(Like many Netflix customers, I too can get quite lax with the timely watching and returning of my movies, which of course defeats the entire purpose of having a flat-rate rental plan in the first place. To combat that, I am now writing standardized mini-reviews of each and every movie I end up watching through Netflix, both instantly and on DVD. Don't forget, all previous 'Justify My Netflix' reviews can be found on CCLaP's main movie page.)

Today's movie: A Prophet, 2009 (Amazon | IMDB | Netflix | Wikipedia)

Why I added it to my queue: Because it was passionately recommended to me by CCLaP friend and genre author Lawrence Santoro, a French prison drama by veteran director Jacques Audiard that's been taking world cinema by storm in the last year, including a Best Foreign Language Film nomination at this year's Oscars, as well as winning the same award in Britain, garnering the Grand Prix at last year's Cannes Film Festival, and taking home the Best Picture prize at this year's Cesars (the French version of the Oscars).

The reality: Wow! Well, it's certainly easy to understand why people have been going so nuts for this movie, once you sit and watch it yourself, because it's an almost perfect combination of a whole series of different genres -- not just an inventive caper film, but also a serious character drama, a sobering look at prison conditions in southern Europe, and a nice primer for us clueless Americans on the various ethnic groups of the Mediterranean and the relationships they have with each other. The story hinges around the changing fate of Malik El Djebena, a 19-year-old petty criminal and lapsed Muslim from French North Africa, who while in prison becomes sort of the b-tch of the Corsican mafia (Corsica being an island in the Mediterranean whose relationship with France is similar to Sicily's relationship with Italy), even while being on friendly terms with several do-gooder Muslims; the plot itself, then, revolves around the evermore complex series of cons and crimes that he is coerced into performing on behalf of these various groups, even while setting up his own operations in secret as he keeps a wary eye on yet other ethnic gangs within the prison system (including the bloodthirsty Egyptians, the haughty mainland French, and more).

I won't go into the details, since as a caper film this movie depends a lot on the element of surprise for its enjoyment; but like I said, one thing I will happily admit is how many other ways there are to be fascinated by this movie other than the convoluted plot, including the complex relationship Malik has with his fellow Muslims, as well as the simple look at the brutal conditions that exist in so many European prisons, even as they grant certain human-rights allowances that will make most Americans shake their heads in disbelief (such as these prisons' habits of allowing violent cons to have entire days of furlough outside the jail itself, on the condition that they dutifully report back to the prison at the end of the day, an element that plays heavily into the caper plot itself). The whole thing adds up to a riveting experience by the end, not least of which is because of what I said before, of it being on top of everything else a nice primer for Americans on the various complicated ways that the ethnic groups of the Mediterranean interact; and it comes highly recommended for those who don't mind subtitles in their movies.

Strangest piece of trivia: Tahar Rahim, who plays the main character, originally met Audiard when the two shared a car ride from a different film set.

Worth your time? Yes

Today's photo of the day is entitled "Sky," and is by a Flickr member who goes by Fredrik Vee. Fredrik is based out of Norway, which I assume is where this particular shot was taken as well. Do make sure to stop by his main photostream for a lot more great images.

Don't forget that I actually maintain a whole page of favorite photographs over at Flickr, for those who would like to see more. To express an interest in having your own work featured, just drop me a line at cclapcenter [at] gmail.com.

It's Monday, which means it's time for another episode of the CCLaP Podcast. Today: It's the triumphant return of the podcast, after a two-month hiatus due to a broken computer monitor; and who better to kick off several months of new weekly episodes than our old pal Ben Tanzer, today making his third appearance on the podcast from over the years. This time Ben's here to tell us everything we ever wanted to know about his new book with the center, the running/writing essay collection 99 Problems, which has been receiving quite a bit of attention in the two weeks it's now been out. Also featuring the music of Satore and The Bird And The Bee. And don't forget, if you download the enhanced MP4 version linked to below and listen on an iPod (or simply subscribe to CCLaP's iTunes channel), chapters and links and images will be at your disposal too!

More about the people and projects talked about in today's episode:
Ben Tanzer
99 Problems
Repetition Patterns, Ben's other book with CCLaP
Sententia
Satore / Pablo Bolivar
The Bird And The Bee

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Download the MP4 (19.8 megs)

NEW! Instead of using a third party for the streaming version of the podcast, I've decided to start trying the new "audio" tag that's been added to the HTML5 specs, which unfortunately works in only some browsers and under specific conditions. Hopefully you should be seeing an interface above for listening to the streaming version; if not, I hope you'll take a moment and let me know (cclapcenter [at] gmail.com), as well as what platform/device you're on and what browser and version you're using. I appreciate whatever feedback you have a chance to send. (By the way, does anyone know of a free and easy way to convert MP3 files into OGG on a Mac? If I'm understanding things right, that's the only way this streaming version will currently work in Firefox.)

Continue reading "CCLaP Podcast 59: Author Ben Tanzer" »

Today marks two weeks now since the release of CCLaP's latest original book, the running/writing essay collection 99 Problems by Ben Tanzer, and we received some exciting news a few days ago regarding its Kindle listing over at Amazon.com: turns out that the book briefly broke into the Kindle store's top 20,000 bestsellers this weekend, which may not sound like much at first until you factor in the millions upon millions of electronic books now available there. And even more remarkable, the book hit the national top 10 as well this weekend, of all sports collections being sold electronically there, which needless to say has both Ben and I shocked and gratified. Anyway, if you're a Kindle owner yourself, I encourage you to stop by and pick up a copy for a mere five bucks; and I do hope you'll have a chance to leave a few thoughts about it as well over there at its official Amazon listing. (Not a Kindle owner? I hope you'll instead leave a comment about the book over at literary social network Goodreads.com, where the title continues to do well -- it's now been added to almost forty people's libraries there, and with ten ratings that are still averaging 4.7 out of 5.)

And speaking of which, CCLaP friend and science-fiction author Mark Brand had some very nice things to say about the book last week at his blog, turning in a lengthy essay on how surprisingly much 99 Problems touches not just on writing but on modern fatherhood, a thought-provoking review that I encourage you to check out; and in the meanwhile, the promotional story-map that was created out of one of the book's stories at Google Maps has now been viewed almost 1,100 times, yet another surprising statistic for this book that's been quickly exceeding nearly every expectation we had for it. Don't forget that the download is completely free if you want it to be, and can be opened in nearly every ebook device on the market, including the ever-ubiquitous iPhone; if you haven't picked up a copy yet yourself, I highly encourage you to do so.

Today's photo of the day is entitled "work to death," and is by Darragh Hehir. Darragh is originally from Dublin, but currently calls Prato, Italy home, which I believe is where this particular shot was taken as well. He also has a nice personal website, for those who would like to know more.

Don't forget that I actually maintain a whole page of favorite photographs over at Flickr, for those who would like to see more. To express an interest in having your own work featured, just drop me a line at cclapcenter [at] gmail.com.

(CCLaP is dedicated to reviewing as many contemporary books as possible, including self-published volumes; click here to learn how to submit your own book for possible review, although be warned that it needs to have been published within the last 18 months to be considered. For the complete list of all books reviewed here, as well as the next books scheduled to be read, click here.)

Urbis Morpheos
By Stephen Palmer
PS Publishing

Of all the small presses that regularly send me books these days, perhaps my favorite is Pete Crowther's PS Publishing over in the UK, despite their titles sometimes getting critically panned here at CCLaP; because more than just about any other small press I deal with, Crowther makes publishing decisions based on his heart and gut instead of his wallet, deeply idiosyncratic choices that are the very definition of "love it or hate it" genre work, which is how it is that I can adore the press yet still give it critical pans on a regular basis. Take for example their latest, the profoundly strange far-future tale Urbis Morpheos by British author Stephen Palmer, who I could barely find any information about online, other than that he's written other SF titles before and perhaps (or perhaps not) a series of nonfiction books on psychology as well; because although I ended up really digging it quite a bit, even I'm a little puzzled afterwards over why exactly that is, while there will be plenty of others who will barely be able to stand this highly challenging, highly abstract story. It's the kind of book that wouldn't even exist in published form without organizations like PS; and that's the reason I like PS so much, is that they regularly lavish a lot of money and attention on titles that will make others often ask what exactly they've been smoking.

And in fact, it's difficult to even describe in a straightforward manner what exactly this novel is about, with many of the details I'm about to mention being mere guesses on my part, based on what I was able to glean from this utterly expository-free tale. I believe, for example, that it's set on Earth but merely in the far, far, far future, one million years or more, in which so much time has passed that there is literally not a trace left of the human civilization you and I are a part of; and I also believe that what passes for humanity in this far future is now forced to share the planet with a highly evolved form of machine intelligence, one that has progressed so much for so many thousands of years that they too are now organic if not necessarily biological in nature, self-replicating creatures that essentially create entire habitats that are hostile to human life, forcing the humans to live in either protected areas or in artificial living environments called 'biomes' they've created themselves. The main character, then, is a woman named Psolilai, who actually exists in both physical form and as a dream state in our narrative itself (one capitalizes her name, the other doesn't), leading similar but different lives and with us never quite sure which is real and which is the dream, the narrative simply shifting regularly from one voice to the other and with both presented to us as "real;" and both Psolilais are on quests of sorts, that apparently have to do with the scheming machinations of her Shakespearean family, and that involve all kinds of "million years in the future" concepts that will have your head spinning, like (to cite one example) the "wreality" biological information devices that "live" in giant pools of water within the biomes, which humans then "catch" like fish in order to have their Wikipedia-meets-Greek-oracle information poetically divulged.

I mean, I could go on and on like this, but it kind of defeats the point of reading it, which is not to get caught up in the plot's intricacies but rather to let the whole thing wash over you like the obtuse gift it is, to wallow in this utterly striking universe that Palmer has created, even more fantastic for it supposedly being a look at our own race but only several rungs along the evolutionary ladder from where we are now. It's the kind of book I would never seek out on my own, out in the far edges of the "New Weird" and just barely understandable as a traditional three-act story; so thank God PS Publishing is around to get such books into our hands, the kind of frustratingly dense yet textually rich treat that I only have the tolerance for two or three times a year. It's simply too strange and designed for too niche an audience to get exactly a high score today, but certainly is a good example of the best that subgenre literature has to offer us, the kind of supremely odd yet deeply rewarding experience that will be perfect for existing fans of Mark Leyner, Mark Danielewski, and David David Katzman. It comes highly recommended to those who at least recognize those names, even as most will end up confusedly scratching their heads over this puzzlebox of a book.

Out of 10: 8.4

Read even more about Urbis Morpheos: Amazon | GoodReads | LibraryThing | Shelfari

Today's photo of the day is entitled "oneAndAHalf," and is a Flickr member who goes just by Myshak. Myshak is a graduate student based out of Košice, Slovakia, which I believe is where this particular shot was taken as well. She has also has a nice personal blog, for those who would like to learn more.

Don't forget that I actually maintain a whole page of favorite photographs over at Flickr, for those who would like to see more. To express an interest in having your own work featured, just drop me a line at cclapcenter [at] gmail.com.

(Since the beginning of 2008 I've been writing an ongoing series of essays here that I call the "CCLaP 100," whereby I read for the first time a hundred books considered by many to be classics, and then write reports here on whether or not I think they deserve this label. For the complete list of books, as well as an explanation behind how the list was compiled, you can click here.)

All Quiet on the Western Front (1929)
By Erich Maria Remarque
Book #47 in this essay series

The story in a nutshell:
Originally published serially the year before, Erich Maria Remarque's 1929 All Quiet on the Western Front concerns the events of World War One a decade previous, and in particular the insanely long battlefront running almost the entire length of western Europe that the war became most known for, in which both sides lined up millions of soldiers along an unmoving border that stretched literally from Scandinavia to Spain Belgium to Switzerland, where over the course of four years the armies died in numbers scarcely ever seen in human history before, because of clueless generals applying 19th-century strategies (like endless frontal assaults and thousands of miles of defensive ditches) to a war full of 20th-century technology (like machine guns, barbed wire, biological weapons and a lot more). Much like Oliver Stone's Platoon, then, Remarque's book is not known so much for its plot than for its astute and unblinking look at the actual warfront environment, establishing for the first time many of the elements that eventually became staples of war fiction -- the chaotic terror of the actual fighting, the maddening monotony of the non-combat times, the pure randomness of war-related death, and the moments of surrealistic humor that can nonetheless be regularly found within such environments. Although it's tempting now to dismiss the novel as a series of cliche-filled vignettes, it's important to remember that this was the title that created many of these cliches in the first place -- a book that spelled out the very horrors that returning soldiers found impossible to share with friends and family, which is precisely why their friends and family devoured the book so voraciously when it first came out -- all told through the filter of our introspective teenage hero Paul Baumer, as over the course of half a decade he watches literally every person he went to high school with eventually get killed, with even Baumer himself succumbing in a random and unremarkable way by the end.

The argument for it being a classic:
Well, as mentioned, according to its fans, there's a pretty simple argument for why this book should be considered a classic; it's demonstrably the very first novel to establish so many of the tropes now found in almost all modern creative projects concerning war, including not only the examples already mentioned but also the older rah-rah schoolmaster who gets all the boys whipped up for combat in the first place, and the concept of a returning soldier finding it almost impossible to reconnect with his old life once getting home from active duty. Plus the book has a strong connection to both Hollywood's past and future, with the 1930 adaptation being the very first non-musical "talkie" to ever win the Best Picture Oscar, and with a brand-new big-budget adaptation in the works as we speak, starring Daniel "Harry Potter" Ratcliffe; plus it's an important landmark of the Early Modernist arts as well, say its fans, the book that inspired the term "Lost Generation" through Baumer's remarkable monologue about halfway through, on how he and all his school buddies left for the war as naive children who thought they understood the way the world worked, but were returning as scarred adults who have lost the ability to understand how polite society even works, shades of the Tropic of Cancer "Jazz Age" times just around the corner. And then there's the fact that the Nazis were so threatened by this book, it was one of the first they banned after gaining power in the 1930s, even going so far as to cut off Remarque's sister's head in retribution for Remarque himself successfully escaping to America; and if the Nazis hated it this much, there's gotta be something to it almost by default, right?

The argument against:
Not much, to tell you the truth; although like most books that are considered classics, you find a fair share of people online complaining about being forced to read this in high school under unpleasant circumstances, which pretty much ruined whatever chance they had to enjoy it. But that's not really a complaint about the book so much as it is about their old high-school lit teacher, so am not sure how appropriate it really is.

My verdict:
As regular readers know, after three years we're finally approaching the halfway point of the CCLaP 100, at which point I plan on writing a long essay about everything I've now learned from the process, including a series of lists such as the titles I've been most enjoyably surprised by; and All Quiet on the Western Front definitely earns a spot on such a list, a shockingly powerful book to this day which is not exactly the anti-war screed its fans claim it is, but rather becomes one by default for so unflinchingly detailing the random, utterly unglamorous brutality that comes with war. And indeed, this was one of the many surprises I had with this novel, was learning just how many military veterans love it themselves, precisely for being one of the most realistic depictions of life along an actual battlefront ever written, which when combined with its poetic Modernist elements makes it still such an affecting winner, even 81 years after its original publication. (And for an excellent example of the "poetic Modernist elements" I'm talking about, see the whole section near the end where Baumer gets caught in an enemy foxhole during an artillery attack, is forced to kill a French soldier at close range, then is stuck with the corpse in the hole for four straight days without food, which drives him so insane that he starts holding conversations with the dead man and promising to deliver his personal effects to his widow after the war is over, a temporary insanity that he quickly comes out of again once being reunited with his buddies. If that isn't one of the most effectively bizarre war anecdotes ever written, I don't know what is.)

Although not exactly a textbook example of Early Modernism when it comes to style, and in fact displaying at points more of an affinity for the now-hated Genteel literature of the same period ("Ah! Mother, Mother! How can it be that I must part from you? Here I sit and there you are lying"...sheesh), this is very much a touchstone of Modernism in terms of expanding the scope of what was allowed to be discussed in "polite company," and it's hard to imagine how we would even have such modern classics as Saving Private Ryan and the like without this trailblazer paving the way. It's not only an undeniable classic, but will probably end up as one of my ten personal favorites of the entire series once it's all over, and it comes strongly recommended today for just about everyone out there.

Is it a classic? Yes

The next four books scheduled to be read:
The Executioner's Song, by Norman Mailer
Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy
To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
Walden, by Henry David Thoreau

Read even more about All Quiet on the Western Front: Amazon | GoodReads | LibraryThing | Shelfari | Wikipedia

(And don't forget that the first 33 essays in this series are now available in book form!)

And P.S., for an even more interesting experience, make sure to spend some time at Google Images looking through all the fascinating covers that have been made for this book over the decades.

I recently came across the work of Italian photographer Giacomo Cosua, and enjoyed it so much that I thought I'd do a little mini-feature today instead of my usual one image. Giacomo is a young professional actually in the industry, whose work has been featured now in such places as Vanity Fair, GQ Italia, and the 2006 Venice Biennial, and who is also the editor-in-chief of his own magazine, called POSI+TIVE. Giacomo was kind enough to answer a few of my questions as well, which I'm running below. I definitely encourage you to check out both his official website and Flickr account whenever you have a chance.

What led to you doing photography, and why do you like it so much?

When i was thirteen i had some photography lessons at school. When i learned how to develop a photo, waiting for the image to come up printed on paper, smelling the papers, i understood that i'll take photography into my life. After a few years i stopped thinking about photography, i didn't find more inspirations and i didn't like the photos that i had done. But when i found a compact digital camera five years ago i started taking photos again, and since that day, i'm still thinking everyday about photography. It was first a hobby and now it's also a part of my job. At the same time i started again working on film cameras. I just bought a Contax T2 and i can't wait to use it! I like photography just because i can show to others my stories and my way to represent reality.

I see in your bio that you've lived in a number of big cities around the world. What did you think of them, and how do they compare to Venice, where you are right now?

Venice, it's a quite complicated city, but i still love it everyday. I was born here and i can say that i'm pretty lucky. I was living in Germany during my Erasmus period. It was quite important for me living there for six months because i discovered again photography. It's quite difficult to compare Osnabrueck with Venice, they are so different! I love the "Osna" snow. The Sunday mornings there are quite relaxing also, because everything is closed, nobody around the streets, and you can just have a quiet walk in the same street where usually there are a lot of people buying everything from the shops. I'm in Venice right now but i'm planning to move to London, i'm waiting on an answer to know my future...

What kinds of things do you like shooting the most, and why? Your photos are a combination of things and people; which of these do you like shooting the most?

It's quite difficult to answer. I don't know what i like exactly to shoot more. People are always telling you a lot when you do a portrait -- inside a portrait you can feel sensation, thinking, doubts, fears, joy and whatever, just looking at the picture. [They say that] every photo tells a story...and it's so true, and you can say that also for the things that i shoot in my life. Also things are telling you a story, you have just to understand the best moment to shoot them, if they are interesting or not, and thinking why others will like that thing or not. Sometimes you can take a photo just for personal reasons, and it's not so obvious that the others can understand your reasons. The perfect photo for me it's when you are able to connect buildings and people just in one shot.

(Like many Netflix customers, I too can get quite lax with the timely watching and returning of my movies, which of course defeats the entire purpose of having a flat-rate rental plan in the first place. To combat that, I am now writing standardized mini-reviews of each and every movie I end up watching through Netflix, both instantly and on DVD. Don't forget, all previous 'Justify My Netflix' reviews can be found on CCLaP's main movie page.)

Today's movie: The Book of Eli, 2010 (Amazon | IMDB | Netflix | Wikipedia)

Why I added it to my queue: Because this post-apocalyptic actioner received an unusual amount of praise earlier this year for being essentially a disposable gonzo B-pic, which is just exactly enough justification for me to add it to my Netflix queue.

The reality: Surprisingly great! And really, this makes a lot more sense once you realize that it was made by the Hughes Brothers, who this time I guess decided to keep their own profiles a lot more subsumed, after first becoming one of the most celebrated teams in the entire history of black cinema with their '90s hits Menace II Society and Dead Presidents, only to become pariahs in the world of comics just as quickly with their truly dismal 2001 adaptation of Alan Moore's From Hell. In this case, though, they get things almost exactly right, bringing a kind of Raimiesque over-the-top zeal to their videogame-feeling ultra-stylish tale of Mad-Max-style competing militias out in the desert of a post-disaster America, but then leaning heavily on a surprisingly smart and subdued script by Gary Whitta (his very first produced project), which proposes an astonishing idea at its center that's open to a whole lot of interpretation -- the idea that the Christian Bible was to blame for the World War Three that wrecked their world, and that almost every Bible in existence has been destroyed in the years since and Christianity almost entirely wiped out, with an extremely rare rogue copy of the book being secretly transported across the country by Denzel Washington's reluctant hero Eli for the purposes of hopeful good, even while Wild-West-style bigshot Carnegie (Gary Oldman) is attempting to steal it for the purposes of evil. That provides for a surprisingly weighty philosophical question (whether organized religion is ultimately good or bad for a society) to anchor what would otherwise be a pretty flighty script, which when combined with inventive special effects makes this a real winner (and seriously, all those first-person moving-bullet shots from when they destroy that elderly couple's house is freaking brilliant), and is way more than enough to make up for Mila Kunis's vapid, glassy-eyed performance (or in other words, business as usual for her), as Carnegie's concubine turned Washington's traveling companion. It comes highly recommended to all my fellow B-pic genre fans.

Strangest piece of trivia: Washington performed all his own hand-to-hand fight choreography.

Worth your time? Yes

Today's photo of the day is entitled "Old Pillars (Goa)," and is by Manpreet Singh Kohli. Manpreet is a software engineer from Chandigarh, India, who shoots photos in his spare time; as the title indicates, this particular shot is from the Goa region of southwest India, under Portuguese control from the 1500s to literally 1961, and with a heavy Christian influence as a result. Do make sure to stop by Manpreet's main photostream for a lot more great images.

Don't forget that I actually maintain a whole page of favorite photographs over at Flickr, for those who would like to see more. To express an interest in having your own work featured, just drop me a line at cclapcenter [at] gmail.com.

Wow! I can't tell you how shocked and gratified I am to see that CCLaP's newest original book, the essay collection 99 Problems by Ben Tanzer, has been downloaded almost 200 times now in just its first week of release, far and away a new record for ebooks put out by the center; and that it's generated almost $200 in voluntary payments in that first week as well, which to give you a comparison, is the same amount that Ben's previous book with CCLaP, Repetition Patterns, has made in an entire two years. And even better, the promotional story-map that was created at Google Maps to help publicize the book has been checked out an incredible 700 times in its first week, and with an average of 50 new people still stopping by each day. Ben and I are both grateful for all the attention the book has so far received, and I really encourage you to keep telling your friends about it, and to make a mention at your blog, Facebook account, Twitter feed and the like.

And even more good news -- critical praise for 99 Problems has been appearing in record amounts this week as well. Here's a roundup of the most interesting things people have been having to say about it in the last seven days:

--Ryan Bradley at online magazine "Big Other" did an interview with Ben last week, calling him in his introduction "certainly one of the kindest, most supportive writers I've met out there in the ether."

--Our old pal Josh Spilker of Impose magazine also did an interview with Ben, saying in his own introduction, "If I want to think of sharply written stories that capture a humorous reality of the day-to-day I think of Ben Tanzer."

--CCLaP friend and all-around good guy Pete Anderson of "PeteLit" posted a few thoughts about the new book, calling it "[a]nother winner from Ben's fertile imagination, and maybe the best thing he's written yet."

--Author Mel Bosworth was similarly impressed, saying at his Goodreads review of the book, "This, to me, is Tanzer at his absolute best....writing about himself in an addictive prose that'll keep your eyes moving so quickly they'll sweat."

--And speaking of Goodreads, author Mickey Hess said in his own write-up there, "99 Problems delivers a sophisticated juxtaposition in reverse, a fascinating and exhilarating literary marathon." (And by the way, of six ratings now posted at Goodreads, the book is still maintaining an average score of 4.83 out of 5. If you're a fellow GRer, I do hope you'll have a chance soon to chime in yourself.)

--And finally, big CCLaP supporter Lori Hettler, moderator of "The Next Best Book Club" (the largest discussion group of the entire two-million-member Goodreads system), had a lot of amazing things to say about the book at the official TNBBC blog, saying among other things that "[t]he words run across the page, smooth and effortless," that "Ben manages to make me wish I was a runner," and admitting that she thinks she might have a little crush on him. Join the club, Lori!

And don't forget, by the way, that this weekend Amazon finally approved the official Kindle version of 99 Problems, which you can now purchase there with the click of a button for a mere $4.99. I've been hearing from a ton of Kindle owners in the last week about when this would be available, so I hope that you all will take advantage of it, now that it's here. Thanks again for all the interest and enthusiasm you've been showing this latest book by CCLaP, and I will of course keep you all updated regularly on the latest; and needless to say, if you haven't downloaded a copy yet for yourself, I encourage you to do so as soon as you have a chance.

Today's photo of the day is entitled "Warsaw - entrance to hell," and is by Konrad Olszewski. Konrad doesn't mention much about himself at his Flickr profile; but as the title indicates, this particular shot was taken in the Polish city of Warsaw. Do make sure to stop by his main photostream for a lot more great images.

Don't forget that I actually maintain a whole page of favorite photographs over at Flickr, for those who would like to see more. To express an interest in having your own work featured, just drop me a line at cclapcenter [at] gmail.com.

(Like many Netflix customers, I too can get quite lax with the timely watching and returning of my movies, which of course defeats the entire purpose of having a flat-rate rental plan in the first place. To combat that, I am now writing standardized mini-reviews of each and every movie I end up watching through Netflix, both instantly and on DVD. Don't forget, all previous 'Justify My Netflix' reviews can be found on CCLaP's main movie page.)

Today's movie: Kick-Ass, 2010 (Amazon | IMDB | Netflix | Wikipedia)

Why I added it to my queue: Because this was the big buzz film this year among the nerd set, an adaptation of the comic-book series by revered industry figure Mark Millar concerning what it would actually look like out in the real world if a group of teenagers really did decide one day to try donning costumes and fighting crime.

The reality: So are you ready for the most controversial statement to run here at CCLaP all year? Okay, here it is -- Kick-Ass f-cking sucked. Start your angry comments, Facebookers! I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm sure it'll be highly loved by all the violent little 12-year-olds in your life; but with such a clunky, immature, groan-inducing script at the heart of it, I'm not sure how any actual grown-up could say with a straight face that they enjoyed it themselves. And also, yes, just like Roger Ebert, I'm one of the people who was horrified by the level of violence and cursing displayed here by the 11-year-old Chloe Grace Moretz, which would've been fine if not eye-rolling if played off as a funny joke ("Ha ha! A little girl said 'c-nt!' Ha ha!"), but instead is played for non-ironic drama in the film itself, the tale of this sad, manipulated little girl who's been literally turned into a psychopath by her revenge-obsessed ex-cop father; and I have to confess, I find nothing about that situation funny or cute at all. I'm going to have to check out the original comics now, because I suspect that this is one of those cases of a ridiculously broad concept that actually works in a medium like that, but that completely falls apart when trying to film it in the real world with real actors (see for example most of the work of Clive Barker); but I have to say, when it comes to the movie itself, I found the whole thing more depressing than even vaguely entertaining, and agree with others that it marks a new low point in human history as far as what we now find appropriate for pre-teen audiences.

Strangest piece of trivia: Although never mentioned in the actual movie, the credits reveal that the names of the villain's heavies are the same as the members of British pop group The Spice Girls.

Worth your time? Not in any conceivable way whatsoever

Today's photo of the day is entitled "maybe ducky," and is by Sasha Cooklin. Sasha doesn't mention where she's from, but does say that this is from an entire long-form photo project called "troydays" that consists of nothing but interesting shots of her dog. She has a whole website set up for it, in fact, for those who would like to see more.

Don't forget that I actually maintain a whole page of favorite photographs over at Flickr, for those who would like to see more. To express an interest in having your own work featured, just drop me a line at cclapcenter [at] gmail.com.