Here's the latest page of Untrue Tales for ya:
Keep Smiling page 2
This week I read The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz.
This one won the pulitzer prize not too long ago which is generally a pretty good indicator of quality. And I'd say this is a quality book, although not one that had a tremendous emotional impact on me. The title character is a grossly overweight, role-playing, sci-fi reading and writing nerd from New Jersey by way of the Dominican republic. It starts off as a story about Oscar's fruitless quest to lose his virginity but morphs into a tale of his tragic family history and their roots in the Dominican Republic under the oppressive regime of the dictator Trujillo. The stuff about life under Trujillo in the DR is pretty interesting (and pretty horrible) and Diaz has an engaging writer's voice - very casual with constant references to Marvel Comics, Tolkien and sci-fi trivia. But when it comes down to it, Oscar himself isn't all that engaging and his life ends up being something less than wondrous. I was a bit disappointed. This never really grabbed me in the same way as, say, The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, or Middlesex, or A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. It's worth a read though, just for the insight into a place and people that I hadn't heard much about before.
On the movie front, I finally saw Synecdoche, New York, Charlie Kaufman's directorial debut with Phillip Seymour Hoffman as a theatre director whose life falls apart while he documents it in an ever expanding play.
This is seriously strange, deep and heavy stuff about life and the choices one makes and where they lead. Here they lead to a lot of depressing shit. Now I generally love me some Charlie Kaufmann. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is one of my all-time favorites along with Being John Malkovich and Adaptation. Groovy, mind-bending films that are unlike anything else out there. This one is in the same wheelhouse, but it's much heavier and much darker and requires a lot more from the audience. More than I've got to give, really. The gist of things is, Hoffman is having problems with his wife who doesn't have much respect for him as an artist, so he decides to put on an autobiographical play about the human condition with himself and everyone he knows as characters - a cast list that constantly expands. He has a guy that plays him in the play and an actress that he has an affair with that plays herself and an assistant that he has another affair with that he then casts with another actress while the assistant has an affair with the guy that's playing Hoffman in the play. Then Hoffman gets burned out so he hires Dianne Weist to play him directing the play so he can take a break and play the cleaning woman. Also, one character gets a great deal on the house because it's on fire a little bit and lives there for years while the house burns. It's that kind of movie. I found the whole thing extremely interesting and kind of boring at the same time. I had the constant feeling that I was missing something. That big ideas were going over my head. I'm the kind of guy that mostly skates on the surface of things. I'm not all that deep and I don't really like to think too hard. After watching the movie, I had to go read a bunch of reviews to see what other people thought was going on. The reviews were pretty much equally divided into two camps - those that thought it was a brilliant masterpiece and those that thought it was a pretentious pile of shit. I can sympathize with both sides. I didn't really get the movie, but I don't think Kaufmann is just being a blowhard and disappearing up his own ass. I just think his ideas might be a bit too deep and heavy for the average bear. Me included. It just didn't work on the level I like to be entertained on. Can't really recommend this one except for serious Kaufmann aficionados who're looking for a challenge. It's a long slog and will likely make you depressed as fuck. My girl gave up after about 45 minutes. It'll be interesting to see what he comes up with next.
On a lighter note, I just read the latest Jack of Fables trade in the bath - The Big Book of War.
I love this series. It's a fun, lightweight companion to Fables and the writers do a great job of keeping Jack likable despite the fact that he's pretty much a gigantic, self-absorbed asshat in every way. Big fun for Fables fans. If you're not reading either of these series, you're missing out. Start with Fables, and once you're hooked, move on over to Jack.
Sketchy:
Bye for now!
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