CHICAGO: If Hepatitis C Were Attacking Your Face Instead of Your Liver You'd Be Doing Something About It

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He prefers cuddling to an orgasm, a kind word to cuddling, and a pleasant Mona Lisa smile from across the room to all of them.

crunkleJ (crunkleJ), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:13 (seventeen years ago) link

Chris gets off on all things others find bland.

bland != banal

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:13 (seventeen years ago) link

xpost to Eric - While I don't think I'd want to be locked inside the room with those people, I would definitely want to look in the window and watch them.

Handgun O. Mendocino (pullapartgirl), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:13 (seventeen years ago) link

I love good, real dialogue.

But why does dialogue have to be banal to be real?

Handgun O. Mendocino (pullapartgirl), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:15 (seventeen years ago) link

"so lacking in originality as to be obvious and boring" = no thx

danno martinez (danno martinez), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:17 (seventeen years ago) link

It doesn't. But there's an element of banality in most conversations. Hardly anyone writes dialogue where people go "umm" or repeat themselves or step over each other's words, but this happens all the time, and I get a kick out of seeing it reproduced. Here I guess I'm talking about form rather than content, though.

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:18 (seventeen years ago) link

I love this thread.

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:19 (seventeen years ago) link

I don't find those 'yeah [pause] yeah' above banal, in part because of the recognizable rhythms (like John just said), and also because the effect, ideally, is like when you overhear something on the El and you have to make sense of it. It's writing that isn't for the benefit of the audience (as far as narrating the story) and ideally has the same what's-going-on-here? pleasure of eavesdropping.

Eazy (Eazy), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:20 (seventeen years ago) link

This kind of sounds like improv to me.

danno martinez (danno martinez), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:21 (seventeen years ago) link

I dunno, are most people not as interested in the aggressively ho-hum as I am? Am I the only one who asks new romantic partners to "tell me a boring story"?

-- Chris Piuma (chri...), February 25th, 2003.

Handgun O. Mendocino (pullapartgirl), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:21 (seventeen years ago) link

so lacking in originality as to be obvious and boring

But when real-life banality is applied to art, it automatically becomes more interesting because a) we're not used to seeing banality in art: it becomes the exception rather than the rule, and b) art has the power to make the banal transcendent.

ideally has the same what's-going-on-here? pleasure of eavesdropping.

Bingo. There's an intimate, voyeuristic thrill to it. It feels visceral, somehow.

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:21 (seventeen years ago) link

Haha.

This thread would be great to have read to you as a bedtime story
-- oops (buttch9...), February 26th, 2003.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Oops is OTM.
-- Chris Piuma (chri...), February 27th, 2003.

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:23 (seventeen years ago) link

Oh, I see you already unearthed the Chris P. contributions to that thread. Nice work.

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:24 (seventeen years ago) link

But when you know it's art and artifice and not someone you're eavesdropping on (which I also enjoy, but not for the banality, more because something interesting than whatever I've got going on might happen), doesn't that undermine that voyeuristic thrill?

Handgun O. Mendocino (pullapartgirl), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:24 (seventeen years ago) link

Chris may be a deLillo character.

JordanC (JordanC), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:25 (seventeen years ago) link

I mean, take this dialogue from the thread above (which I hadn't seen 'til now - fantastic) and add some context and stakes to it (someone's job is on the line, or 'me' slept with boss's wife), and it's great dialogue:

My boss: Did you have a good weekend?

Me: Yes, thanks. You?

My boss: Not bad.

Me: Do anything exciting?

My boss: No.

Me: Oh.

Eazy (Eazy), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:25 (seventeen years ago) link

There's some term I learned in a poetry workshop about the mistake some writers make of writing something that is an example of what they meant to write ABOUT--like writing something boring when writing the dialogue of a boring person, or sounding stupid when writing about a stupid character.

Writing about something banal in a non-banal way would be interesting I guess. But I don't hold out much hope for the outcome.

crunkleJ (crunkleJ), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:25 (seventeen years ago) link

Hardly unearthed. That was the third or fourth post!

Handgun O. Mendocino (pullapartgirl), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:26 (seventeen years ago) link

Has anyone seen Dead & Breakfast? It's a zombie movie (w/Jeremy Sisto!) but it has the best modern use of the Greek chorus that I've seen (i.e. a dude singing funny country songs about the action who eventually gets turned into a zombie and continues singing between scenes until he gets killed by a chainsaw).

JordanC (JordanC), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:27 (seventeen years ago) link

The way Mamet puts it is that people don't say what they want, they say what will get them what they want. As long as the actors know what is at stake for their character, and what they are trying to get from the other person, 'banal' dialogue can be suspenseful and compelling, beyond the ordinary rhythms of daily life.

Using that poetry analogy, I think what we're talking about is more of finding the profound in daily life than in being deliberately boring - it's more like Vermeer and Rembrandt painting daily life in Holland (ho hum) instead of the great moments in religious history.

Eazy (Eazy), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:28 (seventeen years ago) link

But when you know it's art and artifice and not someone you're eavesdropping on (which I also enjoy, but not for the banality, more because something interesting than whatever I've got going on might happen), doesn't that undermine that voyeuristic thrill?

This is a very good question, and the best answer that I can give is that I experience both at the same time, or go back and forth: the pleasure is both in the visceral voyeuristic thrill and the rational appreciation for the uncanniness of the vérité style. (I'm serious, I have like a whole chapter in my senior project about this where I talk about Raymond Carver and Mike Leigh.)

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:30 (seventeen years ago) link

If dialog contains the "ums" and cadences of every day speech but is rendered suspenseful and compelling beyond the ordinary rhythms of daily life, it's no longer banal, is it?

Handgun O. Mendocino (pullapartgirl), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:31 (seventeen years ago) link

Yes, finding something profound (ie, non-banal) in something banal is interesting. But simply reproducing banality, not.

xpost--this is a corollary to what Jenny just said.

crunkleJ (crunkleJ), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:32 (seventeen years ago) link

I grok the concept and I can think of examples of most of those variations, but I cannot abide movies that follow that model. Or books, for that matter. XXXXP

Laurel (Laurel), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:32 (seventeen years ago) link

Mamet is interesting. He writes "realistic" dialogue that nonetheless frequently sounds mannered. There's something incredibly compelling about it.

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:32 (seventeen years ago) link

I mean, it sounds like what John is talking about is a movie of a guy talking on a cell phone about the same crap we all talk about on our cell phones, not a guy having a conversation that is banal on the surface but is designed to support and develop some great conflict.

Handgun O. Mendocino (pullapartgirl), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:33 (seventeen years ago) link

Amen, sister act. Amen.

crunkleJ (crunkleJ), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:34 (seventeen years ago) link

Also, it's only the gigantically obvious self-consciousness that makes HH movies attractive to me, probably...? Because, tho I haven't seen any lately, I recollect that he does extremely stylized banality quite a lot, too, but it's SO ENORMOUSLY DEADPAN that you're waiting for the ball to drop ALL THE TIME.

Laurel (Laurel), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:37 (seventeen years ago) link

Jenny and Jesse may be right about this. It's probably why I never wrote a successful play that put my predilections for banality into practice. When I took a playwriting course in college, I was miserable, because I felt like the professor (Von Washington, what up) cared WAY too much about plot and conflict, and I was like "b-b-b-but Robert Altman, Mike Leigh, etc." (Dan's comment about improv probably OTM here) -- and in the end, I wrote a perfectly well-made dramatic play that I have no affection for whatsoever.

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:37 (seventeen years ago) link

The tension itself just becomes hilarious after about 20 minutes. XP to me.

Laurel (Laurel), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:37 (seventeen years ago) link

Mamet's incredibly mannered. He uses rhythms and grammar that come from the Chicago dialect, but he does it so specifically that it can be distracting (especially when he directs his own work).

I just saw this movie version of his play Edmond on New Years Eve, with WH Macy and Julia Stiles and others, and since someone else directed it the dialogue is less distracting than usually and it's easier to get caught up in the characters instead of thinking about the author. (It's really much better than I'd expected - and a few of the scenes are absolutely perfect as individual scenes.)

xpost- One dramamtic trick, though, Jenny, is to hide the drama in a banal situation. Like - the guy on the cell phone could be talking to the surgeon who is operating on his daughter in an hour - that's dramatic. Or he could be talking with the guy fixing the stucco on his house, and somehow from that "ordinary" conversation, something profound about the guy's life happens. If he doesn't change by the end, that's bad drama - but sometimes our lives change dramatically from a moment that seemed boring.

Eazy (Eazy), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:38 (seventeen years ago) link

Said playwriting prof: http://www.wmich.edu/theater/faculty/images/faculty_14.jpg

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:41 (seventeen years ago) link

I hear you Eric. xp

Handgun O. Mendocino (pullapartgirl), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:41 (seventeen years ago) link

I wrote a short play a few years ago about a late-night college-radio DJ, and the whole point of it is that she's trying to cover up her emotions in order to do her job. And so she's trying to be banal (unemotional), and it doesn't work out. But by the end, when she reads the weather or says 'um', those should be the most compelling parts - not when she speaks all poetically, which is just her trying and failing to do her job.

Eazy (Eazy), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:43 (seventeen years ago) link

Yeah, I love that play.

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:43 (seventeen years ago) link

Although, to John, I think that Altman (I don't know about the other person you mentioned) does more what Eric said - he allows for banal-seeming dialog that actually leads to profound things. It's not just purposeless banality.

Aren't there some web comics (or print, I dunno) that put principles more like what John is talking about into practice? I might be thinking of the Itchy and Scratchy lemonade cartoon that someone quoted on the banal conversation thread, but I can totally see a four panel comic in which two characters have a totally pointless and boring conversation.

Handgun O. Mendocino (pullapartgirl), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:45 (seventeen years ago) link

Near-topic: The Brown Bunny (at least up till the end) was supposed to be an exploration of the tedium of driving cross-country--though cut with weird, silent making out--but it refused to do its part in the exploration. It was lazy "art" that is supposedly engaging the viewers by making them use their imaginations, but it's really just slack slapping together of bits of video. (I actually found some of the road shots really interesting on their own, but in context, really boring.)

crunkleJ (crunkleJ), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:48 (seventeen years ago) link

Jenny: I don't think I actually want to have the completely pointless banal conversation. I think I just love the banal elements, the verite style, so much that I let that overwhelm my sense about what's actually great about what I'm seeing. I don't know how to properly integrate them (not that I've actually tried writing a play in YEARS -- which makes me sad). For instance, I love in EZ's play how she says "famous whatever" -- I love how she doesn't finish, how she can't be articulate, how she stumbles over the words, just like anyone would -- but at the same time, the real powerful dramatic moment of the play, if you've ever seen it performed or on film, is how the "I'm so fucking sad" comes out unannounced, and it pierces.

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:49 (seventeen years ago) link

I actually found some of the road shots really interesting on their own, but in context, really boring.

I don't understand this. I found some of the road shots really interesting, too: the Gordon Lightfoot song soundtracking rain on a windshield is particularly beautiful -- but I don't see how the "context" takes away from the beauty. What is the context, anyway?

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:52 (seventeen years ago) link

The David Lynch cartoon about the meanest dog in the world definitely does that. He just sits in the yard on his chain and growls, and then the sun goes down and that's it.

The Brown Bunny is an interesting example of seeing a guy do very little for a long, long time, but then at the end you understand the circumstances. If it didn't have the payoff, it would be more like a travelogue than anything else. Which, if the scenery was pretty...

x-post - Jesse beat me to it!

Eazy (Eazy), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 22:52 (seventeen years ago) link

I like Eric's premise for a movie, the guy standing in the high rise talking on the phone for 90 minutes. It would be a like a modern day more solitary version of rear window. There would be no interacting with any one in person. I wouldn't want to hear the other side of the conversation. I would make a majority of the film POV, peering into other people's office windows, looking at the activity on the street. It would all work with his conversation on the phone, sometimes relevant, sometimes not. The film would be stylized to an extent, by having the camera have better vision than the man actually has. The detail that he sees out the window would be important.

Jeff... (Jeff...), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 23:00 (seventeen years ago) link

I really like the POV idea. Maybe we wouldn't even see the man, just hear his voice -- which might make it seem more intimate.

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 23:01 (seventeen years ago) link

Hence my earlier question about whether we would see what was going on outside the window, sort of.

danno martinez (danno martinez), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 23:02 (seventeen years ago) link

You're right - you don't even need to see the guy's face, really. Just an establishing shot in the office, something against the glass, and then whatever he sees out the window during the conversation. And with all the HD stuff now (used in the night shots in Collateral), the details could be really beautiful.

Eazy (Eazy), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 23:08 (seventeen years ago) link

Then you could overdub all the audio without even having to worry about matching dialogue to mouth movements.

JordanC (JordanC), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 23:10 (seventeen years ago) link

The context of... endless road shots followed by a so-so payoff with the gratuitous BJ and twist ending. The road shots were not intersting enough to take up as much time as they did and it did not need to be a feature-length movie. I can't imagine how tedious it would have been in the uncut Cannes version that Roger Ebert talked shit about.

crunkleJ (crunkleJ), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 23:12 (seventeen years ago) link

Elephant, Last Days, and United 93 were all interestingly antidramatic movies - those three all have really compellingly banal situations and dialogue. Seeing someone eat a meal or talk about 'whatever' underscores the lack of fate or destiny in any of those situations.

Eazy (Eazy), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 23:17 (seventeen years ago) link

Yeah, The Brown Bunny didn't really add up for me, but I can't deny that I enjoyed watching it -- much more so than Gerry, at least.

And yes, good call on all of those, Eric. I'd also add Bully, which demonstrated the banality of evil more provocatively than anything else I can think of.

jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 23:21 (seventeen years ago) link

I mean, those three films have really artful banality - the scenes have no great subtext or tension to them, and the effect is stronger (to me, anyway) than if there were dramatic storylines (star-crossed lovers and all) that reached a confluence when the big dramatic event happens. Instead, the stakes are low, which is more believable and powerful.

Eazy (Eazy), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 23:21 (seventeen years ago) link

Not to continue this conversation forever, but it'd be interested to get Amanda's fella's take on this -- because, in making a documentary, you really can just capture ordinary moments, if you want, without creating a dramatic arc or storyline. Frederick Weisman's movies are incredibly banal but also edited in a way that they really give you a sense of their subject matter. Sh3rrif is kind of halfway between Weisman and Cops as far as banality-vs.-action.

Eazy (Eazy), Tuesday, 2 January 2007 23:24 (seventeen years ago) link


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