z o s a

A short while back we attended a showing of a film at the Somerville Theater as part of the Independent Film Festival Boston. The director and main actor were there to discuss the film after the showing. Last night we had a very similar experience with a different film at our local favorite theater, the Regent Theater in Arlington.

Turn The River
This film starred one of my favorites, Famke Janssen, best known to me and other fanboys as Jean Grey/Phoenix from the X-Men film franchise. In this film she plays a down-and-out pool hustler trying to get enough money to leave town with her son who lives in sole custody with her ex-husband. I really liked this film as it had a great indie feel with a solid cast and a great post-rock score by the Clogs. Famke and the writer/director Chris Elgeman were there for QA after the film. She was as beautiful in person as she appears on film and seems to be fairly knowledgeable about her craft. I hope this turns into a good dramatic breakthrough for her although some of the reviews from its wider release were not so great.

On Broadway
This locally produced film premiered last year at the same festival. Last night we were lucky enough to have a viewing where Dave McLaughlin (writer/director), Lance Greene (actor/producer) and Bill Janovitz (writer of the musical score) were all there to discuss the film. Before the film showed we had the pleasure of a few acoustic numbers by Bill, who Stephanie and I know personally so it was quite fun. He even dedicated one of the songs to us! The film was a very good classic telling of the struggle one can go through when they find their muse. In this case it was told in the form of a Boston-based Irish-American played by Joey McIntyre (yes that one from NKOTB) and supported by a great cast that included another great local, Eliza Dushku. The Boston scenes were great especially one memorable moment on the T. The whole evening had great layers of self-reference and the basis of all of it in the classic Irish story-telling motif was perfect.

A while back Hieronymus posted about a nice web resource called Muxtape. I’ve used it now on a few occasions to share songs with friends. Today I am wishing I was getting ready for NEARFest this weekend so I decided to put together a muxtape from this year’s NEARFest artists. Most of these tracks are available on the official site but I thought it would be fun to put them one from each artist together as a “tape” to share. NEARFest is an annual weekend-long progressive rock festival in Bethlehem PA. Unlike the Bonnaroo inspired trend this is a very civilized, indoor event with one stage and a tight lineup of progressive rock artists. In addition there are a couple of vending rooms where one can waste a lot of money on hard-to-find music. I went for the first time last year with DavidK. He is kind of busy this year so he couldn’t go and my schedule made it difficult too. Oh well for now juts listen to the good music and maybe next year....

Back to the list….I gave a number of listens Aksak Maboul "Un Peu De L'ame Des Bandits". I’m not quite sure what to make of it other than I like the music overall. The opening piece has a bit too much Yoko-like vocalization for me but after that the grooves groove and the jams jam. The Beligan band provides a multi-instrumental aspect that goes over real well, with the bowed string, reeds and accordion giving an overall cabaret-like feel while the standard rock form of guitar, keyboards, bass and drum give the music its jam-band feel. Wikipedia notes that the more pure avant-garde portions delve into the almost post rock and almost ambient feel and I tend to agree. Well worth the listen.

The other day my older son came home with some homework that involved doing some history research. He had to look up some information online on Hannibal’s famous war-elephant march on the Roman Empire. Being the good father that I am I mentioned to him that there is a very highly rated game that acts out some of the history around the Second Punic War. This, of course, was a great “reason” for me to finally invest in the new reprint of that game, Hannibal: Rome vs. Carthage. I’ve actuially never played it but I've  now walked through almost all the rules and am ready to go through some of it with him. He seems mildly interested but, even though he is an avid Magic: the Gathering player, heavy rule sets tend to intimidate him. Of course I would love the opportunity to play with some of the real experts out there that I know occasionally read this blog.

...somwhere along the line I and everyone I know seem to have adopted the practive of beginning every conversation with "So...". I know I have not always done this but now I seem to do it all the time. In fact I am finding I have to make a focused effort to begin a conversation without an interjected "So...".

So is this blogworthy?