pomegranate

Reese Witherspoon in Vanity Fair

I've been meaning to write about this great little film back from 1998  called Twilight, but I hadn't gotten around to it until the cover story from Vanity Fair this month brought it  back to my attention.  In this issue, Reese Witherspoon promotes Vanity Fair the movie in Vanity Fair the magazine, and there is that feeling of mutual back scratching, "I, the big star, will agree to this as long as you ask me softball questions, as long as I can approve the photos, as long as you plug my product."  I happen to like the Musicians and the Hollywood  issues of Vanity Fair--that's what caused me to cough up the money for a subscription  a couple of issues ago, and now I'm having buyer's remorse.  After reading these profiles,  I feel the way I eventually ended up feeling after seeing mainstream romantic comedies or reading those Bridget Jones novels--a slight intellectual nausea and wondering why I could ever get tricked into buying into this stuff again.

Anyway, in this article, Witherspoon talks about her modesty, and how she wore a bikini in "Legally Blonde" and never wants to show that much skin again.  Now, she doesn't directly say she hadn't shown more skin in the past, but that is the implication, which the interviewer then underscores by comparing her favorably to other young women stars who made the decision to reveal  more of their bodies early in their careers.

Which brings me back to Twilight, this wonderful little film I saw about a month ago through Netflix.  I rented it, because I had loved Nobody's Fool which was also directed by Robert Benton and starred Paul Newman.  There were tons of other famous people in this movie including Susan Sarandon, Gene Hackman, Stockard Channing, and many others including a young Reese Witherspoon.  When the film begins, you see her in a bikini quite a bit and there are topless scenes.  It just makes me wonder.  I would think as a writer for a major publication that you would see all of an actor's films before you did the interview.  Or maybe it's just complicity--the idea that "Hey, we all know that we're presenting something less than truthful here, and there's a lot of moral judgement around the stance that we've adopted, but hey, I want these assignments.  I want access. So, if this is the spin that you want on the "geting to know Reese as a real person" piece, I will go along with what you say."  And does Reese Witherspoon think that no one will see and remember that film?  It's a great little film, although itt is flawed.   Personally, I do think Reese's topless scenes were gratituitous. She actually seemed miscast to me. Twilight  was what I would call a contemporary film noir, and so you had to adopt that classic attitude, which just seems to sit better with people who are more seasoned in life and in their work.  But there are some really wonderful moments.  I have this theory that Paul Newman in real life is a great person--I'm sure I could read a celebrity profile of him somewhere that would verify that position--but I believe it, because when I see him in these movies, there seems to be a real connection between him and the other actors.  I'm sure there are examples of movies where that hasn't happened with him--I haven't seen all his movies, but I can't think of any off the top of my head.  Like Nobody's Fool Twilight dares to have quiet time.  It risks by centering on character as opposed to action.  And now it has this stupid Vanity Fair connection to it that I hate but feel somehow compelled to point out, because we as a public should not be treated like we're cultural idiots who believe any dish we're served.

This Month's Vogue

The quick verdict:  It's a lot a better than the last two Vogues.

There were two articles that were interesting, but I thought skimmed the surface, which is probably the definition of most magazine pieces, but hey, I want more.  One was about sisters where the writer's sister had undergone gastric bypass surgery.  It's a story that will probably get as common as the Botox ads in this magazine, but at this point it's still a bit of an oddity and I wanted to know more.  The second was about food chemistry, and how omega-3 rich fatty acids could stave off depression.  Here I wanted more science and some recipes. The fashion this month--clunky high heels, suits where the tops and bottoms were incongruous to each other made me think thoughts that any sane person would think,  that fashion had little to do with what regular people wore, that it was one of those Emporer's has no clothes bits where if you actually did have the time and the resources to get these things, people would see you as odd at best, at least in my world.   And if it was going to be fantasy, why couldn't people look beautiful?  But I guess beautiful has been done, and they've decided on eccentric.  The styles looked haphazard to me, as if someone was bored and threw ideas up in the air and whatever landed in his hands, he used.

And I didn't care about Natalie Portman, although I thought "Where the Heart Is" was a good chick flick, and that is not a contradiction in terms, although sometimes hard to find.  When I first saw her face on the cover, I thought of the model Gia, and how some people thought that Cindy Crawford initially became successful, because she reminded people of this late model who died young.  Wben I first saw the cover, I thought of two other actreses who were still alive--Winona Ryder and Demi Moore--and wondered if Portman could fill the niche that they had when they were still young and original and had opportunities to act.  And I wondered about Portman's current flapper look.  Was it for a part?  If not, wouldn't it limit her look?  I suppose now she's famous enough that she doesn't have to audition, and I guess there's always wigs.  I wondered about the feeling of walking around in the world with a look so distinct from another time.

But Jeffrey Steingarten made the February Vogue for me.  In this month's piece about food, Steingarten writes about cooking a pig for 40.  He hooked me on the first sentence:  "The biggest problem in roasting a 70-pound pig at home is not being able to lift it."  I laughed out loud and raced on. 

In this piece, he talks of his friends.  He speaks of his follies.  He describes in detail the La Caja China, the box he purchased to cook this pig.  I thought I don't care how silly the clothes are, how ephemeral celebrity seems to be, how obsessed this magazine and this culture is on eradicating wrinkles, Jeffrey Steingarten makes it all worth it. 

The New York Review of Books

It arrived in my mailbox the other day, oversized and formidable, with an cover over its original front that said, "Welcome.  Enjoy your first issue."  I checked to make sure that it was addressed to me.  And then I thought of my father.

My father has a tendency to subscribe me to intellectual magazines.  He started years ago with the New Yorker, an editor before Tina Brown got a hold of it and made it cheesy enough for me to really enjoy.  He gives me Granta when I see him, and often asks me if I'd like a subscription to it, which I kind of shrug off, as Granta is way too dry for my tastes.  Last year, the New Republic arrived.  I've grown to really enjoy that magazine, although for such a thin offering, it feels daunting sometimes, perhaps because the news is often bad.  So, now I have the the New York Review of Books with articles like "Darwin and his Doppelganger" to peruse.   And oh my god, I think it's a weekly.  I set it down with my other stack of reading materials to deal with later.

A few days after I received the magazine, a card arrived from the magazine with a note from my father, saying that Daniel Mendelsohn was his favorite writer on staff.  I picked up the tome and looked him up.  Apparently he writes film reviews, which made me happy, as reading film reviews is one of my favorite things to do.  But then I wondered, "Why does the New York Review of Books cover movies?"  It will be a mystery that I apparently will solve over the coming weeks.

I don't believe I've told my father of my recent subscription to Vogue.  When I made that decision, I could make a good argument for the magazine, saying that the movie and book reviews and some of the essays were worthwhile reads.  With the last two issues, I don't know if I can still make that claim.  The magazine seems to have shrunk, and the cuts seems to have come from pieces that were a bit off the track of who's wearing what at what show.  That fashion stuff was fun when it was the icing, but when it's the whole cake, I'm not as interested.  The upshot of the issue this month seemed to be that Jennifer Aniston has a problem with the papparazzi.  Pardon me while I yawn.

The Night Cabbie

I've read this column off and on for years.  I like the simplicity of his prose.  I wonder if he ever tells his passengers that in his other life, he's a writer.

Lamott

Salon is my NPR of the printed word--a smorgasbord of everyhing I like--interesting alternative political coverage, smart entertainment reviewers, a gossip column that doesn't make me like I have to take a shower after I read it, the sports could be better, but I can live with it, and Anne Lamott, the reason why I originally subscribed to Salon.

Her

new column is out today.  And these lines jumped out at me:

"The thing is, I have a lot of faith. But I am also afraid a lot, and have no real certainty about anything. I remembered something my Jesuit friend Tom told me -- that the opposite of faith is not doubt, but certainty. Certainty is missing the point entirely. Faith includes noticing the mess, and emptiness and discomfort, and letting it be there until some light returns. Faith also means reaching deeply within for the sense one was born with, the sense to go for a walk."

Yes, indeed.

 

"Save the Earth, Dump Bush"

As an antidote to People yesterday, I also read interview of Bobby Kennedy, Jr. in Salon.  I thought it was a great read.

Speedreading People

It's an event that happens every couple of months.  One of my coworkers arrives at the office with a stack of People magazine in her arms which she then plops down on my desk for me to peruse.  And then for a day or two or three, I go through them, skimming, skimming, skimming, because that's the nature of People.  It's not anything to sit down and seriously read.  The experience is the sound of the page turning, a kaleidoscope of images, an occasional surrender to prose.

This time I noticed certain patterns.  Gwyneth and that guy from Coldplay showed up in almost every issue, dressed in cold weather clothing, nothing too fashionable or compelling, but there they were.  Demi and Ashton also appeared in almost every issue, but in more sophisticated clothes.  The Benifer watch continued.  (And here's one of the side effects of reading too much People in too short a period of time.  You begin to refer to celebrities by their first or pet names, as if you actually know them, when it's just that you've been bombarded with their images for the past several months in this magazine.)

The style pages in the back seem to have increased.  There are more pictures of stars all dressed in white or pink or whatever the theme is for that week.  Lots of Sarah Jessica Parker pictures here and Chloe Sevigney whose name I've probably misspelled, who I thought was great in "Boys Don't Cry," and I've never seen her in anything else, except on the fashion pages of Vogue and People.

I'm trying to think of articles that I found really interesting, and I can think of one out of the approximately 10 issues that I leafed through yesterday.  There was an article about Amy Tan. She had Lyme disease and didn't know it for years.  So, she talked about having that illness and how it affected her, and how it eventually got diagnosed.  I thought that was a helpful and informative article that I enjoyed reading.

There is still a stack of People waiting for me when I return to work today.  And I look forward to taking a moment now and then and flipping, until my gossip gene is satisfied, until I've seen what every actress has worn to every event People deemed worthy of coverage for the past few months, until the last page is turned, and I really have had enough for a while.  And then I can wait a few months until my coworker returns with another stack to begin the process all over again.

Natalie Goldberg in The Sun

I hoped to be able to link this interview, because I loved it so much, but when I went over to the Sun's Web site, they just had the photo that went with the interview available for review.

But if you happen to see the November issue anywhere, most likely you'd find it in a small independent bookstore that still retains its mind, you might want to take a look at it.  Or you might want to subscribe.  Sometimes The Sun is too Californian (even though the editorial offices are located in North Carolina) even for me.  Sometimes I put it down and think, "Enough with the dysfunctional families!"  But then other times, it makes me think, it opens my heart a bit.  That's how I felt with this interview with Natalie Goldberg.

I read two of her books long ago--one, Writing Down the Bones was like a Bible to all of us who wanted to write.  We carried it around with us, talked it up, found ourselves in cafes with our notebooks scribbling away, keeping the pen moving.  And I read The Long Highway, a memoir of her relationship with her Zen teacher,  Suzuki Roshi.  I would like to read that book again.

Anyway, what struck me about this interview was this whole notion of practice, because I feel that's inherent to what I do here.  What's important is to show up.  Routine is necessary.  Habit tells the brain, "Yes, it is really okay to write.  In fact, that's what we do now.  You know that."  And it bleeds into other areas.  I'm a better speaker now that I'm a regular blogger, because I'm getting more attuned to organizing my ideas and presenting, cutting through and figuring out what I want to say.  And I feel more in love a lot of times with what I want to say, because this routine teaches you about the power and beauty of words, even though it's just a blog, even though it's these small pieces about ordinary things.

Here's what Goldberg says in this interview about it:

"Writing  practice is always political in that you're not blending into the majority; you're not just thinking what you're told to think.  My writing is political, even if what I write about isn't.  The act of writing is the act of speaking up, of being alive.  When you're alive and connected and awake to details, you're less likely to be quiet when bombs are dropping.  One reason we're so quick to drop bombs is that we see the world as abstract and removed.  If everyone in our country had a regular writing practice and a true relationship to their mind, we wouldn't be as likely to swallow slogans or be ruled by fear."

It was just a lovely interview all around/ I can't recommend it highly enough.  A friend just went to one of Goldberg's writing retreats.  I think I'm going to see her tonight.  I hope to hear about that experience.

And here's the great thought at the end of this piece, one of those keeper quotes:

"No need to worry: you will suffer.  Even if you're quite enlightened, your body will hurt, and you will die someday: you will leave the people you love.  So we don't have to romanticize the suffering artist.  The important thing is not to add to our suffering, not to pour gasoline on top and then light it.  Writing comes from the essential suffering, not from the extra drama.

This reminds me of something Suzuki Roshi said.  He said that asking, "What am I doing with my life?" is like trying to put a horse on top of a horse and then ride it.  It's hard enough to get on one horse and ride; it's impossible to ride two horses, one on top of the other.  So, just get on your horse, your human life, and ride; don't think about suffering, creativity, or imagination.  Just pick up the pen and go."

Some Quick Notes on this Month's Vogue

1) References to Botox seems to be appearing in these pages with an ever increasing frequency.  If Vogue is any indication, it's becoming more and more a part of our culture, a distressing trend.

2)  I liked the article on jeans.  I've never really thought that much about jeans, except for knowing that I like to wear them, even then I never particularly thought about the brand.  It reminded me of cars, how I could look at a car and think it was nice, but in most cases not know what it was.  And I liked Jeffrey Steingarten's essay on food.  I liked reading about how a steak should be properly cooked, and knowing that if I ever wanted to order the same meal that Jeffrey Steingarten had at a Chinese restaurant, I could, because he wrote down the numbers off the menu to order.  But I wondered about the "we."  As the article moved along, "we" became the point of view, and I didn't know whether he was actually talking about a group experience or whether he was speaking from a rather exalted position. 

3)  After reading the cover story on Uma Thurman, I want to see "Kill Bill" more.  Whether I go is another story.  More and more, I find myself resistant to the moviegoing experience--the cost, the advertisements, the crowds--so, who knows, if I'll get there.  But it's a movie that should be seen on a big screen.  If I go, I wonder if I'll just find it a violent, bloody mess.  But I like watching martial arts.  Uma Thurman said she worked out eight hours a day for this movie.  She says it changed her forever.  It's always foolish to believe those kinds of quotes in a magazine, but somehow I did.

More on "Making Movies"

I just finished the New Yorker issue, "Making Movies," and wanted to comment on two other articles I read here, one on the screenwriting guru, Robert McKee, and another on screenwriting credits. 

Here are the two quick things that interested me about the McKee article:  one was that Charlie Kaufman who wrote "Adaptation" and stuck McKee in the story didn't think until he finished the script (or maybe someone told him) that it might be a problem that he used quotes from McKee's books and lectures without permission.  This fit into my worldview of this movie.  The only reason I liked "Adaptation" at all is because I admire Chris Cooper so much, and I was happy that he got such an interesting role--at least for half a movie. I just wished the story could have actually been more about him and not about this pretentious, whiny, lazy view of what it means to be a writer.  Secondly, I thought it was interesting that McKee wants to write a novel, has been thinking about it for years, and freely admits that teaching these courses may be a way of escaping what he truly wants to do.

The second article by Tad Friend, "Credit Grab," talks about screenwriting credit.  It was mostly a depressing read, to see how writers in Hollywood are often viewed as expendable.  If there's a quick fix to be made, often a writer's head is on the block, and the conga line of writers begin for a particular project.  12 scripts can be made for a movie, and as one insider says, you only wish you could have seen Script 7 or 8 on the screen instead of the final version.  It was depressing to read that Robert Towne, one of the more highly acclaimed screenwriters around, was brought in for "Mission Impossible: 11" and given the task of writing around the special effects.  They knew exactly what stunts they wanted.  They just needed some semblance of a story to get them there.  And then there's the whole arbitration process where a number of writers could submit their bid for credit, and it might just come down to who wrote the better essay on why they deserved it, as opposed to what's actually written in the pages of their draft.   Reading this made me glad that I never had a deep longing to write for films.