BLOG AFTER LONG ABSENCE...

Been a while, gang. Sorry to leave you all in the electronic lurch, but glad to be back. Ok, without further ado...some various and sundries.

MOST RIVETTING MOMENTS OF THE SUPERBOWL:

During the pre-game show, watching some pretty young thing interviewing Joe Namath. Watching Joe Willie struggling heroically not to let his eyes go all googly and blurt out "I don't care about any of this...I just...wanna.. kiss you." Rivetting, edge-of-the-seat drama. And I say this with the utmost respect and compassion for the Jets' immortal. While others ridiculed him for the infamous "I ...just ...wanna... kiss you" episode, I genuinely found it to be one of the most truthful and moving things I'd ever seen on television. After all, what is more tragically true and compellingly human than an aging legend reaching out to embrace youth and beauty one more time? Not a single moment of the football game approached this pregame encounter for sheer dramatic value.

And speaking of aging legends reaching out to embrace youth and beauty one more time: The Rolling Stones' halftime show. I mean, no doubt as a musical act, it's vastly preferable to the soulless product (and rehearsed wardrobe malfunctions) of Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake. And, yeah, for people on the cusp of AARP-itude, they can sure rock. But the whole spectacle just made me a bit uneasy. Yeah, Mick Jagger is a really well preserved 62 year old. But I'm really not comfortable with rating rock stars' performances relative to their age. There should be no qualifiers of the "...for a 70-year old" variety in the world of rock. And Jagger's strutting-preening-handwaving movements which used to exert an androgynous kind of sexual magnetism now bring to mind a chickeny old lady on a bar mitzvah dance floor cheering the cringing kiddies on.

One more memorable moment: When Aretha got to the phrase "The bombs bursting in air" in her powerful, pneumatically super-charged rendition of the National Anthem, they cut to a shot of Condi Rice in the crowd. I have no idea if the shot was motivated by the lyric, but it was a striking broadcast moment-- linking 2 of the most powerful African-American women of our time and two of the most radically different: Ms. Soul and Ms. Classical. (Or is it Ms. Soul-less?); Ms. "Do Right Woman" and Ms. "Do Right Wing Woman." (Or is it "Ms. Do Away with Rights Woman?")

As for the game: Really, not memorable. Too much of it determined by the refs rather than the players and by one team self-destructing rather than the other team wining.

Overall, the Superbowl is such a source of ambivalence for me. Obviously, I love the football--even though historically the games have tended to disappoint. But I'm talking about the ever more slick package the football comes in. Part of me really enjoys the ostentatious celebration of celebrity worship and empty consumerism. But part of me can't help thinking of it as a 3 1/2 hour recruitment video for Al Qaeda.

(Actually, a friend disagreed with this observation, pointing out that from an Islamic Fundamentalist perpective, none of these excesses are remotely as objectionable as the glimpse of Janet Jackson's ariola was. Interestingly, of course, that's what provoked America's moral wrath as well.)

OSCARS REFLECTION:

While we're talking about big, annual televised spectacles, a quick thought about this year's Academy Awards. One look at the Best picture nominations (Crash, Brokeback Mountain, Good Night and Good Luck, Munich and Capote) and it’s clear: This year, it's less about deciding what’s the most worthy movie than it is about deciding what's the most worthy issue or cause: So, will it be...a) The racial divide in our country b) The plight of gays in our still homophobic society c) The vital role of the media in a free society or d) The moral complexities of the fight against terrorism. The only film that doesn't explicitly address a pressing racial, sexual or political matter is Capote-but it makes the cut on the basis of two enobling incidentals: 1) the protagonist happens to be gay and 2) the film happens to deal with a case of capital punishment. Hard to know how to handicap the favorites because all of the aforementioned issues are worthy and fashionable. But one thing is for sure: Controversy is just SO in this year! It's not what people will be wearing on their bodies that people are going to be talking about at this year's Oscars so much as what they'll be wearing on their sleeves.

If I’m handicapping the field, I’d give Race and Gay Rights the edge over Terrorism and Freedom of Speech…as they’re more personal and immediate where the other issues tend to become more abstract.

LINGUISTIC ODDITY OF THE DAY:

"Cleave" is the only word I can think of that has two precisely opposite, self canceling meanings (to adhere to and to divide or split). Oh, wait: I forgot about "freedom" and "patriotic" as used by this administration.

Similarly, there';s only one phrase I can think of that has two contradictory meanings: "It's all downhill from here." Depending on the context it can mean it's all easy and wonderful from here (as in the hard work of peddling uphill is over and now we can coast) or that we're going to hell in a handbasket.

EPIPHANY OF THE DAY:

You know you’ve got a problem when a big bowl of mint chocolate chip ice cream functions as your palate cleanser between dinner and dessert.

CULTURAL METACOMMENTARY OF THE DAY:

Here's a quick comparison of New Yorker film critics Anthony Lane and David Denby. After I read a Lane review I think, "Wow, what an artfully articulated and entertaining piece of writing. " But I have no real sense of the film he's purportedly reviewing. When I read a Denby review I think "what an earnestly clunky piece of writing." But I have a strong sense of what the film in question is like. This is largely because Lane subordinates the responsibility to inform to the desire to entertain. The film is to some extent merely fodder for a clever and engaging conceptual premise. Denby on the other hand—unburdened by Lane’s lavish linguistic gifts and conceptual aspirations—interprets his role more humbly: To thoughtfully communicate some sense of the movie in question. In Denby’s reviews, the movie is the true object of the article. In Lane’s reviews, the review is. This brings to mind, in some roundabout way, the apocryphal stories of the difference between Cicero’s and Caesar’s speeches. When Cicero would speak, the Romans would applaud vigorously and exclaim “How eloquent! What oratorical gifts!” When Caesar would speak, they’d stand up and say “March.” Not that I am really seeking to equate Denby with Caesar. (Hey, I knew Julius Caesar and let me tell you: David Denby is no Julius Caesar.) But Lane is somewhat Ciceroan in this respect.

QUOTE OF THE DAY:

That said, Lane spins out some great sentences now and then. Here’s one on the Danish director and agent provocateur Lars Von Trier (“Breaking the Waves,” “Dancer in the Dark,” “Dogville.” etc.):

“In truth, von Trier is not so much a filmmaker as a misanthropic mesmerist, who uses movies to bend the viewer to his humorless will.”

MORALLY-MINDED OBSERVATION OF THE DAY:

Seeing these satellite Google maps of your home too early in life has a similar effect to a premature exposure to porn. It eliminates any sense that you are special. Your home, the place of your origins, is not some mythical realm unto itself, but a little patch of earth on a spinning rock, surveyed exhaustively by an abstracted, impersonal eye. Sex is not an intimate special act involving the intermingling of two unique bodies and souls, but an aerobic event involving readily interchangeable parts. Things should be lived from the inside for a long time before we are ready to see them from the outside.

COMEDIC PREMISE OF THE DAY:

When women gain weight, their breasts get bigger. Could you imagine if men’s penises got bigger when they gained weight? They’d never stop eating!!

Hey Rich: What are you up to tonight?
Oh, you know, eating...down at the all you can grow special. You?
Me too. You know it. Always got to be working on the penis!

You could picture these obese guys trying in vain to move their giant guts to see how much their penises have grown...but ultimately having to take it on faith.

SIGN-OFF OF THE DAY:

Just saw a pretty cool documentary on these guys who meticulously reconstructed the Kennedy assassination and reproduced the trajectory of the "magic bullet" with a single shot. I've always maintained (both out of a native contrariness and out of deep conviction that human beings aren't sufficiently impressive to pull off elaborate conspiracies...let alone to keep their trap shuts about them in this compulsively confessional culture all the way to the grave) that Oswald acted alone and it was nice to see some forensic confirmation of that.

That said, Zapruder and Zamboni are two of my favorite names. If I ever have two pets, I may give them those names.

And speaking of Zapruder and Zamboni, time to get some Zs.

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Posted on 2/6/2006 ( Permanent Link )
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