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Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
Club Notice - 04/06/90 -- Vol. 8, No. 40
MEETINGS UPCOMING:
Unless otherwise stated, all meetings are on Wednesdays at noon.
LZ meetings are in LZ 2R-158. MT meetings are in the cafeteria.
_D_A_T_E _T_O_P_I_C
04/18 LZ: HOWLING MAD, by Peter David (The Lighter Side of Werewolves)
05/09 LZ: Incarnations of Immortality Series, by Piers Anthony
(Mythology as Science)
05/30 LZ: L. RON HUBBARD PRESENTS WRITERS OF THE FUTURE #5 (New authors)
_D_A_T_E _E_X_T_E_R_N_A_L _M_E_E_T_I_N_G_S/_C_O_N_V_E_N_T_I_O_N_S/_E_T_C.
04/08 Science Fiction Association of Bergen County: TBA
(phone 201-933-2724 for details) (Saturday)
04/21 NJSFS New Jersey Science Fiction Society: Josepha Sherman
(phone 201-432-5965 for details) (Saturday)
HO Chair: John Jetzt HO 1E-525 834-1563 hocpa!jetzt
LZ Chair: Rob Mitchell LZ 1B-306 576-6106 mtuxo!jrrt
MT Chair: Mark Leeper MT 3D-441 957-5619 mtgzx!leeper
HO Librarian: Tim Schroeder HO 3D-225A 949-5866 homxa!tps
LZ Librarian: Lance Larsen LZ 3L-312 576-3346 lzfme!lfl
MT Librarian: Evelyn Leeper MT 1F-329 957-2070 mtgzy!ecl
Factotum: Evelyn Leeper MT 1F-329 957-2070 mtgzy!ecl
All material copyright by author unless otherwise noted.
1. NOTE THAT THE PETER DAVID AND WRITERS OF THE FUTURE DISCUSSIONS
HAVE BEEN SWITCHED.
2. A few weeks ago I said that the legal community has been
particularly interested in electronic communications of late.
Now whenever I make a statement like that, one having to do with
facts, whole bunches of people who trust what I say on just about
everything else but facts stand up, take their fingers out of their
noses, explain to me I am all wet, and tell me to stick to writing
without stating facts.
THE MT VOID Page 2
Well, I thought I was already doing that, but let me head off these
"fact-hounds" right away. Somebody is going to ask me if there is
a legal community somewhere. If so, where is it? I mean, you
would think to find it in places such as Long Island where the
smell of money would attract lawyers. Actually, if you go to these
ritzy communities (and they let you in), you discover that the
people who live there are the Mercedes dealers, owners of over-
priced restaurants, doctors who specialize in ailments that take
ten minutes to cure but cost millions, the occasional dentist,
embezzlers, that sort of thing. These are gentle, harmless people
whom you can trust when your back isn't turned, unlike lawyers.
These people do make war on each other, but it is not the legal
sort lawyers revel in. It is a style of war called "glitzkrieg."
That is where someone will throw a wedding party that costs
equivalent to one year of the gross national product of Germany to
retaliate for last month's bar mitzvah party that only cost the
price of the space shuttle program.
Clearly this is not the sort of community that appeals to logical,
clear-headed lawyers who realize that throwing parties would entail
spending money on other people. In actual fact it turns out that
the U.S. hit a population of one billion about the same time China
did, but nearly three quarters of that number is composed of
lawyers who live in the sewers where their parents short-sightedly
flushed them as children. I know you heard it was alligators, and
you were nearly right, but it's lawyers. The alligators refuse to
share the sewers with lawyers. Alligators gotta have standards.
So now you know there really is a legal community and why it is so
all-pervasive. Knowing that you may want to flush more often.
3. WNYC television's show "Women Writers" will feature an interview
with Anne McCaffrey on Friday, April 27 at 8 PM. This is broadcast
channel 31, and who knows what on your cable. [-ecl]
4. Advance notice: Author Michael Miller (published in _W_r_i_t_e_r_s _o_f
_t_h_e _F_u_t_u_r_e _#_1) will be joining us on May 30 to talk informally
about selling stories, as well as writing them. Would-be authors,
take note!
5. Thanks to Barb Lee for donating the following books to the
Holmdel branch of the library:
Anderson, Poul The Day of Their Return
Anderson, Poul A Knight of Ghosts and Shadows
Anderson, Poul The Winter of the World
Anthony, Piers OX
Asimov, Isaac The Foundation Trilogy
Asimov, Isaac The Robot Novels
Bester, Alfred Starlight
Brown, Frederick The Best of Frederick Brown
Burroughs, Edgar Rice At the Earth's Core
Campbell, John W. The Best of John W. Campbell
THE MT VOID Page 3
Carr, Terry (ed) Universe 3
Carr, Terry (ed) Universe 7
Clarke, Arthur C. Profiles of the Future
Ellison, Harlan Approaching Oblivion
Haldeman, Joe Mindbridge
Heinlein, Robert Farnham's Freehold
Herbert, Frank Children of Dune
Knight, Damon The Best of Damon Knight
Knight, Damon (ed) Science Fiction of the 30's
LeGuin, Ursula K. The Wind's Twelve Quarters
Lucas, George Star Wars
McCaffrey, Anne et al Futurelove
Silverberg, Robert et al Epoch
The Lincroft branch has acquired the following discussion books:
Anthony, Piers On a Pale Horse
David, Peter Howling Mad
and the following Hugo nominees:
Card, Orson Scott Prentice Alvin
Effinger, George Alec Fire in the Sun
Simmons, Dan Hyperion
Mark Leeper
MT 3D-441 957-5619
...mtgzx!leeper
Zeus does not bring to accomplishment all the
thoughts of men.
--Homer, ILIAD
NEW DIRECTIONS
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1990 Mark R. Leeper
I generally try to make it to the Bleeker Street Cinema in
Greenwich Village each year for the _I_n_t_e_r_n_a_t_i_o_n_a_l _T_o_u_r_n_e_e _o_f _A_n_i_m_a_t_i_o_n.
Usually what you get from it is a pretty mixed bag of animated films
ranging from unoriginal and little better than competent up to
startlingly good. It is just a set of short films from different
sources stitched together to make a feature film. You really have to go
to a big city art house to see this sort of thing. (This is the sort
of film where the segments were each made independently with no idea
that they would be going together with others to make a larger film. I
distinguish between that and commissioned multi-segment films such as
_A_r_i_a and _N_e_w _Y_o_r_k _S_t_o_r_i_e_s.) It certainly is not going to make it very
close to central New Jersey where it would be most convenient for me.
Perhaps inspired by the success of the _I_n_t_e_r_n_a_t_i_o_n_a_l _T_o_u_r_n_e_e _o_f
_A_n_i_m_a_t_i_o_n, First Run Features, a New York City firm, has put together
eight short films and called the compilation _N_e_w _D_i_r_e_c_t_i_o_n_s. The title
is doubly misleading. Some of these are relatively new, but it seems to
me I even saw some copyrights from the 1970s. And because the films
were not innovative, and usually not even particularly interesting, they
hardly seem to go off in any new directions. These are not really new
directions that any filmmaker will likely follow in. No films were
excellent (E), only one film did I consider to be very good (VG), four
were good (G), two were fair (F), and one was actually poor (P). This
is not really a very good average and on balance I cannot give this film
a very high recommendation.
- "No More Disguises" (G)
The flagship entry is a six-minute music video of protest filmed
secretly in China. "No More Disguises" features Cui Jian, a
Chinese protest singer, who sings about the unhappiness of Chinese
youth in Chinese (with English subtitles) while we are shown scenes
of Tianamen Square, other parts of Beijing, and newsreel footage of
the student protest. On one viewing it is difficult to read the
subtitles, watch the images, and think about the meaning of the
song. Scenes of Cui playing a clarinet facing a stone wall did not
do a lot for me. On careful study this music video could be a
meaningful experience but one quick viewing is insufficient.
- "Joey Joey" (G)
The second and most entertaining of the films was a very
straightforward filming of the act of Joey Joey. Joey Joey is a
street juggler and comedian who performs in Greenwich Village's
Washington Square. He has a good sense of humor and can ride a
unicycle and jump rope--unicycle and all--with twenty-eight inches
of steel sword down his throat, all at the same time. What more do
New Directions April 6, 1990 Page 2
I need to say?
- "Gefilte Fish" (VG)
Gefilte fish is a Jewish dish of ground boiled fish. I have
actually stood in Tiananmen Square, seen Joey Joey perform in
Washington Square, and eaten gefilte fish. Of the three
activities, eating gefilte fish is the one that I have the most
opportunity and the least ambition to repeat. Gefilte fish has a
distinctive bouquet that real experts refer to as "nauseating." I
think most people eat it as a reminder of the adversity Jews have
faced throughout history. This film by Karen Silverstein is just
Ms. Silverstein making gefilte fish and talking about how and why
someone makes the product and intercut are sequences of her mother
and daughter talking about this delicacy. We see how the
philosophy changes from generation to generation. The mother, now
sorry that she no longer has the strength to make it, used to
hand-chop the fish for hours. Silverstein uses a food processor;
her daughter knows how to make the fish but much prefers to buy it
in a jar. It is odd how many generational attitudes are reflected
in these three women's attitudes toward this one obscure food.
- "Tator Tomater" (F)
Back to the subject of food, or perhaps visiting it for the first
time, we have the story of a server in a North Carolina cafeteria
whose whole day consists of asking passing patrons, "Tators?
Tomaters?" and dishing out what they want. Eventually she rebels
under the strain of the monotony. Of fifteen minutes of film,
three are actually entertaining, but the build-up and the winding
down are not very interesting and the sound recording is muddled
and indistinct.
- "Taylor Slough" (G)
This is a short film, only five minutes and in black and white, but
it is an eerie atmospheric portrait of the animal and plant life in
a swamp in the Florida Everglades. It is crisply photographed and
the musical score perfectly sets the mood.
- "Juggling Magic" (P)
Three long dull minutes of amateur jugglers juggling and passing
props from scene to scene. Presumably director Carol Ross had some
sort of connection to the producers of _N_e_w _D_i_r_e_c_t_i_o_n_s.
- "Semper Fi" (F)
Anti-war filmmaker Geoffrey Luck made a film about his relationship
with a close friend who became a U.S. Marine. It is Luck's point
of view that was is bad and that he has a hard time relating to a
friend who could become a Marine.
- "Howard Fenster: Man of Visions" (G)
The longest (but not the most interesting) of the films is a
documentary about a backwoods preacher and religious folk artist.
New Directions April 6, 1990 Page 3
Fenster takes every opportunity to preach to the camera and has
religious homilies written all over his art. He is a self-
professed "stranger from another world" and an "idea man." He says
he comes up with hundreds of ideas every hour. I found his art
unappealing and the "expert" who talked about how great his art
was, was neither unbiased--she displays his art in her gallery--nor
convincing. Fenster is a minor demagogue and just not a very
interesting demagogue either. (Fenster's most well known work is
probably an album cover he did for the Talking Heads.)