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Controlling the Chaos of Fame: The Bling Ring and This Is the End

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Controlling the Chaos of Fame: The Bling Ring and This Is the End

If you want to wrap your head around the absurdity of celebrity in 2013, the New York Times Magazine's recent profile of Stalker Sarah is a good place to start. Sarah, 17, spends 40 hours a week hunting down celebrities so she can take pictures with them for little to no monetary profit on her end. From the profile:

The fans had come to meet the band, but for some, a photo with someone who had met them (multiple times) before was almost as exciting. When One Direction performed on The Ellen DeGeneres Show a month earlier, Sarah was mobbed by dozens of the band’s fans; some tore at her clothes. At LAX, a girl approached her nervously. “Hi, Sarah?” she said. “Could I get a picture with you?” Then another.

On the one hand, our culture takes fame deathly serious: fame consumes consumers; it shapes the dreams of children (a.k.a. our future, according to at least one celebrity); it eats holes through the lives of those who experience it and are desperate to maintain it. On the other hand, fame's elasticity—the loose rules for what constitutes it, the ever-evolving requirements for achieving it, the democratization the Internet has visited on it—suggests that at the same time we don't take it seriously at all. Anything goes! Anyone can be a star with the right angle and marketing and also if there's no angle or marketing at all. Celebrity today can come from standing next famous people. #YOLO!

The whole thing is chaos. To watch fame play out can feel euphoric or like a bad trip, or both simultaneously. The unending saga of Amanda Bynes is reminiscent of Britney Spears in 2008: a dark, dark time for that mentally ill girl made darker by the fact that almost everyone sort of just laughed at her while she crumbled and surrendered to the public, in public. Bynes' crash is just as disturbing, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't giggle at her outlandish wig and conversational peculiarities ("You're ugly!" is her go-to comeback). What an amazing specimen of extreme human behavior. Does it matter that, unlike other beleaguered starlets we've ogled, she's writing her own narrative (literally – most of the action is happening on Twitter)? That this could all be Joaquin Phoenix-styled performance art, calculated to draw attention? Or is that just the comforting veneer of control for a child star who never really had a shot at owning her own life, anyway?

Through the corroded lives we ogle, we have enough evidence to suggest that aspiring to fame for the sake of fame is idiotic. That is why there is a perverse pleasure in watching the self-entitled little shits get their comeuppance in Sofia Coppola's The Bling Ring. The film portrays a group of teenagers from Calabasas, California, who rubbed elbows with the stars at Hollywood clubs, and were so obsessed with celebrity that they robbed the houses of stars like Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, Audrina Patridge, Rachel Bilson and Megan Fox/Brian Austin Green in 2008 and 2009. The story, which lingers on unlocked doors in the visually metaphoric glass homes of stars, and on those stars' failure to engage their home security systems, would be impossible to believe if it weren't true.

The movie plays like living parody. Its driving force, Rebecca (a thinly veiled version of Rachel Lee played by Katie Chang) is cartoonishly obsessed with stars to the point of toying with the idea of attending the Fashion Institute of Design because "it's where all the Hills girls went." When she is finally apprehended by the police, she compulsively asks the officer who's questioning her, "Did you speak to any of the victims?" He spoke with all of them. "Really? What did Lindsay say?"

That last sentence is quoted verbatim from Nancy Jo Sales' 2010 Vanity Fair article, "The Suspects Wore Louboutins," on which Coppola's movie is based. While that article reads like a true-crime short story—low on the mystery, heavy on the intrigue and read-between-the-lines armchair sociology—Coppola's film unfolds like a horror movie with bludgeoning repetition as the Ring's numerous robberies are recreated.

The editorializing is apparent, too, in Emma Watson's brilliant performance as Nicki (based on Alexis Neiers, whose E! reality show Pretty Wild is occasionally recreated in Bling Ring scenes but never referenced directly). Watson plays Nicki with mercurial affect, able to turn on earnestness at a moment's notice and, with an impenetrable straight face, say ridiculous things: "I am a firm believer in karma...I wanna lead a charity organization. I wanna lead a country one day for all I know!" Sales is also fictionalized for the big screen as a Vanity Fair writer named "Kate," who is far more openly skeptical of Nicki than Sales seemed to be of Neiers when she appeared on Pretty Wild. Sales poured on the counterfeit sympathy, at one point even hugging Neiers. Her piece ended up leading to one of the most hilarious meltdowns in the history of reality TV, a culmination of the entire affair's absurdity and the pettiness of other people's problems.

The Bling Ring attempts to solve our culture's fame problem by casting those who seek it as criminals. When the Nick Prugo character, Marc (Israel Broussard), tells the Sales character how his clique's misdeeds against the rich and famous scored them their own fame, it plays like a punch line but feels like a punch in the gut. Chaos.

A much gentler managing of fame, this time from the inside out, comes via another movie released this week, This Is the End. It is co-directed, co-written and co-starring Seth Rogen, who plays himself. Everyone in the movie does: James Franco, Jonah Hill, Craig Robinson, Jay Baruchel, Mindy Kaling, Emma Watson (funnily enough), and an unsurprisingly movie-stealing Danny McBride, all play versions of themselves alongside high-profile cameos from Rihanna (who gets to slap Michael Cera) and Michael Cera (who gets to do blow and have his ass eaten).

Armageddon strikes and the movie turns into a big, bro-y sleepover that is occasionally grumpy and frequently hilarious. As if to reclaim the indignities of Ricky Gervais awards show monologues, we watch celebrities take no-risk shots at each other's and their own images. There are jokes about the shittiness of flops like The Green Hornet and Your Highness, as well as James Franco's ambiguous sexuality. Jonah Hill begins a prayer, "It's me, Jonah Hill. From Moneyball." James Franco talks about fucking Lindsay Lohan: "She was fucked up, she was high. She kept calling me Jake Gyllenhaal."

These celebrities speak about themselves in the very same language that we do when we talk about them, and so it’s not surprising when, discussing the possibility of eternal damnation, James Franco says earnestly, "We're good people. We bring joy to people's lives." There is nothing mercurial in his affect at all. He is as deep and sincere as he always wants you to think he is, even when he isn't in this movie.

(Spoiler: Most of his peers end up in heaven.)

While the jokes are good and McBride's improvisational prowess is always incredible to behold, the movie is fundamentally self-serving. The desired reaction seems to be, “Wow, they're multi-talented and they don't take themselves too seriously? These must be the good guys.” Channing Tatum's 11th hour cameo is a self-degradation of the reigning Sexiest Man Alive unlike any we've ever seen before. This guy is a hero. Relatively, at least.

While This Is The End wants to soften the perception of celebrity, The Bling Ring is mesmerizing hate-watching fare, plain and simple. Coppola's method is disciplinarian. Despite using the actual Bling Ring's words verbatim, she opted to change the convicts' names in her movie "so that those young people don't become more well known" (as if Google won't lead you to them). She and Sales profit from these kids and their disdain for them. In multiple profiles and the introduction to Sales' Bling Ring book, Coppola has distanced herself from relating to the fame-centric, Hollywood world of her subjects, despite her own charmed, Hollywood upbringing. Maybe she can't relate because she never had to want fame – it was always there waiting for her.


Dear Twitter Friends, I am building a box with wallpaper & a nude woman.

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Kmart Swears It Had Nothing To Do with This Really Racist Ad for Kmart

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Kmart's Twitter account is being flooded with angry tweets from customers demanding an explanation for the blatantly racist ad it released this week.

Following in the footsteps of previous oronymic efforts such as "Big Gas Savings" and "Ship My Pants," the "Kmart Knickers" ad plays on the phonic similarities between the word "knickers" and the word "niggers."

Kmart's social media handlers have spent the last day or so insisting this is not one of their ads, and the company does not endorse "this type of content."

Though the spot goes out of its way to seem like an authentic Kmart ad, it actually appears to be the handiwork of the California-based comedy group The Gunfordmay.

The so-called "parody ad" is both patently unfunny and trademark infringing, but worst of all, it is clearly an unabashed rip-off of a Sarah Silverman skit posted on YouTube just a few months ago:

[H/T: BuzzFeed]

NYC Realtor Lists Gorgeous $2000 Loft Located Inside Spacious Penis

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NYC Realtor Lists Gorgeous $2000 Loft Located Inside Spacious Penis

A Manhattan real estate agent inadvertently exposed more than the beautiful brickwork inside a $2000 Upper West Side apartment he listed Friday, when he uploaded a photograph of a large* penis alongside shots of a sunny living room and renovated kitchen as part of an online listing.

NYC Realtor Lists Gorgeous $2000 Loft Located Inside Spacious Penis

When contacted by Gawker, the agent said he was not aware a photo of a penis had been posted with one of his apartment listings. He politely denied the penis was his and speculated that his account had been hacked. (ATTENTION HACKERS: Stop hacking into real estate agents' work emails and posting pictures of a random penis on one of their apartment listings. Rude.)

According to the listing, the penis apartment boasts high ceilings, stainless steel appliances, and a decorative fireplace. The dignified building which houses the penis apartment was erected in 1899. No pets are allowed in the penis apartment.

The photograph of the penis has since been removed from the penis apartment photo album.

*Gawker's in-house penis expert maintains that the there is not enough penis on display in the photo to confidently characterize the member as "large," but allows for the possibility that it is.

[via StreetEasy]

To contact the author of this post, email caity@gawker.com.

In Texas, the War to Save Christmas From Godless Heathens starts in June.

We Don’t Need Another Superhero: Man of Steel

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We Don’t Need Another Superhero: Man of Steel

There’s nothing like superhero flicks to make a moviegoer feel powerless. They are as inevitable as the changing of the seasons, and the changing of the seasons into summer triggers a bunch of them. Welcome to summer, here is your Superman.

Wrapped within that inevitability is the inevitability of a multi-climax crescendo—rolling destruction that prioritizes implicit ideals of saving the world over the human lives suffocated under the ensuing rubble. This is how almost all of them end. This is how Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel ends, with Superman flinging his intergalactic enemies through buildings, pulverizing Metropolis for the sake of saving the world so that he can save it some more in the film’s “fast-tracked” sequel, which will open the doors for a Justice League movie, fingers crossed.

Granted, this iteration of Superman comes with more internal conflict than most. In this retelling of his origin story, we see a young Superman wrestle with his specialness. He just wants to help people with his superhuman strength, but his adopted father (Kevin Costner) warns him against coming out of the closet/phone booth: “You have to keep this side of yourself a secret.” Greatness is like being gay is like being Jesus (Superman reveals himself to the world and opens himself up for persecution at age 33) is like being an alien. The sci-fi side of Superman has never been more explicit, which is cool. I like aliens, man. I really do like aliens.

For the first two thirds of Man of Steel, Snyder and his screenwriter David S. Goyer do a deft job of justifying the retelling of Superman’s origin, teasing out the vulnerability of a virtually unbeatable man, resting so much on his caped shoulders (the continuation of his own people versus citizens of Earth), and hinting at Nolan-style gravity without getting too preachy. This is a story about every person’s inherent ability to be a “force for good,” one that wears hope not on its sleeve but blazing on its chest (that “S,” see, is not an S but a Kryptonian symbol of hope, because they said so). Like last year’s origin-story retelling The Amazing Spider-Man, Man of Steel strikes a good balance, neither becoming overly ponderous or so amused with itself that it’s impossible to take seriously. Washed out and full of Giger-esque imagery, it’s an uncommonly gorgeous blockbuster featuring an uncommonly gorgeous man as its hero — Henry Cavill’s performance is mostly blank, but that symmetrical, broad face with its pronounced features are all the assertiveness that he needs.

All of the explaining about Superman led to more questions in my head: If he strains while holding up a burning barge, there must be limits to his strength and if so, what are they? Why does everyone on his home planet speak English? How did he learn to control the powers that we see disorient him as a young boy? How is Superman’s father Jor-El (Russell Crowe) still able to interact with the world if he’s dead? Why is he interested in Lois Lane (Amy Adams), with whom he has no chemistry? I’d rather let these questions play out in my head than have them shoved down my throat, but Man of Steel’s final hour bludgeoned whatever investment I had about this movie out of me. That its protagonist is so extraordinary makes it even more disappointing that in the end, Man of Steel is just another superhero movie. Watch it so you know what’s going on in the next one, which probably won’t be so great, either.

Deadspin Beer-Wielding Mets Fan Tumbles Over Seats | Lifehacker Why Am I So Tired Even When I Get E

Naomi Wolf Is a Snowden Truther

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Naomi Wolf Is a Snowden Truther

Naomi Wolf—the author, Thought Leader, and political consultant/non-consultant—has been following the story of Edward Snowden, and she has decided to share her thoughts on Facebook. Specifically, Wolf wishes to convey her "creeping concern" that Snowden "is not who he purports to be." Who is he, then? Signs point to his being one of them. You know: THEM.

Key points of evidence, taken from Wolf's letter-sorted eight-point analysis:

  • "He is super-organized, for a whistleblower"—so organized, his methods resemble those of "high-level political surrogates."
  • He conveys his message "without struggling for words." Again, like a political surrogate.
  • He "is in Hong Kong, which has close ties to the UK, which has done the US’s bidding." (Note: Since 1997, Hong Kong has been a Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China.)
  • His pole-dancing girlfriend provides "great sexy or sex-related mediagenic visuals," which are a hallmark of "stories that intelligence services are advancing." ("[R]eally, she happens to pole dance?" writes Wolf, the author of Vagina: A New Biography, skeptically.)
  • "I was at dinner last night to celebrate the brave and heroic Michael Ratner of the Center for Constitutional Rights."

That last one has something to do with Julian Assange, and how Julian Assange is careful to keep lots of lawyers around him, unlike Snowden, who is suspiciously well organized and composed, except for his failure to get a lawyer. Because Julian Assange is the genuine article, not like Snowden, and whistleblowers who are the genuine article "don’t tend ever to call attention to their own self-sacrifice," which is a thing that Julian Assange would never dream of doing in a million years.

But why this whole elaborate ruse? The underlying plan is very simple:

It is actually in the Police State’s interest to let everyone know that everything you write or say everywhere is being surveilled.

Let's just replay that one in boldface:

It is actually in the Police State’s interest to let everyone know that everything you write or say everywhere is being surveilled.

This is why our surveillance apparatus operates using secret orders that are secretly overseen by a closed court, whose decisions are classified. This is why the technology and communications companies cooperating with the surveillance program are forbidden to acknowledge that the surveillance program exists. This is why the Director of National Intelligence lied to Congress about what the surveillance program collected. Because they all wanted you to know about it.


Backtracking: 20 Feet From Stardom's Look At Backup Singers

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Backtracking: 20 Feet From Stardom's Look At Backup Singers

20 Feet From Stardom, from music documentary veteran Morgan Neville, is a film entirely devoted to the overlooked lives and jobs of back-up singers. Everything from the sound and vision to the impeccably selected archive footage to the beautifully shot recording sessions is wonderful. Neville isolates the tracks on well-worn records, forcing us to examine them again. Not that anyone needs to write any more praise of "Gimme Shelter," but isolating Merry Clayton’s vocals is spine-shivering.

While the documentary focuses on individual careers, like Clayton's, it evolves into a larger piece of criticism about the music industry, our fame-centric definitions of success, and a star-focused arts culture. Though Neville has interviewed some of the most notable singers in the spotlight today—Bruce Spingsteen, Sting, Mick Jagger, Sheryl Crowe, and Stevie Wonder—he expertly navigates our attention away from these stars to focus on the people that are behind them: the backup singers.

Backtracking: 20 Feet From Stardom's Look At Backup Singers

Darlene Love, Lisa Fisher, Merry Clayton—these aren't names or faces you necessarily know, but as Springsteen puts it, we have an “allegiance to their voices.” They're Grammy winners and Top 40s toppers, and their stories run the gamut of familiar music industry pitfalls—the bad management, overwhelming pressure, mismatched producers, and mismanaged money. Still, the way Neville demonstrates their talent and dedication to music, it's increasingly perplexing why the world let these voices get away.

Though it's about pop music, 20 Feet From Stardom is a feminism verging on activism documentary. It's about a group of people who were often unfairly overlooked, whose talents were too frequently used and discarded without due credit. By focusing on the background, it changes the way you look and listen.

Dr. Mable John, a blues vocalist and one of Ray Charles's Raelettes, puts the individual stories in a larger context:

“We in the music industry especially African American people, we need to know our worth; we need to know, as women, we're important. I think the breakdown is, when a woman doesn't know what she is and she settle for less. Check out your worth because you're worth more than that.”

The story of Merry Clayton is one of the most powerful in the film. She joins the Rolling Stones in the middle of the night, curlers in her hair and turns her initial shock at singing “rape, murder” into a screaming, powerhouse delivery. She says she suffered a miscarriage on the way home due to the emotional and physical strain of singing. Then her name was incorrectly written as "Mary" in the original record release. Everybody asked why she wasn’t a star. She doesn’t know.

Darlene Love’s vocals were also miscredited, but in an outrageously purposeful scheme by Phil Spector, rather than a likely careless mistake. Singled out by Spector for his Wall of Sound, she ghosted for the Crystals, singing "He's a Rebel" and sending the song to the top of the charts while the touring band never even heard it before it aired. Her voice was on dozens of Top 40 tracks, ghosting and backing Sam Cooke, Dionne Warwick, Frank Sinatra. When she tried to record under her own name and take credit that was hers, Spector continued to box her in—and Love eventually fell so down on her luck she started cleaning houses. It wasn’t until she heard herself singing “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” while cleaning a bathroom, that she decided to try to take back her talents. She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2011 after years of obscurity.

Sting, a man with boundless success, speaks beautifully and sadly on slights likes these:

“It's not about fairness, it's not really about talent, it's circumstance, it's luck, it's destiny, I don't know what it is, but the best people… deal with it.”

You want him to say that the best people will succeed. But he knows better than that. Levels of success vary throughout the film. Some singers seem to have been partially destroyed by this world, others adopt a take it or leave it attitude—continuing to devote themselves to music but avoiding the play for fame.

Backtracking: 20 Feet From Stardom's Look At Backup Singers

Apart from one misguided sequence (several of these singers come together to record the stupidly saccharine “Lean on Me”), the emotions and bittersweet or triumphant moments of 20 Feet From Stardom are not sappy or grabby or forcing you what to feel. It doesn't come to a neat conclusion, but leaves the stories in ambiguity—as you sense that the singers also look upon their careers with ambivalence.

20 Feet From Stardom is a model documentary. It gives thorough, dedicated attention to something that could have otherwise gone overlooked and it changes the way you think and listen. And of course, it sounds fantastic. In the lovely words of Jo Lawry, a singer with Sting, the joy of singing "back-up" is that "something that happens when you lock in with somebody and all the harmonics ping. And if you don't like that, what do you like?"

20 Feet From Stardom premieres June 14, 2013 in limited release. To contact the author of this article, email maggie@gawker.com.

The White House has Pride

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The White House has Pride

President Obama hosted hundreds of members of the LGBT community and their straight allies at the White House yesterday afternoon for a celebration of Pride Month. There was no glitter, or go-go boys, and given that there was no mention of the executive order on the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), we were surprised that there were no hecklers either.

The White House has Pride

The White House has Pride

The White House has Pride

The White House has Pride

The White House has Pride

The White House has Pride

The White House has Pride

[Images: Victor G. Jeffreys II]

Flipping the Fuck Out, Obsessions With Writers, and More Hate Mail

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Flipping the Fuck Out, Obsessions With Writers, and More Hate Mail

This week, a couple of our pen pals wrote some ostensible "fan mail" that turned so aggressively creepy that it bounded over that fine line between love and hate. Other writers served up some checks to our ego, inquired about how we make any money at all, and tipped that Gawker had dove off the deep end last Friday night. More from our correspondence below:

But it's so hard not to be obsessed with ourselves when your complaints are obsessed with how obsessed we are. You're reinforcing.

SUBJECT: About what

BODY: Apparently shame on me for not knowing wth Gawker is, but honestly your "about" page is the least informative one I have ever seen online.

That annoyingly long and information-less video was a giant waste of my time. It just keeps repeating the G word over and over and over and over[kill].

Why do you not want to tell people what it is you do? If you are operating under the assumption that everybody should know by now, then you're missing out on getting the message out to those who still don't know what you do. You are just preaching to your own choir.

This might be love.

SUBJECT: Hamilton Nolan

BODY: Here's a tip: Every single thing Hamilton Nolan writes is the dumbest thing I've read since my last Hamilton Nolan article. Sometimes I get mad at myself for clicking and giving him another unique visit just because I want to see what insanity he has concocted today (I hope that's been his plan for hits all along, but that would require him to admit to capitalistic actions). I get it — he's a fascist gym snob living in Brooklyn. Even in an ideal world, his principles are shaky at best, and, believe it or not, this world is far from ideal. I don't know how he goes to sleep at night but I know he doesn't do it after thinking rational thoughts. Some days, I'll be going about my normal life, say, washing my scrot in the gym shower, then suddenly stop what I'm doing, shake my head, and think about how last August's "Let's Have a Maximum Income" article literally made every single person on the internet dumber whether they read it or not, and how I can't believe anyone allegedly college-educated could possibly write that nonsense.

But then: Hamilton Nolan.

Creepin'.

SUBJECT: Hi Dear

BODY: hello

how are you today i hope that every things is ok with you as is my pleasure to contact you after viewing your profile in love today at www.gawker.com. really interest me in having communication with you

if you will have the desire with me so that we can get to know each other better and see what happened in future.here is my email. i will be very happy if you can write me through my email for easiest communication and to know all about each other.

yours, new friend.

Sent last Friday at 7:40 PM. Seamless subject line incorporation.

SUBJECT: Your website

BODY: is flipping the fuck out right now

And you, dearest writer, added a speckle of sunshine to my day. Continue your cheery attitude towards life—it's a gift and a revelation. And just in case you're still interested, Tom Scocca wrote some thoughts about advertising at Gawker.

SUBJECT: Hello

BODY: Good morning Gawker,

Your website is amazing, i just found out how to write comments on it. Beside telling you your awesomeness i wonder how you're making money because i didn't encounter any ads while reading the articles.

Thanks.

That's all for this week—have a forgettable Flag Day and a fantastic Father's Day. But really everyone should celebrate everyone and all pieces of fabric all the time, isn't that just the truth? Enjoy your weekend!

Matthew Weiner Kills the Internet's Favorite Mad Men Conspiracy Theory

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Matthew Weiner Kills the Internet's Favorite Mad Men Conspiracy Theory

Two weeks ago the Internet came up with what seemed at the time like an airtight Mad Men conspiracy theory: Megan Draper was Sharon Tate, and just like Tate, Draper too was going to die.

[Spoilers below]

Well, as it turns out, the Internet had this one all wrong. Crazy, right?

The LA Times' was in attendance for a round table with Mad Men creator Matthew Weiner, and decided to get the skinny on the theory straight from the Showrunner's mouth:

Yes, Sharon Tate wore that T-shirt, but that was just my costume designer Janie Bryant and I solving an argument. Women's T-shirts had not come into fashion. I always wanted Megan in a Disneyland T-shirt and Janie kept saying, 'They're not around yet.' So I said, 'There's got to be a women's T-shirt,' and Janie brought [the photo of Tate] in and asked, 'Is this OK?' And I said, 'Yes. I want that exact T-shirt.' Little did I know ...

Weiner goes a step further, guaranteeing that not only is Jessica Pare's job safe for the time being, but that, at least as far as this season is concerned, "no one’s going to die."

Maybe that's because... they're already dead.

[image via Uproxx]

The Week in Movies: Man of Steel, This is the End, and The Bling Ring

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The Week in Movies: Man of Steel, This is the End, and The Bling Ring

Welcome to Annotate This, where we gather reviews, trailers, and annotate the posters for movies coming out this week. It will help you decide what to avoid, what to see, and what to pretend to see. Click on the image above to add your comments to the mix.

The Bling Ring (Limited)

A real-life story on girlish materialism and fame-obsession made for Sofia Coppola's wheelhouse. It's splashy, glossy, sensualistic, klepto-philic, and features Kardashian inspired accents. Do you want to read all about how it comments on modern obsessions with fame? Of course you do and it's in Rich Juzwiak's review here. Paris Hilton, interpreted by Leah Beckmann, has thoughts here.


This is the End (June 12)

This movie stars a bevy of young Hollywood as itself: Seth Rogen, Jonah Hill, Michael Cera, Emma Watson, Danny McBride, Craig Robinson, Jay Baruchel, Mindy Kaling, and Rihanna all gather for a blow-out party at James Franco's house, while he and Rogen brainstorm the follow up to Pineapple Express. Then end-times come and they meditate on meditating about their privilege, fame, and the meanings of morality. This referential vanity project is audacious, compelling, and awesomely flimsy.


Man of Steel

Henry Cavill is Superman—without the undies and filmed in shaky-cam, so we can take him seriously. Christopher Nolan produces and Zack Snyder directs this backstory-driven "mad, mod" rehash which features Diane Lane and Kevin Costner as Kent's lovely adoptive parents and Russell Crowe is the biological father. Amy Adams as Lois Lane gets a nice role and Michael Shannon is the villain! Also, the crew doesn't have to worry if this one bombs, because there's a sequel planned anyway. Rich Juzwiak's review here.


20 Feet From Stardom (Limited)

This powerful, fascinating examination of the world of back-up singers from music documentary veteran Morgan Neville is entertaining and illuminating in equal parts. My review here.


Berberian Sound Studio (Limited)

Starring Toby Jones as an English sound recordist hired to provide the sounds for an experimental Italian horror film, this movie tensely examines "horror's effect on a sensitive soul." It's stylish, tense, but as the characters begin to lose hold on reality, the movie starts to falter.


Call Me Kuchu (Limited)

This heartbreaking, unobtrusive documentary centers on the kindly David Kato, Uganda's first openly gay man, and his life in Uganda, in which a new law threatens to make homosexuality punishable by death. The documentary follows Kato for a year, just before he was brutally murdered by a gang.




In the Fog (Limited)

This bleak film takes place in Belarus during the Nazi occupation. The historical context is blurred while the director favors "dreamy, intricately choreographed long-takes." Harkening to old directors, it is "classical, in a good way." While the cinematography stuns, it also depicts complicated and conflicted morality of the time.


Between Us (Limited)

This movie is about really dramatic couples dinners—everyone seems bitter, destructive, competitive, and vicious. Director Dan Mirvish has adapted this from Joe Hortua's play, which takes place over the course of two evenings. Julia Stiles, Taye Diggs, David Harbour, Melissa Georges are the couples who all participate in "a Musical Chairs of annoyance."


Vehicle 19

Paul Walker, Paul Walker. He plays a man who was recently paroled, who continues to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. He picks up the wrong rental car and it has a kidnapped lady tied up in the trunk. The chief of police is pantomime, while Walker is the actor "one least wants to be stuck in a car with." As he declares in the trailer, he's trying to make up for every wrong turn he's ever made, including this one.


Far Out Isn't Far Enough: The Tomi Ungerer Story (Limited)

Far Out explores Tomi Ungerer, a successful children's book author as well as an artist who pushed boundaries with art and erotica, and was able to offend people of all cultural and political types. Jules Ferrer and Maurice Sendak comment on his influence throughout the 1960s—from his illustrative works and angered 1960s posters. This documentary also provides an insight on the "so-called cultural wars" that exiled him into near obscurity.

To contact the author of this post, email maggie@gawker.com.

Detroit Stops Paying Debts in Last-Ditch Effort to Avoid Bankruptcy

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Detroit Stops Paying Debts in Last-Ditch Effort to Avoid Bankruptcy

Detroit's Emergency Financial Manager, Kevyn Orr, had bad news for the beleaguered city's creditors today: Detroit has made the strategic decision to stop paying down some of its billions of dollars in long-term debt in order to try and keep the city afloat.

"Detroit's road to recovery begins today," Orr said in a meeting with as many as 150 of the city's creditors. "Financial mismanagement, a shrinking population, a dwindling tax base and other factors over the past 45 years have brought Detroit to the brink of financial and operational ruin."

Orr, a bankruptcy attorney hired by Michigan to try and fix Detroit's money woes, went on to say that he believes there is still a 50-50 chance Detroit will go bankrupt. If Detroit did have to file for Chapter 9 bankruptcy, it would be the first major city in American history to do so, according to a bankruptcy expert who spoke to Reuters.

Reuters also reports that Orr's plan to forego debt payments began immediately, with a skipped $34 million payment due today:

The moratorium on principal and interest payments on the city's unsecured debt, including a $34 million payment on pension certificates of participation due on Friday, would allow the city to conserve cash needed to provide services to residents, Orr said.

Unsecured creditors, including bondholders and pension funds, will receive a pro rata share of $2 billion of notes the city would issue and pay off as its financial circumstances improve.

"Retirees, bondholders and city workers are being offered pennies on the dollar for the enormous amount of unfunded liabilities," writes Gawker Media's own Jalopnik. "The city has no money to pay it back. It's as simple as that."

Orr's plan, Proposal for Creditors, found here [PDF], further recommends putting the city's water and sewage department into the hands of an independent body still owned by the city but managed by a board of representatives from the city and its suburbs.

Another Orr suggestion sure to stoke ire—and possibly lawsuits—is a potential cut to current and retired city workers' pensions. "Orr said flatly that he does not believe Michigan’s constitution protects vested retirement benefits from a city that cannot afford them," wrote the Detroit Free Press, "an issue likely to face a court battle from retirees who believe their pensions are shielded from cuts under state law."

Orr's recommendation that the city spend more than a billion dollars on removing blight and updating city services over the next decade did little to squelch the fears of some city workers, who couldn't help but focus on the deep and serious cuts Orr is advocating.

William Miller, a representative from the International Union of Operating Engineers, told the Free Press, "It’s very frightening. There are a lot of people retiring soon. It’s not just the retirees saying, 'What’s going to happen to us?'"

President of the Detroit Firefighters Association Dan McNamara said, "The message they told us is we’re in a death spiral." Though he added that he disagreed with Orr's assessment of the city's police and fire pensions as being underfunded.

When the Free Press told him McNamara believed the pensions were fine, Orr said, "I am more than prepared to engage in that discussion. We have different information."

[Image via AP]

Leathery Texas Governor Rick Perry has vetoed a bill that would have helped prevent wage discriminat

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Leathery Texas Governor Rick Perry has vetoed a bill that would have helped prevent wage discrimination against women working in his state. The Huffington Post notes that 42 other states have passed laws similar to the one Perry shot down like he was hunting at good ol' Niggerhead.


Hassan Rowhani, the most moderate Iranian presidential candidate, is leading by a wide margin in ear

Smith & Wesson Gun Sales Hit All-Time High

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Smith & Wesson Gun Sales Hit All-Time High

Americans are not only interested in giving away a large amount of weapons, they're also buying them in record numbers as well.

Smith & Wesson reported a 43% rise in gun sales over last year, with purchases way up during the last quarter (which happened after the Newtown shooting) by 38%. While overall gun sales are difficult to track, the nine of the ten days with the highest rate of background checks in history were recorded after December's shooting. Background checks are a requirement for some gun purchases.

Sales also soared after the July shooting in a theater in Aurora, Colorado, as well as after the re-election of President Obama.

The December massacre in Sandy Hook set off a series of legislative proposals at the state and federal level. And while some states have been able to push through more restrictive gun laws in the six months after Sandy Hook, gun control debate in congress has hit a virtual dead-end, with a bill that would have widened background checks failing in the Senate back in April.

Def Jam "Leaks Division" Is On The Case

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Def Jam "Leaks Division" Is On The Case

Edward Snowden, move aside. America has a new leaker, and Def Jam Records is on the case.

The record company, which apparently has a "leak division," has been investigating yesterday's unplanned internet release of Kanye West's new album, which was scheduled to drop June 18th.

According to the reputable news outlet TMZ, Def Jam "already has a lead" on the leaker and will take "swift punitive action."

Although Yeezy took major precautions to prevent the album from an early release, he is apparently unfazed by the leak. Earlier this week at an album listening party, he told reporters that the album was all about giving and that he gave "no fucks at all" about the process.

[TMZ, image via AP]

Ghost of Daddy's Passing

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Ghost of Daddy's Passing

The house smelled just like him.

Momma and I stopped by unannounced. He wasn't there, but it smelled like he'd run out for a minute, probably to pick up a box of King Edward cigars or whatever it was he'd sometimes have in that brown paper bag. The house looked different than the last time I'd been there, even on the outside. The dusty red brick butted up against the new, dusty red brick of the addition.

It almost matched but not quite.

The two brick columns stretching from the roof to the shallow front porch's floor stood stately, not strictly out of utility, like they once seemed to do. The single carport that was once home to that cream-colored, four-door 1983 Oldsmobile 88 with a dark blue ragtop had grown. A shiny pearl Cadillac Escalade had replaced it, and there was space for another car to the left. The house—the picture of it, at least—was neater and looked more like a home.

It was hot. Very hot.

At some point during the day, July 5, to be exact, the car's thermometer reached 105 degrees Fahrenheit. It was probably every bit of that inside the house since the air conditioner had gone out. Despite the spiffed-up inside, with its added-on bedroom and walk-in closet, the man-decorated foyer and the extended kitchen that the decorator in me gave a "B-," the house was still familiar. Back in the day, it might have been just as hot as it was this day, even if the air was working. My dad didn't much like artificial air. Even in winter, when you actually needed warmth, it'd be uncomfortably hot inside the small house at the end of that long, rugged driveway.

Momma and I were driving home from Sunday evening at dinner at my aunt's house, and I suddenly had an impulse to drive down the road that's named for my father's family, Collier Rd. She drove slowly to navigate the large and small depressions in the road that's poorly paved with grey rocks that looked like they belonged at the bottom of a shabby fish bowl.

As we got closer to the ingress that lead to my father and his sister's houses, Momma said, "We're not going up in there."

That was fine with me.

I craned my neck over my left shoulder, looking out of the back window of Momma’s SUV, watching his house grow smaller. I was curious but would have never admitted it. Momma continued driving slowly. There was more dry, dusty pine-tree forest between each house on either side the more we drove along the road that led to— I still don't know where that road leads. So we turned around in the middle of the used-to-be rock road. When we approached the houses again, she said timidly, "Want to go up there?"

"Yeah," I said, nodding my head in the affirmative.

We parked the car behind that large, freshly-waxed SUV and approached the house.

Neither of us wanted to be the first to approach the door and ring the bell, both thinking it'd be best if the other did the honors.

"You go first," Momma said.

"No. You should go,” I reasoned. “He'll know your face before he knows mine."

Cousin, the man of the house, fixed all of that, as he walked outside to greet us before we even made it to the door.

"I wish y'all would've come another day," Cousin said.

In hindsight, that was the first punch to the gut. He didn't mean it in the "I don't want you here" way my daddy might've very well intended it, depending on the day and who was there.

Cousin’s skin was dark brown, almost black, like burned toast. "My air just went out on me,” he said, as sweat rolled off his bald head. “It’s hot in here.”

"It's OK," was all I could muster. I wasn't sure if I should be talking. And I was almost certain I shouldn't have been there.

Momma quickly followed up with, "We won't be here that long anyway. We just wanted to stop by."

"Come on in," Cousin invited, apologizing again for how hot it was.

The house was completely different at first. He gave us the tour. Voices commented about the men in uniforms playing some sport—I'll never remember which—on the large, flat-screen television that sat atop a makeshift stand of plywood and cinderblocks.

Hmph, I thought. Wait. Isn't that the fireplace? That doesn't go there.

The three of us chatted. We talked weather, extreme makeover his-home edition. I asked a question or two about the branches of the family tree. There really wasn't a lot to say. We were strangers and he, my cousin whom I don't even remember ever meeting, was now living in my father's house that he bought from my brother and me years ago. It was the first time I'd been in the house since before we sold it to him.

We walked past the small, round kitchen table that looked unnervingly like the one that used to be there and stepped outside onto the concrete he'd laid for a patio. Momma complimented him on the storage house he'd built. It was made of pine he'd treated and stained. I didn't walk up to it, but from a distance, it looked like something he bought at Lowe's. A riding mower sat under a covering, and a late-'90s-modeled midnight green pickup truck was parked in front of the unit. He said it was “for hauling things.”

"How many acres is this?" It was a question I'd never been curious enough ask.

He didn't know exactly, and I'd never noticed just how much land was beyond the back door. Land rolled down to an abyss and then grew upwards. It had been cleared off a good bit. All that land belonged to Cousin, too. What was I thinking? I remember wanting to get rid of anything that belonged to Daddy. I had no use for it.

"You know there's a pond back there?" he prodded, interrupting the conversation in my head.

My mother said she didn't remember, but I did. Vaguely.

"Remember when I was little and we used to come to fish fries?” I said, looking at my mother, pointing toward the forest. “Seems like I remember there being a pond somewhere."

"It's dried up now,” Cousin interrupted again. “I've been thinking about digging it back up and filling it in."

No one in the trio spoke for a second that seemed to last minutes.

"Well, thank you for letting us intrude on you,” I said, reaching for the back door to walk back inside the house and head to the car. “We just wanted to stop by.”

I stepped into the kitchen, and to the left in a shallow pan sitting atop the stove was a fat, slightly charred red rose sausage link.

Another punch.

Lots of things were different, but really nothing was. We'd interrupted Cousin’s dinner, the same dinner my father probably would have had if he were still alive.

My stomach started churning a bit and beads of sweat percolated on my skin—my forehead, forearms, the small of my back, the inside of my thighs. I was hot, but I was so cold and dizzy. When I took a deep breath, my nostrils filled with a familiar potpourri of peppery scrambled eggs cooked in bacon fat, Sulfur 8 grease, cigars, the stench of liquor escaping pores, burning wood that hissed and popped, Faultless starch and steam from an iron.

***

I saw him, my daddy, sitting there on a kitchen chair, slight curve at his shoulders. His coconut shell-brown, calloused hands wrapped around a wide-tooth comb he used to tap a steady rhythm on the crease of his crisp, nearly ossified jeans. A few tightly coiled strands of hair from his modest, perfectly-shaped afro rested on his pure white V-neck T-shirt, and his dry, bare feet stealthily held down the floor underneath him.

I never knew which was more embarrassing—the snoring or the sight of him—with him sitting there like that. When friends slept over, I would ban them from the front of the house once he came home.

If he came home.

"What's that noise?" my best friend would inevitably ask during a sleepover.

"I don't hear anything," I'd lie, looking at her quizzically then stand up to before walking over to the 13-inch television to turn up the volume.

My daddy was a man of few words. When his lips weren't pursed, as they often were, his manicured mustache served as a canopy for his mouth. But when he inconveniently sat in the middle of the kitchen floor in one of those solid wooden chairs at the table, after a night out, his head would hang backwards like an open Pez dispenser.

"I want some more of that pizza," best friend would say after a while.

"I'll go get it.” My response was quick: “Do you want something to drink, too?"

I couldn't risk her seeing my daddy smelling my daddy, hearing my daddy and figuring out what that sound was before I turned the volume on the TV up to hearing impaired. I tiptoed past him, glaring at the sight, resenting that I had to play maid for a friend, unaware then that resentment dropped a weight at the pit of my stomach.

In second grade, my class staged “The Alphabet Play.” I distinctly remember my daddy agreeing to attend. It was going to be perfect. I had the solo my elementary school nemesis wanted. Everyone was going to hear me sing, talk about how cute and wonderful I was in front of him. I knew that the cast on my right arm would gain me extra sympathy points, and my daddy would be there to see it all go down. I was “Q,” a severely underappreciated letter in our alphabet.

“I need ‘Uuuuu’ ...” I belted out. The rest of the alphabets agreed in song, “’Q’ needs ‘U.’”

Repeat, “I need ‘Uuuuu’ ...” The chorus confirmed, “Nothing else will do.”

My daddy never showed up. He didn’t see me, and I pretended not to care.

I only have a handful of memories beyond that, and most of them, too, are sour. Holidays, for example, are supposed to be glad memories—good tidings of great joy. And they are for me, minus him. I eventually stopped buying him Christmas gifts because I didn’t know what to buy. Birthdays grew hairier because I didn’t want to spend my money on him. So I didn’t.

Father’s Day was tougher. I never found a Hallmark card with the greeting, “I sure wish things were different between us, dad. I know you’re broken, but now you’re breaking me. I foresee years of therapy to get over this one, but I'll be fine. Do better. Happy Father’s Day!”

Then again, I never looked. Cards are expensive.

I eventually gave up the hope that things would be different. The weight of the wait was too much, and he still never saw me.

It had been eight years and a month since my father died, and standing in the kitchen of his old house, I sadly understood nothing had changed.

***

"Oh, my God.” My insides screamed at me. “Get me out!"

Cousin wanted to show how he'd done little to the other parts of the house. One bedroom now had workout equipment in it. "I use this for my dressing room," he said. The other two rooms looked exactly the same: bed, dresser, mirror, the end.

The bedspread that stretched across the queen-sized bed in the "dressing room" looked just like the one that was there the last time my brother and I went in the house a few months after our father died. That day, my brother cried, and I felt nothing.

At some point, I couldn't hear the words exchanged between my mother and the cousin. I had to concentrate on making sure I kept my breathing even and that I didn't hurl.

Cousin was so warm, so nice. He invited us to come back anytime, and the teenage girl in me, I suppose, wants to think he meant it. It was strange to get an invitation from the man of that house who actually wanted me to come back.

When we pulled off from the house back onto Collier Rd., I told Momma, as my head swirled, "I have to vomit."

She pulled over on the side of the road. I swung the door open before the car stopped, and my mother, afraid I was going to fall out, grabbed the back of my dress. I braced myself between the seat and the opened door with my head hanging out of the SUV. There was only retching and a little bile that came up.

I sat up slowly, sweating profusely and turned the air conditioner up as high as the knobs in the car would allow.

"I don't know what just happened, Momma," I said, when I was finally able to speak.

I blotted my cheeks with the napkin my mother offered me. Momma didn't say anything, as she watched me, trying to figure out what was happening.

It was the first time my body ever felt comfortable in my father's house. That is, until he showed up.

Natalie A. Collier is a southern girl who has seen words destroy and heal. She lives in Jackson, Miss., her beloved community, where she now works at a nationally known non-profit organization with teenagers and young adults since leaving a career in journalism. Find more of her random thoughts on her dusty MsInklination blog.

In a new project overseen by contributing editor Kiese Laymon, Gawker is running a personal essay every weekend. Please send suggestions to saturdays@gawker.com.

Philadelphia Closes 23 Schools, Lays Off Thousands, Builds Huge Prison

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Philadelphia Closes 23 Schools, Lays Off Thousands, Builds Huge Prison

Philadelphia laid off thousands of school employees last week after the state of Pennsylvania continued its austerity measures against public schools. And while the state is essentially destroying Philadelphia public schools through under-funding (claiming budgetary concerns), it somehow found enough money to build a $400 million prison just outside of the city.

The Philadelphia public school system has been a target for school reform and Charter-enthusiasts for the past few years, and several figures (including the mayor) have defended charter schools as a viable replacement to the entire public school system. The school closures, which (of course) disproportionately affect schools in poor and minority neighborhoods, will force students to venture far outside of their own neighborhoods to attend their closest school. Charter schools in Philadelphia have been plagued by scandal and corruption, have no requirement to admit any student and can dismiss a student at any time. Still, Philadelphia Mayor Nutter defended them during an awkward appearance on MSNBC where he defended the cuts.

Philadelphia public school teachers have been negotiating a new contract and are dealing with several draconian proposals by the state-appointed School Reform Commission, which is looking to get Philadelphia schools out of debt (mostly through layoffs and privatization). To meet some of the Philadelphia school employees who lost their jobs this month, visit this site.

In the end, the closings will mean more overcrowding in the remaining public schools and higher unemployment in an already poor city.

Good thing there's about 4,000 new beds about to open up just outside the city.

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