[everything thrown together, novels, comics, movies, etc...]
I forgot to record a bunch of stuff for a couple of months... this is what I can remember from between mid September until now...
9/8
+ April Fools Fright ---- I don't know what the plot was at all unending slow promenade of characters. Was falling asleep near end had to keep swaying back and forth to try to keep awake.
9/15
+ A Bizarre Love Triangle dir Lee Mu-yeong ---- emotional wedding on moon, I have a soft spot for stories about weirdly structured relationships
9/17
+ Karaoke Terror
9/18
+ Glow Ropes: The Rise and Fall of a Bar Mitzvah Emcee ---- too boring couldn't finish
+ Venus Fly Trap ---- loved! Same director/producer (?) As Love Bites
9/20
+ The Cornshucker ---- crayfish crawling dragging key to the cage at the end.
9/20
+ Sweet Bunch
9/24
+ Def by Temptation
9/25
+ Hellacious Acres
9/26 - 11/20
Film
+ Birthday, dir Sato
+ The Baby ---- ending really makes the movie
+ Sweet Bunch
+ The Covenant ---- can't remember a damn thing
+ Vampires, dir John Carpenter
+ Various yokai movies
Music
+ Taemin - Guilty
+ Helmut Lachenmann - Matchstick Girl Opera
+ NCT albums from used bookstore: Resonance, Sticker
Read
+ 10 Dance, vol 1
11/20
+ Toys Are Not For Children ---- surprisingly nuanced, caught me off guard, was in tears by the end. One of my favorites.
12/05
+ Despite All That dir. Shinji Imaoka
+ 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus by Charles C. Mann
+ April Fool's Fright ---- not sure what happened in story, endless slow walk of characters
8/ ???
+ Kathe Kollwitz Museum ---- seems to make sense to add this here. Perfect amount of work to take in, extremely good. Made me want to draw.
2023-09-02
back home, miss friends and traveling but also missed home and computer. stuff consumed the past 3 weeks while in transit:
8/10
+ Interstellar ---- watched on plane to Istanbul (stopover on way to Berlin.) fav part by far was the blocky robots.
+ J's screenplay ---- excellent, put me in a fantastic mood.
8/ ???
+ The Sorcerer's Apprentice by François Augiéras ---- finished on train to Wannsee. Was surprised when it ended, seemed almost abrupt but could have been just the mood / space I was in. One of my favorite books in a while. Made me want to jump in the lake and swim away.
+ Monsieur Venus ---- started reread, tho the translation on my phone seems off.
+ Various songs / mv's by Asiz ---- my friend N introduced me to this singer, was p blown away. There's one music vid where he has sex with a priest and it cuts between that and 3 crucified figures (Jesus and the 2 theives I guess.)
+ Sunday in the Park with George ---- watched halfway through, got busy. Really liked. Lonely late at night in apartment, hot and humid, moths coming in through windows.
+ Send in the Clowns, live performance by Ruthie Henshall: https://youtu.be/jyscZQmRc6w?si=2AivzkNqYOCmWpyE
+ Ay-Yo by NCT 127 ---- was ambivalent at first but kept replaying.
+ Dear Evan Hansen ---- rewatched with 2 friends who moved to Berlin, this was on their cringe watch list, cannot believe I made it through a second viewing of this and all without a break in the middle. Every time the music climaxes I felt alarmed.
+ Waving Through a Window Tony Moran Remix ---- remix of song from above movie, my friends were looking up remixes after we finished watching it. As mucis this makes me feel bad but then it makes me feel happy because I think of my friends. Played a few times because I wanted to remember hanging out with them.
+ vampire movie from 1987 I can't remember the title of ---- watched with J, this was surprisingly goofy
+ recent movie I can't remember title of either...!
+ 1920's Haunted Hotel / Bar Ambience? ---- J kept playing this while working on a project. I liked it because I was spending time with J and also have a weak spot for spooky ambience audio but after a couple of days I found it slightly maddening.
About to fly off to Germany and the UK for 3 weeks.
8/6
+ Simon, King of the Witches ---- I really liked the main character in this a lot, thinking lately that I have a soft spot for wizards/sorcerer characters but not harry potter
8/7
+ The Premonition
+ Gaycation (Japan)
+ A Record of Sweet Murder
8/8
+ Zero Day ---- found footage movie about school shooting, good.
8/9
+ Cult ---- same director as A Record of Sweet Murder and Occult. Find these movies really comforting for some reason.
+ J's screenplay
+ The Sorcerer's Apprentice
+ The Ship by Hans Henny Jahnn
+ misc pdfs and ebooks...can't remember
+ Don't Say Anymore, Darling - Fumi Yoshinaga collection published by DMP
+ Happy Crappy Life by Harada
---- I liked this one.
+ Fetching Cody
+ The Hellstrom Chronicle
+ The Sinful Dwarf
+ Beastly
+ Black Rose Ascension
---- I didn't really want to watch any of the movies listed above but wound up liking them all more than I thought I would.
+ Dear Evan Hansen
---- difficult to finish, felt genuinely bummed out in a bad way.
+ Perfume, NCT Dojaejung
+ My friend's screenplay
+ The Sorcerer's Apprentice by François Augiéras
Haven't been keeping track of anything since February, focusing on reading is still pretty hard. But here's what I remember...
+ some ending by Ben Norris
+ The Equation of Light and Shadow by Yoshimi Seki (reread)
+ The Living are Few, The Dead Many by Hans Henny Jahnn
---- A collection of short stories and then a section from a longer book at the end? One of the best things I've read in a long time. Felt like finding a dark recess that fits your body exactly.
+ Goodbye Eri by Tatsuki Fujimoto
---- Not my fav but everything by Fujimoto is excellent.
+ Magus of the Libary by Mitsu Izumi
---- A big surprise, avoided this series bc I thought it would be like a generic young adult fantasy but it's really one of the most engrossing manga I've read in a while. Genuine excitement. I was upset when I got to the end of the translated volumes because I didn't want to stop reading it, I didn't want to exit the world of the story. Really well written. Fascinating world. Made me cry a few times. One of my favorite parts was when it goes into the backstory of this extremely racist, beligerent girl.
+ Opened Hunchback of Notre Dame and was immediately not into it tho wonder if it's the translation. Can't remember why I had an urge to read it.
+ Lovecraft, The Hound
+ A Centaur's Life, vol 11---- this comic always surprises me with how deep it goes into its world building. Avoided reading it for a while because I thought it would just be like Monster Musume but it's really not like that at all. Writing is really good.
2023-01-04
These are scattered around on my desk:
+ Fencing: A Rennaissance Treaty
---- a little hard for me to penetrate but what was I expecting?
Lovecraft, scattered around a few collections...
+ The Whisperer in the Dark
+ The Dreams in the Witch House
+ The Hound
---- have to find this somewhere else, Och said it was his favorite story.
+ Shonen Jump Guide to making manga
+ Metamorphosis by Shindo L
---- still one of the most moving comics I've ever read, nothing has ever destroyed me more emotionally than this.
Theology, brain...biology / chemistry ---- brain diseases. Does looking at images count as reading?