January 1, 2005
Best wishes to my friends, family, and any serendipitous web readers for a healthy and happy new year. Here are some cultural artifacts that made my last year memorable—let me know about any I missed.Aaron Caplan
Three HIGHLY RECOMMENDED studies in post-colonialism. Made shortly after the Algerians kicked out the French, Battle of Algiers is set a few years earlier, to show the battles lost before the war was won. Think of it as a North African Battleship Potemkin. The Pentagon was evidently studying the film in 2003 for tips in how to manage an insurgency in an unhappily occupied country. But as Stuart Klawans says, there are no bad reasons to see Battle of Algiers. Over in our hemisphere, the personal becomes the political in Bus 174, the story of a Brazilian robbery that turned into a hijacking that turned into a media feeding frenzy when the news cameras arrive. Think of it as a South American Dog Day Afternoon. Or perhaps like Albert Brooks' Real Life, Bus 174 demonstrates Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, since we cannot know what might have happened had the cameras not been there. The same idea animates The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, which uses the story of the recent attempted coup in Venezuela to show that you often cannot know what happens even when there are cameras present--especially when the richest folks in town own the TV stations and have an axe to grind.In theory, one of these films is not a documentary but it would spoil the fun to tell you which one.
How much would you pay to forget a painful memory? As a thought experiment, consider how much better this already-good film would have been without Jim Carrey!
Not for everybody, but if you get past your squeamishness you will find an unlikely guide to love, art, courage, humor, self-control, disease, and death.
This one actually is for everybody, so of course it got canceled after four episodes. Shortly after Jaye Tyler's liberal arts degree is rewarded with a tedious retail job at a gift store at Niagara Falls, the souvenirs start talking to her, usually in the form of Delphic commands like "See a penny, pick it up" or "Don't Squeeze the Charmin." My nominee for best line from the pilot: "Did you always have that goiter?" Fortunately, fan pressure convinced the studio to issue all 13 episodes on DVD next year, even if it could not convince any US networks to air it.
Shaun of the Dead (2004)
24 Hour Party People (2002)
End of the Century (2004)
Napoleon Dynamite (2004)
Hero (2002)
Le Corbeau (1943)
The Incredibles (2004)
Word Wars (2003)
Other People's Pictures (2004)
I was having a hard time buying anything at my favorite record store in Ellensburg. The listening booth had an intriguing-sounding album by The Real Tuesday Weld, but the store had no copies. Next to the listening booth was a pile of used albums, including the luscious-looking Music to Read James Bond By. The clerk first told me the record was too scratched to sell me in good conscience, but then when I explained I only wanted the cover he was forced to admit that he was saving that for himself. Back to my browsing, and I saw a copy of Peanuts: The Art of Charles M. Schulz. Turns out that wasn't for sale, either: it was a gift from the clerk's girlfriend and he just happened to leave it on a display shelf. Inexplicably failing to heed these strong hints to leave well enough alone, I ultimately found this string trio from Vienna whose debut disc features arrangements of music from Ennio Morricone soundtracks, including Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! and Once Upon a Time In The West. The clerk warmly congratulated me on my good taste—and attempted good taste—on my way out. Think how much easier it will be for you to garner such compliments!
Or, as the label says, "The Pine Valley Cosmonauts Consign Songs of Murder, Mob-Law, and Cruel, Cruel Punishment to the Realm of Myth, Memory, and History." Alt-country versions of favorite ballads of crime and utlimate punishment like Tom Dooley and Gary Gilmore's Eyes, with proceeds benefitting the Illinois Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. If you're sufficiently impressed, get Volumes 2 & 3.
A computer security expert tells you how to think rationally about the costs and benefits of various proposals intended to promote safety and safe-keeping. Now, if I can only apply these principles to my favorite Loompanics publication, How to Hide Things in Public Places
A homemade review of contemporary culture and politics, with an emphasis on the advertising industry, copyright abuse, and the history of such American phenomenon as lobotomies, eugenics, the consumer movement, and the subliminal advertising panic. Give them money! The editor will send you helpful updates about life and society via e-mail, which might not sound too enticing, but for me learning about www.bugmenot.com was easily worth the price of a subscription! (So now you owe me ten bucks.)
Tibetan Buddhism meets reality TV, in a dramatization where continual reincarnation and the difficulty of purging one's karma makes it hard to get voted off the island. See this preview from the Seattle Times