Eric Bana is the Man


Not only does the once (and future...Edward Norton is a poser) Hulk have a couple of literary best-seller adaptations in the works, The Other Boleyn Girl (with...Geek Alert...Natalie Portman and Scarlett Johansson) and The Time Traveler's Wife (with...another Geek Alert...Rachel McAdams) but now comes word that he is going to play the villain in the reboot of the Star Trek franchise that J.J. Abrams is directing/writing/producing/doing a kick-a** job at (if his great handling of Mission: Impossible III is any indication).

With the great Leonard Nimoy on board, I can't wait...

Of course, there is that little detail that is still outstanding: They have yet to cast Captain James T. Kirk.

The Next Time Your Flight is Delayed...


A great article in The Times (of London) talks about how a retired Indian Airlines engineer has turned an abandoned passenger plane into a "virtual" journey for those not lucky enough to be able to partake in air travel.

According to The Times, "passengers" go through the whole procedure (pre-flight announcements, safety demonstration, "in-flight" announcements, "in-flight" meals, etc.) without actually going anywhere.

Here is more from the article:

As for the passengers, they are too poor to afford a real airline ticket and most have only ever seen the interior of an aircraft in films.

“I see planes passing all day long over my roof,” Selim, a 40-year-old tyre mechanic was quoted as saying. “I had to try out the experience.”

Jasmine, a young teacher, had been longing to go on a plane. “It is much more beautiful than I ever imagined,” she said.

So, think about that the next time you get snotty with an airline employee (as I do all the time...tsk...tsk...)

Poetry in Motion

Sachin Tendulkar plays one off the back foot, India v Australia, 4th ODI, Chandigarh, October 8, 2007

You could literally take photographs of Sachin Tendulkar playing cricket and turn that into a text book on batting. No posing, no re-shoots, no nothing...just purely in the heat of battle...

Actually, probably not heat of battle...because like A-Rod, our own S-Ten tends to fade in the heat of battle...

Still, it's a pretty picture isn't it?

Political Catch-22


The New York Times is reporting that candidates like Joe Biden, Chris Dodd, and Bill Richardson are having a hard time attracting news coverage because of their low poll numbers...but less news time means lower poll numbers...but lower poll numbers mean less news time...but less news time means lower poll numbers...but...

Don't Blame A-Rod


I know the Yankees got bundled out of the first round by a team with a third of the payroll. I know that $25.2 million-man (and future $30-$35 million-man) Alex Rodriguez will get all the blame.

But what about our vaunted King of New York Derek Jeter?

The "Great" One batted a spectacular .176 with 0 walks and 0 home runs. A-Rod at least put up .267 with 2 walks and 1 home run (to be fair, he was batting about .167 before his one hit and home run in the fourth game after the result had been all but determined). But, it'll still be A-Rod's fault.

Oh well, at least he will that future $300-$350 million contract to lean on for support.

Stanley Kubrick Bloopers


Hilarious animated video of bloopers from Stanley Kubrick movies.

I got this off Anne Thompson's excellent blog (a must-read).

Unexpected People


If I've said it once, I've said it a hundred times: It's always the unexpected who pleasantly surprise you.

I learned this way back at the USC School of Cinema-TV (before it was renamed to the very futuristic sounding "School of Cinematic Arts") when some of the people I knew/was friends with showed up to help me with my thesis...but it was the people who I never expected who showed up almost every day.

And now, it's happening again. I had sent out a call for $5 sponsorships after I got bamboozled into captaining the AIDS Walk LA Team for our four regional offices (I signed up to be part of the team...but since I was the only one that responded, the next thing you know...BAM! I'm the captain!). Since participation was abhorrently low (after all, we are talking rich Orange County folks here - the only charity they do is if a celebrity is involved, or if their bosses are part of the event), I figured I'd reach out to the people I know and see if they could each spare about $5. Most people don't mind giving $5, thanks to my company's matching gift program this turns into $10, and if you add it all up, it ends up being a nice little sum of money that goes to AIDS charities.

Surprisingly enough, the people that I expected to "sponsor" me did...but only some of them. And, again surprisingly, it was the people I never expected to respond either sponsored me, or gave much more than I had any right to expect.

At this point I really should be carefully about judging people too quickly. The ones you think very highly of end up disappointing you, and the ones that you either write off or don't think about at all are the ones that end up pleasantly surprising you.

On the other hand, I managed to compel six people from the four offices to actually walk with the team. That's six out of approximately 300...about 2%.


Links:
AWLA Team

New Bloc Party Single



The boys are back with "Flux"!


Here is the video of their performance on Late Night with Conan O'Brien (terrible sound mix):



Here is a link to streaming audio of the song from the world premiere on a UK radio station (much better sound): We Were Rockstars.

India Beats Australia!

And, waddya know, it's the old guys Sourav Ganguly and Sachin Tendulkar who lay the foundation for a thrilling win in the fourth ODI. Perhaps more surprisingly, we actually won the game defending the total, which means our bowlers actually won the match for us.

That's not a misprint, I said the bowlers defended our very makeable total.

It's now 2 - 1 in favor of Australia with three games to play. India needs to win out to take the series.

At the very least it won't be a white-wash.




Here's how The Guardian saw it:

Australia needed 24 off 20 balls with five wickets in hand following a brutal run-a-ball 92 from Matthew Hayden and yet more fireworks from Andrew Symonds.

But RP Singh bowled Symonds for 75 and then ran out Brad Hogg next ball as the batsman failed to recover his ground after heading off in search of a quick single.

The left-arm spinner Murali Kartik conceded only two singles off the next over, the 48th, and when Singh gave away a mere six singles in the 49th, Australia were left needing to take 16 off Zaheer Khan's final over of the match. James Hopes hammered the first ball down the ground for four, but Zaheer held his nerve and India celebrated their first one-day win over Australia in nine completed matches.

Links:

Cricinfo
The Guardian
Sydney Morning Herald
International Herald Tribune

Hal Holbrook in Into the Wild

Old pro Hal turns his small role into the emotional highlight of the movie.

That moment where he says good bye to Emile Hirsch...sniff...sniff...full-on tears...

Catherine Keener in Into the Wild

CK turns a small-ish role into a heartbreaking one. That moment where she says good bye to Emile Hirsch...sniff...

The Great Roger Deakins

At work during the filming of In the Valley of Elah.

Ashraf Barhom in The Kingdom

Steals the movie from all the stars on display.

Susan Sarandon in In the Valley of Elah

Mrs. Tim Robbins is not in the movie all that much, but pretty much single-handedly forms the emotional backbone of the whole movie.

Just goes to show that there are no such things as small parts when it comes to great actors.

Maid Marion Not So Pretty Anymore


After years of belligerent, holier-than-thou denials, Marion Jones finally admitted to using steroids (well, not technically, she did one of those Jason Giambi I'm-sorry-for-something-I-did-but-I'm-not-saying-what-exactly type apologies/admissions...she plead guilty to lying to Federal officials).

I admit I was a fan...until that CJ Hunter press conference and the way Jones continued to behave after that. At this point everyone is waiting for that other shoe to drop (Barry Bonds); me, I'm waiting for that other shoe to drop (the insufferable Lance Armstrong).

Links

New York Times
ESPN
The Times

Good Teammates

You know how I wrote a couple of week back about how, when I wasn't getting the usual Gift Card team-members usually get on their birthdays (everyone pools in around $10 each), I told my team that instead of that usual Gift Card they could just sponsor me for AIDS Walk LA, and all I got in response were crickets?

Well, I was wrong.

Two of them did come forward to sponsor me.

Sandy Warshaw


and Ruben Pranata





Bless 'em both.

Picaresque 

pic·a·resque * (pĭk'ə-rěsk', pē'kə-) * adj.

The depiction in realistic, often humorous, detail the adventures of a roguish hero of low social degree living by his wits in a corrupt society.

Why Cynicism is Good

For a second there, just for a second, it seemed like the monks in Burma...sorry Myanmar...were going to finally put an end to the brutal military junta.

For a brief second there it looked like the indomitable will of the human spirit was going to accomplish something international governments were incapable of.

Now comes word that several thousand people were butchered by the military, and the monks were rounded up by the truckloads never to be seen again.

And just like that it was over.

This reminds me of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989 when it seemed, for a fleeting meeting, that the human spirit would prevail. Of course, the protests turned into a massacre, quite literally since that incident is now forever known as the Tiananmen Square Massacre. I guess the irony is that China has been the one most responsible for letting the Myanmar government off the hook.

Oh well...I guess that's why being cynical is so much easier.

Britney Loses Sons’ Custody to K-Fed



Oops, looks like her little visit to Sutra cost her dearly.

Seriously, how messed up do you have to be for a judge to not give the mother custody of her children?

Somehow, we are all complicit in this.

Here is the New York Times story.

Magnolia vs. Punch-Drunk Love

Now that I am officially on tenterhooks for Paul Thomas Anderson's There Will Be Blood, I as thinking about the a strange phenomenon among movie lovers.

People who loved his film Magnolia hate Punch-Drunk Love, and people who loved Punch-Drunk Love hated Magnolia.

I, of course, am in the latter category (as my old USC classmate Mike Saenz so memorably said, "Magnolia is the world's most expensive student film.").

Any explanations/insight would be much appreciated.

Oprah and Obama or It's Oprah's World Bit*h, We Just Live In It

What could possibly make a very white, very rich, very conservative Orange County woman go to a Barack Obama fundraiser?

Why Oprah of course! (And the promise of hobnobbing with celebrities at her palatial Montecito estate.)





Maybe Hilary doesn't have it in the bag quite yet.

One can only hope and place one's faith in the ultimate power.

Oprah.

Jo'burg

I overheard these two Orange County "dudes" talking in the locker room of the very fancy Equinox gym below my office and I kept hearing them say something about "Jo'burg." About how it was the best place to get waves, and how people must go even though it's so far away and very expensive to get to, and how it was the most rad place on the planet.

And then it hit me.

They were taking about Johannesburg...as in Johannesburg, South Africa.

Now I know where to go if I want to catch some swell..um...swells....

Now I've Heard Everything!

Will.i.am (lead singer of the oh-so-socially-conscious Black Eyes Peas) sings about...wait for it...climate change.

My god, has it come to that?!

There Will Be Oscars!



Now, I have to say, I was turned off by Daniel Day-Lewis after I heard about all his method-acting shenanigans during the filming of The Crucible (which apparently included him having an affair with Rebecca Miller, daughter of Arthur Miller, and ending his relationship with his pregnant girlfriend Isabella Adjani via fax).

Then I saw his blistering performance in Gangs of New York, and well, all was forgiven.

Now comes early word about Paul Thomas Anderson's next film There Will Be Blood (based on the novel Oil by Upton Sinclair) and apparently this one's a barn-burner.

The movie supposedly rivals Giant and Citizen Kane (really? Citizen Kane?!) in its depiction of naked American ambition.



And, apparently, Daniel Day-Lewis is absolutely incredible in a performance that will surely overshadow every other acting job this year.

I can't wait!

Oh, for all you music geeks out there, the score is by none other than Johnny Greenwood, the most recognizable non-Thom Yorke member of Radiohead.

Links:

Variety
[Warning: Could Contain Spoliers!]

Add Thunderheart to Your Netflix Queue NOW!


HDNet Movies/HBO HD is probably the best way to watch movies at home since it's the only way I will get full 1080p HD quality (nope, I haven't made the plunge into Blu-Ray/HD DVD).

While HBO's slate of movies on their HD channel leaves a lot to be desired, HDNet Movies is a good place to get some oldies-but-goodies (The Hunter for Red October; The Silence of the Lambs; Bottle Rocket; Police Academy 3: Back in Training; etc...).

I had ended up TiVo-ing Thunderheart when I saw it pop up on HDNet Movies, mostly because I am a huge Val Kilmer fan and I had heard some vague things about the movie being "not bad."

Anyways, I was talking to my USC classmate Dave "Marmageddon" Marmor (who had made the trek all the way down to Hermosa for my birthday - which was very nice of him) about how much I loved the great cinematographer Roger Deakins. Dave was in agreement about Deakins's greatness and he used his very fancy Treo to look him up on IMDB so we could see when I had heard of him for the first time (it was apparently when he did Fargo). And what turned up on that list...why Thunderheart of course!

So, last night I convinced The Better Half to watch it with me, and she agreed even though she had seen it before.

It was great!

It's one of those little movies that kinda come and go, and then years later it pops up on some cable channel somewhere, and you realize, "Hey, this is pretty good. I wonder why I'd never heard of it before?"

Okay, full disclosure. Val and the incredible cinematography would have been enough for me to have loved it. The actual plot mechanics are admittedly a little weak. and it's definitely not the kind of movie that holds to up excessive after-the-fact scrutiny. On the other hand, the expert acting from the supporting cast (Sam Shepard; Graham Greene; Sheila Tousey; etc.); the understated directing (man, Michael Apted's career trajectory has really suffered of late, hasn't it?); the mystical elements; the two elderly characters (played to perfection by Chief Ted Thin Elk and Sarah Brave) all added to a very satisfying experience.

It was a little melancholic to see how most of the cast and crew involved (with the notable exception of Roger Deakins) never managed to sustain their careers after the film.

In any case, if you're looking for an enjoyable evening spent in front of the television then add this film to your Netflix queue, NOW!

Dude, Stop Taking My Picture

Catching the Sun

Hands on Hermosa

I guess this now officially makes us Hermosa Beach residents!

I think Dori should practice her signature...

Bright Eyes at The Hollywood Bowl

My birthday celebrations finally came to an end with a concert at the Hollywood Bowl.

M. Ward started things off, followed by Yo La Tengo (both with female drummers - cool!). The main act was Bright Eyes with the LA Philharmonic Orchestra (conducted by a woman - cool!).

Bright Eyes at The Hollywood Bowl

The Hopes and Dreams of Workers in Corporate America