"Slumdog Millionaire": one of the years best films

Tonight I convinced my daughter, Kid Curmudgeon, to go see "Slumdog Millionaire," a film I had already seen at "Talk Cinema" at the AFI and had loved.

The film, filmed entirely on location in Mumbai, was co-directed by British filmmaker Danny Boyle (Trainspotting , Millions, Sunshine, 28 Days Later...) and Indian female director Loveleen Tandan (casting director on Mira Nair's "Vanity Fair" and "Monsoon Wedding," as well as 2nd assistant director on "Monsoon Wedding").

"Slumdog Millionaire" tells the story of Jamal Malik, a kid from the Mumbai slums who improbably becomes a contestant on the Indian version of "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire." The story is told through flashbacks explaining just how Jamal came to know all the answers to the questions he is asked on the show, which he knows as it turns out, by virtue of his life experiences surviving in the slums with his brother Salim and the little girl he rescued and came to love, Latika.

The film covers the lives of the 3 principals at ages 7, 14, and 21, played of course by three sets of actors, the youngest being actual non-actor Mumbai street kids.

The adults are played by Dev Patel (Jamal Malik) a British Actor of Indian parentage known in the US primarily for starring in the BBC series "Skins," Madhur Mittal (Salim Malik) a novice Indian actor, and Freida Pinto (Latika) a beautiful Mumbai model and TV host acting in her first movie.

The film is mostly told in English (which should help its US box office) with English subtitles for the Hindi parts.

Filmed in a frenetic, semi-documentary style by Anthony Dod Mantle ("The Last King of Scotland"), I would describe Slumdog Millionaire as "City of God" meets "Oliver Twist" meets "Monsoon Wedding" and "The Darjeeling Limited ," but that would be selling it short. The film is a wonderfully inventive evocation of a milieu foreign to most of us, told in a completely novel way (based on the novel "Q&A" by Vikas Swarup and screenwritten by Simon Beaufoy ("The Full Monty")).

Ultimately, Kid Curmudgeon puts "Slumdog Millionaire" in the top 5 movies of her life (she's a teenager) and I put it as one of my top two movies of 2008 (along with Jonathan Demme's "Rachel Getting Married"). Highly recommended in any case.

No Doubt about "Doubt"

Christmas time is my time to catch up on the serious movies released around this time for Oscar consideration. Today I went to see "Doubt," the new Philip Seymour Hoffman-Meryl Streep vehicle written and directed by John Patrick Shanley, based on his award-winning play of the same name. The play won the 2005 Tony award for Best Play. The film should enjoy similar success come award season.

The movie is about a parish priest in NYC (Hoffman) who is persecuted by the principal of the Catholic school associated with the parish by the school's principal who was also a nun and mother superior (Streep) based purely on her suspicion that the priest might be getting a little too 'familiar' with the lone Black kid in the school, a loner ostracized by the other students. Still, despite the seriousness of the subject matter, the writing is witty rather than dour, at times even laugh-out-loud funny (God I love good writing)!

The story takes place in the year after the Kennedy assasination (IC was in high school in Texas that year) although the students seem to be about middle school age (what we would have called 'junior high' back then--why the change?!).

Fans of good acting and good writing will find a lot to love in this movie. Still as good as Hoffman and Streep are, and they indeed give the proverbial Oscar-worthy performances, the actor who steals the show is Viola Davis as the mother of the putative victim. She's only on the screen for 15 minutes but, if there is any justice, she will be nominated and win for "Best Supporting Actress" at the 2009 Oscars. She will be familiar to most for her roles on "Law and Order" and "Grey's Anatomy," but I certainly look for her star to rise after this. Worth the price of admission.

"Doubt" was further graced by the wonderful cinematography of the Great Roger Deakins ("No Country for Old Men" and most of the other films by the Coen Brothers).

Why hasTGI Fridays become anti-vegetarian?

For Christmas 2008, I went out to dinner with my meatatarian brother again. Last year we went to my favorite Chinese restaurant, Hunan Manor, which features a whole section of meatless entrees for a vegetarian like me (personal favorite: vegetarian honey sesame chicken).

This year we found out that the local TGI Fridays was open so we went there. The good news is that they were open for Christmas. The bad news was that they had eliminated the last remaining vegetarian option on the menu, some kind of lame cold pasta salad concoction so spiked with sulfiting agents as to be virtually inedible, yet still it was marginally better than nothing.

This is perplexing in that when I became a vegetarian 30 years ago, TGI Fridays was the first chain restaurant to offer a veggie burger (at least in the DC area). They had an excellent Garden Burger on the menu, served with a black-eyed peas salad on the side. Inexplicably, this disappeared from the menu about 3 years ago, along with the veggie wrap (served cold, but delicious) and assorted other veggie alternatives, as they began touting their red meat and Jack Daniels entrees (who oversaw this change, Karl Rove? Rush Limbaugh?). Apparently management has made a decision to stop catering to the white collar yuppie vaguely health-conscious demographic of years past to reach out to the red meat craving blue collar NASCAR demographic (much like Monday Night Football did when they brought in Hank Williams Jr. to annoy us with his "Ready for some football" braying).

I mean, its not just that Fridays has made it impossible for vegetarians like me to enjoy meals there with their non-veggie friends. It is that TGI Fridays has decided to become militantly anti-vegetarian, and that is indeed a troubling trend. It may be TGI Fridays but its not the Fridays I used to love to patronize.

For the record, my brother went with the ribs and I had to go with either the house salad or the Tuscan spinach dip with tortilla chips. I went with the dip since vegetarians need and deserve our veggies hot, not raw (we ain't frickin' rabbits, for God's sake!), even though in retrospect it was probably made with chicken soup since thats the way most restaurants insist on making it.

Therefore, unless and until Fridays gets its act together, I'm sticking with Ruby Tuesdays (great veggie burger, very good salad bar, and lots of veggie alternatives on the menu. Plus they are not afraid to cater to the more health conscious diners).

Sorry About That!

When I first started this blog, I resolved to post new stuff at least once a week, once a month at worst.

Now, bogged down in moving my home and my office and getting a dog and myriad other distractions, I find myself seven weeks past my last post.

This is unacceptable and I promise to do better (for both of you out there actually reading this thing).

In the meantime, be sure to check out the links to my friends' blogs at right, like David Mills who writes "Undercover Black Man." The most prolific blogger I know, he routinely posts several times daily about music, media, politics, about anything on his mind. He augments his posts with terrific audio and video clips, which I would like to do some day too. He used to write for the Washington Post before heading west to the left coast to write for TV. He has written episodes for "The Wire" on HBO and "Homicide: Life on the Streets" for NBC, two of my all-time favorite shows.

Also check out my former student's blog "This Better Not Be Lame." She is a wonderful writer, witty, urbane, sarcastic, profane, with a delightfully snarky tone. She blogs anonymously under the name 'Sexy HU Journalist.'

Another former student, Danielle Scruggs, blogs under her own name at "Danielle Scruggs/Photography." A recent MFA Photography grad from MICA in Baltimore, she blogs about all things photography, championing photographers and their work and occasionally displaying examples of her own work. She too is a terrific writer (part of that Howard U. tradition of writers going back through Toni Morrison to Zora Neale Hurston).

Keeping it in the Howard U. family, check out my friend and former fellow Howard art dept. alum Joyce Owens, whose blog is "Joyce Owens: Artist on Art". Joyce is a celebrated artist and professor of art living and teaching in Chicago whose blog poses intriguing questions about art, about the profession of art, and about the viability of art with particular emphasis on African American art and artists.

Posting more soon, I remain the incorrigible Curmudgeon.

Election Day, November 4, 2008

I got to the polls at 6:30 AM, they opened at 7 AM and I was out of there by 8AM. This photo was at about 6:45 AM when dawn was just breaking to the East. The couple at the very front of the line said they arrived at 5 AM.

This was at a nearby poll where the lines were far longer than at my poll. A friend stood out there for hours in drizzle to vote.

The front of the line at my poll.

This sister had the right idea!

A lot of smiles this morning.

The line wrapping around the building at my poll.

The line stretching off behind me this morning.

Adams Morgan Clown Mural, creepy...

What's up with this mural in Adams Morgan (seen from 'U' Street & Florida Avenue, NW)? Clowns are pretty creepy in general but this one is particularly so.

Car-cam photo by Incorrigible Curmudgeon (c)2008

Car-cam photo of the day: LeDroit Park house.

Cool-looking LeDroit Park house. Looks like the house on the right is available for anyone into fixer-uppers .

First Obama-McCain debate

I watched the debate last night and while I was not surprised at how well Barack Obama did, I was surprised by just how well John McCain held his own.

I suddenly realized that the vote John McCain has locked up and which Barack Obama has yet to reach is the voter who asks themselves the question: "Which candidate would you most like to go out and have a beer with?"

Of course for me the answer would be Barack Obama but for that demographic of young-to-middle-aged White males, the voters George W. Bush was always so successful with, I'm afraid McCain comes off as 'more fun.'

Of course this begs the question of whether we would prefer a fun president or a competent, principled one, yet in American politics getting elected is still very much a popularity contest.

Black portrait project airs on HBO

American portrait photographer Timothy Greenfield-Sanders (b.1952) is collaborating on a portrait photography/oral history project called Blacklist, Vol 1, with Black film critic Elvis Mitchell interviewing the subjects. The subjects are a wide-ranging variety of Black celebrities (including Toni Morrison, Serena Williams, Sean Coombs, Richard Parsons, Chris Rock, etc.). It airs on HBO on Monday, August 25th.

Interesting that White photographers find themselves drawn to photographing Black portraits. Reminds me of Brian Lanker's project "I Dream a World: portraits of Black Women who Changed America," which I both envied and admired. I envied both the sheer beauty of Lanker's portraits and his audacity for having conceived the project in the first place. Green-field Sanders has produced some awesome results as well.

Timothy Greenfield-Sanders seems to favor the unflinching, staring-straight-into-the-camera style of Richard Avedon in his non-commercial non-fashion work in his later years. He also favors Avedon's penchant for very large-format view cameras (11x14). Makes a militantly anachronistic statement in this digital photography age.

Dutch Country Market

The Dutch Country Farmer's Market in Burtonsville, MD has been a landmark for decades. Run by the Pennsylvania Dutch Amish who ply their wares here every Thursday through Saturday, it has been forced to move because a shopping center developer has bought the strip mall with the intention to raze it and build another strip mall in its place (go figure).

It was supposed to close at the end of August 2008 and move to an abandoned furniture store in Laurel, about 5 miles to the east in Prince Georges county.

However, the website (who knew the Amish had websites?) seems to indicate that the move is off indefinitely. I hope so. I like the idea of the market and that people come from all over DC/Maryland/Virginia to shop here, even though, as a veggie, the market is a little too meat-heavy for my tastes. In fact, their is precious little for a veggie, but I'm glad they're staying a while longer anyway.

What do you get when you cross a tire with a pigeon?

This unfortunate bird was too slow to avoid catastrophe in my parking garage at work (no I didn't hit it).

I thought it might be too morbid to post, but everyone I showed it to said I should post it anyway ( there is a certain geometric beauty to the splatter pattern).

(c)2008, Incorrigible Curmudgeon

George Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic

George Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic at the 9:30 Club, July 19, 2008

Garry Shider (in diaper) comparing physiques with Sir Nose (right) and George Clinton.

George Clinton rocking his Chocolate City shirt in Chocolate City

Michael Hampton, worthy heir to the late great Eddie Hazel, is still making grown men cry with his heart-breakingly plaintive guitar wailing on "Maggot Brain." George Harrison once famously made his guitar 'gently weep.' Well Eddie Hazel and Michael Hampton have made their guitars both scream with passion and writhe in anguish.

All photos (c) 2008 Incorrigible Curmudgeon

Like I said, my favorite jam bands are Mandrill, Parliament Funkadelic, and War.

Well this has been a great Summer because I've been able to see the first two and they both kicked ass!

Seeing George Clinton again was like seeing an old friend or your crazy old uncle again after a long hiatus.

I've been watching George and Parliament since 1968 when they had solid radio hits like "I Just Wanna Testify," "Let Hurt Put You Behind the Wheel," and "Get Up On the Down Stroke," great party songs but up to this point they were pretty much just another R&B group in matching tuxedos ala the Temptations.

The next year they re-invented themselves, busting out in costumes (the diaper, the union suit, the hair and make-up) as the Funk/Rock hybrid Parliament Funkadelic we all know and love. Forty years later they are still getting it done, George is still the impish gnome in chief, the screaming guitars (led by Michael Hampton) are still putting a lie to the perception that Black people don't dig rock, and Garry Shider is still rockin' that diaper, well into his 60's.

The show was at the 9:30 Club near Howard University and started 2 hours late so we only stayed for 3 of the usual 4 hours they are still renowned for jamming, even at their age.

Unfortunately, they don't let you bring real cameras to concerts like back in the day, but the 9:30 Club only prohibits "professional cameras and video" so I had the frustrating experience of capturing the show on my point-and-shoot digital from the balcony (my leg was injured and I wasn't about to fight the teeming hoards on the dance floor to get up close to the stage). Still it was better than nothing (barely) but you be the judge.

Check out the Washington Post article about George Clinton and Parliament Funkadelic, a feature piece in the Weekend section the day before the show.

Shark week returns

Discovery Communications bldg. 2006, Shark week
(c)2006 Incorrigible Curmudgeon

It's Shark Week again starting Sunday on the Discovery Channel, July 27 to Aug. 2, 2008.

Too bad they no longer inflate the giant shark on the Discovery bldg.

Really got me pumped for all that week-long shark-gore.

Cluck-U Chicken

(c)2008 Incorrigible Curmudgeon

Another restaurant bites the dust. This venue is just north of Howard University in DC. Love the name, juvenilishly catchy. As a veggie, I can't vouch for the chicken, though I heard good things.

Lake Elkhorn, Columbia, MD

Lake Elkhorn, Columbia, MD, from north bridge
(c)2008 Incorrigible Curmudgeon

Wall murals, Silver Spring, MD

New Hampshire Avenue at Piney Branch
(c)2008 Incorrigible Curmudgeon

Discovery Communications bldg., Georgia Avenue
(c)2008 Incorrigible Curmudgeon

Birds on my balcony

Photo (c)2008 by Incorrigible Curmudgeon

When I first moved into this apartment years ago, I tried to grow tomatoes and flowers on my balcony. The tomatoes failed big time and while the flowers worked fine, one flower box soon attracted a mourning dove in search of a safe nesting spot. I gladly ceded the spot to her so we could watch her nest.

Over the years she, or another mourning dove (perhaps even her grown child), has nested 2 or 3 times each season. This was her first brood of 2008.

Coulda been worse

Photo (c)2008 by Incorrigible Curmudgeon

Mandrill Rules!!!!

I have three favorite jam bands: Mandrill, War, and Parliament-Funkadelic. The first two were in the DC area last week, though War at the Carter Barron sold out before I could cop tickets. And George Clinton is on tour again with Parliament-Funkadelic and will be at the 9:30 club in July. Life is good.

Mandrill was at the Birchmere while I was away on vacation, but fortunately they were also in nearby Annapolis this Monday at the Rams Head Tavern, and they jammed like they had never left the scene! Still gettin' it done! Mandrill stands ten strong, and with the four Wilson Brothers and some others from the original iteration and an outstanding selection of newer talent (notably on drum kit, lead guitar, and violin) they rocked all their hits in a breathless 90-minute set. Highlights included "Mandrill," "Fencewalk," "Children of the Sun," "Mango Meat," "House of Wood," "Get it All," and of course "Ape is High." Carlos Wilson's voice and flute were in fine form, as were Lou Wilson on trumpet and vocals, Ricardo "Doc" Wilson on Trombone and vocals, and Wilfredo Wilson on congas and vocals. Admonitions by the venue that the audience refrain from dancing went appropriately unheeded (as if the audience had any choice once Mandrill started jamming).

Mandrill has always been horn-strong, with trombone and trumpet, soprano and baritone saxes, all mic-ed, so the sound was deafeningly loud. My ears rang for hours after the show since I was sitting next to the stage. Back in the day, I used to shoot concerts with my ear next to the loudspeakers with no problem. Not any more.

Still, it was all worth it, and I can't remember the last time I enjoyed a concert so much.

World's greatest rock band: the Rolling Who?! The Grateful Duds?! They better reco'nize! Mandrill Rules!

Bicentennial Blunder

Photos by Incorrigible Curmudgeon (c)2008

Of all the miss-steps taken in celebration of the Bicentennial 32 years ago, among the worst (at least in DC) has to be the bright idea to make planters out of discarded car wheels and tires. The tires were cut away from the wheel hub on one side of the wheel and flipped inside-out, still attached to the other side. The result was a bowl shape which was then trimmed in a scallop pattern in an effort to make these hideous things as appealing as possible. Filled with soil, they became crude planters of sorts. When painted, you could almost forget their origins save for the tell-tale tire pattern clearly visible. These 'planters' once proliferated throughout DC, though most have mercifully disappeared. These photos were recently taken on Ingraham Street, NW, near Kennedy.

The only thing worse was the brainstorm to paint DC fire hydrants to look like little steadfast tin soldiers, attired in uniforms the likes of which even Michael Jackson would avoid. The color palette on these atrocities was straight out of the local house paint store (where it no doubt came from) and contributed to the garishly grotesque appearance of these stunted humanoids with the phocomelic paddles for arms and their 'we are Devo' helmets. Thankfully, they all seem to have been replaced or repainted in dark green, though a few have been spotted well into the 21st Century. If I ever spot one that slipped through the cracks I'll be sure to post the photo.

Watermelon House, DC

photo (c)2008 by Incorrigible Curmudgeon

1100 block of 'Q' Street, NW, Washington, DC

Taking Inventory

photos (c) 2007, Incorrigible Curmudgeon

Ever since 9-11, I have endeavored to make a point of not taking things for granted. And as a photo documentarian I have always strived to be a vernacular iconographer, an artist capturing, celebrating, and immortalizing in my photos the everyday things and places we too often take for granted, things we will look back on in 30 years saying "whatever happened to?" Like gas stations with signs advertising gas at 29.9. Or the original McDonalds or Little Tavern restaurants. Or storefronts plastered with signs for products that no longer exist.
One could argue that there is nothing 'vernacular' about the U.S. Capitol bldg. or the Washington Monument, but they are certainly among the things we Washingtonians take for granted, barely giving them a glance when we spy them while walking down the street or looking out of our workplace windows. During my commute there is one place at the corner of North Capitol St. and Michigan Avenue where I can see them both. I haven't had much success photographing the monument from my moving car as the monument ducks in and out of the filtration silos for the MacMillan Reservoir at that corner, but here is a shot of the Capitol dome, looking down North Capitol from my car. I shot the monument from the roof of my garage at work. And every day I'm in DC, I continue to take inventory.
What are the things you take for granted in your towns? Whatever they might be, New York has taught us to never do so again.

Pink Snow

Photos (c)2008 Incorrigible Curdmudgeon

Say what you will about the DC metropolitan area, but it can be drop-dead beautiful in the Spring with all the flowering trees that proliferate apart from the more famous Tidal Basin Cherry Blossoms trees. In my neck of the woods, we are blessed with 'Pink Snow" for a brief window of time each Spring. Here are a few examples.

WTF?! moment #3

photo (c)2008 Incorrigible Curmudgeon

I found these hanging under the Florida license plates of a car parked on Howard University's campus recently. NPR says now a Florida legislator is trying to have them banned. Sez they're called "Truck Nutz" and they're proliferating like crazy on Florida cars, particularly pick-ups and SUVs. Not sure what to say about them. An interesting cultural phenomenon, sadly not just for the George Bush demographic anymore.

The Last Little Tavern, Laurel, MD

(c)2007 Incorrigible Curmudgeon

This is the last restaurant in the Little Tavern chain left in Metropolitan Washington, DC. This one is on Route 1 Southbound, just south of Main Street in Laurel, MD. It closed shortly after I shot this photo over the Christmas holidays, supposedly to re-open soon. Not sure if it ever did. Downtown Silver Spring used to have two of these, one's now a red-roofed paper company, the other a yellow-roofed Chinese carryout. Another dying piece of Americana.

Silver Spring, MD, Downtown

photos (c)2008 Incorrigible Curmudgeon

I lived in downtown Silver Spring for 10 years in the '90s, back when it was a dump, okay, actually just seedy, tawdry, and run-down.

These days, its been re-invented as a destination, and has become one of my my favorite places to hang-out, with cool places like the AFI Silver theater, the Austin Grill, Borders books, Whole Foods, and free garage parking on evenings and weekends. Also decent Ethiopian food (Lagano) and bland but decent Caribbean food (Negril's) nearby, along with Panera's, Macaroni Grill, Asian Bistro, Starbucks, Great Eggspectations, the Majestic Twenty stadium seating movie theater, and the incomparable Roadhouse Oldies. Supposed to be free wi-fi throughout downtown, but I haven't vetted it yet.

Silver Spring backroad

Batchellor Forest Road, Silver Spring, MD (c) 2007 Incorrigible Curmudgeon

Omegas on the long-walk

Omegas on the long-walk. Howard University

photo (c) 2006 Incorrigible Curmudgeon

Lake Artemesia, College Park, MD

Lake Artemesia is a man-made lake formed from the land excavated to elevate the tracks of the Metro Green line which run parallel to it. The lake is about a half a mile North of the College Park Metro station.

It has become a beautiful wildlife refuge with paved paths around and across it. The only downer is that boating is prohibited. This lake would be perfect for kayaking.

Talk Cinema/"Elsa Y Fred"

"Elsa Y Fred" (Spain/Argentina 2005) is a wonderful gem of a movie, and yet another Talk Cinema reminder of why I love the movies so much.



Ostensibly a love story between a free-spirited 78 year-old widow and a repressed 79 year-old widower she woos, attempting to free him from his practiced torpor.



It is a love story to film (in particular to fellini's "La Dolce Vita" with elements of "Harold and Maude" and "Cinema Paradiso" and even "Harry & Tonto"), a love story to falling in love despite age or infirmity, and a love story to living life free from fear.



It posits that while many elderly sufffer from the fear of dying, far too many suffer from a fear of living. That worse than the inevitability of death is dying having not lived as fully as one could have/should have.

Fred (Alfredo) is played by Spanish actor Manuel Alexandre, Elsa by Uruguyan actor China Zorilla, both somewhat older than the characters they embody so fully and well. I cannot recommend this movie highly enough.

Kathy & Zamaniya

Kathy & Zamaniya at a Bob Evans restaurant in West Vrginia.

Photo (c) 2006 by the Incorrigible Curmudgeon

Chuck Brown at Howard University

Chuck Brown playing for the Howard University Christmas Party for staff and faculty, thrown by President H. Patrick Swygert, Christmas 2006. Photographed with Nikon D200 with 28-200mm lens, using built-in flash.

Photo (c) 2006 by the Incorrigible Curmudgeon

Kay and Morgan

A couple of great faces.

Photo (c) 2008 by the Incorrigible Curmudgeon

This is What 92 Looks Like

This is my cousin Reba, age 92, from Ohio.

We should all look so good.

Still sharp as a tack and still driving.

A wonderful, warm, and witty woman.

Photographed with Nikon D200 with 18-200mm lens.

Photo (c) 2006 by the Incorrigible Curmudgeon

Talk Cinema/"the Life Before Her Eyes"

Talk Cinema hits another homerun with"The Life before Her Eyes," a brilliant, memorable new film that stays on your mind long after the movie has faded from the screen



Essentially a lyrically beautiful meditation on the ways in which a Colombine-type school massacre affects those impacted for generatons to come.



Told in flashback from the POV of two students who confront the gunman, 17 year-old girls from the low rent side of the tracks, who remain best friends despite polar opposite backgrounds, one a risk-taking rebel who's parents are divorced, the other a God-fearing church goer from a large, pious family.



The acting is superb, particularly Evan Rachel Wood as one of the young girls and Uma Thurman as the girl grown up with a daughter of her own.



Film is directed by Ukrainian director Vadim Perelman and this is his second film, after House of Sand and Fog.



Had I heard going in that a movie was dealing with a school massacre, I would never have been inclined to go see it. I am so glad I was able to experience this movie afterall.

I highly recommend this film.

Chicago Urban Landscapes

All photos (c) 2007, Incorrigible Curmudgeon

In March 2007, I made my first visit to Chicago and was captivated by the imagery I encountered (like finding that Lake Michigan was as turquoise as the Caribbean). These are a few of my favorite images.