Stained Into My Memory

I’m not going to pretend I understand dance for this review. While watching the different ways that the body can move is entertaining enough, I have no idea what they’re trying to do unless it’s fully written out for me. So while watching “Water Stains on the Wall” performed by the Cloud Gate Dance Theater of Taiwan, I was confused, but ultimately entranced. This was the first contemporary dance company that I’ve ever seen, and it was definitely something I wouldn’t be opposed to seeing again.

Choreographed by Lin Hwai-min, founder of the dance troupe, “Water Stains on the Wall” is a visual interpretation into the aesthetics of calligraphy. Throughout the performance, projections of continually moving clouds float across the stark white stage. According to my program, it’s to represent Chinese landscape paintings on an immense rice paper backdrop. It’s not something I would have picked up on without a written description, but now that I think back on it, the technique is nice. Because it’s a fairly constant motion throughout the production, it doesn’t feel distracting in any way. The costumes are likewise, very plain and the dancers never change throughout the performance. From the waist up, they are either shirtless or with a nude color top on. It’s almost like the canvas needed to be bare on the upper half of the body for the giant puffy pants. Seriously, the pants are the same design that we saw out of “Aladdin” during the 90’s, only in a more white and sheer fabric.

Like I said before, I don’t understand dance. On the other hand, I do know design and visuals, and, despite its simplicity of set and costumes, “Water Stains” was captivating to watch. The dancers motions were always fluid, one circular motion flowing direction into another. I studied calligraphy a little bit, and you could almost see the same flicks of the wrist and pressure put down on the brush in the actions of the dancers. Although I’m sure it’s a bit of a stretch for the everyday audience, “Water Stains” is a bizarrely good representation of the process of calligraphy into a large stage. The action is very minimal, and it feels like no movement is wasted.

The other main portion to any dance routine is the music. “Water Stains” has a soundtrack by Toshio Hosokawa that sounds sort of like an adventure video game that I’ve never played before. The soundtrack is somewhat subdued and haunting for the most part, with a Zen-like feeling that relaxes you, and still manages to keep you interested instead of falling asleep. When the music picks up in speed, it also picks up in volume, and starts to sound like I should prepare for battle instead of just sitting around. I didn’t walk away with a certain number stuck in my head, but it was a nice backdrop to the dancers in front of me.

I think my main problem with “Water Stains” is that I was looking for a story. I was looking for that backdrop to tell me the story of the Chinese landscape or the story that the calligraphy was supposed to be telling me. And from what I can tell, there was no story. I don’t think it’s a detriment to the production whatsoever, it’s just a personal preference that I had a hard time looking past.

The all-around production of “Water Stains” feels dynamic and different. I think some of the point of contemporary dance is to feel different, and this show pulls it off wonderfully. From the clouds rolling by in the background, to the peaceful, yet powerful score that keeps me entertained, the entire production is something to behold. Unfortunately, the only performances in Chicago were on October 28/29, but when you see the Cloud Gate Dance Theater of Taiwan name, it’s definitely something to check out in the future.

Tumblr, and Twitter, and Facebook, oh my!

Hello there. My name is Jessica, and I am afflicted with IAD. It’s a chronic disorder, which causes me to stay up to unmentionable hours of the night, and keeps me indoors for good portions of the day. It’s not something life-threatening, but has probably killed my social life more than I care to admit. And to tell the truth, it’s not even recognized as a true mental disorder. It’s the Internet addiction disorder, and I’ve got it bad.
I think my addiction started when I was in around the fourth grade, when my friends and I were possessed with the website Neopets and I suddenly had to be online at all hours to play with my internet pets and gain nonexistent money. Previously, I had an email address which I would check daily, but it wasn’t until Neopets that I felt a compulsion to stay online. It slowly escalated as I grew older, from looking at interesting blogs, to getting a blog myself and updating it regularly. Social networking websites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr have kept me glued to my laptop day after day, and I just can’t help but compulsively check for updates when the internet is in reach. Hours of my day are spent checking the same websites over and over again, just because there may or may not be something new.
The art form of the internet is that it’s a completely open expression of your imagination. Have a story or plotline that just won’t get out of your mind? Join NaNoWriMo every November and there’s a whole community to support you in writing a novel in a month. Want to play games with people half a world away? Go play some Starcraft or Runescape and go on an adventure. My current addiction is Tumblr, a micro-blogging site that lets me post and reblog pictures till my heart is content. Some days, I just feel like editing pictures in Photoshop to see what I get. And by posting them on Tumblr, I get pretty instantaneous feedback. Due to the site’s easy design, it’s constantly being updated, and I feel the need to see what’s new, all day, every day.
Because of my internet addiction, I think I’ve changed my way with words, most of all. Suddenly, stories that could have taken me five minutes to tell are shortened to 140 characters or less for Twitter. On Tumblr, you can tag your posts to describe them. I’ve caught myself thinking in Tumblr tags more than once while drifting into daydreams. The world as I know it has been altered into ways I can tell my blog’s audience what’s going on, while also keeping it relevant to their interests. There are times when I wonder what my internet friends are doing or how their days are going, just because they’re my friends. Even though I haven’t met most of them in person, they still know what’s going through my head at any given point in the day because of social networking websites, which is a lot more than can be said of some of my school friends.
Some days, I wish there were an easy cure to my IAD. I wish I could be a more socially acceptable member of society. I wish the people who I’m closest to were more tangible, and I seriously wish that I could stop thinking in Twitter hashtags. But at the end of the long night, refreshing different websites, the internet makes up a huge part of me and my life. It’s the way that I get my information, and a way for me to express my creativity back to the world. It’s an outlet for my thoughts and feelings, and allows me to apply the art to my every day life.

Living Out Loud - Through Pain

Protagonists. Every movie has them. They’re the people you root to win and to save the day. I should feel sympathetic to their situation. Living Out Loud, on the other hand, gives me protagonists that I have no reason to support. The characters are stale. The writing makes me want something more. Danny DeVito’s voice grates on my last nerve. The story is drawn out and leaves me questioning the purpose of the entire movie in the first place. It’s a good waste for an hour and a half of my time.

The story begins with Judith Nelson (Holly Hunter) having a midlife crisis because her husband, Bob (Martin Donovan) has cheated on her with a younger woman. Normally for a character like this, I’d feel sorry for her. I’d feel sorry about her marriage falling apart and the emotional torture that must be. But Judith doesn’t evoke these feelings in me whatsoever. She’s a medical nurse living in a ridiculously large apartment for the Upper East Side of Manhattan. She goes out to bars and daydreams about talking with strangers. Her life, albeit dull and predictable, isn’t bad.

Danny DeVito and Holly Hunter as a "romantic" couple

On the other hand, we have Pat Francato (DeVito). Pat is a gambler still trying to get out of debt, who also just happened to lose his daughter to cancer. Once again, normal circumstances would cause me to feel sorry for his character. He’s working a low paying job as the doorman in Judith’s apartment complex. But he’s also trying to turn his life around. Pat isn’t gambling, and isn’t trying to linger on his ex-wife or deceased daughter. He’s making money and has ideas for a new business with his cousins in Italy. My personal bias comes into play with Pat’s character, because I really cannot stand DeVito’s voice. There’s something about it that I find so grating and irritating. It’s a personal pet peeve that I tried to overlook for the character, but in the end just kept feeling more and more uncomfortable every time he came onscreen.

Our remaining main character is Liz Bailey (Queen Latifah), a singer at a club that Judith frequents, and a personal favorite artist of both Judith and Pat’s. The problem with Liz is that I’m still not quite sure what purpose she serves to the story. She is an added friend to the unusual social dynamic between Judith and Pat, and provides Judith with the Ecstasy for her dance number at a lesbian bar. The interactions between the three main characters are severely limited and don’t give me a sense of friendship, but more of camaraderie. They’ll moan and bitch about their “bad” lives, then go and drink their cares away. She doesn’t progress the story whatsoever.

Queen Latifah wasn't necessary to the plot.

The one redeeming factor of this movie is the way that it’s shot. Director Richard LaGravenese (now more commonly known for directing Freedom Writers and P.S. I Love You) manages to capture the little lapses in Judith’s sanity perfectly, so we’re wondering for a brief moment if she really did strike up a conversation with Liz, or if she really just get kissed by that random man in the back room of the club. It’s the little things to keep you on your toes when you’re losing concentration on the story.

All in all, Living Out Loud isn’t a movie that I’ll ever feel the need to watch again. There’s no story keeping me tied to the movie, nor are there any characters that I feel sympathetic for. At the end of the day, they’re not “living out loud” so much as “living sort of in the moment through pain”.