Super Tuesdays

Leak Review: Flight of the Conchords' I TOLD YOU I WAS FREAKY

2009-09-15T10:55:00.001-04:00

This article originally appeared on Pegleg Spinners, 9/15/09.

You know you've really made it when people care about your work enough to steal it on the internet. Two weeks ago I wrote a post on Jay-Z's new album, but I didn't provide a full-fledged review because I was writing only days after the record had leaked and didn't feel like I had enough time to fairly judge it as a whole. Now here I am with a full-fledged review of New Zealand acoustic digi-folk parody duo Flight of the Conchords' second album, I Told You I Was Freaky, which leaked less than two weeks ago. Am I just a massive hypocrite? Click the jump to find out!

Answer: Yes, probably, but in this case I have an excuse, which is that I can review this album because I heard most of its material months ago in the second season of the Conchords' TV show. A few of the tracks (for example, "Hurt Feelings" and the title song) have new vocals or verses added on, but the album is mostly made up of the original recordings which were used on the show (in contrast to the band's first, self-titled album, which featured totally new versions of a few tunes).

Kind of like how Sam and I spend our free time.

On the one hand, this makes some sense; the recordings sound pretty crisp, so why bother doing them all over again? On the other hand, though, some new material might've made the album more interesting to fans of the show who are already familiar with the songs. The Conchords tend to add new lyrical twists and improvisations into each performance of a song (which is one reason why their live shows are so much fun--for more on that, check out my gushing fanboy review). Also, it would've been nice to have a studio recording of the longer, much funnier version of "Petrov, Yelyena and Me"--or of "Bus Driver Song," which the TV show inexplicably omitted despite spending a whole episode setting it up.

But whatever. Songs are songs, new or old, and the real question about I Told You I Was Freaky is, how good are said songs? Unfortunately, those who watch the show or have paid attention to the show's buzz should be able to guess that, like the second season, the Conchords' second album is a bit of a letdown. Yes, there are some high points, like "Feelings," "Freaky" and the wonderful "Carol Brown." There are also a few songs that are nice to listen to despite not being all that funny ("Demon Woman," "You Don't Have to Be a Prostitute"). However, there are also songs like "Rambling Through the Avenues of Time" and "Fashion Is Danger" that are just lame, and overall the selections just aren't as assured and nimble as they were in the first season/album. This sophomore effort isn't godawful, and it's worth getting if you're a fan of the show/band, but it's a definite step downward.

You can go to this post if you want my full review of the TV show, but, to be concise, I always enjoyed it less than the Conchords' songs alone. I can do without a third season if it means that the band gets to pursue different, more interesting projects--like, for example, an album of non-show material. Murray, are you listening?

What to Watch After THE WIRE? Try THE CORNER

2009-09-01T01:57:00.002-04:00

This article originally appeared on Pegleg Spinners, 8/30/09.

"When you get that first shot of dope," says diseased drug addict Fat Curt in one of The Corner's mock-interview scenes, "it's the best motherfucking feeling in your life. It's better than sex. And every time after that, you looking for the first time. Over and over again."

If art is also a drug, then HBO's acclaimed crime series The Wire is, for many viewers, a first shot of truly great television storytelling. (I know those of you who haven't watched the show may be sick of hearing how good it is, but seriously, it's amazing.) After the credits roll on the series finale, many viewers are left wondering where to go next. Are there any shows out there that can match The Wire's authenticity, boldness and overall excellence?

In my search for such a show I discovered the HBO miniseries The Corner, which was a direct ancestor and, in a sense, prototype of The Wire. Aired in 2000, two years before The Wire's premiere, The Corner is based (fairly faithfully) on a nonfiction book by Wire creators David Simon and Ed Burns and shares many cast and crew members with its later, five-season counterpart. Look, there's Prop Joe (Robert F. Chew) as a shoe salesman! There's Lieutenant Daniels (Lance Reddick) as a recovering drug addict! There's Detective Sydnor (Corey Parker Robinson) as a basketball-obsessed corner boy! And there are familiar names behind the scenes as well, most notably that of executive producer Robert Colesberry, who produced The Wire and shows up here in a cameo as a judge.

Clarke Peters (a.k.a. Detective Freamon) as Fat Curt

The Corner's story revolves around a year in the life of an inner-city Baltimore neighborhood, and focuses specifically on three members of a sort-of family: Gary McCullough (T. K. Carter), a formerly middle-class heroin addict who spends his days either scheming to scrape together money for a blast or regretfully wondering what's become of his community and himself; Fran Boyd (Khandi Alexander), Gary's ex-wife, also an addict but trying to get herself clean; and DeAndre McCullough (Sean Nelson), son of Gary and Fran, a teenage boy who dabbles in drug dealing and impregnates his girlfriend. The Corner is what The Wire would have been if The Wire focused mainly on Bubbles, so, as you might guess, it can make for a pretty harsh viewing experience. I'm not sure which scenes are harder to watch: Those in which the camera lingers on a needle entering a dope fiend's vein (and there are a lot of those), or those in which an addict betrays his or her closest friends and family members for a single shot of powder (and there are a lot of those too).

As in The Wire, however, the saving grace in all of this misery is the show's compassion and affection for its characters. DeAndre cheats on his girlfriend, but he also encourages Fran when she enters detox. Gary may steal DeAndre's stash of drugs, but he also makes sure to visit when Fat Curt enters the hospital. The characters are human beings, not cartoonish heroes and villains, and they have to be, because that's the point of the show. Above all else, The Corner aims to remind its viewers that no matter how messed-up America's inner cities may be, the people who live there are still people. The terrific performances of the show's actors (especially T. K. Carter, who makes the sad-eyed Gary into one of TV's most heartbreaking characters) serve to drive that point home.

Like Simon and Burns' other HBO miniseries, Generation Kill, The Corner is never quite as addictively gripping as The Wire, simply because it's bound by the limitations of nonfiction. As narrator Charles S. Dutton (who also directed The Corner) notes in the last episode, a year is an arbitrary amount of time; if the writers are staying true to life, they can't force their various subplots to climax and be resolved by December 31st. Still, each of the six hour-long episodes is engaging and well-made, and the closing epilogue, which features an interview with some of the real people on whom the show was based (though no musical montage), provides as much closure as you can expect from this kind of story.

In the end, The Corner isn't quite as entertaining as The Wire, and it certainly isn't as all-encompassing, but it is equally intelligent and heartfelt. I won't say it's better than sex, but at the very least, it's a great way to spend six hours while we wait for the premiere of Treme.

Brains, Brawn and Prawn: A Review of DISTRICT 9

2009-08-25T17:51:00.001-04:00

This article originally appeared on Pegleg Spinners, 8/21/09.

No trend should ever be trusted, especially not in Hollywood. So-called "genre" entertainment (i.e. sci-fi, horror, fantasy, etc.) has always been a staple of mainstream American cinema, but in the last decade the movie industry has become increasingly infatuated with nerd culture. Around the turn of the millenium comic-book adaptations (usually based around superheroes) started earning big money at the box office, partly because of the intense loyalty and engagement of the adapted properties' fans. Ever since then studio executives have been scouring comic shops and internet forums in search of new material. This approach has admittedly yielded some worthwhile results, but it's also quickly becoming a form of cultural strip-mining. These days, films based in nerd culture tend more and more to be pointless, self-indulgent or outright exploitative.

Which brings us to District 9, a new film not based on any existing property but still waving its nerd flag high via its extraterrestrial subject matter and the prominent involvement of Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson. I was looking forward to this movie, but I couldn't help but fear that it was going to fall victim to the excesses of its subculture.

Thankfully, it doesn't; rather, it's an upstanding example of what genre storytelling can be. That is to say, it may be a film by nerds, but it's for everyone, and although it has flaws, it still puts most of its contemporaries to shame.

The plot revolves around a South African refugee camp full of shrimp-like aliens referred to derogatorily as "prawns," whose spaceship has apparently stalled above Johannesburg. When the government hires a sinister corporation, Multi-National United, to transfer the aliens to a more isolated area, a well-intentioned but clueless MNU manager named Wikus stumbles upon a mysterious container of alien fluid. The previews don't give away much more than that, and I won't either.

Actually, this scene isn't in the movie. Damn you, viral marketing!

The film works partly because while it is unashamedly sci-fi, it's also thoughtfully engaged with the real world. Many genre properties are content to rely on generic, navel-gazing storylines about young nerdy men trying to prove themselves, but District 9 uses its premise to comment on racism and the problems facing refugee communities. It's disturbing to see even the insectile prawns getting abused by MNU thugs, but unfortunately it's not hard to imagine impoverished humans receiving the same treatment.

The story is also refreshingly fair to its characters, especially Wikus, who is neither a heart-of-gold hero nor a mean-spirited caricature. The viewer (or, at least, this viewer) is constantly torn between scorning Wikus's obliviousness and sympathizing with the horrible situation he finds himself in. Some of the prawns, including one with the incongruous name of Christopher Johnson, are also given nuanced personalities.

Best of all, none of this prevents the film from being fun to watch. The social commentary, character-driven story and action set pieces work in concert rather than getting in each other's way, and fight scenes/car chases/etc. are shot in a way that actually allows the viewer to see what's going on, unlike most modern action sequences.

As I said, of course, the film isn't perfect, and its main flaw lies in its awkward combination of documentary-style footage and a more conventional omniscient point of view. The documentary scenes, which are gimmicky and seem to exist mainly as an excuse for using a less expensive film stock, should have been eliminated or at least limited to the opening exposition (which is already too rushed and blunt). Also, the screenplay should occasionally be subtler; for example, we'll dislike the brutish military villain enough without hearing him say, "I love watching prawns die."

Still, District 9 is encouraging because it shows that genre entertainment can still be thought-provoking, original and well-crafted--and that sometimes that's exactly what audiences want.

A 3-Part Memorial to John Hughes

2009-08-18T22:36:00.002-04:00

This article originally appeared on Pegleg Spinners, 8/17/09.

Okay, I know filmmaker John Hughes' passing is somewhat old news at this point, but I have a few things to say about the man's work that I haven't yet gotten around to posting (partly because I was on vacation for the past week), so bear with me.

1. God damn it. Another one?

About a month ago, after the loss of cultural luminaries including Michael Jackson, Edward Downes and Walter Cronkite, I called this season "a good summer for death." Now John Hughes is gone as well. (And so is Les Paul!) I think I speak for everone when I say that THIS IS FUCKING RIDICULOUS. Seriously, God, cut us some slack here. I feel like I'm watching the ending of The Departed in slow motion.

2. Ferris Bueller grew up and went into politics.

"This country is on the road to socialism, and that still doesn't change the fact that I don't own a car."

I'm kind of glad that I waited until now to write about Hughes, since if I had written earlier I wouldn't have been able to comment on this Washington Post op-ed piece. Titled "A Mirror Up To the Original Ferris Bueller," the article was written by one Edward McNally, who claims to have been a boyhood friend of Hughes and to have partially served as the inspiration for the character of Ferris. McNally details several anecdotes involving sick notes and expensive cars, but the part of the article that I found the most interesting came at the very end. I quote:

"Edward McNally, 53, a trial lawyer in private practice in New York and Washington, was a presidential speechwriter from 1989 to 1991, and was senior associate counsel to the president from 2001 to 2005."

There's something very appropriate about Ferris Bueller growing up to work in the Bush administration. That's all I'm going to say.

3. Even when he was bad, he was good.

Sure, everyone knows The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, and Home Alone, but how many of you have seen Career Opportunities?

Not many, I'd guess. It's a 1991 comedy written (but not directed) by Hughes, starring Frank Whaley (perhaps best remembered as one of the debtor drug dealers in Pulp Fiction) as Jim, a shiftless college-age janitor who gets locked in a Target overnight with beautiful rich girl Josie, who's played by Jennifer Connelly. (John Candy has a cameo as the store's manager.) For years, this movie has been one of my favorite bad movies, partly because so many parts of it are inexplicably corny and nonsensical. Jim kills time in the store by roller-skating in his boxers and a bridal veil. There's a completely pointless subplot about Jim's father eating leftovers. The oddness kicks into high gear when Jim and Josie get taken hostage by two of the most over-acted burglars I've ever seen onscreen.

Still, I'd be lying if I said that I only enjoy this movie for its flaws. Despite the rampant cheesiness, there's something very appealing about Hughes' script, both in its Home Alone-like concept and its likable (if cartoonish) characters. Hughes had a knack for making mundane day-to-day routines seem like adventures, and it's that gift for which he'll rightly be remembered.

RIP. (You too, Les Paul.)

Search Engine Roundup--#1 Is a New Fetish!

2009-08-11T09:56:00.002-04:00

This article originally appeared on Pegleg Spinners, 8/7/09.

Maybe it's wrong for me to keep going back to the same source for post fodder. Maybe I should have found some new album or obscure horror movie to use as the basis of today's article. But hey, I was taught never to look a gift horse in the mouth, and when you're looking for insane shit to make fun of, the internet is Black Beauty wrapped up in a shiny red ribbon. That's right--it's time for more search engine terms!

As we've mentioned before, Wordpress allows us to monitor what search engine terms have led readers to our blog. Usually those terms are pretty closely related to the content we provide; for example, here are the search engine terms for a fairly normal day:

Nope, nothing wrong here. All of these things relate directly to articles which have been posted on PLS. However, we often see search engine terms that not only don't relate to anything we've written but also make us question both the sanity of the searchers and the existence of God. "Sperm sharking," for example. [Involuntary shudder]

So, without further ado, here are the top five weirdest search engine terms of the past week:

#5: "big peg leg circus"

I have no idea what that would be, but it sounds amazing. I'm picturing a circus run entirely by pirates, with pirate ship rides and colorful birds and concession stands that sell rum and other stands that sell the tickets that are used to buy the rum because for some reason you can't buy the rum with regular money. Sorry to disappoint you, random search engine user, but if we could make this wonderland real we would already be living there.

#4: "womenwithtits"

I'm not sure where to begin with this one. Couldn't you just have searched for "tits" and assumed that the "women" part was implied? Couldn't you have used the spacebar? And I would really like to know why this is what comes up when I Google Image Search this term:

"Womenwithass"? Seriously, internet, what the fuck?

Anyway, searching the entire internet for boobs and ending up at this blog is, I believe, the textbook definition of an epic fail.

#3: "sniffing gay balls"

Geez, title one post "The Traditional Sniffing of the Balls" and all the weirdos come out of the woodwork. What makes the balls gay? Do gay balls smell different from regular balls? Only one way to find out, I suppose...

#2: "reasons to have sex"

#1: All the cool kids are doing it. #2: It's a good way to rebel against your parents. #3: It burns calories. Seriously, though, if you need to be convinced then you should probably stick to celibacy for now.

And, finally, our big winner for the week:

#1: "japanese sleep sharking videos"

You know, this doesn't seem that bad. If sperm sharking means jerking off on people in public, then sleep sharking must mean jerking off on people while they're asleep, right? Hey, I'm from Connecticut; that kind of thing happens all the time around here. Sorry, Japan, but you can't shock me anymore.

Wait a minute...

You win again, Japan. I never should have doubted you.

Will an "Alien" Prequel Save Us from the Worst Idea Ever?

2009-08-04T23:53:00.001-04:00

This article originally appeared on Pegleg Spinners, 8/3/09.

As I've mentioned before, I'm a film major, and being a film major I tend to pay closer-than-average attention to the movie industry. Specifically, I follow blogs like /Film and FilmJunk. Normally I wouldn't want to bore PLS readers with the type of inside-baseball news those sites offer, but a recent story they posted has given me a glimmer of hope for humanity: Apparently director Ridley Scott is going to be making a prequel to his 1979 horror movie Alien.

If Scott's name isn't familiar to you, his movies probably are; besides Alien, his filmography includes Blade Runner, Thelma & Louise, Gladiator and Black Hawk Down. Not all of his movies have been great, but he's certainly established himself as a very talented filmmaker. Make no mistake, however--my enthusiasm for his Alien prequel has nothing to do with whether or not that prequel will be good.

No, I'm thinking back to November of 2008, when it was announced that Scott would be directing a movie version of Monopoly.

Yes. This.

Yes, the board game.

Now, making a movie based on a board game is a pretty fucking stupid idea to begin with. But when that movie--which is supposed to be a family-friendly comedy--is directed by the guy who brought us Black Hawk Down's find-the-vein-in-the-wounded-soldier's-leg scene, that's--well, as /Film put it, that's just the Worst Idea Ever. That's like Quentin Tarantino directing a Care Bears reboot. That's like Barack Obama starting a gangsta rap career. That's like trying to have sex with a garbage disposal. Not good.

Seriously, brand recognition is the only way that movies get made these days. Studio executives pick products people already like and produce film versions--and who can blame them when this strategy works so well? I can't count how many times I've heard someone say, "I don't know if the new Transformers/GI Joe/Land of the Lost/etc. movie is going to be good, but I'll definitely see it because I watched the show as a kid." What? Ten years from now it'll be, "I don't know what Air Conditioner: The Movie is about, but I'll definitely see it because boy do I love air conditioning!"

You're so money, Air Conditioner, and you don't even know it.

Anyway, I'm happy to hear that Ridley Scott is directing an Alien prequel because that means he might not have time for the Monopoly movie. There are already some signs that this could be the case; Monopoly isn't currently listed on Scott's IMDB page, or on IMDB at all, for that matter.

So, to summarize, I'm optimistic for mankind because one unoriginal, creatively bankrupt idea might prevent an even more unoriginal, creatively bankrupt idea from coming to fruition. Hooray for Hollywood!

What do you guys think? Is this news exciting or just depressing?

Sign My Petition and Keep Cannibal Mutants Out of Washington!

2009-07-28T00:19:00.003-04:00

This article originally appeared on Pegleg Spinners, 7/24/09.

A simple man

I'm a simple man. All I really want to do on this blog is make fun of obscure horror movies and share meaningless anecdotes. I don't think that's so much to ask. Yet it seems there's always something stupid going on in the US that forces me to get off my duff, click the "Political" category tab and take a stand.

In this case the match to my powder keg is the "birther" movement, which is kind of like a bowel movement except more disgusting. Birthers are the people who claim, against all available evidence, that President Obama was not born in the US and therefore is ineligible for the presidency. This is wrong on many, many levels, but the worst part of the whole issue is that it distracts from the real threat America faces today: Republican politicians who may actually be cannibalistic mutants.

Rep. John Campbell (R - CA)--Artist's interpretation

Now, I know a lot of you are going to say that there's never been any indication that members of the GOP gather at subterranean black masses and sip human blood to sustain their youthful figures. And that may be true. But think about this: No Republican politicians have ever provided proof that they are not monstrous ghouls that feast on the living, nor have any of them even denied such an allegation. What are they trying to hide?!

Loyal readers, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the Republican/undead flesh-eater agenda is gaining a chokehold in Washington. Members of the Ghastly Old Party make up about 40% of today's Congress, and one of their numbers even managed to get himself illegitimately installed in the Oval Office.

But there is hope! If you recognize the threat that these subhuman hell-spawn represent to our way of life, then there is one thing you can do to stop them: Sign my online petition! It's free, it's quick, and it sends a strong message to America's leaders that we don't want representatives who will devour our children instead of kissing them in photo-ops. Act now, before the cannibals overrun the Capitol and the IRS knocks on your door asking for an arm and a leg--literally.

Still not convinced? What if I told you not only that Republicans are hideous abominations who will kill us and roast our corpses--but also that some of them, unlike our President, weren't even born in this country?!

CANNIBAL MUTANT TERRORIST MUSLIM!

And if some of you are thinking of leaving comments saying that we should be focusing on substantive political issues rather than outlandish conspiracy theories with no basis in fact:

Congratulations. You're sane. But sign the petition anyway, just for funsies.

Assisted Suicide: The Commercial!

2009-07-21T17:15:00.002-04:00

This article originally appeared on Pegleg Spinners, 7/20/09.

Every summer has its anthem. Two years ago everybody was bumping Rihanna's "Umbrella," while Katy Perry's "I Kissed a Girl" dominated the dog days of 2008. This year the competition is fierce, but one song is rising to become the defining jam of the season: Chopin's Piano Sonata No. 2, otherwise known as the funeral march.

Yes, it's a good summer for death! Over the past few weeks we've lost several cultural icons, including Michael Jackson, Billy Mays, and, this past Friday, Walter Cr0nkite. However, the most notable passing, at least in terms of method, was probably that of British conductor Sir Edward Downes, who on July 10 (my birthday!) committed assisted suicide along with his terminally ill wife.

Sir Downes was not terminally ill himself, although at 85 he couldn't have had a whole lot of time left. Since assisted suicide is illegal in England, he and his wife Joan had to travel to Switzerland to procure the services of Dignitas, a Swiss suicide clinic.

Obviously this event raises many moral and ethical questions. I'll leave those for others to ponder, but I would like to state that Dignitas probably isn't maximizing its profit-making potential. They provide a service which is unavailable in most of the world, and every human being on Earth is a potential customer. I don't know why Dignitas doesn't already have an aggressive marketing campaign in place, but in order to help them out I've written the script for a TV commercial they could air in the US:

EXT. CITY STREET--NIGHT

It is raining. A depressed, disheveled-looking MAN is walking down the sidewalk amidst a crowd of people.

NARRATOR: Are you unhappy?

INT. SUBWAY TRAIN--NIGHT

The man is standing in the middle of the crowded train, hanging on to a rail. He is soaking wet and stares off into space.

NARRATOR: Do you feel constantly alone?

INT. DANK APARTMENT--NIGHT

The man sits alone at a kitchen table eating a TV dinner. A yellowish light on the ceiling flickers on and off.

NARRATOR: Do you feel like things are never going to get better?

EXT. DIGNITAS CLINIC, ZURICH--DAY

The sun is shining and the Swiss flag is waving above the building. The GUY FROM THE ALLSTATE COMMERCIALS steps onscreen.

ALLSTATE GUY: Well, they probably aren't. But now, someone's here to help.

INT. DIGNITAS OFFICE--DAY

The man from before, who is now smiling, fills out forms and flirts with a PRETTY SWISS GIRL at the front desk.

ALLSTATE GUY: For over ten years, Dignitas has been helping everyday people end their miserable lives and pass on into sweet non-being. It's the choice of the rich and famous...

Fade through images of Socrates, Virginia Woolf and Kurt Cobain.

EXT. HEAVEN--DAY

SIR EDWARD DOWNES is standing on a cloud wearing a tuxedo and holding a glass of champagne.

DOWNES: Dignitas provided the solution I needed, and now I'm partying with Beethoven and Mozart!

BEETHOVEN and MOZART walk onto the cloud and start dancing. A subtitle at the bottom of the screen reads, "ACTORS' PORTRAYAL."

ALLSTATE GUY: ...And now it can be your choice too. Whether you're joining a loved one in the afterlife...

INT. CLINIC--DAY

The camera pans across several beds which are set up along the wall. The first pair of beds contains an ELDERLY COUPLE in hospital gowns who are holding hands and smiling at one another.

ALLSTATE GUY: ...Can't bear to live without a beloved pet...

The next pair of beds contains a MIDDLE-AGED MAN in a hospital gown and a confused-looking MANX in a cat carrier.

ALLSTATE GUY: ...Or are simply having a bad day...

The last bed contains the man from the beginning, who is smiling as a NURSE hands him an unmarked bottle.

EXT. DIGNITAS CLINIC--DAY

The Allstate guy is standing outside the clinic looking dignified.

ALLSTATE GUY: ...Dignitas is here to help.

EXT. HEAVEN--DAY

The man from the beginning frolics in a cloud with a group of BIKINI-CLAD ANGELS.

ALLSTATE GUY: Dignitas. Because to live is to suffer.

Fade to the Dignitas logo, a smiley face above a pair of crossbones.

END

I wanted to include some customer testimonials, but I guess that's not really an option. Still, this kind of exposure will really increase Dignitas's revenue stream. In time, they should be able to open franchises, or maybe even automate their services.

For now, though, it's enough to know that Chopin's sonata will remain the signature melody of the summer of 2009. Unless, of course, Lil Wayne releases something that gets even more play than "Lollipop." If that happens I might end up boarding a flight to Switzerland myself.

My Pitch for an Animated Kids' Movie

2009-07-21T17:09:00.002-04:00

This article originally appeared on Pegleg Spinners, 7/10/09.

We as humans generally like to believe that we are in control of our own lives, that we are the masters of our own destinies. Occasionally, however, we run into experiences that shatter that illusion. For me, sitting in a theater watching Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs was one of these experiences. If I truly had free will, I would never have allowed those 94 minutes to be taken away from me.

Still, the movie did get me thinking. For those of you haven't seen it (though, judging from the box office numbers, that won't be very many of you), the plot revolves around a woolly mammoth named Manny (Ray Romano), an expectant father who is anxiously settling into domestic life with his mate Ellie (Queen Latifah). Manny's best friend Diego, an aging sabre-tooth tiger with some sort of heart condition, feels excluded from Manny's newly tranquil lifestyle. Meanwhile, Manny and Diego's friend Sid the Sloth tries to adopt a few baby dinosaurs.

At some point during the film I realized that if these characters weren't all anthropomorphic prehistoric animals, I easily could've been watching an episode of Thirtysomething. And the Ice Age films aren't the only kids' movies that revolve around the problems of the middle-aged; you can look to the Night at the Museum and Shrek series for more examples of this trend. This is brilliant. Back in the day, screenwriters working on flicks for children had to actually assume a child-like perspective and come up with situations that children could identify with. Now, instead of doing all that work, writers just project their own mid-life insecurities into their scripts, and apparently the movies still make bank! So, being a film major, I figured I should try my hand at this new template.

Like this, but as a cartoon with Kevin James' voice. In 3D.

My film, Steppe By Steppe, centers around a talking water buffalo named Buffsy (Kevin James) who lives in a Tibetan grassland with his wife Claire (Cameron Diaz) and their two young calves. Buffsy is bored with his job at the grassland office (which will be like a human office but with grassland animals) and dissatisfied in his relationship with Claire, who often argues with him over his inability to pay their grassland bills.

One day, Buffsy is standing by the watering hole with his wisecracking pals Zack the Yak (Zach Galifianakis) and Leppy the Snow Leopard (Chris Rock) when he spies a hot young gazelle named Gazzy (Lindsay Lohan), who is new to the grassland. Although Buffsy is timid at first, he manages to strike up a conversation with Gazzy and is soon meeting with her regularly to graze.

Leppy tries to warn Buffsy about the dangers of infidelity, but is attacked by wolves in mid-sentence and devoured in a wacky slapstick sequence. Buffsy escalates his relationship with Gazzy until she finally agrees to a midnight tryst. However, Buffsy ends up being unable to perform and Gazzy prances away in scorn. When Buffsy returns home smelling of gazelle, Claire takes the calves and migrates north. A grassland doctor (an argali sheep played by Joe Lo Truglio) then tells Buffsy that his mating problem is a side effect of "horn cancer." Buffsy dies. (Obviously grassland animals wouldn't have cancer treatments. That would be ridiculous.)

Now, I know this may not sound like a movie kids would enjoy, but remember, the characters are talking animals. Also, we'll add in some fart jokes and a Jonas Brothers song or something. Plus it'll be in 3-D. Just trust me, this project is going to be huge. Have your people call my people. We'll do lunch. Ciao.

Wasted Resources (Pun Intended)

2009-07-07T00:18:00.005-04:00

This article originally appeared on Pegleg Spinners, 7/1/09.

I know I usually stick to pop-cultural stuff, but I read a New York Times editorial this morning (Yes, in the print version! Keep on truckin', old media!) that I felt I had to comment on. The editorial is called "Binge Drinking on Campus," and its basic gist is this: A new study indicates that ever since the drinking age was raised to 21, binge drinking has decreased among all 18- to 21-year-olds except college students, whose binge drinking remained consistent. Therefore, college administrations should be doing more to prevent underage drinking. This is a repudiation of the Amethyst Initiative, a petition signed by over 100 college presidents which basically advocates re-lowering the drinking age.

Now, I'm no fan of the Asher Roth college-is-all-about-getting-shitfaced-every-night school of thought, but as an American college student I really have to feel sorry for anyone tasked with reducing undergraduate boozing in the US. That's like asking college presidents to empty the ocean with a Solo cup. Young adults (like many regular adults) like drinking, and when you get a whole bunch of them together they really like drinking. How are school administrations supposed to stop them from doing so?

Seriously, though, this would kill you

The Times editorial suggests "better counseling or stronger bans on under-age drinking." First of all, students are less likely to seek counseling if they have to fear repercussions from the school or the police; I believe that's part of Amethyst's point. Students who are forced into counseling without any genuine desire to change their behavior will attend whatever sessions they're told to attend and then promptly forget the whole experience.

Part of this article was published as a letter to the editor in the Times. Since the Times demands exclusivity, that portion has been removed from this post, but you can find the letter here.

Finally, one possibly sophomoric question: Are we to assume that the New York Times editorial staff never drank in college?

Michael Jackson Rocked Ayacucho

2009-06-30T00:57:00.004-04:00

This article originally appeared on Pegleg Spinners, 6/26/09.

Like everone else, I want to talk about the King of Pop for a bit, because I have a personal story that I'm reminded of every time he's brought up.

Last summer I studied abroad in Peru, and for a few weeks I stayed with a host family that lived in the suburbs of Ayacucho, a small city located in the mountains. The family consisted of a married couple and their three young children (all very nice people, by the way). The parents were particularly proud to have an enclosed yard for the kids to play in, as that was an uncommon thing in the neighborhood.

Ayacucho

One night the family threw a birthday party for one of the boys, who was around ten years old. They invited a bunch of neighborhood kids over and set up a large inflatable screen in the front yard, along with a DVD projector and several rows of lawn chairs. The mother handed out boxes of popcorn and cups of chicha (a Peruvian juice, often made from corn), and everybody settled in for an evening screening of The Spiderwick Chronicles. Before the feature presentation, however, the father put on something unexpected: A DVD showcasing Michael Jackson's most famous music videos, back to back.

I don't know how notorious Jackson's legal and personal exploits are internationally, or whether the father was aware of the irony of showing Michael Jackson videos at a kids' party. I didn't really feel like bringing the subject up, either out of a sense of taboo or a lack of confidence in my Spanish skills. Either way, once the "Thriller" video began playing my mind shifted focus to the surrealism of the whole situation. I think every Yankee traveling abroad for the first time is at some point shocked by the omnipresence of US culture; for me, going to a movie theater in Lima and seeing The Dark Knight and Definitely Maybe on the marquee was a little like stepping onto the surface of Mars and finding a discarded Coke bottle on the ground. But what made the birthday party doubly absurd was that I myself had somehow never seen any of Jackson's videos, at least not all the way through. I, like the kids, was experiencing the videos for the first time.

And, as I discovered that night, Michael Jackson music videos are awesome. Everything about them is so beautifully energetic and playful: the music, the often-bizarre imagery, and, of course, Jackson's incredible dance moves. If you haven't seen any of the videos, I definitely suggest that you check them out, and at the highest quality possible--although if you can watch them against the backdrop of the Andes at sunset with a cup of chicha in your hand, so much the better.

I can't pretend to know how the kids felt about the videos; I didn't conduct interviews or anything. I can say that the DVD generally seemed to hold the children's attention, and that's no small feat. Besides, the very fact that the father chose to put Jackson's videos on shows how broad the King's appeal was. Whatever you might say about the man's personal life (and yeah, there's a lot to say about it), his music is one of those pop cultural monuments that can put a smile on the face of pretty much anyone. His songs were awesome in 1980s USA, they were awesome in 2000s Peru, and thirty years from now they'll still be awesome wherever you can find a stereo.

RIP.

"Beat It"

The Birds II: Land's End - Review

2009-06-23T00:27:00.003-04:00

This article originally appeared on Pegleg Spinners, 6/22/09.

Platinum Dunes, the production company that gave us the recent versions of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Amityville Horror and Friday the 13th, is having trouble in its attempt to remake Alfred Hitchcock's 1963 classic The Birds. Producers Brad Fuller and Andrew Form are understandably nervous about following in the footsteps of the Master, especially when the original film's titular villains have such a limited arsenal; as Fuller points out, "What do they do? They peck and poke... There's not a lot of variety as to what can happen." Good point. How is a horror movie supposed to be scary when nobody's intestines get splattered onto the ground?

While Fuller and Form ponder that mystery, us moviegoers might gain some perspective by examining another attempt to cash in on The Birds' success: the 1994 made-for-TV sequel, The Birds II: Land's End. I acquired a used VHS copy of the film (which isn't currently available on DVD) a few years ago at an awesomely grungy Boston record store, but even my deep-seated love of low-budget horror movies couldn't motivate me to watch the tape... Until now.

As you might expect, my hesitation was justified. Land's End is bad--poorly written, far from scary and (with a few exceptions) not quite silly enough to work as unintentional comedy. That's all to be expected from a film credited to "Alan Smithee," the pseudonym directors use when they believe their work has been so compromised that they no longer want their names attached to it. In this case, the name is standing in for Rick Rosenthal, a director familiar to me from his work on the Halloween franchise. That's right, The Birds II is so bad that the director of Halloween: Resurrection didn't want to be associated with it.

"Land's End," by the way, refers not to the clothing catalogue but to a fictional island vacation destination off the coast of New England. Our protagonists, a married couple named Ted and May Hocken, arrive there with their two young daughters at the outset of the film. They're looking forward to a summer of fun, relaxation and other things that don't involved getting murdered by birds. That last part will prove problematic, though not for a while, as this sequel spends almost an hour introducing its characters while only hinting at a possible killer-bird issue. The original did basically the same thing, but it boasted unconventional characters that were interesting to watch. The sequel's main players, on the other hand, are cartoonish clichés.

Brad Johnson really wants to know what this bird is looking at

For example, Ted (Brad Johnson) is a brooding alpha male who's still too fixated on the death of his young son (an event which is replayed in a dream/flashback) to focus on writing his thesis. His wife May (Chelsea Field) is a computer consultant who feels so neglected by Ted that she is tempted by the borderline-harrassment advances of her current client, Frank (James Naughton), a photographer living in Land's End. Ted and May's young daughters are your standard disaster-movie children, cute as buttons and dumb as rocks. Kid, there's a hawk swooping down at your face; you think you might want to move?

Besides the obvious bird attacks, Land's End has only two connections to the original film. One is the presence of Tippi Hedren, who played the original's protagonist but appears only briefly in this movie, and as a different character. The other link is a monologue delivered by the sequel's standard Crazy Old Man, who notes that a few decades ago birds went homicidal in a West Coast town called Bodega Bay. Ted's never heard of the incident. Apparently the audience is supposed to accept not only that the situation depicted in the original simply worked itself out (remember that creepy, ambiguous ending?), but also that an abrupt outbreak of hysteria within an entire class of animals, witnessed by hundreds and causing several deaths, never got any major media coverage. Perhaps the old man read about it in a "News of the Weird" column.

Anyway, birds start sporadically attacking the Hockens, so Ted and the geezer go to the mayor for help. Unfortunately the mayor seems to have learned all his lessons in municipal government from the movie Jaws, and refuses to do anything that would jeopardize the town's tourist industry. The birds, which are smart enough to take down power lines and strong enough to peck through wood and glass, escalate their operations (though, as Fuller said, they can't do much more than scratch faces and poke eyes).

This all leads to a climactic bird attack on a crowd of Land's Enders. Remember how I said most of this movie isn't silly enough to be funny? The last scene is the exception, featuring so many poor blue-screen effects and awkward close-ups that it might as well be a Monty Python sketch. I've posted part of the scene below, but be forewarned that this clip includes lots of fake blood and was filmed off of a TV screen. Watch at your own risk.

Awesome. Anyway, after that the movie trails off into a non-ending even less satisfying than that of its predecessor, and my brain began the task of forgetting the whole thing. Alan Smithee wasn't able to recapture a single bit of the original film's magic, and I doubt that the guys at Platinum Dunes can either. On the other hand, they can probably do better than this.

Dr. Dre's "Detox": The First Review!

2009-06-16T01:22:00.002-04:00

[This article appeared originally on Pegleg Spinners, 6/12/09.]

Hip hop heads, prepare to be jealous: I, Matt Hoffman, have just come into possession of the full version of Dr. Dre's long-awaited magnum opus, Detox. I'm not going to say how I obtained this recording, though I will suggest to Dre that he should change his tindeck.com password to something less obvious. (Just because you spell "chronic" with a K, doesn't mean you're fooling anyone.) I'm also not going to leak the album to the internet, as I have too much respect for the Dr.'s work to give his music away before the official release date. (Plus I'm afraid he'd have me killed.) What I will do, though, is give you loyal Pegleg Spinners readers an overview of what to expect from this rap giant's latest LP.

First of all, Detox's production is, as one would expect, immaculate. The beats range from synth-laden originals to incredibly clever samples--for example, who would've thought that the Jeopardy! theme could be used as a bangin' backing track for a song called "L.A. Skullf***"? Dr. Dre, that's who. The album's instrumentals are so crisp that even when they are played through the best stereo systems on the market, the human ear cannot fully do them justice. For instance, "Spin That S***" sounded to me like three minutes and seventeen seconds of silence, but something must have been going on because while it was playing, my pet terrier got up on its hind legs and started doing the Crip Walk.

Please don't hurt me

Dre's vocals, however, leave something to be desired. Sure, he's got a classic hip-hop voice, and he can still keep up with a rhythm, but the fact that his lyrics are ghostwritten is at times painfully obvious. Take a look at this line that he spits on "Blazin' It Up":

"See us rollin', sweet ride/We don't run, we fly

Chronic gettin' me high/'Cause my name is T.I."

Call me paranoid, but that doesn't sound like Dre's flow to me. And don't get me started on the second verse of "1 Ho, 2 Ho," which seems to be taken verbatim from the soundtrack of High School Musical.

Still, even if Dre's rhymes ain't what they used to be, the album is chock full of notable guest performers. These include Eminem, Snoop Dogg, 50 Cent, Nas, the Wu-Tang Clan, MC Hammer, Grandmaster Flash and the guy from the Montgomery flea market (to name just a few). Lil Wayne gets a track all to himself and spends every verse asleep, his snores Auto-Tuned to the melody of "Hot Cross Buns." The man is a genius.

One complaint I did have with this album was that there was a lot of product placement on it. I thought Dre's Dr. Pepper endorsement deal was bad, but it's small potatoes compared to tracks like "So Easy a Motherf***ing Caveman Could Do It" and "Allstate: You're In Good Hands, B****." Even the skits just consist of Dre talking about how much he loves the ShamWow.

All in all, though, Detox is a really great record, so great that I'd award it the highest honor attainable by modern music: I might actually pay for it when it comes out. Until then, I'll keep hacking Dre's accounts. I'll let you know when I find some tracks from Detox 2.

Wilco (The Album): (Not) A Review

2009-06-09T10:43:00.002-04:00

I have come to realize that I just do not have enough time these days to write posts for both Pegleg Spinners and this blog, especially when the two blogs' schedules often force me to post two days in a row. Therefore, from now on all posts on this blog will be posts which have already appeared on PLS. I know that's kind of lame, but the only way I could make time for two blogs would be to start putting up half-assed posts, and that's not good for anybody. (And yes, shocking as it may seem, most of my posts up to this point have been whole-assed.) Because of its different schedule, PLS will occasionally feature articles which will not appear on this blog, and I would definitely encourage you to follow me on that site.

Anyway, here's the content, which can also be found here.

Wilco (The Album): (Not) A Review

You know Wilco, right? Best American rock band working today? Recorded the modern classic Yankee Hotel Foxtrot? Don't tell me you haven't heard of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot.

Sigh... Uh, maybe you've seen their Volkswagen commercials?

Welcome to the 21st century, era of the niche market, in which there is no Greatest Band in the World, no record so irresistible that its success defies categorization by generation, race or class. Why would we need such things when we have headphones? You don't have to like my music, and I don't have to like yours. Horny teenagers can have their Souljah Boy. Nostalgic Southerners can have their--I don't know, Big & Rich? And I, as an educated (well, getting there anyway) white liberal, have my Wilco.

Perhaps you, too, are an educated white liberal, or perhaps you aren't but have nevertheless become familiar with Wilco through some freak accident. If so, I don't need to lay out the Wilco mythology for you. You already know about the alt-country roots, the expansion into orchestral pop and post-rock sonic experiments, the triumphant battle with the record label that just didn't get it, and the recent return to more conventional rock songwriting. In fact, you've had ample time since Wilco (The Album) leaked in May to scour the internet for pre-release reviews from commentators more qualified than I. If you want, you can run a quick Google search right now, or you can just rely on my summary: Wilco (The Album) is unsurprising and well-executed. It echoes the serenity of Sky Blue Sky without the advantage of that album's place in the group's narrative arc. It is the sound of a band which is comfortable with its own identity and mired in AM-radio pap. Jeff Tweedy is a genius and Jay Bennett was really the talented one.

You?

Got all that? Good. This will be a topic of conversation among people you know.

Unless, that is, you aren't an educated white liberal, or you are but for some reason have missed out on the Greatest Band of Your Demographic. In that case, we have a lot of catching up to do. Here, listen to this song. You like it? Look at this: Rolling Stone calls Yankee Hotel Foxtrot a "masterpiece"! Now don't you feel like you've been missing out? Don't you just want to listen to the entire Wilco discography? Make sure you go in order; if you start with Wilco (The Album), you might be fooled into thinking that "You Never Know" is a decent song rather than a symbol of Tweedy's shift from experimentation to Tom Petty-style throwbacks. Just start with A.M. for now. I'll call at regular intervals to check on your progress.

Once you're done with that, you can help me spread the word! We'll crash house parties, cut the stereos off in the middle of "Crank That" and put on "Hell Is Chrome" in its place. We'll hijack the Nashville airwaves and broadcast the Mermaid Avenue CDs on repeat, 24/7. We'll defeat anyone who refuses to recognize the superiority of our subculture! We'll prove that we are not just a Long Tail--we are the longest tail of them all!

Or maybe we'll just put more Wilco songs in commercials. That might be easier.

Hollywood Leading Men Who Started Out In Terrible Horror Movies: Paul Rudd

2009-06-02T11:34:00.007-04:00

http://www.mania.com/hollywood-leading-men-started-out-cheesy-horror-movies_article_116234.html

BIG ANNOUNCEMENT: The Superblog Cometh

2009-05-26T11:39:00.006-04:00

It'll be like this, except less terrifying

Collaboration has long been a major fuel of the creative process, from Abbott and Costello to Lennon and McCartney. I am proud to announce that this Friday I will be joining forces with my friend and fellow blogger Sam Greenberg to bring the world a blog the likes of which have never been seen. Specifically, a blog which shares free-form thoughts about pop culture- and sports-related topics. No one has ever done anything like that, right? And just in case you were wondering, I do plan on continuing this blog as well, assuming that double duty isn't too taxing on my summer leisure.

In case you're unfamiliar with Sam's work, he actually has three now-defunct blogs which showcase his work.
1. His radio show blog
2. His UConn basketball blog
3. And, of course, his blog about everything he hates
I hope you get the chance to check out those sites and get a taste of Sam's writing.

I would reveal the name and URL of our upcoming blog, but it is still under construction and we're trying to keep its location under wraps. So here's the deal: Once the Unnamed Mystery Blog premieres on Friday, I'll add a comment on this post stating its name and location. (Clearly I won't be able to add a whole new post. This is Super Tuesdays, dammit.)

The Unnamed Mystery Blog will never be as good in real life as it is in your imagination

Mark your calendars. The world you know doesn't end on December 21, 2012--it ends on May 29, 2009, when the Age of the Superblog begins.

An Apology to Rhys Darby

2009-05-19T00:24:00.003-04:00

Don't look at me like that

Those of you who are familiar with Rhys Darby probably know him from his role as Murray Hewitt, the hapless manager on HBO's Flight of the Conchords. While that gig has begun to land him increasingly prominent acting roles in feature films, I know first-hand that he is also a hilarious stand-up comedian. So I felt pretty guilty when I found a New Zealand Herald article online which described how Darby recently lashed out at New Zealand comedy critics, saying that their reviews tend to give away too many of the jokes in comedians' acts. Darby feels that the jokes are being ruined for future audiences, and stated that Kiwi critics probably make this mistake because "live comedy hasn't been around as long in NZ so we're still getting to grips with how to review it, I guess."

Why did this make me feel guilty? Because Darby made these statements shortly after I posted this review of Flight of the Conchords's live show at Boston University. In case you don't remember that article or (God forbid) didn't read it, I'll just tell you that it ends with a song-by-song sampling of the concert's funniest lyrics.

The only conclusion I can draw is that Darby is an avid reader of my blog. He must have directed his criticism at New Zealand writers in order to protect my feelings, or to avoid an unpleasant public "beef" with me. I appreciate the gesture, Rhys, and I assure you that your message has been received. All future standup comedy reviews on Super Tuesdays will maintain a near-sacred respect for the reviewees' material, or "bits," assuming that I ever actually do another standup review.

By the way, the Herald article can be found here, but you don't really need to read it since I already repeated all the important parts.

New Eminem Album: It's... Pretty Good

2009-05-12T02:32:00.006-04:00

It must've taken a long time to arrange all those pills like that

“There’s really nothing else to say, I, I can’t explain it”
--Eminem, “My Dad’s Gone Crazy”

It was right there in the chorus of The Eminem Show’s final song, for anyone who cared to listen: Eminem freely admitting that he had shot his creative wad. With his first two albums he had both articulated his warped worldview and achieved massive mainstream success; after that, he coasted on fumes through Show, committed career/literal suicide on 2004’s dreadful Encore, and finally disappeared into reclusion.

Of course, the world’s best-selling rapper wasn’t going to stay in retirement forever. The only question was whether or not he’d have anything worthwhile to say when he finally made his comeback.

And on that count, the disappointing news about Relapse (which leaked to the internet this past Friday) is that, as the title suggests, it’s mainly a rehash of Eminem’s old Slim Shady persona. Sure, the album is supposedly centered around Mr. Mathers’s prescription drug addiction, but only a few songs address that situation in detail. (And it’s not like Eminem hasn’t rapped about drugs before anyway.) Rather, most of the lyrics are standard Shady shtick: Murder, celebrity-bashing, bodily fluids. Rape figures more prominently than ever before, and homophobia, which Em more or less abandoned after his duet with Elton John, is back in abundance. It’s all even more exaggerated and offensive than it was before, and feels even less justified. Em used to be mad at the world because he was poor. Then he was mad at the world because he was misunderstood. What reason does he have to be mad at the world now, other than the fact that his anger seems to sell CDs?

The good news, though, is that on some of Relapse’s songs, Slim Shady is actually fun again. Eminem may not have many new ideas, but he does sound hungry; his lyrics are still intricately crafted, and his flow has gotten even more slippery. Rhyme schemes melt into each other, disappear, pop up again when least expected. “Now here’s a plateful of painkillers, now just wait ‘til I crush the Valium and put it in your potatoes!”

In fact, Eminem’s flow is so consistent that the production is mainly what determines which songs work and which don’t. Dr. Dre produced the whole album (except for “Beautiful”), and unfortunately, he ain’t what he used to be. Too often the beats here get bogged down with strings and wailing backing vocals. Still, the beats that do work (for example, “My Mom,” “Insane,” or “Old Times Sake”) work really, really well.

Em does try getting serious for two songs, “Déjà Vu” and “Beautiful.” “Déjà Vu” is decent, breaking from the Slim Shady persona but retaining a dark sense of humor to describe Em’s prescription drug addiction. “Beautiful,” on the other hand, is a six-and-a-half-minute non sequitur with a chorus that finds Em singing, “Don’t let ‘em say you ain’t beautiful.” Uh, you do remember that you just threatened to rape the Pussycat Dolls, right? And you do know that in a few tracks you’ll use the word “faggoty” three times in a row? Just checking.

Still, inconsistencies aside, this is an album that people (with strong stomachs) will actually enjoy listening to, and that automatically puts it above Encore. It isn’t amazing as a whole, but its best tracks measure up to the work Em was doing at his peak, and that’s saying something. I’d expect the same level of quality from the upcoming Relapse 2, since it was recorded during the same sessions, but hey, maybe Em’s just warming up. Maybe his next album after R2 will be technically amazing and coherently relevant!

Or maybe he’ll just fall off again. I don’t know. Anyway, here’s my track-by-track breakdown.

1. “Dr. West”—Dominic West is awesome. Also, this skit is nicely reminiscent of the intro to Eminem’s pre-fame Slim Shady EP.
2. “3 AM”—Everyone understands that this song is a series of jokes, right? Rolling Stone called it “deadly serious,” and the music video seems to really want to be scary, but for God’s sakes, he’s talking about about jerking off to Hannah Montana.
3. “My Mom”—My current favorite song on the album. The flow actually gives me a rush just from listening to it.
4. “Insane”—A song about a young Marshall Mathers getting repeatedly raped by his stepfather. Are victims of sexual abuse offended by this?
5. “Bagpipes From Baghdad”—Not about the war in Iraq; really just an excuse to use funny accents. Nice ironic Auto-Tune, though.
6. “Hello”—Meh. The beat isn’t silly enough.
7. “Tonya (Skit)”—“What has it been, five songs? I guess we should put a skit in here.”
8. “Same Song & Dance”—Possibly the album’s worst song. The lyrics are pointless and repulsive stories of Shady kidnapping and murdering starlets, and the beat is too morose to even allow any black humor to work.
9. “We Made You”—I’ve already talked about this one, but suffice to say: Good beat, good flow, dumb content. Why was this the comeback single?
10. “Medicine Ball”—General Slim Shady antics, but pretty funny, especially when Em raps as Christopher Reeves.
11. “Paul (Skit)”—Paul is afraid people may find Eminem’s new album offensive.
12. “Stay Wide Awake”—What’s up with all the rape? Nothing all that interesting about this one, although the repeated assertion that sharp objects are more fun than guns (the weapon of choice for most actual serial killers) is a nice jab at Hollywood slasher movies.
13. “Old Times Sake (Ft. Dr. Dre)”—Hmm, you think Em ghostwrote Dre’s verses? Nice beat, though.
14. “Must Be The Ganja”—Forgettable.
15. “Mr. Mathers”—Another skit, this one featuring paramedics arriving at the scene of Em’s overdose.
16. “Déjà Vu”—I can see substance abuse counselors playing this for support groups. I mean that as a compliment.
17. “Beautiful”—Again, why is this song here? The country-rock verse that opens and closes the track is so corny that it almost sounds like something out of South Park.
18. “Crack A Bottle (Feat. Dr. Dre & 50 Cent)”—Dumb lyrics, but the beat is nice.
19. “Steve Berman (Skit)”—Amusing.
20. “Underground/Ken Kaniff”—The opening line made me laugh out loud. Beyond that, the chorus’s rhythm is really odd, but the verses are badass. (Although “Hit a fag with onions/Then split a bag of Funyuns” has to be one of the dumbest lines ever.) And you know what to expect from a Ken Kaniff skit.

A Short Screenplay About Lil Wayne

2009-05-05T09:56:00.002-04:00

Three styrofoam cups?! He's out of control

I wrote this sketch maybe a month or so ago, and I'm beginning to doubt that it will actually be filmed while it's still relevant, so I figured I'd share it with my loyal readership. I mean, it's finals week; it's not like I was going to write anything new.

Here's the script:

INT. CAR—DAY

BOB is driving down the road, alone in his car. He switches on the radio.

A Kanye West song comes on. Bob nods along to the beat.

LIL WAYNE’s voice appears on the track. Bob frowns and changes the station.

A Jay-Z song comes on. Bob once again nods along with it.

Lil Wayne’s voice appears again. Bob frowns and changes the station again.

“American Pie” comes on. Bob starts nodding along.

Lil Wayne’s voice appears.

LIL WAYNE
(rapping in a raspy voice)
American Pie like Jason Biggs, I’m big like this bottle so—

Bob looks disturbed and quickly changes the station.

A NEWSCASTER’s voice comes on. Bob relaxes.

NEWSCASTER
--is committed to sending more troops into Afghanistan. Only time will tell if this improves America’s image overseas. Now for domestic news, here’s our Washington correspondent, Lil Wayne.

LIL WAYNE
(not rapping but still raspy-voiced)
Thank you, David! This week Congressional Republicans announced their opposition—

Bob switches off the radio and stares ahead, wide-eyed and angry.

Lil Wayne pops up from behind Bob’s seat.

LIL WAYNE
Young Carter!

Bob screams and drives his car off of a cliff.

END

Short Film: "The Reaper"

2009-04-28T17:02:00.003-04:00

Look, classes are ending, assignments are due, I'm busy. Sorry. There will be more real content in the future. In the meantime, you still might enjoy this short film I produced a few months ago. (And you might recognize the protagonist from an earlier short I posted.)

Flight of the Conchords: Live at BU!

2009-04-21T00:47:00.016-04:00

I've been affectionately critical of the Flight of the Conchords HBO show, but I've always had nothing but admiration for their live performances. That admiration was reinforced by their appearance at Agganis Arena, the stadium-size venue at my home school of Boston University [insert reference to Terriers hockey here], so much so that I may end up sounding like Mel in this post. I apologize in advance.

The Conchords took the stage in charmingly awful robot costumes (to perform "Too Many Dicks On The Dance Floor" rather than "Robots," oddly enough), then ditched the Daft Punk getup and settled down for the rest of the set. They both played acoustic guitar for many of the songs, but also included a variety of other instruments, such as a drum kit, keyboards and a glockenspiel.

Jemaine rocks the glock

About a third of the way through the show, starting with the song "Jenny," Bret and Jemaine were joined onstage by "the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra," a.k.a. a cellist named Nigel. Nigel remained onstage for the rest of the concert, providing a nice, unobstrusive musical accompaniment.

The New Zealand Symphony Orchestra

The set list covered a nice range of Conchords material, from electronic club bangers to bouncy acoustic ditties. It generally avoided songs based heavily in the plot of the TV show and included a few numbers which have never been on the show at all, including one of my personal favorites, "Bus Driver Song." (Which almost makes up for that song's absence in the "New Zealand Town" episode... Almost.) The Conchords even managed to perform one song I had never heard before, "The Ballad of Stana," about an incredibly evil cowboy who meets a clone of himself. Very long and very weird. I loved it. I tried to get a video clip of it (in blatant violation of the show's camera policies), but the audio quality came out nasty, so if you're interested, there's a pretty crisp version of the song (being played in DC) here.

However, even the songs I had heard a million times before were kept fresh by the Conchords' nimble, improvisational performance style. The band never plays a song the same way twice--rather, they'll add brilliantly awkward quips into the lyrics, or even switch up the instrumental arrangements. And while most bands drop witty banter into the spaces between songs, Bret and Jemaine take the concept to a whole new level, discussing human pyramids, why whales don't use cell phones, and possible nicknames for the city they happen to be in. ("Boston Space"? "Boston Powers"? Bret insisted on "Boston City.")

And the icing on this concert's cake was the fact that the audio was mixed so well that I could almost always understand what the Conchords were saying. It's a quality one takes for granted, but the last time I saw the band live (at the Gramercy in New York--another great show notwithstanding this complaint) I got lost in a vocal muddle during any song I wasn't familiar with. Not so this time.

Eugene Mirman, the landlord on the HBO show, opened the show with enjoyable standup about Linens 'N Things, Delta Airlines and Detroit. ("Detroit has bears returning to the city. When your city is being gentrified by bears, that's a very poor city.")

Mirman was followed by Kristen Schaal, TV's Mel, who also did a good job. This picture isn't all that clear, but she was wearing glittering golden pants which she claimed to have "killed a genie" for.

Schaal ended her set by putting on costumes and assuming a few offbeat characters, such as a used mattress which wondered, "If you sent a werewolf to the moon, would he be a werewolf permanently?"

And here's the Conchords' set list for the evening. Underneath a few of the song titles I've included choice examples of improvisationary additions to the lyrics.

1. "Too Many Dicks On The Dance Floor"
2. "Hurt Feelings"
3. "The Ballad Of Stana"
--What would you do if you came face to face with yourself?... You'd become lovers, touching one another the way that you once touched yourself, but without the guilt, and without that feeling of, "I should probably be doing some work."
4. "Carol Brown"
5. "The Most Beautiful Girl (In The Room)"
--You could read the news on Fox.
6. "Jenny"
--Jemaine: It was something like but not necessarily Schindler's List.
Bret: It was Weekend at Bernie's Part 2.
Jemaine: I knew it was about ways different people deal with death.
7. "Business Time"
--When it's with me you only need about two minutes, 'cause I'm so intense. It's like love concentrate. It's like Tang.
8. "Mutha'uckas"
9. "Think About It"
--If you've got AIDS, think about what you did before you got AIDS and then don't do that again.
10. "Bowie"
11. "We're Both In Love With A Sexy Lady"
12. "Sugalumps"
Encore:
13. "Demon Woman"
14. "Bus Driver Song"
15. "If You're Into It"

There are plenty of clips of the concert floating around YouTube, but here's a brief sample:

Good on ya, mates.

Short Film: "Red Light Green Light"

2009-04-14T01:46:00.005-04:00

Yes, once again I am too busy/lazy to write a real post. Instead, here's another short film I produced last semester. Hope you like it!

New Eminem Single: It Sucks!

2009-04-07T20:12:00.011-04:00

Yes, this is my second Eminem-related article in two weeks. Sorry.

If you’ve been following this blog for a while (like, since the first post), then you know I’m a big Eminem fan. I’ve even spread my adoration to other blogs. I even got the underground shit that he did with Skam. So you can imagine the anticipation I felt for this morning’s premiere of “We Made You,” the first single from Slim’s first album in five years.

Anticipation and anxiety, that is. Despite a few decent songs, 2004’s Encore was a solidly awful record, the central theme of which being that Eminem had absolutely nothing left to say. (Seriously, one of the songs ends with the line, “I just did a whole song and I didn’t say shit.”) Still, it’s been five years, right? That should be enough time to get an artist’s creative juices flowing again.

Well, here’s the video:

Eminem - New Music - More Music Videos

So yeah.

Let’s start out with the positive: This is some seriously nice flow. Eminem’s rhyming ability was never really in question, but still, in the era of Lil Wayne, it’s nice to have a working rapper who will go to the trouble of constructing lines like “Look at all the massive masses in the stands/Shady, man, no, don’t massacre the fans.” Internal rhyme, alliteration, assonance—these are the things that made Em great on a technical level, and they’re all here in abundance.

I was going to name this post “New Eminem Single: It’s… Okay…” on the basis of the wordplay alone, but the more I listen to the song, the more disappointing it seems. First of all, it’s easy to get distracted from the flow when every word is delivered in the inexplicable, irritating accent that first appeared on Encore. And while the beat isn’t terrible, one sort of expects better from Dr. Dre.

But the main problem with this song is the utter shallowness of the subject matter. The sole purpose of the lyrics is to make fun of washed-up celebrities and reality-TV stars. Celeb-bashing was a part of Em’s act from the very beginning, but even the silly first singles used to mix personal confessions and social commentary with the schoolyard insults. And besides, Britney Spears and N*Sync were genuinely popular back in the day, so when Eminem made fun of them, it actually meant something. Bret Michaels and Lindsay Lohan, on the other hand, are basically famous for the sole purpose of being made fun of, so “We Made You” is about as insightful and caustic as an episode of The Soup. The Sarah Palin gag is obvious and a few months past relevance, but at least it might actually offend someone, somewhere. MTV is already trying to grab publicity through the supposed controversy inherent in Eminem’s lyrics, but I doubt anyone will care about this song enough to get mad at it.

I still want to believe that Relapse can be good, but at this point it seems unlikely. Sorry, Marshall. It’s because we love you that we expect so much of you.

UPDATE: Remember how I said that the Sarah Palin reference "might... offend someone, somewhere"? Apparently that someone is Bill O'Reilly, who claimed that the lack of a general outcry against the Palin parody in "We Made You" proves that the liberal media is hypocritically willing to accept misogyny as long as it's directed towards a conservative politician.

O'Reilly says too many stupid things in this video for me to go through them all, but to begin with, perhaps the reason that liberal groups aren't rising in protest against this song is not because they're brainwashed Democrat loyalists (party cohesion being a well-known liberal characteristic, of course) but because the song's just dumb, and not worth commenting on. Now, I could make fun of O'Reilly for inadvertently helping Eminem, since this type of "controversy" has always been the rapper's best source of publicity. But that would assume that O'Reilly actually believes in or cares about the issue he's bringing up, and isn't just making a mountain out of a molehill to boost his own ratings.

Also, Eminem has threatened to rip Hillary Clinton's tonsils out in "Role Model" and screamed "Fuck you, Tipper Gore!" in "White America." So he's at least a non-partisan misogynist.

2ND UPDATE: Why is this type so small? Fuck you, Blogger!

The Adventures of the Grand Old Party on the Wheels of Steele

2009-03-31T01:10:00.010-04:00

Wheels not pictured

In case y’all ain’t heard, back in February Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele said he wanted to expand the GOP’s principles into “urban-suburban hip-hop settings.” Now, some among you may point out that the Republican and rap communities are total opposites in terms of culture, geography, ideology, racial makeup and wardrobe, and that incorporating a rap culture into the elephants’ “tent” would be like Def Jam signing Mitt Romney. But the two groups may have more in common than meets the eye. Let’s check out a few sample rap lyrics.

“I’m leaning on any n***** intervening with the sound of my money machining”
-Jay-Z, “Can’t Knock the Hustle”

Mr. Z is clearly advocating a laissez-faire economic policy. He believes that the government (referred to here as “any n*****”) would only cause harm by interfering with private enterprise. It’s a subject close to Jay’s heart, as he spends much of his debut album Reasonable Doubt discussing a locally-owned business he operated before entering the world of music. (The lyrics are somewhat vague; perhaps it was a pharmacy?)

“Make fun of gay clubs, men who wear make-up”
-Eminem, “Who Knew”

Eminem believes strongly in the sanctity of love between a man and a woman, as exemplified by the tender relationship he has maintained with his wife Kim. He also believes that those who live openly gay lifestyles set an inappropriate example for America’s children, and exposing children to inappropriate subjects is the last thing Mr. Slim Shady would want.

“As long as I got a Baretta, n*****, I’m down for whatever”
-Dr. Dre, “Big Ego’s”

Dre is delivering a somewhat indirect criticism of gun control advocates (referred to here as “n*****”) and implicitly invoking his Second Amendment right to bear arms. If he were not allowed to have a Baretta, he explains, he would not be down for whatever, with “whatever” possibly referring to loyalty to the federal government. The Dr. is also a strong proponent of tort reform.

“See now I take trips to Baghdad, dummy wow/
Use a stack of chips to count Arab money now”
-Busta Rhymes, “Arab Money”

This is a defense of the Bush administration’s decision to invade Iraq. Busta, who may be angling for a seat in the Office of Management and Budget, argues that the war will eventually pay for itself in the form of a more stabilized Middle East. “Dummy” is widely believed to refer to Michael Moore, instigating a “beef” similar to that between 50 Cent and Errol Morris.

“I’m rare, like Mr. Clean with hair”
-Lil Wayne, “Phone Home”

This has nothing to do with Republican ideology, but Lil Wayne insisted that he be “featured” in this article somehow.

“Now watch me you (Crank that Soulja Boy)”
-Soulja Boy Tell ‘Em, “Crank That”

Soulja Boy is questioning the existence of global warming.

Steele is really onto something here! Now if the GOP can just win the allegiance of Goth kids and the remaining members of the Green Party, the 2012 election will be all locked up.

P. S. I’m so proud of coming up with this post’s title, even though I know I should be ashamed.

Flight of the Conchords Series (?) Review

2009-03-24T23:06:00.007-04:00

The Flight of the Conchords episode that aired this past Sunday night was the last of the second season, and possibly the last of the entire series, since no announcement has been made that the show will be returning. If you haven’t seen the episode, I’ll just tell you now: No, they did not do "Bus Driver Song."

Disappointing, I know. And although a lot of people may disagree with me on this, I always found the show as a whole a little disappointing.

Allow me to explain. Let me take you back to the fall of 2005, when I was a high school senior leaving a Stephen Lynch concert. My friends and I were all riding in one car, and I heard the guy in the passenger seat say that he liked Lynch, but that he thought Flight of the Conchords was better.

“Who’s Flight of the Concordes?” I asked, inaudibly misspelling the name in my mind.

My friends told me that Flight was a comedy band they had found a video of on OnDemand, promised to show me the video sometime soon, and then spent the rest of the ride discussing who was funnier, the longer-haired guy or the guy with the glasses. A few days later they showed me the video, and I, like them, was hooked.

The video my friends were talking about was the Conchords’ half-hour appearance on HBO’s stand-up showcase One Night Stand. If you haven’t seen it, it’s available in bits and pieces on this guy’s YouTube profile (between the obscene amounts of Season 1 clips and the obscene amounts of Season 2 clips). You really should check it out, because in terms of pitch-perfect, laugh-out-loud musical comedy, the One Night Stand special is utter perfection. My friends and I watched it over and over, scoured the internet for other Conchord tracks, taught ourselves the guitar chords to "Jenny," quoted the songs constantly, adopted "Business Time" as the motto of our swim team, and went to see the band play live in New York. Seriously, we were hooked, and I don’t think we were the only ones.

Utter perfection

So when the TV show premiered, a year and a half after that Stephen Lynch concert, we all gathered together to watch. And don’t get me wrong, we enjoyed the show. We watched all the rest of the episodes until we had to go back to our respective colleges, at which point I hunted down the episodes I missed online. But I never felt like the show quite fulfilled the potential shown in the One Night Stand special, and there were a few reasons why.

First, and most importantly, the central storyline was too mundane. The Conchords’ best songs rely on imagination, either in the form of goofily exaggerated fantasy worlds ("Bowie," "Albi the Racist Dragon") or almost-literary casts of awkward characters (“Business Time,” “Jenny,” “Bus Driver Song”). In short, the best Conchord songs tell fascinating stories. Yet, somehow, Flight of the Conchords The TV Show revolved around oddball roommates living in the city, possibly the most clichéd sitcom setup in existence. And beyond being dull, the setup made it nearly impossible to gracefully incorporate the band’s existing repertoire. The show’s writers had two choices: Shoehorn in pre-existing songs, plot be damned (think "Mermaids"), or quickly crank out new songs that fit the story. The latter technique became especially prevalent in Season 2, and sometimes it worked ("Carol Brown"), but a lot of times it didn’t ("We're Both In Love With a Sexy Lady," "Stay Cool," etc.).

This, on the other hand, is awesome

Second, while I might be alone on this, I always found the show to be overly self-deprecating. I suspect that executive producer James Bobin was partly responsible for this, since, as series director on Da Ali G Show, he would’ve been familiar with the painfully-awkward style of humor featured on Ali G, The Office, Curb Your Enthusiasm, and countless other sitcoms since the rise of Ricky Gervais. I have nothing against that style, but I felt like it clashed with that of the Conchords. I wanted to like the show’s characters, at least a little, and instead I felt like I was always having their pathetic-ness rubbed in my face.

Even given these issues, the show had plenty of great moments, and that’s pretty impressive. I’m glad the Conchords got the large-scale recognition they deserve, and I’ll admit that I don’t have any better ideas as to how their humor could’ve been translated to television. Still, if this does turn out to have been the final season, I don’t think I’ll be sorry. The band would be free to pursue other projects, and I, for one, am curious as to what those projects might be.

But I can’t believe they didn’t do “Bus Driver Song.”

They had a bus and everything! What the fuck!

Ways to Stop Wars

2009-03-17T20:06:00.003-04:00

I was cleaning out my closet over spring break, something I don't think I've done since my family moved into our current house over ten years ago. Some of the stuff I found dated back even further than that, like preschool behavior reports, barely recognizable drawings scrawled on construction paper, and a list of "Ways to Stop Wars" written in Sharpie on two pieces of scrap paper which had been taped together. The handwriting on the paper was neater than my handwriting is now, so I assume I dictated the list to my mom. Here's the transcript:

Ways to Stop Wars

Plan 1 – Everybody stop shooting guns & sit down & talk about if there is different way to handle this

Plan 2 – Surround people who are fighting and not let them go anywhere else until they stop the war

Plan 3 – Throw buckets of water on people who are fighting war. Don’t stop until they stop the war.

Plan 4 – Sit down in the middle of people fighting and don’t leave until they stop fighting.

Plan 5 – Throw buckets of paint on people & don’t stop until people stop the war.

Are you listening, Mr. President?

The "Friday the 13th" Movies: From Worst to Best

2009-03-10T01:32:00.016-04:00

In case you haven't noticed, this Friday is going to be 2009's second consecutive Friday the 13th, which means that for the second month in a row I get to write a post about the Friday the 13th film series! Last month I whined about the remake and discussed Jason Voorhees' cultural omnipresence. This week I'm going to rank the first eight films in the franchise, counting down from worst to best, which should hopefully give you a sense of what I find appealing about this often-scorned series.

I've excluded the New Line films (Jason Goes to Hell, Jason X and Freddy Vs. Jason) because they're aesthetically and titularly separate from the 1980s Paramount films, which are the real basis for the Friday the 13th legacy. I've also excluded this year's remake because, as I explained last month, I haven't seen it.

Here's my list:

8. Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives (1986)

This film edges towards being a comedy, then loses confidence and tries to go back to being horror, only to find that it's locked the door behind itself. A lot of people say this is their favorite Friday movie due to its sense of humor, and there are a lot of genuinely funny moments, such as when a pre-pubescent camper is glimpsed reading Jean-Paul Sartre's No Exit in bed. The problem is that writer/director Tom McLoughlin doesn't provide any scares or even a scary atmosphere, and he wasn't allowed to make a full-on spoof. Once the laughs trail off halfway through, the film has nothing to offer.

7. Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989)

Look, Jason's cool and all, but Crystal Lake is the real star of the Friday the 13th series. A summer camp is a brilliant setting for a horror movie because it's so inviting during the day, yet so creepy and isolated after the sun goes down. Jason is basically a complement to his environment, a white-faced boogeyman to be glimpsed through cabin windows or behind distant trees. Jason Takes Manhattan relocates him, first to a cruise ship and eventually to New York, and in doing so strips him of his significance.

6. Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood (1988)

Director John Carl Buechler also worked on the special effects, and it shows. This movie is so in love with its Jason costume (which is admittedly impressive) that it feels the need to show it off in every shot, robbing the killer of any mystery. Also, the psychic subplot is kinda ridiculous, even for this series. Still, The New Blood is visually grittier and more atmospheric than the four entries preceding it, which earns it several points in my book.

5. Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter (1984)

Despite the popular view of the series, no Friday the 13th film has ever included both camp counselors and a hockey mask (okay, except for VI, but that one sucks). The Final Chapter, like several other entries, replaces the counselors with vacationing teens. Besides that, though, this is pretty much what people think of when they think of a Jason movie, which is probably why this is a fan favorite. My problem with it, though, is that it never really meshes its teenagers' subplots with the whole Jason angle until the last twenty minutes or so. There's no feeling of dread, so the whole experience is like watching an American Pie sequel and suddenly seeing characters get killed off.

4. Friday the 13th Part V: A New Beginning (1985)

This entry is often considered the series' black sheep because its killer is not actually Jason, but rather a different character pretending to be Jason. Personally, though, I find the whole whodunit angle intriguing, and wish it was used in more slasher movies. Of course, the killer's identity doesn't really make sense once it's revealed, but you can still have fun guessing.

3. Friday the 13th Part 3

This is the film that introduced Jason to his hockey mask, and, in doing so, cemented the Friday the 13th template. The series really could've ended here, since none of the later sequels added anything to the basic formula. Director Steve Miner (who also made Friday the 13th Part 2, Halloween H20 and Lake Placid) told the actor playing Jason to think of himself as the shark from Jaws, and that's more or less how the camera sees Jason as well. He's barely onscreen until late in the film, and even the hockey mask functions more as a way to conceal his deformed face than as a mark of his identity. It's a pretty effective approach. 3 has been recently re-released onto DVD in its original 3-D format, though I hear you need a huge flatscreen TV for the effect to work.

2. Friday the 13th Part 2

So yeah, we're pretty much moving chronologically now. Besides the hockey mask (which is pretty important), Friday the 13th Part 2 has everything a Friday the 13th movie should have: Camp counselors, a rustic atmosphere, Jason, campfire stories, sex, violence. It's also one of only two movies in the series that are well-executed enough to possibly be considered "good," the other being...

1. Friday the 13th

Like I said before, Crystal Lake is the real star of this series, and I put the original Friday the 13th at the top of this list because its Crystal Lake is the creepiest. I love the ambience of the rainstorm, I love the run-down cabins, I love the faded "Welcome to Camp Crystal Lake" sign. I also love the bad omens scattered throughout the first half, like the full moon, the snake in the cabin, Kevin Bacon's girlfriend's dream. In short, this is the only Friday the 13th movie that might actually scare you, and to me, that earns it the #1 spot.

So this Friday, go rent a Friday the 13th movie and get in touch with your American cinematic heritage. Enjoy the opportunity while it lasts; we won't have another Friday the 13th until November.

---

On an unrelated note, why in God's name didn't Flight of the Conchords use "Bus Driver Song" in Sunday's episode? If that song isn't on the show by the end of the season, my head will explode.

Short Film: "A Friend Like Bob"

2009-03-03T20:28:00.004-05:00

This week's special is a three-minute film I produced last semester called "A Friend Like Bob." Grab a very small bag of popcorn and enjoy.

"Based On a True Story": The Strangers!

2009-02-24T23:48:00.006-05:00

The Plot:

Kristen and James go to an isolated house in the woods to spend a romantic evening together, but the vibe is ruined when Kristen turns down James’ marriage proposal. Oh, and also some masked strangers with knives show up trying to kill them for no reason. Kind of breaks up the whole Joyce Carol Oates feel. The screenplay manages to eliminate the couple’s access to cell phones (always a problem for modern horror films), making attempts at escaping or getting help fairly difficult. Scariness ensues.

The True Story:

For a while I was convinced that the film’s advertising campaign, which claimed that The Strangers was “Inspired By True Events,” was just a flat-out lie. A Google search of the main characters’ names only turned up sites related to the film, no promotional sites or reviews identified a specific factual basis, and the villains’ motives (such as they were) seemed more like part of a Chuck Palahniuk novel (sorry, is two literary references excessive?) than anything real. Most “true story” horror movies made up 90 percent of their stories anyway, so what difference would it make if The Strangers went the extra 10?

However, a recent trip to Wikipedia directed my attention to this article, which includes the following paragraph:

“The suspense thriller is based on an event from [director Bryan] Bertino's childhood that's long haunted him. A stranger had come to his home asking for someone. Later, he found out that empty homes in the neighborhood had been ransacked. With that creepy memory in mind, Bertino took it several steps further in his debut screenplay.”

Remember that scene in Ace Ventura where Jim Carrey sends a slinky down a giant mountain staircase?

That’s what this article means by “several steps.” That is, unless you consider Doorbell Ditch basically the same as murderous home invasion.

But then again, it isn’t lying to say that The Strangers was “Inspired By True Events.” The problem is that EVERY SINGLE STORY EVER WRITTEN, fiction or non-, was inspired by true events. Even Star Wars contains elements of George Lucas’s youth. After all, what could ever inspire a story besides true events? False events? Non-events that take place in another dimension?

Inspired by a true story

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to work on my screenplay, Demon Blades. It’s based on this one time I cut myself shaving.

Why I Haven't Seen the New "Friday the 13th"

2009-02-17T21:50:00.009-05:00

...or, Slasher Movie Rant

Hold on a sec, let me explain

No good can come out of identifying yourself as a fan of slasher movies. At best, you’ll be seen as a juvenile with no taste. At worst, you’re a sociopathic degenerate not to be trusted with sharp objects. And who can blame the genre’s critics? Most slasher films fall into two categories:

1. Cynical attempts to make a profit through slashers’ characteristically low budgets. It doesn’t cost much to film a guy in a mask chasing a few teenagers, and producers know that they can make back their budget long before word gets out that their movie is a piece of crap. This type was most common back in the 1980s, which gave us such classics as He Knows You’re Alone and Cutting Class.

Still better than Benjamin Button

2. A more modern variety: Geeky fanboy tributes jammed with genre in-jokes. Often billed as horror comedies, usually neither scary nor funny. These films are more interested in securing a cameo from the star of Candyman than in actually entertaining anyone outside of the horror convention circuit.

Not to name names or anything

And worst of all, many slasher fans really do conform to their stereotype. Getting a tattoo of Jason on your forehead and writing YouTube comments about how cool it was “that 1 time Fredy cut that bitch” doesn’t really help the cause, guys.

Nevertheless, I do consider myself a kind of fan of the genre, partly due to the few slasher films produced with actual craft (the original versions of Black Christmas, Halloween, Friday the 13th, etc.) and partly due to the cheesy, nostalgic appeal of those films’ sequels and imitators. So it took a good deal of self-control to keep myself from going out this past Friday (the 13th) to see the new version of Friday the 13th.

More self-control than I like to admit, actually. To me, Jason was the face of slasher movies long before I had actually watched one myself (my first being Halloween H20, which I still think is pretty good). The hockey mask would pop up in comic strips, video games, advertisements, Halloween costumes—pretty much everywhere, actually. Jason was more than just a character in a cheap movie series. He was a ubiquitous icon of late-20th-century American culture. When I finally watched the first few Friday the 13th films, they unfolded more or less how I had always imagined they would, delivering simple, archetypal storylines and the occasional campfire-story thrill.

Seriously, everywhere.

The later films in the series, though, abandoned the basic atmosphere set up in the earlier entries, becoming convoluted and overly tongue-in-cheek. So when I heard over a year ago that a remake was in the works, I felt a glimmer of hope. Maybe a complete overhaul was what the series needed. Maybe, after twenty years, we’d finally have a worthwhile return to Crystal Lake.

And that hope might have driven me into the theaters on Friday if I hadn’t felt the same way about Rob Zombie’s Halloween remake.

Hey, I thought, Zombie actually cares about making good horror movies, and he really respects this material. And it’s not like all remakes are bad; just look at John Carpenter’s The Thing, right? Sure, Zombie seems to be making some big changes, but maybe that’s what the series needs. I’ll give him a chance.

So I gave him a chance. I went to see Halloween (2007) on opening night. And I learned my lesson.

The new Halloween, and the new Michael Myers, were fundamentally different from the series and the character that I had enjoyed. Zombie’s ideas might have worked in their own film, but instead they had been awkwardly shoehorned into another movie’s structure, where they didn’t belong. And the worst part was that Zombie’s Myers would define the character in the minds of young audiences and, since the remake made so much money, in future sequels. The haunting boogeyman of the original films was finally, effectively, dead.

God damn it.

And really, what did I expect to happen? Did I think Rob Zombie’s interpretation of the concept was going to be exactly the same as mine? Maybe I would have preferred to have Gus Van Sant remake Halloween shot for shot?

The Halloween remake convinced me not to see the Friday the 13th remake because it proved what I should have already known: That remakes aren’t going to be good just because you want them to be. Carpenter’s The Thing wasn’t based on a film that had a built-in, loyal fan base. (Right? Correct me if you can find any Thing Halloween costumes from 1981.) Carpenter got to make his own film using an idea he thought was interesting—and he knew that his film would be judged on its own merits. On the other hand, the Halloween remake was a freakish hybrid of Zombie’s ideas and Carpenter’s, because if the previews hadn’t looked at least a little like the 1978 original, the whole point of the production—brand loyalty—would have been defeated. Today’s horror remakes are intentionally based on well-known properties so that audiences feel they’re going to get more of what they like, but there’s no incentive for the movies to actually deliver. Remakes (and sequels, and adaptations, etc.) get made because, like cheap slasher movies, they don’t have to be good to make money.

So I decided not to pay for a title. I treated the new Friday the 13th the same way I would treat any non-remake: I decided whether or not to go see it based on the reviews. And in this case, the reviews said it sucked. So I didn’t go.

Of course, one way or another I’ll probably end up seeing it at some point, and when I do, I’ll be sure to let you know how much it sucks. The important thing is that I know it will suck, and I’m a lot more interested in seeing new movies, with new names, that are actually supposed to be good.

Hey, when’s Trick ‘r Treat coming out?

A Few Thoughts on "The Reader"

2009-02-10T10:30:00.003-05:00

1. The Reader is a movie about a teenager who begins hooking up with a hot older woman, only to find out that she is actually a former Nazi. Is if just me, or does this plot seem more suited to a direct-to-DVD comedy than a high-profile Oscar contender? Would you watch National Lampoon’s Cougars of the SS—Unrated?

2. The film’s protagonist, Michael, is involved in a few sexual relationships over the course of the film. In two cases, we are shown how these relationships are initiated.

A. In the first case, Michael is throwing up and crying on a street corner when Kate Winslet takes pity on him and helps him get home. When he visits her to deliver his thanks, she offers to let him use her bath. Cue wah-wah bass. (Dear Penthouse: I never thought this would happen to me…)

Does this actually work? Because I’ve been out on the streets with Ipecac and onions for the past few days, and Kate hasn’t shown up yet.

B. In the second case, Michael and a pretty girl in one of his university classes have a few flirtatious exchanges, but Michael is slow to pursue her because of other preoccupations in his life. When he finally visits her room, she says, “You’ve taken your time,” then immediately begins to strip.

Is this a European thing? Do these things happen in Europe? I’m moving to Europe.

3. Almost every scene in the movie is blanketed by a melodramatic orchestral score. The Reader is an Oscar highlight reel for itself.

In conclusion, fuck the Oscars. Holy Lord, did “Lollipop” just win the Grammy for Best Rap Song? Fuck awards.

"Based On a True Story": The Texas Chainsaw Massacre!

2009-02-03T15:56:00.008-05:00

Remember that time at summer camp when the counselors warned you not to wander around the camp at night, because you might run into Cabin 18? You know, the one where the little girl died, and where people have been hearing strange noises ever since, and where one kid actually went insane after venturing in for an hour? Remember how the counselors swore that that was all true? Hollywood is kind of like them, except richer and less concerned about kids getting eaten by bears.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre

The Plot:

In the 1974 original, a bunch of young people traveling in a van (not the Mystery Machine, unfortunately) get slaughtered by a family of hillbilly cannibals. One of the cannibals, named Leatherface, wears human skin and wields the titular chainsaw. The 2003 remake followed the same formula (keeping the 1973 setting), except that it upped the ante by giving Leatherface the disease from Cabin Fever. It also more or less implied that the entire American South is involved in a cannibalistic conspiracy, raising some questions about the Waffle House menu.

The True Story:

The face of evil.

In the 1950s, disturbed Wisconsin loner Ed Gein decided that the feng shui of his isolated farmhouse would be incomplete without the addition of countless human body parts. Gein began making regular grave-robbing expeditions to local cemeteries, using the bodies he dug up to create such items as skull bowls, shrunken heads, nipple belts and an entire suit made out of women’s skin. His house was sort of like a Body Worlds exhibit, except worse-smelling. By the time Gein was apprehended in 1957, he had killed two local women to satisfy his urges and may have been responsible for the disappearances of several more.

Hollywood looked at that story and decided that it was too tame.

The original Texas Chainsaw Massacre certainly deserves credit for inauthenticity, given that the actual true story contained no Texas, no chainsaw (Gein used a rifle to commit his murders), and just barely any massacre. With the remake, however, Michael Bay treated the truth the same way Gein treated his victims. For example, the end of the 2003 film contains narration stating that “The case today still remains open,” which is true, if by “still remains open” they mean “has been completely closed for half a century.”

Also, look at the picture above. In a truly accurate film, Gein would have been played by Jim Varney.

Fly Will Not Gap

2009-01-27T10:38:00.002-05:00

An Open Letter to the Hanes Company:

I am writing to express my extreme displeasure with both your product and your company’s affiliates. Recent events have convinced me that at the very least I must discontinue my patronage, if not pursue legal action.

My frustration stems from a package of Hanes boxers which I discovered at my local clothes outlet on July 12. A sticker on the package promised, “FLY WILL NOT GAP,” just above the promise of a “Money Back Guarantee.” Having waited most of my adult life for an undergarment which would resolve the “gappage” issue, I immediately purchased the item.

I then put your product to its only valid use: On a particularly muggy day, I went for my usual neighborhood stroll, but this time I wore no more than a pair of sandals and a pair of the afore-mentioned boxers, confident that my private affairs would remain concealed.

Needless to say, the fly at some point gapped, and I was apprehended by a local patrolman. Your product had failed me.

Shortly after I posted bail I returned to the site where I had purchased the boxers and demanded fulfillment of your “Money Back Guarantee.” However, my attempt to demonstrate the product’s obvious defectiveness to a Customer Service employee earned me another indecent exposure charge.

I am currently attempting to convince my court-appointed attorney to represent me, and the presumably countless others traumatized by your product’s failure, in a class-action lawsuit. I expect to receive $3,000,000 in compensation for emotional distress, damage to my reputation, and legal fees, as well as the $13.78 refund promised by your advertising.

First and foremost, however, I want you to understand that you have created a gap not just in the fly of your product, but in the trust of your customers.

My lawyer should be contacting you shortly.

Mugged

2009-01-27T10:25:00.003-05:00

I’m a little surprised when the guy steps out from behind the dumpster, I hadn’t thought there was anyone in the alley. Must’ve been too dark to see him. He says something to me, but his voice can’t get through Mark Mulcahy’s “I Have Patience.” I take off my headphones and drape them over my shoulder. “Excuse me?”

“I said, give me your fucking money and I won’t cut you.”

I glance down and see a large knife in his hand. I chuckle as I reach into my pocket. “Oh, you picked the wrong time to rob me, man, I’m almost broke.”

“Boo fucking hoo. Give me what you got.”

I hand him my wallet. He opens it, grabs the three dollar bills it contains, and tosses the empty shell onto the pavement. “Give me your iPod.”

“Sure.”

I take the iPod out of my pocket and start neatly wrapping the headphones around it, but he snatches it out of my hands. “You should listen to the Mark Mulcahy albums,” I say as he stuffs his loot into his hoodie pocket, “they’re really good.”

“Fuck you,” he says, and runs off down the alley.

I watch him go, sigh, pick my wallet back up. As I put it back into my pocket, I realize that I still have a few dollars in quarters. Maybe next time.

A Real-Life Baltimorean's Take on "The Wire"

2009-01-13T19:52:00.005-05:00

Anyone who’s watched a few episodes of HBO’s now-defunct crime drama The Wire knows how addictive the show can be. I personally spent much of my winter break devouring the third and fourth seasons on DVD, and I’m about to dive into the fifth. I also started digging into some of the behind-the-scenes material, much of which emphasizes how creator David Simon struggled to achieve a realistic and detailed depiction of Baltimore. I was curious about how that depiction might go over with someone who lives in the city, so I organized an interview with real-life Baltimore resident Cheryl Pearson.

MH: I just want to start off by saying that you’re very brave.
CP: Brave? Why?
MH: Well, for living in Baltimore your whole life. From what I’ve seen on The Wire, it can be a pretty rough place.
CP: (Laughs) Oh, I see. Yeah, I think the show gives a lot of people that idea about the city. Personally, though, I grew up in a pretty safe neighborhood.
MH: So you think the show gives an exaggerated picture of the city’s problems?
CP: Not exaggerated, just incomplete. Which isn’t really their fault.
MH: Why not?
CP: From what I’ve heard, David Simon planned to produce a lot of seasons after the fifth one so that he could really show every facet of the city’s culture. Like, there was going to be a season about hospitals, and one about the Orioles, and one about local bowling leagues, and a bunch of others. I think the last season was going to be about a TV crew producing a premium-cable crime show.
MH: How do you know all this?
CP: I spent a lot of time with David when he was researching the ninth season, which was going to be about the dark underbelly of a Stop & Shop deli section. Actually, one of the characters in that season was going to be a composite of me and my supervisor Ashleigh.
MH: Wow. That’s quite an honor.
CP: (Shrugs) Not really. In Baltimore, not having a Wire character based on you is considered kind of pathetic. Like, if you didn’t make it onto the show, your life must really be dull. I knew a guy who robbed three orphanages just to try and get David’s attention.
MH: Did it work?
CP: He didn’t get a character based on him, but he was cast in a cameo as a corrupt member of a zoning board.
MH: If Simon had all these things planned out, why did the show stop after the fifth season?
CP: Baltimore residents signed a petition demanding that the show end.
MH: Because they were offended by the portrayal?
CP: No, the portrayal was dead-on. We just got tired of having David around studying us all the time.

[Drum riff. Cut to black, cue ominous bass.]

You Sure?

2009-01-13T16:03:00.004-05:00

[Note: This is a revision of an earlier post. The original post has been removed.]

   Really? You’re thinking about getting that done?
   Oh, no, I mean, I wouldn’t say there’s anything strange about it. I think it’s pretty commonplace nowadays. Still, though, I don’t know, it always makes me wonder. To me it almost seems like assisted suicide or something. Like, it might be a violation of the Hippocratic Oath. I mean, I feel bad getting my pets neutered.
   No, no, you’re right, though, it’s not the same thing. Well, why exactly are you interested in getting it done? Don’t want any more kids, right, right. And you didn’t want to accomplish that with condoms, or birth control, or something that didn’t involve cutting stuff up?
   No, no, no, I’m not trying to discourage you, man. I’m just trying to make sure that you’ve really thought about the consequences. I mean, it’s not like tying your shoes, you know? You can’t just pull something and have everything pop back into place.
   Hey, you’re right, it is your decision, and I’m sure you’ve spent a lot of time thinking about it. So you’re sure that’s what you want?
   Okay, then, if you’re sure. See my secretary on the way out, she’ll let you know what times my schedule will be free for the procedure. Make sure you allow yourself some time for recovery.
   And hey, just let me know if you want to change your mind. No shame in it. I mean, going through something like this really takes balls.

The 50 Best Movie Titles of 2008 (And More!)

2008-12-30T14:52:00.003-05:00

   I figured I should do some sort of year-end list, so I went onto IMDb’s 2008 list of titles to explore the possibility of a Best-Films ranking. However, the appearance of names like “A-Bo the Humonkey” and “Abracadaver!” convinced me that a list of the best titles would be more fun.
   Only problem is, IMDb includes not just feature films but also short films, TV movies, DVD features, and I don’t know, probably flip books. So while I had a broad range of titles to choose from, I also had to sort through 20,071 names. Needless to say, both my sanity and my eyesight were destroyed.
   I think it was worth it, though. Here’s the list. I skipped over foreign-language titles beause the survey took long enough without doing translations. Porn titles, which have the unfair advantage of always being ridiculous, were excluded and have been listed separately below.

The 50 Best Movie Titles of 2008

50. Attackazoids!
49. 101 Damnations
48. Vampire Blob: Silent Fangs of Horror
47. Banshee!!!
46. Because Washington is Hollywood for Ugly People
45. Resist Evil Part Two: God Is Missing! Let Us Quest for God!
44. Say Goodbye to Grandad’s Retirement
43. Hardball: All Balls Don’t Bounce
42. Bachelor Party 2: Analysis of a Stripper Fight
41. Six Sex Scenes and a Murder
40. Do Unto Otters
39. Oklahoma Rocks!
38. Vile Pervert: The Musical
37. The Spleenectomy
36. Equali-pee
35. Fistful of Brains
34. Tree Slime Tuesday
33. Jesus Was a Terrorist
32. Another Gay Sequel: Gays Gone Wild!
31. Gingerdead Man 2: Passion of the Crust
30. The Adventures of Food Boy
29. The Nitty Gritty Behind the Itty Bitty Titty Committee
28. See Naples… Then Die
27. Abracadaver!
26. Ho Ho Homicidal
25. My Mom Smokes Weed
24. Generic Thriller
23. GasHole
22. Tranny McGuyver
21. FightFuckPray
20. Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-ItchyFooted Mutha
19. Catweazle
18. The Midnight Meat Train
17. The Smelly Janitor
16. Boob Jobs & Jesus
15. Life Is Hot in Cracktown
14. Cheerbleeders
13. Jackin 101: Jiggaboo Jones
12. T.V.: The Movie
11. Ludachristmas
10. Between Gandhi and Hitler
9. Oy Vey! My Son Is Gay!!
8. Colonel Kill Motherfuckers
7. A-Bo the Humonkey
6. Bonnie & Clyde Vs. Dracula
5. The Necessary Assassination of George Lucas
4. A Complete History of My Sexual Failures
3. Retardead
2. God Thinks You’re a Loser
1. The Horribly Slow Murderer with the Extremely Inefficient Weapon

   I’ve adopted “The Midnight Meat Train” as my new nickname; don’t tell Clive Barker. Next up are the best porn titles. I’ve included the directors’ names in parentheses.

The 15 Best Porn Titles of 2008

15. Shorty Iz Fuckin’ Yo Mama 3 (G. Man)
14. Breast Meat (Erik Everhard)
13. Apprentass 8, 9 (Quasarman)
12. This Ain’t the Munsters XXX (Anton Slayer)
11. Asses of Face Destruction 4 (None listed)
10. White Chicks Gettin’ Black Balled 25: Asian Edition (Craven Moorehead)
9. It’s Huge! 15 (Brother Love)
8. How Could I Forget That Asshole? (Seymore Butts)
7. Texas Vibrator Massacre (Rob Rotten)
6. Blackzilla Vs. Manaconda (None listed)
5. Who’s Nailin’ Paylin? (Jerome Tanner)
4. Ahh Shit! White Mama 6 (Lee G.)
3. Areola 51 (Lennie Lenowski)
2. Gov Love: The Eliot Splitz-her Story (Stuart Canterbury)
1. Alexis Texas is Buttwoman (Sam No and William H. Nutsack)

Special Bonus: 10 2008 Movie Titles That Sound Like Porn But (Thankfully) Aren’t

10. Other People’s Breast Milk
9. Genital Genocide
8. The Legend of My Heart Shaped Anus
7. Rubbings from a Live Man
6. Horsefingers 3: Starfucker
5. Lovenutz
4. Bedroom Full of Bees
3. Okie Noodling II
2. The Assasstant [Actually about an assassin’s assistant]
1. National Geographic’s Wildest Moments

   I hope you feel as dirty as I do. Here’s a palate cleanser: I’ve re-posted my instrumental version of “Auld Lang Syne,” recorded last New Year’s, on my (former?) band’s PureVolume site. Check it out:

www.purevolume.com/noiseviolationbu

   Hope you like it. Happy New Year, everyone!

-Midnight Meat Train

A Trip to the Sperm Bank

2008-12-23T19:19:00.001-05:00

   I wanted to donate sperm, for obvious reasons. So I went down to my local sperm bank, but the receptionist there said, “I’m sorry, you’re not eligible.”
   I said, “How do you know? I haven’t told you anything about myself.”
   She said, “You’re too short.” She pointed to a height chart on the wall which showed a red arrow pointing to 5’8”. It was titled, “YOU MUST BE AT LEAST THIS TALL TO REPRODUCE.”
   I asked, “Why is there a height requirement?”
   She replied, “Well, with all due respect, the women who come here don’t want to give birth to freakish midget babies.”
   I said, “I’m not a midget.”
   She said, “I’m sorry. I meant little person.”
   I said, “That’s ridiculous.”
   She said, “Sir, please don’t get short-tempered with me.”
   “What?!”
   “I’m sorry, it just seems like you have a very short fuse.”
   “What?!”
   “Sir, I’m calling security. They’ll be here shortly.”
   Just in case you were wondering, ladies, I do still offer sperm donations. Just not through any official sperm bank. It’s sort of an under-the-table operation. Or on the table, or on the couch, wherever you prefer.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Write Your Own "Dexter"!

2008-12-16T12:43:00.001-05:00

   Season 3 of Showtime’s Dexter came to an end this past Sunday, and I know that all you fellow Dexaholics have one thing on your mind: What’s up next in Season 4? I had the same question, which is why I broke into Michael C. Hall’s home and ransacked the place in search of scripts or treatments. I finally found one relevant document hidden inside Hall’s air conditioner. I’ve reprinted its contents below, but be forewarned that spoilers abound!

--TOP SECRET—

Dexter: Season [SEASON #] Outline
Featuring Special Guest Star [AGING GENRE ACTOR]

   As the season begins, Dexter’s life seems to be going great. He’s in a healthy relationship with Rita, his wacky coworkers at the Miami homicide department are fond of him, and he’s frequently indulging his habit of dismembering unrepentant killers. However, everything gets turned upside down when [DISRUPTIVE EVENT], threatening to change Dexter’s life forever.
   The department has its hands full investigating a mysterious new serial killer known as the “[VERB]er,” who is revealed to the audience to be [EXTRANEOUS SUPPORTING CHARACTER/DEXTER]. Dexter’s sister Deb is assigned to the case, but also has to deal with her tumultuous relationship with [RANDOM, INAPPROPRIATE MALE SUPPORTING CHARACTER].
   To complicate matters, [DISPOSABLE SUPPORTING CHARACTER] discovers Dexter’s secret identity. Dexter contemplates how to deal with the situation and considers [GIVING UP/INCREASING] his murders. His dead stepfather, Harry, appears in a vision and delivers obvious, common-sense advice, which Dexter ignores.
   Deb cries, swears a lot, and violates fundamental guidelines of police conduct. She then discovers several important clues which could blow her case wide open. Dexter has seemingly inoccuous conversations with Rita which, unbeknownst to her, contain double entendres related to Dexter’s secret identity.
   At the season’s climax Dexter is forced into a confrontation with the villain, which ends with Dexter triumphant and [DISPOSABLE SUPPORTING CHARACTER] dead. As the season closes, Dexter’s secret is safe once again and everything seems to be back to normal… Except for [LOOSE THREAD]!

--PROPERTY OF SHOWTIME—

   I kid, Dexter, I kid. Please don’t kill me.

Ode to Tobias

2008-12-13T00:35:00.001-05:00

If you asked an English professor to rattle off the names of a few litrary tragic heroes, he or she would probably mention characters like Oedipus, Hamlet, or Willy Loman. Those are all decent choices, I guess, but your tweed-covered acquaintance would no doubt omit one of the longest-suffering individuals in fictional history: Tobias.
No last name. Just Tobias. He has a last name, but he can’t tell us what it is, because then the Yeerks would get him. Those of you who are familiar with the Animorphs book series (1996-2001) already know what I’m talking about, but be patient while I recap a few things for the uninitiated. I’ll try to be brief.
Okay. The Animorphs were five teenagers (one of them being Tobias) who stumbled upon a dying alien on their way home from the mall one night. The benevolent creature gave them the power to morph into animals so that they could fight the Yeerks, a race of evil alien brain slugs that were secretly trying to take over the world. (Ax, another good alien, later joined on as a sixth member.) To avoid being captured, the Animorphs had to keep their abilities secret. This meant balancing their high-concept battle responsibilities with more mundane teenage activities, like schoolwork and TRL voting.
I should note that Tobias’s life sucked even before he found out about the brain slugs. His parents died when he was really young, and after that his guardianship was tossed back and forth between an aunt and uncle, neither of whom really cared about him. He was constantly bullied at school. In fact, the reason he was hanging out with the other future Animorphs when they all received their powers was that the group’s leader, Jake, felt sorry for him. The only bright spot in his life was a mutual attraction between him and a beautiful blonde fellow Animorph named Rachel. And even that relationship wasn’t destined to go smoothly.
See, the morphing powers came with a catch: If you stayed in one morph for more than two hours, you would be trapped in that morph forever, able to communicate only through telepathic “thought-speak.” (It’s like regular speak except that it uses arrow brackets instead of quotation marks.) At the end of the series’ first book, Tobias got trapped in the body of a red-tailed hawk.
That event determined his identity once and for all, not just as a species but as the most poignant metaphor for alienation since Gregor Samsa. Throughout the series, Tobias’s life illustrated both the pain and the mystique of life as an outsider. On the plus side, he was actually more free as a hawk than he had ever been as a human. Instead of dealing with uncaring relatives and spiteful classmates, he spent his days riding the thermals—that is, the uprising gusts of warm air that keep birds afloat. Animorphs books were educational.
But on the other hand, how much could Tobias ever connect with other people—or, that is, with people? Most high school boys would kill for the attention of a girl like Rachel, but even though Tobias already had that attention, he couldn’t even hold her hand. Because, you know, he didn’t have any hands.
Admittedly, the cleverness of this concept wasn’t really matched by author K. A. Applegate’s prose. Here’s a passage from book #3, The Encounter, which features Tobias at his most angsty:

“…I felt an awful, gaping black hole open up all around me. I was sick. Sick with the feeling of being trapped.
“Trapped.
“Forever!
“I looked at my talons. They would never be feet again.
“I looked at my wing. It would never be an arm. It would never again end in a hand. I would never touch. I would never touch anything… anyone… again.”

So yeah, this isn’t James Joyce we’re talking about. Which is fine, since these are kids’ books. Even if the writing style was a tad melodramatic, the important things were that the stories were interesting and that the characters were believably three-dimensional.
Which brings me back to Tobias. I think the main reason his character works so well is that, despite the emo-ness of the preceding passage, he generally bore his burdens with dignity and a sense of humor. He didn’t spend all his time wondering what he did to piss off God, and whenever Marco (another Animorph) would make a trapped-in-a-hawk-body joke, Tobias would be the least offended out of anyone. As a reader, I couldn’t help but feel sympathy for him.
Unfortunately, he was as underappreciated in the real world as he was unlucky in fiction. The series’ first-person perspective would rotate between each book, and since Tobias for some reason shared his slot with Ax, he ended up narrating about half as much as everyone else. He only got to narrate one chapter in the disappointing final book. And I think the unworthy Nickelodeon TV show actually killed him off, probably because they were sick of having a hawk hanging around on the set.
But if Ridley Scott is directing a movie version of Monopoly, then there will one day be an Animorphs movie. And when that day comes, I hope the screenwriter doesn’t take the bird for granted.

Beastie Boy

2008-11-26T01:59:00.000-05:00

   The message of Beauty and the Beast is, I believe, that what’s inside counts more than one’s outward appearance. But I think Disney undercut that message by making the Beast so damn sexy. I mean, look at him. He’s all buff, well-dressed, covered in a majestic mane. I’m just saying, if I was, I would. You know?
   In fact, all things considered, the Beast is a catch. He’s smart, caring, rich as fuck. Even if you have a problem with bestiality (c’mon, loosen up! It’s 2008!), you still have to admit that Anna Nicole Smith has married less attractive men. (Too soon?) And to sweeten the deal, he turns into a really handsome guy after… I don’t know, after some curse is removed or something. I haven’t seen the movie in a while.
   But the point is, how high are Belle’s standards? If the Beast had stayed beastly, would she have wanted to remain just friends? “Sure, he’s nice and all, but I don’t want to spend the rest of my life coughing up hairballs.”
   Is that too graphic? I’m sorry.
   In the original fairy tale, the Beast is supposed to be really hideous, like Jeff-Goldblum-in-The Fly hideous. Disney even had some original Beast concept drawings that were scrapped for being too scary for little kids. At least, that was the reason given. In reality, the writers decided that having a beautiful woman like Belle fall in love with a physically unattractive guy was just too unrealistic. Then they moved on to the singing-dishware scene.

Church

2008-11-18T00:44:00.000-05:00

   In theory, church seems like it should be a really enjoyable experience. I mean, it’s supposed to be a community coming together to share in a celebration of their deepest beliefs. It should be like a big party hosted by God.
   But it ain’t. You just sit on wooden seats and listen to somebody else talk for a while. Then at the end you get a little wheat disc. When I was a little kid I used to bring a book with me and read. The day my mom told me I couldn’t do that anymore was one of the saddest days of my life.
   Think about the origins of church services. Jesus broke bread with his disciples at the Last Supper and said, “Do this in memory of me.” Why do we assume that he meant anything besides, “Go out to eat with your friends”? I’d be down for doing that every Sunday.
   My ideal church service would be like a big brunch. Everybody gets together to chat about stuff and eat pancakes. (Still discs, but not as small or wheat-based.) Play some gospel music over the place’s sound system, and maybe at the beginning have the priest propose a toast to the Lord. Have the waitress bring a collection basket instead of the bill.
   Give this some thought, Your Holiness. Taking Latin out of the mass was a step in the right direction. Now we just have to add some maple syrup. I’ll admit, people’s scriptural knowledge might be somewhat reduced. But at least parishioners would stop by on days other than Christmas and Easter.

Eminem and Kanye: A Comparative Appraisal

2008-11-11T20:23:00.001-05:00

Is it wrong that two of my favorite rappers are Eminem and Kanye West?
I only ask because I know that they’re the two most obvious choices for a whiteboy rap listener such as myself. But I like to believe that they appeal to me not because I’m racist and/or a pussy, but rather because they’ve both expanded hip-hop’s potential in ways that few other mainstream rap artists have done since NWA.
Don’t get me wrong, gangsta rap has value. I doubt that there’s any other cultural force that has done as much to raise American awareness of the problems of inner-city youth. But the subgenre quickly became so dominant that it degenerated into empty, formulaic, commercialized posturing. For hip-hop to continue to grow as an art form, it needed fresh perspectives. The great thing about Eminem and Kanye is that they both moved away from the norm, but in two totally opposite directions. Kanye tried to be more positive: “I woke up early this morning with a new state of mind/A creative way to rhyme without using knives and guns.” Eminem went, uh, a little more negative: “I ain’t no fucking G, I’m a cannibal/I ain’t trying to shoot you, I’m trying to chop you into pieces and eat you.”

From there, countless clear contrasts emerge: Eminem was white but poor; Kanye was black but middle-class. Eminem is a lyrical master; Kanye is a master of production. Eminem walked around in a wifebeater; Kanye is the Louis Vuitton don. Eminem wrote “Cleaning Out My Closet;” Kanye wrote “Hey Mama.” Etc.
Being a fan of both artists, and aware of how much material rappers release outside of their own albums, I’ve scoured the internets in search of some sort of collaboration between the two. Sadly, I’ve only been able to find “Stir Crazy,” a 2000 Madd Rapper joint produced by Ye and featuring Em:

Kind of disappointing, right? Slim’s lyrics are pretty damn good, as they always were around that time, but the beat pretty much sounds like every other beat Mr. Mathers was rapping over back then. It’s not surprising, I guess, when you consider that The College Dropout was four years away; Yeezy hadn’t perfected his skills, and no one really recognized the earth-shaking potential of this pairing.*
However, there’s still hope of hearing Eminem’s flow mesh with a truly great Kanye beat. Although Dr. Dre is supposedly handling most of the production on the upcoming Relapse, the fact that the album’s release has been pushed back to the spring of ’09 means that rap’s two least likely superstars still have time to reunite.
On the other hand, I’m guessing an Eminem guest spot on 808s & Heartbreak is out of the question.
Whatever. Even if neither of them ever make another good album (and given the average pop music lifespan, that’s entirely possible), they’ve still managed to turn rap from a stereotype into an art form that accomodates an increasingly diverse array of performers, as well as an increasingly diverse array of listeners—including, but not limited to, whiteboys such as myself.

*Two near-misses since “Stir Crazy”: Kanye produced the title track for the album D12 World, but Eminem doesn’t appear on that song. “Like Toy Soldiers” wasn’t produced by Kanye, but it sounds like it was.