Watching: Inside Llewyn Davis (2013).
I wanted to like this but I'm afraid it's very much a dude flick. Specifically, twentysomething white dudes who still believe that you should be able to make a living at the purest, most personal form of your art, and that you should be forgiven for being an absolute jackass to everyone around you because you're a suffering artist, damn it. It's one of the most self-absorbed films I've ever seen. And the dialogue is stilted and it's not funny, no matter what the reviews say.
Worst of all, he's not that good. I wouldn't sign him, either. Movie people, if you're going to base the character's worth on how brilliant he or she is at something, make sure the on-screen execution is actually brilliant.
I'm not a twentysomething dude so I think I must be the wrong audience.
If I were to try to make a living at one of my hobbies, it would be with the understanding that whatever I produced would be what I thought the artistic world needed commercially, not necessarily the way I'd like to see it done in my perfect world. Because, like it or not, making a living means you have to appeal to a certain number of people, and the more personal you make something, the statistically less likely that is to happen. I assume this is the way most (musicians, in this case) work: You play what strikes a balance between artistic integrity and marketability to the public, and you probably still play the weird stuff at home even though you realize it's only going to appeal to you and a few other people.
There is nobody in this film to like. Even if a character isn't technically likeable, it would be nice if he or she had some kind of underlying integrity that made him or her worth rooting for. Instead, we get an entire cast of characters who don't take responsibility for themselves. And somebody doesn't like women: The female characters are two shrews and a bunch of caricatures. And then it mocks the only authentic folk musician character in the entire movie.
I kept waiting for the Easy Rider "We got it wrong" moment, which would have rescued the film, but it didn't seem to happen and I think they might actually be serious.
One more down. Two more to go in this batch.
It's cuter in real life. Bright blue.
I also finally got around to painting the picture frame for the sarcastic deer photo that my friend gave me a billion years ago. I couldn't find a commercial frame I liked and decided it just had to be blue and teal ombré, I guess because of the vignette effect and overall orange-ness of the photo itself. But you can't just go out and buy a frame like that so I bought a blank, a couple of bottles of craft paint, and some clear medium for blending.
I am no designer but I think I was right about this one:
I try to avoid garage sales because, mostly, they don't have anything I need, but not needing stuff has never stopped me, so it's better if I just don't go.
I caved a little bit, though, because I thought I saw something I could actually use. It wasn't what I had hoped it was, but I did rescue an old Hagen-Renaker Monrovia mama cocker. I have one of these but you can't leave an HR at a garage sale. You just can't.
Her name is Tulip.
. . . and an out-of-print Past Patterns 203 Fancy Promenade Suit. It came with a 1996-1997 catalog, but I think this is one of their early ones.
Printed in blue on huge (yellowing with age) paper, and you can see the lines where the layout was done by hand-cutting and pasting:
The 1890s are not my decade but it seems to be complete and I couldn't leave it there. If I don't use it, I can at least find it a home with a costumer. Gonna need some hardcore corsetry if I ever want to wear it, though.
I wanted to like this but I'm afraid it's very much a dude flick. Specifically, twentysomething white dudes who still believe that you should be able to make a living at the purest, most personal form of your art, and that you should be forgiven for being an absolute jackass to everyone around you because you're a suffering artist, damn it. It's one of the most self-absorbed films I've ever seen. And the dialogue is stilted and it's not funny, no matter what the reviews say.
Worst of all, he's not that good. I wouldn't sign him, either. Movie people, if you're going to base the character's worth on how brilliant he or she is at something, make sure the on-screen execution is actually brilliant.
I'm not a twentysomething dude so I think I must be the wrong audience.
If I were to try to make a living at one of my hobbies, it would be with the understanding that whatever I produced would be what I thought the artistic world needed commercially, not necessarily the way I'd like to see it done in my perfect world. Because, like it or not, making a living means you have to appeal to a certain number of people, and the more personal you make something, the statistically less likely that is to happen. I assume this is the way most (musicians, in this case) work: You play what strikes a balance between artistic integrity and marketability to the public, and you probably still play the weird stuff at home even though you realize it's only going to appeal to you and a few other people.
There is nobody in this film to like. Even if a character isn't technically likeable, it would be nice if he or she had some kind of underlying integrity that made him or her worth rooting for. Instead, we get an entire cast of characters who don't take responsibility for themselves. And somebody doesn't like women: The female characters are two shrews and a bunch of caricatures. And then it mocks the only authentic folk musician character in the entire movie.
I kept waiting for the Easy Rider "We got it wrong" moment, which would have rescued the film, but it didn't seem to happen and I think they might actually be serious.
One more down. Two more to go in this batch.
It's cuter in real life. Bright blue.
I also finally got around to painting the picture frame for the sarcastic deer photo that my friend gave me a billion years ago. I couldn't find a commercial frame I liked and decided it just had to be blue and teal ombré, I guess because of the vignette effect and overall orange-ness of the photo itself. But you can't just go out and buy a frame like that so I bought a blank, a couple of bottles of craft paint, and some clear medium for blending.
I am no designer but I think I was right about this one:
I try to avoid garage sales because, mostly, they don't have anything I need, but not needing stuff has never stopped me, so it's better if I just don't go.
I caved a little bit, though, because I thought I saw something I could actually use. It wasn't what I had hoped it was, but I did rescue an old Hagen-Renaker Monrovia mama cocker. I have one of these but you can't leave an HR at a garage sale. You just can't.
Her name is Tulip.
. . . and an out-of-print Past Patterns 203 Fancy Promenade Suit. It came with a 1996-1997 catalog, but I think this is one of their early ones.
Printed in blue on huge (yellowing with age) paper, and you can see the lines where the layout was done by hand-cutting and pasting:
The 1890s are not my decade but it seems to be complete and I couldn't leave it there. If I don't use it, I can at least find it a home with a costumer. Gonna need some hardcore corsetry if I ever want to wear it, though.
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