It is an absolutely TERRIBLE title for a movie. I know, it's based on a true story, and it's the name of the horse. Blah, blah blah. Name it something else anyways. Beyond that however, this was a very good movie. Not great, mind you, but good. The acting was first rate...I love Jeff Bridges. "The Dude" was in fine form. I've never really liked Tobey Maguire, but he was pretty passable. And after his unexpected Oscar, Chris Cooper still continues to impress. I thought the dialogue was just ok, and the plot, since based on a true story, was not fantastic, but solid. I really liked what they did with the material, however. This could have been some ho-hum story about self-made men, the Depression, horse-racing, or even losing a child...but it wasn't. It was about second chances, and good friends making us better, a theme that fit all of that other material I mentioned to a tee. How it tied it all together was wonderful. And sure, it might have been a bit long, and they might have glossed over the subject of gambling, but so what? It was heartwarming, and built tension EXTREMELY well. And the camera shots of the horse racing were second to none. Breathtaking. All in all, this looks like the first Oscar contender of the year, and will be a sleeper hit at the box office, I predict. I would rank it as not quite as much fun as Pirates, T3, or Matrix, but a better movie. Among all the special f/x, trash, and typical Hollywood crap, I highly recommend this movie.
If you want to be the most popular person in your class, whenever the professor pauses in his lecture, just let out a big snort and say "How do you figger that!" real loud. Then lean back and sort of smirk.
Wow, my blog has been pathetic lately. Sorry, folks. I guess it's the combination of being on vacation (and being a bum) with not having any money, so not being able to do anything interesting to blog about. But last night was an exception. A bunch of us went to Bennigan's for karaoke. It was a lot of fun. I didn't sing anything, but I just went there to watch everyone else, which is the true beauty of karaoke. Highlights? There were several. I'm not sure which took the cake. Was it Booth's rendition of Rockin' in the Suburbs, in which he stuck his mike out for us to fill in the profanity? Or perhaps the two black guys, singin' their lungs out, and all of us laughing with a mixture of admiration, and utter hilarity? My personal favorite was sitting near Robbie and hearing him scream/sing (in tune!) every word to every song he knew, right along with each person doing the actual karaoke. That mixed with four or five slightly tipsy gals, getting up to groove to Tone Loc's Funky Comandina, makes for a good time had by all.
Perhaps, if I am very lucky, the feeble efforts of my lifetime will someday be noticed, and maybe, in some small way, they will be acknowledged as the greatest works of genius ever created by Man.
Instead of studying for finals, what about just going to the Bahamas and catching some rays? Maybe you'll flunk, but you might have flunked anyway; that's my point.
I wish I had a dollar for every time I spent a dollar, because then, Yahoo!, I'd have all my money back.
Christin has a very good post about DMB, so you can go see that. But I am going to blog about it as well. As everyone by now knows, we saw them in Dallas on Friday night. The trip there and back was uneventful. The concert was great. Lacey and I were sitting up high as well, but in a different section from the rest of our crowd. We didn't have to deal with drunk frat guys. Anyways, back to the concert. Musically, the guys were totally on form, and that has always been what I appreciate about them the most. Boyd was kickin', Leroi was varied and brilliant, Stefan grooved, Carter rocked like nobody's business, and Dave was dancing like a fiend. I also thought the setlist was fantastic. I had never heard Crush done live, so that was a treat. And they brought out some classics that they RARELY do live, such as Pay for what you get, and Minarets. I was excited about hearing those. But it didn't get any better than Friday's particular rendition of Ants Marching...it was wonderful. They also rocked on Grey Street and Watchtower. All in all, it wasn't the best DMB concert I've ever been to, but hey, I've seen them 5 times. It was well worth it, and a great time.
So yeah, I take things for granted. Like Air-Conditioning for instance. Do you ever sit in a cool room and think: "I am so grateful for the heat and humidity vanishing from this room"? I do. That is because last weekend, and again Sunday, the A/C in my apartment has gone out. And it has changed my whole life. I can't sleep or hang out at my place. Plans change, sleep declines...and I'm supposed to be on vacation! So when the idiot guys finally fix my A/C, I will not let there be one evening where I don't say a little prayer for the wonderfully cool air filtering from my vents.
Somebody told me how frightening it was how much topsoil we are losing each year, but I told that story around the campfire and nobody got scared.
Ok, if you didn't know already, Mel Gibson is making a movie about the last hours (day?) of the life of Jesus. A devout Catholic, he is attempting to show onscreen just how much suffering our Savior went through in His death. It is entirely in Latin and Aramaic with no subtitles. I just saw the first teaser trailer for the movie today and....wow. I cried, I'm not ashamed to admit it. It looks incredibly moving. AND THAT WAS JUST THE TEASER! The question is, will I see it? Should I see it? First of all, it is being made by a Roman-Catholic, so think of the potential problems. But let's give Mel the benefit of the doubt, and assume that he gets it ALL right (from the Gospels). Would seeing this movie be breaking the second commandment? I will say that I am very skeptical and hesitant to see this movie because of that...but is the movie showing merely Christ's HUMANITY, and not his DEITY and therefore not a violation of the 2nd? I really want some advice/discussion on this matter, because I'm not sure what I think yet. I'm torn. So any advice/comments/discussion, etc. would be greatly appreciated.
If I was the head of a country that lost a war, and I had to sign a peace treaty, just as I was signing, I'd glance over the treaty and then suddenly act surprised. "Wait a minute! I thought we won!"
For mad scientists who keep brains in jars, here's a tip: why not add a slice of lemon to each jar, for freshness?
Well, I saw two more movies this past week(end). First, Pirates of the Caribbean on Friday. Callie has a very good review of this movie on her blog, so I won't go into much detail. Suffice to say that this was one of the best movies of the summer thus far. It was a LOT of fun. Johnny Depp is hilarious, and Orlando Bloom continues to kick butt, even when he's not Legolas. The sets, costumes, skeletons, everything was very stylish and cool, and the sword-fighting, while not LOTR, was very entertaining. I highly recommend this movie.
The second movie was Finding Nemo. It took me a while to see this, but it was well worth the wait. I have always enjoyed the Pixar movies, and this was no exception. It was beautiful to watch (the f/x were amazing), as I have always been fascinated by the depths of the oceans. It also had a good bit of humor for both children and adults (I laughed quite a bit), and it had a good message about parent/child relationships. Finally, the father (after a rough beginning) is the hero, and someone to be looked up to and loved by his kids. This is not a common theme for Disney movies, so I was pleasantly surprised to see it here. Again, nothing spectacular or anything (no Oscars here), but good clean fun for the whole family.
Consider the daffodil. And while you're doing that, I'll be over here, looking through your stuff.
If you go to a costume party at your boss's house, wouldn't you think a good costume would be to dress up like the boss's wife? Trust me, it's not.
One thing vampire children have to be taught early on is, don't run with a wooden stake.
"Pearl Jam will play an extra hour-long set prior to opening act Sleater-Kinney at its show Friday (July 11) outside Boston. It's the third of three non-consecutive performances at the Tweeter Center in Mansfield, Mass., during which Pearl Jam is attempting to play each of the nearly 100 songs in its current repertoire without repeats.
At the first two shows last week, the Eddie Vedder-led group was restricted to a total of 50 songs due to an area noise curfew. According to a source, the additional Friday set will likely be a more stripped-down affair than usual, potentially allowing for revamped versions of rarely played tracks from Pearl Jam's vast back catalog."
Update:
They did it. After Friday's show, in which Pearl Jam played an unprecedented 47 songs, without repeats, they had played their entire catalogue in the three shows in Mansfield. If you have ever been a Pearl Jam fan, I urge you to go to tenclub.net and order the bootleg of this show (Friday, July 11th). It will most likely be 3-4 CD's, and have 47 songs on it (12 of which are unplugged/acoustic), and you can get it for under 20 bucks including S&H. It is magnificent.
What have I been listening to lately? Pretty much a smattering of everything. Besides the usual (DMB --- Busted Stuff), the unusual (everything Radiohead...I am addicted to their new album, Hail to the Thief...it is fantastic), and the classical (Mozart was the king), I made a couple of CD's for my recent road trip to Indiana with Lacey. My inspiration was two places. One, my good friend Jill Fagan, who always makes tapes for her road trips. I always thought that was a great idea. The second is Cameron Crowe. When he was young, he decided to start making a mixed tape for each month, of music that he was listening to. That way, he can go back and see what he was listening to at a particular time in his life. That guy is a genius, not just because he wrote for Rolling Stone at age 15, or that he has done classic movies like Jerry Maguire and Fast Times at Ridgemont High, but because he had ideas like this. Anyways, my two road trip CD's incorporated both ideas, and are quite good, if I do say so myself.
If you ever crawl inside an old hollow log and go to sleep, and while you're in there some guys come and seal up both ends and then put it on a truck and take it to another city, boy, I don't know what to tell you.
I hope that someday we will be able to put away our fears and prejudices and just laugh at people.
I have now seen T3 twice now, once on Wednesday when it opened, with Matt and Jordan, and once with my family on Saturday. I was pretty worried about it, being a HUGE T2 fan, and knowing that James Cameron had nothing to do with it. So my expectations were admittedly low. But it turned out to be very good! It was funny (more of Arnold's one-liners, and very audience-friendly dialogue, peppered with references to the first two movies), action-packed (the f/x were great), enjoyable, and had a very good ending. All in all, it was no T2, but well worth the admission price...twice.
Well, it's been a while, and I know you all missed me (yeah, right). Lacey and I went to Indiana over the extended weekend to visit my family. We had a great time. We saw the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra play patriotic tunes outside on Friday, saw Terminator 3 (more later) and visited on Saturday, and then had church and more visiting on Sunday. That, along with a whole lot of my mother's famous cooking (mmmmm) I'm sad to be back at work, but happy to be back amongst y'all, blogging once again.
Broken promises don't upset me. I just think, why did they believe me?
Matt, Thomas, Emily, Jordan and I went to see Danny Boyle's (Trainspotting, Shallow Grave) new movie, a horror/zombie flick called 28 Days Later, last night. Usually, I hate horror movies. But this one was very well done. It is a British movie, and certainly not for the faint of heart, but tension was built well, the acting was fair, the plot not too ridiculous, and there were some truly creepy moments. The zombies were actually scary, which is uncommon amongst your normal horror flicks, where the monsters are usually just stupid. The shots of a downtown London absolutely empty (reminiscent of NY City in Vanilla Sky) are breathtaking, and almost worth the admission price by themselves.As Jordan said, "I wouldn't buy it, but...", I really enjoyed the movie.
As a young boy, when you get splashed by a mud puddle on the way to school, you wonder if you should go home and change, but be late for school, or go to school the way you are; dirty and soaking wet. Well, while he tried to decide, I drove by and splashed him again.