W2 - Wendy to the Second Power

First Night Austin

2010-01-04T03:40:13Z

I got stood up for First Night Austin, but went by myself anyway. It's actually the 5th year* of this event; a funky, local-themed celebration downtown on New Year's evening. I'd resisted going until now because it happens around and on (!!) my office building. Just cannot get excited about driving downtown to that area on my days off... but I did this year.

Oddly, I think I missed some of the cooler stuff of FN. I know from posts on friends' blogs in years past that it was a kind of local, family version of Burning Man. People would dress up, make fantastic games or vehicles, and make it a wild street party. Didn't see much of that this year. But! The norther came in at 5pm and by 8pm I was shivering and wind-blown and the parade was over. I left early, and didn't even watch them burn the thing they built inside a column to burn. (Last year, it was a clock tower of balsa wood. This year that column was empty when I checked it out...)

So it was pretty tame in what I saw. Mostly because it was early, and partly because it was sponsored by HEB. There were three stages at City Hall, which is next door to my office building, and a stage or area right on 1st Street Bridge, and then the big stage they always set up for any event on Auditorium Shores. So lots of live music and dancers. HEB had a couple of tents where you could make your own Mad Hat, like Alice's Mad Hatter. But the hats were just HEB grocery bags with stuff drawn and pasted on, so more goofy and promotional than zany. However, I did score a bagpipe band! The Capitol City Highlanders were marching down the bridge, and stopped and played. Bagpipe bands were something goulo and I shared a love of... These guys did fine, despite the crazy wind.

Stood in front of my very building on Cesar Chavez St for the Grand Procession. It was a funky parade mostly composed of local neighborhoods performing, art cars, jugglers, hoopers, and the pipe band again. Since we didn't have enforcers on the street, idiot people massed in the center area, causing problems and making it hard for us to see. Really, must've seen a half-dozen people on unicycles and strange vehicles shriek to a stop at the way the road width was halved. I was determined to see the Viking ship, which was not so authentic or arty, but did deserve a round of applause for hooking up the oars so that rowing turned the wheels and propeled the thing. My brother is a Viking nut, and he would've appreciated the 12-16 guys working the boat.

Strange, arty chimenea. In person, the fire jumped around in an almost electronic way. Since it was somewhat warm, it got crowds later when the sun went down. (That's my office building on the left.) (And a guy wearing one of the silly HEB bag hats by the chimenea.)

The bag pipe band; with one really tubby but flamboyant drummer and one weirdly tall drummer (in that his head was small, shoulders a little bigger, waist normal size, then his legs were massive tree trunks)

This was a small glass building right outside my office. I saw kids and people flocking to it, and jumping around erratically. When I investigated, I found a woman with paper wishes clipped to strings outside the structure. You wrote your 2010 wishes on the paper, and she burned them on a flame inside the structure and the smoke went into a bubble machine. Everybody was chasing the smoke bubbles, which were all uniformly ping-pong-ball sized. When you touched one, or it hit the ground or a tree branch or whatever, it popped and smoke trailed.

Then I got home, watched TV, drank screwdrivers and listened to firecrackers until midnight. Did the Latino thing of eating 12 grapes in 12 seconds and making 12 wishes just before the clock struck. Should've tried to find a party, but I was beat. And so begins a New Year!

*Boston, Tampa and other cities have done this First Night for years, even decades

2009 Reviewed - the Aughts Jeered

2010-01-02T21:04:13Z

Such a hard year! But I made a point of being grateful for any successes or progress, part of what I'm promising to do more of in the new year. Like in 2009, I:

Did yoga at least 4 times per month.
Signed up for a gym, and went 4-10 times per month. Right through August, when I had the extended trip to Hawaii and came back tired and busy.
Despite not slimming down from use of said gym, bummer, I did get healthier. The couple of times I went in December, after only doing yoga, my heart rate stayed strong and low.
Wrote a whole chapter of my supernatural mystery novel, plus a reasonable (if overly general) synopsis. Did it to enter in the HWC.
Made it to Hawaii for the HWC, despite vacation-time shortages and unexpected major household expenses. Normally, I'd freak out over $$$ and cancel things. Resisted that urge!
Finished my first true comedy script and entered it in 5 screenplay contests. My first new script in 3 years!
Reduced my soft drink and caffeine consumption from multiple drinks per day to 2 Dr Peppers and 3 mocha lattes a week.
Drank a lot more water! (Because I didn't have the mugs of other stuff sitting on my desk at work).
Bought (local whenever possible) veggies and fruit and ate at least 3 servings on most days.
Paid off my car loan 2 years early (despite the trip and household expenses). That put me in the situation of having no debt no more, except for my mortgage.
Increased the amount of money I send to my family in South Austin each month.
Shopped thoroughly and found just the right new (leather!) sofa and loveseat, good quality at a good price. And by giving my old set to my brother, turns out I've helped mitigate his low-back problems from his old, spring-shot furniture.
Made most of the monthly and biweekly meetings of my several writers group: SlugTribe, Austin Screenwriters Group, Austin Cats, Austin Writergrrls.
Coordinated and project managed a very ambitious and successful weekend workshop with screenwriter guru Michael Hauge.
Read and judged scripts for the Austin Film Festival. That's 70+ scripts + 30 "no" scripts. Even though crazy busy. A thing to be proud of, even if it didn't help to network me with the new contest coordinator Alex, who blackballed me from ever judging again. (Oh, and somehow only managed to pass on to semifinals a fraction of scripts by women writers. Really, he and his coterie sent a shamefully small % of female-authored screenplays to the Hollywood judges. But the Hollywood judges? They pretty much awarded 50:50 on the winners of the categories between guys & girls. heh)

But looking back over 2000-2009, I have to say it was probably the worst 10 years of my life. So awful for me, friends and family. Not to go into details, but that hideous decade included:

people getting cancer, having heart problems, accidents with permanently disabling results
and dying from them in some cases
people losing their jobs, their savings, declaring bankruptcy
people with jobs losing salary and vacation benefits
people losing their department to the machinations of a megalomaniac coworker
people getting so unhappy with jobs they quit without a new one to jump to
people going to prison
people losing their children, especially heartbreaking when it's the death of an infant
people spinning off into depression and drugs
people divorcing or otherwise just splitting up
people having to survive 8 years of insane, conservative republican leadership
attacks of terrorism
attacks on basic human rights by our own government

So I say: hear hear to surving the aughts! And let's make the new decade better and shinier and healthier for all!

UP IN THE AIR, a movie review

2009-12-30T04:59:30Z

How I love me some George Clooney! I was flabbergasted at a coworker who says she doesn't find him and his dark hair and big brown eyes the least bit attractive. She likes icy blue eyes and pale hair. Yuck!

What's cool about GC is that he's not only charming and handsome, but he's deep. And he's one of the best (the only?) top-drawing actors right now who can portray smarmy and still be endearing, and show internal emotional damage, and not appear stage-y. Cary Grant had that ability; seems we only get one every 2-3 generations. And I love GC's politics and activism, so I'm happy to buy tickets to his movies to support his ability to support my causes.

Which is all part of why I liked (didn't love) UP IN THE AIR. Jason Reitman, who did such a good job directing JUNO, gets a lot of good moments and cinematic metaphors of isolation, coldness and bleakness into this story of a man who's traveling for his hideous job 320 days out of every year. The hideous job: cutting lose the folks who've been laid off. He's the consultant big companies bring in to calmly and charismatically give you the bad news and try to spin it like they've done you a favor. With the economy and unemployment like it is now for the past 1-2 years, there are some gripping, heartwrenching scenes of anguish too.

Rietman did a wise thing by having non-actors improv their firing scenes. It really grounds (heh!) the drama, in a sad & fascinating way. Of course, we have real actors (shout-out to J.K. Simmons, who is obviously the go-to guy for hang-dog middle-aged characters). Plus we see how family changes affect GC's character, his way of life is at risk (dare we say, made redundant?), then he meets a woman as much at home in the airports and business hotels as him, then he gets a tightly wound graduate of Cornell he has to mentor. GC and the two main women actors, Vera Farmiga and Natalie Keener, all got Golden Globe nominations for the movie, btw. It's the kind of movie with funny appearing dialog that has depth. When a character gets a rant or a declaration, it's written smartly. The kind of movie that wins awards, so I bet they're all tickled at the results.

What made it go from "loving this, loving this" to "oh no, is that what they're going to do?" and only liking it was the very ending. Complete the character arc, people! You take a complacent character (GC is so good at playing that), then knock them sideways, give them a failure, and another one, put them in a pit of misery so they change their personality/behavior, then show us the results of that shift in some cinematic way. They didn't do that final step. No spoilers, but you'll see.

Still love George Clooney though.

Recovering from Christmas

2009-12-27T05:15:21Z

In some ways, being the home the family comes to for the gifts and the meal and snacks means you don't have to get up to travel on Christmas morning. But you still get up early to prepare the vegetables and roast beast and put them in the crock pot. (The crock pot I got last Christmas, btw.) And you spend a lot of time dusting and sweeping and mopping the day before so the place is (relatively) cat-hair free. And if you're like me, even though you can't eat things made with flour, you cook up some homemade goodies to have to snack on. Didn't make the homemade toffee I usually do, but did make a batch of Le Far Breton, the French custard card from my friend's family recipe that's full of egg and milky goodness with cinnamon on top! And banana nut bread and hot rolls. All this on Christmas Eve, plus then I went to a friend's annual party

But all went well, and the meal was deliciious and served right at 12:30 so that was successful! My gifts were successful too, which is the biggest deal of Christmas for me. Even though they were disappointing in their lack of bulk, so I didn't have the spread of stuff under the tree like in previous years. But my niece and nephew are in high school and all they want are pieces of paper (a year subscription to XBox Live and an Old Navy gift certificate). And my mom asked for a gift certificate for her favorite shop. My sister got a Dave & Busters gift certificate so she can take the 2 teenage kids out for food and arcade games. My brother, who doesn't ask for much and lives a very frugal life, had his ancient TV break on him a few weeks ago. So his holiday gift was my mom and me sharing the cost of a 42-inch flatscreen HDTV. I printed a picture of it and put it in an envelope under the tree to act as a symbol of the Christmas gift. Plus I got him 2 weird old horror DVDs. And got my mom a fancy old lady leisure outfit in black velvet with leopard trim as well as the gift certificate.

Me, got the new sonic toothbrush I asked Santa for, plus a gizmo that turns my car radio into a speaker for my cell phone and a gift certificate to Massage Envy. Earlier I'd gotten some cool books and games and scarves and candies from various friends... My Christmas gift to myself* was a mac PowerBook my friend Bryan got me at the price Apple dealers pay. It's the just-previous version, but that's okay because it's 5 lbs and wifi'd and cool! Still one big gift exchange with my pal Leslie too... I got her a nifty 7-inch TV. Curious to see how that goes over...

Then the days right after Christmas are my favorite time to freshen my winter wardrobe. Found a cool wooly sweater at 40% off and a gorgeous black-floral velvet skirt and red top I can wear with my knee-high boots that I gifted myself with last Christmas! And of course I find Christmas cards at discount now for Christmas 2010.

Would've called friends about seeing a movie today (UP IN THE AIR is my top pick) but the cedar fevers got me and I been sneezing and honking since yesterday evening. I won't disturb others in the theater when I have so many DVDs I bought and haven't watched yet. Such as.... the full season of FIREFLY! Only saw the initial episode and was "mehhh." But really liked the feature-length movie.

Oh, and I've started working on my PINKY BLACK novel again. W00t! Happy Seasons Greetings to all!

*I used to have a rule that it didn't count as a Christmas gift if it was also a tax write-off, but it was a hard year for the finances so the MacBook is it!

Filmmaker Friends -- Blaze Foley Documentary

2009-12-19T03:58:30Z

Ha, just watched a short "Between the Scenes" film made by my friend Jill Oleson where she interviewed an (old, haven't seen him in a while) friend Kevin Triplett about his documentary on the notorious singer/songwriter Blaze Foley. Here's the 6-minute film:

http://www.youtube.com/user/POPictures#p/a/A33BA51264F6045F/1/C81CinZgDx0

And then to connect up my network even more, one of my best buddies J4 has a sister Adrienne who was one of Blaze's girlfriends back in the day. (She's been with Butch Hancock for many years now.)

We're all so connected!

I knew Kevin when he was a couple with shaevel, saw him transition from programmer engineer to his MoPac Media videography business. Kevin was one of the few people who was shyer and spoke less than goulo!

UPDATE: Jill wasn't the filmmaker; I was misled by Part Olsen Productions, a too-similar name.

The Gym and Me

2009-12-14T03:21:11Z

First, the bad news. I haven't been to the LifeTime Fitness gym since before my trip to Hawaii. So... late August.

I kept thinking I needed to go, but it was so cold and wet and dark. And I'm so freaking busy! But today, it was 68 degrees. Sunny! And I had the whole day. So I went to work out.

The good news: despite the almost 4 months of only yoga workouts, no aerobics, I had a really hard time getting my heart rate above 138! I pushed it and got to 140. So the heart health I built up before has stayed somewhat!

And I figure $75/mo x 3 months = $225 is enough to pay for the theory of fitness without acting on it.

AVATAR! on the 3D iMAX

2009-12-12T19:34:53Z

Got a ticket at the Bob Bullock 3D iMAX theater for next weekend for AVATAR! I've been hearing about this film from various sources for the past 5 years. One Hollywood friend saw a rough cut more than a year ago and pronounced "industry changing." And now I'll see it on that huge, surrounding screen! It's bound to be mind-blowing. Even at $14.50 a ticket, I'm still jazzed.

I like that it's got such a good SciFi premise (travel to a distant planet with blue-skinned aliens) and a good character problem (paraplegic soldier who can get a fully functioning body again by immersing in an avatar) and a good message (we must develop a conscience to make white men stop exploiting and destroying other cultures).

I installed my Christmas Spirit this weekend

2009-12-07T05:45:42Z

This first weekend of December, I was conscientious and got my tree up and my house decorated. (Well, I don't put up outside lights, even though I paid for an outside plug a few years back just for that purpose.) It's somewhat dusty and tedious, but it really helps me get into the holiday mood! A few years back, I found teal-covered, snowman-themed decorations for my mantel. Even the two Christmas stockings are in colors of winter white and teal!

Plus as I hang my ornaments on the tree, I have a lovely walk down memory lane. Several were given to me by a college friend, now deceased, who'd buy me one of those awful Lillian Vernon ersatz gold ornaments inscribed with my name every year. Now I love the kitsch of them! And there's the one from the older family friend who gave me an embroidered ornament from her childhood. Plus the many ornaments I've found over the years to give as gifts to co-workers? I'd always get an extra one for me. Those are fun. Last year it was a beaded Texana theme, so I have a State of Texas ornament up now.

In one of the boxes I have my Christmas card list which has a few samples of all the cards I've sent annually since 1998. That's when I started typing and printing a little insert, my holiday newsletter. Those are more memorabilia. My announcements about jobs, writing gigs, travel, workshops, complaints about work. Hopes for a major screenplay option soon, or getting a novel written. Yeah, those wishes have been a common theme for decades now. And I also keep the holiday newsletters from friends, so I'm expecting new updates to start arriving soon to tell me what's happening with friends around the world.

My Manx kitty Mojo freaks out over all the boxes and unpacking. But once the Christmas tree is up, she shoves her little wooly bed under the branches and sleeps under it! I think for her it's the best of both worlds: the warmth of the inside combined with the faux forest of the outside.

And this weekend I found and purchased 1/4 of my gift list for this season. That'll be accelerating fast, too!

My Buddy is on Dr. Phil this Tuesday!

2009-11-30T04:46:48Z

Look at the Dr. Phil Website and you can see her photo pop-up! Jennifer and Carol Marine co-wrote a book, NO ONE'S THE BITCH, about making peace with moms and step-moms so the whole family runs smoother. They'll all be on the Dr. Phil show this Tuesday -- click on Tuesday to read more: www.drphil.com.

Very cool! We're all so proud of her. We're having a reshowing on Wednesday night at the home of friends. We'll all bring a potluck dish based on the letter of our last name. For me:

Water (sparkling)
Wheat-free mac and cheese
Watermelon (if I feel like going to the store again)

Visit Jennifer's blog where she reports more life lessons weekly or so: www.noonesthebitch.com.

When Buffy Met Edward...

2009-11-28T17:46:17Z

This mash-up is very well done! Buffy and Twilight. And the inevitable ending if two characters got together (forget about the Spike affair in the later Buffy seasons though)...

DVD Score for the Holiday

2009-11-23T14:52:56Z

This week Thanksgiving is at my house, mostly cooked by me, with some dishes from other members of my family. So I got what will be a family favorite movie on DVD to watch: UP. When I saw the movie this summer, I told my brother and mom they would love the dogs. I myself love little Jordan Nagai doing the voice of Russell. Such funny dialog and he's so perfect at it!

I also got the BBC TV DVD special edition of THE MIGHTY BOOSH. I'd watched most of the episodes on YouTube until BBC TV figured out they wanted to get American money too, and made everyone take down their clips. I don't think my family will remotely get into that series. I find the hermaphrodite merman Old Greg hysterical, but I realize you have to evolve with the show to even "get it."

Then, because I'm a Jane Austen completist, I got the 2005 PRIDE & PREJUDICE. Man, it's awful. Not so awful I wouldn't buy it, and I'm almost always intrigued by how Joe Wright films things (will remain permanently amazed at ATONEMENT). Mostly I'm a fan of Keira Knightley too, with her gorgeous face and upper class drawl.

But the adaptation just removes whole characters the plot needs, and makes over relationships elsewhere. The casting -- like Brenda Blevyn and Donald Southerland for the parents, the bland Jenna Malone as bad sister Lydia -- is sometimes crappy. And having the intensely sharp-minded and socially aware Eliza Bennett drop her jaw, roll her eyes and snort, then go carvorting off around town and field with no bonnet or gloves, it's awful. Keira looks drab, dull, and distractingly flat-chested. Then they end with her fingering the naked calf of Mr. Dorsey who's standing barefooted on their balcony. Yuck.

But now I haz that one too. For me, the perfection of the 1995 BBC series with the hot Colin Firth can never be equaled. I love how Sue Birtwhistle does period stuff!

Visitors Visitin'

2009-11-15T18:24:09Z

Since hooking up with goulo and a2na on Friday lunch at Magnolia Cafe -- where I saw Bryan, the screenwriter who was the only other person from Austin at the Hawaii Writers Conference that I identified -- they've been here for a few nights. Lots of activities with and without them this weekend, so it's being a crazily social few days. Whew!

Had a fun dinner with about 16 folks at Madras Pavillion, which included cow-orkers from Russ's old employer, UD. Including Cow! Also J4, FredS and Clayton. And always good to see martang and Jeffles, plus others from the Russcon days. I ordered what turned out to be 10 little bowls of different vegetarian dishes with mysterious ingredients. Some very tasty! Some so orange that I feared they were made with (despicable!) yams. I got to share most of them when I got full early on, and I was wise to avoid yam-colored foods.
Got my car back early Saturday morning! Finally! And the local insurance adjuster had called me at 4:05 p.m. Friday as I was about to go into a meeting and told me this was the last day for the rent car. I had to point out the North Austin body shop closed at 5:00 p.m. and I was downtown. He grudgingly extended the car for one more day. Then when I got my car, the body shop said they'd had to wait to call me because the adjuster was so late getting there with the check, and they won't release until all funds are paid--!! They'd also told him he was crazy to expect me to pick it up that day, and were concerned about the rental car. All this he knew when he called me trying to psyche me out of that last legal day. What a prince. Still, sure is nice to be driving the Prius again, after a month.
Then took R&A to the Farmers Market at Burger Center Saturday morning, lots of booths with food and drink, and Anna bravely drinks and ingests anything that's remotely vegetarian. There was live music, lots of people with dogs on leashes. I got locally grown green beans and 4 satsumas, which I'd been curious about since they're promoted as citrus you can grow at home.
R&A went off with a UD friend for the afternoon and I was free in time to connect with my progressive women's group for lunch. Many friends I see once a month there to catch up with; others I see more often and they're fun as well.
Then last night, R&A treated me to a dinner and a movie to thank me for hosting them! Now that Russ is vegan, it's harder to find places, and Anna asked that we not do Thai for the 100th time. So I took them to the Asian Center on N.Lamar, and, after a false start at a Vietnamese restaurant that didn't smell or feel right, we went to another of the dozen Asian restaurants there, this one the Korean Grill. They loved the food! All the bowls of vegetables, almost all of them vegetarian, were popular. The owner was a trip, a Korean-American man with a poker face who kept doing crazy teasing. Then killed time at Barnes & Nobles, then on to see the late show of AN EDUCATION. Interesting, well-made movie. Would I give it an A? For me it was B or B+.
This morning, R&A are off brunching with willyumtx and Clayton. I'm about to run errands. This afternoon we'll check out shaevel's house, which I haven't seen for a couple of years. Then they're off for the evening at a board-gaming party and I hope to write some on my novel.

It's fun having them! They move on to another domicile tomorrow, and then leave Austin on Wednesday, not to return for probably another two years...

Company Coming: So Begins the Trek of the Litter Box

2009-11-11T18:07:17Z

Not surprisingly, I found years ago that a good place to keep the cats' bathroom necessities was in my guest bath. So the guest tub holds their litterbox, set upon a bed of newspapers, with a plug over the drain just in case grains of stuff filter down.

But goulo and a2na are coming this week! All the way from Poland! For three nights at my house! And they need their own bathroom. Luckily, the guest room is right next to the guest bath. Over the years, several friends have found that handy. Especially since my room and my bathroom are on the other side of the house.

But the cats, they've got to share now. They're very conscientious about their litterbox, and rarely make mistakes. But now that box location has to be moved. So here's what I do 3-4 days before company arrives...

First, the box can't be fresh litter. Of course I scoop it daily! But it has to have a little funk built up to remind the cats where it is...

Because second, the littlerbox comes out of the tub and lives for a day on the floor of the bathroom. Next day, it moves to the hallway. Next day it moves further down the hallway. Final day, it's placed in my home office, in the corner. And all of this is done with copious amounts of newspaper covering the surrounding area.

The process of going back into the tub only takes 1 day. They just need one interim step to transition back to that familar locale.

NOTICE: For LJ readers who don't already know, we're having a group dinner with Russ and Anna this Friday, 7:00 p.m. at the Madras Pavillion, 183 and Burnet. Followed by hanging out at my house if so inclined.

Aether Paranormal + House of Torment

2009-11-05T23:21:03Z

My friends at the Austin ghost-busting crew Aether Paranormal did an investigation of one of Austin's most intense haunted houses. The House of Torment keeps its building all year long to work on costumes, sets, etc. It used to be a smallish movie theater that I used to frequent in the parking lot of Highland Mall! But word was, it was haunted. Many creepy things happened!

So Aether investigated and found many unexplainable readings there. Spooky! So for Halloween this year, they set up a booth on Saturday nights and sold their DVDs and tshirts and promoted their Website. Now they are hot stuff with the goth-y high school kids in town! Shad showed me some photos.

Check them out: Aether Paranormal at House of Torment. Those are some amazing costumes and makeup jobs! That filthy, disgusting clown is an anglo guy under that makeup!

Ah, the youth of today... And our world is in their hands...

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE - a Movie Review

2009-11-01T23:24:48Z

Wow, this not-quite-kids' movie and not-quite-adult movie WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE has made $65 million+ at the box office as of this week. And it's sure to be a monster hit on DVD too. So, good on Spike Jonz for taking a chance with such an odd property.

The lead, an 8-10 year old actor named Max Records (they started filming in 2005) is precocious and perfect. His face, his furious energy, all just wonderful. The grimy wolf costume, just perfect. You see him on talk shows (he's 12 now) showing eerie calmness and a very deliberate way of talking. He's already acting adult-y. But in ths movie, he's a wild boy with all his emotions showing in his face. It's stunning, and surely an award-winning performance. The stories about filming talk about how affectionate and supportive Jonz was to get Max to be in the moment. And it worked!

Catherine Keener was a great mom. Loved the voice talent. You don't often think of a voice actor being filmed huffing and snorting. But James Gandolfini as the biggest, roughest, most emotionally torn of the monsters, acts through his nose too! Lauren Ambrose, Catherine O'Hara, Paul Dano, Forrest Whittaker, Chris Cooper... They played their parts totally straight. Yes, the monsters are stand-ins for the emotions in Max's developing ego-self. But in this, they're given long-standing beefs and gripes and affinities that influence the plot. There's a bull monster who never seems to talk, or play, and he's played by some no-name actor. Was never quite sure what he was supposed to represent.

Because, yes, the script was full of Jungian analysis and metaphors, with plot developments that come right out of the pages of Bruno Bettelheim fairytale analysis. Jonz and Dave Eggerton were working from a kid's book with 8 lines, after all. They did fine at having a family life set-up that gave Max angst to trouble him, home behavior that made him wanting to stay as a wolf-boy king of monsters appealing, incidents and complications in the monster world that resonated with his psyche. The triggering event, that makes Max realize he needs to return home, was too freaking blatant, so lost the magical spell, but most of the rest of it was well done.

I'm not a fan of muppet movies. They don't give me the required suspension of disbelief because I'm always aware of the puppet assembly and the puppeteer working the gears. That happened here, so I'm not saying it's 100% great. But the voice talents were so strong, that I teared up many times over the monsters' heartbreaks. So there you go.

THE YOUNG VICTORIA - A movie review

2009-11-01T01:54:36Z

Austin Film Festival had the regional premier of the well-produced biopic THE YOUNG VICTORIA this Wednesday at the Paramount. I enjoy watching Emily Blunt, who has charisma to burn no matter what part she's in. She was the snotty, highly strung assistant in THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA. She played a self-destructive American in SUNSHINE CLEANING. But my favorite part for her was as Prudy in THE JANE AUSTEN BOOK CLUB, where, in a large ensemble cast of excellent actors, she created the most memorable and quirky performance with a wonderful emotional arc.

So she's a good choice to play the young Queen Victoria, in her time from the to-be queen, and then her coronation. Followed by her choosing the best suitor for her husband, then figuring out how to make him feel worthwhile to the kingdom. She does a good "calm face" showing emotion underneath. And she passes for young Victoria pretty well from the paintings of the time. The other good choice is totally British actor Rupert Friend as a dead ringer for Albert. The foo-foo hair, the extremely sweet smile, the really good German accent. He was a babe, and Victoria liked him best from the first. Miranda Richardson was also good, and she's making a latter-day career of playing women of the British royal line, it seems. Paul Bettany could've been good, but the script gave him hardly anything to work with, see below.

The costumes and sets were so so gorgeous! And authentic -- they go into Buckingham Palace, the real joint, for a key scene. That's one of the benefits of getting Sarah Ferguson, her royal something, as a producer. But I fear that also made the story tamer than what was needed...

The problems? The script is lame indeed. A few high points, but no real dramatic arc to keep us invested. It's that thing about history: we know the result. She married Albert, had 300 kids and ruled for 900 years. I'm really surprised at how little was done to educate us about the political and historical facts about her taking the crown in a way that had emotional resonance. This was a script by Julian Fellowes (loved GOSFORD PARK) too! They resorted to white words on a black screen to set up how awful was the Order of Regency. Only we never did get a clear idea why the Parliament wanted and the royalty feared it. How would it have been so different from how it was already?

Much of the dialog was unremarkable. Yes, there was the famous rant by King William, her ailing uncle, where he fawned on Victoria but spat at her controlling mother. But other dialog, especially the love connection with her and Albert, not so great. And the direction was flat as could be. In something like this, you must focus on inanimate objects sometimes to support the story telling. You have to vary close-ups, medium shots, and some full shots. The director in this movie did almost everything medium shot. Very static, and with the lack of arc in the scripts, made the movie even more bogged down.

Spooky Writergrrls Lunch!

2009-10-31T22:37:47Z

We had 13 women for the Austin Writergrrls lunch today, Halloween. Ooooh, spooky! At the Ironworks BBQ downtown, where they have huge beef ribs to gnaw on. Scary!

But they're all central Texas women who are creative, smart and funny. So, not so spooky unless you're a de-evolved man who's scared by smart females. If so, may you piss your pants and run the other way. Smart women rule!

Update: Dr. Marjorie (she's a psychologist who drives up all the way from San Antonio) made this animated photo album of it! http://gallery.me.com/marjoriebrody#100366.

It was very cool to have so many wonderful things to celebrate, too! One friend's mystery novel, her first book, has an editor asking to buy it. Another friend's fantasy novel, a past WLT novel contest winner, was just completed and she's sent it to a couple of writing contests. I had my good fortune at the Hawaii Writers Conference to talk about. One friend is in a well-deserved new relationship with a wonderful guy who doesn't have "danger" associated with his name in any way (that's the story of another friend).

But the biggest news is that one friend who released her "How To" family relationships book this year has been filmed by the Dr. Phil Show and is scheduled to appear there in the studios in an upcoming episode! WOOOOOOOOOT! More on that, with links and names, as it becomes a real, contract-signed event.

Trippy & Fun Music

2009-10-29T20:42:26Z

First, the peppy and inventive music film:

Isn't it cute? It's CGI by Animusic. You can find lots of their music machine animations on YouTube, all with robotic arms, tubes and gears playing various music pieces.

But somebody started a thread where this clip is emailed out and here's what the story (HOAX!) says:

AMAZING!
Turn your sound on for this. Read this first, then watch.

This is almost unbelievable. See how all of the balls wind up in catcher cones.

This incredible machine was built as a collaborative effort between the Robert M. Trammell Music Conservatory and the Sharon Wick School of Engineering at the University of Iowa.. Amazingly, 97% of the machines components came from John Deere Industries and Irrigation Equipment of Bancroft, Iowa ...Yes, farm equipment!

It took the team a combined 13,029 hours of set-up, alignment, calibration, and tuning before filming this video but as you can see it was WELL worth the effort.

What kind of pissant takes what's a cool piece of art and technology and then blows all this smoke? John Deere parts, for pete's sake. And can people not see that the laws of physics don't let us use dropping, bouncing balls this way? Maybe for a few bars, which you'd set up a 100 times to get. Jeez!

AFF Day 3-1/2

2009-10-27T04:18:01Z

First, saw a very weird (and the screenwriter had to identify what a character "was" to us afterwards) movie at the Alamo Lakecreek tonight, LITTLE FISH, STRANGE POND. One of the main characters was played, with an American accent, by Callum Blue. And Callum was there in person, and I talked to him! He did a really good, soulful job with an erratic story.

Callum Blue was the drug-addled dead Brit Mason in DEAD LIKE ME. Now he's joined SMALLVILLE as Commander Zod. Because of that, he's bulked up some in muscle -- not the scrawny punk he was. In odd timing, I was just talking to my brother who loves Callum Blue.... hehe

About his movie: it had Matthew Modine as an ambiguously supernatural person. I confess I was watching the whole time to figure out who was real and who people didn't see or hear. There were some quirky and fascinating parts, but mostly it seemed gratutiously weird. And it did that thing Hollywood guys do now that makes me urp -- use serial killing for pure shock value and never give us any depth from such a horrific topic with awful blood-filled scenes. Men! But it had shown once at AFF already, and this night, out in the boonies, the theater was oversold & they had to turn people away. So it's definitely got buzz. Glad I saw it; don't know if it'll get much distribution because it has that wacky plot thing going on.

Saturday I saw a good panel at AFF with Damon Lindelof, co-creator of LOST and producer of the recent STAR TREK movie. And he's just finishing up a movie COWBOYS AND ALIENS. Also on the panel was Roberto Orci, screenwriter for STAR TREK, FRINGE, COWBOYS AND ALIENS, ALIAS, ... And David Hayter, who wrote the X-MEN movies and is also an actor and martial arts person -- and could make a living as a stand-up comedian, he's so quick on his feet. Some of the things they said were useful for SF/F writers, and just cool stuff to know.

All the mysteries in LOST have an answer (the polar bear, the recorded message in French, the smoke monster, the dead who appear, ...) because Lindelof says the weird stuff doesn't go into the scripts unless they know the answer. What's sometimes in flux is how the reveal happens, but they're all meant to be answered. One exception: Mr. Eko was part of an answer but the actor wanted to leave so they had to kill off his character & then scramble for a new answer.
Hayter changed the end of THE WATCHMEN because he was writing the adaptation the year after 9/11 and couldn't face putting a big squid in downtown NYC as an alien-terrorist act. Plus Alan Moore had his characters say such a horrible act would make the world stop fighting and work on peace, but we were too cynical to believe that now. He says the story arc Alan Moore did for Dr. Manhattan already set up the promise and premise of what he did -- he figures Moore would've ended the graphic novel series similarly if he'd had time (he was famously rushed at the end).
They all agreed that you do NOT start a SF/F script with machines in space, robots doing something, fantasy world weirdness. You must start with the human story first, have something people can relate to. Then you expand out. Like in the new STAR TREK movie, where there's a birth happening before the ship is attacked.
The strongest thing you can do with world-building, they all agreed, was put the SF/F stuff around something with emotional impact. Have it be integral to the character arcs. Like they downplayed the beam-me-down technology development because they couldn't make it important to the relationships.

AFF Day 3 - APOLLO13

2009-10-25T16:37:36Z

Crappy photo from the balcony of the filmmakers and NASA retired personnel from the actual Apollo13 mission and movie. Left to Right: Clint Howard, the moderator woman, Jerry Bostick (ground crew), Bill Broyles (screenwriter), Jon Aaron (ground crew), Ron Howard, Captain Jim Lovell (astronaut, Tom Hanks played him), Sy Liebergot (ground crew), Mike Corenbluth (production design), and Al Reinert (screenwriter).

This was the Saturday show at the Paramount downtown for AFF, where we saw APOLLO13, which holds up amazingly well and rightly won all those Oscars years ago. They lined up all these chairs on the stage afterward and these awesome people came together to discuss and answer questions. Really a wonderful moment!

From the AFF program book:
Austin Film Festival and Ron Howard, in association with NASA, present a special screening of Apollo 13! Special guests in attendance include Director Ron Howard, Screenwriters Bill Broyles, Jr. and Al Reinert, Actor Clint Howard, Commander of the Apollo 13 mission Captain Jim Lovell, and retired NASA Mission Control advisors Jon Aaron, Sy Liebergot and Jerry Bostick, who each played important roles in the 1970 Apollo 13 crisis, as well as Production Designer Michael Corenblith.

Friends Do Well at Austin Film Festival

2009-10-23T03:01:54Z

But in happier news, and readjusting my mood here, I found out a second friend from SlugTribe was also a semifinalist in the Austin Film Festival contest! I already knew Patrick Sullivan had made it to finals with his drama screenplay SAWDUST CEASARS, set in the London crime underground during the Mod era, culminating in the Brighton Riots where the Mods and Rockers had an all-out battle.

This was Patrick's first screenplay! And the first contest he entered it in! He made it to the top 5 out of 4500 or so screenplays. W0ot! He was funny today too; studying the pitching panels because he has to learn to talk about it. Even cooler, we watched a panel with Jeff Graup of Graup Entertainment*, a manager/producer. After, Patrick told Jeff he'd enjoyed his comments, and Jeff Graup totally remembered Patrick's script and started giving him life and career lessons! That's the kind of attention you KILL for at these things...

Then color me surprised when I saw that Matthew Bey was a semifinalist in the Science Fiction category. I had no idea he was writing screenplays. For him also it was his first script and first contest. Man! He described THE DORM as being about crazy dorm life, only with cyborgs.

Both guys will now get to be on special panels reserved only for the semifinalists, and also will be written up in the Producers' Book so will have several months of many people asking to read their scripts. Schmoozing will be so much easier and this contest makes them golden for Hollywood folks looking for new talent.

It'll be fun to watch how the rest of the conference works out for them... It goes until Sunday afternoon.

*Alvaro locked his sights on Jeff Graup and got him to agree to go to dinner with some of us! Jeff was on my shortlist, and Al took that seriously. Good on him!

Austin Film Festival -- Not a Single Finalist from My Reads

2009-10-23T02:46:56Z

Out of the more than 100 scripts I read for Austin Film Festival, not a single one made it to the semifinals.

The list is short; only 17. But still.

And I did read some (what I considered) winners this year.

I think this has happened only once before in my 8+ years of reading contest scripts for the contest. BJ told me they'd had some final judges that were very opinionated was the reason, and he commisserated with me that time. This year, I've got to assume the new contest coordinator might've have something to do with it -- he and I didn't agree on stuff. And he brought in his own stable of readers, I'm assuming, who read/judged for the same stuff he liked.

No wonder I didn't get to 2nd Round myself. I had no chance!

Jack o'Lanterning

2009-10-19T05:28:55Z

Flash carve a pumpkin online:
http://www.cubpack81.com/images/carve_pumpkin.swf

Click DONE and it lights up! It also says ho-ho-ho, which is seasonally disconcerting.

Edgar Allan Poe Exhibit -- The SF Group Tour

2009-10-16T13:42:03Z

Kudos to Chris Nakashima-Brown for arranging a special tour for Austin's science fiction/fantasy folks of the !!incredible!! Edgar Allan Poe exhibit at the Harry Ransome Center at UT. A dozen of us met last evening and got a tour of the "unusual topical and contextual approach to Poe's life and work."

And our tour guide? One of the men who put it together! Richard Oram, co-curator of the exhibition and associate director and the Hobby Foundation Librarian at the Ransom Center! Dick was really engaging and fun too. Told us several things about how and why you get such an exhibit together.

The why? It's the 200th anniversary of Poe's birthday.

The how? HRC acquired the full collection of Koester, the most dedicated Poe collector ever, and got a few more items from a Virginia museum.

Lots of stuff in his own handwriting, things about him by other writers, his actual desk for one of his editing jobs, early collections of just about all his works... And great illustrations! Many originals from the 20th century reprints by Arthur Rackham, some Edouard Manets... Even including some Vincent Price movie posters, and Bart Simpson as The Raven. he he

And there's a special sound effect in the mini-art gallery to the left. Walk in, walk around and it'll speed up as you approach a certain wall...

Car Damages - Shazbatt!

2009-10-16T13:27:29Z

Now that my rear-ended Prius is finally in the body shop, turns out that truck driver did hit me a good hard whack! I felt it, but couldn't believe someone would be driving that fast in a slow left-hand turn lane in rush hour.

So now they've taken the car apart, it's 3x the damage of what they'd thought and multiple weeks of a rent car. A stupid red Vibe car from Pontiac that has clunky transmission even though it's only a 2010.

I want my own Prius back! And I want #%^*@!! drivers to quit hitting me!!

In my whole driving career, I realize, I have NEVER caused an accident. Only been the recipient of them.