I woke up a bit after 8 this morning, thinking that I should get up, as my Wednesdays are always abbreviated due to my ridiculously early bedtime.
Of course, I also thought, “Fuck that,” and managed to stay in bed until a bit before 9.
In an unusual bit of motivation, I made my way to the kitchen and began making some breakfast. I hadn’t eaten a proper meal yesterday, opting for a sandwich for lunch and grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner, so hunger was the source of my motivation.
I had just finished making my bacon and eggs and was in the process of setting my plate down on the table when my phone rang.
It was my mother. I opted to eat the eggs, figuring I could do that quietly enough so that she wouldn’t have to listen to me chewing, but decided that the bacon was just going to have to wait.
After talking to my mother – and eating my bacon – I did the whole shower and shave thing, got dressed, and headed off to the comic shop.
I spent quite a bit there, as I picked up a copy of the trade collecting the first five issues of Jack of Fables, as well as a copy of the Fables: 1001 Nights of Snowfall hardcover.
Beyond that I also paid for Scott’s comics (though he will, of course, pay me back), which was pricier than normal, as he’s opted to begin collecting Jack of Fables and Buffy: Season Eight and had requested that I grab whatever back issues of those I could find there, so that added some extra comics, and I grabbed a copy of the Jack of Fables trade for him as well, as it only made sense.
From there it was off to Super Target where, based on the wary looks most of the women present were giving me and their general skittishness around me, I learned that I must have been looking especially creepy today. Not sure what made today so special. Maybe there’s just something inherently disturbing about a guy buying toilet paper and paper towels.
Anyway, that’s been my day so far. It’s not likely to get any more interesting.
I’ve often mentioned that there are certain movies that, when they’re on, I feel compelled to watch. One such movie is Tim Burton’s black and white cult classic Ed Wood, which was on IFC the other night, and which I watched.
(As an aside, people think that, because of my feelings about his Batman movies, I don’t like Tim Burton. It’s not true. With the exception of the aforementioned Batman movies and the complete waste of two hours of my life – time that I will never be able to recover – that was his Planet of the Apes remake, I’ve liked most of what I’ve seen.)
I really enjoy Ed Wood in large part because of the performances of Martin Landau and Johnny Depp, but also because the real Ed Wood was an utterly fascinating man in so many respects.
As terrible as his movies were, you just have to love the cockeyed optimism of the man, and his total commitment to bringing his singular vision to life. Sure, his movies sucked ass, but he put everything he had into making those shitty, shitty movies. Nothing could deter him from following his dreams.
His awful, tacky dreams.
How can you not admire someone like that?
In the Burton movie much time is spent focusing on the making of his movie Bride of the Monster (originally titled Bride of the Atom), and in reading the Wikipedia entry on Wood I learned that, unsurprisingly, Bride of the Monster had been featured on an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000.
So naturally I hit the MST3K newsgroup and downloaded the episode.
It was kind of interesting to watch the movie after having seen the fictionalized version of its making so many times. Seeing an actual scene rather than Burton’s version of the scene often made it rather jarring, particularly if there was a big difference between the two, though conversely it was interesting to see the scenes that Burton had really nailed.
The casting difference were also kind of jarring. I was watching it and thinking, “But that’s not Juliet Landau playing the part of Loretta King playing the part of Janet Lawton, it’s actually Loretta King playing the part of Janet Lawton!” or “Hey, that’s not Sarah Jessica Parker.”
Knowing at least some of the backstory – or at least some version of it – surrounding the making of the movie also added to the experience.
And of course it all made the comments of Joel and the gang that much funnier.
Oh, and the movie itself? Absolutely terrible, but then, how could it be otherwise?
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