Universal Studios has apparently decided that we need another remake of The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. And they have decided that Keanu fucking Reeves is the man for the title role(s).
Now... I'm going to come out and admit that I despise Reeves. It's true that he's done some movies I enjoy (Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, the original Matrix) but he's ruined several others I would've enjoyed (A Scanner Darkly, The Day the Earth Stood Still, possibly Constantine). He is not a good actor, and I don't understand how he still gets work.
But I have a theory...
Science fiction has never received the respect it deserves—not in any medium. Therefor, no studio is going to waste the time, money, and talent required to find really good actors. Instead, they're going to look for the sci-fi niche actors, the ones who spring immediately to mind. And, after The Matrix, that's Keanu.
Never mind that he worked as Neo specifically because he was supposed to be sort of lost and bemused the entire time. Never mind that what made that movie special was the Wachowskis' killer idea, truckloads of unique* style, and the utter bad-assness of Laurence Fishburne. Keanu was the leading man of a madly successful science fiction movie, and thus he's a go-to guy for science fiction leading men.
I'm not claiming it's some sort of conspiracy to marginalize sci-fi or anything like that; rather it's the result of sci-fi having already been marginalized because too many people can't be bothered to take it seriously.
Or it could be bunnies.
* Unique for the time. I'm aware that the whole black-leather-and-trenchcoat bit has been done to death since (and admittedly wasn't exactly new then) but it seemed fresh at the time.
Labels: bunnies, keanu reeves, movies, sci-fi
A couple of coworkers and I wandered over to the Erie Art Museum during lunch to see the annual Spring Show. I don't go to the museum often, but I always enjoy it when I do. I am by no means a discerning art critic, and the following commentary should be taken with a grain of salt.
There were some paintings I really liked by Sarah Burke that had sort of mottled-colored silhouettes of people in various stages of distress or excitement. They were neat images and I think a series of them would look really good together.
An artist from Cleveland (whose name escapes me) had some cityscapes that looked bleak and funky. They kind of looked inked, actually, but the card said it was all paint. In either case, they were really cool and emotive.
The one piece that really grabbed me, though, was called "Under the Bridge" (again, I don't recall the artist's name). It was a mixed-media book that replicated the experience of looking up through a network of girders and supports—I know: hardly a life-changing experience, but interesting to me because it's a visual that can't accurately be replicated in a photo.
Some things simply don't translate to two dimensions. No matter how arresting the real-life, three-dimensional thing is, it loses its luster the moment you flatten it out. If you don't believe me, spend some time looking at pictures of the Grand Canyon and then go check out the real thing.
Each page of this book was a flat image, obviously. It had several criss-crossing beams, all suitably grungy and rusty. The spaces around them were cut out so that you could see multiple pages stacked up together. Each page was also about a quarter-inch thick. The result, when the pages are viewed together, gives you the sense of three-dimensionality you'd have from looking at something like that in real life without losing the scale of it, as you would in a sculpture.
So, bravo to you, artist whose name is hiding in the show pamphlet I left sitting on my desk at work and isn't included for some reason on the website. I have no idea if you were thinking anything remotely like what I got out of it, but I enjoyed it.
Labels: art, museum, painting, perspective, spring show
Speaking of Time Magazine, has anyone else noticed the rather bizarre way they cross-link their stories? I'm talking about the sentence-long links peppered throughout the body copy, hawking vaguely related articles.
I'm assuming these are auto-generated by software that scans through the article looking for keywords. It's the same as those hideously intrusive ad links that pop little boxes up from double-underlined words every time your mouse goes anywhere near the text.
I can't decide which version I actually find more intrusive. The Time method is just sneaky enough that you've read half the link before you catch on, whereas the pop-up box leaps out at you and usually obscures what you're trying to read.
In either case, I'd really like them both to go away.
Labels: advertising, Time
Time Magazine reported recently that Portugal, which in 2001 decriminalized drugs—all of them, apparently—is showing dramatic decreases in drug use and HIV infection from needles and dramatic increases in people seeking treatment for drug addiction.
It seems that Portugal once had the highest drug use rate in Europe. The country's government, against the urging of its own populace, decided to replace mandatory jail time with voluntary addiction counseling. Large-scale dealing appears to still be illegal, but personal possession and use carries no compulsory penalty.
After five years under this new system, marijuana use plummeted to just 10 percent (compare to just shy of 40 percent in the United States). HIV infections fell by 17 percent and heroin use was more than halved.
Well, cool, I guess...
Now, I've stated before that I support the legalization of drugs. This is born not out of any desire to ever try them myself—my uncle saw to that—but out of a simple belief that it's not the government's job to protect people from their own stupidity.
At the end of the day, the (ab)use of drugs is a personal choice; and a large part of the basis of our country is that people are allowed to make their own choices, even bad ones. Things like drugs become illegal not because they themselves are inherently wrong, but because they become associated with or are assumed to incite other activities. In short, drugs get criminalized as a preventive measure.
I'm all for preventing crime, and I'm all for decreasing the use of drugs in our country. However, I don't think the legal system is the way to do it. It's not what the system was designed to do and it's not what the system is good at. If you want to be successful at prevention, you have to take the much harder road of education, urban development, and community-building.
These are, however, not solutions that fit neatly into an elected term of office.
But wait a minute...
I haven't yet touched on the primary thrust of the Time article: that legalizing drugs lowers—or at least does not increase—the use of drugs. This implies that drug legalization could be an effective measure in combating the drug problem, in much the same way the repealing prohibition made the gangster obsolete.
I've neglected this because the article makes a poor case for it. The argument is built up entirely around one study without reference to its methods or reception in the scientific community. This could just as easily be junk science as it is a legitimate study. It spouts a lot of statistics about how drug use has fallen, but gives no clear picture of how those statistics were derived. All of this makes the source suspect.
Oh yeah: and the study was conducted by the Cato Institute, which the article describes as "a libertarian think tank." In other words, it was conducted by people who were specifically looking to justify the legalization of drugs.
In the article's defense, it does cite a few people unconnected to the study, some of whom even make points against it (one points out that Portugal is so different from the U.S. culturally and politically that they can't realistically be compared). But these are just quotes, rather than facts.
It's a potentially interesting situation, all in all. Drawing any real conclusions from it, however, would require more study from less biased sources.
Labels: crime, drugs, legalization, media bias, Portugal
Well... shit.
Just like that I have my blog again. Cleaned out some of the Viagra-peddling clutter, and it's all shiny and new again, just like I remember.
And I still have fucking nothing interesting to say.
Labels: blog, reclaimed
