Discovery #12

Pantha Du Prince - Black Noise (2010)

Driving, outside the window the world floats past. Beyond the glass you know that the air is cold, so cold it's hard to imagine the degree of shock as it hits your face. The grey day feels ancient, a longing that doesn't speak, time that won't tell you a thing. But it hardly matters because this moment is all the power left to help you transform into a blessed being. There's a softness that whistles in your ears and the pleasant aftertaste of life brings a smile to your face. Nothing could be better than the reality of this creative dance as it blossoms in your mind like spilled ink. It flows slowly until your heart is consumed with love. Oh my God, the heat that spreads out of that awareness is so damn exquisite that a light begins to grow and blot out all the shadows that were trying to creep inside. The splatter of muddy ice as it hits the windshield is the only thing that can bring you back to reality. This place, this drive, as the coldness settles in once again. It's okay, because a warm hand reaches over and squeezes a happy essence into your palm, a squishy beautiful pulse that is the heart of love, of the God of nurture. You can share that with the world, no matter how cold it is outside your window as the trees and the snow and the bleak mountains whisk away.


Beeswax - Andrew Bujalski (2009)

I'm a big fan of movies that are about human connections, without all of the preaching boredom that diminsihes the reality of that connection. Isn't it strange that we've come to expect all of the manipulative bullshit from a rom-com and every second of that BS truly detroys any sentimentality we might cherish in our own hearts? We give up the power that we have to imagine a beautiful human interaction beacuse of the despicable art of squeezing a dollar out of a dime. I despise nothing more than that facade that comes across our screens in Julia Roberts format. Andrew Bujalski doesn't care about any of that shit and he's one of my heroes because fo it. He gives us a stroll down the sweet avenues of our lives without any of the pretense garnered for studio acclaim. His movies are about real people who are simply dealing with their lives...and it's interesting! Because I know that so many others try to make these down to earth films and after twenty minutes we're ready to shoot our teevee. But Beeswax isn't like that. It's just cool and sweet and lovely. It's about two twin sisters who are dealing with various struggles in life as they've reached the age where they're now considered grown up. One, Jeannie, owns a second-hand store and is having some issues with her business partner. She is paraplegic but Bujalski never uses her disability as some heavy-handed prop so that we'll truly understand the greater burden of her life. No, it just happens to be the reality of her existence and that's it. Her sister Lauren is trying to decide if she should take an opportunituy to go to Kenya to teach English, which seems like the best option for her life at the moment. The two of them live together and share their lives as they probably would in real life. They stumble through relationships and deal with monetary issues and family dynamics and simply travel through their days just like the rest of us. It's very quirky and honest and just the type of movie I would love to make.