I loved what I was able to see so far of Grindhouse - maybe when the theater gets it's new fire alarm system sorted out, we can go back and finish seeing the movie(s).

My favorite part of Grindhouse was when the film shut off, fire alarm sounded and "Margaretaville" played over and over every 10 minutes as we all sat there in the dark.

It was nice of AMC theatres to keep the place open during construction. Especially when they keep messing with the buildings power. You'd think they would've figured that maybe it wasn't such a wise idea the FIRST time it happend.

TO top this off, a guy standing around was telling one of the "managers" that he deserved double pay for running around restarting the films. How about he go back to "projection" school and learn how to frame the film correctly on the screen and attempt to keep the previews and commercials from being scratched to hell. When the AMC logo comes on and there are dozens of black scratches on screen, screams of competance.

Ugh! Why did I have to be a projectionist for 18 years and have to put up with this?

:p

Color me unimpressed with The Producers. And I'm talking about the original Mel Brooks film, not the newer film-of-a-musical-of-a-film version.

There were some good moments, and Gene Wilder's performance was bloody brilliant, like he was channeling Woody Allen or something, but overall a somewhat "meh" comedy. I laughed much harder at the two Deanna Durbin films I had last week (which were, incidentally, It started with Eve and Can't help singing)

Movies watched so far this weekend:

Born on the Fourth of July - Not really what I expected but still excruciatingly boring.

Mountains of the Moon - A period piece detailing the early attempts to find the source of the Nile by Burton and Speke. Made Born on the Fourth of July seem like a balls-to-the-wall action movie in comparison.

I watched both of those movies while making about 600 MouseAdventure buttons so it was a morning of drudgery all around.

Then we hit the beer-and-pizza theater last night to see The Host, a Korean monster movie that is currently making the arthouse rounds to good reviews. Lani liked it, I was so so on it. As good monster movies are, it was more social commentary than monster scare fest. The external view of Americans was interesting (simultaneously the buffoonish causer of their problem and frighteningly efficient solver of the problem).

It has strong comedic elements that frequently weren't working for me. But the woman behind me was laughing so hard and in such odd moments that I started to wonder if she just found the sound of the Korean language humorous.

In Korean and subtitled.

So on five points scales I'd say, in order: 2, 1, 3.

Saw Notes on a Scandal last night. Still catching up on Oscar nodded or nominated films. Judi Dench was, as always, mezmerizing. I loved Helen Mirren, it was clearly her year, but Dench was just sppoky, creepy and I could not take my eyes off her. It was a grand performance, subtle, funny, sad and pure evil. So I revise my vote, she really deserved to win, even over Mirren. It was a tour de force and not to be missed.

By coincidence watched my second Korean movie within a week last night. This time 2001's Bad Guy from well respected director Kim Ki-Duk.

This is the touching story of a woman forced into prostitution by silent (he only speaks once in the movie) titular bad guy and the relationship they form.

I'm sure there are all kinds of layers and submeanings that I'm missing but damn if I can only watch scenes of abuse and rape so many times before I decide that I just can't be touched by the characters involved.

This is a well reviewed movie but it is the kind of well reviewed movie that gives critics a bad name. It is different from mainstream schlock but I wouldn't say it is good.

Children of Men
 

Ok I've finished the book. It's very different from the movie. The basic premise that no children are being born and Theo comes in conctact with a pregnant woman is about all they have in common.

And besides the characters being named Theo, Julian etc that's about it there as well.

That said I very much enjoyed it. Especially as it was so radically different it was easy to not compare it to the movie. Without giving too much away the book is much less 1984ish than the movie. With no younger generation and the population decreasing things are just kind of decaying. Hope is gone. PD James is one of my favorite writers anyway and the book has a bit of her usual mystery.

I'm happy to pass the book along to anyone who wants to read it.

ooooh [raises hand], pick me, pick me!

PM me where you'd like it sent and I'll pop it in the mail tomorrow.

In looking up some information about Zoe Bell (the real life stuntwoman playing a stuntwoman in the the Death Proof half of Grindhouse) I found she was prominently featured in a stuntwoman documentary called Double Dare.

Watched it last night. Pretty boring, other than touching on some interesting sociological issues it doesn't really have any purpose.