"The Devil" has a Fierce Trailer

Yeah, yeah, there oughta be an X-Men review here. Sue me. I just saw this trailer for The Devil Wears Prada and I must say that it is probably the absolute best trailer that I have seen in years. Maybe ever. If you saw it then you probably know why. It sets up the entire movie in three minutes and gives away nothing. It doesn't tell you why you need to see this movie. It doesn't even show you why you need to see this movie. It makes you WANT to see this movie.

And now I want to see The Devil Wears Prada. There's more to summer than guys who wear their underwear on the outside, you know.

Epiphany

When you give someone excuses you're really telling them it's their fault even when it isn't.

X-Men 3: Rapid Response

I'll have a real review up sometime this weekend if not today but, for starters:

• I miss Bryan Singer
• I didn't mind the deaths
• I did mind the character cramming
• "I'm Juggernaut, bitch!"

More details to come...

X-Men 3 Reviews

Tonight I'm going to attend a midnight showing of X-Men: The Last Stand. Unfortunately, the people who've seen it already don't think its too hot. The rumors are true: some of the heroes die. That doesn't sound like such a good idea, even in a comic book movie, but at least it proves that the filmmakers are "serious." I'll give it a shot anyway but I'm prepping myself for a not-so-hot ride.

It's a shame that Bryan Singer isn't directing because, aside from the script, it sounds like its his touch that's lacking. My own suspicions that the movie caves into character cramming might be in effect too. I could go and try for a refund but I think I'll stick it out. No matter what you guys will get a review from me tomorrow. Hopefully I'll have better things to say than the not so happy reviewers.

A 58 point average so far. Yeesh.

Quote

"You cannot learn anything about truth until you know about deception"

-Penn Jillette, heard on Turner Classic Movies. He and Teller will be hosting a night of their favorite movies including Tod Browning's Freaks at 10:15 tonight on TCM.

Nine Planets Without Intelligent Life

I just have to share this with you. It's a webcomic but far cooler than most of the ones that you see out there. Scott McCloud is probably proud of this thing because it uses a lot of the principals he hoped people would use in putting comics on the web.

And it has robots too.

An Example of Why You Should Never Post Blog Entries at 2 O'clock in the Morning

I was going to post a long entry on how I'm:

1. Jealous of Rob Schamberger
2. Being too lazy
3. Annoyed at my self-imposed anonymity
4. Annoyed at being annoyed at my self-imposed anonymity
5. Depressed because everyone seems to be moving ahead while I'm stuck far behind.

But I don't feel like whining so instead I give you:

MORNING MUSUME vs LIZARD!!!
(THE UNCUT VERSION!!!)

Art School Confidential

Director: Terry Zwigoff
Screenwriter: Daniel Clowes (based on his short comic)
Stars:
Max Minghella as Jerome
Sophia Myles as Audrey

Also features Anjelica Houston, John Malkovich, and Jim Broadbent with a cameo by Steve Buscemi

Terry Zwigoff directed one film I like and one film I love. The one I liked was another Daniel Clowes adaptation, Ghost World. The one I loved was the Christmas Anti-Classic Bad Santa. Both films did away with the usual cliche characters to look at real people or, as others might call them, weirdoes. Both films also had some troublesome endings: Ghost World ended too vaguely. Bad Santa ended with what felt like a cop-out though I suspect that Zwigoff intended this. Art School Confidential ends well enough but, like many professional critics have said, it already colapsed in the second half of the film.

Perhaps it collapsed even before this. Art School Confidential is muddled with unintended plot threads that never go anywhere and characters that are either slaves to the plot or are cliches that don't belong in the plot.

The story starts with Jerome (relative newcomer Max Minghella), a gifted artist who gets accepted into a lofty art school. His desire is to become the greatest artist of the 21st century. The film tells us explicitly that he thinks he's better than everyone else but it never really shows us this. He has outbursts in class where he puts down the work of other students but even though his work is technically better we never see anything that says he has any talent beyond the mechanical. Just as Jerome's criticisms of others are accurate, so are his peers criticisms accurate of him. It doesn't help that he has the personality of a sponge and the motivations of a white-washed caveman.

Jerome falls in love with Audrey (Sophia Myles), another mysterious character who probably shouldn't be mysterious but, unlike the annoying Jerome, these mysteries are more appealing and our disappointment in not having them solved is sweeter than it is sour, but the sourness comes from Audrey performing actions that, like Jerome's, leave us thinking "and you did that because you what now?"

There's something to be said about a film that trusts it viewers to know whats going on so much that it doesn't bother to tell them what's going on. Unfortunately, in the case of Art School, it either says that Zwigoff and Clowes think that we're all telepaths who can read their thoughts via their films or, more likely, it says that Zwigoff and Clowes spent too much time skewering the art world and creating a clever plot to think about the fact that their two main characters didn't make sense and were surrounded by cliches that weren't even good cliches.

There's little else that needs to be said about the story line unless you want the movie spoiled. There is a serial killer who appears although his timing is off with the reactions of the other characters at the end. The film is aware of this with one important character indicating that he knows that what everyone else assumes isn't true. That, however, doesn't explain that it makes no sense for everyone to jump to the conclusion that they do.

It also doesn't quite make sense for the film to end when it does although its conclusion isn't at a bad place. Relative to other films and what the likely sequence of events would be had the film continued on, Art School does itself a favor by stopping short. However, because of this, we miss out on potentially interesting events and what could have been a more satisfying ending be it happy or sad.

In the middle of all of this are plot threads that don't belong or that go nowhere. I love a good subplot but when it doesn't connect to the main plot I can't understand why they're there. Ethan Suplee, who I'll mention later, is a film student doing a movie on the serial killer. As funny as his storyline was it could have been cut without any damage. There's a running gag of a male fashion student who's gay and in denial but who cares? We also have an Animal House style buddy (Joel Moore as Bardo) who disappears halfway through the movie seemingly because the filmmakers don't know what to do with him. There are also hints of what could have, would have, or should have been plot threads featuring John Malkovich that don't go anywhere and were possibly only left in because he was one of the producers.

While it might seem like I'm down on the film I didn't find it a waste of money. John Malkovich provides one of the largest surprises in this film simply in that when you watch him you forget that you're watching John Malkovich. He doesn't do anything fancy or even terribly interesting. He just stops acting like John Malkovich "acting." For a long time I've felt that Malkovich was one of the most overrated actors on screen. In many films, especially period pictures, he seems almost amateurish. His expressions are stiff and his dialogue delivery is cold and stale but in this he's just so natural. There is so much to be said for being natural in films that I could do an entire post on it.

There are also some other good performances and scenes including a hot new artist played by who justifies his own assholiness and garners applause for it--although he does this by being, you guessed it, vague--and a nice turn for Ethan Suplee as a parody of Kevin Smith. Perhaps the one good way this film was vague was in how you couldn't tell whether Ethan's role was meant to be a ribbing tribute or an insult.

Overall this film had a lot of potential and a lot to say but Zwigoff and Clowes are so concerned with being clever that they ignore common wisdom. They provide us with a main character that doesn't make sense, a romantic interest that doesn't make sense, supporting characters who do make sense but don't do anything special, and a lot of loose ends. I respect the film enough not to give too much away, which is why I have been vague myself with the storyline, but I think a much better film was possible given the material. This film is a lesson in focusing on story and character and not getting wrapped up in clever jokes and social statements.

E3 Day Two

Nothing big today. Most of the news I read was left over from yesterday. There's lots of hype about Spore, including a demo done by Robin Williams (yes, that Robin Williams) that was pretty funny and scatacological. Robin is quite the gamer so he's a good fit for funny game demos. The creature he made was ugly like all the others so when I get my copy I'll try to make things that look nice.

I'm excited about the new Super Smash Bros Brawl even though I don't have a copy of Melee for my GameCube. If you haven't heard, Solid Snake from Metal Gear Solid is going to be a guest star in the game and Nintendo is working out the details to get more non-Nintendo characters in the game. Plus it will be using the regular, SNES style controller for the Wii instead of the gimmicky wand so that looks good.

I need to learn more about this Gears of War thing that everyone is talking about. Speaking of games with 'War' in the title I need to remember to buy God of War when (now 'if' thanks to my stupid car) I get a PS2. It's a bonus that God of War 2 will stay on the PS2 so I don't feel any need to sell a liver for a PS3.

Hopefully there'll be a good bombshell tomorrow but I doubt it. I just wish I were there.

E3 Day One

So here's what I'm thinking about all the new games and systems in general: meh.

I'm happy to see Nintendo doing something different than everyone else by skipping graphics to focus on new ways of playing but, well, I don't think I want to play all of my games the way they want me to. I just hurt my elbow a little today by bumping into something. I can't play a Wii game now because it will hurt. My fingers are okay (albeit still CTS'ed) but I don't want to swing my arms around. Video game in general are a lazy experience. A few games with novel controllers like Dance Dance Revolution are great but a whole system based on that? Sounds like too much work.

And while they're pushing for new types of games they're still ignoring the men factor. I think they're ignoring hardcore gamers at their own risk. A lot of people are making the comment "Nintendo doesn't care about me anymore" and now I'm starting to believe it too. If the virtual console doesn't turn out well (i.e. it doesn't have cheap games) then Nintendo might have a dud on its hands.

That doesn't mean the other guys are doing so well either. The Xbox 360 is, for all intents and purposes, a fancy PC with no keyboard. The hottest game on there is not exclusive so why do I need to buy one? I'm not paying 400 bucks for Geometry Wars, I'll tell you that now.

As for the Playstation 3, who cares? They ditched the boomerang controller too quickly because of fanboy complaints even though the reviewers said the controller felt great. It's almost as if they're doing the opposite of Nintendo and catering to the hardcore too much. They're so concerned with feeding that market that they give them what they think they want instead of what they really need. Comfortable controllers are a necessity. Pretty controllers aren't.

That and they did a pseudo rip off of Nintendo's big idea. Industry guys are already crying foul over the gyroscopic features of the new Dual Shock. Their complaints are much more important than fanboy whining as that might lead some developers to be reluctant to develop PS3 games just out of spite. Nintendo doesn't know what's good for them but they still have loyalists.

As for the games, which are what matters most, there's only Spore so far that really excites me. The new games on the Wii seem interesting (the disaster game sounds like the non-traditional game for grown-ups they need) but I'm still getting cold with the extra hand waving and too many of them have the dreaded cute factor. Even though I still like some cute things I'm beginning to realize that as I get older I want things that look and feel my age. Unless the game looks to be brilliant or a nice walk down memory lane (New Super Mario Bros does both so well that I'm going to buy it) I don't want to play cute, colorful games. That said, bloody demon shooters also feel like young stuff. I'm 25. I want to play games that challenge my brain and touch my deeper emotions.

I'm seeing a lot of sequels that I don't care much about. I'm really disappointed with Square-Enix making sequels off of games that haven't even been released yet. The Final Fantasy XIII stuff does well by not having a boy-girl character like that freaky Ashe creature from FF12 but I'm a little put off by the full on sci-fi look they're pushing--but I'll wait and see.

New games? I haven't seen anything that really does it for me. Spore gets me because it lets me be creative and too many games pass that opportunity up. I don't see any really cool RPGs. First person shooters look cool but they all seem the same and nothing is changing with that (plus, I SUCK at them in multiplayer.)

All in all I get the feeling that Nintendo should have stuck with the name Revolution but moreso I feel they should have really tried harder to start a revolution because that's what games need right now. Will Wright could start one (and I even have a few doubts about Spore, believe it or not) but who will take it up after him? People are always talking about how cool and different The Sims is but nothing has challenged it save for possibly Animal Crossing. And for everything else it seems like the same old same old.

Will Wright Says Umm Too Much

I hate to say it but this is so true (mean, but true.) It does help, however, that everything he says between the umms and the you-knows is indeed pure genius.

I can't really complain though because anyone who knows me will tell you that I do more verbal stumbling that Dubya.

Anime - What I'm Watching

Having a cable modem and a copy of BitTorrent can be too much of a good thing, especially if you're an anime fan. It's extra deliciously painful if you're on a DVDs by mail program. I haven't got the hard drive space or the money for it but I'm getting a lot of anime lately and its both painful and tasty.

My Anime series on DVD (by Blockbuster if you're curious) are currently the ones I didn't finish with when I had Netflix some time ago so I'm still catching up with Chobits and Hajime no Ippo (AKA Fighting Spirit.)

Chobits is one of those robot girlfriend shows that are so popular. The genre itself is rather creepy but Chobits doesn't object to a little hard sci-fi examination of the concept. It already deals with the problem of people becoming so attached to humanoid robots that they neglect other people, even their families. Actually, with the robots doubling as computers, the series is critical of our increasingly electronically isolated society but its subtle and not alarmist about this, thereby making its argument both palatable and more inviting to inspection. It doesn't hurt that Chobits is more concerned with pretty girls and embarrassing situations between men and women.

Hajime is a show that really hooks me because, despite the name and mainstream stereotypes of anime, its a boxing melodrama. No robogirls, no magic, no tentacles. Just a high school kid, Ippo, who discovers that he might be a boxing phenomenon. The show even steers clear of the cliches of typical fighting shows like the inexplicably popular Dragonball by having its fighters be mostly good natured people who deserve to win just as much as Ippo does. Ippo, of course, is going to be winning most of the time but that doesn't stop me from rooting on his opponents. The last episode I saw featured a respectfully characterized Black American character, Jason Ozuma, who wanted to make the tiny rural gym he represented proud. Naturally, I wanted Jason to win even though I knew the match would go to Ippo. Still the fighting was exciting, probably more so than real boxing (But I never watch sports so what do I know?)

There's a lot of anime available on the internet as well. I'm not a copyright slave but I don't want to download things if I can buy or rent them legally so with anime I stick to shows that aren't yet liscensed stateside. A.Scarywater.net, linked below, is a good resource of fresh, subtitled, unliscensed anime and related movies and videos. All of the files accessed using BitTorrent so learn about it before downloading.

There are tons of different shows I've peeked at lately, most of which didn't interest me enough to pursue more than one episode, but one has caught my eye. I downloaded a copy of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya on name alone. I thought "Oh, a downbeat 'My So-Called Life' series." It's nothing like that but it does involve high schoolers. Instead it's a wacky sci-fi comedy that makes its mark in two ways. First, its not being shown in chronological order. Second, the first episode invovles a student film that gives the background of the non-normal characters' powers and origins without actually telling us that they actually have any special origins. It's not until the very end of the episode that we realize that the program really is a science fiction show and only in the last minute do we meet the title character. The show is STRANGE but in a way that separates it from the other anime series that debuted this spring.

Guiseppe Ferrario

An Italian artist whose work reminds me of 70s and early 80s MAD Magazine comics but much, much better. You can see his first American comics work in Truth, Justin, and the American Way of which issue one is out now. Take a look. This guy is going to be huge.

NOTE: A handful of the images on his site are not safe for work but there's nothing awful either.

IN OTHER NEWS...

• Sony Entertainment announced that its new video game console, the Playstation 3, will be more expensive than gasoline and will have the same features as Nintendo's unfortunately titled console, Wii. In other news it was revealed that Sony Entertainment is actually a vampire.

• On a personal note I damaged the left headlight of my car while parking my car today. The truck I ran into suffered only minor scratching that the owner didn't even care about. In other news there goes my tax return, damnit.

More news when I feel like it.

New Spore Video Leaked

So it's old new but only a little bit old! A new Spore video for E3 was leaked onto YouTube a few days ago. While it doesn't show off anything new as far as what the gameplay will be like it does let us see a few different types of planets and also goes to the swirly pink planet seen in the 1up Pre-E3 special. Enjoy!

Ho Hum (My Name is Rum)

I'm wondering if I was really ready to return to blogging. Part of it might just be because I'm out of practice and another might be that I miss my LiveJournal (it was so much better looking) but maybe now isn't the time to blog. We'll see what the future holds.

And no one has posted yet but I assume at least some random person has read this so leave a message already!