:: Dillondesk -- the blog of LCD ::

:: Tuesday, January 18, 2005 ::

:: Calvin 11:59 AM [+] ::

I am very tired. Had a hard time sleeping last night -- not sure why but I was nervous about school.

Things always go smashingly -- the kids are all having fun and they work quite hard.

The reading is going to be a challenge with a few of them, but such is life.

I talked to Lauren -- my friend who had her screening appointment last week -- she said it was not that bad, and she gave me some pointers. For her interview there were eight people, and each one asked a question from one of the areas of administrative responsibility. Now I know what I need to review -- it sounds like someone asked her about the achievement gap and what she has done to address it, so I am all over that one -- I just need to be careful to limit my answers.

Hope everyone was warm enough last night -- I actually had REAL ICE on my windshield this morning.

This afternoon I will head to Bealls to get a shirt for Thursday (I might have to return it tomorrow if it does not pass the lovely wife test, so that gives me some time).

Five peeps. Tired and ready to go home already Fu. Wishing I had enough books and did not have to make copies Fu. Ending this post so I can go eat lunch Fu.

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:: Sunday, January 16, 2005 ::

:: Calvin 1:05 PM [+] ::

I don't often disagree with Roger Ebert about movies; the man's reverence for Star Wars and the brothers Coen rivals my own.

But I have toi disagree with him about Napoleon Dynamite. He gave it one and half stars and said that the folks who laughed at Sundance in watching the film "I'm told the movie was greeted at Sundance with lots of laughter, but then Sundance audiences are concerned with being cool, and to sit through this film in depressed silence would not be cool, however urgently it might be appropriate."

While my lovely wife might agree with this assessment, I vehementally oppose it. Speaking as one who spent most of his scholastic academic career on the fringes of actual human interaction, I can readily identify with the sense of "cool" that Napoleon possesses and directs his life by.

The best scene in the film for me is not the dance scene (though Ebert totally missed the boat when he called it clowning -- it is Napoleon's moment to step up and be Pedro's friend, and lose himself in the coolness of Jamiroquai).

By far the best scene is that of the thrift store shopping expedition that ends with our hero wearing the coolest brown three-piece suit in existence. Fade to the dance where he is left to flower against the wall by the cruel Trisha who fails to see the coolness within the hero, and that priceless moment when he fluff's Deb's sleeves and she tells him he made them herself.

The movie is really about accepting who you are and refusing to change in order to belong. It is not about exacting revenge against popular people (Heathers, Welcome to the Dollhouse), being the coolest nerd of the face of the planet (Real Genius) or unrealistically winning over teeming multitudes of both nerds and popular folks (Revenge of the Nerds) or even, as Ebert believes about Napoleon, demeaning yourself for laughs because that is the only recourse you have as one who does not quite fit in.

Napoleon operates outside the circles of the popular kids; he has his own perspective on what is cool (the suit, claiming he has nunchucks in his locker --mispronounced "numchucks-- in true nerd fashion), and sometimes his coolness transcends his situations and makes those around him even envy him a little bit (Napoleon -- gimme some of your tots!)

He sees the beauty that is possible around him, and helps his friends see it within themselves.

We laugh not because we are afraid of not being cool, but because we recognize how cool it is to believe you are cool, no matter how uncoola nd cruel the outside world might be. We laugh because in Napoleon, we have the truest cinematic depiction of nerdness I have personally ever seen. Too often, filmmakers sacrifice verisimilitude in the geek world for happy endings and unrealistic messages desgined to bolster the confidence of those who get shoved into lockers and receive rejection and cruelty as a matter of course. Napoleon is unapologetically free of conventional wisdom; his journey brings him full circle back to the tetherball court, where he is the master of his domain, and he can do "whatever he feels like, GOSH!!" He strikes me as the kind of guy who would feel right at home in his Jedi cloak at Best Buy picking up his copy of the original trilogy. :)

I don't need my nerds to get revenge or dress up nice for prom and get the girl. I want them in their brown suits inexplicably trailing action figures with monofilament out of the back of the bus and feeding their llamas ham.

If you haven't seen Napoleon Dynamite yet, I do believe you should. It's totally sweet.

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