The filmed version of Train Dreams is a genuine modern masterpiece. I watched it once. I’m scared to watch it again. Because; what if I start to notice the flaws? What if it diminishes the feeling I once had while watching it? I wept at the end of this movie, the tears propelled by its beauty, its craft. I cannot take that risk, that feeling is too important. 

So. How many stars should it get on Letterboxd? 

Well, five, obviously, but what does that even mean? 

What stupidity!! To attempt to estimate the value of a piece of art as something measurable. Is art not in our lives to capture that which we can not capture in the the columns of direct communication. 

Let’s talk about it.

BUT FIRST! TOPICS, OF THE LOOSE VARIETY!

• So aforementioned Letterboxd is for sale, apparently. Call me a skeptic, but I can’t recall a media outlet/online company being sold ever led to the actual product getting any better. Just that it gets more expensive and filled with ads and sponsorships.

• NEW MUSIC NEW MUSIC NEW MUSIC

  • Candidate for most underrated and underreported (at least in my bubble) band of the year: Bird Legs. It reminds of the highest peaks of Nerve Agents and Redemption 87, which is no surprise since Eric Ozenne is fronting this new band and Jade Puget (2) is on guitar. Visions Beyond the Ape Cave is a great reminder that the East Bay brings forth a very unique brand of hardcore and it’s worth more attention. Check it out.

  • Speaking of underrated: king of soulful hiphop Oddisee is out here with Heno on a new album, From Takoma With Love. It’s heartfelt, lovely, smooth.

  • The homies in Lies! Put out a new single, Blind Weight and they have the Australian hardcore GOAT Jim Siow from Speed on guest vocals. It’s a banger!

  • Speaking of new singles, Belgian D-beat deviants Raw Peace put out a new single, Violence of Action, from their upcoming record To Dust. It goes fucking harrrrrrd.

• Jackass, you have my whole heart. I’m not sure if I can accurately capture why I love this series in which people-do-pretty-egregious-harm-to-themselves but it feels kind of… wholesome? Despite the raunchy and nasty shit they get up to (literally, in some cases) there’s a spirit of "everyone here is ok with it" and that feels good to me. And it’s funny to watch someone get splattered with pig semen. Anyway, there’s a new movie coming and I’m excited.

• Let’s talk games:

  • Vampire Crawlers is nothing like Vampire Survivors but it uses the same visual language so it does help if you’ve played it. In this dungeon-crawling turn based RPG-ish rogue-lite, you pick a character and try to get to the end of the stage by beating monsters and getting new cards, then you level up and buy better gear and repeat. It’s well made and very pleasing to play.

  • Titanium Court is an insane ride. It’s a match-three game, but also a tower defence game, but also a rogue-lite, but also a crazy story about someone transported to a strange dimension. It’s captivating.

• Some videos that I found edifying:

  • This video is nearly ten years old and the manifesto it’s about is nearly fifteen at this point, but still incredibly relevant. Lidewij Edelkoort handily dissects the current fashion industry and highlights that it is not in the business fashion, but merely making (and selling) clothes. The talk is fascinating and it got me to get a hardcopy of the manifesto and it is a great and enlightening read.

  • A cursory search on YouTube reveals that a popular topic for video essays is the Hedonic Treadmill. Simply put, it’s the feeling that you’re never going to be satisfied, despite always feeling one step away. One more new pair of shoes. One more record for the collection. And so on. Here’s a pretty comprehensive breakdown of this phenomenon and perhaps what we could do to remedy this feeling, done by the author of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck.¹

  • As perhaps last week’s missive already let slip, I do have a fascination with watches; these tiny engineering marvels that help us track this mysterious force. One of my favourite workout watches (as in, videos I like to watch) is the YouTube channel Wristwatch Revival, in which a very kind and patient man takes apart and services watches of all kinds before putting them back together again in working order. Here’s the latest video on the channel, it’s like therapy for me. 

So then, our grand folly of trying to contain the everything-ness of art into the claustrophobic space of five stars, half stars being allowed. Let’s start with my internal logic in this nifty little widget:

This is rough, inelegant. A gut check, if nothing else. Gun-to-my-head type shit. But it feels right. A three is fine, nothing more. A four is good. Fives are masterpieces. Fill in the blanks. 

It’s tempting to think of art appreciation as something unable to describe in objective terms. After all, how often is a piece that you love derided by others? How is that even possible? Suppose any piece of artistic endeavour has a barbed shape and if it doesn’t penetrate and hang on, it just bounces off. If you’ll allow me a visual metaphor. 

And yet, we often find common criticism and praise between us admirers. Why is appreciation of some art so universal and can we as a society generally agree on its greatness?

Another approach then. 

It lodged itself in my brain recently: rating art on two axes: quality of idea and quality of execution. Within this diabolical contraption, a piece of art can be anchored around a magnificent idea, but executed incredibly poorly and therefore get 2.5 stars. Or vice versa. It’s the intermingling of idea and execution that gets it its rating. 

Have a visual aid:

Listen buddy, I’m quite sure this is not an original thought, simple as it is, of course.

But I can’t quite figure out how to properly discuss the quality of a piece of art.

Perhaps it’s simply ungraspable. Perhaps it's time to re-read Zen And the Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance.

¹Listen, I’m not much for self-help authors, but the guy genuinely breaks it down really well and I thought his insights were quite… insightful. 

²Yes, that Jade Puget