I hope this packet finds you well and well-rested and relaxed from your trip to Banff.  At this point last semester, I was on the road hiding from the internet stalker girl from Lousiana.  My camera had not yet arrived because of a little incident of half.com fraud (they took my money, never sent the camera).  I had a dying computer, a backlog of work, and no idea how I was going to pull off the “To Wound” video project in one semester.  Oh, how things change.  I now have the camera, am not presently being stalked by anyone, my computer is working fine, I recently met Mr. McFeely and the Purple Panda from Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood, and I already have more footage taken for this semester’s project than I had until Packet Four last semester.  In terms of Goddard stuff, I feel like I’m in a good place.  In terms of day-to-day life…  Well, yeah.  I get by.  I moved into the new apartment just days after returning from Goddard.  This place is big and echoey and I find myself nailing more and more things to the walls and buying more and more furniture to fill up the place where echoes reside with some semblance of padding.  I’ve been bumped up a notch on the neurochemical scale, so life is very fuzzy and I’ve been quite concerned about not being able to focus enough for this.  Pills numb, but memory remains, made more evident each night at a table two bought at which now only one sits.  There was a tiny overdose a few weeks ago, and I’ve not much wanted to live, but I feel better now.  On with the show.

I’ve not sent a physical packet this time because I don’t yet have anything of substance to show you in terms of video, and because this is just text and images, I thought that I’d just send it via email.  I’ve not included images in this file to reduce transfer time, but I’ve included hyperlinks to pertinent material on my network, including photographs and screen captures of what video footage I have so far.  Because most of my video shots are nearly-still anyways, I’ve created these low-resolution screen caps to give you an idea of what I’m looking at and the kind of images I intend to gather for much of the project.  Later, as I begin to edit these clips together, I’ll start sending you a physical video to look at.

I’ve included in the body of this packet the journal that I’m continuing to write at dyingdays.com.  I started it in June in response to my friend Jacob’s death and Susan’s metaphorical death.  I intend to draw material from this journal for the voiceover segments of my video project.  It’s just about the only writing I’ve done for this packet, so it’s attached.

I’ve not forgotten about sending you a copy of my “To Wound” project.  I’ll also send along a copy of my old [re][surrender] project and the new book.  Sales have been modest; I’m still working on ways to market the book better.  That’s always a pain.

I’ll go through everything that I’ve worked on by medium now.  Take care, Catherine.  Hope to see you online!

Paul.
 

That site includes the still screen captures that I took from video footage shot on location in Philadelphia, Evans Mills, and Syracuse, NY.  I took the footage using a Sony DCR-TRV-740 digital video camera.  The video is edited on a Gateway Solo 9550se using Pinnacle Studio 7.

For these shots, I’ve decided not to use a tripod, instead allowing the natural shaking and bumping of my hands and arms to interact with the images.  I’ve been playing around with the idea of “stillness,” and the way in which I’ve decided to shoot this project could perhaps be a commentary on the concept.  Jacob and I once had a conversation during one of our many bonfires about the busy-ness of life, the constant movement, constant change, constant unfulfilled desire.  I’d been reading the Tao te Ching, and we discussed the concept of finding stillness.  He said that that was all he ever really wanted.  I named his tribute site thestillness.com in honor of that desire, because I sincerely hope that he’s finally found that stillness for which he yearned.

I’ve decided to gather shots of places we’d been to together, gifts that he’d given me, our guitars, the cemetery…  Items that still hold an inherent Jacob-ness to me.  It is my hope that these simple images, when combined with the soundtrack and voiceovers, will let the audience know at least marginally how much he meant to so many.
 

Audio:
I’m currently selecting tracks from Jacob’s considerable body of work (see http://www.thestillness.com/songs.html) to use in the video project.  I don’t have any audio tracks for you to listen to at this time.  I intend to merge several versions of the same song into a single coherent musical gesture.  I’ve also begun relentlessly practicing a song that we wrote together, “Almost There,” to record and use in the project.

Webdesign:
http://www.resurrender.com, http://www.paulevanhughes.com
resurrender.com was once my main personal site, with writing, art, links, resume, bio and contact information.  I’ve begun the process of moving everything but the visual art material to paulevanhughes.com, hoping to create a distinction between my professional life and my artistic pursuits, re-directing potential clients to resurrender.com for the sole purpose of viewing the art.  I’ve neglected resurrender.com for quite some time, so this is a revitalization project on that front and a development project on the paulevanhughes.com front.

http://www.resurrender.net/
Main site motif updated from http://www.resurrender.net/indexOLD8.html to http://www.resurrender.net/index.html.

http://www.dyingdays.com/
Main site motif updated from http://www.dyingdays.com/indexold02.html to http://www.dyingdays.com/indexold03.html.  Special motif designed for 9-11-02 edition: http://www.dyingdays.com/dd91102.html.

http://www.thestillness.com/
Site designed as a tribute to my friend Jacob Pete.  Site will serve as host for files relating to this semester’s video project.  Eventually, I hope to make the video project itself available for download from this site.

http://www.offensemechanism.com/
Still not sure what I want to do with this one…  I’m thinking perhaps a collaborative visual arts site.  For the moment, it stands as a stark frontpage as I test the water with my creative friends to see if they’re interested in participating.  I do hope that our advising group will get in on the fun as well.

http://illout.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=118
The message board I created for the advising group.  I hope it picks up between packets; we could use this as an awesome resource.
 

Reading:
I’ve begun to immerse myself in Sam Delany books.  eBay is an amazing source for out-of-print Delany books and sets.  I acquired six of his science fiction texts from the late sixties for six dollars, including an original paperback version of my beloved Dhalgren.  I also completed The Female Man by Joanna Russ.

Writing:
I’ve done very little writing for this packet other than the below-included stillness journal from dyingdays.com.

My friend Jonathan has a bad habit of asking me if I’ve seen this movie or that movie, to which my answer is inevitably “No.”  One of Jonathan’s main forms of entertainment as a traveling admissions counselor is checking out the latest movies in whatever city he’s visiting.  My inevitable response to his questioning is “I haven’t seen most movies.”  That statement is at once profound, sad, and humorous.  Once upon a time, I’d go out to see a film at least once each week, but for the past few years, I’ve had no desire to go sit in movie theatres all by myself after paying $10 to see a film that might be marginally-entertaining.

Since I am so involved with the online world, you’d think that I would have realized the possibilities that online movie pirating offer for someone with a broadband connection and a giant hard drive.  Just recently, I started downloading entire films in .divx, .avi, and .mpg format from file-sharing services such as Kazaa, Morpheus, and WinMX.  I don’t wish to debate the morality of the pirating debacle; if I view a film that I appreciate, I buy the dvd.

For the past few weeks, I’ve been constantly downloading films that piqued my interest, but that I’d never gotten around to seeing in the theatre.  I must admit, since the year 2000, I’ve only seen “Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within,” “Planet of the Apes,” and “Star Wars: Attack of the Clones” in the actual theatre.  Jonathan was proud of me when I told him I was now catching up on three years of popular entertainment that I had missed.  I do intend this semester to explore the realm of art and independent films, but first I thought that I’d check out what was going on in the realm of popular film.  The results were mixed; I fell in love with some, immediately despised others, but no matter my initial opinion, I forced myself to sit through each film in its entirely.

This is grad school?  I’m watching movies!

The following is an alphabetized list of the films I’ve downloaded and viewed so far this semester, with brief commentary on each.
 

A Beautiful Mind
good.  Recommended to me by Erica, who couldn’t stop talking about it.  She’s a math major.  She said that I reminded her of title character John Nash because I’m too smart and crazy.  Gee, thanks, Erica.  I did appreciate Nash’s mental struggle between reality and his internally-constructed reality.

American History X
good.  Found this film’s portrayal of the white supremacist movement in CA quite disturbing.  I smelled the ending an hour away.  Ballsy film to make.

American Pie 2
ugly.  I guess my personal aesthetic never really included scatological humor.

Austin Powers: Goldmember
bad.  Disappointing because of increased reliance on vulgar humor, recycling of in-jokes, mediocre performances.  Self-referential humor can be brilliant when executed correctly (Spaceballs), but I fear the Austin Powers franchise is turning into one gigantic moneymaking scheme that will continue at least until the audience can ascertain the next line of dialogue by sheer psychic ability.

Blair Witch 2: The Book of Shadows
ugly.  Bad.  Just fucking bad.  The appeal of the first Blair Witch for me rested mainly in the mystery of determining if it was real or entertainment.  The web community and multi-media ad campaigns that accompanied the first film really scared the hell out of me and resulted in the cancellation of a camping trip.  Once the truth was known, once the magic was gone, a self-referential sequel was a mistake.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
good.  The first time I downloaded this file, it had no accompanying sound.  The second time I downloaded this file, it had French subtitles, which don’t help me much.  The third time, I wasn’t expecting much, but the file did in fact work and I did enjoy the film.  It was difficult adjusting to the wire-fighting aesthetic; it just looks too fake for me.  The hand-to-hand fight sequences in this film are the best I’ve ever seen.

Dark City
bad.  In many ways, this film takes elements of The Matrix’s (Matrices’?) plot and executes them even more-successfully than The Matrix, but unfortunately that didn’t make up for Kieffer Sutherland’s annoying portrayal of a doctor with a heart condition and the ridiculous alien antagonists who look like zombies.

Enemy at the Gates
good.  Refreshing to see a WWII film from a viewpoint rather than American.  Still disappointing to hear everyone, both German and Russian, speak with a tentative British accent.

Fight Club
good.  Let’s just say I’d never seen this film before, but the next day I bought the dvd and the next weekend my friends and I played Fight Club at the local Bennigan’s and almost got arrested.  Touches a nerve with my demographic, I suppose.

Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back
good.  I truly appreciate a film that can laugh at itself, or in this case, at the entire Kevin Smith movie franchise.  If you get over the blatant pre-teenage boy fart and shit humor, Smith has created quite a commentary on the Hollywood system.

Jurassic Park 3
ugly.  Bleh.  Same concept recycled over and over and over and over.  Different digital dinosaurs, another kid in trouble, more people dying horribly amidst dino jaws.  Not even Spielberg could have saved this.

Kung Pow: Enter the Fist
ugly.  I’m a big fan of Steve Oedekerk’s film “High Strung,” so I guess I was holding this film up to those standards.  It was a great concept, but poorly executed: taking an old kung fu flick and digitally-inserting modern actors into it, with new dubbed voiceovers.  Reliance on tired, over-used Matrix and Crouching Tiger gags and repetition ad nauseam of dialogue etc. made it less of a film.

Magnolia
good.  Magnolia might be the best film I’ve ever seen.  It touched me on so many levels that it’s hard to explain.  The ensemble cast was filled with extremely talented actors, their respective storylines woven into an overall experience that is crystalline in its merging at the ending.

Memento
good.  This movie immediately entered my Top Ten list.  I’ve never seen a film like it, and how many films can you truly say that about?  Remarkable, playful yet methodical manipulation of converging timelines.

Minority Report
good.  First science fiction film I’ve watched in a long time.  I generally hate the genre.  This had just enough unique and innovative concepts to keep me interested.

One Hour Photo
good.  I think this film was finally released last night in theatres, but because of the magic of piracy, I watched it a few weeks ago, albeit a review copy with an alternate soundtrack composed of bits from “American Beauty,” “Magnolia,” and even a Tindersticks track.  This is the best I’ve ever seen Robin Williams.  Disconcerting, disturbing, beautiful still images and interesting commentary on the nature of memory.

The Others
good.  Wasn’t expecting much, but this film scared the bejesus out of me.  Intimated the ending, and then was proven completely wrong.  I love when that happens.

Pitch Black
bad.  I call it bad, but I really did enjoy it.  I don’t like Vin Diesel (or anyone who becomes a Hollywood pretty-boy overnight), and the other characters were strictly cookie-cutter.  I liked it because…  I don’t know.  Sometimes there’s no explanation for why I enjoy bad movies.  This would make great MST3K material.

Requiem For a Dream
good.  Starkly beautiful portrayal of addiction.  Hit a little too close to home in some scenes, although I’ve never had my arm rot off or had electroshock therapy.  Interesting use of montage, stills, tempo changes.

Resident Evil
ugly.  Video games do not translate well to the big screen, nor should they.

Road to Perdition
good.  Everyone compares every other gangster film to the Godfather series.  This film was definitely no Godfather, and suffered from sappy overacting at many points, but overall an interesting commentary on the nature of crime and criminals.

The Royal Tenenbaums
good.  Ensemble cast, made me laugh.  Sappy in parts, but then it throws the sap right back in your face with biting humor.

Signs
good.  Startling ambiguity culminating in undeniable confirmation of worst fears.

Snatch
good.  I love Guy Ritchie’s crime film style.  Fast-paced, comedic, dark, brutally-violent.

Spiderman
bad.  Let me make this clear: I hate Spiderman.  I always have, ever since an episode of The Electric Company that I saw as a child where Spiderman caught a wild Yeti by luring him into a cage with a series of “frozen ices,” which the Yeti sat on, presumably to chill his hot ass down under the blazing summer sun.  Scarred me for life, but this film was a lot better than I thought it was going to be.

Unbreakable
good.  The first “superhero” film in this list that truly deserves a good rating.  Delves into the nature of survival, fragility versus perseverance, hero worship.

Vanilla Sky
good.  I guess I’m on a “watching films whose endings really fuck with your head” kick with this list.  Another Tom Cruise winner, and I used to hate Tom Cruise’s acting or lack thereof.  Masks…  We all wear them.

XXX
ugly.  This film suffers from what I’ve coined the “Rock” syndrome.  To me, the beginning of the end of action films started with the over-the-top bullshit of “The Rock.”  “Die Hard” started the genre, and was the best action movie ever made, in my opinion.  XXX is one unbelievable scenario after another.  If XXX physics were possible, people could fly to work each day on their motorcycles.

X-Men
bad.  Another comic book-to-film adaptation that just didn’t cut it for me.  Patrick Stewart is no Captain Picard as Prof. X.  Sigh.

 
G2 Packet 01 Resource List

Butler, Octavia. Xenogenesis. New York: Guild America Books, 1987.
• I’ve begun re-reading this book, which I first encountered probably ten years ago.  I remember being and still am fascinated by Butler’s vision of a species with not two but three distinct sexes, and the relationships that form between various permutations of these aliens and humans.

Delany, Samuel R. Driftglass. Garden City, NY: Nelson Doubleday, 1971.
• Trying to make myself more-familiar with Delany’s science fiction work beyond Dhalgren.  This short story collection ranges from the fringe of the galaxy to a psuedo-Greek island.  I could even sense the foreshadowings of Dhalgren in several of the shorts: hologram-projecting jewelry, lost cities, people without a past.

Delany, Samuel R. The Jewel-Hinged Jaw: Essays on Science Fiction. New York: Berkley Windhover, 1977.
• Searched for weeks before finally coming across a copy of this out-of-print book on eBay.  I paid probably a little too much for it, but I’m so glad I did.  A collection of Delany’s essays, this book covers everything from sex at teenage summer camp to his philosophies of good science fiction to writing technique to in-depth analyses of his contemporaries’ science fiction work.  As a science fiction author myself, it was heartening to read Delany defend the genre as a legitimate and valuable form of literature.  Learning how he first became interested in sf (childhood visits to the matinee with his father, pulp magazine) and how he began writing at such an early age in many ways parallels my own experience.  As I learn more about the man, I’m beginning to appreciate his work even more and respect him even more as a writer conscious of his unique position as a black, homosexual science fiction/queer theory author.  Just a few years ago, I can shamefully say that this particular young white heterosexual male from the sticks of northern New York would never have considered reading something from that particular demographic.  Delany has opened my eyes and my heart.

Delany, Samuel R. The Motion of Light In Water: Sex and Science Fiction Writing in the East Village, 1957-1965. New York: Arbor House/W. Morrow, 1988.
• I’ve just begun this book, but I can already recognize anecdotal tie-ins with the above-mentioned Jaw.  It is interesting to read different versions of the same story, particularly his experiences at summer camp.  I am struck by Delany’s analysis of memory, in particular in his memory of his father’s death.  I discussed this earlier on our message board.

Russ, Joanna.  The Female Man. Boston: Beacon Press, 1986, 1975.
• Four women from four different worlds are joined together by a war across time and space.  Russ seamlessly created a coherent merging of four points of view.  Confusing at times, often sarcastic and humorous, truly touched me at a level that had never truly understood the (for lack of a better term) feminist viewpoint.  Reading Jaw offered me more insight into Russ’s talent via Delany’s commentary.  This is truly refreshing science fiction that I never before knew existed.  This is the kind of book that I aspire to write.