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Anything to avoid writing

February 16, 2011 in Blogging, Misc, NBA, Novel, On Writing

Only recently have I come to appreciate just how hard it is to be a ‘writer’.

Sure, it’s fun to ramble on and write on this blog with no regard for what is ‘good writing’, but when it comes to the serious stuff (such as my dorment novels or proper articles), I have a real talent for avoiding it.  Make no mistake — I want to write.  That’s why I quit my old profession and began this path.  I have absolutely no doubt about that.  But somehow, I just keep finding new ways to stop myself from getting down to business (as I like to call it).

Perhaps it’s the fear of failure.  Or maybe it’s the fear of getting started (after all, it is extremely daunting).  Or maybe I’m just a lazy bum.

Lately I’ve been coming up with all sorts of excuses for not working on my ‘serious’ writing.  It’s the holidays.  My folks are in town.  I have video games I haven’t played yet.  I need to finish reading books X, Y and Z.  There are movies I need to see, preferably before the Oscars.  I should watch more live basketball on NBA League Pass.  I should learn about the stock market.  The foreign exchange market.  Enter competitions.  The house needs new furniture (which is true).  I should write a blog post about not writing.

One of my many New Year’s resolutions was to read (books) and write (books) an hour a day.  Two-plus months in, and still nothing.  I have been reading more than an hour a day the last few days, but only because it’s Anne Frank’s diary and it’s bloody brilliant.  But writing?  No. Not as such.  Almost makes me wish I could be locked away somewhere like Anne where it’s so boring that there’s nothing to do but write.

Over this break, I’ve sunk to a new low — exercise (the only thing worse is cleaning up the house).  I tell myself it’s to keep fit, but it’s really just another excuse.  And as a result, I’ve been exercising a lot.  More than I ever did than when I had (or could afford) a gym membership.  Maybe it will get me physically prepared for all the gruelling writing sessions ahead…

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Movie Review: Hereafter (2010)

February 14, 2011 in Movie Reviews, Paranormal, Reviews

Sure, Invictus was just okay, but it seems to me old Clint Eastwood can do no wrong these days.  There is a quiet confidence in his approach, a lovely subtlety in his pacing and pauses.  And no matter what, he manages to evoke powerful, genuine emotional responses from his audiences (I mean, come on — Mystic River, Million Dollar Baby, Letters from Iwo Jima, Changeling, Gran Torino…).

Eastwood’s latest effort, Hereafter, is no different.  It’s a dangerous project because, as the title suggests, the film is about death and what comes after, which makes it prone to soppy melodrama and manipulation.  And of course, the afterlife is a topic often subject to ridicule and parody, so there’s the additional hurdle of keeping the film serious without tipping it over the edge.

Somehow, some way, Eastwood delivers.  Pound-for-pound, Hereafter is perhaps not one of Eastwood’s greatest films, but it’s certainly one of his better ones — and it holds great potential to be one of his most popular films.

It tells three separate stories about three different characters — Marie (Cecile de France), a well-known French television journalist; George (Matt Damon), an American factory worker who just gave up on his old job; and Marcus (Frankie McLaren), a British boy with an older twin brother and a crackhead mother.  I won’t say much more than that except that each of their lives is touched by death and what lies beyond.

Perhaps it’s just my fascination with the film’s themes and/or my appreciation for Eastwood’s direction, but I was totally engrossed by Hereafter from start to finish.  Sceptics might have a natural bias against the film because it lays quite a lot out on the table (similar to say atheists towards The Passion of the Christ or fundamentalist Christians towards The Da Vinci Code — even though it’s fiction), but those who keep an open mind will find it hard not to be moved by at least one of the three stories in the film.  It’s a shame that many people will simply scoff at this film because of its subject matter and try to discredit it on other grounds.  I’m just glad religion played an almost non-existent role in all of this.

Anyway, I loved it.  Eastwood butchered the ending in my opinion with a pointless sequence but apart from that I found it beautiful, absorbing, poignant, and ultimately very satisfying.

4.5 stars out of 5

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The Waiting Game…and Getting Published!

February 12, 2011 in Blogging, Misc, On Writing, Study

Source: guardian.co.uk

It’s a waiting game for me right now.

For starters, there’s not much happening around here lately as I wait for this blog to be moved from the free WordPress.com domain to my own at pacejmiller.com.

Let’s face it, I have absolutely no idea when it comes to the Internets, so all I’m doing is waiting for the free experts from the place I signed up at to work their magic.  I’m just not sure if I’ve ‘applied’ properly and when it’ll actually get done.  It’s always been a dream of mine since I commenced this blog that some day I’ll get my own domain, and now it’s finally happening!  Maybe now I can finally get my own erectile dysfunction ads in the sidebar.

In the meantime, I’ve finally figured out how to add custom drop down menus to WordPress.com posts.  Check it out!  Ahhh…so nice.  I’ve also tried to clean things up a little by reducing and parenting the categories.  Maybe no one else will notice, but it feels good to have done something.

In other waiting news, I’m going to officially become a ‘published’ author in book format.  It’s only one of many entries in an anthology but it’s well respected and paved the way for many successful writers.  And besides, it took a lot of hard work and luck (about a one in ten chance) to get selected, and then I had to endure the brutal process of book editing (working one-on-one with an editor) to get it into shape.  It’s a 4000 word non-fiction piece and I’m very proud of it, and the only thing I hope is that the publisher doesn’t use its veto power to deny it at the final hurdle!

While I wait for all that to sort itself out, I’m waiting to get the motivation to work on my novel(s) and another magazine piece I have signed up to write (with a mid-March deadline).  This one will require me to scour the Internet and go out to speak to professionals.  Looking forward to getting out there again.

Lastly, just waiting before class starts again.  Less than a month away.  Oh, and I’ll be going to Shanghai for a week in March.  Looks like more travel posts are coming.

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Movie Review: True Grit (2010)

February 8, 2011 in Movie Reviews, Reviews

They say remakes seldom better the original, but it’s hard to imagine the 1969 John Wayne classic (which I haven’t seen) being better than the new version from my favourite filmmaking duo.  True Grit is vintage Coen Brothers, more No Country For Old Men than The Big Lebowski but still funny and quirky.  And when it comes to dialogue, human interactions and suspense, few can compare with Joel and Ethan Coen.

Based on Charles Portis’s 1968 novel of the same name, this version of True Grit is supposedly truer to the original source.  It tells the story of young Mattie Ross (Hailee Steinfeld), a wise-beyond-her-years 14-year-old who seeks to avenge the death of her father by tracking down and killing Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin).  To do so, she seeks the assistance of Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges), a merciless but drunk and out-of-shape Deputy US Marshal.  Tagging along for the ride is Texas Ranger LaBoeuf (Matt Damon), who is chasing Chaney for an unrelated crime.

I’m not usually a fan of Westerns, but True Grit had me hooked from the beginning.  It moves with at a pace similar to No Country, which might be on the slow side for some, but whichever way you look at this film — whether it’s the screenplay, the performances or the direction — it’s top notch.  And all through out was that trademark Coen Brothers touch, that unexpected, random hilarity that I can never get enough of.

Jeff Bridges and Matt Damon were expectedly excellent (as were Josh Brolin and Barry Pepper in smaller roles), but it was the remarkable performance of young Hailee Steinfeld that carried the film from start to finish.  Good to see that she received an Oscar nomination, but how it was for Best Supporting Actress as opposed to Best Actress (considering she was in just about every scene) beats the hell out of me.

My only complaint was that it felt like the film needed subtitles at times because of the excessive mumbling (mostly by Jeff Bridges) which made the conversations difficult to follow.  But apart from that, an awesome experience.

4.25 stars out of 5

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Shock horror: I didn’t finish reading a book

February 7, 2011 in Book Reviews, Fantasy, Reviews

As my friend Xander told me yesterday during our brief catch-up, there is a first time for everything.

I’ve always had this frustrating habit of finishing every novel that I start reading, but for the first time, I have decided to abandon this current novel I am reading and put me out of my misery.

According to this blog, the last book I finished was Homeland by RA Salvatore, and I had completed it by the 20th of December 2010.  Fast forward a month and a half and I’m still stuck on the next book, a Star Wars novel called Heir to the Empire, written by award-winning author Timothy Zahn.  I’m not even halfway through.

A friend was kind enough to lend it to me and I am ashamed to admit that I’ve had it in my possession for 6+ months, or some other ridiculously long period of time.  I wanted to finish it and finish it quickly so I could finally return it and get started on that stack of books still waiting for me in the corner.

It’s not that the book is bad — in fact, it is a bestseller and widely regarded as one of the best Star Wars novels ever written.  I don’t know why, but I’ve simply struggled with it, and struggled badly.  Every time I stop reading it, I don’t get the urge to read it again, and when I do start to read it again, I have trouble remembering what the heck is going on (probably because I take such long breaks in between).

I believe the problem lies with me being only a fringe Star Wars fan.  I was born a little too late to be caught up in the frenzy, and while I have watched all the films, I don’t care for Luke, Leia and Han Solo the way the ‘true’ fanatics do.  I just like the lightsabers.

So all that Empire/Rebel Alliance stuff, the politics, the names I can’t pronounce, the history of everything — the stuff that true fans appreciate — never got me going.  And there was too much of that in the first hundred or so pages.  I have no doubt that the book will get more interesting and action packed, but I just can’t bring myself to get to that point.  I quit.

My wife says I should have done it ages ago.  She compares it to my refusal to stop watching or going to watch potentially bad movies.  She still complains that I wasted 2 hours of her life in taking her to see Buried with Ryan Reynolds.  I actually thought it was okay, but maybe that’s my problem.

Next up, The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank.  I’m loving it already.

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