A Movie about a Horse

We went to go see War Horse last Saturday night, because my mom wanted to see something and it was the only thing that looked interesting to her. My father and I were more hesitant, because the title itself seemed unimpressive, but it had Speilberg's name on it and we don't go out to see movies enough for it not to be a treat whenever we do. Committed blogger that I am, I vowed to write my review on it before we even got to the theater.

DeMille's Lost City

As someone who uses the internet frequently, I'm always picking up on random pieces of information, which works out as great fodder for irl conversations or wayward blog posts. Some of these facts or stories that I pick up are amazing, humorous, or bizarre. Sometimes it's all of the above.

In 1983, an amateur filmmaker, following a cryptic clue left in an old book, found an ancient city, complete with sphinxes and a 20-ton statue of the Pharaoh, buried beneath the sand dunes of not Egypt, but Southern California. I'm not making any of this up. The man who made the discovery was Peter Brosnan, the book was the autobiography of Cecil B. DeMille, and the ancient city was the complete set to his silent classic, The Ten Commandments.

December Update

Now that NaNoWriMo is over, I should be back to regular updates this week! I already missed Monday, however, so we'll see how far that goes.

Regarding NaNoWriMo - I won! Again. This was my fourth year in a row winning, and my final word-count was somewhere around 100,211. In case you're wondering, that's about 139 single-spaced pages on my word processor, which might translate to about 350-400 pages in a paperback. It's very, very rough, with copious misspellings, grammatical errors, and plot points that I only remembered to add in halfway through, and are thus out of context.

I sort of feel like this has been my hardest NaNoWriMo yet, though I'm sure I've felt that every year. Still jobless, I doubled my word goal from 50k to 100k, and managed to work away at it pretty easily for the first week or so. During the second and third weeks, I remembered that a particular video game that I had been waiting for would be coming out before the end of the month, and in order to give me some days off to play it, I averaged about a thousand words extra every day.

Bram Stoker's Dracula

According to my Tumblog, which I updated sometime right after starting the book, I spent a little over a month trying to read Bram Stoker's Dracula.

In the book's defense, I have also been working on NaNoWriMo, so I've had my mind on other things, but as I also had most of the month of October to try to read this extremely well known novel, I don't think this escuse really counts. As it turns out, Dracula really is just one of those stories it takes me an unnecessarily long time to wade through.

Treadmill Reviews: Gankutsuou, The Count of Monte Cristo

I've been trying my hardest to keep up with my daily treadmill exercise, but it's been getting difficult to find new things to watch while I walk. I had a haphazard list of shows and anime I wanted to go through, and after much deliberation, a couple weeks ago I finally decided on Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo.

I, Robot (Issac Asimov)

The 1st Edition cover.

Except for a few short stories in my Middle/High school English classes, I'd never read anything written by Issac Asimov, considered to be the master of science fiction. With that in mind, I finally picked up a copy of I, Robot earlier this summer, and I've finally now finished reading it (Unfortunately, the only version of the book at Barnes and Noble had Will Smith on the cover. I like Will Smith as an actor, but I dislike owning the 'movie cover' versions of books).

When the 2004 Will Smith 'I, Robot' movie came out, I saw reviews for it online that said it was "nothing like the book." At the time, I thought that meant it was dissimilar to the book in the same way that all the Harry Potter movies were dissimilar to the books, and years later I figured the I, Robot movie was probably just like the Prince of Persia: Sands of Time movie (which gave a totally different set of characters in a different setting the same items and ultimate goal from the original game).

Having finally read the book, I can say knowingly that the movie is truly nothing like the book.

Cowboys and Aliens

The Friday before we left on our vacation (the 29th, I believe), my mom and I went to the theaters to see one of the few titles coming out this summer that looked interesting: Cowboys and Aliens.

When I saw the trailer for this movie sometime last year, I thought it looked hokey, and wanted to see it, just to have fun with the ridiculousness of it. The title was an obvious play off of "Cowboys and Indians" - as someone who likes words, I can appreciate the fact that 'Indians' and 'Aliens' sound similar and have the same number of syllables - and the movie premise sounded like something made up on the spot for a silly, would-be blockbuster, like Megashark versus Giant Octopus.

Vacation Time: Results Show

Monday, August the first, my parents and I set out for our official summer-vacation-get-away thing. The goal, I believe, was to visit my brother in Utah, see a few people in Idaho, and get to know said-brother's future in-laws in Oregon while we scouted out places to eat in Portland for the upcoming wedding. My own personal goals, meanwhile, were to work through some of my 'to-read' backlog, figure out our new car radio, and drive at least one leg of the trip without mom yelling at me (she's a very nervous passenger).

The drive to Utah took about ten hours, and I drove the first three. The road goes straight through the Mojave Desert, which is relatively pleasant to look at but pretty boring to drive through. Add that to the fact that I didn't know where I was going, and I was kinda stressed (I'm not used to using the overdrive button, so there were a few people riding my tail, and mom was finicky throughout), and by the end of my shift my back was sore and I was ready to stop.

Like this, but with no clouds. Ever.

Captain America: The Star Spangled Avenger

Friday, as I sat hunched over the laptop watching Twin Peaks (more on that later this week), mom poked her head into my room and stated that she wanted to go see a movie on Saturday. She does this every now and then - it's a healthy reaction to having months off work (she teaches at an elementary school) and spending most of her time at home with few other people around.

We don't watch movies that are rated R, or movies that just look stupid, so our options this summer are severely limited. After a quick brainstorm, we decided to go see Captain America, which I have to admit was bordering on the 'looks stupid' side of my chart (I'm not a fan of superhero stories, really). However, of all the movies out right now it's the one I was most interested in, so Saturday afternoon we drove out to see Captain America.

Wilde and Unruly

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I have the beginnings of what would be a list of dead people who I really admire. It's not really a fully-formed list - in fact, I can only accurately think of two names from it, the first being Albert Einstein, who I don't have to say anything about, and the other being Oscar Wilde.

I get the impression that many people today don't actually know who Oscar Wilde is, which is really unfortunate. In my opinion, he's one of the best and one of the funniest English writers of all time. In all fairness, however, he only ever wrote one novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray. When he was alive, he was most famous for his children's fairy tales, published in two collections titles The Happy Prince and Other Tales and A House of Pomegranates, but nowadays I'd wager most people recognize his name from the numerous plays he wrote, including Lady Windermere's Fan, An Ideal Husband, and The Importance of Being Earnest.

Super 8

  Friday evening, my mom and I went out to see the new Spielberg/Abrams movie Super 8. I first saw the poster for Super 8 about a year ago (I think) coming out of one of our local theaters. All I really noticed about the poster was that it was strange, and had both J. J. Abrams' and Steven Spielberg's names, and I was hooked.

Anyone under 30-years old (myself included) might not immediately understand the title reference; my mom had to explain to me that Super 8mm cameras were what she used to make home movies with when she was young. That makes the title of the movie seem a bit more cheery or homey than the poster or trailer would suggest, but after seeing the movie, I completely understand why Abrams choose that as his title.

What's up with...?

...the Diving Bell Spider?
The tiny Diving Bell Spider lives underwater. Seriously. They build bubble-shaped webs that are condensed enough to trap oxygen but malleable enough for them to be able to poke in or out and grab water insects to feed off of. I'm not making this up; here's the Wikipedia article, an article from Discovery News, LiveScience, and the New York Times.

And a picture!

Not only that, but their webs work the same way fish gills do - the oxygen from the surrounding water leeches into the web-bubble while the carbon dioxide leeches out into the water. Over time the spiders have to rise to the surface to restock their air supply, but they're able to live completely in the water.

Discovering that this spider exists was the single-most disturbing news I'd had in a good long while. Spiders are bad enough as it is; their long legs are creepy, and while I don't mind looking at them (preferable in a container), I can't help imagining them crawling over me, sucking my blood dry. Imagining that happen unbeknownst to me while I'm peacefully swimming around at the beach, thinking all is right? I know, logically, that this spider is tiny and would be hiding from me, but I can't help thinking nature has some cruel, evil trick in mind with these things.

...James Tate and the Prom ordeal?

Mystery Men

I was shocked to discover a few weeks ago that several of my friends have never heard of, much less seen, the 1999 movie Mystery Men. I wouldn't say this movie featured prominently in my childhood, but I did see it a couple times growing up and I really like it. My youngest older brother actually introduced the movie to me when I was twelve or so. As far as I understand, the very popular Smash Mouth song "All Star" was written for the movie Mystery Men - you can see clips from the movie in the song's music video - so it seems clear to me that everyone who's heard the song should see the movie.

From left to right: The Bowler, Invisible Boy, The Sphinx,
The Shoveler, Blue Raja, Mr. Furious, and The Spleen.

Mystery Men is a comic superhero movie about a group of unimpressive 'heroes' in a futuristic town already protected by one Captain Amazing. It's based on an actual comic series written by Bob Burden for Dark Horse Comics in the 90s. In the comic series, a group of pseudo-heroic misfits get together to try to save the city from supervillains. There were a lot of different 'heroes' to join the Mystery Men in the comics, since the group happened to have a very high death-rate. The movie just focuses on a team of seven, and presents them as unexpected heroes when Captain Amazing is kidnapped by Casanova Frankenstein, an insane, evil genius.

Captain Amazing - and
his endorsements

As you might expect, Mystery Men is pretty hilarious. The main trio of heroes are The Shoveler, Mr. Furious, and The Blue Raja (who feigns a British Accent and flings forks). They're joined by Invisible Boy (who can only turn invisible when no one is looking at him), The Spleen, The Bowler, and The Sphinx (who's not just mysterious - he's TERRIBLY mysterious). Not only are the actual 'heroes' and their powers pretty hilarious, but some of the lines that poke fun at the common superhero tropes are great. At one point, the team gets into an argument over whether Captain Amazing is really billionaire Lance Hunt, with one half of the team arguing that he can't be, because Lance Hunt wears glasses and Captain Amazing doesn't.

The movie didn't hit the box office nearly as hard as producers were expecting, so it's considered a flop by most people, but I think the movie's great. It's got just a slight surreal edge to it, with a light enough comedic touch to be pure, escapist fun.

I could spend a long time quoting the better lines ("We are number one. All others are number two or lower"), but that would ruin part of the first-time viewing experience. Netflix doesn't have the movie on instant, but you can rent the DVD online or from a nearby still-open Blockbuster or Video Depot. (In case you want to watch this movie with kids - it's relatively clean, though they do curse a few times, and I always skip the skunk scene). I highly recommend Mystery Men, especially for anyone craving a good 90s comedy.

My Valedictorian Speech

Last year, I tested out of High School early, because my classes were boring me and I wanted to get on with  my life. I felt a bit like a traitor, leaving all the friends I loved because of my own desire to get out of school, but watching them graduate this week, I felt such a nervous excitement for them. I decided that, in their honor, I would write the speech I would have given had I stayed in school and become Valedictorian. Not that I ever would - I'm very happy with my B+ average, thank you very much, and don't see any need in overachieving. But the idea for this speech came to me, so I decided to write it anyways.

Incidental Confrontations

When I was young and impressionable, someone in my family watched at least a few episodes of The X-Files. I can't remember who it would have been; neither of my parents, as far as I understand, were huge fans, and I don't remember if my brothers watched TV much. But at least at some point during my youth, I was exposed to one of the decade's greatest and most popular efforts in modern, out-of-the-box, conspiracy science fiction.

I've always considered myself a fan of weird, strange, or abnormal stories. Maybe I have those few moments of The X-Files to thank for that. When I think of The X-Files, however, I can only think about how that show made me so totally, irrationally, terrified of aliens.

There are More Things in Heaven and Earth...

On Saturday, a copy of Hamlet came in the mail from our local Netflix distributing warehouse. I'm in charge of maintaining our Netflix queue, so even though I had been wanting to see this particular version, released in 2009 by the Royal Shakespeare Company in England, I had to wait until after my parents had gotten what they'd added to the queue earlier. I planned to watch it that day, but decided to see if my parents wanted to watch it as well, so we didn't end up sitting down to it until 8:00, and I was the only one who didn't nod off at one point. This version was filmed off stage, but the actors performed the piece on-stage for a live audience as well.

My family owns a copy of Hamlet, which I read last summer because I figured it was probably something I should be familiar with. Except for that reading I did on my own, I had little experience with Hamlet; I've never seen it acted before, and I had a vague idea about a scene with a mother and son and a ghost. So one of the reasons I decided to add this to our queue was to be better acquainted with the story.

I'm not going lie, though. The real major reason I wanted to watch this version of Hamlet was because I knew David Tennant was playing the title role. I (along with most of the world, I bet) am only familiar with Tennant as the ever-popular Tenth Doctor, the role he held for four years on Doctor Who, and I wanted to see what else he could do as an actor. By renting this movie, I figured I could hit two birds with one stone.

David Tennant as Hamlet in the Gravedigger scene, with the skull of Yorick.

Even if Tennant wasn't playing Hamlet, however, I think this was a superb version to decide to watch. It was done in a modern style, with modern dress and sets that didn't detract from the Shakespearean theme at all, I thought, and if anything seemed to drive the emotion deeper. The camera-work was particularly interesting; they used some security camera feed to highlight the invisibility of the ghost, and there were limited camera angles, making each scene look almost on-stage but without giving the impression of a limited view. The whole movie had a stylized taste to it that drew me, at least, into the story.

I was impressed, however, by Tennant's talent, as shown off in this version of Hamlet. He is able to appear in genuine pain, and express that pain across to the audience in a way that almost makes the dialogue and soliloquy unnecessary. I recognized that ability from certain episodes of Doctor Who, but it was powerful to see interpreted in Hamlet. (I also noticed that the director made good use of Tennant's ability to act completely mental on-camera, as seen in every episode of Doctor Who, and when Hamlet starts acting crazy.)

A month or so ago, I watched a version of Macbeth that I only later realized was also done by the Royal Shakespeare Company as well. Both Macbeth and Hamlet starred Patrick Stewart in a major role (Macbeth and Hamlet's Uncle Claudius), and they were both done in a Modernized style. Both, I felt, were emotionally powerful, and if this is the quality of work the Royal Shakespeare Company puts out, I can understand why they're still world-renown as a standard in theater production. Since I can't actually see their stage performances, I'll be looking forward to more filmed productions in the future.

Weekdays

The MacCallum Theater is hosting a musical this weekend called Anything Goes, preformed by the students at the local college. My brother is working as their stage manager, so we decided to go on tonight; we'd originally been planning to go yesterday, opening night, but my dad wouldn't have been able to make it. Since Thursday was unexpectedly open, my mom decided that she and I would go see Thor (I'll probably write a review for that later). I realized that morning, as we were making plans, that seeing Thor was extremely appropriate, seeing at is was, after all, the day of the week named after that particular god of thunder

The Norse god that particular comic book hero is based on.

My oldest brother, when I was younger and he still living with us, would always call Wednesday "Woden's Day" and Thursday "Thor's Day," explaining that those days were originally called that. I always thought that sounded silly, but as I got older I got in the habit of saying "Woden's Day" and "Thor's Day" to myself as well.

Face Stealer

I can't actually find much information about this anywhere, so I'm going to assume that I'm one of a very small group of closet Inadvertent Imitators, specifically when it comes to fictional characters. Of course there are thousands of people who dress up as their favorite characters for cosplay conventions and the like, and may even adopt their favorite character's tenant or sayings, but what I'm talking about is accidental. It only happens when I spend a good deal of time around a certain character (be it a TV show, a movie series, or whatever).

A good example is Doctor Who. I started watching the revived seasons just this past summer in hopes of catching up to the new season. That meant I was speeding through the show, watching anywhere from one to six episodes a day if I had nothing else to do, and hardly taking breaks in between to watch other shows or movies. For four days (The time it took me to speed through the first two seasons), I watched nothing but Doctor Who in my free time. By then, I was thinking in an almost pure British accent. It was almost startling to talk and find myself speaking proper American. I had to force myself to not pretend to be British in my head, and I decided to take a week break to watch Dollhouse to get my head back in order.

This doesn't only happen to me with accents, though. After a week of watching Dollhouse, I found myself walking around the house like one of the characters in their Tabula Rasa state (blankly). After speeding through Firefly, I sauntered like the main protagonist and forced myself not to use their Chinese (though I allow myself the say "shiny" whenever appropriate). I remember coming home from seeing Cyrano de Bergerac and having mom chide me for trying to talk just like he does, though I hadn't realized I'd been doing it.

I think this stems from the childhood act of playing as characters in stories. As if, as an adult, I haven't broken this habit, but instead evolved it to fit my new lifestyle. I'm not sure about this, though; I honestly don't remember pretending, as a child, to be my favorite characters. The only reason I would have adopted the habit growing older would be to help my writing. I know that, while reading a book, I'll copy character's expressions as described in order to help me 'see' the character better. It's easier to imagine a character's grimace if I practice it on myself.

I've found one other blogger who mentioned doing this, so I know I'm not the only one. But it's definitely a goo biological reminder not to get too focused on a single story. As great as a certain TV show might be, once I start inadvertently imitating the characters, I know I've been watching too much.

Twenty Twelve

Many of us have just gotten the hang of writing '2011' on our school papers and checks, and in just over a year and a half, a dusty old calendar mapped by an ancient culture neck deep in polytheism and human sacrifice predicts we will all die horrible, tragic, unavoidable deaths.

The Shop Somewhere Down the Street.

Christmas has been over for some time, and is far from coming again, so this blog is a bit late, but since it's really just a wintery theme, not strictly Christmas, it's not too late.

Every year around Christmas time, since as long as I can remember, my father would sit down to a certain old, black and white movie starring Jimmy Stewart. Sometimes we'd sit in and watch it with him, though I don't remember much about the story until I was ten or so, and we'd be swept by the romantic story about how Jimmy Stewart's character finds himself and discovers what's truly important in life. I'm not talking about "It's a Wonderful Life," by the way, I'm talking about "The Shop Around the Corner."

A few years ago, I was shocked to realize that not everyone had ever even heard of this movie. When it was Christmas time, people sat around and watched "Charlie Brown Christmas" (Which I admit to having only seen once in it's entirety) or "It's a Wonderful Life" (Which I have seen, but only a few times). When "You've Got Mail" came out, people went to it and saw it without even realizing that it was based on Ernst Lubitsch's classic romance. I, who had been familiarized with the story when I was young, couldn't fathom that an old movie like this, so beloved in my own household, would be so forgotten by others who claimed to love "It's a Wonderful Life" or other classics, too.

In case you've never seen or heard of "The Shop Around the Corner," it's basically a romance about two store clerks who grow to greatly dislike each other, despite the fact that, unbeknownst to either of them, they're forming a budding romance through anonymous letters. The audience, in a first time viewing, doesn't find out what's going on until Jimmy Stewart's character goes to meet his pen pal in person, and then cannot bring himself to confront the woman he finds to be frivolous and annoying in real life, but intelligent and romantic in her letters.

Nora Ephron directed a remake starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan (Both of "Sleepless in Seattle" fame), which tweaked the setting and situation a bit, but kept the core storyline. Both movies are pretty good, and really romantic without losing their intelligent script and relatable characters, but I'd have to say I prefer "Shop Around the Corner." Maybe it's because I've seen it so many times, or maybe it's because, as long as you saw the original first, remakes tend to pale in comparison (If you hadn't seen the original first, then the remake can seem better). Either way, I'm still a bit put off when I make a "Shop Around the Corner" reference that no one understands (like when I suggested a friend use a jewelry box that plays music to store candy).

Netflix doesn't have "The Shop Around the Corner" available for instant streaming, but they do have DVDs if anyone has queue space open, and while your local movie-buying-supplier may not have it in store, you'll almost certainly be able to order the movie online. It's a great Christmas movie, but sinceisn't specifically about Christmas, it can be watched any time of the year. If you like "It's a Wonderful Life," you'll almost definitely love "The Shop Around the Corner."

(I don't mean to sound like a pitch salesman - I really just love this movie, and wished more people would familiarize themselves with it, too. I'm always open for lesser-known-about cool movies, too, y'know.)