April 29, 2008
Social tales
Thursday
Had dinner with one of the writers from the Sunday writing group. We stayed till closing time. She is so lovely and positive. I’m a little in love, and I told her so.
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Entries Tagged as ‘film’
February 11, 2008
Sunday still life
On Sunday
Lunch in a popular Union Square diner. I take a seat at the bar—that is, my proofreading job and I take a seat at the bar.
The bartender says, “I remember you.”
The last time I saw him, I also sat at the bar, also with a proofreading job, only without makeup and my hair in [...]
April 26, 2007
“Be a man”
In “Rails,” part three in the documentary West of the Tracks, a young man cries to his father in a restaurant. They live in Shenyang, a dying city in northeast China where empty factories butt up against one another in nearly every single neighborhood—rubber factory, wire factory, steel factory, plastic factory, glass factory, factory after factory [...]
April 1, 2007
A role
When I was nine, I was in a film called The First Emperor. Mine was a very short scene, but I had a line, where I had to lean into a makeshift carriage carrying the emperor’s wife in order to ask her: “Madame, are you all right?” She ignored me. I really longed for her [...]
March 24, 2007
Double take
All throughout Cobra Verde, a scarring film by Werner Herzog and the third collaboration between Herzog and his best friend, Klaus Kinski (right), I kept itching to head home to fish out what I was remembering to be Kinski’s collected writings, sure that he would have scribbled about his own bloated performance in the film [...]
February 25, 2007
It was all just a dream . . .
A few years ago J and I watched three films* in the space of about a week, each of which ended eerily on the following note: It was all just a dream. I had objected to the transparency of two of these films, and felt pacified by the third for its pulling back from that direction at the last minute. And [...]
February 9, 2007
Please have a warm and productive weekend!
James Brown’s “Please, Please, Please” is one of my favorite songs ever. And now this is my most favoritist rendition.
Dear Zhang Ziyi— Just because a movie’s slated to include some action in the martial arts variety, it doesn’t mean you have to take the job. Might you present us with more performances like from 2046? Please? Please? Please?
Another [...]
February 5, 2007
Weekend fun and sleep
Friday: Saw an Italian band in a little East Village bar. My friend F invited this band afterward to a meal at the delectable Assenzio’s on East 4th Street, a Sardinian restaurant whose gnocchi are bites of heaven. The crowd got big and rowdy and very happy, and I sat with F’s longtime friend G, who is nervous [...]
January 19, 2007
Czech views
The Literary Saloon, my daily source and haven for any news related to international literature, points to a film adaptation of another Bohumil Hrabal novel, I Served the King of England. I’m going to devour the film as soon as it’s available here (screw the negative review). Which reminds me: I need to check on [...]
