This photo rules.

lighting
Originally uploaded by francography

This photo rules. That's all I have to say.

~~~o

Every single one of us was a sperm once

but in the internet age with porn

sperm fertilizing eggs is rarer than ever

we are a dying breed

SEND THIS ALONG TO 15 PEOPLE OR YOUR TRUE LOVE WILL BE JERKED OFF ONTO THE FLOOR AND YOU'LL NEVER MEET HER/HIM

Pain by Cody Clarke

Pain
by Cody Clarke

Sometimes you stomp into me suddenly
slam the door
and collapse onto my stomach
to cry your eyes out

so I slump in my chair
or wherever I am
waiting
until you can stand

inheriting the pain
too big for your body
wherever you are now
in this world

Mickey Mouse by Cody Clarke

Mickey Mouse
by Cody Clarke

He occupied two seats of the subway
his ass crack resting right on the split between them
and defended the territory
of the three empty and adjacent seats
against all trying occupants
with a
You can’t sit there
and the timbre of a science teacher
on the impossibility of time travel

His feet were moldy loaves of bread
his legs I forget
and his shirt was Mickey Mouse
large and proud
partially obscured by the cardboard sign
our man wore with string
like librarian glasses
stating simply and in Sharpie
that he loved New York
in words I also forget

I only saw him for the duration of one stop
and he kept quiet except for one burp
that was sort of loud
and then as we entered the station
he got up and waited at the doors
and as they opened he laid a fart
like a bass drum distorted beyond recognition
by a Japanese noise artist
and placed on limited vinyl
to be sold to indie kids
for the price of their allowance

and the man next to me whimpered
and clutched his newly bloody chest
because the fart had had a bullet in it
and the man died before the next stop

Everyone in the subway car went to the funeral
and we all stayed in contact after
and learned sign language together at the YMCA
and helped each other further with it on weekends

and my life is better now and we’re all happier as people

Floors by Cody Clarke

Floors
by Cody Clarke

High School kids
The freaks, the hipsters
the whatever-they’re-called-now

These kids sit on floors
at concerts
on subways
in the halls
in the street
outside venues

You know this and I know this
and I do not know when this originally started

Probably not as far back as greasers
because although greasers were greasy
I can’t see greasers
huddled around each other
like some sort of 2001: A Space Odyssey
reenactment troupe

but I can see hippies and beatniks doing it
and so for the sake of this poem
we will assume that is where it originates

This poem is not about lineage though
This poem is about the subconscious

Yes, they are doing it because their friends do it
Such is obvious
but deeper than that
deeper than what they realize

Floors equal germs
germs equal colds
colds equal absences

I submit that on a subconscious level
those-who-dress-as-though
-they-would-like-to-be-beat-up
sit on floors
in order to

increase their chance of contracting illness

and thus
decrease the days they have to attend school

This is probably why they do
a lot of other stupid stuff too
with their bodies

but I will not pursue this study further

this is not a subject that interests me enough
to write more stanzas
and list more instances supporting my hypothesis

I just thought it was an interesting thought
maybe not enough for an experiment
or an essay
but enough for poetry
or a haiku:

Kids willingly sit
on ground fit for no ass
School is a prison

John Cusack by Cody Clarke

John Cusack
by Cody Clarke

When I was nine years old
I saw Grosse Pointe Blank in the movie theater

and it was my favorite movie
and I thought Martin Blank was really cool

so in class
I'd draw John Cusack all the time
in his hitman clothes fighting bad guys

I'm pretty sure
I was the only nine-year-old doing that
in the entire world
and that made me feel special

even more special
than getting to see this R-rated movie
and not have my eyes covered by a parent
since my sister took me

because I had my own special hero
not a Rambo or an Arnold
but a secret hero

John Cusack

and in the 80's
girls drew him in class just like I did
but for other reasons

They didn't love him like I did

They just wanted to kiss his face
and fuck him in a foggy car
which is stupid

he has killing to do
and that's better than sex
when you're a boy that age

because sex you don't wanna draw in class
because then you get hard
and you don't want that
because even if you were old enough
to be able to do something about it
you couldn't in that setting

but killing is great for drawing in class
because it's just as fun as drawing sex
but without the getting hard part

but it's different for girls
because they can get turned on covertly
so drawing killing has no purpose
since they can draw sex freely

They'd like drawing killing too probably
if they had dicks
and couldn't get turned on covertly

and if that were the case
they'd take John Cusack from me in 1997 for sure
and he wouldn't be my obscure secret hero

and then they'd draw him killing every bad person or thing
as well as draw him kissing them
and fucking them in foggy cars

but it'd be worth losing him
because the popularity for that movie would be higher
which would earn it the sequel
it had always deserved

Water by Cody Clarke

Water
by Cody Clarke

Water doesn't just come from nowhere
That percent you carry
depending on how fat you are

When you were formed in your mother
it came from your mother

and then eventually
I don't know when
but I guess when you're older
(I don't know exactly how long it takes)
all of it has been replaced by new water
from drinking new water

That's something

That's an event
even more interesting than a birthday
even if it can't be precisely measured
only approximately calculated

How does water deep inside you leave though

What makes your gooey organs get less gooey and wet
and need new water
and receive new water

What's the process

Or does it never need new water
Is the water that makes your organs gooey
the same water that's always been in you

It can't be
that's too crazy

I remember going over digestion in school
but I don't remember how water gets distributed
after it gets drank

Your stomach is probably in charge of it
Your stomach does a lot

I don't want to use Google
I'm just gonna give the credit to the stomach
because it deserves it

and if I'm right
the poem is non-fiction
and if I'm wrong
the poem is fiction

Aguirre, the Wrath of God: HIATUS

I'm not gonna finish the Aguirre the Wrath of God analysis I started on this blog. I know I'm not going to. There's too much I'd like to write about each scene, and it'd turn this blog into solely me doing so. There's no way to write about that movie in short, readable bursts. Well, maybe there is, but I don't know how to. I tried to when it came to the first scene, but there was so much more I wanted to write.

Anyway, maybe one day I'll come back to it and work on it. Not on this blog though. I'm having a much better time just writing poems and posting updates here or there.

Speaking of poetry, I'm working on a poetry book! It's 21 pages so far, so it's very early on... but I wrote 3 poems yesterday and 1 today, so maybe it won't take as long as I think. I don't know. Who knows? I don't.

See ya

Bites by Cody Clarke

Bites
by Cody Clarke

I used to take bites out of her
and that was all I looked forward to

I hated school
so I'd cut and sleep through the worst classes
in this corner on the 4th floor
where a big green garbage can
blocked me from the sight of guards

and at the end of the day
I'd bring her home with me
and she'd let me chew her flesh
purple and red

We'd do all the other stuff too
but I liked marking her the most
I liked that she'd see spots of me
in the shower in the morning

then the full map
in the medicine cabinet mirror
as she dressed

and the best was when she didn't see it
when I chafed her in class
under the clothes her mother chose for her

We only lasted a few weeks
and when we got back into bed years later
I could barely touch my teeth to her

She was too far gone
and she smelled of tuition

Girlfriend's Mother by Cody Clarke

Girlfriend's Mother
by Cody Clarke

I opened the door
to see her slide her arms fast
out from between her legs under the covers
and cover her eyes with both hands
blocking the light I'd swung in

I pulled the door shut quickly
and went into the next room down
the correct room
to urinate

When I came out
her bedroom door was open
and she was now sitting
on the side of her bed
turned away from me

I stood and watched her
wipe her forehead
and feel her heartbeat

then realized she was showing me
that she had the same scars
and bruises on my back
as my girlfriend

She turned her head finally
and looked at me in my boxers
in the bright light
sweaty from her daughter

I looked down at the floor
at my shadow stretched out to her
and I closed the door

I went down to the end of the hall
opened the door gently
and saw my girlfriend still dreaming

I climbed into her bed quietly
and stared up at the darkness
for a really long time
and then even longer with my eyes closed

Squeezer by Cody Clarke

Squeezer
by Cody Clarke

She loves pressing against me
pressing pressing pressing

Like I could never be too close
only too far

I could crush her in my arms
like an important scientific document
in an escaped gorilla's fist
and it'd be less painful
than losing me

I've hugged her really really hard

Harder than I've ever hugged
anyone
and she's a skinny thing
but she takes it with a smile

She just loves it so much
and she's the only one
I've met that does

Girls that were crazy about me
and downright crazy themselves
even they had their limits

But this one

She wants all of me
and she's saner than them all
and smarter
and stronger

She knows she can take it all
and she won't stop squeezing
and it feels so fucking good

Intervention by Cody Clarke

Intervention
by Cody Clarke

You can date
all the asshole idiots you want
I'm used to that by now

but if you marry one
that's the day I kidnap you
I take you

stick you in the basement with pens
and yellow paper
and starve you
unless you write

like you fucking should be
you fucking floozy

Bernard Pivot Questionnaire

Bernard Pivot Questionnaire

1. What is your favorite word?
Righteous (I say it too much for my own good, but it never gets old to me)

2. What is your least favorite word?
Venerable (Just can't stand the sound of it, the definition is fine)

3. What turns you on creatively, spiritually or emotionally?
Creativity (For all three)

4. What turns you off creatively, spiritually or emotionally?
Laziness/Ignorance (For all three)

5. What sound or noise do you love?
Meowing

6. What sound or noise do you hate?
Barking

7. What is your favorite curse word?
Fuck

8. What profession other than your own would you like to attempt?
Chef

9. What profession would you not like to do?
Embalmer

10. If Heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the Pearly Gates?
"It's alright, you can keep going back"

Christmas Gripe: Wham - Last Christmas

Christmas Gripe:


When the only reference to christmas in your song is the title of the song, repeated at the beginning of each chorus, you're cheating! Wham cheated!

As good and catchy as the song is, it's barely a christmas song. I cannot prove this, but I'm pretty sure they just took a regular ol' single they had up their ass, stuck the word 'christmas' in it, and shipped it off as a christmas song, because there is nothing christmas about the subject matter of the song. The song is about getting your heartbroken by someone, and then this year, not letting it happen again. What is christmas about that? Nothing, except for the fact we are told it happened last christmas. They could've said it happened whenever! The song could have been called Last Year, or Last Time, Last Ramadan for fucks sake.

Nonetheless, it's catchy as fuck, and now that I think of it, what they did was genius. By turning this single into a christmas song, they made it so it would only be listened to at a certain time each year... which means it can never get old, because if you only listen to it in December each year, it's impossible to get sick of it. Fuck Wham for being smart cheaters!

Aguirre, the Wrath of God: Descending the Mountain (Part II)

Descending the Mountain (Part II)

What do we know about the morality of out adventurers? They've conquered and plundered the Incas, which tells us that they see nothing wrong with murdering and stealing. How do they justify this evil? Later, we learn that they are Christians, traveling with a priest. This tells us that through their personal interpretation of the Bible, their actions are justified; that stealing, murdering, and enslaving (we learn later that they are traveling with slaves in tow) is justified as long as they are the ones doing it. They believe they are superior, because they have interpreted the bible to say they are.

Herzog does not want us to know this about them yet, though. He could've explained it in his written introduction, or possibly shown them coming down the mountain in garish clothing, standing out from the mountain background, in order to convey how superior they feel to the world around them. Instead, he chose to dress them in colors that appear naturally on the mountain:







Until we see them at the lowest point of their trek, they look less like people and more like part of the mountain shifting. This conveys the objectivity of the situation-- that our adventurers are objectively no different than the natural world around them, other than that they are heading downward in an organized fashion. The adventurers represent mankind, and this shot conveys that what sends us downward is delusion, greed, and the perpetration of evil.

This concludes my analysis of this portion of the scene.

Aguirre, the Wrath of God: Descending the Mountain (Part I)

In this entry, I will show how a portion of the first scene of "Aguirre, the Wrath of God" serves as a synecdoche for a major theme of the movie.

In my previous entry, I said there wouldn't be any spoilers in this one, but I didn't explain what I consider a spoiler. Since everyone has their own barometer of what constitutes a spoiler, I'll give my definition. I see a spoiler as anything the director intended to be a surprise during the first viewing of their movie. If you agree, read on. If not, see the movie first.

Descending the Mountain

The camera tilts down as we follow a faint line of people descending a foggy mountain;

(Click any shot to enlarge)

we see more of the line,


and then finally, the lowest section of it.


This shot tells us the grandiosity of their trek, and through their downward direction and the tone of the music we hear, a sense of foreboding is conveyed. We know this will be a difficult journey-- that much is a given even if they were climbing up instead-- but what more does this shot tell us?

In the brief, written introduction from Werner Herzog that preceded this first scene, we were told the following:

After the conquest and plundering of the Inca empire by Spain, the Indians invented the legend of El Dorado, a land of gold, located in the swamps of the Amazon headwaters. A large expedition of Spanish adventurers, led by Gonzalo Pizarro, set off from the Peruvian highlands in late 1560.

In short: Fresh off a brutal victory, swelling with pride and motivated by greed, our adventurers are embarking in pursuit of something that doesn't exist.

A righteous journey (a journey towards an objective, tangible goal) can be described as a mountain climb: the climb representing the upward, arduous journey that must be persevered, in order to reach the 'mountain top' reward.

In this tale, the reward the adventurers are in pursuit of doesn't exist, and thus, they will never reach their destination or attain any riches. This is why the film starts with their descent down a mountain-- there is no 'mountain top' for them to ever reach, where they're headed. The Peruvian highlands they control was their only 'mountain top', and they abandoning it on a greedy, deluded pursuit.

In the next entry, I will analyze the color palette of this shot, and what that tells us about our adventurers.

To be continued...

Movie Analysis: Aguirre, the Wrath of God

Aguirre, the Wrath of God


Introduction

I won't be reviewing this movie further than the five star rating I've given it above. Instead, I'll be analyzing key scenes and themes from it, over a series of blog entries. Whether you should read my analyses before or after you've seen the movie is up to you, and how you like viewing movies.

The next entry will be an analysis of the first scene of the movie, which I regard as one of the most beautiful scenes ever filmed. Plot won't be discussed, only the images on screen, so it's spoiler-free.

Really Good Racehorse Names That Aren't Taken

Really Good Racehorse Names That Aren't Taken
by Cody Clarke

Bruce Lee The Horse

Movie Review: Marked For Death

Marked For Death
Directed by Dwight H. Little
94 min.



This movie kicks fucking ass. It's retarded as hell, and for the majority of the time, wonderfully retarded; counting toothpicks and cards for Tom Cruise like nobody's business. In a few instances though, the retardation hurts the movie, like Samuel L. Jackson's crazy homeless guy fist crashing against his crazy homeless guy head.*

Good Retardations

- The movie is about the Jamaican drug mob destroying small town America and performing voodoo curses on people that get in their way. That's a good fucking plot line right there, I don't give a fuck. Don't act like you don't want to see that fucking movie. Don't act like your brain didn't run tons of possible cool scenes in your head when you read that shit, and quite frankly, if it didn't, you don't need to be reading my movie reviews. My movie reviews are catered to those who when hearing that plot line, there brain immediately starts running cool scenes it thinks might occur, because it can't fucking wait to see it.

- Keith David is Seagal's sidekick. Yes, Keith David from They Live! Holding and using guns again! Fighting people! Is your dick hard yet?

- Seagal's lines, as always. I won't ruin a single one cause those are always best when they catch you off guard. In fact, there's a lot of this movie that I really shouldn't ruin. I'm gonna cut my good retardations list short here. This is one of those movies where you just have to trust me it kick ass, and go see it.

Bad Retardations

- Shitty Jamaican accents. Not quite Jar Jar Binks level, but close to it. Shitty bad guy lines and behavior overall, actually.

"EVERYBODY WANT GO HEAVEN BUT NOBODY WANT DEAD."
No, there were no typos or grammatical errors made by me in that quote. That shit was verbatim as fuck.

I hate it when the bad guys suck in a movie. These bad guys fucking suck. They're stupid as hell. I hate action movies with stupid bad guys. That's why I can't get down with a movie Rumble in the Bronx, which has great action, but bad guys where you'd be surprised if they don't stare at the sky when it's raining and fucking drown. The bad guys in this aren't quite at that level, but they're damn close. These guys are supposed to be the top drug mob? Doesn't make any fucking sense. Takes you right out of the movie, which is never good when you're watching a retarded movie in the first place. Makes you feel dirty. Makes you wonder why you even sat down to watch it, instead of a 'good movie'. Bad retarded fucks a mind up.

- Useless love interest. She does nothing the whole movie, and he doesn't even fuck her. I won't even talk about her more than that. She's wholly forgettable.

- And the biggest bad retardation of all, non-anamorphic widescreen, which means it'll look like fucking garbage on your 16:9 TV. Watch this on something 4:3. Fucking bullshit.

Conclusion

I know you're probably saying to yourself that doesn't seem like a lot of bad retardation, but trust me it is. These bad guys suck, the love interest sucks, so I can't in good conscience give this any more than 3 1/2 stars. See it anyway though, because there's a lot of really great stuff that happens; the kind shit that will make you jump out of your seat and yell and have a good time, which is the reason you're watching one of these movies in the first place. Keep your eyes on the good retardation, and suffer through the bad retardation. I won't be upset if you fast forward through stupid stuff.

*Alright, that movie reference was a little more obscure than the Rain Man one. The Samuel L. Jackson movie I'm referencing is The Caveman's Valentine, a shitty but ambitious movie where Samuel L. Jackson plays a crazy homeless guy trying to solve the murder of a boy. As awesome as that sounds, you don't need to see it, trust me. Also, for the record, I don't even think he punches himself in the head in it. He might at one point, but I honestly don't remember. I chose to reference it because it was the first crazy homeless guy movie I could think of. Now that I think about it though, he was in Resurrecting the Champ too, where played a different homeless guy. He's not self-destructive in that one though, so that wouldn't have worked. Hell, he might not even be self-destructive in Caveman's Valentine, cause honestly I barely remember that shit other than that I didn't like it. Fuck it though, I'm not changing the simile.

Movie Review: Rachel Getting Married

Rachel Getting Married
Directed by Jonathan Demme
113 min.


Fuck this movie. I love the direction, the acting, the cinematography, the sound design, the production design-- but the screenplay is a piece of shit. What we have here is a minimalist storytelling written by a woman who doesn't properly understand what minimalism is. Minimalism isn't just about a low number of brushstrokes; it's about choosing said brushstrokes purposefully and expertly to tell a story the way it needs to be told. That was not done here. The screenplay is a mess, and so what we have here is a piece of shit that Demme has polished (and he's done so very well, hence the 2 stars) but it's still a piece of shit at the end of the day.

There are some scenes in this film I love (solely on technical aspects and/or caliber of acting) but I can't stand the sum of these parts. They're just kernels of sweet corn in the pile of shit that this movie is, as a result of its shitty, first draft screenplay. I don't care how many drafts Jenny Lumet went through to end up with the screenplay that was shot, it's still a first draft. If it walks a duck, talks like a duck, and sucks fucking ass like a duck, it's a duck-- and as such, I won't bother detailing any of the reasons why the screenplay is bad, because fuck first drafts. That might sound like a cop out, since technically this is a final draft since they shot it, but fuck that. There are stupid action and horror movies I review on here with solider screenplays than this, so fuck this movie, and fuck Jonathan Demme too for not knowing how shitty the screenplay was.