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I can't help it; I am excited about The Hobbit. If you are too, you gotta read this interview with Guillermo del Toro.

An imaginarium of his own

Was there ever a director with such grandiose artistic vision and bad luck as Terry Gilliam? His Baron Munchausen has become a byword, and is probably the reason stupid Warner Brothers wouldn't consider him to direct the initial Harry Potters. I've just watched Lost in La Mancha, the highly entertaining documentary about his failed Don Quixote film. Most films, I imagine, hang by a tightrope the way this one did, with actors not showing up till the last second, sound problems from planes, not hammering down contracts, etc. But this one was special. Location was (why?) next to a NATO air base. There was a flash flood on the second day of production. Then there were actor Jean Rochefort's health problems, culminating in a herniated disc. It ended with bangs and whimpers and insurance squabbles.

But it's finally due to be remade next year. The insurance company refused to relinquish the rights for years, but Gilliam's got it back, baby! Here's wishing him the best of luck and a big knock on wood, but word is that he may have to do it without Johnny Depp this time. I hope he can keep some of the old sets and costumes. The design looks absolutely gorgeous, and so did the locations (Spain). Gilliam also drew the most extraordinary mock-ups for his storyboards and designs, which I would love to see in a book.

Of course, bad as Rochefort's prostate problems and back problems were, he didn't go to the length that Gilliam's last leading man did to wreak havoc.

It was Heath Ledger. He died.

Meh, mistborn, mess

I'm always looking for fun reading for the cardio machines, but Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn trilogy doesn't seem to be doing it. When I make it halfway through a book and have no impulse to finish, it is not good. Aside from the fact that few of the characters are compelling, their interactions are not that interesting, and the magical universe is not terribly fun, the writing is beyond repetitive and clunky. Let me give you an example: one of the primary ways that the magicians, for lack of a better term, work is by burning metals that give them specific powers. They can fly through the air by Pushing or Pulling on metal. (Great terminology.) This is painstakingly explained the first time that the hero does it, balancing himself with a coin dropped here, a window sash there, a guard's armor hither, a thrown coin thither. You get the idea, right? Well, then we go through it yet again when the hero teaches the scrappy gutter girl with amazing powers how to do this, and we have to hear her first-time experience -- which adds next to nothing. I blame the editor as well as the author.

Seeing what the fuss is all about

I only read Neil Gaiman after seeing the movie Stardust, and then, hearing all the praise for what an imaginative prophet of modern life he is, I thought I should read some of his more serious work. (Stardust, while fun, is decidedly a light novel.) Having now read Anansi Boys and most of American Gods, I think I can pronounce that he is good, if not quite as earth-shaking as I'd been led to believe. Anansi Boys in particular manages to balance myth with a lot of real-world themes like failed parenting, individualism, finding a truly suitable partner in your life, and so forth, while being a good fun adventure chasing crooks around the world. Anansi's son, Charlie, leads a very boring life in London, which is turned upside down when his more godlike brother shows up... and turns out to be, quite literally, his better half -- or at least more fun, more daring, and more problematic than anyone could imagine, forcing Charlie to become pretty godlike himself. It's fun.

Wise man's fear, indeed

Ah, the life of a fantasy novel fan. Finding the good stuff is hard; not running out of it is harder; waiting for the good stuff to come out is the hardest of all. I threatened to beat my good friend to death with a George R. R. Martin novel when I discovered that this doorstopper series he had highly recommended was not done yet. Robert Jordan fans had to deal with the biggest heartbreak of all, the author actually dying before the series is over. Last year, I stumbled across Patrick Rothfuss' acclaimed debut, In the Name of the Wind, the first of a trilogy, a compellingly narrated doorstop about an orphan (yeah, I know) of inhuman brilliance and power (yeah, yeah) and musical talent (kill me now) who enters a magical school (screams of anguish)... Fine. It does not summarize well, but when I first read it, I was blown away, and recommended it to the Martin friend.

Then it did not really stay with me. I wasn't compelled to reread it instantly, and I found myself forgetting large chunks of plot even as I remembered some turns of phrase so bleakly powerful that they were well worth the whole book. But I did recollect that book two had been scheduled to come out sometime around now, so I got the book out and reread it all today. Hm, I thought to myself, not without its problems and stereotypes, but really it was quite good, wasn't it... I merrily skipped over to my computer to find that the second book, The Wise Man's Fear, had disappeared from amazon. Completely.

Furious with amazon and their damn search system, I then googled, found the author's blog, and learned that... the release date was always a load of optimistic crap. The humorous and blunt blog post, which reminds me a little bit of Kevin Smith, goes a long way towards softening the blow. The book was not done as of February, and judging from the author's international signing schedule, it will not speedily issue forth anytime soon. I expect my friend to come beat me to death any day now.

Grey's mentality

An extremely popular book last year was Alex & Me, the story of a Grey parrot -- think Polynesia in Doctor Doolittle -- and his scientist. Like Polynesia, Alex was wise beyond a parrot's common lot, and talked a great deal; like Dr. Doolittle, Irene Pepperberg had a great many adventures, but the love of her work kept her afloat during all of them. I'm not sure, frankly, if the book reads more as an entertaining and incredibly intriguing look at animal intelligence and language use, or a cautionary tale about academia and women in science. Either way, it is excellent, if a little prosy at the end, and I highly recommend it to everyone as a great short read. It is alternately painful and hilarious, and if you don't tear up at Alex's last words to Irene, "Be good. I love you," you are dead inside.

Coincidentally enough, the same day that I finished this, I took a fantasy novel to the gym for reading, the new Valdemar book by Mercedes Lackey. I almost never look at her Valdemar stuff, and wouldn't you know, I noticed that this one is dedicated to Alex and Irene. Lackey is a big bird lover herself, and works with wild birds.

You can find out more about Pepperberg's work via the Alex Foundation.

Making it new

I always enjoyed the Narnia books when I was a kid and still like to pick them up now; even though I know they're not by any stretch of the imagination Literature with a capital L like you can claim for Tolkien, they have a lot of great description and imaginative characters and places.

I finally got to see Prince Caspian, which I missed in the movie theaters. Fun, though definitely could have used some editing. An entire battle was added, and the themes of teenage frustration with not growing up fast enough were pretty heavily emphasized. Makes sense; I never thought too much about how jarring it would be for these kids to travel back and forth from WWII and post-WWII England to a lovely fantasy world at the drop of a hat. For the religious parable audience, the frustration with a seemingly uncaring and unhearing deity was also a key theme.

As I may have said somewhere before, clearly the children of England all were inspired to take up drama training after Harry Potter and just in time for the Narnia films, because any one of these four could out-act the whole Harry Potter trio at, well, the drop of a hat. The youngest actress (Lucy), who was so delightful and natural in the first film, was straining a bit hard here, but still quite good; ditto for Peter, but Susan and Edmund made the most of their rather un-emphasized characters.

I still want to know what's going to happen if they go on and make this whole franchise, because Narnia's enemies in two time periods are, essentially, Arabs. They're called "Calormenes," but they wear turbans, they're dark, they talk like the Arabian Nights about gardens of delights and so forth, they trade in slaves, they're courteous but cruel, they're treacherous, their women are veiled... you get the idea. They appear briefly in the film under production now, so their appearance or lack thereof might give us a hint as to how it'll be done. I sincerely hope it'll be superior to Peter Jackson's handling of the enemies in Lord of the Rings, who might as well have been bearing flashing signs saying "Dangerous Eastern Peoples."

And finally, what will happen to Susan? Bowing to modern sensibilities and the demand for Girl Power, Susan takes heavy part in the battles here, and Lucy is of course more active in the next film. But in the books, Susan, out of the four, turns her back on Narnia for silk stockings and parties and lipsticks. Will it be blamed on her anger at being shoved around and taken away from her incipient romance with Prince Caspian (in the film, not the books)? Or will they bow to happy endings and include her in the last film? I don't even know what I would like best -- perhaps leaving her out but showing her repenting and thinking of Narnia in England as a closing scene. Lewis was not exactly comfortable with women in his own life, certainly not femininity as such, and it shows badly. I hope it can be improved.

Mortally afraid

Somewhere in this harried weekend, I managed to devour a fantasy novel (first in a while) by famed writer Tanith Lee called Mortal Suns, set in a vaguely ancient Greek kind of world ruled by polygamous kings. It's unbelievably eerie and has some gorgeous descriptive writing; you can understand both these attributes when I say that the main character is an otherwise beautiful princess who is born without feet and is sent away by her mother to the Temple of Death; said mother then almost dies of supernatural feet kicking about in her womb.

Creepy as it is (and that's the tip of the iceberg), the writing does at least carry it along for the first half of the novel, but after that, when the romance gets going, phrasing takes over for any kind of characterization and the whole thing falls apart, character, plot, even imagery, and all. It's a pity, really.