Ghost Cat, Is That You?

Living with cats can often feel like living with ghosts, especially when they learn to open doors. It used to be unsettling to look across the apartment and see a door seemingly open and close by itself, but now it's just like living out the second half of a movie about the Invisible Man and his roommate. I have come to terms with my unusual circumstances, and we have a routine now.

Our apartment is on the second floor of a small house in Bay View on the south side of Milwaukee. Sometimes I hear foot steps on the stairs that lead up to our flat, but when no one materializes at the top of the stairs I realize that,Hegel, named for the 18th century German philosopher, or Murs, named for the twenty-first century gangsta rapper, have had one over on me again. Not that they have any idea what kind of Ghostbusters/Ghost Dad scenarios they create. They only know that they have no yard to run in or wild creatures to hunt. So they hunt each other around our one bedroom apartment, occasionally bumping into a coffee mug or candlestick. When I look to see who is there, all that remains is the spinning cup or a toppled ornament and a spire of smoke. Almost as if some paranormal prankster were trying to make me think I was hallucinating.

"But I'm telling you, officer, someone is lurking around in my home causing all kinds of ruckus. The individual is either incredibly sneaky or returned from the dead to conclude the unfinished business of scaring the begeesus out of me. You don't happen to know if an assistant professor of Art History, overcome with grief over repeated career disappointments, committed suicide in this apartment, because this spook seems to hate my sister-in-law's Pop Art. The same painting has fallen of the wall six times this week. I'm afraid my she is going to notice the wood glue bubbles oozing out of the cracked frame next time she comes over for dinner."

Still, even when I cannot see my feline roommates it is nice to be reminded of their presence by a constant thumping of books being knocked off the book shelf, the scattering of our mail all over the dinner table and surrounding floor or a cry like the restless spirit of an unwanted child thrown off a bridge many years ago.

Hunger

Today I felt a hunger that was not unlike starvation or a hypoglycemic fit, which left me shaking and uneasy--even a little panicked. This is not the first of these episodes I have experienced, and I cannot say why I have never had myself examined by a doctor or at least asked for advice. Being the sensible person I am, I can only reconcile the absurdity of feeling ravenous a mere four hours after breakfast, with a psychological explanation. The idea that I am actually starving being too far-fetched to me. Even hypoglycemia seems to complex an explanation to survive Ockham's discriminant blade.

Regardless, it is at times like these that I find the thought of picky eaters most repulsive. I have no use for those who will altogether reject a particular food because of one single ingredient. I hate raisins. There flavor is completely offensive to my pallet. But if someone offers me oatmeal raisin cookies I will accept with both hands held out, as thankfully as if it were my final communion. I love food. If someone wants to offer me additional options to increase the amount of food I may have for no extra charge I am not going to refuse. I will never conclude a restaurant order with the phrase, "...hold the _____." If they'll add onions or cheese or even fucking sesame seeds for free, I will take them.

In a moment of perceived, irrational trepidation, when I feel that jittery pang wash over me, and my paces begins to clumsily overlap, my mind wanders to the last time I turned down food, not wanting to appear pathetic or greedy to my companions who have forgotten their starving college years. I think of how stupid and overly self conscious I was. If only I had seized the opportunity for a prepared feast, free of charge, I would not be suffering now. I would be satiated and content. Never mind the fact that this probably occurred weeks ago. The satisfaction of that late lunch or late-night snack would have passed, and I would still have this aching in my gut, this hollow-ness. I would still be pawing this very moment at the carb-shaped hole in my soul, longing for the sweat relief of a pita stuffed with lettuce and lamb or a boston cream donut. Oh regret.

Revolver

Today I watched Guy Ritchies latest film, "Revolver". While this movie resembles Ritchie's other works, save "Swept Away," set in the seedy criminal underworld, this time Ritchie adds a Freudian twist. Borrowing the words of many psychologists, who are given exhibition in the credits, Ritchie tells the metaphysical emancipation story of gambler and recent ex-con, Jake, played by Jason Statham, who seems to be good for nothing if he is not in a Ritchie movie. Jake is riding high having made a killing at casinos, since his release from prison. He has spent 7 years solitary confinement--five of those years were spent between the cells of two con men, who play chess and share professional ideas via the pages of prison library books. Jake gets in on the conversation, and, while he gets a grifter's Ph.D. he also shares the location of his nest egg for when he gets out. Two years after his mentors escape prison without him, he returns to the crime boss, Macha, Ray Liotta, whose freedom he maintained by serving time, looking for payback.

Once Jake publicly humiliates Macha and takes him for a large sum, Jake takes a spill and ends up in the hospital where he is diagnosed with a rare blood disease leaving him only weeks to live. Just before the fall Jake was approached by a stranger, Vincent Pastore, offering a prophetic business card. The stranger, after returning to rescue Jake from an ambush, set up by Macha, reveals himself to be a lone shark, who, along with partner, Andre Benjamin, will provide Jake revenge on Macha and protection on the condition that he give them all the money he has.

Revolver is, unsurprisingly, a highly stylized crime/heist movie with strong performances from Pastore, Benjamin and Liotta. Statham also holds his own. Now if he could just deliver this performance to another director, or, at least offer it to a director who deserves it. While all the shine and grime we have come to expect from Guy Ritchie is present, he goes overboard a little with the voices in the head scenes that leave the viewer wondering if they are supposed to recognize two voices or three. Revolver looks at an area of psychology that would sound hokey if it were not within a story of killers and crooks. This grunges up the concept just enough to obscure Madonna's kooky influence on the story.

It's no "Abre Los Ojos," but Revolver succeeds at keeping your attention, while making you think. I suggest a second viewing just to catch up on what you misunderstood the first time through.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

The most striking feature of "The Curious Case of Benjamin Buttons" is the special effects used to make Brad Pitt look like a seven-year-old boy that looks like an eighty-year-old man. I feel relieved that this story was not attempted by the Sci-Fi Channel or some other third-rate joke of a cable channel. This movie could not have been made ten or even five years ago, at least not without having the mood of the film diluted by hammy CGI. More amazing still is the level to which Brad Pitt performs an impossible role. Sure Mark Hammill had to pretend that he had a laser on the end of that stick, but Brad Pitt had pretend he was a miniature old man, who wanted nothing more than to play like other six-year-olds his own age. I realize I am cramming a lot of contradictions into one paragraph, and if you do not know anything about this movie, check it out before continuing. For those who do know something about this "curious" tale, see this movie. It is visually stunning and heart-breaking--two words often used to describe adaptations of F. Scott Fitzgerald's works, but this is no Great Gatsby. This is surrealist fantasy on the level of H.P. Lovecraft or even Stephen King. And the horror is this tale is not visceral, besides the site of a rinkled newborn, but instead, psychological and metaphysical. I cannot escape the suspicion that this story informed Audrey Neffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife, which deals with a similar love relationship that is limited by incongruent paths of the character through time. The love story is none-the-less sufficient and satisfying for the purposes of the story.

My one qualm with this story is the event in which the aged Daisy cheats on her husband with Benjamin, when he returns to visit her after a long estrangement. Benjamin returns looking to be in his twenties and actually meets Daisy's daughter and husband. While I can certainly understand the temptation to continue the affair, especially on Daisy's part, considering Brad Pitt looks like he did in Thelma and Louise, a grown woman feeling as if the only way to find closure with the love of her life is to sleep with him, seems terribly naive and immature. It is enough that she will spend the rest of her life loving a man with whom she cannot be, but she has placed an infidelity and a pernicious weight atop her marriage. A weight that cannot help but have a lasting effect on her marital relationship. I guess some would see this as a brave and empowering act carried out by a strong woman, but I cannot see it in that light no matter what angle from which I approach the situation.

One qualm aside this film is worth seeing, if only for the sheer movie magic of it all. This movie captures what is grand and commendably indulgent about cinema. It depicts real emotion and humanity inside a world of fantastic fiction that leaves one dazzled as they exit the cinema.