I took from my five remaining daily hours of sleep schedule to go watch Shortbus last Sunday.

I know it’s been released a few eons ago in other parts of the civilized world and that, by now, everybody has either seen it or think John Cameron Mitchell is the antichrist (or both)… Yet I felt I should add to the general consensus (met amidst people of taste):

This is one brilliant, thoroughly enjoyable movie.

Definitely not a family movie, and you might not want to take a date there without checking out before… But otherwise: best way to spend ten bucks with your clothes on, these days.

Don’t mind me saying so, but I would make one incredibly bad lawyer.

When I argue my cases, I can’t stay on track, I digress into oblivion, and whenever possible, jump on the most hyperbolic formulations, usually for my sole petty amusement, at great cost to the convincing potential of my arguments. Also, while I certainly love spending hours dissecting the law, I tend to focus on its spirit, and shun its letter altogether; a luxury I understand no sane lawyer could ever afford.

Yet, I have opinions (bet you hadn’t noticed), and I sometimes discuss them. I sometimes even discuss them with actual lawyers, pretty eloquent [French] bloggers at that. A while back the conversation wandered over to the topic of intellectual property. At the time, I did a pathetic job of exposing my somewhat moderate, if slightly provocatively formulated, views on the matter…

Then recently, while reading up on entirely unrelated matters, I stumbled upon a small text by Mr. Jefferson that happened to sum up most perfectly the essence of my thought on this.

The most basic courtesy would call for me to write this post in French, as I am after all reporting and threading on a discussion I had in French, but the quoted material is in English and there’s been a real dearth of pompous highbrow rants on this blog, so I hope my original debater will overlook this unforgivable faux-pas and not hesitate to respond in whichever language he may prefer… Anyway, here is what this famous American communist close to my heart, had to say on the topic of intellectual property:

If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property. Society may give an exclusive right to the profits arising from them, as an encouragement to men to pursue ideas which may produce utility, but this may or may not be done, according to the will and convenience of the society, without claim or complaint from anybody.

“The Writings of Thomas Jefferson”. Edited by Andrew A. Lipscomb and Albert Ellery Bergh, 1905

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I know I haven’t posted much (read: anything) of interest on this blog in a long while.

This isn’t about to change. But in the meantime, here is a Music Quizz, on par with what we had here a while back, made of dub, reggae, disco and pretty much everything in between… It’s tough but interesting (very large spectrum and a few unsuspected samples).

Go have a go at it (I think I got about 5 out of eight).

On my way to work this morning, it downed on me that what the world so desperately needs right now is yet another Human League electro remix, and that I may be the ideal candidate for the task.

Unfortunately, my project-manager, on the other hand, seems to think that what the world desperately needs, is another 3000 lines of code by Monday and that, incidentally, I am the ideal, if not only, candidate for the task.

I think I may be a sell-out.

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I’m not sure if anything can still be done for the reputation of this blog, seeing how the past 24 hours have seen an unusually high amount of somewhat sensible, even possibly useful information put here. Frankly, I don’t know if my blogger’s ethics will ever recover.

I will try nonetheless.

Wars of the Geeks is officially over, silly inconsequent navel-gazing is now back for the month.

Let’s start by what should have been yesterday’s sum up of how to succeed at cooking an enjoyable Summer evening with friends. It goes a little something like this:

[steps sideways, does two entrechats and starts singing while tap-dancing to the beat]

• Some second-hand equipment purchased for a fistful of euros on the outer rim of the Internets.
• Cranberry juice + vodka + a splash of lemon juice + a dash of cointreau + a few wedges of lime + loads of ice, times a few gallons.
• One lovably demented masterpiece of a Japanese movie recommended by S. a while back.
• People (also: other people without blogs, but likeable nonetheless).

Shake but do not stir, serve fresh with cocktail straws.

Such a fabulous evening that our little Cinéma de quartier might very well be on its way to become a regular bi-monthly.

Then there also was yesterday’s recipe: another kind of enjoyable dish. Though it’s made of much harder-to-find of ingredients and I am not even quite sure I remember myself how the cooking process went.

If you absolutely want to try at home, I think it involved a bottle of contraband Absinth, eye-burning Japanese menthol eye drops, one of the most furious thunderstorm of the Summer and lots of Parisian girls running by in the street, wearing but thin blouses soaking wet from the sudden rain.

Also what appears to be a medium-sized rodent stuck to my living room table in a puddle of melted wax and solidifying liquor. But I will only be able to confirm that when I finish removing the few dozens glasses and beer bottles stacked over it.

Heard tonight, while crossing the Seine near Notre-Dame, where a guitarist was giving a [rather mediocre] rendition of Albéniz’s Suite española, op. 47:

Oh, honey! I know this one, that’s the Gipsy kings!

Tonight, in Paris and most other urban areas, is La Fête de la Musique

Not that there’s any point mentioning it: if you don’t live in France, you rightfully don’t give a flying rat’s ass, if you do, I reckon you are all too aware of it by now.

My mum always told me that when you have nothing nice to say, you should keep your mouth shut.

Obviously my mum has never heard of blogging.

I was really looking forward to hearing Bumcello live. I have loved many of their electro-loungy-hip-hop productions of the past few years.

Seeing the ‘acoustic’ mention on the bill when we got there was a big tip-off: when your band is a two-people act and so much of your music relies on sampling and overdubbing, pulling a proper live show would already be enough of a challenge. But choosing to strip it down to a couple drums, a cello and two lo-tech samplers while mostly improvising outside of your usual repertoire… is taking a huge leap of faith in your own live performer abilities.

Something they did, unfortunately to very mitigated results.

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Nevermind the fact he couldn’t mix his way out of a wet paper bag… Felix da Housecat’s old House Excursions mix is still to this day one of the bounciest, most badassest, piece of electro ever put together.

At last the long-awaited solutions to last week’s spot-the-sample quizz. In the end, you guys did pretty good collectively: I sure didn’t expect that many to be found.

Let’s start with those you found:

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I know you (all three of you) are eagerly waiting for more heady insights on French society seen through the prism of a dusty ten-volume political theory handbook, but my aspirin ran out mid-sentence and I have been busy doing other things. Things such as getting woken up at 6am by timezone-agnostic Japanese flight attendants calling to ask if I need green tea brought over and wondering why I sound sleepy. So we’ll be taking a break off socio-politico-froggy-bashing and resuming in a few days.

Instead, today is Musical Quizz.

Not any musical quizz: Catch-the-sample musical quizz!

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It’s official now:

Years after losing its Will-pay-$8-for-it status, falling more recently from Maybe-if-it’s-on-discount-at-Blockbluster’s to Might-download-it-one-day, the James Bond franchise is now being downgraded to If-the-only-other-inflight-movie-has-got-Adam-Sandler-in-it status. Ranking any lower than that involves the use of torture or massive amounts of psychoactive substances as a mandatory condition for viewing.

Let me list a few of the reasons, per my recent viewing of the latest two-hour long necrophiliac gang-bang over Ian Flemming’s corpse to date:

• Perennial intro sequence. Appears Bond… riding the wave… on. a. surfboard. Do I need to go through the foot-long list of why this is wrong on so many levels? I can only expect the next movie will see him shooting villains from his skateboard in between two half-pipes.
• A few random series of explosions later, we get treated to, without a doubt, the worst massacre of a James Bond theme ever. Sung by a vocoder loosely assisted by Madonna’s flailing vocal cords, this song makes Tina Turner’s sub-Shirley Bassey performance a work of art by comparison.
• By then, the average viewer already wants to take his eyes out with a dull spoon. Mind you the movie hasn’t even begun yet.
• It is still unclear whether Madonna’s useless cameo, a few scenes later, was payment or retribution for her earlier vocal pummeling. Either way, she once again proves her uncanny ability to destroy celluloid and ruin scenes with a mere few seconds of her appearance on screen. I guess we should only be thankful the producers talked her out of doing the embarrassingly fake British accent she has instead been serving journalists ever since.
• On the stilted acting front, the battle is fierce, Halle Berry wins, but only by a thin margin.
• Concluding the paroxystic fight of your movie by any variation on the “die, bitch!” theme, uttered by the plucky hero/heroin, is OK. In the fucking 80’s.
• Even accounting for mandatory Evil Genius’ Factor of Unexplainable Stupidity (e.g.: spending 3 hours explaining one’s evil plot instead of just shooting the hero), tell me exactly why would one ever name his Grand Evil Project after the most widely known tale of Rise and Fall in recorded History? Was “Project Miserable Failure” already taken?
• The naming and oh-so-unexpected failure of the Project, along with its 3-mile wide blinking billboard of a metaphor, should give an idea as to the level of subtlety injected in the story altogether.
• Another two or three episodes and the next movie in the franchise will be released as a mere adaptation of the eponymous videogame. Oh wait, it already is.

In other news, word is that the doomsday machine in next episode will be powered by the corpse of Ian Flemming, rotating at supersonic speed inside his grave.

Ever feel some weeks like Kafka is busy writing the story of your life?

Well, he died of a stroke mid-sentence yesterday morning. It seems A. J. Cronin has taken over the writing gig for now (Zola will be contributing, on the family scenes).

Can’t say I will miss Franz…

When I last wrote that entry on the many shortcomings of Japanese mangas, my original intent truly was to follow it up shortly with my own recommendations, or at least observations, as a skeptical, yet sincere newcomer to the genre…

The fact that it took me three months to get to it, is a testament to the sad state of affairs of this industry (and my own sorry ass’ inability to get anything done when not threatened at gunpoint). Actually, the decision to start reading mangas is an old one, one that arose around the time I woke up one day and realized I could suddenly understand Japanese (すっげぇ〜！日本語を喋れるよ！さああ、僕は貝が好きなの・・・). Well, alright: understand might be pushing it a bit, but I’ve been known to conduct reasonably flawless weather-related conversations with my neighbours: a major improvement from my arrival on Japanese soil, where my vocabulary was essentially limited to three Japanese words, one of which I cannot repeat on this site unless you can testify you are over 18 and click here.

Thing is: drunken conversation with Samurai friends did and still does wonders to my verbal skills, I can pull off a semi-decent everyday-Japanese provided it stays on the topic of whose turn it is to pay the next round, or monosyllabic expressions of my appreciation for miscellaneous types of music or other artistic works. Anything slightly off the beaten path usually gets me nodding complacently until I somehow manage to catch a few words that could clue me in on whatever it is we are talking about. Similarly, that whole level-of-speech issue has not been getting any better: you know things are bad when your friend – who has just chugged half a gallon of rum directly off the bottle – kindly worries about your use of excessively colloquial expressions.

Horizons have to be widened and grammar needs improving dramatically.

Hence: Mangas

First, because books are convenient: you can study them anytime, anywhere and by yourself; they do not require a language exchange partner who will be either convinced you are hitting on her, or actually hitting on you (and yea, the feminine form here has a purpose: just check the number of candidates for language exchange in English or French out there and their repartition by gender).

Also because, taking my cue on the local upcoming generations, I cannot read kanjis for shit. Which rules out most magazines and daily newspapers. Some magazines are not that hard – possibly even below my level – but there are only so many times you can read about the latest news on panty thieving activities, detailed voyeuristic recounts of schoolgirl groping-related arrests or nampa tips, straight from the pros (the gist of which can usually be found in all its quaint alliteration-riddled English translation glory on the Mainichi’s website).

As for regular books, real literature, eternal classics of the Japanese masters: try opening an original Mishima volume for laughs, just once. I swear, that guy uses kanjis even my dictionary has never heard of.

Mangas, on the other hand, rarely make use of overly elaborate kanjis, yet can cover a wide array of situations and lexical fields, all along offering saucerplate-eyed visual clues of the ongoing story. Additionally, most have furiganas for part or all of the kanjis used (depending on the target age for the series).

Let’s stop here for a slightly tedious digression that you may want to skip if you know anything about the Japanese language and the black magic art known as reading it:

As you may know, Japanese is written using both kanjis (roughly 1000 to 2000 different ones for basic books and newspapers) and two syllabaries known as kanas. A syllabary is similar to an alphabet, in that each character represents a sound, but unlike, say, the latin alphabet, Japanese kanas each match a full sound (”ma”, “mi”, “mu”, “mo”, “ra”, “ri”, “ro” etc). Each syllabary contains 80-some characters and is usually the first thing anybody will learn when studying Japanese.

In theory, every Japanese word could be spelled using only kanas (and thus easily readable by anybody with reading abilities above kindergarten level). This is quite convenient in cases like computer interfaces, where words are typed using kanas, before being turned into kanjis through some menu selection or such. In practice, though, most people (yours truly, included) will find it incredibly tedious to read a text written entirely using phonetic kanas (remember that Japanese doesn’t separate words either). For texts meant to be readable by kids or sufficiently important not to take a chance with the odd illiterate countryman, a compromise is found by writing both the kanji and its kana spelling alongside. These kanas are usually written in a smaller font above (when writing horizontally) or to the right (when writing vertically) of the kanjis they explain. They are called furiganas and will make the most arcane reading accessible to the casual reader.

One important reason to love furiganas, especially for foreigners, is that if you encounter a kanji you are unfamiliar with, you will probably want to look it up in a dictionary… Which is infinitely easier to do if you actually know how to pronounce it.

It is still possible to look up both meaning and reading of an unknown kanji by using a method known as “multiradical lookup”, relying on the number of strokes and a few recognizable components of the whole ideogram. Even if with a bit of habit and the right tools, multiradical searches can be done fairly fast, they are considerably more annoying to conduct than regular phonetic lookups.

End of digression

Finding readable materials…

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If you are looking for a heart-warming family-oriented feel-good movie to watch this week-end: 血と骨 is most definitely not it.