As ever, there are essentially two kinds of people in the world: Thinkers and Believers. This is a truth, and one that has little to nothing to do with religion, spirituality, education or lack thereof. It's a simple boiling-down of how one ultimately chooses to approach the world: Through a prism of logic, reason and rationality... or through the other thing.Below, a YouTube piece that's been making the rounds courtesy the charmingly-named "MIke Hunt" that intercuts the "Demand A Plan" video - in which various celebrities stumped for new gun legislation...
Monday, 31 December 2012
Sunday, 30 December 2012
This past week, Dr. Michael Eric Dyson had been subbing for Ed Schultz on his MSNBC show - which, for one thing, meant that Ed Schultz otherwise unwatchable show was actually pretty watchable for a change - and offered up one of the more enthusiastic and incisive critiques of Quentin Tarantino's holiday hit (it's currently out-performing "Les Miserables," which NOBODY was expecting) "Django Unchained" and the controversy over Spike Lee's one-man "boycott" of the film, alongside colleague Dr. Eric Peterson.For his trouble, Dr. Dyson...
Friday, 28 December 2012
Thursday, 27 December 2012
Hat tip: BADHey, entertainment industry? Y'know what'd be just great? If something - anything! - could happen between Christmas and New Years so I'd have some content to post between shows other than celebrity deaths and offbeat scoops linked from bigger websites. Just sayin'.Anyway, Badass Digest has posted what is apparently authentic test footage director Alex Zamm put together as a proof-of-concept for a proposed live-action/CGI comedy based on "Hong Kong Phooey" with Eddie Murphy in the lead role. You'll be unsurprised to learn that...
Tuesday, 25 December 2012
Bummer. We lost a legend early this morning: Charles Durning, legendary character actor of stage and screen. You may not know his name, but you've seen him in movies and probably enjoyed him.Durning was one of the great self-made men of modern acting. Born into poverty, he left home of his own accord to ease the financial burden on his mother, traveling and taking odd jobs as he found them. While working as an usher in a burlesque house, he found himself standing in for a no-show stage comic and got bitten by the acting bug. But, before he could...
Friday, 21 December 2012
As ever, there are two kinds of people in the world: Thinkers and believers. I just watched the head of The National Rifle Association - one of the most powerful and influential corporate lobbying groups (though they play at being a citizen's rights outfit for gun owners, of course) in the United States - hold a press conference to say, effectively: Guns don't kill people, video-games and Hollywood kill people.The depressing amusement of the head of The NRA calling anything else a "shadow industry" aside, I'm actually grateful for this kind of...
Thursday, 20 December 2012
Sometimes all you need is a killer premise: In "The Incredible Burt Wonderstone," Steve Carrell is an oldschool Las Vegas stage magician whose status is threatened by Jim Carrey as a David Blaine-esque usurper. Yeah, that could work:If they both ran into Morgan Freeman at one point and he seemed to know both of them, I'd lau...
Wednesday, 19 December 2012
Today, as ever, Quentin Tarantino is - within his medium and within his ability - a hero.As reflexively incensed as I generally get about the "violent media" crusading (particularly when it's raised as a deliberate diversion from the real of what to do about gun violence, as is becoming the case on some ends here) I'm not terribly "worried" about the prospect of anything "bad" happening legislatively in the wake of this. The way "and also video games, and Hollywood" keeps getting dropped in during speeches about gun regulation by both...
For those of you just joining us: It's become a fairly open secret that Michael Bay re-upped with the "Transformers" franchise for at least one more go-around despite openly despising it in order to get Paramount to throw it's weight behind a low-budget ($22 million - that's pennies in Bay and the studios' world) passion project called "Pain & Gain;" a fact-based, likely R-rated action/comedy with Mark Whalberg, Anthony Mackie and The Rock as a trio of dipshit roid-raging Miami bodybuilders who get in over their heads trying...
Tuesday, 18 December 2012
Head's up! "The Game OverThinker" will have it's first independent panel at this year's MAGFest on January 5th at 10:00am. This is my first one of these, so it's going to be straight Q&A format. I'll be out and about at the con itself otherwise from about Friday to Sunday afternoon, in addition. Look forward to seeing any fans the...
Monday, 17 December 2012
Egh. So much for otherwise sitting this one out..."Conservative" astroturfing outfit Breitbart.com doesn't like Jaime Foxx, and definitely don't like that he's the star of Quentin Tarantino's about-to-be-huge slavery-revenge epic "Django Unchained" - a movie they've been trying to "take down" ever since it was announced (for obvious reasons.) They're current tactic? Exploiting the tragedy and Sandy Hooks to attack the film and it's producers over movie violence.Typically, this sort of thing would be ignorable - craven opportunists doing what they...
I really, really, really didn't want to end up having anything to say about the school massacre in Connecticutt beyond "this is terrible and I feel terrible;" but I happened to have the news on this morning and wound up "angry tweeting" about what I was seeing, so now I probably ought to flesh that out a bit.What I was reacting to was this now-ubiquitious monologue by former Republican congressman turned MSNBC host Joe Scarborough saying that he...
Sunday, 16 December 2012
Friday, 14 December 2012
Thursday, 13 December 2012
Latino Review - who've picked up the "rogue nerd-gossip" slack in a major way now that AICN etc have gone a little more legit - have been the go-to guys for scoops on Warner Bros. haphazard scramble to get "Justice League" onscreen, most recently outing Darkseid as the film's apparent (and really kind-of anticlimactic) heavy. Now they've got a new piece of (possible) news: Will Beale's screenplay for the film might be based on a three-issue JLA story-arc from 1980, "Crisis on New Genesis," which involved the League and the Earth-2 Justice...
I unfortunately had to miss this big group sit-down of the Boston Online Film Critics Association with the Post-Movie Podcast, but fortunately for you there's a lot of funny people on here that you probably don't hear from all the time. ENJOY!UPDATE: I will happily report that I was one of the reasons (probably the primary reason, I'd wager, or one of them) that the film that came in at #11 got so close to coming in at #10 - the prospect of which some of the membership found so terrifying. Much as I would've liked to see it land there, I...
Wednesday, 12 December 2012
"G.I. Joe: Retaliation" was supposed to have already come and gone from theaters, but was very publically delayed at the last minute - officially to be re-fitted into 3D, unofficially to exempt Channing Tatum from the "kill everyone from the first one except Snake Eyes so The Rock can be the star" mandate after he surprisingly jumped from beefcake B-lister to bro-comedy icon ("21 Jump Street") and cougar-crowd sex symbol ("Magic Mike") mid-production.Now, with the film getting (slightly) closer to a release, there's a new trailer (yes, in...
Tuesday, 11 December 2012
Things are crazy busy here (and I plan to have more to say on this one soon enough in another context) so you'll forgive me if I don't have much in depth to say on the new Superman trailer beyond... yeah, here's the new Superman trailer:Oh! And here's my final SuperGirl "Big Picture" episode, as well!I'll say this much: I'm not precisely "elated" by any of this, but that's possibly because it's the first trailer for a property like this in awhile that doesn't feel like it's aimed DIRECTLY at "me" demographically and I appreciate that. The whole...
I'm about to head to bed (long day of Holiday work-planning) but it probably means something that this Warner Bros.Viral-Site - which is supposedly a "countdown" timer using Kryptonian alphanumerics - has gone up online as part of a "Man of Steel" ARG promotion. Will we get lucky and get to see the full trailer before it debuts in front of "The Hobbi...
I'm not a tremendous fan of "The Lone Ranger," but having so recently suffered through "Green Lantern" and "The Amazing Spider-Man," my heart breaks with empathy for what Johnny Depp, Gore Verbinski and Disney have in store for them. Holy SHIT, does this look terrible. Cheap self-parody is one thing, but inconsistent and bad cheap self-parody is anoth...
Monday, 10 December 2012
Improbably, M. Night Shyamalan is out of Movie Jail again. Here's the trailer for his latest project, "After Earth," a Will & Jaden Smith team-up project in which the two play a spacefaring father and son who wind up stranded on a post-apocalyptic Earth that has reverted to a neo-prehistoric state (he wouldn't have it turn out to actually be the past with Jaden as The Intelligent Designer... would h...
Saturday, 8 December 2012
The Boston Online Film Critics Association, of which I am a member, has voted on it's innaugural year-end awards. The big winner is "Zero Dark Thirty," taking Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actress. Daniel Day Lewis gets Best Actor for "Lincoln." Go here for the full roster of winners and the "Top Ten" list that "ZDT" topped to win.Since someone is going to ask, I can tell you that three out of the four acting categories match my personal picks (everybody got three ranked picks per category save for Best Picture which...
Friday, 7 December 2012
Thursday, 6 December 2012
I was not an enthusiastic fan of JJ Abrams' "Star Trek" reboot. It was good... just not especially good. Passable. Decent. Not-unwatchable. Might've been better if Chris Pine were capable of displaying a recognizable human emotion beyond vague self-satisfaction.Anyway, here's the trailer for the sequel, "Star Trek Into Darkness" (no, I didn't forget the colon, they did) which doesn't really reveal what everyone wanted it to reveal, i.e. the identity of Benedict Cumberbatch's villain. Everyone has been assuming he's Khan, which would be an...
Wednesday, 5 December 2012
"Tron: Legacy," like "John Carter," was a project that (barely) made it to screens before Disney decided to cut off their plans to take over the "boy market" (their words) with their own genre properties and instead just buy Marvel and Star Wars' catalogue. Both films got a mixed reception from critics and audiences, but "Tron" at least made money... though for awhile it seemed like not enough to justify a planned new set of sequels.Apparently, that's changed. According to the Hollywood Reporter, the project is back on with director Joseph...
I really want to still like Johnny Depp. Good actor (most of the time) and seems like a decent guy. I don't even mind that he's evidently decided to just keep riding the "offbeat actor being weird in bloated franchise epics"gravy train, really... just that he keeps doing such a terrible job of it. "Dark Shadows" didn't work, "Pirates 4" was godawful, "Lone Ranger" looks like a disaster, etc.That said... if ever there was a symbol to summarize just how much Depp's career/image/persona has "turned around" in my eyes, singing up for another big, comfy...
Cinema Salem is a great little outfit in Salem, MA that brings not only major releases to it's screens but indie, arthouse and foriegn features to a local, downtown movie scene. These are the good guys, and like many others they are in danger of being left behind in the push to convert to digital. They've started a Kickstarter to help get themselves secure for the Digital Future, I've already backed them, and in the spirit of The Holidays I'm asking any of my fans (local or otherwise) who're in the giving/seasonal mood to think about kicking in...
I tend to be high-strung and on-edge during the holidays for a number of reasons, but I'm actually quite fond of American Christmas - aka the modern holiday of commercial consumption (presided over by neo-pagan deity figures like Santa, Rudolph and Frosty) that has about as much in common with the Christian holiday it grew out of as that holiday itself had in common with the pagan seasonal celebrations it originally co-opted. Hence, stuff like this tickles me.Loathe as I am to link to batshit-insane, racist, homophobic birther "news" site WorldNetDaily,...
Tuesday, 4 December 2012
Monday, 3 December 2012
I really like the idea behind the newest "Man of Steel" poster, which depicts Superman being led away in handcuffs by soldiers - a scene already glimpsed in the Comic-Con footage shown earlier this year - in as much as it feels like a modern version of Silver Age DC cover, which typically presented an out-of-context "WTF?" scenario (aka the stuff 'Superdickery' has been archiving, basically) that begged you to read it just to...
Sunday, 2 December 2012
Uh-oh.Warner Bros. cannot catch a break in their awkward dash to get "Justice League" onto the big screen for 2015. They already faced having to open the pic in the same relative space as "Avengers 2," and then found out that they'll also be contending with "Star Wars: Episode VII." All of this, of course, comes on top of the fact that the whole project is hinging on "The Man of Steel" doing the kind of business (and audience word-of-mouth) that no DC superhero not named Batman has done in the 30+ years between "Superman II" and right now.Now,...
This is of interest to me, it may be of interest to you.In what are easily two of the most socially and historically significant changes to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (aka "DSM" - the leading though not exclusive manual by which professional psychiatry diagnoses and classifies patients) since the publication removed Homosexuality from the list of mental-disorders two decades ago; a major change has been made to the guidelines for diagnosing the Autism Spectrum that effectively removes Asperger's Syndrome as a...
Friday, 30 November 2012
Thursday, 29 November 2012
Wednesday, 28 November 2012
UPDATED: Gunn has responded, clarified and effectively apologized on his Facebook page.ORIGINAL POST: I'm the first one to say/admit that "it was just a joke!" is more often than not a cheap dodge to get out of being called on saying something racist/sexist/etc; but the thing is... yes, there are times when I think that people go a little overboard being offended by dark/sleazy/sophmoric humor, often involving things being taken out of context - particularly in cases where the joke is at least in-part supposed to be on the teller (re: "look...
Tuesday, 27 November 2012
Monday, 26 November 2012
Short version: HitFix's Drew McWeeny says that Warner Bros. is inching towards making a move that could kneecap their still-shaky "Justice League" project before it even gets off the ground. Long version? Read on...I find myself the odd man out when it comes to the production of "The Man of Steel." The general thread that runs through a lot of the film-geek press regarding the production is that it's in constant peril of being "ruined" by the presence of Zack Snyder as director, and that we are to take comfort in the presence of producer/story-approver...
Friday, 23 November 2012
Tuesday, 20 November 2012
Well, that's that, then.Just over a week since the first man who accused Elmo puppeteer Kevin Clash of engaging him in an "innapropriate relationship" as a teenager recanted, a second accusation has arisen with implications that more are on the way. Citing that his personal life has become a "distraction," Clash has resigned from Sesame Workshop as of today.Sad day for kids everywhere. Ironically, until the documentary "Being Elmo" last year, Clash was as anonymous as most other muppet performers, meaning that - since Sesame Workshop has confirmed...
Saturday, 17 November 2012
What if "Harry Potter" and "Twilight" made a baby? Well, previously I'd have had to say that Harry Potter would play more like early-period Chris Claremont "X-Men" than it already does... but now I guess the more apt answer would simply be "The Mortal Instruments."I'd managed to be largely unaware of this most-recent YA Fiction phenomenon until just now, outside of the fact that it existed and that it was considered vaugely controversial for reasons I never bothered to look up, but it's yet another success story for a onetime...
Friday, 16 November 2012
Thursday, 15 November 2012
By all means, feel free to share around: The upside to being Kristen Stewart in the "Twilight" movies has always been that, since Bella never gets to do anything, she's thus far been spared any truly humiliating footage that will follow her around - unlike poor Taylor Lautner, who will still be associated with "Jacob is unhappy with his mail" when he's in his 70s.All that changes within the first few minutes of "Breaking Dawn: Part II," however...
Wednesday, 14 November 2012
Sam Raimi's "Oz: The Great and Powerful," is officially a non-canonical prequel to Baum's original "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz;" but from the brand-new full trailer it's very apparent that they want audiences to take it as a prequel to the classic MGM film: Here's Oz as you (and your parents, and their parents...) grew up with it - right down to the black-and-white 'real world' - but now even bigger and realized with state-of-the-art FX and 3D cinematography.Given that, the powerful place the MGM "Oz" has in the cultural memories...
Tuesday, 13 November 2012
The New York Times reports that the yet-unnamed man who alleged that he'd engaged in innapropriate relationship while underage with Elmo voice/puppeteer Kevin Clash has recanted his accusations through his attorney.Good news for Clash, certainly, and it's done with quickly enough that the scandal didn't quite go irreparably memetic; but I get the sense Sesame Workshop is probably still going to dial it back on Elmo for just a bit. Still sucks, but could've shaken out a lot wor...
UPDATE: Owing to an error on my part, a bunch of comments that should've gone through got dumped into moderation. Should be fixed now, learning curves and all that.Assuming all the coding works out, this post and all others for the forseeable future will be running on a new commenting system called "Intense Debate," which I'm going to assume most web users are familiar with by now. This decision was made because it allows for last-resort measures such as banning IPs, usernames and emails from trolls, spammers, threadjackers and other abusive behaviors...
Monday, 12 November 2012
I'm just over the line of too old to have ever had any kind of serious affection for Elmo, as he wasn't the "big thing" on Sesame Street until years after I was too old to be watching. Never the less, my heart is breaking for the GenY folks who now have to go through this: Kevin Clash, the performer who has puppeteered and voiced the character since 1984 (recently the subject of the well-recieved documentary "Being Elmo"), has taken voluntary leave from the series in order to defend himself from allegations of an innapropriate relationship...
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