William J Cobb on books & film

New Blog Address: Please go to http://williamjcobb.com/blog/

williamjcobb — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 18:12:05 +0000

So my webpage pal has “migrated” my blog to a new site directly linked to my main webpage, http://williamjcobb.com/blog/, and all my posts will show up there now. Hope that’s not too annoying. Many thanks, WjC

Rare Photos of Famous People

williamjcobb — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 17:13:30 +0000

A friend of mine sent me this link (Thanks, Paul!), and I thought it was pretty cool, so I’m sending it along:

http://www.cracktwo.com/2010/01/rare-photos-of-famous-people-125-pics.html

I don’t know anything about the site, but the Dylan/Sonny & Cher pic is worth it, plus the Alfred Hitchcock and his kids. I tried to add one jpeg here but it didn’t work, must be protected. So go take a look.

117 Degrees in Phoenix

williamjcobb — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 16:32:05 +0000

In the parking lot of my local supermarket, I overheard a woman talking on her cellphone, saying, “It was 117 degrees when we left Phoenix!” (It was, by the way, around 75 here in Custer County where we were, and she was talking about how they had headed to the mountains to get away from the heat.) I mentioned this to another friend at a party last night, and she said she’d been in Phoenix when it was 120. That’s downright freaky. How hot is too hot? The Big Economic Fall has distracted us from global warming, as has the BP Oil Spill and Mel Gibson’s rants and Sarah Palin’s braindead megaphone and assorted short-term distractions. Here’s a good piece about the state of global warming in the Scientific American:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=average-global-temperature-rise-creates-new-normal

NY Times Review of “Life During Wartime”

williamjcobb — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 15:35:57 +0000

Sounds good to me: http://movies.nytimes.com/2010/07/23/movies/23life.html?hpw=&pagewanted=2

A New Todd Solondz film! “Life During Wartime”

williamjcobb — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 16:04:06 +0000

To note that summertime is a wasteland of stupidfilm is an understatement, but to read in the NY Times this morning that Todd Solondz has a new film coming out, well, that puts a smile on my face. Happiness (1998) is wickedly good, even better than Welcome to the Dollhouse (1995), with its classic wiener dog character. Storytelling (2001) has the best writing workshop sequence I’ve ever seen, with a great scary writer dude glowering at his students. And Palindrome (2004) is almost a magic act, with eight different actors playing the same character.

Next comes Life During Wartime, which Talking Heads fans will recognize as an allusion to a song of theirs from the early Eighties. The article describes it as a kind of sequel to Happiness, and usually I flinch at sequels, but because this is Solondz, it’s cool with me. Here’s a url to the Times piece: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/18/movies/18solodnz.html?_r=1&hpw

I agree with the following quote from him: “But Mr. Solondz said he fears he’s on an endangered-species list. “If I were Turkish, I wouldn’t worry,” he said. In Europe, he explained, “there’s a system in place to support and value someone like me, but here it’s purely market forces.”

He’s right. It’s about making money, and you can be as daring as you want, as long as it makes money. If not, you’re a fat boy on thin ice.

On Rick Moody’s new novel, “The Four Fingers of Death”

williamjcobb — Sun, 18 Jul 2010 18:41:40 +0000

So I’m reviewing Rick Moody’s new novel, The Four Fingers of Death, which, after a rocky start, is turning out to be a fun read. A couple quick observations: It’s 700 plus pages, as in Infinite Jest long long long. It’s wacky and rife with high Postmodern hijinks, like a cross between Wall-E and Stephen King’s The Stand, with a dash of Mark Leyner’s The Tetherballs of Bouganville (1997), an underrated gem. Much of it’s about Mars, but the end involves a killer virus and a crawling hand. I think it will get a lot of attention soon.

The Influence of the Beatles on Impressionable Children

williamjcobb — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 18:25:41 +0000

Here’s Rocky Raccoon in the wild.

Fireworks, Lightning, Stardust

williamjcobb — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 15:09:26 +0000

At the annual fireworks show over Lake Deweese in Custer County, Colorado, a terrific lightning show unfolded behind the mountains, with constant lightning & thunder for over two hours. The storm clouds were low and above them, a perfectly clear sky, sparkling with the Milky Way stardust.

On Custer’s Penis and Sitting Bull’s Bloody Arms

williamjcobb — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 15:25:57 +0000

So I feel Richard Brautigan’s (1935-1984, R.I.P.) ghost hovering over me this cool Colorado morning, on this July 4th, while reading about a battle in Montana in 1876, perhaps a mythic, blood-stained centennial. He lived and wrote late in his life outside Livingston, Montana, and is one of our under-appreciated writers. So the Wind Won’t Blow It All Away (1982) and Willard and His Blowing Trophies (1975) are both little classics. Some of his poetry is knockout, too, especially the Donner Party poem. He’s good with one liners, as in, “All of us have a place in history. Mine is clouds.”

On the plains east of Brautigan’s writing home of the 1970s, Custer made his last charge, and they share a common love of long hair and funny hats. Nathaniel Philbrick’s The Last Stand has some juicy tidbits about the Little Bighorn, if you’re a morbid-onlooker like myself. Although not reported at the time, so as not to upset his wife, when Custer’s body was discovered on Last Stand Hill, his penis had an arrow jammed up it. (Lucky shot.) Philbrick describes Sitting Bull’s Sun Dance ceremony where he gouged 50 pieces of skin from both arms and was covered in blood, passed out in the Sun Dance lodge, when he received a vision that foretold a victory over the 7th Cavalry. (Lucky dream.)

Summer of the Beatles and the Caterpillars

williamjcobb — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 02:18:37 +0000

So this summer I’ve been turning my daughter on to the Beatles, meanwhile rediscovering how great they were, taking me back. I was a child when “Let It Be” was on the AM radio airwaves and I remember it as no less than the greatest pop song of all time. In college in the Seventies I pretty much memorized the Beatles songs, even while other bands came and went in popularity. Now I’m listening to Revolver, Rubber Soul, Abbey Road, the White Album, Let It Be, and Sergeant Peppers. Every day I get hooked on a new old song. Today it was “Across the Universe,” jai guru deva om. What a beginning:

Words are flying out like

endless rain into a paper cup

They slither while they pass

They slip away across the universe

Pools of sorrow waves of joy

are drifting thorough my open mind

Possessing and caressing me

What impresses me now, all these four decades later, is how absurd and inventive they are. Plenty of love songs, many titled with female names: Julia, Prudence, Martha. But over and over again they turn the pop clichés on their heads and spin them around. When I queue up “Let It Be” and “Two of Us” comes on, my three-year-old Lili’s face lights up with smile and she starts nodding to the tune. Her favorites are on the White Album, particularly “Bungalow Bill” and “Rocky Raccoon.”

Meanwhile we have a caterpillar barn of sorts, with Monarch butterfly caterpillars just now going into chrysalis. Hence it’s the summer of Beatles and caterpillars.