» Fringe Blog – Writing on Film, Culture, and Things on the Fringe

Fere Est Perfectus

jelewis8 — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 02:54:54 +0000

Well, I suppose that just about qualifies me for a short break. After finishing my first book in about a month and a half back in November 2005 (woot!), I then took the next ten months to write the second book, though technically I took almost three months off for various employment reasons. Now, at least, I no longer have to wallow in the shame of having to say “It’s almost done,” which, if I had a crest, would be labeled in a fine Roman script across the bottom, guilded letters of Latin writ large: “Fere Est Perfectus.”
Nevertheless, just because I’m “finished” doesn’t mean I’m done. I still have the editing, which is a painful process because I never know what’s worth keeping and what needs to be stripped away like old paint until about a month after it’s been written. Which explains every single blog post I’ve ever put online. I also have a tiny…tiny scene I’m considering writing…not because it’s a necessary addition, but because I’m wondering if the obscure reference I leave in the very last line of the book will give readers the necessary clue to deduce the ending to one story thread that seems to be left hanging. If not, it makes readers mad to think I’ve cheated them of a resolution. Though thinking about it, I’d rather commit the sin of omission than to give too much away in a reckless narrative denouement.
The bizarre thing is, I was entirely unprepared for today. I woke up at approximately six in the AM, right arm asleep, drool leaking from my lips, having just emerged from a horrific dream in which I burned down my apartment by cooking for a bunch of guests, only to leave the gas stove burning whilst I cavorted over to a friend’s house to watch the telly. Everything I’d ever left in my apartment whooshed through my mind as I realized that for the moment, my life was slam-bang screwed. No more independent feature film. No more novel. No more screenplays. It’s funny. Of all my “possessions”, the ones I value the most are the ones that don’t really exist in physical form. The possibly thousand or more dollars of DVDs and CDs, my clothes, my camera, my cereal…I didn’t even consider them in my dream. Which makes me realize that what I truly hold dear in my daily grind of work is my writing and film editing–all electronically accomplished, all vaguely transient in their existence. What is written on the screen isn’t really there. It doesn’t actually exist. That’s the great illusion of our time, that what we see for much of our lives is tantamount to magic. This word, this period, this sentence. This blog. All imaginary. Even my decreased hits aren’t really there. Which somehow makes it all either more or less depressing, I’m not sure which.
But once these things make it past your cornea, past the blood-brain barrier that separates the thing from the thingness, this all becomes infinite in its existence. Moreover, it’s a copy of the original, yet isn’t stored exactly as a copy, but a reasonable facsimile thereof. You read, you comprehend, you store the vague memory of the thing, and it is carried along until discarded by the next image, the next visual that takes precedence in the neural binding. We don’t think about it, but the whole world is like this.
What it says to me is that I better back up my shite before my apartment burns down. Not even renter’s insurance is security for the imaginary words that exist only on a microdot. But yay for me, I finished! I’m happy and exhausted, and so very ready for bed. So tomorrow I begin again. Hopefully with better results. Because I always strive for that higher goal.
Perhaps “Fere Est Perfectus” is not a bad motto after all.

Something Sweet This Way Comes

jelewis8 — Fri, 28 Jul 2006 15:29:10 +0000

There’s an uncanny feeling you get when you know something’s about to change. It’s not at all like when you try and squeeze off a silent and hopefully non-lethal bit of stinky wind and realize you’ve squeezed a little too hard–that’s mild shame and even a bit of disappointment (“I thought I was in control here”), mixed with the usual run of regret (“Why did I think that wouldn’t happen?”) and disgust. Nor is it like the anticipation you feel before going on a trip, though it’s more in that vein. That’s a peculiar momentum of emotion, one that is neither happy nor sad, but looking forward to new sights and smells and the dissembling the anger over rising gas prices, knowing it’s not really the gas company’s fault, but simply a factor in the global exchange of products and services, which really took off in the 1800′s, when commerce on a global scale became the known reality. Hard to think that gas prices today were set in motion by some guy who invented the steam engine a few hundred years ago. Then again, it’s all money in or out of the hand anyway, and you could argue your way back to Adam and Eve if you wanted to, claiming that if God hadn’t invented fruit, we wouldn’t have Israel and Hezbollah going at it like two kindergarteners in a sandbox.
Whoa, way off track. That uncanny feeling, the feeling of change I am experiencing, probably has a French word to describe it, a word that carries within it all the necessary definitive properties, without actually containing any descriptives. Like deja vu. You know exactly what it is. Even if you don’t, because you’ve had it before. Like now. You’ve read this Fringe post before!
Anyway, I woke up feeling the world was the same old stinky grey tenement, but I was strangely satisfied, understanding that it was only temporary. I am not sure if the feeling comes from knowing I’ll be seeing sunny weather within an hour or two. No matter the source or the expectations, I feel that change is in the air. There’s probably a thousand Broadway songs that have been written about this topic, but none with this particular brand of sweetness.
I finished up the script I’ve been slavering over like a canine with a bone of contention, confident in the last 110 pages, not so much at the first 15. That’s the most important part, in a way, because it sets the expectations for the rest of the script. Anyone who decides to read past that first rough patch may find the rest a larf, but will they make it that far? So instead of sending it out like I am prone to doing, straight out of the gate, I’ve held onto it. But I haven’t looked at it. I’m letting it germinate. I’ll go back to it fresh, see what sprouts. The hand of God, perhaps.
So in the meantime, good things come to those who jog patiently. Waiting is for suckers, at least in this town. I’m jumping back into the novel, and will (I state that emphatically, though minus italics, despite the fact that it’s easier to use them than type all this, and looks better too) finish before the end of August. I’m also waiting to hear back from a potential animation job (who would have thunk it–me in animation?) that could be worth a few clams, and I also have the usual run of little freelance gigs that have somehow kept me afloat.
I’ve been here a year, and things have, in some ways, greatly changed. Other things are no different than they were when I last looked at my bank statement. But there’s that old feeling again. I know something’s up. I don’t know what it is, but I feel hope and Spring and hear the vague sound of cash registers. Though it might just be church bells. Something’s in the wind, and it smells perfectly sweet.
Have a great weekend, I’ll see you Monday.

Two Vows

jelewis8 — Mon, 06 Mar 2006 22:50:55 +0000

Unfortunately, I broke two pacts this weekend. One was my intention not to watch the Oscars. The other was not to see any theatrical movies this year. The shame is minimal, as you might expect from breaking a pair of baseless, unprecedented vows. It’s not like I slept with a hooker or anything. And it’s not like I was doing it for Lent. That would be one thing.
Oscars were enjoyable. I correctly predicted 16 of the 24 awards, including all the “major” categories. By next year, I’ll be pitch perfect and writing for Rolling Stone. My church put on an Oscar party with red carpet and paparazzi and lots of food. It was a fun experience, but it’s like any party which celebrates celebrity with more celebrity–it kind of feels like giving yourself the Heimlich. The Oscars is a nice way for Hollywood to feel appreciated, if only by themselves, by giving themselves pats on the back, providing they don’t trip over their own gowns and egos. George Clooney gave Hollywood a collective BJ by hearkening back to the days when blacks were still not allowed to sit in the front of buses. Apparently, if you’re letting blacks be gaffers while middle America is stuck in the “White Toilets Only” mode, you’re progressive. Congratulations. Piper, who still isn’t blogging, has more on the evening’s self-fellatio. Not his, of course…
Speaking of progressive, Brokeback Mountain ran out of steam about three days before Oscar ceremony time, giving Crash a much needed boost. Excellent marketing job…indeed, perhaps too successful. They made Brokeback such a ubiquitous catchphrase that it lost all cultural potency. But in truth, I do not believe everything in the Oscars is political. Having only seen clips from Brokeback, nothing impresses me to the point of starstruck awe. Heath and Jake are examples of two actors who are capable, but not extraordinary. They were nominated in the vacuum of other quality actors and in the parachute-like bulge of the movie’s content. Progressive? Maybe. Or maybe it’s just another interesting attraction on the arcade of 21st century culture.
I’ll have a review up later this week of the stinker I broke my other vow with. I can sum up Ultraviolet with three words, for those who don’t like my longer reviews: Ultra Suck It.
About 50 friends showed up in Los Angeles this weekend, which makes this four straight weekends of me getting absolutely nothing done. Not that I mind. But I do. I think it’s my fault, though, since I allow myself to get sucked into the funness of hanging out with old friends. The only solution is to hide myself away in a Malibu penthouse for a month. Call me in five years when I have the mortgage payment plan and a guest house. Then it’s call if you want to get together. I live out in Malibu. I’ve got a great place here, perfect for guests, but I ain’t drivin’ into LA.
A pleasant fiction. But still five years down the road, at least. Until then, I do need to land on a “get out of friends visiting” space. You’d think after eight months going around the board, I’d have hit it at least once. I get “free parking” all the time. But I love my friends. I don’t want to sound like a dick.
Too late.
I love you.
I totally forgot to link Piper’s Los Angeles visit, which he blogs in a more cohesive, comprehensive, and welcoming style than my own rapid-fire accounting. Piper, who is, I repeat, still not blogging, paints a generous picture of his time here, and I appreciate his observations for his mordant wit and style, which blends an East Coast cynicism with a West Coast blaseness. Way to win hearts and minds!
Also, very cool, Jewelboxing has a profile on Red State and how I used their DVD cases to create a wonderful complement to the film. I appreciate the shoutout, guys! While you’re at it, why not purchase the film on DVD, for the low-low price of $6 plus shipping? Link is on the sidebar, FYI.
That about does her. See you tomorrow. With bells on.

Michael Yon, Reporter on the Ground

jelewis8 — Thu, 25 Aug 2005 22:08:49 +0000

Michael Yon writes dispatches on the ground in full combat mode. Gripping stuff, and not for the faint. He’s basically putting every other reporter in Iraq to shame, and he’s doing it on his own time and money.
An interesting note. In the latest dispatch, Yon recounts the capture of a terrorist, and discovers that this terrorist had been captured before.

The doctors rolled LTC Kurilla and the terrorist into OR and our surgeons operated on both at the same time. The terrorist turned out to be one Khalid Jasim Nohe, who had first been captured by US forces (2-8 FA) on 21 December, the same day a large bomb exploded in the dining facility on this base and killed 22 people.
That December day, Khalid Jasim Nohe and two compatriots tried to evade US soldiers from 2-8 FA, but the soldiers managed to stop the fleeing car. Then one of the suspects tried to wrestle a weapon from a soldier before all three were detained. They were armed with a sniper rifle, an AK, pistols, a silencer, explosives and other weapons, and had in their possession photographs of US bases, including a map of this base.
That was in December.
About two weeks ago, word came that Nohe’s case had been dismissed by a judge on 7 August. The Coalition was livid. According to American officers, solid cases are continually dismissed without apparent cause. Whatever the reason, the result was that less than two weeks after his release from Abu Ghraib, Nohe was back in Mosul shooting at American soldiers.
LTC Kurilla repeatedly told me of–and I repeatedly wrote about–terrorists who get released only to cause more trouble. Kurilla talked about it almost daily. Apparently, the vigor of his protests had made him an opponent of some in the Army’s Detention Facilities chain of command, but had otherwise not changed the policy. And now Kurilla lay shot and in surgery in the same operating room with one of the catch-and-release-terrorists he and other soldiers had been warning everyone about.

Later, Yon and the company chaplain and two surgeons discussed the ethics of war and why they were fighting.

Over lunch with Chaplain Wilson and our two battalion surgeons, Major Brown and Captain Warr, there was much discussion about the “ethics” of war, and contention about why we afford top-notch medical treatment to terrorists. The treatment terrorists get here is better and more expensive than what many Americans or Europeans can get.
“That’s the difference between the terrorists and us,” Chaplain Wilson kept saying. “Don’t you understand? That’s the difference.”

I encourage everyone to read and link to Yon’s blog. Also, readers who enjoy his work and want to support Michael’s mission in Iraq, can make a contribution using the following PayPal link.

Donations can also be sent to:
Michael Yon
PO Box 416
Westport Pt MA
02791

Blacksburg Life Is No Pipe Dream

jelewis8 — Thu, 28 Jul 2005 07:54:24 +0000

Leave it to Piper to totally shame me with his far more comprehensive accounting of last weekend’s doings and happenings, and with the added bonus of inline photographs too! He’s got a very different take on the weekend–in fact, the exact opposite of mine. Whilst I focused on the significance of my time with friends as a bookend to my stay here in beloved Blacksurg, his perspective is on learning to accept living on the East Coast and coming to an understanding of the kind of lifestyle that he needs to build for himself for the time that he has here. A very insightful response, I think, and definitely worth the read.

LebowskiFest 2005

jelewis8 — Wed, 20 Jul 2005 07:28:22 +0000

LebowskiFest 2005 is this weekend in Louisville, KY. It’s a shame I’m too tied up to attend, but I do plan on making next year’s Los Angeles festival.
In honour of and in lieu of attending, below are some inspirational quotes for you to ponder and repeat. Oh, and in case you are unfamiliar with The Big Lebowski, be forewarned, the following contains lots of swears.
The Dude: You thought Bunny’d been kidnapped and you could use it as a pretext to make some money disappear. All you needed was a sap to pin it on…you’d just met me. You thought, hey, here’s a deadbeat, a loser, someone the square community won’t give a shit about.
Lebowski: Well? Aren’t you?
The Dude: Well…yeah.
The Stranger: One a those days, huh. Wal, a wiser fella than m’self once said, sometimes you eat the bar and sometimes the bar, wal, he eats you.
The Dude: Uh-huh. That some kind of Eastern thing?
The Stranger: Far from it.
Walter: You want a toe? I can get you a toe, believe me. There are ways, Dude. You don’t wanna know about it, believe me.
The Dude: Yeah, but Walter–
Walter: Hell, I can get you a toe by 3 o’clock this afternoon–with nail polish.
Maude: What do you do for recreation?
The Dude: Oh, the usual. Bowl, drive around. The occasional acid flashback.
The Dude: Fuck sympathy! I don’t need your fuckin’ sympathy, man, I need my fucking johnson!
Donny: What do you need that for, Dude?
The Dude: Well, just take ‘t easy, man.
Walter: I’m perfectly calm, Dude.
The Dude: Yeah? Wavin’ a gun around?!
Walter: Calmer than you are.
The Dude: Just take it easy, man!
Walter: Calmer than you are.
Yeah well, that’s just, ya know, like, your opinion, man.
Walter: Nihilists! Fuck me. I mean, say what you like about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude, at least it’s an ethos.
The Dude: Fuckin’ Quintana…that creep can roll, man.
Walter: Yeah, but he’s a pervert, Dude.
The Dude: Yeah.
Walter: No, he’s a sex offender. With a record. He served 6 months in Chino for exposing himself to an eight year old.
The Dude: Oh!
Walter: When he moved to Hollywood he had to go door to door to tell everyone he was a pederast.
Donny: What’s a…pederast, Walter?
Walter: Shut the fuck up, Donny.
The Dude: I dropped off the money exactly as per – look… man, I’ve got certain information, all right? Certain things have come to light, and – y’know, has it ever occurred to you, that, instead of, uh, y’know, running around, uh, uh, blaming me, y’know, given the nature of all this new shit, y’know, this could be a-a-a-a lot more, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, complex, I mean, it’s not just, it might not be just such a simple… uh, y’know?

Liar’s Day

jelewis8 — Mon, 04 Apr 2005 19:58:48 +0000

April Fool’s Day ought to be renamed to Liar’s Day, because that’s pretty much what it boils down to. One day where you can say anything you want and get away with it scot free. It’s a shame, though, because you start to lose context after about twenty minutes of conversation with anyone who thrives in mendacity. Who knows what good stories are lost on April 1 because the lies simply overwhelm everyone and every place? It’s as if the blanket protections offered by “Fool’s Day” smother every good thing.
As you might know, I completed Zero Sum last week, in time to submit to the Progeny Festival of Motion Pictures and the LA Inspiration Film Festival. This past Saturday evening I held a screening for it. It was, by most counts, a success, both in attendance and reception. Most people approached me afterward to ask questions about “what it meant”. In the indie world, you know you’ve “made it” when people ask those kinds of questions. I was somewhat nervous about the event, given that I have never done a screening before, but it was remarkably stress-free. Except for a few pre-viewing jitters, the atmosphere was relaxed and enjoyable.
Now that the work of completing the film is over, I’m back to a regular schedule of working and writing. I’ve begun my final push to complete Turnpike Blues, my detective novel of dubious wit and mystery. It’s been over a year since I wrote the bulk of the manuscript, though I’ve tinkered here and there, writing around 15,000 words (40 pages, give or take) since then. I’m about 10,000 words away from completion, and with nothing creative on my plate for the next four months, I would like to put this sucker away for good. I know, I’ve written of goals before, but my intention here is not to set goals, but hopeful expectations. I’m not writing it for money, though I would jump at the chance to be published/make money. I’m writing it for me. And for you, even if you’re not reading it.
To wit, I’ve published the latest excerpt from Chapter 19 below this entry. If you’ve not been keeping up with the story, I’d recommend not reading this now. Either start from the beginning or wait until the novel is finished.
There is a certain convention in detective novels, a progression of story and character that is specific to the genre. We’re coming to the place where the detective finds himself in a jam and must use only his wits and a bit of luck to escape the trap. It’s also where he must reconcile his past, an especially sore subject for our friend Ferret-Eye Jack. I’m looking forward to seeing where events take Mr. Jack, for there are some things even the writer doesn’t know until he writes them down as they occur. Call it transcription of the imagination.
In other news, Greg Piper writes that thanks to the deaths of Terri Schiavo and the Pope, Americans can refocus their attention on the really important issues like “gay marriage”. Greg’s not only got the wit (“I can’t tell if she’s saying gay couples will put their souls in jeopardy by marrying, or marriage itself is hell. Either way she needs some remedial theology.”), but the substance as well:

The seemingly unstoppable wave of state marriage amendments should be welcomed by both sides, in my view, as the best they can get. For gay-marriage supporters, the passage of state amendments takes the steam out of efforts to pass a federal amendment. For gay-marriage opponents, who are mad at President Bush for making a halfhearted effort at stopping gay marriage, the statewide bans are about all they can get. Bush is too smart to risk his second term on a federal ban when he has the opportunity to guide the development of democracies and free markets in some of the most autocratic parts of the world.

That’s pretty insightful, an observation I don’t think I’ve seen expressed anywhere else. Props to Piper too for noting that Bush should keep his finger on the pulse of social conservative work in Africa and Asia, melding it with his “democracy agitation” agenda. I’m in agreement, once again, with one smart blogger from DC.
Also in the pipe for later today: a Sin City review that will explore the more aggressive social undertones of the film, its morality and how that relates to its violence and sexuality, and the dark seeds of noir that drives the film’s construction. Oh yes, and I think I owe you a Zen Musing.
Keep checking back here for these updates throughout the day.