When everyone's heading out to Memorial Day barbecues, where else would I go but to a matinee at the Bijou?
It was steamy and the rain had let up for a bit, but I'd have walked through a downpour for a good documentary and "Citizen Jane: Battle for the City" was definitely that.
Based on how many multiple pleasure points it hit - cultural history, architecture, civic activism, feminism, urban life - I concluded that I was just the nerdy demographic for a film about a woman journalist taking on a big league NYC developer to stop him from destroying neighborhoods circa 1950s to '60s.
You go, girl.
Embracing the deeply flawed mid-century goal of urban renewal (aka "Negro removal," the film reminds us), big bad developer Robert Moses has no compunction about extending a road through a park, running a highway through lower Manhattan (a move that would have wiped out entire swaths of SoHo) and replacing tenements with massive housing projects.
Naturally, it took a woman to point out that a city is not made up of shiny new buildings and easy access for cars, but made up of people, people living their lives on the sidewalks and streets of that city. Social engagement nearly 24/7.
And when you take away stoop culture, the neighborhood becomes more unsafe because fewer children on the street mean fewer adults looking out for them. Fewer shops and restaurants interspersed between houses mean fewer people out at night and history has proven that strangers and bad guys show up when few people are around.
Jane also noted that cities are like a social ecosystem that corrects itself when something is out of whack and when you stack people on top of each other, it messes with the ecosystem.
The documentary used lots of wonderful old film footage to show the bustling sidewalk scenes of life in NYC during the 20th century. In one memorable scene, a woman who lives in Little Italy and is at a protest against the Manhattan Expressway expresses frustration about people being made to move so anonymous hi-rise housing projects can be built.
Her complaint? Without cafes scattered along the streetscape, it won't be safe for women to walk around at night. She says she feels perfectly safe walking around the neighborhood, even at 2 a.m., because she knows that all the men are in cafes looking out for them when they go out at night.
Besides the flagrant sexism of men sitting in cafes every night while all their womenfolk can do is walk over to a girlfriend's house, that's a pretty fascinating slice of immigrant life at mid century.
Moses tried to shake off Jane and her band of concerned citizens (so you have to kick some people out of their homes, it's all in the name of progress, rah, rah) but organized protest prevailed and today Soho stands and there's no highway through lower Manhattan.
The film even connected the dots on significant female treatises of the period, linking up Jane's landmark book "The Death and Life of Great American Cities" with Betty Friedan's "The Feminine Mystique" and Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring," all published between 1961 and 1963.
Even so, Jane was mockingly referred to as a housewife by the press despite years of journalistic experience writing for Architecture Forum and Vogue. Twice as hard, backwards and in high heels, that's a woman's lot.
Walking out of the Bijou at 3:30 on a muggy afternoon, I looked around for some of that teeming social ecosystem that populates city streets, but hardly anyone was out and about. Oh, right, it's Sunday, the bland filling of the Memorial Day sandwich.
Looks like everyone else got invited to a cookout.
Showing posts with label bijou film center. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bijou film center. Show all posts
Sunday, May 28, 2017
Sunday, April 9, 2017
Death is Like Chesterfield County
What begins with doughnuts and slapstick and ends with wine glass holder necklaces?
Another day in the life, of course.
Although I'm constitutionally opposed to events that begin at 10:30 a.m., I made an exception for James River Film Festival's Slapstick and Donuts program, not because I'm a huge fan of slapstick (I'm not especially) or because I thought they'd have my favorite chocolate-frosted cake doughnuts (they didn't) but because special guest filmmaker Guy Maddin was going to be there.
Other plans were going to prevent me from seeing any of his films the rest of the day, so it was my only chance to hear what brilliance might trip off his Canadian lips and that's what had me walking to the Bijou first thing in the morning.
Krispy Kreme doughnuts were laid out along with coffee, so I snagged a chocolate frosted one (though I've never understood why KK puts chocolate frosting on an already-glazed doughnut) and found a seat near a woman with a cup of coffee. when I challenged her on not having a doughnut (she'd already scarfed one) she challenged me back on not having any caffeine. Fair enough.
It was while a Laurel and Hardy short with a very young Jean Harlow (in which a baby chick was pulled out of a man's beard) and a Buster Keaton film were shown on 16 mm with the reassuring purring of the film projector the only sound that I realized that almost all of the belly laughs I was hearing around me were coming from men.
When I'm watching Buster Keaton balancing a ladder across a fence with cops on both ends trying to get to him and he's balancing precariously near the center, all I can think of is him cracking his head open when he falls while guys nearby laughed uproariously.
Then Maddin was introduced.
Laughing about Richmond, he joked, "If you don't get 'em with tobacco, you get 'em with Krispy Kreme," but he also raved about watching film on 16 mm and the accompanying clatter of a film projector. Reminding us how fragile nitrate film was and how it could cause projector fires, he commented that it would be nice to arrange an outdoor screening of a nitrate film where the projector could safely burst into flames.
It goes without saying I'd attend that.
We finished with Charlie Chaplin's "Easy Street," which I'd seen before, and I strolled home before noon, something that doesn't happen too often. After a few hours spent listening to my most recent used record acquisitions - Teddy Pendergrass, Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes, the Chi-Lites - I got ready for my couple date.
Flora, in the former Balliceaux space, welcomed us with a booth near the front and a stream of familiar faces - my favorite server from 821 Cafe who'd jumped ship to work here, a longtime Balliceaux server who runs the show and one of the owners thrilled to not be cooking southern - that had me jumping up and out of the booth repeatedly.
The changes to the decor were subtle yet made a statement that this was no longer Balliceaux. The porthole windows stayed (as well they should for the complete uniqueness) but the windows over the steps no longer open (a feature associated too much with Balliceaux). Bright pinks and greens, a peeling door covered with bright pots of succulents and textured walls contributed to a welcoming interior that hinted at Mexico without being cliched.
Conversation, as usual, swung wildly, with Pru getting major laughs for her matter of fact, "You know what's underrated? Chervil!" sending us off on a discussion of sorrel and other less common greens. Beau was also responsible for a bit of gum-flapping just to hear himself be corny, but we mostly ignored what Pru called his "murder of prose." Good times.
With a Spanish Rose that was tailor-made for the food's Oaxacan flavor profile, we dove into queso fundido with Chorizo, crunchy sticks of jicama with chili, lime and salt (and the ideal counterpoint to the queso's obscene creamy richness) and not one but two plates of what I will just go ahead and dub the most sensational and complex guacamole in Richmond, enhanced as it was by queso cotija and ancho.
Not content to be full when we could be stuffed, we moved on to pork shoulder tacos, tamale in banana leaf with mole negro and my choice, grilled shark tacos with a killer chipotle mayonnaise, cabbage, radish slices and a flurry of scallions. Every dish was solidly on point, although our final course of chocolate soup with marshmallows was a lighter milk chocolate than would've been my preference, not that I didn't finish it anyway.
We walked out agreeing that Flora should be part of our date rotation going forward. I say me having a date more often would be an even better plan, but some things are seemingly more difficult to achieve than well-executed Oaxacan food in the former capital of the Confederacy. Go figure.
Sitting chatting before we went to the theater, Beau mentioned Alanis Morrissette's song "Thank You" and specifically the line, "How about them transparent angling carrots?" and how he thought it referred to those crystal pendants people wear.
Funny, but I had to admit that I'd always thought the line was, "How about them transparent dangling carrots?" as a metaphor for always reaching for what you'll never attain. Invoking the power of his phone, we learned I was right. Don't mess with me and lyrics, I know my dangling parts.
Quill Theater was performing "The Heir Apparent" at VMFA, where we took seats in the fourth row and began scanning the Saturday night crowd. Beau got busy trying to adjust his new hearing aid so that it would pick up salient points but tune out Pru and I kvetching.
Our back and forth about his selective hearing got the attention of the couple behind us and the wife explained that it had taken much cajoling to get her husband to be tested and get an aid himself. "It's a man thing," she explained with the wisdom of a well-dressed 75-year old woman who's done it all.
Talk centered on how it's mainly certain shrill female frequencies that both men can't hear and Beau admitted that on occasion he turns his hearing aid down so he doesn't have to hear or respond. Immediately, the husband piped up, saying, "That's a secret you should not have given away!" He also admitted to Pru and me that he loved talking to pretty women and did so with gusto.
The play was fun and funny, an adaptation of a 17th century French play spoken in pentameter, so a pleasure to listen to, and nicely interspersed with references to the present day with comments like, "Of course, if we had national health insurance..."
Even better were local references. When a character asked what dying was like, another quipped, "Chesterfield County!" Amen, brothers and sisters, we can all get behind this one.
Like a Shakespearean comedy, we had masks and lovers, wills and death, plotting and scheming and a cast up to the verse, my favorite being Adam Valentine who made the Crispin character the one to watch at all times.
Post-show discussion went down at the Rogue Gentlemen for cocktails, mine embarrassingly dubbed a "wine glass holder necklace" but made delicious with dry Rose, Cochaca, Pimms, lime, pineapple and mint simple syrup and served in an hourglass-shaped orange-colored tumbler, easily the grooviest glass on the bar despite stiff competition.
As for the music, Whitney Houston first caught my ear, followed by the Carpenters (a favorite of both Beau and mine), which caused Pru to joke, "Omygod, everyone gets a sandwich!" which left the rest of us in stitches.
Mars and Venus used well-crafted cocktails as a means of discussing differences, but that chasm may never be closed. Trying to explain some sophomoric male humor while sipping our cocktails, Beau announced, "I'm 13 in all the right ways!" to which Pru responded, "There are no right ways."
How about them transparent dangling carrots?
Another day in the life, of course.
Although I'm constitutionally opposed to events that begin at 10:30 a.m., I made an exception for James River Film Festival's Slapstick and Donuts program, not because I'm a huge fan of slapstick (I'm not especially) or because I thought they'd have my favorite chocolate-frosted cake doughnuts (they didn't) but because special guest filmmaker Guy Maddin was going to be there.
Other plans were going to prevent me from seeing any of his films the rest of the day, so it was my only chance to hear what brilliance might trip off his Canadian lips and that's what had me walking to the Bijou first thing in the morning.
Krispy Kreme doughnuts were laid out along with coffee, so I snagged a chocolate frosted one (though I've never understood why KK puts chocolate frosting on an already-glazed doughnut) and found a seat near a woman with a cup of coffee. when I challenged her on not having a doughnut (she'd already scarfed one) she challenged me back on not having any caffeine. Fair enough.
It was while a Laurel and Hardy short with a very young Jean Harlow (in which a baby chick was pulled out of a man's beard) and a Buster Keaton film were shown on 16 mm with the reassuring purring of the film projector the only sound that I realized that almost all of the belly laughs I was hearing around me were coming from men.
When I'm watching Buster Keaton balancing a ladder across a fence with cops on both ends trying to get to him and he's balancing precariously near the center, all I can think of is him cracking his head open when he falls while guys nearby laughed uproariously.
Then Maddin was introduced.
Laughing about Richmond, he joked, "If you don't get 'em with tobacco, you get 'em with Krispy Kreme," but he also raved about watching film on 16 mm and the accompanying clatter of a film projector. Reminding us how fragile nitrate film was and how it could cause projector fires, he commented that it would be nice to arrange an outdoor screening of a nitrate film where the projector could safely burst into flames.
It goes without saying I'd attend that.
We finished with Charlie Chaplin's "Easy Street," which I'd seen before, and I strolled home before noon, something that doesn't happen too often. After a few hours spent listening to my most recent used record acquisitions - Teddy Pendergrass, Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes, the Chi-Lites - I got ready for my couple date.
Flora, in the former Balliceaux space, welcomed us with a booth near the front and a stream of familiar faces - my favorite server from 821 Cafe who'd jumped ship to work here, a longtime Balliceaux server who runs the show and one of the owners thrilled to not be cooking southern - that had me jumping up and out of the booth repeatedly.
The changes to the decor were subtle yet made a statement that this was no longer Balliceaux. The porthole windows stayed (as well they should for the complete uniqueness) but the windows over the steps no longer open (a feature associated too much with Balliceaux). Bright pinks and greens, a peeling door covered with bright pots of succulents and textured walls contributed to a welcoming interior that hinted at Mexico without being cliched.
Conversation, as usual, swung wildly, with Pru getting major laughs for her matter of fact, "You know what's underrated? Chervil!" sending us off on a discussion of sorrel and other less common greens. Beau was also responsible for a bit of gum-flapping just to hear himself be corny, but we mostly ignored what Pru called his "murder of prose." Good times.
With a Spanish Rose that was tailor-made for the food's Oaxacan flavor profile, we dove into queso fundido with Chorizo, crunchy sticks of jicama with chili, lime and salt (and the ideal counterpoint to the queso's obscene creamy richness) and not one but two plates of what I will just go ahead and dub the most sensational and complex guacamole in Richmond, enhanced as it was by queso cotija and ancho.
Not content to be full when we could be stuffed, we moved on to pork shoulder tacos, tamale in banana leaf with mole negro and my choice, grilled shark tacos with a killer chipotle mayonnaise, cabbage, radish slices and a flurry of scallions. Every dish was solidly on point, although our final course of chocolate soup with marshmallows was a lighter milk chocolate than would've been my preference, not that I didn't finish it anyway.
We walked out agreeing that Flora should be part of our date rotation going forward. I say me having a date more often would be an even better plan, but some things are seemingly more difficult to achieve than well-executed Oaxacan food in the former capital of the Confederacy. Go figure.
Sitting chatting before we went to the theater, Beau mentioned Alanis Morrissette's song "Thank You" and specifically the line, "How about them transparent angling carrots?" and how he thought it referred to those crystal pendants people wear.
Funny, but I had to admit that I'd always thought the line was, "How about them transparent dangling carrots?" as a metaphor for always reaching for what you'll never attain. Invoking the power of his phone, we learned I was right. Don't mess with me and lyrics, I know my dangling parts.
Quill Theater was performing "The Heir Apparent" at VMFA, where we took seats in the fourth row and began scanning the Saturday night crowd. Beau got busy trying to adjust his new hearing aid so that it would pick up salient points but tune out Pru and I kvetching.
Our back and forth about his selective hearing got the attention of the couple behind us and the wife explained that it had taken much cajoling to get her husband to be tested and get an aid himself. "It's a man thing," she explained with the wisdom of a well-dressed 75-year old woman who's done it all.
Talk centered on how it's mainly certain shrill female frequencies that both men can't hear and Beau admitted that on occasion he turns his hearing aid down so he doesn't have to hear or respond. Immediately, the husband piped up, saying, "That's a secret you should not have given away!" He also admitted to Pru and me that he loved talking to pretty women and did so with gusto.
The play was fun and funny, an adaptation of a 17th century French play spoken in pentameter, so a pleasure to listen to, and nicely interspersed with references to the present day with comments like, "Of course, if we had national health insurance..."
Even better were local references. When a character asked what dying was like, another quipped, "Chesterfield County!" Amen, brothers and sisters, we can all get behind this one.
Like a Shakespearean comedy, we had masks and lovers, wills and death, plotting and scheming and a cast up to the verse, my favorite being Adam Valentine who made the Crispin character the one to watch at all times.
Post-show discussion went down at the Rogue Gentlemen for cocktails, mine embarrassingly dubbed a "wine glass holder necklace" but made delicious with dry Rose, Cochaca, Pimms, lime, pineapple and mint simple syrup and served in an hourglass-shaped orange-colored tumbler, easily the grooviest glass on the bar despite stiff competition.
As for the music, Whitney Houston first caught my ear, followed by the Carpenters (a favorite of both Beau and mine), which caused Pru to joke, "Omygod, everyone gets a sandwich!" which left the rest of us in stitches.
Mars and Venus used well-crafted cocktails as a means of discussing differences, but that chasm may never be closed. Trying to explain some sophomoric male humor while sipping our cocktails, Beau announced, "I'm 13 in all the right ways!" to which Pru responded, "There are no right ways."
How about them transparent dangling carrots?
Monday, April 3, 2017
Sophisticated and Fabulous
If 30 people show up for your birthday party 5 minutes after it starts, you are popular.
I did not show up to the party then, or even during the entire first hour, but I had the best possible excuse: addressing my gross cultural illiteracy. More to the point, I was at the Bijou seeing "Donnie Darko" for the first time in the company of a friend who was just as illiterate.
All I can say is, praise be to the Bijou for upping my movie game just about every single weekend. I owe them a debt of gratitude.
Admittedly, I'd known for years that the 2002 indie film was one I needed to watch and the fact that this was a 15th anniversary restoration only sweetened the pot. But what truly sealed the deal was a friend telling me that when he saw it at 14, it had reordered in his mind what his notion of a film could be.
With no more information than that, we showed up for the weekend's final screening with just minutes to spare. In a testament to the busy weekend the theater had had with the film, they were completely out of popcorn, so for the first time I saw a movie at the Bijou without chomping through a bag of it as I watched.
What struck me immediately was the 1988 setting for the movie, which I hadn't anticipated. From the opening notes of Echo and the Bunnymen's "Under the Killing Moon" through Tears for Fears' "Head Over Heels" to the Church's "Under the Milky Way" to Joy Division's "Love Will Tear Us Apart," I wondered about the choice of year.
Was the era a favorite of the director? Surely we weren't already experiencing '80s nostalgia in 2002 or were we?
You're bitching but you're not a bitch.
Just as distinctive was seeing both Donnie and his father engrossed in reading books, as if suggesting that waaaay back in '88, people still found time to read. References to voting for Dukakis seemed tailor-made to nail a specific time period, as were those high-waisted pants the girls were wearing. It all felt very nostalgic.
You're weird. That was a compliment.
The movie was dark, with an overriding sense of emptiness and more sci-fi elements than I could get my head around immediately. And, yes, that's a compliment because although we discussed it as we walked back to my apartment, we didn't come close to parsing most of it.
Later, I found a message from him with a link to an article about the more scientific elements of time travel so I could better understand what had transpired, although I'm still a bit shaky on that. I feel flattered that he had enough faith in me to think I could read it and comprehend something so very scientific. As if.
So while I was late, once I'd corrected my cultural gap I was free to head to my friend's birthday party at Lulu's - closed tonight for her event - which was pretty much in full swing when I walked in. Barely through the door, I was enthusiastically greeted by the friendliest cool cat musical couple I know, then spotted the party girl's main squeeze across the bar and went to say hello after not seeing him for months while he was snowboarding out West.
We were barely finished saying hello when I turned to see with whom he'd been sitting and there was one of my very favorite guitarists/conversationalists/people of all time, a decade-long friend I hadn't seen in a whole year (for good reason it turns out) and who made my night by being there.
Sometimes it pays to click "going" when you're invited to an event.
Still, it was nothing short of a thrill to settle down next to him at the bar and pick up where we'd left off a year ago.
At his suggestion, I first loaded up a plate of Tio Pablo's offerings (you don't have to tell me twice to eat) fashioning a couple of chicken, black bean and onion tacos with tomatillo sauce to follow chips and guacamole and leave me energized for as much conversation as I could get.
We were soon joined by a music-lover who loves to combine travel with booty calls (she highly recommends the practice to me) and swore up and down she will never marry again. I always wonder about the ones who protest the loudest.
She also shared how she'd gotten into her first Cheap Trick concert (hint: it involved servicing a roadie) and how she'd be seeing them again this summer (ticket in hand this time). When she brought up Robyn Hitchcock, it was a flashback since I hadn't thought of him in eons - I first heard him in the '80s with his band the Egyptians - although my friend said he'd never listened to his music.
Once she left us to our own devices, we wasted no time in talking about the effects of music - old (Pantera, Van Halen) and new (Hiatus Kaioyte, Dirty Projectors) - on us as well as the need for soulful connections, one of those things that affect quality of life for certain people. What's the point of being friends if everything stays on the surface?
Our bar stool real estate meant that we could stay put and dive down multiple conversational rabbit holes all night while the killer well-chosen soundtrack played loudly overhead and people - the birthday girl, the drummer/music fanatic, the DJs) came to us to chat. I only had to move to score some dessert.
Agreeing that a year between conversations is excessive, I cited the uncertainty of life as a better reason to get together more frequently. For proof, I told him about the Maryland friend who'd meet me monthly in D.C. or Fredericksburg, not just because we wanted to keep up with each other, but because life is too short not to spend time with people who make you laugh and really listen to what you say.
Then he moved to Key West and we don't get that pleasure anymore, so I'm all for gathering ye friendship rosebuds while ye may. Let's talk about what's on our minds, everything and nothing, while we can, shall we?
And in what could only be a sign from the universe, as soon as I got in the car, the first song I heard on the radio was Robyn Hitchcock's "I Want to Tell You About What I Want" from his new (and 21st) album.
You know me, I'll happily tell you about what I want. Just ask, then settle in for the answer and a whole lot of laughter.
I did not show up to the party then, or even during the entire first hour, but I had the best possible excuse: addressing my gross cultural illiteracy. More to the point, I was at the Bijou seeing "Donnie Darko" for the first time in the company of a friend who was just as illiterate.
All I can say is, praise be to the Bijou for upping my movie game just about every single weekend. I owe them a debt of gratitude.
Admittedly, I'd known for years that the 2002 indie film was one I needed to watch and the fact that this was a 15th anniversary restoration only sweetened the pot. But what truly sealed the deal was a friend telling me that when he saw it at 14, it had reordered in his mind what his notion of a film could be.
With no more information than that, we showed up for the weekend's final screening with just minutes to spare. In a testament to the busy weekend the theater had had with the film, they were completely out of popcorn, so for the first time I saw a movie at the Bijou without chomping through a bag of it as I watched.
What struck me immediately was the 1988 setting for the movie, which I hadn't anticipated. From the opening notes of Echo and the Bunnymen's "Under the Killing Moon" through Tears for Fears' "Head Over Heels" to the Church's "Under the Milky Way" to Joy Division's "Love Will Tear Us Apart," I wondered about the choice of year.
Was the era a favorite of the director? Surely we weren't already experiencing '80s nostalgia in 2002 or were we?
You're bitching but you're not a bitch.
Just as distinctive was seeing both Donnie and his father engrossed in reading books, as if suggesting that waaaay back in '88, people still found time to read. References to voting for Dukakis seemed tailor-made to nail a specific time period, as were those high-waisted pants the girls were wearing. It all felt very nostalgic.
You're weird. That was a compliment.
The movie was dark, with an overriding sense of emptiness and more sci-fi elements than I could get my head around immediately. And, yes, that's a compliment because although we discussed it as we walked back to my apartment, we didn't come close to parsing most of it.
Later, I found a message from him with a link to an article about the more scientific elements of time travel so I could better understand what had transpired, although I'm still a bit shaky on that. I feel flattered that he had enough faith in me to think I could read it and comprehend something so very scientific. As if.
So while I was late, once I'd corrected my cultural gap I was free to head to my friend's birthday party at Lulu's - closed tonight for her event - which was pretty much in full swing when I walked in. Barely through the door, I was enthusiastically greeted by the friendliest cool cat musical couple I know, then spotted the party girl's main squeeze across the bar and went to say hello after not seeing him for months while he was snowboarding out West.
We were barely finished saying hello when I turned to see with whom he'd been sitting and there was one of my very favorite guitarists/conversationalists/people of all time, a decade-long friend I hadn't seen in a whole year (for good reason it turns out) and who made my night by being there.
Sometimes it pays to click "going" when you're invited to an event.
Still, it was nothing short of a thrill to settle down next to him at the bar and pick up where we'd left off a year ago.
At his suggestion, I first loaded up a plate of Tio Pablo's offerings (you don't have to tell me twice to eat) fashioning a couple of chicken, black bean and onion tacos with tomatillo sauce to follow chips and guacamole and leave me energized for as much conversation as I could get.
We were soon joined by a music-lover who loves to combine travel with booty calls (she highly recommends the practice to me) and swore up and down she will never marry again. I always wonder about the ones who protest the loudest.
She also shared how she'd gotten into her first Cheap Trick concert (hint: it involved servicing a roadie) and how she'd be seeing them again this summer (ticket in hand this time). When she brought up Robyn Hitchcock, it was a flashback since I hadn't thought of him in eons - I first heard him in the '80s with his band the Egyptians - although my friend said he'd never listened to his music.
Once she left us to our own devices, we wasted no time in talking about the effects of music - old (Pantera, Van Halen) and new (Hiatus Kaioyte, Dirty Projectors) - on us as well as the need for soulful connections, one of those things that affect quality of life for certain people. What's the point of being friends if everything stays on the surface?
Our bar stool real estate meant that we could stay put and dive down multiple conversational rabbit holes all night while the killer well-chosen soundtrack played loudly overhead and people - the birthday girl, the drummer/music fanatic, the DJs) came to us to chat. I only had to move to score some dessert.
Agreeing that a year between conversations is excessive, I cited the uncertainty of life as a better reason to get together more frequently. For proof, I told him about the Maryland friend who'd meet me monthly in D.C. or Fredericksburg, not just because we wanted to keep up with each other, but because life is too short not to spend time with people who make you laugh and really listen to what you say.
Then he moved to Key West and we don't get that pleasure anymore, so I'm all for gathering ye friendship rosebuds while ye may. Let's talk about what's on our minds, everything and nothing, while we can, shall we?
And in what could only be a sign from the universe, as soon as I got in the car, the first song I heard on the radio was Robyn Hitchcock's "I Want to Tell You About What I Want" from his new (and 21st) album.
You know me, I'll happily tell you about what I want. Just ask, then settle in for the answer and a whole lot of laughter.
Sunday, March 26, 2017
Use Me Up
Life is a sunny Saturday with cake at the end.
My morning can be summed up as the epitome of soulful spring in Jackson Ward: a guy on Marshall Street washing a car with "Girl, I Wanna Shake You Down" blaring as I walked by. Another was driving down Clay Street with all his car windows down blasting Bill Withers' "Use Me Up." All my apartment windows open so I could share Donny Hathaway with the neighbors, too.
My afternoon took me to the Bijou, past a guy on Broad Street who inquired if he hadn't just seen me at Kroger, proving that some people pay far more attention to their fellow shoppers than I do.
The film that lured me inside on a gorgeous spring day was "Neruda," a biopic ostensibly about a communist poet going underground when communism was outlawed, but actually more of a poetic dream that allowed the director to take us on a journey through brothels and political meetings, orgies and snow-covered mountains as a driven policeman makes it his mission to find the poet.
To write well, one must know how to erase. ~ Neruda
Weird, but utterly entrancing and sometimes as enigmatic as poetry can be, it was a film that left the small crowd - including a musician there on what she called a "lady date" with a girlfriend - dazzled with the beauty of its cinematography and the sheer pleasure of watching the story of how a talented man indulged his every whim, with little regard for consequence but laser-focused desire on seeking out his own stimulation, whether physical, intellectual or emotional.
My evening began at Pru's manse on Church Hill with bubbly on the screened porch before dodging the green-clad masses of the Church Hill Irish Festival to make it down to the Slip and Bistro Bobette for a proper French birthday celebration meal in her honor.
Actually, feast might be a better word because of everything that landed on our table, was Hoovered up and whisked away by our young server, who quietly informed us that not only was it his first night there but we were his first table.
We promised to be gentle.
Out first were bowls of cream of asparagus soup, a cheese and charcuterie plate and ahi tuna tartare, followed by monkfish medallions, two kinds of beef including beef wellington for the birthday girl, and, for me a special of scallops with celery root galette with roasted garlic crema, all washed down with a Sancerre recommended by the barkeep who greeted us with hugs and the intel that a good friend of mine was downstairs at a private dinner.
When I felt a tap on my shoulder, I turned to find said friend looming over me, and soon chiding me for not responding to his recent email, one which I'd mistaken for a mass email (it wasn't, apparently). Still, it was wonderful to see him.
And while I heard two Grand Marnier souffles being ordered, I missed out entirely by heading to the loo, where I ran into friends along the way and chatted a bit too long, returning to see empty plates. It mattered not because we were heading back to the manse for dark chocolate cake with ganache (lovingly made by Beau), and far more my dessert speed anyway.
That the evening was so beautifully temperate ensured that we all set up camp on the candlelit porch again, this time for bubbles, birthday cake and present-opening, a highlight being the exquisite absinthe fountain Beau had bought for his beloved. As much artful as functional, the winged woman holding up the glass reservoir with four taps exuded feminine energy and was a thing of beauty at the same time.
In the interest of testing out the new apparatus - and the new wormwood leaf-shaped absinthe spoons - Beau filled it with ice water and we all set our taps to drip over the Granddaddy of absinthes, Vieux Pontalier, mine being the slowest by far because of how much I enjoy the lead-up to the arrival of the green fairy.
Once she'd arrived, conversation reached new levels. On the subject of a former boyfriend who'd told me he dreamt of eating my belly for dinner once I'd gone to the other side, Pru observed, "Other cities donate their bodies to science, but in Richmond, we donate ours to local chefs."
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
Beau took issue when we pointed out his tendency to titter, claiming he was actually guffawing (as if), finally agreeing that he perhaps did giggle a bit. Neither Pru not I saw that as preferable. "Neither a titterer nor a giggler be," he quipped.
Impossible, we discovered, when you find yourself at an eight-hour birthday soiree. To party well, one must know how to go where the green fairy takes you. Preferably, without tittering.
My morning can be summed up as the epitome of soulful spring in Jackson Ward: a guy on Marshall Street washing a car with "Girl, I Wanna Shake You Down" blaring as I walked by. Another was driving down Clay Street with all his car windows down blasting Bill Withers' "Use Me Up." All my apartment windows open so I could share Donny Hathaway with the neighbors, too.
My afternoon took me to the Bijou, past a guy on Broad Street who inquired if he hadn't just seen me at Kroger, proving that some people pay far more attention to their fellow shoppers than I do.
The film that lured me inside on a gorgeous spring day was "Neruda," a biopic ostensibly about a communist poet going underground when communism was outlawed, but actually more of a poetic dream that allowed the director to take us on a journey through brothels and political meetings, orgies and snow-covered mountains as a driven policeman makes it his mission to find the poet.
To write well, one must know how to erase. ~ Neruda
Weird, but utterly entrancing and sometimes as enigmatic as poetry can be, it was a film that left the small crowd - including a musician there on what she called a "lady date" with a girlfriend - dazzled with the beauty of its cinematography and the sheer pleasure of watching the story of how a talented man indulged his every whim, with little regard for consequence but laser-focused desire on seeking out his own stimulation, whether physical, intellectual or emotional.
My evening began at Pru's manse on Church Hill with bubbly on the screened porch before dodging the green-clad masses of the Church Hill Irish Festival to make it down to the Slip and Bistro Bobette for a proper French birthday celebration meal in her honor.
Actually, feast might be a better word because of everything that landed on our table, was Hoovered up and whisked away by our young server, who quietly informed us that not only was it his first night there but we were his first table.
We promised to be gentle.
Out first were bowls of cream of asparagus soup, a cheese and charcuterie plate and ahi tuna tartare, followed by monkfish medallions, two kinds of beef including beef wellington for the birthday girl, and, for me a special of scallops with celery root galette with roasted garlic crema, all washed down with a Sancerre recommended by the barkeep who greeted us with hugs and the intel that a good friend of mine was downstairs at a private dinner.
When I felt a tap on my shoulder, I turned to find said friend looming over me, and soon chiding me for not responding to his recent email, one which I'd mistaken for a mass email (it wasn't, apparently). Still, it was wonderful to see him.
And while I heard two Grand Marnier souffles being ordered, I missed out entirely by heading to the loo, where I ran into friends along the way and chatted a bit too long, returning to see empty plates. It mattered not because we were heading back to the manse for dark chocolate cake with ganache (lovingly made by Beau), and far more my dessert speed anyway.
That the evening was so beautifully temperate ensured that we all set up camp on the candlelit porch again, this time for bubbles, birthday cake and present-opening, a highlight being the exquisite absinthe fountain Beau had bought for his beloved. As much artful as functional, the winged woman holding up the glass reservoir with four taps exuded feminine energy and was a thing of beauty at the same time.
In the interest of testing out the new apparatus - and the new wormwood leaf-shaped absinthe spoons - Beau filled it with ice water and we all set our taps to drip over the Granddaddy of absinthes, Vieux Pontalier, mine being the slowest by far because of how much I enjoy the lead-up to the arrival of the green fairy.
Once she'd arrived, conversation reached new levels. On the subject of a former boyfriend who'd told me he dreamt of eating my belly for dinner once I'd gone to the other side, Pru observed, "Other cities donate their bodies to science, but in Richmond, we donate ours to local chefs."
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
Beau took issue when we pointed out his tendency to titter, claiming he was actually guffawing (as if), finally agreeing that he perhaps did giggle a bit. Neither Pru not I saw that as preferable. "Neither a titterer nor a giggler be," he quipped.
Impossible, we discovered, when you find yourself at an eight-hour birthday soiree. To party well, one must know how to go where the green fairy takes you. Preferably, without tittering.
Monday, March 6, 2017
Disco Siren Song
Granted, it's painful, but remember life before the Bijou?
Remember what a Sunday afternoon was like before we could count on going to see a Polish synth-pop horror musical about two bloodthirsty mermaid sisters working in a cabaret in 1980s Warsaw at the Bijou?
I sort of recall, but my sunshine, lollipops and rainbows ethos prefers to concentrate instead on how incredibly fortunate we are that three film geeks are curating a near-weekly rotation of films we'd never get to see in Richmond on the big screen otherwise.
This Sunday's was a genre-defying horror-musical mashup from a first-time Polish director who clearly has things to say and budding ways to say them that include garish colors, bodies being sawed in half and disco.
Bijou co-founder Shane referred to it as the "anti-La La Land" while James warned the crowd ahead of time that what we were about to see was the closest we were going to get to Hans Christian Anderson's story "The Little Mermaid" and that's an understatement in a world of sanitized pablum and Disney cutesiness.
Like so many fairy tales, this one is incredibly dark and the filmmaker doesn't shy away from that. Mermaids have beautiful voices for one reason only: to lure men into the sea so they can eat them Polish-style, which involves attacking their throats and eating their hearts.
The two mermaid sisters in this film enter the human world when some nightclub employees are partying on a beach and the sisters decide to go back to the club with them, where they become part of the act, stripping and singing and having water poured on their legs so they sprout scaled tails in front of stunned audiences.
Problems ensue when one sister falls for the cute bass player and decides to have legs sewn on her body to replace her tail so she can live out her life as a human woman. Naturally, the director shows the surgery, which is made utterly surreal by the mermaid singing throughout it all.
But, alas, the bass player falls for another woman and the poor brokenhearted ex-mermaid is reminded by her mermaid sister that she has to kill him or be turned into sea foam.
Mermaid or human, men are always gumming up the works.
And the Bijou always seems to be screening some noteworthy film that Richmond didn't know it needed to see until they saw it.
That we watched it with sirens screeching by repeatedly (Rappahannock was on fire a block away) but always at fitting moments (mid-surgery) only added to the surreal vibe in the theater and the post-film discussion in the lobby afterward.
Just another weird and wonderful afternoon at the anti-multiplex. Thanks, Bijou.
Remember what a Sunday afternoon was like before we could count on going to see a Polish synth-pop horror musical about two bloodthirsty mermaid sisters working in a cabaret in 1980s Warsaw at the Bijou?
I sort of recall, but my sunshine, lollipops and rainbows ethos prefers to concentrate instead on how incredibly fortunate we are that three film geeks are curating a near-weekly rotation of films we'd never get to see in Richmond on the big screen otherwise.
This Sunday's was a genre-defying horror-musical mashup from a first-time Polish director who clearly has things to say and budding ways to say them that include garish colors, bodies being sawed in half and disco.
Bijou co-founder Shane referred to it as the "anti-La La Land" while James warned the crowd ahead of time that what we were about to see was the closest we were going to get to Hans Christian Anderson's story "The Little Mermaid" and that's an understatement in a world of sanitized pablum and Disney cutesiness.
Like so many fairy tales, this one is incredibly dark and the filmmaker doesn't shy away from that. Mermaids have beautiful voices for one reason only: to lure men into the sea so they can eat them Polish-style, which involves attacking their throats and eating their hearts.
The two mermaid sisters in this film enter the human world when some nightclub employees are partying on a beach and the sisters decide to go back to the club with them, where they become part of the act, stripping and singing and having water poured on their legs so they sprout scaled tails in front of stunned audiences.
Problems ensue when one sister falls for the cute bass player and decides to have legs sewn on her body to replace her tail so she can live out her life as a human woman. Naturally, the director shows the surgery, which is made utterly surreal by the mermaid singing throughout it all.
But, alas, the bass player falls for another woman and the poor brokenhearted ex-mermaid is reminded by her mermaid sister that she has to kill him or be turned into sea foam.
Mermaid or human, men are always gumming up the works.
And the Bijou always seems to be screening some noteworthy film that Richmond didn't know it needed to see until they saw it.
That we watched it with sirens screeching by repeatedly (Rappahannock was on fire a block away) but always at fitting moments (mid-surgery) only added to the surreal vibe in the theater and the post-film discussion in the lobby afterward.
Just another weird and wonderful afternoon at the anti-multiplex. Thanks, Bijou.
Monday, January 30, 2017
To Happiness, Poetry and Success
Today we were celebrating what a long, strange and wonderful trip it's been with my Dad at the helm of the family armada.
Unfortunately for me, this involved getting up at an ungodly 8:30 to do so. On the plus side, The XX's "Co-exist" and the National's "Boxer" provided stellar soundtracks for the gray drive on mostly empty roads.
Google maps provided an unexpected new route to the Inn at Montross on the Northern Neck for a celebratory brunch for my Dad's 85th birthday, a free-wheeling meal that involved four of my five sisters, practically non-stop laughter, my first introduction to a nephew's new girlfriend (her master's is in cyber-security), a spirited point/counterpoint about Lady Gaga and endless waffles, although no consensus was reached on what is taboo in waffles (I say we start with Reese's Pieces and move on to chocolate chips...blech, in waffles?).
A family feud broke out when the subject of coconut was broached - turns out Mounds lovers were seated right next to those who liken coconut to cat hair in your throat - and I was shocked to learn that not everyone is the fan of Girl Scout Samoa cookies that I am.
And yet, we spring from the same loins.
A vote was called to determine which faction had the majority and although coconut lovers won the popular vote, someone pointed out that everyone with their hand up was, shall we say, middle-aged or older? Only one millennial professed a passion for coconut, making him the outlier among his people.
My Dad made his usual sunny remarks on the occasion, saying, "Who would have thought I'd be lucky enough to have all this," his hand gesturing at the long table, "And live so long, too?" Corny, but sincere and no doubt partially fueled by a couple of cranberry champagne cocktails.
A family member is leaving this week for the Everglades to fish for peacock bass, a colorful, showy species (because, of course, someone has to pull up a photo) with no eating value whatsoever. A debate on sport fishing ensues, although I take no part.
After the last crumb was polished off, we posed for endless pictures in various combinations, not because any of us are particularly photogenic, but because it's what we do when we get together. When one sister opted out, I reminded her that we'll never look younger than we do today. She is unmoved.
Along the way home, it was challenging trying to avert my eyes from the abundance of road kill: a hound (broke my heart), a deer, a couple of possums and perhaps unlikeliest of all, a chicken, feathers ruffling as cars drove by.
I was home just long enough to answer emails before getting in a little bit of walking by heading over to the Bijou for the fourth and final film in their Facing Fascism film festival, Louis Malle's "Lacombe, Lucien" from 1974.
Like 1969's "Z" which I'd just seen, one of the standard film credits back then was "Script girl," who in all likelihood was also coffee girl and whatever else menial job needed to be done girl.
We've come a long way, baby, and somehow it all seems to be on the chopping block again. How the hell did we allow this to happen? But I digress (again).
I'm happy to report that we barely got three minutes into the film before seeing the requisite biking scene that every French film must have. What was refreshing was that it was a handsome young man pedaling, one who resembled an '80s teen movie hero: all thick, dark, curly hair, sullen attitude, pouty lips and sunglasses.
Louis Malle as John Hughes influence?
The film showed the seductive side of fascism for a simple young man living in the countryside toward the end of WW II in German-occupied France. Turned down for being too young when he volunteers for the Resistance, he winds up working for the Gestapo, a major problem once he falls in love with a Jewish girl.
Like the good arthouse film that it originally was, it's a story about how ordinary people carry on under frightful circumstances with an anti-hero the other characters (and the audience) can't quite condone but don't fully hate, either.
Despite an inscription on a photo to Lucien, "Best wishes for happiness, poetry and success," things didn't work out quite that well for him.
Sitting in the row behind me was a woman who moved to Richmond from NOVA with her husband and is totally loving life here, but had yet to find a vibrant film scene. Needless to say, she was thrilled to discover the Bijou.
Doing our post-film discussion in the lobby, fascism talk naturally turned to the latest national embarrassment, Trump's refugee ban - so much for Washington's declaration that "the bosom of America is open" - and how so many people are still trying to pretend like everything's okay.
When someone I consider well-informed recently told me, "I'm not worried. He hasn't done anything horrible yet," I am gobsmacked.
"It's ostrich syndrome," one of the film-goers commented about such attitudes. It's completely unsettling that anyone can accept what's happened over the past nine days without deep concern. No one wants to quote a bumper sticker, but, if you're not outraged, you're not paying attention.
I took my outrage and appetite to Nota Bene for Pizza Club, the first in a series that pays tribute to the restaurant's beginnings as a friend-based pizza club. Walking in behind a couple with a toddler, I wasn't the least bit upset to hear the hostess tell them that they were full up with reservations even though I didn't have one.
Having already spotted an open bar stool, I was making my way toward it when a friend near the end of the bar motioned me over to join her. A few stools down, another familiar face was insisting that we all needed some Fernet Branca - they to close out their night and us to begin ours.
It wouldn't have been my first choice to start with, but that didn't seem to matter. Meanwhile, familiar faces abounded: at least three chefs, wine and beer reps, several servers from various restaurants, a couple of favorite beer geeks who wanted to talk theater.
Before long even our new mayor arrived, took up a stool and ordered a martini.
"The first rule of Pizza Club is wear stretchy pants," someone announced just behind me as I ordered the evening's signature pizza created by the chef at Secco and guaranteed to win my heart because it was a white pizza: Sbronzo di Bufala (bufala soaked in Aglianico) and Cinerino (Pecorino aged under myrtle ash) with sliced garlic, Castelvetrano olives and crispy Prosciutto over a cream base.
The second rule of Pizza Club should be always get the signature pizza. I can have a fabulous Fig and Pig any day, but the beauty of those two cheeses combined was sublime. Secco for the cheese score.
Having polished off all but one slice, I took her up on it when my friend offered to share her exquisitely fresh-tasting fennel salad with parsley and Pecorino, but I still managed to knock off that last piece of pie, too.
I'm here to tell you, dealing with family is not only exhausting but appetite-inducing.
Several of us at the bar got embroiled in a rant about people taking their news from questionable sources and I was reminded of a scene from "Lacombe, Lucien" that felt like a timely reminder about the role of the media under Fascism.
When a character repeats what he's heard on French radio about the war's progress, Lucien reminds him, "Now you have to go listen to Radio London and split the difference."
Pulling the Gen X card, my friend went so far as to instruct a millennial at the bar, "Pay for reliable, researched news. Even if you have to get the New York Times or Atlantic Monthly for $1 a week, do it so you can have access to researched information."
Don't look at me, I was sitting next to her sipping Fernet and trying to process the affronts to democracy being foisted on us as detailed in my Washington Post.
Because we share similar self-identifiers - I'm heathen Catholic while she self-labels as atheist Catholic - she makes an unlikely book recommendation (sci-fi, but with Jesuits in space) before we got embroiled in discussing the character-building nature of required family dinner conversation, the demise of problem solving skills and the failure to teach critical thinking.
The third rule of pizza club could be that since some Sundays are going to involve family, those nights should be devoted to no more than fine film, good pie, strong drink and as much political conversation as you can grab.
Splitting the difference is going to be the difficult part. Finding happiness and poetry will be the success.
Unfortunately for me, this involved getting up at an ungodly 8:30 to do so. On the plus side, The XX's "Co-exist" and the National's "Boxer" provided stellar soundtracks for the gray drive on mostly empty roads.
Google maps provided an unexpected new route to the Inn at Montross on the Northern Neck for a celebratory brunch for my Dad's 85th birthday, a free-wheeling meal that involved four of my five sisters, practically non-stop laughter, my first introduction to a nephew's new girlfriend (her master's is in cyber-security), a spirited point/counterpoint about Lady Gaga and endless waffles, although no consensus was reached on what is taboo in waffles (I say we start with Reese's Pieces and move on to chocolate chips...blech, in waffles?).
A family feud broke out when the subject of coconut was broached - turns out Mounds lovers were seated right next to those who liken coconut to cat hair in your throat - and I was shocked to learn that not everyone is the fan of Girl Scout Samoa cookies that I am.
And yet, we spring from the same loins.
A vote was called to determine which faction had the majority and although coconut lovers won the popular vote, someone pointed out that everyone with their hand up was, shall we say, middle-aged or older? Only one millennial professed a passion for coconut, making him the outlier among his people.
My Dad made his usual sunny remarks on the occasion, saying, "Who would have thought I'd be lucky enough to have all this," his hand gesturing at the long table, "And live so long, too?" Corny, but sincere and no doubt partially fueled by a couple of cranberry champagne cocktails.
A family member is leaving this week for the Everglades to fish for peacock bass, a colorful, showy species (because, of course, someone has to pull up a photo) with no eating value whatsoever. A debate on sport fishing ensues, although I take no part.
After the last crumb was polished off, we posed for endless pictures in various combinations, not because any of us are particularly photogenic, but because it's what we do when we get together. When one sister opted out, I reminded her that we'll never look younger than we do today. She is unmoved.
Along the way home, it was challenging trying to avert my eyes from the abundance of road kill: a hound (broke my heart), a deer, a couple of possums and perhaps unlikeliest of all, a chicken, feathers ruffling as cars drove by.
I was home just long enough to answer emails before getting in a little bit of walking by heading over to the Bijou for the fourth and final film in their Facing Fascism film festival, Louis Malle's "Lacombe, Lucien" from 1974.
Like 1969's "Z" which I'd just seen, one of the standard film credits back then was "Script girl," who in all likelihood was also coffee girl and whatever else menial job needed to be done girl.
We've come a long way, baby, and somehow it all seems to be on the chopping block again. How the hell did we allow this to happen? But I digress (again).
I'm happy to report that we barely got three minutes into the film before seeing the requisite biking scene that every French film must have. What was refreshing was that it was a handsome young man pedaling, one who resembled an '80s teen movie hero: all thick, dark, curly hair, sullen attitude, pouty lips and sunglasses.
Louis Malle as John Hughes influence?
The film showed the seductive side of fascism for a simple young man living in the countryside toward the end of WW II in German-occupied France. Turned down for being too young when he volunteers for the Resistance, he winds up working for the Gestapo, a major problem once he falls in love with a Jewish girl.
Like the good arthouse film that it originally was, it's a story about how ordinary people carry on under frightful circumstances with an anti-hero the other characters (and the audience) can't quite condone but don't fully hate, either.
Despite an inscription on a photo to Lucien, "Best wishes for happiness, poetry and success," things didn't work out quite that well for him.
Sitting in the row behind me was a woman who moved to Richmond from NOVA with her husband and is totally loving life here, but had yet to find a vibrant film scene. Needless to say, she was thrilled to discover the Bijou.
Doing our post-film discussion in the lobby, fascism talk naturally turned to the latest national embarrassment, Trump's refugee ban - so much for Washington's declaration that "the bosom of America is open" - and how so many people are still trying to pretend like everything's okay.
When someone I consider well-informed recently told me, "I'm not worried. He hasn't done anything horrible yet," I am gobsmacked.
"It's ostrich syndrome," one of the film-goers commented about such attitudes. It's completely unsettling that anyone can accept what's happened over the past nine days without deep concern. No one wants to quote a bumper sticker, but, if you're not outraged, you're not paying attention.
I took my outrage and appetite to Nota Bene for Pizza Club, the first in a series that pays tribute to the restaurant's beginnings as a friend-based pizza club. Walking in behind a couple with a toddler, I wasn't the least bit upset to hear the hostess tell them that they were full up with reservations even though I didn't have one.
Having already spotted an open bar stool, I was making my way toward it when a friend near the end of the bar motioned me over to join her. A few stools down, another familiar face was insisting that we all needed some Fernet Branca - they to close out their night and us to begin ours.
It wouldn't have been my first choice to start with, but that didn't seem to matter. Meanwhile, familiar faces abounded: at least three chefs, wine and beer reps, several servers from various restaurants, a couple of favorite beer geeks who wanted to talk theater.
Before long even our new mayor arrived, took up a stool and ordered a martini.
"The first rule of Pizza Club is wear stretchy pants," someone announced just behind me as I ordered the evening's signature pizza created by the chef at Secco and guaranteed to win my heart because it was a white pizza: Sbronzo di Bufala (bufala soaked in Aglianico) and Cinerino (Pecorino aged under myrtle ash) with sliced garlic, Castelvetrano olives and crispy Prosciutto over a cream base.
The second rule of Pizza Club should be always get the signature pizza. I can have a fabulous Fig and Pig any day, but the beauty of those two cheeses combined was sublime. Secco for the cheese score.
Having polished off all but one slice, I took her up on it when my friend offered to share her exquisitely fresh-tasting fennel salad with parsley and Pecorino, but I still managed to knock off that last piece of pie, too.
I'm here to tell you, dealing with family is not only exhausting but appetite-inducing.
Several of us at the bar got embroiled in a rant about people taking their news from questionable sources and I was reminded of a scene from "Lacombe, Lucien" that felt like a timely reminder about the role of the media under Fascism.
When a character repeats what he's heard on French radio about the war's progress, Lucien reminds him, "Now you have to go listen to Radio London and split the difference."
Pulling the Gen X card, my friend went so far as to instruct a millennial at the bar, "Pay for reliable, researched news. Even if you have to get the New York Times or Atlantic Monthly for $1 a week, do it so you can have access to researched information."
Don't look at me, I was sitting next to her sipping Fernet and trying to process the affronts to democracy being foisted on us as detailed in my Washington Post.
Because we share similar self-identifiers - I'm heathen Catholic while she self-labels as atheist Catholic - she makes an unlikely book recommendation (sci-fi, but with Jesuits in space) before we got embroiled in discussing the character-building nature of required family dinner conversation, the demise of problem solving skills and the failure to teach critical thinking.
The third rule of pizza club could be that since some Sundays are going to involve family, those nights should be devoted to no more than fine film, good pie, strong drink and as much political conversation as you can grab.
Splitting the difference is going to be the difficult part. Finding happiness and poetry will be the success.
Saturday, January 28, 2017
Popcorn-Eating Intellectual Scum
Someone should've warned him that small hands mean small crowds.
When the President is obsessing about the size of his inauguration crowd, pushing an "America first, f*ck the world" agenda and mandating a taxpayer-funded border wall, what else could I do but walk over to the Bijou with Mac for an anti-fascist thriller oozing political messages and dripping with tension?
Headed to the front row of Westhampton Theater seats, I couldn't help but wonder why a guy was already comfortably situated in the back row. So I asked. Seems he's an introvert, but a little digging revealed that he likes to watch the goings-on of others from the safety of the back.
Who wouldn't razz a stranger over that?
Like the Bijou's co-organizer James said while welcoming the small crowd to the early show, "We don't know what's going to happen with Trump." What he didn't say was that we're practically positive it won't be good.
But the Bijou was there for us, screening the 1969 Oscar-winning film "Z" by brilliant political filmmaker Costa-Gavras who'd crafted a riveting story about how a non-violent opposition leader is killed by a right wing conspiracy and his murder covered up by the highest of government and police figures.
We were reminded by co-founder Terry how much this film had resonated with still-grieving moviegoers, debuting not long after both MLK and RFK had been assassinated. He suggested we take note of the movie's pell-mell pacing, tough to miss once embroiled in it.
The film opens with a government leader lecturing a room full of white guys about how eliminating ideological "isms" is much like ridding grape vines of mildew: yet one more chore that's got to be done.
Fascism: just another "honey-do" list.
The period details were fabulous - after all, it was 1969 - with men in flowered shirts open to mid-chest with gold medallions swinging, stewardesses in white gloves and pillbox hats and skinny Brit photographers in satin blazers and Nehru jackets. IBM electric typewriters everywhere. Music swung from '60s pop to traditional Greek.
And, of course, it being 1969, the requisite killer car chase.
But a sense of foreboding hung over every frame as you realized how insidiously the regime had commandeered control of people's lives in every possible way. Knowing the story was based on actual events in Greece in 1963 made it the most chilling kind of fiction, punctuated by the fact that the bad guys were only slapped on the wrist.
So how does the military retaliate? By banning practically everything: long hair on guys, mini-skirts, Tolstoy, Sartre, Albee, freedom of the press, sociology, modern music, Sophocles, labor strikes, popular music, the new mathematics and smashing glasses after toasts.
Even the letter "Z" is banned because it was used for graffiti (Z means "he lives" in ancient Greek apparently) as a tribute to the slain opposition leader. That's right, the government banned a letter. Mind-boggling, yes, but Costa-Gavras ably demonstrates that so is a government bent on deciding what the truth is, then expecting its citizenry to accept and regurgitate those alternative facts.
No surprise, a film about damping down political protest, suppressing the media and ridding the country of "intellectual scum" was bound to resonate a little too close to home right now. Well curated, Bijou.
It would be fascinating, given that Costa-Gavras is still alive, to hear the director's take on the appalling new normal we're still trying to adjust to. Absent his thoughts, Mac and I chatted with other film-goers about what a superb film we'd just seen and how uncomfortably relevant it felt.
Now on my third in the series, the Bijou's Facing Fascism film fest feels like hitting the jackpot for a fan of award-winning foreign films, but also a wake-up call to the hallmarks of a totalitarian government, probably the reason why James had made a point of saying that the Bijou was "a safe space, a community resource and meeting place," the kind of space people may need in the uncertain days ahead.
We did the only logical thing possible after walking home from the Bijou - we got in the car and drove to Garnett's to celebrate National Chocolate Cake Day.
Truth be told, we scored the very last slice of strawberry cake but it had chocolate icing to keep to the spirit of the day and we tucked into it with the Scissors Sisters providing a sassy soundtrack. Comfortably numb, indeed.
Fortunately, it's possible to celebrate such nonsense while still processing the complex ideas put forth in "Z," but it's also worrisome to think what the future may hold...or even how much future may be left. Without the right to assemble and a free press, what freedom remains?
"Z" was a powerful reminder of how quickly things can go south and that's exactly what must be prevented.
Because I'm here to tell you that no one is truly free when music and mini-skirts are banned.
When the President is obsessing about the size of his inauguration crowd, pushing an "America first, f*ck the world" agenda and mandating a taxpayer-funded border wall, what else could I do but walk over to the Bijou with Mac for an anti-fascist thriller oozing political messages and dripping with tension?
Headed to the front row of Westhampton Theater seats, I couldn't help but wonder why a guy was already comfortably situated in the back row. So I asked. Seems he's an introvert, but a little digging revealed that he likes to watch the goings-on of others from the safety of the back.
Who wouldn't razz a stranger over that?
Like the Bijou's co-organizer James said while welcoming the small crowd to the early show, "We don't know what's going to happen with Trump." What he didn't say was that we're practically positive it won't be good.
But the Bijou was there for us, screening the 1969 Oscar-winning film "Z" by brilliant political filmmaker Costa-Gavras who'd crafted a riveting story about how a non-violent opposition leader is killed by a right wing conspiracy and his murder covered up by the highest of government and police figures.
We were reminded by co-founder Terry how much this film had resonated with still-grieving moviegoers, debuting not long after both MLK and RFK had been assassinated. He suggested we take note of the movie's pell-mell pacing, tough to miss once embroiled in it.
The film opens with a government leader lecturing a room full of white guys about how eliminating ideological "isms" is much like ridding grape vines of mildew: yet one more chore that's got to be done.
Fascism: just another "honey-do" list.
The period details were fabulous - after all, it was 1969 - with men in flowered shirts open to mid-chest with gold medallions swinging, stewardesses in white gloves and pillbox hats and skinny Brit photographers in satin blazers and Nehru jackets. IBM electric typewriters everywhere. Music swung from '60s pop to traditional Greek.
And, of course, it being 1969, the requisite killer car chase.
But a sense of foreboding hung over every frame as you realized how insidiously the regime had commandeered control of people's lives in every possible way. Knowing the story was based on actual events in Greece in 1963 made it the most chilling kind of fiction, punctuated by the fact that the bad guys were only slapped on the wrist.
So how does the military retaliate? By banning practically everything: long hair on guys, mini-skirts, Tolstoy, Sartre, Albee, freedom of the press, sociology, modern music, Sophocles, labor strikes, popular music, the new mathematics and smashing glasses after toasts.
Even the letter "Z" is banned because it was used for graffiti (Z means "he lives" in ancient Greek apparently) as a tribute to the slain opposition leader. That's right, the government banned a letter. Mind-boggling, yes, but Costa-Gavras ably demonstrates that so is a government bent on deciding what the truth is, then expecting its citizenry to accept and regurgitate those alternative facts.
No surprise, a film about damping down political protest, suppressing the media and ridding the country of "intellectual scum" was bound to resonate a little too close to home right now. Well curated, Bijou.
It would be fascinating, given that Costa-Gavras is still alive, to hear the director's take on the appalling new normal we're still trying to adjust to. Absent his thoughts, Mac and I chatted with other film-goers about what a superb film we'd just seen and how uncomfortably relevant it felt.
Now on my third in the series, the Bijou's Facing Fascism film fest feels like hitting the jackpot for a fan of award-winning foreign films, but also a wake-up call to the hallmarks of a totalitarian government, probably the reason why James had made a point of saying that the Bijou was "a safe space, a community resource and meeting place," the kind of space people may need in the uncertain days ahead.
We did the only logical thing possible after walking home from the Bijou - we got in the car and drove to Garnett's to celebrate National Chocolate Cake Day.
Truth be told, we scored the very last slice of strawberry cake but it had chocolate icing to keep to the spirit of the day and we tucked into it with the Scissors Sisters providing a sassy soundtrack. Comfortably numb, indeed.
Fortunately, it's possible to celebrate such nonsense while still processing the complex ideas put forth in "Z," but it's also worrisome to think what the future may hold...or even how much future may be left. Without the right to assemble and a free press, what freedom remains?
"Z" was a powerful reminder of how quickly things can go south and that's exactly what must be prevented.
Because I'm here to tell you that no one is truly free when music and mini-skirts are banned.
Monday, January 23, 2017
Easier Than Saying What You Mean
After a thorough reading of today's Washington Post, I needed "Amarcord." Badly.
Why? Because today's entry in the Bijou's anti-fascist film fest, Fellini's 1973 look back at his childhood (the title translates as "I remember") in fascist Italy, promised reassurance that life goes on, even when delusional leaders seize control and, frankly, who couldn't use that reminder along about now?
It wasn't a big crowd - I heard something about a football game - but everyone there seemed to need what the film was offering and although I'd seen it in 2013 not long after visiting Italy, it necessarily resonated differently this time.
Of course, some details of Italian life - "Fernet or coffee?" - don't change.
Discussing "Amarcord" with a film aficionado afterward in the lobby, we agreed on the theme of daily life's durability despite a dictatorship, but, as he pointed out, that worked far better in the un-populated countryside of the 1930s than it might in a metropolitan area circa 2017.
My only other accomplishments were a foggy walk over the T Pot bridge and beyond, nailing a last-minute deadline and an intermittent but day-long listening party of The XX's new "I See You," the better to discuss it with the two fans who've sought my opinion on it this week.
It took exactly one listen to their debut album in 2009 to make me a fan and proselytizer for the band's hushed, minimalist sound. I recall playing it continuously for a fellow music-lover as we drove up Route 301 under a leaden sky. He was completely smitten with the band by the time we arrived. Success.
Naturally, 2012's "Coexist" engendered countless conversations with music fans about the direction their sound had taken, with an Italian cohort saying that it was so stripped down that for their next album, the band would simply dream the songs and fans would hear them.
Humor is a matter of opinion, but my attraction to The XX was as much about the murmuring sound as the lyrics of longing and introspection. Lyrics for fans of lyrics, so right up my alley.
Fiction, when we're not together
Mistaken for a vision, something of my own creation
Any certainties, how am I to tell?
I know your face all too well, yet I wake up alone
Happily, introspective lyrics are still there, only now they're part of a richer, more expansive sound palette that's clearly informed by synths and dance music (even briefly sampling Hall and Oates).
Hot damn, I would play this album at my next party in a heartbeat.
As it is, I'm already in love with it and it's only been a day since I brought it home from my neighborhood record store. Don't come to my apartment any time soon or you're going to hear it.
I've been a romantic for so long
All I've ever heard are love songs singing
Oh, oh, oh, go on, I dare you
Oh, oh, oh, I dare you
I get chills, heart rate multiplies
I'm on a different kind of high
A rush of blood is not enough
I need my feelings set on fire
The truth is, a rush of blood was never enough for me. As long ago as college, my friend Leo dubbed me "hopelessly romantic" and that's a man who knew me well. Still does.
The XX don't, yet they've given me a new soundtrack for 2017 going forward.
Chemistry is rare
in a two, three time affair
There's no guarantees
So I've learned since Leo labeled me way back when. Better, I think, to work on something of my own creation.
Why? Because today's entry in the Bijou's anti-fascist film fest, Fellini's 1973 look back at his childhood (the title translates as "I remember") in fascist Italy, promised reassurance that life goes on, even when delusional leaders seize control and, frankly, who couldn't use that reminder along about now?
It wasn't a big crowd - I heard something about a football game - but everyone there seemed to need what the film was offering and although I'd seen it in 2013 not long after visiting Italy, it necessarily resonated differently this time.
Of course, some details of Italian life - "Fernet or coffee?" - don't change.
Discussing "Amarcord" with a film aficionado afterward in the lobby, we agreed on the theme of daily life's durability despite a dictatorship, but, as he pointed out, that worked far better in the un-populated countryside of the 1930s than it might in a metropolitan area circa 2017.
My only other accomplishments were a foggy walk over the T Pot bridge and beyond, nailing a last-minute deadline and an intermittent but day-long listening party of The XX's new "I See You," the better to discuss it with the two fans who've sought my opinion on it this week.
It took exactly one listen to their debut album in 2009 to make me a fan and proselytizer for the band's hushed, minimalist sound. I recall playing it continuously for a fellow music-lover as we drove up Route 301 under a leaden sky. He was completely smitten with the band by the time we arrived. Success.
Naturally, 2012's "Coexist" engendered countless conversations with music fans about the direction their sound had taken, with an Italian cohort saying that it was so stripped down that for their next album, the band would simply dream the songs and fans would hear them.
Humor is a matter of opinion, but my attraction to The XX was as much about the murmuring sound as the lyrics of longing and introspection. Lyrics for fans of lyrics, so right up my alley.
Fiction, when we're not together
Mistaken for a vision, something of my own creation
Any certainties, how am I to tell?
I know your face all too well, yet I wake up alone
Happily, introspective lyrics are still there, only now they're part of a richer, more expansive sound palette that's clearly informed by synths and dance music (even briefly sampling Hall and Oates).
Hot damn, I would play this album at my next party in a heartbeat.
As it is, I'm already in love with it and it's only been a day since I brought it home from my neighborhood record store. Don't come to my apartment any time soon or you're going to hear it.
I've been a romantic for so long
All I've ever heard are love songs singing
Oh, oh, oh, go on, I dare you
Oh, oh, oh, I dare you
I get chills, heart rate multiplies
I'm on a different kind of high
A rush of blood is not enough
I need my feelings set on fire
The truth is, a rush of blood was never enough for me. As long ago as college, my friend Leo dubbed me "hopelessly romantic" and that's a man who knew me well. Still does.
The XX don't, yet they've given me a new soundtrack for 2017 going forward.
Chemistry is rare
in a two, three time affair
There's no guarantees
So I've learned since Leo labeled me way back when. Better, I think, to work on something of my own creation.
Sunday, December 4, 2016
Love Minus Zero/No Limit
Thanks to the Bijou, I finally saw D.A. Pennebaker's classic 1967 documentary "Don't Look Back."
You know the one, about Dylan's '65 tour of Britain that begins with the inspiration for INXS' finest video moment as Dylan drops cards with the words from "Subterranean Homesick Blues."
But more significantly, I got to watch a film that also caused a music critic to predict the future.
It will be a good joke on us all if, in fifty years or so, Dylan is regarded as a significant figure in English poetry. ~ Donal J. Henahan, New York Times, September 7, 1967
Maybe it's best the prescient Mr. Henahan was dead by the time Dylan's Nobel Prize nomination was announced.
Although I'm no one's idea of a rabid Dylan fan, I've always been aware of the poetry of his songwriting and over the years I've come to appreciate him in an entirely new light. Still, I needed this 90-minute crash course in that pivotal pre-electric moment in the icon's career.
Watching it, what struck me most was his unexpected charisma, the brashness of his youthful confidence and his sheer nerve in challenging the very square British press corps' shallow grasp of his music and mission.
I don't know how he kept a straight face looking at their bad teeth and walrus-like mustaches, or perhaps they're the reason he asked them questions like, "Are you sure you're really friends with [your friends] if you can't satisfy them?"
Fair question, then or now. For that matter, I'd pose it to my own friends.
But also: So. Much. Smoking.
It's a wonder Dylan's still alive given the 80 or so cigs (the press' estimate of his habit then) he smoked daily and that was on camera. Who know how often he lit up behind closed doors.
Like me, Dylan is a Gemini, so I recognized his tendency to constantly observe and make mental notes about people and surroundings. Some minds just don't turn off.
Is it wrong that after hearing him say, "Either be groovy or leave," I want to have that made into a sign for my apartment? After all, it's really not too much to ask of people, is it?
The many clips of him performing onstage and in hotel rooms were invaluable to a casual fan like me because I saw not only how completely androgynous he looked as a young man, but heard his youthful singing voice and realized it was far more melodic and less full-on nasal-y at this early point (he was 23) than it became.
The Bijou crowd may have been small for the late afternoon show, but our appreciation for the big screen Dylan experience was anything but.
Following the satisfaction of upping our Dylan quotient considerably, there were dogs to be let out and fed, shawarmas to be eaten and a show to get to.
We walked into Hardywood - where they were celebrating today's release of Christmas Morning, a gingerbread stout with coffee - just as Baltimore's Great American Canyon Band took the stage to seduce us with their ethereal folk pop and lovely harmonies.
You could tell that the two singers in front of the drummer were an item just by looking at them.
A musician friend looked at the long, tall drink of water playing guitar and observed, "He looks like Evan Dando." I laughed because had he said that to the younger set in the room, they'd have been clueless, while he bemoaned recently mentioning Michael Stipe to millennial blank stares.
Might I say once again that I weep for the future?
I'd have been happy devoting all my attention to the Great American Canyon Band, but in short order, I ran into a half dozen people I knew and paused from soaking up their gorgeous music to catching up with friends on matters of careers, families and pie-baking skills.
Seems some people are unwilling to pay for a wooden pie carrying box, even if it is American made and sold at a trendy shop.
As the next band, Mikrowaves, was setting up, a friend shared that he'd heard their new album and that if it were coming out this year (it's not), it would be his favorite album of the year, a fact which didn't surprise me since I've been an unabashed fan since the first time I heard their soulful sound.
Besides, who doesn't like a band with not only a drummer and a percussionist, but a female back-up singer and horn section? Or a song that singer Eddie described the opening riffs as sounding "like a Wendy and Lisa song?"
Not us, I can tell you that much.
We were totally getting into the band, dancing in place and having a superb Saturday night when, like a plague of locusts, a group of plastered middle aged people showed up all at once, leading us to joke that they'd arrived by bus.
One guy in a leather jacket, beer held aloft and sloshing dangerously near my head, proceeded to dance off-beat so close that his arm knocked me a few times. Meanwhile, the high-maintenance female contingent muscled their bejeweled selves to the front to dance frantically to songs like "Bubblegum."
Their moves weren't half as sweet as the song.
Fortunately, they were so far gone that when Eddie mocked them from the stage, they didn't even realize, although it got a good laugh out of us.
For my part, I began sending out subliminal messages to them so they'd clear out and return to whatever suburban hell they call home.
Either be groovy or leave, dig?
And they did leave so we could finish enjoying Mikrowaves' smooth musical stylings without the distraction of flailing drunks bearing down on us. Their killer set ended to major applause.
And, sure enough, when we left there was a black bus idling on the street outside. All I can say is, thank heaven that ain't me, babe.
You know the one, about Dylan's '65 tour of Britain that begins with the inspiration for INXS' finest video moment as Dylan drops cards with the words from "Subterranean Homesick Blues."
But more significantly, I got to watch a film that also caused a music critic to predict the future.
It will be a good joke on us all if, in fifty years or so, Dylan is regarded as a significant figure in English poetry. ~ Donal J. Henahan, New York Times, September 7, 1967
Maybe it's best the prescient Mr. Henahan was dead by the time Dylan's Nobel Prize nomination was announced.
Although I'm no one's idea of a rabid Dylan fan, I've always been aware of the poetry of his songwriting and over the years I've come to appreciate him in an entirely new light. Still, I needed this 90-minute crash course in that pivotal pre-electric moment in the icon's career.
Watching it, what struck me most was his unexpected charisma, the brashness of his youthful confidence and his sheer nerve in challenging the very square British press corps' shallow grasp of his music and mission.
I don't know how he kept a straight face looking at their bad teeth and walrus-like mustaches, or perhaps they're the reason he asked them questions like, "Are you sure you're really friends with [your friends] if you can't satisfy them?"
Fair question, then or now. For that matter, I'd pose it to my own friends.
But also: So. Much. Smoking.
It's a wonder Dylan's still alive given the 80 or so cigs (the press' estimate of his habit then) he smoked daily and that was on camera. Who know how often he lit up behind closed doors.
Like me, Dylan is a Gemini, so I recognized his tendency to constantly observe and make mental notes about people and surroundings. Some minds just don't turn off.
Is it wrong that after hearing him say, "Either be groovy or leave," I want to have that made into a sign for my apartment? After all, it's really not too much to ask of people, is it?
The many clips of him performing onstage and in hotel rooms were invaluable to a casual fan like me because I saw not only how completely androgynous he looked as a young man, but heard his youthful singing voice and realized it was far more melodic and less full-on nasal-y at this early point (he was 23) than it became.
The Bijou crowd may have been small for the late afternoon show, but our appreciation for the big screen Dylan experience was anything but.
Following the satisfaction of upping our Dylan quotient considerably, there were dogs to be let out and fed, shawarmas to be eaten and a show to get to.
We walked into Hardywood - where they were celebrating today's release of Christmas Morning, a gingerbread stout with coffee - just as Baltimore's Great American Canyon Band took the stage to seduce us with their ethereal folk pop and lovely harmonies.
You could tell that the two singers in front of the drummer were an item just by looking at them.
A musician friend looked at the long, tall drink of water playing guitar and observed, "He looks like Evan Dando." I laughed because had he said that to the younger set in the room, they'd have been clueless, while he bemoaned recently mentioning Michael Stipe to millennial blank stares.
Might I say once again that I weep for the future?
I'd have been happy devoting all my attention to the Great American Canyon Band, but in short order, I ran into a half dozen people I knew and paused from soaking up their gorgeous music to catching up with friends on matters of careers, families and pie-baking skills.
Seems some people are unwilling to pay for a wooden pie carrying box, even if it is American made and sold at a trendy shop.
As the next band, Mikrowaves, was setting up, a friend shared that he'd heard their new album and that if it were coming out this year (it's not), it would be his favorite album of the year, a fact which didn't surprise me since I've been an unabashed fan since the first time I heard their soulful sound.
Besides, who doesn't like a band with not only a drummer and a percussionist, but a female back-up singer and horn section? Or a song that singer Eddie described the opening riffs as sounding "like a Wendy and Lisa song?"
Not us, I can tell you that much.
We were totally getting into the band, dancing in place and having a superb Saturday night when, like a plague of locusts, a group of plastered middle aged people showed up all at once, leading us to joke that they'd arrived by bus.
One guy in a leather jacket, beer held aloft and sloshing dangerously near my head, proceeded to dance off-beat so close that his arm knocked me a few times. Meanwhile, the high-maintenance female contingent muscled their bejeweled selves to the front to dance frantically to songs like "Bubblegum."
Their moves weren't half as sweet as the song.
Fortunately, they were so far gone that when Eddie mocked them from the stage, they didn't even realize, although it got a good laugh out of us.
For my part, I began sending out subliminal messages to them so they'd clear out and return to whatever suburban hell they call home.
Either be groovy or leave, dig?
And they did leave so we could finish enjoying Mikrowaves' smooth musical stylings without the distraction of flailing drunks bearing down on us. Their killer set ended to major applause.
And, sure enough, when we left there was a black bus idling on the street outside. All I can say is, thank heaven that ain't me, babe.
Sunday, November 27, 2016
Sex is a Dish Best Served Piping Hot
The only thing missing from the movie tonight was a bowl of hot ramen, but then, one of the Bijou co-founders acknowledged as much.
"If I'd thought about it in time, we'd have had ramen here tonight," James said during his introduction to "Tampopo," a 1985 Japanese ode to food that began with the requisite strangers of a classic Western riding into town reading from a master's book on how to eat ramen.
First, observe the ramen...caress the surface with the chopstick tips...then poke the pork.
If that didn't make it clear enough that we were about to see a film abut the romance of food (not to mention the sex of it) in the context of a "noodle Western," I don't know what would have. If I'd had a lick of sense, I'd have gone out for ramen before the movie rather than watching two hours celebrating the glory of the steaming bowl while salivating the entire time.
Thanks to the Bijou, we were watching a new 4K restoration of a film I'd never heard of, but one considered the precursor to other classic foodie movies such as "Big Night" and "Eat Drink Man Woman." I was so out of the loop on this one and they were here to bring me up to speed.
What surprised me most about "Tampopo" was how unexpectedly funny it was throughout, never more so than when noodles were slurped to their final whistling sound as they slid between lips.
Our hero was a cowboy hat-wearing truck driver who, along with his sidekick, happens on a ramen shop run by our heroine, a widow with a young son, one rainy night and decides to help her turn the failing venture into a top chef ramen joint.
Along the way, he wears his hat in the bathtub (a scene so steamy and appealing it made me want a bath STAT... Calgon, take me away...), fights some locals to make his point (but as in any good Western, they do it outside so as not to mess up the place) and tastes through every iteration of her ramen until, with the aid of the five men helping her research (so a whole lot of man-splaining goin' on), she finally gets it right, a climax that requires he smoke a cigarette.
Interspersed with the story of building the perfect ramen shop - visiting competitors, comparing recipes, and finessing culinary secrets from another chef - are a series of food-related sub-plots that reinforce the theme.
There's the gangster and his moll, both dressed all in white, sometimes even when they're using food to enhance their sex. Breasts get the whipped cream treatment, honey is poured and, in one startlingly memorable scene, they pass a raw egg yolk back and forth between their mouths until she bites it and it runs out of her mouth. Ahem.
Wait, there's more. A freshly caught oyster is eaten with a drop of blood atop it from a cut caused by the shell. A food-savvy street person sneaks into a restaurant to make a rice and ketchup pancake for the widow's son. A man forces his deathly ill wife to make dinner before dying and she does, then dies.
Easily the grossest thing we witnessed was a soft shell turtle having his throat slit so the blood could drain and he could be cooked. Honestly, that was something I could have lived without seeing.
When our middle-aged heroine got a makeover with a new 'do and very '80s-looking polka dot dress with massive shoulder pads, our taciturn hero was unimpressed. "Now you look hard to talk to," he said.
A scene involving a woman who'd go into a grocery store for the sole purpose of squeezing things - peaches, cheeses, buns - was striking because of the lack of color in the merchandise other than fruits and vegetables.
When I commented on that to my seatmate, the scooter queen, she snickered and said, "Their stores were still made of real ingredients." I fear our stores had already passed that threshold by 1985.
I couldn't have been the only one feeling my head spin watching such an absurdist Japanese take on a Spaghetti Western, but also a seriously sensuous movie. Excellent choice, Bijou.
Watching yet another round of ramen being sampled noisily on screen, my friend leans in and whispers, "This is a movie about slurping, isn't it?" Hmm, well, yes, as long as slurping is a metaphor for savoring food and sex.
Because we all know you can only slurp for so long before you've got to poke the pork. Fact.
"If I'd thought about it in time, we'd have had ramen here tonight," James said during his introduction to "Tampopo," a 1985 Japanese ode to food that began with the requisite strangers of a classic Western riding into town reading from a master's book on how to eat ramen.
First, observe the ramen...caress the surface with the chopstick tips...then poke the pork.
If that didn't make it clear enough that we were about to see a film abut the romance of food (not to mention the sex of it) in the context of a "noodle Western," I don't know what would have. If I'd had a lick of sense, I'd have gone out for ramen before the movie rather than watching two hours celebrating the glory of the steaming bowl while salivating the entire time.
Thanks to the Bijou, we were watching a new 4K restoration of a film I'd never heard of, but one considered the precursor to other classic foodie movies such as "Big Night" and "Eat Drink Man Woman." I was so out of the loop on this one and they were here to bring me up to speed.
What surprised me most about "Tampopo" was how unexpectedly funny it was throughout, never more so than when noodles were slurped to their final whistling sound as they slid between lips.
Our hero was a cowboy hat-wearing truck driver who, along with his sidekick, happens on a ramen shop run by our heroine, a widow with a young son, one rainy night and decides to help her turn the failing venture into a top chef ramen joint.
Along the way, he wears his hat in the bathtub (a scene so steamy and appealing it made me want a bath STAT... Calgon, take me away...), fights some locals to make his point (but as in any good Western, they do it outside so as not to mess up the place) and tastes through every iteration of her ramen until, with the aid of the five men helping her research (so a whole lot of man-splaining goin' on), she finally gets it right, a climax that requires he smoke a cigarette.
Interspersed with the story of building the perfect ramen shop - visiting competitors, comparing recipes, and finessing culinary secrets from another chef - are a series of food-related sub-plots that reinforce the theme.
There's the gangster and his moll, both dressed all in white, sometimes even when they're using food to enhance their sex. Breasts get the whipped cream treatment, honey is poured and, in one startlingly memorable scene, they pass a raw egg yolk back and forth between their mouths until she bites it and it runs out of her mouth. Ahem.
Wait, there's more. A freshly caught oyster is eaten with a drop of blood atop it from a cut caused by the shell. A food-savvy street person sneaks into a restaurant to make a rice and ketchup pancake for the widow's son. A man forces his deathly ill wife to make dinner before dying and she does, then dies.
Easily the grossest thing we witnessed was a soft shell turtle having his throat slit so the blood could drain and he could be cooked. Honestly, that was something I could have lived without seeing.
When our middle-aged heroine got a makeover with a new 'do and very '80s-looking polka dot dress with massive shoulder pads, our taciturn hero was unimpressed. "Now you look hard to talk to," he said.
A scene involving a woman who'd go into a grocery store for the sole purpose of squeezing things - peaches, cheeses, buns - was striking because of the lack of color in the merchandise other than fruits and vegetables.
When I commented on that to my seatmate, the scooter queen, she snickered and said, "Their stores were still made of real ingredients." I fear our stores had already passed that threshold by 1985.
I couldn't have been the only one feeling my head spin watching such an absurdist Japanese take on a Spaghetti Western, but also a seriously sensuous movie. Excellent choice, Bijou.
Watching yet another round of ramen being sampled noisily on screen, my friend leans in and whispers, "This is a movie about slurping, isn't it?" Hmm, well, yes, as long as slurping is a metaphor for savoring food and sex.
Because we all know you can only slurp for so long before you've got to poke the pork. Fact.
Monday, November 21, 2016
It Sounds Terrible Because It Will Be
Luddites, billiards and a Brooklyn band, oh, my.
The Bijou was showing Werner Herzog's new documentary about the Internet, "Lo and Behold: Reveries of a Connected World," a subject that would have seduced me - still very much a 20th century woman in many respects - even if I wasn't a devoted documentary dork, which I certainly am.
From the photographs of the long-haired scientists who came up with the Internet concept in 1969 to artificial intelligence concepts beyond my imagination like soccer playing robot cubes that one scientist expects to beat the Brazilian team by 2050 (and also creepily admits, "We love Robot 8," as he cradles the cube as if it were real), Herzog trotted out the obscure and nerdy.
That kind of thing - pure Herzog oddities- carried through the history of the Internet to hackers, Internet addicts trying to be cured and mad scientists working on self-driving cars, assuring us every time a car has an accident, all cars will learn from it and never repeat that mistake.
Really? can I be the only one who doubts this?
On the other hand, gamers helped research scientists solve molecule and helix problems they hadn't been able to, an extraordinary accomplishment only possible thanks to the Internet.
One of the weirdest, by far, was a family whose daughter had been killed in a car crash where a first responder photographed the head of the decapitated girl and made it public online.
Herzog gives us the family posed in a surreal setting with the family's other three daughters sitting catatonic-looking and overly made up in front of their parents (Mom's clearly had lots of plastic surgery and Botox, but also spouts things like, "The Internet is the manifestation of the anti-Christ"), while on the table sit three plates of baked goods, a homey reminder perhaps of this wholesome family's "before" story.
Wait, what?
We see a group of monks, all staring intently at their cell phones and completely un-involved with the world around them. The likelihood of a solar flare knocking out the Internet is a "when" not an "if" and talking heads mull over what might happen to the food supply when the Internet goes down.
Herzog's film posits that it's no longer people that matter, it's the message and we may eventually not even need humans for companionship because we'll be able to get that from A.I. "It sounds terrible, but maybe it's not," one says with little conviction.
So this is what it's come to, he seems to be telling us. Can't live with the Internet, can't live without it.
All I can say is praise be to the Bijou for landing this thought-provoking documentary by a master observer and commentator about a subject that is changing the course of human behavior.
I have little doubt that I am the sole viewer of it who still operates in the 21st century world without a cell phone, but perhaps that only makes the entire subject more relevant for me. I am the constant in a world of sea change.
Dinner followed at Greenleaf's Pool Room, unexpectedly lively with far more games of pool being played than you might expect for a Sunday evening, although it certainly wasn't a night for outdoor activities.
In short order, we plowed through two kinds of deviled eggs, Bumpkins of country ham with pimento cheese and fried chicken skin which were stellar and Spouter Inn with fried oysters, horseradish and smoked tomato that definitely did not fit easily in my mouth while pomegranate lemonade went down easily.
A thick tomato soup followed because this change of weather today has chilled me to the bone and finally, chicken skewers with a piquant slaw with enough heat for my mouth to take notice. I was taking my warmth any way I could get it tonight.
Walking into Gallery 5 moments before a last-minute show was to begin, we had timed it perfectly to catch the lovely ringing guitars and synths of California Death, the post-punk muscularity of Big Bliss from Brooklyn and the pop exuberance of Young Scum, where the drummer put on a headband before their set began because, apparently, he knew there would be sweat.
Did he have to go online to know this or did he figure it out on his own, I had to wonder? Because I'm in complete agreement with Herzog that the Internet was the beginning of the end for deep critical thinking.
And could it be that our President-elect along with the Internet is the manifestation of the anti-Christ? Post-Herzog, I see the jury as still out on that one.
The Bijou was showing Werner Herzog's new documentary about the Internet, "Lo and Behold: Reveries of a Connected World," a subject that would have seduced me - still very much a 20th century woman in many respects - even if I wasn't a devoted documentary dork, which I certainly am.
From the photographs of the long-haired scientists who came up with the Internet concept in 1969 to artificial intelligence concepts beyond my imagination like soccer playing robot cubes that one scientist expects to beat the Brazilian team by 2050 (and also creepily admits, "We love Robot 8," as he cradles the cube as if it were real), Herzog trotted out the obscure and nerdy.
That kind of thing - pure Herzog oddities- carried through the history of the Internet to hackers, Internet addicts trying to be cured and mad scientists working on self-driving cars, assuring us every time a car has an accident, all cars will learn from it and never repeat that mistake.
Really? can I be the only one who doubts this?
On the other hand, gamers helped research scientists solve molecule and helix problems they hadn't been able to, an extraordinary accomplishment only possible thanks to the Internet.
One of the weirdest, by far, was a family whose daughter had been killed in a car crash where a first responder photographed the head of the decapitated girl and made it public online.
Herzog gives us the family posed in a surreal setting with the family's other three daughters sitting catatonic-looking and overly made up in front of their parents (Mom's clearly had lots of plastic surgery and Botox, but also spouts things like, "The Internet is the manifestation of the anti-Christ"), while on the table sit three plates of baked goods, a homey reminder perhaps of this wholesome family's "before" story.
Wait, what?
We see a group of monks, all staring intently at their cell phones and completely un-involved with the world around them. The likelihood of a solar flare knocking out the Internet is a "when" not an "if" and talking heads mull over what might happen to the food supply when the Internet goes down.
Herzog's film posits that it's no longer people that matter, it's the message and we may eventually not even need humans for companionship because we'll be able to get that from A.I. "It sounds terrible, but maybe it's not," one says with little conviction.
So this is what it's come to, he seems to be telling us. Can't live with the Internet, can't live without it.
All I can say is praise be to the Bijou for landing this thought-provoking documentary by a master observer and commentator about a subject that is changing the course of human behavior.
I have little doubt that I am the sole viewer of it who still operates in the 21st century world without a cell phone, but perhaps that only makes the entire subject more relevant for me. I am the constant in a world of sea change.
Dinner followed at Greenleaf's Pool Room, unexpectedly lively with far more games of pool being played than you might expect for a Sunday evening, although it certainly wasn't a night for outdoor activities.
In short order, we plowed through two kinds of deviled eggs, Bumpkins of country ham with pimento cheese and fried chicken skin which were stellar and Spouter Inn with fried oysters, horseradish and smoked tomato that definitely did not fit easily in my mouth while pomegranate lemonade went down easily.
A thick tomato soup followed because this change of weather today has chilled me to the bone and finally, chicken skewers with a piquant slaw with enough heat for my mouth to take notice. I was taking my warmth any way I could get it tonight.
Walking into Gallery 5 moments before a last-minute show was to begin, we had timed it perfectly to catch the lovely ringing guitars and synths of California Death, the post-punk muscularity of Big Bliss from Brooklyn and the pop exuberance of Young Scum, where the drummer put on a headband before their set began because, apparently, he knew there would be sweat.
Did he have to go online to know this or did he figure it out on his own, I had to wonder? Because I'm in complete agreement with Herzog that the Internet was the beginning of the end for deep critical thinking.
And could it be that our President-elect along with the Internet is the manifestation of the anti-Christ? Post-Herzog, I see the jury as still out on that one.
Saturday, November 12, 2016
A Woman Following the Moon
My evening mirrored the week, both absurd and with a reminder that what is good abides.
After taking care of my hired mouth with dinner, Mac and I battled I-95 Friday evening traffic and VCU basketball traffic jams to get to the Bijou to see John Huston's "Wise Blood."
As one of the Bijou's co-founders said when I admitted I'd never seen the film, "This is a movie for people like you," meaning people who are still trying to fill in gaps in their film viewing history and people willing to wait for a chance to see them on the big screen.
And, yes, I'd read the story, both in college and again 10 years ago, and here was this film geek telling me that the film lived up to the source material. I was there to discover that for myself.
Ditto for the guy in the row behind us from Raleigh, in town for tomorrow's marathon, who'd googled things to do in Richmond tonight and shown up to join us locals for a couple of hours of southern Gothic through a late '70s filter, courtesy of a directorial master like Huston.
Talk about your killer off-kilter movies.
And oh-so politically incorrect. The "n-word" was used as liberally as salt at my parents' dinner table, in a way that seemed shocking for 1979. Quaintly dated, too, like when the Hazel Moates character kept telling people, "I'm obliged" as a way of saying thank you.
Flannery O'Conner's dialog sounded as southern and descriptive as her books. I mean, when's the last time you heard someone's hair described as "so thin it looked like ham gravy trickling down her skull"?
First off, you've got to know what ham gravy is and looks like to even get a laugh out of that. Coincidentally, Mac and I had just been discussing sausage gravy on the way to dinner (and how Anthony Bourdain's recipe for it is an affront to southerners everywhere). But I digress.
Ned Beatty's lavender leisure suit was bad enough, but when you add in the red and pink floral tie, red and white striped shirt, white Stetson and white shoes, it was like the costume designer threw up on him and called it a day.
Add in the requisite '70s details - S & H Green Stamp stores, women in public in pink sponge curlers and a kid wearing a knit cap with the words, "Can you dig it?" - to the fully-formed and totally bizarre characters and I felt more like I was watching an early long-lost David Lynch or Tarantino movie, full of odd moments and even weirder people saying totally unexpected things.
Which is all a roundabout way of saying that James was absolutely correct and that it was most definitely a movie for people like me. And Mac...and the guy from Raleigh. No one shows up for a film like "Wise Blood" accidentally.
Once we left there, we made the inevitable trek westward ho to become part of the mass of humanity in Scott's Addition with all the usual Friday night brewery crowds piled on top of this year's InLight extravaganza.
I've only missed one year of the annual event (best excuse ever: I was in Italy for two weeks) because the combination of artistic endeavor combined with the inevitability of stumbling over (hey, with no street lights on, it was dark) scores of familiar faces make InLight feel like a big community shindig and who doesn't need one of those this week?
Along the way, we met up with Bruno awaiting us on a corner and Foto Boy - camera, lens and tripod in hand, whom Mac summoned via the magic of texting after I provided her his phone number - in the middle of a darkened street.
The good news is how much more spread out the installations were than they've been in some past years and the bad news was the north wind which seemed to sweep down the streets unabated, knocking over signage and destroying elements (one installation began with 54 balloons for the 54 corners in Scott's Addition and by the time we saw it, there were seven left - balloons, not corners, that is).
As in the past few years of InLight, I felt there were a few too many straight-forward projections for my taste (as was a particularly video game-like piece).
Far more interesting to me were installations such as Bob Kaputo's "Cold and Overcast Day 2016," a sepia-toned rectangular light box with images inside projected out and the sound of kinetic energy emanating from it. The artist likened the sound to that of brain synapses, a notion that made sense watching it.
Looking at Leigh Suggs' phosphorescent map of Richmond, Bruno said he better understood Church Hill by seeing it laid out without street names.
As I stood there admiring it and trying to locate my street and neighborhood, from behind me I heard Foto Boy knowingly saying, "Karen loves her maps." She sure does, as he's learned from nearly 8 years of friendship.
I stopped in my tracks when I spotted Rob Carter's "Sun City," Mac's favorite, the black and white images of a Spanish city changing over time, a visual feat accomplished with time lapse images of architecture, history and possibility. So much more than just a projection.
Art on Wheels DIY take on Lite Brite (soda bottles full of colored water you could arrange in a grid to form images) seemed to most delight the generation that grew up on the game, but all of us found it to be an exceptionally clever idea.
Walking through the garage of a lofts building, we encountered a series of framed "clouds" captured in glass, visible on both sides and Foto Boy wasted no time in positioning me, telling me where to look and shooting away. I appreciate that he makes me look good and he appreciates that I give him photo credit if I post his work. Win-win.
"Somebody's got some powerful projectors," a musician friend jokingly observed as we paused to look up at a magnificent tableaux in the sky: the nearly full moon on one side of the glowing red WTVR tower and a huge crescent of cirro-cumulus clouds on the other.
I'm obliged for a Friday evening with such lovely distractions after a week that has worn on even the most optimistic of us.
After taking care of my hired mouth with dinner, Mac and I battled I-95 Friday evening traffic and VCU basketball traffic jams to get to the Bijou to see John Huston's "Wise Blood."
As one of the Bijou's co-founders said when I admitted I'd never seen the film, "This is a movie for people like you," meaning people who are still trying to fill in gaps in their film viewing history and people willing to wait for a chance to see them on the big screen.
And, yes, I'd read the story, both in college and again 10 years ago, and here was this film geek telling me that the film lived up to the source material. I was there to discover that for myself.
Ditto for the guy in the row behind us from Raleigh, in town for tomorrow's marathon, who'd googled things to do in Richmond tonight and shown up to join us locals for a couple of hours of southern Gothic through a late '70s filter, courtesy of a directorial master like Huston.
Talk about your killer off-kilter movies.
And oh-so politically incorrect. The "n-word" was used as liberally as salt at my parents' dinner table, in a way that seemed shocking for 1979. Quaintly dated, too, like when the Hazel Moates character kept telling people, "I'm obliged" as a way of saying thank you.
Flannery O'Conner's dialog sounded as southern and descriptive as her books. I mean, when's the last time you heard someone's hair described as "so thin it looked like ham gravy trickling down her skull"?
First off, you've got to know what ham gravy is and looks like to even get a laugh out of that. Coincidentally, Mac and I had just been discussing sausage gravy on the way to dinner (and how Anthony Bourdain's recipe for it is an affront to southerners everywhere). But I digress.
Ned Beatty's lavender leisure suit was bad enough, but when you add in the red and pink floral tie, red and white striped shirt, white Stetson and white shoes, it was like the costume designer threw up on him and called it a day.
Add in the requisite '70s details - S & H Green Stamp stores, women in public in pink sponge curlers and a kid wearing a knit cap with the words, "Can you dig it?" - to the fully-formed and totally bizarre characters and I felt more like I was watching an early long-lost David Lynch or Tarantino movie, full of odd moments and even weirder people saying totally unexpected things.
Which is all a roundabout way of saying that James was absolutely correct and that it was most definitely a movie for people like me. And Mac...and the guy from Raleigh. No one shows up for a film like "Wise Blood" accidentally.
Once we left there, we made the inevitable trek westward ho to become part of the mass of humanity in Scott's Addition with all the usual Friday night brewery crowds piled on top of this year's InLight extravaganza.
I've only missed one year of the annual event (best excuse ever: I was in Italy for two weeks) because the combination of artistic endeavor combined with the inevitability of stumbling over (hey, with no street lights on, it was dark) scores of familiar faces make InLight feel like a big community shindig and who doesn't need one of those this week?
Along the way, we met up with Bruno awaiting us on a corner and Foto Boy - camera, lens and tripod in hand, whom Mac summoned via the magic of texting after I provided her his phone number - in the middle of a darkened street.
The good news is how much more spread out the installations were than they've been in some past years and the bad news was the north wind which seemed to sweep down the streets unabated, knocking over signage and destroying elements (one installation began with 54 balloons for the 54 corners in Scott's Addition and by the time we saw it, there were seven left - balloons, not corners, that is).
As in the past few years of InLight, I felt there were a few too many straight-forward projections for my taste (as was a particularly video game-like piece).
Far more interesting to me were installations such as Bob Kaputo's "Cold and Overcast Day 2016," a sepia-toned rectangular light box with images inside projected out and the sound of kinetic energy emanating from it. The artist likened the sound to that of brain synapses, a notion that made sense watching it.
Looking at Leigh Suggs' phosphorescent map of Richmond, Bruno said he better understood Church Hill by seeing it laid out without street names.
As I stood there admiring it and trying to locate my street and neighborhood, from behind me I heard Foto Boy knowingly saying, "Karen loves her maps." She sure does, as he's learned from nearly 8 years of friendship.
I stopped in my tracks when I spotted Rob Carter's "Sun City," Mac's favorite, the black and white images of a Spanish city changing over time, a visual feat accomplished with time lapse images of architecture, history and possibility. So much more than just a projection.
Art on Wheels DIY take on Lite Brite (soda bottles full of colored water you could arrange in a grid to form images) seemed to most delight the generation that grew up on the game, but all of us found it to be an exceptionally clever idea.
Walking through the garage of a lofts building, we encountered a series of framed "clouds" captured in glass, visible on both sides and Foto Boy wasted no time in positioning me, telling me where to look and shooting away. I appreciate that he makes me look good and he appreciates that I give him photo credit if I post his work. Win-win.
"Somebody's got some powerful projectors," a musician friend jokingly observed as we paused to look up at a magnificent tableaux in the sky: the nearly full moon on one side of the glowing red WTVR tower and a huge crescent of cirro-cumulus clouds on the other.
I'm obliged for a Friday evening with such lovely distractions after a week that has worn on even the most optimistic of us.
Monday, November 7, 2016
In Our Minds and Hearts
Even after three decades here, I'm still discovering new places to plant myself.
At the Bijou, new were some (but not all) of the re-installed theater seats from the Westhampton Theatre, notable because it meant that we no longer have to abuse our asses with those ergonomically-incorrect white plastic chairs to see film of note.
Tonight's trivia question concerned Holly Hunter's role in the movie and we were instructed to signal when we spotted her. Bags of popcorn in hand, the small group at the 5:10 show settled in to the new seats, ready for what was to come.
Mostly, anyway. How anyone can watch that entire knife through the hand on the window sash scene without averting their eyes is beyond me. Just saying, I felt squirming on both sides of me.
The unexpected beauty of seeing a film you last saw 33 years ago when it was in first run is that it could almost be an entirely new-to-you movie this time around.
And I say "almost" because even with little to no memory of seeing "Blood Simple" in 1984, the film stands instantly recognizable as a Coen Brothers movie because everything they're known for now was fully formed and on display in this, their first film.
I had forgotten how perfectly lovely and very of-the-era 27-year old Frances McDormand looked, somewhere between Tony Tenille and Farah Fawcett. No wonder Joel Coen married her almost immediately.
Like all good '80s films, we saw men's blazer sleeves pushed up a la Miami Vice, as well as a man's shirt with only one button buttoned and far too much curly chest hair on display. But it was the geezer (M. Emmett Walsh's character) who showed his age by sporting a mustard yellow leisure suit with bell-bottom pants.
So completely un-hip by then.
The surprise was that apparently in '84, we were still tying up moving boxes with brown twine and, honestly, I'd have guessed that habit had long since been replaced with packing tape.
Midway through the film, I heard Holly Hunter's vice on an answering machine and signaled to win the evening's prize - two tickets to a future screening at the Bijou - a nanosecond before another woman in my row realized who it was.
After a mini-film discussion post-screening, I walked home in the dark, despite it barely being past 6:30. Autumn, I hate what you bring.
The newness in tonight's music adventure came not from the venue's name, Sound of Music Studio, because I'd seen bands at SoM on Foushee Street as well as at SoM on Broad Street, but tonight's SoM was on Altamont in the hipper-than-thou Scott's Addition 'hood.
I don't ask why they move, I just follow where the music goes.
When I arrived, I found two women bent over a map, one drawing and explaining Richmond to the other, who just moved here. When I saw she'd marked and labeled Short Pump, I took it upon myself to inform the newcomer that she had no need of venturing so far west.
Pointing to Willow Lawn and eastward, I assured her that all the life she needed could be found there, complete with Target on the far western fringes. What more could a person require?
She thanked me with wonder and gratitude in her eyes, or at least that's what I chose to tell myself.
A big reason I'd come was to hear Bad Magic, the musical project of Julie Karr, a guitarist and singer with a throaty voice and confessional delivery of whom I'd long been a fan but who used to do an acoustic solo act.
She was apologizing for her cold when I got there, saying, "The mic is gonna need a bacterial wash after this. That would be my advice!"
Behind the band, a dated film of roller bladers played, with occasional interview segments in front of a flag-draped fireplace.
Trying to decide what to play next, the band bantered about songs. "What's it called?" Julie asked the others, then turned to the crowd. "We named it in the computer, but not in our minds and hearts."
Turns out the song was called "Three" and had some terrific early Interpol-sounding guitar licks in it.
Between songs, she vented about the film behind her, saying, "I do not want to see a Confederate flag behind me again. Not at all. Can we make sure that happens? I do not want to see any more Confederate flags!" Since I'd already noticed the same thing, I appreciated her addressing it for the entire room.
Bad Magic rocks a lot harder than Julie solo did, making for an engaging set before she announced that Toronto's Greys, not local band Clair Morgan, were up next.
"That's what you do, you make a sandwich with the out of town band inside. Welcome to Richmond, we eat you!" she joked about being the rye bread slice to Greys' filling.
Their lead singer began by warning us that they were going to play a quick set and then start driving home. I only hope he meant after a god night's sleep.
Their sound pulled from decades of punk, primarily '90s, some of it crossing into thrash territory, some straight up pop punk and some indebted to the Pixies' alternating loud/soft dynamic. Violent head banging accompanied others while a light show rather than southern relics and tasteless flags played behind them.
"This is the last night of a really long tour," the singer said and his body language showed that he was feeling it, although the other three musicians seemed to be cranked up to 11, maybe as a sendoff for the tour's last show.
All kinds of audio issues kept Clair Morgan from playing right away, but feedback and dead mic problems were eventually resolved and Clair got right down to business, both musical and political.
"In a couple of days, there's going to be a thing." From nearby, someone shushed him. "No, I'm not going to stop. If you want to keep certain people out of the White House, please vote on Tuesday. If you're for Donald Trump, please vote November ninth!"
It's tough to argue with a man who writes such well-crafted songs about life and family and surrounds himself with solid talent, while a breathtaking car chase from Hitchcock's "Family Plot" plays behind them.
Could it be that the point was to remind us of the danger and treachery that lies ahead on Tuesday?
I think we can all agree, the entire country's going to need a bacterial wash after that.
At the Bijou, new were some (but not all) of the re-installed theater seats from the Westhampton Theatre, notable because it meant that we no longer have to abuse our asses with those ergonomically-incorrect white plastic chairs to see film of note.
Tonight's trivia question concerned Holly Hunter's role in the movie and we were instructed to signal when we spotted her. Bags of popcorn in hand, the small group at the 5:10 show settled in to the new seats, ready for what was to come.
Mostly, anyway. How anyone can watch that entire knife through the hand on the window sash scene without averting their eyes is beyond me. Just saying, I felt squirming on both sides of me.
The unexpected beauty of seeing a film you last saw 33 years ago when it was in first run is that it could almost be an entirely new-to-you movie this time around.
And I say "almost" because even with little to no memory of seeing "Blood Simple" in 1984, the film stands instantly recognizable as a Coen Brothers movie because everything they're known for now was fully formed and on display in this, their first film.
I had forgotten how perfectly lovely and very of-the-era 27-year old Frances McDormand looked, somewhere between Tony Tenille and Farah Fawcett. No wonder Joel Coen married her almost immediately.
Like all good '80s films, we saw men's blazer sleeves pushed up a la Miami Vice, as well as a man's shirt with only one button buttoned and far too much curly chest hair on display. But it was the geezer (M. Emmett Walsh's character) who showed his age by sporting a mustard yellow leisure suit with bell-bottom pants.
So completely un-hip by then.
The surprise was that apparently in '84, we were still tying up moving boxes with brown twine and, honestly, I'd have guessed that habit had long since been replaced with packing tape.
Midway through the film, I heard Holly Hunter's vice on an answering machine and signaled to win the evening's prize - two tickets to a future screening at the Bijou - a nanosecond before another woman in my row realized who it was.
After a mini-film discussion post-screening, I walked home in the dark, despite it barely being past 6:30. Autumn, I hate what you bring.
The newness in tonight's music adventure came not from the venue's name, Sound of Music Studio, because I'd seen bands at SoM on Foushee Street as well as at SoM on Broad Street, but tonight's SoM was on Altamont in the hipper-than-thou Scott's Addition 'hood.
I don't ask why they move, I just follow where the music goes.
When I arrived, I found two women bent over a map, one drawing and explaining Richmond to the other, who just moved here. When I saw she'd marked and labeled Short Pump, I took it upon myself to inform the newcomer that she had no need of venturing so far west.
Pointing to Willow Lawn and eastward, I assured her that all the life she needed could be found there, complete with Target on the far western fringes. What more could a person require?
She thanked me with wonder and gratitude in her eyes, or at least that's what I chose to tell myself.
A big reason I'd come was to hear Bad Magic, the musical project of Julie Karr, a guitarist and singer with a throaty voice and confessional delivery of whom I'd long been a fan but who used to do an acoustic solo act.
She was apologizing for her cold when I got there, saying, "The mic is gonna need a bacterial wash after this. That would be my advice!"
Behind the band, a dated film of roller bladers played, with occasional interview segments in front of a flag-draped fireplace.
Trying to decide what to play next, the band bantered about songs. "What's it called?" Julie asked the others, then turned to the crowd. "We named it in the computer, but not in our minds and hearts."
Turns out the song was called "Three" and had some terrific early Interpol-sounding guitar licks in it.
Between songs, she vented about the film behind her, saying, "I do not want to see a Confederate flag behind me again. Not at all. Can we make sure that happens? I do not want to see any more Confederate flags!" Since I'd already noticed the same thing, I appreciated her addressing it for the entire room.
Bad Magic rocks a lot harder than Julie solo did, making for an engaging set before she announced that Toronto's Greys, not local band Clair Morgan, were up next.
"That's what you do, you make a sandwich with the out of town band inside. Welcome to Richmond, we eat you!" she joked about being the rye bread slice to Greys' filling.
Their lead singer began by warning us that they were going to play a quick set and then start driving home. I only hope he meant after a god night's sleep.
Their sound pulled from decades of punk, primarily '90s, some of it crossing into thrash territory, some straight up pop punk and some indebted to the Pixies' alternating loud/soft dynamic. Violent head banging accompanied others while a light show rather than southern relics and tasteless flags played behind them.
"This is the last night of a really long tour," the singer said and his body language showed that he was feeling it, although the other three musicians seemed to be cranked up to 11, maybe as a sendoff for the tour's last show.
All kinds of audio issues kept Clair Morgan from playing right away, but feedback and dead mic problems were eventually resolved and Clair got right down to business, both musical and political.
"In a couple of days, there's going to be a thing." From nearby, someone shushed him. "No, I'm not going to stop. If you want to keep certain people out of the White House, please vote on Tuesday. If you're for Donald Trump, please vote November ninth!"
It's tough to argue with a man who writes such well-crafted songs about life and family and surrounds himself with solid talent, while a breathtaking car chase from Hitchcock's "Family Plot" plays behind them.
Could it be that the point was to remind us of the danger and treachery that lies ahead on Tuesday?
I think we can all agree, the entire country's going to need a bacterial wash after that.
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