Media Round Up
Dec. 1st, 2006 07:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
amari_zPart of my ongoing attempt not to work at work. I’ve been writing this post for what feels like months and it keeps growing. No attempt at profound analysis here, I just like to keep track of what I’ve been reading and watching.
Movies
Some weeks ago I saw Flags of our Fathers. Based on the trailers alone, I would never have watched it, but I was convinced by the reviews and by the fact that Eastwood was directing. I really liked it. Like Saving Private Ryan (which I liked a great deal less but is worth watching really just for the Normandy scene), it makes use of flashbacks, but in more complex way. The story follows three of the surviving soldiers who appear in the famous raising of the flag photo from Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima and who are enlisted (with various degrees of enthusiasm) into touring the country in a huge war bond drive. The battle for the island, and the truth behind the famous photo, is shown through flashbacks. The least effective parts of the movie, I thought, were the parts set in the modern era where the son of one of the survivors is investigating the story. Thankfully, these were relatively short.
This is a fascinating bit of history surrounding what is probably the most famous war photo of all time, and a very well done war movie, one that, for the most part, resists the lure of glorifying the fighting. (There's nothing I dislike more than a non-violent war movie. If you're going to make a movie about a real war, you damn well better show it as bloody, horrible, and disgusting.) I'm not surprised that it didn’t do particularly well in the box office, though. I don't think that Americans are currently inclined to watch films about WWII, given that they can watch a war on the cable news. This is a shame, since the movie has some interesting, salient things to say. If anyone does go to see it (I’m not even sure if it’s still playing), be sure to watch the credits. They show actual pictures taken on Iwo Jima and you get a glimpse of how Eastwood made use of these other historic, but far less famous, shots in the film.
Eastwood is going to release a companion movie to this one next year, Letters From Iwo Jima, telling the story of the battle from the Japanese point of view. I’m really interested in seeing how he handles that.
I also saw Stranger than Fiction a while ago. A fun movie, which might particularly appeal to us amateur writers, with some great performances by Emma Thompson and Dustin Hoffman. Thompson as an author with writer’s block was particularly good, I thought (I loved her voice over narration). The end left me faintly unhappy, but I’m not sure how the moviemakers could have ended it in a way that was completely satisfying. It’s a problem that often seems to plague stories with fantastical premises. After the movie was over, on reflection, I also found myself utterly unconvinced that Thompson’s character’s novel would have indeed been a great work of fiction (for reasons I won’t get into, since it will spoil the movie) but that might just be being over-picky
Books
I recently finished reading Kiran Desai's Inheritance of Loss, which![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
darklyscarlett was kind enough to give me for my birthday. The book, which recently won the Booker prize, moves between an area at the foot of the Himalayas on the Indian side of the border with Nepal, to Manhattan to flashbacks to Cambridge, and deals with such heavy topics as post-colonialism, class, racism and globalization, but does so by focusing on the individual characters and their fates. The characters are often ridiculous (and often seemed like caricatures to me), but for all their flaws, by the end, each of them invokes their own sympathy. The book isn't perfect by any means (and I do wonder if it will appeal to people who know little about the Indian subcontinent, although I'd like to think it would) but over all, highly recommended.
On my protracted plane rides to and from Detroit, I read Rory Stewart's The Places in Between, which I also really liked. The book chronicles Stewart's amazing walk across Afghanistan immediately after the fall of the Taliban. Aside from the sheer audacity of what Stewart did (and the fact that he lived to tell about it), Stewart's writing style is something I found myself admiring. It's understated and matter of fact to the point that it's occasionally easy to overlook just what it is that Stewart is actually doing. There is little that is romanticized, sentimental, preachy or condescending in Stewart's narrative. In this age of tell-all narratives, it was refreshing that Stewart barely tells the reader anything about himself. From the book, it's even hard to figure out his politics, although there are a few hints. I’m currently trying hard to resist the lure of ordering his book Prince of the Marshes, since I have a bazillion unread books cluttering my apartment.
Quite a while ago I read Helen Oyeyemi’s Icarus Girl, which I like a lot. It was a glimpse into a culture and mythology I know very little about, and is extremely well done. I thought the author (who I believe was 20 when she wrote the book) was very effective with the voice of her main character, a troubled young girl who is half-Nigerian and half-English and who finds herself befriended by a mysterious girl who may or may not be real. The book is downright creepy in parts, and I was completely drawn into the main character’s world.
A very long while ago I finished reading a book called Humanity: A Moral History of the Twentieth Century by Jonathan Glover, which ranks among the best non-fiction books I’ve read. Ages ago, I started a post on it, which one day I will finish.
I’ve also been reading a few of the Modern Library Chronicles series. I originally bought Paul Fussell’s The Boys’ Crusade because I wanted that particular book, but having experienced the pure visceral pleasure of holding such a neatly made hardback (that put me in mind of long-gone days spent in primary school libraries), I admit my motive for being interested in the series is a little less than purely intellectual. But, dabbler that I am, I do like the idea of reading short treatments of various topics by experts in the fields. In reality, though, the results seem to be a bit mixed. I didn’t hate but didn’t particularly like Anthony Pagden’s People and Empires: A Short History of European Migration, Exploration, and Conquest, from Greece to the Present, which may be because I found the title misleading, and was expecting something somewhat different. I also just finished the series’ book Communism by Richard Pipes, which was interesting, but made me wonder how it is that, in a book published in 2003, an author gets away with referring to the “Third World” and the “Orient.” It was readable and I certainly don’t know enough about the topic to criticize—but the book did make some sweeping generalizations about the history of property ownership in the introductory section that had my hackles rising.
I’ve now started Jared Diamond’s Collapse, which has been sitting on my shelf gathering dust. I’m about 50 pages in, and it will probably take me a while.
ETA: I knew I was forgetting stuff.darklyscarlett's comment reminded me that I'd also read Nick Hornby's A Long Way Down. I didn't love it. It had brilliant bits in it, but over all was strangely flat for me. I had to force myself to finish it. I enjoy Hornby's writing, but I thought this was the worst of his novels.
Television
I don’t normally watch a lot of television, but with the use of DVR, I’m either watching more, or at least I’m watching things I’m deliberately choosing. I’ve started watching Ugly Betty, which I love so far, although I’ve only seen a few episodes (and if anyone watches this show—what is deal with the woman who everyone thinks is dead but has her face wrapped in bandages??). I’ve also watched a few episodes of Brothers and Sisters, which I wouldn’t have thought would appeal to me, but which I’m liking in an emo-porn kind of way.
I'm also still watching Heroes, which I'm loving even more, as well as BSG, with which I have a love-hate relationship. It's rather like a bad child--so much potential, can't help but love it, but all too often a train wreck.
Movies
Some weeks ago I saw Flags of our Fathers. Based on the trailers alone, I would never have watched it, but I was convinced by the reviews and by the fact that Eastwood was directing. I really liked it. Like Saving Private Ryan (which I liked a great deal less but is worth watching really just for the Normandy scene), it makes use of flashbacks, but in more complex way. The story follows three of the surviving soldiers who appear in the famous raising of the flag photo from Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima and who are enlisted (with various degrees of enthusiasm) into touring the country in a huge war bond drive. The battle for the island, and the truth behind the famous photo, is shown through flashbacks. The least effective parts of the movie, I thought, were the parts set in the modern era where the son of one of the survivors is investigating the story. Thankfully, these were relatively short.
This is a fascinating bit of history surrounding what is probably the most famous war photo of all time, and a very well done war movie, one that, for the most part, resists the lure of glorifying the fighting. (There's nothing I dislike more than a non-violent war movie. If you're going to make a movie about a real war, you damn well better show it as bloody, horrible, and disgusting.) I'm not surprised that it didn’t do particularly well in the box office, though. I don't think that Americans are currently inclined to watch films about WWII, given that they can watch a war on the cable news. This is a shame, since the movie has some interesting, salient things to say. If anyone does go to see it (I’m not even sure if it’s still playing), be sure to watch the credits. They show actual pictures taken on Iwo Jima and you get a glimpse of how Eastwood made use of these other historic, but far less famous, shots in the film.
Eastwood is going to release a companion movie to this one next year, Letters From Iwo Jima, telling the story of the battle from the Japanese point of view. I’m really interested in seeing how he handles that.
I also saw Stranger than Fiction a while ago. A fun movie, which might particularly appeal to us amateur writers, with some great performances by Emma Thompson and Dustin Hoffman. Thompson as an author with writer’s block was particularly good, I thought (I loved her voice over narration). The end left me faintly unhappy, but I’m not sure how the moviemakers could have ended it in a way that was completely satisfying. It’s a problem that often seems to plague stories with fantastical premises. After the movie was over, on reflection, I also found myself utterly unconvinced that Thompson’s character’s novel would have indeed been a great work of fiction (for reasons I won’t get into, since it will spoil the movie) but that might just be being over-picky
Books
I recently finished reading Kiran Desai's Inheritance of Loss, which
darklyscarlett was kind enough to give me for my birthday. The book, which recently won the Booker prize, moves between an area at the foot of the Himalayas on the Indian side of the border with Nepal, to Manhattan to flashbacks to Cambridge, and deals with such heavy topics as post-colonialism, class, racism and globalization, but does so by focusing on the individual characters and their fates. The characters are often ridiculous (and often seemed like caricatures to me), but for all their flaws, by the end, each of them invokes their own sympathy. The book isn't perfect by any means (and I do wonder if it will appeal to people who know little about the Indian subcontinent, although I'd like to think it would) but over all, highly recommended.On my protracted plane rides to and from Detroit, I read Rory Stewart's The Places in Between, which I also really liked. The book chronicles Stewart's amazing walk across Afghanistan immediately after the fall of the Taliban. Aside from the sheer audacity of what Stewart did (and the fact that he lived to tell about it), Stewart's writing style is something I found myself admiring. It's understated and matter of fact to the point that it's occasionally easy to overlook just what it is that Stewart is actually doing. There is little that is romanticized, sentimental, preachy or condescending in Stewart's narrative. In this age of tell-all narratives, it was refreshing that Stewart barely tells the reader anything about himself. From the book, it's even hard to figure out his politics, although there are a few hints. I’m currently trying hard to resist the lure of ordering his book Prince of the Marshes, since I have a bazillion unread books cluttering my apartment.
Quite a while ago I read Helen Oyeyemi’s Icarus Girl, which I like a lot. It was a glimpse into a culture and mythology I know very little about, and is extremely well done. I thought the author (who I believe was 20 when she wrote the book) was very effective with the voice of her main character, a troubled young girl who is half-Nigerian and half-English and who finds herself befriended by a mysterious girl who may or may not be real. The book is downright creepy in parts, and I was completely drawn into the main character’s world.
A very long while ago I finished reading a book called Humanity: A Moral History of the Twentieth Century by Jonathan Glover, which ranks among the best non-fiction books I’ve read. Ages ago, I started a post on it, which one day I will finish.
I’ve also been reading a few of the Modern Library Chronicles series. I originally bought Paul Fussell’s The Boys’ Crusade because I wanted that particular book, but having experienced the pure visceral pleasure of holding such a neatly made hardback (that put me in mind of long-gone days spent in primary school libraries), I admit my motive for being interested in the series is a little less than purely intellectual. But, dabbler that I am, I do like the idea of reading short treatments of various topics by experts in the fields. In reality, though, the results seem to be a bit mixed. I didn’t hate but didn’t particularly like Anthony Pagden’s People and Empires: A Short History of European Migration, Exploration, and Conquest, from Greece to the Present, which may be because I found the title misleading, and was expecting something somewhat different. I also just finished the series’ book Communism by Richard Pipes, which was interesting, but made me wonder how it is that, in a book published in 2003, an author gets away with referring to the “Third World” and the “Orient.” It was readable and I certainly don’t know enough about the topic to criticize—but the book did make some sweeping generalizations about the history of property ownership in the introductory section that had my hackles rising.
I’ve now started Jared Diamond’s Collapse, which has been sitting on my shelf gathering dust. I’m about 50 pages in, and it will probably take me a while.
ETA: I knew I was forgetting stuff.
darklyscarlett's comment reminded me that I'd also read Nick Hornby's A Long Way Down. I didn't love it. It had brilliant bits in it, but over all was strangely flat for me. I had to force myself to finish it. I enjoy Hornby's writing, but I thought this was the worst of his novels.Television
I don’t normally watch a lot of television, but with the use of DVR, I’m either watching more, or at least I’m watching things I’m deliberately choosing. I’ve started watching Ugly Betty, which I love so far, although I’ve only seen a few episodes (and if anyone watches this show—what is deal with the woman who everyone thinks is dead but has her face wrapped in bandages??). I’ve also watched a few episodes of Brothers and Sisters, which I wouldn’t have thought would appeal to me, but which I’m liking in an emo-porn kind of way.
I'm also still watching Heroes, which I'm loving even more, as well as BSG, with which I have a love-hate relationship. It's rather like a bad child--so much potential, can't help but love it, but all too often a train wreck.
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no subject
Date: 2006-12-02 03:30 am (UTC)Having read both of Rory Stewart's books, I can tell you that I'd jump his scrawny, rumpled, mad and cranky Scots arse in a second. I'd have his children, as a matter of fact. Sigh. He read at Astor Place on my birthday, but I missed the signing since
Casino Royale was brilliant. Not perfect, but just so different from the conventional Bond films -- it had a cohesive plot (Paul Haggis was one of the screenwriters) -- and I loved this particular characterization of JB as an angry but oddly purposeful young man. It was nice to see the genesis of 007, and to see him before he hardened into the cold borderline-misogynist killing machine. You can believe that this JB can kill you with his bare hands. Daniel Craig was such the sexy rogue!
Yeah, I'd see it again if I could. Didn't dig the Chris Cornell theme song, though. I would've preferred Franz Ferdinand or even Interpol, really.
no subject
Date: 2006-12-02 05:43 am (UTC)I'll have to see if I can catch CR --maybe this weekend.
Rory Stewart simply seems too good to be true. I refuse to think of him as being around the same age as me. It's depressing.