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Current Music: TV on the Radio -- Playhouses
Tags: compilers, no cat, thesis

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• Made in China *******
  Well, it wasn't what I was expecting, I can say that.
  
  From the synopsis on the festival website, I was expecting a documentary (perhaps mockumentary) about making cheap goods in China for the American export market. What I got was a hilarious (and totally fictional) story about some small-town Texas rube who seeks to make his dreams come true, and figures that partnering with someone in Shanghai that he met over Craigslist is a just peachy way of doing it.
  
  The small-town Texas rube totally carried the movie. It was always going to live or die on the back of that character, and in less-capable hands, could easily have been an ungodly mess. Luckily, Jackson Kuehn manages to master the perfect balancing act of charm, persistence, naivete, humility and optimism to make it work. On the strength of his performance, the entire movie works, and in an odd way, is carried along in his wake.
  
  As the audience, we are able to see the coming pitfalls, we are clearly able to see that Kuehn's character is not able to see the coming pitfalls, but we root for him anyway. And it feels pretty good to share in his successes, small or large. Very charming.
  
  
• Art & Copy ***
  A frustrating documentary. Parts were neat. Other parts, wearyingly defensive.
  
  Not that I entirely blame the filmmaker. Our entire civilization shares with me an (at best) love-hate relationship with advertising, and I can understand the temptation to take advantage of one's time on the soapbox to present some kind of defense for the subject. That doesn't negate the fact that I found it distracting, off-putting, and could have done without it.
  
  Other than that, it was pretty cool. I guess. Rather pedestrian. Given the Creativity (capital C) pursued by those the picture depicts, I was surprised how bereft the film itself was of same. There were certainly no risks taken with the narrative structure, that's for sure.
  
  Indeed the more I think about it, the less happy I am with the movie. I'm not sure how long it'll stick with me.
  
  A slightly disappointing finish to the festival.
  
  

Current Location: T2N 1N4
Current Music: The Guess Who -- Guns, Guns, Guns
Tags: film, kittens

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• Retouches **
  Ok, so you seem to be... playing with what paint can do? And... demonstrating how different forms of movement are similar to each other? I am sure that there are people out there who care. I regret to inform you that I am not one of them.
  
  
• Maverick ***
  This started out interesting enough. I actually liked the use of Super-8, and was faintly fascinated by the juxtaposition of film stock from different eras. I'm not much of a music video fan, but as a music video, I rather liked it. Then the voiceover started. Oh dear. See, I understood where the film was going before the awkward voiceover started morse-code drumming it into my forehead. As a standalone poem (and narrated, as my friend nickate mentioned, by someone different), I think the text might stand a chance. As it is, it is horrendously distracting, and this is a clear case where the whole is rather less than the sum of its parts.
  
  
• 12 toner ned (12 Notes Down) *********
  I have written a truly marvellous review of this, which this blog post is too narrow to contain. In a phrase, the movie could be summed up as, "What now?" What happens when you start outgrowing your life? What would I do if I were to one day discover that I could suddenly no longer program? Or solve the simplest equation? For some, this comes at the end of their life, when they have had years to anticipate, prepare for it. What if this happens when you're but thirteen? What now?
  
  
• Out in that Deep Blue Sea *
  To such a great extent did I not get this movie, that I don't even have the words to describe what it was that I did not get. A pointless juxtaposition of random scenes from...? My best guess is that the writer was going for a "Death of a Salesman" kinda thing, but... it didn't work.
  
  
• Lesh Sabreen? (Why, Sabrina?) *******
  Not that it's necessarily my place to judge, but the word "subtlety" is not often found in the vocabulary of films from the Arab world. Especially when it comes to Israel. I think it's partly cultural, I don't know. Maybe I've just bveen watching the wrong films. Perhaps years of watching Lebanese TV soap operas have irrevocably biased me. Either way, the discovery of the principle by the makers this film was a refreshing breeze. That I walked away with remaining questions to ponder, and hadn't just survived a barrage of "Israel is Evil!" was extremely gratifying.
  
  
• Short Term 12 *****
  I don't know what to say, beyond that I kind-of liked this one. Not a lot, but kinda. I have a hard time even saying why I liked it, or what it was that I liked. I found it pleasant, in perhaps one of the strangest uses of that word ever. I found it pleasant despite itself. It is an affirmation that life goes on? I'm sure that anyone else who has seen it will disagree with me on that point. I can't explain why I feel that way; I just do.
  
  
• Omelet ******
  The movie's scene-setting prologue says it all: in 1996 Sofia ("Somewhere in Europe") inflation is growing "by the hour." Few of us have lived in such a time, and Insha'Allah, few of us will. This is a short and affecting glimpse into what life is like in that place. It's enough of a glimpse for me.
  
  
• Sheva dakot be gan eden (Seven Minutes in Heaven) **********
  It is gray. Blank. You are on a plain. You see something. Or do you? No. Maybe not.
  
  It is gray. Not just gray, but foggy, misty. Through the mist, there is something there. You think. A darker shape that starts to emerge. But it shrinks back into the mist, and is gone.
  
  It is gray. You are on a featureless plain with fog shrouding the horizon. As you wander, you think you see a feature through the mist, the only one you've seen so far. You head towards that feature: something is better than the nothing. The feature starts to take on definition, the shadow adopts a shape. But it remains elusive, and the nearer you approach, the further away it gets. Pretty soon it is again gone.
  
  You wander, still, through the formless void. Your eyes are perhaps playing tricks on you, but you could swear you see your shadow again. Determined not to lose it anew, you change course, and make out for the shadow. This time it becomes more than a shadow. You can make out an outline, and even colour. Your thing has become a landmark, of sorts. The only beacon in this otherworldly place. You begin to ascribe to it character, and even allow it emotions. Or are they just a reflection of your own emotions? Oh wait... as you were pondering, you lost track of it and are again alone.
  
  In your continued travels, you again sight a shape through the mist. At first hurrying towards it, you become apprehensive, perhaps even fearful. Maybe this is not where you want to go? Why the assumption that because it is there, you must go to it? You turn, this time attempting to avoid it. But to no avail: it inexorably nears, a great dark chasm looming close. There is nothing you can do. But as quickly as it approached, it again begins to recede, and is quickly re-enveloped by the fog.
  
  "What are you?" you finally shout in anger and frustration. "What do you want from me?" No response. "Why are you here?" Still no response—can it hear you? Is it alive? Why has it chosen you to torture and taunt in this way? Why does it choose this waltz of approach-and-recede? It is playing with you, but to what end? Spiteful thing!
  
  It is back for another rotation, but you no longer care. You are weary, and resigned to your fate. You regard your companion less threateningly now, maybe even as a friend. Tired, you stop wandering. You sit and wait for it to approach. Let it come to you, then. If every orbit brings it swinging closer, then this time let it. It comes, and you can discern its myriad, now familiar, features. It comes, ever closer.
  
  Suddenly, the mirror makes contact and shatters! A kaleidoscope of colourful shards fills the air and each one expands into a new dimension, growing to form a crazy-quilt patchwork of a scene. Which one to choose? Too late, the shard has you!
  
  
  You hear birds chirping, the slightly muted sound of waves lapping at the sand down on the beach. A rustle of leaves as you feel the wind brushing past your cheek. You smile and open your eyes. "Hi," you say.
  
  
  This is easily my favourite film from the festival so far.

Current Location: T2M 4E6
Current Music: Alexi Murdoch -- Towards the Sun
Tags: film, kittens

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• Cooking With Stella ******
  I was not expecting to laugh nearly so much at this movie. I went to see it because: India + cooking... what's not for this Hindophile foodie to like?
  
  But the name notwithstanding, there wasn't actually a lot of cooking in the movie. Instead we got scads upon piles of comedy. Which: hey, I'm not complaining!
  
  I was (pleasantly) surprised by the manner in which the film paid homage to Bollywood tropes, was able to insert them into a "western" film (make no mistake—this is a Canadian production through and through), and was actually able to make them work (no small feat, that!) without crossing the line into the ridiculous, or compromising the film as a whole by turning its plot into that of a Bollywood potboiler.
  
  A few movies have sold out at this year's festival. Most on the day of the screening. This one sold out a week in advance—to my knowledge, the only one to do so. I'm curious whether that was on the strength of Deepa Mehta's name, or whether these people knew something I didn't? I hadn't heard of the movie before seeing it listed in the festival's schedule.
  
  Anyway. Not at all the movie I went to see. But at the end of the day, a movie I'm glad I saw.
  
  
• Aram bash va ta hatf beshmar (Be Calm and Count to Seven) ****
  I don't know what to say about this one. I am tempted to wonder how much got lost in translation? There were definitely a few things about the movie that I didn't understand until I read the IMDb synopsis (written by the filmmaker himself) after-the-fact. At which point there was an "ohhhhh!" moment, and some of what happens made a lot more sense.
  
  If this was the case on reading a four-line synopsis, how much else did I miss? How much better would it have made the movie had I understood these things as they were unfolding on-screen, and not only later, in retrospect?
  
  It's frustrating. There were elements of the movie that I really liked. Some scenes (especially those, like the one opening the movie, depicting a contraband-smuggling operation in a small Iranian village) that were extremely powerful and held me captivated.
  
  But at the end, leaving the theatre, the prevailing feeling was one of "so what?"
  
  How much of that was my fault, or that of circumstance? After I had purchased tickets, I learned of a conflicting event last night that I also wanted to attend. My intention was to get out of the movie, then hop on my bike and dash to the other event to catch its tail end. But there were technical difficulties and the movie's start was delayed half an hour. It was cold when I arrived at the theatre and starting to rain, perhaps sleet. I wasn't looking forward to biking through that. I was distracted, my mind wasn't on the movie, and was probably unable to give it a fair shake.
  
  This movie was probably better than I am able to consider it. Unfortunately my memory can only be one of a few (very good) highlights, punctuating a lot of "so what" and "man, I wish I'd understood that at the time."
  
  Sorry, Ramtin.

Current Location: T2M 4E6
Current Music: Alexi Murdoch -- Crinan Wood
Tags: film, kittens

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• Sois sage (Be Good) *
  A question for you: if a movie accomplishes exactly that which it intends, and in spades, can it reasonable to consider it a bad movie?
  
  Let me be clear. I hated this movie. Hated, hated, hated. I left the theatre feeling nauseous, reeling from anger and frustration. I had walked half-way home before my mind cleared enough to remember to go back and get my bike. Even writing this a day later, I can feel the anger returning, my muscles tensing up.
  
  But here's the thing: I'm not sure that wasn't the point. The filmmaker seems to have set out to create a character as unsympathetic as possible, and in that, there is no question that she has succeeded. So where does that leave me with regard to the movie as a whole? The festival flew her in from France for a Q&A session following the screening, but instead of attending, I was already outside, shaking and feeling wretched. As soon as the first credits appeared on-screen, I was out of my chair and running for the door, having had to suppress the urge to walk out of the movie a few times already. Too bad – I would have liked to hear what she had to say – but there's no way I could have physically remained in that theatre.
  
  So again: where does that leave me? This is unquestionably the most intense reaction I've ever had to a movie, but when it's so negative, I'm hard-pressed to say anything good about said movie.
  
  Through all the anger and hate, I think really what I feel at the core (it is admittedly hard to pin down) is frustration. We are all familiar with Hitchcock's observation regarding the action of an exploding bomb versus the suspense of an unexploded bomb. This movie was 90 minutes of unexploded bomb. And then the movie ended. That was it. But the bomb was still under the fucking table, and still hadn't exploded. To say I was feeling blue-balled would be putting it mildly. Arrrgh!
  
  It didn't help that at the end, none of the characters were acting in a rational manner. Thoughout the entire movie, but especially at the end, I just wanted to leap into the screen, grab the characters by the throat, shake, and scream: "Why are you just standing there, doing nothing? Why don't you react to this like a real person would?"
  
  Was there a point to their inaction? Arguably, perhaps. But I couldn't bridge the gap; I was far too frustrated.
  
  Well, whatever. I can only say at this point that if I ever hear of another movie from this filmmaker, I will be giving it a wide berth. So I suppose one star is where this remains. But I'll concede there's an argument to be made for giving it a 9 or a 10.

Current Location: T2M 4E6
Current Music: The Velvet Underground -- Oh! Sweet Nuthin'
Tags: film, kittens

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• Revanche (Revenge) *******
  As the film opens, we see a series of images of life in an Austrian town: ripples on a pond. A man mowing his lawn with an electric mower. The man's wife preparing food in their kitchen.
  
  Next scene.
  
  We are in a room somewhere. A city. A man stares out his window at a train going by, before he is summoned by the doorbell.
  
  And how different the cinematography is between the two sequences! The colours in the first, warm and vibrant; in the second, muted. Whitewashed. Dull. Likewise the film stock, from crisp and detailed, it becomes much coarser, and grainy. We might as well have been seeing footage from two different movies. The intended message is clear: we haven't just moved between two places, but two entire worlds.
  
  A character starts the film in one world, and ends it in the other. He is the movie's protagonist at first, but is arguably no longer so by the time the curtain drops. What strange transformations occur when one moves from one world to the next.
  
  But wait! The director has played a trick on us! Why are we so willing to take his word that these two places are so different? After all, there is more than one crime that has been committed here; more than one person, by the end, that is hiding in fear of being discovered. The uneasy truce with which we are left clearly weighs more heavily on the person who has not been in the big gritty city. Perhaps there is the potential in all of us for Alex's actions, and his experiences, no matter what side of the tracks we call home. And perhaps, at the end of the day, that's not such a horrible thing. I think I can live with that.
  
  Might this movie instead have been titled Erlösung?

Current Location: T2M 4E6
Current Music: King Crimson -- I Talk to the Wind
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• Das weiße Band (The White Ribbon) *******
  In 2006, I came out of Michael Haneke's Caché not knowing quite what to make of it, still wondering whether I hated it or loved it. The three intervening years' worth of percolation have convinced me that it was one of the best films I saw that year. Today I came out of this movie with a similar schizophrenic feeling. Haneke sticks to his usual modus operandi of throwing a lot at the viewer, not giving them time to properly absorb what has happened before piling on just a little bit more. And as usual, he chooses very carefully what he does and does not show. Haneke is the cinematic antidote to that other Michael who directed the latest Transformers movie; not all that is pertinent is telegraphed in one-syllable words. Are you sure you're seeing the whole story? And if not, then what of it? Are you sure there is such a thing as the whole story? Today's experience was like watching only one segment from Rashômon, and relying on imagination to fill in the rest that I can only suspect is there.
  
  But I am neglecting the incredible crisp black and white cinematography. It puts Broken Blossoms to shame, if such a thing is possible. Consider the opening shot where we slowly fade in from black, to a pastoral scene that becomes ever brighter and crisper. Brighter, crisper until you think it can't possibly get any more so... but still it goes on until finally we are immersed in the film's village setting. Black and white though it may appear, we are as good as being there. Except I don't need to say much more on this score – everyone else already has.
  
  I'm still recovering from the barrage, picking myself up off the ground. But I have high hopes that it will rank along the aforementioned Caché in the metaphorical Pantheon.
  
  
• Kurôn wa kokyô wo mezasu (The Clone Returns Home) *********
  A man makes a disdainful remark regarding the prospect of treating lung cancer in a person who has been a lifelong smoker. As he does so, he pulls a cigarette from his pocket and places it in his mouth, about to smoke it. Visual irony? Perhaps, and in a different movie, quite likely so. But instead of lighting it up, he makes a motion as if about to remove the cigarette from his mouth, and we cut away. The cigarette is not seen again. Does he actually smoke it? Is he conscious of the image he cuts? Is he just using it as a prop to make his point? Does he do that often? What are the man's intentions? What does the whole charade say about the man as a character? We are only left to infer.
  
  This kind of peculiarly Japanese subtlety infects the entirety of the film, and the scene is symptomatic thereof, in both good and bad respects.
  
  After an intriguing setup, we get a (deliberately) meandering and unfocused second act that came this close to losing me, before it was redeemed with a strong finish. Without the finish, I would have been gone – not literally from the theater, but at least in spirit. As perhaps befits a "meditation on the paradox of life and death" (groan), much of the film's middle third takes place in the twilight between dream and wakefulness. Events occur, then undo themselves. A person is perhaps there, but is perhaps not, then perhaps switches places with someone else. Impossible things occur, and there is a disconnect between causes and their effects. Which is all very well I suppose, but if actions have no consequences, and anything can happen, then why do I care what does happen? I felt my interest waning fast.
  
  Then came a thankfully (and surprisingly) strong third act. It did not erase what came before, but from a point of view more grounded in reality, it was able to shine precisely the needed light on the earlier meanderings. At the very least, we are able to see what the outcome of the middle section "really" was, even if the course of events that brought us there remains fuzzy. And even that is not so bad – after all, it happened to someone else.
  
  There were a few jarring issues with the subtitles and some awkward translations by someone who clearly did not speak English as a first language. Not horrible, but enough to be occasionally distracting. However, the movie was otherwise quite excellent in its technical aspects.
  
  Five minutes into the movie, one character is shoveling dirt. Five minutes from the end, he is doing so again. These actions are not "opposites," as happens in the mirror structure of Eyes Wide Shut. But nor are they exactly parallel. Their relationship is more subtle than that: strangely complementary, but defying precise categorization.

Current Location: T2M 4E6
Current Music: Neil Halstead -- Hi, Lo and Inbetween
Tags: film, kittens

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• It Might Get Loud ********
  Is it too much of a cliché to call this movie a love letter to the electric guitar? Well, I just did so anyway. And what an awesome way to kick off the festival! Three generations of guitarists (Jimmy Page, The Edge and Jack White) get together to reminisce, to enthuse, and to jam. Going in, I was expecting more jamming, but have no complaints about what I did get. A great (and representative) part of the movie had The Edge talking about the guitar melody to Where the Streets Have No Name... where it came from, how he put it together, demoing some early versions, explaining some of the interesting technical aspects to the riff, and then we put on our seatbelts and launch into some absolutely electric live footage from U2 playing the song on tour to a crowd of tens of thousands. I'm often rather "meh" about live tour footage in music videos; finding they rarely capture the mood they are attempting, and are mostly an uninspired cop-out. This time, the preface made all the difference in the world – we got to ride along with the creative process, invest our own emotions in the outcome, and when the finalized, familiar, refrain was blasted at full volume to the cheering multitudes, it sent thrills down this old curmudgeon's spine. Another excerpt from the movie followed White building an electric guitar in a few minutes from a piece of old driftwood and a coke bottle. The result is functionally limited, but the resulting sounds no less gratifying. It (and many other sequences) made for the kind of footage not generally seen in rock docs. Best of genre, for sure.
  
  Oh, and Jimmy Page is the cutest old fart ever.

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Current Music: Link Wray -- Rumble
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Current Mood: bouncy
Current Music: Trooper -- Two For the Show
Tags: kittens

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Current Music: Liz Phair -- Uncle Alvarez
Tags: recipes

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Current Music: Gomez -- Airstream Driver
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Current Music: Natalie Merchant -- Ophelia
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Current Location: T2N 1N4
Current Mood: hopeful
Current Music: Oasis -- Soldier On
Tags: compilers, grad school, other cat, thesis, type theory

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do x     <- SM newVar
   as    <- SM (newVars (length fs))
   bs    <- SM (newVars (length fs))
   g'    <- return $ addSymbols (zip (map (\(n,_,_,_) -> n) fs) (map ATVar as)) Function g
   threadSM () (zipWith3 (ff g' x) as bs fs)
   collect t g' q
   SM (updateEqs (xqNewVars (as ++ bs) []))
   SM (updateEqs (uqNewVar x []))
   return q
where ff g x a b (f, p, ps, cs) =
   do (y:_) <- return $ getConstructorType g Function f l
      xs    <- SM (newVars (length ps))
      atype <- return $ mkArrows ((zipmatch (== p) y ps (map ATVar xs)) ++ [ATVar q])
      btype <- return $ mkArrows (map ATVar $ (zipmatch (== p) x ps xs) ++ [q])
      eqs   <- return [Assign b btype, Assign a atype]
      threadSM () (map (cf g a) cs)
      SM (updateEqs (xqNewVars xs eqs))
      return ()

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Current Music: Oasis -- I'm Outta Time
Tags: compilers, grad school, haskell, no cat, thesis, type theory

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Current Mood: discouraged
Current Music: Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros -- Midnight Jam
Tags: combinatory logic, presentations, research, school, thesis

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Current Music: Jeff Andrew -- Dirt Alley Rose
Tags: adayinthirty

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Current Location: T2M 4E6
Current Music: Jeff Andrew -- The Madhouse Keeper
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Current Music: Jeff Andrew -- Wanderlust
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Current Music: Jeff Andrew -- Faerie Music
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Current Music: Jeff Andrew -- Shapeshifter
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