And this would pretty much be the mission statement of just about every early David Cronenberg movie. Lately he's been more focused on how our perception of reality affects our reality, which is kind of the same idea from a different angle.

I've always been a big fan of Cronenberg, but with his recent spate of films he seems to be turning into one of the Greatest Directors of All Time right before our very eyes. It's amazing product, and amazing to watch.

(maybe like a Don Quixote where Sancho Panza is eaten by a bear)

Which happened in an early cut.

But test audiences responded negatively.

You can taunt Happy Stupid President.

Speaking of which, I encountered this morning a dog poop bag with Cheney and Bush on either side with the headline "Mission Accomplished!."

New topic of discussion!

Randall Munroe of xkcd makes an observation about female leads in movies:

Suppose we had a generic Michael Bay/Jerry Bruckheimer movie with some evil organization (say, a shadow government headed by Dick Cheney or whatever) bent on destroying something (say, the internet). Who would you rather see battling their way through the system to stop them — another basic Bruce Willis/Denzel Washington/Vin Diesel character? Or River Tam, Sarah Connor, Lola from Run Lola Run, or Beatrix Kiddo? Not only could the film industry suck less in the examples it sets, we could have some awesome movies.

Also, there's a table with data. Of course.

I've always been a big fan of Cronenberg, but with his recent spate of films he seems to be turning into one of the Greatest Directors of All Time right before our very eyes. It's amazing product, and amazing to watch.

It's amazing going back to his old movies where you can see, budget limitations (and sometimes his actors abilities) aside, the way he films things has been consistent from the get go. The subject matter has changed, but his attitude towards and his visualization of it has remained pretty much the same. I've been following his career since almost the beginning (I came to his work as a rabid -no pun intended - horror movie fan), and it has been amazing to watch.

I know everyone's self-absorbed, I know that everyone is the star and hero of their own narrative, but the amount to which everyone else was reduced to bit players in these guys' personal narratives was damn near sociopathic.

This is so very well said.

Randall Munroe of xkcd makes an observation about female leads in movies:

WHY did I read the comments? WHY? WHY?

I think you and I probably disagree as to how much Herzog judges him though. I don't think he romanticizes him like a Don Quixote character (maybe like a Don Quixote where Sancho Panza is eaten by a bear).

Gotcha. I was trying to make him seem like a sub-Quixote with my qualifications, but I could have been more clear. I mean, I think the Quixote comparison works to some degree because both chose to address their perceived problem in a completely insane manner. But, yeah, Cervantes actually likes Quixote and I think Herzog didn't so much like Treadwell as he liked the mental place Treadwell went, where madness and inspiration drove him to make beautiful films from a perspective far outside the mainstream of society, although his all-too-human tendency to anthropomorphicize nature led to tragic results. Treadwell's not that different from the classic Herzog protagonist, really, and Treadwell's skill as a filmmaker works well with Herzog's tendency to appropriate documentary film into his movies.

I've been following his career since almost the beginning (I came to his work as a rabid -no pun intended - horror movie fan), and it has been amazing to watch.

Yeah, me too, Frank.

WHY did I read the comments? WHY? WHY?

There's some good discussion in there! I must have skimmed over the bad parts.