The Filmography of David Lynch.

 This was first published in 2017, to anticipate the then-looming release of Twin Peaks: The Return. It was refreshed for a recent retrospective following the death of David Lynch. A fun little overview.

At the movies: Dune Part Two.

 

Dune Part Two. It gets deep here.

At the movies: Dune Part One.

 

My thoughts on Dune Part One are complicated, though generally positive. I am very much psyched for Part Two.

Some assorted thoughts on The Films of David Lynch.

I was fortunate enough to be able to contribute to the Scene's overview of the Belcourt's David Lynch retrospective, and I had a blast with it.

At the movies: Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace 3D.

So, thirteen years after my one and only viewing, I went back to a galaxy far, far away. My key response to TPM in 1999 was that it was the first Star Wars film I didn't feel the need to see with my Dad, and that says plenty. So it was an interesting chance I was given here- to see the film again, get paid for it, and hammer out what did and didn't work for me. Have a read, and let me know what you think...

Accomplishments, if you can call them that, and a grand frustration.

So, I did some things in 2008.

I was Crispin Glover's photo elf.

I got to see Xanadu on Broadway.

I had a political theory proven right within thirty minutes of McCain's concession speech.

I've made a successful go of not having channels or the Internet in my home.

I finally lost the Christmas spirit completely.

I read all of the Dune books.

I designed curricula for three different possible Cinema Studies classes.

I had two of my photographs published in an international publication (Remix Magazine, December 2008 issue).

I invested locally in two start-up businesses.

I got my certification as a sexually healthy human being (which everyone should do).

I learned how to drive a stick shift.

I survived (barely) the scuttling of All The Rage.

I created this blog.

I saw Bette Midler in Las Vegas.

I had an amazing interview/ongoing adventure with Canadian filmmaker Guy Maddin.

I learned that Caesar's Pizza really is the best in Nashville.

I read all the Harry Potter books.

I soldiered on after my house flooded.

I went to the one local wedding I was invited to, but still bear some grumbly rage at the six or seven I was not invited to.

I added Naproxen and Flexeril to my pharmacopia because of freaky biofeedback in my arms.

I saw three hundred and eighty-nine films.

I bid farewell to Constacia, my 1996 Pontiac Grand Prix, and welcomed Brangwen, my 1990 Saab 900.

I lost my weight loss mojo.

I read all the Sookie Stackhouse books.

I never missed a scheduled work shift.

I'm apparently being added to a decently prestigious survey of critics (More on this as it develops).

And despite all this, I still haven't been able to finish the first Twilight book. I've been trying since the day I saw the movie, and I'm still a hundred and fifty or so pages from the end. I've never had this happen with a book before, and I'm utterly flummoxed. I'll say this, though, for Stephenie Meyer; she's the first author who made me think that her book could have its own drinking game, and here's how you do it: everytime Edward says "tell me what you're thinking," you take a drink. Though it's not my fault if you die of alcohol poisioning before anything happens in the book, which you will.

So I read these...

Now that I'm back from the NYC and re-enmeshed in the workday, I've been reading more, and I've finished quite a few in the past couple of weeks.

Paul of Dune by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson.
Pretty good, though since it's occuring in well laid-out time periods in the Dune-iverse, there aren't any big surprises. Still, I love spending time with the characters and the seventeen or so millenia in which the Dune-iverse unfolds.

The Haunted Smile: The Story of Jewish Comedians in America by Lawrence J. Epstein.
Interesting history of both the Jewish-American experience and the evolution of humor and stand-up comedy. A little dry for my taste, but still a brisk and fascinating read.

Silent Bob Speaks by Kevin Smith.
A collection of previously published pieces. Smith is a fun conversationalist and writer, but this collection feels like a cash-in. No offense to Smith, but his bloggery is more immediate and enveloping.

Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman.
A delightful little read, full of whimsy and deadpan humor. Sort of an Afro-Caribbean Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Light in tone, and, as always with Gaiman, witty and imaginative.

My twenty-one favorite fictional spacecraft.

Because I am the biggest geek ever.

In ascending order...


21. The Swinetrek
Everybody now- "Pigs- in- Space!" From The Muppet Show.


20. Starfighters
Although technically a class of ship, I'm going to let that distinction slide. From former Nashville Film Festival Artistic Director Brian Gordon's favorite movie of all time, The Last Starfighter.


19. The Probe what Fucks Up Earth and Talks to Whales
From Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.


18. The Planet Express Ship
From Futurama. Voice of Sigourney Weaver. Dark matter engines. Alcoholic robots. I'd be a fool not to (which I was, initially).



17. The Acanti
From The X-Men's Broodwar back in the late 160s. Originally, these were beautiful space-dwelling creatures, but a parasitic race known as the Brood enslaved them and turned them into living ships.


16. The Ubbo-Sathla Umbrella Cruiser
From Lifeforce. It doesn't look like too much, but three of this thing's nude crew turned London into a ravening soul-sucked bastion of madness and frothing out the face.


15. The Heart of Gold
From The Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy. Because who wouldn't want an Infinite Improbability Drive?


14. Icarus II
From Sunshine. The only reason the Icarus series doesn't rank higher is because of the unfortunate tendency of everyone who crews them to die horribly.



13. The Nightflyer
From Nightflyers (moreso George R.R. Martin's book than the muffled 1987 film version, but either one will do). And it's not even so much because of the design, but rather that it comes with a telekinetic murderous ghost wired into the ship's crystalline hard drive.


12. The Millennium Falcon
'nuff said.


11. Klingon D-7
Threatening but graceful.


10. Serenity



09. Borg Cube
Because I had a Physics teacher tell me this was the most practically-designed spacecraft he'd ever seen.


08. The LV-426 Derelict
From Alien. Because of all the 'alien' spacecraft that the movies throw at us, this one actually looks like it could have been made by aliens. It is made according to a kind of symmetry we simply will never understand.


07. Martian War Machine
From War of the Worlds (1953 and 1988 versions). Technically, we don't see these in space, but they're alien and they fly, so why pick hairs. Graceful and deadly monsters, these.


06. Spacing Guild Heighliner
From Dune. Not much to look at, but if Norma Cenva designed it, then you better believe it has some awesomeness to lay down. It doesn't travel through space- space travels around it.


05. Voyager 6/V GER/Vejur
From Star Trek: The Motion Picture.



04. The TARDIS
From Doctor Who. Timelords know how to travel in style.


03. USS Cygnus
From The Black Hole. Simply awe-inspiring. Truly a ship to go mad in, with its majestic corridors, transport systems, and comfortingly sinister design. Truly unique.


02. USS Grissom
From Star Trek III: The Search for Spock. Still the most elegantly-designed (if horribly impractical) Federation ship in all of Star Trek history.


01. USCSS Nostromo
From Alien. A monster in space. Practically a city, except that most of what we see is a portably refinery, traveling for decades across space while processing ore to keep earth running. The most influential internal ship design in the past thirty years.