bathroom renovation

back after a long absence. Went to law school, so I was a little preoccupied. I'm sure you were able to read and watch your sci fi and fantasy without me just fine. I managed to lose most of my blog posts in the process too.

But such is life. So I'm back, and I'll be blogging about books and movies mostly, but I'll probably fill in on my other ideas too, sports, gardening, home renovation, cooking, etc.

Speaking of which, I just finished renovating my bathroom. Have a look.

e is for effort, e is for empire

Ugh, what a terrible book. What happened to you Mr. Card, where did you go, and when did a crazy neo-con steal your soul and your body?

I used to love Orson Scott Card. Seriously, when I was a kid I read every single one of his published books, even saints (despite the fact that I hated and continue to dislike the Mormon church). His books were subversive and unique. Even when he stole subject matter from other authors, he used the ideas in a new way and talked about something meaningful (see the Worthing Saga were he stole the idea of cryogenic sleep). His short stories are shocking and suggestive, in addition to being well written. Early in his career it seemed like he not only cared about what he was writing, but he cared about writing well.

Now, I think he only cares about what he wants to say, and he doesn't care about disguising what he wants to say with a decent plot or well constructed characters.

I remember Ender and Valentine and Mazer Rackham. They were intelligent, multi-dimensional and puzzling characters. The scenes from Ender's game where Ender is struggling with the morality game are truly provocative. The idea of a child being tricked into xenocide and then turning into a non-violent opposition leader are the definition of subversive.

And it wasn't just Ender's Game. Take Hart's Hope, a obscure fantasy written by Card during his early period. In this book a poor young boy discovers a completely unique ability: in a world controlled by magic, he is a sink. Magic doesn't work on him, and he can make magic stop all around him. How subversive is that, magic as a metaphor for power and the main character as an opposition force to that power? Sounds like fantasy that could have been written in the sixties. Man.

And then you've got the recent stuff by Orson Scott Card. The new parallel Ender series is garbage. I got to the third one (I think, the one before shadow of the Hegemon or giant or something crappy like that), and I gave up. The book was thinly veiled pro-life propaganda. Petra doesn't have any opinions except that killing babies is wrong. The characters read like cranky middle aged men, not 20 something men and women who are forced into "saving" the world.

But this isn't a review for any of the Ender's Shadow books. This is a review of Empire, so I better start talking about Empire before this blog post gets too long. Oh wait it already is? Tough, all you three readers will have to suffer through it.

Empire sucks. And aunt Susan, I blame this on you. You promised me it didn't suck. You said it was like the old Card, before he sold out Ender for money, before he turned into a talentless hack writer. You lied to me, your tenth favorite nephew. How could you?

man in the high castle

There are books out there that don't just challenge the reader, there are books that change the reader.

The man in the high castle, by philip k dick is one of those books. This book, like all of dick's writing, is revolutionary. It is challenging. It is completely and utterly bizzare. It is unique, difficult, simple, readable, entertaining, schizophrenic and so much more than any set of adjectives can covey.

This book is not about the plot. It's about what the plot means. The plot, like all of dick's novels, is cohesive and interesting and detailed. It is fully realized and detailed; it is completely authentic. In this world, the axis wins WW 2. The world that results is a world where Japan and Germany have divided the world in two, with the United States serving the role of Germany after our version of WW2. Japan dominates the west coast while Germany lords over the east. Apparently the heartland of America had nothing to offer to either side.

Jokes aside (especially bad jokes), this novel is an utterly amazing and philosophical exploration of the impact of morality on each and every choice. It uses the chaos of the plot to accentuate the moral decisions made by each character. In fact the chaos of the world this novel takes place in works as a sort of synecdoche for each person and each person's choices. The whole world is difficult, and each event impacts a web of other events. The world and it's events mirror each individual person, they stand in the place of each individual person. The plot unfolds through the narration of five people, ranging in importance from a low level worker to an important German politician. Each person makes choices, and each choice has a moral consequence.

Shadowmarch

Tad Williams is a master of giving the reader exactly what they want in a book, no more and no less. There is action, developed characters, a strong plot, intrigue and most of all entertainment.

This was exactly the kind of book I wanted to read, exactly when I wanted to read it. It's the type of book that transports you to a different world, and then disappears from your thoughts when you aren't reading it.

It's certainly not going to stick with me months down the road, and it's no Lord of the Rings by any stretch of the imagination (although there is a large portion of the book devoted to a short semi-human walking and walking), but it is an entertaining read.

One thing this book made clear however, was my exact problem with Warbreaker. This book took me a couple of weeks to read, and Warbreaker took me only a few days. Yet I enjoyed this one a great deal more. I couldn't figure it out at first because Shadowmarch wasn't really that much better.

The writing in Shadowmarch is, in my opinion, better and I cared about the characters more. I certainly felt, for instance, that Briony was a fully realized female protagonist (as compared to say Vivenna). But it wasn't that much better. And it certainly didn't read as quickly (which goes back to Sanderson's greatest strength, writing action sequences).

So again, I wasn't clear on what was making me enjoy Shadowmarch so much more, until about the third scene from "Lady Porcupine's" point of view (okay a tangent here, but come on Tad, can't you come up with a better name than that? She's supposed to be born for war, how is a porcupine terrifying?). Yasammez, who for those who haven't read the book is the same character, an evil elf princess type who is totally badass ( hm.. I guess lady porcupine is not that bad) is a great villain. She's a perfect foil to Briony and Barrick: where they are young, innocent forces for change, she is the embodiment of an ancient and simmering desire for revenge.

For me, at least, epic fantasy needs this kind of good and evil tension to be epic. You need the crazed god king (another antagonist in this novel) and the badass elf princess consumed with revenge to balance out the noble protagonists. Warbreaker spends 490 pages building up the cultural excesses of one culture (the Hallandren), and then boom, the Phan Khal turn out to be the bad guys. It was a total let down. I didn't buy these guys as bad guys as nefarious evil masterminds, and hell they didn't even buy themselves as such either. I mean what is epic about a bunch of crony old men and servants tricking two countries into war?

Epic is the fantasy equivalent of pre-medieval England being pinned between a crazy god-emperor and a magic wielding army of evil elves.

This is not a fantastic book, but it is a totally satisfying book. I will certainly sign on for the next installment, and probably the third as well, and I would suggest it to anyone looking to waste a week in guilty pleasure reading. C+.

District 9

This movie boldly goes where few thinking man science fiction movies are able, into the realm of edge of your seat dramatic popcorn munching entertainment.

This is the type of movie that has you chewing finger nails, cringing at explosions and cheering for the good guy. And, most importantly, thinking about the implications of aliens as a metaphor for African refugees.

If you've read any other reviews, you've read about the problems in the film. IMO, these problems are grossly exaggerated.

For instance, you don't like the protagonist, Wikus. He's kind of a spineless, xenophobic, overconfident, self-justifying jerk. He has his good points (like the way he treats his wife) but he has a lot of glaring flaws as well. But then, for me at least, this is an effective plot device. It works because he is a normal guy in an abnormal situation. His world is falling apart all around him and he is concerned primarily with reversing this trend. I would like to pretend that I wouldn't be selfish in his shoes, that I would place the welfare of an alien race over my own well-being, but like Wikus I love my wife and I enjoy my life. I would fight as hard as I could to keep the life I lead.

This is not a subtle film. You aren't really supposed to like humanity in general. You are supposed to relate to the very alien aliens. You feel for their plight. For instance, In almost the first scene the relationship between the "prawns" (a pejorative term used to describe the aliens) and genocide fleeing refugees is made brutally clear. In fact, they are even called refugees within the first few minutes.

Additionally (running with the theme of unjustified criticism), there is some shaky camera footage. Again, IMO this is effective. It highlights the chaotic nature of this situation. The movie is designed to be realistic. You watch it the way you would watch a developing story on CNN. So-called expert interview clips are interrupted by news footage. Some camera shots come from the clip of a gun, there are clips from security camera footage, and for me this worked. If you hated movies like the Bourne Ultimatum because of this technique, avoid this movie. But if you like to see movies with innovative film-work, check it out.

Finally, going with the criticism, the movie is bloody as hell. I saw a lot of children in the theater. They shouldn't have been there. Several dozen humans explode in a veritable orgy of gory blood and guts. This is a valid criticism of the film. If you care about that sort of thing. But then it's an action movie for Christ's sake, and it's rated R.

Again, this is not a subtle movie. It's a thought provoking movie masquerading as an action movie. But it is completely action packed. Some scenes are hard to believe, like an alien and a human taking on the world's second most powerful multi-national-arms-dealing-evil-empire-corporation armed only with desperate bravery and a couple of alien guns, but then it's a satisfying summer action thriller. It wouldn't work nearly as well without the unbelievable action sequences. The movie sucks you in, and spits you out raw and bloody. You leave the theater ragged and asthmatic. It's visually stunning in a way that is unbelievable for its tiny budget (well, tiny budget by Hollywood sci-fi action movie standards).

Seriously, the special effects will blow your mind. This movie looks more realistic than any scene in Transformers. I cannot believe how realistic and detailed the aliens look They move and act authentically alien, and they look and speak the part as well. I personally bought into the story, and I loved the way you, as a viewer, have to fill in the background. No one explains why the aliens came, or even very much about them. The viewer just sort of assumes that they're some sort of collective organism with highly intelligent but socially dependent drones that crash landed on earth because a strange space illness killed of their queen during routine extrasolar space exploration (or at least that's what I assumed).

The audience becomes an active participant in this movie, and that's what makes it so brilliant. In addition to edge of your seat suspense, the viewer struggles to connect the dots and fill in the back story for the alien refugees. It unfolds like an actual real life documentary. You leave the theater pissed off at the human race, but in a good way (an entertaining and thought provoking way).

And, on a intellectual level, the movie also works very well. The obvious parallel here is apartheid South Africa. But it's about so much more than that. Actually it's not really about this at all, or at least in any direct way. It's about immigration and violence and neo colonial greed and refugees. You could say that it's about the reality of a "post" colonial Africa. It's about how violence and economics are often linked, and it's brutally (and in no way subtlety) effective.

A solid movie, it effectively walks the razor's edge between being entertaining and thought provoking.

Inglorious Basterds

Quenten Tarantino is one of those directors I will always love no matter what they produce. Ten thousand Death Proof's could not ruin him for me. He has revolutionized film, and you can see it in the testosterone driven excess of films like 300, or Sin City. He redefined my adolescence with Pulp Fiction.

But no one will argue with the contention that Tarantino really really loves what he has to say. In fact, in his movies, the dialogue takes center stage. It is no accident that, quite often, his movies lack a clear protagonist. The main character becomes the consent back and forth of discussion. Every conversation is a form of confrontation, and it almost sounds, at times, like the dialogue is written for a single person talking to himself.

BUT, it is almost always funny as hell. Inglourious is especially funny. It's probably the funniest, no scratch that, definitely the funniest movie Tarantino has created. Which makes it very strange that this is a problem in this film.

The problem is the subject matter. I'm not the type of person to go around preaching about sacred things, and I don't think it's sacrilegious to do a funny movie about Nazism. But the movie had a very clear message. It unequivocally says that film (all film, or film in general) is a constant reminder to the world about the evil of Nazism. Film reminds us (yearly, and always around the time of the Oscars) that Hitler killed six million Jews out of pure hatred. It is a form of vengeance. Or maybe vigilance is a better word, a reminder about what hatred can do to people.

This did not mesh well with the comedy in the movie. I'm sorry, but it didn't. And it was pretentious of Tarantino to think that this could work. This movie would have been so much better if it hadn't had a point. Or if the violence itself had been the point. If, for instance, it had just focused on the way violence is always reciprocated and brutality leads to brutality.

And it was just too long.

There is a lot to recommend this movie. As usual, Brad Pitt is jaw-dropping. He is probably one of the best actors, and definitely the best high powered celebrity actor, in Hollywood. The cast, outside of Pitt, is great. The dialogue is outstanding, the music is (as always with Tarantino) quirky and appropriate. Again, and I can't stress this enough, the movie is outrageously funny.

It's just not, as Tarantino claims through Brad Pitt in the final scene, Tarantino's masterpi

The Fountain

Full disclosure: this is probably my favorite movie. Scratch that, this is my favorite movie. It is my favorite science fiction movie, it is my favorite fantasy movie, it is my favorite movie period.

Because underneath this pretentious, prickly exterior I am, at heart, a big softie.

This movie is absolutely beautiful. There is no better adjective to describe the look, feel, sound and texture of this film. It is also tragic, but it proves that tragedy can be absolutely beautiful.

For Darren Aronofsky, the fountain of life (or more accurately the tree of life) becomes a metaphor for love itself. Basically, the film is about the eternal nature of love. He uses this metaphor as a plot device and when analyzed analytically the film's narrative structure seems almost inconsistent.

This inconsistency is purposeful and directed, however. The metaphorical imagery requires a loose plot structure. The movie is about death as much as it is about life. In a sense, it is about the integral relationship between life and death. This necessitates the apparent looseness of the narrative structure. The pain of Izzi's death causes Tommy's life to unravel. As his wife draws closer to death, Tommy becomes more and more obsessed with his work. He justifies this behavior to himself by pretending that through his work he will be able to save Izzi. The pain of his wife's death causes his life to unravel, and as Tommy's life unravels, the subjective nature of the narrative structure seems to decay.

It only seems to decay, however. In truth, this structure underlines the purpose and theme of the film. Without loss there is no love, without death there is no life. And through this relationship of love and death, life is eternally renewed.

Obsession is a common theme in Aronofsky's work. What makes this film so utterly brilliant is that it suggests a solution to the destructive problems caused by obsessive behavior.

This movie is pure poetry. It is not so much a story as much as it is an experience. It suggests that life is often, perhaps usually, emotional rather than logical. It is inexplicably painful, yet unbearably beautiful.