In case you haven't seen my actual blog in some time, the layout, color scheme, and the banner have changed. No more obnoxiously large photo booth picture of me eating bread in a time warp.
Dressed as a beatnik for Halloween, since my Alex DeLarge costume fell through. (Note: Duct-taping two white belts to the inside of your pants and calling them suspenders isn't as easy as it seems.) We went trick-or-treating for, like, a half hour in Pilsen before we decided to head to this party over in Lakeview. Pretty good fun overall.
Tomorrow we're having another class shoot, this time with a dolly, inside a studio. Hopefully I didn't annoy anyone with my decision to switch from the "homemaker" role to the "pissed off worker" role. Actually, if I did, whatevah.
New favorite movie scene of the moment: Daniel Brühl's performance in 2 Days in Paris. Unfortunately, there is no clip on youtube I could gladly show you, so I'll leave you with a, no doubt, beautiful picture of him as "Lukas" in what was overall kind of a meh film in terms of story:
"I'm a fairy..."
Also saw Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971) for the first timeon the big screen at the Gene Siskel Film Center. It's better and more appetizing than I remembered.
Two entertaining, comical performances of insane people.
Just saw ¿Quíen puede matar a un niño? (1976) or, Who Can Kill a Child?, in English. It's insane, I recommend you watch it to see Spanish children kill adults.
Also had a conversation I've been wanting to have for quite a long time in film class. B (I feel weird using full names in my blog now... for some reason) brought up how someone in his painting class brought in this really exploitative, gratuitous painting of a naked woman bending over, along with a random tit in the corner. He, the painter, apparently wanted to present the naked female figure as "decoration". B was pretty adamant about how he (and, thankfully the rest of the class AND the teacher) disagreed with this student's depiction of women in the painting. Thank gawd -- this gave me hope.
This reminded me of the time someone brought in a drawing for critique in the "comedy" Research Studio last semester. The drawing was as follows: a line drawing of a naked, faceless woman, holding her legs up in the air, with a coin slot for a vagina. Chee-ya. So I expressed my discontent during the critique, and the teacher asks if I think the guy who drew it thinks a woman's vagina is literally a coin slot. My response should have been:
-"Gee, I don't know, has he ever even seen one?"
or,
-What the girl in my film class (the one, who I believe wrote for Second City, or was affiliated with them in one way or another) said. She mentioned how what we laugh at reveals what we truly think in our subconcious...
...Thus, if someone laughs at a drawing of a faceless, naked woman with a coin slot for a vagina, there's a kernel of truth, and sadly enough, odds are, that person subconsciously feels that women can be bought. The "it's funny because it's true" doesn't work in this case because it's not true -- they're stereotypes, and they're certainly not anything new and subversive WHICH IS WHAT COMEDY WAS AND IS MEANT TO BE.
The whole thing kind of distanced me from some people in the Research class, and I definitely felt silenced and a little isolated for the rest of the term, simply for saying I was offended by a line drawing. So it was quite the relief to hear like-mindedness on the situation, instead of the half-witted, apathetic, hipster response on how we shouldn't take sexist jokes and such so seriously because it's supposed to be "ironic". I got a whole 'nother rant on that, but I'll withdraw that and save it for a rainy day.
I also wrote a Feministing article about the line drawing incident, but someone from my class left a comment on it defending the guy who drew it. Weak defense, of course -- s/he said it wasn't a final project and it was supposed to be "lame, bad, ugly" art and we're supposed to laugh at the piece because of that. However, laughing at someone like this, something that degrades half the population using old clichés and stereotypes because you think it's bad is the same as laughing at it because you think it's true. Rant: done.
-We watched this video in puppet class yesterday. A French theatre company called Royal de Luxe constructed these massive puppets to walk across Berlin and meet at the Bradenburg Gate. It's in celebration of the 20th anniversary of German Unification. WATCH IT! It is breathtaking if you imagine yourself there. (I'd post pictures, but I can't decide which ones to put up -- it's that crazygood.)
-Saw Was nützt die Liebe in Gedanken or Love in Thoughts, as we'd say in Americaland. Also highly recommend this, as it is good, available instant on Netflix, and contains (semi-) nude Brühl.
-The past few days have been very, well, German. I'm constantly thinking of where I'd like to study abroad next year, and London seems like the most doable in terms of having a film program that teaches in a language I understand. The other places my school has an exchange deal with are Weimar and Berlin, and apparently the Berlin one is one of the best for film. However, I don't know German, and attending that school requires that I speak and understand it. Lately, due to my very German days, I have a feeling that I'd be able to get a good grip on the German language. Whether I could be fluent by Fall 2010, that's a tricky subject. Damnit, Madrid, why can't you have an outstanding film program that has an exchange deal with my prestigious art school?
-Went to MAC today, the cosmetics store. Got some concealer for the droopy droopy purple bags under my eyes (thanks, Italian genes!) and a very dark green eyeliner with speckles of gold in it to bring out the green in my round-ish, hazel eyes.
Was nützt die Liebe in Gedanken (2004)
That's all for now. I'm about to go on Etsy. Might return with pictures of the crap I bought, a.k.a. the source of my buyer's remorse.
I had another mini-flashback this morning. In case you don't know, I tend to suffer from these small, abrupt flashbacks, usually stemming from really emotional moments I've had. But this one was somewhat startling, mainly because it involved someone who I really like, but have been really confused about. It's a long and complicated story, but, in essense, I can't decide whether I should "let him go/forget about him" or keep him in mind and continue to like him.
This dilemma developed after he decided he couldn't be in a relationship quite yet after a pretty messy break-up, from what I can gather. However, I often get pissed because he's ditched me on several occasions to hang out, hasn't paid me back the money I lent him, and hardly ever responds to any message I send him, be it on AIM or Facebook (I guess I can understand the last one, but, come on, he borrowed $25 from me two months ago and hasn't paid me back even a cent.)
But recently I fucked things up. A few nights ago I had a few too many beers, and I think I might have blacked out for the first time. From what I can tell, I sent some angry instant messages to him, basically saying, "Since you aren't replying to these [obviously catty] messages then I guess that means you're trying to ignore me" yadda yadda yadda. He sent an im the next day reading, "wow ok", and that's when I discovered the big fuck-up. I frantically sent him back messages saying, "fuck, I don't even remember sending those, I'm sooooo sorry I don't really mean that", etc. He just responded, "ok." Of course, it's a pretty ambiguous response, and tone is so hard to read via AI fucking M. I asked him what he meant, but he still hasn't responded.
Anyway, back to this morning's flashback. So I'm feeling pretty shitty, like most mornings. And then I had a flashback from the time we first met. We were at this party in Roger's Park, sometime this past December. We went outside and sat on the wooden staircase coming down from the deck outside this apartment. It was nighttime, of course, and it was snowing. We're both a little drunk, but sober or not, I gotta say it was a pretty magical setting. We started on this deep conversation, one mostly brought about by him. He was talking about how he has a fear of a flying. I distinctly recalled this portion of the conversation:
Him: What are you afraid of? Me: I don't know... maybe... not being liked. Him: Well, I like you.
It hit me like a ton of bricks. It sounded like something straight from a John Hughes film, which is what we were gushing about earlier that night, and how we "connected", I suppose. I thought about how it go to this point: how we went from this happy little place to him thinking I'm a total psycho. I guess he has a right to think so, I mean, those messages did make me look like a crazy person. But right now I'm just hoping to move on, see what else is out there.
If any of you have read up to this point, I say to you, in the words of Samantha Baker in Sixteen Candles: "It's really human of you to listen to all my bullshit."
Went to Lincoln Park Zoo today for Film as Capture to get acquainted with the Bolex camera, much like we did in Media Practices: Moving Image. Only this time we didn't have to film BOTH a video and a film version of it, and we had a much better idea of what the hell we were doing. We shot: flamingos, warthogs, giraffes, a bear, and zebras. We tried to shoot these funny-looking, spastic monkeys, but, being spastic, they scurried away before we could film.
Also unlike last time, I walk away actually knowing how to read a light meter. Turns out it wasn't even complicated to begin with - friggin Media Practices teachers complicated it. Just like they did our first film assignment, where we were using the Bolex for THE FIRST TIME yet still had to shoot on friggin video, too.
Bamboozled is coming in from Netflix sometime soon - a movie shot entirely on mini DV video cameras...
Yesterday I went to Myopic Books, a used book store just off the Damen stop on the blue line. Yes, in the heart of Hipster Park. It was nice, cozy, musty, and probably ridden with mold in every corner, just the way I like my used book stores. It reminded me a lot of the Book Loft back in German Village, back in Columbus. It also, surprisingly enough, reminded me of a bookstore in Madrid that only sold books on film. It was glorious.
I purchased:
-The screenplay for The Royal Tenenbaums (it would be a nice guide for my screenwriting class this Fall) -A book from 1977 about Swedish film (mainly for the design of the front cover, I'll admit) -A biography on Walt Disney (meh, could contain some interesting little fun facts) -A book on the cinema of Almodóvar (it's about time, Kimberly) -A book in Spanish called Guardian Devil (whatevs)
Today in Media Practices I was introduced to Kenneth Anger through this nightmare-ish piece called "Rabbit's Moon." But most of all I was introduced to the song in the film called "It Came in the Night" by A Raincoat. It is perhaps the first song I've heard that uses the term "bump in the night", so therefore it must scare the hell out of me, because the phrase itself freaks me out. But it's so goddamn catchy!
Think this was made in the 70's? WRONG! It was filmed in 1950 and the soundtrack was added in 1976. Clearly.
I will admit that I discovered the following information on Feministing:
According to Entertainment Weekly, there are no active women directors good enough to make it on their super-cool exclusive "Top 25" list. Even though Almodóvar, Tim Burton, Gullermo del Toro and Scorsese made the list, this still pretty much offends me slightly.
I used to subscribe to EW in middle school with big dreams of going to NYU film school and graduating to become the most kickass film director like ever. I guess it's a good thing my parents ended the subscription before I realized I would have to squinch my face up real hard and grow a penis.
And Zack Snyder? Seriously? The dude who did 300? What the fucking fuck.
Woody Allen isn't even listed. I mean, he fits the genitalia requirement for the list, so why not?
But back to my story of struggle and soon-to-be triumph: Pretty much ever since I started taking video classes in high school I've been the token "chick" in the class who ends up making art videos as opposed to some lame, poorly lit "parody" of "Pimp My Ride" titled "Pimp My Lunch." If you catch my drift. For partner projects, I'd end up working alone because the number of people in the class conveniently happened to be an odd number. And I still made better videos.
That was probably kind of irrelevant, but now that I'm in art school and my video/film class is actually made up of mostly women and a gay guy, I can harshly criticize mainstream ideas of gender association through my own experiences.
"I'm a fairy..."
