The Stygian Hollows

The future starts now?

2008-06-05T11:13:00.000-07:00

Obama has won. Putting aside my animosity towards Hillary Clinton for a minute, I think all Americans, regardless of who you support, should take a second to realize how historic this moment is. For all the controversies about race that have flared up (sweet lord I hope those rumors of a tape involving Michelle Obama going batshit nuts on white people are false) it is easy to overlook the fact that our country is slowly (rapidly, even?) pushing the issue of race into the background. Young people are overwhelmingly becoming colorblind and the fact that an African-American named Barack Obama could be the next president is an incredibly important moment for America. Is race gone? Nope and you'll no doubt be hearing much more about it in the next 5 months. But its worth taking a moment to smile and recognize that America has changed and is changing. Who knows, in a couple more generations, race may not even be a major factor anymore. Gotta hope :)

I've got no idea where the next part of this blog is going to go. It's going to be a sort of stream of consciousness attempt to figure out why I "connect" with Obama as opposed to every other politician I've ever seen. I'm sure it will end up sounding overly gushy, but I don't really have a clear grasp as to why I care about "just another politician". I'm going to try and work it out, and probably fail miserably, but hey, this is my blog and I can write whatever I want :)

On a personal level, seeing Barack Obama win the nomination was incredibly satisfying for me. I've been following him since 2004, went to see him in person, donated a couple hundred bucks to his campaign and almost obsessively followed all of the ups and downs of the primary campaign. I feel like I've really invested a lot of time, money, and energy into a person I really believe in and to see, against all odds, that payoff is such a great feeling. I used to hear all these stories from members of my family about how amazing John F. Kennedy was. My grandma, as conservative as you can possibly get, would tell me how much she loved and connected with JFK. I'd ask her why and she couldn't really explain it, only that she really believed in him even though he didn't share her views. To this day, she'll tear up when you mention his assassination. For my entire life I couldn't relate to that. Most of my friends can't either. It's just a politician. In 2004 I was totally for John Kerry, but the guy didn't connect with me on any real level. Obama's different. Don't ask me why, I probably couldn't explain it. Obama supporters like to identify themselves as a family. Maybe there is something to that. I sort of feel like I'm supporting a friend or family member. I feel like we're on the cusp of changing America forever.

For all I know, these changes could be horrible. Obama could be the worst president in the history of our country. I have no idea. I'm not really talking about political ideology or inspirational speeches, I'm saying that on a personal level, the only politician out there that I connect with is Barack Obama. Why? I don't know. Maybe its a generational thing. Maybe its the hopeful, forward looking speeches. Maybe its that I agree with him on most of the issues. Maybe I just think the dude's cool. Who knows? All I know is that it feels different. I actually feel like I have a stake in what happens. I think it sort of goes back to that friend/family thing. If somebody tried to attack one of my friends, I'd take that as an attack on me as well. So everytime I hear or read some sort of anti-Obama rhetoric, I take it personally. I think its probably a lot like when conservatives get defensive if somebody says something bad about Ronald Reagan. Especially those who grew up really believing in Reagan the way people like me believe in Barack Obama. Did Reagan do some shitty things? Absolutely. Will Obama do some shitty things? You bet. But just like our friends and family, who also do shitty things from time to time, you still feel that connection to them, a sort of bond that can't be broken. Every once in a while a politician comes around that really moves people in a way that 99.9% of other politicians just can't. For me, Obama is that politician.

Trying to work through this, I think I've come to a much greater understanding of why people will defend certain politicians as hard as they do. It could very well be that said politician is doing something horrible, but that if you've connected with them in a way that creates some sort of internal bond (?), then you're far more apt to defend them to the end. For people who haven't connected and just don't give a shit, not only is it easier to criticize, but also to flat out disregard the supporters.

In any event, I've connected on some level with Obama. Am I sure what the thing is that is different about him than other politicians who have said the same things? No, but I'm sure all those Roosevelt, JFK, and Reagan devotees would have a hard time placing it as well.

In other news, Obama didn't even wait a day to start remaking the Democratic party. He has kept Howard Dean as DNC chairman (a great move) and has disallowed the DNC from taking money from federal lobbyists or PACS (a magnificent move). He's also allowing full transparency at all of his fundraisers by allowing the press to be present (wow. that's definitely a change. I wonder if McCain will let the press into all of his Republican fund raisers?)

The Democratic Party is changing for the better already!

aliens? you're really serious? asassination, really?

2008-05-25T11:15:00.000-07:00

The vast majority of people who go and see Indy 4 are probably going to be utterly satisfied by what they see. They'll get lots of explosions, Harrison Ford donning his iconic fedora, and space aliens. Yes, space aliens. I thought Indy 4 was pretty much the epitome of everything that is wrong with "summer blockbusters". Whereas the first 3 Indy films grounded in some sense of reality, from the opening frames of Kingdom you'll be like "wait a minute, how can a couple dozen KGB agents take out an entire top secret military base? Everything in this movie is supernatural. From Cate Blanchett's psychic mumbo jumbo to aliens with skeletons made out of crystal, the entire film feels like George Lucas read Chariots of the Gods and decided to throw Indiana Jones into it.

You may say "well, even Raiders had the supernatural Ark", and you'd be right. But the earlier films only tossed in a spattering of supernatural elements. Raiders was more about Indy fighting Nazi scum and it was only the last scene where we finally got to see the power of the ark. Kingdom is nothing but CGI overkill in set piece after set piece of ridiculously over the top scenarios. I love Indiana Jones, but watching him stand and look upon a giant mushroom cloud that he just lived through by hiding in a lead lined refrigerator was one of the dumbest things I've ever seen (that whole set piece, by the way, was recycled from the original draft of Back to the Future). The film is just so void of any charm or substance. Cate Blanchett plays a stupid villain. Shia LaDouche is put in scene after scene of Lucasinian banal comedy. Oh look, Shia just got hit in the balls by a tree branch! How funny! Oh look, Shia is swinging through the trees with the help of CG monkeys! How cute! Harrison Ford fares no better. Does he do anything in the last third of the movie? Almost every scene involves some sort of nostalgia shout out in place of actual development. And Karen Allen? She shows up to say "Shia's your kid" and have some unfunny comedic bantering and then basically disappears from the film.

"But there is action", you say! Too bad we've seen all of it before. Everything in this film was done and done better by Raiders without being a glorified ILM demo reel. And even then, I can't say that the CG was that good. Every shot in the film has a fake gloss to it, even down to horizon backgrounds. Its like George Lucas decreed that no film should ever have a normal, realistic sunset. Kingdom is two hours of bad acting, dialog, comedy, structure, pacing, plotting, coherency, and set pieces. It's pure spectacle excess that places its illogical storyline and massive plot holes front and center. There's no fun here. It's just an empty, hollow excuse to capitalize on a franchise that should have stayed finished.

Now that that is off my chest, what else am I doing? Way back when I quit Bear Eats Fish one of my major reasonings was that we only ever played the same 10 songs over and over again. I had multiple new songs written but it got to a point where nobody really wanted to spend the time to practice new stuff so we'd just play through our set a couple times and then head our separate ways, always with big plans to work on new material that would never come to fruition. Since we're having a BEF/THC reunion show late next month, I've been trying to remember some of my old stuff and have 2 completely new songs ready to go. I plan on forcing us to practice them :)

So the big news story of the past weekend is Hillary Clinton invoking RFK's assasination during an interview session. The quote exploded all over the internet and it has effectively given many Obama supporters the justification to unload on Hillary in a fashion that wasn't occurring before. There's a lot of bad blood between both groups of supporters. Hillary's forces are straight out pissed that she's lost, something they never would have foreseen since, you know, they've got that whole concept of entitlement. Barack's idealistic supporters are infuriated with the constant barrage of negative comments such as Hillary praising John McCain and saying he's ready to be president while implying Barack isn't, Bill Clinton's South Carolina Jesse Jackson moment, etc. Her assassination reference comes on the heels of her meltdown about the Florida votes being equivalent to civil rights, slavery, and women's suffrage and reports that Bill Clinton is trying to force her onto the ticket. Rightly or wrongly, that last report about Bill Clinton has been seen amongst Obama supporters as nothing less than blackmail, a sort of "Put my wife on the ticket or we'll make sure her voters don't vote for you in November". So you can see how Obama supporters were already in a heightened state of agitation when Hillary decided to drop her assassination remarks into the boiling political landscape.

First let me say that I don't honestly think that Hillary Clinton is waiting around for Barack to be assassinated. Hearing her comments, it is extremely easy for people to come to that conclusion though. For better or worse, the political climate is crazy right now. You can't expect any candidate to go through a 15 month process, with the media focusing on every single thing, and not say something stupid. I can't imagine how difficult it must be for a politician running for president to constantly be on guard about every thing you say. It almost seems like they have to constantly be self-censoring themselves just to make sure nothing comes out wrong and infuriates some group of people. But all these candidates are human and stuff is just going to come out wrong sometimes. I can give Hillary the benefit of the doubt on this.

But should she get off easy? You'll remember that when Barack said his now infamous "bitter" comments, Hillary took that opportunity to try and destroy him, turning herself into a Republican and pulling a page from their playbook. A lot of Obama supporters want him to give her the same non-courtesy, seeing it as a way in which to literally destroy her political career and permanently taint the "Clinton Legacy" within the Democratic party. A lot of people want this as revenge for everything she has done in this primary and probably more subconsciously as a way to permanently separate the Clinton's from the democratic party of the future, led by Obama. Piling on and keeping the story alive would definitely please the sadistic part of me. Karma is a bitch, after all, and I won't deny that with all the emotional highs and lows of this campaign, a part of me would like nothing better than to see Hillary knocked off her holier than thou soap box.

But of course, we don't need to pile on. Obama did the perfect thing by saying that it was an unfortunate statement, that he takes her at her word that she didn't mean it, and that the world should move on. He doesn't need to make this an issue because Hillary has screwed herself over on this one. Every Obama supporter in this country, myself included, lives with the frightening possibility that he may be assassinated. For a rival candidate to even mention an assassination, even in a historical context, is just stupid plain and simple. Hillary could have pointed to any number of Democratic primaries that lasted into June. Why did she bring up RFK's death as one of them? The reason there is such cynicism towards these latest statements is because she is the definition of "say anything, do anything" politics. Everybody remembers Tuzla and every Obama supporter thinks she's nothing but a habitual liar, so of course when she comes out with a pseudo-apology, people are going to look at it skeptically whether that was how she meant it or not.

A word of advice to Hillary Clinton: when you're in a historical race with an african-american candidate, don't ever use the word "assassination" in any context. You're just asking for trouble, especially in our hypo-politically correct world. Personally, I think the fallout from her comment is going to be felt far into the future. In the short term I think it will make a lot of those Hillary supporter holdouts shift to Obama. I think it effectively ends any leverage Bill Clinton was using to try and force her into the VP slot. The long term consequences may heal over time but that rift with the african-american community was probably damaged beyond repair. A future run for Senate or Governor of New York will now depend on whether or not the NY african-american community will forgive and forget. At least she's got a few years to work on penance.

But Hillary has a bigger problem. She absolutely cannot be perceived by the media and public as the person who took down Obama's presidential aspirations. This is an election year that the democrats should have no problem winning. If Hillary is seen as keeping her loyal voters from Obama in some way out of spite, there will be hell to pay in the future. The party is in transition right now. Half loyal to the old guard, half to the new. Whether Hillary likes it or not, Obama's people will be running the party in the coming decade and the last thing she wants is a party establishment that would like nothing better to muzzle her at every opportunity. And believe me, the grassroots liberal wing of the party won't forget and will probably salivate over the chance to take down her political career when the opportunity arises. They probably still will even if Obama wins the presidency.

So fair or not, what Hillary's "assassination" remark will do is force her into doing whatever she can to get Obama elected. People like to talk about the idea that Obama's sheen isn't as great as it was when he got into the race, but in relation to the Clinton's reputation, it's downright sparkling. The Clinton's have badly damaged their credibility and perception with millions of democrats across the country. They have effectively caused a rift and brought about the divisiveness that Obama and his supporters have been trying to end on a broader level. If Hillary goes out blazing, history will not treat her or her husband kindly. She has to help Obama succeed, else face the long prospect of being a leper in her own party. But this is also conditional on Obama giving her the olive branch. Telling, and convincing, his supporters to take in the person they've considered the enemy for the last 5 months.

Time will tell whether he'll embrace the Clinton's when this is all over, or tell them to screw off and take his chances.

Time flies

2008-05-12T18:56:00.000-07:00

I don't know why I've forgotten about this blog, but I've got some time to kill before the next Splattercast.

just got word from my pal Bill that our film professor was floored by our video project dealing with african-americans in horror and wants to set up a public screening of the film for faculty members and impressionable Lincoln citizens. We'd also be doing a Q&A panel session afterwards discussing the representation of blacks in horror films. Essentially what this means is that the film professors that I greatly respect would be watching my film and then asking me questions. That's kind of funny to me. Anyway, all of us have voted "Yea" and it looks like this public screening is going to move forward.

The thing that sucks about it is that, though I am happy with the finished product, it could have been so much better. It's 20 minutes long, but I could easily made it feature length. Coming at it from a filmmakers perspective, I'm not totally happy with the structure. Our time limit was 20 minutes max, and so I had to make a lot of concessions in order to trim the film down such as deleting an entire sub-discussion on black female representation in horror. I wanted to originally do interviews, pull in some scholarly discussion, and focus more heavily on the trends, themes, and ways in which black representation has been handled in the horror genre. In other words, I wanted a lot more detail and focus rather than the broad "Here's a taste of what's going on" generalizations we ultimately had to go with. For our class, it worked just fine since we didn't view any horror films during the semester and it was all new to our classmates. But for an audience of professors and intellectuals, I think there may be a lot more depth needed to really make the film work. Still, we'll see what happens in the months going forward. If I find time, maybe I can add to the film.

In other news, I'm voting for Barack Obama in the primaries tomorrow. What a shocker, I know.

Man, its been a while...

2008-04-16T19:53:00.000-07:00

Yeah yeah, I haven't posted here in a long time. I'm insanely busy right now and am taking a quick break and just wanted to post some thoughts about the debate tonight on ABC.

I missed the entire thing because I was at a talk about God showing beauty in monstrosities (it was damn interesting, by the way). However, I'm watching clips and post-debate reaction and it seems the consensus is that it was the "pile on Obama" debate. The first 50 minutes didn't deal with any policy issues, but rather Obama and the Weather Underground, Obama and his lack of a flag lapel pin, Obama and Jeremiah Wright, and more Obama "bitterness".

It was pretty much fast ball after fast ball trying to knock Obama off his game. Hillary pounced on every response. The liberal blogs are flaming and ready to burn ABC headquarters to the ground. My response? Calm down. The fact that Obama had all these questions thrown at him is pretty strong evidence that he's on the path to the nomination. The Republicans are going to bring all of this up and the best way for Obama to get it out of the news is to address it all early. Let him get roughed up a bit. It's better to be pummeled now than to be pummeled in an "October surprise", y'know? The rumors have been out there for weeks that Obama has tons of superdelegates locked up and ready to endorse him. They won't do it until after North Carolina. The only way he loses the nomination is if he starts losing the states he's supposed to win, such as North Carolina, Oregon, and South Dakota. Relax Obama supporters, he's fine. He's the frontrunner, you've got to expect this treatement. Besides, there's been 20 debates already. Everybody knows where Hillary and Barack stand on the issues. We've gotta get the controversies out of the way.

There's also another reason for Obama supporters not to worry. When pressed on whether or not she believes Barack can win in November, she said "Yes, Yes, Yes!". Kinda hard to make the argument to superdelegates that Barack can't win when you just told a national audience that he can. Also, for as much "baggage" as Barack has, it doesn't even scratch the surface of what Hillary has. I mean, if you're Hillary Clinton, how do you explain to a superdelegate that you can win an election when only 39% of people think you are honest and trustworthy? How can she explain her "Screw em" comment to southern working class voters? The only candidate that potentially can't win the presidency is Hillary and everybody knows it. Half the country hates her. She's gone so negative on Obama that it's become apparent that she will lose the "Obama vote". Could her "Girl Power" rallying cry carry the day? I thought so, but now I'm not so sure.

Also, though Obama is going through the motions right now, being "vetted" as the pundits like to call it, John McCain is going to get his day. I predict the democratic nomination is going to end in 4 weeks. After North Carolina, you're going to see the party leaders end it. The reason is two-fold: first, no democrat wants to see Hillary fight this out until the convention. The reason being that it will be nothing but negative press until August. If that happens, John McCain continues his free pass, but as soon as the democratic race is over, everything will get quiet and the press will go in their predictable cycle and start paying attention to him and his policies. I guarantee you, you'll be hearing about the "Keating 5" this summer and everything else McCain has said and done the 10,000 years he's been in office. And his health records. And the rumors about his post-tramatic stress disorder from being tortured in Vietnam, etc. etc. McCain's not going to coast.

And during that time, Obama will be building his coalition, raising 500 million dollars, and preparing for the fall election. Then the media will hype his convention speech, he'll deliver it, it'll kick ass, and we'll get into the real race.

That's my prediction. Calm down Obama fans. You're invested in your guy and when the "Big Bad Liberal Media" piles on, the natural reaction is to lash out and be protective of your candidate. But everything's alright. Every0ne knows he wasn't going to win Pennsylvania. He's still going to lose it, but he's still got a grip on the nomination.

Unless he loses North Carolina...then he'll have a problem :)

MaT's Rule #1: Duke Sucks

2008-03-08T20:14:00.001-08:00

Ha!

What a great night. Not only does Barack crush Hillary in Wyoming, but UNC beat those pussies over at Duke.

As a Carolina fan,I hate Duke. HATE. The hatred goes deeper than even the Miami Hurricane football team. And that's saying something, because I'm a Florida State Seminole fan.

So suck it down, Duke! Suck. It. Down.

UNC's gonna win the tournament this year. Just you watch.

Obama is about to have the worst week ever.

2008-03-03T18:55:00.001-08:00

This is when we find out how tough a presidential candidate is: when the shit hits the fan. Do they come out swinging, or crumble meekly in a corner?

Barack Obama is about to have the worst political week of his life. He's going to lose Texas and Ohio tomorrow which will lead to not only Hillary proclaiming she's the reincarnation of the "Comeback Kid", but also scrutiny as to why Obama can't "close the deal" (putting aside the fact that he was down 20 points in both states as of 2 weeks ago). Not only will he have to deal with a gloating Hillary campaign, but the press is going to show no mercy in other areas. The Rezko trial started today and this conspiracy about NAFTA and the Canadian government pretty much assures that the entire week is a lost cause.

Barack hasn't really had to deal with anything too severe so far. Let's see how he deals with Hillary moving forward.

Meanwhile, somewhere John McCain is laughing hysterically as he taps some lobbyist ass.

P.S. I'm in a political blackout right now. I plan on turning on the television about 8pm tomorrow night to see what's happened. It's not gonna be good...

Oscar

2008-02-24T22:36:00.000-08:00

No Country basically swept the big awards: Director, Supporting Actor, Screenplay, and Picture. The only "major" award it lost is Cinematography, and it almost feels like the voters gave it to There Will Be Blood out of pity. I was happy to see Sweeney Todd win an Oscar. Not because I thought it deserved it, but it's just so rare to see Hollywood honor a horror film on such a big stage. I was disappointed 3:10 to Yuma lost some of the technical awards to Bourne Ultimatum (huh?). How the hell did Transformers lose Visual Effects? Chalk that one up to the anti-Michael Bay sentiment that's all over Hollywood. Classy move for Jon Stewart to let the "Once" girl come back out after the commercial break and give her acceptance speech after her partner hogged the light and they cued her off the stage. That was ridiculous. Anybody else notice that Brad Renfro wasn't in the "In Memoriam" segment? They extended it from 2007 into 2008 to accommodate Heath Ledger. Tacky. Diablo Cody is such a flash in the pan. I'll eat my words if I'm wrong, which I'm not, but this chick is a one-Oscar wonder. She's like Cuba Gooding Jr. of strippers. Happy today, writing Snow Dogs 2, tomorrow.

I'm finishing up everything for the Splatcademy Awards. I think this will be fun. As far as I know, we'll be the only podcasters that have ever attempted something like this (I could be wrong on that. Honestly, I just don't listen to podcasts very often. I find them annoying) and maybe this will get us some more listeners.

Just some random pieces of useless information

2008-02-16T23:20:00.000-08:00

Currently listening to Soundgarden's "Fell on Black Days", via Pandora.

Watched Werner Herzog's Rescue Dawn (B) and Curtiz's Casablanca (always an A) today.

Girlfriend is pestering me to go see Juno, which I might be seeing Monday afternoon. After that, I'll be checking out The Orphanage.

Did an interview tonight with some newspaper called Red Line (I think?) about politics and why Obama is so great.

Did anybody else notice tonight that Dwight Howard's "Superman Dunk"wasn't really a dunk at all? It was cool to watch, don't get me wrong...but the guy threw the ball into the hoop. That's not a slam dunk.

Watched the latest episode of Nip/Tuck tonight. This show jumped the shark in the 4th season (one could argue it happened in the first episode of the first season, but whatever) and it just added incest to its scroll of ridiculous plotlines. I love this show.

Next four films in my Netflix queue in order: American Gangster, We Own the Night, Gone Baby Gone, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.

Currently contemplating: Should I buy a cheap HD-DVD player and cash in on the bargain price discs before they go out of print, buy a stand alone Blu-Ray player, or buy a PS3 which comes with a Blu-Ray player (and will allow me to play this game when it comes out in 2010...it'll be delayed even longer, you just know it)?

Obama opens up a significant lead in the Gallup tracking poll. Best case scenario: double digit victory in Wisconsin, upset win in Texas, narrow loss in Ohio= Hillary out of the race

Did you know that this amazing band came from this amazing band (disregard fan made music video)?

Debating whether or not to see Jean-Luc Godard's Weekend...or Paul Verhoeven's Starship Troopers at the Ross this week. Decisions, decisions...

Do the Kennedy's still have "it"?

2008-01-27T22:40:00.000-08:00

Obama pasted Hillary in South Carolina. Ted Kennedy, supposedly disgusted by the Clinton attacks on the future of the party, is going to endorse Obama and campaign for him. It's a big pickup. Obama also scored about 878 newspaper endorsements today and a potential VP candidate in the female governor of Kansas (I don't know much of anything about her, but apparently she's a "rising star" in the Obama vein, and she'll be the Democrat rebuttal to Bush's SOTU speech).

We loyal Obama supporters have new life and enthusiasm after the results of SC, no doubt about that. But I still think the nomination is Hillary's to lose. I said that if Obama lost Nevada, he'd be toast. I still stand by that, although this rash of endorsements gives me pause. Obama's biggest problem now is that there just isn't time to be able to cut into Hillary's huge leads in all these big states coming up on Super Tuesday. Though the nomination won't be decided on that day, if Hillary builds up a sizable enough delegate advantage, there's nothing Obama can do other than to hope he can remain close and have Edwards send his delegates to him and hope that the super delagates, which Hillary has a commanding lead in, break his way for some reason.

And that's where Ted Kennedy comes in. The Kennedy's are Democratic royalty. The name is gold and Ted is pretty much the godfather of liberal ideals. In other words, his opinion carries weight with old school democrats, minorities, and union members. This will be his last go round in terms of impacting an election. He's gone all in and is supporting the young upstart over the establishment and he's going to do everything he can possibly do to see that it happens.

Think about it for a second. If Ted Kennedy swoops down as the "savior" of Obama, not only will the Kennedy name be revered by the next generation of Democrats, but he'll go down in history as the man who changed the party forever. He'll be the man who laid the hammer to the Clinton dynasty single handedly, crushed it, and assured that the name "Kennedy" will always usurp the name "Clinton".

But can he do it? This is going to end one of two ways: either Ted Kennedy will show Democrats that he is still relevant and is the true leader of the party, or he'll flame out on the campaign trail in embarrassment. He's drawn his line in the sand and it's going to be fascinating to see what happens in the next 10 days. Can the Kennedy name once again impact democratic politics? I think there is a lot riding on the line here. None of which I've heard anybody talk about.

Even more fascinating, can Ted Kennedy convince Al Gore to join the party? Whereas Kennedy has more of an impact on Obama's perception and gives him some "inside Washington" support, only Al Gore can have the sort of impact that would really make a ton of voters re-evaluate Hillary Clinton before Super Tuesday. Remember, there is a huge amount of democrats that were actively calling for Gore to get into the race. Everything he touches right now turns to gold. And he's got an incentive: Gore could potentially play kingmaker and crush his old boss at the same time.

Obama has got to get that endorsement. Preferably on Tuesday, so as to completely overshadow Hillary's underhanded sneak attack in Florida by making a speech, thus putting pressure on Howard Dean to seat Florida at the convention (which is another reason the Clinton's are pissing off the establishment at the moment, and Dean in particular).

p.s. rumors are swirling that Obama might open a campaign office in Omaha and Lincoln for the Feb. 9th caucuses. If so, I'll probably be knocking on your door telling you to vote for the future :)

Barack needs a xenomorph to visit Hillary

2008-01-24T22:08:00.000-08:00

So I saw Ridley Scott's Alien on the big screen this past tuesday. It was great. Nothing like seeing the famous chestburster screen in a theatre full of people. Next up on my list of free movies this semester is Mad Max, Blade Runner, and Robocop among others. What I absolutely can't wait for is The Thing. That film is part of my Holy Trinity as far as movies are concerned (the others being BTiLC, and Halloween) so to see it in a theatre is hugely exciting for me. According to my mother, she took me to it when I was 6 months old. Unfortunately, I don't remember any of that experience :)

Obama is dropping in the polls in South Carolina, which leads me to think that Bill Clinton is single handedly beating him in this race. You know what the interesting thing is? Before Bill got personally involved in the way he is now, Hillary lost to Obama straight up. It was only when Bill Clinton started being the attack dog for his wife that Obama started losing. One South Carolina poll showed Obama's support amongst white's down to 10%. Unbelievable. It's ironic that John Edwards is actually keeping him afloat in South Carolina by splitting the white vote with Hillary when he's hurt him in Nevada and New Hampshire. Obama's support is coming almost solely from blacks in SC. I wouldn't be surprised if this becomes another New Hampshire scenario: a voting bloc that tells pollsters one thing (I'm voting Obama), and then votes Bill Clinton when they get to the voting booth. I'm sitting back and watching all of this with a big blank stare on my face. Bill Clinton has decided to run for president again and Obama really can't do anything to stop it. He's got to hope that something dramatic changes the dynamic, because he's toast. I'm beginning to think he won't even win South Carolina now.

New York is destroyed tonight

2008-01-21T14:07:00.000-08:00

In a few hours I'll be watching a giant monster destroy New York. At least, that's what I hope to see. Hopefully the hand held nature of the film will allow for some real glimpses of the monster and not some "blink and you'll miss it" crap. A lot of people are saying Cloverfield is good and a lot of people are saying it's hollow disposable garbage. I'll find out tonight which camp I fall into.

Because I'm watching Cloverfield tonight, I'm going to miss the Democratic debate. In any event, below is the video that everybody is calling a "historic" speech by Barack Obama (it seems that that label is thrown around with him quite often, actually). I question the "historic" tag of it, but it goes to what I've always said that he's such a better speaker with a prepared speech in front of him. Whether you agree with what he says or not (Jeff, I can see your eyes rolling at the Scooter Libby Justice comment :) ), what can't be argued is that he does have a really magnetic and powerful presence when he speaks. I do find it great that he doesn't just pimp the black community (poor choice of words, sorry), but also tells them that the black community has been just as intolerant of King's vision as white's. C'mon South Carolina, don't bow to the Clintons: Vote Obama.

P.S. I won "Backloader of the Year" at Gallup's awards ceremony. I'll let your imagination try to figure out what that one means :)

There is no truth....or snow....

2008-01-18T20:06:00.000-08:00

Orangutan Island is kickass. The show follows a group of orphaned Orangutan's that have been saved and put together in close proximity with each other on a small island to coexist. The show is just fascinating. These animals are solitary by nature but put them together and they start using tools, helping each other, and testing their human constraints. In one episode, a group of Orangutan's from a neighboring island not only tested the electric fence, but started dismantling it when they found it unexpectedly shut off. I can't believe their are dickheads that go around killing them. Anyways, it's a good show and I recommend taking a look.

The professor of my Christians and Pagans class is bizarre. Just bizarre. He explained to everyone in class today how to prove that snow falling from the sky is just an illusion (objects can't move an infinite distance in a finite amount of space), how red is actually green and vice versa, and that there is no such thing as truth. Every fundamental institution and way of thinking is apparently not real at all. We're trying to wrap our heads around Cicero's "on academic scepticism" and it's mind-numbing. Seriously, try reading this. It'll give you a migraine. Luckily, my friend Jeff is in the class with me, so at least I have somebody to bitch to :)

My african-americans in film class is very interesting. Especially since one of the requirements is that we do a visual presentation of some kind for our final (i.e. a video). Luckily, one of my friends from past film classes is in it as well. I'm thinking about trying to convince him to make a blaxploitation film with me :)

My other english class started out like shit. I thought it was going to be terrible. Then we read Rip Van Winkle and had a fun class discussion about it and I was like "Okay, this might not be so bad". Then I found out that for the next two weeks we're going to be reading gothic horror/supernatural stories from the 1800's. Wow! I'm looking forward to that. Science in the Classical World is my "easy" class at the moment. I don't foresee any difficulty in that one.

Tomorrow night I'm going to a big awards forum at the State Theatre for my job. I've been hearing murmurs that I may be receiving something. I hope that's not the case. In any event, they are catering some place called The Green Gateau. Anybody ever eaten there?

Go Barack Obama! I have a feeling this caucus won't be close, but I'll cross my fingers. Hopefully when the awards thingy gets over a 9, I'll come home to a victory. I'm decidedly pessimistic about it though.

For what it's worth

2008-01-17T06:54:00.001-08:00

For what it's worth, I just woke up from a really vivid dream of the Patriots losing. My dream overall was weird. It was of the kind that wasn't quite a nightmare but made me wake up suddenly. Has anyone ever had those? Where you feel fairly unsettled even though you can't really remember what you were dreaming about? I didn't wake up screaming or anything, just a little uncomfortable.

Anyway, the focus of my dream wasn't the Patriots. I was with some other people who were watching it and something bad happened. I can't remember exactly what the bad thing that happened was, but I do remember quite clearly watching the Patriots lose and walk off the field, players yelling at each other. The final score was 17-10 and the Patriots screwed up a chance to tie the game when the botched a 4th and goal play. The mood in the room was fowl and unfortunately, I can't remember exactly what happened after that, but I woke up suddenly in a jolt. Weird, but if this scenario plays out, you heard it here first :)

My classes suck. I'll get into more of that on another blog.

Hillary's anti-democrat shenanigans...

2008-01-14T08:56:00.000-08:00

Well, the 800 pound gorilla in the room has finally begun to throw its weight around: race is now an issue in the Democratic primary. Make no mistake about it, this was all the Clinton campaign's doing and as a democratic voter, I am seething with loathing for Hillary. Everybody in their right mind can see as clear as day that when Obama talked about Martin Luther King in his speeches, it was in the context of dreaming for bigger and better things, not in a "Clinton hates black people" kind of way. Of course, the sad reality of the world we live in is that race is still a huge issue in this country. Hillary's people are smart, and they want to exploit that issue to their advantage.

By doing so, Hillary is pushing all her chips into the middle and daring Obama to do the same. The underreported storyline throughout all of this is that Hillary Clinton has no more opportunities to be president after this election. Let's assume that whoever wins stays 8 years, which both Bill Clinton and George Bush did. Hillary would be 68 years old by the time her next opportunity came around. I don't mean to be sexist, but voters aren't going to elect an old woman to be president. Therefore, Hillary has to do everything she possibly can to knock off Obama. The problem though, is that she is alienating democrats everywhere. I've already gone on record as saying I would not vote for her in the general election if she wins the nomination. Now I feel like joining democrats in trying to prevent her from getting into the white house. I can only speak for myself in this, but Hillary's recent tactics have been so low and unseemly that I would contemplate voting for the Republican just out of spite. I can only assume that many democrats around the country feel the same way.

As we were talking a bit about on Dead Politics 4, there is a huge change going on in both parties right now. Democrats are flocking to Obama in a way that hasn't been seen in a long, long time. Whether enough go to him to overtake Hillary is unclear, but my generation of Democrats have clearly seen the light, and that light is not the wife of an ex-president. Hillary's actions are what is causing this divide. There is an unwritten rule in Democratic primaries that our candidates are supposed to be "above" the political attacks that characterize the Republican side of things. You don't tear down another person in your own party purely for political gain. You don't bring up divisive issues of past admited drug use, or worse, race in an attempt to win. The Democrats are supposed to be the party that showcases the fact that race belongs in the past, not drudging it up in an effort to enflame racial tensions. What Hillary and Bill have been doing absolutely disgusts me as a proud democrat.

So the question now becomes: Can Obama transcend the race issue? Race is the ugly topic below the surface of America that nobody wants to talk about. There are deep seeded anti-black roots that are all over this country, not just in the south. Hillary bringing up race is obviously a southern strategy to get every state except South Carolina. Personally, I think Obama can do it, but he needs some help. He needs Colin Powell, one of the most respected black men in the country and who hinted at an endorsement but backed away, to actually step up to the plate and endorse him. He also needs, as I've been saying over and over, the endorsement of Al Gore. Those two are probably the most liked and respected people, arguably, in their parties and a major news event, particularly with Powell, would change the dynamic of the race. I don't know if it's going to happen, but I'm not sure that Obama has a viable counterattack to Hillary. Idealistic speeches can't overcome centuries old racist undertones. He needs to have some big name, respected politicians come out and say "This is bullshit, what Hillary is doing. We won't support her because she is pissing on what the democratic party is supposed to stand for".

Perhaps Obama has some magic up his sleeve and maybe Karma will come back to bitch slap Hillary across the face.

p.s. I will be donating to the Obama campaign this evening because I feel strongly that this is the guy to make things happen. I also feel that by contributing a small sum, I'm at least making the effort to give a big middle finger to Hillary. I hope my contribution is put to good use.

New Semester starts Monday

2008-01-11T09:21:00.000-08:00

Here's my classes:

African Americans in Film (English)
Pagans and Christians (Classics)
Science in the Classical World (Classics)
Short Story (English)

"Change" and looking forward hypothetically...

2008-01-07T19:50:00.001-08:00

Hillary Clinton has always fallen back on the notion that, nationally, she is way ahead of Obama. That was always the silver lining. Losing Iowa and/or New Hampshire would suck, but in the end, the national support would win her the big delegate states. Oh how the mighty have fallen.

Stories today have been littered with Hillary's so called "demise". I, for one, am not willing to just concede Obama's inevitability. After all, Hillary was inevitable 2 months ago, and as we all can see, politics can turn on a dime. You never really know what's going to happen in the future. It could be just as possible that Obama does something stupid, or Hillary's rumored "dirt" has a big impact, or world events shift the electorate's priorities. In other words, Obama supporters can't just assume the nomination is theirs.

But this is the first time that national poll numbers are showing Hillary sinking and sinking fast. Which seems to tell me that the "Obama Wave" that the press seems so enamored by (Tom Brokaw said he hasn't seen anything like it since the days of Kennedy) is happening nation wide. The sheer immenseness of the Democratic electorate flocking AWAY from Hillary tells me that, her support was never that strong to begin with. Democrats are, at their heart, idealists. We want big things, big changes, and bigger than life politicians we can feel have our best interests at heart. But I think this is the first time, in my lifetime at least, that there is a Democrat with the resources to compete with the "establishment" candidate. Let's not forget that Obama, even when way far behind in the polls this past summer, raised just about as much money as Hillary. Even back then, signs were pointing to the fact that Democrats wanted "change".

What is this "change"? Everybody is jumping on the "change" bandwagon, donkey and elephant alike. Hillary is struggling desperately to tell voters that she is change. Mitt Romney has evoked Obama by telling Republicans that he is the only change candidate on their side, thus the only one who could beat Obama in the general election. Likewise, Huckabee and Edwards are chanting the mantra of "change, change, CHANGE". Let's not forget, that Obama and Edwards were, from the very beginning, the only candidates who offered this slogan. Obama's success has come not from just preaching "change", but from incorporating "hope" into his speeches. Obama has a way of making people believe that better days are just around the corner. That there truly can be an end to the horribly polarizing divisiveness of our country. He brings that across far better and more emotionally evocative than any other candidate. Now, whether or not he can deliver on that message is a different debate. But in the minds of Democrats across the country (and independents, and Republicans), that message is resonating in a way that has even the most hardened political pundits and insiders shaking their heads in disbelief.

Obama, by all accounts, is supposed to cruise to victory tomorrow. Gallup has him winning by 13%. I think it will be a lot closer than that, but who knows? There are two important things to look at tomorrow if he wins.

1) Did he win the Democratic vote? The common thinking is that Obama will overrun Hillary because of the large numbers of independent voters in New Hampshire. That could happen, but if he doesn't win the registered democrats, expect Hillary to go on the attack immediately. She'll frame it in a way that tells the upcoming states that don't allow independents to vote "Don't let outsiders determine our party nominee". That's a solid base rallying cry and it will may even enflare the paranoia and conspiracy theories that Republicans are "infiltrating" the democratic primaries in order to affect the outcome they want. Of course, Obama will counter that one of the entire points of his candidacy is that he can bring independents and republicans into the democratic ranks. But if he wins amongst registered democrats (he won 32-31 in Iowa), Hillary won't be able to use that as a line of attack.

2) Can he replicate the youth and 1st time voter turnout of Iowa? I think this will be the most important thing to look for tomorrow. Obama's candidacy is predicated on the notion that he can DELIVER new voters to the party and finally accomplish the democratic "holy grail": bring young Asses to the voting booth. The amazing thing about Iowa is that he did it. Now comes the real test: can he replicate it? If the polls show tomorrow night that more record turnout among youth and first time voters skew heavily in favor of Obama, then Hillary is toast. Why? Because no matter how strong her base may be in New York or Florida...it won't be enough when Obama's youth support come out in droves to offset Hillary's 65 year old grandmother's. Young voters are also far more forgiving. If Obama does have a screw up that the media magnifies, it will matter a lot less to a 25 year old kid with an iPhone than it would to an older voter. At the very least, the young voters would keep Obama competitive in the later states. However, if Obama does not duplicate his success in Iowa, then Hillary is certain to jump on the fact that Iowa was a mere aberration and that he only won New Hampshire because of the independent vote, and things will change as soon as they get to the closed democratic primaries.

Will an Obama victory tomorrow end the Clinton candidacy like some pundits are predicting? Probably not. There are rumors that Hillary doesn't have much money, but I don't put much stock in those. Hillary supporters can raise just as much money in a crunch as Obama supporters, probably moreso. What I think is troublesome for Hillary is that she's going to have to do a Rudy Giuliani, only focus on Feb. 5th, strategy. There's been a lot of talk about the delegate count. Hillary currently holds a commanding lead in "superdelegates" and that if she can pull out New York, California, and Florida, it won't matter if Obama runs the table. Looking at the numbers, this is actually a somewhat apocalyptic scenario (Hillary will automatically win Michigan since Obama ain't on the ballot). If Hillary does rely on her establishment buddies to secure her an insurmountable delegate count, that will have terrible consequences for the Democratic party.

If Obama is running through states with an overwhelming grassroots support and bringing new voters into the party, and Hillary tries some strange, seemingly underhanded tactic to win (putting aside that it is a perfectly sound strategy well within party rules) by calling in all her congressional and senate favors to throw their support her way even in the face of a huge movement against her...the party will disintegrate and she will have no chance in hell of winning the nomination in November. Obama supporters are nothing if not insanely passionate about the guy and if Hillary is perceived to be doing it more for the Clintons and not the party, there will be a rebellion against her by democrats in the general election. If this nomination process gets to that point (which I don't think it will, but I don't put anything past Hillary Clinton; I'm just talking hypothetically right now) you will see a nightmare scenario where the party fractures and it would probably kill any chance for the Democrats to ever get the youth out in huge numbers. You don't invest this much and then watch a politician sneakily come in the back door for the nomination, even if it is perfectly legit to do.

Wow, this went really long. These are just some of my observations about what may or may not happen. Believe me, I'm definitely stoked beyond belief that Obama has done as well as he has. It's sort of a validation for me on a personal level since I've been singing his praises for the past 4 years. But I'm also realistic and I know this could change at any moment. He very well could lose tomorrow in an upset and then the entire dynamic is changed.

But for now, I'm going to revel in Hillary's misery :)

It's ON bitches!

2008-01-03T21:26:00.000-08:00

Ha! Obama completely blew away expectations tonight in a historic vote, crushing Hillary by 9 points in Iowa.

Not only did Hillary lose, but she got 3rd place! On top of that, Obama actually got the much maligned "youth vote" to actually get out and vote! Over 50% of his support was from people under 30. That is amazing. He also beat Clinton in the female vote. It was pretty much the worst case scenario for Hillary in every respect.

Here's hoping those New Hampshire independents see the light and forgo voting for John McCain (the only Republican I think could beat Obama or Hillary, for that matter) to back Obama. A McCain loss, and another Obama decisive victory will put major pressure on Clinton.

By the way, the much maligned Des Moines Register poll that was released this week that showed Obama up by 7% on Hillary, completely opposite to what all the other polls were saying...was actually the most accurate of them all. They predicted a huge independent voter turnout (though not as big as they expected), and showed Hillary up 1% on Edwards. The final vote showed Edwards up less than 1% on Clinton. Remarkably accurate for the second caucus in a row.

Gallup didn't do an Iowa poll, but they are doing a major New Hampshire poll this weekend that is supposedly going to be all over the news come Monday. We're actually staying open later on saturday and sunday to do it.

Oh happy night!

It's now or never....i think?

2008-01-02T20:21:00.000-08:00

Well, this seems to be "it". The general consensus amongst the pundits is that if Obama wins the caucuses tomorrow night, it will catapult him to the nomination. If he doesn't, then we're stuck with Hillary as our nominee. It seems that every single poll has a different leader and other than the Des Moines Register poll, which shows Obama way ahead, every one is within the margin of error. On a pure fan of politics level, this is incredibly fascinating and exciting. It's literally a toss up. I was watching Hardball earlier tonight and Chris Matthews said he hasn't seen anything like this since Kennedy-Nixon. Usually in the last week, someone pulls ahead. Not so this year. Even on the Republican side it's too close to call. I'm going to go out on a limb and say John Edwards won't get nearly as much support as everyone seems to be saying he will. In fact, I think he'll finish at least 5 points behind the winner.

Tucker Carlson had an interesting point of view earlier tonight. When talking to some campaign manager, he said he thought the entire caucus process was undemocratic. By its very nature, the caucus excludes people. Soldiers overseas, people who work night shifts, single parents who can't leave their kids to caucus for 2 hours at night, etc. Carlson's argument stems from the fact that people just can't get out and vote like they can in a primary. It takes time to caucus. You've got to rearrange stuff in your life. It's not a secret ballot. You have to get in front of people and argue for what you believe in. Because it is so "difficult", you end up with a small amount of people who make the decisions for everyone.

Now, I can see Carlson's point. However, I think it brings up an interesting argument to the bigger debate of whether or not there should be a "test" in order to vote. I've said in the past that I believe everyone should be able to vote. However, I do believe that people should be able to answer some basic questions. As of now, I'd be for a weighted voted system: everyone gets to vote, but their vote isn't worth as much if you don't know what the hell you're voting for. Come to think of it, that's definitely another area in which I'm not "Leftist". I don't know a single liberal who would even consider a "test" to vote :)

Anyways, my point is that I think a caucus is sort of a "test" in a sense. The people who caucus are far more knowledgeable than the average primary voter who just drops their ballot in a box and leaves. Caucus goers have to interact with the presidential nominees. They have to actually get in front of their friends and neighbors and argue why their nominee is the right nominee. Isn't this a more democratic way of doing things? I'm not quite sure. It would be a good topic to talk about on the Dead Politics podcast. Obviously, one argument against this would be "well, that Iowa soldier in Iraq might really want to participate but can't for obvious reasons". Of course, there's plenty of people in primaries who have stuff come up as well. I don't know, it's an interesting thing to talk about.

One thing's for sure, I'm gonna have my popcorn out tomorrow night :)

I'm watching Leno and he's knocking stuff out of the ballpark. The Tonight Show and Conan are hamstrung by the writer's strike, whereas Letterman has struck a deal with them, so Leno and O'Brian are relying on themselves to do jokes and come up with bits. I have to say, Leno did a fair job. I can't wait to see what O'Brian does.

2008 is here

2007-12-31T23:01:00.000-08:00

I finally got my copy of Stephen Tower's Nightmare USA. This is the biggest book I've ever owned in my life. It's 527 pages, coffee table sized, and weighs probably 6 or 7 pounds. It's enormous. The book, from Fab Press, covers American independent horror from 1970-1985. There are literally hundreds of films that Tower covers in depth in here. Everything from your typical Last House on the Left to stuff like Microwave Massacre. It's going to take me days to read through all the info in here. On top of that, it is chock full of photographs. I can't wait to dive into it.

After hanging out with some friends, I came home and watched a few episodes of the Twilight Zone marathon on the Sci-Fi channel. It's sort of amazing the quality in these old episodes. It makes you wonder why there can't be something like that on nowadays. I never watched any of the TZ relaunch they did a few years back. I read some reviews claiming it was pretty abysmal. Would it really be that hard to do a half-hour show like TZ in today's day and age? Heck, even put it in black and white. I would watch that.

Florida State lost their bowl game today. I didn't watch it, but I'm sure the fact they didn't have 36 players because of cheating and injuries didn't help their cause. It looks like next year will be Bobby Bowden's final year. The schedule gets easier, but we're still stuck with the same shitty quarterback situation. Things don't look promising.

The Des Moines Register poll is showing Obama opening up a lead on Hillary. Every other poll shows this way closer so it may not be trustworthy. It should be noted, though, that the Des Moines Register poll was the only poll to correctly predict the winning order last time around, for whatever that's worth. Thursday's going to be an exciting day. I plan on getting some pizza, kicking back, and watching the results. Is it really going to be as close as the pundits think or will there be a big separation when the final results are in? Will the youth actually show up for Obama? Can't wait to find out.

Overall, 2007 was a pretty good year for me. I'm hoping 2008 brings some big things. I'm now officially a Senior (ended up with an A- in my Politics class) and look forward to my final semester and a half of college (f**k my last two Spanish classes, argh!). I've also got grand plans for Outpost Doom. It's going to be interesting....

Bored and cold

2007-12-28T22:15:00.000-08:00

Caught two excellent flicks on Friday. First, Alyssa and I went to Sweeney Todd. It's a really good movie. I wouldn't say it is great, though. The songs can get a little long and repetitive in places, I would have liked to have seen more of Sweeney's back story explored (such as his prison time and escape, which wasn't shown at all), and I absolutely hated the stupid "sailor" Anthony. Every time he came on screen, I wanted to punch his face in. The guy just looks like a total sissy and his musical numbers make him the most annoying character I've seen on screen in a long time. Sort of sad, because the film was almost perfectly casted with the exception of that whiny man-bitch. Johnny Depp is aces as Todd and is the highlight of the film. If I were writing a review for Deadlantern, I'd probably give it a 7.5/10

I also caught Eastern Promises over some delicious Valentino's pizza. Cronenberg is one of my favorite directors and I just loved this flick. Great cast, story, and direction. My girlfriend commented that she wished the film had been longer, which I suppose is a compliment in and of itself considering that the film isn't what you'd call "action packed". Cronenberg is such an underappreciated director. I can imagine film scholars fifty years from now rediscovering many of his films and bumping him up the ladder of great directors. I read a rumor that his next film is going to involve Freud and Jung and their interaction with a patient of some sort. Sounds weird, but I'll watch it. Somebody coax him back to the horror genre, please!

I'm still waiting on one more grade to come in this semester. I got A's in Aesthetics, Greek Religion, and Gender/Communication and am now waiting impatiently for my World Politics grade. That's the one class I have no clue as to what my final grade will be and it sucks to have to wait this long to find out.

I purchased Splatterhouse and Punch-Out with my Wii Points cards that I got for Christmas. I haven't spent any time in depth with Splatterhouse, but from little I played, it seemed fun. I got past a couple mini bosses but succumbed to a flying killer picture frame. I'm gonna spend my New Year's Eve slaying monsters. As I was playing, the though occurred to me that if some company were to develop a God of War type game but stuck it in a horror-inspired universe, that could be the greatest game ever. If they can do it for mythological monsters, why not classic horror monsters?

I predict that the Patriots are going to lose to the Giants Saturday night. Just got a feeling...

Christmas: Wherein I Brag about all my Christmas Loot

2007-12-27T15:15:00.000-08:00

Christmas is finally over. I'm so glad. Between the family bickering, sheer boredom of two days in Grand Island, and general annoyance factor of having to be in the vicinity of people I can't stand, it's amazing I didn't kill my self. One salvation was getting a much needed excuse to leave my grandma's house and hang out with Jeff and Steve. We caught Aliens vs. Predator and recorded a Splattercast which was a lot of fun. So did I score a bunch of great swag to compensate for putting up with family fighting all weekend? Here's a rundown of what I got:

Digital Camera w/ memory card
2 Wii Zappers
2 Wii 2000 point Cards
Wii Classic Controller
Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles
Guitar Hero III
Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games
Live Free or Die Hard
A big ass Griddle
Aunt Jemima syrup and Pancake Mix
Calculator
Electric Blanket
2 Packages of Socks
Countless shirts and sweatshirts I'll never wear
An FSU t-shirt and hoodie
3 much needed new towels
2 Pairs of gloves
2 packages of Lil' Dutch Maid cookies
1 Coca-Cola mug stuffed with cherry candies

Considering that I only asked for the Griddle, I'd say I came out ahead. I've played all the way through Guitar Hero on the easy setting and have come to the conclusion that I hate almost every song on there. In fact, off the top of my head, I can't think of any song that I liked (actually, I just thought of Welcome to the Jungle and Bulls on Parade). The moral of the story is that I have no real desire to play through the game again on the higher difficulty settings. I suppose if any of my friends want to play online, I'd be up for a match, but I just could give a shit about unlocking new guitars or playable characters, y'know? Maybe it's more fun as a party game?

I'm currently reading through Cinema Sewer. It's pretty great if you're into reading old fanzines. The book is a compilation of the best of the first 12 issues. I'd always heard about the magazine, but never had the opportunity to take a look. Wouldn't it be great if Fangoria or GoreZone put out a big compilation book of their old issues? Fangoria has that famous "Order our back issues" page at the end of its issues, but god, early issues are just way too expensive for my taste. If I could pay twenty bucks and get the collected reprinted issues in book form, I would gladly throw down money for that. Comic books already do this with graphic novel collections, why not Fango or GoreZone?

I'm off to get ready for Dead Politics.

Sweeney Obama Cheaters

2007-12-22T16:03:00.000-08:00

Sweeney Todd has been getting rave reviews and I'm getting anxious to go see it. I absolutely love the broadway version with Angela Lansbury as Mrs. Lovett. It's great and has hilarious tunes. I'm not a big fan of Tim Burton, but this flick looks really nice. I also like the fact that Hans Gruber has been getting so many big roles lately. Dude has the perfect villian voice. He looks a bit too much like an Trent Reznor as an old man in the Harry Potter movies though...

A kind old woman quizzed Obama on his Islam ties today. Even when he explained, she still felt the need to verify that he was a Christian by making him define what a Christian is. This exchange shows that Clinton's goon squad's tactics are working. Planting the question of Muslim in voters' minds doesn't work as well with younger people, but it DOES work great with older voters who tend to be far more prejudiced towards those sorts of things. In other words: The voting bloc Hillary is depending on. If Obama cracks the older vote, then he's won Iowa.

It's going to take a miracle for Florida State to win its bowl game against Kentucky. 36 players aren't going to be playing, most of those because of an academic cheating scandal. What an utter embarrassment. I mean, it would be one thing if these players were cheating and WINNING, but sucking and cheating together stings all the more. And it's not like this shit doesn't happen all over the country. Alyssa had a class a couple years back where the professor let the football players take the same test after the rest of the class take it (thus knowing every question on it) as a matter of POLICY. Which probably explains why there were dozens of football players in that class. Unfortunately for Florida State, they've had, shall we say, a shady reputation of past problems, so they're always going to be under the microscope. I wouldn't suspend these dipshits. I'd gank their scholarships.

It's over

2007-12-21T07:44:00.000-08:00

The semester is finally over! I had to drag my ass out of bed to do my philosophy final at 8 this morning. Is there anything worse than trying to write an essay on the nature of the meaning of "Is" in artistic identification? Bill Clinton has a famous quote saying "It depends on what the meaning of 'is' is" in regards to the Lewinsky affair. The context obscures the fact that there is a difference in how 'is' is used (I used too many is' in that sentence).

There is an "is" of identity. "Cicero is Tully" is an example of this. The names refer to the same person. Tully is Cicero and vice versa. On the other hand, there's an "is" of predication such as "Grass is Green". The 'is' refers not to something that is the same (Green is not the same thing as Grass), but the state of something. I mention this because a famous 20th century art critic named Danto claimed there is a third type of 'is' involved in artistic identification. The theory goes that you must have an intrinsic knowledge of the history that goes into art in order to be able to recognize something as art.

The example Danto uses is an imaginary person named Testadura. Testadura looks at, say, Warhol's Brillo boxes and says "That's not art. Why is a recreation of a Brillo box so great? I could do that". Testadura represents someone who just "doesn't get it". Another example would be a Jackson Pollack painting where the paint is just randomly put all over the canvas. Is that art? Testadura would say no because a chimpanzee could do the same thing. However, Danto argues that there is an artistic identification that Testadura just does not have. He doesn't understand the evolution of art, the history of technique, application, and dynamic. Warhol's Brillo boxes would not have been art 50 years before, yet they are now precisely because the artist can see how things have evolved. In other words, Testadura is just ignorant to the fact that there is something more to art than just what we see with our own eyes. Danto argues that there is more to it than that and only certain people have access to the trait of artistic identification. Anyways, I had to write about that. Now I'm finished. Yay.

Christmas is coming up soon. Alyssa is gone all weekend visiting her grandparents in western Nebraska, so I've got the apartment to myself. I think I'm going to do some cleaning. Every once in a while I get in this mood to just clean everything like I'm possessed. Other than that, I plan on watching some movies. Stupid ass Netflix sent me an e-mail saying that three movies are being shipped from the east and west coast. I mailed these back on wednesday, so instead of having movies to watch this weekend from my local Omaha distributor, the bastards won't get me my movies until next week AFTER Christmas. I hate Netflix!

Gallup is showing Obama tied with Clinton in New Hampshire. I still think Hillary will pull out the nomination because I think most undecided people are ultimately going to go with the person they "know" rather than someone new to the scene, regardless as to whether or not Hillary would be good. That's sad, but probably the truth of it. As I've always said, this experience and exposure in the primaries will only help Obama in a future presidential run if he falls to Hillary. Still, I hope Santa brings a victory :)

The Toll of a Campaign?

2007-12-16T22:17:00.001-08:00

Ah yes. The famous Drudge "Unflattering photo". The photo of Hillary has been on the top of Drudge's page all night. No link accompanying it. Just this bad picture with the headline "The Toll of a Campaign". What is the point of this, exactly? Nothing more than to take a pot shot at Hillary Clinton. Openly mocking the way she looks to the millions of visitors to the site who will no doubt see this pic and laugh. Is this news worthy? Nope. In fact, I'm pretty sure that you could find just as many pictures of all the candidates looking tired and worn out right about now.

Is there an agenda behind this picture? Probably. Drudge is part of the anti-Hillary conservative psychosis who seem strangely obsessed with bringing her down. Don't get me wrong, I don't care for Hillary, and by comparison, Obama has been getting nothing but positive stories on the site, but this is just a little tacky, don't you think? Drudge, Rush, Hannity and the club would like nothing more than to see Hillary beaten in the primaries. That would officially end the "Clinton Era" of Democratic politics. Considering the fact that Hillary has recently gotten some momentum back because of the Des Moines Register endorsement, it's not surprising certain interests are trying to make her look stupid again. After all, the conservatives want Obama to win and it looks like they'll do whatever it takes to help him climb that extra mile. If they can take out a Clinton in the process, that will make it all the more sweet. Perhaps they should focus their attention on the wackjob they have leading their own primaries because even Hillary would crush him in the general election.

I Am Legend sucked ass. Terrible CGI monsters. Terrible ending. Terrible just about everything except for the shots of a desolate New York. After the movie got out, my girlfriend and I couldn't stop talking about all the stupid shit that this supposedly "genius" guy did. The religious element brought in out of the blue in the last 20 minutes of the film didn't work at all and I'm still wondering why the hell Will Smith didn't get in the wall opening with the other two. Pull the pin, throw the grenade, jump inside, shut the door. Nobody in his position would do what he did. Stupid.

What also sucked is that they didn't show the trailer for The Dark Knight before our print of I Am Legend. Instead, we got 10,000 B.C. , which I'm predicting is going to fail horribly. It looks like Apocalypto, only with wooly mammoths. By the way, what the hell is up with all the atrocious CGI in movies lately? The Mist suffered from the same poor CG. Here's an idea...it might be sort of radical, but hear me out: use practical, real fx work. I seem to remember it working pretty well The Thing. I know, I know, it's cheaper and easier to chug out some shitty CG monster in a fast amount of time, but you lose so much with unrealistic fx. If you're dead set on CG, then you have to spend the time doing it right, perfecting it so as not to draw attention to its own fakeness. Give me a Tom Savini, a Rick Baker, or a Rob Bottin over ILM any day.

Gender and Communication final today, World Politics on Tuesday, and Philosophy on Friday.

I Am Kickass?

2007-12-14T21:37:00.001-08:00

I've been anticipating seeing "I Am Legend" all year long. I love the story, I love the the Vincent Price version "Last Man on Earth", and I love post-apocalyptic stuff.

Checking Rotten Tomatoes, it's currently right below a fresh rating at 59%

The general consensus seems to be "Will Smith is awesome, the CGI is god-awful, and the ending is sappy". As I was walking home from work tonight, I passed by a stream of people who were getting out of a showing and all these guys were like "That movie was fucking sad!". Everybody was chatting about it like it was cool, so I've got high hopes that this is one of those films that kicks ass but the critics are too proud to rate highly, for fear of looking like they enjoy a big budget Hollywood flick. I think I might be going to this with Alyssa tomorrow night after work if it isn't snowing badly.

Speaking of work, I heard a bunch of people around me doing USA Today surveys and asking questions about the presidential elections. I'm not sure if this is just a general nation wide survey, or if Gallup has started individual states yet, but soon I should have a better idea as to where Obama actually stands. One of the latest in state Iowa polls shows Obama with a commanding 9 point lead over Hillary. That seems a little overly optimistic. Still, he's gotten nothing but great press since Oprah and Hillary has looked like a shrill, vindictive bitch the past week or so. If you want to see a campaign in absolute desperation mode, you have to watch Hillary's campaign strategist try and weasel his way out of the negative publicity in this video. Mark Penn wobbles back and forth and actually uses the "Cocaine" word when denying Shaheen's attack (Shaheen himself didn't even say cocaine when talking about Obama's past drug use). Keep your eye on Joe Trippi who looks at Penn in utter disgust.

Mark Penn: sleazeball.

There's some news out that the Halloween 6 producer's cut may finally be coming out on DVD in the future. I hope so. I've always wanted to see it.

Dog Soldiers miraculously showed up in my mailbox this afternoon (along with Hollywood Gothic by David Skal) and I watched it with some Subway and Doritos. I had seen this, gosh, probably 5 years ago, but didn't really remember much of it. I think I was distracted at the time. Anyway, watching it again, I liked it more than I thought I did. I was pleasantly surprised to see Kevin McKidd in the lead role. He's one of my favorite actors going right now (still mad I missed Journeyman this year). There's just something missing in this film for me. It's got so many great elements that I like, but I can't shake the feeling that it doesn't all come together like it should. Some of the editing is bad and the werewolves seemed to be under-utilized to their full potential. Still, I like it, just not enough to give it a glowing review.

B-

Woo hoo! School's almost out!

2007-12-13T18:08:00.000-08:00

Oh happy day! Writing papers doesn't bother me...except when they have to be 15-20 pages long. I've got 3 finals next week and then the semester will be over. On sucky thing is that my last final is next friday at 8 in the morning. I'm so close to finishing school I can taste it!

Hillary Clinton apologized to Barack Obama earlier today for her drug story hit job on him. Anybody that follows politics in any meaningful way, even superficially, doesn't believe that she had no idea this was going to happen. I've said before that I used to think the portrayal of her as some great evil were overblown, but I'm really beginning to despise this woman. I think I'm starting to understand why so many conservatives hate this woman. Regardless of whether or not you support Obama's views, I don't think anyone can honestly say the guy is some conniving force of evil. In the unfortunate event that Hillary is elected in the primaries, I'll be writing in Obama as my selection next November. As for that picture....don't they say the Sith always come in pairs?

:)

I was supposed to get Dog Soldiers from Netflix last week. It still hasn't arrived. I've reported it, but that's one less Christmas horror film that I'll get to watch this weekend. I think I might head to Audio Visual this weekend to see if they have the Silent Night, Deadly Night collection on VHS. 5 for $5 is where it's at

There's been a interest in my idea for Super Smash Casters. The idea is that all the different horror podcasts will play Smash Bros. Brawl each week and trash talk the hell out of/promote each other each week. I think this could be great with the proper planning. Looking forward to it.

I was doing some investigation into illegal immigration with my professor and came to an interesting "bigger picture" point. Most people know that European populations are declining due to lower birth rates. The long term effects of this are devastating as the population grows older and there are less working age people. But did you know, the same thing is happening to the population here in the U.S.? Our country is essentially "break even" in terms of birth/death rates. Ironically, the U.S. is not having the same problem as the European countries. Why? Because immigrants both legal and illegal are replacing the affected population. Therefore, in a bigger picture future scenario, the U.S. will hypothetically be less affected by a power reduction precisely because illegal immigration is continually renewing a working class population. Weird, huh?

I have no idea if this is true or not, but just goes to show, the government is everywhere :)

Procrastinating again...

2007-12-09T23:10:00.000-08:00

My goal was to have 3 papers done by Sunday. I did 1.

I really need to break this procrastination habit. Argh!

There's an interesting observation stating that none of the Republicans in the field are inherently electable, even though collectively they have the advantage in experience and accolades over the Democratic candidates. It's kind of weird to see a party have nobody they really like.

"Oprahpalooza"? I've watched the rallies both times so far and it's definitely odd to see grown women screaming like little girls at a Hannah Montana concert. I read somewhere that there were 30-40,000 people at the South Carolina rally. Crazy. I also read that Obama's campaign asked the crowd to text message their phone numbers so they could sign up to be volunteers and a Guinness World Record was set when thousands of people called at the same time to their congressman's office to voice their support for Obama. Gotta give his campaign props for creativity.

While at work, I decided to check out the "liberal blogs" like Dailykos and Mydd. I can't believe the venom many of these people have towards Obama. Whether it's the lack of interest or brushing off of coverage by the main bloggers, or the readers who publish "diaries" criticizing him...it's very odd. Then again, all these blogs are huge supporters of John Edwards, which still baffles me. You would think that the blog community would rally around a guy who was against the war in Iraq from the beginning (something Hillary and Johnny Lawyer can't say). The best I can figure is that the "Leftist Blogs" aren't as irate about Iraq so much as they are healthcare. They are so hung up on the fact that Obama does not want a mandate for healthcare that they've just turned on the guy. Well, that might be too harsh a statement. More like they are standing on the sidelines, making snide comments every once in a while and waiting to see the dust clear. I guarantee you that if Obama beats Hillary, all these guys are going to be singing praises.

From what I've seen, if Obama wins, he'll be doing it without the support of the "blogosphere", which is telling in and of itself.

Food for thought: In the event that Obama pulls off the "miracle" and wins the Democratic nomination, who would he choose as his VP? This is a story that I haven't heard anybody talking about. You always hear who Hillary might pick, but not Obama. Here's an idea: Harold Ford, Jr.

A couple reasons I think this would be a good choice. First, Obama has already expressed the desire to put some conservatives in his Cabinet. He's stated that it is important to be surrounded by differing opinions. That's a good thing and I completely agree with his sentiment. Ford offers a unique set of talents that would help Obama's candidacy. Ford is definitely not what you'd call a "Left leaning Liberal". He supported the war in Iraq, has advocated stricter abortion policies, and believes in banning same sex marriage. He would be a good yin to Obama's yang in many ways. He lost his race for Senate in Tennessee a couple years back...by only 50,000 votes. Meaning, with him on the ticket, Obama could very well pick up Tennessee in a general election. Ford also offsets Obama in the area of public speaking and eloquence. Stick Ford in front of a group of people, even when he's been beat, and he just has it in a way that Obama sometimes struggles to articulate. It also doesn't hurt that he has big influence with religious voters in the South. And that he's one of the only Democrats who isn't afraid to be on Fox News (regular on Hannity and Colmes). And that he's chairing the DLC and is probably looking for a promotion...

I'm not saying it's gonna happen, but if Obama wins and you start hearing the name Harold Ford Jr. floating around in VP conversation, you heard it here first :)

Jumping into HD

2007-12-07T11:15:00.000-08:00

So I'm buying a 50" HD television in January or February. I've actually never bought a TV before. The only one I've ever owned is a little 13" that my grandma bought me back in 1999. I'm doing this for a couple of reasons:

The first is that the tv we currently use, my girlfriend's 27" standard, is just begging to be replaced. Something happened a couple years ago and suddenly there is a huge green glob in the upper left corner of the frame. It looks like a magnet went across it somehow. The television is well over 10 years old and besides its age, it's just large and clunky. It's served us well, but its living room privileges have been revoked and it is destined to be put in an extra bedroom somewhere.

The second reason I'm doing this is, frankly, HD television is soon to become the standard. I have no problems with standard television and I have no intention of replacing my enormous DVD collection with HD versions of the films unless I find out for some stupid reason that I can't watch a regular DVD on an HD tv (haven't done much research yet, so I don't know all the nit picky rules). I've had big debates with buddies of mine about whether or not HD is just as good as a theatre to see a movie. I still firmly believe that the theatre is the superior viewing experience. That hasn't changed. And no Jeff, you can't change my mind :) Still, in a year or so, all of television is going to be in high-def (that's the government for you, I guess) and whether I like it or not, our normal tube TV isn't going to cut it. I'm sure I could buy some sort of digital box to plug into it or something, but I don't want to bother with all of that. Might as well just buy a new TV.

You might be wondering why I'm getting a 50"? Well, to be honest, if I'm going to splurge on a new TV, I might as well make it as impressive as I can. I've seen the 32" Hi-Def's but god do they seem tiny to me. Maybe it's the widescreen nature that doesn't seem to do it for me. A box shape looks much better in 32" than a rectangle to me. I don't know, there just seems to be something a little off with the smaller HD's. Maybe the bigger ones give the impression of the "real" theatre experience? Regardless, I just don't like the little ones. And since I'm getting three thousand bucks from my job as a "Thanks for being smart!" bonus in January, I might as well get the best I can get. Why buy a small hi-def when I can one that covers an entire wall? :)

I think gaming will be a lot more fun as well. In fact, I know it will. Playing Mario Party on Jeremy's big screen was great fun a couple years back and I'm looking forward to seeing a three foot tall Bowser on Smash Bros. Brawl :) Maybe I'll even check out God of War which Jeff says is great on HD. I can't imagine the coolness of playing it on a 50" TV.

One other thing, by actually having an HD tv and using it on a regular basis, I'll be able to really figure out whether or not home theatre systems are on par with regular movie theatres. Perhaps my position will change once I've had some in depth usage? We shall see in January/February I guess

Crunch time

2007-12-06T15:35:00.000-08:00

I've got 7 days to write 4 papers. 3 of which need to be about 8 pages, the other needs to be 15-20. This is going to be the suckiest week I've had in a long, long time. On the brightside, I think I aced two more exams this afternoon and had a fun time reading to my Gender and Communication class the sex tips offered by Seventeen magazine, which included telling a girl what an orgasm was. In case you're wondering, Seventeen magazine claimed an orgasm was "Like a sneeze, only it feels great!"

A couple polls that came out have shocked some people. In one, Obama is essentially tied with Clinton in South Carolina, and the other shows him within 6 points of Hillary in New Hampshire. People are wondering why he isn't attacking the crap out of Hillary, but his message seems to be catching fire. Is it too little, too late? We'll see, but it's ads like this that bring people to his cause, I think. It's kind of weird to see a non-attack ad in a race this close.

Kudos to the person who put this together. They hit up that swelling orchestral score for max "goosebump" points. It reminds me of his big speech at the DNC a few years back that put him "on the map". I've already heard accusations of "cheese!" in regards to the ad, but at least it's positive while still taking a high road swipe at Hillary in the process, which is always a good thing :)

Find out what all the hype is about at BarackObama.com

Braving the cold for a Nintendo Wii

2007-12-01T19:02:00.001-08:00

Batman Begins was fantastic. Arguably, the best part of it was the last scene where Commissioner Gordon gives Batman the joker card, thus tantalizing us for the inevitable kickass sequel. Heath Ledger was cast as Joker, much to the chagrin of many people? Clear pics are finally coming out and I've gotta say, Ledger looks pretty great as the Joker. There's a real sense of menace or something here. Not like Nicholson, who played it as over-the-top as only Nicholson can do. But the problem with Nicholson was that he never seemed psycho enough. I suppose that fits with Burton's world, but now that Nolan is doing a more "realistic" Batman world, I have a feeling that the Joker is going to be one scary mofo. Good to see he's still rockin' the purple, as well.

Tomorrow morning, I'm heading off with my mom to stand in front of Toys R' Us at 6 a.m. in hopes of getting a Wii. I decided to tag along for moral support. She's picking one up for my step-sister and her husband, and I figured I'd be a good son and hang with her. Then I figured "Geez, I should just buy one myself and sell it on eBay". So that's what I'm going to do if I can get my hands on one. Supposedly, Toys R' Us is getting 21 Wii's in tomorrow morning and if I can, I might as well pick one up for my misery standing in the cold and sell it for a nice profit. Yay capitalism! :)

Frank Rich has an interesting Op-Ed piece in the New York Times about how Obama could be the Republicans' worst nightmare if he gets the Dem nomination. My pal Jeff seems to have this same view as he was trying to convince me that Obama would fare much better in the general election than Hillary. I'm still not completely sold on that line of thinking. It's one thing to have all these nice predictions a year ahead of time, but for the vast majority of Americans, they still have no idea who Barack Obama is. Most Americans wake up and start paying attention to the election when there are only two choices left, Democatic and Repbulican, and then it's a whole new ball game.

Nevertheless, all these glowing Op-Ed pieces are popping up because Hillary is dropping in the polls. The latest Crapmussen is showing her lead in the single digits in New Hampshire. These daily polls are fun to digest on a superficial level, but wake me when Gallup starts polling in these states. I'm still ecstatically restrained, but could the snowball be getting bigger and could it be rolling faster?

Next week is going to be insane. I've got to write 3 long papers and 1 extremely long paper (15-20 pages). Then I've got to finish the Outpost Doom script. I've got a lot of damn writing to do in the next couple weeks.

An Ego Boost from various professors....

2007-11-27T20:41:00.000-08:00

Now isn't this promo poster for the new Terminator series kinda ridiculous? Maybe a closeup of giant breasts with the faintest hint of erect nipple is an eye-grabber, but Sarah Conner doesn't strike me as a character that screams feminine sexiness, you know? Maybe in the first Terminator you could make a case, but the progression of her character in T2 kinda destroys that entire view. And by the time she becomes the mother of the "leader of the resistance", she's pretty weathered and beaten down. Then again, maybe this is a closeup of the new Terminator, who I hear is a female. In that event, props to Skynet for mimicking the female form :)

I'm looking forward to seeing this. I'm hoping the show is great and if it is, maybe it will lead into more movie franchises adopted for the small screen. I'd love to see a Predator show, wouldn't you?

I don't know what it is, but apparently I'm some highly talented writer. During my college career, I've had three different professors either tell me bluntly that I should be doing more writing or have told me as much in lengthy comments at the end of papers. One of my film professors even suggested that a paper I did on the horror genre could be published if I beefed it up. I've always sort of just disregarded their opinions, thinking it was mainly because I had a good relationship with them that they were writing these kind words. I'm revisiting that, now. I got back 2 papers today. The first was my Gender and Communication essay and as I flipped through the pages, I noticed that there were no comments anywhere. This had me worried, as the whole point of a communication professor is to give detailed feedback on EVERYTHING (i.e. communicate!). I figured I had some horrible grade. Then I get to the last page and see this comment: "Your writing style is absolutely engrossing. As I read your paper, I was so engaged that I didn't even think about corrections or comments. That's a good thing! You should develop this skill".

Interesting. I wrote the paper so well that she completely forgot to grade it like she normally would :) I'd be lying if I said I wasn't pleased. It was nice to get feedback from a non English professor about the very thing I've been praised for (though I'm not quite sure why). Then I got my Philosophy paper back which applied Aristotle's theory of tragedy to Sam Raimi's "A Simple Plan". Once again, I aced the paper and the paraphrased comments went something like: "Fantastic writing style" and he went on to imply that it's "scholarly" without reading like a "scholarly" essay.

When I was a kid, I won a bunch of school awards for creative writing. I like to write, but for whatever reason, I just never felt I was very good at it. I like coming up with stories and ideas but dialogue has always escaped me. Anyway, this new positive feedback has made me revisit this writing thing. Maybe I should actually sit down and write a book or something? I really enjoy doing the "Disease of Death", so I'm already on that path and I wrote 2 chapters for the "novel" version of The Grand Horror last year, only to set it aside and never come back to it (busy with other stuff).

How hard can it be to be a writer anyways? If Carlin can do it, I certainly can :P

It would be pretty swell to sell a movie script or two, or even a book for that matter. Talk about the ultimate stay at home job :) Nothing will probably ever come of this newfound interest, but it doesn't hurt to try I guess. Who knows, maybe my calling isn't in making movies, but in writing them.

"So you're saying there's a chance....."

2007-11-20T18:38:00.001-08:00

Obama supporters are all aflutter. First it was the news that a recent poll showed him winning in Iowa. Now it's a New Hampshire poll showing Hillary dropping by 7% (though she still holds a big lead).

Working in the polling business, I know that one can't get overly excited by these numbers. One-shot polls are great for the weekly news cycle, but you need to string together sustained weeks to create a trend one can feel confident about.

Still, this is great news for Obama supporters. If nothing else, it will galvanize them to feel that their support is actually having some effect. The more positive exposure these polls bring Obama, the more voters will take a closer look. There's quite a big difference between Hillary and Barack. If Hillary become the nominee, I might just take the next election off. I used to think she wasn't the evil incarnate that Republicans made her out to be. I still don't believe that, but I don't trust that woman at all. My gut tells me that if Hillary is elected, nothing is going to change. For better or worse, at least with Obama, I get the feeling that this is a pretty good guy who really wants to change how things operate. He's a fresh, positive alternative to Hillary. For example, Hillary wants to mandate health care to all Americans, forcing everyone to buy it, whereas Obama wants to require it for children, but not mandate it for adults. The idea is that if you get employers to pay more, then more people will be willing to voluntarily get health care if it's cheaper. That's a sensible solution, in my opinion.

Obama can exploit the health care debate to his advantage. I think most people don't really understand the difference between their plans. Obama needs to take a page out of the Republican Handbook and hammer home the fact that Hillary wants to FORCIBLY REQUIRE YOU TO BUY HEALTH INSURANCE (Edwards wants to do the same, populist poseur that he is). I'm probably at odds with most liberals on this issue. I believe in "Universal Healthcare" if the definition is you have the OPTION to buy into it. It should be a public good, but nobody should be forced to HAVE to have it. It's a complicated issue, but one I think Obama can really stick Hillary with.

You know what the really sad thing about all of this is? Why the hell are there so many John Edwards supporters? I mean, he's basically taking the same "I'm not the establishment guy" shtick that Obama is, but he's so obviously a weasel. Edwards is getting 22% in Iowa. Imagine if his supporters woke up and joined Obama.

Hillary would be pissing her pantsuit with Fear! :)

Still, I'm ecstatically restrained at the moment. When Gallup starts doing surveys in Iowa and New Hampshire later this year, and the results are similar, then I'll start doing the cartwheels. Until then, Obama needs to take this new exposure and use it to slam Hillary into the ground.

Interesting paragraph from the NYT article: His aides also circulated an article in which Mrs. Clinton was quoted as saying that she had not yet proposed any punitive measures for people who do not get health insurance. An aide to her said that a Clinton White House would work with Congress to create an enforcement mechanism.

Enforcement mechanism? WTF is that all about?

Back from the Technological Dead

2007-11-17T20:41:00.000-08:00

I've finally got home internet access again. Yay.

Some quick thoughts:

Congress is at record disapproval levels, but America still likes the Democrats.

Florida State secured a winning record for the season this afternoon. Bobby Bowden is kickin' it with a bunch of cheerleaders in this very strange picture...

My grandparents' 50th Wedding Anniversary was today and it was boring as all hell.
More stuff to come...

Here comes another busy week...

2007-10-28T21:08:00.001-07:00

I'm sitting here trying to come up with questions to ask Uwe Boll. I wanted to make sure I knew how to correctly pronounce the guy's name and luckily for me, I found this great clip of Mr. Boll actually telling some haters how to say it correctly. Good thing I found that site, because I've been saying OOO-VAY this entire time.

I'm pretty nervous about this. Uwe Boll definitely isn't some huge celebrity or anything, but it still feels a little intimidating to be talking to someone who is so recognized the world over. I've only ever done interviews through e-mail, so actually speaking with someone "famous" is going to be a first. I hope I have the courage to channel my inner Chris Matthews and confront him with some "tough" questions :)

Who are those striking football players clad in evil black uniforms? Those be the Seminoles, fresh off their 25-6 beating of Duke. I watched this game and came to the realization, somewhat abruptly, that there is a hell of a lot of talent on FSU's team. The one glaring weakness is the horribly spotty QB play. Neither Drew Weathorford nor Xavier Lee seems able to bring it all together. For example, against Duke in the first half, the Noles were in the red zone 4 times and came out of it with 9 points. We can move the ball, we just can't score. And now comes the brutal part of the schedule: @ #2 Boston College, @ Virginia Tech, Marlyand, and @ Florida. A betting man would say that the only reasonable victory would be Maryland, and even that isn't a sure thing. I'm predicting an upset this weekend, as FSU will go into BC's house and beat them. We only need 1 win to be bowl eligible. Still, next year look's like it could be a return to form, as the schedule gets decidedly easier and we get a bunch of stellar recruits coming in.

By the way, if you're wondering why the black uniforms, every year for one game the university honors the Seminole Indian Tribe for being the only tribe never to have signed a treaty with the United States. The slogan is "Unconquered" and it's to pay respect to the traditions of the Seminole people.

Meanwhile, Nebraska is mired in a blackhole of suck. Here's the way you defeat Nebraska: spread them out with 4 wide receivers, go into shotgun, and then run down their throats. How can one guy put up 200 yards and 3 TD's in a single quarter on a defense? Can you imagine what the score would have been if Texas had done that from the get go instead of trying their hardest to pass all over the place? Still, I think Nebraska has enough in the tank to knock off Kansas, who is overrated in my opinion.

I have two more tests this week: Communication and Philosophy. I'm getting real sick of constant exams. I can't wait for college to be over with. At least we're talking about film in Philosophy now. Even though I bitch about it all the time, I've aced all of my philosophy exams and my paper on Psychical Distance and Halloween. Philosophy really is easy when you think about it. All it is is some guys arguing an opinion. As long as you have the nuts and bolts of what they are trying to say nailed down, it's pretty easy to grasp the concepts.

I thought I was going to lose this week's Dead Lantern Fantasy Football game. I felt Steve clearly had the upperhand in terms of matchups. Unfortunately for everybody, Tom Brady is on my team and as long as he's giving me 5 TD's per game, it's going to take an awful lot to beat me on most days. Of course, I'm going to go out in the first week of the playoffs by a lucky game from someone because the regular season apparently means nothing. I'm a very competitive person when I'm involved in something (even something just for fun, like this) and I've taken quite the interest Fantasy Football, trying to figure out how it all works, what the best matchups are, etc. For never doing anything like this before, I'm pleased that I seem to be picking it up so well. But heaven help those around me if some joke punks me out of the playoffs because all my guys are riding the pine in order to save themselves for the real NFL playoffs. Where's the justice? :)

Anyway, I should get back to compiling Uwe Boll questions. It should be an interesting Splattercast #50...

I Kant take it anymore

2007-10-19T00:49:00.000-07:00

Most stressful day of school ever. Yesterday I had a midterm exam in Political Science, a Philosophy exam, and a paper in Communication.

Immanuel Kant is my enemy. Not only did I have to write an in-class essay on his somewhat complicated theory on beauty and the sublime, but the dude popped up in my PolySci class as well forcing me to write another huge essay on liberalism and the Kantian Trinity of Democratic Peace, Economic Interdependence and IGO's. Ugh. At least it's over and I feel confident about how I did, but still, I was up all damn night trying to wrap my brain around this guy.

I remember when Florida State-Miami used to be the biggest game of the year, every year. Now nobody cares except the fans of each team. As far as a Seminole fan like myself is concerned, we can lose every game this year...as long as we don't lose to Miami. Speaking of bad football teams, I'm reveling in the misery of the Cornhuskers. Tom Osborne has been brought in to save the team, and considering stories like this, it shouldn't be too long before Callahan is out of work again. Which begs the question: If Nebraska goes on a great run and makes it to a decent bowl, will Callahan still be fired? Word on the street is "Yes" and that Osborne will hire Turner Gill. Which begs the question: Is Nebraska going to junk the West Coast Offense and go back to the Option with Osborne and Gill at the helm? Should be an interesting year in Lincoln.

I got sent a DVD called "Heartland Horrors" which is an anthology of short films from the midwest. I actually was sent two of them, so I'll be giving one away on Splattercast 50. I also ordered a bunch of cheap horror dvd's to give out as well. We've already had a bunch of people e-mail us about Splatterpiece Theatre with the correct answer. I'll have to make this week's a little tougher. I've also noticed that there is some German site called Nerdcore or something that regularly links to Deadlantern, I found that kind of strange. Ah well, the more viewers the merrier I suppose.

The Splattercast is filthy

2007-10-10T23:03:00.000-07:00

For those of you who don't keep up on such things, next year is going to bring lots of negative publicity on Hollywood. That's because, the Directors/Writers/Actors unions have expiring contracts and they are all expected to go on strike at the same time, effectively shutting down Hollywood. There's a bunch of horror films that have been fast tracked into production and the writer of the article brings up a good point, albeit without really following up on it. Are all of these movies going to suck because they are being made as fast as humanly possible? In the mad rush to have a bank of films ready to be released in the event of a prolonged strike, is there a big potential for low quality output? I think so. There's only so much talent to go around and personally, I'd prefer to see the Wolf Man or Black Lagoon film a couple years later if it means the quality will be better rather than some rushed hack job in order to have something to release. Of course, on the plus side, the horror genre has thrived throughout its history on rushed hackjobs, so maybe everything will turn out fine :)

More Republican congressional seats in jeopardy. That first one hints at the bigger problem for Republicans. If they can't get at least a small majority of Hispanic voters to vote for them like African-Americans vote for Democrats, then it could be a looooooong time before we see Republican majorities in our government. This will become especially prevalent in 10-20 years when more and more Hispanics coming to this country. I wonder if Republicans will stick to their current philosophy or change in order to court the Hispanic vote in the coming years? If the Democrats secure the Hispanic voting block, it's game over for Goopers. Game over.

Looking for ways to improve the Splattercast, I've been browsing around various horror message boards, looking for info on what people like and hate in a podcast. Overwhelmingly, it seems people are just looking for shows that focus solely on horror (i.e. stay on topic and don't veer off into stuff they either don't understand or have no interest in) and, most importantly, aren't filled with crass jokes about other non-related stuff. I'd like to start giving out more horror info and at least attempt to allow our listeners to learn something practical about the genre. I think we need more debate and fresh segments, but I have no idea what those would be. Gotta start brainstorming. I did find it quite humorous that one of the moderators on the Rue Morgue board wouldn't include us in the main list of horror podcasts because of our filthy mouths, ah well :) I like our crassness, but we do have a tendency to go overboard a bit (I'm looking at you, Deejay) and fly way off topic. But I think that must be part of our charm, because we've got a lot of listeners. Can't please everybody, I suppose, but I think we can improve.

After I get back from the haunted house tomorrow, I'm gonna catch the Florida St. Wake Forest game. Last year, Wake Forest beat us like little bitches, 30-0, in Tallahassee. I'm hoping we can pull out the win at Wake to set up a big game with Miami at home next week. Go 'Noles!

Mark it down, Oklahoma State's spread offense will shred Nebraska this weekend. OSU's problem this year has been a constant string of turnovers that have caused them to lose all 3 of their road games. If their offensive line can give the QB time, Nebraska will be in another shootout. Here's hoping Nebraska goes down in flames just so I can watch Callahan scrunched up face again.

"God hates faggots"?

2007-10-10T09:10:00.000-07:00

I suppose one of the downsides of going to a public university is that you get extreme religious wackos that feel the need to preach to you about the fires of hell as you walk to class. For the past week or so, there has been a group of Christians standing in front of the Union, yelling out to everybody about how Jesus hates "faggots" and that pretty much the entire college is one giant Satan love orgy. This isn't a new phenomenon, by any means. Christians are constantly out and about on campus, railing against various things. I don't have a problem with that, but I do have a problem when they are walking around holding billboards that say "God Hates Faggots". First of all, doesn't their God love everybody? What disturbs me the most is that there is always a huge contingent of students sitting around listening to their hate speech.

So what I'd really like to do sometime is get a group of people together, dress up like the gods of ancient Greece, and preach right next to them. I'd like to stand right beside one of these douchebags holding a lightning bolt and telling the audience not to piss me off else I'll fry their asses. I'd like a girl to dress up as Aphrodite and preach how awesome sex is and how it's a natural part of life. That would be funny and great all at the same time.

Speaking of annoying Christians (I don't mean to dog on this, but I have yet to have a Muslim come up and annoy the piss out of me), I get off work a couple weeks ago on a friday night. Every weekend, there is a couple Christians who stand on the corner of our downtown theater holding a giant white cross and yelling at people who walk by. The way the walk lights turned out, I just happened to walk right by the guy. Oddly, there weren't that many people out that night so I was the only person on the corner with him...except for two little girls on the opposite side, standing by the light pole. These girls could have been no older than 7 years old. They were a ways away from the lunatic with the cross, and of a completely different ethnicity. I figured they were just waiting for their parents to pick them up from a movie. So I'm standing there, waiting to cross the street and one of the little girls says "Here you go" and hands me a small business card. I didn't really look at it and I said "What is it?". The girls looked at each other and said "Um...it's just an IQ test". The walk light turned and I started across the street. Naturally, I glanced down and it was your typical "Are you going to burn in hell?!" propaganda.

That wasn't what pissed me off. What pissed me off was the fact that not only did this asshole carrying a cross feel the need to invade my personal space by yelling that I was going to burn in hell as I walked by, but he had a couple little girls trying to whore his message to passersby. Not only that, but I'm pretty sure he instructed them to LIE about what it was they were handing people. I seriously wanted to walk back over there, ask the little girls if Jesus loves liars, and then break the cross over that dickhead's face.

As you can tell, I've been pretty angry lately. So angry in fact that I told an annoying little girl to shut the fuck up here at my apartment "complex" who was getting on my last nerves. Argh!

In other, somewhat less angry news (but still unhappy), Hillary Clinton is crushing potential Republican candidate Rudy "9/11!!!" Giuliani in Ohio and Pennsylvania. As of right now, Democrats are way up in Senate races, Governor races, and the Presidential race. It's weird, because much has been made of the low ratings of congress, which the Democrats control, but those low ratings do not seem to be transferring to individual races. It leads one to believe that there is a huge Republican backlash sweeping this country right now. It's almost like voters are in the frame of mind that "we don't give a shit who the opposing candidate is, as long as it's not another Republican". I guess that would also explain why the Democrats in congress aren't really worried about anything even with historically low approval ratings. The Republicans in congress are getting just as bad reviews by the American people. It is quite possible that come next November, the average Republican in America will wake up to see a Democratic President with a fillibuster-proof congress staring them in the face.

Damn, it's been a while...

2007-10-02T17:57:00.000-07:00

Wow, I haven't posted in a long time. Not sure why. I blame being busy.

Florida State got a big win against Alabama. The coaching staff finally got some goddamn sense and put Xavier Lee in at quarterback, benching the scarecrow (a.k.a Drew Weatherford). Hopefully this move will be permanent. Lee has already been named the starter this weekend which is a positive sign. He'll make some mistakes, but he's far more talented than Weatherford. Who knows, maybe they'll actually break that 5 win total I predicted they'd get this year.

I watched yet another Democratic debate on MSNBC last week, and once again, Obama did nothing to help himself. I've sorta tossed my hands in the air and resigned myself to the notion that Hillary is going to be our nominee. I haven't given up. Maybe Obama knows something we don't know. There are some internal polling reports floating around claiming that he is actually leading in both Iowa and New Hampshire. Winning those two primaries would definitely change the race dramatically and make him the front runner. His problem is that he's running on not attacking his opponent. I'm all for making politics a nicer place, but you can't simply change 200+ years of how politics works in your first primary. You gotta start playing hardball with Hillary, and sadly, he won't do it. It's a shame because he could really nail her on multiple issues.

My Philosophy class has been like a revelation to me. I finally found somebody with credibility that has the same views as I do (mostly...) on viewing art. The dude is David Hume. What's ironic is that he was a total subjectivist. Most of my friends fall into this category. Essentially, a subjectivist's position is that everything is relative. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and all that. Can you really judge a piece of art objectively? A subjectivist would say no. However, Hume was having a difficult time reconciling his views as a subjectivist and facing the "reality" that there are accepted standards for "taste". Without going to far into it, he listed 5 criteria that come together to create objective standards. The ironic thing is that in trying to use subjectivity in a theory of aesthetics, he actually created a template for the opposite. Stuff I've been arguing for for years is straight out of Hume's "On the Standard of Taste" essay. In my free time, I plan on reading a criticism of Hume's essay by Peter Kivy. Anyways, this Philosophy class is great and really gets my mind going. I'm thinking of starting a "Know your Philosopher" category on Deadlantern, giving the main arguments each of these philosophers have on how you judge art. Maybe we can enlighten our listeners and readers :)

I'm tied with Steve at the top of the standings for the Dead Lantern Fantasy Football league. Considering I constantly sign and drop players, I've considered myself extremely lucky to get my wins. I pretty much owe my three victories to Tom Brady, who keeps amassing yards and touchdowns at an MVP rate. Now I'm glad Jeff took Peyton Manning :)

I made it a point to watch the Cavemen series premiere tonight on ABC. It is one of the worst shows I've ever seen. I will not be watching it again. On the positive side, the season premiere of Dexter was rockin' and it's pretty much the only thing that's decent on television right now.

Now, I'm off to watch my first Uwe Boll movie, Alone in the Dark. Please pour a libation for the Cthonic gods on my behalf if you don't hear from me again :)

Gillian Anderson's inch long erect nipples

2007-09-19T21:33:00.000-07:00

Some site called Citizens for Ethics just revealed a listing of the most corrupt members of congress. Sort of interesting if you're into that sort of thing

I didn't see Dragon Wars this evening, instead choosing to watch Closure, the Gillian Anderson revenge flick. God this movie sucks. And Gillian Anderson has very unattractive nipples. My girlfriend said it looked like she had udders. It reminded me of seeing Naomi Watts' crazy long nipples in 21 Grams.

I picked up the 2-disc Death Proof dvd today. It comes with a $5 off coupon for Planet Terror. I suppose I could ask for it as a stocking stuffer (I wouldn't pay for it myself) and give the coupon to my mom so she can save some money.

Now, off to eat some Green Apple Jello

Um...

2007-09-17T00:49:00.000-07:00

Hillary Clinton is requiring everyone to have health insurance. This is a terrible idea. Terrible.

Terrible.

USC, FSU, and You

2007-09-15T23:01:00.001-07:00

USC just crushed Nebraska tonight. The final score isn't indicative of just how badly they were beaten. Nebraska got a couple touchdowns late in the game after USC put their 8th stringers in the game. The Trojans didn't even bother to throw the ball around, amassing an insane amount of running yards. It actually seemed like they were gaining 30 yards every time they ran the ball. My little sister could have gained 100 yards on Nebraska's defense tonight. Nebraska is blessed by having a weak ass schedule every year because they play in the Big 12 North division. If this team were in any other conference, they wouldn't win 4 games.

Speaking of not winning games, Florida State somehow managed to beat Colorado in another terrible offensive performance, 16-6. Please, somebody tell Drew Weatherford to transfer and can the coaches please make a gameplan around 6'6" Greg Carr? When you have a wide receiver who should be playing basketball, it might be wise to throw him the ball. Especially considering he catches it every time they throw deep. He's got a good vertical, y'know?

Alyssa and I have been making our way through the first season of Six Feet Under. It's a pretty good show. Looking forward to seeing the next few seasons. Speaking of shows, the second season of Dexter starts in 2 weeks. This is a really fine program and something most horror fans will probably love. The only thing that sucks about it is Dexter's annoying ass sister. The actress who plays her sucks and delivers some rotten dialogue on a constant basis. Other than that, the show is marvelous. Check it out.

Game 2 of the Dead Lantern Fantasy Football League starts tomorrow. I'm benching Larry Johnson for Maurice Jones-Drew. Let's hope I actually get some running back and wide receiver production this week.

Off to sleep.

Random musings...

2007-09-12T00:05:00.000-07:00

I just saw a poll that shows Al Franken within 5 percentage points of Norm Coleman. Franken is running for Coleman's Minnesota Senate seat next year. Can you imagine Al Franken in the Senate? I mean, seriously? One thing is for sure, he would make C-Span much more interesting. In a way, I'm really hoping he pulls it off and wins just to watch the loon show that will no doubt be the United States Senate (as if it weren't already). I also just read some info stating that the reason Hillary has such a lead on Obama in all the polls is because Democrats simply think she has the best shot to beat whoever the Republican nominee is. The sad thing? That's true. She's the only one of the frontrunner's that has any semblance of what the electorate defines as "experience" and she has that last name that garners an automatic 45% of the voters.

So this is what all the waiting has been for? This essentially means "I'm stopping the surge." So, in reality, what has happened is that Bush threw in a bunch more troops to "stabilize" an area that hates us only to take those extra troops out next year because Petraus recommended it? Huh? This reeks of politics to me. Sorta like, "the elections are coming up next year, let's bring some troops home so it will look like we are capitulating to the electorate's wishes". The funny thing about this is that if Democrats say we should start bringing troops home, Republicans say we'll destabilize the area and allow terrorists to "win". Yet if a general says the same thing, and a Republican president brings troops home, it's suddenly "things are better in Iraq!". The hypocrisy is maddening :)

Californication is not getting any better. Disappointing since I thought the first episode showed a lot of promise. The biggest fault of the show is that the dialogue is just downright bad. It amounts to David Duchovny saying fuck a lot or "hip" sarcastic jokes like "You want to suck my cock?" and referring to the "Brown Eye" when discussing a woman who tried to put her finger in her husband's asshole. Seriously. The scripts are trying desperately to be edgy but are coming off as forced and contrived. Even the plotlines are stupid. For instance, Duchovny's agent is cheating on his wife with a Suicide Girl who likes to be degraded and dominated. The agent character isn't anybody you even care about or want to be watching, yet the show deems it necessary to throw in Suicide Girl plugs and a separate storyline for it. It's stupid. Even the main hook of the show (Duchovny accidentally sleeping with the 16 year old daughter of his ex-wife's fiancee) is going nowhere. I'd give the show so far a C- rating and I wouldn't be surprised if that grade goes lower in the coming weeks.

I just read a review of the latest Argento flick, and predictably, it isn't good. Personally, I've never been a fan of Argento and don't really understand the fanaticism he is shown by some horror fans. Still, I don't think he's some hack or anything. I thought Pelts, his latest Masters of Horror episode was pretty good.

I'm seeing 3:10 to Yuma tomorrow. I'm looking forward to that. It's been a while since I've seen a good western. Ironically, it's a remake that is getting great reviews, although remake haters won't mention that fact :)

I was trying to come up with a good way to describe the difference between liking a movie and the movie being "good". This seems to be a concept that most people I've come across just can't understand. They just can't seem to separate the idea that though they really enjoy a movie, that that same movie can be utter garbage. In other words, there's a difference between liking a movie and recognizing it as a quality piece of cinema. I've got this analogy of Gold and Pyrite (Fool's Gold) that I'm working out in my head. I'll post it in an upcoming blog. Until then, time to rearrange some stuff in my living room

Colds

2007-09-09T23:05:00.001-07:00

Ugh. I've got a cold. It's not one of those "I don't want to get off the couch because I'm miserable" kinds, but rather one that's just annoying, as in you've gotta constantly have a couple boxes of kleenex within reach and your head aches yet not enough to be an excuse to skip work or school. I'm in a weird middle state of sickness right now.

The Evil Empire known as Time Warner Cable is giving me a bunch of free channels and I happened upon the Florida State/UAB game this weekend. FSU looks bad. Really bad. Late in the 2nd quarter, UAB was ahead 17-3...at Doak Campbell stadium. They were losing at halftime and needed a late run to put the game away. This saturday, Florida State plays Colorado in Boulder.

I was wandering around Best Buy today and noticed they have a pre-order for Guitar Hero III, which will be coming to the Wii. I've never really played Guitar Hero. I've picked it up a couple times at Best Buy and tried going through a song only to put the guitar controller down immediately because I found it near impossible to play. I hear it's great fun if you get into it, though. Maybe when it comes to the Wii I'll give it a shot.

I coerced my girlfriend into watching Robocop with me this evening, fully expecting her to hate it. Much to my surprise, she thought it was good. There's hope for her yet :)

The Deadlantern myspace page has 35 subscribers to the blog already. Crazy.

And just like that....

2007-09-05T08:24:00.000-07:00

...we're out of the top 25. Watching the FSU-Clemson game was excruciating. I didn't think Florida St. would win (brand new offense and coaches, opening with an ACC game on the road at the loudest stadium in the country, same shitty quarterback as last year) but I didn't expect them to look that bad either. Particularly the offense. I mean, there's no way they could suck worse than last year with Jeff Bowden right? Wrong. They had 1 first down the entire first half and had like 50 yards of total offense. This is going to be a long ass season....

I've sort of made it my mission to review every single horror film from the 1930's for Deadlantern. If my investigations are correct, there were 42 horror movies released in the 30's that have been available on vhs or DVD at one time or another. I have most of them on DVD, but I plan on trying (if possible) to track down the others. Most horror sites never focus on these early films, mostly because audiences today just don't have the patience to watch them. That's sad. I suppose if my reviews get one or two people to watch these movies when they otherwise wouldn't, then that is a success. Look for some Mummy reviews coming soon...

The Dead Lantern Football League starts tomorrow when Indy takes on New Orleans. I'm playing against Carlin's team this weekend, so I'll be keeping a close eye on how Marvin Harrison and Marques Colston do. I don't have any players on either the Colts or the Saints, but if Harrison and Colston put up a ton of TD's, I'm going to have some serious ground to make up come Sunday. Jeremy just dropped Jeff Garcia for the Denver defense. Sucks for me since my top WR, Lee Evans, is going against them this weekend. We'll see what happens. Expect trash talk and an update on Monday's Splattercast.

Go Noles!

2007-09-02T21:57:00.000-07:00

College football season started this past weekend, but for me, it starts tonight. Florida St. vs. Clemson on national tv, labor day. I'm a huge Seminoles fan and long gone are the glory days of the 90's when we were winning 12 games a year, beating Nebraska, and winning national championships. I wouldn't be surprised if Duke kicked our ass this year. Anyways, since FSU has sucked the hard one the past few years, I rarely get a chance to watch their games. However, tonight I'll get to see just how much we've "improved" with Jimbo Fisher and all the other new coaches at the helm. For the record, I think FSU will struggle to have a winning record this year. The schedule is brutal and unless Drew Weatherford magically becomes the second coming of Chris Weinke, I don't see us winning more than 5 games. Still, I can't wait to watch it!

Also tomorrow night, one of my all-time favorite movies ever is on TCM, La Jetee. It's 28 minutes of pure awesomeness and brilliance. Terry Gilliam later remade it as the hack job 12 Monkeys. Everybody that reads this blog is here in Nebraska, so I'd recommend you guys check it out tonight. It's on at 7 p.m. on Turner Classic Movies.

Rob Zombie's remake of Halloween was utterly abysmal. I can't even fathom how somebody can defend it on the basis of quality. It's just unbelievably bad. Even I didn't think Zombie could make something that poor. On the brightside, it's now blatantly obvious who intelligible movie critics are. This is one of those movies that is so bad that anyone giving it a positive rating must not know jack shit about what a good movie is. It's become easy to see the critics in the pocket of the studios and any self-respecting horror fan that thinks this film is good is delusional an not to be trusted.

My classes

2007-08-29T21:38:00.001-07:00

The Senator Craig situation is a big deal because 1. A U.S. Senator pled guilty to a crime and didn't tell anybody about it 2. Said Senator is now blaming a newspaper for his guilty plee and claiming he didn't do it 3. He's a freaking Senator. Those guys are pretty important. Paris Hilton doesn't make policy decisions that affect this country.

anyways...

Here's my initial thoughts on my four classes this semester

Ancient Greek Religion: For some reason, I thought this was Roman religion. Turns out I was wrong. Class looks easy enough. I've come to the conclusion that the goal of all Classics classes is to make you memorize the Iliad and Odyssey. I'll be reading both for what seems like the 28th time in my college career.

Gender Communication: A very interesting class. First off, our professor has started a blog that everyone in the class must participate in. Part of the class curriculum is to post anything and everything you want on that blog anonymously, if you so desire. I just cut and paste my previous blog into it to be the first non-professor blog entry but I plan on doing some strange stuff and riling up controversy if at all possible. See, the professor has told us we can have multiple personalities and sign up for multiple accounts if we want. It's all anonymous (a very convoluted process I don't want to explain) and the idea is to "see what happens". Apparently this is a way that everyone can express what they really think of other people in the class without feeling threatened. It's a very strange idea, that the entire class must blog about each other, and it seems very dangerous when you get right down to it. Maybe part of the idea is to see if the blog degrades into namecalling and nastiness? We'll see soon enough, I suppose. The other cool aspect of the class is that the final project is completely creative, so instead of writing a paper, I can do a video. Depending on how much time I've got, I may go that route. I was thinking about going around and interviewing all of the homeless people downtown and getting their perspective on things. Who knows, maybe I can be Lincoln's version of Michael Moore :)

Aesthetics: There's a reason why UNL Film Studies majors are always pissed off. The classes offered for our major are completely screwed up. I won't get into it, but basically over half of all the classes we can take are either not available or are in the broadcasting and art departments, of which you either have to have a bunch of pre-requisites to get in or are shit out of luck because the broadcasting and art majors get first dibs. Seriously, it is almost impossible to get the classes you need.

There is only one Philosophy class offered for Film majors: Aesthetics. It's a 300 level course. I was lucky to get into it and the class itself looks fun. Essentially, we'll be reading a bunch of philosophers and their theories of art and how art works. We get to go to a bunch of plays, concerts, and art galleries. Cool. What isn't cool is that the professor comes in and says "This is a 300 level class and I'm sure some of you haven't taken any philosophy classes before". The actual description says you need a 100 and 200 level philosophy class as a pre-requisite. He then asked for a show of hands of who hadn't taken a philosophy class before. Out of the 30 or so people in the class, at least 25 (including myself) raised their hands. They guy was completely taken aback. He then looked at the student roll and noticed that almost everyone in the class was a Film Studies major. Like I said, UNL is retarded.

Anyways, the class sounds fun, but there are 3 papers to write and 7 essay exams. Good lord. I'm supposed to be reading Tolstoy right now, but instead I'm writing this blog. I have a feeling I'm not going to be able to skate through this class...

Understanding World Politics: Now this class is going to be right up my alley! First off, the professor is bat-shit crazy. Secondly, the entire class is about future events. The major project is creating a scenario paper about how we see things going in the future regarding world politics. Now I can finally write down my entire China/Russia/United States scenario I've been claiming is going to happen for years. This class will be fun, I think.

All in all, I like all of my classes. The Philosophy class still kinda frightens me, but at least I'll be having fun (we get to write a paper on any piece of art we want and apply a theory to it...I'm already waiting for the right theory to apply to Big Trouble in Little China). The other classes should be relatively easy.

Another thing I've noticed is that lately, professors have been in open revolt against textbook manufacturers. This semester, two classes have eschewed with required books altogether (the professors just giving info in lecture) and the professor for my politics class has built his entire semester on free articles from UNL's website, thus no books whatsoever. I noticed this change a year ago, as more and more professors I had started saying "Screw you" to the book companies (one professor who had no choice but to get us a $75 book gave us the e-mail address of the company so we could complain). I have no reference so I'm not sure if this is a widespread thing or just localized to UNL, but it seems to me that professors are collectively trying to force the hand of book companies to either drop the prices or risk them not using them at all, especially with the easy access of articles online that can be had for free. It's interesting....

I purchased the latest Metroid game tonight. There is absolutely no way I'm going to be able to play it anytime soon, but I'd rather pick it up cheap at Deep Discount then spend fifty bucks at Wal-Mart or Best Buy. Same goes with the Robocop disc that just came out. Twenty bucks at Best Buy, only sixteen at DD. I'm sure there are cheaper places online if I looked hard, but I don't really understand why people buy stuff at Wal-Mart and Best Buy. I mean, if DD were a store here in town instead of an online retailer, you would definitely buy your stuff there rather than go to Wal-Mart.

The Deadlantern fantasy football draft went well. It took longer than I thought it would, but it was still fun. Now I just have to make decisions, which sucks :)

I love Fox News

2007-08-28T21:00:00.001-07:00

When a United States Senator is busted for not only trying to solicit sex in a bathroom, but for also covering up the fact that he pled guilty to the crime, that's big news. It doesn't really have anything to do with the fact that he is Republican who preaches anti-gay rhetoric. That's beside the point. It could have been Joe Biden caught banging some Catholic schoolgirl. Point is, it's major news.

I like flipping through the major news channels during the day. CNN, MSNBC, and FOX all have very different ways of portraying the news. Case in point:

Today, I was watching the press conference with the Senator Craig. MSNBC and CNN were covering it live and then had commentary afterwards. Cuz, y'know, it's a big story. I flip over to FOX, just to see how they are covering it, and I swear to god, this is what I saw (I even wrote it down because I was so dumbfounded):

"Is Katie Couric Really America's Sweetheart?": they then interviewed some author of a book claiming that Couric "slept her way to the top"

"Healing Owen": In which the FOX host speculated that Owen Wilson was strung out on drugs and interviewed some psychologist dude about how a guy who "has everything in the world: fame, women, tons of money" could possibly be depressed.

"Fight in a courtroom!": in which FOX showed a mother screaming and having to be held back at the trial of a guy who murdered her son. There wasn't even a "fight". It was a bunch of people holding her back.

Remember, these were the stories FOX was running while the Senator news was breaking.

Are you kidding me? People who get their news from this station are brain dead. Seriously. You can claim CNN is liberal, but at least when a major news story breaks, they don't run stories mocking Owen Wilson's suicide attempt. It isn't surprising though. FOX hates Hollywood and CBS and enjoys pumping their sheep with stupid "news" like "Fight in a courtroom!"

I mean, c'mon...

Another boring semester

2007-08-27T22:24:00.000-07:00

The fall semester is upon me and I've set up all my classes to be back-to-back on Tuesday and Thursday, giving me 5 days off a week. Classes:

Ancient Roman Religion
World Politics
Gender and Communication
Aesthetics

I'm kind of worried about my philosophy class. I've only ever heard horror stories about college philosophy courses so hopefully I won't have to explain the nuances of the Socratic Dialogue in some New Age way.

I posted a review of Entrails of a Virgin over at Deadlantern. I'm having a great time sticking screencaps in the reviews. I think it adds a much needed visual element and makes the reviews more interesting to read. Of course, I could be wrong about that. Hopefully everyone else is getting a kick out of them. There were some better screencaps for Entrails, but I'm not sure how much we can "get away with" so I decided against showing some of the more racier stuff. Still, I think the theme of the film comes across just fine :)

I am really tossing around the idea of trying to get a Public Access show started. I think it would be a fantastic way to get our name out there locally and could be a lot of fun to do. Imagine Deejay as some mad scientist in front of a green screen introducing old horror films. It would be great, and probably pretty simple to do. Once again, lots of ideas floating around that will probably never come to fruition.

Now, off to watch Employees' Entrance while my laundry is going...

Rarely Recognized Advances

2007-08-26T22:03:00.000-07:00

Caught the season finale of Big Love tonight. Overall, it was a good season. Not as good as the first, but still really good. The finale was filled a lot of character decisions that push the boundaries of "suspension of disbelief" and was fairly lackluster all things considered. Part of the problem with the finale is that it doesn't leave you craving for season 3. In the end, the status quo is maintained. Bill is still fighting Alby, they still have Weber Gaming, and Ben is still going the polygamist route. Disappointing. Here's hoping the show doesn't take a precipitous dive in quality next season.

Hollywood scored a record $4 billion dollar summer. Not surprising considering the insane amount of tent pole franchises that were released this year. Holy crap were there a lot of big name movies! More than I can remember during any other year in recent memory. Here's a prediction: Next year will be seen as a major disappointment. There isn't a whole lot of huge films coming out next year. Indiana Jones 4 will be big, but I don't see it making anymore money than what Spidey 3 did this year. 10,000 B.C. is going to be a major flop, I think, as well as Speed Racer (does that film even sound appealing to anyone?). Iron Man will do some bank, but will probably end up with a high first weekend and then drop off considerably, tailing off around 200 million. The Dark Knight is my "sleeper" pick to be the box office champ next summer. I think most people will be thinking Indy 4, but I think Batman Begins is fresher in peoples' minds and I think the whole Joker aspect will drive people to the theatres in droves. But really, there isn't a whole lot of big stuff coming out next year, which is going to lead to the inevitable drop off in box office receipts and you'll no doubt be reading many articles about how the sky is falling and Hollywood executives are pissing their pants trying to make the audiences come back. Yawn. Hey Wolgamott, didn't I tell you?

One film that is getting zero buzz and that I'm most curious about is the apparent remake of The Day the Earth Stood Still. It's supposedly going to be released next May, and yet I have seen next to zero info about it. No trailers, no news, no anything. It's the most mysterious thing about next year's movie lineup, even moreso than "Cloverfield". At least that film has some damn teaser trailers and enough news to keep people guessing! Still, I'm eagerly hoping to hear something about this film. Maybe they are planning on revealing some badass trailer upon an unsuspecting public with the release of I am Legend?

I hate technology. Mostly because it always fails when I'm around it. But there are some advances that I greatly appreciate. Take the vending machine where I work, for example. In the "old days", popping in a couple quarters and pressing the buttons for your desired candy was a scary thing. Maybe one out of every 10 times, you'd get a machine where the the steel spiral thingymabobs that held the candy would be off by a little bit. It would spin, you'd watch your Reese's Pieces come forward, only for it to become "stuck" because the spiral moved its set length and your candy didn't happen to be in the correct position. Usually, you'd start cussing and try shaking the machine. Always a bad idea if the Darwin Awards are to be believed. Anyhow, we have a new vending machine where I work and the same damn thing happened to me. The spiral spun. The candy was stopped right before it could drop. I cussed. Then a strange thing happened. The machine paused for a few seconds and then spun again until the candy fell. Turns out, the machine has a sensor at the bottom that reacts to the candy hitting it. So, if it doesn't sense anything, it auto continues to turn until the candy falls. You're guaranteed not to lose any money because the machine won't stop until it gives you your item. Why the hell didn't they of this for the last 40 years?

My mom surprised me today with a copy of the final issue of Weekly World News. This magazine was an integral part of my childhood (and probably explains quite a bit now that I think of it). I moved a lot as a kid and every time I made sure I knew where the closest gas station was so I could head over each week and pick up the latest issue. I was with Bat-Boy from the beginning and I was there with Ed Anger bitching and moaning about America. I wanted to write for this magazine and would come up with ridiculous storylines so I could feel as "cool" as the writers at WWN. Ah to be a kid again! I haven't bought an issue in years, but I would still make a point to check out the cover every time I went to the grocery store and if it was particularly good, I'd pick up an issue and thumb through it while waiting to check out. I'm sad that I'll never be able to read about Satan appearing in a U.F.O over New York ever again and even sadder that there will be one less time I smile while at the grocery store. Apparently, they are continuing the website but that's just not the same, you know? Weekly World News, you will be missed!

20 more favorite films in no particular order:

61) House on Haunted Hill
62) Rosemary's Baby
63) Night of the Living Dead
64) Ace Venture, Pet Detective
65) The Shawshank Redemption
66) The Truman Show
67) Raiders of the Lost Ark
68) The Neverending Story
69) Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
70) Freaks
71) The Clash of the Titans
72) Karate Kid II
73) Matinee
74) The Burbs
75) King Kong (1933)
76) The Ten Commandments (1956)
77) Contempt
78) Safe in Hell
79) The Mouthpiece
80) Night Nurse

Worst Movie Ever?

2007-08-23T21:23:00.000-07:00

I've seen a lot of bad movies, but Dead Clowns has to be right up there. I'll save my comments for the next Splattercast, but my goodness...I'm flabbergasted at how a movie like this can get distribution from a place like Lion's Gate. Doing a little research, I noticed that the film was actually made back in 2003 and has been released in Europe. It must have gotten noticed across the pond by Lion's Gate. Maybe it did some great business over there? God this movie is terrible. It's a bad, bad ripoff of The Fog with clowns that look like Fulci zombies.

While everyone is clamoring about the upcoming football season, being the basketball junkie I am, I've been following USA basketball. This is what I like to see. Basketball is my sport of choice and I've been angered by the way our country has performed in the recent Olympics and World Championships. There is no reason anybody should ever beat us. Ever. Yeah yeah, I understand how the rules are changed slightly for international play, and I get that the world just goes into a zone defense to stop our athleticism, but if anybody seriously thinks that Argentina can field a better group of players than the U.S., you're insane. Our problem the past few years is a lack of interest by the players themselves, a neglect of the "team concept", laziness, and the refusal of superstars like Kobe and Shaq to play. I hate Kobe Bryant, but does anyone think we would have lost a game the past couple years if he was on the team? If we've got our best on the court, and they aren't taken out every 4 minutes in an effort to get "everybody minutes", nobody can beat us. With Kobe and Redd draining 3 pointers from everywhere, we've now got some bonafide "i can hit a shot from anywhere on the court" players. Now, if someone can coax Shaq into stomping on some twig Euro centers for us, we should be good to go :)

Speaking of sports, Florida St. just named Drew Weatherford their starting quarterback. This isn't surprising, but both Weatherford and Xavier Lee suck, so it doesn't really matter. Weatherford is a scarecrow who is mediocre at best. Lee has great athleticism, but since he has never really been given the opportunity to play, he always forced a lot of stuff when he was in the game, causing a lot of turnovers. It's kind of sad because Lee was a huge recruit and in my opinion, should have been given the keys to the car from the beginning over Weatherford. Bowden is just way too loyal.

The next two Netflix movies coming are Entrails of a Virgin and The Legend of Hell House. I remember seeing Entrails a long time ago and remember it being pretty hardcore when I watched it, but at the time, I hadn't seen much "extreme" horror so I don't know whether or not my memory makes it out to be gorier than it really is or not, so I figured I'd revisit it in preparation for our "gore-a-thon" next Saturday. I'll have to dig up my Slaughtered Vomit Dolls notes. I've done a little preparation for this and already and I've been having trouble coming up with anything positive to say about these "gory for the sake of being gory" movies. I think it will be fun to sit down and watch all of these with everyone, but I'm wondering how much we'll actually be able to take? 7 or 8 hours of straight torture and murder may be enough to turn all of us psychotic :) I'm most interested to hear what Jeff has to say about these movies. He's got far more expertise in this area of horror than I do and I think he's the one in the group that "likes" these movies. I can't honestly say that I enjoy watching torture for the sake of torture. I'm not against extreme gore and violence in movies by any means, but if there is no real context or subtext to why it's there, I find it as nothing more than pretentious horror geeks trying to "push the envelope". Still, I'm looking forward to watching the movies with everyone. It should be a fun time....as long as Deejay doesn't go nuts and slit our throats :)

Speaking of which, I'm twistedly looking forward to seeing Halloween next week. A bunch of clips were released this week but I forced myself to not watch any of them and I've been avoiding clicking on any Halloween news or message board threads and every time a trailer pops up on TV, I change the channel immediately. I've been doing my best to put my mind in the best frame possible for when we see it, sorta by trying my best not to think about it at all. Still, I'm a horror fan at heart and it's impossible not to get a little excited about the film's upcoming release. Halloween happens to be my favorite horror film ever, by my favorite filmmaker ever, and even though there's that "how could you remake this!!!" teen punk angst popping out, the fan in me still would like to see the movie be really good. On one level, I hate the idea and Rob Zombie directing, but on another level I'm so damn curious that my anticipation is really growing.

Alyssa and I checked out the new Super Target yesterday and are extremely happy to report that we will no longer be going to Wal-Mart ever again. Yay. The prices (at least right now) are cheaper or the equal for what we buy grocery-wise and their fruit isn't nasty and fly ridden like Wal-Mart's. Speaking of Wal-Mart, I heard that they got rid of all of their self-checkout's because people were stealing electronics by distracting the employee's? That's funny if it's true.

Here's another 20 of my favorite films and an obligatory picture of Joan Blondell

41) Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
42) Back to the Future
43) Curtains
44) The Blob (1958)
45) Robocop
46) Escape from Alcatraz
47) Five Star Final
48) Three on a Match
49) Pet Sematary
50) American Psycho
51) Cube
52) Happy Gilmore
53) Creepshow
54) The Day the Earth Stood Still
55) Invasion of the Body Snatchers
56) The Wolf Man
57) Existenz
58) Street Trash
59) The Fly (1986)
60) Seven Samurai

It's filthy hot outside

2007-08-21T06:12:00.000-07:00

This hi-def war is so stupid. Judging by some of the comments posted on the site, most people find it moronic as well. Personally, I have no real desire for a hi-def player right now. Standard definition suits me just fine. If I don't have a problem watching 70 year old film prints barely hanging on to life, I certainly can stand watching one of the near archaic DVD's on my bookshelf. There's no doubt that I'll eventually get a hi-def TV. My girlfriend insists that she just doesn't see any real jump up in meaningful quality, so there's no real reason to purchase one. Inevitably, everything will be going to HD, so I know I'm going to have to get one at some point. However, I will not be repurchasing all of my DVD's. In fact, I probably won't be buying many HD flicks at all. It'll take many, many years for DVD to go the way of VHS (which I still watch and love, by the way. Screw you HD) and by that time, maybe HD-DVD will have finally given up its losing struggle (I'm of firm belief that the reason it is losing the "war" is because its name is too close and similar to that of DVD. Blu-Ray just sounds futuristic and it rolls off the tongue. HD-DVD sounds like a standard DVD with more extras while Blu-Ray sounds like something from outer space). In any event, I'll be sticking with standard for the foreseeable future.

I went and saw Sunshine last night. It's really good. Not much beneath the surface and the plot seems to fly in 20 different directions during the last third of the film, but it's great fun to watch. It's got a real Event Horizon-ish vibe going on, so much so that at times it feels like a remake of that film. I guess you can consider Sunshine a companion piece to Event Horizon? There's some gore in Sunshine, but the main difference between it and Horizon is that it focuses far less on the "this ship went to hell and came back!" aspect. Sunshine is more grounded in "reality", though that term may be a reach. Still, it's a definite must see in the theater.

Scientists are throwing together the proteins needed in order to create life. This will happen at some point in the future regardless if the 3-10 year prediction doesn't hold water. I wonder what will happen then. Will religious people get all up in arms or will they just shrug and say "Um...somebody had to make those proteins in the first place" :) Then what happens when scientists start making things "out of thin air" by using nothing more than energy and molecules, reenacting mini "big bangs"? Then what are people going to say? It probably won't happen in my lifetime, but I'd love to see what happens to society in 100 years. Who knows, maybe by then science will have stopped the aging process, or reversed it, and I'll be able to find out!

It's been so damn hot across the country that I'm not surprised to read articles like this. Have you ever noticed that when it is scorchingly hot, you don't find any articles on sites like Drudge or the mainstream media for that matter, about how or why it could be related to global warming? However, when temperatures get low or there is some freak snow storm, all you get is stuff about global warming? It's a textbook example of trying to demonize and ridicule a certain topic. That's fine, though. We'll all find out who was correct in 50 years :)

Here's 20 more of my favorite films off the top of my head:

21) Red Dust
22) La Jetée
23) The War Game
24) Commando
25) Predator
26) Predator II
27) A Simple Plan
28) Terminator 2: Judgment Day
29) The Great Mouse Detective
30) Evil Dead II
31) Spider-Man 2
32) Scream
33) A Nightmare on Elm Street
34) A Nightmare on Elm Street 4
35) Aliens
36) The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
37) Them!
38) Goodfellas
39) In the Mouth of Madness
40) Cannibal Campout

Way too busy

2007-08-18T22:25:00.000-07:00

Finally got Deadlantern updated.

I've been trying to figure out this fantasy football thing. There doesn't seem to be any handy dandy "Help" section on the Fox Sports site. Apparently, unless we do the draft live online, I'm going to have to manually upload everyone's picks and manage all of them...or something. Don't hate me if I bungle this thing, guys :)

I'm been on a movie overload recently. Tonight I caught The Final Cut on IFC. It stars Robin Williams as a "cutter". In the future, people can get implants in their brain that records all of their memories. When they die, Robin Williams goes through their life and edits a "movie" of their lives to play during their funeral, editing out all of the bad stuff. I thought the premise was fantastic and that the movie was really good. I wish it had focused more on the ramifications of the technology (solving crimes, morality, etc.) rather than on Williams' sort lame backstory, but I think the film is definitely well made and thought provoking. I'd wager that this will be a film a bunch of scholars write about in 10 years.

Alyssa and I rearranged our living room. It's actually livable now and not just a bunch of junk cluttered around. Maybe we can finally have that house warming party now.

There was tons of political stuff I wanted to talk about, but I've been so busy that all of it has left my memory. Maybe next week. Until then, here's 10 more of my favorite movies

11) The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
12) Kiss Me Deadly
13) Head-On
14) Re-Animator
15) Baby Face (1933)
16) The Most Dangerous Game
17) Sleepaway Camp II
18) Heat Lightning
19) Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman
20) The Thing

I like the blank way you fill up my mind

2007-08-13T22:37:00.000-07:00

Alyssa and I went out into the country Sunday night (after stopping by Taco Bell to try those new chicken taquitos) to watch the Perseid meteor shower. We watched for an hour and only saw 3 comet particles burn up in the atmosphere. Disappointing. Maybe there was just too much light from the city still glowing up the sky from a distance.

We're watching The Mummy next class period. Can. Not. Wait.

The guys seemed to really dig The Body Snatcher on the latest Splattercast. Even Deejay seemed to like it, which I found sort of surprising. Next up on my list The Ghoul and a companion piece of sorts to The Body Snatcher, the Peter Cushing/Donald Pleasance vehicle The Flesh and the Fiends. This underrated film actually focuses on Burke and Hare rather than the Robert Louis Stevenson short story that Body Snatcher is based on. It'll be interesting to see how they compare the two.

Rather than post all 113 of my favorite films in one post, I'm just going to do 10 or so at a time. These are in no particular order since most of these will just be off the top of my head until i start getting down to the last 20 or so, but here's the first 10:

1) Big Trouble in Little China
2) I am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang
3) Halloween
4) The Last Man on Earth
5) Requiem for a Dream
6) The Body Snatcher (it's fresh in my memory!)
7) Wild Boys of the Road
8) Paranoiac
9) Cell 2455, Death Row
10) Vertigo

I am mad at technology. Mostly because I just don't understand it. I've got this problem that's annoying simply because I don't get how to easily fix the problem when I know an answer is floating out there somewhere.

Last friday, Turner Classic Movies had a Vincent Price marathon and there were a couple flicks that I had to obtain. There are multiple reasons why TCM is the best movie channel on television, but one of the foremost reasons is that they show old movies that are unavailable on DVD or VHS. Every once in a while, the occasional unreleased horror film will be shown. One of these films was The Mad Magician which I've only read about and eagerly wanted to record. I've got my computer hooked up so that I can watch cable television on it and used Windows Media Center to record the film while I was at school . So now I've got an unavailable copy of The Mad Magician sitting patiently on my harddrive. Awesome!

Well, sorta. I hate watching movies on my monitor, so I decided to use Media Center to burn a DVD of the film. It'll burn the film all right, but after 2 freaking hours, it was only 25% finished. It seems the "this may take several hours" message is right on. I got sick of waiting and tried to look for an alternate way to burn the disc. There must be an easier way, right? So I look at the file and it is in some div-r format. I tried opening it in Premiere and it is an unsupported file type. I tried using MovieMaker and got the same message. I was hoping to open up the damn file and trim the bit of commercials I recorded before and after the film but apparently I can't do that. I'm assuming I need to convert this div-r file to something else in order to allow me to open it in an editing program, but damn if I'm not just pissed off at the whole thing. I went into the Media Center options to see if it can output my recorded movies to a different file type but couldn't find any such option.

I really like the ability to record these rare films on my PC. I've normally had to make due with taping them to VHS, which degrades the picture quality something terrible, and I really don't want to go back to that way of procuring stuff like The Mad Magician. I know there must be an easy way to correct this situation. I just wish I had that knack for "getting" technology that all my other friends seem to have. Eh, I'm sure I'll figure it out soon enough.

Now, time to go watch Slaughter Hotel

Gearing up for a long day...

2007-08-11T08:22:00.000-07:00

A long day of work and then my Uncle's National Guard retirement/birthday bash at 6. I hate long days.

My friend Brady (sorry to keep bringing this up, buddy!) went to a rock concert last night to see one of his favorite bands, The Rentals. He raved about the show and how great it was to see them live on his myspace blog.

This got me thinking about our debate about theater vs. television. It's the same type of thing in many ways. A rock concert is expensive, has tons of sweaty people, is smoky, and is generally a chaotic thing. If you really wanted to, you could toss in a CD in a good quality stereo and get better sound and better quality songs (less screwups, etc.). So I'm curious to know if he would consider a live show "superior" to listening to the band at home or heck, even watching a DVD of a show. I'll probably have more to say about this when I have more time, but now I gotta run to work.

Stardust looks sucky

2007-08-09T16:36:00.001-07:00

Stardust looks like the biggest pile of crap hitting theaters this year since Evan Almighty. I can't decide whether it's just the horrid trailer (which unwisely states all the things "you've seen before") or if the story just looks unoriginal and stupid as all hell. Of course, I haven't read the book it's based on, and I'm sure Neil Gaiman wrote something interesting, but there seems to be zero buzz about this movie. I'm predicting that it will crash and burn this weekend. Maybe I'm just put off by fantasy male leads named Tristran...

I caught Shadow of the Thin Man earlier this afternoon. Good stuff, however it's much less interesting than the earlier Thin Man movies. William Powell and Myrna Loy are still great together, but this film is far removed from the raging alcoholics they were in the first film. Nick still likes his cocktails, but now that the characters have a kid, they are far more "mature", therefore losing much of the charm they had together on screen. The wisecracks just don't have the same oomph that they used to, but Asta is still awesome.

C+

Speaking of Monday, I'm going to be very interested to see how the guys react to the film I selected for review for this week's Splattercast, The Body Snatcher. I don't think any of them, particularly Deejay, really get into old films like this. Since I'm planning on only picking older films to review from now on (in an effort to introduce these great films to our audience, which probably hasn't seen any of them, and to give some background info on the films), it'll be fun to see whether or not the guys hate it, therefore dreading the next film they've got to watch from me, or maybe they'll like it and anticipate the next one. Should be interesting...

Another Democratic Debate

2007-08-07T20:41:00.001-07:00

Yet another Democratic debate (or "forum", if you will) was held tonight. Keith Olbermann moderated what was a moderately informative affair. A couple things I noticed:

* please, for the love of anything, somebody get Obama to be more direct and to the point when he's answering questions. During the youtube debate, he seemed to be making progress. This one, however, he regressed badly during the first few questions asked to him. This will be his one fatal flaw against Hillary. Hillary is so insanely polished when it comes to speaking in clear, decisive ways and Bill has obviously coached her how to turn every issue back into an appeal to the voters that Obama needs to do something immediately, else he stands no chance. If Obama had Biden's delivery, with Kucinich's bluntness and clarity on the issues, Hillary would actually have something to worry about.

* Hillary will win the presidency next year. Believe me, I'm not totally on board with a Hillary presidency for a number of reasons, but I don't see how any of the Republican candidates would be able to challenge her in a debate. Love her or hate her, she can definitely hold her own against strong men in 90 second answers.

* Joe Biden needs to get out right now. 15,000 union members booed him nearly off stage when a union member asked him a question and he totally blew off answering him. Instead, he decided to answer a question posed to a candidate before him that had nothing to do with the question he was asked.

* Obama not answering the Barry Bonds question was stupid. I'll answer it for you: "No."

* Did anyone else notice that John Edwards wasn't asked a question for nearly 25 minutes? When Dodd, Hillary, and Obama had their big "Pakistan" scuffle (the only real highlight of the night other than the completely sympathetic 70 year old union member on crutches who cried when asking a question about why he was laid off and is now unable to pay for his wife's medical bills. It's time for universal health care.), Edwards wasn't asked anything about it. The media has written him off, as has most of the country for that matter.

* Dear Barack, next time one of the challengers questions your opinion on taking action in Pakistan, don't go nuanced on them, because they aren't the ones who will be voting you into office. Instead, say this: "If I get intelligence that says Al-Qaeda operatives are in Pakistan and Musharraf won't do anything about it, then I will take them out myself. Period. End of story. Next question, please." Short, sweet, and to the point.

* To all of the Democratic candidates: China is not "a competitor". They are an enemy. Olbermann asked all the candidates whether they felt China was a friend or an adversary. Every candidate dodged the question by saying they are a "competitor". Bullshit. These guys have a plan. I've said for years that they are the threat. I'm willing to concede that maybe the candidates just don't want to go on record as saying China (which is a tiny bit more important than say, oh, Pakistan) is an enemy. But still, I would certainly hope that they don't really believe what their public rhetoric implies. More on China in a minute.

* It's time for Richardson, Biden, Kucinich (guy is great, but he's got no shot in this race), and Dodd to step away. I'm sick of seeing Dodd getting questions I want Obama or Hillary to answer.

* There's been some media publicity about the "icy" relationship between Obama and Hillary. When the debate was over, they barely made any eye contact and said "thanks" and moved on. Maybe that Hillary/Obama ticket ain't as surefire a thing as many think...

In closing, it was a lame debate with only two really knockout sequences. Trim the field down or people are going to tire of this even more than they already are.

In other news, I clicked over to Drudge awhile ago and found this. I've been saying for years that our enemy is not terrorism, but China. Islamic radicals are barely a blip on the problem chart of what's going to happen in the next 20 years. China, as well as Russia, should be the number one priority of concern for the next Administration.

Though I'm pegged as some far left radical liberal (which isn't true in the slightest), I completely support increasing defense spending, bulking up the military, and developing new weapons. I also believe that we should invest in a missile defense shield for this country, no matter what the cost. Democrats who believe that we should junk any type of missile defense shield, whether it be land or space based, are dead wrong on the issue. Wow, a liberal for strong defense spending, optional universal health care, and a balanced budget. Look how radical I am! :)

Breaking news, Barry Bonds just passed Hank Aaron. Obama, the answer is "No."

By the way, the big news this past weekend is Hillary's 20 point lead in national polls over Obama. These mean absolutely nothing right now. Anybody remember Howard Dean? The only polls that really matter are Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. If Obama can pull out 2 of 3, he'll become the frontrunner. Supporters can calm down, stop overreacting. It's still an uphill battle, but don't take a huge stock in national polls right now. Here's an article defending Obama's recent Pakistani remarks.

P.S. The United Nations says it's gettin' hot out there.

Cagney loves the big screen

2007-08-05T22:13:00.000-07:00

Just finished up paper #3 for my film class. I wrote a ton about one of my favorite films, The Public Enemy. Only a week and a half left in my final college film class ever. It's going to be weird to walk out of that final day of class knowing that my film education is effectively over at UNL. Even though I've seen many of the films we're screening this semester, it's still awesome to watch Cagney slam a grapefruit in a dame's face on the big screen. Fittingly, the final day of class is what I'm looking forward to the most: a screening of Karl Freund's The Mummy, which I absolutely love and have never seen on the big screen before. I know most of my friends find it dreadfully dull, but I think it's a far more entertaining flick than the oft-praised Lugosi Dracula. At least my film career at UNL is going out with a bang.

Mitt Romney is looking more and more like a crazy loon. Way to drop a Dr. Strangelove reference there, Mitt. I do find it interesting that he is desperately trying to beat up on Obama who is way down in the polls behind front runner Hillary. You would think that a guy hoping to win the Republican nomination would spend more time on his own party's rivals then a guy with virtually no shot at unseating Hillary. Mitt Romney as president? Never. Going. To. Happen.

The Simpsons Movie dropped an astounding 65% of its audience from last week. That's not surprising since the film isn't very funny. As I predicted, Sicko is not the gargantuan hit that people were expecting it to be. It's going to finish its run right about where I said it would. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that the DVD release will be next year, probably early summer, to coincide with the election hoopla. It'll make far more money on DVD then it did in the theatres.

Now, off to watch Popcorn...

A near death experience a month late

2007-08-03T19:26:00.000-07:00

See that collapsed bridge? I've crossed it many times. That bridge happens to be a necessity in order to get to the Shriner's Children's Hospital that my family visits twice a year. My mom, grandma, and sister were on that very bridge one month ago for my sister's checkup. My mom and grandma are rattled quite a bit by what happened. This incident will do nothing to help my mom's fear of bridges.

It's very strange to know that you've made regular trips across that bridge and that it could have fallen at any moment. Then again, that's life. Much like a random terrorist attack, bridges and buildings will fall, trains will go off their tracks, and vehicular accidents will occur. Live everyday like it's your last.

I'm disallowed to give specifics since it's supposed to be part of a "media blackout", but the company I work for just scored a high priority, high level contract to do some work in a country that happens to be in the news right now. Those of you who know me can probably guess what I'm hinting at. Let's just say that the Bush administration knows who's the best there is at what they do.

In the past couple of days, Barack Obama has been criticized for saying he would not use nukes in Pakistan and Afghanistan and that if Pakistan wouldn't round up the terrorists in their "tribal region", he wouldn't hesitate to send troops into that country to take them out. And he's being criticized, why? First off, dropping a nuclear bomb on any Arab country would be the most retarded thing ever. You think they hate us now? Watch what happens when a nuke lands on their soil. And sending troops into the western "wilds" of Pakistan is something I wholly support. A recent report came out that said Al Qaeda has set up training camps and is using the area to plan, possibly hide Bin Laden (I've always wondered...doesn't make more sense for him to be in Iran?), and carry out attacks across the borders. Why the fuck aren't we blowing the shit out of that area? Oh yes, I forget, because George Bush is buddy buddy with Musharraf. Which kind of defeats the whole purpose of all his "any country who harbors terrorists is our enemy" mouth excrement. Look, I get it. Pakistan has nukes and you don't want to piss off Mr. In Power Via a Military Coup. But if Al Qaeda is sitting in the hills, laughing their asses off, and Obama says "Blow me, dickheads", I don't see how you really can't support that. As far as I'm concerned, he's right on both points. Go learn more. Incidentally, this is one of the few instances that I wish I had a car. I'd love to go see Obama speak in Iowa sometime before the primaries. I've never been to any type of national political rally or anything. Maybe I can wear my girlfriend down to accompany me to an Obama event :)

I'm really looking forward to going over to Steve's next friday and having an all-night extreme horror movie marathon. I love doing those and sadly, it's rare that it ever happens. One of my favorite things in the world is to just sit around with friends on an all-night movie bender. It's unfortunate that "adulthood" seemingly murders time. In any event, I'm really looking forward to eating pizza and watching women disemboweled.

I'm planning on an upcoming post that will reveal my 113 favorite movies ever. The hip thing to do is add that extra number (such as 101), but I'm going to do the top 113 just for the hell of it. Bog Creatures will not be on that list. Look for that soon.

p.s. Democrats got some interesting stuff done this past week. You wouldn't know it from the media, though. A tighter ethics bill and more healthcare for the poor.

Florida State and Miami

2007-07-31T21:51:00.000-07:00

The college football season is right around the corner and I'm dreading it. I live in Nebraska, attend the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and have had to negotiate the fact that I'm a die-hard fan of the Florida State Seminoles in a state where football is a religion. I remember going to a Nebraska game about 10 years ago with my grandma and I wore my Seminoles cap. Some dipshit sitting behind me constantly annoyed and mocked me. Of course, I have a mouth on me. So I just brought up 1993. After some "you guys paid the refs!" talk, he left me alone. It's been a tough go to be a Seminoles fan the last 5 or 6 years. When you are used to your football team kicking the crap out of everyone (except Miami...damn you Miami!), losing 5 ACC games is a realization that you've entered the dreaded "rebuilding" phase. This year sees an impossibly tough schedule. 3 out of the last 4 games are on the road @ Boston College, Virginia Tech, and Florida, not to mention the first game of the year, the Bowden Bowl, is @ Clemson. Add home games against Alabama and Miami, and you're looking at possibly a losing season. Maybe Xavier Lee can turn into Charlie Ward and save the program from impending doom. Mediocrity is one thing, sucking is another. If only we had a cream puff schedule like Nebraska....

Basketball season is also on the horizon. The big news of the past month was the ref scandal. If you were to ask me what my favorite sport is, basketball would the answer...by a mile. I used to live in Southern California and basketball is huge down there. Football doesn't hold a candle to the Lakers (which might explain why there is no NFL team in LA anymore). Once again, I was the odd fan out, as my favorite team was the Chicago Bulls (see Jeff, I've been contrarian from the get go!). I was in attendance at the Great Western Forum when Mike, Scottie, and the boys beat the mighty Lakers for their first championship. There's nothing quite like seeing your favorite team, as a kid no less, win a championship in person. The excitement and energy is amazing.

There was a comment made, possibly on the deadlantern forum,a couple years ago when we were following Miami-Dallas series. I was a huge supporter of Miami and still am as of today. Someone said something like "I can see how you can root for a college team and follow them, but how do you feel that connection with a pro team?". For me at least, basketball has never been about the "team". Basketball, more than any other sport, can hinge on one great player. Michael Jordan was so far better than anyone else, that he elevated his entire team. Sure, you need the 4 other guys to score and keep the game in reach, but in basketball, one guy can take on 5 and win. Basketball is a game of stars. For me, I've always followed my favorite player, not the team. In the 90's it was Jordan and Pippen. Those were my guys. When Jordan retired, he was replaced by Shaq. Currently, Dwyane Wade is the guy I follow on a day-to-day basis. Shaq and Wade are on the Heat, so naturally I'm just going to root that team.

Critics will call me a "fair weather" fan and that I'm just going where the championships are. I don't see it like that. I can't help it that I became a fan of Michael Jordan at a young age (along with millions of other people). I can't help that I really dug Shaq's personality and performance (I didn't know he was going to win 3 championships in a row). I also didn't know that Dwyane Wade was going to turn into the second coming of Jordan for 4 consecutive games (I had picked Dallas to crush the Heat). The Heat probably won't do anything of consequence in the next few years, but I'm still going to support them just cuz my favorite players are on that team.

With college football, it's different. I will be a Seminoles fan till the end of my days...but only football. For example, I could care less about how well the Seminoles basketball team is doing. But I'm a fanatic for the Tar Heels. Duke-North Carolina is pretty much the highlight of my sports year. I think the main reason for this is that college teams have a constant turnover of new faces and players. It's harder to get attached to players who only stick around 1 or 2 years, so the team becomes the loyalty and allegiance rather than the individual player. Plus, there are so many more college teams and so many more players around, the team just comes to the forefront more than in professional sports. I like college sports a lot more than professional, but the pros can be just as good when the situation calls for it. Those Miami-Dallas games were freakin' amazing. Those moments are just fewer and far between in the pros than in college.

So this year, I'll be closely following the 'Noles with my eyes closed, and I'll be hoping D-Wade can recover fully from his shoulder and knee surgeries (it would be a shame to see such a talent fade out so early in his career due to injuries) and Shaq can contribute more than just 14 and 6 every night. The Celtics made a big splash by acquiring Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen. I don't think they'll be all that great, though. Garnett, Allen, and Paul Pierce are all in their 30's and prone to injury. The Celtics will be improved, but no Finals contender. My pick for the finals this year is: Bulls vs. Suns, Suns winning in 5.

Trying to pick the finalists in college is so much more difficult. Every game is important in college football and with all those computer systems and their equations and formulas, it's a crapshoot. Anybody can be upset on any given day. But, I'll throw caution to the wind and say Texas vs. California in the championship, with Cal coming out on top.

As for my Seminoles..I'll sadly predict 6-6. I wouldn't be surprised if they had a losing record though.

Gambling, Catholics, and Obama's win-win situation

2007-07-29T21:58:00.000-07:00

Ah yes, gambling. I don't consider myself a gambler. If the Powerball jackpot gets up over $100 million, I'll purchase a ticket or two. I'll usually bet my girlfriend a dollar on something I think I'm right about...only to find out that I'm wrong and have to pay out. I've been to the casinos once for my birthday a couple years back and I remember being in Las Vegas as a kid and watching a guy ride around on a 3" bicycle at Circus Circus. That's about the extent of my gambling experience. However, tomorrow I'll be heading up to Iowa and will be hittin' the nickel slots (gotta make that money last!) hard. Hopefully, I'll come back with a few hundred thousand dollars to build a studio for Dead Lantern. Good thing we're not doing the Splattercast on Monday because I'll probably be losing my pants at the black jack tables.

I did an interesting survey this evening where I asked Catholics and former Catholics how they felt about their faith. It wasn't pretty. Out of the all the surveys I did this weekend, practicing Catholics are pretty jaded by the whole church sex abuse/cover up stuff. At least half of the Catholics I spoke to either left the Church entirely, stopped going to Mass, or have distanced themselves from the Church. Word to the wise: When you find out a zillion Priests are molesting your followers, expose and kick their asses out.

I'm writing my second film paper right now. I've got about two pages left to write. I feel a burning desire to watch Demons right after I'm finished...

This Obama/Hillary "feud" that the press is playing up is pretty hilarious. The election cycle has started so early that the press is desperate to find something, anything, to try and make a story out of. I had the idea the other day that Obama has no intention of winning the primary. I'm sure that isn't true, but here's something to wonder about: Obama is obviously a political star on the rise. Unlike John Edwards in 2004, he's not facing a tough re-election for Senate next year in the event he doesn't win the primary. It's pretty much understood that unless Hillary makes some black hole-esque mistake, Obama just isn't going to be able to beat her in the primary. It's a massive upset that just doesn't have any chance of occurring (I'd love to be wrong though) so why is Obama running?

It's one of two reasons: either he wants to be vice president, or he wants to introduce himself to the American public.

If Clinton picked Obama as her running mate, you'd have a trillion dollars flowing into the presidential campaign. They'd probably have to store all those donations in Fort Knox. Assuming a Hillary win, Obama gets the "experience" his detractors claim is his weak spot by getting all that great foreign relations/national defense stuff for the next 4-8 years with Hillary in the White House.

However, If Obama refuses a VP role (if Hillary even offers), he goes right back to the Senate where he can spend more time orating, drafting bills, and getting his name on legislation to quell those "just 2 years in the Senate!" screams. Not only does he have a safe place to land, but he's gotten something more important. He's introduced himself to the American public. By the time the ads start heating up and he's toured the country over and over, the name "Barack Obama" will be well ingrained on the American consciousness. He'll be a name politician, which means he'd be well positioned for a future, Non-Clinton presidential primary (maybe running against me and Jeb in 2016?).

So really, this is all a win-win scenario for Obama. If he doesn't get president this time around, he'll be set up well for a future run. Personally, I'm hoping with every ounce of the fiber from the apple I just ate that he pulls off some miraculous defeat of Hillary. The country needs to move on from Clinton/Bush. We'll see what happens, I guess.

The Issues: Immigration

2007-07-28T19:19:00.001-07:00

So what's the deal with this immigration issue everyone seems so up in arms about? Nobody can agree on what to do. Here's the solution:

1) Lock down the borders temporarily

In a fair world, we'd be doing the same thing to the northern border as we will do to the southern, but the reality of the situation is...we don't have 20 million French-Canadians running around illegally in our country. Instead, it seems our Canuck's to the north love their liberal utopia a little too much to want to abandon all those keen social programs (more on this in a minute). Mexicans (they are from Mexico, by and large, therefore they are Mexicans. This is not a racist word when describing people from Mexico no matter how many ACLU lawyers tell you it is) are abandoning their home country like teens to a cornfield during a M.I.P bust. I saw a statistic that said 10% of Mexico's population now lives in the U.S. There's nothing inherently wrong with that. If Mexicans want to immigrate to America, by all means, let them come.

The problem is the whole "illegal alien" thingamabob. Let's all agree that these people are breaking the law. Nobody in their right mind can deny that fact. Instead, the argument becomes "well they are breaking the law but we can make an exception because of x,y,z" We'll deal with these reasons later on. But if we truly want to put a sudden halt on illegal immigration while we get our shit in order, we're going to need to lock down the borders immediately.

I recommend doing this by posting the National Guard (after all, the name says it all) along the border with Mexico and creating a temporary suspension of all new immigrants from Mexico. Is this racist? No, I don't think so. As I've said, I think any Mexican who wants to come to this country is more than happy to do so, but the only way to control illegal immigration is to freeze everything we're doing and take some "drastic" measures for a short period of time (could we do this in 2 years?) in order to revamp our immigration system. Understandably, the National Guard won't be able to cover every mile of the border, but imagine having 160,000 troops along the border instead of in Iraq. What Bush sent was ridiculous and laughable. Take our National Guard troops and give them this mission: protect the border from any incoming Mexicans and search and destroy all the tunnels you can find that are used for smuggling, drug running, etc. Any illegal immigrant caught by the Guard has their picture taken, fingerprints recorded, and interrogated before beings sent back. This is not denying any Mexican their "rights" either. This is simple, basic information that will be needed the next time they come back...and they will come back. We're not setting up a new Guantanamo here, just getting some prints and photos. This information will be used to put these immigrants to the back of the line. They'll still be able to get in eventually, but their penalty will be a long wait.

Imagine the drop in illegal immigration just by having troops on the border. They won't be able to catch them all, but they'll make someone think twice about crossing. Now, temporarily, we've put a band aid on the bleeding, allowing us to get some breathing room to think out some more things...

2) Come to the sober realization that we can't deport 20 million (or more) people

This is the hardest thing for people to accept. Yes we have millions of people living here illegally. Yes it's against the law and we are a "Nation of Laws" (just ask Scooter Libby), therefore we should have no sympathy for these obvious miscreants. This is where American sympathy should come into full force.

I propose to use President Bush and Scooter Libby as an example: We should commute the sentence of the 20 million illegal immigrants.

I am not advocating a full amnesty/pardon. They have broken the law, and for that they need to do a penance. The biggest problem right now is that each side wants to have it their own way with no concept of compromise. Illegal immigrants refuse to concede they did anything wrong, citizens refuse to think of them in terms of actual people. So here's what we shall do:

Once the borders have been sealed, initiate a nationwide volunteer registration for illegal immigrants with the assurance that they will not be deported nor will their families (the exception to this is anyone found to be a criminal in anything other than simply wanting to make some money to live). The volunteer registration will involve background checks, a history of employers, photos, fingerprinting, etc. Some civil rights activists will claim that this is not legal. It's perfectly fair. It's called compromise! I'm not advocating we deport masses of people. They will still be able to live and work in this country if they voluntarily register their info. They are, after all, criminals in the legal sense. The ACLU will make a fuss about every illegal immigrant needs the representation of a lawyer. Fine, if they can afford one, and if the ACLU has enough kooks to go around, then give them one. But remember, this is voluntary. The government is not putting a gun to anyone's head saying you have to do this.

Businesses need to be involved in this because the days of them hiring known illegal immigrants is just about over. Encourage the businesses to have the immigrants register (registration does not involve citizenship, by the way, and even legal citizens in this country are registered in some way shape or form, so don't give me any of this "persecution" bullshit for a few fingerprints). Offer a one time tax credit to any businesses who get immigrants to register. The more immigrants that register, the more tax credit the businesses get. Any illegal immigrant that voluntarily registers will be allowed to continue at their job (with no penalty to the employer) and be allowed to stay in this country. They will then be required to reach some benchmarks that I will elaborate more on later.

Now, we've got the majority of illegal immigrants (at the very least, a huge amount of them) registered, on file, and content that they aren't going to be deported by our government. So now that the borders are secure and a big chunk of workers are now identified, we can get on with the next phases...

3) Levy humongous fines on businesses caught hiring illegal aliens

This will occur after the registration period is over and the businesses have had their tax credits. This is why it is in the best interest of the businesses to get their immigrants to register, because if they don't, and they are caught, then an insane fine will be levied against them. Let's just throw out an arbitrary $500,000, with the possibility of more depending on the amount of illegals caught working for them. A business is not going to hire someone if it knows the government is ready to make it go the way of the dinosaur. Big companies can probably absorb some major fines before they'll get serious. Wendy's can probably take a few million dollars in losses. Some rinky dink orange grove pickers can't. The moral of the story: don't hire illegal immigrants.

If there are no jobs, there will far less illegal immigration. That's why they are here, after all. This will piss businesses off, and there will be a lot of uproar about this. Then again, the business owners are breaking the law just as much as the illegal immigrants, and in my view, are an even more insidious type of criminal. They exploit for profit. They need a cold hard punch to the balls to make them get serious. If you want the government to leave you alone, don't hire "criminals".

4) Standardize federal laws for illegal immigrants.

We've "commuted" the sentence of deportation for millions of illegal immigrants. Now we must deal with those who did not voluntarily register. We opened our arms and said "let's be friends. Do this for us and we'll do this for you" but you decided to hide behind the ACLU. That's fine. By this time, the American people will be more forgiving. Once they've seen that the government is actually doing something by securing the border and getting millions of illegals to register who they are, public sentiment will then turn on those who have refused.

Instead of manually hunting all of these people down, make it impossible for them to maneuver within society. Federally mandate that non-citizens cannot get credit cards, cannot get government services , cannot be allowed driver's licenses, cannot get bank accounts, and will be instantly deported for any type of transgression, no matter how minor. If an illegal immigrant hits your car and isn't registered, he's deported. If an illegal immigrant is not allowed access to the financial system, coupled with the fact that huge fines and taxes will be levied against any companies found to be harboring illegals in any way, he or she will find no reason to be in this country.

Most importantly, if illegal immigrants are not allowed into the public school system unless they are registered as such, then you eliminate the second main reason illegals come here in the first place. If businesses can't hire illegals, they won't bring their families. These families come for a better education for their children. Eliminate the concept of "free education" for them, and they really won't come.

Once again, this is not racism. This goes for any illegal immigrant. I doesn't matter if it's a bunch of Europeans fleeing socialist utopia, or someone coming over from Mexico. Everyone has the opportunity to stay in this country and continue to work as long as you concede that you have to let the government know who the hell you are. Maybe you're really against giving up your fingerprints. You're more than welcome to head back to Mexico if that's such an inconvenience. If you don't take the generosity we give, then you're saying "come get me and deport me". And sadly, that's what we'll be forced to do.

Hopefully it won't come to that. Hopefully, the incentives that "yeah, you can keep your job, keep your residence, and keep your kids in school" will be enough that most immigrants will comply with little resistance from the ACLU.

5) Create some rules and benchmarks for those who have registered

You have 3 years to get your act together. We've allowed you to stay. Your employer is keeping you at minimum wage. Your kids are in school. You don't need to worry about INS agents raiding your home in the middle of the night. But you are not a citizen.

Neither are your children, for that matter. Personally, I think at least one parent needs to be a legalized American citizen before your child can be considered a citizen. If we enact that law, then that will eliminate illegal immigrants running across the border to have kids and therefore use them as a tool in which to bilk the American taxpayer. Your kids aren't citizens and neither are you. However, you will have ample opportunity to become a legalized citizen. 3 years is plenty of time.

During that time period, you must not be found guilty of any crime. You must show the ability to have maintained a consistent job (tax breaks for the companies who register their illegals, and keep them employed for the full 3 years) for all 3 years. Obviously, stuff will happen, so I'm not advocating you have to work all 1095 days. Maybe a benchmark of averaging 35 hours a week or something will do. Anyway, during this time you will be forced to pay taxes just like any other legal citizen now that you are registered. On the other hand, you will not be required to pay back taxes for however long you lived in this country before registration (which, consequently, will also be an incentive to register in the first place). Again, this is compromise. It might make the average citizen bitter as all hell, but remember, we're trying to give you guys all the opportunity in the world to become full fledged citizens. Besides, you weren't paying taxes before registration, and if it hadn't gone into effect, you wouldn't be paying taxes now. So, I think the average citizen may grind their teeth a little, but the tradeoff is that we at least have a large portion of the population paying taxes where they weren't before. Welcome to America.

During your stay, you will be given an ID card which you'll be able to use for government services etc. This card is only valid for the 3 years from which you were registered and is basically the equivalent to a driver's license but can also be used to gain access to certain government services. Use this to prove who you are. Don't lose it.

During your 3 year period, you will be required to do all the things that a legal immigrant is required to do in order to obtain citizenship in this country and more. Those people trying to become citizens legally are waiting 2 years because of the temporary lock down, and they aren't too happy. Registered illegals will be required to learn at least an ability to understand and speak the English language. This will also be a part of the schooling of children. Nobody is advocating that you must switch languages, but an ability to at least converse in the basics is a necessity. Conversely, public schools will begin to initiate mandatory grade-school spanish classes in the future (first things first). Also, registered illegals will be required to do a set number of community service hours. Community volunteering is important in helping adjust to the new country and more importantly, is a "penalty" with benefits for everyone. Not only will you become more aware of society, but you'll learn things faster, and earn the respect of honest Americans who might otherwise not trust your intentions for being in this country. Community service will be a requirement for all registered illegals.

The consequences for not meeting the above requirements can be no less than deportation unless their are specific and justifiable causes as to why you could not meet the requirements. 3 years is plenty of time to learn a bit of English, get your community service in, and meet any other criteria that is settled upon. If we're letting you off the hook for back taxes, allowing you to use our government services, and helping you in the transition to citizenship, then that's the least you can do for us. If all requirements are met by each family member, full citizenship will be granted, and with it the right to vote.

6) Stop handling the Mexican government with kid gloves

The Mexican government encourages illegal immigration. That cannot be allowed to happen. The government must do everything within its power to put pressure on Mexico. If that involves a temporary embargo on all Mexican goods imported into this country, then so be it. Will that hurt the economy? Yeah, temporarily it would. But America is more than able to compensate with goods from other countries (Asia, I'm looking at you) as a short term solution. Mexico on the other hand would probably face a complete bankruptcy if we pulled out financial support and backing for their economy. Perhaps a temporary suspension of tourism would get their attention. Could we forbid people to travel to Mexico like we do with Cuba? Who is the bigger threat to our country right now, the incompetent Mexican government, or a near dead Fidel Castro? I'm guessing Mexico might cry a little bit when they realize all those thousands of college kids won't be hitting up Cancun over spring break. If that still doesn't get their attention, the fact that they can no longer pawn off their unemployed on our country sure will. With troops on the border, Mexican citizens will be forced to either take a long hard look at their own government, or go somewhere else. I have a feeling it would be the former.

-----

dang, I could keep going on and on with this, but this post is turning into a novella. I need to sum it up:

Secure the border for real with the National Guard. A mass illegal immigrant registration initiative that allows them to stay in this country for 3 years without threat of deportation, meet benchmarks such as community service, and become citizens. Fine and tax the fuck out of businesses who hire illegal immigrants. Standardize federal laws to disallow any non-registered illegal access to government and financial services. Confront Mexico head on economically and politically and force their hand.

There's your answer to the immigration problem. I'm sure many of you out there will have examples of things that can go wrong with my plan. Understand that illegal immigration can never be completely stamped out. There will always be a segment of the population running around illegally and there will always be businesses willing to take a chance. But to stop the arterial gushing that is currently going on, it's going to take concessions from both sides, citizens and non-citizens. This plan will be labeled "amnesty" by most conservatives, but in all reality, it's not really amnesty. American citizens need to show their tolerance and their ability to care in this situation. Are they here "illegally"? You bet. But most of them are hard-working people just looking for the mythological "American Dream". I don't think it's too much of a stretch to say "Okay, if you voluntarily register, we'll give you some leeway and allow you 3 years to prove to us you mean what you say".

Not everyone will register. But what's the alternative? Right now we have 20+ million not registered. Hell, if you got that total down to a still large 5 million, that would be one hell of a success. I firmly believe that if you show these people you are willing to come to a middle ground, they'll be more than willing to do what it takes to be citizens. A lot of people will be pissed. The people waiting legally in line to be citizens will have to wait a little longer. Life sucks sometimes. Then again, they won't be required to do things like community service when they get into this country.

In a 3 year period, we can drastically cut down illegal immigration. And I'll do that as your president in 2016 :)

Securing the borders and registering illegal immigrants is a necessity if we are to implement social programs such as universal healthcare, which I'll talk about in my next entry on the issues.

Random tidbits: mini-reviews and news

2007-07-27T20:51:00.001-07:00

Made it through the first season of Deadwood. I was slightly disappointed. I really dug the characters and all the actors are perfect. But the story lines given to those characters were pretty lame. Maybe the subsequent seasons will improve the narrative, as I can understand that this first season is an introduction, but meh. The only character I'm not sold on is Timothy Olyphant as Seth Bullock and I didn't particularly like how Wild Bill Hickock was portrayed. Regardless, I liked it enough to want to watch season 2.

B-

I also watched the first episode of David Duchovny's new Showtime series Californication. Have you ever wondered what would have happened if Mulder and Scully had hooked up, had a kid, and then Scully had left him for a regular guy? That's pretty much this show. Duchovny plays a writer with an eternal case of writer's block whose "wife" has left him. In the meantime, he replaces writing by banging hot women, being a sarcastic bastard (imagine Mulder's humor and add in extreme nihilism), and banging more hot women. He's also trying to deal with his 12 year old daughter who is maturing a little faster than he thinks she should. I thought the show was pretty cool. You can tell that the creators stuck as many tits in it as humanly possible. No less then four girls are banged by Duchovny in the 30 minute episode. I laughed multiple times throughout and with a little refinement (dialog could be a little better), I can see this being a really good show. Plus, the "twist" at the end of the first episode will definitely make you want to watch the rest of the series. A good solid start.

B

Earlier today in my film class, another point was revealed as to why going to the movies is better than watching them on TV. We watched Babyface and although my professor had seen the film a dozen times, had written an entire article about the film, she had never seen it on the big screen. When it was over, she got incredibly excited and was telling us all of the unique things that she had never seen before that doesn't come across on a television. So, you have somebody who has spent years of their life watching a film, dissecting it in every way...and by seeing it on the big screen they see things in the film they've never seen before. Chalk it up to another reason movies are better on the big screen.

There are now allegations floating around that Pat Tillman was murdered. The White House and Pentagon won't release some documents about the case due to executive privilege. Hypothetically, if it turns out that friendly fire was not the cause of death, does that mean that the Bush administration has been covering up a murder? If they did cover up a murder...what the hell happens then? Now, I'm not going to jump off that ledge yet, but there's some weird information coming out about Tillman that makes you sort of stand back and say "um...this doesn't feel quite right..."

Tomorrow, I begin my candidacy for the 2016 presidency. Don't miss it!

Goofy can't smoke?

2007-07-25T20:11:00.001-07:00

The big movie news today is the fact that Disney has banned smoking in its "family" films. I fully expect Disney to go back and digitally remove the cigarettes from Cruella DeVille's fingers.

Disney is calling this a historical and groundbreaking edict. Is it, though? Do kids watch cartoon characters smoke and say "Damn, Goofy is badass cuz he's puffin' a stogie!" The implication is that seeing characters smoke on screen causes people to smoke. Disney is making a concerted effort to keep its cartoon personalities from promoting a truly despicable habit. That's admirable, in a way.

But here's where the problem comes in: Where does Disney stop and how does it justify the other "bad" things in its films? Let me first say that this isn't going to affect films by Touchstone and Miramax. Disney's statement is that it will strongly "discourage" smoking in films put out by these companies. That's code for "We're not going to do a damn thing if Tarantino wants to make Smoking Bastards of Hellcat Highway".

So for now, it's just relegated to Disney flicks starring the pre-cokehead Lindsay Lohan's of the world...and their cartoons. I wonder why this is being treated as so revolutionary by the press? This is self-censorship. It is a company telling its artists "sorry, you can't do that". But you know what, I'll bet Disney will have no qualms about bringing 101 Dalmatians out of their vault in a few years for an HD release. Their commercials will say something like "The TIMELESS Disney classic that you will want to share with your children again and again". One of the most famous villians in animation history is Cruella DeVille. Her trademark, besides her hair, is the fact that she is a chain smoking bitch. In a film like Dalmatians, the smoking is made to look bad. The puppies regularly cough and wheeze. The cigarettes are portrayed as disgusting, yet they become an integral part of Cruella's character. I wonder how many children start hitting 8 packs a day after watching the film? My guess is zero.

But where does Disney stop? Do they tell their animators "You know what? Cut out all the fight sequences in Hercules because we don't want kids to start fighting each other. While you're at it, better cover Ariel with a little more than a seashell bikini because we don't want kids to get any unnatural ideas." I don't doubt that Disney's intentions may be partially honorable (though I do think this is a marketing ploy for some good PR), but I think it makes Disney out to be a complete hypocrite.

Groups have been lobbying forever to get smoking out of Hollywood movies. Those voices now have a much larger sound due to Disney's PR tactic. The chants of "ban smoking in the movies" is going to get much louder. Hypothetically, if in 20 years the anti-smoking lobbyists pressure into effect an actual ban on smoking in movies, what happens to the first 120 years of cinema? Do we ban every movie that ever had a character who smokes in it? Will Turner Classic Movies be forced to shove all those Film Noir's into a vault? Will John Wayne become an American anti-hero?

I firmly believe that movies have a tangible effect on people. I don't discount the possibility that someone might see David Strathairn in Good Night and Good Luck and decide to turn their lungs black in a week. But "banning" what can and can't be shown in movies is censorship, plain and simple. Disney comes out safe in this. I'd venture to guess that if you asked most parents whether or not smoking should be in cartoons, they'd say "no". Then again, if you asked those same parents if they like Elmer Fudd shooting Daffy Duck in the face with a shotgun, they'd say "yeah!". So Disney gets some good "common sense" PR and the rest of Hollywood is left to fight the dogs that have now been set upon it. Could this seemingly innocent Disney smoking ban lead to a new Production Code? I don't think so, but I wouldn't be surprised to see slow steps moving in that direction.

The end of Netflix?

2007-07-24T11:41:00.000-07:00

I haven't been able to get into my Netflix account since Sunday night when I logged in and was greeted with the message that the price of my account was dropping by a $1. As this article explains, the systems have been down, the customer base is eroding, and the stock price is plunging.

This is mostly because of the direct competition from Blockbuster, a company I try to avoid at all costs. Technically, Blockbuster's online plan is "better" than Netflix. Not only can you get all the DVD's you want, but you can drop them off at your local Blockbuster store instead of mailing them back, giving you an extra day or two to receive an extra movie. When I signed up for Netflix, I thought it was great...until I started being "throttled" early on. Often times I've sent all the movies back, only to have to wait while Netflix holds off on sending me the next flicks in my queue. Couple that with the scores of films that I've wanted to rent only to be forced to "save" when, though released commercially already, Netflix gives a "release date unknown" flag.

I'm not planning on dumping Netflix for Blockbuster any time soon, but I think they've got some giant problems. It's obvious that Netflix has some business related problems right now. The fact that customers are leaving the service in droves is telling. It's one of two things: either people just want to pay less to go to Blockbuster, or the people leaving Netflix are people like me who watch a movie immediately and then toss it back in the mailbox. Netflix loses money on people like me. I've read that Blockbuster is much more forgiving about this group of customers and doesn't "throttle" like Netflix, but I can't be sure of that unless I actually tried out the service.

One thing Netflix could do to immediately satisfy its customers is to include the extra bonus discs on DVD's without having to use an extra slot to get them. It's annoying to have to use 2 of my 3 slots in order to get the extra disc of Street Trash for a few extras. It's like Netflix is charging me full-price and making me waste time for another movie in order to watch a couple featurettes. It's retarded. Shipping the bonus discs with the film would be a nice gesture to customers.

Netflix also has a program setup where you can view movies online without using up your queue slots. I was going to try this, until I realized that you have to download a program from the site (which doesn't work with Firefox, for me at least). I looked over the terms of agreement and it said something about how the program will take personal information off your computer and send it back to netflix. Eh, I'm just not in to doing something like that. I realize Netflix already has personal information and probably gathers even more based on the films I rent, but they don't need to have a program installed onto my computer to get more information. If they could set up something where a limited amount of movies each month could be viewed in a streaming fashion when you log in to the site, rather than have a program be installed on your pc, I think that would go a long way to making customers such as myself happy.

I'll stick with Netflix for now, but I do have misgivings. Hopefully they can figure out why they're getting pummeled by the evil empire that is Blockbuster before they go down in flames.

Obama's problem(s)

2007-07-23T18:45:00.001-07:00

Update: Just found this interesting piece of footage from the Fox News focus group. Seriously, get Obama against Hillary one-on-one. I want to see what happens...

I just watched the "historical" (according to CNN) youtube presidential debate. Before I get to Obama, I just want to say a few questions about the debate itself. I thought the format was great. Stooge Cooper served as moderator but rather than direct the questions to the candidates himself (other than a few follow-up questions when candidates evaded answering), the questions were asked by "regular" Americans in 30 second self-recorded youtube videos. It was fun to watch and a pleasant change of pace from the usual monotonous (i.e. boring) debates put on by the media. I hope this format sticks because I'd definitely tune in. In fact, I'm planning on submitting my own video for the Republican youtube debate. I'll have to craft a good question...

Now, to Obama and his performance. Contrary to what the media is spinning at this very minute, there was no big smackdown (Drudge is mocking the debate with the soon to be infamous "snowman video" and a pic of Obama and Hillary labeled "clash", and the first thing CNN did when the debate was over was try to frame the entire thing as a war between the two top contenders). If you watched the entire debate in context a couple things stood out. First is that Obama got the biggest applause on almost everything he spoke to any length on. In fact, immediately after the debate, CNN's pundits were clearly saying Hillary "won" the debate, only to switch to a focus group that "surprisingly!" gave the nod to Obama. Who "wins" a primary debate, especially one with such a large amount of contenders in it, is meaningless at this stage of the game. The only time you can really judge whether or not somebody "wins" a debate is when they square off against each other and have adequate time to respond to each other. But what is important in these debates is how the candidate comes off to the viewers, how they respond to the questions, and whether or not they distinguish themselves as "presidential material".

This was the first "officially sanctioned" democratic debate, which is retarded when you think about it (what, I'm just supposed to ignore the non-sanctioned debates?). I'm a big supporter of Barack Obama, and his previous debate performances left much to be desired. He has a bad tendency to pause a lot, stumble over some of his words, and use the dreaded "Ummm...." which is a killer in public speaking. I don't necessarily think this is a negative attribute. It seems to me that Obama can't quite get that "populist" language down pat. It's almost like he's trying to hard to think of how to phrase his answer while he's giving it, and that makes him look, frankly, unprepared. There's no denying the guy has massive chops when he has a prepared script in front of him and can fully articulate his message in order to deliver it in the best way possible. It's just those "on the spot, need an answer now!" questions that debates are formatted for that really hurt him. The guy speaks articulately, but it takes him a looooonnggg time to get his words out (which, to be fair, he has admitted). With this debate, you can tell he's been coached up quite a bit. You can tell he's been honestly striving to be better. That's not to say that the same problems didn't crop up in this debate, only that this time he was more focused with his delivery.

Obama's main problem is Hillary Clinton. We all know Hillary is dominating in the polls, but people forget that Hillary is being coached by one of the best political speakers of the 20th century, Bill Clinton. This was evident during a montage of health care questions submitted to the candidates and Hillary addressed each of submitters by name and their respective disease before answering the question. This is textbook Bill Clinton. Address the voter as an individual, make them feel an immediate rapport by using their name and problem. In other words, talk directly to them and show pathos. It's not that Obama doesn't do this, it's that he can't do it like Bill Clinton. Arguably, that's how Bill won his election. Elections are won on speech and how you present it. Obama needs to compete with Hillary on this.

The other problem is that Obama has shown very little inclination to actually attack Hillary on issues. A couple weeks back, there was a big uproar about John Edwards and Hillary discussing paring down the debates to include fewer candidates. I am completely for that. Everybody knows, the democratic primary is going to be decided between Hillary and Barack. Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel have no shot to win this thing. Do I think they should be banned from the debates? Of course not. I love when the both of them rile up the top contenders. It's good to have people like that in the process. However, there comes a point when the democratic primary voters have to say "um, ok, it's getting down to crunch time now, we need to see Barack and Hillary and find out how the do against each other". If Kucinich and the others can show they have the popular support in polls and money to really compete with Barack and Hillary, then by all means, put them in the later debates. But when it becomes clear that Chris Dodd is at 1% in the polls, and the primaries begin in a month, I want that question on health care or Iraq to go to the front runners who will actually be the nominee. So, let the contenders get in on the early debates, then start trimming it until you've got the front runners (by the way, Edwards is not a front runner. There is no chance in hell of him getting the nomination).

And this is directly Obama's problem. It's established that he's a guy that needs the extra 60 seconds to really get his message out. You can't really engage Hillary when questions are so random and going to so many different candidates. By its very nature, these debates don't give response time to the candidates. I want to see Obama vs. Hillary one on one.

Gotta go, time for a Splattercast

If only I were finished

2007-07-22T19:49:00.000-07:00

I'm getting ready to write the first paper for my Pre-Code Cinema class which is due tomorrow morning (why do I procrastinate?) and I realize that I've gotten to the point in my college life where I've hit a wall. Actually, I've scaled the wall only to find there's another one waiting for me. A needless one...

Technically, I'm still a Junior. I've finished my minor (History) and after this upcoming semester, I'll be completely finished with my major (Film Studies) with the exception of one goddamn class that I can't seem to get registered for. You would think that I'd be ready to move out into the "real world". Not so. I'm going to have to take about 8 more classes just to get my degree. These classes will have absolutely nothing to do with anything, other than line the pockets of UNL . Sure, I suppose I could minor in something else, but I don't want to. So after this fall semester, I'm staring at two more semesters of mindless garbage just so I can get hooked up with some swell decent paying government job. Before, it didn't really matter. I was taking enough classes to keep me interested, but now that I've essentially finished my major and dried up the pool of elective classes that interest me, I'm going to be going through the motions rather than be engaged in learning, which is what college is supposedly all about, right?

This fall, I'm taking Aesthetics, Gender & Communication, Understanding World Politics, and Women & Gender in the USA. The first two are required as part of my Major and the last two are leftover classes I had to take because nothing else was available. I'm holding out hope somebody drops the Ancient Greek Religion course and the Women in Popular Culture class that I need to complete my major. This next couple semesters are going to be incredibly frustrating.

Anyways, enough bitching. This week I plan on starting my 2016 Presidential candidacy platform. First up will be my solution to immigration with other issues to follow. I'm looking for a vice-presidential candidate. If you know of anyone, let me know. In all seriousness, I'm hoping this will eventually lead into the new podcast I'm going to try and start up (again, if time and laziness don't interfere).

I've been hammering away at the details for Outpost Doom, the potential next film for Dead Lantern Pictures. I say "potential" because nothing seems to ever happen with all of our other projects. I've decided to take this one slow and make sure the script is great before we jump into filming. It's going to be filled to the brim with obscure horror movie references that directly relate to the character types in the film. These are all going to be incredibly subtle. I'm talking about only die-hard horror nerds will pick up on any of them, if at all. The main character's name is Jack Glendon. At some point, after watching the movie, somebody's going to go "duh!", slap their head, and hopefully think "well that was kinda cool. Why didn't I catch that obvious hint?". I'm still waiting for the rest of the cast to post their character stuff and back stories (we'll see if it actually happens). It's going to be interesting to see what they come up with.

Anyways, I better go write my damn paper now. But first, I think I'll cut myself an apple...

The Horror of Wheelchairs

2007-07-21T15:38:00.000-07:00

The importance of wheelchairs in horror films is often overlooked. Off the top of my head, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Homicidal, Friday the 13th Part 2, What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, and Misery all contain characters who are confined to wheelchairs. And there's probably a lot more that I'm just not thinking of at the moment.

Wheelchairs are important because I think it gets to one of the main fears that everybody, regardless of class, age, or ethnicity, is fundamentally afraid of: being paralyzed. Short of death, I can't think of something that would be worse for day-to-day life than not being able to use your legs. With paralyzation (is that a word?) comes the sense of hopelessness, one of the greatest emotions that the horror genre feeds on. When you take that and manifest it into a single character, the audience becomes immediately sympathetic to that character. Everybody knows how much it would suck to have to rely on someone else to be with you and help you constantly, and I think that notion of a certain lack of freedom really gets to viewers. More than other disabilities such as being blind, deaf, or mute, the idea that you are essentially stuck in one place is deeply unsettling to many viewers.

In horror, this is used with great effect. Wheelchairs are clunky and tough to maneuver unless you are on a level surface, and even then, you aren't going to wheel yourself away from a killer on two legs no matter how ripped your upper body is. Things get even dicier when steps are involved. Horror movies love to exploit surfaces and terrain. When Joan Crawford looks down the stairs to the waiting phone, and possible salvation, the roadblock is her wheelchair being unable to go down the stairs. The threat that Davis could come home before she could drag her legs down the stairs is what initially keeps her from attempting to get to the phone.

Other than maybe blindness, I think being confined to a wheelchair would easily be the one disability most people would not prefer. When Annie takes the sledgehammer to Paul's feet, we cringe not only because the physical idea is nasty, but we know that Paul will now be completely hampered in any attempts to escape. Not only is Annie's house now a prison, but Paul's own body becomes a prison. Instead of escaping one, he must now escape two.

I'm not sure if anyone has ever really looked into the psychology of this and how characters in wheelchairs affect audiences toward the genre, but I think it would be fascinating to really delve into it.

Museum of the Damned

2007-07-19T20:00:00.000-07:00

A couple years back, I had the pleasure of viewing Wolf Rilla's Village of the Damned on film. The print I watched had the distinction of being the only one known in existence. The last known celluloid copy of Damned was as you'd expect: after 45 years, the print was hanging on for dear life. The frames were scratched badly and many of them had shrunk. Three times during the screening the film had to be stopped in order for the reels to be reloaded because many of the perforations were shredded. The quality was abysmal. I didn't find out until after the film screened that I had just seen the last original print in existence. MGM decided not to spend the money to restore and make copies for future audiences.

Over the fourth of July holiday, I overheard my mother having a conversation with a family member about Shawn Levy's Night at the Museum. I had taken my mom, grandma, and sister to the film when it was released in theaters. It's one of those perfect "family films" that is safe enough for your grandma while still being entertaining for your little sister. Everybody loved it. In fact, it was quite disturbing to me just how much my mother loved it. She instantly declared it as one of her favorite film ever, and was laughing hysterically and repeating the jokes and gags all the way home. So of course, she eagerly purchased the DVD upon its release and the subject was never mentioned again until this past fourth of July.

That's when I overheard my mother and grandma (she loved it as well, just not to the psychotic extremes of ma') complaining about the film. My ears perked up and I began eavesdropping on the conversation. Unfortunately, their talk ended with the frenzy to cook hamburgers and pie. On the way back to Lincoln, I asked my mom about what I'd overheard her say. She went into a big rant about how, though she still thought the movie was "good", that it just "wasn't the same" as when we'd seen it in the theater. I had just had a "debate" (which I firmly believe is an impossibility on the internet) with some buddies about this very topic, so I was interested in getting an outside person's viewpoint. It was a typical response from people trying to explain why the theatrical viewing experience is better than the home viewing experiece: "I don't know..it just is"

Film Scholars talk about the "warmth" of watching a film in its original format. They argue that there is a tangible effect that impacts the senses of the viewer differently than the "coldness" of the digital format, such as a DVD. My mom tried as best she could to explain it. She thought the jokes just didn't work as well on the small screen. She thought the facial expressions of the actors, especially the close-ups, just weren't as funny as they were when they were 30 feet tall. The film's sense of scope was smaller. The T-Rex just didn't seem very imposing, and so on. Basically, she was dismayed that a film that had been one of her favorites had suddenly been merely "ok" when she watched it on DVD. My mom's television is 27"; not huge, but not overly small either (although, according to some people, the theatrical experience suddenly begins at 32"). In other words, Night at the Museum was not the same movie on DVD as it was in the Theatre.

When I got back, I spent a few days at my girlfriends' parents house. They have a 52" big screen TV. I watched Running Scared, The Pursuit of Happyness, The Illusionist, and The Hitcher. Not once was I ever being affected the same way as watching a movie theatrically. It was a bigger screen, so therefore it should have been an "equal" viewing experience, right?

No. The theatre is superior to TV.

There's a reason Village of the Damned was screened in its original format rather than the DVD. The DVD wouldn't have stalled three times into the film. It would have looked a lot cleaner. The audio would have been much better. On the face of it, there should be no reason to ever watch a print in such poor quality when there is something so obviously "superior". But therein lies the greatness of the theatre. Whatever the home viewing experience can claim to do, the theatre can do it, but not vice versa.

Let me say first up that whether or not an individual likes or prefers one way of watching a movie over the other is irrelevant. Maybe you just hate going to the theatre. That's fine. But don't kid yourself by trying to argue the point that watching a movie on your TV is the equivalent of seeing it on a movie screen. Here's the reasons why:

1. The most obvious is the size of the screen. You're never going to be able to replicate the immersion a huge theatre screen can give you in your home. If a 52" television screen is not big enough to give you the exact same viewing experience as a theatre, then it's never going to happen for you. Most sane home viewing loyalists cede this point. And you can forget that line of vision bullshit. If I watch Evil Dead on my pc screen while sitting two feet away from it, that's not the same thing. Just like it's not if I watch a 52" TV sitting 8' away.

2. Less distractions. This is one of two major points that TV adherents latch on too. The theory goes that when you get to a theatre, you have to deal with cell phones, people talking, kicking seats, etc. etc. What isn't ever talked about are the distractions at home.

Here's a few: Cell phones ring at home. Sometimes you get hungry, pause the movie, go grab a sandwich, then come back. It becomes much easier, when watching a film with a friend or spouse, to make comments and talk during it. Your eyes (and this is actually a scientifically verified fact) tend to wander around the room. Maybe the flick you're watching is sorta boring, so you're more apt to look over at that Death Proof poster on your wall that seems a little off-center. There's the definite aspect of having to stop/pause and rewind something, causing an unnatural break in the movie viewing experience. Personally, I refuse to piss when I go to the theatre. At home, I'll pause the movie.

The point is that there are at the very least an equal, if not more, distractions at home than at a theatre. At best, you can call it a wash, at worst, you can call TV the distraction center of the universe.

3. The Theatre "Experience". Yes, you can have surround sound at home. Have me over sometime when you blast it at the levels of a theatre. "But it's all relative!", you say. No, it isn't. Again, maybe you like your home surround system, but that isn't replicating what a theatre can do. The sound in a theatre has a physical effect on your body that can't be replicated by the average home theatre experience. The only way this is possible is if you have your own home and neighbors that won't call the cops when they hear explosions across the picket fence. If you live in an apartment...forget about it.

Another aspect of the theatre is the "strangers" effect. When you're in a theatre with a bunch of people you don't know, you become influenced (sometimes minutely, sometimes largely) by their reactions, either by gasps and screams in a horror film, or crying and weeping during a melodrama. You can't control this variable. You may hate every single person around you, and you may do your very best to place yourself in your own personal vacuum, but it isn't possible not to be affected somehow by the strangers around you. The argument now will become "But I can bring a bunch of friends over and get the same feelings". No, you can't. This is because human beings are affected differently by people they don't know. Your friends are "safe", you can anticipate how they will react to something, and most importantly you can interact with them at any time during the viewing experience. You can't do that with a bunch of strangers in a theater.

4. The price of going to the theatre is outrageous! Is it really? It's pretty trendy to slam on the price of a theatre ticket. It's also trendy to use New York and L.A. as examples of how crazy ticket prices are. It's true. Ticket prices have gone up over the years. But according to the National Association of Theatre Owners, the average price of a ticket last year was $6.55 If you look at the stats since 1990, that's only a $2.33 increase. That may sound pricey, but considering the demand for blockbuster movies with insane special fx costs and twenty million dollar actors, it's surprising ticket prices are as low as they are. Here in Lincoln, a saturday matinee for two people, two waters, and an order of nachos is $16.50. Reasonable, considering most new DVD's cost $15 or more and if you include the high price of the HD DVD's, then that's something else entirely.

The argument against this is "I can wait until it comes out on DVD and then just rent it for $4.00". Sure, you could definitely do that. But then you aren't watching the movies, you're watching television...

5. You're not watching the movies, you're watching television. Any movie that is in a theatre is designed to be seen in a theatre. That's the whole point. You don't shoot a movie on 35mm and then say "gee whiz, I'm sure glad this isn't being shown in a retarded movie theatre!" The very medium demands that it is projected onto a big screen. The DVD medium is designed for a television. The TV screen and the Theatre screen are two different mediums that are projected differently and thus, need to be treated as such. Now, is one "superior" over the other?

What's the difference between watching Treasure of the Sierra Madre on TCM uncut commercial free, and popping in the DVD? The answer is that there is no difference. Now take Treasure and put it on the big screen. Now what's the difference? Everything. As mentioned earlier, a television cannot replicate what the theatre does, but the theatre CAN replicate what the television does.

Hi-def is the newest arrow in the home theatre quiver. Rather than get into the nuances of hi-def as it effects the cinema experience, let's just give the home theatre enthusiasts this one. Of course, theatres can be equipped with any of the same hi-def equipment that a home theatre has. You wanna watch that overrated Wes Anderson flick in hi-def at home? Think of how great it looks on the big screen of a theatre, with all the extra bells and whistles that can't be replicated in your living room. Hell, just think of how awesome The Sopranos would be on a theatre screen. The excuse that "my TV image can look BETTER than a theatre screen" is moot when one realizes that a hi-def capable theatre can do the same thing.

For the sake of argument, let's assume that on a technical level, your television is equal to the theatre. The image quality is the same. Your "line of vision" counteracts the 30 foot cinema screen. Your surround sound is on par with a theatre, relatively speaking. You still can't get the other intangibles that a theatre offers in your living room. There is only one thing that home viewing can use to try and offset the extra stuff the theatre can provide...

6. Convenience. This is what it ultimately comes down to and this is where personal preference muddies the debate. Convenience has nothing to do with a comparison of the mediums. I'm a die-hard supporter of the theatre experience (can you tell?). If I had the means, I would watch every movie in a theatre rather than on a TV. Unfortunately, I just can't do that. Nobody can. I get plenty of enjoyment from throwing Creepshow into my DVD player and kicking back with some snacks. There is nothing wrong with that in any way shape or form. In fact, I find nothing even remotely wrong with anyone who says they like or prefer that way of viewing movies. It's personal preference, not an objective perspective of the pros and cons between the theatre and TV.

From a pure convenience standpoint, home viewing has the edge. Pretty much all mainstream movies from the past 50 years can be found on Netflix (though if you try to find anything even remotely obscure, I've found Netflix to be incredibly lacking) and delivered to your mailbox. There are thousands of films that will never be on DVD, but the only demand for them is by film geeks like myself; a niche market. But watching Village of the Damned the way it was intended, with a projector and film reels, is just not the same as putting a DVD in your player and seeing it on your hi-def 32" TV screen.

Is it "warmth"? I find that term to be insufficient. The reality is that even Film Scholars have a hard time putting the difference into words. The point is that the effects can be measured. Give nearly all filmmakers a choice, and they are going to want their films shown in a theatre. The reason is because of people like my mom, who have such a different reaction to a film simply because of the way it's shown. Studios pay a lot of money to get their films shown in theatres. If the home theatre experience is so great, I've gotta wonder why they even bother with the expense of prints, advertising, etc.? There's a reason why people go back to the theatres over and over again, and it isn't just to watch the movie. It's because its an experience they can't get in their living rooms.

In closing, the theatrical experience is superior to the home viewing experience. It doesn't matter how big your TV is. It doesn't matter how clear the image is. It doesn't matter how grand your sound system is. Convenience is irrelevant. A movie on a TV is still nothing more than a movie on TV, whether it's a cable line or a DVD.

The theatre, however, can do everything your living room can do...and things it can't.

My Springfield Alter-Ego

2007-07-16T23:04:00.001-07:00

If you head over to the official website for the Simpson's movie (which looks great, by the way), you can find a cool program where they allow you to customize yourself to look like a Simpson's character. That's supposed to look like me if I lived in Springfield. The Mii's for the Wii are pretty lame. This is much more impressive. I'm such a geek.

The Splattercast tonight went fairly well. Episode 35 should be posted in the next day or so. We definitely need more sound fx from Spooky. More foul mouthed Schwarzenegger one-liners are always a good thing.

The first day of my film class, Pre-Code cinema, was great. We watched a documentary about pre-code women and how they riled up the Catholics with their portrayals of guilt-free sex, criminal behavior, abortions, and power in the workplace. Things never change, I suppose. Next time you're wondering why Jean Harlow always has hard nipples, it's because she'd put ice cubes on them before each shot. And you know how those Catholics hate erect nipples!

Review: Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers

2007-07-15T21:50:00.001-07:00

With the exception of the inconceivably awful Halloween: Resurrection, no film in the Halloween franchise is as reviled as Curse amongst fans. It had been a long time since I'd watched it so I popped it in this evening (along with Resurrection) to give it a fresh look. While it definitely deserves its reputation for sucking, I found there to be quite a bit of stuff I liked about the film. The problem was the story the filmmakers decided to frame the film with.

A lot of things go into why this film is despised by Halloween fans. The main reason is the "explanation" of Mike's origin. If you haven't been keeping tabs, it turns out he's the chosen child possessed by some ancient Celtic god named Thorn. A group of modern day Druids uses Myers as a tool in which to experiment with pure evil and kill off his family in order for theirs to be safe...or something like that. It gets pretty convoluted and once Tommy Doyle shows up to explain that Shatner goes on a murder spree every time a constellation appears in the sky, the film becomes the equivalent of the Pope blaspheming God. There's no way to defend any of this "origin". It's just shit, plain and simple. The story is a continuation of stuff that was hinted at in Revenge, such as the weird rune symbol on Mike's wrist. Whatever. After watching Curse, you'll understand why H20 pretended that 4,5, and 6 never existed (although to be fair, 4 is a pretty good flick).

What I did appreciate in Curse was the attempt to bring some familiarity back to the franchise. I loved that they brought back Tommy Doyle, one of the surviving kids from the first flick. I didn't particularly care for how the actor played the part, but it seemed like an understandable continuation. It was great to see a character from the original other than Loomis try to get involved. I absolutely hated the idea that the "Man in Black" (don't get me started...) somehow kidnapping and impregnating Jamie, but I did like the concept of the baby needing protection from Michael. Not only does the baby continue the family bloodline (thus giving Myers continued reason to kill), but it makes for a great character completely helpless on one side and a burden to the others in the film that have to protect it. All the filmmakers needed to do was trash the entire Druid/demon/constellation storyline and this could have been a really decent flick.

A couple other things. I thought there were some great shots of Myers hiding/coming out of the shadows. The film has a definite cinematic polish to it and some of the death scenes and cinematography with Mike are top-notch. Donald Pleasence is just sad here. It's not that he acts bad (he's only in a handful of short scenes), but with each subsequent film in the series, his health gets noticeably worse and worse. It's almost like you're watching someone die on film, literally, before your eyes. This was his last film, and although he classes it up, you just can't help but feel awkward. It just feels like Moustapha Akkad grabbed him off his deathbed by gunpoint and said "be in this movie".

The one last thing that ruins this movie is the incredibly lame "death" of Myers. Tommy Doyle just beats him over the head repeatedly with a pipe and...that's it. Loomis shows up cryptically to say something about unfinished business and the the movie abruptly ends with Myers' mask lying on the ground. Huh?! When you couple the lame ending with all of the Druid nonsense, the movie becomes unsalvageable. Too bad, because there is a really good skeleton frame of a film here with some interesting characters and a kernel of a great continuation to the series, but there's just too much crap that doesn't make any sense (somebody explain to me how Mike got in the van to kill the deejay).

There is a "Producer's Cut" to this film that I've never been able to get a hold of. It apparently fleshes out the story a lot better than the theatrical release. I've heard it's a lot better but still retains all of the dumb Druid stuff. I'd like to see it sometime.

D+

Pre-Code Cinema and the Gallup Poll

2007-07-14T21:35:00.000-07:00

My two month vacation officially comes to an end on Monday. Beginning bright and early, I've got to attend the first day of my summer film class on pre-code cinema. The class is going to have a heavy emphasis on horror flicks, which is always good. From what I've gathered, the class is going to be highlighting a lot of stuff Richard Maltby finds ridiculous. A word to the wise: If you know your professor is going to have a certain view and teach a certain way, prepare yourself ahead of time in order to challenge them on some of their points. This accomplishes a couple things. First, it makes class much more interesting and second, you're more apt to get a high grade because the professor will think you're smarter than the average student. In one of my film classes a couple years back, I had to challenge a film professor who was completely disrespecting John Carpenter and I had to correct, and sort of argue with, a communication professor (who minored in Film, by the way) that Martin Scorsese didn't direct The Godfather movies. Yeesh! Anyways, I'm looking forward to Monday morning. The girl in the picture is Annette Kellermann, in case you didn't know.

Next week also means I've got to go back to work. Right now, you can check out an interesting video on Gallup's site about Michael Moore and Sicko. Basically, Gallup did what it does best: it polled the countries that Moore pimps in Sicko and asks them directly if what he says is true. The results aren't surprising. I'm pretty excited, all things considered, to be going back to work. Everybody loves living in a Democracy (well, most people) but very few people can claim to do work that directly influences how politicians act, companies do business, and get reactions from the president himself.

I watched all of Bush's Iraq appeal (translation: "um...let the generals decide what to do...even though, you know...i fired previous generals...and uh...didn't listen to the others...but yeah...let's wait a couple more months!") to the American people a few days ago and one quote was really hilarious. He came out and said he wasn't going to run the country based on "a Gallup Poll" (there's a reason he named Gallup, by the way). It's widely known by just about everyone in Washington that Gallup is the only poll that really matters. I could tell you some pretty funny stories about George Bush and how much he depends on what I do. You see, I'm one of the people who calls citizens and lets their opinions be heard. What I do is sent directly to President Bush's desk. When the politicians say they don't look at polls to lead, they're lying. They have to look at polls, otherwise they have no idea what the people really want.

Heavy political seasons are always great because you know that every single call you make, every single opinion you record is going to impact how the media shapes issues, how politicians are going to respond, and most importantly, allows democracy to work. So when you're reading the dozens of polls that are sure to come out over the course of the next year and a half, remember that Gallup is the only one that really matters. Why? Because it's the one that makes Georgey run up to Laura exclaiming "They love me again!" when his approval rating goes up...

As well as the one that makes him say he's not going to base any decision on "a Gallup Poll" when he drops to Nixon levels.

Editorial: Revisiting a Supposed Horror "classic", Friday the 13th

2007-07-13T17:59:00.000-07:00

In 1996, director Wes Craven and writer Kevin Williamson created Scream, a film that reinvented the slasher film and genre. The film's now famous opening scene involves Ghostface calling Drew Barrymore and forcing her to answer horror trivia in order to save her and her boyfriend's life. The most memorable question is Ghostface asking his victim: "Who was the killer in Friday the 13th?" Barrymore quickly responds with "Jason! It was Jason!!!!". Of course, as we die-hard horror fans know, Jason wasn't the killer in the first movie and Ghostface quickly dispatches of Gertie.

What's interesting about this piece of horror writing is that most common folks would have given Jason as the answer to Ghostface's question. The fact that this minor piece of trivia becomes so clever and powerful is that it first establishes that the audience has no earthly clue as to why Friday the 13th is famous in the first place while simultaneously reinforcing the notion that the film is known not for its quality, but for one character who doesn't appear in it until a 5 second "dream sequence" at the very end.

I'm going to take an unpopular stance within the realm of horror fans and supporters. I'm going to argue that Friday the 13th is no "classic". It's popularity and notoriety are due in large part to the series taken as a whole, 80's pop-culture factors, and an unwarranted reputation (extreme gore, sex, and nudity) that has become the stuff of pop legend. To say that Friday the 13th is a "good" horror movie requires one to suspend disbelief and sense, something horror fans have seemed more than welcome to do the past 25 years.

Let me first state that I like the F13 films. I have no inherent disdain towards the slasher genre. I consider Bob Clark's Black Christmas and John Carpenter's Halloween to be right up there in my top tier of favorite horror films. As far as I'm concerned, the F13 films are all fun in their own way, some way better than others, but I don't begrudge the notion that horror fans prop this series up on a pedestal. Jason Voorhees is an iconic horror figure, no doubt about that. Watching him spear, hack, and slice up one-dimensional characters never gets old. The sheer amount of movies in the series (10, not including Freddy vs. Jason, all released theatrically by major studios Paramount and New Line) is part of the appeal and something most horror franchises (other than that venerable Witchcraft series) can't match. The fun ofthe F13 series is in the idea, not the execution of the movies themselves.

So here we are, revisiting the film that "started it all", the original Friday the 13th directed by Sean S. Cunningham. To take a close and critical look at this movie requires a couple of things. First, you must divorce yourself from all the baggage associated with the rest of the series. There's been 25 years of hype to set aside and since the F13 films are one of the premiere "gateway" franchises for prospective horror fans, you've got to suppress any warm and fuzzy feelings of nostalgia. In effect, you've got to pretend that Friday the 13th is in a vacuum; that it's a stand-alone film and judge it on its own merits. When we do that, what do we get?

The plot of the film is about as simplistic as you can get: a group of teens restarting a summer camp get picked off one-by-one by an unseen killer. From the opening scene (a killer POV shot), it becomes clear that the film is a blatant knock-off of Halloween, a film that was released a couple years earlier and became the highest grossing indie film of all-time. There is no denying that the film is an attempt to cash-in on the sudden demand for slasher films that came with the success of Halloween. Interestingly, I've never heard a supporter of F13 do so because of the film's "quality". If you compare Sean S. Cunningham's direction against that of John Carpenter, you'll find no comparison. I challenge any horror fan to watch the two films back-to-back and find an area where F13 is superior. Understand that one's personal feeling's of preference or whether you "like" one over the other is irrelevant. I'm talking strictly on the cinematic level these two films have no comparison in terms of quality. F13 to Halloween is the equivalent of De Palma to Hitchcock. The divide is immense, measurable, and easy to see. It's just not in the same league.

Now, just because something is a knock-off of something better, doesn't necessarily mean that the movie is bad per se. After all, even De Palma put out some good films by plagiarizing Hitchcock, though to compare De Palma and Cunningham would be an insult to De Palma. So let's de-construct some of the reasons, and myths, as to why F13 works. Maybe then we can get to the heart of why it is considered a "classic".

1) The story is great, the setting is classic.

The story behind Jason Voorhees (drowned in Crystal Lake while the counselors were "making love") is one of the most recognizable in horrordom. It's become a mythology in its own right. But remember, we're just focusing on the first movie here, and pretending as if the ensuing 10 films never existed. The film opens in 1958 and then flashes forward to the present. We find out that the camp has been closed ever since the deaths of the two counselors who are making out at the beginning of the film. Sprinkled throughout the film are characters who show up to offer cryptic insights, but nobody ever explicitly implies that Jason is the character who may or may not be running around. I'd argue strongly that Jason is never made a threat and his presence is not integral to either the characters or the audience themselves. Instead, you have a pseudo-mystery (who's the killer?) involving an unseen killer (who seems to be recognized by a couple characters before they are offed...) hacking up teens in non-gory ways (more on this later). The back story is serviceable, but there is nothing more to it than something like Halloween and in the context of the film, it doesn't really strike fear into the audience. The setting itself is a good one (an isolated camp) but Cunningham never makes full use of the isolated nature of the camp and the visuals become too repetitive over the course of the film. The setting is just a variation on the standard formula, and one that is not supported to its full potential.

2) This film sparked the 80's horror boom!

Sort of untrue depending on how you look at it. The reality is that Friday the 13th was just one of many that were jumping on the Halloween success train. Other slashers released the same year included Tourist Trap, Terror Train, Mother's Day, De Palma's Dressed to Kill, and even Carpenter's ghostly slashers in The Fog. There had already been a strong trend towards these films when Friday the 13th came along. Where F13 gets props is for being the most successful of the bunch, grossing about 40 million dollars. However, grossing that much money doesn't necessarily mean people liked it. The sequel released the following year (and other than the first 15 minutes, a clearly superior film than the original in almost every respect) only grossed half that amount showing that audiences had a decided lack of enthusiasm to the original film. It took word of mouth, the introduction of Jason Voorhees, and the novelty of "the final chapter" for 3 and 4 to make some bank. But the fact that the original film had such a drop-off in audience in comparison to the sequel is very telling in my opinion. I think it shows a direct correlation between the success of the character of Jason Voorhees, rather than the success of the film itself. In other words, the series started getting its love not from the original film, but from the accumulation of all the films together and the character of Jason Voorhees. Did F13 lead to the 80's horror boom? It had an impact on subsequent slashers in that they all wanted to mimic the formula to gain the same amount of success, but to say it began the 80's horror movement is giving it far too much credit. There were many other factors for that, not the least of which was home video.

3) The sex and violence are awesome! Long live Savini!

This is probably the most overrated aspect of F13 and not surprisingly the fall back position for every supporter of the film. F13 is one of those films that seems a lot more violent and racy than it actually is. This is not a new phenomenon. TCM is considered by many to be one of the goriest movies ever made even though it has less than a single bottle of Karo used throughout. Same goes for Halloween, which is incredibly light on gore and T&A (girls frolic around in their underwear a lot, but even the most famous scene, P.J. Soles's "see anything you like?" is no payoff). To illustrate this, I'm going to go through the numerous kills in the film. To be fair, F13 was allegedly butchered by the MPAA, but we can only go based off what we see in the film. Maybe it would have been more impressive without the censorship, we'll never know. So, here's the kills. I'll let you be the judge of how graphic they are:

1. counselor holds bloody stomach. stabbing is not shown.
2. counselor screams, freeze frame, opening credits.
3. counselor's throat slit. Shown for less than 3 seconds before fade to white.
4. counselor shown with throat slit on top bunk, killed off camera
5.Kevin Bacon's famous "throat scene", lasts 6 seconds.
6. counselor gets axe to the head. impact not shown. shot lasts 2 seconds.
7. counselor killed off camera
8. lead counselor killed off camera.
9. counselor killed off camera, later found to have arrow in his head and torso. shot lasts 3 seconds.
10. decapitation of Mrs. Voorhees. less than 2 seconds.

As for the T&A, only one couple actually has sex in the film. During the sex scene, no nudity is shown other than Kevin Bacon's ass. In fact, the only time you see a boob (and it's only one, funny enough) is after the sex has taken place and even then, only briefly. So what you have here is a film that has reached legendary status for how gory it is and for how much nudity is has, when in reality it doesn't have much of either. The funny thing is that this is probably one of the tamest films Tom Savini has ever done. Dawn of the Dead is an example of something far gorier than this.

So what you have is a film that is 95 minutes of plodding, uninteresting buildup and less than 20 seconds of actual violence and nudity. I wonder if anyone has ever stopped to think about that for a second. You've got a film with no characters of any discernible interest, whose only saving grace is supposedly the villian, Mrs. Voorhees...

4) Mrs. Voorhees is the shiznit!

First off, the idea that Jason's mother is the killer and not Jason himself is a great one. The few scenes where Betsy Palmer goes a little off her rocker are awesome. But a couple shots do not make a great villian. In reality, the last 20 minutes of the movie is a plump old woman chasing a young girl around the woods. They slap each other around a bit. They sorta "throw down", but in a "we don't want to get hurt making this low-budget movie" kind of way. It's really a pretty pathetic sequence when you really think about it. The character of Jason's mother has become iconic, but it's noteworthy that the character is more recognizable as a rotten head surrounded by candles .

If you really sit down and watch Friday the 13th you'll realize very quickly that as a film, it's almost nonexistent. It's got a clever title, a reputation that is more myth than reality, and frankly isn't even the most entertaining or well-made film in the series. Over at Deadlantern.com, my friend Jeff posted his top 10 in the series and listed this as #1. One of his reasons was because "it laid the foundation for one of the most enduring franchises in horror history". That's true, but that has nothing to do with the movie itself. If F13 were released today, it would be ridiculed for its terrible pacing, uninspired one-dimensional characters, lack of gore and sex, as well as its lame direction. It's amazing what 25 years can do to a film...

And ultimately, that's all I'm saying. I'm not knocking Friday the 13th so much as I'm trying to show that the credibility it has accumulated over the years is not the result of the film itself, but the entire sum of the series and everything that sprang forth from the series.. Just like Freddy Krueger, Jason Voorhees became a pop-culture icon in the 80's (I was Jason for Halloween one year, Freddy the next). The horror industry turned its boogeymen into merchandise. An R rated horror movie became a video game for kids to play on their Nintendo. Jason was elevated to something above cult status and became a household name. Tons of sequels were released, each more ridiculous than the last, and I think the original film became lumped into the frenzy that came about because of it. People have a natural inclination to prefer the "original" over what comes after, but a strict reading of the original film shows that the legend doesn't live up to the reality.

If you do not let the other films influence your viewing experience, you'll find that Friday the 13th is an incredibly overrated film. One that does not hold up upon repeat viewings and one that's more notable for what comes after it than for what it itself is.

a Rampage in Cloverfield

2007-07-12T09:33:00.001-07:00

If there's one thing the internet loves, it's mysterious marketing campaigns. J.J. Abrams (the dude behind the most overrated television show of all-time, Lost) put the above trailer before Transformers and almost immediately the internet was geeking out. As you can see, the trailer is great in that it reveals just enough to make you go "wow" while maintaining an air of near-complete mystery as to what is going on.

The marketing campaign is all about secrecy, with nobody really knowing what the film's title is (Cloverfield, Slusho, Rampage...more on this last one in a second), the supposed studio behind it denying they know anything about it (government style), and everyone wondering just what the hell is causing buildings to explode (aliens, godzilla type monsters, something else?). It's a perfect marketing ploy...for now.

Eventually, the expectations will destroy the film if they continue on the path they are on by turning the trailers into 30 second Lost spots. What's going to happen is that people are going to get so worked up by the mystery, that whatever is revealed will be such a huge disappointment that it can do nothing but hurt the film. For now though, it's pretty cool what they are doing. And let's face it, there's no way that they can keep something like this a secret all the way to the release date. When internet folk get interested in something, they start digging. Soon you'll probably find grainy pics of the monster popping up on entertainment sites everywhere or one of the cast will accidentally let slip a piece of vital information during their thousandth press junket.

But of course, in the now, we love a good mystery. Rumors are flying as to what the film might actually be. The most interesting to me? The idea that this is the Rampage movie that has been talked about for years in Hollywood.

Now that would be cool

A complete and utter sense of relief

2007-07-10T23:15:00.000-07:00

Nothing as awesome as this picture is going to occur in the next Dead Lantern Pictures film. But damn if I'm not actually excited again to make a movie. Tonight accomplished everything that I feel Dead Lantern should be: a collective group endeavor. For the first time in what seems like ages, everyone got together and pitched in ideas and actually gave great feedback. It didn't feel like it was just Steve and I dragging everyone along with whatever we had come up with.

Over the 4th of July, Steve and I had gotten a decent idea for a film, but had hit a complete roadblock. We didn't know how to end the movie, what the monster would be, or connect the dots character wise. In an hour and a half, 95% of the movie was solved just by the interaction of the rest of the guys (and gals, thanks Tina!). It's kind of strange how months of frustration can be relieved just by a good old fashioned brainstorming session.

And that's all that was ever needed. It's one thing to have a leader telling people what to do when the cameras are rolling, but the entire process before that point needs to be a collective group collaboration. It makes everyone feel as if they are a part of the process and not simply meat to be guilt tripped (coerced?) into following some dumb asses delusional dream to make movies. If you're going to go through the grinder of making a movie (contrary to popular belief, The Grand Horror was a grueling experience) then it's vital that everyone feels like they are contributing something. Maybe you didn't come up with the major story points, but if you can chime in with "Hey, it would be cool if the character did this...", you'll feel just as much a part of the process as anyone else. And that's important. It's not one person saying "We're doing this and that", it's an entire group of people who you'll need every step of the way sharing their own ideas and feeling like they are just as important and vital as everyone else. That's how Dead Lantern should operate and that's how I hope it will operate in the future.

As for the movie, I honestly think the story we've come up with is the coolest thing we've ever done. If we can nail the dialogue down and get the characters spot on, I think we could really make something vastly superior to TGH. I think that by getting back to a single location, we can really get back to making a good movie rather than trying to bite off more than we can chew, which was the downfall of all our other aborted projects.

I think part of the reason I'm really excited about this next film idea is that it really gets to my favorite aspects of the horror genre. I love movies about people trapped in an isolated place. I love movies where you can't figure out who is trustworthy and who isn't. I love monster movies. I love the old EC Comics that had creepy twists in the final panels. I think this film idea has the potential to combine all of those things into a fun horror movie.

I can't wait to begin shooting.

A Sarcastic "Big Surprise" coupled with eye rolling

2007-07-09T20:50:00.000-07:00

Geez, who didn't see this coming ?

I was against this war from the beginning. During the lead up, I tried telling everyone that the reasoning didn't make any sense. Iraq was never a threat to us. I was highly suspicious of the so-called "weapons of mass destruction" that Sadaam was apparently ready (this minute!) to attack us with. Iraq had nothing to do with September 11th. To me, it seemed blatantly obvious that the war had been planned well ahead of time.

So were us "liberals" right? Even most conservatives will admit that Iraq has been a total mess. Our "leadership" (I don't think you can even call it that) dropped the ball big time and what's most infuriating to myself, (and I think to most liberals in general) is the complete lack of accountability by anybody involved. Simply having low poll numbers is not adequate accountability for Bush. What you have is a president who led us into a pointless war costing tens of thousands of lives...that seems to have no end in sight because he can't admit he was wrong. Bush and his cronies tell us constantly "Things will get better. Give the plan time". First off, there is no plan. There never was any plan to begin with other than "um...let's get Sadaam and justify it by linking him with 9/11!"

Now we get word that this ridiculous "democracy" we've installed can't get any of their shit together after years of our training, help, money, and lives. What's the point of having goals and benchmarks if they're never met? Everything about this administration is spin and damage control. For every terrorist who blows up 30 people at a market, the nuts on the other side will say "Yeah, but our soldiers built a school!!!!!!!!!". Thanks. Great. Not only is that school probably going to preach how much America should be hated to the very citizens we are helping, but it's got a good chance of getting bombed in the future anyway.

I have a close family member who spent almost 2 years in Iraq. He was able to come back for two weeks over Christmas in 2005. Naturally, I was interested in any information I could get. We got to talking about pulling troops out and he started laughing. His exact words were "We're not going anywhere for a long time". The reason? His men were building multiple bases around the country to hold 30,000 soldiers at a time as opposed to the regular bases that held around 3,000. This whole "surge" thing was not something Bush came up with as a solution. It was the plan from the beginning. Of course, the media won't tell you that and neither will the administration. It's simply spun to make it look as if Bush is conceding to a "new strategy". It's all bullshit.

So I'm sitting here thinking I'm more intelligent and could make better decisions for this country than our own goddamn president. How scary is that? To know that the evil, moral less liberals were right in saying this war was stupid from the get go (talking about ordinary citizens here, not the retarded democratic politicians who were too gutless to say "no". The bane of every liberal in Washington is to be spun as "anti-American", therefore anytime a president says "let's go to war" there is near universal support in congress).

There is no articulate argument that can be made for staying in Iraq.

The only excuse anybody can offer is "It'll be worse than it is now!!!!!" If that is the basis for your argument, then admit that we'll be in that country with a major force forever and that you're ok with spending trillions of dollars and giving American soldiers' lives up for a permanent presence in that country. It's obvious that the Iraqi government isn't going to get its act together anytime soon. It's also a distinct possibility that when we leave, they'll end up "electing" a terrorist regime to run the country. Then what?

Bush is probably counting down the days until he leaves office. After all, Iraq won't be his problem anymore. A democrat will be in office, will order the removal of our troops, and when things start going to hell in Iraq, Rush Limbaugh will preach to the wingnuts that the Democrats are allowing genocide to happen, that it's their fault for the chaos in Iraq, and that they are the root of all evil in the world. I say "Let it happen. The sooner the better". Let Iraq fend for itself. There are bigger threats in the world right now, and just beyond the horizon, than some yahoos blowing themselves up in mosques. The war in Iraq has made terrorism explode across the globe and Bush should have that on his conscience. His actions have led to the deaths, broken lives, and misery of more people than any terrorist could hope to have done.

So the cycle will continue unless a democrat is elected president. Congress will do nothing (realistically, there's nothing they can do anyway), Bush will continue to play keep away and let the clock run out until the aftermath is someone else's mess, and we'll endure another 2+ years of bitterness, dead soldiers, and hate towards our government.

I guess I should thank Bush for one thing: for delivering government control to the Democrats for the foreseeable future.

"If you can find the money to kill people, you can find the money to help people"

2007-07-08T18:11:00.000-07:00

I saw Michael Moore's newest flick "Sicko" earlier today. It's easily Moore's best film to date and should be required viewing for those who don't think a universal health care policy is feasible or possible. Since this blog deals with a lot of political stuff, I'll save the health care debate for a later post, but if this film doesn't at least sway you in the direction of support, if only for an hour or two, then you're just a cold hearted bastard. I'd give the film a solid 9/10.

I'm just about to go make some cheeseburgers and finish watching Band of Brothers , but an interesting thing happened over the 4th of July that I feel helps vindicate my position that viewing a film at the theatre is far superior to the home viewing experience in every way. If you think watching a movie on a 32" television screen is just as good as going to the theatre, you're wrong. Even If you think watching a movie on a 52" television screen is equivalent, you're wrong. In the coming days, I plan on describing why this is true and why I'm absolutely right and my friends are so completely wrong. The battle between the cinematic theatre experience and the home viewing experience will be brought out in full force. Thanks must go out to my mother who made a comment about Night at the Museum that I believe helps support my notion that the theatre experience is not only completely different than the home viewing experience, but also superior.

Steve and I got together over the 4th of July to blow up some explosives and go over the potential next feature length film for Dead Lantern Pictures. We've come up with a solid premise but have become stuck on some major points in the film and at this point, if nobody can help rectify the plot difficulties, we'll be in big trouble (in little Lincoln...bad joke, my apologies). Basically, the film is The Thing in a barn. I want it to have the same feel as that film, yet have a different tone. We'll see if anybody can offer some ideas.

So, in the coming days, look for blogs on health care, the movie viewing experience, and more. By the way, the new Seven Wonders of the world were announced. Apparently, Catholics came out in full force for "Christ the Redeemer", whereas the pagans just couldn't quite get the Acropolis (and thus the Parthenon; a temple to Athena) onto the list. This is the biggest travesty on the list, not because a giant statue of Jesus is classified a "wonder" (indeed, two of the original wonders were giant statues...the Colossus of Rhodes and the Statue of Zeus) but because there is nothing inherently special about Christ the Redeemer. I could make an argument that it was more impressive and "wondrous" for the multiple Easter Island statues to be on the list over Christ the Redeemer. Again, I'm not knocking Christianity. I'm saying that in this day and age, building a giant statue just isn't all that impressive compared to other structures. I wouldn't even have put Christ the Redeemer in the running let alone crown it one of the new seven wonders of the world. As for the other wonders chosen, I can live with them.

Until next time....

The Great Pyramid, not a wonder?

2007-07-03T07:59:00.000-07:00

Right now, you can head to this site to vote for the new 7 wonders of the world. A lot of people are up in arms about this, most notably the Egyptians who think it is ridiculous that their cherished pyramid has to re qualify for "wonder status". They have a point. I think you'd be hard pressed to find anybody that would disagree that the Great Pyramid is still one, if not the, most magnificent structure ever created. After thousands of years, it's still standing, something that can't be said about the other original 7 wonders. So, let's just get this out of the way: the Great Pyramid should be on this list no matter what. The fact that the pyramids are given "honorary" status, yet you can't vote for them is inexcusable. I understand this group wants a brand new list and that it's part of the fun, but c'mon..these are the pyramids we're talking about here, folks!

But really, aside from that grievous mistake, this drive to name a new 7 wonders is pretty cool. I have no real problem with it because it can only help bring more attention to some of the most beautiful creations on the planet. So, go vote and let you opinion be heard. I know you're all wondering who I voted for:

The Acropolis, The Roman Colosseum, Machu Picchu, The Taj Mahal, The Great Wall of China, Angkor, and Hagia Sophia.

And if you're interested, here's the original wonders

God, Bush, and Scooter Libby

2007-07-02T21:02:00.000-07:00

By now, everybody knows that the worst president in the history of our country gave Scooter Libby a "get out of jail free" card. Right about now, conservatives are jerking themselves with copies of the constitution while listening to Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. Liberals are screaming to everyone (yet nobody in particular), uttering curses that the founding fathers allowed for such a devious clause to begin with.

Personally, I find the lame-duck in chief to be an utter pussy in this.

You can read Bush's "reasoning" for the decision right here. Instead of pardoning Scooter Libby, Bush simply commuted his sentence, axing the 30 months of jail time that Libby was convicted of (by a jury of peers, no less). Libby still has to pay a fine and serve probation. This is what makes Bush a pussy. By not pardoning Libby, Bush is admitting that he himself believes that Libby lied and committed the crime of perjury. In the eyes of Bush, he's basically admitting that "yeah, Libby committed perjury to save Cheney's ass...but in this case, perjury is only worth a fine and probabtion, not jail time". If Bush truly thought Libby was completely innocent, why the hell didn't he just pardon him? Why just commute the jail term?

Because he wants to have it both ways. He isn't man enough to deal with the political fallout the word "pardon" brings, so he tries to skate around it by making it seem like a fine and probation is a tough sentence. Regardless of whether or not you believe Libby lied or didn't lie, the fact that Bush saved one of his cronies from prison is just another example of the joke the presidency has become. I guarantee you, tomorrow morning, every conservative talking point is going to bring up Bill Clinton and his pardons. They'll bring up Clinton to do what they always do: deflect attention away from what's happening right now. And you know what? Those pardons were a joke as well. They are indefensible. The pardon of Marc Rich was one of the lowlights of the Clinton presidency and most liberals would agree with that.

I'm actually happy Bush did this. The fact that he was too much of a pussy to announce the decision from the White House (gotta love those press releases!) and the fact that he did it during the 4th of July holiday when most Americans are traveling and have other things on their minds shows what kind of a cowardly douche he is. Maybe now the American people will actually grow a damn spine and voice their displeasure with how things are going in this country. Maybe now the Democrats will step up and say "Bush is a loser, and so was Clinton for his pardons...now is the time for a constitutional showdown". Somehow I doubt that will happen.

The sad fact is that even if the Democrats wanted to do something about it, they can't. Impeachment will go nowhere. They can bitch about this pardon, but it's completely within Bush's constitutional right, i.e. legal. They can subpoena the shit out of everyone in the administration, but executive privilege will put a stop to that and it's clear that even if they did catch someone, Bush would just pardon them or "commute" their sentence anyway. So in the end, what you have here is Democrats pulling their hair out over something they can't do anything about, Republicans scared out of their minds that Bush just delivered a bomb to next year's election chances, and Bush sitting in the white house, praying to his god for direction as to what to do about Libby....his god must have answered...

"Let him go to trial. Let the jury convict him. Let the Republican appointed judges condemn him. When the appeals court denies his plea to stay out of jail during the appeals process, immediately commute his sentence. That's what I want. So it shall be written, so it shall be done."

If Bush had any of these so-called "morals" his supporters cry about, then his reasoning for the commuting of Libby's sentence shouldn't have been bogus crap about respecting the court's decision, or feeling that the sentence was too harsh (since it was well within legal jurisdiction and upheld by GOoPer appointed judges, no less) and just come out and say "This trial was ludicrous, in my opinion, and I think this man was wrongly convicted, therefore I am pardoning him". But Bush wouldn't do that:

he's a pussy.

a suitably gothic title

2007-06-29T22:14:00.001-07:00

My name is Mat and I help run deadlantern.com, a horror news and review site that doubles as the hub for Dead Lantern Pictures.

In the coming weeks, this site will be used as a place that I can express opinions about stuff that generally doesn't fit the theme of deadlantern.com. You can expect to find editorials and musings on all sorts of things. Most of it will center around film but I'll cover whatever strikes my fancy. Whether its politics, current news, or various forms of entertainment, you can probably expect to be pissed off at some point in time.

But that's what makes it fun, right?

So, now that I've selected a stereotypically "clever" title that hints at Gothicism and pseudo-hipster sensibilities, it's time to be opinionated. See you soon....