Weekend Edition Saturday, April 7, 2007 · Political satirist Christopher Buckley's novel Boomsday features a young blogger who suggests the U.S. government might offer baby boomers tax incentives to kill themselves before retirement age.
Boomsday
by Christopher Buckley
Outraged over the mounting Social Security debt, Cassandra Devine, a charismatic 29-year-old blogger and member of Generation Whatever, incites massive cultural warfare when she politely suggests that Baby Boomers be given government incentives to kill themselves by age 75. Her modest proposal catches fire with millions of citizens, chief among them "an ambitious senator seeking the presidency." With the help of Washington's greatest spin doctor, the blogger and the politician try to ride the issue of euthanasia for Boomers (called "transitioning") all the way to the White House, over the objections of the Religious Right, and of course, the Baby Boomers, who are deeply offended by demonstrations on the golf courses of their retirement resorts.
Sunday, April 08, 2007
Saturday, April 07, 2007
Rickie Lee Jones' Divine Departure
All Things Considered, April 7, 2007 · (npr.org)
In Rickie Lee Jones' heaven, Janis Joplin works at the corner bar and folks ride around in Elvis' Cadillac.
It's a paradise that only the "Dutchess of Coolsville" could imagine, and one she's brought to vivid life in her new album, The Sermon on Exposition Boulevard.
The Grammy winner's first original album in four years was inspired by the words of Jesus – some with a bit more poetic license than others.
Jones isn't religious in the traditional sense. Growing up, she occasionally attended Catholic mass, but was never baptized. She tells host Debbie Elliott that in America, Jesus is "kind of owned by the religious right."
Jones says her album is an attempt to spark a conversation about Jesus' teachings, and make him more accessible to people who don't go to church.
She credits longtime friend Lee Cantelon with providing the genesis of her new album. In 1997 Cantelon published The Words, a compilation of Jesus' words taken from the four Gospels of the New Testament.
He turned his book into a spoken-word project, and in 2005 he asked Jones to read a passage. Rather than do a reading, Jones improvised and sang "Nobody Knows My Name," which eventually became the first track on the album.
The Sermon on Exposition Boulevard doesn't stray entirely from Jones' bohemian roots. The lyrics, which tell stories of the divine and the worldly, still contain her beat-poet style.
In Rickie Lee Jones' heaven, Janis Joplin works at the corner bar and folks ride around in Elvis' Cadillac.
It's a paradise that only the "Dutchess of Coolsville" could imagine, and one she's brought to vivid life in her new album, The Sermon on Exposition Boulevard.
The Grammy winner's first original album in four years was inspired by the words of Jesus – some with a bit more poetic license than others.
Jones isn't religious in the traditional sense. Growing up, she occasionally attended Catholic mass, but was never baptized. She tells host Debbie Elliott that in America, Jesus is "kind of owned by the religious right."
Jones says her album is an attempt to spark a conversation about Jesus' teachings, and make him more accessible to people who don't go to church.
She credits longtime friend Lee Cantelon with providing the genesis of her new album. In 1997 Cantelon published The Words, a compilation of Jesus' words taken from the four Gospels of the New Testament.
He turned his book into a spoken-word project, and in 2005 he asked Jones to read a passage. Rather than do a reading, Jones improvised and sang "Nobody Knows My Name," which eventually became the first track on the album.
The Sermon on Exposition Boulevard doesn't stray entirely from Jones' bohemian roots. The lyrics, which tell stories of the divine and the worldly, still contain her beat-poet style.
Sunday, April 01, 2007
AFI Dallas
DISPATCH FROM TEXAS Newbie AFI Dallas Fest Kicks the Door In
Wednesday March 28 4:58 PM ET
by Michael Jones
Four hours north from the Whole Earthy shops that sell "Keep Austin Weird" merchandise, an upscale Dallas thread shop displays, for twice the price, their own T-shirt: "Keep Dallas Pretentious." And with no apologies, the AFI Dallas International Film Festival began as founder Liener Temerlin, an unabashed "old ad man," stated that Dallas "may now hold the world record in size, films, venues, and sponsors for an inaugural film festival." Though the birth of yet another new film festival shouldn't make much of a ripple, Temerlin and company might have started a new franchising trend. Licensing the AFI brand for a festival was probably akin to attaching stars to a script -- it brought in a laundry list of big blue chip sponsors.
Artistic Director Michael Cain, previously of the Deep Ellum Film Festival, and his team built a program heavy on Texas-born talent, AFI alum (David Lynch's "Inland Empire"), and suggestions from AFI Los Angeles' Christian Gaines ("Drama/Mex" and "Screamers"). Opening the fest with Dallas-native Steve Sawalich's "Music Within" was the safe choice. Starring Ron Livingston as a deaf Vietnam vet fighting for the disabled Americans' rights, the film rides the middle of the road well, though breaks no ground.
Fellow Dallasite Amy Talkington's light, cheery romp, "Night of the White Pants," turned a circus mirror onto the furs and boots in the audience. Shot locally, it stars Tom Wilkerson as an ex-millionaire Dallas dealmaker battling lawyers, greedy ex-wives, spoiled children, and his own spoiled past. Wilkerson threw himself into the North Texas drawl with both feet and fists, but within all his character's good ole boy ego, Wilkerson's hound-dog eyes keep his performance refreshingly grounded. The audience ate it up, as they'll do with Talkington's next target: Dallas debutantes.
Narrative competition films included a few imports from Sundance 2007 including Steve Berra's "The Good Life" and Martin Hynes' "The Go-Getter," a lost-in-America story that, despite genuine moments of young love between the illuminant Zooey Deschanel and Lou Taylor Pucci, manages to lose its way mid-story. Crowds inside the Majestic Theater in Dallas attending the inaugural festival. For more photos, check out the festival's Flickr photo site.
Among the docs, Joel P. Engardio and Tom Shepard's "Knocking," put the audience inside the homes of Jehovah's Witnesses, for a change. In its best moments the journalists follow a Witness family into a "bloodless" liver transplant. Witnesses don't believe in using another's blood, or even a stored bag of their own, during surgery. Most even carry a card instructing caregivers "no blood." When a father decides to donate a portion of his liver to his ailing son, the family searches far and wide for a hospital that will do a transfusion-less transplant. They find it at USC who, in exchange, want to use the surgery to test new procedures that will reduce the need for donor blood. Using that as a jumping off point, the filmmakers continue to outline Jehovah Witness history, including their imprisonment in Nazi concentration camps and their victories in litigating for free speech in the US and abroad.
Other noteworthy docs included University of Texas professor Andrew Garrison's "Third Ward, TX," named after a Houston neighborhood where a group of African-American artists took over a block of abandoned homes just before their leveling. After creating unique artist spaces, parks, and much-needed low-income housing, the group then faced the result of their success: gentrification and myopic real estate development. In the aptly titled "A Lawyer Walks Into a Bar," filmmaker Eric Chaikin follows six people striving to become among the measly 39% that pass the California bar exam, including one unlucky subject who's failed it 41 times.
While potshots at Dallas pretension are easy, it's as useless as shooting barrel fish. Dallas doesn't care what you think. They like their art and they like to pay for it. The Dallas Contemporary, The Nasher, and neighboring Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth are all well funded and arguably premiere destinations for modern art in the Midwest. And while Variety reported the fest's pricetag at $4 million, much of that money seemed spent on the filmmakers: from the first class airfare to the swank W Hotel rooms, complete with a 3-bottle gift of fine wine in a fancy Target-designed box (just one item among the avalanche of swag). And when Dallasites show up to see David Lynch present his three-hour, interior-view of Laura Dern's head, they do it in their Neiman Marcus best, they stay through the whole thing, and they applaud when it's over. There is pretension here, and there is also class.
[EDITOR'S NOTE: The inaugural AFI Dallas International Film Festival continues through Sunday, April 1 in Texas.]
Wednesday March 28 4:58 PM ET
by Michael Jones
Four hours north from the Whole Earthy shops that sell "Keep Austin Weird" merchandise, an upscale Dallas thread shop displays, for twice the price, their own T-shirt: "Keep Dallas Pretentious." And with no apologies, the AFI Dallas International Film Festival began as founder Liener Temerlin, an unabashed "old ad man," stated that Dallas "may now hold the world record in size, films, venues, and sponsors for an inaugural film festival." Though the birth of yet another new film festival shouldn't make much of a ripple, Temerlin and company might have started a new franchising trend. Licensing the AFI brand for a festival was probably akin to attaching stars to a script -- it brought in a laundry list of big blue chip sponsors.
Artistic Director Michael Cain, previously of the Deep Ellum Film Festival, and his team built a program heavy on Texas-born talent, AFI alum (David Lynch's "Inland Empire"), and suggestions from AFI Los Angeles' Christian Gaines ("Drama/Mex" and "Screamers"). Opening the fest with Dallas-native Steve Sawalich's "Music Within" was the safe choice. Starring Ron Livingston as a deaf Vietnam vet fighting for the disabled Americans' rights, the film rides the middle of the road well, though breaks no ground.
Fellow Dallasite Amy Talkington's light, cheery romp, "Night of the White Pants," turned a circus mirror onto the furs and boots in the audience. Shot locally, it stars Tom Wilkerson as an ex-millionaire Dallas dealmaker battling lawyers, greedy ex-wives, spoiled children, and his own spoiled past. Wilkerson threw himself into the North Texas drawl with both feet and fists, but within all his character's good ole boy ego, Wilkerson's hound-dog eyes keep his performance refreshingly grounded. The audience ate it up, as they'll do with Talkington's next target: Dallas debutantes.
Narrative competition films included a few imports from Sundance 2007 including Steve Berra's "The Good Life" and Martin Hynes' "The Go-Getter," a lost-in-America story that, despite genuine moments of young love between the illuminant Zooey Deschanel and Lou Taylor Pucci, manages to lose its way mid-story. Crowds inside the Majestic Theater in Dallas attending the inaugural festival. For more photos, check out the festival's Flickr photo site.
Among the docs, Joel P. Engardio and Tom Shepard's "Knocking," put the audience inside the homes of Jehovah's Witnesses, for a change. In its best moments the journalists follow a Witness family into a "bloodless" liver transplant. Witnesses don't believe in using another's blood, or even a stored bag of their own, during surgery. Most even carry a card instructing caregivers "no blood." When a father decides to donate a portion of his liver to his ailing son, the family searches far and wide for a hospital that will do a transfusion-less transplant. They find it at USC who, in exchange, want to use the surgery to test new procedures that will reduce the need for donor blood. Using that as a jumping off point, the filmmakers continue to outline Jehovah Witness history, including their imprisonment in Nazi concentration camps and their victories in litigating for free speech in the US and abroad.
Other noteworthy docs included University of Texas professor Andrew Garrison's "Third Ward, TX," named after a Houston neighborhood where a group of African-American artists took over a block of abandoned homes just before their leveling. After creating unique artist spaces, parks, and much-needed low-income housing, the group then faced the result of their success: gentrification and myopic real estate development. In the aptly titled "A Lawyer Walks Into a Bar," filmmaker Eric Chaikin follows six people striving to become among the measly 39% that pass the California bar exam, including one unlucky subject who's failed it 41 times.
While potshots at Dallas pretension are easy, it's as useless as shooting barrel fish. Dallas doesn't care what you think. They like their art and they like to pay for it. The Dallas Contemporary, The Nasher, and neighboring Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth are all well funded and arguably premiere destinations for modern art in the Midwest. And while Variety reported the fest's pricetag at $4 million, much of that money seemed spent on the filmmakers: from the first class airfare to the swank W Hotel rooms, complete with a 3-bottle gift of fine wine in a fancy Target-designed box (just one item among the avalanche of swag). And when Dallasites show up to see David Lynch present his three-hour, interior-view of Laura Dern's head, they do it in their Neiman Marcus best, they stay through the whole thing, and they applaud when it's over. There is pretension here, and there is also class.
[EDITOR'S NOTE: The inaugural AFI Dallas International Film Festival continues through Sunday, April 1 in Texas.]
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