The Collection Project

Ooooh, the Collection Project! How grand! What's that gonna cure??

Okay, okay, shut up. It's just a name. Let me explain what this new project is going to be, and how it's going to work, and we'll see if, by the end, it makes any sense.

Last night, I was lying, as is my custom, on the couch, and I happened to begin an idle scan of my DVD collection. Bragging about the size of one's DVD collection is a pretty stupid, not to mention bizarre, thing to do, so please understand that's not what I'm doing when I say that I own a fair number of them. This is not unusual, or noteworthy in any way. But for whatever reason I started thinking about writing about all of them -- not writing about them en masse, but individually. And not writing about them as DVDs, but as films. Writing about each film I owned, one (or so) at a time, on this here blog, and stopping only when I'd run out of films to write about. That is what I now propose to do. I mean, not tonight, but starting now. Well, Sunday, but I think you get me.

But do you? Do you really? Once the basic idea for this project occurred to me, I began to wonder about the practicality of it, how I could do this without burning out on it after a week, and how to do it without letting it completely overwhelm what I like to think is a certain level of diversity on this blog. So this project is going to take several different shapes. The first thing you should know is that there will be no order to this -- I'll write about whatever movie or movies I happen to feel like writing about. So on Sunday, it is my intention to write about a couple of movies that jumped out at me from my shelves as possibly being an interesting little double-bill. That's one form this project will take: interesting pairings. Self-explanatory, I should think, and if not you'll get the idea on Sunday. Another, more standard-issue form will be simple, long-form reviews of a single film, not at all unlike the many others I've already written here.

Okay, so, how's this any different from what I already do? Well, I'll tell you: every blog post you see here until the project reaches its end (at which time, Ragnarok will be upon us, so I wouldn't even worry about it) will be about a film in my DVD collection. But not every post I write from here on out will be about films in my DVD collection. Right now, if I had to guess, I'd say you're probably thinking one of two things: "Hah?" or "The fuck??" Please, to explain: let's say that tomorrow I go see Kick-Ass (I'm not going to, but let's just say), and then I come home and decide to write about it. At the end of that review, after I've signed off with a righteous "Time to move off the field, gramps!" -- signalling to those who dislike Kick-Ass that they are aged -- I would then tack on an addendum, a little capsule review of a film in my DVD collection like, say, Spider-Man. Because, you know: comic books. That's the kind of left-field connection I hope to make on a regular basis.

So, every post will be about The Collection Project, even when it's not. That includes lazy-bones picture posts, where I just put up a picture of an actor or writer or director -- with this project, I will be forced to go one step further, every time (of course, if I've already written up the movie at some length elsewhere on the blog, then I'll just provide a link, and you can cry all you want on those days -- I'll be at home chomping on a big old cigar, wishing only that I could smell your misery). Of course, there is the possibility that I'll have to break off from this on occasion. For instance, if this October I decide to go another round with The Kind of Face You SLASH!!!, then The Collection Project will have to take a hiatus. That would simply be too much -- I wouldn't be able to do it. Barring that sort of special occasion, however, every day, in every way, The Collection Project shall grow. Also, not every day. I'm going to post as often, or as rarely, as I ever have. Forget what I said about "every day". That was just me lying. But if you understand anything about what I've just laid out, let it be this: the only way in which this blog will change by having The Collection Project added to it is that each post will be at least just a little bit longer. Every post will at least have a post-script. In some cases, I won't write a full capsule review, but rather some general thoughts, or I'll write about a particular scene, or performance, but I'll always write something.

The only other question I can anticipate from you, My Readers, is: "Why? Are you just dumb?" Not at all! There are a couple of reasons for this. One, essentially ancillary, reason is to lay my cards on the table. What I mean is, have you ever been in a store that sells used DVDs, and they're having a sale where you buy three and get one free, and you find three DVDs you really want, and then find yourself scraping for that free fourth title, and for reasons known only to you and your God, you eventually find yourself leaving the store with a copy of Dragonheart? You were not a person who owned Dragonheart twenty minutes ago, and now look at you. That's what I mean about laying my cards on the table: I do this all the time. I own some movies that I'm quite frankly embarrassed to admit I own, and you're going to hear about them all. Not that I think this is somehow necessary, but for some reason I do think it will be interesting and/or fun. Time will probably prove me wrong. Incidentally, I also own a lot of movies that I'm not embarrassed to own, but that I don't really like all that much. But they interest me anyway. Those should be good to dive into.

The other two reasons are more important to me (in the important-by-blogging-standards sense). This project will force me to revisit old movies that I haven't watched in years, or even at all, because I own them, and have begun to take them for granted. Movies mean a lot to me, but I own a fair number of DVDs that are just collecting dust. This is my way of dusting them off and connecting to them again (or for the first time, or not at all, as the case may be). The other reason is that, simply, I think a person's book collection, or DVD collection, is interesting. I think all biblio- and cinephiles would agree with me on that. I'm not so stupid or shallow as to think a person's DVD collection in any way measures their worth, but it does say a hell of a lot about their taste, and what the hell is a movie/book blog like this but an expression of my tastes?

So, there you go. That's my big idea. I know, it sounds stupid. But I'm doing it anyway, and we begin on Sunday. See you then.

Do You Like What You See?

And then BLAM! I'm being controlled by Satan. So to the list of things I would be useless during -- which already include quests for treasure in the Amazon and anything that would require me to become an astronaut -- you can now add 18th Century occult/Satanic-type situations involving pretty blonde ladies. I still think I'd be okay if me and a small group of friends found a bag of money, unless I suddenly turned greedy or one of my friends betrayed me. Barring either of those occurrences, though, I think I could swing it.

Chekhov's Gun

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Johnny and Lisa seem to have everything. Johnny is Lisa's future husband, and Lisa is Johnny's future wife. Johnny has a very secure job, plus he's about to be promoted. They share an apartment in San Francisco, and it has couches and chairs and paintings in it. On their roof is lawn furniture and a corrugated tin shed, and elsewhere in their building lives Johnny's pseudo-adopted son, an emotionally regressive 18-year-old named Denny. What else could they possibly need?

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Love. Love is what else they could need.

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Oh hi. The problem, it seems to me, with writing in any controlled or structured way about Tommy Wiseau's extraordinary The Room is that there isn't a single moment in the entire film that isn't worth mentioning. I've seen it twice now (the second time around, I fast-forwarded through the sex scenes, and if you've seen The Room you know what a time-saver that is), and I found myself latching on to particular moments that had to make it into this write-up, only to have them completely crowded out in a snap by an avalanche of dialogue and performance choices that each deserved an entire post of their own. Wiseau's film is, in short, a gift that won't stop giving, and by the end the attentive viewer is overwhelmed with sensation, with such a variety of experiences, that upon reflection The Room begins to seem like nothing more than a jumble of roses, footballs, wax apples, and words and phrases like "hi", "future", "best friend", "it doesn't matter", "I don't want to talk about it" and "I definitely have breast cancer".

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Shot like a SyFy Channel Original Movie, minus all the rock monsters and sharktopi, The Room is, as I indicated above, the story of a failing relationship. As the film begins, we are introduced to Lisa (Juliette Danielle) as she greets Johnny (Tommy Wiseau) upon his return home from work. Johnny gives her a present, a slinky red dress, and it is here that one of Wiseau's aesthetic hallmarks (he not only stars in the film, but also wrote and directed it, taking each job in both the first and second units, if the credits are to be believed), which is an inability to remember, or to read, what he's just written, and therefore writing it all over again. Here, Lisa has just accepted the dress:
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Lisa: Can I try it on now?

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Johnny: Sure, it's yours.

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Lisa: You wait right here, and I'm going to try it on right now.

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Johnny: Mm hm.

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After Lisa puts the dress on right now, Johnny's adopted-ish son Denny (Phillip Haldiman) arrives, to tell Lisa how pretty she looks and to ask how much the dress cost. He also asks if he can take a nap with Johnny, but after being gently rebuffed twice (not only is the nap a no-go, but he's told he can't watch Johnny and Lisa have sex, either), Johnny and Lisa make love. It is here that I believe Lisa begins to hate Johnny.

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This growing hatred, this rending asunder of a love once so true, forms the heart, soul, spine, brain and lungs of The Room. Lisa will awaken from their passionate and incredibly slow love-making to decide, abruptly, that she no longer loves Johnny, despite the fact, as Lisa's mother Claudette (Carolyn Minnott) points out, that Johnny provides for her, and Lisa can't provide for herself (Claudette, by the way, is the one who has the evidently mild case of terminal breast cancer). Lisa will begin a campaign of manipulation, betrayal, infidelity, and not-wanting-to-talk-about-things that will include seducing Johnny's best friend Mark (Greg Sestero) and fixing Johnny, a non-drinker, a potent cocktail made up of one part whiskey and one part vodka (which I've dubbed the Necktie Headband, after the couple's ensuing drunken shenanigans) so that she can later make the claim that Johnny got drunk and hit her. Since nobody cares if Lisa got punched, this is soon dropped. But the one thing that is not dropped is tragedy. Tragedy looms, and is also symbolized. I just this second decided that there's a symbol for "tragedy" in this movie. More on that later.

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If The Room was merely (merely!) a story of love gone cold, it would deserve our attention for Wiseau's indelible performance, carried by his rich, South-Northern Frenchtalian accent, and for the scenes of emotional violence between Johnny and Lisa (LISA: Women change their minds all the time! JOHNNY: Ha ha! You must be joking, aren't you!(?)), as well as the crushing tragedy that forms the story's devastating endgame (okay, the symbol for tragedy is a football, but just hold on for the rest), but, of course, The Room is so much more than that.

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Wiseau's loose storytelling method allows for a host of supporting characters to appear at random and leave a trail of rich texture behind him. Denny, in particular, has a habit of repeatedly dropping by Johnny's apartment to exchange dialogue with either Lisa or Johnny that seem to be constructed from the beginnings and endings of about a dozen different conversations. Such as:

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Lisa: Hey Denny, how are you doing?

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Denny: Fine. What's new?

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Lisa: Actually I'm really busy. Do you want something to drink?

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Denny: No thanks. I just wanna talk to Johnny. You look beautiful today. Can I kiss you?

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Lisa: You're such a little brat!

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Denny: Just kidding. I love you and Johnny!

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Early in the film, it is also revealed that Denny has some sort of vague drug problem. He is accosted on the rooftop of his building by Charlie-R, a drug dealer, who pulls a gun and demands that Denny pay him his money. Denny is rescued by the sudden appearance of every other character who's been introduced up to that point, and a long, tearful and hysterical third-degree of Denny at the hands of Lisa ensues. This conversation consists primarily of Denny saying that he owed Charlie-R money because he bought some drugs from him, but that he got rid of the drugs and it doesn't matter, and Lisa screaming "What kind of money?" and "What kind of drugs?" The answer to the question "What kind of money?" is probably "American", but the kind of drugs that Denny bought and then disposed of is one of the film's many intriguing mysteries.

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This crisis in Denny's life is never mentioned again, but, crucially, a gun, or the idea of guns -- of violence -- has been introduced into The Room's false sense of love and peace. It is with these supposedly, and so-called, meaningless scenes that Wiseau subtly shapes his tragedy (or "football"). Two other non-sequitor events lay the symbolic groundwork. In one, a character named Mike stops Johnny as he's running through what appears to be a tiny abandoned warehouse. Mike, we know, is the boyfriend of Michelle, Lisa's friend. Earlier, we saw Mike and Michelle preparing for sex -- in Johnny's apartment -- by eating chocolate out of each other's mouths, which is gross, and which I don't think you're supposed to do. They were caught in the act by Lisa and Claudette, who found Mike's underwear hanging out of his pocket. It was a light-hearted scene, and Mike recounts the events to Johnny (significantly referring to the incident as a "tragedy"), in the tiny warehouse, in a light-hearted way. Johnny assures Mike that he's not only listening to his story, but that he understands stories about underwear, and points out, when Mike has concluded, that "That's life!" At this point, Denny shows up, carrying with him a football. This football -- or possibly many footballs -- is seen throughout The Room, and leads to more than one round of catch. This is precisely what Johnny, Mike and Denny proceed to do, when suddenly Mark shows up. Mark, Johnny's best friend, is at this point well into his affair with Lisa (Johnny's future wife), and we know that he's experiencing a lot of guilt about this. When he agrees to take part in their game of "catch the football", Denny and Johnny begin to hint at Mike's crazy underwear story. Thunderstruck, Mark says "Underwear!? What's that!?", and then shoves Mike into a nearby pile of trashcans. Mike is clearly injured -- badly injured -- and has to be helped away by his friends. A "tragic" story leads to tossing the football around, which leads...to violence.

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Later in the film, Johnny, Mark, Denny, and Peter (another friend, and a psychologist) meet at Johnny's apartment, each of them wearing a tuxedo. The purpose of this evening wear is left to our imaginations, but it occurs to Denny that it might be fun to go down to the alley and throw the football around. Peter -- who knows that Mark and Lisa are having an affair, and who Mark threatened with violence -- demurs at first. He doesn't think this is a good idea. As a psychologist, perhaps he is more in tune to the emotional and phyiscal tragedy that is represented by Denny's football, but Peter's own pedestrian human nature causes him, eventually, to succumb, after the other three call him a chicken, and make chicken noises at him. So they all go to the alley and start throwing the football. Denny tells Peter to "go out" so that he can throw the football (or "tragedy") to him, and as Peter does so, he trips and falls. While he does not appear to be badly hurt, Peter never again appears in the film. The football/tragedy has led to his disappearance/death.

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Finally, Wiseau is ready to stage his inevitable climax, which revolves around the surprise birthday party for Johnny that Lisa has been planning ("You invited all my friends! Good idea!"). The well-informed viewer will instinctively recognize this section of the film as the "third act", and as he or she comes to this realization, perhaps he or she will remember, as I did, something that Anton Chekhov once said: "If in the first act you have hung a pistol on the wall, then in the following one it should be fired." And once you think of this, you think of Charlie-R's gun. How can you not?

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The birthday party goes badly, with Mark and Lisa brazenly "making out" in the middle of the room, despite the protestations of Michelle, and some brand new guy who may only have been the plus-one of one of Johnny's work friends, but who nevertheless clearly knows what the shot is. In any case, Johnny and Mark fight, Johnny announces that "everyone betray me", he and Lisa break up, and then Johnny tears his bedroom apart. After humping the red dress he bought Lisa for a few seconds, he notices his hope chest, laying among the waste of his trashed bedroom. In that hope chest, we see that he keeps a gun and, just beneath that, nothing else. He removes the gun, asks God to forgive him, and then shoots himself square in the mouth.

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When I was first planning to compose this critical essay of Tommy Wiseau's The Room, it was my belief that Charlie-R's gun -- which we see Mark take from the drug dealer -- and the gun Johnny uses to end his shattered life, were one in the same. It was based on this belief that I was able to construct my Chekhov idea. However, screengrabs of the two guns provided to me by a friend prove that they're two different guns, and I was, briefly, despondent. But only briefly, because then I thought of something Denny said, up there on that rooftop, under the blue sky of San Francisco. He said, "It doesn't matter!" And despite Lisa and Claudette's continued averring that it did, in fact, matter, Denny stuck to his "guns", and you know what? He was right. It doesn't matter. Because each of The Room's guns represent all guns, just as however many footballs they used represent all tragedies. When Charlie-R introduced that first gun, it was assured that either that gun, or another one, would go off. The tragedy of The Room -- as is far too often the case in our world, in our streets, in our homes -- is that it went off in Johnny's mouth.

Yes I Said Yes I Will Whaaaaaa!?!?

Since you asked, my energy levels are still dangerously low, so this post will be a whole lotta nothin'. You should know, however, that I have something more substantial percolating for some time on Saturday, when no one will be around to read it. But I don't write this blog so that people can read it anyway -- I write it for me.

In the meantime, while I'm waiting to see what I have in store for me this weekend, here's a picture I took while in Austin, TX a couple of weeks ago. This is inside an "Irish" "pub" (the food's really good, though) called Fado.

Because any time James Joyce found himself in Austin, TX, he made sure to swing by the Fado Irish Pub and get himself some of their delicious fish tacos.

Affinity #20

Fine. So almost nobody cares about books I claim to have written, but, in fact, haven't? Just for that snub, I'm going to make no effort to get past my complete lack of energy, resulting in a post that consists entirely of a picture of a person I like. Take that, so-called friends!

Excerpt

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Another battle lost to the network suits occured in 1980, over at ABC. Dogs of War was the original title for Too Close for Comfort. This was the idea of the late Ted Knight, who viewed the series as his magnum opus. While he had nothing to do with the creation or writing of the show at any time during its run, he felt that calling it Dogs of War would convey a sense of doom and general existential malaise, which he felt was clearly a part of the show’s subtext.

“By definition, subtext is unspoken,” remembers Jm J. Bullock, who played “Monroe” on the series. “And Ted felt that, when he read those early scripts, there was a palpable sense of unease and dread that underlay all the surface shenanigans. In those early days, the show didn’t have any title at all, and Ted believed that by calling the show Dogs of War, that powerful, sub-textual darkness would be brought to the fore. So, for instance, there might be an episode where Ted’s character needed Monroe to help him catch a mouse in the attic, and while we’re up there he finds a bunch of old letters from his wife that seem to indicate she’d once had an affair. After a series of mix-ups, though, it turns out it was just notes for a novel she’d been writing years ago, and which, by the end of the show, Ted has encouraged her to finish. All very pleasant and fun, you know. But when the viewer connects all that fun to a show called Dogs of War, they start to think, ‘Hmm…Vietnam? Racism?’ That title made anything possible.”

To add the dark tone, Knight wanted the show’s opening credits to run accompanied by Barber’s Adagio for Strings. But the network nixed both the music and the title, in the latter case opting for the more generic Too Close for Comfort.

“Ted was crestfallen,” says Bullock. “And the gloating from Nancy Dussault, who’d never liked his ideas, didn’t help matters. When you watch the show now, you can see he’s just going through the motions. For my part, I wanted to do what I could to keep Ted’s vision alive with my performance, but looking back, without Dogs of War as the title, my shrill, circus-freak demeanor just doesn’t work.”

- from my upcoming book The Alienation of the Other or Benson?: Sitcom Title Changes and What They Say About America, coming soon from Penguin Press

Oh Goodness! It is the First of the April Fools!

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Raaarrrr!!! I'm a wolf!!! RAAARRRRR!!! I eat everyone up! I turn into a wolf yesterday!!! Maybe today, I think! Around midnight, I turn into a wolf!! Midnight counts as today!!! RAAAARRRRR!!! 12:00 AM is midnight, and "AM" stand for "ante meridiem", which is Latin for "this morning"!!! I EAT YOU UP!!! Although Gene Ray's Time Cube argues in favor of a four corner day, and I think this make a lot of sense!! I eat up evil educators!!! RAAAAAAARRRRRRR!!!!
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Ah ha ha ha! You stupid! Today is the day of the "April Fool", and that, my friend, is you! For you see, I am not a wolf, and never have been! I had you! I had you so much!! But it is April Fool. I am not a wolf.