MOMMA SAID KNOCK YOU OUT Momma Said Knock You ...

Who You Calling Less Solvent?

It would be easy, of course, to ignore the clouds of shit heaved my way by Armond White in his hysterical manifesto about the New York Film Critics Circle ("Their Souls for a Freebie," 10/29). I could shrug off his rant, as so many do who are familiar with (and often amused by) his penchant for disdaining anyone who disagrees with him as dumb or compromised: That's just our crackpot Armond. But when White essentially condemns me and Entertainment Weekly as corrupt, his own stupidity becomes defamatory and calls for a response.

Anyone who writes for a Time Inc. magazine (or Newsweek or The New Yorker or any better-funded publication owned by a successful media conglomerate) has no doubt experienced the resentment, couched as esthetic righteousness, of colleagues writing for less solvent owners. For White's purposes, my paycheck from Entertainment Weekly even affects my motor skills: I don't just stand up because I'm making a point from the back of a restaurant dining room, but I rise up "with the full arrogance of Time Warner hoisting [me] up." I don't just acknowledge the existence of the Oscars as a factor in our debate (which was just that at the NYFCC business meeting-an internal debate), but I am a minion who values "pop commerce and celebrity over everything else and who [has] wrecked the currents of film culture."

It is idiocy like this that wrecks White's own reliability as a critic, week after week. Were he really as iconoclastic and unsullied a thinker as he claims, he would know that I and my colleague Owen Gleiberman are completely independent within EW, which is independent within Time Inc., which is free to cover or ignore any entity in the Time Warner universe. White's delusions about what I value, extended to his proud ignorance of what any of the rest of his colleagues in the New York Film Critics Circle value, ought to cast doubt on the strength of his entire fanciful thesis about what he sees as the moral decay of film criticism today.

The dumb thing is, White and I are on the same side in the screener debate; it just doesn't suit him in mid-harangue to grasp that nuance, as is true about so many fine points when he is in full apoplexy. That is his undoing as a critic, and in this case it's also his undoing as a person.

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly

Quotegate

Armond White is right on-target in his cover story last week, indicting journalists for being in bed with the big studios ("Their Souls for a Freebie," 10/29). Not all journalists, of course, are unethical: The two distinguished critics who write for New York Press are sharp, comprehensive and obviously unaffected by big-studio goodies.

What did not gain mention is the phenomenon of quote-whorism, the practice of praising even mediocre-to-poor films as though the journalists were dropping their wad every time they spent a couple of hours in a dark auditorium or screening room.

See the sluggish Beyond Borders and you'll wonder what the hell the "critics" have in mind when one calls it "the quintessential love story for the new millennium," another "the most powerful and compelling film you will see this year," still a third, "one of the year's best films," and a fourth, "a romance in the style of Bogart and Bergman."

Catch Radio and you'll wonder what these guys are smoking: "Run, don't walk to this phenomenal film," while another rhapsodizes, "You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll stand up and cheer." When was the last time you stood up and cheered? That critic must have looked awfully eccentric when he was the only one in the theater who thought he was at Yankee Stadium watching his team get a grand-slam home run.

If you take the view that these writers are not mental patients, you'd have to conclude that there are pressures on them from 1) the studios, which may have granted them access to junkets in L.A., paying for their round-trip air fare, their deluxe hotels and the chance to meet their favorite performers up close to ask cotton-candy questions; 2) the media, which gains free advertising each time their names are mentioned in the studio-paid ads; 3) their own egos, as writers hungry to see their names in print time after time after time.

Harvey Karten, director, New York Film Critics Online

Heard the One About THEWTC?

My recent mourning for Elliott Smith was broken by a horrible realization. The cool people in America, the urban hipsters and the one-up stance-rats, were bound to convert this last and most sublime work of Elliott Smith's into an occasion to do what the cool people do best: sneer.

Here's how J.R. Taylor's newest column ("B-Listers," 10/29) starts: "How can you tell when you're at an event that's part of the College Music Journal Convention? Because you can suddenly relate to Elliott Smith."

Already Elliott Smith is no longer the subject, but rather, people who like Elliott Smith. They determine Taylor's reaction to Smith's life, art and death. There is no relation between the critic and the artist, just the critic and the lesser critics. American intellectuals are a culturally insecure lot, and that lack of confidence only gets worse the higher up the avant-garde scale you go.

Elliott Smith sang about pain, misery, loathing and an incessant hatred of winners and brutes, and he did it better than anyone. He took a knife and stabbed himself in his heart. His sin, in the eyes of the cool people, is obvious: He took things too seriously, in life and in death. He was "mopey." Even after killing himself, a bland little coward like Taylor can still dismiss Elliott Smith in one word: "mopey." An artist who takes himself too seriously is the greatest threat of all to the cool people, who are consumed by the shallow pursuit of stances and counter-stances. J.R. Taylor is little different from a fashion victim sizing up the fashions of his rivals.

Taylor continues: "Q: How many DreamWorks employees does it take to stage an intervention for Elliott Smith?

"A: 'Hey, don't mess with our catalogue sales, man.'

"I keep that funny joke to myself, though, along with the one about how there's finally a needle-exchange program that works."

Yeah, keep that joke to yourself. It's just too damn edgy for the rest of us.

Weasels like J.R. Taylor are incapable of confronting Elliott Smith's suicide as something deeply personal. For him, it's merely an occasion to prove his cool credentials, delivered through cheap black humor. Smith dies. Someone less cool, an industry type, mourns Smith. Her mourning is uncool, as revealed by her uncool hairdo and her association with a recognizably uncool store, Diesel. If people with lame hairdos who throw parties in uncool stores mourn Elliott Smith, then, by simple hip arithmetic, it follows that a truly cool person would not only not mourn Elliott Smith, but rather make jokes about his death, and thus by extension, the industry publicists with bad hairdos who do mourn him. Get it?

In other words, J.R. has proved, through Elliott Smith's suicide, that he is cooler than a record- industry publicist. How fucking impressive.

And he thinks he's being dangerous, so dangerous he wants his readers to know that he's afraid to tell his jokes. Dangerous? Elliott Smith stabbed himself in the heart at the peak of an amazing career. That's not only dangerous, but physically really hard. It's not easy to actually stab yourself in the heart. Leaving aside the fear and queasiness issues, it's just physically hard to drive a knife through all that rib bone and cartilage and into the heart muscle-just look at the instruments open-heart surgeons use.

How hard, physically, was it for J.R. Taylor to pen his quips? How much pain did he fight through to construct the punch line to his catalogue joke? What did his readers confront? They didn't confront anything. They were given a Tylenol PM and kept far away from the scene of the suicide.

Taylor's quips are just poses. The best black humor hurts and offends because it forces us to confront things that we otherwise deny or ignore. Black humor should make you more capable of confronting what is painful, not deflate the horrible or, worst of all, make you merely cooler, more detached, more of a dickhead. It should make you pay. In the hands of Taylor, black humor is merely a copout. Taylor turns away from Elliott Smith's suicide, focuses on a harmless publicist and reduces it all to the kinds of cheaply bought quips that might upset an obvious corporate creep like her. It's black humor that exists in a vacuum. Black humor without consequences, or even the vague possibility of consequences.

"I keep that funny joke to myself, though, along with the one about how there's finally a needle-exchange program that works."

Want to try a genuinely daring black-humor joke? Try 9/11. A veritable gold mine of untapped black-humor deposits that your Manhattan readers are just dying to see you indulge in. Those bond traders cannon-balling out of the 104th floor? Come on, an urban hipster like you has got to have a few quips up his sleeve about that. Show us how really dangerous you are. A whole column of quips and jokes, using the real names of the people who jumped out of the windows. How many splattered bond traders does it take to shut J.R. Taylor's clever little mouth?

Mark Ames, Moscow

It's a Great Time to be a Movie Fan?

I am appalled that a recent editorial so blatantly tells readers to pirate licensed anime titles ("On the D/L," 10/29). To put this into perspective, the article would be the same as if it said "It's a great time to be a movie fan-all the new movies are available online for free!"

A great number of the titles he speaks of are available for purchase at your local DVD store (RahXephon and Ah! My Goddess to name only two-the latter is referred to under its Japanese title in the article of note, ) and licensed by American companies, which send a part of the proceeds back to the original creators.

Just because anime companies don't have the money or the time to go after every little writer that tells people to pirate their materials doesn't mean it's right. Theft is theft, and just because technology makes it easier to illegally download copies of shows available to buy at the store doesn't mean you should do it.

It is such a "great time to be an anime fan" because these great shows are finally available to be bought and experienced over here. No so-called "anime fan," published or no, should stoop to stealing from the very creators they laud in their articles. If you are looking for something to watch, you need go no further than your local DVD outlet-there is no need for larceny.

Luke Morgan, Rochester, NY

Hiroshi Don't Apologize

You might want to give some thought next time to what is legal and what is not. I read "On the D/L" (10/29) and saw the author mentioned series that are readily available in the U.S. on DVD. It's cheapskates like him who destroy the commercial viability of anime by undermining the industry that I support with my purchases. I believe some apologies toward the American companies that are working hard (and paying good money to get these shows on the shelves) are in order.

Leon van Hooydonk, Haarlem, Holland

Acts of Dog

While superficially mocking lawsuits in last week's paper, you wrote that the Staten Island Ferry crash was a nightmare made even worse knowing it was human error ("Page Two," 10/29). Well, smart asses, could you tell us what crashes or tragedies (that don't involve earthquakes or tornados) are not the result of human error? That's precisely why America is such a litigious land-there's so much human error, and people have no recourse except to sue the negligent asshole.

I also wanted to bitch about your reader, Jack Seney, who says the Catholic Church isn't evil like strip clubs, even though more rapes took place in the church than in any titty bar ("The Mail," 10/29). He glosses over the endless crimes of the church to tout the millions of good deeds they've done, but isn't that like saying Mussolini got the trains to run on time? And didn't Hitler improve the German economy and its pride for a while?

Don't forget, you creep Seney, that the church scandals didn't just involve priests raping children; it also involved the entire hierarchy of the church covering up the astronomical crimes. A moral person would demand half the world's priests and their bosses be sent to jail. Hey Jack, you wouldn't by chance be a priest, would you?

Janice Amato, Manhattan

MSN: Judge of Talent

I see that now both of Knipfel's readers have written in to defend his virtue ("The Mail," 10/29). I can't remember the last one's name, but as for Pat Vitucci, let's have MSN Search determine our talents objectively. Here are the number-one hits for each search:

Pat Vitucci: "True Romance edited by Pat Vitucci also buys poetry but not fiction and with the same requirements as True Confessions" (NWU Poets & Fiction Writers Market News List, October 2000)

James J. O'Meara: "Wartime Rank: Squadron Leader; Service: Royal Air Force Squadron: 64, 72, 91; Awards: DFC & Bar. Flew in battle of Britain. Source: Ness, William N.-The Allied Aces Of World War II, 1966, Arco Publishing Co., Inc., New York."

Finally, leaving aside Mr. (Ms?) Vitucci's baseless and irrelevant speculations as to my motives and background (don't let your literary imagination get ahead of ya) let me just remind him of the home truth that it takes just as much courage and struggle to write a bad book as to write a good one.

Metal mags? There's some scary editorial talent. Sweet Jesus in a tar pit!

James O'Meara, Long Island City

The Real Bad Thing

Lucas Rivera's article on the targeting of Coca-Cola's Colombian employees by death squads ("Coca-Cola's Killers," 10/22) was important and timely. Since there are many cases of activist workers being taken off buses on their way to and from work and butchered by the masked assassins, it's obvious that Coke management has to be identifying the victims to the state-sanctioned killers. These euphemistically called "paramilitary units" could not operate without army cooperation. They serve to give the government of Colombia deniability.

And of course the U.S. supports this system since it drives labor costs to their absolute minimum. It's even better than outright slavery since the bosses aren't responsible for even clothing, housing, and feeding the workers and their offspring (forget medical care). Any attempt by workers to better their lives is met with hyperviolence. The guerrillas laid down their arms a few years ago and tried to participate in elections-the ruling class of Colombia responded by assassinating their candidates, so they were forced back into insurrection to try and bring change to their country. (Although I think the guerrillas have politically degenerated over time.)

The Colombian government would have been overthrown by now if it weren't for the U.S., so ultimately this country is responsible. More Americans need to know and try and do something about it, like the "School of the Americas" protestors.

Jason Zenith, Manhattan

World Domination, Mid-30s

Does anyone actually read this crap? I just happened across the "Souls on Ice" article written by Matt Taibbi ("Cage Match," 8/13). I read about half of it, and it was so stupid and convoluted I had to stop. What is your agenda, and how old are you?

Dennis Sheffield, Nashville

Armond in Love

While I agree with a good many notions that Mr. White espouses ("Their Souls for a Freebie," 10/29), I have to state emphatically that making broad generalizations like "no intelligent person thinks The English Patient, Shakespeare in Love, Chocolat, The Cider House Rules, In the Bedroom and Chicago are good movies" is the kind of heavy-handed, single-minded journalism that the author appears to be criticizing.

Rhetorically, if a movie is not "good," then what is it? "Bad," one has to assume, especially since the author made no attempt to define what it is about these movies that does not measure up to "good."

I am an avid movie-goer and I, for one, saw Shakespeare in Love long before there was any hype for it by Miramax. I was dazzled by the high romance, astounded by the taut script and the amazing rethinking of Shakespearean dialogue, and impressed with the art direction, scenery and costumes. Of course, my writing these compliments does not make the movie "good" to anyone except me, of course. Why is an otherwise intelligent commentary tarnished by this kind of sophomoric outburst from White? I think his point is legitimately made without bashing Miramax films (again).

I could just as easily say that all independent films, with their edgy social awareness, are poor films because they don't "entertain." And I would be wrong, too. Controversy, social commentary and abstract use of the camera or media (among many other things) do not make a movie any better than, say, The Sound of Music with all its polished, G-rated, family-friendly singing. It's a matter of opinion, and while I certainly agree that the article I'm speaking of is an opinion piece at heart, I think it is important to note that the remainder of the article appeared to be well-supported in fact. This paragraph near the end of the article, however, is without support and is poor journalism (in my opinion).

John Rainwater, Memphis

Mugger's Balls

Russ Smith comes through again with another clutch take on the World Series and the fate of the New York Yankees ("MUGGER," 10/29). His analysis of what happened to this year's Yankees is right on the mark. Mugger is still the best writer you have at New York Press. Matt Taibbi should take more time studying the success of Mugger and less time talking about genitalia.

Tracy Meadows, Brenham, TX

No, It's There

I really enjoyed Matt's review of the Runaway Jury ("Film," 10/22), which actually makes me want to see the movie-a rarity when reading reviews. I am left wondering if I will come out with the same interpretation of the world being stolen by the political right. Is this just Matt's post-ideological fear that life will imitate art and Inherit the Wind will be rewritten with John Ashcroft playing Honorary Gov. Brady convincing a politically savvy New York jury that Jonah actually did stop the sun from revolving around the Earth? Or am I just drawing more from the article than is really there?

Mitchel Sobel, Jersey City

Concession Stand

You know, I thought for a minute that MUGGER actually had some baseball knowledge-until I read that you think the Yankees should move Bernie Williams to right field ("MUGGER," 10/29). If you've watched baseball even a little bit, you'd know that the strongest outfield arm is placed in right field. (The throws to second base and home plate from left and right field are equal, but the throw to third is considerably longer, thus the practice of the strongest arm in right.)

Please-stay away from sports. It's obvious you know little about them.

Matt DeMazza, Manhattan

Russ Smith replies: DeMazza, obviously correct. In the delirium, I suppose, of the Yanks losing to the Marlins, I rushed the sentence about Bernie Williams. I meant to move Williams to left field, put Soriano in center and put Matsui in right. This is why the Yanks' speedy banishment of Raul Mondesi was dumb: Mondesi was a hothead, but with his cannon of an arm in right field, he changed the running game of the opposing team.

Green Meanie

I'd like to point out a few inaccuracies in Adam Bulger's article, "The Jolly Green Defiance" ("New York City," 10/29). There was indeed a mix-up in the booking process for the event we held at the Brecht Forum on Oct. 16, but it was not the fault of the group organizing the event. My colleague booked the event more than one month in advance, and called two weeks before to confirm. The confusion may have been over which room we wanted to use, as there is a small meeting room in the building in addition to the main room where larger events are held. The person holding the rainforest event, while not in charge of booking herself, told me that this was not the first time something like this had happened. At any rate, we arrived at a solution, and our event proceeded as planned.

Turnout was not as large as we had hoped, but that may be due in part to the fact that the New York Yankees were playing game seven of a storied League Championship series against their arch-rivals, the Boston Red Sox. As for the vodka spilling on the "only" microphone, nothing of the sort happened. We didn't use the portable microphone we brought because the Brecht Forum had one that we could have used. I decided not to use the microphone because of the low turnout, but it was working, and anyone who wished to use it could have done so.

Let me close by saying that the Green Party is all-volunteer. There are no paid positions in New York State. Every one of us involved, including the candidates, have full-time jobs in addition to the work we do for the party. Mistakes do happen from time to time, but these are inevitable, no matter the party involved. I would like to thank everyone who takes the time to make events like this one happen. We fully expect the Green Party to continue its rapid growth, and we will continue to win elections, notwithstanding the erroneous reporting of some media outlets.

Michael Emperor, Green Party Office in Manhattan Committee

The Hicks Defense to the Nash Slash

With the publication of Henry Flesh's "Boning Up: The Resurrection of Soft Skull Press" ("Books," 10/1), I have been maligned. Not only by the writer, but by his subject, my ex-best friend, Richard Nash, current publisher of Soft Skull Press. Their loose allegations have blown up into exaggerated talk elsewhere, online and on the street. It's getting out of hand. I'd rather not resort to lawyers immediately. I just want to give my side of the story.

Flesh writes, "There are the independent book publishers who didn't pay their authors a dime? This happened to many authors at Soft Skull Press under former publisher Sander Hicks."

That's just not true. Soft Skull Press, Inc., (SSPI) under my leadership paid modest advances and then fair royalties under good contracts. SSPI has accounting records to prove it. Yes, sometimes we were late. Yes, the legal bills with Fortunate Son ($15,000 in 2001 alone) did slow down our payment schedule. But notice that of the 65 authors I published in my time at Soft Skull (1996-2001), not one is quoted in Henry Flesh's article. Why? And why is this article appearing now, in October of 2003, a full two years and a month after I took a leave of absence from Soft Skull, and handed over the reins to my (former) best friend Richard Nash?

The time has come to let the public in on a few secrets inside the cryptic world of Richard Nash and his dilettante henchmen. Since filling a power vacuum in my absence and stepping into an (un-elected) position as publisher, Nash made it a point to alienate yours truly. Right away, he claimed for vague reasons that I could not come back to the company.

So, I lived for about two years out on Long Island, licking my wounds and working other jobs. I didn't understand Nash. Angering me and pushing me away couldn't be in the SSPI shareholders' larger interest. I was the one who acquired the bestseller Fortunate Son (about Bush) and two other books that made the L.A. Times and Washington Post bestseller lists. I had developed an explosive little e-commerce engine at softskull.com and had gotten us national distribution.

Things became clearer one day last April. A special emergency shareholders meeting was urgently called for April 30, and announced about a week prior. Nash told everyone that due to a bureaucratic snafu, our NY State corporate status had been dissolved (due either to an accountant's misfiling of (S) Corp status, or due to SSPI falling behind on state income tax; it's still not clear to me which). Under the advice of business consultant Neil Reshen, Nash proposed that the company re-incorporate in Delaware, and that he be given 51 percent of that new company. His two right-hand men, Tom Hopkins and Don Goede, were also to be given sizable chunks of the new deal. I communicated with a majority of the shareholders, and we rapidly formed a majority that said "no." It was an easy argument to win: For the current management to gain that much equity, someone had to lose. The Nash plan called for all current shareholders to have their share sizes cut down to 33 percent of what they had paid cash for. I had sold friends and family $115,000 worth of stock in the Soft Skull vision. Nash was about to cut their dream down by two-thirds.

April 30 came. I could not attend the meeting, and didn't need to. I let Richard Nash know that I had the majority of shares on my side. We would not vote in favor of his proposal. Richard Nash opened up the meeting by issuing stock to his yes-men, Tom Hopkins and Don Goede, just enough so that they would gain a majority of votes to approve their rapacious plan. In any other country, that's called stuffing the ballot box.

I decided to move on, instead of filing a lawsuit (at the time). I decided to let Nash attempt to resuscitate the beleaguered Soft Skull Press, Inc. without further input from me. A few other shareholders weren't opposed to Nash's proposal; they felt that the debts were fearsome, and that Nash was doing an okay job. But the April 30 massacre of the equity that I had worked hard for showed that Nash was developing an incredibly pragmatic set of ethics. What happened to the brilliant, non-linear, poetic, Foreman and Yeatsean, experimental theater director we all knew? Is this what Enron and crony capitalism have taught us?

As a professional courtesy, I recently let Richard Nash know that I was incorporating a new publishing company, the Drench Kiss Media Corporation. I guess I meant that to give us some closure, but now regret such a gentlemanly move. Shortly after, this piece by Henry Flesh appeared in New York Press. Nash deals in vague complaints (here in the Press, and earlier in the Brooklyn Rail), but the shareholders have never received any serious documentation of his case.

What exactly does the company owe, what's in the bank, what have we paid off, what have we made? Henry Flesh praises Nash and Tennessee Jones for their "interest-bearing bonds" to creditors, but Nash was actually seriously late on the June 2003 payment to the bond company. When I asked him about this, he said something like, it's okay, they won't default on us, it's easier for them to just wait.

I have attempted to communicate with Nash several times about Flesh's defamatory piece. He has not returned phone calls or emails about this story. So, we have a piece now online and in print in which Nash claims that accounting was "a disaster" when he took over Soft Skull Press, Inc. Okay, now, we know it wasn't perfect, but I was working with a good accountant, OSB, at the time. Funny. OSB is now suing Nash and his version of SSPI. Why? Well, they want to get paid. And maybe they're also tired of Nash's bombastic, undiplomatic style.

Sander Hicks, Manhattan