JessicaRulestheUniverse.com

The winners of our Crappiest Job contest are:

Saint Gigi, for courage in the face of ickiness
Rye, for perseverance in the face of Orwellian absurdity
Freelancer Autumn for patience in the face of people who can’t distinguish between bi and semi.

Congratulations!

Please post your real names in Comments (they’ll be kept private). You can claim your posters starting Friday at Wild Ginger in the basement of Power Plant Mall, Rockwell, Makati. The restaurant is open from 11am to 8pm, look for Nida or Marge. You’ll need to present an ID. If you’re sending someone else to claim your prize, send them your ID (or a photocopy of your ID).

Public Enemies is a gorgeous movie about the American myth of the outlaw. Specifically, the myth of John Dillinger as propagated by the media and consumed by the Depression-era public who cheered on bank robbers. Interesting that it comes out now, amidst another recession and public fury at the looters who took their money through legal means.

When Johnny Depp as John Dillinger is taken by car to a jail in Indiana, the street is lined with photographers, fans, and gawkers. He’s the biggest celebrity of his day. He is more myth than man: director Michael Mann, working with cinematographer Dante Spinotti, seems less interested in what’s going on in Dillinger’s mind than what’s going on in ours. We don’t have to know Dillinger’s motivation, his childhood traumas, or whether his mama loved him. That’s corny. Dillinger steals because he gets a charge out of it—you can feel it when he leaps over the counter of some hapless bank. The essential fact of Dillinger’s life is that he is a Star. Even he isn’t interested in his own past (which he mentions mockingly at a press conference); he is that most American of characters, a Jay Gatsby figure who invented himself.

The simple definition of fame is, You do it for them, they live vicariously through you. Sticking it to the system makes him a hero to the masses, and this, more than the loss of the money, makes him a dangerous man. One might argue that Dillinger deserves his celebrity more than today’s celebrities who don’t have so much as a scratch to show their audience. He certainly has cojones: in one scene he casually strolls into a police station. (Which accounts for the urban legend that his penis was not just unusually large, it was on display at the Smithsonian.)

Mann’s approach doesn’t make for psychological complexity, but what a great-looking picture. The story is told mainly in close-ups: this is John Dillinger’s world, we just live in it (plus Johnny’s beautiful). It’s significant that the historical Dillinger was a movie fan who was killed coming out of the cinema. He was living in a movie.

From New York Magazine’s fashion blog The Cut:

The publicist for Marc Jacobs’s men’s division, Tim Mark Garcia, faces plunder charges and extradition back to the Philippines. The Trump Park avenue condo purchased in Garcia’s name by his father was allegedly bought with stolen money. Former Armed Forced of the Philippines comptroller Major General Carlos F. Garcia is accused of stealing $6.2 million in public funds. The condo was bought for $765,000 in 2004. Garcia’s lawyer denies the charges.

Ellen Tordesillas on the former Armed Forces comptroller General Carlos F. Garcia’s plunder case.

The New Yorker dance critic Joan Acocella on Michael Jackson as a dancer.

Jackson, who had a thorough knowledge of the movie musical, revered Fred Astaire. He records in his memoir how thrilled he was when Astaire praised him. The old master even invited him over to his house, where Jackson taught the moonwalk to him and his choreographer Hermes Pan. (Astaire told Jackson that both of them, he and Jackson, danced out of anger—an interesting remark, at least about Astaire.) But despite Jackson’s awe of his predecessor, he never learned the two rules that Astaire, as soon as he gained power over the filming, insisted on: (1) don’t interrupt the dance with reaction shots or any other extraneous shots, and (2) favor a full-body shot over a closeup. To Astaire, the dance was primary—his main story—and he had it filmed accordingly. In Jackson’s videos, the dance is tertiary, even quaternary (after the song and the story and the filming). The camera repeatedly cuts away, and, when it comes back, it often limits itself to the upper body. Jackson didn’t value his dancing enough.

The piece does not mention the Bob Fosse-ness of Billie Jean.

Mat wanted to send in an entry but he’s never had a job, unless you count neighborhood feline sperm bank.

The Crappiest Job You’ve Ever Had competition is now closed. You can continue posting stories as therapy, but only the entries received by noon today are eligible for our not really fabulous prizes. Ms. Stella Arnaldo has kindly agreed to be the judge for this contest. Stella is a journalist who covers business, politics, and general absurdity, meaning she is eminently qualified to spot a crappy job. Watch out for the announcement of winners.

I hadn’t bought a pair of jeans in three years so I figured it was time. Last Saturday I went to the Levi’s section in SM Makati. The jeans on display were draped on metal pipes. When I tried to pick up a pair I discovered that the pants were chained to the metal pipes! Pantalon, nakakadena! There was a metal chain about a half-inch thick running through their belt loops. One of the salespersons approached, produced a pair of pliers, and undid the chain so I could see the pants. When I was through looking she put it back on the chain-and-pipe display.

As far as I could tell the other brands of jeans in SM were not chained to their displays so this must be a Levi’s policy. Other Levi’s stores don’t employ the chain gang security method, but then I haven’t visited them since I went to laugh at the 7 or 8,000-peso jeans with the Damien Hirst design. Who would pay 7,000 pesos to show off a Damien Hirst skull on his ass? Clearly, I know nothing.