By Max Goldberg

It’s enough to make you wonder. Not twenty-four hours after headlines announcing Ingmar Bergman’s death at 89 news arrived of Michelangelo Antonioni’s end at 94. Both died this past Monday. They seemed on parallel tracks throughout their careers—producing strings of self-consciously intellectual films bent on existential meaning—making their alignment in death all too temptingly neat of a frame for the heavy eulogizing to come. Still, maybe they would have appreciated the coincidence: a flash of suggested meaning, the intimation of magical thinking.

By Gazelle Emami

Remember stoichiometry? It tells us the relationship between certain reactants and products. Like two parts hydrogen plus one part oxygen equals water. Diet coke plus Mentos equals explosion. And a baby eating a lemon equals hilarious.

By Molly Freedenberg

Screw my red velvet duvet cover and all its soft, squishy opulence. If only I had an extra $1300, I'd redecorate my bed with a bit of bite from Quiltsryche. But since I'm poor, I'll just have to settle for going to sleep with Ministry on my headphones.

Bangover, by Quiltsryche

Thanks to Thrillist for the tip.

By Molly Freedenberg

For some of us, playing is an escape from work. But for a lucky few, playing is their work. Sound like fun? It is, say the professional partyers we interviewed. But it's still ... well ... work. Below are full interviews with Juanita More, Justin Morgan, DJ Solomon, Nicole Cronin, Andie Grace, Lisa Hix, and Syd Gris -- all people whose job it is to make you forget yours.

JUANITA MORE
HOSTESS, DJ, PERFORMER, ARTIST, ILLUSIONIST, MUSE, MODEL
www.juanitamore.com

San Francisco Bay Guardian: What do you do and what are your primary duties?

Juanita More: I wear so many different hats, it's hard to throw a label on me. But, I think the persona the public most perceives is that I am a full-time party girl. In reality, I spend the majority of my time creating, supporting and developing new ideas, artwork and events.

SFBG: Is this your primary form of income? If not, how else do you make money?

JM: What money?

How 'bout this for a shot of homegrown comedy -- and lord knows I need some after the homegrown shot of comedy that was my night at the sex club. Gurl, remind me NOT to wear my night goggles up in there. I saw too much! Too much!

The kids from the new queer comedy public access show "Access of Evil" just popped me a couple new rough vids of their sketches, and they're pretty bombatastic. You can catch the first "Access of Evil" installment on August 19 at 1am on Channel 29 -- and then every third Sunday of the month at 1am thereafter.

Hit up Trax Bar at 1437 Haight on Saturday the 18th around 11pm for a cute viewing party of the first episode. Check it out!

Secret Prison Torture Playset
with the adorable Syphilis Schlaftly

Tweaker's Choice

"Don't text your dealer!"

Upcoming eps include, apparently:

- Carol Channing in "Goodbye Faggot"
- Homeless Crack-whore Julie Andrews
- Zombie Judy Garland
- Goth Richard Simmons

How can they miss? Oh, and for more info or if you want to get in on the act, contact them at accessofevil@yahoo.com

One of our favorite trannies of all time, Felicia Fellatio, has just informed us that she will be OOC (that's "out of commision" for you non-TXTRS) for a while after a little necessary testicular surgery (nothing cosmetic, she informs us). But that's not gonna stop her from partying! Below this incredibly juicy and possibly illegal pic, a message from her about the procedure -- and this Sunday's scrotum surgery celebration!

Hey friends -

So (and apologies for those that don't know this yet) on Monday I go under the knife for surgery on my ... scrotum. It's a routine procedure, totally cool, and I will be fantastically drugged up for a week.

So mark your calendars for a BALLS OUT party next Sunday!

8:00 pm - whenever
Sunday August 12th
Truck - 15th and Folsom (they have food and a full bar!)

please bring NUTS: cashews, almonds, pecans, brazil nuts, etc
to celebrate

and no, I am not getting them removed or any sort of tranny castration surgery. (Balls and nuts are metaphors, people.)

LOVE XXOO

By Maria Komodore

There aren’t many things that haven’t been written about Andrey Tarkovsky’s Stalker. Of course the film’s mysterious subject and Tarkovsky's even more mysterious direction do open the film up to all kinds of discussions. The story, if one can say that there is such a thing, revolves around an enigmatic Zone whose creation conditions never become quite clear. The suggestion is that it was the product of a meteorite fall—but that doesn’t really matter anyhow. Within the obscure Zone there is the equally abstruse Room which is supposed to be capable of granting men’s innermost wishes. Writer and Scientist are the film’s two protagonists, who want to access the Zone and get to the Room, although doing so is prohibited to everyone. And this is where the Stalker, the film’s third main character, comes in. Writer and Scientist use him to reach the Room. The Stalker has managed to find his way in the forbidden area and navigate it safely.

By Sam Devine

So the City just killed Halloween (although, in all fairness, they had plenty of help from a few masked assailants and some assorted weaponry), but there may be hope for the haunted holiday yet. As long as you’ve got a DVD player.

What is surely the funniest and most watch-able monster movie of all time, “The Monster Squad,” (originally released in 1987) has just been dubbed a “cult classic,” and been re-released on DVD. In it, all the old-school Universal movie monsters – Dracula, the Mummy, the Wolf Man, the Creature from the Black Lagoon, Frankenstein’s Monster – return to claim a sacred amulet that can forever alter the balance of power between good and evil. And a group of Junior High kids are the only ones that remember the special ways to kill these monsters.

(Sound silly? All right hotshot: how many ways are there to kill a Werewolf? Would an accident with power tools do it? What about falling out of a window – onto a bomb? Isn’t a silver bullet the only way? The really silly thing is that a lot of us carry around arcane monster knowledge. Hell, the president couldn’t find his ass with a map, but it’s a safe bet he can help you out with your Werewolf problem: “See, whatcha do is… you get a silver bullet. It’s like the reverse of Iraq, heh. see. Where there is no silver bullet. Heh. Learned that from my buddy Lon Chaney – I call ‘im Lonny, heh, for short.”)

By Maria Komodore

The exact moment when I decided to study cinema is very clearly imprinted in my memory. It occurred three years ago while I was watching Man Ray films.

What impressed me most about films such as Return to Reason, Ballet Mécanique, and Emak Bakia was the potential they seemed to add to the film medium. Strange, almost indistinguishable forms and shapes danced around on the screen to generate equally mysterious inner associations. Though at times this colorful and playful montage of images didn’t make sense, at least not in the conventional way that films are supposed to make sense, they had deep impact on my perception.

Independent Exposure's Animation Edition 2007 —a series of short animations series that Microcinema Inc. has compiled on DVD and will also be showing all around the world—made me relive that moment. All fifteen shorts are exceptional not only for their subjects and the imaginative manner in which they're treated, but also simply for their aesthetic value.

By Michelle Devereaux

True, Frank Oz has made his living for the last twenty years as a director of glossy, big-budget Hollywood comedies: from the mega-hits (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, What About Bob?, In & Out) to the occasional colossal flop (The Stepford Wives). And for the discerning nerd, Yoda always he will be. But for me, it's hard not to meet the man and think of him as anything but a pig. Oz not only provided the voices of Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, Animal, and the Swedish Chef, among other classic Muppet characters, he's also a master puppeteer in his own right.

So how to "keep the Muppet questions to a minimum" as instructed by the publicist on the occasion of his new movie, Death at a Funeral? (Especially when Oz himself makes an off-the-cuff remark about going "whole hog"? Well, it helps that Funeral is actually pretty amusing. An ensemble farce about a repressed English clan attending the funeral of a patriarch with a scandalous secret, the film features British vets like Rupert Graves, Robert Vaughan, and Ewen Bremner, plus American actors Peter Dinklage and Alan Tudyk (a standout). I sat down with Oz to discuss the movie, his desire to become a master of the "dark" arts, and other things (sigh) no
Muppet.

In the Visual Art section of this week’s Fall Arts Preview, San Francisco Open Studios gets a shout out. I recently talked with Therese Martin, Executive Director of ArtSpan, about Open Studios, and about ArtSpan’s role in helping Bay Area artists. We also discussed art by 'hood, and people who visit 75 artist studios in one weekend.

Guardian: How do you feel Open Studios is different from many art events in the Bay Area? I’d guess that while it’s larger, it’s can sometimes be more direct in terms of a chance to meet with artists.
Therese Martin: It’s definitely different because of the number of artists involved in so many different neighborhoods. It’s something you can participate in and not move beyond the 2 or 3 neighborhoods you normally go to.
The personal connection is unique. You really have the opportunity to shake the hand of a creative person. Even if you’re in a studio that’s not the living pace of an artist, it’s still a very personal space.

By Stephen Torres

UPDATE: 8/27 -- Castro still not officially dead. Sorry, Perez!

The poison pen of notorious blogger Perez Hilton has apparently sealed the end of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro. According to the celebrity mudslinger's eponymous website, www.perezhilton.com, the infamous leader is dead.

Rumors of his death have been circulating for awhile now, but due to Hilton’s reputation for leaking celebrity gossip before anyone else, including veterans of the gossip biz, the interest of the media and Cuban Americans alike has been piqued. Apparently, Miami is afire with the news.

Hilton is of Cuban descent and stands by his source, claiming it is only a matter of time before the Cuban government concedes the truth.

We want to know: What does it mean for the state of our world when news outlets get their tips from PhotoShop-happy celebrity bloggers?

Oh yeah, and we guess Castro (alleged?) death is important too.

The crazy part is that this “news” comes by way of Hilton instead of the AP and that people take this Hedda Hopper of the Internet as a serious source. The fact that I write about this as bog posting only continues this dubious gossip mill.

For an inside glimpse at Hilton and his thoughts on journalistic responsibility and his place in the media firmament. Check out the latest issue of the delectable BUTT Magazine on newsstands now.

The busiest guy with an undead name in showbiz? Rob Zombie. Like a certain mask-wearing maniac, the man can’t be stopped – at least when it comes to doing press for Halloween, his latest film, which opens Friday, August 31 (giving you a full two months to prepare for the actual holiday). I zoomed into the office after an ill-advised night out for my 8:45 a.m. interview. My phone was lit up like Vegas – Mr. Zombie was running a bit late, could I hold on for a few minutes? Yeah, I could hold on to talk about Halloween – John Carpenter’s 1978 original is my go-to favorite film citation, and I’m anticipating the remake with every bloody bone in my horror-geek body. I don’t like doing interviews before I’ve seen the film, but again – it’s Halloween, dude. A movie that – let’s be honest – needs no enhancement to be scary, even in 2007. But I’m willing to see what Zombie has to offer. Which leads me to my first question …

San Francisco Bay Guardian: What do you think makes you different from other directors who’ve remade horror films (see: The Hills Have Eyes, Dawn of the Dead, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Fog, etc. etc.)? I know you’re a huge horror fan...

Rob Zombie: It’s hard to say. All directors are different. And for me to assume I know who they are and what they do and what their motivations are would be presumptuous on my part. But the only thing that I know is that what makes this remake possibly different from others is that it’s not just a job. If you’re gonna take on something, you have to take it on because you have some passion for the project. Because I’ve been offered other things in the past and I’ve turned them all down because I was just kind of like, “Why would you remake that? Who give a shit?” So I mean, maybe that’s different. Sometimes people just take on jobs that they really don’t have a passion for, and it shows.

By Michelle Tea

Last Saturday night I went to Sewdown, a fashion party that billed itself as an alternative to San Francisco’s fashion week.

Yes, San Francisco has a fashion week, and it’s OK that you didn’t know that.

Sewdown took place at the Temple Nightclub, a place that does indeed look like a temple, for a religious sect worshipful of art galleries: the place is all white with high-ceilings and cold columns on the inside. The perfect place for a fashion show!

Me and my partner in finery, writer/filmmaker Tara Jepsen, grabbed some Cokes (no Diet Cokes? at a fashion show?) and started posing. Tara had raided the closet of an employee of Danielle Steel who gets to go on shopping jaunts to Paris, and as a result was wearing a Behnaz Sarafpour dress of silkscreened black lace and a mesh heart that framed her cleavage in a sweetly pornographic style. She also scored a knit Dolce & Gabbana purse, which we entertained ourselves with by speculating on its original price. Tara confirmed that yes undeed it does make you feel like a better person to wear amazingly fancy clothes, and I believe her because I felt like a better person just standing next to her. But this is not about me and Tara, this is about Sewdown.

It's been a huge week for the gay (and, as someone hopelessly embedded in the daily news cycle, I'm queerly grateful) -- Larry Craig's water-closeted restroom fumble, gay marriage in Iowa, briefly ....

Let's round it off on a pre-Labor Day musical high note, shall we? Ladies, gentlemen, and other --- a delightful mashup of Larry Craig's putative televised denials and Avenue Q's poignant gut-buster (addressed to a closeted Republican Craig doppelganger puppet -- prophesy!) "If You Were Gay."

Take it away, fellas .....