# simultaneous review of taipei and spring breakers review summary: "a mild attack of extreme underwhelmism" one gets the sense that anything already said or which might be said about ebook slush "taipei" / unrewound-vhs skin flick "spring breakers" contains more (projected) meaning and meaningful content than both of them combined these do not seem clever experiments in modern media - insightful post-ballardian forays into the internalized politics of distributed online mis-identity - or even the 'free interplay of postmodern hyper-surfaces' rather they're more hollow shells; a vacant parking lot for cardboard souls to gather and 'gchat' - forever only to themselves even to suggest that both these products contain no meaning whatsoever might be giving them undeserved credit there's just too little to see there; the mundane madness of the self-consuming borderland fire might be more compelling (??) both productions are simply devoid of characters story context motivation - not that anyone should bemoan the loss of such overused artistic elements - but rather there's just no real point in bothering with some(non)thing that has so little to offer in return for one's efforts - and which seems utterly unconcerned by the fact at the very most all one might say about "taipei / breakers" is that they're half-stabs at 'performance trolling' - casual dribbles in the general direction of the reader / viewer's intelligence (that is neither truly presenting nor demanding much) despite the raw undisputed awesomeness of korine's "gummo" and the fact tao lin genuinely seems cool (if indeed 'cool' could ever be genuine) perhaps it's the seeming inseparability between the characters of these listless performers and ir dreary new works which is causing flans to froth enthusiastically about ir deadpan antiheroes - and therefore remain uncritical of ir lo-calorie output too many reviewers who don't like either still mistakenly talk of "taipei / breakers" as the emperor's new clothes (the real issue is not simply to denounce ir existence or become the emperor - but to provide such idle idols or even the mere idea of them with a polite kick in the stones before swiftly moving on with one's day) life's not too short for "tai-break" - but it does feel considerably shorter after mistakenly watching the limp displays of these 'ph7 personalities' unfold with the all the neutral cheerless interest of a dead hamster high on prescription mood levellers that misogynistic lit hack 'brat' easton ellis states that lin is "the the most interesting prose stylist of ir generation" should tell anyone all they need to know - ie. there's nothing there to be known or understood (and in any case if lin's the most interesting it'd be amusing to see anything any less interesting) it's not enough to be smart and boring; never has the phrase 'pop will eat itself' shone with all the brightness of its thin 20watt bulb insight "tai break forever yall!" (*yawn*) lt. vincent hanna said it best ok perhaps it's wrong to urinate on anyone's chips - especially that of a fellow 'artiste'. yet despite the often positive aspects of an open willingness to go along with the ideas of fellow artists one must also be prepared to go further in ir position than even they themselves are able or willing to; this is zizek's notion of philosophical support through extension of critique but what if something has so little to work with in the first place whatever you say about it becomes the actual 'truer' work? // republic of bob