I'd prefer that those be the ones making the final cut so the pain wasn't all for nothing.

Heh. One of the deleted scenes in Punch Drunk Love is a commercial that Philip Seymour Hoffman's sleezy mattress king is shooting. Hoffman is filmed on top of a building dropping down onto a huge stack of mattresses - and then he goes sproing up and off the stack and falls down to the ground about 12 feet on his back where he yelped:

"Fuck that hurt! Did you get it on camera?"

I didn't think the It Girl was forgotten at all - you guys?

Forget those eyes? I don't think so.

There's an outtake in the supplementary material of The Frighteners where Michael J. Fox is running through the woods, takes a bad tumble out of frame and badly injures his foot. You can hear him say "Ow, fuck." off camera.

I just had Meet The Feebles recommended to me. So surreal to see that discussed enthusiastically by people who aren't invisible.

On other fronts, I caught Rollergirls on cable tonight, which is a surprisingly affecting documentary tv show about the TX Rollergirls here in Austin.

Oh, that's good. I will def check it out now. There was an article in the NYT last year about the resurgence of roller derby in NYC and I was totally like, "that's the sport for me!" but of course did nothing about it. At least I can enjoy it vicariously.

There was an article in the NYT last year about the resurgence of roller derby in NYC and I was totally like, "that's the sport for me!"

The very first professional sporting event Emmett ever saw was Rollerderby. They tried to revive it locally (where the Bay City Bombers had been huge in the 60s) and had an event at Kezar Stadium about two blocks from my house. We saw it when Emmett was 3 and then when he was 4. He keeps asking when it will come back.

There's a great picture of Clara Bow on Dorothy Arzner's lap that I want as a poster, drat it. It just captures all her charm.

In fact, it's so damned great *because* it feels realistic. It has humor and pain and feels very much like what going to high school in the early '80s felt like.

That's why I couldn't watch it past the first disc.

In fact, I realized while trying to watch and enjoy F&G that I require more magic than realism in my TV viewing. I could appreciate F&G intellectually, but my gut reaction to it was nausea. It made me feel like a peeping Tom in the bad way while at the same time flashing me back to all the worst parts of middle school and high school.

FWIW, Ple, the excruciating recognition factor became more muted and fun became more prominent in F&G as it went on. It never lost its perfect pitch, but the characters begin to move beyond their situations in surprising and interesting ways.

Eh, life is short, and it was so firmly in Not My Beautiful Cake land that I'm not sure I'll ever have the nerve to try beyond that, and what I said about needing more magic in my realism is totally true, and kind of a refreshing epiphany that will totally help me choose what I want to watch in movies and TV.

Basically, I need something where the emotional truth is wrapped in a fairly stylised package, and it will sing for me.

The more I think about it, the more I can apply this to damn near all my preferences in life, from what I watch to what sort of church service I enjoy attending.

I am nothing if not predictable.

Basically, I need something where the emotional truth is wrapped in a fairly stylised package, and it will sing for me.

Oh, I totally get that. Not applying this to you, but I remember much of the debate about BtVS S6 being about the loss of the metaphoric base of the show. Which was a conscious decision on Joss' part, but jarring for a lot of fans. Also it came at cost of much of the humor of the show. With the distancing effect of the metaphor you had more room for humor somehow.