Buys'n'GiftsDVD purchases this week include Boondock Saints, on a strong recommendation from Sniper Ninja Bears artist Bass; Michael Clayton, as part of my usual late Oscar-related pick-ups; and Cloverfield, to insert right next to my Godzilla collection.
And my thanks to my friend Bauble for mailing me some Free Comic Book Day offerings I just couldn't get my hand on at the time.
"Accomplishments"
Borges' protégé Alberto Manguel, who seems to specialize in writing about the literary experience, had impressed me with his History of Reading a few years ago, and now again with The Library at Night. This "history" of libraries and book collections is actually more of a meditation on the concept of libraries, both public and personal. What does our choice of books say about us? What does the way we classify those books? How do they live in our minds? Attention is even given to imaginary libraries, electronic media and the act of book burning. The library as everything. There isn't a page in this book that doesn't contain a fascinating fact, a lucid observation or a well-chosen quote. Man... I really have to get my shelves in order...
Flipped a couple of unusual thrillers this weekend. First was Michael Clayton, a lawyer drama without a courtroom, about a "fixer" (George Clooney) who really needs to get out of a business that is gnawing at his soul. Others around him (like the superb characters played by Tom Wilkinson and Tilda Swinton) have already payed a high price. As much as the acting impressed me, I have to give props to the completely immersive script. It managed to make this world feel absolutely authentic, yet at the same time wasn't afraid to spin into ambiguous lyricism. The DVD has a good commentary track with the director and editor (brothers) that toes the line between being informative and not giving the game away, and a few interesting deleted scenes.
The second was The Machinist, starring a 110-pound Christian Bale as an insomniac who hallucinates a great deal of the movie. I admit to being distracted by the similarities to Fight Club in the premise, but the stronger influences here are German expressionism, Hitchcock and Kafka. What we have here is an atmospheric puzzle movie that doesn't rely on a twist ending, but asks you to figure out what's real at any given time. Very dark, but worth it for Bale's courageous performance and the literary script. The DVD includes a good make of documentary, many deleted/alternate scenes, and a commentary track that shifts between explaining the nuances of the story (sometimes too much) and recounting how they made Barcelona pass for L.A.
On role-playing night last Monday, we finished out little time travel tale back to Camelot. The adventure was largely based on the beats in TimeMaster's The Clash of Kings. Some quicker thinking on the part of some of the players this time, and in the end only 20th-century anglo poetry was erased (from T.S. Eliot on). Oops! Clash of Kings was something of a try-out to see if TimeMaster's set-up was a good avenue for a time travel campaign. I thought it worked well, though some players complained it took them too long to work out the details so that they didn't, y'know, erase their own ancestors by mistake.In other geekery news, crafted 9 new cards from The Time Warrior for my Unauthorized Doctor Who CCG and got GTA4 up to 28.87%. Go Niko Bellic!
Someone Else's Post of the Week
I've been a big fan of Chris Sims' Invincible Super-Blog's parallel presidential campaign, but you know I would never have voted for Cobra Commander even with Destro on the ticket. But Chris has finally given me someone I CAN vote for!
Comments
I keep coming back to that, and feeling stupid because I can't come up with anything beyond the obvious freedom/innocence parallel. My English degree is failing me! :)
What did Arthur see in that book? That's the real question that's difficult to answer. I'd need to watch it again to really grasp what that thread is saying (though on a first level, brothers in arms that can't trust each other = the lawyers in this film).
So the horses, yes, are freedom. Michael comes upon them as he's given up on "fixing". He's disgusted with himself and stops at 1) an image he saw in Arthur's (and his son's) book (so they relate to the other men he's loved in his life) and 2) the freedom they represent and he wants to embrace (they aren't fenced in). Perhaps we would have had the same ending even without the car bomb, and this moment of reflection (tying Arthur to freedom rather than madness) might suggest.
And of course, by stopping in admiration of the horses' freedom, he's literally saved from the car bomb, so he decides to emulate that freedom and in doing so, metaphorically saves his life.