I Never Had Big HAIR

My daughter's in choir this year. A few nights ago, they had this big concert performance thing with the other high schools in the city where we live. Mostly, the choirs sing the kinds of songs you'd expect high school choirs to sing: old songs, frequently religious in nature, that sound very somber and serious. Mostly, it's uninspired, safe choices, but that's the way these things go, right?

Don't get me wrong, there are exceptions even when the school is staying within the paradigm, but, generally speaking, the music isn't very... exciting.

However! One of the schools did a whole 80s-themed set with music by the likes of Tears for Fears and Queen. It was a lot of fun, and the kids even dressed in (mostly) 80s styles. The one thing they didn't get right? The HAIR! Not a single one of them had appropriate 80s HAIR!

Now, look, I get it: 80s HAIR takes a certain amount of commitment, possibly more than is appropriate to ask of a high school student for a single evening's performance, but I think it would have taken their performance up another level.

But, then, who am I to talk? I never had 80s hair.

Hey! It's not my fault! My hair was already thinning by the time I was 15, and you can see the progression of my hair loss in my student IDs/yearbook photos. No, I can't show them to you. For one thing, I only have one of my yearbooks (and that not exactly on purpose), and, though I still have my student IDs (at least, I'm pretty sure I do), I have no idea where they are in the catastrophe of boxes that is my garage. (If you want to buy any of my old collectible stuff, make sure you check out my eBay auctions!)

At any rate, the whole HAIR thing got me to thinking... And I kind of wish I had an old 80s photo of me with big HAIR to post: But do I really? Okay, no, not really. Don't get me wrong; if I had one, I would post it, but, alas...

Oh! But the HAIR thing got me thinking; I'm just not sure about what. How weird things were in the 80s? Where things actually weird in the 80s? Would I go back and re-live the 80s and high school if I could? The answer to that used to always be "no fucking way," but I've been rethinking that a bit lately. Not because I would want to go back to the 80s for its own sake, but it's clear to me now that the 80s was when we really started to go off the rails as a nation. Reagan's presidency was a disaster and set up for so much of what is going on today. So, yeah, I would probably choose to do that all over again just so that I could be more politically aware at a younger age and start working then to stop what is happening now.

And, well, opt out of "christianity" at an age where I could have been saved from "christianity" and its harmful effects.

So, anyway, one of the songs that choir sang was "Everybody Wants to Rule the World," and that also got me thinking. I mean, would I want to rule the world? At this point, oh, absolutely! Which I never would have said when I was younger. Or even a few years ago. So, I thought, hey! I'll write a post about that in relation to the song! I mean, that would be cool, right? But...

The problem arose when I looked up the lyrics to the song... What the fuck? What does any of that even mean? Which reminded that I have actually looked up those lyrics before and had the same thought. Other than the line, "Everybody wants to rule the world," which is pretty self-explanatory, the rest of the song is nearly meaningless phrases joined together by... nothing. And maybe that's what the 80s were like? Anyway... Because it's probably still a good song, here you go:

Blade Runner revisited (a movie review post)

You know how in just about every cop show these days they do crazy-insane enhancements on photos in order to catch the bad guy? My kids and I were watching something recently and they were doing that, and it occurred to me that that whole thing comes from Blade Runner. As far as I know, that's the first time that was used in a movie like that, and we all know how influential Blade Runner has been. It also occurred to me that only 1/3 of my kids had seen Blade Runner, so we set about fixing that. And, well, it had been a long time since I'd seen it and, with a sequel coming out, it seemed like a good time to watch it.

I chose the original theatrical version to show them 1. because that's the version that had such a huge impact on movies and pop culture, and 2. because it's been so long since I've watched any version that I couldn't really remember what the differences are beyond that some don't have the narration. I happen to like the narration; it gives the movie that film noir detective feel that is one of its appealing aspects to me.

The first thing that became apparent is that the movie has retained its very unique look and feel. It was original 35 years ago when it first came out and, despite the amount of influence it's had on other movies, has rarely had that visual tone duplicated. That's kind of amazing, actually.

Beyond the fact the movie time is now present time and that the movie isn't anything like the present, it holds up remarkably well. And it's still a conceivable future in that none of the things in it have become things we no longer think are possible. In fact, all of the sci-fi things in the movie are on track to one day just being science. Which is kind of scary, still, especially considering the environmental implications in the movie, and we haven't done anything to stop that bit of future from happening, either.

Really, the only piece of the movie that has worn on me is Rutger Hauer. Remember back in the 80s how Hauer was such a big deal after Blade Runner? Well, I do. He was a name... that didn't last. Because he wasn't really a great actor. And that goes for in Blade Runner, too. Granted, some of the issues with his character are a matter of the directing, but I'd be willing to bet that a better actor could have pulled off some of his flubs (like the howling) more believably. Which is not to say he doesn't have his good moments, but he's probably the only real weakness in the film as a whole.

Unless you want to talk about Sean Young and her huge 80s hair, because wow... It should have been listed separately in the credits.

I'd say it's still a movie worth watching with a message that is still just as important now as it ever was. Even though I've read Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, watching the movie makes me want to go back and read that again, too. I'm not going to, right now, but I want to, and you have to give credit to an adaptation that makes you want to go back to the source material. Again. And watching it again makes me both hopeful and fearful of Blade Runner 2049...

I definitely think there's more to explore in the world that was created for the first film; I just hope it's good. Harrison Ford said the script for 2049 is the best script he's ever read, but, then, he's the guy who wanted Han Solo to die, so I don't know if his opinion is trustworthy. At least Ridley Scott isn't directing it; he's more miss than hit.