Bill Reed: Idle of Millions

Cut out the "about"

2012-01-18T18:16:00.004-05:00

A lot of my time on the internet is spent reading articles or critical essays on other works of art, literature, film, comics, TV, etc. Some of my time is spent writing about those same things. The rest, obviously, is naked ladies and pictures of cats, because that's what the internet is for. In this dangerous territory where information is the most dangerous game of all and the government threatens to turn off the lights, only Snake Plissken can escape... the internet.

What am I saying? Right, reading and writing about stuff. After a while, that cuts you off from the stuff itself. It's all middleman. And, you know, it's cool that the world has a platform on which they can praise, discuss, and condemn the culture around them, and I enjoy reading a lot of that. The internet, however, is a hungry beast, and it eats time. I've spent a lot of hours reading about things, writing about things. I have 35 tabs open in Firefox right now. "That looks nice, I'll read that eventually," I say, popping it open into a new tab and moving onto the next headline, the newer fix. The internet chokes on its babies, like the titan Cronos. It is just about time to ralph.

I really need to stop. 2011 was going to be the year I weaned myself off the internet, starting watching and reading the real material, not the stuff written about it, started writing things, creating. It didn't happen. We're in year eight or so of my five year plan.

I've really got to cut out the about.

(By the way, Hausu is awesome.)

That gum you like? Its time has come.

2011-11-05T21:33:00.002-05:00

Damn, the David Lynch years on Doctor Who were weird.

First Issue Special? Bill Ranks DC's 52 #1s

2011-09-28T16:41:00.021-05:00

For laughs, I decided to read all 52 new superhero #1s from DC Comics. I survived to tell the tale. Let's break 'em down, then, and count down from the best the new crop of series has to offer, to the comics that would have been better off remaining in tree form. To be as scientifically accurate as possible, we will rate them on the 5-star quantitative Morrissey/Marr scale, with no editorial commentary whatsoever.

There Is a Light That Never Goes Out (5 out of 5 stars):

Nope.

Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me (4.5 stars):

Atomic Robo and the Ghost of Station X (Oops, wait, that's not DC.)

A Rush and a Push and the Land Is Ours (4 stars):

1. Static Shock
2. All Star Western

This Charming Man (3.5 stars):

3. Swamp Thing
4. Action Comics
5. Frankenstein: Agent of SHADE
6. Demon Knights
7. Birds of Prey
8. Batman
9. Animal Man
10. Batwoman

Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want (3 stars):

11. Justice League Dark
12. Men of War
13. Deathstroke
14. Wonder Woman
15. Aquaman
16. Superman
17. Batman and Robin
18. Stormwatch
19. The Flash
20. OMAC
21. Resurrection Man

What Difference Does It Make? (2.5 stars):

22. I, Vampire
23. Batwing
24. Nightwing
25. Green Lantern Corps
26. Green Lantern
27. Green Arrow
28. Captain Atom
29. Grifter
30. Blackhawks

William, It Was Really Nothing (2 stars):

31. Justice League
32. Justice League International
33. The Savage Hawkman
34. Legion Lost
35. Green Lantern: New Guardians
36. Blue Beetle
37. Supergirl
38. Superboy
39. DC Universe Presents: Deadman
40. Voodoo
41. Legion of Super-Heroes
42. Teen Titans

That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore (1.5 stars):

43. Suicide Squad
44. Mister Terrific
45. Batman: The Dark Knight
46. Detective Comics
47. The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Men
48. Red Hood and the Outlaws
49. Catwoman

Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now (1 star):

50. Red Lanterns
51. Hawk and Dove
52. Batgirl

Superhero Comics

2011-09-05T19:20:00.002-05:00

Sometimes when you try too hard, you start fuckin’ up, because you forget the fuckin’ ingredients. When McDonald’s has their 99-cent Big Mac sale, right, people love the fuckin’ Big Mac. But because it’s 99 cents, everybody fuckin’ wants ’em, right? People order four, five at a time. But now, the people who work there gotta rush. They gotta fuckin’ rush to make the fuckin’ Big Macs faster, because everybody wants ’em. They’re fuckin’ 99 cent! But, now they’ve fuckin’ rushed them so fuckin’ fast that every once in a while, you’ll bite into a Big Mac and it’s missing one of the goddamn ingredients! Everybody knows it’s two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions, on a sesame bun, right? You fuck around and bite the Big Mac and one of them missing special sauce, you’re like “Fuck! There’s no special sauce on this motherfucker.” You bite another one, the pickles ain’t in the shit. You know why? Because motherfuckers is rushing. It takes time. You gotta make the shit how it’s supposed to be made. When you start rushing the burger, you open the shit up, the burger crooked and shit. What the fuck? The burger’s hanging halfway off the goddamn bun, because they fuckin’ rushing, and they not doing it. You gotta make it how the ingredients was initially pitched to the person, and how it’s supposed to taste, and how it’s supposed to look, and how it’s supposed to feel. And that’s what the problem is when you start to make too many fuckin’ changes to shit. And you don’t know what the fuck they want, because they don’t know what they want.

~J.B. Smoove on a crappy sitcom he was on, but really, what doesn't it apply to?

"OMAC lives... so that MAN may live!"

2011-08-10T12:39:00.005-05:00

Colin Smith started writing about OMAC, and if anything's going to assure I pop up out of the woodwork, it's somebody talking about 70s Jack Kirby comics. I wrote the following comment on part one of Colin's post and, being the narcissist I am, decided it was TOO GOOD just to leave in a comment gallery. So here's what I scraped together:

OMAC is one of my favorite Kirby works. I mean, obviously New Gods ranks higher from a more considered standpoint, but OMAC is barnstorming stuff.

We're most likely not supposed to care about Buddy Blank. Look at that name-- he's a cipher trapped in a world he never made, a world that's in the throes of becoming Orwell's 1984, a "world that's coming." It's some kind of left-wing nightmare world, where the Global Peace Agency is a vaguely sinister, faceless group of deciders with an omniscient sentient satellite on the payroll, and *they're the good guys*. Where OMAC is the hero because he is a one-man military who has the might to be right. He's an apotheosis of an individual but the antithesis of the world that made him-- note how he doesn't say he's bulletproof, but that his body "is rejecting the bullets!" That is some fine hyperbole, but it also speaks to the nature of OMAC's character in this world.

It is interesting that OMAC never transforms *back* into Buddy Blank between adventures. This isn't Captain Marvel, where a child lives out his fantasy of being a cool adult. This is a cog in a machine being transformed into a living weapon that can break that machine. Buddy Blank's only friend is Lila, who isn't even real, and he becomes OMAC, who is equally unreal, or, this being Kirby, uber-real, realer than Buddy Blank. It could be read either way. But look at that story where he fights "Kafka," who is clearly a sci-fi Castro, but with the name of an existentialist writer. What the hell does it mean?

Kirby wasn't trying to make literature here, just crazy action comics, but his 70s DC work, particularly the Fourth World, has a lot of personal philosophy bleeding into the pages. I imagine OMAC is the same, but it's a much more cynical philosophy.

Now you've got me wanting to write an article on the book, and I have thought about doing so before. I'd also love to resume the series with #9, just picking up with the story 35 years later like a day hasn't gone by, and keeping Kirby's original series going. There's so much you can say with OMAC's world, and from a modern perspective, there's so much more you can do with the concepts Kirby brought up but didn't quite flesh out.

God help us all

2011-06-16T20:22:00.001-05:00

It begins:

@billreads

And now for 52 Marvel relaunches

2011-06-15T17:39:00.003-05:00

They asked, I answered. I never thought I'd make it to 52, but then, well, I hit over 60, and had to pare it down.

Whereas DC Comics seems fit more for big ideas and concepts, Marvel is all about character interaction. There are a lot of team and group books below. Marvel's also got a bigger problem with diversity, in my opinion, but I tried to hit as many vital demographics as I could, and I push hard for a wider audience base. Anyway, here we go:

The Marvel Universe:

1. Fantastic Four
2. Marvel Two-in-One featuring The Thing
3. Amazing Spider-Man
4. Web of Spider-Man: A monthly collection of a free weekly six-page Spider-Man webcomic
5. Sinister Six: A series about Spidey's rogues gallery
6. The Avengers
7. Secret Avengers: Featuring Black Widow, Venom (Flash), Ant-Man, Sleepwalker, Cloak, and Dagger.
8. Avengers UK: Captain Britain/MI13 but with a more profitable title
9. The All New, All Different X-Men: Hated and Feared
10. Iron Man 2099
11. Here Comes Daredevil, the Man Without Fear
12. The Incredible Hulk
13. Black Panther
14. Sleepwalker
15. Journey Into Mystery with Beta Ray Bill
16. Marvel Boy
17. ROM Spaceknight
18. The Offenders: Starring Deathlok, SuperPro, Zombie, Satana, Sun Girl, and Nth Man the Ultimate Ninja
19. Nextwave: Kick/'Splode
20. Shang-Chi: Kung Fu Superspy
21. Alias Cage & Jones
22. Devil Dinosaur: Agent of SHIELD
23. D-Man and the Howling Commandos
24. Marvel Comics Presents - a bi-weekly or monthly anthology that also collects webcomic features in print. Starts off with Wolverine, Deadpool, Damage Control, and Howard the Duck, with rotating features.

Marvel Midnight:

25. Dr. Strange
26. Ghost Riders
27. Brother Voodoo
28. Nightstalkers: Starring Man-Wolf, Wolfsbane, Werewolf by Night, and Hannibal King
29. Where Monsters Dwell: Starring Elsa Bloodstone, Gilgamesh, and the Legion of Monsters

Young Adult/Teen:

30. Thor: The Mighty Avenger
31. Captain America: The Fighting Avenger
32. Avengers Academy: Now with Amadeus Cho
33. X-Men: Gifted Youngsters
34. Runaways
35. Power Pack
36. Galacta, Daughter of Galactus
37. Spider-Girl and the New Warriors: Featuring Spider-Girl, Gravity, Thunderstrike, Patriot, Power Man, and Ladyhawk)

Written, Drawn, and Edited by Women, for Women, Starring Women:

38. She-Hulk: Super-Lawyer
39. Miss America: A new, Native American superheroine
40. Night Nurse: Hospital drama set in the Marvel Universe
41. Thoroughly Model Millie: '60s-set romantic comedy
42. Dakota North, PI
43. Heroines for Hire: Starring all the women of the MU

MAX:

44. Punisher MAX
45. Nick Fury MAX: Starring Samuel L. Jackson
46. The Gulf MAX: A “sequel” to The 'Nam about the current Iraq War
47. Dazzler MAX: A mature readers book aimed at women.

Everything Else:

48. Ravage 2012
49. Strikeforce: Morituri
50. Killraven: War of the Worlds
51. Not Brand Ecch
52. Street Poet Ray

So they asked who should take over the Batman film franchise...

2011-06-05T20:57:00.001-05:00

...over at Spinoff (hi, Graeme), and I said:

Wes Anderson: A wry, modern reclamation of the 1966 TV series, Anderson's Batman (Sam Rockwell) is a guy in the throes of a midlife crisis, who has built himself a family from the ground up, with Robin (Jason Schwartzman), Batgirl (Ellen Page), and his trusty butler, Alfred (Michael Gambon)-- plus Aunt Harriet (also Michael Gambon), who is starting to think Bruce and Dick's relationship might not be so platonic. Meanwhile, he continues his harried caped crusade against his enemies, including a Joker who's forgotten how to laugh (Bill Murray), a Catwoman who's becoming more cougar than sex kitten (Gwyneth Paltrow), a Penguin who's just been diagnosed with lung cancer (Bud Cort), and a Riddler who has seemingly mellowed out thanks to prescription medication (Willem Dafoe).

Also, every villain's henchmen are played by the same three guys-- Luke, Owen, and Andrew Wilson.

If they asked Bill to relaunch the DC Universe and write all 52 titles, these are what they'd be.

2011-06-03T17:25:00.006-05:00

Bully sorta did a gag like this already, yes. And I won't clog up CSBG space with my fandreams. But really, DC, you shoulda gave me a call before you went ahead and gambled your stamp. You can't just publish "superhero comics." Everything needs its own subgenre.

Action Comics #1 - Would not actually be #1, but #905 or whatever, for there are some traditions even I like to uphold. This one would basically be Superman Family, an 80 page bi-monthly anthology aimed at the newsstand market especially. There will be action in it.
Superman #1 - The Adventures of Superboy (when he was a man). Sci-fi adventure romance.
Supergirl #1 - Actually aimed at teen girls, because it's about a teen girl
The Adventures of Jimmy Olsen #1 - A crazy, hyper-compressed day-glo adventure tour of the DCU.
Lois Lane & the Daily Planet #1 - Investigative journalism adventure.
Detective Comics #882 or whatever, not #1, that's just silly, Batman didn't even show up until #27: Another 8-buck 80-pager, covering the Bat-family. Lead story is crime-fic, but with Batman. Or supernatural horror, but with Batman. Whichever.
Batman #1 I guess: The Wire, but with Batman. And punching. And death traps, and explosions. Did The Wire have those things?
Batman Inc #11: Grant Morrison can keep this one. It has two ones, so it is superior.
Robin the Boy Bastard #1: Damian needs his own series.
Batwoman #1: Because JH Williams has to draw something and I guess he wants to draw this.
Gotham Central #1: Now with Gordon and Bullock back, it'll be even better.
Aquaman #1: Undersea Arthurian science-fantasy adventure.
Flash #1: A new guy. Asian particle physicist. No more Speed Force, no more Barry. Science hero for the 21st century.
Green Lantern #1: A new lady. Indian astrophysicist. Space exploration adventure for the 21st century.
Wonder Woman #1: Anthropological mythology adventure. Yes, I use the word "adventure" a lot. I will continue to do so. Superhero comics are about adventure, goddammit.
J'onn J'onzz, the Martian Manhunter #1: Philosophical detective spy-fi superhero adventure. The concept shapeshifts as much as the hero.
Justice League International #1: Bwa-ha-ha but with the Big Seven or Eight or whatever.
JLB #1: The second-run team. The back-ups, the reserves, the trainees. The Little Seven or Eight or whatever.
Justice League Universe #1: A bi-weekly, 16-page (with backmatter) series exploring the whole of the DC Universe, no stone left unturned, no character left unloved. Sold for $2 an issue.
Jonah Hex #1: Hardboiled western noir.
Blackhawk #1: Retro-future aviator espionage adventure. There are no white guys in this comic. There is a talking gorilla.
Challengers: F#$% the Unknown #1: In glorious KIRBYVISION.
Phantom Stranger #1: A tour of the supernatural underbelly of the DC Universe. H.P. Lovecraft's Doctor Who.
Swing with Scooter #1: Archie meets the Beatles meets Scooby Doo meets Buffy meets Scott Pilgrim.
Wednesday Comics II #1: It is what you think it is.
Teen Titans #1: There's gotta be a way to make it not suck.
Legion of Super-Heroes #1: See also - Teen Titans.
Shazam! (is a word Captain Marvel says) #1: See also - Legion of Super-Heroes.
Metal Men #1: This one is a manga.
Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld #1: So is this, but for girls.
Swamp Thing #1: By comics blogger law.
Justice Society of America #1: Takes place during WWII, dammit.
Sgt. Rock #1: So does this, come to think of it.
OMAC #9: This one picks up where Jack Kirby left off and just keeps going like it hasn't been 36 years.
Elongated & Wife #1: Thin Man. With superheroes.
Plastic Man #1: Because you can probably sell two different series featuring stretchy dudes if the tones are drastically different.
Kamandi the Last Boy on Earth #1: Post-apocalyptic boy's adventure, c'mon.
Adventure Comics #1: 80 pages, 8 bucks. What's in it? Space adventure, sea adventure, land adventure.
Blue Beetle #1: Jaime gets another go.
Doom Patrol #1: It's been like three months, time to do it again. But properly. Existentialist, nihilist body horror superheroes. With hearts of gold. Who stumble into the weird shit.
Rex the Motherfucking Wonder Dog #1: Maybe it's a Vertigo title.
Seven Soldiers #1: A new mini-series, with seven different obscure DC characters, in various points in the timeline, and yes, Tommy Tomorrow and the Viking Prince are in it. And probably Tomahawk, or Scalphunter.
Frankenstein! #1: But let's not forget the last Seven Soldiers guys. Especially the spy-fi horror action hulk.
The Manhattan Guardian #1: Or the inner-city adventurer of the people.
The Sinister House of Secret Love #1: Because damn, what a title.
Solo #1: For those too cool for Wednesday Comics II.
Static #1: For Dwayne.
Black Canary & the Birds of Prey #1: Chicks with kicks. (Just for giggles, let's say the "Birds" this time are Huntress, Big Barda, Nightwing (Cassandra Cain), the Bulleteer, The Question, and Skyrocket. None of them have exposed midriffs.)
Xombi #8: John Rozum can keep it. I don't want it to go away.
Dial H for Hero Hotline #1: I had Hawkman in this spot, but fuck Hawkman.
Plop! #1: Yes.
First Issue Special #1: Tee-hee.

I was running out of steam by the end, but I could also keep going, because I am an idea machine.

An excerpt from the upcoming Chesty McBookerton novel, Seduction in the Stacks: Tales of a Bacardi Librarian

2011-05-26T17:46:00.003-05:00

by Geraldine Bouvier

Chesty delicately slipped the latest bound collection of the Horn Book Guide back onto the shelf between its compatriots. As she reached up to adjust the plain beige bookends to firmly tighten the shelf's tomes, the top button on her self-knitted sweater burst from her chest, her ample cleavage surging forth like water threatening to topple a dam. The button, in its aerial bid for freedom, hurtled through the empty space amidst the shelves, into the adjacent aisle, before coming to a sudden stop.

"Ow!" came a voice. Shortly thereafter, a ruggedly handsome face poked around the corner. "Yours, I presume?" asked the gentleman to which the face came attached, holding the button gently between his thumb and forefinger. He seemed to be winking at her, but Chesty soon realized the button had fired from her breasts straight into his eye.

"Sorry," she replied nervously, taking the button from him. Their fingers met; his felt coarse, the fingers of a man whose livelihood came from his hands.

"No problem," he assured her. "After all, it gave me an excuse to talk to you." At that remark, his face turned slightly sheepish.

She gazed into his eyes, the deep and penetrating eyes of a longshoreman, or perhaps a cattle farmer of some kind. "I'd wondered what you were doing amidst the library journals," she said. "Could I--?" She paused, swallowing, nervous. "Could I help you find something?"

His eyes faltered, his line of sight dipping toward her bust. "I think I've found it," he told her, taking her waist into his strong, rough hands, and lowering his perfectly-stubbled face toward her smooth and waiting one.

In which Bill pitches his latest book idea

2011-05-13T16:09:00.002-05:00

It's called Things Hipsters Like.

Page one: "Irony."

Pages 2-200 are blank.

/PHRENOLOG/5/5/11

2011-05-05T17:39:00.001-05:00

What Bill's thinking/watching/reading/writing/doing. This is the shape of my head.

//X-Men: First Class Title Sequence from Joe D! on Vimeo.

//What Is Pop? by Colin Smith. Why aren't comics pop anymore? That's it, Colin. Get angry.

Competency and caution is the name of the game in 2011, with occasional brilliant exceptions and pathetic collapses of craft serving to make the sub-genre at times seem more dynamic than it is. Mostly, I read unambitiously well-structured and utterly predictable stories written for the trade. Often this means that I'm paying for complacent rubbish churned out by folks who surely should know better, but who apparently don't, although they do produce a story in the requisite number of pages. I read stories written by folks with no apparent concept of the genre's long history and the skills developed by generation upon generation of comic book professionals, but who know how to tell a four issue arc perfectly adequately, as if creating comics was a mechanical rather than a creative endeavour. I experience page after page of shoddily designed and executed storytelling, packed with money-shots of be-muscled costumes and porn-actress "super-heroines" parading as if their function is as masturbationary aids for young prospective metrosexuals prevented by their parents from using a search engine and the "start private browsing" button on the family computer. I see not Pop, but aspects of exploitation and complacency which could be fascinating if they were part of a brilliant creation rather than lazy unquestioned examples of shallow thinking and practise.

... is that what Private Browsing does!??!? I mean, uh...

//The Spaces Between Stars by Warren Ellis:

So when I write science fiction I’m a crime writer, and when I write crime fiction I’m an sf writer. I’m talking about our lives, and the way I see the world. I’m writing about the new thing, the disruptive event that enters that world, its repercussions and the attempts to deal with it. But I’m talking about where I think I am today, and what I think it looks like.

//Lois Lane, Girl Reporter - a pitch by Dean Trippe and friends. I would buy this. Is anyone listening? I am far from the target audience, but I can tell from the pitch that this is a caring, considered thing that would open up new doors for new audiences into our little world, and it needs to happen.

//Chris Sims writes a nice little essay on one of my very favorite comics, Jack Kirby's New Gods:

Kirby, a veteran of World War II who had nightmares about the horrors he saw for the rest of his life, created a mythology where there's no such thing as a god of war, because the very act of war itself is a losing proposition. Orion himself refers to it as "packaged murder," and at best, it's shown to be a regrettable necessity that can never truly be won through the temporary solution provided by, but by eliminating the root causes of hatred and fear.

//Remake/Remodel is Aquaman for HBO, so of course I loved it. (Pia Guerra; Craig Payne)

I throw up a little in my mouth

2011-05-05T00:11:00.001-05:00

every time someone says "I threw up a little in my mouth."

Real men (and ladies) go the whole hog and full-on vomit. That's the way it's done.

/PHRENOLOG/4/2/11

2011-04-02T12:00:00.005-05:00

What Bill's thinking/watching/reading/writing/doing. This is the shape of my head.

//They should do a big-budget remake of The Final Sacrifice, right? I'd say Christopher Mintz-Plasse as Troy and Danny McBride as Zap Rowsdower.

//Speaking of gloriously awfulsome movies, here's a trailer for The FP, a film that can only be described as a post-apocalyptic competitive video game dancing movie:

The FP - Trailer from Trost Bros. on Vimeo.

// Old-timey minimalist paperback covers for comics storylines: some new, some have been kicking around a while.

//What ostensibly begins as a discussion between Abhay and Mark Sable over Secret Avengers turns into a madcap dissection of mainstream super-comics.

//Colin Smith begins a new series of articles-- one I feel he's uniquely suited to write-- entitled "How to 2000AD." I'm taking notes.

//Seneca on Quitely on Kirby.

//Remake/Remodels: Fantastic Four and Misty, the world's craziest comics anthology for girls. My favorites (Chip Zdarsky; Tom Bland):

Lots of great stuff all over those threads, really.

//Via Warren Ellis, of course:

//Oh geez oh man oh geez oh oh oh

Oh, dear, sorry. Better clean myself up.

The Greatest Film Subtitles of All Time

2011-03-29T14:39:00.004-05:00

Can you place the subtitle to the movie? Let's begin:

1. Electric Boogaloo
2. The Wrath of Khan
3. The Secret of the Ooze
4. The Revenge
5. The Legend of Curly's Gold
6. In Space
7. The Stone of Cold Fire
8. Back in the Habit
9. Back 2 tha Hood
10. High Voltage
11. The Quest for Peace
12. ... Your Sister Is a Werewolf

Can you think of any other awesome ones?

When I was a kid...

2011-03-25T19:10:00.001-05:00

... I thought there was a specific curse word assigned to each finger.

R.I.P. Michael Gough

2011-03-17T14:43:00.003-05:00

My grandmother comes from a large family, so there was always another great aunt or uncle popping up out of the Polish woodwork when I was a lad. Having watched the 1989 Batman movie a few hundred times, Michael Gough may as well have been another great uncle of mine. I'll miss him, and always return to Batman, or Top Secret!, or what-have-you the same way one would return to a family album.

/PHRENOLOG/3/11/11

2011-03-11T17:00:00.001-05:00

What Bill's thinking/watching/reading/writing/doing. This is the shape of my head.

//Dear Hollywood: Can we get a Frederic Wertham biopic? I don't ask for much. Can Christoph Waltz star as Wertham? Thank you.

//Gary Groth arguing with folks about the merits of Dilbert. My view? Dilbert, at its height, was hilarious and awesome, and occasionally, we still get a glimpse of same.

//Jog on Ditko's recent output and Alan Moore's Swamp Thing. "Novel-length criticism!" a '70s comic would say.

//Witzke and Seneca go to town on Elektra: Assassin.

//The Mindless Ones' Amy Poodle writes about The Invisibles for the new Comics Journal, which is the new happenin' place to be (which is why I'll never be invited to their parties).

//Naked Cities by Miru Kim. (Contains butts.) Absolutely tremendous photography, a haunting exploration of our dilapidated urban detritus, as if these images come to us from a post-apocalypse, when the first brave, naked human wanders back out to explore the destruction we brought upon ourselves.

//Qaddafis/Bluths. It's Arrested Development.

//Four unused songs from the Scott Pilgrim movie.

//Chris Sims talks about one of my all-time favorite comics (spoilers: it's ROM Spaceknight).

//Weird old comics TV show interview with Grant Morrison (with hair!) and Dave McKean about Arkham Asylum and stuff.

//Stained glass comics cover reproductions by Brandon Michael Barker. Holy crap, you guys.

//Enter the Void: I kinda wanna write more on this later. But, it's a fucked-up visual feast. See it.

//So I've now watched the first three Friday the 13th movies before they expire off my Instant Queue, and... they're not very good, are they? I mean, they're passable, sure, and improve as they go along, which is rare for a franchise, but they're not about anything, are they? Each movie is basically a remake of the last one. Is it an anti-teen-sex PSA? With machetes? Compare it to Halloween, which defined the slasher genre for America, or to Evil Dead, which was visually inspiring and self-consciously ridiculous, or to Nightmare on Elm Street, the first of which works great thematically and visually, a fine entry into the Craven/Raimi one-upmanship competition, and clearly a major influence on Joss Whedon's Buffy, and, and, etc. The Fridays have almost no interesting or likable characters, very little plot, weak atmosphere, the endings are deliberately nonsensical, etc. Line up the pins and cut 'em down, that's all they are. Hardly the stuff of horror cinema legend. I guess that's why Jason inevitably becomes the protagonist, instead of the villain.

(Now, Jason X, there's a movie.)

/PHRENOLOG/3/5/11

2011-03-05T18:28:00.001-05:00

What Bill's thinking/watching/reading/writing/doing. This is the shape of my head.

//Aquaman redesigns over at Project: Rooftop. But you can't improve upon perfection!

//Read The Pint Man by Steve Rushin - a book I feel written just for me, about a guy who spends a lot of time in bars and holds a lot of useless trivia inside his head. "His mind was like a lint trap"-- holding the detritus of knowledge around him. Low on conflict, but enjoyable.

//Goodnight Dune.

//Legend of the Super-Heroes in retrospect.

//Remake/Remodel: Magician of Mars

//MGK on Superman.

//James Bond covers.

//Like Ed Gorey, Maurice Sendak, and the guy who drew Scary Stories (Stephen Gammell; thanks, Internet!) had an art baby.

//My favorite part of To Kill a Mockingbird (the film), as drawn by Dan Hipp:

If I were to rank the Coen Bros. movies, which would be a silly thing to do...

2011-02-23T21:38:00.003-05:00

...the list might look like this. But then, most of these I've only seen once, and in the case of the one that comes dead last, I gave up halfway through. Still, the Coens remain in the top echelon of my favorite filmmakers; even if I don't like everything they do, everything they do is still worth seeing, and usually interesting in some fashion or another. Right? Right. Your list is your own, but mine is like this:

1. The Big Lebowski
2. O Brother Where Art Thou?
3. The Hudsucker Proxy
4. True Grit
5. Intolerable Cruelty
6. The Man Who Wasn't There
7. Fargo
8. Miller's Crossing
9. Raising Arizona
10. Blood Simple
11. Burn After Reading
12. A Serious Man
13. Barton Fink
14. No Country For Old Men
15. The Ladykillers

I should watch some of these again. Hell-- all of them.

/PHRENOLOG/2/15/11

2011-02-14T18:40:00.011-05:00

What Bill's thinking/watching/reading/writing/doing. This is the shape of my head.

//Black Sabbath is another one of those Italian giallo films-- I'm a bit addicted now. This one lent Ozzy's band its name and Pulp Fiction its structure, according to the infallible internet. "A Drop of Water," the first story in the American version and the last in the Italian, makes the whole film. Once again, it's all about the colors-- gorgeous, eerie, unsettling colors, adding to the general Poe vibe of the whole story. It very much looks and feels like a short story from EC Comics-- in fact, the whole movie is basically an issue of Tales from the Crypt or Vault of Horror or what have you, including its own creepy host character, played here by Boris Karloff, who also appears in one of the stories, looking like a vampiric Mark Twain.

//Mike Norton's Battlepug.

//Giger bar.

//Great Gatsby reconfigured for the NES, like some even-more-feverish fever dream version of Michael Jackson's Moonwalker I played on the Sega Genesis. Damn those spectacles.

//Jack Nicholson's Joker = Jack Nicholson's R.P. McMurphy in whiteface.

//Matt Seneca writes about racist caricatures in Will Eisner's Spirit:

When I try to think of a comparison for the comics field's benign neglect of Eisner's Spirit work, the first thing that jumps to mind is the recent, much-maligned "New South" edition of Huckleberry Finn, which replaces all Mark Twain's original-text uses of the word "nigger" with "slave". New books for a new world. But it's not a perfect comparison because Ebony White, the ridiculously offensive racial caricature above, was the Spirit's sidekick for the better part of a decade -- and this being comics, there's no easy way to replace Eisner's cringe-inducing pickaninny with a more palatable depiction of the black kid who helped Denny Colt's alter ego out of many a jam when he wasn't commenting wryly on the hero's tangled love life.

Berlatsky rebuts:

Cutting out “nigger” from Huck Twain defaces one of the great anti-racist texts we’ve got; doing so lies about the nature and the contours of the struggle against. On the other hand, Ebony White doesn’t show Eisner struggling with racism. It just shows him being racist. And when you talk about Ebony White as part of a “textured, carnivalesque America of yesteryear,” you come really close to celebrating it for its racist caricature. Because that textured, carnivalesque America? It was really racist — more racist than Mark Twain’s America, in many ways, which still had a strong strain of racial idealism and hope which got crushed after massive Southern resistance to Reconstruction.

And Seneca rebuts again in the comments, etc. Anyway, it's an intriguing argument, with two valid sides to it. When's the last time both sides of a piece of internet discourse made valid points? Never?

//Tina Fey, sayin' stuff:

I know older men in comedy who can barely feed and clean themselves, and they still work. The women, though, they’re all “crazy.” I have a suspicion - and hear me out, because this is a rough one - that the definition of “crazy” in show business is a woman who keeps talking even after no one wants to fuck her anymore.

The only person I can think of who has escaped the “crazy” moniker is Betty White, which, obviously, is because people still want to have sex with her.

I wish I was half the woman she is.

/PHRENOLOG/2/13/11

2011-02-13T18:48:00.012-05:00

What Bill's thinking/watching/reading/writing/doing. This is the shape of my head.

//So Matt Seneca wrote this pair of pieces about Grant Morrison's short-lived revamp of Wildstorm's Wildcats and Authority properties, both of which suffered from crib death after an issue or two, never to return. That makes them little nothings, overlooked and ephemeral curios, but that also makes them fascinating. Were these comics too beautiful to live?

I've got nothing to say about the glo-pop sex scenes of Wildcats that Seneca hasn't already covered, but The Authority intrigues me, mostly because I dug it out of the bins and read it on the toilet (BIFF BAM POW, TOILET NOT JUST FOR SHITTING ANYMORE) today. And the toilet is the perfect place for this comic, which goes out of its way to achieve banality:

It's astonishing to see stuff this actively drab in a mainstream comic, to own a commercial object that gives up this hard. The total lack of motion on the page, the failure of the grid to cohere into a single design unit, the choppy cropping that always fails to hit whatever germ of drama this rather pathetic scene might contain... there's really no comparison to make, nothing I can think of that makes this much of a point about getting the mechanics of its medium wrong. ...

Like I said, this isn't just mediocrity -- it's aggressive mediocrity, visual art by a couple of talented artists working at evoking something. That something, of course, is the "real world" the comic's titular characters are set to collide with, and while it's still drawn on a page and printed on thousands of copies more, it gets closer to the gray ghost-guts of de facto existence we've got going here on Earth-Prime than anything pretty or even half-assed would be able to.

Of course, this being a Grant Morrison comic, this is done on purpose. In fact, the complete devotion to reproducing the mundane makes this the most visually important comic book of the past decade, outside of, I dunno, We3 (which was also a Morrison book, you see).

I'm not really sure who deserves the most credit here, but let's just say that Gene Ha (lines) and Art Lyon (colors) combine to create the most brilliantly drab comic of all time. There is no How-To-Draw-Comics-the-Marvel-Way dynamism, no outlines around the panels, no bold four-coloration. Objects and whole panels go blurry, come at odd angles. Heads and bodies get chopped off, like someone's not framing the image correctly. Panels and moments linger on mail dropping through the slot, alarm clocks, ashtrays, cups of coffee, cell phones-- these are the things we look at during the day. This is what real life looks like when broken up into static moments. Pause a movie, it's not always going to be a perfect image-- blurs set in. Pause life, you might catch us staring at our breakfast.

This is a superhero comic? The title characters don't even bother to show up in the first issue, coming late to the party. Most of the action is about a guy waking up, looking for his phone, going to work, and losing his wife. Sad white folks gettin' divorced-- that's true literature! These nine panel grids of introversion, they're the visual equivalent of the Raymond Carver style of writing hammered into me in college. Clipped sentences, sad actions. Grays, browns, a bit of mauve-- the yawning colors of reality. At least, in comparison to the bombastic colors of comics from days gone by.

Small actions fill this comic-- hitting the "End" button on one's cell phone, stirring your cuppa-- the kind of actions we don't see in comics, that occur between the panels if at all, that aren't important. Here, they're given importance, shown to us instead of kicks and uppercuts. We do these things on automatic in our daily lives, and here, Morrison, Ha, and Lyons point them out. The dialogue is naturalistic, the actions realistic, the colors muted. This is the comic folks would read in a superhero universe, to escape from their fantastic, over-the-top lives. This is a comic for superheroes, not about them.

//So at last I saw Dario Argento's Suspiria, a 1977 Italian horror classic, which does the opposite thing that The Authority does-- Argento bathes this film in primary hues, drowning the viewer, and the characters, in a four color soup not unlike what your parents secretly think all your comics look like. The name of the genre is giallo, after all, a word which means "yellow" in Italian, and refers to the sickly color of old paperback novels. Suspiria is far from a hacky B-movie, however; it is, in fact, a secret A-movie, with a visual auteurism that serves as a clear influence on stuff like Sam Raimi's Evil Dead, which came out a couple years later, and some of Tarantino's stuff. The story/script is clunky, the acting is often dreadful, but the way the camera moves is magnificent, the soundtrack is chillingly awesome, and the use of color in this film surpasses every other movie I've ever seen. In terms of how it looks and sounds, Suspiria was probably a decade ahead of its time. They literally do not make them like this anymore-- the printing process that gives this film its glorious Technicolor atmosphere is deader than disco now. Hell, it was on the outs at the time.

Being a movie about a ballet student drawn into a psycho-horror nightmare, it would probably serve as a good companion piece to Black Swan (haven't seen yet), and Natalie Portman's name was even floated for a possible remake. Remakes, though, are usually for suckers-- today's horror films, despite all the torture porn, can't live up to the ballsiness or sheer weirdness of their predecessors. These movies were gritty and visceral, by virtue of being filmed with practical effects in bizarre conditions. When the zombie fights a shark in Lucio Fulci's Zombi 2-- the best zombie movie ever made, even if it's technically worse than its fellows in every respect-- that was done by having a guy dressed as a zombie mess around with a drugged-up shark, something you probably couldn't-- wouldn't want to-- get away with today. When George Lazenby fights some guy in an Ozsploitation movie whilst on fire, he's actually on fire.

I spent a lot of time reading about Italian horror today-- movies with titles like The House with Laughing Windows, Naked Girl Killed in the Park, Planet of the Vampires, Don't Torture a Duckling, Twitch of the Death Nerve-- and ended up with another dozen things on the ol' Netflix queue. Our current American horror flicks are the latest bastard descendants of these grimy, exploitative, psychosexual, shitty weird movies cooked up by crazy Italians and Australians and what have you. Tracing this stuff back to the source gives you the real, primordial experience-- less practiced and refined than modern movies, but also less artificial. They're weirder, sillier, funnier, scarier. These fascinating old movies don't exist in our canon; they lurk, and feed on those that cross their paths.

The Essential X-Files

2011-02-05T15:56:00.004-05:00

Here are the ones worth watching, if you're not as crazy as me and decide to spend half a year watching the whole thing. These aren't the only good ones-- there are a lot more-- but these are the crown jewels. You will note, however, that none of them really have anything to do with the main conspiracy plot, though several are informed by their context. To be honest, all the conspiracy episodes bled together in my brain, and it's hard for me to distinguish any specifics.

In chronological order:

Beyond the Sea (Season 1, Episode 13): In the early years, Scully was often used as a go-to damsel in distress, always needing to be rescued by Mulder and the power of his convictions. Here, she takes over, as she has her first real crisis of faith. Her father dies, Mulder needs her, and an apparent psychic on death row (Brad Dourif, being awesome) is the only one who can help. Gillian Anderson acts the hell out of this one.

Humbug (Season 2, Episode 20): Auteur screenwriter Darin Morgan's first full episode. Mulder and Scully investigate mysterious deaths in a circus sideshow community. Here, Mulder and Scully are the freaks of the week, and it's everyone else who looks at them funny.

War of the Coprophages (Season 3, Episode 12): Mulder investigates a town-wide infestation of roaches. He and Scully have an episode-long duel over explanations thereof. Extremely funny and clever. Darin Morgan again.

Pusher (Season 3, Episode 17): One of the earliest episodes written by Vince Gilligan (later to create Breaking Bad), this episode just happens to be a really, really well-crafted monster-of-the-week, played as straight as an arrow. This time, our monster's just some guy, who can talk anyone into doing anything.

Jose Chung's "From Outer Space" (Season 3, Episode 20): The seminal, and final, Darin Morgan episode. Considered to be one of the finest episodes of any television show. An author (Charles Nelson Reilly) investigates some weird stuff and crosses paths with our heroes. I... I don't even think I can encapsulate this one. Read what Todd VanDerWerff said instead. The truth is what we make of it. The truth is what we believe. Nothing sums the series up better than that.

Home (Season 4, Episode 2): The darkest episode of television I've ever seen. The nicest small town in the world's darkest secret-- the inbred family on the outskirts of town-- seeks an ugly vengeance. I can't believe this ever made it on network TV.

Paper Hearts (Season 4, Episode 10): Tom Noonan plays a serial killer of children who may be responsible for the disappearance of Mulder's sister. Things twist from there, but Noonan plays a better creep than anyone else alive, and sells the whole thing on his performance.

The Post-Modern Prometheus (Season 5, Episode 5): Chris Carter tells a bizarre story (in black and white) of a modern Frankenstein's monster obsessed with Cher. Yes. It's awesome. And weird.

Bad Blood (Season 5, Episode 12): The Rashomon episode! Every show has one. Mulder and Scully remember events surrounding vampiric attacks differently, and hilarity ensues.

Triangle (Season 6, Episode 3): Another off-kilter Chris Carter episode. Each "act" is done in one extended shot, Rope-style, as Mulder is lost in the Bermuda Triangle and finds himself in 1939-- but surrounded by folks who look just like the people in his modern life.

X-Cops (Season 7, Episode 12): The X-Files crosses over with COPS as the reality show happens upon an investigation by Mulder and Scully, who continue to chase a monster that no one describes in the same fashion. Brilliantly filmed, it's about all the wild fears one has in a bad neighborhood, and how panic acts as a virus.

Other Favorites/Honorable Mentions: Ice (The Thing, but with Mulder and Scully), Eve, The Host (Fluke Man!), One Breath, Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose (Darin Morgan, Peter Boyle, and the nature of life and death), Quagmire, Memento Mori, Drive (how Vince Gilligan met Bryan Cranston), Orison, Hollywood A.D. (Garry Shandling, as himself, as Mulder. Yes.).

The Truth Is Outre

2011-02-05T15:29:00.010-05:00

I just spent the past five-and-a-half months watching the entirety of The X-Files, a pop culture curio-turned-phenomenon-turned-curio-again that I had somehow missed in its entirety when it was on the air (I was too busy watching Batman and SWAT Kats to notice, I guess; then I discovered Buffy, and that was that). Had I found the show as it aired, I'm sure it would have turned into an obsession to rival that of Fox Mulder's; with time and distance on my side now, I can look at it more objectively. What the hell was the X-Files about?

One could say it was about The Truth; after all, that's what Mulder searched for all those years. The Truth, however, is an ambiguous concept, something the writers seemed to understand. Answers are hard to come by in life. Often, they never do, and when they do, they're rarely easy. Every time Mulder thought he found what he'd been looking for-- evidence of a worldwide conspiracy, or the existence of alien life, or what happened to his sister-- the rug would pull out from under him, and he'd tumble down a different rabbit hole. The truth is out there, remember-- it's never here and now. It's weird, it's scary, and it sounds stupid when we try to explain it to other people. It's never what we really want to hear. Perhaps we're better off not knowing.

The X-Files is also about belief, or, at least, wanting to believe. Mulder's the resident "believer," but Scully's the heart of the show, and it's her beliefs that drive the storyline-- not necessarily in aliens or ghosts or fluke men, but in faith, in God, and in Fox Mulder. The entire series showcases the death and destruction Mulder leaves in his wake during his quest. Scully is the first to be caught up in this, and outlasts all others. She sacrifices everything she has for a mission that's not even hers, all because she believes in one man. That belief is the only thing either of the two leads has in the conclusion of the show, a convoluted, unsatisfying ending that leaves our heroes broken and alone. A lot of poor writing goes into those final moments, but in many ways it's the only possible ending-- two people holding onto each other, in the shadow of a nigh-incomprehensible colossus they can neither control nor escape.

The show sheds light on hidden corners of America, where monsters, myths, folklore, and legends live, where superstitions are always true and the more improbable answer always turns out to be the right one. The X-Files mythologized America, and it's in the standalone, monster-of-the-week type episodes that this comes out. The series often lost the plot, as it continually expanded the nature of its ongoing conspiracy arc, in needless and confusing ways. That aspect of the show does not conclude, but rather peters out. The standalones however, do what their name implies, standing the test of time and lending the show its real strength.

Is there a happy ending? No; the show doesn't really end at all, in fact. Mulder and Scully should ask themselves-- was it all worth it? I'm not sure what they'd answer. As a viewer, was it all worth watching? Well... 70-75%, sure. When it was good, it was damn good. Were those last couple years a slog? Yes. (Robert Patrick is the most watchable thing about them. He gives it everything he's got, but at that point, he's the only one trying.) Will the truth set you free? Perhaps not. If your belief is strong enough, however, the truth doesn't really matter.

Sorry for the poorly-written rambling above. I spent a lot of time watching this damn show, and I have to make some record of it. Coming soon: the Essential X-Files.

And for the love of all that is good and pure, Bill

2010-12-08T18:34:00.001-05:00

Stop playing so much Minesweeper.

Things You've Really Got to Get Around to Doing, Bill

2010-12-07T22:44:00.002-05:00

1. Exercise ~~more~~ at all.
2. Drink ~~less~~ more.
3. Write every day.
4. No, seriously, write every day.
5. Why are you typing up stupid lists when you should be writing
6. Stop dicking around on the internet so much.
7. Wear suits all the time.

Things That Are Funnier Than $#* My Dad Says

2010-09-29T22:05:00.002-05:00

Community, Thursdays at 8 on NBC
Boston Legal reruns
Raw Nerve, the show where Shatner talks to celebrities about tragedy and alcoholism;
Aftermath, the show where Shatner talks to serial killers
That Sarah McLachlan commercial with the really sad animals
Chemotherapy
Pregnant widows
Quadruple amputees
Starving children in third world countries
Sudden Infant Death Syndrome
The Holocaust
Two and a Half Men (I know, right?)

Harry Brown

2010-09-08T11:57:00.001-05:00

It seems as if every member of the cast and crew of this film set out to make Harry Brown as despicable an experience as possible. The characters are reprehensible, the colors and lighting are sickly, the dialogue is profane, the violence is-- technical term here-- squicky. Michael Caine goes Charles Bronson on a bunch of teenaged punks and druggies terrorizing his rundown English neighborhood. His wife and child are dead; his best friend is killed. He is a man with nothing left to lose.

The film has a lot in common with Garth Ennis' Punisher MAX comic book run, I would say; an old man accepts violence as an answer to violence, and sets about punishing the guilty. The filmmakers ensure that the audience thoroughly despises Caine's opponents, until we at home are actively supporting the elderly explosion of murder and mayhem that occurs in the back half of the movie.

Many will compare this to Clint Eastwood's Gran Torino, and while the trappings are the same, the films are tonal opposites. At its heart, Gran Torino was an anti-violence film, a cathartic purging of Eastwood's Dirty Harry mentality. Harry Brown remains dirty, advocating bloodshed in response to bloodshed, glorifying vigilante violence, and making the audience complicit therein. But hey, at least Michael Caine can walk through that underpass again.

The Woods

2010-08-30T17:00:00.003-05:00

I gave this two stars. The first star is because Netflix won't let me give a movie anything lower than that-- and the second star is for the bit where Bruce Campbell buries an ax in an old lady.

Unless your religion compels you to see anything with Bruce Campbell in it, no matter how fleeting (he appears for five, maybe ten minutes total), avoid this movie.

Louie

2010-08-22T17:09:00.002-05:00

Ian A.: I really like the laid-back absurdity of Louie

Bill: I still can't tell if I like that show.

Some episodes will be great, or parts of episodes will be great, and others put me off.

The tone is so befuddling.

Ian A.: it's still finding its voice and its legs, yeah, but I think it's more hit than miss

Bill: Oh, I think the tone is exactly what CK wants; it's just so outside the rhythms of every other TV show ever.

Even stuff like Buffy and MASH, which would turn from comedy to drama on a dime, felt different.

Ian A.: he is in total control of the thing, writing, directing, starring, so it probably is his pure vision on screen

Bill: Louie is stone-faced black humor, with bits of outright comedy, outright tragedy, skin-crawlingly awkward moments, etc. It's both more realistic and natural than any other sitcom, and also more absurd than any of them.

Ian A.: exactly

Bill: All at the same time, and sometimes different times, and it's just... so weird.

And the narratives, which aren't narratives at all, just bits. And sometimes the bits connect, and other times they don't.

And where Two and a Half Men or something would have a coda where they show that mother and son really do love each other, or a punchline where he gets beaten up by the bully's parents, Louie keeps going past that, not giving us what we expect...

And I didn't like those episodes, they just really made me feel uncomfortable. Which is the point.

Ian A.: it's more honest than any other comedy, in that it's not all about setting up punchlines and fabricating outlandish situations

Bill: My favorite moment is still the bit from the pilot where his skeeved-out date flees into a waiting helicopter and disappears

Ian A.: haha, yes

Bill: It helps that CK's worldview hews very close to mine.

It's, like, Vonnegut. A tragicomedian who loves humanity but despises society.

Ian A.: precisely

Coen Bros porn oeuvre

2010-08-16T21:27:00.006-05:00

In chronological order of release:

Jizz Simple
Miller's Tossing
Barton Fuck
The Cumsucker Proxy
Fuckgo
The Big Leboinkski
O Boner, Where Art Thou?
Unswallowable Cruelty
The Ladyfillers
Two Girls, No Country for Old Men
Burn After Peeing
A Serious Wang

Some of these might actually exist, but I'm not going looking.

The Merry Gentleman

2010-08-13T15:42:00.005-05:00

If you cut all the awkward pauses out of this movie, it would only be half an hour long. However, if you keep telling yourself Michael Keaton will interrupt each pause by saying "I'm Batman," it's the funniest comedy of all time.

Two Nightmares

2010-03-07T15:47:00.003-05:00

I tried mucking with the fonts and styles and format of this page. Everything looks ugly, and I don't know enough HTML to make it prettier. So let's at least experiment with dropping the orange.

So I just watched A Nightmare on Elm Street and the ten-year-follow-up, New Nightmare, both by Wes Craven, for the first time. Dang, that first one's deeply ingrained in the pop-pulp consciousness, isn't it? I'd never seen it before, but somehow, nothing seemed unfamiliar-- the cut, bleeding body of teenaged Tina being drug up onto the ceiling, the faces stretching out of a wall, the Raimi-inspired geysers of blood (then again, did Raimi not use the blood geysers until Evil Dead 2, which came out after this? Craven and Raimi had such a back-and-forth during this horror era that I can't remember), etc. The imagery lingers still; we all know who Freddy Kreuger is, even if we haven't seen the films. The imagery, however, doesn't interest me as much as the ideas. The core concept-- that our dreams are when we are safe, no matter what happens in them, and what happens when that changes-- is a solid one, but there's some decent stuff in there about the human experience, as well.

It seems safe to say Joss Whedon's Buffy the Vampire Slayer was heavily inspired by Craven's first Nightmare, even if we forget about Whedon's own Nightmare-riff in the first season of the Buffy TV series. Whedon portrayed high school as hell, but Craven beat him to it by showing high school as a nightmare, and protagonist Nancy's nightmares are mostly tied to the horrors of being a teenager-- remember, Craven originally intended Freddy to be an invention of Nancy's mind, not an actual supernatural serial killer. Nancy's fears come to fruition through the loss of her friends, and her parents' unwavering disbelief in whatever she tells them, even when faced with the 'truth.' Teenagers often stuggle with their parents, and with the notion of their own mortality; I'd say the fear of death begins to emerge in the teenage years. If not a fear, then a grudging respect, an acknowledgement of its existence, even as teenagers try to act immortal. Nancy doesn't so much defeat Freddy as she accepts him, yet turns her back on him-- because she's grown and matured past the point where she needs him, where he derives his power.

Craven's creation grew without him, however, and the studio pumped out five more in rapid succession. On the series' tenth anniversary, Craven and the original Nancy, Heather Langenkamp, return, and New Nightmare focuses on distinctly adult fears. Craven throws amusing metafictional twists in-- this time, Freddy invades the "real world," tormenting the creators of his films. Rather than a silly romp where Freddy tries to kill everybody on-set, however, it shoots to be more ambitious than that. Langenkamp plays herself, and Freddy-- and Craven, whose script within the movie is also the script for the movie itself-- attacks her by playing to the fears of a wife and mother and actress: the loss of her husband, the taking of her child, a fannish stalker, and the haunting presence of her career, always drawing her back to the Nightmare series. Within the movie, Craven describes this new iteration of Freddy as a manifestation of the loss of innocence; how great is that? Such a loss occurs in the teenaged years, as showcased in the first film, but it doesn't end there, and kids don't just wake up as adults one day. The movie also likens horror film mythology to the grim and grisly fairy tales of yore, which is a neat comparison. Yes, the themes and ideas within the movie are great; the execution is less so at times, and the movie develops extremely slowly, lurching into plodding and repetitious at a few points.

The first one's wacky horror fun, a clear 80s classic; the, er, seventh one's a mediation on horror films and the adult experience. I'd say both are worth one's time.

And hey, who knew that Johnny Depp kid would make something of himself?

2010-03-07T15:21:00.001-05:00

Sometimes I cross my 7s
and sometimes I do not
but they are all my children
and I love them.

Bill's favorite films of 2009 (the list so far)

2010-02-23T00:19:00.002-05:00

Still many more films to see. But so far, here's what I liked the most. Alphabetical order:

(500) Days of Summer
Adventureland
Black Dynamite
Crank 2
Up
Whatever Works

My expectations! They are high!

Words I use far too often in my writing

2010-02-19T16:09:00.001-05:00

1. However
2. This
3. Is

Example: "This is, however, the way I write."

Film flam

2010-02-13T14:43:00.000-05:00

I only want to do stuff-- like write these capsule film review things-- when I'm supposed to be doing something else, like, you know, getting a Master's Degree. Screw that. Movies!:

88 Minutes: I get that mysteries and thrillers need some red herrings in there, but this movie is nothing but red herrings, to ridiculous, plot-devouring lengths. Other ridiculous lengths? Al Pacino's hair. Good gravy, it's a terrifying bouffant, and probably got paid 20 million for this. The hair, not Pacino.

Criminal: It's a low-key con man movie with John C. Reilly, before he did nothing but absurd comedies. It's alright. Moving on.

District 9: So this movie cost like a tenth of Avatar or something, but the effects work is phenomenal anyway, with real alien aliens and crazy violence. I wish it had stuck with the documentary style throughout, but I can see why that would have been difficult to maintain. Mostly, though, I didn't like it-- 85% of the dialogue is just the man guy screaming "Fuck!," after all, and it doesn't so much end as slap on a "To Be Continued." There's not a lot of story here, but the violence is well done, and the apartheid theme is very apparent. Give Blomkamp the Halo movie now.

Everything Is Illuminated: Slow going, mostly in Russian, but just funny and moving enough.

Frost/Nixon: Frank Langella really doesn't look or sound like Nixon, but here, he is Nixon, somehow.

Ghost Town: Ricky Gervais stars in a romantic comedy in which he can talk to ghosts, and it really goes through the regular screenplay motions, and relies too much on some of that awkward humor Gervais likes so much, but it still turned me into a blubbering wreck by the end and I don't know why. So I ended up liking it a lot. That was odd.

Good Dick: This, however, was shit. Jason Ritter plays an idiot, and Marianna Palka-- who wrote, directed, and stars-- plays some damaged porn addict he tries to woo. The characters' interaction doesn't feel real, or make much sense at all, and it's one of those films where you can't root for anybody because you want everybody to get hit by a bus at some point. Sure, in indie movies, everyone's a fuck-up-- bleh.

Human Nature: Maybe Charlie Kaufman's worst movie? I can see what he was trying to do, but the script could use another pass. Still-- Dinklage!

Let the Right One In: I'd rather this than Twilight. What appears to be sweet puppy love in this is actually deeply disturbing when you put any thought into it at all, and I like that that's the point. It's tops as far as Swedish vampire flicks go.

Man Bites Dog: Nothing is more disturbing than this, however, the blackest of black comedies, a faux documentary about a serial killer where the main actor's family, playing his family, had no idea it was a killer picture, and showcasing just how completely insane this killer guy really is, following him around on his murder sprees, watching him give friendly advice, mixing drinks called "Dead Baby Boys," raping, killing, and, as the movie progresses, dragging the film crew further and further into his dark vortex. There are a few laughs, but mostly, it's satire that stabs instead of tickles.

Terminator Salvation: Well, it was better than Terminator 3. McG was clearly trying to make this Children of Men, only with killer robots. The story feels completely empty, though, and the set pieces aren't particularly clever, so it's all just sort of there.

Up: I bawled like a baby at about three separate points in this movie. All of the elements feel completely incongruous-- floating houses, lost explorers, boy scouts, talking dogs, rare ostrich creatures-- but it all comes together in a beautiful way. Just change the name of the Best Animated Feature Oscar to the "Pixar Award," already.

Vantage Point: Listen, if you're going to base your movie around a gimmick-- like showing a crazy incident from multiple perspectives-- don't throw the gimmick away once you get to the third act. That feels pretty lazy.

Wall Street: So... greed is... bad?

Whatever Works: Maybe Woody Allen's best film in a decade or more. Sure, it's an old script, but it's because of Larry David that the whole thing comes together. He plays the "Woody Allen" role here, but where Woody's characters are usually nebbishy, passive, easily walked over, David is callous, direct, forceful, though he still ends up letting things happen, rather than express any true sense of control. He somehow falls into marriage with young runaway Evan Rachel Wood, and as her family comes to claim her, they too fall under New York's bizarre sway, and everyone is sort of transformed by the end-- finding whatever works and sticking to it. Meanwhile, it's goddamn hilarious.

World's Greatest Dad: Who knew Bobcat Goldthwait had it in him? He wrote and directed this, and did a pretty fine job. Robin Williams plays the failed writer father of a kid who dies by autoerotic asphyxiation; Williams fakes a suicide note, and accidentally creates a nationwide movement worshipping his son as anything but what he truly was. Williams goes along with it in a bid for success, but-- well, naturally it all falls apart, though said destruction appears triumphant in the end, with a fantastic usage of "Under Pressure" winkingly telegraphed.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine: Well, it was better than X-Men 3? I guess? I don't know why they keep shoehorning 50 new mutants into every movie, or why sense is the first thing thrown out the window, really... Bleh.

Six Word Reviews

2010-01-13T20:10:00.002-05:00

Back to my old ways already.

(500) Days of Summer: Unapologetically clever, bittersweet, and heartbreakingly true.

2001: A Space Odyssey: I'm sorry, I fell asleep. Repeatedly.

Being John Malkovich: Malkovich Malkovich. Malkovich? Malkovich Malkovich Malkovich!

Bonnie and Clyde (1967): So much better than Public Enemies.

The Brothers Bloom: Life is but a long con.

Dial M for Murder: Palpable narrative tension is Hitchcock's trademark.

Dog Day Afternoon: Never knew this was a comedy.

Domino: What was the point of this?

Is Anybody There?: Let's care more about old folks.

The Maiden Heist: Walken, Freeman, Macy (nude). Lame movie.

The Mutant Chronicles: Surprisingly not a pile of shit!

My Favorite Year: Peter O'Toole yay, everything else, nayyyyy.

Network: This gets more relevant every year.

Public Enemies: Precious hours you won't get back.

Revolver: You're not that clever, Guy Ritchie.

Sherlock Holmes' Smarter Brother: More like Gene Wilder's lamer movie.

Spies Like Us: This movie is no Three Amigos.

Strange Brew: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern drank my beer.

State of Play: Almost as good as BBC's original.

Sunshine Cleaning: Needs more cleaning, less aimless angst.

Tootsie: This Hoffman guy is going places.

The TV Set: Showbiz is an ouroborous of turds.

The Zero Effect: Bill Pullman? Best sociopathic detective ever.

Duplicity; Humpday

2009-12-24T18:05:00.002-05:00

All the commercials made Tony Gilroy's Duplicity out to be a romantic comedy about zany spies trying to backstab each other and get in each other's pants at the same time, and it's really not that. It's the closest thing we've got to a modern day Stanley Donen caper picture, however, combining corporate espionage and intrigue with some PG-13 sexy romance. Clive Owen gets to pretend to be James Bond again, Julia Roberts gets to do the same thing she always does, Paul Giamatti and Tom Wilkinson get to pick up their checks, and everybody goes home kinda satisfied but not overly so-- that waiter's not getting any extra gratuity, just the usual 15%. It sounds like I'm ragging on it here, but it's a decent movie.

Humpday, from "mumblecore" veterans Lynn Shelton (who writes, directs, and appears here) and Mark Duplass (co-director of The Puffy Chair, which I hated, and Baghead, which I loved, and star both here and on FX's the League, which is a great show), is also a decent movie, albeit the commercial opposite of Duplicity. Duplass plays Ben, a husband with a normal life (and wife), but his old buddy Andrew (Joshua Leonard, of Blair Witch and a bunch of other things), a Kerouacian free spirit, shows back up, and soon enough the duo, after much drinking, decide to enter an amateur porn festival together, in which they plan to film themselves going all slash fiction on each other. It turns into a ludicrous macho standoff, with neither one willing to back down from it, even at the cost of Ben's marriage. It is the most narratively monumental game of gay chicken ever.

In most hands, this movie would be an utter farce, a potentially Wildeian comedy of errors, but in the so-called "mumblecore" (I'm beginning to hate that word) movement, it's as grounded as possible, with the characters taking it pretty damn seriously. There's some issues with tone and storytelling here, but I don't really see how else the filmmakers could've pulled it off; they did the best job possible. Naturalism is the key with these mumblecore pictures, especially in the semi-improvised dialogue, and the acting. Leonard puts in a great performance as the wild card who isn't as wild as he tries to be, and who yearns to have the kind of life Ben does, though Ben is equally jealous of his friend. Alycia Delmore, however, as Ben's suffering wife and the only sane character in the entire film (though she has issues of her own), steals the whole thing, and should get some kind of award for this, though I sincerely doubt the Academy will be sending out screeners.

I didn't love it, but I'm glad to see these naturalistic films (way better than "mumblecore," right?) gaining more legitimacy and notoreity, and I'm interested to see what the participants do next. If they get too polished and Hollywood on us, however, they'll lose some of the magic.

The Girlfriend Experience

2009-12-23T19:10:00.003-05:00

So I'm back (from outer space) and I'm attempting a new (to me) film/movie/talking picture (or two) a day. And the idea is to write about them.

For a semi-experimental film about an escort and starring an honest-to-todger porn star, Steven Soderbergh's The Girlfriend Experience has precious little sex or nudity of any kind. What it seems to be is a disjointed film, chronologically, narratively, and thematically. Is it about a specialized escort trying to make it to a higher class? Is it about the decline of her relationship with her boyfriend, who's okay with her sex work-- to a point? Is it about the recession and the silly expenditures the rich people indulge in despite the financial crisis? Well, obviously it's all these things, but nothing every really gels, and no plot strand seems to reach fruition, or-- tee hee-- climax.

The titular girlfriend experience is a service protagonist Chelsea (Sasha Grey, whose career is mirroring her character's a bit-- a sex worker trying to make it up a few rungs higher on the ladder of legitimacy) provides, as well as her own relationship with the boyfriend, whose plot arc never goes anywhere despite all the screentime wasted on it. So much of the film seems a bit of a waste, and whether it's because Soderbergh is more content to meander than clearly move forward, or because Grey's acting is, while not terrible, incredibly flat, I'm not sure. Should the audience project on her character like her clients do, molding her into whatever they need, particularly the ladyfriend they wish for? That would be the pretentious film student's view, but I was hoping for something a bit more concrete.

If anything, a more conventional plot or tone would've helped this, and for an independent film, that's surely crazy talk. So many directions could have been taken, but the filmmakers appear more content to just let everything sit there onscreen instead. If the film were a call girl, I'd complain that her rates are too high. She's a pretty thing, sure, but I thought she'd have more substance, and the sex should be better.

Everything I've seen in the last four months in one sentence or less

2009-12-23T15:17:00.005-05:00

...and on ZMF's "Optional/Not Optional" scale:

9 Songs: Not a movie, more like pornography spliced with concert footage. Optional.

30 Rock season 3: Just about as good as the first two seasons. Not optional.

Adventureland: It's about a socially inept writing major and the emotionally destructive girl who makes or breaks him-- yeah, this one hit really, really close to home, but it was damn good. Not optional.

Andy Richter Controls the Universe: As funny as I remember it being-- maybe funnier. Not optional.

Barton Fink: Falls somewhere in the middle of the Great Coens Ratings List. Optional.

Black Sheep: You'd think a movie about man-eating sheep that turn people into were-sheep would be, you know, better. Optional.

Brick: A cool high school film noir with dialogue and atmosphere that takes a bit of getting used to; worth it. Not optional.

Californication season 2: The definition of guilty pleasure. Optional, for that reason, but I like it.

Celebrity: Kenneth Branagh tries his best Woody Allen impression in a Woody Allen movie, Woody Allen Woody Allen. Optional.

Cowboy Bebop: The Movie: Like a really good episode of the show, but not as great as the show itself. Optional, I guess? Make up your own damn mind.

Crank 2: High Voltage: The batshittest movie ever put to celluloid, and one of my favorite films of the year. Not optional.

Dexter season 3: Not as good as the first two, by a lot. Optional.

Drag Me to Hell: Middlin' Sam Raimi, not a patch on Evil Dead 2. Optional.

Good Night, and Good Luck: A great portrayal of the social responsibility of journalism, which is just what we need right now. Not optional.

Gran Torino: Clint Eastwood at his scowliest, in a movie that could be about my dad. Optional, though.

I Love You, Man: Way funnier than I thought it'd be, Bro Montana. Not optional if you like humorous things and/or Lou Ferrigno.

IT Crowd season 3: Very nearly a funny sitcom. Optional.

Once: The songs are great, but everything else is sort of there. Optional. Soundtrack? Not optional.

Primer: This must be how people who hate time travel stories feel all the time; this movie is smarter than me. Not optional.

The Royal Tenenbaums: Wes Anderson makes films like Kurt Vonnegut writes books (don't ask me to explain that; I can't). Not optional.

Star Trek (2009): All spectacle, no substance; too much Lucas, not enough Roddenberry. Optional.

Stupid Teenagers Must Die!: Stupid, should die. Optional.

Visioneers: Galifianakis can do better, and has; dull to the point of annoyance and forgettable. Optional.

Watchmen: Sort of like Watchmen, only with more fight scenes, violence, sex, cursing, and slow motion; read the book, for Chrissakes. Optional.

Zombieland: (That's right, I went to a theater!) It's no Shaun of the Dead, but it's better than 98% of those other tired, dead-eyed zombie pictures. Not optional if your taste is remotely similar to mine.

I've seen this happen in other people's lives, and now it's happening in mine

2009-08-26T14:45:00.002-05:00

3:10 to Yuma: Third acts aren't usually the best part of a film, but here they are, probably because that's the original bit-- the short story and later stageplay-- that the screenwriters are writing around. This remake of a movie that adapted a play that adapted a short story or whatnot is okay, I guess, but that scene in that one room holds all the power, and all the thematic presence. Everything else is just there to fill in the run time.

The Adventures of Baron Munchausen: A fanciful look at the power of belief and imagination, dressed up as a truly bizarre Terry Gilliam adventure movie. Really quite fun, though, although I could've done without the Robin Williams shtick. Everything else is grand, however, from John Neville as the titular Baron, to a young Sarah Polley as the precocious young girl who accompanies him on his adventures, to round up his former compatriots and save the town from being sacked. Throw in a dozen other familiar faces, from fellow Python Eric Idle to a teenaged Uma Thurman. Then, go nuts. It's a cool kooky movie.

Australia: It's been too long since I saw this, and I really don't have anything specific for it. It was okay, an almost paint-by-numbers Western epic set in the Australia of some decades back, and it's okay if you like that kind of thing. I didn't run screaming, so there's that. But it's also pretty darn forgettable. Nicole Kidman's the proper English lady who meets the rough and tumble Hugh Jackman, and together they've got to save her cattle ranch or something, and a half-white, half-Aboriginie kid who becomes mixed up in these affairs. Points for Bryan Brown, though. But no Paul Hogan? For shame.

Before Sunrise/Before Sunset: I finally got to see both of these in a sort of double feature format, and I absolutely loved the experience. Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy play two characters who have a chance meeting on a train in Vienna and spend an entire night walking and talking, and falling in love-- in the sequel nine years later, they encounter one another again in Paris and do much the same as in the first one. The entire focus of both films is on two people talking-- over, over, two-shot, etc. The dialogue sounds like that kind of pseudo-intellectual bullshit you might not put up with in reality, but in the films, it endears you to the characters. The things they say are the story, shaping what plot there is, who the characters are, and what they will be. The young romantics (and apparently professional conversationalists) reunite nine years later, echoes of that one night they shared in the past, defined by their missed chances. Both films really have a marvelously naturalistic style to them, and work as fantastic companion pieces. Exceptional acting from the two leads, combined with passive direction that really puts focus on the characters and the dialogue. When I eventually run my hole-in-the-wall independent movie theater, I'll run this as a double bill sometime. I could probably go on about these for ages. I think I'm in love with these films.

Changeling: J. Michael Straczynski wrote this; he also wrote Spider-Man comics for several years, and one can see the relation between the two concepts in the notion of power and responsibility. Angelina Jolie plays a mother whose child goes missing; the police find and return a boy, a boy who isn't her son, but the cops refuse to admit a mistake and eventually send her to a mental hospital. Of course, their comeuppance eventually comes up. As this is a Clint Eastwood movie, it occurred to me to think of it as a Western; one woman versus overwhelming odds, but with the posse she manages to accrue, she gets the job done.

Enchanted: Disney never really needs to make another movie again after this one; it's the apotheosis, really, of the entire storytelling engine they've been using for decades. Animated princess (Amy Adams) finds herself banished to the real world, and learn that fairy tale love might not be as happily ever after as she originally imagined. The "real world," of course, starts falling into line with animated Disney tropes as worlds collide. But it's fun, and sweet, and aims higher than most of these cartoons, meaning parents should enjoy it along with kids. (Side note: James Marsden only ever plays the role of the boyfriend/husband who the lead female ditches for another guy, doesn't he?)

Gone Baby Gone: I suppose we'd call this neo-noir, wouldn't we? Ben Affleck puts in a surprisingly good directorial effort with the story of a young private eye dispatched to find a kidnapped girl, and all the harsh and grisly directions it takes him in-- leading to a pretty good moral dilemma, but it's about power and responsibility again-- and "our hero" follows up on his original responsibilities, and bears the consequences. Affleck succeeds with the casting-- I'm not talking about his brother Casey, Morgan Freeman, or Ed Harris, or any of that-- I'm talking about all the folks in the background, ripped from the streets of Boston, perfectly matched to their slum-ish surroundings. Weird looking folks-- regular folks from regular streets. It adds realism. Also? Amy Ryan is good at this stuff.

Sleuth: A super twisty-turny remake of the original Sleuth, also starring Michael Caine, this time as the old man, with Jude Law as the younger guy. Blatantly adapted from the stage, but captivating in the performances, though it starts to go a bit too out-of-left-field by the end. Still, keeps the audience guessing.

Taken: I've been waiting to see this one for a while, thanks to the pure elegance of the trailer. That's where the plot really should've started; the obligatory 25 minutes of set-up wasn't really needed, as everyone watching this just wants to see Liam Neeson destroy people. Should've started like Crank. But otherwise, it was a good action piece, as one expects from Luc Besson. It reminded me of, say, Garth Ennis' Punisher MAX series. You know with absolute certainty that Liam Neeson will complete his mission; it's all about how he takes the bad guys apart. Their inevitable comeuppance. I love inevitable comeuppances.

WALL-E: My word, this film was just absolutely brilliant, wasn't it? From the animation-- so intent on appearing like an actually filmed movie that they hired Roger Deakins, los bros Coen's favorite cinematographer to consult on the lighting-- to the romance-- who knew two robots with a limited vocabulary would be so captivating?-- to all the little details and laughs Pixar loves to throw in-- only they would have the balls to make a couple clips from Hello, Dolly vitally important to the emotional throughline of the story-- yeah, a great movie. The story's superb, an utterly scathing satire on how our consumer culture is destroying the planet and turning us into fat, helpless babies. One tiny robot, the Johnny-5-lookalike Wall-E, however, gets caught up in a HAL-esque robot conspiracy when he discovers one weak sapling still on the otherwise desolate Earth. From there, it's a race to save the future of humanity. My, what a charming, smart, fun, funny, exciting, and emotional bit of work, certainly Pixar's finest.

My Xbox is now pretty much just a Netflix machine

2009-08-03T12:07:00.005-05:00

I may be busy, but since when has that stopped me from setting aside 20 hours a week to watch TV? Eh?

Charade: A delightful Cary Grant/Audrey Hepburn/other-people-you-know caper picture that twists the plot about every ten minutes to keep the audience on their toes (or the edge of their seat), like a humor-laden Hitchcock. But I expect nothing less of Stanley Donen.

Charlie Wilson's War: I had no idea who was behind this as I watched it, but it makes sense that it's a Sorkin/Nichols joint. It's just damn well written, filled with quick dialogue delivered by clever actors like Tom Hanks and Philip Seymour Hoffman, a surprise guest appearance by Ned Beatty, and good based-on-a-true-who-cares characterization of Wilson himself.

Coraline: Can I use the word "delightful" again? Henry Selick brings the goods when it comes to stop motion, and a creepily cute Neil Gaiman story is perfect material for him. A young girl finds a tunnel to another world where button-eyed doppelgangers of her parents seem to care more for her than her real parents do, but that's before all the body horror creeps in and only this lonely girl can save the day. Also: Keith David. See it.

Delicatessen: From the director of Amelie, eh? Well, it's set in a dystopia where food's hard to come by and a butcher/landlord feeds his tenants by chopping up the hired help. Gotta love the French. Wonderfully bizarre, sweet, ridiculous, and exciting, it reminds me of Dead Alive, but with cannibals instead of zombies.

Dexter seasons 1 & 2: I'd seen a few episodes of this before, but watching them all from the beginning-- well, now I'm hooked. As I'm sure you know, Michael C. Hall plays a serial killer who works for the cops and kills murderers to sate his needs, and who has trouble processing human emotion-- but then, how does that make him different from any other male? The first season, based on a novel, is mostly marvelously plotted, a tight suspense thriller; the second season initially sacrifices plot in favor of character, delving further into Dexter's underlying psychosis, before pulling the rug out from under him-- and the audience-- a few times. Do we root for him? Do we hate him? Should we? There's really some fantastic writing on this show. Also, grisly murders. Everybody wins!

The Fall: Quite possibly the most gorgeously shot movie in the last decade or so, Tarsem's The Fall was on my list just because Lee Pace, of Pushing Daisies, was the star-- but man, I'm glad I watched it. It's a period piece story of a crippled stuntman (Pace-- and they actually managed to convince the crew and the other actors that he was a paraplegic) who tells a young girl an epic adventure story in order to get her to sneak meds to him so he can commit suicide. The story within the story was filmed in about 18 different countries, according to the credits, with minimal CGI-- and these locations are utterly amazing, breathtaking in their beauty. Action, unrequited love, bandits, pirates, and Charles Darwin-- it's got everything. But the visuals! They're the best part.

Fanboys: I watched this because I was promised Kristen Bell in the slave Leia outfit. Shallow, I know, but not as shallow as this incredibly unfunny movie about a bunch of hopeless Star Wars geeks who infiltrate George Lucas' compound or whatever. But hey, a Shatner cameo! All is right with the world.

The IT Crowd season 2: I'd watched season one a little while back, and so I watched this too. Six episodes isn't so bad for a sitcom that's usually on the cusp of being clever and funny but never quite manages to reach it. But hey-- this season has two former stars of Garth Marenghi's Dark Place! Yeah! Richard Ayoade either brilliantly plays bizarre, awkward, inept characters, or he's the William Hung of acting. I'm pretty sure it's the former.

Leverage season 1: I'd watched this as it aired weekly on TNT, but I'm rewatching it again on Netflix, in lieu of purchasing the DVD set. But I have to say, this is a marvelously well-done show, and watching it in the intended order, as opposed to TNT's slapdash reordering, opens one up to the subtler character arcs and recurring gags and plot bits. It's a bad-guys-gone-good con artist heist show, very similar to the BBC's Hustle, and just as cool and tasty. Tim Hutton leads a magnificent ensemble, but it's usually Beth Riesgraf, as the slightly-crazy master thief Parker and Aldis Hodge, as uber-geek hacker Hardison, who steal the show. The writing is very strong-- hurray for John Rogers and his crew. Season 2's on now, so catch it if you can.

Party Down season 1: I didn't know what to expect from this, a comedy show about a group of failed actors and Hollywood types who work for a catering service, starring people who are sort-of vaguely familiar (plus Jane Lynch and Martin Starr, who I guess are vaguely familiar to people who aren't obsessed with pop culture), co-created by Paul Rudd and the guy who did Veronica Mars, among others. But it turns out it's quite funny, very crass, and successfully manages to make me care about the characters, not just chuckle at their antics.

The Puffy Chair: So I loved Baghead, also from the Duplass brothers, right? So naturally I'd love this, the little indie movie that put them on the map and stuff, right? Well, no; the main characters generally come off like unlikable assholes or unlikable fools, as they do exactly the opposite of what sane people would do on their long journey to deliver a chair to the protagonist's dad for his birthday or something. It's mumble-y, relationship-y, and seems to be about the pointlessness of just about everything. I really, really hated it.

Son of Rambow: This was good'un, though. From the directors of the pretty-okay Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy movie, with Jessica Hynes/Stevenson of Spaced in a dramatic role! But what it's really about is a sheltered, awkward boy and a pain in the ass troublesome boy who team up to film a sequel to First Blood. Yes! It's about weird kids becoming cool and cool kids being weird and dogs attached to kites and friendship and all that, but it's a good little movie.

Some talkies what I seen down at the picture show

2009-07-05T16:49:00.005-05:00

Ever listen to Kashmir on repeat for two hours while playing Halo? I have.

30 Rock Seasons One & Two: I watched these quite a while ago, but I figure I'll give quick capsule reviews to the TV seasons I watch, too. I don't follow 30 Rock regularly on NBC, but I ended up marathoning through these two seasons and falling completely in love with the show. It's wonderfully absurd, with quick, sharp dialogue, and Alec Baldwin at his comedic best. Also, I may have fallen in love with Tina Fey. While it doesn't utilize the various members of its cast as well as it could-- with some just fading into the background or disappearing altogether for long stretches-- its pace keeps you in rapt attention. It's just the right kind of offbeat to work in both mainstream and alternative circles, I think. Combine that with a parade of guest stars at their silliest (Tim Conway: "Who is Conan O'Brien, and why is she so sad?"), and you've got a lovely show formula. Upload season three already, Netflix!

Alien Apocalypse/Man with the Screaming Brain: Saw these two Bruce Campbell flicks years ago when they aired on the Sci-Fi Channel, but I just bought the two-pack for super-cheap on Amazon (It literally says "Double the chin!" on the packaging). They're two movies Bruce filmed back-to-back in Bulgaria on the cheap. Alien, directed by Bruce's pal Josh Becker, isn't as terrible as I remember. Cobble together Planet of the Apes, Independence Day, and Spartcus, and you've got the plot-- astronauts return to Earth from deep space to find giant bugs took the place over and enslaved humanity. Leave it to Bruce to save the day. In made-for-TV sci-fi standards, it's watchable.

Screaming Brain is what the hardcore chin fans are after here, though; it's Bruce's feature directorial debut, the story of a rude American businessman who travels to Bulgaria, dies, and ends up sharing a brain with a dead KGB agent. They team up to find the woman who killed them both, and it takes them on a path involving robots, Ted Raimi, and Stacy Keach. The film's pretty awful (in a good way), but the extras on the disc are great, detailing the 20-year chain of dead ends that finally let up so they could make the film. Bruce always gives the best commentaries, as well-- he's a natural raconteur who will gladly reveal all the ridiculousness of the moviemaking process. The movie's clearly not up to snuff with how it was originally conceived, but he seemed glad just to get the damn thing made.

Anatomy of a Murder: Preminger's classic, this movie's almost three hour running time just flies by. It's a classic courtroom drama for a reason; marvelously written, incredibly realistic, and fairly incendiary for its time-- Jimmy Stewart is pretty much the precursor to James Spader's Alan Shore here, though there's no damn closing argument, which is upsetting-- it's a great old-timey movie.

Baghead: This is a Duplass brothers flick, part of that "mumblecore" genre all the kids are talking about, which usually describes a movie shot for next to nothing on camcorders, with plotting and script giving way to improvisation about relationships. But! The Duplasses take that and throw it into the middle of a cabin-in-the-woods horror story, which turns the film into a generally tense story featuring characters we actually care about. It's funny, it's scary, it subverts the viewer's expectations every ten minutes or so, undergoing constant permutation. If you're up for an indie horror-dramedy-mumblecore-relationship-spoof sort of movie, you're not going to find one more well done than this. Fantastically written. Definitely the best movie I've seen in a while. And I watch a lot of movies.

Bananas: An early effort from Woody Allen, this has the feel of a Peter Sellers or Mel Brooks movie, instead. The usual Allen nebbish follows a girl he's hung up on to a stand-in for Cuba, accidentally becomes involved in the resistance, and later becomes the leader. There are some really fantastic scenes here rife with intellectual absurdism. The courtroom scene in particular is famous for a reason ("This trial is a travesty. It's a travesty of a mockery of a sham of a mockery of a travesty of two mockeries of a sham.") And the Catholic cigarette commercial...! I lost it. Great movie.

Californication Season One: I turned this on because I was bored and depressed, and I figured it would have boobs. Color me surprised when I cottoned to it pretty quickly! I think that's how the show probably hooked all its viewers. It's a great guilty pleasure show, with crass humor and sex scenes, but the writers put great dialogue in David Duchovny's mouth, and that sells the whole thing.

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: There's little plot to speak of in this film, but Johnny Depp's acting is excellent. He embodies the completely disintegrative character of Raoul Duke (aka Hunter S. Thompson), as he goes on the mother of all benders. What's it actually about? Good question, but just sit back and experience the thing with Terry Gilliam's excellent direction and the parade of people-who-are-now-famous. It's probably the closest thing to a drug trip you can get without actually dropping acid.

Jeremy Clarkson: Heaven and Hell: This isn't a movie, but rather some kind of straight-to-DVD Top Gear spin-off, where Clarkson talks about cars. And it's cheeky enough, I guess, but lacks all the true madness and camaraderie of proper Top Gear, so it's just okay.

A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy: Another Woody Allen picture, this incorporates some Bergmanian and Shakespearian riffs (obviously) as three couples in the early 20th century undergo their own romantic crises and partner-swapping. Kinda cute, funny, well-written... you know the drill with Woody by now.

North by Northwest: I'd somehow avoided seeing this classic Hitchcock adventure film. And it's fun and all, but knowing all the beats going in probably hurts it. Cary Grant tries his damndest to play an everyman, and pretty much succeeds. Eva Marie Saint-- who looks exactly like Kristen Chenoweth here-- does a capable job as well. Still not my favorite Hitch film (that's Rear Window), but it's a fun, exciting sort of film.

The Reader: No fun or excitement here, but it's very good nonetheless. This is one of those movies you only need to see once. It's a thoroughly dramatic tale of a young man who has a sexual relationship with an older woman when he's in his teens, only for her to vanish from his life-- and turn up on trial for Holocaustian war crimes when he's in law school. He must struggle to come to terms with it, yadda yadda. Winslet got all the credit and awards here, but it's the young David Kross who owns the whole movie. He's a revelation. The first, hell, hour or so is slow, but it's filled with sex so that you'll stick through it. And you'll be glad you did, though you'll never want to see the movie again. You should see it once, though.

Slap Shot: Paul Newman clearly had the time of his life on this picture, playing an over-the-hill, unscrupulous hockey coach/player looking to get his team one last shot at glory by becoming the most violent sumbitches they can. And it's great. Not exactly funny for a comedy, but just plain fun.

Sleeper: Supposedly one of Woody Allen's classics, but I didn't like it. It's a 1984/2001 sort of future-sci-fi spoof, but a lot of the comedic bits fall flat or are too dumb. Too dumb? From Woody Allen? I never would've expected it.

Slumdog Millionaire: What a miserable pile of movie this is. Maybe I willed myself to dislike it-- because I never, ever like the Best Picture winners-- but damn. It was shot well, and the subtitles were done interestingly, and that's all I liked about it. Every character except our protagonist and his main squeeze is an asshole, and the entire plot is massively contrived-- so every question he's asked on Millionaire happens to relate somehow to a story from his unfortunate life? Ugh. Ugh ugh, ugh, bleh.

The Thomas Crown Affair: This is the original, what with Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway. And it's dreadfully boring, wasting time on McQueen playing with toys like a dune buggy or a glider, or staring off into space, or whatever. The music's neat, the splitscreen techniques are good, and McQueen's maniacal laughter is awesome, but it's still dull.

Valkyrie: It's a Tom Cruise/Bryan Singer movie, so of course I didn't like it. Flat, flat, boring, dull, etc, whatever. But Bill Nighy's in it! Yay!

Unfortunately, Steve Guttenberg does not appear in any of these

2009-06-19T12:46:00.003-05:00

Scratch the life thing. Agoraphobia is less stressful. Odds, ends, and Woody Allen:

Crimes and Misdemeanors: Martin Landau acts the heck out of his role in this Allen movie mostly about a guy who slips further and further down the moral scales as he lets himself be convinced into offing his mistress. Meanwhile, Woody Allen plays the same guy he always plays-- he's the misdemeanor here. Eventually, the two converge, sorta. I guess it's not a bad film, but it's not my favorite.

Defiance: James Bond, Sabretooth, and Billy Elliot play Jewish brothers who end up forming a community of Jewish refugees somewhere in Belarus, and have to deal with Russian partisans, harsh weather, and dwindling food reserves, not to mention Nazis. The performances are all pretty damn solid, and the whole thing is just shot beautifully. I quite enjoyed this one. Seems it's truer than most based-on-a-true-story stories.

Definitely, Maybe: I will watch Ryan Reynolds in anything, even chick flicks. This one's got a pretty decent structure, at least, as future Reynolds regales his daughter with his romantic past, and she has to figure out which lady in the story is her mom. There were really only two ways to take the plot-- the obviously obvious way, and the obviously "twisty" way, and they went for the latter, but there's some decent writing along the way, and some very pretty girls. Also, Elizabeth Banks is becoming the white female Samuel L. Jackson-- she's in everything.

Manhattan: Apparently Woody hates this one, which is odd, as it's one of his most beloved. A black-and-white tale of a nebbish (guess who) unable to choose between his jailbait girlfriend or his best friend's mistress, and-- hilarity ensues!-- as well as truths about the human condition, as always. Um, I liked it. 'Nuff said. Moving on.

Memoirs of an Invisible Man: Despite the title, it's not a Woody Allen movie, but a John Carpenter one! Sort of noir, almost a comedy, but not really, it's Chevy Chase's middlin' period, in which he plays a guy who gets turned invisible and runs away from Sam Neill. It's fairly good, rather than terrible! Hurray!

Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist: I only rented this because the title had a Thin Man reference, but that's about all I liked. Michael Cera's basically me if I was an actor instead of a recluse, but I can't see his career lasting past 25 if he only accepts "awkward teenager" roles. C'mon, kid!

Shadows and Fog: This is Woody's Kafka tribute, or possibly Threepenny Opera homage, or both. Black and white, filled with... well, shadows and fog, it seems to be primarily about illusions in one form or another. Nothing quite makes sense by the end, but there's a veritable parade of famous people in bit parts throughout.

Sukiyaki Western Django: A Japanese Spaghetti Western, and sort of remake of like three other movies. Shot in English, apparently, and featuring a gratuitous Quentin Tarantino cameo. Uh... Yeah. I didn't quite get what was happening in most of it, due partially to the dialogue being so quiet and everything else being SO LOUD, but the action was pretty badass.

Sundown: The Vampire in Retreat: On its way in the mail seconds after David Carradine's death was announced, this forgotten imitation gem from the late 80s features the man himself as a powerful vampire who had formed a sort of vampire retirement community, feeding off fake blood, but naturally everything goes wrong when a human family moves to town and a vampire faction decides to go back to eating people. The real reason I watched it is because Bruce Campbell plays a Van Helsing. It is by far his campiest performance, but he at least provides some much-needed mirth. The lunacy of this film is brewing under the surface, usually going unacknowledged, but very much there the whole time.

Words about pictures

2009-06-04T12:51:00.002-05:00

A life. A life would be good.

Broken Flowers: I'll watch anything with Bill Murray in it, and this travelogue-of-an-aging-lothario-who-finds-out-he-might-have-a-kid-and-so-goes-on-a-journey-through-some-women-in-his-life-and-maybe-undergoes-some-self-discovery works as a mystery with no solution, with clues that have no meaning save what we may give them out of a need for something. It's another suitable entry into the "Bill Murray states off into space" genre.

Dead Alive: I really really really didn't like any of the Lord of the Rings films, or the King Kong remake, so this is my new favorite Peter Jackson movie. It owes pretty much everything it's got to Sam Raimi, in that it seems like it's trying to top Evil Dead for sheer horror lunacy. And I think it succeeds. Not just because it's officially the goriest movie ever made, thanks to using up oceans of fake blood, but because it goes completely mental in the brilliant third act, after a slow, slow build-up. But we get mutant zombie baby violence, lawnmower violence, womb-on-man violence, and lawn-gnomes-on-bleeding-cavities violence. That's my kind of violence.

Die Hard: So it came as a surprise that I never actually saw this. I mean, I know everything about it-- it's so engrained in the public consciousness-- and I've seen the ending a bunch-- but most of it was kinda new to me. And it's probably one of the best action movies ever made, with a fantastic villain from Alan Rickman and awesomeness from Bruce Willis, back when he had hair and stuff. Well-scripted, even if there's a large portion in the middle where Bruce is just kinda sitting around and not doing anything.

Edge of Madness: I only watched this because I've been crushing on Caroline Dhavernas since Wonderfalls, and... it's boring boring boring. A period piece drama with a tinge of mystery... and I didn't give a damn about any of it, sorry.

Hancock: There was a story in here somewhere, but it went off the rails about halfway through, with some bullshit mythos stuff that tried to explain stuff, but that was entirely unnecessary. Will Smith's character arc is not earned, but done out of convenience. Jason Bateman plays the same guy he always plays. Meh.

Hatchet: This also had some fun gore in it, and cool makeup effects. It's a cheesy, purposefully shlocky B-movie horror flick with some cameos from horror icons like Robert Englund and Tony Todd. See it if you like that kind of thing.

JCVD: I would've liked this better if Netflix Instant had given us the subtitled version instead of the awful dubbed version, where Jean-Claude Van Damme doesn't even voice himself, I'm pretty sure. Otherwise, it's his best movie ever, playing himself as an action star who's lost his edge, is losing his daughter, and finds himself in a hostage situation where the police believe he's the perp. He has to try to live up to what everyone sees him as-- his family, the cops, his captors-- when he really just wants to be a guy. I had some issues with the ending, but Van Damme's performance is excellent. I could tell from his face alone.

Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior: I admit, I pretty much slept through this whole thing, but I think I absorbed it by osmosis. ... Pass.

Mister Foe: Or Hallam Foe to everyone not in the US, this movie is completely despicable. I only watched it because I have a crush on Sophia Myles, alright? But anyway, it stars Jamie Bell as this messed up peeping tom who does some really lousy things and suffers no repercussions, and Sophia Myles as a woman who takes a liking to him for no discernable reason whatsoever, especially after she finds out about some of those really lousy things. It seems everyone in this movie is either an idiot or an asshole, and I don't like those types of stories. At all.

Paul Blart: Mall Cop: Die Hard in a mall. With a fat guy! Fat guys are always excellent physical comedians, which doesn't entirely make sense. Otherwise, this was dumb dumb dumb. I hate awkward comedy, especially when it's shoehorned in. This could've made for a good 80s-style action comedy, but they managed to dumb it down to its basest levels.

Point Blank: It's kinda stylish, but instantly forgettable. Lee Marvin doesn't kick as much ass as I assumed he would. Needed more ass-kicking.

Terminator/Terminator 2: I had not seen these in years and years, so running a double feature was a fun idea. The first one's a great chase flick with some monster movie tropes and time travel conundrums thrown in. And the second one, of course, is one of the biggest and best action flicks ever, and one of Arnold's best. Does the new Terminator have skull-laden grounds and laser guns? Because it should.

What About Bob?: Is another Bill Murray movie I hadn't seen in forever. Anyway, it's about a super-neurotic fellow who learns to cope with people and the outside world as he drives his psychiatrist insane. But! I want to talk about Charlie Korsmo, who plays the kid here. I think this lad made like four movies ever before he went into MIT to be a genius. Those movies-- Dick Tracy, Hook, etc-- are all great, and feature some of the best and/or most popular actors ever. Man, what an awesome life this kid had when he was like 12. Hot damn.

Young People Fucking: I'm sure this was only popular because of the title. But anyway, the script is actually pretty good, and some of the acting is... well, surprisingly better than I thought it would be. It follows a night of hawt sexxorz among different couples-- the friends, the exes, the first date, etc-- and features some pretty good dialogue. I mean, it could work as a stageplay. Almost.

Bride of Son of Godzillastein

2009-05-23T11:52:00.005-05:00

Loads of stuff to whine abo-- review and discuss. Onwards. (Updated slightly later on 5/23/09)

The Amateurs: Jeff Bridges and a remarkable all-star B-list cast consisting of guys like Ted Danson, Joey Pants, and Bill Fichtner fill this cute little movie about some old small town nobodies trying to make a porno and instead discovering themselves. No, I don't know how that's suddenly become its own genre, either, but this movie tells a fun story. Jeff Bridges can sell anything.

Bottle Shock: Based-on-a-true-etc. of that time in the 70s when a bunch of snobs decided California wine tasted better than the French stuff. I watched it because it had Bill Pullman and Alan Rickman. Also: the new Captain Kirk plays the central character, a hippie loser who manages to pull together and etc. etc. Cliche, sure. The romantic relationship angle of the story completely failed to work, but everything else was okay enough.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button: Yes, it's just like Forrest Gump, and yes, it's three hours long. I still liked it. Some would call it slowly paced, and there are huge bits which could probably have been skipped with no harm to the narrative, but I enjoyed moseying about in its world. The CGI was fantastic and mostly invisible. It's that kind of movie that just slowly wraps you into a bear hug; not a "feel good" tearjerker or anything, but a comfortable drama, of sorts. Brad Pitt and David Fincher make good movies together.

The Darwin Awards: Here's an odd one. Joseph Fiennes and Winona Ryder are insurance investigators winding their way through odd episodes of Darwin Award candidates-- idiots who got themselves killed. Except sometimes no one dies, which therefore defeats the definition of the Darwin Awards themselves. It's not quite funny or cute, but it strings together mishaps and a sort of murder plotline, but the entire thing never quite gels.

Doubt: I expected to be bored to death by this, but was surprisingly fascinated. Meryl Streep and Amy Adams and The Seymour Hoff are all fantastic in their roles, which captivated me enough to get me into the plot-- of the hardass nun who's on the case to expose the priest as a kiddie fiddler. But is he or isn't he? It's got actors' actors acting their hearts out and is written so well (after all, it's a stage adaptation) that you'll forgive the slow build and get sucked into the story. Also, it might, just maybe, make you think, rather than melt your brain into fine Hulu goo.

The Good German: The incongruities in this caused it to fail for me. Soderbergh shot the whole thing like it was made in 1945, and rips off Casablanca enough that it's got that whole feel of an old-timey film-- except for all the cursing and the gratuitous boobies and the violence. Why capture the mechanics of an old movie if you don't go for the feel, as well? Lame. And Tobey Maguire is at his most annoying. I'll watch Clooney in anything, but c'mon.

Hanky Panky: I went on a bit of a Gene Wilder bender. Here's one that features him and his later (and now late) wife Gilda Radner, rather than Richard Pryor as it was originally written. It's yet another Gene-Wilder-is-wrongfully-accused-and-gets-into-an-adventure-to-clear-his-name movie, but I love those, and this one's got enough of a Hitchcockian feel to keep one interested. Ends too abruptly, though. And those computer tapes! How quaint is that?

How to Lose Friends & Alienate People: Like I said, Bridges can sell anything, but the rest of this movie falls apart despite the Simon Pegg. All of the jokes fall flat, everyone's an asshole, and it succumbs to Hollywood cliche by movie's end. No wonder this was a massive flop.

Last Chance Harvey: And here's your movie for the old people. It's a romance between Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson that seems too easy-- I never quite believe it. And it's all about the old guy finding himself and becoming a man to his daughter again and bleh. I hate nonstop awkwardness, be it for humor or drama's sake, and the first third or so of this movie is nothing but that crap. Blerg, as Liz Lemon would say.

Naked Fear: Alright, I admit sometimes I seek out crap just to amuse myself. This movie was bloody awful-- the Most Dangerous Game, but with a lot of female nudity in act two. You can probably extrapolate the rest from that, except maybe not the pointless B-plot of the determined deputy who contributes nothing to the story, nor the chick going crazy at the end, etc. Why was Joe Mantegna in this? To whom did he owe money?

Outland: The little description called this "High Noon in space," and I didn't believe them until the last act. Unfortunately, I fell asleep during the climax. Otherwise, it's probably your standard "Sean Connery is a space cop whom no one wishes to help but he gets the job done anyway, by gum" story, with added Peter Boyle.

Ratatouille: I am not the biggest Brad Bird fan-- right, I'm the guy who didn't like the Incredibles-- but this wasn't bad. Needed more Patton Oswalt, but it's sort of a sweet story as only Pixar can bring you, I guess.

See No Evil, Hear No Evil: Another one of those Gene Wilder flicks. This time, he's deaf and Pryor's blind and they're on the run and have to save the day, and it's actually a fairly amusing and enjoyable romp with some fun adventure bits. I love this genre of movie-- the comedy adventure road trip sort of thing they don't make anymore. We need more of these.

Stir Crazy: Okay, and in this one Wilder and Pryor are wrongfully imprisoned and there's a rodeo and Craig T. Nelson and-- look, just watch the damn thing. If you like those kinds of movies--you know the ones--then you'll like this.

Superfly: You know, I think I like parodies and homages to blaxploitation more than the blaxploitation itself. This one bored me. Not enough awesome.

Sweet and Lowdown: Woody Allen directs Sean Penn as a self-destructive and apparently crazy genius guitar player who goes through a series of episodic misadventures until finally he breaks down as an unhappy loner. A kooky mix of Woodyesque styles, but pretty good.

The Ten: The guys from the State bring you a series of interconnected episodes sort of related to the Ten Commandments. The best one is probably the bit with Liev Schrieber (who is surprisingly hilarious) and all the CAT Scan machines. If you like casual absurdism and comedy sketches, as well as movies stuffed with famous people and "that guy!"s, then you will probably like this.

Vanishing Point: I was digging this a lot right up until the ending, when it stopped making much sense to me. But it's cross-country car chases and weirdos in the desert and naked girls on motorcycles and you've all run to go watch this by now, haven't you? The inspiration for Tarantino's Death Proof, but far more exciting! That's what this is. No excuses-- just drive.

Where the Buffalo Roam: Bill Murray plays Hunter S. Thompson in a brilliant and dangerously mad performance, while Peter Boyle plays Dr. Wylie-- I mean Dr. Robotnik-- I mean Carl Lazlo. I didn't quite see much of a throughline here-- it's a few episodes that feature both Thompson and Lazlo being crazy, and that's it-- so I didn't quite get it, but it was wildly entertaining the whole time, so I think that's enough.

Who's Harry Crumb?: This here's a John Candy detective adventure comedy from the late 80s or somesuch. It tries to be Fletch, but it fails miserably, and is one painfully awkward joke after another. Pass.

Let's see if I even remember anything I've watched

2009-04-27T13:58:00.003-05:00

Dear Blog,

Haven't written in a while. Hope you are well. How is the missus? I need a distraction. Time for reviews.

Death Race: I imagine video stores (what are they?) have entire shelves dedicated to the "Jason Statham drives around and kicks ass" genre by now, and this one's another entrant into that oeuvre. And it's okay, I guess, more like a by-the-numbers story about the wrongfully imprisoned Statham getting roped into a dystopian future prison racing circuit. Nothing defies expectations, but you get what's on the tin: Jason Statham, in a car, kicking ass.

The Hoax: I'm not usually one for Richard Gere movies, except maybe The Jackal, but this one was pretty good. Gere plays a dude who fakes his way through writing Howard Hughes' biography, and it becomes an overly complicated mess that takes his life and sanity on a downward spiral. Alfred Molina plays his man Friday pretty effortlessly, and there are some other famous people in it. Gere's desperately improvising his way out of screw-up after screw-up was pretty fun to watch, however.

Kindergarten Cop: One part of my Schwarzenegger/Reitman double feature, this is another Arnie entry in a long string of solid, awesome movies. Badass cop Schwarzenegger ends up becoming a substitute kindergarten teacher to root out and rescue a mobster's ex-wife and kid, and, you know, it becomes one of those comedies that is also a drama. They don't make those kinds of things anymore-- it seems like they almost went out with the 80s, and this is one of the last and best of them.

King Ralph: A surprisingly solid movie that's got a lot of heart and a couple laughs, and shows how great an entertainer John Goodman is while also reminding us of how Peter O'Toole can take any old script and raise it up. Loaded with British actors you're bound to recognize-- even Camille Coduri, who would play Rose's mum on Doctor Who years later-- it's another genre-mixing picture worth watching, of a Vegas slob who accidentally becomes king of England and ends up becoming a better person, etc-- it's the journey that matters, and it was a fun one.

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang: I somehow managed to avoid this movie for years, but I'm thankful to see it now. It's excellent-- Shane Black at maybe his loosest and best. What may be a standard action/comedy flick in other hands becomes something almost transcendent when you add in actors Robert Downey Jr and Val Kilmer, both of whom had a sort-of comeback with this film. Funny, exciting, and quite awesome, I enjoyed it as it riffed on old pulp novels and stuff. Also: Corbin Bersen.

Memento: I also can't believe I'd never seen this. I knew the general structure of it, but watching it for the first time is a revelation-- the viewer's brain constantly working, ticking away, trying to unravel the plot and story and inevitable twist as the scenes unveil themselves backwards, our opinions of the characters shifting as we go further into the past, following the path of what Guy Pearce forgot. It's more than a mystery thriller with a fun structure-- it's a filmic experiment, and further proof that Christopher Nolan is one of the best directors working right now.

Radio Days: Another Woody Allen movie (with a young Seth Green playing a young stand-in for Allen himself!), this picture, as the title implies, takes us back to the age of radio, and tells various interspersed and intertwining tales about New York life back when the radio tied all of society and culture together. Great stuff.

The Shadow: Meanwhile, this is even worse than I remembered it being. Alec Baldwin, Penelope Ann Miller (of Kindergarten Cop fame!), and more stuck with a dire script playing characters we aren't given any reason to care about, while the Shadow's pulp roots are mostly ignored for a more overblown, supernatural focus. Who knows how crappy this movie is? Not the Shadow, apparently.

A Shot in the Dark: The supposed best of the Clouseau movies, this follows Peter Sellers' bumbling detective through a series of mishaps whilst he attempts to solve a murder that everyone else believes is already solved. Of course, he just happens to be right, as the lunacy explodes around him. Nudist colonies, crazed kung fu manservants, and senior officers with slipping grips on reality collide.

Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot: Sylvester Stallone thought this movie was a big pile of crap, but frankly, it's better than most of his resume. Sure, it's trite and silly, but it's short and the story gets stronger as it goes. Estelle Getty is a badass, by the way.

Twins: The other half of the Ahnold twofer, we have this, also from Ivan Reitman, and also in the vein of comedies that are more than just comedies. It starts off broad and gets slightly more nuanced as it goes, as Danny DeVito plays a sleazy bastard that gets a little nicer as he introduces lost twin Schwarzenegger to the world. Also, Kelly Preston was a major fox.

Videodrome: So apparently they're remaking this Cronenberg/Woods collaboration for the modern era, probably as a generic sci-fi thriller. The original, however, is something more, something that could only exist during the emergence of home video, offspring of crappy VHS and Betamax and pirate television. The graininess of the magnetic tape world helps the atmosphere of this film-- you couldn't do it on DVD. James Woods gets sucked further and further into a conspiracy that gets more and more unhinged from reality as we know it, and discovers the new flesh-- the electric womb of the boob tube. Trippy but interesting.

P.S. Reviews of My Name Is Bruce, Hellboy 2, and Punisher War Zone are on Comics Should Be Good. They were all better than I expected!

It turns out Blogger doesn't like infinite titles

2009-04-06T22:18:00.002-05:00

A four word review of Synecdoche, New York, auteur writer Charlie Kaufman's difficult-to-pronounce directorial debut and quite possibly magnum opus, an utterly bizarre story of a lonely genius played by Philip Seymour Hoffman who mounts a play about his life that takes place in a life-sized replica of New York, which creates worlds within worlds, infinitely looping inwards, and seems to be about life, death, love, the endless enormity yet meaningless minisculity of existence, which, coincidentally, the movie in which this is all taking place is also about, that is a film I was totally not in the right emotional state to watch, though maybe I was, and which has the librarian from Ghostbusters in it, which is awesome:

I didn't get it.

Bill is way behind on his so-called "reviews" that no one reads anyway

2009-03-26T11:09:00.004-05:00

Rapid-fire capsule review time gooooooooooooo:

Choke: Deleted scenes are usually deleted for a good reason, but there's an ending they cut that, frankly, should be in this film. It's another Chuck Palahniuk work, with the poor man's Edward Norton (Sam Rockwell) in it instead of the rich man's Edward Norton (Edward Norton) this time. However, it's pretty fun, and worth watching. I mean, it's a movie about a sex addict who works at a colonial-themed park and may or may not be the clone of Jesus, so...

Dawn of the Dead: I didn't go see Watchmen, but I did watch this directorial debut from Zack Snyder. Yeah, the remake with Ving Rhames and stuff. It wasn't bad... but, you know, it wasn't anything special. If you like your zombies to move a little faster, this is the one for you, I guess.

Dead & Breakfast: Two Carradines for the price of one in this (David and Ever), as well as Kendra from Buffy (also in Supergator, see below) and Tony Perkins' son. And some other mildly famous people who never really found that stardom they so craved. Also, Jeffrey Dean Morgan. Where was I? Right. It's a horror spoof, of sorts, only it's not really funny, and what is there owes a lot to Evil Dead and Dead Alive (there are blatant references, even, such as the Evil Dead poster hanging in the room where the Comedian finds a chainsaw). And it's got some musical narration, which is interesting. If you like campy B-horror and you've got an hour and a half to kill, you could do worse. Much worse. Trust me. Violent fun! I guess.

Dilbert season one: The strip used to be absolute gold every day, and this cartoon spinoff that aired on UPN that no one watched was equally clever and hilarious. Daniel Stern is the perfect beleaguered Dilbert and Larry Miller is the perfect clueless Pointy Haired Boss.

Enter the Ninja: I watched this expecting it to be absolutely awful and it turned out not half bad. Surprise! It's a movie from the early 80s about a white guy who is also a ninja who hangs out in the Phillippines and wrecks the shit out of dudes. The voices all seemed terribly dubbed even though I'm pretty sure it was filmed in English. Uh... that's all. If you want to see awesomely hilarious ninja-inflicted pain (the sound effect alone, my God) starring a guy who really looks like he missed his calling as a 70s porn star, then watch it. WATCH IT NOW

Get Carter: The original! That's right, Michael Caine, drivin' around, drinking Scotch, hitting women about the face, and getting his revenge! I think that's the plot. It... didn't work for me.

Grindhouse: Netflix Instant Viewing wins, simply because it has Grindhouse the way it was meant to be seen-- the theatrical double feature with all the trailers and stuff, that isn't available on DVD. This is the first time I've seen the whole shebang like this, and it was a glorious three hours. They cut out the fun lap dance scene in Death Proof, but whatever. Planet Terror is hilarious, awesome, and explosively gory, and Death Proof is, well, Tarantino. Great stuff.

Lake Placid 2: Listen, I have a high tolerance for crap. But no. Just no.

Maniac Nurses Find Ecstacy: I didn't actually sit through this-- but even on fast forward, it's too damn long.

Michael Clayton: George Clooney is watchable in anything, even Batman & Robin, and Tom Wilkinson is flippin' amazing, but this bored me. A lot. And I don't see why Tilda won the Oscar, but whatever. It was about as fun as Syriana, which is to say, as active as a Pet Rock on barbituates.

Orgazmo: From the creators of South Park comes the sweet story of a Mormon-turned-porn-actor-turned-superhero, and you know, it's actually pretty great. I'd avoided it before, but people whose taste in schlock I trust wholeheartedly recommended it, and I quite liked it, in the end.

Redbelt: This would've been a great little Mamet drama if not for the ending. Chiwetel Ejiofor is one of my favorite actors, these days, but even he can't save the nonsensical ending, where the hero wins back his honor by... beating the crap out of the MMA champion backstage? And cameras are watching? And security doesn't break it up? And no one knows why he's fighting, which is that the champ is trying to stop him from revealing the fights are fixed? And yet they give him the champion belt anyway? Even though they don't know why? Aaauuugh.

Silver Streak: Gene Wilder is absolutely brilliant, and the addition of Richard Pryor being awesome surely helps, too. And Patrick bleepin' McGoohan is the bad guy! And Jaws is in it, with metal teeth and everything! And it's, like, this pastiche of Hitchcock suspense action films, wrapped up in a comedy road movie, and it's marvelously scripted the whole time, and superbly delivered, and Ned Beatty shows up, and it's awesome!

Sky High: You know, this didn't suck. It's that simple "teen misfits with superpowers band together and prove they're real heroes and coming of age and teen romance and angst and shit" formula, but it's also got Kurt Russell and Bruce Campbell. You can't go wrong with those two! Er, unless you're Escape from L.A. But it's got two Kids in the Hall alums and Lynda Carter and stuff too, so we're good. Everybody makes up for the main kid, who is the kid from Forbidden Kingdom, which was awful. Moving on.

Supergator: On the Sci-Fi Original Picture scale of quality, this ranks well below classic fare like King Cobra, Boa vs. Python, Earth vs. the Spider, Manquito, Blood Monkey, Spiders 2... I think you get my point.

What Just Happened?: This is the question I asked when this movie was finished. Stupid, unfunny, and pointless. Bruce Willis finally appears in a crappy movie-- but at least he was the best thing about it, Grizzly Adams beard and all. Hollywood seems too inept to satirize itself. Also, Sean Penn plays himself. I wonder what "method" method he went through to get into that role. "Please, please, only refer to me as 'Sean' on set, please."

Zack and Miri Make a Porno: As Kevin Smith gets older, two things happen: his films get raunchier, and his films get more sentimental. This is his crassest movie yet-- don't watch it if you have shame-- but it has a soft, nougaty center of actual heart, which is the reason I keep watching his stuff. So, yes, there are poop jokes and wangs and all sorts of stuff. But it's really a love story-- and if you can get past the sex comedy pretense, it sort of works. Also, Brandon Routh has, like, a scene and a half, and yet he delivers more dialogue than in all of Superman Returns. Also also, Craig Robinson steals every scene he's in with pitch-perfect delivery, and owns the entire movie-- it's worth seeing just for him alone.

In which Bill verbally fellates Woody Allen

2009-03-18T13:44:00.003-05:00

Man, I'm behind on my movie-capsulizing, and my memory ain't what it used to be, but let's try to get these things straight.

So I liked Vicky Etc Barcelona enough to check out some other Allen works that were instantly streaming, and here is what I remember of those:

Manhattan Murder Mystery: This is the one that made me a believer. Made in the early 90s, it stars Allen, Alan Alda, Anjelica Huston, and, hey, Diane Keaton! in a bizarre reunion with the Woody. It's about bored, older Manhattanites who stumble onto what might be a murder. It's rife with Hitchcockian suspense as well as Allenian hilarity-- I have never seen such tension on the screen at the same time as I was chuckling at the jokes. Absolutely brilliant. Also, there's a blink-and-you'll-miss-him cameo from teen Zach Braff.

Love & Death: So then I sought out this one, a comedic take on Russian literature. I've never read anything Allen's spoofing, but I majored in English, so I know how to fake it. A ludicrous farce, this movie out-Mel-Brooks-es Mel Brooks. It was made in the 70s, from Woody's "Diane Keaton period." I love how everyone speaks with a Russian accent except ol' Woody, playing the same guy he always does, in another ridiculous situation. Great stuff; loved it.

Alice: Here comes trouble. Now we're in the "Mia Farrow period;" Woody does not appear onscreen, and everything's a tinge more dramatic. This is apparently, the description tells me, a takeoff of Alice in Wonderland, but I didn't really notice; it is, however, a strange urban fantasy with appearances by every actor ever, as Chinese herbs cause bizarre transformations for Farrow's Alice; but the true transformation, by the end, must come from within. It was okay.

September: My three seconds of research informs me this is a Chekovian chamber piece, or "bottle episode," where a handful of people are thrown into a single setting and drama happens. We get unhappy people trying to be with each other and failing at it; the existentiality of the universe is revealed; and yet, they look forward to the titular month anyway, always pushing at the future. It was a bit boring, I have to admit; very stage-like and theatrical, in that way. Not bad; Allen movies are always written well, I've noticed, but it didn't thrill me. Apparently he filmed this at one point with actors like Maureen O'Sullivan and some scenes with Christopher Walken but then threw it out and started over with Sam Waterston and stuff. Hmm. Maybe the original would've been kookier.

Regardless, my opinion of Woody Allen has skyrocketed now that I've actually taken in a decent sample of his stuff. Amazing dialogue and some neat little themes woven in from time to time. I shall seek out more, more, more!

Mo Moobies

2009-03-03T18:05:00.002-05:00

I'm sure I'll get off this movie kick eventually.

21: I liked Jim Sturgess a lot in Across the Universe, one of my favorite films of the last ten years, but even he can't save this paint-by-numbers production. A group of MIT kids are trained by the devious Kevin Spacey to count cards and make thousands off of Vegas casinos. But then trouble brews, naturally, and the universe attunes to the laws of screenplay mechanics. Thoroughly mediocre.

Burn After Reading: And then there's this one, which is like Coens-by-numbers. A couple of idiots get mixed up in something and try to profit from it, and disaster strikes, because all of the people on the other side are also idiots. In the end, maybe one person gets lucky and everybody else suffers. There are some pretty funny bits (Brad Pitt doing his "mysterious face" is hilarious), but then there are parts that feel completely extraneous. Really, I was expecting a death-by-dildo and it never came. Bah. At least it was better than No Country.

Raising Arizona: Another Coens production, one from twenty long years ago, that I've never seen. Nicolas Cage at his most watchable, bolstered by the makes-it-look-easy Holly Hunter and the always enjoyable John Goodman. Add in wacky baby hijinks and an apocalyptic biker and you've got a movie that falls right into the solid middle of the Coens' oeuvre.

Same Time, Next Year: My God, this was fantastic. I'd never heard of it-- just turned it on 'cause it had some Alan Alda-- and man, I was pleasantly surprised! Nothing would really separate this film from its counterpart on the stage, and yes, Alda does use a few of his Hawkeye-isms, but the entire movie rests on him and Ellen Burstyn convincing the audience that they're changing as people over the course of 25 years, as their characters meet for an annual affair. The dialogue's marvelous.

Steamboy: And here's an anime I'd never heard of, but it's from the guy who did Akira, so you know it's good, right? It takes place in a steampunk Victorian England, with factions fighting over who will have ultimate steam-y control of the future's armaments, with one boy caught in the midst of the struggle. Also: jetpacks. Really awesome stuff.

Vicky Cristina Barcelona: Woody Allen's latest, this eschews his usual love triangles for a sort of love rhombus, shot in beautiful Spain. Javier Bardem takes a great role as the impossibly charming Spanish painter who sweeps all the ladies up in his wake. Penelope Cruz won the Oscar for playing Bardem's ex-wife, but I really don't see why. Anyway, it's all cleverly written and shows that Rebecca Hall is going to become quite famous and respected one of these days, but the story starts to fall apart for me as it gets closer to the end. And then it just... ends. Also, there's third-person narration, which is an intriguing choice that irked me at first, but I grew to like at the end. So yeah, it's worth watching.

Sweet sassy molassy it's a smorgasbord of Netflixxx

2009-02-26T12:04:00.002-05:00

A veritable cornucopia of delivered cinema! Or a bunch of crazy shite. U-Decide!

The Bank Job: For a while there, I was afraid Jason Statham wasn't going to kick any ass in this movie. But then the world righted itself. Yeah, it's a heist-goes-wrong movie, more serious than the trailers made you think, but it's another excellent British production. "Based on a true story" is probably laughable, but I actually cared about the characters in this.

Blood Sucking Freaks: Here's a movie that's more fun to watch in fast forward, or perhaps not at all. The granddaddy of torture porn like Saw and Hostel, this old fogey blows them all out of the water. I mean, if that's your thing. It isn't mine, so I didn't sit through this, but there are bits where a dwarf with an afro cuts off a naked woman's hand and eats her eyeball, or bits where naked people dance and there may or may not be a severed penis sandwich. Yeah.

Lone Wolf McQuade: Dave Campbell is right; this is probably Chuck Norris' most gloriously awesome movie (I still prefer Sidekicks for the hilarity). Walker faces off against Cain from Kung Fu, for cryin' out loud! People get roundhouse kicked, lots of things explode, there's a maniacal dwarf in a wheelchair, and everyone McQuade loves almost or does die. The acting is abysmal, but the lines (and line-readings) are hilarious, and the movie is terrifically energetic.

The Seat Filler: This is not quite what I expected, but the premise is good (seat filler at award show falls for starlet) until the mistaken identity trope shows up. Still, it made me chuckle at times and it's worth showing to your girlfriend.

Six-String Samurai: I only half paid attention to this, but it's Road Warrior meets Buddy Holly meets Wizard of Oz. A bespectacled guitarist/swordsman travels the wasteland on his way to claim the throne of Lost Vegas. And then things get weird. While it looks like it was made in 1980, it's only ten years old. The budget is shoestring (if the shoes even have strings) and the acting is worse than Lone Wolf McQuade but it's cool and silly and has a few ridiculous lines, such as "Why, the wind shear alone on a pink golf ball can take the head off a 90-pound midget at over 300 yards" or "Only one man could kill this many Russians!" It's like David Lynch and Sam Raimi and Terry Gilliam had a squid baby.

This Netflix post is about hitmen.

2009-02-19T12:33:00.003-05:00

And two of the hitmen are John Cusack. Yeah, look at that! Themes! Or motifs! Or whatever.

In Bruges: This one does not have John Cusack in it. What it does have is an awful lot of Colin Farrel sitting on benches, which is fine, because the dialogue is quick and snappy and there's a running gag about midgets. The film revolves around two hitmen sent to bide some time in the purgatory that is the town or city or tourist trap of Bruges, until Bad Things Happen. And sure, along the way there's a dwarf and a girl and some cocaine and some violence. I enjoyed the way the movie easily drifted from "dramatic and introspective" to "cleverly silly" and back again, while somehow never seeming like a tonal disaster. The third act posed some trouble for me-- I wasn't a big fan of the ending, and there's a major thematic coincidence, which is a thing lots of people hate (not me), so watch out for that. But it's beautifully shot in the actual, beautiful town of Bruges, and the dialogue flows marvelously-- I see that it's up for Best Screenplay at the Oscars, and I wouldn't mind if it won.

Also: Colin Farrell's eyebrows are capable of forming 45 degree angles, which is odd and fascinating.

And now, the Cusack:

Grosse Point Blank and War, Inc: I find it might be best to review these in tandem, because they're so damn similar and yet so far apart. They share a production company, a screenwriting credit for John Cusack, and three actors-- John and Joan Cusack and Dan Aykroyd. And, of course, they're both about a disillusioned hitman who wanders into a situation that will inevitably topple his currently jaded worldview. It seems War, Inc was deliberately written to echo Grosse Point Blank, without ever actually being a sequel. And hell, Joan Cusack is basically the same character in both. John Cusack usually plays the same character in everything anyway, but here they're very similar-- Brand Hauser may as well be Martin Blank if he never went to that reunion. But where Grosse Point succeeds, War fails. GPB, on the whole, is a pretty clever enterprise filled with entertaining and interesting situations and snappy patter, yet that cleverness is nonchalant; Cusack makes it look easy, as he usually does in his better work. War constantly tries to tell the viewer that it's so damn clever, and here's what society's going to be like in five years, but it sits there like a lump. Most of the things it's supposedly satirizing are old hat by now; it's been done, and better, by many others, so the movie comes off as tired as Cusack's character looks in some scenes.

We get energetic performances from everybody in Grosse Point, from Cusack to Driver to Azaria to Mr. Trick from Buffy to Cusack to Greg's dad from Dharma and Greg to Arkin to Aykroyd to Cusack to Cusack to Piven; War, Inc tries to imitate the same feel, but the characters come off less "energetic" and more "bipolar;" we've got Hilary Duff as a Middle Eastern Britney Spears/Lindsay Lohan/etc. media whore who craves attention but really just wants to be loved or something (yawn); Marisa Tomei as Lois Lane (this wasn't so bad); and Ben Kingsley as... hell, this guy isn't even trying anymore. John C. is again a hitman who needs a therapist, but instead of turning to Alan Arkin like in Grosse Point Blank, he turns to his car's OnStar device. (Do you see? It's so damn clever!) The character dynamics never feel true, nor does anybody consistently change-- things just happen and get weird, or "twists" pop in for the sake of spicing up the plot.

Like In Bruges, Grosse Point Blank has a major coincidence at the end and doesn't ring true in the final few minutes, but the ride is a fun one throughout the film. War, Inc never rings true at all. Well, except for Cusack's badass fight scene. In Grosse Point Blank, we still had the lithe, young, whippersnapper of a Cusack; War, Inc leaves us with the puffier, jaded version, still trying to deliver lines like he did in Say Anything.... I know he's still capable of good work, and he's watchable in just about anything (I love America's Sweethearts. There, I said it), but I sense some lack of caring in this production. Surely, I'm wrong, but in the end, War, Inc comes off as an overstuffed, undersouled production, and Grosse Point Blank is the exact opposite.

Netflix 3: The Search for Suck

2009-02-16T11:56:00.004-05:00

Watchin' stuff and stuff. Yeah.

Blade Runner - Theatrical Cut: I've seen bits and bobs of various cuts of this movie over the years, but never the whole thing straight through. And I still haven't, having dozed off more than once-- hell, more than twice-- during this movie. It's considered by some to be the best sci-fi ever, but I found it to be a cure for insomnia. I can't say I'm interested in going back and watching the bits I missed.

Bullitt: Here's another movie whose reputation is far greater than its worth. Here I was thinking this would be a marvelous 60s flick about Steve McQueen kicking ass, but it's pretty boring, overall. I may have started to snooze during this one, too. And the car chase, called by some the best car chase ever? It isn't. Not by a country mile. (Best car chase ever? Still the Blues Brothers.)

A Clockwork Orange: Now, this might be the best novel-to-film adaptation I've ever seen (though honestly, how much competition does it have?). Sure, it leaves off Burgess' original final chapter, but that part of the book feels more like it's been tacked on out of necessity rather than growing out of the plot and character as we know them. Kubrick gives us an unflinching film filled with the worst humanity can offer us, shot more or less as blatantly as possible, stuffed with lingering close-ups of faces going mad and constant scenes of Malcolm McDowall being utterly tortured by the needs of the film. I imagine this was hell to shoot, but it was worth it. Perhaps not as great as the book, but a very interesting creature in its own right-- needs more Nadsat, though. Would I have liked this as much if I hadn't read the book? Not sure. And I don't usually ask that question with a book adaptation.

I Spit on Your Corpse!: And here we have a shlocky grindhouse feature from the 70s. Apparently produced in two months, from script to screen, and also known as "Girls for Rent," this actually turns out to be a pretty fun exploitation flick, if you're into that genre. It has chase scenes more exciting than Bullitt, at least, funneled through the plot structure of a screwball comedy of errors and near misses, even though it's supposed to be a tense thriller, and chock full of gratuitous nudity and violence. The acting's bloody terrible, there's no real protagonist, and the whole thing goes as far as it's able before collapsing in on itself, but for a piece of crap thrown together thirty-five years ago, it's-- *gasp*-- more well done than it should be. And I like that. I feel like Tarantino's Death Proof owes a helluva lot to this movie.

Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels: The movie that made careers for Guy Ritchie and Jason Statham! It too has that familiar comedy structure filtered through the collander that is fun English accents and zany criminal violence! A highly enjoyable crime romp.

Slaughterhouse-Five: Another book-to-film. Here's the thing: Kurt Vonnegut's novel is my favorite book of all time, so I felt it was my duty to see the movie version (released in 1972--three years after the book came out) even though I was sure to hate it. Well, I didn't hate it. The book, of course, is infinitely better. I could say the same of V for Vendetta-- even though the movie was pretty good, it can't hold a candle to the prose. If you've never read the novel, this movie might be highly enjoyable. For me, though, it excises my favorite part (the explanation of Tralfamadorian novels), we never *see* the little hand-plungers themselves, and "So it goes" does not pop up at all. It's like a Vonnegut story with all the really Vonnegutian bits cut out. The performances, from a cast almost entirely unknown to me (Edgar Derby looked familiar-- he was on Magnum PI in some episodes! And Miss Teschmacher is Montana Wildhack!), aren't bad, but nothing groundbreaking. So, good, but not, you know, Slaughterhouse-Five.

Smart People: One of those introspective not-really-comedies that shows us that the intelligencia are as dysfunctional as the normies! Well, bleh. Ellen Page is Ellen Page-y, Thomas Haden Church does his funny deadpan thing, sure, okay. Dennis Quaid goes back and forth from his Harrison Ford impression to his Jack Nicholson impression as he plays a stereotypical bearded, misanthropic English professor. They're all miserable, but by the end, they shut up and deal with it, apparently, because all you really need to be happy is to decide to be happy. Uh, no. For smart people, these people are not very smart.

THX 1138 - Special "Ruined by George Lucas" Edition: Wow, did this suck. I thought this was supposed to be a smart sci-fi film. I mean, Robert Duvall and Donald Pleasance, man! But, no. I should have remembered I hate everything with George Lucas' name on it that isn't Indiana Jones 1-3. What was the point of this movie? What was the plot? Why does any of this matter? It doesn't. Nothing happens and then the movie is over. Logan's Run is very similar, only that, at least, is awful because it's a silly B-movie, rather than being a pretentious pile of Wookiee dung. And it also has a plot.

Winter Passing: From the DVD cover, and the fact that Zooey Deschanel (whom I adore) and Will Ferrell are in it, one would assume this movie is another quirky indie comedy. It isn't. It's "sewious dwama," by which I mean it's about sad, broken people who supposedly grow by the end even though they really don't/shouldn't. Deschanel plays a self-destructive actress who goes back home and Learns About Her Family, and blah blah. Ed Harris plays the exact same character he played in The Hours, only heterosexual, this time: a broken, mostly suicidal author living like a sick recluse. Again, yawn. Give it a pass.

Man, I hate so much. So much! But I want to love!

Netflix Interlude: A List of Things that Appear in Tokyo Gore Police

2009-02-13T10:30:00.002-05:00

Having just watched the most ridiculous epic of our times, the over-the-top-so-far-it's-under-the-bottom and yet strangely glorious Tokyo Gore Police, Japanese cinema's thematic follow-up to Machine Girl, I thought about doing a review. But a review would not do it justice. This is the kind of movie that Chris Sims loves to summarize. It's absolutely mad. So I'll just list a few of the details that are in this baby. Like so:

Characters called "Engineers" whose wounds morph into monstrous body-horror weapons
Topless women with sewn-shut scars in place of nipples
Top half? Lady. Bottom half? Fearsome, toothy maw.
An Engineer gets his wang bitten off only for it to transform into a mutant cock shotgun
A drawing-and-quartering
Exploding heads
A quadruple amputee in a BDSM gimp suit with swords for arms and legs
The above, but with assault rifles
A man getting his hands cut off
An old medical examiner with a blue fauxhawk
A gun that shoots fists
TV commercials glorifying and selling wrist-cutting products
PSAs against seppuku
A snail woman
A guy who bleeds so hard that the force of his bleeding propels him into the air like a rocket

Etc. And yet, it's still often dull in parts. Half of this movie consists of shots of blood spraying everywhere.

But if you like absolutely gratuitous violence, copious amounts of gore, and utter, utter nonsense, this is the perfect movie for you.

Netflix Diary 2

2009-02-09T11:31:00.003-05:00

All I've been doing is watching movies. Oh God. Help me. Send women.

---

Color Me Kubrick: Yeah, the trailer made this one out to be a lot more fun than it ended up being. John Malkovich plays Alan Conway, an alcoholic con man who goes around pretending to be Stanley Kubrick so that people will buy him things. Hilarity should rightfully ensue, but instead it's more like a sad clown going around making other people sad. The most fun I had watching this was counting how many of the actors appeared in Doctor Who or its various spinoffs. The answer? A lot. I suppose there would've been more in this for me were I more familiar with the real Kubrick's career, as there's a lot of allusions/riffs on his work here-- I caught some Clockwork Orange and Spartacus refs, but most of it surely went over my head. Anyway, I don't recommend this. It turns 85 minutes into a long haul.

Dan in Real Life: I would also assume that romantic comedies are supposed to be, you know, comedic. This one isn't. It's more of a drama about a guy who is known for giving many readers advice on life (we don't see/hear any of it in the film) but whose own life is falling apart a bit. Things get more and more awkward until everyone just decides that things are okay again. Yawn.

Fido: Here's a good one. A film that I could only describe as "Shaun of the Dead meets Lassie," this charming little movie is about a boy and the docile zombie he befriends. It takes place in a bizarre, Tim-Burton-esque 50s-era world where everything's just quaint and peachy except, oh yeah, zombies are the new slaves, that is, when they're not trying to eat you. All the world's children are now desensitized to violence and trained to shoot zombies in the face. Anyway, things break down a bit and trouble brews, of course. The tone is quite interesting, but the farce and the emotional content blend pretty well in the end. Carrie-Anne Moss puts in a good performance. I might have to buy this one. It's an excellent little entry into the zombie oeuvre.

The Good Night: I knew nothing about this going in other than it had Martin Freeman and Danny DeVito in it. Imagine my pleasant surprise when the first two shots of the film feature Jarvis Cocker (of Pulp) and Simon Pegg (of awesomesauce). It had to be good, right? Well, it was okay-- a twisting drama of a man who finds reality to be unfulfilling, so he regresses into his dreams, only to become unfulfilled by those in the end, too. I think it was labeled as a comedy, as well. Who decides genres these days? Life has comedic moments, sure, but that doesn't turn life into a comedy. Same with some of these movies. Anyway, this one was okay. A bit too slow in places, and held up by Simon Pegg being quite funny, as usual.

Meet Bill: This one's the story of a sad guy named Bill who hates his life and decides to make it better by... well, quitting. Naturally, I can relate, but that just further depresses me. Jessica Alba's character is completely pointless, but then, so's her career. Aaron Eckhart is pretty decent in the title role, Elizabeth Banks further demonstrates her ubiquity, and the kid from that Jack&Bobby show does surprisingly well. A decent way to kill an hour and a half, I guess.

The Nines: I also knew nothing about this going in, except that Ryan Reynolds is in it. That man can make anything entertaining by his reaction shots alone. And we get a few of those in this, sure. It's a very odd, three-part sort of movie in which Reynolds plays multiple roles and the audience slowly comes to understand just what the hell is happening, almost. It's a bit weird, it's a bit meta, but I enjoyed the way the connections came together. Really, it's just hella strange, and I can't even begin to explain the plot, but it involves levels of reality and people being other people and things not being what they seem. If you enjoy working through confusion, see it.

Severance: I've been meaning to see this for a while, because it's a British horror-comedy and James Moran wrote it. Again, however, tone becomes important-- there's a lot more horror than comedy. That's alright, I guess. The horror is pretty good and everything. Unfortunately, the whole thing wasn't very funny. But the last line is priceless. So, yeah. It's okay. Not everything can be Shaun of the Dead. Woo. Scintillating review.

Now go away, I have movies to watch.

Netflix Diaries: 2/4/09 - 2/6/09

2009-02-07T12:57:00.004-05:00

Well, well! Another interminable stretch of time has passed on this empty desert I call a "blog," and nothing new has been posted. I guess I haven't had much to say. Or perhaps I did and didn't feel like saying it. And then, I suppose, there's those things I wanted to say that I've forgotten.

This post, however, may be the first in a series. I say "may" because I get distracted and/or bored quite easily. But here's the deal: I just signed onto Netflix this week and have begun watching seemingly endless hours of marvelous and horrible cinema through instant streaming on the ol' Xbox 360. This will be the place where I blather on about what I watched. Because I know my imaginary audience craves an infinite stream of my amazing opinions! Off we go:

Instant:

Maniac Cop: One of the few Bruce Campbell movies I hadn't yet seen, this mid-80s horror/thriller is a terrifically bad movie. Once again, Bruce plays a guy who only really becomes the hero by default, and then proceeds to do nothing really heroic, though I guess he at least sort of distracted the Maniac Cop by getting punched in the face long enough for said Cop to accidentally impale himself. But sure. It's not a very good movie, but it's got some fun stunts, some neat cameos (Sam Raimi! Jake the hillbilly from Evil Dead 2! Jake LaMotta!), and, of course, The Chin. Oh. And Shaft is in it. So it ain't all bad.

No Country for Old Men: Seriously? This won Best Picture? Geez. I'd been looking forward to seeing this for aaaages, and finally got the chance. Well, I didn't like it, really. At all. I usually love the Coens, but this one did nothing for me. None of their signature sparkling dialogue was to be found, and long stretches of plodding, plodding, plodding actually started putting me to sleep. Josh Brolin is a cipher, Javier Bardem's haircut outperforms him, Tommy Lee Jones is living furniture, Woody Harrelson is Woody Harrelson, and Kelly Macdonald's lovely Scottish lilt is nowhere to be seen. These people can do better. Really. But at least it keeps up the streak of me really not enjoying the Best Picture winner, like, ever. Since Forrest Gump, at least.

The Omega Man: Now, here we go. As devoted a fan of Chuck Heston as I am, having adored just about everything in which he's ever starred, in fashions ironic or otherwise (gotta love El Cid, the Naked Jungle, Planet of the Apes, and, of course, Soylent Green), I had never seen this. Oh my, am I glad I have. This is probably the best of Heston's "dystopian sci-fi" films, as he plays Robert Neville, the last man on Earth-- or is he?-- who spends his days cruising around town, hallucinating, talking to himself, watching Woodstock footage over and over, and shooting up robed, albino mutants with a submachine gun. When the plagues came, some of the infected turned into weird, hooded Puritan monster men who want nothing more than to rid the world of science and technology and revel in their dark ages-- but they've gotta kill Chuck to do it! And he ain't havin' none of that.

Really, this film is just ten kinds of awesome. Heston wanders around shirtless when he's not dressed like Jon Pertwee in Doctor Who, plays chess with a bust of Caesar, and falls in love with a blaxploitation caricature who-- gasp!-- begins to show real depth before the inevitable tragedy. But yeah, this movie's loads of fun, a veritable 70s masterpiece. Suck it, Will Smith in I Am Legend.

The Thing: No, I'd never seen this either. Yeah, this is the John Carpenter version, which is improved upon the original in that it has 1000% more Kurt Russell, Keith David, and Wilford "Diabeetus" Brimley. A bunch of dudes in Antarctica go paranoid when a shapeshifting alien invades their base. Excellent bottled premise, loads of creepy stuff going on, some great tension-ramping, and absolutely brilliant creature effects, especially since this came out 27 years ago. Kurt Russell's finest film? Maybe... this or Captain Ron, surely.

On disc:

Sunshine: This is that 2007 movie directed by Danny Boyle and starring the Scarecrow and the Human Torch on a journey to reignite the sun. It sounds awesome-- I love me some helionauts-- but the lovely Bradburian premise only gets it so far. At first, one thinks the movie is a well-shot, indie arthouse space flick. But then it becomes a disaster movie, and then some kind of thriller/slasher picture, and then I wasn't quite sure what the hell was happening at the end because of how confusing the shots were, and then it was over. All in all, it was decent, I guess, but it never really pulled together for me. Scarecrow and the Torch hate each other, then they try to save each other, then they hate each other again, but it's all about the "mission," and, yawn.

Things You Should Know About Me I

2008-06-30T18:05:00.003-05:00

1. The "Director" and "Producer" claims on the sidebar are pretty much lies. The "Writer" claim is debatable. The "Crazy Person" is true. I have a certificate. It's laminated, mostly so I don't accidentally die from a paper cut.

2. My hatred for John Travolta knows only one bound: Pulp Fiction. (The Samuel L. Jackson Effect cancels out the Travolta Factor, thereby enabling the Willis Quotient and Walken Vector to create a cinematic triumph).

3. #1 was a lie. It's not laminated.

4. I find White Castle to be delicious, even though it makes my intestines want to be out-testines.

5. I will watch anything that has Simon Pegg in it.

6. My Google-fu is better than yours.

7. Doctor Who is really, really, really, really, really, really awesome. David Tennant makes me confused about my sexuality. (Not really.)

8. Whenever I attempt to do an accent from any of the British Isles, it quickly lapses into very poor Scottish.

9. The URL ("loaf of doom") of this blog is the combination of my favorite word and my favorite phrase.

10. The sun is my natural enemy.

Happy New Year

2008-06-30T18:02:00.003-05:00

Yes, it's nearly July. Shut up.

No one knows this blog exists even if I post on Comics Should Be Good (though not as often as I should) in something resembling a frequency. But I should maybe have some content on here or something in the event that someone accidentally lands on this here blog and uses it to judge whether life is worth living or not. Though, frankly, reading it will probably land them on "not," though I should remind you that a good 15% of my readership does not have the urge to hurt themselves upon visiting this site, thank you very much.

Favorite suffix?

2007-12-11T19:27:00.001-05:00

I like "-opolis."

Additions to Bill's Favorite Words

2007-09-02T00:01:00.000-05:00

6. Homunculus
7. Zeitgeist

Happy Birthday, Steve Guttenberg!

2007-08-24T15:06:00.001-05:00

Still rocking at 49 years young, I'm sure. One day, I'll write that USA Network series just for you. You'll see.

Meanwhile, I can't wait for Three Men and a Middle-Aged Lady.

I just had an out-of-personality experience.

2007-08-18T23:34:00.000-05:00

'Twas like I was spying on my own brain, and recalling my emotions as if they belonged to someone else. Strange.

Comics genius Mike Wieringo has died.

2007-08-13T13:17:00.000-05:00

Rest in peace, Ringo. You were great.

Blog About Nothing

2007-08-12T14:05:00.000-05:00

I've decided this is a "blog about nothing," much like Seinfeld was a "show about nothing." Except this blog is rarely funny, and therefore more realistic.

I'm not really sure why I keep this site up, even. I did write some good posts back in the day. That was two years ago. You should go read them. Heh.

Otherwise, catch me at Comics Should Be Good every day.

Bill War Journal 8/10/07

2007-08-10T11:43:00.000-05:00

It's been a harrowing week-and-a-half, but my standoff with Wal-Mart has come to an end. They shall provide me with Hot Fuzz in widescreen and I get to keep the bonus disc.

Good thing it didn't come to a hunger strike.

Bill's Favorite Words

2007-08-05T13:16:00.000-05:00

I've probably done a post like this before. Oh well.

1. Loaf
2. Haberdashery
3. Portcullis
4. Zeppelin
5. Sandwich

Introducing: My new Fantasy Adventure series of novels.

2007-07-27T19:26:00.001-05:00

Here's a preview of the titles in the semi-autobiographical seven-book series:

Bill Reed and the Shatner's Kidney Stone

Bill Reed and the Chamberpot of Secretions

Bill Reed and the Pensioner of Alzheimer's

Bill Reed and the Giblets of Filler

Bill Reed and the Opera of the Phantom

Bill Reed and the Half-Black Artist Formerly Known as Prince

Bill Reed and the Dastardly Hellos

Thoughts?

She cannot doooo... the Smurrrrrrf.

2007-07-25T17:31:00.000-05:00

This blog is over three years old. Surprisingly. Yes. And I've done next-to-nothing with it. Haha.

Also, I have fallen completely in love with Rilo Kiley's song "The Frug." And not just because of the Robocop reference.

That is all. Continue your fulfilling lives.

The Greatest Scam Perpetuated on Mankind

2007-06-24T17:51:00.000-05:00

Bottled water.

Followed by the Electoral College.

My Favorite Ducks

2007-06-06T19:30:00.000-05:00

Not really in order of preference, but almost. Google and/or Wiki the ones you're not familiar with.

1. Darkwing Duck
2. Howard the Duck
3. Scrooge McDuck
4. Destroyer Duck
5. Count Duckula
6. Daffy Duck/Duck Dodgers
7. Plucky Duck
8. The Mighty Ducks (from the animated series)
9. Duckman
10. Donald Duck
11. Launchpad McQuack
12. Gizmoduck
13. NegaDuck
14. Moby Duck
15. The Aflac Duck
16. Baby Huey
17. Psyduck
18. Huey
19. Dewey
20. Louie

Purposefully left off the list: Mallard Fillmore.

Did I miss any good ones?

I Remember.

2007-05-21T18:58:00.001-05:00

The awesomest thing on the internets

2007-04-22T00:09:00.000-05:00

Master Chief vs. Samus vs. the Covenant. This is maybe the coolest thing I've seen in a long time. Holy crap. I mean it. Jeezum crow. The dude who did this is a genius. Read the tags for some more info.

Watch it now. And don't blink or you'll miss something mind-blowingly awesome. And watch it till the end. Especially after the credits.

The Greatest Movie of All Time?

2007-04-13T23:39:00.000-05:00

I'm supposed to be writing a paper, but I've decided to watch a telecast of Robocop 3 instead. Geez, I haven't seen this in years and years-- maybe since it first hit TV. I used to love Robocop. Well, I still do, I just never act upon it. (Now I realize I have to somehow track down every issue of the Marvel Comics Robocop series. Damn.)

The cast is ridiculous. EVERYBODY is in this movie. Mako. Jill Hennessy. Stephen Root. Bradley Whitford. Rip Torn. CCH Pounder. The commandant from Malcolm in the Middle. The obligatory Kurtwood Smith archive footage. Hot damn. (No Peter Weller in this one, though. Bah.)

It's got jetpacks, robot ninjas, dirty cops, shootouts... it's got Dark Knight Returns-esque (after all, Frank Miller did co-write the thing, apparently) groups of corporate flunkies (the bad cops, and some thugs) versus a resistance movement (underground shmoes and disillusioned Detroit cops looking to do the right thing despite the consequences). There's a scene where Robocop punches through the windshield of a pimpmobile he's driving to shoot at a SWAT van of dirty cops. Did I mention the pimpmobile is on fire? And he's still coming at them? When the people of the city finally band together against OCP, there's even an old lady firing an automatic weapon! It's got Robocop flying in on a jetpack and blowing stuff up! Dear God, it's uncanny.

And it's got the return of the ED-209. Oh hell yeah. (Actually, I think they cut out the only ED-209 scene in the movie. Damn network television.)

So one would think it's the greatest movie ever, right? Well, no. Far from it. In fact, it's bloody awful. The acting, the cinematography, the production values... a lot of it is pretty subpar. I mean, it's got the best special effects ever, for 1984. Too bad it came out in 1993.

However, I still like it. I mean, it's hilarious. If anything, its overall quality is enhanced by its craptitude. It's so big and crazy, but the scope couldn't compete with the budget. Still-- dammit, they tried so hard. It's about time they were recognized for the effort. And it's a hell of an effort. Then again, what else would one expect from Frank Miller (Lord knows how badly they butchered his script--in fact, I don't even think he actually worked on this movie, but, whatever) and director Fred Dekker, the guy who helmed The Monster Squad. Yes, the one with "Wolfman's got nards!"

The film, if I dare call it that, is really just an over-the-top B-movie. I am perfectly okay with that. I love this kind of movie. Hell, I want to know why they haven't made a new Robocop movie! (Researching this, I discovered an animated series and a TV mini I hadn't heard about. Now, the original TV show, I knew, but... a mini-series made in 2000? I must find this. And something else called Robocop: Alpha Commando? What the hell are these things? Why did no one tell me about them?) If I ever find myself with any power at all in Hollywood... I'm bringing Robocop back. Right after I adapt Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency to the big screen.

Robocop 3 absolutely bombed at the box office. Box Office Mojo tells me it only made ten million in the theater. Compared to the first two, that's abysmal. I can see why it performed as such. Regardless, it now lives forever in Bill's Hall of Awesomeness, where many obscure, forgotten, or disrespected things can proudly exist. At least one person thinks they're cool, even if it's just me.

For more things in the Hall of Awesomeness, check out my (here comes the plug, do do doo doo) 365 Reasons to Love Comics column at Comics Should Be Good.

Something new from Bill every day.

2007-03-03T23:52:00.000-05:00

The 365 Reasons to Love Comics Archive at Comics Should Be Good. And check out the main page every day for a new Reason to love my favorite arts medium!

THE INTERNETZ IS MINE

2007-01-17T23:44:00.000-05:00

I'm on Comicspace now. You'll want to be my friend. Like the cool kids.

Also, I'm still doing the Comics Should Be Good thing. Seventeen days in and haven't missed yet! This is probably a record in terms of me doing stuff.

Soon I will control all of the internet superthoroughfare! MWAHAHAH

World's best redundant word

2007-01-16T00:51:00.000-05:00

Spunge

\Spunge\ (sp[u^]nj), n. A sponge. [Obs.]

I LIVE

2007-01-05T23:40:00.000-05:00

That's right. I dispatched your assassins. Ha. And I am up to things. Things and nefarious plans. Moohoohahahahahaha

Anyway, so, like, I've started a short-but-sweet daily column over at Comics Should Be Good entitled "365 Reasons to Love Comics." Look for it every day ending with Y.

Otherwise, I'm not doing much, excepting sitting around and watching MASH on DVD.

Batman Saves the Day

2006-11-25T22:11:00.000-05:00

Years ago, I discovered a Batman script sample on the internet so terrible, it boggled the mind. It stayed as an in-joke in instant messaging conversations for years, but it was lost to the winds of time and never seen again.

Until today.

Finally, my Google-Fu prevailed, and I discovered a dead URL. But hey, there's this Internet Archive thing now. Success! I've found it again: the worst script ever. It's called "Batman Saves the Day," and I save it here, for posterity's sake. Cherish this, my friends.

---

OCT/99
DEAR EDITOR PERSON:

My name is XXXXX XXXX. I am a resident of Canada. Lately I have been trying to break into the comic book business as a script writer. I have done much research on the subject. I have contacted different companies by mail, phone and E-mail. I have gotten books from the library, spoken to people at comic book stores, and even been to several conventions. I have finished high school and two years of college. I have even gotten hold of a real comic script. I have practiced writing in my spare time. I would now like to work for your company. I have included some of my work with this letter. I would like for you to glance at it and tell me if you are interested in my work in any way. Feel free to take your time looking over it, and responding. Thank you.

SINCERELY YOURS
XXXXX XXXX

Bat-sample script:

SAMPLE SCRIPT by XXXXX XXXX Starring Batman

Panel 1: It is past midnight in Gotham. We are looking at the downtown area of Gotham City. We see vapor coming from the many factories and buildings. We see atop one of the buildings we see the dark knight, Batman himself. He Has a serious look on his face as he peers out over his city. He is deep in thought. This is a back view of him. His cape flutters in the wind. The moon is partly hidden by the clouds.

#1 CAPTION (cap for short): The city seems quiet tonight. But looks can be deciving. Somewhere out there is some innocent person is being raped, murdered or worse.

#2 CAP: There are times when I wonder if I do any good

#3 TITLE: BATMAN SAVES THE DAY
#4 WRITER: XXXXX XXXX
#5 PENCILER: ######
#6 INKER: ######
#7 COLORIST: ######
#8 EDITOR : ######

PANEL 2: Batman hears a scream, he swings his head he has a frightened/concerned look on his face. This is a close up of his head.

#9 SOUND EFFECTS (SFX for short): EEEEKKKK!

#10 CAP: I knew it was too good to be true.

PANEL 3: Batman shoots out his cable thingee. As he does this he jumps off the side of the building we see his cape fly in the background.

#11 CAP: That scream was not the kind made by people fooling around. Someone was in dire need, and I intend to help them.

PAGE TWO
Panel 1: We change views we see an alley now in the alley we see an little old lady being mugged two young punks. The lady is short. She is terrified we see a tear coming down her cheek. She is screaming. The two punks are young. Their jackets are similar, one would think they were in a gang. One punk is grabbing for her purse. He has a red mohawk. The other is a black kid. In the background we see a scared alley cat hiss

#1 LADY: "OH GOD, SOMEONE HELP ME, PLEASE!!"
#2 PUNK: "Shut up and gimme yo purse lady."
#3 CAP: I never have to look very hard to find filth in this town.

PANEL 2: The lady falls down, the two punks turn and see the Batman come swinging down on his cord thingee. Batman looks mean, and ready to teach these punks a lesson. The punks are surprised by him. One punk even drops the purse.

#4 PUNK: "What the......"
#5 PUNK #2: "It's the Batman!"
#6 LADY: "sob..."

PANEL 3: Batman lands, as soon as he does this he is on the punks. Batguy lunges at the black punk, the punk tries to pull out his knife, but he is not fast enough
The other punk backs up against the wall, terrified

#7 CAP: I had to take these punks out fast and quick.
#8 CAP: I didn't see a gun, but I didn't want to take chances.
#9 PUNK #2: "The Batman, I'm outta here!"

PANEL 4: The old lady backs against the wall not knowing what was going on. Batman is finishing off the first punk. Batman smothers him. The other punk drops his knife and starts to run.

#10 CAP: I see his partner is running, not much of a friend is he?
#11 CAP: His friend will get a broken jaw, broken leg, and a dislocated arm.
#12 CAP: Fair enough payment for what he did to the woman.

PAGE THREE
PANEL 1: The punk tries to run, but the Batman is upon him. The punk is terrified. The old lady sits against the wall, not quite sure of what is happening. We see the other punk on the ground in much pain

#1 CAP: This punk is mine.
#2 PUNK: "Oh God! Oh God!"
#3 LADY: "Mother of Mercy....."

PANEL 2: Batman lands on the punk, smothers him, and incapacitates him. Exactly what the Batman does to him is not shown. We just see the punks face. He is in pain

#4 CAP: This punk is taken care of, the police will do the rest.

PANEL 3: The action is over. Batman rises ignoring the punks. They will not eb going anywhere. He calmly walks up to the old lady. As he does he extends his hand to help her. The woman extends her hand as well. She is crying. Batman feels sorry for her

#5 BATMAN: "Are you all right MIss, it is over. Those two will not be harming anyone any time soon."

#6 LADY: "Who...who are you?"
#7 BATMAN: "I am called the Batman."

PANEL 3: Batman helps the lady to her feet, as he does he hears police sirens

#8 SFX: WOOO WOO WOO

PANEL 4: The Bat starts on his way. He turns his back on the lady and makes his exit. before he does the lady asks him a question

#9 BATMAN: I must go, my work here is done."
#10 LADY: Wait young mane' "

PANEL 5: She smiles at him, she still has a few tears on her cheek, but she smiles

#11 LADY: "Thank you for saving my life young man. there are times when I thought there were no good people left in this city. I see now that I was very wrong.

#12 BATMAN: "Thank you Miss, I must go now."

PAGE FOUR
PANEL 1: The Bat shoots out his grappling cord thingee. He leaps away just as the cops come around the corner. The lady still has a few tears come down her cheek, but she has a smile on her face. She has her hands cupped. The two punks are on the ground out cold.

#1 CAP: My job here is done. The police will do the rest.

PANEL 2: The Bat lands on the roof of the building he just climbed. He dashes away, he does not even look back. We see the moon in the background.

#2 CAP: On an earlier note this night I was wondering if I had made any difference.

#3 CAP: That kind old lady I saved tonight showed me that I did.

PANEL 3: The Bat stands there on a roof ledge and looks out over his city as he did previously We see smog coming from several roof factories

#4 CAP: What that lady told me did more good for me than all the money in the world.

#5 CAP: Many times I have wondered about the path I would have chosen. wondered what would have happened if my parents had never died.

PANEL 4: In this panel shows a front view of the Bat standing on the ledge. His cape flaps in the wind

#6 CAP: But I learnt tonight that any act of good, no matter how small, makes a difference.

PANEL 5: This is another close up. In this panel we only see his face. The Bat smiles

#7 CAP: And that makes my burden just a little bit lighter.

Panel 6: The Bat shoots his grappling thingee and jumps away. This panel is silent.

Boot sector!? DIE

2006-08-05T21:39:00.000-05:00

Damn you, Microsoft!
My laptop crashed this morning;
Next time I buy Mac.

Guess what I just saw...

2006-08-04T00:56:00.000-05:00

My Most Hotly Anticipated Movie of 2007

2006-08-02T16:13:00.000-05:00

Take this, Spider-Man 3:

Dr. House sings

2006-07-31T21:26:00.000-05:00

Yeah, I've pretty much given up on updating this thing in any sense of regularity or coherence. If anything, you imaginary readers (maybe some poor schmoes who accidentally clicked onto this thing from the links at Comics Should Be Good) can expect, oh, sporadic non-sequitirs and wacky pictures and maybe an incoherent rant here or there.

Anyway, here's Hugh Laurie being awesome:

SHA---coughcough or "How To Cast a Captain Marvel Movie"

2006-07-05T12:20:00.000-05:00

Remember, I can't draw. At all. But this idea was too good to pass up. So here is Bruce Campbell as Captain Marvel!

Click to enlarge.

I didn't ink it because, well, when I ink things, I ruin them. And it took twenty minutes of fighting with my scanner to get this image looking like this, anyway. But... there it is! Voila!

Happy Father's Day

2006-06-18T21:12:00.000-05:00

2006-05-28T17:29:00.000-05:00

No, I haven't posted in a while.

Yes, Comics Should Be Good has moved. We're on CBR now. Clicky the linky.

Carry on.

The 2005 Year-in-Review Revue

2006-01-02T17:21:00.000-05:00

I’d like to say that year went by fast, but frankly I lost track of it anyway. January, you say? I didn’t notice. I’ve been too busy watching my Wonderfalls DVDs which all you gits should have purchased and watched and loved by now. It’s the most brilliant cancelled show in years.

So, did this year suck? A bit. I think. From what I can remember. Good year for storms. And pirates. And yeah, there were a few good comics which will be covered over on Comics Should Be Good over the next week or so. Check those out. My opinions are the best. Naturally.

I’m speaking in very short sentences today. Phrases, mostly. Defying the rules of grammar? Yes. Screw grammar. I am a writer, and hence I can invent my own grammar. Other poor schmucks have to abide by the rules. Poor bastards.

(Is my surliness coming across as comedic or more assholish? I’m trying to perfect my asshole comedy.)

Anyway, 2005. Let’s all just agree that it sucked now and move on. But then, what about those gleaming bright spots throughout the craptacularity (it’s a word now, dammit. Yes, I could’ve just said ‘craptacle’ but there’s no going back now) of the past 26 fortnights? They deserve coverage too. So I’ll talk about, like, pop culture. Because, y’know, reality? I’m not a big fan. I try not to pay attention to it. It hates me enough as it is.

Best Movie: There were a few contenders for this. Naturally, there are the nerd picks, which include Batman Begins, as well as the movie I eventually chose as my favorite. But then, there was Sin City, which had surprising mainstream appeal (especially for a black and white comic adaptation that may be the most violent movie ever). Another good one was The 40 Year Old Virgin, the funniest movie I’ve seen in years. However, these cannot surpass the glory that was Serenity. We nerds stick with our own. Action! Comedy! Romance! Fist-pumping awesomeness! How could I ever doubt Joss Whedon? I mean, I was no big fan of Firefly, but the movie made a believer out of me and it totally kicked Star Wars’s ass. Yes, Revenge of the Spliff sucked, though not as much as War of the Worlds.

Side note: This year, I hit a record for most times I ended up watching stuff in the theater for full price. Damn. I hate spending money.

Best TV Show: Now, it was not Lost. You Lost nerds can skip to the next part now, and the truly righteous will keep reading.

Still with us? Good. Okay, this year I officially became addicted to medical dramas. House! Grey’s Anatomy! ER reruns on TNT every morning! I know. Dreadful, isn’t it? And then, well, there was the return of Family Guy. And Arrested Development remained the world’s smartest comedy. So what did I end up going with?

Boston Legal. Yes, I still shamelessly love this show (Canada episode? Best episode ever.) I’m going to cheat, however, and declare it a tie. The co-winner? House. I mean, I never thought a cohabitation domicile could carry a doctor show either, but it did.

Edit: Never mind. Screw it. I'm giving it to Arrested Development anyway. Bwahaha.

Best Book: What the hell’s a book?

I’d do an Actor/Director/Writer thing, but I’m lazy. So, screw it. Hee hee.

P.S. I’ve become addicted to this Kingdom of Loathing game. Yes, I’m the last one to find out about it. But it’s fun. Try it out if you haven’t already. It’s a good game for nerds and dorks. Like yourselves, lowly peasants, for I am your Nerd King.

Of course, I’ve only just now become addicted to the Grand Theft Auto games (except San Andreas which refuses to work on my Xbox, the bastard), but I already know I’m the last person on Earth to start playing that. Bah.

Go buy Wonderfalls now. I command thee.

Addendum:

You are Wash. Not only are you a great pilot, you
are also the joker of the group. Your devotion
to your wife is admirable, though you sometimes
feel insecure. Thank god you shaved off your
moustache.

Which Firefly character are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

We all saw this coming.

Coolest Old People

2005-12-08T21:02:00.000-05:00

So here's a top ten list of the coolest old people that are still alive. I think they pretty much speak for themselves, and I'm too lazy to make with the 'splainy. Readysetgogogadgethotpants!

10. Hugh Hefner
9. Bob Barker
8. Stan Lee
7. Carol Channing
6. Kurt Vonnegut
5. Sean Connery
4. Alan Alda
3. Adam West
2. William Shatner
1. Abe Vigoda

Honorable Mentions: Michael Caine, Clint Eastwood, Gerald Ford, Angela Lansbury, Carl Reiner, Andy Rooney, Elvis.

ASS2ASS*

2005-11-18T22:11:00.000-05:00

It's later. Here's more.

All-Star Superman, simply put, is brilliant. Grant Morrison just instinctively *gets* it. Buy it now.

P.S. See what I did with the title there? Utilizing the acronym of the comic and relating it to the name of Morrison's band, ass2ass? No? Well, I thought it was funny...

This Just In...

2005-11-16T17:07:00.000-05:00

All-Star Superman = Awesome.

More later.

The Greatest Thing of All Time

2005-10-31T18:22:00.000-05:00

One guy playing a jaunty tune and reading out 700 hobo names for an hour.

It's utterly brilliant.

(And is that 'Big Rock Candy Mountain' he's strumming?)

I am a leaf on the wind.

2005-10-02T19:48:00.000-05:00

Go see Serenity.

NOW!

Best Ye Be Talkin' Like a Pirate, or It Be the Plank for Yeh!

2005-09-19T15:15:00.000-05:00

Avast, ye land-lubbers. 'Tis the 19th of Septembarrr, and so it be Talk Like a Pirate Day! Yarrr. And if ye don't wish to be walkin' the plank or swabbin' the poop deck or fetchin' me bunghole, ye be wantin' to pay attention to me pimpin' this'n following comical novelette: Scurvy Dogs!

This be true pirate literature, it be. Also it be hilarious and zany romp about pirates and hobos and monkeys and Portuguese lepers and pop culture references. Arr.

Buy it here, but be lookin' at their site first, matey. Truly, it be the funniest comic book evarrr made.

Gyarr. It's a pirate's life for me.

I Will Write Aquaman for Free (DC, I'm callin' you out!)

2005-09-12T17:33:00.000-05:00

Reprinted from Comics Should Be Good:

Attention! DC Editorial. This is Bill Reed speaking. Do not adjust your monitors. I am in control of the internet. It's also come to my attention, thanks to Lying in the Gutters (no fancy links, I'm pressed for time! You all know where it is, anyway), that no creative team has yet been chosen for Aquaman (unless it has. In which case, bah).

I offer you my services, for free. I shall write Aquaman, and it shall be glorious. And it will cost you nothing.

All I ask for is one year to prove my mettle; and in that time, (or even six months), if sales are not doubled on what they current are (which is from 15-17k if I remember correctly), I shall eat something which most folks would consider inedible.

Trust me; I've got a fun pitch. I've got mad ideas. I am Grant Morrison Jr. (When I say "Grant Morrison" out loud, I transform into a pint-sized super-version of him!). I can do this. No sweat.

With a decent enough artist, hopefully one that's at least slightly well-known, and quite capable, I can make Aquaman the brilliantly awesome comic it was meant to me. Arthurian fantasy. Madcap modpop. The thing writes itself.

And if you get Mike Allred to draw it, I'll pay you twenty dollars.

That is all. You are free to go. For now. But remember my offer. One day, I'll have to write Aquaman. Might as well get it over with, eh?

Aquaman Should Be Good. Over and out.

*ksshk*

Brains.

2005-09-05T17:23:00.000-05:00

Yes, now I'm stealing gimmicks from other blogs. Blog link of the now!

Anyway, continuing the short-but-sweet blogging ditties, I've been playing a lot of Urban Dead, a text-ish-based zombie apocalypse massively multiplayer online RPG. It is fun. Check it out.

Watch this space

2005-09-05T15:57:00.000-05:00

For those of you interested.

2005-09-04T17:57:00.000-05:00

This is for my own records.
Continue going about your business.

Da Fug!

2005-08-29T12:24:00.000-05:00

No, I never got around to writing that Seaguy thesis or whatever, but here's a post I just made on another message board which sums up most of my thoughts:

Yeah, Seaguy is pretty bewildering, but I liked it. It's a fugue-like madcap romp in a world that doesn't know it's crazy, and has charming characters and kooky stuff and all the things one likes in Grant Morrison comics. It seems to be mainly about how corporations and brands are trying to homogenize the world and rob it of its special qualities, and of the power of the individual; after all, individuation is a key theme in most of Morrison's stuff.

Seaguy is also the story of a child's life, or at least, I think so. We've got Seaguy, who is, apparently, a superhero, but he never really goes on any adventures; it could be all in his head, with Chubby da Choona as his "imaginary friend." There are also the parent figures; Anti-Dad is the father and he "dies" but his presence still lingers (I'm sure he's behind Mickey Eye, somehow), and as the "child" that is Seaguy discovers the horrors of the world, in his process of becoming an "adult," his world falls apart around him, the shadows creep in, it seems like everyone's after him, something harmless and cuddly turns into a giant penis monster, his "imaginary friend" dies, the girl he has a crush on (She-Beard... and if that's not a euphemism, I don't know what is) rejects him, the friendly old guy he hung out with turns out to be just like any other adult (evil and in the world of business... it's like when you hear that Mr. Rogers was a sniper in the military) and he runs off to hide with his mummy (mommy) on the moon, but the horrors of the adult world follow him anyway, and then brainwash him into being an imagination-less slave of an evil conglomerate.

So it's really a coming-of-age story about puberty and adolescence.

The ambiguous ending has me wanting more. Does the wink mean Seaguy remembers Chubby and is totally on top of the world, or that he only *thinks* he knows what's going on, but is really just a pathetic cog in the machine? I'm dying for the other two mini-series to wrap it up, but Cameron Stewart tells us that nothing's in the pipeline yet and might not be for some time, or ever. So who knows? Maybe Mickey Eye wins after all.

Stuff.

2005-08-23T19:44:00.000-05:00

For those of you who may be interested: Penultimate Battlers, over at the Parodyverse. The second in a series of concentrated superhero madness filled with crazy ideas and imagination, much like this "Lithium Age" I've been talking about.

And over at Comics Should Be Good: Egg Story review.

Sent from a Lappy
Probably in the basement