January + Half of February 2020 Roundup
Posted: 15 February 2020
I tried to start writing these as I finished things halfway through the month.
Books
Exposed - Jean-Phillipe Blondel
I checked this out of the library because it seemed like a quick, fun read, and there’s some irony in my wishing there was more of it when I was done. I was becoming very invested in the narrator by the end and feel like all of the development was cut short and the book ended before fully diving to explore and resolve whatever the narrator was going through. The best book I can think to compare this to is Steppenwolf, also dealing with something like? a midlife crisis, but Exposed approaches it from a modern perspective. The narrator is clearly suffering from some existential malaise, but isn’t a person dripping with evil or spiteful thoughts the way he is in Steppenwolf. I felt like I was really starting to understand and process the narrator’s trauma with him, and thought it was really interesting how the line blurred between his writing and his waking thoughts, and wanted to see where that all went before the novel very suddenly ended and wanted me to take for granted that the course of events led to everybody resolving some of their issues. I don’t buy it. It was a quick, fun read though, I’ll give it that, I just feel like it had more potential.
Love’s Executioner - Irvin D. Yalom
Psychiatrists’ patient logs are really exciting to read - they feel like real life mystery novels, with the therapist working to figure out and solve the mystery of how to help their patient, and they have to figure out the best way to conduct their investigation without letting the patient on to what they might be doing until it’s the right time. Love’s Executioner is very engaging and Dr. Yalom comes across as very human, constantly refers to his own problems as he deals with his patients’. I felt empathy for the people coming to him, thrilled at the process, and relief when he wound up (usually) solving their problems. It feels almost vouyeristic, and reading this makes me want to go to therapy, fantasizing about a doctor who tells me all of what is wrong with me and sets me on a path to fixing my problems and becoming an actualized person.
Movies
Parasite
I thought this was a good movie and respect how successful it’s been - I think it found a really nice balance between having a message and being an engaging movie that many people would enjoy. That being said, I feel like it felt afraid to get too ugly - I never felt like it pushed me to question myself or my complancecy or role within society. MLK day just passed recently and I can’t help but think about this movie through the lens of nonviolence. The role of nonviolence is to hold a mirror up to the perpetrators of violence and force them to look at the horrible cruelty and injustice they are inflicting on the nonviolent. I want this movie to do something similar and hold a mirror up to me, the viewer, and force me to address my conscious and subconscious attitudes towards the poor, but I feel like it falls short. The victim family in the movie is incredibly rich. The great offense they see in the (protagonist?) father, his smell, is a sense we have no access to as moviegoers. And what we DO get out of the movie, visually and auditorily, is that the poor family do everything they need to to conform, and don’t offend bourgeois sensibilities. I didn’t leave the theater wrestling with who I was. And I feel like this movie could have really challenged me. Maybe I’ve fallen into its trap, and it was intended to subvert an audience that was going into the movie prepared to tear it into tiny little pieces looking for more meaning. Maybe the film accomplished exactly all of this with its Korean audience, and the cultural gap is just a bit too much for me to understand or cross.
All of this over-intellectualizing aside, I had a good time watching this movie. The scene with the family escaping back to their home and climbing down an almost infinite amount of staircases is very powerful. I think it’s one of the best movies of the past few years and I’m optimistic that its popularity will lead to more meaningful movies like it in the future.
Portrait of a Lady on Fire
I walked into this not realizing I had seen a trailer for it when I went to watch Parasite. To be totally honest this movie wasn’t up my alley. It’s a very beautifully shot movie, it’s just not my kind of thing. I dunno what else to say here. The pacing felt very slow and frustrating for me. I thought it was very cool how we, as the audience, were put in a position where we were constantly looking at Héloïse as an artist would, imagining how she would look on a canvas in various day to day moments.
Television
The New Pope
I think the Young Pope was great, I think the New Pope is great, I don’t understand why season 2 of a show has a different name but I’m on board.
Music
The Devil and the Almighty Blues - S/T
The first track starts off on the weak side but they pick up the pace and by the time you get to Storm Coming Down you’re way on board. I love it. Storm Coming Down and Root to Root are amazing tracks. This band is kind of like if the Black Keys were chuggier and heavier. I love the vocals, I love the scratchy sound quality, I love the chugginess, it’s all really great. Looking forward to them hopefully touring in the US sometime in the future.
Black Satori - Lucy Lane
I had this on in the background and it was fine to listen to but didn’t on the whole it didn’t really stand out. Listless was my favorite track. I think I would’ve liked it more if it was less classic rock-y - it feels like they could’ve gotten away with experimenting and pushing the envelope way more, like they do in the second half of Comet Overdrive, and it would’ve been a more compelling release.
Inside Voices - Seek
Love how this album sounds, love the noodly guitars, love the sound of the guys voice, and am really crushed by how bad I think the lyrics are. I’m still going to listen to it a bunch just because I think sonically it comes together so well and gives me exactly what I want in emo but man. The lyrics.
Tricot - 真っ黒
Really good album, same great sound I expect when I think of Tricot. I think the language barrier is a little tricky because as much as I love the sound, I feel like I can’t really connect with the music on any more meaningful level given that I don’t know what any song is about.
Jank - Versace Summer
I like Jank, I think this album is alright. I feel like it could be a little tighter.
Two Door Cinema Club - Tourist History
One of my favorite albums that I come back to regularly - I haven’t been as into any of their other stuff. There’s definitely a lot of nostalgia in this album for me, I was around graduating high school age when it came out, and it has a lot of sound qualities that feel like they’re from the late 2000s/early 2010s. Whatever happened to indie pop.