Andrew Gumbel in this week's L.A. City Beat takes a look at the mess that is the Democratic primary system and how it's affecting Obama, Clinton, and the ultimate showdown with John McCain.
It’s an odd moment to be turning to Eliot Spitzer for any sort of wisdom – on politics, or anything else. But the man said something inescapably interesting in the first of his brief, excruciating responses to the prostitution ring scandal – the one where he had his devastated wife clutch hold of him from behind while he offered an apology about as heartfelt as a public-address announcement at the DMV.
Here’s what he said: “I do not believe that politics in the long run is about individuals. It is about ideas, the public good, and doing what is best.”
In context, of course, this sounded like so much self-serving horseshit, some tiny glimmer of an attempt to convince New Yorkers that having a flaming hypocrite for a governor might still somehow be okay. That lasted about two minutes. But Spitzer – precisely because he was being so self-serving – also hit on one of the deeper conundrums of American politics. It is always, theoretically, about the greater good – the realization of ideas, not just personal ambitions. But, as we know, those personal ambitions (and character flaws) keep getting in the way. In fact, the system just about ensures that personality, and the clash of personalities, trump ideas and progress every time. Just look at Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, and the sorry state of their battle for the Democratic presidential nomination.
It wasn’t just Governor Spitzer’s career that melted down last week. The entire Democratic Party primary process melted down right along with him. How do we know this? We know it because when Barack Obama won the Wyoming caucus and the Mississippi primary, it barely mattered anymore. We know it because, for all the wrangling about Michigan and Florida, neither of them necessarily matter all that much anymore either.
The results don’t matter because the whole process has become a lie, a sort of small-d democratic con job. Anyone honestly looking at the state of the race knows that Obama will – barring some freak occurrence – end up in June with more pledged delegates than Clinton, and a bigger share of the popular vote. If the voice of the people were paramount here, then the contest would be over already. The party could embrace Obama as its nominee, put an end to all the damaging negativity, and start building up the guy rather than, à la Hillary, finding every possible means to pull him down.
The fact that Hillary is still fighting gives us a big clue that this is not about the voice of the people at all. It’s about raw power and the manipulation of a system that is already loaded, unfair, and byzantine to try to reach a desired outcome, will of the people be damned. The Clinton’s campaign spin – that Obama can only win in “boutique” states, that caucuses don’t really count, that he only appeals to “latte liberals,” not “real” Democrats and “real” American voters – ignores the hard reality of the numbers, which is that she is behind in this contest by any objective measure and is more than likely to remain so to the end.
Her suggestion that some votes are more “real” than others follows an inglorious tradition in this country of trying to exclude certain groups from participating in the political process at all – blacks, newly naturalized immigrants, Catholics, factory workers, reformist intellectuals, and so on. The Clinton campaign even appears to have embraced the overtly racist aspect of this tradition, distancing itself only hesitantly from Geraldine Ferraro’s outrageous remarks about Obama’s candidacy and apparently calculating that, in Pennsylvania at least, awakening the racist sensibilities of all those blue collar former Reagan Democrats might have political mileage.
Granted, the crisis in the Democratic Party is not just about Hillary’s overweening ambition and distasteful campaign tactics. The party has been trying for decades to rig the primary process in such a way as to insulate itself from unpleasant surprises, and now it is receiving the biggest conceivable karmic kick up the rear end.
Everything about the process is designed to favor the establishment candidate – the kickoff in white, relatively conservative states like Iowa and New Hampshire, the quick pile-on of races on Super Tuesday (itself originally conceived as a regional primary in the South to keep upstarts like Jesse Jackson at bay) and, of course, the votes accorded to unelected superdelegates, who make up the backbone of the party and have the option, if they feel the need to exercise it, to buck the will of the people at the national convention.
Most years, the primary battle is quick and painless, precisely because it is so unfair. Sometimes, for sure, it takes a little extra effort to silence upstarts like Gary Hart, or Jesse Jackson, or Howard Dean. This year, though, the extraordinary success of the Obama campaign has torn the party rulebook to shreds, making it unclear which side the establishment should be on and exposing the entire jerry-built system to ridicule. Some of the greatest absurdities have been at the Clinton campaign’s expense. She won the Nevada caucuses by a six-point margin, yet ended up with one fewer delegate.
And she won the Texas primary – albeit narrowly – only to lose the delegate fight there because of the Lone Star state’s weird allocation system, and because of its even weirder hybrid system that had voters returning to their precincts for caucuses as soon as the vote was over. I’m old-fashioned enough to believe that the winner of an election should be the candidate with the most votes, but those aren’t the rules by which this fight is being conducted, on either side. If the Clinton campaign is behaving worse, it is because they are ones running behind. For sure, Hillary had a choice – whether she would bow out for the sake of party unity and the bigger prize of victory in November, or whether she would embark on the high-risk strategy of trying to destroy her opponent and thus leave the party no option but to offer the nomination to her. The choice she made is her responsibility, and the damage it does will surely be laid at her door – especially if John McCain becomes the next president.
Once made, though, the choice taps right into the ugly electoral logic of fighting and winning at any cost, the sort of mano a mano combat we last saw play out in the Bush-Gore fiasco in Florida in 2000. It’s the absolute nightmare scenario for Democrats – two talented, potentially winning presidential candidates battering and bloodying each other so badly that the Republicans don’t have to do much more than sit back and watch. For Clinton to say John McCain is better prepared to be president than Obama is not just unforgivable – you can bet it will be played and replayed in television ads all summer and fall if Obama ends up being the nominee anyway.
Obama appears more conscious of the risks of going too negative, but he doesn’t have a whole lot of choice in the matter. Already he’s started asking tough questions about how much real-world governing experience Clinton gained as First Lady – questions that, once again, the Republicans can just lift to bolster their own campaign later in the year.
Mitt Romney said last week that the Clinton 3 a.m. red phone advert was “the greatest gift she could have given the McCain campaign,” because if she wants to make this election about national security experience then there is only one possible winner, and he’s not a Democrat. McCain can probably count on a few more similar gifts before this is all over. Who can stop the madness? Not the Democratic Party grandees, who are as divided amongst themselves as the candidates. And not the voters, who have already been put on notice that they don’t entirely count. Their job, at this point, is to provide political cover for whatever manipulative tricks the party chooses to pull to justify its ultimate decision.
Don’t expect the enthusiasm and high participation they – we – have shown in this primary season to sustain itself in the general election.
3.22.2008
3.08.2008
Top 10 "X-Files" Episodes
1. The one where Mulder and Scully get help on a murder investigation from Clyde Bruckman, the hangdog psychic who can predict how and when people die. The series’ best line: Scully’s “There are hits and there are misses. And then there are misses.” (“Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose”)
2. The one where Mulder and Scully uncover a government test to send murderous subliminal messages through TV signals. (“Wetwired”)
3. The one where Mulder and Scully pose as married couple Rob and Laura Petrie to investigate at a gated suburban community that uses a Tibetan monster to enforce the Homeowners Association rules. (“Arcadia”)
4. The one where Mulder and Scully pursue a man who uses telepathy to bend others to his will, a 1996 version of the Jedi mind trick. (“Pusher”)
5. The exceedingly oddball “meta” one where Jose Chung writes a salacious book about Mulder and Scully’s investigation of an alien abduction. (“Jose Chung’s From Outer Space”)
6. The one where Mulder and Scully battle two bitchy teenage girls whose violent telekinetic powers are linked to sharing a birthday with an unusual planetary aligment. (“Syzygy”)
7. The really, really creepy one where Mulder and Scully uncover a satanic cult among the teachers and PTA in a small town. (“Die Hand Die Verletzt”)
8. The one that’s a ripoff of The Thing where Mulder and Scully discover weird parasites in an Arctic research station that create murderous paranoia in its hosts. (“Ice”)
9. The one where Mulder and Scully fight deadly green insect swarms freed by old-growth logging in the Pacific Northwest. (“Darkness Falls”)
10. The one where Mulder and Scully investigate a murder among the freaks and carnies in a traveling circus. Also, Scully eats a bug. (“Humbug”)
2. The one where Mulder and Scully uncover a government test to send murderous subliminal messages through TV signals. (“Wetwired”)
3. The one where Mulder and Scully pose as married couple Rob and Laura Petrie to investigate at a gated suburban community that uses a Tibetan monster to enforce the Homeowners Association rules. (“Arcadia”)
4. The one where Mulder and Scully pursue a man who uses telepathy to bend others to his will, a 1996 version of the Jedi mind trick. (“Pusher”)
5. The exceedingly oddball “meta” one where Jose Chung writes a salacious book about Mulder and Scully’s investigation of an alien abduction. (“Jose Chung’s From Outer Space”)
6. The one where Mulder and Scully battle two bitchy teenage girls whose violent telekinetic powers are linked to sharing a birthday with an unusual planetary aligment. (“Syzygy”)
7. The really, really creepy one where Mulder and Scully uncover a satanic cult among the teachers and PTA in a small town. (“Die Hand Die Verletzt”)
8. The one that’s a ripoff of The Thing where Mulder and Scully discover weird parasites in an Arctic research station that create murderous paranoia in its hosts. (“Ice”)
9. The one where Mulder and Scully fight deadly green insect swarms freed by old-growth logging in the Pacific Northwest. (“Darkness Falls”)
10. The one where Mulder and Scully investigate a murder among the freaks and carnies in a traveling circus. Also, Scully eats a bug. (“Humbug”)
Knee-jerk review: "The Other Boleyn Girl"
1. The Cheese Fry still can't decide whether or not Scarlett Johansson is a good actress. She's sublime in Lost in Translation, charming in The Nanny Diaries, but a disaster in The Black Dahlia and In Good Company.
2. It's not the polite period drama you might expect. This one's got a darker, more tragic vibe, centering as it does on the sad moral collapse of Anne Boleyn.
3. Eric Bana is a man's man. (See also: Clooney, George; Craig, Daniel; Ford, Harrison; Quaid, Dennis; Wahlberg, Mark)
4. PG-13 apparently means no royal decapitation on screen. And no nudity. This in a movie that's all about affairs and executions.
5. The dialogue really crackles. And it's so beautifully economical, conveying so much in so few words. Thank you, Peter Morgan. He's also the reason why The Queen was so good.
6. What's with all of the stillbirths and miscarriages back in those days?
7. The Duke of Norfolk (played by David Morrissey) is one cold-blooded mofo. That is no joke, people.
8. Kristin Scott Thomas is looking old.
9. Jim Sturgess is starting to grow on us. We'll forgive his involvement in the abomination that was Across the Universe. That'll be his one mulligan.
10. The moral of the story: nothing good comes from a greedy, ambitious grab for power and money, especially in the court of Henry VIII. Also: men will do incredibly self-destructive things to get a girl into bed.
2. It's not the polite period drama you might expect. This one's got a darker, more tragic vibe, centering as it does on the sad moral collapse of Anne Boleyn.
3. Eric Bana is a man's man. (See also: Clooney, George; Craig, Daniel; Ford, Harrison; Quaid, Dennis; Wahlberg, Mark)
4. PG-13 apparently means no royal decapitation on screen. And no nudity. This in a movie that's all about affairs and executions.
5. The dialogue really crackles. And it's so beautifully economical, conveying so much in so few words. Thank you, Peter Morgan. He's also the reason why The Queen was so good.
6. What's with all of the stillbirths and miscarriages back in those days?
7. The Duke of Norfolk (played by David Morrissey) is one cold-blooded mofo. That is no joke, people.
8. Kristin Scott Thomas is looking old.
9. Jim Sturgess is starting to grow on us. We'll forgive his involvement in the abomination that was Across the Universe. That'll be his one mulligan.
10. The moral of the story: nothing good comes from a greedy, ambitious grab for power and money, especially in the court of Henry VIII. Also: men will do incredibly self-destructive things to get a girl into bed.
3.03.2008
Knee-jerk review: "Vantage Point"
1. That was sure one cool trailer. But the movie? Not so much. In fact, it's quite terrible.
2. Dennis Quaid is the man, as always. He does what he can in a stale archetype: the Haunted Law Enforcement Agent Who's Trying to Cope with a Recent Traumatic Shooting.
3. The gimmick here is that the movie keeps rewinding... and rewinding... and rewinding to show the same two-hour period from the perspective of a different character. The hope seems to be that you'll piece the truth together like a jigsaw puzzle. A clever idea, but as more than one critic noted, had the filmmakers just told the story linearly without any flashback razzle-dazzle, you'd be left with a fairly ordinary movie.
4. Too many plot turns - including the film's biggest twist involving a shocking double-cross - hinge on one character or another being in the right (or wrong) place at the right (or wrong) time. And audiences can only swallow so many coincidences before they tune out.
5. If you're trying for a gritty political conspiracy-theory thriller, you probably don't want the audience groaning in frustration or stifling laughter. Which is exactly what happened at the Friday night 8:00pm show at the Arclight Hollywood.
6. The dialogue is often quite awful.
7. For such a huge explosion in the Spanish square, it's odd how many people seem to survive. Must be that PG-13 rating that protected them.
8. You know you're in trouble when the very first performance of the film - Zoe Saldana stumbling through a role as a CNN-type reporter - is this awful and utterly unbelievable.
9. Watching the complex plan to kidnap the President unfold is engaging. It's probably the best part of the movie. But there's just no way one guy could get through that many Secret Service agents. The Cheese Fry refuses to believe it.
10. Do not see this movie. Instead, go rent Three Days of the Condor or The Parallax View.
2. Dennis Quaid is the man, as always. He does what he can in a stale archetype: the Haunted Law Enforcement Agent Who's Trying to Cope with a Recent Traumatic Shooting.
3. The gimmick here is that the movie keeps rewinding... and rewinding... and rewinding to show the same two-hour period from the perspective of a different character. The hope seems to be that you'll piece the truth together like a jigsaw puzzle. A clever idea, but as more than one critic noted, had the filmmakers just told the story linearly without any flashback razzle-dazzle, you'd be left with a fairly ordinary movie.
4. Too many plot turns - including the film's biggest twist involving a shocking double-cross - hinge on one character or another being in the right (or wrong) place at the right (or wrong) time. And audiences can only swallow so many coincidences before they tune out.
5. If you're trying for a gritty political conspiracy-theory thriller, you probably don't want the audience groaning in frustration or stifling laughter. Which is exactly what happened at the Friday night 8:00pm show at the Arclight Hollywood.
6. The dialogue is often quite awful.
7. For such a huge explosion in the Spanish square, it's odd how many people seem to survive. Must be that PG-13 rating that protected them.
8. You know you're in trouble when the very first performance of the film - Zoe Saldana stumbling through a role as a CNN-type reporter - is this awful and utterly unbelievable.
9. Watching the complex plan to kidnap the President unfold is engaging. It's probably the best part of the movie. But there's just no way one guy could get through that many Secret Service agents. The Cheese Fry refuses to believe it.
10. Do not see this movie. Instead, go rent Three Days of the Condor or The Parallax View.
2.28.2008
Drivers who deserve the finger
If you have just a half-hour commute to work, then you're in your car fighting traffic about 20 hours a month. That's almost an entire day dealing with other drivers' stupidity, incompetence, and lack of appropriate attention to the world around them.
Below are the worst offenders, those degenerates who deserve the middle finger salute from all of us. You may find yourself on this list. We did.
* Drivers who suddenly merge into your lane without signaling
* Drivers who do signal a lane change and then refuse for some reason to come over even though you're very clearly slowing down to give them a nice big space to merge into
* Drivers whom you allow to merge in front of you and then lack the common courtesy to give you the hand wave of thanks
* Drivers at the front of a line of left turners who become Cathy Cautious and refuse to turn until there isn't another car coming for at least two nautical miles
* Drivers who run extremely stale yellow lights when they really shouldn't, blocking the intersection and thereby preventing you from making a left turn before the light turns red
* Drivers whom you expect to run an extremely stale yellow light, but then at the last minute suddenly don't, thereby preventing you from making a left turn before the light turns red
* Drivers who insist on blocking an entire line of cars in a parking garage because they shortsightedly want to take the spot of the first person they see (who take 15 minutes to put two bags in their trunk - they get the finger too) when you know damn good and well that a few levels up or down is a sea of empty spaces
* Drivers of SUVs who insist on cramming their ridiculous, penis-substitute vehicles into spaces clearly marked "compact"
* Drivers who take up two parking spaces because they so overvalue their stupid little souped-up 1992 Toyota Camry
* Drivers who skip their turn at four-way stops
* Drivers who won't let you merge in one of those situations where doing so is extremely reasonable, like when you're just trying to get out of a garage after a concert or baseball game
* Drivers behind you who honk a fraction of a second after your light turns green
* Drivers who, when they do decide to honk, don't give you a short little friendly toot, but a long, obnoxious blast that goes on for so long the sound bends with the Doppler effect as they zoom around you
* Drivers who are clearly lost, but refuse to pull to the curb and get out of the way, preferring instead to creep along at the pace of pedestrians as they swivel their heads looking for an address or stare at the map in their lap
* Drivers who take an inordinate amount of time paying to get out of a parking garage
* Drivers who block traffic because they're having some utterly pointless conversation with another driver, who's likewise blocking traffic, the both of them apparently unaware of a new device called the telephone
* Drivers who block you because they're not following a clearly posted traffic sign, like "no left turn" which surely doesn't include them, right?
And no list like this would be complete without special finger given to those jackass motorcycle riders who roar down La Brea Avenue with their throttles wide open and revved as loud as possible for that short little 300 yard stretch until they hit another traffic light. Sure did go fast for a second there, huh, Captain America?
Below are the worst offenders, those degenerates who deserve the middle finger salute from all of us. You may find yourself on this list. We did.
* Drivers who suddenly merge into your lane without signaling
* Drivers who do signal a lane change and then refuse for some reason to come over even though you're very clearly slowing down to give them a nice big space to merge into
* Drivers whom you allow to merge in front of you and then lack the common courtesy to give you the hand wave of thanks
* Drivers at the front of a line of left turners who become Cathy Cautious and refuse to turn until there isn't another car coming for at least two nautical miles
* Drivers who run extremely stale yellow lights when they really shouldn't, blocking the intersection and thereby preventing you from making a left turn before the light turns red
* Drivers whom you expect to run an extremely stale yellow light, but then at the last minute suddenly don't, thereby preventing you from making a left turn before the light turns red
* Drivers who insist on blocking an entire line of cars in a parking garage because they shortsightedly want to take the spot of the first person they see (who take 15 minutes to put two bags in their trunk - they get the finger too) when you know damn good and well that a few levels up or down is a sea of empty spaces
* Drivers of SUVs who insist on cramming their ridiculous, penis-substitute vehicles into spaces clearly marked "compact"
* Drivers who take up two parking spaces because they so overvalue their stupid little souped-up 1992 Toyota Camry
* Drivers who skip their turn at four-way stops
* Drivers who won't let you merge in one of those situations where doing so is extremely reasonable, like when you're just trying to get out of a garage after a concert or baseball game
* Drivers behind you who honk a fraction of a second after your light turns green
* Drivers who, when they do decide to honk, don't give you a short little friendly toot, but a long, obnoxious blast that goes on for so long the sound bends with the Doppler effect as they zoom around you
* Drivers who are clearly lost, but refuse to pull to the curb and get out of the way, preferring instead to creep along at the pace of pedestrians as they swivel their heads looking for an address or stare at the map in their lap
* Drivers who take an inordinate amount of time paying to get out of a parking garage
* Drivers who block traffic because they're having some utterly pointless conversation with another driver, who's likewise blocking traffic, the both of them apparently unaware of a new device called the telephone
* Drivers who block you because they're not following a clearly posted traffic sign, like "no left turn" which surely doesn't include them, right?
And no list like this would be complete without special finger given to those jackass motorcycle riders who roar down La Brea Avenue with their throttles wide open and revved as loud as possible for that short little 300 yard stretch until they hit another traffic light. Sure did go fast for a second there, huh, Captain America?
2.23.2008
"My fellow Americans..."
Artist R. Luke Dubois has used the familiar optometrist's eye-chart to provide an interesting dissection of Presidential State of the Union addresses in a piece he calls "Hindsight is Always 20/20." The more often a word is used in the speech, the bigger the word appears on Dubois' chart. It's genius, the way one can easily see the big topics and themes with which the nation was grappling (or what topics and themes these presidents wanted to grapple).
George Washington's top 3 words: gentleman, provision, fellow
Thomas Jefferson: limits, sum, soon
Andrew Jackson: bank, money, payment
Abraham Lincoln: emancipation, rebellion, proclamation
Teddy Roosevelt: corporations, railroad, wage
Woodrow Wilson: processes, energy, tasks
Herbert Hoover: unemployment, recovery, major
Franklin D. Roosevelt: democratic, unity, allies
Dwight Eisenhower: nuclear, scientific, planning
Richard Nixon: truly, environment, vision
Jimmy Carter: us, 1980s, sector
Ronald Reagan: deficit, let's, bless
Bill Clinton: 21st, got, lot
George W. Bush: terror, iraq, iraqi
George Washington's top 3 words: gentleman, provision, fellow
Thomas Jefferson: limits, sum, soon
Andrew Jackson: bank, money, payment
Abraham Lincoln: emancipation, rebellion, proclamation
Teddy Roosevelt: corporations, railroad, wage
Woodrow Wilson: processes, energy, tasks
Herbert Hoover: unemployment, recovery, major
Franklin D. Roosevelt: democratic, unity, allies
Dwight Eisenhower: nuclear, scientific, planning
Richard Nixon: truly, environment, vision
Jimmy Carter: us, 1980s, sector
Ronald Reagan: deficit, let's, bless
Bill Clinton: 21st, got, lot
George W. Bush: terror, iraq, iraqi
2.21.2008
And the Oscar goes to...
Here's an interesting one-sheet almanac on Oscar trivia and factoids.
Looking at the past 25 years of Best Pictures (going back to 1983's Gandhi), which ones stand the test of time? Which are truly enduring cinematic classics?
The most deserving Best Picture winners
1. The Silence of the Lambs (1991), obviously
2. Unforgiven (1992), genius
3. Titanic (1997), popcorn filmmaking at its best
4. Platoon (1986), operatic in a good way
5. American Beauty (1999), the whole is far greater than the sum of its familiar parts
6. Chicago (2002), razzle-dazzle fun
The most undeserving and ridiculous Best Picture winners (and who should have won)
1. the insipid Shakespeare in Love (1998) (Saving Private Ryan packed a far stronger and more important punch)
2. the tedious Gandhi (1982) (Tootsie is about as perfect a comedy as you can make, but the Oscars don't reward that kind of thing)
3. how many people have actually seen The Last Emperor (1987)? (Fatal Attraction captured the 1980s zeitgeist, but the best film is probably a toss-up between Moonstruck and Broadcast News, although neither has aged well - guess 1987 wasn't so good a year)
4. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (2003) (sorry, The Cheese Fry is one of those people who think Lost in Translation is sublime on every level)
5. the bombastic, empty-headed Gladiator (2000) (the most exciting film of the year was Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon)
6. the solid but familiar biopic A Beautiful Mind (2001) (the true cinematic masterpiece was Moulin Rouge)
Who will win this Sunday? Look for a strong showing by No Country for Old Men.
Looking at the past 25 years of Best Pictures (going back to 1983's Gandhi), which ones stand the test of time? Which are truly enduring cinematic classics?
The most deserving Best Picture winners
1. The Silence of the Lambs (1991), obviously
2. Unforgiven (1992), genius
3. Titanic (1997), popcorn filmmaking at its best
4. Platoon (1986), operatic in a good way
5. American Beauty (1999), the whole is far greater than the sum of its familiar parts
6. Chicago (2002), razzle-dazzle fun
The most undeserving and ridiculous Best Picture winners (and who should have won)
1. the insipid Shakespeare in Love (1998) (Saving Private Ryan packed a far stronger and more important punch)
2. the tedious Gandhi (1982) (Tootsie is about as perfect a comedy as you can make, but the Oscars don't reward that kind of thing)
3. how many people have actually seen The Last Emperor (1987)? (Fatal Attraction captured the 1980s zeitgeist, but the best film is probably a toss-up between Moonstruck and Broadcast News, although neither has aged well - guess 1987 wasn't so good a year)
4. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (2003) (sorry, The Cheese Fry is one of those people who think Lost in Translation is sublime on every level)
5. the bombastic, empty-headed Gladiator (2000) (the most exciting film of the year was Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon)
6. the solid but familiar biopic A Beautiful Mind (2001) (the true cinematic masterpiece was Moulin Rouge)
Who will win this Sunday? Look for a strong showing by No Country for Old Men.
2.03.2008
Ding dong, the witch is dead
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.
17-14. Scoreboard.
There are no words to accurately describe the immense feeling of elation and satisfaction that comes from watching the wheels come completely off the New England Patriots in the waning minutes of Superbowl XLII. If ever there was an insufferably arrogant team in dire need of some humble-pie humiliation and come-uppance, it was this one. So smug with their false humility, soberly claiming to respect their opponents but so clearly resenting anyone who believed their unbeaten season was anything other than a God-given right. So lucky with miraculous play after miraculous play in the regular season that give them a "W" in the nick of time and preserved that annoying unbeaten streak that so consumed the media. So self-righteous at justifiable suggestions of a blotch on their legacy courtesy some shading dealings from the coaching staff (that the off-season could further taint them with accusations of cheating in Superbowl XXXVI is all the sweeter). And so phony in their self-created image as hard-working Boy Scouts above it all, even though their roster is filled with just as many thugs and dirty players and jackass hotheads and free agent mercenaries as anyone else.
Yes, it's always fun to see the villain defeated. Especially on national television.
So much for 19-0. How's it feel to finally lose a game? Sucks about the timing.
17-14. Scoreboard.
There are no words to accurately describe the immense feeling of elation and satisfaction that comes from watching the wheels come completely off the New England Patriots in the waning minutes of Superbowl XLII. If ever there was an insufferably arrogant team in dire need of some humble-pie humiliation and come-uppance, it was this one. So smug with their false humility, soberly claiming to respect their opponents but so clearly resenting anyone who believed their unbeaten season was anything other than a God-given right. So lucky with miraculous play after miraculous play in the regular season that give them a "W" in the nick of time and preserved that annoying unbeaten streak that so consumed the media. So self-righteous at justifiable suggestions of a blotch on their legacy courtesy some shading dealings from the coaching staff (that the off-season could further taint them with accusations of cheating in Superbowl XXXVI is all the sweeter). And so phony in their self-created image as hard-working Boy Scouts above it all, even though their roster is filled with just as many thugs and dirty players and jackass hotheads and free agent mercenaries as anyone else.
Yes, it's always fun to see the villain defeated. Especially on national television.
So much for 19-0. How's it feel to finally lose a game? Sucks about the timing.
2.01.2008
Knee-jerk rewind: "Juno," "Atonement," and "Charlie Wilson's War"
Juno
1. Very funny, very satisfying.
2. But its Best Picture nomination is a bit of a reach. This thing gets released in April, no way it gets the Oscar nod (see also: the ignored Zodiac). More proof that Academy voters have inexplicably short attention spans: they nominate films with fall releases. And Hollywood happily obliges them, stacking fall slates with Oscar bait. Hey, that rhymes. Let's make T-shirts.
3. Ellen Page is great, the anti-Lohan, all rough edges and slouchy confidence. Worth a look: the dark thriller Hard Candy in which Page's character takes hostage a possible hostage.
4. An exceptionally strong cast. Jennifer Garner's never been better.
5. The media's fallen in love with screenwriter Diablo Cody, fawning all over her in a way that suggests Cody's completely re-invented the very fabric of cinematic storytelling. It's frankly a little annoying and probably part of the reason for the growing Juno backlash. But the real fascination with Cody is surely the fact that she's an oddball character herself: an ex-exotic dancer and blogger. In any event, Cody gives the film a distinctive point of view and snappy dialogue that's really pops, which is what any good screenwriter should do. Don't be surprised if it takes the Best Original Screenplay Oscar.
6. Bonus points to everyone involved for not letting the Ellen Page/Jason Bateman dynamic get too icky.
7. The last scene's duet of "Anyone Else But You" is infectious in its charm. Just try to resist.
Atonement
1. The textbook Oscar nominee. Big sweeping story. Period setting. Lush costumes. World War II. Drawing room sex. English accents. Stylish chain smoking. Tragic ending. Doomed romance. The thing practically writes itself.
2. Keira Knightley is surely the hottest anorexic-looking actress working today. Seriously, like, whoa.
3. Some call the ending a cheat, but it's no more a cheat that any other twist movie ending that Changes Everything. If you go with it and try to understand the "why" behind it (hint: look at the movie's title), you'll be fine.
4. Lesson to be learned: if you're going to send a bratty teenaged girl to deliver a letter to her sister, please be sure you give her the right letter.
5. It's most certainly better than the vastly overrated The English Patient.
Charlie Wilson's War
1. Philip Seymour Hoffman steals the movie.
2. It's a lot of fun, thanks mostly to the sharp dialogue and political scheming by "West Wing" auteur Aaron Sorkin. But then you start to realize... there's no conflict. Once Tom Hanks and his cronies decide to fund the mujahadeen in Afghanistan, that's exactly what they do. No hiccups, no detours, no obstacles.
3. Critics have complained that the film takes liberties with the truth. On one hand, hey, it's a movie, not a textbook. Then again, the media culture is slowly but surely blurring the lines between reality and fiction and many in the audience may think this is how it all happened because Tom Hanks says so. But what's the solution? Stay tuned for this argument to get kicked up another notch come fall when Oliver Stone's biopic of George W. Bush may hit theaters.
4. The appeal of Julia Roberts is frankly lost on The Cheese Fry. If you're honest with yourself, digging deep, you'll agree that she's really been interesting in just one film: Erin Brockovich. Her work is typically of the softball popcorn variety that calls for her to just flash that twangy smile. Even Tom Cruise sometimes mixes his Mission Impossibles with his Magnolias. She's kind of dull here as well.
5. Consider it a push. Some concerns, yes, but the running time's only 90 minutes. Get in, make some laughs, score some satirical points, turn Hoffman loose, let Hanks shine, get out.
1. Very funny, very satisfying.
2. But its Best Picture nomination is a bit of a reach. This thing gets released in April, no way it gets the Oscar nod (see also: the ignored Zodiac). More proof that Academy voters have inexplicably short attention spans: they nominate films with fall releases. And Hollywood happily obliges them, stacking fall slates with Oscar bait. Hey, that rhymes. Let's make T-shirts.
3. Ellen Page is great, the anti-Lohan, all rough edges and slouchy confidence. Worth a look: the dark thriller Hard Candy in which Page's character takes hostage a possible hostage.
4. An exceptionally strong cast. Jennifer Garner's never been better.
5. The media's fallen in love with screenwriter Diablo Cody, fawning all over her in a way that suggests Cody's completely re-invented the very fabric of cinematic storytelling. It's frankly a little annoying and probably part of the reason for the growing Juno backlash. But the real fascination with Cody is surely the fact that she's an oddball character herself: an ex-exotic dancer and blogger. In any event, Cody gives the film a distinctive point of view and snappy dialogue that's really pops, which is what any good screenwriter should do. Don't be surprised if it takes the Best Original Screenplay Oscar.
6. Bonus points to everyone involved for not letting the Ellen Page/Jason Bateman dynamic get too icky.
7. The last scene's duet of "Anyone Else But You" is infectious in its charm. Just try to resist.
Atonement
1. The textbook Oscar nominee. Big sweeping story. Period setting. Lush costumes. World War II. Drawing room sex. English accents. Stylish chain smoking. Tragic ending. Doomed romance. The thing practically writes itself.
2. Keira Knightley is surely the hottest anorexic-looking actress working today. Seriously, like, whoa.
3. Some call the ending a cheat, but it's no more a cheat that any other twist movie ending that Changes Everything. If you go with it and try to understand the "why" behind it (hint: look at the movie's title), you'll be fine.
4. Lesson to be learned: if you're going to send a bratty teenaged girl to deliver a letter to her sister, please be sure you give her the right letter.
5. It's most certainly better than the vastly overrated The English Patient.
Charlie Wilson's War
1. Philip Seymour Hoffman steals the movie.
2. It's a lot of fun, thanks mostly to the sharp dialogue and political scheming by "West Wing" auteur Aaron Sorkin. But then you start to realize... there's no conflict. Once Tom Hanks and his cronies decide to fund the mujahadeen in Afghanistan, that's exactly what they do. No hiccups, no detours, no obstacles.
3. Critics have complained that the film takes liberties with the truth. On one hand, hey, it's a movie, not a textbook. Then again, the media culture is slowly but surely blurring the lines between reality and fiction and many in the audience may think this is how it all happened because Tom Hanks says so. But what's the solution? Stay tuned for this argument to get kicked up another notch come fall when Oliver Stone's biopic of George W. Bush may hit theaters.
4. The appeal of Julia Roberts is frankly lost on The Cheese Fry. If you're honest with yourself, digging deep, you'll agree that she's really been interesting in just one film: Erin Brockovich. Her work is typically of the softball popcorn variety that calls for her to just flash that twangy smile. Even Tom Cruise sometimes mixes his Mission Impossibles with his Magnolias. She's kind of dull here as well.
5. Consider it a push. Some concerns, yes, but the running time's only 90 minutes. Get in, make some laughs, score some satirical points, turn Hoffman loose, let Hanks shine, get out.
Were the Democrats serious with that whole John Kerry thing in 2004?
L.A. Weekly's Joe Donnelly offers a fascinating and rather scathing look at the apparent inability of the Democratic Party to nominate a presidential candidate who can win in November. It's only been four years since the John Kerry disaster. The Cheese Fry recently had the misfortune of seeing Kerry on TV. He may be bright and utterly capable, but what an uncharismatic bore. Blech. Donnelly makes the interesting point that Bill Clinton's upset win in 1992 was something of an accident - if the Democratic Party had its way back then, the nominee would have been another smart-but-dull Yankee: Mario Cuomo. No way he beats George H.W. Bush, which would have put us in year 27 of a GOP Reaganite-Bushian monarchy. The mind reels.
1.20.2008
Top 10 "Star Trek: The Next Generation" Episodes
1. The one where Picard is captured and assimilated by the Borg and Riker is fully prepared to destroy the Borg anyway. Best cliffhanger line ever: “Mr. Worf, fire.” Fade to black. (“The Best of Both Worlds, Part 1”)
2. The one where Q allows Picard to reconsider past choices as a Starfleet cadet, including an unfortunate encounter with a Nausicaan and his knife. (“Tapestry”)
3. The one where an Enterprise from the past appears, changes the Federation timeline, and brings Tasha Yar back from the dead. (“Yesterday’s Enterprise”)
4. The one where, in the blink of an eye, an alien probe makes Picard live out an entire lifetime on a doomed alien planet (and learns how to play a flute) as a means to preserve its culture. (“The Inner Light”)
5. The one that features low-level junior officers, including the super-cute Ensign Sito who dies during an espionage mission. (“Lower Decks”)
6. The one that’s a Die Hard ripoff where Picard must all alone fight terrorist thieves when the ship’s vacated for a baryon sweep. (“Starship Mine”)
7. The one where Dr. Crusher’s the only one who notices that people on the Enterprise are disappearing one by one – because she’s unwittingly trapped in Wesley’s static warp bubble. (“Remember Me”)
8. The one with the trial to determine whether or not Data is the property of Starfleet. (“The Measure of a Man”)
9. The one where the Enterprise gets stuck in one of those pesky causality loops and only Data – with the help of Riker’s command uniform pips – can break them free. (“Cause and Effect”)
10. The one where Wesley Crusher is investigated for his role in a cadet flight training accident. Note to self: don't ever try the Kolvoord Starburst. (“The First Duty”)
2. The one where Q allows Picard to reconsider past choices as a Starfleet cadet, including an unfortunate encounter with a Nausicaan and his knife. (“Tapestry”)
3. The one where an Enterprise from the past appears, changes the Federation timeline, and brings Tasha Yar back from the dead. (“Yesterday’s Enterprise”)
4. The one where, in the blink of an eye, an alien probe makes Picard live out an entire lifetime on a doomed alien planet (and learns how to play a flute) as a means to preserve its culture. (“The Inner Light”)
5. The one that features low-level junior officers, including the super-cute Ensign Sito who dies during an espionage mission. (“Lower Decks”)
6. The one that’s a Die Hard ripoff where Picard must all alone fight terrorist thieves when the ship’s vacated for a baryon sweep. (“Starship Mine”)
7. The one where Dr. Crusher’s the only one who notices that people on the Enterprise are disappearing one by one – because she’s unwittingly trapped in Wesley’s static warp bubble. (“Remember Me”)
8. The one with the trial to determine whether or not Data is the property of Starfleet. (“The Measure of a Man”)
9. The one where the Enterprise gets stuck in one of those pesky causality loops and only Data – with the help of Riker’s command uniform pips – can break them free. (“Cause and Effect”)
10. The one where Wesley Crusher is investigated for his role in a cadet flight training accident. Note to self: don't ever try the Kolvoord Starburst. (“The First Duty”)
1.19.2008
My anaconda don't want none
Want a prime example of the artistic genius that might otherwise be undiscovered were it not for YouTube? Here's Sir Mix-a-Lot's "Baby Got Back" remixed ala Gilbert and Sullivan and edited with the video from a 1980 TV version of Pirates of Penzance. If you haven't already seen it, check it out.
Knee-jerk review: "Cloverfield"
1. Believe the hype. For those who cynically predicted this would be a big cinematic con job and the movie would never fully reveal the danger (ala The Blair Witch Project), rest assured that it delivers the goods.
2. The subway tunnel sequence is among the scariest, most intense ever put on film. It ranks right up there. This is a very hardcore PG-13.
3. The first 20 minutes are a little dull, perhaps, but you have to set up the characters so you'll care about what happens to them later on. Some critics have snarked that the characters are all cardboard pretty faces, full of callow angst like those on J.J. Abrams' first TV hit "Felicity." There's some validity to that, but keep in mind that "Felicity" was a fairly successful show.
4. The lead character's "Felicity"-ish quest to risk his life to go find the girl he stupidly rejected before the attack began gives the movie what little emotion it has. And it's just enough. We're not here to see dynamic character arcs and subtle internal struggles. We're here to get scared and see things we've never seen before.
5. The conceit with the first-person camcorder works well, especially the way the filmmakers play with the idea that this attack footage has been taped over older footage. The clever juxtaposition between the two timelines is more poignant than you'd expect.
6. Note to self: you don't want to hear the sirens signaling the start of a Hammer-Down.
7. This is a movie packed full of amazing visual effects, made all the more impressive given the shaky handheld camerawork. It's not often that the Cheese Fry is left wondering "how the hell did they do that?" Happens many times in this film.
8. If there's a worry, it's the way Cloverfield so vividly evokes 9/11, especially in the first half hour as a cloud of debris floods the streets of Manhattan as buildings come down and onlookers flee in panic. In what's otherwise a traditional popcorn sort of movie, that imagery feels too realistic, too tragic. The film turns a modern-day horror into entertainment, which is a little queasy.
9. An ingenious idea executed at a high level: a B-movie monster flick told the from the POV of the frightened civilians caught in the middle, not the brilliant monster expert or the dour Pentagon general or the charismatic American president.
10. Go see it.
2. The subway tunnel sequence is among the scariest, most intense ever put on film. It ranks right up there. This is a very hardcore PG-13.
3. The first 20 minutes are a little dull, perhaps, but you have to set up the characters so you'll care about what happens to them later on. Some critics have snarked that the characters are all cardboard pretty faces, full of callow angst like those on J.J. Abrams' first TV hit "Felicity." There's some validity to that, but keep in mind that "Felicity" was a fairly successful show.
4. The lead character's "Felicity"-ish quest to risk his life to go find the girl he stupidly rejected before the attack began gives the movie what little emotion it has. And it's just enough. We're not here to see dynamic character arcs and subtle internal struggles. We're here to get scared and see things we've never seen before.
5. The conceit with the first-person camcorder works well, especially the way the filmmakers play with the idea that this attack footage has been taped over older footage. The clever juxtaposition between the two timelines is more poignant than you'd expect.
6. Note to self: you don't want to hear the sirens signaling the start of a Hammer-Down.
7. This is a movie packed full of amazing visual effects, made all the more impressive given the shaky handheld camerawork. It's not often that the Cheese Fry is left wondering "how the hell did they do that?" Happens many times in this film.
8. If there's a worry, it's the way Cloverfield so vividly evokes 9/11, especially in the first half hour as a cloud of debris floods the streets of Manhattan as buildings come down and onlookers flee in panic. In what's otherwise a traditional popcorn sort of movie, that imagery feels too realistic, too tragic. The film turns a modern-day horror into entertainment, which is a little queasy.
9. An ingenious idea executed at a high level: a B-movie monster flick told the from the POV of the frightened civilians caught in the middle, not the brilliant monster expert or the dour Pentagon general or the charismatic American president.
10. Go see it.
1.16.2008
Knee-jerk review: "The Sarah Connor Chronicles"
1. The pilot felt like a complete retread of the second movie (John on the run, a visit to Miles Dyson, yadda yadda)... until that cool time-travel twist ending.
2. There's some interesting angles to be mined with the teenaged-girl Terminator named Cameron (a too-cutesy nod to the original films' writer-director), but most of the characters are rather dull. The guy who plays John Connor is particularly boring.
3. And really, we all know "interesting angles" above is code for the skeevy kick of seeking a possible android-human romance with Cameron and John. You know that's where we're going.
4. Is Summer Glau hot? It's debatable, isn't it? And that's a problem for this show's core audience.
5. The Cheese Fry will get very tired, very quickly of seeing any more of the obligatory scenes in which two Terminators fight, crashing through walls and floors, and suffer no lasting injury.
6. The headless Terminator was kind of cool.
7. The films had such epic scope and high production values that the TV show suffers by comparison. It feels small and cheap.
8. Yeah, it's a decent show, but did we really need it? We'd rather rent the first two movies.
2. There's some interesting angles to be mined with the teenaged-girl Terminator named Cameron (a too-cutesy nod to the original films' writer-director), but most of the characters are rather dull. The guy who plays John Connor is particularly boring.
3. And really, we all know "interesting angles" above is code for the skeevy kick of seeking a possible android-human romance with Cameron and John. You know that's where we're going.
4. Is Summer Glau hot? It's debatable, isn't it? And that's a problem for this show's core audience.
5. The Cheese Fry will get very tired, very quickly of seeing any more of the obligatory scenes in which two Terminators fight, crashing through walls and floors, and suffer no lasting injury.
6. The headless Terminator was kind of cool.
7. The films had such epic scope and high production values that the TV show suffers by comparison. It feels small and cheap.
8. Yeah, it's a decent show, but did we really need it? We'd rather rent the first two movies.
There is no joy in Cowboy-town
What a disaster.
Cowboys 17, Giants 21.
And to lose at the hand of a Manning. Oh the humanity. Anyone's who had the misfortune to deal with Eli Manning in fantasy football knows what a gridiron retard he is, perpetually struggling in the shadow of his older brother, always looking confused on the field and surely one throw away from yet another inopportune fumble or interception. But not last weekend. In Texas Stadium, Manning had the poise of Joe Montana from 1989.
You have to understand that Cowboys fans aren't used to losing. Like Yankees fans, it's just not in our DNA. Football seasons are about getting to the Superbowl. Eight appearances, five wins. And this season, after so many mediocre seasons and teams led by the likes of the hapless Quincy Carter or the gruff-but-impotent Bill Parcells, it looked like we had a winner. Maybe we couldn't beat the Patriots on February 3. But then again, maybe we could. Maybe we could get a record-setting sixth Lombardi Trophy.
There's always next year.
So why did the NFC's number one seed lose? What allowed them to join fellow Metroplex losers the Dallas Mavericks as a pro team that steamrolls everyone in the regular season, racks up records and accolades, only to crumble like a termite-infested gazebo deck in the playoffs?
Here's the top ten reasons.
1. Lack of discipline - The Cowboys often look like the old Oakland Raiders in the way they continually draw stupid penalties. There's a loosey-goosey quality to this team (a facemask here, a horse collar there, hey, what's the big deal?) that surely connects right with the loosey-goosey head coach. If you played a drinking game that involved taking a shot every time Flozell Adams got a false-start penalty, your ass would be plastered by halftime.
2. Patrick Crayton's ego - He's one of the team's big smack talkers, but although he's a decent #2 receiver (you have to admire the fact that he barely wears any kind of shoulder pads), he's not yet exactly striking fear in the hearts of defensive coordinators. Players who can back up the smack are the only ones who should run it. In this game, if Crayton makes the catch on that long slant and converts a first down, odds are good the Cowboys march down and go up 24-14. But he doesn't and the Cowboys didn't. And he just got a huge contract extension.
3. No running game - Marion Barber 3 steamrolls the Giants in the first
half, so the Giants understandably stack the box to limit his yards in the second. Okay, fine. And the Cowboys counter that with... What exactly? Isn't there some other way to get Barber involved? Throw the guy a frickin' swing pass! Isn't that why offensive coordinator Jason Garrett is such a supposed genius, nay, wizard? Or was Garrett already thinking about all those head coach offers?
4. Tony Romo - You could see the confusion and frustration in Romo's
eyes at the end of the Giants game. For a guy who's always grinning and high-fiving, last weekend in the fourth quarter Romo wasn't having any fun. The Fox cameras even caught him yelling in disgust and anger at his teammates. The O-line did him no favors, but it was Romo who was making the bad decisions, failing to throw the ball away to avoid the sack on one play, then throwing deep for the home-run ball instead of looking short to get a first down.
5. Believing the hype - The Cowboys were playing an elite level back in November when they beat the Packers. And it was all downhill from there. No energy. No urgency. And despite the sudden streak of shaky games Dallas escaped by the skin of its teeth (to crappy teams, no less) and some in which they didn't escape (there is zero excuse to ever lose to Axis of Evil teams like Washington and Philadelphia), no one seemed to be bothered. Don't worry, be happy. The folks at Valley Ranch, in fact, were the only people who figured the December meltdown was just a hiccup on the road to the inevitable Superbowl appearance. Unfortunately, the Cowboys still had to, like, play the games. But the Cheese Fry's fortune cookie read,]: if they sucked in December, why should January be any different?
6. Poor clock management - It'd have been nice to have all three time outs in the waning minutes of the game, but confusion and chaos ruled the second half and the Cowboys had to burn two time outs early on to avoid a delay of game penalty. You could see the reality of the situation dawning as the game went along and panic began to set in. "Y'all, are we really going to lose this game?" Memo to the Dallas Cowboys: the NFL playoffs are single elimination. You only advance if you win.
7. The curse of Wade Phillips - No one applauded this hire last winter. Phillips is an oatmeal-headed, grandpa coach in the mold of the gratefully departed Dave Campo. But with all of those regular season wins, us Cowboys fans began to drink the Wade Kool-Aid. But like all of Wade's other teams (including last seasons #1 ranked San Diego Chargers who lost its first playoff game - sound familiar?), this one choked away a playoff game. The reason seems clear: he's too laid-back and easy-going to crank everyone up to the next level.
8. Bad luck - Not only did the Cowboys need to beat a division rival for the third time in a season, they had the bad luck to go against a division rival who'd regained its footing and found some real momentum. (Everyone always says that December momentum is critical in the NFL.) The Packers may have drawn the higher seed, but the Giants are playing much tougher football than the Seahawks.
9. Terrell Owens - Where the hell was he? All this talk about his high
ankle sprain and the hand-wringing about would he or wouldn't he play... In the second half he was a non-factor. The blame for this must go to Tony Romo (see #4) and Jason Garrett (see #3).
10. Terry Glenn - Enough is enough. He was a speedy, sure-handed player, but it's time to move on. He's old and injured. What if the Cowboys had somehow managed to land another, more able-bodied #2 WR for the season? Someone who could have contributed all season long instead of trying to mesh with the offense in the, you know, biggest game of the entire season.
You'll note that Jessica Simpson was nowhere on this list. She has nothing to do with anything. We're not even sure if she knows what a touchdown is.
Go Packers.
Cowboys 17, Giants 21.
And to lose at the hand of a Manning. Oh the humanity. Anyone's who had the misfortune to deal with Eli Manning in fantasy football knows what a gridiron retard he is, perpetually struggling in the shadow of his older brother, always looking confused on the field and surely one throw away from yet another inopportune fumble or interception. But not last weekend. In Texas Stadium, Manning had the poise of Joe Montana from 1989.
You have to understand that Cowboys fans aren't used to losing. Like Yankees fans, it's just not in our DNA. Football seasons are about getting to the Superbowl. Eight appearances, five wins. And this season, after so many mediocre seasons and teams led by the likes of the hapless Quincy Carter or the gruff-but-impotent Bill Parcells, it looked like we had a winner. Maybe we couldn't beat the Patriots on February 3. But then again, maybe we could. Maybe we could get a record-setting sixth Lombardi Trophy.
There's always next year.
So why did the NFC's number one seed lose? What allowed them to join fellow Metroplex losers the Dallas Mavericks as a pro team that steamrolls everyone in the regular season, racks up records and accolades, only to crumble like a termite-infested gazebo deck in the playoffs?
Here's the top ten reasons.
1. Lack of discipline - The Cowboys often look like the old Oakland Raiders in the way they continually draw stupid penalties. There's a loosey-goosey quality to this team (a facemask here, a horse collar there, hey, what's the big deal?) that surely connects right with the loosey-goosey head coach. If you played a drinking game that involved taking a shot every time Flozell Adams got a false-start penalty, your ass would be plastered by halftime.
2. Patrick Crayton's ego - He's one of the team's big smack talkers, but although he's a decent #2 receiver (you have to admire the fact that he barely wears any kind of shoulder pads), he's not yet exactly striking fear in the hearts of defensive coordinators. Players who can back up the smack are the only ones who should run it. In this game, if Crayton makes the catch on that long slant and converts a first down, odds are good the Cowboys march down and go up 24-14. But he doesn't and the Cowboys didn't. And he just got a huge contract extension.
3. No running game - Marion Barber 3 steamrolls the Giants in the first
half, so the Giants understandably stack the box to limit his yards in the second. Okay, fine. And the Cowboys counter that with... What exactly? Isn't there some other way to get Barber involved? Throw the guy a frickin' swing pass! Isn't that why offensive coordinator Jason Garrett is such a supposed genius, nay, wizard? Or was Garrett already thinking about all those head coach offers?
4. Tony Romo - You could see the confusion and frustration in Romo's
eyes at the end of the Giants game. For a guy who's always grinning and high-fiving, last weekend in the fourth quarter Romo wasn't having any fun. The Fox cameras even caught him yelling in disgust and anger at his teammates. The O-line did him no favors, but it was Romo who was making the bad decisions, failing to throw the ball away to avoid the sack on one play, then throwing deep for the home-run ball instead of looking short to get a first down.
5. Believing the hype - The Cowboys were playing an elite level back in November when they beat the Packers. And it was all downhill from there. No energy. No urgency. And despite the sudden streak of shaky games Dallas escaped by the skin of its teeth (to crappy teams, no less) and some in which they didn't escape (there is zero excuse to ever lose to Axis of Evil teams like Washington and Philadelphia), no one seemed to be bothered. Don't worry, be happy. The folks at Valley Ranch, in fact, were the only people who figured the December meltdown was just a hiccup on the road to the inevitable Superbowl appearance. Unfortunately, the Cowboys still had to, like, play the games. But the Cheese Fry's fortune cookie read,]: if they sucked in December, why should January be any different?
6. Poor clock management - It'd have been nice to have all three time outs in the waning minutes of the game, but confusion and chaos ruled the second half and the Cowboys had to burn two time outs early on to avoid a delay of game penalty. You could see the reality of the situation dawning as the game went along and panic began to set in. "Y'all, are we really going to lose this game?" Memo to the Dallas Cowboys: the NFL playoffs are single elimination. You only advance if you win.
7. The curse of Wade Phillips - No one applauded this hire last winter. Phillips is an oatmeal-headed, grandpa coach in the mold of the gratefully departed Dave Campo. But with all of those regular season wins, us Cowboys fans began to drink the Wade Kool-Aid. But like all of Wade's other teams (including last seasons #1 ranked San Diego Chargers who lost its first playoff game - sound familiar?), this one choked away a playoff game. The reason seems clear: he's too laid-back and easy-going to crank everyone up to the next level.
8. Bad luck - Not only did the Cowboys need to beat a division rival for the third time in a season, they had the bad luck to go against a division rival who'd regained its footing and found some real momentum. (Everyone always says that December momentum is critical in the NFL.) The Packers may have drawn the higher seed, but the Giants are playing much tougher football than the Seahawks.
9. Terrell Owens - Where the hell was he? All this talk about his high
ankle sprain and the hand-wringing about would he or wouldn't he play... In the second half he was a non-factor. The blame for this must go to Tony Romo (see #4) and Jason Garrett (see #3).
10. Terry Glenn - Enough is enough. He was a speedy, sure-handed player, but it's time to move on. He's old and injured. What if the Cowboys had somehow managed to land another, more able-bodied #2 WR for the season? Someone who could have contributed all season long instead of trying to mesh with the offense in the, you know, biggest game of the entire season.
You'll note that Jessica Simpson was nowhere on this list. She has nothing to do with anything. We're not even sure if she knows what a touchdown is.
Go Packers.
12.19.2007
Why the second season of "Heroes" was so lame
The Cheese Fry was a big fan of NBC's "Heroes" when it debuted last season. What initially seemed to be some half-baked X-Men rip-off turned out to be engaging and smartly produced. It was deservedly a breakout hit. While ABC's similarly mythic show "Lost" was getting bogged down in tedious subplots and red-herring tangents that took the narrative one step forward and two steps back, "Heroes" moved at a relatively breakneck pace, packing in more twists and cliffhangers and revelations in a single episode than "Lost" mustered in a whole season.
Which is why the second season of "Heroes" was such a huge letdown. It was a mess and you know it. Even creator Tim Kring knows it.
Here's the reasons.
* Rehashed elements. Season one involved one character getting a horrifying glimpse at a future apocalypse (the "exploding man") that destroyed New York City. Season two went to the same exact well, only this time the future apocalypse was a man-made plague so it's, you know, completely different.
* Not playing fair. As abbreviated and anticlimactic as the season one finale may have been, there was real power in the shocking twist that seemingly killed both Nathan and Peter Petrelli. Network TV shows don't do that sort of thing, which is why it was so unexpected and... real. But here in season two, Nathan and Peter are back in action. And the show did very little to explain how exactly Peter survived being the cause of an explosion that lit up the Manhattan night sky. Then again, even if the show did work harder to explain it, we wouldn't be buying it. Shades of Bobby Ewing in the shower: Nathan and Peter survived for the simple reason that they're popular characters. Further points must be deducted by introducing the idea that Claire's blood can regenerate anyone, even someone shot in the face. Now apparently no one can die, which further undermines any genuine worry we may feel for these characters' safety.
* Too much Hiro. His cutesy broken-English and sad-sack romanticism gets real old real quick. Season two inexplicably spent weeks and weeks on Hiro's boring visit to feudal Japan. Moments after the Cheese Fry saw Hiro meet his beloved hero Kensei and realize Kensai was a loser drunk, this entire subplot was immediately apparent: Hiro must show the hero how to be a hero. Which is exactly how it all played out. Very very slowly. No curveball, no twists. Audiences don't like to connect the dots that quickly. It's boring.
* Horrible new characters. By the Cheese Fry's count, season two was 2-6 in the new character department. The troubled immortality of Kensei/Adam Monroe was certainly interesting, but the show waited until the last couple of weeks to really explore him (and how seeing hundreds of years of human cruelty had warped him) in any detail and so everything felt rushed and clumsy. Maybe it's just the plucky charm of Kristen Bell, but there was also something likewise intriguing about her character, the petulant and lonely Elle. The other four new characters, however, ranged from the dull (muscle mimic Monica - cool power poorly utilized) to the derivative (evil nerd Bob) to the infuriatingly pointless (twins Maya and Alejandro). Maya may be the most annoyingly gullible, dim-witted, and whiny character ever put in a prime-time TV show without being intended to come across as annoyingly gullible, dim-witted, and whiny. The Cheese Fry hates her.
* Narrative confusion. Can someone explain to us what the hell exactly was going on with the virus and the cure and all that? A bunch of mumbo jumbo.
* Narrative volume. There's epic and then there's bloated. This season tried to cram in too many characters, too many subplots, too much intrigue. Try watching an episode of "Heroes" with someone unfamiliar with the show and see how convoluted and ridiculous it all sounds as you try to explain the characters and their backstories.
* Mohinder. We'd like to apologize to Maya. Mohinder Suresh is the most annoyingly gullible, dim-witted, and whiny character ever put in a prime-time TV show. We can only hope that his character will die a most painful death as quickly as possible. Perhaps we can throw him to the Sarlaac.
* Using amnesia as a plot device. This is never a good thing. Ever.
Which is why the second season of "Heroes" was such a huge letdown. It was a mess and you know it. Even creator Tim Kring knows it.
Here's the reasons.
* Rehashed elements. Season one involved one character getting a horrifying glimpse at a future apocalypse (the "exploding man") that destroyed New York City. Season two went to the same exact well, only this time the future apocalypse was a man-made plague so it's, you know, completely different.
* Not playing fair. As abbreviated and anticlimactic as the season one finale may have been, there was real power in the shocking twist that seemingly killed both Nathan and Peter Petrelli. Network TV shows don't do that sort of thing, which is why it was so unexpected and... real. But here in season two, Nathan and Peter are back in action. And the show did very little to explain how exactly Peter survived being the cause of an explosion that lit up the Manhattan night sky. Then again, even if the show did work harder to explain it, we wouldn't be buying it. Shades of Bobby Ewing in the shower: Nathan and Peter survived for the simple reason that they're popular characters. Further points must be deducted by introducing the idea that Claire's blood can regenerate anyone, even someone shot in the face. Now apparently no one can die, which further undermines any genuine worry we may feel for these characters' safety.
* Too much Hiro. His cutesy broken-English and sad-sack romanticism gets real old real quick. Season two inexplicably spent weeks and weeks on Hiro's boring visit to feudal Japan. Moments after the Cheese Fry saw Hiro meet his beloved hero Kensei and realize Kensai was a loser drunk, this entire subplot was immediately apparent: Hiro must show the hero how to be a hero. Which is exactly how it all played out. Very very slowly. No curveball, no twists. Audiences don't like to connect the dots that quickly. It's boring.
* Horrible new characters. By the Cheese Fry's count, season two was 2-6 in the new character department. The troubled immortality of Kensei/Adam Monroe was certainly interesting, but the show waited until the last couple of weeks to really explore him (and how seeing hundreds of years of human cruelty had warped him) in any detail and so everything felt rushed and clumsy. Maybe it's just the plucky charm of Kristen Bell, but there was also something likewise intriguing about her character, the petulant and lonely Elle. The other four new characters, however, ranged from the dull (muscle mimic Monica - cool power poorly utilized) to the derivative (evil nerd Bob) to the infuriatingly pointless (twins Maya and Alejandro). Maya may be the most annoyingly gullible, dim-witted, and whiny character ever put in a prime-time TV show without being intended to come across as annoyingly gullible, dim-witted, and whiny. The Cheese Fry hates her.
* Narrative confusion. Can someone explain to us what the hell exactly was going on with the virus and the cure and all that? A bunch of mumbo jumbo.
* Narrative volume. There's epic and then there's bloated. This season tried to cram in too many characters, too many subplots, too much intrigue. Try watching an episode of "Heroes" with someone unfamiliar with the show and see how convoluted and ridiculous it all sounds as you try to explain the characters and their backstories.
* Mohinder. We'd like to apologize to Maya. Mohinder Suresh is the most annoyingly gullible, dim-witted, and whiny character ever put in a prime-time TV show. We can only hope that his character will die a most painful death as quickly as possible. Perhaps we can throw him to the Sarlaac.
* Using amnesia as a plot device. This is never a good thing. Ever.
Knee-jerk review: "I Am Legend"
1. There are two movies here. One - about what it means to be the last man alive as Will Smith ekes out a lonely existence and seems to be losing his grip on sanity - is pretty fresh and interesting. The other - about fighting (and surviving) a zombie plague and seeking a cure - is one we've seen before.
2. In fact, the makers of 28 Days Later could have a plagiarism case here. There are that many similarities. Had that film not been made, I Am Legend would probably be a lot more memorable.
3. Will Smith is the man. If you were making an A-list action thriller, who would you cast in the lead to insure a slam-dunk? Nowadays, there's Will Smith and there's Matt Damon. That's about it. Maybe Tom Cruise. And the fact that we're saying "maybe" to Tom Cruise says a lot about how his fortune has changed.
4. The movie toys with the suggestion that some of the zombies, er, "infected mutants" have developed an intelligence, but it never really follows through.
5. The panicked, cruel evacuation of Manhattan is vividly portrayed here, but - again - there's a sense that we've seen it all before.
6. Film's best sequence probably is the one that involves a little strip of sunlight slowly shrinking.
7. How does Smith's character - who's all alone - manage to install a high-tech containment lab in his basement and install all of those steel barricades on his windows?
8. It's hard to believe a mutated virus could create some of these symptoms, like being so susceptible to UV light that your skin burns, or growing big long fangs, or having a stretchy mouth that looks an awful lot like CGI effects.
9. Is it worth a look? Yes. Will you want to ever see it again? Probably not.
2. In fact, the makers of 28 Days Later could have a plagiarism case here. There are that many similarities. Had that film not been made, I Am Legend would probably be a lot more memorable.
3. Will Smith is the man. If you were making an A-list action thriller, who would you cast in the lead to insure a slam-dunk? Nowadays, there's Will Smith and there's Matt Damon. That's about it. Maybe Tom Cruise. And the fact that we're saying "maybe" to Tom Cruise says a lot about how his fortune has changed.
4. The movie toys with the suggestion that some of the zombies, er, "infected mutants" have developed an intelligence, but it never really follows through.
5. The panicked, cruel evacuation of Manhattan is vividly portrayed here, but - again - there's a sense that we've seen it all before.
6. Film's best sequence probably is the one that involves a little strip of sunlight slowly shrinking.
7. How does Smith's character - who's all alone - manage to install a high-tech containment lab in his basement and install all of those steel barricades on his windows?
8. It's hard to believe a mutated virus could create some of these symptoms, like being so susceptible to UV light that your skin burns, or growing big long fangs, or having a stretchy mouth that looks an awful lot like CGI effects.
9. Is it worth a look? Yes. Will you want to ever see it again? Probably not.
12.13.2007
Knee-jerk review: "Enchanted"
1. Exceedingly cute and charming. It's been a long time since there's been a hilarious comedy this... well, pleasant. The great comedies of the last year or so have been either edgy (Little Miss Sunshine), raunchy (Superbad), or just plain twisted (Borat). Enchanted throws in a few requisite gross-out gags, but for the most part it's all very PG.
2. Much has been made of Amy Adams' breakout performance here as Princess Giselle. What you've heard is all true. She lights up a film frame like Julia Roberts and Meg Ryan once did. Some may wonder if Adams is just playing herself since both Giselle and her Oscar-nominated role in Junebug are so similar: the wide-eyed ingenue innocent. But the Cheese Fry suspects she's got more layers than that.
3. The big dragon ending may have been too much, but if you have Susan Sarandon playing your villain, you probably should give her something to do at the end.
4. The premise is pure genius. One of those ideas that seems so obvious you wonder why no one thought of it sooner. What happens when a Disney princess comes to our world and realizes the real world is no fairy tale?
5. That Disney was the one to poke fun at those cliches earns them bonus points. Although, as some critics have suggested, this good-natured deconstruction of the familiar Baby Boomer Disney movie is also lovingly rendered in such a way that the film also honors that tradition. Yes, "happily ever after" is cheesy, but don't we all also sort of long for it?
6. The little chipmunk Pip steals the movie.
7. That narrator may sound familiar. Can you recognize the voice? No fair peeking.
8. Old screenwriting rules suggest every great movie needs at least three memorable set pieces, the kind of thing audiences remember long after they leave the theater. This one has two huge ones that probably count as three. One is Giselle's clean-up of Patrick Dempsey's apartment. Two is the showstopper musical in Central Park. Instant classics.
9. James Marsden's always seems a little wooden and dim, traits that serve him perfectly here as Prince Edward.
10. You're seeing a new Disney franchise being born. Maybe they don't need Pixar after all.
2. Much has been made of Amy Adams' breakout performance here as Princess Giselle. What you've heard is all true. She lights up a film frame like Julia Roberts and Meg Ryan once did. Some may wonder if Adams is just playing herself since both Giselle and her Oscar-nominated role in Junebug are so similar: the wide-eyed ingenue innocent. But the Cheese Fry suspects she's got more layers than that.
3. The big dragon ending may have been too much, but if you have Susan Sarandon playing your villain, you probably should give her something to do at the end.
4. The premise is pure genius. One of those ideas that seems so obvious you wonder why no one thought of it sooner. What happens when a Disney princess comes to our world and realizes the real world is no fairy tale?
5. That Disney was the one to poke fun at those cliches earns them bonus points. Although, as some critics have suggested, this good-natured deconstruction of the familiar Baby Boomer Disney movie is also lovingly rendered in such a way that the film also honors that tradition. Yes, "happily ever after" is cheesy, but don't we all also sort of long for it?
6. The little chipmunk Pip steals the movie.
7. That narrator may sound familiar. Can you recognize the voice? No fair peeking.
8. Old screenwriting rules suggest every great movie needs at least three memorable set pieces, the kind of thing audiences remember long after they leave the theater. This one has two huge ones that probably count as three. One is Giselle's clean-up of Patrick Dempsey's apartment. Two is the showstopper musical in Central Park. Instant classics.
9. James Marsden's always seems a little wooden and dim, traits that serve him perfectly here as Prince Edward.
10. You're seeing a new Disney franchise being born. Maybe they don't need Pixar after all.
12.10.2007
Knee-jerk review: "The Mist"
1. Writer-director Frank Darabont has certainly carved out an odd niche for himself. He's written and directed four feature films and three are Stephen King adaptations, including this one. The best, obviously, is The Shawshank Redemption. But you knew already knew that, right?
2. It's a good movie, but it never quite becomes a "great" movie. Or even a "pretty good" movie.
3. What the heck happened to Thomas Jane's career? It all looked so promising for him back in 1999 when he was the star of the deeply strange, steroid-shark thriller Deep Blue Sea. He's got a stoic and steely charm about him that's not unlike Steve McQueen. If they ever remake Bullitt - and they probably will/are - Jane's the guy.
4. You may have heard about the ending. Yes, it's different from the original Stephen King novella, but not necessarily better. Whereas the novella ended on a note of hopeful ambiguity, the movie answers all of the questions and offers up a very depressing twist moments before the fade-out. At first it feels like a real sucker punch, a cinematic middle finger offered to the audience for no good reason other than it's "cool" to do it to us. A twist for twist's sake, much like the dark and pointless ending of The Departed. But upon further review, Darabont may actually be onto something. If the story is all about faith and hope in the face of tragedy and certain death, then the ending undeniably suggests what can go wrong if one stops holding out hope.
5. Marcia Gay Harden's always great, even if she's stuck here with the stereotypical religious kook role that's so prevalent in King's stories.
6. The mist refugees, all huddled up in that supermarket, display a curious lack of preparation and foresight. They know something's out there, they have hours and hours to prepare... and when the creatures attack, these people run around like the Keystone Kops. It's the kind of phony moment that creates exciting action and suspense in the story (i.e. someone catches on fire and no one knows where the extinguishers are), but does so at the expense of logic and plausibility.
7. Best part of the movie is Toby Jones as bagger Ollie.
8. Points must be deducted for the blatant Aliens rip-off involving cocooned people.
9. Additional points must be deducted for stooping to explain the mist with one of the most cliched and tired excuses possible. It might have been cool and intriguing back in 1990, before "The X-Files" debuted on Fox.
2. It's a good movie, but it never quite becomes a "great" movie. Or even a "pretty good" movie.
3. What the heck happened to Thomas Jane's career? It all looked so promising for him back in 1999 when he was the star of the deeply strange, steroid-shark thriller Deep Blue Sea. He's got a stoic and steely charm about him that's not unlike Steve McQueen. If they ever remake Bullitt - and they probably will/are - Jane's the guy.
4. You may have heard about the ending. Yes, it's different from the original Stephen King novella, but not necessarily better. Whereas the novella ended on a note of hopeful ambiguity, the movie answers all of the questions and offers up a very depressing twist moments before the fade-out. At first it feels like a real sucker punch, a cinematic middle finger offered to the audience for no good reason other than it's "cool" to do it to us. A twist for twist's sake, much like the dark and pointless ending of The Departed. But upon further review, Darabont may actually be onto something. If the story is all about faith and hope in the face of tragedy and certain death, then the ending undeniably suggests what can go wrong if one stops holding out hope.
5. Marcia Gay Harden's always great, even if she's stuck here with the stereotypical religious kook role that's so prevalent in King's stories.
6. The mist refugees, all huddled up in that supermarket, display a curious lack of preparation and foresight. They know something's out there, they have hours and hours to prepare... and when the creatures attack, these people run around like the Keystone Kops. It's the kind of phony moment that creates exciting action and suspense in the story (i.e. someone catches on fire and no one knows where the extinguishers are), but does so at the expense of logic and plausibility.
7. Best part of the movie is Toby Jones as bagger Ollie.
8. Points must be deducted for the blatant Aliens rip-off involving cocooned people.
9. Additional points must be deducted for stooping to explain the mist with one of the most cliched and tired excuses possible. It might have been cool and intriguing back in 1990, before "The X-Files" debuted on Fox.
11.11.2007
Clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose
Via the very-readable film/TV criticism blog The House Next Door comes a great posting by Joan O'Connell Hedman who ponders some possible reasons for the continued struggles of NBC's Friday Night Lights.
This is the best drama on television. This statement is true even with this season's rather obvious attempts to expand its audience base by making it more of a traditional prime-time soap (e.g. road trip to Mexico! dead body in the river!). Even with that tinkering this remains a tough show to categorize, a fact that is clearly driving the NBC promotions department crazy. Everyone agrees it's a good show, but how to get good ratings? This isn't a slick, violent, high-concept police procedural like CSI or an over-the-top, wink-wink dramedy like Desperate Housewives.
Friday Night Lights may be a little too gritty and real in its depiction of everyday life. Yes, there are some uncomfortable and painful truths, but there's also some poignant and uplifting triumphs. But you'll never know unless you try it.
This is the best drama on television. This statement is true even with this season's rather obvious attempts to expand its audience base by making it more of a traditional prime-time soap (e.g. road trip to Mexico! dead body in the river!). Even with that tinkering this remains a tough show to categorize, a fact that is clearly driving the NBC promotions department crazy. Everyone agrees it's a good show, but how to get good ratings? This isn't a slick, violent, high-concept police procedural like CSI or an over-the-top, wink-wink dramedy like Desperate Housewives.
Friday Night Lights may be a little too gritty and real in its depiction of everyday life. Yes, there are some uncomfortable and painful truths, but there's also some poignant and uplifting triumphs. But you'll never know unless you try it.
11.04.2007
New TV season three-word reviews
* "Survivor: China" - Still enjoyably addictive
* "ER" - Time to cancel
* "Friday Night Lights" - Soapier but solid
* "Bionic Woman" - Gilmores meets Alias
* "The Office" - Getting much sillier
* "Heroes" - Losing my patience
* "30 Rock" - Deserved the Emmy
* "Desperate Housewives" - Regaining its glory
* The Bachelor" - Shameful and embarrasing
* "Kid Nation" - Clever but icky
* "ER" - Time to cancel
* "Friday Night Lights" - Soapier but solid
* "Bionic Woman" - Gilmores meets Alias
* "The Office" - Getting much sillier
* "Heroes" - Losing my patience
* "30 Rock" - Deserved the Emmy
* "Desperate Housewives" - Regaining its glory
* The Bachelor" - Shameful and embarrasing
* "Kid Nation" - Clever but icky
Knee-jerk review: "Dan in Real Life"
1. Funniest line of the movie: "This corn is like an angel."
2. There's been much ado in the reviews and PR about the film's use of a single songwriter - Sondre Lerche - to provide the music, with some applauding the bold decision and others complaining the songs are too heavy-handed. Truth be told, the songs really doesn't have much of an impact either way. They're just some nice background filler.
3. It is possible: Dane Cook can dial down his self-satisfied mugging and deliver an understated performance if he so chooses.
4. John Mahoney's looking old.
5. Steve Carrell's most naturalistic role yet and he hits a home run.
6. A tough film to market. More a warm, sweet romantic comedy than the sort of broad, profane, high-concept comedies that have been so popular lately. Hopefully word of mouth will get audiences into theaters.
7. Nice to see a big extended family that actually, you know, gets along and enjoys each other. No one in this film is dysfunctional in the brash, exaggerated way Hollywood movies families typically are.
8. And for those of us who don't come from the East Coast, there's something incredibly soothing and attractive about the rural Rhode Island setting of this movie. All flannel and fleece, sprawling lake houses, and fall colors. It's like a J. Crew catalog, only wthout the snooty condescension. You want to be there with the characters.
9. We'd probably pick Juliette Binoche over Emily Blunt, too. But it's close.
10. A good reminder of how satisfying a movie can be if you really, truly care about the characters. All of the characters.
2. There's been much ado in the reviews and PR about the film's use of a single songwriter - Sondre Lerche - to provide the music, with some applauding the bold decision and others complaining the songs are too heavy-handed. Truth be told, the songs really doesn't have much of an impact either way. They're just some nice background filler.
3. It is possible: Dane Cook can dial down his self-satisfied mugging and deliver an understated performance if he so chooses.
4. John Mahoney's looking old.
5. Steve Carrell's most naturalistic role yet and he hits a home run.
6. A tough film to market. More a warm, sweet romantic comedy than the sort of broad, profane, high-concept comedies that have been so popular lately. Hopefully word of mouth will get audiences into theaters.
7. Nice to see a big extended family that actually, you know, gets along and enjoys each other. No one in this film is dysfunctional in the brash, exaggerated way Hollywood movies families typically are.
8. And for those of us who don't come from the East Coast, there's something incredibly soothing and attractive about the rural Rhode Island setting of this movie. All flannel and fleece, sprawling lake houses, and fall colors. It's like a J. Crew catalog, only wthout the snooty condescension. You want to be there with the characters.
9. We'd probably pick Juliette Binoche over Emily Blunt, too. But it's close.
10. A good reminder of how satisfying a movie can be if you really, truly care about the characters. All of the characters.
10.28.2007
The New England Patriots Must Be Stopped
Lo, there was a time when The Cheese Fry was an unapologetic New England Patriot fan.
What wasn't to like in the early 2000s as the Patriots won their first Superbowl in 2001 in the shadow of 9/11 on the arm of an unknown quarterback (Tom Brady) and the leg of a clutch kicker (Adam Vinatieri)? Unbeknownst to those of us watching, that victory sowed the seeds for a powerful NFL dynasty. New England won two more Superbowls in 2003 and 2004, a streak unprecedented in this new era of NFL free agency. Before the Patriots began their roll, analysts liked to say the days of the Steelers/49ers/Cowboys dominance were over. Indeed, the Dallas Cowboys were systematically dismantled in the mid-1990s as its Superbowl teams were raided by free agent defections. Maintaining a good team year in and year out was virtually impossible; player turnover was just too high. So they all said. But the Patriots kept finding a way.
Verily, in the early- to mid-2000s it was fun to root for the Patriots. Why?
1. Tom Brady was as mild-mannered a recluse as Peyton Manning was an extroverted media darling, making Brady seem refreshingly no-nonsense and all-business. He didn't appear in stupid TV commercials like Manning. Instead, Brady spent his time winning Superbowls.
2. The Patriots had no real history of winning, so this was an entirely new experience for them (and for the viewers at home). Remember, as late as 2002 or so, the Patriots were still sort of playing the role of underdogs. They weren't a glittery, premier franchise like Green Bay or Dallas or New York.
3. Coach Bill Belichick was known for being some kind of coaching android, able to dissect an opposing team like a thorasic surgeon to expose vulnerable weaknesses. You wished he coached for your team.
4. There was also something very blue collar about the Patriots: players didn't earn big contracts in New England; in fact, they took pay cuts to stay. Those who dared to ask for more money, like CB Ty Law or WR Deion Branch found themselves shown the door.
And so it has come to pass, that almost midway through the 2007 NFL season, the Patriots look unstoppable. Adding a new corps of capable receivers in he 2007 off-season has at last given Brady a fleet of able targets. And he's good enough to use them - give him enough time and he'll find the open man. Especially if there's five men trying to get open. This team is like a franchise Terminator, sent from the future to win another Superbowl.
But enough is enough.
The Cheese Fry is off the Patriots bandwagon. And we're trying to find a way to break its axles and slash, no, steal its tires. Why?
1. The cheating scandal. This is where it all started to come apart. Belichick's staff was caught videotaping Jets defensive signals at a game earlier this season. Supposedly, this practice - though expressly forbidden by the NFL - is somewhat common. But it was the Patriots who got caught. Naturally, people started to wonder how long they'd been doing this and what sort of edge it provided. What role did this kind of cheating have on those three Lombardi trophies? Such speculation angered Patriots players and coaches to no end. Which brings us to...
2. Belichick is kind of an asshole. When questioned about the scandal by reporters, Bill Belichick stubbornly refused to comment. And he refused to comment with a smugly unashamed tone to his voice that made The Cheese Fry want great harm to come to him. This was a major scandal and Belichick was acting like his staff was just caught out past curfew. You'd think a coach would want to say something about what had happened, how he understood it might tarnish the whole team, how he regretted it, how he wished it hadn't happened, how he wanted to reassure fans he ran a clean outfit of the utmost integrity. Just some lame PR babble would have sufficed. But instead, he only wanted to talk about the next game. He's oh so above it all.
3. Running up the scores. Here's where things get interesting. Apparently, those who dared to besmudge the great invincible powers of the Patriots Dynasty were beneath contempt. Players, especially LB Tedy Bruschi, huffed and puffed about how awful it was to suggest their Superbowls were somehow tainted by the cheating scandal. This rage may be getting vented on the football field. The Patriots seem to be a mission to punish other teams and Make a Point. In the waning minutes of the Cowboys game, backup RB Kyle Eckel runs in a touchdown with 20 seconds to go, making the final score 48-27. And today, up 45-0 on the Redskins, the Patriots are still trying to score. And so they do with backup QB Matt Cassell scrambling for the endzone as if the fate of the game hung in the balance. This isn't the BCS, Belichick, and you're not LSU. Yes, it's a fine line between running up the score and ensuring victory in a league where every team can win on "any given Sunday." But like pornography, we know it when we see it. And today, we saw it. Utterly classless. Even in the waning minutes of the game, with the score 52-7, the Patriots were running pass plays. Luckily, NFL teams have a long memory - hopefully there will come a day when Belichick gets a taste of his own medicine. Wonder if he'll have a comment about that.
4. Tom Brady is kind of a louse. We'll keep this simple: when you get a girl pregnant and then leave her and the baby, you lose points. You lose additional points when you leave impregnated Hot Actress to hook up with Hot Model. Very dickish. Say it ain't so, Tom.
5. Dynasties are no fun. At this point, no one seems capable of stopping New England. Maybe Indianapolis, maybe Pittsburgh. Everyone else is playing for sloppy seconds. One wonders why we don't just call the whole thing off, hand them the Superbowl trophy now, and give us some free time to go read a book or take up pottery. Some talk of the good old days when the Steelers ruled the 70s, the 49ers the 80s, the Cowboys the 90s. But those dynasties weren't like this Patriot juggernaut. The Cheese Fry enjoyed cheering the Cowboys to three Superbowls in the 1990s (it's fun to have a winning hometown team), but the road to those Superbowls were tough. Every game was a question mark. Emmit Smith once played with a dislocated shoulder in a final regular season game to make sure the Cowboys beat the Giants to win the NFC East. These 2007 Patriots, by contrast, are cakewalking. There's no dislocated Patriot shoulder in the immediate future for anyone, it seems. Unless you live in Boston, it ain't fun.
6. False humility is almost worse than justifiable arrogance. Following the Washington stomping, WR Wes Welker gave a post-game interview in which he actually said Washington has a good defense. Is he serious? He's referring to the defense that just gave up 52 points, right? Who the hell does he think he's kidding? Such phony sentiments somehow make all of this even more infuriating. Yes, we'd be mad if Welker said "Clearly, their defense really sucked and we enjoyed riding them like $10 whores," but at least it would seem honest.
7. Belichick's ridiculous sideline hoodie. This was a charming idiosyncracy back in 2001. Now it's just pathetic.
And so, we say unto you, that The Cheese Fry is irrevocably revoking its support of the New England Patriots. We ask you to do the same. Perhaps together, our hatred and anger can give Tom Brady a sprained elbow or at least allow Randy Moss to become the irrational jackass locker-room cancer we all know he can be.
This team must be stopped if mankind is to survive.
What wasn't to like in the early 2000s as the Patriots won their first Superbowl in 2001 in the shadow of 9/11 on the arm of an unknown quarterback (Tom Brady) and the leg of a clutch kicker (Adam Vinatieri)? Unbeknownst to those of us watching, that victory sowed the seeds for a powerful NFL dynasty. New England won two more Superbowls in 2003 and 2004, a streak unprecedented in this new era of NFL free agency. Before the Patriots began their roll, analysts liked to say the days of the Steelers/49ers/Cowboys dominance were over. Indeed, the Dallas Cowboys were systematically dismantled in the mid-1990s as its Superbowl teams were raided by free agent defections. Maintaining a good team year in and year out was virtually impossible; player turnover was just too high. So they all said. But the Patriots kept finding a way.
Verily, in the early- to mid-2000s it was fun to root for the Patriots. Why?
1. Tom Brady was as mild-mannered a recluse as Peyton Manning was an extroverted media darling, making Brady seem refreshingly no-nonsense and all-business. He didn't appear in stupid TV commercials like Manning. Instead, Brady spent his time winning Superbowls.
2. The Patriots had no real history of winning, so this was an entirely new experience for them (and for the viewers at home). Remember, as late as 2002 or so, the Patriots were still sort of playing the role of underdogs. They weren't a glittery, premier franchise like Green Bay or Dallas or New York.
3. Coach Bill Belichick was known for being some kind of coaching android, able to dissect an opposing team like a thorasic surgeon to expose vulnerable weaknesses. You wished he coached for your team.
4. There was also something very blue collar about the Patriots: players didn't earn big contracts in New England; in fact, they took pay cuts to stay. Those who dared to ask for more money, like CB Ty Law or WR Deion Branch found themselves shown the door.
And so it has come to pass, that almost midway through the 2007 NFL season, the Patriots look unstoppable. Adding a new corps of capable receivers in he 2007 off-season has at last given Brady a fleet of able targets. And he's good enough to use them - give him enough time and he'll find the open man. Especially if there's five men trying to get open. This team is like a franchise Terminator, sent from the future to win another Superbowl.
But enough is enough.
The Cheese Fry is off the Patriots bandwagon. And we're trying to find a way to break its axles and slash, no, steal its tires. Why?
1. The cheating scandal. This is where it all started to come apart. Belichick's staff was caught videotaping Jets defensive signals at a game earlier this season. Supposedly, this practice - though expressly forbidden by the NFL - is somewhat common. But it was the Patriots who got caught. Naturally, people started to wonder how long they'd been doing this and what sort of edge it provided. What role did this kind of cheating have on those three Lombardi trophies? Such speculation angered Patriots players and coaches to no end. Which brings us to...
2. Belichick is kind of an asshole. When questioned about the scandal by reporters, Bill Belichick stubbornly refused to comment. And he refused to comment with a smugly unashamed tone to his voice that made The Cheese Fry want great harm to come to him. This was a major scandal and Belichick was acting like his staff was just caught out past curfew. You'd think a coach would want to say something about what had happened, how he understood it might tarnish the whole team, how he regretted it, how he wished it hadn't happened, how he wanted to reassure fans he ran a clean outfit of the utmost integrity. Just some lame PR babble would have sufficed. But instead, he only wanted to talk about the next game. He's oh so above it all.
3. Running up the scores. Here's where things get interesting. Apparently, those who dared to besmudge the great invincible powers of the Patriots Dynasty were beneath contempt. Players, especially LB Tedy Bruschi, huffed and puffed about how awful it was to suggest their Superbowls were somehow tainted by the cheating scandal. This rage may be getting vented on the football field. The Patriots seem to be a mission to punish other teams and Make a Point. In the waning minutes of the Cowboys game, backup RB Kyle Eckel runs in a touchdown with 20 seconds to go, making the final score 48-27. And today, up 45-0 on the Redskins, the Patriots are still trying to score. And so they do with backup QB Matt Cassell scrambling for the endzone as if the fate of the game hung in the balance. This isn't the BCS, Belichick, and you're not LSU. Yes, it's a fine line between running up the score and ensuring victory in a league where every team can win on "any given Sunday." But like pornography, we know it when we see it. And today, we saw it. Utterly classless. Even in the waning minutes of the game, with the score 52-7, the Patriots were running pass plays. Luckily, NFL teams have a long memory - hopefully there will come a day when Belichick gets a taste of his own medicine. Wonder if he'll have a comment about that.
4. Tom Brady is kind of a louse. We'll keep this simple: when you get a girl pregnant and then leave her and the baby, you lose points. You lose additional points when you leave impregnated Hot Actress to hook up with Hot Model. Very dickish. Say it ain't so, Tom.
5. Dynasties are no fun. At this point, no one seems capable of stopping New England. Maybe Indianapolis, maybe Pittsburgh. Everyone else is playing for sloppy seconds. One wonders why we don't just call the whole thing off, hand them the Superbowl trophy now, and give us some free time to go read a book or take up pottery. Some talk of the good old days when the Steelers ruled the 70s, the 49ers the 80s, the Cowboys the 90s. But those dynasties weren't like this Patriot juggernaut. The Cheese Fry enjoyed cheering the Cowboys to three Superbowls in the 1990s (it's fun to have a winning hometown team), but the road to those Superbowls were tough. Every game was a question mark. Emmit Smith once played with a dislocated shoulder in a final regular season game to make sure the Cowboys beat the Giants to win the NFC East. These 2007 Patriots, by contrast, are cakewalking. There's no dislocated Patriot shoulder in the immediate future for anyone, it seems. Unless you live in Boston, it ain't fun.
6. False humility is almost worse than justifiable arrogance. Following the Washington stomping, WR Wes Welker gave a post-game interview in which he actually said Washington has a good defense. Is he serious? He's referring to the defense that just gave up 52 points, right? Who the hell does he think he's kidding? Such phony sentiments somehow make all of this even more infuriating. Yes, we'd be mad if Welker said "Clearly, their defense really sucked and we enjoyed riding them like $10 whores," but at least it would seem honest.
7. Belichick's ridiculous sideline hoodie. This was a charming idiosyncracy back in 2001. Now it's just pathetic.
And so, we say unto you, that The Cheese Fry is irrevocably revoking its support of the New England Patriots. We ask you to do the same. Perhaps together, our hatred and anger can give Tom Brady a sprained elbow or at least allow Randy Moss to become the irrational jackass locker-room cancer we all know he can be.
This team must be stopped if mankind is to survive.
Some delicious children's breakfast cereals
* Honeycomb (Post)
* Trix (General Mills)
* Frosted Flakes (Kellogg's)
* Apple Jacks (Kellogg's)
* Lucky Charms (General Mills)
* Cinnamon Toast Crunch (General Mills)
* Trix (General Mills)
* Froot Loops (Kellogg's)
* Cocoa Pebbles (Post)
* Trix (General Mills)
* Frosted Flakes (Kellogg's)
* Apple Jacks (Kellogg's)
* Lucky Charms (General Mills)
* Cinnamon Toast Crunch (General Mills)
* Trix (General Mills)
* Froot Loops (Kellogg's)
* Cocoa Pebbles (Post)
Scariest 10 movies
1. The Blair Witch Project - An ingeniously simple concept (three teens get lost in the woods while chasing a witch legend) spoiled by hype that made it impossible for the film to ever live up to its reputation. The scares here come from what isn't seen, such as the main characters fleeing into the dark woods surrounded by mysterious noises that may be chasing them.
2. Night of the Living Dead - The grainy rawness of director George Romero's low budget approach makes it all the more terrifying as a group of strangers huddle in an isolated farmhouse to escape the army of undead outside. A watershed film that spawned an entire sub-genre of pop culture (see #6 below).
3. The Ring - Usually Hollywood can't be trusted to remake a foreign film, but this is the exception. Exporting a strange "J-horror" premise (you die seven days after seeing a weird haunted videotape) gives the film an unexpected freshness that makes it impossible to predict how it's all going to turn out. The weird music is just the cherry on the cake.
4. The Omen (1976 original) - Many prefer that other tale of superatural childhood evil, The Exorcist, but that movie's too intellectual and, frankly, rather boring in the first half. It's like sour medicine: you know it's good for you, but it's not that much fun. The Omen, however, is the tasty junk food, delivering big scares start to finish.
5. The Others - Many lumped this in with The Sixth Sense because of the fashionable Big Twist Ending That Changes Everything, but this is a much scarier, much creepier movie because of the old-school Gothic ghost story elements: the rambling house full of shadows and lanterns, the question of what's real and what isn't (including the sanity of a brittle Nicole Kidman). Good stuff.
6. Dawn of the Dead (2004 remake) - A peerless updating of the zombie genre. A bigger budget allows for more action, better zombie effects, and a better cast (yes, Ving Rhames is always good, but the revelation here is Jake Weber). Director Zach Snyder stuck to the Romero playbook...
7. 28 Days Later - ...while director Danny Boyle reimagined the Romero template by making the monsters "infected" rather than "undead" and, of course, by making them sprint like terrifying Olympic relay runners. Points must be deducted for a muddled and anticlimactic third act, but the first hour is so strong and scary that we can overlook any shortfalls.
8. Hostel - Unfairly labeled as worthless "torture porn," this does what any good horror film does: take society's fears to the extreme. Here we get a murky Internet rumor come to life as our hapless characters stumble onto an Eastern European black market snuff ring. It's scary because you imagine such a thing is possible.
9. The Shining - The cold dread of this movie, filling the empty rooms of the massive Overlook Hotel, is almost palpable. So many of the small touches can still give one goosebumps, such as little Danny Torrance suddenly seeing the ghosts of two dead twin girls. The Cheese Fry is freaked out just typing that.
10. Texas Chainsaw Massacre (the 1974 original) - Like #2, the cheap grit of this low-budget film gives everything a sweaty newsreel immediacy (i.e. "oh my god, this is really happening"). And because it's filled with unknown faces, you have no one of predicting who - if anyone - will survive. The godfather of the many teen slasher movies (FYI, the best of the 1980s: Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter, the quintessential slasher movie).
2. Night of the Living Dead - The grainy rawness of director George Romero's low budget approach makes it all the more terrifying as a group of strangers huddle in an isolated farmhouse to escape the army of undead outside. A watershed film that spawned an entire sub-genre of pop culture (see #6 below).
3. The Ring - Usually Hollywood can't be trusted to remake a foreign film, but this is the exception. Exporting a strange "J-horror" premise (you die seven days after seeing a weird haunted videotape) gives the film an unexpected freshness that makes it impossible to predict how it's all going to turn out. The weird music is just the cherry on the cake.
4. The Omen (1976 original) - Many prefer that other tale of superatural childhood evil, The Exorcist, but that movie's too intellectual and, frankly, rather boring in the first half. It's like sour medicine: you know it's good for you, but it's not that much fun. The Omen, however, is the tasty junk food, delivering big scares start to finish.
5. The Others - Many lumped this in with The Sixth Sense because of the fashionable Big Twist Ending That Changes Everything, but this is a much scarier, much creepier movie because of the old-school Gothic ghost story elements: the rambling house full of shadows and lanterns, the question of what's real and what isn't (including the sanity of a brittle Nicole Kidman). Good stuff.
6. Dawn of the Dead (2004 remake) - A peerless updating of the zombie genre. A bigger budget allows for more action, better zombie effects, and a better cast (yes, Ving Rhames is always good, but the revelation here is Jake Weber). Director Zach Snyder stuck to the Romero playbook...
7. 28 Days Later - ...while director Danny Boyle reimagined the Romero template by making the monsters "infected" rather than "undead" and, of course, by making them sprint like terrifying Olympic relay runners. Points must be deducted for a muddled and anticlimactic third act, but the first hour is so strong and scary that we can overlook any shortfalls.
8. Hostel - Unfairly labeled as worthless "torture porn," this does what any good horror film does: take society's fears to the extreme. Here we get a murky Internet rumor come to life as our hapless characters stumble onto an Eastern European black market snuff ring. It's scary because you imagine such a thing is possible.
9. The Shining - The cold dread of this movie, filling the empty rooms of the massive Overlook Hotel, is almost palpable. So many of the small touches can still give one goosebumps, such as little Danny Torrance suddenly seeing the ghosts of two dead twin girls. The Cheese Fry is freaked out just typing that.
10. Texas Chainsaw Massacre (the 1974 original) - Like #2, the cheap grit of this low-budget film gives everything a sweaty newsreel immediacy (i.e. "oh my god, this is really happening"). And because it's filled with unknown faces, you have no one of predicting who - if anyone - will survive. The godfather of the many teen slasher movies (FYI, the best of the 1980s: Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter, the quintessential slasher movie).
Knee-jerk review: "Michael Clayton"
1. This is a movie that makes you work. It takes about 30 minutes to piece everything together and figure out who's doing what to who and why. While it's nice that the filmmakers so clearly trust the audience to be intelligent, a little bit of narrative hand-holding would have helped.
2. We're also not convinced the confusing flashforward prologue was 100% necessary.
3. A plausibly complex look at big-money machinations of corporate lawyers, their multi-millionaire clients, and the class-action lawsuits that brings them together in an ugly symbiosis of profits and self-delusions.
4. An outstanding cast that clearly relishes the A-level dialogue supplied here by writer-director Tom Gilroy.
5. George Clooney may not be a movie star who can open films just be the virtue of his being in them (this one's struggling a bit at the box office), but the guy knows how to pick projects. If he's got anything to do with a film, chances are it will be a good one. Even better, chances are it will be an interesting one. Clooney's more than willing to use his power to make unconventional films. Looking back on his career, the only real dud is 2003's Intolerable Cruelty.
6. The murder that happens here is unusually chilling in that it happens so simply and matter-of-factly. It doesn't take much at all to end someone's life.
7. There's something strangely attractive about Tilda Swinton. Or is it just us?
8. Love the satisfying ending, even if it disappointingly relies on one of the more creaky of thriller cliches.
9. Very very good, but not quite as great as it could have been.
2. We're also not convinced the confusing flashforward prologue was 100% necessary.
3. A plausibly complex look at big-money machinations of corporate lawyers, their multi-millionaire clients, and the class-action lawsuits that brings them together in an ugly symbiosis of profits and self-delusions.
4. An outstanding cast that clearly relishes the A-level dialogue supplied here by writer-director Tom Gilroy.
5. George Clooney may not be a movie star who can open films just be the virtue of his being in them (this one's struggling a bit at the box office), but the guy knows how to pick projects. If he's got anything to do with a film, chances are it will be a good one. Even better, chances are it will be an interesting one. Clooney's more than willing to use his power to make unconventional films. Looking back on his career, the only real dud is 2003's Intolerable Cruelty.
6. The murder that happens here is unusually chilling in that it happens so simply and matter-of-factly. It doesn't take much at all to end someone's life.
7. There's something strangely attractive about Tilda Swinton. Or is it just us?
8. Love the satisfying ending, even if it disappointingly relies on one of the more creaky of thriller cliches.
9. Very very good, but not quite as great as it could have been.
10.16.2007
Cassette tape rewind: Sophomore year (part 2)
Back to the fall of 1987 and the Cheese Fry's 10th grade hell of senior pranks (please don't ask about the "I ride the bus" sign) and secret crushes. Billboard Issue date: October 17, 1987.
1. Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam "Lost in Emotion" - This actually made to #1? Go figure. Whatever happened to Lisa Lisa? And why the two names? She was probably a little too similar to Paula Abdul for her own good back in the day. Same sort of baby-girl voice and exotic ethnic look. A catchy song without question with a dreamy steel drum/marimba vibe.
2. The Artist Formerly Known as Prince "U Got the Look" - A truly great song, even with the rather dated lyrics "Your body's jammin'/Your body's heck-a-slammin'." When Prince is on his game, the guy is a genius.
3. Europe "Carrie" - Ouch. Among the worst of the hair-band 1980s power ballads. That's one musical trend that's particularly embarrassing for Generation X. But the Cheese Fry never liked this song. Seriously.
4. Michael Jackson "Bad" - I think we can all agree that Jackson peaked with Thriller. "Your butt is mine"? Eww.
5. Madonna "Causing a Commotion" - Catchy dance pop song, neither here nor there.
6. Whitesnake "Here I Go Again" - Among the best of the hair-band 1980s power ballads. I've got my cigarette lighter up.
7. Heart "Who Will You Run To" - The Cheese Fry definitely had a thing for guitarist/singer Nancy Wilson. She's the skinny blonde sister, not the pudgy brunette sister. Good stuff.
8. Levert "Casanova" - Hmm, this sounds familiar, yes. But can't remember the melody. Or the lyrics. Or what Levert looks like.
9. John Mellencamp "Paper in Fire" - Solid Mellencampian rural twangy rock. It aged nicely. The Cheese Fry wasn't a fan of the song when it was on the radio, but now it's definitely in the oldie-but-goodie category.
10. Bananarama "I Heard a Rumor" - Among the best dance pop songs of the 1980s. It's essentially perfect. A sonic masterpiece of fluff.
11. Tiffany "I Think We're Alone Now" - Cough-guilty pleasure-cough.
12. Expose "Let Me Be the One" - A fun song, but if Expose's songs were never played again, you'd probably never notice.
13. Fleetwood Mac "Little Lies" - Part of that little mid-80s hiccup of Fleetwood Mac renaissance. The darkly odd "Big Love" is the better song.
14. Billy Idol "Mony Mony" - One of those utterly annoying songs that top 40 radio played the all-hell-crap out of. Couldn't stand this stupid-ass song in 1987, can't stand it now. Even worse: the Thomas Jefferson H.S. drill team performed this as one of their numbers so the Cheese Fry had to actually play this song in marching band. Oh the humanity.
15. Whitney Houston "Didn't We Almost Have It All" - Yawn.
1. Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam "Lost in Emotion" - This actually made to #1? Go figure. Whatever happened to Lisa Lisa? And why the two names? She was probably a little too similar to Paula Abdul for her own good back in the day. Same sort of baby-girl voice and exotic ethnic look. A catchy song without question with a dreamy steel drum/marimba vibe.
2. The Artist Formerly Known as Prince "U Got the Look" - A truly great song, even with the rather dated lyrics "Your body's jammin'/Your body's heck-a-slammin'." When Prince is on his game, the guy is a genius.
3. Europe "Carrie" - Ouch. Among the worst of the hair-band 1980s power ballads. That's one musical trend that's particularly embarrassing for Generation X. But the Cheese Fry never liked this song. Seriously.
4. Michael Jackson "Bad" - I think we can all agree that Jackson peaked with Thriller. "Your butt is mine"? Eww.
5. Madonna "Causing a Commotion" - Catchy dance pop song, neither here nor there.
6. Whitesnake "Here I Go Again" - Among the best of the hair-band 1980s power ballads. I've got my cigarette lighter up.
7. Heart "Who Will You Run To" - The Cheese Fry definitely had a thing for guitarist/singer Nancy Wilson. She's the skinny blonde sister, not the pudgy brunette sister. Good stuff.
8. Levert "Casanova" - Hmm, this sounds familiar, yes. But can't remember the melody. Or the lyrics. Or what Levert looks like.
9. John Mellencamp "Paper in Fire" - Solid Mellencampian rural twangy rock. It aged nicely. The Cheese Fry wasn't a fan of the song when it was on the radio, but now it's definitely in the oldie-but-goodie category.
10. Bananarama "I Heard a Rumor" - Among the best dance pop songs of the 1980s. It's essentially perfect. A sonic masterpiece of fluff.
11. Tiffany "I Think We're Alone Now" - Cough-guilty pleasure-cough.
12. Expose "Let Me Be the One" - A fun song, but if Expose's songs were never played again, you'd probably never notice.
13. Fleetwood Mac "Little Lies" - Part of that little mid-80s hiccup of Fleetwood Mac renaissance. The darkly odd "Big Love" is the better song.
14. Billy Idol "Mony Mony" - One of those utterly annoying songs that top 40 radio played the all-hell-crap out of. Couldn't stand this stupid-ass song in 1987, can't stand it now. Even worse: the Thomas Jefferson H.S. drill team performed this as one of their numbers so the Cheese Fry had to actually play this song in marching band. Oh the humanity.
15. Whitney Houston "Didn't We Almost Have It All" - Yawn.
Knee-jerk review: Drew Carey on "The Price Is Right"
1. The good news is that while the set's got an upgrade (don't worry, it's still ridiculously garish), the overall feel of the show remains exactly the same as the Barker era. That includes the iconic handheld wand microphone.
2. Drew Carey is certainly having a good time, it seems, especially the way he's willing to share a laugh with the contestant...
3. ...but he also seems a little nervous. Fidgety. He keeps dipping one hand into his coat pocket where he keeps the "actual retail price" for the contestants' row bids.
4. He certainly lacks the effortlessly smooth polish of Bob Barker. Doing several thousand shows can probably takes some of the edges off.
5. Carey also misses a chance to pay respect to Barker. Introducing a game called Barker's Bargain Barn, Carey tries to make a joke and say it's named after the founder of the show Ezekial Barker. It's almost like Roger Moore giving Sean Connery the finger. A weird moment.
6. CBS hired Carey to pursue a younger audience. We'll have to wait and see if it works.
2. Drew Carey is certainly having a good time, it seems, especially the way he's willing to share a laugh with the contestant...
3. ...but he also seems a little nervous. Fidgety. He keeps dipping one hand into his coat pocket where he keeps the "actual retail price" for the contestants' row bids.
4. He certainly lacks the effortlessly smooth polish of Bob Barker. Doing several thousand shows can probably takes some of the edges off.
5. Carey also misses a chance to pay respect to Barker. Introducing a game called Barker's Bargain Barn, Carey tries to make a joke and say it's named after the founder of the show Ezekial Barker. It's almost like Roger Moore giving Sean Connery the finger. A weird moment.
6. CBS hired Carey to pursue a younger audience. We'll have to wait and see if it works.
10.10.2007
Top 10 "Gilligan's Island" episodes
1. The one with the active volcano that the Professor hopes to seal up using a gourd bomb with a bamboo timer. (“Operation: Steam Heat”)
2. The one with the experimental robot the castaways train to walk all the way to Hawaii underwater. (“Gilligan’s Living Doll”)
3. The one where the castaways eat vegetables grown from radioactive seeds, giving them supernatural powers – Lovey gets double-time energy from beets, Gilligan gets superhero strength from spinach, Mary Ann gets incredible eyesight from carrots. (“Pass the Vegetables Please”)
4. The one where the big radioactive meteor crashes on the island and the Professor rigs up those weird all-silver suits so he, the Skipper, and Gilligan can investigate. (“Meet the Meteor”)
5. The one where Gilligan’s hunted by big-game hunter Jonathan Kincaid ala “The Most Dangerous Game.” (“The Hunter”)
6. The one with the ancient stone tablets that show a secret way off the island. The best episode button in the series: when the castaways realize Gilligan’s had the last missing tablet piece all along - using it as a serving tray - he’s so excited that he drops and breaks it into a million pieces. Fade out. Classic. (“The Secret of Gilligan’s Island”)
7. The one where Gilligan falls asleep when he’s supposed to be keeping an eye on the castaways’ precious oranges (The Professor: “Those tiki torches must stay lit!”). (“V for Vitamins”)
8. The one where Gilligan knocks some burning logs out of whack so an orbiting pair of astronauts see a message on the island reading S.O.L., not S.O.S. (“Splashdown”)
9. The one where Gilligan’s likeness appears at the top of a headhunter totem pole. Ever notice how many headhunter tribes there were in that part of the Pacific? (“High Man on the Totem Pole”)
10. The one where a mad scientist uses a mad-scientist-type contraption to switch the castaways’ personalities. Perhaps the most ridiculous episode in a ridiculous television series – shamelessly implausible. (“The Friendly Physician”)
2. The one with the experimental robot the castaways train to walk all the way to Hawaii underwater. (“Gilligan’s Living Doll”)
3. The one where the castaways eat vegetables grown from radioactive seeds, giving them supernatural powers – Lovey gets double-time energy from beets, Gilligan gets superhero strength from spinach, Mary Ann gets incredible eyesight from carrots. (“Pass the Vegetables Please”)
4. The one where the big radioactive meteor crashes on the island and the Professor rigs up those weird all-silver suits so he, the Skipper, and Gilligan can investigate. (“Meet the Meteor”)
5. The one where Gilligan’s hunted by big-game hunter Jonathan Kincaid ala “The Most Dangerous Game.” (“The Hunter”)
6. The one with the ancient stone tablets that show a secret way off the island. The best episode button in the series: when the castaways realize Gilligan’s had the last missing tablet piece all along - using it as a serving tray - he’s so excited that he drops and breaks it into a million pieces. Fade out. Classic. (“The Secret of Gilligan’s Island”)
7. The one where Gilligan falls asleep when he’s supposed to be keeping an eye on the castaways’ precious oranges (The Professor: “Those tiki torches must stay lit!”). (“V for Vitamins”)
8. The one where Gilligan knocks some burning logs out of whack so an orbiting pair of astronauts see a message on the island reading S.O.L., not S.O.S. (“Splashdown”)
9. The one where Gilligan’s likeness appears at the top of a headhunter totem pole. Ever notice how many headhunter tribes there were in that part of the Pacific? (“High Man on the Totem Pole”)
10. The one where a mad scientist uses a mad-scientist-type contraption to switch the castaways’ personalities. Perhaps the most ridiculous episode in a ridiculous television series – shamelessly implausible. (“The Friendly Physician”)
10.04.2007
Knee-jerk Round-up
The Kingdom
1. An interesting movie in that it tries to have it both ways - inciting some simple-minded, anti-Arab American bloodlust with the shoot-em-up gunfights while also suggesting that the Middle East situation is, like, you know, complex with by daring to show the Saudis are people, too. The action movie meets the arthouse drama. It doesn't quite succeed at either. But you have to give it points to trying.
2. The Cheese Fry isn't sure what the big deal is with Jennifer Garner.
3. No way they surive that alleyway ambush. Seriously.
4. Chris Cooper always gives an interesting performance.
5. Inside joke: Jamie Foxx gives an onscreen shout-out to his real hometown of Terrell, Texas. Yee haw, y'all.
6. Clever bit: you can always spot a bombmaker because he's missing fingers.
7. Nice set-up and pay-off with the lollipops.
8. Don't you wish in the real world someone would insult the U.S. Attorney General like that?
The Brave One
1. That one scene in the cafeteria with Jodie Foster and Terrence Howard is worth the price of admission. Brilliantly written, directed, acted. One of those great scenes where what they're talking about isn't what they're really talking about.
2 Nicky Katt's always fun to watch.
3. Not exactly sure what point this movie is making about vigilantism. It may destroy your psychic soul, but some thugs deserve it anyway? Don't try this at home because it's bad, but have a good time watching someone else do it?
4. The ending pretty much goes off the rail and undermines a lot of what we've known about the two main characters. Disappointing. Going or the big catharsis whether it makes logical sense or not.
5. It may be flawed, but the movie's better and more intelligent than most films. Jodie Foster - with the exception of 2005's unfortunate Flightplan - knows how to pick projects.
6. "I want my dog back." Cheesy, predictable, eye-rolling money line. And very effective.
7. The brutal attack that starts the movie is very tough to watch. We get it, the bad guys are bad and deserve Jodie's wrath. Enough is enough. Have mercy on us, director Neil Jordan.
8. Come on, seriously? Jodie Foster's occupation is a talk show commentator?! Yeah, that's an everyman sort of job. No one in movies are ever databasemanagers or air condition repairmen.
3:10 to Yuma
1. One of the best movies of the year. Oscar worthy, people. For real.
2. The ending may stretch credibility in some ways, but as a Cheese Fry colleague noted, you really do have to look at it as myth or melodrama. This is a big story of Good and Evil told on a big, sprawling canvas. It's not a documentary.
3. Russell Crowe is very good. But Christian Bale is even better - and he's got the less showy role.
4. Get thee to a cinema and see it.
The Invasion
1. If you want to make a zombie movie, make a zombie movie. Don't be ashamed. Don't dress it up as a pod person movie. You're not fooling anyone.
2. We've seen all of this before - and done much better. Case in point: the projectile vomiting of the infected, which is a steal from 28 Days Later.
3. There's something... plastic about Nicole Kidman. And she's getting more and more plastic as the years go by, it seems. The charming humanity of Moulin Rouge is but a distant memory these days.
4. Naturally, the cure to the "invasion" is in the blood of our heroine's son thanks to a rare disease. And her ex-husband is a bigwig at the CDC. Yeah, it's that kind of movie.
5. For about 10 minutes, the film gives you a hint of what it could have been as Nicole Kidman must try to "pass" as a pod person (quietly assisted by other secretly uninfected humans who are "passing") among crowds of pop people by showing no emotion. Truly terrifying.
Sunshine
* All you need to know if this: for the first 3/4 of the movie, this is the kind of smart, suspenseful, plausible science fiction movie they just don't make anymore. It's just this side of brilliant...
* ...and then the wheels come completely off in the final 20 minutes with such unexpected suddenness that you're left completely stunned. Did that just happen? It's a terrible thing to do to a good movie.
* Cillian Murphy is too feminine and weird-looking to be a good guy. You keep figuring he'll snap and kill everyone.
1. An interesting movie in that it tries to have it both ways - inciting some simple-minded, anti-Arab American bloodlust with the shoot-em-up gunfights while also suggesting that the Middle East situation is, like, you know, complex with by daring to show the Saudis are people, too. The action movie meets the arthouse drama. It doesn't quite succeed at either. But you have to give it points to trying.
2. The Cheese Fry isn't sure what the big deal is with Jennifer Garner.
3. No way they surive that alleyway ambush. Seriously.
4. Chris Cooper always gives an interesting performance.
5. Inside joke: Jamie Foxx gives an onscreen shout-out to his real hometown of Terrell, Texas. Yee haw, y'all.
6. Clever bit: you can always spot a bombmaker because he's missing fingers.
7. Nice set-up and pay-off with the lollipops.
8. Don't you wish in the real world someone would insult the U.S. Attorney General like that?
The Brave One
1. That one scene in the cafeteria with Jodie Foster and Terrence Howard is worth the price of admission. Brilliantly written, directed, acted. One of those great scenes where what they're talking about isn't what they're really talking about.
2 Nicky Katt's always fun to watch.
3. Not exactly sure what point this movie is making about vigilantism. It may destroy your psychic soul, but some thugs deserve it anyway? Don't try this at home because it's bad, but have a good time watching someone else do it?
4. The ending pretty much goes off the rail and undermines a lot of what we've known about the two main characters. Disappointing. Going or the big catharsis whether it makes logical sense or not.
5. It may be flawed, but the movie's better and more intelligent than most films. Jodie Foster - with the exception of 2005's unfortunate Flightplan - knows how to pick projects.
6. "I want my dog back." Cheesy, predictable, eye-rolling money line. And very effective.
7. The brutal attack that starts the movie is very tough to watch. We get it, the bad guys are bad and deserve Jodie's wrath. Enough is enough. Have mercy on us, director Neil Jordan.
8. Come on, seriously? Jodie Foster's occupation is a talk show commentator?! Yeah, that's an everyman sort of job. No one in movies are ever databasemanagers or air condition repairmen.
3:10 to Yuma
1. One of the best movies of the year. Oscar worthy, people. For real.
2. The ending may stretch credibility in some ways, but as a Cheese Fry colleague noted, you really do have to look at it as myth or melodrama. This is a big story of Good and Evil told on a big, sprawling canvas. It's not a documentary.
3. Russell Crowe is very good. But Christian Bale is even better - and he's got the less showy role.
4. Get thee to a cinema and see it.
The Invasion
1. If you want to make a zombie movie, make a zombie movie. Don't be ashamed. Don't dress it up as a pod person movie. You're not fooling anyone.
2. We've seen all of this before - and done much better. Case in point: the projectile vomiting of the infected, which is a steal from 28 Days Later.
3. There's something... plastic about Nicole Kidman. And she's getting more and more plastic as the years go by, it seems. The charming humanity of Moulin Rouge is but a distant memory these days.
4. Naturally, the cure to the "invasion" is in the blood of our heroine's son thanks to a rare disease. And her ex-husband is a bigwig at the CDC. Yeah, it's that kind of movie.
5. For about 10 minutes, the film gives you a hint of what it could have been as Nicole Kidman must try to "pass" as a pod person (quietly assisted by other secretly uninfected humans who are "passing") among crowds of pop people by showing no emotion. Truly terrifying.
Sunshine
* All you need to know if this: for the first 3/4 of the movie, this is the kind of smart, suspenseful, plausible science fiction movie they just don't make anymore. It's just this side of brilliant...
* ...and then the wheels come completely off in the final 20 minutes with such unexpected suddenness that you're left completely stunned. Did that just happen? It's a terrible thing to do to a good movie.
* Cillian Murphy is too feminine and weird-looking to be a good guy. You keep figuring he'll snap and kill everyone.
8.26.2007
Top 10 "Brady Bunch" Episodes
1. The one with the cursed Hawaiian tiki, Greg's surfing wipe-out, and the spider crawling on Peter. ("Pass the Tabu")
2. The one where everyone covers for Peter's crime of breaking a vase. Mom always said don't play ball in the house. ("Confessions Confessions")
3. The one where the kids sing "Keep On" and "It's A Sunshine Day" in matching outfits and with choreography for a TV talent show. ("Amateur Nite")
4. The one where Peter tries to defend lisping Cindy against the taunts of nerdy bully Buddy, who says "baby talk baby talk, it's a wonder you can walk." ("A Fistful of Reasons")
5. The one where Marcia gets smacked in the nose with a football and her date dumps her. Oh, my nose! ("The Subject Was Noses")
6. The one where Cindy can only bring one parent to her school play. What kind of sick school is this? ("Eenie Meenie Mommy Daddy")
7. The one where Marcia's slumber party gets cancelled because a horrible picture she drew of George Washington is mistaken as a caricature of her teacher, which gets her in trouble with the principal. Considering she's a straight-A student, it's awful how, like, no one believes Marcia when she says she's innocent. What kind of sick school is this? ("The Slumber Caper")
8. The one where Carol gets taken to court over a fender-bender and Mike saves the day by throwing his briefcase on the floor and proving the plaintiff is faking his injury. ("The Fender Benders")
9. The one where Bobby's inexplicably obsessed with Jesse James and Mike manages to track down someone whose parents were killed by James. What a show off. ("Bobby's Hero")
10. The one where the rival high school jock uses Marcia to get a chance to steal Greg's playbook. Only in 1973... on television. ("Quarterback Sneak")
2. The one where everyone covers for Peter's crime of breaking a vase. Mom always said don't play ball in the house. ("Confessions Confessions")
3. The one where the kids sing "Keep On" and "It's A Sunshine Day" in matching outfits and with choreography for a TV talent show. ("Amateur Nite")
4. The one where Peter tries to defend lisping Cindy against the taunts of nerdy bully Buddy, who says "baby talk baby talk, it's a wonder you can walk." ("A Fistful of Reasons")
5. The one where Marcia gets smacked in the nose with a football and her date dumps her. Oh, my nose! ("The Subject Was Noses")
6. The one where Cindy can only bring one parent to her school play. What kind of sick school is this? ("Eenie Meenie Mommy Daddy")
7. The one where Marcia's slumber party gets cancelled because a horrible picture she drew of George Washington is mistaken as a caricature of her teacher, which gets her in trouble with the principal. Considering she's a straight-A student, it's awful how, like, no one believes Marcia when she says she's innocent. What kind of sick school is this? ("The Slumber Caper")
8. The one where Carol gets taken to court over a fender-bender and Mike saves the day by throwing his briefcase on the floor and proving the plaintiff is faking his injury. ("The Fender Benders")
9. The one where Bobby's inexplicably obsessed with Jesse James and Mike manages to track down someone whose parents were killed by James. What a show off. ("Bobby's Hero")
10. The one where the rival high school jock uses Marcia to get a chance to steal Greg's playbook. Only in 1973... on television. ("Quarterback Sneak")
Cassette tape rewind: Sophomore year
When The Cheese Fry was but a tater tot entering the 10th grade in the fall of 1987 and considering such topics as Algebra II and Economics, the following songs were on the Billboard Hot 100. The soundtrack of Generation X, whether on MTV or your local Kiss-FM radio station. Issue date: August 29, 1987.
1. Los Lobos "La Bamba" - Here's a song no one's likely clamoring to hear again. They played it a whole lot on the radio. But it sure came in handy in Spanish class when you had to recite a Spanish poem from memory. Mr. Hidalgo let us use this song.
2. Madonna "Who's That Girl" - Forgettable song from a forgettable movie.
3. Richard Marx "Don't Mean Nothing" - There's undeniably a guilty pleasure aspect to the repertoire of Mr. Marx's cheesy college-creative-writing-class lyrics, "tender" sensibility, and perfectly arranged power chords. This was his first hit; his prom power ballads ("Hold Onto the Night" and "Right Here Waiting") hadn't yet invaded our culture. "Don't Mean Nothing" is his most interesting song, cynically exploring the many ways that Hollywood screws artists over.
4. Suzanne Vega "Luka" - We can all agree that this is an Important Song, but do you really want to ever hear it again? The radio played the hell out of this. Luka lives on the second floor, upstairs from you, perhaps you've seen him before. Yadda yadda. We get it. And in hindsight, it's really pretentious.
5. Debbie Gibson "Only In My Dreams" - Textbook 1980s bubble-gum pop, all synthesizers and drum machines.
6. Michael Jackson "I Just Can't Stop Loving You" - Kind of hard to enjoy Michael Jackson music these days (exception: "Thriller" and "Billie Jean") knowing What We Know Now.
7. The Whispers "Rock Steady" - The first surprise of the list, one of those catchy R&B funk songs that you forgot how much you liked until someone reminds you of it. "And we begin to rock (dee-deeee) steady... steady rockin' all night long." Good stuff.
8. Whitney Houston "Didn't We Almost Have It All" - Typical Whitney ballad. Boring verses, great chorus. Whatever.
9. Starship "It's Not Over (Til It's Over)" - Seriously?
10. Dan Hill and Vonda Shepard "Can't We Try" - Very VH1.
11. U2 "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" - The only song on this list considered today to be a classic. Those guys are the real deal, it seems. The perfect song representative of The Joshua Tree.
12. Dionne Warwink "Love Power" - We don't remember it, either.
13. George Michael "I Want Your Sex" - If you were going to put a 1980s mix tape in a time capsule, this song would have to be on it. So tame now, but it created a firestorm of controversy when it first hit the airwaves. And the jingle-jangle, woodblock backbeat still seems fresh.
14. Huey Lewis and the News "Doing It All For My Baby" - We all know Huey Lewis plateaued with the Sports LP. But an argument could be made for "Hip to Be Square." Maybe.
15. Whitesnake "Here I Go Again" - Hell yeah. Make the devil horns! One of the few on the list that could easily go back into heavy rotation on the radio.
1. Los Lobos "La Bamba" - Here's a song no one's likely clamoring to hear again. They played it a whole lot on the radio. But it sure came in handy in Spanish class when you had to recite a Spanish poem from memory. Mr. Hidalgo let us use this song.
2. Madonna "Who's That Girl" - Forgettable song from a forgettable movie.
3. Richard Marx "Don't Mean Nothing" - There's undeniably a guilty pleasure aspect to the repertoire of Mr. Marx's cheesy college-creative-writing-class lyrics, "tender" sensibility, and perfectly arranged power chords. This was his first hit; his prom power ballads ("Hold Onto the Night" and "Right Here Waiting") hadn't yet invaded our culture. "Don't Mean Nothing" is his most interesting song, cynically exploring the many ways that Hollywood screws artists over.
4. Suzanne Vega "Luka" - We can all agree that this is an Important Song, but do you really want to ever hear it again? The radio played the hell out of this. Luka lives on the second floor, upstairs from you, perhaps you've seen him before. Yadda yadda. We get it. And in hindsight, it's really pretentious.
5. Debbie Gibson "Only In My Dreams" - Textbook 1980s bubble-gum pop, all synthesizers and drum machines.
6. Michael Jackson "I Just Can't Stop Loving You" - Kind of hard to enjoy Michael Jackson music these days (exception: "Thriller" and "Billie Jean") knowing What We Know Now.
7. The Whispers "Rock Steady" - The first surprise of the list, one of those catchy R&B funk songs that you forgot how much you liked until someone reminds you of it. "And we begin to rock (dee-deeee) steady... steady rockin' all night long." Good stuff.
8. Whitney Houston "Didn't We Almost Have It All" - Typical Whitney ballad. Boring verses, great chorus. Whatever.
9. Starship "It's Not Over (Til It's Over)" - Seriously?
10. Dan Hill and Vonda Shepard "Can't We Try" - Very VH1.
11. U2 "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" - The only song on this list considered today to be a classic. Those guys are the real deal, it seems. The perfect song representative of The Joshua Tree.
12. Dionne Warwink "Love Power" - We don't remember it, either.
13. George Michael "I Want Your Sex" - If you were going to put a 1980s mix tape in a time capsule, this song would have to be on it. So tame now, but it created a firestorm of controversy when it first hit the airwaves. And the jingle-jangle, woodblock backbeat still seems fresh.
14. Huey Lewis and the News "Doing It All For My Baby" - We all know Huey Lewis plateaued with the Sports LP. But an argument could be made for "Hip to Be Square." Maybe.
15. Whitesnake "Here I Go Again" - Hell yeah. Make the devil horns! One of the few on the list that could easily go back into heavy rotation on the radio.
Knee-jerk review: "Superbad"
1. One word: McLovin.
2. Jonah Hill's Seth may be the more aggressively wise-cracking character (think Vince Vaughn as a high school loser), but it's the quietly stammering drollness of Michael Cera's Seth that carries the movie. He's hilarious.
3. Dig those opening credits, baby. Bonus points for the retro 1970s Columbia Pictures logo.
4. Though Judd Apatow didn't direct this film, it's definitely got his R-rated sensibility. Like this summer's Knocked Up, which Apatow did direct, the language here is exceedingly profane. The f-bombs (and c-bombs - since when did that supplant the d-word to describe the prime male reproductive organ?) come fast and furious to the point that it goes from distracting to annoying. Do high school kids really talk like this? They sure didn't in the late 80s.
5. The middle of the movie drags. You really want the guys to make it to the house party already to find out what happens with the girls they're pursuing.
6. But the real problem with the middle of the movie are the cop characters played by Seth Roger and Bill Hader. They're funny, yes, but they belong in another film. They're every bit as cartoony and over-the-top as Seth and Evan are realistic and utterly plausible. This is a movie with some serious tonal problems. Just because something's funny doesn't mean it belongs in the movie.
7. Extra credit to the filmmakers for making Jules an unexpected teetotaler, even if it feels rather implausible.
8. After all the gross-out humor and explicit gutter talk, the ending is surprising sweet and earnest. The last scene involving an escalator is especially satisfying as our heroes finally consider the possibility of a future in which one's best friend is someone of the opposite gender.
9. Let's say it one more time: McLovin.
2. Jonah Hill's Seth may be the more aggressively wise-cracking character (think Vince Vaughn as a high school loser), but it's the quietly stammering drollness of Michael Cera's Seth that carries the movie. He's hilarious.
3. Dig those opening credits, baby. Bonus points for the retro 1970s Columbia Pictures logo.
4. Though Judd Apatow didn't direct this film, it's definitely got his R-rated sensibility. Like this summer's Knocked Up, which Apatow did direct, the language here is exceedingly profane. The f-bombs (and c-bombs - since when did that supplant the d-word to describe the prime male reproductive organ?) come fast and furious to the point that it goes from distracting to annoying. Do high school kids really talk like this? They sure didn't in the late 80s.
5. The middle of the movie drags. You really want the guys to make it to the house party already to find out what happens with the girls they're pursuing.
6. But the real problem with the middle of the movie are the cop characters played by Seth Roger and Bill Hader. They're funny, yes, but they belong in another film. They're every bit as cartoony and over-the-top as Seth and Evan are realistic and utterly plausible. This is a movie with some serious tonal problems. Just because something's funny doesn't mean it belongs in the movie.
7. Extra credit to the filmmakers for making Jules an unexpected teetotaler, even if it feels rather implausible.
8. After all the gross-out humor and explicit gutter talk, the ending is surprising sweet and earnest. The last scene involving an escalator is especially satisfying as our heroes finally consider the possibility of a future in which one's best friend is someone of the opposite gender.
9. Let's say it one more time: McLovin.
8.12.2007
Knee-jerk review: "The Bourne Ultimatum"
1. Jason Bourne is a bad ass. End of story.
2. Director Paul Greengrass demands our complete attention. He also delivered 2004's locomotive The Bourne Supremacy (which surely influenced the decision to strip down the James Bond character in Casino Royale) and 2006's harrowing United 93. This guy has the goods.
3. Poetic symmetry in the way this film ends with a watery shot reminiscent of the beginning of the first film, 2002's The Bourne Supremacy.
4. David Strathairn is always a pleasure. Even when he's stuck barking all those cheesy spy-movie dialogue cliches.
5. Considering the non-stop action, the film is curiously bloodless. Less so, it seems, than the first two films. Yet a quick check of IMDB surprisingly confirms that all three films received a PG-13 rating. The Bourne Ultimatum is all car crashes and fistfights and footchases. One shooting death, one death by explosion. That's just about it for extreme violence. Which serves as a reminder than blood splatters and noisy special-effect squibs aren't always necessary to create satisfying action.
6. Instant classic sequence: Bourne trying desperately to shepherd to safety Paddy Considine's reporter in a crowded train station packed with assassins and agents. (Note to self: always follow Bourne's instructions. To the letter.)
7. The Cheese Fry has never been a big Julia Stiles fan, but she looks nice here. Really nice.
8. Nothing good was ever code-named "blackbriar."
9. That Bourne was brainwashed and turned into an assassin is sort of expected... how he "commits to the program" is a shock.
10. Albert Finney is looking old, people.
11. Go see it.
2. Director Paul Greengrass demands our complete attention. He also delivered 2004's locomotive The Bourne Supremacy (which surely influenced the decision to strip down the James Bond character in Casino Royale) and 2006's harrowing United 93. This guy has the goods.
3. Poetic symmetry in the way this film ends with a watery shot reminiscent of the beginning of the first film, 2002's The Bourne Supremacy.
4. David Strathairn is always a pleasure. Even when he's stuck barking all those cheesy spy-movie dialogue cliches.
5. Considering the non-stop action, the film is curiously bloodless. Less so, it seems, than the first two films. Yet a quick check of IMDB surprisingly confirms that all three films received a PG-13 rating. The Bourne Ultimatum is all car crashes and fistfights and footchases. One shooting death, one death by explosion. That's just about it for extreme violence. Which serves as a reminder than blood splatters and noisy special-effect squibs aren't always necessary to create satisfying action.
6. Instant classic sequence: Bourne trying desperately to shepherd to safety Paddy Considine's reporter in a crowded train station packed with assassins and agents. (Note to self: always follow Bourne's instructions. To the letter.)
7. The Cheese Fry has never been a big Julia Stiles fan, but she looks nice here. Really nice.
8. Nothing good was ever code-named "blackbriar."
9. That Bourne was brainwashed and turned into an assassin is sort of expected... how he "commits to the program" is a shock.
10. Albert Finney is looking old, people.
11. Go see it.
7.22.2007
Knee-jerk review: "Live Free or Die Hard"
1. That's a pretty lame title.
2. But this is a pretty kick-ass movie.
3. With the possible exception of Harrison Ford in his Indiana Jones prime, no actor can take a beating quite like Bruce Willis. It never takes long for Willis' John McClane to get bruised and bloody and covered in a film of sweat and grease. He always seems to be just barely hanging on...
4. ...then again, the McClane character has by now proven to be wholly indestructible. There's no hopelessly dead-end situation that he can't somehow manage to wriggle out of at the last possible moment (see also: "jumping off a high-rise building tied to a fire hose" and "using an ejector seat to avoid hand grenades"). With this film in particular there's a clear connection to the 1930s cliffhanger serials. You know he'll get out of it - you're just not always sure how.
5. Maggie Q is exceedingly hot, just in case there was any debate.
6. It's hard to remember a movie with this many scenes of people typing on computer keyboards and staring into computer screens with colorful, sleek graphics that only exist in Hollywood movies.
7. Here's how The Cheese Fry rates the Die Hard movies: 1) 1988's perfect Die Hard, 2) 2007's Live Free or Die Hard, 3) 1990's over-the-top Die Hard 2, and 4) 1995's abominable and essentially unwatchable Die Hard with a Vengeance.
8. The PG-13 rating feels a bit awkward, what with the many bloodless shooting deaths and the clumsy use of "jerkoff" as a curse word. It's a wonder McClane's trademark "yippe-ki-yay" line got to stay in.
9. The action scenes here certainly do strain credulity at times (note the spectacular but silly truck/plane fight or the SUV-in-an-elevator-shaft sequence), but this is without question the best pure action film since Casino Royale. And much of it is fairly cleverly plotted, one move ricocheting into another and spinning things out of control.
10. Justin Long, the guy from the PC/Mac ads, is much better than you'd expect as McClane's reluctant sidekick. He fares much better than Samuel L. Jackson did as the sidekick in Die Hard with a Vengeance.
2. But this is a pretty kick-ass movie.
3. With the possible exception of Harrison Ford in his Indiana Jones prime, no actor can take a beating quite like Bruce Willis. It never takes long for Willis' John McClane to get bruised and bloody and covered in a film of sweat and grease. He always seems to be just barely hanging on...
4. ...then again, the McClane character has by now proven to be wholly indestructible. There's no hopelessly dead-end situation that he can't somehow manage to wriggle out of at the last possible moment (see also: "jumping off a high-rise building tied to a fire hose" and "using an ejector seat to avoid hand grenades"). With this film in particular there's a clear connection to the 1930s cliffhanger serials. You know he'll get out of it - you're just not always sure how.
5. Maggie Q is exceedingly hot, just in case there was any debate.
6. It's hard to remember a movie with this many scenes of people typing on computer keyboards and staring into computer screens with colorful, sleek graphics that only exist in Hollywood movies.
7. Here's how The Cheese Fry rates the Die Hard movies: 1) 1988's perfect Die Hard, 2) 2007's Live Free or Die Hard, 3) 1990's over-the-top Die Hard 2, and 4) 1995's abominable and essentially unwatchable Die Hard with a Vengeance.
8. The PG-13 rating feels a bit awkward, what with the many bloodless shooting deaths and the clumsy use of "jerkoff" as a curse word. It's a wonder McClane's trademark "yippe-ki-yay" line got to stay in.
9. The action scenes here certainly do strain credulity at times (note the spectacular but silly truck/plane fight or the SUV-in-an-elevator-shaft sequence), but this is without question the best pure action film since Casino Royale. And much of it is fairly cleverly plotted, one move ricocheting into another and spinning things out of control.
10. Justin Long, the guy from the PC/Mac ads, is much better than you'd expect as McClane's reluctant sidekick. He fares much better than Samuel L. Jackson did as the sidekick in Die Hard with a Vengeance.
7.15.2007
"So You Think You Can Dance" shagging odds
Jaimie and Hok, 3:1
Sabra and Dominic, 5:2
Sara and Pasha, 6:1
Lacey and Kameron, 10:1
Lauren and Neil, 30:1
Anya and Danny, 500:1
Sabra and Dominic, 5:2
Sara and Pasha, 6:1
Lacey and Kameron, 10:1
Lauren and Neil, 30:1
Anya and Danny, 500:1
Knee-jerk review: "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix"
1. It's fun to see Gary Oldman channeling his considerable thespian energy into playing a heroic character like Sirius Black. He is the man.
2. This is a pretty dark movie.
3. Yes, Imelda Staunton as Dolores Umbridge steals the whole movie, her sweet smiles and cheery sing-song voice hiding some very scary, very fascist aspirations. This story is a product of post-9/11 jackboot politics, with the Ministry of Magic suggesting that anyone who dares disagree with its myopic, misguided policies is "disloyal."
4. A close runner-up to Staunton is Evanna Lynch's creepily oddball character Luna Lovegood. She's hilarious.
5. For the uninitated, there's quite a bit of dialogue and backstory that can get pretty confusing, especially in the first 15 minutes or so.
6. How cool would it be if Patronus Charms were real and you could use them to whack pretentious snob jackasses who text-messages during a movie like Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix? Whoever you are, Mr. Porkpie-Hat-and-Plain-White-T, be glad I'm not a wizard.
7. Alan Rickman seems to enjoy the brooding character of Severus Snape.
8. The Cheese Fry, as uninformed as it may be when it comes to the Potter universe, still maintains that it's very possible that Voldemort is Harry Potter's father, a la Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker.
9. Emma Watson isn't legal yet (she's 17), so stop thinking what you're thinking.
10. The ending gets a little bit protracted with all of the swooshing special effect sparks and lightning and clouds, though it is invigorating to see Harry and his classmates band together to fight the bad guys.
11. In a world that's so consistently creative and clever, there's a tired quality to this business about Harry's mind being invaded by Voldemort. Been there, done that.
12. Harry gets the best line of the movie as Dolores Umbridge meets her fate.
13. What does Harry see in Cho Chang?
14. All in all, not as entertaining and magical as Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, but still solid.
2. This is a pretty dark movie.
3. Yes, Imelda Staunton as Dolores Umbridge steals the whole movie, her sweet smiles and cheery sing-song voice hiding some very scary, very fascist aspirations. This story is a product of post-9/11 jackboot politics, with the Ministry of Magic suggesting that anyone who dares disagree with its myopic, misguided policies is "disloyal."
4. A close runner-up to Staunton is Evanna Lynch's creepily oddball character Luna Lovegood. She's hilarious.
5. For the uninitated, there's quite a bit of dialogue and backstory that can get pretty confusing, especially in the first 15 minutes or so.
6. How cool would it be if Patronus Charms were real and you could use them to whack pretentious snob jackasses who text-messages during a movie like Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix? Whoever you are, Mr. Porkpie-Hat-and-Plain-White-T, be glad I'm not a wizard.
7. Alan Rickman seems to enjoy the brooding character of Severus Snape.
8. The Cheese Fry, as uninformed as it may be when it comes to the Potter universe, still maintains that it's very possible that Voldemort is Harry Potter's father, a la Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker.
9. Emma Watson isn't legal yet (she's 17), so stop thinking what you're thinking.
10. The ending gets a little bit protracted with all of the swooshing special effect sparks and lightning and clouds, though it is invigorating to see Harry and his classmates band together to fight the bad guys.
11. In a world that's so consistently creative and clever, there's a tired quality to this business about Harry's mind being invaded by Voldemort. Been there, done that.
12. Harry gets the best line of the movie as Dolores Umbridge meets her fate.
13. What does Harry see in Cho Chang?
14. All in all, not as entertaining and magical as Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, but still solid.
6.12.2007
Knee-jerk review: "Ocean's Thirteen"
1. Is it Ocean's 13 or Ocean's Thirteen?
2. A lot of what happens in the movie just doesn't make a lot of logical sense. You just have to go with it. If the filmmakers say some chemical doo-dad that Matt Damon's character wears will make the Ellen Barkin character swoon with unquenchable lust, so be it. But it often goes beyond that. There's also a lot of plot points here that hinge on happenstance that simply could not have been predicted or planned for, not even by seasoned con men like this.
3. The movie's a lot of fun, but very long. We really didn't need the Mexican worker strike.
4. No matter how many times The Cheese Fry saw Brad Pitt and Matt Damon talk in the TV spots about how "the nose plays," it's still damn funny. And you know what? The nose does play.
5. Two very funny Oprah Winfrey gags.
6. With their silky smiles and perfectly-fitted designer wardrobe, George Clooner and Brad Pitt make it all seem so effortless. Bastards.
7. The cinematography - it's director Steven Soderbergh working as his own DP under the psuedonym Peter Andrews - is spectacular, all strange contrasting colors and lights. It's like looking at paintings.
8. Ellen Barkin's great, true, but we could have used a few more women.
9. The premise, you have to admit, is very clever: instead of stealing from a casino, the boys rig the games so that the house loses, thereby punishing the very tan bad guy Al Pacino.
10. The Don Cheadle as the Robby Knievel-style daredevil bit didn't work.
11. The mug shot morphing that happened in that same scene, however, did work. Hilarious.
12. In the end, this is a movie with charm and style to burn. The epitome of cool. And so the film's chief strength is also its chief weakness - it's all sizzle and no steak. These aren't characters so much as chess pieces to be moved here and there to wow us with the film's narrative gymnastics. The pleasure doesn't come from worrying if Danny Ocean and his ever expanding crew will succeed. They're so ridiculously unflappable that success is essentially a given. The only pleasure to be had instead comes from seeing how this mousetrap contraption - which consists of a great many moving parts (did we mention the diamond necklaces that also have to be stolen?) - will work together.
2. A lot of what happens in the movie just doesn't make a lot of logical sense. You just have to go with it. If the filmmakers say some chemical doo-dad that Matt Damon's character wears will make the Ellen Barkin character swoon with unquenchable lust, so be it. But it often goes beyond that. There's also a lot of plot points here that hinge on happenstance that simply could not have been predicted or planned for, not even by seasoned con men like this.
3. The movie's a lot of fun, but very long. We really didn't need the Mexican worker strike.
4. No matter how many times The Cheese Fry saw Brad Pitt and Matt Damon talk in the TV spots about how "the nose plays," it's still damn funny. And you know what? The nose does play.
5. Two very funny Oprah Winfrey gags.
6. With their silky smiles and perfectly-fitted designer wardrobe, George Clooner and Brad Pitt make it all seem so effortless. Bastards.
7. The cinematography - it's director Steven Soderbergh working as his own DP under the psuedonym Peter Andrews - is spectacular, all strange contrasting colors and lights. It's like looking at paintings.
8. Ellen Barkin's great, true, but we could have used a few more women.
9. The premise, you have to admit, is very clever: instead of stealing from a casino, the boys rig the games so that the house loses, thereby punishing the very tan bad guy Al Pacino.
10. The Don Cheadle as the Robby Knievel-style daredevil bit didn't work.
11. The mug shot morphing that happened in that same scene, however, did work. Hilarious.
12. In the end, this is a movie with charm and style to burn. The epitome of cool. And so the film's chief strength is also its chief weakness - it's all sizzle and no steak. These aren't characters so much as chess pieces to be moved here and there to wow us with the film's narrative gymnastics. The pleasure doesn't come from worrying if Danny Ocean and his ever expanding crew will succeed. They're so ridiculously unflappable that success is essentially a given. The only pleasure to be had instead comes from seeing how this mousetrap contraption - which consists of a great many moving parts (did we mention the diamond necklaces that also have to be stolen?) - will work together.
Cootie Queens and Lint Lickers
Following in the footsteps of Mac vs. PC ("I'm a Mac." "And I'm a PC.") and the Geico cavemen comes another ingeniously oddball commercial that demands repeat viewing.
We're talking, of course, about Orbit Gum's campaign to suggest that its gum is so refreshing that it will clean the dirtiest of mouths. The dirt-eating secretary was funny, yes, but the grand prize surely goes to a spot called "The Affair." You can find it here, here, and here.
Funniest Lines from "The Affair"1. "Who are you calling a cootie queen? You lint-licker!"
2. "Stinky McStink Face."
3. "What the French, toast?"
4. "Pickle you kumquat!"
5. "You Hoboken."
We're talking, of course, about Orbit Gum's campaign to suggest that its gum is so refreshing that it will clean the dirtiest of mouths. The dirt-eating secretary was funny, yes, but the grand prize surely goes to a spot called "The Affair." You can find it here, here, and here.
Funniest Lines from "The Affair"1. "Who are you calling a cootie queen? You lint-licker!"
2. "Stinky McStink Face."
3. "What the French, toast?"
4. "Pickle you kumquat!"
5. "You Hoboken."
6.10.2007
Knee-jerk review: "Knocked Up"
1. Not as consistently hilarious as The 40-Year-Old Virgin, but very funny nonetheless.
2. This probably won't make her a bankable movie star just yet, but Katherine Heigl's definitely well on her way. She's very funny and likable. If anyone could inspire a pothead loser to turn his life around, it'd be her.
3. An added benefit: remembering the late, great, one-season TV shows of director Judd Apatow "Freaks and Geeks" and "Undeclared." Much of the Knocked Up cast worked on one of those (or both).
4. The Cheese Fry has obtained real-world confirmation that for (some) women adultery indeed isn't as grave a crime as lying to one's wife in order to sneak off for a fantasy baseball draft. Incredible but true.
5. Paul Rudd continues to be underrated. Possible best line of the movie: "You look like a cholo dressed up for Easter." Possible runner up: "There are five different kinds of chairs in this hotel room."
6. Who knew Leslie Mann could be this great?
7. Ben's right: who genuinely likes Steely Dan? Who even knows a Steely Dan song?
8. Is that really how you get pink eye? Gross.
9. We bet the "missing gynecologist" sequence feels a little too scary and real, doesn't it, new parents and soon-to-be new parents?
10. There's one quick cutaway shot here that you won't believe.
2. This probably won't make her a bankable movie star just yet, but Katherine Heigl's definitely well on her way. She's very funny and likable. If anyone could inspire a pothead loser to turn his life around, it'd be her.
3. An added benefit: remembering the late, great, one-season TV shows of director Judd Apatow "Freaks and Geeks" and "Undeclared." Much of the Knocked Up cast worked on one of those (or both).
4. The Cheese Fry has obtained real-world confirmation that for (some) women adultery indeed isn't as grave a crime as lying to one's wife in order to sneak off for a fantasy baseball draft. Incredible but true.
5. Paul Rudd continues to be underrated. Possible best line of the movie: "You look like a cholo dressed up for Easter." Possible runner up: "There are five different kinds of chairs in this hotel room."
6. Who knew Leslie Mann could be this great?
7. Ben's right: who genuinely likes Steely Dan? Who even knows a Steely Dan song?
8. Is that really how you get pink eye? Gross.
9. We bet the "missing gynecologist" sequence feels a little too scary and real, doesn't it, new parents and soon-to-be new parents?
10. There's one quick cutaway shot here that you won't believe.
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