Ted Kennedy: 1932-2009

MSNBC is just this moment reporting that Senator Ted Kennedy, last of "the" Kennedy Brothers, has died.

I'm here in MA right now... and somehow that still just feels strange to say. For whatever else he might have been, few figures have ever loomed over American political life for as long and in so many different forms.

This will DOMINATE the news for at least the next few weeks, and probably more considering how much his name will be invoked in the Health Care debate. But for now... wow. It's surreal, and also hugely tragic. Here was one of those figures who goes beyond politics and parties... I don't care who you are or how you vote: If you know thing-one about the last several decades of American politics, you know that a Titan has died this day.

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Escape to the Movies: "Inglorious Basterds"

Boy, I hope people actually turn out for this...



...and, concurrently, I hope that the folks who've turned out for the action aren't angry that it's not quite so all-encompassing; and that the folks who wanted Tarantino to return to his more character-centered style have by now recieved word that this is the case.

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Thought(s) For The Day 8/20/09

Ah, so much going on today...

Well, we got our first look at "Avatar" finally, with a trailer that actually manages to FINALLY tell people what the damn thing is apparently about... without ANY spoken dialogue. That's kind of impressive when you think about it; though one wonders if that's more an indicator of James Cameron's expertise as a visual-storyteller or of how much of the now-evident plot is familiar from other things. Whatever. Campbell, Jung, hero's-journey, only-three-stories, etc. Main thing is, you can't deny it's pretty incredible-looking:

Here ya go:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Qd_IsxgAf8

Gotcha. Look, tell me they DON'T look like that...

Here's the real thing:
http://www.apple.com/trailers/fox/avatar/

We also have the trailer for "The Wolf Man," which is light on the title monster and heavy on the yes-we-did-it-"period"-and-here's-Anthony-Hopkins-to-prove-it. GREAT trailer, oozing class... to the point that the very matter-of-fact monster-movie title coming up at the end almost plays like punchline. The lack-of-monster worries me, suggesting that those rumors about the studio being skittish about having a practical/makeup-FX Rick Baker creature and ordering CGI retooling might have some truth. Dammit...
http://movies.yahoo.com/feature/the-wolfman.html?showVideo=1

But, as some of you may imagine, my interest was most-piqued by far by Script Shadow's rundown of Darren Aronofsky's "Black Swan" screenplay...
http://scriptshadow.blogspot.com/2009/08/black-swan.html

...in which we learn the film features a sexual encounter between character's played by Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis. Yeah, so I'm easy - though anticipation is, of course, tempered by the fact that the last time I went to an Aronofsky movie for girl-on-girl action it turned out to be part of that montage at the end of "Requiem For A Dream."

Yikes.

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Thought For The Day 8/18/09

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Thought For The Day 8/17/2009

POSSIBLE SPOILER ALERT!!!

So... is there a consensus forming yet i.e. Christopher Johnson as THE "breakout" movie character of 2009? Cause... I'm not really sure who it'd be, otherwise.

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"Inglorious" Marketing

I'm fairly certain I'm "embargo'd" against telling you whether or not "Inglorious Basterds" is good or not until it opens on Friday. So, let me just say this i.e. the film's marketing and how people may be percieving it.

By now, if you're pre-experience of "Basterds" is limited only to it's "official" advertising, you've probably absorbed the notion that this is basically "Kill Bill in WWII," another one-beat "Grindhouse"-style lark about a hit-squad of Jewish-American GI's carrying out a pre-DDay shock-n-awe campaign against Nazis in occupied France. And, depending on how that pitch sounds to you, you're probably letting that imagined-film influence whether or not you plan to see it. Let me be very clear here: STOP THAT.

Imagine if "Pulp Fiction's" trailer had bee nothing but the "action" beats from only Butch's story. That's all I'll say.

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Escape to the Movies: "District 9"

GO. SEE. THIS. MOVIE.



Off-topic: I don't care if you live in Philly or not - anyone who still roots for the Eagles this year is a douchebag. And yes, I would not have been "behind" my Pats this year if they'd been the ones who took Vick. I'm pissed (but unsurprised) enough that Bellichick wanted to sign the bastard - y'know, because he hasn't done enough to make us the Klingons of the NFL.

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