CRS
Chandler, Arizona, United States

There's an old saying. If you don't want someone to join a crowd, you ask them, "If everyone were jumping off of a cliff, would you?" Well, I have. So my answer would be "Yes". True story.
Profile continued . . .

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POLARITY 220

Monday, November 27, 2006

this entry brought to you by eagles of death metal, "i want you so hard (boy's bad news)"


THE GOOD

The Life and Death of Peter Sellers Firstly, I've only seen Sellers in Stanley Kubrick's Lolita, so while I'm not necessarily a fan, I am of course familiar with his work from the countless clips and parodies I've seen from such classics as The Pink Panther and Dr. Strangelove. The Life and Death covers mostly Sellers' erratic personal life, and it's fascinating stuff-- Sellers was a terrible father and husband, leaving his family for a crush on Sophia Loren that was not reciprocated. Despite being at the top of his game, he suffered from low self-confidence and was never satisfied with his performances, once walking off the set of a Bond satire, forcing the movie makers to hastily re-edit the film. The script for Life and Death, which is based on a book, comes off as a purely negative look at Sellers; indeed, I'd read one reviewer complain of never feeling for Sellers. And while the point of the movie does seem to show the darker side of a much-praised comic genius, actor Geoffery Rush, who is perfectly cast here (shame he couldn't be considered for an Oscar nomination, due to this movie originally airing on HBO), gives every single fragment of himself, giving Sellers' bipolar behavior, both self-abusive fury in one scene, boyish exuberance in the next, as well as playing a myriad of Sellers' classic characters, plus he gets a turn playing every single important character in the movie. With just enough directorial flourish to make this movie as imaginative and playful as it should be, Sellers' life on film never becomes too much of a downer despite its dark portrayal of Sellers, making it that much better as a movie.

Thanksgiving I had to work Thanksgiving, but I got off at 6 in the evening, so that was acceptable; actually, it was more than acceptable, because I got paid double-time-and-a-half for a day with very minimal work, and I got home with enough time to eat and watch movies. Anyway, dinner was nice (with some delicious home-made whipped cream, which was difficult to not sit down with a bowl of and simply eat by itself), and although we had some problems getting Celest to eat turkey (for reasons unknown—kids are frustrating), it was nice having such a nice meal with the family without having to have 40 people around at some relative's house.

Brandon Flowers The lead singer of The Killers has been getting a lot of flack lately for talking so much shit and for comparing his new record to the greatest records of all time. Now, I'll admit to reading some things he's said and saying "Oh shut up, Brandon." But really, it doesn't bother me. I've always complained about celebrities that are afraid of sharing their opinions-- if someone stops listening to your music just because you said such-and-such, and not because they think your music sucks, then fuck 'em. And I'm also annoyed that everyone loves it when rappers talk shit, but boo and hiss when rock stars do it. People were annoyed when John Lennon, Kurt Cobain, and Billy Corgan talked smack, and yeah, they went on to change the world, and no, I don't think the Killers are capable of having that sort of impact, but at the time of Lennon's, Cobain's, and Corgan's respective smack talking, no one knew what they would go on to do. And for the record, Sam's Town, the Killers' new album, is pretty darn good, and I certainly don't see what's so wrong about comparing yourself favorably to your heroes. I'm also really annoyed that my favorite bands of right now (The White Stripes, The Yeah Yeah Yeahs) selling way less records and getting much less radio play simply because they're too humble to really go for it. Now, Brandon isn't my favorite rock star, nor is the Killers my favorite band, or even in my top 10. Or top 20. But cut the guy some slack.

The trailer for Grindhouse, directed by Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino I'm not really into gore movies, and I've never been a fan of Troma-like exploitation, but this is totally the most insane trailer I've ever seen in my life. Seriously, give the link a click and keep in mind that it's the trailer for a new movie by one of Hollywood's most praised mavericks, with his friend, an Oscar winning director. I couldn't get the image of Danny Trejo flying through the air on a motorcycle, shooting an enormous gatling gun, out of my mind for days and days. This movie looks fucking awesome.

The Love Corner This made me laugh. Give a click.


THE BAD

PS3 advertisments I love weird, attention-getting marketing, much more so than other people do. I found some PS2 ads for the launch in Europe, and they were genius. But here in America they just don't seem to grasp marketing the Playstation in an esoteric way. The PS2 launched with the idiotic and obtuse PS9 campaign, where in the future you plug your PS into your brain-- so go out and buy PS2. PS3 has much better ads, but still missing something. The ads are minimalist and eye-catching, but end up emphasizing the Cell processor the system has, which is meaningless. If the system is powerful-- and it is-- show me. Attaching importance to a name like "Cell Processor" is meaningless, like a buzzword. It's not like a PC, where attaching the word "Pentium" is important-- consumers can actually buy a PC without a Pentium chip, so knowing that there's a difference is crucial. Intel isn't trying to sell you a PC, they're trying to sell you a chip. With PS3, the name of the guts don't matter to the people he need to know that the PS3 is coming out. Nobody had a choice to buy the chip inside, but they do have a choice to buy a PS3 instead of an XBox 360 or Wii or what have you. The name matters about as much as Blast Processing meant 12 years ago-- it's just words.

The negative backlash to Lost season 3 from asshole internet assholes There's been a backlash on-line about season 3, some complaining that they've jumped the shark, others running at the mouth that it's been "all shit" since the beginning of the season. Now, I've watched every single episode of the show's run, and I have absolutely no idea what anyone's complaining about-- I find the current storyline, with Jack, Sawyer, and Kate prisoners of The Others, while Locke back at camp starts being a badass again, completely enthralling television. I have no idea what anyone would have that could be considered a complaint, and it pisses me off that some people seem to exist just to piss on things.

Britney Spears wants sole custody of her two kids Nobody thought their relationship would last, but after she gets two kids out of him and then promptly dumps him, this whole thing seems creepily like a white trash, gender-swapped version of Michael Jackson and Debbie Rowe, if Rowe had also tried to use the media attention to start a shitty rap career. What I want to know is why Britney is trying to get sole custody. She's currently working on a 5th album, which will inevitably be followed up with a massive come back tour. Federline's schedule is filled up over the next few years with doing absolutely jack shit, and would actually have the time raise their children.

Playing multiplayer games on-line I've been asked why I haven't played any games on-line since Team Fortress Classic, 6 years ago, despite having a broadband connection for a while now. Well, I recently saw a video of a kid that couldn't have been any older than 12, playing on-line with his X-Box headset, screaming at his mother and calling her a fucking bitch for asking him to stop playing-- and this went on and on for like, 12 minutes. Well, you could say, why not just keep the mic turned off? I saw another video where players in Halo 2 make a kill, then run up to the corpse and press the crouch button repeatedly, so it looks like one character is tea-bagging the other. There is no fucking way in hell you could get me to tolerate that kind of shit for any length of time. I'd rather just play alone.

Lil' Wayne I don't know if you've noticed this, but Lil' Wayne just might be the ugliest human being on the earth.
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on this day last year an update to how my last thanksgiving. sweet, but not worth returning to.
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with love from CRS @ 7:51 PM 

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