Lady Sheherazahde's Journal

I watched Will Smith's "I, Robot". It was good. I had no idea Shia LaBeouf was in it. He plays a character who is supposed to swear a lot, but they cut most of his swearing. Which makes Spooner's constant berating him for swearing sort of strange. I like Shia LaBeouf. I watched it again with the commentary. The commentators mentioned a few plot holes. I had no problem with the robot transports attacking Will Smith. It seems reasonable that USR Co. would have remote control over their transport trucks and it was established that VIKI had some control over traffic and cars could be driven by remote. The big mistake was how did the demolition robot got reprogramed? The commentators said they had a scene where an NS5 robot was reprograming the demolition bot but they cut it. They talked about a lot of deleted scenes. It's too bad there were no deleted scenes on my DVD.

Last night I watched the first 3 episodes of the second season of "Dexter". All the epsiodes have the names of movies, or variations on the names of movies. "Dexter" is still a good series. I recomend it. I might actually read the books.

I watched "The Fantastic Four" last night and "TFF2: Rise of the Silver Surfer" tonight.

TFF2 was a little thin. When I listened to the commentary on TFF1 the actors kept saying "in the next movie everything will be so much better because we won't have to do back story and they will know how to do the effects". But I when I listened to the writer's commentary on TFF2 they kept saying "the effects in this scene are awful, we wanted it to be so much better" and "we didn't think this should be here but nobody listens to us".

I had no problem with the effects or the scenes that the writers didn't like. The writers thought too much was going on in the plot, I thought not enough was going on.

The only scene I had a real problem with was the wedding. And that is because I have a bee in my bonnet about marriage. Setting aside the legality of performing a ceremony in a different country then you got your license, and importing a cleric to do it (really, considering the paperwork involved it would have been much easier to go back to Manhattan for the ceremony). My real issue is what constitutes a marriage ceremony. The only complete line the cleric gets to say is "I now pronounce you husband and wife" implying that that, and the rings, are the only part of the ceremony that is necessary for a marriage. In fact neither of those are important.

My favorite TV marriage was on "Night Court". A couple spends the whole show agonizing about getting married. Harry finally asks each of them if they want to be married to the other. They each answer "yes". Then he signs the license.

The only essential part of the ceremony is that the couple declare their intent before witnesses.

And that is the part that was left out of the ceremony in TFF2.

People have this strange idea that officials perform marriages but really the officials just administer the ceremony. Marriage is the one sacrament that is performed by the people not the official. It's like the difference between administering a test and taking a test. The official is just there to make sure everything is done properly, otherwise people could cheat and say they did things they hadn't done. Which is part of the legal history of our marriage laws. You need an official to sign the papers in case there are any legal complications, and you need two witnesses to keep the official honest.

I have now watched all three "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies and I think they are swashbuckling fun. Not Great Art or anything, just fun.

The special effects monsters are top notch. The "Clash of the Titans" for this generation. I'm thinking particularly of the Kraken battles, the sea monster crew of the Flying Dutchman, the maelstrom, and the transformation of Calypso.

The choreography is also great. Here I'm thinking of the prolonged sword fight and box passing of the island scene in Derad Man's Chest as well as the numerious other sword fights.

I love the use of classic dramatic "clowns", Ragetti and Pintel, for exposition and comic relief. And the two other "clowns" acting as guardians of the box when Jack Sparrow steals it.

There are lots of plot twists and deceptions but all the characters are clear in their motivations and conflicts which is what keeps the plot moving.

On Tuesday I watcher "The Specials" and the "The Incredibles" with B&K.

I thought that I had never seen "The Specials" before. But it turns out I had. It is just so unmemorable I had forgotten everything about it. I knew more about "The Incredibles" and "Hot Fuzz" which I had never seen.

"The Specials" is one of those post-modern super-hero movies about the ordinary lives of super-heros. In this case 6th rate super-heros. It goes with the logical observation that if ordinary people are going to be getting random powers some of them are going to be pretty useless.

When I consider toddalcott's question "What does the protagonist what?" I have to conclude that this movie's first problem is too many protagonists. It isn't about any one individual it is about a whole group. It might have done better if it had really focused on one of them. But still, when I try to figure out what all of them want I would have to say "acceptance". They all want to be accepted, to belong somewhere. I'm surprised K didn't like it more, it really was about people and relationships, there were no battles or chase scenes, nothing blew up.

"The Incredibles" was fast and fun. A nice lighthearted adventure. There was a good theme of the value of family. But I was a little bit disturbed about the message of "When everyone is special no one is". It really was the exact opposite of "The Specials".

Last night I watched "Hot Fuzz" three times. I love Simon Pegg! Strangely enough "Hot Fuzz" was the exact middle ground between "The Specials" and "The Incredibles". The Protagonist, Nick Angel, is a super cop 400% better than any other cop in London. But his buddy in this buddy movie is chubby bumbler who yearns to be a hero like the cops in the movies.

The first time through I thought this movie had a wonderful "let's put on a show in the barn" feel, as if Simon Peg had got together with his friends and had a lot fun making a movie. But when I listened to the commentary it turns out it was the opposite. The director said actors would not just be in your movie because they were your friends they had to actually like the script. And there were a lot of things going on that I didn't catch. It turns out the script was a combination of details from interviews with real cops and notes from "Ebert's Little Movie Glossary: A Compendium of Movie Cliches, Stereotypes, Obligatory Scenes, Hackneyed Formulas, Shopworn Conventions, and Outdated Archetypes" by Roger Ebert

The actors were mostly famous british character actors. The audience is supposed to recognizing that they played similar characters in other movies. There is a wonderful scene at the beginning where increasingly famous actors play increasingly ranked police officers. It is Monty Pythonesque in it's absurdity.

Anyway, it was a bit slow through the middle with the detective story. But the final act was great fun. I would love to watch it a few more times on better TV (where I can see more detail).

Watched "10 MPH" last night. Two geeks decide to travel from Seattle to Boston on a Segway. They meet a lot of nice people along the way. Very boring. I wish I had that hour and a half of my life back.

The message of the movie was that if you are not doing your "thing" you are not making good use of your time.

So, what is my thing?

I have a lot of things. But mostly they come down to art and religion.

Hmmm.

I really should be doing more of my thing.

Watched "Dusk till Dawn 3" with B. K ordered it but I can't imagine why, it is a vampire horror movie set in the old west, she generally doesn't like violence and gore. I thought it was funny though. It has Ambrose Bierce as a main character. He delivers the "If I told you I would have to kill you" line, although in much more flowery language. And one of the bandits does the "You talking to me" scene from Taxi Driver entirely in Mexican. Orlando Jones does a wonderful Tango scene with Rebecca Gayheart during a bar fight. Just very funny.

Then I watched "Little Miss Sunshine". Twice. The second time with the commentary. I would not have called this movie a comedy, more of a light hearted drama. I really liked it. It just wasn't something I would choose if I was looking for a comedy. It is not even a dark comedy. I would call it a road trip/family drama with a happy ending.

I went over to B&K's this evening as I usually do on Tuesdays. We watched "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory".

I left at 9pm as I usually do, but my car wouldn't start. B came out and tried give me a jump start but to no avail. So he called AAA. They sent Charlie. Due to some communication errors he didn't show up till 11:30. Charlie got my car started. I drove several blocks and the car died again, this time at an intersection.

I called B again and he came and pushed my car into a nearby parking lot. A helpful stranger gave him a hand with that.

By that time it was almost midnight so B just drove me home. I called Charlie back but he wants to wait till morning to tow the car, or look at it, whatever.

It sucks to be without transportation.

I quite enjoyed the first season of Californication. David Duchovny's character, Hank Moody, seemed like a jerk at first but he really does love women and treats all women with gallant courtesy.

I don't think I have ever seen anyone drink that much before though. There is a lot of drinking, and throwing up, and sex and violence.

["Fucking and Punching" is the name of a novella he writes during the first season.]

Watched "Serial Mom" last night B&K had not seen it before. It is a funny movie. I'm always a little afraid of John Waters movies, he can be so gross. But this one was easy to watch.

B was in the mood for Japanese food. I ordered Oyako Don (Diced chicken cooked with vegetables and poached egg over a bed of rice) because it seemed a lot like something I liked at a Korean restaurant. It was very good.

I have finished the first prep step in the necktie skirt. All the ties are opened and have their linings removed. Next step is ironing, and fixing the edges.

Watched "Helvetica" with Bu last night. It is a documentary about the typeface. As an artist and someone who has done desktop publishing I think I have a more than average interest in typefaces. I found it incredibly boring, and not very informative.

Did I mention that we watched "The Dresden Files"? I quite liked them. Too bad they got canceled.

Also watching "Californication". Which I like. Bu asked me why I like that and Don't like "The L Word" since they are both soap operas. And I'm not really sure. The only thing I could think of was that "Californication" is funny, and "The L Word" is serious.

Speaking of funny, I was also watching "A Bit of Fry and Laurie" and "Jeeves and Wooster". It is very interesting getting to know Hugh Laurie as a comic actor after coming to love "House".

Now I have to check out Steven Fry.

Was watching "Brisco County, Jr." with K. It is better than I expected. The only reason I was willing to try it was because I have decided to watch Bruce Campbell.

Also watched "War of the Worlds" and "Jurassic Park II". They were OK.