Cold Souls, Film by Sophie Barthles

COLD SOULS (2009)

written and directed by Sophie Barthes

starring Paul Giamatti

If you like the films by Charlie Kaufman (Being John Malkovich) and Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind), you’ll probably enjoy the comedy-drama Cold Souls.

Screenwriter Sophie Barthles, who also directed the movie, based the story on a dream where Woody Allen was carrying around a jar that contained his soul, which looked like a chickpea. From this germ of an idea, Barthles has created a fun cross-genre romp that’s part sci-fi, part existential art film, and part flat-out comedy.

As an angst-ridden actor, Paul Giamatti (playing a character named Paul Giamatti) has trouble separating himself from the characters he plays, so he decides to  try soul extraction — a new technology he’s read about in the New Yorker.

During the course of the film, Giamatti has his soul removed, tries to get it back, but it gets stolen, so he borrows someone else’s soul, then decides to retrieve his stolen soul, and on and on — from New York to Russia and back. The story moves quickly, but has a lot of depth — exploring what, after all, makes us human. Highly recommended for people who find it easy to enter an alternative universe and suspend disbelief. 

Find it at Amazon.com.

Defining the Magic, Poem by Charles Bukowski

DEFINING THE MAGIC

Poem by Charles Bukowski

a good poem is like a cold beer
when you need it,
a good poem is a hot turkey
sandwich when you’re hungry,
a good poem is a gun when
the mob corners you,
a good poem is something that
allows you to walk through the streets of
death,
a good poem can make death melt like
hot butter,
a good poem can frame agony and
hang it on a wall,
a good poem can let your feet touch
China,
a good poem can make a broken mind
fly,
a good poem can let you shake hands
with Mozart,
a good poem can let you shoot craps
with the devil
and win,
a good poem can do almost anything,
and most important
a good poem knows when to
stop.

Painting: “Hollyhock Pink with Pedernal,” 1937 by Georgia O’Keeffe, Milwaukee Museum of Art

Note: “Defining the Magic”  is included in Betting on the Muse: Poems and Stories by Charles Bukowski, available at Amazon.com.

Sam Shepard and Georgia O’Keeffe

MOTEL CHRONICLES (Excerpt)

by Sam Shepard

They caught him with a stolen print of a cottonwood tree. He was in the parking lot cramming it into the bed of his pickup. When they asked him why, he told them he wasn’t sure why. He told them it gave him this feeling.

 He told them he saw himself inside this picture lying on his back underneath the cottonwood. He said he recognized the tree from an old dream and that the dream was based on a real tree he dimly remembered from a long time ago in his childhood. He remembered lying down underneath this tree and staring up through the silver leaves.

He remembered voices from those leaves but he couldn’t remember what the voices said of who they belong to.

He told them he was hoping the picture would bring the whole thing back.

Painting: “Cottonwoods Near Abiquiu” (1950) by Georgia O’Keeffe

September 1918, Poem by Amy Lowell

SEPTEMBER 1918

Poem by Amy Lowell

This afternoon was the color of water falling through sunlight; 
The trees glittered with the tumbling of leaves; 
The sidewalks shone like alleys of dropped maple leaves, 
And the houses ran along them laughing out of square, open windows. 
Under a tree in the park, 
Two little boys, lying flat on their faces, 
Were carefully gathering red berries 
To put in a pasteboard box. 
Some day there will be no war, 
Then I shall take out this afternoon 
And turn it in my fingers, 
And remark the sweet taste of it upon my palate, 
And note the crisp variety of its flights of leaves. 
Today I can only gather it 
And put it into my lunchbox, 
For I have time for nothing 
But the endeavor to balance myself 
Upon a broken world. 

Painting: “Berry Picking Children on a Summer Day” by Gerda Wallander (1905)

Poetry by Gerald Locklin Featured in The Más Tequila Review

Lola Alvarez Bravo: El Sueño del ahogado, c.1945

Poem by Gerald Locklin

Ambiguities haunt our languages
Of dream, desire, figuration.
Are there little quince princesses
Posing upon the river, fallen branches,
Rocks, and diving-board pilings—
The inhabitants of the slumbered Head
Of the decapitated, recapitulated Orpheus,
Or is he the handsome cynosure
Of their collective virginal lust?
 
Do we meet our Incubi and Succubi
In the colorless weather of the night?
Are we allowed to remember
Our silver seductions
In monochromatic flashbacks,
Or do they only remain as muscle memory?
 
My wet dreams are getting drier,
But awake I can shoot down every aircraft.
 
How damp are a woman’s humid dreams? 

Illustration: El Sueño del ahogado, c.1945, photograph by Lola Alvarez Bravo. According to photoicon.com, “Lola Alvarez Bravo is widely recognized as Mexico’s first woman photographer and a pioneer of modern photography…[her work spans] six decades…images include street photographs, images documenting indigenous people and traditional culture in Mexico, portraits, and Surrealist-inspired photomontages.”

Note: Gerald Locklin wrote the above poem after visiting the “Women and Surrealism” exhibit at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in the spring of 2012. The poem and several others inspired by visual art at the exhibition appear in Issue #5 of  The Más Tequila Review, available at Amazon.com. The 130-page issue, edited by poet Richard Vargas, includes 66 poems from 37 poets. This is an amazing collection in a beautiful large format edition that includes Richard Vargas‘s homage to one of L.A.’s finest entitled “salvation…for Ray Bradbury.” Highly recommended — and a bargain at just $7.00! 

The Más Tequila Review is now accepting submissions for its Winter 2013 issue. Details here.

Coco Chanel and Simplicity

Simplicity is the keynote of all true elegance.”

COCO CHANEL

Photo: Hans Silvester from his book Natural Beauty.

Lois Smith and James Dean

Lois Smith made her film debut in East of Eden, based on the John Steinbeck novel, where she shared the screen with James Dean — or more aptly, he shared his sizzling screen presence with her. Warner Brothers released the movie in April 1955, about six months before Dean’s death in a car crash.

Now, 57 years later, Lois Smith is starring in Heartless, the Sam Shepard-penned drama that opened in New York earlier this week, where she plays Mable, a woman who is partially paralyzed because she fell out of a tree while watching East of Eden on a drive-in movie screen. Somehow, this begs the expression “fearful symmetry.” (A nod to William Blake.)

Break a leg, Lois. Wait a minute, let me rephrase that. Have a great run, Lois. No, let me rephrase that. Enjoy the fearful symmetry of your full-circle experience, Lois.

Cecilia Gimenez Attacks Another Art Icon

Amateur art restorer Cecilia Gimenez, an octogenarian from Borja, Spain, has struck again — this time attacking a fellow woman and fellow Latin, legendary artist Frida Kahlo.

Since Cecilia did not have an original Kahlo self-portrait within easy access, she did the next best thing — applied her renegade restoration brush to a Nickolas Muray photograph of Kahlo (see below).

Asked why she had defaced the prized photograph, Cecilia responded, “Defaced? I’m just showing Frida Kahlo for what she really was.”

When asked what she meant, Cecilia said, “Don’t get me started! Just Google Frida Kahlo’s views on religion and politics and you can find out for yourself.” Despite repeated prodding, Cecilia refused to say anything more specific.

For the record, Frida Kahlo is beloved around the world for her artistry, courage, creativity, sensitivity, and inspiration. But, to Cecilia Gimenez, Kahlo is just another icon to bring down to size. 

Cecilia Gimenez Takes Art World by Storm

Unless you’ve sworn off the news during the past few days, you’re familiar with Cecilia Gimenez, the 81-year-old attempting to shave off a few Purgatory points by doing some good works — in this case, restoring a 19th century fresco of Christ on the wall of her church in Borja, Spain.

For the record (and this is why I’m not showing how she ruined the icon), this blog assiduously avoids discussions of religion or politics — that’s not our territory. But I couldn’t resist commenting on this story — there are so many levels and layers to it.

First, it’s a fine example when your children ask, “What does it mean when someone says ‘the road to hell is paved with good intentions’?”

Second, it shows the value of getting regular eye checkups. I have to wonder if Cecelia Gimenez has cataracts. Before her cataract operation, my mother could not distinguish yellow from white or brown from purple. She had the front door of her house painted a Barney purple, thinking it was “umber” (true story, and I have the photos to prove it!).

Third, I’m wondering if the other parishioners stopped Cecilia Gimenez before she was finished with her work. (You know how messy works-in-progress can look!)

Finally, I feel this story expresses the importance of art education — and why we need to support funding for the arts (hey, that sounds political).

Cecilia Gimenez refuses to repent for her sins (mortal? venial?) and appears belligerent, arrogant, self-satisfied, defiant, and convinced her work is beautiful. Wait a minute. She sounds like most of the artists I know. Welcome to the club, Cecilia!

Articles about this art restoration debacle have swept the Internet — but my favorite is a piece at hyperallergic.com called “Octogenarian Restorer Strikes Again.” The brilliantly written article imagines what Cecilia Gimenez could accomplish if allowed to restore some of the world’s art treasures, including Andy Warhol‘s portrait of Elizabeth Taylor  (below), Munch’s “The Scream,” Van Gogh‘s self-portrait, Vermeer‘s “Girl with a Pearl Earring,” and Leonardo‘s “Mona Lisa.”

Everyone Needs a Red Balloon!

TRAGEDY 

Poem by Jill Spargur

I always wanted a red balloon,
It only cost a dime;
But Ma said it was risky,
They broke so quickly,
And beside, she didn’t have time,
And even if she did, she didn’t
Think they were worth a dime.
We lived on a farm & I only went
To one circus and fair,
And all the ballons I ever saw were there:
There were yellow ones & blue ones,
But the kind I liked the best
Were the red, and I don’t see why
She couldn’t have stopped and said
That maybe I could have one –
But she didn’t –
I suppose that now
You can buy them anywheres,
And that they still sell red ones
At circuses and fairs.
I got a little money saved;
I got a lot of time,
I got no one to tell me how to spend my dime;
Plenty of balloons – but somehow
There’s something died inside of me,
And I don’t want one now.

Photo: Barkervillegirl (ALL RIGHTS RESERVED)