“Funny can mean different things to different people.” Perhaps no tagline better describes the fluctuations of sketch comedy than that of veteran gagsters Killing My Lobster. And they should know, since they’ve been dishing up their irreverent brand of short-attention span comedy since 1997. Even if, as a performance format, sketch comedy isn’t really your thing, the variables built into its basic equation — rotating writers and cast members, wacky themes, and the unique juxtaposition of the ludicrous with the everyday — ensure that, like the weather, if you don’t like something, just wait 10 minutes, and you will probably be rewarded with something you do.
The blink-and-you-missed-it one-night run on Saturday of “Killing My Lobster Takes it to the Streets,” at Stagewerx naturally included the weather in their microhood-specific roundup of familiar, Bay Area moments.
Fog, of course, and even the sun (in the East Bay, natch) got referenced in sketches which ranged topically from botched muggings and marauding food trucks to a series of wildly ineffectual 911 dispatch calls and a night in the life of a drug-loving cabdriver. Using San Francisco as their canvas, the Lobsters created a humorous collage of snapshots of city living, in a city that takes making fun of itself more seriously than most.
Opening with a brief spate of beat-boxing from Tommy Shephed aka Soulati of Felonious, (whose creative partner Dan Wolf directed the show), the first sketch featured the aforementioned mugging. A menacing Brian Allen tried to divest a pair of yupsters of their cash only to have them snort derisively that they don’t carry “money” and obnoxiously compare his mugging skills to that of robbers past, until he was forced to flee out of shame for his poor performance. The obligatory roommates from hell trope got a ribald twist in the form of an orgy, and a flashback to the birth of MUNI gave insight as to why the Richmond District has been deprived of metro lines for all these years.
Other highlights included a tearful wake being held for an amiable youth, Cody (Anthony Tupasi), who, it turns out, wasn’t dead at all, but might as well be, since he moved to the East Bay, a video of clip-board zombies soliciting donations on 18th Street, a retro-hipster faceoff which included the best line of the evening “I want to have your babies so we can watch them die of cholera,” and a visit to Blue Toad Farm which included the second-best line of the evening: “This is a locally-grown, artisanal, heirloom carrot root.” Maybe you had to be there.
Which brings us right back to that tagline. Humor is so highly subjective that conveying it adequately, sight-unseen, can be a tricky business, and it’s precisely why seeing it live is so important. Fortunately, this is a lesson that KML fans seem to have fully absorbed as the house was packed despite the torrential downpour. And happily this is a lesson that KML seems willing to teach often, the only real question being, what sacred cows will these Lobsters skewer next?
Burning Man founder Larry Harvey sent burners scrambling to Wikipedia on Friday when he announced the art theme for the 2013 event, “Cargo Cult,” and posed the intriguing question, “Who is John Frum?” It was perhaps the most esoteric and obscure theme ever, but one that I heard only positive reactions to at a couple of burner-populated parties over the weekend, including the Black Rock Art Foundation’s Artumnal Gathering.
The theme draws from stories of indigenous cultures in the South Pacific that have been awed by the advanced technology of American visitors, forming cults and rituals to beckon them and their airplanes back. As an art theme, it then morphs into our own modern fascination with the cargo dropped on us by mysterious visitors, whether they be multinational corporations or extraterrestrial life forms.
As Harvey wrote in a description of the theme that’s well-worth reading, “All we can do is look beyond the sky and pray for magic that will keep consumption flowing.” The base of eponymous Man will be a crudely formed flying saucer, artistically trying to summon back alien visitors and their transformative gifts (that is, if they didn’t already arrive on 12/21/12).
In an interview with the Guardian, Harvey cast the Cargo Cult theme as the first one since 1996’s Hellco, in which a demonic corporation had supposedly taken over Burning Man, to have a theme that he called “satirical,” although he’s quick to say this satire sparks layers of meaning as people ponder it.
“People seem to be imagine this in multiple dimensions and that was the intention,” Harvey said, noting the nods it gives to consumerism, religion, anthropology, metaphysics, and a variety of other disciplines and frames of reference. “You see all kinds of glosses on it.”
He said the kernel of the idea began with a rumination on Polynesian themes, sparked by reading Paul Theroux’s book The Happy Isles of Oceania: Paddling the Pacific. When he hit on the notion of cargo cults, Harvey said the ideas and possibilities of it began to immediately expand in his imagination.
They continued to grow ever outward as he collaborated with others on it, include Stuart Mangrum, a Cachophony Society stalwart who Harvey worked with on the Hellco theme (possibly raising the questions for old-school burners, “Who is John Law?” and might he someday return?), and the architect Lewis Zaumeyer, who designed the Man’s UFO base before he died earlier this year
Harvey said the theme prompt is already triggering lots of creative interpretations. “It’s a spur to invention. People are finding all kinds of ways to riff off of it,” Harvey said of that creative, collaborative spark that he tries to provide. “This is what Burning Man has always been about and what we try to give to the world.”
Unlike past years, when themes such as Fertility, Rites of Passage, Metropolis, and Evolution have been easy to safely ignore, Harvey said the intrigue and excitement around the 2013 theme is causing the event organizers to plan on incorporating references and reminders throughout Black Rock City.
“We want to work this in more thoroughly into the event than we’ve done before,” Harvey said, hoping that it prompts all kind of unpredictable and imaginative manifestations. “The beauty of it is it’s ambiguous even when you look at it in the academic literature.”
Business took me into the dark heart of Union Square Friday afternoon, a dolorous place to be indeed for those of us less inclined to celebrate the holidays with slow-moving tourist packs and glittery, non-denominational drifts of plastic crap. But Scrooge all you like, the kitties in the SF SPCA windows at Macy’s are the height of December glory. Feast your eyes on my overly-comprehensive slideshow documenting their glory.
Or better yet, do that and then go adopt one. You can, as local queer pornographer and nudie Guardian coverperson Courtney Trouble informed me she did just last December with her sister. Trouble’s not alone. A volunteer who was collecting donations (P.S., Macy’s will be matching your donations if you give on Dec. 14 “Believe Day”) alongside the colorful, be-kittened displays told me that in 2011, over 320 members of SPCA animalia — there’s doggies in those windows some days — were plucked from their shiny, cardboard snowflake-y surrounds and taken home with bighearted shoppers. (After the proper documentation was exchanged, and a successful getting-to-know-you process that can happen inside the department store takes place, of course.)
This year, 77 furry souls have already found a home — and the windows will be up until January 1st! Hie thee hence, and take advantage of the loveliest sight in the bustling clusterfuck that is downtown in December. If you’re still hesitant to brave the sharp elbowed-sidewalks, the SPCA has been good enough to set up a livestream so that you don’t have to miss any of the napping, staring, or sauntering cuteness.
Attention burrito vendors of the Mission, there is a sale to be made at the arrivals gate of SFO this weekend when newly-minted TV star W. Kamau Bell makes his triumphant return to the city in which he spent 15 years honing his comedic chops. He is aching for a Mission burrito like this city is aching for a more efficient MUNI system.
Culinary yearnings aside, this Sunday Bell headlines a standup show at the Fillmore as part of his “Kamau Mau Uprising” tour. The tour’s moniker should come as no surprise to those who are familiar with Bell’s politically progressive, acerbic wit.
These days, that category includes more people than ever. Earlier this year Bell ditched left our lovely 49-square-mile patch for Gotham when he was offered his own TV show on FX (Thursdays at 11:30pm). And it looks like he’ll be spending more time back east — said show Totally Biased with W. Kamau Bell just got picked up for a second season that will start January 17.
In the inaugural season of Totally Biased, Bell and his crew of writers have covered a lot of ground, exploring the differences between Sikhs and Sheiks, sweet potato and pumpkin pies. They’ve made a fake PSA telling men to stay home and watch porn on Election Day instead of vote, and watched presidential election returns with the Brooklyn Young Republicans (some of whom are not, it turns out, are not so young.)
Now that both he and President Obama will be back in 2013, Bell looks forward to holding our Commander in Chief to task. Right before the Thanksgiving Break, and just hours after finding out his show got renewed, the self-proclaimed “billionth most famous person in the history of New York” took some time to chat with the Guardian about his homecoming, and on what makes a San Francisco comedian different from those from NY, LA, or Boston. Plus, on whether he’ll ever drop a “hella” on Totally Biased.
SFBG:In the past you’ve referred to Totally Biased executive producer Chris Rock as the “foul-mouthed Yoda.” How far along have you come in your Jedi training?
Assuming that this is the original prequel, I would say I’m probably halfway through the first movie. Although Yoda wasn’t in the first movie, so I’m screwing up my nerd status, but I’m at the very beginning of the Jedi training, if it’s Empire Strikes Back, I’m at the point where I lifted the thing out and then I got scared.
SFBG: What’s Mr. Rock’s involvement in the show? Is he more hands-on or hands-off?
WKB: I just talked to him and he literally said, “I’m around if you need me, call me.” He’s as available as we need him and he jokes that’s he’s on sabbatical from show business because he has no projects right now. He comes to all the tapings, but then again he also wants this to be my show so he allows me to use him as much or as little as I want to. Overall, I’ve used him a lot less than people thought I would.
SFBG: Would you say that your show is in competition with The Colbert Report and Daily Show?
WKB: Not really, but I would say that they’re a standard that we’re measuring ourselves against. You know, I’m just the new guy who likes “Hey guys can I hang out!” We’re certainly aiming for a lot of the same people, but I think that by the nature of Totally Biased we’re also reaching a group of way different people.
SFBG: Do you ever plan on saying hella during the show?
WKB: Here’s the thing, by the time I moved to San Francisco, I knew if I started saying hella, people from Chicago would think I had lost my mind. On the back of the set, we have these designs and there are a couple of Bay Area shout-outs and that’s the closest I’ll get to saying hella on air.
WKB: When I wrote that show, the idea behind it was: what kind of show would I write if I was famous? I would have a screen, I would have a computer, I would talk about the world, I would talk about racism all the time, and I would be very topical.
So I did Ending Racism the way I would do it if I had a TV show and through lots of luck and hard work I ended up with Totally Biased. I know for sure that I would not have gotten Totally Biased if I had just done stand up. And by the time Chris saw me at the UCB (Upright Citizens Brigade) Theatre in New York, I had already been doing for about three or four years.
SFBG:Do you have writers from the Bay?
WKB: Janine Brito, Kevin Avery, Kevin Kataoka, and Nato Green.
SFBG: What’s the history of your relationships with them?
WKB: I used to do “Siskel & Negro” with Kevin Avery, who’s from San Jose, on Live 105 back in the day and I met him right when I moved out to San Francisco. We did a lot of shows together, we were writing partners and almost got hired to do a D.L. Hughley show for CNN.
Kevin Kataoka is originally from Oakland and I met him when I first moved to San Francisco, in the SF comedy scene. He actually introduced me to Chuck Scolar who’s an executive producer of the show, and he’s the guy who introduced me to Chris Rock.
I’ve said many times that Janine is my comedy daughter, who’s this little hipster, half Cuban, all lesbian. I met Nato on the scene about six or seven years ago, so I had already been on the scene by the time I had met Nato and Janine.
Myself, Nato, Janine, and at one point Hari Kondabolu (fellow TB writer) had a three-headed standup comedy monster called “Laughter Against the Machine” that we started in the Bay Area and the New Parish in Oakland was the home base for that show. We’re currently working on a documentary about going on the road last year to various political hotspots in America.
SFBG:What’s your take on the SF comedy scene?
WKB: The thing about San Francisco is that it always has had a good reputation as a good comedy city. Ever since Mort Sahl stepped on stage at The Hungry i in the ‘50s San Francisco has had a great reputation as a comedy town. Even though we’re not the biggest city, all the greats come through San Francisco.
I remember seeing [Dave] Chappelle when I moved to town, and he was already packing the club despite not being nationally famous. This is was big because this was before the Internet took hold. He was already a legend and I remember one night when he was stage and he said yeah I just finished filming this movie and it’s all about weed! I saw him go to the next level when he got his own show, and so San Francisco is a great city for developing comedic talent.
If you come up in the San Francisco comedy scene, clubs like The Punchline and Cobb’s are loyal to local talent if you show loyalty to them. You will work with the best in the business. I’ve heard that New York comics say that San Francisco comics know more headliners and have more personal relationships with headliners than New York comics do because San Francisco comics hang out a lot before and after shows, whereas in New York everyone is always running to the next thing. The city is known for having good comedians but there’s not a style called “San Francisco comedian.” You can pick out a Boston, New York, or LA comedian but you can’t really pick out a San Francisco comedian.
SFBG: How does it feel to headline a show at The Fillmore?
WKB: In some sense that’s bigger than getting a TV show [laughs] when they said that I was going to play The Fillmore, I thought “wait a minute! It’s too soon!” And time will tell if it is too soon. It’s just weird to me that it’s happening now. I think a lot of it is because I’ve built up a name in the Bay Area.
SFBG: Will you have time to stop by your old spots?
WKB: I’ll have a chance to visit my old spots and look at the “did that really happen?!” look on people’s faces.
SFBG:What are places and things you miss the most about the Bay Area?
WKB: The one thing overall that both my wife — who’s from Monterrey — and I miss most is that the style of living in Northern California is so easy. When I think about my time in San Francisco, even walking outside my house, it feels like a baby bird being born. When I think about New York, every time I walk out of my house, I feel like a paratrooper jumping out of a plane. And there are definitely five or six Mission burritos in my future because New York does not understand how burritos work.
I also want to go back to The Punchline on a Sunday night where all of it really started for me. That place is my mecca. I just need to go there and walk around the stage seven times and really reflect on all that is happening. And oh! I’ll be probably ride the N-Judah and visit my old block of Ninth and Irving.
SFBG:I know you just found out about the second season but now that the election is over and your boy is back for a second term what direction do you think the show will be taking?
WKB: My career and act has followed Obama’s presidency and a lot of comics say it would have been better if Mitt Romney had won and I’m like noooooo this black president thing has worked out for me nicely. And the great thing about Romney being gone is that now we can actually talk about Obama from a more critical angle. Now we can talk about how Obama is not a great president, we can talk about Guantanamo and immigration. I don’t just want to be a cheerleader.
Also! Check out my rundown on the Another Hole in the Head film festival, an annual event stuffed with catnip candy for fans of horror, sci-fi, and cinema du sick ‘n’ wrong. (If you love Franco Nero, John Saxon, Henry Silva, and guys with 1970s mustaches fighting in junkyards like I do, don’t miss my top pick: Eurocrime!)
Other movies opening this week include period detective flick Dragon (it stars Donnie Yen, so you know what that means: sweet fight scenes); and Henry Jaglom’s latest, family drama Just 45 Minutes to Broadway (at the Roxie). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8P0PPqUewr8
Back to 1942Multiple storylines wend through Feng Xiaogang’s historical epic about a devastating drought that brought famine to China’s Henan province. Abandoned by their government, millions of refugees would eventually die in a situation compounded by corrupt officials, the Chinese army’s demands on the region’s nonexistent grain stores, and looming Japanese troops. The scenes from the road are grim, on both small (a desperate family tries to trade their child for grain) and larger (Japanese bombing raids, cannibalism) scales — though there are moments of hope, as when rival families put aside their differences to help a pregnant daughter. (Hope doesn’t last, though: when the baby is born, the half-dead mother mutters, “Kill it.”) Meanwhile, an American journalist (Adrien Brody) chases the story with the help of a priest (Tim Robbins, working a distracting accent); after witnessing horrors in Henan, his reporting helps nudge the government into action, however slightly. It would take an exceptionally even hand to prevent this heavily tragic material from sliding face first into melodrama, something Back to 1942 doesn’t even attempt to do. Whether you feel moved or manipulated is up to you. (2:26) (Cheryl Eddy)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msSH5v6tK9k
The Collection As soon as you behold the neon sign “Hotel Argento” shining over the grim warehouse-cum-evil dead trap, you know exactly what you’re in for — a wink, and even a little bit of a horror superfan’s giggle. In other words, to tweak that killer Roach Motel tagline: kids check in, but they don’t check out. No need to see 2009’s The Collector — the previous movie by director-cowriter Marcus Dunstan and writer Patrick Melton (winners of the third season of Project Greenlight, now with the screenplays for multiple Saw films beneath their collective belt) — the giallo fanboy and gorehound hallmarks are there for all to enjoy: tarantulas (straight from 1981’s The Beyond), a factory kitted out as an elaborate murder machine, and end credits that capture characters’ last moments. Plus, there’s plenty of fast-paced shocks and seemingly endless splatter, with a heavy sprinkle of wince-inducing compound fractures. The Collection ups the first film’s ante, as gamine Elena (Emma Fitzpatrick) is lured to go dancing with her pals. Their underground party turns out to be way beyond the fringe, as the killer mows down the dance floor, literally, and gives the phrase “teen crush” a bloody new spin. Stumbling on The Collector’s antihero thief Arkin (Josh Stewart) locked in a box, Elena releases him but can’t prevent her own capture, so killer-bodyguard Lucello (Oz’s Lee Tergesen) snatches Arkin from the hospital and forces him to lead his team of toughs through a not-so-funhouse teeming with booby traps as well as victims-turned-insidious-weapons. All of which almost convinces you of nutty-nutball genius of the masked, dilated-pupiled Collector (here stuntman Randall Archer), who takes trendy taxidermy to icky extremes — even when his mechanism is threatened by a way smart last girl and a lock picker who’s adept at cracking building codes. Despite Dunstan’s obvious devotion to horror-movie landmarks, The Collection doesn’t turn out to be particularly original: rather, it attempts to stand on the shoulders — and arms and dismembered body parts — of others, in hopes of finding its place on a nonexistent drive-in bill. (1:23) (Kimberly Chun)
Killing Them Softly Lowest-level criminal fuckwits Frankie (Scoot McNairy) and Russell (Ben Mendelsohn) are hired to rob a mob gambling den, a task which miraculously they fail to blow. Nevertheless, the repercussions are swift and harsh, as a middleman suit (Richard Jenkins) to the unseen bosses brings in one hitman (Brad Pitt), who brings in another (James Gandolfini) to figure out who the thieves are and administer extreme justice. Based on a 1970s novel by George V. Higgins, this latest collaboration by Pitt and director-scenarist Andrew Dominik would appear superficially to be a surer commercial bet after the box-office failure of their last, 2007’s The Assassination of Jesse James By the Coward Robert Ford — one of the great films of the last decade. But if you’re looking for action thrills or even Guy Ritchie-style swaggering mantalk (though there is some of that), you’ll be disappointed to find Killing more in the abstracted crime drama arena of Drive (2011) or The American (2010), landing somewhere between the riveting former and the arid latter. This meticulously crafted tale is never less than compelling in imaginative direction and expert performance, but it still carries a certain unshakable air of so-what. Some may be turned off by just how vividly unpleasant Mendelsohn’s junkie and Gandolfini’s alchie are. Others will shrug at the wisdom of re-setting this story in the fall of 2008, with financial-infrastructure collapse and the hollow promise of President-elect Obama’s “Change” providing ironical background noise. It’s all a little too little, too soon. (1:37) (Dennis Harvey)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUSNZGYIfD4
Starlet Fresh off the bus from Florida, Jane (Dree Hemingway, daughter of the perennially undervalued Mariel) is living an indolent existence in the San Fernando Valley — it takes a while for us to realize she even has a job, albeit a pretty irregular and undemanding one. (Hint: What movie industry is largely based in the Valley? Second hint: It’s not the non-porn one.) Most of the time she just hangs about with her equally immature, similarly employed housemates, tanning and playing with her little dog. When a chance find at a yard sale yields a stash of hidden cash, Jane goes on a brief spending spree, then guiltily tries to return the remaining cash to Sadie (Besedka Johnson). The latter is an extra-cranky elderly woman who has no idea she’s missing any money and slams the door in Jane’s face before she can explain. Undaunted, perhaps needing some semblance of family in her vapid new life, Jane basically forces her friendship on the old lady, with eventual success albeit a few speed bumps. Sean Baker’s film is often an uncomfortable watch, because the dynamic between lead characters is so frequently awkward and discordant. (And also because the other major figures, Jane’s housemates played by Stella Maeve and James Ransome, are so completely obnoxious.) But its resistance to easy odd-couple sentimentality ultimately works to Starlet’s favor, making the low key (like everything else here) close unexpectedly poignant. Real-life adult entertainment stars Manuel Ferrara and Asa Akira appear as themselves. (1:59) (Dennis Harvey)
If you are part of the yoga community, here’s what you probably see when you log on to Facebook: invitations to expensive yoga retreats in exotic locations, photos of friends or teachers modeling seemingly impossible yoga poses atop striking mountains, snippets of inspiring poetic wisdom that have garnered varying amounts of likes, and YouTube videos of 95-year-olds, sexy young things, and domesticated animals doing yoga.
The yoga community definitely has a strong presence on Facebook. But is it a good thing for the spiritual path?
During a discussion in a meditation group I went to last year, a woman confessed that Facebook was ruining her life. Every time she’d hop on to the site, she never ceased to become anxious, depressed, and lonely. Why wasn’t her life as cool and exciting as that of all of her “friends”? Why was she just sitting at home, viewing this unrelenting news feed of her acquaintances’ accomplishments, international sojourns, and glamour shots?
It got me thinking about social networking sites, and how they can be detrimental to cultivating a sense of peace and clear seeing. From a broad view, you might say social networking is good for the yoga community. Teachers promote their events and classes. Practitioners post their daily revelations about life, which can be inspiring to their pals. But at its heart, yoga is about things that sites like Facebook implicitly or explicitly counter — like single-pointed focus and diminishment of ego. And you know how your teacher in yoga class is always telling you not to compare yourself to others? Kind of hard not to do that on Facebook. And, when you’re at work on the sofa at home, your teacher’s not there to remind you, either.
Of course, we could make the Facebook experience into a conscious one. For instance, create an intention to stay on it for an allotted period of time, resist the temptation to judge or feel judged by others while trolling its contents, and stay unattached to how many likes we receive on our latest instagram photo. And we could check our intentions when posting: Is it to connect with others, or to strengthen our own egos? Is it to find an old friend or to put a bandaid on loneliness? Or we could just stop using it altogether. (Um, well, could we?)
Maybe this is a question for the community at large. How does social networking affect your practice? And what tricks have you used to make your social networking experience a more conscious one? Let us know what you think.
Top Yoga Pix for Upcoming Weeks:
The Skinny on Fat: Surviving the Holidays without Overeating Do the holidays make you think of weight gain, bloating, and regret? Nutrition coach and founder of Food Freedom Programs Darshana Weil offers this one day workshop for women on how to use yoga, meditation, and mindfulness to stay healthy around holiday time, and live a nourished life. 12/2, 1-5pm, $40-$50, Yoga Tree Mission, SF. www.yogatreesf.com/workshops-retreats/workshops.html
Suzanne Sterling in Concert Join ecstatic vocalist Suzanne Sterling for a concert of epic proportion at this sweet Berkeley spot for sacred art and music. 11/30, 8pm, $15-$25, Rudramandir, Berk. www.rudramandir.com/performance/suzanne-sterling-concert.html-1
Shakticura Healing Lounge This four-hour multisensory event takes place in a healing lounge and offers you the opportunity to revitalize your spirit and body, and deepen your connection with others. Includes contact yoga, sound healing, nourishing herbal elixirs, tea, raw chocolate, and healthy snacks. Sweet. 12/2, 4-8pm, $12-$20, Berkeley Namaste, Berk. www.anjulimahendra.com/shakticura
Restorative Yoga with Live Singing Bowls Don’t miss this juicy opportunity to relax deeply into restorative poses while listening to a blend of live crystal bowls and poetry Dress to be cozy! 12/8, 6:30-9:30, $30-$35, The Mindful Body, San Francisco www.themindfulbody.com/main/workshopkevin24.htm
Hypnoyoga Ready to get hypnotized? In this restful yoga class taught by Brit Fohrman, certified Hypnotherapist Rachel Yelin will guide you into a deep hypnotic state for the sole purpose of bringing you the exact type of healing that your whole body needs. This practice of healing is open to everyone, regardless of health conditions or fitness levels. 12/9, 1-4:15pm, $50, Yoga Tree Valencia, SF. www.yogatreesf.com/workshops-retreats/workshops.html
Karen Macklin been up-dogging her way down the yogic path for over a decade, and is a lifelong lover of the word. To learn more about her teaching schedule and writing life, visit her site at www.karenmacklin.com. Follow On the Om Front on Facebook:www.facebook.com/ontheomfront
I was a little devastated when I found that the owner of Ricardo “Apex” Richey’s Market and Sixth Street studio — where he painted his canvases of street art abstractions — had sold the building to a new owner intent on converting the raw space to tech offices. What of the Asian-run garment factories, the rickety elevators? And what, more importantly, of the rooftop that Apex had the run of, where he’d let his street art friends paint huge burners? Over the years, the space had converted into a guestbook of sorts, with murals done by Mona Caron, Neon, Chez.
In our recent interview, which appeared in this week’s paper, Richey told me that the owner had mentioned that though he intended to gut the structure, he may leave the rooftop gallery standing. Hopefully, that’s the case. In the meantime, here’s some shots from those sky-level works — and a few snaps of Richey’s murals from the Sixth Street neighborhood’s past and present. Hopefully whatever ‘hood he finds for his next studio space will benefit just as much from the aerosol artist’s work.
Play is a powerful tool in almost every human society. The dynamics of play are found in most forms of human interaction as well as in the foundations of problem-solving and analysis. Play provides a learning-by-doing environment that is difficult to replicate in a classroom. Plus, high-minded assertions aside, play provides something even harder to quantify but no less vital to our development — a vehicle for joy.
Since 2006, the Come Out & Play Festival crew has been throwing festivals of interactive games, from New York to Amsterdam to San Francisco, providing a space for players of all ages to gather and game. In between wrangling the many details of her innovative brainchild, festival co-founder Catherine Herdlick graciously let me interrogate her via email as to what San Franciscan’s can expect at this year’s festival (which runs through December 2), and on the importance of games in general.
SFBG:Navigating the festival’s schedule can be daunting, what games do you feel are going to be absolute standouts this year? How many games are represented in total, and how many of them are new or new to the festival?
Catherine Herdlick: There are 35 total games including Art Boy Sin, which we just added. Absolute standouts include Journey to the End of the Night (which happened Nov. 10) as well as Undercover Assassins (Nov. 27)—both are well-established and tuned. Another game that will be amazing is Sloth Chase (Dec. 1), a parkour-inspired game designed by two champion parkour practitioners.
I’m also really excited to play The Hush (Dec. 2), which is a pervasive game with a different tempo than our usual games. It invites players to moments of silence and reflection. Finally, The Third Person OuterBody Experience Labyrinth (Dec. 2) by local artist Jason Wilson is a really interesting way of navigating yourself and a space.
SFBG:What prompted the creation of the festival in 2006 and how has it grown since?
CH: A group of five of us game designers were working together on computer games at Gamelab in NYC in 2006. We were all making different kinds of real world games on the side, staging each of our events as one-offs. We decided to converge and run a festival so that our respective audiences could cross-pollinate. Greg Trefry, who still runs the show in NYC, was able to take the helm and he oversaw the production of the festival as part of his master’s thesis at ITP. When I moved out to SF in 2009 it was a no-brainer to bring the festival with me as there were already so many designers out here that had been involved since the beginning. In terms of playership, we estimate that well over 10,000 players have played at Come Out & Play in NYC or SF. We’ve also directly inspired a bunch of other festivals around the globe in places like London, Bristol, Berlin, Athens, DC, and Pittsburgh.
SFBG: Gaming is a huge part of your resume. What do games provide its participants that can only be received through gaming? What is the socio/cultural value of games?
CH: This is a big question. I heard Ian (Kizu-Blair, from Journey to the End of the Night) say he wants to inspire people and that succinctly sums it up for me as well. We created a new tagline for the exhibition and festival this year: “United By Play,” which also sums it up. Games are a great equalizer. Everyone, everywhere plays in some ways at some ages. Being in the ludic space frees up the mind to see things differently. Further, we love seeing spectators transform into producers, not just participants, but the very creators of the experience. Street games and less-digital games tend to have more “grey areas” for house rules and that’s a very interesting social space.
SFBG: What is your favorite game ever and why? What makes a “successful” game?
CH: It’s successful if I never wonder who designed it and if it leaves enough room for me to express myself in some way. My favorite game? I can’t pick one! If I had to I’d say the first game of Junior Yahtzee I played with my nephew — it was the first game where I didn’t let him win, after watching him learn how the strategy worked. I also love overnight puzzle hunts a lot, Undercover Assassins (gentle use of space), Air Hockey, Zelda, and Super Mario.
Flavor! Napa is a five-day food and wine festival that took place last weekend in its second annual incarnation, potentially the definitive event representing the wines of the region, and the chefs and cooking that make this grouping of small towns and countryside one of the great culinary and wine destinations in the world.
Despite some nasty rainstorms hitting the area for part of the week, festivities were many and varied, classes and demos, dinners and galas. Here are a few highlights in photos, including sessions with two of the biggest chefs in the world: Thomas Keller and Masaharu Morimoto.
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Tango is spicy music. It makes you think of deep red dresses, glasses of rich wine, and warm nights for taking a long walk with your lover. Although we didn’t have one-way tickets to Argentina, an evening with the Redwood Tango Ensemble at the intimate and tiny Red Poppy Art House made the audience feel like they were that much closer to the real deal.
This five-piece ensemble of passionate and talented musicians performed a mixture of well-known and danceable tango pieces, along with a selection of its very own originals, which were sometimes a little more dark and moody, but also very different from traditional tango, posessing a certain home-grown flavor.
To top it off, there was even some tango dancing to accompany the music, showing the beautiful collaboration that tango music can bring between musicians and dancers.
Bay Area Trekkers (don’t call them “Trekkies”!) set their coordinates for the city this past weekend as the official 2012 San Francisco Star Trek Convention took over the Westin St. Francis in Union Square, filling the hotel and the surrounding area with a galaxy’s worth of creative costumes, collectibles vendors, parties, and an impressive slate of stars from the franchise’s 46 year and counting history.
Several of the most esteemed names in the Trek universe made appearances over the course of the three day fete, including George Takei and Walter Koenig (Sulu and Chekov from the original series), along with Brent Spiner, LeVar Burton, Michael Dorn, and Martina Sirtis (Data, Geordi, Worf, and Counselor Troi from The Next Generation).
Fans enthusiastically listened to behind the scenes stories and heard the actors share their thoughts on being part of the Star Trek universe, and also asked about some of their other projects and outside work.
Burton got the crowd going on Sunday morning, charging up the cheering throngs with stories about playing the blind engineer Geordi La Forge, along with reminiscing on the 35th anniversary of the TV mini-series Roots, which was his first starring role. He even elicited a spontaneous group sing-along when he asked if there were any Reading Rainbow fans in the audience, and started singing the theme song to the 1980s literacy-encouraging PBS program that he hosted in the 1980s.
Throughout the weekend’s talks, cast members of The Next Generation — who were celebrating that show’s 25th anniversary, and clearly are all still friends—would sneak up and tease one another during each other’s programs, with Spiner suddenly popping up at an audience microphone during Burton’s Q&A session and asking about the new “Reading Rainbow” iPad app and whether or not it featured a variety of made up of book titles in a nerdy voice.
Burton returned the favor when Spiner took the stage later in the afternoon, as did Sirtis, who proceeded to show off her still-limber body by doing the splits in front of man who played an emotionless robot on the show, but was visibly impressed by her heat, and was hilarious when answering questions from fans.
The keynote speaker for the convention however, was George Takei, who has become a figurehead in Hollywood for LGBT rights over the past several years, after coming out and marrying his long time partner in 2007. After receiving a standing ovation upon his introduction, the 75 year actor charmed the crowd with his signature smooth voice, and went on the emphasize the importance of the Star Trek fan community as a continuing inspiration for him in his current personal and professional endeavors.
“This longevity was created by you fans, of all generations, and I personally am so indebted to you, because my career has been a great blessing,” he said.
Echoing the original sentiments of creator Gene Roddenberry, who wove many of the pressing social issues of the 1960s into the fabric of the Star Trek ethos, Takei urged fans to take the spirit of unity and collaboration that forged the fictional “Federation of Planets” and put it into action in their own lives.
“I am very confident that Star Trek is going to continue to be strong base for making America a better nation, and building a better future for the world, working together.”
Five yogis walk into a kitchen and prepare seven dishes made with heavy cream.
This sounds like the beginning of a ridiculous and hilarious joke, but in all honesty, it’s pretty much how Saturday morning started out, with the very first recipe being homemade Irish cream (note: it was 11am). Things were off to an awesome start at the Studio of Good Living, Phoebe Schilla’s school of experiential cooking.
After introducing ourselves in chef Schilla’s beautiful home kitchen (and finding out that we’re all yoga fanatics), we got down to the business of preparing a variety of holiday sides and desserts, excited to master a few new recipes before this weeks holiday cooking bonanza begins.
Our chef, who trained at the Cordon Bleu and the Culinary Institute of America, is a personal chef and cooking instructor whose goal is to teach people how to cook simple, delicious food — and also eat it. Phoebe teaches out of her home, combing cooking with a yoga session and trips to the spa or the Ferry Building Farmers Market for her “signature experiences” offerings. She usually keeps class size under five students, so the experience is intimate, informative, and very hands-on. We not only learned new recipes, but we also got instructions on how to properly hold a knife, the perfect way to dice an onion, and how to crack an egg with one hand (more practice at home may be required on this last item!)
For our holiday cooking class, our lessons included the art of the perfect pie crust, two delectable stuffing recipes (one made with chestnut, another with wild mushroom), a chocolate truffle tart that would make an chocaholic beg for more, and a creamy vegetable soup that came with the option of increased richness with the addition of some heavy cream.
Overall, it was extremely fun — and a wonderful way to explore your kitchen and feel confident for the holidaze.
To add something wonderful to your Thanksgiving table this year, consider baking up a pan of Phoebe’s wild mushroom bread pudding
STUDIO OF GOOD LIVING WILD MUSHROOM BREAD PUDDING
Ingredients (serves 10-12):
1 (1-pound) loaf crusty-style white bread
¼ cup olive oil
1 ½ tsp. dried thyme
2 garlic cloves, chopped
4 TBS. butter
1 pound assorted fresh mushrooms
2 oz. dried porcini mushrooms, rehydrated in 1 cup boiling water, strain, and chop.
Reserve the liquid.
3 cups heavy whipping cream
8 large eggs
2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
1/3 cup finely grated aged parmesan, pecorino or gouda.
Instructions:
Preheat over to 375 degrees F. Butter a 13x9x2-inch glass baking dish. Cut the crust and short ends off the bread. Cut remaining bread with crust into ½ inch cubes. Place cubes in very large bowl. Add oil, thyme, 1 tsp of salt and ½ tsp of pepper; toss to coat. Spread cubes out on large rimmed baking sheet. Bake until golden brown, about 15-20 minutes. Transfer the toasted cubes to a large bowl.
Melt butter in large skillet over medium-high heat. Add sliced fresh mushrooms. Saute until golden and juices have evaporated, about 15 minutes. Continue cooking and allow to brown – about 10 additional minutes. Deglaze the pan with the porcini mushroom soaking liquid. Add chopped porcini mushrooms and reduce the liquid until it is almost dry. Whisk heavy cream, eggs, salt and ground pepper in large bowl. Pour egg and cream mixture over the bread. Let the custard soak into the bread for 15 minutes. Fold in the mushrooms and grated cheese. Transfer stuffing to prepared baking dish. Bake stuffing uncovered until set and top is golden, about 45 minutes to 1 hour.
This week: Keira Knightley takes on a classic, but Jennifer Lawrence proves more worthy of leading-lady praise in a decidedly contemporary tale. Also, The Twilight Saga takes its fangs and goes home (at last), and HOLY MOTORS HOLY MOTORS HOLY MOTORS.
Anna KareninaJoe Wright broke out of British TV with the 9,000th filmed Pride and Prejudice (2005), unnecessary but quite good. Too bad it immediately went to his head. His increasing showiness as director enlivened the silly teenage-superspy avenger fantasy Hanna (2011), but it started to get in the way of Atonement (2007), a fine book didn’t need camera gymnastics to make a great movie. Now it’s completely sunk a certified literary masterpiece still waiting for a worthy film adaptation. Keira Knightley plays the titular 19th century St. Petersburg aristocrat whose staid, happy-enough existence as a doting mother and dutiful wife (to deglammed Jude Law’s honorable but neglectful Karenin) is upended when she enters a mutually passionate affair with dashing military officer Count Vronsky (Aaron Taylor-Johnson, miscast). Scandal and tragedy ensue.
There’s nothing wrong with the screenplay, by Tom Stoppard no less. What’s wrong is Wright’s bright idea of staging the whole shebang as if it were indeed staged — a theatrical production in which nearly everything (even a crucial horse race) takes place on a procenium stage, in the auditorium, or “backstage” among riggings. Whenever we move into a “real” location, the director makes sure that transition draws attention to its own cleverness as possible. What, you might ask, is the point? That the public social mores and society Anna lives in are a sort of “acting”? Like wow. Add to that another brittle, mannered performance by Wright’s muse Knightley, and there’s no hope of involvement here, let alone empathy — in love with its empty (but very prettily designed) layers of artifice, this movie ends up suffocating all emotion in gilded horseshit. The reversed-fortune romance between Levin (Domhall Gleeson) and Kitty (Alicia Vikander) does work quite well — though since Tolstoy called his novel Anna Karenina, it’s a pretty bad sign when the subsidiary storyline ends up vastly more engaging than hers. (2:10) (Dennis Harvey)
Brooklyn CastleGeeks rock — that much we all know in the science- and math-rich Bay Area. That doesn’t lessen the impact of this documentary about Brooklyn I.S. 318’s young chess players, who have won the most junior high chess championships in the country and were the first middle school team to win the US Chess Federation’s national high school championship. With 60-plus percent of the students below the federal poverty level, the players certainly aren’t rolling in privilege, especially during these budget-slashing times. Nonetheless, with the help of caring teachers and an intensive chess class, the school’s players, spanning a spectrum of skills with some surpassing even Einstein’s rating, have managed to bring home state and national championships for the school — and vastly improved their prospects along the way. They range from Rochelle, the shy girl who has the chance to become the first African American female chess master; Alexis, the boy who yearns to get into a good high school and college to care for his immigrant parents; Justus, the sixth-grade chess prodigy who’s already a master and suffers intensely when he loses; and Pobo, the sweet-faced son of Nigerian émigrés who says he probably wouldn’t even be in school if not for chess. Brooklyn Castle is about chess, yes, as director Katie Dellamaggiore takes the time to spell out the rating and tournament point systems, but it’s also just as importantly about the kids, who are smart, strategic, and getting primed to play the game of life. (1:42) (Kimberly Chun)
Holy Motors Holy moly. Offbeat auteur Leos Carax (1999’s Pola X) and frequent star Denis Lavant (1991’s Lovers on the Bridge) collaborate on one of the most bizarrely wonderful films of the year, or any year. Oscar (Lavant) spends every day riding around Paris in a white limo driven by Céline (Edith Scob, whose eerie role in 1960’s Eyes Without a Face is freely referenced here). After making use of the car’s full complement of wigs, theatrical make-up, and costumes, he emerges for “appointments” with unseen “clients,” who apparently observe each vignette as it happens. And don’t even try to predict what’s coming next, or decipher what it all means, beyond an investigation of identity so original you won’t believe your eyes. This wickedly humorous trip through motion-capture suits, graveyard photo shoots, teen angst, back-alley gangsters, old age, and more (yep, that’s the theme from 1954’s Godzilla you hear; oh, and yep, that’s pop star Kylie Minogue) is equal parts disturbing and delightful. Movies don’t get more original or memorable than this. (1:56) (Cheryl Eddy)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGXNQu3fpP8
A Royal Affair At age 15 in 1766, British princess Caroline (Alicia Vikander) travels abroad to a new life — as queen to the new ruler of Denmark, her cousin. Attractive and accomplished, she is judged a great success by everyone but her husband. King Christian (Mikkel Boe Følsgaard) is just a teenager himself, albeit one whose mental illness makes him behave alternately like a debauched libertine, a rude two year-old, a sulky-rebellious adolescent, and a plain old abusive spouse. Once her principal official duty is fulfilled — bearing a male heir — the two do their best to avoid each other. But on a tour of Europe Christian meets German doctor Johann Friedrich Struenesse (Mads Mikkelsen), a true man of the Enlightenment who not only has advanced notions about calming the monarch’s “eccentricities,” but proves a tolerant and agreeable royal companion. Lured back to Denmark as the King’s personal physician, he soon infects the cultured Queen with the fervor of his progressive ideas, while the two find themselves mutually attracted on less intellectual levels as well. When they start manipulating their unstable but malleable ruler to push much-needed public reforms through in the still basically feudal nation, they begin acquiring powerful enemies. This very handsome-looking history lesson highlights a chapter relatively little-known here, and finds in it an interesting juncture in the eternal battle between masters and servants, the piously self-interested and the secular humanists. At the same time, Nikolaj Arcel’s impressively mounted and acted film is also somewhat pedestrian and overlong. It’s a quality costume drama, but not a great one. (2:17) (Dennis Harvey)
Silver Linings PlaybookAfter guiding two actors to Best Supporting Oscars in 2010’s The Fighter, director David O. Russell returns (adapting his script from Matthew Quick’s novel) with another darkly comedic film about a complicated family that will probably earn some gold of its own. Though he’s obviously not ready to face the outside world, Pat (Bradley Cooper) checks out of the state institution he’s been court-ordered to spend eight months in after displaying some serious anger-management issues. He moves home with his football-obsessed father (Robert De Niro) and worrywart mother (Jacki Weaver of 2010’s Animal Kingdom), where he plunges into a plan to win back his estranged wife. Cooper plays Pat as a man vibrating with troubled energy — always in danger of flying into a rage, even as he pursues his forced-upbeat “silver linings” philosophy. But the movie belongs to Jennifer Lawrence, who proves the chops she showcased (pre-Hunger Games megafame) in 2010’s Winter’s Bone were no fluke. As the damaged-but-determined Tiffany, she’s the left-field element that jolts Pat out of his crazytown funk; she’s also the only reason Playbook‘s dance-competition subplot doesn’t feel eye-rollingly clichéd. The film’s not perfect, but Lawrence’s layered performance — emotional, demanding, bitchy, tough-yet-secretly-tender — damn near is. (2:01) (Cheryl Eddy)
The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2 The final installment of the Twilight franchise picks up shortly after the medical-emergency vampirization of last year’s Breaking Dawn – Part 1, giving newly undead Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) just enough time to freshen up after nearly being torn asunder during labor by her hybrid spawn, Renesmee. In a just world, Bella and soul mate Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) would get more of a honeymoon period, given how badly Part 1’s actual honeymoon turned out. Alas, there’s just enough time for some soft-focus vampire-on-vampire action (a letdown after all the talk of rowdy undead sex), some catamount hunting, some werewolf posturing, a reunion with Jacob (Taylor Lautner), and a few seconds of Cullen family bonding, and then those creepy Volturi are back, convinced that the Cullens have committed a vampire capital crime and ready to exact penance. Director Bill Condon (1998’s Gods and Monsters, 2004’s Kinsey) knows what the Twi-hards want and methodically doles it out, but the overall effect is less sweeping action and shivery romance and more “I have bugs crawling on me — and yet I’m bored.” Some of that isn’t his fault — he bears no responsibility for naming Renesmee, for instance, to say nothing of a January-May subplot that we’re asked to wrap our brains around. But the film maintains such a loose emotional grip, shifting clumsily and robotically from comic interludes to unintentionally comic interludes to soaring-music love scenes to attempted pathos to a snowy battlefield where the only moment of any dramatic value occurs. Weighed down by the responsibility of bringing The Twilight Saga to a close, it limps weakly to its anticlimax, leaving one almost — but not quite — wishing for one more installment, a chance for a more stirring farewell. (1:55) (Lynn Rapoport)
Humans are funny creatures. We don’t need to be reminded to complain or judge someone else (or ourselves)—that’s so easy. I mean, things always go wrong and people are constantly screwing up, right? So who needs a reminder to begrudge or kvetch? But to feel deep appreciation for what you have in this moment … that’s hard. We need reminders for that. In fact, we need a holiday.
Why is a simple thing like gratitude so difficult? It’s not because we’re self-centered people who are intentionally fixated on what’s wrong rather than what’s right (though certainly this is what it often feels like). It’s because, and recent research by neuroscientists supports this, our brains are simply wired to solve problems. And if your brain really wants to solve a problem, and a problem does not currently exist, your brain will create a problem to solve. You’re probably trying to solve a problem at this very moment. You just can’t help it.
But you can shift your brain out of problem-solving mode consciously—it just takes a bit of practice. Way before neuroscience, the Buddhists were hip to the fact that most of us need to foster positive mind states in order to bring those mind states about, and one of the main practices in that tradition is to meditate on gratitude or katannuta. The Pilgrims knew something about this, too. Despite the sketchy conditions of their first Thanksgiving (on Native American soil and all that), their aim was to practice gratitude. And that T-Day was not the first: Holidays of thanks-giving have been happening around the world for time immemorial.
So, on your Thanksgiving this year, try this practice: all day long, no matter what comes up, employ a feeling of gratitude. Focus on what you actually already have, rather than any real (or nonexistent) needs. The turkey or tofurkey gets burned? Be grateful your kitchen didn’t burn down, too. Your Uncle Hal smells like a mix of Wendy’s and engine grease? Be grateful your sense of smell is intact. Your family is fighting over absolutely nothing at the dinner table? Be grateful they’re all alive—or simply that you are alive to witness their bickering. Just for one day: View everything as a gift. It’s a great practice in mindfulness and it beats the cranberry sauce out of solving problems all day.
Top Yoga Picks (including Thanksgiving classes!):
Grand Opening Weekend for Yoga Tree Corte Madera!
The Yoga Tree chain that we all know and love is expanding to the North Bay. Such a great studio, and definitely something to feel grateful for. There’s a free yoga class from 6-7:30, and then the party goes from 7:30-10:30. DJ Drez is spinning. There’s also a whole weekend of free classes, too. Find the details on the site.
9/16, 6-10:30pm, free, Yoga Tree Corte Madera. More info here
Yogi Amrit Desai and Yoga Nidra
Yoga nidra is the ancient practice of yogic sleep, and it allows you to shed light on your most unconscious and unconditioned inner truths. You can bring an intention to your yoga nidra—maybe gratitude?
11/16-18, $75 for the whole weekend, less for individual sessions. More info here.
Yoga and Live Music for Hurricane Sandy
Join me for a delicious rhythmic flow class accompanied by Sean Feit on harmonium and cumbus (Turkish banjo). After class, we’ll join voices in a soulful Kirtan (yogic chanting). All proceeds to benefit our East Coast peeps still dealing with fallout from Sandy.
11/16, 7:30-9:30pm, $25 suggested donation, Yoga Garden, San Francisco. More info here
Thanksgiving Day Gratitude Practice with Chad Stose and Sam Jackson
Take this easeful, breath-focused Anusara flow class with Chad Stose on T-Day, accompanied by the deep meditative quality of Sam’s unique crystal bowl soundscapes. Better than turkey.
11/22, 9-11am, $20, YogaKula, San Francisco. More info here
Thanksgiving Yoga St. Anthony’s Benefit with Janet MacLeod
100% of funds raised by this Thanksgiving class will go to St. Anthony’s Foundation, which offers shelter, housing, meals, medical care, clothing and furniture, rehabilitation and senior services to the poor and needy of San Francisco.
11/22, 9-11am, suggested donation $30, Iyengar Institute, San Francisco. More info here
Thanksgiving Yoga Benefit for the San Francisco Food Bank with Kate Lumsden
Yet another wonderful donation-based Thanksgiving class with another wonderful teacher. The Mindful Body is a special place—this is a great opportunity to check it out if you’ve never been.
11/22, 9:30 – 11:30am, by donation, The Mindful Body, San Francisco . More info here
Karen Macklin been up-dogging her way down the yogic path for over a decade, and is a lifelong lover of the word. To learn more about her teaching schedule and writing life, visit her site at www.karenmacklin.com. Follow On the Om Front on Facebook:www.facebook.com/ontheomfront
Preparing for a marathon of theatre is similar to preparing for any other kind. Of paramount importance: lots of rest, good hydration, comfortable layers.
This year’s test of my theatre-going tenacity, clocking in at 11.5 hours, came courtesy of the ever-ambitious Cutting Ball Theater, who, with translator Paul Walsh, have been preparing for this event for years: the production of a five-play cycle of August Strindberg’s “chamber plays,” written in the last years of his life. After a year-long series of staged readings, and creation of an archival website, the Strindberg cycle debuted in repertory on October 12, including four all-day marathons of the entire cycle of which I attended the first (the last will play this Sunday, November 18).
Here’s the play-by-play:
High noon: Settled in our seats we get the obligatory rundown of the planned marathon route, safety announcements, and acknowledgments, after which the cycle kicks off with both bang and whimper. The lonely howl of a night wind groans above the figure of an elderly man haunted by memories of a lady, dazzling in a red, floor-length gown and long velvet gloves, holding her hand out to him. These silent vignettes precede each piece, boiling down the heart of each into a single powerful image.
The first leg lasts just under three hours. Written in 1907, the plots of both “Storm” and “Burned House” revolve around a pair of elderly brothers, played in both instances by James Carpenter and Robert Parsons. The tone is somber, grim, accentuated by the heavy dark wood of Michael Locher’s set, the almost soporific murmuring of Cliff Caruthers’ sound design, and the ice-cold lighting palette of York Kennedy. The pace is deliberate, unhurried, almost languid, the action mostly confined to verbal showdowns and uncomfortable revelations. The calm in the center of “Storm,” the practical, incurious housemaid played by Ponder Goddard, points to a redemptive path not taken, while in “Burned House,” the crime of arson tarnishes even the most innocent characters with a patina of suspicion, almost noirish in its relentless besmirch.
4:30pm: After a coffee and stretch break the second leg of our journey, “The Ghost Sonata” quickly assumes a level of domestic intrigue only hinted at by the first two plays. Another elderly man nearing the end of his days (James Carpenter again) takes on a youthful protégé (Carl Holvick-Thomas), promising to make him his heir. That’s about the most prosaic moment of the play, as ghosts wander in and out of each character’s periphery, an elderly woman who believes she is a parrot becomes an avenging angel, and a young woman surrounded by “virginal” hyacinths succumbs to her own death perhaps for no other reason than that she’d nothing left to say.
6pm: A welcome dinner break arrives, a time for fortification and rumination, or anyhow Thai food and Irish whiskey.
8:30pm: The last laps of our journey are, by design, the most harrowing. “The Pelican” features the most dysfunctional family yet (it hardly seems possible). A cruel mother played to the hilt by Danielle O’Hare, who might be about thirty years too young to portray a matriarch who recently celebrated her silver anniversary, but whose fierce, uncompromising demeanor give her villainy an enjoyable heft. Her sleazy, social-climbing son-in-law Axel (Carl Holvick-Thomas) and her cringing, abused children (Caitlyn Louchard and Nick Trengrove) give her ire plenty of reach and when her own comeuppance comes its hard not to feel disappointed that such a witch could not be suffered to live.
By contrast, O’Hare’s self-absorbed character in the evening’s final play “The Black Glove,” gets an opportunity to redeem her reputation in the eyes of her household, as well as those of a pair of supernatural beings (David Sinaiko and Ponder Goddard) sent to teach her a lesson on Christmas—shades of A Christmas Carol. It’s described as Strindberg’s most light-hearted chamber play, but by 11pm weariness begins to take its toll, and my patience for redemptive speechifying worn thin. But when at last the marathon ends at 11:30 a sudden rush of adrenaline buoys us all up and over the finish line, everyone a winner.
It’s Saturday afternoon and, two weeks before the gala that will mark its 10th year of existence (coming up Wed/14) outLOUD Radio is talking style. Elders from the queer community are sitting in a circle in a LGBT Community Center third floor conference room, translating their thoughts on the concept of “gay uniform” into the waiting mics of outLOUD Radio youth volunteers.
“Describe what you’re wearing today.”
“Jeans, which could be categorized as old hippie jeans with tight ankles — not flares. That’s what I feel comfortable in, pants.”
“I’m wearing designer jeans. I bought them from Goodwill for $4.” “Nice.” “Very nice, actually.”
“I’m a dyke, and I wear pants. I’m cold a lot of the time because of my peripheral circulation.”
“There’s something about this T-shirt that makes me feel more alive, more vibrant.”
This is outLOUD’s intergenerational storytelling project.
Phuong Tsing is 20. Tsing is holding the mic for the seniors to talk about their clothes because “I wanted to feel more connected with the LGBT community, to make myself feel more comfortable about myself. [The elders] make me feel like I live in the present, but I’m connected with the past.”
“What does your outfit say about you?”
“I decided at some point in my old age I was not going to dress like a geezer. And I live in San Francisco, so I don’t have to.”
“Not too flashy, except for the rhinestones on the shoes.”
“I’m alive, grateful, a vital human being.”
“I have on what I have on to keep warm.”
The first generation of out LGBT elders are coming of age these days, and they’re providing the community with a heretofore unique resource — the chance for baby gays to sit around and listen to what it was like being queer back in the day. Pre-Stonewall (some of the seniors at this Saturday session were actually present at the infamous raid and insuing protest), pre Glee, pre civil unions. Not only that — one of outLOUD’s major goals is the empowerment of youth through this archiving. Young people assemble pieces on the salient issues of their day, forming their own voice in the process.
“Is there a gay uniform?”
“No. It just seems to me that there’s so many reasons why people put on one thing any morning. Right now in modern times you can wear anything, be anything.”
“What I really love about his group is that it feels really empowering,” say Tsing. Like outLOUD’s other projects, eventually this footage will be edited, and assembled into a radio show that can be streamed online and heard on radio stations across the country. Past podcast topics have included transbodied athletes, the definition of masculinity, sexual harassment on the Muni, even history like the piece below, that interviews members of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence about creating the first safe sex pamphlet.
The work, led by executive director Noah Miller, has been going on for a decade, and needs more funds to stay on track. This week’s gala, featuring gay NPR White House correspondent and sometimes-Pink Martini vocalist Ari Shapiro, and KQED host and reporter Scott Shafer.
“Did you dress differently before and after coming out?”
“Not really. But I got my ear pierced when only gay men wore earrings.”
Assembling stories is important work — and not just for those that would compile and listen to the recorded product. That afternoon in the LGBT Community Center, the seniors being interviewed were aglow after interacting with the young people, and probably had plenty to think about after being interviewed about what they were wearing, from the guy in rhinestone shoes to the woman who proudly asserted she was wearing the activist dyke uniform. Telling your stories makes you realize that you have stories, to be really simplistic about it.
Anyway, listen to this podcast — we need 10 more years of this right?
Well, pschitt! Although Alfred Jarry — schoolboy playwright, raconteur, and progenitor of ‘pataphysics, “the science of imaginary solutions” — died 105 years ago of decidedly prosaic malady tuberculosis, his outré influence lives on. Adopted and championed by generations of outsider artists, avant-garde writers, and revolutionary thinkers, the self-styled “Pere Ubu” gave artistic anarchy a nexus during his lifetime, an iconic figurehead after.
Last weekend, the four-day Carnivàle Pataphysique, part commemoration and part investigation, gave amateur pataphysicians, situationists, and conceptual artists a free zone to mingle, to expound, and to congeal, over lectures, concerts, puppet shows, and other unique performative opportunities in and around the practically imaginary stronghold of “North Beach,” a land where strip clubs and surrealists collide.
On Saturday, beneath an almost oppressive sun, a small group of eager urban explorers embarked from City Lights Bookstore on a situationist-inspired dérive — a psychogeographical walking tour of North Beach using maps of Paris (ala Jarry’s creation Dr Faustroll) to orient ourselves. Our intrepid guide, City Lights events coordinator Peter Maravelis hurried us along the less familiar side streets of Chinatown, stopping to exclaim over abstract, easily overlooked details. In a psychogeographical foray, murals become prophecies, placid streets become daunting Rubicons, oddball ephemera becomes omen.
At St Mary’s Square aka “The Amorphous Isle,” beneath the stainless steel monolith of Beniamino Bufano’s sculpture of Sun Yat-sen, Frederick Young and Linus Lancaster demonstrated their latest attempt to make contact with the USS Macon, a military zeppelin which crashed in the ocean at Point Sur in 1935. Involving a slowly inflating weather balloon, soil from France, a stack of Heidegger texts, and a curious mechanical component best filed under “moves in mysterious ways,” (or, rather, doesn’t) Young and Lancaster’s absurdist experiment was conducted with all appropriate gravity until we were hurried off again to another park (“The Great Church of Snout Figs”) to watch actors Leonard Pitt and Kurt Bodden orate from a hodge-podge of cut-up texts beneath a gracious gazebo.
Marching onward, we found ourselves faced with a seemingly insurmountable mountain — the Vallejo Steps — leading straight into the sun. After our climb, more readings followed, courtesy of Mark Gorney and Josh Mohr, and a chance sighting of the Uniqlo blimp, shades of the USS Macon, and a jeering band of North Beach’s famous feral parrots, added local color to our border-blending dérive.
On such a journey, the most mundane minutiae becomes unaccountably fascinating. An abandoned pair of pants on the sidewalk raises the real question, who abandons their pants in the middle of a sidewalk? A cluster of television sets and sandwiches begs for an archeological explanation. Sloppy graffiti reads like a coded message. Empty streets twist unexpectedly, like lines of a labyrinth.
“I think we’re lost,” Maravelis announced at one point.
“At last!” exclaimed a committed voyager.
Our final destination, Jack Early Park, renamed for our purposes as “The Land of Lace” involved one more sunward climb, and a rare treat worth the exercise—a command performance by dark folk duo Hazy Loper, whose sorrowful San Francisco ballad “The Graywood Hotel” should be required listening for all poet philosophers and vagabond flâneurs no matter which streets they wind up wandering, and for whatever purpose.
(Interested in more things ‘pataphysical? Festival co-curator Andrew Hugill’s ‘Pataphysics, a Useless Guide (MIT Press, 2012) is available at City Lights, as is Jarry’s seminal work, Ubu Roi.)
There’s perhaps nothing in your life that will ever get you as excited as when you a youngster with a toy trip trip on your schedule. Not even the Giants winning the World Series twice in three years or scoring free VIP tickets to Outside Lands can come close to eliciting that brain-paralyzing gush of euphoria and innocent bliss.
But since you can’t quantum leap back to being eight (get on it science!), the Guardian can offer you the next best thing, and that is the upcoming National Toy Store Day on Sat/10.
In an effort coordinated by the American Specialty Toy Retailing Association — whose members include over 1400 locally-owned toy shops — over 500 independent centers of child-like joy across our glorious nation will be participating in Toy Store Day.
In the Bay, The Ark, which has locations in Presidio Heights, Noe Valley, and Berkeley, is planning to go all out for the occasion. A veritable carnival will be taking place inside the stores — there’s going to be prizes galore, an “I Spy” contest, and a meet-and-greet with several toy inventors (your mission: find out how to become a toy inventor.)
And definitely check out some of our other favorite independent toy stores: eternal Best of the Bay winner Jeffrey’s, West Portal classic Growing Up, the Mission’s rad place for organic, sustainably made gear Aldea Niños, and Clement Street action figure wonderland Heroes Club/Art of Toys. Should you need inspiration in your quest, totally-not-locally-owned Toys ‘R Us has released its “Fabulous 15” list of top toys for 2012 (we suggest finding the off brand equivalents to avoid having your gift recipients’ holiday hijacked by corporate advertising.)
Saturday! It’s the perfect excuse to get your holiday shopping done early. Trust, you don’t want to get caught up in the December crush:
The election is over and, thank Zeus, good defeated evil. So you can stop making snarky Romney gifs and turn your attentions to more important matters — like seeing Lincoln (yeah, he was a Republican, but as Spielberg’s movie makes abundantly clear, Democrats were actually the bigger assholes back in the day). Or, you could see what ol’ James Bond is up to in his 4785th film, Skyfall (just kidding — it’s his 23rd, so Godzilla still has him beat). Reviews for both below the jump.
Elsewhere, DocFest opens tonight and runs through Nov. 21; check out my take on this year’s programming (spoiler alert: lots o’ good stuff) here; and read Dennis Harvey’s review of a very strange movie starring a very strangely coiffed Sean Penn, This Must Be the Place.
And … as if that would be everything going on in San Francisco’s film scene this week? Are you new in town? There’s also the San Francisco Film Society’s local showcase Cinema By the Bay (my overview here) and New Italian Cinema programs; the always-popular (and now 10th annual!) San Francisco Transgender Film Festival; and Marc Huestis’ multi-film tribute to the late, great Natalie Wood at the Castro.
PLUS more short takes, including the good word on Ursula Meier’s acclaimed Sister, below.
Dangerous Liaisons John Malkovich and Sarah Michelle Gellar may have already starred in pop culture’s favorite adaptations of this classic French novel, but since pretty people scheming never gets old, here’s a Chinese take on Les Liaisons dangereuses, complete with big-name cast and all the visual allure of 1930s Shanghai. “You are such a cad!” a woman shrieks at Xie Yifan (Jang Dong-gun) in the first scene, and indeed he is — though his heart belongs to “Miss Mo” (Cecilia Cheung). The malicious wager (if you seduce her and then horribly dump her, I’ll let you sleep with me … plus: incidental affairs along the way) is struck and things proceed on schedule, until Yifan finds himself actually falling for virtuous widow Fenyu (Zhang Ziyi). You know how it ends. Gorgeous costumes and mise-en-scène add visual interest to the familiar story, which also adds a little political flair in the form of Chinese students protesting the early days of Japanese occupation. (1:45) (Cheryl Eddy)
The Details One of the hardest hurdles to clear in watching Jacob Aaron Estes’s The Details might be the sight of Tobey Maguire, erstwhile boy-man and Spider-Man, inelegantly proposing to Elizabeth Banks (playing his character’s wife) that they put their small child to bed and F-U-C-K. On paper, or perhaps under the right mood lighting, that could work, but it’s not a sexy sight here, and it’s almost a relief when she turns him down. Far less appetizing intimacies lie ahead, though, as Maguire’s gynecologist and family man Jeffrey Lang triggers a sticky, unsalutary domino effect involving marauding raccoons, marital infidelity, enabling friends (Kerry Washington), unstable neighbors (Laura Linney), planning codes, pesticides, and kidney disease. Like Estes’s 2004 film Mean Creek, which he also wrote and directed, The Details shows us what can happen when baser human impulses meet unforeseen circumstances. There, it was children making painfully bad decisions. Here, we squeamishly watch Lang get caught, but the drama has a glossy, dark-comedy finish to it that prevents us from suffering too much as we witness his domestic life imploding. Dennis Haysbert plays a pickup basketball buddy/better human being drawn inexorably into the mess our protagonist has made; Ray Liotta, a husband made irate by Lang’s misjudgments. (1:31) (Lynn Rapoport)
Lincoln Distinguished subject matter and an A+ production team (Steven Spielberg directing, Daniel Day-Lewis starring, Tony Kushner adapting Doris Kearns Goodwin, John Williams scoring every emotion juuust so) mean Lincoln delivers about what you’d expect: a compelling (if verbose), emotionally resonant (and somehow suspenseful) dramatization of President Lincoln’s push to get the 13th amendment passed before the start of his second term. America’s neck-deep in the Civil War, and Congress, though now without Southern representation, is profoundly divided on the issue of abolition. Spielberg recreates 1865 Washington as a vibrant, exciting place, albeit one filled with so many recognizable stars it’s almost distracting wondering who’ll pop up in the next scene: Jared Harris as Ulysses S. Grant! Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Robert Lincoln! Lena Dunham’s shirtless boyfriend on Girls (Adam Driver) as a soldier! Most notable among the huge cast are John Hawkes, Tim Blake Nelson, and a daffy James Spader as a trio of lobbyists; Sally Field as the troubled First Lady; and likely Oscar contenders Tommy Lee Jones (as winningly cranky Rep. Thaddeus Stevens) and Day-Lewis, who does a reliably great job of disappearing into his iconic role. (2:30) (Cheryl Eddy)
Sister Twelve-year-old Simon (Kacey Mottet Klein) looks like any other kid vacationing with a family on the slopes of a Swiss ski resort. That’s a big plus, because he’s not one of them — he’s a local living “downhill” in an anonymous high-rise apartment block, sustaining himself and his pretty but irresponsible older sister Louise (Léa Seydoux) by stealing expensive sports equipment and clothes from the oblivious guests. He has no guilt about what he does, but then why should he? Those people are rich, he’s not, and sis’ short attention span toward jobs and boyfriends isn’t going to pay the rent. Ursula Meier’s French-language second feature isn’t heavily plot-driven, though it doesn’t feel like a second is wasted. The casual, somewhat furtive relationships that develop between Simon and stray adults who glean enough to worry about him — a seasonal restaurant worker (Martin Compston), a maternal resort guest (Gillian Anderson), Louise’s better-than-usual new beau (Yann Tregouet) — come and go but are toeholds on stability for him. It’s the contrast between Simon’s aggressively take-charge premature adulthood and his unaddressed needs as a child that ultimately make Sister rather devastating. It’s been aptly compared to the Dardenne Brothers’ similar dramas, but Meier lets her film’s heart beat a little more in open empathy with its protagonist while aping those Belgians’ brisk surface objectivity. (1:37) (Dennis Harvey)
Skyfall Top marks to Adele, who delivers a magnificent title song to cap off Skyfall‘s thrilling pre-credits chase scene. Unfortunate, then, that the film that follows squanders its initial promise. After a bomb attack on MI6, the clock is running out for Bond (Daniel Craig) and M (Judi Dench), accused of Cold War irrelevancy in a 21st century full of malevolent, stateless computer hackers. The audience, too, will yearn for a return to simpler times; dialogue about “firewalls” and “obfuscated code” never fails to sound faintly ridiculous, despite the efforts Ben Whishaw as the youthful new head of Q branch. Javier Bardem is creative and creepy as keyboard-tapping villain Raoul Silva, but would have done better with a megalomaniac scheme to take over the world. Instead, a small-potatoes revenge plot limps to a dull conclusion in the middle of nowhere. Skyfall never decides whether it prefers action, bon mots, and in-jokes to ponderous mythologizing and ripped-from-the-headlines speechifying – the result is a unsatisfying, uneven mixture. (2:23) (Ben Richardson)
It’s a symbol of the atrocities suffered by Chinese Americans on this continent: a lumbering machine that stripped thousands of their livelihood and was even named for the epithet used against them, the Iron Chink.
For Escape To Gold Mountain graphic novelist and community activist David H.T. Wong, who will read from the book at a Sun/11 event in Berkeley’s Eastwind Books, the 1903 invention of the mechanized fish gutting machine that stole cannery jobs from Asian immigrants — who already had to fight racism to find jobs at all — made the perfect title for his historical graphic novel.
But, and perhaps this is a sign of the historical progression that Wong converted into panels for us in his graphic novel, things just don’t get named the c-word anymore.
“Though it’s a historically accurate name of a real artifact, people today will not accept these sorts of racist terms,” writes Wong in the afterword of Gold Mountain. The name was changed before it was officially released.
We don’t get enough Chinese history in the United States. Growing up, even in a Sunset District public elementary school that had 90 percent Asian American students, the only thing I recall learning about the Asian diaspora here was Chinese New Year, Japanese internment camps.
This is a wrong that Wong’s Escape to Gold Mountain corrects, and in comic book form at that. The book follows Chinese laborer Wong Ah Gin to the United States, where he becomes inextricably linked with the capitalists’ quest to build a railroad across the United States.
The task was accomplished using Asian immigrant labor, the cheapest on the market. After the coasts were connected, many communities rejected the workers who made the task possible. We all know this story: use immigrant labor to accomplish previously-impossible tasks, then castigate the same people for stealing jobs.
In the case of Asian communities in the United States and Canada, this xenophobia lead to extreme violence. In 1885, mass killings occured in Wyoming and Washington. Tacoma’s Chinatown was even burned to the ground by bigoted townspeople. After the physical violence came the bureaucratic castigation: elaborate immigration codes that stopped refugees from coming to North America and separated parents from their kids.
Escape to Gold Mountain wends its way through all this injustice via Wong and other characters, ending up at a Chinese restaurant in Victoria, BC. The author’s panel work makes an at-times painful history easily read (my only quibble is small: why must most of the characters’ mouths be frozen in mid-word?)
Spoiler alert: there’s a hopeful ending. Escape to Gold Mountain ends on a look at the Chinese Americans who have been elected to public office in the 20th and 21st centuries, and a real-life reconciliation story that will make you grateful for your own awkward trips home for the holidays.
The comic is really a jumping-off point for those interested in the subject matter — the epic research that Wong put towards the book made for enough bibliography and reading resources to launch a thousand syllabi, or at least a sense that an important portion of history may have been missing from your childhood textbooks.
David H.T. Wong reads from Escape From Gold Mountain
“Some weird, Kool Aid-tasting shot. I don’t really know what it was, but it was something.”
— was passed around at the League of Pissed-Off Voters‘ party at El Rio last night right after Obama’s acceptance speech. Generally speaking, this was not the bar to spend last night hashing out the district races and local ballot measures (though the back patio housed its fair share of politicos weary of the election trail.) This was where you went to celebrate, wholeheartedly, the next four years of President Barack “we actually like that his middle name is Hussein” Obama, and the trouncing of those who would seek political office by qualifying and diminishing the atrocity of rape. Seeeee ya Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock.
This was not 2008, of course. Biking to the bar through the Mission at 9pm, there was nowhere near the number of rowdies that had flooded the blocks only recently for the Giants’ World Series win. Obama has split quite a bit of his political capital over the last four years, of course, invading people, imprisoning people, stealing our medical marijuana.
“I can, like, jump in the air for you!” said a curly-haired cohort when I told her I was taking celebration shots for the Guardian. “I’d be happy to do that!” We never quite got around to the staged exuberance, but I dug her game enthusiasm.
For last night’s El Rio denizens — which included sex workers, legislative aides, community radio hosts, the League of Pissed Voters (who has hosted the election night party here for a few years running), and off-duty drag queens — it was either this halway-exciting victory or withering away under the social policies of a backwards Mormon who can’t stop talking about winter sports and would like to ignore the fact that half the people who were smashed into the Mission dive existed. A lot of these folks travel, so they were pleased that they could continue to leave the country with their head held high. They cooed in mock sympathy when Obama mentioned, kindly, the drive of his opponents.
“I can’t see much difference between this crowd and the Giants crowd,” said a woman on a stool next to me who must have been in her seventies. She had filtered in just before Obama’s acceptance speech with some supporters of unsuccessful D5 candidate John Rizzo.
I had to admit, as I watched the capacity-crowd punters inside the bar explode in cheers when that confetti windstorm engulfed the Obama and Biden families after Barack’s well-paced, perfectly acceptable acceptance speech — these were the same people I’d been celebrating Posey and Scutaro with the Sunday before last. There wasn’t a local returns-scanning political junkie in sight. Or at least one that didn’t drop their cellphone in the cheer that followed after El Rio owner Dawn Huston announcement of the free shots of mysterious sweetness.
But they were my neighbors. And you don’t always get free shots at El Rio.
The scents of burning sage and copal were thick in the Mission on Friday night for the neighborhood’s annual procession and Dia de los Muertos festival of altars. Crowds in face paint and costumes lined the streets waiting for the march to begin. To our suprise, a group of calaveras-painted faces led by several drummers jumped the gun, marching down 24th Street before the official procession surged from the other direction with its Aztec dancers, live music by percussion champions Loco Bloco, and skeletons made of fabric and paper floating above the crowd.
One audience member remarked that the festival seemed disorganized, but really, the atmosphere of chaos and revelry was perfect.
Dia de Los Muertos honors death through celebration rather than mourning, and the unsystematic nature of the Mission’s festivities framed the atmosphere as a way to reflect on death throught the lens of life (just like those skeletons that jumped above their living and breathing makers’ heads.)
After the procession, the crowds mixed in with the band to dance their way into Garfield Park for the festival of the altars. There was a wide array of tributes in the park, each carefully planned and grounded with a sense of ritual, from traditional homages to Burning Man-esque art experiences.
Some altars were modern. One, a tribute to recently-deceased playwright and Man arsonist Paul Addis had neon lights in addition to candles and Boba Fett helmet to represent a skull. Others were entirely traditional: old photos, food offerings, papel picado, marigolds. Those who hadn’t prepared altars were invited to write to lost loved ones on notecards, which were strung together between the trees. Despite being a space for sober reflection, the energy stayed strong throughout the evening with double-dutch jump rope, flamenco dancers, scattered musicians, and continuous dancing in the street that lasted until bands got tired and marched everyone out.
Pack up the leftover Halloween candy and head to the movies this weekend — what better way to escape election-related craziness and/or rest your liver after all that LET’S GO GIANTS damage you just did?
Your options are pretty spectacular, as well: intriguing Israeli doc The Flat, in which a Jewish filmmaker learns his grandparents counted a Nazi couple among their social circle (my interview with director Arnon Goldfinger here); bonkers 1987 rock ‘n’ roll taekwondo spectacular Miami Connection (Dennis Harvey’s take on this newly discovered instant cult classic here)
Plus, RZA’s The Man With The Iron Fists, an homage to chopsocky classics (with, I’m assuming, a much better soundtrack); Denzel Washington playing an airline pilot whose secret drinking problem comes to light only after he prevents a plane from crash landing in Flight; and Deep Dark Canyon, a NorCal-set thriller by former locals Silver Tree and Abe Levy starring Ted Levine.
And that’s not even the end of it! Read on for video game characters run amok, two found-footage horror flicks, a musically-inclined Pacific Film Archive program, tributes to Tony Bennett (speaking of the Giants) and Monty Python’s Graham Chapman, and, I kid you not … even more.
Amber Alert An audition tape for The Amazing Race quickly turns into an epic chase in this low-budget “found footage” drama. Arizona BFFs Nate (Chris Hill) and Sam (Summer Bellessa, wife of director Kerry Bellessa) — and Sam’s teenage brother, shaky-cam operator Caleb (Caleb Thompson) — notice they’re driving behind the very Honda that’s being sought by an Amber Alert. “Following at a safe distance,” as advised when they call the cops, leads to high-decibel arguments about how to handle the situation — and for the next hour-plus, the viewer is trapped in a car with two people communicating only in nails-on-chalkboard tones. Amber Alert‘s nonstop bickerfest is so tiresome that it’s actually a relief when the child molester character starts taking an active role in the story. Not a good sign. (1:20) (Cheryl Eddy)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctkkn1qSYKw
The BayTop-quality (i.e., realistically repulsive) special effects highlight this otherwise unremarkable disaster movie that’s yet another “found footage” concoction, albeit maybe the first one from an Oscar-winning director. But it’s been a long time since 1988’s Rain Man, and the Baltimore-adjacent setting is the only Barry Levinson signature you’ll find here. Instead, parasites-gnaw-apart-a-coastal-town drama The Bay — positioned as a collection of suppressed material coming to light on “Govleaks.org” — is a relentlessly familiar affair, further hampered by a narrator (Kether Donohue) with a supremely grating voice. Rising star Christopher Denham (Argo) has a small part as an oceanographer whose warnings about the impending waterborne catastrophe are brushed aside by a mayor who is (spoiler alert!) more concerned with tourist dollars than safety. (1:25) (Cheryl Eddy)
“Don’t Shoot the Player Piano: The Music of Conlon Nancarrow” The late Texarkana-born composer’s birth centenary is celebrated in this two-part (Fri/2 and Sun/4) program of films examining his unique contribution to 20th century music. Frustrated early on by the inability of standard musicians to play his incredibly complicated scores, he turned to composing for player pianos, with their greatly heightened capacity for producing density of notes and rhythms. A member of the American Communist Party, he returned from fighting fascists in the Spanish Civil War to discover the U.S. government had revoked the passports of many citizens with similar political convictions. As a result, in 1940 he moved to Mexico, where he remained until his death 57 years later — his reputation remaining an underground musicologists’ secret until the early 1980s, in large part due to his disinterest in fame and dislike of crowds (he’d always avoided any gathering of over five people). But in his last years he became much more widely known, thanks in large part to fans like fellow composer Gyorgy Ligeti, who in one documentary here calls him “the most important composer of our time,” comparing him to Beethoven and saying “his work is completely, totally different from [his contemporaries].” Among the movies screening are Uli Aumuller and Hanne Kaisik’s 1993 German Music for 1,000 Fingers, in which the reclusive, elderly subject allows us into his studio to explain his (still somewhat inexplicable) methodologies. The brand-new, hour-long Conlon Nancarrow: Virtuoso of the Player Piano offers a posthumous appreciation of his life, music and influence. It’s a first film from James Greeson, a professor of music at the University of Arkansas who knew the man himself. Also featured are several international shorts that provide interpretive visual complements to Nancarrow pieces. His widow and daughter, as well as kinetic sculptor Trimpin and composer-former KPFA music director Charles Amirkhanian will appear at both PFA programs. Pacific Film Archive.(Dennis Harvey)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXFOYmsYCTA
A Late Quartet Philip Seymour Hoffman is fed up playing second fiddle — literally. He stars in this grown-up soap opera about the internal dramas of a world-class string quartet. While the group is preparing for its 25th season, the eldest member (Christopher Walken) is diagnosed with early stage Parkinson’s. As he’s the base note in the quartet, his retirement challenges the group’s future, not just his own. Hoffman’s second violinist sees the transition as an opportunity to challenge the first violin (Mark Ivanir) for an occasional Alpha role. When his wife, the quartet’s viola player (Catherine Keener), disagrees, it’s a slight (“You think I’m not good enough?”) and a betrayal because prior to their marriage, viola and first violin would ”duet” if you get my meaning. This becomes a grody aside when Hoffman and Keener’s violin prodigy daughter (Imogen Poots) falls for her mother’s old beau and Hoffman challenges their marriage with a flamenco dancer. These quiet people finds ways to use some loud instruments (a flamenco dancer, really?) and the music as well as the views of Manhattan create a deeply settled feeling of comfort in the cold —insulation can be a dangerous thing. When we see (real world) cellist Nina Lee play, and her full body interacts with a drama as big as vaudeville, we see what tension was left out of the playing and forced into the incestuous “family” conflicts. In A Late Quartet, pleasures are great and atmosphere, heavy. You couldn’t find a better advertisement for this symphonic season; I wanted to buy tickets immediately. And also vowed to stay away from musicians. (1:45) (Sara Vizcarrondo)
A Liar’s Autobiography: The Untrue Story of Monty Python’s Graham Chapman Blessed with recordings made by Monty Python member Graham Chapman (King Arthur in 1975’s Monty Python and the Holy Grail; Brian in 1979’s Life of Brian) before his death in 1989 from cancer, filmmakers Bill Jones, Jeff Simpson, and Ben Timlett recruited 14 different animation studios to piece together Chapman’s darkly humorous (and often just plain dark) life story. He was gay, he was an alcoholic, he co-wrote (with John Cleese) the legendary “Dead Parrot Sketch.” A Liar’s Autobiography starts slowly — even with fellow Monty Python members Cleese, Terry Jones, Terry Gilliam, and Michael Palin lending their voices, much of the bone-dry humor falls disappointingly flat. “This is not a Monty Python film,” the filmmakers insist, and viewers hoping for such will be disappointed. Stick with it, though, and the film eventually finds its footing as an offbeat biopic, with the pick-a-mix animation gimmick at its most effective when illustrating Chapman’s booze-fueled hallucinations. In addition to opening theatrically, the film also debuts Fri/2 on premium cable channel Epix. (1:22) (Cheryl Eddy)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIIMFHcC1Fc
The Loneliest Planet Travel broadens, they say — and has a way of foregrounding anxiety and desire. So the little tells take on a larger, much more loaded significance in The Loneliest Planet when contextualized by the devastatingly beautiful Caucasus Mountains in Georgia. In this film by Russian American director and video artist Julia Loktev, adventuring, engaged Westerners Nica (an ethereal Hani Furstenberg) and Alex (Gael García Bernal) hire a local guide and war veteran (Bidzina Gujabidze) to lead them on a camping trip through the wilderness. They’re globe-trotting blithe spirits, throwing themselves into new languages and new experiences, though the harsh, hazardous, and glorious Georgian peaks and crevasses have a way of making them seem even smaller while magnifying their weaknesses and naiveté. One small, critical stumble on their journey is all it takes for the pair to question their relationship, their roles, and the solid ground of their love. Working with minimal dialogue (and no handlebar subtitles) from a Tom Bissell short story, Loktev shows a deliberate hand and thoughtful eye in her use of the space, as well as her way of allowing the silences to speak louder than dialogue: she turns the outdoor expanses into a quietly awe-inspiring, albeit frightening mirror for the distances between, and emptiness within, her wanderers, uncertain about how to quite find their way home. (1:53) (Kimberly Chun)
The Other SonThe plot of ABC Family’s Switched at Birth gets a politically-minded makeover in Lorraine Lévy’s The Other Son, in which the mixed-up teens represent both sides of the Israel-Palestine conflict. When mop-topped wannabe rocker Joseph (Jules Sitruk) dutifully signs up for Israeli military duty, the required blood test reveals he’s not the biological son of his parents. Understandably freaked out, his French-Israeli mother (Emmanuelle Devos) finds out that a hospital error during a Gulf War-era evacuation meant she and husband Alon (Pascal Elbé) went home with the wrong infant — and their child, aspiring doctor Yacine (Medhi Dehbi), was raised instead by a Palestinian couple (Areen Omari, Khalifia Natour). It’s a highly-charged situation on many levels (“Am I still Jewish?”, a tearful Joseph asks; “Have fun with the occupying forces?”, Yacine’s bitter brother inquires after his family visits Joseph in Tel Aviv), and potential for melodrama is sky-high. Fortunately, director and co-writer Levy handles the subject with admirable sensitivity, and the film is further buoyed by strong performances. (1:53) (Cheryl Eddy)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCD00LLZmys
A Simple Life When elderly Ah Tao (Deanie Ip), the housekeeper who’s served his family for decades, has a stroke, producer Roger (Andy Lau) pays for her to enter a nursing home. No longer tasked with caring for Roger, Ah Tao faces life in the cramped, often depressing facility with resigned calm, making friends with other residents (some of whom are played by nonprofessional actors) and enjoying Roger’s frequent visits. Based on Roger Lee’s story (inspired by his own life), Ann Hui’s film is well-served by its performances; Ip picked up multiple Best Actress awards for her role, Lau is reliably solid, and Anthony Wong pops up as the nursing home’s eye patch-wearing owner. Wong’s over-the-top cameo doesn’t quite fit in with the movie’s otherwise low-key vibe, but he’s a welcome distraction in a film that can be too quiet at times — a situation not helped by its washed-out palette of gray, beige, and more gray. (1:58) (Cheryl Eddy)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87E6N7ToCxs
Wreck-It RalphWreck-It Ralph cribs directly from the Toy Story series: when the lights go off in the arcade, video game characters gather to eat, drink, and endure existential crises. John C. Reilly is likable and idiosyncratic as Ralph, the hulking, ham-fisted villain of a game called Fix-It-Felix. Fed up with being the bad guy, Ralph sneaks into gritty combat sim Hero’s Duty under the nose of Sergeant Calhoun (Jane Lynch), a blond space marine who mixes Mass Effect‘s Commander Shepard with a PG-rated R. Lee Ermey. Things go quickly awry, and soon Ralph is marooned in cart-racing candyland Sugar Rush, helping Vanellope Von Schweetz (a manic Sarah Silverman), with Calhoun and opposite number Felix (Jack McBrayer) hot on his heels. Though often aggressively childish, the humor will amuse kids, parents, and occasionally gamers, and the Disney-approved message about acceptance is moving without being maudlin. The animation, limber enough to portray 30 years of changing video game graphics, deserves special praise. (1:34) (Ben Richardson)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLxP8snjdGc
The Zen of Bennett Landing somewhere between a glorified album making-of and a more depthed exploration, this documentary about famed crooner Tony of “I Left My Heart in San Francisco” fame shows him recording last year’s all-standards Duets II disc. His vocal collaborators are an eclectic — to say the least — mix of mostly much younger artists including Norah Jones, John Mayer, Carrie Underwood, Willie Nelson, and Andrea Bocelli. Some pairings are clearly a matter of commerce over chemistry, while others surprise — Lady Gaga is better than you might expect, while Aretha Franklin is certainly worse. Most touching as well as disturbing is his session with the late Amy Winehouse, whose nervous, possibly hopped-up appearance occasions his most gentlemanly behavior, as well as genuine admiration for her talent. (Others on the record, including Mariah Carey and k.d. lang, do not appear here.) Unjoo Moon’s rather mannered direction includes little displays of temperament from the octogenarian star, and glimpses of his family life (which extends well into his work life, since they all seem to be on the payroll), but just enough to tease — not enough to provide actual insight. Still, fans will find this less than-definitive portrait quite satisfying enough on its own limited terms. (1:24) (Dennis Harvey)
It was a mix of pre-Incan Moche, Tumblr-ready Pikachu, Satanic Barbie, and Catholic imagery — in other words, the essential Bay Arean celebration of Dia de los Muertos (check our complete listings for a guide to all the altars, drums, and processionals this year.)
Yesterday’s opening reception of “Fluorescent Virgins”at SF State’s Cesar Chavez Student Centerfeatured more traditional trappings of the holiday as well: papel picado flower-making, a wall of memorials written by exhibition attendees, food for days. The show was brought to light by curator and altar-maker Colblos, a.k.a. Pilar Gordillo, a.k.a. a visual arts student at the university. The altars, by Dick Van Dick, Maga Sama (Gabriela Sanchez), Unbear (Hannah Birch Carl), La Pinta (Ivana Pinto), and M.E.Ch.A. (Movimiento Estudiantil Chican@ de Aztlán), will be on view through Nov. 8, which gives you plenty of time to make your way to the M-Ocean View.
