Scott Said What? - Rated PG-13

This was my most highly anticipated movie of the summer. It was “The Departed” starring Batman and The Joker. I went with 2 people a couple of years older than me and 4 teens (14, 14, 15, and 15)

The teens’ reviews: “Boring”, “I thought it would have been better”, “Loved it”, and “FN awesome”.

My review: Pretty Good.

Heath Ledger as the joker turned in a good performance. He was the highlight of the film. The blazing reviews he has been getting for his acting job is based on these factors: 1) He did a GOOD job. 2) The movie is very slowly paced so his under-the-top performance is a jolt in a slow paced movie. 3) Post Death Honors 4) All the cool lines in the movie went to the Joker. (They didn’t give Morgan Freeman, Gary Oldman, Aaron Eckhardt, or Michael Caine anything interesting to say or do. I don’t remember 1 thing Batman said.) The Joker’s magic trick is CLASSIC.

I picked up on several of the inspirations for Ledger’s Joker. The obsessive annoying lip licking is straight from Hannibal Lector when he licked at Jodie Foster. The punk kid act is straight from A Clockwork Orange’s Alex as played by Malcolm McDowell. There were a couple of forced Nicholson’s Joker laughs. He also very much reminded me of Jigsaw puppet from Saw. So for me it was like listening to a really good a Beastie Boys song from “Paul’s Boutique” where all the samples form something cool but you still know that it’s really a lot of other people’s work that’s been incorporated. Kinda of an Andy Warhol painting of a soup can or Marilyn Monroe. No matter how many people say how original it is, it’s still not a Michelangelo.

So if The Academy wants to give him a posthumous Oscar that he maybe should have earned for Brokeback Mountain, who am I to protest. But, this was not in the same class as Jack Nicholson’s joker by any stretch of the imagination.  Had Jack Nicholson reprised his role with this script it would have been truly something magical.

The Rest of the Movie: I’m tired of the self conscious superhero looking for an excuse to quit storyline. But, I enjoyed the movie with all of its flaws. I would watch it again. To me it was as if they took the movie, “The Departed” and added in Batman and The Joker. And I really liked The Departed. I’m going to break it out on DVD asap as soon as I watch Jack Nicholson, Michael Keaton, and Tim Burton’s more entertaining Batman on DVD. Maybe I’ll watch them in picture in picture.

I do recommend the movie. It is pretty good. Better than The Incredible Hulk (who also played that get me out of here superhero role). Not as fun as Iron Man but with a much better villain. Not as good as Wanted with Angelina Jolie.

UPDATE: Quote from MSNBC review about Heath Ledger’s performance: “Nothing that Jack Nicholson, much less Cesar Romero, created even comes close.” That is utter nonsense. It’s a journalistic crime to insult and belittle the all-time best superhero villain performance just for the sake of hyperbole. Jack Nicholson has 3 Academy Awards (Oscars) for Best Actor and another 9 nominations. He was robbed of an Oscar for his take as the Joker in Batman but did win a Golden Globe for Best Leading Actor for Batman, a BAFTA, a Saturn, and various other awards. It’s a fallacious argument to tear one person down in order to build another up. How come it isn’t reasonable to say Ledger’s performance stands up to Nicholson’s?

Not me.

I carry my notebook pc around in a backpack like I’m some college kid or something. I got my hand and forearm lodged in the shoulder strap and instead of pushing my hand back through and then pulling my elbow through I just used my otherworldly strength to pull my elbow and hand through at the same time. Needless to say, my shoulder hurts now. This aging thing sucks big time.

P.S., I have a sprained ankle that I apparently got from walking. The area between my thumb and forefinger feels like it was slammed in a car door that I got from playing softball. My neck hurts from how I sleep. My lower back hurts because my computer chair is a stump (literally a tree stump in my house). I really need to do more to loosen up these crackety joints. It’s taking me a while to realize that I’m not 20 anymore.

This guy’s one panel comics are freaking genius. http://bigeyedeer.wordpress.com/ At his site he has a lot of them and they get funnier and funnier.

I bought Animal Farm by George Orwell on a whim for like $6. Buy it. I know you heard about it in school and choose to not read it but read it anyway. It is fascinating. It’s like Charlotte’s Web meets The Matrix. What’s sad is that it was written in 1943 as a political satire about the USSR but layed over the progressive social agenda that has engulfed the United States, it is a sad prophecy that is being fulfilled.

One of my favorite people handed me down a great book. Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely. It’s kinda on the same path as Freakonomics by Stephen Dubner and Steven Levitt but more straightforwardly written. Me getting the book was an accident but you would have thought it was bought for me specifically. The book shows that even though we believe we are in control of our lives, in reality we are controlled by marketing, envy, the government, and various other outside factors. You will not shop the same after reading it. You will not view your co-workers the same after you read the book. It’s the kind of book you could finish on one plane ride and totally look at economic development in a different light. Or something like that.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1110ap_greatest_dad_charged.html?source=rss

NOVI, Mich. — A 33-year-old Michigan man is accused of wearing a “World’s Greatest Dad” shirt to a meeting for sex with what he thought was a 14-year-old girl.

Daniel Allen Everett of Clarkston was arraigned Tuesday in Novi (NOE’-veye) on charges of child sexual abuse and using the Internet to attempt child sexual abuse.

A jail official says it isn’t known whether Everett has a lawyer.

A spokesman for Attorney General Mike Cox could not confirm whether Everett has children. But Cox says in a statement that the arrest is a reminder that “a parent can pose a threat to our children.”

Magistrate Andra Dudley set Everett’s bond at $50,000.

I’ve been told recently that I have a Miley Cyrus fascination which I deny but I saw this picture of Miley Cyrus’ older brother Trace Cyrus on PerezHilton.com and this should be a warning to all those who dabble in emo androgyny. The road leads here. The crash is not pretty.

UPDATE: Apparently Trace Cyrus is at least marginally talented and has a synth-pop band signed to Columbia and is currently touring with Good Charlotte as an opening act. He has a clothing company selling emo clothes for anorexic guys and has a vampire style model “girlfriend” named Hannah Beth. Here’s a video on youtube showing him in various photographs. The music in the video isn’t his though. As my future brother-in-law I guess I better warm up to him.

This is a funny short clip of a girl telling him, “don’t be so emo”

Dangerous Distraction as opposed to the more pressing issues of doing an interview with his children on ACCESS HOLLYWOOD or kissing up to OPRAH or playing a little basketball with kids for the camera, or sitting through twenty years of “hate whitey” church sermons or pretty much anything else.

“I can’t move my arm,” while he raises it completely over his head to take his shirt off.

“I’ve lost my eyes,” while he is crying them both out.

“I’ve lost my feet,” while the Canadian interrogator says, your feet are at the bottom of your legs and says, “you seem to be getting good health care to me.”

Awe, poor little terrorist, cries crocodile tears after leaving home country of Canada to go to Afghanistan and was caught throwing grenades at our forces. Maybe I’m old school but I’d like to see James Bond or Jason Bourne getting information from him. I’d like to see the tactics used in Hollywood movies. Geez, I’d like to see some Law & Order interrogation or CSI showing him the DNA of the people he murdered. Not this wimpy crap on this video. All the kid has to do is say, “Ok, look. Here’s the deal…” and spell it all out. He might actually save some lives. Or any person with half a brain would say, “I don’t know what I was thinking, I wanna help all I can. I’ll get information from the rest in here” and then become an inside man. In 18 months he’d be living in Tucson with the Witness Protection Program.

On the left, Gary Oldman (Dracula, Sirius Black) On the right Queer Eye’s Ted Allen. Or is Ted on the left and Gary on the right? Either way, they were definitely separated at birth.

It’s official. Both publicists confirmed that they have broken up. In my warped world this is bigger news than Angelina Jolie having my babies with Brad Pitt.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/thedishrag/2008/07/sarah-silverman.html

Speaking of Angelina having my babies. She did, gave them more silly names, Knox Leon and Vivienne Marcheline. The names scream, “hey look at me. I’m unique.” I actually like knox but not leon and neither of the girl names because they are pompous.

“We’ve all had just about enough of your emo bullshit.”

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25674375/

The New Yorker says this is satire and the 2 articles inside the magazine are very supportive of Obama. OK, right. I heard from my sources that the obamas plan to use this image as the photo on the new $1 bill once they are elected. Somewhere McCain is saying, hey, I can dress in muslim and terrorist clothes too if it’ll help me get elected.

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/07/14/obama.cover/

Real or Fake?