All the preparation in the world!

Alfred Hitchcock's thing was planning. Scheming. Preparing. His job was to take a scenario, coax it through a writer into a script, and then figure out the geometry of the thing. Camera angles, lens lengths, the shapes and colors of the foreground and background. He took notes, he storyboarded, he imagined and decided and determined and produced. By the time the first frame was shot, he was essentially finished. He had produced a specific plan, and filming was just the tedious process of capturing all the little snips of colored thread so that they could be sewn into a suspenseful needlepoint later on. He didn't shoot coverage, he didn't run a dozen cameras so he could make up his mind later, he didn't waste film on anything; he just shot the plan. This way, if he was fired before the edit was done, the movie would still look like he planned, because there would be no alternate footage or angles to choose from. Actors - props that eat - were expected to know their roles, literally and figuratively, and do their best not to mess it up. (I don't think Hitchcock would go in for the creepy Zemeckis-favored animation thing though, that's giving whole staffs and departments worth of people the chance to screw up the performance.)

In theory, if you had all of Hitch's notes and storyboards and perhaps, in the spirit of planning, you discussed his intentions with him, he wouldn't even have to show up. Someone else could relay the same set of decisions, made in advance, follow the boards, shoot the plan.

So how did Gus Van Sant screw up Psycho? They not only had the original materials, they had the original film to look at! Maybe that's the trouble. Maybe too much effort was spent on imitating the original cast instead of acting. Maybe it was mis-cast. Maybe part of the problem was that it was shot in color - Hitchcock certainly could have shot it in color, and had already done several color films; the black and white was a choice.

So....what? Imitation is flattering, but lousy art? There was more method to Hitchcock's madness than met the eye? Does the meaning of the film change when the audience goes in knowing the surprises on which the original was hinged? Was the movie actually okay, just not able to stand its own weight, in the form of the original's legacy and the criticism that comes with touching it?

Journal Entries in Bad Taste

No lie! Thursday, Sept 13, 2001 - When the people are clear and they start sifting through the rubble, I wonder if the insurance companies will classify it as an 'Act of God.'

Monday, Aug 29, 2005 - Why aren't there more Katrina and the Waves jokes in the news lately? It looks like there's gonna be a whole lot of people without power or water, just waiting out the storm. I'll bet we start seeing a whole lot of little girls named Katrina next year.

[EDIT: Fake entry I thought of today!] Thursday, Sept 11, 2003 - Generations from now, the date of September 11th will live on in infamy, in memorial of the senseless loss this nation has sustained. R.I.P. John Ritter.

Another web thing.

I had an idea, so I signed up for that Twitter the kids love.  It's greenglassdoor if you're into that sort of thing. But let's be honest, if you're one of my two known readers here, you probably already noticed that I added you over there. At least I'm not on facebook. But Dave Brand will be! Just 32 more days!

Burgled again! The Criminality Continues!

In what I presume may have been somehow related to the car break-in(s), someone emptied out my bank account at an ATM in Las Vegas yesterday. I was here, in Los Angeles, with my ATM card. Good going, someone. I am left to wonder, however, if security was ever compromised at the bank, or if I happened to have been unwittingly embroiled in some more clever scheme, since my own PI number was apparently used, and that's not the sort of thing a rational person keeps written down. Smart of them to do it yesterday though. Less likely to be noticed when everyone else was moving money around in uncharacteristically big ways. Bunch of savages in this town, I swear.

Another Spooky Thanksgiving!

First of all, De-Gifting.com is up and running. It's the answer to giving boring gifts to snoozy relatives you don't know or like. It's a non-gift, but not careless. Thoughtful, considered, Nothing. Second, I got invited to a Thanksgiving thing, and since I find I am so rarely invited anywhere, I do make an effort to show up when it happens. I made them an old-fashioned thanksgiving feast just like Snoopy used to do:

For the uninitiated, what you've got there is your buttered toast, your popcorn, your pretzels, and your jelly beans. It should have been pretzel sticks, I know, but the store was out. I'm sure this is a popular Thanksgiving treat.

Cooking here, serving here!