#119 - acquired tastes.

about a week back, after an eight plus month hiatus from netflix, i decided it was high time that i got back on the ol film-by-mail wagon. i'd originally put the service on hold partially because i wanted to save $15 a month & partially because i'd get films in the mail & they'd just sit there unwatched for weeks on end before i'd get around to watching them. a couple times, i even sent a few back unwatched. in general, i was bored with film & ultimately decided that it just wasn't working out between netflix & i, so we took a break.

but the bitch is back! the first two films arrived in my mailbox last week. they're the same ones that i had all queued up back in november when i initiated the break--mister lonely (trailer here) & fay grim. mister lonely (2007) is the latest film from harmony korine, the dude who's responsible for creating gummo (1997) & julien-donkey boy (1999), but is mostly known for penning the script to kids (1995). the other film, fay grim (2006), is the most recent film from nyc filmmaker hal hartley. after ten years & a few films in between, hartley decided it was time to revisit the story from 1997's henry fool with a sequel. that sequel = fay grim.

the first one i took on was mister lonely. korine is no stranger to odd storylines & this is no exception. it's the story of a michael jackson impersonator who crosses paths with a marilyn monroe impersonator, who then invites him to come live with her in a commune inhabited by nothing but impersonators. with a cast of impersonators, there are endless moments where you get the juxtaposition of famous people doing mundane things (abe lincoln riding a tractor, larry, curly & moe slaughtering sheep). the story between marilyn & her husband (charlie chaplin) really brings out the idea that while these people get to pretend to be other people, they still have issues, as the lovable chaplin is actually, in the words of marilyn, "more like hitler than chaplin."

on top of that, there's an unrelated side story involving a father (played by werner herzog) & the nuns he works with. after one of the nuns falls out of the plane during a food drop & lives, they believe that they can fly because god will protect them. oh religion. overall, it's a pretty good film & definitely more accessible than his other two directorial efforts, but it's still nowhere close to a "traditional" film. if you can believe slashfilm.com, who have info from the toronto international film festival, his next film, trash humpers, is already in the can. with a name like "trash humpers," i can only assume that it's about people having sex with trash, a topic that's even more accessible than that of mister lonely.

as for fay grim, there was once a time when i thought that hal hartley's films were absolute genius. he's made eleven feature-length films over the last twenty years, all of which contain his signature style, one that can very easily rub viewers the wrong way, as his films typically feature some sort of social commentary, everything filmed at dutch angles & characters who speak their thoughts out loud. the last part pretty much goes against the whole "show don't tell" mantra i learned in screenwriting classes, but regardless, i've always loved the blatant feel of it.

it doesn't work as well here. the characters often speak their thoughts, but they also often use dialogue to explain a good deal of the plot from henry fool. it just seems too unnatural. the plot of fay grim revolves around a woman (fay grim, played by parker posey) whose husband (henry fool) is on the run from the law. he's penned a series of notebooks containing U.S. security secrets, so the CIA convinces fay to go to paris to find him. even with the blatant plot explanations, it expands upon what we've learned from the first film, so if you haven't watched henry fool first, there's a good chance you're missing half the story & will have no idea what's going on or know why you should care. if you have seen henry fool though, it's worth a watch, if only to see jeff goldblum play a CIA agent...not recommended for those who believe that the fast & the furious and its sequel (2 fast 2 furious) are the pinnacle of filmmaking.

#119 - acquired tastes.
snack: nori
drink: ito en's dr andrew weil for tea gyokuro green tea



the other night, whilst watching mr lonely at some unspeakable hour of the eve/morn, i was feeling a wee bit peckish. earlier in the day, i'd stopped by my brother's place for a bit & as i was leaving, he was all, "you want some nori?" yes. yes i did...so he gave me two strips & i put them in my backpack for later consumption & went on my merry way. since my peckishness came at an hour in which i probably shouldn't have been stuffing my face with snacks, i decided that the two strips of nori would suffice...& they sort of did.

nori's nothing more than the dried seaweed used to wrap sushi sans the filling sushi part. that's it. apparently japanese people love it. my favorite way to consume nori is to break off little pieces & let them dissolve in my mouth like some sort of salty, fishy breath strip. then i like to make out with the nearest person. since i was alone watching a movie in my apartment at the time, i settled for making out with my hand. please note that i did draw a mouth on my hand before slipping it the tongue, so i'm not a complete weirdo.

to wash down the nori, i went with a can of ito en's dr andrew weil for tea gyokuro green tea. it's one of a line of special ito en teas made in conjunction with dr andrew weil. as the can shows, he's a bald but thickly bearded man who enjoys gazing skyward. in addition to his skygazing, the doctor's also a leader in integrative medicine & according to his website, he's "your trusted health advisor." a side note for health advisors: that "trusted" slogan's totally trademarked, so don't even think about claiming that you're someone's trusted health advisor. anyway, essentially, he's a proponent of combining conventional medical treatments with unconventional, alternative medicines. that means CAH-RAZEE stuff like homeopathy & meditation & healthy diets & whatnot.

the healthy diet part includes drinking his bland, crappy teas. sorry, doctor, but your gyokuro green tea sucks. i mean, i understand that green tea has all sorts of antioxidants & junk & you're all about keeping a simple diet, but would it kill you to add a little sugar or honey or something? basically, you're paying for a can of tea that you can just as easily brew & chill at home except at home, you can at least sweeten it a little bit. sure i could have poured it in a glass & dumped in some sugar or something to make it taste better, but what's the point on buying it pre-made then? actually, i know where i went wrong. you need to fully embrace the dr weil-branded lifestyle to enjoy the tea. i didn't do that. to enjoy the tea, you need to purchase some dr weil multivitamins & some dr weil mega-mushroom face cream & some dr weil fruit & nut bars & dr weil sockeye salmon sausage & if you still have money left after that, you should pick up a couple of his books & DVDs. without them, the tea just won't work.

nosh nook #88 - wednesday, july 15, 2009

docu "food, inc." gets boost from chipotle (link)
07.14.09 - reuters - by alex porter

when the documentary food, inc. came out as part of a limited release last month, it got a good amount of press for its insight into the workings of our nation's food system. in the same way that fast food nation (the book, not the lackluster linklater movie) aimed to get people thinking about where their food comes from, food, inc. aims to educate american consumers about the big business that is the american food industry. to help spread their message, they've formed an interesting partnership with chipotle mexican grill to promote the film.

as alex porter reports, starting yesterday, chipotle began sponsoring "free screenings of the film in 32 U.S. cities" and placing "promotional material in all of its more than 860 restaurants." chipotle, who began as a company out of denver and has since been bought & sold by mcdonalds, prides themselves on using as many fresh, organic ingredients as possible, putting them in a unique position. they've both been a part of the world's largest chain of fast food restaurants and an advocate for "food with integrity."

steve ells, founder, chairman and co-CEO of chipotle is excited about the partnership. "i hope that all our customers see this film," he said, "the more they know about where their food comes from, the more they will appreciate what we do." what does chipotle do? according to this article, "35 percent of the beans it uses are organically grown and that it serves more naturally raised meat than any other restaurant worldwide." the last part of that probably wasn't that tough of an accomplishment, given that they're huge, with 860 restaurants & over a billion dollars in revenue last year.  for food, inc., pairing up with such a huge part of the american food system to promote a film about the problems with the american food system is an interesting approach, but if it gets the word out about the film, good for them.  at least they're not working together with a company still owned by mcdonalds.

#108 - tropical cherries.

for as much as i hate war, i'm sort of a fan of non-spielberg stories that deal with war. renowned director samuel fuller's novel the big red one is one of my favorite books, but i've yet to see the film by the same name. three kings, stalag 17, apocalypse now (obviously)...i love all three films. generation kill is possibly my favorite tv miniseries. it's not like i've ever been in the military or anything. the closest i've ever come was saying to my mother back in high school, "really? so i have to fill out that selective service card or i go to jail? well, ok then. i guess i'll sign it." to be honest, i'd have likely fled for canada if they'd ever reinstated the draft. i'm the first generation in my family who hasn't gone to war or at least been in the military. i'm pretty sure my high-school aged brother doesn't have military ambitions, so maybe the military tradition in my family will skip a generation.

...but i like war films. friday night, after i returned home from a short evening with two friends down 5th ave at bar reis & reis 100 (the bar's newly opened sandwich shop, where i totally had a white anchovy, pickled carrot & daikon, spicy mayo & cilantro sandwich. BAM!), i decided to watch a movie. i was in the mood for a lil comedy, so i queued up tropic thunder, the comedy about a group of actors shooting a war picture that turns into the real thing. it's taken me so long to see it because for me, the film had ended up in the same category as the crying game & its secret ninja penis, in that one aspect of the movie--academy award-nominated robert downey jr playing a black man--often became the main story surrounding the film. the cast is stellar beyond downey jr, with ben stiller (who i like) & jack black (who i tolerate) & a cast that includes nick nolte, steve coogan, kenny powers danny mcbride & friggin' tom cruise.

as the story goes, downey jr, stiller & black's characters are part of a group of prima donna actors shooting a vietnam war film directed by steve coogan's character, written by nick nolte's character & produced by tom cruise's. to be honest, i didn't even know it was cruise until at least half way through the movie, although i suffered some serious "who the hell is that guy" feelings every time he came on screen. the film shoot's going horribly, so the director & writer decide to shake things up by dropping the actors into the jungle, miles away from the set & their trailers. the director takes charge & coogan's character really explodes on the screen as the war picture becomes MORE REAL THAN THEY'VE BARGAINED FOR.  hilarity ensues.

i liked it so much that i've decided to go back & watch a few war films this summer, most of which i've yet to see. how the lineup plays out thus far:

ON LIST:
- three sam fuller war pictures--the big red one, fixed bayonets! & the steel helmet
- renoir's la grande illusion
- jarhead (the only war movie i own)
- the deer hunter

POSSIBLY ON LIST:
- quentin tarantino's inglorious basterds
- the hurt locker
- in the army now, with pauly shore

NOT ON LIST:
- saving private ryan

#108 - tropical cherries.
snack: cherries
drink: samuel smith organic cherry ale



cherries are probably my favorite fruit. when i was but a wee lad, i'd eat those bright red maraschino ones right out of the jar. ice cream with a cherry on top? i'd have ice cream with four cherries on top & four others hidden within the ice cream itself. i can't say that i ever remember eating a non-maraschino cherry as a kid though. now that i'm an adult (of sorts), i'm trying to overhaul the diet a bit these days & that includes eating nothing but natural snacks for a little bit, hence the bowl of cherries. i'm so glad that i eventually discovered non-jarred & juice immersed cherries, because, pit & all, they're a damn tasty fruit...now if i could just get down that sexy cherry stem-tying thing. actually, screw that. i don't need cherry stems to prove my dexterity.

it turns out that cherries don't have a very long shelf life. tonight, i went back to finish them off & those mofos had already started molding & turning into wine & whatnot. boo cherries. now i'll have to get more of you tomorrow to get my fill. if you're not careful & i'm not stuck to my mattress come 8am, i might even get feisty & chop yo ass up into a morning smoothie along with no less than four other fruits. your own mother won't even recognize you.

since i was going all tropical & fruity, i opened up a bottle of samuel smith organic cherry ale to accompany the cherries. along with the raspberry & strawberry varieties, it's one of sam smith's three fruit beers, which are brewed with actual fruit juice. it's absolutely amazing tasting--think the flavor of a cider, but not as watery & bitter. it's a flavor similar to what you'd get from a syrup-infused berliner weisse, sans wheatiness. paupers take note: it's not a beer for the indigent & downtrodden. i forked over $8.50 for a 18.7oz bottle & i'd do it again, since the ale & cherry combo created an orgasmically pleasurable & fruity explosion in my mouth.

also, in other recent work/cherry-related developments, i'm now heading up the site for john mellencamp's fan club--"club cherry bomb." i grew up with "hurts so good" and "jack & diane" & "pink houses," but they've mostly just been a part of the larger mass of 80's songs in my head. coincidentally, npr's fresh air had an interview with him on friday, timed to coincide with thursday's start of the dylan/mellencamp/willie nelson tour of minor league ballparks. after listening to the interview & mellencamp performing a few songs acoustic, i have a better appreciation for his music & for his take on things. when asked what he learned from the experience of his song "this is our country" being used in chevy silverado ads, he had this to say: "i learned that an artist shouldn't have to do this. this is not what my songs are about...but i also learned that chevrolet was a better record company than columbia." amen, john. amen.

#106 - ready for my closeup.

back in the mid-nineties, i spent four years of my life & $100K in pursuit of a coveted boston university film degree. as previously noted, other than writing a handful of unproduced feature-length scripts in the late nineties, i've put the film portion of that degree to little use. the only time it led to the creation of an actual film was in 2003, when i documented a cross-country trip a friend & i took to yellowstone for a week of backcountry hiking & camping.

about two-and-a-half years ago, almost ten years after graduating, i found myself on a film set for the first time. i had moved back to nyc a few months earlier & was living the totally glamorous, totally bohemian no-apartment, no-job lifestyle & as such, had a lot of free time on my hands. a friend who i'd met through my girlfriend at the time was acting as producer on a short film & they needed somebody to drive one of the vans that transported the crew from union sq down to one of the sets, a school in new brunswick, nj. other than missing the holland tunnel one night & having to drive through an extra 30-45 minutes of traffic to the lincoln tunnel, i did a fairly good job. in fact, nobody died on my watch.

since my main job was basically two hours of driving to the set & two hours driving from the set with a full day of waiting on the set sandwiched in between, i finished a hell of a lot of crosswords but also provided random assistance here & there. i helped carry in gear, hung a few signs around the building to direct cast members to the appropriate rooms & given my food expertise, was obviously a part of setting up craft services/catering. in addition, since i still get carded for cigarettes & lottery tickets & whatnot and the plot revolved around a high school teacher & a few of her students, i filled in as an extra, playing the part of a high school student. basically, along with a number of extras who were actually high school students, i was tasked with hanging out in the background & reacting to stuff.

my big break came during a scene where the teacher (played by leslie lyles, who also played andy kaufman's mother in man on the moon) was selling fundraiser candy to another teacher (played by eric christie). they conversed for a bit over the candy transaction & then he stepped away & i stepped forward & uttered my one line--"hershey bar, please." this past wednesday, the film--LANDLOCKED--had its first set of screenings & my one line made the cut & was right up there on the screen for all to see. i might be slightly biased, but i really believed that i wanted that hershey bar...& i'm now four degrees away from kevin bacon. leslie lyles was in man on the moon with jim carrey, who was in the truman show with laura linney, who was in mystic river with kevin bacon.

#106 - ready for my closeup.
snack: hershey's mini milk chocolate bars
drink: heineken from a mini keg



along with the screenings, there was a reception that featured an array of tasty wines & beers & cheeses & whatnot. there was even a cake shaped like the state of oklahoma (where the film is set). since the plot largely revolved around the teacher trying to raise money for a class trip by selling candy, there were mini candies sprinkled throughout the reception area. given my on-screen preference, i made sure to make quick work of a few hershey's mini milk chocolate bars during the reception.

recently, i've become somewhat of a chocolate snob, opting for dark chocolate most of the time. regardless, there's always something satisfyingly comforting about hershey's bars. they take me back to my childhood, a time when the parow clan filed into a rented minivan & took a summertime excursion down to hershey park, the most chocolate-themed amusement park on earth. unfortunately, that memory doesn't consist of any actual events from that trip, although i assume that some chocolate was consumed at some point & we probably went on some rides & i probably punched my sister and/or brother at least once.

as part of the reception spread, there was a mini keg of heineken. since i was feeling celebratory & i'm a total lush, i had myself a few classy plastic cups of that along with the chocolate bars. even though it's the world's most popular lager, the best part about the heineken is definitely not its bitter ass taste. it's the adventure that accompanies pouring it from that cute lil keg into a small plastic cup, a task that i discovered is not as easy as it appears to be.

the mini keg is dutch engineering at its finest. for starters, the "tap" extends out from the top of the keg at a 90-degree angle, which, if you're not careful, leads to the beer shooting out of the keg, clear past your waiting plastic cup. luckily, the fancy spread included napkins, which i put to good use. on top of that, the mini keg produces a lot of foam, a development which is fine when it involves tasty beer, but not when it involves heineken. if i have to wait five minutes for my beer, it damn well better be a guinness or a boddingtons or some such draught beer. sure i could be a total heathen & like my friend who i was getting my beer with, swirl a finger covered in nose grease into the foam to speed up the process, but i'd much rather not. it might be fine for her, since she's not a film star like me, but i now have a reputation to uphold & a film star would never do such a thing.  that's not to say that i didn't stick my finger in the foam...i just didn't cover it with nose grease before doing so.

#90 - got milk?

i finally got around to watching milk the other night (for those who haven't seen the film, spoilers may be ahead), starring sean penn as gay rights pioneer harvey milk. to be honest, going in, i was watching it partly for the story but mostly because it's a gus van sant film & i've absolutely loved his last four films, even more than his earlier, pre-good will hunting stuff. they've made me more excited about the possibilities of film making than most films have recently. i was most interested in seeing how he handled a straight biopic, as he has a history of making films loosely based on actual events, films like to die for (the pamela smart murder), elephant (columbine) & last days (kurt cobain's suicide).

it definitely has the feel of a gus vant sant film. the titles play over black & white archival footage of gay bars being broken up & the title of the film is barely noticeable during its three seconds on the screen. early on, harvey meets scott smith (james franco) in nyc & van sant chooses to show them kissing in extremely extreme close ups. he shows them moving cross country to san fran in 72 via what looks like home video footage.

throughout, he works in actual news reports by walter cronkite (chi phi alum!) & actual clips of anita bryant, a powerful anti-gay rights advocate & all around evil bitch who was basically milk's antithesis. near the end of the film, there's a scene at harvey's 48th bday party with him & the desperate & drunk dan white (milk's assassin, played by josh brolin), where van sant initially frames them as these tiny figures in a large room...oh & there's the emotional pain of the characters. van sant loves pain.

i was discussing the film with a co-worker (sweet head shot!) yesterday & it turns out he actually worked on to die for in some capacity, so he's familiar with van sant & was curious as to my thoughts on the film. to be more specific, he asked me if there was redemption for the characters, as van sant doesn't often offer that up for his characters. in the end, milk's boyfriend has hung himself & harvey is assassinated, but he's been elected to office, created a protege in cleve jones (emile hirsch), defeated prop 6 & even heard from a boy in MN, who had years earlier called harvey out of the blue, saying he was going to kill himself over his parents' reaction to him being gay. it felt like redemption to me.

& just over 30 years later, here we are. after the shit storm that CA created with prop 8 last year, 2009 has been a busy year thus far for gay rights. NJ & NH recognized civil unions as of this year & after iowa made gay marriage legal two weeks ago, this week, ME voted to make gay marriage legal come september, the same month where it becomes legal in VT. D.C. voted to recognize gay marriages this week (subject to congress approval) & NH sent a same-sex marriage bill to governor lynch. his signature awaits & if he does sign, gay marriage will be legal in five of the six new england states & is recognized in RI. harvey's actions are starting to lead to something...perhaps eventually they will lead to the secession of new england from the u.s.?  i would totally move back there if that happened.

#90 - got milk?
snack: lindt kirsch m&ms with almonds
drink: rice dream supreme chocolate chai rice milk


the other day at the local polish grocery store, as i was walking in, i spied the lindt kirsch bar (pictured above) on the counter & figured i'd give it a shot. while watching the film, i finally broke it out. as the packaging depicts, you're basically getting a flat piece of chocolate with a little bubble on top that's filled with what you might assume is some sort of cherry liquid.

i didn't do my research beforehand to find out what exactly kirsch is & when i bit into the first piece, i was greeted with a flavor akin to taking the cheapest, hoboiest vodka you can find & soaking a couple of cherries in a glass of it overnight, before drinking the whole damn thing, cherries & all. then there was the crunch. oh the crunch. apparently, kirsch is a fruit brandy distilled from sour cherries & when placed in chocolate, they also put in a layer of hard sugar to compensate for its lack of sweetness...wasn't expecting that either.  at first, i'd thought it had gone bad & crystallized.  the approximate sound i made was mlaaaaaahhhhhchhhhh...followed by a series of panicked, rapid tongue movements.

the thought of eating a second piece never even crossed my mind, but i was having a serious chocolate craving, so i paused the film, ran out to the bodega & grabbed an old standby, a bag of m&ms with almonds. since i'm a slave to almonds, whenever i'm in a candy/double consonant/ampersand mood, i always go back to the almond m&ms. other than the obvious candy shell & chocolate awesomeness, there's just something about the size of them that makes them so damn appealing...much better than those wussy sized regular, non-nut flavored ones.

my beverage of choice for the evening was a tall glass of rice dream supreme chocolate chai rice milk, with a couple of ice cubes tossed in for good measure. i originally picked it up a few days back for #88 - (rice dream), but ditched it in favor of the rice beer, which i felt was much more appropriate to have with chips. since then, i've been using it in my morning coffee, instantly making it infinitely better.  coffee + mocha + chai = my secret to getting to work this week.  it's not only helped me in that regard, but along with the m&ms, it helped immensely as far as casting the demons of the kirsch taste away from my mouth.

i could definitely get down with rice milk on a regular basis, especially if it's all flavored & junk.  over the past week, i've actually drank milk outside of my coffee & cereal, so having it around, with all its vitamins & nutrients, is definitely having a positive effect...& you know what they say about milk & bodies.  it totally does them good.  if i keep this up, i'm going to be so awesomely buff.