Ramblings of a Constipated Mind

All right. Quick update. Rhapsody went well both nights. The majority of people seemed to enjoy it. One teacher commented it was the best school circus she had seen in 5 years, or perhaps even the best ever. Even though my role was basically just jumping around like a frog on crack (hopefully there will be pictures of this soon), helping with props, and generally just being a bad dancer, it actually wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. The awful script was somehow transformed into a much better show once all the details of how it was going to look onstage were worked out.

Pictures of Thursday can be seen here on a classmate's website. Hopefully this page will be updated with pictures from Friday, and my school website should have some up soon as well.

Other news: Last night I went to the "Show", as they call it, at my church. The theme this time was Romance. As usual, it was really funny and lots of fun to watch. Plus, 26 people were saved. Now we're even closer to reaching our goal of 500 people by the end of the year. Pictures should be up on the Seguidores website soon.

The Passion of the Christ came out! Woohoo! It only has a rating of 53% on Rotten Tomatoes, which is definitely a lot less than I thought it would be. Even almost half the reviewers are complaining that it's too violent or anti-semitic, I still plan on seeing it whenever it arrives here. Hopefully I'll have a review up shortly (Reminder: Write those reviews!)

Time to rant. The reason I'm writing this now instead of watching the Academy Awards is because of a little thing known as Canal 6 (Channel Six). It turns out they acquired the rights to show the Oscars here in El Salvador. ABC is currently filled with wonderful bars of colors that are great for hypnotic trances or simply just to annoy people. Since I don't feel like putting my ear up to the television in order to hear over the Spanish dubbing, it looks like I'll be missing the show once again. My opinion of El Salvador just went from being very high to lower-than-the-chances-of-that-girl-from-Whale-Rider-winning-the-Oscar. And even though she's a good actress, that's quite low. Billy Crystal is hosting. Billy! Billy! I wanted to see Billy!

Even though I already have a good idea of who all the major awards will go to (Return of the King, Tim Robbins, Renee Zellwegger, Sean Penn or Bill Murray, Charlize Theron and Peter Jackson) I'm still feeling depressed. *sob*

I guess the thought of showing it on more than one channel never occurred to people here.

I know it's been a week since the last update, but I've been busy rehearsing. In approximately two and a half hours I'll be jumping around, dancing, and generally just going nuts. Now that I've seen the entire show with costumes and everything, my opinion has changed. It's actually pretty good.

And that's actually all I have time to write now. I'll post more later.

Ok. I just got back from a rehearsal for the school circus. The final show is next week; the 26th and 27th. The final title: RHAPSODY. The sub-title: PLAY IT LIVE. Now, this was decided a while ago, and I'm still annoyed about it. First of all, Rhapsody doesn't have much to do with the theme of the circus. However, I can tolerate it. Play It Live, on the other hand....to be blunt, that just sucks. What kind of title is that? Does it even make sense? The other proposed sub-titles weren't great either, but they were a whole lot better than that.

Conclusion: We can't even think of a decent title. If this foreshadows anything, it's that our circus is going to be bad. Really bad. Now, I'm trying to have a good attitude about it, and be optimistic, but the simple fact is that right now I don't have much faith in it.

I'm in two of the dances. The first one has a Matrix twist to it, with fight moves, dodging bullets, agents, Neo, the works. This had incredible potential. It could have been awesome. It could have been grand. So I showed up to rehearsal and here's what the final product is: we have a short little sketch that involves our "Neo" pretending to dodge bullets. Then in come a bunch of Agents. There are 3 "good guys". Basically, they block a lot of kicks and punches and kick some butt. Then I and some others come in as yet some more Agents. We do this weird little dance in a circle around the three guys, then take turns attacking him. What the heck was the choreographer thinking? When you've got someone surrounded by 5 opponents, you don't have them attack one by one. You have them go in as groups. It makes for improved choreography and overall a much cooler fight - who wouldn't rather see a guy fighting three people at once instead of just one? Anyway, I go in, try for a kick, which is blocked, and then I end up on the floor.

And that's it for the fighting. Just as it was starting to get good, they stop it. The track changes to a different Matrix tune, and we all get up, stand in lines, and do some more "organized" dancing that makes me want to puke. So my part in the dance has basically been reduced to:

1. Run in.
2. Walk around in a circle making strange gestures.
3. Attempt a kick.
4. Fall down.
5. Get up and do some stupid dance moves.

Wow. How exciting. The dance has been ruined.

After rehearsing that, we rehearsed the big finale. Now pay attention: We have one week until the show, and we just now chose the music for the finale. The dance begins with just guys, and that's what we practiced tonight. Basically, it involves us shaking what God gave us and doing some really fast stuff. I'm definitely going to have to practice by myself if I'm ever going to get the timing right. But the fact that we just started working on it tonight bothers me. If this is the kind of organization that has been put into the two dances I'm in, I don't even want to think about what the other dances or the final product are going to be like.

Enough about that. The team came, and from what I hear things went great. They leave tomorrow, which is good because it means I no longer have to ride a taxi home from school. Plus, they brought in my Amazon order. Now I have 4 new DVDs to watch and write reviews for. Speaking of which, I think I'd better make a list of the movies I need to review once I see them. Just to remind myself:

El Mariachi
Wings of Desire
Raising Arizona
The Truman Show (maybe)
Fearless (maybe)

And it's a long weekend (no school tomorrow or Monday) so I should be able to watch most of those and have time to post a few reviews. That is if circus rehearsals don't take up all of my time.

On another note: Less than a week until The Passion of the Christ! This movie's going to do well at the box office just because of the amount of controversy it's receiving. If a lot of non-Christians go to see it because of this, it's going to be huge. It might even make back it's $25 million budget on the first weekend. I just hope it makes it to El Salvador soon.

A few days after its release, we have the Academy Awards. This year, I actually agree with most of the nominations. But of course, the Academy can be really stupid, and there's one thing that really gets on my nerves. It involves the Oscar for Best Visual Effects. Now, if you asked me which movie of 2003 had the best special/visual effects, I would immediately say: the Matrix sequels. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying they deserve Best Picture or anything, but when it comes to visual effects they are King. The big Kahuna. Especially Matrix: Revolutions - that movie had me gaping in awe throughout the final Zion battle sequence. However, the members of the Academy once again were morons and did not even nominate one of them. Now, it would be okay if one of them was nominated but didn't win - it would still be stupid, but much less so. However, to not even nominate them is just pure idiocy. The three nominees were:

1. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King - This deserves to be nominated. Although some effects looked extremely fake, overall it was some top-notch work. And besides, Gollum was in it - that won The Two Towers an Oscar for Visual Effects last year, so it's only logical that the sequel at least be nominated.

2. Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World - I haven't seen this one yet (I might go this weekend), so I can't comment. However, from the trailers I've seen, the visuals aren't anything special. Then again, maybe I'm wrong.

3. Pirates of the Caribbean - Yes, I'll admit that those skeleton pirates looked pretty good, but are they more worthy of an Oscar than the Matrix movies? Absolutely not.

Other than that, however, I pretty much agree with the nominations. We all know that Lord of the Rings is going to win Best Picture, and Peter Jackson will snag Best Director. However, if the Academy pulls a fast one and they don't win...I will seriously consider boycotting the Oscars next year. There's a limit as to how much stupid decision-making I can handle.

Well, I'd write more but I don't have the time. Adios. For now.

Finally got a chance to update. And you know what? I don't really have much to say. Not much has been happening, unless you count the fact that it's Valentine's Day and I got to eat some hot fudge. Yummy.

I watched two very Valentine-ish movies today and yesterday. Last night, it was The Dancer Upstairs about a detective in South America who's trying to track down a guy known only as Ezekiel who engages in terrorist activities and is trying to start a revolution. It's John Malkovich's directorial debut (I think), and basically involves terrorism, explosions, and dancing - all done with some very artsy directing. It's actually pretty good. Then tonight I watched Identity for the second time, it was still just as good as I remembered, even though I already knew all of the twists that were going to happen - you know, twists involving murders, a psycho, and 10 people trapped in a hotel who keep getting picked off one by one and are somehow connected to each other.

You could definitely feel the love. These movies were just screaming Valentine's Day.

On another note, I seem to have recovered from my illness. Whatever it was. So that's good. Now I just have to gain back the weight I lost and resume my quest of getting reasonably fat before I'm a legal adult. Bring on the junk food - not that it'll matter much.

Hm. A team flies in tonight. They're coming to work with the doctors here in the city. It sounds like things are going to go really well. Plus, they're bringing me a whole bunch of video games and DVDs that I ordered. Now I have more toys to be lazy with. Woohoo!

That's all for now. Unless I think of something incredibly fascinating and interesting that I just have to tell in the next five seconds.

...

Nope.

Okay. It's about 1:15 AM, but I'll post anyway. It's not like I have anything else to do. Except sleep - how boring is that?

I haven't really been doing much except reading, surfing the Net, sleeping and watching movies. I'm quarantined. Now, I'm not exactly a very extroverted guy, but after a week of not being able to leave the house except to see the doctor, you start to go a little crazy. Before long, I'll probably be found cuddled in a ball in the corner of my room, sucking on my thumb, mumbling something about homosexual ninja squirrels taking away all of the world's Spam. I'm going nuts (no pun intended).

Speaking of movies, I've seen a few lately: Narc, Gangs of New York, Fearless and Vanilla Sky. The last two I just saw tonight, and will probably post reviews on my site. But I'd rather discuss the first two here:

Narc - I loved this movie. What do you get when you mix two detectives, a murdered cop, drug dealers and a huge conspiracy? One awesome movie. It begins with one of the most gripping opening scenes I've ever seen, and things only get better from there. This wasn't a high-budget flick, but I think this actually adds a lot to the style. The directing is dark and gritty and shows no mercy in terms of graphic violence. The story is sprawling and filled with multiple sub-plots, all designed to keep you guessing who the "real" bad guy is. The story weaves in and out through time with the use of flashbacks, and this only adds to the mystery. I thought I had come up with every possibility as to the ending, but I was wrong. The only real flaw I found was that at times it was hard to follow - though this is probably due to the blessing and curse that is TV Guardian. Sure, it takes out the profanity, but in this case parts of the film were so silent that I no doubt missed some important information. To be honest, I'd like to go back and see it without the TVG and see what I missed. Overall though, this is a movie that grabs you from the very beginning and doesn't let go until the end. 8/10.

Gangs of New York - I have mixed feelings about this film. I mean, sure, it's directed by Martin Scorsese and was nominated for Best Picture. But I found a ton of flaws (but of course there are good things, don't worry). The storyline is extremely intriguing and follows the "war" between the New York "natives" and the Irish "foreigners" in the 1800s. Leo DiCaprio isn't half-bad as Amsterdam, the main character, and Daniel Day-Lewis is amazing as Bill the Butcher. Overall, it was good, but there were a few things that got on my nerves (other than the gratuitous sex and nudity, of course). First off, what's the deal with the religious imagery? There's tons of it. One guy is even hung on a cross - how much more religious can you get? There's a story told at the beginning that's about how Saint Michael cast Satan out of Paradise; this added a lot of depth to the film for me, since Amsterdam is trying to force Bill the Butcher out of New York, and one of the key areas is nicknamed Paradise Square - nice parallel. Scorsese's take on religion, however, is extremely ambiguous. One the one hand, we've got the Paradise thing. On the other, we have Amsterdam and Bill both praying to God for the strength to brutally kill one another. I couldn't figure out what Scorsese was trying to say with this.

Also, I couldn't seem to grasp what the whole "message" was. At one point the idea comes up that the war was a good thing, because it provided a strong foundation that helped modern-day New York become what it is today. However, one character's last words, as he's surrounded by the carnage of war, are, "Thank God I die a true American." Does this not seem to anyone else like a huge political statement, and possible insult to the USA - maybe it's supposed to inspire us to think or something. Who knows. But I couldn't figure it out, it was just all too ambiguous. It's a good movie but not perfect. 6/10.

Now on to something else. I finished the book of Jeffrey Ford short stories, and I promised to add links to my favorites. So here you are:

At Reparata - Excellent, though its length may discourage some from reading it. Basically it involves a king, a mysterious disease, a funny little healer, and a giant moth, among loads of other things. It's amazing.

Malthusian's Zombie - It's about a funny old guy, mysterious government projects, and zombies (what did you expect, given the title?). Good stuff. Also, it's worth noting that although there is a small amount of profanity, it's not distracting - Ford uses it in ways that only brought me more into the story and made me read even faster. You've got to be a good writer to pull that off with me; although I usually don't have much of a problem with profanity, most of the time it does at least distract me for a split second, taking me out of the story.

Out of the Canyon - A really weird Western involving a curse and a time spiral that stretches throughout generations. Good stuff.

I would post more, but it's late. I need to go get high on some medicine and then it's off to bed.

Just kidding. Well, halfway.

The reason I haven't updated this is ages is that I've been sick. As in, really sick. I haven't gone to school this week. The doctor says I might have typhoid fever, but the tests keep showing up negative, so for now it looks like I have an unknown disease. How inspiring. Maybe they will name it after me.

There's a lot more I could mention, but I don't have time now. Maybe tomorrow. I just thought the few that actually care about my life should know why I haven't posted in a while.