Films of old for the new.

And here comes a list of the old classic films that every film student will implore you to see.

There is the scene in The Rules of Attraction where the POMO film student is reeling off his love about cinema, and speaking about “Man and A Movie Camera (MAMC).” Forget the disaffected artiste chic pretending to be in on the know; this is a moment that so encapsulates the outward persona of a film student, that even if it is a ultimately false moment due to the fact the guy is trying to score, it’s true to the spirit of a film kid.

Being a film student is a rush. The film business is at best a lottery; the making of film can be, at its best, an ultimate act of human expression and art. Combining the two of these with their best parts creates a lore that is able to include art, mythology, business savvy, guts, determination and everything good about humanity. It’s hard not to be moved when in the process because in the program, one comes to believe that film is the ultimate achievement of mankind… it’s the one media that can speak to us in two senses and in a set period of time. Being in film school allows a person to be subjected (en mass, I must note) to all of the great works of the history: you study, discuss, philosophize and illuminate the medium.

For anyone who truly cares about film “Man and Movie Camera” is an artistic wonder, it’s a work of a person capturing the real world with little tricks or emotional approachability, it’s just life on film, just a bit surreal, it’s not Dada esque in it’s minimalism, because there is sense to the approach meant for the mass and not in abstract. You don’t have to be a film student to enjoy MAMC, because if you get the artists purpose, you will understand what the film is about… though it helps if you do care about film… or you are high.

The loser film guy in Rules of Attraction (I call him a loser because he elicits porn references when making a amateur sex film) speaks about the film like a religious zealot, because it’s something that he has been taught to appreciate, and in the moment of seeing that film – likely for the first and last time in a recent day – wants to share what he sees as beauty. It took me years to figure out that this wasn’t how people look at film, and even if they do, it’s not what they want to hear at parties.

But that’s who and where you are as a film student. It’s all encompassing and empowering… you feel part of a special world and clique. I still do this when it comes to Springsteen, but if I have learned anything from life in film school is that it’s not about film, it’s about finding your voice. That’s what film school is supposed to help an artist do… containing the didactic impulses created in the process is the great trick for social viability.

I don’t know if it’s that my or any of my fellow film students opinion that may be tarnished to do a air of self-righteousness about the subject, but I know that when I recommend something to someone, I come with an almost preset verbal warning of: “I think I’m more informed that you on this, but I think you will like this.” I feel a similar way on most opinions, but at the same time, I know now that if someone brought up MAMC, I would dismiss it unless they were one of my three best friends or they watched it with me. I know this because of The Wire… it’s the best show I have ever seen, but it’s something that has to find you…

It’s a little bit of the boy who cried wolf, it’s also about akin to the lesser known fable of the room mate who claimed his farts smelled worse than any one else. Sure, they may be right 3 out of 10 times, but when it comes to the other 7, it’s just a matter of it you needed to experience it at all.

All that said. I think I have learned my lesson. I don’t recommend Rules of the Game unless the person wants to learn about cinema.

I’m not going to suggest seeing Children of Men when a 45 year old white woman is going to see “Stomp the Yard.” (I had to do this week, and it damn near killed me)

Ten films from before 1975 that are really worth seeing, not as a cinema, history, or elitist, these films are great films, regardless of date, color, or year of production.

10. Some like it Hot – For anyone who is a fan of Arrested Development… this is a film that matches the mad cap juggling of multiple scenarios, each the more zany and ridiculous, and has Marylyn Monroe in her best role as an actor. A lot of old timers call this the best comedy of all time. It’s kind of hard to say that straight faced when Top Secret, Airplane, Austin Powers, and Caddyshack have been made since, but it’s one of the most complete movies that is funny ever made.

9. Tom Jones – The book adaptation of a book that few people ever could actually read. In the whole of the 900 pages, there is a great, funny, and deep tale about class, sex, and growing up… but for all of the brilliance of the book, it’s still 900 pages, and who wants to read that much about a male slut and his humorous misadventures. In a two hour movie that winks to the nature of its adaptation, it’s a stuffy olde English piece that feels like a modern comedy… they know where the laughs are, and they treat the joy of the book as a well… joy. As far as literary adaptations go, few are as fun as this one.

8. Chinatown – It’s the only film post 1970 on this list, but now, 30 years on, it’s falling in the grounds of criminally underappreciated. If you think “The Departed” is a great film, don’t just watch “Mean Streets” or “Goodfellas” again. See this. Scorsese may be better than Polanski on the whole, but he never did anything better than Chinatown.

7. To Kill a Mockingbird – Just to see the model from which all boomers thought a father should be. Then go ahead and watch. It’s a capsule of America that showed what we were, and how we overcame it, with belief in the spirit of our fellow man. Then ask your parent why they supported the second Iraq war, if they believe in Atticus defending a soul trapped by racial stereotypes, why did they think any good would come from this. A great deal of fun with Nam vets, as well.

6. The Searchers --- Probably the most difficult film on this list to watch. It’s a little dated, the matte shots are borderline amateur compared even with youtube works by 14 year olds. The film takes it’s time getting to it in almost a painful fashion, and while John Wayne is at his iconic best, he forces his son upon us in one of the worst acting roles ever (he’s the fat trumpet boy). There are a lot of little things that make this movie what it is both good and bad. The Searchers is the film that inspired Spielberg, Scorsese, Coppola, and Lucas, and you can see the touchstones back to this film in their works (including Taxi Driver, which Paul Schraeder has called a direct adaptation). And then there is the last shot, one of the most ambiguous and difficult shots ever to end a film. What served as rouge filmmaking in the late 1950’s, filled with antiheroes, cultural murkiness, and right for the wrong reasons morality. If this summary is baffling, well, like I said, this film is difficult.

5. Seven Samurai. Convincing a group of friends to watch a 3 hour film made in a foreign language, from the 1950’s, and in black and white… it’s a hard sell. Especially since the first few reels have egregious overacting on the extras part. Getting past that, Seven Samurai is one of the best action movies ever made. Once you get beyond the language barrier and social differences, it’s about the time in the movie when the plot enters the second act, and then it’s just awesome. Like Die Hard with swords awesome.

4. North By Northwest – Pro: Cary Grant. James Mason. Two of the best voices (as in how they spoke) in history. It’s one of the greatest adventure films of all time, it’s paced wonderfully, it’s genuinely funny, and the atmosphere is top notch… aside from the lack of mobiles and model years, this doesn’t need much adjustment to feel modern.

3. His Girl Friday -- I showed this to Steaze tonight. Pitching it to him, I said is a 90 minute film with 3 hours of dialogue. It’s over the top, it’s hilarious, it’s true, it’s one of those films where the old timers say “they don’t make ‘em like this anymore,” and you know that while they could, a newer version wouldn’t be nearly as good.

It’s filled with double logic worthy of Shwartzwelder, with lines like

Walter Burns: What were you when you came here five years ago - a little college girl from a school of journalism. I took a doll-faced hick...
Hildy Johnson: Well, you wouldn't take me if I hadn't been doll-faced.
Walter Burns: Well, why should I? I thought it would be a novelty to have a face around here a man could look at without shuddering.

2. Brief Encounter – The best short term love story ever made. While the time and place dates it as a work, where and when it was made is meaningless to the potency. It’s about the right love at the wrong time.

1. It Happened One Night ---. It’s got everything that a romantic comedy should have, strong leads working with worn in yet likeable archetypes, a solid courting disguised as animosity, a setting where they have to remain together (this time it’s a road trip), the guy showing the girl the ropes, the girl occasionally doing him one better, ultimately settling into man and woman roles and falling for each other. Made in 1936, it’s never been topped, even if it’s been redone, remade, and ripped off countless times.

Everything happens at just the right moment… and it’s got Clark Gable. There is a reason his friends called him King.

That and it has this line:

Alexander: Oh, er, do you mind if I ask you a question, frankly? Do you love my daughter?
Peter: Any guy that'd fall in love with your daughter ought to have his head examined.
Alexander: Now that's an evasion!
Peter: She picked herself a perfect running mate -- King Westley -- the pill of the century! What she needs is a guy that'd take a sock at her once a day, whether it's coming to her or not. If you had half the brains you're supposed to have, you'd done it yourself, long ago.
Alexander: Do you love her?
Peter: A normal human being couldn't live under the same roof with her without going nutty! She's my idea of nothing!
Alexander: I asked you a simple question! Do you love her?
Peter: YES!! But don't hold that against me, I'm a little screwy myself!

Yeah, sometimes they can’t make em like they used to. The best line in the movie would be an outrage. Link here for a full take from Dave circa 2001 Enjoy.

(continued...)

Fucking Brutal

Jim Valvano… The man who defined the Cinderella Story of the 80’s (The Miracle on Ice was David vs. Goliath), the NC State Wolfpack.

Aside from one truly great quote for sports life: Don't give up, don't ever give up.

He gave one of the best about life.

“To me, there are three things we all should do every day. We should do this every day of our lives. Number one is laugh. You should laugh every day. Number two is think. You should spend some time in thought. And number three is, you should have your emotions moved to tears, could be happiness or joy. But think about it. If you laugh, you think, and you cry, that's a full day. That's a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week, you're going to have something special.”

In the ever changing definition of masculinity, it’s a hard role for most of us. In an era when we are now supposed to cry, it’s hard to because, the people who want us to start crying… are women. They cry about children down a well in Finland.

They want us to cry about Natalle Holloway, Terry Schiavo, and Baby Diego.

We don’t cry about that.

We cry about fathers, about brothers, about honor, about tradition, and once in a long while about women.

The sad thing is we are far more likely to cry about John Wayne or Walter Peyton than Rick and Ilsa.

Before I go on, I beg you to watch this.

It’s one of the most uplifting, endearing, and purely from the heart speeches. He makes you laugh, he makes you think, and he makes you cry.

I hate to evoke As Good as it Gets… but I’m left bare for cultural references… It’s something that makes me want to be a better man.

That’s not only rare, that’s worth savoring. I listen to the entirety of the speech about 10 times a year.

When he gets to the “Don’t give up…,” and mind you he dies from cancer later this year, it’s unbearable. To hear a man say he’s going to keep fighting a death sentence, and do so with all the power of his soul, I find it hard to fathom that people over 18 (including men) can’t be inspired to the point of tears by this.


++++

So the point of this being… crying and laughing at the same time.

I remember the first time I cried over a movie or music or whatever…

It was Spring Break of 1996. It was when seeing Braveheart.

I actually had seen 90% of the movie a month earlier when I watched it with Peter Kuzma. I fell asleep at the end of the movie. When it was over I asked how it ended. He told me how “Wallace is tortured, and when he is asked to repent, he yells “freedom” instead of surrender. The Scottish army then wins their independence.”

To be fair, that’s the long and short of the last 10% of Braveheart.

To see it though… it was everything I believed was good about the human spirit. That was what did it for me. I finally cried about something that wasn’t about life. Maybe it was really about life and the parts I cared about… but seeing the film in that situation.

All that in mind, I was not really shocked by the fact I cried at this.

The second time I ever did was piercing.

It was from the Simpsons.

The Episode was from the 7th season; Mother Simpson is still the episode I would call the best. It’s Burn’s best episode, Homer isn’t at his funniest, but he is at his most sympathetic. It’s got running gags, flashback jokes, the penultimate ABBA/Apocalypse Now spoof, and for the first time gives true depth to animated characters.



This is the episode that all syndicates show every Mother’s day.

I’d like to say that this was one of the few times something other than my own mom made me appreciate her. That in some way, Homer silently musing about the heartbreak from his mom was enough to give thanks for what I had and in that moment in the show, I’d like to think I never appreciated my mom more.

But the reason I cried was because of Homer, because I saw him go through all the pratfalls and problems with life, he finally had a reason to truly be melancholy.

I winced because of the latter, cried because of the former. In media, as in life, it’s not the actual moment that can raise the biggest lump; it’s the flashpoint of past memories that creates the reality of the vis-à-vis on screen. To love is to feel pain.

I guess I love my mother more than I did before because of Homer Simpson. What makes me happy now is that I know that’s the truth; in him I saw what it was to be a son who has a mother. I’m going to spend the rest of my life with a fictitious character and his family while living 2300 miles from my own... to save you from a long point, when my mother passes, the first thing I am going to turn to is my DVD which has “Mother Simpson.”

“Remember wherever you go, you have a mother and she truly loves you.”

That’s comfort, and I don’t care where it came from.

So… the top 10 TV comedy episodes which double as tearjerkers. (mostly 1985 on)

Off the list… All of Band of Brothers, I have written before this is one of the best things mankind has ever done. When I did a list of films where it’s ok to cry, this was at #1 (tied with Saving Private Ryan).

The Wire. It can be genuinely funny at times (Bunk burning his own clothes to hide his adultery, Macnulty crashing his car… twice into the same pole). This is in a different category.

#10. Friends – The one where Rachel finds out. – To me this is the great Friends episode. The show is always going to enter the “Gay/chick” genre when it comes to male viewing pattern. It’s not hip enough to be cool, it’s far too sentimental when it doesn’t need to be, and by the end of the 2001-2 season, it had run it’s course as a show and just started to suck. This episode is a collection of the series strengths, it’s ability to switch male and female roles in a situation (Joey and Phoebe’s dating analysis, where Joey teaches Phoebe to be a man… “This guy has made you believe that it’s ok to just have sex, and that you never have to call him again? This is my god!”, the best Ross/Rachel moment, and a dynamite conclusion which at the time was an in-season cliffhanger. It’s one of the funnier episodes of the run, and yet it has one of the most romantic and sweet coda’s in TV history. I never actually cried at this, nor did I ever come close, but there are a couple of notes hit in this that I know that if I am drunk or sad enough, I would cry at.

#9. The Simpsons - Lost Our Lisa – In college, I wrote a paper on the dynamic of Homer and Lisa. From my paper:

He spots Lisa from the sky and upon making eye contact yells: “Lisa stay there, I’ll come down and save you.” However, his ineptitude with the cherry picker’s controls causes the vehicle to go skidding down a steep hill and towards the Springfield harbor, prompting Homer to exclaim: “Lisa, save me.” Lisa is able to get Homer out of his peril, and they soon start to head out. The conversation that takes place begins as a sad confessional of Lisa, who feels overwhelmed by her failure to get to the museum; it ends up as one of the best dialogues between Homer and Lisa in the history of the show. The dialogue reveals both of the characters at their core interacting, and provides surprisingly moving advice from Homer to Lisa.
Lisa: I should have known I wasn’t old enough to take the bus on my own, but I really wanted to see that exhibit. I’ll never take another stupid risk like that again.
Homer stomps on the brakes, bringing the car to a screeching halt.
Homer: Don’t ever say that.
Lisa: What?
Homer: Stupid risks are what make life worth living. Now your mother, she’s the steady type, and that’s fine in small doses. But me, I’m a risk taker. That’s why I have so many adventures.
This exchange shows Lisa struggling with her desire to escape the traditions of the Simpson family, who are not the intellectual, museum going people she is, and believing it is a failure on her part. When she speaks about her drained hope, “I’ll never take a stupid risk…again,” it seems like she is succumbing to the families’ traditions. However, it is Homer, the very type of person she hopes to avoid becoming, who gives her reason to believe in herself. The advice is also a great explanation for why Homer seems to be having new adventures every week: he believes that “stupid risks” are what he needs to take in order to feel alive.
Inspired by Homer’s non-traditional fatherly advice, Lisa decided to take a stupid risk and break into the museum to see the Treasures of the Isis. Homer and Lisa sneak into the museum, with Lisa jimmying opening the door because “the cops have Daddy’s prints on file.” Inside they wander through the exhibit, Lisa marveling at the Egyptian treasures, Homer simply glad to be there with his daughter. Lisa: “Have you even seen such exquisite ushaptes?” Homer: “umm, not this exquisite.” Lisa then catches a glimpse of the fabled Orb of Isis, a mysterious orb whose purpose and function has yet to be figured out in decades of study. Lisa is worried about the velvet rope that surrounds it, but Homer sees it as another task to master. However, he trips and causes the velvet rope to crash into the Orb’s podium, causing it to crack. However, instead of breaking, the orb opens and it is revealed to be a music box. Homer and Lisa are awestruck and humbled by the event. Realizing they are the first to hear the song in over 4,000 years, Lisa is immensely grateful. She hugs Homer, thanking him for making her take such a stupid risk. She ponders they may be the last humans to ever hear the song, and Homer attempts to comfort her by telling her, “Yeah but it will always live on because we’ll never forget it.” He then begins to whistle another tune however, prompting Lisa to realize, “Dad that’s the old spice song,” to which he responds, “Oh, well that’s a good one too.” He begins to hum the song and Lisa joins in, singing the song with a loving, and ultimately touching, enthusiasm.
The episode ends with Lisa learning to not be afraid of life, and Homer learning about his daughter and her interests as well.

Seriously, I wrote 7 papers on the Simpsons in college. Anyway, this is for the man who has children. Something around loving the differences and bonding with family because you have to, and ultimately making each other better in the process. It’s not the quick change cry, it’s more of a mellow, sometimes life is really worth living.

#8. Futurama – Leela’s Home world. If Futurama should be renowned for anything, it should be for it’s ability to create red herring plots that create emotional 180’s for the plot. This episode revolves around Leela learning of her true origins. Introduced as an orphan, she was always trying to discover why she was a Cyclops in a world of two eyed people. This episode reveals the truth, and once it does, it reveals a shocking level of depth and sacrifice by her parents. The great reveal of the episode and the montage that follows serve as one of the most rare tricks in cinema… purely loving without being forced or cheeseball; it shows Leela’s childhood with the almost imperceptible force of her parents, who are forced to be far away, but never stopped caring. Once again it’s a parental dynamic, but this is not the last of the Futurama episodes on this list.

#7. South Park - Kenny Dies – It craps out in the final resolution… if only because it has to. This is the only episode in the series that even tries to be emotional, and it does through by killing a character and the gimmick that he served.



Between this, Stan’s guilt, and Kyle’s heart, it’s a fucking brutal episode.

#6. Futurama – The Sting. An episode that could fit in the Twilight Zone, Fry is victim to a bee sting that kills him (or so it seems). Leela is ravaged by guilt by her part in his death and keeps seeing him in different places, shapes, and forms to the point she believes she is crazy. The resolution is heartwarming and triumphant… to the point of beauty.

#5. The Simpsons - Mother Simpson. It’s just him looking at the sky.

#4. Development Arrested – While it is easy to say that Arrested Development was cut short, it’s hard to argue that the show didn’t go out in the best possible way. The episode begins with “why is this man crying?” In the course of 22 minutes we get jokes, references, and layered storytelling that reminds the loyal viewers that while we may be losing something great… at least it’s ending in the right way.

#3. Newsradio. Bill Moves On- Much like Cheers, Newsradio had to deal with the real life death of one of its principal characters. While it’s been a while since I have seen the Coach death episode (I wasn’t old enough to see on Network) I know this episode. Enough cannot be said about Newsradio… this episode brought back actors who left the show, gave the character and the actor a wonderful, fourth wall breaking send off, and there are times when you as the viewer know the actors aren’t crying in character, it’s because they miss Phil Hartman. The final shot of an empty chair in a spotlight says it all.

#2. Scrubs. My Screw-up – 2004 was 5 years removed from The Sixth Sense. It’s just long enough for the viewer to forget the plot trappings of the movie to be duped into falling for the same trick. And it’s fucking brutal when it happens.

#1 – Futurama – The Luck of the Fryish. Upon learning that there is a famous Phillip J. Fry who was the first man on Mars, the Fry of the series is convinced that his brother Nancy stole his lucky 7 leafed clover and changed his name to Phillip, and then traveled the world and won the hearts of it.

What begins as a tale of sibling rivalry set 1000 years in the future ends as a loving testament to brotherly love.

If so inclined, get the DVD with commentary… at the reveal, you hear two guys making jokes about the little bits… only to be quietly interrupted by another guy saying “Hey, I’m trying to have a cry here.”

The epitaph that reveals it all is a pure and loving as possible. “Here lies Phillip J. Fry, named for his Uncle, to carry on his spirit.” In then ends with “Don’t you forget about me” by Simple Minds. And it’s not the least bit ironic.

I must note that all of these are not as wrenching as yet another Futurama episode titled Jurassic Bark.

It’s about losing love, it’s about the notion of the right time for people to be with one another, it’s about love at the wrong time, it’s about love in the unrequited sense.

So much so that I can’t even watch it anymore.



I mean this isn’t even fair. It’s just fucking brutal, even if it has Dolomite references. But to think, to love, and to cry in one day... that's a pretty good way to live.

(continued...)

Dave’s hates of 2006.

The long list of things that pissed me off in 2006.

Paula Denada. Rather than get into a “thing” again, I am just going to say this chick bothers me to no end with her music.

Her new single has a rapper for urban stations and not one on pop stations. It’s one thing to have a remix, it’s another to be the focus of dual minority marketing forces when she’s no older than 17.

In her second single, “Walk Away” she opens up the song by complimenting her ex boyfriend: for her new girlfriend, and does so in a way that sounds Sapphic.

++++

Puff Daddy

First I’m pissed he’s still around. He’s not on top exactly but it’s still been ten years. I would have wagered dollars to donuts that he’d die off faster than boy bands.

Second, he’s clearly dong payola with MTV for his new singles. No one I know has bought or listened to his album. I say this with this as my personal reference.

1. The people I hang out with have some of the more diverse tastes and lifestyles.

2. I work at a hotel where all sorts of people come in everyday. I hear what music they are listening to and ask where they are visiting from.

3. I spend long binges on myspace music boards about every 3 months. It’s a problem. Nobody even defends Diddy anymore.

I mean he was always bad, but at least he was ripping off good songs. Now the shit he’s making isn’t even ripped off from anything. Diddy, wanna know why you aren’t making hit albums anymore? You stopped ripping off top 10 hits of yesteryear. You don’t give up the bread and butter because Pro Active is helping you maintain your sexy.

And I hate him for coining that statement.

It’s not a question of if he is relevant anymore, it’s why young artists keep thinking he’s a hit maker when every other major producer is ten times more bankable than he is.

The thing about hating Diddy was that he made semi decent remixes of sometimes obscure 70’s era pop like “I’m coming out” and turned it into “mo’ money, mo’ problems.” I’m still not sure how much credit to give or take away from his involvement on Life After Death. But I know that his relevance is to Life After Death as Amnesiac is to Radiohead’s catalogue. Yeah, Life in Glass Houses is among their top 15 songs, but there are some awful tracks that beg why it wasn’t more focused; Puffy was the one who found between the sheets and I’m sure the opening montage is all his work and not C. Smalls, but every time he laughs or whispers bad boy I want to flip the song.

I mean he was a con artist who helped make two great albums, then got a taste for the limelight, stole from Sting, made the worst song in history in the process, and if “No Way Out” came out like it was supposed to before Bi got shot (Smalls was to play Puffy, and vice versa, and it was supposed to be tongue in cheek) Puffy would have been the George Martin of hip hop instead of Ringo.

All he’s done in the last 4 years is try to bring back Mase, run MTV’s Making the Band, and pimped proactive acne care. Sure he found Yung Joc, but I don’t think that’s a good thing. Not for me. For anyone. Now he’s rendered himself irrelevant as Cain, Black Rob, and the Lox. The music sucks. And he’s rich and still around.

I just wanted a blaze of glory ending, now we get his Sandinista.


Speaking of the making the band.

Danity Kane.

First off, really what kind of name is that? It’s like they scoured the Natal Wards at hospitals and found the most ridiculous baby name and put it in front of the last name of the character from one of the best films of all time. Combining black naming techniques with Orson Wells is equally mentally infuriating as it is pointless.

Second, the lead single of the group is nothing more than product name dropping.

Listen if you care.



What is the point of this song? It’s a bunch of girls singing that they are like rappers when it comes to bragging of wealth to buy luxury items. That and pointing out the seating arrangement of their car. It couldn’t be more insipid.

Never mind the logic as is. This is a bunch of hot girls oohing and aahing like Donna Summer in “Love to love you baby” as if they feel post coitus about rims and Maseratis.

The hooks of “OH OH” made me listen more than once, but I know when I am actively being given sex as a selling point. And just like in real life, I am not going to pay for the whore’s service, but I’ll listen to the pitch because it makes me feel funny downstairs.

++++

A quick short list:

A. Pitchfork picking “my love” by J-Tim as the #1 single. While I stopped paying attention to pitchfork months after staying on the bandwagon when everyone with any know how was trashing it (I still say that when it goes Hornby’s Songbook in record reviews, it’s everything I want to read in music criticism. Not the site, but the style) it’s still a handy toll for sorting through mass levels of new music without the distractions of blogger mp3’s sites, which can post Reggae from 1969 and rock from 2004 (I mean, I love it, but it’s impossible to filter out new stuff that may be of my liking).

But J-Tim as number one. Really!

REALLY?!

B. Bones by The Killers (more on them coming later). My bones on your bones. That doesn’t even make bad sense.

C. Wyclef in “Hips don’t lie” just one of the most pointless featuring specials ever.

D. Racism roundup:

1. In the wake of the Michael Richards scandal, Yung Dro makes a Japanese slur in “Rubberband Banks.” No one says anything.
2. In the wake of the Rosie blowback, her response to be angry at the implication was one thing. It’s another for her to out Clay Aiken in the name of gay rights.

I think if anything, Donald Trump should wage at her for being a passive aggressive. Just because the irony level would be through the roof.

It’s interesting when The View and Regis and Kelly have had two of the most awful fits of racism that doubled as hilarious. I’d like to see Kelly, Barbara, and Rosie talk about racial stereotypes. I think it would run the gamut of every bad preconception. I have written before women love to be racist when it comes in the guise of self defense.

3. I wish that someone prominent came to the defense of Mel Gibson or Michael Richards, with some level of apologetic condolence instead of outright venom.

For Mel, I think he lost all righteousness with the “Are you a Jew” comment. At the time, Israel had just finished bombing a country back into the 18th century and their vulnerability due to 1/3 of the impetus of the Iraq war logic. Not to say that it’s a blanket truth, but it’d be nice if Americans were given a decent explanation to why we side with Israel. If we are protecting the country from Terrorism, it’d be nice to hear why we support Israel in a logic sense instead of a compassionate protector argument. I’m not saying we need to change the policy, but it’d be nice for someone in the Gov. to defend - in plain English- why we stay with them when Osama and co. cite this as one of the main reasons they attack us. We were an isolationist country before WWII. That worked pretty well.

As for Kramer… I learned one thing. White people just can’t say that word. It’s curious because more has been done to create a bridge in the last 40 years politically, but in the end all of the overarching societal improvements fall meaningless when we allow ourselves to be pettily offended by archaic slurs.

I don’t know what to say about the issue other than I am disgusted by the state of America.

One. Richards wasn’t being derogatory. He was using the word to prove a point, and the point that was proven was not what he intended. He never reprimanded the man for being anything stereotypical, he was saying the word to be mean, not to be insulting. He was angry when he said it, but he wasn’t being classically racist. Not once did he demean the man, he just simply used a slur.

Two. Black leaders took this event as a forum for ending the N word. Yeah. I’ll be long in the ground before society forgets the words “nigger” and “nigga.” Not while Black, white, Latino, and everyone else are still around. Being black is a thing. It’s not a problem. People of Earth are going to have different skin tones. It’s the effect of the sun over years of evolution. I’m white (duh) and I don’t get offended by someone calling me a cracker or honkey or whatnot. It doesn’t mean anything because I know it’s a cheap shot and in the end, it’s character that matters.

Not to sound preachy or didactic, the difference between most white people comes when they want to flaunt their heritage, be it Italian, Jew, Irish, or whatnot. I have been taught- by a revisionist schooling method- that no race is better than the other.

Stop being a race. Stop being Black, Latino, Finnish, Russian, or Chinese. You came from somewhere, just like everyone else. Noting about you is special until you are special.

There is culture and there is color. While I grew up white, I never thought to care about why they are one sort of white and not another. I write this in 2007 because if you want to make the distinction.

I just wish someone would call them on it, by them I mean anyone. Say Lance Armstrong says something like “I find Floyd Landis’s demeanor niggardly following his tour win and controversy.” Then Jesse Jackson takes exception and Lance Armstrong says, “Look I faced cancer, the wrath of the foreign press, and won the hardest single athletic feat 7 times. I faced death and then won. And yet a single word hurts you? Are you that weak?”

It would take something like this for people to own up that unless it’s institutionalized, race differences are skin deep.

++++

The release plan for Children of Men by Universal. The film is going to find it’s audience. It’s just going to because it’s that great of a work.

But by the time the buzz becomes where it should be, the Oscars will be airing, and likely the film won’t be nominated. This was a buried job by the studio. While the Departed may win it all and bring Marty his first Oscar, it’s kind of a shame, because Cuaron’s work is that much better.

On another note:

I have an uncooked post about the best directed films of the decade.

The list portion follows:

5. Munich – Spielberg
4. Traffic and Ocean’s 11 – Soderbergh
3. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.
2. In the Bedroom – Todd Field
1. Batman Begins – Christopher Nolan.

I dreamed this up when I was watching BB almost daily, and doing the same with Prisoner of Azkaban when they were on HBO in the summer.

Anyway, I think the climatic scene pretty much nailed a spot on this list, though I’m not sure if he knocks off the Dark Night. But if Mr. Cuaron ever is to read this site, I say this:

And why do we fall? So we can learn to pick ourselves up.

I’m kind of glad something legitimate like Children of Men came along, because the top 3 movies on my list for this decade were LOTR: The Two Towers, The Incredibles, and Batman Begins. It’s nice to know this decade isn’t one of fantasy escapism in the wake of 9/11. Children of Men is the kind of film that should have been made in 2003, when the sense of what we could become with negative actions might have helped, you know, make W a one term aberration instead of a ruin on the world.

++++

So what would my worst of the year possibly be?

There are many reasonable choices.

And so I’ll bitch about Beyonce.

Mainly for “Irreplaceable.” The latest in the long line of sh-empowement (I think it’s funny if you read it as Shemp –owerment, but he never happened to the Three Stooges in my book.)

I have written before, she is one of the most destructive forces in America. It’s diva riffic life for her, and that’s all she writes about. At least Aretha sang about being in love for the right reasons… Beyonce is known to date one of the richest men of the world, and yet she’s got nothing but vitriol about life in her music.

So this song, which is about a rich woman throwing her boy toy out under suspicion cheating on her (honestly I’d be more forgiving of the travesty we are suffering to endure if there were actual proof, much like with W and WMD’s), and she kicks him out.

The “To da’ lef, to da lef” is a decent hook, but it’s empty because it’s needless righteous; I mean, a woman in a cougar position complains about taking a man into her life for companionship. Never does she mention the life lost, the investment spoiled, or the future soiled; it’s all about her.

What bothers me most is that she says “I can find another you in a minute/ in fact he’ll be here in a minute.” Avoiding the idea about rhyming a word with the same word, why the hell does she have another man ready? Isn’t this cheating if she is ready to move on after a mere 3 hours? She had a man ready, and yet she is bitter because her man had one too? I mean WTF!

Where is this song targeted to? I mean which woman in the world is a multi-millionaire who can buy a Bentley GT for her man, as well as designer clothes, and who has a mansion? How many of such people exist? And for god sake, how many of them would choose a lowlife like the man in the song? I’m almost tempted to ask, “Is this a black thing?” But it’s not about race or even gender, it’s about wealth, and why they hell would a woman smart enough to earn millions make such a blunder when it comes to a mate. I mean, Britney dumped her man (albeit much too late, but she got kids out of it), but really who is this song targeted to.

Are all artists today this vain?

Are we so enamored with them that their problems of financial freedom translate to mass art we can relate to. While I am sure this can be felt by women with deadbeat baby daddies or victims of abuse, it’s still not like Beyonce creates a familiar character, she’s just Beyonce in the song, not a character in a song, but a replication of her success.

In “Lost One” Jay Z writes about B being too attached to her work, so clearly she’s the selfish one. Even if she is a workaholic, hasn’t she at this point achieved enough to stop bitching about the petty stuff? She now has the ability to become something few people are, let alone a confident, black woman, a role model and a hero. In her art, she could transform herself into a great artist, someone who has the notoriety to return R&B to it’s glory, to stop worrying about sex selling the art because she has the marquee level to withstand career risks that most artists can’t.

But with her classic “black woman sitcom from the 80’s” MMMMMMMMN that opens “Irreplaceable” she’s clearly just selling to her base.

It’s like the CEO of Home Depot getting 250 million in severance for lowering the stock value of the company; the head of Enron avoiding judgment by dying in Aspen; she is getting rich by making the world worse.

Like the other two, and many more that could be listed, she is being rewarded for making the world lesser than when she became involved.

In her mind, the only victim is her. That’s a hard sell for me, a guy making somewhere around 37 G a year, and still toughing it out at times. I know many women who are making much worse, and yet still look to women like Beyonce for inspiration. I just wonder, what’s there to relate to. She had no struggle, she had no dark hours; the world was handed to her on a platter at 17. It’s not just a matter of who is she to complain, it’s that she continues to pretend she’s one of us.

++++

But on another note…as the world grows smaller via myspace, cable, satellite, and the net allow us to find new texts and media to love. While I am sure few people are familiar with everything I mentioned on this post, I am equally sure that it’s possible that someone stumbles upon this and knows nothing of what I wrote.

The era of the “Culture of Choice” is upon us, and the end is a world of entertainment at ones fingertips. The problem is, unless you watch something with a person, it’s hard to share media anymore. There is so much out there now everyone can find exactly what they want. In the wake of this is solitude… who are we as a county, state, or people if we don’t have familiar benchmarks.

For 40 years Looney Tunes was the only cartoon made for kids. Now, not only is there a network devoted to old cartoons, there are knock off channels. What used to be the joy of Saturday morning is now every day and every hour.

It’s hard enough working with people who have English as a second language; it’s bitter to know that they don’t know what you do. 20 years ago, I’d bet that a border crosser who barely spoke English at least knew of the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote. Even if he couldn’t articulate “dynamite into a wall” we’d still be talking about the same cartoon.

Left are we but with fragments to build a bridge. Sadly, the common ground is shrinking.

But this is for me and all those who grew up on it.



For those who don’t know, I hope you find it. For those who do, I hope I am not alone in the idea that I will show Looney Tunes to my kids on DVD.

(continued...)

Children of

I never have been able to stay away from the big topics. Last year I worked 3/4’s of it in relative solitude, toiling along on a graveyard post.

The silence of the job in the hours between 2a and 5a creates a perfect time in which to delve into the long topics of existence. I don’t know what I did more in 2006 that could be deemed worthwhile than to debate the existence of God.

It’s a simple umbrella concept pondering everything in life.

How are we here?

Why are we here, and more personal, how and why am I here in the exact moment at any given time?

If there is a God, what are we to do? If not, what are we supposed to do with a collection of 50 or so years of personal will?

The meaning of life, in its most basic terms is to reproduce. Save for the Giant Panda, it’s something that comes remarkably easy to all species on Earth.

The dilemma comes with the rest of the time given, and for those handful of species with a minor notion of self, the most frequent act is violence.

It’s the one thing animal life is good at. Perhaps the reason that humans sit on the throne of dominance of the kingdom is because we excel at violence where others use it as a tool of survival. On this scale, the greatest achievement of all life would be the nuke. It’s the one item in the world that wields true power.

As Frank Herbert wrote in Dune: He who has the power to destroy something controls it completely.

With the novel it concerned the mythical spice of the planet Arrakis; in our world, the nuke represents life itself. If humans can end life all together, we rule Earth.

Which comes to the climatic scene of Children of Men where the pastime of life is triumphed by the meaning of it; the walk in the film renders those who exist in it to beautiful souls, who for 18 years knew nothing more than violence, suddenly to be reminded of the sole reason we are here.

The beauty of the scene from an artistic standpoint is not the triumph of life, but the notion of how fleeting this power is, and the moment when meaning gives way to violence is perfectly timed.

It’s hard to note any work so highly on original impressions, for the test is always time.

But I thought one thing above all others during this scene which came at the end of the most compelling film I saw all year.

Children of Men is the best film I have seen this decade, and the first film since Saving Private Ryan that rendered me static once I got into my car. I sat for a good minute before I could even turn the key.

The greatest feeling in the world is inspiration. Not the impetus kind, but the feeling that reminds you, even in a movie as dystopic as Children of Men- and perhaps because of it- why it’s good be alive

(continued...)

Dave’s Top 10 of 2006.

As in the I still can’t believe that it’s no longer 2005. God I miss 2004. Finish my construction. Whatnot.

Some of my favorite things, most of which have some tangential relation to 2006

http://www.rogue.com/brews.html#hazelnut

This is probably my favorite beer. The only reason the probably is there is because I can only find it in one place in LA and it’s a ridiculous 5.69 a 22 ounce bottle. I’d pay double that in a bar. It’s just that good. Creamy, tasteful, sweet and smooth, it’s a got the smoothness of Guinness with the complexities of a winter ale.

Dane Cook backlash.

As per blog style, I write: for all of the things I can’t stand about (insert object), I actually liked: The commercial for Employee of the month, in the clip when Dax from Punked yells “This is an 82 Honda. HOW DARE YOU!”

Some things are irritating but you can’t understand why you have a personal dislike of them. In the scheme of life rules, the more you dislike something, the more popular it gets. IE Steaze and I hating Dane Cook (seriously, women LOVE him) came before his HBO show, but as he got bigger, we would go out of our way to rip on him. We could be watching the Daily Show, be talking about work, and insert a 3 minute digression to work in an aside about how much he sucks.

Things like this wrack with the mindset of society, and it renders us either dumb or needlessly intelligent in trying to dispel why they can’t stand it. You will either hear the diatribe of a college kid on how vastly flawed the approach of global leaders is on their soapbox issue, (like my sister explaining her protest of Victoria’s Secret because it destroys virgin forest. But to be fair, as soon as I heard virgin and Vickie’s in the same sentence, I stopped paying attention) t’other side is like that of a 7th grader trying to explain why they don’t like Brokeback Mountain (it’s gay)

Thankfully, most of the writers for TV parodies don’t like Dane Cook. The problem is that the top three TV satirists:

South Park, SNL, and Daily Show, all stayed away from him. South Park probably didn’t want to waste time, same with Daily Show. SNL currently sucks at the Dane Cook teet, and so they are right out.

Which meant that, oy, it was Mad TV and Family Guy were the first to come up with a Dane Cook Comedy Vaccine. They simply made him out to be a loud, spiky haired doofus who says the same words over and over again. Subtle it’s not, welcome it is.

Comedy Vaccine’s are the solution to problems like these. They initiate a vocabulary for the masses and for the intellectuals by creating a parody Golem, we can laugh at the recreation because it exemplifies everything we don’t like about the object into a laughingstock.

Will Ferrell never will be more socially prominent than when he’s doing his W, and he’s as good of an example of a parody Golem as a Comedy Vaccine than anything else. While many look better playing a W, others sound better, and others are written better, Ferrell succeeds because he does all three the best on average. It’s easy to call Bush an idiot in public, it’s more successful to just say “Strategery” to reinforce a point or standing.

And by the way the shocker is two in the pink, one in the stink, no thumb is involved. I don’t care if you call it the S’Fuer, but go to hell. Dane Cook, you have become the rent a homosexual diversion for comedy. And you’re not gay. That’s not good.

++++

The Dems winning the house

Sure it’s two years late, but it’s a good sign that above anything, we’re not afraid anymore. Fear has ruled the choices we have made, and permeated our better senses since 9/11. It’s nice to know that we have learned a lesson, and on the mass level, wanted not to continue.

These dems could be terrible just as likely as they could be awful. But this one was about the general populous not about the ultimate idea. This was more a referendum on Bush than the impeachment was for Clinton.

++++

“The Hardest Way to Make an Easy Living”

It’s certainly not the best album I heard all year. But there is something to be said about making an album that is just like the ones the artist made before, i.e. tales about living your 20’s. I like this album because I like Mike Skinner and because I feel like the problems I deal with are the ones he is talking about. Sometimes it’s easier to mellow out chemically than to reason with one’s problems.

It has 3 of the top 100 cuts I heard all year, but the remainder are spotty at worst. Songs about masturbation, doing too many drugs, and the 20 something realization of “momento mori” are ones I’ll listen to.

++++

Movie wise, I have yet to see Little Children, a film by Todd Field who I think made the best “adult” film of this decade with “In the Bedroom.” If you have never seen that film, rent it immediately. It’s the cinema that deals with few realities any person wants to deal with, and does so with a sympathetic, pathetic, and vengeful eye. If not for Band of Brothers or the 2001 World Series, this is the best work of art of that year.

And it’s hard for me to call “The Departed” the best film of the year, since I haven’t seen more than 10 in theaters, and while that’s my favorite even if I enjoyed Apocalypto just as much, it’s almost a backup choice. I would love to join the impassioned bandwagon of a great film, I just didn’t see one.

This is the first time in 5 years when I can honestly say the best of the year was not only the best, but the best by a considerable margin.


Just Off the list.

Borat – funny, but it’s caught in the nether region of faux reality. What is staged, what is real, and what is coherent as a character if half the time he’s acting a role and the other half he’s eliciting response? While I laughed a lot, it was hard to enjoy after because of a flimsy underline.

Jackass 2 – I liked it more that Borat. Mainly because these people were willing to whore themselves out for the gag.

10. Heroes – Sure it’s ripped from X men and other comic books. Sure it’s hokey (Save the Cheerleader, save the world. Come on, that’s the best you could do!?!) Sure it’s goofy and Ali Larter’s character is a quagmire of plot and reality issues, but I cannot turn away. While Battlestar Galactica was a far better show, half of the episodes in the run are from 05 and/or will be in 07, Heroes triumphs the serial fantasy shows because it’s in its first run. Sci-fi and fantasy always can come out of the gate swinging, while comedy can take up to three years. Heroes may be crap in three months, but the appeal and joy of this first run were special. Everyone at my work talked about this show (and they also talked about Lost) and while everyone had complaints, everyone, including me, enjoyed this on a basic, child like level. While Transformers, GI Joe, and MASK may be gone (until Hollywood remakes them as features), this was the first TV show in primetime that equaled the joy of Saturday Morning Cartoons.

9. South Park, Season 10. I don’t know if there was a bad episode in the bunch. The only weak one was the finale, which retread all the sports clichés. Maybe this was an early knock at Rocky Balboa, but this was done better in “The losing edge” episode.

However, this episode, like “the Losing Edge” were made watchable because of the third act, both which used the sport clichés to fantastic results.

It’s a funny episode, yet it treads on familiar ground, something this season of South Park did not.

This season attacked Family Guy with perfection, it had a great 2 part episode about time travel, and it had Mr. Mackey asking “Oh, so you think it’s funny? How would you like it, if someone came into your house, opened up their butt cheeks, maybe spread them apart a little, and let out a big fudge dragon.”

Minge and Gary. A great Halloween episode. And the phrase “Nice.”

8. A World of Hurt – The Drive by Truckers. (The closing track off of “A Blessing and a Curse”) When the opening lines are about suicide and whores in the light of encroaching death it’s a hard shot to swallow. To make a song that is about living for the next day’s futility shaded in the poorest life that ultimately makes you care about everything good in life, well… it’s great to be alive.

7. Ten Silver Drops – The Secret Machines – it’s not the best of the collection, but at the same time, this perpetuates the love I want to live in. Something about endless musing about the loves that go pear shaped. Some guy, sitting alone in his room is listening to the album and reminiscing about the worst parts of his relationship with a girl.

Albums about heartbreak are not rare. Rob Gordon said it at the beginning of High Fidelity: What came first, the music or the misery? People worry about kids playing with guns, or watching violent videos, that some sort of culture of violence will take them over. Nobody worries about kids listening to thousands, literally thousands of songs about heartbreak, rejection, pain, misery and loss. Did I listen to pop music because I was miserable? Or was I miserable because I listened to pop music?

If anything, music is a gateway to a gateway away from life. It’s the simple answer to the crushing reality of life. And it’s a sick addiction, and the best notion of this idea is that in the movie, Rob plays “you’re gonna miss me” by the 13th Street Elevators, one of the all time great tell off songs of the genre.

Many songs are about being heartbroken. Many blame the other “You’re Cheatin’ Heart” others blame themselves “See Frank Sinatra.” And those two forms dominate the landscape, more so now since Beyonce and crew made a career about moving on and being with the best man.

Songs that deal with the loneliness and misery without mentioning the cause are the most deadly of all, if only because they allow a person to wallow in the misery.

Ten Silver Drops isn’t that great of an album musically. But simply for the idea of being “alone, jealous, and stoned” and extrapolating on it, well, it’s like listening to Graceland again, in a different mood.

Side note: on my Itunes playlist, Alone Jealous and Stoned” is #1 for the year in terms of play.

2. “Sweet Talk” by Spank Rock. The 2nd best thing to come out of Baltimore this year.
3. Woman by Wolfmother. Call me an old school elitist when it comes to rock, but sometimes the simple joys sound a little bit better to my tastes.
4. Strausberg and The World Was a Mess but His Hair was perfect – Both by the Rakes. One perfectly short and one perfectly over the edge long.
5. Wolf like Me – TV on the Radio. Still digesting the album, and even if it sounds like Bloc Party 2, I’ll be damned if this thing doesn’t get me every time, even with the old “lets go slow for a bit” lull.

6. PTI podcasts. Yeah. Podcasts are so 2005. PTI is my favorite news show. It’s 30 minutes + of sports news jabbering. My father “hates” this show. I’ll also note, he never liked sports, and thinks that it’s almost absurd that people know who won the Super Bowl in 1999 (Denver in 99, but for the 99 season, it was St Louis over Tennessee on the goal line stand, which I have to note for anyone with a column, if the Titans had scored, they wouldn’t have won. They would have scored 6, and they still had to hit a PAT to tie. If they wanted to win, they would have had to go for 2. In the 99 era of sports, no body in the NFL went for it. It would have gone to OT, and the Titans D was not good enough to stop one of the best offenses in NFL history after 4 quarters. If the game was 23-18, this would have been a great game. It was a good game with a great 4th quarter, but that’s it. The 98 Super Bowl with Denver and Green Bay is the best, with Carolina vs. New England and New England in 2004 and vs. St Louis in 2002) This is what I talk about and my father can’t stand. This is why I love PTI and my father hates it. If I didn’t look exactly like my father, I would be sure I was switched at birth.

5. Life on Mars – I hate cop shows. Hate them, and on two separate occasions chastised my father and sister about liking and referencing CSI in real life terms in a 3 day period. Yet I have two cop shows in my top 5. First off, the #1 choice is above and beyond the best thing to come out this year. #2, Life on Mars was more than a cop show, and was as far away from a procedural as one can find on TV.

I thought about doing a post comparing Life on Mars and The Wire when I was going through the first seasons of both in September. Both are not the run of the mill TV shows. LOM is a BBC production, which has produced Cracker and Prime Suspect, two great cop mini-series/ shows. LOM is a cop show with a Lost “where the hell am I” atmosphere. It’s also a show with a central premise that takes everything 30 years back in cop tech and life, making everything about the show nostalgic and old school when it comes to the meat and potatoes parts of the show. For 8 episodes it was one of the most engrossing shows because it had

A. An overarching plot.
B. A genuine cool premise.
C. It was a testosterone fueled cop show, something that disappeared until season 2 of the Wire. (Note, I have Prime Suspect on this list, where the female is the lead. This is not about men being men, it’s about the raw idea of enforcement opposed the blind eyes of justice. When OJ, Jacko, and Richard Blake get off the hook, while Martha Stewart goes to jail, and the head of Enron dies in his mansion in Aspen, it’s easy to say media law isn’t fulfilling. That’s why the simple answers and brute force of line crossing cops is easy to feel reassured by on TV but miserable in real life. The American individual can decide right vs. wrong far better than the American People.)
D. Smoky offices and cops in leather jackets boozing on duty in small pubs.

4. The Surrogates (Comic Book) – A 5 part series I am sure will be made into a feature in the next 3 years, this is a graphic novel centered on the premise that people can live (vicariously) in robot/human synthetic bodies. It’s somewhere between The Matrix and Blade Runner in terms of Sci-fi setting, it’s almost an alternate reality for living, as it is now possible to live in and experience the world in a new shell; one can become another gender, athletic type, gender, etc. The positive result is that people lose racial and gender bias; the negative result is that people are merely living a half-virtual reality, they may get short of breath via nanodes, but they aren’t really breathing hard, and hence aren’t really living. In the middle of this, everyone looks like they want to. The protagonists in the series come from a cult of religious zealots (term used only to imply drive, not belief) who decry the idea of improving on God’s creation. A consummate look on the coming impacts of technology, plastic surgery, and the notion of body perfection, and the true notion of beauty in the world, even if it’s set 40 some years in the future.

3. Mark Nason and Antik Denim – While I don’t claim to be a fashionista, I have started to care about how I look these days. Maybe it’s LA getting to me, but part of it comes from the fact that my wardrobe hasn’t changed since 2001 or so. Mark Nason makes ridiculously gaudy boots for men; they have crosses, dragons, and flaunting design flair that scream videogame fantasy. Antik Denim is a jeans line that features styles named “Elvis,” “Bronson,” and “McQueen.” The jeans are somewhat mass produced, but each one is scuffed and designed by hand, giving each pair an individual look. While the latter is a recent trend in fashion, the idea of both is something I can cotton to: while women have been given fashions for other women and men to look at, these are two brands that are built for men to wear for themselves. It’s one thing to look good in a suit, it’s another to build the wardrobe with pieces of clothing that look and feel like accessories to a look than a fashion statement; it’s the stylistic end of RPG videogames, where buying a piece makes an wardrobe seem like a battle outfit. I may be nerdy in thinking this, but I don’t know if I have dressed as well in my life. Part of me says this is a means to getting girls to approach me, but I care more about looking like a action star/ vampire hunter to myself than pussy. (Why do I put this at 3? Because I am hoping this is the beginning of male oriented fashion, if anything, we deserve to go out looking like samurais, cowboys, or 70’s style cops (Serpico or Bullit). So what if straight men may now care about clothes on a level 50% that of a normal woman, I say, it’s about time we started looking like the badasses we want to be instead of the Ralph Lauren prep or skater kid extremes; we have the suit and tux for the work and formal, it’s kind of cool and nice to feel boyish and masculine at the same time in party gear. I will not be surprised if the utility belt some how makes its way into everyday fashion within 2 years.

2. Pearls Before Swine (Comic Strip) – The first strip since the best days of Dilbert worth going to the funny pages in the newspaper, and the first one since Far Side and Calvin and Hobbes retired in 95 and 96 that actually qualifies as genius. It’s morbid, cynical, stupid, and loving; often in a mere 4 panels. Featuring 4 characters, Pig (stupid but happy), Rat (smart, but miserable) Goat (smarter than Rat, but a hermit from the world) and Zebra (loving but doomed to be eaten by the killer crocs) it’s not a comic strip as much as it is a forum for Steven Patsis, who through his 4 main and a few other recurring regulars, is able to offer a slighted look at life that is mostly miserable, occasionally heartfelt, and always hilarious. The greatest part about the strip is its’ self awareness, as the author is a participant and acknowledges it’s medium and counterparts. It mocks Cathy, the characters show up in Family Circus and Marmaduke, and the characters live in the world of the comics page, both blessed and cursed by the trappings.

1. The Wire. The only “top 10 TV shows of the year” list that I read this year that didn’t have The Wire as #1 was IGN.com. They had Battlestar as number one, which, in all fairness, is about right for a nerd show and site. Scratch that, TV guide had 24 as #1, though both had the Wire as #2.

In 2001, I watched Band of Bothers. To this date, it’s still the best thing I have seen this decade in terms of performed media. However it was #2 to the World Series of that year for the best things I saw in 2001. Both I rated high because of the effects of 9/11. BoB gave hope that the American Ideal, although misguided and faulty at times, still has the right basic belief system for triumph against evil; simply the good instilled by the founding fathers in the Constitution and Bill of Rights allows American Citizens to sacrifice their life for the good of the country. The 2001 World Series was the living example of the “never say die” attitude of this country. I don’t know if anything will mean more to me than that series, even if the 2004 ALCS felt better.

So what about The Wire?

I have written about it too many times, but season 4 of The Wire was more than special, it was a once in a decade masterpiece. I don’t know care to explain why it’s so great, or even why I evoked comparisons to events 5 years ago, other than the notion that when greatness finds you, it’s hard to get out of one’s system. Everything from this point on in the decade will be compared against The Wire, Band of Brothers, and the 2001 World Series.

My top 2 of the decade became a top 3 list of the unassailable. It’s going to take something extremely special to get into this list.

(continued...)