colin showed me.

and despite the fact that, according to some youtube comments, i’m a “far-left whiny little bitch,” i must say that this movie didn’t do it for me.  now, i wasn’t necessarily looking for a bush-bashing film, and in fact i had heard that w. actually takes on a sympathetic view of the president–and i would’ve been cool with that.  especially with today’s political climate, seeing something that intelligently and introspectively sides with bush would’ve been a refreshing change of view.  so politics aside, the movie was just hellllllllllllaaaaaaaa boring.

maybe it was the repetitive soundtrack, or the lack of a climax in the story, or the fact that the events in the film are so recent i felt like i had just seen half of them on the news this week, but in creating a biopic about perhaps one of today’s most controversial public figures, director oliver stone forced himself to be so non-partisan and non-opinionated that all that was left was monotony.

sure, stone gets his jabs and embracements in.  there are points in the script where you can tell they inserted famous bush-flubs for laughs, like his pronunciation of “nuculer” or him choking on a pretzel.  but the film was draped with a lingering sense of self-consciousness, in not wanting to poke fun so much that it became a widescreen version of Saturday Night Live, but at the same time not wanting to be so sympathetic to the protagonist that it was seen as conservative pre-election propaganda. the conflict here is obvious–the point of a story is to make you love the main character, but because of the timing of this release, stone had to consider the fact that a large portion of the audience don’t want to love bush.

unfortunately, by not choosing a side, w. resorts to hopscotching between the two extremes, and at best falling flat dead in the middle, and not taking the audience anywhere.  and because the audience isn’t taken anywhere (and in stone’s defense, the story that he was trying to write technically isn’t over yet because it’s still going on) when at the end of the film the words “the end” pop up, i was left feeling like instead the words should’ve been, “that’s all.”

even still, the acting is pretty good and the backstories of bush’s career obstacles and strained relationship with his father will unearth new perspective to many audience members.  but if you’ve ever taken a poli-sci class or sat through an episode of anderson cooper, there won’t be much that’s new.

but perhaps what overshadows all of this is how WEIRD it was to see laura bush and condoleezza rice played by parker posey and thandie newton, two hella sexy actresses who have had nipple slips.

awwwkwarrrrrrrrdddddd…

Is it just me or have WalMart moms been talking about Islam more than…well…Muslims?

In case you can’t understand the doll or momz, the suspected phrase is “Islam is the Light.”

BONUS: Although it seems heaven sent, we ain’t ready to see an Arab president!

one thing i love about the UK is that there’s a bit more flexibility for art that steps outside of itself.  street performances and subway music aren’t prohibited (like in the bay) or starving for industry attention (like in nyc).  it just is.  and street art might not always be embraced, but it has the capacity to be.  for example, banksy, has managed to evolve from guerilla stencil artist to fabled warhol reincarnate.  when he replaced a bunch of paris hilton albums with fake ones, rather than treating it like a case of shoplifting or vandalism, they reacted more in a “oh, that’s our neighborhood banksy” sort of way.

well, he’s finally created a dope ass installation in the states, but unfortunately it’s all the way on the other side of the country and i’ll be arriving about a week late. this, on top of the fela musical that ended last week has me very mad that i didn’t make a nyc visit for october.

oh, i was gonna write something about how profound this is in confronting the relationships between humans and animals (something that i’ve posted about before, but in other ways), but banksy beat me to that too:

From Banksy:

“New Yorkers don’t care about art, they care about pets. So I’m exhibiting them instead. I wanted to make art that questioned our relationship with animals and the ethics and sustainability of factory farming, but it ended up as chicken nuggets singing. I took all the money I made exploiting an animal in my last show and used it to fund a new show about the exploitation of animals. If its art and you can see it from the street, I guess it could still be considered street art.”

photos by sabeth718.  Via miss info.

I don’t even know where to begin describing how problematic this is…golden Buddhas carrying a white guy with a sombrero in a rickshaw, who turn into ninjas and cartwheel away.  One thing I can say: if cultural appropriation always looked this cool, the world would be a much better place!

The vlogs are back in the BUILDING!

hah!  and you thought i wasn’t going to use the DONT’ SLEEP button for my own alterior motives.

b-t-dub, can i take a moment to boast about my photoshop skills on that cover art though???

EDIT: oops, forgot the link.
HERE

wow.

i hope that one day if i run for president of the united states and/or hair club for men, there will also be articles calling china, a country i wasn’t born in and have only visited  couple of times, LUIS NATION.

Woooohoooooo rehearsals got pushed back till later on tonight so before we head out we’re going to meet up at Nico’s and watch the debates.  The homie Josh hipped me to Palin Bingo.  It’s ON!

due to unforeseen circumstances, i recently found myself actually considering liking t-pain. because of this video, i’ve officially been won over.

a.k.a.: self-realizing humor is da bomb!