NO WORDS_DAILY PIX BY HUGH CRAWFORD
STUFF AND THINGS
Brooklyn blogger, Callalillie, has the dope on where the new Whole Foods is going up in Park Slope. She even has sketches!! Check it out. Y’know that old mansion (or whatever that is) on the corner of Third Avenue and Third Street…
On New Year’s Eve, Brooklyn Borough Hall will show off the capabilities of the their new high- tech lighting system. The night’s show, "Fantasy," described by a spokesperson as "a choregraphed dance of different colored lights." Read all about it in last week’s City Section.
Liberty Heights Tap Room in Red Hook is having a Family New Year’s bash with Cool and Unusual Punishment. Food, non-alcoholic drinks and teen bands. The fun starts at 8:30…
And of course, the 24th annual fireworks display in Prospect
Park. Best locations for viewing the fireworks include anywhere in
Grand Army Plaza, inside the park on the West Drive, and along Prospect
Park West and nearby side streets. Just before midnight. Also, Deja Blu
(10-piece big band) plays at 11 pm.
Great way to Run in the New Year: Slope Sports and Brooklyn’s
Road Runners Club host a healthy way to ring in the new year. Start and
finish line at the Grand Army Plaza entrance of Prospect Park.
Post-race party at Burrito Bar and Kitchen. $20 entry fee. 11:15 pm.
Walkers welcome.
POSTCARD FROM THE SLOPE_NEW YEAR’S PAST
New Year’s Eve is meant to be memorable night but I don’t remember that many of mine. I wish I could google them. 1984 New Years Me What did I do? We rely on Google now for so much. Why not that?
There’s pressure to make it a great night but it’s usually just another night. What’s the big deal? (But it is a big deal.) Happy New Year. A kiss. A roomful of kisses. Asleep. Awake. Another year…
And yet. And yet, some of these nights I remember sort of. Or can reconstruct from one or two images…
1969, I was only 11 years old and my father let my sister, a friend, and me have sips of champagne. It was the end of the sixties and we thought we were drunk listening to Janis Joplin records waiting for the ball to drop on television.
Early 1970’s: I remember watching Veronica Lake in "I Married a Witch," in the TV room of a camp-friend’s house in Roslyn, Long Island, waiting until midnight so that, finally, we could go to bed.
In high school, there was a party at the elegant home of a classmate on Central Park West. Later there was pizza at Tom’s Pizza on Columbus Avenue, "This Will Be" by Natalie Cole on the jukebox.
Another year — also high school — "Day for Night" by Truffaut at the Carnegie Hall Cinema and later a hockey game at Madison Square Garden (is it possible there was a hockey game on New Year’s Eve?). The midnight moment at a restaurant, also on Columbus Avenue, and then drinks with some friends in a bar (could we get drinks in a bar?).
During college, New Year’s Eve at "Alice’s Restaurant" in the Berkshires (or a restaurant owned by that Alice) with my mother and sister. Ran into a friend of mine from elementary school who had, inexplicably, become an airplane pilot. We went cross-country skiing the next day for the only time in my life.
In 1979, a childhood friend who’d married a Palestinian man had a party in her Los Angeles apartment. There was a belly dancer and middle-eastern food. At midnight, everyone hooted and yelled and danced a circle around the belly dancer, while drinking paper cups of champagne.
New Year’s 1980, I was in the social room of an Israeli kibbutz feeling exhilarated — being so far from home and feeling sad — being so far from home in a room full of people I barely knew dancing to Madonna Blondie, Bruce Springsteen, Beatles’ and Israeli rock ‘n roll.
Another year, I attended a party in an artsy townhouse on East 11th Street. After midnight, the party guests walked down to Tribeca and party-hopped from one weird and unwelcoming loft party to another; it was a freezing cold night.
1986: I met David Duchovny — this was before he was the star of "The X-Files," before he was even a professional actor — at the apartment of a friend, who knew him from Yale. I’d just cut my hair short for the first time and
was feeling very festive, very chic. We talked for a while, our fathers were friends in college and we’d met as young children. I don’t remember much else about the party.
1987 was my first New Year’s on Husband’s family farm in Northern California. We attended a party given by a local chapter of the American University Women’s Association held in someone’s home and played a party word game invented by Husband’s grandmother.
In 1988, we’d spent a beautiful day at the Arboretum in San Francisco and drove home after dark. Sitting in the car in the garage of Husband’s childhood home, Husband asked me to marry him. We just sat there stunned, excited, unsure what the hell we were doing. That was New Year’s eve, I think. Maybe the day after. We didn’t tell anyone until we were back in New York.
Another year we went to a dinner theater in Stockton and saw the play:
"A My Name is Alice." Some years we played scrabble, Monopoly. One year
we watched "Like Water for Chocolate" and fell asleep before it was
over, well before midnight.
There were other New Year’s Eves. Obviously. When Son was six months old we were too tired to do anything more than eat dinner and go to bed. Google: 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995 New Year’s Eve, what did we do?
1996, we stayed in New York because I was pregnant with daughter and went to see "The People Vs. Larry Fink" on West 23rd Street and ate dinner at the Empire Diner.
1997: Daughter was just 10 months but would be walking within weeks…
In the millennial year, Husband’s family gathered on the farm for a lamb feast prepared by Husband and an enormous Jeroboam of champagne bought in Napa Valley for the occasion. We watched the rest of the world’s elaborate festivities on television and waited for something terrible to happen (Y2k). Father, Sister, Mother: everyone called from New York to wish us a happy new year at 9 p.m. – California time. We’d bought fireworks at a firehouse in Salida, a nearby town, and at midnight shot them off in the backyard which was decorated with lumanaria. The children lit sparklers and spelled their names in the air.
New Year’s Eve dinner on the farm in 2001: Son told "Guy Walks Into A Bar" jokes that had everyone in hysterics, he was only 10. We’d flown nervously cross-country as it was just months after 9/11 and we were still limping (emotionally) barely recovered, full of stories of what had gone on…
2002, 2003: late dinners, rented movies, sparklers in the backyard.
2004: it was just days after the Tsunami, the house was cold, we were all getting sick, what a depressing New Year’s. After mid-night, Son and I watched "Garden State" on his iBook, it had just come out on DVD and was, at that moment, his favorite movie of all time.
I loved it too.
NO WORDS_DAILY PIX BY HUGH CRAWFORD
POSTCARD FROM THE SLOPE_Pink Shoes Redux
Just days before
Christmas when I was 8 or 9, I stood on a chair in a coat
closet and found one of my Christmas presents: a pair of pink patent
leather Mary Janes from Saks Fifth Avenue. They were EXACTLY what I wanted.
Mintues later, my mother found me in the closet and grabbed the shoebox away: that was exactly what I didn’t want to happen.
On Christmas Day, there were no pink shoes. None. My parents did, however, give me the shoes a few days later.
Lesson learned.
That
story has become something of a cautionary tale around our apartment. If I try to get hints from Husband about my birthday or Mother’s Day gift
he says: "Pink shoes, pink shoes. Remember the pink shoes." Same for Son and Daugther when they ask about their Chrismakah or birthday presents: "Pink
shoes," we’ll say. "Pink shoes;"
And yet as a cautionary
tale, "Pink Shoes" just doesn’t cut it. Instead, I still get angry at my parents who felt they had to punish me for something
so innocent, so human. "Pink Shoes" is not a cautionary tale at all but
a poignant reminder of a terrible punishment for the delight
at finding the gift I so desired.
Shiny, pink, glowing with
potential: it was impossible not to hold those shoes in my admiring
little hands. Even if it was just days before Christmas.
That said, I was really pissed when Daughter told me that she found the Felicity DVD I’d hidden in the laundry hamper. She also found a bunch of her stocking stuffers. "You’re just a terrible hider," she said. "You’re so bad at it."
That pissed me off even more. It’s not enough to give her gifts but I’ve got to be a great hider, too? Give me a break. Our closets are stuffed to bursting with clothing, coats and all the hand-me-downs we get from friends with older girls.
Finding a place in the apartment to hide gifts is, well, excruciatingly time consuming…
Pink Shoes. Pink Shoes. Doesn’t anyone remember the story about pink shoes?
THINGS TO LIKE ABOUT 2005
Here is a list of some of the "ordinary" things that were so special in 2005 (in no particular order).
–A baby named Sonya (Ducky)
–Great family
–Great friends
–Great neighbors
–A great therapist
–Daughter and Sonya together
–FINISHING the Brooklyn Half-Marathon
–Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn (started Feb. 1, 2005)
–Writing the weekly Smartmom column for The Brooklyn Papers
–Getting published
–BKLYN Magazine
–Husband’s NEW JOB
–Husband’s PHOTOGRAPHY (No Words_Daily Pix)
–Hearing Cool and Unusual Punishment at the Liberty Heights Tap Room for the first time
–Daughter’s puppy calendar/research project she worked so hard on
–Hearing Cool and Unusual again and again
–Teens for New Orleans benefit concert at the Old Stone House
–Husband’s Birthday at the Old Stone House with friends, family, and Cool and Unusual Punishment
–Amy, Elizabeth and Todd coming all the way from California for the big party
–The Gates
–February in Central Park
–MY OFFICE
–Valentine’s Day Portraits at Fou Le Chakra
–Brooklyn Reading Works at Fou Le Chakra
–Brooklyn Reading Works at the Old Stone House
–The people who gave us work and/or helped us find work
–Our week in Sag Harbor
–Ice skating on Thanksgiving
–My birthday dinner at Chez Panisse
–the Diane Arbus birthday cake Jollybe Bakery made for Husband
–Christmas and Hanukkah in Brooklyn for the first time in a long time.
–Daughter’s second and third grade teachers at PS 321
–Bay Ridge Prep
–Planning our 30th high school reunion
–Sonya’s first steps (walking on December 27th)
–Running in Prospect Park
–Meditation
–Husband’s chicken curry with almonds and dried cranberry
–The new wall dividing the living room into a work space/family space
–Kim Maier’s stewardship of The Old Stone House
–"The Other Woman" (Directed by Margarete Von Trotta, screenplay by Pamela Katz) at the Museum of Modern Art; Nancy Graham’s poems and stories in Chronogram, Prima Materia, and elsewhere; "A Widow’s Walk" by Marian Fontana; David Konigsberg’s paintings at the Alan Shephard Gallery; Toby Fox’s Elizabeth Bishop paper and Bunny Thoughts; Roxanna Velandria’s drawings; "Flightplan" at the Zigfield with Florian Balhaus and friends, Emily Berger’s show of paintings at the Painting Center, Charlotte Maier ’s scene with Steve Martin n "The Pink Panther," Henry Lowengard’s show of prints at the Esopus Public Library, Fofolle’s clothing
–Henry L. GETS A JOB
–The Squid and the Whale
–So many said-to-be-great 2005 movies yet to see
–Reading "Heir to the Glimmering World" by Cynthia Ozick
–ROSE: our babysitterandsomuchmore
–Writer’s group
--Life Space Coaching with Deborah Ager
–Therapy
–"Coming Home to Your Heart" retreat in the Berkshires
–Park Slope
–Zoloft
NO WORDS_DAILY PIX BY HUGH CRAWFORD
POSTCARD FROM THE SLOPE_New Year’s 2004
I wrote this on New Year’s Eve 2004 just days after the Tsunami. 2005 saw its share of tragedy, too: the war, Hurricaine Katrina, the London bombing, there was more. Some thoughts from last year…
The last day of 2004 and we’re well rid of that one. It was a year,
alright, quite a year. Natural disaster, human suffering of unfathomable proportions, war,
political disaster, tragedy, human cruelty…
And yet daily life
goes on. The clock ticks, the internet connection hums, the children
need lunch, there is work to be done. The dailiness of things keeps us
going when nothing else does. It’s the ordinary things that pull us
through.
There’s a lot of talk right now about the absence of
God, the existence of God in the first place, the reality that bad
things happen to good people often, unremittingly, all the time, a lot.
Too much.
There are a lot of people who are very angry at
their God right now. And there are many whose belief in their God will
pull them through. Those without a belief in God are also in a quandry.
No matter what kind of God or no-God you’ve got, you’re probably
struggling to understand the breadth of this tragedy.
There is
also the unpleasant feeling of uselessness. At this distance, other
than contributing money, there is nothing to do but watch and cry. With
this comes a kind of survivor’s guilt – guilt for the fact that our
lives are (thankfully) untouched by this kind of pain and suffering.
Guilt for our abundance, guilt for the superficiality of what ails us
right now.
And then there’s the fear, a deep, penetrating one:
what happens if and when our lives are touched by such terribleness.
What would we do?
When bad things happen, Fred Rogers, that
dapper genuis of children’s television, used to say, "Look for the
good." Even in the worst of times, he’d say, there is good to be found.
In this case, one has only to look at the faces of the
survivors who are burying the dead, beginning to clean up, helping one
another heal. Good people the world over are also flocking there to
help: Doctors Without Borders, the International Red Cross, and other
local and international organziations are pitching in. There is good to
be found.
For the moment, the world’s focus is on this tragedy
– everyone is grieving for the missing, praying for the survivors, and
trying to help in some small way.
Wouldn’t it be amazing if
this shared moment could change the course of history? Wouldn’t it be
amazing if the world came together and recognized the importance of
daily life, the power of the ordinary, the simple things that everyone
holds dear?
Wouldn’t that be amazing?
NO WORDS_DAILY PIX BY HUGH CRAWFORD
POSTCARD FROM THE SLOPE_FULL TIME AGAIN
Something very exciting happened last week: Husband took a full time job. And boy are things going to change around here.
For one thing, we’ve grown used to his 24/7 presence in the apartment. Since leaving his last job, Husband set up shop as a professional photographer in the living room and he’s been spending an awful lot of time in there. So much so, that we built a make-shift wall dividing the living room. That was completed just days before he got the offer he couldn’t refuse.
A job. A good one.
But having Husband around here was pretty special. It meant I didn’t have to worry when I left the coffee pot on, that there was always someone home when Son returned from school –always a good thing for a teen. He was also available to pick up Daughter, make dinner, help with homework, change light bulbs, fix computers, and much, much more.
And his cooking: Husband has a way in the kitchen. And it’s completely improvised and delicious: Risotto, Curried Chicken, steak, pasta sauce with ground turkey, capers and many mystery ingredients, the best scrambled eggs, french toast with Tabasco Sauce….
And that’s just the utilitarian stuff. Having him in the same borough day in and day out was pretty special. We really got to know one another again and in a different way. We didn’t exactly work together but we did partner up on a few projects and supported each other.
And I got to see the intensity with which he approaches his photographic work. The perfectionistic printing technique, the daily photo walks, the complete immersion in his art.
So, it is with some trepidation that we send Husband into Manhattan. He has a tendency toward workaholic-ism. During the era of his last job, he was known to stay at the office until four in the morning.
It was just him and the cleaning staff sometimes. And we missed him back at the ranch. We really, really did.
Getting laid off, outsourced, axed — whatever you want to call it — was probably one of the best things that ever happened. It meant a severance that supported his efforts to reclaim his photography and establish himself professionally. It was a win-win situation, a gift to us all — we got more time with him, he got more time with us, and he spent a lot of time developing his art.
And then he got an e-mail from his old boss. Like Mr. Incredible in The Incredibles he was lured out of "retirement" from the computer biz. We never thought he’d go back in. But as the Al Pacino character in The Godfather 3 says, "They just keep pulling me back."
But Husband’s reasons are good. He’s doing something he really enjoys. Health Insurance. Benefits. A reliable salary. Money for Son’s college.
It should be fun to try the stable life for a while. Yes, OTBKB is losing her staff photographer (though No Works_Daily Pix by Hugh Crawford will continue as before), and she’s losing her sometime lunch mate at the local sushi shop. Hopefully, Husband will be home in time to make those great dinners he makes. And his homework help is much appreciated.
This time around, we’re hoping that he can set some boundaries. That he can get home at a decent hour and clock some time in as Dad. It’s as important a job as any and one whose time clock is running just about all the time.
Congratulations Husband.
POSTCARD FROM THE SLOPE: Real Women Like Movies
I found this list and article on a new site (for me) called: Lifestyle Filter. The bloggers, who live in Brooklyn, made OTBKB a Blog of the Day, for which I am quite flattered.
"In this post-feminist world," writes Los Angeles Times staff writer, Carina Chocano, there are 54 films that got it right. The also wrote an accompanying piced called Fettered by a Stereotype that takes aim at the term "chick flick." Here are the 54 films she thinks get it right:
1930s-1940s
"Private Lives" (Sidney Franklin, 1931, VHS only): A newly remarried
woman winds up in the hotel room adjacent to her newly remarried ex
during her honeymoon.
"Stage Door" (Gregory La Cava, 1937): A young woman fulfills her dream of becoming an actress.
"Holiday" (George Cukor, 1938 — only on VHS, but worth it): A free
spirit gets engaged to a society girl who would like him to change,
then falls in love with her free-spirited sister.
"The Women" (George Cukor, 1939): No men appear on-screen in this classic satire of women’s problems.
"The Philadelphia Story" (George Cukor, 1940): On the eve of her
remarriage, a socialite is confronted with her ex-husband, whom she
still loves, and a reporter who falls in love with her.
"The Lady Eve" (Preston Sturges, 1941): A smart, beautiful card shark
tries to land a naive millionaire on a cruise ship, then, when he finds
out, tricks him into believing she is someone else.
"Adam’s Rib" (George Cukor, 1949): A prosecutor and a defense lawyer,
married to each other, take opposite sides on a case in which a woman
tried to kill her cheating husband.
1950s-1980s
"All About Eve" (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1950): A legendary aging stage
actress takes on a young assistant who tries to take her place on stage
and in her life.
"Pat and Mike" (George Cukor, 1952): A talented female athlete teams up with the sportswriter who would be her manager.
"Nine to Five" (Colin Higgins, 1980): The classic working girls’ lament.
"Fast Times at Ridgemont High" (Amy Heckerling, 1982): The sexual initiation of high school girls and boys in the 1970s.
"Desperately Seeking Susan" (Susan Seidelman, 1985): A suburban
housewife becomes obsessed with a female grifter she learns about from
the personals.
"Broadcast News" (James L. Brooks, 1987): Two male TV reporters and a
workaholic female producer work together and get involved in each
other’s lives.
"Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown" (Pedro Almodóvar, 1988): A
woman’s lover leaves her and she tries to find out why. When the police
come looking for her to talk about her lover’s illegal activities, she
hires a lawyer who turns out to be her lover’s new lover.
"Say Anything … " (Cameron Crowe, 1989): The romantic initiation of high school girls and boys in the ’80s.
1990s
"Belle Epoque" (Fernando Trueba, 1992): During the Spanish Civil War, a
young man deserts the army and winds up on the farm of a man with four
beautiful and very different daughters.
"Heavenly Creatures" (Peter Jackson, 1994): Based on the true story of
best friends who plot to kill one of their mothers when their parents
come between them.
"Muriel’s Wedding" (P.J. Hogan, 1994): A lonely young woman obsessed
with getting married comes into her own when she meets and moves in
with a free-spirited stranger.
"Before Sunrise" (Richard Linklater, 1995): A young American guy and a
young French girl meet on a train and spend a night in Vienna, and talk
about life.
"Clueless" (Amy Heckerling, 1995): A high school girl in Beverly Hills
tries to play matchmaker to her friends. Based on Jane Austen’s "Emma."
"Home for the Holidays" (Jodie Foster, 1995): A comedy about a
40-year-old single mom who returns home for Christmas after losing her
job and finds out her daughter plans to have sex that weekend.
"Sense and Sensibility" (Ang Lee, 1995): Adapted from Jane Austen’s
novel, the story of two very different sisters and their love lives.
"The Daytrippers" (Greg Mottola, 1996): A woman discovers evidence that
her husband is cheating and enlists her mother, father, sister and
sister’s boyfriend to track him down over a day in New York City.
"Flirting With Disaster" (David O. Russell, 1996): A new dad sets out
to find his birth parents along with his skeptical wife and the
adoption agency worker who’d like to steal him away.
"Walking and Talking" (Nicole Holofcener, 1996): A woman deals with
single life in New York as her best friend prepares to get married.
"Clockwatchers" (Jill Sprecher, 1997): Four very different women become
friends at work, but when someone is accused of stealing, the
friendship can’t withstand the pressure.
"Living Out Loud" (Richard LaGravenese, 1998): A poignant comedy about
a woman who struggles to regain her identity after a divorce.
"Slums of Beverly Hills" (Tamara Jenkins, 1998): A young girl’s
peripatetic life in the low-end apartment buildings of Beverly Hills,
with her shiftless father and the wealthy cousin who comes to stay with
them.
"Being John Malkovich" (Spike Jonze, 1999): A puppeteer discovers a
portal into the head of actor John Malkovich and he, his wife and a
woman he’s fallen in love with at work become obsessed with the idea of
living another person’s (better) life.
"Election" (Alexander Payne, 1999): An uncommonly ambitious high school
student finds herself locked in a battle of wills with a resentful high
school teacher.
"Holy Smoke" (Jane Campion, 1999): A young woman who has joined a cult
is deprogrammed by an expert, but her personality proves a challenge to
him.
"Mansfield Park" (Patricia Rozema, 1999): An adaptation of Jane
Austen’s novel, about a woman who struggles to remain true to herself
in a society where an unmarried girl has no control over her own life.
2000s
"Ghost World" (Terry Zwigoff, 2000): Best friends and art geeks
graduate from high school and drift apart when one of them becomes
involved with a much older man.
"Girlfight" (Karyn Kusama, 2000): A young girl from a troubled home relies on her boxing talent.
"The Anniversary Party" (Alan Cumming, Jennifer Jason Leigh, 2001): An
actress on the decline throws a party for her closest friends to
celebrate the anniversary of her shaky marriage.
"Lovely & Amazing" (Nicole Holofcener, 2001): A comedy about the
three daughters of an insecure woman dealing with identity issues in
contemporary Los Angeles.
"Me Without You" (Sandra Goldbacher, 2001): The touching story of the complicated relationship of two lifelong best friends.
"Y Tu Mamá También" (Alfonso Cuarón, 2001): A woman in her 30s,
secretly dying of cancer, leaves her husband and takes a road trip with
two teenage boys who have been best friends since childhood.
"Adaptation" (Spike Jonze, 2002): An insecure screenwriter struggles to
adapt a book by a journalist about whom he fantasizes, as the
journalist adapts to being made into a character.
"The Good Girl" (Miguel Arteta, 2002): A woman bored with her job and
her marriage hooks up with a cute young guy who thinks he’s Holden
Caulfield.
"Sex Is Comedy" (Catherine Breillat, 2002): A female director directs a sex scene involving a prosthetic penis.
"Easy" (Jane Weinstock, 2003): A promiscuous young woman gives up on sex as she tries to figure out who she is.
"Funny Ha Ha" (Andrew Bujalski, 2003): A young girl navigates the murky waters of postgraduate life.
"Lost in Translation" (Sofia Coppola, 2003): A young woman with a
splintering marriage meets an aging movie star in a hotel in Japan and
a tender friendship develops.
"Pieces of April" (Peter Hedges, 2003): The black sheep struggles to
make Thanksgiving dinner for her family before her mother dies of
cancer.
"Before Sunset" (Richard Linklater, 2004): The couple meet in Paris 10
years after having failed to reconnect as planned, and talk about the
turns their lives have taken.
"Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" (Michel Gondry, 2004):
Depressed over their breakup, former lovers attempt to have their
memories of each other erased.
"Look at Me" (Agnès Jaoui, 2004): An overweight, directionless young
woman deals with the pressures of having a famous, critical father and
a beautiful stepmother close to her own age.
"Saving Face" (Alice Wu, 2004): A young Chinese American doctor comes
out as a lesbian after her mysteriously pregnant widowed mother moves
in.
"Me and You and Everyone We Know" (Miranda July, 2005): A lonely female
artist meets a lonely, recently divorced shoe salesman and tries to
connect.
"I’m the One That I Want," "Notorious C.H.O.," "CHO Revolution":
Stand-up comedy by Margaret Cho that takes on sexism and racism in the
funniest way possible.
"Six Feet Under" (four of the five seasons are on DVD): Best female characters on TV.
NO WORDS_DAILY PIX BY HUGH CRAWFORD
POSTCARD FROM THE SLOPE_The Doll House
‘Twas the day after Christmas and all through the Slope there was gift wrap and packaging in the apartment building garbage pails.
Daughter and I were walking to a friends when we saw something quite extraordinary in front of one of the limestone buildings just a few doors away.
A beautiful doll house — a three-story mansion, really — with a small shopping bag full of faux-elegant doll furniture.
It was being discarded, we surmised, because its owner had to make space for her new gifts. The bedrooms are quite small in the buildings on Third Street. We knew that most of the girls in that building are ten or older — perhaps its owner had finally outgrown the doll house.
Maybe it was some kind of spiritual exchange. The child had been taught that in order to receive a gift, she had to give something away….
All possible explanations for the doll house’s presence on the Third Street pavement.
The doll house was in good condition. Nothing a little Fantastik couldn’t shine up. And the small shopping bag filled with doll furniture was a gesture that said: here take this. It’s yours if you want to carry it away.
First we looked at the house, discussed whether or not to take it, and decided it was too much trouble as we had somewhere to be. I was surprised that Daughter was able to pass it by.
Then she backed up.
"Can we take it? Please?" she begged.
"Where are you going to put it?" I said. Her room is tiny.
"Please?"
"You already have a doll house," I said reminding her of the mid-century modern doll house I’d bought for $20 dollars at a stoop sale on Third Street complete with a shopping bag full of incredible doll furniture.
"I know. But one’s a mansion…"
A mansion maybe. But it’s made out of molded plastic and says Fisher Price right on it. The mid-century modern one we’ve already got is so much more tasteful.
Still, we carried it into the vestibule of our building. "You’re going to need to clean this thing up." I said. "I know," she said. "I know."
The large plastic doll mansion is sitting on top of Daughter’s homework desk until we clear more space in her room. Her Polly Pocket dolls have already taken up residence. The scale isn’t quite right. Whatever.
Let’s see. What item can we choose to discard, to place on the street with a note that says: Take this. It’s yours if you want to carry it away.
NO WORDS_DAILY PIX BY HUGH CRAWFORD
POSTCARD FROM THE SLOPE_KING KONG
We topped off our Christmas day/first night of Hanukkah with the 3-hour "King Kong" at the Pavillion.
At our Hanukkah lox and bagels brunch, my cousins, who had seen the film the previous day, could not say enough bad things about the movie. "Horrible," one cousin said. "Way too long," said another. "Stupid," said a third.
My cousin’s son did, however, enjoy it.
So off we went. I was pretty sure I was going to hate it. Husband really wanted to see it and thought it would be worthwhile. Daughter kept saying, "Why does everyone say we shouldn’t see this movie. I want to see it," she said. Son wouldn’t even cease napping in order to schlep over to the Pavillion in the rain to see the spectacle.
There is something about a 3-hour movie. You settle in for the long haul and prepare to get really wrapped up in the show or get comfy for a looooooooong nap.
Surprise. Surprise. Right from the start, I found the computer-created scenes of New York City during the Depression very compelling. Naomi Watts, as a down-at-the-heels depression era vaudevillian and Jack Black, as a maniacally driven movie director, are really fun to watch.
I realized pretty soon that the film is as much homage to the original King Kong and its subtext of the little guy triumphing over the double threat of the depression and on-coming European menace as it is a contemporary attempt at a blockbuster. And yes, beauty conquers the beast in what is an erotically charged relationship between a woman and a super-sized Kong.
The film also reminded me that even if computer effects take over Hollywood, there is still a need for great actors who know how to act with blue screens as their co-stars.
Leeches, dinosaurs, huge insects, and more, the middle section of the film on Skull Island is quite a scary/joy ride. But it would be pretty awful if we didn’t care about the actors and their characters.
The cast is great. The beautiful Naomi Watts, could have been a silent movie star with her wonderful facial expressions and expressivity. Her big eyes and looks of longing communicate affection for the big ape in a moving and real way. Jack Black, Adrian Brody, and a crew of great character actors, do a lot with their roles, as well. Andy Cirkus, as the motion actor for Kong, is incredible and makes this computer ape into the highly emotional, big baby he is.
The last hour of the film, the New York section, is worth the price of admission. You’ve seen it before but it is well worth seeing again: Naomi and Kong on the tip of the Empire State Building…
Luckily, my suspension of disbelief was established hours before. The occasional thought: wouldn’t she be cold in that summer dress in the dead of winter in Central Park?; How does she run through the jungle with bare feet?; Wouldn’t she be terribly injured or dead by now…
Ah, but those were but small blips of distance during what was is basically a very entertaining experience. Peter Jackson, who is a obsessive student of one of the most popular films of all time, remakes it with all the computer bells and whistles money can buy.
He also had the smarts to cast a great slew of actors and to not use his special effects at the expense of narrative, pacing, and a great respect for the original.
