Merry New Year!

I saw The Curious Case of Benjamin Button yesterday. Although I liked it in general, my biggest beef is with one line in the movie that Cate Blanchett's character says.

About halfway in to this 3 hour movie, she says, "I have to pee."

Totally took me out of the movie. Not fair that her character gets to go pee (and it's act-pee no less!) partway through, and we the audience can't.

The Truth About Twilight: Part II.

I'm up to Chapter 3 or 4 in Twilight, and I'm peeved. One of the earliest encounters between Bella and Edward is a rip-off of the pilot episode of Roswell, a show for which I have a special place in my heart (excluding season 3, of course, because Tess is a bore).

Plus, Max is way cooler than Edward. Fo' shizz.

Chabon Ranking.

Of what I have thus far read of Michael Chabon, my favorite author, here is my ranking from best to worst:

1. Wonder Boys.
2. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay.
3. The Yiddish Policemans Union.
4. The Mysteries of Pittsburgh.
5. The Final Solution.

I just finished YPU (for which one of my freshman college roommates wrote a laudatory blurb that appears inside the front cover). The ending has problems, and doesn't quite transcend the hard-boiled drama in the way that Chabon achieves in the first 2/3rds of the novel. Oh well, still awesome. Of these 5, I really only actively disliked The Final Solution.

The Truth About Twilight: Part 1.

I give up. I do have limits. For example, even though I know that there are three Jonas Brothers, I don't know their names. Even though I know that Miley Cyrus and Hannah Montana are the same person, I couldn't tell you what season they're on. And even though I've seen High School Musical (please, who hasn't? losers, you're missing out), I have not seen 2 or 3.

But for this, I caved: I bought the trade paperback version of Stephanie Meyer's Twilight. You might have heard of it. Even if you're a snob, or more likely, a grown-up with taste. Scratch that, you don't even need taste. But this has become such a huge phenomenon, that I'm dying to know what all the fuss is about. So I picked it up. And I started reading last night.

It's awful. But there's something about it that makes me want to keep reading. So here are My Reactions, Part 1, because the internet wouldn't be complete without anonymous surfers being able to find the Truth About Twilight.

• I've finished Chapter 1, and so far I've learned that Bella is from Phoenix, Arizona, and that somehow counts as a city of irony. Sorry if I scoff from over here on the, you know, entire eastern seaboard if I think of kittens and poodles frolicing when I consider Arizonian-sarcasm. West coasters are so cute when they think they're disaffected.
• Also, I can't help but picture Robert Pattinson whenever I read about Edward Cullen. Granted, Meyer only describes him as devastatingly beautiful (sort of like me, but actually beautiful), so I don't have much clay with which to imagine my own Adonis, but it's the fate of reading the book after the movie.
• The trade paperback copy happens to have Robert and Kristen Stewart on the cover, instead of the red apple. That blows. I kinda liked the cover themes.
  

The Universe Distracts Me.

I finished a killer book yesterday and watched a killer movie yesterday. It's like the universe wants to remind me--on this grand long weekend off from Bar/Bri--that there is so much awesome writing and film out there still to be inhaled.

The movie:

I watched Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang. Golly. Robert Downey, Jr. is like a puppy that poops on your carpet, but whom you can't help but forgive and love. His charm-o-meter is on ludicrous in this pulpy, fictiony, filmy, noiry type movie by Shane Black, who wrote Lethal Weapon, which, um, I haven't seen yet. KKBB is about this dude who's mistaken for an actor, who pretends to be a private eye, and kills a lot of people, which sounds terrible on paper, but works. There's too much good stuff in the script to have to choose one to quote, so I'll pick one instead from Val Kilmer in the gag reel:

"Can we get Russell Crowe, Sheryl Crow, the Counting Crows, and the Black Crows together with Jack Black, Shane Black, and Will Smith?"

The book:

I finished reading Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies, the short story collection that won the Pulitzer a couple years back. I haven't been this obsessed with a book in a long, long time. After reading the first story, "A Temporary Matter," I had to remind myself to breathe, and then I instantly went on the internet (I'm such a dork!) to see what else Lahiri had written, and, yes, if there were any blogs or reviews of the book.

I usually don't like short stories, for no good reason really. Maybe because I don't understand the idea behind a collection? Like, is there supposed to be a reason certain stories are collected? It's sort of like the music album, which in this day of iPods and mp3s has really fallen out of vogue. But once upon a time, there was this idea that the songs on an album weren't just thrown together, but that there was a rhyme, a reason, and a story behind the collection. Some artists bemoaned the emphasis on a la carte music listening that Napster exemplified, but I suppose it was inevitable with music. Probably not so much with books.

But at least with Interpreter of Maladies, I get it. Or maybe I just want to get it, so I imputed my own cohesive theory on the book. Basically it goes like this: Minorities seem to always criticize and and every pop culture protrayal of someone representing that group, as if he or she has to be perfect, but not too perfect, and represent every victory and every defeat that minority group has ever faced. Right, an impossible task. But given the minority status, pop culture never has more than one or two such characters--and most definitely not from the same minority group--in any TV show, movie, or book. So critics bash, and audiences moan.

But then little miracles like this book come along... where each piece tells a complete story bursting with ideas and emotion, and where each character can be flawed and humane. The collection is ostensibly about Indians, Indian-Americans, and the dislocation of the first-generation/second-generation experience. But by offering a variety of vignettes, there's no need to tear down one character as being too self-centered and therefore a "negative" image, or ripping another one for being too goody-goody and therefore a token "positive" image. Instead, there's a more complete picture, where the main character is simply the idea of being Indian in America. Turns out the impossible task ain't so impossible.

Loose Ends.

I'd been meaning to write some follow-ups so here goes. I know, I know, it's like waiting for the last episode of Lost or Battlestar Galactica around here (the latter being far, far, far, far, far, far superior).

1. Firefox v.3 doesn't get along with Skype. I've changed 3 things since the displeasure of June 18. First, I reduced the cache. Second, I limited the number of backtrack pages. And third, I got rid of a Skype installation, which I had recently installed in v.2. So far--knock on wood--I've been able to reset the cache with no crashing. Hopefully, I can reset the number of backtrack pages. It's my guess that Skype and v.3 don't get along.

2. In much more important news, I just came back from WALL-E. It's good. Boy howdy.

3. In slightly less important news, I finished reading A Confederacy of Dunces, which I had tried to read 4 or 5 years ago because it was a "cool" book to read. I picked it up again because I'm working my way through the Pulitzers. You know how Greek comedies aren't all that funny? Sort of like that, but with more farting. Seriously.

4. The Dunkin Donuts flavor trial is all done. Herewith:

Raspberry: B. Surprisingly better than blueberry. Maybe it's because I think raspberry is a more distinctive flavor and so it can hold its own better, or maybe I'm just being silly.

Toasted Almond: C. Completely irrelevant. Take that two-worded-flavor. You think you're so special because you're toasted. Who wouldn't be? Minus points for trying too hard.

Hazelnut: B+. Classic! This is the only way I can get my hazelnut fix. I'm allergic to them. Yup, that means no Nutella, either.

Caramel: C+. I can't remember what this tasted like. I'm guessing caramel.

5. "Sackbut" is a real word.

Dunkin Donuts Coffee: A Midterm Assessment.

As previously noted, Dunkin' Donuts coffee is sweet angel sweat collected for our unworthy human lips. Being the arrogant race that we are, we've nonetheless attempted to improve upon this liquid happiness. DD allows you to order your coffee in a variety of flavors, to varying degrees of success. What's particularly awesome about the flavoring is that they aren't sweetened (unlike some evil empire's flavors), which means you can still customize your coffee precisely how you want it.

I've taken it upon myself to provide a user's guide for these options. Herewith, a midterm report:

Original (no flavor added): A+. Really. No improvement needed. Therefore, "improve" is the wrong word. Let's just agree that adding flavor is but a different experience--familiar, but incomparable. That's the only fair thing to do.

French Vanilla: A-. Classics never go out of style. I'll likely bookend this little journey with that other stalwart standby, hazelnut.

Blueberry: B-. The newest in the line, and not exactly the slam dunk you might expect. I think it's because DD's coffee isn't roasted that intensely, and fruit essences tend to go with the more nutty flavor of coffee (think orange valencia). I'm not looking forward to raspberry.

Coconut: A. A winner. This is what dreams and puppy dogs are made of.

Cinnamon: C+. Bitter beginning, but then you get used to it. I think it would be better if I liked my coffee sweeter. But since I don't, the cinnamon just sort of sits there.

Some movies.

Stardust (2007): A.

I'm not even going to pretend that this movie wasn't awesome. I'm completely serious. It initally caught my eye because I'm a sucker for fantasy movies, but it was on the backburner of my Netflix queue for some reason until I just couldn't take studying for the bar anymore (after only 3 days! who's in denial?). Once it started, I couldn't stop it. Tristan lives in a village called Wall, which borders a mysterious land. When he sees a falling star literally fall there, he vows to retrieve it for a girl he's trying to court. And off he goes.

Sometimes the fantasy genre forgets that even where magic trumps science, stories have to be grounded in rules. That's where Stardust succeeds. Each of Tristan's moves are logically human as he finds Yvaine, the star, and eludes the multiple characters pursuing them, each for their own reasons (that's another highlight -- it's not just a good v. bad tale -- multiple parties with independent objectives cross paths). The movie ends up being more cheeky than ironic, which evokes pleasant comparisons with The Princess Bride without feeling derivative. In the end, it's the best kind of bedtime story: exciting, romantic, and complete.



Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008): C+.

Don't read this if you're the three people who haven't seen the movie yet.

Indiana Jones was always grounded in magic realism of the very best kind. It didn't just look to same ol' mythology we knew and grew to love in 7th grade, with Zeus and Medusa and Odysseus being all kickass. No, Indy had the audacity to dive into religion and basically say, "yup, it's all true." What that did was engage in one of the best academic exercises you'll find at colleges and universities: it viewed the Bible as a historical text while simultaneously tapping into our faith.

And then Part IV shat all over that by giving as aliens. They just don't belong in this movie. Those stories have entirely separate rules from the Indyverse, and it was like none of that mattered. The only identifiable remnants of the original trilogy was that Indy could get into and out of trouble like Britney's... career. Cate and Shia deserve better.



Forgetting Sarah Marshall (2008): A-.

Holy shit! Mila Kunis isn't an annoying windbag!

Duel.

Dunkin' Donuts coffee is better than Starbucks.
Chipotle is better than Qdoba.
Full episode updates are faster on CBS and ABC than CW and hulu.

Is librarything better than goodreads?

Foreign Affairs.

I'm working my way through the Pulitzer Prize winners for Fiction. We'll see how that turns out. But at the very least, it led me to find Alison Lurie's Foreign Affairs. It has already paid for itself.

Foreign Affairs follows two Americans doing research in England, both of whom fall into parallel--but distinct--affairs. When you have two independent protagonists, it's hard to make them equally compelling. I'm reminded of the musical Anything Goes, where I think the effort was ultimately a failure. Here, however, Lurie created two characters who stand on their own, inform each other, and whom are missed when not talked about. It's a simple, effective novel that examines loneliness and alienation.

I wonder if I could have picked it out of a pile sua sponte and recognized it as worthy of a Pulitzer.