March 2013 - Page 4 of 7 - Ramblin' with Roger

Movie Reviews: Oscar-nominated live-action short films for 2012

On my birthday this month, I decided to see the Oscar-nominated short films at the Spectrum Theatre in Albany. This was predicated on the fact that I might see Zero Dark Thirty on video, but might be less likely to find these. As it turned out, it was the very last day of its three- or four-week run. The program ran for 115 minutes. The films were interspersed with commentary by Luke Matheny who won a couple of years ago for God of Love, which as I noted at the time, was probably my least favorite of the nominees. Unlike the commenters for the animated films this year, I didn’t think Matheny brought that much insight to the table. It didn’t help that he was trying to be wryly humorous and the films, for the most part, were not.

Film descriptions were from the Spectrum website.

Death of a Shadow (France and Belgium/Dutch, 20 minutes) – A soldier attempts to ransom his soul from Death and return to the girl he loves. Directed by Tom Van Avermaet and Ellen De Waele.
This was the darkest of the five, and quite metaphysical, taking photos of people’s shadows at the moments of their deaths, any time in history. It was well done, but most uncomfortable.

Henry (Canada/English, 21 minutes) – Henry, an elderly concert pianist, undergoes a series of confusing experiences as he searches for his wife. Directed by Yan England.
The audience may be a bit confused by the action at first, intentionally so, but ultimately this is a very sweet story of aging. I’ve seen a couple of full-length films about getting old recently. This is not as cavalier as Quartet, but not nearly as depressing as Amour. In fact, this movie showed far more of the couple’s good times than Amour did. This was my favorite of the five.

Curfew (USA/English, 19 minutes) – A young man on the verge of committing suicide receives a call from his sister asking him to babysit his niece. Directed by Shawn Christensen
This film was the Oscar winner, and I can see why. It’s about second chances. The protagonist is the last person his sister knows she’d want to leave her daughter with. Possibly the most whimsical of the five, despite its beginning.

Buzkashi Boys (Afghanistan/Persian, 28 minutes) – Two boys in Afghanistan, a blacksmith’s son and an orphan living on the streets, dream of winning a popular and fierce polo match. Directed by Sam French and Ariel Nasr.
In many ways, Kabul, Afganistan itself is the star. Can you get out of this bleak place, or are you stuck by birth to your destiny? Very magnetic lads, especially the one playing the orphan. The ending is vaguely unsatisfying, but it was still a good film.

Asad (South Africa/Somali, 18 minutes) – A boy from a poor Somali village must decide between piracy and life as a fisherman. Directed by Bryan Buckley and Mino Jarjoura.
The pirates are some scary dudes who our young hero has to deal with, which he does with great skill. Then he is put to another test. An interesting, somewhat peculiar story, though I’m not sure of the ending belongs in this film, which, not incidentally stars a cast of actual Somali refugees.

All in all, a good crop of films worthy of nomination.

Great Caesar’s Ghost!

Great Caesar’s Ghost is a jam band that formed in 2004 in Bridgehampton, NY.

It’s too bad that Clark Kent has quit the Daily Planet newspaper. Not that I’ve read the comic for years now. But I always had a soft spot for his editor, Perry White, who would often bark, “Great Caesar’s ghost!”

Even before Perry, there was a Sunday comic strip called Great Caesar’s Ghost! And Great Caesar’s Goat! It “follows the exploits of Julius Caesar who is living in a Rome that has more than a passing resemblance to contemporary society (of the mid-1910s anyway). This setting features suffrage parades and the strange fashion statements involving the ankles of the fairer sex among other things. Julius himself is less the figure you might remember from history class, and more the sort who might fib to his wife to sneak out with the fellas.”

Also, Great Caesar’s Ghost is a jam band that formed in 2004 in Bridgehampton, NY. “They are noted for their unique approach toward honest American music.

“Great Caesar’s Ghost is not a tribute band and has created seven albums of blues, jazz, rock, and original music in its eight-year history. They have charted nationally twelve times.”

So beware the Ides of March [LISTEN].

Mondays and technology

At home, the Internet is not working. Well, it is on but I can’t receive it.

Some days, I work hard to bring you a well-crafted thought process. Other days, the piece just writes itself. This is what happened on Monday, March 4, 2013:

I get the Daughter to school barely on time (too long a story), and just catch the #10 Western Avenue bus. I would not have if people were all using bus swipers; fortunately, the cash users slowed the process down sufficiently.

I then ride the #737 bus to Corporate Woods. Near the library on Henry Johnson Boulevard, I overhear the driver say to the dispatcher that the bus has broken down. Did I hear him correctly? I did! He announces that a replacement bus would be there in five minutes; I thought this was an optimistic estimate, since the last time I was on a bus that broke down (also a #737, on the way home, stuck on Northern Boulevard near WTEN-TV), it took 20 minutes. Fortunately, this time, it was only eight minutes.

Bypassing my work office, I go to my allergist’s office. I get a couple of shots every four weeks for my allergies. I can visit a few days earlier, but if I go a day later than the 28 days, I’ll have to start the regimen all over, building up the dosage. They have this new computerized system, whereby I swipe a card they gave me and it’s all automated; no paperwork. From a medical privacy standpoint, this makes much more sense than the sign-in sheet, where one can see the other patients’ names. But, in the short term, this is taking much longer; the staff has a learning curve, so it took 30 minutes to be called, rather than the usual five or ten. After the shot, I’m supposed to wait 30 minutes to see if I get a reaction.

I’m getting to work much later than I anticipated. One of my colleagues is stymied, and feeling poorly to boot. She’s using this software to do a ring study around an address in Kingston, NY. But the output says it’s in Eddyville, NY. I don’t even know what Eddyville is, and I lived in Ulster County for a time; it’s not even recognized in Census geography. My co-worker asked, “Could you figure this out? I’m going home sick.” The ultimate fix was to use the latitude and longitude, rather than the street address, which allowed me to rename the map whatever I wanted to, such as the street address in Kingston.

At home, the Internet is not working. Well, it is on, but I can’t receive it. This proves to be a relatively easy fix of rebooting the wireless router.

I receive these annual dividend checks from an insurance company, MetLife. Do I want to complete enrollment with their vendor Computershare of Providence, RI so I can get the money automatically deposited into my checking account? Sure! Twenty minutes later, I was stymied by the fact that I had to set up an account with Computershare, and the password I had to create was in the wrong format – but I couldn’t find instructions as to the correct way: no caps? ALL CAPS? alphanumeric? Then I called their less than instinctive automated “customer service” number, but ended up in voicemail hell, before it cut off altogether, blasting a loud hum in my ear. Finally, I gave up and snail-mailed the information. Curse you, Computershare!

I surely understand why people are technophobic. While I had some successes that day, the last encounter, in particular, was quite frustrating.

Prince of Egypt at First Presbyterian on Sunday

It’s so odd that Brian Stokes Mitchell started out playing the minor character Jackpot on the television show Trapper John, MD for seven years.

The youth at my church, First Presbyterian in Albany, are putting on, with the assistance of a number of adults, a production of The Prince of Egypt, the musical based on the 1998 animated film. The storyline is adapted from the Moses story in the biblical Book of Exodus. It will take place this Sunday, March 17 at 12:15 pm

In a decision beyond my understanding, I, who am a bit older than 18, have been asked to perform the song Through Heaven’s Eyes, which my character, Jethro, passes along his staff to Moses. Initially, I was reluctant for a few reasons. One is that it was moderately high in my range and modulates even higher. Another reason is that it’s sung in the movie by Brian Stokes Mitchell, only the greatest male singer who regularly performs on Broadway. It’s so odd that he started out playing, as Brian Mitchell, the minor character Jackpot on the television show Trapper John, MD for seven years.

The song also has a lot of tricky lyrics. Thrice it goes “So how can you” or So how do you”, and I had to note that the verbs that follow are in backward alphabetical order – see, measure, judge – which has helped propel the rest of the phrases. Other lines are difficult to spit out clearly in some sections, such as “cool fresh spring”; lots of consonants.

I thought about it quite a bit. But when the director wanted to know whether or not I would participate, I became tired of my own indecision, so I just said yes, masochist that I am.

Meanwhile, listen to the far superior Mitchell version HERE or HERE.

Oddly, this is NOT the first time I ended up singing a Stephen Schwartz song I thought was high in my range. I was in a production of Godspell in New Paltz, NY in 1975 or 1976. Initially, I was given We Beseech Thee to sing, well within my range. Later, though, the director gave me All Good Gifts instead, which was not.

It would have been mom and dad’s 63rd anniversary

In the late 1960s, my mother took to wearing a red wig, which made her look even more fair-skinned.

Did I mention that I was always appreciative of the fact that my parents were wed in 1950? It was always easy to remember how long they had been married; the math was easy. I was a five-day-early third anniversary present to them, my mother used to say.

I wish I could find this particular photo of my parents on their wedding day. Actually, there are a couple of them. One is of them cutting the cake, which is nice. The other, though, was one taken in the living room of my maternal grandmother. There’s the smiling, happy couple, plus Mom’s mother Gert, her aunt Deana, her uncle Ed, and her Uncle Ernie, all looking sullen. Also in the photo, Ernie’s wife Charlotte, looking like myopic people sometimes looked in photos, and their kids, Raymond, ten years to the day younger than my mother, and Frances, looking mildly bored as tweens (a term that didn’t exist then) were wont to do.

Fran was interviewed in 2005, as I noted here in 2010. Fran believed that my grandma’s family’s resistance to my father was because of his skin color. They were rather light-skinned black people, especially Deana and my mom, who probably could have passed for white.

Fran said: “My family on my father’s side was very much impacted by the racial notion of the time, so they liked it that my father married my mother because she was white. That was, you know, really acceptable. When my cousin Gertie — Trudy [my mom], they call her now — started to date the man who eventually became her husband, Les Green [my father], he was deemed too dark for the family. And I think my father and my Uncle Ed had to intervene and say, Listen, I’m not going to be able to ever speak to you again unless you stop this nonsense.”

The Yates clan eventually lived with the marriage, especially after the children came, but there was always hostility between my father and his mother-in-law, with my mother as the uncomfortable DMZ. I thought that it was the fact that he lived in a house that she owned, and that was an affront to his manhood, and that could have been part of it. But I’ve since realized it was also the lack of her acceptance of him. My sisters and I remember this to this day, although it happened at least 45 years ago: We’re eating dinner, and somebody asks my grandma if she wanted any peas; she replied, “I’ll have a couple.” My father, seated nearest to her, and the peas, proceeded to put TWO peas on her plate. (And people call ME a literalist.)

In the late 1960s, my mother took to wearing a red wig, which made her look even more fair-skinned. My favorite story from that period: My father was on a business trip to San Francisco, and my mother went along. While the guys were doing business, the wives were at lunch chatting about the issues of the day. Eventually, something about race came up. One woman said, “What do you think, Trudy?” My mother replied, “Being a black woman…” Apparently, the next sound heard was a bunch of jaws dropping.

Even after my mother came up to Albany to see my daughter, and visited my church, at least one member thought my mother was white, even though he had abandoned the wig decades earlier. This was, of course, after my father had died.

My parents were married 50 years, and 2 days shy of 5 months.

Photo of my parents and me – great shot of the back of my head – at my 1992 graduation from library school at UAlbany; taken by either Zoe Nousiainen or Jennifer Boettcher.