Two interesting mash-ups have strayed across my radar screen recently. I like them both, but they also reveal some interesting things about the bands involved and the whole genre itself.

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Word on the street is, it happens tonight, ladies and gentlemen. Yes, Ken Jennings, master of his Jeopardy domain, loses. I won’t share the details of how or what the question is, but a few newspapers have carried the story. He’ll also be on Letterman tonight, so tune in!

Ok, since Karen’s interesting Bottomless Hole post turned into a discussion of the merits of Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings, I’ll give my take here and you can discuss below.
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There are a lot of filmed versions of this story. My friend George compiled a list, which I’ll include here. My vote: the best are Scrooge, with Alistair Sim (British 1951), and the TV movie with George C. Scott (1984). A sentimental favorite: Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol (1962).
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My family was always big on classic movies / musicals. I was raised on a healthy dose of Astaire, Rogers, Keel, Powell, Hayworth, Garland, Hepburn, Grant, Peck, etc, etc. Howard Keel died a couple weeks ago at the age of 85. He will always be remembered in my heart as that tall-rugged-seriously-good-baritone-voice guy.

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So I have to admit, this post is inspired by National Treasure.  (Disclaimer:  This post is the only thing in the universe actually "inspired" by National Treasure, unless you count the snarking that must be going on elsewhere on the ‘net.)  I realized while watching the very unsuspensful climax of the movie, how much action/adventure directors rely on the concept of a bottomless hole to create that scary tingly feeling in the audience.  Lazy lazy directors.

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On the strength of a really cool Homestar Runner link, I’ve been granted posting privileges here, so I’ll begin abusing that privilege now.

Eating two big turkey dinners in three days has me thinking about good movies about good food. Here’s my short list:

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Greetings, fellow fans of low culture, nice to be onboard Kulturblog.  For my niche, I will focus on documentary films, a genre which seems to be getting a bit more popular these days.  And I’m fairly liberal in defining the genre — it doesn’t have to be a grainy, black-and-white film in French with subtitles to be a documentary.  My first victim, for example, is Michael Collins, starring Liam Neeson (shown at left, dramatically gesticulating) as the famous Irish nationalist.  Well, famous if you spent high school reading books about Irish history rather than mastering the latest first-person shooter video game.  I finally rented this DVD last week to figure out who Michael Collins was and why he deserves a movie starring Liam Neeson.

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As what I hope will be a fun little feature, for each of the next thirty days I will feature on our radio.blog one song from each year from 1965 to 2004.  Using the top singles lists from Acclaimed Music, I’ll post the highest ranked song I have from each year.  For some years I have a lot of highly ranked music, and for others not so much.  You’ll get to see (and hear) the kind of music I do have and notice the holes in my collection.  I’ll post a new song each morning around 8:00 am eastern time, and I’ll update this entry to reflect the songs I’ve chosen.

The list so far:

• 1965 - Monday: "My Generation", The Who
• 1966 - Tuesday: "I’m a Believer", The Monkees
• 1967 - Wednesday: "Brown Eyed Girl", Van Morrison
• 1968 - Thursday: "(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay", Otis Redding
• 1969 - Friday: "Proud Mary", Creedence Clearwater Revival
• 1970 - Saturday: "Layla", Derek and The Dominoes
• 1971 - Sunday: "Imagine", John Lennon

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I confess, I’m a huge South Park fan. On occasion, they’ll go a bit overboard, even for the likes of me. But the satire is so spot-on so often it’s hard not to watch. Take last week’s episode about competitive TV news reporting, and how they sucker you in by making you believe living is fraught with danger. I’m surprised the show hasn’t yet lost its way, unlike other animated series (cough*Simpsons*cough).

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This is one of those movies that thinks it’s automatically clever just by virtue of the fact that it has a catchy subtitle rather than a name of Bridget Jones’s Diary 2. Well, it’s not that clever and neither is the subtitle. But at the same time, I must say, I did laugh quite a bit.

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Ahh, good old U2.  It’s been four years since the return to normalcy Bono first presented in All That You Can’t Leave Behind.  U2 fans were betrayed by the technorock of Pop and the overwrought, nonsensical Zooropa.  Why couldn’t we just have another Joshua Tree?  The single ‘Beautiful Day’ was met with a collective sigh of relief — at last, they were good again!  U2 seems now to realize that when you’ve got a good formula going, you don’t screw with it.  How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb demonstrates this understanding — it’s as if someone asked Bono and The Edge to put out an album inspired by the songs of classic U2.  It’s very familiar, and very good.

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…in which there are actually 123 films.

In 2002, Sight & Sound magazine published the poll results of the greatest films of all-time, which were voted upon by film critics and directors from around the world.

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I haven’t seen it yet, but I read a review of a preview performance with a quote that I found so funny, I have to repeat it here.

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Update 12.3.04: Today’s edition of the San Francisco Chronicle features a print ad for "Christmas with the Kranks." Four ‘film critics’ are included in the ad. Gorman Woodfin of CBN’s The 700 Club — who is mentioned below; the Film Advisory Board, a group that promotes children- and family-oriented entertainment and has developed an alternative ratings system to the MPAA; Cheryl Barber, co-host of Good News TV, a Christian talk show that air on Faith TV; and Trish Ragsdale of Family Net, a television network owned by the Southern Baptist Convention.

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Do you have some extra room on the lid of the toilet in your guest bathroom?  If so, Eats, Shoots and Leaves may be a good pick to fill that gap. 

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I always knew I was cool, but I didn’t realize exactly how…cutting-edge, since my home theater is just a hobby to me.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/14/movies/14DVD.html?oref=login

The weekend is quickly approaching, and for all you New Yorkers out there, I’ve scoured the scene and put together some recommendations.  Feel free to quibble with my picks, and bring our attention to anything I’ve missed.

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I’ll bet you all didn’t know that Technicolor films were shot on black and white film.

Sorry beforehand for the lecture.

Though Kodak color film existed in the 30s, its clarity and contrast weren’t up to the rigorous demands of large dimension projection, a necessity for movies. Enter Herbert Kalmus, and his invented technology, Technicolor.

A Technicolor camera is a simple 35mm camera with a very odd modification — behind the lens is a prism splitting the white light three ways, into red, green and blue light. Inside the camera are inserted three black and white nitrate film stocks, two back to back and one on the side, with a small mirror reflecting the light to the side film. Each strip of film recorded one color of a color picture, and the recording is on fade-proof black and white nitrate stock film.
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Kinsey is hugely disappointing, a conventional narrative devoid of insight or creativity. I actually wondered if it had been made for Showtime, because it has that TV movie kind of sensibility. It does have some explicit scenes, some good male nudity (Peter Sarsgaard) and so it titillates, which is why I suspect most of the audience was there. I wondered if some of its "ordinariness" was intentional, as an homage of sorts to this kind of movie, a Cinemascope biography from the 50s. But I found Bill Condon’s previous effort, Gods and Monsters to be similarly conventional. In both movies, the best moment belongs to Lynn Redgrave — here she appears at the very end, in a touching scene. The other actors are fine, though fatally underused as Liam Neeson is overused. More money has seemingly been spent on "fities" looks, makeup, hair and clothes, and not enough time on developing a script with a point.

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This was originally posted at Bcc:, but I thought it would also be of interest here:

Over the past week I’ve had some emails with an artist involved in the most original and interesting news the LDS arts community has seen in years.

Michael Allred is one of the biggest names in modern comics and graphic novels, with titles under his belt like X-Statix and Red Rocket 7, and his most famous work, Madman, is being made into a film by the fantastic Robert Rodriguez.  His style has been compared to such greats as Jack Kirby and others, and his wife, Laura, has been his amazing colorist for years. Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve heard of Mike’s latest project, The Golden Plates, a series of Book of Mormon narratives that takes LDS doctrine in a bold new direction. I asked him a few obsequious questions, and he’s generously responded. And maybe, just maybe, he’ll answer a question or two of yours if he’s so inclined.

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Let me guess — somewhere in your dusty CD collection is a copy of Flood, the 1990 hit album by They Might Be Giants.  Chances are, you’ve danced some kind of silly dance to "Istanbul (Not Constantinople)."  And chances are, it didn’t take long for you to get tired of a band that is the musical equivalent of The Kids in the Hall.  The quick, madcap beats of their twenty-someodd songs were frankly a little exhausting, and TMBG lacked the musical depth and lyrical depth to retain the interest of listeners beyond catchy tunes like "Particle Man."  Frankly, I’d assumed that the band went the way of Smashmouth, until I came out East and found that TMBG still played shows in NYC.  So, I got my hands on a copy of The Spine this summer and went to a show in Brooklyn.  Imagine my surprise when I found their music enjoyable…

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Okay, I’ll start.  But if we’re really gonna go through with this thing, there’s something you all should know about me: I’m a Wallflowers fan.  I mean, I really like them.  Normally I don’t go around thinking of myself like this, but on rainy afternoons such as this it comes out.

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It’s all right–you can
admit it. When the bedroom lights are out and all you can see are the
shooting stars on your screen saver, you’ve heard yourself whisper:
"It’s so not okay, computer. You mediate our work, our play, even our
sex lives. Do you have to mess with our rock bands, too?"

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I wonder if Cobra Commander would be a good president?  The PSA films at Fensler Films (NSFW) seem to suggest that he has a plan that’s better than GI Joe’s politics of failure.  I wonder also if Cobra has a plan to save Social Security. 

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More likely, they would just kill the old and the sick with some sort of death ray.  That will make it difficult for Cobra to take some of the swing states, particularly Florida.

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