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An Asinine Hodgepodge

So I’m browsing the ‘net mindlessly this afternoon, and decide to take a peek at the Star Tribune’s movie page just to see if any new movies have come out I may be interested in. And what do I see halfway down the page but a story to the movie “Alone in the Dark” that came out this week, and this is what the synopsis said before you even click to read their review:

If you took the 100 worst ideas ever conceived for a science-fiction film, rattled them around in a Lotto tumbler and spilled them out onto the screen at random, you could not produce a more asinine hodgepodge than this.

How many people do you think will even read that review, much less go to that movie? That cracks me up, tell it like it is Star-Trib!

The Breakfast Club

John Hughes’ seminal teenage movie, The Breakfast Club, turns 20 next month. I stumbled across an article on the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel discussing the film’s anniversary. It briefly covers the movie, and also 5 things you might not know, 5 things that would be different, and 5 reasons why it’s still relevant.

The Breakfast Club still remains my favorite John Hughes movie, but Pretty in Pink has to be a close second. The Breakfast Club introduced us to the actors that become the Brat Pack in the late 80’s, and the view on high school it had in 1985 isn’t too different even 20 years later.

Why DRM is Evil, and what it means to your DVD Collection

Cory Doctorow discusses why you can’t legally back up your DVDs and who is to blame. Suffice to say, DRM, Digital Rights Management, is evil.

Cory Doctorow, European OutReach Coordinator for the EFF, is a science fiction author, DRM expert, and blogger.

One of my favorite authors on the evils of DRM, he once even gave a speech, at Microsoft, on the evils of DRM. From the speech, introducing himself to the crowd, he sums up what he does:

I work for the Electronic Frontier Foundation on copyright stuff (mostly), and I live in London. I’m not a lawyer — I’m a kind of mouthpiece/activist type, though occasionally they shave me and stuff me into my Bar Mitzvah suit and send me to a standards body or the UN to stir up trouble.

Last Starfighter: The Musical

Ah, the 80’s. When I was young, impressionable, and naive.

From the goodness that is BoingBoing, I bring you: The Last Starfighter: The Musical, an off Broadway production.

Jason Scott’s blog has the review.

One of my favorite movies, I remember when Jason bought this a year or two back (at full price, no less) and we watched it. And then John mentioned a month or two back he had bought it too.

Must add to the wishlist.

Random Goodness

Boing Boing is full of random goodness today.

First, BB has a link to Found Item Clothing, who has re-created the shirts from the movie Real Genius that Chris Knight (played by Val Kilmer wore).

Next, BB points out that William Gibson (of Neuromancer and other books’ fame) has started blogging again.

It looks like the current election cycle has gotten to him. Let me quote one of the jokes he has up on his site:

President Bush goes to an elementary school to talk about the war.

After his talk, he offers to answer questions. One little boy puts up his hand and the president asks him his name.

“I’m Billy, sir.”

“And what’s your question, Billy?”

“I have three questions, sir. Why did the US invade Iraq without the support of the UN? Why are you President when Al Gore got more votes? And whatever happened to Osama Bin Laden?”

Just then the bell rings for recess. Bush announces that they’ll continue after recess.

When they return, Bush asks, “OK, where were we? Question time! Who has a question?”

Another little boy raises his hand. The president asks his name.

“I’m Steve, sir.”

“And what’s your question, Steve?”

“I have five questions, sir. Why did the US invade Iraq without the support of the UN? Why are you President when Al Gore got more votes? Whatever happened to Osama Bin Laden? Why did the recess bell go off twenty minutes early? And what the heck happened to Billy?”

Help a Fat Guy Out!

So here I am watching NFL football.. watching the CBS feed on NFL Ticket and Kevin Smith pops in a commercial for Jersey Girl.

Holy crap was it funny – he holds up a picture of his wife, says how hot she was and a guy who looks like him needs the bling bling to keep her. So buy his movie. And help a fat guy out.

His self-deprecating humor cracks me up.

On a related note, I watched Jersey Girl this past Tuesday.

It was one of his better films, and very much unlike anything he has done before. While hints of his style and his older films were there (the jokes in the beginning, the 80s references, the obligatory Star Wars reference) the story was touching without being too sweet. And as much of a hard time as Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez got / get, I thought they had amazing chemistry on screen. (Don’t worry, she dies early in the flim). George Carlin has acting chops few know about, and the the girl who plays Gertie was a great actress for one so young. I highly recommend it.

Sunday Sunday Sunday!

Ahh, NFL kickoff Sunday. Sitting here in the living room with the laptop wirelessly, flipping between games, currently on Bengals @ Jets.

Saw Resident Evil 2 last night. It was entertaining, closer to a rental than in the theater, but we had a good time.

White Chocolate Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups are weird.

In general silwenae.net news, I have my old blog re-installed, but I cannot get it imported into this one for whatever reason. Both the RSS importer and the b2evo2wp importer crap out. I might look into doing it by hand, but blech.

Have some plans for the silwenae.net homepage, but all this CSS & PHP stuff needs to be learned.

I did get my GPG key uploaded so now you can email me securely!

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The Passion of the Clerks

Tomorrow, Clerks X is released on DVD. This 10th anniversary edition of Kevin Smith’s Clerks is the definitive version of the movie including the original cut of the film shown at the Sundance Film Festival, as well as the version released in theaters.

But wait, there’s more! Kevin Smith has been hinting that he would be doing a “small project” prior to Green Hornet. And it’s a sequel to Clerks, tentatively titled “The Passion of the Clerks”. (Link to press release on Kevin Smith’s site, View Askew).

Jumping the Shark

I think Inside the Actor’s Studio has jumped the shark.

I have my TiVo set to record all of the new episodes, and the latest one with the cast of Will & Grace, was disappointing.

About 6 months ago, NBC bought out Bravo (as you can see from the re-airings of West Wing, Boomtown, and the Queer Eye for the Straight Guy partnership).

If NBC hadn’t bought Bravo, would we have seen the cast of Will & Grace on Inside the Actor’s Studio? Probably not. As one of the anchor’s for NBC’s Must See TV Thursday night, and soon to be “the” anchor with the demise of Friends after this season, I believe NBC used the Actor’s Studio to help position Will & Grace.

At the beginning of the show during the interviews, James Lipton even introduces the President of Bravo (and VP of NBC) who is sitting in the audience.

The show itself wasn’t bad – I might not care for Will & Grace, but with the 4 lead actors they also had the two main writers, and James Burroughs (director). It was interesting to hear them talk and James Burroughs is an icon himself, with his work on Taxi, and directing 75% of all Cheers episodes.

I can appreciate NBC flexing their marketing muscle. And I understand why they purchased Bravo. But I think it’s unfortunate that the one show that should have remained pure and free from marketing bias was affected.

(And I’m still waiting for the anniversary episode that Will Ferrell referred to on Dinner for Five on IFC – where Will Ferrell (as James Lipton) interviews James Lipton!)