OSCARS much?

Nope.

You may have noticed the lack of Academy Awards blogging on this site. Guess what? It was intentional! The Academy Awards are a joke; they almost always pick terrible, terrible winners. Why? Because Hollywood doesn't actually care about talent or good cinema (read: Frank Langella, Mickey Rourke, The Dark Knight); it only cares about its own agendas and who will shove them down our throats (read: "Milk" and Sean Penn). I mean, hell, "In Bruges" and "Milk" were both nominated for Best Original Screenplay, Angelina Jolie was nominated for Best Actress in "Changeling", and yet "The Dark Knight" was not even NOMINATED for Best Picture. I understand a film like that would never win in such a snobby competition, but the Oscars voters ought to at least pretend like they actually saw some of the films for which the rest of America paid damn good money. So there.

~~
Tyler, the emphatically grouchy Oscars Grouch
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"Coraline" Review

Last night I went with my little brother to the Rave at Ridgmar to watch "Coraline" in 3D. Ticket prices were $9.50 for adults, and so I fibbed and said that Christian was only 12 (as he and I see it, such situations are the only apparent advantages to him being a 'late bloomer'). But even with my liar's discount, our two tickets together cost a whopping twenty three dollars! I realized then that I had been charged an additional $2.00 per ticket because Coraline is a 3D Movie. Was I now broke? Yes. Did that fact infuriate me? You betcha. But in the long run, was it all worth it? YEEESSSS!!!

Let me preface my little review by saying that I have only ever read one graphic novel in my entire lifetime. I am an avidly avid supporter of the idea of reading comic books, but I myself never actually go out and read any. It must be because I am not a very visual person, or perhaps it is just another odd form of my all-pervasive laziness. Whatever the case, I say again, I've only ever read through one graphic novel, and it was hardly enjoyable. After watching Coraline, I am rethinking all of that. I am going to buy the Coraline comic and the Graveyard Book, as well as reread the Sandman comic I did not at first enjoy. Before, I (unfairly) found Neil Gaiman to be more than a bit overrated. Now, I think he is under-appreciated.

So, to the purpose. "Coraline" is a children's ghost story that centers on a young girl who has just moved to a new house, a house in which she soon discovers a secret doorway to another world, a world that mirrors her own. This new world gives her everything she lacked in her old one; it gives flesh and voice to all her unfulfilled dreams and fantasies. Where her first mother had always been too busy and had no time for her, her "Other Mother" shows her daughter unusual kindness and affection, loving her even to the point of adoration -- and her Other Mother has shiny black buttons for eyes. In fact, every creature on the other side of the door has shiny black buttons, and they all demand Coraline's unqualified affection. They whisper how she could even stay there with them forever...
.....and soon, Coraline's dream-world transforms into a nightmare, one from which she must desperately try to escape.

This movie is brilliant, absolutely brilliant. It is one of the most imaginative children's stories I've ever seen on film. It is the longest stop-motion picture to date, but it has to be to tell this spellbinding tale of phantasmagoria. And because Neil Gaiman is such a literate writer, the adaptation of his graphic novel isn't just any other kiddy goosebumps flick. I mean, how many villains from a kids movie are a reference to a character from a Keats poem? (The Beldam 'old woman / grandmother' ---> "La Belle Dame Sans Merci")

But I've yet to tell you the best part about the movie, for the visual beauty of "Coraline" surpasses even its superior storytelling. The cinematography is gorgeous and truly stunning: in every shot there is a galaxy of budding shapes and colors; in the next shot they burst into bloom. It's also the first stop-motion animated feature to be shot entirely in 3D, and it can safely boast that it elevates that genre from the gimmicky to the nuanced. Because of its visual splendor, "Coraline" is a film that must be seen on the big screen at least once, to enjoy the so-called "eye-popping" 3D effects it employs. It's just not the same without them.

So, in conclusion, I give Coraline 5 creepy eye-buttons out of 5. Go see it now.

Read, Kindly Light...

Um, my GEEKOMETER just EXPLODED: the full script for the pilot episode of HBO's "A Game of Thrones" has been LEAKED!!!!!!

Ok. Let's just get this out of the way. I am a fantasy geek. No, actually, I'm a huuuuuumooooooongous fantasy geek. Now, Tolkien aside, George R. R. Martin is my preferred idol of worship. HBO has already picked up the rights to his A Song of Ice and Fire series and greenlit a pilot episode for his first book, A Game of Thrones. Today, the uber-geeky and ever helpful blog Winter Is Coming has posted a few links to the ENTIRE LEAKED SCRIPT!

I just read it all; I suggest you do the same. Thus far it seems a great adaptation, mostly for its ability to do a lot with little. Not to say that the source material is small (on the contrary, it's overwhelmingly huge!), but I mean that despite having to abridge and truncate many, many scenes and chapters of the novel as well as adding a few scenes of their own, the writers still stay very faithful to the book and develop the characters while creating suspense and intrigue. My only big critique from my first reading is the original scene with the conflict between Eddard and Jaime. It seemed more than a little forced, and it simplifies Jaime's character to a dangerous extent. Other than that, however, the script is practically flawless!

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Ron Sexmith at Futureappletree Studio 1

Ok, I need to get something off my chest: I have not been faithful in providing a Daytrotter session a day. In point of fact, I've been quite feckless. Now, I figure, I could certainly cover a Daytrotter session whenever I want. So, from now on, I'm reducing the Daytrotter sessions to a minumum of whenever I feel it. So there.

Now, on to Ron Sexmith:

Ron Sexsmith is an inexplicably sweet force of nature. [...] Sexsmith, with his economical and slightly warbling crooner’s voice, is able to mine many of the beautiful sights and sounds of a stroll through the park or a picnic by the lake for the kinds of universal dialogue that he’s still able to process from pure cane into an edible sugar or salt from the veins into the table salt that goes on our mashed potatoes. He dresses these very tender, everyday moments into timeless thoughts that feel like wispy cloud systems emblazoned across an otherwise clear blue sky.
---Sean Moeller, founder of Daytrotter

It would not be very fair to Sean if all I did in these posts was rip off his writing and links, so that means I should probably say a few words of my own on the artist. Ron Sexmith has a smooth, lush voice, ripe with strains of joy and sorrow that have been folded over one another over and over again, ever shifting, up and down, up and down, a perfect medium of conveying life's many ups and downs. As with all the artists I have featured thus far on this site, Ron is a singer who writes simple but evocative songs. He stopped in at Futureappletree Studio Number One to record four songs from his latest album "Exit Strategy Of The Soul" ( a grrrreat name, by the way). My favorites from the session are "Impossible World", in which he croons and serenades us into thinking that perhaps this life isn't quite so bad as we imagined, and the song "Chased By Love", in which he sings these child-like lyrics: '...Who from way back when, / I'm the same boy that you knew then. / I just want to be chased by love, / Embraced by love, / Just like you."


Ron Sexmith's Daytrotter Session

Ron Sexsmith - Welcome to Daytrotter
Ron Sexmith - Impossible World
Ron Sexsmith - One Last Round
Ron Sexmith - Chased By Love
Ron Sexsmith - Poor Hopeless Dreams
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Evening Buzz: Zooey Deschanel and Burger Beds and Dresses

Ingrid Bergman wants you to join her in lighting up the collective pop culture cigarette. Here is your Evening Buzzzz!


!!BUZZ!!
Well, first off, Fox has picked up the remaining Narnia movies since Disney copped out. I'm glad C.S. Lewis's books are being adapted to film and not TV, 'cause we all know how Fox treats its best shows (*cough* Arrested Development *cough*cough*).

!!BUZZ!!
Are you a big fan of He-Man? Yeah, I'm not gay either. But apparently Warner Brothers, Joel Silver, and John Stevenson are teaming up to remake "Masters of the Universe". Actually, I suppose it's not bad timing, as Skeletor is being nominated for an Oscar this year.

!!BUZZ!!
You should watch the trailer for "500 Days of Summer", an indie film starring Joseph Gordan Leavitt and Zooey Deschanel. I liked Leavitt a lot in "Brick", and I'm straight-up in love with Zooey Deschanel. I've loved her ever since her bit in "Elf", and she's just wowed me more and more in each new flick (not to mention her musical work with the brilliant M. Ward, especially her band She & Him!). Apparently, 500 Days of Summer has blown everyone away at Sundance. Yay!

!!BUZZ!!
Here's some more good news: Neil Jordan is gonna direct a live-action movie adaption of Neil Gaiman's "The Graveyard Book" (a ghostly retelling of The Jungle Book). I have to say, Neil Gaiman is winning me over; I'm coming around to his Sandman comic books, Coraline is shaping up to be really good, and now this.

!!BUZZ!!
Amy Poehler's new government sitcom finally has a name -- "Public Service". This will be one to watch; besides the presence of the ever-funny Poehler, it's from the creators of the Office, and will also feature Aziz Ansari and Rashida Jones (of Office fame). Public Service airs in April.

UPDATE: It's called "Parks and Recreations", and the pilot was BAD. Here's hoping the show gets a looooooot better.

!!BUZZ!!
And finally, here is a fun, provocative, and even -- dare I say it? -- yuuummmyy dress. Hint: It's a HAMBURGER dress. This is the best thing to happen to hamburger-themed non-hamburger products since The Hamburger Bed!
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Top Movie Villains of All Time???

Who are your favorite villains of the silver screen? Who do you think are the most classic? The most evil? The ones that carry the biggest presence? The most terrifying, the most twisted, the most sadistic?

I want to know your opinion. Vote in the comments, and I'll update my list and eventually rank them. There's no rule about genre. Be the film a gangster flick, a detective thriller, western, sci-fi, fantasy, horror, drama, or even kids' cartoon, its villains are up for grabs. But note: I WILL NOT accept antiheroes or mere antagonists. The entries must truly be VILLAINS, and that means evil characters with whom the audience cannot sympathize.

Update: Well, I've racked my brain. Here are my current contributions, from the Devil to Disney villains, and everything in between.

The Joker (The Dark Knight)
Hannibal Lector (Silence of the Lambs, etc.)
Keyzer Soze (The Usual Suspects)
Sauron (Fellowship of the Ring, etc.)
Darth Vader (Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi [before the end!])
Voldemort (Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone, Etc.)
Maleficent (Sleeping Beauty)
Freddy Krueger (Nightmare On Elm St.)
Lord Caldlow (The Prestige)
Detective Stansfield (The Professional)
Bricktop (Snatch)
Frank (Once Upon A Time In The West)
Arthur Burns (The Proposition)
Sheriff Cooley/The Devil (O Brother, Where Art Thou?)
Count Tyrone Rugen/The Six-Fingered Man (The Princess Bride)
Bill (Kill Bill)
Ernst Stavro Blofeld/Dr. Evil (From Russia With Love / Austin Powers, etc.)
Mr. Blonde (Reservoir Dogs)
John Doe (Seven)
Jigsaw (Saw)
The Judge (The Natural)
Mr. Glass (Unreakable)
Scar (The Lion King)

So, who makes it on your list?
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DAYTROTTER OVERDOSE!

I just wanted to make up for lost time. Prepare to OD on DT!



Ben Kweller



Dawn Landes



Horse Feathers



A.A. Bondy



Jaymay



The Snake The Cross The Crown



Frank Smith

Well, as always, dear readers, happy sounds :-)
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The hiatus has been put......on hiatus...

So sorry for the long and unannounced break; that's what school does to you.
I will be back to my usual daytrotting, popculturecigarettebuzzing, and general tom foolery.

thank you.
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Six-String Samurai: the Coolest B Movie Ever

Imagine a movie that is part Red Dawn, part Mad Max / Road Warrior, part Kill Bill (definitely the all-style-no-substance Volume 1), part Wizard of Oz, part The Seventh Seal (or Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey, if you prefer), and part tribute/satire to rockabilly music and the 50's.

Put it all together and what do you get?
(I'll tell you after the jump.)



I will not be coy. This movie has many, many problems, but most of them can be attributed to the B movie budget of the production. The dialogue is terrible, and the delivery is worse. The special effects are obviously limited, though the film-makers do a lot with what they've got. The biggest single problem is the overuse of the orphan sidekick character, who started out as just another bit of comedy, but eventually progressed to become a predictably and disgustingly sentimental prop on the scale of Tiny Tim. Let me put it this way: he mostly speaks in whiny shouts like "aAaaaAah!" and "oOooaah!"

However, the CORE IDEA of the story and the world in which it exists is amazing, and one can forget some of the poor details when one looks at the beauty and imagination in the grand scope of the film. What is this amazing story? Well, let me let the film do the talking; it speaks for itself. Here are the words from the prologue that scrolled over black:

In 1957 the bomb dropped, and Russia took over what was America.

The last bastion of freedom became a place called Lost Vegas, and Elvis was crowned King.

After forty rockin' years, the King is dead.

Every guitar-picking, sword-swinging opportunist, including Death himself, hears the call echoing across the wastelands.



Vegas needs a new King.

Who is the Six-String Samurai? His name is 'Buddy'...as in Holly; he looks the same, dresses the same, plays the same sort of music, and even wears those signature geek-chic glasses.

So, most of the movie then is Buddy wandering around the wastelands, dueling to the death a bunch of people lamer than he, including a trio of strong-arm bowlers, a car-roving band of crazed cannibals, silent killer astronauts, a bizarre cult that worships an all-powerful "Windmill God", an inept battalion of left-over Soviet soldiers, and finally, DEATH himself. That's right. Death himself is the true villain of this movie, and Death wields a katana and plays a mean guitar. Of course, Death obviously plays death metal. In fact, he kinda looks like a Nazgul version of Ozzy Osbourne as the tophat-wearing Prince of Darkness.

On top of all this, many of the characters speak in ridiculously dated vernacular, constantly saying such slang as "Swell!" and sometimes arguing the merits of different 50's automobiles, and the entire soundtrack consists mostly of songs from the cooky on-screen Russian band, the 'Red Elvises'. Also, Six-String Samurai won Best Cinematography and Best Editing at Slamdance in 1998, and it shows. Best of all, this movie knows its a B-movie, and knows its cheesy, and is willing to poke fun at itself. It has no pretensions. It is very up-front. "Hey this a movie about samurai rock stars that kill each other to become King of Vegas/Oz." Who wouldn't wanna watch THAT???

Basically....if you have seen aaaany B-movies at all, I cannot recommend Six-String Samurai enough. In fact, if you have watched aaaany B Movies at all, you have a categorical imperative to watch this film. At the very least, you should watch it on Instant Netflix and just skip everything but Buddy Holly slaying all the weird troop of posers. You could maybe even skip that, so long as you watch the end when the Six-String Samurai duels with Death, who raises his sword and charges him while shouting the line "Bend before the ways of Heavy Metal!"

CLICK HERE TO SEE OUR HERO BUDDY KILL A WHOLE ARMY OF COMMIES!

P.S. This is definitely the best line from the movie...
Ward Cleaver: You ever try a pink golf ball, Wally? Why, the wind shear alone on a pink golf ball can take the head off a 90-pound midget at over 300 yards.
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Can you write 10 songs in 4 weeks???

I'm gonna try.

The RPM challenge

UPDATE: Whoops. Well, *I* failed. How 'bout you?
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Ben Taylor at Futureappletree Studio 1

Ben Taylor gives off some of the same vibrations that his father started giving off back in the late 60s and early seventies – there’s no avoiding that in his voice – but he lends more of the sea salt laze that must make up the other percentage of people calling the Vineyard home that wasn’t already accounted for by water. It’s a committed, but lackadaisical flair for being able to keep things in perspective and to keep the blood pressure at all-time lows. Here he sings about America, a country that he grew up seeing from one angle and has since discovered in all its warts, shadiness and overriding splendor on his own, in a way that Simon & Garfunkel sang about it, while adding to the description (mostly a love in spite of the black eyes and sour reports) a carefree tonality that’s vaguely of a reggae feel, where the drinks are helping.
---Sean Moeller, founder of Daytrotter

Welcome back, dear readers. Today's Daily Dose of Daytrotter gives us Ben Taylor, who certainly has music in his blood, as he is the son of James Taylor and Carly Simon. His voice sounds a lot like his dad's; to compare his music to to that of other contemporary artists, I think Ben's sounds like Jack Johnson and Ben Harper finally had a baby after touring so long together, and that baby grew up loving James Taylor and Carly Simon and so he changed his name to Ben Taylor....I understand if you didn't follow that; neither did I. The important thing to understand is that Ben Taylor makes amazing music, and if that's not enough, he writes great lyrics to boot. Any guy who makes an album called "The Legend of Kung Folk, Pt. 1: the Biting Kiss" is a guy I want to listen to. "Kung Folk" is the coolest silly album phrase I've heard in a while. Ben crafts fun and meaningful songs that stand up to the acid test of constant (and I mean constant) loop replays. He can even keep you very entertained just by telling a hilarious anecdote, or reading a short poem (a surprisingly good poem!).

My favorites from his Daytrotter session are "Wrong", "Turn On The Lights", and "Wicked Way", though "America", "After It's Over It's Over", and his untitled "Poem" are all great too.


Ben Taylor's Daytrotter Session
Ben Taylor - Turn on the Lights
Ben Taylor - Wrong
Ben Taylor - Wicked Way
Ben Taylor - America
Ben Taylor - After It's Over It's Over
Ben Taylor - Poem

Buh-bye. As always, happy sounds.
Read, Kindly Light...

you know what really SUCKS...?

.....................VAMPIRES, that's what. Literally. They will suck your blood. They. Will. Suck. Your. Blood. They will suck it up. Dare I say, they will drink your milkshake.

So, I hate vampires. Seriously. I hate vampires. Every single one of them. I HATE vampires! I have not seen a vampire movie in I-don't-know-how-long, and yet in the past few months they have continued to show up in violent, graphic nightmares to get me and everyone I love, the evil bastards. I HATE vampires!

Oh, I know what you're thinking... "But vampires are so cool. Vampires are sexy!"
(My reply after da jump.)

Um, yeah, they're sexy...until they're about tear out your jugular,

and eat your soul (and then theres' that whole afore-mentioned blood-sucking thing). Dear readers, take note: the whole reason why they're sexy is because they wanna get close to you and bite you. Vampires only have one thing on their minds. Bloooooooood. You see, our current pop culture has deceived us. Our media want you to think that vampires are dark, sexy, freaky, spooky superheroes. I'm sorry to break it to you, but there's no such thing as a gothic/vampire/bat superhero.

Ok. That kind of backfired on me. But notice, Batman does not bite people's necks. Batman does not suck people's blood. And Batman certainly does not listen to emo crap like My Chemical Romance. He's way too cool to do something lame like that.

The sad thing is, our current pop culture has progressed beyond even the Underworld-era vampire as the sexy, cool superhuman; this type of vampire has been replaced with one far more repulsive...

That's right. In addition to whiny, melodramatic teenagers wanting to be vampires, we now have VAMPIRES TRYING TO BE WHINY, MELODRAMATIC TEENAGERS! These vampires are so far removed from Count Dracula that "the harmful effects of sunlight" don't burn these vampires, don't kill them, don't turn them into bats. No. No. The magical harmful effects of sunlight make these vampires...


...sparkle...
......................
..........................
...............................Yes, you read that correctly. They sparkle in the sunlight. OooOoOooOooOooOoOOOOOoOooOOOOooh!! Scary. And. Glittery. That's just what we need -- glittery, glitzy vampires.

What we need now is a new vampire movie that is completely old-school, totally non-new. The last thing we need is to "reinvent" vampires; that's how we went wrong in the first place. We've reinvented them eleven times over, and humanized them to a fault. What we need is something like a more modern retelling of Nosferatu; what we need is a classic Dracula-flick with an updated setting. The vampire need not be Dracula himself necessarily, but he ought to be modeled after that seductive but terrifying gentlemanly archetype.

Also, I'm so sick and tired of every single vampire movie featuring the most arrogant vampires explaining to the silly humans that every single bit of oral tradition handed down about vampires is wrong, that somehow all the oldest and best-known tales about these monsters are pure superstition. When's the last time you saw someone try and kill a vampire with a good old-fashioned stake, or ward him off with holy water, garlic, or a crucifix? We need to return to these archetypal sorts of tried-and-true props and motifs. Because God knows, no one (thirteen-year-old girls aside) wants to see another dumb teenage vampire angst movie.



P.S. Vampires are real, very, very real, and very, very scary. They are ABSOLUTE evil! The hierarchy of evil is Satan/Morgoth/Sauron, Maleficent, the Joker (ala Dark Knight), the Sith, the Nazgul, Count Dracula, Keyser Soze, Hannibal Lector, and vampires in general. That's why this post is so vitally important. We humans (and we werewolves) must win the war against the blood-suckers. I'll explain all about werewolves in another post.

Read, Kindly Light...