truth in advertising. john kenney. (93)

i can't remember how i found out about "truth in advertising", i want to say it was featured in a barnes and noble email or maybe a goodreads one. but i do remember that nick hornby was referenced in one of the reviews. (its actually a publishers weekly quote, i found it on the back cover: "a comic tour de force; fans of nick hornby and jonathan tropper will have a new author to watch for.") since i love, nick hornby, i had to check it out. figured it would be the "high fidelity" of advertising. and it kinda was.

*this entry will contain some spoilers. if you plan on reading the book, read it first than read this blog.

"the truth in advertising" is the story of finbar dolan, the name is odd but i like it, though he goes by fin (love the nickname too, reminds me of "adventure time" . . . and i just realized . . . "glee", hmm maybe not so cute, after all).  fin works in advertising (duh?) and is going through a mid-life crisis.  though mid-life crisis seems like a misnomer, he is only 40, but if you think about it, if the average man lives til 80, than 40 is mid-life.  it's weird because when i think mid-life crisis, i think kevin spacey "american beauty", but i didn't think of fin as that old.  it could be that i was in high school when i first saw "american beauty" and far from 40 and now that i'm a closer to it, think of it as young.  i imagined fin as someone younger, like a not-as-hot-bradley-cooper (though i just googled and cooper is only 38). 

anyway, back to fin's mid-life crisis.  it's not so much a mid-life crisis, but a "what i'm a doing with my life" funk, which i feel is not a product of age, but a side effect of being born after 1970.  i feel like my friends and i are constantly in this funk, not so much because of how old we are, but because we are part of that "everyone gets a gold star" generation.  (this is what klosterman discussed in "the visible man" if you read that entry.)  as kids we were never really awarded for hard work but were constantly given positive reinforcement, as a result our work ethic isn't the greatest.  plus we have always been taught that work should make us happy but the fact of the matter work should just pays the bills.  as a result we end up on this search for work that makes us happy but this search is frivolous because work is never fun no matter how much you think you love your job.  so though fin is in advertising, he is questioning, "is advertising really for me?"

so normally if your work life isn't stellar, it's okay because you can fault your home life.  however, fin's home life is non-existent.  he was engaged but he got cold feet.  about eight months prior to when we meet him in the novel, he had just called off his wedding.  it's kinda sad but really not that horrible because better cold feet than a nasty divorce.  there is also a beautiful story about him calling off his wedding and a gravy boat.  it was sad and lovely and could be a great short story on its own.

so this is fin when we meet him.  i would like to say that things get better for him, but since this is a novel, it gets worse before it all sorts out in the end.

lets start with the advertising, because the title includes the word advertising. fin is a copywriter and his big account is diapers, think huggies but not cos kenney prolly couldn't get the rights to use their name so came up with "snugglies" to use.  so the big news is that snugglies designed the first flushable, biodegradable diaper and decided to launch this new product with . . . a SUPERBOWL COMMERICAL!!!!  this is exciting for fin, cos it is the superbowl.  however, he has a family emergency that makes this even more of a challenge. but before that, a word on superbowl commercials.

superbowl commercials used to be great but now they kinda suck.    they used to be clever and funny and now they are just lame.  in the novel, they came up with two pitches.  the pitch i liked most was based on "an inconvenient truth".  the commercial would show babies being born all over the world but with al gore heads, to show how green they were.  i thought that was clever.  the other commerical, the one they went with, i thought was a horrible idea and would have never worked in real life.  it was based on the apple 1984 ad.  i mean why even try to mess with that?  that ad is classic and any kind of spoof or parody would be bad and should never be attempted.  i know this was novel but still no one in their right mind fictional or non-fictional would ever give this commerical the green light.  (do you green light commericals, like show?)

back to fin's family emergency, sadly his father dies.  well not really that sad because fin hadn't spoken to his father for about 28 years.  without giving too much away, the father was abusive and there was an incident with his mother.  but the bottom line is that fin does not view his father as his father.  to add to this, fin and his siblings are not that close.  this actually broke my heart, i have my ups and downs with  my family but i can't imagine being in contact with none of my family members.  it must be really lonely.

so fin's father's dying request was to have his ashes spread in pearl harbor, near the spot where he was when the war ended.  fin's siblings nor fin himself,  want to do it because they all hate him.  and i hate to sound heartless, but i get it.  i found it odd how all of fin's friends kept telling him that he needed to do it because it was dad.  but the fact is, it wasn't his dad.  i think it's hard for people who grew up with both parents to grasp how it is to have an absent parent.  that person is a stranger.  the only connection you have to that person is your DNA and maybe some facial features.  that man is not your dad.  he didn't look under your bed for monsters, or taught you how to ride a bike or took you to your first baseball game.  he is not a dad that was there to help you when scraped your knee or had your heart broken.  he is not that dad from the google ad that always makes me cry, a dad who sends his daughter encouraging emails when times get tough. he is simply a man who helped create you but didn't really want much to do with you after, kinda like god in the old testament.  he is essentailly a stranger?  would you do it for stranger?  probably not.  or you would but not out of love but respect for a person's dying wish.  but you get my point.  (please note i'm not bitter about living in a single parent home, i think i'm better for it.  but i just feel it's unfair to assume that i owe my dad something when he was never really there for me.)

to not spoil one of the main themes of the book, i will not tell you what fin ends up doing.  you have to read to find out.  i'm also not going to tell you how the superbowl ad went.  you have to read that for yourself.

when i first started reading, i thought fin would become one of my book crushes. he is witty and has a great sense of humor. he also did this cute thing when he first moved to new york. he read "here is new york" and "traced the steps". he then "reread 'catcher in the rye' and did the same." this was kinda perfect cos the last time i went to new york i read books with famous new yorkers (i found a list online). i read "franny and zooey", "stuart little", and "from the mixed up files of mrs. basil e. frankweiler." i also read "extremely loud & incredibly close" because it was set in new york. so totally fell in love with him for that. (i plan on retracing "catcher" on my next nyc trip.). however i didn't fall complete. sure he was hip, he referenced a bunch of cool things but he was weird at times. like i hated his sarcasm. i was annoyed reading it so i could only imagine having to deal with it in real life. and i'm sure it was some defensive mechanism but still would be a dealbreaker for me. also his whole internal dialogues of convos with talk show host was not attractive either. though i loved how he framed life like a commercial and how he scanned through life. like on his first date he goes through a whole life with her. it's a lot to type out here but if you read it, i'm allison to page 145. he also flashbacks about his dad and sister, he sees them doing all of these mundane things but realizing the beauty and simplicity of each thing. it reminded me of charlie from "the perks of being a wallflower".

though those last two things just really mean that i enjoyed kenney's writing. how he captured life in an instant  he was clever and had excellent pop culture references.  i mean he called gwyneth paltrow, mrs. coldplay, kinda cool.  he also quoted f. scott fitzgerald. there were some other references that made me smile but didn't mark them so can't share them but i am sure kenney and i could be friends in real life.

also if you are in advertising you should read this. you will prolly get a kick out of the rundown of fin's agency.

oh last but not least, in the story there is a character keita, who i adore. he is the son of this super rich japanese shipping company owner and in charge of fin's agency. he was sweet and kind and for some odd reason i pictured him in my head as PSY. lol

harold and maude.

"harold and maude" has been on my to watch list for at least 10 years. i first heard about it from my friend leslie, it is her favorite movie. so when bill had charlie watch it in "the perks of being a wallflower", i decided i should finally watch it.

"harold and maude" is a love story but what makes it unique is that harold is in his early twenties and maude is a seventy-nine year old woman. the idea of them together grossed me out but it's only because i think of the sex involved. oddly the priest in the film shared my opinion. though i hope to be in my seventies and still getting my kicks, the idea of being a twentysomething and sleeping with some that old is gross. but i mean people love this film so i needed to get my mind out of the gutter.

due to its status as a cult classic, i wasn't sure what to expect and then seeing the drawing of harold hanging himself on the cover, i was all sorts of confused.

quick endorsement for the criterion collection edition. it comes with a booklet with interviews and the illustrations for it and the disc menu are adorable.

so harold hanging himself is actually how the movie opens. turns out harold is obsessed with suicide. he fakes his own suicides throughout the film. i find most offbeat protagonist quirks attractive however did not find this endearing at all. it was just creepy especially since his mom turned a blind eye to it. it is eventually revealed why he does it and within that context it makes sense so
he becomes less weird. but initially i was like what is wrong with this kid?

and i guess that is why i didn't enjoy this film. i didn't get the appeal of the characters, i wasn't attracted to harold or maude. if a love story is good, you will fall in love with both characters: tom/summer, celeste/jess (though both of these couples do not end up together). think of "sleepless in seattle" you love both hank and ryan's characters so you want them to be together, you root for their love. sadly, this did not happen for me, i did not fall completely in love with harold or maude.

i did think harold was cute, especially in his little 70's outfits, though the suits he wore for dates were horrid. also i dug the sound of voice. i actually found the pranks he played on his dates funny and would not have ran out screaming like the girls did. however the dealbreakers were definitely his mommy issues and his immaturity. at the dinner table he seemed more like a 12 year old than a twentysomething. i often couldn't gage his age which made him unattractive because he seemed like jailbait.

maude was a delightful character. i read the first part of the essay written by film critic, matt zoller seitz in dvd booklet and i got what she was supposed to embody, the counterculture ideals of the sixties but within the older generation versus the youth. i found her interesting with her smell machine, vagina sculpture (that was a vagina he sticks his head in right?), desire to free trees and her lust for life. i also appreciated her philosophies in life, understanding that we are a special individual and not all the same flower or part of a larger group of flowers. however, i hated the fact that she stole cars and her reckless driving. there was nothing cute or spunky about those two things. i mean i'm all for damning the man but you should still have respect for private property. i was disgusted by how she just took cars and this kinda ruined her for me. i mean steal government cars as a form of protest but not your neighbors. also cars can kill people so did not like the reckless driving. i could see how harold would fall for her but she was not my cup of tea.

and let me clairfy, i didn't support their love because of the age gap but rather because i didn't fall in love with them myself. in fact, i was disappointed with myself for being judgey earlier. people should be allowed to be with those that make them happy. it reminded me of the may-december romance in "dandelion wine" and how upset i was that others did not understand it, yet here i was being close-minded. and at the risk of like a lolita (cos that was not the case), i feel like i could have had my own "harold and maude" friendship with my high school english teacher, mr. brice. my senior year we bonded over mullets (i had an "i heart mullet" pin on my backpack and he used to have one, he showed me his id as proof), "a clockwork orange" (i tired to get him to have our class read it), and my civil disobedience (he gave me a pep talk about doing what you believe in, when i called into the office for trying to stage a student protest). he also wore vans. he was totally my maude down to the bohemian-counterculture-free spirit though i prolly wasn't his harold. lol

even with all this, i was not crazy about the film. maybe i need to give it another watch. i know it was a black comedy and i got the humor, but still no sparks. i do understand why bill had charlie watch it. maude does share some very valuable gems about life with harold:

"vice, virtue. it's best not to be too moral. you cheat yourself out of too much life. aim above morality. if you apply that to life, then you're bound to live life fully."

"harold, everyone has the right to make an ass out of themselves. you just can't let the world judge you too much."

"a lot of people enjoy being dead. But they are not dead, really. they're just backing away from life. reach out. take a chance. get hurt even. but play as well as you can. go team, go! give me an L. give me an I. give me a V. give me an E. L-I-V-E. LIVE! otherwise, you got nothing to talk about in the locker room."

i think these are important life lessons for everyone. but i guess i watched this too late in life. these thoughts aren't new to me though they are important. i should have watched it my first year of college when leslie first mentioned it. i mean i understand why it is great and it is, and it deserve all the praise it received and more, it just didn't blow my mind.

ps also without giving any spoilers. i did love the ending in terms of maude. she did live life to the fullest!!!

pss oh and damn you at&t for ruining the cat steven's song that harold and maude sing in the movie! and way to go cat steven's on the soundtrack!

psss the night that i watched this totally dreamt that i was dating an old man, not just older but old. lol

the perks of being a wallflower. stephen chobsky. (81)

"the perks of being a wallflower" has been on my to reread list ever since i saw the movie. i have been hunting for my copy from high school (well not too seriously, i think it's in storage) so that i could read it for nostalgic reasons. however, i recommended allison (one of my adventure day kids, i take a couple of kids from the dance studio to the library on tuesdays) check it out. and since she is in a middle of a book, i borrowed it so i could reread it. right now i am in the middle of "les miserables" but took a break to read this. it took me 6 hours to read.

like i gushed in the blog post about the movie, i absolutely love love love love love this book. for proof check out that post.

even though i read it a handful of times in high school, i forgot a lot of things. i forgot about charlie's friend michael's suicide, sam's molestation as a child, his sister's pregnancy, and charlie and sam's talk on her last night. furthermore, i realized that the movie really did do the book justice. paul rudd made an excellent bill, i seriously have a huge book crush on bill. i also plan on reading the books and watching the movies bill gave charlie.* (maybe i should look for a nice high school english teacher to date?) i have to add that my rereading was greatly askew by the movie because i saw all the characters as their actor counterparts. sadly i can not remember how i imagined them before. however, all of the actors did fit, so it was fine. overall, i realized that i may have been a little harsh on the movie version, it was not as horrible or disappointing as i said. it was true to the essence of the book. however, i have to reiterate my disappointment in the christmas poem not being recited in the film.

my rereading not only made me realize how harsh i was on the film but also why i didn't love it like i loved the book. the reason being that as a reader you really get to know charlie, as a viewer your relationship is superficial. charlie is a great character and the best way to get to know him is through his letters. the ramblings in his letters paint a better picture of who charlie is versus the tales of his high school years. yes the stories were great but the true beauty is his musing and thoughts on life.

here are some examples:

his thoughts on old photos and how people happier people look in them:

"i just hope i remember to tell my kids TJs they are as happy as i look my old photographs. and i hope that they believe me."

when he discovered his grandfather once beat his mom when she was a child and received bad grades:

"i don't know if that's good or bad. i don't know if it's better to have your kids be happy and not go to college. i don't know if it's better to be close with your daughter or make sure that has a better life than you do."

on mixed tapes:

"i has an amazing feeling when i finally held the tape in my hand. i just thought to myself that in the palm of my hand, there was this one tape that had all these memories and feelings and great joy and sadness. right in the palm of my hand. and i thought about how many people loved those songs. and how many people got through a lot of bad times because of those songs. and how many odious enjoyed good times with those songs. and how much songs really mean. i junk it would be great to have written one of these songs. i bet if i wrote one of them, i would be very proud. i hope the people who wrote those songs are happy. i hope that they feel it's enough. i really do because they've made me happy. and i'm
only one person."

i just realized that i will end up quoting the whole book so will stop. but the point is that what makes charlie so great is his selflessness, his ability to think beyond himself. i try sometimes to think about the lives of strangers, wondering what they have experienced and when i do, it humanizes them and then it easier to understand and then eventually love thy neighbor. charlie was just as described, a wallflower and an observer but what made him different was his empathy. as i read about charlie, i thought of another boy who felt too much, douglas from "dandelion wine". i didn't discuss it in that blog but at the end of "dandelion wine" douglas became ill because he takes on the suffering and feelings of others. it's kinda jesus-y but not in a cheesy way. but both saw the world in a ego-less way which resulted in novels with great life lessons.

the ramblings of charlie get one thinking about their life and that is what make this book so great. charlie's inner thoughts were lost in the movie. it's probably because these thoughts would have been too random in the movie but make sense in the book. like when charlie's mother told his brother to watch his language in front of charlie. his brother used the words "faggot" and "high" and charlie realized that he is the only one in the car that has a gay friend or has done drugs. he also realized that maybe everyone is in family has been high and they just don't say anything. and he's so right. i bet a lot of people who know have toked up but we just don't realize it. its random thoughts like this that make you love charlie.

as i was reading, i wondered what it was that made the younger me fall in love with this book. i know for one it was the music. i actually made a mixed cd version of the tape charlie gave patrick as his secret santa gift (i listened to it as i wrote this blog). and to this day i am hopeful that a boy will gift me a copy of the beatles' "something" because it reminds him of me. i also love the idea that certain moments soundtracked with the right song can makenone feel infinite.

so quick digression. in the movie, the infinte song was "heroes" by bowie. but in the book it's simply a song about a boy. i thought maybe pearl jam's "jeremy" but that song came out in '92 and that moment took place in '91. i tried googling songs about a boy in 91 and no luck. even looked through list of top songs of 91 and found nothing. curious about others theories on what song it is. though i did discover that the love song they heard while searching for music that had the word "baby" had to be amy grant's "baby, baby" that came out in 91.

the poem that charlie gave patrick for christmas had a profound effect on the high school verison of me. i thought it was really deep. i had the same reaction as the rest of the group at the christmas party. i was in awe of it. now as an adult, the poem is sad but less profound, i guess the difference is that i have lost my naiveté about the world. when i read it as a teen, i was starting to question my world as i knew it. i was realizing that not everything is black and white and that though i may have strong morals, it doesn't mean the world does. i always mentioned my religious upbringing but i remember the priest part because i was starting to realize maybe religion wasn't capital t-truth. and that maybe things done in the name of god where not always the right thing. the ending of the poem never seemed a solution to any problems i had as a teen, it wasn't profound because i had thoughts of sucide. though it did make me sad for kids that did. i lived in a bubble, i never suffered any kind of abuse, and lead a straight-edge life. so did not connect with the story because it was a shared experience.

reading the perks was a voyeuristic experience for me. i never did drugs or had sex in high school, i was such a good mormon. so "the perks" was how my high school years could have been if i released my inner party-er at a teen. i would have done everything except the lsd. and no coincidence that one of the first things i did in college was attend a midnight "rocky horror" showing. i loved reading about their performances. (i always say myself playing columbia versus dammit janet. i would get down in those tap shoes!). so maybe i was charliesque in that sense, i didn't "participate" in that crazy lifestyle but enjoyed reading about it.

"the perks of being a wallflower" will always be one of my favorite books. these characters have always felt like my friends and even as i grow older, i won't lose my connection. they are like high school friends, you may outgrow each other but you will always be friends because of the experiences you had together.

last random note: the lowercase-ness of the title is why i stopped using capital letters.

*charlie's reading and watching list:
to kill a mockingbird
this side of paradise
peter pan
the great gatsby
a separate piece
catcher in the rye
walden
on the road
naked lunch
the stranger
halmet
the fountainhead

the graduate
harold and maude
my life as a dog
dead poets' society
the unbelievable truth

the perks of being a wallflower. stephen chbosky. movie version.

before i start, i haven't blogged in a while because i haven't read anything new. "war and peace" is taking forever to read and i have been working a lot so lo siento but will be better in the future.

second, this isn't a movie i checked out but saw in theaters and it isn't based on a book i checked out, but it is a book that i absolutely loved in high school. and so i decided to blog because it is one of my all-time favorite books (and sadly not one of my all-time favorite movie.)

i remember finding in at the bookstore and since it was an MTV book, decided to give it a go. plus the title sounded interested. i read it my sophomore or junior year, my friend stephen warren ruined my copy by highlighting a line about masturbation in it, and i think that happen in our sophomore english class. but regardless i love it, i love it so much that at the mention of it, my heart gushes with love for it.

it was my favorite book in high school. i read it a handful of times throughout high school. i made a mixed cd of the mixed tape that charlie gave patrick for secret santa and listened to it constantly. i also recited the poem that he wrote for a 4H speech competition. (it was pretty heavy but i won a medal). and i started picking up pennies and sharing the luck just like stoner bob said, i would also tell people "stoner bob says . . .". i was kinda obsessed with it.

so when i first saw a trailer for the film i was not excited but scared. i was scared that they would a) ruin something near and dear to me and b) take something that i felt like was my own little secret book and turn into this huge public fad. (the book deserves success but not the trendy let's read it cos emma watson is in it but more of the word of mouth (which trust me in high school i tried to get everyone to read it). so i was not planning on seeing it. but then i talked to people about it and discovered that chbosky wrote (well, adapted his own novel, that sounds very charlie kaufmanesque) and directed it, so decided it would be true to the book and decide to watch it.

i was expecting to be in tears over it. but i wasn't. i was kinda disappointed and the only reason i can think of is that my love for the book is so great that any movie would have failed. i mean the author made the freakin movie, it was his vision i initially loved and eventually saw. but i wasn't filled with warm fuzzies like i expected. and i'm not sure why. i mean the casting was great, everyone seemed like their character, i mean patrick was amazing and charlie was charlie. and who
doesn't love emma watson and "anne"?!? also i love the actress that plays his aunt though i don't know her name. and i wanted to hug paul rudd as his english teacher. i loved that the tunnel song was bowie's "heroes". the rocky horror scenes were great. but i still didn't connect like i thought i would. i got tear-eyed during some moments but no crying. and oddly one of the most emotional scenes for me was the dance with the "living room" routine because it was straight up my best friend miguel and i at our 8th grade graduation dance.

i will add that i was disappointed that chbosky edited out the poem that charlie gives to all of them at christmas. its sad but one of my favorite things about the book. i also did not like how he tried to tie in "something" to the aunt verses it being sam's favorite song.** i would have also like to have seen stoner bob share his penny wisdom.

and i'm not saying its a bad film. it's a great film and if you are reading this, go see it! i might go again. everyone did a great job. it just wasn't for me. but it did inspire me to dig up my old copy and re-read. i last read it probably my senior year though it did travel with me to college. but didn't re-read it recently because i figured that the story not so fresh in my head would be better for movie watching. but not the case.

i would also like to add that the douchebag sitting behind me, annoyed the hell out of me which could have caused my un-enjoyment of the film. he was not the brightest bulb in the pack and kept on asking his girlfriend questions. he also ruined a scene between patrick and charlie because of his homophobia to which i gave him a dirty look in the dark and debated lecturing him out of the film. also his girlfriend laughed inappropriately during a scene with charlie and sam. i hate how immature/ignorant people can be. it was at the landmark, i expect more from their audience.

but go see it and fall in love with the movie and then read the book and fall into deeper love with it.

**blogger note: i just finished rereading "the perks" and realized that i was wrong about this. in my head, sam had played "something" for him as her friend song. but not the case. sorry. (12.12.12)