soundtrack sidedishes

Will Smith is getting old.

I noticed this last night, stretched out on somebody else's carpeted floor, watching his performance in the most perplexing and morbid jigsaw puzzle of a film I've ever seen. I spent the first half of Seven Pounds in rather amazed confusion, the second in an almost paralyzing disbelief.

in the middle of this jigsaw awesomely putting itself together, we are invited into Emily's garage. in this shadowy refuge, she works printing letterpress greeting cards and invitations on a couple of old, beat up presses. behind these rare monsters we get glimpses of printing paraphernalia--paper, inks, and pinned up scraps. the idea of this was so lovely to me. I can't envy Emily her heart condition, and I wouldn't want to be looking after an ugly great dane, but I wouldn't mind access to a garage so equipped as hers. it is a relatively minor part of the film, but our hero in the shape of Will Smith spends all night repairing this woman's broken Heidleberg while Muse's cover of Feeling Good rushes around in the background. as I remember that moment now, it seems a little island of calm and normal purpose before the driving perplexity takes over again.

coincidentally, the internet has offered me this not completely irrelevant bit of trivia concerning the woman who plays Emily. Rosario Dawson once appeared in The Chemical Brothers' video for the song Out of Control, which Chris and I included in the first chapter of Starcustard, as the third optional music track--just as the slavekids are attacking the giant slug. how interesting.