I Can't Get Behind That! #3

The Shat said it best:

So here are even MORE things I can't get behind! Feel free to share your own!

Drivers on Topanga Canyon Road
I drive Topanga almost every single day to get to work. Maybe the prettiest drive in LA, but I fear its enchantment suffers a bit at the hands of locals who try to teach commuters like me a lesson by getting in front of us and driving 20 mph under the speed limit. Gah. The average speed limit on Topanga is 45mph. Look, I'm all for taking 'er easy and driving carefully on this potentially treacherous road, but when someone with one of those "Enjoy Topanga slowly" bumper stickers cuts me off at the Mulholland fork and then proceeds to drive the length of Topanga at 20mph, never once using any of the "slow traffic" turnouts, he is not encouraging me to enjoy the scenery. He is being a dick.

Oh, and I understand if you're driving a rig or hauling some massive burden of lumber or machinery through that windy road. It can be wily and you should take your time. But if you are driving along Topanga Cyn Road and look into your rearview mirror to see a looooooong train of cars inching their way along behind you, USE THE TURNOUTS. That's why they're there!

The Cost of the Service Call Goes Toward the Repair
Who came up with this idea? What a crappy business model. I pay you $65 or more per hour to come out and assess the situation with my hot tub or fence or tree or whatever it is that needs to be repaired. When you determine what the problem is, the cost of that assessment fee goes toward the repair. Noooo. Here's how it works: I go with the person who does a free estimate. Who knows, maybe you're better at the job than he is. Maybe you would have charged less for the overall repair. But I'll never know, because your way of doing business just lost you the job. Way to go.

Oh, um, hi again. Yeah so, er, sorry about earlier. No, I couldn't find anyone who does a free estimate. When are you available to come out?

Restaurants and Bars With TVs
Dear Viper Room... here's the deal. I came here to see my friends' band play. I did not anticipate having the new episode of Lost spoiled for me via Closed Captioning on the TV right behind the stage. But thanks. Now I don't have to watch it when I get home. (yes, I know Lost is no longer on the air. But this happened a while ago and it still bugs me.)

As a side note: ah, this Crave Cafe place sure is a nice place for brunch at 10:30 on a Saturday morning. Here, Tristan, eat your eggs. (spooning food into toddler's mouth) No, buddy, don't watch the TV. Say, what's on that TV? Oh, dear lord! It's... it's... a news story on stillbirths! WHAT THE FU-

The TSA
Why even fly anymore? Seriously. I mean, if I am in LA and want to spring over to New York or Colorado just for a quick weekend trip, sure, I guess I have to take a plane. But if I'm just going from LA to San Jose? Why would I?

Standard metal detectors and x-rays have been swapped out in favor of new devices called Backscatter scanners that essentially photograph you naked:



Already stories have been cropping up of security employees high-fiving one another as a hot girl walks through. Those who know me well know I have no personal issue with that aspect of it. I'd go pretty much everywhere naked if I could (the way things are headed, that may be an airport security requirement soon enough). But no way am I going to expect my wife and son to go along with this procedure, particularly since the side effects of the new higher radiation x-ray have not yet been conclusively determined.

A person can opt out of walking through the scanner, of course. But the alternative is a full body frisk, one that by most reports tends toward the invasive. Breast groping, cheek spreading, exploration between underwear and skin, manhandling (if you catch my drift). By many accounts those who elect not to go through the scanner are made examples of, so as to encourage others in line to simply go through the machine. As a result, at least one rape survivor has been devastated (you really should read that article). A breast cancer survivor was forced to show TSA agents her prosthetic breast. Several pilots have themselves refused to take part in either the scanning or the patting down, and planes have been grounded when these pilots are sent home and suspended. A flight attendants' union is up in arms over the procedure. There are even people planning a "National Opt-Out Day" for November 24, just to jam up the system as much as possible on the busiest travel day of the year. My mother-in-law recently walked through the scanner at LAX with little concern. And for many I'm sure there is little worry. Heck, Lewis Black even makes a solid argument when he says "I get to go from New York to San Diego in five hours, and someone touches my balls? That's a great deal!"

I don't know, though. Something about the entire situation stinks of invasion. Of both privacy and dignity. And it stinks of the gradual erosion of our basic human rights.

New Jersey legislators have been the first to put their feet down:



Listen to this:

Now watch this:



Anyway, to allow for the time it takes to accommodate these new procedures, the TSA recommends arriving up to two hours before your departure time, even for a domestic flight. Consider then that flying from LA to San Jose would suddenly take nearly as long as driving there, and that it would still cost more than six times as much, and it becomes a no-brainer.

People don't drive enough anyway. Get out there, people. See the country. Traffic is too light these days.

Now, some might argue that these new steps are necessary to prevent terrorist attacks. To this I say that if terrorism among nuns and middle class housewives and college students heading home for Christmas is so prevalent that this is what's required, then geez. Just another reason not to fly.

There are always going to be terrible people. Evil people. But if we go through every single aspect of every single day in fear then what does that mean but that those people have won? That they have succeeded in spreading terror?

I say no. If flying means paying through the nose just to succumb to the repercussions of that one asshole in five million who one day boarded a plane with a razor blade in the sole of his shoe then count me out. Anything can be used as a weapon anyway. The soda can you order from the flight attendant can be folded in half and torn apart to create a jagged edge. But you can't go through life thinking like that. As Edward R. Murrow once said, " we will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason."

At the end of the day we need to trust each other. We need to believe that the person sitting next to us on the bus or on the plane isn't out to kill us. Because without that fundamental belief, what do we have? What remains? Of our humanity? Of our reason for going on another day? What is left but ignorance?

The Glorification of Ignorance
Have I touched on this in a previous post? Maybe so, but it warrants mentioning again. What is with this current direction in which the U.S. seems headed? The perception of education and thoughtfulness as elitist or - dare I speak the word - socialist? I had hoped that Jon Stewart's speech at his rally might spark about the nation a new sense that no, we will not let the stage be taken solely by the morons of this nation. Though they speak the loudest they have the least to say, and enough is enough. But that wasn't really even the point of his rally. And well, by now we know how this latest election went. Lower-income households voting against their own best interests and a state $19 billion in debt once again voting down a proposition that could generate massive revenue. Personally, I'm of the mind that if you voted against either same-sex marriage or the legalization of marijuana, you should no longer be allowed to complain about the state of California's deficit. (see what I did there? The state of California's... oh, forget it.)

Oh and one more thing, people. Sarah Palin is not, nor has she ever been, attractive. Had John McCain chosen Diora Baird as his running mate I'd be singing a different tune. But no, dudes. Show some self respect. Sarah Palin looks like she smells of old coffee spilled onto the floor of a chicken coop.

All this being said, there is something important we should all still keep in mind. Myself included.

News
As it's become clear that there is no reliable, trustworthy source from which to objectively learn the goings on of the world, where does one turn? My technique is probably the same as yours: read a bunch of different websites, listen to NPR, and then try to triangulate the truth using these sources as your reference points. How close do I get? Hope and pray, I guess. But it beats the hell out of humoring this country's preferred Monster of the Week: the Latest Thing To Fear! Be it swine flu, terrorists, the dangers of moisturizers in the home, or whatever the Fear of the Week is, network and 24-hour cable news is exhausting. And again, enough is enough. Vote with your remotes, people. There's always an episode of Star Trek on somewhere.

The Way Avid Handles Effects
Hey here's one only a couple of you will care about: Avid sucks at effects management! Okay, I understand that whatever's on the topmost layer is the dominant effect. That makes sense. But if I drag something else on top of an existing effect shouldn't it automatically push the effect that's there down one layer, thereby making the new effect the dominant effect? Instead, I need to think backwards. Anticipate what I'm going to want on my uppermost layer and then work down from there in terms of dominance. That. Is. Retarded. Someone at Avid needs to study how Final Cut Pro handles effects. You can pile as many effects as you want into one clip, then double click the clip in your timeline and manage the dominance of the effects there. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. Why - WHYYYYY - must Avid make everything difficult difficult lemon difficult?

P.S. I've heard that Avid 5 mimics many of the features of Final Cut. If effects is one of them, then awesome. But I'm not on Avid 5 yet, I'm on Avid 4. So I am not aware yet of that change, if it exists.

Wankers Who Say Movie Trailers Suck
Here's an argument I'm sick of hearing:

Trailer editing is what annoys me the most. It becomes so blatant. I don't know when this trend started, but every cut is a fade in-fade out. Look at every trailer now and they're all like that. Its not the use of computer editing, its the formula behind trailer editing which is so strict now, and has been, every trailer has to be cut the same way. The same techniques, fades, dissolves, fade in-fade out, you just get these little bits of information. Its this dumb sort of way of advertising, its moronic, the whole package, its put together so idiotic, I don't know how or why this began or what the reason is for it, because trailers used to be a lot different, they were creative and each one had a little bit of style to it, but then the marketing niche formula started. They're all the same, they're all advertising to the same idiot mentality. It’s almost impossible to tell what a film is going to be like from trailers now. They all look the same and they could look good or bad depending on what your interpretation of what that is. I guess they figure that makes it look great, so whether the film is good or bad it doesn't matter.

That quote is from an interview the "Journal of Interstitial Cinema" did with Damon Packard, the underground filmmaker I myself interviewed a while back (read my interview with Packard here). And it's completely idiotic.

Let's start with this idea: every trailer has to be cut the same way. The same techniques, fades, dissolves, fade in-fade out, you just get these little bits of information. Its this dumb sort of way of advertising, its moronic, the whole package, its put together so idiotic.

Oh my gosh. My brain can hardly process how much ignorance there is in just that one statement. Is the trailer for Domino cut the same way as the trailer for The Social Network? No, of course it's not. What does that even MEAN? "Every trailer has to be cut the same way..." is he talking about structure? Style? Seriously. Because speaking as a professional trailer editor, this is asinine. You use the techniques that are appropriate to the trailer you're cutting. There's no one over my shoulder telling me "this trailer has to be cut using lots of fades". At least not during my first cut. Oh, this just betrays a complete ignorance of both the movie advertising industry AND what it's like to be a professional editor.

Someone else recently made this argument to me:

Given how bad the films are, how can the trailers NOT be a hyped hopped juicehead job in order to "sell" the picture? WTF are you gonna do as trailer editor of SAW 17: 3D JASON VS. MICHAEL MYERS to make it anything more than just another tired variant on:

1. Flash cuts.
2. Adobe filters.
3. Sped up footage.
4. CGI'd shots.
5. Rehashed score.

You know, there are tools at our disposal. And we can use them or not. Again, I reiterate that you do what's appropriate given the film, and you work with the tools at your disposal given the limitations imposed by the studio or producer. CGI shots? Really? That's a problem? Any shot with CGI in it is now evidence of a crap movie? Adobe filters? So this guy obviously uses Final Cut or Premiere, by the way, since he's referencing Adobe. But whether we're talking Adobe or not, Sapphire plugins or Boris FX, should I refrain from using an effect entirely? Is the use of a plugin evidence of a bad editor or, as this numbskull is arguing, a bad movie? Rehashed score? If you don't have access to the score of the film, if the score of the film sucks, if you can't clear a certain cue, what are you gonna do? What if the score from The Day After Tomorrow is the exact thing you're looking for? Are you gonna deliberately use something else?

I also take umbrage at the argument that movies today suck. Heck, a San Diego film critic recently retired from his job because, he says, the declining percentage of inspiring films these days leaves him with a declining sense of hope. Fair enough, I guess, though I would argue with anyone who says this period in film history - which has given us modern classics from the likes of Paul Thomas Anderson, Peter Jackson, Danny Boyle, Terrence Malick, Tarsem Singh, David Lynch, Ridley Scott, Gore Verbinksi, Errol Morris, Chris Nolan and the Brothers Coen, along with stellar new indies like Catfish, Exit Thru The Gift Shop, Monsters, Garden State and I could go on and on - is anything less than a third Golden Age. Consolidation of studios and distributors, along with easy access to cameras and websites like YouTube, have changed the game, to be sure. And perhaps made it easier for garbage to rise to the surface. But the good stuff still far outnumbers the bad. Alas, I'm getting off topic.

The Hills Have Eyes 2 was a sequel to a remake and had a terrific, original teaser. There can be artistry in advertising, regardless of the product. It all depends on who's at the keyboard. Shrugging off the entire enterprise based on some similarly dismissive attitude toward contemporary cinema is idiotic.

Is the trailer for Marmaduke crap? Oh, it's an almost sublime symphony of suck. But it goes without saying that I am not on the same page as the person who watches the trailers for Little Children or Gone in 60 Seconds and says there's no art there.

Movie trailers have grown SO MUCH as an art unto themselves in the past twenty years that to dismiss them just pisses me off. And not just because I make a living editing trailers. But because even before I worked in trailers, even back when I was a kid, great trailers inspired me. I am a better editor and visual artist today because I grew up loving movie trailers. And to be able to meet and work alongside the brilliant editors who cut those pieces I loved when I was growing up continues to be a complete thrill to me.

Are there crummy trailers? Of course there are. Are there crummy movies? Are we even debating this?

You know what else there will always be? Crummy people, dead set on taking a dump on whatever excites you, whatever it is you love. Sometimes it's hard to ignore them. Sometimes they get elected to office. Sometimes they get hired by the Transportation Security Administration. But at the end of the day they're still losers. And if they can't or won't see the artistry and influence of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre trailer, I can't get behind them.

On a related note, I never did share with you Gentle Readers the latest piece I cut. So check it out, the teaser for the new Coen Bros. movie True Grit: