Brilliant Corners

How sad is it that out of all the Academy Award nominees for this year, I've seen only one in its entirety (Sicko) and another half-way through (Ratatouille)? Well, pretty sad.

When going through some boxes at my wife's childhood home we came across many books from her (and her siblings') youth. One of them is a book called Walt Disney's World of Nature. Inside, I found a passage that perpetuates (or continues) the myth that lemmings all migrate to the sea (sometimes plunging from a cliff) in an act mass suicide. We now know that this isn't true at all.

For how the mass suicide is explained in the book, here's a crappy scan of page 28:

I love how they describe the deaths of the lemmings in the water. There's no explicit mention of drowning, just this:

The bubbles in their fur make them buoyant, and the cool water feels good. They swim on and on, perhaps for miles. Bubbles foam out behind. But these bubbles are not entirely from padding feet; the fur of the lemmings is losing its buoyancy.

One minute they're having a swim, and the next minute they're dead. Poor lemmings.

The only evidence of the lemmings' mass suicide is from the Disney "documentary" Winter Wilderness (and this book). I remember watching this as a child and recalling the sad fate of the lemmings. Too bad (or, thank goodness!) it's just a myth that the producers of Winter Wilderness set up.

Some references:

• The Disney book on Amazon.com
• You can now buy the Winter Wilderness episode on DVD as part of the True Life Adventures series, but according to some of the reviews there's no mention of the controversy surrounding the lemmings segment
• Lemmings myth article at Snopes.com
• "Lemming Suicide Myth: Disney Film Faked Bogus Behavior" article from the Alaska Dept. of Fish & Game
• "Great Moments in Science: Lemmings Suicide Myth" (included audio as well)
• The lemmings article on Wikipedia with a section on the myth

When I watched You're Gonna Miss Me at the SXSW premiere last year I had heard _of_ Roky Erickson, but I had never really listened to his music and I had no idea of the troubles he had been through in the last decade or so. Two of my great friend happened to be the producers of the documentary and I was there at the premiere to help celebrate the happy occasion with them. Then the film started.

It's amazing how much Roky had suffered while in the "care" of his mother. In a sense, this musical genius was wasting away and if it wasn't for his brother Sumner helping out, who knows what would have happened to Roky. It's inspiring to know that he's back and playing music again. Because of the documentary, I bought a recent compilation of his music (I Have Always Been Here Before), both solo and with the various bands he played with over the years.

While the doc was on the festival circuit, I put together and maintained the website for the film. The version(s) I put up have been taken down (but here's a snapshot from the Web Archive of the first version of the site) and replaced by another. Watch the trailer at the site, and you'll definitely get sucked in to his story.

The reason I bring this up is that the documentary is now available on DVD, and it seems to be packed with loads of extras. So, congrats to my friends; I know they've looked forward to this day for a long time.

Update: Via coudal's Fresh Signals blog, a new music video for Spoon's song "The Underdog" directed by You're Gonna Miss Me's director Keven McAlester. More of his music videos here.

Another year is now (just about) over and I guess it's about time I did a yearly media roundup. I've done similar things in the past, but I let the tradition lapse a few years. Since I don't have the last few years' roundups available for comparison, I'm not too sure if I did any better (consumed more media) this year or not. These lists will just have to stand on their own.

So, without any further ado, here are the lists...

Literature

Thanks to my English classes at school, I've had to read more than I normally would in a year. Here's the full list of books I've read this year (in the order read):

1. The Scarlet Letter - Nathaniel Hawthorne (for ENGL 4400)
2. The Polysyllabic Spree - Nick Hornby
3. The Crying of Lot 49 - Thomas Pynchon (for ENGL 4400)
4. Cat's Cradle - Kurt Vonnegut (for ENGL 4400)
5. The Big Sleep - Raymond Chandler (for ENGL 4400)
6. Native Son - Richard Wright (for ENGL 4400)
7. The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck (for ENGL 4400)
8. The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald (for ENGL 4400)
9. My Ántonia - Willa Cather (for ENGL 4400)
10. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain (for ENGL 4400).
11. Moby Dick - Herman Melville (for ENGL 4400)
12. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
13. Shutterbug Follies (Graphic Novel) - Jason Little
14. Blankets (Graphic Novel) - Craig Thompson
15. The Tipping Point - Malcolm Gladwell
16. The Postman Always Rings Twice - James M. Cain
17. V for Vendetta (Graphic Novel) - Alan Moore
18. Freakonomics - Steven D. Levitt
19. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone - J.K. Rowling
20. Alias Vol. 1 (Graphic Novel) - Brian Michael Bendis & Michael Gaydos
21. Spring Snow - Yukio Mishima
22. Ice Haven (Graphic Novel) - Daniel Clowes
23. Y: The Last Man Vol. 1: Unmanned (Graphic Novel) - Brian K. Vaughan
24. Superman: Red Son (Graphic Novel) - Mark Millar
25. The Fortress of Solitude - Jonathan Lethem
26. Stranger Things Happen - Kelly Link
27. Men and Cartoons - Jonathan Lethem
28. Tricked (Graphic Novel) - Alex Robinson
29. Gary Benchley, Rock Star - Paul Ford
30. More Box Office Poison (Graphic Novel) - Alex Robinson
31. Magic For Beginners - Kelly Link
32. Double Indemnity - James M. Cain
33. The Golden Compass - Philip Pullman
34. The Pragmatic Programmer - Andrew Hunt & David Thomas

Film

I didn't see as many films this year as I wished I had. We subscribed to NetFlix for most of the year, but we were horrible about using it, and eventually cancelled. That being said, here are some of the better films I saw this year (in no particular order):

• Howl's Moving Castle
• Hotel Rwanda
• Me and You and Everyone We Know
• Serenity
• City of God
• The Incredibles
• The Bicycle Thief
• Maria Full of Grace
• Vera Drake
• The 40 Year Old Virgin
• Mad Hot Ballroom

Music

I definitely stubled onto (or was introduced) to some fantastic new music this year. Here's a list of bands or artists that I first heard of, and began listening to this year:

• Emiliana Torrini
• M.I.A. (I think she was this year)
• Diplo
• Keren Ann
• Built to Spill (yes, I'm late to the game here)
• Carla Bruni
• Spoon (late, yet again)
• Klint

Well, that's about it for 2005. I'm looking forward to many more good books, good films, and some new music in the coming year.

Okay, now off to the New Year's Eve party!

Finally, three of Errol Morris' early documentaries are available on DVD: Gates of Heaven; The Thin Blue Line; and Vernon, Florida (my personal favorite). You can also get all three in a combo pack. It's been years since I've seen any of these because either the local video store doesn't have a VHS copy, or the VHS copy that's supposed to be in, never is. I'm glad these are now on DVD, and hopefully this will allow many new fans of his to see his earlier work, which I think is just fantastic.

His style has changed quite a bit over the years, but there's still some of his odd sensibility in everything he touches. I think it'd be quite a trip to watch Errol Morris work, on the set or out in the field. This recent interview with Mr. Morris at the Onion's A.V. Club gives a great look into how he works. I particularly like this quote:

One of my favorite guys, the guy I did the Miller High Life campaign with, Jeff Williams, paid me the greatest compliment that I've ever heard. The first day that we worked together, he looked at me in a kind of funny way and said, "You know, when the director has everything set up perfectly, my job is to come in and fuck it up. But with you, Errol, I don't have to come in and fuck it up, because it's fucked-up already!" [Laughs.]

There's also a whole slew of stuff on Errol Morris' home page, like:

• All the excellent Miller High Life commercials
• His personal take on Intelligent Design
• An essay on how his filmThe Thin Blue Line got an innocent man out of prison

I'm really not sure how I've managed to avoid everything Harry Potter for so long. I haven't seen any of the films, and up until a week ago I hadn't picked up any of the books. But now, and I'll admit it: I'm sucked in.

Sure, the books will never go on to win the Pulitzer Prize, but they're certainly engrossing if nothing else. I'm really enjoying the adventures of Harry, Ron, Hermione, and the rest of their Mugwarts classmates. I think I finally see what all the noise was about.