I asked the alethiometer if this was a good movie, and it told me, "Meh."

You'd think that anyone embarking on making an epic adaptation of a highly praised trilogy like Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials could simply go to the Steven Spielberg playbook of moviemaking to ensure success. Did Chris Weitz, director of The Golden Compass do that? Let's find out.

Rule 1: Find and tell a kid-friendly story that appeals to both young and old alike. Now I've never read the first part of this series that this film was based on, but it's purported to be on par with C.S. Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia. And the idea of a world where your soul takes the manifestation of an animal "daemon" who accompanies you wherever you go, where armored ice bears rule the far reaches of the Arctic north, and magical Dust holds the key to traveling between a myriad of parallel universes, I'd almost believe that this is true. Unfortunately, it almost seems like the rules of this world are a bit too complex to fully absorb in a two hour movie, at least that's how it felt watching this film. Trying to figure out the laws of this world kind of weighed down this film, even for a relatively intelligent adult like me. I wonder what a 10 year old would think. This is the first of a planned trilogy, though, so hopefully they got all the introductions out of the way to make room for some meaty stories in the future.

Spielberg Grade: Fail

Rule 2: Use a sassy child actor as your main character. Dakota Blue Richards takes the lead role as Lyra, a young orphan girl left in the care of the scholarly Jordan College. Unfortunately, I think she almost got upstaged by her transforming daemon. Still, I think she has enough charisma and presence to establish herself as a good lead for the film.
Spielberg Grade: Pass

Rule 3: Wow them with CGI animation. The CGI-animated daemons and armored bears are believable characters that actually keep up with the likes of Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig. Whether or not that's a result of the animators or good acting by the real people in the movie, I don't know, but it's impressive.
Spielberg Grade: Pass

Rule 4: Who needs characterization when you've got a musical score to manipulate the audience like a marionette? This is the problem I have with most blockbuster movies these days. No one seems to take much care in developing a worthy orchestral score anymore. I guess a lot of films have resorted to the trendy hipster soundtrack, but I think an original score still goes a long way. I'd venture to guess that Star Wars wouldn't be half the classic it is without John Williams' score. The Golden Compass is one of those films that begs for a theme song that pulls at your childlike emotions, yet I can't even begin to remember what music they had.
Spielberg Grade: Fail

I'm sure there's other rules, but this post is getting long, and I'm getting bored writing it. Basically, I thought this movie was OK and is entertaining, but didn't live up to its potential. The best things about it were the armored bears and a supporting character of Lee Scoresby, an aeronaut played by the handlebar-mustached iconic cowboy Sam Elliott. Kind of sad when you think of all the CGI and Oscar winning/nominated talent that was in this production. I'd like to see what they do with the next two movies, but based on how well this first one is doing, I'm not even sure they'll green-light the rest of the trilogy.

This Makes Me Happy But Not for the Right Reasons

Imagine if you were poised to receive a LARGE inheritance. Let's say that it is going to be in the multiple billion dollar range. You decide life is worth wasting on all sorts of frivolous things because you can afford it. But then BAM right across you face you are hit with the fact that your large inheritance is going to be given away to charity. You get stuck with only 3% (around 7 million dollars). That is nothing to sneeze at for the Kool-Aid Gang, but when you spend that amount in a year you might be a little upset.

If only they had a martini bar to complement their Genius Bar, the Apple Store would be perfect...

Apple stock has been on a steady climb all year, and finally surpassed the $200/share barrier yesterday. It isn't rocket science to understand why they're doing so well, but it is bewildering why no one else ever quite got the combination of easy usability, stylish ergonomics, cutting-edge technology, and friendly service right until Steve Jobs came along. Try throwing those words in for Microsoft or Dell--kind of hard to do. The success of the Apple Store epitomizes why this company remains profitable. Unlike most stores, Apple encourages you to relax and linger in their stores, whether you're going to buy something or not, as this story from The New York Times shows:

The policy has given some stores, especially those in urban neighborhoods, the feel of a community center. Two years ago, Isobella Jade was down on her luck, living on a friend’s couch and struggling to make it as a fashion model when she had the idea of writing a book about her experience as a short woman trying to break into the modeling business.

Unable to afford a computer, Ms. Jade, 25, began cadging time on a laptop at the Apple store in the SoHo section of Manhattan. Ms. Jade spent hours at a stretch standing in a discreet corner of the store, typing. Within a few months, she had written nearly 300 pages.

Not only did store employees not mind, but at closing time they often made certain to shut Ms. Jade’s computer down last, to give her a little extra time. A few months later, the store invited her to give an in-store reading from her manuscript.

“Everyone is free to use the Internet and do anything they want — within reason,” said Paul Fradin, the general manager of the SoHo and 14th Street stores. Visitors spotted surfing pornographic Web sites are quietly asked to leave, and are escorted out.

Visitors can bring almost anything they like. Ms. Jade showed up nearly every day with her full set of notes, and enough food to see her through a few hours of writing.

I went to the Sony Style store once, and kept getting stared down by a security guard. I can't imagine what would have happened if I had pulled out some food, let alone sat down for more than half an hour and made myself at home.

Insomnia is a terrible thing to waste...

A rare known fact: The director's cut of Way of the Dragon actually included this version of the famous showdown between Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris before the director figured out that the choice language used wasn't for artistic purposes but because the musical supervisor had Tourette's.

Big NSFW warning for much profanity that had me laughing hysterically (of course, it's 2:00 AM and I'm feeling hysterical about now):


[from Best Week Ever]

On a side note, I'm always amazed in this fight sequence by how slow Chuck Norris, who I seem to think is a respectable martial artist, looks compared to Bruce Lee.

As if Jessica Simpson's career could get any worse...

I'm not sure who should be more embarrassed, the actors who are forever attached to this movie via the Internet Movie Database or the people not related to the Simpson family that will forever be plagued by the fact that they actually paid money to see this. From Cinematical:

[Blond Ambition] grossed a whopping $384 bucks on Friday, meaning the per screen average was $48.

You almost have to wonder if Papa Joe Simpson bought all those tickets himself and gave them away to unsuspecting, innocent teenagers roaming the theaters.

I don't think I've ever been so disappointed in my life...

The new teaser for Knight Rider is up.  Yawn.

Perhaps this is a sign that big cats with big teeth don't belong in cages...

You've all probably heard or read about the tiger that got loose in the San Francisco Zoo that left one person dead and two others severely injured. Kind of scary that they can't figure out how the animal got out of her enclosure in the first place:

Officials were at a loss to explain how Tatiana got out of the enclosure, which is surrounded by a 15ft (4.5m) wide moat and a 20ft (6m) high wall. The zoo's director of animal care and conservation, Robert Jenkins, said: "There was no way out through the door.

Teleporting tigers perhaps? I don't know, but I'll think twice about going to the zoo now. Then again, large amounts of Cheetos seem to pacify me. Maybe they should try a bag or two with these crazy cats.

Maybe if he was drinking less on the job, Porkins would have been the hero of the Rebels instead of Luke...

An astrokeg (yes, that's KEG) droid? You'd think there would be more of these in the Star Wars universe considering how depressed everyone must have been being under Imperial rule.

And I can't believe this Porkins Lego model built by Count Blockula actually looks like Porkins!

More homemade Star Wars-related Lego models at Gizmodo.

Latest revelation from reviewing visits from Sitemeter...

We're the first result when you Google the word "synechdochy?" Get outta here! To think Firecracker George has lifted our blog to haute academic levels. And all I can come up with is bad David Hasselhoff videos and stories about poop.

One last Christmas carol for your listening pleasure...

I'm headed out of town tomorrow, so in case I don't get the chance, Happy Holidays to the Kool-Aid Gang and anyone else bored enough to read this blog!



MERRY CHRISTMAS!

How much time did I waste waiting for tape to rewind?

I don't know about any of you, but I can't remember the last time I actually handled a video tape.  I think I detached my VCR from the TV long ago once we went to DVDs.  Watching the trailer for this upcoming movie, Be Kind Rewind, made me feel kind of nostalgic for the ol' VHS and reminded me of those poor quality movies we'd make for school projects:

Television--the end of democracy as we know it?

Here's a recent article in The New Yorker which discusses literacy and how it effects our ways of thinking. It's not shocking to know that the numbers of us who actually read a book is on the decline (and it's not just limited to the lazy American way of life--Europeans aren't reading either), but I found it interesting how the actual ability to read can even change how we perceive the world:

There’s no reason to think that reading and writing are about to become extinct, but some sociologists speculate that reading books for pleasure will one day be the province of a special “reading class,” much as it was before the arrival of mass literacy, in the second half of the nineteenth century. They warn that it probably won’t regain the prestige of exclusivity; it may just become “an increasingly arcane hobby.” Such a shift would change the texture of society. If one person decides to watch “The Sopranos” rather than to read Leonardo Sciascia’s novella “To Each His Own,” the culture goes on largely as before—both viewer and reader are entertaining themselves while learning something about the Mafia in the bargain. But if, over time, many people choose television over books, then a nation’s conversation with itself is likely to change. A reader learns about the world and imagines it differently from the way a viewer does; according to some experimental psychologists, a reader and a viewer even think differently. If the eclipse of reading continues, the alteration is likely to matter in ways that aren’t foreseeable.

This effect may go on to influence even our ability to "think out of the box" and be more tolerant to other viewpoints:

Self-doubt, therefore, becomes less likely. In fact, doubt of any kind is rarer. It is easy to notice inconsistencies in two written accounts placed side by side. With text, it is even easy to keep track of differing levels of authority behind different pieces of information. The trust that a reader grants to the New York Times, for example, may vary sentence by sentence. A comparison of two video reports, on the other hand, is cumbersome. Forced to choose between conflicting stories on television, the viewer falls back on hunches, or on what he believed before he started watching. Like the peasants studied by Luria, he thinks in terms of situations and story lines rather than abstractions.

Luckily, this blog may not induce as much decay to your brain. Then again, you do have to read all the stupid stuff I write. And based on this blurb below, perhaps Firecracker George would have gotten better grades if he just looked at more porn:

The Internet, happily, does not so far seem to be antagonistic to literacy. Researchers recently gave Michigan children and teen-agers home computers in exchange for permission to monitor their Internet use. The study found that grades and reading scores rose with the amount of time spent online. Even visits to pornography Web sites improved academic performance. Of course, such synergies may disappear if the Internet continues its YouTube-fuelled evolution away from print and toward television.

Turn the sound on or this link won't work...

OK, so I still have that freakin' Wham! song in my head (thanks alot, Willie). Luckily, I came across this link to get another annoying song stuck in my head.   Aaaaaaaaaaargh!

Jackie Chan in his prime...

Alright, I think this fight scene is a bit better:

"My suits are wearing me!"

In regard to a previous comment regarding How I Met Your Mother and "the slap," here's a video reference to those a bit unfamiliar:

Then again, these are the critics that probably got "Driving Miss Daisy" an Oscar for best picture...

So if you didn't remember or still need an idea for a last minute stocking stuffer, Blade Runner: The Final Cut came out on DVD this week. As I've already posted about before, I think this is the definitive version of a great film, but I guess many out there don't share the view that this movie was all that good. According to this article from Slate, which follows how this sci-fi classic went from being considered laughable kitsch to true film art, the initial reaction to Blade Runner when it first came out in theaters back in 1982 wasn't that flattering:

Reviews, however, were overwhelmingly negative ("A film that has neither strong characters nor a strong story," wrote Janet Maslin in the New York Times; "It forces passivity on you," Pauline Kael tsked in The New Yorker), and audiences were baffled, sometimes even hostile.

Even some modern audiences that never saw any version of the film before this newest release didn't like it:

My wife had never seen Blade Runner, and it held her rapt until the penultimate scene. Here, the most godly of replicants, played by über-Nord Rutger Hauer, bays primitively at the moon before subjecting Harrison Ford to a poetic oration about mortality. "I've seen things you people wouldn't believe," says Hauer, clutching a white dove to his naked breast. "Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die." At which point, Hauer releases the bird, and it flies in slow motion toward the sky. At which point, my wife laughed uncontrollably

I thought that scene was pretty nice. Oh well. What do I know?

Merry Christmas

With Firecracker beating Swany to the punch on upcoming movie trivia, I thought I would go out and beat him to the punch on one of his other signature style posts - videos so crappy you can't turn away. Of course this isn't really beating him to the punch considering he recently posted a hideous choreographed fight scene. We will just pretend this video is like me clawing and ripping at his shirt.

A little background on this ... I have always enjoyed listening to Christmas music this time of year, but it wasn't until I moved to North Carolina that I heard this piece. What really gets me is that it sticks in your head once you have heard it. I dare you to listen to the whole thing. You will be singing it the rest of the day.

Yo Joe, Yo Joe, Yo Joe, Yo Joe, Du-na-na-na-na-na-na...

I think only Firecracker George (or maybe even Wankmaster and Wander) may get that reference in the title of this post. Well, having been a bit lax and getting beat to the punch regarding The Hobbit, I thought I'd have to come up with some even cooler film news. Yeah, that's right--break out your Yo Joe Cola, 'cause Paramount Pictures is making G.I. Joe: The Movie! WOOHOO!

They've already cast Snake Eyes (Ray Park of Darth Maul fame), Storm Shadow (Korean actor Byun-Hun Lee), and Scarlett (Rachel Nichols, the Sydney Bristow replacement of sorts in the last season of Alias).  Sienna Miller has also signed on, although the descriptions of her role seem to make it sound like she's playing either the Baroness, Lady Jaye, or some new character all together.  

Granted the old cartoon and comic book weren't the most mature or sophisticated things we ever enjoyed back then, but the basic premise of it all still seems kind of cool.  Done right, this movie might actually have the potential of being really good (or could devolve into something completely embarrasing).  So long as they leave out any, "Cooooobraaaa la-la-la-la-la-la!!!"  And if they throw in some G.I. Joe PSA ads at the end, even better!

Booyah! I scooped Swany!

I caught wind of this today. It looks like Peter Jackson will do the Hobbit movies after all. And yes, you read that right. The word is they're doing the Hobbit in two movies so they don't have to leave a bunch of it out.

Click here to read the news I posted before the Pimp did.

Getting closer to the end...

Since Wild Willie has limited opportunities to hit the movie theaters, I guess he'll have to make do with what's on TV.  Luckily, Lost comes back next month, and here's a trailer.  

Who needs music videos anymore? TV shows do a fine job these days selling bands and their music...

I never really caught much of The O.C. during it's run since I didn't find anyone except the characters played by Adam Brody and Rachel Bilson all that interesting to watch.  The show was good for finding fresh emerging musical artists, though, and I'd often peruse the web looking to see who's music got featured on the show to pull myself out of a rut of listening to old familiar tunes. The creator of The O.C., Josh Schwartz, has gone on to start a couple of new shows this season such as Gossip Girl (sort of The O.C. reimagined in the high society atmosphere of New York City) and Chuck (sort of The O.C. reimagined if Seth suddenly became a secret agent man) complete with their own edgy soundtracks featuring a mix of hip songs and more obscure, lesser known bands put together by musical supervisor Alexandra Patsavas (who's also responsible for other music-laden shows like Grey's Anatomy and, of course, The O.C.).  

Anywho, this is a long-winded segway to say you should all check out this group, Band of Horses.  I got their latest album Cease To Begin awhile back and thought it was pretty good, but never thought to post about it until I recognized a couple of their songs ("No One's Gonna Love You" and "The General Specific") during key scenes in recent episodes of Chuck and Gossip Girl.  Now, this is not to say that this is a predictable radio-friendly pop album, but it does show a wide spectrum of moods from ethereal and mysterious to foot-stomping fun.  It's more kind of what would happen if you put The Shins and My Morning Jacket in a blender, and listened to the results.  It's indie rock with just a hint of the South.  
 

Pour some kerosene on top, light it up, and suddenly you're Ghost Rider...

In case you were looking to put together that Warhammer 40,000 Space Marine Chaplain costume, or if you just plain want to scare the heck out of passers-by while running down the road on your motorcycle, this helmet might just fit the bill.

They just don't make fight sequences like this anymore...

I guess this video will remind you of the importance of proper eye protection.  I especially like the quip at the end:

This looks (in falsetto voice) AWESOOOOME!!!

The new trailer for The Dark Knight is up on the Internet, and you can check it out at Gizmodo.  

Is it ever too early to look forward to the Summer Movie Season?

Alas, it's not a lesbian porn film either...

I've probably mentioned this before, but I'm sort of a sucker for any movie with Meg Ryan.  Romantic comedy (Sleepless In Seattle, French Kiss), action war drama (Courage Under Fire), suspenseful thriller (The Presidio, In the Cut)--if she's in it, I'll watch it.  Even an ensemble chick flick like Hanging Up and it's threat of the ubiquitous girlie sing-a-long--yup, endured it, watched it, liked Meg Ryan in it.  You could almost say, I have a crush on her.  So, of course, I had to watch her last movie on DVD, In the Land of Women.  

Oddly, the movie studios marketed this movie with posters like that to the left, screaming Generation Y romance.  Watch Adam Brody, straight from that hipster show The O.C., and emerging young star Kristin Stewart make out, fall in love, have babies, etc.  In reality, that kiss lasted all of five seconds, and really had nothing to do with a romantic coupling in the making at all.  This is not bad, though.  Instead, the debut film of young director Jonathan Kasdan is something much less formulaic, telling the story of Carter Webb (Adam Brody), an aspiring writer and softcore porn scripter from LA who gets dumped by his pretty Hollywood starlet girlfriend, and subsequently volunteers to take care of his senile grandmother in Michigan as an excuse to nurse his broken heart and figure out what's going on his life.  While there, he meets the Hardwickes across the street, who are dealing with their own heartaches, as well.  Sarah (Meg Ryan) is wrestling with regrets as she struggles with a new diagnosis of breast cancer and the realization of her own mortality, while her daughter Lucy (Kristen Stewart) tries to understand her own anger towards her mother as she maneuvers through the challenges of her teenage years.  The end product is a touching without being too sweet story of relationships between Carter and the Hardwicke women that helps them all heal and move on.  

This is the sort of movie that seems to beg for formula pieces.  Forbidden love affair between Carter and Lucy.  Abrupt reentrance of old girlfriend at some inopportune moment after Carter finds true love.   The Hardwicke girls breaking out into song using wooden spatulas as faux microphones to sing in.  Emo hipster soundtrack.  Luckily, it has none of that, and doesn't rely on any of the typical crutches.  Perhaps to illustrate this point is a scene where Carter, who went to private school in LA, asks Lucy to tell him about the usual normal high school stuff he probably missed out on like football games, prom, "You know, all that John Hughes stuff."  Lucy's reply, "Who's John Hughes?"  

This isn't Oscar-winning type stuff, but it's a solid DVD rental, and a fulfilling way to spend an hour and a half some evening.  Meg Ryan gives a pretty strong performance that may tell us what kind of movie roles we'll see her in now that she's getting past that typical romantic comedy leading lady age.  Kristen Stewart is believable as a sweet, yet confused teenage girl.  And Adam Brody shows some promising charisma that will probably have him emerge as the lone successful thing to come out of The O.C. cast.  If this was a film I rated in the theater, I'd probably call it "Cheesy."  But for a DVD, I'm willing to say it's...

Maybe he was better off as Homo after all...

I happened to listen to some of the pre-game radio commentary for the Cowboys game while I was driving around Dallas, and the word was that no one, players and fans alike, seemed all that excited about today's matchup against the Philadelphia Eagles.  So I guess it shouldn't shock anyone that Dallas lost 10-6 today.  This is December, after all, and this team is known for their late season collapses going into the playoffs.

Of course, it just so happened that Jessica Simpson was prominently shown to be in the box rooting for her new beau, QB Tony Romo, to publicly announce their dating status to the world.  Coincidence and bad luck, I'm sure, that she happened to be present when Romo had probably his worst performance all year.  Then again, he seems to have a history for not playing so well when his ladies are watching. From ESPN:

Romo finished 13-of-36 for 214 yards, with a career-low rating of 22.2. It came in front of his parents and his newest A-list girlfriend -- Jessica Simpson, who tugged the front of her pink No. 9 jersey, then mouthed the word "Romo!" when cameras spotted her. For what it's worth, Romo's previous worst rating came last December against Philadelphia when then-girlfriend Carrie Underwood was here.

The post-game radio call-ins from fans seemed to make it sound like they wanted Jessica Simpson run out of Dallas and banned from anything remotely related to the Cowboys from here on out.  I sort of feel sorry for the girl, but then again, I kind of find Jessica Simpson annoying anyway.  She seems kind of desperate to latch on to any famous guy these days, and milk it for publicity.

Say it ain't so...

Damn. So now we have to find out from the just released Mitchell Report that Roger Clemens was on "the juice," too? Considering how big he looks, I guess that shouldn't have surprised me, but I was always giving the guy the benefit of the doubt. I actually admired the guy for still having some pretty good heat left in his throwing arm at the ripe old age of 45. I still remember seeing his jersey retired I think with Wild Willie and Fandango back at the old Disch-Falk Diamond during my days at UT. It seemed kind of neat to see some minor history being made at that time. Too bad it all means nothing now. Now all he's good for is doing Google Image searches and finding scantily clad women attached to him like above (which was really the first hit that popped up...really...I swear).

At this point, I'm hoping they just make some new sports leagues where everyone has to be on steroids. Heck, they pretty much do it with horses already. Kind of reminds me of that classic SNL skit:


All Drug Olympics - Watch the best video clips here

Almost as bad as making Bond drive a BMW instead of an Aston Martin...

If you haven't heard yet, NBC has plans to release a reinvented pilot of Knight Rider in a couple of months they're hoping might spawn interest in an entire new series. Now, you can make fun of the Hoff all you want and mock the corny plotlines of the original series back in the 80's, but as a kid, I thought Knight Rider was the coolest thing on TV. I had hopes that this new iteration would have the potential to be on par with another recent update of a classic Glen Larson-produced show--Battlestar Galactica. Alas, by the looks of some of the pictures, this might actually turn out even dumber than the original. As much as I like the Shelby Cobra, it seems completely wrong as K.I.T.T. More pics at Ain't It Cool News.


Oh, and the new voice of the Knight Industries Three Thousand supercar? None other than Arrested Development's George Oscar Bluth II. Huh? Will Arnett?!


If David Hasselhoff actually does make a cameo, I'll be convinced this is supposed to be a spoof comedy, and will be looking for Leslie Nielsen to pop out at some point in the show.

A little football enjoyment for your Friday procrastination...

I figure Wild Willie and Wander would appreciate this video:

Cue theme music...

Is Swany losing his TV touch?

The Kool-Aid Gang's television guru has done all of a a great disservice. I guess we can blame it on the fact that he is now a full time career guy. But I still think he deserves to receive a hard time for not warning us ahead of time that the Sci-Fi Network would be airing a 2 hour special on the Battlestar Pegasus at the end of November. After searching for additional airings of the show, all I could come up with was that you could buy it on DVD. You can pre-order Battlestar Galactica: Razor and have it shipped just in time for Christmas. If anyone gets to see it let me know how it was.

I guess my model of the planets wouldn't have gotten too far in this science fair...

Most (or all) of the Kool-Aid Gang would probably admit that we're all just a dumb bunch of cavemen that keep out of trouble thanks to the intelligence and common sense of our better female halves. Perhaps girls are finally realizing their superior intellect, as well. For the first time in history, females took the top prize at the Siemens Competition in Math, Science, and Technology this year. Winning prizes by these super-smart ladies included "creating a molecule that helps block the reproduction of drug-resistant tuberculosis bacteria," "studies of bone growth in zebra fish, whose tail fins grow in spurts, similar to the way children’s bones do," and "research that identified genetic defects that could play a role in the development of Lou Gehrig’s disease."

Comparatively, the "research on combating jet lag" by the only male mentioned in the article sounded much less elegant.

Ugh! Ugh! (Caveman talk)

Go, Speed!

The new trailer for Speed Racer just came up tonight. It's a bit Dick Tracy-esque, but I think it will work a lot better for this movie. I'm already getting jazzed:



Alas, the closest I'll probably ever get to being Speed Racer in this world is dreaming about that ever elusive Lotus:



And did you know that the Lotus Elise/Exige is glued together--literally. At about 3:40 into this video, you'll briefly catch a glimpse of a Lotus factory worker with a bottle of glue, beading the adhesive onto a seam.



Someday. Someday.

BCS now stands for...

That mini football rant I posted a couple of days ago? Carl sums up my feelings much better:

Evel Knievel may be dead, but his spirit lives on...

Rednecks, a Suzuki Sidekick, a mound of dirt, and beer--sounds like a formula for disaster.  A little NSFW due to some cussing:

Go go gadget - uhmmm

It was at this point that Glenda realised that the word "Elephant" on her tampons, had not been the brand name.

from Cracked

Mild football rant of the day...

Is it just me or has this entire wacky season ended up leading to a really boring roundup of BCS matchups?  Ohio State vs. LSU--yawn.  Have a system where they could have put Hawaii in that game, and I might get excited just for the chance of some Boise State-like creativeness like last year.  Instead, the only unbeaten team left gets left out of the national title game.  How is that fair?  Mizzou not only beat KU in the regular season, but also finished higher in the BCS ranking, yet the Orange Bowl gives their bid to the Jayhawks?  That's just a blatant crime.  

I don't know if a playoff is truly the answer, but this current system isn't any better than what they had in place before the BCS existed.  

And luckily, no rumours of including the Wonder Twins...

I know most of you (or maybe none of you) read Justice League of America comics, but I'm sure you all watched Superfriends on Saturday mornings back in the day. The movie blogs have been abuzz of late regarding preproduction plans for a live-action JLA film. George Miller, who helmed all three of the Mad Max films as well as Happy Feet most recently (now that's what I call a diverse resume), has already been announced as the director. Even more spoiler-filled leaks have come to light, some of which sound cool, and some of which I'm a bit disappointed to read.

I'm very interested to see how they're going to make such an ensemble superhero movie work on the big screen. Having lots of people running around a movie screen in colorful tights, I'm afraid there's going to be a temptation to camp it up a bit. The conflicts between Batman and Superman were some of the more memorable subplots of Frank Miller's Dark Knight graphic novels and continue to be used well in more recent mini-series like Justice (recommended even just for the Alex Ross painted artwork alone), so I hope they keep that stuff up in the movie. Heck, they could have made a whole movie out of that. Let's hope they don't dumb this down too much.

Somehow, a vital member of the group, Aquaman, got left off the list. I guess he's hard to incorporate into a movie with six other superheroes that can't breathe underwater. Or maybe Vinnie Chase wasn't available.

And what's with Green Lantern? Everyone knows Hal Jordan is the best version of the Green Lantern Corps. I find the use of John Stewart as strictly a PC move on the movie studio's part.

Anywho, the official casting list has yet to be announced, but apparently they've already decided on Wonder Woman--Australian supermodel Megan Gale. Suddenly, Linda Carter seems really old:

Someone's got a wee bit of an anger management problem...

I'm not sure why, but I found this video of a confrontation with Bobby Knight during dove hunting season pretty funny, especially the way the guy holding the camera reminds us, "It's on feeilm."  If you listen carefully, Knight's buddy actually fesses up that he might have shot in the general direction of this guy's house, which gets lost in the coach's usual tirade.

Luckily, no foldable chairs were available in the back of the pickup.

More human than human is our motto...

Blade Runner: The Final Cut made its way to Dallas this week. When it first premiered, I wasn't even a decade old. I'm not even sure I was aware Blade Runner even existed that summer (and probably wouldn't have been that interested in it anyway at that point in my life). Instead, like most kids my age, I was wrapped up in E.T. mania and eating Reese's Pieces every chance I got that year. Some years later with the advent of VHS and the influence of a couple of members of this Kool-Aid Gang, I eventually got the urge to watch Blade Runner. It has since become a true favorite of mine that has continued to be engrossing with every repeat viewing. E.T. now seems like a distant fond memory--a classic movie of my youth that has just sort of stayed there. Over the years, though, Blade Runner has grown to a true work of art that will live with me for sometime to come. 25 years after its initial release, I'm still trying to wrestle with the central theme of the film--what it is that makes us all truly human. Blade Runner presents a bleak future where the world seems so polluted and crowded as if humanity is being choked out of existence. The only people in the film who care about life and seem truly human at all, end up being replicants. The Final Cut release puts to rest any doubt about Deckard--he's the most human character in the movie, and even he's a replicant.  It's our recognition of our mortality that truly makes us what we are, and no one seems to understand that more than the "skin-jobs" who are literally facing death with every minute they breathe.

Despite it's age, this new version of Blade Runner plays like a modern new release.  The special effects and the cinematography seem almost ageless.  Even Harrison Ford, with his short cropped hair, fits in with the modern trends of fashionable men today.  Sean Young is mesmerizing, which makes me baffled as to how her career turned out to be so unimpressive over the years.  News was that the entire film was re-edited, re-touched, and even re-shot in some places (which I'll have to admit, I had a hard time picking out other than the Zhora chase scene which has now eliminated any remnant of the John Hall from Hall and Oates-looking stunt double of the original cut).  The Vangelis musical score is beautiful, and sounds completely fresh in the big screen setting.

Although Blade Runner: The Final Cut comes out on DVD later this month, I think it's a shame that it's not getting a wider release in the movie theaters.  If it's out near you, be sure to make time to catch it at least once.  This is the definitive version.

A flurry of movie reviews for your procrastinating pleasure...

I've managed to watch a flurry of movies over the past few weeks given my monk-like existence living by myself, and I've gotten quite behind in throwing my Cheetos of endorsement to some mighty good flicks this season.

First up, No Country For Old Men. This may be the best movie of 2007. This film seems a bit less quirky than most of Joel and Ethan Coen's earlier works, but still holds up to the fine quality of moviemaking we're all accustomed to from them. Based on a book by Cormac McCarthy (whose prose doesn't easily lend itself to movie adaptations), No Country For Old Men follows Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin), a nobody guy hunting on the plains of west Texas who stumbles upon a Mexican drug deal gone bad and ends up with a briefcase full of cash. Hot on his trail is Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem), a hired bounty hunter who seems to embody the devil himself, seemingly having no one to answer to except fate itself. Throw in a gang of Mexican drug dealers trying to recover their money, and a Tommy Lee Jones as the local sheriff trying to keep Moss out of trouble, and the entire mess becomes a bloodbath where you're not really sure what's lurking around the corner.

If for nothing else, this movie is worth watching strictly for Javier Bardem. This may be one of the scariest villains on film in quite some time, ranking up there with Jack Nicholson in The Shining or Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs. You may never feel comfortable around a tank of compressed gas again. And if Bardem doesn't get an Oscar for his performance, I can truly say he got robbed. The Coen Brothers manage to use only lighting, camera angles, and some strategic moments of sustained silence that will keep you on edge for the entire movie--all of this with nary a soundtrack to use as a crutch.

What's the central theme of this film? I'm not quite sure, other than an exploration of evil, and the influences of fate that seemingly have no bearing on whether we are good people or bad. There are forces of nature that exist that we can't control which will kill you or allow you to live with seemingly no reason at all other than the a flip of a coin. Like Cormac McCarthy's books, it takes some time to really digest the deeper meaning of it all, and I haven't yet had the time to figure it all out. Still, if you want a movie to chew around for awhile, this one is it.

*******

Next up--Beowulf. Beowulf was one of those epic poems I actually enjoyed reading back in high school. Telling the tale of an ancient hero slaying monsters and dragons, I'm surprised it hasn't got the high-dollar Hollywood treatment before. I was actually a bit hesitant to see this, though, given the use of that motion capture animation Robert Zemeckis has grown so fond of. I guess it's sort of cool to be able to manipulate actors at will using this technology. How else to get Anthony Hopkins to cavort around in nothing but a sheet in a beer hall, give Ray Winstone six-pack abs, and get Angelina Jolie to show full frontal nudity? Still, just a brief glimpse in those animated eyes gives you a soulless body staring back at you, which is kind of freaky.

The action, though, is top notch, and you don't need much in the way of soulful eyes to ramp up those types of scenes. The kinetic scenes alone probably saves me from giving this a "Stale" rating on the Kool-Aid Gang Cheetos scale. Given the freedom of computer animation, the laws of physics can be thrown out the window to provide the means to have epic-sized battles between mere men and dragons that will get your heart rate pumping along. And because it's all in 3-D, I managed to give it a pass on those animated zombie eyes, and stepped up it's rating just a bit. But watch this movie without the those special glasses, and I'll call this movie kind of "Bland."

*******

Finally, to round out my backlog of good films to review--Before the Devil Knows You're Dead. There's nothing spectacular about this movie about a simple jewelry heist that goes terribly wrong, but it's a good drama nonetheless. The beginning scene, watching Philip Seymour Hoffman's naked white chubby ass having doggy-style sex with a very naked and beautiful Marisa Tomei kind of puts you in an awkward situation, not knowing whether you're enjoying what you're watching or not. It's seems wholly out of place, a pairing that seems to be totally mismatched, and almost seems to be foreshadowing the whole clusterfuck that's about to happen.

Everyone in this cast has "Academy Award Winner" or "Academy Award Nominee" attached to his or her resume, so it goes without saying that the performances are great. Nothing that will get more Oscar credentials for them with the next Academy Awards, but good nonetheless. This is one of those movies that probably would play just as well in the comfort of your home on DVD as it did on the big screen.

Two Penguins

So there are two penguins heading towards each other on a one penguin bridge. When they meet in the middle one penguin asks the other to turn around and go back. That penguin responds by saying,

"What do you think I am a radio?"

Bwahahahahahah

Maybe I should try and buy some land on the moon now...

Wired Magazine has a short essay about the current battle for Arctic ownership that I've been somewhat obsessed with lately, and it's implications for future territorial disputes on the moon. Little did I know how much those Canucks were trying to flex their muscles up north:

In 2005, the Canadian military launched Exercise Frozen Beaver. Eleven soldiers flew in helicopters to Hans Island, a hunk of rock off the coast of Greenland that's long been claimed by both Denmark and Canada. When they landed on the half-square-mile outcropping, the troops planted a Canadian flag, ripping down the Danish colors that had been flying there since 1984. Once they got home they mailed the confiscated flag to the Danish ambassador in Ottawa.

Of course, they would pick on some puny country like Denmark. Sheesh! But as other countries besides the United States and Russia embark on journeys to the moon, similar skirmishes may begin to occur in the space above us. Even wars in space may not be science fiction either soon:

But what has gone unnoticed amid the international clamor is that the Arctic battle has implications that reach far beyond the top of Earth. The squabbling will be a prelude to — and even set the tone for — eventual sovereignty claims on the moon. At the same time that it was making Arctic claims, Russia announced plans for manned lunar missions by 2025 and a permanent base there by 2032. Japan might beat them to the punch with a 2030 base. Both will be able to stop over and share a glass of Tang with US astronauts, who are supposed to start setting up shop in 2020. China also has lunar aspirations, though officials will say only that they plan to get to the moon sometime after 2020.

Actually, I don't know what all the hub-bub is all about. The U.S. already planted the American flag on it's lunar mission back in the 60's. As far as I'm concerned, that entire orbiting rock is ours. Bwahahahahahahaha!!

Who watches the Watchmen?

If I were to write a script for a spy movie, I'd probably make up some diabolical scheme for world domination headed up by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the founders of Google. They probably could already figure out what our deepest, darkest vices and fears are just skimming through the multiple Google searches performed in our lives probably linked to identifying IP addresses somehow, and the secrets hidden in the myriad number of messages stored on their Gmail servers. And now, they've figured out a clever way to keep track of your very whereabouts using their Google Maps service. Starting today, Google Maps with My Location can actually locate what cell tower your phone is hooked up to and approximate what your current location is. I wonder how many times this has been used by the CIA for a surgical assassination strike. Hmmm...perhaps I should turn off my cell phone now before the guys from Mountain View send in their own Predator drone in to kill me for exposing their nefarious plans.

And now that I've got that conspiracy theory out of my head, I'll just say that Google is very cool. Perhaps the most frustrating part of using my Blackberry to map directions for me was that I could never quite figure out where I was in the first place.

I am completely geeking out about this.

Check this out. Science fiction just became science fact.

What is the Kool-Aid Gang to do when Chuck Norris speaks?

Forget Oprah and her endorsement of Obama. The guy you really want on your side is Chuck Norris!

Hey Wait... that's not how you're supposed to cook a turkey?

Alternative title: How I plan to injure myself, my lawn, my house, and my neighbors this weekend.

Earlier this year after bringing home some Maine lobsters from one of my work trips, I realized that I didn't have a pot big enough to boil them in. No problem... I got a turkey fryer to cook those delicious suckers. Now, Thanksgiving has rolled around and I am excited to attempt a turkey fry.

Hot, hot oil. Check.
12 lb ball of meat. Check.
Couple of beers. Check.

Emergency room, distinct possibility. I'll let you guys know how it turns out.

Even cheetahs need a little walk-a-bout sometimes...

I don't know why everyone's so baffled by how this cheetah got out. Us cats are not only dangerously cheesy cool, we're also super intelligent. Like mere cages can hold us in when we're in search of a bag of Flaming Hot Cheetos:

Cheetah cub escapes briefly from zoo
ASSOCIATED PRESS
11/20/2007

ST. LOUIS -- St. Louis Zoo officials are trying to determine how a cheetah cub got out of its exhibit for a short time.

The cub escaped around 10:45 a.m. Monday on a day when the popular zoo in Forest Park was crowded, in part because of the unseasonably warm weather. The cub was found a short time later, about 30 feet from the exhibit. It was unharmed.

A zoo worker tranquilized the cub.

While the cub was out, zoo visitors were told to go into buildings, but the zoo was not evacuated.

I guess this is one way to get people to slow down...

I guess this guy got so fed up with speeders in front of his house, he made his own speed bump.  Why do Germans always sound so intense?

The most awesome rendition of the Star Wars theme ever...

Oh, words cannot describe what I thought of this lady's version of Star Wars:

If you see something strange, going on in your neighborhood...

Who ya gonna call?  Terrorist Busters!  

Just sing the title of this post to that old theme song from Ghostbusters, then insert a trio of idiots in jumpsuits with this logo on their chests:


I imagine Osama bin Laden is sitting in some cave somewhere and has milk all over his beard because he was laughing so hard. Yes, this really is an official logo from the CIA counter-terrorist unit.  

Spidermen of the world unite...

I'm not exactly sure what I just watched:



And on a somewhat related note, Spiderman was seen rescuing babies in Brazil:

A five-year-old boy dressed as Spider-Man became a real life hero when he saved a baby girl from a burning house in Brazil.

Pint-sized superhero Riquelme Maciel stepped into the house to pull the one-year-old to safety after he saw her mother crying. The boy had been playing with a friend in his back yard when they spotted smoke coming from the window of a wooden house. Using his Spidey senses he ran to tell the baby's mother Lucilene dos Santos, but she was too afraid to enter the blazing house.

Without hesitating, the tiny masked crusader decided he would brave the flames to save baby Andrieli from her cradle. Mrs Santos told reporters: "He said, 'don't cry, don't scream because I'm going to save Andrielle'.

"Then I began shouting for him not to go because I was scared he would die in the fire."

But Riquelme did not think twice. After the rescue the Spider-Boy simply said: "I decided to go inside the house and save her."

There's a reason why we were called band geeks...

I guess I read the newspaper online, so why not comic books?

I saw this on Pop Candy and figured it was cool enough to mention again on this blog.

Marvel Comics is putting up 2,500 back issues of their comic books online. Now, instead of having to worry about putting creases, fingerprints, and undo ultraviolet light exposure on your near-mint condition copy of The Incredible Hulk #180 featuring the first appearance of Wolverine (which I, of course, don't own), you can find it online and read it to your heart's content. You can read through the entire Phoenix saga in The Uncanny X-Men without having to buy a trade paperback or pilfer through the dusty back issue bins at your local comic store while some creepy smelly guy in a black trench coat stares at you with condescending eyes.

I have long since ditched my fanboy misconceptions that comic book collecting is a great investment vehicle that will someday make me rich, but I still enjoy reading comics for the stories and the artwork. Considering I used to spend a lot more than $9.99/month, getting an online subscription almost seems worth it so I don't have to hassle with the problems of storing a bunch of books in space I don't have. Too bad the majority of what I read these days is from DC and other publishers. X-Men hasn't been all that great in a few years.

Anywho, head over to Marvel Digital Comics, and give it a try. They've got 250 issues you can view for free, and the the "Smart Panel" feature actually makes reading a comic book online not so bad.

Not Sure I would want to wrap it in a bun and eat it now ...

HT: michiganzone.blogspot.com

Super Mario Bros. - The greatest video game ever?

Apparently, the existence of Super Mario Bros. 2 is the stuff of legend. After the success of Nintendo's break out game for the NES gaming console, the designer of Super Mario Bros., Shigeru Miyamoto, came up with a sequel much harder than the first. His sequel, however, either looked too much like the original game or was too difficult, and an alternate sequel game was eventually released for the American market instead. The American version is generally forgotten, but the legend of the real sequel game lived on.

Recently, this mythic version was released for play in the United States on the Nintendo Wii 20 years after the original game was released. Entitled Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels, it almost seems to solidfy Miyamoto's stature as a true artist based on this review by Slate:

In most games, you trust that the designer is guiding you, through the usual signposts and landmarks, in the direction that you ought to go. In the Real Super Mario Bros. 2, you have no such faith. Here, Miyamoto is not God but the devil. Maybe he really was depressed while making it—I kept wanting to ask him, Why have you forsaken me? The online reviewer who sizes up the game as "a giant puzzle and practical joke" isn't far off.

That sadistic torment, however, is central to the game's appeal. Unlike most game designers, who make sequels that are identical to their predecessors, only with better graphics, Miyamoto used the Real Super Mario Bros. 2 to do something new and dangerous, turning his original and beloved game on its head. Once you accept that mushrooms and warp zones can be punishments rather than rewards, you start to question the nature of the game and to ponder strategic gambits you would never have considered while playing the original Super Mario Bros. Upon discovering the Warp Zone to World 1, I contemplated letting the clock on Level 3-1 expire—a tactic that would have caused Mario to lose a life but would have allowed him to stay on the third level.

Perhaps there is some reason to all of that Japanese quirkiness after all.

I now submit Exhibit B as evidence that I truly am back in Texas...

"Yeah. I said to him, 'I want to take you out for chicken-fried steak.' But he didn't know what a chicken-fried steak was. And I went. 'Kid, you know about hookers, but you don't know about chicken-fried steak?' That relaxed him and put him on a higher plane. He was going to become somebody else, you know. He was going to be made a man that night." - Bill Murray, commenting about the first time he worked with then newcomer Jason Schwartzman on the set of Rushmore

Nothing truly quite says Texas cuisine more so than a chicken fried steak. It's a man's man kind of meal. A cheap cut of meat, with some seasoned flour, fried up in a skillet of hot oil, smothered in a peppered milk gravy--it seems so simple, but tastes so good. Yet outside of the great state of Texas, the chicken fried steak seems almost as rare as finding water in the desert. During my time in Missouri, I searched far and wide for any acceptable version. Up there (and in just about any other place outside of Texas), they call it "country" fried steak. Blasphemy. About the only edible version I could stomach was from a chain restaurant coincidentally named Texas Roadhouse (although even more interestingly, the original restaurant was started in Indiana, of all places).

It was torture for the past few years not having a reliable supplier of my favorite comfort food. Of course, I'm back in Texas now, where you can't walk ten feet without running into a place with a decent chicken fried steak. So I went through a major chicken fried steak binge this weekend to make up for all those lost nights that I yearned for one for dinner, with the last place I went to today pictured above. Along with the staple sides of green beans, mashed potatoes, and rolls, it's a match made in heaven. About all I needed to make this perfect was a chicken fried corn on the cob. Yeah, I'm flirting with major arteriosclerosis, but you only live once, right? And how can you possibly go wrong getting all of this at a place called Bubba's?

Yup, it's good to be back in Texas.

Damn, it feels good to be a gangsta...

I was trying to remember a movie Denzel Washington starred in that I didn't like. Considering his resume, that's kind of a hard task. Same goes for Russell Crowe. Both are well known to be two of the more consistently good actors in the business. So it came as a surprise when the film that I disliked for each of them happened to be the one they both starred in--Virtuosity. A lot changes in 12 years, though, and mediocre films like that tend to get buried when you cover it up with a pile of quality movies like these two guys have. Would a reprisal of this team-up yield the same results? With Ridley Scott directing them, of course not. Still, it wasn't as great as I thought it could be.

American Gangster tells the story of Frank Lucas, a driver and right-hand man to a powerful crime boss in Harlem. When his boss suddenly dies, Lucas finds an opportunity to make a name for himself by using good ol' American entrepreneurship to sell a quality product at a competitive price by cutting out the middle man. With discipline and smarts, he finds himself at the top of the New York heroin trade while cleverly alluding the law. Meanwhile, Richie Roberts (Russell Crowe), a by-the-book New Jersey police detective, is put in charge of a task force to bring down the drug trade which eventually puts him in an intersecting path to Lucas.

It's no surprise that Washington and Crowe give strong acting performances. At this point, I wouldn't be shocked if this was just second nature to them. Ridley Scott puts together a solid film, visually on par with any of his great work, and engrossing from start to finish. Unfortunately, all of that put together was just good. Going into the theater, I was expecting something on the scale of The Godfather. Instead, this was just an entertaining movie that I'll probably forget by next year. The problem, perhaps, was trying to make this a great film. Movies that focus on both sides of the law tend to show the similarities that both good and evil men inherently share. We're all capable of good deeds and terrible deeds, but it's the choices we make in life that define who we are. In the case of Lucas, his evil is depicted in his ruthless actions to prove himself to other mobsters trying to move in on his territory, going so far as to shoot a crime lord in the head in broad daylight on a crowded Harlem sidewalk. The inherent badness of his profession and the endless lives that the drug trade is destroying almost seems to be lost on him as he enjoys the spoils of his riches. At the same time, he remembers to take care of his mother and family, and tries to help out some of the poor in his neighborhood. Richie Roberts, too, has his duality. Rather than keeping a stash of unmarked cash for himself that no one will notice is gone, he turns it in at the scorn of the rest of the police division. However, his home life is a wreck with his womanizing ways and the neglect of his son.

Michael Mann's Heat was perhaps one of the better films to capture this and move a film into a true climactic satisfying clash between it's two leads, Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro. A lot was said about these two greats finally meeting up in the same scene together for the first time in both of their illustrious careers. The buildup to the sit-down between them in a generic coffee shop and their eventual showdown along the runways of LAX seemed to truly capture two men on opposite sides of the law that were really the same in many ways. The Earth didn't shake and lightning didn't strike when Pacino and DeNiro were finally on-screen together, but it was a truly memorable moment in its own way. I think American Gangster was trying to achieve the same thing, but the final intersection between Washington and Crowe was completely anticlimactic, and almost made me wish they had scrapped most of the Richie Roberts story, even despite Crowe's great acting work. The real meat of this film is the rise and fall of Frank Lucas, and Scott should have focused on that 100%.

Still, I enjoyed watching this movie. It just had the potential to be so much more, I think. Don't expect it to garner too many nominations come awards season.

Love will tear us apart...

I'm only a casual New Order fan, and truth be told, I haven't listened to all that much of their earlier work as Joy Division. So I was more than surprised to have enjoyed Control as much as I did, a tragic biopic film of the late Ian Curtis.

As the lead singer of a band emerging from the Manchester music scene that followed the influences of David Bowie, Lou Reed, and The Sex Pistols, life for Ian Curtis seemed to be coming together. But internally, he felt his life was falling apart. Trapped in a life married to a woman he cared for but didn't passionately love, Curtis struggled with his desires to pursue true love in the form of a beautiful Belgian journalist while still trying to figure out how not to hurt his own wife and child in the process. His struggles epilepsy and the pressures of fame attached to the rising success of his band Joy Division only add to his troubles, leading to the eventual tragic end when he hangs himself in his kitchen only a day before his band was to embark on their first American tour.

This is the debut film for Anton Corbijn, previously known for his music videos and photography work. Pull out the album cover for U2's The Joshua Tree, and you'll know what imagery he can capture on film. It is said that the gritty industrial surroundings of Manchester, UK were essential to the musical underpinnings that born bands such as Joy Division, Buzz Cocks, and The Smiths as well as their contemporaries Happy Mondays and The Stone Roses. Perhaps to capture this bleak environment Curtis' grew up and lived in, Control is shot in black and white. The cinematography that results is moody and spectacular, adding a whole new dimension to the depression and conflicts Curtis was trapped in. This is expected from a director whose background is in photography. However, Corbijn's treatment with the camera is additive to the overall product, and never overwhelms or distracts from the story. Sam Riley, playing the title role, is good in his role, although I'm not quite sure how much he truly embodies Ian Curtis given my lack of knowledge about the late singer. Samantha Morton, as his wife Deborah, probably gives the strongest performance, though, and you feel all sorts of sympathy for the situation she's left with. The formation of Joy Division plays a minor background part to the movie, and you almost want to learn a bit more about the other members of the band Bernard Sumner, Peter Hook and Stephen Morris.

Ian Curtis seems to have an almost cult following by fans of the post-punk Manchester music scene that may rival those for Jim Morrison or Kurt Cobain. The interesting approach Corbijn takes to Curtis in this film, though, is not to idolize his life and add to the mythology, but instead to paint a grim picture of a man with tangible struggles that we might all perhaps relate. It probably goes without saying that Wander and any other Joy Division/New Order fanatic would have loved this movie, and earned the highest rating possible on this blog. I'm not sure I'm ready to call it "Dangerously Cheesy," but it's pretty close in my book.