Yakkety Yack--watch Pitch Black

Recently, I went to the video store.

I rented three movies: Bubba HoTep, The Chronicles of Riddick, and Fahrenheit 9/11. I have seen the first two.

Dusty, Jason, I'm sorry. Bubba HoTep was not that funny. It was okay. It wasn't horrible, but when people rave about a movie, you gain certain expectations and Bubba HoTep did not meet up to those expectations. It had a lot of potential, but only average delivery. I realize that some of you will now see Bubba HoTep and will e-mail me and call me up to address your disgust at my review, but remember that by reading this, your expectations have been lowered, and now Bubba HoTep will meet those expectations and surpass them.

It's like The Blair Witch Project. The first people who saw it loved it. Then they raved about it to their friends who saw it and didn't think that much of it. Then they cursed it to their friends (me) who saw it and wondered what that second wave of viewers was smoking. That movie was ingenious.

Much like Pitch Black. Now, I'm not going to comment too much on the movie being retitled. Obviously, I picked up the Chronicles of Riddick and assumed that I was getting the sequel to Pitch Black, but no. They've just changed the title so that this movie and it's sequel are more recognizably from the same universe. I still haven't seen the sequel. I want to see the sequel and here's why.

Every ten years or so, a science fiction movie is produced that is beyond the pale. Aliens was this movie for the late 80's. Pitch Black is this movie for the late 90's (yes, I know it was made in 2000). I hold both in the same regard (Alien was it for the late 70's). Why?

First of all, Pitch Black has one of the great qualities of a movie of its type and that is essentially rather no name actors. Sure Vin Diesel is a name now, but back then he was a nobody. Secondly, this movie does not make us go crazy over strange technology as does The Fifth Element or Event Horizon. While both of these are great films, they require that you suspend something to enter into their universe. Pitch Black does not require this in any way. It's a movie about getting off the road your supposed to be on and breaking down. How prevalent is that fear? Don't know how to answer that, consider how much emphasis you put on your gas gauge while traveling through Nevada.

The movie then proceeds with essentially the most simple premise derived. Bad things are about to happen and no one is going to come to your rescue. A sense of community is created. Now many movies do this, but they all make certain mistakes that Pitch Black does not make. Identity, for instance, works on this same premise, but unfortunately, Identity (though a great movie) fails to round out its characters. There isn't a flat character in Pitch Black. My favorite scene of this is when the Muslim children (who could very easily have just stayed Muslim children) are playing spy with Jack trying to get the imaginary drop on Riddick. The Muslim children are essentially playing with a "boy" who has made a hero out of a confessed murderer.

What I think is Pitch Black's ultimate power, though, is it's ability to stay to its subject matter. Nature is brutal. She will shoot meteors through your ship when you think yourself safe enough to sleep. She will send legions of monsters at you with a greater understanding of their world then you could ever hope to have. She kills children. She kills lovers. No one is safe. Make one mistake in the world of Pitch Black and you die.

In that vein, there is never a moment when Riddick tries to apologize for what he is. He's a murderer, and a damn good one. A lesser movie might have tried to give us some justification for his murders, but not Pitch Black. Riddick is as much a force of nature as the monsters are. As is the co-pilot, who lies about being Captain in order to take charge of the survivors, as is the mercenary who is more than willing to sacrifice his fellow man for his own benefit, as is Jack who takes to hero worshipping the only person she sees who may very well survivor this whole ordeal. Never does Pitch Black flinch.

Now I realize there are some minor problems with the plot, but I am willing to forgive them, and so should you. I recommend this movie as one of the all time best five sci-fi movies. It is so good, in fact, that I doubt that my endorsement will taint your viewing experience of the film.

Now, somebody please, how's the sequel?

Gravity's Rainbow-Tarot: The High Priestess

Here's the card. Here's the section of Gravity's Rainbow. Here's the earlier commentary:
Intro
The Magician

This card is essentially about seeking wisdom, which also means, shutting the hell up for a minute so that wisdom can be found. Notice that the High Priestess sits between two pillars and has the crescent of the moon at her feet. She holds the Torah in her hands, wears a cross at her neck, and behind her is a tapestry of what appears to be fruit, but could also easily be cells in the process of division, and therefore, the origins of life. Seen as an upward movement, we see a religious transition of paganism to pre-Christian Judaism, to Christianity, and beyond to the worship of life's proliferation.

In terms of the Tarot's narrative, the fool (zero card) has progressed to learn of the infinite powers and possibilities that are before him (magician first card) and has come up against the High Priestess who has none of these powers, but has the one thing that the fool does not have: wisdom. She stands between the pillars of the world with access to all spiritual knowledge.

In Gravity's Rainbow, the associated scene is of Pirate Prentice returning to his den of inebriation with the bananas from the rooftop. He then makes his insane banana breakfast only to receive a phone call that he is needed. A message has been sent across the English Channel by rocket. He hitches a ride on a personal carrier to the crash site and begins to be invaded by one of his fellow traveler's daydreams--he envisions the surrounding passengers as characters from old world Transylvanian legends. This causes the story to step back and explain Pirate Prentice's ability to have other people's fantasies for them, and recalls two occasions when the ability became apparent: the first, when it became apparent to Prentice; the second, when it became apparent to the government. However, before either of these flashbacks can occur, there is a montage moment where Pirate Prentice does a dance and sings his theme song surrounded by penny arcade animatronic phantasmagoria.

It might, of course, bear out to mention that the first of these fantasies involves scenes from Lawrence of Arabia and an all out revolt by the colonial army of natives. The second fantasy involves the foreign directors fears that his speech impediment will screw up diplomatic meetings with the prime minister of Novi Pazar (a Baltic nation) and will therefore instigate war. The foreign director's fantasy is that a giant adenoid gland will attack downtown London, monster movie style, and nothing will be able to stop it.

So, where does the high priestess come into all this. Well, first of all, those pillars in her card stand as the worlds of meaning which the High Priestess acts as intermediary between. How many worlds are in this scene? There's the Caribbean where the bananas come from, there's the camaraderie of Pirates barracks, there's the espionage-centered messages being sent across the English Channel in a rocket, the rocket is sent from Peenmunde, Norway--so Viking legend works in there too (V-2 rocket= Valkyrie 2), one fantasy involves the Baltic nation of Novi Pazar and London, and another fantasy involves British controlled Persia. That's seven, and I have yet to count the strange montage scene.

But the montage scene should not be counted with the others, because as strange as the world is in Gravity's Rainbow, this scene is clearly not part of it. Even with the possibility of being usurped by a stranger's daydream, this scene does not fit in with that liberal definition of reality. And here is the high priestess.

Prentice is acting as the intermediary between all these worlds, but the scene with its mechanical special effects representing everything that the reader is accepting as real, seems to suggest that, behind the scenes, what seems to be real is all just moving gears, smoke and mirrors. It's a movie. And Pirate Prentice is performing the ultimate movie trick.

All time and space are being set against each other as simply zones of the screen and in their center is a character out of time and space dancing and swinging a cane with W.C. Fields head on the end of it. Beyond the time and space of the novel, when all of the meaning to these two contexts has been rendered null, there sits Prentice performing his act.

When one moves "beyond the zero" of meaning, one finds only a celebration. The lack of meaning, rather than being hopeless, grants freedom from investing all of one's attention on the "here and now," or even the "there and then." It is as if to say, if all of our experiences amount to nothing more than a movie of our lives, we might still move beyond it to the figure dancing at the center of our montage moments. He is not part of the movie's meaning, and yet is inseparable from its experience. He enjoys the movie no matter what--and in the case of Gravity's Rainbow, that's quite a feat as the movie is about supersonic rockets falling at you at any moment, exploding before their incoming warning sound.

The figure of Prentice, the figure of the High Priestess, enjoys the movie because it is a farce. It is set up to defy meaning, and therefore, meaning can only be derived once it is accepted that the whole thing was a set up. The powers of The Magician (previous card) were a farce too. He seemed to have infinite power, but control is an illusion, and one event is as important as any other (no matter how grand, no matter how seemingly act rather than occurrence). It is the lesson that is important, and this is why the High Priestess lacks the trappings of the world that are so prevalent to The Magician.

The Yankee Candle Company

Many of you have been to a mall at some point or another and so you know that the best way to open a lucrative business is to sell candles. Oh don't argue. You know as well as I do what it's like to shop in a frickin' candle store. It's crazy! In fact, the two worst stores ever to shop in are candle stores, and soap stores. I have no idea what that's about but it's true. The second worst part is that both kinds of stores train their employees to blend in so that you never know who works there and who doesn't and if you're like me--male--you've got no idea what to do while shopping at one of these stores. I mean, honestly, do you really want to turn to someone and say, "excuse me, but which of your candles would be the best at covering up the smell of ass in my bathroom," knowing full well that the person you're asking is most likely not an employee, but rather someone dressed in the closest proximity of a uniform that civvies can deliver: the holiday outfit.

Don't ask why these stores are so popular. The reason is obvious. They smell like food. But unlike other stores that smell like food, and which actually have food, there is no possability of taking in unwanted calories at the soap shop. Such stores afford the populace the ability to experience food without actually risking weight gain. There is no other reason for the candle and soap stores' popularity.

The worst thing about such stores is, of course, their price. Soap should not cost that much. Candles are made of WAX. They probably cost all of ten cents to make; they sell for seven dollars. I guess I shouldn't talk, given that I'm willing to spend ten dollars on a couple ounces of lead, but still, at least someone took the time to mold it.

In any case, I recently visited the mother land of candles--the Yankee Candle factory and main store. Let me try to describe.

The Yankee Candle main store is a lot like a store in Disney Land, except not as repressed. It is honestly like walking into some toy makers workshop on top of one of the swiss alps. There are displays that boggle the mind. For instance, the store is now displaying about sixty different Christmas villiage sets, and each set is erected so that you feel as though you are standing in some giant jigsaw panorama of eras of Christmas town. Except that this isn't Christmas town. You wouldn't call an urban environment with that many buildings a town. It's a metropolis, complete with gondolas climbing moutains leading up to even quainter villiages and a train that runs the entire circuit of the room with stops in Santa's Villiage Christmas, Victorian London Christmas Villiage, Simpson Christmas Land, ancient Bethelaham, and Norman Rockwell Christmas villiage. All scales are represented. Every friendly character has a figurine. Every domicile costs between $80-120.

Many of you may know that just after Christmas is my favorite time of the year. Mainly because all of these quaint little villiage components are cut to 25% of their price, and that can only mean one thing. Warhammer 40k battle on an ice planet!!!, but let's face it that's not going to happen at the Yankee Candle Company. This is high end stuff.

Meanwhile, as Christmas is a-coming. You must also realize that Yankee Candle Company has all manner of decorations. My favorite, and Lynn will attest that she hates them, are the Edward Gorey-esque crazy ass animal freak ornaments. Basically, think Nightmare Before Christmas. Fish dressed in Santa Hats with legs that are thin and 6" long. Freaky. Frog princes. Elephants on long spindly appendages. Clocks melting. You get the idea. Lynn was actually disturbed by them. She did not want to be in the same room as these things. I cannot for the life of me imagine people hanging them from their tree unless they were trying to scare their children away from Christmas by instilling deep seated psychosis.

Anyways, my favorite part of the Yankee candle company is the toy store, or more precisely, just before the toy store and just outside of Santa's Villiage. There is a castle wall about twenty feet high, surrounded by a lit up moat complete with water falls. Beyond this lies this strange soundtrack straight out of Little Nemo: Adventure is Slumerland, and behind you is the thirty foot tall display of nativity scenes. I'm not kidding you on this: the castle wall is huge, and did I mention the moat?

All in all, the store is the size of a small mall. Lynn and I walked around it for about two hours looking at all things either Yankee or Candle. They have kitchen stores, an animatronic band that plays every half hour or so, ornaments, bed sets, build your own candle stations, a country crockerie place, a gift shop, a toy shop, and oh yeah, candles.

Now, about the candles. I have noticed that candle smells have recently branched out from food to general atmosphere. Sure anybody can get apple cider right, but how about the smell just before a thunderstorm. That's a little harder. But Yankee Candle has done it. Within reason. I mean, they don't have a smell for every occasion, but then who wants, "Just Prior To Being Submerged In Lava?" and I think we can all agree, "wind changing directions across the near by Sewer Treatment Facility," may not be the best choice either (though I'm sure it would cover the smell of ass mentioned earlier).

This move of candle scents away from food, however, got me thinking, and I think I may have come up with a new line for the Yankee Candle company. Bear with me on this folks, but what about "white glue," "rubber cement," "Sharpee." Hell, I bet they'd see an increase in sales just by adding candles that smell like gold paint. Well, I feel I've finally done my part for the industry that finally brought us back pre-electric light (and the business ploy of the 700% mark up).