Lost in Cyberspace
When you run a blog on WordPress, one of the handy features they give you (when they’re not totally changing the format and functions without warning, while leaving the “Help” section unmodified), is a guide to the search terms people use each day to find the blog.
Why are you all so strange? Some of the search requests are so specific to Shadowplay that I have to assume somebody’s not bothered to bookmark me and just uses a different weird search every time they want to find the site. But the ones I like best are the deeply peculiar requests that are in no way going to find satisfaction here, but which coincide in some peculiar way with some turn of phrase I’ve used or some subject I’ve mentioned in passing, like Walpamur Petrifying Liquid.
Here are a few:
The Great War Zeppelin (quite a popular one, this. All I did was mention Zeppo Marx.)
Giant squid (probably THE most popular search. Why, people?)
Songs with the word shovel (just BEAUTIFUL. I wanna party with this guy.)
Jessica Rabbit nude (very popular, beaten only by Angelina Jolie.)
Shelley Duvall fake (I’m slightly mystified.)
Williams Syndrome pictures (People, you need to learn about Google image search.)
Pittsburgh films Demonlover (Not sure I’ve ever mentioned the Olivier Assayas movie DEMONLOVER, which I like a lot, but I have mentioned the city of Pittsburgh in connection to George Romero, I think.)
Arthur Clarke pederast (I became the web’s top source on this pressing issue when the Great Man died. Sorry, Art.)
Videos feet smelling (No comment.)
Cut her hair really short.
Rot wang.
Balloo emote (I love this one like a brother.)
Shorter people quotes (?)
Surreal train (OK, you got me, I’m hooked. Now please EXPLAIN.)
Mathew Broderick on March 15th, 2008 (Intriguing, but I’m damned if I’m going to Google this in turn to try and find out what he was up to. Give the man his privacy!)
Mans final breath.
Sexual mental hospital stories.
Lactulose (Which leads folks unerringly to MY MOST POPULAR POST EVER.)
The worst toilet in Scotland (Somebody wants to find it?)
Stolen ambles (OK, now I’m officially FREAKED OUT.)
Wigs sex (Well, sure, we’ve all done this, right?)
I’m gonna open up your gate Phaedra song.
Smeel feet movies (If anything, MORE disturbing than “Videos feet smelling” since it conjures the image of a horribly stupid person with a somewhat disgusting and comical fetish. Stay on the internet! Avoid reality!)
There is a post to be written about what John Waters calls “shrimpers” in the cinema, a field taking in not only Tarantino but also probably Bunuel. But I’m not ready to write it!
April 5, 2008 at 3:44 pm
Are you familiar with Demon Lover Diary by Joel DeMott?
April 5, 2008 at 5:57 pm
Nope!
Just Googled — looks fascinating.
http://www.laweekly.com/film+tv/film/the-horror-the-horror/3829/
I saw American Movie and found it utterly heartbreaking.
April 5, 2008 at 8:10 pm
“Shrimpers” is a term I’ve come across in a musical/California context but I was too embarrassed at the potential exposure of my own ignorance to ask for an explanation at the time.
Now that I’ve exposed my ignorance, please feel free to enlighten me…:-)
Regards,
djp
April 5, 2008 at 11:38 pm
According to Waters, shrimpers = foot fetishists. Because of the little toes, you see.
It’s a great word because it manages to make an already ridiculous and kind of gross obession even more absurd and unpleasant. But good luck to them, who am I to judge?
And for such a silent minority, they’re doing quite well to be able to choose between Tarantino and Bunuel, that seems to cover plenty of bases.
April 6, 2008 at 9:36 am
Now that you’ve toe’d me, I think I have nailed my embarrassment…:-)
Regards,
djp
April 6, 2008 at 10:03 am
Yeah, *I* should be embarrassed that I DID know it. What a heel.
April 6, 2008 at 11:30 am
Yeah, Hell hath no fury like a woman’s corns…
Regards,
djp
April 7, 2008 at 7:17 pm
Nice. Phrases to find my site include:
“george kuchar 2008 appearances”
“horror movie wife on fire”
“tv adverts that use avant garde”
and
“movie no such thing spoiler ron perlman”
I like that last one. Firstly, I haven’t written about “No Such Thing”, and secondly it wasn’t Ron Perlman it was Robert John Burke.
April 7, 2008 at 7:23 pm
I like “wife on fire”.
I just got another good one: “David Lean explains Mulholland Drive.” I’d LOVE to hear him try!
So where’s your site? I know, I should just try
http://www.deeperintomovies.com, but give me confirmation!April 7, 2008 at 10:19 pm
It’s…
http://www.deeperintomovies.net/journal/
Only written for myself – and I don’t mean that modestly, I write about the movies I watch exclusively to help me remember having watched them. So there are lots of spoilers about endings. But I share your love for screen shots, so it’s always worth scrolling through without reading the words.
Not posted yet: my thoughts on last night’s WTF screening (is there any other kind?) of Rivette’s NOROIT.
SHRIMPER is also the name of an indie record label, one-time home of The Mountain Goats and Lou Barlow’s Sebadoh side projects.
April 7, 2008 at 10:43 pm
I’ve added it to my blogroll, it’s great! People (if there are any out there) should check it out.
Disgracefully, I’ve yet to watch Noroit, but it’s on the list. And Losey’s The Big Night just arrived.
April 8, 2008 at 12:46 am
There’s no disgrace in not seeing Noroit, which isn’t even available in an English edition. I should feel far more disgraced in not having seen Potemkin or Sunset Blvd., but I just haven’t gotten around to ‘em yet. That’s from a youth misspent watching Friday The 13th sequels instead of the classics.
Glad you like the movie journal. I just proofread some posts I’d been sitting on, so now there are new front-page screenshots of Sissy Spacek and Justin Timberlake with blood all over them. I actually kinda like my Southland Tales post.
So we watch enough movies and keep writing about ‘em, eventually we’ll become *great* at it, and when the papers start paying for film critics again we will be first in line. That’s how it works, right?
April 8, 2008 at 3:51 pm
Ah, but I’ve had a subtitled Noroit for a couple of months — since you made me a copy! Somehow it keeps not getting watched.
Maybe the future of film writing isn’t weekly reviews, but books and articles. I’d be quite happy as long as somebody paid me something to do SOMETHING film-related.
Actually, not true, I NEED to make films. But I don’t mind supplementing that meagre income with journalism / criticism / cheap jokes.
April 11, 2008 at 5:02 pm
Another good search request: “wact break gag bob read”…