Word: leopard
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...18th-century Napoleonic wars in Africa, but soon reveals more central concerns as a meditation on the ties between man and beast. The central conceit of the picture is a love affair, not as platonic or intellectual as you might think, that springs up between a soldier and a leopard. Yes, that is what I said, and it's a lot of ground for one picture to cover conventions of visual storytelling cannot easily accommodate such philosophical ambitions. It's hard enough to stage this cross-species romance, much less unpack what it could possibly mean...
...when he steals water from a Bedouin maiden. The resultant man-hunt sends Augustin hiding in a deep crevasse in a large, barren plateau, but no sooner has he escaped their swords than he runs into a whole new set of daggers, this time in the mouth of the leopard who has claimed the cave as his own. The Frenchman thinks his luck has, like everything else in the desert, finally evaporated, but the leopard merely sniffs him, paces around and performs instead a nasty little fast-food job on the Bedouin hitman still on Augustin's tail...
...inciting unintentional giggles. Unfortunately, Currier has the same problem, though her deadpan close-ups and unrelieved seriousness work hard to wipe those smirks off our faces. In fairness, much of what happens in this central chapter of Passion in the Desert is tense and engaging, Augustin must fight the leopard for water, food and freedom to move, all of which the leopard jealously guards, though it otherwise remains far more docile and generous than Augustin has any reason to expect. When the soldier discovers a gigantic facade of columns and stairs within the mountain (an identical twin to the Grail...
...telling you, he's pushing an agenda," the man said in an agitated voice. His wife calmly replied, "He's pushing his book, that's what he's pushing." The man considered her words and shook his head. "You think Newt Gingrich isn't pushing an agenda? A leopard doesn't change his spots...
After this mostly promising start, though, Weiland's album is spottier than a leopard-skin fur coat. None of the songs outright suck, but the album's second half is too little musical creativity spread over too much time. "Cool Kiss" and "The Date" combine blinding flashes of white noise with lyrics ("Keep your hands up off of my lips / Capsize just like a tanker / Kill Kill Piss Piss") that are an amateur Freudian's wet dream. "Son" is a gently motoring ode to Weiland's new son, a la "Kooks" off Hunky Dory. "Jimmy Was a Stimulator...