The Island of the Day Before

Umberto Eco is one of the most broadly intelligent, literate authors around. When you read his books you expect to encounter characters speaking in multiple languages about meticulously researched and well perceived eras of history. My first encounter with Eco was the film version of The Name of the Rose, which was an excellent mystery set in a Franciscan abbey in the middle ages. The first book of his that I read was Foucault's Pendulum, which remains one of my all time favorite reads. It's also the book which may be the most accessible as it's set within our own time.

The Island of the Day Before is set in 1643 and purports to be constructed on the writings of Roberto della Griva which were found abandoned on a wrecked ship some time after his death. Roberto's predicament is unique: Shipwrecked in a storm, he comes to as the currents carry him past a ship at anchor. He climbs aboard and finds the ship recently abandoned. Without a boat, unable to swim and surrounded by strong, seaward currents Roberto realizes he is marooned on a deserted ship!

A seemingly deserted Island is very close, but it might as well exist in yesterday, it is so unreachable to Roberto. From here the story unfolds - constructed from Roberto's own diary, it is part narrative of what occurs on the ship (perhaps he is NOT alone), part memory as Roberto communicates his story in a series of love letters to the Lady whose presence occupies his heart, and part novel which Roberto begins to write in order to provide outlet to his romantic imagination.

The book finds unification in a philosophical exploration of rational relativity and the concrete search for a means to accurately measure longitude. In 1643 the nations of the world were in a desperate race to discover a method of longitude, and Roberto is tied up in this quest. But it was also the time where rationality and the scientific method were trying to ally and make progress together and all ideas seemed possible. So it is that as Roberto looks from his nautical prison at the unreachable Island, he becomes convinced that the International Date Line (180 degrees or the antipodal meridian) separates the ship from the Island, and that the Island is unreachable because it truly exists in the previous day.

It's a heavy read full of philosophical gymnastics, but if you like Eco, you should certainly like this.

Night at the Museum

We watched this as a family last night. It was very entertaining. Lots of laughs for everyone. The concept has been around a while - what if you were stuck overnight in a museum and the exhibits all came alive? In this scenario Ben Stiller plays Larry, a down on his luck single father who needs a stable job so his son will respect him. Night guard at the museum seems stable enough, but his first night takes a surprising turn when everything comes alive. Larry's first inclination is to quit - he's quit lots of jobs in the past - but it's time for Larry to grow up and meet the challenge of responsibility.

The themes are clear and simple and well tied to the action of the story: Some men are born great, others have greatness thrust upon them AND if you study the past you'll be able to face the future. There's lots of funny scenes and jokes, a couple of nice roles for supporting cast: Owen Wilson, Ricky Gervais and Mickey Rooney are particularly funny. Dick Van Dyke too. Not a lot of drama, but there are some nice turns - and ultimately we get a fun fantasy adventure suitable for the whole family.

Now on dvd ...

Just a shout out to remind you that my favorite film from last year is now available on dvd: Pan's Labyrinth. I can't wait to buy it and watch it again. I posted a reflection on the film here.

Not a Walk in the Park

Friday - Thayne, Michelle and I climbed the Stawamus Chief in Squamish. This is on the bridge to Shannon Falls close to the bottom of the climb.


Much high now - almost at the summit. It's steeper than it looks. Thayne and Michelle are using chains to pull themselves up the incline. This is at the top of a crevasse that narrowed as we climbed this second last leg.



Several sections of chains and a long metal ladder later we emerged onto an angling shelf of rock and could look back on where we had come. Those trees look a long way down, but they're not the bottom. We climbed up past those trees.


We're resting on the summit of the second peak. We're higher than the first peak - some 2000+ feet above Squamish.



This is Howe Sound. Squamish means mother of winds and this body of water is one of the world's the top five sites for windsurfing because there's always a wind. As we looked down we could just see about half a dozen para-surfers in the mouth of the river. They don't show up on the pic though.

Winter Passing

Interestingly enough I probably pulled this film out of the library because the kids bought Elf last week, and have been watching it. Both films feature Will Ferrel and Zooey Deschanel but Elf is a much more comic turn. Winter Passing is the story of Reese Holden, an emotionally unbalanced actress who returns to her fathers house in the wake of her mother's death. She is in the winter of a debilitating depression and over the course of the story she is able to discover another perspective on her past and break into a new season of self-awareness and hope. Which is great - too many movies of this genre just tell stories about people who are locked in depression because they have trouble relating to others and then they end with any real revelation as to how to move forward into wholeness.

But be warned - this is a very slow moving film. After about 50 minutes we actually turned it off. Some people continue watching a poor film even after they know it's poor in hopes that it will somehow get better. In my experience if they're bad at the start they do not get better - they most often don't even stay uniformly bad - they get worse. BUT - even as we ejected the disc we we realized that Winter Passing was not "bad" - it in fact had delivered a number of very interesting elements so far - it was just very slow paced. So we put it back in and finished it. I'm glad we did because, as hinted above, the story is actually really good.

What makes it good is that the Reese is surrounded by so many people who genuinely care about her. In the early part of the film at least three people look her in the eye and ask: "Are you okay?" We never get the sense that the world is bad and doomed, instead we get the sense that there is hope and health out there, but our main character is not able to embrace it. No wonder - both her parents were famous writers more absorbed in their work than their family. She heads home and discovers that her father living in community with a socially awkward Christian rocker (former rhythm guitar for Punching Pilate) and a pretty grad student whose focus of study is Reese's parents. And what's amazing is how willing they both are to care for Reese and her father, and the profound effect that simple care and love can have on people.

The film is quite subtle but if you watch closely you'll learn a wealth of information about the characters and the journeys they've been on. It's definitely worth seeing.

Local Children Assault Ocean

Matthias, Thayne and Analena, in that order, went swimming in the ocean yesterday evening. "It was very cold," said Thayne, "And when you went underwater you kind of came up freezing."

"It was a brain freeze," said Analena.

"Weeeell, it was pretty cold. I mean freezing," said Matthias when asked to comment.

A local naysayer who had accompanied the trio to the beach, heckled their courage and was heard to say, "You won't be in there long enough to try out your snorkeling gear," and, "You guys are crazy".

Nonetheless, Thayne and Analena managed to don their flippers and goggles, submerge in the frigid waters off Tunstall Bay and peer at the bottom of the sea. "There's greyish flecks of stuff floating around. What do you call those things that float around?" asked Analena.

"I saw rocks. The water was pretty dirty. No sea life. Just things floating around," said Thayne.

"I didn't look under the water," said Matthias, "but if I did I would have seen something alive: Sea soup. " Oceanus Soupus is the scientific name for the motes of vegetable and marine life that float in the water and that can appear, to the casual observer, as greyish flecks of stuff and are locally referred to as "things".

When asked if they'd soon be returning to the water they were quick to agree that they would. "Next time it's warm enough. Tomorrow, if it's not windy and the sun's out. And it's warm. Maybe. We might not get around to it."

Our interview was interrupted by a knock on the door. One of Thayne's friends had arrived with a towel around his neck. Turns out he and three other locals were on their way down to the beach for a quick dip. Throwing caution to the wind Thayne and Analena agreed to head down.

Matthias was last seen heading for bed.

In other reports, a local man was observed doing jumping jacks on the shore before plunging into the water and engaging in a series of self-inflicted dunks and screams.

Your eye on Bowen,

Andre Harden

Death and Taxes

Frankly, these could have come in a more convenient order.

Spiderman 3

Howard Hawkes once said that you only really need about four great scenes to make a movie that connects with people in a meaningful way. Four scenes. You can put most of your energy toward those scenes. For the rest of your scenes you just want to avoid annoying people.

Spiderman 3 has a couple great scenes but for every great scene there are a dozen annoyances. That's bad math because once you get annoyed you look at the film differently. As you wait for the scenes to move the story forward you have too much time to notice the implausibilities, the lack of coherent, causal drama, the out of character actions, and the insanity that is the resolution with the Sandman and no matter how much you wanted to love the film, you're ultimately forced to conclude that however much promise it might have held, however brilliant Spiderman 1 and (especially) 2 were, however stunning a set piece the Sandman is - it's just, scene for scene, not a very good story.

Dear Heroes

I guess, we've been going together now for, wow, I guess it's about eight months. Twenty dates ... it's been really good. You're fun. You're cool. You're going places. Um ... I've really enjoyed our time together. I really have. I think you have so many great personalities. And you look as great as you ever did ... I just, and maybe it's just me, maybe it's me but ... I think we need to talk. I want us to be honest with each other and for me, that means telling you that something's felt off lately. I mean, I still like you ... it's just these last couple weeks have felt ... different. You know what I mean?

I know I really missed you when you went away for six weeks. I wondered what you were doing, I thought about you lots. I was so looking forward to you getting back and us spending some time together. I guess - and maybe I'm way wrong here - but I guess - what it feels like is maybe, just maybe you're not being honest with me. I'm not accusing you of anything - you're free to do what you like, but I'm just, you know, that's how it feels. I thought I was really getting to know you and ... well, now I'm just not so sure.

I've noticed some ... I guess I can call it erratic behavior that makes me wonder - just a bit - if maybe you don't really know who you are. That came out wrong. I just - I guess there is something particular that's bothering me. And I suppose I should warn you, it's a SPOILER, so if you didn't look at yourself this week, you might want to stop reading ...

But you remember when you did: Sylar captures Hiro "I bend space-time" Nakamura and tells someone else to dispose of him while he flies out of his way to kill Claire "I merely heal myself" Bennet? I guess my response is: Never in a million years.

And if, as you suggest, Sylar wants to fight Peter "I have EVERY power" Petrelli and Peter thinks Sylar is his brother, am I actually to believe that Sylar wouldn't have set up an ambush for Peter? No, I am not to believe that.

So I guess what I'm saying is ... I still like you and everything, but do you know who you are? Are you okay with yourself? Because sometimes it looks like you do things just to be cool instead of doing things that reflect who you really are.

Also - you're seeing so many other people. That feels awkward.

But still friends? See you next week?

The Quiet American

Adapted from the Graham Greene novel (which I haven't read). This film is from a few years back - you might recall Michael Caine's best actor nomination. Let's not be fooled by a story synopsis about love and journalism; the title tips us off that this story is really about America quietly establishing a presence in Vietnam while the French imperial presence of the 1950s collapsed beneath a communist invasion.

But Greene and the filmmakers have created a great drama about Thomas Fowler (Caine), an aging British journalist who is deeply in love and living with Phuong, a beautiful Vietnamese dancer. When his paper threatens to return him to England - he' s only had three stories printed in the last year - he knows it's time to get out of her bed and into the field to get a serious story.

While Fowler's away his recent acquaintance, Alden Pyle (Fraser), an American doctor newly arrived in Vietnam, falls in love with Phuong. But he doesn't tell her. He confesses his feelings to Fowler, arguing that if Fowler has no intention of marrying Phuong he should give her up and allow him to propose.

Now in the film they come right out and say that Phuong is a metaphor for the whole country; Fowler and Pyle represent European and American interests. But where a poor film might have made this overbearing, The Quiet American keeps the drama human, and despite the title and the obvious metaphor, keeps a few cards up its sleeve, which means I can't say much more. Just this: if you're in the mood for a good drama it's worth checking out.

15 Years

May Day. Fifteen years ago Michelle and I stood at the front of the Salvation Army church in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan and vowed our love to each other. However many moves, jobs and dreams later, here we are, three kids and living on the edge of the country. I love Michelle more than I ever have. Our marriage is about as good as it's ever been. It helps to marry a wonderful person (like I did) and it helps to be gracious (like she is). I can't imagine having married a better person.

It hasn't all been sunshine. Marriage and, even more so, parenting demand a great amount of self sacrifice that is often difficult to deliver. But in retrospect, one looks back on the trying times as proof of love. What's commitment worth when it costs you nothing? But a love that you've bound yourself to, whatever the cost, come what may, is a commitment that truly recreates your souls.

I am a grateful, grateful man. Grateful for my wife and my family; for who they are, and for who they've made me become.

Have Fun Storming the Castle

This castle has been guarding the side of our fridge for at least six months. I have been meaning to scan and share it for some time, but was looking at it again this morning and knew now was the time. It's an original Matthias, metallic white, blue and teal and black paint on off white paper. One of the bridges is a false bridge meant to collapse if invaders gain the walls of the castle. But so far its imposing towers have kept foreign armies far from the fridge.