Hollow Hype on “Blonde” & Bowie

Andrew Domink’s Blonde is a mostly dissatisfying film which chronicles most of MM’s iconic moments – the skirt flying up, taking drugs, rendezvous with JFK – all of which can make it tedious. The NC17 hype is silly as well, all because it seems of a brief shot of an erect penis. And while Ana de Armas’ commitment to the role is clear, she is exhausting to watch, pouting and crying at every turn. There are also very strange scenes of a talking fetus which really detracts from the film.

Talking fetus in Blonde

However, given all of this, I was struck by some lovelyshots from Cinematographer Chayse Irvin, especially MM’s final moments, over-exposed, drinking and drugging herself into oblivion. It was a long wait and perhaps even worth it.

Brett Morgen’s Moonage Daydream also suffers from an obsession with the iconic moments – Ziggy Stardust, Thin White Duke, et al – and is further hamstrung by a limited Bowie view of Bowie.

While the visuals are great and many of the song selections, there is nothing on David Bowie being David Bowie except one vague interview that barely touches on anything. It’s not like I was looking for a tabloid tell-all of the drugs and sex mania or even the ego-centrism and abandonment of Ronson and others. It’s just that completely ignoring this aspect of Bowie’s life renders the film, for all of its sound and vision, little more than a Look Video Magazine.

The Loving Other of Bowie

I did not have complicated musical tastes as a boy. I liked The Partridge Family, Helen Reddy and K-Tel records like Fantastic.

Elton John was on the track list…twice!

I collected 45 singles like Disco Tex’s Get Dancin’ and Shirley and Co’s Shame, Shame, Shame and sang along. You get the picture.

I also liked David Bowie. I loved Ziggy Stardust. I listened to that record over and over. I didn’t understand any of it, that it was a concept album or that he was challenging gender stereotypes. None of it. I just loved the music.

Ziggy Stardust Artwork
Who is he/she?

When I realized many years later that the music gave people who were shunned and excluded a feeling of being part of something, I was amazed because I felt like that too, even though I looked like I didn’t fit into that bracket.

In my kid brain, it was just music. And now I realize there is no such thing.

David Bowie’s Death on Facebook

Social media – yes, like you are reading now – is fatuous and inane, worse than anything ever produced on radio or television – and that includes The Bachelor. getting aa roseFacebook posts on the death of David Bowie serve as sad exemplars.

Mark Pautz 06h30 this morning. I was awake. Strange, as I’d only got to bed four hours earlier. But it was then that the musical soundtrack of the first 55 years of my life came to an end.

Terry Boyd I am 43 and I have always known David Bowie to be singing he was an iconic singer, and there will never ever be another David Bowie of his kind.

William Lemos David Bowie a true hero

What is it about any of these people – indeed anyone, you or me – that makes one a David Bowie expert? Our facile love of his music? Our hyperbolic connection to his lyrics? Good god, even The New York Times sounded ridiculous in their piece on how Bowie “transcended” music and art. 20160112_BOWIE_HP-slide-DMXR-videoSixteenByNine1050-v2The truth is his music didn’t transcend anything. He was a great musician, and all of this  blather only acts as a depressing testament to how lonely everyone is too scared to admit. 20150820_162923While keeping up to date with each other’s life moments on social media can be a nice thing, as is watching cute red pandas, reflections on the importance of an artist for an individual is irrelevant and utterly pathetic.20151205_162003Someone to claim us, someone to follow
Someone to shame us, some brave Apollo
Someone to fool us, someone like you

We want you Big Brother, Big Brother