Kill is kiss (a response to the film Pontypool)

Every now and then a film is made that has a central premise that is so important that, if it is well made, becomes what many would call essential viewing.

Last night I watched a movie that, because of its central theme and the way it was handled, instantly became a film of significance for me. It’s called Pontypool, and is one of those movies that you can’t believe you’ve never heard of and quite glad you know nothing about when seeing it for the first time as then it just unfolds in front of you. And in that sense you could consider this entire blog post as a spoiler. Not that I think this would genuinely diminish your enjoyment of it, should you choose to seek it out.

It’s based on the book Pontypool Changes Everything. I don’t doubt for a second that the idea has been done before and probably even better, but I’ve yet to come across it, so this was a nice surprise indeed.

Looking at the trailers you’d think it was a zombie movie, and it definitely uses the tropes of that genre to structure its message. I would say it is a movie that writers would really enjoy as its main subject is words, language and most importantly, meaning. It very cleverly gets across the idea that language itself, how it is used and misused, can carry with it an infection, and in the movie it has the rather nicely added little touch that it is only English that has become contagious, and only certain words, but only when those words are understood.

The cure for the decease is to un-understand words, change their meaning, but at the same time to not understand their new meaning either.

In a way I could say that this is one of the most important films I have ever seen. And I’ve seen tens of thousands of films. But this is a film about, what to me, is the most important thing we have: Language.

And if you believe as I do that all language is code, then I think you will ‘get’ this movie.

We all silently agree to accept that certain words have commonly agreed upon, or even inherent meanings. But we so rarely define what those meanings are. And without defining what a word can mean in any given context we are, to a certain extent, merely making noise. The meaning and significance we give the noise is more reliant on what the hearer decides rather than what the speaker intended.

So, do you wreck-a-nice-beach, or do you think it’s in-con-sea-quench-shall?

“Sample is a colour. The sky is a person. Laughter is walking. Yellow is crowded. Friends are verbs.”

Cemetery. A poem by D Harkness

In a forest that on the dead feeds

flakes of names fall and are forgotten.

The place they marked, now covered by weeds;

The dead supped through soil when rotten.

Swallowed by root, exhaled by leaves:

carbon, oxygen, hydrogen returned.

And so it is this solemn place breathes

with those we’ve buried and those we’ve burned.

Why Book Covers?

The reasons I chose to make book covers are both separate and inseparable.

I didn’t learn to read until I was quite old so never had a relationship with literature and yet, even as an illiterate child I would hear things that moved me deeply, and all I knew about them was that they came from a book or a play or a poem etc. Eventually I learnt to read and in my early 20′s began reading in earnest. Being a terminally slow reader always hindered me but I just got on with it and always read by recommendation and so read a lot of great books that I now consider to be directly connected to the person I am.

Until then I had of course developed the habit of flicking through books looking for the illustrations and the first books I bought were art books of all kinds, and for the most part I ignored the pages with writing on them.

I never thought I would read a great deal and much less write, and although I had no innate ability at art I stuck at it and over the years developed skill and talent at several techniques of art, starting with drawing, slowly moving on to colour, and eventually progressing to painting and lastly sculpture.

I had no real hope of making a living with these skills, not because they weren’t good enough, but more because I was not wired in the right way to think in those terms. I just did for the sake of doing.

After many, many years of keeping up with these practices and at the same time doing numerous day jobs I eventually decided to bite the bullet and try to make a living with my artistic abilities, and in a way that could keep my interest and so be sustainable – in an intellectual and emotional sense. I had spent years doing portraits etc and I found that that was not enough on its own to keep me focused and motivated.

After much thought it came to me that I could combine art with literature and in so doing kill many birds with one stone: I wouldn’t have to think of what to create in isolation – there would be a starting point, sometimes a very specific starting point. I would be working with writers who are by nature people who think, which is not something to be dismissed. My art would have an audience and that audience would also more likely be people with certain sensibilities. I would inevitably read more, as even now I often need an external motivation to read. And all this turned out to be true.

As much as I have to constantly struggle to get work I can honestly say that that decision to design covers for books, which to date has involved sculpture, painting, illustration, model making, photography and a bunch of other hands-on methods, as being one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.

Of course some bum-head then invented the Kindle and as much as I’d like to push them in a ditch for doing so, I still want one.

Rom-com or kiss of death?

OMG! I just had this brilliant idea for a movie! Or maybe a TV series… sitcom perhaps! It could even be a documentary….

Basically it would be about this man and this woman who meet, or know each other or whatever and they would like each other, but maybe not at first, although at some point they would definitely be in love, like really, really in love. But some stuff would happen showing up the differences between men and women, cos men and women are different, and the things they do and say, which just go to show how different men and women are, would makes things worse, and other people would be in the film and say things to try to help, but they probably wouldn’t help cos they don’t understand just how much in love they are with each other because theirs is a really special kind of love. But eventually they would realise how special they are and how much they love each other cos they like the same things like being healthy and clever and sensitive. The guy would definitely find it harder to deal with his emotions and how to show them cos men aren’t very good at that, even though he would be really deep and sensitive and have a really amazing job that made the world a better place in some way. He could do something like design cars that have extra safety features that mean that even if you were in a really bad accident where other people were hurt or even killed you would be ok because of his design, or maybe an architect or something. Either way it would be important. And he would also do something manly and physical like mountain climbing or ride a motorbike at the weekends.  And she would work in fashion or with kids to show how creative and sensitive and caring she is, and in her spare time she would do ballet or something like that to show that being really fit and healthy is important too. And they would see that they are just meant to be together and how the world would be a better place if they were a couple and had some kids of their own.

It could be set somewhere really cool like London or New York and their friends would be really good looking too and successful but one of them would be a bit weird and quirky and not really understand, even more than the others don’t understand. There would be a really sexy love scene, but not too sleazy, just enough to show that they are actually open minded and not narrow minded or self obsessed at all, and it would have some awesome soundtrack to it by Damien Rice or someone like that, nothing too mainstream, cos they are clever and not just following the herd and can think for themselves and be original and everything.

Most of the film would be quite funny but at some point it would get really serious and maybe even make people cry a little because of how difficult love can sometimes be and how things can go wrong even when you don’t want or mean them to and there would be a bit where it looks like they really aren’t going to get back together just to keep people on the edge of their seats for a bit.

I really don’t think anything like this has ever been done and I’m sure people would love it and go and see it and get the poster and that, and it could make loads of money and have a sequel where they do it all again but even more. Can you imagine? It’d be amazing!

I thought it would be really good to have Jennifer Aniston and Matthew McConaughey in the lead roles but someone said they’ve already made a film together so it should probably be someone else, but definitely not Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie cos even though they are good actors they are a bit too perfect and I think it should be with actors that are good looking but in a believable way.

I really think I’m going to start working on a script because the world needs a film like this and it could be entertaining but also help people who are in relationships, and show them that it is always better to fight for what you really care about if you want to be happy and that there’s nothing wrong with wanting nice things so long as you’re a good person really.

 

Time

Time is not told by watches,
past my best-before date: see end.
Movement restricted by cells,
I see only dull things.

Here I am,
protest,
breathing more uneasy.

The vows I made recede
slow as gums.

Teeth no longer
belong to me,
made of resin
they fit too well.

The void in the vacuum,
no singing,
no floating.
There is a word for this…

True Blood, or not so true?

I don’t own a TV and haven’t done for years  and years, mainly because I’m not interested in the majority of stuff on it and can’t afford the licence fee that we have to pay in the UK. As far as the TV licensing people are concerned there are two types of people living in the UK: those with TV licences, and criminals. If you don’t own a licence you will get regular visits from them asking to enter your house so that they can check that you are no lying when you tell them you haven’t got a television and therefore don’t need a licence. They have no right to enter so I always tell them to piss off, though I don’t use those words and am always as polite as I can be about it.

Anyway, that’s not what this blog is about….

As I don’t have a TV but love drama and acting (acting was my first love and is something I really should be doing, but that’s another story) I use my PC to watch shows. Great thing about not having a TV is that it makes me so much more selective about what I watch – it can’t just be switched on and left to babble away in the corner, and I can’t mindlessly channel hop hoping to find something worth watching. The only draw backs with using my PC as a television are that I can’t watch everything that has been shown on TV – the various channel sites are selective about what they allow for online viewing, so I miss some things, and sometimes buffering can be a problem and a programme wont play smoothly, or sometimes at all. But the most disappointing thing about it is a mildly misleading appearance it can sometimes have by the way things are advertised. –

Last night on the main page at Channel 4 there was large picture advertising the start of the new season of True Blood. I enjoyed the first few series and was quite excited to see it was continuing, especially as the last series I saw had ended on a very dramatic scene and moment. Bill Compton was about to fight the head vampire and Sookie had discovered an alternate reality or fairyland, and the truth about Bill. I was dying to see how they would carry on from there.

And there, on the site, it clearly said Brand New Series. So I got myself ready, turned the monitor to point in the right direction, snuggled up on the sofa in a cosy blanket (it is getting so damned cold here now) and clicked play. And about 20 seconds in I realised that this was a repeat of the last series I had seen. What a gip! I saw the first three series on the Channel 4 website so I don’t really see what their excuse is. But they’ve obviously decided to repeat season three, presumably to then lead into season four, which hasn’t been shown over here yet. Or at least I hope so!

I was so disappointed that if I could I would have drained the programmers at Channel 4 of their blood and then disembowelled them just for good measure.

I watch and episode of Derren Brown instead, and while he’s evil, he ain’t no sexy vampire!

Twitter

Millions of people use Twitter and millions of people know what Twitter is and are having a fine time using it. It’s like a miniaturised version of The Internet. What do we do on The Internet? We find new sites, new technologies and new information on whatever interests us. Well imagine that condensed into a single stream and you have an idea of what Twitter is. It’s doing the searching for you according to your preferences. It is the best and most powerful tool for doing this and yet is deceptively simple and uncomplicated looking, and maybe that’s why some don’t get it.

What Twitter isn’t (primarily for) is a place for celebrities to tell the world what they had for breakfast. And yet that is what most people that don’t use it think it is precisely for. And why is that? Well celebrities are attention junkies. And that’s not even a criticism; It’s a commonly known fact about the kind of people that seek out and work extremely hard at becoming well known. I myself have always wanted to act, so I’m not complaining, just making the point that that is not what Twitter is for the most part. It is however what celebrities use it for and because they get lots of followers they actually end up believing that people are indeed interested in what they had for breakfast. Unfortunately celebrities get their voices heard and give a very warped picture of what Twitter is all about, and the press relay that information because we live in a celebrity culture. So it is the worst examples of how to use Twitter that get the most publicity.

If you are interested in anything at all then get on Twitter and you will find out things that you either wouldn’t find yourself or that would take you an awfully long time to discover. If you want to connect with like minded people from all around the world, or in your own area, get on Twitter. If you want to be ahead of the game and have your finger on the pulse – get on Twitter. In fact if you want to be engaged in any way about anything then you need a good excuse to not be on Twitter.

And like everything else in life: What you get out of it depends entirely on what you put in.

Lecture over. Now go have fun…. on Twitter!

 

Communication – The designer’s dilemma

kuh-myoo-ni-key-shuh n  Blue = Orange

One of the hardest things I find as a designer comes in two parts: One is trying to convey to clients that I can work in whatever style they like. This comes after decades of studying and practicing art in a huge variety of styles, techniques and media from sculpture to photography – from abstract surrealism to traditional naturalism. The other is drawing out from the client what it is they want and conveying to them that taste varies too much for me to make assumptions about what they are after and what they consider good or bad. There is no accounting for taste.

Also, and it is connected to the above, there is the problem of not having to hand an example of every single possible subject that a client might want. A client may look at my port folio and say, ‘Ah, but you don’t do animals.’ When in fact I have done dozens all in different ways but simply don’t have any on show.

What one really wants from a client is that they are able to see one’s abilities alone. Then, if they can convey what it is they would like, work can begin.

But all too often they do not see an example of the very thing they are wanting and simply move on, presumably to find someone who specialises in, for example, just doing animals.

It is the main frustration of the artist that has chosen to work for many and varied clients on many and varied projects.

As someone who made portraits for many, many years I found that even then the main part of the work was deciphering what it was the client wanted from what they were saying, and I was always amazed at how limiting language is when it comes to communicating ideas about visual arts. It seems that people often don’t know what they want until they see it and yet on some level expect the artist to know from the outset what it is they desire.

Communication. Communication. Communication.

 

Think you can’t write? You do!

So, you think you can’t write either?

It’s just occurred to me….  For years and years now I have been a huge admirer of writers. The art and craft of writing is something I have always felt is not a talent I will ever have, and could never create the amazing worlds and characters, scenarios and stories that so many incredibly gifted writers manage to do. And I don’t suppose for a second that even if I tried I would ever be able to compete with the greats, or even not so greats.

Partly this is because I was not taught to read and write much as a child and by the age of nine still didn’t know my alphabet and did not read my first book until age seventeen, which was The Hobbit. I took up reading properly in my early twenties and have always been terminally slow at it, but I’ve put in the hours and now am pleased to say that I have read a great many wonderful books, something I am immensely pleased and proud about.

I’ve always wished I could write and have always told myself that I know I can’t, perhaps subconsciously because of having no real grounding in it, but then it struck me! –

For about a decade now I have been communicating with people around the globe by email, Myspace, Facebook and several other sites. I write lengthy emails, sometimes several a day, in fact usually several a day. These emails are reasonably well written – I seem to have an intuitive grasp of grammar and punctuation. The emails, which in volume would equate to a couple of Bible’s worth, are well structured and because of the reasons for writing them have to contain coherent information and descriptions of what is going on in my life. And yet it has taken me till now to realise that not only can I write but that I am in fact a writer! OK, so I’m not writing books or even short stories and I’m not published, but the simple fact of the matter is that I write every single day in blogs, to friends and for my own amusement. Quality is another matter and form is its own thing but there you have it:

I’m a writer!

And there’s none more surprised than me at that realisation.

 

Do you have kids?

There’s a little comment that really annoys me:

Every now and then, in general conversation, someone will ask, ‘Do you have kids?’ and I answer, ‘No.’ That’s a fairly simple question and has a fairly simple answer. But then comes the comment – the clichéd, small minded comment that says more about the person saying it than it does about who they are saying it to, and it speaks volumes about them. Alarm bells start ringing. The comment is, for reasons I may come to, nearly always muttered rather than stated clearly, and it’s this: ‘Well, none that you know of.’

Now, as far as I know, we are not dogs and monkeys. We do not go around sniffing each other’s crotches and shagging in the streets. I was under the impression we are conscious beings, with a sense of self awareness – sentient thinking beings. Am I mistaken?

It is simply not possible to inseminate someone unknowingly. I mean, we do all know how babies are made, right?

So, besides being slightly annoyed at the presumption anyone who says this has made about me, I am also mildly irritated by the implied dishonesty of those that say it. It is an attitude that comes from people who are prepared to make excuses for their actions, and those action’s consequences, in the world.

It is a comment that diminishes us all.