Posts from — December 2006

You know, I keep recommending Daniel Craig’s earlier movie, Layer Cake. But when I look back at my own “review” of it, I see I only gave it one star. Buzz killed it for me. Yet, I own it on DVD and watch it now and again. I guess it holds up well.

I’m not so sure that Casino Royale will hold up so well over time. That said, let me clarify that I really really liked the movie. I saw it in an actual movie theater too! (wow, shocking I know).

I loved the new direction of the franchise, I liked how they were going to blow up something in Miami (yeah, no one likes Florida), I liked the darkness, I liked Judi Dench, I liked Eva Green. In fact, there was little I didn’t like.

The only negatives I can think of were surrounding the poker game. But then again, I’m a bit of a poker nerd. There was also a bit of a suspension of disbelief problem with LeChiffre’s portfolio management style too, but then again, if I were to believe that, I could believe the rest of the movie.

I’m going to give it four stars, which is a lot coming from me. Go check it out. And try to see it in the movie theater.

Well, it’s the end of the year. I didn’t manage to increase my movie theater attendance since I whined about it in my last post. I did go one time over the Xmas break, but you’ll read about that in the next post. Anyway, here’s the last DVD Roundup of the year:

My Netflix queue gets backed up sometimes. Backed up in the sense that I sit on some movies. I try to keep my queue balanced between my typical mix of new-releases (action), foreign, art and documentaries. Depending on my mood, I’ll skip over some movies, or they just sit on my shelf while I watch movies around them. Eventually I’ll get to them though, but sometimes it makes the order at home pretty interesting. That’s what happened this month.

One Day in September – ***

A quick documentary, wait, that’s an oxymoron- a 94 minute documentary about the 1972 Munich Olympics, where Palestinian terrorists took Israeli athletes hostage. The movie uses current interviews but relies heavily on the actual news footage from 1972. The interesting bits were when they would use the current interviews from people involved in the various episodes to explain what had happened in the past. I don’t want to ruin the movie for anyone who hasn’t seen it, but let’s just say Germany was way f’d up. A good 4 star recommendation from me, mostly due to the fact that the movie stays focused just on the event, not the lead-up or aftermath (although they mention it before the end credits). There’s a lot of information that I never knew about, and I bet you didn’t either. Go check it out.

Munich – *

Yeah, I obviously didn’t like this movie too much at all. It’s too bad too, it has a great cast and a good story. My main problem with it was that I thought it was over-acted. Bana was really good (but he’s never bad), as the team-leader. His team was great too, although it’s a bit of a stretch to accept Daniel Craig as a member of the tribe- but he’s a good enough actor that I let it go. Hrm, now that I’m rambling I think I liked everyone’s performance except Geoffrey Rush’s. He’s so good though that I was willing to let his over-the-top stuff go. (His character’s lines about the receipts and getting the contact’s names were annoying, and really bugged me for some reason).

So I guess I’m contradicting myself- it’s not over-acted, it’s a great cast and they do a good job. Maybe it’s because I watched this right after the other documentary. Or perhaps the movie gets weird about halfway through when instead of focusing on the heist-type events and their possible repurcusions (which, to be fair, they get to at various points in the movie), they start focusing on “daddy-issues” with the Louis/Papa subplots and Avner’s baby. Sure, they’re interesting, but it’s a bit ham-handed. Err, I didn’t mean that in a kosher-pun-offensive way. It’s a bit thick. And what the hell, how come they didn’t beat the crap out of Louis after what happened in the safe-house? Sure, he was their best informant but sheesh . . .

Anyway, this is supposed to be a quick movie “review” so I’ll cut it short. Munich could have been edited down a bit. It loses it’s focus and subtlety. I think that’s been my main problem with it.

Normally I wouldn’t have anything to say about Gerald Ford on my blog. But as it’s tamale season, and I’m finishing the last of my Chanukkah tamales, I remembered the tie-in.

People not from San Antonio might not know this story, but in 1976, he was running against Reagan in the Repub primary, and during a campaign stop in San Antonio (near the Alamo), was presented a plate of yummy tamales (or at least one tamale, I’m not sure). As he was a yankee from Michigan, he picked it up and tried to eat it– still in the husk.

Although a minor gaffe, people still talk about it today. People even debate the significance of the tamale husk and the “latino vote” in political columns and articles.

So the lesson is, eat more tamales- just be sure to shuck ‘em first you mother shuckers!

What the F? I thought I’d score higher than Angie, and she got 60%!

You Are 46% Evil

You are evil, but you haven’t yet mastered the dark side. Fear not though – you are on your way to world domination.

I meant to write about something that had been bugging me but work’s been keeping me preoccupied. I was just reminded so I thought I’d jot down the thoughts before I forgot again.

I’m a bit bugged that three points have come together in a disturbing fashion:

• An ad agency is using the N64 Kid for a car advert.

The fact that the N64 Kid is in a car ad doesn’t bug me, the fact that I immediately recognize the kid from YTMND.com does. Man, I’m a nerd. What? You don’t know what YTMND.com is? It’s pointless giggly fun.

The fact that I giggle and tear up while watching some of them just reminds me how nerdy I am. Stupid net cliches, but I love them.

Links: History | N64 kid search

• As I’ve written many times, I’m a huuuuge fan of PBS’s Frontline. Well, the same ad uses Will Lyman, the voice of Frontline, as the narrator.

What’s wrong with that? Nothing really, other people have complained about Lyman selling out. But what freaks me out is that hearing Lyman’s voice makes me poop my pants, almost instantly.

I have a pavlovian reaction to his voice. To me, it means, what I’m telling you is very important, hard-hitting news and you should pay attention. Watching Frontline does that to you. You hear Lyman, you think your constituitional rights have gone away or someone was just shot.

Frontline can be scary enough to make you poop your pants. Ergo, watch Frontline, hear Lyman- watch Frontline, poop your pants- hear Lyman, pants are choc full ‘o pooh.

So to combine his voice with the image of the N64 kids confuses me. I now laugh THEN poop my pants.

• The last point is minor. The fact that I, media nerd, didn’t know about (or blogwrite about) this sooner.

In fact, people complained about Lyman “selling out” long ago. I don’t think he sold out. He has a great voice. Actors need work when they can get it. Check out his website link above.

Well, that’s what I meant to tell you about, my faithful readers. Now go kill time watching some YTMND.com things. I highly recommend Cosby Bebop, The Once and Future King. (let the boy try!!), and the ubiquitous Set Phasers to Rock.

Just remember to put on your headphones. And your diapers.

As I sit here eating my Chanukkah pork tamales (does that make me a bad Jew?) I was thinking about the big holiday break. Not that I get much of a break, but here’s what I want to do over the holidays, as I won’t be heading to Texas:

• Drink wine
• have at least one cigar
• see Casino Royale, Borat, and The Fountain
• maybe eat at Q if they’re open

Achievable goals, no?

Here’s a copy of an email I sent to some friends talking about the soccer craziness this month. . . .

I don’t know if any of you have been keeping up w/ soccer news this month, but crazy cool stuff has been going on.

4 items.
[If you're bored skip to #3 and #4 for the youtube links.]

1. US Soccer Men’s National Team

Klinsmann didn’t take the US job. Sucks for US. Bradley’s decent, but Juergen would’ve been cooler.

google news 1

google news 2

2. Boca f’d up in Argentina today.

Basically, they had been doing really well all season. They canned their original coach early in the season (their latest run of coaches has been bad- one of the last ones spit on a Chivas player during a game in a tourney). They got La Volpe to come in and take over coaching- (he’s fun to listen to coached the Mex national team, used to get in trouble for smoking on the sidelines) . . . Anyway,
Boca had been at the top of the table and had stuff wrapped up w/ 4 games left in the season.

The upstart team, Estudiantes, who got Diego “simian” Simeone to take over as coach, had been on a tear all year, and actually caught up to Boca in the points. Boca didn’t win or tie their last three or four games. . . Estudiantes won theirs, forcing a rare playoff final game today.

Boca went up early and then sat back. There was a fight later, both teams had to play most of the 2nd down a man. Estudiantes ties it off a penalty. Then they won the game (and the Argentine season) on their 2nd goal, which was a crazy, kickass goal (no video on youtube yet, but I’ll pass it along when I see it on youtube tomorrow).
EDIT: The vid’s up here — the replay of the goal starts at 41 seconds.

3. Ronaldinho vs Villareal in the Spanish league.

The mother effer pulls off a “chilena” Don’t know what a Chilena is? Well, it’s when you score a goal like this: youtube 1

4. Ronaldinho vs Werder Bremen in the UEFA Champion League

Barca gets a penalty shot. Ronaldinho goes to set up the shot. Looks around a lot at his teammates. Everyone thinks he’s going to bend it in the far upper corner. But he basically runs at the ball, let’s all the defenders jump up, and he side-taps it under the wall and in, making Werder look like Colonel Klink. youtube 2

Peter was in one of my favorite movies of all time, Young Frankenstein. :(

Via NYT:

In 1974, Mr. Boyle made a memorable impression in Mel Brooks.s .Young Frankenstein,. in which he played the bumbling monster brought to life by the addled grandson (Gene Wilder) of the original Dr. Frankenstein. In one high point, Mr. Boyle.s monster, decked out in white tie and tails

I put up a good chunk of pics today. They’re in this subfolder in the pics section on the site. There are subfolders in some of them so be sure to explore around.

Starting later this week, I’ll post some notes on where we went and what we did as well. I should have more pics later this week too because Jodi didn’t get all her pics off her camera, just some Chilean pics. So hopefully I’ll have more Polo pics and pics from La Cabrera and Rigoletto, where we went for Thanksgiving. And hopefully the ubiquitous mate pics. Thanks again Jodi and Gretchen for letting me have copies of your pics.

@!$#!#@$%

People complained about the scented bus ads here. There were supposed to be up for a month.

Representatives from the California Milk Processor Board, which was behind the ads, said complaints were from groups that are trying to ban all public scents, anti-obesity organizations, diabetes organizations and homeless advocates who argued the smell would leave them hungry and unable to purchase food.

More info here and here.

Gross(?) quote from the examiner story: Besides, it’s white, boring and comes in gallons. [insert kenneth-alone-on-a-friday-night joke here]