In Passing: Kim Jong Il

I was living in Japan when Kim Il Song died and passed the reins of power to Kim Jong Il. I remember being worried, at the time, that the DPRK might become unhinged, that KJI might launch conventional missiles at Japan just to demonstrate his power and resolve. My father, who was working in the military at the time, helped to allay my fears. KJI, he said, is reportedly more interested in wine, women, and song than in any expansion or conflict.

Dad was right. KJI was, at heart, a petty dictator riding on the rails set up by his much more conflict-oriented father. Over time, KJI became the keystone in a power struggle between the warring factions in the DPRK's military. The colonels and generals would plot against each other, but none of them would risk opposing The Great Leader Jr. for fear of being purged.

And purge he did, on occasion. Indications are that his own closest relatives have tried, over the years, to distance themselves from him. His eldest son, Kim Jong Nam, tried to get into Japan on a forged Dominican Republic passport; the DPRK's story is that he was trying to visit Tokyo Disneyland.

And now, Kim Jong Eun; the youngest, at 27, of the sons, and now The Great Leader III. While this cannot have been a complete surprise to the military leadership, it also presumably won't be welcome news all around. With winter really just beginning to bear down, and with a lot of the world's dictators gone in the past year or so, the cracks may just be showing. As disrespectful as it may seem, this could very well be the season for diplomatic overtures. If the son can be assured safe passage off the tiger, well, we just might be able to see the end of this misbegotten dynasty before the decade's out.

What a Merry Xmas present that would make.

Three Years Ago Today

The weather is so much more appropriate today.

POTC: OST (No Spoilers)

Do you know, it's a bit off-putting when a sequence of films has enough entries to qualify for its own acronyms. It starts to feel as though perhaps the enterprise would be best served as a serial on TV: weekly episodes of Cap'n Jack Sparrow and Crüe seeking this or that odd treasure from piratical lore. Mind you, that way Hanna Barbera lies, and madness.

There's something about the POTC franchise, however, that wouldn't translate to the smaller* screen, and that something is almost certainly the pay-and/or-royalty check that Johnny Depp would have to get for his usual fun, rambling, charming, and roguish rapscallion performance. Say what you will about the romance between yon Orlando and Keira (and believe me, it's been said), but the real draw of the franchise is watching Depp inhabit the role of inebriated Keith RichardsCap'n Jack. And, in OST, inhabit it he does.

The movie's a ripper, a load of fun, and a decent ride. Like the original ride, it doesn't bear too much close inspection, mind, and, while it stands on its own, being somewhat familiar with the first three of the series will enrich the experience. We saw it sans 3D and were almost certainly better off for it; I can't think of anything in the film that needed (or would have benefitted) from a third visual dimension... though the plot/characters/etc. could have used more depth.

If you like the movie but wish there was more to the story, you might want to check out the book On Stranger Tides by Tim Powers, listed in the end credits as the book the idea of the movie was "Suggested from." The similarities are really quite few (Fountain of Youth, Blackbeard, incidental magic), but Powers creates a fascinating world with rather well-thought-out rules for everyday magic (loads of Sympathy; a smattering of the Law of Contagion; plenty of negotiations with odd powers), and his research on pirates and how they lived is spot-on. Powers is also one of my favorite authors, so there's that, too.

* Not that much smaller, mind, given the distance from the couch; crikey, you could almost count the pores on Keith Richards' face if you brought this to some home screens these days.

AT&T: Free Calls to Japan

AT&T Offers Wireless, Wireline Billing Relief for Consumers Calling and Texting Family, Friends in Japan

And with that, AT&T is forgiven some of those &@#! dropped calls.

Japan: Earthquake, Tsunami; but the family's all right

Quick post to let folks know that Yoko's family seems to be all right. They're all in the south of Japan, so they haven't been directly affected by this disaster.

Our hearts go with the people of the Tohoku region where the tsunami hit.

UPDATE: Live Japanese news (in Japanese) here:

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/tbstv

The chirp-chirp, chirp-chirp is the alarm that another quake has hit; a ringing bell means it's over M6.

TV Shows to Watch

If you have access to Cooking Channel and you're not watching Nadia G's Bitchin' Kitchen, you're not WINNING.

Just sayin'.

Addendum: For example:

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

Kazuo Ishiguro's novel, Never Let Me Go, is primarily a schoolgirl's diary with a bit of the unusual thrown in. Ishiguro seems to be obsessed with the propriety of British public school life and the repressed attitudes it engenders, so there's a palpable atmosphere of impotence mixed in with fear of societal opprobrium; even if one wanted to stand up for oneself, well, it wouldn't do, don't you see? It's simply not done. One doesn't tell off one's supposed friends; at best, one traps one's frenemies in awkward social circumstances where one can heap castigation without fear of reprisal.

It's like playing Spades with barbs and jests and feints instead of cards.

The thing is, Ishiguro is very good at writing in this fashion, and the story flows past like a powerful stream, not unpleasant at all in its flow, but inexorably pulling toward an unpleasant end. Kathy, his narrator, tells the story in a series of gushing remembrances, almost as though confiding to a carer of her own; her restrained passion for her story, and her need to confess it to the reader, are infectious, even as the story becomes more sinister and creepy.

In the end, however, propriety and its ability to rob one of all outrage win out, leaving this reader to wonder many things, not least of all, can the horrible complacency be undone?