mjh's blog

Jennifer’s Body (3 Stars)

Go to IMDb page

Information © IMDb.com

Despite the fact that I was only mildly amused by Diablo Cody’s Juno, I decided to see Jennifer’s Body, in part, because some reviews said Cody’s screenplay has a special take on both horror and teenage girls. Indeed, the relationship between hottie Jennifer and ersatz-mousy Needy is central, albeit a little sketchy.

The movie is littered with the arch, wry, and sarcastic pop-culture references required of all things hip. Not everyone pulls it off like Joss Whedon, who is such a master he can make it work in another galaxy (Firefly).

I’m not sure whether Cody simply exploits movie clichés or mocks them – both, it seems. Is the thing you fear behind the open fridge door? Ha, no, guess again. Don’t go down the dark hall or into the woods. The movie is dark, creepy, and gory, if not very rewarding of one’s time. You gotta wonder about a small western town with an entire block of abandoned townhouses and similarly abandoned natatorium up a well-groomed hill.

I don’t think the frame story enhanced the film, though I appreciate justice being delivered under the final credits. The explanation of Jennifer’s, uh, condition comes a little late in the film. Her blasé acceptance of her fate makes it hard to care about her. No doubt a pretty girl can lure a guy – even a goth dude – to scale a fence and enter an abandoned house to his own doom, but is there a teenaged girl in America who would jump into a van with a band of strangers headed into the woods? Sure, it actually happens too often, but Jennifer seemed too smart for that and it makes no sense her BFF would let her go alone, except that there is no story if it doesn’t happen that way. And while we’re supposed to laugh at would-be Satanists who get their rituals off the Web, it’s frightening to think what that might inspire.

Although my thumb is slightly down on this film, most of the actors are interesting in their roles, including Amanda Seyfried (who has a very different role in Letters to Juliet), a couple of the teen boys, and J.K. Simmons, a great “character actor” who was also in Juno. And, I’m always glad to see Chris Pratt, the ironically-named Bright from Everwood.

How many men? [updated]

Just days ago, NewMexiKen reminded us of the conquest of New Mexico by the USA. Nearly 200 years before that, the Pueblo’s gave the boot to the Spanish:

NewMexiKen | The Pueblo Revolt

On this date in 1680, the surviving Spanish settlers under siege decided to abandon Santa Fe and began the trek to Chihuahua. The Spanish did not return to Nuevo México for 12 years. …

The Puebloans removed all signs of the Spanish — the churches, the religion itself, the crops, even the animals (the horses let loose on the plains, eventually transforming the culture of the Plains Indians) [mjh: That fact always blows my mind.]. One vestige remained: one man rule. Popé declared himself that man and moved to the Palace in Santa Fe.

Spanish attempts at reconquest failed until 1692.

NewMexiKen | The Pueblo Revolt

But, wait, there’s more!

The Pueblo Revolt of 1680 By Joseph Sando | Published  07/1/2002

In 1675, Governor Juan de Trevino arrested 47 Pueblo men and charged them with sorcery. Four were hanged and the rest were publicly whipped in the plaza in Santa Fe.

Among those whipped was Popé, of San Juan Pueblo. Upon his return home, Popé began to think of a way to get rid of the Spaniards. He set up meetings that soon included nearby pueblos. The word of an organized Pueblo revolt spread to include Taos, Picuris and Jemez, as well as the Keresan-speaking pueblos of Cochiti and Santo Domingo. The meetings were highly secret, held generally at night, and composed mostly of each pueblo’s war captains.

Five years later, at one of their last meetings, at Tesuque on August 8, 1680, two messengers were detailed to carry a knotted rope showing the number of days before the revolt would begin.

The Pueblo Revolt of 1680

And today, we all live in glorious harmony and love. [Insert cartoon of characters laughing and hugging and suddenly glowering at each other before laughing and hugging again. Loop endlessly.]

PS: OK, yes, what would we (er, I) do without NMK? (Well, I remembered the 47 connection from long before.) I even have a NewMexiKen blog category. (As well as, 47, of course.)

[Update]

This just in: Writing after NewMexiKen about a time before Ken’s subject, but essential to that topic, Rudolfo Carrillo invokes that number, too. It’s all coincidence; it’s all connected.

los que llegaron con caballos y acero – Duke City Fix

Four hundred and seventy years later, there is a large and beautiful shopping mall, miles from the river, named after the man.

los que llegaron con caballos y acero – Duke City Fix

[Update Two]

As chance would have it, the original post floated over to Facebook before the previous update, then found its way into Google Reader at 3:47pm – really! Moreover, Reader said parenthetically “(5 min ago),” but I’ll bet it was just rounding up from 4.7 minutes.

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

I’m amazed so many people have read this book. I think more people reacted to seeing it on my table than any other book in a long time.

It was too long for me. And, too slow. The first hundred pages crept by like The Wall Street Journal. I’m assuming the author intended for me to guess the “big secret” the moment I read about it in the Preface. No doubt, he used that as a hook (readers will stick around to make sure they’re right). There were, indeed, other surprises. The frequent mentions of other mystery writers went from cute, to predictable, and back to cute again. The multitude of people – first, middle, last, and pet names – and town names, often jammed into one sentence, taxed my interest. Yeah, I know it’s set in Sweden. (Mind you, I majored in German Language and Literature. I’ve read a lot of unusual names – in German, yet.) Speaking of translation: There were several times I stopped in amazement, wondering what was really meant. I’m well-read enough to handle gaol, and to figure out the translator meant arranged when he wrote organized. Maybe it’s all perfect British English. I haven’t a clue what dogsbody means, even in context. But I was susceptible to distractions because, again, the book is too long. Still, the very end was quite moving.

On the other hand, the two major characters are well-done. Since one of them a journalist, like the author, he may not have been much of a stretch, though I wonder if Larsson had so much sex. Still, Lisbeth Salander is a very original character.

And kudos to Stieg Larsson for drawing such attention to violence against women, not only in terms of several aspects of the plot, but even in the pages between sections. And the original title: Men Who Hate Women. Larsson does not glamorize this violence and he documents it well-enough to make me quite uncomfortable. I gather he is building towards even larger issues involving violence against women and children. Not sure I can stomach more, especially at a slow pace. I’m undecided.

The Cooler (4 stars)

Go to IMDb page

Information © IMDb.com

We watched the Cooler primarily for William H. Macy and Alex Baldwin. They did not disappoint. Maria Bello was a pleasant surprise and equal to the others.

I hate the real Las Vegas, Nevada, and almost every depiction of it. It’s an awful town. This movie touches on the dead-end, endless night aspects of the place. The caricature of mob involvement is a bit old, of course. The fresh aspect is in the notion of the “cooler” himself: a man so unlucky that just being near him ends any lucky you have at the moment.

The violence is at the edge of my tolerance. I understand why this created some buzz for Alec Baldwin, who is a very good bad guy. 

This Week’s OMFG-WTF?!

At least 20% of the American public is horribly, woefully, tragically – proudly and intentionally – dumb as shit. Are our pipes made of lead? Does HFCS decrease intelligence? Maybe global warming makes people stupid?

Growing Number of Americans Say Obama is a Muslim: OVERVIEW – Pew Research Center for the People & the Press

A substantial and growing number of Americans say that Barack Obama is a Muslim, while the proportion saying he is a Christian has declined. More than a year and a half into his presidency, a plurality of the public says they do not know what religion Obama follows.

A new national survey by the Pew Research Center finds that nearly one-in-five Americans (18%) now say Obama is a Muslim, up from 11% in March 2009. Only about one-third of adults (34%) say Obama is a Christian, down sharply from 48% in 2009. Fully 43% say they do not know what Obama’s religion is. The survey was completed in early August, before Obama’s recent comments about the proposed construction of a mosque near the site of the former World Trade Center. …

The belief that Obama is a Muslim has increased most sharply among Republicans (up 14 points since 2009), especially conservative Republicans (up 16 points). But the number of independents who say Obama is a Muslim has also increased significantly (up eight points). There has been little change in the number of Democrats who say Obama is a Muslim, but fewer Democrats today say he is a Christian (down nine points since 2009).

Growing Number of Americans Say Obama is a Muslim: OVERVIEW – Pew Research Center for the People & the Press

Happy Dependence Day!

Head over to NewMexiKen’s for the story of the conquest of New Mexico (a continuing saga of 13,000 years or so):

NewMexiKen | New Mexico

New Mexico officially became part of the United States 164 years ago today when 1,600 troops under General Stephen Watts Kearny raised the American flag over the plaza in the Royal City of the Holy Faith of Saint Francis (Santa Fe), reportedly as the sun broke through the overcast sky. There had been little or no resistance. (It came at Taos the following January.)

August 18. Gen. Kearney proceeded through the pass and at 5 pm reached hill that overlooks Santa Fe. …

NewMexiKen | New Mexico

Balderdash and Fiddlefaddle

We were very excited when Sun Chips (fish flakes for humans, as Rebecca put it so well) came out with a compostable bag. What a great idea! Sadly, the bags don’t live up to the promise. The photo shows two bags. The one on the left sat in full sun, while the other was in our compost pile (not buried). I don’t know exactly how long these bags have been exposed to the elements, including New Mexico’s monsoon season, but it is more than the 13 weeks the bag says it takes to completely compost.

If you’ve picked up one of these bags, you know they make such a weird and load rustling noise. No one sneaks a chip without the rest of the household knowing about it. (As if the orange residue wouldn’t give you away.)

OMG, This Week’s LOL+WTF?!

This photo is priceless. The guy looks like a member of Draco’s clan – the one who embarrasses them all. Geert must have been made up by a Hollywood hack with the intent of making fascists look bad. What a jackass. A ‘political tool,’ indeed.

Think Progress » Gingrich, Bolton, Breitbart Team Up With Far-Right Muslim-Basher Geert Wilders For 9/11 Rally

[Photo of] the far-right Dutch Parliamentarian Geert Wilders. “Islam is not a religion, it’s an ideology,” Wilders told the Guardian in 2009, “the ideology of a retarded culture.”

In the past, Wilders’ extremism has been condemned by conservatives such as Bill Kristol, Charles Krauthammer, and even Glenn Beck, who called Wilders “fascist.” It’s a clear sign of how far the Republicans have shifted to the right and embraced Islamophobia as a political tool that movement figures like Gingrich, Bolton, and Breitbart now have no problem sharing a stage with Wilders.

Think Progress » Gingrich, Bolton, Breitbart Team Up With Far-Right Muslim-Basher Geert Wilders For 9/11 Rally

Reading Process Is Surprisingly Different Than Previously Thought, Technology Shows

Very interesting. It makes me wonder if dyslexia is a problem with one eye or the fusion of both.

Reading Process Is Surprisingly Different Than Previously Thought, Technology Shows

Analysing these eye movements enables psychologists to understand how our brain processes the sentence.

With sophisticated eye tracking equipment able to determine which letter of a font-size 14 word a person is looking at every millisecond from 1 metre away, Prof. Liversedge’s team went one further and looked at the letters within the word within the sentence. They were able to deduce that when our eyes are not looking at the same letter of the word, they are usually about two letters apart. Prof. Liversedge explains: ‘Although this difference might sound small, in fact it represents a very substantial difference in terms of the precise "picture" of the world that each eye delivers to the brain.’

So if our eyes are looking at different parts of the same word, thereby receiving different information from each eye, how is it that we are able to see the words clearly enough to read them? There are two ways the brain can do this; either the image from one of the eyes is blocked or the two different images are somehow fused together.

Reading Process Is Surprisingly Different Than Previously Thought, Technology Shows

The Void

The following is from Roger Ebert’s journal (he is so much more than a movie reviewer). This post is about Christopher Hitchens, a renowned atheist. (I reject atheism proselytizers as much as any others.)

Traveler to the undiscovere’d country – Roger Ebert’s Journal

Ebert: I was asked at lunch today who or what I worshipped. The question was asked sincerely, and in the same spirit I responded that I worshipped whatever there might be outside knowledge. I worship the void. The mystery. And the ability of our human minds to perceive an unanswerable mystery. To reduce such a thing to simplistic names is an insult to it, and to our intelligence.

Traveler to the undiscovere’d country – Roger Ebert’s Journal

It’s an interesting take, although he lost me at worship (barf). I think a lot about the unthinkable, especially the unknowable. I think we’re fools – scientist or priest – to believe the entirety of our knowledge is more than one grain of sand on an infinite beach. Moreover, I believe there are things not merely unknown, but truly eternally and infinitely unknowable.

However, gawd, in every variation humans have imagined, is not a part of that. (But, I can’t know that, can I.) More to the point, death is not part of that. We know what death is and we deny it every chance we get. Death is not a passage to a new adventure. Death is the end of self. But, no worries, you won’t feel a thing. After all, you didn’t spend the millennia before your birth tapping your foot and watching the proceedings.

Fearless Leadership

Obama-haters must be apoplectic over his latest principled stand. (As is usual, in such matters, the atheists get left out, but Obama has acknowledged our existence – and rights – on other occasions.) peace, mjh

Think Progress » Obama Speaks Out On Mosque Controversy: ‘Our Commitment To Religious Freedom Must Be Unshakeable’

OBAMA: Let me be clear: as a citizen, and as President, I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as anyone else in this country. That includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances. This is America, and our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakeable. The principle that people of all faiths are welcome in this country, and will not be treated differently by their government, is essential to who we are. The writ of our Founders must endure.

Think Progress » Obama Speaks Out On Mosque Controversy: ‘Our Commitment To Religious Freedom Must Be Unshakeable’

One Idiot Does Not Spoil the Whole Bunch

Only 30% of idiots believe Obama is a foreign-born Muslim socialist. Hey, they’re idiots – they’re not crazy.

[below: from a year ago]

mjh’s blog — Why Are ‘Birthers’ Hiding the Results of Their IQ Tests?

It’s time to demand tangible proof that the people who question Obama’s citizenship aren’t the idiots they appear to be. Show us proof you graduated from the 6th Grade. Submit to a drug test, while you’re at it.

There is, indeed, a conspiracy afoot. Dangerous fanatics are conspiring to stir up the easily-confused so that some freedom-loving kook does something horrible. And when the next Timothy McVeigh strikes, all these vile rabble-rousers will say, “oh, we never intended such consequences.” Liars. Destruction is their goal.

mjh’s blog — Why Are ‘Birthers’ Hiding the Results of Their IQ Tests?

Japan takes vending machines to their logical, 47-inch touchscreen extreme — Engadget

Japan takes vending machines to their logical, 47-inch touchscreen extreme — Engadget

this latest spin on the vending machine dispenses with those silly windows unto what you’re buying and furnishes its user with a 47-inch touch panel from which to make his (or her) selection. An embedded camera will recognize your gender and age, allowing the machine to recommend a beverage suitable to whatever stereotype is attached to your particular circumstances.

Japan takes vending machines to their logical, 47-inch touchscreen extreme — Engadget

Pan’s Labyrinth (4 Stars)

Go to IMDb page

Information © IMDb.com

Wow. The Labyrinth of the Faun is quite a weird fairy tale / history. Guillermo del Toro has an amazing vision and knack for realizing that vision.

Certain items, such as insects and clocks, figure into most, if not all of his work. And creatures with misplaced or too many eyes. (The second Hellboy wasn’t as good as the first, but had several mind-blowing images clearly from del Toro.)

The violence of the history – of the real monster, played too well by Sergi López – was difficult to watch. I don’t think the movie had a “happy” ending, but that may depend on your faith.