"your record sleeves are better than your songs!"

I recently came across Jazzin' for Blue Jean which is a 20 minute David Bowie gem shot to promote his single "Blue Jean" in 1984. Picking up where Patty Duke and Hayley Mills left off, Bowie plays both Vic (the socially inept everyman and possible David Brent prototype) and Screaming Lord Byron (basically, David Bowie).
Magic ensues:

how strange it is to be anything at all

A documentary starring Slavoj Zizek, Judith Butler, Peter Singer and Cornel West? Astra Taylor has philosophy nerds pegged.

*side note: Taylor is married to Jeff Mangum, the man responsible for writing my favorite album haunted by the ghost of Anne Frank

Adaptations Gone Wrong: The Golden Compass

Reading the recent AV Club interview with a less-than-thrilled Bret Easton Ellis promoting (?) the latest adaptation of his work brought to mind all of the terrible ways novels adapted into films tend to go wrong. One of the first butcherings to come to mind: The Golden Compass.

Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy is nothing short of amazing, so how did such a promising project go so terribly wrong? I think we have Chris Weitz to thank for that. Although he wasn't the original director linked to the project, the film ended up in Weitz's hands, and he is the one responsible for turning down a screenplay written by Tom Stoppard...maybe you've heard of him. Deciding he was better suited to adapt the novel than TomfuckingStoppard, Weitz wrote the screenplay himself.

What ensued can only be described as a weak, censored, cliff-notes-written-by-someone-who-maybe-didn't-even-read-the-book kind of film. I could rant about this for days. But I won't. Instead, I'll only say this: when a novel ends on the heartbreaking yet-suspense-filled note of a young protagonist realizing she has just inadvertently led her best friend to his death at the hands of her father and your film adaptation ends with said protagonist and said best friend floating off into the sunset before any of this even happens, you have failed.

between violence and rationality there is no incompatibility

To bastardize something Steven Shaviro once wrote about My Bloody Valentine, if you don't think their music is violent, then you're not listening to it loud enough.

A Nocturnal Vacation

The Sophie's Choice of Muppet Show guests:

or

Our Secrets Sleep in Winter Clothes

It's nearly summer. OBVIOUSLY, it's the perfect time to go out and impulsively buy overpriced jackets. Yesterday, that's exactly what we did. I can't speak for the other so-and-so involved in this venture, but I have an excuse: I'll be working in a 42 degree vault this summer. Reason enough for me.

How to Win Friends and Influence People

Why not try incorporating this phrase into your daily vernacular:

Oh I Do Believe

Maybe I'm projecting, and I should mention that I lack substantial proof, but I'm pretty sure that as Lou Reed was writing "I Found a Reason" he was envisioning a future with Tanqueray Rangpur. And not thinking about heroin. For once.

My Favorite Song, Age 3

My absolute favorite song when I was three years old was "Your Wildest Dreams" by The Moody Blues. The song came out in '86 and I remember singing it around a house in Lakewood where we once lived (we later moved when I was four).

Other than this anecdotal lapse in judgement, I would in no way consider myself a Moody Blues fan. In fact, the only other Moody Blues related memory I have is really liking this 45 my dad had. Not because it was a Moody Blues record, but solely because it was blue.

For some reason, the memory of really loving this song stayed with me. I still know some of the lyrics. The weird thing is, I distinctly remember someone slaying dragons in the "Your Wildest Dreams" music video. Recently, I looked up this up and was shocked/dismayed to find that there is not one dragon to be seen anywhere in the music video. I repeat, no dragons.
This is entirely disappointing:

Moody Blues Your Wildest Dreams
Uploaded by avajra

Write This Date Down: July 14th

The wait is over! The State finally has a dvd release date:

Thomas Lennon told reporters that The State will be coming to DVD this summer. "July 14th," Lennon said in a news conference on Sunday in Beverly Hills, Calif. "For real: Bastille Day. The whole goddamn thing. I have no idea why it's coming out on Bastille Day, but it's coming out on Bastille Day."

Rumors on the Internets

IMDB Revelation of the Day: Reportedly, Bret Easton Ellis sued Ben Stiller over Zoolander ripping off Glamorama. According to random gossip on the interwebs (and a BBC interview with Ellis) the two settled out-of-court.

Anger. Pain. Fear. Aggression. Spaced

I'm not a comic book nerd (or if you're sensitive, enthusiast) nor was I in my mid-twenties in the late nineties, but none of this makes Spaced any less relevent. Movie references galore. Marsha and her wine glass. Brian and his art. Tim and Daisy's two anniversaries for their fake relationship. Colin the dog. The typewriter birthday cake. I love them all.
...But I especially love this:

Bret Easton Ellis: Books/Film

The Informers comes out later this month, and as a Bret Easton Ellis fan, I'm both excited and apprehensive. As far as remakes of his works are considered, I find it best to think of the books as separate entities from the films. For example, The Rules of Attraction as straightforward adaptation of the novel fails miserably. The film focuses primarily on the first few pages of the book, leaving out a multitude of plot points/ characters/ significant relationships, and it's laughably homophobic in the way it handles the relationship between Paul and Sean. Roger Avery's film only works for me if I consider it as a loose interpretation. Ellis himself has described it as the best interpretation of his work thus far.

So the jury's still out on The Informers. I have a feeling it's not going to be as awesome as Harron's American Psycho but maybe, just maybe, it won't be as terrible as Kanievska's Less Than Zero.