David Lynch Needs a Vehicle

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He made Twin Peaks, Mullholland Dr. and Blue Velvet–save yourself some adjectives and just call him the GOAT.  But if David Lynch had any less momentum right now, he’d be stationary. Considering his body of work, this doesn’t seem possible, but consider Inland Empire (his most recent feature). Its a film determined to ride the asymptote between watchable and directionless. Maybe its esoteric. Hopefully its before it’s time…but I really doubt that. Drivel is closer to home. Next, consider Crazy Clown Time, a music video directed by Lynch, music by Lynch. Consider it right now. Peep:

Now put on your role playing cap. You’re a studio exec. You’ve got a big swingin’ dick. You’ve got comic book flicks printing you money. You’ve got slaves 3D printing you an island in Key West.   Now consider funding this man…Now consider your island… Take off your cap, ash the Cohibo, get your dick out of that poor assistants mouth and reflect on the current state of affairs: Sometimes David Lynch torches studio cheddar and I’m telling you he and needs a vehicle.

Lynch Cart

                                                     (Every Lynch needs a vehicle)

Before we get to why Lynch needs a vehicle, let’s get to the Elephant Man in the room. Some of you savvy bastards are reading this, scratching your heads, thinking about the Peaks Reboot–thinking about how that’s a vehicle. This line of reasoning is faulty on account of the Peaks reboot is not a vehicle. The Peaks Reboot is a grisly harbinger of layoffs at Showtime, its ill advised, its a desperate power play from the other premium cable channel, its a money grab by co-creator Mark Frost, and its a tragedy for David Lynch. Its a chance for him to visit Coop and Harry and the Great Northern– everyone and everything in Twin Peaks!–the town and the people who were ripped away from him, from us. Its heartbreaking. Peaks is the most influential, most important, most groundbreaking, heart-wrenching, most terrifying TV show in American history, and the reboot will suck hard. This is for upwards of a lot of reasons. I’m guessing the actors have all quit or had plastic surgery, which wont play in quiet upstate Washington.  I’m guessing Windom Earl is dead. I’m guessing Coop will have a scheduling conflict with Portlandia or Sex In The City 6. But the real reason it wont work is that Peaks is dead and canonized. Dead too soon, dead nonetheless, and canonized. All post-Peaks TV is derivative of Peaks–a reboot will be anachronistic. It’s akin to Ted Williams’ frozen head in the batters box vs. Max Scherzer. Obviously Ted Ballgame would go yard in a hurry but his damn body’s been chopped off, not to mention he’s dead.

                                                          (Is this Donna Hayword?)

The tragedy here, and the reason a reboot gained traction, is that Peaks never reached a critical mass, never collapsed into itself. The studio meddled then pulled the plug and Peaks died. It left us needing more Coop and Harry and Ben and Jerry and Leland, it left is ripe and primed, legs spread lubed up and tied to the bed, begging for Audry and Shelly and Laura Palmer to run a wholesome, metaphysical Network TV train on us. But the operative words here are: “it left us”. Peaks left us bros. There’s no window of opportunity, no event horizon to approach. Theres no salvation, no black hole for us or Matt McConaughey to jump into and save this whole mess of a situation. The plugs been pulled, the window is shut, the black hole has collapsed. Whats left is a singularity. Its the single most important TV show ever, and it’s dead and thats okay. And the reboot is not a vehicle.

So why does Lynch need a vehicle? Because of Peaks. Because Mullholland and Blue Velvet, because of the Cowboy and Frank Booth. Because he shouldn’t be doing voice acting for Seth Mcfarlane on The Cleveland Show. Because this man is so genuine, he turned down Star Wars because it wasn’t his. Because most of his formative years were spent making Eraserhead. Because Lynch has heart and it spills out. Because he’s a sick fuck. Because he makes mundane terrifying. Because he’s got pathways in his brain no one else has or should have. Just think about the burden this man carries. The part of his brain that loves and cares and celebrates humanity has a highway straight to dismembered ears and bugs and Bob and Frank Booth. He deserves a vehicle but moreso he needs one–his work emanates existentially compulsive self-expression. Watching Lynch is pure voyeurism, and sometimes, we get it and it resonates, and when that happens we get the full spectrum of the human experience and it’s terrifying and sweet, grounded and ontological, and always immediate. Someone give this man some goddamn cheddar please. Studio cheddar for a shiny new vehicle. network, film, streaming, it doesn’t really matter, just get Lynch a effing vehicle.

-DickStock

Cooking with The Cultish

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Look, you dumb pricks.  I’m bout to step up on my BreadBox and teach you mofos how to eat.  I’m giving you the eternal gift of cooking.  Something you can share with your children one day – if you haven’t already gone sterile from the Chipotle and iPhone6+.

In America, our eating habits are fucked.  They’re so fucked that we have to resort to impractical diets that shed hope for an ultimate cure to our Dorito-and-M&M-filled-Crunchwrap cravings.  I tried the Paleo diet.  I ate a lot of steak and avocado.  It was pretty schving.  Then I had a fry, and went back on with my life.

What I’m offering you here is a way out.  A way out of the MacDime’s drive-thru (before midnight), a way out of the overrated Chipotle guac cup.  A way out of the Prego jar. I’m offering you the gift of cooking with your hands.

People are afraid to cook with their hands for many reasons.  What if I cut myself?  What if my food tastes like shit?  You will, and it will.  Ultimately, you have to decide if you wanna be a coward, or if you wanna be Hatori Hanzo.  I can only show you the Duck Fat, you have render it.

COOKING WITH THE CULTISH (AND YOUR HANDS) RECIPE #1: PORK BUTT

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what you need

1 five to eight pound Pork Butt (hopefully purchased at a Mexican meat market)

1 Knife (this is the part where your virgin hands bleed, and we hang the bloody napkin)

Assorted spices (does not matter. don’t believe these inbred fucks who swear by their rub recipes.)

1 Weber Kettle (any charcoal BBQ is cool)

1 big bag of Charcoal (Kingsford is cool – no match light tho)

A couple handfulls of Hickory wood chips (soak em for about an hour. yes, put them in water.)

2 hands

method

I’m trying to get the point through to you that none of this shit matters.  Make it up as you go.  Also I want it to be known that I’ll be including pictures from the first pork butt I ever cooked.  Ever.  This is to show you how fucking easy it is, and how it’s really no big deal to just mix fire and dead pig.  Let’s start with the rub.

rub

Generally the rub consists of salt, pepper, sugar, and aromatic spices.  Aight, aromatics are spices that have strong SMELLS.  (I.e. Cumin, Paprika, Garlic powder, anything that makes you sneeze.)  So it’s that easy.

Look in your parents’ spice cabinet. Grab salt, pep, brown sugar, and whatever else you think smells good.  Mix it all together.  If all you taste is salt, add more sugar and aromatics.  No tablespoons or teaspoons necessary.  Unless your rub contains Heroin or Cocaine, feel free to just dump shit in there liberally until you have a tasty seasoning.

prep

This is where you bleed.

Your pork butt should have a beautiful cap of thick, white fat covering one side.  Now, if you don’t score that bitch, that fat will just burn instead of render.  You will not only be cheating the dead pig you are working with as well as the folks who are waiting six hours to eat the dead pig you are preparing, but you will be cheating, worst of all, yourself. Your ugly, greedy, hedonistic self.

Take the biggest knife your parents own, and place it in your most dominant hand.  Feel the immediate rush of strength in realizing you have the power to chop, cut, slice, and kill.  With your less dominant hand, grab a hold of that pig’s ass – with the cap of fat facing up.

Now. Slice into that bitch.  Slice that fucking fat.  Slice deeply enough to go through the fat, but do your best to not cut into the flesh.  Right when you start hitting pink, lay down your sword. (Insert Erectile Dysfunction joke here FOR ME because I don’t have time to come up with something as trite as the word trite.)

Your scored pig should look like mine – sort of a checkerboard pattern.  Like life, it’s not gonna be perfect.  So quit crying about it, and do your best.

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smoke

I mean this in more ways than one.  Yes, we’re going to smoke this pork butt in a Weber kettle for anywhere from 4 to 7 hours.  In that 4 to 7 hours, we’ll also most likely smoke a lotta weed and about 10 cigarettes.  It’s like working on a Nicki Minaj music video – lotta downtime, lotta smoke.

Now, I’m not here to tell you how to get your charcoal going.  People experience problems with this.  If you use lighter fluid- let that shit soak in for about 5 minutes before putting the flame to it. Thats a free tip.

IMPORTANT: once you get the coals going (a good amount, enough to cover half of the weber) push all those lit coals to one side of the weber.  This is BBQing, not grilling.  Big fuckin’ difference, homes.

Once you’ve pushed those lit coals to the side, place your pig on the side OPPOSITE the coals.  Indirect heat, homie.  This is how we do.

Add a handful of pre-soaked wood chips to the fire, close the lid, and don’t even look at that bitch for like two hours (at which time, you’ll need to remove the pig from the BBQ temporarily while you add more coals, smoke).

Now.  They make these hi-tech gadgets that you can stick on top of your Weber that will tell you the BBQ’s temperature.  I do not have one, but I am told they are effective.  You can use one if you choose.  You want that BBQ’s temperature between like 220 and 250 degrees.  They say the money zone for Pork shoulder is an internal temperature of about 180 – 220, which, if your BBQ is at 220, takes a long fucking time.  The bigger the shoulder, the longer the time.  The lower the flame, the longer the time.  The bigger the shoulder and the lower the flame, the more fucking delicious this pig is going to taste.  The way I tell temperature without a thermometer is I put my hand up to the BBQ’s vents.  If it feels really fuckin’ hot, that’s not good.  Too much heat.  You can dial this back by adjusting the vents on the bottom of the BBQ.  If you feel the BBQ’s vents and it feels warm, but you can leave your hand there without feeling pain, you’re probably close to where you wanna be.

After a few hours, it’ll look like Predator’s face.  This is a good start, but it still needs time.

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After a few more hours it’ll look like this – very schving.

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Now check what it did when I pulled it apart.

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eat

But Mike! How do I know when my pork is done??? (But Slim, what if you win? Won’t it be weird?)

That’s easy.  Your pork is done when you say it is.  Imagine me 3 years ago when I cooked my first pork butt.  I put it on the BBQ at maybe 5:30 and started inviting friends over.  The friends showed up and sat around getting fucked up for the next several hours, occasionally coming into the backyard and asking when it was going to be done.  My answer?  When I say it is.

For me, the pig was done when I jostled the bone in the middle and it started to come loose.  That’s when I knew all that connective tissue had broken down and the meat probably tasted pretty fucking good.  So that’s when I pulled it off.  Some time around 10, 1030pm.  And then we did this.

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It was good ya’ll. Very good. Better yet, it took a lot of time.  I got a little effed up and had time to myself, all centering around a healthy activity.  I encourage you to try this in your own lives rather than eat more corn syrup.

People got so full on my pork, I was even able to get my roommate laid.  He didn’t even have to take off his Jordans.  If that’s not a job well done, I don’t know what is.

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–Mccruthers

Quick Movie Picks

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I could hit you with some movie picks. Maybe flex a bit, prove I’m cultured. We could all jerk off and talk classics. Then, like I said, 15 minutes from now, you don’t give a fuck. So lets play fast and loose and I’ll hit you with: Quick Picks: 4 Okay Movies.

Two years from now you’ll be in a hotel room. You’ll recognize one of these movies and you won’t flip the channel. Why did you stop flipping? Surely you don’t put stock in blogs. No one of consequence ever has. Bemused, you’ll continue watching. And slowly, this movie, from this list, will give you just enough to stay put.

LORD OF WAR
Nic Cage is some sort of Russian expat. He lives in New York. He cooks at his family’s restaurant, and his family pretends to be Jewish. Sooner rather than later, Nic Cage is a hard hitting international arms dealer. With his bro Jared Leto at his side, Nic Cage pulls some crazy stunts in his rise to the top. Along the way, Ethan Hawke and the original Bilbo prove to be worthy adversaries, yet ultimately, they are bested.
Unfortunately sometimes the gun running game does hit back. At one point, Jared Leto dies (sawed in half by hollow points). That’ll happen if you bring your conscience to West Africa. Despite the Nic Cage voiceover this movie can be remarkably poignant. Its got some good acting, its got the Jeff Buckley version of Hallelujah, its got lessons, and its got one nipple (pink).

THE GREAT SANTINI
This movie is rad. Forget the bit about the hotel room and go check out this movie. I’d assume it’s on Netflix. If that call to action fell flat for you, here’s a YouTube clip. It’s Robert Duvall playing one on one vs his son.

If you skipped that link you’re a damn idiot. I can’t see any reason to skip this clip. If its because you think I lack rapport, I guess that’s fair, but go out on a limb for me papi.  Click the link. It will enrich you.

THE LADYKILLERS (2004)

This movie has redeeming qualities out the ass. Whillst watching, stick to these guidelines:

  • Don’t focus on Tom Hanks’ accent
  • Don’t be put off by the disgusting body functions of the Farmers Insurance guy.
  • Don’t get shook when a Wayans brother makes you laugh.
  • Don’t worry about the limited scope
  • Don’t ever ask yourself why this movie was made.

Stick to this checklist and you’ll enjoy the hell out of this movie. Its hapless riverboat Oceans 11 meets Greek tragedy meets contemporary flare and hilarity with good music.

MY LEFT FOOT
This movie is fucked. Daniel Day Lewis (DDL) is an Irish cripple who draws pictures with one of his feet.  As his body fails him, his foot is the only faculty he’s able to maintain mastery over. Via the indomitable will of the unbroken human spirit, he begins creating artwork. His art becomes his self expression–his only cathartic medium. This movie explores what it means to be human and proves to us there is no such thing as a simple character–whether they be crippled, Irish, or otherwise. This film stuck with me. I remember the anguish and the frustration. I remember the inescapable hopelessness of an impoverished family and the story of their son, broken and betrayed by an unyielding fate. I remember the cruel incongruity of body and mind.


In time, Day-Lewis is accused of masterminding an IRA terrorist attack on a Belfast pub. Needing a patsy, British intelligence forces pin the attack on DDL and coerce a full confession. Sentenced and sent to British prison, he is housed with actual IRA masterminds. It is then that he learns the nature of the IRA separatist movement is ugly, chaotic, and reactionary. Ultimately his dad is also arrested and jailed for the same crime. His dad dies, and eventually DDL captivates a nation in his quest for freedom. He is cleared of the false charges, roll credits.

For all its twists and turns, this movie is simply riveting. It is humanity at its most compelling. The only downside is a run-time approaching 6 hours.

-Dick Stock