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Little Jackson lost

"The word normal was never used to describe me," Janet Jackson claims in her new...erm, nonfiction book, True You. Perhaps this is true, but True You should cause at least a few to label her boring and pointless. If no one has yet, I'm happy to be the first. I had no idea what True You was before I read it, and after reading it, I still have no idea what it is.

What the hell is up with James Nguyen?

 

Full disclosure from a lifelong connoisseur of garbage: I did not enjoy Birdemic: Shock and Terror. What is most irritating about it has little to do with the movie itself, though: in the rush to anoint this legit shitpile the BEST WORST MOVIE EVER, all the press that talked about it being a cult sensation neglected how cult films work (I'll give you a clue: it doesn't happen overnight!). But on top of being annoyed at the way the rush to claim and describe everything perverts long-standing institutions (I'm an old man, so what?), Birdemic: Shock and Terror is just tedious. Part of what makes it hilarious is the stilted editing style, which at times places several beats between each line of dialogue, the sound audibly cutting out between each exchange. This is funny for five minutes and excruciating at 90. Birdemic: Shock and Terror is too long by at least half, which makes repeat viewing virtually impossible (not that various outlets gave anyone the time to watch it again before declaring it a cult classic, and repeat-watching has everything to do with a film's worthiness in assuming that title).

However, its director James Nguyen is at least morbidly fascinating, because there is something decidedly...off about him. I hate saying "off," but "wrong" would be even worse, because I frankly believe he has some kind of mental or emotional impairment. The guy just doesn't get anything. He thinks he actually has made a movie with a "great storyline" that he hopes will leave people "thinking," per his commentary on Severin's newly released Birdemic DVD. Here too is a problem with Birdemic: the ambiguity of intent that is so essential to camp appeal is obliterated by this guy's every clueless interview that asserts how seriously he takes his work (and even a little seriously would be way too seriously in this case). "I think that the majority are laughing with the movie, but some percentage are laughing at the movie, and that’s fine. What do you expect from a movie that was made for less than $10,000? But, I think that the people who are laughing with the movie really like it, they just see through all of its imperfections, and they appreciate the sincerity of the story – a very serious, compelling story," he recently told the Wall Street Journal. For the record, people are only laughing at this thing, if he's lucky, and his assertion regarding the "sincerity of the story – a very serious, compelling story," is exactly the kind of thing they're laughing at.

There's something socially out of touch about Nguyen and if I had to make an armchair-ignorant diagnosis, I'd say he has Asperger's. I mean, who knows, really? It's just a stab at a mind that comes off as alternately complicated and simple. The DVD commentary I mentioned is plagued by the same shitty sound editing as the movie and he repeats himself endlessly. The central point of his rambling goes something like, cars = civilization, and his central question is, "Why did the eagles and vultures attack?” On his so-heavy-handed-it-hurts environmental message conveyed by fake newscasts regarding global warming and polar bears, he assures us, "You really have to watch it closely to catch all that." Is it a lack of intelligence on his part that causes him to question ours? As the commentary goes on, he becomes as insufferable as his film, a pretentious blow-hard that over-explains the overt. He also mispronounces names at random (The Birds is alternately referred to by its actual title and The Bird, and he also says “Angela Jolie” and “Yoko Owner”). I'm not willing to give him the benefit of the language barrier, either: he was born in Vietnam but his family moved to America 36 years ago. It's gotta be something...else.

But look, clearly people are charmed by this guy and his film, and if I can distill what he has to offer, it's in the video above, which cuts together instances of him literally just stating what's on screen during his commentary. His simpleness makes the average director-as-narrator shtick we often hear phoned in on these tracks seem sophisticated and insightful. The video above reminds me of that story John Waters often tells about Edith Massey: they'd go driving and she'd look out the window and just say everything she saw the whole time: mailbox, house, schoolchildren, fence, etc. You know, come to think about it, what the hell was up with Edith Massey?

What I'm mostly saying is: go ahead and laugh at (or if you are one of Nguyen's fantasy viewers, with) Birdemic: Shock and Terror. But at some point, do ask yourself: what the hell am I laughing at?

Nevermore

Without making a big deal out of what is not at all a big deal, I should inform you that I will no longer be writing recaps of America's Next Top Model on this blog. I no longer have the time and, frankly, the interest. Once upon a time, spending 10+ hours on a recap of this show was an accurate reflection of my love for it. But like everyone else, my interest in it has waned over the years. Right now, with what I have going on, I have time to either only cover ANTM or only cover (some of) the other pop cultural stuff I'm into at any given moment. To go the former route would turn this blog into a complete distortion of my interests, and that is so not the point.

If there is little incentive from within, there's probably even less from without (I at least feel an odd sense of guilt about all this!) -- over the cycles, traffic on the recaps has declined. When I started, I could take a few days to put together a recap and it was no big deal -- things move so fast on the Internet now that by the time Monday rolls around, a million other people have written about it and nobody cares anymore. And also maybe I've gotten worse. I don't know. Basically, killing weekends on virtually thankless posts isn't really something I'd be into doing even if I had the time.

Maybe I'll tweet about the show, but stuff that's taking up my time tends to fall on Wednesdays, anyway. So probably not. I'll never say never (but I will say, "Nevermore," apparently), so maybe I'll notice a trend on the show and write something about it mid-season. But probably not that either. Oh well. It was bound to happen. I'm 32, you know? I will continue to update this blog as actively as possible with things that catch my interest, but as far as ANTM is concerned, I'm the opposite of these people:

 

Appropriate, right?

Dogtooth, for your consideration

I can't think of a movie that demands you know absolutely nothing about it more than Giorgos Lanthimos' Dogtooth. Seriously, the charm drops off considerably even during a second viewing. This movie is about blissful ignorance from within and without. However, if you need just a taste of what you're getting into, look no further than this scene:

 

It, of course, makes a lot more sense in context, but all the knowledge in the world couldn't keep it from being absolutely insane. Anyway, the point is if you have an inkling that you might want to see this Oscar-nominated (insanity, meet insanity!) Greek film, by all means do it without reading a damn thing about it. Otherwise, below are my way overdue thoughts, since it is Oscar Week, after all (Happy Oscar Week! What's on your wish list?)...

Judge Judy gifs

Keeping in mind that there will never be a gif that sums up Judge Judy's scowling genius and technophobic lifestyle as good as this one grabbed by Tracie...

...below are others that I made, which amuse me greatly. I've been collecting them for a while now -- I watch Judge Judy virtually everyday and aspire to be 1/10th as brilliant and quick on my feet as this sprightly 68-year-old. In most courtroom programming, I think you mostly watch for the cases and the trashy, ridiculous people who present/defend them. I go to Judge Judy for Judy, who's oftentimes the biggest lunatic in the room. I don't even know what she was going for with probably half of the gestures below, but I'm sure glad she did them anyway.

A shining moment in pop culture history

 

It's too bad I'm posting this too late for Valentine's Day, because it is truly a love anthem of modern life. Long Island-born female rapper LeShaun released "Wide Open" in 1993 and it went precisely nowhere, quite possibly because it was, to my knowledge, the first and only rap song to date, in which a woman extolled the virtues of playing with her partner's ass. Hard. "Grab the booty cheeks, spread 'em open wide / Feel the surprise that I'm about to put inside," she rapped 18 years ago, and the world has yet to catch up. I was reminded of this track because of a mini-project I recently did on XXX-rap of the early '90s, and I can say for certainty that "Wide Open" towers above the rest in brazenness and uniqueness (I don't know, maybe Odd Future or someone similarly salacious has topped it since, but I somehow doubt it).

On top of that LeShaun (whose big break came when contributed to LL Cool J's "Doin' It" -- it was also her only break, as she wasn't so much as invited to appear in the video) makes this move on a 17-year-old ("So yo, if I do this, don't say you were molested / Run home and tell your moms so she could have me arrested"). In fact, the cleaned up radio/video edit (they were serious about trying to get this getting airplay?) has her mostly dropping the ass and focusing on potential statutory rape (and this time, her object of implied anal intrusion could be as young as 16). That's at least a bit more conservative, I guess.

I love this track because it's so cheerful (courtesy of a horny sample from Johnnie Taylor's "Ain't That Lovin' You (For More Reasons Than One)"), like the sun is shining out of the behind she's all up in. Playing with a straight guy's ass is a joyous occasion, damn it! Even her heteronormative/gender-roles-beholden stuff is said with a sly sense of irony: "When I ask who's the man, you say Shaun is the man." Try, just try finding a more thematically sound use of tongue-in-cheek sentiment in pop culture. Impossible. For that reason alone, this is a slept-on classic.

This is love?

 

For Valentine's Day, I'm presenting an extremely accurte portrait of the non-reciprocated love I have for Winston. What happens above happens almost daily. We torture each other, I suppose.

BTW, if you're wondering whether I'm writing about the Grammys, I'm not -- but I tweeted about it throughout the ceremony, as I'm wont to do with awards shows these days. This method really beats watching the show, then grabbing screen shots, then putting it all together and staying up till 5 am in the process, let me tell ya.

"Born" right

"Express Yourself!" "Express Yourself!" is mostly what I saw as I rode to the airport Friday morning. I'd missed the boat, so to speak, neglecting to download Lady Gaga's "Born This Way" when it hit the world at 6 am, so for a few hours, I had to form an idea of the awaited track based on my Twitter timeline. I had expected a sleek, proto-pop-house anthem (the comparisons to "Vogue" that were present in smaller numbers only reinforced this). When I finally was able to download it, instead of processed horns and the plastic beats of Steven Bray and/or Shep Pettibone, what Gaga was serving to my ears was hi-NRG realness.

While there is some melodic intersection with "Express Yourself" (see Madonna's "What you need is a big strong hand to lift you to your higher ground" versus Gaga's "So hold your head up, darling you'll go far, listen to me when I say..." and/or "So if you want it right now..." versus "I'm beautiful in my way..."), the sound of the song has a much more tenuous connection to the (former?) Queen of Pop: the galloping arpeggiation, the swift tempo, grinding guitarishness of the track is most reminiscent of
"Born To Be Alive," the biggest hit of Patrick Hernandez, whom Madonna dated and danced back-up for. If "Express Yourself" is a fancy car that goes moderately fast, "Born This Way" is a parade of sounds zooming by.

What a perfect setting for gay pride! The production by Gaga, Fernando Garibay and DJ White Shadow seems to bespeak an understanding of gay culture way beyond the ham-fisted lyrics. I talked to MTV News regarding the conflation of activism and commerce (and previously wrote about the trend of gay-pandering by pop stars for the Voice), so I have little left to say as far as what Gaga's doing with that (although no matter what, I think we can all agree that tailoring explicitly gay anthems on such a mainstream level is something new and foreign to pop, and more importantly, gay culture, and its effects remain to be seen). The lyrics are kind of dumb and simplistic, yes (since when is being on the right track a birthright?), and they do contain some off-color terminology for the sake of meter and rhyme. (However, I wish all the energy devoted to arguing about words like "chola" said by someone clearly invested in the concept of harmony would instead be placed on fighting actual bigots or charity work. Splitting hairs with those clearly on the right side is a gigantic waste of time for everybody.)

But underneath all that is a fairly sophisticated knowledge of gay music -- in echoing "Born To Be Alive," "Born This Way" falls in line with the music "Alive" helped birth -- the hyper-electronic, hi-NRG sounds that disco morphed into after the '80s (the kind of stuff that was played at the insane NYC gay club the Saint back in the day). My favorite thing about "Born This Way" is how dorky it sounds -- it's just so bold in its exuberance. This works so well because if you examine overt expressions of gay pride -- parades, rainbows, drag queens -- the thing about them is that they aren't cool. They're amazing and special and so, so important, but their flamboyance is direct at odds with the notion of cool. Within pop culture, there's a current notion that being gay is cool, and it's so ridiculous. It's not. It's just how some people are. "Born This Way" seems to get that entirely.

The only Britney Spears video that matters

 

While the world waits for Britney Spears' "Hold It Against Me" video, being doled out in one 5-second scrap at a time, feast your eyes on this re-edit of her ...Baby One More Time-era VHS, Time Out with Britney Spears. This was back when she was funky, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool and capable of delivering a modern anthem like "Email My Heart" ("Everybody's been doing emails!" is her rationale for the song's relatability). It's so amazing to me in this oppressive cards-to-the-chest climate of celebrity sound bites that they allowed a 17-year-old to just babble and babble at a camera with no concern of how inane she was coming off. Aw! I miss the old days. Also, be sure to stick around for her serenade a decidedly latent pre-teen with "Born To Make You Happy." Even though he's at least 10 years her senior, this kid fully aware of how icky that is. Precocious!

Happy Chow Daddy Day!

I don't suspect that anyone besides Tracie (who told me about this) could possibly share my excitement for the fact that the entire 30-second Chow Daddy PSA has at long last been uploaded to YouTube. Lord, have I waited for this day! I don't remember being this excited about the reissuing of a piece of media since Beyond the Valley of the Dolls came out on DVD. For years, Tracie and I have obsessed about 10 seconds of footage of this Boston-area, mid-80's school lunch advocate who was like a cross between the "Thriller" werewolf and Teen Wolf -- who owed much to "Thriller" himself! So basically, this is 3/4 "Thriller," 1/4 guttural recitation of foods that aren't even special (spaghetti? burgers?!?) with a smear of "Billie Jean"'s DNA and shavings of Zoobliee Zoo and Cats. I think it says a lot about the magic of Chow Daddy that I didn't even witness him as a kid and am in love with him, as though I were. If nostalgia is a narcotic, retroactive nostalgia is a straight up hit of crack.

But now, a new world has opened up! It's a world where actual human beings try to ply kids with not just acrylic face fuzz, but the notion that candy and gum are no fun and the suggestion that pretending to dislike spaghetti is a thing ("I relate to that!" -- No one, not even those severely bigoted against Italians). I don't know, I'm just so, so happy about this. I feel like starting a "FUCK YEAH, CHOW DADDY" Tumblr just to express my jubilance, except I couldn't get very far with just 30 seconds of material. I mean, there's a lot, but not enough for something as prestigious as a niche Tumblr.

Anyway, here's what FUCK YEAH, CHOW DADDY would look like, start to finish (or, I guess, finish to start since this would be in reverse Tumblr order, which is reverse order because BLOGS):