Guess Where I\’ll Be on Sunday?
Raise the Dead in Montreal
This was on the main Buffy CCG page. How’s that for making your tournament known?
I hope there’s a good turnout!
Undercover Brother
Much, much funnier than Austin Powers, largely because the satire is directly equally at all the characters instead of being focused on a single character. We’re laughter with the characters instead of directly at them. Indeed, the humour only fails when it stops being double-edged and starts being single-minded and mean, such as the unbearable scenes where Billy Dee Williams acts under the influence of “The Man’s” mind control drug and starts behaving the way whites are presumed to want blacks to behave. The stereotypes are unsettling.
But where the stereotypes are used for self-mockery, then the movie is really quite funny. Like Austin Powers, Undercover Brother recreates pretty much every 70s blaxploitation action flick, and finds humour and insight in anachronism; Undercover Brotherhas the additional advantage of cultural contrasts. Undercover Brother is funny in and of himself because he’s a ’70s throwback who’s happiest doing his own ridiculous thing, but the movie itself is funny because it posits a world of secret cultural warfare, where the bad guys fear harmony and the good guys fear assimilation. The funniest scenes in the movie occur when Undercover Brother goes undercover at The Man’s banking conglomerate and runs into Denise Richards (a.k.a. White She-Devil, a.k.a. Black Man’s Kryptonite). The karaoke sequence where they sing “Ebony and Ivory” in front of a mixed audience is hilarious–especially given the audience reaction..
Eddie Griffin does a great job as the title character, Dave LaChapelle is very funny as Conspiracy Brother, Neil Patrick still looks like a kid in his role as the affirmative-action member of the B.R.O.T.H.E.R.H.O.O.D., and Denise Richards is never funnier than when she seems to satirize her own impossible-bombshell persona, as in Drop Dead Gorgeous or her stint in Friends…plus, it covers up the fact that she’s a fairly wretched actress.
Despite the good performances, the movie isn’t that well directed. The comic close-ups are a little too close and held a little too long. The movie shines when the director decides to imitate the style of ’70s action flicks, as he did in the opening sequence, but, after that, the director loses his way. If the performances weren’t just on the right side of being over the top, the direction would have stifled the comic potential of the movie. As it is, some scenes are far shakier than others.
But, what am I really looking for in a summer comedy? “Beat It” in the climactic fight sequence?
Check.
Besides, how can I not love a movie that inspired this cartoon?
Comics!
Green Arrow #14: Connor is in the hospital, and Oliver won’t leave his side. Neither will Dinah or Oliver’s would-be sidekick, or, unfortunately, Onomatopeia himself. While Oliver lies weakened from an emergency transfusion given to his son (this time not do to a curiously-rare blood type, but to an all-too familiar blood shortage), Onomatopeia goes on a rampage through the hospital in order to finish the job.
“Blam” Blam! “Blam” Blam!
Simple. Effective. Scary. Kevin Smith has created an interesting vigilante. I half hope that he allows Onomatopeia to remain a cipher.
A curious side-effect of Onomatopeia’s sparse dialogue is that it impedes skimming. Usually, I just read right over the sound effects, and concentrate on either the dialogue or the obvious images, and I’ve found it’s easy to overlook Ono. sneaking around when he says nothing but “Creak” as he crosses the wooden floorboards; or, as in this issue, where we have three panels of Oliver sucking on a straw. The first two sound effects are real (Sssip. Sssip.). In the third panel, the straw isn’t between Oliver’s lips, and Ono’s in the background, saying “Sssip”. When Ono made his precence known, I was as surprised as Oliver, until I flipped back to this three-panel sequence.
Next issue is Kevin Smith’s last, It’s been a good run, I have to say.
Just Imagine Stan Lee’s Sandman: Oh, this was very nearly a perfect issue, but for a couple of non-sequiturs. The nonsense I can deal wth: The Sandman is Larry Wilton–an astronaut who is marked as a figure of destiny in the dream world. Larry was a sickly kid, who always had a recurring dream about a dream kingdom…a dream that seemed just as real as reality. When he recovered from his childhood illness, he embarked on the usual impossible carreer track of getting an astrophysics degree from MIT, becoming a fighter pilot, and then becoming an astronaut.
During a space walk, Rev. Daark’s minions attempt to kill our hero. The tree Yggdrasil (Lee’s greatest creation in this series.) saves Larry’s life and transfers him to the dream kingdom of his childhood. There, he meets up with all the characters from his youth, including a little pixie who has grown up into a very shapely nymph…and he can’t resist coming on to her (I think that last bit is hilarious). So, he’s told his destiny, given his weapons and magic items, given an absolutely terrible bit of poetry to recite when he wants to shift back and forth between the dream realms, and is sent to fight some dream-stealing demons. These demons are responsible for a mysterious coma epidemic on Earth.
Naturally, Larry can use some of his abilities on Earth, but less effectively than in the dream kingdom. What I find really interesting is that Lee sets up the real and dream worlds in perfect parallel: where Sandman is fighting demons in the dream kingdom, his unconscious body is being beaten by Daark’s minions in the real world; when he runs away from the gang in the real world and escapes into the dream world, he’s still being chased…this time by demons. This parallelism (which reminds me of nothing so much as Dark Dominion, from Jim Shooter’s Defiant comics label) is managed very well throughout the issue, strengthening the tension in the story.
Larry kills one of the lieutenant demons. This, in turn, kills Rev. Daark (how little we knew ye!) But, an even larger demon arrives in the real world from the dream kingdom, sparking the finale of the series…Crisis (on Infinite Earths).
(Where’s the non-sequitur? After Larry defeats one of the head demons by turning himself into a sandstorm (don’t ask), he has this weird metallic-looking scar on his jaw, which is the same colour as the dream-demons he’s been fighting. The Nymph proclaims that this is the true “mark of the Sandman.” Huh? Wasn’t that already decided when he got the gadgets and garb?)
Lone Wolf and Cub #22–Heaven and Earth: The final confrontation between Ogami and the Yagyu takes place on an open plain, but not before Retsudo finds Abe, sees through the faked suicide, and spares his life as being unworthy of a samurai blade. Abe knows where Ogami and Retsudo will meet, and so he sets upon the swollen river, hoping to break the dam and flood the plain.
On that plain, Ogami and Daigoro stand against the remaining Yagyu forces and reveal what they’ve purchased with the assassination fees: grenades, so that Daigoro can face a samurai army on better terms and thereby participate in the blood feud. A weapon that would be cowardly in the hands of Ogami is oddly-heroic and fitting in the hands of his four-year-old son (of course, that’s still a horrible fate for a child).
Retsudo and Ogami also clarify the terms of their vendetta. Ogami reveals his knowledge of the secret of the Yagyu letter, and explains why he chose not to blackmail or publicly shame the Yagyu: their hatred is personal, and he wanted to keep it that way. He is not calling the Yagyu to account for their larger crimes against the nation; he merely holds them responsible for their crimes against his family.
And so, Ogami faces the army, while Daigoro watches from the distance. During one particular sequence, Daigoro throws a grenade to break up a group that has surrounded his fahter, and it knocked unconscious by the blast. Ogami and Retsudo are about to settle the vendetta with a duel when they recieve news of a broken dam–from the very man who delivered the grenades to Ogami (there’s a nice flashback story about how Ogami met this man–a ship’s captain who he saved, and who showed him the power of the grenades–that ties in to the themes of fate and destiny woven throughout the series).
Abe has opened a floodgate, but not the one he hoped. Now, the floods threaten the heart of Edo itself. The only hope is for Retsudo and Ogami to set aside their differences, and use the grenades to dam the river at a further point.
Yes, we’re reaching the operatic conclusion to the series.
Ogami and Retsudo leave their swords in the ground, swim down the river to a hill, plant the explosives, and appear to have succeeded in their quest, they have left Daigoro behind. The final chapter in the volume shows Daigoro waking up, searching for his father, finding the two swords, and rejoicing that he found no blood on Retsudo’s sword.
The issues focusing on Daigoro are always the most poignant.
Hey, Give Me Back My Head!
Jon built a pair of new 7th Sea decks, and I’m kind of sorry he did…at least, I was after the cannon concussion wore off. He played a fast-cannon Corsairs deck, using the new Captain, the smaller boat (more damage prevention that way), fifteen cannon adventures within a three-sea range of his starting sea, and he used dear Andres the Rower as the the cannonneer, untacking Andres with mutliple copies of Gustolph Hirsch.
My zippy little Sea Dogs boarding deck was scuttled three times, each time with a full complement of crew.
The kicker, of course, is that Jon’s deck isn’t built to be specifically a fast-cannon deck, but it can adapt to the opponent’s style. My deck is fairly typical, with a great deal of damage-prevention and evasion, but it was never quite enough for me to break free.
I never did see his second deck, but I understand that it’s a Vestenmannjavir weather-sorcery deck…I’ve been on the receiving end of Francois design for that faction, so I shudder at the prospect.
I think I’ll have to prepare some surprises for next meeting.
I’ll also have to build a couple of decks for Shadowrun, which is my latest defunct CCG dalliance (in case you’re wondering, this time Jon asked for my extra cards, so shush! He also asked for Heresy cards, which will be a great deal of fun.)
After the 7th Sea matches, we played a couple of quick and brutal Warlord games. I played Rogue’s Guild, and Jon played Uriel, the one-hit wonder (if he hits, he does at least three wounds—Jon arranges matters so that he gets much more than one attack). Some lucky dice-rolling and poor card-drawing kept the games close, and we ended up splitting the matches. Ranged strikes and Black Tom’s ability won me won game, and very nearly won me the other.
I need to get more assassins, assassin-only, and poison cards for this deck. Otherwise, I’m quite happy with the results…
Holiday Weekend Roundup
We never plan for the weekends to be this busy, but they invariably turn out that way. Given that this was a holiday long weekend in Quebec, the days were even busier than normal.
Friday–The STC Summer Banquet
Ah, my final spin at being President of the STC. We held the annual summer banquet at Hurley’s Pub, smack in the middle of the downtown core on the hottest day of the summer and at the start of the long weekend. There were some logistical issues with the reservation that forced us to start the evening slightly earlier than normal, and I think that was the final factor that consipired to keep attendance lower than the norm.
However, everyone who attended seemed to have a great time. There were a couple of free drinks at the bar, and a great buffet of quality pub fare…and chocolate cake! Delicious.
There were door prizes, my final speeches, the presentation of an award for extraordinary contributions, and the usual thank-you gifts to the members of the Executive. Then, the President-in-Waiting and myself settled the bill, and I was free of nearly all my Presidential obligations! The relief was immediate.
Dina captured most of the telling moments with her digital camera. She’s become an avid photojournalist with her new toy, I must say.
I was happy to volunteer for the Executive, and to run the Portfolio for the last three years, and I’m just as happy to pass on the responsibilities to more capable hands. Now, I have no volunteer responsibilities of any kind. I went through a volunteer binge during high school and CEGEP, took the university years off, and then resumed the binge from my Master’s Degree onwards. These were all worthwhile efforts, but now it’s time to enjoy being a member of the audience for a while.
I enjoyed this Summer Banquet more than any other! [grin]
Afterwards, Dina, Maggie and I followed Bill to her apartment, and Dina saw the full extent of the apartment’s size for the first time. The place is quite striking, and it was also strikingly hot. We’ll be sure to return during more clement weather….
Saturday–Afternoon Drinks, Dinner, Evening Walks
The weekend officially began much like every other day–with the squawking of cats looking for their food. After that was resolved, Dina and I spent a lazy morning about the house.
In the afternoon, I went out to meet Jon for a couple of beers under the sun (we returned to Hurley’s, much to the amusement of the waitresses who recognized me from the previous night), while Dina ran off to various garden centres in seach of flower box filler for the back deck. I left Jon behind at around 5:30, and then meandered up St. Laurent St towards a restaurant on Prince Arthur E., where Dina and I were to meet Kathy and Ralph for dinner. It was a balmy evening, and the streets were full of Fringe Festival revelers, very happy Turkish football fans, and wandering couples of all sorts.
Outside the restaurant, I nearly tripped over Montreal’s guerilla chalk poet–he leaves his chalked verse on sidewalks around the city. This was the first time I’d ever seen him work on cobblestones, but he managed the problems of ascenders and descenders and word-breaks adroitly. It was interesting to see how respectful the crowds were towards his work: everyone side-stepped the poetry (perhaps a telling description of our popular culture), and some stopped to admire his efforts.
Dina overshot Prince Arthur by a long while, so she was the last to arrive. First, we found a terrace and enjoyed a couple of drinks while chatting about work and gardening. Then, we returned to the restaurant in time for our reservations, and found ourselves under the tender care of a first-time waiter. I felt badly for him because Dina is a Sally-esque substitution queen. The poor kid looked like a deer caught in the headlights as Dina asked him for substitutions, and he looked even worse when she asked him about the restaurant’s extremely liberal birthday discount policy (which she deserved–the restaurant advertised on its Web site that all diners get a $10 discount within ten days of their birthday…but I don’t think the waiter knew what a Web site was, judging from his reaction). We both enjoyed starters of pikilia, and seafood platters of lobster, scampi. scallops and rice (I’m glad the public degustation of lobster didn’t take place during our courtship [grin]. Next up–ribs!). Clearly, our marriage is starting to affect our restaurant ordering habits…
It was a very pleasant evening. Kathy and Ralph are certainly a fun, quirky couple to hang around.
After dinner, we parted ways with Kathy and Ralph, and we set off in search of the car. On our way, we passed by a used book store guarded by the most languid cat we’ve seen in public. The little beastie was stretched out on a display table in front of a book titled “Natural Cats.” Dina couldn’t resist taking a few pictures, and I can’t say that I blame her! There wasn’t much in the store that grabbed my interest, but there was a copy of Solar: Alpha and Omega in the comics section, which amused me to no end.
It was a wonderful evening.
Sunday–The In-Laws Visit, Stormy Weather, Birthday Dinner:
Sunday morning was a flurry of activity, as we cleared up the apartment in anticipation of a visit from Dina’s parents. They were bringing up Dina’s tomato plants and her deck cabinet/grandfather-clock, and were going to return with an old metal shelf that I’d been lugging from the house in St. Bruno. It seemed like a fair trade.
So, they arrived, and there was much lifting of objects and racing up and down stairs. Then, I fixed lunch (we fed them veggie burgers–we’re always big on giving them something different to eat every time they come over for a visit. It’s never too late to try something new). Then, we sat around and looked at photographs and then planned Dina’s next project for them–some extra cupboard space for the kitchen. There was much climbing of chairs and step ladders, and some humourous measuring-tape errors on my part, and we generally had a good time.
Later that afternoon, they left, hoping to get home before the rains came. They made it.
I’m glad they did, because the rain that fell was positively torrential. For about forty-five minutes, the rain and wind blasted our little corner of Montreal, tearing branches from trees at the park, and soaking our apartment where we left the windows open just the slightest crack. We feared that the power would fail, but, fortunately, that didn’t happen. Dina recorded the storm with the video function of her digital camera, and that really brought home to the power of the storm.
When the storm passed, we drove over to our Indian restaurant to have dinner with Maggie and Andrew to celebrate Maggie’s birthday. They had the misfortune of driving through the storm on the highway, and their experience sounded simply hair-raising. Then, they came home to find their house untouched by the weather, despite the open windows!
We alsways have a great time at these dinners. It was a Douglas Adams theme, as Andrew gave Maggie the DVD of the BBC adaptation of the Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and Dina and I gave her the sixth installment of the trilogy (published posthumously, no less).
Monday–Gardening, Naps, Good News and Power Failures
I spent holiday Monday much like a working Monday, but with some important differences. Sure, I went for my morning jog at an early hour, but that was about it. Dina went out to play in her garden while I lugged dirt down to the railway tracks, built LBS decks, finished a round of Diablo on the PS-One (let me just say that finding the Scavenger Carapace was the best thing I did. Having a -8 base AC is a small price to pay for having my enemies suffer -15 damage when they hit), and did the laundry.
In the afternoon, Maggie, Andrew, and the kids came by for a quick visit to deliver basil plants and admire the deck.
After that, Dina and I settled in on the couch to watch Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Naturally, I fell into the deepest daytime sleep that I’ve enjoyed in a long while. Apparently, the cats settled around me and enjoyed a good nap as well.
I was awoken by a phone call from my mother, bearing good news. Last week, she asked her employers if they were going to buy out her temp agency contract and hire her full time, and they refused, so Mom left the company [cheers from the crowd]. Yesterday, she learned that she landed another job through a different agency! Congratulations, Mom!
After the phone call, I napped some more, and then put together a simple BBQ supper. Afterwards, Dina and went out for ice cream, and we walked around the park, examing the fallen tree branches. I’m sure that the photos will become available soon.
Afterwards, there was a half-hour power outage as (we presume) Hydro crews worked on the power lines, but there was still light outside. If I had fallen asleep right then, I would have thought the whole weekend was an eventful and pleasant dream…
Next Weekend: Buffy CCG tournament, more gardening, and more naps (I’d imagine).
Comics!
100 Bullets: A Foregone Tomorrow: In the fourth trade paperback collection, we see the storyline move from pulp revenge fantasies to historical conspiracies. We already know that some of the earlier beneficiaries of Graves’ gun-and-bullets CARE package were actually amnesiac members of the Minutemen, a freelance gang of internal enforcers for The Trust: a group of thirteen families who have run the USA since colonial times. The Minutemen exist to keep the peace between the Trust families (one of these families are the Medicis, which I think is a nice touch), and Graves is the commander. When Graves refused a direct order, the Trust attempted to have him, and all the Minutemen executed.
Clearly, they’ve failed. The resurgence of Graves, and the return of at least two of the Minutemen to active duty, have proven that.
A Foregone Tomorrow covers eleven issues, and contains a nice mix of stories for the new and continuing reader. Among the best is the famous baseball issue, where an elderly Joe DiMaggio talks to Graves about the bullets that went missing from the JFK assassination site (when Graves says the bullets are untraceable, he’s not kidding), but also remarkable is a story about the gathering of the Trust in Las Vegas. The scion of the Medici family, Benito, gambles with the assurance and confidence of young man far too comfortable with too much borrowed power.
In a high stakes private poker game, Benito raises the stakes too high for a compulsive gambler who is desperate to pay his wife’s medical bills, and who is, for that hand, sitting on what he believes to be an unbeatable hand. The gambler can’t meet the bet, and is forced out of the game. He returns a few days later with a perfectly untraceable gun…purchased at a pawn shop. Graves isn’t involved, but the threat to Benito Medici–and the Trust as a whole–is no less real.
We learn that Benito is willing to gamble with human nature.
We also learn that not all of the members of the Trust have turned their backs on Graves, though he has certainly turned against them.
The second long-form story involves an attempt to recruit another amnesiac Minuteman. This attempt fails, because neither of the recruiting agents can remember the key phrase to unlock those memories (but who is responsible for those key phrases, I wonder? Who saved the Minutemen from their executions and scattered them around the USA?). It’s a story about contraband and mistaken identity, and it makes for a fairly exciting story.
The third long-form story contained in this collection involves a drug addict trying to figure out what turned him into the failure he’s become. Was it nature, or nurture? The end of each issue provides a possible answer, each as plausible as the one before. This story is, I think, my favourite of the collection.
Midnight, Mass. #3: The Kadmons continue their story about the fight that led them to search for an assistant. The monsters in the farmhouse, Magellan and Arturo, are old enemies of the Kadmons, but they’ve actually bought the farmhouse as a refuge from the world, except that the neighborhood kids kept on investigating their “abandoned” home. Of course, they’re far from the helpless victims here, given that they’ve eaten every person who has investigated, but it was interesting to see an argument against human encroachment upon the supernatural worlds, as well as the natural.
Julia was badly outmatched in her fight with Magellan, because she couldn’t remember the full text of an invulnerability spell. Unfortunately, Magellan remembered the complete text. At least Adam knew a loophole in the spell that allowed him to stop Magellan, but he couldn’t defend himself against Arturo. The monsters leave them alive and escape, but the Kadmons can’t rely on such mercy in the future.
As they consider their mistakes on the drive back home, the Kadmons decide to hire an assistant to provide balance and perspective to their investigations.
That’s how they end their story. They fail to mention the number of monsters waiting outside their mansion. Hmm…
Now, presumably, it’s the assistant’s turn for her story.
This series doesn’t feel like a limited series. There’s no sense of containment or structure. Instead, it feels like the first issues of a larger series, as perhaps it is. Either way, the pacing is too introductory for a limited series, and too slow for an ongoing series. There are three issues left to go, and I’ll be happy to see where they’re headed.
All-Night Indexing Parties
I had been noticing that my index reports (managed by Atomz.com were looking a little thin, so I took a peek at my site’s settings. Turns out that I never updated those settings when I reconfigured my site architecture, so I haven’t had an up-to-date site index in 18 weeks!
It’s all better now.
Fellowship of the Ring–Third Time
It’s been quite the week for seeing movies: three in seven days. That’s pretty darn good for the two of us.
Last night, we went to see Fellowship of the Ring with Guislaine, who had yet to see it (something about scheduling problems with her erstwhile beau) at the Eaton Centre. Although the seats are certainly less comfortable than the Paramount, I appreciate the fact that the Eaton Centre theatre is a cheap second-run movie house. Tickets are now the low, low price of $7.50 apiece (which, once upon a time, I thought to be exhorbitant).
This was the third time I’ve seen the movie, and this time, I saw Ian McKellen’s and Sean Bean’s performances differently than before. In Gandalf, I saw more weariness than before, as if the wizard was becoming worn by his earthly cares, and with the knowledge that larger forces have been unleashed against which he cannot contend. I saw him as exhausted, and tempted to despair (but he doesn’t give way, which is the important part.)
In Sean Bean’s Boromir, I now see a tragic figure. Unlike Aragorn, who has abdicated his responsibilities for fear of failure, Boromir has stayed in Gondor, where he is hopelessly outmatched. He would give anything to save his people, but he would do so without hope for success, even though his love for his people motivates the attempt. Bean portrays Boromir as being aware of his inability to succeed, shows him grasping at fragments of hope, and reveals Boromir’s contradictory yearnings to lay down the burdens of leadership and serve a true king while having his own past service recognized as befitting a king. Boromir overcomes his sense of betrayal at Aragorn’s voluntary exile and offers peace when he describes their return to Minas Tirith as the “Lords of Gondor”: he accepts Aragorn as his true king, but is also asking Aragorn to recognize him as an equal. And then, at this death, Boromir urges Aragorn not to abandon Gondor, and declares that Aragorn is “my brother…my King.”
I was moved by this scene where I had not been moved before, which I think is a testament to the depth of the performances in the film. There is enough material to keep us engaged for repeat viewing.
And, at the end of the film, we saw the preview for The Two Towers, and I have to admit that my reaction to this trailer matched the intensity of my reaction to the first. To see Eowyn, Eomer, Faramir, Theoden, Wormtongue, and more of Gollum that has heretofore been shown, was simply marvellous.
I’d see Fellowship a fourth time, for that trailer.
First Hit\’s Free…
Despite what Bill claims, I am not evil. I am perhaps, too eager to share. It was all perfectly innocent, I tell you. Innocent and harmless fun!
It all started when I picked up a couple of boxes of Burning Sands cards at the post office. I had ordered them from different vendors on eBay, and was surprised (and not a little alarmed–they’re heavy, after all) to see them arrive at the same time. So, I loaded the boxes into my backpack, and then marched off to the Croissanterie to meet Francois and Bill for some games.
First, Francois and I ran off to grab a bite to eat. When we returned, Bill was seated at a table, pouring over her newest 7th Sea deck. While she sorted through her cards, Francois and I decided to try our hand at Burning Sands. I played a modified version of the Assassins dueling deck that I had used last week, while Francois deployed a spell- and Jinn-laden Qabal deck. His deck is designed to get large, expensive Jinn out fast and overwhelm me quickly. He’s also got a couple of strong Sahir (spellcasters), who can discard cards from hand to cause significant damage. Often enough to kill the opponent.
The dueling deck is, surprisingly, a stall deck. My characters are cheaper than Francois’, and I can usually bring out more than one each turn. So long as I have the cards to initate duels, I can usually pick off Francois’ characters individually, and I had other card effects that forced him to not to attack me, which bought me more breathing room. My deck was just fast enough to slow him down, and it looked like I had the game in hand, when I had used most of my dueling cards, and turned to attacking.
Francois wasn’t prevented from defending against an attack., and, as defenders get the first action, he was able to use his discard-for-direct-damage ability and wipe out my forces. Sure, I had a some military success, but at a terrible cost. Soon, I couldn’t hold back his onslaught of Jinn attacks, and I lost the game.
Even at the last, I used duels as a defense. I locked down his largest Jinn in a duel, but Francois managed to tie two of my attacks, resulting in no damage (here’s how dueling works: Each card in the game as a random number, called the Fate value, ranging from 0 to 5. As the attacker, I play a card from my hand, and the defender either plays a card from his hand or from the top of his deck. We compare the Fate values of these cards. The defender takes damage equal to the difference. The only way not to take damage to have the cards tie). Francois tied twice, much to my dismay, and his Jinn ran rampant over my armies.
It was a very close game, and Bill seemed intrigued.
Then, while Bill and I played our match of 7th Sea, Francois started opening some of the starter decks I had received from eBay (at my request, naturally). Bill and I matched wits on the high seas (she had a new Castillan boarding deck against my Gosse boarding deck), but some strange card draws and reckless attacks brought the came to a quick end (plus, Bill had a headache…make of that what you will).
As she packed things up, I rifled through the starter decks, removing the rare cards, and Bill picked up a rule book. I gave her a deck so she could give the game a try. Then I realized that she’s another deck to play with someone else, so I gave her another deck.
Aren’t I a nice guy?
Later, Cecil arrived at the Croissanterie and exclaimed: “I can’t believe you gave her two decks!”
And then we talked about the rules for a while. He seems hooked.
I didn’t say that I wasn’t a little evil [grin].
The Importance of Being Earnest
Oscar Wilde’s play manages the curious feat of being visually static and verbally frantic. The first time I saw it , I had trouble believing that people could sustain such concentrated at a single setting, and then marvelled at how infrequently those settings changed.
The creators of this most recent film adaptation have found a clever way of mediating between the two Oliver Parker, the director of Othello and An Ideal Husband (also by Wilde), has, aside from a musical sequence, remained faithful to the original text of the play, but has decided to present the material contained therein in such as way as to comment on the play itself. He’s added action to match the pace of the dialogue–filming, so to speak, between the lines of the play. While nothing presented on screen actually contradicts what’s written on the page, Parker has created some interesting subversions.
After all, having Algernon descend upon the country home of Jack Worthing in a hot-air balloon isn’t forbidden by the text. It’s simply more preposterous…and a lot more fun. A more typical change is to have most of Algernon & Jack’s dialogue take place at various dance halls and restaurants around London, where their quips can be appreciated on their own, as opposed to having them overwhelm each other in the Algernon’s parlour. Likewise, Lady Bracknell’s interrogation of Jack’s heritage is much funnier when it’s held in her own parlour…and Gwendolyn’s message of reassurance is all the more telling when it’s delivered at the pub where Algie consoles poor Jack.
But Cecily’s visions of Algernon as a dark knight out of some Dante Gabriel Rosetti painting takes the cake. It has to be seen to be believed.
A comparison to Baz Luhrmann would not be out of order, although the visual comments on the play are certainly of a different order.
The actors are clearly enjoying their role: Rupert Everett is Algernon Montcrieff, the dissolute bachelor with an invisible friend named Bunbury, who he can visit whenever he needs to get away from his aunt, or his creditors; Colin Firth is Jack Worthing, who has an invisible brother named Earnest, who he has to visit when he needs to get away from his boring country home and so impersonate and thereby enjoy the spendthrift delights of the town; Judi Dench is Lady Bracknell, an impossibly vicious aristocrat to whom Parker has given an interesting origin, and for whom Dench gives her best Queen Elizabeth performance; Frances O’Conner is Gwendolyn, Bracknell’s daughter who loves Jack because his name is Earnest (and who makes me want to rent Mansfield Park of all things); and Reese Witherspoon is perhaps a little too mannered as Cecily, especially after her free-flowing comedic performance in Legally Blonde, but those fantasy sequences are too funny to ever be ignored.
I have to say that I was most struck by Colin Firth’s performance (though not, I imagine, the same way Dina is stricken by him [grin]). This is the first time I’ve seen him in a role not titled “Mr. Darcy” so I quite enjoyed the boyish, rambunctious energy and bemusement he brought to the role. I expect as much from Rupert Everett, but I was pleasantly surprised to find it in Firth.
I must also confess that I came across Wilde’s work at exactly the right time for it to make the worst impression: it gave me unbridled support for my desire to quip cleverly at all times. While amusing, this habit isn’t actually constructive, and it’s been surprisingly tricky to manage it’s attractions/distractions. I’m now less inappropriately Earnest than before, but I remain, in my own way, a Bunburyist…and so I must away!