YouTubing-To-Obscure-Shameless-Self-Promotion Wednesdays: What's Arguably Creepier Than the Scene in Dorothy's Apartment from Blue Velvet?

A. This. (I.e., The same scene re-staged so as to implement both Slavoj Zizek's interpretations and readings of the scene and Slavoj Zizek himself. Sweating and sputtering forth as Dennis Hopper abuses Isabella Rossellini, the Slovenian philosopher doesn't settle purely on a voyeuristic reading of the scene, arguably Lynch's finest. In less than five minutes, Zizek breaks it down into different perspectives, acknowledging Dorothy's "passivity," as evidenced by that look of rapture after Frank coldcocks her.)



The scene, by the by, comes from Sophie Fiennes' epic doc The Pervert's Guide to Cinema, just one of the many pieces of Zizek-centric cinema from the last couple years. (There's also Zizek! and The Reality of the Virtual. So far, only the former is available on DVD.)

This Weekly!! I contributed two speculative bits for this issue's "Next" cover story, including a piece where I diss the HD DVD/Blu-Ray tussle and declare celluloid dead. (It's roughly halfway down, but you'll have better luck just typing my moniker into a page-search function. Funnily enough, a printing mishap left both pieces snipped from the print version. Whoops!) Elsewhere, I compare/contrast Children of Men's long takes with Ugetsu's (second down), review Michael Apted's Amazing Grace (the grade's a notch too high, by the way -- my bad) and The Lives of Others. And then there's Rep.

Oh, and I'm going to be on the radio Friday (2/13). That's right. The City Paper's Sam Adams and I will be joining Marty Moss-Coane on Philly's NPR affiliate, WHYY, to talk Oscars from 11am to noon. Those who'd like to listen but live nowhere near need only go to the site and listen on-line, either live or via archives. I promise not to cuss. (Addendeum: It happened and it appears to have gone well. You can download the clip at the bottom of this page.)