lipstick jihad

reading that, and marvelling over the similarities between the 'immigrant outcasts'. even the smiles are different - tight-lipped where you don't want to be, and light-heartedly honest where you belong. so far, couldn't agree more with what's written on each page. 'the struggle' continues.

and a cool quote right from the start:

you ask me about that country, whose details now escape me,
i don't remember its geography, nothing of its history.
and should i visit it in memory,
it would be as i would a past lover,
after years, for a night, no longer restless with passion,
with no fear of regret.
i have reached that age when one visits the heart merely as a courtesy.

- faiz ahmed faiz

can we start over?

sometimes i read things, see things, listen to stories that happen to people, and i conclude again and again that this world is fucked up. can we start over please? can we at least eliminate stupidity, ignorance, and in general making the ones we live with/by/for miserable? oh, and paying attention wouldn't hurt either. there's a lot written between the lines.

one year

year old memories are sneaking up on me, peeking from behind the courtains. stirring up my hard-worked-on peace. i'm back at the club, at the studio, in the stick shift car. but most of all, i'm back at the empty little euro bar, it's a cold friday night, and i'm having the best time of my life. the most amazing, crazy, sweet and real evening ever. so that's what i miss. but a couple more songs and i will go back to voluntary amnesia. it's better that way.

if i should be so lucky

there's nothing better than a good conversation. it's so rare, for the longest time now, that i forgot how great it is.

i'm still here

they had me fooled. and worried about joauquin's mental health - for real! what an epic

on-camera melt-down. kudos for thinking outside the box, and making an excellent commentary on today's society.

observations:

1) the role of media in presenting the world to the brainless, gullible masses

2) drugs do fuck you up - the damaging easiness of drug abuse is simply scary (even if pretended in the movie)

3) there's an abundance of cold-hearted individuals, always ready to judge

4) virtually complete lack of concern about a human at his lowest - very disturbing

5) media's widely acknowledged violation of one's privacy and dignity

6) truth? what truth?

7) context? what context?

8) he really can't rap :)

9) joauquin phoenix - staying in character for over a year in order to make this crazy documentary (barely anybody will go to see), being on top and risking his career to make a point, massive beard, tangled hair and beer belly, making a fool out of himself so convincingly, finally, putting his heart into this project from start to end - priceless!

and this is what the director, casey affleck had to say about the whole thing:

http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2010/09/casey_affleck_levels_about_im.html

gone baby gone

in 2007 i heard that ben affleck made 'gone baby gone'. i also heard that it was yet another flick full of tough guys using 'fuck you' as a comma. well, i must have been high. or drunk. out of my mind. distracted. wrong. they must have been talking about a different movie altogether.. what a wasted 3 years without seeing this brilliant feature. and if ben affleck was not so damn handsome, i would surely advise him to stay behind the camera - forever. he managed to prove it again with 'the town'. he'll shut everybody up when at some point he makes a third movie, not based in boston, and not about the place he grew up in and knows inside out. but yet another movie about different aspects of human nature, with all its undertones, and still distinctly important. i had no idea he was so observant, intriguing, willing to discuss life's dilemmas, disturbing moral issues, without lectures and sparing the empty commentaries. at the same time, skillfully capturing the subtle moments between people, intimate looks, bonding embraces, touches that say more than words. his movies concentrate on tangible issues - a missing child, bank robbers - but gain artistry and depth by portraying a whole spectrum of emotions and fleeting feelings - love, anger, disappointment, fear.. viewer's attention stays with the characters, wearing their dark worn-out hoodies, as they glide through the story with irresistible street-smart charm, a certain aura of dignity, honesty, and unsettling angst.

my favorite scene from 'gone baby gone' takes place in a white empty hospital corridor. patrick has just killed a child molester in a violent break in, and is now standing in a blood-stained t-shirt, staring at his own reflection in a hospital window. he's visibly shaken by recent events and tries to pull himself together. angie comes up to him and tells him she's proud of him, and then in a gentle whisper 'let's go home'. with her hand, she lightly touches his neck, his brown hair, and patrick closes his tired eyes, soothed and relieved for a split second . a soft yet reassuring secret gesture.

what?

ps. with my alcohol clouded mind, i forgot to tip javier (bardem)! so much for drinking to bad memory.. must go back and fix this.

frrriday

it is. officially. and thank heavens for that. watched 'going the distance' as a make-your-sucky-day-better therapy yesterday. and laughed out loud. planning on eating at the theatre cafe in a little bit. and later? who knows. maybe some gypsy musica?

dark chocolate

being bitter is overwhelming. that's the problem. you can't just be bitter about one thing, exclusively. eventually, the bitterness spills over other areas in your life, stains your point of view, then just takes over like some kind of viral infection. also, the beginnings of life long bitterness are usually undetectable - it starts off as a bad (hair) day, a crappy week, a shitty situation. there's no way out, you're lazy, and, after all, the world owes you that much - to let you lay low, with unfulfilled claims on life.

i find that staying in bed, thoughtless, staring at the white ceiling, and pouting are very helpful devices in indulging one's bitter(er) episodes. but even that, after a while, gets simply boring.

on the road

they are filming it right now! so excited. release date sometime in 2011. to celebrate, here are some of kerouac's wisdoms:

"Live, travel, adventure, bless, and don't be sorry."

"There was nowhere to go but everywhere, so just keep on rolling under the stars."

"Happiness consists in realizing it is all a great strange dream"

"What's in store for me in the direction I don't take?"

"I don't know, I don't care, and it doesn't make any difference."


and my personal favorite, dedicated to all those way (!) too eager to help:

"The best teacher is experience and not through someone's distorted point of view" !

random wishes

i want to be a blond movie star, live in a parallel universe, and sing in a cigarette-smoke filled corner bar by night. now, if i were a guy, i would uninterruptedly wear a two day scruff and dark cool shades on the subway. and put on the same old t-shirt to fancy events.

on a more real note, i would like to keep my summer freckles all year round.

thursday morning

tired but strangely calm. i just don't care. summer nights should be walked on empty city streets (humidity 100%), summer mornings should be started with a cup of sweet coffee with milk. and i should be sleeping.

http://silviasencek.blogspot.com/search/label/One%20minute%20W

a thousand splendid suns

just finished reading it last night. a beautiful story. makes you think about your own choices, endless possibilites, unappreciated. very simple, to the point style of writing but because of that very poetic. every detail contains incredible amounts of images, feelings; simple words create a complex world of entrapment, violence, repressed desires, absurd inequality. the essence of life stripped down to a simple will of surviving, somehow, yet another day. another proof that too often a person can become a shadow of one's own self, one's life a mockery of existence. until eyes wide shut become eyes wide open.

paradoks

the paradox of being sleepy and wanting to stay up. what's one to do? decisions, decisions, solved by closing your eyes and drifting inside your head. good night.

inception and leo

to me inception was somehow similar to shutter island. but shutter island was much more mysterious and did play with the viewer's mind. at least it did with mine. and it had some real drama. inception, on the other hand, was just a good idea with visually interesting pictures. it lacked, however, real substance and depth. but there was leo again, with his dead wife who, shortly before her death, pretty much lost it. leo searching, struggling to find reason in maddness, truth between lies . leo with his distant memories of a perfect family, his two children. leo trapped in his own mind - the heart of darkness.

inception reminded me of an italian job squad robbing the mind of its own subconscious ways. the idea of designing dreams to access one's thoughts, defenses and subconscious decisions was intriguing, as was ereasing memories in eternal sunshine of the spotless mind. i wish, though, that the motives behind it were more vital. all this psychological drama, risking staying in the limbo of subconsciousness and having memories forever removed in order to change one man's mind regarding the future of his father's business - that's just plain shallow. yes, there was also leo's personal drama, but its true potential and importance were down-played. that's the true weakness of inception. an elaborate, seemingly complex plot serving a very insignificant purpose - aspiring independent idea played out, unfortunately, hollywood style. but those two hours felt like being in one of those dreams where you try to get somewhere, to some very important meeting or place, and you just can't. one obstacle after another stop you from moving on, as if trapped in frustrating inaction. at least that's what i dreamt of that night after watching inception.

all i got from no smoking band concert is this memorable phrase: do you agree? fuck you mtv! now that's maybe because i'm not serbian. kusturica wore the same black t-shirt and his hair was one day greasier. lots of running back and forth on the stage, the singer dressed in a tight blue costume with wings and his genitalia hanging somewhere between his legs - also blue. a russian girl dancing on the stage like the concert was for her and she was lady gaga. creative chaos. i smoked a cigarette and got a headache. the end. spasiba.

emir kusturica looks like jeff bridges - maybe a bit more disheveled with his somewhat greasy grown out hair and a random black t-shirt. the interview at AF was recorded for NPR. kusturica was introduced by his interviewer, a movie critic from 'time out'; he entered the small auditorium and sat down at the table. the audience clapped and he just sat there, glancing at us, as if the event was not really held for him. then visibly tense and a bit nervous 'time out' guy stared with his questions; they were interesting questions, i have to say. he asked about how music related to his movies, if kusturica's studies at prague film school taught him anything, how he went from making movies about troubled balkans and mystic gypsies to a documentary about maradona. and kusturica answered so intelligently, with such bright and fresh comments, funny stories, insightful observations about today's society, the state of cinematography, his own mischievous childhood years, and current human condition which can be summed up in the heightened anticipation for a new iphone. he sounded nostalgic about his now lost innocence and freshness present in his past movies, dictated by inexperience, youth, and fascination with human stories caught on a 35 mm film camera. he is so unpretentious and creative, capturing the audience in his own eastern european mindset. an artist, a careful observer of life, a narrator of human stories, a director with so much to say - such a cool guy. there is, though, some controversy related to kusturica's political views, his alledged collaboration with milosevic regime, pro-serbian views in 'underground'... but to that i cannot add much, as i am uninformed and have at this point some major gaps in knowledge on the subject. so, as i do not wish to sound ignorant, i will just say that i liked that simple guy, a director with such distinct vision, willing to take his audience on a journey to some crazy yet forgotten worlds. i would like to ask american film people to have his movies, old and new, available on a much larger (than currently) scale. now, that would be cool.