More Confused Young-ish Men

I wanted to add to Miss Mabel's post about Confused Young-ish Men. Along the same theme, there's The Last Kiss, starring Zach Braff, Casey Affleck and Rachel Bilson. The movie shows the problems of several relationships as the guys approach 30. Michael's girlfriend Jenna announces she's pregnant, putting them on the fast track to marriage. But then Michael meets Kim... Besides that, Chris and Lisa can't stop arguing about raising their baby, putting their entire marriage into question. Kenny won't commit to his newest girlfriend, and Izzy won't let go of Ariana. Jenna's parents have their own problems, as well. The key line is that Michael is having a crisis because his life feels way too planned out, as though there will be no more surprises. I'll add that of the 30-ish guys I've polled, this is a common type of crisis. It's a significant movie in the sense that it makes life into art, in a very real and touching way. As an aside, The Last Kiss is a remake of the Italian film, L'Ultimo Bacio.

I'll make another connection that is a little further afield: Vanilla Sky, directed by Cameron Crowe and starring Tom Cruise, Penelope Cruz and Cameron Diaz. Also a remake, of the Spanish film Abre Los Ojos, also starring Cruz. It's a sort of sci-fi/drama/romance/mystery. David Aames seems to have it all, until a car crash changes his life in exceedingly strange ways... But David learns alot about what is important in life, and that comes back to the theme of the movies for Confused Young-ish Men.

Connections for The Confused Young Man

The Tao Of Steve, starring Donal Logue and High Fidelity, starring John Cusack and based on the book by Nick Hornby.

I re-watched these movies this month and they both deal, in part, with the 30-something male crisis of Settling Down. Get out the popcorn and have a boys night!

(Hmm maybe boys don't do that.)

Reflexive explanation

In the book The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell describes three types of people, all of whom can combine to make great things happen, that is, to help ideas/items/fads/fashions/etc. reach their own tipping point and become an epidemic. The three kinds of people are mavens, connectors and salesmen.

Mavens know everything: where to get the best of everything, where to get the best price, how to game the market. They are the connoisseurs, helpers and educators. Salesmen, of course, infect their co-converationalists with whatever they're interested in, be it a mood or an item or an idea.

And finally, there are Connectors. These are the folks who know everyone. If you were to look at a social networking website (facebook, linkedin) you would find some people to be 'nodes' on the social network; these are the connectors. The important point about connectors, though, is that they have mastered the 'weak link'. They aren't best friends with everyone in their network; there isn't enough time in the day for that. But they maintain a casual, friendly connection to each person in their network. On top of all of this, connectors know people who move in different circles. One connector that Gladwell describes knew people in 8 or 10 different circles: politicians, actors, writers, doctors and so on.

Gladwell described a classic study 'Getting A Job' by sociologist Mark Granovetter. Of professionals who had discussed a job hunt with people they knew, and for whom those contacts had helped them to get a job, 56% were 'weak ties' as compared with 17% that were closer friends. This is the point: the important connections are the weak ties.

And this is also the point of this website. I am proposing that the weak ties are the ones that will help you to find new and interesting works that you might not have found otherwise. If you were to go to the bookstore, The Black Swan and The Long Tail are displayed next to one another, but The Black Swan and What Are You Optimistic About? probably never would be. They are in different circles. The proposition of this website is to show how these circles overlap in unexpected and surprising and interesting ways.

I hope you'll enjoy it, and I hope even more that you'll contribute.

Intense, genius acting

I just saw There Will Be Blood, directed by PT Anderson. It stars Daniel Day-Lewis as an oil man in early twentieth-century California. The intesity of the acting is just incredible. I couldn't look away - the man is awful, thoroughly unlikeable - but completely watchable. It's just amazing. Here's a quote to give you an idea of the character:

"I have a competition in me. I want no one else to succeed. I hate most people."

And I associated this with the Alec Baldwin part in David Mamet's Glengarry Glen Ross. He, too, was incredibly intense, mean and commanding. Co-star Jack Lemmon said the cast was the greatest acting ensemble he had ever been part of. It's a sort of Death Of A Salesman for the 90's - but the plot is almost secondary to the incredible acting talent on display. If you haven't already seen it, then see it now.

Good Will Geeks

Freaks and Geeks was a TV show (Judd Apatow produced it, and the stars include James Franco and Seth Rogan) about two overlapping groups of kids in high school in the early eighties. There's one episode where Sam, one of the geeks, found out that one of the popular, good-looking cheerleaders liked him and wanted him to ask her to a party - a make-out party. He was discussing whether to do it with his other two geek buddies. One of the geek buddies, Neal, was arguing that Sam should do it because they couldn't. (Not to mention that it would also help his own situation.)

This very much made me think of the scene in Gus van Sant's Good Will Hunting where Chuckie (Ben Affleck) tells Will (Matt Damon) that being in construction is a waste of his time. Will is a genius, but does not want to take advantage of that, to leave his life, to challange himself. Chuckie goes on to say, "you owe it to me," to cash in the winning lottery ticket. It's a turning point, where Will finds that even his most trusted friend wants better for him.

Those geeks were feeling the same way for the Sam! OK, OK, it was a much less serious moment, but it still felt very much the same to me.

Grey swans and optimism

As an aside to the last post, The Black Swan shows how ridiculous it is for humans to make predictions: we're terrible at it. So I was both pleased and disappointed to see the Taleb had not contributed to the current Edge book, What Are You Optimistic About? edited by John Brockman. On the contrary, he was (appropriately) a contributor to What We Believe But Cannot Prove. These Edge books are pretty phenomenal in terms of the contributors: they are generally the thought leaders of today. Check them out.

Framing is amazing

The ability of framing to alter a person's perception is amazing. It was mentioned in Nassim Nicholas Taleb's The Black Swan as one of the classic errors that people make in prediction. If you were to ask a person the last four digits of their social security number, and then ask them the number of dentists in Manhattan, you'll find that their estimate is influenced by the answer to the first question. This and other tactics for affecting the decisions of a person were put to use in Covert Persuasion by Kevin Hogan and James Speakman. It is an applied course in interpersonal strategery.