15 April 2024, early afternoon
A weird double header of sorts for Sunday: Civil War in the afternoon with my friends and family, and then Aftersun alone at night. Two films that are difficult to watch in completely different ways. Civil Wars is Alex Garland’s latest film. The film follows war journalists covering a modern day civil war taking place in America. It’s an Alex Garland film, so we get to experience the full monstrosity of humanity. An intense movie that builds and builds to what felt like an inevitable conclusion. I felt the ending was a little bit rushed, the arc of the two leads felt too fast. Still, I enjoyed the film all the same. Aftersun was something else. A coming of age film. A film about memory and trying to understand the moments in our life that shape us. This film begins with a sense you’re going to watch one thing, and ends with you understanding you watched something completely different. This was a really beautiful movie. The ending sequence one of those incredible pieces of cinema that people will probably talk about forever and ever. It was a solid day of cinema.
Movies
10 April 2024, mid-morning
I was off to the Lightbox last Friday watch Wim Wenders latest film, Perfect Days, a film following the quiet life of a Tokyo sanitation worker, played wonderfully by Koji Yakusho. The audience experiences the perfects days of the films protagonist Hirayama, the structure and repetition of his life. Each day Hirayama wakes up to the sound of a women sweeping the street. He brushes his teeth, trims his moustache and shaves, and gets dressed. He picks up the keys and camera and change he put away the previous night at his door before heading out to start his day. He buys himself a coffee from a vending machine and heads off to work. And so on and so forth. His days are simple, but quietly joyous. The film shows us the patterns of his life, and the audience intuits whats going on through the little snapshots of his life that follow as we experience subsequent days of his life. The movie is meditative. There is very little dialogue. Koji Yakusho’s performance is incredible. This was a wonderful film.
The trailer for Perfect Days.
Movies
- Martin Greenfield dies at 95.
He dressed six presidents, coached designers and made thousands of suits for TV shows and movies. But his beginnings were dismal: He learned to sew at Auschwitz.
A very incredible life.
- The untold story of Kickstarter’s crypto Hail Mary—and the secret $100 million a16z-led investment to save its fading brand.
This article really explains some of the bizarre moves Kickstarter has made in recent years. My friend Mark feels the article misses the mark when it comes to articulating Kickstarter’s current woes. They haven’t made things easier for creators on their platform. Meanwhile, Gamefound and Backerkit entered the market and hoovered up creators. The perfect example, that’s even mentioned in the article: Sanderson’s latest crowdfunding effort is taking place on Backerkit. I can’t imagine he’s there because of Kickstarter’s lack of web3 nonsense. 17 million and counting, on someone else’s platform.
5 March 2024, mid-morning
It was an emotional performance from Leslie Feist at Massey Hall last night. My cousin Mahi had an extra ticket to her show, and so I found myself listening to her perform songs from the start of her career through to this very moment. The show was beautiful. No opening act, just Feist. But really, Feist was her own opening act. Alone on a stage with an acoustic guitar. Chatting with the crowd, about her time during the pandemic, about the show. It all seemed very low-key, until it wasn’t. I don’t think I’ve been to a show where I want to say so little, because the act of talking about it may spoil the experience for someone else. There were moments of genuine surprise at this show. Plot twists! What a performer!
They were filming it all, so hopefully you’ll be able to watch it at home one day. Until then you can enjoy her encore, Love Who We Are Meant To. I was happy to have experienced it all in person.
Music
- Textpattern turns twenty / Textpattern CMS.
Wordpress and Textpattern felt like peers when I was trying to pick what to replace MovableType. Nowadays it’s quiet clear Wordpress was maybe the horse to bet on. But, I really love Textpattern. The platform has served me well for over 19 years! I used to run my own fork of this software, so I could hack in clean URLs and some other features missing from the earliest versions of the product. Nowadays I run a few plugins I wrote and use a stock install. This is much easier to manage and maintain. Dean Allen, the creator of Textpattern, died many years ago now. Tragically. Prior to his death he was already a distant figure when it came to this software. It’s a real testament to the power of open source software that it continues to live on till this day, a small community keeping it going.
27 February 2024, late morning
It’s been a full week since we returned from a trip to Paris. I managed to go through all my photos and share them on Flickr, and then edited that group of photos down to a smaller set I’ve shared on my Format portfolio. Paris is an incredible city. Beautiful and dense. Even in the grey of February it’s pretty and lively. This trip was all about doing the most touristy things our niece and daughter wanted to do. Next time we can get back to wandering the city looking for the best croissants.
Life | Photography
