THE AGENT Origin: Bolt (2008) Motivation: Penny is a cash cow. An asset to be exploited. I don’t know anything about Hollywood agents–they tend to get portrayed as scummy despots, like dentists or salespeople or gym teachers. We get a glimpse of his true motivation at the end when he says he’s thinking of “executive producer” credit for Penny’s story. Character Strengths: The Agent is pretty charismatic, but he’s terrible at lying. He never really convinces Penny to stop waiting for Bolt and to go on with the show. But he does succeed in getting her to the press junkets and photoshoots. And he never stops working, even when Penny’s…
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Is Anyone Besides Me Sick of Hollywood Sucking its Own Dick?
For the past ten years, it seems at least one movie gets nominated for Best Picture that’s all about Hollywood’s past grandness. How classy and chic and vogue it all used to be (as long as you’re into constant cigar smoke, copious alcoholism, and three-piece wool suits (plus hat) that stunk of sweat because no air conditioning). Where you could get rich on talent alone (as long as you were an adult white male. If you were Black, you were a janitor. If you were a woman, a sexually harassed pair of tits with no volition. And if you were a kid, pumped full of drugs and treated like a…
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The Books I Read: January – February 2017
Geek Love by Katherine Dunn I wasn’t aware of this novel until the author died, which was recently. Neil Gaiman and a few other writers used this as their parting memory–a particularly influential book (Kurt Cobain cited it as an influence). I looked it up and found the summary intriguing — a married couple engineers their children to be circus freaks for their literal “Family Circus“. It sounded horrific and darkly bizarre, like all those dark carnival/clown tropes I love. The accolades are not dismissible. Whereas a book like “Stranger in a Strangeland” is tainted by anachronisms (like the hippie counter-culture and there being actual life on Mars), this one…
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The Real Mermaid Problem
Let me tell you my pet peeve with mermaids and the movies. No matter what kind of production it is, big or small budget, bit player or star, Hollywood always makes the same mistake. Maybe it’s just ignorance or a limited special effects budget. Probably a bit of both. So let me take the opportunity to enlighten you. Mermaids don’t have knees. If anything, a mermaid’s spine is closer to a dolphin’s. It tapers into a tail with lots of vertebra. There’s no joint that lets them tuck their knees in. If you asked a mermaid to lift her tail, it would curl up like a snake. Right But you…
