Friday, October 09, 2009
Behind Every Great Writer Is An Editor
if Lish edited Carver so heavily, then is what we think of as “Carver-esque” really Lish?
Pondering
Everyone Loves A Good Metaphor
Communicating without metaphors would be like eating without taste buds. I know, I just used a simile to describe a metaphor ... My head hurts.
Perhaps this will help.
Philosophers have long wondered about the connection between metaphor and thought, in ways that occasionally presaged current-day research. Friedrich Nietzsche scornfully described human understanding as nothing more than a web of expedient metaphors, stitched together from our shallow impressions of the world. In their ignorance, he charged, people mistake these familiar metaphors, deadened from overuse, for truths. “We believe that we know something about the things themselves when we speak of trees, colors, snow, and flowers,” he wrote, “and yet we possess nothing but metaphors for things--metaphors which correspond in no way to the original entities.”
Saturday, August 29, 2009
Loglines From The Headlines
Reading this:
Dr Venter, who has been chasing his goal for a decade, is already working on projects to use synthetic biology to create bacteria that transform coal into cleaner natural gas, and algae that soak up carbon dioxide and turn it into hydrocarbon fuels.
made me go, hmmmm.
I can see it now: The global ecosystem overrun by artificially created carbon dioxide consuming algae, humans must now produce massive amounts of Co2 to save earth.
I posted it on a screenwriting BB. Have at it!
Friday, August 21, 2009
Mathematics Of Zombies
Proves that we’re all screwed.
A ZOMBIE attack would need to be countered hard and early to give civilisation any hope of surviving, according to a mathematical study.
A Canadian team - which includes an Australian researcher - has done the maths on what would happen should zombies really appear on the streets.
The first thing that comes to my mind is, I hope they didn’t get grant money for this?
Friday, August 14, 2009
Bonnie And Clyde Then And Now
Stephen Hunter writes this concerning depression era bandits Bonnie and Clyde; both the historic and film versions.
That point is that the legendary Penn movie that invented the New Bonnie and Clyde was such a ideological crock that it deserves placement in that list of other leftist crocks mistaken by gullible critics and film lovers as somehow great: Beatty’s own Reds, the appalling JFK, and the toxic oeuvre of Michael Moore and his tribe of screwball clones in the documentary field, as well as the recent spate of angry, misguided Iraq war films.
This really is not news; when Bonnie and Clyde was released and soared, following an initial few weeks of failure, the Chicago Daily News columnist Mike Royko launched a mini-crusade to restore Clyde and Bonnie to their actual dimensions, as vicious murderers, no matter that (as the ad copy said) they were young, they were in love, and they robbed banks. The only thing that mattered about them, Royko said, was that they killed, and killed a lot of people. The critic of the New York Times, Bosley Crowther, then the oldest, whitest guy in New York, also dared to denounce the film; he not only felt the lash of social ostracism and contempt, he may have even lost his job as a consequence.
I thought they were both idiots. I know better now.
Heh.
Saturday, May 16, 2009
So Called Hate Crimes …
Are simply crimes. But, unfortunately, some defendants are less equal than others.
“Better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer.” This quote, from the Englishman William Blackstone, aptly describes the aims and priorities of our own American system of justice . . . Unless, that is, you are a liberal crusader who is out to get someone because he was accused of a “hate crime.” In that case, Blackstone’s formulation is turned on its head: better to convict ten innocents than to give people a symbolic impression that “hate crimes” aren’t more serious and worse than all other crimes.
To give people special consideration based on gender, sexuality, race ... anything is simply wrong. Think about it; two people are murdered under similar circumstances. The only real difference is that one victim is, say, homosexual, and the other is straight. Why should the severity of the punishment be more with regards to one victim over another?
Can someone please answer that?
Proof There Is A Valid Use For Waterboarding
No, waterboarding is not torture, no matter what some people say. But even the most pacifistic among us would agree that some people should be waterboarded just because.
Ever wonder how tabloids get such juicy stories?
A reporter with the National Enquirer allegedly checked Brooke Shields’ mother out of her nursing room on Thursday by posing as a friend, according to People. Teri Shields, 75, suffers from dementia.
Damn.
Sunday, November 09, 2008
Film Wisdom
An interesting article on cliches in film, or more accurately, how they have changed. There are the givens like the fact that no matter where someone on the screen lives in Paris, the Eiffel Tower will always be visible through their window. Really, keep your eyes open and you’ll notice it.
Fans of traditional western movies, for example, know that the gunmen on the American frontier settled their disputes fair and square, meeting in one-on-one main-street pistol duels, ideally at noon. I was shocked when Elmore Leonard said he made it a rule to omit that scene from the western books and movies he wrote. He claims no one would ever be so foolish as to do that.
Good on Elmore Leonard. Thankfully, for the most part, you’ll never see a western movie with two pistol-swinging gunmen facing each other down in the middle of main street. Nowadays, mainstreet is turned into a gritty, gut-shot, messy bloodbath. Think of Open Range or Unforgiven. Watching Open Range, I remember thinking that it felt like watching Vietnam War footage.
One “wisdom” not mentioned in the article is that, as of the past few decades, Republican or Conservative means bad.
When I was very young, I wasn’t subjected to much television or film. It’s not that I’m that old (46), it’s just a result of where I grew up at. The 60’s and 70’s, in the mountains of Idaho didn’t lend itself to much television. Try to see what kind of reception you get with rabbit ears while living in a town of 400 or so people at the bottom of the second deepest canyon in North America. Also, there tends to be very little in the way of local theater going experiences. What people mostly did for entertainment was bitch about the weather and government, and read a lot.
The reason I bring this up is because while growing up, my young eyes and ears caught much of what the old-timers would say and talk about. There was a certain standard of how a “man” was supposed to act. I still have vivid memories of ranch hands standing around the fireplace, holding cups of coffee and talking about one thing or another and through it all, for the most part, there was a certain code of behavior that was pretty cut and dry. That’s not to say that there were not those who did not or would not live up to expected standards. They just weren’t respected. In hindsight, I realize that human behavior is what it is and has not changed much for perhaps thousands of years, but, often times, people like to put on a good and/or righteous face. A few years later, when I became more exposed to film and television, I saw, in westerns, much of the same kind of “code” of behavior that I witnessed as a child when men with names like Jake, Jasper, and Arlin stood around that stove holding their coffee talking in low-toned, rumbling voices.
At the time I wondered if this code of behavior presented in the western films was a reflection of reality, or if the reality was a reflection of the cliché. I still haven’t figured that one out because I’m pretty sure that Jake, Jasper, or Arlin hadn’t had much exposure to films and television as well. Of course, I’m sure that they all had lots of experience reading Louis L Amour and other writers of the Western Mythos. I also must point out that some of the most well-read individuals I’ve every met were simple, rural types that I’ve come across in remote villages and mountain campsites. Show me a real cowboy who spends a good portion of their life in the outdoors away from people, doing the things that cowboys do, living the lonely life that cowboys do, and I would be willing to bet that they are extremely well-read. Think about it, what the hell else is there to do out there in the great wide open? You will rarely see something so incongruous as a bow-legged, filthy cowboy with a wad of tobacco in his mouth, punctuating his dialect with “y,all”, “fixin’”, and displaying the manners of someone ill-equipped to handle social interactions beyond telling his dog to “Git in the back of the truck” while at the same time, in casual conversation, throwing out a quote by Keats or Oscar Wilde or applying a Shakespearean incident to an anecdote. Trust me, this isn’t all that uncommon.
Which brings me back to the whole cliché thing. Sometimes the anti-cliché is the cliché.
Go figure.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Single With Howling Dispair
My wife is my absolute best friend, period. Somewhere, back in some sequestered section of my brain, I vaguely remember being single and--God forbid--dating. Oy, what a nightmarish thought. For those of you out there in the dating world I pity you.
“Don’t tell me that you and your wife have an arrangement’”; “Don’t hit on my friend(s) first. Yeah, I saw that”; “Don’t ever say to me, ‘Your breasts don’t look like the ones in my magazines’”; “Don’t lick my face - I get flashbacks from Silence of the Lambs”; “Don’t ask me if my friend might be interested in a threesome”; “Don’t try to guilt me into something - you are not my mother, and you don’t have her skills.”
Apparently we men must adhere:
...to impress, men need to be hugely successful, but pretend that they are not. And this is only one aspect of the almost impossible balance that needs to be struck. Men need to convey sexual desire without sexualising the person in front of them, need to be authoritative, opening doors, paying bills, deciding where to go and so on (recent research found that 60 per cent of women would consider it a bad first date if they paid), yet treat women as absolute equals. They need to flatter without seeming overly impressed, they need to care about their appearance (but not too much), and when it comes to chatting up, they need to take the initiative, and absorb any humiliation that comes their way, without seeming at all arrogant or pushy.
I can tell you right now that if I was still single, date night would consist of a six pack, a roll of duct tape, and my right hand.
The Night Before The First Day Of The Rest Of My Life
Earlier, my wife and I watched a splendid film entitled Les Invasions Barbares--in English it translates to The Barbarian Invasions. If you don’t mind reading subtitles, I highly recommend it. One thing that struck me was the stinging indictment the writer/director delivered concerning Canada’s version of socialized health care. The film isn’t about Canada’s socialized health care system, to be sure. But I can’t decide if the filmmaker was indeed making a statement or if he was simply portraying a fact of life in a Canadian hospital; much of the film takes place in a hospital. You know, if you make a film, say, about a bunch of skiers in a mountain town in the Colorado Rockies, the film isn’t about the Colorado Rockies, but mountains will be present in the film as a simple matter of fact. If the film’s treatment of Canada’s health care is even remotely indicative of reality, I’m telling you right now that I want no part of it. Just saying.
Okay, moving on. Related to my previous post I direct you to this article. It touches on the notion that, basically, most American voters are probably not well enough educated on the political issues of the day to be voting. Well, to be honest, I may be throwing out a bit of hyperbole, but you get the drift.
Studies of this sort make it pretty clear that political ignorance matters—not only for individual votes, but also for election outcomes.
Gee, ya think?
For example, a team of psychologists led by Alex Todorov established that candidates for governor, senator, or representative who are rated as “competent” by people judging them solely on the basis of photographs are considerably more likely to win real-world elections than those who look less competent. Brief exposure to the photographs—as little as one-tenth of a second—is sufficient to produce a significant correlation with actual election outcomes. A follow-up study showed that the electoral advantage of competent-looking candidates is strongest among less informed voters and those most heavily exposed to political advertising.
It makes one wonder how the hell any democracy can work. Again, this all comes back to the above hyperbole. Should there be some kind of test to determine who should be able to vote? Should voting be relegated to those who have a vested interest, such as tax payers? I mean, it’s amazing to me how many people don’t even know who their representatives are, or can’t identify the three branches of Government. Granted, knowing the basics of how our country works does not guarantee political sophistication, but, at least, if someone is interested enough to give a damn, they may have a better chance of being able to cast a reasoned vote, right?
Alas, it all may be a valiant attempt at pissing up a rope:
For one thing, voters’ perceptions may be seriously skewed by partisan biases. For example, in a 1988 survey a majority of respondents who described themselves as strong Democrats said that inflation had “gotten worse” over the eight years of the Reagan administration; in fact, it had fallen from 13.5 percent in 1980 to 4.1 percent in 1988. Conversely, a majority of Republicans in a 1996 survey said that the federal budget deficit had increased under Bill Clinton; in fact, the deficit had shrunk from $255 billion to $22 billion. Surprisingly, misperceptions of this sort are often most prevalent among people who should know better—those who are generally well informed about politics, at least as evidenced by their answers to factual questions about political figures, issues, and textbook civics. If close attention to elite political discourse mostly teaches people to believe what the partisan elites on “their” side would like to be true, the fundamental premise of books such as Rick Shenkman’s—that a more attentive, politically engaged electorate would make for a healthier democracy—may be groundless.
If the above is true--and I’m leaning towards it--than it does not bode well for the future of any democracy.
Let’s see, started out the post discussing a fine film and a question regarding it, then ended on this note.
Probably time for bed.
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Word To Yahoo
STOP CHANGING YOUR SHIT AROUND!!!
Jesus. Nothing I HATE worse than people changing crap in an attempt to make it better. Yahoo has been doing this a lot lately. I use My Yahoo for an internet based mail client. I have the home page set up JUST THE WAY I LIKE IT! I like simplicity when it comes to my web browsing experience. I know right where my e-mail is. I know where everything is. That is until you CHANGE EVERYTHING AROUND!
Yahoo changes their shit and then I have to search for the link to change it back. No, Yahoo, you’re not improving my experience with you. You are pissing me off.
Stop it.
Stop it.
STOP IT!!!
I’d love to find the little geek responsible and pimp slap his/her ass so hard their great grand children feel it.
Monday, August 27, 2007
Tumbleweeds A Blowin’
It’s true. There are literally tumbleweeds blowing in, about, and through Danielmedley.com. This summer has been amazingly eventful for a relatively uneventful summer which has left very little time to do almost anything superfluous, including regular updates to this website.
Just when things started to get on an even keel something came up that sent everything askew once again. Now, I’m not bitching about this, I’m just voicing what’s going through my head. What sent my world reeling once again is not a negative thing; far from it. But it could potentially result in some serious changes in my life. I’m not going to get in to it extensively at the moment. All I will say is that I’m doing something that I’ve not done in years which is studying in a formal, regimental manner with a specific goal in mind. Anyway, enough about that.
Side note:
My wife and I watched The De Vinci Code last night. What a pathetic, banal, gut wrenchingly bad piece of cinematic dog poop that film is. The reasons that it was so bad are too numerous to even discuss.
Last week, we went over to Justin and Julee’s house and watched 300 on their big, fancy, schmancy 53 inch HD flat-panel. Now, that movie was so good that it gave me wood. The reasons that it was so good were as numerous as the reasons that The De Vinci Code was so bad.
Just perusing the net, I see that Owen Wilson may have tried to commit suicide. Don’t know if that’s true or not, but if it is my message to him would be to buck up, trooper. Not that he’s likely to stop by this website anytime soon to see what I have to say.
Speaking of famous people, what the hell is up with Amy Winehouse? Man, I was in to her latest album before it was even released in the states. If you haven’t done so yet, go out and buy it. It’s truly a great piece of work. It’s too bad she’s in a quick, downard, spiral. My advice to her would be to stop being an idiot and lay off of the heroin, crack, and cocaine immediately after she eats a couple of meals heavy in carbs and protein and a bit on the largish side. In fact I’ll be specific in advising her first step to recovery be that she jump on a plane to Vegas and take up residence at a 24 hour all-you-can-eat buffet and do nothing but eat for a couple of weeks.
I’m just saying.
Ok, I’ll stop with the juvenile mental meanderings concerning others and wrap this up so that I can go pick up my son from his first day of school this year. Hopefully the building is still standing.
Wednesday, August 01, 2007
Waiting For A Heartbeat
Yeah, yeah. It’s been a long time. I’ve been busy, though. Busy with summer crap. Actually, it’s been a pretty good summer. We went to Idaho, visited and had fun, and then a few weeks later we were off to Vegas with some friends. That was fun as well although I did get to experience up-sale techniques from a waiter in a French restaurant that would’ve made a used care salesman blanch. That’s a whole other story.
Man, I’m sitting here—typing of course—and I have Vh1 Classic playing in the background. Don Johnson has to wish that he could get his hands on every copy of Waiting for a Heartbeat and purge the earth and his life of that debacle.
Friday, July 13, 2007
The Vacation
Driving into Council I was amazed at the local Shell gas station’s price of 2.42 per gallon of mid-grade gasoline. The same stuff in Salt Lake was 2.28. Supply and demand my ass. Tell me, how can the demand be higher in a town of just over 900 people than it is in a metro area of over a million?
Anyway, I digress.
One of the highlights of the vacation was our camping trip with a couple of friends; Rob and his wife Kim. We drove up to an area out of McCall, Goose lake road to be exact. We went above Hazard Lake, kept to the right heading towards Little French Creek towards the Hershey Point Lookout, and found a great camping spot over an area called Elk Meadows.
On the way we stopped in a little antique shop/coffee house for what I believe to be the best damn cappuccino in Central Idaho. For the life of me I can’t remember the name of the place. When I get my credit card statements back I’ll be sure and make note and mention them. Anyway, we stopped and got our cappuccino and I struck up a conversation with the proprietor. He mentioned that he’d just read in the local paper that the Fish and Game department was bragging about dumping a bunch of tiger muskies—a beast that is a cross between a northern pike and a muskellunge—into many of the backcountry lakes in an attempt to deplete the eastern brook trout population. See, the eastern brook trout is not indigenous to Idaho. Some time in the 1930’s they were planted in a few streams and took off like gangbusters. As a result they’ve practically chased out the native rainbow. Sure, in the streams like the Salmon River and Snake, you can catch rainbows like nobody’s business, but in many of the backcountry lakes the brookie is what you are most likely to catch. They are so plentiful that the limit is 25. Yes, 25 freakin’ brookies. Stop by the gas n go, grab a bunch of worms, then go to almost any high mountain lake, and you can catch a shit-load of brookies and have one hell of a fish fry.
The Fish and Game department stated in the article that they wanted to kill off most of the brookies with the tiger muskies then gill the tiger muskies out of the lakes. Then they planned on planting rainbow trout back into the lakes because that’s what anglers wanted. This was much to the chagrin of the coffee house proprietor. He, like most locals, prefers the brookies to the rainbow simply because they taste better. The Fish and Game, however, is interested in catering to the pompous catch and release crowd who live in the cities and come in from other states. They spend lots of money buying fishing licenses and then lots of gas money to drive into the mountains, commune with nature, catch a rainbow and then throw it back. This is something that to most locals is patently absurd. They sure as hell aren’t going to go traipsing about the wilds to catch a fish simply to throw it back. It’s fuckin’ goofy. And, most of the locals prefer the taste of a brookie over a rainbow.
Just mere days before we left for this camping trip my dad was reminiscing about all the brookies in those lakes and how it was such a pleasure to eat them right out of the lake; roasted on an open flame and how he hated catching rainbows because they taste like shit. I actually began to struggle with how I was going to inform him that that was all about to change.
When we got to Hazard Lake we stopped for a little break and I was amazed at how things had changed since the last time I’d been to Hazard Lake proper some three decades prior. Then it was truly a back-country lake requiring what seemed an eternity on rough road to get to. Once there you could find a secluded, shady camping spot pretty easy in and among the thick timber that surrounded the lake. The road is still a bit slow-going in spots, but now there are developed camping spots around the lake that require a fee. I’m talking paved pads and a handicapped equipped hand-crank water pump. The place had a few campers parked like a small city in the making and I saw at least two people carrying what appeared to be thousand-dollar fly rods. Also, the lake was just shy of a moonscape in that most of the trees had been burned back in—I believe—1993 when 330,000 acres went up in the Corral Complex fire. That was the one where then President Clinton dropped in via helicopter to give a pep talk to the thousands of firefighters and National Guardsmen. The fire burned until the snow fell.
We continued past Hazard Lake and towards Hershey Point, to the head waters of Little French Creek, traveling through what seemed an endless landscape of burned forest. The scope of the burn is almost incomprehensible. Intermittently among the vast acreage of carnage there would be an inexplicable patch of forest that had somehow survived the inferno; a gray, dead sea of burned landscape speckled with an occasional patch of pristine beauty. Just off the road we found just such a spot along side of a creek coming from the snowmelt in the mountains above. It appeared to be a hunting camp with an ample stock of split wood. Rob and I agreed that this place would be perfect to set up camp. Besides, everyone, with the exception of my son, had a strong hankering for a beer which could only happen once camp was set up.
Ok, I’m lying. The beer didn’t wait until after camp was set up. By the time we got there, I’d already put away three. New Castles if I must admit; the best damned beer God ever created.
After we set up camp and put back a few more beers we decided to load up in the truck and do some exploring to see how far the road might take us. The biggest impediment was the prospect of wind-fallen burned trees that had landed across the road. Since we’d managed to forget to bring the chainsaw with us, it was a concern. About two miles up the road from the camp we saw 7 wolf pups in the middle of the road. They were romping about, playing grab-ass and then stopped and gawked at our appearance. I figured them to be around 8 to 10 weeks of age and they didn’t seem overly concerned with our presence. As we got within 40 yards or so they split up; 4 going up the hill from the road, and 3 heading down the hill. Over the last ten years or so, since the reintroduction of wolves to this part of the country, they have done quite well. Better, in fact, than I think anyone had anticipated. So good in fact that they have become a bit of a nuisance to the point that there will be a hunting season on them to thin them out. Seeing 7 pups made me understand their voracious appetite for reproduction. You will very rarely, if ever, see that many coyote pups. The most I’ve ever seen are three and coyote pups have a much larger mortality rate than wolves. Think about that and than consider that coyotes are almost always shot on sight, and then realize that there are more coyotes there than there are crooked politicians and you get an idea of just how well the wolves have done since reintroduction. Ask the cattle and sheep rancher too. Especially the one who lost 30 calves to a pack just outside of Council.
Don’t get me wrong. Unlike most people in that area, I’m not of the mindset that wolves should be exterminated like they almost were over the last century. Notice I said almost. That’s because it’s a myth that the wolves were exterminated from Central Idaho. Oh, they tried to exterminate them for sure, but there have always been wolves there. Not many, but they were there. Now, after the so called reintroduction, they are rampant. Love it or hate it, the fact is that people live there now and always will until some global catastrophe or meteor or whatever occurs. It will never be like it was before humans come around. That’s the reality. Since that’s the reality, it means that there has to be some middle ground. In fact there will be middle ground no matter what some government lackey tries to do or say. I guarantee it. The thinning has already begun.
Anyway, I did rather enjoy seeing those wolf pups. The next morning when we woke up and crawled from our tents, we noticed two sets of adult wolf tracks that had paid a cautious visit to the parameters of our campsite. Something, we aren’t sure because we couldn’t verify with immediate tracks, pissed all over Rob’s tent. I can’t imagine a wolf coming in our camp to do it, but because Rob is a rancher and there is a natural hatred of wolves in him, well, hell, maybe the wolf thought to itself, I’m going to piss all over this asshole’s tent. Ok, I’m starting to sound like Shirley McLean.
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Zoetrope And Triggerstreet
I’ve got accounts at both Triggerstreet and Zoetrope. At Zoetrope I participate in the short story, novella, and screenplay parts of the website. At Triggerstreet, just the screenplay. I’ve reviewed three screenplays at Zoetrope and the only thing I can say is, ouch. Man, I haven’t read one screenplay there that doesn’t suck. I’m not talking, “sucks, but there are good aspects to it.” I’m talking sucks in every way imaginable. I’ve read a couple of novellas too and they are every bit as bad. Over on Triggerstreet I have managed to read a couple of screenplays that are pretty decent. But even so, the majority are just horrible.
Now, I’m not trying to come across as some Know it all who is a great story teller, or who has written a bunch of screenplays, but I can tell you that I do have a pretty damn good understanding of story plus I have at least a modicum of understanding concerning the screenplay form.
All this said, I must say that I absolutely love these sites because I love to read other people’s work. Even if it is like pulling teeth. The reason for this is that you can learn a lot from deconstructing a story or a screenplay. It’s gotten to the point where I can tell early on why something isn’t working. I can see it as plain as day. In fact it’s easier to see why something doesn’t work than it is to recognize why something does work. Even so, knowing why something doesn’t work is very helpful.
OK, I’m through babbling.