A Perfectly Cromulent Blog

Marriage is all about the wagering

The Wife and I have a lot of gambling in our marriage. We bet on the sex of our child (back before we knew, obviously), and I still haven't gotten my new grill, come to think of it. The wagers on the annual Texas-Texas A&M game can also get pretty ugly, depending on which team is in ascendancy (I did a lot of yard work in the mid-90s). Lately, we've sated our competitive natures by betting on politics.

For example, The Wife maintains - as she has for weeks - that Bush is going to dump Cheney and make John McCain his Vice President. I remain unconvinced: they've already made all those Bush-Cheney '04 signs and bumper stickers, after all. And if there's one thing this administration stands for, it's fiscal repsonsibility.

And while it's hard to believe Cheney would step aside quietly, both of us agree that a Bush-McCain ticket would be a slam dunk (to coin a phrase) for the Republicans. Hell, they could probably keep bin Laden's body on ice for a while longer. Until the next dip in the polls, that is.

We'll find out by the end of the week, I guess. Network coverage of the convention starts tonight, and a new VP announcement might actually get half the ratings as Trading Spouses.

And I don't care what the outcome is, I'm not paying up until I get my grill.

Texas Tuesdays - 08/31/2004

The tour of the State House concludes this week with Stephen Frost, who's running to replace retiring Democrat Barry Telford in District 1.

There's an introduction to Frost here, and you can also read a brief interview with him as well

But when are the Eltingville auditions?

IFC will be holding tryouts for Ultimate Film Fanatic in the coming weeks, here are the locations:

Boston - Sept. 13 - Loews Boston Common 175 Tremont St., Boston, MA 02111
Austin - Sept. 15 - Alamo Drafthouse Cinema 409B Colorado St., Austin, TX 78701
Chicago - Sept. 17 - Loews Gardens at Old Orchard 7-13 175 Old Orchard St., Skokie, IL 60077
San Francisco - Sept. 20 - Loews Metreon Theatre 101 Fourth Street, San Francisco, CA 94103
Seattle - Sept. 22 - Cineplex Odeon Meridian 1501 7th Avenue, Seattle, WA 98101
Los Angeles Sept. 28 - Universal Cineplex Theatre 100 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, CA 91608

The format of the show, if you haven't seen it, is pretty straightforward. Round 1 is general movie trivia, where you are grilled on genres you know little to nothing about. Round 2 is the debate round, where you take a topic given to you by the host and try to convince the panel that it sucks or rules. And Round 3 is your chance to demonstrate your true geekery by displaying the cream of your movie memorabilia crop.

Finally, a chance to show off those misspelled Star Wars patches.

I'm not eligible for this, as Film Threat publisher Chris Gore is the host and the IFC is so wary of a Charles Van Doren-like scenario it's saying you're ineligible if you ever shook Chris' hand at the Anchorage Film Festival in 2000. I fared pretty well against the contestants on the episodes I watched at home, though.

Except for Round 3, that is. I have a handful of decent collectibles, but my seven varieties of lightsaber would pale in comparison to what some of these guys show up with. By the end of the first season, I half expected someone to trot out Doris Wishman's bones.

Confession Time - Gone with the Wind

Today's Confession Time is brought to you by the great taste of Stroh's.

As a person who reviews films and also someone who prides himself on being a bit of a movie aficionado, it is with a heavy heart and a mild case of plantar fascitis that I inform you I've never sat through 1939's Gone with the Wind in its entirety.

Oh, I've seen it. At one point or another I've watched all 238 minutes of David O. Selznick's Civil War magnum opus, just not all at once. It was never re-released when I was a kid, which would've been my best chance to catch it on the big screen. There was another theatrical run in 1989, but I'd have a hard time telling you where I was when that took place. So would most of my family and friends.

Home video? I must have watched the first tape a dozen times, always intending to hop off the couch and pop in the second one after the intermission. For some reason, I could never bring myself to watch the second half. There was always something else that needed doing, or somewhere I had to be, or some other excuse to not have to deal with two more hours of harpy extraordinnaire Scarlett O'Hara and beleaguered Southern characters I had no sympathy for. I'd sometimes catch the second tape a day or two later (the sea of Confederate wounded makes for great hangover material), and I've seen the ending on TV several times, but for whatever reason, I've never made the time committment to watch in all at once.

As cinematic sins go, it's not very significant. Just thought you should know.

Next up: the shocking revelation that, while I have in fact been to Paradise, I've never actually been to me.

Last convention-related post

And it's only tangentially related to the convention, but what are you gonna do?

I've read Hunter S. Thompson's Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72 a couple times, and I always found myself growing nostalgic for the era when political conventions actually meant something. I know both parties like to trot out their celebrity endorsers and try to prove to the opposition how much more they love America, but there's a reason the damn things aren't more widely covered on TV. With both contenders chosen months ago during the primaries, the only purpose the conventions serve is to further confuse the addled 5% of the populace who don't already know for whom they're voting, and to annoy the rest of us who decided on November 8, 2000.

I guess that's more then one reason. Curse my flip-flopping.

More importantly, after seeing coverage of last weekend's protests, can I humbly suggest to the organizers that they come up with some original music for the damn things? If I have to hear one more variation of "Hey Hey Ho Ho" or "What Do We Want? Something! When Do We Want It? A Time Frame of Relative Immediacy!", I'm going to hunt down Country Joe McDonald and force feed him about 25,000 mics of brown acid.

Joan Baez is still alive, right? Or what about Ian MacKaye?

You call this a convention?

Okay, fine...so you've continued the fine Buchanan tradition of bringing out a crackpot whose speech probably sounded better in the original German, but if you guys really want to get this exercise in back-slappery and 9-11 necrophilia off the ground, you need to bring back Shannen Doherty to lead us all in the Pledge of Allegiance.

Because let's face it, the rest of your entertainment lineup isn't exactly going to rock the house:

Top GOP officials say the duo of Kix Brooks and Ronnie Dunn will perform during the convention at Madison Square Garden, along with country singer Lee Ann Womack, Latin gospel singer Jaci Velasquez and Christian rock band Third Day."

Does the GOP platform allow "boot scooting?"

Among other performers who will appear the convention are Christian singer Gracie Rosenburger, rock band Dexter Freebish, country singer Darryl Worley and gospel singer Donnie McClurkin.

Other celebrities scheduled to attend the GOP convention are singer Wayne Newton, actor Stephen Baldwin and actress Bo Derek.

The GOP announced other performers for the convention earlier this month. That list included country singers, the Gatlin Brothers, and contemporary Christian performer Michael W. Smith.

Sounds like the convention will have all three kinds of music: country, western, and gospel. Should be a hell of a party, espcially if the rumors about James Watt introducing Wayne Newton are true.

"Ooh, Navy Seals!"

I haven't decided if I'm very jazzed about this or not:

More details on the "Clerks" sequel were released on the weekend when Kevin Smith told the Associated Press that he's begun work on the film which will be entitled "The Passion of the Clerks".

The original $27,000 movie chronicled the adventures of Dante and Randal, two guys who talk about life, death, sex and movies while working at neighboring stores. The sequel will pick up events ten years on and shooting is scheduled to begin in January with Miramax distributing the film.

"It's about what happens when that lazy, 20-something malaise lasts into your 30s. Those dudes are kind of still mired, not in that same exact situation, but in a place where it's time to actually grow up and do something more than just sit around and dissect pop culture and talk about sex. It's: What happened to these dudes?" says Smith.

No offense, Kev, but the dissecting pop culture part was what appealed to me in the first place (it sure as hell wasn't the acting). Any time Smith gets serious - witness Chasing Amy or Dogma - the results are less than satisfying.

In short, it sounds like we won't be enjoying the same brand of humor that made Clerks: The Animated Series such a ratings success.

The "Clerks" sequel has moved to the top of his to-do list, making it quite likely he'll no longer direct "The Green Hornet" adaptation. Both the original "Clerks" main stars Brian O'Halloran and Jeff Anderson are signed on, and Jason Mewes, will return as stoner Jay, the "hetero life-mate" of Smith's stoic Silent Bob.

I liked Clerks, probably more than any of his subsequent movies (the first half of Chasing Amy comes close). One was able to forgive the stiff performances and poor direction because - come on - the guy made it for $27,000. His later films have generally left me cold, however. Jersey Girl must have done more harm to Smith's cred than previously reported, if he's reversing his "No more Jay and Silent Bob" pledge so quickly.

As long as Alanis Morrissette isn't in it, we won't have any problems.

Go Astros

The NL Central race has been more or less decided for weeks (St. Louis' magic number is still 18*, but I have to believe Rolen, Pujols, and Edmonds would all have to come down with trench foot to stop their momentum now), but I'll cheer for anyone to beat Chicago and make their playoff hunt that much more difficult.

Happily, the Astros complied this weekend, taking 3 of 4 from the Cubs, dropping the latter into a tie with San Diego for the wild card lead. Of all the team in contention for the WC, the Cubs scare me the most, so the more they lose, the happier I am.

More so than usual, I mean.

Cards 1B Albert Pujols also used today's game to became only the 4th player in MLB history to get 100 RBIs in his first four seasons. The others? Just a couple guys named Al Simmons, Joe DiMaggio, and Ted Williams. He also homered to get his 2nd consecutive 40+ HR season.

I'm still cheesed there aren't any more head-to-head StL-ChC games, however.

*Stay tuned to Len's blog for the countdown

It's a doughnut, people - Pt. II

A scant four months after APCB brought you the story of Hawaiians overloading storage bins on inter-island flights with Krispy Kreme doughnuts comes this story of suckers in DC waiting in line 13 hours for the opening of their new Dupont Circle location (via Fark):

The nation's capital became the latest to join the craze Tuesday, when the city's first Krispy Kreme shop opened. About 150 people waited in line outside the store in Dupont Circle - some for as long as 13 hours - to get their hands on the goodies. They were rewarded when workers gave out trays of doughnuts to the crowd shortly before 6 a.m.

Rami Genauer was awarded a dozen free doughnuts each week for a year for being first in line. The District of Columbia resident said he had been waiting with his folding chair since 4:30 p.m. Monday.

"It's a spectacle," Genauer said, standing amid a sea of sleeping bags, pillows and inflatable air mattresses. "The doughnuts are just secondary," he said, adding that he plans to give them to the homeless.

You evil bastard. Like their lifespans aren't short enough.

13 hours? I've waited in some embarrassing lines in my life (Episode I and Adam West's autograph, to name two, and I was only 6 or 7 for that last one), but never 13 hours. They're still just doughnuts.

The 800-square-foot store expands the chain's presence in the region to three, with stores already in operation in Alexandria (website - news) , Va., and Rockville, Md.

You know, in 13 hours, you could drive back and forth from Alexandria about 22 times. Or watch The Godfather three times. Or reverse some of the horrible psychological damage you've done to your kids. Just a thought.

Why'd it have to be snakes?

Strangely enough, the one movie I managed to review for Film Threat this week - Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid - may earn the best notices of all this week's releases. Suspect Zero is getting widely panned, and early word is that Baby Geniuses 2 may join its predecessor on the all-time worst list.

Then there's Hero, which doesn't count because it's, like, foreign and stuff.

Anyway, my write-up of the "perfect keeling machines" is up here. Remember: "Everything gets eaten out here. It's a jungle."

Word.

Friday Offspring Blogging - 08/27/2004

I don't have a cat or a hamster, and the only birds around these days are grackles and evil blue jays who have an unholy thirst for my sweet, sweet eye juices. As a result, I'm unable to participate in some of the more popular end-of-the-work-week blog phenomena.

Luckily, and for entertainment purposes only, I have a child. I've been kind of squirrely about putting her picture up here, not because I'm paranoid about child predators (I am), but because I dread the day when her technological savvy outstrips mine (in about six years) and she takes revenge for my past exploitation by posting pictures of her old man drunkenly taking a leak off the front porch, waving a machete and singing Sheena Easton's "Morning Train (Nine to Five)."

But if President Bush has taught us anything with his wise stewardship, it's that we can't live our lives in fear. And since I was so proud of this picture The Wife took of our Holy Terror, which conclusively demonstrates how much she shares her dad's love of the cinema, I thought I'd share it with you:

A few things:

- That copy of Spice World was a gift, I swear.
- She's obviously only moving that X-Files tape out of the way so she can get to the real prize: Return of the Living Dead.
- I'm told that soon after this, she went for one of my VHS copies of Raiders of the Lost Ark (I kept a backup, just in case). That's my girl.

I'll be sure to share some equally moving pictures whenever she gets around to destroying my comic book collection.

Strange bedfellows

I don't like Jim Rome. The legions of moronic callers and the affected baritone voice aside, his "takes" - as he calls them - veer between the sycophantic "I love that guy" attitude reserved for athletes and coaches who agree to appear on his show to easy potshots at the others who get busted for drunk driving and blowing games. Obviously, I don't listen to him most days. This is also because I don't listen to local radio in general, but occasionally I find myself without CDs and desperate, so I tune in. This happened today.

My respect for the guy rose a notch, because he was talking about his love for the Replacements.

The Replacements are one of my top 5 all-time favorite bands. I started listening to them in high school (Pleased to Meet Me era), and never really stopped. I even got to see one of their shows in Austin when attending UT. Their (relative) sobriety was tempered by my own extreme state of inebriation, but it was still an outstanding show. Paul Westerberg's solo stuff never struck the same chord with me, but the guy is still an excellent songwriter.

Rome's experiences with the band echoed a lot of my own, right up to his drunkenly attending a 'Mats gig. He didn't have nice things to say about Westerberg, who apparently blew off his fanboy attentions after the show, but it's understandable. The guy probably had to deal with hundreds of intoxicated dipshits professing their love for him every tour.

Anyway, I still won't be tuning in Jim Rome with any regularity. Just thought it was amusing.

If I hadn't had four beers after giving blood, I probably wouldn't even have brought it up.

"You know what they call a boomerang fish is Paris?"

Quentin Tarantino and the Muppets, two great tastes that taste great together:

The Daily Record indicates that Quentin Tarantino, the director behind "Pulp Fiction" and "Kill Bill" will play himself in a Muppets adventure movie for ABC based on L. Frank Baum's classic tale "The Wizard of Oz".

R&B singer Ashanti plays aspiring performer Dorothy Gale, who works at the diner of her Auntie Em in a small Kansas town while dreaming of hitting the big time. One day, a tornado sweeps up the trailer where Dorothy lives, and she finds herself in a Muppet version of Oz.

There, she meets the Munchkins (played by the Muppet rats), the Scarecrow (Kermit the Frog), the Tin Man (Gonzo) and the Lion (Fozzie). The group's quest to get the Wicked Witch (Miss Piggy) culminates with a fight scene between Dorothy and the witch. The film cuts to Tarantino pitching to Kermit how the scene should be done.

Isn't Fozzie a bear?

I run hot and cold on Tarantino, but I'm all for more Muppet entertainment, especially if they can squeeze in cameos by Link Hogthrob, the Swedish Chef, and Statler and Waldorf. Up the creep factor by letting the Skekses play flying monkeys and I'd go see it.

But keep Elmo off the set.

And they didn't even need Tatum O'Neal

Kudos to Richmond, TX's Lamar National Little League team, who beat Morgantown, NC to advance to the U.S. championship game:

The Richmond all-stars again revved up the offense and pounded Morganton, N.C., 8-2 Wednesday before an estimated crowd of 18,250 at Lamade Stadium.

Lamar National, now 4-0 in the Series, advances to Saturday's U.S. championship game, where it will play the winner of today's other semifinal between South Caroline Little League of Preston, Md., the Mid-Atlantic champ, and Conejo Valley LL of Thousand Oaks, Calif., the West champion.

"I'm about as excited as you can get," [Lamar National manager Jim] Michalek said. "We're extremely honored to be representing the state of Texas at the next level."

The winner of the U.S. championship, of course, faces the international champion on Sunday.

It's hard to imagine Lamar National at another level, since it has been so consistently dominating for the past week. Indeed, Wednesday was the anomaly — for the first time in the Series, Lamar National did not hit double figures in runs.

But the Richmond stars hit just about everything else, racking up 11 more base hits. And for the fourth straight game, Lamar National entertained the fans with its Texas air show — Chance Murski belted a grand slam, and Randal Grichuk, who was 3-for-4, delivered a three-run shot.

Grichuk, who is batting .769 (10-for-13) in the Series, has four homers and nine RBIs in the four games, energizing an offense that has amassed 51 runs and 51 hits, nine of which have been homers.

Finally, somebody's playing decent baseball in Houston. Too bad Grichuk's a little young to replace Jeff Bagwell.

Speaking as someone who was - at best - a mediocre Little League player, I'd like to extend APCB's congratulations to Lamar and thank them for allowing me to ignore the Olympics for a few days.

The cashin' of the Christ

Don't fuck with the Jesus:

Film studio 20th Century Fox has launched a massive marketing campaign in US religious communities for the DVD of The Passion of the Christ. The studio has sent e-mails to more than six million Christian households, according to The New York Times.

It has also sent 260,000 postcards to churches offering bulk batches of the film, the newspaper reports.

Orders for the Mel Gibson-produced film are 20% ahead of projections, said Fox. The DVD is out in the US on 31 August.

This sounds like the same bulk buying strategy used by right wing groups to get Michelle Malkin's book to the top of the bestseller lists. At least in this case, the movies will actually end up in someone's house. Did you volunteer at the church bazaar? Have a DVD. Erase the dirty words from the missals? Have a DVD. Pay hush money to that altar boy's family? Have a DVD.

Fox has also urged church leaders to persuade their parishioners to buy individual copies too.

One man called Fox hoping to buy 100,000 copies, Fox executive Steve Feldstein told The New York Times.

Fox have also distributed 10,000 limited-edition lithographs depicting Jesus and other religious images to church officials.

Jesus swag is nothing new, but you've got to give Gibson and Fox credit for elevating the distribution strategy to such impressive levels. In addition to Passion merchandising, the market for Christian t-shirts, action figures (check out Job), and entertainment media is growing at a frightening pace. It's no longer enough to half-ass it, apparently. Or to paraphrase David Mamet, the rapture is for closers.

For now, I'll just savor the irony of religious leaders promoting the purchase and ownership of a hyperviolent R-rated film.

Just thinking of the children

Huzzah, it's the 20th anniversary of the PG-13 rating:

LOS ANGELES -- This is the story of how a gooey green guy in a microwave, a pagan witchdoctor with a beating heart in his hand and that unlucky numeral 13 changed the way Hollywood makes its movies.

It has been two decades since the summer of 1984, when Gremlins and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom caused an uproar among some parents who took their young children to the PG-rated films and walked out wishing the rating had suggested more guidance than just "parental guidance suggested."

The solution became the PG-13 rating.

But instead of being solely an extra warning to parents, as it was originally conceived, it has evolved into the preferred rating of studios and filmmakers. As Steven Spielberg told The Associated Press recently, PG-13 puts "hot sauce" on a movie in the viewer's mind.

Steve must prefer Louisana style hot sauce to the habanero stuff, because the PG-13 rating is a pretty mild seasoning. It stopped denoting extra zestiness long agao, and has more recently provided studios with a means to angle for the teen crowd by emasculating movies that might otherwise have shot for an R.

After Temple of Doom opened May 23, some parents complained to theater managers and the ratings board that their kids were mortified, and news reports began questioning whether the ratings board was being too lax.

Jack Valenti, the longtime MPAA head who recently announced his retirement, told the AP that the heart scene was the catalyst. "By today's standards it's not a big deal," he said. "But it was pretty off-putting. And there was a real problem about how to label that picture."
...
The debate might have faded there if not for Gremlins, which came out two weeks later.

Joe Dante, the director ofGremlins, and later Small Soldiers and Looney Tunes: Back in Action, blames the backlash on the early trailers.
...
Dante said the spots also were deliberately "imitating the color and style of the E.T. ads" from two years earlier, hoping to draw people in based on Spielberg's producer credit.

"So the idea of taking a 4-year-old to see Gremlins, thinking it's going to be a cuddly, funny animal movie and then seeing that it turns into a horror picture, I think people were upset," Dante told the AP. "They felt like they had been sold something family friendly and it wasn't entirely family friendly."

I honestly don't remember the Gremlins trailers, but even back in the hoary days before internet movie gossip, I don't think anyone doubted that it was going to be more frights than "Phone home."

Valenti is right, for once, that it's not a very horrifying movie by today's standards, but plenty of films that were both gorier and more horrifying than either Gremlins or Temple of Doom. Hell, Jaws was rated PG, and that was the movie that made an entire country scared to take a bath.

Okay, maybe it was just me. I was only eight, for crying out loud.

And a lot of the stink surrounding Temple of Doom, aside from Mola Ram's Eagle Claw of Kali, was aimed at the steamed monkey brains, scenes of torture, and overall darker tone of the film compared to the first. If Valenti had just admitted he was looking for a way to put Kate Capshaw out of work, I'd have backed him 110%.

"In a way it's better to get a PG-13 than a PG for certain movies," Spielberg said. "Sometimes PG, unless it's for an animated movie, it turns a lot of young people off. They think it's going to be too below their radar and they tend to want to say, 'Well, PG-13 might have a little bit of hot sauce on it.'"

The disposable income teens spend coming back again and again to their favorite flicks is the fuel that keeps Hollywood running. Would they have flocked to Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl in as many numbers if it had not been marked with the darker PG-13?

Please. Teenagers don't care as long as a movie isn't obviously aimed at the child market, like the Pokémon films. Teen girls went to Pirates of the Caribbean because they wanted to see Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom, teen boys went because their dates wanted to see Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom. And because everyone likes pirates.

The article goes on to note several of the top grossing movies of all time (Titanic (#1), Spider-Man (#6), Jurassic Park(#10)) were rated PG-13. Obviously, those mercurial adolescents wouldn't plunk down their hard-earned allowances for anything else, right? Right, except for Shrek 2 (#4), Star Wars: Episode I (#5), Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (#15), and the G-rated Finding Nemo (#12).

What a PG-13 does allow movie studios to do is tone down films that might otherwise get an R rating in order to fatten their take. This is why recent releases like Alien vs. Predator and King Arthur are bled dry of anything that might make them more interesting to adult fans. Movies don't necessarily have to be swimming in blood or nudity to make them more appealing to an older crowd (and I don't know how much it would've helped in either case), but it's nice to occasionally have the option available.

Ultimately, the PG-13 rating is a failure because it doesn't increase the restrictions on kids getting into the movies. A 10-year old trying to buy a ticket for an R-rated flick is going to have a tough time of it, the same kid going to a PG-13 film won't get a second glance. The rating is only as good as the parents make it, and if they're in the habit of dropping the kids off at the theater with their friends, it might as well not even exist.

Which means, according to the MPAA's carefully thought out ratings system, those lucky children will be able to see decapitations, drownings, exploding buildings, multiple gunshot wounds, stabbings, and every variety of murder imaginable, but no "sexually oriented" nudity (women flashing their tits for "humorous effect" is right on). And no more than one utterance of the word "fuck." Because any more than that and your children will become sex-crazed Ecstasy addicts, roaming the city in feral packs on an insatiable quest for ass and pills.

Clinton Democrats, in other words.

And I hear he's a big Rob Schneider fan

Headline from yesterday's Studio Briefing on the IMDb:

Satan Rules Box Office

This is news? I know they're referring to the weekend grosses for Exorcist: The Beginning, but I always assumed the Father of Lies has had a stranglehold on the movie industry at least since Armageddon hit the $200 million mark.

Thou shalt not be an asshole

I'm pretty sure that's the 11th Commandment. I think I saw it in one of those hotel Bibles.

A friend forwarded this story, from the Albany Times Union, about some particularly dimwitted abortion protestors (I know that sounds redundant, but bear with me):

Parents of a newborn were erroneously targeted Wednesday by about 50 abortion protesters who raised posters of mutilated fetuses and called "Evil dwells here" through a bullhorn.

The problem is they had the wrong house, said Tricia Lehra, who was on the receiving end. The group apparently thought Lehra's Washington Road home belonged to a doctor who performs abortions. Lehra, who has a 2-month-old daughter, is a Shenendehowa Central Schools counselor; her husband, August, is an electrical engineer. The target of the misplaced protest was a neighbor, Paul Drisgula, an executive of Planned Parenthood Mohawk Hudson.

"I feel terrorized," said Lehra, who was not home when the group arrived.
Still, later that evening two teens bicycled past her house and screamed "No
abortion," she said. "They do not have their facts straight," she said of the protesters. "They took pictures. Is my house going to end up on their Web site? I feel victimized in my own home."

This would be funny if it wasn't so repulsive. Oh wait, no it wouldn't. Having an assemblage of underemployed nutbars randomly descend upon your house can't be anything but unnerving, especially if you have no idea why they've decided to visit.

I didn't see any pictures of their house on either the ScriptureWall or Operation Rescue web site, but it's a valid question, considering OR links to the Nuremberg Files, which posts "wanted" posters of doctors and other such examples of Christian love and tolerance.

The 90-minute parade angered some neighbors on the quiet, maple-lined street, drawing them to the sidewalks at around 2:30 p.m.

"I heard them yelling, 'A murderer lives on your street,' " said Brian Whitter, who lives up the block from the Lehras and was getting ready for work when he saw the parade shortly after 2 p.m. "They were shouting about homosexuals. It was really offensive."

"The police told us to go inside because we were arguing with them," Amy
Cremo said. "My 8-year-old came in and asked, 'What's abol-chion?' I couldn't let my kids outside. They're coming to a residential area with these disgusting signs, saying 'You have blood on your hands.' They don't know what we believe. They said, 'There's a gay couple on the street.' I said, 'What's next, you're going to come with burning crosses?' It was rude. It was just a circus."

These guys must share a marketing firm with PETA. At the very least, parading around with 4' high posters of dismembered fetuses in a residential neighborhood is going to alienate a number of people who might actually be sympathetic to your viewpoint, but displaying the same thing or screaming about "sodomites" in front of someone's kids is going to net you nothing but hostility. And trotting your own bewildered toddlers out, as these mouth-breathers are known to do, doesn't make it all right.

This marks the second year in an August campaign called "Oh Saratoga!" organized by The Rev. Francis McCloskey, a Roman Catholic priest from East Durham, Greene County, and Flip Benham, director or Operation Rescue/Operation Save America, a militant group of abortion opponents based in Dallas. Neither Benham nor McCloskey could be reached for comment Thursday.

Big surprise. Benham doesn't talk publicly if there's the slightest possibility that he can be called on the carpet for his misinformation and smear tactics.

Linda Scharf, a Planned Parenthood spokeswoman, said the protesters were wrong to approach anyone's home. "We feel this is creating a climate that leads to violence and it has crossed the line, using free speech to attempt to coerce," Scharf said.

"I don't feel we disrespected their neighborhood or their rights,"
countered Lawrence Willette, a marcher and deacon at St. Clements Catholic church in Saratoga Springs.

That settles that, I guess.

Apparently no one bothered to ask Willette how he'd feel if picketers showed up outside his house, informed all his neighbors that he was a hatemonger who derived some perverse thrill from harassing innocent people, and then posted pictures of him, his home, and his car on the web. Shouldn't be a big deal, since anti-choice groups practice such tactics all the time.

Yeah, I know, none of them "officially condone" such practices. Pull the other one.

The group didn't violate any laws, said Scotia Police Chief John Pytlovany, who had several officers accompany the group of parents, children and grandparents after an earlier protest outside Planned Parenthood in Schenectady. While McCloskey did pray in the street, he did not impede traffic or block pedestrians, Pytlovany said. Police asked Lehra's neighbors not to argue with the protesters because they wanted to keep things calm, Pytlovany said.

Lehra said police told her she was overreacting. One officer "stated that
we're not in any danger because this is a religious group. I told him I lived in Buffalo when Dr. Slepian was killed. I've got a baby in here. I'm afraid."

Wow. That's one stupid cop. Lehra's answer is a good one, but she could have just as easily countered that al-Qaeda, Aum Shinrikyo, the IRA, Hezbollah, the Sudanese Janjaweed, and the Branch Davidians are all "religious groups" (and that's without even bringing up the major churches).

"I was raised Catholic. I consider myself to be a Christian," added Lehra, who has a large cross on her living room wall. "This is not Christian behavior. The fact that these people are terrorizing people in their homes in the name of Jesus is outrageous. What accountability is there for this kind of thing?"

Well, if you're a Christian, I guess you could just wait until they stand in judgment before your god and he casts them into the Pit for being such intolerant scumbags.

Or you could have a friend dress as Jesus, walk down the street to where they're assembled, and ask them to stop. Probably wouldn't work, though. Today's on-the-go fundamentalist doesn't have time for that "love thy brother," tree-hugging, hippie New Testament crap.

I'd probably just turn on the sprinklers, open the windows, and play some Minor Threat.

And release the hounds. Mustn't forget the hounds.

Might (re)makes right

Once again, news from Hollywood prompts my demand for a loaded bazooka:

The Hollywood Reporter indicates that "The Munsters" are headed to the big screen, thanks mostly to the Wayans brothers.

Keenen Ivory, Marlon and Shawn Wayans have all struck a deal with Universal Pictures to take the classic 1960's television show about a family of friendly monsters who never quite get why people react in terror to them and give it a modern makeover that "will stay true to the original characters, but will place them in a contemporary setting".

The deal means the three Wayanses will write the screenplay as well as produce along with Rick Alvarez through Wayans Bros. Prods. There is a possibility that Keenen Ivory Wayans would direct, though no deal is in the works without a finished script.

I might see this, if they made it a Blacula crossover, concluding with Al Lewis and Yvonne De Carlo machine gunning the Wayans to death at the end. Otherwise, no thanks.

Oh, and find something for Butch Patrick. I hear he needs to work (things have been pretty sparse since "Lidsville").

Wait, there's more:

Terence Winter, a writer and executive producer of "The Sopranos," has been drafted into "The Warriors" gang. The scribe will write the remake of the 1979 street-gang classic that Tony Scott is directing. Scott's version will follow the outline of the first film -- in which a gang leader is assassinated during a truce, and The Warriors, wrongly accused of the assassination, must make their way home through hostile gang territories -- while updating the heightend reality of the original film for contemporary audiences..."

First, Tony Scott needs a visit from the Gramercy Riffs. The last thing that would be welcome in a Warriors remake (or any film, for that matter) is his masturbatory St. Vitus' Dance style of directing. He torpedoed Man on Fire - which had the potential to be a decent little revenge flick - with an endless series of jump cuts and exposure tricks.

Second...that's twice now I've heard the word "contemporary" used, and it scares me. How do you update monsters that were affectionate knockoffs of Universal creatures in the first place? Make them black (that seems like a given, if the Wayans are starring as well)? Enlarge them to ridiculous proportions (also known as the Van Helsing strategy)? Or maybe cast Lindsay Lohan as Marilyn and Lil' Bow Bow as Eddie? You're talking $45 million opening weekend, minimum.

What's that? He just goes by "Bow Wow" these days? A thousand pardons.

As for The Warriors...good luck. One of the conceits of that film that doesn't hold up too well in modern times was that almost nobody in the film had a gun. I suppose if they set the film in modern day Limerick, Ireland, that would be one thing, but it only takes about fifteen minutes to get across town.

In trying to appeal to "contemporary" audiences, the Baseball Furies will give way to the Soccer Psychos, who incapacitate their victims with well-aimed bicylcle kicks. The Orphans will all dress like Fred Durst, and Dave Chappelle will play the mysterious DJ. I can't even begin to imagine who'll play the Warriors themselves, but I wouldn't lay money against any of the following: Ashton Kutcher, Rider Strong, Sean Patrick Thomas, Seth Green, Larenz Tate, or Chad Michael Murray.

With Lindsay Lohan as Mercy. Why the hell not?

Finally, one that I'm not too worked up about:

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Comedian Ellen DeGeneres is getting a promotion -- to supreme being.

DeGeneres will star as God in a remake of the 1977 comedy "Oh, God!" The original starred George Burns as the creator and John Denver as a supermarket manager tapped as a new prophet.

"Ellen is a strong comedian and she has always done material about God and questions about God," said Jerry Weintraub, who produced the original movie and also will oversee the remake.

Meh. The original did nothing for me, so it's hard to get irate over a new version. One thing that will be hard to duplicate is the smoldering sexual chemistry between Denver and Teri Garr. Any chance of getting Anne Heche to costar?

How about "Yakko?"

That plastic curgery addict who lives in a 2,600 acre amusement park and is facing charges for child molestation doesn't want you to call him "Wacko" anymore:

Michael Jackson has denounced the recent VH1 movie about him, Man in the Mirror, starring Flex Alexander, which critics had generally described as "pro-Jackson." The Hollywood Reporter faulted it "for studiously [soft-peddling] most instances of Jackson's bizarre behavior and famed eccentricity." The Los Angeles Times' Robert Lloyd concluded that the film, which aired on Aug. 6, "goes pretty easy on him overall, making him out to be more of a sad victim than, say, a perverted creep." Nevertheless, in his statement on Thursday Jackson maintained that the movie "in no way, shape, or form, represents who we are as a family. It is unfortunate that for years, we have been targets of completely inaccurate and false portrayals. We have watched as we have been vilified and humiliated. I, personally, have suffered through many hurtful lies and references to me as 'Wacko Jacko' as well as the latest untruth about me fathering quadruplets. This is intolerable and must stop."

We at APCB are sensitive to the plight of our treasured national celebrities, and so we bring you the Top 12 Alternate Nicknames for Michael Jackson:

12. Uncle Ernie
11. Convict EO
10. (Barking at the) Moonwalker
9. Man-Thing in the Mirror
8. Gary Glitter's Future Neighbor
7. Touch My Kid and I'll Kill You
6. Little John Merrick
5. Hot Barely Legal Action Jackson
4. Hyperbaric Manilow
3. Smooth (But Innocent Until Proven Guilty, Don't Forget) Criminal
2. I'm Still Big in Europe
1. LaToya

"You shut up."
"No, you shut up."

"Why don't you BOTH shut up:"

CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) -- Former Republican Sen. Bob Dole suggested Sunday that John Kerry apologize for past testimony before Congress about alleged atrocities during the Vietnam War and joined critics of the Democratic presidential candidate who say he received an early exit from combat for "superficial wounds."

Dole, the GOP candidate for president in 1996, also called on Kerry to release all the records of his service in Vietnam.

Appearing on CNN's "Late Edition," Dole said he warned Kerry months ago about going "too far" and that the Democrat may have himself to blame for the current situation, in which polls show him losing support among veterans.
...
Dole added: "And here's, you know, a good guy, a good friend. I respect his record. But three Purple Hearts and never bled that I know of. I mean, they're all superficial wounds. Three Purple Hearts and you're out."

Kerry wasn't lucky enough to fight in the Last Good War, like Dole. Then again, he made his Vietnam service a cornerstone of his campaign almost from day one, so ordinarily I'd say it's disingenuous to cry foul when the opposition calls you on it.

Ordinarily, but not in this case.

I respect the fact that Dole lost use of his arm thanks to wounds suffered in combat, but his Purple Heart was awarded for a scratch on his leg (caused, according to his own 1996 campaign bio, when he muffed a grenade throw). How badly would Clinton, who "creatively avoided" the draft, have been crucified if he'd attacked Dole's medal record during the 1996 campaign? Why does Bush, who used Dad's connections to keep from going to Vietnam and then bailed on that obligation, get a pass?

Reading about this anymore, I'm convinced that I've switched places with my Bizarro counterpart. I'm over here, living in a world where a dedicated group of liars is attacking the record of a man who volunteered to go to combat in Vietnam, while the record of the guy who couldn't even be bothered to show up to protect the Gulf Coast of Alabama from the VC hordes enjoys near immunity in the media. Meanwhile, back on the real Earth, Bizarro Pete stumbles around declaring, "Me can't wait for new Resident Evil movie. Me drink beer now."

And I was worried they'd start talking about the issues some time before the election. With any luck, Teresa Heinz Kerry will mouth off to another "reporter" and give us another week's worth of editorials once this swift boat BS dies down.

George Lucas must be destroyed

I will not comment on the latest Star Wars rumors
I will not comment on the latest Star Wars rumors
I will not comment on the latest Star Wars rumors:

Star Wars creator George Lucas could be poised to make three sequels to the original space opera trilogy, according to insiders at Lucasfilm. According to fan site Theforce.Net, employees at Lucas's company Industrial Light And Magic (ILM) have all been made to sign non-disclosure agreements to promise not to talk about the possibility of episode's seven, eight and nine being made. Now industry insiders are predicting the American Graffiti director will make the follow-ups, which pick up where 1983's Return Of The Jedi left off, despite insisting he would never be lured into filming them. A posting on the site says, "You didn't hear this from me, but you might be curious as to why everyone at ILM just signed NDA's saying that they will not discuss Star Wars episodes 7, 8, or 9. Since they're not being made, why the NDA's? Of course, since when has Lucas been consistent?"

Back in October, word was that Spielberg might step in to take over. Then in January, much was made of Peter Mayhew's Episode III contract requiring his appearance in another trilogy. Etc, etc. World without end.

As your faithful Star Wars running dog, I've faithfully tried to keep all of you up to date on the rumors that keep trickling out of Lucasfilm. But with all the contradictory information floating around, fans of the franchise become hungry for The Truth. Can the self-flagellation end after Rise of the Sith? Or will we be tortured for yet another decade only to have the honor of watching Admiral Thrawn step in bantha pudu and Han and Leia's kids team up to fight crime?

Even though it is Lucas' right to continue toying with the fanbase that made him richer than Croesus by screwing around with his old films and sucking the soul from his new ones like a bearded Stormbringer, it is my right to call for action.

That's right: it's time to call in Wayne Dolcefino.

Drastic times call for drastic measures and, as HWRNMNBSOL noted below, APCB is only 5th on Google for WD searches. Lucas might be able to pull the wool over our eyes, using his army of litigators while he broods deep within the fortress-like bowels of Skywalker Ranch, but neither electrified gates nor beefy security guards can keep our hirsute hyena of truth at bay. Wayne would get to the bottom of this, especially if any unsafe strip clubs were involved.

Help us, Obi-Wayne Kenobi...you're our only hope.

Greek love

Good to see the hometown refs are out in full force at the Olympics this year:

Greek fans had something to cheer about, too. Dimosthenis Tampakos sent the Olympic Indoor Hall into a frenzy on the final event of the night, winning gold on still rings. Tampakos was the first of eight competitors, and the hometown fans -- including local games chief Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki -- roared each time a score was posted and Tampakos maintained his hold on first place.

Jordan Jovtchev of Bulgaria won the silver, and Italy's Yuri Chechi took the bronze.

"It was the best moment for my life, and thank God for it," Tampakos said as music from the movie "Zorba the Greek" played in the background.

Zorba the Greek, eh? What singluarly American movie music are our athletes hearing when they win, I wonder? "He Ain't Heavy (He's My Brother)" from Rambo, by Frank Stallone? Or perhaps "Me So Horny" from Malibu's Most Wanted? Personally, my bosom would swell with pride to hear Vanilla Ice's "Ninja Rap" from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze.

Sorry Greece, but your boy didn't deserve the gold. Both Jovtchev and Chechi had better routines, and both stuck their landings. To their credit, neither bitched about the result like women's gymnast Svetlana Khorkina, who placed second behind Carly Patterson in the all-around:

MOSCOW, Aug 22 (Reuters) -- Russia's Svetlana Khorkina, who was second to American Carly Patterson in the women's all-round gymnastics competition, has accused the judges of robbing her of the gold medal and said "everything was decided in advance."

"I'm just furious," Khorkina, who had been favourite for the coveted title, was quoted as saying in the daily Izvestia. "I knew well in advance, even before I stepped on the stage for my first event, that I was going to lose."

That's not a winner's attitude, Svetlana. I admit to being mystified by the scoring system used in gymnastics, but nothing I saw during the all-around made me think Patterson wasn't deserving.

The Russian was also favourite for the all-round title four years ago in Sydney, where her hopes were dashed after she crashed to her knees from the vault. It was later discovered the horse had been set five centimetres too short.

She said she was hoping Sydney's experience would cause the judges to be more sympathetic to her plight in Athens -- her third and last Olympics.

It's never a good idea to count on the Pity Gold. Then again, maybe the judges were just evening things out after that bullshit gold medal the Soviet basketball team won in 1972.

Khorkina confirmed that Athens were her last Olympics but she wants to remain in the sport.

"I'd like to work for the International Gymnastics Federation. These competitions have shown the sport needs a lot of changes," she said. "It should be judged primarily on grace, elegance and beauty rather than simply on mechanical tumbling."

Translation: "I want to amend the current system that favors short, muscular gymnasts in favor of emaciated divas like myself who draw unfavorable comparisons to a praying mantis when performing our floor exercises."

On Sunday the Russian will compete in her last event -- the uneven bars, where she is hoping to become the first gymnast in history to win three consecutive Olympic titles on the same apparatus.

Yeah, well, Khorkina was "robbed" again when she muffed the move that bears her, dropped off the bar, and ended up finishing with an 8.9.

A little murkier is the challenge being made by the South Koreans over the scoring in the men's all-around, where Paul Hamm took the gold by .049 over Yang tae-Young. While it does sound like the there was a screw up, it appears that the Koreans might have only themselves to blame now that the arbitration court isn't taking the case:

Harry Bjerke, an American judge who was on the panel but not one of the two who determined start values, said the South Koreans never came up to the table, or to the president of the technical committee, either of whom could have fixed the mistake.

"They waited until the medals had been given out -- until after the fact," Bjerke told The Associated Press. "It was a very unfortunate mistake and it happened at the worst possible time."

Acknowledging an error was made, FIG suspended the two judges who determined start values -- Benjamin Bango of Spain and Oscar Buitrago Reyes of Colombia -- along with the judge who oversaw the panel, George Beckstead of the United States. But the federation said the results will not be changed.

That's too bad for Yang, and it casts a bit of a pall over what's actually been a pretty interesting Olympics competition.

The good news is, we can stop keeping score of the number of times Elfie Schlegel uses the word "amplitude" (I counted seven tonight).

Episode III: Rise of the Schizo

Some Episode III promo artwork has hit the web. Because I am weak, and will see this movie no matter how awful the advance word is, I thought I'd share:

Hey, lookit that. Darth Vader. I...oh no...he's trying to take over again...*erf*...mustn't give in...have to...withhold judgement until film is released...losing control of own mind...

Oh, pipe down you candy ass. Your average moviegoer willpower is nothing compared to the brute force of your sinister alter-ego, Righteously Indignant Star Wars Fan. You might as well just come out and admit it to yourself: this movie will make Pearl Harbor look like Rashomon. You've heard the old adage about 1000 monkeys typing for 1000 years? Well, Lucas only uses five monkeys, and he pays them scale!

Shut up, shut up. It might be good. After all, this one's going to be darker than the first two.

What the hell does that mean? Sam Jackson has more scenes? Lucas has no concept of the word "dark," which is saying something for a guy who spends so much time with his head up his ass.

But what about the fight scene on the volcano between Anakin and Obi-Wan? That should make a difference, right?

Did the three-way duel in the Episode I make a difference? Did Yoda jumping around like Dripalong Daffy on rotgut in Episode II make a difference? The fight scenes only last for ten or fifteen minutes, meaning we're still left with an hour and a half of green screen crap and Hayden Christiansen's acting to deal with.

What about Darth Vader? We get to see him in this movie. Shouldn't that count for something?

We already saw him in three movies! The fact that you mewling fanboys are getting so excited about the appearance of a 25-year old character shows how bankrupt this franchise has become.

At least Vader was named before Lucas went completed insane and started coming up with characters like "Sidious," "Sleazebaggeno," and "General Greivous."

Chewbacca's in it...

Everybody's in it! There's a whole planet of Wookiees! And Grand Moff Tarkin! Plus Luke and Leia! Would anybody be surprised if Lucas included two little boys running through one scene while somebody called from offscreen, "Han, Lando, time for dinner?"

I'm not listening to you anymore. Episode III might not suck.

Wise up, dipshit. Even if Obi-Wan wakes up and discovers the last two movies were just a dream - Bobby Ewing style - you''re still stuck with the knowledge of what has come before. No retconning of midichlorians, Jar Jar, or Anakin surfing on a space cow is going to take the pain away, and you know it.

Bah, you bore me. Quit posting crap like this or I'm coming back again. And I might bring Star Wars Fan Who Bitches Endlessly About Continuity Errors with me.

No, no...I'll be good.
...
Is he gone?

Man, I hate that guy.

Ugly Americans

Now that the swimming and gymnastics sections of the Olympics are coming to an end, we can all look forward to greater focus on track and field and those flamboyant peacocks of the athletic world, track and field athletes.

Now, I'm not trying to paint all track stars as boorish louts. Just the American ones. Specifically, the sprinters. I probably first became aware of their unbridled egotism in 1984, when Carl Lewis first came to national attention. I wasn't a fan, but the guy won. Like the saying goes, it isn't bragging if you can back it up.

Things have gotten out of hand lately, however, and really reached a head in Sydney, when the American sprint relay team commenced to strip off their shirts, drape themselves in the flag, and generally act like idiots after their win. Perhaps they were just rejoicing that all had passed their steroid tests.

I haven't seen much of the track and field competition yet, but what I watched tonight made me realize I need to schedule my viewing a little more closely. The overall favorite in the 400 meters is a 20-year old from Baylor named Jeremy Wariner. The guy idolizes Michael Johnson (also from Baylor and one of the greatest 400m guys of all time) to the extent that he appears even to have copied his taste in jewelry. Nothing wrong with that, and one can probably even forgive the fact that Wariner, maybe the only white sprinter on the U.S. team, is one of those inexplicable Caucasians who seems to think he's black. The thing that's really annoying is that he insists on wearing his sunglasses at all times: even during a night preliminary, and also during his post-race interview. That's fine if you took a fork in the eye as a kid, like Jim McMahon. Otherwise, you just look like a prick.

Might be one of the reasons coverage of Wariner has been so sparse. If he's lucky, returning American sprinters Bernard Williams and Maurice Greene will help take some of the heat off him with some more antics.

Speaking of pricks (and getting back to swimming), please tell me we've heard the last of Gary Hall, Jr. The American gold medalist in the 50M freestyle was insufferable, both in his pre-meet interview and after his win, when he eschewed exiting on the side of the pool like everyone else and took a bow that the crowd wasn't really asking for. After his race, Hall was queried about why he wasn't asked to participate in (I think) the men's 4 X 100 freestyle. After listening to his answers, I feel pretty safe in saying it was because the other swimmers didn't want to swim with such an obvious jackass. And while I doubt many of the American swimmers are old enough to remember the S&L crisis of the 1980s, the fact that Hall is Charles Keating's grandson can't help his cause.

More High School Confidential

Reading the comments in the entry below, I'm reminded of an amusing episode from my own high school days.

It's amusing today, that is. Back then I was sweating bullets.

The year was 1985. Yours truly was on the cusp of emerging from the cocoon of lower classman geekery to assume the Monarch butterfly status of 11th grade coolness (okay, maybe gypsy moth status...I was still in band, after all). The Cold War was thawing, thanks to the overtures of Mikhail Gorbachev and the music of Rush, whose new album "Power Windows" was changing the world one dateless wonder at a time.

Among the popular styles of the day were the ubiquitous t-shirts of the Corona Beach Club. Even as a teenager, I suspected that Corona beer, an up and coming brew at the time, didn't in fact have a beach club, but I kept such dangerous information to myself. High school is not the place for the malcontent, or the whisperer of secret truths. I kept a low profile, without a Beach Club t-shirt of my own. Publicly, I derided the sheeplike masses who costumed themselves so identically. Privately, I had no clue where to buy one. I was still in the habit of wearing Hawaiian shorts and Star Wars t-shirts, after all.

What I did have was a Lone Star Beer t-shirt. Provided by some friend of my parents, the shirt featured the words "Lone Star" over the front pocket. On the back, running the full length of the shirt, was a Lone Star beer bottle. Attached to the bottle's neck was an air hose, which ran over the shoulder, ending in a regulator over the right breast. I was fond of this saucy scuba sendup, and wore it to school as often as our laundry schedule would allow. Until one day...

I was taken aside at lunch by Coach Terrel (corrected per Tim's remarks in the comments). He was about 6' 5" and fond of wearing those goddamned gray Bike shorts that are issued along with your kinesiology diploma. He pulled me aside one day at lunch to tell me I'd have to change my shirt. The conversation, to the best of my recollection, went something like this:

Pete: Why do I have to change my shirt?
Coach: Because it's got a big beer bottle on the back of it.
Pete: So?
Coach: So, clothing that advertises alcohol or tobacco products aren't allowed in school.
Pete: Can I just wear it inside out?
Coach: Hold on. [He lifts the back of my shirt] No, you can still see it.
Pete: Well, I don't have another shirt here at school.
Coach: Well, then I guess you'll have to go home and change.

Not having a car at this time, going home meant either an hour's walk or calling my mother to pick me up. Neither of which was a pleasant option.

I should point out that this coach was the worst kind of faculty member: bullying, sarcastic, and utterly unwilling to negotiate about anything. I knew it was futile to argue, so I did the only thing left to me: I ruined everyone else's fun.

Pete: Fine. But how come Tracy gets to wear his Corona Beach Club shirt?
Coach: [Looking over at Tracy] What do you mean?
Pete: I mean, half this school walks around all day wearing Corona t-shirts and you don't make them go home.
Coach: ...
Pete: You know Corona is a beer, right?
Coach: Son of a...

The edict came down the next day: no more Corona Beach Club shirts would be allowed. There was a great deal of grumbling and cries of "students' rights" and other such bullshit. I kept my mouth shut and silently entreated the God of Adolescent Smartasses that Coach Terrel would do so as well. To his credit, he never finked me out. More likely, he wanted to take credit for spoiling everyone's fun.

So now the secret's out. My apologies to A&M Consolidated's classes of 1985-88, who were forced to dig out those old Izods and OP shirts to compensate for the ban.

"Your mother owns stock in Shell!"

Or words to that effect.

Once again, there's a movie coming out this weekend that wasn't screened in advance for critics. That movie is Exorcist: The Beginning. Saw it last night. Review's up today in the usual place (i.e. Film Threat).

It seems I didn't hate it as much as many reviewers did, which essentially means I didn't pan it. Given your other options, I'd go see Open Water, myself.

Quote of the day

"Although you may consider purple, blue, and pink beautiful colors, effective Monday, they are not acceptable hair colors." - Announcement at our local high school this morning.

Gee whiz

Via Andante come this breaking news about Germany's uncertain excretory future:

German men are being shamed into urinating while sitting down by a gadget which is saving millions of women from cleaning up in the bathroom after them. The WC ghost, a £6 voice-alarm, reprimands men for standing at the lavatory pan. It is triggered when the seat is lifted. The battery-operated devices are attached to the seats and deliver stern warnings to those who attempt to stand and urinate (known as "Stehpinkeln").

"Hey, stand-peeing is not allowed here and will be punished with fines, so if you don't want any trouble, you'd best sit down," one of the devices orders in a voice impersonating the German leader, Chancellor Gerhard Schroder. Another has a voice similar to that of his predecessor, Helmut Kohl.

This is what happens when you don't do your share of the chores. Just think of all the humiliation that would've been saved by just spritzing a little 409 around the bowl. Seems pretty apparent who trägt die Hosen in German households.

I might think about putting one of these in my own house if I had a wider selection of German voices to choose from. Colonel Klink, for example. Or Franka Potente.

So far 1.8 million WC ghosts have been sold in German supermarkets.

But Klaus Schwerma, author of Standing Urinators: The Last Bastion of Masculinity? doubts whether it will ever be possible to convert all men.

"Many insist on standing, even though it leads to much marital strife," he said.

In German, the phrase for someone who sits and urinates, a "Sitzpinkler", is equivalent to "wimp".

Christ, but Germans are weird (and I say this as a half-Kraut myself). My dad used to live in Alsace, and he was the one who introduced me to the Teutonic obsession with bodily functions. There was one bar with toilets for stools and rools of TP for napkins, for example, and every commode I saw in the country had a little shelf inside the bowl for help in examining your...leavings. I guess the only thing more natural than relieving yourself is feeling ashamed of it.

Sitzplinker is a great insult though. I'll have to remember to use that.

"Smoke up, Johnny!"

Hold on to your butts:

Councilwoman Shelley Sekula-Gibbs, the only physician on the City Council, is studying smoking ordinances in other cities with an eye toward proposing what would be Houston's first outright ban on smoking in workplaces, bars and restaurants.

"The ban would be on smoking in public places — anyplace that conducts business and where people would gather, not in residences," she said. "Smoking and secondhand smoke are dangerous for all Houstonians, and that's why we are looking to move forward."

"Not in residences." Man, that's a relief. And before you laugh, remember that Houston is the city where two gay men were prosecuted under the state's anti-sodomy laws for something they were doing in their own damn house.

Mayor White has said he isn't yet behind a full ban, while others on the City Council are a bit more eager:

But Councilman Gordon Quan believes that, if proposed, such an ordinance has a strong chance of passage.

"I don't know how the sides are going to line up, but I was at a Quality of Life Committee meeting a while ago, and there was a lot of support," he said Tuesday.

This doesn't surprise me, but only because I doubt there are many 2-pack a day types on the Quality of Life Committee. Similarly, I could claim there's widespread support for bringing an NHL franchise to Houston by polling the attendees at my Bring an NHL Franchise to Houston Club meetings.

Houston is the only major metropolitan area in Texas that has not banned smoking in either eateries or workplaces, although many Houston businesses voluntarily have limited smoking.

The city does ban smoking in elevators, restrooms and certain retail establishments; requires workplaces to accommodate nonsmoking employees; and sets special ventilation standards for places that allow smoking.

El Paso barred cigarettes inside all workplaces, restaurants, and bars in 2002; Dallas followed with a restaurant ban in 2003; San Antonio and Austin banned workplace smoking earlier this year.

I don't have much of an opinion one way or the other about this. Like Chuck, I have a hard time thinking of any restaurants I frequent where cigarette smoke is noticeable, if not already banned outright. My main sympathies in this regard concern the employees of restaruants and bars, who don't have the option of just moving tables or going to another establishment.

I've never understood the concept of an ouright ban on smoking in bars, however. Our own Mucky Duck has demonstrated the workability of featuring non-smoking shows by many musical acts, while others have implemented similar restrictions for the table areas. If enough customers bitch about something, owners tend to listen. And there'll always be places you can go to get your cancer on.

They found an interesting workaround in Southern California (which would unfortunately never work in Houston's climate). Because of the smoking ban, none of the bars there have ashtrays, so the bartender just cut empty beer cans in half and gave them to the regulars. The doors and windows were usually open, so the smoke never accumulated. The only catch was that the bartender would claim ignorance if any cops stopped in.

I don't spend enough time in bars anymore to really claim much of a vested interest in this. Sure, the price for spending an evening throwing a few back with friends might be coming home smelling like Mickey Rourke, but no one can convince me that one night breathing a little secondhand smoke is going to give me insta-tumors. I'm more worried about the quality of the air itself in this town.

Besides, I concur with just about everyone else who's written about this that Houston's City Council has bigger problems than whether or not I want to hurt my lungs while I poison my liver and brain.

Up yours, Tim Daggett

My biggest gripe about the last couple days of Olympic coverage (guess I wasn't done with it after all) has been the commentary of former U.S. gymnast Tim Daggett. The scoring in gymnastics is inscrutable enough without having to listen to his switching between hypercriticism and gushing praise during the events, but tonight was especially bad. American Paul Hamm, a medal favorite, ate it on the his vault during the men's all-around competition, scoring a 9.1 something or other, and dropped to 12th place. Daggett was quick to declare him "finished," even though Hamm wasn't mathematically eliminated.

Then the Chinese gymnast, who took the lead after Hamm's spill, scored an 8.9 on the high bar, while the rest of the field made a series of errors that allowed Hamm to work his way back into the hunt. After a solid parallel bars routine, Hamm was 4th and needed a 9.66 on the high bar to win the bronze. He scored a 9.837 to come from behind and win the gold, a first for American men in the all-around. Daggett, of course, does a hasty and stammering 180 to give Hamm his props.

One of the only reasons to watch the Olympics (aside from Amanda Beard) is for these kind of moments: the "Miracle on Ice," Mary Lou Retton's perfect 10 on the vault, or Mark Spitz's seven gold medals. Daggett was a great gymnast in his own time (nailing a 10.0 of his own to secure the men's gold in 1984), but he must still be bitter about Mitch Gaylord getting the lead in American Anthem. Thankfully, the gymnastics competition is almost over, meaning Boxey's little friend* can go back to doing whatever it is he does in the offseason.

* Apologies for the lame Battlestar Galactica reference

"I am haunted by (Roger) Waters."

How the hell did I miss this?

Tommy Mottola and Miramax Films are building "The Wall" on Broadway. The hit album by rockers Pink Floyd will be transformed into a Broadway musical.

"Great!" said Pink Floyd co-founder Roger Waters in a statement Thursday. "Now I can write in some laughs, notable by their absence in the movie."

I dunno, I thought the school children falling into the meat grinder was pretty funny.

Not having listened to much Pink Floyd in a while, perhaps I was mistaken in thinking that a serious autobiographical work about alienation and isolation didn't really lend itself to, uh, "laughs." Must've been all the harmless tobacco I was smoking.

"There are few projects as timeless as 'The Wall,"' said Mottola in a statement. "Even after two decades since its first release, 'The Wall' continues to break through every generational, socioeconomic and political boundary."

Good to see a lackluster Broadway season hasn't dimmed Mottola's sense of humor, or his flair for hyperbole.

Like most whiny teenagers, I found some solace in endlessly replaying "The Wall" in my bedroom, and I still enjoy the movie, but come on. I'm betting generations younger than mine, raised on hip hop and nu metal, don't care much about "The Wall." And if they do, they can always just download it.

Which throws Mottola's "socioeconomic boundary" comment into relief, as well. It isn't like anyone other than Waters' bloated Baby Boomer counterparts are likely to shell out $120 a pop for mezzanine seats to watch a kookier version of "The Wall." Waters knows this, and has probably been planning a stage show ever since he convinced organizers in Berlin that, because his album has the word "wall" in it, booking him for the reuinification festivities would be a great idea. All it proved was that "The Wall" is nothing without David Gilmour, Cyndi Lauper is just plain wrong for "Another Brick in the Wall, Pt. 2," and Bryan Adams is the face of evil and must be destroyed.

Subsequent concerts at the Wailing Wall, Great Wall, and the remains of Hadrian's Wall never panned out, for some reason.

What frightens me the most is the trend itself. Sure, they start with the classics like "Tommy" or "The Wall." Next come the lesser know but still decent concept albums, like maybe "Joe's Garage" or "Operation: Mindcrime." But what happens then? Where do the producers go after they've plundered all the marginally interesting stuff? I'm not much for grim prognostication, but within ten years, I predict we can all look forward to either ELP's "Tarkus: The Musical," or "KISS: Music from 'Music from the Elder.'" One way or the other, civilization is doomed.

"You're gonna need a bigger hutch."

The good folks at Angry Alien have done it again. This time around, it's Jaws, in 30 seconds (and re-enacted by bunnies).

Today's reason to be thankful

As of this writing, I have yet to receive information on screenings for either Benji: Off The Leash! or Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2. Life is good.

Nevertheless, I did spend a little time digging for info on the people behind such highbrow fare, and came up with a few interesting tidbits.

For example, Bob Clark - esteemed director of the original Baby Geniuses as well as its upcoming sequel - also directed the 1972 D-grade zombie classic Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things (a film as notorious for actor Alan Ormsby's pants as it was for the subject matter). He also helmed several '80s classics, such as Porky's, A Christmas Story, and Turk 182! (okay, a couple of classics anyway), as well as crapfests like Rhinestone and From the Hip. In fact, it was after the latter that we can see the quality level of Clark's films start dropping precipitously. Eventually, he switched to directing children's fare exclusively (I hear working with Judd Nelson has that effect).

Conversely, Benji writer/director Joe Camp found something he was good at and stuck with it. Namely, Benji. Aside from a throwaway 1979 kid's caper movie called the The Double McGuffin, Camp has focused with laserlike intensity upon furry animal movies. He's made five Benji flicks (and also penned the novelizations), one movie where Benji gets 90% more screen time than top-billed Chevy Chase (Oh! Heavenly Dog!), and one camel movie. I saw that last one - Hawmps! - on some horrible pre-adolescent afternoon, and decades of therapy have yet to help me regain my lost innocence.

Really though, no movie with Slim Pickens, Denver Pyle, and Jack Elam in it can be all bad.

There's not a lot of info about Joe Camp out there. About all I could dig up was that the guy was born in 1939, allegedly in St. Louis (though I think he lives near Dallas now), and wrote a now out-of-print book about making Benji called, wait for it, Underdog. I did manage to find a few pictures floating around out there, and I've decided to share my favorite with the world:

That's former Democratic Presidential hopeful Dennis Kucinich with Benji and Joe Camp in 2002, when Kucinich was awarded the Humane Legislator Award from the Humane Society. Rumor has it this was the photo Karl Rove was going to use to spread some unsavory rumors about Kucinich's "love" for canines if he ever got the nomination.

Ha ha, no. I'm sure whatever Rove had planned was much worse.

Texas Tuesdays - 08/17/2004

Today on Texas Tuesdays: Rep. Scott Hochberg, incumbent in SD137, who faces a challenge from Republican Ann Witt in November. Hochberg has a great record of service to his district, and is a great presence for Harris County in the Legislature.

There's also an excellent write-up of the race here.

Seed of doubt

Eli Roth, director of last year's sleeper horror hit Cabin Fever, is set to helm a remake of 1956's The Bad Seed:

The original, about an 8-year-old girl who seems all sugar and spice until she begins killing people, was one of the first to apply Freudian psychology to the psyche of a kid killer. Roth has gorier plans for the remake:

"The original was a great psychological thriller, and we are going to bastardize and exploit it, ramping up the body counts and killings. This is going to be scary, bloody fun, and we're going to create the next horror icon, a la Freddy, Jason and Chucky. She's this cunning, adorable kid who loves to kill, but also loves 'N Sync."

Great. I don't think remaking the film itself - a rather stilted and overlong affair - is the problem, but rather Roth's approach. The effectiveness of the original came from the concept that a cherubic little girl could actually be a maniacal killer. Every "evil child" movie since owes something to the The Bad Seed. Unfortunately, as the Elijah Wood/Macaulay Culkin stinker The Good Son taught us, this angle has pretty much been played out.

And unfortunately for Roth, I'm not sure there's a lot of immediate demand for another "horror icon." The successful horror films of the last few years, such as they are, have been less campy than their goofball '80s counterparts (even if they do feature werewolves or zombies). Movies like Dog Soldiers, 28 Days Later, Ringu, and even more mainstream fare like Final Destnation take themselves more seriously and have been better received as a result.

Long lasting characters like Freddy and Jason have their niche, but I wonder how well an 8-year old mass murderer is going to go over in an environment where violent video games are vilified and one bared breast has led to widespread media restrictions.

And frankly, I thought Cabin Fever was overrated. For a supposedly "original" horror movie, it ripped off elements of everything from The Evil Dead to Last House on the Left. There were few actual scares for all the ample gore, the dialogue was ridiculous, and most horror fans would appreciate some kind of backstory regarding where the virus came from.

Tarantino can proclaim Roth "the future of horror" until Uma Thurman finally agrees to sleep with him. Personally, I'll stick with Hideo Nakata, Neil Marshall, or Shugo Fujii.

A star is porn

Courtesy of Ginger, it appears Matt Damon is looking to expand his acting horizons somewhat:

Matt Damon has confessed he wants to star in a porn movie.

The heartthrob actor said: "What I want to do is make a character-driven porn movie. It's all going to be about the character and the porn's going to grow out of the characters."
...
He said: "My theory on action movies is that they're like porn movies.
A porn movie has got really bad writing, really bad acting and really thinly drawn characters. And then you get the action and you don't really feel anything for the action.'

I'm with him so far.

Matt, who is currently starring in the sequel to his hit film 'The Bourne Identity', told Britain's Independent newspaper: "You know how porn films rip off movie titles?

Well, a producer suggested we do 'The Porn Identity.'"

Stop, you're killing me.

If you're expecting me to be surprised by this turn of events, you haven't been reading my stuff for very long. I suggested just this sort of thing a few months back. Granted, I was talking about a way to spice up network TV, but mainstream Hollywood could see the same economic benefits. Sure, the theater box office might suffer (and you thought they picketed a lot for Last Temptation of Christ), but think of the home sales and rentals.

I suspect Damon is having a bit of a goof at the expense of the media (and this story is being reported by the World Entertainment News Network, which isn't exactly known for laserlike accuracy). Even if he isn't, his point about the naming of adult films is right on, and I couldn't let such an opportunity pass me by. And so, with little further ado, I present to you APCB's Top 12 Porn Names for Matt Damon Movies*:

12. Courage Under Myra
11. "Facing" Amy
10. The Stainmaker
9. Good Will Humping OR Oh My God That's Good, Will Hunting
8. Dogma Style
7. The Anally Talented Mr. Ripley
6. Titan DD
5. The Lodger in Bagger's Pants
4. Ball the Pretty Horses
3. Ocean's Eleven Inches
2. Spirit: Italian Stallion of the Cimarron
1. Stuck It In You

Have Damon's people call my people. We'll dine.

* Shaving Ryan's Privates has already been done

"You're forgetting what the Olympics are all about: giving out medals of beautiful gold, so-so silver, and shameful bronze."

I think I'm essentially done with my Olympics viewing (not counting any future Amanda Beard events, that is). I should point out, howver, that this has nothing to do with my sitting through the U.S women's 2-0 soccer win over Brazil on Saturday, though I still couldn't tell you why I did it (I must've been morning nap sentry). The match was sparsely attended and intermittently interesting, which would appear to describe just about every event to this point.

Aside from that, track and field's a juiced-up joke, I'm not very hip on volleyball, basketball, or - uh - badminton, and watching gymnastics any more makes me feel like a creep.

And speaking as one who is not a fan of basketball, the U.S. men's loss to Puerto Rico was hilarious. Best comedy performance of the year. I may tune in a few more times to see if they can bring the laughs against Greece or Australia as well.

As for the opening ceremonies...between the creepy red centaur and the woman who was about to give birth to the thing in the trunk from Pulp Fiction, I found myself growing increasingly disturbed. This quickly gave way to a more general unease as the Parade of History began, though they did an admirable job blitzkrieging through 3000 years of Greek cultcha.

Of the many drawbacks to tape delay, allowing NBC to take half a dozen commercial breaks during the last 15 minutes leading up to the torch lighting was one of the more annoying. Biggest aggravation of the night, however, goes to Bob Costas and Katie Couric, who were able to put a muzzle on their inane jabbering for minutes at a time while a bunch of Greeks in tights were running in place but couldn't shut up for five consecutive seconds during Bjork's song. I was really quite interested in hearing it, believe it or not.

Ah well. Only a month untl football season.

Still no word on the status of monkey knife fighting

Man, Hong Kong really needs a college basketball team:

In Hong Kong, 115 people have been arrested following a police investigation into alleged betting on insect fights.

A police spokesman said the Far East Friends of Crickets Social Club was raided following a surveillance operation by undercover officers.

Cricket fighting is legal in Hong Kong, but gambling on the result is not.

What's the PETA stance on something like this? Is it below the group's radar because they're insects? And let's face it, doesn't everyone takes a certain godlike thrill out of stomping the bejeezus out of tiny creatures in order to give more importance to our meaningless lives?

On second thought, don't answer that.

Cricket fights, which were a popular pastime in the 1950s and 60s, are quite rare in modern Hong Kong.

For one thing, the widespread use of pesticides has reduced the availability of suitable fighters.

And now we know why there have been so few Mothra sightings in the last decade or so.

What's their excuse?

I mean, I saw this piece of crap for free, what was everyone else thinking?

The sci-fi smackdown "Alien vs. Predator," featuring the creatures of the "Alien" and "Predator" franchises, debuted as the No. 1 weekend movie with $38.25 million, studio estimates showed Sunday.

"Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement," with Anne Hathaway and Julie Andrews reprising their royal roles, opened in second place with a three-day gross of $23 million, pushing its total since premiering Wednesday to $37.2 million.
...
"This continues the trend of combining franchises to very strong box-office results," said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office tracker Exhibitor Relations. "If you're a fan of the 'Alien' movies, you want to see this movie. If you're a fan of 'Predator," you want to see this movie."

Geez, when you put it that way, why not just put every character from every genre movie or TV series ever made in one movie and call it a day? The budget would be pretty outrageous, but think of the opening grosses for something like Alien vs. Predator vs. Godzilla vs. Kerr Avon vs. Batman vs. Min Mei vs. Yoda vs. Spider-Man vs. Sam Beckett vs. The Gorn Captain from 'Arena' vs....well, hopefully you get the idea.

Audiences shelled out $16.8 million to see "Alien vs. Predator" on Friday, but the movie's gross fell to $12.5 million Saturday, a steep 26 percent decline. Most new movies do better business on Saturday than Friday.

That's a sign that "Alien vs. Predator" could follow the pattern of "Freddy vs. Jason" and other horror tales, which tend to open well then plunge in subsequent weekends.

Still, "Freddy vs. Jason" topped out at a healthy $82.2 million domestically. Budgeted at $60 million, "Alien vs. Predator" would turn a solid profit for 20th Century Fox if it matches the gross of "Freddy vs. Jason."

Movies like AvP are, truthfully, more or less critic-proof (Van Helsing, for example, took in over $51 million its opening weekend), so the fact that no press screenings were offered made little difference. Word of mouth, on the other hand, is pretty lethal, and most people inclined to see AvP at all most likely did so the first weekend. It may make a $20 or $30 million profit, but it won't approach Van Helsing's $120 million total gross.

Of course, Van Helsing cost $160 million to make.

All this just proves that, no matter critically panned a movie is, geeks (a category in which I include myself) are going to see just about anything Hollywood throws at them. I'd make some comment about the need to become a little more discriminating, except I know that - were I not a film reviewer myself and got to see it for free - I probably would've been one of those guys in line to see AvP opening night.

The Unsinkable Grandmother Brown*

We were able to get a hold of Grandmom and she (and her home) emerged more or less unscathed. Lee County, while hit pretty hard, still avoided the effects suffered by Charlotte County to the north, which took the brunt of the storm:

A Charlotte county official said hundreds of people were missing and tens of thousands of homes and businesses were destroyed.

Wayne Sallade, Charlotte County’s director of emergency management, did not have a specific number but said there are “a number of fatalities” at a mobile home park and confirmed deaths in three other areas in the county. There were three confirmed storm-related deaths elsewhere in the state Friday. The federal government is sending a 25-member mortuary team to help process bodies.

Early estimates put damage figures at $15 billion, which would make Charley the third costliest disaster in U.S. history behind the Sept. 11 attacks and Hurricane Andrew in 1992, which killed 26 in south Florida.

Grandmom, and most of Lee County, is still without power. Officials aren't speculating when it will be back on, but she said they were estimating last night they it might not be for two weeks. I can't imagine going through August in Florida without A/C for two days, much less 14, but I imagine crews are working around the clock to get things up and running.

Her complex didn't sustain much in the way of damage, which didn't surprise me. It was built shortly after Hurrican Donna hit that same part of the state, and from what I've seen, I think it could handle a nuclear airburst.

The woman who's been checking in on her since she broke her ankle is supposed to stop by today and help her open the hurricane shutters and resupply. Grandmom was lucky. Lots of people down there are in a bad way.

Thanks to everybody for your kind comments. APCB will return you to your regularly scheduled tomfoolery shortly.

*Not actually her last name

Not cool

Hurricane Charley jinked to the right and is now bearing down on Ft. Myers, FL.

My grandmother lives in Ft. Myers.

Ordinarily I wouldn't sweat such things. Grandmom's been through hurricanes before, having lived in Florida and North Carolina for the last 40 years. She's a tough broad, but she's been laid up with a bad ankle lately, and stuff like this makes me uneasy:

She's right north of the dot labeled "Sanibel," for those unfamiliar with Florida geography. The local paper is predicting a 10-13 foot storm surge in Lee County.

I talked to her this morning, and she's got the hurricane shutters down in her condo, has her lanterns, and is stocked with gin and smokes. I told her to get some ice into a thermos so she can have a few gale force martinis. We laughed. Ha ha.

Anyway, if y'all could send good thoughts out Florida way (where they'll help infrequent commenter MacinFLA as well) I'd surely appreciate it.

UPDATE: As if 1:30 AM Central Time 8/14, I haven't heard anything. Power's out in her area, and phone calls aren't getting through. We'll keep trying in the morning.

Karma's a bitch

And even moreso in India, fittingly enough:

A man standing trial for rape was killed by a group of women and children in court in the city of Nagpur in central India on Friday, reports say. Initial reports said about 14 women and several children forced their way into the courtroom and knifed the accused, Appu Yadav, to death.

The attackers then escaped from the scene of the crime.

Police, who have launched an investigation, admit that they were caught unawares.

Which time? When the mob broke into the courtroom? When they stabbed the defendant to death? Or when this crafty rogues' gallery of women and children made their thrilling escape back out of the building?

However, the BBC's Zubair Ahmed in Bombay says they also admitted they had to throw a security cordon around the defendant last week when he was jeered by angry women as he arrived in court.

Yadav was facing 24 counts of molestation and rape.

Which might go a long way towards explaining the police's slow reaction time, I guess.

Duplicate this event in the States, and I'll bet you'd start to see a lot more plea bargains.

Guess that torture worked

Here all of you were criticizing the brutality of the old regime in Iraq, and now look what that steady diet of cigarette burns and cattle prods has done for their soccer team:

PATRAS, Greece -- In its first Olympic competition since its country was shattered by war, Iraq upset star-studded Portugal 4-2 on Thursday in a gritty, come-from-behind victory as about 200 chanting fans cheered and jumped wildly. "This victory will be received with happiness by my people, who have suffered through much," said Iraqi coach Adnan Hamad, whose countrymen were already taking to the streets of back in Baghdad, lighting up the night sky with streaks of celebratory gunfire.

The stunning victory over a country whose senior team made it to final of the recent Euro 2004 tournament brought a rare moment of joy for residents of a country plagued by violence, chaos and constant power outages during the hot summer.

Uday kept telling everyone his specialized programme of super-negative reinforcement would take years to show results, and nobody listened to him. It's a shame, really, that he's not around to enjoy this moment.

It's no fun
Being an Antarctic alien

Normally, this is the place where I'd tell you to go check out my review of Alien vs. Predator at Film Threat. Unfortunately, the site appears to be having problems right now. Since I figured you're all dying to know what I thought, I decided to summarize:

+ Bullet-time facehuggers
+ Writer/director Paul W.S. Anderson (Resident Evil, which should scare you away right there) presents a mildly interesting theory regarding the aliens, predators, and the origins of human civilization, then has every character explain it five times
+ Lance Henriksen plays a man names Charles Bishop Weyland, obviously to connect him to both The Company of the Alien films and the android Bishop. You need to know this going in, however, because nothing that takes place in the movie ever connects with anything else in the two franchises.
+ For a movie called Alien vs. Predator, it might be nice to feature more than 15 minutes of actual combat between the two
+ The alien gestation cycle now takes minutes instead of days, which would really help move along the action, if there was any (see above)

Current rating at Rotten Tomatoes: 13% fresh. 'Course, this is only based on 8 reviews so far, which is Fox's own fault since they didn't have any press screenings. Not screening the movie for the press, as you all know, is the surest sign that a movie is going to be a large, steaming turd.

"Well then Mr. Smartypants," you're saying right now, "How did you get to see it?" At a promotional screening last night, thrown together at the 11th hour, which I found out about on Wednesday.

No aggregate score at Metacritic yet, for the reason cited above.

My rating: 1 1/2 stars. And that for the all too brief combat scenes.

UPDATE: Review's up here. Looky, looky.

As true today as it was back then

I think we just pegged the No Shit Meter:

WASHINGTON -- Many parents seem to be in the dark about the sex lives of their adolescents, U.S. researchers reported today. They found that 84 percent of parents they surveyed did not think their teenager was sexually active -- despite a recent government study showing that nearly half of ninth- through 12th-graders aged 14 to 18 have had sex.

But 90 percent of the 1,600 mothers and fathers surveyed said they had started talking to their children about sex, most by the time they were 12 years old.

So, either talking to your kids encourages them to try sex...or it doesn't. Thanks, Society for Adolescent Medicine, you've allowed this parent to breathe a sigh of relief.

I haven't devised a strategy for ensuring my child doesn't become sexually active too soon. We've heard advice from people like proponents of the "Cleaning the Guns When the Date Comes to Pick Her Up" school to the "Casually Mentioning Your Friendship with the Local Crime Lord" adherents. There's something to be said for all these approaches.

It's a fine line you have to walk. Remain too distant, and your kids will think you don't care who they end up rolling around with behind the bleachers. Act too maniacal and your children will never bring their dates home again.

For this reason, I'm a big fan of the insanity gambit.

Don't get me wrong, simply declaring yourself a badass or a nutcase is like giving yourself a nickname, it just doesn't work. Similarly, acting crazy in front of your daughter's suitors will eventually backfire, once the little gropers realize you're all bark and no bite. The easy way around this is doing something legitimately nuts, whether biting someone's ear off or getting really drunk and firing guns off your front porch. These are effective methods, to be sure, but they're inconveniently overt and have the drawback of being illegal. Therefore, the best way to establish your shithouse ratness is by getting caught doing something sinister while maintaining the appearance that you don't want to get caught at all.

Here's my idea. Some time before She Who Shall Not Be Named reaches double digits, I plan on going out in my backyard some summer night when I know the local kids will be about. 4th of July perhaps, or maybe when one of them is throwing a pool party nearby. While there, I'll use my trusty shovel to dig a shallow grave, with only a few low wattage droplights to illuminate the scene. I'll take my time, allowing any passing children ample opportunity to take up position around the fence, then I'll retrieve from the bushes my previously prepared mannequin wrapped in a tarp and dump it in the hole, muttering blackly to myself all the while. Then I'll fill the hole, tamp down the soil, look furtively over my shoulder, and shuffle off to the tool shed. By the time my daughter is old enough to date, I'll be well-established as That Crazy Bastard Who Buried Someone in his Backyard. Even better, the passage of time will further embellish my legend, until it's whispered that I buried an entire family behind my house. With a spork. After chewing the still living flesh from their bones.

I'm starting to enjoy this fatherhood thing.

Stiller-born

Seeing Ben Stiller's latest appearance on The Late Show, where he "hilariously" plummets to his death while throwing a dodgeball from a rooftop, I suddenly came to the startling conclusion (which many of you probably reached years ago) that the man just isn't that funny.

Further, I've come to realize that he never has been.

He fooled me for a while, I admit. I've still got some old episodes of The Ben Stiller Show taped, and while I always knew Bob Odenkirk was the funniest one on the show ("Maaaaanson!"), I must not have paid that much attention to the great writers the show had: Odenkirk, Judd Apatow, David Cross, Robert Cohen. Cohen and Apatow have worked on some great shows you may have heard of (the former on The Simpsons, Apatow on Freaks and Geeks and Undeclared). Stiller's only other current writing credit, on the other hand, is for the sporadically amusing Zoolander. And aside from a few decent celebrity impersonations on his show, he never really pulled off any big laughs.

Before taking a look at his entire career, I attributed his lack of funny to the natural tendency of formerly "indie" stars to abandon their quality acting pursuits to take an increasing number of mainstream roles as they get older (paging Steve Buscemi). Then again, I'm pretty sure Stiller's old stuff like Empire of the Sun and Next of Kin (Stiller and Swayze together for the first time!) don't exactly count as indie films. In other words, it's not the material, it's the performer. I don't even think he's a bad actor, just not a particularly funny one.

UPDATE: Comments are open now. Sorry about that. Now click below for the rest of the entry.

These last few years, he's made some pretty questionable casting choices. Increasingly, every time I'd see Stiller in one of these bad roles, I'd try to recall the times he actually made me laugh in the hopes of reminding me that I used to find the guy amusing. Trouble is, I realized I'd been cobbling together bits recalled from across his career - not just one or two juicy parts - and several that he had little to do with: the "It's just a bunch of guys" comment from Zero Effect, for example, or his exchange with Harlan Williams in There's Something About Mary. Perhaps the funniest thing I can actually attribute to him is when Mr. Furious tells Casanova Frankenstein not to correct him because it "sickens" him (in Mystery Men), and even that is merely a dig at the genius that is Shatner.

Stiller's comedy movie parts (going back to 1994, anyway, when he started toplining) can be broken down into three basic templates: the stammering nebbish (SN), put upon by individuals and forces outside his control; the manic/angry freak-job (MF). who channels his emotions into comically positive results; and the sadistic asshole (SA), pretty self-explanatory. There's some overlap here and there, but you get the idea.

As I went through his filmography, I started to get progressively more annoyed with myself, because I could have sworn I found the guy funny at some point. Here's what I came up with, judge for yourself.

Reality Bites (SN) - I remember being occasionally amused by this when I first saw it, thanks to my current (at the time) crappy employment situation and tempered by my unbridled loathing for Ethan Hawkes' grungy Nazi character. Later viewings, however, have shown me the error of my ways. Advertising jingles are used as a subsititute for actual dialogue, and Stiller's bad guy (who's one of the few somewhat sympathetic characters in the movie) is neurotic yuppie so annoying his name is actually "Grates." Delicious. I sometimes wonder if Stiller didn't direct this movie just so he could make out with Winona Ryder.

Heavyweights (SA) - Stiller's fat camp owner who drives his hefty charges to mutiny (Tony Perkis sounds suspiciously similar to Dodgeball's White Goodman) might be his best role. Of course, this was written by Apatow, so Stiller had it easy.

Happy Gilmore (SA) - Stiller's retirement home orderly was his second sadistic asshole character in as many movies. It wouldn't be his last.

If Lucy Fell (MF) - Showcased our hero as a borderline psychotic, but in an allegedly humorous way.

Flirting with Disaster (SN) - A low-key role, but not bad. Also not that funny, however. Watching it all the way through is tough to do, unless you buy the premise that someone who looks like Patricia Arquette would ever be married to the vaguely simian Stiller.

Though she did date Nicolas Cage, didn't she?

The Cable Guy (SN) - Less memorable for Stiller's small role than the fact that this was his second big screen directorial effort. TCG got a lot of flack when it came out because it wasn't what people had come to expect from a Jim Carrey movie. I suspect that means they didn't find it funny, and they'd be right. No, no, hear me out. There are some amusing bits (the Medieval Times/Star Trek fight scene), but continuous pop culture references - also overused in Stiller's first director's gig, Reality Bites - do not comedy make (just read this blog for any length of time). and watching Jim Carrey portray a psychotic with a speech impediment for two hours isn't nearly as knee-slapping as it sounds.

Zero Effect (SN) - More straight man shenanigans for Stiller, this time to abet Bill Pullman's take on Sherlock Holmes. I liked this movie, but more for Pullman's performance and the gradual way the story unfolds. Stiller's not bad in it, but I think just about anyone could've handled the role of Arlo.

There's Something About Mary (SN) - Widely considered the high point of Stiller comedies, despite the fact he's the foil to Matt Dillon and Chris Elliott. The "franks and beans" scene is funny because of everyone's reactions, not really in how Stiller sells it, but the rest of the movie generally finds him befuddled by the goings-on around him. TSAM also marks one of the first appearances of Stiller's trademark mispronunciation gag, where he draws out the vocalization of an allegedly comical sounding word for alleged comical effect (see also Mystery Men and Meet the Parents). In this case, "Favre."

Your Friends and Neighbors - Uh, not a comedy.

Permanent Midnight - Also not a comedy, but damn I never get tired of films about successful people who piss their lives away for drugs. For my money, Hollywood can't make enough of these. Really.

Mystery Men (MF) - I actually enjoyed this movie quite a bit. Stiller, however, couldn't match the performances of William H. Macy (The Shoveller) and Paul Reubens (The Spleen). And Geoffrey Rush was excellent as well. Stiller got to misquote common phrases ("I'm a Pantera's box you do not want to open") and mispronounce words ("cadre") though, so I'm sure somebody found that amusing.

Keeping the Faith - Arf. Next.

Meet the Parents (SN) - The hype factor really fooled me on this one, as did all the "best comedy of the year" accolades. All we really get is Stiller settling into the twitchy Everyman groove that will define many his later comedy roles. I did find the idea of a septic tank leaking at an outdoor wedding to be amusing, however.

Zoolander (MF) - Stiller's third directorial effort is a scattershot collection of mild satire and dumb humor. An inspired Will Ferrell brings Mugatu to life, and also has the best lines, leaving Stiller to bludgeon us over and over with the fact that his character is really, really stupid. I appreciated the male model theory of political assassinations, but could've done with less of Stiller and Owen Wilson mugging on screen.

The Royal Tennenbaums (SN+MF) - It's probably my fault that I expected something as slyly hilarious as Rushmore from Wes Anderson, but TRT - while visually stunning - didn't do a lot for me. I can't really blame Stiller for this one, since most of the cast (with the exception of Bill Murray and Kumar Pallana) is mired in the same "is this a comedy or not?" conundrum.

Along Came Polly (SN) - Stiller plays an amped up version of Greg Focker from Meet the Parents. "Plays" might be an overstatement, as I'm convinced Stiller is now capable of flicking an internal switch in his hyopthalamus and knocking out a neurotic romantic comedy performance on autopilot.

Starsky and Hutch - Not seen at blog time.

Envy (SN) - Thank the box office performance of School of Rock for resurrecting this almost straight-to-video piece of crap, which is in the running for many "Worst of 2004" lists. Not even Christopher Walken as a deranged homeless man can take the pain of Stiller and Jack Black's phoned-in performances away.

Dodgeball (SA) - In a surprise twist, this movie produces a few laughs in spite of one of its lead actors. That actor being - who else - Stiller. "White Goodman" is possibly one of the most obnoxiously unfunny characters in cinematic history (he gets a good last line, I'll admit). Luckily they got Vince Vaughn, Rip Torn, and Steven Root to make up for it.

In retrospect, it does indeed appear that I was mistaken in finding much jocularity in Stiller's past performances. Fortunately, it doesn't look like I'll have that problem anytime soon: next up for Stiller is Meet the Fockers and the next Dreamworks SKG animation project, Madagascar. He stars in the latter with Chris Rock, who actually has a worse record in comedies than Stiller does, so you know I'm looking forward to this one.

More ratings gold

If it wasn't enough that security concerns are keeping a number of American athletes away, or that most of us will be able to find out contest results hours before they air on network television, now there's another reason many of us in the States may be tuning in to anything but the Olympics:

Icelandic singer Björk will open the Olympic Games in Athens tomorrow.

The eccentric star will perform before 70,000 spectators at the Greek capital's new Olympic Stadium and a worldwide TV audience of four billion at the four-hour opening ceremony.

The centre of the stadium will be turned into a lake for the event, which will also feature important symbols of Greek mythology, including a giant Trojan horse, a statue of the goddess Athena and a centaur shooting an arrow.

I vaguely remember when the Sugarcubes were the hip "college" band to listen to (I was in college at the time, which makes it all right), and so I gave Björk and company a listen. It wasn't really my bag - didn't like the music and her voice gives me facial tics - so I quickly retreated to my regular diet of Frank Zappa, TV show themes, and whatever Norwegian black metal band the guy across the hall was playing.

My tastes aside, many may wonder if Bjork is a big enough artist to open an event as majestic as the Olympics. I would point out to these people that similar concerns were expressed at the prospect of a certain Lionel Richie performing at the 1996 opening ceremonies in Atlanta, and who among us can forget his moving rendition of "All Night Long?"

Maybe this was the best Iceland could do for a representative at the Summer Games.

Royal pain in the ass

Disney releases The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement today in an attempt to get a jump on a movie that shares almost none of its target audience: Alien vs. Predator. I can't speak for AvP yet (I don't see it until tomorrow night), but my review of PD2 is up at Film Threat for your amusement/merciless ridicule. Enjoy.

Like a hurricane

The Wife brought up a good point last night: how can the World Meteorological Association compile a list of tropical storm names for the year that uses "Bonnie" for "B" and doesn't have "Clyde" for "C?" I can understand not using cutesy monikers like "Huey, Dewey, and Louie," or "Mutt and Jeff," but what's wrong with naming storms after criminals, or notorious political figures? Especially when the names would follow on consecutive letters, as noted above?

Besides, shouldn't the name for a potentially damaging system elicit a little fear? Doesn't Tropical Storm Attila sound more intimidating that Hurricane Stan? Batten down the hatches, Hurricane Hitler's coming!

At the very least, we should take Lewis Black's advice and use names indicative of how most of us feel when a category 4 hurricane is bearing down on us. My current favorite is "Hurricane Holy Fucking Moses."

Biting the four-fingered hand that feeds you

One of the Simpsons actors is displeased with the direction the show has taken of late:

Humorist Harry Shearer, whose disgruntled attitude in real life (and exhibited on his public radio program Le Show) is often transposed into brilliant comedy in the characters he portrays, has indicated that he is so dissatisfied with the course of The Simpsons that he'd "rather not be there now." Shearer, who voices numerous characters on the animated series, including Mr. Burns, Smithers, and Ned Flanders, also complained in an interview with the Irish Examiner that he has been relegated to essentially walk-on parts on the series. Referring to the fact that he reportedly earns $250,000 an episode for recording only a few lines of dialogue per episode, Shearer remarked, "It's possible to make a very nice living and still get totally screwed." His remarks outraged The Simpsons producer, Al Jean, who told the New York Post: "He's a guy who's been a malcontent, in my view. ... For someone earning millions off the show this year ... I just think it's unfathomable for him to take a shot at us."

I have respect for Shearer and find that his routines, when they don't go off into the comedy nether region of "I think this is funny so everyone else will too" (e.g. The OJ Simpson Rap) are generally decent. Unfortunately, the guy has garnered a rather...prickly reputation among his peers and industry professionals for being arrogant and something of a hypocrite. He takes paychecks for roles in Godzilla and My Best Friend's Wedding, then promptly turns around and talks shit about everyone involved. He likes to have control over his own material, and when he doesn't get it (SNL and The Simpsons), he tends to become pissy.

As far as being "screwed" while still raking in $250K an episode...Shearer signed the latest contract, just like all the other voice actors. If his working conditions were really that miserable, he should've walked away when he had the chance. As it stands, both he and fellow millionaire Al Jean would probably do well to just shut up already.

Conversations with Famous People, Pt. 8

The Year: 1998
The Place: Online Learning Conference, Anaheim, CA
The Person: Noted humorist Douglas Adams

Pete: Mr. Adams?
Douglas Adams: Hmmm?
Pete: I'm sorry to bother you, but could I get you to sign my conference program?
Douglas Adams: Certainly.
Pete: Thanks. You know, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is one of my favorite...
Douglas Adams: Good heavens, they don't expect me to talk about that, do they?

Don't panic, another installment of "Conversations with Famous People" is on the way.

Curly shoots first?

Check, please:

George Lucas, a longtime foe of "colorized" movies, has sharply criticized Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment's decision to release two Three Stooges DVDs today (Tuesday) that will allow viewers to watch them in either their original black-and-white or digitally colored versions. In an interview with the Associated Press, Lucas said, that the Stooges' slapstick comedy belongs in a black-and-white universe. "Would color distract from their comedy and make it not as funny anymore?" Lucas said. "Maybe just the fact that they're in black and white makes it funny, because their humor is dated. But by putting it in black and white, it puts it in a context where you can appreciate it for what it was. But you try to make it in full living color and try to compare it to a Jim Carrey movie, then it's hard for young people to understand. ... It's not fair to the artist."

Someone is obviously confused by the critical point here; that Columbia TriStar is giving customers the option of watching either the black and white or color versions. This is unfathomable to Lucas, who refuses to release the original versions of the Star Wars trilogy on DVD, forcing fans to sit through the same kind of updating he's bitching about here. Worse, he continues to pile even more CGI into the films. Certain aspects of the original trilogy are "enhanced" (the space battles, filling every square inch of the Mos Eisley scenes with crap), while others are still woefully dated (the state-of-the-art Asteroids graphics of the Millennium Falcon's targeting computers). Does this not "distract" from the viewing experience?

The ones who should really be offended by this are the "young people" Lucas talks about. It wasn't bad enough that he thought they'd embrace Jar Jar Binks, who's destined to go down as one of the most loathed characters in movie history, but now he's saying that youngsters are too stupid to realize The Three Stooges aren't contemporary comedians. This in spite of the show's music, clothing styles, and the fact that all three principals (even Shemp) are long dead.

And I'm still waiting for my Howard the Duck special edition.

"Oh Smithers, I would have said anything to get your stem cells."

Laura Bush stepped up to defend her husband on the issue of stem cell research:

LANGHORNE, PA. - First lady Laura Bush defended her husband's policy on embryonic stem cell research Monday, calling Democratic rival John Kerry's criticism "ridiculous" and accusing proponents of overstating the potential for medical breakthroughs.

"We don't even know that stem cell research will provide cures for anything — much less that it's very close" to yielding major advances, Mrs. Bush said.

"Forget about that infernal polio vaccine, Salk. We're justing going to stick with the gamma-globulin."

The first lady weighed in on the highly charged political and scientific issue on the third anniversary of Bush's decision to limit federal funding of embryonic stem cell research to only the 78 stem cell lines in existence Aug. 9, 2001.

Religious groups oppose the scientific work in which culling of stem cells kills the embryos, equating that with abortion, and had urged Bush not to be the first president to fund the research — even with limits.

I'd comment more on this passage, except I'm having a bitch of a time getting my head around the phrase, "Religious groups oppose the scientific work." I wasn't aware that medical research made the baby Jesus cry.

With polls showing overwhelming support for stem cell research, Kerry has promised to give scientists more freedom. He has used the word "ban" to describe Bush's actions when what the president has done is limit the research.

"That's so ridiculous," Laura Bush said in an interview with The Associated Press, calmly fielding questions about her husband and his presidential race.
...
Kerry spokesman Phil Singer said Bush's restrictions apply to 99.9 percent of potential stem cell lines that could be studied. "If that's not a ban," he said, "we don't know what is."

Unusually combative, the first lady said Kerry was trying to make a political issue out of her husband's policy "without saying what's right. I imagine he knows better."

I hope she used that "stern librarian" tone when saying it. That's so hot.

"I hope that stem cell research will yield cures," the first lady said. "But I know that embryonic stem cell research is very preliminary right now and the implication that cures for Alzheimer's are around the corner is just not right, and it's really not fair to people who are watching a loved one suffer with this disease." ... "It's not fair" to raise false hopes "because stem cell research is very, very preliminary," said Laura Bush. Alzheimer's contributed to the death of her father in the 1990s.

By my count, that's three times Mrs. Bush referred to the "preliminary" status of stem cell research. I'm no expert on genetics, like the First Lady is, but my understanding of such things is that scientific progress takes, like, years and stuff. Even more importantly, it helps to have the actual necessary materials to work with. Of course any potential cure for Alzheimer's, or Parkinson's, or stinkfoot is years away, but using that as an excuse for not doing anything is akin to saying we should stop cancer research because we haven't managed to cure anything in fifty years.

Proponents and members of the medical community say more than 100 new cell lines have been created worldwide since Bush's decision — some with new techniques that may make them more scientifically useful — and could be studied under more open rules. An exact count isn't possible because private funding means much of the work is done without any public scrutiny.

Yeah, but they were created by those godless Scandinavians. Why would we want to have anything to do with them?

Americans may be more equally divided over concerns about terrorism and the economy, but the stem cell issue is one where his alliance with the religious right is really going to hurt Bush. Worse, the US is starting to slip behind other industrialized countries in science and technology, while the Administration continues its practice of suppressing or smearing those facts and research it doesn't agreee with. Placing America's Den Mother in front of the press to put a friendly face on her husband's ugly policies only worsens the problem. That's my hypothesis* anyway.

*"Science" word

"Whatever happened to Fay Wray?"

Hollywood's first scream queen has passed away:

NEW YORK - Fay Wray tried twice to wrestle free from a giant gorilla's grip. Once onscreen in the 1933 classic "King Kong" and then again in the years that followed when she yearned to shake the ape's prestigious shadow.

"I used to resent `King Kong,'" she said in a 1963 interview. "But now I don't fight it anymore. I realize that it is a classic, and I am pleased to be associated with it."

30 years. That sounds about right for certain actors to acknowledge genre work with which they'd previously avoided being associated (e.g. The Shatner). Too bad Alec Guinness didn't live longer.

And they're still waiting on Harrison Ford.

Pity Wray's death will get about 1/10 the coverage of a coked-up one-hit wonder who burned women with crack pipes and was directly responsible for unleashing Eddie Murphy's "Party All the Time" upon an unsuspecting world.

Birth pains

Given the chance, I'd definitely like to check this out:

Four years after angry protests by the Los Angeles branch of the NAACP and other groups forced him to yank his planned showing of D.W. Griffith's 1915 film The Birth of a Nation, the owner of the Silent Movie Theater in Los Angeles has vowed to screen the film beginning tonight (Monday). Charlie Lustman, who describes the film as both "a cultural and artistic monument" and a "shameful stain" on the history of U.S. race relations, told Saturday's Los Angeles Times that he intended to launch a series on the most important silent films with Nation because he regarded it as "the biggest and most cinematic gem in history." (He intends to show the film with a disclaimer stating that he does not endorse the racist content of the film but wants to honor its place in cinema history, the Times observed.) However, L.A. NAACP President Geraldine Washington told the newspaper that she still opposes the screening. "This movie has no positive value whatsoever," she said. "And it runs the risk of creating unrest and hate crimes. It's just too risky to take a chance."

Heavens, yes. You know, I remember seeing The Birth of a Nation for a film class. At the end, it was all the TAs could do to keep us from donning our Klan robes (Whitey always has one handy), jumping on our mighty steeds, and galloping across I-35 to scare hell out of some minorities.

That Lustman even has to offer a disclaimer is asinine. Still, if theater owners covering their asses is the future of moviegoing, I wish they'd at least post something useful like This theater does not endorse the directorial style of Michael Bay, or Audience members may experience uncontrollable nausea at Ashley Judd's performance.

Ignorance runs on both sides of the political spectrum when it comes to film. Every few years the religious right has to single out another movie they haven't bothered to watch to get lathered up about (The Last Temptation of Christ, Priest). And now the NAACP wants us to believe a 90-year old movie will inflame latent racist passions and lead to attacks on African-Americans.

Washington ignores the fact that The Birth of a Nation does have positive value, provided you have an appreciation for film. From the innovations Griffith brought to the screen (cross-cutting, fade-outs, full screen close-ups, moving tracking shots, and many more) to the brilliance of the early battlefield scenes, its significance can't be denied.

I'm not insensitive to the feelings of those who see the film's horrendous caricatures (white actors in blackface) or, to cite one example, the fact that the leader of the black horde that overruns the Reconstruction South is named "Lynch" (subtlety wasn't Griffith's forte) and are honestly dismayed. I wonder, though, if Washington sees any parallels in her denouncement of Birth and in the way some public officials asked theaters not to show Malcolm X because they were afraid it would incite widespread gang violence. It didn't, though I almost had to resort to violence myself to get white guys to stop wearing those goddamn 'X' caps.

And who besides film nerds will want to sit through a 3+ hour polemic on the dangers of the Black Man? Maybe Washington is worried that skinheads will attend the screening and go on a rampage, although speaking from personal experience, the skins I've met don't have that much of an attention span. Really, the only people seeking this screening out are those with an honest desire to see the original classic of American cinema on the big screen. And the only thing The Birth of a Nation is likely to inflame in those people is their hemorrhoids.

UPDATE: I'll be damned. They canceled it again:

The owner of the Silent Movie Theater in Hollywood canceled a planned screening of D. W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation after the Los Angeles branch of the NAACP and a group called the National Alliance for Positive Action vowed to picket the theater. Although owner Charlie Lustman had planned to show the film with a disclaimer stating that he does not endorse the racist content of the film but wants to honor its place in cinema history, the two groups had charged that the film would continue to poison race relations. Lustman said that he had also received threatening phone calls and was concerned about the safety of patrons and 92-year-old Bob Mitchell, the onetime leader of the famed Mitchell Boys Choir, who was to provide organ music to accompany the film.

Un-fucking-believable.

Scum swept

Sometime in the early '80s, we were in St. Louis visiting family and the Cardinals were playing a home stand against the hated New York Mets. A KSHE DJ referred to the visiting team as "pond scum," and the name stuck. Stores sold "Mets are Pond Scum" t-shirts all week, and I've been unable to unentangle the two in my mind ever since.

And I still have the shirt.

The Scum are no longer in contention for a playoff spot, so last weekend's sweep by St. Louis lacked some of the "oomph" of earlier meetings. All the same, watching them bomb Al Leiter back to the Stone Age was satisfying, and it helped put a little more distance between the Cards and the Cubs, who fell another game off pace.

Since I live in Houston, I should probably mention the Astros. They suck. Moving on...

Oh, okay. I remember the preseason hype as well as anyone: Clemens and Pettite were going to anchor an aging but talented team, making them favorites (along with Chicago...*snicker*) for the NL Central title. Now, after 111 games and dropping two of the last three to the lowly Expos, you could say their "turn" is over. They were done before the All-Star break, but I think it's only now starting to sink in for some of the locals.

Including GM Gerry Hunsicker, who started talking yesterday about the "major changes" coming to Houston in the offseason. Maybe they could move the Minute Maid Park fences in a few yards. And add a few more outfield hills. However, I think I speak for all fans of other NL Central teams when I say the Astros should definitely keep Jeff Bagwell for another three or four seasons.

"Tonight at the Pit, everyone gets laid."

Only substitute Six Feet Under for The Pit, and 2/3 of the cast for "everyone."

Okay, so I lied a couple weeks ago when I said I was through watching SFU. I have no excuse except...I'm a hypocrite. That, and Sunday nights are when I'm feeling my least creative, so I rationalize that it's okay to space out in front of the great glass teat for a couple hours.

But enough of that. It's summertime, and the loving was easy last night. Keith nailed Celeste, and got fired for it. David banged that paintball guy - whose exhortations during said act earned the biggest laughs of the night. Nate got with Brenda...again, and both were caught by Joe, who promptly left (throwing my Billy returns to kill everyone plot prediction into disarray). Claire sorta kinda tried to get into some hot lesbian action with Mena Suvari, but decided Banky Edwards was right, so that's done.

Who am I leaving out? Rico finally got Biblical with "Infinity" last week, but the hilarious repercussions weren't felt until last night. I have to admit, after watching her play Vanessa, Rico's soon-to-be-ex-wife who went after Infinity and then destroyed the stripper's car, I've decided I'm in love with Justina Machado. Something about a woman with curves who can bust out a windshield with a baseball bat makes me tingly in ways I'm not comfortable discussing on a family forum.

The laughs are coming back, though they're more unintentional...such as when Nate hustled Maya out of the house, or Rico bunking down in the prep room, but 'll take what I can get.

And what happened to the talking corpses? The creators must have decided it was too cheesy, but I kind of liked the idea. It was a welcome bit of silly surreality that would help to offset some of the more cloying melodrama, and I wish they hadn't gotten rid of it.

Not that it matters. SFU will stay in my weekly rotation, for now. Quality writing, however spotty or occasionally pretentious, is tough to find on TV. And there's a certain amount of schadenfreude involved in taking pleasure at the screw-ups of the Fishers and their friends.

And in hoping Vanessa picks up the bat again. Ay caramba.

Walker, St. Louis Cardinal

I hadn't heard about St. Louis' trade for Larry Walker until today. I admit, while I admire the way Jocketty and company continue to try and improve the team, I have some mixed feelings about it. Sure, the guy's a 3-time NL batting champion with some heavy numbers, but he's also benefited heavily from playing in Coors Field. He's prone to injury, and he's been known to fade during the stretch. I'm not sure where The Genius is going to put him on Sunday, and neither is he, saying 2nd or 4th (Walker claims he'll be batting 5th). Either he'll be helping Renteria set the table for Pujols (Womack won't keep the lead-off spot), or he'll be coming behind Rolen and Edmonds (I don't think even LaRussa would bump Edmonds down in favor of Walker). That there's some power.

Walker's an expensive addition - $12.5 million this year and $15 million in 2005, of which $7.5 million will be paid by Colorado. Still, I'm glad that the Cards aren't sitting on their hands, even with a 10.5 game lead in the division, because the Cubs have been playing some fierce ball of late. It would've been nice to add Randy Johnson, given the obscene offensive numbers St. Louis has been putting up and the feeling I can't shake that the Cards' pitching can't possibly hold up, but a little insurance at the plate can't hurt.

As usual, Redbird Nation has some great analysis.

"Christ, seven years of college down the drain."

Sometimes I read the news and fear I am hallucinating:

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush said Friday he opposes the use of a family history at colleges or universities as a factor in determining admission.

Bush stated his position to what's known as "legacy" in response to a question during a Washington forum for minority journalists called Unity 2004.

He was asked, "Colleges should get rid of legacy?"

Bush responded, "Well I think so, yes. I think it ought to be based upon merit."

Under legacy programs, applicants are given an advantage if their parents or grandparents attended the school. Bush, a third-generation graduate of Yale University, joked about his own legacy.

"Well, in my case, I had to knock on a lot of doors to follow the old man's footsteps," he said to laughter.

The laughter of an audience nervously waiting for a punch line, I guess.

Those must've been some doors. I mean, like, the iron gates of Hell itself, to explain how a guy with an SAT score 200 points below that of the average Yale freshman managed to get into that particular school.

Bush's remark came as he was being grilled about his opposition to affirmative action programs that consider race as a factor for admission, particularly through quota systems.

Bush said admission should be based "on merit."

Bush has not previously expressed opposition to the use of family lineage at a university to help admission.

Well sure, he's got nothing to lose by doing it now. The guy's been the beneficiary of preferential admissions policies his entire life, whether at Yale, or the National Guard, or Harvard - where he managed to secure a slot in their prestigious business school despite graduating from Yale with a 'C' average. Plus, his daughters' have both already graduated. Unless he's planning on going into medicine or getting his doctorate after serving as President, what does he care about family legacies going away?

I personally never checked into my own family's legacy history. Not that it would've mattered, as the odds of my choosing Columbia, MO over Austin, TX were remote, at best.

"You killed him?"
"No, I shot him. The bullets and the fall killed him."

I wasn't lucky enough to see Little Black Book this week, and there are already about a half dozen (okay, two) write-ups of Open Water up at Film Threat. So all that was left to me to review was Tom Cruise's latest, Collateral. Enjoy.

UPDATE: Almost forgot: Code 46, which opened at SXSW, is in limited release this weekend. Just in case you cared.

Music for the asses

'Mudge started this, with his post on listing the worst songs ever by allegedly "great" bands. Leaving aside the subjective question of what makes a band great, I started giving the idea some thought.

Then Metafilter joined the fray with an entry asking people to list the worst songs from albums and CDs in their own collection. Rather than cheat and list every track from Shatner's "The Transformed Man," I decided to merge the two, using CDs in my travel case (currently holding about 75 discs) and not my full collection (which I have neither the time nor the inclination to sift through at this point). Not only is it hopelessly subjective, but now I can deflect any criticism for omitting something by claiming I don't own it. Genius!

Having said that, here's my listing of the 15 worst songs from great bands whose CDs I actually own.

15. "Stand" - R.E.M. (Green) - I saw R.E.M. about a half a dozen times between 1987 and 1989, and on at least two of those occasions, Michael Stipe described this as "the worst song ever written by man." Who am I to argue?

14. "Damaged II" - Black Flag (Damaged) - Someone needed a swift kick in the ass for including this droning punk equivalent to a slow jam on an otherwise great album. I vote for Greg Ginn, mostly because Henry Rollins would put me down like a crippled dog.

13. "Try Not to Look So Pretty" - Dwight Yoakam (This Time) - I like Dwight, and this album contains two of the greatest country/pop/ songs ever recorded: "A Thousand Miles from Nowhere" and "Ain't That Lonely Yet." It's also home to this unfortunate selection, which stands apart from the aforementioned tracks thanks to its inexplicably whiny tone and half-assed execution. Perhaps he was singing to his rapidly departing hair.

12. "Roll to Me" - Del Amitri (Twisted) - Okay, I think the Dels are a great band. Most of their albums (especially the excellent Change Anything) are chock full of songs about alienation, loss of love, and drinking, which is what makes "Roll to Me" so obnoxious. Apparently written to improve the group's mainstream appeal, this atrocious bubblegum concoction went on to become their biggest hit, marking the band as a one-hit wonders for life (and for a song used to promote a goddamned Flipper movie, for crying out loud). They're still fairly popular in their native Scotland and Europe, but their future in America is probably non-existent, thanks to this one song.

11. "I Was Made for Loving You" - KISS (Best of) - There are plenty of borderline KISS songs ("Love Gun," "Lick it Up"), but none of them made the mistake of incoporating a quasi-disco melody like "I Was Made for Loving You." Even "Beth" sounds like Gershwin compared to this.

10. "New York, New York" - Ryan Adams (Gold) - I'm cheating on this one, because I'm not that much of an Adams fan but I love Whiskeytown, his former band. I'm also convinced Adams wouldn't have half the mainstream recognition he curently enjoys had not Gold fortuitously come out right around 9/11, allowing radio DJs the country over to latch on to the single. Compared to the good songs on the album ("La Cienega Just Smiled," "Rescue Blues"), and even the average ones, it doesn't hold up.

9. "Long Live Rock" - The Who (The Kids Are Alright) - It's written somewhere (or should be) that songs extolling the virtues of "rock" by name are abominations and should be cast into the fiery pit from whence they came.

8. "Roll the Bones" - Rush (Roll the Bones) - Not the entire song, just that horrible "rap" in the middle of it. I'm a Rush fan from way back (Permanent Waves era), and I've usually gone along with their occasionally ill-advised attempts to branch out musically (letting Lee and/or Lifeson write lyrics, for example), but this was horrendous. Reminded me of rapping Abe Lincoln from Duff Gardens.

7. "Tonight She Comes" - The Cars (Greatest Hits) - Ric Ocasek and Ben Orr made some great music in the late '70s. They were crap live, but I'd put their self-titled debut album and Candy-O up there with the best of the decade. Then Ocasek married swimsuit model Paulina Porizkova and got cocky. "Tonight She Comes" - a hammy, self-indulgent single that is too lazy to even make an effort to mask the double entendre (the video featured a cowgirl riding a giant silver phallus) - was the result.

6. "Chiquita" - ABBA (Gold) - It was a gift, swear to god.

5. "Body Language" - Queen (Hot Space) - Hot Space is a lousy album, and "Body Language," a monotonous ode to getting your groove on, is the worst of the lot ("Calling All Girls" is a close second). By the time this album came out (1982), Queen were entering the doldrums of their career. Sadly, they would only turn it around when Freddie Mercury wrote some of his best stuff while dying of AIDS. Queen remains one of my top 10 favorite all-time bands, which is what makes "Body Language" such a kick in the groin, musically.

4. "Night Time in the Switching Yard" - Warren Zevon (Excitable Boy) - Zevon had perhaps more ups and downs than any artist in memory. When he was on, as with songs like "Desperadoes Under the Eaves" or "Splendid Isolation," he was impossible to top. But for each of those, you'd get a "Long Arm of the Law" or a Mutineer album. "Night Time in the Switching Yard" is partcularly inexplicable, however, coming as it did on one of his otherwise greatest wire-to-wire albums. Even talented artists weren't able to escape the siren's call of the disco guitar groove.

3. "Wild Honey Pie/Revolution 9" - The Beatles (The White Album) - I've always thought of the White Album as a great album buried in another album's worth of filler. I believe if you culled the weaker tracks, you'd have something to rival Sgt. Pepper's or Revolver. As it is, the presence of songs like these two (I couldn't decide which one I hated more) keep the White Album from being one of those rare CDs I can listen to from start to finish.

2. "Hot Stuff" - The Rolling Stones (Black & Blue) - This is what happens when you let Mick determine the musical direction of the group.

1. "Mother" - The Police (Synchronicity) - Andy Summers always got a few token songs to pad out various Police albums. Some were barely tolerable ("Friends" from Message in a Box), and some were actually pretty funny ("Be My Girl - Sally" from Outlandos d'Amour). "Mother," on the other hand, completely threw off the tenuous cohesion of the last Police album. I can't hit the Skip button fast enough to get to "Mrs. Gradenko."

Reason #4,328 to boycott Starbuck's

Not only is their overpriced coffee about as tasty as a styofoam cup of warm tobacco spit, but they're litigious assholes:

GALVESTON — The beer tap will continue to flow at a Galveston bar involved in a legal battle with coffee giant Starbucks Corp.

With no resolution late Tuesday following an eight-hour mediation hearing in Houston between Starbucks’ attorneys and the creator of Starbock — the draught beer at the center of the dispute — the two sides will likely not meet again until they go to trial in 2005.

“Nothing was settled, but we’re pleased with the fact that we get to continue to use the name Starbock and can sell the beer as usual,” said John Egbert, the Houston attorney representing Galveston businessman Rex Bell, owner of the Old Quarter Acoustic Café.
...
The case, which pits the $4 billion Seattle-based corporation against the Galveston entrepreneur, revolves around Starbucks claims that the name of Bell’s beer infringes on its well-known brand. In March, Egbert filed a complaint for declaratory judgment in Kent’s court — in essence asking Starbucks to prove its case in a trial setting.

Leading trademark lawyers have said the case centers on one key premise — whether someone asking for a mug of Starbock beer on tap at Bell’s bar was thinking she was drinking something associated with Starbucks.

Depends on how bad the beer is. I suppose it's possible that a patron at the Old Quarter Acoustic Cafe might take a drink from a skunked batch, wrinkle his nose is disgust and say, "Damn, that taste's worse than Starbuck's house blend!" Otherwise, it's a stupid case.

Separately, Egbert said Wednesday that he is set to file a notice of opposition with the U.S. Trademark Office in Washington, D.C., to counter several Starbucks applications filed in May 2003 for “distilled spirits and liqueurs” that were recently approved. Starbucks plans to sell alcohol under its brand name in restaurants, bars and liquor stores, but not at its familiar coffee shop retail outlets. The liqueur will be made under a private-label agreement with Jim Beam Brands Co.

Starbucks has used those trademarks as evidence in its filings against Bell. Egbert believes he has a strong case to counter those trademarks because they were filed several months after Bell’s initial Starbock trademark application, which was approved by the Trademark Office.

“(Starbucks) has said that Bell’s use of the Starbock name would cause confusion with their trademarks even though our mark was filed before theirs and we have priority,” said Egbert. “If that’s the case, then what’s good for the goose is good for the gander. We can also say that Starbucks is causing confusion in the marketplace.”

Now, I'm no big city lawyer, so I have no idea how much water Egbert's argument is going to hold. Even so, it doesn't make a lot of sense to me that Starbuck's is making so much hay out of this. Surely the bad publicity they'll reap from stomping Rex Bell's guts out in court is something they'd want to avoid.

Then again, this isn't first time Starbuck's has pulled out all the legal stops to go after a comparatively defenseless target. Just ask Kieron Dwyer (and see the image they sued him over here).

Chuck has written some about the Starbock situation. So have Scott and Michael, who makes possibly the best point there is to be made about the whole imbroglio:

In any case, how can you take a company seriously that’s named after Dirk “Face” Benedict?

I always rooted for the Cylons, personally.

Gordon's alive?

Hurray.

Variety reports that "The Mummy" & "Van Helsing" writer-director Stephen Sommers and his producing partner Bob Ducsay have landed the rights to Flash Gordon, and will adapt a feature film based on the iconic comic book superhero for Universal.

Sommers is producing the Flash project with an eye toward scripting; Sommers has yet to helm a project he hasn't scripted. "Flash Gordon" dates back to 1934, when it was created by famed comic strip artist Alex Raymond, and for decades after appeared in movie serials, animated fare, TV shows and a ultra camp 1980 feature helmed by Mike Hodges.

The "ultra-camp 1980 feature" is still the best. Complain all you want about Sam Jones ("Flash Gordon. Quarterback. New York Jets!"), or the garish sets, or histrionics masquerading as dialogue ("Open fire! All weapons!"). Actually don't complain at all, for without it we wouldn't have the modern classic we do today.

And the best Queen soundtrack of all time, mind you.

Besides, I don't care how cheesy you effete 21st century snobs find the Hodges version, do you really want the hack responsible for The Mummy Returns and...ugh...Van Helsing to get his greasy hands on Flash Gordon? None of your childhood classics will be safe after that, so don't come crying to me when your beloved Goonies are snatched up by Resident Evil director Paul W.S. Anderson.

You scream, we all scream

Sick of the blatant liberal bias in your freezer section? Tired of flavors with anti-American names like "Cherry Garcia" and "Karamel Sutra?" Well, look no further...Star Spangled Ice Cream is here.

From the touching tribute to the Gipper on the front page to Ted Nugent's stirring endorsement of their "Gun Nut" ice cream, I think we've finally found something as deliciously cold as Ann Coulter:

"This ice cream is awesome!” proclaims The Nuge. “After I kill and grill it, I top my wild game off with a bowl of GUN NUT!"

No word on The Nuge's endorsement of banging underaged girls, however. But who cares? SSIC donates $1 to the Gun Owners Foundation's education project, which includes advice for dealing with a visit from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. No pushing, kids!

And check out these great flavors:

Choc and Awe
I Hate the French Vanilla
Nutty Environmentalist
Iraqi Road
Rushmallow

What, no Kerry Waffle Cones? Or Gore's Sour Grape? What about Hillary Carpetbagger Crunch? You guys obviously aren't trying very hard.

(Found on Bob and David's web site)

Hope I die before I get...never mind

I'm debating the wisdom of going to check out this show:

CPATW PRESENTS
JUDAS PRIEST
KLOL'S B-DAY PARTY
WOODLANDS PAVILION
"RAIN OR SHINE"
SUN AUG 8 2004 GATE 5PM

Omitted from that highly informative blurb is the fact that Slayer is one of the opening acts.

I saw Slayer way back in 1988, but I've never seen Priest, and now that they're back touring with Rob Halford this seems like as good a time as any. Except that it's August, and temps will probably be approaching a nice even 100 by concert time...and it's at the Woodlands, access to which is only slightly more maddening than hunting for parking...and it's a KLOL gig, which means that in addition to the usual complement of meatheads that show up for a metal concert, I'd get to interact with that odd breed of humanity that finds Walton and Johnson funny.

Bah, who am I kidding? Unless I can see music in a dimly lit bar while leaning against a wall near the stage with a drink in my hand and an A/C vent blowing directly on me, I tend not to bother. And if it's an outdoor show, I'll at least need a cooler of beer, which most venues (including the Woodlands Pavilion) forbid. It might be interesting to see Slayer again, especially if I could find another group of 30-something complainers like myself to hang out with, but I'm sure Priest won't take the stage until 9 or 10 PM, ending around midnight. I'd be lucky to get home by 1 AM.

And me with an early squash game.

Maybe I'll just read the latest Golf Digest and call it a night.

Would you believe...Don Adams is still alive?

Oodles of cinematic speculation today, boy and girls (courtesy of Dark Horizons).

Everyone can breathe easy, the Get Smart movie is on its way:

Warner Bros. has finally found a star to anchor its bigscreen version of the sitcom classic "Get Smart." Steve Carell -- formerly a field reporter on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" and a supporting player in such films as "Bruce Almighty" and "Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy" -- is making a deal to play bumbling secret agent Maxwell Smart...

I would think the continued existence of Leslie Nielsen makes the idea of a Maxwell Smart movie redundant. I suppose the original series was funny in that obvious '60s comedy sort of way, but the first movie spin-off - The Nude Bomb sure wasn't. It was so ridiculously unfunny, in fact, that children actually had night terrors for weeks afterwards.

---
News of coming sequels may not fill most of you with dread, and that's fine, but don't let your comfortable lifestyle numb you to the fact that some of us are out there on the front lines every week seeing movies that wouldn't even exist in a just and ordered universe:

Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo" has found its German gigolo in the form of Til Schweiger. The Teutonic actor will play Heinz Hummer, a suave, cocky, high-ranking German gigolo whose life is threatened before the 73rd Annual Man Whore Awards. Rob Schneider and Eddie Griffin star in the Happy Madison sequel, which begins lensing this month in Amsterdam...

"Heinz Hummer?" Ah, le mot juste. You gotta hand it to Rob Schneider, though. When I finally sit down to write the Annals of Improbable Celebrities, Schneider will have an entire chapter.

Or maybe he'll share one with Steve Guttenberg. Haven't decided.
---
Say it ain't so Slater-san!

CSI Files reports that a main character character will be killed off in the season premiere, click the link to find out which one.

Whoops, already spoiled it. In keeping with the locale, I predict Cochrane is quitting in order to travel the world and smoke weed with ex-Dolphins RB Ricky Williams.

---
Finally, good news for fans of the X-Men films:

Halle Berry told The BBC that "After playing Storm in 'X-Men' and now Catwoman, I think my comic book hero days are probably over. That's unless I was lucky enough to play Catwoman again. I would love to do that. But other than that, I think I've pretty much done it".

Oh, I seriously doubt you'll be playing Catwoman again.

Still, this is great news, if only to spare us more lines about toads and lightning. Knowing my luck, however, Singer will replace Storm with Gambit or Jubilee or someone equally lame. I say bring on Colossus and Beast.

Or the White Queen. If you want to maintain the hot babe quotient, that is.

"If I'm so 'super' why did Daddy leave?"

"City of Heroes" is one of those PC games I'd like to pick up once they add another 12 hours to each day. It goes on my list of "Gee, wouldn't that be fun?" activities along with doing more writing, playing "GTA:San Andreas"/"Splinter Cell:Pandora Tomorrow"/"Madden 2005," or watching the entire World at War series in one sitting.

I haven't really caught the massive mulitplayer game bug yet, and I suppose I should be happy for that. Gaming time is a precious commodity these days, and my heart probably wouldn't be into taking it too seriously.

Worse, I'd probably resort to the kind of behavior The Sneeze is exhibiting. Only I doubt it would be as humorous.

Sorry about your penis

But at least there's a new Hummer on the way to compensate for it:

DETROIT — The brawniest SUV is about to get brawnier when General Motors Corp. gives its Hummer line a high performance makeover next year. The Hummer H1 Alpha will go on sale next spring — bringing high-performance to the off-road brand.

The 2006 H1 Alpha’s 205-horsepower gasoline engine will be replaced with a 310-horsepower Duramax diesel powerplant. The new engine will give the $100,000 H1 more power and off-road capabilities while lowering emissions and enhancing fuel economy.

Any improvement on 6 MPG has to be considered an "enhancement," I suppose. And with a mere $100,000 price tag, they'll soonhave the market cornered on upscale off-road enthusiasts.

All three of them.

GM confirmed Tuesday it will build the H3, a mid-size SUV that will arrive at dealerships in the first half of 2005 as a 2006 model.

It will be priced at about $30,000 and make the Hummer brand more affordable. "

Which will finally allow middle-class weekend warriors with sexual adequacy issues to join their wealthier brethren. After all, why should rich guys be the only ones to blow half a tank of gas driving their rugged, off-road vehicles to the Gap on weekends?

In an interview last month, Hummer General Manager Mike DiGiovanni said there’s no chance Hummer will grow any bigger than the H1, but it could shrink smaller than the H3 in size and price.

“We could go down market,” DiGiovanni said, “but it has to be a real Hummer.”

He continued, "I mean, we can't have people buying affordable, regular sized automobiles that get reasonable gas mileage and don't pose a hazard to their occupants or others on the road, could we? That would be downright nutty."

Texas Tuesdays - 08/03/2004

This week on Texas Tuesdays, two Houston-area candidates. Wade Weems is running against incumbent Dennis Bonnen in heavily Republican SD25, while Charlotte Coffelt is taking on House Redistricting Chairman Joe Crabb in SD127. Head on over for interviews with both candidates and to see what you can do to help out.

Good riddance

Jon Matthews, former talk radio host/current sex offender, was sentenced today:

RICHMOND - Former radio talk show host Jon Matthews was formally sentenced to seven years' probation on a charge of indecency with a child for exposing himself to an 11-year-old girl last year in his Sugar Land home.

After sentencing, the father of the victim read a statement in the court of state District Judge Brady Elliott describing Matthews' actions as inexcusable.

Nothing like seeing one of the mouthpieces for the religious right hoisted by his own intolerant petard. He may be lower profile (and that won't change any time soon), but you can add Matthews to the ranks of Swaggart and Limbaugh as a holier-than-thou loudmouth who couldn't walk the walk. Maybe he can still figure out a way to blame Clinton.

And if that wasn't enough, here are Matthews' thoughtful post-sentencing comments:

"Those of you who have listened to my radio show and read my newspaper columns over the years know how strong a supporter I was of our criminal justice system. I can only say how misguided I was. Our criminal justice system is not based on justice; it is a quota system where conviction is the only scorecard."

"You know even the accusation of this sort of thing destroys a person," Matthews said. "They can never recover."

Dude, you pled guilty. I'd expect anyone wrongfully accused of something like this to be on their roof with a bullhorn every night protesting their innocence. The fact that Matthews is trying to spin the conviction like he had no choice but to take the deal - after years of "tough on crime" rhetoric - is pathetic.

Don't want people to whisper behind your back and pull their children to the other side of the street when they see you coming? Shouldn't have dropped trou in front of an 11-year old. Seems pretty simple to me, but I'm a liberal and I hate freedom.

Matthews said he hopes one day to talk about the case.

"The justice system is a scandal. Mimes and murderers are coddled.
Victims are abused. As a vigilante, I can make only one conclusion: all
judges are mental perverts and communists. Thank you."[1]

UPDATE:Chuck sums everything up quite nicely.

[1] Opus the Penguin, on trial for whacking mimes with an olive loaf

Intelligence regarding my daughter's potential attack on her schoolmates predated 9/11 by months

Sorry for all the family-related posts today, but I just can't bring myself to expound upon the latest "alerts" by Homeland Security chief Chicken Little Ridge.

Anyway, my daughter (She Who Shall Not Be Named) is currently the youngest kid at her child development gulag (her "grade" goes from 6 weeks to 18 months). As she was only a few months old when she went in, there was some concern expressed by the teachers that a few of the biggest kids might pick on her, and this was shared by her old man. I wasn't much of a scrapper as a wee lad, and I was afraid of passing these wussy tendencies on to my little girl. I needn't have worried.

One of the oldest girls in my daughter's class is a child we'll call "Griselda." Griselda and her cohorts rule the toys in that place with an iron fist, even - as is often the case with children - if they aren't playing with them. My daughter has apparently developed a knack for a little toy piano they have there, just like Schroeder. Unlike Schroeder, I think her interest is centered mostly on banging on the thing with a hammer. Of course, it's too small a toy for Griselda and her ilk, but that doesn't prevent them from taking it away from my little girl whenever she starts to play with it. This happened again yesterday.

For the last time.

Did my daughter cry and make a fuss, thereby involving the teachers and marking her as a tattletale for the rest of her days? No. She bided her time, waited until Griselda was otherwise occupied, then stealthily crawled up on the little bully and bit her on the leg.

Granted, my sweet darling angel doesn't have any teeth yet, so the worst the foul Griselda got was a rather slobbery gumming, but it does her old man's heart good to know that she'd rather use vigilante justice than resort to going to the proper authorities.

Now I just have to teach my little Josephine Don Baker how to use a 2X4.

Hell is for husbands

One of the advantages to living in the Greater Paved Swamp, at least as far as Netflix goes, is the rapid turnaround we get on our movies. If I send a DVD in on Tuesday, we'll get its replacement on Thursday. Makes it much more convenient when planning for that big stay-at-home, TV-watching weekend.

But this can also have its disadvantages. Since Netflix processes the returns so quickly, you have to make sure your queue (the order of DVDs you want sent to you) is updated. Otherwise you get something like what happened to me yesterday.

I should preface this by saying that my opinion differs somewhat from The Wife (and the majority of America, it would seem) regarding a certain TV show, namely Sports Night. This will be a familiar diatribe to some, but I always felt the show was rather overrated. Part of it was Aaron Sorkin's fault - the repetitive dialogue, precious characterizations, and the time-honored "will they or won't they?" plot device. Part of it was other factors - some of the actors (*cough*Josh Charles*cough*) come up short in the comic timing department, and then there was ABC's insistence on a laugh track. I've backed off some from my initial hatred of it, but not much.

The Wife enjoyed it somewhat more than I did, and figured out some time last week that the entire series is available on DVD. She naturally updated the queue, bumping Sports Night up to the top on the assumption (so she says) that I would go in and change the order around after mailing two DVDs back on Saturday. Naturally, by the time I got on to the website yesterday, they'd already shipped disc 1 of Sports Night, along with disc 2 of the 1st season of The Gilmore Girls, which at least offers the sublime pleasures of Lauren Graham in cutoff shorts.

In retaliation, Master of the Flying Guillotine is going to the top of the queue today. Followed by, I think, COPS: Too Hot for TV.

"Do you expect me to yabber, Goldfinger?"
"No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to cark it."

I think everyone probably already heard this, but that's never stopped me before:

Australian actor Eric Bana may be set to be the next James Bond - beating Jude Law, Orlando Bloom and Heath Ledger to the part of the British spy. The Hulk star, 35, is still in negotiations with movie bosses to take over the coveted role from Pierce Brosnan in the next installment, which sees 007 on a mission to save the world from a killer virus. A source says, "Eric is the guy they want but he has a reputation for being demanding. They want to modernize Bond and turn him into a youthful, suave and modern hero to compete with the likes of Spider-Man and Keanu Reeves in The Matrix."

Bana was one of the few high points in Troy, and anyone thinking his sleepwalk through last year's big green bomb is indicative of his acting skills needs to go rent Chopper.

Not that modern James Bond movies require much in the way of acting, of course. More and more, I equate them with the Star Wars films: lots of green screen posing and ridiculously over-the-top villains. Bana will take a few paychecks for playing second fiddle to the flood of gadgets and product endorsements, then move aside for the next hapless sucker to be unfavorably compared to Sean Connery.

UPDATE: Now it seems Bana's rep is denying the reports, according to Moviehole:

London newspapers reported this past weekend that Eric Bana has signed to star as James Bond in the next 007 movie "The Man with The Red Tattoo", citing an anonymous source.

Moviehole checked in with a rep for Eric Bana today who debunked reports that the Melbourne-boy actor has been offered the role of 007.

"There's no truth to the story. He hasn't even been approached to play the role", says our source.

And so on.

The punishment due

It would seem there's a downside to the success of the X-Men and Spider-Man franchises:

Sci-Fi Wire talked with Thomas Jane lately and the actor seemed very keen on doing a sequel to this year's comic adaptation of "The Punisher". Of a sequel, Jane says "Yeah, we have had discussions. We want Jigsaw to be the bad guy. We'll probably shoot it for much the same budget and probably go to Australia or South Africa where we can stretch the dollar. I'd do another one. It's a niche market film that will always be that, and that's what it should be".

In regards to film's apparent lack of box-office success, the actor shrugs and says "In today's market, there's certainly a place for the blockbuster type of film, but if you can make a film for $30 million and its grossed like 50-something so far worldwide and then do a bunch more business on DVD, then that film has done its job".

It would have to be Jigsaw, wouldn't it? I mean, were there any pre-Ennis era Punisher bad guys of note besides him or Bushwhacker? Why not make a film version of the the Double Edge fiasco where the Punisher apparently killed Nick Fury?

Hell, bring Hasselhoff back to play Fury, and Reb Brown can return as Captain America.

Or Peter Fonda. Whatever.

The Punisher movie was pretty disappointing, and so is Jane's take on the sequel. He's right that it should be a niche film, but that isn't how Marvel played it. Otherwise Lion's Gate would've had Castle going completely psycho after his family was murdered. The setup in the movie was perfect, for crying out loud. In the comic, his wife and kids are murdered. In the movie, his wife, kids, parents, uncles, aunts, and cousins are killed. Howard Saint effectively cut down the Castle family tree, so you'd think he had plenty of justification to go a little nuts. As it turned out, The Punisher was standard revenge fare, and even less shocking than something like Death Wish.

In the meantime, Jane has a much better role in Stander, which opens up later this month. Check that out if you get a chance.

So that's how you establish the insanity defense

The disappearance of Lori Hacking just keeps getting weirder:

SALT LAKE CITY - Mark Hacking directed a relative to give police new information about his wife's disappearance that has police turning again to a municipal landfill, detectives said today.

Authorities investigating the case were surprised by the family's request that volunteers stop searching for Lori Hacking based on new detail from her husband.

The statement released late Saturday by the families of Mark and Lori Hacking did not say what Mark Hacking had told them.

Authorities would only say that the relative provided "additional substantive new information," said Detective Dwayne Baird. He declined to comment further.

I'm no prosecutor, but that sounds pretty bad for the husband. Maybe the idea of an anonymous tip never occurred to him.

The organized search for Lori Hacking was called off by the families earlier this week, a decision they said was made out of concern for the volunteers' safety. The search was in neighborhoods, industrial areas and canyons near the park where Lori Hacking was said to have been jogging the morning she was reported missing.

Since that day, Mark Hacking's credibility has crumbled amid revelations that he lied to his wife about enrolling at medical school in North Carolina and about graduating from the University of Utah.

The day after Mark Hacking reported his wife missing, he was taken to a psychiatric ward after he was seen running around at night naked outside a motel where he'd taken a room.

Kinky. Me, I would've probably claimed the neighbor's dog told me to do it, or insisted I was distraught by the cancellation of Oliver Beene, so you've got to give Hacking credit for going the extra mile.

Then again, facing a possible death by firing squad tends to encourage creativity.

UPDATE: Quelle surprise. Hacking's been arrested.

"Take your mind off contaminants for one night and have a hot dog."

Loved by millions, deplored by thousands, and swallowed in bulk quantities by a happy few at Nathan's on Coney Island every 4th of July, the hot dog is a lasting testament to the willingness of Americans everywhere to eat just about anything placed in front of them.

Eating hot dogs is something most of us have done at one point or another. Whether we were young and foolish, caring little for the actual contents of our pressed meat tube, or older and (possibly) wiser, but unwilling to ignore the siren's call of the vendor at out favorite ballpark. We all know the fleeting joy and secret shame of downing a couple franks. We're only human, as Billy Joel would say.

And he oughta know.

But man (or woman) does not live on hot dog and bread bun alone. No, for one of the glorious things about American wieners is we can put almost anything on them. And have. Even so, I'll bet most of you didn't know that your choice of hot dog topping broadcasts inescapable facts about your personality, political affiliation, and credit rating.

Here at APCB, we're constantly striving - to paraphrase Fat Albert - to get our readers to learn something before they go. So without further bloviation, here's what your particular hot dog garnish says about you:

Mustard: Perhaps the singular frankfurter topping of a true patriot, a healthy dollop of French's or - in a pinch - Guilden's says that you are a decent, hardworking American with whom anyone would be lucky to engage in sexual congress.

Pickle relish: Acceptable as a complement to mustard. However, taken on its own, relish usage is often indicative of illiteracy, pernicious anemia, and a penchant for frottage.

Ketchup: Joke's on you, pinko, since I have it on Highest Authority that individuals so brazen as to befoul a fine hot dog with ketchup are sleeper Communist agents, acting on orders from Pyongyang. Enjoy Leavenworth, comrades.

Catsup: What are you, a smart ass?

Chili: Children and animals find you irresistible, offsetting the manner in which you send law enforcement types and flight attendants into a boiling rage.

Onions: Sure, it's a bit iconoclastic, but putting onions on your hot dog won't make you forget about getting drummed out of the clergy.

Cheese: "The true measure of a man is how high he bounces after he hits the bottom...and how much cheese he puts on a hot dog." - Gen. George S. Patton

Tomato slices: I've heard of this phenomenon, but until I witness it first hand I'm going to treat it like Bigfoot sightings, which fill me with extreme loathing and nausea.

Sauerkraut: Unafraid of owning up to their proud Teutonic heritage, sauerkraut fans are assertive to a fault, in tune with others' emotional needs, and more human than human. It's also fulfilling to give them money for no reason.

Mayonnaise: Only someone with the utmost contempt for mankind would consent to slathering an otherwise inoffensive hot dog with mayo. Your IP address has been logged and the FBI notified, you rotten bastard.

Unlikely as it sounds, I probably missed some, so feel free to add your won favorite topping and I'll tell you what horrible secrets it reveals about you.