Art Exhibit: Jenny Majeske at "The Frame Shop", Wellington CBD

Last weekend I went to a Jenny Majeske art exhibition at “The Frame Shop” on Taranaki Street in the Wellington CBD.

The Kind One

I've seen Jenny's art previously, and have often discussed her “Girl with a cupcake on her shoulder” (the actual title is “Night of the Cupcake”) with friends and colleagues. The concept is so interesting and unusual that everyone is immediately curious about its intended meaning. When I ask Jen what the cupcake means, she answers with a question, “What do you think the cupcake means?” There don't seem to be any wrong answers, and Jen seems more than happy for people to interpret her work in a personal way.

I enjoyed two walks through the exhibition, first by myself and then with the artist. I find myself reacting sharply to each and every piece. Most often, I'm laughing out loud and curious. Less often, I'm simply confused or taken aback. With most exhibitions, I don't have have to ask questions, but these paintings aren't landscapes or portraits, and the meanings and symbols are packed tightly in skilfully constructed realistic abstracts.

What I mean by "realistic abstract" is that most of the time, objects in the paintings are realistic. They represent real things that you clearly recognizefor what they are. However, the pieces of the painting are arranged in abstract ways that you would never find in the world. Probably the most striking piece for me was of a little girl, 5 or 6 years old, laughing and looking out of the painting standing between two wolves growling and snapping at each other. The girl seems oblivious to the animals.

Other times, an objects in the painting are recognizable, but distorted or coloured differently from what you'd expect, placed in an ordinary setting. “Deer Park” shows a beautiful landscape with two deer near the centre of the painting. The deer are candy coloured, one pink and one powder blue and the deer have human heads. One of these deer people is missing the right antler and the other missing the left. The blue and pink could represent male and female (or not) and the incomplete nature of each could mean they need each other (or not).

Deer Park

Words I think best describe the exhibition are “intellectual” and “personal”. It's obviously the work of someone thoughtful, creative and skilled who isn't particularly worried about following a set of artist rules. The end result is well crafted pieces, each with multiple, strong messages and deep personal meaning to the artist. If you find yourself in the Wellington CBD, I highly recommend dropping by to take a look.

Movie: Limitless (3/5 stars) (2011)

Limitless is a soft sci-fi/action/thriller movie starring Bradley Cooper as Eddie Morra, an aspiring writer who is, to be blunt, a complete loser. He happens across an old acquaintance who happens to be a drug dealer dealing in the perfect drug. NZT doesn't get you high, just focuses the mind, clears your thoughts and gives you all the motivation you need to get things done.


I've been following Bradley Cooper since his Alias days, and thought that he was perfect for this role - he looked like a loser and cleaned up into a believable winner with all the answers and the confidence and charisma to win anyone over. Along with Cooper, there were supporting roles by the lovely Abby Cornish playing Eddie's girlfriend and veteran Robert De Niro playing a rich and powerful boss. Both did solid jobs with their roles.

This is a fun movie, and covers one of my own fantasies... what would you do if you were the smartest person on earth ("A 4 digit IQ") and could figure out any problem? It appeals to me for that reason and the does a decent job at tackling that question - super-intelligence and the world being against you. However, it suffers from the lack of a real, challenging opponent for Cooper's character as well as a plot hole you could drive a truck through that I will leave as an exercise for the reader.

I now feel like re-watching Phenomenon with John Travoltra.

Movie: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 (4/5 stars) (2010)

If there was a Harry Potter book that could have used some editing, #7, "The Deathly Hallows" was it. The last thing I wanted to hear was that they were splitting it into two movies. That was such a money grubbing move from JK Rowling and Warner Brothers. Hold on to the cash cow just a few months longer! We can make another $400M!

That gripe aside, I liked the movie. It has its flaws, patchy pacing issues (just like the book's 200 pages of Harry, Hemione and Ron in the forest hiding out and trying to figure things out), some questionable acting and some random departures from the book, however, it's HARRY POTTER!!

While there are pacing problems, 200 pages of the book translates into half an hour in the movie, during which, pretty interesting things happen and I'm entertained. I won't be lining up to see this again, but it was a good time at the movies.

To talk from a neutral position, my wife, who hasn't read the books, didn't mind the last book beingsplit in half - it was exactly like another book, which was fine.

If I were to rate this movie against the others , it was in the middle of the pack somewhere. I would say that it was the most like the book of all the movies and I liked it as much as I liked the book, maybe a little more, unlike "The Goblet of Fire", which was my favourite book and one of the least favourite movies, and "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban", my least favourite book (why does the rat stay with the Weasleys for TEN YEARS!!!), but one of my favourite movies - different stresses I guess.

Movie: The Road (3/5 stars) (2009)

"The Road" stars Viggo Mortgenson as "man" and Kodi Smit-McPhee as "boy". There are no names at all in the movie. There was a "woman", played by Charlize Theron and lots of other parts like "bearded man", "thief" and "old man" etc...

The movie is a post apocalyptic science fiction movie. I can only assume that it is set in the future, but it may have been set in the past - it's hard to tell. There is only devastation and barren waste everywhere in the movie.

The story is simple. A man and a boy are wandering the wasteland headed south for no reason except that they are looking for the ocean and hopefully something better than what they left behind. They meet some people and see some screwed up crap and you quickly get the idea that the world is not what we are used to. This isn't "The Book of Eli", where there is a quite thick veil of bullshit over the entire movie. This feels REAL.

Despite its simplicity, each scene is thick with detail and has real impact. The psychology of the situation is evident constantly and the concepts of "hunger", "loneliness", "happiness" and "friendly" are violently twisted into new meanings.

The movie does nothing to explain the apocalypse itself, i.e. what happened or why. It isn't part of the focus. We don't know if there was nuclear holocaust, a disease or aliens, we just know that we're here and it's dire.

In many ways brilliant, but at the same time, depressing and and unsatisfying. You go away impressed at the quality of the acting, directing and cinematography, but don't really know the point of it.

Movie: Salt (2/5 stars) (2010)

Get ready for Jasina Bourne, except not as good as Jason.

This is a run-of-the-mill action/spy movie staring Angelina Jolie as Evelyn Salt, a CIA agent with a mysterious past. It was gimmicky action, with attempts at doing what no other movie had done, something that's become cliche in its attempt to avoid cliches. The worst was Salt using a taser to make someone press the gas pedal on a police car - it was just too ridiculous to keep a viewer watching without rolling their eyes.

I really have nothing more to say about this one. It's just not worth your time. I am glad that I saw it on cheap night, otherwise, I would have felt ripped off completely.

Movie: Inception (3.5/5 stars) (2010)

On the way back from my recent holiday in Canada, schedules didn't work and I ended up with 2 days in Los Angeles. I watched Inception in Santa Monica at a crappy little theater called the Santa Monica 7. Pretty much any Wellington theater is better. The seats had almost no incline and we were hoping (against hope apparently) that no tall people would end up sitting in front of us.

Enough about the theater itself, on to the movie.

There is lots that is great about the movie. The concept, people stealing ideas in shared dreams, is immediately interesting to a science fiction fan. I liked the action scenes, the special effects (especially the weightless scene - very cool), and almost all the characters. My favorite scene has to be the kick, kick, kick sequence which I will say no more about.

Leonardo DiCaprio is consistently good. I know he gets labeled as a bad actor, since he is a teen heart throb and ends up in Hollywood blockbusters regularly, but he has starred in a string of good movies that are all worth watching (Shutter Island, Revolutionary Road, Body of Lies, Blood Diamond, The Departed and The Aviator to go back only 6 years). His body of work is solid and I will watch anything he stars in.

Ellen Page , on the other hand, has a reputation of being a great up-and-comer. I love that she's from Halifax, where I lived more than 10 years, but I don't get the big fuss over her. She's good, but I find that she is a little off in most of her movies (there are LOTS) and I can't quite put my finger on it. Still - she's today's superstar and ended up in this movie.

All the other main actors do their job well. The directing is good - it tells the story clearly and simply (despite the many twists and turns and the levels of dreams).

The problem for me was the writing. I've written a lot of first drafts. I know what a first draft feels like and there is lots in this movie that feels like a first draft. It seems that Leonardo DiCaprio's character Cobb is the only person who knows everything about dreams and when something surprising happens, Leo throws out another gotcha that no one else knew about. These are just rough edges that could have been smoother, and it feels like the dream "physics" was just made up on the spot and never revised or made consistent. It's a slap in the face since it happens so often in the middle of the action and is no where near as clean as everything else in the movie.

It could have been The Matrix all over again. It tries to be, but fails. Too bad - I would have loved another Matrix.

Movie: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (3.5/5) (2009)

If you haven't heard of this movie or the novel, then you've probably been living under a rock for the last two years. It's new to DVD, and we rented it last night.

I wasn't sure what to expect, since I'd never read the novel. I knew there was a female hacker with a dragon tattoo and that's about it. AND - just so you know, it's not a cute, little tattoo of Mushu from Disney's Mulan, it's a honking, huge, evil looking dragon tattoo that covers her whole back.

I was pleasantly surprised. The movie was simple and didn't try to over reach itself. There was no pretension, just a nice, simple mystery movie that was interesting the entire way through. The fact that it was in Swedish didn't hurt it at all, and I really loved comparing the Swedish to the English subtitles and noticing how similar many of the sounds were. There are several sentences that are identical ("Are you ok?") and lots of nearly identical words that added a positive dimension to the movie.

Mikael Blomkvist is hired by a rich businessman named Martin Vanger to solve a 40 year old murder. Vanger's favorite niece Harriet, who he loved like a daughter disappeared in 1966 and he wants to know what happened to her. He isn't really expecting results, but wants someone working on it who won't give up.

Mikael doesn't know it at first, but the title character Lisbeth Salander takes an interest in his case after hacking his computer for another job. Lisbeth is by far the most interesting character and comes from a dark and sordid background. She is 24 years old and still has a guardian assigned by the state for some reason. Eventually, Mikael and Lisbeth track various tenuous leads and get pulled into a mystery bigger than either imagined.

The movie taught me quite a lot about storytelling. Since I've been writing my own novels, I pay close attention to how movies and novels progress their stories. The main thing it taught me is that motivations for your villains is a nice to have, but not 100% necessary. You can just have them just being evil with almost no explanation - the success of the book and movie are proof of this. Another lesson that I've already learned from Taken with Liam Neeson - if you make the villains evil enough, your hero can do whatever they want to them and you will feel absolutely no sympathy.