Besides a lot of DP/30 shooting, my 21-month-old perfected crib escape last night. Proud of the developing skills, exhausted by wearing a hole in the carpet walking him back to his crib 60+ times. Welcome to Bed Life, kid.
Daddy will return to blogging soon…
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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?
So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.
And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.
There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.
I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.
So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.
But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”
My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher
“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.
~ David Simon
So here I was, all set to get the wife an iPad for her impending birthday (she really wanted one and had no idea I’d planned to get it for her), when she announces last night that she wants a Kindle Fire instead. Her argument is that it can do everything she wanted to do on the iPad (reading, web browsing, Facebook, the occasional game) but at a third of the cost. I was somewhat disappointed to hear this, as I was really excited to surprise her with the iPad, but even though money isn’t an issue for me, I’m having a hard time justifying getting it for her in light of last night.
Can anybody give me a good reason why I should spring for the iPad after all? Or should I just bite the bullet, save some coin and go with the Fire?
Got an awards screener of ATTACK THE BLOCK today. Anybody think it has a legitimate shot at anything? (I say that as one who liked it).
Maybe LAFCA’s “New Generation.”
mark — i agree with your wife…i’ve had a nook color for several months now and really like it…does all the web stuff i need when not on my laptop and very handy for reading….the kindle fire is their answer to the nook color, i haven’t actually tried it yet but if it’s as good as the nook, i’d go for it….
btw — if you go with the kindle or nook, don’t fall for those expensive leather covers sold in the stores…i bought a great cover and stylus on ebay for a fraction of what best buy was charging…just a suggestion…
babies review paranormal activity 3 …
http://www.buzzfeed.com/paranormalactivity3/babies-review-paranormal-activity-3
I watched Young Adult earlier in the week. It’s a huge departure for both Reitman and Diablo Cody. Good movie, but not a great one. Charlize Theron gives an excellent performance, but I don’t think it will win her an Oscar though.
As a horror geek I’m ashamed to have to ask this but I picked up THE EXORCIST: EXTENDED DIRECTOR’S CUT blu ray for $10 at Wal Mart yesterday. Before I open it, is it the the same as “The Version You’ve Never Seen”? I know it has the spider walk. But I guess I’m asking if this is the Blatty approved version that Friedkin restored sort of as a gift to Blatty after he complained about it being all horror show and lacking details as to why the devil chose her. Does it have the Kinderman/Dyer scene at the end? Thanks in advance.
Also: The HALLOWEEN blu ray doesn’t look worth buying. It’s bare bones and I looks simply like a port of the original DVD release whereas the 25th Anniversary DVD has tons of stuff, and still looks great in HD even though the color correction and clean-up done to the film was sort of ill-considered. It’ was supposed to look washed out. Is the blu ray more of an original print? Think I’m skipping it for now as I’m sure a better edition is on the way. But it’s my favorite film so I feel weird not having it on blu ray.
Thanks to anybody w/ info.
MarkVH: How do the screen sizes compare? Isn’t the Fire just 7 inches?
Joe, Fire is indeed 7 inches, same size as the Nook Color. Since she takes the train in the a.m., the smaller size is actually advantageous for reading. At this point I’m thinking Fire is my best bet.
OK, best use of a pop song in a coming attractions trailer. My nominee (using the Bus Boys’ “The Boys are Back in Town”):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XoAIC2tFfPk
lately i’ve been addicted to arizona ice tea ..the green one …
the ice tea cans they are bigger than coke cans and cost 99 cents. but are totally worth it to me.
so if one person tries one and likes it…well great.
heres a rap video about it ..yes about tea.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u44S9eifoCA
Bought the regular kindle for my wife’s birthday and between the purchase and the day they announced the Fire, for the same price I had just paid. Sooooo she unwrapped and I immediatly returned it and placed an order for a new one. We looked at Ipads but there was really nothing she would use it for to justify the 60% more we would have to pay.
Plus our four year old would probably be much more curious about an ipad where she might not be interested in the Kindle. On a somewhat related note, does anyone know the safest way to remove purple crayon from a flatscreen?
Sideshow – That extended cut is, indeed, the one with the spiderwalk and the scene on the stairs where Merrin and Karras discuss evil, etc, as well as the ending you mentioned. IMO the original is better without these scenes.
Don’t know about Halloween.
Thanks, arisp. I have the original on DVD and will keep it but couldn’t pass up the price. Went back and grabbed Spinal Tap, Let Me In, The Shining and There Will Be Blood. $10 a piece. Hate being a slave to wal mart but I like saving money.Got Near Dark for $5 over the summer (despite the HORRIBLE Twilightesque cover art).
Just gonna skip Halloween. However, the recent Halloween II blu ray is great, and Terror In The Aisles is an ace extra feature.
The Halloween Blu has the same “warmer” color temperature as the 25th anniversary DVD, but it looks pretty good to my eyes. It also has the Carpenter/Curtis/Hill commentary, A Cut Above The Rest, trailer and TV spots.
I finally caught TAKING SHELTER last year and…..wow. That is a truly amazing movie. I cannot recommend it highly enough to be honest. I was completely moved and nearly started crying on the drive home. It manages to speak to the state of America that we love in as well as personal struggle and it’s extremely creepy as well.
I wish we crits could help bring it to the fore but alas, the blogger noise machine would prefer to trumpet ATTACK THE BLOCK. (That’s NOT a knock at you, LYT). I really, really like ATTB but TAKING SHELTER is a superior film that needs to be seen and talked about and seen some more and then talked about some more.
Maybe it’s just because I’m /4 of the way through Jonathan Franzen’s FREEDOM but it’s about time we started making and looking at films and literature that takes a look at post 9/11 America.
Dave, he’s ready for a big-boy bed with a baby gate at the door so he can’t leave his room. 🙂
And, I love my iPad. That is all.
why no more Jackass movies . if they do it every 3 years it gets attention – if they do it every year it won’t get as much attention ?
they could have made 8 of them by now and they could have been on endless reruns on cable tv
plus it doesn’t seem like it takes weeks to set up these stunts … plus the guys on the crew don’t seem that busy doing anything else
why did mtv give up on these guys ? did these guys just get lucky on stupid stunts or is there something more …
i blame you oscar bloggers for forgetting about these guys .
DP – go find wee man and give him a dp/30 …
http://www.iamweeman.com/
Never mind Jackass — how about this great new Avengers trailer?
http://www.movingpictureblog.com/2011/10/holly-smoke-buffy-vampire-slayer-is-in.html
Joe, the guy at the end literally beating meat made me laugh so hard i about ruptured something.
I know it’s not a knock, Don…I’ve found that ATTACK THE BLOCK hype annoying at times, though to be fair I’d never have seen the film if HitFix hadn’t held a screening, because I don’t think Sony ever did.
I haven’t seen the film, but Wells putting himself out there as a fundraiser for TYRANNOSAUR screenings impresses me more, though it did play LAFF, and Strand invariably sends screeners of everything.
Not sure how TAKE SHELTER is really comparable to ATB, though. And it’s definitely more likely to get noticed for acting awards. Not to mention it was the first screener (save the commercial DVD of BEAUTIFUL BOY) that arrived…which boded well for ANIMAL KINGDOM’s Jacki Weaver last year.
Just saw Three Musketeers.
Two of the Three Musketeers don’t do ANYTHING, Logan Lerman is a no-charisma douche who makes you nostalgic for Justin Chambers, but that constipated knob from Pride and Prejudice is pretty good, Jovovich gave me a boner, Bloom’s hair is the highlight, and Christoph Waltz gave the same performance for the fourth time in two years.
It also furthered my ongoing, post-Kill the Irishman theory that Ray Stevenson is actually a REALLY terrible actor.
And the BLONDE CHICK is SO HOT (I think her name is Gabrielle Wilde.)
LexG: Here’s one just for you.
http://www.movies.com/movie-news/opening-next-week-39showgirls-2-penny39s-from-heaven39-yes-seriously/5084
Jason Reitman keeps making “good” films. Does he have a great one in him? I fear not. It’s all cutesy with fuzzy emotions, an indy-soundtrack unobtrusive visual style (by which I mean articulate grammar which in no way distracts or draws attention… but neither does it actually say very much beyond what you see)… and nothing with an edge. Nothing with a twist of lime or lemon… nothing that leaves an after taste. It goes down smoothly but once you’ve left the table, nothing lingers.
Lex, you really need to be a bit more discerning when it comes to seeing films. Why on earth would you see Musketeers? Seriously.
Some of the shots from Immortals look pretty cool.
Second trailer for In Time is much better than the first, but the pitch still suffers from an Inception knock off vibe with J. Tim as the second rate DiCaprio, although obviously there’s continuity with Niccol’s previous work. Everytime one of these sci-fi thrillers come out I’m surprised like it’s hard to believe they get made instead of superhero properties or violent badass movies. But it’s a fairly healthy genre I guess.
Reitman, Breck Eisner and now Max Landis. Ugh.
…and The Walking Dead is highly overrated.
I was glad to see Mary Blair honored by Google on her 100th birthday, yet it’s rather sad that most associate her only with “It’s a Small World”. Yes, the fiancee could ride that for hours, but I was just as impressed by her work on a variety of Disney movies. Her color and design style is hard to miss–the train sequence in “Three Caballeros” is quite a show-stopper.
there are some who think the “no-chrisma douche’ is pretty talented and the constipated knob is really the pervy commenter who actually thinks people want to know who/what gives him a boner…just a thought…
Did you see the movie where he plays GEORGE HAMILTON? And registers none of the GREAT MAN’S effortless charm?
He was okay in Yuma, but has been phoning it in like a motherfucker lately… My One and Only, Gamer, Musketeers… He’s terrible. I guess when you grow up in Beverly Hills and your manager mom puts you in showbiz at age four, you don’t have to give a shit.
THE THREE MUSKETEERS is absolutely worth seeing. P.S.W. Anderson is one of the few directors who knows what he’s doing with 3D, so there are a number of well-staged action scenes. The script is pretty dire though, with line after line of predictable dialogue, and an endless supply of witless witticisms. Lex is pretty much spot on about the acting; only Macfadyen and Jovovich are good (though Waltz isn’t bad exactly; it’s just that we know how good he can be when he has great words to work with). Gabriella Wilde is gorgeous, but cannot act a lick. Lerman lacks charisma, but handles the action well (and he’s only 19, so I’ll cut him a little slack).
new lytro camera – cool or what ?
2 minute video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDyRSYGcFVM
I haven’t been to the movies in a week, so I’m going to have to play massive catch-up, but I have been renting.
SUBMARINE is a wonderful movie.
Count me in as a defender of WS Anderson….within reason. 3 Muskateers looks fucking retarded and I won’t go near it. But the guy is a perfectly good B movie hack, and that’s nothing to be scoffed at. Event Horizon is great. I really really like Death Race because of Stath, and it proves WS can shoot action pretty damn well. I like his Resident Evil movies, which get hammered for not being solely based on the games. WHY DO YOU WANT TO SEE THE EXACT SAME STORY YOU JUST PLAYED? They feel part of the universe, and are built like games, and I enjoy them. As for Aliens Vs. Predator, it was a bad idea to begin with and the movie overall is dumb as a box of hair. But the creatures are great and he pulls off some good sequences.
Mortal Kombat is dated. Soldier? Can barely remember it. I’m not saying he’s GOOD by any means, nor am I saying those who hate him don;t have good points. I also don’t want him doing, say, The Dark Knight or som ething that demands the right touch. He’d be a solid choice if the Escape From NY remake ever gets off the ground. But he is what he is, and when he stays in his wheelhouse he entertains. The decade long Harry Knowles thing is more proof of how awful a person Knowles is.
On a more sensible not, pissed MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE isn’t playing nearby. Guess I’ll carve pumpkins with the kids then delve into Batman: Arkham City.
first episode of grimm nbc show is out on the internet …
i liked it – its a sci-fi type show so nbc will figure out a way to cancel it ..
boss on starz – also on the internets – a bit too much going on but great acting – there is 5 minute speech in an office thats pretty good…
Does anybody else remember the proposed THE LONG GOODBYE remake that W.S. Anderson was possibly going to do after DEATH RACE (which I think is one of his better movies)? It seemed like an interesting change of pace. It also seemed like an obvious project for Guy Ritchie, although probably too obvious since his crime films feel so inspired by it already.
looks like Milla needs a DP/30 fast…
Milla Jovovich accuses Summit Entertainment of ‘making no effort’ to promote ‘Three Musketeers’
“She continued about one hour later: “I think ‘summit’ hve swept ’3 Musketeers’, a grt family adventure film, under the rug in the US. Shame on them. SHAME ON YOU ‘SUMMIT’.” It’s an undeniably personal battle for Jovovich: The film was directed by her husband, Paul W.S. Anderson.”
I saw the Three Musketeers trailer in front of about five movies. Never saw the Footloose traielr in theaters once.
Too bad Thing’s having such a big dropoff. It’s a pretty decent remake. Sorry, “prequel.”
I’ve seen THREE MUSKETEERS spots every 5 minutes for weeks, since September. Maybe people just thought the same thing I did: it looks really really stupid.
For some reason I got a chuckle out of the idea of Sideshow Bill NOT carving pumpkins with his kids if MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE had been playing nearby. You gotta have your priorities. The other night I was going to visit my sick grandmother but HOUSE was on.
It’s hard to hate a guy like Anderson…he does what he does and he certainly doesn’t ruin anything I give a shit about. But his movies are just so boring.
IN TIME next week:
SEYFRIED vs WILDE: Best matchup in ages, CANNOT WAIT.
Actually throw in Matt Bomer and I don’t know who the dreamiest person in that movie is. ZING!
AM I RIGHT SCOOTERZZ?
LexG – the crazy amount of movies you watch and review you should be getting paid for this . your better than half these oscar bloggers ….
lexG – you should write more rants about oscar bloggers …
they are busy writing 10000 word on Clooney’s next oscar while you want K-Stew to win.
a lot of oscar bloggers / journalists aren’t objective anymore. Roger Ebert should take away their movie review license .
no ‘zing’ about it, you are totally right on the money lex…(fwiw: in this particular case, the prize goes to olivia wilde…really)….
cool 3 minute video about Toronto … some of you movie critics have been there for that tiff thing they do
http://vimeo.com/reemond/torontotempo
the guy who made this should get a dp/30 … but he won’t
cause its not NYC the best city in the world.
hey DP – you need to ask more big name actors the smaller movies they’ve done …Ryan Reynolds made movies called
Chaos Theory and the Nines…
also could you predicted he’d be a huge star when he did
that tv sitccom 10 years ago Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place…
also why no dp/30 with him ? it’s like when any actor does a comic book movie you kinda ban them from doing interviews with you… unless they do some small indie movie you like .. that fair ?
“LexG – the crazy amount of movies you watch and review you should be getting paid for this.”
I really should. But I don’t know how, where, or by whom… I also don’t think I could write professionally as “LexG” which is just an annoying persona I’ve saddled myself with, or who’d “hire” a guy who’s said even half the offensive shit I have. I’ve basically painted myself into a corner where it’d never be possible… And if I just started writing straight reviews under a real name with less offensive stuff… what would be the hook? One more white dork with a Blogspot?
Who had that comment on the sidebar the other day here? Shawn Levy or the other Oregonian guy about how they’d kill themselves if their only outlet was ANONYMOUS COMMENTS? That kind of stung, but really… where do you get a VENUE? NO ONE would read some flat looking “blog” if I started one, I don’t work well with others, and I wouldn’t trust some movie web site with my SSN to do an I9 over the web to get PAID… I’d have no idea how to get paid at any of this. I don’t really trust anyone, plus fucking Wells has SO MANY deranged readers who’ve sent me death threats and shit, it’s SO not worth it.
LexG — just post video reviews on youtube get fan base going .. your humor is the Maxim magazine type ..
beer companies should sponsor you directly ..
Lex, I definitely think you could write in your persona. look at carles from hipster runnoff. he occasionally doesnt hit the mark, but he IS “relevant” and writes some good stuff for Grantland now. How could you know if you don’t give it a serious try?
you know how shows on cable are the bestest thing ever and get millions of people to watch … i noticed that all these series have at least 5 minutes per episode where nothing new or exciting or dramatic or funny actually happen .. they need even higher quality writing .
but they keep getting tv awards .
i want critics to ask these actors about the parts that actually suck in these huge tv series.
Since the NYT won’t let us comment any longer an an article linked to on the front page ( http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/23/opinion/sunday/bruni-occupy-wall-street-and-hollywood.html?_r=1 )
Since it’s silly for the rich to support Occupy Wall Street, I guess it was ludicrous for whites to support the civil rights movement?
Next I suppose he’ll be telling us that the only people allowed to protest capital punishment are those wonderful individuals who’ve committed a capital crime.
i was checking random musicals on youtube …
10 million views for this ? lots of popular musicals are under 1 million views..
there’s so many musicals out there…hard to tell if the writers / composers are alive or not.
old musicals from 20 + years ago – still worth watching ?
you old movie critics were forced to watch these old musicals so they must be super awesome.
DP – do a dp/30 interview with that phantom of the opera mask . see if anybody notices.
Cats Musical – Memory – 10 million views.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-L6rEm0rnY&feature=related
Adam Sandler – I Feel Pretty – Anger Management
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kmv3WlKa6U8&NR=1
“all these series have at least 5 minutes per episode where nothing new or exciting or dramatic or funny actually happen…but they keep getting tv awards”
Among those few remaining “Heroes” fans, the first season is considered the absolute best by far, and yet while that season played out even some of the actors were complaining about pointless diversions created just to keep the characters busy until the final meet-up at the season conclusion.
“Hot Chicks of Occupy Wall Street”
http://hotchicksofoccupywallstreet.tumblr.com/
Sanj: The gal in glasses really is kinda smokin’
That’s actually a shot of Fredell Pogodin from a protest a while back. Joe.
I’ve always thought Fredell Pogodin was hot. Just ask her. She’ll say I’ve told her.
Which may explain that restraining order, come to think of it.
so i was having speed issues on the internet. mostly it was a bit slower.. called up and they got a few techs to fix it up….it was outside phone line
simple static on a phone line an cause lower speeds ..
right now the phone monopoly and the cable monopoly are fighting each other on the fastest internet .they are buying full page ads …
the fine print is data usage limits and gotta get a new modem…
those high speed modems ain’t cheap …
instead of doing somethihng basic like double your speed for 5 bucks – they got all these plans ..
the smaller internet providers are better. go with them.
wonder what would happen if netflix became an internet provider .. they could go unlimited access and people would actually use it and netflix streaming would go way up …
watched batman year one 2011 ..animated .
didn’t like the voice overs – story wasn’t amazing .
catwoman did nothing .
they should rerun this on the cartoon network
“The Walking Dead” is “Lost” with zombies. Am I the only one who’s quickly losing interest in it?
“Attack the Block” is among the most overrated movies of the year…and one of the most unintelligible. More than half the dialogue was lost on my Yank ears. Simply cannot fathom what all the fuss was about last summer.
The closest thing to NC-17 movies these days are episodes of premium cable series like “Boardwalk Empire.” Thank you, HBO.
I loved the first episode of The Walking Dead this season, but the second one was pretty damn slow. I get that they have twice as many episodes this season and want to to focus on character a little more, but over and over again I thought to myself, “That scene was pointless.” Look, for the 7th time in this episode we’re seeing them walk through the woods. So much redundancy set in in only 42 minutes. Ep 1 was suspenseful and exciting and entertaining, and Ep 2 brings it all to an abrupt halt. There are some great moments, but it was really slow overall and I also found myself losing interest.
I was even impatient with the first ep, Paul. (Did it REALLY have to be 90 minutes? Seriously.)
The “Lost” giveaway–and I don’t know why I hadn’t thought of it previously–was the opening, pre-credit scene in this week’s ep.
(“Ahhhh, so they’re going to keep flashing back to the characters’ lives before the zombie plague for contextualization, story beats, etc…..otherwise just watching them drive to a new town and fending off yet another zombie attack week after week will get old awfully fast.”)
It was the same thing with “Lost.” We couldn’t really stay on the island with them the whole time: the flashback/backgrounding stuff was essential, or otherwise we would have quickly lost interest watching the characters’ build campfires, fish and search for potable water every week.
I think AMC screwed up a good thing by going beyond the 6 original episodes. And with those record-smashing ratings, they’ll surely run it into the ground well past the point of diminishing returns (which for me have already begun).
Yeah I agree about the Lost element. We already knew Rick’s marriage was troubled before he was shot. We know his wife took up with Shane. That opening scene didn’t seem necessary at all, and annoyed me because of how the first episode ended. There’s just such a major pacing shift between episodes one and two, and it doesn’t do the show any favors.
I couldn’t make it past episode 3 of WALKING DEAD season 1. Bits were well done, but I just didn’t find anything fresh about it. Characters didn’t interest me.
watched the thing 1982 ..just boring. could see why they wanted a remake …
still need to see citizen kane…ahhh black and white movie. its going to take 10 minutes for my eyes to adjust to non color movie.
Walking Dead suffers from the problem most series fall into in that there is that they cannot plan for a three act structure for the larger narrative. Even in making plans for the season, if they map out what they want to happen it feels like they often have to drag things out to fill the 13 to 26 hours worth of time. Certain shows have overcame this and made each moment compelling (Mad Men, Wire) but I found that even a superior show like Breaking Bad would sometimes get mired down in inaction for a few episodes (they seem to have turned that around in a big way from what I have seen this season).
As for Walking Dead specifically, I watched the first two episodes of the first season and gave up, gave it another try this year and will likely do the same thing for the same reason, I have never finished a zombie movie and thought, “that was great, only problem was it wasn’t 40 hours long”
And as long as we are talking about television, just finished Downton Abbey on Netflix and loved it. Sort of an expanded version of Gosford Park without the Altman bitchiness (which is missed, but the more conservative overall tone probably works better for a series).
Angelenos:
Last week I had cause to go to the WESTSIDE PAVILLION… This is probably where most of you guys live, like Poland and co… HOLY SHIT, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing: WHITE PEOPLE. WHITE WOMEN. AWESOME OLD JEWISH DUDES and RABBIS and WHITE SKIN EVERYWHERE.
Is this how the better half lives? No Filipinos, Koreans, shrieking Chinemen? I couldn’t BELIEVE such a PARADISE was possible in this city… No wonder Poland and everyone here seems so jolly… You actually live in LOS ANGELES without being a 1% minority in a sea of Koreapinomenianxican gel-heads.
How much does rent cost to live in a neighborhood with WHITE PEOPLE? I never knew a Los Angeles that wasn’t totally olive-skinned.
LexG – you need a travel show ,.. where you attempt to meet new people and attempt to talk to them.
Funny, the only person who shrieks around here is LexG. Are you a “Chinemen”?
if DP doesn’t quit MCN and takeover netflix as the biz guy …netflix could go out of business within 2 years.
seems like they are over paying for content.
maybe a small group of 6 movie critics can takeover ..
if it does go out of business… the people in charge of netflix will still get rich right ? thats what they do …
or maybe hbo screws up – ratings go down and netflix just buys them and fixes them up in 2 years. hbo to go dies and all hbo content is exclusive to netflix forever.
have people predicted the dozens of ways something could happen to netflix … like when they changed names to that quickster … any super smart business person predict that one ?
maybe a group of actors / directors just buy the company.
theres 1000’s of people making content on youtube. netflix has the money to buy all that content.
make those creators a bit richer so they can come up
with more video content or five fox / aol / hbo / starz.
and other super rich corporations who have crazy amounts of money.
we rarely hear about people who got real money from netflix and used it to make even more content.
also i’m no expert on netflix .
There must be a doppleganger Burbank somewhere, because I go to the AMCs there all the time, and I see almost no minorities. In fact, the only theatre I go to with a significant minority attendance is the Plant in Van Nuys, and I only go there as a last resort, because they seem incapable of starting a film in frame, in focus, with the sound on and the house lights off.
WHITE SUPREMACY POWER
This LexG Carte Blanche & Yes-Men version of the Blog is a shadow of its former self. Boring.
Oh, boo-hoo… I post a trillion times less than I used to 2-3 years ago, and am more heavily moderated than anyone here but maybe Don M. The thread says BYOB so you have the floor to opine anything you want that’s more interesting… seriously, HAVE AT IT. I don’t recall “INX” ever posting a damn thing, so put up or shut up.
Hcat- I loved “Downtown Abbey”! Watched it on PBS last winter, and can’t wait for season two in January.
The time frame was definitely “Gosford”-y, but the overall tone and feel was more classical (e.g., “The Forsyte Saga”).
Or, uh, “Upstairs/Downstairs,” lol.
Walking Dead this season is tremendous because each episode is a set-piece, and they build on it. Last year they kept going back and forth on that Atlanta highway and constantly used that matte painting. Now, we have new locales, we have new characters, and we have the emerging greatness of Daryl. I understand your complaints up above but every problem this show had for me, has been fixed. Thank goodness.
Now, MM, Attack of the Block is tremendous for no other reason than Moses is one of the greatest characters to show up in this young decade and century. He’s that rare fuck up who rises to the occasion and does it in such an astounding way, that it makes Attack of the Block immensely enjoyable.
DP – you should take advantage of the late night talk shows ..
you saw Emma Stone on Leno yesterday ..now check the dp/30 . 30 full minutes that Leno won’t give you.
plus you need to occupy a movie theatre until Pitt and Clooney do a dp/30 …
plus i’m missing 30 rock. DP use your movie power to get that show back next week. call up some important people and do some deals like you’ll do 5 dp/30’s with
the people on SNL nobody knows about.
tv shows into video games
NCIS: The Video Game Trailer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9VPEU_PABk
The Walking Dead is so slow the episodes should be delivered to your TV by a short bus.
I asked the producers to change the show to ‘The Jogging Dead’ in the hopes of picking up the pace.
Hcat is exactly right, Walking Dead is narrative sprawl.
Romero’s first Dead trilogy worked so well because constraint of time and budget, created constraint of environment, causing constraint of story focus. Because Walking has no time limits but severely restricted budget, it’s already entered, (as Movie pointed out), the worst aspects of Lost.
Here’s a challenge if you haven’t done it already – try to watch Walking AS IT AIRS, sans DVR. Beyond frustrating. Horrendously placed commercial breaks leaving truncated scenes stopping in mid-beat. Death by micro-management.
The first time they hit a true zero-momentum episode, ratings are going to fall off a cliff. I think the current interest is based around the thought the vast majority of television doesn’t play towards a down ending, so where does Walking finish? Once people feel a Romero conclusion on the horizon, it’s ovah. If they worked towards the opposite – a chance to eradicate zombies on some scale – it can hold on.
Very much enjoyed “In Time.”
It’s no “Gattaca,” but as a stylish, great-looking hunk of sci-fi noir (think Theodore Dreiser Meets Philip K. Dick,) it’s pretty irresistible.
My major quibble is that Timberlake isn’t a seasoned enough actor to pull off the emotional intensity his role demands (DiCaprio a decade ago, or the mid-’80s Cruise would have been perfect).
Loved Seyfried’s Anna Karina ‘do, though. Almost made me think I’d landed in “Alphaville.”
I really like “The Walking Dead”, and I think the slower pace of the show is actually kind of interesting, in that it gives the show a laconic quality but also makes the intense moments feel more intense.
Did anybody else watch the pilot for “Boss”? Kelsey Grammer is amazing in it, and I love how it has Van Sant’s style all over it (the extreme, jittery close ups; the ugly/beautiful photography). I’m psyched to see where the show goes.
MS, what are you on about? No down ending? Did you watch BSG? Lost? Hell, isn’t Breaking Bad beloved because of the down ending? Same with Homicide and the Wire? People can handle the down ending but this show is doing what it needs to do to maintain tension, people love that shit, and it doesn’t exactly need to find some bigger overall arc. It just needs to keep on building that tension and have it crest at some point, and let Daryl kill more zombies.
JS Partisan is right. Even “kids cartoons” have bummer endings as often as not. Young Justice ends nearly every episode with the major villains mocking the good guys for not seeing through their evil plan, while Wolverine and the X-Men (fantastic show, by the way) ended every single episode of its 26-episode run on a serious bummer note.
Was BSG a down ending? I remember it being incomprehensible but wasn’t the whole starting over from scratch supposed to be seen as a win? Especially with what they all went through before?
Now Breaking Bad is a good analogy, here we are watching breathlessly for years watching this guy slowly circle the drain, barely able to keep his head above water, always finding some last ditch attempt-worse case scenerio way to stay alive. The thing is the downtime in BB is spent showing the fallout of his actions with the people in his life. Now not having gotten all that into Walking Dead I can’t say if they do the same. Are we learning more and more about these people and the shredding of their psyche that must be occuring? I must say that nothing I have read about the series mentions all that much character development. If its just random meatbags running from the zombies, will the appeal dwindle over the longer season (though based on the success of reality television and procedurals it seems audiences never get that put off by repetition).
ETA: I think what MS meant was an overall down ending to the series. Sure people are willing to accept a down ending to a episode, in fact it usually increases their interest for the next one like the end of a book chapter where you just have to keep reading. Again not wanting to put words in his mouth but I thought that MS is saying that if Dead does not look like it will eventually end in a Mankind will survive the apocolypse resolution people will generally be put off. Not unlike the downer ending of Twin Peaks caused a lot of complaints among the faithful.
Some spoilers for Walking Dead
My problem with the character development in TWD is that it’s too repetitive. It was well-established that Rick and Lori’s marriage was on the rocks before he was shot. Using a flashback to reiterate that at the start of the most recent episode was unnecessary. Andrea and Dale continue to battle over what happened at the CDC. Lori and Shane continue to argue about their previous relationship. It feels like it’s spinning its wheels and not adding much depth to what’s already been established. They seem to be trying really hard to ensure that this isn’t just a show about random meatbags running from zombies, and the strain is often too apparent.
reviews on the run review the star wars blurays ..
they really don’t like the new ones.
watch and be shocked….or not.
http://www.reviewsontherun.com/watch/10/201/1/0
i’ve been waiting forever for these guys to get a dp/30 .
they are located in Vancouver so they could skype it .
yeah 90% of the time they review video games .
but the movie reviews end up on tv . so they are legit.
zombies a living history is on history channel .
some real critic needs to yell at them to get some real history back.
history could have made a J. Edgar movie but instead Leo gets paid milions to do this . Leo wins ..history channel loses.
history channel should have a total monopoly on all things history but they don’t .
am i the only one who notices this ?
i’ll honestly be surprised if Chloe Moretz or Amber Heard have a dp/30 this year ..they have movies coming out.
Daniel Craig won’t do one cause he’s Bond. they have
to protect Bond for saying anything to anybody or next
Bond film won’t make like 250 million bucks.
i’m way more interested in who doesn’t do a dp/30 than anybody who does .
If Poland ever needed me to fill in for a DP/30, Sanj, I’d be all over a Moretz or Heard DP/30…
IE, I’d sit there dumbstruck and have NOTHING to ask them.
LexG – yeah i figured that .
i’m not a huge fan of hugo but Moretz can’t turn down
Martin Scorsese.
Heard can’t turn down Depp.
i haven’t forgotten about Brit Marling – Greta Gerwig – Jennifer Lawerence and Alia Shawkat.
Hailee Steinfeld and Natalie Portman – up for oscars .. never came back.
Liz Olsen lots of hype for 1 movie. no oscar nominations =- no dp/30 for 6 months ? she does talk unlike her sisters who don’t seem to be around much.
1 movie can totally change your life .
Sasha Grey – tried to be real actress with Steven Soderbergh help. not much happened ..
Sofia Coppola tired to Stephen Dorff an oscar ..not much
happened …i liked the dp/30 a lot and now he’s stuck
Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star … sad but he does
have more movies coming out ..so i wonder how much credit
Coppola will get 2 years after the movie came out.
Keira knightley is too famous for a dp/30 . she probably gets to hang out all day with the royal family playing polo. so that means Evan Rachel Wood gets another 2 dp/30 next year…
maybe of the Duplass brothers makea a really good film next year and DP finally gets to tell everybody he had
them before other movie critics did.
i vote Juno Temple as the nicest celeb this year..
like if i met her she’d talk to me for at least 2 minutes
and move on to somebody more famous.
when you become more famous as an actor- you just
can’t talk to regular people.
list of Top Most Beautiful Actresses – IMDB ..
http://www.imdb.com/list/RrFplzbpm6o/
DP – update the top dp/30 graphic – John Sayles is creeping me out … i mean sure it’ll cost 10,000 bucks for a web developer to make another banner but its worth it…
if you put super happy dp/30 people it’ll increase the odds
people will click on it .
Has anyone ever tried to buy a poster from Mondo Tees? I like their stuff and tried to buy the new Jurassic Park poster this morning. Saw the message announcing that the poster was on sale 1 minute after it was posted. The site wouldn’t load for a few minutes, and when it finally did, the posters were sold out. They were gone 5 minutes after the sale was announced. I figured it’d be quick, but was a little disappointed.