Vacancy

Starring: Luke Wilson and Kate Beckinsale

IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0452702/

I’m blogging about this one to get me going again, since I’ve been so lazy lately.

Vacancy is the classic bad guy chasing two innocent people around and trying to kill them for no reason type of movie.  If that’s a genre you dig, you’ll dig Vacancy.

Frank Whaley (Moonlight Graham, Field of Dreams) plays the manager of the hotel.  He convinces the stranded couple to stay in the honeymoon suite.  When the couple gets to the room, they find tapes of other guests being tortured in the very room they are in!  You can guess for yourself how the movie plays out.

I’m not huge into the horror genre, but this movie was entertaining.  The relationship between the couple kept me rooting for the good guys, which is important. 

Glenn’s Reviews Really hurried score: 5 out of 10

Best Performance: Frank Whaley

Worst Performance: Ethan Embry

I’m taking a break from movies and music to give my thoughts on the biggest pop-culture event this year, the presidential election. 

Disclaimer:  I am against the war but have a close friend in Afghanistan.  I have a great deal of respect for him and all troops.

I’d like to outline a few things:

A.  What issues I would like the next president to address.

B.  Why I think Barack Obama and John McCain are both poor choices for president.

C.  Who I’m voting for and why it’s not a wasted vote.

 

A.  What I would like a president to do.

While many of my friends are very excited about an Obama presidency, my excitement about this election faded as soon as Ron Paul was out of the running.  His campaign was doomed from the start for several reasons.  1.  He’s not handsome, not a good public speaker, and answers questions directly.  2.  He is agianst the war in Iraq and running as a republican.  3.  He had no support from big business, unlike McCain, Obama, Clinton, and Romney.

Ron Paul took a different approach to what the president ought to do and I agree with his views.  Here is what I would like a president to do.

1.  End the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

In 2003, I was the biggest supporter of the war you could find.  I thought, based on the intelligence we had, that using force was necessary in Iraq.  I was dead wrong.  We are now over in that part of the world vainly attempting to build democratic nations and spread liberty to people who have little interest of becoming Americanized.  I want a president who will have the courage to bring our troops home.  While we’re at it, let’s go ahead and bring the troops home from Germany, Korea, and all the other bases we have on foreign soil.  Our military should be a defense of American liberty, not a world police force.  I know the counter argument, that if we leave Iraq now, it will collapse.  So how long do we have to wait for them to be ready to sustain a democratic government?  Frankly, I don’t see that happening anytime soon and yes, the country might break out into civil war if we leave, but I would imagine civil war will still be imminent in 10 years if we are still occupying their territory.  We need to reestablish what our military is for, protecting Americans from foriegn acts of aggression, not being a world police force.

2.  Drastically reduce the roll of the federal government, transfering the responsibilities to the state and local level, and cut the federal spending by a huge margin.

Here is an example:  You may have seen the commercials about the switch from analog to digital TV for over the air broadcasts and that a digital converter will soon be required for over the air TV.  I use over the air TV, so I need a converter.  I went online, gave my name and address, and soon two $40 coupons came in the mail from the federal government.  The government is subsidizing this so I don’t miss my reruns of King of Queens and Seinfeld.  This is just a small example of how the federal government keeps growing, spending, and wasting.  Is my TV digital converter box what the governement should be worried about?  I say no.

I want a president who will end the spend spend spend mentality that has been in place for 20 years.  Everything is subsidized from corn to student loans to car companies to investment banks.  Not only that but things like social security are well intentioned programs that end up wasting massive amounts of money and excessively tax Americans. 

I would like a president to leave things like education, transportation, social programs (health care, etc.) to the state and local level.  The federal government is not suited to fix these things and it would give citizens more of a voice in these areas.

3.  Fight for the rights of the unborn.

George W. Bush won my vote by being pro-life.  Yes, he has appointed conservative supreme court justices, but I think he used this issue to win the presidency without having the intention of doing anything.

It may be futile, but I’d like a president to attempt to introduce legislation to protect the unborn.  Bush did nothing like that.

B.  Barack Obama and John McCain are equally poor choices to be president.

I’ll keep this short.  Obama thinks the government should get bigger.  (Bad).  Abortion should stay legal.  (Bad).  And the war in Afghanistan should expand.  (Really Bad).  He’s promised tax cuts and to reduce the troops in Iraq, which is good, but I doubt he’ll actually end that sick war.  Many non-partisan analysts say that there is no way Obama’s plan for the economy would work without running a huge deficit.

John McCain still defends the Iraq war starting, and would likely spend just as much as Obama would.  He is anti-abortion, which makes him a better choice if you could only choose from two candidates, but luckily there are more choices.

C.  I’m voting for Bob Barr.

Bob Barr is pro-life and has vowed to end both the Iraq and Afghanistan war if elected.  I can’t say the same for either of the major party candidates.  While McCain and Obama were talking about how giving Wall Street banks 700 billion bucks is a great idea, Barr was pointing out that that money comes from you and me.  Barr is against wasting law enforcement money locking up harmless pot heads and thinks a business should choose for itself whether or not you can smoke inside.  Barr believes useless bureaucracieslike the department of education and the department of homeland security waste money and accomplish little.  In short, he thinks the government is NOT the answer to all of my problems.

Many have told me I’m wasting my vote.  Why?  Because my guy can’t win?  My vote is the only real chance to speak out against two power hungry, violent parties run by millionaires.  I’m using my vote to tell the republicans that they failed by not nominating a real conservative, and the democrats that their candidate is even worse.  So what if I vote for the loser (I AM a K-State, Royals, and Chiefs fan), I think we should vote for the person who we feel is the best choice for the office of the presidency, not one of two men who think the USA should police the world and run our lives. 

Bob Barr is the only pro life candidate.  Anti-Abortion.  Against the wars.

You do have more than two choices.  Don’t believe the lie that McCain or Obama is all you can choose from.

Check out Barr’s website.  http://www.bobbarr2008.com/splash/?s0820

 

Thanks.  Please leave comments.

I’ve been a little lazy in October, here is a really quick set of reviews of pop culture I’ve seen this month.

 

1. Broken Social Scene, Live at the Beaumont, October 16th.  8 out of 10.

Great band, they played everything I wanted to hear.  The only problem is knowing that the female vocal parts would be better if sung by Feist than Lizzy Powell.  Also, the sound wasn’t the best.  Cause=Time was my favorite song.

 

2. American Gangster.  8 out of 10

Good movie.  I can’t resist a little Denzel Washington.  Russell Crowe was really good also.  The performance of Josh Brolin was my favorite in the movie.

 

3. Superbad. 6 out of 10

Super funny.  Super dirty.  Seth Rogan cracked me up.

 

4.  Smart People.  3 out of 10

Bad characters, bad story, bad movie.

 

5. The Office Season 5 (so far) 7 out of 10.

Still not as good as seasons 1-3, but better than season 4 so far.  Too much Jim and Pam and the Angela/Dwight drama is kind of stupid, but Michael Scott is as funny as ever.  Steve Carell still makes the show the funniest on TV.

 

6.  The Toadies, Rubbernecker.  6 out of 10

I know I’m about 12 years late listening to this album.  Sorry.  It rocks, no lyrical depth, but lots of rocking.  “I come from the water” is my favorite song.

 

7.  David Bazan, Alone at the Mic.  7 out of 10.

If you like Pedro the Lion/Headphones/David Bazan it’s worth watching.  My beef was that it was too short and could’ve had more interviews.  “Never Wanted You” is awesome.

 

8.  Relevant Magazine, November/December 2008.  8 out of 10

The cover has Thom Yorke covered in chocolate.  Enough said.

 

9.  The 2008 presidential election.  0 out of 10.

“This is the most important election of our LIVES”  No it isn’t.  I’ll write about my thoughts on the election tomorrow.

 

That’s all for today folks.  I’m caught back up.  Check in tomorrow for my election thoughts.

What: Paw reunion

When: Saturday October 4th 2008

Where: The bottleneck, Lawrence, Kansas

Setlist:

I don’t have a complete setlist, but it included:

Jessie

Sleeping Bag

Hope I die Tonight

Texas

Built So Low

Death to Traitors

Home is a Strange Place

Sunflower

School (Nirvana Cover)

One of the best rock bands from the local scene in the 90s decided to reunite, and I’m glad they did.

After the opening bands, which included Brodie Buster, Paw took the stage at about 12 AM.  They rocked for over two hours playing a style of Grunge which is raw, passionate, and dark.  After roaring through their set, the Bottleneck tried to get them off stage by turning up the house lights and cutting the sound system.  Paw didn’t care.  As the house lights went up, they said into the mic “We’re dinosaurs, we don’t care, we’ll keep playing.”  It was as rock and roll a moment as I’ve seen in a while.

In a time where many artists (REM, Bruce Springsteen, Toby Keith, Pearl Jam, Jackson Browne, A Perfect Circle, etc.) are openly campaigning for politicians, it’s nice to see a band that was about rocking, not about being partisan.  Also, it helps remember a time when bands ROCKED until Creed, Linkin Park and Korn took over the airwaves in the late ninties until they were replaced by “indie” rock bands like The Strokes and Death Cab.  I actually like many bands from the indie rock genre, but I’m ready for a grunge band to come out, even if the style is 15 years out of date.  Until then I’ll just hope Soundgarden reunites and tours.

Death Cab is a great band, but I miss grunge.

Paw Reunion

Glenn’s Review Score: 7.5 out of 10

Best Song:  Death to Traitors

Worst Song: Can’t remember them all, so they get a free pass.

Check out their myspace, it has videos and songs.

http://www.myspace.com/pawofficial

What: 3:10 to Yuma

Starring: Russell Crowe and Christian Bale

Directed by: James Mangold

3:10 to Yuma is a remake of a 1950s western of the same name, which I have not seen.

The movie focuses on a rancher (Bale) in the post civil war era New Mexico.  He fought for the North in the war, losing a leg and is now in serious debt due to the drought on his ranch and the stream flowing through his land being used by other farmers upstream.  The men who he owes money to are threatening to burn his house down and burn down his barn in the opening scene of the movie.  At the same time, a stage coach robber, Ben Wade (Crowe) has robbed yet another wagon full of money.  But this time his arrogance led to his apprehension and the town Marshall decides to transport him to go on the 3:10 train to Yuma and to the prison there.  Dan Evans, the rancher with a dry ranch, volunteers to assist in the escort for $200.

The movie’s plot is pretty predictable from there on out.  They make the trek, fight some indians, the bad guy’s friends try to break Ben Wade out, and so on and so on. 

What makes this movie great (and it is a great movie) is the relationship between Evans (the good guy) and Wade (the bad guy).  These two characters represent honesty vs. lying, faithfulness vs. promiscuity, simply good vs. evil.  Each tries to sway the other to come over to their side.  The movie is more about reforming a bad guy and a good guy staying true to what he believes in, honesty, even if everybody else is a coward.  The relationship between the two characters is beautifully done.  That, and some good old shootout scenes make for a fantastic movie which I highly recommend.

3:10 to Yuma

Glenn’s Reviews Score: 9 out of 10

Best Performance: Logan Lerman, as Dan Evans 14 year old son William.  He accompanies Dan on the journey and is part of the motivation for Dan stay honest.

Worst Performance: No performance sticks out as particularly bad, but since I have to choose one I’ll go with Sean Hennigan as Marshall Doane.

What: Rescue Dawn, staring Christian Bale, Directed by Warner Herzog

IMDB page:  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0462504/

Warner Herzog (Grizzly Man director) has been interested in the story of Dieter Dengler for a long time.  He directed a documentary about him, “Little Dieter Needs to Fly”, in 1997, and in 2006 made a feature about him, “Rescue Dawn”. 

Dengler was a pilot in the Navy flying over Laos in 1965 on a classified mission when he was shot down by enemy fire.  He was captured and put in a POW camp with several others, some who had already been there 2 years.  (I promise this isn’t about John McCain)  The guards were brutal, they weren’t given any real food, and were put in shackles at night.  But from the moment Dieter got there, he was ready to break out.  The rest of the movie is about just that, the planning, execution, and aftermath of the escape from that camp.

Part of my initial reaction to the movie was negative because of my expectations.  I think I expected an action movie, a fancy escape plan, and a 2000s version of “The Great Escape.”  In that regard, the movie failed to deliver, but what it does deliver is equally compelling.  The beauty of the film is found in the minds of the prisoners, as their captivity has had profound negative effects on their mental health.  Each of the men becomes less in touch with reality, but it happens to each man in a different way.  Gene DeBruin (Jeremy Davies) has the most severe mental health problems and each of the scenes with him are difficult to watch.  The movie does a great job showing how damaging an experience like this would be, and what physical and mental damage was done to these men.

Some of the acting in the movie though is not of the best quality.  Christian Bale’s performance didn’t do it for me.  (This makes two movies I’ve seen him in this summer where his acting disappointed me, the other being The Dark Knight).  When the lead actor isn’t convincing, the movie suffers.

All in all I’d recommend “Rescue Dawn”.  Good story, good cinematography, and a surprisingly understated story.  Too bad Christian Bale couldn’t deliver a better performance.

Rescue Dawn

Glenn’s Reviews Score: 6 out of 10

Best Performance:  Steve Zahn (Saving Silverman, That Thing You Do!) as Duane Martin, a fellow prisoner.  He did the best job of portraying the suffering the POWs endured.

Worst Performance:  Christian Bale.  I don’t know why, but I didn’t find him believable.

What: The Republic Tigers, Keep Color LP

The Republic Tigers are a band from Kansas City MO.  They were recently signed to Chop Shop Records, a division of Atlantic.  They released “Keep Color” in May 2008 and have been promoting it since, including a performance on David Letterman.

The Republic Tigers have a sound similar to The Shins or The Strokes, with less of a lo-fi vibe to it.  The distinctive sound on the album is the vocals, which are very heavily layered and looped.  Often, singer Kenn Jankowski can be heard on five or six different vocal lines simultaneously.  While this technique often sounds like a studio gimmick, it works beautifully on this record.  The resulting sound gives the album a more professional, produced sound than you might hear in most of the indie rock scene.

The songs themselves, stripped away from the studio tricks, are good but not great.  The opening track and single, “Buildings and Mountains” is without question the only song on the album with what could be described as a great melody.  Much of the rest of the album fails to live up to the opener.  There are a couple of songs that could definitely be described as filler.  “Air Guitar” is an interesting track, with the lyrics sarcastically pointing out that everyone you meet is a guitar hero “with no guitar at all”.  Other highlights include “Contortionists”, which highlights the falsetto of Jankowski and is one of the prettiest songs on the album.  The closer, “Cast On, Cast Off”, is a mellow, grooving track that is a perfect example of how the layered vocals work to the advantage of The Republic Tigers.

Overall I was pleasantly surprised by “Keep Color”.  The sound of the band is outstanding, with the songwriting not too far behind. 

On a note separate from the album itself, I think Kansas City needs The Republic Tigers to be successful.  I recently attended Lollapalooza, and the only KC band was The Terrible Twos, a childrens side project of The New Amsterdams.  The last rock band to make it big out of KC was Puddle of Mud, hardly a group our city can be proud of.  The Get Up Kids were popular across the country, and maybe The Republic Tigers can fill the void they left as ambassadors for Kansas City.  I would love it if they were headlining theaters across the nation soon.  Support them, our city needs a band like this.

The Republic Tigers will be playing a free show at KC Live in the Power and Light District on Wednesday September 3rd.

The Republic Tigers, Keep Color, Glenn’s Reviews Score: 7 out of 10

Best Song: The best song is probably “Buildings and Mountains”, but lately I’ve dug “Cast On, Cast Off”, so I’ll go with that.

Worst Song: “Fight Song”, too many samples, no melody

myspace: http://www.myspace.com/therepublictigers

Video for Buildings and Mountains

What: The Invasion (2007)

Starring: Nicole Kidman, Daniel Craig

Director: Oliver Hirschbiegel

Internet Movie Data Base Page: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0427392/

Warning: Minor Spoilers (not major spoilers)

The Invasion was released in 2007 as a remake of the classic Sci-Fi movie Invasion of the Body Snatchers.  Vanessa and I attempted to watch this movie in the theaters when it came out but left ten minutes into the movie due to a group of rambunctious adolescents that had no concept of appropriate public behavior.  Now that the DVD is out, we watched it.

The movie opens with a story on the news about a space shuttle exploding upon it’s reentry to earth.  Cut to a scientist surveying the wreckage, “This spore can survive the cold of space and the heat of entering the earth’s atmosphere, whatever it is, it’s not from around here.”  The next hour and a half tells the story of Carol Bennell (Kidman) trying to save her young son from the rest of humanity, which has had their bodies taken over by these mysterious space spores.  Luckily, Bennell hangs out with a group of doctors who can explain the cause of, and possible cure of this pandemic in a matter of hours.  This is a particularly annoying movie cliche, the scientist who can calmly explain to us the chaos we are seeing, and what quick fix will make it all go away.  Not that any of this matters to Bennell’s son, who is of course immune because he had an extreme case of chicken pox as a baby.  The spores make a good case for their existence though.  Their society isn’t violent and they help one another, not like us evil humans. 

The story is also filled with political overtones (aren’t all movies these days?) pointing out the errors and arrogance of the United States government.  This wouldn’t be so bothersome if the writers were somewhat clever in the way they included this in the movie.  Iron Man for example is a movie that has a politcal theme (War is bad and weapons manufacturers are responsible for what they create) but manages to not shove it down your throat and the plot coincides well with that message.  The writers of The Invasion must have felt they needed to include a political message, without any regard for the fact that it doesn’t fit in well in the overall story. 

Despite its faults, the movie did have some interesting scenes.  Once the majority of humanity becomes possessed by alien spores, they become zombie like, emotionless beings.  One particularly chilling scene takes place in Bennell’s office (she is a therapist) when a man who is obviously one of the aliens comes looking for his wife.  This takes place after the wife had told Dr. Bennell that her husband is not her husband.  There are more exchanges like this one, between emotionless zombies and the living that compensate for the plot holes, a weak political message, and mediocre acting.  

Overall I would recommend The Invasion only for Sci-Fi junkies and fans of zombie movies.  If you’re looking for much more, skip it. 

The Invasion

Glenn’s Reviews Score: 4 out of 10

Best Performance: Adam LeFevre, playing Richard Lenk, an alien possessed husband searching for his wife.

Worst Performance: Jackson Bond, the child actor portraying young Oliver, who is immune to the aliens.  (I hate to pick on a kid, and it might be the fault of the writers and director, but he was BAD)

What: Radiohead, headlining Lollapalooza 2008

Where: Grant Park Chicago

When: 8/1/2008 8 PM

Setlist

15 Step
Airbag
There There
All I Need
Nude
Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
The Gloaming
The National Anthem
Faust Arp
No Surprises
Jigsaw Falling Into Place
Reckoner
Lucky
The Bends
Everything in Its Right Place
Fake Plastic Trees
Bodysnatchers

encore

Videotape
Paranoid Android
Dollars and Cents
House of Cards
Optimistic

encore 2

2+2=5
Idioteque

Vanessa and I traveled to Chicago IL to attend days 1 and 2 of Lollalpalooza 2008.  We were excited about and enjoyed many performers, but the trip was really about one thing, Radiohead.  We managed to squeeze our way close to the stage during the set by Bloc Party so that we had a very clear line of sight and had no complaints about the sound (which is less than I can say for Rage Against the Machine’s set 24 hours later).

The anticipation in the crowd grew from the time Bloc Party left the stage until Radiohead started.  All of the corporate logos were covered, a few dozen glass tubes for lighting were hung from the stage, and two camera men climbed the scaffolding and sat atop the lighting rig.   By the time it was 7:45, people were chanting, clapping, and every little movement on stage drew a reaction from the crowd. 

At 8:00, Radiohead took the stage and went right into “15 step”.  After “Airbag”, guitarists Johnny Greenwood and Ed O’Brien joined in on percussion for “There There”.  They flew through their set which was VERY heavy on material from In Rainbows, leaving the stage around 9:20, only to come back twice for encores.  Without question, “Fake Plastic Trees” (complete with fireworks accompanying) got the most enthusiastic reaction of any song during the night, with much of the crowd singing along.  “Dollars and Cents” was a fun surprise to the set, and the closing song, “Idioteque”, featured some serious dancing from Mr. Thom Yorke.

Radiohead’s performance was stellar, they genuinely seemed to enjoy playing and their sound was absolutely amazing.  Several times during the concert the thought went through my head that I was watching the greatest band in the world, that Radiohead will be the band kids will look back on in 30 years and wish they would’ve been there to witness (much like my generation does with Led Zepplin or Pink Floyd).  If my grade of the concert was purely based on musical performance, it would be a 10 out of 10.

Looking back though, there are several things, outside of the actual performance, which keep the show from getting a perfect 10.

First, Lollapalooza is an outdoor festival with 75,000 people who all paid a hefty fee to attend.  Yet the festival organizers (possibly the city of Chicago) have forced the shows to end precisely at 10 PM, meaning that all encores seem completely staged and unnecessary.  Personally, I would rather Radiohead would’ve stayed on stage, or left only once rather than waste 10 minutes of their two hour timeslot with phony encores.  Also, for a band like Radiohead who plays a set of over 20 songs, they seem completely rushed on stage with each song starting the moment the previous had finished.  It was only during the first encore that Thom Yorke stopped and spoke to the crowd, I would’ve liked more banter on stage from him.  You knew that as soon as Radiohead took the stage, the clock was running, so anything extra was tossed aside in order to get through the setlist. 

My only other complaint is this: People around us seemed more concerned with capturing the show on their phones and cameras than actually watching it.  I snapped a few pictures (see above) so I could have something to look back on and remember the show by, but there were people around us who spent more time looking at their display screen on their camera than the actual stage.  This seems backwards to me.  When I first started going to shows, people watched the band, not their phones.  Just another example of human interaction going by the wayside.  (Oh the irony of pointing this out in a blog, and not telling you about it face to face)

Overall though, the show was still fantastic.  Radiohead’s live sound is unbelievably pure, so the concert gets a good review.  If you have a chance to see them, do it.

Glenn’s Reviews Score for Radiohead at Lollapalooza: 9 (out of 10)

Best song: Idioteque, (The Gloaming was also amazing, the lights and Thom’s dancing skills displayed)

Worst song: Faust Arp, it doesn’t translate well to such a large stage.

 

“The Gloaming”, Live at Lollapalooza 2008

 

Wow.  That’s a long review.  Most won’t be so long, but most won’t be as memorable as a Radiohead concert.

I’ve had the idea for a while. 

People tell me all the time that I’m a harsh critic.  I’m often telling people my thoughts on movies, music, books, magazines, concerts, TV shows, or newspaper articles.  It’s time I put my opinions in writing.  My plan is to write a post weekly reviewing something I saw, heard, or read.  I’ll write a short article, have a best and worst category (for example, if I review a movie, I might nominate a best and worst performance, or the best and worst song on an album, etc.), and give a few stats about whatever I write about.  I’ll rate everything on a scale of 1-10.  Leave comments for me and tell me why I’m wrong the next time you see me. 

I’m addicted to media.  I can’t stay away.  I’d rather force myself to think about what I watch and hear than give it up.  I hope you enjoy.