movie reviews

i've often thought that if i failed at everything else (which isn't out of the question yet) i could still make a living reviewing movies. i'm opinionated beyond belief, and i've seen most movies in existence - some many, many times. i've actually thought so much about this i've developed my own rating system. if someone rips this off i hope this blog holds up in court.

see it in the theater - the best level. the system is mostly based on how much money you have to spend, and since seeing a movie in the theater is like $20, this is about as good as it gets. the movie either has to be exceptional or it has to be a movie that really must be seen in the theater to be fully appreciated. this can be hard given the impressive home theaters so many people have.

rent it - the movie is definitely worth seeing, but don't spend all your money on it. it can be fully appreciated at home and if seen with the right setup might be just as good.

watch it on tv - i generally don't like watching movies on tv. they cut stuff out, and of course you have to deal with commercials. but for movies i don't care that much about - i don't really care. maybe it's unfair to judge a movie based on a lackluster presentation, but chances are i've seen it in all its glory and i'm saving you the disappointment and expense.

don't bother - sadly most movies will get this rating. blame my persona if you will, but given the number of movies that come out in a year it's just in the numbers that most of them will be junk. and it's pretty clear that we ran out of good ideas years ago and we're just regurgitating stuff onto the screen.

so with the system in mind, here are a few movies i've seen recently. "i am legend" - my family sees a movie for Christmas every year. last year my family listened to my older brother and ditched "the pursuit of happyness" to see "the good shepherd." it's a decision that will never be forgiven as long as we all live. "pursuit of happyness" - rent it/"good shepherd" - don't bother. so this year we gave him a shot at redemption and forced "i am legend" on him. well, it was worlds better than "good shepherd" if only because it wasted about one third less of my life. i'm thinking it would have been better overall if i'd been able to go in totally clean - i hate knowing anything about a movie i see. in this case i had heard too much. so if you want to see it like i would want to - stop reading now. i liked the setup of a cure for cancer that had horrible consequences, but the convenience of smith's character being immune was a bit much. his acting was for the most part quite good. he especially handled the madness of being all alone really well. the dog - i just wish they'd left all of that undone. the effects were pretty great, but i could have done without the movie being an extended Ford ad. the zombies were worlds more annoying than scary or anything else. all in all, "rent it" but watch it at your friend's house with the big plasma screen and bose surround sound.

"national treasure: book of secrets" - i took my youth group to see it when "fred claus" was eliminated. i still haven't seen the first movie, but i recently learned of a deep love one of my friends (cat) for the "national treasure" genre. i was at first horrified, but i guess i've come to understand her position. i mean, you know it's not gonna win any oscars, but it succeeds at its mission. it's entertaining and generally wholesome. you get to see some pretty cool places and learn some useful trivia. if you have at least a tenth grader's knowledge of american history this movie will make you feel pretty smart. like i knew about the plot to kill lincoln and the people involved and what the Resolute Desk was and a few other things i've forgotten. my main gripes involve disney's obsession with vindicating even the villian (which if the things i've heard about disney being a nazi sympathizer are true i guess shouldn't surprise me) and the fact that several beautiful people are in the movie and the only ones that kiss are jon voigt and the aged woman playing his ex-wife. i truly don't need or want to see that. so yeah, if you've got a family or a youth group or want to hang out with someone else's family - see it in the theater. if not, watch it on tv.

i was pretty excited about seeing "charlie wilson's war." i like tom hanks and philip seymour hoffman - julia roberts i can tolerate. i generally love anything aaron sorkin touches. well, it was good and moments of it were pretty great, but again, i think i went in knowing too much. i didn't even know a lot about the real charlie wilson - but i know plenty about the cold war. put those things together and there weren't really any surprises. everyone did a fine job - but special mention goes to hoffman and julia roberts' dogs. rent it - but mainly because the funniest parts wouldn't make it on tv.

by way of a preview - i'm declaring "the dark knight" to be amazing based solely on the trailer. i can't believe i'm writing this, but by the few seconds i've seen heath ledger looks incredible as the joker. come soon june.

i have a comment for everything

so this person i know named casey commented on my last post about how i should discuss the winner of the recent Christmas movie poll. i don't really know how to take this. i'm second only to God in making casey who she is today. when i first met her i thought, "this girl...this is not my kinda girl." but now she's totally amazing, and i rightfully take most of the credit. the thing is, i've shaped her so much, i can't even tell who she really is anymore. so when she mentioned me commenting on the poll, i don't know if she was being sarcastic or that she expected me to do that - like the time she elbowed me at an ash wednesday service when i saw a pregnant woman nearing the front of the line because she could tell what i was thinking before it happened. anyway, it doesn't really matter. i was always planning on commenting, and so here it is.

i gotta say i'm not all that surprised Christmas Vacation won. it's rich on so many levels. i think maybe the greatest thing about it is it seems that every time i watch it i catch something new - or there are things other people point out to me. only like a year or so ago my friend jana pointed out to me that in one part randy quaid (eddie) is wearing a green dickie (sp?) under a white sweater. i had never seen that, and i lost it when it happened. then there are those little things that i never stop laughing at - like when his hands are all sappy and his wife's hair sticks to one hand and the lamp the other. or when eddie (i think) touches the windmill and all the blades fall off. it has really timeless lines: "can't see the line can you russ?" "that's pretty low mister. if i had a rubber hose i would beat..." "well why is the carpet all wet todd?! i don't know margot!!!" there's such animosity between practically every character in the movie. to me that rings true during the holidays. pretty much all the national lampoon movies before and after sucked - but for one great moment, they got it all right.

so i guess that's it. i'll be thinking about a new poll. and you, keep doing what you do.

bloglift

i've added a couple things to the blog today. the first is a link to other blogs i find insightful or witty or appropriate. i'm hoping it will grow as i find new ones or think of ones i've forgotten. the second is a poll. i really like polls, and i saw there was the new option to have one, so i went for it. polls are fun. i like voting for stuff - especially when the stuff you vote for doesn't have the ability to lie the country you live in into an endless war and rape the environment for oil. wow, sorry. that was heavy. i'm just talking about polls. i flatter myself to think enough people actually check my blog that the voting will be significant. but perhaps now that i have a poll untold masses will flock here. after all, everyone wants democracy. in conclusion, i like polls (and good blogs), and i hope you do too.

p.s. in this poll you can vote for your favorite two!

what luck

drat, i was really hoping to get one more post in while it was still november. maybe i'll be less lazy next year. this post is just to recount a horrible phenomenon that has plagued me lately.

i don't know anyone who writes checks anymore, except maybe to pay a bill or two that you can't access online. so it's safe to say that in my universe checks are all but extinct. well, in the past week i've been stuck in line behind four separate people writing checks. they do this with all the speed of cold syrup. one lady had to produce her driver's license twice. it's really just awful for everyone involved. so if you are one of these people, get a debit card for everyone's sake. i'm sure your bank offers free cards with your account. they aren't hard to use - not nearly as much trouble as writing a check. you won't even have to ask anyone for the date. that can be your gift to humanity this year.

a tale of two cities

i used to kinda stick up for my hometown. when everyone else in high school was hellbent on getting out as fast as they could, i maturely observed that most places were no better or worse than most other places as people everywhere are pretty much the same. so i stayed and went to college in my hometown. it helped that they threw money at me. by the time i finished college i was very thankful for my education in a specialized degree, but i too was ready to get the hey outta dodge. i felt as though everything around me was getting smaller. the city seemed content to backslide rather than progress. the path of least resistance seemed the programme de jour. now when i return i all but suffocate.

i went to nyc to see my brother over thanksgiving. i expected the pace to be daunting, especially since i was on holiday. instead the rhythm of the city was infectious. i soon realized the tremendous asset great cities possess that my hometown severely lacks: options. i'm not at all talking about a great plethora of chain restaurants from which to choose - my hometown has that in abundance. a place needs options of cultures, of opinions, of beauty to enjoy. i guess you can live anywhere, but i think there are only certain places that live in you. new york is one of those places. i also felt it when i lived in chicago. i wonder if it's possible without a huge city.

the last straw with my hometown came when i was leaving after my thanksgiving visit. i was on my way out of town when i noticed one of the staples of the city (and my childhood) was gone. growing up village inn had been the greatest restaurant. the place was a classic in so many ways. it had bad lighting, but it only made the table candles that much better. the brick walls were home to countless names and memories. when deciding where the family should eat, the mention of village inn always met with total agreement. but a few years ago, things changed. it was remodeled in a way that robbed it of its charm. decent lighting came in, and with it horrific paint over the bricks and dorky logos for the local schools. the sign out front went from being original to being anything but, and slowly but surely, that's what happened to the place - just another option among harmless competitors. the pizza was more or less the same, but the place wasn't. and now, it's totally gone - not torn down, that might be somewhat palatable. but of course my hometown wouldn't do anything so gracious. instead it's been wood paneled and turned into the old hickory steakhouse. just what the city ordered.

thanks Luke

i'm pretty glad the Diatessaron didn't catch on. it was an early attempt to smooth out the differences in the four canonical Gospels into one seamless "super Gospel" (my phrase). as much as not having to address the disagreements between the Gospels (and yes my literalist friends, there are disagreements) might make my job and life easier, i really am thankful we have the four different accounts. it's tough to think about what we would lose - especially based on certain criteria. for instance, if we went with the so-called multiple attestation criteria, those stories that appear most frequently between the four should stay. if we did this, what would the Christmas story look like? it doesn't appear at all in Mark or John, and the version in Matthew is quite brief - sparing the tricky details about why Joseph and Mary were in Bethlehem in the first place. only in Luke's Gospel do we read the details about Mary and Joseph laying the baby Jesus in a food trough "because there was no place for them in the inn." Luke is proclaiming Jesus to be the son of God and the savior of the whole world, so such beginnings would be pretty convenient to leave out - unless Luke was also trying to tell us something else.

i think he was as Luke reiterates throughout his Gospel God's love for the poor, outcast, and abandoned. i think he included these details to show us from beginning to end a world that made no room for the very people who bless us beyond measure. i couldn't help but remember this story the last few days. there's a gentleman who comes regularly to the community soup kitchen. last week, the trailer he was living in was burned down. now he has no place to live. it was only by trying to help him find some temporary housing that i learned my community has no homeless shelter which is inexcusable on so many levels, especially considering the new multi-million dollar addition to the local jail. (i wonder why the jail needs so much space?)

thankfully members in one of my churches agreed to let him stay in our fellowship hall until we can find him permanent housing. i've been asked several times why the larger churches in town don't do such a thing regularly as there is no shelter. officially, i don't know that they don't because i only spoke with three, and i didn't ask if they could put him up in their fellowship halls. but this is something it makes sense for churches to do. this man spent a few nights sleeping under a bridge when almost every church on the street he slept under could have taken him in.

maybe if Luke hadn't included that little phrase about having no room for Mary, Joseph, and Jesus it wouldn't be such a big deal to keep people out of our churches or houses. but i think God had a purpose for the very words Luke used. we can't say we don't know any better. that phrase should remind all who read it not to turn anyone away, because there's no way to know who you're making sleep in a barn or under a bridge. at the very least, it's a child of God. but it could very well be God's only begotten Son.

not hyperbole

wow, i've done a really great job of writing regularly on here. it's encouraging that i post fewer writings each month. so i guess this one will knock out my november quota. but at least i'm coming back strong, because i have a story that may be the most preposterous thing i've ever dealt with.

a few weeks ago i went to get my driver's license transferred from tennessee to alabama. i think i've voiced my disgust for having to do things like this when we supposedly live in a country of "united states." oh was my temper not prepared for what was to follow!

so my number gets called, and thankfully i don't have to retake some test of knowledge i've totally forgotten and never been called upon to use while driving. i just show this nice lady my old license, take a vision test, and start filling out the paperwork for the new one. i have to show her my birth certificate, and that's when she says to me, "so you realize you don't have a middle name." "what?!" she continues, "yeah on your birth certificate, it doesn't have your full middle name, just your middle initial. so in the eyes of the state, your middle name is 'b'." i insist, "but the 'b' stands for my middle name which is brent." she counters, "well we can't put that on anything, and officially that's not your name. now, you can of course get your name legally changed to be 'brent' but for now it isn't." fuming, i respond, "so i would have to get my name changed to be what my name already is?!" "yes."

well i'm pretty much beside myself at this point. what's especially interesting is that my social security card has my full middle name. i wonder where they got it from. so i called my mom to yell at her about giving me a middle letter instead of a name, and she insists that she put my full name on the paperwork. she later found the paperwork, and sure enough, she did her part.

so now the prevailing theory points the blame at a lazy typist somewhere in the tennessee government who couldn't be bothered to type four more letters that would have made all the difference in the world to me. thanks to this person, my new nemesis, my middle name will legally just be "b."