There’s something delicious about this movie. It’s so tasty and satisfying I want to go see it again.
[ AMC 1000 Van Ness, Friday night, 11:45pm, w/ JB]
Run down Lake Street
After work, got home and futzed around for an hour. finally got out the door at 6:45 or so. The Asics hurt my arches whenever I went uphill. Went down Lake to 30th; did a loop there towards El Camino del Mar, but only for 1 block. Then back to Lake @ 28th, and back home.
A family of Asian kids and a dad on their bikes, riding on the sidewalk on Friday evening, between 20th and Park Presidio.
Showered, then went out dinner (CPK) and movie (Collateral) with JB.
roughly 3 miles.
Ambulance Ltd
Went with PL to see Ambulance Ltd at Great American Music Hall on Thursday night.
We were supposed to have a softball game that night. It got cancelled. was at dinner with PL on Wednesday (Kabuto) and he suggested going to see this band.
It was cool because I had just bought their CD at Virgin the week before.
Great show. 4 beers, fries. tons of cute kids, but they were all 12 years old. Or looked like it. And lots of girls with long noses, for some reason.
Ambulance was on first. Great set–but straight from the album–which I didn’t know so well yet, so that was okay. I got the sense that they were really modest, and into the music. I liked that. The lead singer was cool. They all definitely had indie rock hair, though. The last song of the set is the first one of their album–“Yoga Means Union”–all instrumental. And it kicked ass.
Elefant was the other headliner. Great band–lots of sound, and only 2 guitars and drums. The sound is Brit-pop, and the lyrics–unexpectedly romantic. The vocalist is sincere and his Argentinian roots show through–unfortunately, they came of as slightly histrionic. Or maybe they’d just be romantic and gushing if I weren’t so ironic and angsty.
My new glasses
Hard Rain
Ooooh Man.
Just got Hard Rain by Barry Eisler, from Amazon yesterday. Started it on the commute this morning…. man, just a couple chapters in and I can’t pull myself away when I sit down at my desk…
It’s really good to pull up a chair and spend some time with a hitman. Eisler’s John Rain is a lot of fun to follow around. I wouldn’t want him following me, though.
Eisler’s 3rd book in the series came out today, in hardback. I might have to break my no-hardbacks-for-fiction rule.
If you haven’t started reading Eisler, you’re in for a treat.
update: so, i came home from work and instead of going for a run, climbed onto the couch and finished the book. How was it? Oh, I don’t know–books like that are like ice cream cones on a hot summer day. You like em up before they melt, and you’re still hot, but you feel great. Maybe a little sleepy.
Four Star’s Asian Film Festival
I was at the 4 Star on Monday night, and they have fliers out for their 8th Annual Asian film festival. So exciting.
Well, I know what I’m doing in August….
I’ll update this entry later with a list of films I’m interested in seeing…
Shinya Tsukamoto
Ok, so I’ve watched 2 Shinya Tsukamoto movies in the last couple days. They are both amazing.
Bullet Ballet. I loved this movie. Loved it. So tense, violent, brutal. And so emotionally real. The main character comes home to his apartment to find that his girlfriend of ten years has killed herself–with a gun. Guns are uncommon in Japan–and he starts to obsess about where she got the gun, and then decides to get one himself. Chaos ensues.
I’m a big fan of movies where ordinary people lose it, and this film delivers for me in a big way.
The actress Mano Kirina plays a punkish girl gangster; her looks and fierceness absolutely glow in the black and white world that Tsukamoto paints with his camera.
A Snake of June( Midnight Eye review) is, you could safely say, an erotic movie. But it’s not pornographic, and it’s not sexist.
A conservative woman lives with her cleaning-obsessed husband. They have a companionable, but not intimate relationship. One day she receives a package of photos in the mail. They are photos of herself, masturbating. The photographer blackmails her into doing in public what she’s heretofore only done privately.
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Both films are shot in black and white (A Snake of June in a kind of blue tinted monochrome), and they have a distinct editing and visual style. Tsukamoto is the screenwriter, D.P., producer, dirtor and actor in these movies. So it’s fair to judge that these movies bear his indelible style.
I watched both of these on DVD. Both were Chinese DVDs, and Bullet Ballet had English subtitles.
One more thing. Tsukamoto’s musical collaborator, Chu Ishikawa, does a brilliant job with the score in both movies. The soundtrack is a real pleasure.
Skateboard
I bought a skateboard at Skates on Haight this afternoon. Fun!
The American Astronaut
There’s nothing better than being surprised by a movie.
So I’m going to tell you to stop reading here, and if you ever run across a movie called “The American Astronaut” to go watch it.
I saw this this afternoon at the Red Vic Theater on Haight Street. I came out of Zona Rosa full of burrito, and the movie caught my eye.
I was early, so I kept walking and I wound up going into CityOptix. What a nice store. Really attractive painting and cases. And lots of cool frames. On impulse I bought a new pair of glasses. The woman who helped me was really good–when I shop for frames, I’m really looking for an opinion–no, a first impression–of each frame I put on.
This is funny because I also just spent a lot of money on a pair of frames in June when I was in New York. I like both of these frames–they have more personality then what I’ve worn in the past. A little edge, I think.
On the other hand, my eyeglass expenses are getting out of hand. I don’t think I get to buy new glasses in 2006. (I usually buy new ones every couple years.)
Anyway, I tried the frames–went to the movie, bought a cookie, laughed a lot, and came back to CityOptix afterwards to plunk down my credit card.
Fun afternoon.
Love Battlefield
So, I thought I was going to see a goofy Hong Kong comedy, but it turned out to be a pretty good melodrama. More of a melo-drama/thriller.
official website:Love BattleField
so, it’s a B-movie melodrama, but it’s got great characterization. A couple moments at the beginning that manage to capture the essence of a relationship–the quiet moments, the fights. And then the chaos begins.
Some decent acting–not too over the top, and a great set of gangsters.
update: One line that’s stayed with me–over a week later: “You have it too easy… you don’t value life.”