Jordan Hoffman Dot Com

I just learned that Odetta died yesterday. Somehow, despite those influential years at the Bottom Line, Fast Folk Cafe and events at Town Hall, I never saw her perform live. RIP.

Dig this video about my friend Adam. I swear this is the best video you’ll see about traveling with type 1 Diabetes.

It’s the fun little feature that’s tearing up the internets. Take a look at the eloquently titled Top 50 Hottest Sci-Fi Girls.

According to Wikipedia:

Controversies

Helms was particularly vitriolic when speaking of blacks, gays and lesbians, blaming them for “the proliferation of AIDS,” and stating that he disliked using the word “gay” to refer to them since, “…there’s nothing gay about them.”
Helms opposed the Martin Luther King Day bill in 1983 on grounds that King had two associates with communist ties, Stanley Levison and Jack O’Dell; as well, he voiced disapproval of King’s alleged philandering.
Of civil rights protests Helms stated in 1963 that “The Negro cannot count forever on the kind of restraint that’s thus far left him free to clog the streets, disrupt traffic, and interfere with other men’s rights.”[6] (WRAL-TV commentary, 1963) He also wrote, “Crime rates and irresponsibility among Negroes are a fact of life which must be faced.” (New York Times, 2/8/81)
Helms’ referred to the University of North Carolina (UNC) as the “University of Negroes and Communists.” (Charleston Gazette, 9/15/95)[7]
Helms once deeply offended a black colleague, Democratic Senator Carol Moseley-Braun of Illinois, by singing part of “Dixie” on a Capitol elevator.
Soon after the Senate vote on the Confederate flag insignia, Sen. Jesse Helms (R.-N.C.) ran into Mosely-Braun in a Capitol elevator. Helms turned to his friend, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R.-Utah), and said, “Watch me make her cry. I’m going to make her cry. I’m going to sing ‘Dixie’ until she cries.” He then proceeded to sing the song about “the good life” during slavery to Mosely-Braun (Gannett News Service, 9/2/93; Time, 8/16/93).[7]
While working on the 1950 campaign of Republican Willis Smith against Democrat Frank Porter Graham, Helms helped create an ad that read “White people, wake up before it is too late. Do you want Negroes working beside you, your wife and your daughters, in your mills and factories? Frank Graham favors mingling of the races.” Another ad featured photographs Helms himself had doctored to illustrate the allegation that Graham’s wife had danced with a black man. (FAIR 9/1/01, The News and Observer 8/26/01)
Helms was an ardent supporter of the late Chile dictator Augusto Pinochet.[8]
When Roberta Achtenberg was appointed Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in 1993 by President Bill Clinton, Helms attempted to block her confirmation, stating that he refused to vote for her “because she’s a damn lesbian.”
After a protest during his 1986 visit to Mexico, Helms opined: “All Latins are volatile people. Hence, I was not surprised at the volatile reaction.” [1]
In 1994 Helms spoke out against metal industrial singer Marilyn Manson. Manson responded by painting an anti-gay slur on his chest during a show in Winston-Salem, in a sarcastic and critical display against Helms’s social viewpoints.
Hendrik Hertzberg of The New Yorker noted in his memoirs that Helms had “the ‘humorous habit’” of calling all black people “Fred”.
Helms used race issues in many elections; for instance, in 1990, he ran the famous “Hands” television ad in a tough re-election race. The ad has become legendary in Southern political circles as the most direct appeal to white backlash in modern American politics. The ad played upon white voters’ ideas that affirmative action might lead to a job going to a less-qualified candidate (”Gantt supports Ted Kennedy’s racial quota law, that makes the color of your skin more important than your qualifications.”) (watch the ad).
Helms opposed an amendment offering war reparations to Japanese-Americans who had been interned during World War II; he proposed an amendment stipulating that no reparations would be made unless the Japanese government compensated the families of Americans killed at Pearl Harbor.
In 1994, Helms created a sensation when, on the anniversary of John F. Kennedy’s assassination, he told broadcasters Rowland Evans, Jr., and Robert Novak that Clinton was “not up” to the tasks of being commander-in-chief and suggested that Clinton had “better not show up around here [Fort Bragg] without a bodyguard.”[9]
Helms was a strong supporter of drug prohibition, and opposed former Massachusetts Governor Bill Weld’s nomination as Ambassador to Mexico because Weld supported medical marijuana.[2] Helms proposed several bills as part of the war on drugs.[10]
Helms once claimed that “The New York Times and Washington Post are both infested with homosexuals themselves. Just about every person down there is a homosexual or lesbian.”[11]

Dude made some shitty movies, but he made some good ones, too. They Shoot Horses, Don’t They especially and, of course, this scene – one of the best you’ll find anywhere.

You were a tomato!

I’m not the only one blogging in this house. You can check out Ann’s interpretation of events over at Banana Soup, by going to banana2goober.blogspot.com.

He drinks it up!

Very entertaining report in Variety.

Now if only I can get Leonard Nimoy to read my witty comments about Pon Faar.

Maybe, but not for me.

Not the best rendition, but the only one I could find on YouTube.

Is Chris Pine Kirk-worthy? The jury is out.

Please say hello to Olivia Aldrin Rozger and Phoebe Beckett Rozger. As the one responsible for the meeting of Jason and Melissa, I anticipate a full ten percent of their gross as this pair of tall blonde girls commences to make a fortune – first in cereal commercials, then a bit part in a remake of The Shining, then, eventually, wacky romantic comedies aimed at Tweens.

A summit of some of my favorite New Yorkers: The Levys took their Panorama Challenge to the Brian Lehrer Show.

The MP3 is available below. It’s awesome.

For a made-for-cable movie this is pretty damned good. It gets talky at times, but the “discourse,” if you will, isn’t dumbed down that much. This is more The West Wing than A Man Called Horse. Indeed, one of its strongest attributes is how much it downplays the imagery of soaring eagles or meditative great spirits that seems to be a necessity in every other film I’ve ever seen about Native Americans. This is (for the most part) played straight and its a better film for it.

(best part about this is the use of the word “douche.” From La Voir.)

BODY/ANTIBODY
(États-Unis, Kerry Douglas Dye et Jordan Hoffman)

Body/Antibody de Kerry Douglas Dye et Jordan Hoffman.

Body/Antibody de Kerry Douglas Dye et Jordan Hoffman.
Obsessif-compulsif, Kip (Robert Gomes) ne quitte presque jamais son appartement de Manhattan, qu’il nettoie à répétition. Lui-même se douche cinq fois par jour et se lave parfois tellement les mains qu’elles en saignent. Lorsqu’il rencontre Celine (Leslie Kendall), une nouvelle voisine de palier, sa petite vie rangée se voit chamboulée. Le scénario est inspiré des propres expériences de Kerry Douglas Dye, qui souffrait d’une peur maladive des germes jusqu’à ce que cette dernière soit surpassée par son désir de contact sexuel. Ceci donne d’abord lieu à une comédie romantique joliment tordue, qui glisse graduellement vers le film noir, alors que l’ex violent (Frank Deal) de Celine débarque et pousse Kip à faire des trucs particulièrement salissants! À la fois drôle, sexy et troublant, Body/Antibody mérite que vous sortiez de votre appartement pour aller le voir. (30-31 août; 2-3 sept.)

Two pretty entertaining pieces have gone up at UGO.  The Top 11 Classy Assassins (which I did not write) and the Top 11 Uses of Classic Rock in Cinema (which I did.)

Please read both over and over again and then send to your workmates and make them do the same.  We’re all in this together.

I believe that when God invented the blog His primary reason was so that independent filmmakers could crow about their moderate success. To that end, I would like to congratulate Mr. Kerry Douglas Dye, Mr. Robert Gomes, Ms. Leslie Kendall, Mr. Raoul Germain and myself for being prized with the Audience Award for Best Feature at the Rhode Island International Film Festival.

I still think awards for films are a dumb idea. . .for established filmmakers. For we insurgents still struggling to get our voices heard, they are a blessing.

For those keeping score, this is award #5 at our third fest. The biggie is in 2 weeks, though — Montreal. We’re not in competish (dastardly French!) but we’re hoping we get reviewed. If anyone knows anybody we could bribe to make that happen, please get in touch.

Max Roach has died. His friend and personal alarm clock (”Good morning MAX!!”) Phil Schaap has scheduled a week-long marathon memorial on WKCR.

I am not the man to eulogize Max Roach. I’ll just say that he was the beat of bebop and, if you check your favorite jazz albums, you’ll find that he’s playing on 9 out of 10 of ‘em.

I saw him perform a few times. Once in a “supersession” environment at the Blue Note, where he played it stylish and cool. Similarly at the Charlie Parker fest in Tompkins Square. But I’ll never forget the time, late in the evening midsummer on the campus of Columbia University – he and Cecil Taylor, neither of them young men, got up on the bandstand and just fuckin’ wailed for a breathless forty-five minutes. No charts, no pause, no mercy. Absolutely unbelievable.

Max Roach was an artists, a civil rights leader and a very cool New Yorker. It was cool knowing he was always around, ready to call Phil Schaap up and give him shit, and still working the clubs. With Max Roach gone there are perhaps no true living links to the golden age of bebop still around. Listen to Max Roach.

I don’t normally shill for the Man on my own blog, but I think JH.c readers will be tickled by the current Dance moves and pick-up line contest UGO is running with the cast & crew of Superbad.  Check it out and vote for your favorite.