks it away in awkward discomfort, choosing to sweep the floor while Rosemary smiles and laughs giddily in a chair. When she eventually meets her son (inside a black-draped bassinet above which a silver, inverted crucifix dangles) she again stands up to an entire room of Satanists, first to Roman, "Shut up, you're in Dubrovnik, I don't hear you," and later Laura Louise, "You're rocking him too fast."

While we never get a look at baby Adrian for ourselves, we are left in the film's final scene with the image of Rosemary rocking him, gazing lovingly, with Guy somewhere among the crowd, unimportant.

With any luck, the Satanists pitched him over the fire escape Terry-Gionaffrio style . . . .

Heat

Heat, 1995. Directed by Michael Mann.
starring: Robert DeNiro, Val Kilmer, Al Pacino.

"The lives of two men on opposite sides of the law - one a detective; the other a thief." (IMDB).

Now before I really get going on this one (and I'm gonna go, believe me), yes, it's a pretty long ass film. 170 minutes, to be exact. But call me crazy, I loved every one of those minutes and was almost bummed when it was all over.

Forget for a moment that this was back when DeNiro was in his forties (and smokin' hot). Or that Danny Trejo is not only on the crew, but drives an EL CAMINO. There are so many brilliant things in this film that it's hard to even itemize them, but still, I'll try.

Cast: Unbelievable, both lead and supporting players. Jon Voight, Hank Azaria, and (a probably coked-out) Tom Sizemore were my faves; they were just fun to watch together. Bonus for Voight's long, ratty hair, and Ted Levine (JAME GUM) working probably the greatest mustache ever seen in film.

Mise En Scene: Some nice bits of production---the each-different hockey masks from the armored truck takedown and the subsequent fluttering down of car dealership sparkly blue streamer just after the truck crashes. The boat of a station wagon DeNiro drives through that open lot where he's supposed to make the pickup but gets double-crossed (and the way that damned thing bounces like ten feet in the air over all the bumps in the road). And that shoot-out in the middle of LA is pretty impressive; lots of bullets flying, lots of breaking glass, and sorry, but something about DeNiro in a suit, firing off rounds seriously excites me.

Lines: Al Pacino is a pretty outlandish kind of actor, but he's effective, and his lines are funny. Sing-songing "there'll probably be a note on the door," "You can get killed walkin' your doggie!" and "DON'T WASTE MY MOTHER-FUCKIN' TIME!" . . . not to mention the whole "great ass," exchange with Azaria. Over the top, clearly, but hilarious.

Isn't it funny and frustrating how *nothing* they do goes according to plan? Armored truck---jerkoff guy starts shooting the guards (necessitating an already-lined trunk for his later disposal). Station wagon drop-off, all a ploy. Drilling into the metal place, whoops, cop makes a thump, they walk away. Bank, obviously not a smooth operation. My favorite scene in the entire film is Charlene's (Ashley Judd) tiny motion to Chris (Val Kilmer) to let him know that the cops are waiting for him when he sees her out on the balcony, but the two major scenes between DeNiro and Pacino---first their respective deadpans into the camera after the thump gives them away during the metal heist, realizing suddenly that they've just both been made, and second, their little standoff conversation in the diner----these scenes are pretty damned cool, too. And for anyone who really enjoys this film, I highly recommend it with the subtitles on; I feel like I learned everything I thought I was missing before.

Atari Art (Cross Stitch)

1. Space Invaders. 14 ct fabric, black, 2011. This is my most recent, made for my youngest son, and is probably my favorite one in the collection. By this time I'd learned to work on black fabric instead of filling in the black with floss (as with Miss Pac Man) and larger count fabric, too. My eyes can't handle the small ones anymore! I thought initially that compared to all the others the tones of only green and orange might seem dull, but I was wrong, it's plenty colorful! I played this game frequently with my brother, and always used to get performance anxiety when that last one standing used to go all super-fast-spazzy, whipping back and forth across the screen . . .

For this one I just printed out a screen shot and then drew out the invaders, the shooters, and the numbers for the score. It's a little hard to see in the photo over there, but I messed up on one of the invaders and added like two extra rows to its body, making it look extremely fat compared to the others; can you spot it?

SPLAT!

2. Frogger. 14 ct fabric, white, 2010. My very favorite Atari game growing up. We didn't get it until I was in about sixth grade, but I was fortunate enough to have cousins who not only had it for their Atari(s) but were extremely good at playing it; I owe all my abilities to Jill, Heidi, Amy, and Paul---thanks guys! This one was done with them in mind for my youngest daughter and was probably the most fun to make. I tried to find a screen grab that had a challenging traffic scene but didn't want to over-do it on the top level. If I ever get the motivation to do another one I'd probably include the log-snake.

If I could do it all over again, I'd probably do it against a black background (as with Space Invaders), the white just seems to wash it out too much. Maybe cut a few of the cars from the bottom section out, too, but I really do like the way the bright colors resonate down below.




3. Miss Pac Man, 22 count fabric, 2009.

This one was for my oldest daughter (here it hangs in her room next to Princess Leia); she's a girly girl, a princess girl, and Miss Pac Man was the closest thing I could find to the stuff she likes. This is the one that cost me my eyesight, y'all. 22 count fabric was NOT a good idea; nor was doing it on white and then filling in what ended up being solid black after everything else was in place. I started in the middle, with the ghosts (which I drew out first), and then went with the white pellets since you really have to do white before black (or any other dark color) if you don't want the white to get bled into. . . so white pellets against a white background with a tiny count fabric again, was not smart of me. I think I was working on this for over a year. Turned out nicely, but damn. My eyes hurt when I look at it.

4. Pitfall, 28 count fabric, 2008.

My first piece, for my first child and oldest son. I think he may have been going through an Indiana Jones phase at the time. This, too, was way too small a count of fabric and probably ruined my eyes just as much as Miss Pac Man, but it's tight. I did it with two strands of floss, so the x's don't even look like x's but solid color, which is cool. My cousins played this one, also, and getting to the gold and silver bars will always remind me of my cousin, Paul. When I played it, I always had to have him get past the jump-on-the-alligator-heads part for me; I was awful at that. I was thinking of doing another project with the Pitfall elements sometime in the future, like maybe a bell-pull or something with the snake, the fire, the scorpion, and the treasures.

LOST ART (cross stitch)

So these are for the Losties, or anyone else who likes cross stitch. Enjoy knowing intimate details of how I spend my time (when I'm not actually watching the show or other films). I'll now be accepting my nomination into genuine Nerd-dom.

We have to go back! 

1. LOST Island Map, 2009. 22 count. I spent the summer with this one. I love maps and flags, so it was only natural that I throw together a little sampler of my favorite island, right? I debated for a while about including the black and red hieroglyphics, and almost didn't do it, but I think the finished piece would really have been lacking without them as a border and I'm glad I went for it.



I have no idea if the Dharma Stations are in the correct places, I patterned this after a map I found on DarkUFO.










2. Countdown to Death Hieroglyphics, 2010. Felt/embroidery.

I always felt that these were so ominous, only appearing briefly during the show's second season, but still---what they indicated turned out to be pretty major, right? For a while I used to refer to all chaos breaking loose inside my house as, "John Locke forgot to push the button." A great, great story line, wasn't it?



3. Moving On, 2011. 22 count.

There were hardly any decent (full) still images of the stained glass online anywhere, so I had to wait until I was able to get my own LOST box set to really plot this one out. It took a lot more work than anything else I've done---I changed the shape of the outline a bit, it's slightly more boxy than the real stained glass, and there was a pretty major oops on this one (bottom right yin/yang icon) that I took up after um, well, drinking a little bit one evening; you can probably see that it's slanted in a very non-circular way compared to the others, but hey. All part of the experience, I guess.


When I initially framed it, it was just the image on off-white fabric in the frame with the white mat, and something about it just didn't look right---too washed out or sterile or something, so I took it out a few weeks ago, cut the cross stitched image out and then stitched it onto the tan corduroy that it's in now and it looks much better. Does this do enough to cement and confirm that I absolutely loved the show's finale? I hope so.

4. Nine Dharmas, 2012. 18 count.

I originally wanted this to be a sort of tribute to not only the Dharma Initiative but also the blast door inside the Swan Station (that only John Locke sees during the lockdown) but once I got all of them finished, I just really liked the way they looked in a block arrangement so I kept them that way. I'll do a blast door, proper, in the future, don't worry.

When people see the stuff I do, the LOST pieces in particular, I usually get two comments or questions. The first is, "Oh Man! That's so dope that you do all this shit, but I still really hated the ending of that show!" Since I'm non-confrontational by nature, I'll just smile and nod, but just for the record, I did not hate the ending, thought it was brilliant, thought the entire show was brilliant, obsess over it at least once or twice daily (and usually tear up if I think about it too long). Yeah, I'm a crazy-ass fan.


The second bit of feedback, if you can call it that, is to ask me, "WHERE DO YOU FIND THE TIME TO DO ALL THIS?" Valid question, I have kids, I have a part time job out of the house, and I write, so time is always difficult to come by. My younger kids nap at the same time every day, and if I'm caught up on all my writing, I'll cross stitch. On the nights I don't work at my coffee job, I'll catch up on my writing, read whatever I'm reading in the bath for a half hour, turn something on to watch, and cross stitch. It's not just leisure or art, but almost therapeutic for me to do this, and if I go too long without it, I honestly start to get snappy. Most of my stuff was conceived/begun during subzero Minnesota winters, and I'll probably continue to do them until either my hands swell up or my eyesight fails, or both because it's something I just need to do.

There were some near-disasters with this last one, I won't lie; three of the last Dharmas were stitched onto their felt backings with a sick child sprawled across my lap, and the Looking Glass (rabbit) had an unfortunate collision with someone's pink marker but was cropped closely enough for it not to matter . . . but it's all good. I like making things; my kids see me making things and then go make their own things, too. They're not drawing Dharma logos or anything yet, but you know, I'll be extremely supportive should they start.

Should you be interested in getting a closer look of all this business, I'm displaying it at Starbucks, 54th and Lyndale in Minneapolis next Sunday for two weeks.