Affect of art on the soul
I've said over and over again that great standup comedy is some of what keeps me going, keeps me happy. Even when some things suck, I can crank up some Patton Oswalt, some Bill Cosby, some Bill Hicks, some Paula Poundstone, Judy Gold, Lisa Lampanelli, some Ellen DeGeneres, Bonnie McFarlane (she's wonderful)....and whatever painful thing I'm going through is just a little less painful.

Standup is art...It is art that has a good effect on my soul. Today I saw a film that...also affected my soul. It touched me...It was "bad touching". The film was a good, honest film. This was obviously not MEANT to be the feel-good movie of the year.

The film is called Osama. It's about a dirt-poor family (well, mother, grandmother, and daughter) in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. The family is hungry, in a world/community in which few, if any women can get work. Widows, orphans, divorcees (assuming no one didn't just shoot the divorced wives)...none of `em can work. So the mother of an 10 or 11 year old girl, cuts the girl's hair, and, with little preparation or indoctrination, sends the kid out and tells her she's to pretend she's a boy.

This occured in a society that stones women for the allegation that they'd used profanity! Disguising a girl as a boy, could EASILY get the kid killed if she's caught. The mother sends the kid out as a boy anyway. She had no say in the matter. I imagine she wanted to eat too. But it was her ass on the line. The mother sent the kid out to work. It was just wrong.

Needless to say, things do not end well for her.

I hated fuckin' Arabs before this movie. I hate the Arabs and the whole culture even more after it. I'm not sure I should spill out the whole plot /story and the details here.

I need some good standup. After this movie, I need a LOT of it.

- posted by Dana Friedman @ 1:27 PM