Ernest Alba's Blog

Boston Symphony Orchestra performs Mozart and Tippett

Tippett's A Child of Our Time, an oratorio of the extermination of the Jews during WWII, is a haunting and powerful interpretation of the tragedy. My favorite passages from the libretto, written by Tippett himself, follow.

The world turns on its dark side.
It is winter.

I am caught between my desires and their frustration as between the hammer and the anvil.

Mother! Mother! Though men hunt me like an animal, I will defy the world to reach you.

And my favorite
Man has...driven the gods from their thrones. But the soul, watching the chaotic mirror, knows that the gods return. Truly, the living god consumes within and turns the flesh to cancer.

Tippett intersperses African-American spirituals in the oratorio, adding another layer of richness and sadness to the piece. At once, one is hearing the tragic plight of the people of Israel, slaves in the land of Egypt, the people of Africa, slaves in the Americas, and the people of Poland and Germany, slaves in their own lands. The performance of the piece was, as far as I could tell, excellent.

The piece was preceded by Mozart's Posthorn Serenade No. 9 in D, K.320. By the way, whenever you see K. # - that signifies that you are looking at one of Mozart's works. The Köchel catalogue attempts to organize Mozart's works in chronological order from K.1 to K.626, which happens to be Requiem mass in D minor, his most famous work. Posthorn Serenade No. 9, K.320 is divided into seven movements. I very much liked this piece. It's a classic example of Mozart's style.

1. Adagio maestoso - Allegro con spirito
2. Menuetto: Allegretto - a personal favorite
3. Concertante: Andante grazioso
4. Rondeau: Allegro ma non troppo
5. Andantino - a dark, brooding piece - another favorite
6. Menuetto - superfluous, in my opinion, overshadowed by seventh movement
7. Finale: Presto - a rousing, triumphant piece with plenty of fireworks

Now For Pictures

A wide and blurry look at Symphony Hall. Unfortunately, a lot of these pictures look blurry.

The frame of the stage is elaborately carved gold-painted wood with a single name at the very top center of the piece: Beethoven.

front to back: Daneaya, Jose, and Hugo

front to back: Jose, Daneaya, me

Reactions after hearing K.320. Daneaya looks thrilled; Jose looks less happy.

More reactions to K. 320. I guess Hugo didn't much care for it, either.

My reaction to K. 320. It's supposed to be a look of intense thought.

Jose inside the Prudential Mall on his way to the MIT Safe Ride.

First Snow '05

A lot of news today, it seems. Later tonight, I'll probably be posting about the Boston Symphony Orchestra concert. (!!!)

The snow came down really fast this afternoon. This morning, everything was dry and clear. Then, around noon, the flakes started drifting down from the sky. They came down sporadically at first, then thicker and thicker, similar to the first level in the fourth world in Donkey Kong Country. What I mean is shown below.

So first, it's clear skies.

Then, the skies darken.

Then....snow - in the distance.

The snow thickens and approaches....

It's upon us! A blizzard of biblical proportions!

And this is what it actually looks like. I know, I know, it's less than biblical in magnitude.

Thomas shows off his pectoralis minisculus, biceptus nonexisticus, and ego gigantimus.

Sarah celebrates the return of winter.

IM soccer players play soccer on Briggs Field. WE were going to play IM football, but the other team didn't show up, so we went back into the blessed warmth of New House.

Richard Smalley dies at 62

I can't properly give this man credit for his accomplishments. Please click here for a better eulogy. This Nobel Laureate and Nanotechnology pioneer taught at Rice University since 1976. I first read about this man in my high school chemistry book, and then had the privilege of visiting Rice University and seeing him in flesh and blood, working in his laboratory. I knew at the time who I was seeing, and that moment was one of the pivotal moments of my life. It steeled my resolve to follow in the footsteps of the great scientists that have contributed to our knowledge of the universe. Professor Smalley was a great loss not only to the world, but also to me.

Richard Feynman

One of the most admired and influential physicists of the 20th century, Richard Feynman was a great man in more ways than one. He was obviously highly intelligent, but he was also charming, funny, and an eloquent orator. He is probably the greatest lecturer Caltech has ever seen, and one of the best students to pass through the halls of MIT. I believe MIT recognized that fact when they named him a Putnam Fellow the same year he graduated. His graduate work at Princeton layed the foundation for the "path integral" approach in quantum physics and Feynman diagrams. He was eccentric and free-spirited. A few of his many, many dictated words are below.

To those who do not know mathematics it is difficult to get across a real feeling as to the beauty, the deepest beauty, of nature...If you want to learn about nature, to appreciate nature, it is necessary to understand the language that she speaks.

When you are solving a problem, don't worry. Now, after you have solved the problem, then that's the time to worry.

The wonderful thing about science is that it's alive.

Dear Mrs. Chown, Ignore your son's attempts to teach you physics. Physics isn't the most important thing. Love is. Best wishes, Richard Feynman.

from wikipedia.org:

It is also worth recalling a question Richard Feynman raised while exploring the capabilities of mechanical calculators at Los Alamos, during the Manhattan Project. In a letter to his wife, Arline Feynman, he pointed out that the decimal expansion of the fraction 1/243 repeats in a rather amusing way:

1/243 = 0.00411522633744...

This letter irritated the censor reading mail between Los Alamos and the outside world, who feared that strings of numbers may communicate technical secrets. Gleefully, Feynman pointed out that if you actually do divide 1 by 243, you do get that string of digits, so there cannot be more "information" in the long string of numbers than there is in the single number 243. This illustrates how "information" can be a subtle concept; is there more information in pi, for example, than in the definition of a circle?

Hopefully, now that you're thinking, I can lay one more on you. Philosophers think deeply about abstract questions. Albert Einstein asked the question "Did God have any choice in creating the Universe?" Averroes proposed that not even God could create a triangle whose internal angles did not add up to 180 degrees. Carl Sagan believed that "the idea that God is an oversized white male with a flowing beard, who sits in the sky and tallies the fall of every sparrow is ludicrous. But if by God, one means the set of physical laws that govern the universe, then clearly there is such a God. This God is emotionally unsatisfying...it does not make much sense to pray to the law of gravity."

Review: Flightplan

Jodie Foster is one of my favorite actresses. She's smart, talented, and sexy. A bit about her life:

She was born in El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles de la Porciuncula, Los Angeles for short, L.A. for shorter and educated at Le Lycée Français de Los Angeles, an exclusive prep school which follows French curriculum of study, allowing students to study for the French general Baccalauréat. She went on to earn a B.A. in literature from Yale, graduating in 1985. At 14, she received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her role as a teen prostitute in Scorsese's Taxi Driver. She's fluent in French and has performed in French films. She has won two Academy Awards for Best Actress, one for The Accused (1988) and one, of course, for The Silence of the Lambs (1991). She is a director and producer, having founded a production company called Egg Pictures.

I first saw Jodie Foster in Contact at the University of Kansas in the summer of my seventh grade year. I was taking a Psychology course, and Foster's portrayal of a brilliant scientist who deeply questions matters of physics, mathematics, religion, the universe, politics, and extra-terrestrial life is sufficiently superb to write a lengthy paper over her psychological disposition. Next, I saw her in Silence of the Lambs, in which she once again showed that she is an excellent actress. Finally, I saw her in Anna and the King, which I actually bought. She is just so very beautiful!

Finally, Panic Room, which was pretty good. Of course, she did a flawless job as a cunning but scared mother.

Now she is starring in Flightplan, a suspenseful whodunnit thriller where Foster is once again trapped in a very small space. It's amazing how so much can be done with such a modest premise. In Panic Room, she was trapped in her house with no possible way of escaping. Now she is trapped on a plane, with no possible way of escaping. The setup is this: she and her daughter are the first to get on a plane. They are transporting her husband's coffin to New York. He had died tragically a week before, jumping (Foster believes falling) off of a building. She goes to sleep next to her daughter on the plane and wakes up to find her gone. She goes around looking for her and can't find her. That's the setup. Now she has to find her. And that is what the rest of the movie is about. It sounds like it couldn't be a movie, but it is. And a good one, too. It's all about psychology. Brilliant stuff. And the way Foster handles the character shows how incredibly talented she is. This is a fun movie. I suggest seeing it. All that being said, I do have one bone to pick with the movie. But if you haven't seen it, then I can't discuss it because it will give away important plot points.

Philosopher of the Decade

To whom does this distinguished honor go? That question should be secondary to a more relevant question: Who is bestowing this honor? The answer to the second question is this: a panel of experts for Men's Health Magazine compiled a list of men who have "used their talents to change the world around them, rather than just to draw attention to themselves." Each man on the list represents a different area of expertise, including sports, music, food, business, and design.

About the Philosopher of the Decade, "We were particularly pleased to have [this man] on the list. He has taught a whole generation how to take on the challenge of modern fatherhood and win - although not always with honor."

I'm pleased to report that the Philosopher of the Decade is....

Homer Simpson

The Simpsons is seen by many critics as the greatest animated series ever. In 1998, Time named it the best TV show of the 20th century. The show also has a vast array of colorful supporting character, some of which are displayed below. Each has his own life and his own story. Avid fans will know exactly the personality of each of the characters below. That is part of the beauty of the Simpsons. In fact, Bart Simpson was named to the Time 100, the publication's list of the century's 100 most influential people - the only fictional character on the list. The show has won 21 Emmy's, a Peabody, a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, 22 Annie Awards, and numerous other awards. The creator, Matt Groening, even won a Nobel Peace Prize for creating The Simpsons, the show's producer was anointed Saint Ian Maxtone-Graham by Pope John Paul II himself, and Hank Azaria, a voice actor for the Simpsons, was subsequently inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame even though he plays no instruments, can't sing very well, and doesn't even like rock. The Simpsons is broadcast in several countries in the Americas, Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. Family Guy creator, Seth MacFarlane, has said that his show was strongly influenced by The Simpsons and many jokes, even episodes, are extremely similar.

The Most Beautiful Love Song Ever

These are some lyrics from a love song by an artist you might know. Imagine playing this song at your wedding....

The day in which you were born, my love,
That day all my pains were born.
Evil person, you're going to pay dearly
because you don't interest me anymore,
Evil person, because you are a liar and evil
And in your entirety, you are going to burn in hell!

Can you guess who it is?

It's Juanes, "Mala Gente.".

Get some new ideas, guys.

i just got a tv. Daneaya gave it to me because she just bought a new one. I don't know how they do it at other colleges, but MIT has free cable for its students. There's this one channel that's like an MTV for bands that aren't well-known. Basically, for bands that are one level above playing in garages. There aren't any music videos or anything, it's just the band playing in front of a camera. One band on there made me laugh. Well, they started playing and they sounded pretty good for the first ten seconds because they were really using the piano and had a nice melody. Then the drums started and the electric guitar and I realized why it sounded so good, and I had to laugh. It sounded almost EXACTLY like Clocks by Coldplay. I mean, maybe the notes were slightly different, but it was pretty much the same. The band lost all credibility right there.

A New Era in Cinema

Does anyone else feel it? I can feel it in my bones. It creeps into my body. It's a disturbing feeling. Quietly, slowly, and subtly, Americans are losing their interest in film. Can anyone tell me what were the major showings are this week? No? What about last week? I'll tell you what they are: Last week: The Fog, Elizabethtown, Domino. This week: Doom, Dreamer, North Country, Stay. Do you know anything about these movies? No? Neither do I. Wait, yes I do. I know that they are throwaway movies that are made solely to entertain and to make money. (Except for North Country which is a disappointing Oscar contender.)

The worst thing about this is that movies that are actually worthwhile are movies that are even less well known. In these past two or three weeks: Capote, Good Night and Good Luck, Proof, The Greatest Game Ever Played. These are the movies that should be lighting up the marquee. Instead, they gather small audiences in small venues, while the "greater" pictures play at bigger venues to smaller and smaller audiences. We need a revolution in cinema. Who will make it happen?

Review: Murderball and Wedding Crashers

So I saw two movies this weekend, Murderball and Wedding Crashers. Chances are you've heard of Wedding Crashers, starring Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson. Chances are you haven't heard of Murderball, starring no well-known actors. In fact, it doesn't star actors at all. The stars of this movie are quadriplegics in wheelchairs. But these are no ordinary wheel chairs - they are wheelchairs from hell. They are made specially for this rugby sport modified for wheelchaired people. But it's every bit as intense and violent as classic rugby. That's why the chair is made from a really tough metal. Despite being tough, after a while on the court, it gets to look really banged up and dirty, giving it an authentic look.

This movie is more about people than anything else. It's about their relationships to their girlfriends, their wives, their sons, their families, their friends, and their enemies. After all, it was made by MTV, the people who thrive on stories about relationships. To that extent, it is a far better story than any other MTV media I've seen including The Real World:Cancun, some of the reality shows they have on TV, and The Perfect Score. It is NOT as good, however, as some other movies released by MTV such as Better Luck Tomorrow and the Original Kings of Comedy. This is a well-shot, thoughtful movie that sheds light on the lives of quadriplegics in a complete manner. It delves into all aspects of this new life - dealing with the past, dealing with the future, sexual functionality (can you get it up?), getting dressed, using the bathroom, driving, dancing, drinking, parties, sports, typing, working, LIFE. This is a great sports movie, a great drama, and a great documentary.

So what about Wedding Crashers? This is a standard funny movie. You don't need to be bothered with the plot. It's there to create situations where Vaughn and Wilson can be funny. One sentence should be enough: Vaughn and Wilson crash weddings to hook up with chicks until one day Wilson finds a girl he loves and Vaughn is dragged along with him to the girl's family's home where Wilson tries everything he can to get this girl to love him back. Along the way we meet some wacky characters including a gay character that I hope people would take offense to, Christopher Walken as the girl's dad, and Jane Seymour looking insanely hot and for an unknown reason, being really hot for Wilson. This is pretty standard fare, and I laughed a lot, got my money's worth, and left chuckling, so the movie works. It ain't great, though.

It's sad to note that the theatre was PACKED for Wedding Crashers, but for the far superior movie, Murderball, there were at most fifteen people in the entire theatre.

The Final Word on iPod video

It's strange that only one day ago, I was wondering why my friend had bought the iPod video in the first place. Now I see that it's the type of video player I'd been waiting for. It plays everything after getting a small free program off the web and using it to convert your files in a relatively little amount of time. And the screen resolution and video quality are extraordinary. Even your movies look fantastic on this screen and you'll have no qualms about watching them over an extensive period of time - it'll be enjoyable. And the huge hard drive (30gb or 60gb) is a steal at 300 or 400 dollars, respectively. Plus it's the smallest video player you'll find out there. It's even smaller and thinner than the 20 gb iPod and weighs less, too. And you can't forget that it's still the iPod music player everyone loves.

Finally, Apple does something right.

Oh, the iPod nano is nice, too. But since it's only fifty bucks to upgrade to a video, you might as well get the video.

Update: It's interesting that all the press is following my lead. Now, everyone is talking about how the ipod video isn't really an ipod video just a new generation of ipod that plays video. Soon, I suspect, they're going to realize that it actually is a powerful video player more than just an audio player.

Example Headlines:
ABC NEWS: "Don't call it the Video iPod, the vPod, or anything that indicates that this is a video player. It's the new iPod, period."
Washington Post: "With Video IPod, the Music Still Comes First"

The MIT Symphony Orchestra (MITSO)

At 8 PM, or a little after, Dante Anzolini began conducting the MIT Symphony Orchestra in Suite No.1 of one of the most popular operas ever composed, Carmen. That began one of the most delightful two hours in recent memory.

MITSO is composed almost entirely of MIT undergraduates, students like me, but students unlike me because they are incredibly gifted musicians while I am an incredibly gifted....well I can't quite think of anything I'm gifted in. Being showcased tonight was the prodigy and MIT student, Serenus Hua. He began studying violin at TWO years old and attended Julliard at NINE. He came to MIT at FIFTEEN, and is almost finishing his degree. He's won several international competitions, performed with orchestras from major cities, and toured Europe twice. In short, he's got the goods.

After the first piece, the aforementioned rousing Carmen Suite No. 1, Serenus Hua starred in the second piece, a variation on a theme in Bizet's Carmen by Pablo de Sarasate. A bit about the piece: though it certainly copies the melodies from Carmen, it uniquely and grandly displays them. Or maybe I was just taken aback by Hua's use of the violin. I thought it was incredible. There he was, in front of the rest of the orchestra, swaying to and fro with the music, quickly and deftly moving his bow against the strings, creating so many, many different kinds of sounds. I didn't know anything like that was possible with a violin. A friend sitting next to me, commented afterwards, "I've never seen anyone play so well. It's like he and the violin were one." She would know; she has been playing the piano and violin since she was a child.

The final piece, Shubert's Symphony No. 9, is something you need to hear to appreciate. I don't know enough about classical music to properly describe it, but I know I enjoyed it. The last movement is definitely my favorite. I'd like to finish this post by quoting from Steven Ledbetter's critique of Symphony No. 9.

The first movement begins with a horn theme that might be the typical "slow introduction". But Schubert welds it to the body of the movement, making it a cornerstone of the entire symphony..The second movement is laid out on the simplest of musical plans. Yet the flow of ideas is so lavish and imaginative that one scarecly notices the straightforwardness of the design in the poetry of the elaboration.The scherzo, too, is elaborated in extenso as a full-scale sonata form. In several places, Schubert introduces themes that truly waltz, lilting in the style that became the hallmark of Vienna.The last movement is nothing short of colossal in time span, energy, and imaginative power. Two seperate motives - one dotted, one in triplet rhythm - stand at the outset as a call to attention and a forecast of things to come. Both play a role in the opening theme, which grows with fierce energy to the dominant cadence. After a pause, a brilliantly simple new idea - four repeated notes in the unison horns - generates an independent marchlike theme that shows off its possibilities later on as it dominates the extended development. The opening dotted motive prepares the recapitulation with increasing intensity, though when it arrives, Schubert arranges matters so as to bring it back in the completely unexpected key of E-flat! The first section of the recapitulation is abridged, but it works around to C major for the more lyric march of the secondary theme. This closes quietly on a tremolo C in the cellos; they sink down two steps to A, starting the massive coda, which reworks the materials nearly as extensively as the development section in the middle of the movement. The mood passes from mystery and darkness to the glorious sunshine of C major as the symphony ends in a blaze of glory.

Jasper comes thru once again.

At first, I thought it would be enough to thank him in another comment. But Jasper Cheing deserves a post specifically to congratulate him. I don't know how, but Jasper has a gift. He can find virtually anything on the Internet. He's done it many times, the most memorable being his rare discovery of a Salvador Dali/Walt Disney animation and now this.

Not only has he found a converter for mpegs and avis, but it converts them straight to mp4 so they drop nicely onto your ipod. The best part is this: mpegs are not compatible with quicktime because the way the data is coded interlaces the audio and video. Quicktime separates video and audio tracks. So if you convert mpegs using quicktime, you get no sound. I'd been frustrated by this development for several hours now. But this program overcomes that obstacle in one single step. The second part of the best part is this: Quicktime could convert some files, avi's mostly, but it took about two hours for five minutes of conversion. How long does it take this program to do five minutes? about a minute and a half.

As the days progress, it becomes easier and easier to find what Jasper found. The point is, though, that he found it very soon after the ipod video came out. That is much harder to do than waiting a few days till a lot of programs are being made or word of mouth gets around. In fact, just a day after, all you have to do is google ipod video converter and BAM, it's the first link. But when Jasper found it? not a chance. Believe me - I searched for a good hour to no avail.

Jasper, I'm much obliged.

Update on video iPod

So I might have spoken too soon. Apple is still a sleazy company, but apparently there IS a way to put all your mpeg's and avi's on your ipod. From what I hear, you have to have Quicktime Pro, a 30 dollar purchase, AND something like Riverpast Video Cleaner, another 30 dollar purchase. So your 300 dollar investment becomes at least a 360 dollar investment. And you're roped into Apple even more then you had wished.

Latest Update:

I have once again spoken too soon. You DON'T need Riverpast Video Cleaner for SOME of your videos, particularly your avi's, which are probably your TV shows and movies. MPEGS (most music videos), however, probably need somthing like Video Cleaner.

My Concern for Bloggers

Dear Fellow Blogger,

We all have our reasons for creating our blogs. Sometimes, we want to fit in with a group. All of our friends have blogs, why shouldn't we? Or perhaps we just want to write down what we think. Or perhaps there is an informative purpose to our posts. Whatever the reason may be, do not be discouraged by lack of response.

The irony here is that few people read my blog. So this message is hardly reaching its target audience. That doesn't really matter, though. Blogs are as much for ourselves as they are for anybody else. They allow us to delve into our own feelings and learn how to express them in words that make sense to others. Have you ever gone back and read something you wrote a long time ago? Of course you have. In that manner, you can see whether your writing was effective or not because over time you forgot the meaning and have to regain it through your writing.

It may feel awkward to write when you know no one is going to read it. But, please, get over yourself. You're doing yourself a favor by not caring. See? I'm doing it right now.

Sincerely,
Ernest Alba

Google is a baby

Check it out: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2005/10/we-get-letters-3.html

Be Wary of the Video iPod

I bet you've heard of the video iPod. Apple's advertising campaign is deceptive. They make it seem like you can watch your music videos, TV shows, maybe even movies on your iPod. Not true.

First of all, the screen resolution on this ipod is lower than you'd expect. The highest resolution you can watch videos in is 480X480, which isn't bad compared to everything else that's out there, but you certainly aren't going to watch your movies on it. Not only that, the battery life is two hours for video so you'd barely be able to watch one movie before needing to juice up again. Oh and it doesn't allow widescreen. That's just the beginning, though. All those music videos and Family Guy episodes you downloaded with Limewire? Sorry, can't put 'em on here. Only Quicktime format (mov and mp4) is allowed. So that reduces your viewable library down to practically nothing. And the few Quicktime videos you do have? Probably too high resolution to watch.

So why the hell did they release this video ipod? Well, you CAN watch music videos and TV shows on them, but you have to pay for them on iTunes. So, if you want the ipod video, then know what you are getting into. It's just another ipod with a bigger screen and better resolution. It's great for pictures and home videos, by the way. So if that's a big thing for you, then I'd suggest the video ipod. The price isn't bad either. The 30gb is the same price as the regular 20gb ipod ($299) and it's smaller and thinner. I can vouch for all of this stuff - my friend just bought one.

I found a great quotation that sums the whole thing up succintly:

The new iPod is "really not a video iPod - it's an iPod with video," says Mr. Greengart. Buyers will still find the chief value in the audio features. "The screen isn't large enough to be a real video iPod," he says.

Fat People - are you one? Or are you one who makes fun of fat people? Or are you one who looks beyond the superficial?

As part of research for her role as an obese woman in Shallow Hal (2001), Gwyneth wore the 200 pound latex "fat" suit she used for the film to a bar where people refused to make eye contact with her and treated her rudely. She said that this experience made her saddened by the injustice faced by overweight people in society.

Richard Roeper, columnist for the Chicago Sun Times and Ebert's partner on the movie critic show, Ebert and Roeper, caused a national controversy over a column he published in July 2005 wherein he ranted that the images of the women sized 6-12 in the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty were "too chunky" for him to look at in public. He promptly received a few thousand pieces of hate mail for it.

I personally won't treat fat people any different from anyone else. Why would I? They ARE like everyone else. Obesity, I think, is a result of lack of information on how to be healthy, lack of will to be healthy, or lack of ability to become healthy. If I don't know why someone is fat, how can I judge her or him based on assumptions of mine? I treat obesity honestly. IF someone has the ability to start living healthy, I would encourage that person to start doing it. I wouldn't blame her, though, any more than I would blame any one else if she didn't do it because of laziness. Everyone is lazy, not just fat people. So once again, there is no reason to treat them differently just cause they don't become skinnier even if they could. Skinny people have it good; they can eat the same thing fat people eat, and not get fat. How is that fair? It isn't, but I don't really care for the word "fair" anyway. Life is tough. Fair never comes into play unless it's forced into a situation. I certainly never expect things to be fair. How can they be when everyone is looking out for number one?

god, why do i get onto tangents?

A mathematical relation between The Simpsons and every other American animated sitcom

Imagine the difficulty of describing the brilliance of "The Simpsons" as a vector we will call V_x. That is, a line of certain length pointing in a certain direction. Now imagine another vector (V_y) with equal magnitude (length) but opposite direction. That vector is the difficulty of saying that the importance and quality of "The Simpsons" is leaps and bounds above any other animation sitcom in the United States. To gather any significant meaning from this we need to establish a coordinate system. Both vectors lie on the x-axis. My coordinate system says that difficulty increases with higher x-values. 0 equals neutral difficulty; It's neither difficult nor easy. Negativity increases as difficulty decreases.

KNOWING all that, now you can easily deduce from the following relation the purpose of this post.

V_x > V_y

Review: The Interpreter

This movie is one of the best in the genre. It doesn't give us cliches, instead it engages our minds. As Ebert so shrewdly pointed out, the movie doesn't rely on cheap shock value moments or a shoddy romance side story. It fully develops and deals with much deeper emotional trauma. It also covers a lot of other ground, including politics, crime-solving and deduction, human rights, literature, music, and art. It's being touted as an intelligent thriller, and that it is. It's a taut thriller, too, except for the last scene which is quite unnecessary as the story as already reached its conclusion before it. It's a really poorly constructed scene that was obviously meant for the average Joes who don't get the real ending. If you go see this movie, the movie ends after the last shot in the montage of the United Nations building. You might as well walk out of the movie before the next scene begins. It ain't worth watching.

This movie can, above anything else, make you rethink your beliefs, your morals, your way of living. I believe that this movie has a good message that we all need to hear at one point in our lives, in one way or another.

I don't know why I failed to see good actresses before. I've always hated Gwyneth Paltrow and Nicole Kidman. I didn't think they were good actresses. But then I saw Gwyneth Paltrow in Proof and was blown away. Now I've seen Kidman in The Interpreter, and I'm blown away. How could I not have seen this before? I did the same thing with Charlize Theron before Monster. I guess now I need to recant on my beliefs of a person I still loathe as an actress: Naomi Watts.

It's unsettling to note that all these actresses have something in common: None of them are American.

Editor's Note: Nicole Kidman IS actually American, though she was raised in Australia since she was 3 years old.
Though at the beginning of her career, Gwyneth Paltrow was widely thought to be a British actress (including by me), she's actually from L.A.
Charlize Theron was born and raised in South Africa, and Naomi Watts was born and raised in England.

Love? No Way!

How long does it take to learn to love? Longer than you believe. People think they know it all. Especially when it comes to "love". They believe they are "in" it. They believe they love someone more than anything. Especially after several years of being with the same person. But when something happens, and they end the relationship, their true, underlying selfishness is revealed.

Case in point, someone I know had the same thing happen to him. What did he immediately do? Seek the affection of someone else. What did she do? Same thing.

Why did they do this? Simply because they felt unwanted, unneeded. Their pride was hurt. They needed to feel like they had value. You may argue that this is an indelible and good part of being human. I contest that vehemently. I believe firmly that one's value can only be increased through a selfless love for others. That means NOT trying to make yourself feel better by seeking affection of other people.

Review: Before Sunset

Have you heard of this movie: Before Sunset? You probably haven't.
It opened in limited release in 2004, playing at only 200 theaters on its opening weekend.

For a long time, I felt frustrated that so many worthwhile films were being ignored by most Americans. But I've become accustomed to seeing these wonderful movies playing to small audiences. In recent history, I can easily recall movies like Proof, The Saddest Music in the World, Bubba Ho-tep, Pieces of April, Frida, and Howl's Moving Castle. These movies are intelligent, moving, cinematically inventive works of art. And they are relegated to small openings in less than mainstream theaters because the media moguls don't trust the public to pay to see movies that make them think.

I've resigned myself to that.
But this movie can change all that for you.

Before Sunset, starring well-known actor Ethan Hawke (Training Day, Taking Lives, Gattaca) and French actress Julie Delpy (King Lear, An American Werewolf in Paris, MacArthur Park), is a delicious stroll through the park - literally. The movie takes place in Paris, France nine years after the two main characters, Jesse and Celine, spent the most romantic night of their lives together in Vienna. They meet for the first time since then and decide to go to a cafe to grab a cup of coffee before Jesse has to get back on a plane to go back to the U.S. This is essentially all you need to know. The next hour and a half is dedicated to a continual, uninterrupted conversation between the two characters. That's right, NO time passes between scenes, it is all done in real time. This is part of what gives the movie its charm. The most important part, though, is the way Hawke and Delpy become Jesse and Celine. It is extremely difficult to make an hour and a half conversation that is completely scripted sound completely spontaneous. But, somehow, Hawke and Delpy make it work. At no time, does the audience feel like they are being read a script. This is acting at its best.

You might be thinking, why on earth would anyone want to watch an hour long conversation? That's gotta be boring. And it would be. Except the script, written by Hawke, Delpy, and Linklater, the director, is an intelligent, subtle, involving dialogue that stirs emotions and thoughts in our minds that, otherwise, we might not ever think. Has your brain ever felt like it was at rest? Free from the consuming frenzy of life? Peaceful inside? That quotation from this movie is exactly how this movie will make you feel. It might seem like boredom at first, but it quickly becomes very soulful.

Highly Anticipated Movies

I've been a big fan of Philip Seymour Hoffman since his role as "Mattress Man" in Punchdrunk Love. I remember him vaguely from Scent of a Woman and Twister, but I didn't truly appreciate his talent until his more recent movies like Spike Lee's brilliant 25th Hour and Red Dragon. Punchdrunk Love is one of my favorite romantic comedies, and a part of that I can attribute to Hoffman's performance.

I'm sure you can tell where I'm going with this. I read my first Truman Capote story in high school, and I remember thinking it was clever. Now that Capote is coming to the big screen, I'm anxious to see Hoffman's portrayal of this odd little man. I have a suspicion that this could be Hoffman's best performance to date, even worthy of an Oscar nomination.

Review: Wallace and GroMIT

Saturday night was a night of firsts. It was the night I first experienced the freezing torrential rains of New England, it was the first time I visited the famous Pourhouse Bar, and it was the first time I went to Fenway Theatre, close to the legendary home of the Boston Red Sox, Fenway Park.

The Pourhouse isn't as smoky as many bars, perhaps because it's filled with college students that know better than to smoke. I know there were students from Tufts, BU, BC, Northeastern, and MIT there. Probably there were also students from Berklee, Emerson, and Harvard. So the six of us, Amerigo and Mael, his friend from Brown, Thomas, Alberto, Jesus, and I squeezed into a booth and ordered up burgers and fries. The funny thing is, everyone around us is drinking, and when the waitress comes up and asks us what we want, Thomas starts. "Just water, please." Mael, "Water, too." Amerigo, "Water." "Water." "Yeah, water, too." till everyone's ordered a glass of water. The waitress looks like she wants to roll her eyes, but she smiles and goes off to serve people who will actually run up a bill. So what did our bill come to? For six people - 16.43. Combined, I kid you not.

So after Pourhouse, Thomas is the only one who shared my admiration for Wallace and Gromit, so we went off to see the new movie and everyone else went home. The sky was still falling all around us, so we had to keep sloshing through puddles on the uneven sidewalks. It was bad enough getting the bottoms of my jeans soaked, but while waiting at the bus stop to go to Fenway, a bum walked up to me and Thomas and asked Thomas if he could have his coat. Thomas, of course, refused, but the guy persisted. He kept talking about how nice of a coat it was, and how he would like to have a coat like that. The guy was perfectly harmless, but everytime he spoke, spittle flew inbetween the toothless gaps in his mouth and out of his lips and onto my arm. Disgusting.

But it was all well worth it, for the opportunity to see a childhood memory reanimated. Gobless whoever showed us those three cartoons at the Catholic school when we were kids. Wallace and Gromit are a perfectly balanced duo. Gromit is wise, and, thus, knows how to fix things whenever Wallace creates messes. Wallace is intelligent. His inventions are crazy, yes, but also practical and useful. One of the greatest things about these characters is that they are claymation. That is, they are animated using clay models. This gives them a realism unparalleled by any CGI available to date. Even drawings don't give the same feeling that these tangible beings do.

Saturday night was long, I don't think we got in until one in the morning. But when you fill your stomach for less money than you planned and stoke the ashes of dimmed but fond memories, the small things like cold weather and unpleasant people become less important. I realize now that Saturday was not so much a night of firsts as it was a night of remembrance. I remembered the delight I experienced after watching Wallace and Gromit as a kid, and that delight is priceless.