personal

Sunday

I wrote something today, with my weekly free-writing group:

“If there’s one thing I don’t believe,” she said, “it’s ghosts.”

He knew that she was lying but said nothing, turned back instead to face the window where the writing had appeared. Out of habit, he pulled the pencil stub and notebook from his pocket. The letters were messy streaks of dark red paint, or maybe blood, and if any of the phones in this damn house had been working, he’d have already called in forensics. The red was smudged on the glass like a kid’s finger-paint, and there had to be at least a half dozen prints in there that they could match. That was sloppy, he thought, as he transcribed the message into his notebook. These ghosts, or whoever it was, were just banking on his not being able to call this in to the department anytime soon, or to do to him and Sarah what they’d reportedly done to everyone else who’d been dumb enough to spend the night.

“YOU’RE BOTH GOING TO DIE,” the letters on the dining room window pane said.

“I know I can’t explain it,” Sarah said, “but that doesn’t mean it’s the Joyce family. It’s not a haunting. There’s someone here, and they’re dangerous, but vengeful spirits they’re definitely not.”

He grunted a reply, still wishing absently for crime scene tape, blood kits and dusting powder, his badge and his gun. He didn’t believe in ghosts, wasn’t talking just trying to convince himself like he knew Sarah was. He believed in cold, observable facts. The house had a reputation, and had earned at least some of it — three people had disappeared here or nearby in the past year alone — but he didn’t believe half of what they said about it. He’d done the research just like Sarah, maybe even dug a little deeper because he didn’t have to pretend he didn’t believe in ghosts. He wasn’t even convinced there had been a Joyce family, not like they were depicted in the neighborhood stories, anyway. Inbred mutants at the turn of the century, their suburban house a bloody killing ground. It was all just a little silly, like something out of a bad movie, and there wasn’t anything so clear-cut in any of the newspaper clippings that he’d read.

And yet, someone was here, someone other than the two of them. And everything that had happened tonight — not just the writing, but everything else — proved if nothing else that someone was very hostile.

I am operating under the idea that forty minutes of bad writing — and even if this isn’t awful, it isn’t great — is better than forty minutes of not writing.

After the writing, we went to see Django Unchained. I’ll say this much for it: it isn’t boring. Jamie Foxx and Christoph Waltz are both quite good in it, as is the scenery-devouring Leonardo DiCaprio. I think Nathan Rabin’s review is probably the closest to my feelings about the film:

In the films of Tarantino’s revenge collection, a noble desire to cinematically right (or re-write) historical wrongs mingles with and mutates more problematic impulses toward exhibitionism, sensationalism, voyeurism, fetishism, and exploitation. In film after film, Tarantino combines aggressively combustible elements—racism, sexism, profanity, hard drugs, violence against women, rape, Nazi brutality, slavery—with the deranged delight of a mad scientist, then cackles with glee as he lights a flame and watches the magnificent destruction that ensues. Tarantino remains an entertainer above all else, so his lurid provocations are generally in service of the intense emotions he forcefully, confidently orchestrates. Part of his genius in manipulating audiences lies in creating immersive cinematic experiences so overpowering that they distract from the thorny questions about race, sex, violence, and representation his films pose without answering. For better or worse, Tarantino aspires to an experience more emotional than intellectual, more in line with the giddy, transgressive thrill he experienced devouring B-movies as a young cinephile than the more cerebral, less immediate charms of the arthouse. He straddles the line separating art and trash, but his allegiance clearly lies with trash.

I’m not sure I’d be quite as generous in grading as Rabin, but I agree with him about pretty much everything here, including the fact that Tarantino’s own return to acting in the film was, at best, ill-advised. It’s an interesting film, with some really great — or at least incredible to watch — moments, but I think it might be my least favorite Tarantino movie. That said, I’m generally a fan and liked Django Unchained, so…

Anyway, that was Sunday.

“How do you trust your feelings when they can just disappear like that?”

The dog woke me up earlier than I might have liked this morning, so I took him out and then decided to take down the Christmas tree. Not as much fun as setting it up, as you might imagine, although a much quicker process, once I got the lights and tinsel off. I also took down the lights from outside, so we have officially moved past Christmas.

This evening, I watched Blue Valentine. Wow, not what I’d call a fun movie, but Michelle Williams and Ryan Gosling are terrific and fearless in it. It’s difficult to watch a lot of the time, but worth it for their performances alone.

Other than that? I went to the post office, the bank, the library, and I took a nap. Exciting times.

Friday

I had my yearly performance review today, which I think went well. It was over and done with first thing this morning.

After that, it was pretty much just an ordinary day. I can’t tell you how glad I am that it’s a Friday, though.

This evening, on the train home, I finished reading Stephen King’s Carrie. Having only just watched the movie, and generally being a fan of King’s work, I was curious about the book. It definitely feels like a first novel; some of the themes and techniques that would later seep into King’s other books are on display here, but they’re handled less gracefully. You can see how the book would have struck a chord in 1974, when it was first published, how it could feel like the emergence of a new literary voice (which is what it turned out to be). But I also think you’d have a tough time arguing that it’s King’s best novel, or even one of his best.

I was also curious about it because there’s a new film adaption of it coming this year. And this, I should warn you, is where I venture deep into spoiler territory. The new movie purports to be “a more faithful adaption” of King’s book, but the thing is, Brian De Palma’s version isn’t unfaithful at all. Most of the differences between it and the book are negligible, and mainly slight differences in tone. Carrie, I found, was actually a much less sympathetic character in the book. She doesn’t deserve what happens to her there either, but she does learn to take a certain amount of joy in it, if only because it’s the only joy her troubled life allows. There are moments when she’s quite mean, and while it is the meanness of a wild animal backed into a corner, it doesn’t make her more likable. Sissy Spacek is very likable in the movie, on the other hand, and so what happens to Carrie at the prom seems all the more tragic — and not just inevitable — because of it.

The main difference, as I see it — and maybe the only significant one — between King’s book and De Palma’s movie is the number of people that Carrie White kills. In the movie, it’s practically everyone at the prom. In the book, it’s practically the entire town. And it’s that thought, that all we’re going to get out of a “more faithful adaption” is a higher body count, that worries me.

Oh sure, there’s also a lot more about telekinesis in the book, and about the town itself — the novel is framed as a patchwork of newspaper clippings, book citations, and interviews more than a decade after the fact — but none of that feels particularly vital to the heart of the story. (It is, in fact, where King’s book starts to feel a little creaky.) De Palma’s movie tells Carrie’s story mostly through her eyes; I don’t know that anything is gained by re-framing it through the eyes of her victims and survivors. Even if that is the author originally intended it.

And yet, the new movie was directed by Kimberly Peirce, the director of Boys Don’t Cry, which suggests it could at least be interesting. Carrie is the sort of character that might benefit from a female perspective. And the trailer doesn’t look awful… I just question how necessary it is.