I watched Cars and Kinky Boots back to back, and I was a little surprised how they seem to have exchanged the flaws I would have expected from each film.
I wasn't expecting much from Cars given its lukewarm reception, but I thought it would be fun, if not creative or memorable. Instead it just went on interminably, with a fairly uninspired set of stock characters. Other than maybe the Cinque Cento voiced by Tony Shalhoub who's obsessed with Ferrari and Italian auto racing, none of them stood out. It's really the length and the slow pace, all while stuck on the same dusty street.
Kinky Boots was a lot more enjoyable, but really only because Chiwetel Ejiofor steals the show as Lola. Kinky Boots is the story of a man who inherits his family's ailing shoe factory in the north of England, and tries to save it by turning to a nice market: making shoes for transvestite men. The inspiration is Lola, a boxer turned drag queen whose heels keep snapping off under his weight. Chiwetel Ejiofor is fantastic as Lola, with a fearless vivaciousness that fools everyone into missing his deep vulnerability. A great character, in sexy red thigh boots. Seriously, I don't care who's wearing them, I can't get enough thigh high boots.
My only complaint about Kinky Boots is its use of a very overused female character, the antagonist, materialistic girlfriend who just doesn't understand what our hero is trying to accomplish. Abbie Bartlett on The West Wing played off of this archetype, by giving it a lot more depth and exposing her husband's tendency to try to cast her in that role unfairly. As an obstacle in a romantic subplot, it's just too overused. Frankly both movies had uninspiring romantic plots that gave us no reason to believe in them.
But despite all that, Kinky Boots is still a good movie, but Cars is just boring.
Saturday, December 09, 2006
No Stuka for you
Six months into the search for a new national team coach, the only progress we've made is that Jurgen Klinsmann has officially withdrawn his name from consideration. Kalifornia Klinsy was our great weiss hope after he coached Germany to third place in the World Cup, since we could offer him a job that would allow him to keep his family based in California. The other big name alternative, Argentina's Jose Pekerman, also looks like a long shot, since nothing has materialized and he also doesn't speak English.
The interim coach is Bob Bradley, who coached the Fire to a double in their first season back in '98. He has also been made the under-23 team coach, which seems a little more his forte. We still need somebody who can instill some sort of tactical sense, and hopefully somebody with some media credibility for the four year project of building a team to take to South Africa, and the Copa America in Venezuela next year. We can't blow it in the Copa America next year, we just can't. Not with Hugo Chavez as our host.
In other news, Gibraltar has been admitted as a UEFA member. Spain had threatened to withdraw, taking all their clubs out of European competition if Gibraltar were allowed in, so this should be fun. The chances of a Gibraltar club being drawn against a Spanish club are incredibly slim, since the Spanish clubs get a bye to later rounds, but the hissyfit expected from the Spanish government would have been some quality entertainment.
The interim coach is Bob Bradley, who coached the Fire to a double in their first season back in '98. He has also been made the under-23 team coach, which seems a little more his forte. We still need somebody who can instill some sort of tactical sense, and hopefully somebody with some media credibility for the four year project of building a team to take to South Africa, and the Copa America in Venezuela next year. We can't blow it in the Copa America next year, we just can't. Not with Hugo Chavez as our host.
In other news, Gibraltar has been admitted as a UEFA member. Spain had threatened to withdraw, taking all their clubs out of European competition if Gibraltar were allowed in, so this should be fun. The chances of a Gibraltar club being drawn against a Spanish club are incredibly slim, since the Spanish clubs get a bye to later rounds, but the hissyfit expected from the Spanish government would have been some quality entertainment.
Friday, December 08, 2006
Porto 0-0 Arsenal
In a truly uninspired game, Arsenal stumbled their way through to the last 16 in the Champions League. Most of the action took place in Arsenal's half, but the best Porto could come up with were a couple of alarmingly close shots Ricardo Quaresma banged off the post. Both teams went in knowing they only needed a draw to advance, but it really looked like Porto was going to come up with a winner. In the end it didn't matter, because Hamburger picked up their first points in six games against CSKA Moscow in the other game, meaning CSKA couldn't overtake Arsenal or Porto no matter what the result of this game.
Tragically, Anderlecht are going home for the year, along with the other last placed teams from each group. Third place teams continue on in the UEFA Cup, which is kind of the NIT of Europe, and I was suprised to see former European champions Steaua Bucharest in that group, because the Romanian league really dropped off a bit in quality after the Iron Curtain lifted and all their players headed for Spain and Turkey. Players were being paid in firewood not that long ago in Romania, and the national team has dropped a tier in Europe as well since the days of Gheorghe Hagi and that wife-beating striker girls inexplicably continued to go crazy over.
So here are the last 16 in Europe (draw takes place next Friday):
Chelsea
Barcelona
Bayern Munich
Internazionale
Liverpool
PSV Eindhoven
Valencia
Roma
Lyon
Real Madrid
Manchester United
Celtic
Arsenal
FC Porto
Milan
Lille
And can I just say I'm definitely looking forward to next week when Ajax try to get something going in their UEFA Cup run by heading to Belgium to take on Zulte Waregem. The new crop of stars coming up through the youth system and their African development all seem to have moved on (Ibrahimovic, Van der Vaart) or imploded (Mido), and now they're scraping their way to a third place tie with Sparta Prague, trailing Zulte and Espanyol, ahead of only the mighty Austria Wien. I really wish they'd gotten the Atlantic league off the ground with the Belgians, Scots, and Portuguese, and some kind of bigger stage at least on a par with the French league for these guys.
Tragically, Anderlecht are going home for the year, along with the other last placed teams from each group. Third place teams continue on in the UEFA Cup, which is kind of the NIT of Europe, and I was suprised to see former European champions Steaua Bucharest in that group, because the Romanian league really dropped off a bit in quality after the Iron Curtain lifted and all their players headed for Spain and Turkey. Players were being paid in firewood not that long ago in Romania, and the national team has dropped a tier in Europe as well since the days of Gheorghe Hagi and that wife-beating striker girls inexplicably continued to go crazy over.
So here are the last 16 in Europe (draw takes place next Friday):
Chelsea
Barcelona
Bayern Munich
Internazionale
Liverpool
PSV Eindhoven
Valencia
Roma
Lyon
Real Madrid
Manchester United
Celtic
Arsenal
FC Porto
Milan
Lille
And can I just say I'm definitely looking forward to next week when Ajax try to get something going in their UEFA Cup run by heading to Belgium to take on Zulte Waregem. The new crop of stars coming up through the youth system and their African development all seem to have moved on (Ibrahimovic, Van der Vaart) or imploded (Mido), and now they're scraping their way to a third place tie with Sparta Prague, trailing Zulte and Espanyol, ahead of only the mighty Austria Wien. I really wish they'd gotten the Atlantic league off the ground with the Belgians, Scots, and Portuguese, and some kind of bigger stage at least on a par with the French league for these guys.
Thursday, December 07, 2006
The Doug Mientkiewicz Trade Postmortem
Now, 2+ years after the deal went through, Twins fans finally know what we got for Doug Mientkiewicz. Absolutely nothing but the peace of mind of getting rid of Doug Mientkiewicz.
Back in 2004, the Twins had a 1st baseman playing in Rochester who looked like the best power hitter to come through the organization since Kent Hrbek, while the Twins were starting Mientkiewicz, a gold glove fielder who couldn't hit anything, not a good trade-off at 1st base. They had to get playing time for Justin Morneau at the major league level, so the Twins fielded any and all offers for a 30-year old 1st baseman to use as a late-inning defensive substitution. In a four way deal, Mientkiewicz went to the Red Sox, and the Twins got Justin Jones, a 19-year old class A pitcher who just had his pitching arm come detached from its socket and go flying over the plate, or some other less zany but still career threatening injury. Mientkiewicz was really popular in Minnesota, and fielded the last out of the World Series when the Red Sox won that year. Things seemed pretty good for him, and a lot of Twins fans wondered why a team contending for division titles was trading away starters for dim prospects.
Then he started acting really nuts, and got into a feud with the Red Sox over the World Series game ball, which he had just kept in his glove following the last out. Eventually, honest to god, they refused to pay him $50,000 for it, but asked to "borrow" it, and then never gave it back. Mientkiewicz also claimed credit for the Red Sox victory, because of his critical contributions as a sub on 8th and 9th inning ground-outs. Since then he's been shown the door by the Mets and was antsy to get out of KC after an atrocious year. It seemed good to see the back side of him, and just remember him in his exuberant, rally-cap, not quite so insanely self-aggrandizingly insane days with the Twins. And Morneau did win the MVP. The real upside to the trade was supposed to be the gamble that Justin Jones could become a lights-out major league pitcher. He had the talent to do it, if his arm recovered, which was unlikely enough to make him equal in value to Doug Mientkiewicz. Now, two and a half years later, he's been picked up by the Washington Nationals in the Rule V draft.
In brief, the Rule V draft is a mechanism by which every winter, major league teams can take underutilized players from each other's minor league organizations to keep anyone from anti-competitively stockpiling talent that should be on display in the majors. Anybody who takes a player this way has to keep them on their major league roster for the year, so it's only worthwhile if the player can contribute at a higher level for a different organization. Jones obviously developed into a major league pitcher, but it didn't do us any good, so the Twins traded Mientkiewicz for nothing. (There is a possibility under Rule V that the Nationals would return Jones to the Twins if they can't keep a roster spot for him.) I really would have enjoyed seeing Jones pitch once for the Twins as the conclusion to the Mientkiewicz saga, but alas, it was not meant to be.
I guess they can't all be like the time we robbed the Los Angeles Giants of San Francisco so badly in the A.J. Pierzynski trade. But that's another story.
Back in 2004, the Twins had a 1st baseman playing in Rochester who looked like the best power hitter to come through the organization since Kent Hrbek, while the Twins were starting Mientkiewicz, a gold glove fielder who couldn't hit anything, not a good trade-off at 1st base. They had to get playing time for Justin Morneau at the major league level, so the Twins fielded any and all offers for a 30-year old 1st baseman to use as a late-inning defensive substitution. In a four way deal, Mientkiewicz went to the Red Sox, and the Twins got Justin Jones, a 19-year old class A pitcher who just had his pitching arm come detached from its socket and go flying over the plate, or some other less zany but still career threatening injury. Mientkiewicz was really popular in Minnesota, and fielded the last out of the World Series when the Red Sox won that year. Things seemed pretty good for him, and a lot of Twins fans wondered why a team contending for division titles was trading away starters for dim prospects.
Then he started acting really nuts, and got into a feud with the Red Sox over the World Series game ball, which he had just kept in his glove following the last out. Eventually, honest to god, they refused to pay him $50,000 for it, but asked to "borrow" it, and then never gave it back. Mientkiewicz also claimed credit for the Red Sox victory, because of his critical contributions as a sub on 8th and 9th inning ground-outs. Since then he's been shown the door by the Mets and was antsy to get out of KC after an atrocious year. It seemed good to see the back side of him, and just remember him in his exuberant, rally-cap, not quite so insanely self-aggrandizingly insane days with the Twins. And Morneau did win the MVP. The real upside to the trade was supposed to be the gamble that Justin Jones could become a lights-out major league pitcher. He had the talent to do it, if his arm recovered, which was unlikely enough to make him equal in value to Doug Mientkiewicz. Now, two and a half years later, he's been picked up by the Washington Nationals in the Rule V draft.
In brief, the Rule V draft is a mechanism by which every winter, major league teams can take underutilized players from each other's minor league organizations to keep anyone from anti-competitively stockpiling talent that should be on display in the majors. Anybody who takes a player this way has to keep them on their major league roster for the year, so it's only worthwhile if the player can contribute at a higher level for a different organization. Jones obviously developed into a major league pitcher, but it didn't do us any good, so the Twins traded Mientkiewicz for nothing. (There is a possibility under Rule V that the Nationals would return Jones to the Twins if they can't keep a roster spot for him.) I really would have enjoyed seeing Jones pitch once for the Twins as the conclusion to the Mientkiewicz saga, but alas, it was not meant to be.
I guess they can't all be like the time we robbed the Los Angeles Giants of San Francisco so badly in the A.J. Pierzynski trade. But that's another story.
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
Timberwolves 90 - 84 Big Chinese Dude
It's sometimes publicly bemoaned that Yao Ming never seems to get the superstar credit he deserves, but after tonight I find myself wondering how unfair that really is. Neither Yao nor Tracy McGrady had a great night for the Rockets and both were basically invisible, and really only offensive rebounding (15 total to the Wolves 5) and ridiculously good three point shooting (11-23) kept them in this game. To be fair, both were part of that rebounding advantage, but 25% shooting from the guys who take half your team's shots is pretty sketchy.
The amazing thing is the Yao wasn't that much of a presence in the paint, despite towering over other freakishly tall players like a monster from a children's cartoon and having a remarkably graceful game. I still think of the Rockets as Hakeem Olajuwon's team, 11 years after their last title, because when he played your eyes naturally gravitated towards him, and he had such an indefensible offensive arsenal that opponents just watched and hoped he'd miss. When Kevin Garnett was playing at an MVP level, he was an obvious center of attention like that, because opposing forwards would just slump their shoulders and watch his fade-away.
Tonight, the final turning point was when Garnett blocked a shot by the Yao, forced him to clumsily trap his next attempt against the glass and then tore the ball away. When The Big Ticket on his way down the floor paused to skip and pump his fist towards the stands, the whole crowd got to its feet to get behind the Wolves as they finished off the Rockets, and everybody knew that was all that was going to happen in the final minutes.
The amazing thing is the Yao wasn't that much of a presence in the paint, despite towering over other freakishly tall players like a monster from a children's cartoon and having a remarkably graceful game. I still think of the Rockets as Hakeem Olajuwon's team, 11 years after their last title, because when he played your eyes naturally gravitated towards him, and he had such an indefensible offensive arsenal that opponents just watched and hoped he'd miss. When Kevin Garnett was playing at an MVP level, he was an obvious center of attention like that, because opposing forwards would just slump their shoulders and watch his fade-away.
Tonight, the final turning point was when Garnett blocked a shot by the Yao, forced him to clumsily trap his next attempt against the glass and then tore the ball away. When The Big Ticket on his way down the floor paused to skip and pump his fist towards the stands, the whole crowd got to its feet to get behind the Wolves as they finished off the Rockets, and everybody knew that was all that was going to happen in the final minutes.
2006 Oscar Shorts, or The Chill Breath of the Reaper
I've caught almost all of last year's Oscar nominated short films, and there's this recurring theme through three animated films and five live action films where they're all about death. Okay, one of the cartoons was about a hibernating badger, and one of the live action films was about working the late shift at the supermarket, but my god did that feel like death. There's certainly some quality stuff, and a couple deserving award winners, but yikes, it's like Hollywood thinks America's going down in flames and like the Greeks in the last hours of their civilization, our artwork is going to be non-stop death until the very end.
The 2003 Oscar shorts were also released in a collection, and it's a pretty stark contrast in tone. That collection had some lighter fare like "Mike's New Car", the Pixar short with the characters from Monsters, Inc.; "The Chubbchubbs!", a hilarious film about a janitor at a cantina packed with science fiction movie characters and carnivorous fuzzballs; and "Das Rad", a German film about rocks watching the temporary distraction of the rise and fall of civilization around them. The live action films included quite a bit of humor as well, like the Belgian film "Fait d'hiver", which is an urban legend about a man calling his house and having his five year old daughter (who was curiously reminiscent of Bryan's niece) tell him Mommy's playing in the bedroom with "Uncle Wim". The best film in that collection was "This Charming Man", a comedy about a Danish man whose unemployment paperwork gets screwed up, so he has to pose as a muslim asylum-seeker to get a job and takes Danish classes to hit on the instructor, and sees how differently Danish society is views Lars Hansen than they do his alter ego El Hassan. Either the Iraq war or rampant movie piracy must have the Academy a little depressed.
Some things are worth commenting on, like "The Mysterious Geographic Explorations of Jasper Morello", which in title and in a brief description sounds like a much lighter film than it really is. It tells the story of Jasper Morello, living in a very vertical and airborne industrialized society, navigating an airship into the unknown reaches of the sky with an old biologist on a mission to seek new medicines in the wild places of the world. However, Morello's mission is seeking a cure for a wasting, coughing disease afflicting his whole society, which he and the doctor find in a carnivorous jungle plant, which is kept alive for the journey home by feeding it the entire crew and all of Morello's blood. All the characters appear as black silhouettes against the white walls and grey clouds around the airship, turning a fantastic craft and landscape and a noble adventure into this blighted, diseased, black tale. The use of silhouettes, only shifting to detail to show the diseased, and the hungry, carnivorous plant, things that are impure and not whole, is visually interesting, as is the world of open-decked airships Jasper Morello comes from.
The Oscar went to "The Moon and the Son: An Imagined Conversation", which is an imagined attempt by a son to speak to his recently deceased father about his father's life and criminal past, and the bitter, violent anger that poisoned that life. I felt it was a well made film, and I found its style of animation reminiscent of children's drawings, all in bright primary colors, to tell the story of a son who still feels small facing the memory of his father, even after his death.
The live-action films include some wonderfully filmed stories like "The Last Farm" and "The Runaway" which are perhaps better left unspoiled, ironically about the end of one life, as an Icelandic farmer concludes his last day on the farm, and the beginning of another when a man is forced to spend his first day as a father by a small child who shows up at his door insisting to be his son who needs a ride to school. But still, the impact of our fragile mortality lingers over these films like a dying gaul bleeding to death in the seat next to you at the theatre.
I've always liked Kevin Pollack, so the first short I actually watched was "Our Time Is Up", which introduces the recurring theme of death the most directly. Pollack plays a disinterested, ineffective therapist who is diagnosed with terminal disease, who starts brusquely just speaking his mind with his stable of hopeless clients. His unprofessional outbursts and enjoying tweaking their phobias actually challenges them for the first time in their therapy. Being able to ignore the risk that his clients will quit therapy actually allows him to do something to help them. "Our Time Is Up" is an amusing comment on the way death is sometimes the only thing that can force us to live our lives.
The Oscar went to the Irish film "Six Shooter", which is about the weirdest, darkest, most violent, and unmistakably funniest of the whole lot. This was an absolutely bizarre yet absolutely captivating film about a man who has just lost his wife and a couple who've lost a baby to crib death, who end up in a train car with a young man who seems to have no sense of propriety. It's the best movie about suicidal and lapicidal train passengers being entertained by stories about an exploding cow with a climactic police shoot-out I've ever seen, that's for sure. Just a great, bizarre film, well deserving of an Oscar, that touches on death, religion, pain, companionship, courtesy, and police procedure. Seriously, my reaction was what the fuck, and wow.
Besides that I have to add a kind word for "Cashback", a film about working all night in a supermarket, and how to pass the time. It really goes through the expected bits about surrounding oneself with the dregs of the working world for mind-numbing tasks under a fluorescent glare, and the dreary horror of it all. Every worker has their own technique for managing the gray ocean of time. What made it interesting was the narrator's artistic bent and interest in still life leading him to embrace the timelessness void of the supermarket, fascinated by a near-infinite beauty he finds in passing moments. His main obsession is the striking beauty of the female form, that every woman unconsciously shines with in every gesture, and his inner life consists of converting tired, bored female shoppers doing the least sexy thing in the world into beautiful nude sketches. It's all about fascination, when something sublime appears out of the mundane, like plunging through a crack in a frozen lake but falling into warm blue water. This film struck a real familiar chord on the lute strings that I'm told are the strange, strange inner workings of my mind.
And while finishing this up, I did finally catch Pixar's contribution "One Man Band", and it is a cute little film at the end, and it charmed me once the scowling girl picked up the violin and played it herself. Now I can't decide whether to actually watch Cars or just return the DVD now that I've seen the short.
The 2003 Oscar shorts were also released in a collection, and it's a pretty stark contrast in tone. That collection had some lighter fare like "Mike's New Car", the Pixar short with the characters from Monsters, Inc.; "The Chubbchubbs!", a hilarious film about a janitor at a cantina packed with science fiction movie characters and carnivorous fuzzballs; and "Das Rad", a German film about rocks watching the temporary distraction of the rise and fall of civilization around them. The live action films included quite a bit of humor as well, like the Belgian film "Fait d'hiver", which is an urban legend about a man calling his house and having his five year old daughter (who was curiously reminiscent of Bryan's niece) tell him Mommy's playing in the bedroom with "Uncle Wim". The best film in that collection was "This Charming Man", a comedy about a Danish man whose unemployment paperwork gets screwed up, so he has to pose as a muslim asylum-seeker to get a job and takes Danish classes to hit on the instructor, and sees how differently Danish society is views Lars Hansen than they do his alter ego El Hassan. Either the Iraq war or rampant movie piracy must have the Academy a little depressed.
Some things are worth commenting on, like "The Mysterious Geographic Explorations of Jasper Morello", which in title and in a brief description sounds like a much lighter film than it really is. It tells the story of Jasper Morello, living in a very vertical and airborne industrialized society, navigating an airship into the unknown reaches of the sky with an old biologist on a mission to seek new medicines in the wild places of the world. However, Morello's mission is seeking a cure for a wasting, coughing disease afflicting his whole society, which he and the doctor find in a carnivorous jungle plant, which is kept alive for the journey home by feeding it the entire crew and all of Morello's blood. All the characters appear as black silhouettes against the white walls and grey clouds around the airship, turning a fantastic craft and landscape and a noble adventure into this blighted, diseased, black tale. The use of silhouettes, only shifting to detail to show the diseased, and the hungry, carnivorous plant, things that are impure and not whole, is visually interesting, as is the world of open-decked airships Jasper Morello comes from.
The Oscar went to "The Moon and the Son: An Imagined Conversation", which is an imagined attempt by a son to speak to his recently deceased father about his father's life and criminal past, and the bitter, violent anger that poisoned that life. I felt it was a well made film, and I found its style of animation reminiscent of children's drawings, all in bright primary colors, to tell the story of a son who still feels small facing the memory of his father, even after his death.
The live-action films include some wonderfully filmed stories like "The Last Farm" and "The Runaway" which are perhaps better left unspoiled, ironically about the end of one life, as an Icelandic farmer concludes his last day on the farm, and the beginning of another when a man is forced to spend his first day as a father by a small child who shows up at his door insisting to be his son who needs a ride to school. But still, the impact of our fragile mortality lingers over these films like a dying gaul bleeding to death in the seat next to you at the theatre.
I've always liked Kevin Pollack, so the first short I actually watched was "Our Time Is Up", which introduces the recurring theme of death the most directly. Pollack plays a disinterested, ineffective therapist who is diagnosed with terminal disease, who starts brusquely just speaking his mind with his stable of hopeless clients. His unprofessional outbursts and enjoying tweaking their phobias actually challenges them for the first time in their therapy. Being able to ignore the risk that his clients will quit therapy actually allows him to do something to help them. "Our Time Is Up" is an amusing comment on the way death is sometimes the only thing that can force us to live our lives.
The Oscar went to the Irish film "Six Shooter", which is about the weirdest, darkest, most violent, and unmistakably funniest of the whole lot. This was an absolutely bizarre yet absolutely captivating film about a man who has just lost his wife and a couple who've lost a baby to crib death, who end up in a train car with a young man who seems to have no sense of propriety. It's the best movie about suicidal and lapicidal train passengers being entertained by stories about an exploding cow with a climactic police shoot-out I've ever seen, that's for sure. Just a great, bizarre film, well deserving of an Oscar, that touches on death, religion, pain, companionship, courtesy, and police procedure. Seriously, my reaction was what the fuck, and wow.
Besides that I have to add a kind word for "Cashback", a film about working all night in a supermarket, and how to pass the time. It really goes through the expected bits about surrounding oneself with the dregs of the working world for mind-numbing tasks under a fluorescent glare, and the dreary horror of it all. Every worker has their own technique for managing the gray ocean of time. What made it interesting was the narrator's artistic bent and interest in still life leading him to embrace the timelessness void of the supermarket, fascinated by a near-infinite beauty he finds in passing moments. His main obsession is the striking beauty of the female form, that every woman unconsciously shines with in every gesture, and his inner life consists of converting tired, bored female shoppers doing the least sexy thing in the world into beautiful nude sketches. It's all about fascination, when something sublime appears out of the mundane, like plunging through a crack in a frozen lake but falling into warm blue water. This film struck a real familiar chord on the lute strings that I'm told are the strange, strange inner workings of my mind.
And while finishing this up, I did finally catch Pixar's contribution "One Man Band", and it is a cute little film at the end, and it charmed me once the scowling girl picked up the violin and played it herself. Now I can't decide whether to actually watch Cars or just return the DVD now that I've seen the short.
Tuesday, December 05, 2006
Calcio, Cancer, Castration, and Kazakhstan
After a quick binge on rentals, I discovered there were some things I was missing out on, and some I really, really wasn't.
Borat I obviously caught in the theater, and it really is funny. Borat pushes all the boundaries of good taste, but where it really rises above crude fun is when it pulls in the public and even its own audience. When this film exposes something in people, ranging from at its mildest gullibility to at its worst the racism and sexism and the condescending, ignorant xenophobia that Borat can bring out so easily, that's when it's truly memorable. The real joke is that people are willing to believe that Borat plans to kidnap Pamela Anderson in a homemade bag to drag her back to Kazakhstan, and so easily coaxed into defending slavery, or to warning him as a friendly aside to shave his mustache and not look so much like an Arab, in short that they actually believe in Borat's Kazakhstan, is hilarious. I was also impressed with the consistent tone of the film, where Cohen never winks, and never steps out of Borat's documentary.
Thank You for Smoking was pretty much everything I expected it to be, sharp, quick, and very entertaining. It's fairly light in both story and message, really not taking any of its characters anywhere new as a result of their experiences, so really it's just enjoyable to see a nice set of actors have fun dancing through an amusing script. One surprising consequence is that any meaningful comment is more subtle than I would have expected. For instance, the ironic smugness exhibited by Aaron Eckhart when he is given a nicotine overdose and the only thing that saves his life is being a smoker, I loved the refusal of the film to teach him a lesson. The look at the anti-smoking forces discussing proper auditioning of "cancer boys" mirroring the callousness of the tobacco lobby, and the general impression that everybody seems to have lost any sense of perspective they may have started out with lingers long after watching what is definitely an amusing film.
I wondered what I was missing by not having gotten around to catching Goal! The Dream Begins, which I presumed from the subtitle had further installments on the way. As it turns out, not a whole lot. This is really fluffy, and feels like the film that somebody who read Uplifting Sports Movies for Dummies would make. It's a collection of mild cliches, where our hero has to suffer very predictable defeats and betrayals yet score the big goal in the end, where every turn of the plot is so ordinary it really feels like it came from a checklist. Some things don't make a lot of sense, like how Santiago somehow doesn't need a work permit in England, but really I don't think this film needs too much nit-picking. While it never rises above mediocrity dramatically, I have to admit it pulled me in and gave a warm fuzzy feeling all over every time Santiago caught a break. The football is filmed nicely, and it has the usual cameos by legendary names which are for the most part nicely done, although Beckham's was perhaps appropriately a bit forced. It's watchable, and being so starved for quality soccer since the World Cup, I needed a fix. And Anna Friel may not be creme brulee, but she is like a chocolate-covered fortune cookie.
I also rented two films with creepy, disturbed children who invoke the story of Little Red Riding Hood, but exhibiting rather different levels of filmmaking. I haven't seen anything as clumsy as the horror movie Red Riding Hood in ages, and it was truly forgettable crap that tried to slap together superficial elements of as many horror films as it could find over terrible acting, just yikes. Hard Candy is actually a serious project, and about as far away in quality from the other as you can get. The two actors who are 99% of the film's focus are perfect as a charming photographer with an interest in teenage girls, and the emotional shadows that go over Ellen Page's face during any line are fascinating to watch on their own. The seeds of doubt and of guilt are enough to keep conflict alive and loyalties wavering all the way up to the last frame, as the film 's conflict can creepily enough be easily appreciated from both sides, predatory photographer and castrating child. The whole thing is beautifully shot, staying intimate with its actors faces under harsh light that shows every twitch. I'm actually still unnerved enough to pat my balls thankfully.
So basically, Hard Candy and Thank You For Smoking are both worth digging up and checking out if the latest Drew Barrymore romantic comedy is out of stock, and Goal! The Dream Begins is a nice guilty pleasure.
Borat I obviously caught in the theater, and it really is funny. Borat pushes all the boundaries of good taste, but where it really rises above crude fun is when it pulls in the public and even its own audience. When this film exposes something in people, ranging from at its mildest gullibility to at its worst the racism and sexism and the condescending, ignorant xenophobia that Borat can bring out so easily, that's when it's truly memorable. The real joke is that people are willing to believe that Borat plans to kidnap Pamela Anderson in a homemade bag to drag her back to Kazakhstan, and so easily coaxed into defending slavery, or to warning him as a friendly aside to shave his mustache and not look so much like an Arab, in short that they actually believe in Borat's Kazakhstan, is hilarious. I was also impressed with the consistent tone of the film, where Cohen never winks, and never steps out of Borat's documentary.
Thank You for Smoking was pretty much everything I expected it to be, sharp, quick, and very entertaining. It's fairly light in both story and message, really not taking any of its characters anywhere new as a result of their experiences, so really it's just enjoyable to see a nice set of actors have fun dancing through an amusing script. One surprising consequence is that any meaningful comment is more subtle than I would have expected. For instance, the ironic smugness exhibited by Aaron Eckhart when he is given a nicotine overdose and the only thing that saves his life is being a smoker, I loved the refusal of the film to teach him a lesson. The look at the anti-smoking forces discussing proper auditioning of "cancer boys" mirroring the callousness of the tobacco lobby, and the general impression that everybody seems to have lost any sense of perspective they may have started out with lingers long after watching what is definitely an amusing film.
I wondered what I was missing by not having gotten around to catching Goal! The Dream Begins, which I presumed from the subtitle had further installments on the way. As it turns out, not a whole lot. This is really fluffy, and feels like the film that somebody who read Uplifting Sports Movies for Dummies would make. It's a collection of mild cliches, where our hero has to suffer very predictable defeats and betrayals yet score the big goal in the end, where every turn of the plot is so ordinary it really feels like it came from a checklist. Some things don't make a lot of sense, like how Santiago somehow doesn't need a work permit in England, but really I don't think this film needs too much nit-picking. While it never rises above mediocrity dramatically, I have to admit it pulled me in and gave a warm fuzzy feeling all over every time Santiago caught a break. The football is filmed nicely, and it has the usual cameos by legendary names which are for the most part nicely done, although Beckham's was perhaps appropriately a bit forced. It's watchable, and being so starved for quality soccer since the World Cup, I needed a fix. And Anna Friel may not be creme brulee, but she is like a chocolate-covered fortune cookie.
I also rented two films with creepy, disturbed children who invoke the story of Little Red Riding Hood, but exhibiting rather different levels of filmmaking. I haven't seen anything as clumsy as the horror movie Red Riding Hood in ages, and it was truly forgettable crap that tried to slap together superficial elements of as many horror films as it could find over terrible acting, just yikes. Hard Candy is actually a serious project, and about as far away in quality from the other as you can get. The two actors who are 99% of the film's focus are perfect as a charming photographer with an interest in teenage girls, and the emotional shadows that go over Ellen Page's face during any line are fascinating to watch on their own. The seeds of doubt and of guilt are enough to keep conflict alive and loyalties wavering all the way up to the last frame, as the film 's conflict can creepily enough be easily appreciated from both sides, predatory photographer and castrating child. The whole thing is beautifully shot, staying intimate with its actors faces under harsh light that shows every twitch. I'm actually still unnerved enough to pat my balls thankfully.
So basically, Hard Candy and Thank You For Smoking are both worth digging up and checking out if the latest Drew Barrymore romantic comedy is out of stock, and Goal! The Dream Begins is a nice guilty pleasure.
If I did it...
Fox has decided not to publish and promote O.J.'s purely speculative treatise about how he might have gone about murdering his ex-wife and her boyfriend. I shared the horror of the public that forced this, because I also believe O.J. is circumventing Henry Hill laws and cashing in on a criminal act. I wish the book hadn't been yanked though, because my problem with it is O.J. isn't going far enough. Nothing can really happen to him that already hasn't, so I wish he'd just say he did it. This book would have gone a long way towards that, and if O.J. admits he did it we could all move on a bit because nobody could ever claim that there was a vast conspiracy to bring him down. Well, they still could, since being guilty doesn't actually preclude evidence being planted, but even there, a full confession would help establish any misconduct in the investigation and the trial, if the actual facts could be established. I suppose I really still don't know if the author of such books as I Want to Tell You, (if) I Did It, and others is guilty or not, but I do like how the titles of those books flow together, and how the "if" really is in a different color from the rest of the title on the jacket cover.
Monday, December 04, 2006
The Sign of the Cross (1932)
I only recently became aware of this film and its infamous role in ushering in thirty years of censorship of the American film industry. Cecil B. DeMille's The Sign of the Cross has been credited with being single film most responsible for making mandatory the Hays Code, which banned any film that would lower the moral standard of any person viewing it. I wondered what could possibly have been so damaging to the moral sense of the viewer about this movie that it could have had such a chilling effect, and yet had such broad appeal as to be a profitable studio release. And really, I wondered if the House of 1,000 Corpses of the 1930's could have a similar effect today, and whether I would be morally damaged by the act of watching it. Here is my analysis, which contains several spoilers, to warn anybody into 30's cinema, or you can just skip to the last two paragraphs (I know I wouldn't read this boring rambling). The odd thing, given its place in history, is that it's such a wholesome story. It features very pure and wholesome Christian heroes who choose righteousness over evil, and celebrates their inevitable triumph over paganism and their heavenly reward, without the slightest bit of irony or cynicism. And despite all that the answer to my question was yes, it was highly morally damaging. The darkest reaches of my psyche, full of lust and rage, were certainly stimulated by watching this deeply immoral film, and God I loved it.
The film is set during the reign of Emperor Nero, in the immediate aftermath of the great fire that destroyed much of Rome. Nero deflects suspicion by blaming the Christians, and ordering them all rounded up. All the Christians are forced underground, while Roman soldiers pursue them relentlessly and torture them for information on their friends and family and fellow worshipers. The Christians are noble, human, and sympathetic heroes, suffering religious oppression of the worst kind. This makes the notorious nature of the film that much more amusing, since it's so wholeheartedly pro-Christian in its themes, strongly playing on the idea that Rome's Christians may be suffering, but their faith is rewarded by the eventual triumph over pagan cruelty modern audiences know is coming.
Meanwhile, the Romans are extraordinarily decadent bed-hopping fools. Half of the immorality of this film comes from the hedonism of the Romans, particularly the Empress Poppaea, sleeping with half of Rome and inviting gossipy neighbors to strip down and enjoy a nice bath with her in a giant, frothy tub of donkey milk. Every time Claudette Colbert's nipples came peeking out of the milk, I'm sure it was another nail in the coffin of freedom of expression in cinema, and her command to Vivian Tobin to “Take off your clothes and get in here,” certainly can't have helped.
The film's main story centers around one particular good Christian woman, Mercia, and the Roman Consul Marcus Superbus. Marcus has shown some rare moral fiber by fending off the advances of Empress Poppaea (no doubt because of her ridiculous bangs), and when he becomes smitten with Mercia, he uses his influence to keep her family from being rounded up, since she's hot. Tension builds between Marcus, trying to save the woman he's loved for five minutes, and Poppaea, who is determined to have Marcus all to herself and figures bumping off his Christian hoochie-mama is a necessary first step.
Marcus attempts to convince Mercia to accept the inevitable slaughter in the Coliseum of her fellow Christians, and to just renounce her faith and hide out with him in his house, where he's throwing a giant party. Marcus tries to convince her to abandon a cruel god who wants all his followers to just calmly parade like lambs to the slaughter. Mercia will not yield to temptation, and so Marcus in frustration allows his fellow pagan party-goers to mock her and seduce her to their hedonistic lifestyle. Eventually Marcus's party is cut short, as the music is drowned out by the hymns the Christians are singing as they are marched through the street past Marcus's house on their way to the Coliseum. Mercia then smugly announces that her place is with the doomed Christians.
The seduction of the hedonistic Romans once again damaged my moral character, although in this case particularly I should stress this is only from the perspective of a Hays Code censor. The most sinful woman in Rome, Ancaria, for the amusement of the rest of Marcus's guests, mocks Mercia by singing The Naked Moon. This mainly consists of dancing erotically, running her hands over Mercia and kissing her neck, singing her song about love, while the hyperstimulated party crowd make out and paw themselves. When the Christian singing comes into earshot, it breaks the erotic spell and Mercia smugly puts on a sad, chaste smile, while Ancaria cowers in fear. Jesus is a sure-fire cure for tempting, hot girl-on-girl action, but after dismissing his frightened party guests, Marcus is only prevented from attempting to rape Mercia in an attempt to make her stay by the arrival of Roman soldiers who take her away. The whole scene is full of sexualized violence, as Mercia is intimidated by Ancaria's dancing and the oversexed Marcus's sense of power, and my moral character was seriously weakened by this film's temptation to secretly enjoy it while frowning outwardly along with Mercia.
What really gives the film its shock value though is the arena, which I suppose on reflection couldn't actually be the Coliseum, what with it not being built yet. The Romans are once again shown as hedonistic, petty people bickering over seats and gorging themselves while the Christians sublimely await their brutal, horrible deaths by reading from scripture and consoling one another. When the games begin, the Romans are treated to the sight of several rounds of bloody combat while different crowd members laugh and cheer, turn away in horror, or simply sigh in boredom and pore over their programs. All the fighting is shown in all its brutal glory, including swordsman, pygmies with spears, and most bizarrely men with spiked gloves repeatedly punching each other and spitting out teeth and blood. DeMille puts his audience in the arena, savoring over the fighting, and he lingers on the dying gladiators suffering the boos of the crowd, bringing us as close as he can to the brutal, now forbidden spectacle.
This would not be all that remarkable, certainly not by modern standards, except for when the Christians begin to enter the arena. Generally the Christians are matched up in losing situations with wild animals, and a few are sacrificed individually, for instance men are staked down and trampled by elephants, who then drag their bodies away. The big finale for the Romans is a mass feeding of Christians to lions, where the Christians all march out placidly, humming Christian hymns, while the lions are driven into the arena by their handlers. The actual scenes of lions attacking Christians, with a broad panorama of several scenes of people being eaten, is actually quite shocking in their realism.
The most striking images are of women wearing nothing but garlands tied around her in a spiral in a very decorative sort of bondage motif. One is staked out on the ground with some supports to keep her prone body a few inches off the ground, while hungry crocodiles his and saunter 
towards her, and she screams in terror, waiting to be eaten. Another woman, shown here, has her hands bound to the top of a pole, with the same rope of garlands barely covering her breasts and genitalia, while a gorilla menaces her. In the finale, another woman is shown tied up in the same situation while lions eat all the screaming Christians around her. These scenes are highly sexual, and imply the brutal deaths these women are about to suffer. This is just like the combination of sex and death in modern slasher movies, only since it's done by somebody competent, this is actually pretty moving, and starts blood flowing into all the dark recesses of the mind. Seriously, I was all set to find a Christian woman to sacrifice before my phone rang and I lost my train of thought.
The film's primary story concludes here, as Empress Poppaea has ordered that Mercia be held behind to go out last, so Marcus will see her die horribly and achieve closure. Mercia comforts a boy who is afraid to go out, despite the prodding of soldiers, but convinces him to go out singing and be happy because he's going to heaven and she'll be there with him again soon. He walks out singing, and then his voice is abruptly cut off. Marcus arrives to try and dissuade her from going to her death, but instead Mercia converts him to Christianity and they both walk out into the arena, while the doors close behind them and rays of light falling on the doors illuminate a patch in the shape of a cross. The fatalism and willingness to die of the Christians is certainly unnerving,
There are several elements that make this feel so wrong, one is obviously the sexualized violence, both in the barely covered women being terrorized in the arena, but also the near molestation earlier in the Naked Moon dance. This really does entice the audience to enjoy the growing horror, and so do the cheering and laughing spectators. The thing that really makes it feel so visceral is the way DeMille makes sure to linger on the horror and anticipation of the victims, as they wail or whimper but can't look away from the advancing animals, or as they curl up under the claws of the lions. He lingers again over the last grimacing gasp of breath and then concludes each round of slaughter by showing the still, bloody bodies. The familiar reaction of the crowd, where some laugh and clap while some look ill, is a disturbing reminder of ourselves, while watching this on film we are tempted to be horrified and entertained, and showing people a side of themselves they aren't ready to see will always run afoul of censorship. The question that could have been asked by this film is most visible in the third reaction mixed into the crowd: boredom. Some people are too desensitized and impatient to even pay attention, lacking any real empathy or capacity to really grasp what is going on, and those are the truly frightening people, not those who enjoy it but the people who turn their heads in disinterest.
So the eventual conclusion I came to was startling and dismaying. Over the next few years following the release of this film, the events of the plot actually happened. A religious minority was blamed for the leading problems of the day, rounded up and murdered according to the whims of their jailers, and nobody really much cared. When the St Louis tried to dock in Florida, we sent all its passengers back to Europe to be murdered. This film was a chilling warning about human nature and the events to come, and what we all as spectators would probably do, and the forces of censorship in the United States thought it would lower our moral standard? This is really why I zealously oppose censorship, and why I sometimes dig into certain unsavory topics with a seeming lack of propriety. But mostly it's because I'm an idiot. (At least I'm honest.)
Dutch cleaning up after filthy Canadians?
The Dutch are widely regarded as the world's best hydrological engineers for having created windmills to pump out their land, and for the gates protecting Rotterdam and Amsterdam from storm surges, as well as numerous other achievements. So of course when Victoria, British Columbia had a problem controlling the amount of urine flowing through their streets, of course they turned to the Dutch for help.
Hup Holland, indeed.
The Dutch are widely regarded as the world's best hydrological engineers for having created windmills to pump out their land, and for the gates protecting Rotterdam and Amsterdam from storm surges, as well as numerous other achievements. So of course when Victoria, British Columbia had a problem controlling the amount of urine flowing through their streets, of course they turned to the Dutch for help.Nobody likes a stinky urinal or port-a-potty just sitting around on the street, next to some cafe serving lunch, and larger public toilets are notorious havens for gay sex and drugs, so the obvious solutions were really out. Fortunately, the problematic pissers in Canada and Holland are nocturnal, and only fill the streets with urine under cover of darkness when the bars and clubs close up, so the Dutchies came up with a nocturnal solution.
They created a urinal which rises up out of the street via remote control after dark, and retreats back underground when normal people are up and about. I just think this is bizarre enough to comment on, the fact that Victoria and other cities now have remote control pissoirs rising up out of the pavement. To answer one question that seems to come up, of how come there's a urination system that works for men but not for women: women didn't piss in the street before, and any woman who would use an open toilet on the street will long since have worked out how to piss standing up. There are more pictures and video of this thing here on John Chow's blog.
Hup Holland, indeed.
Sunday, December 03, 2006
A letter to a friend, regarding the films of Martin Scorsese
Some people apparently haven't ever seen a Martin Scorsese film, and they really should. There are lots of Scorsese film options, but it is important to select the right one, and to actually see something he directed. For instance, his voice acting performance in that fish cartoon with Will Smith was certainly missable. With that in mind, here is your guide to the films of Martin Scorsese, or at least the ones I've actually seen.
I've never gotten around to seeing Mean Streets, Scorsese's first noteworthy film, which began a series of films with similar themes with a familiar cast, this one starring Harvey Keitel and Robert DeNiro. I also haven't seen any of his documentary work, and I can't really comment on that Michael Jackson video he directed (for "Bad", as I recall). I also missed a fair bit of his work in the 80's, like The King of Comedy and The Last Temptation of Christ, but I'm working on it.
I have however seen some of his legendary work in Taxi Driver and Raging Bull, both of which arguably center on Robert DeNiro's unflinching portrait of a sociopath. Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver is pretty explicitly a man with no real grip on the real world around him but a haze of sex and violence, but the image of Jake LaMotta Scorsese presents in Raging Bull is a man with no capacity to understand why he cannot fit into a normal life with the people around him. The violent rage that tears into every facet of his life leaves him with one remarkable ability: he is the only person in the world not afraid to step into a boxing ring with Sugar Ray Robinson, and there's an incredible tragedy to seeing a career that has to end with most of his life left to live but all his friends and family long since driven away. Raging Bull is such a beautiful film as well, which captures the romance of 1940s boxing that was killed by fixed fights, Mike Tyson, and pay-per-view, it's definitely a significant piece of Americana. Both films have some of the most quoted film lines of all time, but my favorite is still the bruised and bloodied LaMotta approaching Sugar Ray after their last fight, grinning with bloody teeth and a black eye, to say "You never got me down, Ray. You never got me down."
I've never seen The Color of Money or Scorsese's remake of Cape Fear all the way through, but I have to like the challenge represented by both films, because of their reference to earlier material, so I'll rave about them anyways. Taking the story of Fast Eddie Felson from The Hustler and telling us what happened when Eddie got older and lost his edge, and tries to vicariously relive his days of glory through a younger protege, is daring in its way, even as an adaptation of Walter Tevis's novel. There's something about film that's unforgiving when we revisit images, like George Lucas found trying to humanize Darth Vader, because otherwise Fast Eddie can stay back in the 50s forever. Cape Fear takes on an icon as well, revisiting Robert Mitchum's performance in the 1962 film, as well as invoking Mitchum's evil preacher from Night of the Hunter. Scorsese and DeNiro recapture Mitchum's eerie mix of charm and violence, but DeNiro's Max Cady is a step beyond. Where Mitchum is sharp and his relentlessness and sociopathy are not obvious to the society around him, DeNiro is quite clearly operating by a completely different set of mental and emotional rules. There's a clear moral order to the 1962 film, where Scorsese's film presents its victims quite differently in a much more morally and sexually flexible world, and the far more insanely scary version of Cady is part of what allows him to do so. Plus it gave birth to that great Simpsons parody where Sideshow Bob stalks the family like Max Cady.
Then there's Goodfellas. This is like a quintessential piece of American movie culture, and the classic Scorsese film in its use of music and slow motion, as well as the usual profanity and violence. (I really don't know what to make of you not having even seen this, P.J., seriously.) This was the defining American gangster movie for a specific era, like the true story behind the Godfather, adapted from Henry Hill's memoirs of his own criminal enterprises. In Casino, Joe Pesci and Robert DeNiro reunited with Scorsese to tell the story of the rise and fall of the mob in Las Vegas in the same style. Seriously I don't know how Goodfellas didn't penetrate that rock in the Swiss Alps you've been hiding under.
Other than Casino, A lot of Scorsese's work after Goodfellas didn't generate the same kind of response, but there's some quality work. The Age of Innocence was horrendously boring and did a lot to kill Winona Ryder's career, since her performance was also truly horrendous, and I never quite got around to seeing Scorsese's take on the exile of the Dalai Lama, Kundun. I did enjoy quite a bit Bringing Out the Dead, a black comedy which stars Nicholas Cage as an ambulance driver whose life is crumbling, desperately searching for a life to save, which serves for him like a sexual experience, directly comparing it himself to falling in love. The scene where his partner Ving Rhames goes through a dramatic faith healing ritual holding hands with the crowd over the body of an overdose victim calling for him to rise up, knowing that Nicholas Cage is quietly administering medical care and seeing how many stupid club kids will let the faith healing take the credit, just killed me.
The big return of Martin Scorsese was supposed to be his epic Gangs of New York, which is an interesting recreation of a particular place and time in history, even if unfortunately the main characters and the primary story are not particularly gripping. Daniel Day-Lewis is tremendous as Bill the Butcher, and Scorsese should be credited with bringing him and Leonardo DiCaprio out of retirement. The Aviator is also ultimately a forgettable film other than its recreation of a certain era and certain personae, and the real highlight is DiCaprio's expertly captured descent into madness as Howard Hughes, and Cate Blanchett's Katherine Hepburn.
However, and here's the thing, The Departed is his best movie in over fifteen years. The fantastic performance Leonardo DiCaprio gives as an undercover police officer unraveling under stress is simply fascinating, and a spectacular cast delivers the most amazing and brutal crime film I've seen in years. It's absolutely captivating, and likely to be a highlight of a lot of careers, and possibly the film that wins Scorsese his first Oscar as a director. I raved about The Depahted (alternate pronunciation) in detail here, and I can't believe you haven't seen it, or any other Scorsese movie. My god man, would you please quit torturing me with this Scorsese boycott and please see this movie?
I've never gotten around to seeing Mean Streets, Scorsese's first noteworthy film, which began a series of films with similar themes with a familiar cast, this one starring Harvey Keitel and Robert DeNiro. I also haven't seen any of his documentary work, and I can't really comment on that Michael Jackson video he directed (for "Bad", as I recall). I also missed a fair bit of his work in the 80's, like The King of Comedy and The Last Temptation of Christ, but I'm working on it.
I have however seen some of his legendary work in Taxi Driver and Raging Bull, both of which arguably center on Robert DeNiro's unflinching portrait of a sociopath. Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver is pretty explicitly a man with no real grip on the real world around him but a haze of sex and violence, but the image of Jake LaMotta Scorsese presents in Raging Bull is a man with no capacity to understand why he cannot fit into a normal life with the people around him. The violent rage that tears into every facet of his life leaves him with one remarkable ability: he is the only person in the world not afraid to step into a boxing ring with Sugar Ray Robinson, and there's an incredible tragedy to seeing a career that has to end with most of his life left to live but all his friends and family long since driven away. Raging Bull is such a beautiful film as well, which captures the romance of 1940s boxing that was killed by fixed fights, Mike Tyson, and pay-per-view, it's definitely a significant piece of Americana. Both films have some of the most quoted film lines of all time, but my favorite is still the bruised and bloodied LaMotta approaching Sugar Ray after their last fight, grinning with bloody teeth and a black eye, to say "You never got me down, Ray. You never got me down."
I've never seen The Color of Money or Scorsese's remake of Cape Fear all the way through, but I have to like the challenge represented by both films, because of their reference to earlier material, so I'll rave about them anyways. Taking the story of Fast Eddie Felson from The Hustler and telling us what happened when Eddie got older and lost his edge, and tries to vicariously relive his days of glory through a younger protege, is daring in its way, even as an adaptation of Walter Tevis's novel. There's something about film that's unforgiving when we revisit images, like George Lucas found trying to humanize Darth Vader, because otherwise Fast Eddie can stay back in the 50s forever. Cape Fear takes on an icon as well, revisiting Robert Mitchum's performance in the 1962 film, as well as invoking Mitchum's evil preacher from Night of the Hunter. Scorsese and DeNiro recapture Mitchum's eerie mix of charm and violence, but DeNiro's Max Cady is a step beyond. Where Mitchum is sharp and his relentlessness and sociopathy are not obvious to the society around him, DeNiro is quite clearly operating by a completely different set of mental and emotional rules. There's a clear moral order to the 1962 film, where Scorsese's film presents its victims quite differently in a much more morally and sexually flexible world, and the far more insanely scary version of Cady is part of what allows him to do so. Plus it gave birth to that great Simpsons parody where Sideshow Bob stalks the family like Max Cady.
Then there's Goodfellas. This is like a quintessential piece of American movie culture, and the classic Scorsese film in its use of music and slow motion, as well as the usual profanity and violence. (I really don't know what to make of you not having even seen this, P.J., seriously.) This was the defining American gangster movie for a specific era, like the true story behind the Godfather, adapted from Henry Hill's memoirs of his own criminal enterprises. In Casino, Joe Pesci and Robert DeNiro reunited with Scorsese to tell the story of the rise and fall of the mob in Las Vegas in the same style. Seriously I don't know how Goodfellas didn't penetrate that rock in the Swiss Alps you've been hiding under.
Other than Casino, A lot of Scorsese's work after Goodfellas didn't generate the same kind of response, but there's some quality work. The Age of Innocence was horrendously boring and did a lot to kill Winona Ryder's career, since her performance was also truly horrendous, and I never quite got around to seeing Scorsese's take on the exile of the Dalai Lama, Kundun. I did enjoy quite a bit Bringing Out the Dead, a black comedy which stars Nicholas Cage as an ambulance driver whose life is crumbling, desperately searching for a life to save, which serves for him like a sexual experience, directly comparing it himself to falling in love. The scene where his partner Ving Rhames goes through a dramatic faith healing ritual holding hands with the crowd over the body of an overdose victim calling for him to rise up, knowing that Nicholas Cage is quietly administering medical care and seeing how many stupid club kids will let the faith healing take the credit, just killed me.
The big return of Martin Scorsese was supposed to be his epic Gangs of New York, which is an interesting recreation of a particular place and time in history, even if unfortunately the main characters and the primary story are not particularly gripping. Daniel Day-Lewis is tremendous as Bill the Butcher, and Scorsese should be credited with bringing him and Leonardo DiCaprio out of retirement. The Aviator is also ultimately a forgettable film other than its recreation of a certain era and certain personae, and the real highlight is DiCaprio's expertly captured descent into madness as Howard Hughes, and Cate Blanchett's Katherine Hepburn.
However, and here's the thing, The Departed is his best movie in over fifteen years. The fantastic performance Leonardo DiCaprio gives as an undercover police officer unraveling under stress is simply fascinating, and a spectacular cast delivers the most amazing and brutal crime film I've seen in years. It's absolutely captivating, and likely to be a highlight of a lot of careers, and possibly the film that wins Scorsese his first Oscar as a director. I raved about The Depahted (alternate pronunciation) in detail here, and I can't believe you haven't seen it, or any other Scorsese movie. My god man, would you please quit torturing me with this Scorsese boycott and please see this movie?
Bears 23 - 13 Vikings
I really wish I could analyze this sordid affair in detail, but I really can't. It's just too bizarre and painful. 10 turnovers in all, and at one point Brad Johnson threw an interception, the Bears offense came out and lined up, Grossman threw an interception right back, and then Johnson threw another interception as soon as he came back on the field. Johnson over the course of four passes threw three interceptions during that stint... at halftime his QB rating was 16.7, still better than Grossman's 0.0. The difference was, the Vikings did not advance the ball after turnovers, and therefore failed to capitalize on them, especially when the Bears fumbled the opening kick-off, the Vikings started in field goal range, but lost 8 yards on the penalty-ridden drive and had to punt. And I have to agree with Tony Sirigusa about how stupid a punt returner has to be to get near a ball they can't field, because they only risk making it a live ball and causing a turnover. Tony Sirigusa's sideline reporting was a little strange, but I'll cut him some slack since he was in The 25th Hour, which I still think was a great movie.
There was some nice stuff at the end, when Brooks Bollinger came in at QB and drove the team down the field, scoring a touchdown rather than faltering in the red zone as the Vikings have all year. It was late in the game, and the Bears had to be feeling a little comfortable following the safety that put them up by 17 points, but it was still a nice sight. Then the Vikings decided to be daring and went for an unexpected onside kick, which frankly I would have enjoyed even had they lost it. Typically, after recovering the onside kick the Vikings failed to move the ball and the line couldn't protect Bollinger, who predictably got hurt. The Tardis came in on our last possession and lost a fumble while trying to run away from the Bears pass rush, but I'm hoping maybe we see more of the Tardis next week.
This was a game nobody really won, and the Bears should have headed to the locker room with the knowledge that they had just been exposed as being a far more vulnerable team than their 10-2 record would indicate, and that they will be eaten alive in the playoffs when Grossman can't stop throwing to the other team, and they aren't playing the Vikings anymore. The Bears would be better off not going to the Superbowl, because playing like this versus the AFC champions and losing 41-0 would be a stain on the franchise for decades.
This is the punishment of the Weauxf Gawdz for bandwagon fans straddling the fence waiting to see who won, a game neither team can be proud of. Thanks to you, we all suffer, and I think you know who you are.
There was some nice stuff at the end, when Brooks Bollinger came in at QB and drove the team down the field, scoring a touchdown rather than faltering in the red zone as the Vikings have all year. It was late in the game, and the Bears had to be feeling a little comfortable following the safety that put them up by 17 points, but it was still a nice sight. Then the Vikings decided to be daring and went for an unexpected onside kick, which frankly I would have enjoyed even had they lost it. Typically, after recovering the onside kick the Vikings failed to move the ball and the line couldn't protect Bollinger, who predictably got hurt. The Tardis came in on our last possession and lost a fumble while trying to run away from the Bears pass rush, but I'm hoping maybe we see more of the Tardis next week.
This was a game nobody really won, and the Bears should have headed to the locker room with the knowledge that they had just been exposed as being a far more vulnerable team than their 10-2 record would indicate, and that they will be eaten alive in the playoffs when Grossman can't stop throwing to the other team, and they aren't playing the Vikings anymore. The Bears would be better off not going to the Superbowl, because playing like this versus the AFC champions and losing 41-0 would be a stain on the franchise for decades.
This is the punishment of the Weauxf Gawdz for bandwagon fans straddling the fence waiting to see who won, a game neither team can be proud of. Thanks to you, we all suffer, and I think you know who you are.
Thursday, November 30, 2006
Bears vs Vikings, or let's not start sucking each other's ***** yet
To any Bears fans getting overly excited about this Sunday's game, I'd like to point out a few things.
Any defensive powerhouse relies heavily on the running game as their first line of defense, because if you leave any defensive unit on the field too long, they'll wear down, make mistakes, and give up points. It remains extremely difficult to run on the Vikings, who are ranked 1st in rushing defense. Really, their glaring weakness recently has been the ridiculous amount of passing yards the team has given up, and even when they give up 400 yards passing and keep coughing the ball up, the Vikings still don't give up that many points, and have played a lot of close games. So realistically, the Bears need to get something out of the passing game to keep the whole game-plan from unraveling, and to keep this from coming down to a lucky break.
And therein lies the problem. Rex Grossman has 10 turnovers in the last month, including seven interceptions. And it's not enough for Grossman to just suck, he has to do it in style. After the Bears defense bailed him out by coming up with a turnover in the closing minutes of his last game against the Vikings, Sexy Rexy started off on such a ridiculous tirade of trashtalk that even he had to admit he's an idiot for patting himself on the back so hard over that one. And Darren Sharper has promised that nobody on the Vikings defense has forgotten what a dick Grossman is, and they're all salivating waiting for a chance to embarrass him. The first mistake he makes, they'll be in his head, and the snowy grass of Soilder Field (sic) could easily turn to quicksand under his feet.
The Vikings are coming off of a win that was closer than it should have been, fired up about Grossman, and the Bears are coming off a possible momentum-killing loss. Their lead in the NFC and dominance in the division may make them start to look ahead to the play-offs and lose their drive after 12 weeks of regular season football, and the Patriots may have them wondering if they're really cut out to win anything better than the NFC North with Sexy Rexy running the show. The 10-point spread just shows the overconfidence of the betting public, and I can't help but wonder how much of that has trickled into the Bears heads as well.
All I'm saying is, it's just possible somebody in Oldtown may be flipping over his reversible Vikings-Bears jersey this Sunday afternoon...
Any defensive powerhouse relies heavily on the running game as their first line of defense, because if you leave any defensive unit on the field too long, they'll wear down, make mistakes, and give up points. It remains extremely difficult to run on the Vikings, who are ranked 1st in rushing defense. Really, their glaring weakness recently has been the ridiculous amount of passing yards the team has given up, and even when they give up 400 yards passing and keep coughing the ball up, the Vikings still don't give up that many points, and have played a lot of close games. So realistically, the Bears need to get something out of the passing game to keep the whole game-plan from unraveling, and to keep this from coming down to a lucky break.
And therein lies the problem. Rex Grossman has 10 turnovers in the last month, including seven interceptions. And it's not enough for Grossman to just suck, he has to do it in style. After the Bears defense bailed him out by coming up with a turnover in the closing minutes of his last game against the Vikings, Sexy Rexy started off on such a ridiculous tirade of trashtalk that even he had to admit he's an idiot for patting himself on the back so hard over that one. And Darren Sharper has promised that nobody on the Vikings defense has forgotten what a dick Grossman is, and they're all salivating waiting for a chance to embarrass him. The first mistake he makes, they'll be in his head, and the snowy grass of Soilder Field (sic) could easily turn to quicksand under his feet.
The Vikings are coming off of a win that was closer than it should have been, fired up about Grossman, and the Bears are coming off a possible momentum-killing loss. Their lead in the NFC and dominance in the division may make them start to look ahead to the play-offs and lose their drive after 12 weeks of regular season football, and the Patriots may have them wondering if they're really cut out to win anything better than the NFC North with Sexy Rexy running the show. The 10-point spread just shows the overconfidence of the betting public, and I can't help but wonder how much of that has trickled into the Bears heads as well.
All I'm saying is, it's just possible somebody in Oldtown may be flipping over his reversible Vikings-Bears jersey this Sunday afternoon...
Monday, November 27, 2006
New ABN-BBY corporate policy memo
Given the recent merger, the following corporate policies will apply to both firms, effective immediately, so we can immediately begin building synergies:
1. All structured finance products will be sold with a service plan, allowing customers who have a problem with their structured finance product to exchange it for a structured finance product of equal or lesser value* within two years. The price of the service plan will be determined as 2% of assets under management and 20% of returns. (*-value to be determined as market value at time of exchange, not of sale.)
b. All ATM maintenance operations will include installation of a Superdisk drive which will contain data essential to the functioning of the ATM. Our new corporate partners assure us it's far more efficient to break ATMs by inserting a disk soaked in coca-cola than with the giant hammer we normally use.
3. All branch banks will adopt the electronics division's successful customer service policy, and have twenty people mill around discussing collateralized debt obligations with customers while only one teller is available so anybody can deposit their paycheck. Free pizza will be served to the 8,000 people waiting in line at the only ATM we plan to have working.
d. Early sales will be coordinated to maximize customer convenience and develop synergies between structured finance and consumer electronics. I can't stress this enough, none of the customers camping out in the parking lot for first crack at a Wii or PS3 should leave the store without also buying into our securitized Minnesota State Fair mini-donut booth.
5. All banking employees should take note, the complimentary lasagna in the new combined employee lounge is made with artichokes, mushrooms, and codeine. Should anyone go back for a second helping and go into a coma, the adrenaline shots and the defibrillator are under the sink.
f. Synergies will be pursued between our pro sporting endorsements. As part of an expanded sponsorship agreement, Ajax players will now grow porn-star mustaches and wear wife-beaters, while the NASCAR drivers we sponsor will not use their hands.
7. Our new corporate slogan is, "Make it More Possible for Thousands of Impossible Things to Get Up Yours". This a compromise hammered out on an international conference call with no translators (they have no word for "synergy"). It sounds equally bad in all languages, creating synergies between diverse and previously unconnected groups of confused and insulted customers all over the world.
g. Remember, without a "g", there are no synergies, only sinners.
9. Our not fixing the holes we make in people's walls policies will be immediately coordinated with our not fixing ATMs policy.
j. Any meal being claimed as a business expense will be reimbursed on the assumption that all parties ate about the same, including the waitress, who must chip in as well.
Synergetically Yours,
Brad and Rijkman
1. All structured finance products will be sold with a service plan, allowing customers who have a problem with their structured finance product to exchange it for a structured finance product of equal or lesser value* within two years. The price of the service plan will be determined as 2% of assets under management and 20% of returns. (*-value to be determined as market value at time of exchange, not of sale.)
b. All ATM maintenance operations will include installation of a Superdisk drive which will contain data essential to the functioning of the ATM. Our new corporate partners assure us it's far more efficient to break ATMs by inserting a disk soaked in coca-cola than with the giant hammer we normally use.
3. All branch banks will adopt the electronics division's successful customer service policy, and have twenty people mill around discussing collateralized debt obligations with customers while only one teller is available so anybody can deposit their paycheck. Free pizza will be served to the 8,000 people waiting in line at the only ATM we plan to have working.
d. Early sales will be coordinated to maximize customer convenience and develop synergies between structured finance and consumer electronics. I can't stress this enough, none of the customers camping out in the parking lot for first crack at a Wii or PS3 should leave the store without also buying into our securitized Minnesota State Fair mini-donut booth.
5. All banking employees should take note, the complimentary lasagna in the new combined employee lounge is made with artichokes, mushrooms, and codeine. Should anyone go back for a second helping and go into a coma, the adrenaline shots and the defibrillator are under the sink.
f. Synergies will be pursued between our pro sporting endorsements. As part of an expanded sponsorship agreement, Ajax players will now grow porn-star mustaches and wear wife-beaters, while the NASCAR drivers we sponsor will not use their hands.
7. Our new corporate slogan is, "Make it More Possible for Thousands of Impossible Things to Get Up Yours". This a compromise hammered out on an international conference call with no translators (they have no word for "synergy"). It sounds equally bad in all languages, creating synergies between diverse and previously unconnected groups of confused and insulted customers all over the world.
g. Remember, without a "g", there are no synergies, only sinners.
9. Our not fixing the holes we make in people's walls policies will be immediately coordinated with our not fixing ATMs policy.
j. Any meal being claimed as a business expense will be reimbursed on the assumption that all parties ate about the same, including the waitress, who must chip in as well.
Synergetically Yours,
Brad and Rijkman
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Morneau wins AL MVP
For anybody keeping up on important world events, Minnesota Twins 1st baseman Justin Morneau has won the American League MVP award. It was a close vote, and Morneau split all the first place votes with Derek Jeter except one (which went for Johan Santana). Joe Mauer, the Twins catcher came in 6th in MVP voting, and Twins pitcher Johan Santana came in 7th.
I'm still surprised that Joe Mauer didn't win, because his achievement, leading the league in batting average while playing as an everyday catcher, hasn't been done since the 40s, but there is a notable bias in sports media towards power hitting. Johan Santana also had a rare feat, winning a major league triple crown (only the third since WWII), but there's a similar bias against voting for a pitcher as MVP, but Santana does get the AL Cy Young award. In any case, I think Justin Morneau may have finally ditched the nickname "Morneau-for-4", and I hope the ovation he and Santana get on opening day next year is enough to get him to stick around.
I'm still surprised that Joe Mauer didn't win, because his achievement, leading the league in batting average while playing as an everyday catcher, hasn't been done since the 40s, but there is a notable bias in sports media towards power hitting. Johan Santana also had a rare feat, winning a major league triple crown (only the third since WWII), but there's a similar bias against voting for a pitcher as MVP, but Santana does get the AL Cy Young award. In any case, I think Justin Morneau may have finally ditched the nickname "Morneau-for-4", and I hope the ovation he and Santana get on opening day next year is enough to get him to stick around.
Saturday, November 18, 2006
Casino Royale, or Europe's New Toy vol. 2
I really enjoyed Casino Royale in a way I haven't enjoyed a Bond movie in twenty years. Judi Dench as M particularly hits just the right note in terms of mixing humor with ruthless gravitas, and the verbal fencing between Bond and Vesper is perfect, seductive and funny. Casino Royale refers to the franchise's hallowed traditions with a sense of humor as well, such as mocking James Bond's tremendously mannered drink order, while simultaneously giving it a special place in the new Bond mythos by giving it an origin and significance. The reference to the unusual names of Bond girls (Pussy Galore, Holly Goodhead) is nicely woven into the interplay between Bond and Vesper. In another simultaneous break with and nod to the past, the opening credits dispense with the usual naked ladies, silhouettes, which had progressed from silhouettes to models with oil pouring over their breasts, another example of how style had given way to excess in the franchise. Actually I really missed the barely-disguised nude women, because I first discovered Bond films in the awakening sexuality of my youth, and I find I still really like boobies. To me though, the new opening credits were very reminiscent of Dr. No, reinventing the franchise by returning to its roots, using Ian Fleming's only un-filmed Bond novel as inspiration.
The two opening action sequences were wonderfully done, the first serving as an introduction for Bond and the whole franchise reboot by doing something unusual, opening the film in black and white, alternating between a callous assassination in a dark office and a flashback to a brutally violent knock-down drag-out fight to the death in a bathroom, all concluding with its own take on the signature Bond gun barrel opening shot. After the credits, there's a fantastic chase sequence of Daniel Craig pursuing Sebastien Foucan through a Madagascar construction site, in which Foucan's ability to evade Bond through a whole monkey-like style of movement, and Daniel Craig's attempts to follow resembling the proverbial bull in a china shop made for an amusing but still tense chase.
The film can really be split into three acts, and the first act plot really seems to be about affirming an English commitment to Europe and European industry, as amid speculation about the future of EADS and Airbus, Eon has James Bond foiling LeChiffre's plot to manipulating the market by shorting EADS stock and then blowing up the A380 at its launch. It's not actually the A380, but I thought the message was clear to those speculators considering abandoning Airbus and forcing a bail-out by the French government, when LeChiffre loses $102m overnight. The A380 apparently takes over from the Chunnel (featured in Mission Impossible) as Europe's new toy.
The second act, where Bond meets the absolutely scrumptious Vesper Lynd (Eva Green) and engages with LeChiffre in the Casino Royale, all went very well, with just the right balance of high class gambling, brutal violence, and shower finger-sucking. My only gripe was I wondered why they played No Limit Texas Hold'em, when the dominant game in Europe is supposedly the very similar Omaha, but then it would be somewhat harder for Giancarlo Giannini to give a play-by-play to the audience. And to those who criticize the ridiculously rare hands played, I'd just have to point out that no matter how gritty it gets, this remains a Bond film, and Bond doesn't win on a pair of threes facing a broken straight, and I would wager Bond and LeChiffre are guys who like to rake in huge pots when everybody's looking at a monster hand, not professionals who grind out wins.
It's really the third act that hurts the film, and has caused the most criticism. The beginning of this third section is easily the poorest part of the film. It asks us to skip ahead quite a bit by introducing a romance with very little real groundwork, and explore the softer side of Bond, and then compounds its clumsiness by dragging quite a bit, and by offering somewhat clumsy foreshadowing. At that point we all know where the film needs to get itself to, and losing its way two hours in is not good. The overall length wouldn't be as much of a problem if it didn't head into the third hour with a declaration of "I've loved you ever since... actually just since 5 minutes ago" and a very long, long series of romantic scenes in romantic locations. First the lake, then the beach, then St. Mark's Square, it just crashes the whole film, when what needs to actually be explained in the third act is very rushed and unclear. It all concludes with one of the signature action set pieces of the film which the trailers had to tease us with, the collapsing Venetian building, which is quite well done, and concludes the story of how Bond came to be the strange lover and killer he's been for decades, so it's by no means a complete derailment, but it is the clear flaw of what is otherwise a really fun film.
All in all, Casino Royale is really just a hell of a lot of fun, and immensely exceeded my expectations, especially in its sense of humor. And was that really Richard Branson in the airport?
Rufus will return in "Sotongfinger"
Thursday, November 16, 2006
Saddam Hussein's trial is over
--------
| O
| \|/
| | S A D D A U S S I
| _/ \_ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
| Game Over
=====
BC E H LMNOP T VWXY | Letters Missed
** ** ** * | 7
(borrowed from an anonymous coward on slashdot)
| O
| \|/
| | S A D D A U S S I
| _/ \_ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
| Game Over
=====
BC E H LMNOP T VWXY | Letters Missed
** ** ** * | 7
(borrowed from an anonymous coward on slashdot)
Recently overheard at a midwestern financial institution
Look, you the arbitrage guys, why do you think we worked on the Asian bond market divergent interest rate package all week? Barings Bank lost 827 million dollars because Nick Leeson couldn't pick up a goddamn backside bandit on max protection! You and I know this is goddamn stupid structured finance, and you're stressing this shit outta me! We've worked on the calls over and over again but you have no goddamn focus or concentration! McKenna, keep your head on a swivel, you've got to slide out there and pick up that tsunami in the Indian Ocean -- roll up those leveraged loans! Sanderson and fox will break off their positions but you have to deliver the variation margin on time. We've had two goddamn margin calls in this half, you guys are dumping on my reserve ratio.
You the CDO guys, you've got to create something out there, you've got to start flying around the fucking securitized operating assets and hitting somebody. Don't let these assholes chew up the clock on us! On first down, they're killing us with the interest rate swap! Accountants, when we put anything in the 88888 box, you've got to jam the SEC, take 'em on, you're hesitating. If you're gonna make a mistake, go on. Make it a big one! I'm not gonna eat your lunch for that, but don't fuck around like pussies at a pee party, you hear me?! PJ, Mac, Beast Man, Horny, Shark! One, two, short term capital gains less each time and we'll get two and eight instead of two and six! Stuff the goddamn tax shelters! The IRS is killing us!
No more stupid penalties, okay?! Concentrate. Focus. We're only down by 6 billion dollars. We can win this mother! I'm sick and tired of losing! Are you?! Three losing quarters in a row. Are you guys sick and tired of this?! Stand up if you're not! Raise your hand! Raise your hand if you're a pussy! Stand up, let's go! What the hell are you doing, PJ, put your hand down.
Gentlemen, this is our house! We live here. Don't let them fuck with us in our own house! We're gonna get some money in the goddamn bank if I gotta get out to the floor myself and make the goddamn trades! Now let's go and kick some second-half butt!
(Employees were later heard commenting, “Does the guy who wrote this speech have any clue what we do here? And why are there unedited references to half-time like he just stole this from a football movie?”)
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Top 10 Things you shouldn't say to your girlfriend's mother this Thanksgiving
10. There's something I need to say. Thank you. Thank you for being responsible for the best thing in my life. Thank you, and all other Chinese people, for bringing the gift of fireworks into my life. You and Marco Polo, God bless you all.
9. Yes, my friend Kevin learned all his filthy Chinese phrases from your daughter.
8. Singapore? Hey, you know they've got four floors of whores there. right?
7. Oh I'm sorry, does our golden retriever startle you because when she runs into the house barking you think it's Godzilla coming?
6. Wow, I can see the family resemblance. Oh no wait, you all look alike, never mind.
5. By the way, I'm not one to brag, but since Lian moved in big cracks have started forming in the ceiling outside our bedroom. I call that room "The Dutch Oven"... high five, come on!
4. Maybe you can help me out with something, I'm looking at securitizing a whole class of profitable Asian assets which are all denominated in US dollars eliminating currency risk, it's a sweet deal. So my question is this, do you know any Snakeheads who I could contact about securitizing payments by Chinese immigrants? I mean configuring the cargo containers and feces buckets as securitized operating assets would reduce the capital at risk by 20% in the first year alone.
3. I'm sorry about your bedroom, but here's the deal. That idiot Al MacInnis stayed here once, and he put a hockey puck through the window, so if you think it's cold in there, go back to Calgary and whine to him about it.
2. Here's a fortune cookie for you... in the year of the rat, you will get the hell off my back about grandchildren.
1. 我将采取您击倒, 我的朋友。我把您带击倒对瓷镇。
9. Yes, my friend Kevin learned all his filthy Chinese phrases from your daughter.
8. Singapore? Hey, you know they've got four floors of whores there. right?
7. Oh I'm sorry, does our golden retriever startle you because when she runs into the house barking you think it's Godzilla coming?
6. Wow, I can see the family resemblance. Oh no wait, you all look alike, never mind.
5. By the way, I'm not one to brag, but since Lian moved in big cracks have started forming in the ceiling outside our bedroom. I call that room "The Dutch Oven"... high five, come on!
4. Maybe you can help me out with something, I'm looking at securitizing a whole class of profitable Asian assets which are all denominated in US dollars eliminating currency risk, it's a sweet deal. So my question is this, do you know any Snakeheads who I could contact about securitizing payments by Chinese immigrants? I mean configuring the cargo containers and feces buckets as securitized operating assets would reduce the capital at risk by 20% in the first year alone.
3. I'm sorry about your bedroom, but here's the deal. That idiot Al MacInnis stayed here once, and he put a hockey puck through the window, so if you think it's cold in there, go back to Calgary and whine to him about it.
2. Here's a fortune cookie for you... in the year of the rat, you will get the hell off my back about grandchildren.
1. 我将采取您击倒, 我的朋友。我把您带击倒对瓷镇。
Monday, November 13, 2006
Annoying Euro2008 Update
The Road to Klagenfurt continues on Wednesday, in the last meaningful international competition until next spring. All the teams are organized in to 7-8 team groups with the top two finishers advancing directly to the finals in Austria and Switzerland two years from now.
In Group A, if Portugal wins their home game against Kazakhstan (cleanest prostitutes in all of central Asia), and the Finns handle the Armenians in Helsinki, then the one significant match-up is a battle between Belgium and Poland to break up the likely three way tie with the Portuguese for third place before heading into the winter break, while the Serbs and Finns will almost certainly continue to top the group. In the spring I'm sure the Finns will fall, and with the Portuguese on their heels, the Belgians and the Poles each have to be looking at this game as an opportunity to take out a rival.
In Group D, the Germans are playing Cyprus, and the Irish play San Marino, a team that loses to Belgium by double digit scores. The Irish are trailing way behind the Czechs and Germans, with Slovakia and Wales between them, but the Germans can use a win to take a lead over the Czechs going into the winter break.
In Group E, there's a four way tie for first, with the fifth place Russians only two points back from first place England. Israel hosts Croatia (both tied for first), while the Russians travel to Macedonia (also tied for first). The Israelis and Croats have a game in hand over England, so they can both take first place outright with a win or draw, while the Russians also have a game in hand. The order could shift dramatically, but it's still a tight group no matter what happens. Only a Croatian road win would put anyone in what could be described as a commanding position.
The next Road to Klagenfurt update will be next February when the Republic of Ireland travel to San Marino for the return leg of that thrilling encounter.
In Group A, if Portugal wins their home game against Kazakhstan (cleanest prostitutes in all of central Asia), and the Finns handle the Armenians in Helsinki, then the one significant match-up is a battle between Belgium and Poland to break up the likely three way tie with the Portuguese for third place before heading into the winter break, while the Serbs and Finns will almost certainly continue to top the group. In the spring I'm sure the Finns will fall, and with the Portuguese on their heels, the Belgians and the Poles each have to be looking at this game as an opportunity to take out a rival.
In Group D, the Germans are playing Cyprus, and the Irish play San Marino, a team that loses to Belgium by double digit scores. The Irish are trailing way behind the Czechs and Germans, with Slovakia and Wales between them, but the Germans can use a win to take a lead over the Czechs going into the winter break.
In Group E, there's a four way tie for first, with the fifth place Russians only two points back from first place England. Israel hosts Croatia (both tied for first), while the Russians travel to Macedonia (also tied for first). The Israelis and Croats have a game in hand over England, so they can both take first place outright with a win or draw, while the Russians also have a game in hand. The order could shift dramatically, but it's still a tight group no matter what happens. Only a Croatian road win would put anyone in what could be described as a commanding position.
The next Road to Klagenfurt update will be next February when the Republic of Ireland travel to San Marino for the return leg of that thrilling encounter.
Friday, November 10, 2006
King Kong
I've just finished watching the original King Kong from 1933, and now it's official. I hate this movie. I hated both remakes, the endless Peter Jackson homage to nostalgia and CGI, and the 70s version with Jessica Lange and Jeff Bridges with an evil oil company plundering skull island. Three attempts at the same iconic story by three directors in three different eras, and I've been sitting here trying to figure out why I find it all so tedious.
First off, I hate monkeys. I just think they're annoying, misshapen little creatures who glorify playing with your own feces and screeching, neither of which is something I approve of. I can't help but think this hindered my enjoyment of a series of films whose entire raison d'etre seems to be making people squeal "OMG look at the giant monkey!" A movie based on showcasing some grand, cutting edge special effects spectacle always ages incredibly badly, with the classic example being ID4 where "OMG look at the exploding White House!" wore thin before the movie was even out of theaters. And all of these movies feature long, long sequences of the giant monkey doing stuff for us to marvel at. In the case of the original, I kept thinking this must have looked really cool back in the 30's, but the thing looks so much like the Bumble from Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer it's completely comical now.
Maybe it's the whole story about a powerful savage being civilized by the sight of a blonde woman, only to have Our Aryan Hero keep stealing her back, capturing Kong and transporting him back to America on a boat in chains, taking a magnificent force of nature and turning it into an immobile sideshow attraction in a theater. There's so much material there ripe for exploration, so many themes to build a story on, and instead they give us "OMG look at the giant monkey!" I'm not asking for a deep exploration of colonialism or the vanishing wild, but seriously, the human story of King Kong, how Ann Darrow is changed by her experience with Kong, is nonexistent in the original, and since abruptly ends at Kong's death, there's a really abrupt, dour conclusion to that poorly explored subplot, implying Ann Darrow finally makes a meaningful connection to another living thing and but then it dies so she lives out her meaningless life in a loveless marriage making babies for the guy who kept coming to drag her away. This is the problem with it being a giant monkey movie, any real theme, like the obvious metaphor of the heartless oil company raping the earth in the 70's remake, gets a real halfhearted treatment.
Peter Jackson's version goes the way of all nostalgia fests, in that proudly magnifies all the fondly remembered flaws, and is too afraid to really commit to any of its innovations. It's disappointing, because he wasn't afraid to make Lord of the Rings into a story that would work on film and add and subtract material and characters, and add as many endings as necessary, but there's a timidity towards finishing anything he starts exploring here besides the endless restored spider-pit sequence (aka OMG look at the giant slugs!). The preciosity of trying to nostalgically recreate the film style of the period, which really boils down to Jack Black running around belting lines out to the back row and doing jazz hands, is also something I find unbelievably irritating. And after two and a half hours, the "I am Peter Jackson and you will marvel at my terrifying CGI dinosaurs!" sequences get as uninspiring as they did in the Jurassic Park sequels. King Kong... it doesn't matter what version you see, unless you have some sort of unnatural interest in giant monkeys, they all suck.
First off, I hate monkeys. I just think they're annoying, misshapen little creatures who glorify playing with your own feces and screeching, neither of which is something I approve of. I can't help but think this hindered my enjoyment of a series of films whose entire raison d'etre seems to be making people squeal "OMG look at the giant monkey!" A movie based on showcasing some grand, cutting edge special effects spectacle always ages incredibly badly, with the classic example being ID4 where "OMG look at the exploding White House!" wore thin before the movie was even out of theaters. And all of these movies feature long, long sequences of the giant monkey doing stuff for us to marvel at. In the case of the original, I kept thinking this must have looked really cool back in the 30's, but the thing looks so much like the Bumble from Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer it's completely comical now.
Maybe it's the whole story about a powerful savage being civilized by the sight of a blonde woman, only to have Our Aryan Hero keep stealing her back, capturing Kong and transporting him back to America on a boat in chains, taking a magnificent force of nature and turning it into an immobile sideshow attraction in a theater. There's so much material there ripe for exploration, so many themes to build a story on, and instead they give us "OMG look at the giant monkey!" I'm not asking for a deep exploration of colonialism or the vanishing wild, but seriously, the human story of King Kong, how Ann Darrow is changed by her experience with Kong, is nonexistent in the original, and since abruptly ends at Kong's death, there's a really abrupt, dour conclusion to that poorly explored subplot, implying Ann Darrow finally makes a meaningful connection to another living thing and but then it dies so she lives out her meaningless life in a loveless marriage making babies for the guy who kept coming to drag her away. This is the problem with it being a giant monkey movie, any real theme, like the obvious metaphor of the heartless oil company raping the earth in the 70's remake, gets a real halfhearted treatment.
Peter Jackson's version goes the way of all nostalgia fests, in that proudly magnifies all the fondly remembered flaws, and is too afraid to really commit to any of its innovations. It's disappointing, because he wasn't afraid to make Lord of the Rings into a story that would work on film and add and subtract material and characters, and add as many endings as necessary, but there's a timidity towards finishing anything he starts exploring here besides the endless restored spider-pit sequence (aka OMG look at the giant slugs!). The preciosity of trying to nostalgically recreate the film style of the period, which really boils down to Jack Black running around belting lines out to the back row and doing jazz hands, is also something I find unbelievably irritating. And after two and a half hours, the "I am Peter Jackson and you will marvel at my terrifying CGI dinosaurs!" sequences get as uninspiring as they did in the Jurassic Park sequels. King Kong... it doesn't matter what version you see, unless you have some sort of unnatural interest in giant monkeys, they all suck.
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
Ten things I only recently became aware of
1. Following a crucial midterm election that served as a referendum on the two land wars America is currently fighting in Asia, several races were too close to call, including the crucial racist moron vs sexist moron race in Virginia that will determine who controls the upper chamber of the legislature and whether the Vice President will cast deciding votes for a split senate. I've received as many email updates about this from CNN as I have about Britney splitting up with K-Fed. I only recently became aware of how ashamed I am to even know who that is, and by my total lack of surprise at which story CNN figures I'd be more interested in.
2. The Republican Whore vote has been seriously underestimated in Minnesota electoral politics. The DFL had a pretty solid sweep in the statewide elections except mysteriously for the top of the ticket, where Hatch managed to blow it against Governor Pawlenty. The immediate cause of his loss according to the media was his denigrating a reporter as a "Republican whore", which somehow shifted key undecided voters. As a result, I'm sure in 2008 Senator Coleman will be sure to line up the League of Republican Whore Voters early.
3. Mike Freeman is alive and well, and was just elected to be the next Hennepin County Attorney. Mike Freeman was last seen giving a real-world, practical demonstration of how unappealing a candidate Hubert Humphrey III was to anybody who ever heard him speak, by beating him for the DFL gubernatorial endorsement in 1998. Apparently everybody got the message but Humphrey, who went on to come in third in a two-party system.
4. I had no idea so many same sex marriage bans were being considered by states, but I really was surprised by a couple of results. South Dakota voters overturned the insanely restrictive, blatantly unconstitutional abortion law that the legislature passed to try and force the Supreme Court to review Roe v Wade. If a doctor saved a pregnant woman's life while terminating her pregnancy or aborted a fetus conceived through by a man sexually abusing his own child, they would have been charged with felony murder under this law just to create more test cases for the Supremes to consider, and apparently South Dakotan voters didn't feel like the legislature served their interests by offering those women up as sacrifices. Also, Arizona narrowly rejected a same-sex marriage ban, meaning this is the first time voters rather than judges have stood up for gay marriage. This could get interesting.
5. Michael Steele is a Republican. Who knew? Apparently he didn't, since he didn't mention the fact anywhere on his website and had bumper stickers that said "Steele Democrat". His loss to Democrat Ben Cardin in the Maryland senate race while trying to live down his support of the president was pretty symbolic of this election cycle.
6. Microsoft's MSN music store is incompatible with Microsoft's own music player, the Zune. I guess they figured out Apple's domination of the portable music player market with devices that seamlessly integrate with their music store was obviously just a fluke. I know this has nothing to do with the election, but my god is it stupid.
7. Donald Rumsfeld prefers softball questions. About five minutes after Democrats took over the House and had oversight over the Department of Defense, he was out the door. The party line before the election seemed to stand tough over Iraq and show no weakness by admitting anybody had screwed up, that any change of direction was called for, or show any regret in hindsight. Now we found out Rummy apparently had a cab waiting outside the Pentagon with the engine running, I wonder what else will turn out to be election year rhetoric. What's next, will Britney take back K-Fed?
8. It's not just me, other Minnesotans also want some new transit options. The constitutional amendment to commit automobile sales tax revenues to transit with a minimum of 40% going to public transportation passed, and if you remove all the dumbasses who voted but left that question blank because it didn't have a party endorsement (or Ryan Seacrest there to explain how to text message your vote to the Capitol), or just didn't flip the ballot over, it passed by a pretty big margin, since leaving the question blank counted as a no vote. With the passage of this amendment, transit projects in Minnesota will now only be underfunded by 1.2 billion dollars a year. So it will be awhile before we get that elevated train from Rosedale Mall to Randolph and Dunlap, boys.
9. Minneapolis is getting rid of costly non-partisan municipal primaries. Last year, for city offices such as mayor, an open primary in September reduced the field down to two candidates who appeared on the November ballot, a system also used for non-partisan county offices such as sheriff. Instead, now we'll have instant run-off voting, so the city doesn't need to hold a separate election in September practically nobody's aware of where many races may not even have two candidates, much less the 3 or more serious candidates required to make such a primary meaningful. Seriously, voting in a 2-candidate primary for city council where the incumbent got 93% really made me wonder why I got up that morning.
10. The Hennepin County Soil and Water Commission outspends its budget by a factor of 2 to 1. I only found this out because the board is publicly elected and puts up candidate statements on the strib's election website and have to be publicly accountable. One seat was contested by a guy who pointed that out as perhaps a reason not to reelect the board, while this geology student ran by saying he'd been researching the public and private partnership in the state environmental community composed of governments, private industry, and NGOs, and found that the only group not represented were the goofs at the soil and water commission who didn't talk to anybody else... he actually got elected. So it's nice to have some public accountability in the bureaucracy.
2. The Republican Whore vote has been seriously underestimated in Minnesota electoral politics. The DFL had a pretty solid sweep in the statewide elections except mysteriously for the top of the ticket, where Hatch managed to blow it against Governor Pawlenty. The immediate cause of his loss according to the media was his denigrating a reporter as a "Republican whore", which somehow shifted key undecided voters. As a result, I'm sure in 2008 Senator Coleman will be sure to line up the League of Republican Whore Voters early.
3. Mike Freeman is alive and well, and was just elected to be the next Hennepin County Attorney. Mike Freeman was last seen giving a real-world, practical demonstration of how unappealing a candidate Hubert Humphrey III was to anybody who ever heard him speak, by beating him for the DFL gubernatorial endorsement in 1998. Apparently everybody got the message but Humphrey, who went on to come in third in a two-party system.
4. I had no idea so many same sex marriage bans were being considered by states, but I really was surprised by a couple of results. South Dakota voters overturned the insanely restrictive, blatantly unconstitutional abortion law that the legislature passed to try and force the Supreme Court to review Roe v Wade. If a doctor saved a pregnant woman's life while terminating her pregnancy or aborted a fetus conceived through by a man sexually abusing his own child, they would have been charged with felony murder under this law just to create more test cases for the Supremes to consider, and apparently South Dakotan voters didn't feel like the legislature served their interests by offering those women up as sacrifices. Also, Arizona narrowly rejected a same-sex marriage ban, meaning this is the first time voters rather than judges have stood up for gay marriage. This could get interesting.
5. Michael Steele is a Republican. Who knew? Apparently he didn't, since he didn't mention the fact anywhere on his website and had bumper stickers that said "Steele Democrat". His loss to Democrat Ben Cardin in the Maryland senate race while trying to live down his support of the president was pretty symbolic of this election cycle.
6. Microsoft's MSN music store is incompatible with Microsoft's own music player, the Zune. I guess they figured out Apple's domination of the portable music player market with devices that seamlessly integrate with their music store was obviously just a fluke. I know this has nothing to do with the election, but my god is it stupid.
7. Donald Rumsfeld prefers softball questions. About five minutes after Democrats took over the House and had oversight over the Department of Defense, he was out the door. The party line before the election seemed to stand tough over Iraq and show no weakness by admitting anybody had screwed up, that any change of direction was called for, or show any regret in hindsight. Now we found out Rummy apparently had a cab waiting outside the Pentagon with the engine running, I wonder what else will turn out to be election year rhetoric. What's next, will Britney take back K-Fed?
8. It's not just me, other Minnesotans also want some new transit options. The constitutional amendment to commit automobile sales tax revenues to transit with a minimum of 40% going to public transportation passed, and if you remove all the dumbasses who voted but left that question blank because it didn't have a party endorsement (or Ryan Seacrest there to explain how to text message your vote to the Capitol), or just didn't flip the ballot over, it passed by a pretty big margin, since leaving the question blank counted as a no vote. With the passage of this amendment, transit projects in Minnesota will now only be underfunded by 1.2 billion dollars a year. So it will be awhile before we get that elevated train from Rosedale Mall to Randolph and Dunlap, boys.
9. Minneapolis is getting rid of costly non-partisan municipal primaries. Last year, for city offices such as mayor, an open primary in September reduced the field down to two candidates who appeared on the November ballot, a system also used for non-partisan county offices such as sheriff. Instead, now we'll have instant run-off voting, so the city doesn't need to hold a separate election in September practically nobody's aware of where many races may not even have two candidates, much less the 3 or more serious candidates required to make such a primary meaningful. Seriously, voting in a 2-candidate primary for city council where the incumbent got 93% really made me wonder why I got up that morning.
10. The Hennepin County Soil and Water Commission outspends its budget by a factor of 2 to 1. I only found this out because the board is publicly elected and puts up candidate statements on the strib's election website and have to be publicly accountable. One seat was contested by a guy who pointed that out as perhaps a reason not to reelect the board, while this geology student ran by saying he'd been researching the public and private partnership in the state environmental community composed of governments, private industry, and NGOs, and found that the only group not represented were the goofs at the soil and water commission who didn't talk to anybody else... he actually got elected. So it's nice to have some public accountability in the bureaucracy.
Monday, November 06, 2006
The video game movie trend is continuing, despite like none of them making any money unless they had Angelina Jolie in shorts (and even that got boring). There's supposedly a sequel to Doom coming out, even though eye candy like Rosamund Pike can only do so much to distract the audience from the dialogue. Take it from somebody who saw Bloodrayne, Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, House of the Dead, Tomb Raider 1&2, Mortal Kombat 1&2, Resident Evil 1&2, Street Fighter, and Wing Commander, it's not often done well, and when it is, don't worry because they'll find a way to screw it up with a sequel.What really stands out is the continuing struggle for Microsoft to find a way to lose even more money on the Xbox, which sells at a loss but makes it up on volume. The Halo movie had its projected budget creep up to $200m without entering production. A cocktail napkin estimate of how much this movie would need to earn is $600m, and I seriously have to wonder who would rent or buy it. No matter how popular it was, who would get a bunch of their buddies together to watch "Halo: The Movie" when they could just play the game instead? I would think if you take a date to this movie and all you're going to do later that night is play Halo in your bedroom by yourself. This movie is like an ad for the Xbox, and the Xbox is like a subsidized platform to keep people from buying anything from Sony. As I've noted before, Sony is also working that, so I'm not sure how much effort Microsoft needs to put into it.
All that being said, what I really found shocking was this: there's a Castlevania movie coming out next year. Castlevania? All I remember about that game is using the whip under the stairs to fight the giant bat that was the first level boss, 20 years ago on my nintendo in between thrilling games of Duck Hunt, which I believe was actually the original first person shooter. With his dreck coming up, I thought I might just stay out of theatres... until I saw the trailer for the Pac-Man movie.
Ketchup at the Maid-rite, the end is truly near
An era has ended in American cuisine, as the final frontier for the ketchup bottle has been conquered. My dad reports that the Taylors Maid-rite in Marshalltown, Iowa, now has ketchup bottles on the counter. This is a shocking development, since the permissible set of condiments at the maid-rite (for use with their eponymous product, left) has always been tightly controlled, limited to salt, mustard, pickles, and chopped onions. When I sampled my first maid-rite at Taylor's some twenty years ago, I asked for ketchup and was told in no uncertain terms that no ketchup would be provided or permitted, but I was welcome to put some salt on it. When I tasted my maid-rite, I clearly understood how ketchup would destroy the subtle texture of this delicacy from the center of Iowa.
I'm sure one of the first questions the average person asks themselves when they hear this news is "What can I do?", shortly preceded by "What the #*$% is a maid-rite?" Both of those questions are answered in greater detail on the Taylor's maid-rite website, where you can answer their online poll with a resounding "NO! Keep America strong! Do not allow ketch-up in the Maid-rite!" This is far more important than tomorrow's election... America needs your vote.
Friday, November 03, 2006
Are you watching closely?
I've been accused of being a bit biased towards any film starring Christian Bale (I even liked Reign of Fire) but I also adore Edward Norton, and here's what I thought of The Illusionist back when I saw it.
Thursday, November 02, 2006
Surviving Megabus
This weekend and in the days after, whenever I mentioned having taken Megabus, people asked me what it was like, because they or a friend were considering it due to the cheap fares, so I had the privilege of serving as the guinea pig for everybody else. The Megabus stops a few blocks from my apartment, goes straight into the heart of Chicago, and I was able to secure a round-trip ticket for $40, so it sounded too good to be true. It's cheaper than driving, puts no miles on your car, and involves no labor. Unlike flying, Megabus goes into the heart of the city without multiple modes of transportation, there's no security, no waiting at the baggage claim for lost bags or checking in an hour early, and a sudden gust of wind doesn't stack up planes six deep on the runway at O'Hare or Midway, and it's cheaper. It's cheaper than the train, and offers an overnight service so you don't lose a day in transit for a weekend trip. Could the miraculous new option provided by Megabus revolutionize intercity transit? The answer is... NO, and when God opens a door, he slams a window shut on your fingers. To hear about my overall impression and the strange events of this trip, read on.
I arrived at the bus stop under the 4th Street Garage at 6:45 am, on a completely deserted covered street under the skyway. Which is really just where you want to be before the sun comes up. When neither the bus or passengers showed up by our 7am departure time, and there were no signs or anything, I knew something was wrong, and in a panic I ran over the skyway to 2nd Ave thinking I was on the wrong street. I wasn't, I'm just an idiot and the bus was actually scheduled for 7:45. The Megabus eventually arrived, complete with a giant picture of a British bus driver on the back. Passengers load their own bags, give a reservation number to the Megadriver, and choose their own seats. The bus made one more stop near the UofM, the driver took a quick count of passengers and noted any passengers with connections, and we headed onto I94, running a bit late.
Somewhere in Saint Paul, without a word of explanation, the bus driver pulled over to the side of I94 and shut off the engine. After a moment he restarted the engine and pulled back out onto the highway. A few moments later, I overheard him telling the dispatcher that our Megabus had a broken Megatransmission and couldn't go any faster than 30 mph. They told him to pull over and shut off the engine for five minutes, which really didn't sound promising. While parked, a state trooper pulled out of a speed trap to approach the bus and tell our driver that the Megabus was pouring thick blue Megasmoke out the back, and we had to head back to the Megagarage where they had a replacement Megabus. It was then that our troubles really began.
Our Megadriver headed back to downtown Minneapolis, apparently without purpose since the Megagarage isn't downtown, but he didn't really know the way. Cruising down 12th st he called his dispatcher to ask how to get to 8th (here's a hint, it's four blocks from 12th), but they had no idea either so he had to ask the passengers for directions. I told him to take a left and away we went, off to an even rattier vehicle with a working transmission (and so ensued the mad scramble to get a solo seat). Amusingly, the guy who took charge of loading and unloading bags and getting people secured in their new seats was some random black dude with a kindly air of authority, not the clueless driver. The new bus wasn't exactly a great example of craftsmanship either: when our driver attempted to stow his gear in the overhead bin, one of the hinges came off, leaving his bag barely suspended by the fragile door over some poor girl's head. The same black dude shouted up to him "Yo bus-man! Yo bus-man!" until he came back and (kind of) fixed it. The bus did at least make it the rest of the way to Chicago, only maybe 2-3 hours late.
Perhaps I should share a few brief comments about the comfort level of riding Megabus for anybody tempted by cheap fares and avoiding O'Hare during the holidays. Now, I don't know what kind of scoliotic midgets these buses were designed to carry, but at 6'2" with some of my vertebrae turned the wrong way I barely crammed myself in by turning sideways and stretching out over two seats. There's also an emergency exit bar below the window strategically placed to push more vertebrae out of place if you lean against it for eight hours, so the smarter Megapassengers brought along a pillow and a blanket (I'm not that smart). There were a couple of TVs and headphone jacks in the seat backs on our new bus, but no movies were shown, possibly due to the unexpected bus replacement.
That was all to be expected, but what really was unexpectedly uncomfortable was the way the creaky old bus shook violently during our trip. I don't think cruise control or shock absorbers are a big priority for this company's Megamechanics. Between the touchy accelerator and the shaking it was impossible to read and preferable to just close my eyes to alleviate the inevitable motion sickness, so I probably couldn't have watched a movie anyways. There's a sign in the bathroom (this is the one very welcome convenience of the Megabus) advising all passengers to sit down when they use the toilet, and there is a serious risk of injury from being thrown around the small metal compartment. I wanted to touch the seat as little as possible so I tried to just bend my knees and absorb enough of the shocks to mostly stay on target.
Our Megabus did make one stop along the way at a gas station in Wisconsin, where they let us out for half an hour of exercise and to hit the adjoining Wendy's. I found the spot outside least covered in birdshit to wolf down some chicken nuggets and chase away bees while getting a bit of fresh air, and looking around I decided the reason they stop there is so you can see there's an even drearier place to be stuck than the back of a Megabus. Which was interesting when we pulled out and somebody farther back asked "Are we all here? Because there was a guy sitting across from me on the way down, is he here?' (I'm not sure what the point was of taking a count in Minneapolis if the driver didn't really care how many people he left in Wisconsin). As we pulled out of the parking lot, a familiar-looking guy came running frantically out of the gas station towards the Megabus, which didn't seem to faze the driver, nor did polite requests to stop and pick him up, until the same black dude from before started shouting "Yo bus-man! YO BUSMAN! Ho'dup!" and finally got his attention. But as it happened, our nearly-stranded passenger need not have run.
After he embarked and we headed back out of the parking lot, there was a sharp bang and the whole Megabus took a sudden lurch. Half the frustrated passengers began to wonder aloud about who or what had just been run over. The Megadriver stopped, got off and walked around the vehicle doing an inspection, and we all feared we'd had a Megatire blow out in the middle of nowhere and would force a delay of several hours. As the driver came back on, we all sighed fearing the worst, and he opened his mouth to say, "Did anybody else feel that?" I think the guy seriously thought he must have imagined it, which makes me wonder what other dancing pink elephants nobody else could see he's run over. Without solving the mystery, we headed off back down the road like nothing had happened, possibly with a deer carcass hanging under the front bumper. Actually the shaking really started after that, so maybe it was the antlers dragging.
The rest stop did give the driver a chance to ask who had to make Megaconnections in Chicago, and then assure them that they weren't going to make it. One passenger was heading to St. Louis, so the driver asked, "Are you going to the World Series? Because you're not going to make it." After taunting us further over the delays he passed around customer comment forms and free Megapens, noting that if you got a $1 fare, with the free pen you were coming out ahead (no value is placed on the hours of your life wasted by incompetent drivers and faulty equipment). Much as I may make fun of this guy, I did appreciate the fact that the driver clearly acknowledged we probably all had a lot of negative feedback and seemed genuinely concerned that we have a fair opportunity to do so.
Coming into Chicago, traffic on the Kennedy was down to a crawl, and I could measure our lack of progress by watching the blue line El stops click by once every 15-20 minutes. This was something we should have avoided by leaving early, but because of our bus shenanigans, we got stuck in miles and miles of stop-and-go traffic. But you know, sometimes in the middle of an unpleasant situation there's an unexpected bright spot made all the more striking by grey surroundings, like a single white flower poking up out of the mud. Everybody gets bored and frustrated in traffic, but apparently somebody found a nice relaxation technique, to make the time go by a little more pleasantly. I looked down at a woman in a black jetta who kept falling behind every time traffic around her moved, as if she was distracted and taking as long as she could before getting back into gear and darting forward for another pause. And then I looked at her right hand. Her forearm curled around her hip and over her thigh so she could surreptitiously slider her fingers down over her crotch, slightly spread and gently pressed onto her vagina. With her back slightly arched against her seat and her fingers gently massaging, I'm sure the warm buzz from light stimulation and a touch of adrenaline from doing this in public took the edge off her commute, and the light head, quickened pulse and slightly raggedy breathing did make it a little difficult to keep up in traffic. As the only person on the highway with the vantage point to see her through the window and speculate on this, I was definitely rooting for the traffic jam to continue, so he totally changed my perspective as well.
When we arrived in the city, there was some irritation and confusion as to the route we took into the city and our final destination. We got off on the north side and took Lake Shore Drive, which seemed like a fairly odd exit to take to most of the people around me, and apparently violates ordinances about heavy vehicles on LSD. It's seriously possible the goof at the wheel didn't actually know Chicago any better than he did Minneapolis, and this wasn't the approved Megaroute. We passed a couple landmarks I recognized, and I found myself wishing I could just hop out and walk, then we drove through the loop and I wished I could hop off and get on the El, then we went over the river to Union Station. Apparently, Union Station isn't really connected to the El or near anything, and I doubt anybody gets off a bus to get on a train. Stop in Chinatown so I can get some fake adidas and some sotong or something, lah.
I figured the trip back had to be better, because at least the bus wouldn't break down, and I'd sleep through most of it. Given time constraints, I called a cab, but of course the cab company sent me a cab with no gas, and the guy wanted to stop for a fill-up on the way. My friend's Chinese mail order bride was kind enough to loan me a blanket and a pillow, which (literally) took the edge off of the emergency exit bar and let me doze a bit. Unfortunately the bus was late, or more accurately it sat in plain view down the street for half an hour while another Megabus (running late I guess) pulled in and discharged passengers, then our Megabus sat in plain view down the street for another half hour for no apparent reason. The muslim brother standing next to me assured me that "It's always something with this company. It's always late, and if it ain't late, it breaks down, if it don't break down, something else gonna happen. I guess for five bucks, you get what you pay for."
Instead of being a better trip with a better bus and room to stretch out and go to sleep, the whole bus was packed, including passengers left behind by earlier Megabuses, probably because everybody like me took advantage of an overnight bus allowing for a full sunday in Chicago. A girl sat down next to me so I had about a three inch range to shift my buttocks around every couple hours when the pooling blood and stiffness became overwhelming, and couldn't really watch hardcore bisexual porn on my ipod, but then again I was pretty tired. This bus also shook the whole way, even more than the way down, so there was nothing to do but try to doze. We stopped off at the same rest stop, and had a much faster trip since we didn't hit anything or blow the transmission, but my god did I not envy the people going straight to work or school.
Really, Megabus has some significant drawbacks, and it is exactly what you'd expect: a cheap, shitty, uncomfortable bus. Before doing it again, I would have to identify which competitive advantage was justifying that particular trip. The ability to pack and carry anything I want without regard for airport security or greedy airline policy, like being able to bring water, medicine, and my own food so I don't have to by a $5 "snack pack", and carry a cellphone, laptop, nailclippers, or whatever else I may want in my pockets, and use them without somebody jumping on me shouting "I'm watching you, Al Qaeda!" is kind of nice. It's still cheaper than driving, involves no labor on the part of passengers, and you don't have to pull off the highway every time somebody wants to use the bathroom or stand up and stretch. My initial estimates of flying time involved really 2 hours of public transportation, at minimum an hour of security and waiting around, all slapped onto a 90 minute flight, meaning it will still tend to dominate the day, and while Megabus takes longer and is apparently always late, the risk factors are lower, when overbooked flights of holiday travelers start piling up at O'Hare, you can spend over 24 hours waiting, and I really doubt Megabus is that bad (unless you're connecting to a different Megabus, which I would probably not advise). So really I would rate the competitive advantages as a) avoiding airport security and general hassle, b) no money and no car (all students and poor black people on the bus), or c) O'Hare holiday travel risk.
In conclusion, I think the whole tone of the experience was summed up by the muslim brother talking to me as we waited outside Union Station when he said, "I guess we really should expect what we're getting. The company did paint a big ol' sloppy fat dude on the back of the bus. Can't expect too much effort from that big ol' sloppy dude."
I arrived at the bus stop under the 4th Street Garage at 6:45 am, on a completely deserted covered street under the skyway. Which is really just where you want to be before the sun comes up. When neither the bus or passengers showed up by our 7am departure time, and there were no signs or anything, I knew something was wrong, and in a panic I ran over the skyway to 2nd Ave thinking I was on the wrong street. I wasn't, I'm just an idiot and the bus was actually scheduled for 7:45. The Megabus eventually arrived, complete with a giant picture of a British bus driver on the back. Passengers load their own bags, give a reservation number to the Megadriver, and choose their own seats. The bus made one more stop near the UofM, the driver took a quick count of passengers and noted any passengers with connections, and we headed onto I94, running a bit late.
Somewhere in Saint Paul, without a word of explanation, the bus driver pulled over to the side of I94 and shut off the engine. After a moment he restarted the engine and pulled back out onto the highway. A few moments later, I overheard him telling the dispatcher that our Megabus had a broken Megatransmission and couldn't go any faster than 30 mph. They told him to pull over and shut off the engine for five minutes, which really didn't sound promising. While parked, a state trooper pulled out of a speed trap to approach the bus and tell our driver that the Megabus was pouring thick blue Megasmoke out the back, and we had to head back to the Megagarage where they had a replacement Megabus. It was then that our troubles really began.
Our Megadriver headed back to downtown Minneapolis, apparently without purpose since the Megagarage isn't downtown, but he didn't really know the way. Cruising down 12th st he called his dispatcher to ask how to get to 8th (here's a hint, it's four blocks from 12th), but they had no idea either so he had to ask the passengers for directions. I told him to take a left and away we went, off to an even rattier vehicle with a working transmission (and so ensued the mad scramble to get a solo seat). Amusingly, the guy who took charge of loading and unloading bags and getting people secured in their new seats was some random black dude with a kindly air of authority, not the clueless driver. The new bus wasn't exactly a great example of craftsmanship either: when our driver attempted to stow his gear in the overhead bin, one of the hinges came off, leaving his bag barely suspended by the fragile door over some poor girl's head. The same black dude shouted up to him "Yo bus-man! Yo bus-man!" until he came back and (kind of) fixed it. The bus did at least make it the rest of the way to Chicago, only maybe 2-3 hours late.
Perhaps I should share a few brief comments about the comfort level of riding Megabus for anybody tempted by cheap fares and avoiding O'Hare during the holidays. Now, I don't know what kind of scoliotic midgets these buses were designed to carry, but at 6'2" with some of my vertebrae turned the wrong way I barely crammed myself in by turning sideways and stretching out over two seats. There's also an emergency exit bar below the window strategically placed to push more vertebrae out of place if you lean against it for eight hours, so the smarter Megapassengers brought along a pillow and a blanket (I'm not that smart). There were a couple of TVs and headphone jacks in the seat backs on our new bus, but no movies were shown, possibly due to the unexpected bus replacement.
That was all to be expected, but what really was unexpectedly uncomfortable was the way the creaky old bus shook violently during our trip. I don't think cruise control or shock absorbers are a big priority for this company's Megamechanics. Between the touchy accelerator and the shaking it was impossible to read and preferable to just close my eyes to alleviate the inevitable motion sickness, so I probably couldn't have watched a movie anyways. There's a sign in the bathroom (this is the one very welcome convenience of the Megabus) advising all passengers to sit down when they use the toilet, and there is a serious risk of injury from being thrown around the small metal compartment. I wanted to touch the seat as little as possible so I tried to just bend my knees and absorb enough of the shocks to mostly stay on target.
Our Megabus did make one stop along the way at a gas station in Wisconsin, where they let us out for half an hour of exercise and to hit the adjoining Wendy's. I found the spot outside least covered in birdshit to wolf down some chicken nuggets and chase away bees while getting a bit of fresh air, and looking around I decided the reason they stop there is so you can see there's an even drearier place to be stuck than the back of a Megabus. Which was interesting when we pulled out and somebody farther back asked "Are we all here? Because there was a guy sitting across from me on the way down, is he here?' (I'm not sure what the point was of taking a count in Minneapolis if the driver didn't really care how many people he left in Wisconsin). As we pulled out of the parking lot, a familiar-looking guy came running frantically out of the gas station towards the Megabus, which didn't seem to faze the driver, nor did polite requests to stop and pick him up, until the same black dude from before started shouting "Yo bus-man! YO BUSMAN! Ho'dup!" and finally got his attention. But as it happened, our nearly-stranded passenger need not have run.
After he embarked and we headed back out of the parking lot, there was a sharp bang and the whole Megabus took a sudden lurch. Half the frustrated passengers began to wonder aloud about who or what had just been run over. The Megadriver stopped, got off and walked around the vehicle doing an inspection, and we all feared we'd had a Megatire blow out in the middle of nowhere and would force a delay of several hours. As the driver came back on, we all sighed fearing the worst, and he opened his mouth to say, "Did anybody else feel that?" I think the guy seriously thought he must have imagined it, which makes me wonder what other dancing pink elephants nobody else could see he's run over. Without solving the mystery, we headed off back down the road like nothing had happened, possibly with a deer carcass hanging under the front bumper. Actually the shaking really started after that, so maybe it was the antlers dragging.
The rest stop did give the driver a chance to ask who had to make Megaconnections in Chicago, and then assure them that they weren't going to make it. One passenger was heading to St. Louis, so the driver asked, "Are you going to the World Series? Because you're not going to make it." After taunting us further over the delays he passed around customer comment forms and free Megapens, noting that if you got a $1 fare, with the free pen you were coming out ahead (no value is placed on the hours of your life wasted by incompetent drivers and faulty equipment). Much as I may make fun of this guy, I did appreciate the fact that the driver clearly acknowledged we probably all had a lot of negative feedback and seemed genuinely concerned that we have a fair opportunity to do so.
Coming into Chicago, traffic on the Kennedy was down to a crawl, and I could measure our lack of progress by watching the blue line El stops click by once every 15-20 minutes. This was something we should have avoided by leaving early, but because of our bus shenanigans, we got stuck in miles and miles of stop-and-go traffic. But you know, sometimes in the middle of an unpleasant situation there's an unexpected bright spot made all the more striking by grey surroundings, like a single white flower poking up out of the mud. Everybody gets bored and frustrated in traffic, but apparently somebody found a nice relaxation technique, to make the time go by a little more pleasantly. I looked down at a woman in a black jetta who kept falling behind every time traffic around her moved, as if she was distracted and taking as long as she could before getting back into gear and darting forward for another pause. And then I looked at her right hand. Her forearm curled around her hip and over her thigh so she could surreptitiously slider her fingers down over her crotch, slightly spread and gently pressed onto her vagina. With her back slightly arched against her seat and her fingers gently massaging, I'm sure the warm buzz from light stimulation and a touch of adrenaline from doing this in public took the edge off her commute, and the light head, quickened pulse and slightly raggedy breathing did make it a little difficult to keep up in traffic. As the only person on the highway with the vantage point to see her through the window and speculate on this, I was definitely rooting for the traffic jam to continue, so he totally changed my perspective as well.
When we arrived in the city, there was some irritation and confusion as to the route we took into the city and our final destination. We got off on the north side and took Lake Shore Drive, which seemed like a fairly odd exit to take to most of the people around me, and apparently violates ordinances about heavy vehicles on LSD. It's seriously possible the goof at the wheel didn't actually know Chicago any better than he did Minneapolis, and this wasn't the approved Megaroute. We passed a couple landmarks I recognized, and I found myself wishing I could just hop out and walk, then we drove through the loop and I wished I could hop off and get on the El, then we went over the river to Union Station. Apparently, Union Station isn't really connected to the El or near anything, and I doubt anybody gets off a bus to get on a train. Stop in Chinatown so I can get some fake adidas and some sotong or something, lah.
I figured the trip back had to be better, because at least the bus wouldn't break down, and I'd sleep through most of it. Given time constraints, I called a cab, but of course the cab company sent me a cab with no gas, and the guy wanted to stop for a fill-up on the way. My friend's Chinese mail order bride was kind enough to loan me a blanket and a pillow, which (literally) took the edge off of the emergency exit bar and let me doze a bit. Unfortunately the bus was late, or more accurately it sat in plain view down the street for half an hour while another Megabus (running late I guess) pulled in and discharged passengers, then our Megabus sat in plain view down the street for another half hour for no apparent reason. The muslim brother standing next to me assured me that "It's always something with this company. It's always late, and if it ain't late, it breaks down, if it don't break down, something else gonna happen. I guess for five bucks, you get what you pay for."
Instead of being a better trip with a better bus and room to stretch out and go to sleep, the whole bus was packed, including passengers left behind by earlier Megabuses, probably because everybody like me took advantage of an overnight bus allowing for a full sunday in Chicago. A girl sat down next to me so I had about a three inch range to shift my buttocks around every couple hours when the pooling blood and stiffness became overwhelming, and couldn't really watch hardcore bisexual porn on my ipod, but then again I was pretty tired. This bus also shook the whole way, even more than the way down, so there was nothing to do but try to doze. We stopped off at the same rest stop, and had a much faster trip since we didn't hit anything or blow the transmission, but my god did I not envy the people going straight to work or school.
Really, Megabus has some significant drawbacks, and it is exactly what you'd expect: a cheap, shitty, uncomfortable bus. Before doing it again, I would have to identify which competitive advantage was justifying that particular trip. The ability to pack and carry anything I want without regard for airport security or greedy airline policy, like being able to bring water, medicine, and my own food so I don't have to by a $5 "snack pack", and carry a cellphone, laptop, nailclippers, or whatever else I may want in my pockets, and use them without somebody jumping on me shouting "I'm watching you, Al Qaeda!" is kind of nice. It's still cheaper than driving, involves no labor on the part of passengers, and you don't have to pull off the highway every time somebody wants to use the bathroom or stand up and stretch. My initial estimates of flying time involved really 2 hours of public transportation, at minimum an hour of security and waiting around, all slapped onto a 90 minute flight, meaning it will still tend to dominate the day, and while Megabus takes longer and is apparently always late, the risk factors are lower, when overbooked flights of holiday travelers start piling up at O'Hare, you can spend over 24 hours waiting, and I really doubt Megabus is that bad (unless you're connecting to a different Megabus, which I would probably not advise). So really I would rate the competitive advantages as a) avoiding airport security and general hassle, b) no money and no car (all students and poor black people on the bus), or c) O'Hare holiday travel risk.
In conclusion, I think the whole tone of the experience was summed up by the muslim brother talking to me as we waited outside Union Station when he said, "I guess we really should expect what we're getting. The company did paint a big ol' sloppy fat dude on the back of the bus. Can't expect too much effort from that big ol' sloppy dude."
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