the greatest distraction

THE BEAUTIFUL GIRL IN THE BEAUTIFUL PICTURE

Appears to be Devon Aoki. I am unsure who is responsible for the perfection of the shot; I don’t know who took the
picture or who worked the wonders of the details that the picture contains. The image of course is a loveliness and
the hair especially is a dream.

ART IS A LIE THAT MAKES US REALIZE TRUTH

STORY — Anton Chekhov. The Duel

FILM — Apichatpong Weerasethakul. Syndromes and a Century

BOOK — Haruki Murakami. Norwegian Wood

SONG — Of Porcelain. The Greatest Distraction

EXCITING.1

Norwegian Wood has been adapted into a film to be released this fall and stars Rinko Kikuchi as Naoko. This film has chances then to be as quietly devastating and beautifully restrained as the book is. Norwegian Wood is not my favourite Murakami but I did really love and admire it: Murakami’s writing often is a a kind of slow hypnosis, the worlds he creates are lonely, sleepy and surreal. Norwegian Wood might be his most honest and most personal work and it ends with such mesmerizing inconconclusiveness that the whole weight of sadness and beauty contained in the story is delivered hauntingly and most fully in the final line.

EXCITING.2

The Brief Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao is also going to be made into a film and I hope it will at the very least do the book sufficient justice. Walter Salles is directing the film and while I’m not overly familiar with his work as a director, I did enjoy both The Motorcycle Diaries and Linha de Passe. Generally it seems Salles’ films are beautiful to look at,
the camera work and moving photography always are excellent and gorgeously very precise. He at least is visibly competent, I just hope everything else falls flawlessly into place. I’m curious to know who will be cast as Yunior, Lola and particularly: who will be Oscar. I’m sure Junot Díaz is similarly curious [though he’s probably as ’worried’ as he is excited].