Pristine Angie’s Good Homemaker Adventures at www.d332.com

John Cage once said that for two people to read the same book would be a waste of time. Instead, one person should read a book and communicate it to the next person, who is then free to read another book. Liberal interpretations notwithstanding, I think that by the sheer quantity of information to be absorbed these days, this strategy may be necessary.

I have noticed that I’ve often watched movies people recommend. However, the same cannot be said of movies I recommend. None of my friends, readers, colleagues, co-workers have seen Tarkovskij’s The Sacrifice, Mirror, Stalker, or Kryzstof Kieslowski’s A Short Film on Killing, and come on dudes! Why has anyone not even considered Jacques Rivette’s four-hour adaptation of Honore de Balzac’s La Belle Noiseuse?

I was surfing around this morning and guess what I found? Austrian filmmaker Michael Haneke is remaking his own fascinating Funny Games. The remake will have Naomi Watts and Tim Roth, so perhaps mainstream American viewers, who can be sold easily on brand names (as opposed to conceptual storytelling), will finally pay attention.

If you get a chance, do make the effort to watch the 1997 original . Haneke, whose films have been written about by theological authors, continues to make films that are infused with social commentary, disturbing insights, and the chaos of destiny. His filmography includes La Pianiste, Caché, and 71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance (How Cage would have loved that title!). I have faith that he will create a remake that will not sacrifice the intent of the original. However, rent the dvd of the 1997 version now, and you will get his full insights into the film on the extras.

The most hypnotic moment of the film arrives when the innocent couple gains the upper hand, overpowers the intruders, and kills one of the two. The surviving antagonist picks up a remote control, screams that the story was not supposed to progress that way, and procedes to press rewind. The movie reverses back to the juncture where the good guys were about to gain the upper hand, and instead, loses it.

To hear Haneke’s analysis of the audience in the cinema during this scene is worth the trouble of the rental or dvd purchase on its own.

I’m not sure whether it was Bergman who once said there is only a finite number of about a dozen stories in Hollywood. From those dozen, a few thousand movies have been made.

Haneke’s movies belong to neither to the dozen, nor the thousands that were derived from it.

The most astonishing highlight of reading transgender personals arrives when I find the single girl who lists as one of her demands from the man she seeks: “must beat up and silence anyone who looks at me the wrong way in public.” I’ve even come across girls who have gone so far as to attest that mirrors would need to be smashed for maidenly honor and knightly chivalry to be restored.

Now I’ve heard that transgendered girls often covet all things girly to the point that even negative girl traits are celebrated, and once you combine this tendency with the the recent trend of the raunch culture among girls - essentially the riot grrls movement shot up with testosterone and steroids: huge tattoos, loud cussing, and a thirst for violence - and these are just Bridezillas - it almost makes you wonder if it isn’t just a couple of guys hanging out after all.

A close friend has actually witnessed a fight on the lower east side between men who were defending the honor of their genetic galpals. As each guy got increasingly bloodied in the face, my friend reported that their women’s faces lit up with delicious delight. Seeing your guy pummel another human being in your honor must surely be a poor woman’s cubic zirconia.

Now THAT doesn’t sound very ladylike does it?

I know taunting looks are a pain and an annoyance, depending on how much attention you give it. And sure, the inner psyche may see red when it does happen.

But ladies, let us not forget: When soulmates look out for each other, I believe it should go both ways. It is true that a man should protect the woman when she is in physical danger. But what we can’t make up for in brawn, we ought to make up for with the protectiveness of a gentlewoman. The woman should always look after her man in all things nonphysical: She protects spiritually, emotionally, and steers her man away from danger. If anything, no gentlewoman would ever desire the man of her life to physically put himself in harm’s way for such a petty and selfish reason as the upkeep of her ego.

A woman triumphs at her femininity when she puts an assuring hand around her man’s arm and say, “Let it go. Violence is not the answer.”

Over the weekend, I was hanging out with the boyfriend (which I refer to other friends named Bob as “my Bob”) and I turned to him and asked, “what does it mean when girls call each other skanks?” And he said in a judicious tone: “that would mean they’re jelis cuz the other girl is so much hotter that she rawks ten times harder.”

I never understood why girls put each other down as a secret code for admiration, that jealousy is regarded as the highest form of praise. Whenever people say, “I’m so jealous of you!” (ie. there was a two-for-one sale of pizza and I took the last order before the pizzaria ran out of dough), I never knew I was supposed to be flattered, and instead, I’d shrug, touch their arm and say, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it! Honest!”

Either it’s just my lack of cultural sensitivity (ie. Total Lack of Hipness ) or just that my old lady fashion sense is going to my head. When a girl is totally hot, I take the path of least resistance and make the zen utterance: “Wow, the girl is like totally hot.”

And if she sleeps around and has a penchant for 150-man Bukkakes, then I usually add, “and what marvelous ambition!”