Posted by Allen on September 30, 2005 under General | 
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The trailer for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (QuickTime or Windows Media) looks pretty impressive to me, even though as one of my co-workers noted, it seems that they’re trying to shove too much impressive stuff into one two-minute trailer. Still, it’s a pretty massive book, much bigger than the three previous books in the series, and I’d bet they wanted to show as much of the material as they could so the people who’ve read the books could feel good that the filmmakers have retained as much of the story as possible.
I just finished reading “Goblet of Fire” a couple of nights ago, and to date it’s my favorite in the series. There’s a ton of Very Important Story Details they’re going to need to convey, both points local to this story and to the larger “Harry Potter” mythos, and I’m really curious as to how they’re going to squeeze it all in. I swear, that movie’s going to have to be three hours long, easy.
Anticipation Factor: 90%
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For those of you who maybe haven’t really thought about the effect that editing has on the movies you watch, take a look at this brilliant “trailer” for Shining, a family comedy-drama about a writer looking for inspiration and a boy looking for a father.
Posted by Allen on September 29, 2005 under Memes, Writing |
The lovely Amy hit me with this 23/5 meme–go to the twenty-third post in your blog, pick the fifth sentence and then try to expand on it, the themes that are either explicitly or impliclty present in that sentence. So I dug up said post and said sentence, which I reproduce now exactly as it was presented then (on May 26th):
THREE-HUNDRED-FORTY-FIVE-THOUSAND FRIGGIN’ WORDS.
(Yes, it was in all caps. Go look yourself if you don’t believe me.)
The original context for the sentence was in dicussion of the first draft of John Irving’s Until I Find You–a draft he threw away so he could rewrite the book in third person instead of first. I was simply astonished by the fact that he was able to write one single piece of fiction that was so horrendously long…well, you can go back and read the original post if you’re interested.
To expand on that sentence somewhat–well, obviously I’ve been having some issues with my fiction lately, largely in the getting-my-ass-moving-forward front. As you might have noticed from the sidebar, my first draft has been stuck at a little over 15,000 words for about a month or so. Not all of that has been directly related to a lack of motivation, of course; my father’s recent illness (he came home from the hospital yesterday, by the way), helping my boy Jay drive up to New England from Florida, plus any number of other sundry happenings have helped divert my attention from the manuscript long enough that I’ve found it incredibly hard to pick up where I left off. (To be fair, some of my problem has been purely a lack of motivation.)
I know that word count isn’t the measure of whether or not a story or a novel is successful–that would be like saying the main reason I dig The Killers’ “All These Things That I’ve Done,” for instance, is because that song has just the right number of notes. That’s clearly ludicrous. But numbers work for me, they keep me going. Watching my word count has the same effect for me that all the fancy readings on the treadmill do: both give me a measurable objective against which to gauge my progress. I might not be able to use that info to judge quality, but at least I know how close I am to being done.
Realizing just how far away I am from being done with that draft, however…looks more and more like I have to re-think that “end of October” deadline. Grr.
Posted by Allen on September 27, 2005 under Photography |
We took the girls to the pumpkin patch on Sunday for Laurel’s first expedition pumpkin-picking. (Well, she went last year, but wasn’t walking yet and couldn’t really get around looking at the pumpkins, so we don’t really count that time.) One of the biggest reasons for going was just to get out of the house for a little while since Terry had spent most of the previous 40 hours or so in bed with her nasty stomach flu-like thing.
I can’t say Laurel truly understood just what it was we were trying to do; she wandered among the pumpking for a couple of minutes and then followed her big sister over to look at the cows instead. But I’m presenting this picture both because of the goofy look on Laurel’s face…and as the Official Do or Do Not Monday Photo Welcome to Fall Picture. Huzzah!
(And yes, thankyouverymuch, I do sometimes take pictures of subjects other than Laurel. But c’mon, she’s just so damn cute!)
Posted by Allen on September 24, 2005 under General |
Today’s the thirty-first birthday of my most excellent friend Jay; unfortunately, even though he just moved up here to New England, we’re not going to get to hang with him on his b’day because of an unfortunate and sudden attack of disgusting-type sickness to Terry. So he’ll just have to make do with this birthday shout-out in lieu of our presence.
Jay’s a fantastic photographer–he was, in fact, one of the main strengths our college newspaper had when we worked there together. I was able to use a magazine-style format for the paper with full-size photos on the front page because I knew I had Jay as my photo editor and therefore I’d always have quality pics to put there. Jay’s also a thoughtful and dedicated friend, and one of the most capable people I know–he has the ability to dive right into just about any task and get it taken care of.
So happy birfin’ day, Jay, and we’ll see you as soon as we can!
Posted by Allen on September 23, 2005 under Writing |
On the heels of last night’s whiny post about not being able to muster up much in the wy of momentum on my writing right now, today I found (via 43Folders) this link to The Scarlet Letters’ “Notes on Making Art.” To some degree it’s more suggestions along the lines of what I’ve been trying–keep moving forward, don’t sweat the editing until you’re doing with the first pass–but it has a couple of other nice insights in there for anyone who finds themselves stuck in first-draft hell or I-ain’t-got-any-damn-ideas hell. Though this site seems focused on visual artists in particular, the ideas are written in such a way as to be applicable to any whichever art form(s) you happen to dabble in:
How to have “lots of ideas”: permute. Start anywhere. Once a piece is done, try varying some aspect. Think of all the variables that could have permutations.
Hopefully these ideas will help kick my ass back in gear and I can start making some more progress! I’ve started thinking maybe it’s time to kill a character, just to give the plot somewhere to go, though it seems awfully early in the story to break out that particular gambit. Hmmm. Much pondering to do.
Posted by Allen on September 22, 2005 under Writing |
As you might possibly have noticed, I’ve been having some trouble writing lately. I admit it. Those of you who drop by here regularly might have noticed that A] I haven’t been posting a whole lot lately, and B] the little novel-progress bar over there on the right hasn’t budged in a few weeks. Yes, I’m lame. I don’t even have a really good excuse–yeah, sure, stuff’s been going on, but not so much to excuse my not writing anything.
Honestly, I feel like I’m kinda stuck on the novel. I need to figure out how to get myself moving forward once again. I was doing pretty well for awhile with the “just keep pressing forward” strategy because I had momentum. That momentum dried up (thanks to the aforementioned life stuff) and I’ve had a great deal of difficulty getting it back. It doesn’t help that I had written myself to a point where I had no idea what was going to happen next in the story. I’m afraid I still have too many sitting-around-talking scenes and not enough stuff-happening scenes.
My goal had been to finish the first draft by the end of October. I’m starting to feel kind of iffy about that goal, thanks to the three or more weeks off I’ve wound up taking. I need to find some way to kickstart both my plot and my momentum if I’m going to have any hope of making it–suggestions are always appreciated from the writers in the crowd, of course.
(I also need to get back to posting here regularly…I know how much my worldwide audience hates it when I leave the site fallow for too long.)
Posted by Allen on September 18, 2005 under Pop Culture, TV |
In just a couple of hours, the most telegenic and name-recognizable members of the television industry will gather together in Los Angeles in a vain attempt to pretend that they know which are the best products put out on TV in the last year. Those of us who actually watch TV know what a fraud this entire process is, of course; any awards show claiming to honor the best of TV but which has consistently failed to even acknowledge the existence of “Gilmore Girls” and failed to bow down before the mighty and fearsome talent of Joss Whedon clearly has its head so far up its own ass it can smell its own duodenum.
But I have no vote in the Emmys; I don’t get to pick who makes the final cut of five for each of the categories. I can only contribute by trying to pick the winners and mocking the losers mercilessly.
Best Drama Series: If there’s any justice in this cocksucking world, “Deadwood” will take this trophy home. My sense is that the real competition will come down to “Deadwood” and “Six Feet Under,” the latter more because of the “lifetime acheivement” effect than anything else. [1] I just can’t quite bring myself to completely count out “The West Wing,” though I can bring myself to do so to “24″ and “Lost”–genre shows have a hard time winning the big one, and just the nomination is usually enough to pat them on the ass, tell ‘em they did good and hit the showers.
Best Actor in a Drama Series: In the event Ian McShane doesn’t win for his absolutely riveting perforance as “Deadwood”’s Al Swearengen, he has my permission to throttle every last drop of life out of each of the other nominees. Nothing personal–I like Hank Azaria, James Spader, Kiefer Sutherland and Hugh Laurie just fine. But this award can only go to McShane, lest I go all violent-like. (I won’t be surprised if “House”’s Laurie wins it, though. Disappointed, yes; surprised, no.)
Best Actress in a Drama Series: Um, geez, I’ve got no frickin’ clue. I’m going to go with Glenn Close from “The Shield” since she’s got the movie cred backing her case (meaning even those voters who don’t actually watch TV have heard of her). If it’s not Close, I’d probably go with “SFU”’s Frances Conroy.
Best Comedy Series: “Arrested Development” damn well better take this one because it’s the funniest damn show on TV. “AD” won in a surprise last year, so it’s possible voters might decide they don’t need to vote for it again; I hope that’s not the case, or it’ll simply confirm that Emmy voters really are as big a batch of idiots as they seem to be. “Desperate Housewives” might have some trouble here since it’s not a comedy in the traditional half-hour sitcom sense, and that might confuse said batch of idiots. I can’t count out “Everybody Loves Raymond,” if only for the “hey, it’s your last season, thanks for leaving before you really overstayed your welcome” effect. “Scrubs,” sadly, has no chance and falls into the “just happy to be here” club. “Will and Grace” might have an outside shot if voters forget it’s not 1999.
Best Actor in a Comedy Series: I’ll be happy with “AD”’s Jason Bateman, Zach Braff of “Scrubs” or “Monk”’s Tony Shalhoub (who I think will actually win it again). Eric McCormack and Ray Romano have both already seen plenty of days in Emmy’s sun, so no go for them–likely both are nominated more for their connections to shows Emmy voters prop up every year based on name alone rather than actual quality.
Best Actress in a Comedy Series: I swear to whatever gods you deem it acceptable for me to swear to, if Paticia Heaton of “Everybody Loves Raymond” wins this award for the upteenth year, I will find every single person who voted for her, tie them down, tear off their eyelids and piss into their forever-staring eyes. No more, you hear me, Emmy voters?! NO MORE!!!
(Conversely, if Desperate Housewife Felicity Huffman wins, as I think she will, I’ll send each and every of you pretty flowers. And a pretty hooker.)
(And I suppose it’s too much for me to hope that “Gilmore Girls” star Lauren Graham steals this one in a write-in, huh?)
[1] Note: That’s completely different from the “achievevment on Lifetime” effect, which only applies to middlingly-successful actresses between 35 and 45 who discover career resurgence in movie-of-the-week land.
So that’s it. Tune in tomorrow or so and we’ll recap to see either just how brilliant or how Emmy-voter-like I am.
Posted by Allen on September 17, 2005 under Media |
I haven’t actually clicked on the link to read the story, so I don’t know exactly who is being discussed here (nor, honestly, do I really care), but when I see a headline on CNN.com that says:
Report: Supermodel admits cocaine use
…I start to think it must be a really, really slow news cycle.
Posted by Allen on September 14, 2005 under Movies, Pop Culture, TV |
Oh…oh…oh my gawd! It’s a new review by Allen up on Moviegeekz! I know, I know, it’s–hey, hold on, are you okay? You’re looking a little…oh, jeez, c’mon, pick yourself up off the floor–you can’t? Let me help, hold on, I’ll get you up onto the couch…
I realized when I posted the new review (this one’s for Layer Cake) that it had been three friggin’ months since I’d written a review. That certainly wasn’t my intention…I just hadn’t seen any movie at all since we went to see Batman Begins for Father’s Day. We’ve watched a number of TV shows on DVD since that time–all of “Wonderfalls,” season three of “Gilmore Girls,” the first season of “Deadwood,” plus another go-round with “Firefly”–but I didn’t want to write those up since they’re not technically movies, and the name of the site ain’t movie-n-tvgeekz.com.
But I’m starting to reconsider that decision. The two forms are quite obviously similar enough that it wouldn’t be absolutely out of place to discuss DVD sets of TV series on the site, and I’m sure whatever audience there is for the site wouldn’t complain much. (If they’re not complaining about the overall lack of updates, I seriously doubt they’ll complain about getting new reviews of TV shows.) Also, I don’t see my appetite for watching these series dying out any time soon–hell, season four of “Gilmore Girls” comes out the week after next. And of the 300+ movies in my Netflix queue right now, I’d wager about 100 of them are discs of TV shows. I’m growing more and more fond of series television as a storytelling medium with every excellent series we watch.
So I guess that’s settled then. Reviews of DVD sets for TV series will start appearing on Moviegeekz starting as soon as I write up a review for season one of “Deadwood.” Keep your eyes peeled. (Not literally, of course; you couldn’t read the reviews if your eyes were really peeled. Gross.)
Posted by Allen on under Movie Reviews, Movies, Pop Culture |
Take a story about several denizens of the criminal British underworld, mix in a few spoonfuls of dark humor and a couple of cups of violence, a handful of plot twists to taste, and what do you end up with? Snatch. Well, OK, yes, you do, but if you mix the recipe up a bit and drop in a couple of shots of character development, you isntead get Layer Cake, a movie which clearly follows in the footsteps of Snatch and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels but jumps off the path and finds its own way.
The story of Layer Cake follows a cocaine dealer (Daniel Craig) who’s on the verge of retiring, getting out of the drug business–but we all know how those sorts of plans turn out in movies like these. And sure enough, our hero finds himself set up and double-crossed, forced to break the rules he’s created to allow himself to survive and even prospsr in the viscious world of narcotics commerce–all over one million stolen high-octane ecstasy pills. Eventually he ends up caught between two competing crime bosses (Sir Michael Gambon and Kenneth Cranham), each with an agenda far beyond our hero’s grasp, and a ruthless German assassin (menacingly named “Dragan”) brought in to retreive the pills for the cartel that manufactured them in the first place.
(Why do I refer him to simply as “our hero” above? Because we never learn his name. It’s never entirely clear whether the other characters know his name or not, though it seems to me conducting business–especially this kind of business–with someone whose name I didn’t know would be more than a little difficult. But it’s a fun conceit, and leads to a nice twisty bit of black humor at the end of the movie.)
| Layer Cake (2004) |
| Grade: B+ |
| Starring: |
Daniel Craig
Kenneth Cranham
Michael Gambon
Colm Meaney |
| Directed By: |
Matthew Vaughn |
| Written By: |
J.J. Connelly |
| Studio: |
Paramount |
Director Matthew Vaughn, who was one of the producers of Guy Ritchie’s Snatch and Lock, Stock, clearly took some of Ritchie’s story sensibilites but left aside some of his more garish visual excesses. (Side note: I like some of Ritchie’s garish visual excesses.) Layer Cake deals with character far more than either of those movies, however, and Vaughn wisely lets his excellent cast do much of the heavy lifting. Vaughn, in his first effort as director, works the story’s many twists and turns well and keeps the tension cranked high throughout the movie. And while the visuals might not be quite as stylized as Ritchie’s, Vaughn certainly has his own flair which owes as much to David Fincher as it does Ritchie.
Daniel Craig’s name has surfaced several times as a rumored successor to Pierce Brosnan as James Bond, and watching Layer Cake, you can certainly see why. Craig has an effortless command of the screen, an easy but intense presence; even when relaxed, he seems coiled, as if he could explode into action in an instant. He might not look quite like a typical Bond (especially if he were to be following Brosnan, who seems to have been scuplted from clay scooped directly from Ian Fleming’s brain), but he possesses exactly the right kind of masculinity for Bond, the kind that makes women swoon and men envious. (Or the men swoon and the women envious, depending on your inclinations, of course.)
