jackassworld

This isn’t exactly what you would call the timeliest of reviews. In fact, I think Derek requested that I do this over a year ago now, when the Vice-produced documentary Heavy Metal in Baghdad was just about to hit theaters and pre-orders were being taken for the DVD (as you’ve no doubt seen on that ad banner stuck in rotational purgatory on jackassworld). Since that time, the DVD, which was stupidly handed to me without a sleeve or case of any sort, has served as a coaster, a frisbee, and the eventual foundation for a large pile of garbage on my desk that I finally got around to cleaning up the other day. Unearthing the DVD, I was filled with a flash of remorse—or perhaps it was just gas, because I soon farted and felt much better. Regardless, I decided to “get with the program” and watch Heavy Metal in Baghdad.

After preparing my usual frozen bowl of food stuff, I sat down and popped in the DVD during lunchtime. For whatever reason though, it didn’t work. The DVD got stuck in the loading process. So I sat and finished my food while watching the LED blink its repeated error message over and over until I just lost interest altogether. I know, this does sound like a surefire sign of IGS (Instant Gratification Syndrome), but in defense of this ADD-like move I did finish a book last week, Bowl of Cherries, by Millard Kaufman, that used the land of Iraq as a backdrop to its irreverent tale of a scholarly boy and his passionate love for a girl with an absolute perfect rack.

The book’s author, who artfully blends a mixture of scintillating highbrow literacy (he uses lots of really, really big words) and remarkably lowbrow wit (he created a fictitious Iraqi city by the name of Coproliabad, which, if you’re any fan of scat, makes perfect excremental sense), would possibly strike you as some hot shit young Harvard grad, when in fact he began writing the novel at the age of 86. Millard, who co-created Mr. Magoo in 1949, passed away this past March. He was 92-years-old.