Losing that hour this week really set me back to doing just a few things. For those of you who actually watched the bread movie, I guess that would be an hour and 23 minutes lost. April fool, suckers.

On Thursday I headed to the Dryden at George Eastman House (900 East Ave.) to see the original 1956-version of Invasion Of The Body Snatchers. It really felt like trying to be myself in the current political climate — I want to be able to speak as I please and I feel strongly that is how society functions best, yet the powers-that-be have a desire to make sure everyone conforms. No, they don't want to kill me, they just want to change my brain so it fits their model of society, that's all. It might as well have been a line lifted straight from the film. Of course, the director denies its cautionary stance toward either Communism nor McCarthyism — and why not, speaking in times of McCarthyism, he might have been branded a Communist and executed if he said otherwise.

A couple weeks ago I read Mortimer Shy's essay titled People Who Watch Movies and was amused by the thought of people being strongly influenced by movies, especially considering my own track record. I had talked with the guy earlier in the week about it (no, wait, maybe I just saw it in a movie somewhere.)

He begins his essay, "people who watch movies become people in movies, I am afraid." In much better poetic style than I can muster, he lays out the idea that human beings and all their wonderfully fucking annoying uniqueness get blotted out by the shine of giant faces on a wall. Hopefully by exposing myself to lots and lots of different movies and ideas I can fool him into thinking I'm pretty dynamic.

On Friday I started out at Image City Photography Gallery (722 University Ave.) to see the opening of Stephen Spinder's Budapest/Transylvania photography exhibition. At first I thought it was just more tourist snaps but the images had such good composition that I ended up really liking them. Shortly afterward I went to The Rochester Contemporary Art Gallery (137 East Ave.) for the screening of The Abortion Diaries. It was a pretty good film that oulines the lives of a dozen women and their experiences with having an abortion and puts a human side to why one might want an abortion. Since that is something the pro-choice movement already knows and that the pro-life movement considers irrelevant, I don't know what is the target audience who would be influenced. If nothing else, it can give women who are in the process of making such a decision some grounding in what happens, and lets them know they are not alone.

Later, I swapped my movie hat for my music hat and went to The University of Rochester (Elmwood Ave. at Intercampus Dr., details on River Campus Map) and eventually found The Community Living Center (CLC). The band I believe was Myriad started things off. I thought they were a great dirty, gritty, garage (mostly cover) band with synth, drums, and guitar, but they seemed to quarrel a lot. I missed most of Worm Quartet's hilarious novelty-song set because I was helping singer Shoebox's wife find the place. I thought Gaybot was as crazy as usual but their set lost some steam in the middle as they regrouped and invited audience members to entirely replace the band. Finally, Seth Faergolzia finished up ... he does some really good acoustic rock, but it was sometimes a bit too stylized with guitar and vocal tricks for my taste.

Saturday I started off at Daily Perks (389 Gregory St.) I got to see Nora Kaminski again — it's been over a year. This time she was playing with a band and she's matured a lot as a singer ... she's now got a bit of a coutry twang.

From there it was off to The Montage Live (50 Chestnut St., formerly the Montage Grille) to check out more bands. Moustache started things off and I appreciated their technical hard-rock/metal skills more than last time. The UV Rays then rocked hard for a good show. I didn't get Trystero who I gathered was doing some kind of math-metal (highlighting the mathematical repetitions in the music) — but to me, it was just pretty uninteresting metal. I was wiped out and had to go home, but I did see a bit of The Isotopes with their surf-rock and stage show — I really did want to see how they'd use all the extra space on the Montage stage.

Sunday I was back to the Dryden to further delete my own personality once again, this time to see Sam Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch. Introducing the evening was Nick Redman, fan then friend of Peckinpah and director of the documentary A Simple Adventure Story: Sam Peckinpah, Mexico and 'The Wild Bunch' which preceded the main feature. It followed some of the friends, family, and crew of the film back to the locations in a remote, small Mexican town where the film was shot. I thought it too bad that it was shown before the film because it made much more sense after the fact (of course, I was among the few who had never seen The Wild Bunch before.) Fellow fan and friend of Peckinpah, Donnie Fritts joined Redman to discuss the film and answer audience questions.

As for The Wild Bunch itself, it was indeed a "perfect" movie. I could really appreciate that not a film frame was wasted — everything went to telling the story with no excuses and no apologies. There's nothing particularly unique about the plot: aging bank robbers are back together for one last heist. The characters are the whole story — four powerful men, each with their own code of honor. Wow ... I really can't do it justice. If you'd like to see what an action movie can be — or what a movie can be — definitely check this out.

Ah, Monday. All that nail-biting about climate change over a stable and mild beginning of the year finally abated as our weather returned to normal. Monday was 70°F and sunny, and by Tuesday night it was snowing. Whew! Dodged that bullet!

But back to Monday night ... I made it out to The Bug Jar (219 Monroe Ave.) for the bands there. Starting off was Knife Crazy who did some technical and elaborate rock with a good, full, powerful sound. The other band was Gil Mantera's Party Dream who did their awesome disco-rock with a hilarious stage presence.

Tuesday I was back at the Dryden for another Louis Malle film. Although I haven't known much about his films in the past, I've come to be attracted by the plots and consistently impressed by the films. This time the film was Pretty Baby in which Violet, played by a 12-year-old Brooke Shields is coming of age in a New Orleans whorehouse in the early 1900's with her mother Hattie (Susan Sarandon.)

It's terribly uncomfortable to watch as a male because Brooke's budding sexuality is evident, but she also seems way too young to be having any sex for at least another few years. My own biology was telling me I was looking at a girl who was on the brink of sexual maturity which conflicted with my general apathy for really young women, particularly in light of my American upbringing that brings severe repercussions for sex with women under 18. On the one hand, it reinforced my disdain for the stupidity of the harshness of such laws since 18 years is not some magical birthday when every girl suddenly sprouts breasts and becomes a woman [and that it's often used to arbitrarily punish young couples where the male partner turns 18 but the female doesn't.] On the other hand, it reminded me that biological maturity does not indicate being prepared for sexuality at all — I mean, nobody should have sex until they are at least 35.

Ironically, the movie only skirts the edges of these issues and instead just treats the actions as fact — as if there were no morality at all inherent in the camera. It is solely the judgement of the viewers that gives the film this character as a social commentary. In the absence of that judgement, it would be simply a lovingly shot coming-of-age story.

Along the vein of Mortimer Shy's essay (although without, presumably, having actually read it) my friend Cynthia mused, "I've always wanted to go back in time before there were movies and before television and radio because it's fascinating to think how people interacted without those fictional role models." (She sounds a lot like my writing style because I'm pretty much paraphrasing, even though I used proper quotes.) Specifically, she was curious about kissing, romance, and sex. (And I assure you she's not hitting on me.)

I mean, what if we didn't have preconcieved notions of the romantic theme building as we chatted over glasses of wine by the fire, followed by kissing that involves (and this is very important, apparently) a lot of hair fondling, and then a stationary camera in a dimly blue-lit room focused on shuttered Venetian blinds that focuses back to reveal a couple racked in passionate embrace crashing onto the sheets. Then, we are in the same room with the camera slightly higher, looking down upon us both — sometime during the night we apparently put back on our collective underpants — the white sheets bathed in smoky morning sunlight.

You know? What if we didn't have that?

Maybe somebody should make a movie about that because I tend to see a lot of movies.

• Joyeux Noël (at The Little) - Remember that story about World War I soldiers who stop fighting on Christmas Eve, bury their dead, and play football?
• Thank You For Smoking (at The Little) - Ah, the life of a tobacco company lobbyist.