Movie Review 19: Norwegian Wood

It will come as no surprise to my long time readers that Haruki Murakami is one of my favorite authors. I've reviewed several of his books here over the last several years, including:

• Dance, Dance, Dance
• The Elephant Vanishes
• Sputnik Sweetheart
• After Dark
• Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman

When people ask me which Murakami book they should read first, I always suggest Norwegian Wood. It is the most accessible of his novels. It has a reasonably straight forward plot, and the reader sort of know what happens at the end.

It's also strange and dark enough to give the reader an introduction to Murakami, but the plot is not so weird as to scare off the novice.  Plus it still has the beautiful language that is a mainstay of Murakami's work. And it's the only one that lends itself to a movie adaptation.

Last weekend (2011-06-11) the GF and I were lucky enough to catch the US premiere of Tran Ahn Hung's adaptation of Norwegian Wood, part of the SIFF. The UK website is here. The Japanese website is here.

It's a very good movie that does an effective job of capturing the tone of the book.  That means it's a dark, depressing story featuring characters with complex relationships and personal issues.  Since it's been several years since I read the book (it was before I even started this blog) I'd forgotten how the story ended.

The movie is in Japanese with English subtitles.  I was a little concerned about that because the magic of a Murakami novel is in the language and flow of the words.  Would subtitles fail to capture that essence or be too overwhelming? I needn't have worried. The Director opted to minimize the dialog in the film, and communicate Murakami's vision with the visuals.  There's relatively little exposition in the film and it works well.

The scenes that make up the film are snapshots of moments in the characters' lives rather than a continual or even flow from one to another. The director is giving the audience a lot of credit for following the story.  It moves forward in sections, and relies on the viewers to fill in the blanks.  Scenes jump, rather than transition, and it works well in this film.

Also striking is how the director used music. In most American films, it seems there is always music in the background, reinforcing the action and further building the tone.  In Norwegian Wood, the director takes the opposite approach.  He minimizes the music and let's a silent background or one of relevant environmental noise carry the scene. The audience hears almost as much water in the movie as it does music -- water in the form of crashing waves, rain pouring down, babbling streams, or bathroom vanities.

In some respects minimizing the music seems a little odd, since one of the selling points of the film is that the soundtrack was created by Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood.  I'm not sure if this is common in foreign films, but it was certainly interesting to see and not hear, well, here.

The book and the film take place against the backdrop of student protests in Tokyo in the 60s.  While the protests do make their appearance in the film, I don't get the sense that they really needed to be here. Their influence on the main character is more pronounced in the book, but in the film, they almost feel irrelevant. The story feels like it could have taken place in 1985 as easily as it did in 1967. Placing the film in the 60s gave the director the opportunity to costume the actors in period appropriate garb, and to not use cell phones, but didn't feel like it impacted the core of the movie.

Those familiar with the book, may be wondering about the main character's roommate, whom he refers to as the Stormtrooper because of his intense, eccentric ways. He had a couple of appearances in the movie, but not many. It's too bad, because when he does appear, he's really funny. The flag raising ceremonies that also are a feature of the book are mostly left out, too.

It's too bad because those characters, and the deeper discussion of the protests help to reinforce the narrator's own sense of alienation and make it easier for the reader to go on the journey he pursues.  At the same, time, though, it could be that much of that material is better suited for the internal monologue of a book than for the more visual movie. After all, it's not those scenes that make a difference in the book; it's how the narrator reacts to them and feels about them. I can't really fault the film for that, but if you are looking for more of those aspects in the film, you may be disappointed.

The writers do a good job with the lost and generally damaged Naoko. Rinko Kikuchi plays the role well. She plays the delicate and at times dramatic character in a restrained way.  Kiko Mizuhara captures the confidence of Midori, but the script seems to cheat her a bit.  The character lacks the depth of Naoko in the film and as a result, it's more challenging to relate to the tension Ken'ichi Matsuyama's Toru Watanabe feels as he tries to navigate his and the two women's feelings.  Matsuyama himself plays Watanabe as confused and struggling to do what's right as he feels alone no matter what he does.  He seems to do an effective job with the role.

If you are not familiar with the story, know that it is not a happy one.  It's dark and strange. It explores the issues of alienation, grief, regret, depression, and suicide. There are extensive, frank discussions of sexuality.

That said, it is a very good movie.  It's reasonably faithful to the book and is and interesting alternative to the style I've come to expect from US movies. It's is beautifully shot, well acted, and a joy to listen to. It had treats for the eyes, the ears, the brain, and the heart.

But perhaps it's not the best choice for a first date.

Tokyo Travels Part 23: Ometesando and Shibuya Redux

Note:  This is the latest in a series of posts about a trip The GF and I took to Tokyo in May, 2010.  More posts are available here.

It’s tough to take in the sights and sounds of Tokyo in just one exposure -- even if that exposure is to just a small part of the city. One day we decided to head back to Harajuku and to Shibuya during the day on a quest -- a quest for squished pennies.
You may have seen these machines at tourist stops around the country. You put in two quarters and a penny, and then you turn a crank. As you turn the crank, the machine flattens and elongates a penny and imprints a design. You get your now fancy penny back, and the machine keeps the quarters. There are websites that track these machines and a surprisingly large and passionate web community surrounding them. It’s a fairly inexpensive souvenir; the GF has been collecting them for years.

Of course in Tokyo, they don’t use pennies. Or quarters for that matter. The machines come preloaded with copper blanks, so all you need to supply is 100 Yen. Armed with a list of locations, we set off to find the machines.

First we headed to Omotesando-dori in the Harajuku neighborhood to visit Kiddyland, a seven floor toy store known around the world. They have an entire floor dedicated to Peanuts merchandise and another dedicated to Sanrio. It’s a pretty amazing place. A couple months after we got back, they closed the store for remodelling and expect to reopen in 1.5 years. The idea of a store planning to close for a year and half and then reopen is something I have trouble wrapping my head around.

The Omotesando Hills shopping center is across the street from Kiddyland. It’s a high-end mall, surrounded by dozens of high-end, stand-alone retailers. We wandered the narrow streets off the main road and peeked in the windows. We walked through the Tumi store and fortunately did not buy anything. I liked the location of the Tumi store, though. It was just off the main strip on a quieter street.

The wandering itself wasn’t all that pleasant. We were there in mid-May and it was warming up. It was humid. And then the humidity hit 100% and it started to drizzle. So now we were damp and warm and starting to feel a little moldy.

Our next quest was to find the Marimekko store. They don’t have a squished penny machine, but they do have some cool designs (or so I’m told). The GF is a big fan of this Finnish brand and they have stores all over the world.

The challenge was finding this location. This was the only major navigation challenge the two of us encountered on the trip (I did get myself temporarily misplaced in Ebisu, but that’s another story). Google maps wasn’t much help, and neither was the Marimekko site. It listed the address, but the map function didn’t work. And and as I understand it, many Tokyo denizens have trouble decoding local address, so I had little-to-no-chance. I led the GF up and down roads and across boulevards in what I guessed was the appropriate direction. I was usually wrong. I finally found a few directions in an article about the opening that were published a couple years earlier. 
Here's the location, in case you're looking for it:

View Harajuku And Shibuya By Day in a larger map

We got there, walked around a bit, and were distinctly underwhelmed. It mostly had stuff the GF had already seen online and elsewhere. I’m sure we would have been more pleased if it hadn’t taken so much work on our part to find it. I can’t fault them for that; that’s just one of the risks inherent in travel.

We had planned to find a nice ramen place for lunch and headed into the Omotedano Hills Mall.

Ahhhhhhhh. Air conditioning.

When we got there, we decided it was bit too warm for Ramen, and opted for Gelato instead. That turned out to be an excellent choice.

Sufficiently chilled and sugared up, we headed out on the next quest -- the squished penny machines at the Disney store in Shibuya.

We headed down Meiji-Dori. Here is the map of the day’s wanderings (including the train ride from the hotel).

We found the Disney store with no problem and the people couldn’t have been nicer. The first penny machine was right inside the door, and as soon as one of the reps saw us using it, she immediately pointed out the other machine they had, too. She was also more than happy to make change for us. And then we had one of those encounters we would have throughout the week.

She asked where we were from.

“Seattle,” I said.

“Ahh,” she said. “Ichiro”

We wandered more though the streets, visited Tower Records, crossed the street at the Shibuya, and had coffee at the safest and perhaps busiest Starbucks in the world.

This visit to a Starbucks had the distinction of being the most expensive one I’ve had. It’s that combination of Starbucks expensive coffee and Tokyo’s expensive prices.

Okay, that’s not it. Sure I had a Matcha Latte and the GF had an Iced Latte, but what probably put it over the top was the snacks. And the snacks for later. Okay, and maybe the souvenir mugs. Afterall, we needed our toys.

Afterwards, we headed back out to the muggy streets, turned a corner passed a significantly strong and yet limited zone of “fragrant” storm related air as people walked past. We continued to be amazed by the sights and sounds, and after 25 feet, no longer the smells as we plied the narrow streets. After almost succumbing to the allure of the Outback Steakhouse (we resisted) we headed back to the train station to see Hachiko.

Back at the hotel, and back in the airconditioning (Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh) we caught some rest and began to record the day’s adventures.

Municipal Wi-Fi is a bad idea

Every now and then a city will announce plans to provide free Internet access points around the city, and there will often be praise from the hi-tech community.  Or a state will move to ban such initiatives and heaps of scorn will be heaved on top of them and the local cable and DSL provides.  That's a mistake.

While I realize folk love to hate their cable companies (often with good reason) and the woeful state of broadband in this country, having the cities provide the access is worse idea.

Once municipal broadband is wide spread and available at no additionl cost than the taxes people are already paying, then the rational, individual decision is to stop paying Comcast or someone else for Internet access.  With enough people doing that, residential broadband from private companies will eventually go away.

That may be fine, assuming the municipalities allow free and open Internet access, but I'm not convinced they will. There are many great things on the net, but there are many foul ones as well.  We already see debates in favor of blocking undesirable websites at libraries and schools.  Will a vocal minority really allow the city to make such content available in homes?

Obviously the first target will be block already illegal or obscene content. I can't imagine many city councils will oppose a determined group of citizens who want to prohibit the city from "supplying" child pornography.  You can already imagine the campaign ads.

So what's next? Should the city be in the business of sending regular pornography into homes? Can't children see it then? Is that how we want to use tax money?

Porn is an easy target for those who want to restrict access to content. And a city blocking such content from it's own service may not be in the business of censorship.  After all, it's not like their banning the content.  They're simply choosing not carry it on a municipal service.

So what's next?  In many places, it's probably hate speech.  Should the city be facilitating content that is racist or misogynistic?

There are extremes on both the right and left of our political landscape that would like to see certain content go away.

Many would argue that the city should block sites that enable violence -- perhaps content related to building explosives and fighting a government force.  But what about sites that promote non-violent political unrest?

At this point I think it's safe to say that no city would ban a legitimate new site's content from it's service.  But then who is determining  the legitimacy of a new site?  I think CNN and Fox would be safe from calls to ban it from the city's service, but what about Al Jazeera?

In the recent uprisings in the middle east, one of the first things dictators try to do it cut off 'net access for the people. Can we count on local governments there to not do that if pressed?

The Internet is a powerful tool because of both the good stuff and bad stuff that's on it.  And I trust the users of the Internet, and, yes, many of the private party ISPs out there, to deliver a free 'net experience much more than I trust a city council trying to stand up to a vocal group of citizens barking their vocal call to, "Think of the children!"

Eddie Rabbit meets Anime

My friend Trina posted this video on Facebook. It's anime girls dancing to Eddie Rabbit's "I Love a Rainy Night."  It makes a lot more sense that you would think.



The first 20 seconds or so is a bit jumpy but then it smooths out. Link directly to the video: http://youtu.be/qvE892xEDn0

Shatner-Palooza: Searching for Major Tom

While everyone can surely agree that "Has Been" by William Shatner (earlier comments here, here, and here) is one of the best albums of the 21st Century (oh, calm down, I said one of the best), many have asked what he can do to follow that up.  Well, the answer is he can go find Major Tom.

Major Tom was a great song, and more recently represented a poor marketing decision by Lincoln. But it does have a certain melodramatic element that lends itself to Shatnerness.

Shatner's new album is due out later this year and will feature covers of popular space related ( or quasi-space-related) songs.  Among the songs he plans to cover are:

• Bohemian Rhapsody
• Iron Man
• Walking on the Moon
• Major Tom

And...

of course...

the one song that started it all...

and made us love and hate the man at the same time...

bringing silliness and awesomeness to its epic confluecne

ROCKET MAN

You can see the full track list here and read more about it here.

Thanks for the link, Britt!

Obvious Warnings aren't new

We tend to think that obvious warnings (like this one) are a product of our modern litigious society, and that those lawsuits can be traced all the way back to Judge Wapner's People's Court with Doug Llewelyn's admission of "Don't take the law into your own hands; you take them to court."

But silly warning have been around for much longer, as this sign (ostensibly for children) from a 1910 Seattle Cable Car indicates:

A contained Tulip Festival

The weather was not kind to the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival this year.  The chilly spring and non-stop drizzle delayed the tulip blooms quite a bit. Whereas during many years you could drive up there in the mid-April and see acres and acres of brilliant color that looked like you could set sail on and float across a sea of red, this year, it wasn’t quite to be.

When my Mother and I took the drive up there one afternoon, there was plenty of green, and the occasional spot of yellow as the Daffodils made their last stand, the tulip blooms remained scarce.

Fortunately, we still got to experience the reds and purples of the Roozengaarde display gardens. The contained and disciplined gardens showcase a variety of blooms and it was a enough of a tulip fix for the year.
 
I shot these images using the same macro lens I brought to the Northwest Flower and Garden Show.
This is just a sampling of the pictures from that day.  You can find more of my pictures from that day here, on my Flickr page.

Of course it was drizzling that day, which made walking in the nature more complicated, but it did do some interesting things to the flowers. The water droplets clung to the tulips as though they feared being soaked up by the ground.

They also did something that’s I’d only every seen on CSI. They captured the reflection of neighboring plants, the sky, and me. Granted, it was more of a silhouette and a bit distorted. It would never result in my conviction for anything, but it was still quite cool. 

I’m not sure how well that translates to the small image posted in Blogger; you may need to open the images to their full size on Flickr to check it out (Image 1, Image 2, Image 3).

In this shot, I used the flash.  It made the water droplets on the ruffled petal edges sparkle like an artificial, fiber optic Christmas tree. It’s a little challenging to see it in this post, but you can see a larger version here.

I was able to get very tight on this one.

They did some creative stuff with the flowers, creating a blue river of Irises through the beds.

It wasn’t the wide swaths of color I’d seen in previous years, but it was still worth the visit.
You can find posts from previous visits to the Tulip Festival here:

Tulips and Hail

Tulip Festival -- 2006

And you can find more pictures from various years here.

Tickling a Penguin

This may be the cutest thing I've seen all year. The Penguin is named Cookie.

Here's the short version that's been all over the 'net they past couple days:

http://www.collegehumor.com/video/6479500/penguin-getting-tickled

Here's a slightly longer version that's higher quality on YouTube:

http://youtu.be/3wTWWjYTe1I

Not much has changed in 90 years

My Mother and I visited the Museum of History and Industry last week, and it is a fascinating look back at Seattle through the years.  They currently have an exhibit called Now and Then, which showcases historical photos of Seattle next to the an image shot from essentially the same location today.

They showed classic images of the opening of the first floating bridge across Lake Washington.  Years later, it would become part of I-90.




What struck me most was the placard next to it.





The first line reads:

After 20 years of debate about whether to build it, and where and how, the first bridge across Lake Washington took 18 months to complete.

Twenty years.

Twenty years to make that simple decision.

The most frustrating thing about Seattle and probably what will keep Seattle from ever achieving its potential is its inability to make a decision and do anything in a timely manner. The Seattle characteristic that drove the city to discuss this bridge for 20 years in the past is the same reason why we don't have a significant rail system today. It's why we have 3 yes votes before having a no vote and scrapping the monorail.  It's why we're still arguing about how to get light rail to the east side and why we're still arguing about replacing our crumbling viaduct that was severely damaged in an earthquake 10 years ago.  The contracts are signed and we still may have another vote on it.

I guess it's reassuring to know that this is not a new phenomenon.  Seattle has never been able to make up it's mind about infrastructure in anything resembling a sensible time frame.

I guess this also means it's never going to get any better.

Dinner and a Soda

So on Thursday I turned 27 for the 14th time (everyone else is telling me that is actually 40,but I refuse to believe it).

Here are some random observations about the concept and the day.

• Dinner at Sullivan's in Seattle?  Definitely a good choice. Located at the former site of the Union Square Grill, it's easy to walk to from my apartment. And they have plenty of meat, which is awesome.
• Apparently you can get cases of soda from Jones with custom labels. The Shoebox Chef created a batch for me with what had been one of my sillier Facebook profile pictures. It's quite good.
• My Mother is in town, and that's always fun.  It gives me an excuse to some of the remaining tourist things in the area, and it's always great to see her. Visiting MOHAI was particularly interesting especially when this article in the Seattle Times followed that visit.
• The age itself?  Yeah. That's a little weird.  I'm still not sure how I feel about that.  There comes a point when you start to realize you are no longer preparing for your adult life, but actually living it.  I can see that in the distance.
• I'm kind of stunned by the number of birthday greetings I got on Facebook this year.  It's awesome, and quite different from years passed.  It's great hearing from the awesome folks I've known over the years, and it's fascinating how this appears to represent a larger cultural shift...but now is not the time to drift into an analysis of the impacts of social media.
• Perhaps next year it will be time to turn 28. We'll see what happens next spring.

It's been a great 26+14 years so far, and I am grateful for all the awesome people who have been a part of that and contributed in large part and small to making me the person I am today.

Now, let's see what the next 160 years have to bring...

Hurricane Ridge

After a visit to the Olympic Game Farm, The GF and I headed into Olympic National Park to visit Hurricane Ridge.  The trip up there is a beautiful, windy drive through the trees.

This video shows part of the drive.  The GF just held the camera up to the windshield.  We are lucky to live in such a beautiful part of the country.




You can also see the video on Youtube here.

One the drive, we pulled off at a scenic turnout.  The overlook was at Ancient Lake Morse.

Thousans of years ago, a great ice sheet from Canada flowed south through the Puget Sound and west through the Strait of Juan de Fuca. The ice shee abutted alpine glaciers flowing from the Olympic Mountains. As warming occurred, meltwater from mountain glaciers was dammed by the ice sheet, forming ancient Lake Morse. Continued warming caused the ice sheet to withdraw, draining the lake. Morse creek now parallels the road. In ancient times it flowed over a ridge of soft sediments connecting Blue and Round Mountains. When glaciers dammed the creek, it was diverted to a new path between Round Mountain and the present road, cutting through hard lava rocks. The resulting gorge is visible as you drive down the road or from the short trail at the Tunnels parking area.

The science is cool, but the scene is impressive.  I shot these pcitures with a 10mm - 17mm fish eye lens.  It was my best shot at capturing the land scape, but it's still a poor substitute for the real thing.

I didn't expect this to be a great portrait lens, but I really like how this turned out.  I had the camera 3 feet from the GF's face, and she thought I was nuts (which puts her into a rather large group).  But I think it worked out.

She shot some, as well.

We continued up the road to the visitors center and gift shop.  The views were much more open there. And the crowds were much larger.  From here, we could see the glaciers in the mountains and the August snow in the park.

From there we drove a short distance to the Hurricane Ridge trail head.  Then we began walking.  Uphill.  It took a little longer than I expected -- probably about an hour (maybe a little more).  It's 1.5 miles to the ridge, but we stopped a bunch of times to take pictures and to take in the scenery. While the guidebooks talked about cold weather in the middle of summer, we lucked out and had gorgeous weather the whole time.

It was quite a walk, but the views up top made it all worthwhile.  Once we got up there. a deer walked right past us.  It was pretty amazing how close it was.

When we turned around, we had fantastic views of the Strait on Juan de Fuca.  See that land across the water?  That's Canada.

The GF had a lot of fun, too.

Eventually, it was time to head back.  We made sure to spend enough time up there to be sure the walk was worth it.

If you go, dress in layers.  We got lucky with how warm it was.  Also, be aware that the trail isn't wide.  And there are no gurad rails or hand holds.  And off to one side there are major dropoffs.  Bring water and snacks to stay fueld up.  And take your time. The views are worth it and your lungs will appreciate it, especially if you aren't acclimated to the 5700 foot elevation.  You can't count on cell phone service along the way, although I did manage to check in on foursquare at the top of the trail.

It was a fantastic, if tiring experience.

You can see more pictures here.

Life in the Garden Part 46: Northwest Flower and Garden Show 2011

Somehow it survived and once February rolled around it was again time for the Northwest Flower and Garden Show. The last serveral Christmases my mother gave me a new lens for my camera, and I've always used that new lens as the sole one I bring to the garden show,  This year, that lens is a Sigma 105mm f/2.8 EX DG Medium Telephoto Macro Lens.

The lens gave me some nice reach and was fast enough for most shots I wanted to take (especially when I used a monopod).  The great thing about it, especially for this event, was the macro capability.  I got some really detailed shots.  The disadvantage for many of the shots, though, was that same long reach I mentiond a moment ago.  There were shots I couldn't take because I couldn't stand back far enough without other people getting in the shot, or me knocking over everything that was behind me.

I find this to be a good exercise from time-to-time.  It forces me to think more about the pictures I want to take, and I have to make decisions that I don't have to make when I carry my full kit.

This was a neat idea for a fake Koi pond -- fish figurines in black grass.

This was from the section on Ikebana.

The show gardens had a fictional character theme.

The small gardens section in the atrium over Pike St. always has asome great views and creative designs.

The doll diorama was also interesting.  They were all having a BBQ in the back yard. And the whole display was in a converted day bed.

The tradeshow has lots of neat stuff for an actual dirt-based garden for people who have "land" or "space." Neither of which really applies to me, but there was still stuff worth seeing.

I managed to spend very little money at the show, except, of course, for the two container sized apple trees I bought for my deck. I may now be just a year away from growing my own apples.

If you're into gardening, plants, flowers, vegetables and related stuff, and are in the Seattle area, check out the show next year.  And good luck on not spending so much on stuff you can't afford seeds.

More pictures from this year's show are available here.

Other posts I've written about the Garden show:

2011-03-01: Problem with a QR Code
2010-06-04: Life in the Garden Part 40: Northwest Flower and Garden Show – 2010
2009-02-22: The strengths and limitations of my new lens
2009-09-21: Life in the Garden Part 09: Photography and the Garden Show