"Cheese is the devil's play thing."

-- House

$8.00 review: My Bloody Valentine 3-D

Despite some plot holes and a couple of eye-rolls MBV delivers what it promises. The 3D is surprisingly effective. Had the audience been less savvy and taken the genre seriously, it wouldn't have been as fun.

$6.00 review: Slumdog Millionaire

I try to hit the mantinee once a week. Here movies are $6 before noon Friday-Sunday, and thank god for it. This week's movie was so satisfying that I didn't feel the need for a double feature.

Slumdog Millionaire is based on a novel called 'Q and A' by Vikas Swarup. The screenplay was written by Simon Beafoy (The Full Monty, Ms. Pettigrew lives for a Day), Directed by Danny Boyle (Trainspotting, 28 days Later) and co-directed with Loveleen Tandan ( Art Direction for Deepa Mehta's film Earth, AD for Monsoon Wedding and Casting for Vanity Fair and Brick Lane).

It has been a long long time since I've seen a movie that combines the elements of so many genres without feeling like a casserole of mistake. Instead this took the talents from a wide range of talent fields and combined it to make it something amazing.

The story telling, the visuals, the use of language and music-- all of it came together to be one of the better movies I've seen in a long time. Dark, brutal, and yet somehow managed to maintain an optimism that didn't feel contrived, or inorganically attached after rounds of notes and a profoundly abused screenwriter.

( We're ignoring the last 1 minute of dialog here. Nobody's perfect.)

Dev Patel did an admirable job of playing Jamal. I was surprised to find out that he's only 18 years old. Not because he looked older, but because he was the kind of good that usually only comes after years of training. As Freida Pinto's first role, I think she played Latika as a smart survivor when it would have been very easy to play her as a flat 2 dimensional object.

So, you have a guy who directs horror movies, a screenwriter who's known for 'the little movie that could' scripts and an AD/Art director with a stunning visual sense usually reserved for art house films. It could have been a disaster of pretension and instead all those parts worked together amazingly well.

Auld Lang Syne

2008 in which I took a full time job working for the man that has gone from 40 hours a week to far too many for far too little reward, gained 20 lbs and lost a loved one.

2008 in which I traveled to London for the first time, secured full time work, had holidays full of joy and family behaving well, finished my first script, submitted, made top 5%, got to see my friend 2 weeks before she kicked the bucket.

2009

look into becoming an elementary school teacher. What is involved?

finish two features. submit them.

send said scripts to agents.

write short story for anthology.

floss.

rolled into work at... well. 4pm. Left at 8.30.

lunch: palak paneer on brown rice from Trader Joe's.

Dinner: cod cake, arugula with lemon juice. Rockrabbit wine.

so far-- cash only today.. with the aid of a $10 gift certificate to Whole Foods.

Operation: povertà non più

or, operation: Broke no more.
I need to change a habit or fifteen.

Effective immediately:
I will be living a cash only lifestyle, with the exception of items for medical necessity. Alcohol does not count as a medical necessity. Each Monday I will take $120 out of the bank, and live on that. In the majority of the country, this seems like a more than reasonable undertaking.

In fact, even in New York, it is a totally reasonable undertaking. It does mean that I'll be changing a lot of things. In the past few years I've gotten into the very bad habit of eating out nearly every meal. Some of that comes from the social structure in New York. When we want to get together, we go to a bar or a restaurant.

Part of that is the culture of singlehood. Part of that is related to the fact that most of my friends don't have living rooms to speak of- I do, but I don't have people over very often for two reasons. 1) I live in the equivalent of the Canada in relation to the rest of the city. And 2) as much as I like my roommates, keeping the apartment clean with these two is a Sisyphean task.

Breakfast at home before work, pack lunch, come home and make dinner.

Outline for next screenplay is tomorrow's project.

Tonight's dinner:
Spinach and goat cheese quesedilla with a side of almonds and kalamata olives.

Wine: Rockrabbit Sauvignon Blanc 2006. $9.99 at Trader Joe's.

Fun, very fruity, crispy but not wimpy and not a hint of that oak.
Cheerfully drinkable with a screwtop. I would serve it to others with dinner. I'm thinking salmon with a mushroom risotto. Tomorrow's dinner I think.

Ah. It seems I'm being fed a line of something silly.