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Flight, in book and movie form
Sunday, September 7th, 2008 08:37 pmIn terms of general entertainment, I've been doing really well: a steady supply of Netflix, awesome independent bookstores/comic stores nearby, and a partner who generally shares my opinions on what to watch/read. What we've been grooving on lately:
Movies: Man on Wire
I've been thinking really hard for a few days now about to recommend this movie without degenerating into complete fannish babblery and squealing over scary and tense scenes. What I've come up with is this: you know how there's one relative (uncle, cousin, aunt, half-brother, etc.) who you've never spoken to, and suddenly you're thrown into conversation with her/him at the family reunion and it turns out she/he has this enthralling life story that you're fascinated by, because she/he actually lived through it and is telling you in the neatest, most exciting way? This movie is the cinematic equivalent of that: sitting spellbound at someone's feet, listening to a story that you might want to disbelieve (because parts of it are preposterous) but can't because there's all this amazing, concrete evidence right in front of you. What's equally amazing to me was that even though there is no film footage of the act in question, I was still enthralled by the still photographs and found myself animating them in my head as the story went on. (The film is a story about the French performance artist/tightrope walker Phillippe Petit and how, in 1974, he and a crew of friends managed to sneak into the just-constructed World Trader Center Towers, avoid all detection from an only somewhat competent security force, and rig a wire between the two towers, which Petit walked back and forth on for 45 minutes straight, pausing every now and then to do tricks, like lying down on the wire, before the NYPD threatened to extract him by helicopter.) And the other amazing thing about this film is that it MUST be seen on the big screen in order to properly convey the scale of what's happening and what's at stake. Most documentaries can be seen on the TV screen and not lose too much, but this documentary can't. This documentary made me glad to have spent the money to see it, and that there's enough of a market for this sort of thought-provoking storytelling film to be made. I know what I'm rooting for in the Oscars this year, at least in the documentary category.
Books: Flight, Volume 5
I've not read the previous Flight anthologies, but I picked this one up on a whim, and was not disappointed. There is some very fine artwork and storytelling in here, not to mention some magnificent coloring and lettering. All in all, well worth the purchase price. Highlights include:
~ "On the Importance of Space Travel" by Svetlana Chmakova, a sweet but heartfelt story about a little girl who may or may not be an alien, her elementary school classmates, and a literal leap of faith and its consequences. The strongest thing about this story is the ambiguous ending (is she really a Princess of Pluto?) and Svetlana's affectionate rendering of relationships and the way they change over time.
~ "Voyage" by Kness and Made, a wordless story about a polar bear floating through a ravaged landscape on a diminishing chunk of ice.
~ "The Courier", by Kazu Kibuishi, which ends with my favorite image of the entire volume: the hero leaping into the unknown, realizing what his place in the world is. The art is simple, but the details are telling, and the setting could be steam-punk Victorian ages, or future dystopia. The story is to the point but poignant and engrossing. I really loved this one.
DVDs: The 4400
We've actually been grooving on this one for quite a while, thanks to a recommendation from![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
orichalcum. This is a heartily satisfying sci-fi series, and what I like about it is that nothing is ever in black and white; there are no simple answers to the questions the story poses and the characters grapple with. (What I also love is playing "spot the Vancouver landmark!" in the background, but that is neither here nor there. OTOH, I do find it amusing that the same hall I got handed my Master's Degree in doubles as the meeting room for the 4400 therapy group.) I'm dreading the cliffhanger that will ensue when we reach the end of the episodes available on DVD (sometime this later this week or early next, depending on what we end up seeing.)
Movies: Man on Wire
I've been thinking really hard for a few days now about to recommend this movie without degenerating into complete fannish babblery and squealing over scary and tense scenes. What I've come up with is this: you know how there's one relative (uncle, cousin, aunt, half-brother, etc.) who you've never spoken to, and suddenly you're thrown into conversation with her/him at the family reunion and it turns out she/he has this enthralling life story that you're fascinated by, because she/he actually lived through it and is telling you in the neatest, most exciting way? This movie is the cinematic equivalent of that: sitting spellbound at someone's feet, listening to a story that you might want to disbelieve (because parts of it are preposterous) but can't because there's all this amazing, concrete evidence right in front of you. What's equally amazing to me was that even though there is no film footage of the act in question, I was still enthralled by the still photographs and found myself animating them in my head as the story went on. (The film is a story about the French performance artist/tightrope walker Phillippe Petit and how, in 1974, he and a crew of friends managed to sneak into the just-constructed World Trader Center Towers, avoid all detection from an only somewhat competent security force, and rig a wire between the two towers, which Petit walked back and forth on for 45 minutes straight, pausing every now and then to do tricks, like lying down on the wire, before the NYPD threatened to extract him by helicopter.) And the other amazing thing about this film is that it MUST be seen on the big screen in order to properly convey the scale of what's happening and what's at stake. Most documentaries can be seen on the TV screen and not lose too much, but this documentary can't. This documentary made me glad to have spent the money to see it, and that there's enough of a market for this sort of thought-provoking storytelling film to be made. I know what I'm rooting for in the Oscars this year, at least in the documentary category.
Books: Flight, Volume 5
I've not read the previous Flight anthologies, but I picked this one up on a whim, and was not disappointed. There is some very fine artwork and storytelling in here, not to mention some magnificent coloring and lettering. All in all, well worth the purchase price. Highlights include:
~ "On the Importance of Space Travel" by Svetlana Chmakova, a sweet but heartfelt story about a little girl who may or may not be an alien, her elementary school classmates, and a literal leap of faith and its consequences. The strongest thing about this story is the ambiguous ending (is she really a Princess of Pluto?) and Svetlana's affectionate rendering of relationships and the way they change over time.
~ "Voyage" by Kness and Made, a wordless story about a polar bear floating through a ravaged landscape on a diminishing chunk of ice.
~ "The Courier", by Kazu Kibuishi, which ends with my favorite image of the entire volume: the hero leaping into the unknown, realizing what his place in the world is. The art is simple, but the details are telling, and the setting could be steam-punk Victorian ages, or future dystopia. The story is to the point but poignant and engrossing. I really loved this one.
DVDs: The 4400
We've actually been grooving on this one for quite a while, thanks to a recommendation from
orichalcum. This is a heartily satisfying sci-fi series, and what I like about it is that nothing is ever in black and white; there are no simple answers to the questions the story poses and the characters grapple with. (What I also love is playing "spot the Vancouver landmark!" in the background, but that is neither here nor there. OTOH, I do find it amusing that the same hall I got handed my Master's Degree in doubles as the meeting room for the 4400 therapy group.) I'm dreading the cliffhanger that will ensue when we reach the end of the episodes available on DVD (sometime this later this week or early next, depending on what we end up seeing.)
