fight the power

For the first time in my life today, I contested a charge on my credit
card bill. And I have to say: it was incredibly satisfying.

The first was a strange online charge to a wierd online-fantasy game
site. I have no clue how that happened. I have assume its a mistake
on the game-company since anyone who would be into credit card fraud
AND online gaming would have surely spent a lot more than one $42
charge.

I liked that one, since the nice email i had sent the gaming company
had gotten back just a snippy form letter.

But it was the second that felt so good. This one was a giant, heaping
Fuck You to fuckin' Delta fuckin' Airlines.

Delta is the worst airline on earth. In fact, they are probably the
worst company on earth I know of, of any kind.

I used to fly a lot, and Mandy now flies as much as I ever did, so
between us we've seen them all. No one comes close. Delta is the
worst airline this side - maybe that side - of Aeroflot. And with
Aeroflot, you now what you're getting.

Delta has lost an 80lbs, bright red bag for 5 days on a non-stop
international flight (?), and offered compensation of $50 a day IF you
had reciepts.
Delta has damaged Mandy's luggage to the point that stuff fell out
and was lost, twice in two trips.
Delta's SkyMiles program is essentially a rumor - both Mandy and I
have been told that no SkyMiles seats were available on a flight but we
were welcome to buy a seat on the same flight. Skymiles fees, when you
do get a seat, are the highest in the industry, making it hardly worht
the effort.
Delta, alone among airlines, uses American Express as their credit
card partner, meaning their annual fees start at 85 and go up to nearly
200.
Delta has left Mandy stranded in two different airports on the same
trip with no accomodations, forcing her to pay to drive to a third
airport to catch a connection.
Delta has NEVER given our money back, offered a discount or upgrade
or offered to pay expenses on any of the above problems.
And Delta is the major player at Hartsfield I'ntl, the second worst
airport in America behind Philly, and far and away the worst among any
and all hubs (yes, worse than Dallas, particularly if you are
attempting to drive to or from it).

Please, join us in boycotting Delta, won't you?

Well, they charged us $50 a few months ago for some unfair fee, but
they made the mistake of charging it twice. And we even played ball -
we called them. we waded through their elaborate, inept phone system
(worst in the industry, by the way). we got to "Refunds" (which they
keep locked away on its own phone-system island, which you must have
permission from other gatekeepers to enter).
And the "refunds" people said, 'oh, we don't do credit card
refunds.' Or maybe it was, 'we don't do fee refunds.' Whatever - the
Delta Refunds department said they weren't going to refund us a charge
they rest of their operators said they owed.

here, they said, call another number.

So I did: bank of america. Fuck you Delta.

Just an invigorating thing to do.

Fuck Delta.
matt

Charity's insightful analysis

first off, soldiers at checkpoints don't get kidnapped BY
DEFINITION. Do we 'kidnap' taliban guys from Kabul? Everytime I hear
someone throw out the word 'kidnap' or 'abducted' I feel 1-percent less
supportive of Israel. When it's an Israeli official saying it, it
bumps up to 10-percent, because then it's intentionally manipulative
and NEVER goes unchalleneged.
Call them 'captured' or 'prisoners' or just 'missing' or even
'casualties.' If they're 'kidnapped' than Isreal is already a
world-leader felon, along with the US. can't have it both ways.
Of course, also never spoken, is that you can't very well sell
marching a country to war over 'captured' soldiers, and certainly not
over three (three!) 'casulaties.' But three 'kidnapped, solders ' I
guess, is enough to let slip the dogs.
The result, of course, has been predictable: the debate is now, 'is
Isreal over-reacting?' as if there is an argument that three captured
(and, so far, still alive) soldiers at a roadblock could ever
rationally equate to the shelling and invasion of a country. There
have bee armies in the last 100 years that practiced that scope of
retaliation. The state Israel was formed in defiance of their memory.
But of course, it's not about kidnapping. We might as well start
calling them KMDs - Kidnappings Of Mass Destruction. Its precisely the
same lie with precisely the same motive (though, in Israeli's defense,
there is not an abundance of evidence that those soldiers don't exist).

You want to go to Lebanon? Go to Lebanon. Just don't sell it as
Entebbe II.

Second, what no one (including Charity's delightfully well informed
email) is saying is that Israel could lose. and they could.
not in absolute terms (I mean, Tel Aviv won't fall or anything), but
their 'ultra-modern' army (and its unchalleneged air force - sound
familiar?) could take far greater casualties and accomplish quite a bit
less than they think they can, and that would be the same thing as
losing. Throw in any kind of a 'quagmire' scenerio, and its 10 times
worse.
I JUST GOT that that word is the same as the name of the Family Guy
bachelor. Just hit me.
Anyway, I would never have considered that notion to be plausible
before a) a group of alledged 'terrorist' street thugs managed to
attack and set afire an underway warship, a just fall-over amazing
feat, B) they proved that - Holy Shit! - they actualy have rockets that
can reach out and touch someone (begging the question, what else do
they have) and C) the last three years in Iraq.
Modern-army-vs-hometown-thugs 101.
(though the "rockets in Haifa" thing strikes me just like the
'kidnapped' thing - last night CNN had a US reporter obviously in some
imbed-like position who sort of manfully reported that he'd been with
an Israeli artillery brigade that had been launching shells into a
Lebanese city for four hours. And i'm confident Israel owns more than
one company-worth of canons).

but from a military/political standpoint, I have a feeling Hezbollah
would like nothing better than to watch the Israeli's roll their
(American) tanks up a road and into a city. plenty of guys in there
with friends in baghdad and access to the internet. Could be a hell of
a fight - and if it is, regardless of who wins, Israel loses.

So what would happen if Israel went all in and was handed a
genuinely embarrassing battlefield setback (I'll abstain from the word
'defeat')? THEN what? I'll tell you what: stay the fuck out of
Damascus for a few weeks.

Maybe, just maybe, this will workout for exactly the reasons Iraq
hasn't. Consider:
Dubya went in to impose democracy via bayonette on a nation entirely
committed to despotism. Given 10 years, it might work, as it
occasionally has other places (a notion I've NEVER disputed and in fact
have always thought was really a great idea - just not worth 1/100th of
the cost in lives and coin, not for a shit-ass, nearly-first-world
country like Iraq when the globe is brimming with more deserving
candidates). In 10 years, Iraq could settle out and look like...
Modern Lebanon: able (and willing) to hold elections and make them
stick, influenced by and aligned with Dark Neighbor (Syria/Iran) but
not Of them.
again, that's 10 years away in Iraq, but it's a week ago in Lebanon.

That would be the Good Outcome: Israel effectively shoots the locks
off the last chain holding back Lebanese democracy (WOW, what a visual!
I just made that up, too! I wish I knew somebody at the White House -
I'd charge them for it).

Or the Bad Outcome: The sight of tanks crossing the border does
exactly what it did in Iraq - squash debate, progress and reason, end
democracy and fire up the militias. So long to 2, 5, 10, 20 years of
good.

Plus: $77 oil. Gas prices effectively tripling in 2 years. No
matter what, Israel just made that the floor.

matt

Rose Bowl Requiem

Did you see Chicago? remember when Zelwenger's Roxie watches Lucy Lu
gets dragged into jail and she realizes her 15 minutes are up? Flicker, go the lights. Snap, goes the neon. Darkness.

That's what I thought of as SC's players walked around on the field
after the game, stunned and aimless, thier faces suddenly 15 lbs and 10
years heavier, seeing for the first time the cameras all pointing the other way.
Welcome to the rest of your life, kid. We've been waitin'.

It was quite a run. It started four years ago the night Carson tore
apart once-beaten Notre Dame.
It ended last night.
It ended, technically, when VY ran it in, on a busted play, on 4th
down, probably the all-time least surprising, most-predictable
championship-clinching 4th-down in history. I mean, who ELSE was going
to make a play on either side of the ball? Who else, to that point,
had?
But really, it ended - the game, the streak, the magic - the second
Reggie Bush made that astonishing lateral-attempt inside the Texas 20.
His reasons are easy to understand but impossible to believe. At that
moment - for the first time since Carson-ND - one of the cogs in USC's
machine forgot how to win.
There's been the down games, the big deficits, the ND squeeker and
all the rest. There was even the two fourth downs SC failed to pick up
in this game, either one of which would have won it.
but never - not once - has one of USC's go-to players mistaken
stupid for bold. Not once had somebody panicked. Until that moment.
And then - buzz-snap - it was over.

I stayed excited and nervous and stomped around the living room
through the bitter end (even fired off a cocky TM to a friend at the
game when SC took a 12 point lead) but from that Reggie disaster on, I
had an It's-Over pit in my stomach I haven't had said Carson put up his
fourth TD pass of the night on Next-Rockne Willingham.
Reggie, both on the stat sheet and in every observable way, never
recovered. nice little run at the end with a flying walenda finish,
but even that felt empty. And you could see when they followed him to
the bench, moments later, he was still haunted.
The cold reality is, Reggie lost that game, and it was probably the
biggest post-Heisman bust since Detmer.
Surprisingly, Reggie's self-emolation didn't spread to Leinart and
White, who were simply marvelous (I hung my hopes, in fact, on the
notion that White would rise to the occasion of replacing Reggie in
this brightest of spotlights).

But "marvelous," it turns out, gets off two exits before Vince Young.

I have little to say about VY - he's a witch. He's Tiger in pads.
He's a joke. I could go on but I'll leave that to... everybody.

(VY aside 1: by far, the most delicious post-game moment was watching
ESPN's top bimbo, Kirk Herbstriet, try to simultaneously keep from
throwing up in his mouth while trying to climb on the VY wagon, weighed
down by the full weight of his month-long, any-open-mic campaign to
declare Reggie Bush "the greatest college player I've ever seen." When
UT's linemen stormed the stage, I thought he was going to cry -
fabulous moment)

So Leinart and Bush and White and that whole team doesn't get 3 (and
yes - it would have been 3), and now never will. I think after going
to the trouble of winning so damn many in a row, it would have been
nice to see them finish. But now we clearly know that VY was always
the best player in the country, by miles. It's only been 40 minutes
since the game, and already his non-win at the Heisman has that ghostly
"did I really grow a fu-manchu in '96?"-feel to it.

(VY aside 2: second most delicious moment was Lee Corso not asking or
suggesting but DEMANDING that VY be taken first in the draft - one week
after the incessant, month-long ESPN-led "Reggie Bush Sweepstakes"
drumbeat climaxed in the niners-texans "Reggie Bush Bowl")

All the things they're saying now are wrong:
- first and foremost: not a 'great game' though it had highlights.
The finish was fun, and any time evenly matched teams go for it on 4th
down five times, you've got something. But 5 first-half trips in the
redzone for SC and they score once? And how many turnovers for UT?
And how many drives stayed alive on penalties? Great games are when
two teams take turns cashing in opportunities, not blowing them.
- under no circumstances could USC have possibly NOT gone for it on 4th
down at the end; first off, they were rolling; second, they're SC;
and third, VY had 3 timeouts and almost 3 minutes - he was going to
score from Riverside if he got the ball.
- Mack Brown still can't win a big game and Greg Davis still should be
fired; all 3 of VYs rushing TDs, his (kneedown) downfield pitch for a
TD, the 2-pter and most of everything else (including his biggest
openfield run) were broken-play VY improvs. Just like last year's Rose
Bowl. Just like everything in the Mack-VY era, all the way back to
that 4th-and-27 at Kansas. Greg Davis apparently knows how to draw up
a flip over the middle to a tight end, though, and he should be
congratulated for it.
- Vince's knee WAS down on that pitch, and it's utterly meaningless;
UT (like USC if Reggie hadn't pitched) would have gone in for the TD
within 3 plays anyway.
- the one bad call that did matter was the by-a-mile fumble on the pass
over the middle, but it led only to 3 points, not enough to truly get
pissed about.
- (disclaimer: the last two items are not blame-the-refs whining - but
both of those calls are in heavy rotation in the post-game shows.
that's my rebuttal)
- I suppose I was going to be bitter, no matter what, but here's what I
want: just one - JUST ONE - of the grinning stooges on the networks to
say: "USC is 4 TDs better than Texas - but Vince is worth 5." Anybody
want to seriously dispute that? Any evidence at all to the contrary?
What would be so taboo about saying it? WHERE THE HELL IS TREV!!!

I guess in the end, the harder they really do fall. It took maybe
20 minutes for the Kings of LA to morph before our eyes into sloppy
has-beens - not quite Celebrity Fit Club, but headed down that road.
We got a chance to see what Matt Leinart looks like wearing a bad loss,
and it was incredibly unattractive: he was whiny and bitchy and pouty
after the game. ESPN said he and Reggie visited the UT lockerroom to
congratulate them, but that "class" (my least favorite of all sports
non-words) didn't show up to the cameras. He looked like one of the
Laguna kids after losing a cell-phone bitch-off.
What little I saw of Reggie in the post-game was pure shell shock.
even if nobody reading this agrees with me that Reggie lost the game
for SC, I'm quite sure Reggie does.

(VY aside 3: until last night, he'd said "i'll be back" more than the
Governator, but about 14 seconds after the whistle he wanted to "sit
down with my family and make the best decision for everyone" - time to
earn your $25 mil, Mack)

I am never interested in "would he make a good pro?" talk, but I
will confess to some fascination over the fall-out of this game. Did
we just see VY leap into the top 5? Into #1? Did Reggie just fall
out? Did Leinart just lose 7-figures in signing bonus? Did LenDale
White just pick them up?
Corso's spittle-fit aside, VY can't play like that in the pros (for
the same reason that, a week ago, it was ridiculous to even discuss
whether or not USC could beat an NFL team) and he absolutely showed no
sign of being able to throw NFL passes. And, PLEASE, enough with his
"most efficient passer in the nation" thing. I'd be efficient too if 9
guys were on the line to stop me from running and my recievers averaged
6-8. VY didn't throw a single timing pattern, a single accurate deep
ball or a single on-the-money sideline route all night. Not one. He
dinked to his tight end, hit streakers over the middle and dumped to
running backs.
That will win you State 5A Championships and, evidently, beat SC in
the Big Game, but it won't beat The Patriots.
Enough VY-as-a-pro abuse. It's his night.
But how far did Bush fall? This was the next Hershell, the guy who
you could pick-and-trade for multiple pro-bowlers. That kid? One dumb
play and he climbs under the bench - you want him? If all you had was
that tape, and you had to take Bush or LenDale - any doubts? Hell,
you'd probably take UT's running back, whoever that was. Or Limas
Sweed (hands down, best name of the Bowl season).
And Leinart? Maybe he's still the next Payton - but maybe he's the
next Leif.
no, that's too harsh - not only did he lose his first game since 7th
grade or whatever, but he had to sit there and NOT rip his own defense
for losing it. that can't be easy. And what was he - 17-for-19 in
the second half? Are you kidding? He needs to stop showing up drunk
on the internet with bimbos, but he's a player.

And finally - lost like tears in rain in the middle of it all was
the fabulous performance by Dwayne Jarrett. Prior to 4th-and-Green
Jersies, I considered him a tall, good-on-paper bust who appeared to be
on scholarship to drop third downs. Since 4th-and-That-Grass, he's
been a revelation. And he was retard-good last night, bailing out
Leinart (and everybody else) over and over, and, on his final catch,
causing two of UT's excellent Dbacks to run into each other so hard,
one broke his arm and the other broke his head. Jarrett stepped
between them and fell back over the line for a TD. Absurd performance.

But not enough to beat VY.

So that's it. it's over - bring on Booty or, I suspect, Sanchez.
Bring on the next two guys who can run and four or five Parade All
Americans who can hit. Build it from the ground up again. Mix in a
loss or two to Oregon or Cal or whatever. Even drop one to ND, so we
can go back the next year ready to pick back up.
I hope UT runs with it for a while - the number, the streak, the
bullseye, the 'nothing lasts forever' behind every corner. Let's see
just how deep a hole Mack can dig in Waco or Boulder or even Austin
before VY runs out of rope to pull him out. Lord knows they both just
earned it.

Carson to VY. thanks for reading along. as the bad 80s band nearly
said: the streak is over, you were with me all the while.
(wow. bookended with bad Chicago references. I couldn't be prouder)

GTA: Fairbanks

I'm now as done with Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (5) as I ever
intend to be. I spent the first two days here finishing off the
Airstrip and Vegas-based missions, two of which were the toughest in
the game. I'll get to those. The last one was to steal a Harrier jet
off an aircraft carrier, shoot down 3 others (more tedious than it
sounds) and bomb 5 boats in Lake Powell. When all that was boring, I
realized it was time to quit.
The only remaining missions are boring return-to-LA, gang-based
missions. But I've played all 3 cities, flown lots of planes, shot
everything imaginable and, yes, beaten up plenty of hookers, so I
think I'm done with it.
So to sum up: The initial part – about 1/5th of the game – is based
in LA ("Los Santos") and isn't that great. In fact, I almost quit
playing. It's dreary, in fact.
The second part – out in "the country" is just bizarre, utterly
different from the LA part. And by itself, I'd have quit playing it
then, too, because, again, it wasn't very engaging. No gangs or the
blight of the LA part, but then, not much else. Strange little
missions based in the strange little towns set in the hill country. I
mean, you have to steal a combine harvester from a hippy commune at
one point. A race on 4-wheelers. Strange but, with so much time
invested in that point – and with now no idea what to expect from the
rest of the game – I had to press on.
Then you get to San Francisco which is a strict GTA-city – urban,
kinda funny missions involving shooting and driving. Straight out of
Vice City. Lots of fun. Quickest part of the game.
Then comes your trip to the desert and, for my money, the game really
starts.
You go to the airstrip in the desert and learn to fly planes.
And that takes a WHILE.
Then the city of Vegas opens up and that's where the good missions
are. At this point, you start parachuting onto dams, hijacking police
bikes and running collecting them in the back of a moving van, running
motorcycles up the rear ramp of an about-to-take-off airplane, raiding
a secret desert-based military compound (Area 69) and stealing it's
jetpack (!) and generally raising hell around an amazing replica of
Las Vegas.
The final couple missions are fantastic – in one you take a Lear Jet
(you fly a lot of lear jets) to old Liberty City (Original GTA city)
and do a hit there. It's quick but a nice touch.
And then you rob the vault at Ceasar's Casino (named "Caligula's
Palace" – goes right along with calling Pirates of the Caribean
"Pirates in Men's Pants' and Excaliber the "Came-a-lot'). That's
quite a mission, using night vision goggles, blowing stuff up,
shooting LOTS of dudes and then escaping in a parachute.
Right there with the Steal-the-Harrier mission.

So the hardest missions. Two are "gunner" missions where the entire
mission is from the sites of a gun, and you are shooting at the
landscape. Two are chase mission. And then there's the flight
school.
First is early in the game, a "tail gunner" mission where you sit on
the back of a motorcycle and shoot at the mafia guys pursuing you.
Great mission – lots to see, lots of action, but HARD. Basicly, it
becomes one of those that makes video games hateful – you just
memorize the pattern to get you a few seconds past the part where you
died last time until finally you get finished. It saps all the
creativity and fun out of it.
The second is a goofy subplot mission in San Francisco where you have
to defend a Remote Control store from dive bombing remote control
airplaines – and no, it doesn't even make much sense when you're in
it.
(If you recall, I thought the hardest mission in Vice City was the
helicopter-based gun run mission where you shoot down at a bunch of
mafia around a property – same idea here).
Then there's several missions where you have to chase somebody and
kill them in a roughly equal vehicle. One, between two boats, simply
takes forever. You have to follow him and follow him and follow him…
and finally you can slowly damage his boat badly enough that he dies.
Takes forever.
But that's nothing next to "High Noon", a very late mission which
opens up the final hits I mentioned above. You have to chase a guy
through the desert highway system. And he's a VERY good driver. He
escaped me probably, conservatively, 30 times, before I FINALLY shoved
his car into the ocean, which is actually kind of a backdoor way to
kill him. No, 50 times.
That one was tough.
But not as tough as the Flight School. You have to pass 10 tests
flying a plane – most of which are simple (learn to land, do a loop,
parachute, etc). But you have to fly through specific gates/hoops in
the sky, and a couple of them are unbelievably demanding.
Those took me forever.
Another thing – you have to meet specific girls and 'date them,'
taking them out to eat and stuff. One of which you have to date until
she gives you a key to the vault (or something) at the casino she
works at. Here's how you pass it:
So you go see her, and her boyfriend is coming to meet her – so you
kill him. And he drops a 'weapon,' which is a 2ft purple dildo. And
no, there's no mistaking it.
Then you follow her while she goes shopping and she goes to a sex
store (this is Vegas, afterall). So you figure out that you have to
buy a "gimp" outfit, a full-body leather suit, complete with ball gag.
Then once you are dressed in that, you show up at her house 'armed'
with the dildo – instant night of sex in her dungeon/bedroom.
And the key!

So I've flown most of the airplanes (including the AT-400 Airbus-like
plane), and done all the Vegas stuff. Enough for me.

Guantlet - don't miss it.

i know BSG makes mention of it every now and then, but this season's
Real World/Road Rules Gauntlet on MTV is the Final Product. They've
finally nailed down a perfect competitive format, with members of the
losing team each week forced to fight to the death for the right to
stay. And the personalities that have risen to the top are superb.
At the top of the Rookie Guys is Alton, already a legend for setting
the world record for hook-ups and sleezy behavior in the mythic Vegas
season. Turns out, he's at LEAST as good an athlete as a pimp, because
as the team captain (who is required to do the death-battles every
week) he's like Lance Armstrong. As BSG says, "he is taking us all to
a new level."
Opposed to him, as the Veteran's captain, is the tiny, wiry,
pitbull-like Derrick. He's a small, punk of a guy who lets nobody -
nobody - step on him. Derrick was last seen a season ago beating Brad,
who he gives up 50 lbs to, in a monster-tackle drill Inferno. I can't
overstate how amazing that contest was, and how close it was
(literally, after 10 minutes of bloodthirsty rage, a ball needed to go
in a hoop for Brad to win, and it lipped-out). SC-ND wasn't as good as
Brad-Derrick. So now Derrick is center stage, and through sheer
force-of-asshole, he's great.
If there's an Alton-Derrick showdown at the end of this, it'll be
bigger than Game 7, '03.
But on the girls side, you've got the rise and rise of Beth - a
36-year-old, completely narcicistic whiny bitch roundly despised by
everyone on the show. you knew where Beth stood in previous seasons,
when Tanya threw all of Beth's clothes in the pool and nobody stuck up
for her. Well, now she is the captain for the Vet girls, after a great
turn of events: the Vet girls voted her into the Gaunlet, hoping that
Ruthie - year in, year out, the most respected, loved and athletic of
any of the chicks - would take her out. In so doing, they let slide
the useless Montana and Ainesha, both of whom do nothing but whine, and
aren't half the athlete that Beth is. A horrible gamble by the chicks,
motivated by pure bitchyness.
But when they spun The Wheel, Beth got to choose the event and,
outweighing Ruthie by probably 40 lbs, she chose tug of war. In a
great Guantlet, she used her flabby mass to wear down Ruthie and -
whammo - sent Ruthie home and took over the Captain's spot.
If VY had blown out his knee on the first snap of the Rose Bowl,
UT's sideline would not have deflated as completely as the Vets did.
If the Lost plane had crashed on the beach at that moment, they
wouldn't have reacted. A fantastic moment.

So since then, Derrick made quick work of Ace in a wrestling match
and Beth sent home Montana in another tug of war, giving her an air of
invincibility that clearly has the rest of the team reeling.

And it's only going to get better, because the weak players are pretty
much gone, meaning the Gauntlets from here on will only be more
competitive. Looming in front of Alton is the Philly Cast two-some,
the huge and capable Landon and ex-Vanderbilt wide reciever, MJ. MJ,
taller and leaner than anybody else, is playing it cool, staying low
key and just executing. We'll see what happens when the crowd
continues to thin.
For Derrick, a rematch with Brad is a real possibility.
On the girls side, Beth is clearly now in Munich mode, one by one
taking down the bitches who sold her out.

And, of course, they all get drunk and hook up every episode, too. Of
course. Catch a marathon to get caught up - it's fantastic.

UPDATE: Latest episode was subpar. Very little social drama, and the
rookie chicks went to the guantlet, again, that's good since they
needed some thinning out, but they are a pretty bloodless group.

Movie Eruption, plus Narnia

I had a little email going last week with a few friends about the
perfect storm of movies currently out. I can't remember a stronger
crop since the revolution of 94-95 - Swingers, Lonestar, Secrets and
Lies, etc - and even then i don't think there where ever this many
solid looking movies out on one weekend. Either way, this is far and
away, over the horizon, the best month of movies of this decade.

Out now: Walk the Line, King Kong, Harry Potter 4, Narnia,
Syrianna, Good Night and Good Luck, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, Memoirs of a
Geisha, Brokeback Mountain, The Producers, Munich.

That's no less than an 11 movies - all diffferent, all distinctive -
that have all the indicators of at least an A-. You could even
throw in at least 2 documentries that are supposed to be excellent but
then, generally, what documentry isn't? Here we have 11 movies, with
actors and budgets and ad campaigns, that all look first rate.

this weekend also marks the first christmas in the last 10 where i'm
a) not with my parents and b) not in a war zone. so i plan on seeing
as many as i can.

In fact, from that list, I'm already at 4 - Walk the Line, Harry
Potter, Good Night and Good Luck (early returns: Walk The Line is the
Movie of the Year until somebody proves otherwise) and, as of an hour
ago, the Chronicles of Narnia.

Of The Big 11, I had the most doubt about this one. It's a
double-whammy of unoriginality: a remake of an old book, and a cash-in
on Lord of the Rings withdrawal. Plus, as ABC/Disney has ceaselessly
pointed out, the old book it's based on was actually written with a
Christ-story theme, perfect for a Holiday release. There has been no
secret at all to the 'secret' marketing campaign being conducted at the
church-level, trying to recapture some of that "Passion" magic from
'04, implicitly promising that Narnia was really a stealth Christian
Message movie. And there was some sort of church-based teenage group
in the theatre with us tonight.
I know they were a church group, because they were well behaved. In
our movie theatre, on our side of town, around our breed of teenagers,
its the only explaination.

And I'm glad they were, because it was a movie that a few loud kids
could ruin - it's a movie based around children, who say childish
things, starring at the center a girl probably, at most, 8. It has
animated animals with funny accents, and several predictable scenes and
themes designed to lure in children's built-in sense of awe. It has
careful timing and fragile plot conciets meant to slip past mesmerized
children, not too-cool-for-school teenagers. A few, "yeah rights" from
the peanut gallery would really shatter this movie.
But if the teenagers in the theatre bight their tongues, the movie
does everything so well - and the little girl in the middle of it, who
plays Lucy, is such a revelation - that, you fall effortlessly into the
same trap.

Four kids, in wartime london, armed only with grey clothing and
frowns, are sent to a country home to wait out the bombs. All four
are perfectly English: the girls with pie-eyes and moon-shaped faces,
the boys with reedy features and nasal overbites. A home run cast from
the the giddy up.
Also, the mid-century English nature of the movie never evaporates,
and that's good news. Most of the creatures are distinctly English,
both friends and foe, and the built-in sensibility of british culture
keep the magical-talking-creature-element grounded. What I mean is:
none of the talking animals tries to talk like they are Hip Hop, Saved
by the Bell or Robin Williams - they're just talking creatures and
haven't got to time to bother with whether or not they should be, what
with the world to save and all the tidying up to do.
Thanks to Lucy, they find a wardrobe which, through some quick but
well-executed baffoonery, transports them to a magical forest in
winter. They soon learn that the forest is ruled by an evil queen - a
role not played by Cate Blanchett but by someone who sure wishes she
was. They travel across the land, hobbitt-slash-gnome-slash-elf-like,
meet talking creatures and then meet Aslan, the Lion King of the realm.
All that above is about as perfectly constructed as you could want -
the world of the kids, from stuffy english house, to bizarre forest, to
cute creatures, to the grand map of the place, is revealed with perfect
pacing. You never question a single leap, and instead find yourself
wondering what's around the next corner.
Aslan and his army are ready for the kids to lead them against the
witch, which they do, eventually.

In the middle of this, in an isolated 10 minutes, you get the promised
Christ allegory.
Knowing it was coming, I thought it was a bit underwhelming. I
wanted Mandy's thoughts on it:
Me: "You know, if a hard core christian had gone to see that
expecting a Christ allegory, they'd have been pissed, don't you think?"
Her: "What Christ allegory?"
That exchange lets you know how thick they lay it on.
This movie does not feel like religious themes have been painted on.
If anything they feel scrubbed off.
And since Mandy and I both went in wanting nothing more than talking
animals and the like, we left happy. But i guarantee the
church-vertising audience left feeling a little cheated.

So while Aslan is rehabing his allegorical injury, the battle begins.
And it's a doozy. I had expected that the climactic battle scene
would have to be pretty soft - it's led by children in a children's
movie. The kid leading it, in his too-big, too-shiny brand new armor,
looks nearly Dubyaian. I figured you'd get some extras pushing each
other to the ground, the requisite archers and some burning barrels and
call it good.
Not hardly.
for a good 15 minutes, two vast armies of hatchet, club, lance,
spear, sword, claw and tooth wielding animals have at each other.
creatures of every concievable combat-suitability are in the line-up
for the two sides, and the attacks are ferocious and constant. The
queen's war chariot is pulled by Polar Bears, a terrifying juggernaut
of queen-bitch-fury not equaled since Tina Turner ran down Mel Gibson
at the end of Thunderdome. The collisions take place at a bloodless
video-game pace, but there's no short supply of bodies falling and
twitching under swords. The fight runs off the main field, back up
into the hills, where it turns into a a defacto-tunnel fight in a
ravine. the main characters here all collide and bounce off the rock
walls like sword-wielding pinballs. It's a great fight, right there
with any of the Rings collisions.

A word on little Lucy: she's played by Georgie Henley, who is 10, says
IMDB. She is miraculous. Her face is a billboard of well-tuned
emotions and as danger and then trickery and then tragedy come and go,
the movie follows pretty much only where her face leads it.
At a key point early, the boys hit a cricket ball through the window
in the country home. They both instantly freeze, the
oh-shit-we're-screwed look on their face. The older sister (weak link
of the bunch) is horrified and angry. Lucy, who'd been cut out of the
game, spins and looks on with a shock of fright at what's to come but
with unmistakable wild glee at the predictment her brothers are now in
and she is not.
She owns the movie from that point on.

More to come.

Narnia - A-

Music: Fake girl rock

A year ago, in the wake of Ashley Simpson's mythic SNL/Orange Bowl
streak plus the kelly Osbourne-rehab thing, I absolutely thought the
fake-girl-rock movement was dead, the least mourned passing in recent
musical history. Not that it had actually started - there was that
Skater Boy song by April Lavigne ("can i make it anymore obvious") and
the April Lavigne song that Wierd Al blew up ("Pi-zza! Par-ty at your
house...") and that was about it. it looked DOA, and if it wasn't,
Ashely finished it off in Miami, right?

Well, to my astonishment, it hung around. And now, fresh of my
Best-Summer-Vacation-Ever! trip to Australia, I can tap a winner.

The Veronicas. As it happens, they are twin sisters who, we can
assume, grew up riding the ferries in Brisbane. And, I guess, rocking!

I first encountered The Veronicas a few months ago, when they were on
the pre-movie audiotrack that our local theatre plays. As you eat your
popcorn, they subject you to never-heard-of-'em bands, and then a
cheesy announcer comes on and tells you who it was and that they are
The Next Big Thing. For every song.
Still, they played "Everything I'm Not" and it was actually pretty
good.
Turns out, the Aussies agree. You can't turn on a radio for 3 minutes
there without hearing Everything I'm Not, and you can't open a paper
without reading about Veronica sightings (neither of the sisters who
make up The Veronicas, by the way, are named Veronica).

They have a few other songs - "4Ever" is a beach-summer theme waiting
to happen - which are about the same (all from the album, "The Secret
Life Of The Veronicas"). high school break up lyrics, voices
well-honed at cheerleading practice and enough musical ability to
change cords with voice and guitar without making you wince. but since
there's two of them, they sing a slightly interesting kind of harmony,
and it sounds like they actually occasionally practice. its simple,
but what else do you want these days?
I think we're all a little tired of The Killers and the slump that rap
is in right now is getting worse by the day. With the exception of
Nelly's excellent Grillz, the best rap song of the winter was the Miami
Football rap, "7th Floor Crew", which peaks in the 2nd of it's 7
minutes ("whachu name?" "big playa" whachu do?" "Hold my nuts" "How you
do it?" "With both hands a grin").
Which leaves us temporarily with fake-girl-rock. The contenders
available include:
- Kelly Clarkson's desperate last-breath re-branding to rocker with
"since you been gone," memorable for the karoke treatment it got from
the Laguna Beach girls in the back of a Limo on prom night - who, in
their collective tuneless, drunk teenage squeal, did not appreciably
damage the song.(UPDATE: predictably, it won the Grammy for Song Of
The Year - seriously, what's funnier than the Grammys?)
- the newly re-bustified Lindsay Lohan who I'm PRAYING goes Jennifer
Love Hewitt and adds her own contribution to the canon of
hubris-inspired covers of "Me and Bobby McGee." It's going to take
something special to pass up Jessica Simpson's crime against "These
Boots Are Made For Walking," but i think Lindsay has it in her.
- and continuing her flight from credibility, Orange Bowl-Ashley with
the fabulously terrible "l.o.v.e." Just as bad as you imagine it is.

So that's not exactly a list to make PJ Harvey or Ani Difranco fans
re-wallpaper thier rooms. Or even Nellie Mckay fans. But it's what's
out there.

So into this shallowest of musical shallow ends wades The
Veronicas. Are they a modern channelling of the Go-Gos? Probably not.
But they seem to be trying to hold the songs up. After listening once
or twice, it's possible to imagine they actually grew up wanting to be
in a band, not the Mouseketeers.

MAJOR CAVEAT: None of the above includes The Faders. The Faders,
behind thier iTunes-ad song, "No Sleep Tonight" could mop the floor
with anybody here - but they also qualify as a 'real band' and not a
Fake Girl Rock band.

In any case, there's not much else now to check out, so it might be
worth a listen before they inevitable climb back on a ferry and head
back to Brisbane. And have I told you yet- I went to Australia!

Fairbanks discovery: Greenlight

This is pretty much one of my major points from a week of TV in
Fairbanks, but BSG got to print with it quicker:

• Speaking of reality TV, I hope you're watching John Gulager's
meltdown on "Project Greenlight." I am now convinced that they go out
of their way to select crazy directors that will make for good TV, at
the expense of the actual movie. This guy takes the cake -- it's like
they pulled him out of line at the Store 24 when he was buying scratch
cards and Winstons, then handed him a multi-million movie. I also
loved Matt Damon's Will Hunting-like meltdown in the first episode,
when he started screaming at the Dimension execs, "The master of
horror is sitting two seats away from you and just told you the script
can't work!" I kept expecting Robin Williams to come in with a beard
and tell him, "It's not your fault, it's not your fault..."

So all i can add to that is to tie it together. In fact what happened
was this: all the 'studio' corporate guys ran over Damon in the
initial selection of the script (as a group, they had 3 to pick from),
demanding a possibly-profitable horror script written by hollywood-ish
dweebs over the smart, funny scripts written by 40+ middle managers
from Portland. Damon argued, hard, that the smart script had a chance
to be the next Bill and Ted's or something, but the Studio guys wanted
the surer, easier thing (cheap horror).
And Damon couldn't talk them down.
So when it came to pick the director, two young guys with obvious
but traditional talent interviewed like young hot shots. The studio
guys all liked one.
The third guy was Gulager, a 40+ sad sack who does wedding videos
for a shitty living. Obvious hopeless introvert wierdo. But his
audition film (3 minute movie from everybody with the same script) was
awesome.
His interview was... just unbelievable. He literally didn't talk.
Not about himself, not about his vision for a movie, not about his
thoughts on film. He was a hopeless dud.
The studio guys instantly were toxic on him. But Damon (and
Affleck) wanted him. They wanted to, ya know, take a CHANCE. They
used gambling analgies.
And the studio guys caved and they hired Gulager.

And he has been unbelievable. He won't talk to a single staffer -
and keep in mind, as director he is literally the captain of a
200-person ship. He CAN'T not talk. He is offending everyone with
his absolute insistance on hiring family members for all the key roles
(sidenote: the ONLY non-white guy of the enitre 100-person cast is
one blonde, hot casting director chick. And since its her job to find
actors to fill roles, Gulager sees her as the enemy - awesome
tension).
He has no ideas, can't talk in a group and doesn't seem interested
in the movie at all.
So not only is, as BSG says, this hopeless intorvert dweeb about
to submarine this prodiction and the series - but it's completely
Damon's fault.

Also, bears mentioning: if you take the 'easy' script, you HAVE to
take the 'easy' director, right? If you take the 'edgy' script, get
the edgy director, right? but you CAN'T mix and match, right? I
mean, leadershp 101, huh?

Anyway, if you get a chance to catch up (only 2 episodes so far) on
Project Greenlight, do so. Best find of the week up here -
particularly with the weak BET playlist.

matt

TV - LB, 10/31

(thoughts from Season 1)

As the opening credits and most cuts from commercial let you know,
Laguna Beach is a community built up against the Orange County
palisades, plungling cliffs that seperate the sea from the land.
Perhaps then, just to keep the stunning beauty of the place forefront
in our minds, we can imagine that it is these gorgeous cliffs - and not
some boring, inland, desert, Wiley-Coyote-like cliffs - that the
producers have decided to throw the show off of.
Because that's what they've done - into the abyss for the long, slow
plummet.

Last year, the show was a look behind the curtain at the true Other
Half, at obscenely rich and privilidged and happy children in a green
and golden California wonderland.
This year, the whimsical kids from last year have returned from
college visibly deflated from the experience, while the kids left
behind have given away the secret that last year labored to hide:
white trash knows no boundries.

"You know what? You should know who's lap you're sitting in. You
know what? Put make-up on her and get her out to walk. If she falls
over, its her own fault."

Wow. How did we get here? Let's take a look...

At a fashion show (don't ask) Jason, the unshaven, indifferent sexual scavenger whose vapidness
girls so often mistake for personality, made a series of clumsy,
half-hearted gropes and kisses at his ex-plaything, Jessica. Childish,
akward and at war with her own self-esteem, Jessica - of course - let
him.
And LC saw them. Or rather, saw him.

It was a depressing swing of events, if only because the last two
weeks have been on an upswing. LC and Stephen, back from failed stints
at college, have retaken the show from the dreary and bitchy Kristen.
That development alone is all the information you need to know what the
season has been like - as sherri and terri might have told Kristin, you
ruin everything, you ruiner.

But LC fell for Jason (which, sadly, is pretty much the final
evidence we need to give up the last bit of hope on interprettying LC's
reserved personality as being, ya know, 'soulful' or 'shy' or
'thoughtful' rather than 'a complete bimbo'). We all knew a White
Trash eruption was brewing - just a question of when.

It began with a rare swerve into current events, the kids took an
interest in the landslides that had brought down "like 20 houses in LC
and Stephen's neighborhood." The bulk of last year's cast - back for
the summer - decided to put on a fashion show-benefit.
OK.
LC, as the fashion student, was in charge of the whole thing, and
she actually attacked it. Where was all this passion when she was
dueling with Kristen for Stephen's affections? it would have been a
runaway.
To the cause they recruited this year's cast. And really, here was
a chance to put Kristen - clearly in full-time training for her
eventual entry into the Matt Lienart-level of Young Hollywood - in a
leather bra and pants and let her shake her ass. How could they miss?
Well, first they let Talan sing. man, was that funny. I think he's
such a frieght train of ambition and well-planned exposure that he's
going to end up famous somehow - and all this will really just look
like the funny stuff that happened 'on his way up.' but for now,
knowing he's a high school kid who thinks he's a TV star and- evidently
- a rock star - man, was that funny.

And then, as Talan sang, Jason pulled Jessica onto his lap. And
started feeling her up. There was no question, none, who initiated
what (as if Jessica ever initiated anything in her life...)
Lauren saw it, called out Jason and he promtply did the "she just
came up to me. I didn't do anything, i just want to be with
you"-thing.

That seemed OK but of course, it wasn't. Backstage, LC confrotned
Jessica. here's how it went down:
"You are a very rude girl. Sitting in other people's boyfriends
lap."
"Who's lap was I in?"
"You should know who's lap you're in. You know what? Put make up
on her and get her out to walk. If she falls over its her own fault."
(blink)
HOLY SHIT!!!

As great as that was - and it certainly was the highlight of the
season - it got far, far trashier. 20 minutes later, backstage, Jason
and Jessica were fumbling and kissing at each other. And LC saw it.

Honestly, i think what is happening here is that Jason simply can't
communicate normally, and has probably gone through life not needing
to. If he can skip words, he does. When seen with his friends, they
are always playing basketball or something, but rarely with any sense
of urgency - they just play with a ball rather than relate to each
other. If this was a boys prep school - of just a place where tough
kids actually lived - he'd probably be in 4 fights a day (or a
ceaselessly carnal gay guy - it's a fine line).
Jessica, of course, simply craves approval, and jason's fumbling
looks and feels like it.
So, in each other's company, they play ceaseless grabass.

LC, of course, wasn't interested in all this. She just wanted to
punch something.

She yelled at big J. He sat around with that pissy-ness that only
the eternally-unpunished can muster when they finally get caught. And
LC, in a fantastic final shot, walked off into the night past him, like
he wasn't there, in a knee-high skirt - even her legs are perfect this
year - and halter-top. He had to sit there and watch her walk away.

It was pure white-trash, and it could have just as easily been in an
Omaha trailer park as California's most elite beash community. But for
white-trash drama, it wasn't bad.

West Wing, 10/30

In the first segment of last night's West Wing - an episode entitled
"The Al Smith Dinner" wherein the candidates debate whether they should
attend the Al Smith Dinner - one of Josh's aides asks him: "Who's Al
Smith?"

Lord, but they're mailing it in.

I'm certainly nobody's political operative, but i feel pretty good in
sayiing that "Al Smith" is kind of one of those tripwires between
people who have studied politics - or just really like it - and those
who haven't or don't. Like Tris Speaker and Bob Lemon and Luke Appling
- maybe you never heard of them, but theyre in the Baseball Hall of
Fame.
(full disclosure: I have no idea who who Luke Appling was. None)
So the average West Wing viewer (though not, i bet, the average WW
fan) may not know who Al Smith was.
But there is no chance - none - that any character who has ever
passed in front of the camera didn't. Not even that horny british
ambassador, and certainly not an aide to Josh Lyman.

(for the record, Al Smith was the gov of NY and one of the great
progressive politicians of the early century - and i mean that with
emphasis on both words: he was a great progressive and a great
politician - he started as a hired hand in the NY fishmarkets, moved up
through the union ranks, and then city government and then did 4 terms
as governor, where he took on child labor, care for the mentally ill,
factory conditions, expansion and urban construction and a long list of
stuff that needed fixing. He would have been President except he was
Catholic, which back then was enough to sink him. Any decent Poli Sci major (of just anyone from New York) - would know that. I know who Smith is because he is the central character in the first 100 pages of Robert Caro's biography about Robert Moses, The Power Broker, the absolute #1, retire-the-trophy greatest political biography of all time. There is NO WAY a Democratic staffer on a presidentail campaign never read
it. It's not plausible).

So I'm not sure if they're getting too stupid to breathe or too cute by
a mile. This week was Abortion week, always a fun topic, but like the
song said, how bizarre, how bizare. The R nominee, Vinick (Alan Alda)
is pro-choice, a position which his party, obviously, detests. He is
CONSTANTLY defending himself to his own party on this point.
Here's the good bit - Matt Santos (the cancerous Jimmy Smits) is
personally pro-life, and skates as close to pro-life as a D can.

In other words, we now have a show with a D defending his sorta-pro-life
tendancies and an R as a pro-choicer.
And the national women's group - a stand-in for NOW - is thinking of
endorsing Vinick on the shrewd grounds that he'll win and suddenly
they'll be online with a pro-choice R President.

I'm wondering if maybe they think they're all in Australia. Or
Germany. Or Singapore. Because none of the above - none of it -
resembles anything close to America. A pro-choice R, in real life is
called... Hilary. What used to be a great Inside Baseball show is now
fanciful, utopian fiction.
As I've said, real elections are won not
by clever ads and soaring rhetoric but by TURNOUT - voter roles,
registration, base-level organizing. Bad TV, maybe, but if you want a
tv show about how to be President well.... that's how you become
President!
And, much worse, jeanne garafallo is wrestling the show away from
Josh. Here character is an idealogue, she's a well-known real life
leftist flunky and she can't act a lick. Great - let's hand her the
keys.

Good news: Donna's back! With Josh! And we even got a flare of the
old black magic:
Josh, curtly and angrily: "Do you have any references?"
Donna: "Santos for President Campaign Manager Josh Lymon, try the
main switchboard." sing it, dollface!

So they've resorted to sitcom antics with a West Wing budget (as
Vinick entered the Al Smith dinner, all the copcars and security had
their flashers on, filling the set with pulsating red lights; when
Santos came in, the same lighting, only it was all blue - GET
IT?!?!?!?!)

And now, we get a LIVE debate next week - between, I assume Jimmy
Smits playing Santos and Alan Alda playing Vinick. nice stunt - a live
TV non-debate debate with 2 non-real people (also, did i see that ER is
going to have a - deep breath - AIRLINE CRASH right outside the doors
of the hospital. What, at NBC, are they saying no to?)

i think the debate will be fun. And as I've said before, it's
STILL the West Wing, and they still lap everything on TV (inluding
Commander in Chief, which is DYING to be called Desperate
Whitehousewive). And I imagine it will be better than Vampire Bats
(starring Lucy Lawless!). I'm just a little concerned about how much
better.

matt

Weekend of Movies - Crash, Blade Trinity, Red Eye

thanks to a vicious headcold, just had a movie-rich weekend.

Crash - I know, i'm late to the party, but you'll have trouble finding
a more arresting movie in recent years.
So what is it about Ryan Phillippe? Ever since he seduced Selma
Blair away from Sarah Michelle Gellar, Phillippe has been that rarest
of things, a professional catalyst - BSG might put him in the Robert
Horay/Nate Dogg corrlelary - He never carries a project, but if he's
AROUND it, you're guaranteed a funky, exotic and quality movie.
Way of the Gun. Gosford Park. Cruel Intentions. Antitrust
(ENORMOUSLY underrated dot.com/Microserfs/teen-thriller - see it just
to take in Tim Robbins playing a guy who is 1-based on Bill Gates and
2-is really a 70s-Bond-level villian. Also, in the mandatory Hot Girls
slot, you get Rachel Leigh Cooke, just months removed from her
jiggle-queen breakthrough in She's All That, and Claire Forlani, soon
after Joe Black, when it looked like she was poised to take over the
world - how did this movie disappear so completely?)
But back to Phillippe - he was even the "Host" on Outkast's watershed
'Hey Ya' video.
AND he bangs Reese Witherspoon.
And now, Crash. Phillippe, now that i've carried on about him, is
just one of about 10 A-minus/B-plus actors who play in Crash, which is
a multi-story meditation on various kinds of racial hate in America.
It's incredibly smart and tough and - key point - expertly made. All
the jumps are seemless, the cameras zoom smoothly through rooms to
follow conversations, the lighting paints the mood, and the director is
as likely to keep watching the actor reacting to a key line than on the
actor delivering it. Big League talent behind the camera.
The plot takes the four or five main stories of the movie - the
lives of a few sets of strangers, all with various racial issues - and
wraps them around each other. In fact, it wraps them so tight, by the
end it gets a bit comic. You're basicly asked to believe that the
population of Los Angeles is, at most, 30. It's like 6-degrees of
seperation, only, at most, 3-degrees.
But again the writer helps you out - often when the stories collide,
the characters don't even know it - only you do, since you're been
following them.
The movie builds all its hate and mistrust and loathing into two
critical moments - the first one is diffused by Phillippe. The true
apex, then, comes a minute later on the driveway of the locksmith's
house (interesting metaphor, the locksmith, the man we trust to keep
the world at bay) and it's one for the ages. You think you know what's
coming, you think you know, you think you know and bam! - Way worse
than you thought.
From there, the movie begins to diffuse, which turns out to mean
that only 5 or 6 coincidences still have to be revealed.
Of the 10 central characters, only Brendan Frasier can't punch his
weight, which should surprise no one.
It's fun to watch Sandra Bullock be a screaming, unapologetic rich
racist bitch.
And almost stealing the show is Ludacris, the planet's current best
rapper - he is so good as a conflicted street criminal that the
director allows him to both open and close the movie.
One more interesting note - this genius I've been going on about who
wrote and directed Crash is a guy named Paul Haggis, who also wrote
Million Dollar Baby. And episodes of Diff'rent Strokes and the Love
Boat. Just for perspective.

Also checked out Blade Trinity. Usually, I wouldn't even bring it
up, but, like i said, it was a movie-filled weekend, so I will: Skip
it.

Finally, we went out and saw the still-in-threatres Red Eye - and what
a pleasant surprise, to find a low-budget, formula studio movie as well
made as this one. It's directed, with pop and tempo, by Wes Craven,
who puts in absoluetly nothing that isn't vital. The movie ads and
trailers, for some reason, sell this movie as a sort of horror movie,
'Elm Street' in a 767, but it isn't at all. It's a thriller, closer to
Die Hard than Freddy. Well, closer to Hitchcock than either of those,
and like Hitchcock movies, it lives and dies on its lead - and on that
note, Rachel McAdams has arrived. She was great in the Notebook
(dragged to it, but she was the only thing that kept it afloat),
stellar in Mean Girls and she's great here. If Nicole Kidman can be a
major star, so can this woman (of course, by that corollary, so can
anyone, but whatever). She's paired with the guy from 28 Days Later,
who is just too creepy to be boring. The entire movie is a mind game
between a pretty, smart girl and the wierdo she's next to on an
airplane. And all of that is really great. It's so cerebral that the
one moment where violence erupts is so unexpected, the whole theatre
gasps.
It falls apart - as absolutely every movie like it must - when they
land the plane and, therefore, take away the playing field. Then it
quickly becomes a very ordinary chase movie with explosions and killers
lurking behind shower curtains. But that bit - again, to Wes Craven's
credit - lasts at most 10 minutes.
But perhaps the best part is the opening 20 minutes, where Red Eye
expertly captures the misery of modern airport/airplane living. The
gate person, overhead compartments, the ticket agent, the mindless
pre-flight 'announcements' (all electronic items in 'off' position,
etc), the stuffy sense of privilidge that you have to walk through as
you transit the first-class cabin back to your seat - it's all here.
Great movie.

ps - This is season premier week on (network) TV, and my expectations
are low - Lost and Desperate Housewives are going to have to find an
entirely new trick to keep the mojo rising, and I don't think either
will (Lost has a fighting chance; Housewives, I think, is already in
the post-sex "Moonlighting" realm); West Wing - it's been a long, long
time since I rooted for a Republican, but I think that's what I'll be
doing this year, but will it matter? The last 2 years have been so
bad; the Simpsons - no clue what's going on with that show, but I just
spotted this the other day - does anybody watch The Family Guy? I
caught one episode and it's like the Glory years of the Simpsons all
over again! Hysterical! Revelation!
(PS on the Simpsons - if you're unclear on "the Glory years," that's
seasons 5, 6 and 7 - and six just joined 5 out on DVD - worth
mentioning)
And Season 2 of Laguna Beach... come ONNN!!! Know your worth,
girls! KNOW YOUR WORTH!!!!! Tomorrow (Tuesday) night is the Cabo
episode - I'll have more after that.

TV - LB Season 2

Laguna Beach - THIS was the Orange County Aristocracy I was waiting
for. A nearly perfect collection of soulless, emotionally isolated,
lonely and vicious children of infinite privilidge. I think I see what
happened - the filmmakers latched onto last season's central kids - the
sleepy but good-natured LC and Stephen, the ditzy Lo, the artsy and
soulful Trey, the oddly priggish Morgan and Kristina - and in the deal
they got the scorching hot vampiress Kristen, then a junior. Kristen
virtually took over the show, but her evolution was fun to watch,
particularly amid the ebb and flow of the other characters.
Unfortunately, all of the above graduated except Kristin, leaving
the whole franchise to her. So this season we get Kristin's more
natural social class - the screaming bitches and callous jocks - that
no TV producer would have picked in a vacuum, but here we are anyway.
I wish i was exagerating or being dismissive. I'm not. The bile
between the clans of girls and sexual indifference of the guys has been
like the opening 3rd of any really over the top teenage movie. And I
think the producers hate them as much as we do - unlike last year, they
routinely humiliate the kids by showing moments they never did last
year - mean jokes and thoughts about each other said in private, the
giggly retellings of other's failures and even routine drunkeness (I
mean, last year's kids never seemed to be far from a good time, but the
producers didn't seem to enjoy watching them stumble and fall, nor
drunkenly lick each other's faces, as they do this year).
Perhaps inevitably, Kristin - the scheming slut queen of last year -
is now the nearest thing to a wise voice of reason - the three or four
less-hot friends she pulls behind her, like satelites pulled behind a
planet, are worshipping and needy. She is strict and demanding. most
appualing is the season-long destruction of the sweet-natured but
hopelessly niave and insecure Jessica - she is just cute enough (or,
more plausibly, just stacked enough) to attract the preying attention
of the school's cruelest boys, but not near skilled enough to naviagate
thier waters. She hooks up with baseball stud Jason - possibly the
shallowest male character in Reality history - who is bored with her
almost before he begins.
Hitting way out of her league, Jessica falls for him. Her life
becomes an unending series of unreturned phone calls, almost all of
which the producers show us.
Kristin intially tries to help her friend ("take it from a girl who
cheated on her boyfriend - he's cheating on you!") but sours on the
project when she realizes Jessica isn't in her league, either. Soon
Alex M., a lurking girl of average looks but striking availability
latches onto Jason. Or rather, Jason, managing briefly to string
together five or six words, takes up her open offer (literally in front
of Jessica - nice).
Alex M.,, a bit of a queen bitch herself among the girls but no
expert with guys, then misses all the same signs that Jason is done
with her, too. As far as she is concerned, they are together. The
glee she takes from having 'stolen' someone's guy is palpable.
Jason, in a piece of calculated sexual theatre I personally think he
did entirely to show off for the camera, then calls Jessica (from a
golf course, where he's goofing off with friends - she's the butt of a
quick round of jokes between them) and later on hooks up with her. At
a party, full of eyes. Alex M., out to dinner with Kristin and the
clan, get s text message on her phone about the liason AS IT'S
HAPPENING. Say this for the Laguna kids - they know how to leverage
technology.
At fault, clearly, is Jason. He's a grinning, thoughtless asshole,
who went a step too far entertaining himself between two willing girls.
And he gets blamed by exactly no one.
Instead, the entire herd comes down on Jessica. Crucially, Queen
Bitch Kristen, who could have solved the problem, doesn't. She piles
on. The girls all go to Cabo - where last year's show hit an historic
high note - where they all get drunk and party all week, except for
Jessica- she gets to sit in her room and cry. Kristin does nothing to
make the peace, and as the week wears on, Alex M. attacks and
humiliates Jessica at a nightclub. No one holds her back. The only
person who tries to diffuse it is Jessica's friend, Emily, who's
argument is:
"If you ruin Jessica's Cabo trip, you're ruining my Cabo trip." -
wow. that's sticking up for a friend.
Alex M replies: "Sorry Dude."
Once back home, Alex M. 'confronts' Jason while he's playing
basketball (though only sort of grab-ass, shoot-around ball) with his
friends. Smart. She hits him with some dreary "where are we right
now?" and "do you have feelings for me?" rap. She never had a chance,
of course, but this particular form of relationship suicide is really
painful to watch.
He says, literaly, nothing. He nods, grins, grimaces, shrugs, and
then caps it with a "whatever."
And the star-crossed lovers part.
It's about as fun as it sounds - mean people behaving horribly.
Funniest of all is that the very best looking of the new cast could not
have cracked the starting line-up against last year's (except for
Morgan, who didn't really count anyway), who never, ever treated each
other so badly.
(though, could it be some of the ol' LB-Season 1 magic that the
producers end the Cabo show with a shot of a downtrodden Alex M walking
away while, in the foreground, Jason now back on the court, happily
hits a lay-up? Now that I think about it - of course it was)
In all a vast letdown from last year.

(As Kristin would say, more drama)

Movie - Aristocrats, Lord of War

I forgot to mention a while back that I saw the aristocrats.
I probably laughed to the point of hypoxia more than three times. I also almost walked out twice. As 'brave' as the movie is, if you're not repulsed to the point of anger at least once or twice, you may be too far down the Cool path for your own good.

On the other hand, this probably statistically - (# jokes/minute)*funniness - the funniest movie of all time.
Favorite part was a montage, early, when they bounce from comic to comic
in this machine-gun fire of filth that never seems to stop. That
technique, however, got a bit old, particularly when they got to the
incest bit. Also, thought South Park was brilliant, but thought the
Jesus bit in the Onion office was not.
But I think the Rabbi hit it Poo-Holes style with his review. 9/11
is the new incest - if it's not a 9/11 joke, then it's not really good.
Bob Sagat was ridiculous. Also, I loved the guy who, to my
knowledge, only plays bad guys in movies but was too funny
(sittingoutside, looking stoned). "After the tragedies of Jan 12,
can't we all.... That was the day i left my wallet in a restraunt on
Wilshire."
Wait - i just remembered the funniest part - watching Hefner twitch,
miserably, as Gilbert does his thing.

Also saw "Lord of War" with Nic Cage. A movie that wanted so badly to
be "Blow + explosions" but didn't have the story telling ability. The
final act, where he gets busted, is particularly empty. In fact, it
has the smell of desperate rewrite.
But there's a time-lapse sequence - where a bunch of locals, in 24
hours, completely dismantle a Russian jumbo jet - that is almost worth
the price of admission.
A good rental is Game Over, a documentry about Gary Kasparov's chess
game with the IBM computer Deep Blue. Heavily over-dramatized, and
clearly done by a guy who want to be Errol Morris but isn't, but still
entertaining.

Blaine, follow-up

(this post is a follow-up to this one, below)

So I actually did spend an hour cleaning up the kitchen and living room
with the Cameos playing. Here's the preseason Top 10.

10 - The Miami guy who keeps slapping away a Florida State guy's
helmet, while yelling, 'it's all about this 'U' ". What's so great
about that is that, as we know from self-labeled "Soldier," Kellen
Winslow, "It's all about this 'U' " is the unofficial team slogan for
Miami players. So from one cameo, we get to think about Kellen's
timeless "Soldier" tirade, Kellen's recent two-wheel hijinks AND the
endlessly amusing irony that, of all the letters that the Miami
Hurricanes football players can cling to for identity, they choose the
one that stands for "University."
9 - The three bruisers in halter tops for whom it's a Great day to be a
Gator.
8- The Florida State sorority, 20 strong, that lets you know: It's In
The Game.
7 - The East-West all-star game sideline roll call of conferences -
they run quick clips of players from different conferences lining up
with their helmets and giving shout outs about how their conferecne is
just SO totally In The Game. SEC, Big 12, Pac 10, all In The Game.
ACC is in the game, hilariously fronted by a Duke guy (I mean.. come
on...) And so is Boise State, San Jose State and Utah whose players
stand around together giving a collective, vague non-BCS-Is-In The Game
shout. Hilarious. And if you don't think ANYTHING sounds cooler when
you sandwich it around "baby," just listen up for "Boise State, baby,
Boise State!" Terrific.
6 - the Florida State twins dressed in Porno Pocahontas outifts. It's
in the Game.
5 - Lloyd Carr, back for at least his third cameo, with not an inch
more charisma. The squarest coach in the nation - It's In The Game.
4 - (to the hook of Biz Markie's "Just a Friend) "EYE... I love
U-S-SEE-EEE....And I hate U-C-L-A (and Oklahoma! (yelled)), and I hate
UCLA (and OKlahoma!) OH BAY-BEE, EYE... I love U-S-See-eee.... and I
hate UCLA (and Oklahoma!) - EA Sports it's in the Game!!!!!" There's
five of 'em, each wearing more red and yellow than the next (three
Blaine jerseys between them), each with frizzier, blonder hair than the
next, each in jean shorts shorter than the next. Filmed, obviously, in
the parking lot of the Orange Bowl. Them Sooners never had a chance.
3 - Tommy Chang at the East West Bowl. With a rare solo cameo, Chang
looks in the camera and says, "Tpmmy Chang, University of Hawaii, NCAA
passing leader" with about the same commitment that Scott McClellan
answers Rove questions.
2 - The 3 drunk Wisconsin chicks in half-shirts. Not surprisingly, the
director gave them a full, uncut Cameo ("E-A-Sports, N-C-double-A
Football Two-thousand-six - If it's in the Game, it's in the Game -
whooooooooo!"). Arms draped around each other, they teeter farther and
farther forward towards the camera, in a manner that becomes more and
more fellatious as they go (Yes, that's a word - I just heard it in
"Kinsey"). For sheer horsepower, right there with the three assassins
ABC found in the Miami stands during the '02 FSU game.
1 - USC. Hey - everybody else with a preseason list has them here.
And since I don't actually rank teams anymore, here's my chance.

Blaine 2006...

...aka, EA Sports' "NCAA 06", the latest release of the only serious
college football video game franchise for playstations and the like.
You're either with Madden or your with me, and if you're with me, well,
here we go.

(hey - since i'm doing a video game post, anybody know how to watch the
porn on Grand Theft Auto 5? I don't mean how to unlock it, cuz I won't work that hard. I mean, have the actual movie parts been captured and posted anywhere? Leave it in the comments below. thanks)

After a 30 minute initial shakedown, I'll cut to it: thumbs way the
hell up. Where the 2005 game was a sloppy re-release of 2004 with a
thin coat of new paint (and 2004 was a clone of 2003), for 2006 they've
totally updated the product, with only one or two obvious missteps and
a whole list of clear upgrades.

I'm 4 days away from spending 45 days in front of a giant plasma screen
in a hanger on the other side of the world. Now I can hardly wait.

Coverboy and Packaging: (UPDATE FROM PREVIOUS POSTS) D-. Every version of an EA Sports college franchise ever released for the PS2 has had on its cover one the sports' elite players from the previous year, including this month's NCAA basketball with Emeka Okafore.

They have been, if memory serves, Danny Wuerfel, Joey Harrington, Carson Palmer and last year's Larry Fitzgerald (to break the QB lock, I guess). Two runaway Heisman winners and two saavy shoulda wons.

This year they went with Desmond Howard.

The only reaction this can possibly elicit: Who said no?

And the bizsarre part is, assuming they felt like they needed a midwest pick, Michigan had a terrific departed player available for the first time this decade in Braylan Edwards. In fact, Edwards is pretty much the only first-tier talent
to emerge this decade from the Big 10 (other than Clarett), and he even stayed all four-years, always a nice touch for a college-based game. If they were going to do a Big 10 guy, this was it.

and they did. Big 10-circa 92.

In fact, it kinda HAD to be Edwards: the three best players from '04 are all
back in school (SC's Leinart and Bush and Texas' Young) so they
couldn't be on it. The #1 draft pick, Utah's Alex Smith, has still
never played in a game of national interest. Two of the top 3 running
backs were from Auburn, and neither was really the team's star, and the
third, Cedric Benson, wasn't the best player on his own team. I think
any true college fan would have appreciated seeing Cal's Aaron Rodgers get the cover
- who had a more complete, memorable college season in 05 than Rodgers?
But both the 03 and 04 games had Pac 10 QBs on the cover, and the frat
boys in Austin, Columbus and Tuscaloosa are only going to buy so many
of those.
This might have been a good year for a defensive player (David
Pollack? Marcus Spears? Either, or both, Sean Codys?). But I suppose it was time for a midwest guy, Michigan is the Midwest's franchise team and so Braylon would have been a solid choice from a limited field.

Instead - an NFL-flopping, early 90s guy who, the year he won it, wasn't even the best player at his own position in his own bowl game.

Other than that bizarre pick, the packaging is updated. They gave the typeface a tech look
and added some stadium elements. And they dropped it from "2005" to
just "06"

Not enough to sink the product, but a terrible, terrible start.

Fortunately, things recover.

Opening Cameos: The Cameos (the live-action clips that run as the
intro at every boot up) were strongest in 03, which was nothing but
campus clips. And let's just say it: it had the ASU chicks. The 04
cameos were dull, with mostly shots of ex-players at the all-star game
and some annoying band clips - plus the two random clips of two skinny
SDSU chicks who weren't even so much as hot as jarringly slutty. 05
just sucked. boring. bands, all-star games, lame.
Welcome back to the good stuff. Lots of on-campus rallies, TONS of
hot girls screaming "its in the game" and then bouncing around, drunk
frat boys, fighting mascots - terrific.
And here's the hammer: there's now an option in the game that you
can watch all the cameos, back to back to back to back to back......
awesome. honestly, i could probably just let that play for like 2
hours while i clean the kitchen or cook or... just watch it.

They made an improvement and a mistake in the menus - they added
actual famous game tape to the menus. As you select what you are
doing, to the right they have, say, Desmond Howard's return against
Ohio State, or Warren Sapp destroying an FSU runningback. That's good
(though it looks like there's only 5 or 6 clips - they repeat pretty
fast).
Unfortunately, the soundtrack over all the menus is no longer fight
songs (what else COULD it be?) but now skate/surf-punk music. That was
the cool thing to do in the late 90s, but its pretty dated. not to
mention all the punk songs so far suck. the only hip hop is "me myself
and I" from De La Soul and, again, it seems pretty limited. The songs
repeat pretty fast.
bad decision.

And now... the game.

Gameplay: they altered the controls, which is interesting and i
think good. For dodging and juking, rather than using the
front-mounted 'L1' and 'R1', you now use the right stick. Juking is
one of the best parts of the running game so its important to get it
right. we'll see, though, because it's a bit akward to snap the ball
with the X and then shift your thumb to the stick. Particularly since
the circle is still the spin the move. It'll take a few hours to sort
it out.
But at least they're trying something new.

Defense seems a bit more responsive around the line, but i think
some of the mechanisms for switching plyers has changed. again, time
will tell. But i always sucked at playing D anyway, so it won't matter
to me.

Animation - which was always a strong point - is terrific, i think
actually redrawn from previous years, but i'm not sure. either way,
looks great.

Strange Features - the clownish "crowd noise" is still there but oh
well. last year Madden added something called "playmaker" where a
certain player had some sort of super-powers and could fly, or
something. i don't know. Apparently they've migrated the concept to
this game, with one player on the field highligheted as an 'impact'
player by a white dot - when the white-dot is pulsing, that player is
'in the zone' and has triple-magic-hitpoints. Or something. i don't
know - i'm always against any sort of invented superpower thing. So
far its mildly distracting. And Reggie Bush is always pulsing. I wish
you could turn it off.
Also back is that odd 'match-up' option where you can, before the
snap, compare the relative talents and fatigue of your players at the
line and the guys they are lined up against. Actually not a bad
feature, but unneeded.
They reddid the pregame animation, which after 4 years needed
rewrite, but they made it into this bizarre studio show - the three
ESPN guys sit around and talk and then Lee Corse puts on the helmet of
the team he picks. stupid.
But unlike last year, where the bizarre add ons swamped the game to the
detriment of the expereince, here it's all secondary. the game play
appears to be the focus again.

Now, the truly good news: the structure of the game.
revamped and massively improved the practice options. Now the
'practice' part of the game is like an arcade-style game of its own.
They have 4 drills: option (QB and RBs versus 2 LBs and a safety),
passing skeleton (passing game without linemen), running game including
and "oklahoma."
"Oklahoma" is terrific - its 2 on 2, a ball runner, a lineman going
each way and a linebacker, all hemmed in to a 10 yard area. you get 10
snaps as the ballcarrier, trying to use your blocking past the line
then beat the linebacker in the backfield. then you get 10 snaps as
the linebacker, trying to stop the CPU as the ballcarrier.
In all of the pracitce games, it keeps score, and records your high
score.

There is still Dynasty mode, roughly the same as Madden's
"Franchise," where you run a program as the coach through multiple
seasons. But they've also reworked it from the bottom-up - now rather
than be the Dynasty coach, you can play a full career as a specific
player in a mode called "Hiesman." You start as a high school kid and
'tryout' - you run through one of any of the practice arcades as your
tryout for a scholarship. Your score determines the scholarship offers
you get. I picked option QB, and screwed up the first couple then did
real well on the last 5 snaps. I got offers to mississippi st, akron
and Syracuse (you can also 'walk-on' anywhere you want - not sure what
the advantages or disadvantages are of that). Then you 'enroll' and I
guess play a full season. As you go through (and this part, obviously,
i didn't do), your heisman hype goes up and down depending on your
performance. they have a little structure set up for 'college life' -
you get fan (or hate) mail, earn awards, be on the cover of SI and all
the stuff from Dynasty (playbook, rankings, bowl games, etc).
A nice effort to rework the long-term part of the game.

All the standbys are still there - historic teams (which i like) and
mascots (which I don't). And they appear to have dialed down the
stupid crowd animation, which was one of the 'new' things last year.
thank goodness.

There's also online play, if you're into it.

In short, where 2005 was a major let down, 2006 is a terrific
product. I guess that bodes well for the new Madden, for those of you
who dig that. so if playstation football is your deal, don't hestitate
to get it.

matt