the juicer

"darkness falls" by jonathan liebesman, 2003: grade c-

this horror movie, darkness falls, about the "tooth fairy," a 150-years dead and deformed nice-old-lady-turned-vengeful spirit, is not as bad as other movies i've seen in the last year. but it does almost stink, if not on ice.

the plot is very stephen king-like and so is the setting, coastal maine, but that is where the similarities end. not that stephen king movies are ever what they could have been, but this story doesn't even meet the same level of actual scariness as sleepwalkers, and that film was awfully stupid.

the story focuses on a ghost that will kill whomever sees her face and only comes out at night and hides in the dark. now, stephen king is afraid of the dark, from what i understand, but this film tries to create a rational reason for scotophobia or nyctophobia, the irrational fear of night and darkness, by explaining that all scotophobes and unsolved murders in the region around darkness falls, maine, are connected to the curse of the wrongfully-accused and horribly deformed woman, nicknamed the tooth fairy for her penchant for giving local children a gold coin for their baby teeth.

i'm tired of describing the film. suffice to say, it wasn't good enough to pay any money for, and i'm glad i didn't, but it can kill an afternoon just fine if you want to borrow it from the library as i did and like an overly curious preteen you can't follow the advice, "don't peek."

"61*" by Billy Crystal, 2001: grade b+

for a first time director, billy crystal doesn't do too bad a job in presenting the story of the race to beat babe ruth's single season homerun record between teammates mickey mantle and roger maris. following a yankee victory in the world series and maris being named american league mvp, the year promised to be something, but no one had an inkling that the two yankees would both be on a course to break the record.

the story contrasts the two players. mantle, the rakish and charismatic star of the team is the almost polar opposite of the quiet family man maris. the only thing they seem to have in common are blond hair and rural roots. oh, and they can both hit the long ball. a rivalry is purported to be between them in the papers while the two develop an unlikely friendship.

the two are also linked by burdens put upon them by the press and public. mantle, the man of the people and the darling of all new york city and its reporters, is shouldering the expectations of an entire city and baseball franchise. while maris bears the black mark of not being personable to the reporters who scald him in the papers as a surly hick from the sticks of fargo, north dakota.

barry pepper turns in a fabulous performance as maris, subtly portraying the taciturn and worried, earnest and humble demeanor which put maris on the wrong side of a demanding publicity machine. thomas jane puts forth a truly charming mantle. and crystal is perhaps too sympathetic to the all-but unknown sports legend and his underappreciated accomplishment in breaking the babe's mark.

the story is bracketed in the 1998 homerun race between sammy sosa and the man who made the new single-season record, mark mcgwire and this may be the only weakness to the story. the intentional poignancy of this backdrop for the story as remembered by mrs. pat maris, the yankee's widow, (played by pat crowley), is a bit heavy-handed and tale of the "m&m boys" and their race for the record in the summer of 1961 could have stood on its own without ms. crowley tearfully watching mcgwire break the record and make his press conference on the television screen from her hospital bed. but overall, the story and portrayals are strong and i enjoyed learning, albeit rosy-coloredly, the story of that exceptional summer.

"one night at mccool's" by harald zwart, 2001: grade z

just so you know, and make no mistake, "one night at mccool's" is a horrible film. i'm convinced that if liv tyler had not starred in it, that it would never have even made it to direct-to-video release.

i cannot more strongly recommend that no fans of paul reiser, matt dillon, john goodman, michael douglas, andrew dice clay, or eric schaeffer see this movie.

i'm serious, this movie is almost as bad as "very bad things."

shampoo planet by douglas coupland, 1992: grade b+

so, another book by douglas coupland, author of generation x, microserfs, and girlfriend in a coma. as in these other novels, the characters in shampoo planet are foaming with the desire to start over, free from the past and history, and at the same time unable to truly escape them. and this is good.

again, our protagonist (though in the modern novel this term may be nearing irrelevance) is a young man (named tyler johnson) who is both naïve and place-weary. i say place-weary, because, as opposed to world-weariness, when a person is place-weary the idea of anywhere else is both promising of all that is not where he or she is and, at the same time, necessary in the mind of that person to the success and development of him or her self. the idea of home is stifling, like history. tyler is itching to get out of the cocoon of his hometown and mother's house and into the corporate yuppie-world he admires so much.

but tyler, as opposed to the protagonists of coupland's other novels, is not a corporate drone who dropped out of the life (gen x), nor a drone who with others created their own hive (microserfs), nor is he a sleeper awakened by his coma-revived girlfriend to the reality of a world in its death-throes (girlfriend). no tyler is the slacker who doesn't quite realize it yet; who hasn't become jaded, though he thinks he is; he is the beginning of the story.

there is a tendancy, in coupland's novels, for him to create a coded subtext, most remarkably in microserfs, which is again evident in this book. tyler's felt-tip, fortune-cookie-like messages to people he knows on small denomination bills and his telethon-speech with his hometown girl, anna-louise, are not really communication to one another as characters, but meta-text to the reader about the reality of their lives. it, as i say, is less encrypted in this novel than the fables of the gen x-ers, ghost in the machine messages, and the apocalyptic dreams of the coma-surviving girlfriend, but this meta-text is still there for the between the lines reader.

overall, this book was gratifying for me, a reagan-era kid who had my own big plans ten years ago, when this book was set and written. i understood tyler, even if i disagreed with him. even as seen through his little experience and thinly-disguised optimism are amazingly insightful glimpses by coupland into the late-90s and early 21st century.

i think if someone read this book when it came out ten years ago and tossed it on a shelf with a "so that's what followed gen x" shrug, the book warrants another read. instead of the now-cliché gen x life-is-no-big-deal message, this book says that life is as serious as you choose to make it.

selina's big score, by darwyn cooke: grade a

what can i say? this book rocked! talk about a reboot of a character.

i never much liked the post-miller selina kyle in her latest incarnation and the hideous jim balent version made me want to scratch my nails across a chalkboard or screech like a cat in a fight. but this heist story is just what the comic doctor ordered for the woman.

i had avoided reading the book for its alterna-comic look, but i'm in now. dc really has something here.

the art is a perfect blend of jaime hernandez and dick tracy and the story is straight out of a pulp novel. just great.

buy it.

dk2: the dark knight strikes again by frank miller: grade b

this is not the groundbreaking and character-changing event that the original the dark knight returns, but frank miller's return to the bleak, possible-future batman in dk2: the dark knight strikes again still shares a biting commentary on the progress of today's world with that original tale. however, this story, in keeping with miller's desire to make a statement on the development of comic books before the original, no longer holds any possibility of being just a generation away. the present dc comics continuity could not consistently lead to miller's dark knight, and that's just how he wants it.

all my favorite dc heroes make an appearance in the book, and i mean all of them. green arrow, the question, ray palmer atom, hal jordan green lantern, and the barry allen flash all factor strongly in the plot, and the creeper also makes an appearance if only to be killed by the new joker. but it is precisely the plot which i found weak in comparison to the original dark knight. i found the story to be full of the same sarcasm and nose-thumbing at today's media, but the actual plot-conflict was simplistic at best and all the real twists were in the pulling together of the cast. there are a couple of surprises, but they are in-jokes for those of us who've been reading comics since the silver age or earlier, rather than contributions to the actual story.

i found the book thoroughly enjoyable, but only as a reminder of what the present state of comics could have been, as seen through a jaundiced eye. i miss barry allen and hal jordan and i guess miller does too.

thanks, frank.

over the rhine, films for radio, 2001: grade a

films for radio (2001), is the 9th release by cincinnati-based over the rhine and represents the band's pinnacle of a better than 12 year career in the music biz. following several years touring as the opening act for the cowboy junkies and two attempts at self-distribution, before and after a disasterous deal with the now-defunct i.r.s. records, the band has taken a rocking chair on virgin's back porch records. and the label is a good fit for the not-quite-categorizable band.

the album, the second on back porch after a year 2000 re-release of the group's 1996 independent offering, good dog bad dog, is well-produced and thoroughly enjoyable, both for those of us who have been listening since the beginning and for new listeners who may have been introduced to otr on the multiple cowboy junkies' tours. karin bergquist's 'unmistakable' voice is still the perfect complement to linford detweiler's keyboards and writing, and these two have been the core of band since they formed in 1989. the sound of the band is more consistent from song to song on this outing and what had been high notes on previous albums is here the general output. track three, 'give me strength', written by dido, is haunting and masterfully interpreted by karin, who can reach and hold notes that the author herself could not dream of making.

to any who may be drawn to vocally driven beauty-rock like the cowboy junkies, dido, jewel, sixpence none the richer, or the innocence mission, i cannot more highly recommend this album so they may hear the way that form is absolutely supposed to sound.

"mondo" by tony gatlif, 1994: grade b

'mondo', the second film in the gypsy trilogy by tony gatlif, is maudlin and at times too obviously purposeful in its attempts at metaphor.

the story of a homeless or runaway gypsy child in the french port of nice it is another visually captivating and enigmatic voyage to the eye and mind of director tony gatlif. the acting is wonderful and the boy portraying the film's title character is rapturously cute. but the film at times drifts unapologetically into the fantasies and dreams of the boy, mondo, and it is often inconsistent in its apparent message, which might be that life is meant to be lived free, or it might be that we all belong to one another.

but the greatest weakness of this film may be in its mistreatment of this adorable urchin. illiterate and parentless, mondo is treated lightly and indifferently by both his fellow characters in the french port city of nice and by the director. the only characters in this film that mondo makes any real connection to are themselves outcasts and immigrants and are completely powerless to actually to affect his greater welfare or their own.

i am not an advocate for the hollywood ending, nor for a contrived closure of the conflicts and miseries of a film about life, i was just left absolutely unhappy by this film.

maybe this bleak impotence in the grand schemes of life is the theme of this film, and this is too grievous for me to embrace.

"latcho drom" by tony gatlif, 1993: grade a

wow. who knew the story of gypsy migration could be so fascinatingly musical or relaxing?

'latcho drom', or 'safe journey' in english, by tony gatlif is beautifully directed and visually stunning in its story of the migration of gypsies or 'rom' from out of india, across the middle east, north africa, and over southern europe, told through the music of each of these different communities. but it's very hard to suss out for the first couple of segments that you are following the migration through time and over land. i didn't really pick up on the fact that there is no actual story, just a visual and musical drift through the changes for gypsies over time and geography, until the romanian segment.

don't get me wrong, the music is great. and, as i stated before, the visuals are captivating and beautiful. just make sure that if you're in for a penny, you're in for a pound on this film. it's not as short as it could be and there truly is no plot.

i fell asleep twice while watching the film, but my dreams were incredibly captivating and musical.