Category: The Arts/Media

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Wildfire: The Remix

I know, I know—I have a few weeks worth of journal entries to finish and this post will be sitting at the top of the screen for a while, but it just can’t wait. Some of you may remember waaaaay back in December ’08 when I wrote a movie review (or rather, comments made between Jeremy Gustafson and myself while watching it) about “Wildfire: The Arabian Heart”. The movie sucked. A lot. But don’t take my word for it—read some of these other reviews I found online:

  • imdb.com
  • blockbuster.com
  • The Dove Foundation

    • (Michael Vincent, the writer/director/actor/editor/musician/producer—yes, he did all of these—is extremely proud of Wildfire receiving “The Dove Award”. The award is given solely because the movie is family friendly and not objectionable, but it’s an award, dammit!)

    You may have noticed that one of the above sites is blockbuster.com. That’s right, the movie has somehow become available for public consumption. You can buy it from a couple stores and websites, so that’s what Jeremy Gustafson did. He decided to relive the pain and suffering by inviting a bunch of friends over to his place and had a viewing party for “The Worst Movie You’ll Ever See”. (That might be a stretch, but not by much.)

    But it wasn’t the same worst movie. If you go to amazon.com and buy episodes of Beauty and the Geek, you can see that they’re edited differently than when it was aired on television. Similarly, Wildfire changed various scenes and plot twists, but why? What was Michael Vincent’s motivation? Honestly, I think he may have read my blog entry and made some changes because of it. He didn’t fix all the holes in the plot and inadvertently created some new ones, but you can’t blame the man for trying. … Actually, you can. I sure do. Continue reading “Wildfire: The Remix”

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    Go Team Charlie!

    Twilight: Eclipse is about to hit the movie screen and, quite frankly, I’m a little concerned at what this series of movies is teaching the youth of America. I know, I know, I just admitted that I watched both Twilight and New Moon, but listening to Rifftrax in the background made them immensely more tolerable.

    Here’s an example: there’s the big “Team Edward vs. Team Jacob” controversy that’s dividing the nation—Should Bella want to suck face with a vampire or a werewolf for the rest of her (potentially eternal) life?—but according to the movie, there is no controversy. She says she’s madly in love with Edward and wants to live with him happily forever after. At the end of New Moon, he agrees to turn her into a vampire “under one condition.”

    The condition? He wants her to marry him.

    Her response? She stares at him and doesn’t answer.

    Sure, it’s a suspenseful way to end a movie and get viewers to anticipate the sequel, but it also follows the theme of both movies so far. It’s been extremely rare for characters to finish three lines of dialogue without a dramatic (see: extremely long and awkward) pause. Still, if she claims she wants Edward to bite her so she can spend eternity with her true love, why would asking her to marry him be suspenseful? You think she might say “No”?

    And during the course of Twilight and New Moon, Bella is running around with vampires and werewolves (at this rate, I’m expecting some other supernatural creatures soon, too—“Go Team Zombie!”). Meanwhile, her dad Charlie is stuck at home freaking out when she disappears for days at a time. First, she echoes the shit that his ex-wife said when she left him; the next, she doesn’t bother to contact him at all and he thinks she’s dead. How selfish is that?!

    Charlie loves his daughter (a love which naturally includes extremely long, awkward pauses in dialogue), but she runs away, comes back, runs away, comes back… it’s always about the vampires, not her own flesh and blood [insert rim shot here]. You think that sets a good example for kids nowadays?!

    So here’s some of what kids watching these movies have learned: Spending forever with someone is no big deal, but marriage? Be afraid… be very afraid. It’s also okay to run away, do what you want and not care about people who love you until you want to come home, at which point they’ll take you in with little more than a long, awkward pause.

    Essentially, teenage girls can be self-centered, pretentious bitches who lust after hunky guys and ignore their parents with no negative consequences whatsoever. Don’t agree with that message? Then repeat after me: “Go Team Charlie!”

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    “I always sparkle when I’m high.”

    I’ll admit it, I went ahead and watched Twilight earlier this week. Thankfully, I was listening to an mp3 file from Rifftrax at the same time—commentary provided by the same people who produced MST3K in its later years—so I never felt the need to grab a pencil to puncture my eyeballs or eardrums to ease the pain. In fact, I almost feel bad that I missed some of the horrific, angst-filled dialogue because of the commentary, but better safe than punctured.

    The thing that concerned me the most—even more than the sparkles and the 90-year-old’s desire for a teenager—was when Bella made Edward fess up about being a vampire. During the course of that conversation, he told her, “You’re like heroin.”

    Now I have two concerns. Think about this for a second: he doesn’t eat food, he doesn’t sleep, he sparkles, he can leap over tall buildings in a single… well, he can climb big trees really fast. My point is that his biological makeup isn’t the same as a regular human’s anymore—how likely is it that heroin would have any effect on him at all, let alone the effect that Bella seems to have?

    I did a little bit of research and found out that heroin did exist back in the early 1900’s, so it’s possible that he would have known what it was like while he was still human, but that would also mean Edward was using heroin as a teenager. Sure, it was sold as medicine, but if he remembers it being that much of a rush, he must have had a lot of coughing fits as a kid.

    Even if we brush this concern off to the side and just assume that Edward knows what heroin is like, what does that say about his relationship with Bella? He’s extremely possessive and wants to keep her for his own. He thinks about her day and night. He’s willing to rip out the throat of someone trying to take her from him. He got a taste of her and needed an intervention to stop drinking her blood. He wants her to stay away from him, but can’t let her go. She is what he lives for.

    Time to face the facts, Twilight fans: EDWARD IS A JUNKIE! (Feel free to reach for your pencils now.)

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    Maybe 90 seconds if you’re a slow reader

    I was in the bookstore a while back looking through the Philosophy section because an old professor of mine, Andrew Pessin, wrote a book that he recommended to me (an author who thinks his book is worth reading… go figure…). It wasn’t on the shelf there, so I had them order it for me—in the meantime, there was another of his sitting there, begging for my attention (and if you’ve never seen a book beg before, you’ve been missing out).

    The title? “The 60-Second Philosopher.” The release date? Apparently, a month after I bought it. I guess that book was begging really hard for my attention. Anyway, since AP wrote it, I wanted to take a look. He has a fun lecturing style (take a look at the AP quotes in this post to see what I’m talking about), so I wanted to know what his teachings were like on paper. I was not disappointed. Admittedly, I kept my expectations low to improve his odds, but I think he would have exceeded higher expectations as well. Continue reading “Maybe 90 seconds if you’re a slow reader”

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    My new love/hate relationship

    Ah, my not-quite-as-beloved-as-before Buffalo Wild Wings. We once relished each other’s company and felt that the world was at peace while we were together, even when the New York Yankees were in town. That’s when I would order my wings with the Caribbean Jerk sauce, which is indeed quite yummy. But now, whenever I see your logo on a store or a commercial—especially a commercial—I suffer from a horrible flashback of Thursday. Horrible, horrible, horrible…

    In a way, it’s reminiscent of being on Beauty and the Geek. Various people across the nation loved Richard because they thought he was funny. Lemme tell ya, he’s a lot funnier when you only get a 20-minute dose of him every week. If you’re there all the time… it gets aggravating after a while.

    Similarly, if you’re an extra for a 30-second commercial, people might love to see someone they know right behind one of the main actors. Lemme tell ya, that’s a lot funner (yes, I said funner) when you only see the 30 seconds. If you’re there for the entire filming session (this one in particular)… it gets way more than aggravating after a loooooong while. Continue reading “My new love/hate relationship”

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    Can you get kicked out of a movie theater…

    For trying to slit your wrists? It may have been a more preferable option than sitting through the independent movie I watched on Monday night. A couple friends of mine were going (one of whom was involved with the film) and wanted me to join them. Even though the theater was about five miles away from my house, I was still a little hesitant. After all, “I don’t want to waste a couple hours of my life on a movie that sucks!”

    They had two screenings, 6:30 and 8:30; I had to attend a Boy Scout meeting at 7:00, so I told the guy who was in it that I’d call him between the screenings and ask him if it was worth coming.

    I gave him a ring at about 8:10 and he told me that the movie was… well, I don’t quite recall his answer (or maybe I’m editing it out since he was part of the film), but he made it sound like it was okay. Consequently, I jumped in the car, got to the theater and went inside. It was one of the worst mistakes of my life. Continue reading “Can you get kicked out of a movie theater…”