Which feature do you miss most?

Friday 31 July 2009

Thursday 30 July 2009

One-Shot (30/07/09)

Twitter, Facebook status updates, and daily blog missive series' such as this are enemies of posterity. At least, that's how it feels "in the moment." That doesn't excuse my lack of enthusiasm of late, but it does explain it.

Tuesday 28 July 2009

One-Shot (28/07/09)

Waiting for a new SModcast isn't sweet, but it does involve sorrow.

One-Shot (27/07/09)

Sorry I'm late. The lack of worth in this series lately is the greatest argument for me spurning Twitter.

Sunday 26 July 2009

One-Shot (26/07/09)

When I started really mucking around with instruments, nobody ever emphasized the satisfaction gained from working out a beloved song - or part of a beloved song - by ear. I'm glad.

Saturday 25 July 2009

One-Shot (25/07/09)

What's your favourite album track segway? I don't know about you but the rambunctious "Merchandise" giving way to "Blueprint" on Fugazi's 1990 release Repeater + 3 Songs would certainly be up there for me. It'd be easy for a band to miscalculate following such a noisy little track with something slower, more grandiose. It could have been too jarring sonically, a reminder that the "loud-quiet" dynamic popularized around the time is best deployed within a single song. It could have looked like a calculated shot at profundity. Or they could just have liked that arrangement. Whatever it was, it works.

Friday 24 July 2009

One-Shot (24/07/09)

Resisting the urge to purchase Day of the Dead (2008) is a struggle best handled on a day-to-day basis. Having a source as trusted as this blog's own Christophe* to dissuade you is splendid medicine.

* Please, post more. You're missed online.

Thursday 23 July 2009

One-Shot (23/07/09)

After watching "The Cannes Kids", the final episode of Entourage's fourth season, two things struck me:
  1. Season 2 remains this show's highlight.
  2. Kanye West should have his own Saturday morning cartoon wherein he helps celebrity friends in need the only way he knows how: destroying problems with his lavish private jet.

Tuesday 21 July 2009

One-Shot (21/07/09)

What better way to watch IT than on a misty, rain-swept Tuesday morning.

Sunday 19 July 2009

One-Shot (19/07/09)

This is foolish and disappointing, but if I thought I had any shot, I'd still throw in for Fry.

One-Shot (18/07/09)

Sorry about the delay. If you don't already know how easily a quick blast on Grand Theft Auto IV can turn into a marathon, you really ought to.

Friday 17 July 2009

One-Shot (17/07/09)

I'm not really a Rock Band/Guitar Hero guy, but this is inspired. Shame it's U.S. only.

Thursday 16 July 2009

One-Shot (16/07/09)

The new Manchester United home kit looks much better up close, but there's still way too much black.

Tuesday 14 July 2009

One-Shot (14/07/09)

Disturbing moment of the day: the video for Jimmy Eat World's "Sweetness", a musical cornerstone of my adolescence, was on MTV2 Vintage Anthems tonight. Vintage Anthems.

Monday 13 July 2009

One-Shot (13/07/09)

Done some Scott Pilgrim vs. The World production catch-up today. There's a lot out there to be excited about; Alison Pill as Kim Pine numbers chief amongst them.

Sunday 12 July 2009

# 27 Review - Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Two years ago, I wrote a summer movie retrospective ("Autopsy") for the first issue of Low Standards for High Fives' Grandiloquent Vagaries & Other Miscellany. The print magazine, not the blog. The blog came after the magazine (bone up on your Grandiloquent history here.) The centerpiece of that feature was a review of Michael Bay's Transformers. I loved the toys and accompanying animated works, as a kid, so I was ideally placed to enjoy that movie. Even without this prior fondness, I can only imagine the movie's bubblegum charm would have won me over.

Two years later, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen arrives. It promises more action, more robots, more Megan Fox in various states of undress... more of everything that made the first such good, harmless fun. Returning director Michael Bay kept his word, but Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is awful all the same. Why? Because more and better aren't synonyms (I checked.) It's unwieldy, obnoxious, and easily my worst of the year, irrespective of expectation.

Last time around, naysayers bemoaned the human presence. This time would have been better spent, for them, watching irrelevant robot carnage. "Rock 'em, Sock 'em Robots: The Movie" as Kevin Smith put it. I disagreed then and I disagree now. Transformers succeeded as much because of the fish out of water shenanigans caused by the robots' presence on Earth as it did the SFX. Revenge of the Fallen fails because it brings nothing to the table but chronic indecision and stupidity.

Rather than reign in (and improve) the shaky, broad humour of the original, Bay lets it off the leash. Rather than settle on a clear, perfunctory concept that facilitates maximum good times (like the original), we're given a boring re-tread that refuses to step aside and let the fun in. It's one thing to look past a flimsy MacGuffin or two - "the Allspark", "the Matrix of Leadership" - but the lazy arrogance on show here is unacceptable. At one point, John Turturro's ex-Government agent yells at Jetfire - an elderly, bearded, British robot with a cane - to deliver exposition faster. If handled right, this could have been a winning little meta-moment. Having him essentially say "give us this information faster so we can go back to running around and screaming" is not handling this right. Especially, when the movie think it's cute.

For many, the stunning mech throw-downs of Transformers were a saving grace. By an hour or so into Revenge of the Fallen's inexcusably bloated 2 and a half hour run-time, even those become bland. With the exception of Optimus Prime beating lumps out of various Decepticons in the woodland battle, there's little here to rival the action of the first. The new-fangled human/Autobot alliance is an inviting opportunity for variety as well as excess. Like so much of the film, though, this is largely squandered. The climactic showdown in Egypt is surprisingly small-scale and, worse, overly familiar. Even those who last watched the original theatrically will feel like they've seen it all before in its predecessor's Middle Eastern sequence.

Watch it: because you think Sam is a name you just don't hear screamed enough in movies anymore.
Don't watch it: if you write McSweeney's style microfiction.
Ranking: 3/10 (Disgraced Cadet.)

--

Ian Pratt refuses to let Transformers' sudden franchise debacle mar his excitement for G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.

One-Shot (12/07/09)

Friday's news that Ryan Reynolds is to star as the eponymous ring-wearer in Green Lantern pleased me then and it pleases me now. Considering the guy's power to endear despite middling material (everything from Van Wilder to Definitely, Maybe) it's about time he got the chance to break out of the generic rom-com mold.

Saturday 11 July 2009

One-Shot (11/07/09)

Some riffs just don't want to find their chorus.

Friday 10 July 2009

One-Shot (10/07/09)

Sometimes, enjoyment suffers because of anticipation (The Wrestler.) Sometimes, it just makes it better (Marvel vs. Capcom 2.) Yes, I downloaded the free demo from the PlayStation Store the other day. After finally playing it yesterday in all of its manic, trans-warp glory, the choice between it and the admittedly graphically superior Street Fighter IV just got a whole lot simpler.

Thursday 9 July 2009

One-Shot (09/07/09)

I need to take my own hints about when to walk away from an argument.

Wednesday 8 July 2009

One-Shot (08/07/09)

Yesterday's Michael Jackson memorial broadcast has divided opinion here. Opinions divided in Northern Ireland? I know. It never fails to amaze and infuriate me how some people Here can't get their head around the idea that something sad can be turned into anything other than just an awkward inevitability for the grief-stricken. It's like an Irish Wake never happened.

26: The Untouchables

If there's any doubt that this blog moonlights as an advertising outlet for CHUD.com then this post should do to that uncertainty what reality did to TV.

Noel Gallagher once sang "true perfection has to be imperfect." Whether you agree or not, there's no denying he's in the majority. One need only look at movie fans for evidence. Self-professed cinephiles are often associated with a paradoxical taste discrepancy. They praise classics new and old alike, (say, Once and The Graduate) before adding "I can't wait to ogle Sienna Miller's baps in G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra!" Moreover, such fans will often count flawed genre properties amongst their favourite films ever, knowingly, legitimately defending them as above critical reproach.

The notion that a movie can be "perfect" despite a flaw or two isn't radical. It's, essentially, an extension (or variation) of the label "popcorn movie." Rather than being a term used to describe the type of film though, this breed of "perfect" cinema is "popcorn" in the sense that it's a source of entertainment first and foremost, an example of the end outweighing the sum of its parts. Pure movie, if you will. Drop into your local pub or coffee house and you might well hear something to the effect of "I know the tangent with Dennies Haysbert's getaway driver isn't essential but it's part of what makes Heat so perfect."

Why not liberate yourself from formulaic Channel 4 100 Greatest List territory by reading this list and getting in on the discussion with kindred spirits? See if you can spot the guy championing Office Space's chunky running time, while you're at it. Before you go... behold!

5 of Ian's "Perfect" Movies... with annotations!*
(In no particular order)
  1. Annie Hall (1977.) Dir. Woody Allen. Club Med for neurotic zingers, insightful, touching, hilarious.
  2. Re-Animator (1985.) Dir. Stuart Gordon. Four words: "cat dead; details later?!"
  3. Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986.) Dir. John Hughes. Most films are lucky to have one legendary performance. This has two: Jeffrey Jones and Alan Ruck. It's also the pick of "the Brat Pack" oeuvre.
  4. Starship Troopers (1997.) Dir. Paul Verhoeven.** Devin really called it with this, in the original article. Still a benchmark for pulp sci-fi actioners.
  5. Chasing Amy (1997.) Dir. Kevin Smith. The film his detractors say he peaked with. An endearing, supremely quotable charmer with what should have been a star-making turn from Jason Lee.
After reading this article, maybe you'll feel like sharing your own "perfect" movies here. Or maybe you'll want to bust my balls for not featuring older movies. Be my guest in the comments section below, movie Nazi!

* I'm trying not to repeat myself, so no Office Space or Heat.
** This wasn't an easy choice, as the mercurial Dutchman could easily warrant a list of his own.

--

Ian Pratt is looking forward to G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra. He's really more of a Rachel Nichols fan, though.

Tuesday 7 July 2009

One-Shot (07/07/09)

Ethan Hawke needs to be busier.

Monday 6 July 2009

One-Shot (06/07/09)

Weak. "From the mind of..." just pipped "from the visionary director of..." to the Most Audacious Trailer Boast of all-time.

Sunday 5 July 2009

One-Shot (05/07/09)

Andy Roddick deserves great things.

Saturday 4 July 2009

One-Shot (04/07/09)

The trailer for I Love You, Beth Cooper is like a Lovecraftian onion: sprawling and grotesque on many levels.

Also, happy Independence Day, America!

Friday 3 July 2009

One-Shot (03/07/09)

I'm two-for-two in the not getting classic rock ticket stakes; the two in question being Faith No More and the Pixies. I blame mutual lack of a Belfast date for this debacle, of course.

Thursday 2 July 2009

One-Shot (02/07/09)

It's been a good day. Chris has updated our new site to fantastic effect and The CHUD Show, a podcast dear to my heart as anyone reading this will probably know, is pushing its own envelope. I'm more excited to hear the results of their first foray into the "live" realm than I am to hear any album, imminent or otherwise. If that doesn't make you wanna check it, it's no skin off my nose because you clearly have no taste.

Wednesday 1 July 2009

One-Shot (01/07/09)

H.P. Lovecraft's writing could've used a few less "thesaurus moments" and a lot less "inconceivables" and "unimaginables."