If 90% of everything is crap, that rule certainly applies to television. Most of what I see of current television series leaves me woefully unsatisfied, and even a little pissed off. Then, this past weekend, my parents introduced me to In Plain Sight, a show that a friend of mine called “a mid-grade crime procedural.” Interesting take, as I had a significantly more positive reaction.

I’ve only just gotten through season 1 and into season 2 on NetFlix Watch Instantly, in addition to the few season-3 episodes I saw on Sunday. Based on what I’ve seen, this show stands out, in my view, from other crime procedurals. Because it integrates character and plot more deeply than the typical TV crime drama, for a much more powerful result. And In Plain Sight provides an opportunity to talk about Critical Fandom.

In Plain Sight tells the story of Mary Shannon, an inspector for the Federal Witness Protection Program, as she hides and protects the hunted from their criminal would-be murderers, all while dealing with the insane antics of her flaky, dependent mother and sister. To call Mary’s family “dysfunctional” is an understatement, as is to call Mary herself “codependent.”

As a writer, when I read a book or watch a film or television show, I don’t merely enjoy the experience. Don’t get me wrong: I do enjoy it. But I also think about why I’m enjoying it (or not enjoying it as much as I ought to be). Because if I can understand the why, then I can use those insights to reproduce similar qualities in my own stories. This is what I call “Critical Fandom,” not just reading or watching for the enjoyment, but also for the insight, and I believe it’s a key skill writers should develop.

Here are a few storytelling truths that In Plain Sight demonstrates:

• Character drives all story conflict. Even in television procedurals! If you’re big on books (and not on TV), a “procedural” is a plot-driven story (external conflict), like a crime mystery, as opposed to a character-driven story (internal conflict), like a romance. One of the big misunderstandings of the fiction writer is that plot drives external conflict, whereas character drives internal conflict. The truth: character drives all conflict, whether internal or external. That is, all story conflict is associated with changes in the way a character perceives his reality. The difference between these two types of conflict is that internal conflict changes how the characters think about their reality, whereas external conflict changes that reality itself.

  And as I watch In Plain Sight, I see that the writers understand that every story is a character story, even a crime procedural. It’s not enough that the heros want to figure out whodunnit and save the day; but this urge must come from their character and how they perceive their place in their world.

• Plot reveals character. This is the corollary to the above. This is “Show; don’t tell.” We don’t connect with characters through what they think or say, but what they do— and how it matches with and differs from what they think, and what they say, and what they say they think.

  Interestingly, the guest characters feel deeper than the recurring characters— at first. But after a string of episodes, you start to see subtle patterns in the recurring characters’ behaviors, because each “procedural” storyline helps to build the recurring characters. You eventually figure out that Mary protects federal witnesses so well, because she learned to be codependent by taking care of her dysfunctional family, but that she’s also learned to run from anything that smacks of genuine human relationship. You begin to sympathize with Mary’s sister and mother, at least with what they’re trying to make of their lives. And don’t even get me started on Mary’s relationships with her coworkers.

• Character is more than just a list of quirks and behaviors, and character change is more than just a random shift in direction. I object to the way some writers of TV procedurals try to inject character into their scripts. They seem to think that revealing character means boring scenes where people talk about their feelings to one another. Or even worse, magical changes in relationships or personalities. Not so! Columbo was full of character, not only in its detective but in its villains as well; and not once did he ever talk about his feelings or change his personality. Columbo was a quirky character, yes, but don’t mistake the quirks for the character itself: his quirks work because they reveal his character, not because they substitute for it.

  Similarly, the characters of In Plain Sight have deep pasts, deep needs, and deeply held psychological patterns. Sometimes their patterns help them in meeting their needs, and sometimes they hinder them. These are the qualities that make for interesting characters. Go deep with your characters, way deeper than you think you need to, in order to understand them from the inside out, to understand them even better than they understand themselves.

• Extraordinary changes require extraordinary forces. If character change is not just a random shift in direction, what is it? The answer: characters change in response to human needs. And the bigger the change, the more powerful the need has to be, and the more critical that need must seem to the character.

  Most of the stories of In Plain Sight begin with a character change. A person witnesses a murder or some other crime, and now the criminals and their friends want that person dead. Enter the Witness Protection Program, which will relocate that person and give him a new life, safe from his would-be murderers. Our heros protect that person’s life, but only if he gives up everything he was and becomes someone else. That’s character change, of the most profound.

• Extraordinary forces produce extraordinary changes. The corollary to the above: whenever a character faces a traumatic event, she’s going to be affected by it. You don’t always have to understand the psychology of that effect, although understanding helps to build a full, self-consistent character.

  When Mary was captured and almost murdered by a drug lord (the plot-based, “procedural” story thread), maybe she escaped and was rescued, but her PTSD was only beginning (the character-based story thread). Changes of this sort occur with all the characters, in a layered fashion, with plot-based story threads like building blocks filling out the character arc.

• Different people meet their needs in different ways. We tend to think of needs in a hierarchy. Our need to stay alive comes first, because if you’re dead, none of your other needs really matter. Then physical needs, like food and water. Then emotional needs, like attention and community and a sense of purpose. But reality doesn’t quite work that way. It is true that we tend to prioritize the fear of being eaten by a lion, for example, over the pleasure we would experience by sharing that lion’s kill. But that applies to any fear versus any pleasure, and if we feel one of our emotional needs slipping from our fingers, that generates fear, too, a fear that might seem even more pressing to us than the physical need to stay alive.

  In Plain Sight, because it’s about witness relocation, provides a perfect setting in which to explore these issues. Why would a hidden witness blow his anonymity? Some of the characters do. What’s more valuable than life itself? Lots of things: honor, friendship, affection, status, autonomy.

• The main characters don’t have to do everything. Most TV procedurals have the main characters doing everything, especially working miracles in fields that they’re completely incompetent at…

  … like Mary playing lawyer to her family, friends, and (especially) her witnesses. Oy vey. If she really cared, she’d realize that her duties and competencies are to secure her witnesses’ safety, not to represent them in legal proceedings. But this is what TV procedurals do, because otherwise, they’d have to introduce strong secondary characters, who actually perform an heroic act (at the hero’s behest) and save the day, and that would be wrong on so many levels. But not in my stories, thank you. I prefer tales with characters—even secondary characters—who function realistically and responsibly in their world.

• Know more than your characters about their world. This not only applies to the characters’ situation, e.g., what’s going to happen when the hero turns that dark corner. It also applies to specialized knowledge in fields that your characters’ lives will be touching. Research, research, research. Pretend you’re writing a scholarly paper on the field, and that after you present your paper, there will be questions from the audience, and you don’t want to look like an idiot.

  For example, when Mary’s drunk-driving mother goes to an AA meeting to show the court that she’s serious about dealing with her alcoholism, you the writer have to know that AA is just one of the myriad options available, and that statistically, AA doesn’t keep alcoholics off booze any better than if they just wing it by themselves. And when the court orders her into state-run rehab, which apparently follows an AA-style process— Well, that particular cliché at least might be realistic, because courts in some parts of the country are still very stone-aged about drug and alcohol treatment options. But that presents storytelling opportunities that you shouldn’t let escape. Maybe she fails because of the ineffectiveness of the rehab methods. Maybe the local ACLU chapter takes an interest in her case, because AA advocates a regimen with decidedly religious implications. Of course, that would require a strong lawyer character in a TV crime drama—Gasp!—and we can’t have that.

I’ve been seeing much more, both that excites me and that disappoints me. The difference between character-relevant drama and melodrama. How each story is actually about something, an art I feared was lost with the decline of SF. That heroic characters, no matter how flawed, have heroic qualities, and villainous characters have villainous qualities. How morality (right and wrong) interacts with intent: “good” characters don’t do good out of a need for status or attention, but for spiritual satisfaction (e.g., charity, duty, or even a need to find meaning outside of oneself), even if to dysfunctional extents. And on and on…

Critical Fandom is not about In Plain Sight, because you may not enjoy that show as much as I do. Critical Fandom is about organizing ideas, ways of thinking about what we see that help us to understand the patterns in them. Whatever television, movies, or books you rave over, look deep for storytelling insights that you can use in your own stories.

Keep writing!
-TimK

I called it “alternative conflict” in Monday’s post, but a better monicker might be “problem-free conflict,” because it pops up over and over again in literature, TV, and film. Usually, it’s used alongside the more traditional character problems.

“But character problems cause conflict,” I hear you objecting. “How can you have conflict without character problems?”

Well, actually, this introduction itself is an example of problem-free conflict. But first, let’s look at a more obvious example.

Mischievous Miscreant

Our story begins as the rising sun beams in on sleeping Dag. He rolls over just long enough to get in one more snore, before his alarm jolts him awake.

“Time to annoy my brother,” Dag says, an evil gleam in his eye.

He reaches for his “365 Ways and Days to Completely, Totally, and Fully Annoy Your Brother” calendar and flips to January 7, today: “Bop your brother till he bleeds.”

“Kooky!” Dag says to himself. “It’s a good thing I got this ’365 Ways and Days to Completely, Totally, and Fully Annoy Your Brother’ calendar. I could never think of this many ways to completely, totally, and fully annoy my brother on my own.” And he sets off to find his brother, and a boxing glove.

You have to get the humor of the Angry Beavers in order to fully appreciate that scene from the episode “Same Time Last Week.” (Yes, Dag and his brother Norb are animated beavers.) My brother and I used to watch them all the time before stupid Spongebob pushed them off the air. But now most of those episodes are available on NetFlix Watch Instantly, and I’ve been having loads of fun getting reacquainted with them.

What struck me most about that scene was that there’s no character problem. Not-a one. This is supposedly one of the no-no’s of storytelling. But the scene works, because Dag’s mischievous plan produces conflict. At least, it does by the definition of conflict I used in Monday’s post:

Conflict is a perception by the reader that compelling change has occurred and will occur.

In this case, Dag has begun going through his “annoy your brother” calendar, something new for this episode, something beyond his normal Daggaliciousness. And we expect both fallout and humor from this mischief. Indeed, we get both. He eventually ends up with a real character problem, but only after the plot has thickened a couple of times.

What’d'ya Mean, You’re Dead?

“Someone was looking at me, a disturbing sensation if you’re dead.”

That’s the first line of Laura Whicomb’s debut novel A Certain Slant of Light. This is what we call “a hook.” But whence comes its power?

We have several things happening, all at once, in this tiny sentence:

1. Someone is staring at the main character.
2. It puts her ill at ease.
3. She’s dead.

The second of these is clearly a traditional conflict. The character has a problem: she is comfortable with the way things are (a need), and this someone is interfering with her status quo (an obstacle). That’s a problem. We expect her to address that conflict, and indeed she does. But first, we have to deal with the other two conflicts posed by this introductory sentence.

I think of them as “What the hell is happening here?!” conflicts. You get one of these for free whenever someone first begins reading your story, because he doesn’t know anything about your story or its world or characters. But this freebie only lasts for a paragraph or two. In that space, you have to give him something more. And one path is to explore related “What the hell is happening here?!” conflicts.

In A Certain Slant of Light, the story has implicitly promised us that we’ll find out who the someone is who is staring at the main character (and why he’s staring).

We also want to know how she can be aware that someone’s staring at her if she’s dead. She’s obviously a ghost. But so what? Why shouldn’t someone see her? (That is, if she’s standing right in front of him?) Don’t people see ghosts?

Note that this sort of conflict drives non-fiction essays— like this very piece you’re reading right now. We usually don’t think of non-fiction as a story, with conflict, thickening, and resolution. But that’s because we usually think in terms of character-problem conflict, and non-fiction usually doesn’t focus on character-problem conflict. Well-written non-fiction, however, does follow the general structure of a story, including using conflict to push the story along.

It Don’t Matter Much to Me

One last quick example. Remember Forrest Gump? Winner of six Academy Awards, including Best Picture— Yeah, that Forrest Gump.

(BTW, at the time of this writing, you can also stream the film via NetFlix Watch Instantly.)

A profound story, but the main character, Forrest, nothing bothers him. Well, almost nothing. He certainly doesn’t get uptight about most of the life-pressures that constantly stress us out. That was, in fact, how the film was marketed back in 1994. Yes, I saw it when it first came out— and some of you may not be old enough to remember the movie trailers: “The world will never seem the same, once you’ve seen it through the eyes of Forrest Gump.”

I don’t want to make it sound like this character doesn’t have needs, because he does, and sometimes he has to strive to meet those needs. But a great number of the problems he faces are not his own.

For example, Forrest runs into his old platoon leader, Lieutenant Dan Taylor, who had lost his legs in Vietnam. Dan immediately tears into Forrest, because stupid Forrest got a medal of honor, while Dan lost both his legs and is now poor and destitute. Forrest—much more of a man than I would be—doesn’t even seem to notice the slight. Instead, he opens up his life to his old friend, and they eventually become partners in a lucrative business.

A number of forces drive this scene. One of them is the promise that the situation will change, either for the worse (if Dan’s raging anger eventually sinks through Forrest’s skull) or for the better (if Forrest’s unconditional affection eventually sinks through Dan’s skull). Neither one of these addresses any problem, but either would have been significant.

As I recall, Forrest Gump is full of story threads like this, where a non-problem drives the story via the promise of a change-to-come.

When this movie first came out, I wanted to write a long, detailed essay exploring its many layers and the many angles from which one could interpret the story. I never did. But if you haven’t seen this classic film, it’s definitely worth renting on DVD. In the meantime…

Keep writing!
-TimK

I watched the film online at NetFlix, and I was pleasantly surprised. You can read the plot summary and so forth at NetFlix or Amazon or IMDb or wherever. My reaction: The deep characters enthralled me, especially Helen Hunt’s character, who lives a conflicted life without regrets–if you can believe that–and who is immediately sympathetic, despite her nefarious reputation. The complex character-driven storyline kept me on the edge of my seat, literally. At one point in the film, I jumped from my seat, angry at one of the antagonists, a wimpy, red-headed prig, with a little dog she obviously loves more than she loves other people– I jumped from my seat in anger, certain she was going to hell. Everything came together in the penultimate scene, which set up a resolution I did not see coming. This is a story about love, trust, gossip, and the nature of truth.

Note that Helen Hunt plays a different kind of character in this film, one that not everyone may find enjoyable. And some of the characters are weak, thrown in for comedic effect, which unfortunately doesn’t always work. And if the critics are right, you might enjoy Oscar Wilde’s original play more, but you can’t get that from NetFlix or Amazon.

Bottom line: There is only a handful of films that have enthralled me as A Good Woman has. Despite the critics’ balking, 93 minutes well-spent. I rate it 5 stars out of 5, because not only did I love watching it, I feel like I want to watch it again as soon as possible.

-TimK

P.S. To become my NetFlix friend, click here.

A word about my rating system: I use a variant of the Netflix rating system.

1 star = I hated it. This is not necessarily bad, because it means it inspired fierce emotion in me. Negative emotion, yes, but emotion nonetheless.

2 stars = I didn’t like it. Also didn’t hate it. The only thing worse than being hated is finding out that no one gives a damn.

3 stars = I liked it, but I probably wouldn’t watch it again.

4 stars = I really liked it, and I would watch it again.

5 stars = I loved it, and I want to watch it again and again and again.

Hee! I so miss Harlan Ellison’s rants. Back in the day, when the SciFi channel actually had programming worth watching, he did a segment on a half-hour SF news show. I watched it regularly. He disgusted my brother. Me too, actually. But I loved it, and I miss it. Ellison’s recommendation put me onto Stanislaw Lem, another of the best science-fiction writers who ever lived.

Okay. Enough reminiscing and fawning, as though I actually like the guy. On to the video:

This video is excerpted from the upcoming (next year) documentary about Harlan Ellison, his career, and his writings, entitled Dreams with Sharp Teeth. (You might want to turn down your speakers before clicking this link, though. I need to do a rant about poorly designed web sites that blast music at you…)

-TimK

I borrowed the Bones DVD’s from my parents, and now I’m hooked. More importantly, this show looks like it would make a good drinking game. Here are a few rules. Please add more rules in the comments!

Cheers,
-TimK

The Dr. Temperance “Bones” Brennan Drinking Game

• When Brennan says, “I don’t know what that means,” take a drink.
• When Bones levels a goon bigger than she is, take a drink.
• When Angie shudders at the sight of a dead body, take a drink.
• When Brennan tries unsuccessfully to explain something to a layman (except for Booth), take a drink.
• When Brennan complains about not being issued a gun, take a drink.
• When Hodgins blames it all on a government conspiracy, take a drink.
• When Zack gets confused by anything having to do with girls, take a drink.
• When Booth makes a snap judgment, take a drink.
• If Booth’s judgment turns out to be wrong, take another drink.
• When you subconsciously mistake FBI Deputy Director Sam Cullen for Walter Skinner, take a drink. (And be honest about it!)
• When Booth belittles Brennan’s boyfriend (or does anything else to make it seem like he has a thing for her), take a drink.
• When Booth says anything nasty about “squints,” take a drink.
• If Bones is within earshot, take another drink.
• When Angela calls someone “Sweetie,” take a drink.
• When you think Booth wants to drink someone’s blood, take a drink, and say, “Blah! I want to suck your blooood!”
• When any of the forensics team says something Booth doesn’t understand, take a drink.
• When Hodgins makes eyes at Angie, take a drink.
• When Brennan literally corrects a metaphor or joke, take a drink.
• When the characters switch back and forth between two conversations, confusing each other, take a drink.
• When Bones tries to use pop lingo (unsuccessfully), take a drink.
• When Brennan uses logic to cover up the true feelings everyone else says are trapped inside her, take a drink, groan, and roll your eyes.
• When Bones says the truth bluntly and dispassionately and offends someone (“just making conversation”), take a drink.
• When Bones gets offended because someone else says the truth bluntly and dispassionately (“just making conversation”), take a drink.
• When Bones in one breath shows she’s an expert on every religious belief on Earth and then in the next shows she’s ignorant when it comes to Christianity, Judaism, or some other mainstream religion, take a drink.

Basically, it doesn’t actually tell a story. It tries, yes. But really it just shows us penguins. Lots and lots of penguins. And we’re supposed to be sad that some of them die.

These penguins are just the unnamed amongst the many, and it’s hard–actually impossible–for me to work up any great sympathy for a million bazillion penguins.

Now, show me one close-knit family of penguins, and that’s something I can sympathize with. The hardest thing you’ll have to do to make sympathetic penguins is make them seem human. And you can only do that if you zoom in on individuals and tell their story. March of the Penguins doesn’t do that.

It’s still a good documentary, mind you. But I’m not going out of my way to see it, no matter how many awards it’s won. Because I’ve already seen it, and i know what level of mediocrity to expect.

Want an alternative recommendation? Rent Broken English instead: A “too much like real life” film about a woman so desperately lonely, she gives up on real life. Maybe I like it so much, because I can really sympathize with Nora Wilder. Regardless, I’ve already lost count of how many times I’ve seen it since it came out on DVD, and I still want to watch it again. It’s the best Parker Posey role ever.

-TimK

Alexis Bledel’s latest film I’m Reed Fish, also starring Jay Baruchel as the title character Reed Fish, actually came out on DVD on September 4. Netflix even sent me a copy, which I enjoyed immensely. But Amazon still has the I’m Reed Fish DVD scheduled for release this coming week, on Tuesday. Whatever.

In any case, if you haven’t seen this yet, I think it’s well worth watching. (As if you cared about my opinion.) You may have to watch it twice to catch all the nuances. But if you keep in mind that it’s not a romance story, you’ll probably enjoy it more the first time.

I’m Reed Fish is about a radio personality, Reed Fish, in the back-woods hamlet of Mud Meadows. Now, Mud Meadows has been compared to Stars Hollow. But Stars Hollow is much too urban to make the comparison work. Mud Meadows is more reminiscent of Cicely, Alaska. But Reed is no Chris Stevens. No, Reed Fish is going through an acute crisis of self-identity. He’s always done what everyone else expected him to, has always been who everyone else expected him to be. This film is about whether he’ll be able to break that mold and be the person he actually is.

As I said, I really enjoyed the film. And if you haven’t seen it yet, get a copy, or rent it from Netflix.com. In fact, you can watch the movie on-line using Netflix’s “Watch Instantly” feature, which is included with your Netflix membership.

Therefore, to commemorate the I’m Reed Fish DVD release, on whatever date you celebrate it, here’s the official Gilmore-ism.com top-10 list of best things about I’m Reed Fish:

10. Quirkiest Character: D.J. Qualls as Andrew. He thinks he’s Chuck Norris. He says, “I love you,” when he gets drunk. You smile at him, because that’s what you do to crazy people to calm them down. He would fit right in in Stars Hollow. If Kirk got married, it would probably be a lot like Andrew’s wedding.

9. Most Overused Line: “Quit zorsing around and get back to work!” Hey, it was actually funny when Jill first said it!

8. Most Hitchcockian Moment: Reed Fish’s cameo as “John Penner.” (Alfred Hitchcock always made a cameo appearance in each of his films.)

7. Coolest Voice You Almost Recognize: Katey Sagal, as Maureen, Mayor of Mud Meadows. (I hope that’s enough M‘s.) If you close your eyes, you might recognize her as Leela, from Futurama. Yes, in Reed Fish, she has both eyes.

6. Most Obscure Actor from a Famous TV Series: Blake Clark, as Irv Peterson, Kate’s father. He also played Harry, the owner of the hardware store, in Home Improvement, which you can still catch in reruns on multiple channels. Of course, he was 10 years younger then, but you can still recognize him.

5. Coolest Scene: Schuyler Fisk (as Jill Cavanaugh) singing “From Where I’m Standing.” Here’s the video clip. And no, Reed shouldn’t be kissing her, because he’s engaged to Kate.

4. Biggest Goof that Actually Made it Into the Film: Two goofs tied for this one. First of all, in the above clip, look at Schuyler’s left hand when sings the bridge. “Let it fall. Let it come down…” On the words “come down,” she forgets what the next chord is she’s supposed to play. I guess they didn’t use that take for the audio!

Then in the scene following, when Reed goes to talk to Kate, look at Alexis’s hair. Her bangs suddenly change. Then they just as suddenly change back again.

3. Coolest Surprise Character: Shiri Appleby as the real Jill Cavanaugh. This is not a spoiler. But I’m still not going to tell you what that’s all about. You’ll have to watch the film.

2. Most Sympathetic Kate Moment: When she took Reed back. That’s when you felt the worst for her. In fact, it’s the only time I truly felt bad for her. Silly girl. She forgot that this is not a romance story. It’s about Reed finding himself. And he hadn’t found himself yet.

Well, you knew I had to work Alexis Bledel into the list somewhere. Seriously, though, she did a wonderful job as Kate. This was a very unsympathetic character–not a villain, but also not someone you root for. That means Kate was for the most part very 2-dimensional. But Alexis made her memorable.

1. Most Romantic Moment: Reed and Jill on Miss Sandstrom’s roof, looking at stars, making up constellations, sharing secrets.

So that’s my top-10 list for the movie I’m Reed Fish. As I said, definitely worth seeing, at least once. And maybe 4 times, as I did.

-TimK

P.S. Here’s the I’m Reed Fish trailer:

I rented Kickin It Old Skool, because it co-stars Aris Alvarado of Gilmore Girls fame, and I’m a huge Gilmore Girls fan. But I clearly could have done better. Maybe by watching grass grow instead of watching this movie.

Kickin It Old Skool is the comedic story of one Justin Schumacher (Jamie Kennedy), who as a boy hits his head in a breakdancing accident and ends up in a coma. After 20 years, he wakes up to find that his parents kept him alive by mortgaging their house to the hilt, and now the bank is threatening to foreclose. He also discovers his childhood sweetheart Jennifer (Maria Menounos) is engaged to his arch-enemy. He must get his old breakdancing group together again, now all in their thirties, and win a TV dance contest with a $100,000 prize, in order to save his parents’ home and to get the girl back from the villain.

And yes, it really is as stupid as it sounds. Frankly, this film is too juvenile to be enjoyed by an adult, but has too much adult content to be suitable for a kid. However, I have labored through this film, not just once, but twice, so that you won’t have to bear it even one time. And so that you can still appreciate the full depth of its shallowness, I’ve compiled a top-10 list… er… I mean, bottom-10 list of the 10 worst aspects of this movie.

10. Most Juvenile and Trite Character: The villain, Kip (Michael Rosenbaum), who was a cliché as Young Kip (Taylor Beaumont), and who somehow didn’t grow up any better than Justin, even though he was not in a coma. He’s nasty; he’s snide; he’s self-absorbed; he demeans everyone, including the girl (and inexplicably gets her anyhow); he fights dirty and thinks he can get away with it; and he always wears black, because that’s how we know he’s the villain. And his idea of a funny joke is offering to shake your hand and then yanking his away at the last minute.

Note that Kip beat out Justin’s parents for this coveted spot, just barely. They are even stupider than Samantha Who‘s parents. (Why must the parents of fictional coma patients be more brain-dead than their children?) Kip beat them out for the “Most Juvenile and Trite Character” award only because… well, because he was on-screen first.

9. Worst 80′s Allusion: “Do you wanna come over and maybe watch Blue Lagoon? We have it on Beta.” Beta? Need I say more?

8. Stupidest Plot Device: 20 years in a coma? Come on! The brain degrades while one is in a coma. And the longer one is in it, the less likely he’ll wake up, at least without being a vegetable. When Samantha Who wakes up after several days in a coma, she can’t remember who she is, and that’s actually plausible. But to wake up after 20 years and just pick up where he left off? What is this? Sci-fi? (No, because sci-fi is way better than that.)

7. Dumbest Joke: When the bum urinates all over himself. On two separate occasions. Or maybe when Justin pretends his chocolate birthday cake is feces. Yeah, pee and poop jokes. Real funny. Sorry, was I supposed to laugh?

6. Most Contrived Plot: Justin plans to get the Funky Fresh Boys back together again, win the dance contest and the $100,000 prize, so that he can save his parents’ house and so that Jenny will have to come back to him.

5. Most Contrived Character: Justin himself, because throughout this sordid tale, he continued to act and think like a pre-adolescent from the 1980′s, even though he clearly knew 20 years had passed. A real person in that situation (if that preposterous situation ever could exist) would have questioned everything he knew, until he was sure he had come up to date. It was clear that the only reason he persisted in this silly, backward behavior was because if he acted like a real person would have, most of the movie’s jokes would have disappeared.

4. Most Disturbing Scene: Hector pretending to be a woman, in a wig and bra, in order to demonstrate to Justin how to get, uh, amorous. Or maybe the most disturbing scene was Justin seeing a woman’s breasts for the first time. Sheesh! Grow up already, will you!?

3. Dorkiest Surprise Guest Star: David Hasselhoff acting like Michael Knight in a Kit look-alike. And then making a veiled reference to a woman’s nipples. Almost made me puke.

2. Most Misplaced Actress: Maria Menounos as Jennifer. It’s wrong to waste such a gorgeous and talented actress in such an unsympathetic and unsatisfying role.

1. Most Melodramatic Moment: When Justin at the end of the story in order to win the dance contest must perform the same move that put him in a coma for 20 years. Gosh, I never saw that coming. Will our hero finally pull it off? Or will he end up in another coma for another 20 years? Find out in the next exciting episode!

Using just about every Nickelodeon-after-school character and plot device in the book, combined with just enough crude sexual content and language such that I wouldn’t let my kids watch it–and I’m a pretty forward-thinking parent… Kickin It Old Skool is best rented only if you want to get together with a bunch of friends and make cheap fun of it. Don’t expect to laugh at this movie. Expect to laugh at its expense, if at all. And expect to roll your eyes a lot.

-TimK

P.S. Here’s the Kickin It Old Skool trailer:

When she suddenly broke off their engagement, and then went and married her daughter’s father… Of course, we also understand what pushed her to this. Luke did. He was pushing her away, making her second place, being insensitive to her needs. I miss the old Luke, who was always there for Lorelai, no matter what. He’s always loved her, even before they were dating. And whatever problems they face, we know they’ll never be truly happy unless they find happiness together.

This might be the last season of Gilmore Girls. And what do fans like this do when their favorite show is about to be canceled? Answer: Everything they possibly can to keep it going. They don’t want GG to end at the current, seventh season. So there’s the “Great8Mandate” write-in campaign. And there are numerous online polls, which GG fans vote on in droves. There are petitions. And then there are blogs and forums, and almost every TV blog or forum out there has at least one comment on it begging for a Gilmore Girls season 8.

As I write this, there are only 4 episodes left for Luke and Lorelai to reconcile. And fans are getting very nervous. They want Luke and Lorelai to reunite. But how can they possibly do so in only a month? After all the bridges they’ve both burned? How do you get by all the anger and hurt, and find love and contentment, that fast? It just doesn’t happen. I tried to soothe their fears, reassuring them that Luke and Lorelai can indeed get back together, even get married, this season. I even described exactly what kind of thing would have to happen to make it work, and why. The only question is whether the writers go ahead and do it.

But fans are not writers. Our hero has gotten himself into a fix. And the fans think that he can’t get out, because they can’t see a way out. Of course, that’s what makes for great drama. Because when he does get out of the fix, free to save the world, we’re overjoyed. Fans don’t understand storytelling. And that’s why I pray the writers of Gilmore Girls ignore fans when it comes to the story. I pray they don’t let the fans tell them how to write a good story.

Because the fans keep saying we need to give Luke and Lorelai time to get back together. Amy Amatangelo, the TV Gal, reflects the opinion of many Gilmore Girls fans:

I am on “The Great8Mandate” bandwagon… We deserve a proper farewell. Or as TV Gal reader Rebecca put it an “unrushed conclusion.”

An “unrushed conclusion”? Okay, here’s the problem. An “unrushed” conclusion is a boring one. Like dialogue, pacing is not about what’s realistic. It’s about what’s plausible. And when fans say “unrushed,” they mean they don’t understand how Luke and Lorelai can possibly get by the China wall that currently separates them. In other words, if the fans can’t see how the conflict will be resolved. But if they could see how the conflict will be resolved then the suspense goes right out of the story. I can’t think of one top story that has an unrushed conclusion. They always have dramatic, mind-bending, tear-jerking conclusions that leave you saying, “Wow!” Unrushed conclusions suck.

Rushing the ending can make it all the more powerful. If it seems like Luke and Lorelai just can’t reconcile, doesn’t that make it all the more powerful when they do? And this is true no matter how unrealistic it is. It doesn’t matter whether the ending is believable, only whether it’s plausible. And whether or not it’s plausible depends more on the characters themselves than on real life. Once you have strongly sympathetic characters, as Gilmore Girls does, you can do almost anything you want in the story. And if the characters go along for the ride, the audience will, too.

When Steven Spielberg directed Jaws, the story goes, when he got to the end of the movie, where the shark dies– Peter Benchley had written the original novel and the screenplay. And Spielberg’s ending was different than the original ending. Benchley disagreed with Spielberg’s ending, because he said it was unbelievable. He said no one would believe that an air tank would explode like that or that it would explode a shark like that. Because none of that could possibly happen in real life. And as the Mythbusters proved, Benchley was right. The ending to Jaws could never happen in real life.

But Steven Spielberg said, he’s had the audience on the edge of their seats for 2 hours, and he’s going to give them a satisfying ending. He said the story was going to go out with a bang. And you know what? Spielberg was right. In theaters, when the ending came, audiences cheered. They not only believed the impossible; they exulted in it!

It has nothing to do with what would happen in real life. It has to do with the drama. It has to do with identifying with a hero who, being in an impossible situation, somehow overcomes, triumphant. It’s the plausible impossible. And that’s what I want to see of Luke and Lorelai.

What do you think? Is it better for a story to have a rushed ending? Are there case in which a story should have an unrushed ending?

-TimK

The Lake House is definitely one of my all-time favorite movies. It’s marketed as a romance, but if I could make up any genre in which to place this film, I’d call it Romantic Sci-Fi, which I think is the best genre ever. I’m a big fan of intelligent romance–or any story that explores the complexities of relationships. And I also love science-fiction. Combining the two is something that’s not done nearly enough.

The story is based on the Y2K Korean film Siworae (a.k.a. Il Mare), which by the way is correctly categorized on IMDb as “Romance, Sci-Fi.” The Lake House is the story of two people whose destinies were bound together even before they met. Dr. Kate Forster (Sandra Bullock) has been living at the lake house. Now, in February 2006, she takes a position at Chicago City Hospital and moves to a city apartment. She leaves a letter in the lake house’s mailbox, asking the next tenant to forward her mail.

The problem is, the “next tenant” is Alex Wyler (Keanu Reeves), who bought the lake house before she even moved in, back in February 2004. Anything Kate puts into the mailbox is delivered 2 years earlier, and anything Alex mails, Kate finds there in 2006. The two pen pals begin exchanging letters, and a relationship blossoms.

Two things really draw me to this film, as a storyteller. Firstly, it has good interaction between character and plot. From the way they write, it seems many science-fiction writers–especially beginners–don’t understand how important character conflict and change is, because their stories are so heavy-laden with techno-babble or strange occurrences. Similarly, new romance writers often underestimate the value of plot-based conflict to move their stories forward. Making character and plot work together isn’t a matter of getting the right “mix,” but the right relationship between the two. Both character and plot should be going full bore. Because characters react to the plot, and they determine the plot. In other words, the draw of The Lake House is not the magic time portal that sends letters across 2 years. The draw is that these particular characters encounter the time portal, and use it to establish a relationship, and it affects their lives in a way that could not have occurred otherwise.

The second storytelling draw of The Lake House is the complexity of the characters. Complex characters are common in romance, of course, but not so much in science-fiction. That may make this film more of a “SF romance” than “romantic SF,” because maybe most SF fans can’t understand character complexity. (It’s a thought that’s occurred to me, anyhow.) They can’t understand that Kate is miserable and empty, and that Alex speaks to her soul. Nor that she has met Alex before, multiple times, and that she doesn’t remember him, because her own problems have absorbed her thoughts. They can’t understand that Alex bought the lake house because it brought him closer to his estranged father, and that he allowed Kate to move into the house, only because she was already an integral part of his present and his future.

Romance fans (i.e., “women”) are likely to love this film. Sci-fi fans (i.e., “men”) are likely to rate it as okay, not the worst chick-flick ever made. Interestingly enough, on IMDb, males under 18 rated The Lake House almost as highly as the girls did, with the highest chunk of those boys giving it a 10-out-of-10 rating. I think I will think twice before joking about testosterone-crazed, adolescent boys again.

One more note: Inspired screenwriting and cinematography permeates this film. I won’t talk about it much, except to say that for me to mention the cinematography, it must be really worth mentioning. Because for me, cinematography is normally one of those things that if you notice it, the director has done something wrong. Cinematography is a tool you use to tell the story. And wild cinematography gets in the way of storytelling. This is one of those rare cases, however, in which the cinematography goes above and beyond its call. It tells the story, but so artfully that it leaves me with that “That’s so kewl!” feeling.

As I said, I think this is going to become one of my all-time favorite films. I’ve already watched it numerous times, and I like it more each time I see it. So here are the top 10 things I like in The Lake House:

10. Coolest Character Who Can’t Talk: Jack, the dog. Jack is one of the only characters who exists in both time frames. The others being Dr. Klyczynski (Shohreh Aghdashloo) and Henry Wyler (Ebon Moss-Bachrach). Jack has a special bond to the lake house and to its magic. She ran into Alex’s life out of nowhere, and then at the right time, she ran out again… into Kate’s. And she has a special bond to Alex and Kate, both people, in both time frames. Kate originally named Jack, in fact, in the future, before she knew Alex. (Don’t get confused. Just accept it. It’s part of the magic.)

9. Most Confusing Occurrence that Actually Makes Sense When You Think About It: When Alex plants a tree in front of 1620 N. Racine, it magically appears at that location in the future. At first thought, that made no sense to me, because if he had planted it in the past, it would have always been there in Kate’s present. But this isn’t how the lake house works. If Kate asks for something, as she did with the tree, Alex can change it in the past, and it will change in Kate’s present. That’s the rule. It has to be, or else the ending wouldn’t even work. (And with this rule, the ending works perfectly.)

8. Best Secondary Character: Simon Wyler (Christopher Plummer), Alex’s father. He actually has a personality, which is pretty important, because he’s such a significant influence in Alex’s life. He fills a room with his presence and is demanding on his underlings, including his sons. He’s been described as a “sadistic, bitter, bitter, bitter old man.” For a long time, Alex refused to have anything to do with him, because of the way the old man acted when Alex’s mother died. But then when the old man himself dies… It’s because of Simon Wyler that we get to see what a deep, complex character Alex is.

7. Best Song: Paul McCartney’s “This Never Happened Before,” which will never feel quite the same to me again. It’s the closing theme of the film, and it’s also the song Kate and Alex dance to at her birthday party. (See “Most Romantic Moment” below.) And furthermore, it’s the coolest anachronism in the film. As I said, this song was playing at Kate’s birthday party, in the autumn of 2004, shortly before Alex’s father dies on October 6, 2004 (according to the death certificate visible on-screen). However, Paul McCartney didn’t actually release this song until September 13, 2005, a year later.

6. Coolest Plot Hole: There aren’t many plot holes, and most of the so-called plot holes that fans identify aren’t really plot holes at all, just misunderstandings of the rules of the magic of the lake house. There is a set of rules that explains all the supposed plot holes, except for one. Just before Kate sends Alex a scarf, writing to him that there was a freak snowstorm in April 2004, she looks at a picture taken April 3, 2004, and notes that Jack (the dog) was not happy that day. But April 3, 2004 was many months before Jack had run into her life. In April 2004, Jack was with Alex, at the lake house, not with Kate.

Of course, we didn’t actually see Jack in the picture. So this could just be Kate’s memory screwing up again. (See “Most Romantic Moment” below.)

5. Coolest Camera Angle: From inside a revolving door. When Henry Wyler goes through the revolving door, the camera follows him through. Then the camera continues around, in the door, so we can see via reverse angle that Henry’s companion, who he had been talking to, has remained behind. The door and camera finally come to rest pointing forward, where we can see Henry go out to reunite with his brother Alex.

4. Most Hitchcockian Moment: Or rather, “moments.” Twice in the film, Kate sees Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman on TV, starring in Alfred Hitchcock’s Notorious.

3. Most Romantic Moment: Kate’s birthday party. Depressed and struggling with doubt and loneliness, she ends up dancing with some random guy and kissing him. Some random guy indeed! (It was Alex.) Alex knew exactly how to speak to her soul. But Kate wouldn’t even remember him. (She never remembers him.) The classic romantic moment, doomed to fail.

2. Saddest Moment: As Kate discovers that Alex’s father has passed away, exactly 2 years after the fact. She rushes to the lake house, and leaves a touching letter in the mailbox. It appears, when need be, Kate also knows how to speak to Alex’s soul.

Or maybe the saddest moment is when Kate breaks up with Alex, as it were. I can’t go into why that’s so sad, because it would spoil the plot. Suffice it to say that it gets more heart-wrenching each successive time you watch the film.

1. Most Dramatic Moment: The climax. Sorry, can’t tell you more about it without spoiling the plot. But I will say that I knew how the story ended before I saw The Lake House for the first time, and I loved the climax just the same.

In summary, if you like a good romance, or just a good tear-jerker, The Lake House is worth checking out.

-TimK

P.S. Here’s the Lake House trailer:

-TimK

The Gilmore Girls Fanatic recently mentioned how much she is enjoying learning about Sylvia Plath, one of the most mentioned cultural figures on Gilmore Girls. I almost heard the Fanatic say she was ashamed to admire a giant so disturbed. But I imagined it.

Then writer Charles Deemer, at The Writing Life, asked, “Why do so many writers commit suicide?” There’s a long list, including Ernest Hemingway, Anne Sexton, Virginia Woolf, and of course Sylvia Plath. It almost makes one think of writing as a dangerous occupation.

And then I fall head over heels for Sylvia, a film that may have generated more complaints than understanding.

The problem is that Sylvia Plath and her husband Ted Hughes, like many artists, are so frequently misunderstood. The gift the artist has is a double-edged sword. It allows him to move others with nothing more than shapes on a canvas, or words on a page, or vibrations in the air. But artists are a special breed. They are passionate and temperamental. Their feelings flow into the work they create. And they love it when you identify with and appreciate what they’ve created, because by doing so you are identifying with and appreciating them. Artists can be impossible to get along with, or even to get to know. But if you can know one, he’ll become a most understanding and dedicated friend, more loving than an old dog. I know, because I’ve known enough artists. And I myself am one. I’ve been a musician since I was a little boy. And I’ve been writing since I was a teenager. And I understand what makes artists tick.

In The Heart of the Artist, Rory Noland tells the story of Dan, a twenty-year-old art student. Dan spends innumerable hours with his paintings and drawings. Sometimes, he forgets to eat and to sleep, because he’s so involved in a project. He’s eccentric and passionate. He wears his heart on his sleeve, but he socializes almost not at all. He allows himself only one activity besides his art.

Marshall stacks don’t know Christians from atheists.

Dan appreciates his spiritual side. There’s a part of art that is innately spiritual. In fact, in this age of pop secular humanism, I don’t think many people realize how important a healthy spiritual life is. Especially for an artist. Sometimes, it’s all that holds you together, all that connects you with who you are and with how you feel.

So once a week, Dan visits his friends Fred and Nancy at their home bible study. It’s the only time he spends with other people.

Fred is studying to be a pastor, and this week he asked each person to select a passage from the book of Psalms. But not just any passage. Each person should pick something that describes his life right now. Fred went first. He opened to the very first Psalm, a passage he had just been studying. “Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners.”

Nancy went next. She wanted to talk about how well she and Fred were doing financially. Her voice swelled as she read. “The Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.”

Adele’s turn came next. Fred and Nancy have been trying to fix up Dan and Adele. She just started a new job, and she’s been having problems making it work. So she chose a passage about trusting God. “Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him and he will do this: He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun.”

As Adele finished and closed the book, everyone’s eyes turned to Dan.

Dan has been feeling a little depressed. No one knows why, not even Dan himself. Maybe it’s that he’s been having trouble getting started with his latest project. Or maybe it’s the fact that he just started a new semester at school, and he’s got all new classes, and he’s still adjusting. Maybe it’s because he has some money issues, as many students do. Or maybe it’s just because the cold, wet winter is dragging on, and the weather is getting him down.

The group stares at Dan as he begins to speak. He tries to explain, where his life is, why he chose the passage… But everything comes out in gibberish, pieces of half-understood, half-pieces of words and sentences, incoherent. How can Dan explain the way he feels when he doesn’t even understand it himself.

Suddenly, he stops. He stands up and reads:

I cry to you for help, O Lord;
In the morning my prayer comes before you.
Why, O Lord, do you reject me
And hide your face from me?

From my youth I have been afflicted and close to death;
I have suffered Your terrors and am in despair.
Your wrath has swept over me;
Your terrors have destroyed me.
All day long they surround me like a flood;
They have completely engulfed me.
You have taken my companions and loved ones from me;
The darkness is my closest friend.

Silence.

Dan sits back down.

The room is still.

Fred swallows, then clears his throat.

“Why, Dan,” he says, “with all the blessings God has given, I was hoping you would read something uplifting, like one of the praise psalms.”

Thwack

Right about this point in the story, I feel like slapping Fred upside the head.

I unfortunately have known enough of these types, too busy to listen, too busy to care. I’ve known enough of these types to notice that each of us does this at least once in his life. We each have become one of them.

And they said Sylvia Plath was insane. I would be lucky to be so insane. And inspired. As it is, I only fall into depression with the coming of winter. This winter has been especially hard, with all of the sadness and little of the inspiration I have come to appreciate. Yet I would have it no other way. I enjoy being able to lose myself in a sad movie, and I enjoy being able to cry.

But I digress. My point is simple. Don’t look at Sylvia as a tragic case of a woman troubled by depression, unable to escape, until finally it took her life. Yes, her story does kind of give that impression. Even Sylvia may have thought of herself in those terms. The Bell Jar she wrote during the last part of her life. She based it on her own experiences. The main character is a reflection of Sylvia herself. Except that in The Bell Jar, Esther gets help and escapes the bell jar. Or at least we can imagine that she did.

Even the ending to the story parallels how Sylvia must have felt writing it. We never actually find out whether Esther makes it out of the insane asylum. This was Sylvia’s cry to escape the suffocating confines of the bell jar. And would she succeed? Even she did not know the ending to the story.

Writers often write of the worst experiences in their own lives. Except in the story, the hero conquers the challenges. Sometimes, there has to be a happy ending. A story is a wish.

They say Sylvia gives short shrift to the real Sylvia Plath’s life. Of course it does. How can you sum up a person in 110 minutes? They say it is inaccurate. Yes, it is, to an extent. But I still believe it captures a part of the person that makes her worth admiring.

• Sylvia papers her walls with rejection slips. Real writers actually used to do this back in the day of typewriters and carbon paper. They’d send out an inquiry letter and manuscript, along with a self-addressed, stamped envelope. And when the publisher sent back their manuscript with a rejection slip, they’d immediately send it out again to another publisher. And then they’d pin the rejection slip up on the wall. Why would they do that? To show progress. In writing, 95% of success is just showing up. And so the more publishers you can send your manuscript to, the better your chances of getting published. Now, writers print out the rejection emails and paper their walls with them. Sylvia sends out manuscripts for her husband and never misses a beat. Still, when someone rejects her own work, it gets her down. Sometimes, I guess, it’s good to have someone to lean on.

• Sylvia struggles with writer’s block. And instead of struggling with writing, she fills her time with… stuff. She finds excuses not to write. And she needs someone to put her back on the right track. Again, this is a challenge every writer faces. Every writer will have times when she needs to write, and she can’t. Nothing she tries comes out right. Those are the times when she is most vulnerable, when it’s easiest to focus on how much housework needs to be done, or how relaxing it would be to watch TV, or even how much more research she needs to do before she can finish her book. And thank God for those in our lives who get us back on track, focus us on our work, and remind us what makes our writing worthwhile.

• Want to know who Sylvia was? Read her books. Sylvia’s subject is herself. Her father’s death devastated her and became her theme. Her own attempted suicides are her topic. Her depression is her inspiration. They say beginning writers lean more on their own lives as subject matter. But that’s a myth. Experienced writers do, too. But they disguise it better. They combine myriad experiences into an exciting, new whole, and then they pepper it with variations. It looks like something new and different. But really, it’s all happened before. The best writers know how to draw on their own history, feelings, and passions. These things, sometimes the good ones, but especially the bad, center of the best works ever written.

• Sylvia’s life is bound together with that of her husband. Some think that caring about what other people think of you makes you weak. Some think that the movie’s portrayal of Sylvia, becoming lost in her husband, makes her an unworthy heroine. The opposite is true. Because this is part of her passion, and part of what gives her character. Their relationship brings meaning and fulfillment to her life. So when he stays out late, it upsets her. When she suspects he’s cheating on her, it devastates her. The ability to sympathize and identify with others is a strength all artists have and something we should foster. It’s the strength that allows us to love the stories we read, the music we hear, the art we see. And it’s the strength that allows us to reflect that love in our own art, to carry on the tradition. This is surely a part of the real Sylvia Plath’s personality that made her the great poet she was.

And they say Sylvia Plath was insane. But don’t look at Sylvia as a tragic figure so overcome by depression that it killed her. Rather, see in her a heroine, a Christ-figure even. Because Sylvia gave her life for us, those who now understand her through her art. The passions that tore her apart were also what enabled her to create:

You stand at the blackboard, daddy,
In the picture I have of you,
A cleft in your chin instead of your foot
But no less a devil for that, no not
Any less the black man who

Bit my pretty red heart in two.
I was ten when they buried you.
At twenty I tried to die
And get back, back, back to you.
I thought even the bones would do.

But they pulled me out of the sack,
And they stuck me together with glue.
And then I knew what to do.
I made a model of you,
A man in black with a Meinkampf look

And a love of the rack and the screw.
And I said I do, I do.
So daddy, I’m finally through…

Please, make me cry

I love stories of all sorts. A character doesn’t have to have any particular characteristic in order for me to sympathize with him. Usually, attempts to build a character out of interesting, as it were, characteristics, these attempts just come out gimmicky. But Sylvia is one of those stories that affects me in a special, very personal way. Because she’s not just a compelling character. Sylvia reflects part of who I am, making the bittersweet denouement all the more intense.

But I would have it no other way. I like losing myself in a sad movie. And I want it to make me cry.

If Grey’s Anatomy is known for one thing, it’s the sex. You’d think that would make it an extremely boring show. Because sex is boring. Despite all the sex, Grey’s Anatomy is actually worth watching.

This is not about pop-culture morals (although it could be). This is about the nature of relationships. Love is not about sex. Love is about companionship, caring, and commitment. But here’s the clincher: What kind of a person would go to bed with someone she didn’t love? And I mean love in the “commitment” sense of the word. I don’t mean just the feelings and the passion. (Although they’re really cool, too.) I mean, what kind of a person would bring sex into a relationship that could end with a simple morning-after spat? That’s unhealthy.

Yet which of our favorite characters has not had an unhealthy relationship with sex? This is the irony. As human beings, what motivates us is love, not sex. Sex is boring. But what keeps us spellbound are the character’s problems. Healthy characters are boring. Disturbed characters are interesting. So when a character has an unhealthy relationship with sex, it’s the relationship part that motivates us, and the unhealthy part that keeps us glued to the TV set.

How can Grey’s Anatomy be such a good show even with all the sex?

• It’s not just about the sex. It’s about the characters’ relationships and reactions. For example, in the first episode we meet the main characters’ resident surgeon, Miranda Bailey, nicknamed “The Nazi.” Their relationship with her is a key part of the show. But their relationships include their feelings about and reactions to sex with each other. So while it’s not just about the sex, sex is an element that in the lives of these characters makes the story happen.

• Even the sexy characters are sympathetic. Izzy Stevens is played by the supremely sexy Katherine Heigl. In one episode, she says of Denny Duquette that he treats her as more than a supermodel. He treats her as he would an intelligent person. That was the one quality this man, 15 years her senior, whose condition had confined him to a hospital bed— That was the one quality he had that made her fall in love with him. They never had sex. Yet it has been one of the most meaningful relationships in the series, and certainly one of the most significant. All because sex goddess Izzy Stevens is a sympathetic character.

• Even the average characters are multifaceted. One of the least melodramatic characters in the show has got to be George O’Malley. What can we say about George, besides that he’s a wimp? He had a fixation on Meredith. But for a guy with no sisters, sharing a house with two women hasn’t destabilized him too much. Despite his wimpy demeanor, he has a clear sense of professional ethics. He can’t give a straight answer to an uncomfortable question, but he’s willing to break the rules and even risk his job to do the right thing as a doctor. Remember when he questioned whether the anesthesiologist was drunk and got expelled from the OR? He was right, and he was heroic. Multifaceted.

• The conflicts are complex. Once you’re embroiled in a complex story, it’s almost impossible to get untangled from it. Meredith, an intern, fell in love with Derek, an attending and her boss, until his wife showed up. He had left her, because she had had an affair with his best friend. And when this ex-friend showed up and started talking to Meredith, Derek hauled off and decked him in the face. Anyhow, this whole relationship between Derek and Meredith got them into trouble, because they were keeping it secret, because it’s improper. Except that intern Christina has an even more involved relationship with attending Preston Burke (her boss). And that’s apparently okay, because no one found out about it until Burke intentionally told the Chief of Surgery, who incidentally when he was a resident had had an affair with Meredith’s mother. But Meredith just recently figured out that her father had left because of this. Her father reminds us a lot of George, whose heart Meredith broke because of her feelings for Derek. Like mother, like daughter. And speaking of Meredith’s mother…

It’s the same reason everyone slows down to rubberneck at an accident on the road (thus risking another accident). It’s why no news is good news. All the most horrible stuff that happens to a person, that’s what makes for a great story. And Grey’s Anatomy has represented in its heroes every last dysfunctional corner of the human psyche.

“Either your signature or your brains are going to be on the contract.”

Which Gilmore Girls character said that? In what episode? And what was he^* talking about?

^* I use the pronoun “he,” because it’s convenient. But this doesn’t mean the character is a man.

Where does that line come from, anyway? Here’s a hint: It’s a movie, the first of a trilogy. And there are references to that trilogy in at least 5 other episodes of Gilmore Girls. Do you know what they are?

I’m always becoming obsessed with Gilmore-isms, those witty Gilmore Girls allusions to pop culture. I end up spending hours digging up answers, and I still feel like I’ve missed a lot.

So, I thought, wouldn’t it be cool to have a website that had all the Gilmore-isms? And the more I thought about the idea, the more excited I grew. And the bigger the concept grew. And before I knew it, I was facing a grand vision of the Gilmore-ism Database Project, the comprehensive Gilmore witticism site. The theme has powder-blue menus and dark borders. Each quote has its own page, which includes the quote, which episode it’s from, maybe a screen snapshot, what the quote refers to, and an explanation of what it means in the context of the episode. Similarly, each episode, character, and pop reference has its own page, with links to all the Gilmore-isms associated with it. You can search or browse by quote, season, episode, reference, character, or whatever.

And from there, you can do almost anything you want. The site would probably have a blog and could have its own forums. It could have a feature to display a random Gilmore-ism. The site could have a “trivia game” mode, in which the computer asks you about a random Gilmore-ism. Or it could have a trivia area, with Gilmore-ism trivia quizzes that you can compete to win. And there’s no technological reason the site must be limited to Gilmore-isms. Any memorable Gilmore Girls quote could be included. Do you remember Squeegy Beckenheim and Tookey Clothespin?

The thing is, I can’t do this by myself. The actual website development is pretty straightforward. I’m a software developer, and I’ve done websites, and I (or any competent web developer) could throw together the basic structure of the site in a week or two. The real work comes in researching and writing up all those witty quotes. There are 6 full seasons of Gilmore Girls already on DVD and more episodes coming out all the time. And each episode is packed with Gilmore-isms. And I mean packed. I estimated, on average, one Gilmore-ism for every couple of minutes of program time. So it’s a mammoth task for one person. But there is a way out.

With enough eyeballs, all problems are shallow. In other words, if enough of you are willing to support this project, it is possible to actually do it. If enough of you are interested, I will pay for the web hosting,^† make sure the web design gets done, and so forth. If enough of you are interested, I will put my other projects on hold for this.

^† More accurately, I’m willing to put up the investment capital, as I intend to make the site self-supporting.

Contributors, Sign Up Here

EDIT: See Gilmore-ism.com for information about how to keep up to date on Gilmore-isms and how to participate.

Take care,

-TimK

P.S. “Either your signature or your brains are going to be on the contract” is an allusion to the movie The Godfather. In the first scene, Michael Corleone explains how his father got Johnny his first big singing gig:

My father made him an offer he couldn’t refuse… Luca Brasi held a gun to his head, and my father assured the bandleader, that either his signature or his brains would be on the contract… That’s a true story.

The character who said this in Gilmore Girls was Jackson, in the episode “Emily Says Hello.” Having been elected town selectman, and having been bombarded for several weeks with town business, and handling it pretty poorly, at the end of his rope, Jackson discovers a pair of giant scissors on his doorstep. They clearly want him to preside at a ribbon-cutting ceremony. But Jackson, too overloaded, takes it as a threat. “This is the fish on the doorstep. It’s the horse head in the bed. It’s the ‘Either your signature or your brains are going to be on the contract.’”

The Godfather trilogy is clearly one of Lorelai and Rory’s all-time favorites. At least 6 different episodes reference these movies. There may be more, but the ones I know of are:

• “The Bracebridge Dinner” (2×10) (“We have to rent Godfather 3 on DVD… In the audio commentary, Coppola actually defends casting Sofia.”)
• “Ballrooms and Biscotti” (4×01) (“… the day of all days – Godfather I, II, and III, with extra showings of the Sofia death scene over and over as long as the Mallomars hold out.” Then, “and we’ll do Godfather I through ‘Monday, Tuesday, Thursday,’ and a quick Sofia dying.”)
• “Chicken or Beef” (4×04) (“Remember in The Godfather, Michael telling Sonny how he was gonna kill Tattaglia and Captain McCluskey in that Italian restaurant?”)
• “An Affair to Remember” (4×06) (“Every family needs its Fredo.”)
• “The Festival of Living Art” (4×07) (“Bada-bing all over his nice ivy-league suit.”)
• “Emily Says Hello” (5×09) (“Either your signature or your brains are going to be on the contract.”)

The Dr. House Drinking Game

• When Gregory House pops a Vicodin, take a drink.
• If he goes the entire episode without popping a Vicodin, take three .
• When someone has a seizure, take a drink.
• When someone goes into cardiac arrest, take a drink.
• When a patient bleeds profusely, take a drink.
• When a patient spews fluid from a body orifice, take a drink.
• When a patient spews blood from a body orifice, take two drinks.
• When a patient doubts House’s diagnosis, take a drink.
• When House’s team disagrees with his diagnosis, take a drink for each member of the team.
• When Cuddy countermands House’s orders, take a drink.
• When House acts against Cuddy or hospital rules, take a drink.
• When House insults one of his clinic patients, take a drink.
• When House talks down to one of the hospital staff, take a drink.
• When House or his team illegally searches someone’s home, take a drink.
• When House and his team performs any medical procedure against the patient’s wishes, take a drink.
• Whenever you find out a patient is fibbing on his medical history, take a drink.
• Whenever House lies in a patient report, take a drink.
• Then, when House tells a patient he’ll die unless he cooperates, take a drink.
• Every time there is sexual tension between two characters, take a drink for every doctor involved. (Borrowed from the Grey’s Anatomy drinking game.)
• Every time House makes an inappropriate sexual comment to Cuddy or Cameron, take a drink.
• Every time House makes an insensitive racial remark to Foreman, take a drink.
• Every time House makes fun of Aussies to Chase, take a drink. (Hey, we can’t leave him out!)
• Whenever someone makes a current-event or pop-culture reference, take a drink. (Borrowed from the Gilmore Girls drinking game.)
• Every time someone has mommy or daddy issues, take a drink.
• Every time it’s not lupus, take a drink.
• If they think it might be cancer, take a drink.
• If they have to choose which tests to do, because they’re out of time or there’s some other restraint, take a drink.
• If they perform every test they can think of on a diagnostic fishing expedition, no matter the cost, take a drink.

I’ve actually tried this game, and it is enough to get you a good buzz watching an average episode of House. In fact, it may be a bit too much.

-TimK

What I noticed was about Dan and Amy:

1. They’re passionate.
2. They’re story geeks!

Of course, we could always tell they were story geeks, from the early seasons of the series. We could tell they were weaving a deep, intricate, character-based story. Still, we need look no further back than the latest episode, “Super Cool Party People” to see how deep, how intricate.

Lorelai and Luke

Lorelai and Luke don’t trust each other to stay even when the going gets tough. Whether their doubts are founded, two people need this trust in order to make a marriage work. Lorelai loves Luke, as Luke loves Lorelai. Just from this episode, Luke goes shopping for Lorelai, something he usually hates, but he does it and enjoys it, just because she’s there. Lorelai buys and wears clothes that Luke likes, just because it pleases him. This is after almost two years of dating. They are so into each other. They are even ready to commit. But the other side of commitment is trust, and we can see so clearly that they do not trust each other.

Lorelai doesn’t tell Luke about her drunken toast at Lane and Zach’s wedding. Even though Miss Patty covered up for Lorelai, Lorelai should have come clean. She should have told Luke the truth and used it as a way to tell him how she felt. She should have told him she wanted to meet his daughter April. She should have told him she felt excluded from his life. She should have told him she was afraid they would never make it to the altar.

It took Luke months to tell Lorelai after he found out he even had a daughter. Then he doesn’t want April to meet Lorelai, because he fears Lorelai will take April away from him— just as her mother Anna fears, but we’ll get to that in a moment. It takes April’s birthday party, which Luke tries to throw without Lorelai’s help. It takes this birthday-party disaster to push him to letting Lorelai in, despite his fears.

Lorelai and Rory

These fears are strangely reasonable. That is, Lorelai misses the relationship she had with Rory. Their relationship has changed, has been ever since Rory went off to college. Rory’s been making her own decisions. She’s no longer Lorelai’s little girl, no longer Lorelai’s best friend. April’s birthday party, for Lorelai, was a throwback to this relationship she had with her own daughter. I wonder how Lorelai felt when April told her, “You remind me of my Mom. I think you’d like her.”

And I wonder how she felt when Luke told her that Anna was mad about her being at the party. She looked like she was about to cry. Lauren Graham is so cool.

Of course, Anna is with April just like Lorelai was with Rory, trying to protect her daughter from turmoil, from disappointment, from getting too attached to the guys dating her, trying to provide stability in an unstable existence, afraid to get attached herself. And like Lorelai, Anna also doesn’t trust Luke:

“He’s not a kid guy, never has been. And [April] she’s getting very attached. I need to know he’s sticking around first.”

No, that’s not Lorelai talking about Christopher, but it could have been.

Rory and Logan

Now Rory is her own woman. Remember when she moved in with Logan without even telling her mother?

Rory loves Logan. Yes, we hate him. But she really is in love with him. We know because she races to the hospital to see him, even though she hates hospitals. Then this usually timid, waifish girl proceeds to chew out Colin and Fin for acting insensitive. And what she said to Mitchem! I wonder what he thought. She must have broken all his conceptions about her.

But Logan is still a little boy. He has not undergone the right of manhood. He hasn’t taken responsibility for his choices. He has two alternatives. He can take on the family business as his father Mitchem wants him to. Or he can forgo his family’s wealth, blaze his own path. Either alternative would make him a man. Instead, he avoids choices, because he doesn’t want to think about the consequences. He needs to grow up, stop trying to weasel his way out of his choices and their consequences.

But now, in a hospital bed after parachuting drunk off a cliff, in “serious but stable condition,” his choices are staring him in the face. Maybe he’s growing up after all. He tells Rory, “No, it is not okay” that he almost got himself killed. And he tells her there was nothing she could have done to stop him. “I was goin’ no matter what. It’s my fault… I’m the one screwing things up with us here, not you! I’m sorry you’re in the hospital right now. I’m sorry about all of this. I don’t know what’s going on with me…”

What did Mitchem say to Logan? Or was it just staring death in the face?

Passionate about stories

This only touches upon the complexity in the epic tale that is Gilmore Girls. What motivated this story? In Michael Ausiello’s interview, Amy Sherman-Palladino tells us:

… when you see stuff happening, and when scenes and moments happen that you didn’t think could happen before, and when you add a kid like Matt Czuchry to the show and all of a sudden it brings in different layers and different stories and different textures, it’s like, it doesn’t have to end…

It’s horrifying… if we can’t ensure the quality… every year we’ve tried to push the bar higher. For better or worse, whether people like it or don’t like it, we tried to make our stories more complex. We try and push the quality higher…

They’re passionate about stories and passionate about Gilmore Girls. Everytime they saw an opportunity to make the story better, it energized them. It energized them until it burned them out.

Well, Dan and Amy, we’re sorry to see you go. I pray that your successors will at least be able to finish off the current storyline with the same passion you’ve shown. And wherever you go, whatever you end up doing, I’ll be looking forward to your next project.

-TimK

Review of The Notebook, directed by Nick Cassavetes, based on the novel by Nicholas Sparks.

An elderly woman (Gena Rowlands) stands, looking out of the nursing home window. An elderly man (James Garner) visits her. She doesn’t know him, but he clearly considers her an old friend. He reads to her a story from a small notebook, a story about young Noah (Ryan Gosling) and his one true love Allie (Rachel McAdams). They fell madly in love one summer. But she comes from a rich family, and her mother doesn’t want her marrying below her class. Allie gets not even one of Noah’s letters. She falls in love with and gets engaged to a handsome busnessman, with her parents’ full support.

Meanwhile, with a big hole in his heart, Noah buys and rebuilds a 200-year-old house, his dream house. It had been his dream even before it was his and Allie’s dream. And now this dream is all he has of her.

Recounting this plot makes me feel a little like crying. Of course, Noah and Allie encounter each other again. And when they do, it is a tense moment indeed. Their longings and struggles are the best and worst of first love.

The man and woman in the nursing home are also not just there as an excuse to tell the story of Noah and Allie. They have their own story as well. Who are they? Why doesn’t she know him? Why does he sit and read to her? This is just for starters. That story made me cry, too, by the way. The Notebook is a story within a story, a two-barreled romance.

The film is rated PG-13 for sex. It’s also a little on the long side, a little over 2 hours. And at times, the story dragged. All outstanding conflicts seemed to be resolved. I felt like the story should be over. I wondered why I was still watching, why I cared about what was happening on the screen.

All said, I enjoyed The Notebook and fully recommend it as a heart-stabbing, romantic tear-jerker.

The Notebook
directed by Nick Cassavetes
Rated PG-13 for some sexuality
US movie release: June 25, 2004
US DVD release: February 8, 2005
Run time: 124 minutes

Note also the novel by Nicholas Sparks.

P.S. Here’s the Notebook trailer:

A review of Smilla’s Sense of Snow, the movie.

I first encountered this underappreciated sci-fi mystery flick when Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert gave it two thumbs up in 1997. Smilla’s Sense of Snow stars Julia Ormond and Gabriel Byrne and is based on the novel by Peter Høeg of the same name. And of course, now we can see it on DVD.

Smilla Jaspersen is a resident of Copenhagen, but she grew up in Greenland. She comes home one day to find the little boy from the apartment below hers. He is lying face-down on the sidewalk, having fallen from playing on the roof of the building. The young boy Isaiah was not just her neighbor; he was also her friend, probably her only true friend. And immediately, Smilla knows that something is terribly wrong. You see, Isaiah was scared of heights. She goes to the snow-covered roof to investigate, to see for herself. The police rebuff her, but to Smilla the evidence is clear. Isaiah was not playing on the roof. He was running from something, something so terrible that he ran right off the edge. She can tell from his tracks in the snow.

Near the end of the story, the plot gets a little crazy, and Siskel and Ebert had noted the crazy plot. But all I remembered from their review was snow and intrigue, a romantic image inspired by the cinematography. Directed by Bille August, indeed the film shines as art in its own right, even without a plot. Still, years after having watched the movie, reflecting back, all I remembered of it were the characters. Now, watching it again recently, I realized that it was the crazy plot itself that made these characters real.

Actually, the plot is not all that bad. Smilla’s Sense of Snow is a sci-fi flick wrapped up in an Hitchcockian thriller. The plot is full of twists and turns. And it all makes sense… if you accept the ending. Whether you do or not, however, Smilla accepts that ending, and that’s why, to echo Roger Ebert, “The plot is totally absurd, and I didn’t care that it was!” Actually, Smilla may or may not accept the ending. She may or may not even care. By the time the ending comes, she has invested so much of herself in her quest to find out who killed Isaiah, the screwy plot only serves to highlight her commitment to this passion.

The film makes exceptional use of strong language. Early on, Smilla says, “I’m sorry I’ve given you the impression it’s my mouth that’s rough. I try to be rough all over.” It’s rated R for strong language, some violence, and a sex scene. But none of it is superfluous. It all just serves to heighten the powerful mood.

Smilla’s Sense of Snow is not mainstream, as it sports neither the massive, glitzy, overdone special effects nor the shallowness of the ’90′s sci-fi movie. But watching it was an extremely enjoyable experience for me, one that I have repeated numerous times and will repeat in the future.

Smilla’s Sense of Snow
Rating: R (Restricted)
Theatrical release: 1997
DVD Release: May 21, 2002
Run Time: 121 minutes

Note also:

• Siskel and Ebert’s 1997 review
• IMDb page

When Buffy the Vampire Slayer was on TV, I resisted watching it, over my friends’ recommendations. I just couldn’t get over the name. I mean, Buffy? How gay is that? I’m not going to watch some show called “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” no matter how good people say it is. I was younger then. Or at least more immature.

(This was all before I started watching Gilmore Girls, by the way.)

My first exposure to Joss Whedon’s work was with Firefly on DVD, then the movie Serenity. Now I know I need to watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer, no matter how silly that title sounds.

Recently, I got the first two volumes in the Astonishing X-Men series of graphic novels, Volume 1: Gifted and Volume 2: Dangerous. That these stories were authored by Joss Whedon was a big selling point for me.

Each volume includes 6 issues of the Astonishing X-Men comic book series. So, Volume 1 includes issues 1-6, and Volume 2 includes issues 7-12. Presumably, more volumes will be forthcoming as the series progresses. (Individual issues can be bought from Marvel Comics.)

I should add that John Cassaday’s artwork is a fine match to Joss Whedon’s storytelling. Very cool.

The reason I love the X-Men—and this is personal taste, I know—is that they are outlaw superheroes, like the Serenity crew. The X-Men are suspected and distrusted. And they sometimes make mistakes, but that’s not why they’re suspected and distrusted. People distrust the X-Men, because they’re mutants. But what really resonates with me is that no one controls the X-Men. They answer to a higher authority than any Earthly one. They answer to a higher morality. They fight for the right, no matter what anyone else says, and they have a developed sense of justice, which cannot be controlled by the mob mentality of popular opinion. Ironically, this is possible because they are outcasts, and it makes them even further outcast.

(I know I’m going all literary-analysis on you. Please forgive me.)

The X-Men cater to my sense of justice and my sense of civilization. For example, in Dangerous, after working with the Fantastic 4 to save the world from a terrible monster, they get a mere 30 seconds coverage on the local news.

Logan says, “I got a C-note says our epic battle doesn’t even make the nationals.”

Scott replies, “The news isn’t there to tell you what happened. It’s there to tell you what it wants you to hear, or what it thinks you want to hear. They already have their stories worked out. They just wait for events to fill in the blanks. When they don’t fit, they get sidelined or twisted till they do. ‘The mutant menace’ is the story. Always has been.”

You may call me cynical, but remember, a cynic is what an idealist calls a realist.

Later in the same story, Xavier himself uses the classic excuse, that yes, he himself oppressed another life, but he had no choice. He needed to perpetrate it, for the greater good of mutant-kind.

Scott skewers him. “What does it hurt? The oppression of a new life form… You figure we’ve taken enough from the sapiens, why not dish it out?”

“You know it’s not that simple,” Xavier replies.

“You’re the man that taught me that it was.”

-TimK

Astonishing X-Men Vol. 1: Gifted
Paperback: 152 pages
Publisher: Marvel Comics (December 29, 2004)
ISBN: 0785115315

Astonishing X-Men Vol. 2: Dangerous
Paperback: 144 pages
Publisher: Marvel Comics (November 9, 2005)
ISBN: 078511677X

It looks like following episodes air, one per week, each successive Friday at 9PM.

Here’s the SciFi.com page: http://www.scifi.com/doctorwho/.

-TimK