Pop, Pop, Pop Culture Community Established

I have begun the set up process for the Pop, Pop, Pop Culture Community. We are designated in the Culture category on the Truth Laid Bear Community Page. I have taken the role of community administrator and that means I need to solicit and delegate. So first things first, here is a list of the current community members:

1. Cinerati
2. Hungry Ghost
3. News on the March
4. Perrero
5. The Shelf
6. Shouting Into the Wind
7. The Ziggurat of Doom

I have already made some updates to the community, but the page only updates every few hours so be patient.

With the creation of a new community there are a couple of things that still need to be done.

First we need a "homepage" for the community.

Second we need someone to design the homepage and include links to all the member sites and an RSS feed of all the posts coming from our individual sites, a kind of news hub if you will. We could even add a message board, if we wanted, but I think comments sections are sufficient.

Third, we need to solicit more members. So if you know a site that discusses pop culture get them to shoot me an email and if they meet the criteria (I will post that above) then I will gladly add them.

Fourth, we need a "community banner" to be posted on the TTLB website, our own websites, and the community website.

With that in mind I am asking for volunteers and making the following proposal. We can if everyone wants use http://cinerati.net as our hub page.

Cinerati: The Origin Continue...The Last Samurai and Thomas Hibbs

As I mentioned in the first origin post, I had wanted to create a blog to discuss movies and popular culture, but in order to commit to writing commentary (even inane commentary) on a semi-frequent basis.

March 15, 2004 I re-read an article by Thomas Hibbs, author of Shows About Nothing, which really set my low art loving furnace aflame. I had to respond to Hibbs degredation of the Last Samurai and the films of Quentin Tarantino (whose work I firmly find to be high art, not low). Without further ado, here is that first article.

In the Shadow of Kurosawa

By Christian Johnson

I can still remember the first time I saw Rocky Horror Picture Show. There I was, a “virgin” watching rolls of toilet paper flying and getting wet from squirting water when I realized that I was sitting surrounded by an audience that didn’t “get it.” Here they were talking, mocking, and interacting with a film that was hilarious on its own merits. Somewhere in all the chaos I managed to watch a parody of some of my favorite classic Hollywood horror films. I had a similar, though drier, experience when I watched John Water’s Cecil B. Demented in a theater full of people who didn’t know who William Castle was.

I experienced the same frustration when I read Thomas Hibbs’ recent article regarding Quentin Tarantino’s most recent film Kill Bill vol. 1 and the Tom Cruise blockbuster The Last Samurai ( Kurosawa Kills Bill). In particular, I took issue with his claim that “despite their critical acclaim and their purported desire to be faithful to Japanese sources, these films are but vulgar distortions of Japanese film culture, especially the work of Akira Kurosawa.” I was surprised by my reaction because I have more respect for Professor Hibbs than I do for most of the celebrated “cinerati” who, like me, enjoyed these two films. You see, I think that the Distinguished Professor of Ethics and Culture is on to something with regards to America’s elites having a disturbing affection for nihilism. So my reaction did not originate from a disagreement about the merits of these films with regard to virtue or an expression of human excellence. To be fair, I don’t know what his opinions are regarding The Last Samurai as a film about virtue, but I have a fair idea regarding Kill Bill. My frustration stemmed from his accusation that these films were “distortions” of a genre “especially” the work of Akira Kurosawa.

This leads me to ask two questions. First, are these films a “distortion of Japanese film culture?” Second, are these films “especially” referencing the work of Akira Kurosawa? I refuse to address any other of the statements made in Hibbs’ article because they provide a wonderful introduction to the works of an inspirational filmmaker. Though I do think that Hibbs was remiss in not mentioning Chushingura by Hiroshi Inagaki as another wonderful film about feudal Japan.

Kill Bill is exactly what it purports to be, a celebration of Japan’s b-movies in the Chambara genre (and to some extent the Wuxia and Kung Fu films of Hong Kong). While Akira Kurosawa’s films (among them Sanjuro, Seven Samurai, Yojimbo, Ran) are great films about Samurai culture, they do not stand alone nor are they in the b-list of this genre. Tarantino’s film is closer in tone to the Lone Wolf and Cub and Zatoichi films, but he adds the bloodiness of the films of Kinji Fukasaku whose recent film Battle Royale (based on the book of the same name) is a brutal combination of Lord of the Flies and the Survivor television show. One need only watch a few Sonny Chiba (who stars in Kill Bill and is referenced in True Romance) films to understand that Japan, like America, has an appetite for graphic violence. You cannot claim that a film is a vulgar distortion of a culture based on a case study, a more random sample is needed. I think that if Professor Hibbs takes a random sample of Japanese cinema post 1970, he will find more Hanzo the Blade than Throne of Blood.

Typical of Tarantino, any celebration requires examples of a genre’s influence on Western film. So we have a perverted “Charlies Angels,” called the DiVAs, based on the Five Deadly Venoms by the Shaw Brothers. We have the exaggerated camera use of Sergio Leone used in the fight scene between Uma Thurman and Lucy Liu (the snow covered ground of which directly references the final fight in Chushingura). Tarantino gives us the Tokyo of Black Rain and Godzilla visually reminiscent of the Los Angeles of Blade Runner. We hear the theme song to The Green Hornet and Uma Thurman dressed like Bruce Lee in Game of Death. Through his director’s eye the audience sees the way Western movies, largely b-movies, have influenced Japanese b-movies, which have in turn influenced Western b-movies. We are presented with a dialogue, not a distortion, between two arguably vulgar cultural representations of the action genre.

The Last Samurai is more difficult to defend from Professor Hibbs’ criticism. While the film is infinitely less vulgar than Kill Bill, Edward Zwick appears to be imitating rather than celebrating what he thinks a film about feudal Japan should look like. The palette is reminiscent of Ran as is the tragic nature of its Japanese protagonist. The Last Samurai isn’t a film about feudal Japan, rather it is a film about how an American reacts and views feudal Japan. The framing device makes it apparent that we are watching the memories of an American Civil War veteran struggling to understand Japanese culture. The director has the difficult task of combining genre and cultural messages. How do you balance the need to show both Western and Eastern concepts of military virtue? How do you do this through the eyes of a character who has forgotten Classical virtue and is a product of Machiavellian prudential virtue?

The conflicts for Cruise’s character prevent the director from fully utilizing the Japanese cultural setting and so he abbreviates it. There are moments in the film when Cruise’s character is given advice from the Book of Five Rings a classic samurai text. The advice given him to him regarding sword fighting mirror advice from the 2nd chapter of the Hagakure (published in 1716 at a time when Japan’s Samurai class had experienced 100 years of relative peace), “There is surely nothing other than the single purpose of the present moment. A man's whole life is a succession of moment after moment. If one fully understands the present moment, there will be nothing else to do, and nothing else to pursue. Live being true to the single purpose of the moment.” The Last Samurai converts the advice into a physical representation during one particular duel between Cruise and a number of ruffians. The camera’s eye captures a perfect combination of single-minded concentration and void.

In the end though, these arguments regarding the merits of Kill Bill and The Last Samurai as examples of Western art encountering Japanese art may be unconvincing to the viewer who might believe that these films represent how we have come to “prefer sorrow over pain, suffering over peace.” To that viewer I can only offer the following.

My first example is one of hope. It is the moment in The Last Samurai when Katsumoto tells Nathan Algren that one could do worse than to spend one’s life looking for the perfect blossom. In this moment, we are told that the pursuit of beauty is a better profession than the pursuit of war.

The second example is one of caution, for it shows that man’s love of pain and suffering over peace isn’t a new one. It is a quote from the 10th chapter of the Hagakure, “If you cut a face lengthwise, urinate on it, and trample on it with straw sandals, it is said that the skin will come off. This was heard by the priest Gyojaku when he was in Kyoto. It is information to be treasured.”

If the first moment is merely a pretentious effort to seem profound, maybe we truly have abandoned the pursuit of a summum bonum. I dread a world in which it is “not the natural sweetness of living but the terrors of death [that] make us cling to life.”

I didn't mention in the article, because I didn't think of it at the time, while Hibbs is right that Kurosawa influenced American Film, let us not forget that Yojimbo was a Samurai version of Dashiell Hammett's story Red Harvest.

I Have Attempted to Create A Pop Culture Community

I received an exciting email a couple of days ago. It appears that with the new design format, The Truth Laid Bear has created a submission form for the creation of blog communities. As you know I have desired to create a community of exceptional magnitude for some time and I am hopeful that my request will be recognized. So far, I have include The Shelf, Pererro, Shouting Into The Wind, The Ziggurat of Doom, Cinerati, and Hungry Ghost as examples of blogs I desire to be a part of the online community.

Obviously, I won't limit membership to those sites, but those were the ones whose "users" I have contacted in the past about a community. I have used the tentative name "Pop, Pop, Pop Culture" as the name of the community.

Here's to wishing us luck.

Netflix and Friends

As you all may or may not know, I am a Netflix member. I am also a Netflix member in search of "friends."

If you are a Netflix customer, shoot me an email at the address in my profile and let's share our intimate movie choices. How far down your queue is Roll Bounce?

Happy Anniversary Jody!

Nine years ago today Jody Lindke and I were married in a lovely ceremony which was followed by an equally lovely, but totally breakneck, honeymoon. Since we were friends for a couple of years before we actually started "dating," it has been a swift nine years filled with adventure.

What about that breakneck honeymoon? What do you mean breakneck?

Okay, okay, I'll tell you.

Jody and I planned our wedding for a year, honeymoon and all. We were to get married at Arlington Gardens, Arlington Gardens Country Garden catered the wedding, a local nursery/small shop area that has a beautiful central area. Our cake was from Josef's conditerei and our honeymoon was going to be at Disneyworld.

But then Jody decided, rightly so, that she wanted to bring her childhood pet into our household. Our apartment let us have cats, but Oreo was a lovely 14 year old and 10 pound dog. Jody missed Oreo, who had lived in Nevada City with Jody's father, and Oreo missed Jody. Oreo was a wonderful addition to our lives, she was love personified, so finding a new place to live was not a burden. It did mean finding a place that allowed dogs and in a short timeline. We found a place and the necessary number of roommates (some friends), but given the short notice our friends couldn't pay the deposit up front. They were able to pay it rapidly after moving in, but not the day (May 1) that we were moving into the new place. This meant Jody and I had to put down the deposit, and this meant no Disneyworld. We still have yet to go to Disneyworld, but that is another story and the perfect gift for a future anniversary.

Having no place to go for our honeymoon turned out to be more of a blessing that a curse. Unbeknownst to us Jody's mother and step-father had arranged for us to spend a few days in the Napa Valley and at Fort Bragg. Both places that have significant emotional importance for Jody. It was a lovely gift. Fort Bragg, BTW, is where they filmed both Overboard (with Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn) and Kindergarten Cop (with der Governator), and a lovely Northern California Costal community. The only drawback was that the arrangements Jody's mom made started on Sunday and we were married on a Saturday. What to do, what to do?

Jody immediately booked us a room at a Hotel Casino up at Lake Tahoe (not the view from our hotel room). We had a wonderful night, watched a magic show, had an exquisite meal and prepared for Napa and Fort Bragg. Family members had also given us spending money for our honeymoon, in addition to the money they gave us for our Wedding. So we planned additional days away, in fact we decided to continue our journey up the coast and to finish our honeymoon in Seattle at the Seattle International Film festival. We drove the north along the California coast and continued to Washington and Seattle. It was a wonderful, and long, drive through redwood forests.

Of course, Jody and I, being who we are we watched a ton of movies along the way in preparation for the festival. We also watched Twister and inordinate number of times. We were gone for about two weeks in total and when we were done we had not a dime to our name (we still had Wedding checks for beginning our lives, but none of those were in the bank) and prayed that the gas in the car would get us back to Reno safely. It took us many days to drive to Seattle as we meandered along seaside roads, but we made it home in a single day. Along the way we learned some interesting facts of life.

1. The rain in Washington is very hard to drive in.
2. There are apparently no 7-11s in Oregon. A lot of convenience stores, but no 7-11s. We looked frantically, longing for Slurpees, but to no avail. We might have missed them, but it was eerie.
3. You cannot pump your own gas in Oregon.
4. Twister is a great road trip movie and pretending that you are in the film while driving on the highway is fun.
5. Jody didn't really want to go to Law School, rather she wanted to make movies.
6. Jody has the uncanny ability to make me smile, inside and out. She still does.
7. Oregon rest stops serve free coffee.
8. Most importantly, you can make a wonderfully romantic honeymoon from scratch and a spontaneous honeymoon is far more romantic, in my experience, that a prepackaged vacation.

I could go into greater detail, but you can only write so much during a fifteen minute break.

FTP Annoyances

I have decided I want to host this blog over at cinerati.net, but alas my skillz as a hacker are severely lacking. I have managed to get the information up at ftp://ftp.cinerati.net/cinerati.net/public/index.html, but not at cinerati.net.

Whoever in our community can help me migrate our little blog over to cinerati.net will receive my undying gratitude. Oh, I have made it so we can all have cinerati.net email addresses as well. That was much easier to accomplish.

TV Upfronts

FYI, I'm blogging up a storm regarding the TV Upfronts over at my blog.

The upfronts are when the networks unveil their fall lineups to woo advertisers to buy ad spots for their shows. NBC released their schedule today and will be followed by ABC, Fox, CBS and CW.