Date: Sat, 23 Apr 2005 04:00:58 -0400
Subject: [ark] Re: Blind leading the Dumb
Status: RO

In alt.religion.kibology, kibo@world.std.com wrote:

Mark Fergerson (nunya@biz.ness) wrote:
>
>  James "Kibo" Parry (kibo@world.std.com) wrote:
>  >
>  >  Mark Fergerson (nunya@biz.ness) wrote:
>  >  >
>  >  >  I'm so sorry for those who favor Beat Takeshi, but he looks too 
>  >  >  much like he's trying to look cool. I mean, Zato supposedly went 
>  >  >  blind in childhood and remembers very little of the visual world; 
>  >  >  how the *uc* is he supposed to know what "cool" looks like this 
>  >  >  year, even in stultified Medieval Japan?
>  >
>  >  Because cool comes not from the eyes but from the soul.  Until you
>  >  understand that you know nothing about cool, you will know nothing
>  >  about cool.  Also, I'm cool even though I'm only as blind as Mr. Magoo
>  >  when I take my glasses off.
>  
>  That's exactly what I mean. You get it, I get it, Shintaro Katsu 
>  got it, but Kitano just beat it to death. Ahem.

No, you don't get it.  See, if I get it, then you can't.  Because
no two people can simultaneously be really cool, and I'm really cool.
Ayyyyyyy, sit on it, Potsie!

And Takeshi Kitano's reason for existence is to beat things to death,
especially if they're two-legged things.  'Cause he's a Yakuza and
a game-show host, therefore the meanest man in the world.  He should
do a remake of the 1943 Jack Benny movie about that.  In Kitano's version
of "The Meanest Man In The World", there would be spinning newspaper
front pages that said things like "BILLIONAIRE PHILANTHROPIST SHOOTS
MAN IN FACE TWENTY TIMES" and then he'd say "Hey!  It was only nineteen,
and it was entirely accidental!"

Jack Benny's movie is not to be confused with the old United Way
propaganda film of the same title, about the guy who goes around
smacking glasses of milk out of kids' hands, and yanking cripples'
crutches away because he doesn't give to the United Way and therefore
he's The Meanest Man In The Heaviest-Handed Propaganda In The World.

>  >  [...]
>  >
>  >  In addition to the "Zatoichi" parody, there's a sequence where he joins
>  >  some very cliche'd Yakuza, and eventually the obligatory Japanese giant
>  >  rubbersuit monster movie parody.  The best parts are near the beginning,
>  >  when he's simply trying to buy or steal a car cool enough to make women
>  >  willing to sleep with him.  (It's amazing how many men still can't figure
>  >  out that women won't automatically put out for anyone in a muscle car.)
>  
>  All I can say is, you cruise the wrong streets.

I meant women who aren't covered in open running sores, you dink.

>  BTW, anyone know what kind of car lesbians cruise in to pick up chicks?

A sidecar.
  
>  >  Thankfully, Kitano doesn't play the lead (he has a small role)
>  >  because his acting range is really quite limited -- he's always good
>  >  when he's playing a Dirty Harry-like character who just has to gun
>  >  people down without smiling, but I can't see him as being a wacky
>  >  slapstick dude.  He's a better director than actor, but "Getting Any?"
>  >  is something he did before he had even figured out how to do the
>  >  directing thing well.  It's like watching one of those movies Tim Burton
>  >  made before he reached puberty.  Enjoyable, but defective, with a real
>  >  "Special Show" vibe -- partly intentional, partly not.
>  
>  "Special" as in Monty Python, or as in "short bus"?

You're new here, aren't you? 
  
Hey look!  It's time for spring cleaning!  He's a fragment of an
episode of "The! Special! Show!" I once typed out but never considered
worth actually using in a real episode!  And I never would have posted
it except now I have to, and it's all your fault!


  (FIRST MAN enters from screen left.)

       FIRST MAN
       (to audience)
       Hello, I am not blind.

  (SECOND MAN enters from screen right.)

       SECOND MAN
       (to audience)
       Hello, I am blind.

  (FIRST MAN removes a turd from his pocket and holds it out.)

       FIRST MAN
       (with no pauses)
       You're blind eat this turd.

  (SECOND MAN takes it and eats half of it.)

       SECOND MAN
       Hey, wait a minute -- I'm blind, not stupid!

  (SECOND MAN eats the rest of the turd.)

  (SOUND FX: "BOI-OI-OINGGGGG!")

  (FIRST MAN looks shocked.  Camera zooms in and out on his face.
  FREEZE FRAME.)

       NARRATOR
       (voiceover)
       Ladies and gentlemen, blind people are just like you or me
       or a potato with no eyes.  Do not tease them.  Do not
       punch them in the legs.  Do not steal their cars for
       spite.  Do not seal them in a Krazy Glue-based torture
       cell.  And absolutely do not do this:

  (CUT TO:  FIRST MAN and SECOND MAN on stage as before)

  (FIRST MAN takes some dynamite from his pocket.)

       FIRST MAN
       (with no pauses)
       You're blind eat this dynamite.

       SECOND MAN
       No.

  (FIRST MAN begins crying like a baby throwing a tantrum.
  FREEZE FRAME with crying sounds played continuously during
  the following.)

       NARRATOR
       (voiceover)
       Do not cry in front of the blind.  It may fool them into
       thinking you are a baby and they will eat you.

  (UNFREEZE FRAME as FIRST MAN continues bawling.)

       SECOND MAN
       (with no pauses)
       I'm blind you're a baby yum.

  (SECOND MAN bites FIRST MAN's nose off.)

       FIRST MAN
       Ow, my nose!

       SECOND MAN
       That's what Marcia Brady said.

  (SECOND MAN excitedly points at something offscreen left.)

       SECOND MAN
       Hey, look!

  (THIRD MAN enters from screen left, pushing a large cannon.
  He positions the cannon so its muzzle is pressed against
  FIRST MAN's head.  He fires the cannon.  There is a massive blast.
  FIRST MAN's head is reduced to an irregular vertical charcoal line
  with two eyeballs somehow attached to it.  He blinks.)

       SECOND MAN
       Hey, he just killed you.

  (FIRST MAN drops dead.)

       THIRD MAN
       Was he making fun of you blind folks?

       SECOND MAN
       Naw, I'm not really blind, I just have bad gas.

  (SECOND MAN cuts a big fart.)

       THIRD MAN
       Hey, that's even worse than being blind.

       SECOND MAN
       I wanted to be blind, but they wouldn't let me because I
       fart too much.

  (CAMERA PANS to a house.  A sign on the lawn says "HOME FOR THE
  BLIND".  Several people in dark glasses are hanging out on the
  porch.  One of them wags his finger disapprovingly.)

       BLIND GUY
       No farting!

  (The home collapses, crushing all the blind people.  There is a
  momentary pause, then we hear several simultaneous farts as a
  brown cloud rises above the rubble.)


Science cannot explain why I chose never to post that after I wrote it.
Heck, not only did I never post it, I didn't even finish it -- it really
should have featured at least one crime for them to solve.

>  >                                              It was easily three hundred
>  >                                              times more entertaining than
>  >                                              the live-action "Mr. Magoo"
>  >                                              starring Leslie Nielsen and
>  >                                              a big politically-correct
>  >                                              apology from the filmmakers.
>  
>     I stood for the first eight or so minutes of that. I remember the 
>  'toon version too well, apparently. Maybe it would have been better 
>  if I'd taken off my glasses first (I'm 20/300, and coolest in my sleep).

20/300?  Baby.  That's only three diopters.  I'm about 20/1000, which
is seven diopters cooler than you.

Hey look!  It's more spring cleaning!  I wrote this a couple weeks ago
to incorporate into a followup in my thread about writing on rice, but
nobody displayed a lot of interest, so I never posted it, and now
I have to post it just to annoy you:


  After writing that, I thought that since I hadn't actually done
  it in a while, I should make sure I still have the motor capabilities
  to write words on grains of rice.  But I only have .1 mm tech pens
  handy (not .05 mm ones) and, worse, the only rice in the kitchen
  is some super-short-grain arborio only a third as long as basmati.
  The grains are at most 1/8" long, which is only enough space for
  four letters.  ("KIBO" is actually one of the more difficult things
  to write small, because the "B" clots up.  "E" and "G" are the other
  two clotty letters.)  Anyway, yeah, I can still write on rice just
  fine even though today I was limited to four letters, less than
  even the little Necco chalk hearts ("U R COOL", "I M UGLY").

  With a better pen and better rice, ten-letter words are possible.
  Of course, people other than me may need a strong magnifying glass
  to read them.  Whereas, my powers of SUPER NEARSIGHTEDNESS mean
  all I have to do is take my eyeglasses off and WHAM! I can focus
  on things three inches from my eyeball!  (Yes, I've measured,
  my reading distance is three inches.  Since it's normally supposed
  to be about eighteen, that means that without my glasses everything
  can appear six times bigger, which is considerably more "x" than 
  most household magnifying glasses -- those are usually about 3x.)

  If you've got rice lying around, go ahead and doodle on it, it's
  really not that big a deal.  (Uncooked white rice accepts ink very
  nicely, more cleanly than most paper.)  Now, writing on salami with
  a yellow crayon, that would be a big deal, especially if it's one
  of those special crayons that can write upside-down in outer space
  but releases poison gas when it touches meat.


So, are you happy now?

                                               -- K.

                                                  Kitano should also do
                                                  other Jack Benny remakes,
                                                  especially "The Man Who
                                                  Could Work Miracles".