Teel – Page 249 – Teel McClanahan

The Time Machine – DVD review

I’m not going to do a full and proper review of the DVD here, but I wanted to make a comment or two. I just got this DVD used yesterday in exchange for some old CDs I’ve never really cared for, and watched it tonight. My first comment is a little thing that while perhaps correctly done, seems strange to me.

Among the special features included on the DVD is “Deleted Scene.” It says “Deleted Scene” right on the back of the box, and again in the menu, and boy is it accurate. One deleted scene. Not two or three (or 16, thank you Devil’s Advocate), but one. It actually helps add not just thoughtful depth to the main character, but adds visual depth in relation to some peculiar architecture featured later in the film. I might argue that it ought to have been left in. Many who make DVD decisions believe that deleted scenes were deleted for a reason, and ought not be included on the distribution, but even they might agree that this one scene is acceptable, and of fully the same quality as the rest of the film (as opposed to the video quality of some other delted scenes I’ve seen, thank you Devil’s Advocate). Except there was another scene I wanted to see.

You may not know this, but The Time Machine’s theatrical release was pushed back something like three months because they had to totally recreate a set of special effects for the scene in 2037, where the Moon is crashing into New York city. You see, in the first rendering parts of the Moon are shown actually colliding with a tall building or two, and the buildings collapsing. Apparently their special effects were so well done that it looked remarkably like the real camcorder footage of airplanes crashing into the World Trade Center and those buildings collapsing. In light of the tragedy, they had to figure out a new thing to do, and ended up with the city street cracking open and lava breaking through, which does seem a little confusing and less visually stunning. I was really hoping I could have seen at least some of the special effects visualizations of the moon crashing into the Earth on the DVD. I guess it’s still too much in bad taste, even though it was all conceptualized and rendered before the tragedy.

Do I have another comment? Not right now. Anyway, good movie, good transfer, and there are a couple of good special features including Deleted Scene.

About Schmidt – movie review

There are things about this movie that will make my older sister cry. Possibly quite a bit, actually. The least of which is the confirmation that Kathy Bates would play our mother in a movie version of our lives with uncanny accuracy. Her character in this movie has very nearly been written as though someone had known my mother and put her into their screenplay. It’s uncanny, really, some of the details they got right.

Anyway, in case you aren’t already aware, About Schmidt is possibly the most engaging and yet at the same time almost impossibly boring film you’ll see all year. Since I always seem to end up giving away the movie anyway, and since there is so very little to give away here, this is your warning that if for some reason you want to be suprised by a drama not to read on. About Schmidt tells the story of Warren Schmidt from the very minute he retires after 42 years from the Woodmen Insurance company. Before he figures out how to adjust to retirement, his wife dies suddenly. He is hopeless, and after a couple of weeks of making mess with no one to clean up after him, he decides all of a sudden to drive across the country in the Winnebago his wife made him buy. I might point out that it is an $125,000 Winnebago, The Adventurer. Anyway, he was going to drive from Omaha to Denver, where his daughter is preparing to be married, but when he calls her to tell her he is on his way, she tells him to turn around and not show up until a day or two before the wedding at the earliest. So he decides to just drive around. He visits the place he was born and the university and fraternity he was part of, but you can see that he doesn’t really know the significance of what he finds there yet. He communes with fellow travelers on the road, and with nature, and begins to come to terms with the death of his wife. He finally ends up in Denver and then has to deal with an entire family of in-laws he does not approve of his daughter marrying into. After so long with no involvement in his daughter’s life, there is really no way he can influence the situation at this late hour. Just as he was powerless to help the man who replaced him, powerless to save his wife’s life, powerless to influence his daughter, and powerless to come to grips with his own life, he finds in the end that he must at least accept these things.

There is beauty in this film. In the cinematography, sure. In the way it so accurately depicts the powerful details of reality, of life and of death as well. But also there is beauty in Schmidt himself. In watching Schmidt as he learns about Schmidt himself. This is possibly the best performance I have seen give jack Nicholson give, and it is masterful. Warren Schmidt is a fully realized human being and you can see his struggle, see his pain and sadness and you can see the undercurrent of anger that never really has the opportunity to surface properly, and you can see how you may end up at the end of your days as you see your humanity reflected in Schmidt.

I think that’s all I have to say about Schmidt.

DVDs on Sale now!

Okay, so … I haven’t been buying DVDs lately, what with the having no source of income. When I had a job, I spent probably an average of $300/month at Zia on DVDs and a few CDs. I haven’t (until today) even really set foot in Zia in probably a month, and haven’t spent money there in two. So when I went there today and there was a huge “ALL DVDs ON SALE!” sign in the front door, and almost all DVDs were marked down $2 (including used DVDs, meaning some are as cheap as $6.99!!!), and the DVD section has expanded to fill a fourth seven foot high four foot wide shelving unit, I naturally assumed that it was because I hadn’t been shopping there enough.

I had been planning on getting together a batch of old CDs I never listen to and taking them down to Zia for store credit (or cash, if they accept enough of them), but I haven’t yet put anything together. I felt it was a safe enough gamble to not put the couple of DVDs I want the most on hold while I come home to see about getting CDs together, and I hope they’re there when I get back later. I also hope that Zia is doing well enough to buy my CDs.

I’m feeling pretty good today. In addition to the “Little things” I mentioned last night, there are some other things I won’t go into today, but will go into later, when it is more safe to talk publicly. Still, good things. We’ll see how they work out in the next few days. I’ll let you know if I get the DVDs I want, and what they are, later.

Top 15 search terms right now

The following are the top 15 terms typed into search engines that resulted in people clicking through to something, somewhere on Modern Evil. They also happen to be the only ones that were typed in exactly the same more than once. My tracking software only pays attention to the last day or two’s worth of searches, but here we go:

Little things

I’ve spent the last 45 minutes ironing handkerchiefs.

On and off all day today I’ve been working on trying to clean up my front rooms, and get my laundry properly done. In trying to clear off the table in my front room I kept coming across old stacks of pages I’d written or sketches I made and pausing to read or try to decide what exactly to do with what I’d found. I posted a couple of the things I found earlier today on Modern Evil.

I also addressed the mound of clean laundry that has existed perpetually on the other side of my bed for a while now. As I cleaned the laundry that was dirty and sorted through and folded the laundry from the mound, I discovered that the lowest layer of clean clothes was my work clothes. Which means I haven’t actually put away my laundry in three months. I’d just clean it and dump it straight from the dryer onto my bed, and dig through the pile when I needed to get dressed. I had noticed some time ago that the mound had stopped growing, probably right around the time every article of clothing I own was already in the pile, but I didn’t do anything about it. Until today. Today I sorted and folded all my laundry and seperated out all the work clothes that need ironing, and today I included my cotton handkerchiefs in that set.

I’ve been out of work for three full months now. I’m literally running out of money. All my credit lines are tapped as far as I know how to tap them. Next week after Apple announces whatever it announces and its stock goes up a dollar or two for a day or two I’m going to sell the 37 shares I own at around a 50% loss from my original investment, but for a few more dollars than I would get if I sold it last week or today. That’s just a couple hundred dollars, but maybe between that and Unemployment I’ll make it through another month, right up until the moment I have to pay rent again. That’s it. My 401k is cashed out. My credit lines are tapped. My spare electronics have been sold on eBay. I never had any real savings. I have been applying for jobs left and right without much in the way of responses, mostly because everyone is looking for years of experience I don’t have, and no one is hiring in the field I do have experience in. For the first time I can remember, my cupboards are beginning to empty and I can’t refill them, and seeing the places I know food should be is like my sadness exteriorized.

For New Years Eve I was whisked away by Zoe, and for about 36 hours with him and his wife (and a few others at times) had a good time. And ate and drank and ate and ate and ate. Too much. (You’ve seen those ads for losing 5lbs in 48 hours? I gained 5lbs in 36hrs. I weighed 225 again when I got home Wednesday night.) And I can’t thank Zoe enough. He wouldn’t let me pay for any of it, the saint. For me, when I moved out on my own and found myself with money that was my own, the reassurance that I was successful was that I could afford to buy name brand food and was never short of food I liked to eat. Over time, as people who have shopped with me or seen the insides of my cupboards know, I got into the habit of practically stockpiling certain foods. When I lost my job I had close to 20 boxes of cereal, over 5lbs of peanut butter, a dozen cans of canned fish, pounds and pounds of crackers, dozens of cans of vegetables, my freezer stuffed with frozen dinners, and 4+lbs of cheese in my refrigerator, and on and on, not because I knew I would be losing my job, but because having a refrigerator, freezer, and cupboards full of food is comforting to me. I didn’t eat constantly, but having the food available feels good. Or it did, until it started to dwindle. I’m not out of food yet, but there are gaps, and they’re growing. I know I’m trying to lose weight, but I’m trying to stay healthy at the same time, and feel good generally. Food is very emotional for me, and facing more food than I could eat for New Year’s Eve lunch and dinner and then breakfast lunch and dinner the next day, I ate more than I could. Thank you, Zoe.

It’s little things. Eating without thinking about when I’ll be out of food. Clear horizontal surfaces and clean floors. Crisp, clean, creased handkerchiefs in my closet. Soon, a closet full of clean, crisp, ironed shirts sorted in rainbow order. Fresh, clean sheets on my bed and no mound of laundry waiting to be done, taking up half the bed. Plenty of posts on my website. Paintings hung instead of stacked or leaning against the wall, on the floor. A clear counter with dishes and appliances put away. Holding someone’s hand for the first time. Not big things, because there aren’t many big things left to be happy about. Not things that will last, or things that will make a difference in the long run, or things that will change the world. Still, things that are worth the time and effort and thought and sometimes struggles that go into reaching them. Little things.

I’ve spent 45 minutes ironing handkerchiefs tonight, and I’m glad I did.