Thought I’d share my Dune entry for January (on a side note there’s a great article about it in this month’s Art of America (unfortunately it’s print only))
This is called Junkyard Buddha. I kind of based it on the story of Buddha’s sermon in the Deer Park.
I’m not sure if I’m implying this is a post apocalyptic setting or not.
This week was a bit of a bust. My idea for a topic was Western Musicals. I think the reason for this was it seemed to be too genres that clash in an amusing way but seriously, I’d heard of several, Oklahoma of course and what sounded like an amusing one called Go West Young Lady. But I had two in mind. Unfortunately the reliable classic, that was half of my selection, Seven Brides For Seven Brothers turned out to be unplayable so I was left with watching the one that had piqued my curiosity to do this selection in the first place Paint Your Wagon.
I’d heard all of the stories about it of course but I decided to give it a chance mainly because I liked it’s best known song “They Call The Wind Maria”
To put it mildly I set myself up for disappointment.
Paint Your Wagon features Lee Marvin and Clint Eastwood as the drunken prospector Ben Ransom and his partner er… Pardner. It takes place in a boom town during the California gold rush that was built so quickly there are no woman. Naturally the men get.. Frustraed. All of this changes when a Mormon with two wives stops in the town and puts up one of the wives, Elizabeth, for auction. From there hilarity ensues.
The biggest problem with this film Is while they both look like they’re having fun, Marvin and Eastwood can’t sing and even Ig they could the playlist really isn’t that good to begin with. Marvin as Ransom is really the best thing about this as a wonderfully comic character. Regrettably Eastwood’s only there to be pretty.
The other thing that got to me was all of the values dissonance. I’m sure if I bothered to look I’d find a number examples of women as commodities and Polyamory in the history of the old west but personally it kept getting to me.
It has it’s moments but not enough to save it. In the end it’s a relief watching the town collapse into the earth when a bull gets loose in the honeycomb of tunnels Marvin and Eastwood and several others ugh to steal gold dust from all of the casinos, bars and brothels in the town.
For this week’s Rhapsody we have Rapsodija br. 3 (Rhapsody No. 3) by Jovan Pacu.
I went to Woodland Park Zoo again to draw the Gorillas. I’m still working on figuring out what times of the week are the most dead for visitors at the zoo and which of those times fit into my schedule. Unfortunately for the most part weekends are flat out so it generally long lunches are the best or quit early on Fridays.
Ultimately I don’t think this was my best session partially because it was an especially bitter and wet day so only three of the inmates were out and I only had an hour to work with because once again I forgot that the zoo closes at five during the winter months.
Also I’m finding that gorillas are much better models than orangutans. 
Well it looks like the voice of God has passed away. (I know that compared to Harry Potter, the Metatron from Dogma is his best known role but it’s my favorite so I’m going with it)
Alan Rickman will definitely be missed. That snarky superiority of his just made everything work, is Hans Gruber was one of the best criminal masterminds to hit film. His washed out Shakespearian Actor Spock expy from Galaxy Quest made the film worth watching, And whatever else you think of the franchise just try to picture anyone else as Servius Snape after watching a Harry Potter movie.
So let’s remember him at his best and enjoy all of his scenes from Dogma. (please try to ignore Kevin Smith’s strange obsession with celestial beings having to prove their divine nature by pulling down their pants.)
For this weeks selection I sort of went with dreams or to put it more closely films about personal fantasies… or at least that was the best explanation I can give at the moment for why I thought these two films would go together.
The first on my lis,t Dreamchild, was a film that as a Muppet fan I’d been wanting to see for a whole long time. It tells the story of an 80 year old Alice Hargreaves ne Liddell , the “real” Alice in Wonderland, who has been invited to New York to accept an honorary degree in honor of the 100th anniversary of the birth of Charles Dodgson aka Lewis Carrol.
Alice is the last surviving member of her family and has accepted her mortality as this sinks in to her she begins to remember the events of her complicated relationship with Reverend Dodgson played with wonderfully by Ian Holm as well as starting to relive events of the book with all of the characters wonderfully recreated by Jim Henson’s Creature Shop. This is a poignant film about regret, mortality and the fantasy of memory.
For me the best part is how the Mock Turtle sequence is used to frame our story with the Mock Turtle becoming a stand in for Dodgson who, as the Gryphon says, “Has no sorrow, it’s just his fancy”.
The next film on my list was Heavenly Creatures by Peter Jackson. This film tells the story about the lead up to the 1954 Parker–Hulme murder case in Christchurch, New Zealand. Primarily dealing with the friendship between Pauline Parker, played by Melanie Lynskey, and Juliet Hulme played by Kate Winslet in her first role. The two girls meet at school and become fast friends together they start to create an elaborate fantasy world that is far more interesting than the real life in New Zealand. It’s only a matter of time before this world is better than the real thing and becomes tainted by sex, a bond between the two girls that goes far more that mere friendship and fear of being separated eventually leads to their brutal murder of Pauline’s mother.
I’m not sure what to make of this film it certainly is beautiful, written and performed and up to Jackson’s usual level of craft but ultimately I’m afraid I was not the target audience and didn’t really get into it.
