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Manic-depressive posts from Red Wright-Hand. Because there are thousands of worthless blogs out there and who am I not to add to their number?

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Total US troop deaths in Iraq to date (09/01/07) since 03/20/03: 3739

From 05/02/03 through 06/28/04: 718

From 06/29/04 through 01/30/05: 579

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From 02/01/07: 653

(Sources: US Dept. of Defense, Iraq Coalition Casualty Count)

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SOME LONG-DELAYED CULTURAL NEWS: Among the Missing, a 2001 story collection by Dan Chaon, is as good as everyone says. It's remarkable how much emotion and tension Chaon creates out of a disarmingly simple prose style. (Raymond Carver, who provides the book's epigraph, appears to be the model here, but Chaon's work struck me as far more subtle and rich.) These are tales of deep feeling, exploring loss and fear and personal collapse without ever succumbing to morbidity or anger. Quite an accomplishment, and an interesting contrast to You Are Not a Stranger Here, another highly regarded fiction collection that appeared a year after Chaon's, which often sinks, so it seemed to me, under the weight of its author's (no doubt genuine) sadness.

Saw the Ramones documentary a couple weeks ago, and was suitably impressed. It's not a great example of filmmaking per se, but a comprehensive assemblage of interviews and archive footage...some of which is astounding: the band being mobbed Hard-Day's-Night-style in Rio de Janeiro (where they had major fans in the impoverished youth), and bickering live on-stage about what song to play next (something they managed to get out of their systems early, as anyone who ever witnessed their supersonic concerts will attest.) The doc really captures the feel of the band and the era they created.

Then last night saw Sideways, and was impressed by Alexander Payne's work all over again: he really is one of the best current American filmmakers, and so much better at dramatizing the sexual messiness of life than such self-righteous pricks as Neil LaBute and Todd Solondz. The less you know going into this one, the better, I think, so just go...among other things, you'll get a painfully comic reference to Alain Robbe-Grillet. Watching this, you could almost believe the year is 1973. Movie-making has come to a pretty horrible state when the appearance of a solid character-study onscreen comes off as an almost radical event.
posted by Red at 11:07 AM