Here and There...

First off, congrats to the Movie Blog! They won the 2006 Weblog Award for Best Podcast. If you love movies, or talking about movies, do check it out. Be advised, they can sometimes dip into R rated verbosity, but it is hilarious and informative at the same time. Plus, they put up podcasts a couple times a week. Great site and podcast…congrats guys. I finally got around to watching the movie Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. The scenes of Sky Captain flying the Curtiss P-40 fighter plane through the city were just cool. A lot of fun, good action, and I always like anything set in the 40’s / 50’s era, even if this was a futuristic sci-fi flick set in the past (“Oh dear, I think I’ve gone cross-eyed.”) Gwyneth Paltrow and Jude Law were great, and I absolutely loved the last line of the movie. Cracked me right up. Ranks up there with Mal’s “What was that?” line from Serenity. :) I’m not a fan of Rascal Flatts (they’re basically country’s version of a boy band), and the songs they’ve put out that I like I could count on one hand with a couple left over fingers. However, their new song What Hurts The Most, is actually kind of good. Heard it on the radio a couple times, and it’s a good enough tune. The video however, sets new heights (or lows?) of over the top melodrama. On top of that, the whole thing grinds to a halt in the middle for a talking segment (in which the girl may as well have used Eric’s line from That 70’s Show – “I love cake.”), which kills any momentum the song has. Mini movie videos have their place, and are usually better than the abstract performance type of video. However, having a talking chunk at the front, middle, and end of the video for melodramatic “character development” is somewhat out of place. Not only that, video stations like CMT usually cut those parts out after the first viewing so that they can cram more videos in an hour, so you then lose the effect. A good director and video tells the story within the time frame of the song – hence the term, music video. You’d think that’d be Directing 101… Funny quote from TV show: (At breakfast table, girl to Grandpa, who’s reading the morning newspaper) “So, Grandpa, what’s new in the world today?” “As usual, it’s going to hell in a hand basket.” “Well, it’s nice to have something you can count on.” “It is at that.” And this is just kind of odd…a wearable sleeping bag. I bet that would feel funny…