1. "The Films of Alejandro Jodorowsky": House contributor Jeremiah Kipp delves into Anchor Bay's new Jodorowsky box set.

["El Topo, a mystical outlaw clad entirely in black, leads his naked child to the wasteland, where borderland towns have been wiped out by marauding thieves and the puddles are red with blood. Father tells son, "Today you are seven years old. Now you are a man. Bury your first toy and your mother's picture." The cult audience that tapped into the hallucinatory surrealism of Alejandro Jodorowsky was comprised of midnight-movie freaks and counterculture intellectuals, stoned hippies, and avant-garde artists. But I discovered El Topo somewhat differently, not as an adult seeking either a movie as part of my LSD experience or as an apostle of Gurdjieff and Eastern spirituality. Instead, I stumbled upon El Topo as a child not much older than El Topo's and was transported to a wild fantasy realm. Children can tap into that surrealist dream logic very easily, since they can run around a playground and transform the jungle gym into a spaceship and sticks into swords. When El Topo shoots a rock in the desert and water spews forth into his girlfriend's mouth, the child may not comprehend the sexuality of that image, but they nevertheless accept it."]

["Since I finally got my hands on the new DVD release of Twin Peaks' second season, I've decided to pretend as if the show is airing once a week and will do episode recaps as if I'm watching them for the first time and they are airing for the first time. So please indulge me and pretend that we are suddenly back in the fall of 1990. I hope you Peaks fans out there enjoy this exercise."]

["European astronomers have found the most Earth-like planet outside our solar system, and here's what it might be like to live there:"]

["Forty-something woman, to a quiet ticket-taker: "That was awful. I mean AWFUL! I've never seen anything so horrible. What was it? What was it? Have people been complaining?" Quiet ticket-taker: "No. I think people probably go in expecting something a little weird.""]

["It's a little past my bedtime—I think the sun is about to peek over Queens, and the neighbor's alarm clock is due to shriek through the wall any minute. But really, I don't know how I could sleep with everything going on today at Reeler HQ; particularly all this business about the 2007 Tribeca Film Festival launching tonight. I don't subscribe to the hype, but I do believe in the opportunity: 150-something features; six dozen shorts; a few clever panels; and a press pass to rule them all."]