Mr. Struggan's Regards

Siegfried Vol. 1, 2012
Alex Alice

Nico here. As a participant in the Graphic Novel Reading Group at Politics & Prose Bookstore, I read at least one graphic novel per month. Mr. Struggan has invited me to share my criticism of this month’s selected reading here.

Alex Alice’s Siegfried is the first volume of a three part adaptation of German composer Richard Wagner’s Ring Cycle, a pretty grand story to be condensed into 50 pages of comics. Alice weaves the origin-story of Siegfried, a boy who is friends with wolves, raised by an outcast and whose mother was a goddess. Pretty epic.

Unsurprisingly, Alice’s art is heavily french-influenced, from the looks of characters to unabashedly cinematic paneling, even to the innocent, hopeful tone of the story. His warm, romantic style is evocative of late ’70s heavy metal, The Legend of Zelda, and the art of Disney animated films, an influence the artist credits.

It’s a beautiful book. Alice deftly mixes hand-drawn and computer-generated illustration to create evocatively, detailed panels. As good as the graphics are, the quality of the materials used in printing made a huge difference. With a hard cover and glossy pages, no expense was spared.

As strong as the work is, Siegfried may be a little too psyched about itself. Over 60 pages of an interview with Alex Alice and preliminary sketches are nice, but unwarranted. I might expect these extras in a reprint, but not a first edition. As nice as they are, I’d prefer the first edition to let the work speak for itself. That said, it’s a great change of pace from diaristic indie comics and more familiar American comic books.

Mr. Struggan sends his High Regards.

Les Misérables, 2012
Directed by Tom Hooper

Wilson here. Mr. Struggan had to call an audible this week with his film review assignment. He was going to have me go see the new film Movie 43, but unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately, considering the nearly unanimous bad reviews it’s received) it was not playing at the theater near me. Instead, he asked me to pick an Oscar contender that I hadn’t seen yet, so I caught a showing of Les Misérables. 

I feel it is important to note, given the popularity of Les Mis, that I have never seen it before, neither on film nor on stage. I didn’t even know much about the story going into it. My suspicion is that this fact directly affected my inability to like Tom Hooper’s film, which seemed, in its marketing campaign and the actual viewing of it, like it wanted to position itself as a bold remake of a beloved story targeted at its fans. To me, the uninitiated, I could not buy in.

Listening to music is an emotional experience above all, and the musical genre succeeds best when it is able to tap into this emotive potential and elevate the action of a story. Hooper’s Les Mis attempts to tap into this aspect of the genre by paying particular care to the music, but rather than having the intended elevating effect, it instead distracted. The film tries to ride a line between musical and realist drama which shouldn’t, maybe even can’t, be riden; musicals demand a suspension of disbelief, mostly because people don’t actually burst into spontaneous moments of choreographed song and dance when expressing their feelings in real life. Hooper’s attempt to inject a bold, in-your-face grittiness to his production is, therefore, ultimately ill conceived.

Hugh Jackman, as the most competent member of the cast, managed to keep me with the program with his performance as Jean Valjean. Similarly, Sacha Baron Cohen and Helena Bonham Carter, kept me entertained as the comic relief. The rest of the cast had too little screen time to impress me, or enough to bore me. 

From a technical standpoint, the film had some great moments; the grand visuals and set pieces were truly awesome, and Hooper deserves a lot of credit for his ambitious vision alone. Ambition without execution, though, left me feeling nothing about the film. Given the hype, that only left me disappointed. 

Mr. Struggan sends his Low Regards. 

Zarina: Paper Like Skin
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
January 25 - April 21, 2013

Wilson here. After a very exciting night on Friday at Postcards From the Edge (my piece sold!), Mr. Struggan sent me out Saturday night to the Guggenheim to cover their new exhibition, Zarina: Paper Like Skin. I was supposed to attend the opening Friday night, had I not had business in Chelsea, and Mr. Struggan was kind enough to let me reschedule the assignment. The long, cold line for the Guggenheim’s pay-what-you-want hours was well worth the visit for the new retrospective exhibition of the work of this Indian-born master printmaker.

The exhibition charts Zarina’s practice through several decades of her career. Her work draws on traditions of religion and spirituality, poetry and calligraphy, and western minimalist aesthetics, all to a beautiful and delicate effect.  The work on view, a wide range of prints and sculptures, is nothing short of gorgeous.

Zarina’s work could best be described as schematic. Sometimes this is manifested quite literally in pieces that map cities or the layout of a room. More often though, her pieces reveal inner structures, such as in a series of ink prints made using found scraps of wood, or even in the material presence of the handmade paper in some of her more sculptural pieces. The results are, for the most part, powerful and evocative. 

I found the show’s curation was awkward at at times. This is mainly due to the fact that I find the Guggenheim’s annex galleries to be somewhat awkward spaces. The work on view deserved a bit more breathing room, and generally I found many of the curatorial choices, especially the texts, to be a bit stuffy. I’d be curious what the differences are between the Guggenheim’s installation and the installation at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, where the show originated. Regardless, Zarina’s work speaks clearly for itself as masterful and elegant. 

Mr. Struggan sends his High Regards.

Everything Must Go, 2010
Directed by Dan Rush

Wilson here. Mr. Struggan, in search of something to assign for my next film review, took a scroll through his Netflix queue this past week. He settled on Everything Must Go, a 2010 film that he’d been hesitating to watch for some time. Being the willing test subject that I am, I offered to watch it and write up a review to save him the trouble.

After watching the film, my recommendation to Mr. Struggan was clear: don’t bother. The film reaches for the pinnacle of mediocre filmmaking, and nearly makes it to the summit. It is no surprise that the film was director Dan Rush’s debut, and no wonder that his IMDb page lists no projects since.

Will Ferrell leads the film as our protagonist Nick Halsey, an alcoholic who, after being fired from his job, returns home to find his wife gone, the locks changed, and all of his possessions piled up on his front lawn. With nowhere to go, Nick decides to take up residency on the lawn and, with the help of teenage neighborhood loiterer Kenny (Christopher Jordan Wallace) and with the emotional support of his new neighbor Samantha (Rebecca Hall), sets about staging a yard sale to rid himself of his things.

None of the cast members are particularly bad; Ferrell, considering the circumstances, actually forces a good performance into the production, seemingly through pure willpower. His character conveys the sad charm that it ought to, and his chemistry with Rebecca Hall holds a few key scenes together, like their middle-of-the-night confrontation, enough to add a silver lining to the viewing experience.

By and large, however, they are let down by core characters whose relationships with each other aren’t developed well enough for us to care about them, and extraneous secondary characters who add little (Glenn Howerton’s second scene as Nick’s boss at the end of the film), if anything at all (Stephen Root as Nick’s BDSM enthusiast neighbor) to the story. An overhanded score, several unresolved plot points, and ultimately a lazy script, amateur editing, and unassertive direction top off the the long list of reasons why one mustn’t go see this movie.

Mr. Struggan sends his Low Regards.

Beta Love, 2013
Ra Ra Riot

Nico here, reporting from Mr. Struggan’s Possum Alley bureau in Washington, D.C. In keeping with our new schedule, Mr. Struggan has assigned me a review of Ra Ra Riot’s new album, Beta Love, this week. Tuesday morning, I stayed home with a fever of 100.8. Beta Love did not soothe my senses as well as other music could have; it sounds like a quarter life crisis.

The main problem with this release is that it does not offer much sonic or thematic breadth. Lack of lyrical ingenuity could be forgiven if the sounds were more convincing.

“Wilderness” shows me something, but then, the verse line’s cheesy, repetitive arpeggio drops in. It doesn’t give the listener much to work with. I can’t tell whether this is minimalist, or just bad. I’m leaning towards the latter. ”I Shut Off” is supposed to be some kind of final-track-of-the-album anthem, but it lacks instrumental backbone. Aside from a few tracks, this album is pretty flat. “When I Dream” showed a lot of promise as the album’s single. As lead vocalist Wes Miles switches between alto and falsetto, it creates interplay that is absent from the rest of the album. 

Synth rock can be a great genre from bands to tap into. Add some synths and beat, and your average rock group can fill arenas, get people moving, and reach a broader pool of listeners. This summer, Passion Pit’s sophomore album Gossamer attained a broader reach emotionally and musically than the group’s debut album, showing that the genre doesn’t result in being pigeonholed. Ra Ra Riot does not have the same success in their reinvention.

One might expect that after three albums, Ra Ra Riot would know a thing or two about restraint and focus. Many groups come to a point when they jump the shark in their creative direction. Perhaps Ra Ra Riot is there now.

Mr. Struggan sends his Low Regards.

Wilson here. Mr. Struggan has decided that, on occasional off-days, it would be alright for Nico and I to advertise some of our own projects. So for the first ever edition of Mr. Struggan’s Shameless Plug, I am pleased to announce that one of my pieces has been accepted to the Postcards From the Edge benefit exhibition hosted by Sikkema Jenkins & Co! 

Postcards From the Edge, now in its 15th year, is an art benefit sale conducted by Visual AIDS, an arts non-profit that works to promote AIDS awareness in the arts. Every year, their benefit sale draws submissions from some of the art world’s biggest names. All the artists in the show exhibit anonymously, and all the postcard sized pieces are $85, meaning if you show up opening night and have a discerning enough eye, you could snag yourself an $85 Baechler, Ruscha, Baldessari, Marclay, … or even a Duggan!

Consider stopping by and seeing the show if you are free this weekend.

Mr. Struggan sends his regards.