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Reader Submission: Title by Elihu Dietz.

Harper Lee: To Kill A Mockingbird

I know. I know. Harry Potter 7 Pt2 came and went. I’m way behind the time, but I have an excuse! I am a grad student. I’m surprised I’m typing this right now at all. I’m sure there are a million things I should be doing…documenting every thing I think, collecting data about those thoughts, double-checking and cataloging that thought data and then prepping yourself to do it all over.

If none of this makes any sense to you, it is because you are not a current grad student and your brain is sane and intact. Enough about boring schmoring grad school; let’s talk HP.

I saw. I cried. I saw it again. I cried again. I, bizarrely enough, felt okay with it being over. In fact, for all the hype about being sad to see it over, everyone seemed to get over it well enough. Is it that the movie sucked so bad that they were glad they’d never had to see that shit again? No. That’s not it. Was it because they were so incredibly impressed with the final installment that they had no words left so they mourned in silence? No, that’s not it either.

I could be wrong but I’m willing to pose a theory. I think everyone was pleasantly pleased with the movie and despite the few problems, surrendered to the reality that HP is done. (It will actually never be done…people are still obsessed…it is just that we are done waiting on something more). Harry Potter is what it is. We’ve read the books; we’ve seen the movies; we now have nothing to do but live like reading fools and do it all again!

Okay, so what did I think of the movie. Overall, I’ll give it an A-. Good movie. Good moments. Quite a few holes. A lot of tears. Here’s the breakdown:

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Aww poor deprived dragon—The beginning was action packed like the whole movie. I felt so bad for that dragon.

Glad they showed Hermione destroying the horcrux (not in the book)- This was nice for her character. I was always sad that that wasn’t played up in the book. Why don’t we get to see Hermione shine!? I also liked their passion kiss at that moment. 

Neville is like 45 years old!— He looks OLD. What happened??

Ginny still sucks. She just does. Shouldn’t we like Ginny? Shouldn’t Ginny have feelings? Emotions? Try acting.

Hermione, Ron, and Harry are all decent when they have high stakes—I will concede that they each have come along way. That made me smile.

“Die you bitch” actually pretty lame—-Face it. We were all looking forward to Mrs. Weasley’s big kick-ass moment. The filmmakers knew that and instead of building it up to what we wanted it to be, they stuck it in like an afterthought. C’mon! Die you bitch! That’s so good. We never even got to see Bellatrix threaten Ginny. That’s the key! Stupid filmmakers! You ruined the moment.

Um. Way awkward after Voldemort—Seriously, why didn’t anyone say anything after Voldemort bites the dust? Harry just wanders through awkardly stunned? No one says, “Oh hey, good work Harry!” Thanks a lot? Nothing? WTF!?!?!?!

Finally some fucking magic in this goddamn Magical world!—Have we not all been waiting to see the magic happen. All we’ve seen before this are sparks and some fire and some lame little gimmicks. I don’t know about you but I wanted that magic! They finally delivered.

Snape…speechless. The montage of his story was either brilliant or I am so emotionally distraught that I would have cried at anything.—I loved Alan Rickman in this. I loved the telling of Snape’s story. I thought the image of a crying baby Potter, the dead body of Lilly, and a crying Snape was a trifecta of tearduct motivation.

Neville. Finally kicks some ass.—Although he looks forty-five, he also kicks some ass.

Voldemort. Really not that tough after all—Am I the only one who never found movie Voldemort very scary? Isn’t he supposed to be terrifying? This movie, moreso than ever before, made him so human and defeatable that it was barely exhilirating to watch him die. Voldemort, maybe you should study Darth Vader. That was an intimidating dude.

I miss Hagrid. His role really bit the big one.—Okay, it’s been a while now since I read the book, but I know Hagrid was more interesting in the final chapters. The movie makers just blew him off.

Harry never said goodbye to Hermione and Ron before. I think the movie did a passable job but it kind of ruined the martyr thing.—Harry isn’t supposed to let anyone know that he’s going to die. I get that moviegoers wanted to see a goodbye  but I miss the book version.

Filch trying to sweep up the rubble-classic.

Mcgonagall kickin ass! YES! YES! YES!—She made the movie for me. When she goes to kick Snape’s ass, just sign me up for the McGonagall army!

My conclusion: The movies had their highs and their lows. Turns out I enjoy them but it’s only because I’ve determined away to make the terrible story holes make sense:

I must think of the movies as “Harry Potter’s Greatest Hits.”

Ever work a low-wage job? Retail? Food services? Anything that made you feel like shit and paid you like shit? Yeah, many of us have done it at least once. The majority do it all the time. The elite never do it. I will not begin to believe that I really know what it is like to work these jobs for a living, since most of my experience in retail and food services was the result of pressure to get a summer job. I have since focused my life on even less profitable ways of making money but that promote a bigger ego: theatre. I am now attempting teaching but, for the time being, am only a student. Still, there are a huge number of people out there, the working poor, that face a terrible cycle of no money for a very poor quality of life. Although I am not an economist, I feel comfortable saying that this will only escalate in light of the most recent economic developments.

Seeing that I am not an authority on the subject, I will direct your attention to a book I just finished (and will be teaching this year!!!) called Nickel and Dimed: Or (Not) Getting by in America by Barbara Ehrenreich. This author took a great leap and decided to do a journalistic investigation of the life of the working poor. She took low wage jobs ($6 to $9 an hour) in various fields in Florida, Maine, and Minnesota. She honestly describes and analyzes the lives for her co-workers, who make a living this way, and shares her own feelings and experiences. It is an extremely riveting book, even though you are listening to what seem to be the mundane tasks of boring work. Still, it is interesting because people have to do these things every day. Their lives depend on it. It is terrifying and tragic. I found it a very insightful read of a topic a lot of people live, a lot of people would like to ignore, and a lot of people are ignorant about.

Alright, I hate to admit this but I have not read any Faulkner until this summer. At least, I don’t think I have…maybe I forgot…or blocked it out.

Anyway, between my short story class and my preparation for teaching 11th grade English, I have had to read a great deal of Faulkner. For my short story class I read the collection of short stories called Go Down, Moses. It was okay. Long-winded. Wordy. Bizarre stream of consciousness writing. Confusing. “The Bear” is waaaay too long. Only the first half is really interesting. My thought process the entire time was: ” Who the hell is talking!!!??!?!?!” Turns out, it doesn’t really matter who is talking.

As of this evening, I finished reading As I Lay Dying. This is not a happy story. Cheating wives. Cheating husbands. Crazy sons who burn down barns. Confused children surrounded by assholes. Daughters just trying to get an abortion. Broken legs covered in cement! An epic journey to bury a dead body. Buzzards. Gross.

This story was completely grotesque, even if Faulkner was not one of the writers we have discussed as  “grotesque” writer. I really did not like it at first but it grew on me by the end.

As a side note, did anyone know that Faulkner was super short and a total liar about being in the war? Napoleon complex. I need to read happier things. Perhaps I should re-read Harry Potter.

Now that I am back in a town with semi-reasonably priced movie tickets, I have seen two movies! Let’s discuss.

Bridesmaids: A truly, delightful female romp of over-the-top scenario mixed with wry wit. I must say I was very excited to see a movie with females leads (Kristin Wiig=hilarious and relatable) who, although could be construed as stereotypes, are actually pretty true to life characters. All the women of the bridesmaid party were exaggerated in their mannerisms to an extent but they still embodied humor for humors sake and not just because they were women. I have been thinking a lot about feminism lately, if only because my short story class keeps reading short stories with severely lame women! Anyway, I was thinking about how few movies I have seen that are centered around female comics or funny actresses that my boyfriend would enjoy watching as much as I would. I think Bridesmaids did the trick. My boyfriend was laughing louder than anyone at a few of the scenes (diarrhea in a sink, drunken plane ramblings, infected tattoos, etc,.).

In the end, I truly enjoyed the movie and thought it brought up a very relatable issue for people in this wayward time of life. Our friends get married, move in with significant others, and generally go about developing our lives. This proves a challenge when one or many of us are forced to see ourselves as a lone entity and aren’t sure how to move forward alone or in conjunction with our friends. It’s a challenge, a challenge that can be funny. Good movie. Enjoyable message. A light-hearted, romantic end. What more could you ask for?

Next movie!

Midnight in Paris: This was a little gem. I enjoyed this film for what it was trying to be but I think that it fell a little short in the overall character development. Owen Wilson plays a man, Gil, who yearns for a “golden age,” specifically the 1920s in Paris. He finds himself in Paris with his utterly annoying fiance, Rachel McAdams. After being further convinced he’s failing by a pompous, pedantic friend of his fiance’s, Gil goes for an evening stroll and finds himself transported into the very era he has been yearning for. Over the course of a few nights of time travel, he meets a series of famous writers and artists who offer advice and enlighten his life. He also falls in love with a young woman (okay…all these woman he has things for are half his age it seems) and begins to doubt his own feelings for the woman of his own era to which he is engaged. Wow. Mouthfuls of storyline! Ahhhh!

Anyway, it is a charming storyline with beautiful sets and cleverly inserted historical figures. It is fun to think of anyone experiencing this phenomenon let alone someone with the understated comical timing of Owen Wilson. Needless to say, I enjoyed my hour and a half in the theater but I left a little unsatisfied. The moment of epiphany you wait for the entire movie comes and goes without really living up to what it should be. The characters, specifically those outside of the magical 20s world, are so over-the-top in a negative direction that it’s hard to really see what the struggle is for Wilson’s character. Why does he even want to marry this girl!? The only real answer we’re given is that she is physically attractive. Boo.

There you go. Two movies in one week. Small town life does have its advantages.

I fully support and recommend the watching of Californication, if only because David Duchovny has that sexy, bad boy, hopeless, puppy dog thing going. Face it. Cynical and witty is pretty damn sexy when you look like David Duchovny. Besides by clear desire to be a notch on Hank Moody’s bedpost (maybe not the actual David Duchovny’s because he’s apparently a sex addict!??), I think the show has some pretty solid characters all around and proves to be pretty entertaining.

However, I’m on Season 3 now and I’m still waiting for David Duchovny’s character, Hank, to show any real change in his bad-boy ways. I guess the point is that we all really want to change something but it’s never as easy as we like. It is getting a little formulaic though: Hank sleeps with some girl he shouldn’t, Karen finds out, Hank punches someone, his daughter guilts him, Karen leaves him, Hank tries to get her back. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

Still, watch it.

Let’s talk about The Great Gatsby.  We’ve all heard of it. Great American novel. Roaring 20s. Gatsby. Daisy. Green light. We all read it in high school or were supposed to read it in high school. It came it went. We read it out of necessity and never for enjoyment.

Well, I just re-read it and was pleasantly surprised to find that I actually love the book. I, like millions of other American English students, read it in my 11th grade English class. Now I am about to be an English teacher! In that very same high school! Crazy! As a part of my prep, I am reading those books that I was never required to read and re-reading those books, like Gatsby, that went in one ear and out the other. High school is a bundle of pressure and angst so I am not altogether surprised that the art and “greatness” was totally wasted on my self-absorbed thought processes of that time period. I am glad, however, that I had reason to revisit this American-must-read.

I also believe that this book requires a little life experience to truly appreciate. You need to know what it is like to walk through the hot, oppressive New York City streets in summer, or go to a drunken, licentious party (I was not one of the ones doing this in high school!), and know what it is to be in love or alone in those troublesome years that are the mid- to late- 20s. That valuable life experience is lacking for high school students. With so much more time to make my own mistakes and see a little of the world, I could look at Gatsby, the character and the book, with a fresh pair of eyes.

My favorite quality of this book was F. Scott Fitzgerald’s uncanny ability to qualify a person’s entire character, a facial expression’s layered subtext, or the feel of an evenings unsettling quality in one sentence, where other authors/writers would elaborate for paragraphs, pages, chapters! The simplicity with which he approaches the story, told through Nick Carraway, a pleasantly honest and direct narrator, is a breath of fresh air after all these convoluted books that seem to clutter shelves or electronic shelves these days.

The story itself is tragically poetic in such a delightful New York way. After living in New York, I see one too many people go stumbling home drunk-as-a-skunk, wasting away their existence wishing they were making more of themselves, living up to a New York dream they dreamed up upon graduation. Apparently this is a quality that has been cursing New York dwellers since the 20s and probably before. Gatsby has his riches but not the girl. There’s always a girl. Gatsby plays the perfect fool, falling over a dream that he made-up and will never have. Tragic to the end. We all like our heroes, tragic or not, to have the balls to make things right. Not Gatsby, slightly pathetic and totally misguided, he is merely tragic, but we love him all the same.

I guess I liked it a lot. Maybe it’s just the warm night in the city that makes me pine for  Gatsby party to attend. Maybe I was just happy to read a story with a love triangle that does not involve supernatural creatures. Maybe it’s just that The Great Gatsby is actually worth of the title “great American novel.” All I know is that it’s worth a re-read if you only read it in high school.

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”

Packing is a pain. When you’re an obsessive, nostalgic fool like myself, it is worse. Everything I put in a box feels like something I will never see again. All the things I consider throwing away suddenly develop great emotional connotations and I put them in a box to ship to my new place of residence. Packing is a lonely and miserable task. Necessary, though. That is what I keep reminding myself of.

I am moving away from the Big Apple, the big hot, often bruised Apple. I’ve lived here for about two years, a decent amount of time to get a feel for what it’s like here but with plenty of parts of the city that I haven’t even seen. I am certainly sad to be leaving because of the friends, the cat, and the sense of comfort I have developed here. Grad school beckons me onward and so I must go!

But before I can get caught up in the excitement of starting something new, I have to pack. I find myself miserably packing the things I will need before the week is out and then unpacking them and then re-packing them. Of course, I could have started with the photographs and pictures plastered all over my walls but staring at empty walls is too heartbreaking. If I could just pack everything I’ve used and lived with in twenty minutes before my truck shows up, then I might enjoy the packing experience more. Instead, it is dictating my last week in New York City. I don’t want to go out because I packed all my good shoes. I don’t want to make the dinner I really want to make because the slow-cooker is all nestled in a box. Moving is ruining this move for me.

Celebration should be a key part of leaving behind any step of your life, at least for someone like me. I hate change! I do! Even when I beg for it and crave it, I really still want the stability of the familiar. That’s why I think that this last week should have been about celebration! I should be celebrating throwing away the things that don’t matter and keeping the things that do! Celebrating with friends (if I could only get them to quit their jobs)! Celebrating change!

Of course, It’s 9:30 in the morning, which means I should really start packing up some more of my stuff. Sunday is only a few days away.

I know I have been missing for about two weeks or so. That is because I was in Europe! Be jealous. It’s okay. I don’t mind,

Anyway, I am back! Back and still slightly exhausted. Because of that, I can not divulge all my little review details at this time. Still, I will give a preview of things to come!

Rome: Beautiful city. Great culture. Lovely streets and buildings. Awesome history. Noisy place to sleep.

Amsterdam: Too chilly for June! Easy to get turned around (reasons for this are numerous). Totally unique culture. Pretty relaxed in comparison to most cities. Death-trap staircases!

On a side note, I saw a movie yesteday.

Super-8: Kick-ass train crash. Adorable puppy-love relationship. Kid-centered/alien drama only slightly attention-worthy. Lacking adult storylines. Cop out, wham bam, it’s-over ending. I give it a B- or 3 silver stars. Maybe one thumbs up and a sideways, hitchhiking thumb.

I love pickles. This is a true setback to what promised to be a good trip to Europe…