Crimson campy charred

It seems I am no fan of Impressionism - of vague visions, dull subjects or abstract ideas.

The Lifestyle section of The Straits Times today highlights the "Best & Worst of 2011". Dreams & Reality (Oct 2011–Feb 2012 at the National Museum) made the best list under Visual Arts. It is a showcase of mainly 19th-century (and hence mainly Impressionist) European art loaned from the Musée d'Orsay, the 10th most visited art museum in the world. Yvonne, Jinglin, Zhi Wen and I went to see it two Sundays ago.

The exhibition started off promisingly for me, but by the end I realized that out of the four divisions of the galleries - Allegory & History, Man and Contemporary Life, Man and Nature, Solitude
 - my three favourite pieces all occurred in the first. This was the historical section, with works that looked backwards more than forwards, and so was probably the least representative of (or the least likely to be branded as) the 19th century.

Heracles Killing the Birds on the Stymphalian Lake, Edgard Maxence, c1893. Bright crimson bow and crazy hair (Edit: Oops I just found out that's a lion skin). The Knight of the Flowers, Georges Rochegrosse, c1894. Kinda campy.

The Enigma, Gustave Doré, 1871. The sky glowed brightly but its glare couldn't touch the charred, pitch-black earth.

I think I love clean composition, clear focus and a striking image. We're going to look at stamps today. o_O

"Ring! Ring!" went the bell

The four cameos

In 1990, Janet made the video for "Alright", a bright retro spectacle of zoot suits and shoulder-shrugging choreography. It definitely contributed to the impression in my childhood that Janet was some kind of dance genius. The clip features four big names from the history of entertainment. I didn't know this at the time. Even the man whose name is prominently presented I initially thought could have been a fictional character. Only a few years ago, after seeing her in a sparkly green dress in Singin' in the Rain, did I properly discover the identity of a second person out of the four cameos. This is Cyd Charisse (d. 2008).

Also in 1990, Black Dance in America by James Haskins was published--a chronicle of African American dancers, largely in the 20th century. I read Black Dance in America two months or so ago, and made a list of performances mentioned in the book that I would seek out on video. Not long after, I got hold of Stormy Weather, a 1943 Hollywood musical film that was a rare gathering of African American talent. This includes, from the world of music, Lena Horne (d. 2010), Fats Waller (d. 1943), and Cab Calloway (d. 1994), who is the prominent presence in Janet's "Alright" video. From the world of dance are tapper Bill "Bojangles" Robinson (d. 1949) and modern dancer Katherine Dunham (d. 2006). Dunham and her troupe were a disappointment, but most dazzling was the finale tap sequence by the Nicholas Brothers, Fayard (d. 2006) and Harold (d. 2000). This pair had turned out to be the last two of the four famous cameos in "Alright".

The one song in Stormy Weather I absolutely fell in love with is "Ain't Misbehavin'" by Fats Waller. It has a beautiful melody and a soothing drawl. It's pretty Christmassy too.

Ad compare: KFC

(2 Nov 2011) "Grandma's Porridge"



In a word--ham-fisted.

Script problems:

• In first scene, Greatgrandmother laboriously unloads plot and back story.
• Stereotypical ang moh client felt trite in Money No Enough, 13 years ago.
• "What are you doing" should be "What have you done".

Camera problems:

• While Greatgrandmother unloads plot at length, camera is uncomfortably stuck behind her.
• Framing of ang moh client is too close-up and doesn't match framing of Protagonist.

Speech problems:

• Protagonist stumbling over "start" and "tomorrow" should have got another take.
• A few seconds later, he says, "I can't bring Rachew over tomorrow." Hm...
• Greatgranddaughter accent is wack, at one point British, and at another, she says, "We rot you rat first!" Oh dear.

The rainy palette is nice, but it gives the brand such a dreary image.

(For more awkward acting over a stiff script, check out... well, it doesn't seem to have a title, so I'll use its top-rated comment, "So cheesy i feel like eating cheese fries".)

(4 Apr 2011) "One Big Family"



In a phrase--the power of suggestion.

There are two motifs, as I see it: makeshift furniture, and intimate interactions.

Spoilers of subtlety would be the lyrics "We got family", and the final lingering shot.

Alternative finds

I was recently looking for Radar Detector and discovered the Triple J Hottest 100 series, which is hosted by an Australian alternative rock radio station. The 2010 instalment yielded the following finds. I didn't know Sia had such verve!

#13: Sia "Clap Your Hands"


#15: Duck Sauce "Barbra Streisand"


#19: Flight Facilities "Crave You"


#28: Darwin Deez "Radar Detector"


#50: Hot Chip "One Life Stand"


#55: Vampire Weekend "Giving Up the Gun"


#56: Sia "Bring Night"

Book feast

Cord was still speaking to no one in particular, with some vehemence, of the world backdrop situation. "Once Brazil has cut down a critical percentage of her rain forest," he said, "she ceases to deserve a place at the world brunch table, agreed? Likewise any taggable thrust of experts from Southeast Asia has to inmeld within the Sino-Japanese corral, agreed? And in an exactly identical mode, we have the Egypto-Libyan community hugged into Europe, you see where I'm at? You see the patternification in and on all theaters of movement? A kind of glaciatizing effect, where..."

Strangely, it was only in the middle of reading Tik-Tok (1983) by John Sladek that I realized: my favourite kind of literature is satire. Last year, which was my gap year, or the start of my gap year-and-a-half, I read a fair number of books—compared with my previous yearly average of about zero, anyway. Before, the only book I would cite as a favourite was The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne—a novel roughly as long and as funny as its title. Out of the bundle I read last year, the two books I loved the most were Gulliver's Travels (1726) by Jonathan Swift—famous more for its first half on Lilliput and Brobdingnag, though its second half has sharper wit and a bigger heart—and Slaughterhouse-Five (1969) by Kurt Vonnegut—this one made me resent war even more, made me feel better about feeling like a loser. And now, only in the middle of writing the previous sentence do I realize that my favourite favourite kind of writing is probably a combination of heart and humour—with a sobering dash of pessimism.

I've been having some sort of a little book festival this past week involving solely myself. Last weekend, I picked up Tik-Tok from Jurong Regional Library, a trip inspired by the recommended reading lists I had researched on robots and unicorns. I also brought home The Iron Man (1968) by Ted Hughes, and The Last Unicorn (1968) by Peter S. Beagle. On Thursday I purchased, from the Times Book Fair in the basement of Paragon, Pickles to Pittsburgh (2000) by Judi Barrett, a sequel to the classic children's book Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (1978). Chris said its plot is rather empty compared with its predecessor, and I could imagine so, but I absolutely loved the line art by Ron Barrett.

Lastly, there was yesterday. I had heard earlier about the shutting down of Borders and its 70% off clearance sale at Parkway Parade, but thought it too out-of-the-way. I read about it again in the papers Saturday morning and decided on an impulse to go check it out before heading for Allegra's classes. I arrived, and found more than half the shelves emptied. A quick browse discovered unsurprisingly that the remainder had few of the classics that I usually buy (indeed, the only one I recognized was Evelina; oh, I wondered who would bring her home!). I was ready to leave empty-handed, then somehow had the mind to tour the Fiction section a second time and pick out a copy of every Penguin Mini Modern Classic I could find (only $2.68 apiece!). I left with 21 of them (plus a green Daisy Miller by Henry James).

You think my little book festival had come to an end. So did I. But I was wrong, and so are you. It was still early when I reached town, and so I went to Orchard Central to pass the hour. I stepped in to find another book sale on the ground floor. Buyer's guilt could not stop me from rampaging through the trolleys. In the end, my bag was heavier by three children's books: The Real Mother Goose (1916), The Great Recycling Adventure: A Lift-a-Flap Look at Old Things Made New (1994), and Book 12c: The open door to reading (1967), the last of the Ladybird Key Words Reading Scheme (aka Peter and Jane) series.

Phew.

I love the YouTube series on the making of the Penguin Mini Modern Classics. I don't know if there will be more, but here are the five parts currently available:

Termites

Today was the last day of the MBS flash mob. Relief. Gin and KH apparently arrived seconds after our last pose.

I had (have) work to complete and so plonked myself at the Marina Bay Link Mall Starbucks--which I had visited with Chris and Jeremy a couple weeks ago. The place is pleasurably cold and happily secluded (and I liked my hidden corner table).

Hours later, I followed the signs to the MRT station, and was led through empty tunnel after spacious tunnel. Only a handful of us crawling to and fro. Felt like we were tiny burrowing creatures, maybe like termites. I imagine the sensation is even more intense during rush hours.

Another discovery: Raffles Place escalators are fast! No geriatrics allowed.

Two days before Polling Day

A look at the first ten pages of today’s edition of The Straits Times, two days before Polling Day. On page 1: ‘President is still no “super-MP”: Tony Tan’. I like the use of ‘President’, a colon, and ‘Tony Tan’ in close proximity.

On page 3: The Singapore Business Federation decided not to outrightly back a specific presidential candidate, ‘felt it was enough to send a powerful message to Singaporeans of the stakes involved in this presidential election’, that the ‘poll result could affect jobs‘, that voters should make ‘Sound Electoral Choices’. Their statement announces: ‘Businesses will continue to invest and expand in Singapore if Singaporeans make electoral choices which favour sound economic management and provide political stability.’

While SBF makes no ‘official endorsement’, their chairman Tony Chew lets us knows ‘Why Tony Tan is Best’: ‘As a businessman, I hope for an environment of political stability, safety and security, and economic rationality. Speaking in my personal capacity, I believe Dr Tony Tan possesses the best qualifications, experience and attributes, as our next elected president.’

More Tony Tan reports on page 6 (in fact, his coverage creeps onto page 7), declaring him ‘A steady hand amid uncertainties’. Sharon Au’s endorsement is not very enlightening, but I like the photo of her hugging Tony Tan exuberantly, as well as the long shot of the lunchtime crowd at Tony Tan’s Boat Quay rally. (For photos of the crowd at Tan Kin Lian’s Yio Chu Kang rally, you'll have to refer to Facebook.) Apparently supporters ‘shouted: “Tony Tan... president.”‘ (It is unclear whether there was any cheering at Tan Kin Lian’s rally.)

Coverage for the rest of the candidates includes a two-page spread for underdog of underdogs (i.e. fourth place) Tan Kin Lian, touting him on page 7 as the voice of the ‘common people’, or in even more derogatory terms on page 8, ‘Political newcomer with a folksy style’; Tan Jee Say on page 9 is ‘Rebel with a cause’, the left-winger who ‘appeals to people unhappy with the government’. If Tan Kin Lian is too tame and Tan Jee Say is too wild, what about Tan Cheng Bock? According to the only article on him, found on page 10, he is holding a rally today.

To the right of this, a short piece informs us that ‘Tony Tan slams claim of fears’: ‘Presidential candidate Tony Tan has slammed a claim made by opponent Tan Cheng Bock yesterday as fear-mongering. The claim: That people dared not support Dr Tan Cheng Bock out of fear that they would lose their jobs or be penalised.’ I find it bizarre that Tony Tan casually slaps back on Tan Cheng Bock the accusation that was made in the first place.

Girls

My favourite songs from the first half of 2011, in chronological order. Videos in periods.

Jessie J. Who You Are. 1 feb. You may complain that her vocal is too thin and sharp here, but, I feel her.

Diddy-Dirty Money. I Hate That You Love Me. 15 feb. Gin's class introduced this. Drum-and-piano hypnosis.

Calvin Harris featuring Kelis. Bounce. 12 may. What a treat this pairing makes.

The Saturdays. Notorious. 13 may. If pop is guilty pleasure, I'm a happy hedonist. (Don't bother with the video.)

Beyonce. Run The World (Girls). 18 may. Beyond brilliant. B is such a pro. Why so many haters?

Nicola Roberts. Beat Of My Drum. 3 jun. Diplo again. Pale and proud, y'all.

Shakira. Rabiosa. 7 jun. Maybe I exaggerate, but this is the perfect nugget of a video. Simple, uncomplicated fun.

14. Marriage

The day after he married her, he delivered a scolding to his wife: "No sooner do you arrive here than you start wasting our money." But the scolding was less from him than from his aunt, who had ordered him to deliver it. His wife apologized to him, of course, and to the aunt as well—with the potted jonquils she had bought for him in the room.

- Akutagawa Ryunosuke, "The Life Of A Stupid Man", 1927.

Glitz and getai

Idol got boring again. The judges got it wrong again with their top 24, except this time the errors lie more with the guys than the girls. Usually the problem with the choices of girls (and this applies to the sister dance competition) is the prevalence of insipid blonde Barbies. This year, the judges went for different, and while different is good, I think their good intentions backfired, because among the guys, there are just far too many crazy singers! And by crazy, I mean loony! And by loony, I mean Loewenstern, Abrams, Lusk, and Durbin. And what is up with the inclusion of insipid Latin lovers Barreto and Langone, and pushing them into the wild card round for a second chance even after the public has obviously said no thanks? I blame J. Lo.

I liked McDonald. I liked Adedapo. I liked Alaina. Such an effortless pro. Alaina-McDonald final, please! I liked Zevita, but she suffered from having too many heavy-handed theatrics. My thoughts were with the mic stand as she shoved it mercilessly to the ground. Great song choice, except it was reworked beyond recognition, and I only realized it could be Fiona Apple's Criminal when I heard a familiar lyric (When a girl will break a boy just because she can). Okay, her execution was full of problems, but I think Zevita has artist potential, although probably something more organic like Regina Spektor and less glitz and getai.* Alas, eliminated already.

A few words on marketing strategy. Rodriguez was shameless! But hey, it worked. She appeared in a pagaent gown, switched to Spanish in the middle of Hero (ohp! Latin vote!), and finished with "I love you mom". She left out the glistening eyes and queenly wave, but I guess she needs the tiara and bouquet for those. Megia went the route of a smart arrangement. While your competitors dance and dazzle to their doom, keep your own performance pure, simple, easy to digest. Leave an impression, even and especially if it's a false, positive one. Problem is you probably can't do this more than once. Toscano didn't deserve a standing ovation, come on. She benefited from the hype this round, but subsequently I think Nicole Scherzinger syndrome will catch up. Superstar quality aside, she lacks likeability, i.e. she's seems like a bitch.

* I've just about had enough of ten years of Idol's red/blue/green/ purple/orange/white wash lighting designs. Singers need to be less karaoke but staging needs to be less disco!

Kick-ass

There's something compelling about watching a woman kick ass. A lot of my favourite TV shows are helmed by empowered female characters played by captivating actresses. Here are my top ten:

1. Jennifer Garner - Alias, 2001
2. Kyra Sedgwick - The Closer, 2005*
3. Lisa Kudrow - The Comeback, 2005
4. Fran Drescher - The Nanny, 1993
5. Julianna Margulies - The Good Wife, 2009*
6. Kristen Bell - Veronica Mars, 2004
7. Calista Flockhart - Ally McBeal, 1997
8. Christina Applegate - Samantha Who?, 2007
9. Lucy Lawless - Xena: Warrior Princess, 1995
10. Laura Linney - The Big C, 2010*

* still running

Waste paper

The month of January was largely spent back in the army for reservice. A lot of early-morning commuting from Bukit Batok to Changi, until we shifted to Jurong halfway through the exercise. I also stopped taking classes entirely at O School, partially because I didn't want to waste a whole month's package on a few classes, partially because I felt a little fatigued. I still had alumni rehearsals for Blast though, and so continued to dance a little on the weekends.

A few thoughts regarding reservice. I hate the job. I hate how I am at it. I always forget this after getting caught up in the cogwheels and accustomed to its rhythms and discomforts. Or, when one stint concludes, elation takes over, amnesia sets in, until the next stint looms near. I still do my best. I still am bewildered by the good reviews here and there, which I take with a bucket of salt. The best thing in all these years is still the people. I love-hate people. I'm a humanist, in the secular sense. I believe in the value of people. I got to know awesome people this reservice. They become the only motivation for me sometimes; they give me a sense of ownership. My strangest, most favourite memory this reservice was of the last night of exercise. Everybody gathered at the training shed just before they were dismissed to go home. As I stood in the darkness, suddenly and slowly the faces of those seated before me drifted into view, and I could barely make them out, one after another. All tired, mute, some looking back at me. Previously I had mostly seen the twenty-plus of them in shifts and specific roles, but now in this last moment, the whole lot gathered exposed their individuality. So many people. I was stunned with emotion for a moment.

If there was one change I wish for Singapore a decade from now it would be in its conscription policy, because if I had to sum up my impressions of the system in one word, that word would be waste - not just of money, but more important, of people. Defence is again the top spender in this year's budget with $12.1 billion. I glance down the list to see that the biggest loser is the Ministry of Info, Comms and the Arts at $1 billion, a 20% cut from last year, and immediately think of Mun Wai haha, whom I met in reservice. Out of the $1 billion even, how much goes directly into "the arts"? I think about what he does best. I think about waste. I'm sure there are merits to the aesthetic of the struggling artist, but seriously, there's more than enough to go around.

News month
In the month of February, I started religiously reading the papers sent to our doorstep - The Straits Times and Today. My question after all of it is, who has the time to read the papers? I skim and skip through a lot (the Sports sections entirely), and still take a lot of time. If most people skim and skip even more of it, then that's a great waste of words and writing. Why bother? Here is a summary of the month's news in less than a minute:

Nature: Cyclone Yasi hits Australia. 6.3 earthquake hits Christchurch. Politics: Mubarak resigns. Protests in Algeria, Yemen, Iran, Bahrain, Libya, Iraq. Thai-Cambodian clash at Preah Vihear Temple. Religious violence in Java against Ahmadis and Christians. Local: Budget released. ArtScience museum opens. Electoral map released. Business: Borders files for bankruptcy, closes 200 stores in US. Technology: Nokia adopts Windows Phone. Nintendo 3DS launched.

Welcome to Precambria
Cassandra Chew, "MDA hits pause button on Aware's DVD of 2009 meeting" (what an unnecessarily witty mouthful), The Straits Times, 19 Feb 11, p. B6. MDA blocks the distribution of Aware's EGM DVD, and slaps it with an M18 rating because of its "discussion of homosexuality and Aware's sexuality programme". Just last week, Never Let Me Go was released also with an M18 rating for "Some Sexual Scenes and Nudity". I don't know if the MDA folks are living in the Precambrian era, but I honestly don't remember the sex or nudity in Never Let Me Go, one of the tenderest, purest love stories. I only remember the pale, sick faces, and the sadness. As for the Aware DVD, I suppose they endorse Precambrian education as well, where homosexuality and pre-marital sex are treated like viruses that infect naive, unsuspecting, under-18 minds, and that can be contained by the silent treatment. Oh, please.

It's all about her!
"What's in a surname?", 20 Feb 11, The Sunday Times, Lifestyle, p. 16. Sumiko Tan takes a week to think up what zips through most minds in a second. When my eyes hit the teaser headline "Why I won't take my hubby's name", placed together with her mug at the very top of the front page for The Sunday Times, they instinctively rolled off to the right, so did my head turn also, as if a few seconds more of taking in those words would infect me with their banality like a zombie virus, and lingering on the image of her face would petrify my brain.

For a long time women have protested the tyrannies of old-fashioned patriarchy, and for good reason. Just take a glance at a gallery of current Middle East dictators and have all those despicable men stare right back at you. But consider this: I think we have advanced so far along that it is now possible to be an old-fashioned fussy feminist, someone who champions "a woman of strong and sarcastic opinions", over the "subservient" act of losing her maiden name; someone who is shrill and whiney; someone I just want to swat.

Poor husband. It is declared publicly that his surname "'Quek' sounds too lightweight, unfinished and (let's be honest now), even funny." Prospects of their marriage don't look too rosy, either: "The problem with changing your surname or incorporating his is what happens should the marriage fail? You'll have lots of explaining to do and think of the embarrassment and inconvenience." Splashed across the full height of the article is a towering colour illustration of the writer styled as a pink-haired Mulan bearing a short sword in one hand and hoisting an oversized flag screaming TAN in the other. Imagine the horror if she were in the slightest way as petty and self-absorbed a wife as she is a commentator.

Her last line: "There are more important things in a marriage than getting fussed up over a surname." o_O Whatever regard she holds marriage in, clearly her column, together with her readers' eyes and brains, bears little value, is the dustbin for the less important things.

Early in our courtship, she nearly called everything off when I took her to Stars, then the fanciest restaurant in Singapore, at the newly opened Chijmes. I can still recall the wrinkling of her nose when the waiter served her a steak the size of a chwee kueh, accompanied by three artfully arranged dwarf carrots. She thought the meal was somehow a reflection of me as a person - pretentious and unsubstantial. I immediately went into triage mode and took her to eat claypot rice at Geylang Lorong 33. Dabbing her mouth with approval, she said, "Like this must marry you already".

Contrast the surname rant with Colin Goh's "A Valentine gift with a kick", humbly positioned on the same page. Instead of making it all about him! we get to know his plucky, witty, idiosyncratic wife (and not just her surname). He imagines her reactions to various Valentine's Day gifts: flowers ("must cut lah, water lah, find a vase lah, then a few days later, they die and stink up the place"), a plush bear with a heart on it ("wah, si beh original"), jewellery ("wear for who to see?"), lingerie ("you ready for another baby, is it?"). He finally decides on a month of classes in Krav Maga, an Israeli combat system, which she is thrilled to receive. He professes simply, "I'm happily married to someone I love deeply." I'd say that is a thought more appropriate to the occasion, giving valentines and singles alike a lot more hope than say "what happens should the marriage fail? ...think of the embarrassment and inconvenience." (Is she for real?)

Too good to be true
I feel like I could live off romantic comedies for the rest of the year, but alas, it is probably too good to be true. I've recently watched two good ones, but I'm quite sure the next one I try will stink. I caught Love and Other Drugs just before going back for reservice, and it cheered me up some. I don't fancy Jake Gyllenhaal, but he was dashing enough; I'm not the biggest Anne Hathaway fan, but she was likeable enough. The Rebound was even better, helped no less by the magic of its New York backdrop. I don't admire Catherine Zeta-Jones, but she was believable enough; I loved Justin Bartha in the short-lived TV series Teachers, and he didn't disappoint here. A good romantic comedy balances romance and realism, has a tight plot, and funny dialogue.

A nanny? You're not from Trinidad, you're from the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Did we send you to college for this? [Looking for support:] Harry?

You always said you just wanted me to be happy.

Within reason. This is not how you contribute to the world.

Mom, you worked for Ralph Lauren.

People need clothes.

Scrapped

I'm having fun with my item for the coming Blast concert, and that's always a good sign. By fun of course Fred the Sling-bagger doesn't refer to social interaction of any form, but the enjoyment of playing with music and choreography.

Blink of an eye; I feel like the concert is almost here, that there is little time left. I hope to give away everything I can give away. I'm taking this as my last opportunity to do so, even if it isn't.

I choreographed the item after a month-plus break from taking classes, and it was a pleasant surprise for me to see which influences arose over others.

I think at this point, the concert will with zero-doubt be decent, good. The anxiety for me is for it to be very good, awesome.

My item is a collaboration with Chun, and it took a long time for us to even agree on music. Following are three cuts of ideas that were disagreed upon, and scrapped. Following these are even more, even older ideas that were also scrapped for one reason or other.


Daft Punk, Da Funk (1995). Fatboy Slim vs. Hervé, Machines Can Do The Work (2010). This is the second cut for the original Tetris idea. Drones in a Tetris machine, halfway through transport blocks to and fro. The blocks stack up in the background, culminating in the dropping of the long block; black out. Luminous lighting like Tron. Chun wanted to do light poi and silver suits.


Daft Punk, Aerodynamic, Digital Love (both 2001). The sounds of Daft Punk's Discovery are pretty brilliant, avant-garde, especially a decade later. I tried to continue the electro theme, after refusing Chun's idea to use Commander. I think this cut left her completely lost. I guess it is weird. That's the challenge of collaboration; seeing and hearing different things. I love the tolling of the bell tower. Makes me think of gargoyles at evening-time. And I think the electric guitar is quite orgasmic. Happy house finale.


Dinah Washington, Is You Is Or Is You Ain't My Baby (Rae & Christian Remix) (2002). Gramophonedzie, Why Don't You (2010). Learning from the previous debacle, I tried to come up with something that could incorporate Chun's flair and sass, electronica, and the housey-ness we both love. This attempt however fell on deaf ears again.


Katy Perry, Teenage Dream (2010). I originally only wanted to post about the three items that our upcoming collaboration is not, but started to reminisce other items that didn't make it in the past. I wanted to do a Wei Na-centred item for Welcome Tea last year, hoping Magnus would take the choruses. As I suspected, he only found the chorus remotely danceable. But I didn't believe in the crowd-pleasing ability of the item, and so I didn't push for it. I love, love, love, love this song.


Switchfoot, Oh! Gravity (2006). I've always wanted to do an item to rockish pop (We Used to Be Friends, Gives You Hell). And I thought Oh! Gravity could be an unusual but powerful competition piece. There are many things in the music to play with. The cast of Seriously would have been perfect for this; a bunch of rascals. But I didn't have it in me to choreo the entire thing, and I knew nobody else would know what to do with the song.


Lady Gaga, LoveGame (Space Cowboy Remix) (2009), Starstruck (feat. Space Cowboy and Flo Rida), The Fame (both 2008). This was a cut done earlier in 2009 for an all-girl item. By the time rehearsals started, I wasn't feeling it anymore, and used Kill the Lights instead.

Death certificate

Darling boy, the letter said. I know that you have never yet been down the mountain since you were thirteen days old, but as soon as I die you must put on a pair of shoes and a clean shirt and walk down to the village and find the doctor. Ask the doctor to give you a death certificate to prove that I am dead. Then take this certificate to my lawyer, a man called Mr. Samuel Zuckermann, who lives in New York City and who has a copy of my will. Mr. Zuckermann will arrange everything. The cash in this envelope is to pay the doctor for the certificate and to cover the cost of your journey to New York. Mr. Zuckermann will give you more money when you get there, and it is my earnest wish that you use it to further your researches into culinary and vegetarian matters, and that you continue to work upon that great book of yours until you are satisfied that it is complete in every way. Your loving aunt—Glosspan.

Lexington, who had always done everything his aunt told him, pocketed the money, put on a pair of shoes and a clean shirt, and went down the mountain to the village where the doctor lived.

"Old Glosspan?" the doctor said. "My God, is she dead?"

"Certainly she's dead," the youth answered. "If you will come back home with me now I'll dig her up and you can see for yourself."

"How deep did you bury her?" the doctor asked.

"Six or seven feet down, I should think."

"And how long ago?"

"Oh, about eight hours."

"Then she's dead," the doctor announced. "Here's the certificate."

- Roald Dahl, "Pig", 1960.

From Cs to Bs

Ng Jing Yng, Today, 10 Feb 11, p. 12. The headline may be "Schools go the extra mile to cultivate a love for reading" (what a mouthful of cliches), but the bottom line, you eventually realize, is grades, or more specifically, the shoving of students towards better grades. Near the end of the article, a student testifies to the profit of reading, how the routine, initially forced upon her, lost its tedium once it improved her English Language grades "from Cs to Bs". If that doesn't sell it, the effectiveness of our reading programmes is indubitably proven by Singapore's number five position (out of 65 countries, mind you!) as scored by the Programme for International Student Assessment. Wait, who exactly is jostling for better grades, here?

The revealing, sinister, and mind-boggling final paragraph is worth noting. For "weaker students", reading programmes have been "tweaked" to include the completion of "additional worksheets outside curriculum time". o_O

Pictured: Morning "mass reading". In the foreground, presumably, the bespectacled B-students, reading newspapers. In the background, anguished and disheartened C-students, slumped over storybooks.

Twogger

Got a new phone today. Omnia 7. Go Microsoft!

Lady told me it has 16GB memory but turns out there's only 8GB.

My shoulders are abnormally broad for my scrawny frame. Or is my frame unnaturally scrawny for my broad shoulders?

As a result clothes fit strangely. e.g. the shoulders are size M but the torso and arms are size S.

I realized how to describe what I do in the army already: we are the wartime SingTel.

My dad actually beseeched me today to make more friends.

I think I'd rather have few to no friends and manage being alone than have many friends and pretend not to be alone.

"Maybe there's a better world somewhere. One without people." Harry's Law, S01E01.

Two amazing classes by my two favouritest - Gin and An. I was very very happy. And very grateful.

But I realize I celebrate alone. And so hm, I think - this joy is to what end...?

They made me sweat again. As I age, fewer things can make my body come alive.

Haven't experienced dehydration like this in a long time. Treating it with a diet of milk and arugula did not help.

Hamstring cramp. O yeah.

Pretty pictures

I think my first encounter with Mark Romanek (ro-MAN-ik, like "romantic") was the famously expensive video for Scream in 1995. Two years later came the rich treatment he gave Got 'Til It's Gone, and in 2002, yet another video so perfectly married to its song that its images would thereafter for me be inseparable from the music and its musicians. This was Hella Good.

Eels, Novocaine for the Soul, 1996. An indelible image from childhood.

Together with an impressive catalogue of landmark music videos, a quick survey of Romanek's work in commercials (e.g. Nike - ESPN - Saturn) reveals him to be a master of ambience, unusual and arresting imagery, and percussive musicality.

Knowing this, I would never have told from watching the film alone that the same man was the director of Never Let Me Go. Here he held back from making the prettiest shots or the most stunning compositions. The film has a soothing beauty, but nothing that crams the attention. The Ghost Writer for instance
had much stronger cinematography. I got the sense that Romanek made the film with the greatest respect for Kazuo Ishiguro's text, treating the story with the utmost delicacy. It was only half-surprising then to later read that he would even film with the book in hand, referring back to it or deferring to Ishiguro himself whenever questions of adaptation arose. Romanek has said that he didn't want to be an auteur on this film: "I didn’t just come in to shoot it and make pretty pictures. The performances are foremost." Looking back at the film, you realize that most of the time, the camera basically follows where the characters go, and Romanek frames their faces simply as they speak to each other.

Perhaps the shocker for those who for a long time have known only the Mark Romanek of short films and iconic photography is when he says, "This is the film-maker I always wanted to be, this is the film-maker I always worked to be." He calls his music videos "sketches... for when I wanted to finally take up a brush and make a painting". Romanek says the important things in directing a film are "telling the story well, and trying to stay out of the actors' way as much as possible". By these standards, Never Let Me Go is a tremendous success; the film moves the audience through good storytelling and engaging performances. I just wonder what the film would be like had he been more of an egoistic auteur. Maybe it would be easily hailed as a classic or a masterpiece. I wonder if his collaborators are at all short-changed, whether they had expected a prettier painting, something closer to his many unforgettable "sketches".

In Never Let Me Go, Andrew Garfield plays Tommy D ("a big heart, and terrible rages"). As I was trawling YouTube for interviews related to the film, I would invariably seize up with emotion whenever the five-second clip of Garfield screaming at the top of his lungs from the trailer came on. Co-star Carey Mulligan has said that his acting never has a false note. And it's true, of everything I've watched him in, from the opening scene of Boy A, to the role opposite Robert Redford in Lions for Lambs, from trashing Eisenberg's laptop in The Social Network, to playing the most adorable CPU in I'm Here (available online). He endows every character generously with wide-eyed genuine soul.

This was the most obvious for me in The Social Network, a movie I deeply dislike and dread every time I click to find at the top of both the awards and critics lists at Metacritic, far outstripping even the movies in second place. I look around at reviews to see what moved so many critics to give the movie full marks. A lot are vague, and make me suspect that these probably just clicked Like because it had 41 other Likes already. The closest-to-concrete reason for its universal acclaim I find is the wit of Aaron Sorkin's script. This is baffling. Have they seen The American President? The West Wing? Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip? I often take issue with how Sorkin makes all his characters speak in the same zero-response-time-required, machine-gun manner, but that aside, the dialogue in The Social Network is far from funny and a lot less sharp than his previous writing. More frustrating than this one disagreement, is that I cannot see how The Social Network is even a decent movie. David Fincher, quite the auteur and master of ambience in the past, offers nothing exceptionally pretty or exciting to the eye. Take the basic elements of story and characters: I didn't care for either. Justin Timberlake is horribly miscast (a real-life pop star acts as a music pirate who acts like a pop star), and interprets his character too much like a straightforward villain. Jesse Eisenberg is phlegmatic beyond phlegmatic, and talks like a robot. At first, it is unusual and interesting. On second thought, the script probably didn't imagine the protagonist to be that unsympathetic, and his relationships, with girl or best friend, are enormously unconvincing. He throws out the sole possibility of a focus in the movie. At the end, I don't know what statement the movie is making, or what question it is asking. It dabbles a little in tech (but requires edgy music to diffuse the tedium, and to combat Eisenberg's droning delivery), tries to drum up some legal drama in mighty offices (to differentiate, one is wood and geriatrics, the other is glass with a view), provides vicarious peeks into the world of the rich and the privileged (they row boats, they wear nice clothes), revels a bit in collegiate diversions (although Eisenberg's lack of enthusiasm is hardly good advertising for clubs or alcohol or fine dining), raises ethical issues (with no satisfying conclusion). On every front, there was no pay off. I only cared for Andrew Garfield's character. I don't think I was supposed to.