RKNet Blog... Thing

Evening children, welcome to Clippings & Scribblings, a news entry with editorials. I’m Sketch E. Whiteface, and I’m an alcoholic… err, close enough.
In the musical metallurgy realm, if not already aware, the masked nine-piece band Slipknot is back and with full force with a new album dubbed “All Hope Is Gone” coming out this Tuesday. The band started performing for the first time in nearly two years in July on the Rockstar Mayhem Festival tour with Disturbed, Dragonforce and Mastodon. I attended the show in Mansfield, MA and breathed chaos from the energy exhumed, it was pure gold. If you’ve been keeping track of the tour or the band you would know that Slipknot’s DJ, Sid “0″ Wilson, had injured himself during on of the shows. In the body of their set he jumped off one of the raised platforms and broke both his ankles. Whereas some would put off the rest of the tour they marched on through and Sid was confined to a wheelchair until healed properly. They’ve gone through much worse injuries (especially Wilson), such as concussions, severe burns, lacerations and other often life-threatening bumps. However recently they’ve acquire a rather large set-back, an issued statement from the band apologized for the fact they will have to cut their appearances at the Reading & Leeds Festival in England and their European tour due to drummer Joey “1″ Jordison broke his ankle. Apart from canceling of a tour they subsequently had to cancel several appearances in light of the incident.
In other unfortunate news for entertainers canceling things, the highly anticipated “Ghostbusters” video game expected to be released this October is CANCELED. I’ll give you a few moments to finish crying and throwing your computer chair out the window. Activision was due to be the distributor behind the cult classic based game but dropped it and several other titles.  While franchise games such as “Crash Bandicoot” and “Spyro” where sold to Activision by Vivendi Games the interactive sequel to an iconic film series was left in the dust. However all hope is not gone for this game for the developers are searching for someone to release it and have assured fans that it will be released. Now on the commentary for this: are you fucking kidding me? You pass up something that’s existed for 25 years to something that’s been around only 10 aimed solely at kids? And keep in mind, the “Ghostbusters” game features the original cast and was penned by Reitman, Aykroyd and Ramis. This is more or less the sequel everyone’s been hoping for and courtesy of schmucks with calculators it’s left out in the desert with a canteen and a compass.
And now for more theoretical blabberings. Last weekend the nerd orgasm known as “The Dark Knight” was taken over at the box office by Ben Stiller comedy “Tropic Thunder“. However as it lowered to the number two spot it also arised to the number two spot at the all-time box office having earned $475 million dollars passing “Star Wars: A New Hope” and settling just under “Titanic” which holds the record at $600 million (for some reason.) Currently on IMDb.com the Christopher Nolan directed comic-book movie is holding it’s place at #3 on the top 250 highest rated movies, and also broke the record for being #1 after only two days of it’s release. Since the weekend prior it made it’s box office jump by a good $40 million and this fan has a strong belief that it will knock the boat over. I plan to toss another seven bucks into the pot this weekend and I strongly encourage you to do the same. One more hill to get over, people. Come on.

=Sketch/Ed

“Now drugged, and wielding a camera tripod, Blacky begins to charge…””

Last night, while flipping through the channels, my roommates and I came across an exceedingly misleading show entitled “Untamed and Uncut: Goose Attack.” Naturally, we were sold. The boys and I exchanged solemn nods. “Let’s do it.””Would it be weird to watch porn with my roommates? Such, apparently, specific porn? Don’t care. Maybe you missed the title…it contains the words “Goose Attack.” With visions of rampaging men and their equally rampaging and, well, uncut mansticks (too far?) goosing chicks (with, I like to think, perforated wooden paddles), I eagerly clicked “select.”

Well, “Untamed and Uncut: Goose Attack” was not a porn… I suppose I should have guessed. In fact, it was on Animal Planet, though incidentally, the description of the show straight from animalplanet.com is as follows:

Gritty, shocking, compelling, *and always raw*, each half-hour episode takes viewers on a journey around the world to meet the people who’s lives are forever changed by a moment in time with an animal.

I wish I could tell you I made that up.

No, “Untamed and Uncut” wasn’t porn. And it didn’t even feature animal sex (foiled again.) What it was, though, was one of those “when animals attack” type deals. And, just what was the series-documentary covering today? A rampaging bastard (named Blacky, oddly enough) looking something like this:

Dude, Blacky was a Beast; almost the size of an elephant! Motherfucker was raging his way through a little town in Thailand- tipping over motorcycles, throwing trashcans like fucking Donkey Kong and just generally charging around, terrorizing tourists, for three hours… Three Hours! At one point (after poor Blacky had been shot with a tranquilizer dart) the announcer actually said, “Now drugged, and wielding a camera tripod, Blacky begins to charge…” This show rules!

If you’re wondering what the deal with the “Goose Attack” portion of the show was all about… well, a goose attacks a fisherman and his dog. I’d actually seen it before and to this day it gives me visions of being mauled to death by legions of loons every time I go kayaking. Speedy fuckers.

For reference, film evidence of various persons being assaulted by large birds.

Whether or not you feel that you’ve just wasted four minutes of your life reading about my (decidedly satisfactory, though misguided) attempt to catch some silly porn action, I highly recommend you start watching this “series-documentary.” It’s got all the elements of a good “when animals attack” show: gratuitous violence, badly generated computer animation (though the website claims to offer “ground-breaking computer graphic imaging,”) stupid commentators and an obtuse morbidity that’s just damn funny (later in the show, someone says, “I was just waiting for that sickening sound of Stan’s flesh being chopped up by those propellers…”) If that doesn’t sell you, I don’t know what will…

• i’ve decided not to to comb my hair anymore. I’m going to let my bedhead be my guide! #
• my coagulated twitter posts are all out of order My grumpus behavior from early in the day is clearly mixed w/ drunken stupor from later on! #
• Internet! Tell me what I should do today! (besides laundry) #
• oh man, yeah I’ve had stuff to post up since forever. it has since scattered about the apartment willy-nilly and the camera is dead. woe #
• @13badluck13 er, yeah, see last tweet. nurp #
• house cleaning, grateful dead, generally kickin it I think I can live like this shame I dont feel well enough to hit that party I heard bout #

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• I TOLD YOU I GOT THE STREETS ON LOCK #
• @warrenellis you’re welcome #
• @jmspool dude really? is it honestly worth watching, even for designer spotting? #
• dear internet, I seem to have drunk more than I would have expected for a Thursday. tomorrow holds such mysteries #
• Dear Twitter Admins, even with your restrictions, spam runs rampant. I will get by. I enjoy your service. good luck and frith speed. #
• dear internet. flargleplops. also I am drinking a zin irresponsibly. #
• @SocialDynamite you are local, that is good. explain to me why I should follow you otherwise #
• what’s the best thing to tweet while drunk #
• @SketchballEd run avg and any other antivirus you have going. sounds like ‘antivirus 2009′ may have hit you. kill it with fire! #
• @geechee_girl it could be ok. I saw a cool notcot post on it the other day #
• note to self: don’t drink a large amount of booze after abstaining for a while. imbalance central. smack me if I’m “blar hangover” tomor-ah #
• I seem to have been rather drunk last night. What, ah, what happened? #
• finally where I should be: at home in bed #
• @davesnyder what’s this? a colorwars revival? #
• wish I’d brought my jello with me! #
• @davesnyder oooo I see. I’ve never gotten to attend ses, supposedly it’s not my department #

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• obviously I’m an idiot. why didn’t I think to use fnord as a hashtag before now?! #fnord #
• i told you i had the streets on lock two steppin with my hand on my glock #
• I mean, wait. I don’t want to hear it anymore, make it stop #
• @jmspool Is that the one with Get Over It on it? #
• @jmspool Yeah I’m inclined to agree. the one after is a lot more in the hit-and-miss department #
• Why do all the “lol gonna make tons of money on the internet” psuedo-SEO people follow me? #
• Solid plans, reasonable expectations, sensible internet presence, & good marketing FTW, spammy “SEO” blogs & overbearing “coversation” FTL #
• I just get so bent out of shape by following notices from people who may be simply trying for my wallet or my attn as a marketing target #
• the real challenge is, now that everybody is some kind of web marketing guru, how do you seperate the junk from the real people? #
• case in point: @barryplaskow just followed me. did he do that because a robot decided it would be a good idea, or because HE thought it was? #
• @chrisfurniss that is a pretty good metric, actually. It’s a very common trait of the “ima spam you for to somehow make monies on teh tubez” #
• @hansthered well, I just followed you based on this humanity claim, but I gotta ask, why follow nearly 2000 people? #
• @7DeadlyIcePops is it bad that my brain translated “ether and sour” to “life-threatening heartburn” instead? what a woeful state of affairs #
• reading the news does not help my sense of disappointment with humanity. #

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• well kids, naptime approacheth #
• I am unbelievably tired, and I’ve had a headache all day. some kind of dehydration “hangover” thing>? #
• @chrisfurniss I’m slugging down water and sipping coffee the catch with the hangover feeling is I didn’t GET drunk last night :psyduck: #
• @cheshster hair of the dog that growled at me through the fence? #
• I think someone replaced my spine with bubble wrap’s evil twin. Fie on this wretched development! #

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Let me start by saying that this grouping is little more than a list of some of my favorite books. It in no way purports to be comprehensive in any sense, nor are the books presented in any particular order.

Many are distinctly Modern (I’m looking at you, Dave Eggers, Nicole Krauss and Lauren Slater). Others employ a favorite story-telling technique, Magical Realism, that I personally, can’t get enough of (thanks Toni Morrison, Salman Rushdie and Gabriel Garcia Marquez). Still others are included because they’re beautifully told, utterly unique or just plain cool.

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (Dave Eggers)
Eggers’ first novel is part memoir, part fiction and all modern. This book is bigger than itself. Eggers’ wildly experimental prose, self-conscious narrative and sheer humanity make this one of my all time favorites. The story details his family’s struggle to adjust to the death of both their father and mother in the span of just 32 days- yet much of the book is sheer fantasy and Eggers takes creative liberties in calling this story a “memoir.” (See “Lying: Lauren Slater, below) I would highly recommend this book to aspiring writers.

100 Years of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
A legend in and of itself, this book traces the lineage of a family in a small, supposedly South American town “on the edge of nowhere.” Employing some stunning examples of Magical Realism, a literary technique that has one character literally being drawn into the sky never to return, Marquez’ style is resonant of a fairy-tale so that the impossible is readily, even eagerly accepted. The opening line alone speaks volumes about the way this book hooks you: “Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.”

Song of Solomon (Toni Morrison)
Morrison needs little introduction on my part, and I had a difficult time choosing just one of her novels to highlight. However, Song of Solomon, to me, is perhaps her most experimental yet down-to-earth story to date. The story is a part coming-of-age, part alamentation of the lasting effects of slavery and part an examination of love, in all its strange and often distorted manifestations. Oh, and you’ll find some gorgeous instances of magical realism thrown in there for good measure as well.

Midnight’s Children (Salman Rushdie)
Hilarious, beautifully written, and impeccably structured, Rushdie constantly teases and tests his readers. The story, which traces a young man, Saleem, and his family as he grows up during India’s independence movement has been called a metaphor for the growth, and coming of age, of the country. Rushdie is truly a unique voice and Midnight’s Children is unabashedly accessible.

The History of Love (Nicole Krauss) 2005
A beautifully understated story with distinctly modernist leanings, The History of Love braids together the lives of three characters inextricably, yet distantly tied to each other: Leo, an old man who fears he is disappearing; Alma, a young girl on a quest to find happiness for her withdrawn mother; and Litvinoff, a mysterious and brooding Chilean man from another time. The History of Love truly stuns with some of it’s passages, one in particular stays with me:

“The first language humans had was gestures. There was nothing primitive about this language that flowed from people’s hands, nothing we say now that could not be said in the endless array of movements possible with the fine bones of the fingers and wrists. The gestures were complex and subtle, involving a delicacy of motion that has since been lost completely…”

The Unbearable Lightness of Being (Milan Kundera)
Perhaps a bit pretentious, this work of modern/post-modern fiction examines the insignificance of each and every one of us through a couple and their various infidelities. Uplifting, no? While it’s fair to say that not much actually *happens* in The Unbearable Lightness of Being, so much is said. Kundera believes this “lightness” (our insignificance) to be somewhat wrenching. I myself find it a bit liberating. Whether or not you enjoy the story, Kundera’s structure and prose make this piece worth reading, and the points it raises might send you on a philosophical quest of your own.

The Ear, the Eye and the Arm (Nancy Farmer)
I’m biased because this was a childhood favorite. Set in Zimbabwe in the year 2194, this story follows three royal youths through the various underbellies, subcultures and cults they encounter after they’ve been kidnapped. Three detectives with genetic deformities (super sensitive ears; excessively perceptive eyes and the third with a sense of empathy that often causes him to break down in tears) are assigned to find the children. Yes, it’s science fiction. Yes, it’s a children’s book. Yes, it’s worth reading. Take it to the beach!

The Darling (Russell Banks)
Russell Banks is a beautiful storyteller with the unique ability to put himself in the shoes, and heart, of almost anyone. The Darling is the story of Dawn/Hannah, a middle-aged woman whose rebellious past led her into the depths of Liberia where she experienced all manner of horror and beauty. A striking story told with the fresh rawness of a new wound, passages from the Darling will haunt you for years after you put it down.

Ulysses (James Joyce)
Read this book just to say you did it. Ulysses is an epic novel, yet spans just one day in the life of its protagonist, Leopold Bloom. Some say the book is pure genius. Others denigrate it as over-hyped fluff. Personally, I’d need to read it about five more times to make a fair assessment… But one thing is certain: Joyce went places with Ulysses (which was banned in the United States for obscenity in 1933) that few writers had gone before, and few have gone since. From his topical choices to his stylistic ones, Joyce has a voice and character all his own.

Lying: A Metaphorical Memoir (Lauren Slater)
This book will change the way you think of the term “memoir.” Slater challenges the concepts of truth, its contexts and even its very existence at the core of the human experience. Beautifully written and constructed with a modern twist, Lying has been called “metaphorical memoir,” (though she begs throughout to be understood as non-fiction.) This book continues to frustrate and enchant me, yet Slater’s beautiful prose and (here it is again) modernist tendencies keep me coming back for second, third and fourth readings.

Honorable Mention:
The Angel on the Roof (a collection of short stories by Russell Banks), How We are Hungry (a collection of short stories by Dave Eggers), What is the What (a creative non-fiction account of the life of one of Sudan’s Lost Boys, as told to and expanded upon by none other than Dave Eggers)

Note: If my liberal use of terms like “modernism” and “magical realism” annoyed or offended you, please see my upcoming post detailing these literary techniques and my interpretation of them. Until then, click the links, fool! Modernism - Magical Realism

• @SketchballEd was she the girl in your film or am I totally not remembering the right name? #
• @SketchballEd sucks dude. sorry to hear it #
• I wish to put forth a theory: For every one site that doesn’t suck, there are 50 that do. #
• naptime face is NOW #
• I seem to have awakened to a very similar reality tunnel as yesterday. Crap. #
• HORRIBLE VIRUSES EVERYWHERE #
• @Kurt_McAllister nah, this is like strong bad style. Virus = very yes! PC viruses at remote office #

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I believe that long shots in action movies are one of the biggest “fuck you”s to Hollywood. I recently rented “Death Sentence” which stars Kevin Bacon and is directed by James Wan (of “Saw” fame, not the shitty sequels.) For those unexposed to the movie, the story takes place around a white-collar family man Nick Hume (Bacon) whose son is murdered during a gang initiation then after retaliation is targeted by the gang. In the middle of the film there’s a scene where Bacon is being chased by the gang through a parking garage and it is all in one continuous shot, and even better it’s one take (no cuts, no CG blending, nada.)

I consider “cinematographer” to be under my film repertoire and whenever I can see a shot like this I can’t help but tip my hat to the director and crew behind it since it shows they really busted their balls and want it to feel real. Side by side, the sequence at the end of “Children of Men” where Clive Owen is going after Chiwetel Ejiofor and the baby, and the sequence in “Bad Boys II” where Marcus and Mike are speeding down the highway going after Haitians, “Children of Men” wins hands down. Granted the two sequences are different beasts but I’ll explain why. It’s a lot simpler to put a camera on a tripod and film two seconds of an explosion then to have a handheld shot spanning over five hundred feet with squibs (artificial gunshots) and explosions and other things that goes for five minutes and covers every possible vantage point. Reason why I give more props to the long shots is because that takes a lot of timing, coordination, and collaboration in order to pull it off right so that the end result leaves the viewer believes he just saw a .50 caliber rip through six people.

But to get into the specifics of the “Death Sentence” shot I’ll explain the effort. It starts out with Bacon entering a parking garage and moving up floor by floor to the top where his car is while the gang targeting him is pursuing him. Now on paper you might think one camera operator follows around him but you’d be wrong. Instead of having one man rock a Steadicam and go only inside the garage it is passed around like an Olympic torch. It starts with one man in the hallway then he passes it on to a man on the next level near a gap between two levels (where Bacon is climbing through), to a man sitting on a crane/platform (so the view is now outside the parking garage by a good few feet) which lowers down to the first level where the gang is. The man then passes it off to another operator who goes in closer to the gang, backs onto another elevated platform to go up two floors to where Bacon is running and after that it’s all on that guy. My explanation sucks a bit, I’ll admit, but if you watch the clip you’ll get it.

TOP FIVE LONG TAKES

1. . “Children of Men” - Theo’s pursuit of Luke and the baby. (Clip)
2. “Panic Room” - Dubbed as “The Big Shot”, a floor by floor survey of the house’s three floors as its being broken into. (Clip)
3. “Touch of Evil” - The opening shot going from the rooftop looking down on a parking lot, to past the US/Mexican border several blocks away. This was in the late ’50s. (Clip)
4. “Children of Men” - Where Theo and everyone in the car is attacked.
5. “Rope” - A Hitchcock movie, the whole thing is one continuous shot. Done in the late ’40s (Buy the fucking thing)

The whole purpose of the long shots is to show the viewer that no matter where, what and when the setting is there is a reality that lies in the film. It is more cerebral than your typical quick cut from here to here to here to here and only a second has gone by. That’s my time for now. In an unrelated note I’ve enclosed a picture that can only be described as EPIC (a term heavily being overused now but fuck it.) Picture courtesy of my coworker Timmay.

• dreamt that @JasonCalacanis followed me without me following him first. woke up to the imagined sound of a grenade pin being pulled. wtf? #
• Wish i’d gone ahead and gotten up at 7:30 or so when I woke up the first time. going back to sleep always does weird things to me #
• I am the Emperor of weirdtown today #
• @garyvee lambics are delicious! tho there’s a cherry one that’s got a serious cough syrup vibe. yikes #
• I DEMAND SNACKS! that is all #
• I just now started experiencing the gmail issues everybody’s freaking out about. oh well. #
• life’s a bitch and then it throws in some more bitchiness for good measure, and then just when you think it’s over, BAM more bitch #
• @robertjaques I couldn’t make up a dream that weird. dreamt I checked my mail, and @jasoncalacanis had followed me unprompted! super odd #

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