Creative Title

Overall Impression: Pretty freakin' awesome, actually.

So last night, after a busy day of saying goodbye to The Sister and B.I.L. (I think I mentioned once that they're moving to Texas. Well, that was them leaving.) and some car maintenance, Independence Day came on TV. I decided to watch it since, believe it or not, I'd never seen it before (so sue me, I was 7 when it came out). The primary thing I noticed was the cast.

Because, dude, who wasn't in there? I knew Will Smith was there, but President Roslin, The Hero of Canton, Copperhead, and that Jurassic Park guy? Heck, even that lady named Margaret Colin was apparently thrown in (which is more of a personal coincidence than anything anyone should really get). This must've made at least half of those people's careers, seriously.

That one teenager who kept talking like Napolean Dynamite did bother me, but I'll get over it. It was about the only bad acting in the whole thing.

So, let's get to the movie itself. Despite the fact that my immediate recognition of every actor in there was slightly distracting, I'm pretty sure I got enough of a grasp on the whole thing. And yeah, it was really well-done. The story, even with Aliens attacking the earth, was incredibly realistically done. They didn't just throw out all reason because it's an obviously fictional story ("Dude, it's about aliens."); instead, that basic premise is the only disbelief that need be suspended. All human reactions--and heck, even the reason for the aliens being there to begin with--were completely believable. The intense parts that you would really hope would appeal to some emotion within the audience did--small ones (lighting the cigars) and large ones (cities being annihilated) alike. The ending can be easily categorized as happy, but still realistically so (see any work by Joss Whedon for more examples of this).

I probably do still need to see it uncensored, but it didn't seem to really be missing anything. A bunch of people still died, all the aliens still got blown to smithereens, and Will Smith still got his crazy-rant moment. All-in-all, it was pretty darn great.

The Sister has always been under the impression that everyone must do everything exactly the way she does. That, coupled with my meekness, status as the younger sibling, and the fact that my sanity has hinged for the past year on social interaction with her and the B.I.L.T.B., makes me a prime target for fulfillment of this belief. This includes forcing me to watch some real stupid shows from which she feels I'd somehow benefit. I'll admit that the tactic worked with The Girls Next Door (believe it or not), but Sex and the City and What Not To Wear have absolutely no chance.

However, my sister has never been easily deterred, so I watched the Sex and the City movie last night (after having my "woman license" revoked for not having had the theme song stuck in my head when we were shopping for the bridesmaid shoes) and will now be writing a very quick review of it.

Overall impression: It's a miracle from Lucifer that that show stayed on the air for ten years.

Now, I can accept it when there's something good about things I don't like, so I'll just go ahead and admit that there were a few pretty funny moments. The plot of the movie also had some mildly unexpected twists, which is something I always like. That's about the extent of any praise I have for it.

My biggest problem is the characters (so don't say I'll still like the show because "it's different"). It's four idiotic women going around New York being dumber than two of the three girls (that is, Hugh Hefner's girlfriends) in The Girls Next Door. Seriously. Not to mention, they all were wearing the absolute most hideous outfits I have ever seen in my life. Throughout the entire movie.

All-in-all, that's the sort of movie that's best when you've drunk enough to forget it even came into existence. 2 1/2 hours (let me repeat that: two-and-a half! HOURS!) too long.

Greater Importance: I now have my computer at the dorm! Therefore, I will finally get back to playing WoW... tomorrow. Unfortunately, I have a quiz tomorrow of three Greek tragedies, only one of which I've ever read (and that was last year). Nevertheless, I missed my beautiful, larger-than-1G computer, and am glad to have it back:



The camera-phone never does justice to anything.

Since I haven't been getting any pageviews whatsoever for the past three days, I don't really feel like posting anything worthwhile if no one's likely to read it. Not a grudge thing, but just trying to not waste blogspace if need not be.

I posted a few months ago on a movie being made called Ninja Assassin. Well, now they have a plot written up on the page, and it looks fairly interesting. There's also a behind-the-scenes video, but it's in German so... yeah. Watching it, though, the fighting looks potentially iffy, though there's no way to tell exactly how things will turn out on screen. I, for one, will be keeping my eyes peeled for a trailer.

Also, in case you've been living under a boulder the past few weeks, they're making a new Terminator trilogy, beginning with Terminator Salvation and starring Christian Bale. Personally, he's relatively high on my list of favorite actors, so I have a fair bit of hope for it. However, it's directed by the Charlie's Angels 2 guy and written by the Catwoman guys so... yeah, there is a large chance for it to not make it. At all. Nevertheless, I'll remain optomistic and look at later trailers to determine a level of excitement.

Also, I saw The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor Friday. I'm not not doing a long review because it was terrible, but just may slow down on the reviews in general. Anyways, my friend invited me along (for once) because I'm a bit of a history buff (switched to Psychology major, BTW. Thought I might want a job after college) and figured I would kill her for not coming with me to this one. I didn't have incredibly high expectations for many reasons: no Egypt, no Rachel Weisz, it's seven friggin' years after the last one, it's just genrally a sequel, and so on and so forth.

That being said, it wasn't nearly as good as the first two (if you liked the first two to begin with... seems like one of those love/hate movies), but it was nevertheless better than I thought it would be. Maria Bello certainly didn't pull off an equivalent performance for Evie as Rachel did, but it was really the best they could do under the circumstances. The story was good. The selfish emperor trying to unite China and gain immortality (I believe there actually was an emperor who attempted that, though the rest of the whole thing was a bit inaccurate. Also, the terracotta army had long since been busted up by the time anyone found them... then again, the pyramids of Giza aren't in Thebes), and I did like that there was a fair amount of detail intertwined about what everyone had been doing since the last movie. I say "intertwined" because they didn't just tell everyone's stories, but let them be known through arguments and the like... that was actually relatively well-done.

I'll admit that the dialogue wasn't terrific, though a few conversations ended up being pretty good. One that comes to mind are Rick and Alex getting out their gun collections before a battle. Rick kept trying to come out on top in the size, stamina, etc. comparisons before just claiming, "it's all about experience." I know it's rather typical and childish, but still entertaining. Overall, it wasn't a great movie and it would probably be best to wait for the DVD, but it wasn't absolutely hopelessly horrid.

In random music video news, I realized something after hearing Dancing With Myself while bowling yesterday: that wasn't uncommon in 80's entertainment, yet people (teenagers, etc.) called the Reagan administration a sign of the end of the world? Seriously?

Just in case you guys missed it on Hot Air, Jon Voight wrote an article pretty much tearing up the entire democrat party, peace movement, and Obama campaign. His political leanings aren't really news to me, since I saw him a couple years ago on The O'Reilly Factor back before Bill started on his crusade against all things internet.

He's also one of my favorite actors. I've seen him in quite a few different roles, including (among many others) old father; Mr. Sir; old, grumpy father; and crazy, snake-obsessed Spanish guy. The thing is, though, unlike the large majority of actors these days, he's great in all of those parts instead of being confined to basically the same role. While he seemed pretty much perfect for his somewhat wimpy character in National Treasure, you watch Anaconda (all things considered, really not a great movie) and you can hardly see him as anything but that crazy, snake-obesessed Spanish guy. Heck, I didn't even recognize him in Holes.

Maybe it's just me. Oh well. Yay for stomping on liberals' faces!

Yeah, I actually occasionally see movies less than a decade after they're released.

Overall Impression: Cool, Hans Zimmer did the music. That's my third favorite composer.

Hah, just kidding. That's just some random thing I noticed during the credits.

Real Overall Impression: That was an awesome movie. Seriously.

This is one of those I may have to see a couple times to really "get" everything, but it would be totally worth it. First and foremost--what absolutely everyone is talking about--The Joker. Ah, but everyone has reason to talk about him... and not just because of the whole Heath-Ledger's-dead thing (may he rest in peace). It truly was a spectacular performance. He was... really very creepy. The character was completely twisted, and Heath Ledger just added to the sense of absolute psychopathy with every little thing. The sort of constant shaking, somewhat neurotic licking of the lips, extreme swaying in his walk, and--of course--the eyes. His (uh... the character's) expressions and actions weren't completely out of control, and he obviously was aware of what he was doing the entire time, but there was the obvious sadism and lack of empathy at the same time.

God help me, I'm writing a psychological profile on a fictional character. Aww... I don't think that's the first time I've done it, either.

The thing about this particular line of Batman movies that makes them stand out from... everything is that they're very darkly themed. There are no cheesy catchphrases, few jokes (though there are, in fact, some very good ones), and absolutely nothing cartoonish in any way. It hardly seems to be a "superhero" movie in any way, shape, or form. Bad things happen to everyone in here. Innocent people die--even ones we really care about, Bruce gets very injured, people are driven mad with need for revenge, and generally terrible things of the sort. Even so--and perhaps I just have a terrible mind--but it was a far better movie because of all that. It was simply realistic... well, not entirely with all the special effects and gadgets and all (what Batman does at the end of that big batmobile chase sort of scene, for example), but the emotions and characters, at least. the Joker's plans and threats and videos and everything, Harvey Dent's entire change from beginning to end, Batman's decision in the end, all that jazz. Bits were certainly surprising, but everything was realistic.

Another thing about it is that things don't stay the same in this series. The citizens' attitudes towards Batman, which decision a given person would make in a given situation, relationships, certain characters' alive/dead status, etc. There are very few things that are static, which is the way the world would really work in situations such as those presented in the movie.

Well, before I yammer too much to keep making any sort of sense (I sure hope I haven't already crossed that threshold), I'll go ahead and leave. Just go see that movie; it is truly wonderful.

So I can't find the second one. I'm sure I'll get around to it eventually.

Overall impression: Jeremy Irons! YEAH!!!

Now, I said in my review of the first movie that Alan Rickman had nearly the perfect villain voice. However, I have long since believed that Jeremy Iron's voice knocks anyone else's right off the face of the planet. This time around, though, I wasn't aware of the gorgeous casting before my viewing of the movie. During the second call from Simon to the police, I began to realize that he sounded somewhat familiar (and not just because it's actually very similar to that of Rickman's. Perfect casting, I tell you.). Whilst pondering this, I determined that it must be Iron. Being my careful self, I wouldn't say for sure until the credits, at which time it was confirmed. He was just a little hard to recognize without a mane and a scar... and blonde hair (that was a new one). Rickman does give the impression that he'll kill you in just a few seconds, but Irons gives that plus the idea that he'll be laughing about it the whole time.

But that's enough of that. The rest of the movie turned out to be very good. It's rather rare that the quality of a series doesn't plummet after the first one (See Indiana Jones (particularly Temple of Doom) and Pirates of the Caribbean for examples of this). Yet--to my knowledge--that doesn't seem to be the case at all in Die Hard. I'll admit that this one wasn't quite as good as the first, but it was still an exhilarating ride from beginning to end. John McClane's character didn't change one bit, and they didn't seem to be trying to make the storyline bigger, better, more meaningful, or anything of the sort. It was simply a continuation of the first one, but with enough important differences to make it its own movie.

For example, there was the entire style in which it began. The first movie gave us a great deal of exposition on all the characters, their relationships with each other, etc. before anything remotely exciting happened. This one, however, lures you into a sense of security by playing a nice song (those sideburns!) and letting you lazily half-read the credits. Then, all of a sudden, BOOM! A bomb goes off near the street, and you're plunged, without bathing suit or noseguard, into the cold waters of the plot. That was actually probably the best beginning I've seen yet--or at the very least, the most creative. However, it's something that may only work in a sequel, as background information is absolutely essential for any good story. It just so happens that anyone who sees this is expected to already be familiar with John McClane and what happened to Hans Gruber. Since that is probably the usual case, it worked very well for this movie.

If I have any qualm, it is that the "Yippie-ki-yay, motherf*cker" line felt far less like it belonged in the context of the film than the first one. On the other hand, I would have been incredibly disappointed had it not been present at all, so we get the double-edged quote-sword here that ends up being present in just about any sequel. However, the side that they chose to use was immensely less painful than the alternative, so I can't really complain. At least it wasn't overused the way some quotes end up being ("Why is the rum gone?" anyone?).

All-in-all, it was a wonderful movie. I was very pleased with the way it managed to live up to the standards of the first one and didn't try to overshoot it or anything of the like. It turned out very well, even though it wasn't Christmas, (and) he didn't get any help from Alan (Yeah, great video. Thanks, Hober).

Overall impression: Dude, that was the best movie ever. Seriously awesome.

This was another one of those that I've been meaning to see for a while, but have continually procrastinated on actually doing so. So sue me, my dad felt that it was more necessary for me to be able to change a tire should I have to rather than be knowledgable of the awesome action movies of the time. However, I recently found out that Alan Rickman plays the villain, and I just couldn't deny myself that movie any longer. It's the voice--far too perfect for any bad guy. Sort of like Vincent Price, but instead of a somewhat cartoonish creepiness, Rickman's got more of a "I'm going to kill you right now" kind of creepy.

Granted, the plot may not have been the deepest one imaginable, but the movie certainly had plenty of storyline behind, around, and through it. It also had lots and lots of explosions, gunfights, blood, and other forms of awesomeness. To me it had nearly a perfect balance of the two, actually. The exact amount of various fight scenes did outweigh the amount of plot, but it certainly wasn't lacking in thought. Every time someone was killed or some spectacular explosion took place, it had a clear purpose in the film. Not only that, but it gave plenty of background on every character--even Al, the random police officer talking to McClane on the radio the whole time.

Speaking of Al, I also loved how this completely lacked the whole PC "guns are evil" brainwashing. In fact, it seemed rather pro-gun, save for the fact that the only good people doing any shooting were police. What happened with Al was that he'd apparently accidentally shot a kid years back and "couldn't draw my gun on anybody again." Yet at the end, when a bad guy comes out of the building looking dead-set on killing everyone in sight, Al is the one who shoots and kills him--and that's a happy ending! I just love seeing actual logic in movies.

There's really not a thing I didn't like about it. The gunwork was, of course, a little hollywood-esque, but at least people didn't cock their guns two or three times before firing or anything major like that. It wasn't anywhere near unbearable.

One last note: the "Yippee-ki-yay, motherf*cker" line was delivered with infinitely more greatness than I could have possibly imagined. It was almost beautiful.

Well, I was going to reload bunches of ammo today for the IDPA match tomorrow, but there's a primer stuck in the machine, thereby keeping any primers from being loaded, rendering quite a few cartidges I've just made completely useless (as the primer is a fairly necessary component). So instead, I'll write a post and perhaps clean my gun later, though the gun itself is useless for a match without bullets.

So, Gangs of New York came on TV yesterday. I missed the very beginning and bits and pieces in the middle due to my current unwillingness to watch commercials, but I believe I got a general grasp of the overall plot.

Overall impression: Pretty good, actually. I didn't quite get what was going on in the ending, but my knowledge of what was happening in NY during the Civil War is rather rusty.

From what I understand, Leonardo DiCaprio's father was killed by the big crime boss guy who pretty much runs the city ("The Butcher"). He grows up, and plans to take him down by infiltrating his organization. He quickly gains The Butcher's trust, and becomes something like a right-hand man/son to him.

That's most of the movie. Naturally, there are many other things going on, including an affair of sorts with Cameron Diaz (Oddly enough, during one commercial, I turned to Vh1 where they were talking about her trip to Peru with the commie bag), but I'll not yammer on about every little detail. What follows is probably spoilers.

Eventually, Leonardo's character, Amsterdam (thank you, IMDB!), is betrayed to The Butcher by his friend, Johnny, the only character whose name I can really remember. A big, awesome, dramatic scene follows, and the whole battle between the two grows and comes out in the open. I'll not give away what exactly happens in the end--made easier by the fact that I'm not entirely sure about it (though I did completely understand the resolution of the primary conflict), but it was nice--dramatic.

So, here's the song that came on during the credits. I'm no fan of U2, but I'll not deny that I enjoy quite a few of their songs. So, here are the credits. The Hands that Built America begins at 26 sec. after the Spanish dub stops talking, followed by what seems very much like nothing. Oh well:



I recommend the movie, though I really need to see it all the way through real soon. Perhaps I can convince my mom to rent it, since she wanted to see it as well...

Yeah, here's a nice link, in case you're unfamiliar.

Overall impression: Awesome.

It all began on Saturday, as I went over to my sister's as usual. The temperature was beginning to cool down, and was probably only in the mid-90's (I love living here) when she and I went to Pier 1 to figure out centerpieces for the wedding reception. No definite decisions were made, but we got some nice ideas (by the way, this is a very real medical condition, and we are now starting to see symptoms).

After that, we went to a video store, where one of my old friend's brothers apparently works, and looked through all they had. After her considering buying a season of Sex and the City to force me to watch the show until I like it (yeah, ain't gonna happen), we reached the martial arts section. Apparently, her Tae Kwon Do friends had told her of this movie, so she gave a general pronunciation (as she didn't know how it was spelled) and we started to look for it. I discovered its position, and we checked out and went back to the apartment.

After ordering Chinese (for delivery! How awesome is that?), we popped the movie into the DVD player, and started it. We tried the English dub at first, but it sucked, so Thai it was!

The story begins in a small town in Thailand, where the residents worship a Buddha named Ong Bak, and the protagonist is mastering the art of Muay Thai. Some criminal--whom I believe tried to get money from one of the village leaders (the dub was really distracting)--stole the head from the Buddha statue. Yes, it is somewhat reminiscent of that one episode of The Simpsons.

The protagonist, Ting, is sent to retrieve the head from the criminal guy, Don. Lots of great fighting ensues, and that's just about the whole rest of the movie. Granted, it's a rather thin plot, but no one watches a martial arts movie for that anyways.

It was incredibly interesting to watch the mechanics of the fight scenes, especially since my general knowledge on the topic consists of Korean martial arts, with slight hints of Chinese and Japanese influences thrown in. I've yet to be acquainted with Thai arts, so it was nice to compare and contrast. The most noticeable difference was the large amount of techniques using the knees and elbows. While Tang Soo Do does use the occasional knee or elbow strike in a form, one-step, or ho sin sool, they are not very prominent in the style. This, however, featured many moves of the sort in every fight scene, and they were all very good, strong moves, too--obviously very effective in combat. The majority of other techniques were fairly similar to what I'd learned, though I also did note that much more was done with the feet rather than the hands--something else I found incredibly interesting, indeed.

My one complaint is that the more impressive moves were always shown 2-3 times. Always. I don't mind the occasional instant replay, but it got pretty annoying after the length of the movie. Other than that, though, it was terrific. I highly recommend it to anyone who doesn't completely suck. You go watch now!

UPDATE: I still need to see The Protector, and it is more critical now than ever before that I do. Yeah, I apparently like martial arts movies.

UPDATE: Part Two is now up, a fact that I really hope y'all would have already noticed, since you had to scroll through it in order to get here. So yes, changing the timestamp worked. I just needed to figure out how to do that, which ended up being fairly simple after all. Yay!

Granted, I do prefer it to 30 degrees, but still. Should have done it back in April. 'Twas fun, though, and I think I'm getting better. I also like it because I feel useful when covered in engine grease.

So, this post is to say that I will begin work on Part Two in a couple hours after a semi-late lunch (occasionally known as, "linner.") and a shower, because I just changed my oil in 94-degree weather.

I actually began Part Two right after finishing Part One, so there will be an update on the top of this post when that happens, so as to not confuse anyone. Until then, I found the following video whilst continuing to listen to the Goo Goo Dolls, and really, really like the song. It's the one from Transformers, which is a movie I actually rather enjoyed. I know everyone complains about humans being included and all, but I sort of always assumed they were. I mean, what's the point of awesome fighting robots being diguised as human-made machines if they're not even on earth?

Oh well, maybe I just missed something. Ye need not watch the video if you didn't like the movie for whatever reason (the video quality is terrible anyways).