MOVING DAY!!!
I'm moving my blog to Wordpress. I know, it's going to be hard to remember another URL, but look on the bright side. You're the only one who reads this anyway.
http://www.tervelandrews.wordpress.com
...We had fun, right?
Showing posts with label Massive Update. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Massive Update. Show all posts
3.26.2009
3.24.2009
THE MYSTERIES OF PITTSBURGH
Michael Chabon's novel "The Mysteries of Pittsburgh" is being (or has been, it's just being released now) into a movie. From what I've seen, it may be my new indie crush.
It takes place in the 1980's, dealing with young adulthood, identity, responsibility, and Mina Suvari on a pooltable. Michael Chabon is the author of The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay (Great book. Even Seth Cohen of The OC liked it.) and Wonder Boys (I put the links there so you could buy them. So buy them.), both of which are high quality, nerd-impressing, best sellers.
The official synopsis is as follows:
"Set in Pittsburgh in the early eighties, the story chronicles the last true summer of Art Bechstein's (JON FOSTER) youth. Stuck in a dead-end job working for his eccentric sometime girlfriend Phlox (MENA SUVARI), and forced into an endless series of airless dinners with his mobster father (NICK NOLTE), Art begins to believe that perhaps he doesn't even exist at all.
What begins as a mundane summer is quickly interrupted when he encounters a beautiful debutante (SIENNA MILLER) and her lusty, no good hoodlum of a boyfriend Cleveland (PETER SARSGAARD). Together they reveal a side of Art and Pittsburgh that he has never known.
As the summer boils on and their adventures darken, Art decides to risk everything to preserve his new-found paradise, and thrusts himself headlong into the blurring boundaries of family, friendship, and love."
Here's the official trailer:
CHECK IT OUT!
The Mysteries of Pittsburgh on IMDB
Michael Chabon's novel "The Mysteries of Pittsburgh" is being (or has been, it's just being released now) into a movie. From what I've seen, it may be my new indie crush.
It takes place in the 1980's, dealing with young adulthood, identity, responsibility, and Mina Suvari on a pooltable. Michael Chabon is the author of The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay (Great book. Even Seth Cohen of The OC liked it.) and Wonder Boys (I put the links there so you could buy them. So buy them.), both of which are high quality, nerd-impressing, best sellers.
The official synopsis is as follows:
"Set in Pittsburgh in the early eighties, the story chronicles the last true summer of Art Bechstein's (JON FOSTER) youth. Stuck in a dead-end job working for his eccentric sometime girlfriend Phlox (MENA SUVARI), and forced into an endless series of airless dinners with his mobster father (NICK NOLTE), Art begins to believe that perhaps he doesn't even exist at all.
What begins as a mundane summer is quickly interrupted when he encounters a beautiful debutante (SIENNA MILLER) and her lusty, no good hoodlum of a boyfriend Cleveland (PETER SARSGAARD). Together they reveal a side of Art and Pittsburgh that he has never known.
As the summer boils on and their adventures darken, Art decides to risk everything to preserve his new-found paradise, and thrusts himself headlong into the blurring boundaries of family, friendship, and love."
Here's the official trailer:
CHECK IT OUT!
The Mysteries of Pittsburgh on IMDB
3.15.2009
BAT FOR LASHES
Daniel - Bat For Lashes
Daniel
What's a Girl To Do - Bat For Lashes
What's A Girl To Do
____________________
I remember falling for this group when I first saw What's A Girl To Do on CurrentTV. Then my short term memory betrayed me and they slipped off my radar.
But today, I was wandering the streets of the internet and came across the video for their newest single, Daniel, and I was hit by a truck full of nostalgia, and helmed by a drunk driver. This video is clearly amazing. And it's causing me to daydream, which is always the sign of a good video or film.
Bat For Lashes. Check them out!
Daniel - Bat For Lashes
Daniel
What's a Girl To Do - Bat For Lashes
What's A Girl To Do
____________________
I remember falling for this group when I first saw What's A Girl To Do on CurrentTV. Then my short term memory betrayed me and they slipped off my radar.
But today, I was wandering the streets of the internet and came across the video for their newest single, Daniel, and I was hit by a truck full of nostalgia, and helmed by a drunk driver. This video is clearly amazing. And it's causing me to daydream, which is always the sign of a good video or film.
Bat For Lashes. Check them out!
1.26.2009
WHAT/WHY OF HUMANITY
People are interesting. It's a fact. Even in the lives of the most boring person, there's bound to be something or some interaction that has cause a chain events in their lives that helped shape who they are today. The problem is that you can't always understand how small actions in a series of small actions that a have been directed at a person can change them one way or another.
This makes people interesting to study, to observe. Oliver, the main character of IED Tokyo, spends a huge part of his life studying and watching people, trying to understand why people do the things they do and hopefully use it all as a tool for creating stronger characters and stories in his writing. He fixates on lives and aspects of them, trying to work out people's actions in relation to their motivations, and in return, what they would do when placed in a particular situation.
This is what writers like Brian K. Vaughan are amazing at; taking a character and making them a person through their decisions and indecisions, and building their story so that no matter how unexpected and tragic or brilliant their actions are, there's always a firm link that allows you to believe that a character's actions were within them. This is something that the writers of Heroes didn't do a good enough job with when they overhauled Sylar in Volume 3. It's also what makes it believable, yet completely fucking unbelievable!, that Alter would kill 355 in Y: The Last Man (and don't even get me started on her motivations for EVERYTHING she put the world through).
There's a difference between writing a story and writing people into existence. When you write people, its easily possible to become emotionally invested in their lives and deaths (Skins, I love you).
And that's what I hope to be able to do in my own writing. Because what's the point of creating a person if no one cries hysterically when they die?
People are interesting. It's a fact. Even in the lives of the most boring person, there's bound to be something or some interaction that has cause a chain events in their lives that helped shape who they are today. The problem is that you can't always understand how small actions in a series of small actions that a have been directed at a person can change them one way or another.
This makes people interesting to study, to observe. Oliver, the main character of IED Tokyo, spends a huge part of his life studying and watching people, trying to understand why people do the things they do and hopefully use it all as a tool for creating stronger characters and stories in his writing. He fixates on lives and aspects of them, trying to work out people's actions in relation to their motivations, and in return, what they would do when placed in a particular situation.
This is what writers like Brian K. Vaughan are amazing at; taking a character and making them a person through their decisions and indecisions, and building their story so that no matter how unexpected and tragic or brilliant their actions are, there's always a firm link that allows you to believe that a character's actions were within them. This is something that the writers of Heroes didn't do a good enough job with when they overhauled Sylar in Volume 3. It's also what makes it believable, yet completely fucking unbelievable!, that Alter would kill 355 in Y: The Last Man (and don't even get me started on her motivations for EVERYTHING she put the world through).
There's a difference between writing a story and writing people into existence. When you write people, its easily possible to become emotionally invested in their lives and deaths (Skins, I love you).
And that's what I hope to be able to do in my own writing. Because what's the point of creating a person if no one cries hysterically when they die?
1.25.2009
WRITING EXERCISE
Strings of beads break apart and fall down stone steps in Japan, while a vision quest leads a teenager to certain death in California, while a cross is inverted to signal the start of mass in New England, while an a life-long and career psychic in Reykjavik lights a candle and covers it with a lacquered skull, and asks it about what it means that she’s stopped dreaming. Even on the dangerous amounts of LSD she’s downed with her ice water, all she can hear is nothing. And this is the first time she’s feared the future.
A vision quest leads a teenager to certain death in California, while a cross is inverted to signal the start of mass in New England, while a candle flickers dully through the eyes of a skull in Iceland, while a family of Shinto shrine keepers ascend to the highest mountainside in their region of Japan to divine the annual lunar forecasting, using the beads, strung on the hair of a goddess, and passed down through countless generations. As the eldest male rubs the beads in his hand, this god-hair twine snaps with a chalky sound and the beads that make their lives worth living are taken by gravity to the edge of the high stone stairway. And the fall.
A cross is inverted to signal the start of mass in New England, while a candle flickers dully through the eyes of a skull in Iceland, while strings of beads breaks apart and fall down stone steps in Japan, while a young Native American boy with no clue what to do with his life, and dreams that extend beyond the reservation, sets out on a vision quest, hoping to get signs and advice from his gods and ancestors. He does everything right, entering his trance and wandering into the desert, beyond the recent tracks of man, but nothing expected happens. He doesn’t see his future, his gods, his past, or the edge of the cliff he’s walking toward. All he sees is black.
A candle flickers dully through the eyes of a skull in Iceland, while strings of beads break apart and fall down stone steps in Japan, while a vision quest leads a teenager to certain death in California, while a Satanic church prepares to start their Saturday mass, inverting a cross in the function room of the Catholic church they’re renting for the night as a sign of respect for their beliefs. They follow one another in prayer, then take communion of fresh goat blood, not knowing that they’ve all just been infected with rabies. They pop hallucinogenic mushrooms, partly to disrespect the premises, but mostly to prove they’re more fun than the stuck-up Satanists across town. And as they take effect, the congregation doesn’t feel any of the usual sensations associated with mushroom use. All they feel is an overwhelming urge to help people, because something bad is going to happen.
All these things are related, and thus can not be mentioned without one another. Seriously. Try to mention just one event. You can’t. You took a deep breath and it all poured into your head as one. All these things are related, and thus can not be mentioned without one another.
Strings of beads break apart and fall down stone steps in Japan, while a vision quest leads a teenager to certain death in California, while a cross is inverted to signal the start of mass in New England, while an a life-long and career psychic in Reykjavik lights a candle and covers it with a lacquered skull, and asks it about what it means that she’s stopped dreaming. Even on the dangerous amounts of LSD she’s downed with her ice water, all she can hear is nothing. And this is the first time she’s feared the future.
A vision quest leads a teenager to certain death in California, while a cross is inverted to signal the start of mass in New England, while a candle flickers dully through the eyes of a skull in Iceland, while a family of Shinto shrine keepers ascend to the highest mountainside in their region of Japan to divine the annual lunar forecasting, using the beads, strung on the hair of a goddess, and passed down through countless generations. As the eldest male rubs the beads in his hand, this god-hair twine snaps with a chalky sound and the beads that make their lives worth living are taken by gravity to the edge of the high stone stairway. And the fall.
A cross is inverted to signal the start of mass in New England, while a candle flickers dully through the eyes of a skull in Iceland, while strings of beads breaks apart and fall down stone steps in Japan, while a young Native American boy with no clue what to do with his life, and dreams that extend beyond the reservation, sets out on a vision quest, hoping to get signs and advice from his gods and ancestors. He does everything right, entering his trance and wandering into the desert, beyond the recent tracks of man, but nothing expected happens. He doesn’t see his future, his gods, his past, or the edge of the cliff he’s walking toward. All he sees is black.
A candle flickers dully through the eyes of a skull in Iceland, while strings of beads break apart and fall down stone steps in Japan, while a vision quest leads a teenager to certain death in California, while a Satanic church prepares to start their Saturday mass, inverting a cross in the function room of the Catholic church they’re renting for the night as a sign of respect for their beliefs. They follow one another in prayer, then take communion of fresh goat blood, not knowing that they’ve all just been infected with rabies. They pop hallucinogenic mushrooms, partly to disrespect the premises, but mostly to prove they’re more fun than the stuck-up Satanists across town. And as they take effect, the congregation doesn’t feel any of the usual sensations associated with mushroom use. All they feel is an overwhelming urge to help people, because something bad is going to happen.
All these things are related, and thus can not be mentioned without one another. Seriously. Try to mention just one event. You can’t. You took a deep breath and it all poured into your head as one. All these things are related, and thus can not be mentioned without one another.
1.21.2009
TANK GIRL (IN THE SPIRIT OF RETURNING TO COOL THINGS)
Tank Girl was one of those things I'd let pass me by during my childhood. I was, after all, quite a self-involved little fucker. I remember the movie starring Lori Petty, which played in the background of my mind and almost certainly contributed to the present state of my imagination.
I didn't know why, but when I fell in love with The Gorillaz, the animated band that paved the way for my band, DINOSAUR!, the art style and atmosphere created by their videos set off my nostalgia detector like a marathon of Johnny Quest on Boomerang. If I'd known then what I know now, I probably would have had a seizure.
It seems, and I apologize for being so goddamn late to the party, but both of these things seem to be products of the insanely brilliant mind of one Jamie Hewlett, British-born artist and comic creator. In a mad dash to restore my cool, I've been attacking Amazon for every possible Tank Girl graphic novel collection. I'm working on making amends, Jamie (I write as though he'll ever read this). I'm in the process of just sitting back and admiring his quality of work. Tank Girl is genius for it's character and setting design alone, but the quality of writing and the execution of the plot make this worth reading. READ IT.
Also check out Hewlett's work for The Gorillaz, especially the Journey To The West video for the Beijing Olympics.
But that's enough ego stroking for now. Hopefully my next update will be about me. I like me.
Tank Girl was one of those things I'd let pass me by during my childhood. I was, after all, quite a self-involved little fucker. I remember the movie starring Lori Petty, which played in the background of my mind and almost certainly contributed to the present state of my imagination.
I didn't know why, but when I fell in love with The Gorillaz, the animated band that paved the way for my band, DINOSAUR!, the art style and atmosphere created by their videos set off my nostalgia detector like a marathon of Johnny Quest on Boomerang. If I'd known then what I know now, I probably would have had a seizure.
It seems, and I apologize for being so goddamn late to the party, but both of these things seem to be products of the insanely brilliant mind of one Jamie Hewlett, British-born artist and comic creator. In a mad dash to restore my cool, I've been attacking Amazon for every possible Tank Girl graphic novel collection. I'm working on making amends, Jamie (I write as though he'll ever read this). I'm in the process of just sitting back and admiring his quality of work. Tank Girl is genius for it's character and setting design alone, but the quality of writing and the execution of the plot make this worth reading. READ IT.
Also check out Hewlett's work for The Gorillaz, especially the Journey To The West video for the Beijing Olympics.
But that's enough ego stroking for now. Hopefully my next update will be about me. I like me.
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