four leaf clover

all part of the plan

nobody@vox.com(hotrod) — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 20:31:05 -0400

I bet yinz thought I forgot about Batman. Noooo nonononono.... I kill the bus driver. Oh, wait - that's not it.... No, I just didn't want to gloat. Yet. It's unseemly, and I'm a better sport than that. Besides, I wanted to ensure that I was right. I mean, there was a lot riding on this movie. Aside from Warner Brothers' coffers and Heath Ledger's lock on a posthumous Oscar, there is the matter of settling once and for all a longstanding debate over who is the greatest superhero. But now that I officially win, it's gloating time.

....to admit defeat

I've known Dabysan for well over a decade now, and he's had the upper hand for much of that time. The first installment of the shameful Joel Schumacher era of the Caped Crusader hit the theaters the first summer I lived in Virginia. I saw it on opening day. Twice. And it wasn't even that good. (I saw every single movie that came out that summer. That's what happens when one has no friends and works a mere twenty hours a week in a new city.) A couple years later saw the infamous "batsuit with nipples." Yes, I paid to see that travesty in the theater as well - but only that once, and I don't think I've seen it since. I've no idea how or when our debates started, but I had a tenuous edge in that at least somebody had bothered to make movies about Batman.

That all changed in the twenty-first century. Sam Raimi (a lifelong fan) made an awesome movie about Spiderman. It took all of my forensic abilities, but I eventually won the day on the indisputable argument that there were two excellent movies about Batman and only one excellent movie about Spiderman. But that argument was for naught two years later when Raimi achieved the impossible and surpassed his original outing with what was then the greatest superhero movie of all time. I had no choice but to concede - at least for the time being. We could resume the debate the following summer once we saw what the director of Memento might bring to the table in his reboot of the Batman franchise.

Now Daby and I don't agree on much, but one item that was never at issue was that Superman is the hero of choice for retards. He's completely bland and boring (here's a surefire recipe for an uninteresting superhero: make him an alien and give him every superpower that you can think of) and he hasn't been relevant since Truman was President. Oh, sure - there were a couple of overlong movies about him thirty years ago, but certainly there wasn't anyone out there stupid enough to claim that Superman might contend with the heavy hitters. And then we "met" Jodi. Make no mistake, her arguments are specious and she's way, way wrong - but at least her presence spices up the debate. It was getting a little stale with Daby's stupid and tired arguments; a fresh jolt of different stupid has livened up these past few years.

And what, exactly, have those couple of years seen? Well, I'm glad you asked. First, there was the awesomeness of Batman Begins. Then the first Superman movie in twenty years sputtered and flopped. And then Raimi failed to strike gold a third time with a muddled and overlong emo-Spidey. Meanwhile, the creative forces that made Batman Begins all kinds of awesome were hard at work making the best movie of all-time, ever. The Dark Knight, in the mere eighteen days since its release, has grossed over $400 million dollars. It's the fastest movie ever to that lofty plateau, and is poised tomorrow to become the highest-grossing ever superhero movie. There's talk of it passing Titanic. The critics have spoken. The people have spoken. Batman is the best. Ever. Case closed.

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christian bale might not be acting

nobody@vox.com(hotrod) — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 20:48:29 -0400

Last weekend, when I was in Pittsburgh, Vrabel and I got to talking about movies. That's no surprise; we always do. One of the films that came up was Rescue Dawn, the Werner Herzog picture about Dieter Dengler - a German-born Navy pilot who escaped from a Laotian POW camp. The story obviously resonates with Herzog, as this was the second movie he has directed about Dieter. Little Dieter Needs to Fly was a documentary; Rescue Dawn was the dramatization of the same story. Christian Bale was cast as little Dieter in the not-quite remake.

Now, Rescue Dawn had been on my rental short-list for a while. I remember hearing about the movie when it was filming (one of the scenes in which the stars eat bowls of worms was apparently not faked) and it was fairly well reviewed. The Video Vault tagged it as one of their best of 2007. So I was a little surprised when Vrabel remarked that he could barely finish watching - that he figured it must be a spoof. (These opinions were later verified and echoed by Vanna.) Without going into too much irrelevant detail, it was determined that I must watch the movie as soon as possible, because public opinion was both divided and emphatic, to the point that we wondered semi-seriously if there were two different versions of the movie out there. My email to Vrabel after last Monday's screening said simply: "Why did Christian Bale choose to play the part as if Dieter was retarded?"

So Bale's appearance this morning on the Today Show might shed some light on the subject. To wit: maybe it isn't Dieter who is retarded. If anybody can offer an explanation as to what the fuck is going on with this accent, I'd like to hear it.

succinctly speaking

In other celebrity news, my dream girl - Sarah Silverman - is now single. And it's about goddamn time. I suspect it won't be long before she and I are making amusing viral videos. People often confuse me with Matt Damon.

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uncle

nobody@vox.com(hotrod) — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 20:32:25 -0400

I surrender. Yeah, I know I promised to stay on top of all the latest developments leading up to the theatrical release of "The Dark Knight" on July 18, 2008, but I just can't keep up any more. The next Batman movie is destined to be the greatest motion picture in the history of time, and the accompanying marketing blitz is equivalent to the film's stature. The last straw - the one that lamed that poor camel - debuted today on the Domino's Pizza website. For the low, low price of one pizza, your online order will unlock special content - including a new trailer with twenty whole seconds of new Joker material. Why would a pizza company promote a movie, you ask? Well, why not? It's synergy. And it's probably "Xtreme," because Batman is the most Xtreme of all the superheroes.

Well I, for one, am sick of this cross-pollinated corporate bullshit. It cuts against the grain of the spirit of Batman - a self-made hero who maximized the power of his inheritance to buy a bunch of nifty gadg-- uh.... Okay then, Batman would never stand for the glorification of multi-national corporations like Warner Brothers Pictures or Dominos Pizza or the mighty Wayne Enterpri-- er.... Oooh, I got one: the shameless self-promotion belies the humility of a hero with the taste for the theatrical who has bestowed upon the local police department a beacon with which to summo-- oh.... Hmmm, I'm kinda hungry. I think I might order a pizza.

the dark knight with pepperoni and mushrooms

[UPDATE: Every time I think I'm out, they pull me back in. A new poster was recently released, and as you'd expect, it's totally badass. Meanwhile, everyone agrees: Spiderman is played out and Superman still blows. I'm.... what's the opposite of shocked? That badass new Batman poster is below, by the way; it should help take your mind off of other lesser superheroes who would remain nameless but for the fact that I mentioned them earlier in this paragraph.]

all part of the plan

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two thumbs up

nobody@vox.com(hotrod) — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 07:31:19 -0400

The Instructions:

List the first hundred of IMDB's Top 250 user rated movies.
Bold and underline the movies you've seen.

The Movies:

The Godfather (1972)
The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
The Godfather, Part II (1974)
Il Buono, il brutto, il cattivo [The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly] (1966)
Pulp Fiction (1994)
Schindler's List (1993)
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Casablanca (1942)
Star Wars (1977)
Shichinin no samurai [The Seven Samurai] (1954)
12 Angry Men (1957)
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
Goodfellas (1990)
Rear Window (1954)
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
Cidade de Deus [City of God] (2002)
C'era un volta il West [Once Upon a Time in the West] (1968)
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
The Usual Suspects (1995)
Psycho (1960)
Fight Club (1999)
Dr. Strangelove or: How I learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Citizen Kane (1941)
North by Northwest (1959)
Sunset Boulevard (1950)
Memento (2000)
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)
It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
The Matrix (1999)
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
Se7en (1995)
Apocalypse Now (1979)
Taxi Driver (1976)
American Beauty (1999)
Léon [The Professional] (1994)
Vertigo (1958)
American History X (1998)
Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain [Amélie] (2001)
Paths of Glory (1957)
The Departed (2006)
M (1931)
To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)
Chinatown (1974)
The Third Man (1949)
A Clockwork Orange (1971)
Alien (1979)
Das Leben der Anderen [The Lives of Others] (2006)
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
Forrest Gump (1994)
The Shining (1980)
Double Indemnity (1944)
The Pianist (2002)
El laberinto del fauno [Pan's Labyrinth] (2006)
Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi [Spirited Away] (2001)
Saving Private Ryan (1998)
Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)
L.A. Confidential (1997)
Requiem for a Dream (2000)
The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
Aliens (1986)
Das Boot [The Boat] (1981)
Reservoir Dogs (1992)
There Will Be Blood (2007)
The Maltese Falcon (1941)
Der Untergang [Downfall] (2004)
No Country for Old Men (2007)
Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
Raging Bull (1980)
Rashômon (1950)
Metropolis (1927)
Modern Times (1936)
Rebecca (1940)
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
Singin' in the Rain (1952)
Sin City (2005)
Hotel Rwanda (2004)
All About Eve (1950)
Amadeus (1984)
Some Like it Hot (1959)
La vita è bella [Life is Beautiful] (1997)
The Prestige (2006)
The Great Escape (1963)
City Lights (1931)
Det sjunde inseglet [The Seventh Seal] (1957)
The Elephant Man (1980)
On the Waterfront (1954)
Touch of Evil (1958)
Full Metal Jacket (1987)
Jaws (1975)
The Sting (1973)
Cinema Paradiso (1988)
Once Upon a Time in America (1984)
The Apartment (1960)
The Great Dictator (1940)
Blade Runner (1982)
Braveheart (1995)
Strangers on a Train (1951)

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sketches of sydney pollack

nobody@vox.com(hotrod) — Tue, 27 May 2008 20:16:44 -0400

So this guy Sydney Pollack died yesterday. He's probably best known for his acting roles as a skeevy doctor in Stanley Kubrick's criminally underrated Eyes Wide Shut and skeevy lawyer in last year's sublime Michael Clayton. But he was a director, too. A few years back he made a boring documentary about a boring architect.

that is so stupid looking....

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PSA

nobody@vox.com(hotrod) — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 21:29:17 -0400

Look, it's time we came to an understanding. Yinz all know by now that the greatest motion picture ever made by a human being is set to drop this summer. So to make a long story short, every time Chris Nolan so much as sneezes between now and July 18th, our crack staff at hotrod.vox.com is going to report it. There's no need to thank us; it's the least we can do. We're givers.

shattered glass

In other news: the new Batman movie (or at least the marketing campaign for the new Batman movie) looks totally badass - way more badass than either Spiderman or *snicker* Superman, that's for damn sure.

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the new bat-signal

nobody@vox.com(hotrod) — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 15:55:23 -0400

Batman is cooler than Superman (or Spiderman), Exhibit #12,647

no rules

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wild thing

nobody@vox.com(hotrod) — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 05:45:56 -0400

I've been thinking about baseball movies lately, like I do every spring. Baseball movies are vastly superior to the real thing because (A) they have a finite time frame - which usually makes them (B) shorter - and (C) more stuff happens. I've been contemplating baseball movies even more than usual this year, though, because DC has been buzzing for weeks about opening day in general and the opening of a new ballpark in specific. But Mother Nature threw the Nationals a curve ball (see what I did there? how clever!) last night with some abominably dismal weather. It was cloudy and cold, and it probably rained - not exactly the mild and pastoral setting evoked by the phrase "the boys of summer." I sincerely hope that none of the nearly 40,000 hapless spectators contracted pneumonia at the game last night as I enjoyed "Major League" for the seven thousandth time from the warmth and comfort of my sofa.

Major League

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call it, friend-o

nobody@vox.com(hotrod) — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 15:02:06 -0500

If you've spent any significant amount of time around Dabysan, you have no doubt heard him offer the (often unsolicited) opinion that Oscar's snub of Martin Scorsese and "GoodFellas" is the greatest injustice in the history of the Academy Awards. He's wrong, of course. Not so much about the Academy's indefensible position regarding the best picture of 1990, mind you, but about the magnitude of the offense. There's no question that "GoodFellas" is a superior picture to eventual winner "Dances With Wolves," but let's keep a little perspective here. "GoodFellas" wasn't even the best movie about gangsters released in 1990. That honor goes to "Miller's Crossing," which we saw last night at the AFI Silver Theater. "Miller's Crossing" wasn't nominated; it was passed over in favor of such timeless masterpieces as "Ghost," "Awakenings," and Kevin Costner's aforementioned paean to political correctness. The 1990 Academy Awards were a joke on every level. It's kinda tough to become overly exercised over an award that is so clearly not intended to be taken seriously.

No, the greatest Oscar crime occurred six years later, and not in the Best Picture category - or even Best Director. Despite the overwhelming popularity of "Sack Lunch," we might have expected the overwrought "The English Patient" to take home the hardware. Oscar loves a Big Statement. And comedies - dark comedies, especially - never win anyway. "Fargo" never stood a chance. But that hardly excuses Cuba Gooding, Jr.'s victory over William H. Macy. "Jerry Maguire" is - simply put - the worst movie ever made, and people who like it are retards. Every performance in that particular shit-show is one-dimensional, and none are worse than Cuba Gooding's cartoonish buffoonery. He shouts insipid catch-phrases at the top of his lungs for ninety minutes and we are supposed to be overwhelmed by his, uh, passion. Meanwhile, Bill Macy turns in a quiet depiction of frustration and utter desperation. It's a tour de force. He owns every scene in which he appears. Not only should he have won the Supporting Actor award - and by a mile - I would question just who he is supporting.

I would expect that the Academy will keep this in mind tonight when they award Best Director honors to Joel and Ethan Coen and Best Picture honors to "No Country for Old Men." "No Country" is hardly the Coens' best picture, but the Academy has a long history of "Lifetime Achievement" awards for filmmakers lesser efforts. Martin Scorsese finally got his last year for a film that wasn't even as good as his recent grasps at lifetime achievement glory. In a perfect world, Scorcese would have won in 1990 and the Coens would have won in 1996. But this isn't a perfect world. The important thing is that tonight the Coens will finally be officially recognized as the best filmmakers of the past two decades.

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2007: the year in review

nobody@vox.com(hotrod) — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 21:15:21 -0500

One of the best things about early January - better, even, than the merciful end to the dreaded Holiday Season - is the plethora of "top ten" or "best of" or "my opinion matters" lists regarding popular culture. Fortunately for you, dear readers, you are already plugged in to the the only opinion that really matters. And we loooooove making lists of stuff.

The year Two-Thousand and Seven was an odd one: The recorded music scene was unusually terrible, but that mediocrity was compensated - perhaps overcompensated - by better than usual years in both (and especially) film and (in the DC area, at least - and in spite of impossibly shitty venues) live music. Books - well that's always tough to judge, since we don't often read books in the year of their release (and we're making some concessions here). And what else is there, really? Lists follow below, and top selections may or may not be (but hopefully "may") expanded upon in further detail before the end of the month.

The Year in: Movies
5/ Superbad
4/ No Country for Old Men
3/ Ratatouille
2/ Juno
1/ Zodiac

The Year in: Recorded Music
5/ Living With the Living -- Ted Leo and the Pharmacists
4/ Magic -- Bruce Springsteen
3/ We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank -- Modest Mouse
2/ In Rainbows -- Radiohead
1/ Wincing the Night Away -- The Shins

The Year in: Live Music
5/ Wilco -- June 21, Merriweather Post Pavilion
4/ Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band -- November 12, Verizon Center
3/ The Shins -- October 22, Merriweather Post Pavilion
2/ Neko Case -- August 16, Nightclub 9:30
1/ The Polyphonic Spree -- June 30, Nightclub 9:30

The Year in: Books
5/ -- open-- (We didn't read enough 2007 books in 2007)
4/ The World Without Us -- Alan Weisman (reading now, see #5)
3/ The Yiddish Policeman's Union -- Michael Chabon
2/ American Creation -- Joseph J. Ellis
1/ Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows -- J. K. Rowling

The Year in: Television
5/ Who cares?
4/ Seriously, though, it's television.
3/ I mean, who watches TV anyway?
2/ Okay, fine....
1/ Arrested Development (on DVD)

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