Culture
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On Beating Dead Horses

Source Weekly

Okay, has anyone ever actually “beat a dead horse”? You hear that phrase a lot (especially in this column), but have you ever seen or heard of anyone
actually going through with it? I'm really wracking my brain here, trying to think of any conceivable occasion where one might be inclined to physically assault a dead horse. Okay… how about this: Let's say the horse was the mastermind behind a huge Ponzi scheme that robbed me and my family of millions. But before I could have the horse arrested, he overdoses on a big pile of snort he was enjoying with some high-priced call girls and drops dead on the spot. I rush into the room to find him dead, and seeing that my opportunity for revenge has been dashed, perhaps I would be tempted to beat the horse – you know, out of sheer frustration.

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Following the Beep: Why I have a metal detector and how it (hopefully) helps me find treasure

Suzanne Burns

This late winter and early spring, I have become a slave to the beep. Beep, beep, beep – a quick metallic staccato as our metal detector, the Garrett Ace250, teases us with the possibility of unearthing a rare coin, a lost Rolex or an antique diamond ring. Armed with our “kit,” slang in the metal detecting culture for our detector, a pin-pointer, a shovel and an ice pick, my husband and I have scaled hill and dale in the hopes of finding that elusive buried treasure.
Metal detecting, like gambling, attracts the eternal optimist. Who else would spend a sunny Saturday afternoon waving a metal wand for hours over countless acres of park, forest and desert on the slim chance of striking it rich?
If you are a group-joining type, you can sit in on a meeting of the High Desert Treasure Club. They meet the second Wednesday of every month at the Bend VFW Hall at 7pm.

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Our Picks for 3/31 – 4/8: West Side Story, Taarka, Art Hop, The Becker Family Benefit and more

What to do in Central Oregon the week of 3/31 – 4/8/2010.
Source Weekly

West Side Story
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You've probably heard of this story – it's like Romeo and Juliet, but with more dancing. This performance is brought to you by the shining youngsters of the BEAT program and enjoys a three-day, four-show run at the spacious Summit High auditorium. April 1-3 at 7pm and April 3 at 2pm. $15/adults, $10/youth, available at bendticket.com. 7pm Thursday, Apr 1. Summit High School, 2855 NW Clearwater Dr.

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Playing God: Latest God of War serves up the gore gleefully

Source Weekly

It's almost impossible for any God of War-type game to distinguish itself – even God of War III. The first game's formula, featuring hordes of enemies and weapons swinging in all directions, has been copied so much (and sometimes so well) that it has pushed the designers of God of War III to try a change of scale rather than style. Now, Kratos – the angry mortal hero on a mission to destroy the gods – is lost in ever-larger environments, to the point that he often becomes a dot in the landscape.
In the background, the peaks of Mount Olympus and the cliffs of the Underworld glow like dioramas lit with colored Christmas lights. In these settings, Kratos resembles a plastic figurine, clinging to walls like he had been glued on and sometimes even hovering slightly above the ground as though he were being held by an invisible hand.

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Repossess This! Harvesting organs reduces Repo Men to the sum of its bloody parts

Morgan P Salvo

Sharing nothing in common with Alex Cox's 1984 punk-rock-crazy Repo Man yet more aligned with Darren Lynn Bousman's 2008 film Repo!: The Genetic Opera, this Repo Men has some wit, violence and gore, but also some problems. Like Saw VI, this film provides commentary (albeit only at surface level) on the current health care debate.
Repo Men introduces us to the future with a news voiceover montage of how things came to be: global recession, fifth stage of war in Nigeria, technological breakthroughs. A corporation called The Union manufactures technologically sophisticated artificial organs, or “artiforgs” marketed and sold to gullible customers at exorbitant prices. The downside lies in the fine print that tells patients that if payments aren't made, hotshot repo men are sent to cut them open and yank out the bionic organ. Then, of course, you die.

Posted inCulture

Dead People's Court

Source Weekly

Guys, I should TOTALLY be a judge on one of those daytime courtroom shows! You know, like Judge Judy, or Judge Joe Brown, or Judge Judgey McJudgerson? I'd be all sassy (and possibly black) and smackin' down the witnesses with snappy quips such as, “Hey! Don't pee in my mouth and tell me it's raining pee!” Or “Don't slice off my head with an ax and tell me it's a pencil sharpener!” Or “Shut your G-D baloney-hole or I'll kick the tongue out of your yap.” (Okay… that one needs work.)
But instead of settling arguments in the old-timey, boring, legal way, my courtroom would have a super-cool twist – such as Judge Wm.™ Steven Humphrey's Kangaroo Court! Basically it would be like other courtroom shows, except at the end, the loser would be kicked in the face by a kangaroo. Another amazingly awesome idea would be Judge Wm.™ Steven Humphrey's Famous Court Cases Reenacted by Chimps. Is that title too vague? Basically I reenact famous court cases – with chimps. Like the Scopes Monkey Trial? Admit it… I'M BRILLIANT.

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Suffer Little Children: Michael Haneke asks: “Where do little Nazis come from?” in The White Ribbon

Holly Grigg-Spall

Funny Games director Michael Haneke's loudly lauded black-and-white drama, The White Ribbon, isn't a film to be enjoyed. It's not exactly a film to be endured, but it is closer to that end of the entertainment spectrum. Bob Dylan once said to a Time magazine reporter who asked if the audience at the concert was entertained by his performance, “Who wants to go get whipped? And if you don't want to go get whipped, then aren't you really being entertained?”
In Funny Games, Haneke questioned the use of violence in films for entertainment, but here he theorizes on the origins of the violence committed by the Nazis. With Funny Games, the director was vocal about how he expected his audience to react – he wanted them to walk out once the child gets shot by the intruders. I read this in an interview after seeing the film, of which I did walk out. I didn't want to be entertained, and he didn't want to entertain me.

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Laughing by the Seat of His Pants: Cash Levy decides Bend is the place for his improvisational humor

Cash Levy, Tower Theatre, Comedy Central, Showtime, Late Late show, craig ferguson,
The Source Staff

One wouldn't think that mentioning the anatomy of an extinct animal could offend anyone, but comedian Cash Levy learned otherwise when he told a joke in one of his shows that included the phrase “pterodactyl scrotum.” A couple just couldn't handle the fact that he'd made such a comment and voiced their concern. Perhaps they were offended by the mere size of prehistoric junk, or maybe it's still too soon to poke fun at dinosaurs because, well, they've had a rough go over the past couple hundred million years.

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Our Picks for 3/24 – 4/1: Portland Cello Project, Cool Nutz, Cash Levy, Portland Indie Infusion, Nershi-Law Duo and more

Source Weekly

Portland Cello Project
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Yeah, OK, the notion of a bunch of cellos on one stage might not sound terribly cool, but trust us, it is quite cool. This crew of cellists from their namesake town is playing a free show in which they combine their string talents Captain Planet style to give us often-rocking arrangements. They can play classically, and that's cool, but they also roll out covers of contemporary favorites, and well, that's preeety cool. Free. All ages. 7pm. McMenamins Old St. Francis School, 700 NW Bond St.

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wRite: When Nothing Works

Source Weekly

Nun: Do you ever wake up scared in the early hours of the morning?
Me (the cop): Almost every night.
Nun: And does this fear originate somewhere in the area of the navel.
Me: Above the navel, somewhere between the navel and the solar plexus.
Nun: And what do you do about it?
Me: My mind finds specific things to worry about, and the fear gets absorbed.
Nun: These things you worry about, are they to do with recent acts, statements, events you have set in motion?
Me: Always.
Nun: Good. You're not going to understand immediately, but this vulnerable area around your navel is the only thing about you that is fully human.
– John Burdett

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