Submitted by Geoffrey Dow on Thu, 2012-03-08 23:34
March 23, 2012, OTTAWA — I did something I seldom do Wednesday night: went out to the theatre. To the National Arts Centre, no less, having spent a full day's wages on the tickets to take the chance — as the artist put it during a post-performance question and answer session — of being badly disappointed, but guaranteed a unique experience.
The show was Ronnie Burkett's seventh, Penny Plain, and it is one that will never show up on video. Burquett is the singular artist and craftman who has made his career as a marionette artist: he writes the plays, builds the puppets and performs every part.
Burkett's craft is an ancient one and, like other ancient arts — fairy stories, for instance, or poetry — one often perceived as belonging to that oft-maligned, low-status realm of "children's work" (never mind that there is nothing inherently inferior in art meant for children; that is an argument for another time). But Burkett's stories are not intended for children, nor is his love for the art and the craft of puppetry a childish one.
His latest show is not his best, but if you get the chance to see Penny Plain, you should. The technical achievements alone are worth the price of admission. My full review is behind the link: Housebound apocalypse less than the sum of its parts.
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March 14, 2012, OTTAWA — It seems like the American cinema comes up with a good time travel film of a certain kind once every decade or so — Peggy Sue Got Married and Pleasantville come immediately to mind, as does Groundhog Day, in its own way.
Not strictly-speaking science fiction, these movies are more like fables, presenting time travel as an arbitrary fact which allows their protagonists to learn some life lesson, sometimes leading to acceptance of what is, more often leading to some sort of important life change.
That grand old man of American cinema, Woody Allen, is the latest to offer us a nostalgia-steeped visit to the past, along with a cinematic love-letter to a city that is not New York (for a change), but Paris. Paris now and, especially, Paris then.
The Oscar-winning Midnight In Paris has become Allen's most financially successful movie. Though flawed, it is the work of a master-crasftmen that tells its slender tale with style and efficiency, generating laughs and dramatic tension despite its decidedly old-fashioned pacing.
Does it deserve its awards and critical acclaim as Woody Allen's return to form? Click here for my full review (yes, with spoilers), Twilight of an auteur.
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The Ballad of Saddam Hussein (and me)
— Sung to the tune of Joe Hill
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| Siggy says: "I give up. Vut do you zink it means?" |
I dreamed I shot Saddam Hussein,
Left a flechettte in his eye.
But that arrow only slowed him down,
Saddam he didn't die.
Saddam he didn't die.
It started when he walked by
With his ageing Labrador.
That vicious mutt leaped for my throat,
But I blocked him with my arm.
I blocked him with my arm.
The humiliation of his dog,
Angered Saddam, you see.
Right then and there, like Daffy Duck,
He swore revenge on me.
He swore revenge on me.
So I shot him in the head,
The bullet pierced his brain.
Though he collapsed upon the floor,
The wound only made him mad,
It only made him mad.
When I saw that he was coming to,
I kicked him in the side.
He rolled away and called his dog —
The chase was on again.
The chase was on again.
While making plans to kill me off,
He rubbed his hands with glee.
'Twas not only me he wanted dead,
He had a list of enemies.
A list of enemies.
The last I saw, he stood in a line,
Protected by robots.
He was going to torch my house,
And things seemed pretty dire.
Things seemed pretty dire.
Heart-breakingly, I then woke up,
With no resolution found.
For all I know, Saddam's still there,
Plotting my demise.
Plotting my demise.
But that isn't why I will never be president (of anything).
Spread the word!
Submitted by Geoffrey Dow on Mon, 2012-02-06 02:27
February 9, 2012, OTTAWA — I got to the office early yesterday, because I thought I might need to spend some time debriefing the boss on the Great Big Gaping Hole now grinning from the rear left door of one of his vehicles — the one I had been driving the day before.
I'd parked my bike at the lot, picked up the van that was waiting for me and shucked my leather jacket in hopes of cooling down a bit before I had to greet my passengers. (Wednesday was not nearly as cold as I expected, so I'd worn a much heavier sweater than I ought to have. I digress.)
I fired up the van, confirmed it was fully fuelled and that I had a spare bottle of washer fluid; tuned the radio to CBC in both Ottawa and Montreal and adjusted my mirrors; set the beast in gear and headed on in, secure in my knowledge that I was without blame, but still, just a little insecure about what the boss was going to say about his mangled vehicle.
The SUV was still where I had left it on Tuesday, the guts of the rear door exposed the world, like bones and tendons stripped of skin. I couldn't help taking another look, rubber-necking at my own misfortune.
It being afternoon, the office was a little cramped. The number one and number two guys were at their desks, the day-time dispatcher — let's call him Normand — was at his, and a couple of my fellow drivers were hanging around.
"Good afternoon, gentlemen," I called out as I slipped through the swinging gate.
Normand looked over at me, smirking. "Hey, Geoff," he said with obvious delight. "You're supposed to bring the whole vehicle back with you, not just part of it!"
"Hey man! It's in the back!" I said, referring to a dinner-plate sized scrap of metal that had once been part of the vehicle's door.
I took a look at Ahmed, my boss, and was pleased to see he was smiling, but was distracted when Charley, an older driver, asked me, "Geoff, do you live in North Gower?"
"Uh, no," I said, "No, I live in the Glebe. Why?"
"Oh," he said, deadpan. "I thought I saw your sweater in the garbage."
"My sweater!" I thought wildly for an appropriate response, but was too taken aback by the non-sequiteur insult to do anything but sputter while the office rocked with laughter.
Grinning, I shook my head and approached the boss' desk to explain just what had happened.
So what did happen? Click here for Dump Truck Horror on Autoroute 40!
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February 6, 2012, OTTAWA — Thanks to those of you who wished me a happy anniversary of birth — it was.
The whole week was a good one, the highlights including an outing in Gatineau Park on snowshoes (I am the bigfoot-like creature in the photo at left), finally getting out onto the canal and dining Sri Lankan style.
And also, a Mysterious Ottawa Valley Apparition, caught on camera by the one and only Phantom Photographer, who was able to attend this year's Winterlude opening ceremony, while I laboured on this week's edition of True North Perspective.
Cut to spare those uninterested in my personal blatherings. If you want them, or the striking photo of the Ottawa Valley's no-longer mythical Dance of the Winter Turkeys/Danse des dindes d'hiver come to spectral life, click here.
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Spread the word!
Submitted by Geoffrey Dow on Thu, 2012-01-12 13:20
Well of good intentions slakes no thirst
January 12, 2012, OTTAWA — I hate coming down hard on books by relatively unknown writers; given my 'druthers, I'd much prefer to pass over them in silence. At the same time, if a writer goes to the trouble of sending me a review copy (even an electronic copy), it seems disrespectful to ignore it.
So I've struggled with this review, and not only because I have been "friends" with the author (or rather, with his pseudonym) on Livejournal for a while, but because it became clear in the reading that Benjamin Tate's heart is very much in the right place.
Well of Sorrows tries hard to play with, and even to reverse, many of epic fantasy's tired tropes. The protagonist is more peace-maker than warrior, and in plays of scenes of glorious battle we are given the blood and the shit and the brutality of hand-to-hand combat.
Unfortunately, good intentions alone don't make for good art. Well of Sorrows suffers from shallow characterization, structural confusion and world-building that is not remotely convincing. Click here for my full review (hardly any spoilers).
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Blistering Barnacles! The Adventures of Tintin reviewed!
January 6, 2012, OTTAWA — Remind me, please, if ever I get the urge to spend good money on a "major motion picture" from out Hollywood way, that I shouldn't get my hopes up too high.
My girlfriend and I decided to ring in the new year by doing something we've never done in the nearly two years since we became Involved. You guessed it, we decided to go out to the movies, that time-honoured North American tradition.
For quite different reasons, we both had an urge to see Steven Spielberg's The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn, and so we set out this past Tuesday night, one of the coldest of the winter thus far.
I don't think I'm committing any spoilers in saying that we were both disappointed. Not an awful movie, but not a good movie, either. It looked good, had a few laughs, but if you are among those who want some story to go along with the eye-candy, you'd be out of luck. Billions of billious blue blistering fight scenes! Click here for my full review!
Submitted by Geoffrey Dow on Tue, 2011-12-06 21:29
Closing the curtain on 2011
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(Ottawa, Canada, December 25, 2011.
Photo courtesy of the Phantom Photographer.)
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(So much for) The War on Christmas
December 27, 2011, OTTAWA — As most of you know, there is in the air at this time of year, a recurring noise about a "war on Christmas". Out of the blue, otherwise intelligent and reasonable people are trade angry anecdotes about how they are tired of "giving in" to "political correctness" by being forced to say "happy holidays" or "seasons' greetings" instead of "merry Christmas".
Click here for more Christmas cheer!
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Catching up
December 6, 2011, OTTAWA — Seems like only yesterday I was making an ass of myself by forgetting how to Bcc people, but it was in fact actually about a month and a half ago.
Despite the appearances here, I have been keeping busy, beavering away on a long-form writing project, getting myself back into the paid work-force as a driver, doing a lot of cycling to the Ottawa International Airport, experimenting with a technology a bit more recent than a velocipede, and taking note of some lunatic developments in urban "design".
I've also been doing some reading and expect to have a couple of book reviews posted here shortly.
Meanwhile ...
City life is full of familiar risks. Traffic, pollution, crime, unfortunate fashion decisions.
But there are other dangers, too, stationary hazards that lurk right out in the open, waiting for the unwary, the distracted.
In recent years, Ottawa (and many other cities in the ostensibly advanced first world) is in the midst of a lunatic experiment in Ergonomic Selection. I speak of course, of the boxy behemoths which have replaced the old-fashioned, coin-only parking meters.
The new meters take coins, bills and any number of varieties of plastic.
And if they haven't yet, they will also soon take lives.
Don't believe me? Find out why the new parking meters are an ambulance-chaser's best friend!
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I've taken the plunge and purchased not one, but two, e-readers. (In succession, one replacing another.)
And I fear I may never again purchase a book make of paper and ink.
¡Viva la Revolución!
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Slouching towards the Singularity?
Speaking of technology, it seems I'm a little slow on the uptake, because I have only just now realized that, well, I do think about the applications of science with which we surround ourselves and on which we depend.
So, a new section, ever-so-imaginatively entitled, "Technology". The name will likely change at some point in the nebulous future, but for now my experience as an e-reader reader has convinced me I'll be talking more about the machines in our lives.
The intro page is here, though it is little more than a holding page at the moment. But if you're interested, click away.
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That's it for now. Coming soon, a review of Steven Pinker's provocative new book, The Better Angels of Our Nature, which claims we live in the best of all historical (if not of all possible) worlds, of Benjamin Tate's unusual epic fantasy, Well of Sorrow and, sooner than later I hope, of Von Allan's sequel to Stargazer.
So check back soon or, better still, subscribe to my newsletter and let me keep you up-to-date!
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Submitted by Geoffrey Dow on Thu, 2011-10-20 00:43
October 27, 2011, OTTAWA — If you're new here, welcome and thank you; presumably you got my invitation and, if you did, more like than not you also know that I screwed up in sending it.
I've gotten so used to dealing with actual mailing list software, I had completely forgotten that email programs don't work the same way and that putting a "list" name into the To: field means that every address there will show up in every recipient's mail.
To say I was (and am) embarrassed is to put it mildly.
If it makes you feel any better, my sub-conscious also gave me a helluva hard time last night as well. All right. Time to brave my inbox, and then get to work.
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| The MacKenzie-Papineau Monument in Ottawa. Photo by The Phantom Photographer. |
October 26, 2011, OTTAWA — The past couple of weeks have offered some stark reminders of how small the world can seem.
I attended a ceremony at the Spanish embassy on the 20th, and a funeral in the south end of Ottawa on the 22nd. Both events involved family.
I could not help but be reminded of just deep are my own roots into the past. For instance, I am but a single "degree of separation" from the 19th century; my father's father, who lived until 1996, was born in 1899 and fought in the Russian Revolution.
Almost two weeks ago now, my father's last remaining aunt, his mother's sister, passed away (though her funeral was not held until this past Saturday).
I didn't know her well; she had been more of an occasional, if benevolent, presence than a person to me, but the elegies I heard made me wish I had known her much better.
Mother of five, whose husband ran out shortly after the last baby was born, Auntie Pearl raised her children on her own. By all reports, she did so with a generosity and love that spread far beyond her blood-ties; I think close to a hundred people turned out to say goodbye, many of them friends, not family.
Coincidentally and on a much happier note, on my mother's side of the family, my great uncle Jules was in town last week, the last living Canadian veteran of the Spanish Civil War.
Uncle Jules was here at the request of the government of Spain which, finally, was to follow through on a promise made 15 years ago to those who had volunteered to fight against Franco's fascists in the dark days before the Second World War.
Entirely by accident, during a ceremony at the Spanish Embassy, I learned that the man who designed Ottawa's memorial to the "Mac-Paps" lives in Sudbury and knows my mother, as does his wife, who is the editor of Sudbury Living, a magazine for which my mother has been writing recently.
The world can sometimes seem very close indeed. And history too is often not nearly so far away as it seems.
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October 20, 2011, OTTAWA — It seems churlish — and a bit pointless — to dwell on the negatives, so let's get it them of the way.
The Man Who Never Was is the weakest serial of The Sarah Jane Adventures's final half-series. The details are clunky and there is an almost unforgivable bit of idiot-plotting to get us to the cliff-hanger at the end of the first episode.
But never mind all that; it is still an entertaining episode and a fitting tribute to its late star.
The other parts of the story, the important bits, more than make up for the deficits, and Russell T Davies deserves our thanks for reigning in his tendency towards over-blown melodrama.
I'm going to miss The Sarah Jane Adventures an awful lot. In its quiet way it offered its young (and not-so-young) viewers a powerful moral vision and provided an example (instead of a lecture) of a subtly radical alternative to life as most of us know beneath its fantastic trappings.
Some spoilers behind the link. And I'll try not to get blubbery.
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