I'm sold

I'm sold

I just watched a trailer for a (presumably bad) anime called L/R, and the tagline is:

"They're intelligent, elegant, mysterious, and everything they touch...turns to excitement."

It's like King Midas only, you know, excitement. It's just like the episode of The Family Guy where Jesus turns water...into funk, but I don't think the humor of the situation is as intentional in L/R as it is in The Family Guy.

D

Take my apartment! Please!

Take my apartment! Please!

I don't suppose anyone knows anybody that needs an apartment for the summer, do they? Pretty much everything is paid for with the rent except for electricity, which shouldn't be much during the summer. You'd get to share a place with Big Eric P., as the ladies call him. He's a great roommate and you (or someone you know) will be sad you only get to have him for three months. I live on the 600 block of Green St., and the Loop and Green buses go past every 20-30 minutes for trips toward campus. It's a very nice apartment with cool hardwood floors and very spacious rooms. If you want a place or know someone who needs a place for the summer, send me an email at aweaver@uiuc.edu.

D

Avoiding work in all the right places

Avoiding work in all the right places

Listening to:

DJ Shadow, The Private Press

Interpol, Turn On the Bright Lights

Beck, Odelay

Cypress Hill, Black Sunday

Watching:

Apt Pupil

Xanadu

The Adventures of Pete and Pete

Hard Eight

Hellboy (disappointing as hell)

Dawn of the Dead (awesome as hell)

Eerie, Indiana

Qrio videos

Reading:

P. T. Anderson interviews and articles

Film magazines

Nothing I should be reading

As if this stuff isn't bad enough when I have exams, papers and theses staring me down, I keep getting very strong urges to watch a Wong Kar-Wai movie and watch it but soon. The guy's one of my favorite directors, and I haven't seen anything of his (besides his absolutely delightful The Hire film for BMW) in probably a year. I'm dying here. Who wants to watch Fallen Angels with me sometime this week?

Dream Factory: Day Two

Dream Factory: Day Two

March 21, 2004. High 69° F, Low 57° F. Hazy. Zero precipitation.

SCENE ONE - THE FARMER'S MARKET

NAOMI and DREW walk through the crowded marketplace, keeping an eye out for celebrities and interesting stores. Over here someone pays too much for socks at an Abercrombie & Fitch. Over there a woman in pink walks her chihuahua. The chihuahua wears a pink tutu to match her owner and pink sneakers to protect her paws (the dog's) from the hard asphalt. They wander through the open air food court and decide to have crepes for a late afternoon meal after drifting through the three-story Barnes & Noble. They sit in a dark theater, eyes wet, at the end of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. NAOMI and DREW walk home satisfied having spent a relaxing afternoon in a relaxing atmosphere doing nothing in particular.

SCENE TWO - THE ORBIT BARBECUE TIME

NAOMI and DREW sit down with roommate TREY and friends LISA and ALTHEA at the free Sunday night barbecue The Orbit provides for its customers. They chat about the movies they love unti ALTHEA makes her fateful mistake...

ALTHEA
...but who I really love is Nicolas Cage.

DREW
(face twitches) Oh Jesus God no.

NAOMI
(squeals; arms flail) Don't you just LOVE him?

DREW
(to NAOMI) Could you not ask the next--

NAOMI
Don't you think he looks like a goat??

Silence.

LISA
(to DREW) What did she just ask?

DREW
How's your burger? Does anyone want anything while I leave this conversation?

SCENE THREE - THE ORBIT - THE PORCH

NAOMI, DREW and TREY sit drinking, smoking and talking when BRIAN, a tall guy in his early forties with dyed black hair down to his shoulder blades, asks for a cigarette and a seat. The group starts out talking about gory movies and shuffling recommendations around for those who haven't seen, but the conversation soon switches to the life of BRIAN.

CUT TO: ONE SHOT OF BRAIN IN PROFILE

BRIAN
Man, I've led a crazy life, man. I played bass for Blondie for a while. That's when I met all these other big musicians and stuff. I was married to a professional dominatrix for a while. She ran her own business in town, but I divorced her when I walked into my bedroom and found a guy strapped to it. I whored out my Korean wife for a place to stay. I was smoking crack on a fucking LEAR jet, man. I did porn for a while. It was crazy.

I was on tour with my band one time though, and our bus went over a cliff. I woke up in a hospital two months later, and I didn't remember anyone. I didn't even know who I was. My dad, the vice-president of Dutch Boy Paint, lost his job because he spent everyday by my bed. I had to re-learn how to walk and how to do everything. It was crazy, man.

After I woke up though, I stopped doing the crack, you know? That's when I dyed my hair black and just startetravelingng and everything. I stayed here for a few nights and they asked me to work here and I was like, "Alright, man."

I want to be a stand-up comedian and talk about my life, you know? I tell this to people, and they just can't believe what they hear. They start laughing, you know? It's cool, man. All I want to do is make people happy, so I think I should be a stand-up comedian.

CUT TO: SHOT OF THE GROUP

TREY, NAOMI and DREW sit silently, eyes wide. BRIAN takes a drag of his cigarette.

NAOMI
Holy shit.

DREW
That's fucked up, man.

The group sits smoking their cigarettes, thinking about their own lives and wondering what will happen around the corner.

DREW
You ever see DEAD ALIVE?

BRIAN
Yeah, man. It's fucking awesome.

The groups sits outside for a few more hours chatting with anyone who passes. One of these passers-by is ELLIOT, the fifty year old gay hairdresser whose shop is across the street. The group wanders over to his studio/home enticed by pictures and good conversation and learn that ELLIOT works on such celebrities as Keanu Reeves, Rachael Leigh Cook and members of The Goo Goo Dolls. He also let loose about Sylvester Stallone's small penis--Sly used to do porn--which he had "enhanced", Brad Pitt's former job as a call girl drivers, and how Steven Spielberg is a hack and a crook. With such juicy tidbits in their heads, the trio headed back to their hostel and packed it in for the night.

To be continued.