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January 29, 2005
Ideal
I feel like I have been dropping the ball on the MtC blog but I haven't been to any movies lately. I haven't read any books lately. I haven't heard any new good music lately.
I have downloaded and watched the first three episodes of a new BBC3 comedy called "Ideal" or "I Deal" depending how you look at it. If you happen to be reading this in England, then you can watch it on the telly but if you are like me, you have to use your mad 1337 interweb skillz.
Ideal is the story of Moz, an English drug dealer. The comedy takes place entirely in his apartment and concerns his life and those he deals to. He is having trouble with his live-in girlfriend, infatuated with a college student named China who said in the second episode "You know if I slept with you it would only be out of pity." Moz's reply "What are we waiting for then?"
The oddest character is Cartoon Head, a hitman who wears a mouse mask who may be responsible for the series of murders in the neighborhood. There is also a subplot of a new dealer two streets over who is getting all the good stuff.
I have the first three on DVD. If you are in Athens and want to watch, I'll lend it to you. Otherwise, you better boot up your bittorent client and get to the downloading.
Link: BBC - BBC THREE - I Deal
Posted by chip at 02:40 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
January 26, 2005
Hudsucker Proxy
Watched Hudsucker Proxy last night and really enjoyed it. It's not for everyone, but for a Coen brothers movie, it's pretty accessible. It's very stylized, pays homage to an earlier sort of movie. My favorite part was Jennifer Jason Leigh as the fast-talking hard-driving female reporter. The dialogue is fun, clever and fast, the sort of thing you could watch over and over and always enjoy and find something else in. Seems like it would be a fun script to read. But then you'd miss out on Leigh's accent.
Posted by courtney at 07:16 PM | TrackBack
January 25, 2005
3 Moviesin 3 Days
So maybe this says a little about my priorities right now, but I have seen a movie a day for the last three days. I have really procrastinated the real work in my life, but the movies have been worthwhile.
On Saturday, I watched Wicker Park with Brad. We both enjoyed it. I have heard it described as "edgy." I would have to agree. I was a little confused by the setting switches after it was all said and done; however, I think I would even watch it again.
Sunday was not only football, but tennis time at my house. I watched Wimbeldon. Loved it. Yes, it is a girl flick, but it has lots to offer the boys too. Kirsten Dunst I love!
Monday night started with dinner at Hannah's house, but then I met up with Daniel to see Ray. I was a little tipsy when I got there, but I thought that the excitement wore off after awhile. The movie and music was great overall, but I think it was a little lengthy. Maybe I was upset my buzz didn't last the whole 2 hours and 45 minutes, but more likely I think that there were a couple of parts that dragged. Enjoyed it though.
3 for 3 ain't bad!
Posted by jocelyn at 12:25 AM | TrackBack
January 18, 2005
America the Book
I thought this book was quite amusing. I loved how it was a fake textbook right down to the lines for the names in the front.
Apparently, not everyone thought Jon Stewart was so funny. Read the CNN article about its banning here.
Thanks big sis for the heads up.
Posted by jocelyn at 03:24 AM | TrackBack
January 17, 2005
"In Good Company"
2nd movie of 2005.
Kate, Hannah, and I went to see Topher, Dennis, and Scarlett.
Carter (Topher) is the new 26-year old boss of 51-year old Dan (Dennis). Carter ends up meeting and eventually dating Alex (Scarlett), the daughter of Dan. The movie focuses a little less on the love story between Carter and Alex than the previews would lead you to believe. It's almost more of a like story between Carter and Dan as they both come to terms with their changing lives.
It's one of the two best movies I have seen this year. It's cute. The actors are decent. Better as a matinee. That's all I have to say on the subject.
Posted by chip at 04:55 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
January 15, 2005
"Battlestar Galactica" - the new series
The new Battlestar Galactica premiered last night on the SciFi channel. This is Ron Moore's "reimagining" of the original 1970s television series. The premise is that there are only 47,000 civilians on a handful of spaceships and one aging military spaceship (the Battlestar Galactica) that survived a Cylon attack on the homeworld and colonies. These were the people already in space during the attack, basically.
They can't go home because home is no longer there. I think they are trying to get back to this place called "Earth" from their stories but I may be getting that confused with the original story. They are flying through space with a lack of supplies, constant threat of attack, and no sense of how long it will take to get where they are going. During the first five days after the attack, the caravan of ships was found by the cylons every 33 minutes. They had to "jump" to a new sector 238 times in a row. Every 33 minutes. We start off the new series with everyone really tired and extremely irritated.
It differs from the original series in the character development and type of stories. One of the plotlines concerns the new President and how she is adapting. She was Secretary of Education until everybody ahead of her in the line of succession died during the attack. There are people trying to find lost family members, an Admiral who was at the end of his career thrust into this new world with six carefully marked out shots of whisky left for the rest of his life, there is a scientist influenced by Cylons, and a sleeper Cylon agent on the Galactica.
It is shot with that whole handheld camera kind of thing which is odd for an sci-fi show but it ends up working.
I'm a geek. I'll keep watching it. What else do I have to do Fridays at 10:00?
SciFi Channel Galactica Website
Posted by chip at 07:08 AM | TrackBack
January 13, 2005
Marnie
Marnie is a classic Hitchcock. Beautiful and suspenseful. See it.
The story is of a woman (Tippi Hedren) who is an accomplished thief, who gains her bosses' trust then robs them blind and moves on. You see she clearly has suffered some psychological trauma--you don't know what, but she goes beserk when she sees red, sees lightning, or is awakened by tapping. She applies for a job at Mark Rutland's place, and he (Sean Connery) recognizes her from her previous employer, knows she robbed that employer, and intrigued, hires her 
and watches to see what she does. He calls her in to work one Saturday, and while there she is clearly terrified by lightning out the window, and he goes to comfort her and falls for her. Then the storm sends a tree branch crashing through a huge glass window. This very subtle symbolism is the heart of the story, a big masculine branch breaking through the fragility and frigidity of this woman. (There's even a rape scene--eek--more on this in a minute.) Anyway, Mark becomes obsessed with discovering what traumatized Marnie. Eventually she tries to steal from him as well, he catches her, then essentially holds her prisoner, threatening to turn her over to police if she won't marry him. What a deslightful man.
Marnie decides marriage is not quite as bad as prison, and on their honeymoon, Rutland discovers she is "frigid." She is disgusted by the touch of a man. (She TOLD you she didn't want to marry you, fool. She's clearly disturbed in many ways. You only forced her to marry you by threats, it wasn't love, remember?!) He is "patient" for a long time, until one night, despite her terror, he consumates their marriage. Actually, when I first saw it, I didn't think it had gone that far. I thought he'd had remorse for pulling off her gown, because he wrapped her up in his robe and apologized, then laid her down on the bed, then smiled over her. It does imply something progressed from there, but I just couldn't believe he'd rape such a terrified woman. How are you supposed to not hate the character after that? Later, when watching one of the DVD features, I learned it *was* in fact a rape, that Hitch fired a screenplay writer who tried to remove the scene. Marnie's suicide attempt that follows is a direct result of the rape, but in my unwillingness to believe, I thought it was due to her being tired of being held prisoner and her usual overwhelming psych trauma.
Despite this, it's a movie worth seeing. Ultimately Marnie and the audience and Rutland discover what exactly happened that causes her so much fear and woe, and you get a sense she will now start to recover and have a seminormal life. She decides willingly to go back with Rutland, saying again that she'd rather go back with him than go to prison. A lovely love story.
It is so bizarre that Rutland, from an established Philadelphia family, has a Sean Connery accent. And his father has none. Weird, but you soon forget about it and just go with it.
Also, originally Grace Kelly was going to play Marnie, but because of unrest in Monacco, her husband said it was a bad idea. Tippi Hedren is great, but what could it have been with Grace Kelly?
Posted by courtney at 01:17 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
January 11, 2005
"The Aviatar"
I made it to my first theatre movie of the year on Sunday. Hannah, Ashley E., and Kate went to see the new Leo movie. OK, Howard Hughes was a crazy crazy rich rich man. I would probably trade in some of my sanity for some of his money.
The movie focused on the 1930s-1940s Howard Hughes. Leonardo did a good job as Howard and I thought Cate Blanchett did good job as Katharine Hepburn although her accent bothered me. It was authentic, it just bothered me.
The movie was very long. It never quite got boring but it would get very slow and then something cool would happen. Of course, we saw it with a bunch of old people who would NOT SHUT UP during the film prompting people to yell for them to be quiet so it was a pretty crappy viewing environment.
It was good but I didn't think it was great.
Posted by chip at 06:49 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
January 09, 2005
"Zoey 101"
We have been given a chance to make right what once went wrong.
Remember back before the Red Bull, Kaballah, and grocery store feet when Britney Spears was kind of this cute kid? That's what Jamie Lynn Spears is. It's like looking into a time machine. What we can do is not let this one go crazy. We need to help Jamie Lynn know that you CAN take the Kentwood out of the girl. Write her a letter. Let her know you are out there.
But, this has nothing to do with Jamie Lynn's new Nick TV show "Zoey 101". Z101 is about a boarding school next to the beach that has just admitted girls for the first time. Episode 1 has Zoey trying out for the boys basketball team and decorating a urinal.
It's directed by Savage Steve Holland who I have always liked since Better Off Dead and Onc Crazy Summer.
I can give you no compelling reason why you should watch this show.
Posted by chip at 09:45 PM | Comments (201) | TrackBack
January 08, 2005
"life as we know it"
I'm laying on the couch watching this week's episode and I realized I really like this show. There is something weird about it that I haven't been able to put my finger on yet. It's based on a teen novel from the UK called "Doing It" which is floating around my house somewhere. It seems a lot like "My So-Called Life" with the focus on three boys and three girls (and parents) instead of just Angela.
Boywise: One of them was involved with a teacher and is dealing with that. One's parents are getting divorced and he is having relationship and sexual issues and the other guy is dating a girl he likes but she's Kelly Osborne so he has that to deal with.
Girlwise: One of them is a beautiful jock who is realizing that people don't like her and think she is stuck up and she just broke up with her boyfriend. One is smart and pretty and likes a boy who was sleeping with a teacher. She has a rep of a girl who has slept around but really hasn't. And one of them has self esteem issues and is Kelly Osborne so she has that to deal with.
Peter Dinklage from The Station Agent was on this episode as a counseler to help Dino after he punched someone.
As teen dramas go, this was is much more like DeGrassi or MSCL than Dawson's or the O.C. I think it's Thursdays at 8 on ABC but you should check your local listings and all of that.
Posted by chip at 09:34 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Napoleon Dynamite
With a name like Napoleon Dynamite, well, obviously this movie is great. Strange, awkward, funny, amazing visuals that are mostly hideous/sublime eighties influenced, though it is supposed to take place in present time.
The basic idea is that Napoleon is this strange awkward slack-jawed kid who considers himself pretty badass. (Although he lacks "skills.") He's very angsty in his own way: the first dialogue in the movie is
Kid on bus: Hey Napoleon, what are you going to do today?
Napoleon: (Defiantly) Whatever I want to do. (Angrily) Gosh!
You just have to see it to appreciate it, I suppose, the way Napoleon turns his head so exasperated by the question. What he does do, by the way, is put an action figure with a long string tied to it out the bus window and drag it behind.
There are many other quirky characters, including Napoleon's love interest, the girl who takes her job as a glamour shot photographer very very seriously, and Napoleon's even geekier and skinnier older brother (or cousin?) who chats online with his girlfriend Lafawndah all day and imagines himself a ninja, and Napoleon's best friend, Pedro, whose head grows hotter and hotter until he shaves his head then requires a very unconvincing wig.
I am in love with Napoleon.
Posted by courtney at 12:44 AM | TrackBack
January 07, 2005
Committed
Wow. This show sucks.
Keith keeps telling me to give it a minute, but I'm pretty sure I'm on SUCK, as far as the love-of-the-show meter is concerned. Yeah. It's pegged at SUCK. Tom Poston, did you JUST throw a pie into your own face because an old friend from clown college sent it to you?
Oh, and jokes about the physically disabled are always funny. "We got off on the wrong foot." (To the guy in the wheelchair.) "I don't want there to be any bad blood." (Reply: "I got some bad blood once. It was supposed to regenerate my spinal tissue.") Oh, and now with the, "Why must I be able to play basketball? Because I'm Black?" joke. Wow. That's just always comedy.
Way to go NBC. Refuse to bring Significant Others over from Bravo, which would've given it a chance beyond two short seasons, but give this dreck a slot during Must See TV. Or can we even use THAT phrase anymore?
Posted by bonnie at 12:06 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
January 03, 2005
The Human Stain
Anthony Hopkins and Nicole Kidman in very interesting roles. I would rate this one a 8 out of 10. There are definitely skookum scenes, but I don't know if everyone will love it. If you have read the book, please tell me if it is better or worse.
Posted by jocelyn at 10:07 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
"Please Describe Yourself" by Dogs Die in Hot Cars
Allmusic
Purchase: iTunes, Amazon
New favorite album. Dogs Die in Hot Cars is a Scottish indie rock band. There is a bit of a ska feel and they remind me a lot of XTC and all those 80s bands I liked back in the day. It's pretty catchy and I'm listening to it way too much right now.
Listen to the first track and let me know what you think:
"I Love You Cause I Have To"
Posted by chip at 09:29 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
"Shadow Puppets" by Orson Scott Card
I'm getting a little burned out on the Orson Scott Card. This is good since I have finished all of the published Ender books. A new one comes out in March.
This book is hardly science fiction. I guess the term these days is speculative fiction. Basically, the gist of this book is that the graduates from Battle School are all in important military tactical positions after the battle with the Buggers. China has taken over India and all of the Asian countries and it is up to our kids to help defeat China.
Blah blah blah.
Posted by chip at 09:20 PM | TrackBack
January 02, 2005
Pieces of April
Just watched Pieces of April, which was recommended to me by my cousin's husband the Presbyterian minister. He was right. It's a movie about a girl who is sort of the black sheep of her family, and she's having her family over for Thanksgiving. Her oven isn't working, so chaos ensues as she tries to enlist the help of neighbors in her apartment building. It's funny, but also sad and moving without being sappy. Very real. And it stars Katie Holmes, which I know means a lot to Chip and perhaps others on Spynotebook.
(Sorry Chip, don't know how to upload pictures yet. Maybe someday I'll catch up.)
Posted by courtney at 11:07 PM | TrackBack
Eats, Shoots & Leaves
I know everyone read Lynne Truss' book Eats, Shoots & Leaves in 2004 and I finally finished reading the book that I started in June this past week. I had dusted off Strunk and White's The Elements of Style in preparation for writing my third book (I always like to be sure I'm NOT *as* rusty when I start a book) and that inspired me to read something a little more current. Ah, yes. What better than Eats, Shoots & Leaves to get me in gear?
Well, if I could've stopped editing her book for mistakes that I found (and wondering how many of them were US vs. UK usage issues), I'm sure I'd have enjoyed it more. What did I find online today (and not even looking for it, truly--it was just a link in a friend's blog)?
Richard Jenkyns' wonderful article on The Mother Tongue. In it, he refers to Louis Menand's New Yorker review of Eats, Shoots & Leaves.
He began by observing that Truss's first punctuation mistake comes in her dedication and found many more errors and inconsistencies, as well as poor argument.
That's my kind of guy!
Anyway, fun book, if not 100% accurate for my needs. Do the punctuation game on the author's book site for fun. And leave it at that.
Posted by bonnie at 02:21 AM | TrackBack
January 01, 2005
What? No Wheat?
This is a lighthearted book about Celiac Disease, wheat allergies, and gluten sensitivities of all kind. Having recently begun a gluten-free diet, I am reading quite a few books on the subject. Most of them are so overloaded with medical studies, overly-specific testimonials, and complicated recipes that they have intimidated me, starting out.
If you or someone you know suffers from a wheat allergy, I suggest that you start with What? No Wheat? by LynnRae Ries and then move on to the "big boy" books on the subject in order to become an expert on this health issue.
Posted by bonnie at 09:34 PM | TrackBack
The Office: Series One
People have been telling me how funny this show is so I finally got around to renting the first season. I had seen some on TV and thought it was sort of funny but only so-so.
I was wrong. It's really really funny. The weird thing is that it is the type of humor that usually really bothers me. It's really uncomfortable watching David Brent make an ass of himself at almost every chance he gets. The interaction between Tim and Gareth is hilarious and the interactions between Tim and Dawn are like watching a train wreck.
If you rent it, you need to actually watch it. I am very bad about multi-tasking (reading and computing while watching) and I think I would have missed stuff. Series 2 is hopefully in the mail.