Potrait of a Loser: Edition the First

There are only a few who can achieve the status of pure loser.  Here is a photo of one such loser.  First time I met him he had one of his eyebrows shaved off because he was drunk.  He is 30 and lives at home.  He only talks to girls under the age of 23 and has no awareness of common sense or respect.  I have called the Lincoln Park Zoo to have him caged, but they won't take him.  The governement refuses to acknowledge that he exists.  He has been compared to a cross between Loch Ness and the Yetti if they had a child.

Black Swan- Movie Review

BLACK SWAN (2010)

Director:

Darren Aronofsky

Stars:

Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis and Vincent Cassel

 Darren Aronofsky follows his overrated film The Wrestler with the dark and melodramatic ballet feature, Black Swan.  It is the story of Nina Sayers played gracefully and stunningly by Natalie Portman who deservedly won the Best Actress award at this year’s Oscar’s ceremony.  The story is simple, Nina is a ballet dancer who desperately wants the feature role of the Swan Queen in Swan Lake, but the role necessitates a dancer who can portray the White Swan and Black Swan.  Nina has all the makings of the White Swan but lacks the passion and sensuality needed to do justice to the role of the Black Swan.  She is given the part anyway and we follow her slow and sometimes confusing descent into madness.

The story really is simple, but told with such originality and fear, as we follow Nina’s descent into madness.  The subtexts and symbolism are what makes this movie great.  When I was in high school I dated a dancer who spent all her free time dancing.  She didn’t have to attend half of her classes so she could be in the studio dancing.  Ultimately our relationship failed because she had no time for me, or better said, a life outside of dancing.  When she wasn’t dancing, she was sleeping, and when she wasn’t doing either of those things she was thinking about dancing. 

Nina spends the movie living completely in a world inhabited by dancing.  This has led to a great ability to dance, but has robbed her of passion, because she hasn’t lived life.  Her dedication to her art has cheated her out of experiencing many things the rest of us experience every day.  This is a part of the film I liked best.  Artists spend so much time practicing their art that they forget or just simply don’t have time or make time to experience life.  That experience is crucial in the success of whatever art medium one has chosen.  So when other girls are out having fun, having sex, and living, Nina is dancing or being kept under lock and key by her overbearing and creepy mom, played by Barbara Hershsey.  Nina doesn’t even have a lock on her bedroom door.  Her mom is her shadow making sure Nina doesn’t miss out or lose the chance at greatness that she herself seems to have lost or sacrificed.  Nina’s determination and passion coupled with her mom’s overbearing ways drives Nina out of control.  She starts hallucinating, and soon we realize that Nina’s White Swan is starting to be overcome by the birth of her Black Swan.  The Black Swan within her is fighting desperately to be released.   Nina just wants to be the best performer she can, and soon it seems as it’s at any cost. 

Nina becomes friends with Lily, played by Mila Kunis, who herself seems just like the Black Swan, and soon Nina becomes delusional as to what Lily’s intentions are.  She becomes convinced that Lily is there to steal the title role and she won’t let that happen.  Lily actually represents the Black Swan growing within Nina in real life.  Reality and fantasy becomes blurred in regards to Lily and what she is and what she does.  We, the viewer, are kept off guard because truthfully, Nina is off guard, not realizing what is happening to her.  She is finally confronted by her mother who now thinks she is out of control and she keeps Nina locked in the bedroom, but Nina will not be stopped from performing and actually assaults her mother in an effort to escape.  At this point the Black Swan has completely taken over Nina’s persona and all traces of the White Swan seem to have vanished.

The film ends with the performance of Swan Lake, and in between moments show the final descent of Nina and what extreme’s she went to achieve perfection and success.  Nina’s story is extreme, but not uncommon in the real world where people dream of and strive for stardom, success and perfection.   The story also reveals that artists need to live a life outside their art in order to better serve their art.  And sometimes we just have to accept who or what we are.

GRADE: A

FACEBOOK: The New Drug or The New God?

WAKE UP PEOPLE-

Facebook has ruined it for all of us. We waste so much time on that fucking site updating our current mood and seeing what other people's current mood is. Who cares if I was wiping my ass at 2:15, but then at 4:15 I was at Starbucks? The control it has on us all makes me think its the new God. And our inability to now live in a Facebook free world makes me wonder if its the new Super Drug.

There are those few who live in caves or on the outskirts of town who don't have a Facebook account and I sit there listening in amazement to their stories wondering how they exist. When the walk, I look closely to make sure they don't have some third leg or hoof, or maybe a tail to reveal they are not human and therefore not subject to the mind-control that Facebook has over us.

Facebook has made it unnecessary to pick up the phone and call a friend or loved one. We can just anonymously log on and check up on them. I mean, who really wants to interact with the outside world? Sitting at home on facebook alone, is much like sitting alone with a few grams of cocaine. We have all we need right in front of us and when we close the curtains we can peer outside for a moment here and there and realize that life does exist outside the confines of our computers and phones.

Maybe I am more critical because I am older and remember a time when we didn't live online. I remember a time when four people sitting at a restaurant featured discussion, not four people looking down at that glowing screen in their laps as they eat dinner while checking facebook.

Facebook is like porn without the sex. Its addictive, and takes you out of reality and into a world where you can create a new reality. Change your name. Change your hometown. Change your job. Make shit up.

Soon my 20 year High School reunion is coming up and I see no purpose in going. Seeing as the people I am interested in keeping up with are my friends on facebook. I see what they look like, what their kids look like and what they are doing. Facebook has made the "reunion" obsolete.

How terrifying is it that a website has made human congregation and interaction obsolete?

Mark Zuckerberg was a loser who sat at home without friends geeking on his PC, and guess what, he has now made us all like him. 

He controls us.  We have even gone so far as to create Facebook pages hating facebook.  We have even created events where on a certain day we are all going to shut down our accounts, but no one ever does.

This millionaire fuck is laughing at us all.  Like Lennon when he said the Beatles were more popular that Jesus Christ, so now is Facebook, and to boot Jesus and God have facebook pages.

It's not to late to avoid armageddon.  We need to shut off the computers and talk to each other.  Could the Terminator really be true that there will be a Rise of the Machine's?  Oh wait that has already happened.

Looks like we already lost the war.  Ok, I gotta run, time to go update my facebook status, which I actually did while writing this piece.

The Squirrel Incident: American Patriot Act Version 6

Its been a long while since Dr. Teeth has indulged his senses in any sort of chemical orgy.  No I live the clean life now, realizing that being clean and sober is just as mundane and obscene as being sideways on cocaine or some as of yet unnamed substance I allowed myself to be guinea-pigged for. 

The paranoia still surrounds me.  The voices still echo like a carnival.  There are eyes everywhere waiting for me to fall.  And its during those moments of realization that I realize my true enemy is not people, not they are not. My true enemy is the squirrel.

Upon exiting my car this afternoon I heard the warning chirps of a squirrel coming from above. I peered toward the sky and resting on the edge of a tree limb, bare of its summer coat, was a squirrel chirping out to the other squirrels a warning or maybe it was a call to arms. 

What had I done? Was I safe?  Could any moment be more uncertain and unsettling than this.  I looked around but so no evidence of any other squirrels.  They were readying for the ambush.  They had amassed their weapons and their agenda was etched in the cold ground.  They were ready for battle, and it was me, Dr. Teeth left to fend for himself.

I thought about running back to my car and locking all the doors, but the back doors don't lock and certainly the squirrels already knew that.  And even if they did lock, it doesn't take but ten squirrels to overturn a 95 Honda Accord.  Shit, I've seen six do it to a Prius. 

The squirrel on the limb chirped out again.  I pleaded with him to hush.  Fumbling in my pockets for some cash, quickly realizing that squirrels have no need for money.  God damnit are they self sufficient and angry. 

It mattered not what I had done to insult or irk their kind. I looked at the front door to the building which just seemed further and further away as the seconds clicked.  I was stuck between that door and my car.  If I jumped in my car and drove off, I'd never be able to return, but if I ran for the door and made it inside, I'd never have to leave.

I allowed the adreneline to coarse through my veins and fill me with super energy and just like an olympic runner waiting for the gunshot, I was in position.  In one final moment of defiance I cried out, "FUCK YOU SQUIRREL. TODAY I WIN!!!!!!!"

I darted for the door and panted once inside. I had made it. I was out of breath but I was still alive.  Those nut eating bastards hadn't bested me.

As I stood there celebrating my victory, I noticed my neighbor staring at me in worried amusement. "What the hell was that all about?"

I shook my head smiling and got on the elevator.  "Good luck out there. Fuckin' squirrels"

My hands haven't stopped shaking since.  Fuckin' squirrels indeed.  Not my favorite!  We will do battle one day, but until that day I am alive.

I live.

I Just Wanna Be Friends

Ok, let's face it all relationships end.  Even the ones that end in marriage end!! It's a fact.  But what I don't get and wish would go away is that old female cliche, "I just wanna be friends."

I wish I could Wikipedia or Google who the first woman was who said this to a man. I am sure it was what started the Salem Witch Trials.  And possibly responsible for at least 6 beheadings back when that was the "in thing" to do when you were king.

Women sit you down and tell you how great you are, but that they "just wanna be friends".  What they don't know is that we as men would rather hear, "I fucked you're best friend", because it stings and annoys less than the "Friendship Escape". 

There should be honesty in a breakup, and the friendship excuse is anything but.  When a woman tells you she just wants to be friends she really means she wants you to pack your bags and move to another planet as soon as possible. She wants you to lose her phone number, address and forget what she looks like.

And god forbid you actually lower yourself to trying to be her friend, she'll suddenly never answer her phone or return texts and when you ask to get together she'll say its too soon. And if you actually do get to the final round where the two of you hang out, you're gonne spend that time trying to fuck her while she realizes you need to leave.

I have to admit Norah Ephron was right when she wrote the dialogue for Billy Crystal in When Harry...Met Sally, "Men and women can't be friends because the sex part always gets in the way."

How many female friends do you have? Attractive ones? And isn't true you really wanna fuck them?  And how many ugly female friends do you have?  See my point.

Women need to stop using the convienent escape route of saying, "I just wanna be friends", because you don't really want to be friends.  You just want the relationship to be over, which is ok, and you're right. Just don't lace it with that crap phrase. Guys see through it and guys get pissed when they hear it.

How would you like it if a guy walked up to you and said, "I just wanna fuck you"? Sounds crass and a bit insulting, and I am sure guys have said it. 

If you really care about letting the guy down softly then dispense with the cliche, break it off, and move on.  And don't even say, "maybe one day we can be friends."  The word FRIEND should never enter into a conversation about breaking up.

Just sever the head, lick the blood off your hands and move on.

Thanks Ladies!!!!

Dr. Teeth

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HEAT: Pacnio and DeNiro Face Off

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xbBLJ1WGwQ

I was home recently with the flu and decided to watch, for the 90th time, HEAT starring Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro.  Not only is this a great film, but also the project that finally brought Pacino and DeNiro on screen together for the first time ever.

Some looked at this as a match, like in a Rocky movie, who would best the other in acting skills?  It was DeNiro vs. Pacino not only as crook vs. cop, but as actor vs. actor.

DeNiro plays the role of Neil McCauley very restrained, yet menacing.  He is a man in full control but capable of tremendous emotional coldness and violence. 

Pacino, on the other hand, plays the role like its his first acting gig.  He hams his way through the film, overacting and being obnoxious.  We know that he is a great detective and is obviously more dedicated to his work than his family, but with the level of cockiness he portrays as Vincent, one would think it would be DeNiro standing there at the end holding the hand of a dying Pacino.

That is the one flaw in an otherwise great film.  Neil's actions would suggest he'd get away although his undoing is his inability to let things go.  He just had to go after Waingro and finish what had been started. There is that short moment in the car when DeNiro is smiling and there is a bit of light on his face, then suddenly obsession takes over and it get real dark in the car as he swerves over three lanes to ultimately meet his fate.

It makes sense that Neil dies, but it seems hard to believe that Vincent remains unscatched throughout the entire movie.  Neil realizes that living life alone is not worth it, but Vincent truthfully could care less about getting a third divorce.  When his wife allows him to answer the page at the end, he runs down the stairs with such eager glee.

One of Heats great dynamics is that it isn't just about cops and robbers, but also about their relationships with women.  Each crook his a significant other, and their relationships vary from happy to strained, to DeNiro not even really having one.  The Cops also have wives, but the main focus is on the failing marriage of Pacino's.

The most suprising element of the film for me, and the one that makes me get goose bumps everytime, is that by the time the movie ends, Neil and Vincent are friends in many ways.  And Neil reaches for Vincent's hand as he dies not only to show friendship but to feel some sense of safety and consolation as he dies. 

There is a lingering shot of Vincent's face.  We don't see him enjoying his victory over Neil, but rather watch him seem very uncomfortable being forced to console another human being.

I think Neil was the first criminal Vincent saw as human, while the rest were just part of the job.  Vincent has trouble accepting the humanity of people, but revels in the inhumanity of people. 

When Vincent kicks the tv set out of his car, its not because he's angry at his wife, but that he's angry that Neil has seemingly escaped.  Vincent doesn't see three divorces as failure, but he does see the escape of a single criminal as total failure.

With such depth to his character, its amazing to me that Pacino decided to play him so one dimensional and over the top.  He's rude, brash, short, cocky and ultimately he should have paid more of a price for his personality, such as at least being shot. 

But for what its worth if HEAT was DeNiro vs. Pacino, the winner was easily DeNiro. 

Its amazing that these two actors returned 14 years later in RIGHTEOUS KILL and proved that they both could be the shittiest actors in the shittiest role.

I'd rather watch their 5 minute scene in HEAT than all of Righteous Kill.

By the way, Director Mann has stated that the coffee shop scene in Heat consists mainly of take 11.  But that he got most of what he needed earlier. He just wanted to let the actors play a little more, and he himself wanted to get as much of this scene on film as possible knowing it was historical.

Finally, the Urban Legend that Pacino and DeNiro are never really on screen at the same time is total bullshit.  One only needs to actuallly watch the coffee shop scene and the lengthy chase scene at the end to realize they are on screen together.