bad behavior/good excuses

A possibly relevant thing from this article / interview with Kelly Link in Gigantic, which is great in its entirety and might even get me to watch The Vampire Diaries one day:

Look, think about how gossip works. What are the best stories? When you're telling stories, you're telling stories about people who have made a really poor choice, who do or say the kind of thing we all know you shouldn't. In fiction, at least, there's a kind of cathartic, discomfiting joy—a pain/pleasure—in people behaving badly. 

So I don't know, maybe I just want to be a good story one day. It's healthier, though, and longer-lasting, to let the girl in the story do all the bad things, and for me just to write them down from here, where it's safe.

(I just finished reading Kelly Link's new book of short stories, is what brought that up. She's one of my favorites.)

In very closely related news, I watched a little movie called Happy Christmas recently. The trailer makes it seem bleaker than it is, as if everyone in it is kind of horrible, or too flawed to pull for. Like Young Adult (which I loved, but oof, harsh). But it's not, really; it's very sweet. Sad, but realistic, and not conclusively sad in the end. I used to hate Joe Swanberg's movies because nothing ever happened in them; my theory is that he was trying to show the way young people these days avoid conflict or confrontation of any kind, squirming away from it at all costs. Admirable mission, but frustrating to watch (for me, anyway). But he no longer avoids painful discussions, he dives right in and it turns out he's great at that.

Anyway. Fun for the holidays!




Also the other night I saw this crazy thing, which - OMG. Why Don't You Play in Hell?, it's called. It's pretty fantastic. A crazy love song to film and art and the urge to die to make something meaningful, and what a waste that is (or is it?), or, alternatively, what a badass way to live forever. Plenty of ultraviolence, great screen faces, and extremely fabulous costumes all around.



And an unrelated side note: my friend David Walker had a release party yesterday for his kick-ass new comic book about Shaft (you know, the black private dick that's a sex machine to all the chicks), and along with that, he screened Shaft's Big Score (1972), and I'm like 95% sure that at one point in the movie, the sexy race-car driver named Rita said, "Anything with a stick shift is my meat." And that wasn't even close to the best line. Good stuff, and I totally plan on bringing back "it's my meat" as an expression of enthusiasm/proficiency.

But now I'm back in reading mode, so I might talk about something other than movies here next time, in case you all were getting bored (Karl). :)