Word Wars

Directed by: Eric Chaikin, Julian Petrillo

In the world of competitive Scrabble, who is the ultimate champion? This film, through its motley cast of players, tries to answer that question.

The best I can say is that this documentary is "ok." It's not a great film by any standard, but it is definitely entertaining. The relatively low production value hinders it at points, but the players featured (such as G.I. Joel - G.I. for Gastro Intestinal) help make up for it.

I wouldn't put this at the top of any list, but I can say that it's a good view for a lazy afternoon.

Mayor of the Sunset Strip

Written and Directed by: George Hickenlooper

If you met Rodney Bingenheimer at the supermarket, you'd hardly find him remarkable. He's rather small, has a nerdy voice, and his haircut is always terrible. But, as Hickenlooper's documentary "Mayor of the Sunset Strip," reveals, he has been at the forefront of the music scene in Los Angeles and for decades has hosted the influential "Rodney on the ROQ" program on KROQ.

The film is mostly entertaining, showing how this seemingly small man came to be one of the most influential and well-connected men in the business. He name drops powerhouse players from Gwyneth Paltrow and The Ramones as though they were neighbors.

Unfortunately, that's just about as far as the film goes. In the end, it's not quite clear what the message or purpose of the film is (beyond "Hey! Look at this guy!") Not that it is necessarily a bad thing that the moral isn't handed to us or jammed in, but it definitely feels like something deeper is missing.

The movie is definitely enjoyable and worth watching. I recommend keeping a tally of how many celebrities he knows, and a separate tally of how many celebrities he discovered.

Song of Susannah

The Dark Tower: Book VI

Finally, the players are in play and the stories are moving forward! The ka-tet is separated as they travel through the Unfound Doo, so the novel follows three separate storylines.

In the central story line, Susannah's body has been hijacked by the Mia personality, who is ready to give birth. Mia has dragged them to New York City, where she has made a deal to hand over the baby to the the Man in Black, who will then use the baby to destroy the Dark Tower once and for all.

At the same time, in a parallel universe, Roland and Eddie need to save the property where the rose is growing, but are confronted with the same mafia hunchmen they've already killed. They escape and eventually convince Calvin Tower to hand the property with the rose over to them. Not sure what to do next, they follow the path of the beam to find the alcoholic author Stephen King who has been writing their story, but stopped out of fear for his life. Roland and Eddie convince him to start again before leaving.

Father Callahan and Jake (and Oy) get the least page time in this novel. They basically follow Susannah's trail around New York City until they come across the place where Mia is having her baby surrounded by the forces of evil. The novel ends with them storming the building, guns drawn, prepared to die if necessary. (There's also a brief postscript in which the reader finds out that Stephen King has died before finishing Roland's story.)

Alright, enough plot summary for now.

This book definitely moved forward, in terms of plot, more than any of the other books. (Sure, "Wolves of the Calla" had a lot of action, but the ka-tet only inched towards their goal in the end.) The fractured narrative - jumping between the three groups - helped break up the monotony that sometimes dragged the other novels down. Before the reader could be bored with one story line, the book jumped to the next story.

As usual with Stephen King, there was a lot of description and internal monologue that could have been cut down to make the novel more efficient. At several points, Susannah thinks to herself about how awful her situation is - as if the readers couldn't already figure that out. There were also whole scenes describing things that could have been resolved in a paragraph or so. For example, I'm not sure why Calvin Tower needed to argue with Roland for fifty pages (exaggerated only slightly) about handing over the property, but eventually Roland got what he wanted and that hiccup did not effect the plot in any way.

I'm not sure where the series is going from here. This book ended on a major cliffhanger, but the next book looks so massive as to be intimidating. I'm glad this segment ended where it did, though. It stopped just before it became intolerable.

I'll be taking a deep breath before diving into the final novel. At this point, I'm hooked, and I can't wait to find out where the Path of the Beam leads Roland and his ka-tet in the end.

The Velvet Underground and Nico

For several years, Continuum Publishing has been releasing books about albums as part of the "33 1/3" series. The series represents albums from across several genres, and the authors come from backgrounds just as diverse.

Joe Harvard's book on "The Velvet Underground and Nico" can easily be described as more pseudo-academic and less personal narrative. Rather than blathering on about how great the album is and his personal connection to the songs, Harvard takes a much more analytic approach to discussing the album. The book is divided into three major sections: the Setting, the Songs, and the Aftermath.

In "The Setting," Harvard provides some historical background on the band and how the album came to be recorded and produced. It was interesting to find out things like how exactly Andy Warhol was involved on the album as the "producer" (which was not much, although his influence was key to getting the album recorded) as well as how Nico became a member of the band. At times, when the chronology of when a certain song was written and recorded and re-recorded is unclear, the book can become a bit tedious - Harvard explains each and every scenario while acknowledging the contradictions and lack of support.

In "The Songs," Harvard breaks down the influences, history, music, and lyrics of each song from the album, one by one. Although each song is, ostensibly, given equal treatment, it's clear that the more significant songs are discussed with a little more passion and interest. Still, it is at this point that the book loses some of its objective veneer and some of the author's personal feelings sneak into the book.

The final section - "The Aftermath" - discusses the album's public reception and places the album in it's larger place within the history of rock music.

At times the attention to detail in the book interfered with the "bigger picture" that I was hoping for as a reader. Throughout the book, the author assumes that the reader already knows a bit about the band's history, the dynamics between the various band members, and the techniques used in producing the album. Although I did know some of these things, I felt like I "couldn't see the forest because of the trees" at some points - the details were too overwhelming. The author also references details on alternate takes and demo recording which are not widely available (and which are incredibly pricey when they are to be found), which became discouraging.

That being said, this book was very interesting. I appreciate the analytical approach to breaking-down the album. Too often, books of appreciation - such as this - become bogged down in the personal stories of the authors and the idolizing of those involved with the record. Though Harvard definitely treats those involved with an elevated level of artistic respect, it did not seem out of hand. Rather, it felt more like one artist respecting another artist's work. In any case, I've been inspired to read another book in the "33 1/3" series, eventually.

Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair

A few weeks ago, I was lucky enough (with some help from the Wifey) to get tickets to a special screening of "Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair." The New Beverly Cinema was screening this elusive and long-rumored print which includes both parts of the film unedited, as it was originally shown at the Cannes Film Festival, showing it as "The Fourth Film by Quentin Tarantino" as it was originally advertised. Coming in at just over four hours, this version is how Quentin Tarantino (supposedly) intended it to be seen.

There is no need to get into the bloody details of the plot (pun intended) here. Essentially, a woman survives an attempted assassination and then seeks revenge on the group of people who tried to kill her. There are a few subplots involving the assassins and a couple of battles, all leading to the climactic confrontation with Bill.

A few of the differences between this version of the film and the final version released in the US:

1. The story is treated as one long film, rather than two separate movies. Although it is still divided between "Volume 1" and "Volume 2," they are shown together with only a brief intermission.

2. Since the two parts are shown together, the narrative bridge at the beginning of "Volume 2" - in which The Bride reminds everyone of what happened in "Volume 1" - is completely cut.

3. The Japanese animation sequence showing the back story of O-Ren is slightly more gruesome, including a shot of a human having been gutted.

4. The Bride is shown removing an extra limb from Sophie Fatale, which was only implied in the regular release.

5. The battle in the Japanese dance hall between The Bride and the Crazy 88 gang seems longer and is shown in full color, making it much more graphic. (Apparently, it was edited to black and white to help earn the "R" rating for the final cut.)

From the opening shot of the bloody bride and Bills narration followed by the straight opening credits scored with Nancy Sinatra's haunting "Bang Bang, My Baby Shot Me Down," this film hooks the audience completely into its suspense. Yet the suspense is interesting because it's never a question of if the Bride will get her revenge (especially in "Volume 1" - how else would we get "Volume 2?"), but a question of how. How will all her training pay off? How will all these story lines tie together? How will she overcome the seemingly impervious Bill?

I definitely enjoyed seeing both parts together on the big screen. Although I own both films (and even have the special box that Best Buy gave away when the "Volume 2" DVD was released), I know for a fact that I would never sit down and force myself to watch them back-to-back. Viewing it in this way, though, made it much easier to see the continuity between the two very distinct parts. For example, the importance of the Hanzo sword always seemed out of place in "Volume 2," but made much more sense immediately after "Volume 1."

The New Beverly Cinema also added several trailers to the beginning of the film which were obviously major influences on Tarantino. Although not necessarily affecting the film in any way, it added an interesting perspective to the entire experience of the screening. It also revealed the significance of Gordon Liu and Sonny Chiba's inclusion in the cast, if it was not already understood

Given that Tarantino's films are all so different, it's hard to compare them to each other. And given that his career is still relatively young, it's hard to give this film much perspective. But, ultimately, "Kill Bill" will stand as one of his best, if not, at least, as his most unique.