i m N s h o

I wish I could lay claim to that title, but that's what they referred to the weekend's box office as on KROQ this morning, and it was just TOO accurate. Weekend Box Office Results, February 24-26, 2006 Admittedly, I haven't seen any of these (nor am I likely to!), so I'm judging them simply on the trailers I've seen. Since trailers are what are supposed to get you into the theatre to see the movie, I'm going to bet that, if I can't stand the trailer, I'm not going to like the movie. ( Rotten Tomatoes rankings in parentheses.) Tyler Perry's Madea's Family Reunion (30%) Tyler Perry has a huge following. It can't have anything to do with his acting or writing abilities. Eight Below (72%) One of those "based on a true story" animal films that I've just got no interest in, nor time for. The Pink Panther (20%) I really like Steve Martin, but in recent years, he's apparently forgotten how to be funny. This doesn't look lik

I couldn't pass this one up! In my most recent post , I started to refer to Borders and Barnes and Noble as "superstores." In an interestingly Freudian slip of the fingers, what I actually typed was "stuperstore." Acknowledging that "stupor" is spelled with an "o" rather than an "e" I found the construction really amusing. And so, felt the need to call it out and even attempt to define it… Stuperstore: any large, blandly generic, overly sanitized store which strives to provide a "comprehensive" shopping experience, while depriving the consumer of any of the personality and unique qualities that make shopping anything more than a chore or duty. That definition is surely a work in progress, so feel free to contribute clarifications or alternate suggestions and I'll incorporate them as the mood strikes me.  

I've always loved reading and could spend hours in a good book store, digging through the stacks, looking for something new to catch my eye. SF/Fantasy/Horror for the most part, but branching out into the Classics, Theatre, History, even Language occasionally, as I'm sometimes fascinated by the English language and how it got to be what it is today. And I still WANT to love going to book stores. Despite the genericization of the Borders/Barnes & Noble superstores (can anyone tell them apart from the inside? Or from the outside, for that manner, once you get past the neon signs.) I miss the little independent bookstores like Dangerous Visions or Dodd's in Long Beach, or the little neighborhood hole in the wall used book store I could find in every place I've lived. I keep thinking I'll do a search for book stores near the house to see if there's anything in the area, but I'm afraid I'll find out there isn't. (I just succumbed. A quick search of t

As I posted a while back , I have a theory. In order to spare you having to follow that link and read my post, the gist of it is, there's a universal speed limit—an average speed—that traffic is not allowed to exceed. It's kind of like the speed of light (in that it's unbreakable) but a hell of a lot slower. Since I tend to exceed the posted speed limit every chance I get, the universe is compelled to throw slow moving vehicles in my path 'cause I'm throwing off the curve, as it were. I, of course, do my best to ignore the universe on this one. I may be doomed to failure, but not for lack of trying. (Yes, that means I'm still speeding.) But this week, I've noticed a new tactic. Yesterday was President's Day, so the freeways were quieter than normal. We got out of the house at a decent time and I didn't feel any real pressure to get to work too fast. We got caught at, maybe, four stop lights between the house and work. But at nearly every one of them

I saw Chris Rock on HBO the other night and he did a bit about misdirection (though I don't think he called it that), talking about our apparent obsession with celebrity gossip or the airhead of the week or whatever piece of "news" is currently obsessing the nations media. And he blamed it all on Bush. It was hilarious. George Bush was responsible for everything from Laci Peterson to Paris Hilton's latest sex tape to the inexplicable succss of Big Momma's House 2 (ok, I added that last one. Still, you gotta wonder.) All of it to distract from the latest real news story about corruption in Washington or the Bush administration's latest blunder or the bad news from Iraq… whatever the President needs to distract us from. And I laughed my ass off at the bit. Of course, I'm laughing through the pain because, absurd as his examples were, I'm betting there's more than a kernel of truth behind the humor. Never has that seemed more true than this week, wit

I remember being interested in seeing this movie when it came out last year, but it disappeared from the theatre so fast, I never really had the chance. Now that I've seen it on DVD, I think I can understand why. Not that it's bad, per se. A team of fine actors, written and directed by the guy that made Gattaca (high on my list of all-time great under-appreciated SF films), the movie is certainly well-crafted. But once you look past that… Part of it is simply the subject matter. Despite the critical acclaim and decent box office for films like Good Night and Good Luck or Munich , not everyone is going to rush out to see an obviously politically charged movie like this one. It's not helped by the fact that your protagonist is an international gun-runner who defends his business with the arguably solipsistic "I'm only providing a service, I can't control what people do with my product" defense. Another problem is in the presentation—in that it's too

I wish I could tune out commercials better. Dani never seems to hear them when we're driving. Me, I can't seem to NOT hear them. More often than not, they're annoying, pointless, or insulting and I swear I can feel myself growing stupider just by listening. The latest one to annoy my is from Cars.com. The family is staging an intervention to convince Dad that it's time to dump his car… it's just not practical and he needs a "daddy car"… 'cause, god knows, you can't be dad and drive a convertible! MY GOD, how positively un-American! Doesn't he realize he must conform? He needs a car that says "hi, I'm a dad now, and I've put away my childish things!" Never mind that he may like his current car… may prefer his current car… and maybe he doesn't feel the need to have a "daddy car"… nope, we're gotta have an intervention to rescue Dad from himself! Yeah, I'm reading way too much into a damn website commerci

I'm finally taking advantage of my free Friday afternoons and catching up on some of this year’s Academy nominated films. So I saw Capote today, and I can understand all the buzz and acclaim this one's gotten. Hoffman's performance is impressive. I know there's always a question, when someone's playing a real person, as to how much is acting and how much impersonation. And, at first, I was wondering the same thing. He does an incredible job of mimicking the mannerisms of the man (at least, what I remember from footage I've seen in the past). But as the movie progresses and you see the conflicted human he's playing, it's obvious it goes a lot deeper than mimicking. He is, at one moment self-involved and petulant, uncaring and dismissive of others feelings, and then the next seems honestly interested and caring about the plight of a young murderer. You watch him with Perry and question whether his interest is personal or professional, carnal or cerebral,