A Wild Musics Appears

What...?

Demasiado Fuerte: Training Mode!

But, Gutter Trash, what is this?

Glad you asked. You see, I play a video game called Super Street Fighter 4 and use a character named El Fuerte. He's a quirky luchador/chef who fights like no other Street Fighter character ever, and I'm very drawn to him. Often when I play him, I listen to DJ mixes or tracklists of funky/techno/upbeat shit because it makes me play better, so I thought I'd make one for myself.

I was venting to a friend of mine about how much trouble I was having mixing shit (having never done it), and he thought I should upload it for him to hear, so I'll just put it up here.

So... what's on this mix?

1. "Wanna Be Starting Something" Michael Jackson (DJ Jazzy Jeff edit)

2. "Wanna Be Starting Something" Michael Jackson

3. "Coachella #7" Travis Barker and DJ AM

4. "Make Her Say" Afrojack Remix

5. "Pon De Floor" Major Lazer

6. "One" Swedish House Mafia

7. "Lose Control" Missy Elliot

8. "Be Faithful" Fatman Scoop

9. "It Takes 2" Rob Base

10. "Dance Tonight (Dance Remix)" Lucy Pearl

The transitions are gross, the mix is amateur, but if you feel like getting your fuerte on, it can be downloaded here

GT out.

Films, a lot of them

This Monday marked the first class of my Asian Fantastical Cinema course, meaning I'll be watching a movie every day Monday-Thursday for four weeks. This means I'll probably die just before I go on my amazing trip to Japan. That being said, I'm going to try my darndest to post a review about every film we watch, letting y'all follow along with me just like I know you want to.

Without further ado, here are the first two. Remember, there be spoilers.

Dorm (2006, Songyos Sugmakanan)

Dorm, a 2006 Thai film, chronicles one young boy’s experience with the supernatural at a boarding school he unwillingly is sent to by his strict father and easygoing mother. Yet what lies beneath all the suspenseful nighttime trips to the bathroom and encounters with dead classmates is an interesting comment about guilt and a boy having to grow up when faced with a scary new situation.

Ton Chatree, the young boy being uprooted from his normal school and group of friends to attend a boarding school far from home, first views his being sent away with great resentment and ignores his father who he blames not only for sending him away but also for having what seemed to be an affair with a younger woman. Ton has quite the difficult time adjusting to the new location, which is large and intimidating and comes with a student body that does not seem ready to accept any new kids into their groups. Around this time, the bulk of the “scary” moments begin when Ton is told two ghost stories about a pregnant teen who hanged herself and a boy who drowned in the pool. I think that the way in which these ghosts manifest for Ton in a terrifying manner simply mimic his underlying feelings about being in a new location. Moving from the known (normal school and town) to the unknown (the new boarding school) is enough to scare any young kid, so it is certain that Ton’s feelings towards the school found a catalyst in these supernatural encounters.

In this way, as Ton grows more accustomed to his new surroundings, he also makes friends with a fellow classmate Vichien who seems to empathize with Ton’s situation. Vichien and Ton’s relationship could only be an allegory for Ton Chatree’s transition from a complacent victim to one who is dealing with a new situation the best way he can. He is no longer feeling sorry for himself about being sent to boarding school (though he still refuses to speak with his father), and thus is no longer being victimized by things that go bump in the night. On the contrary, Ton seems to be learning that perhaps this new place isn’t so bad and begins to befriend not only Vichien but also still-living classmates such as Doc Nui or Peng. He even manages to get himself interested in a girl!

Finally, to solidify the allegory, Ton aids his deceased buddy Vichien to break free of the vicious cycle wherein Vichien must reenact his death at the exact same time every night, and by doing so, Ton enables his best friend to pass on. If we are to assume that the ghosts are supernatural manifestations of Ton’s feelings, then this would mean that Ton has released his inner “demons” and fully accepted his new life. He begins wearing the gift his father gave him (which he had refused to wear before), is accepted by his peers as an equal rather than “the new guy,” and even reconciles with his father. There’s no doubt that Ton has embraced the new situation, responding with happiness as opposed to fear, and there are no longer any ghost sightings in the dorms of the boarding school.

All things considered, the sound design of Dorm was well executed, if perhaps a bit cliché yet it serves the purpose of drawing an audience in during the tense moments; making full use of creaking doors, Ton’s cot making noise, and the principle’s record skipping over the same spot on a record. The color palette is very earthy, employing yellow tones (perhaps mimicing old newspaper) when utilizing flashbacks to explain both the deaths of characters and Ton’s discovering of his father’s affair. Beyond that, the editing and pacing of the story are both standard fair, feeling more like a Hollywood film than an edgier foreign feature. That isn’t to say Dorm isn’t enjoyable, it certainly is, but it may not be the most special example of a ghost-story-turned-flick.

I'd give Dorm:

Angry, really scary ghosts > pleasant dead student/10

The Host (2006, Joon-Ho Bong)

There’s something about a monster movie that hails back to the days of drive-in theaters, extra buttery popcorn and cheap theater tickets. As long as film exists, so too will those films about giant terrifying creatures preying upon unwilling humans. With this in mind, we settled down in our Asian Fantastical Cinema movie to see The Host, one of South Korea’s highest ever grossing movie and also remains in Quentin Tarantino’s (the man behind Pulp Fiction¸Kill Bill and many more) top ten of all time.

The first part of The Host that jumps to my mind is the way in which the United States and, by association, Western culture is portrayed in this film. It opens with an American doctor ordering a Korean subordinate to poor bottle upon bottle of formaldehyde into the Han River, showing little concern for the effects that such a chemical would have upon the living creatures who call the river their home. The interest here is two-fold; firstly, it exhibits a careless attitude towards nature that the filmmaker must assume we Americans possess (and he is not entirely incorrect on this count), and secondly, implies that the Koreans (possibly, by extension, all of Asia) kowtow to American will. This is only further compounded by later scenes in which an American doctor comes in to perform and operation on Gang-Du’s (the protagonist) brain while fully understanding that the virus he seeks does not exist. Combine that with the unnamed U.S. citizen who “valiantly” gets his arm severed by the creature in an attempt to play the hero, and what we’re left with is a biting parody criticizing the way the U.S. behaves itself abroad.

However, it must be noted that criticism of the United States is not the only parody to be found within this movie. The basic premise, a monster being created by chemicals dumped into the Han River (perhaps composed of many different river animals, judging by the fish that falls off of the monster’s body), clearly is stressing the disconnect between the human world and that of nature, pointing out the disconnect between the two. I would certainly argue that Joon-Ho Bong seeks to open the audience’s eye to this issue and succeeds in making the viewer aware of just how poorly we treat our world. Yet this is not the only thing being treated poorly in the film, and it could be possible that Joon-Ho Bong also criticizes his home government for mistreating its own people and we get a lot of soft undertones about student protest (Nam-Il is mentioned to be a former activist, those protesting the unlawful holding of Gang-Du etc).

Moving beyond this parody, The Host really seems to center on Gang-Du’s coming of age tale where he supposedly transforms himself from a hopeless git to model parent. He begins the tale asleep, and indeed spends much of the movie like this (when not frantically searching for his missing daughter), mistaking another girls calls for her father to be Hyun-seo. The second time he makes a mistake proves to be fatal for his beloved daughter, and Gang-Du spirals into a feverish search for the one person he really seems to care about. As the film progresses, so too should Gang-Du’s maturity level, but it seems to lag behind. I think for this movie to work, we have to assume that this man is just a bit off, thus relieving ourselves of any sort of frustration born out of the choices he makes (especially when he miscounts how many bullets he has left). Lucky for us, Gang-Du finally shows a glimmer of hope by taking in a small orphan boy who had previously been forced to steal from others as means of survival and also by ridding himself of that awful bleach-blonde dye job.

Even though this may have been my third viewing of The Host, it only seems to increase in depth each time I watch it. I can certainly see why it’s rated so highly on all film websites, and definitely has a comfortable spot in my Top 100 films of all time. This being said, the pacing at times can grow a bit too slow, and the action involving the monster doesn’t have as much terror as it could have. All in all, though, one certainly could not afford to miss The Host.

Monster Mouth looks like Genitals/10

And that's it! Check out http://www.getrightmusic.com/2010/06/16/mixtape-veterano-barbeque-blends/ while you're here, and props to A-Ton for the link.

GT out.

PS: Got a mix in the work dubbed Demasiado Fuerte (Street Fighter aspects inc)

Mini Update

Been a while, right? My fault. Mostly work has been a constant, summer school starts on monday, and I've been trying to keep as busy as possible in order to put off writing my novel.

Which isn't coming along very well. The outlining, though nearing completion, is hard to motivate myself for. At the same time, I go to bed every night and read while thinking how much I'd rather just read the book I have planned, so I'm thinking that'll be a reason to keep pushing through until I hit my groove and crank some hardcore zombie action out.

I'm thinking I won't be updating this post with any reviews until I've seen Inception either tonight or tomorrow, and then I'll just do a few write-ups in one go. While I'm here though, why not talk about:

I marathoned Season 1 in roughly a day and a half (probably what kept me from writing/updating shit), and I've moved on to the second season (I think it's in the third right now?) yesterday. 4 episodes in, and the writing hasn't started slacking yet.

Vampires, to me, are an interesting staple in the horror genre; perhaps one of the OG's of scary stories, if you will. For this, I was hoping that the creators of this show would do justice to the myth unlike some rather successful teenage trash that hogs the limelight. Unfortunately for me, though, Let The Right One In this is not.

I get the feeling that this was originally some sort of romance novel that was turned into a tv series, because there's loads of sex (thank God for nudity) but it's not usually counterbalanced with good story. It's undecided whether Anna Paquin, playing the lead roll of Sookie, is just a bad actress or the writers can't seem to figure out her character. Either way, 90% of the cringe worthy moments come from her, and the other 10% are gifted to the audience via her vampy boyfriend Bill (played by Stephen Moyer). If you thought that Batman's growly voice in Batman Begins was laughable, just wait until you hear Moyer try and sound menacing with his deep growl vampire voice. So srs.

Luckily, the rest of the show is pretty damn entertaining, and the premise of Vampires attempting to integrate with normal society rather than live as outcasts is by far the most enthralling portion. Mix that with a really solid supporting cast, and True Blood becomes a pretty decent show. Here's hoping they stop writing shitty dialog.

Until next time, I'm off to see Inception!

Movies Update, New Section!

Slackin' off lately, right? My bad, things been coming up. I'm desperately trying to get this novel off the ground in a way that'll assure its completion, so I've been devoting more time on that and less on movies and blogs and everything else aside from gaming.

Speaking of gaming, there's going to be a new little section here at Gutter-Trash dubbed "I Love Free Stuff". Scroll past the Movie reviews to check it out (though it's not for everyone).

[Movies]

Midnight Cowboy (1969, dir. John Schlesinger)

I first became aware of this picture thanks to my Dad gifting me the 2-disc special edition DVD set for Christmas (might have been last Christmas, I think) after having told him how interested I was in doing movies (specifically, writing). He thought that, if I were to be studying film, I might start with something like this.

I then proceeded to not watch it due to moving out of my parent's place and into my own, successfully losing it in the packing up process. Upon rediscovering it, the girlfriend declared that we should watch it together, to which I hastily agreed. Yet, of course, we didn't seem to find time for it. Fast forward to Spring Term 2010, and I'm sitting in the mid-term session of my History of Film course and lo and behold; we write an impromptu essay on the drug sequence of this film!

Let me stop this babble. My dad was completely right in recommending me this movie. Dustin Hoffman delivers a powerful performance as the sleazy Ratso, selling the role more than even the producer thought he would considering his star-power after The Graduate. This character is far from the pretty-boy look of Mr. Ben Braddock and to be honest, I welcome the change. Then again, when has Dustin Hoffman not been good in a movie? I mean come on.

John Voight really sells the lovable idiot role here as well, and I'd argue that he even steals the audiences' eye away from Ratso and onto Joe Buck (a name that will forever remind me of the opening scenes in Kill Bill Vol. 1). At first, Buck was a very frustrating character to me as a viewer, but then I realized that for the movie to make sense, we have to accept that Joe Buck is a good-natured idiot who makes all the wrong decisions with money as well as people. The rest sort of falls into place after one stops fretting over the little things.

The narrative is well placed and terribly interesting, featuring subject matter that earned Cowboy an initial X-Rating (later dropped down to an R) that even today seems a bit ballsy. A film like this certainly wouldn't be playing at the big Cinemark joints, and would instead be headed to limited release and niche theaters (God, what a sad thing that is). To me, Cowboy captures the feel of the time much in a way that seems reminiscent of Taxi Driver. It's almost as if Travis Bickle could be driving the taxi that nearly runs into Ratso.

See this movie.

I ain't a f'real cowboy. But I am one helluva stud!/10

The Road (2009, dir. John Hillcoat)

I loved The Road by Cormac McCarthy, and I was semi-excited to hear back in '09 that there was going to be a film rendition with Viggo Mortensen and the like, but my movie-loving-self was also very wary of how many movies manage to take a source and completely rid it of all the things that made it so good, and churn out an absolutely dismal flick. Fearing the worst, I dove into The Road with a friend last week.

Little images. First off, I think that when you approach a movie like The Road, you need to realize that your beloved memory of the source material shouldn't be the commanding reason you like or dislike a movie version. Yes, some people will take a book and make a bad movie out of it, but I absolutely loathe the phrase "well, the book was better." To me, The Road as a film and as a book are two different entities. The book is wonderful, emotionally taxing, and very tough and the movie is similar.

There were a lot of moments in this movie that I found to be very tough to watch, and Mortensen plays Man in a way that shows how much he really respects the character and cares to give a good performance; which he does. His companion, Boy, is played the way I think the book character would come across in real life; sweet, but ultimately really fucking annoying. Not on the level of the little girl in War of the Worlds, but still kind of hard to watch (how it should be). These things considered, the movie is well acted.

The desolate world in which these characters inhabit is truly stunning, and the contrast between Man's dreams of the past and the present contrast so much (well done with the use of bright colors in one, and an almost black and white palette in the present) that it makes our viewing of the dreams and flashbacks feel as if they may never have really existed. It was also interesting to note that as Woman falls deeper into her depression, the color of the images also darkens. The image above is perhaps my favorite shot in a series of scenes towards the end. I won't spoil anything, but I was very close to getting all misty for a little bit there.

I knew this was coming. They were warning us./10

I've seen a few movies here and there since but I can't quite recall. I watched some Hong Kong movie about police in the future which was so bad I had to turn it off, and haven't really watched a movie since. Perhaps tonight!

But now, without further ado, it's time to jump into

Gutter Trash Loves Free Stuff!

That's right boys and girls, here's the part of the blog where I test out free-to-play games on PC so you don't have to (not that you would anyway, of course). This week, I sampled a free-to-play MMO called Allods Online.

Those familiar with World of Warcraft style games will feel right at home here with this game, as it features some similar races and classes that are reminiscent of WoW (though to be fair, WoW wasn't the first MMO to feature things like Orcs or Warriors). Upon downloading the game and signing in, I was eager to see what the world had in store for me. One thing I immediately found to be unique to Allods was a race called the Gibberlings:

These little tikes are essentially furry midgets with great big busy beards and a happy disposition. Rather than control one single one, you assume control of a group of 3 (and even a pet squirrel depending on the class you choose). One midget holds the beatstick/sword/axe, one is so small that they can only carry a shield for blocking, and one manages the ranged weapons. It's adorable, but quickly grew tiresome when I encountered high-level Gibberling players and saw just how awful armor looks on them.

The gameplay feels very similar to WoW-type MMOs and I had absolutely no trouble settling right in and killing shit in order to level up. The quests are easy enough and you gain your first few levels rather quickly on the noob island they start you out on, where you don't need to party up with anyone to achieve anything. In fact, though I couldn't find my way around at first, things are generally intuitive and your quest objectives are clearly marked on the map in order to aid you in your adventuring. How nice.

Yet the problem became that the XP rate slowed WAY down after you complete the quests on the beginning island, and killing mobs takes ages being that I selected the Warrior archetype. It's one thing to need to do some grinding in order to reach max level, but if I'm mashing keys for hours just to go from lvl 8 to lvl 9, there's something not right. Upon talking with guild mates, I found out that after the next patch, they'll be making the XP gain even LOWER and more Item Shop (the place where you spend real money to get in-game items) involvement, I figured it was time to finish my time with Allods.

All in all, it's a beautifully crafted world, pretty decent gameplay (though I couldn't tell you much about the pvp), and a fun class/race customization that keeps things pretty fresh. If you can stand the grind and long hours of questing, then Allods is the place for you! I'd recommend it as a good WoW alternative for those not wanting to shell out $15 a month to play.

Until next time,

GT

Peep this mixtape:

http://www.datpiff.com/Dj_Jazzy_Jeff__Mick_Boogie__Summertime.m133115.html