I love J.G. Ballard.
Continue readingJ.G. Ballard: Kingdom Come
Posted in Reading, Real Men with tags book-reviews, books, Crash, David Cronenberg, Empire of the Sun, Fiction, Five Books, J.G. Ballard, Jeff Buckley, Joyce Carey, Kingdom Come, Marquis de Sade, reading, Robert Plant, Running Wild, Steven Spielberg, The Atrocity Exhibition, writing on June 5, 2025 by Jarrod Boyle
Pussytown: Denis Villeneuve punks out on Blade Runner 2049
Posted in Film, Pretensions toward cultural theory, Real Men with tags Anais Nin, art, Blade Runner 2049, books, Denis Villeneuve, Dune, education, Film, Hans Christian Andersen, K, Kafka, Peckinpah, Replicant, Sara Stewart, Simone De Beauvoir, Steadfast Tin Soldier, The Castle, Vanity Fair, Verhoeven, writing on April 25, 2025 by Jarrod Boyle
‘You’ll love the new Blade Runner – unless you’re a woman.’
- Sara Stewart, New York Post, Oct 4, 2017
There was much ‘feminist’ criticism of Blade Runner 2049. I found it almost as astonishing as the pissweak rejoinder from its director, Denis Villeneuve in Vanity Fair, November 25, 2017:
“Blade Runner is not about tomorrow; it’s about today. And I’m sorry, but the world is not kind on women.”
My question is: what the fuck kind of film did Sara watch? And why doesn’t Villeneuve have the balls to stand up and defend the film he made?
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The Magic Mountain
Posted in Reading with tags book-review, books, Dickens, Dosteyevsky, Fiction, Judi Dench, literature, Nobel Proze, Pavel Tsatsouline, reading, Shakespeare, Sonnet 26, The Graham Norton Show, The Magic Mountain, Thomas Mann, Tolstoy, War and Peace on March 26, 2025 by Jarrod Boyle
The internet is like having a giant bilge pipe mounted above the armchair in your lounge room with all kinds of garbage gushing out of it. There is hardly a moment to take stock and discriminate amongst the torrent of what’s raining down upon you.
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The Duel
Posted in The Duel with tags ants, bible, boaz, faith, naomi, Pike Bishop, Russel Hoban, ruth, scorpions, The Lion of Boaz-Jachin and Jachin-Boaz, The Wild Bunch, William Holden on November 18, 2024 by Jarrod Boyle
The End
2.
The oldest of them stepped forward and struck me on the chest with an open palm. Confident and aggressive.
‘We saw you walking up the beach,’ he said, smiling.
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The Duel
Posted in The Duel with tags James Ellroy, Yukio Mishima on November 9, 2024 by Jarrod Boyle
The End
1.
‘Perfect purity is possible if you turn your life into a line of poetry written with a splash of blood.’
– Yukio Mishima.
You imagine certain things when you see a beach like this.
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The Substance
Posted in Film, Pretensions toward cultural theory with tags Brian De Palma, Coralie Fargeat, Demi Moore, Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Ellsworth Kelly, Franz Kafka, horror, I Spit on Your Grave, Margaret Qualley, metamorphosis, Revenge, surrealism, The Night Porter, The Substance on October 6, 2024 by Jarrod Boyle
The Talented Mr. Ripley
Posted in Film, Real Men with tags bath, Dickie Greenleaf, Jude Law, Matt Damon, mirror, Narcissus, Patricia Highsmith, psychoanalysis, reflection, The Talented Mr Ripley, Tom Ripley on August 30, 2024 by Jarrod Boyle
Part of what makes The Talented Mr Ripley so effective is the casting of Matt Damon in the lead. Most of us have been in his position; awkward, insecure and in awe of someone like Dickie Greenleaf, played by the never better Jude Law.
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When the Kite String Pops
Posted in Music with tags Alice in Chains, John Wayne Gacy, Nick Cave, Pogo the Clown, Slayer, The Blue, When the Kite String Pops on July 26, 2024 by Jarrod Boyle
The debut album by the band Acid Bath, ‘When the Kite String Pops,’ features a painting of a clown by the serial killer John Wayne Gacy. Rumour is that it was forced on the band by the record company, but it’s definitely the right cover.
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Americans, Scorpions and Ants
Posted in Fiction, Film with tags A Farewell to Arms, a Revolution in Hollywood and the making of a Legendary Film, ants, Camille Paglia, Coppola, De Palma, Emilio Fernandez, Ernest Hemingway, Pike Bishop, Sam Peckinpah, scorpions, Scorsese, The Wild Bunch, The Wild Bunch: Sam Peckinpah, W.K. Stratton, Warner Brothers, William Holden on June 30, 2024 by Jarrod Boyle
2.
The governing metaphor of Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch is impressed on both protagonist and audience alike in the first moments of the film.
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Americans, Scorpions and Ants
Posted in Fiction, Film with tags A Farewell to Arms, A Mouthful of Stones, Americans, ants, Ernest Hemingway, For Whom the Bell Tolls, Frederic Henry, Hadji Murat, Leo Tolstoy, scorpions, War and Peace on June 20, 2024 by Jarrod Boyle
1.
“If people bring so much courage to this world the world has to kill them to break them, so of course it kills them. The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the broken places. But those that will not break it kills. It kills the very good and the very gentle and the very brave impartially. If you are none of these you can be sure it will kill you too but there will be no special hurry.”
― Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms
Theme Park at its Darkest 