Happy New Year!!

This reminds me of being a smartass in calculus at AU:

New Mars Volta!!

The new album will be be released 1/28, entitled The Bedlam in Goliath. The background on this one sounds even creepier than Frances the Mute (from wikipedia):

On a trip in Jerusalem, Rodriguez-Lopez purchased an archaic ouija-type talking board at a curio shop as a gift for Bixler-Zavala. They would return to their tour bus after shows to play with it during their 2006 tour with the Red Hot Chili Peppers, as it quickly became the band's post-show ritual. Dubbed "The Soothsayer", the board revealed stories, gave names and made demands, as the band was contacted by three different people who appeared in the form of one, whom was then referred to as "Goliath".

Midway through the recording sessions, Rodriguez-Lopez buried "The Soothsayer" as an attempt to undo the curse and halt the unforeseen tragedies, who ended the ordeal by swearing never to give away the whereabouts of its burial, and also asking the band not to speak of it again during the remainder of the album's production.


Needless to say, I am very excited.

Best of 2007?

NRO rates the top movies of 2007. I've only seen half of them, but wanted to see the rest. I agree with most of the list, except I would switch numbers 1 and 2. And No Country For Old Men was FANTASTIC. However, The Simpsons Movie is absent? Anyone have thoughts on that? Because I thought the movie was good. Also, There Will Be Blood is a 2007 release and has Daniel Day Lewis ever been in a bad movie? And his mustache looks pretty sweet in that movie.

For Kris, John Boorman's ridiculous ideas for LOTR

I had no idea that John Boorman ever wanted to make Lord of the Rings in the seventies, and that his failures to land the project eventually led to the animated versions, while he went on to make Excalibur. I found this digging around chatrooms looking for information on Zardoz (directed by Boorman), which I now desperately want to see. This picture of Sean Connery should help you understand why. Has anyone seen Zardoz? Remember anything about it?

Anyway, here's the long entry on what Boorman's ridiculous LoTR might have been like, from an interview with one of Boorman's chief collaborators:

The adaption is also highly creative and inventive (ideas which Pallenberg still hopes to use in some other epic project). The history of Middle-earth is told in an interesting way, although the writer would do it differently today. "I devised kind of a Kabuki play in which the story of Sauron and the creation of the rings was explained to a gathering in Rivendell. [Reading the script] 'A play has begun. The stage is the table (a huge round table). The acting is stylized, emphatic. As in Kabuki Theater, the costumes are flamboyant, and symbolize beings and entities of Middle-earth.' In other words, with this device, we tried to simplify the backstory. But I think if I were to revisit the scene now, I would think of a faster way of doing it."

New material for the dwarf Gimli came from Pallenberg's fondness for the character. "I remember liking him a lot. I knew quite a bit about Wagner's operas and the German literature. I was sympathetic to him, and I tried to work him in wherever I could. I believe it was I who came up with idea where they bury Gimli in a hole, throw a cape on him, and beat him up to utter exhaustion to retrieve his unconscious ancestral memory." This ancient knowlege allows Gimli to know the word for entering Moria, and to find insights about the ancient dwarf kingdom.

Pallenberg contributed another original idea to the Moria sequence. "I had a rather fanciful idea involving these orcs that are slumbering or in some kind of narcotic state. The fellowship runs over them, and the footsteps start up their hearts. John liked that a lot."

He mentioned another change. "There's a duel between the magicians, Gandalf and Saruman. I was inspired by an African idea of how magicians duel with words, which I had read about. It was a way of one entrapping the other as a duel of words rather than special effects flashes, shaking staffs, and all that. I tried to keep away from that a lot, and Boorman did too. [Reads from script]:
GANDALF: Saruman, I am the snake about to strike!
SARUMAN: I am the staff that crushes the snake!
GANDALF: I am the fire that burns the staff to ashes!
SARUMAN: I am the cloudburst that quenches the fire!
GANDALF: I am the well that traps the waters!

"John Boorman and I didn't give too much importance to the Christian component of Tolkien's work. It came across as a tad heavy-handed at times. It is a story of redemption, and that seemed to be enough."

{jumping ahead to elswhere in Plesset's article}
Pallenberg continued, "Because it had to be one movie, and we couldn't waste time with too many complicated effects, I was an advocate of eliminating all flying creatures. I thought it would make it too rich, and it would depart too much from the ordinary. John Boorman agreed on that. At Minas Tirith, instead of a flying steed, the Nazgul Chief rides a horse that 'seems to have no skin. Its live, raw, bleeding flesh is exposed.' I still have this feeling that the dazzle can take away from the fundamental drama. We always tried to do things on the cheap, simply. When you saw a castle in the distance, it could have been made out of anything, even gleaming, high-voltage transmission towers. You saw those in the distance between the trees and then, suddenly, you were inside it. John Boorman is tremendously clever at that."

{jumping further ahead to the article's concluding paragraph}
The script ends with Gandalf, Frodo, Bilbo, Galadriel, Arwen, and Elrond leaving Middle-earth on a sailing ship. A rainbow arcs over the vessel. Legolas, who is watching from shore with Gimli, says, "Look! Only seven colors. Indeed, the world is failing." "I think that's the ideology of the picture," said Pallenberg. "That is from me, not Tolkien. From a physics standpoint, it's incorrect to say that there could be more than seven colors, but what it's saying is, 'we live in a diminished world.'"

Oh, thanks, NFL

It's a Christmas miracle! The NFL commissioner deigns to allow the lowly peasants to watch the NFL Network's game on Saturday night on simul-cast. How magnanimous! How beneficient!

Except, not.

He had his arm twisted by the senate (Specter in particular), who reminded him that the NFL has an exemption from anti-trust laws that lets them rake in money off of tv contracts. And perhaps that exemption would be revoked if Senator Specter, and the rest of us, didn't get to watch the Patriots play the Giants this Saturday.

And yet look how the arm-twisting is portrayed by sports-patsy ESPN. Football is great for a lot of reasons, but the way that ESPN and other major sports outlets (ahem, Sports Illustrated) are so in bed with the NFL is pretty disgusting.

Happy Xmas

The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus needs to be re-inserted into the holiday roster of movies.

"Our powers are as great as yours, Immortal fool!"

And Merry Christmas from me:

Merry Christmas from Carl, also his Bowl picks

His Dark Materials

Here is a review that addresses some of the issues in the hubbub over Pullman's anti-Christianity (in a non-inflammatory manner). Looks like I have some reading to get to. I guess I should read Paradise Lost first (yes, I am that uneducated that I haven't yet read it in all my 27 years).

Four or five edits on this post. I need a nap.

FYI Slaps

It appears Bigface has been reborn. The wheel of time turns....

Micheal Moore endorses Alan Keyes (in 2000)

This has resurfaced from the 2000 presidential campaign. The man I voted for in the 2000 primary (but will not this time) took up Micheal Moore's invitation to body surf in a travelling mosh pit to Rage's Guerilla Radio. Pathetically Gary Bauer criticized him for it in a debate because Rage is, well, anti-american and "pro-Cop killer," etc. (which is sadly true). Needless to say, I'm not a fan of Moore, but it's a bit entertaining.

Do you remember laughter?

Rumors I had read said that they were breaking The Hobbit into 2 movies. How, I don't know. There's really no natural breakpoint in the book (that I remember). So have heart! If he screws it up that badly Robert Plant is sure to piss in his empty eye sockets with his massive Tolkien-bulge.

I look forward to spending this coming coming caturday at the Fairbanks DMV, as, alas my driver's license finally expired. Real-looking ID, here I come! Maybe Santa will be there registering his abandoned boat again.

That Batman trailer really scared me. I don't know if I want to see it. Especially if I'm just going to have nightmares about Heath Ledger-Joker carving my face up with a knife. Jeez.

OMFG PETR JAKSN WTF?!?!?!

So apparently Peter Jackson is producing The Hobbit and, get this, it's sequel. I'm confused. Isn't LOTR basically the sequel to The Hobbit? So what the hell is Jackson doing? I hope this isn't a case of letting all the talk about him being a legendary filmmaker go to his head and just basically doing what he wants. I'm afraid that this is going to be a cinematograpy version of all those shitty Star Wars books about what happens in between the movies (although after the Episodes, I, II & III, the one about Vader being a whiny, needy bitch when a horny green man becomes all buddy-buddy with the Emperor becomes somewhat more along the lines of the story). I don't need someone else telling me what happened in between the Hobbit and LOTR. Bilbo used the ring to avoid the Sackville-Banginses and adopted an heir, which is all very apparent from the first chapter of the Fellowship. The only way I see this being useful is if the "sequel" turns out to be a massive prequel and dumb down The Silmarillion for me. That shit's whack.

New Batman Trailer

is here. I know we all had our doubts about Heath Ledger as the Joker, but I'm actually a little intrigued about seeing it now because he does sort of pull off the whole creepy aspect of the character pretty well (as opposed to Jack Nicholson's sort of goofier take on him). This preview looks like they kept the quality pretty much along the lines of the first one. I'm (re)excited about this now.

Coming soon to America

...the horrors of socialized medicine. Also see this article on the costs of healthcare and the implications of a government takeover.

For Slaps

In honor of registering your mustang while in Alaska...

Billy Squire ridiculousness/gayness

This site made me laugh. Mostly because he also has a link to the "Gay Paul Stanley pic of the week" so...you know...enjoy that. But Bert, he addresses your question of Squire's straightness rather vehemently.

Al Franken Says It's Time to Get Serious

He's got one thing going for him in trying to shake off the funny man image (was he ever really funny?): socialism surely isn't funny. He's running for Senate in Minnesota if you hadn't heard.

Wow!

Did he make that one for Richard Simmons? Honestly, I haven't seen an eighties rock video where a woman was so conspicuously absent.

Is this why there is a rumor that Billy Squire is gay? Can anyone confirm that outside of this admittedly overwhelming circumstantial evidence.

Too bad my tax dollars didn't fund rock instead

I think you know we all contributed to that study with our tax dollars. >:(

This, on the other hand, should make you happy. I couldn't stop laughing for the first half. Bless you early morning VH1 classic.

Mitchell Report

Can be read in all of its 409 page glory here. I think it's funny that a significant portion of the accusations are actually based on hearsay (unnamed stadium employee found a bag of steroids in this players locker or locker room attendant saw an envelope addressed to a player from a "steroid company"). Ridiculous. I wish I had the patience and time to read this because I'm guessing it's just another shoddy example of a half-assed attempt by a Congressman (?) to justify his banging twenty year old interns and getting free vacations from oil companies. Incidentally, I skimmed it a bit and couldn't find a source of funding. Anyone know? Did Mitchell pay out of pocket? Because I hope my tax dollars didn't go towards paying for this sixth grade quality research report.

Clemens

Supposedly Roger Clemens' name is on the big list of baseball druggies being released today. (Though what drugs one has to take to make the list I haven't been able to find yet).

Boy, that sounds really similar to something I said here before.

Damn I hate being right all the time. It's such a burden.

Kissinger on the NIE and Iran

Kissinger has an interesting op-ed in today's Washington Post.

Money quotes:
"When Iran halted its weapons program and suspended efforts at enriching uranium in February 2003, America had already occupied Afghanistan and was on the verge of invading Iraq, both of which border Iran. The United States justified its Iraq policy by the need to remove weapons of mass destruction from the region. By the fall of 2003, when Iran voluntarily joined the Additional Protocol for Nuclear Non-Proliferation, Saddam Hussein had just been overthrown. Is it unreasonable to assume that the ayatollahs concluded that restraint had become imperative? By the fall of 2005, the American effort in Iraq showed signs of bogging down; the prospects for extending the enterprise into Iran were diminishing. Iranian leaders could have felt free to return to their policy of building up a military nuclear capability -- perhaps reinforced by the desire to create a deterrent to American regional aspirations. They might also have concluded, because the secret effort had leaked, that it would be too dangerous to undertake another covert program. Hence the emphasis on renewing the enrichment program in the guise of a civilian energy program. In short, if my analysis is correct, we could be witnessing not a halt of the Iranian weapons program -- as the NIE asserts -- but a subtle, ultimately more dangerous, version of it that will phase in the warhead when fissile material production has matured. "

...

"I have often defended the dedicated members of the intelligence community. This is why I am extremely concerned about the tendency of the intelligence community to turn itself into a kind of check on, instead of a part of, the executive branch. When intelligence personnel expect their work to become the subject of public debate, they are tempted into the roles of surrogate policymakers and advocates."

SHPIGS!!!!

My new favorite animal...tasty and a source of warm clothes!

Golden Compass, in depth

So, as a big fan of the books, I'm fairly split on the outcome of the movie, but in the end I think my thumb points more downwards than upwards.

The film deliver the things I wanted in a massive war bear fight and Sam Elliott as a aeronaut cowboy. Check. Also, it stayed fairly true to the books in that it did not invent any new scenes, and kept very close to the movement of the original story.

Having read the books, I knew what was going on... but I have to grant that anyone who hasn't would be hopelessly lost as Lyra moves from one culture/society to the next. Jordan College is fairly well established, by after that the movie simply moves too fast to get to know any of these other places. The Gyptians, the Bolvars, the war bears, all detailed cultures get basically no treatment in the movie. Even Ms. Coulter's high society gets very little play.

The movie is rescued from terribleness by its particularly strong casting. Elliott, Kidman, Craig... but even here I have a gripe. It seems obvious to me that New Line was so intent on creating a new fantasy hit that they artificially tethered the movie to Harry Potter and LotR in rather obvious and stupid ways. Jordan College, in a dinner scene, strongly resembles Hogwarts. Christopher Lee shows up for the briefest of cameos. And I'm pretty sure that an original voice actor's performance as Iorek was overwritten in favor of Ian McKellan. As a fan of the source material, I can't help but feel a bit betrayed by New Line's shameless hit-mongering.

SPOILER, sort of

Finally, there is a fatal, fatal flaw that both fans of the books and anyone who sees the movie cannot fail to notice. The ending. In the books, the ending is dramatic and powerful, as Asriel (who is not at all a good guy, after all he is playing the part of Satan in Pullman's version of Paradise Lost) sacrifices Lyra's friend Roger to open rifts to other worlds. Lyra is betrayed and awakened to this new reality. It's an ending that would have served as both a cliffhanger for the next film and closure to her adventures in her own world.

Instead, the movie ends several chapters earlier, with Lyra and Roger in Scoresby's airship, heading north towards the lights and essentially begging for a sequel. This is a wimpy, awful ending. Unforgivable, I think.

And it's unfortunate, because Compass is without doubt the most cinematic and much better positioned for a transition to film than the other two books. I don't think the director deserves to do the rest of the books, and in my mind the only thing that could rescue this film is releasing a longer version (the movie is under two hours, it needed 30-40 minutes more all around) that includes the ending from the books.

Probably won't happen, but there is a kind of precedent with Oliver Stone's Alexander. After the first version bombed so bad, Stone recut a longer version that most critics agreed was significantly better. And if the movie 'bombs' (it may not meet expectations, but it will probably recoup its expenses), maybe there will be enough groundswell of fan disapproval and incentive to release a longer, better version on DVD.

3 Reasons To be Excited for Golden Compass

I'm going to see the movie tomorrow, and my biggest 3 reasons for excitement:

3) Sam Elliot

2) The prospect of tussling with protesters either inside or outside of the theater.

1) Armored War Bears.

Also, rumor has it that Philip Pullman originally wanted Samuel L. Jackson to play Lee Scoresby? WTF?!

Interesting, but I'm glad they went with Elliot.

Just how many miles can YOU walk in my Air Force Ones?

I know at one point or another we've all wanted rap cliches mathematically quantified. Done and done.

Prince Caspian looks....IDK

I think we can all agree this is a good lolcat

Unpremeditated

This is not legal jargon as far as I know. I don't know how the Flordia statutes define their levels of murder. Premeditated murder is a colloquial way of saying the actor intended to cause the death of the victim.

Now, who writes state laws? State legislators. Not always the sharpest tools in the shed, let alone great students of English. Perhaps that's what the statute calls a lesser degree of murder. Or perhaps it is just the way the police distinguished it from premeditated murder aka 1st degree murder and other names signifying the conscious intent of the offender was exactly what resulted from his act.

Buckeyes #1? WTF? College football is bad

Now I know I'm going to catch some grief for this, but how in God's name are the buckeyes #1? I think it might be because OSU vs. LSU, plain and simple, is a more billable game and would make the most money out the possible match-ups. Honestly, who did OSU play that would warrant them to play in the title game over undefeated Hawaii, one loss Kansas or any of the two loss teams? I don't understand college football and I don't understand the fans (because I'm sure everyone in C-bus is strutting around like the cock of the walk because OSU is in another title game and how you can be proud about basically buying your way in is beyond me). You can argue that teams benefit from weak schedules in the NFL, but at least there's a play-off system in place and the rewarding of a title isn't arbitrary and money-based (possibly excepting the Steeler's most recent title). As disenchanted as I am with New England this year, I will root for them before I ever root for OSU (or LSU - I'm hoping that they both lose somehow). At least the Patriots are going to earn whatever they get in the end on the field and not in the pocketbooks of the big wigs.

Legal jargon???

"Charles Wardlow, Eric Rivera and Venjah Hunte were denied bond in Fort Myers. All are charged with unpremeditated murder in Taylor's death, a killing police said was unplanned and arose out of a burglary at the player's home."

Unpremeditated murder. "Unpre-" Bert is this actual law speak or is it just the AP suckin balls?

And for the record, is the "pre" even necessary? If a murder is meditated, doesn't that imply thought went into it?