Monday, July 19, 2010
Go watch "Inception"! NOW!!
Christopher Nolan’s latest creation, “Inception”, truly is a brilliant movie... actually it is so good the title should have been “Fucking Brilliant Movie”.
It’s got it all: the heart breaking romance; the struggle for freedom (both juridical and psychological); good action; breath taking special effects (with absolutely original scenarios); excellent soundtrack; realistic and witty dialogues; guns (!!!); no cheesiness; scary bits ...it has everything.
As a matter of fact it is like someone went through the archives where all the good movies are kept and said “Ok, now we are going to make a movie with: some of The Italian Job, a bit of The Matrix, ...what else?...Oh yes! Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (duh...), a sprinkle of The Heroes of Telemark and, for the ending, a WTF! Donnie Darko last scene, just to send you home with the need to talk about it”.
Leonardo Di Caprio once again shows how much of an actor he is but the best thing of this flick is that he is not the one that makes the movie: the whole cast does an outstanding work.
Team-work is mixed with individuality: great performances made possible only thanks to a simple but really effective way of alternating different layers of settings.
Reality meets subconscious, creating a plot that litterally dances through the characters, hooking you from start to end.
A further praise goes to the female cast: to Marion Cotillard (Public Enemies), scary as hell, and to Ellen Page (Juno), who plays the role of a “Jiminy Cricket” to Leonardo Di Caprio, steering him through the quay of his tortured subconscious with the humanity that by now is her trade mark.
“This time we have to go deep”.
And deep they went.
Only criticism I feel confident to make: some comic relief more here and there would have made this movie actually perfect.
A truly memorable cinematic experience.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Politics
The problem is, though, that everyone seems to focus on the actual height of one of the candidates than actually focusing on the fact that he is going to be guilty of the exact thing he claims he's trying to fight as Minister for Public Administration and Innovation: absenteeism.
And, nation-wide, he is one of the good ones: and for “good” I mean “with no criminal records”.
The fact that there's a good chance that this power-addicted little Minister (and by “little” I mean he is the head of a secondary Ministry, and not that he's ridiculously tiny) is going to be elected doesn't really bother me for one reason: I've lost my faith in politics when I started thinking with my own mind and found out what politics actually is.
Politics is, with whoring, the most ancient trade of the so called “civilized world”.
Remember Athens from the history books?
Remember how democracy started there?
It started when a guy called Cleisthenes decided to overthrow Hippias the Tyrant, son of Peisistratus (the man who said “let's write this down” while pointing at a guy who was chanting the Odissey in a tavern), and to acomplish that he did what in my opinion is the very foundation of modern politics: he bribed the high Priestess of Delphi to “persuade” (read: “do it or the gods will smack your silly arse from here to eternity”...) the Spartans to help him in his campaign.
Little detail: Cleisthenes's daddy built the new temple of Delphi...how fortunate for Cleisthenes, right?...
With this I'm not saying a tyrant is better than a thousands corrupted politicians, even though we must keep in mind that the concept of tyranny in those days was very different from the one we have nowadays.
All I'm saying is that politicians were a bunch of power-seeking dogs since the beginning of modern times and it shouldn't surprise anyone if the system is corrupted to the extent that nothing we can do or no one we can vote for would ever be able to change anything.
Not even the impending climatic doomsday is good enough a reason for them to sit and talk solutions: they are just too much worried for their own dirty interests to do shit about it.
They are actually waiting for the oil supply to run off because that's the only way they can squeeze every last penny out of it.
So, at this point, one can argue: what kind of stupid man would just stand up and say “politics is shit, the system has not worked since the beginning and our way of life and our very own lives are in jeopardy because the ruling class is actually far from interested in the greater good” without presenting a solution?
Well, I am.
And you know why?
Because there is no solution.
The human race has taken the wrong turn far too many centuries ago to be able to take the right exit now: politics, religions, wars and racial hatred fucked us up for good, all of us, in a way that goes way more deeper than our rationality and we can not come up with a solution simply because we are way too deep in the mud of our history.
And, let's face it, we have a pretty messed up history.
There was some good, but obviously not enough.
So what I'm saying is very radical and maybe a little crazy but bear with me, I'm almost finished. Next time you go express your preference for an election think about this: what would YOU do (and I mean REALLY do, not just some hypocritical bullshit like “if I was in charge I would clean up this town”) if you were to be elected?
I think that deep inside, when you have really thought it through you would realize that we are at this juncture in history just because we deserved it.
We deserved Bush, we deserved Berlusconi, we deserved Sarkozy.
Why?
Because, as Aristotle once wrote, man is “zoòn politicòn”, a political animal: I really believe that he was right and if I was an animal I would be so fucking offended by it.
We invented politics, but politics also reinvented our kind and now we have to deal with the consequences of our creation.
The shit-storm is always up ahead...
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Ma perchè???
E se uno ha il gusto per l'orrido non riesce a fare a meno di pensarci...
Il fatto che la manifestazione più importante della musica italiana si sia appena conclusa di certo non facilità la mia obiettività sull'argomento ma, in tutta onestà, avrei la stessa opinione anche in giugno e tale opinione, al di fuori di ogni metafora, è semplicemente che il Festival da almeno trentanni fa tristezza e sempre la farà se non viene cambiato completamente l'approccio che “mamma Rai” ha verso uno dei suoi appuntamenti annuali più importanti.
Il motivo?
Semplice.
È l'unico festival musicale che conosco in cui il pubblico è costretto a star seduto per ore con il solo scopo di vedere delle performance dal format ormai obsoleto già da una trentina d'anni.
Il pop italiano o meglio, come vogliamo chiamarlo per colpa di un ingiustificato sentimento di superiorità, il cantautorato italiano non è mai stato caratterizzato dal desiderio di rinnovarsi (basti pensare che i più grandi successi degli anni '60 e '70 sono cover di band anglofone, per lo più) e se a questo si aggiunge la pomposità di un'orchestra che suona dal vivo il risultato è un sound ormai liso e scontato che da sessant'anni intasa le vie aeree per un mese circa nel periodo più freddo dell'anno.
Non voglio dire con questo che l'italia non abbia mai visto nascere talenti musicali, tutt'altro: De Gregori, Dalla, De Andrè, PFM (e la lista è troppo lunga per essere comprensiva di tutti) hanno scritto pezzi senza tempo.
Il piccolo problema di cui nessuno sembra rendersi conto da più di mezzo secolo è che nemmeno uno di quei pezzi senza tempo è uscito da Sanremo.
Una delle canzoni più famose uscite dal Festival è “Vita Spericolata” di Vasco Rossi, nell'ormai lontano 1983.
E mi astengo da qualsiasi commento, soprattutto perchè la seconda in classifica recita “...Trottolino amoroso, e dudù dadadà....”.
Non sono mai stato un grosso fan delle versioni orchestrali di pezzi di musica pop o rock, principalmente perchè sono due mondi troppo paralleli e distanti per poter collidere in modo produttivo ma devo ammettere che qualche esperimento ben riuscito è stato condotto con successo.
Ma non è il caso del Festival della Canzone Italiana.
Certo, Nilla Pizzi faceva la sua porca figura con una “band” di quaranta elementi, Modugno sembrava l'apostolo della canzone e Orietta Berti strappava la testa delle classifiche ai Beatles con le sue canzoni confezionate a puntino per Sanremo.
Sessant'anni fa.
Oggi abbiamo la banalità di Valerio Scanu, costola dell'altrettanto genialmente banale Maria De Filippi e della sua “fabbrica di plastica” (e vediamo se indovinate la citazione :P), abbiamo Arisa e la sua giovialità demenziale, abbiamo canzoni su tematiche come l'omosessualità che fanno accaponare la pelle e arrivano seconde.
E quest'anno abbiamo raggiunto il fondo del magazzino in cui è conservato il fatidico “barile”: Pupo torna al Festival dei fiori e chi si porta dietro oltre a un tenore?
Emanuele (Eccetera Eccetera Puccio Eccetera) Filiberto Di Savoia, Principe di Venezia (dice lui).
E come se questo non fosse già abbastanza per sprecarsi in insulti verso di lui, suo padre, suo nonno e tutta la sua linea genealogica di nani prezzolati, il titolo della canzone sembra scelto apposta per istigare la gente a bruciargli la Porsche: “Italia Amore Mio”....o per tentare nell'immediato futuro una carriera politica, facendo tesoro della lezione di Berlusconi che prima ancora di venire eletto aveva già pronto l'inno per Forza Italia.
Mi chiedo se la mancanza di commenti da parte di Antonella Clerici su tanta spudoratezza sia frutto di estrema professionalità o indice di un cachè ai limiti del criminoso...
Infatti, il trasporto del “Principe” nel cantare il suo amore per il Bel Paese è tanto stucchevole che viene voglia di prendere uno stura lavandini chimico per uso industriale e svuotarglielo in gola...
E poi prendere Pupo, che canta con voce spezzata dall'emozione, rivolgendosi a Filiberto
“...Tu non potevi ritornare pur non avendo fatto niente, ma chi si può paragonare, a chi ha sofferto veramente...”, e mandarlo a contare le macchine nel traforo del San Bernardino un sabato d'agosto.
Vediamo poi chi si paragona a chi....
Voglio ribadire che questa è una mia opinione, tanto quanto lo è stata quella dei DIECI milioni di telespettatori che con il televoto hanno decretato il vincitore di quest'anno e penso anche che, se la logica non m'inganna, tutto questo possa portare a una sola conclusione: l'italiano medio ha gusti musicali di merda....ma per quanto questo possa infastidirmi, comunque non si merita di avere Pupo che canta insieme a un Savoia sul palco dell'Ariston.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
I've heard the news today, oh boy!
You might have not heard yet but the Prime Minister of Italy, Silvio Berlusconi, got attacked a couple of days ago.
He got hit by a plaster “Duomo di Milano” replica right on that small spot between mouth and the tip of the nose: a nasty spot indeed...and a bloody one too, from what appears from the pictures taken after the fact.
For the record Berlusconi was attending a public event the night he got “ambushed” and you also might not know that more or less last week he came down pretty hard on Italy's President Napolitano and all the justice apparatus (better yet, the part of it investigating him for “organized crime-related issues”).
Now the tension in here is pretty palpable: Facebook groups claiming the head of the attacker, others trying to name roads after him, some just linking the video of the agression (oh yeah...we got it all on tape...HD baby!) with the only comment ROFLMAO.
What I am trying to say here is that being this a political matter first of all, all it took was a small(-ish) piece of clay that smashed Berlusconi's face in to turn the political switch back on among the “shallow” cyber comunity in Italy...who would've guessed that!?
I am also not trying to say I am above the laughter: infact what I wrote so far was just an introduction to my first reaction, which I wanted to share with you.
Berlusconi's face when he gets hit is pretty fucking funny!!
Like the face Josef Blatter made when he fell into that hole during that Fifa ceremony (footage that was on for weeks on one of Mediaset shows...everybody in Italy have seen it atleast once)...except Blatter did all that thanks to his wit...silly silly man...
Anyway, my point is: funny? Yes. Hilarious? Not really.
Hilarious would have been the same guy running up to the “Invincible” (I'm quoting Berlusconi himself here...) Prime Minister and kicking him the nuts, hard, like that guy in the jumpsuite and orange wig from the tely!
That would have been a freaking hilarious masterpiece of italian politics!
Now, instead, we have something mildly grotesque: the whole cabinet and the PdL asking for retribution, an opposition condemning the act but also implying (“openly” implying let's say, in some cases...like Di Pietro...) that Berlusconi has been fishing for an “ass whooping” the last two mandates (and that's being generous...) and the media world gone wild like wolves on a dead dear...
With a kick in the nuts everybody would have been just too busy laughing their asses out to care about the political side of the accident, which was, as it happens, the random act of violence of a quite disturbed fellow.
Of course there are also some conspiracy theories, all very interesting and all very entertaining but the bottom line is: we have “our guy”, the perpetrator, so we are pretty much satisfied in the “justice department”... all we want now is more gossip!!
We want to know everything, real or not real, about this Tartaglia guy.
We want to know when a next attack is expected for (i'm not shitting you, people-mostly dumb people, to be fair- are actually waiting for an escalation...ye, I know...imagine what would have been the escalation of a kick in the nuts!!!) and what happened and what was said in the hospital during the two days Berlusconi was “held” there.
Yes! Held! The Prime Minister was actually full of rage and spunk and clearly wanted to kick Tartaglia's ass: it would have taken just the pinky of one of his bodyguards to brake that coward in two, I bet!
The bastard that from a distance of at least one or even two meters (two meters! Wow! Almost like impossible to wrap your mind around that concept...), like a sniper hiding in the shadows and waiting for the right moment, cowardly attacked one of the most heavily guarded persons in Europe and managed not to get butt-raped by a big dude in a suit with a 234 size of shirt collar!
You gotta love Italy right now, I tell ya!
To conclude let me indulge a bit on this thought I had: let's say that I was writing a pure fiction novel with the same elements as the abovementioned; what would be a better ending than the scared and scarred leader fakely (...that's right! I can make up words!...my blog, my words!) retiring from politics “for it would not be safe for him and his family anymore” just to wait for his followers to chant in the streets for his glorious return as Prime Minister, or better yet a “constitutionally improved” return as full USA-style President?
That would be a great book, right?
Pure fiction of course, being the Prime Minister even in the least interested on becoming...ooops!
Entertaining and scary! The kind of book that makes the big bucks nowadays...
Meanwhile we'll just have to cope with fuck-heads saying “what would be illegal about giving the Tartaglia guy to us for justice instead of leaving him in the cares of the inefficient legal system?”
P.s. Read this fast because the goverment is seriously thinking about censorship on every webpage instigating to violence and related to the bleeding mouth incident (not a snuff movie)....kidding...not really...yes I am...ask Maroni if i'm kiddin'...
Sunday, November 29, 2009
going home
First: diarrhea is like taxes when you travel, someone might say, for it will come, sooner or later.
I had the luck to get attacked by the vicious disease in Bangkok the day before my flight back to Italy, where I could benefit of a clean and private bathroom in my hotel room.
My concern is the airplane experience.
Will I stink up the all plane and force the captain to emergency land and throw me out, like someone suggested me?
Thanks for giving me that new paranoia, by the way...
As usual I ended up talking about shit...
Second: I was walking around looking for souvenirs and gifts in Kao San Road (where the morning is an experience of smells that remind you how drunk everyone was the night before) and i realized that it would be a waste of time.
The same crapy bracelets, dishes and whatnot are easily found all around the world for, pretty much, the same money.
My logical conclusion is this, then: fuck souvenirs and gifts from Kao San Road.
I'm gonna stick with Toblerone from airport: a classic!
Third: I can't stand the heat anymore.
I'm a cold guy.
Fourth: Le Mangueise (I think it's written like this but not positive) it's by far the coolest place I've had the luck to visit and, as a plus, I made new awesome friends there.
In conclusion, if I was (and still am) not exactly in my element for various reasons (height, weather, culture, etc) this was the most thrilling and mindblowing trip I've ever taken and I guess it will keep the title for quite a long time.
Thanks everyone.
Sir Crapalot
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Ultimo giorno a Bangkok
Devo dire che non mi intristisce nemmeno l'idea di abbandonare un posto dove il Palazzo Reale e' fatto d'oro massiccio a 24 carati (una guida commentava orgogliosa come tutti i soldi del biglietto d'ingresso, circa 10 euro, vadano nella manutenzione di un intonaco cosi prezioso...ovviamente passando prima nel Portafogli Reale...) ed e situato giusto alla fine di un viale dove c'e gente che dorme su materassi fatti di sacchi di immondizia...
Alle sette di domani mattina prendero un bel bus che in 9 ore circa mi portera' a Siem Reap, da dove potro' visitare i templi di Angkor.
Spero onestamente (anche se so gia' che e' fatica sprecata) di non diventare anche laggiu' il tizio di cui tutti si ricordano perche' "very tall eheheh"....
A presto.
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Arrivato a Bangkok
Per tutti i miei fan posso garantire che il viaggio e stato un incubo vero e proprio e in questo momento sono sveglio da piu ore di quante ne riesca a contare...
Non sono ora in grado di descrivere con precisione i due animali rarissimi e grazie a dio in estinzione che ho avuto come vicini di posto nelle due tratte di volo per arrivare fin qui ma posso dire che me li ricordero a lungo....
....se non altro per avermi tenuto sveglio con il loro parlarmi di cose di cui non mi interessava una mazza....ma di gente che non riceve segnali palesi ne e pieno il mondo...
La prima immagine di questo posto che vorrei commentare, comunque, e il biglietto di auguri gigante per il compleanno del re della thailandia (il 5 dicembre prossimo): una gigantografia della sua faccia su sfondo DORATISSIMO con la scritta che io credo voglia dire "buon comple vecchio animale"....sembra che butti da bere a tutti il 5 sera...
La seconda immagine e invece quella di una ragazza di neanche 25 anni che collassa in mezzo alla strada e le macchine la schivano...spero seriamente che non sia morta.
Il terzo e ultimo oggetto che tengo a commentare, per concludere, consiste nel arabescato inginocchiatoio da pompini che ho trovato nella mia stanza d albergo a 4 stelle (stanotte volevo dormire bene...), giusto in fianco alla bottiglia dell acqua minerale gassata con sopra un biglietto/ avviso che recita "per ogni persona extra che si porta in stanza sono 500 thai-soldi in piu. grazie".
salutoni