Films'n'Such

I'm giving serious thought to heading down to ChiTown one day this week to catch a flick or 3. Not only is the director's cut of Alien playing, but the new Matrix flick is showing on an IMAX screen out in Lincolnshire. And there's Bubba Ho-Tep too. You know what else is playing? La jatee, the short that 12 Monkeys was based upon. And then we have a Polish film festival going on down at the Copernicus Center. Fuck me! And the Gay & Lesbian International Film Festival on top of it. I may a breeder but film festivals of any ilk are just cool. Mayhaps I can convince a friend to head down there with me.

Looking ahead, I see that there are some flicks with potential hitting the big screens. Ollie Stone's Alexander opens on 11/5/2004. Rodrigo Prieto is shooting. (He was the DP on Frida and 8 Mile, among other films.) I wonder what happened between Ollie and Bob Richardson...Speaking of Bob, he's shooting Martin Scorsese's The Aviator, a biopic of Howard Hughes starring Leonardo DiCaprio. Hmmm...What else? Tim Burton returns in a few months with Big Fish. Another PKD short story is hitting the big screen - Paycheck. John Woo is directing and Uma Thurman stars. Personally, I think Woo's American films have been shite but, like a moth to the flame, I'll always go see a flick based on a PKD story. And I do have that infatuation with Uma. The next installment of the Harry Potter series comes out next summer. Gary Oldman is playing Sirius Black so that should be cool. I sure hope they leave what little conflict there is between him and Severus Snape in the book intact because Oldman vs. Rickman should be classic. On the documentary side of things, Errol Morris returns in February with Fog of War. Everyone's favorite Canadian goofball, David Cronenberg, has Painkillers on tap for us. Janusz Kaminski is shooting Spielberg's next opus, The Terminal. I don't care how bad Lost Souls is, Kaminski is probably the best DP working in the biz right now. Speaking of which, Vittorio Storaro shot the new Exorcist flick. No doubt it will be a waste of his talent (and Stellan Skarsågrd's) but I gotta see it. Darius Khondji photographed Wimbeldon. The story of a tennis player doesn't interest me but I'll prolly see it anyway. Khondji's work on Se7en was so awesome and then he goes and does all these crappy flicks like The Beach. Going back to fave directors, Terry Gilliam's work on The Brothers Grimm continues unabated while Robert Altman gives us The Company starring Neve Campbell. Curiously enough, she is given a writing credit.

Well, that oughta keep me busy in the sinny next year.

I've been listening to Porcupine Tree this morning and it ain't doing good things to my head. Let's see here...ah yes, let's hear some Pavement. There was a thread about the lyrics to PT's In Absentia up at the G forum in which some guy asked about the lyrics. Steve Wilson doesn't like to say what individual songs are about but someone posted an interview excerpt in which he related his fascination with "...people on the fringes, on the edges of humanity and society. I have an interest in serial killers, child molesters and wife beaters - not in what they did but in the psychology of why, what caused them to become unhinged and twisted? Why are they unable to empathize? It's [In Absentia] sort of a metaphor - there's something missing, a black hole, a cancer in their soul. It's an absence in the soul." So the guy who made the post replies that he cannot listen to the songs relating to this theme for reasons of "personal ethics". What the fuck? I asked him what he meant and he reiterated the spiel about personal ethics and that a sibling of his was raped at a young age. OK, so why does this preclude him from listening to songs that ponder why the person who raped his sibling would do such a thing? Like the woodcutter said, I just don't understand. Harrumph.