- I have to say, even on a simple design and aesthetic level, I pretty much hate this new Twilight-inspired cover for Wuthering Heights. And that’s even before you throw in all the kind of sad cross-marketing with Stephanie Meyer’s books — which, as near as I understand these things, are pretty bad:
Quite what Emily Brontë would make of it all is anyone’s guess, although she would probably be quite gratified to actually have her name on the latest editions of Wuthering Heights – like her sisters, in her early career she adopted a male-sounding name, Ellis Bell, to overcome the prejudice against women writers. There’s a fair chance, though, that she might be spinning in her grave at the thought that her work is best marketed with the intimation that it is a pale imitation of Stephenie Meyer. And that’s not a course of action which is to be encouraged, given the latest publishing fad for mashing up classic texts, re-inventing them as gory horror stories, and flogging them to the Twilight generation.
I must add, however, that I have no great fondness for Wuthering Heights, which I quit reading about halfway through. Like Jessa Crispin, I worry about young girls swooning over Heathcliff just about as much as over Edward. These are not exactly healthy relationships, ladies.
- I liked Eat Pray Love both more and less than I expected to. It’s often wildly self-indulgent, whiny, and desperate in its new-agey-ness, but those are all complaints the book levels against itself throughout, and it’s often incredibly engaging, so… But honestly, I don’t know if I’m up for a sequel.
- I can’t say I agree with all of Quentin Tarrantino’s picks for top 20 films (since 1992) — I think Unbreakable is underrated, and arguably Shyamalan’s best movie, but masterpiece of our time? Not hardly — but he thinks intelligently and not at all pretentiously about movies. Here’s a man just madly in love with the medium, warts and all. (Also a man, if I’m not mistaken, physically morphing into Charles Nelson Reilly.) [via]
- Every time I read an interview with director Eli Roth, I feel like I’m getting one step closer to breaking down and finally watching Hostel. The movies he makes don’t really appeal to me, at least on the immediate and visceral level, but he speaks passionately and intelligently about them and the genre.
- And finally, via Gerry Canavan comes this (I wish) surprising statistic: 62% of Republicans say the government should stay out of Medicare. Which really does “[illustrate] the profound levels of ignorance that currently interfere with the debate over health care…”
movies
“Future events such as these will affect you in the future.”
Last night, three fellow cappers and I went to see Rifftrax Live in Union Square, allegedly the first theater in the nation that sold out for their simulcast riffing of Plan 9 from Outer Space. I’d never seen the movie in its entirety before — just bits and pieces, and then a big block of it earlier this week when I discovered Netflix had it online — so it was a blast seeing it on a big screen in a crowded theater. It’s such an endearingly awful movie, obviously made with a huge amount of love and excitement by Ed Wood, if not even the tiniest shred of talent or ability. For a movie that is so terrible — “the Citizen Kane of bad movies” — it really doesn’t drag at all, and I think it could be genuinely entertaining even without three really funny guys making fun of it on the side.
But Mike Nelson, Kevin Murphy, and Bill Corbett did a great job, first with a really terrific short — “Sorry, Fort Worth!” — and then the feature, really bringing their A material, a script you can tell they’ve been honing for awhile. It was also great to see and hear Jonathan Coulton do a couple of songs (and help out with another), and you definitely got the sense that some people were going to go home after the show and look him and his music up.
Speaking of going home, I didn’t make it there until sometime after midnight, just missing the first subway uptown from Union Square — no Metro card, and long lines at malfunctioning machines — and then having to wait around Penn Station for half an hour until my train showed up. It gave me time to chat with some of the station’s late-night drunks and transients, particularly the one gentleman who, instead of just asking me for some money, wanted to give me a story about how he’d just gotten out of prison for…well, something cocaine-related, though it wasn’t entirely clear what. I was happy to give him a dollar, especially if it meant he’d wander off and bother someone else. He had the unmistakable scent of alcohol on him, plus the look of a man whose good humor and gregariousness could turn to violence, so I just wanted to escape with my book to another (more crowded) section of the station. He, of course, wanted to fist-bump me in thanks for the dollar and to ask me about the book. When I told him it was a book about gardening, I don’t think he approved. But at least that seemed to end the conversation, and he walked off to the Amtrak station upstairs.
Those few moments of weirdness — plus the disgusting heat in Manhattan, especially in the subway — notwithstanding, I had a great evening, and I’m definitely glad I went.
Friday various
- I think it’s great that Monty Python is being honored for outstanding contribution to film and television, and I hope some or all of the show is recorded and made available. But I can still remember when Python reunions were rare events, and a little part of me kind of misses that. That said, when I read the award ceremony would be held in New York, I absolutely did wonder about the possibility of getting tickets. (Unlikely, I know, and probably just as well. That’s the evening of my sister’s wedding rehearsal — which, as a groomsman and her brother, I should probably attend.)
- Speaking of comedy reunions, the Kids in the Hall are get back together again…for a murder mystery miniseries? It sounds interesting if nothing else.
- Remaking Yellow Submarine? In “that creepy 3-D motion-capture technology” used in The Polar Express and Beowulf? Okay, Robert Zemeckis needs to be stopped.
- So you say you’ve never read Bradley Denton’s award-winning SF novel Buddy Holly is Alive and Well on Ganymede, and you’d like to do so before the movie version comes out? Well, Mr. or Ms. Hypothetical-Type-Person, you’re in luck: Denton is making a free, Creative-Commons-licensed copy available at his website. (And at ManyBooks.net.) It’s been years since I read the book, but I remember being pleasantly surprised at the time. I think it’s time I re-read it.
- And finally, ladies and gentlemen, the Batman fish. Whatever happened to the gilled crusader? [via]
Wednesday various
- Molly Ringwald remembers John Hughes:
Eventually, though, I felt that I needed to work with other people as well. I wanted to grow up, something I felt (rightly or wrongly) I couldn’t do while working with John. Sometimes I wonder if that was what he found so unforgivable. We were like the Darling children when they made the decision to leave Neverland. And John was Peter Pan, warning us that if we left we could never come back. And, true to his word, not only were we unable to return, but he went one step further. He did away with Neverland itself.
- The Daily Show Is Now Hiring Real Reporters. I think this has less to do with a desire for verisimilitude at The Daily Show, or a blurring of the lines between real and fake news, and more to do with somebody over at the show just finding Radosh smart and funny. The piece he says first caught their interest, after all, is amusing, and it does a good job of laying out the absurdity of the political situation. The Daily Show is best at providing commentary and context. Millions of Americans may get their news from John Stewart, but I don’t think this signals their intention of doing independent, investigative reporting. I could be wrong, though. [via]
- The first rule of Write Club… John C. Wright’s rules for writers are as good as any I’ve ever read. [via]
- I love these lesser-known editing and proofreading marks and plan to use them at every opportunity I get. [via]
- And finally, while everybody’s making a big deal about this upcoming Sesame Street Mad Men parody, it really hasn’t struck me as so far outside their norm. After all, if Sesame Street can parody Desperate Housewives and Law & Order, why not this?No, what I found oddly compelling was a bit from this report on the parody plans:
The panel was introduced with a clip with President Barack Obama, saying, “This video is brought to you by the number 40.” Along with TBS’ George Lopez talk show, this is the second program featured at press tour that’s nabbed an intro clip from the president leading some critics to say, “enough already.”
I can see the President introducing Sesame Street — it’s an educational institution — but George Lopez’s talk show? Surely the Commander in Chief has better things to do with his time.
What I do find interesting about the Sesame Street parodies, overall, is that the show has increasingly skewed younger, aiming more squarely at pre-schoolers than in its earlier days. (One could argue this started with Elmo, but it was all but inevitable as more edutainment options became available outside Seasame Street.) Yet these parodies skew way beyond pre-school. The show is courting two very different audiences, while increasingly widening the gap between them.
Friday various
- It’s the obvious joke, but you couldn’t pay me to watch Fox News. I’m dubious about the efficacy of any pay wall, much less one proposed by Rupert Murdoch. Heck, I was disturbed enough to learn that Bill O’Reilly was the recent Career Day Keynoter at my old high school. (He’s also an alum.) [via]
- Aw man. First Farrago’s Wainscot and now Jim Baen’s Universe. Sometimes, it can seem like not a day without another short fiction marketplace closing. Honestly, the main thing that keeps Kaleidotrope running (beyond my own enjoyment at putting it together) is me turning a blind eye to exactly how much each issue costs me. (It’s a couple hundred dollars, let’s say that. And that’s even though I pay my writers next to nothing.) Sad to see these two markets close.
- Still, here’s some good news: Scott Westerfeld’s terrific YA novel Uglies is now available as a free e-book. And non-US readers needn’t worry: though publisher asks for a US zipcode, as Westerfeld says, that’s really just five numbers.
- Generally, I like Richard Corliss (or have never really seen any reason to dislike him, in the few times I’ve run across his work), but he really doesn’t know what he’s talking about in his criticism of Netflix.
- And finally, although I can’t be at Worldcon, John Scalzi explains the Hugos.