Gas Cost Map - This is an interesting little widgit that tracks the average fuel expenditure in 2000 versus 2008 in metropolitan versus suburban areas around the country. Looking at Philadelphia, I am proudly located in the little yellow center between Washington and Girard in which we spend the least amount of our income on energy costs, annually. Yay! The best place to be in the most urban place to be these days, it seems. Less exciting - the average cost of gasoline a mere 8 years ago. $1.60/gallon.
It's been a busy month (or three). I wandered into the mire of production deadlines and suddenly I turn around, it is the first of June, I have hours of Frontline specials backed up on my DVR, friends I haven't seen in months, an apartment I haven't cleaned, and an impending bout of unemployment breathing down my neck.
So while I watch Richard Armitage bloviate in "Bush's War" (Seriously, has that man done anything since leaving his post but berate the decisions he helped make while in government? I'm all for admitting mistakes, but there is only so much of his fat face one can take. Get another source.), I will take this opportunity to make an announcement that I am exceedingly happy about.
My impending unemployment has been veered off track for the next few months because my company has decided to take a chance on me and move me over the feature film department. Not only am I now inspired to give the owners completely inappropriate hugs in the office kitchen, but I can't stop fidgeting over how eager I am to start the upcoming project. As of June 9, I will be a post-production coordinator on the final months of work on 'The Road.' Not only am I an aggressive Cormac McCarthy fan, but the director's first film was a breathtaking, blood-soaked existential morality play - watch the trailer here. Add to your Netflix immediately. So I get to spend the summer working alongside an award-winning independent director who is making a dystopian, post-apocalyptic film starring Viggo Mortenson based on a Pulitzer-Prize winning novel by one of my favorite authors. I dare you to paint me a more ideal scenario.
In other entertainment-related news, I got a chance to see 'Indian Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull' while visiting Kayleen in Denver last week. The Indiana Jones series is one of those landmark viewing experiences in my youth that solidified the notion in my brain that making movies was really the only worthwhile occupation that a person could pursue, so I've been eagerly anticipating the fourth movie. I know everyone has been uber-disappointed with it, but I am going to go out on a limb and tell you that I loved it, and not just because of Shia LaBeouf, although he didn't hurt. Yeah, it totally dragged in some places (seriously, George Lucas - were the monkeys really necessary???), but it was set in the 1950s and it winked at so many 50s sci-fi motifs that the film nerd in me couldn't help but be overjoyed. Coming into it with nothing but a sense of cinematic fun, I thoroughly enjoyed it and look forward to many future viewings on TNT.
Otherwise, on to the LOST finale. I have to give a shoutout to the writers, who took their episode deadline and worked some narrative magic by switching to the flash-forwards instead of the flashbacks. In the first season, the flashbacks were an interesting technique for creating dramatic tension, because the viewer always knew more about the characters than the other characters knew about each other. It was all "Who the f did Kate murder?" and "Holy crap, Locke was in a wheelchair!" aha moments that kept propelling it forward. Except that sort of petered out not too far into the second season and millions of people gave up. But the third season finale pulled the biggest aha of all by launching into some indeterminite future (which I am guessing is roughly now-ish) to make sure we all knew that 1. some of them WERE getting off the island, and 2. that was no where near the end of the story. So they edged themselves out around PRISON BREAK (hello, they broke out- end of story) by reinventing their own technique and creating an entirely new kind of tension. All season long we have known that most of our characters were not making it off the island and in fact some of them were definitely going to die, so you just kept waiting with anticipation - when WAS Jin going to get it? Who is in the f'ing coffin? How does Kate end up with the baby? Mad props to the producers and writers for discovering a way to draw tension out of a story by telling us exactly what the end is and then making us beg to find out how it gets there. And also for making Jack Shephard one of the most pained, guilty, selfish, Daddy-issue-riddled heroes in modern storytelling. Never has the American heroic archetype looked so twisted.
No primary commentary other than I am not surprised (but I wouldn't be surprised by anything other than a landslide in either direction) but I, like the rest of the country, am a little bit "blah" over the fact that it's going to continue right down to the bitter and our next moment of definitive action probably isn't coming until the August caucus. Blah.
Otherwise, two things to check out, stat:
Talula's Table, Kennett Square, PA Why have I not heard of this place before now? John Turturro (yeah, that John Turturro) calls "each dish a love affair." To which I respond: John Turturro, what the f are you doing in Kennett Square?
John Oliver "Terrifying Times" This ran on Comedy Central on Sunday. He's much funnier than I expected from a weekly player on the "Daily Show." He riffs on his show persona but it's the funniest stand-up special I've seen in a long time. Time to set the TiVo. Here's the first segment:
