song of the day: Dead Man's Party Oingo Boingo
word of the day: Word / Speech, utterance. 2, a thing or things said, a remark or remarks. 3, verbally represent or cause to be represented as
koan of the day: "Pee on me"
- Jerry Blank (Amy Sedaris' character in Strangers With Candy to a girl she's trying to seduce in a hotel room...)

i almost have a real roof on my house. gives one the sense of enclosure...

i meant to bring up the movie magnolia in my last blog, but i went another way. i saw magnolia this week again-i've seen it four or five times by now. john c reilly (who plays the cop) and melora walters (who plays the coke addict sexual abuse victim) make one of the all-time great couples in cinema if you ask me (you didn't...). reilly's inhabits his character's sincerity, resolve, loneliness, and purity so convincingly- it becomes the anchor of the film for me. it's almost like his character gets us through the film, and his relationship with Claudia (menora walters character) is the metaphor that keeps us going. menora walters is fucking stunning in this film, her portrayal of the fragile, brutalized young woman right at the edge of the abyss is gripping. seeing her character and the cop fall in love while this large caste of troubled, lost characters seek redemption and forgiveness is what keeps me in the movie every time. i loved Magnolia the first time i saw it, but there's something about the film that almost makes it irrelevent whether you "enjoy" it or not. the acting is so good, and the way the film is edited (paced perfectly with the music, includoing aimee mann's soundtrack offerings) makes the 3 and 1/2 hours evaporate, just watching Juliane Moore, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, and everyone else- except tom cruise. cruise's acting, or maybe it was the character as written, but cruise's character is so over the top, so ineffectively overblown that every time i see the film it's the only spot i check out. i feel like i'm watching a cartoon everytime he's on the screen. just the opposite with reilly and walters- you can really just sit and watch their faces and feel into the layers and dimensions of their characters. the film is really quite dark too, i mean literally as well as figuratively, the picture is shot in dark rooms, overcaste exteriors, it's surprising that doesn't back fire a bit more, but it seems crucial to have that tension and mild claustraphobia in order to make the frog scene work.

yes, the frog scene.

some people thought it was ridiculous and it ruined the film, most people thought it was daring, brilliant, and made the picture unforgettable. i myself thought it was one of the coolest choices i'd ever seen in a movie, and what a perfect metaphor! another choice that assures this movie classic status is when the characters all start singing aimee mann's song (So Just Wise Up, i think it's called?). that was so cool, especially because of the point it occurs in the movie, so far toward the end that for a moment you're like "hey, you can't do that, what the-- this isn't a musical), but then you don't care, because it so WORKS. that's their anthem, all of the characters. well, that's what i felt anyhow.

it kinda seems like this person who directed it (don't know the persons name) was using a Robert Altman-esque approach. the ensemble, how their storylines all inter-relate, big tapestry thing going on, a big natural / whether event that operates as a character in the film somehow... altman stuff. remember that scene in that altman film where juliane moore walked around with her bush exposed for like FIVE MINUTES while she told Mathew Modine's character that she had sex with some other dude? that was weird. that much screen time for pubic hair is affectation if you ask me...

i think instead of pixillating nudity on t.v. they should cover exposed genitals with a picture of the president's face....

especially if it's a butthole.