Author: Roger

I'm a librarian. I hear music, even when it's not being played. I used to work at a comic book store, and it still informs my life. I won once on JEOPARDY! - ditto.

MOVIE REVIEW: Vicki Cristina Barcelona


A friend of mine met a woman at a party that I threw. They had a torrid, tempestuous relationship that he once described as “like heroin”. Couldn’t live without her, couldn’t live with her.

That description pretty much describes at least one of the relationships in the new Woody Allen movie Vicki Cristina Barcelona, which I saw on Columbus Day by myself – well, OK, with four other people, but without my wife, who kindly stayed home with the daughter. She knows my favorite film is Woody’s Annie Hall, that I’ve seen several Allen films, and was anxious to see this one, especially since the reviews were mostly positive.

Like many good Allen movies, VCB is about sex. Whether it’s about a giant condom or a split screen ascertaining whether three times a week is “all the time” or “hardly at all”. In this case, it’s about whether the two title characters, played by Rebecca Hall as the engaged Vicki and Scarlett Johansson, a Woody Allen regular, as the unsettled Cristina, will succumb to the title vista. That includes Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem) as the most forthright Lothario you’ll ever meet.

I found the movie to be a quite nice experience when Maria Elena (Penélope Cruz), the ex of Juan Antonio shows up. She is a force of nature, and ramps up the film from a pleasant diversion to one worth seeing.

There’s also a mildly interesting subplot involving the Nashes (Kevin Dunn and the always great Patricia Clarkson) that informs the main story. Chris Messina is stuck with that thankless role of Doug, the earnest, somewhat unpleasant finance of Vicki, the archtype which shows up in every other romantic movie, but the twist in this storyline makes that ultimately pay off as well.

I’ve watched a LOT of Woody Allen films, though none since 1995’s Mighty Aphrodite, save for the disappointing The Curse of the Jade Scorpion (2001). This is Woody Allen back, if not in his 1970s form, at least in his 1980s form, which is good enough to recommend.

ROG

ROG

Time to Vote!

Oh, not the Presidential election. I can’t vote until next week. I’m not in one of those states with “early” voting and long lines; I’m in one of those states with November 4 voting and probably longer lines.

No, I’m talking about the 2008 Podcast Awards. The voting is open until November 6 and you may vote once every 24 hours.

Here’s the thing: I just don’t listen to that many podcasts: Gordon’s Cast THIS, Pal!,Brian Ibbott’s Lyrics Undercover, Arthur’s AmeriNZ, Rick Bedrosian’s movie thing. More to the point, there are only two podcasts that I listen to that are nominated: Brian Ibbott’s Coverville in two categories (Best Produced and PodSafe Music) and James Howard Kunstler’s KunstlerCast (Cultural/Arts – really?) in one. I’ll vote for them.

But this means my ballot is…susceptible to your suggestions. Go to the ballot and let me know which shows YOU like, and why, and I’ll vote for them. Every day unless two or more of you pick from the same category; then I’ll alternate.

I have made some tentative selections in some categories: I’ve voted for Grammmar Girl, which I HAVE heard, in the Peoples Choice (why isn’t this People’s Choice?) and Education categories. I voted for Ramble Redhead based solely on the fact that he leaves comments for Arthur’s podcast. Under the Mature category, I picked Dan Savage’s Savage Love because I read him in our local arts weekly; also because he helped create another definition of the word santorum.

Now you might think this is somehow inappropriate, me voting for things I don’t know about. I contend that it’s the American way; happens all the time.

So sway me.
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Free taco at Taco Bell tomorrow from 2 to 6 pm. Blame it on base stealing. ROG

ROG

The Lydster, Part 55: Politics and Race


Carol and I have never talked to Lydia about the Presidential campaign. Yet, because she’s been exposed to it from TV or her friends or whatnot, she knows that John McCain and Barack Obama are running for President. (She thinks that Hillary Clinton is still running, and I haven’t been able to dissuade her of that fact; I KNEW the primary season ran too long.)

Not only does she know this, but she can identify the three of them by sight, although she does sometimes confuse McCain with other gentlemen near his vintage, including Joe Biden.

She doesn’t know Sarah Palin, but I’ve heard her say to her stuffed animals/sisters, “I’m going to be governor of Alaska.” I have no idea what THAT’S about.

But there is one big disappointment: she supports McCain. I don’t know if it’s his avuncular look or what, but she’s glommed onto the GOP candidate. Just one more reason not to lower the age of voting to four years old.

I realize that we haven’t really talked to her about race. It was important for us to go to a mixed race church and for her to attend a mixed race day care, but we never talked about it overtly. I realized this when she referred to a woman in our church as a lady with “brown hair and brown skin.” (Which is why I’ve always had a difficult time believing that people don’t see race; it may not be important to them, but if a four-and-a-half year old picks up on it, as a matter of fact, then I suspect a universality to it.)

ROG

ROG

BeckyRebecca is 30

One of the things I came across in my sojourn through old journals was how much I adored my eldest niece, Becky, practically from the moment I saw her. I wrote about her ad nauseum. She was the first person I could just love without the complications that being the child or sibling or lover tend to engender.

Becky was born five days shy of her parents’ third anniversary, which was our first linkage since I was born five days shy of MY parents’ third anniversary. She and her family were living in NYC and I in the Albany area at the time, so I recall seeing her about a month after she was born and being entranced. I made it to her first and second birthdays before her parents moved south.

But Becky and I always had a bond. I came across pictures of my grandmother’s funeral in 1982 and I’m the one tending to her while she’s coloring or needing to go for a walk. Other pictures show me always carrying her around. In some way, she helped train me to be a good uncle for four more nieces and maybe even a good dad to Lydia.

Much more recently, she got married on my birthday, as it turns out, to a decent guy named Rico.


Becky is in the center. This is one of a number of the bands she sings with, the one she performed with last December 31. Her birthday’s actually tomorrow.

Happy 30th birthday, Rebecca. I love you.

Uncle ROG

ROG

QUESTION: Political endorsements

As you probably know, Colin Powell endorsed Barack Obama for President. In his conversation with Tom Brokaw on Meet the Press, he noted that if he had just wanted to endorse the black candidate he could have endorsed Obama months ago. Powell’s a Republican and would have endorsed McCain but for his unfocused and nasty campaign and his choice of Sarah Palin. Naturally, commentators such as Rush Limbaugh and Pat Buchanan suggested that Powell endorsed Obama because they’re both black; my favorite resdponse to that.

1. Do political endorsements matter to you? If so, from whom?
It’s much more likely to matter to me in a local race where I don’t have enough of the facts.
2. Do you think political endorsements matter to the population at large?
I was struck by the number of newspapers that endorsed Bush in 2004 who are endorsing Obama in 2008.
3. Can this election be stolen?
Probably.
But I’m much less worried by ACORN than I am by polling stations with long lines (as has already happened in early voting in Florida) and/or with machines that don’t act as they should. This recent New Yorker column speaks to my concern:
“The idea that Democrats try to win elections by arranging for hordes of nonexistent people with improbable names to vote for them has long been a favorite theme of Rove-era Republicans. Now it’s become a desperate obsession.”
More cynical people than I believe that bringing up the Bradley effect is a screen for hiding voting machine manipulation and disenfranchisement strategies. Tell people to call their COUNTY board of election and make sure they’re registered and verify the voting location. (My voting location has changed, but it’s not reflected on the STATE Board of Elections site.)
4. Would you like to know more about the health of the four candidates for President and Vice-President on the major party ticket? This article suggests we don’t know enough about ANY of them, especially McCain and Biden, but also the status of Obama’s cessation of smoking. The mysterious circumstances around the birth of Sarah Palin’s last child is pretty much the ONLY info the press has on her health.

[Stolen from the Frog.
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STILL undecided?
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Oooh, the photo above? That’s a shot of a lovely 8 by 10 color glossy that a relative of mine, a Republican but not a McPalin supporter, received from the RNC and gave to me, knowing just how much I would appreciate it. And I do, I really do. I obliterated the name so you can photoshop in the name of your favorite liberal and make him or her nuts.

Wait, what if someone did that [GULP] to ME?! And it must be a different Roger Green…

ROG

ROG
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