Moral Highgrounds: A 55 Word Story

 

This is inspired by a line in Catch 22.

What's in a name?

A 55 word story gets you thinking about change - big and small.

How do you like them apples: A 55 Word Story

The step mother speaks her piece in this 55 word story. 

That Place Beyond the Pines

Have you heard of this movie? I hadn't when I went to see it. I don't want to say this a terrible movie. I want to say I didn't get. Was it too cerebral? Perhaps.

The Place Beyond the Pines is a 2013 American crime drama film directed by Derek Cianfrance written by Cianfrance, Ben Coccio, and Darius Marder. It has an 82% Critic Rating and a 79% Audience Rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

What the movie does is change perspectives twice. I don't mean it tells the same story from three different viewpoints. I mean it continues linearly, with no flashbacks, telling quite literally three very different stories.

<Spoilers ahead>

A Thing of Beauty

Tiny white beads, flawlessly round, not too large but nowhere near too small, each bead identical to the next yet unique in every way, each pearl tells a different story; they are not a clear white, but more of a subdued ivory with a tinge of pink, hard and smooth, unbreakable yet delicate, their texture and color changing with every touch and at every different angle. Light cascades down the the necklace, strung together in a halo of sparkling and reflecting beads, and bounces off from one pearl to the next with the elegance of a ballerina on a moonlight floor. Magnificent in its versatility, it can highlight the risque or add excitement to simplicity. It is not too long, but made to fit perfectly around the neck, caressing the edge of the shoulder bones, a circle of charm and sophistication around a smooth naked neck. The end is knotted with black ribbon into a bow creating an air of Victorian elegance. It stands as a vision of beauty in simplicity, a marriage of modern elegance and immortal style. 

  
Inspired by James Agee’s voice

Afterglow

Afterglow tells the story of a woman coping with her husband's recent death and having to deal with the pseudo condolences of relatives and neighbors.

It's a short film based on a short story. The original story is by Rohinton Mistry, titled "Condolence Visit". It is part of his collection of short stories "Tales From Firozsha Baag". It is a diploma film by Kaushal Oza (Film and Television Institue of India). It won the Best Indian Film award at 10th Kalpanirjhar International Short Fiction Film Festival.

Sitting silently in a park

It was a Tuesday night and the place was packed.  The center of attraction was a young man in a hat, strumming on a guitar and singing along. A crowd gathered around him, some tapping their feet, some swaying to the music.

A woman on her phone perched herself on the ledge of a fountain. She wore a long flared bohemian skirt and her high heels peeked through. She stopped for a moment to light a cigarette and resumed her conversion. A whiff of smoke blew in my direction. 

Another group of young men were seated on the steps around the fountain. They wore baggy, brightly dyed clothes and multicolored beads. One of them sported shoulder-length dreadlocks. The man on the guitar was strumming “Redemption Song”.

Surrounding the fountain was dotted clusters of trees. Under one of them, a couple sat, her head on his lap, smiling at one another. He leaned over to whisper something in his ear, and she giggled audibly, stretching out under the canopy. Notes of "Can't Buy Me Love" drifted in the air. Behind them a man walked his dog, or the dog walked him, it was hard to tell.

It was getting darker. The park was beginning to clear. The woman with the cigarette had migrated towards the music. By now the musician was playing, “Come on baby light my fire.”  The couple under the tree moved closer.

A few others sat under the branches but most people gathered within earshot of the music.  The guitar was strumming, “Feels like Home.”

Inspired by Harry Burnstein’s voice.  

The Museum of Innocence, Orhan Pamuk

I began writing about this book long before I finished it. Halfway through I realized what a momentous feat it would be to get through it. At the end I felt quite a sense of accomplishment.

The book reads less like a movie and more like a TV series. That is to say, missing a few chapters wouldn't throw you off the plot at all. (Mostly since nothing concrete happens.)
It's the story of an older man's obsessive, compulsive, unrequited love for a lower class girl 12 years younger than him.  He begins visiting her house, where she lives with her parents and husband and stealing whatever personal items of hers he can get his hands on to build an odd assorted collection of memories. You might find this deeply romantic or deeply creepy depending on your perspective. 

To truly experience Kemal's 8 years of unrequited love  for Fusin one has to take the long and arduous journey with him (through 600 odd pages). What you get is a collection of symbols and motifs woven together into a story. There are some pieces that are beautiful: assigning each cigarette she has smoked with a part of her personality (which he added to his quirky collection) or the chapter 'sometimes'  (a list of things she does 'sometimes') which itself reads like a museum of moments. 

Pamuk was so obsessed with the idea of a museum he spent his Nobel Prize grant of $1.5 million to set up an actual museum in a 19th century house in Istanbul. You can visit it to pour through everyday items you might find in 1970's Istanbul: old clocks, film clips, soda bottles, clothes of that fashion, and of course a wall of 4,213 cigarette butts. 

 <Spoilers ahead>

The Games We Play: A 55 word story

What do you think of the extra short story format?

Peering into the slipper: a cynics look at Disney’s Cinderella

At the surface, it is the tale of the compassionate and beautiful girl, mistreated by her stepfamily, saved by the fairy godmother and rewarded with the coveted love of the prince. It's got it all: love and dreams, rags to riches and good triumphing over evil.

Let’s start at the end: the ‘happily ever after.’ Cinderella’s reward, at the end of her struggles, is not a poor but loving woodcutter, it is the prince, and with it the castle, the title and the financial windfall. We have a word for that today - it rhymes with coal digger. Mind you he's no Shrek either - he's gorgeous.

And what does she have to be to get this happy ending: beautiful and obedient. The unnamed prince falls in love-at-first-sight with a woman, based only on her good looks, clearly uninterested in any mutual interests, intelligence or accomplishments. They spend the night in each others arms and forget to exchange names. If that happened at a bar today it would involve a bit of excessive drinking and a possible walk of shame home. In a Freudian analysis the slipper, as any other hollow object, is symbolic of the female genitalia. Needless to say, in such a reading the prince’s intentions would be even less noble.

Wedding dresses never worn

These are the most spectacular and unforgettable wedding dresses that I've seen in movies for weddings that didn't end up happening.

Sex and the City

Love it or hate it, you've got to notice the this poofy, layered Vivienne Westwood and the blue feathers in her hair. The wedding gets cancelled by the groom's cold feet. 

The Princess Dairies
Elegant and simple, a young Anne Hathaway looks truly the princess. Full length white lace sleeves quite prophetically channel Kate Middleton's royal wedding. Thankfully that princess went through with the ceremony.

My favourite costumes from film and television

The most spectacular costumes I've seen in movies and TV series. 

Fantasy - unknown historic time period

Mirror Mirror

The inspiration is hybrid classic from 16th century to 19th century design. Julia Roberts, who plays the wicked stepmother in this Snow White inspired film, had over 100,000 Swarovski crystals sewn into three dresses.

Game of thrones

Here's another example of the villainess getting some of the best outfits, and I love it. While Daenerys looks as ravishing as she does because of the ash blonde wig, Cersei Lannister gets the costumes. I'm such a big fan of layers and the exaggerated sleeves. 

18th Century

Anger Management

 Anger Management is the new comedic sitcom starring Charlie Sheen. 

Season 2 starts this April 2013.

What I like about Anger Management 

Charlie Goodson is a grownup Charlie Harper

Most people find that to be a sanitized version of Two and a Half Men but I really like the new, mature Charlie doling out advice, being a family man and trying to commit to a relationship.

3 very fun supporting female characters

Selma Blair (the best friend with benefits), Shawnee Smith (the ex-wife), Daniela Bobadilla (the daughter). I really them. There's something about the way Selma Blair dresses and Shawnee Smith talks that inexplicably draws me in. 

What I don't like about Anger Management

Kafka

Franz Kafka is the perfect example of a What the Fuck writer. When you are done with a Kafka story you are filled with an overwhelming feeling of What the Fuck did I just read?

Kafka narrates the absurd in the most everyday language. When a story (Metamorphosis) opens with a man waking up as an insect it's odd. When the man's most important concern is how he is going to get to work that day (it's not easy getting out of bed being a bug) that's absurd.

Bytes from a Culture Vulture

Books, movies, TV shows, plays and more. 

These aren't reviews. They're are mini op-eds.