The Dude

The Coen brothers have fertile imaginations. You would certainly need such fertility to make a movie like "The Big Lebowski". Then again, these are the same guys who wrote "Raising Arizona", a cult favorite from 1987 that solidified both Holly Hunter's and Nicholas Cage's respective careers. And even if the stories of these two pictures are quite different, they share an uncanny similarity in terms of the quality and quantity of humor.

"The Big Lebowski", much like "Raising Arizona", does a similar favor for another actor's career. In this case, it is Jeff Bridges, who ordinarily plays intense, dramatic roles. As Lebowski, he plays a deadbeat nobody who gets caught up in a rather improbable kidnapping scheme that was never meant to reach him, throwing "The Dude" (a self-appointed name for Bridges' character) into a wild and hilarious goose-chase. It turns out that (and this was unexpected, I must say) Bridges is simply unforgettable as Lebowski, taking "deadbeatness" to a whole new level and proving that he can indeed play all kinds of roles, dramatic and comedic. Makes us wonder why it is that Jeff Bridges has never played such a character, for he is a perfect choice.

Beside him are other talented, established actors - John Goodman, Julianne Moore, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Steve Buscemi and John Turturro, just to name the first and more widely known batch - who also play fantastically funny and rich characters without whom the story would be positively inexistent. Indeed, the supporting cast is fundamental in eliciting the wit of the story, as well as Lebowski's ludicrous behavior.

But it is Bridges that sweeps the movie, drawing almost rib-cracking laughing attacks with his lackadaisical antics in face of the absurdity of the events that unfold in front of him.

It's a shame that "The Big Lebowski" did not get the attention it deserved. It was thrown aside by the ever-present and ill-humored critics as a movie to chuckle to but not to admire. Their loss...

The public, however, has done the production justice by placing it right alongside "Raising Arizona" in the CULT FAVES shelf.

Bouncing Round The Room

Nothing better to write about, so I thought I would write about the first thing that came to mind. Or in this case, shall I say, ear...

Again, the topic is music. But this time, I will focus not on what is coming out of the speakers, but the speakers themselves.

So here's the deal: Last time I was in the States, I bought a rather kick-ass hometheater setup, with 7 speakers, and had it brought down here to my side of the equator. And like any classic, decent, 21st century hometheater setup, you can connect even your grandmother to it, should you feel inclined. Right now, grandma is home and my iPod is wired to it. I'm sitting here enjoying some sounds while I type.

Oh, just in case you care, the system is an Onkyo HTS-780. That translates to: Right under BOSE in terms of sound quality and sky-high over SONY and the likes. I definitely recommend it if you like good sound but don´t feel like being ripped off for it.

Also for your information, my little toy is a little loud. Ready for the description package?


1. For starters... Max volume is 68. I made it as far as 61. 62 is not funny. It´s painful.

2. I had it cranked up to 51 before I started writing this. It´s now at 36 because I couldn´t concentrate.

3. If you go up into the mid and upper 40's (and beyond), the sound is such that the speakers move.

4. At the current 37, I can feel the vibration on my keyboard. At the previous 51, the hairs on my legs were vibrating.

5. Big sound, not so big room... You add it up. Makes things pretty interesting, especially for blasting a good action flick!


Funny, I've always been the type to condemn excessively loud music. Generally, I still do. But I'm finding that sometimes loud is necessary!

So far, I've gotten no complaints from my neighbors. Then again, it´s not like I could ever hear the doorbell...

Discovering Music

Maybe it´s time to start writing again, regardless of the 4-month long writer's block that has been installed in me. But let´s start slow...

All music deserves a chance. No matter how regurgitatively bad it may seem at first, it nevertheless has its value. Lately, I've been slowly learning this curious little fact.

Don´t get me wrong, I still think that some musical genres are positively atrocious, unhealthy for both mind and body. I might cite hard heavy metal or rap or brazilian funk, in my case. But you know the saying: Opinions are like...CENSORED Everybody's got theirs.

However:

Let's look at my case; it´s the one I'll have the most authority to deal with. I may indeed loathe the genres named above, but if I look at certain qualities and aspects of each one, they all have at least one valuable facet.

Heavy metal derives much of its inspiration from classical (believe it my friend, it´s true).

Rap incorporates into its contents healthy doses of modern negro culture (and don´t ask me to use "african-this or african-that" - I'm not european-latin-brazilian, nor do I want to be labeled in such manner. But that´s another subject altogether!)

Brazilian funk has a similar, although less developed, cultural ingredient and hordes of people love to dance to the rhythm (myself NOT included).

And so on and so forth -

And I... I have recently been bitten by the most improbable of bugs. Having discovered, shall we say by a "friendly shove", one of electronic music's segments, I am forced to admit that I'm quite addicted to TRANCE and PSYTRANCE. If you had forecast this future to me six months ago, it is likely that I would have developed a distrust for the mirrors in my house, because it certainly wouldn't be ME looking back.

But there it is, I'm in love with the music. More importantly than that, I'm in love with something much more dear to me. It's been TOO LONG since the last time I discovered a new musical passion worthy of an amplified and meticulous exploration of new sounds and rhythms.

And I do acknowledge that trance and psytrance does not offer all that much in terms of cultural and spiritual value (and that it may be simply maddening to some!). But it is a sound capable of drowning me in an unstoppable need and desire to move, do dance, to feel. That is its value. It is energy. And once you have understood this, you can start searching for what is minute and precious, what is beautiful and hypnotic. I feel I am starting to perceive this.

And this is true about any type of music. Some have large quantities of one thing and almost none of another. But its appeal depends on the listener's needs.

I will never like rap, I will never like heavy metal, I will always classify brazilian funk as truly vile and there are more dislikes in this list. But at least I can finally understand their existence. It is a valuable lesson to learn, and one which I have always been somewhat reluctant to accept.

Estou precisando de férias de novo... Desta vez, da minha cabeça. Eu penso tudo e nada ao mesmo tempo, indefinido entre ebulição e zero-Kelvin. Que esta foto me sirva de refúgio. Por enquanto...

Segue a vida.