Continued list of amazing actors...

Well, I promised I'd add more to the list. I wrote down many more guys, but here are a few that have captured my heart (and they can actually act, not look pretty!)

First off,

A Mexican actor. (Trying to get everywhere around the world)
Gael Garcia Bernal

This actor is a phenomenal star todo el mundo (all of the world-- thought I'd put some Spanish in it.) He has worked all around the world, with small films to major features. Examples of these fantastic films are The Motorcycle Diaries (Ernesto Guevara's beginnings aka Che), and a young teenager whom with his friend, Tenoch (Diego Luna-- Milk) take a road trip with an older woman where they learn about life, Y Tu Mama Tambien directed by Alfonso Cuaron (A Little Princess-- amazing children's film, that I still love! So glad my 6th grade teacher had us watch it) Gael has played such a variety of roles, from a overstimulated, fantasy driven art student in Science of Sleep (which my brother had me watch because of the creativity and odd imagery), which was amazing, he spoke 3 different languages for it, English, Spanish and even some French. He also starred in the production, Babel, a more mainstream job. Very well done. Pretty great, Gael is still early in his career, at 31, who still has a lot to offer and has shown his talent.

Another actor that I admire. James Franco, now I don't know who caught him as a host for Saturday Night Live last night, which was hilarious by the way. And I don't watch the show regularly.

I knew of his other work before Pineapple Express (which surprisingly loved him being a pot dealer) or Spider-man, he has captured my heart doing the movies as Tristan + Isolde (an Irish version of Romeo and Juliet-- liked that more, and in school we were reading the original), and James Dean-- he did fantastically, at certain points during the film, I thought it was the real James on screen, but it James Franco. He (J.F.) worked his butt off in everything he does. He also has done Flyboys and learned to fly an airplane, Sonny, where he plays a solider coming back to New Orleans, his hometown to being a male prostitute, who has to try to leave that life behind. Very touching, film directed by Nicolas Cage. Before that role, he played a drug addict, and teenage deliquent as Jimmy with DeNiro playing his dad as a cop. A great crime-drama. He can play anything one can dish out, with all energy and effort. And is soon to be playing Allen Ginsberg in Howl. Can't wait to see it! Especially with my love of Beat stuff.

Another fantastic actor,
River Phoenix.

I've only seen 2 of his works, but those are enough for this post. In Stand by Me, he plays a young boy who is a complete bad boy, who smokes, really doesn't have parents, but is the best of friend to a boy who is innocent in many things, well sort of. He does that fantastically, and he pulls you into his role. The other role was My Own Private Idaho, which I've written about before, and it is a great film done by Gus Van Sant, who I respect very much, and this film is a very complex piece of work and he is one of the most vital characters in this. His performance is jaw-dropping, and a inspiring piece of cinematic work.

I know it's only a few...more later.
Included: Marlon Brando, and others.
I'll do my favorite actresses soon to. :)

Sondre Lerche: Norway's Singer-Songwriter

Sondre Lerche is a singer-songwriter who is amazing, and can capture an audience with either his live serenades or a recorded wonder. He mixes a simple troubadour style with delightful beats with cheerful lyrics. I heard of him through a friend, and am grateful because now I adore his music. I love Heartbeat Radio, his recent album filled with acoustic pop and sarcastic songs that remind me of Tom Wait's trickery. That makes me happy that someone is keeping that tradition alive. He also got some of his recent fame in creating the entire soundtrack for Dan in Real Life, which I have yet to see and hear. He is adorable, and can capture girls hearts worldwide. His simple lyrics, that say so much that can make one hopeful, giggly, or just warm your heart that there is still a guy like that out there. :)

But girls (and maybe guys)...he is married, happily. Darn it! LOL

Well, back to actually talking about his music, he is still relatively unknown, and I guess that's part of why he is so special. Only a few of my friends listen to him, and it's like a separate clique who knows what we are talking about. His live songs are amazing. He's done a few duets, two with Regina Spektor, "Hell No", and "Modern Nature."

A guy with a guitar, simple as that. Everyone love simplicity at some point in their lives.

Florence + The Machine

I first heard of Florence on a YouTube trail-- from Joy Division. Weird right? I've became addicted and I have grown to love her style. She somehow embodies a spitfire facade, with dark, morbid lyrics, and then your listening and have a smile on your face. Florence has only created one CD, Lungs, filled with songs from one end of the spectrum to the other. A pop song about a coffin builder to a song that was in New Moon? Odd. But I don't care. Part of why I love her.
Her voice is so strong, and she can hit notes fantastically. This redhead can sing!

She's been a part of a few bands back in Camberwell (hometown), but this is where she hit it big. Florence has had critical acclaim, in England and in the US. She was on the list in Rolling Stone to look out for her. Funny thing is, I receive that subscription and never noticed it. Found her on my YouTube.

Florence's songs know how to transport you to a new world, and throw you back again. But yet you become addicted to that place along the way. I have found her to be fantastic, and it's only a debut album! Can't wait to hear what she comes up with next :)

Mix tapes and CDs

Ok, has anyone seen High Fidelity? You know when Rob goes to make a mix tape for a friend. How it's a delicate process. I've just undergone this. Being a music lover, it's surprising that I've never really made one before.

I tried to combine artists like The Beatles, Stevie Wonder, Blondie with some girl pop-- Kelly Clarkson, Duffy and of course I had to represent some local bands I knew, or listened for a while...those bands being Chicago's Oh My God, and Breathing Underwater. Harder than it looks, and also try to fit all these amazing songs onto one CD. Now that's a challenge. This was for my younger cousin, by the way.

I had to delete song songs, some fillers and helpers to the transistion songs. It somehow sounds fine.

It's the first time I ever made one. It is so much fun, revisiting all the music you've loved during your musical love again...
Forgot about some great artists.

It's fun, choosing songs for a person that'd you'd like to send them.

Music really is the greatest thing. I was talking with a few friends at the time, having a YouTube video recommendation war for about an hour...very fun. I was also talking to a friend of mine that's a musician-- about love of music. Making mix CDs reminds me of it.

Everyone should make one at some point in their lives.

"...if you ever get lonely, just go to the record store and visit your friends."

Penny Lane of Almost Famous

Perks of Being a Wallflower

This book I read in 3 days. 3 days. Now most books take me at least a month to read unless required by school. And sometimes it takes me that long even if I do like the book. But every once and a while there is a book that I read, and read quickly. This book is an example of that.

It is written by Stephen Chbosky, an independent filmmaker (Four Corners of Nowhere) about this boy named Charlie who writes letters to some anonymous person or the reader of this novel. He writes about his life, friends, and life in high school. Seems like several teen books...right? Well, your assumptions are all wrong. This book is filled with great humor, and somehow seems to understand the teenage mind and it covers everything that most high schoolers go through, with such grace and honesty. It also references some of the best music, and film. (In my opinion) Charlie writes about meeting his friends, Patrick and Sam, and going to The Rocky Horror Picture Show with them, and all the costumes. And driving in the backseat of the truckbed listening to music that makes him feel "infinite" while in a tunnel. There's a lot of amazing moments in this book, so I just suggest reading it. It grabbed my heart by the end of Part 1.

I read this on a snow day, when there wasn't much snow. And that's what we call ironic. But I was talking to friends while reading, then decided around Part 3 I was going to listen to the mix Charlie created. It starts out with Asleep by The Smiths, amazing song, by the way. I found the song on YouTube and started to go down the list. Amazing, how the words of the book and the lyrics and tone/mood of the songs fit. They carried the feelings Perks had, but with music. It left me awe-struck and made me read more. I suggest reading this way. It is just better. I then switched to my own favorite music, and it still went with the book. It was so good.

I had a conversation with my friend because I mentioned his film which I wanted to see, and she was upset about how her favorite books never turn into good movies. They never do it justice. For a film lover, I do not want this book ever turned into a film. I like it in my imagination, it could never be better than what I imagine his family, friends, high school looks like. Wendy also mentioned that that was an "awesome book" and "now I have to listen to the Smiths." I completely agree. This book is awesome, and shouldn't be touched. I laughed while reading, and cried a bit too...fantastic. Another friend of mine (Lee) wrote how he looked up the playlist on YouTube also. I was listening to The Smith's song for the first time. It's an amazing book. This little post doesn't do it justice either. But I'm trying. This book is now in my favorites.

The music, the references, the style of writing, all of it is part of why it is so great. I love this book. I want to own a copy and own all the music and the the films referenced. The stories will forever live in my heart, and there are certain parts that will stick in your brain forever. It is well-written story of growing up, and the process of it. And it's not traditional, but that is why I love it.

Thanks for all the people who told me this book was great, I'm glad I picked it up.

5, well 6 Times Where I Wish I Was Alive...

You know, the times or places where movements started, seen the stuff people have seen, but yet you weren't even conceived or your parents weren't even born yet. Ya, this is the list for you. And it reminds me of John Cusack in High Fidelity with all his Top 5 lists. These are in no perticular order because then I'd never have a list.

1. Camden Town, London, mid 70's

I wish I was alive during the British punk revolution, going to "Sex" and see the original Sex Pistol's members hanging out. Then The Clash, oh my. My favorite "band," not artist. They are pure amazing, and would have loved to hear them live. I can't believe my parents never went to their concerts when they played. But then they were "too punk" for them. I guess who knew how amazing they would be. Their songs mattered, and still do. I was watching Let's Rock Again! and a fan coming out of the Mascaleros concert, thanked Joe for writing "The Call Up", that's why he didn't enlist. Now what other rock stars receive that kind of thank you? He is forever missed, and I wished I knew them, and could have hung out with them before and after they became a band. The movement still goes on today, it can relate to anyone. I so wish I was there..

2. The Village, NYC. San Fransisco, CA. 1956

The Beat times. My favorite time in literature. It was on both coasts, both so similar and so different. I love Jack Kerouac, and Neil Cassidy, Allen Ginsberg. From the stories, poetry readings, hitchhiking (which was more acceptable then)...to just hanging out with them in the stingy apartments with the typewriter's keys making rhythms of the writer creating a manuscript at four a'clock in the morning, with everyone asleep on the floor with unfinished paintings, photographs hanging from the ceiling...with jazz records put on repeat. Take me there! And let's go on a road trip in a broken down station wagon for the heck of it. Ya. I've always loved movies like that. And because of Tom Waits, and Bob Dylan I will forever love these ideas. Really need to re-read On the Road again.

"Here's to the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes...the ones who see things differently -- they're not fond of rules... You can quote them, glorify and vilify them, but the only thing you can't do is ignore them because they change things... they push the human race forward, and while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius, because the ones who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do." - Jack Kerouac

"Our battered suitcases were piled on the sidewalk again; we had longer ways to go. But no matter, the road is life." -Jack Kerouac

"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked..." Howl

"Fortunately art is a community effort-- a small and select community living in a spiritualized world endeavoring to interpret the wars and the solitudes of the flesh." -Allen Ginsberg

3. Italy/France, early 60's...

Well, this one is two places in one. I could split them up, but I'm not quite sure how. Fellini. as I was saying to my brother on my phone "I would bow down to this man, metaphorically and literally...I'd actually stand there dumbstruck." He is my film god. I adore everything this man has done. 8 1/2 started it all and I am now going through every film he's ever done. I'd watch the old film reels from the archive if that's the only copies of his films. His imagery still leaves me breathless.

Then the French, I'm into a lot of early 60's French New Wave films. I also am into the contemporary scene too...Paris, Je T'aime, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Amelie, A Very Long Engagement...(mainly because of my celebrity crush on Gaspard...but it's amazing).

I also have seen Umbrellas of Cherbourg (known to be a film where every line is sung-- it is), and about an hour and ten minutes of Jules et Jim. I love what I have seen, but every copy I have gotten has been all messed up during a vital scene. It's all so beautiful, in black and white, where people dressed up for everyday. And cool old bicycles is how they came to and fro into the countryside and city. And people knew art, and argued about culture and interpretations...things were so different then. The French always seem to beat us out way too many times. I am going to find a way to study film in France, their films are so amazing, from whatever time they come from.

4. Woodstock, NY 1969.

Yes, all of the best music, free love, peace. A idealized world that the hippies dreamed of. Well, I have hippy mindset..."high on life"...

All of the GREAT music played there, from Santana, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jefferson Airplane...that's the music I grew up listening to because my dad is a classic rock guy. I grew up listening to these legends, so therefore most modern music has got to live up to these people, and sadly it does not. But the band that got me into music was The Beatles..and my taste just continues to evolve...

If I was alive, I would have found a way to go...and all the great 60's films. aka Hair, Billy Jack, etc.

Donovan's "Colours" and "Catch the Wind" playing in background..so fits the mood.

5. New York, 60's

All the culture, the mecca that is New York City. So much culture and places I want to go...ya, the normal tourist places, but yet I still want to go there. The Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island (I loved learning about that in elementary school and now...), Times Square...

But I really want to go to the Village, explore. Find all the old apartments of my heroes, and find all that culture. Joe Strummer's memorial, Imagine memorial (I read a book where a girl goes there and sees a man that looks like John Lennon...Harley, btw. Have to go), then the places where the Beats lived. And Brooklyn, Andy Warhol's old hangouts, the big city vibe that I adore so much. Sick of living in country land. It's beautiful, but I like old buildings instead of farm land with combines sitting in dead leaves of corn plants. I just plain love the 60's, jealous of everyone who was alive then.

6. Fairmount, Indiana late 1940's

James. Dean. James Dean. My hero, who I can't describe why. I've been asked, and I always reply with I'm not quite sure, he just is. is. my hero. I read what he loved, and contemplate his life, with posters of him all around my room. Rebel Without a Cause is by far my favorite, but I love anything this man has ever touched. I wish I knew him before he was famous, back in Indiana..I wish to see his gravesite, see his school, and walk the streets he walked...and put a rose on his tombstone. James or Jimmy Dean is so inspiring...

Control

Ok, I read a short posting on another blog, about this film. It showed some stills from the film and seemed good. Let me tell you, it was amazing. It's now on my list to own.

It's a "rockumentary" and biopic, except it has no interviews, pictures of the band, or really any dedications to lost band members. Control is based on a biography of Ian Curtis, written by his wife Debbie. He was the lead singer of "Joy Division," a post-punk alternative band. Now I have only heard of this band a few times, I'm thinking from all The Clash reading I've done.

Ian Curtis is a writer, a lyricist inspired by Bowie, the 60's (it shows Howl and other major works of the times) on his shelf. He finds a band (Warsaw) at a Sex Pistols gig and starts singing showing off his skill using words and instruments creating a new sound that became a movement in Manchester in the late 1970's.

This film was shot so beautifully, in black and white. It was just beautiful, and it put you in the picture and felt his emotion, and everyone elses. It was a tad creepy seeing a character look like a guy I've met. It was directed by Anton Corbijn, a rock photographer, and music video director.

Sam Riley, of 10,000 Things is the actor portraying Ian Curtis and does a fantastic job. It is more about his true life, not what the media portrayed him. The true, depressed, confused man...which eventually led to his suicide. Now every great rock musician dies. Yet some are living legends, but he was no hero by any stretch of the imagination. He was merely himself. I have now listened to all major songs by Joy Division and now a fan. Because of this film.

This film shows the frustration and confusion he had with his two loves, after marring Deb young, and figuring out the marriage was not working and that he was not a good father to his young daughter, Natalie and the hard decisions he had to make. Ian then met a young Belgian embassy worker, part rock journalist named Aniuk who steals his heart. This is one of the best films that shows true confusion and Sam Riley had a fantastic independent debut. He also being in the band "10,000 Things" also helped. Fantastic job, there are some well known actors performances that don't make me cry, and that did.

Favorite song: She's Lost Control. Great song, fits the mood of the entire film. It's so good.

Shot beautifully, with the black and white of Jim Jarmusch's Coffee and Cigarettes, and Down By Law (both films I adore), this man is so cool. Listen to his commentary on Down By Law and you will agree.

I'm talking to one of my friends about this band..well as I've been writing this YouTube videos have been playing. Addict. This film got me into them, and an odd thing is...one of my artist friends on Facebook mentioned The Stone Roses, which I listened for a while and saw they were in the same movement as Joy Division. They are a post-punk/alternative/independent band, with major inspiration from Bowie (who I adore anything he does-- no matter how weird..that just makes him cooler), and came after the Sex Pistols, and The Clash punk rebellion times. Let's just say it was an easy love. The film just brought their name to the table. The rest is history, I am now a fan of this 2 album band.