Television in the 21st century

I'm amazed by how artistic television has become in the last decade. Critics say that this trend started with HBO's The Sopranos in 1999. This kind of television, with its heavy serialization, deep characterization, and overarching themes, has found its niche on cable TV, especially on HBO, Showtime, AMC, and FX. (There aren't as many network shows of this kind; the outstanding examples are Lost and 24.)

New York Times film critic A. O. Scott argued that TV is just as good as film now and there is really no reason why films should be higher in the pecking order. (Unfortunately, film's prestige still lingers. Compare the coverage of the Oscars to the Emmys.) Some even think that TV is better than film now! Patrick Meaney wrote a very long piece citing the advantages of the TV format over the two-hour film. He pointed out that the length of the TV series allows more creative freedom and time to explore characters. On a TV series, with good material, an actor can showcase his/her diversity and range. More and more big name film actors are jumping into TV. Here's a sampling: Martin Sheen (West Wing), Alec Baldwin (30 Rock), Sally Field (Brothers and Sisters), Glenn Close (Damages), Claire Danes (Homeland). Recently, Dustin Hoffman signed on for HBO's Luck. He told the press that

You cannot get a shot at doing your best work in the studio system. There's committees, there's meetings, they're on the set ... they get involved in a quasi -- at least I think it is -- creative way. They buck heads with people they shouldn't be bucking heads with. And with HBO, once they give a go, there is no committee, there's no meetings, these guys are allowed to try to do their best work and they then give it to us.

Famous film directors are getting into TV, too. Martin Scorsese directed the pilot for Boardwalk Empire and Michael Mann is directing and producing Luck.

The biggest changes have come for writers and their audiences. If anyone is happy about the state of television, it's got to be the writers. Can you name any film script writers? In television, the showrunner (head writer) is truly the boss of everything and (provided that the network doesn't interfere) can realize his/her creative vision. The public has heard of David Chase (The Sopranos), David Simon (The Wire, Treme), Ron Moore (Battlestar Galactica), and the nerd favorite Joss Whedon (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, Dollhouse). Many playwrights are writing for television, to gain experience (and to put bread on the table, so they can go back to the theatre).

The audience has become a greater, more vocal participant in television. Fans gather on forums to extol the virtues of actors, or trash showrunners for clumsy plotting. By its nature, Serial drama invites discussion and analysis. TV criticism websites have proliferated, for instance, Television Without Pity, AV Club, and HitFix. (Again, TV criticism is still lower status than film criticism, but hopefully that will change.) There are wikis to keep track of complicated plot threads and numerous characters. Writers monitor forums and occasionally go onto boards to personally talk with fans. On learning the audience's reaction, they can adjust the series before the fans revolt. (Some crazy fans have actually become a nuisance for showrunners and networks -- demanding changes as if they own the show.)

Personally, I enjoy watching a great TV series unfold. Every week, I watch an episode, read the critic reviews, and participate in forums. It's a heavy investment of time, but well worth it, for the enrichening experience. I learn so much about the human condition (e.g. endurance in Battlestar Galactica), archane topics (e.g. horse racing in Luck), acting (Claire Danes in Homeland), and writing.

The massive serialization and strong audience participation remind me of the Victorian novel. Back then, authors like Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy wrote in installments. It's hard to remember this, since we read these works as complete (and very thick) novels in our literature classes. Writing in installments meant that the lower classes could afford fiction and that writers had to keep their readers interested. In Dickens's Great Expectations, there's a line of dialogue where one character brings up another character out of the blue in the dialogue. My high school English teacher explained that the reason was so the reader wouldn't forget the named character later. Supposedly, Thomas Hardy inspired the term "cliffhanger"! Nowadays, the cliffhanger is a standard trope in modern television. Large ensemble casts and intricately woven plot threads in TV series like Battlestar Galactica remind me of my favorite novel, George Eliot's Middlemarch (which was also serialized).  The serial television drama really is the 21st century's version of the Victorian novel.

TV isn't the end of the story. New players are emerging in this media game. Felicia Day stars in and produces The Guild, a web series about gamers fully funded by donations. Netflix just committed $100+ million dollars to two seasons of a Kevin Spacey drama without even seeing a pilot. YouTube is trying to become more than just a streaming video site and commissioning several original series.

The only danger now is that we'll have so much good material to watch that the audience will splinter into niches. I actually know a substantial number of people who've watched Battlestar Galactica or The Wire. That's because there were only a few shows of that caliber at the time. It's a little like how everyone watched Walter Cronkite because there weren't any alternatives. In the future, there may be so many good TV shows that everyone will watch their own thing or be desperately trying to catch up on the huge list of "classics." (Exactly the situation we have with books.) The last decade of television has proven that there is no shortage of talented writers, actors, and crew. I look forward to see where we go next.

Thought of the day: Presentations are a form of writing

I've come to realize that presentations are just another form of writing. The critical thinking skills you use in writing words on a page are the same ones you use when you "write" your presentation slides. You need to map out what you're going to say, come up with a logical flow, provide supporting evidence/data for your points, etc. The main difference is that presentations are written to be performed. In that sense, they are similar to plays, movies, and television. A presentation can be a very personal work because you are both the sole writer and sole performer. Since I've started watching television with a critical eye, I want to write a post explaining how you can use ideas from TV writing to improve your presentations. If you are a good writer, you are probably a good presenter and vice versa.

NFL Films

NFL Films is making the news since its founder Ed Sabol was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. I found it fascinating to learn that the company pioneered sports film making and even had an influence on Hollywood. This is a company started by a 45 year old overcoat salesman whose only experience was shooting his 14 year old son's football games! Ed Sabol was uncompromising in his artistic vision. NFL Films has shot over 100 million feet of film (Sabol jokes that no other subject has been shot as much on 16 mm film, except WWII.) Some even claim that NFL Films was the propaganda machine that transformed the NFL from a middling sport to the billion dollar money making machine it is today.

This is an amazing American success story and an inspiration to artists. Since I started doing photography a couple years ago, I have developed a better visual eye and am starting to appreciate great camera work more and more.

Here are some quotes from various articles around the web. First, CNN's article:

Big Ed calls that first film his favorite and points to the end scene as something that set his group apart. The last shot is of the empty stadium after the game. Wind blows newspapers and programs around the lonely goal posts.

"I had a saying that I always told all of our cameramen: 'Finish like a pro,' " he said, "and this cameraman got this memorable shot because he finished like a pro."

"NFL highlight reels had a real impact on how movies get made, particularly montages," two-time Academy Award winning director Ron Howard told the New York Times in 2000. "Lots of different images. Images on images. Using the slow-motion, combined with the live action. The hard-hitting sound effects, juxtaposed against incredible music, powerful music, creating a really emotional experience for the viewer."

From the Canton Repository:

The company’s methodology was — and is — mythology, with innovation and creativity its foundation. Sabol told the stories of professional football through close-ups, various camera angles, hypnotic slow-motion, the wiring of coaches and players for sound, unique narration and musical scores.

Fans saw football in a way never displayed before. Action was not shot from a single angle high above the field. There were multiple angles, including ground-level. There were zoom shots of live action. There was slow motion. Montages of highlights were put with composer Sam Spence’s scores and narrator John Facenda’s haunting voice.

Players went from distant, almost indistinguishable figures to instantly recognizable heroes. Images of Jack Lambert’s teeth-challenged snarl and Gale Sayer’s graceful strides became imbedded in fans’ minds.

They saw Willie Brown’s zoomed-in stare — eyes on the end zone, helmet bouncing ever so slightly — as he returned an interception from Fran Tarkenton in Super Bowl XI. They heard Chiefs coach Hank Stram, who became a close friend of Ed Sabol, offer his famous line, “Just keep matriculating the ball down the field, boys,” as Kansas City won Super Bowl IV. They witnessed the spiraling flight of the football and the carnage of line play. They even saw blooper films.

Quote of the day: Committing is funny

Today I thought of a quote I read recently. Sometimes I goof off by reading interviews with actors I like. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Reese Witherspoon said:

When I started out, I was only doing dramas. Then I segued into comedy sort of accidentally. I did this movie when I was 18 or so called Freeway. I thought I was being so sincere, playing this juvenile delinquent, and everyone was laughing at the premiere. People were like, "You're so funny in this movie!" And I was like, "Funny? I thought I was playing this serious character!" And I realized, what's funny is just committing. That's what sent me into comedy, and it's been the greatest thing that's ever happened.

I think anyone who studies comedy quickly realizes that committing is extremely important to humor. As Witherspoon says, "what's funny is just committing."

But the power of committing can be extended to all aspects of life. The people we admire... all of them have committed themselves to something. I'd like to make this a motto for myself:

I will commit myself to something big and important. I'll run with it and see what happens. Even if I'm scared, even if it's risky.

This is why parents sometimes say "it's better to do it well, or not at all." We should decide what's important to us and then commit ourselves to it.

Link of the day: Looks, 1/f distribution, myth of meritocracy

First, an old link from months ago that I forgot to post: Your looks and your inbox. OK Cupid, an online dating service, does cool statistical analyses of how your profile affects response rate. One idea to take away is that women are very harsh on men's looks. Ouch.

One of the key ideas in my research is quantum noise. So it's neat to find an article claiming that modern movies have a cut frequency that follows a 1/f distribution.

Finally, via Cal Newport and a few links, I enjoyed the following New York Magazine article on why kindergarten admissions tests are worthless. The single most interesting takeaway message is how unreliable intelligence tests are for 4 year-olds.

I wrote to [University of Iowa psychologist David] Lohman and asked what percentage of 4-year-olds who scored 130 or above would do so again as 17-year-olds. He answered with a careful regression analysis: about 25 percent.

Dr. Horrible's Sing-a-long Blog review

Dr. Horrible's Sing-a-long Blog is an independently produced musical film project originated by Joss Whedon, who created the famous Buffy the Vampire Slayer (BtVS), Angel and Firefly TV shows. Joss and his half-brother Jed co-wrote the music and lyrics. What makes the project unusual is that the film was self-funded without the involvement of a studio and that the film was released via internet channels (iTunes, Hulu). The cast was unpaid, though the production and crew casts were recouped via iTunes and DVD sales.

I am a huge fan of musicals and also a huge fan of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. After watching "Once More With Feeling" (the BtVS musical episode), I was compelled to watch Dr. Horrible's Sing-a-long Blog on Hulu [1].

The story is basically a satire on the comic book superhero stereotype, with a few twists thrown in. I'm not a huge fan of superheros or most comedy, so I wasn't really entertained. I'm not the person to ask though.

Neil Patrick Harris (Dr. Horrible) and Nathan Fillion (Captain Hammer) were very good. I expected no less from Harris, who in addition to being an actor, has sung professionally in Sondheim's Sweeney Todd and Assassins. Harris sings very well, with nice expression in his voice. In contrast, I'm not aware of Fillion having any musical experience. I was pleasantly surprised with singing. He acts very well through his singing. Fillion steals the show as a swaggering Captain Hammer. Felicia Day (who plays Penny, the love interest) has a weak voice and not much expression in it. It was weird to have a love interest played by an alto. Her vocal range overlapped pretty heavily with Harris's tenor. This is definitely not typical in most Broadway musicals.

The music and lyrics were decent (worse things have been put on in multi-million dollar Broadway productions), but not as good as "Once More With Feeling." I enjoyed "My Freeze Ray", "Brand New Day," "So They Say", and "Slipping." A few songs seemed repetitive. I didn't like any of Penny's songs. Fortunately, there weren't too many obviously pastiche numbers besides the Bad Horse songs (where pastiche was done for the comic effect). I would have liked some ensemble songs (think "Into the Woods" or "A Weekend in the Country") and there just weren't any in this musical. I realize that wasn't possible with the small-scale production values and the brevity of the work. The lyrics were good, but nothing remarkable except for Captain's Hammer's amusing posturing.

I don't understand all the internet hype about this musical. It's a decent musical and impressive for the small cast/crew/budget, but who are all these people -- Whedonites? I suspect that Dr. Horrible is a romp for comic book fans (in the same way The Guild is for MMORPG diehards). Maybe that's what I'm missing.

I do appreciate Joss Whedon's efforts to bring musicals and small, independent projects to a wider audience. It's sad but musicals are a dying interest in the US. Dr. Horrible's Sing-a-long Blog is a good introduction to musicals for the superhero nerd but non-musical nerd in your life.

[1] The free Hulu viewings expire in two days.

Quote of the day: Forgiveness in Spiderman 3

Spiderman 3 wasn't the greatest movie, but it had a decent quote that resonated with me. Peter Parker (alter ego of Spiderman) begins to realize what a jerk he's been: seeking vengeance against his uncle's murderer, retaliating against a workplace rival, harassing his girlfriend. His Aunt May comes to visit him and Peter tells her that he's hurt people and he doesn't know what to do. May tells him:

Well, you start by doing the hardest thing: You forgive yourself. I believe in you, Peter. You're a good person. And I know you'll find a way to put it right.

I think it's harder to forgive yourself than anyone else. And you need to find people in your life who believe in you, believe that you are inherently a good person, no matter what you've done in your past.

Eat Drink Man Woman review

Eat Drink Man Woman has become one of my favorite movies. Or shall I say Drink Eat Man Woman since that is the literal translation of the Chinese title <<飲食男女>>?

The movie is about a father, Mr. Chu, and his three daughters living in Taiwan. The father (as typical in many Chinese families) is not very good at verbal communication. He only knows how to show his love through cooking. Even though his three daughters are adults, they still live with him and they are required to be home for a special Sunday dinner every week. As time goes on, one daughter after another leaves her father's house and becomes independent. That's all I can say without giving anything away.

I really enjoyed watching a film that depicted modern Chinese society. I was frequently struck with the feeling of seeing my own family on camera. Chinese people tend towards stoicism and this aspect was emphasized in the family interactions. I can relate to the way that the Chu family struggles to communicate. Asian families don't hug or express verbal affection. Just doesn't happen much. They express their love through actions like Mr. Chu's cooking or the second daughter's criticism.

Eat Drink Man Woman has often been called a food lover's film because there are extended scenes of the father cooking extravagant meals. He uses all the freshest ingredients including fish out of the tank and chickens from the coop. It's almost as if the passion is focused on the food in the first half of the film, rather than on the people, who seem repressed. In the second half, this dynamic flips around and we see people's emotions boil over. Another great foodie film is the German movie Mostly Martha. The food aside, it's also an outstanding movie overall.

Eat Drink Man Woman is a funny movie and even more so to me, because I have the personal experience of growing up in a Chinese family. In one scene, Mr. Chu worries about his friend's elementary school aged daughter. He doesn't think the girl has a proper lunch, so he cooks a hot lunch for her and swaps this lunch with the lunch prepared by the girl's mother. Of course, the girl's mother is a terrible cook, and Mr. Chu ends up having to eat it. I can see my own father doing the exact same thing. The final kicker is that the girl starts "taking orders" from her classmates and sells her lunch to them for extra cash. Another scene I really like is when Mr. Chu goes to the bedrooms of each of his daughters and wakes them up in the morning. In particular, he tells the second daughter not to sleep at her desk because it's bad for her posture. My dad did the same to me when I was growing up. Although this was not supposed to be funny, I liked how the sisters talked while washing the dishes by hand. You know it's a Chinese family, when there are only human dishwashers. There are many other humorous scenes, but these three are the ones that were most personally relevant to me.

[Spoilers below]

The main source of tension between the three daughters is who gets to leave home and who has to stay behind and take care of the father. I expected that the eldest daughter (the spinster, religious schoolteacher) would be the one who stays at home and takes care of the father. In fact, it's the rebellious, independent-minded second daughter who ends up staying at home. She realizes how much she has in common with her father (she loves to cook) and how much she loves him. The ending scene where she cooks dinner for her father is especially touching.

Why I love theater

Maybe I should amend that title, because I really mean musical theater (though I do want to make time to see some plays at some point). I've become a theater addict in the last several months. The main reason I love theater is that it's like real life. Actors can make mistakes or forget their lines (hopefully not in a professional Broadway production). Every performance is slightly different and you can't predict every action even if you've seen the show before. A live performance packs so much more emotional punch than watching a film, especially if you're like me and try to get seats as close to the front as possible. When you go to the theater, you have to concentrate and involve yourself where as with a movie, you can just pause the DVD or turn it off. I suppose you can walk out of the theater, but most people don't do that unless the show is horrible. Theater is not meant to be realistic the way the TV and film are and I think that allows audiences to focus more on the acting and story. Pretty scenery, pretty actors, and special effects can disguise bad material on a screen, but not in a theater (at least not as much). A theater show opening is so much more exciting than a film opening, because you know that the show is only going to be playing for a limited duration whereas you can just wait for the movie to come out on DVD (which sucks all the fun out of it for me). Another nice aspect is revivals. Since good plays and musicals are done more than once, you can compare performances and really appreciate different interpretations of the same material. TV and film is frequently a very passive experience for me and I didn't appreciate the craft of acting until I started learning about theater. I've become more attentive to details (maybe that will help my social life).

I'm not trying to bash TV and film. Rather, I'm trying to say that theater should be more important in American culture than it currently is. That being said, I'll try to catch as many good shows as I can!

Review: Children of Men

Last weekend, I went to see the film "Children of Men" starring Clive Owen and Michael Caine and directed by Alfonso Cuaron. The film is based on the premise that humankind is no longer able to produce children (for unknown reasons). As the film opens, the youngest person on Earth has just died, an 18 year old named Diego born in 2009. Since humans will probably die out in 70 years, the world has dissolved into anarchy. There are nuclear wars, riots, bombings all over the world. One of the few "safe" places left is Britain but only because it has become a police state. Refugees who try to get into Britain are arrested, rounded up in camps, and deported. Theo (Clive Owen) is a disillusioned, alcoholic bureaucrat. Theo is contacted by his old flame Julian. The two of them were activists in their younger days. Julian needs Theo's help to get transit papers for a young woman named Kee who is eight months pregnant. The rest of the movie is essentially a chase in 2027 as Cuaron puts it. Theo tries to get Kee to safety by delivering her to a group called the "Human Project." The film doesn't explain this very well, but I believe the Human Project is a utopian society where scientists are researching human reproduction.   

It's easy to label Children of Men as a sci-fi flick or a typical humankind-meets-disaster film, but I found it moving and meaningful even in the healthier world of 2007. I enjoyed the many subtle details that are weaved into the film without disrupting the main storyline. For example, there is a TV commercial for a suicide drug called "Quietus". We see a religious group flagellating themselves on the street -- they claim that God is punishing mankind for their sins by preventing reproduction. As Theo takes the train home from work, riffraff(?) throw stones at the windows. There are also a couple showstopper scenes: Kee's baby silences a shooting war behind activists and military, Kee sits in a playground swing while Theo watches through the shattered window of an abandoned classroom. Ironically, the most hopeful (and colorful) character in the film is Michael Caine's character, a former political cartoonist and hippy.

I found Children of Men to be a riveting tale cautioning of what happens when a society loses all hope. It would be scary if we destroyed ourselves through terrorism, nuclear bombing, bioweaponry, etc, but even worse if humans just died off slowly and helplessly. I think it's better to die by fire than by ice.

Review: Ultimate Gretzky

I really enjoyed watching a DVD documentary on Wayne Gretzky yesterday.

The story of the "Great One" was really inspiring. It really drives home the point that you have to be passionate about what you do to be the best, and also a little selfish, but hopefully not too selfish.

Gretzky is certainly a classy athlete especially for a hockey player.

I also really liked watching the footage of Gretzky playing hockey in front of the TV with his mother as the goal keeper. And apparently, his dad would have him watch TV while following the puck with a pen on paper. His dad said that his goal was to develop Wayne's peripheral vision and that he doesn't believe in talent -- he thinks you can learn these skills.

I like to think of hockey and physics as very much the same thing. They both require competitiveness, persistence, drive, and mental toughness. Just like there is a Wayne Gretzky in hockey, it is possible to be successful in a competitive job without being a jerk. You don't have to become the bigshot scientist who drives his/her grad students to insanity and walks over his/her rivals.

Movie review: The Notebook

The Notebook is an idealistic story about first love, young love, and true love (if such a concept really exists). Noah is a working class boy who works at a lumber yard. Allie is a well-educated girl from an old money Southern family. One summer vacation, Allie's family stays in Noah's town. Noah spots Allie at a carnival and wins her heart with a little persistence. They proceed to fall madly in love with each other, but the romance breaks up because 1) Allie's parents disapprove and because 2) Allie goes off to a women's college. I won't give away the rest of the story, but will merely say that true love triumphs in the end.

I'm a bit of a romantic, but even I had trouble sometimes giving way to the utter optimism and sappiness at some parts. I did enjoy the chemistry between the actor playing Noah (Ryan Gosling) and the actress playing Allie (Rachel McAdams). They made the true love aspect of the story believable. According to the commentary on the movie DVD, Ryan Gosling is an outstanding actor but he is more well-known for intense, dark, brooding roles. Maybe that is why I liked his character; he seemed serious and self-assured but young and ardent at the same time.

Overall, the Notebook is an average movie for average circumstances, a good movie for a date, and a delightful movie for the hopeless romantic.

Movie review: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

First, the Netflix summary:

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Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

Jim Carrey stars as Joel in this offbeat romantic comedy about a guy who opts for a procedure in which memories of his girlfriend, Clementine (Kate Winslet), are erased after he discovers she's opted for the surgery, too. But as his doctor (Tom Wilkinson) begins to wipe out traces of Clementine, Joel decides he doesn't want to lose what's left of their relationship, so he squirrels away the memories he wants to keep somewhere else in his brain.
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The film's title is taken from a quote by Alexander Pope:

How happy is the blameless vestal's lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd.

This movie is founded on an intriguing premise -- what if you could erase your most disturbing, painful memories? [Ironically, I was once in a research group meeting where a professor said he wished he could erase the memories he had of his mother. I responded that you can't selectively delete memories. As a counterpoint, I pointed out that he wouldn't want to lose the memories of his two-year old daughter.] Returning to the subject at hand, the movie seems to say that even if one could selectively erase memories, one could not really escape life's problems. Joel and Clementine are an unhappy couple. Their relationship is hanging by shreds. They have their memories of each other blanked. Yet the next day, they end up meeting and hooking up -- purely by chance. Or is it really chance? We're attracted to certain people for certain reasons and cleaning the slate does not change our predispositions. I'm certainly not an advocate of this extreme form of therapy. Painful memories teach good lessons (most of the time). As some famous philospher said, you can't know happiness without sadness.

Stylistically, the movie has many flashbacks and stream-of-consciousness moments, from Joel's point of view. The nonlinearity of time makes for an entertaining mind trip (though not as crazy as Memento). Also, there is some weirdness -- technicians running around in their underwear while erasing a man's memory.

Overall, a very unique and fun movie. Thumbs up.

Movie review: "His Secret Life"

My Italian friend has been suggesting (surprise) Italian movies. I've been getting them from Netflix for him and also for myself since I'm curious about foreign movies.

Here's the summary of the latest movie (taken from Netflix):

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His Secret Life (2001)

While recovering from the shock of her husband's death, an Italian woman (Margherita Buy) discovers that her husband had had a secret lover for the last 7 years. But she's even more surprised to discover that he and his lover (Stefano Accorsi) were part of an extended "family" of gays, transgenders and other social outcasts … a family she finds herself drifting toward as she overcomes the emotions of her husband's passing.
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As you can tell from the summary, this is sure one strange movie, but I think it came off as believable. I personally have never been part of a gay community, so I can't judge if the movie did a good portrayal of the "gay family" in the movie. The Italian wife was very sweet and likable. It was an interesting idea to have a wife and her husband's lover bond over their shared memories of the man they loved. All in all, I liked the movie and think it was worth watching.