Posts Tagged ‘explosions’
3 items.
Explosions really do make things better.
Are Cami and I really thinking about boycotting Tom Cruise and Stephen Spielberg’s newest sci-fi horror remake The War of the Worlds? Let me tell you – it’s crossed our mind.
This is kind of a weird thing to proclaim. Particularly in the light that I am a fairly large Spielberg fan and had begrudgingly come to respect Cruise as an actor in the last few years. I enjoyed what he did with the character of Frank T.J. Mackey in Magnolia. I thought the intensity he brought to Vincent in Collateral was layered and made a lot of sense. Hell, I was one of like, FIVE people who really enjoyed The Last Samurai.
But in light of his progressive meltdown taking place in front of any camera he gets in front of, Cruise has repulsed me to the point that I don’t much feel like supporting his latest effort.
I know, big deal, right? As if my paltry 8 bucks is going to make a difference in the grand scheme of things? War of the Worlds is one of THE tent pole flicks of the summer. A sure-fire blockbuster that brings together one of America’s most popular actors and one of its most popular directors.
At this point my disgust really has nothing to do with his laughable “engagement” to Katie Holmes. It has nothing to do with his beliefs as a Scientologist. It has nothing to do with the highly misinformed sparring matches he’s having with the press over the practice of psychiatry. At the end of the day, it comes down to one thing: Cruise is a smug bastard who DESERVES to be taken down a few pegs.
There seem to be very few people who can break the meniscus of Cruise’s very small world and let him know what everyday people think about him. His level of denial is deeper than a Nuremberg war criminal. It doesn’t help much that most people in the media continue to kiss his ass because he’s “Mr. Hollywood” and is good for ratings.
I think the other shoe dropped when Cruise appeared on The Late Show with David Letterman last week and Dave crawled so far up his ass I could barely see that gap-toothed grin.
It all had to do with the recent events in London where Cruise was squirted with water from a disguised microphone while at the UK premiere of War of the Worlds. Letterman applauded Cruise for not beating the crap out of the offending prankster and showing true composure.
Okay, points there. Because if he had taken a swing at the guy, it would have looked bad. But in all honesty, I got a real kick out watching it all go down. In turn, watching Letterman effuse his admiration of Cruise resulted in me losing a lot of respect for him. This was the guy who is ALL ABOUT taking celebrities down a few pegs with a few cutting remarks when they’re sitting right in front of him. All of a sudden he goes soft?
Then I realized it wasn’t Letterman’s fault. It’s the Culture of Celebrity. Cruise is high-profile right now and not just because of the movie. If you can snag him while he’s on his promotional rounds, that’s gonna bring great ratings because you don’t know what he’ll say or do next. Don’t piss him off or else he might not come back next time. NBC should FTD Cruise a basket of flowers for all the attention he brought to The Today Show after his spat with Matt Lauer.
But kissing Cruise’s ass doesn’t solve the problem, it makes it worse. Because it continues the notion that his public outbursts are acceptable. Getting sprayed in the face with water was the public saying “No it’s not.”
Don’t get me wrong. The implications of the water-squirting incident are really scary for a public figure. Because if someone can get that close to you and humiliate you that thoroughly, what are the odds the next guy will be a real nut who might try to take you out?
By no means do I wish any harm to befall the guy. Because despite how loony tunes he appears in public, no one deserves to have their safety threatened.
But at the same time, you can’t jump on couches, deride psychiatry, get engaged to someone after 10 weeks under questionable circumstances and not expect some kind of backlash.
The water-squirting incident was benign enough as to not frighten people while simultaneously being the utmost effectiveness tactic in knocking Cruise down a few pegs. It’s like throwing a cream pie at Ann Coulter or Bill Gates. It clearly communicates, “We don’t like what you’re doing. You’re abusing your status as a celebrity/commentator/entrepreneur/whatever.” It’s a way to punctuate the contrary opinion that isn’t being absorbed within the target’s circle of influence.
And, in its own way, reserving my entertainment dollar and saving it for something other than War of the Worlds is my cream pie in the face of Tom Cruise.
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Hey, guys. Sorry that this comic was late. As you can see, it was inspired by The Fourth of July and I meant for it to go up yesterday.
My plan was to take the oddly placed vacation day here in the middle of the week to do something extra fun for you. It didn’t work out like I planned because I’m still having computer problems. Maybe you can help.
As you know, my computer crapped out on me last week. So, last weekend I installed a new 320GB HD in my machine. I put Windows XP on it and the computer is booting up fine.
The only problem is, now the computer things that the old 20GB HD I was using to store Theater Hopper stuff is the C:/ drive and it identifies my new 320GB HD as the G:/ drive.
Is there anyway I can get the computer to recognize the new HD as C:/ so I can remove the old 20GB?
I’m sure your first response will be “Just remove the 20GB HD, ya dummy!” But when I attempted to do that, Windows wouldn’t start up. The computer thinks it needs it to make it run.
I’ve talked to Dell customer service. They’re useless. They want me to reinstall the operating system and all the drivers. After everything I’ve been through this week, I’m not enthused with that option. So I’m turning to you guys for help.
I talked to a friend who told me to buy a program called “Ghost” that will take a snapshot of the 320GB HD, then he instructed me remove the 20GB HD, reformat the 320GB HD and run Ghost. He said I would be back to normal in 15 minutes.
Does anyone here have thoughts or suggestions? It pretty much seems like another reinstall is my only option, but I don’t wanna.
For the time being, my computer is working fine. I’m able to scan in, color and upload comics. It’s just not working to my complete satisfaction. The 20GB drive is old. It came from the computer before last. It’s also very loud when it’s running. Plus, I’m afraid if the thing ever does fail, it’ll be inevetable that I’ll have to do a complete reinstall on the new drive. So if I’m already digging around in there, maybe now is the time to do it. I just want the most effective solution.
So, let me know!
Sorry that today’s post doesn’t have all that much to do with movies. Between these computer problems, the holiday and everything else, I’m really disjointed.
I was hoping to see Transformers last night, but the computer issues put the kibosh on that one. I think Cami and I might try to see it this weekend. Originally, neither of us were interested, but I felt compelled to go because I knew it would be the movie everyone would be talking about. Cami has since read some reviews and I think she’s more open to seeing it. So, that’s an option.
Incidentally, there will be a third (!!!) comic for Friday about Transformers – so you have that to look foward to!
Talk to you soon!
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Apologies that I left you high and dry without the blog I promised you yesterday. I thought I could get it done in the morning before I went to work, but I was thrown a curve ball when Cami woke up with a crazy eye infection. She was a little paranoid about handling Henry because she didn’t want to pass the infection onto him. So I ended up calling in late to work, managing Henry until I could take him to his 6-month check up at 9:00 AM. I pretty much spent the rest of the day catching up.
But better late than never right? I wanted to jump back in here to give you my thoughts on Shoot ‘Em Up, which I saw last Sunday.
I’ve had a few days to digest the movie and I still really like it. The movie is what the title implies – a full-throttle action movie with an hour and a half of gunplay. A shoot ’em up. As cliche as it is to say so, this movie comes barrelling out of the gate and doesn’t let up. It’s pretty much nothing but back to back action sequences.
Clive Owen plays Smith, a mysterious carrot-chomping gunhand. A kind of new-millennium Bugs Bunny in flesh in blood. Lots of blood. In the opening sequence he protects a pregnant women from a gang of gun-toting hoods in black leather. Within five minutes, he crams a carrot into the mouth of one of the aggressors and shoves it through the back of his skull. Later, after helping deliver the baby, he severs the umbilical cord at point blank range.
That level of cartoonish, over-the-top violence is Shoot ‘Em Up’s trademark. Either you recognize that and go along with it or you’ll be frustrated by the number of action movie cliches the movie piles one on top of the other. But if you’re in on the joke, Shoot ‘Em Up is one of the best action movie parodies of all time. Due in no small part to Clive Owen, who plays it completely straight.
The only time the movie falters is when it attempts to add plot or character motivation to the proceedings. This is weird for me because, typically, movies I don’t like generally don’t give enough focus to these integral aspects of movie making. Here’s a film that I think would be better served if they did away with them altogether!
I don’t need to know the grand political conspiracy behind Clive Owen’s motivation to keep the baby safe. I don’t need to know that his character was the son a British gunsmith who moved to America in the 1960’s, was a crack shot, recruited into the Army and trained by Black Ops. Who cares? Half of the stuff he does in the film is physically impossible anyway, so why try to contextualize it with any sense of believability?
I usually bristle at movies that ask you to switch your mind off and "enjoy the ride." It contributes to the dumbing down of our culture when we don’t ask for more from our media. But I’m completely willing Shoot ‘Em Up slide because any attempt to add shading or complexity only slows it down. It works much better as a parody. In some ways, I’m disappointed it didn’t go further!
At any rate, that’s my reaction to the film. If you have a lazy Sunday, I suggest checking it out. I’d didn’t do great at the box office last weekend, but I have a feeling that this movie is going to be huge on DVD – a cult classic. Check it out on the big screen while you still can.
New comic tomorrow! See you then!
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