Friday, February 26, 2010

it's melting, it's melting!

As the snow withers away, and my internal sleep schedule continually wakes me up at 3:30 on the nose ... ugh ... I'm watching lots of Olympics! I love that NBC has Olympics on at least one channel 24/7 ... but I'm also watching other things too.

Watched Judgement at Nuremburg .. in HD, btw ... and it was SPECTACULAR. What a film ...
what
a
film

the politics abounding in the film aside. One can debate those forever, but the performances. Seriously ... Montgomery Clift .. sigh ... just love him and I wish he could get the recognition he so deeply deserves. Judy Garland ... wow, best performance of her career ... Tracy .. Dietrich ... Schell ... Widmark ... Lancaster .. shoot, even William Shatner!!!! It's an intense 3+ hour film and it is timeless. I guess I'd have to say that my favorite performance was by Clift, but I'm biased too. You can tell how sick he is, in real life. It was one of his last films. I have to wonder if Tarantino challed Stanley Kramer when he was writing Inglorious Basterds.

I've been watching the show The Middle and I have a big issue with it.

Ok, it's really really funny, well written and the kids are the reason to watch the show. The Dad is played by the janitor from scrubs and he's about 10 feet tall and the wife is played by the wife from Everyone Loves Raymond and she's about 3 feet tall, so that's funny right there. The kids are all nuts. Oldest son runs around in boxer shorts, middle daughter is a loveable loser and the youngest, named for a building product, is strange, but in a good way. The storylines are always funny, the acting is good. But here's the issue ... this series is supposed to take place in southern Indiana. The dad works in a quarry, the mom sells cars. They are also several generational residents of this small southern indiana town. The parents have WisCANsin accents! Nobody has any hint of a ketuckiana drawl that most native southern indiana folks have. Oh wait .. there was one character who had a ketuckiana drawl ... a guest character played by Brooke Shields, who was a ... skanky, to say the least, white trash, probably drunk and drug addled neighbor who's equally gross boys terrorize the neighbors .. who are also winCANsin accented. No, the white trash lady has a wonderful southern drawl!!!! Really???? That's just really demeaning to those of us who live in southern indiana ... accented or not. I don't know if there are any writers from indiana on this show. I'm going to hope not because if there are ... shame on them for depicting southern indiana people is such a derogatory (Brooke Shields) and unrealistic (the family and neighbors) way.

Monday, February 15, 2010

snow snow snow

Well it looks like we are getting our annual mega dump of snow ...


poor birds:










At least I have the Olympics to keep me warm. Ahhhhhhh, I'm so glad that I only have to wait for 2 years to get my Olympics fix. Found myself jumping up and down cheering for ... the nordic combined? And just think, Curling doesn't start until tomorrow!!!

I've been watching the latest Erroll Morris documentary called Standard Operating Procedure. I'm about halfway through it and it's hard to watch. Here, for your viewing pleasure, are most every picture from Abu Ghraib and it's just gross. Morris managed to collect most everyone involved in the picture taking too ... Lindie England being the most telling. Listening to her retell the story of how she got involved with that sick b-word, Charles Grainer ... wow ... that guy should stay in jail. and what's up with all the thumbs up pictures? I don't know. Several of the soldiers involved as well as at least 1 army intelligence guy was interviewed (he was dishonorably discharged) and Janice Karpinski, who was the person in charge of the jails in Iraq sounds just as flummoxed by the entire ordeal now, as she did when it happened. What I like about Morris films, unlike the bang you over the head nature of michael moore films, is that he passes no judgements. You feel both sympathy and pure contempt for Lyndie England. I feel like she's just not that bright and did get railroaded into making really bad choices. Again, she's not that bright. I'll have to report back on the second half.

Nip/Tuck is winding down, with a wimper ... Kimber is dead ... maybe. They haven't found her body anyway. Sean and Christian's characters are going through the motions ... I'm sure they just want it all to be over too. I'm sticking around to see if there's any big whoop dee doo series finale.

I'm back to watching Damages. I didn't watch season 2 ... can't remember why ... was it because it was too dark? I don't know. I'm sticking around because of the 2 comedians who are taking dramatic turns and are quite impressive. Lilly Tomlin is playing the spouse of a Bernie Madoff character and Martin Short is their defense attorney. It's really cool. The character of Ellen is so BORING!!! Seriously, she's never happy ... always dour, blah blah blah. Glen Close looks like she's having almost too much fun with Patty Hewes' character. Boy, who knew one bad girl character would typecast her! What happened to the sweet mother from World According to Garp???

Watched a movie called the Break with Stephen Rea and Alfred Molina .. meh.

Started watching The Middle. A friend recommended it and it's pretty good, not great. It's the lead in for Modern Family, which is the best sitcom on tv. The Middle is supposed to take place somewhere in southern Indiana. The husband works at a quarry ... no quarries north of Indianapolis, so that's why I'm guessing southern Indiana and they talk about going to French Lick. It's pretty good, but it's not really believeable ... again ... I'm living in southern indiana right now and I'm sorry, if this family is a multi-generational southern indiana family ... husband works in a quarry ... that entire family would have kentuckiana accents and the sure as heck don't. I'm not entirely thrilled with the mom and dad ... they're kind of boring actually. The kids who play their kids are worth watching the show, as is Chris Kataan. Wow, Saturday Night Live didn't do Kataan justice. He's so much better now. I'm glad that I watched his turn in Bollywood Hero, because he was really funny in that. He would make a fantastic Charlie Chaplin.

Modern Family and 30 Rock are chugging along. I love Modern Family. Cameron has to be my favorite character. So loveable and sweet. Jay is next ... Ed O'Neil is a great actor and it makes me happy that he's left Al Bundy in the dust. He's so much better now. Hopefully many many awards will be coming it's way. 30 Rock is reaching institutional status. Still not a big fan of Tina Fey ... she tries too hard at being pathetic. It's incredibly obvious that she grew up privileged and was a mean girl and uses her role as Liz Lemon as a mea culpa. I watch the show for every character except Jenna and Liz ... everyone else is hysterically funny. Tina Fey just rubs me the wrong way.

ok, one more snow picture for the road: