Some Kind of Creative Drought

To put it mildly, I have been neglectful of this blog, through a myriad of circumstances and distractions. I have been working on a few writing projects to keep me somewhat sane during the long harsh Hoosier winter. I have also been a perpetual bad mood, caused in part by my chronic sinus pain and sleepless nights.

Tonight, after I finished taking random facebook quizzes and reading a story or two on a blog or two, I just started grooving on my iTunes party shuffle mode.

Music usually puts me in a better mood, but I haven't even listened to music much lately. I've purchased four albums (two in stores, two online) since January, but I have hardly taken the time necessary to truly appreciate them. What follows are a few of my first impressions on my latest musical acquisitions.

Pink, Funhouse
I have been a fan of Pink for many years, and this latest album seems much more angry and introspective than any of her other work. I like the songs, but they deserve more attention and analysis than I have given them, so I can't say much more. I wouldn't know whether to recommend this or not, but the single, "So What" is a fun anthem for self acceptance.

Goldfrapp, Seventh Tree
I inflicted this on a couple of friends who like dance and electronica, but it's not at all a dance or electronica album in the traditional sense. The beats are somber and drift from cheery to melancholy. Overall, it's a beautiful collection, a virtual symphony of electonic music with lots of texture and understated beauty. I would recommend this and it's probably my favorite album of the set. It's also the one I've listened to most.

Adele, 19
This singer was recommended by a friend and I checked it out online, before she won the Grammy for best new artist. The music is soulful and solid. I'm also a sucker for great taste, especially when they cover good Bob Dylan songs. Adele covers "Make You Feel My Love," which has been recorded oodles of times, each time sounding progressively more pleasant than Dylan's original. Adele's was amazing and it was that 30-second sample alone that made me buy the disc at the store. The rest of the album does not disappoint at all.

Matt Alber, Hide Nothing
Of course, you all are thinking "Who?" and you aren't wrong. I found out about this singer on a blog post of all things. He has a great video for the song "The End of the World." I posted a link on facebook and added the YouTube video to my favorites and I bought the album. There are maybe one or two other songs on it that I like, but most of the time when a track of his comes up on the iPod or iTunes, I kind of regret the $12.99 download price.

So that's what I've been listening to. My advice for any readers is to just take a break every now and then and listen to the beauty of the sounds all around you.

By the way, the title of this post is a lyric from the Barenaked Ladies song "Brian Wilson."

Rachel Getting Married

[CONTAINS SPOILERS]
Weddings are purported to be when people are at their best. The reality is that weddings are pretty intense events. Anyone who has ever been part of a wedding party knows that all of the preparation and stress got to be a little too much at times.

I just saw Rachel Getting Married at Cinema Center, my local art house theater. This was a truly engaging film, mainly with all of the entrancingly claustrophobic hand held cameras capturing the action. I was transported into the fray as a guest at the wedding, privy to what happens backstage as well as at the altar.

Kym (Anne Hathaway) is a troubled woman damaged by a lifetime of drug abuse who has come home from rehab for her sister's wedding. She is deeply flawed and manipulates every situation she is in because she is desperate for attention. She seems to be suffering from loneliness and isolation even though she's with the people who know her and love her best. She twists her sister's metaphorical arm (almost to the point of metaphorical amputation) into making her maid of honor, even though she clearly has little honor left.

But something strange has happened. Rachel (Rosemary DeWitt) is grown up and is getting her PhD in Psychology. (I can't imagine why she would have an interest in helping troubled people.) Rachel is no longer willing to put up with her sister's personality flaws, and with the major exception of making her maid of honor, Rachel calls Kym's bullshit for what it is. Through several events, it's revealed that Kym is directly responsible for the death of her toddler brother when she was a teenager. It's hardly a spoiler to say this, as it's mentioned fairly early into the film. This is quite obviously the reason everyone around her secretly loathes Kym. Their visceral disgust with her is almost palpable as she makes an awkward toast slash twelve-step amend to her sister in front of everyone at the rehearsal dinner.

The fights ensue following a post-rehearsal recap of Kym's manipulations back at the family house of their father and stepmother, played brilliantly by Bill Irwin and Anna Deavere Smith. Rachel preempts Kym's further attempts to manipulate the situation by announcing her pregnancy to everyone in the room. Everyone moves on to Rachel and leaves Kym in the cold.

The film's prime example of cold is Debra Winger, playing Kym and Rachel's mother, Abby. She is noticeably absent at the wedding rehearsal and arrived very late at the rehearsal dinner with her husband Andrew. As the film progresses, it becomes clear that although she loves her daughters, the loss of their little brother was something she never quite got over and has transformed into a cold and quiet housewife. She seems to be bothered by the hassle of Rachel's wedding and is positively, yet quietly, unnerved by Kym's reemergence at the festivities.

Kym meets a former fellow rehab patient at a salon when she and Rachel go to get their hair done for the wedding. He retells his inspiration he got from Kym's story in a rehab exercise about overcoming what Rachel knows is nonexistent child molestation and anorexia. Rachel is set off and tears out of the salon, leaving Kym to bask in the adoration of her former friend at rehab.

Another fight breaks out back at home when Kym calls out the family for not really forgiving her and she takes the station wagon to her mother's house to get away from the wedding madness. She finally asks her mother why she left the brother (Ethan) in Kym's care when everyone knew Kym was high all the time. Abby tells her that Ethan made Kym better and that Kym was the best she ever was when she was playing with Ethan. The two become hysterical with grief and rage and hit each other with fists instead of words.

Kym runs out to the car sobbing and bleery-eyed runs off the road and crashes on a boulder in a small glade of trees. She crashes emotionally and physically and we next see her in the fetal position in the driver's seat the next morning as a police officer knocks on the window.

Kym makes it home and has a very intimate moment with Rachel who bathes her and tends to her black eye as they prepare for the wedding. The next twenty or so minutes are finally uplifting as Rachel puts the getting married into the movie with a beautifully schizophrenic ceremony and party with everything from samba drums to african signing and belly dancers straight from Carnivale in Brazil. Kym finally is at her best and is content to skulk on the outer reaches of the party throng and looks desperately for her mother, trying to make amends for the fight and Ethan's death.

Rachel and Kym are dancing on the home's porch when Abby and Andrew try to make a quiet exit. Rachel laments her mother's departure and trip out of town that will make her miss the "post-wedding gossip reconnaissance" they planned to share. Rachel presumably knows about the fight and brings mom and Kym together in a three-person hug in a desperate attempt to get some closure for all three of them. But at the same time she knows her family will always be psychically fractured on an epic scale.

The film is simply a brilliant study of people who are at their worst when they are striving with all possible strength to be better. Where the film goes right is at the end when all three women finally admit to themselves that their best may not be possible.

8 1/2

Like most neophyte film buffs, I had heard of Fellini, but something kept me from seeing any of his movies. Today I watched 8 1/2, probably his most famous film.

My gut reaction was something like "Oh, that's what that movie is referencing." The list of other movies that reference sequences from 8 1/2 is endless. But it really is a head trip. Sometimes you can't tell if your watching a movie about a guy or a guy in a movie, or maybe it's not a movie at all and it's really a documentary of the filmmaker's process. It's every dream sequence that's been in every other medium, but amped up times a thousand.

The story goes that Fellini was stuck in between movies and couldn't decide how to finish a production, so he wrote a story about a famous film director in the same situation. On the surface, it's a semi-autobiographical story of a man in a midlife crisis, but it explores lots of different themes. Childhood innocence, the objectification, brutalization, and eventually celebration and an almost deification of women. The stress of a lover, the triviality and nuisance of a business, the pain of trying to make art while making money for yourself and your boss. The film is 45 years old, but its themes resonate today.

I finally see what I think everyone else sees, it's a truly brilliant film. Get it and get in touch with your inner angst, then throw a party where everyone gets to dance and live life to its fullest.

Technical note: The version I watched was the Criterion Collection DVD from Netflix with an introduction by Terry Gilliam (you know, the genius behind all the Monty Python animations and 12 Monkeys). But don't watch the introduction until after the movie because it has some spoilers.

Book Review for Reality Magazine

[twin posting appears on Featured Writer]

My latest work is a book review in the September issue of Reality Magazine, the local LGBT magazine.

Click here to download the PDF. Click here to visit Reality Magazine online.

Transcending

This is a great album. I love the harmony and the lyrics are beautiful. These songs transcend genres, giving the listener an airy, relaxed feel. It's almost like New Age with steel guitars. Check it out at iTunes.