[Ricardo Tisci's] ten-piece Couture lineup was divided into three rooms. The first was devoted to crocodile, and what the Givenchy atelier has done to the precious skin is positively jaw-dropping. For a long, clingy dress, the scales on the hide were individually cut and numbered, then bleached, dyed, and resewn one by one in order onto a tulle body stocking. It took 350 hours to make.

-Nicole Phelps, Style.com

That dress above is everything I love about fashion:  glamour anchored by grit, beauty bolstered by craftsmanship, and grandeur built from pieces.

I seem to be writing a lot about caves these days.

Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (친절한 금자씨)

Park Chan-wook, 2005

A dark comedy tinted by violet, the cold meld of blue reason and red vengeance.

Lady Vengeance leaves my mouth frothing with a saccharine taste and an acidic kick. Geumja is kind-hearted yet manipulative, pitiful but twisted. Her life consumed by plans of revenge, she raises the question: does redemption come with revenge, or are both ultimately unattainable? The film also represents cinema at its best with its impeccably composed frames, sharp-witted dialogue, and detail-bursting production design.

The American release chose the word “sympathy” in translating the title of the film, yet the Korean title “Chinjeolhan Geumjassi” literally translates to  ”Kind-hearted Ms. Geumja.”  The nuance of sarcasm is different in the two titles, which is why I’m not a fan of the American title. For one, the word “kind-hearted” is much more cutting than “sympathy.” “Sympathy” reads as eliciting a certain emotional response from the viewers, which may be a forced laugh from understanding its tongue-in-cheek nature, or well, sympathy.

The poster for the American release also misses the point by excluding the contrast between the modern backdrop and the retro vibe of Geumja, the bakery, and the cakes. The poster for the film’s Korean release:

The alternate version:

My favorite from the film though, are the cakes:

Fuck. Now I’m craving chocolate cake.

All stills captured by me. I own no rights to these images. 

]]> http://idontdrinkbutidobatheinflowers.wordpress.com/2011/12/13/diev/feed/ 0 idontdrinkbutidobatheinflowers world's largest underwater cave russia http://idontdrinkbutidobatheinflowers.wordpress.com/2011/11/30/in-the-secular-night/ http://idontdrinkbutidobatheinflowers.wordpress.com/2011/11/30/in-the-secular-night/#comments Wed, 30 Nov 2011 12:56:27 +0000 idontdrinkbutidobatheinflowers http://idontdrinkbutidobatheinflowers.wordpress.com/?p=1557 ]]>

I have a sausage hanging from the door. It is troubling, like oceans rolled into the plastic floor, dandelions burnt in the oven, an extra spritz of perfume. I kick back and evenly mutter:

In the Secular Night

In the secular night you wander around
alone in your house. It’s two-thirty.
Everyone has deserted you,
or this is your story;
you remember it from being sixteen,
when the others were out somewhere, having a good time,
or so you suspected,
and you had to baby-sit.
You took a large scoop of vanilla ice-cream
and filled up the glass with grapejuice
and ginger ale, and put on Glenn Miller
with his big-band sound,
and lit a cigarette and blew the smoke up the chimney,
and cried for a while because you were not dancing,
and then danced, by yourself, your mouth circled with purple.

Now, forty years later, things have changed,
and it’s baby lima beans.
It’s necessary to reserve a secret vice.
This is what comes from forgetting to eat
at the stated mealtimes. You simmer them carefully,
drain, add cream and pepper,
and amble up and down the stairs,
scooping them up with your fingers right out of the bowl,
talking to yourself out loud.
You’d be surprised if you got an answer,
but that part will come later.

There is so much silence between the words,
you say. You say, The sensed absence
of God and the sensed presence
amount to much the same thing,
only in reverse.
You say, I have too much white clothing.
You start to hum.
Several hundred years ago
this could have been mysticism
or heresy. It isn’t now.
Outside there are sirens.
Someone’s been run over.
The century grinds on.

Margaret Atwood

I find writing incredibly soothing. On soul-searing days when the brow-grappling wind wants to rip my face right off my jaws. On honey-dripping days when I feel so light that my grin melts into clouds. I trace my thoughts, admit what I could not, and harness it all when I craft the words on paper. It keeps me from packing away life in 4817 e-mails.

I glide down the streets on my bike, the sun coiling around my neck and the wind whistling into my mouth. Sometimes I feel so goddamn happy for the tiniest things. Like how the smell of grapefruit lingers in the air when it’s burst open. Or how the shadows tickle the arms of a scrawny wooden cabinet. The smoky scent of cumin brushing against my cheek, and the warmth of peppermint tea soaking up my cold belly. The ring of my guitar permeating the bones, the grip of a pen locked between my fingers.

It’s these moments I’d think back to that scene in American Beauty, about how much beauty abounds in the world. And then I’d grin to myself at how awfully cheesy I can be, and how blessed I am to begin to realize how much happiness it brings me.

이상한 글을 쓰고, 이상한 노래를 듣는다.
구두점이 잔뜩 찍혀 있는 문장의 구두점은,
구두 뒷굽에서 튀어나온 못대가리 같다고 생각한다.
규칙적인 것에 저항하는 사람의 습관과
굵은 소금을 눈동자에 뿌리는 습관 사이를 배회한다.

생태찌개 집에서 아저씨들이 담배를 피고 있다.
항문이 가려웠다.
주인과 눈이 마주치기 전에 그 집에서 나왔다.
맛없는 술은 기억과 접속을 못했기 때문이다.
어머니의 집에 다녀왔다.

서랍 정리와 공구 정리를 했다.
우리 집에 드라이버와 나사의 숫자가 풍족한 것을 확인한다.
망치의 고독도 확인한다.
죽다,가 우울한 자동사라는 걸 기억하라.
피어나지 않은 꽃과 손톱 공장.
TV에서 예능버라이어티 프로그램들이
모두 사라졌으면 좋겠다.

너무 늦기 전에,
바람을 타고
해변의 묘지까지 가야지.

-김도언

I like his poems a lot.