Category: screen

This is a movie based on an Elmore Leonard novel of the same name. It’s a 2008 movie that Gail came across so she DVR’d it, thinking we would like it. Man, she nailed it. Great movie. It’s a solid, gritty crime story. How often do I use that gritty crime term? I did a search and I’ve used it three times before this when talking about fiction. I guess I’m a cliche-ridden fool.

This movie didn’t do much at the box office and from what I can gather, it was only shown in a few test markets then released straight to DVD. That, according to IMDB. Kind of surprising when you consider how prolific and popular Elmore Leonard is. Take a look at all of the stuff he’s been attached to. It’s pretty amazing.

I’ve never read any Elmore Leonard, although he’s always been in the back of my mind as a writer I’d potentially like. In fact, it just so happened that I purchased an Elmore Leonard novel a few weeks ago (Maximum Bob) from a used book store. I’m reading it after this.

Like many of Leonard’s stories, this movie takes place in Michigan. It’s about an estranged husband and wife (Thomas Jane and Diane Lane) who witness a crime by an accomplished killer (Mickey Rourke) and a bumbling crook (Joseph Gordon-Levitt). The husband and wife eventually get on the witness protection program when the FBI get involved, but the killer and crook are dogged in their pursuit. There’s other stuff going, but his is the gist of it.

Despite the all-star cast and the high-powered writer, I’m not surprised that this got killed at the box office. Most people probably don’t have much tolerance for crime novel type of pacing and fluffy character exploration, but that’s what you got here. Which is probably why Sue Grafton novels will never be made into movies. Damn.

But I think Mickey Rourke did a great job as the killer and the Joseph Gordon-Levitt character had a lot of funny moments, like the time he made a Wade Boggs reference related to eating chicken. It was a great example of the warped humor this movie contains. I wonder if Leonard had that reference in the book. I can’t wait to read Maximum Bob now. Gonna start it soon.

Did Tony Stark (Robert Downey, Jr.) call the senator (Garry Shandling) an ass-clown? I think he did. What is this movie rated? PG-13. I think Jon Favreau is spending too much time reading the Urban Dictionary. Maybe Tony Stark would say such a thing. I don’t know. He seems pretty arrogant but his heart is in the right place I guess.

You have to understand: superheroes have flaws. You gotta take the good with the bad.

This is a cute movie. The opening fight scene is worthy and there is plenty of humor. The special effects are cool. It makes you think, man, we’ve come a long way since Minority Report (referencing the scene where they use their hands with air-touch-holograph method to sort through information and the like).

The cast of characters is strong. Samuel L. Jackson as head of this do-good group of superheroes is somewhat fitting. I don’t know much about these superhero comics, but the back story is highly appreciated by many fans. I posed this question to someone in the know the other day, “Who is this character played by Samuel L. Jackson?” Boy did I get an earful.

I guess his name is Nick Fury. How was I supposed to know that? Did they say his name during the movie at all? I think not. And Scarlett Johansson’s character has like three names. I’m a geek about certain things, but Marvel Comics is not one of them.

Did I mention that AC/DC and Garry Shandling are featured prominently? You really can’t go wrong with that.

So yeah, after watching Talking Funny, I hung around HBO a little longer and caught this hour-long episode of Game of Thrones. It’s an HBO series based on the books by author George R.R. Martin. I saw some headlines weeks ago about this HBO series but I had no idea what it was. I ignored them because we don’t have HBO and I don’t do TV series in real time. The only TV series I’m watching right now is season two of The Wire (2003).

Game of Thrones was cool. I read about one sci-fi/fantasy book a year and I think the first book of this series will be it. I would rather read it than watch it. Sure, if it’s great I’ll probably grab the video in a few years, but I read very little fantasy so I need to be highly selective. Heck, I’ve seen an hour of the story and I’m comfortable that the plot and characters appear interesting, so let’s do this.

I’ve heard it described as “Lord of the Rings for Americans.” I’m not sure where I heard that or why they said it. Martin is American, but the show seems to have a lot of British accents and uses the whole king and royalty schtick. Hmmm, whatever. I’ll know more in a few months. I’ll probably read it this summer, especially if I get to a beach or pool.

I was out of town and it just so happens that the cable system in the hotel had TNT adjacent to HBO on the dial. So as I was watching the Heat clinch against the Sixers, I checked on HBO during commercial breaks. We don’t have HBO at home so it’s one of the few redeeming things about business travel. I got sucked in to this show and couldn’t turn it off. It’s just four comedians sitting around discussing the trade for an hour.

The four comedians are Ricky Gervais, Jerry Seinfeld, Chris Rock, and Louis C.K. It appeared that Ricky Gervais was the ringleader/moderator and I think his company produced the show. It’s specifically about stand-up comedy. The topics ran the gamut, they talked about the engaging the audience, writing jokes, using profanity, style, delivery, getting started, etc… You name it. It was a rambling conversation and really funny.

I do love stand-up comedy, but I haven’t been to see any stand-up in years. It used to be that my wife and I would hit the comedy clubs a few times a year back in the 1990s. I don’t think we’ve been in ten years, actually. This makes me want to go back.

They spent about 10 minutes talking about profanity. Jerry Seinfeld has used the f-word during stand-up once in his life. Only once! He says he just doesn’t need it for laughs. He didn’t deride the word though and is not offended by it. In fact, he sounded like he was appreciative of how the other guys use it. If you’ve seen any of the others, you know that they are heavy users of the f-word.

Then they moved on the the n-word, which Chris Rock uses mightily. Now I’m not familiar with Louis C.K.’s comedy, but evidently he uses the n-word also. I gotta tell you, it was a little uncomfortable watching him throw it around during the show. You just don’t see white guys using that word ever. Seinfeld and/or Gervais commented with something like, “only you, Louis, can use the n-word.” I’m not sure what that means. I need to check out his comedy to get a better understanding.

I started following Louis C.K. and Chris Rock on Twitter. It doesn’t look like Seinfeld or Gervais use the medium at all. I have a comedy list on Twitter with a mix of popular and indie comics and it provides a ton of laughs on a pretty regular basis. I need to reintroduce myself to stand-up.

My bro-in-law said this movie was great. He was right, the guy knows movies for sure. This is a classic cops and robbers flick that takes place in the Charlestown neighborhood of Boston. Like any Boston movie worth it’s salt, Ben Afleck is running the show. It’s a great movie.

Charlestown is different from Southy, which is another Boston neighborhood featured in Afleck’s first movie, Good Will Hunting. So Afleck is diversifying into different ‘hoods, which is good. I feel like he’s dabbled in a few other Boston neighborhoods also, but that’s just a feeling.

** Plot Killer Warning **

It’s a great story. Guy robs a bank. Guy finds out bank manager (female) lives in the same neighborhood. Guy follows bank manager to make sure she didn’t recognize any of them. Guy falls in love with bank manager. Guy tries to get out of the game. Guy gets dragged back in for one last gig. Oh yeah, FBI is pissed.

“If we get jammed up, we’re holding court on the street.” That’s what Jeremy Renner’s character says before the big final heist. It foreshadows a big final shootout and chase scene that will rock your world. A chase scene that occurs after robbing the Fenway Park cash room.

Despite the formula and the hyperbole, it was a great movie. The “sunny days’ comment at the end by Claire (the bank manager) was worth the price of admission.

There was never any doubt that I would watch this documentary. It was just a matter of when. I have some strange TV watching habits. I mostly watch live sports, never recorded. If I miss it, I miss it, oh well. Same with news/info shows like 60 Minutes. In contrast, I never watch TV shows on their first run, I time-shift everything, often for years (just finished season 1 of The Wire).

Now sports documentaries – those are different beasts. I can’t really generalize my watching of those. I’m guessing that I usually time-shift, but I happened to pop this on for it’s first run Sunday night the 13th. I think I had the TV on because I was sorting through the NCAA tourney selection. In retrospect, I’m very thankful that I hung with this thing on opening night because it made the ensuing conversation and controversy it prompted that much more fruitful for me.

Here I sit, Saturday of the tournament (post date though is viewing date), and this thing has played out rather beautifully.

Most of the controversy stemmed from Jalen Rose’s labeling of Grant Hill and Duke players as “Uncle Toms.” That sparked an immediate backlash, which didn’t subside as the week went on. An especially scathing take was written by Jason Whitlock in an article for Fox Sports entitled Fab Five Film Fantasy, Not Documentary. Whitlock denounces Rose’s view that the Fab Five were revolutionary, instead branding the Georgetown teams of the early 80s (coach Thompson, player Ewing) as the true revolutionaries.

A whole cast of characters added to milieu of analysis and critique. Grant Hill chimed in with this response, portions of which were published in the NYT. A third party, Michael Wilbon, stepped in with some thoughtful moderation in this article entitled What Grant Hill, Jalen Rose Share. The Twitterverse was abuzz for days and now, on Sunday at around lunchtime, the rematch between Michigan and Duke will happen when they meet in the West region third round. How poetic is that?

Really poetic, in my estimation. I’ve lost touch with the game of basketball over the last 20 years. Before that, I was a certified hoops junkie. But lately, I’ve reacquainted myself with the game and I’m especially interested in both the NBA season and the NCAA Tournament. It could be that Derrick Rose and the success of the Irish are so compelling that I just had to jump on the bandwagon. But I’d like to think it’s deeper than that. I’d like to think that this decades-long hoop latency finally just bubbled to the surface because it was time. It was just supposed to happen and would have done so regardless of the externalities.

I know, I’m a little behind the times, but I don’t watch any current dramatic, comedic, or reality TV. Period. If I turn the TV on, it’s sports. It’s that simple. I’m not out of touch though. Notice, I said current. I do watch old stuff on DVD, Netflix, or downloaded from iTunes. Every movie or TV show that I watch starting January 2011 will be listed here in the film category (for lack of a better name, I know it’s all digital). Every one.

I’ve been hearing about The Wire for a long time, mostly from a guy at one of my clients. The seriousness with which he suggested this show was compelling. He’d be like, “The Wire, now that’s the best show on TV.” And that comma, after he said “The Wire,” was a long comma. It was like he was giving the title some breathing room because it was so deserving to stand alone on the mountaintop of TV greatness. Chilling.

So I grabbed it (Seasons 1-4) at a silent auction a few year’s ago and I’m finally getting to the business of watching it.

It is friggin’ awesome. It’s a cop show + that takes place in Baltimore. I say + (pronounced plus) because it actually spends about equal time between cops, lawyers, and drug dealers. It spans the cop genre by including homicide, narcotics, beat cops, and even the FBI a little. It spans the drug dealer genre by including the distributors, the managers, the enforcers, and the junkies. And it goes beyond the illegal activities to dig into the personal and private lives of both the criminals and law enforcement. It’s an hour long soap opera style show and Season One lasts thirteen episodes.

Season One is about a special task force trying to bust a very successful drug dealer (Avon Barksdale) in the Baltimore projects. The police task force is a group of stars and misfits from various departments who are able to convince a judge to let them put wire taps on Barksdale’s crew. The cast of characters is incredible. Absolutely incredible.

The characters are so compelling that I’ve fallen into that trap of relating their character traits to things in my life. I’ll ask, what would McNulty do? How can I bring Kima’s passion to this gig? And I notice others doing this. Heck, you can’t tell me that Jason Whitlock (a huge fan of The Wire) didn’t find some inspiration in McNulty’s “disdain for authority” when he left the Kansas City Star last year. Another example, I was at a friend’s house the other night and he casually referenced a character. I’m telling you, they suck you in.

Season One ends with a big bust of much of Barksdale’s crew. Stringer is now running the show while Barksdale is in prison. McNulty got transferred out of homicide and is working harbor patrol. Kima looks like she’ll recover from the bullet wound and I think Lt. Daniels is back in narcotics. Freamon is working homicide and I think he is partnering up with Bunk. I’m not sure what happened to DeAngelo, I couldn’t tell if he went into witness protection or prison. I’m getting Season Two rolling soon.

I’m dumb.

Well, it’s over. I just watched this one on Netflix, so all three books and all three movies are behind me, done, finito. I can now get back to normal life. That is, at least until the American version of the TGWTDT comes out at the end of this year.

I don’t know, for some reason these books and movies just grabbed me. In the course of about 12 months, I consumed them all and was never disappointed. This movie wrapped things up nicely and the deviations from the book worked well. As with the books, I think the first movie was best and the third movie (this one) was the second best.

This Noomi Rapace person was so perfect as Salander it’s scary. Rooney Mara has some big shoes to fill. I’ll be careful to go in to the America version with no pre-conceptions though. One thing is for sure, you’re going to be able to tell who your film snob friends are. They will be the ones who say, “Oh, the Swedish version was so much better.” Tell them to shut up. These are the same friends who say things like, “Guiness tastes so much better in Ireland,” and, “I only eat crab if I’m overlooking the Chesapeake Bay.” I will unfriend anyone on Facebook who pulls this film snobbery.

It’s got recency going for it, but for me, I can’t think of another pop-cultural phenomenon that I’ve embraced like this in the last ten years. I’ll have to think about that. Hmmm. But that’s why I’m keeping this blog, so I can reflect on my pop-culture consumption.

Great movie(s) and great books. Feel free to get sucked in to them.

Yeah, it’s funny. Pretty damn funny. It’s a solid, mindless comedy, there’s not much more to say. Steve Carrell plays the same character that he often does, but he does it right. James Franco and Mila Kunis have bit parts that are great.

Funny quotes:

I bet you do all kinds of right.

Why don’t you shirt it up.

Is that supposed to be me or is that like Fat Albert or something?

Those clamps hurt me!

I have a Kindle.

Yeah assbag, he’s my pimp.

I’m glad I didn’t see it in the theatre, but it’s a worthy Netflix option.