Jason's Blog, page 172

Late 80s drawing

The period of drawing with a rotring pen again. Luckily it didn't last that long.

The Thing

Antarctica. An American research station is taken over by a shapechanging alien. Starring Kurt Russell and some other guys, directed by John Carpenter.

Seeing the trailer for the prequel made me want to re-watch the original. Or the remake, I should say, not the Howard Hawks film. It holds up pretty well, I think. The computers in the film date it more than the creature effects. The walking head sequence is still great, the image I remember best from seeing it in the cinema. The dog in the film should have gotten an Oscar! Russell is pretty good as well. One thing about being Norwegian is that you understand what the crazy Norwegian guy shooting at the dog says, so you know from the opening what is going on, giving the film even more of a gloomy, hopeless feel.

Breathless

Richard Gere is a car thief who kills a policeman. He tries to escape to Mexico with his French girlfriend, Valerie Kaprisky. A remake of Godard's A Bout De Souffle, directed by Jim McBride.

This isn't really a good film. For one thing, was Kaprisky really the best French actress willing to take her shirt off they could find? Ok, she's pretty, but she can't act. She's no Jean Seberg! And Gere is as usual a bit too full of himself. But it's interesting to see how this film influenced Quentin Tarantino. There's the surf music, the clearly fake back projections, there's the scene of Gere reading for Kaprisky from The Silver Surfer, that Tarantino ripped off in True Romance. And would Bruce Willis have had a French girlfriend in Pulp Fiction if it hadn't been for this film?
The final scene of the film, though, I must admit makes the film worth sitting through. And, strangely enough, they quote "Between grief and nothing I choose grief", that was also quoted in Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

Some books I've read 5

Chronicles, volume one by Bob Dylan
Interesting, but slightly rambling autobiography from Dylan. It's more honest than one could expect. But just two pages about Joan Baez? I guess he will go back to that period in volume two. When is that coming, anyway?

Road Dogs by Elmore Leonard
It's another novel with Jack Foley from Out of Sight. The dialogue is maybe slightly less sharp, and the part of the ending involving an unloaded gun was a bit disappointing.

Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson
A great collection of stories forming a novel, about life is a small city. The main character is a writer who in the end leaves, as part of growing up.

This Party's Got To Stop by Rupert Thomson
A memoir about Thomson's relationship to his brothers after the death of their father, and how easily a family can be torn apart. Wellwritten, as always from this author.

Captain Easy volume two by Roy Crane
I enjoy this series but mostly because of the drawings. There's not much tension in the stories. And what was it about Crane and drawings of women being spanked? Not that I'm complaining.

Currently reading:
The Most Beautiful Woman in Town by Charles Bukowski

Waiting to be read:
Notes of a Dirty Old Man by Bukowski
Touch and Tishomingo Blues by Elmore Leonard
The Karamazov Brothers by Fyodor Dostoevsky

The eighties, part 3

Back to the eighties. First: Ferris Bueller's Day Off. High school students Matthew Broderick, Mia Sara and Alan Ruck play hooky. Principal Jeffrey Jones tries to catch them. Also starring Jennifer Grey and in two small parts Charlie Sheen and Richard Edson. Written and directed by John Hughes.

Is there some midlife crisis thing going on if I re-watch this film? I don't know. It's still an enjoyable film. In classic comedy style it makes fun of authority figures. You can't help, though, to feel that Broderick is a bit of a spoiled brat. Just like Duckie in Pretty in Pink, it's the supporting character, Cameron / Alan Ruck, that is most interesting. The Twist And Shout sequence is of course a lot of fun, but I think my favourite sequence is the one at the art museum. If I one day should visit Chicago I would have to go see Nighthawks by... anyone?, anyone?, Edward Hopper.

Macanudo

The third volume of Macanudo, by Liniers, is now out in French. I met Liniers once, in Barcelona, I believe, and he signed me a copy of the Argentinian version. Since it was in Spanish I couldn't read it, but only enjoy the drawings. As usual there are his regular characters, the penguins, the sheep, the girl Enriqueta and her cat Fellini, the sensitive robot, the mysterious man in black, and as usual his strips are filled with humour, but also melancholy and poetry. When will this man be translated into English?!? While we wait, here's his website: http://www.porliniers.com/

Late 80s drawing

Eddie Izzard on cats and dogs

Montpellier sketches

Envelope doodles