Just watched Immortal, a great little semi-animated movie in the spirit of Scanner Darkly - well technically yes, but the story was very different.
Egyptian gods float over a post genetic-revolution NY. Blueskinned Dyaks on a mission to be human, gods on a mission to impregnate the blue skinned Dyak, a steel sculpture legged man fresh out of 30 years hibernation finds he's become a leader in his sleep.
Oh, and a hawk keeps popping in and out of him to borrow his manly bits.
Sounds like it could be a total mess, but in the spirit of A Jodorowsky this movie pulls it off (and did I read the other day Jodorowsky tried to do a PK Dick novel - or was it Dune?). When I was younger and watched Alejandro's movies, be it Santa Sangre or Holy Mountain, I really thought I was being spoken too. I thought the heavens had folded back for just an hour and 40 minutes, and a message was being piped straight to me. PKD's pink light comes to mind.
High-intensity messages being flashed straight onto my brain, only they weren't impressionist works from Moscow galleries.
Now age has delivered its tiresome punchline and I grin mirthlessly like all my other compatriots who have made it to here, this point, this hour, this destination. ANd I believe in no magic, no light, no escape, just a repetition of prior experience. Though I know I have deliberately induced sensory deprivation, and a side-effect of such is a belief in nothing magical, still, knowing what I feel is just a side-effect does in no way dispel the notion.
Queer, huh?
A girl was in Brisbane last night that I thought I should have visited. For the first time in 13 years we could have exchanged pleasantries, but my predictive negativity dissuaded me. "It'll just turn out bad. Why make her suffer more than you've already made her suffer. What could you say?". ETc. My mind is never more creative than when thinking of reasons to do nothing, or score. So I let her play her vibraphones, her numeric band and fuzzy sound shook some little walls in the Valley and then the vibrations ceased and she left my town.
(My dialup modem screams again. I have not paid some bill or other again, or maybe it was yesterday's storm? ADSL gone since last night. When you're always broke you learn not to complain too loudly - it's usually your fault).
Off to watch Total Recall. PKD (why do I keep mentioning him?) helps return me to reality. Just finished three days of heavy stoning. All day today i could not make eye contact, I could not bring myself to answer questions on my weekend with more than a cursory hmmmph. Although to be fair it did seem there was a general malaise across my workplace, everyone trotted in and retreated to their respective and respectless cubicles. And we all seemed content to leave each other alone.
An office of grey cats sit licking their wounds while the rain purrs down outside. Life at 37. News at ten.
Thankfully the soundtrack to Vanilla Sky is available. Red House Painters, Sigur Ros and Peter Gabriel keep me on this side of sewer.