capsized dancers make jennifer dark and raw
Why do we do this to ourselves? Knowing full well that Bjork’s movie Dancer in the Dark was going to bury both the missis and me in a deep and dark funk-hole, one that we would need to hire an excavating crew to rescue us from, we nevertheless decided that after a nice meal out on the town that we would retire to the cosy crib and have a good cry. Hell, the week has been depressing enough with the amount of money and dignity lost on the elections, why not just keep it up? Pile it on – listen to Morissey and John Lee Hooker records. Get low.
Well Dancer in the Dark was even more than I bargained for. Holy-spending-christmas-alone, is that a sad movie. Damn good. But seriously sad. I couldn’t even begin to predict how sad the movie was going to turn out. I’d be like, “oh this one bad thing is going to happen here”, and then something would happen that was like 20 times worse than I had imagined. I don’t know where Bjork found the inspiration for her galactic performance but frankly I don’t want to know because it was probably something painfully horrible. How do you even recommend a movie like Dancer in the Dark? You really have to get ready to go to “that” place before watching this one. I wonder if Lars Von Trier will ever make a comedy? I remember I was dating this women who, how can I say this, tipped the scales of sensitivity, when Lars Von Trier’s Breaking the Waves came out and she wouldn’t speak to me for a week after we watched the movie. I think that film permanently broke her.
The daydreaming aspect of the movie was something I could relate to well. For me its been coming on stronger as I’ve increased my time behind the wheel again. As scary as that sounds, it’s true. My head just goes to a whole different place when I’m driving. It’s probably one of the reasons that I don’t like to drive very much. I know that I am a terrible danger on the road.
Yesterday I was driving to work and I was busy reading all the signs and advertisements along Lyndale Avenue, when my eyes came upon a new billboard for the restaurant Chino-Latino that simply said, “Think Jennifer Lopez – Only Raw.” Well shit, that was it. Game over. My head was lost until I found myself pulling into my parking place at work. I mean, I’m…still…puzzled! What the hell is that supposed to mean? It’s so irreverent that it’s a kissing cousin of stupid and misogyny. I spent a good amount of head time just imagining the agency sitting around the walnut table coming up with that line and the possible ideas that failed – “Think Anna Nicole Smith – Only Deep Fried” or “Think Kevin Bacon – Only Not as Bacon but Something More Like Tuna”. What an odd world.