Movie: All About Steve

I've stopped reading/listening to movie reviews until after I've seen the film so I view it on its own merits rather than someone else's.  Still, since I watch about everything through Netflix, by the time the movie comes, I've heard about it.  I heard only bad things about All About Steve and was expecting terrible.

This movie comes under the genre of Silly.  But for a silly movie it was delightful and for the life of me, I can't figure out what the critics were bitching about.  The movie allows us to look at people we would consider "peculiar" and empathize with them.  Sandra Bullock plays a girl who is too smart for her own good, she is book intelligent but socially naive.

I'm thinking it was because Ms. Bullock played a different role than her usual fare such as in The Proposal or Two Weeks Notice.  If you like the comedy/romance genre, you will probably enjoy Proposal.  Betty White is especially funny in the movie.

Back to All About Steve, my significant other said he could see very well why the critics didn't like the movie:  it was stupid.  Of course, he says that about almost everything, so take that with a grain of salt.

Movie: Frailty

When I ordered this movie, it seemed like maybe I had seen it before.  Turns out, I had, but I couldn't remember one single thing about it -- nothing stuck in my head including the ending.  So, since I didn't know what was going to happen, I watched it again.

You know, that was a pretty good movie.  It stared Matthew McConaughey back before he was a drop-dead gorgeous hunk, in this movie he's just a nice-looking hunk.

This movie is just the right amount of creepy.  There is not a lot of blood in this movie, which proves my point blood and gore are gross and don't add to the fear intensity of a good thriller.  There's violence and murder, but you don't see the stabbing and the blood spurting out and the guts all over the floor, and the movie is still intense.

As I recall, watching it the first time, it was kind of hard to understand.  This time -- I'm no genius here -- I got it.  Overall, however, it is not worth two viewings, but if you like tales of murder and woe, grab some popcorn and enjoy.

Movie: Inglourious Basterds

When trying to think of something to say about the movie Inglourious Basterds, the phrase: worst movie of the year comes to mind.  Chapter 1, is quite good and lulls you into thinking the rest of the movie will only get better.  Quite the deception.  After watching the film for over an hour, I wondered when and if it would ever end, looked on the Netflix cover to find it was a two and half hour movie.  In my opinion the movie was two hours and fifteen minutes too long.

One scene was so long and tedious I fast forwarded.  Since most of the movie  has sub-titles and I am a fast reader, I was able to fast forward until the end, then put it on regular speed and finished it off before midnight.

In the movie, Brad Pitt played himself as a doofus.  Whenever I see Brad Pitt in a movie or on a tabloid, I always ask myself this question:  How is this guy supposed to be God's gift to women and what does Angelina Jolie see in him?  Okay,  2 questions.  AJ was married to the multi-talented and handsome Billy  Bob Thornton, and then she settles for a doofus.  I do not get it.  But then I don't go for pretty boys.  I go for really, really smart guys.   When I hear a guy talking about his 2 PhD's and work as a nuclear physicist, whew, I'm hot.  I don't care if he has beady eyes and pop bottle glasses, umm, baby.

Movie: Julie and Julia

How does one review a movie that was enjoyed, but not immensely?  It's easier to review something you either passionately hate or passionately love, but most of the movies deliver neither.  This movie was okay and you don't have to like cooking or even French food to watch it.  Meryl Streep, as usual, gave a superb performance.  

What the movie did not do was inspire  me to buy either Julia Child's cookbook or to read Julie's blog.  But then, I don't cook.

There's a reason for that.

Nobody eats what I cook.  Oh, a lot of times it tastes okay, but there is always a missing ingredient to my recipes -- love.  It's just not there.  Cooking for me is a chore and apparently a chore for anyone who happens to eat what I prepared.  Ask husband number 1 who took my hard cooked dinner and threw it on the floor screaming:  You expect me to eat this shit! Ask husband number 2 who did the exact same thing.  But I do learn from my mistakes.  No more marriages and no more cooking.

My honey-bunny has to take us out to eat 2 times a day, or prepare food himself, which he refuses to do, so we eat out all the time.  We should get some kind of award for eating out the more than anybody in the world.  What's worse, we live in Huntsville, Alabama and the restaurant offerings are terrible here.  Just terrible.  They over-salt everything.  We found a really good Indian restaurant and it went out of business because the food was spicy, delicious and authentic.  Now we're stuck with the other Indian restaurant that serves on its all you can eat lunch buffet:  fried okra.  Their food is also bland and over-salted.  There are 3 Thai restaurants in town and only one is worth patronizing.  Unfortunately for us, they are on the other side of town and pricey, pricey, pricey.  When I lived in the San Francisco Bay area, we could get great Pad Se Eu just down the street for $8.95.  In Huntsville for the same dish, almost as tasty, we pay $12.95.

Oh, and one time I was asking my neighbor where to go for a salad bar, and she didn't know what a salad bar was, had to think a minute, and then suggested a couple of greasy spoon buffets -- both dirty, both with over-cooked vegetables and lots and lots of fried.

Even though we eat out all the time, we try and eat healthy -- which here in the deep south is an oxymoron; and sometimes I would actually like to learn to cook.  Occasionally, I'll go to the Farmer's Market and load up on Amish veggies, which is wonderful -- but I have no clue what to do with them.  There's no way I'm going to flour up anything and fry it.  There just has to be a better way.

In the meantime, we have reservations at 7.

Television: Dexter

John Lithgow is one of my favorite actors and I follow him on Twitter.  When I found out he was playing a bad guy in Dexter, I quick, put Dexter Season 1 on my Netflix queue and put the first CD all the way to the top.

I'm sort of anal, and I couldn't just start watching Season 4 of Dexter without seeing every single episode of every single season.  A couple of days later Dexter arrived, and I was all excited because this is my genre.  It turned out to be mind-numbing and terrible.  There was too much blood and death, there's a lot of death in 24 but not so much blood.  Yes, I know it's fake blood, but it is still icky.  What's more, Dexter is just okay looking, but he's not very interesting to look at -- and he's a psychopath and has no emotion.  Playing an emotionless person doesn't lend itself to a lot of drama.  Yet, Data in Star Trek Next Generation was a android without emotion and he pulled it off.  He became one of the most interesting characters in the show.  Dexter is not an interesting character.  Yet he's doing very interesting things and people around him are interesting...and I do want to see John Lithgow.  Hmm.

So I'm in this anal-retentive quandary.  Do I skip all the seasons and go ahead to Season 4 and just watch Lithgow;  all the while intensely bothered about all the shows I missed?  Or do I sit through and watch the gory details of each episode and hope like hell the show gets better?  Any suggestions from anyone out there who on some slim chance is reading this blog because hell froze over?

Movie: Bruno vs. Borat

Whenever I watch a movie with Sacha Cohen (not to be confused with Sasha Cohen, which I did, but it turns out Sasha is a figure skater where Sacha is not)  -- either Bruno or Borat -- I wonder many things:
     What in the movie was set-up vs. what wasn't
     Does he stay in character even when the cameras aren't rolling
     How does his wife put up with him and just how mentally deranged is this guy.
But he could be a Howard Stern type person:  obnoxious for the job and at home a pussycat.  Who knows.

Both movies are worth seeing, but Borat is much, much better and funnier.  Borat gives us a character that is naive and likable, whereas there is not much to like about the self-centered, worldly-wise Bruno.

Movie: 17 Again and 13 Going on 30 and my cousin Steve

Both of these movies have a lot more in common besides having numbers in their titles.  In 13 Going on 30 Jennifer Garner (or the girl who was playing the 13 year old role) is magically transported to being Jennifer Garner and 30 years old.  In 17 Again Matthew Perry goes back in time to when he was 17 and becomes Zac Efron.  13 Going on 30 is a "girlie" movie, and 17 Again tries to be more "manly" and had some kind of sporting event that required an orange ball and a hoop and some cheerleaders.

I preferred 13 Going on 30.  Jennifer Garner was just too cute.

In 17 Again, however, Thomas Lennon played the rich, eccentric friend of Matthew Perry; and I'll be darned if he doesn't look  exactly like my cousin Steve. He acted like him too, except Steve would be into sports and not into Dungeons and Dragons or Spock, or whatever it was with the ears.  Thomas Lennon even had the same facial expressions and movements as my cousin Steve.  Is that not amazing?  I think he and Steve must be related and don't even know it.

Steve and I rarely see each other.  We played together when we were kids and he was really mean and rough with me and never got into trouble for it.  When we were real little we took baths together and the last time we were together he said:  Ha, ha, ha remember when we were little and took a bath together and I peed in the tub and you were screaming.  Ha, ha, ha.

I said:  I think that was one of those memories I successfully repressed, thank you for bringing that terrible event back to the surface.  It's coming back now, why I hate you.

Documentary: The Corporation

The best thing about this movie is how it likens a corporation to a psychopath, which explains why according to the book Snakes in Suits, (see previous blog) why there are so many psychopathic personalities in the corporate world.  The Corporation is well worth viewing maybe even a couple of times.

The problem with this movie (and with many documentaries) is that the the producers/directors -- whoever they are -- have information and a message they want to get across.  But they are so focused on getting their message across they forget how their film will be perceived by the viewer.  So many documentaries become "talking heads" films interspersed with photographs or video-clips.  The Corporation did a good job steering away from being a "talking head" movie; but tried to encompass everything -- and I mean everything -- wrong about corporations into one film.  Thus it runs around 2-1/2 hours which feels like 4 when you have to use the bathroom.

My recommendation for this movie is to take a break in the middle and come back to the final part later.

Snakes on a Plane vs. Snakes in Suits

Snakes on a Plane is a movie that got very bad reviews which I didn't see, because it just sounded stupid. Snakes in Suits is a non-fiction book which I read and enjoyed and believe everyone who has to work for a living should read.  Because Snakes in Suits is about the psychopath in the workplace.  It turns out not all psychopathic personalities are serial killers.  You actually may know a few.

If you also read the Sociopath Next Door, the author's statistic is about 1 in 25 people fit the psychopathic disorder profile.  Wow.  One evening after reading the book and driving home in the suburbs, I assumed two adults per house and disregarded children.  That would be mean that statistically every 13th house could contain a psychopath/sociopath. That's a lot of people. Determining where they actually live is another matter.

Snakes in Suits is an easy and interesting read.  It is very informative and a little bit scary.  All of a sudden you will understand that those lying, manipulative, two-faced people you've worked with who made your life miserable were likely psychopaths.  It explains what they do and how they do it.

The authors make it very clear you should not start labeling people psychopaths, but, of course, I ignored that advice and made a list of everybody who fit the profile.  You can do the same.

Snakes in Suits is written by Paul Babiak and Robert D. Hare.  Both have studied psychopaths, and Hare is a world-renowned expert on psychopathy and wrote the book: Without Conscience.
The Sociopath Next Door is written by Martha Stout.

 

Movies: "Babel" and "11:14

Excellent movie centering around a rifle.  Different vignettes of people's lives who owned or used it.

Good movies need to be discussed and Babel left me with a major question.  When the father comes home and sees his daughter standing naked on the balcony -- and he knows a man just left the apartment -- the father comes up and they share a tender moment.  Deaf or not, if my father witnessed this, I would have heard:  Get your clothes on!  There would be no hugs, and definitely no understanding.  So what was going on here?  Is there a cultural different I don't understand, was it symbolic of her exposing her entire self to him, or was there some kind of incestuous relationship between them?

The movie 11:14 is similar to Babel -- and why did they title that movie Babel?  The only Babel I know about is the Biblical tower of Babel?  Was it because so many different languages were spoken in the film?

Oh, 11:14 is similar to Babel but it has several vignettes centering around an accident that happened exactly at 11:14.  It is not as good as Babel, but well worth watching if you like vignette-types of movies.  You have to watch these kind of movies more carefully and think a little bit -- that is if they are well done.  Again, maybe I missed something, but what in the world was that girl going to do with that bowling ball?  Did not get that at all!

Movies: Ghosts of Girlfriends Past and also Guess Who

Besides starting with the letter "G," these movies have something else in common:  they are classics reworked with a twist.  Guess Who is a take on Guess Who's Coming to Dinner.  This time instead of a white chick in the 60's bringing home her black fiance to meet her parents, it is reversed, now she is black and bringing home her white guy to meet the folks.  Even with Bernie Mac, Guess lacks laughs.

Ghosts of Girlfriends Past is a remake of a Christmas Carol but instead of Scrooge learning about the Xmas Spirit, it is Matthew McConaughey who learns about love and commitment and crap like that and gets kind-of sappy at the end.

You can't go wrong with a classic, can you?

Both movies are extremely predictable, and I managed to stay awake throughout each of them.  But I liked Ghosts and Guess left me kind of flat.  Naturally, I have to torment myself as to why?  Why did I prefer Ghosts over Guess?  Why? Why? Why?

Was is that Matthew McConaughey is just so sexy and good to watch?   No, but he is just yummy.

Was Guess lacking in heart?  No, it had a little heart.

I had to think about this until I came up with an answer, even though there are so many more important things in the world that I should be thinking about instead:  poverty, pollution, politics, tornadoes.  Real issues.  I live in the tornado belt and those things are scary. I mean SCARY! Especially in the middle of the night when the tornado siren goes off and wakes you out of a sound sleep.  You wake up and it takes you about 15 minutes to figure out what that noise is:  why is my alarm going off in the middle of the night,?  Did I set it wrong?  How come it won't go off when I hit the snooze button?  And then:  OH, NO, Tornado! Bolt to the basement and huddle down there wondering what's going on.   Nothing happens, but the siren is still going, so I always go back upstairs to see if anything is coming.

So I finally figured out why I like Ghosts and not so much Guess.  In Ghosts the main character -- that good looking hunk of a man -- Matthrew McConaughey, gains some insight into his own self.  He gets to see himself how others see him.  While he thinks he's being sophisticated and funny, others see him as a jerk.   He sees how his actions that he considered inconsequential, hurts others.  Ah-ha -- characters that are less than perfect and are able to grow, make for interesting watching.

Prison Break: The Final Break

When describing the 2 hour finale to the series Prison Break, one word comes to mind:  unnecessary.

One question keeps ringing in my ears:  How is it possible that a series that started out so strong, interesting and thrilling ends up weak, boring and plain old blah?

They could have tightened up Season 4 and incorporated all of this in the last season.

Sara looked terrible and Gretchen was getting a little chunky.

The only interesting character in The Final Break was Big Daddy, who heretofore shall be called Daddy-Dyke, but they didn't even tell us why she was in prison.  What's more, Daddy-Dyke was married, so how can she be Daddy-Dyke?  I was waiting for the line where she claimed she murdered her husband for cheating on her.  Then she could have added:  That would have only gotten me 12 years, but when I ripped his heart out and chopped it up and sauteed it with some garlic and vegetables, they said that showed no remorse and so I'm in here for life.  Then Sara, always calm and always wise would say:  Why didn't you just get a divorce?

Daddy-Dyke was so good, if they ever do a women-in-prison type TV series she should be the main foil.  This isn't a bad idea here.  How about a Texas women's prison, and some cute young thing is falsely convicted and accused of some heinous crime.  Instead of focusing on the escape, focus on the dysfunction and abuse in the prison.  All the women (guards and prisoners) could be PMS-ing all at the same time, and they could get really mean.  They could bring in this woman half crazy who claims up and down she didn't kill her child and keeps insisting:  A dingo ate my baby.  Having scenes with the women showering would be sure to get the male viewership, and women would watch because of its intense plot and off-beat characters.

Movie: Dillinger with Johnny Depp except the Movie is actually Public Enemy...I think

I love Johnny Depp.  As an actor, he is really fun to watch. He is just cute. Unfortunately, just because I love an actor, doesn't mean I will go see all their movies.  No matter how much I like someone, if the movie doesn't interest me, I won't go see it.  Likewise, if I really hate an actor, like Angelina Jolie, but she's in a movie that I would like to see I'll go see it.  I don't hate Angeline Jolie, I'm just jealous -- not of Brad Pitt or her big lips, but her great body.  God, I hate her.

A long time ago I knew this guy and his last name was Dillinger, and his first name was maybe John, or Steve, or Brian or something like that.  I asked him if he happened to be any relation to the notorious criminal John Dillinger.  He said he was, that the criminal Dillinger was like a great uncle or something.  How cool!  He said it wasn't cool, that their entire family had a bad name due to him.  I guess that movie's going to bring up some bad memories.

When I heard Johnny Depp had another movie out, I was jumping and down, shouting with joy; and my boyfriend who hates Johnny Depp because of his politics said there was no way we were going to see that movie.  Of course, I always have to have my way, and I convinced him that we should see it anyway, because after it was Johnny Depp, who was so distractingly attractive when he played that pirate.

Yeah, he looked good in Pirates of the Caribbean.  It gave me plenty of fantasy material for years. Is there something wrong with me that I'm attracted to the slimy, unkempt pirate with braided beard over that nice Orlando Bloom, who anyone could take home and proudly introduce him to mother?

Anyway, the previews for Dillinger were happening and I realized the only reason I wanted to see the film was because it starred Johnny Depp.  But Johnny Depp wasn't looking very much like a pirate in that movie, so I decided to defer to my boyfriend's stupid politics and pass.

You know how like on Facebook they're always doing those stupid quizzes? I think they should do a Johnny Depp quiz where you guess his movie based on a picture of his teeth.  It would go something like this:
Question 1:   A picture of smiling lips and big, white straight teeth.
    a.  Chocolat    b.  What's Eating Gilbert Grape  c.  Charlie and the Chocolate Factory d. Ed Wood
Question 2:  A picture of a mouth full of braces.
   a.  Blow   b.  The Secret Window  c.  The Ninth Gate  d.  Edward Scissorhands
Question 3:  A picture of mouth full of crooked, rotten teeth.
   a.  Arizona Dream  b.  Platoon  c.  From Hell  d.  The Libertine
Question 4:  A picture of his gold tooth  -- easy Pirates of the Caribbean, but wait
  a.  Pirates 1   b.  Pirates 2   c.  Pirates 3  d.  all of the above  e.  Pirates 1 & 2

PS:  Great news,  a Pirates 4 is coming.  Yippie Skippie.  I'm getting hot just thinking about that bad boy Jack Sparrow.

Movie: Greenfingers

Slow start, it takes about 30 minutes to get into it.  Then the film gets a lot better and is worth watching.  It's about prisoners gardening.  Parts are delightful, makes you want to go plant a garden.

Television: Grey's Anatomy

Last week was the 2-hour season premier of Grey's Anatomy.  I sort of listened to it while I worked on the computer.  Regardless of all it's flaws, I'm hooked.

Last night (Oct 8, '09) I broke down and watched it in its entirety.  I correctly predicted that Little Grey would not be a match for her father's liver and that Meredith would be a match and in the end donate a portion of her liver.  The cynic in me thought her father would die anyway and Meredith would have gone through that whole operation for nothing, but he lived.  I guess they're going to let Meredith finally come to terms with her father. There were a couple more predictable events in the show; hopefully as the season drags on it will get better.

Grey's Anatomy started going downhill Season 1 when they hosted a high school prom in the hospital.  Oh, yeah, that was totally believable.  Then it redeemed itself with the dramatic scene of Izzy falling apart when her sick-guy (Denny) died, but I had the distinct feeling kids out of high school were writing the script.

The next major flaw was the season where Izzy fell for George.  George?  Oh, yeah, that's going to happen.  Izzy and George, come on.  Izzy played it well, but did any viewer out there for one second find that pairing believable?  I wish they had done more with George and his wife instead of making her gay.

Speaking of gay, my boyfriend always goes on-line and checks out actors and actresses and reads up on what is going to happen.  He looked up Grey's Anatomy and comes to me, guess who on the show is gay.

Me:  In real life or on the show?
Him:  In real life.
Me:  I have no clue and I don't care.
Him:  Come on, guess.  Just one guess, come on.
Me:  George?
Him:  Bingo!

What I didn't understand is since they are exploring gay relationships, why they didn't just make George gay.  Let him and Callie deal with that one.  Oh well, he's dead and the show goes on.  Maybe in typical soap opera fashion they'll bring him back alive somehow.

My favorite character on the show is Sandra Oh.  I just like her, I liked her in the movie Sideways too.  That was a good movie.  You know how they're doing product placement in TV and movies.  Whenever I'm watching something and I see product placement, I yell out, "Product Placement!"  My boyfriend snarls at me to shut-up.  Well, the movie Sideways was like a total product placement for Napa Valley. Afterwards I just wanted to go out and drink wine.

So anyway, I really liked the romance Sandra Oh had with that black guy who turned out to be a homophobe so they fired him.  Now that George is gone maybe they'll bring him back so Sandra Oh can choose between him and that rough and tumble red-haired army guy.  I can never remember these people's names.  That would certainly heat up Grey's lukewarm seasonal start.

Television: Carnivale

Carnivale takes place during the 30's dustbowl.  That with a cast of freaky characters is exactly like something I would want to watch.  Disk 1 came up on Netflix and my boyfriend and I started watching.  I remember a woman throwing up coins which was pretty cool -- I wish I could do that.   Then I woke up and the show was over.

Me:  What happened?
Boyfriend:  Nothing.
Me:  I mean on the program.
Boyfriend:  Nothing.
Me:  Mind if I put it back where the woman was throwing up coins?
Boyfriend:  I do actually.
Me:  You want to watch the next installment?
Boyfriend:  Not really.
Me:  Okay then.

The only thing I can really say about this show is it might be really good for insomniacs.

Movie: Inconvenient Truth

I was afraid to watch this film because it would be too depressing, reminding us that the earth as we know it is being destroyed and very little is being done to stop it.  Kind of makes you want to jump off a cliff.

Al Gore explains in layman's terms the compelling evidence of global warming.  Unlike most documentaries which become those "talking head" movies, this one steers clear of that and isn't too boring. There are some tedious parts, but overall, it is very interesting and watchable.

Rather than learning more about Al Gore, however, I would have liked to hear more of the hard science.  He explained a little about how some of the science was done, but more may have been dull, but it would have made the movie more substantive.  I would have liked some of these scientists to be interviewed and seen names and institutions doing this research.

Overall, it is a good film with an important message and well worth your time.

Prison Break, 24 and spirituality???

As I mentioned before we are temporarily living in Huntsville, Alabama. We really don't fit in the Bible Belt: not that I have anything against fundamentalist and evangelical Christianity. I'm not religious, but I am striving to become spiritual. To me, spirituality is life affirming, being thankful, finding inner peace, being kind, etc. Being religious is adhering to a dogma. People here tend to be on the dogmatic side so we keep to ourselves. Thanks to Netflix, we order movies and TV shows to fill the long, quiet evenings. It's really great watching TV shows without commercial breaks, and not having to wait a week or more for the next addition. Who cares if you have to wait a year before you see the season, we're going to do that with Grey's Anatomy.

Right now we've started season 4 of Prison Break. Seasons 1-3 turned out to be exceptionally good. We'll watch an entire disk in the evening and it gets me all wired up so I can't sleep and I'm thinking about the show and analyzing and trying to second guess where its going to go. My boyfriend is really bad, he cheated and read what's going to happen. He keeps telling me these tidbits and I plug my ears and scream, "Don't Tell Me! Okay, tell me a little. No, no more. Good, Sara and Michael get married."

24 and Prison Break are similar genres. But Prison Break is so much better (as compared the the first season of 24). Although 24 was gritty, edgy and exciting and also wired me up too much to sleep, I didn't really like any of the characters. To me, all the women in 24 were either needy, bitches or in the case of the teenager girl...both. The one female character who seemed to have her act together turned out to be the bad guy. What's more, it seemed like someone was getting shot and killed every 15 minutes. On one CD that would be 16 people a night. I don't know how healthy it is to be watching that many people being murdered in the course of an evening, and it is definitely not spiritual. I've heard that instead of watching crap like 24, spiritual people need to be careful what they view and watch uplifting movies and television programming. So instead of Season 2 of 24, I thought I'd give Prison Break a chance.

Once I started watching Prison Break there was no stopping. It is that good, and my spirituality has gone down the toilet. A lot of people do get killed in this one, but not as much as 24. In fact, sometimes there's an entire show where no one gets killed! Prison Break actually has some character development and I like every single character in that show, even the bad ones. In this case, especially the bad ones. It is fast paced, interesting, gritty and well...I characterize this show as a "manly" soap opera. But I'm female and still love it.

Unfortunately they killed off one of my favorite characters early in the second season. He was the mafia guy who, I don't know his name, but he's actually Swedish presumably from Sweden.

Another one of my favorite characters is Sara. She has such a pretty complexion, it just glows. I wonder if it's her make-up or diet or just good genes. I bet she eats her vegetables.

The show does have its drawbacks. When you watch 4 shows on CD sans commercials the common-occuring, strangely bizarre coincidences that save the day become just a little too obvious.

One of the biggest drawbacks of this show is they filmed most of it in or around Dallas, TX. In Season 2, this became readily apparent. They did not get their geography correct at all. Especially Utah. Instead of looking arid, mountainous and rugged, Utah looked flat and fertile, more like what you would see in the the mid-west as in maybe Texas outside of Dallas. The time, distance and season didn't correspond either. First it's winter then the grass is green and leaves are on the trees. The convicts drive across the country and make it from Illinois to Utah in what seems like a matter of hours. All that driving and they're not even stiff and tired. Then Season 3 this was supposed to take place in Panama, and they're on this dirt road and there's a tree in the background with yellow autumn leaves. Autumn in Panama, hmm. Because they had to film mostly in Texas and couldn't get their geography correct, it gave the show the appearance of a low-budget movie.

Other than that, watching Prison Break is a lot of fun, which either speaks well of the show or how boring life is here in Huntsville. The first and third season has the main characters in prison, and the way prison-life is depicted on this show seems very close to how it would be in real life. It was almost too bad they escaped because the prison dynamics was fascinating, especially with the corrupt guard, Bellick, who is just mean.

Another aspect that makes the program so good is several of the key players are very, very smart. You have the main character Michael Scofield, and he is a genius. He is the good, thoughtful man who thinks things through and wants to see justice and goodness prevail in the world. Couldn't hurt a fly. Then you have the evil genius who in some ways makes the show. That character is often called T-bag, and he played the role so well I actually looked up the actor's name and profile: Robert Knepper. What is amazing is he's been in other movies/TV that I've seen and he went by completely unnoticed. I noticed him as T-Bag.

Mr. Knepper has created a character who is a cold-blooded, sexual predator and murderer from Alabama, but I don't think it's Huntsville. He talks and acts exactly like the people around here. T-bag can be very creepy and very scary and looks out for Number 1. His character is totally believable. Yes, Robert Knepper plays that part a little too well.

I can actually see him watching the show with his wife and kids, and asking her what she thought. And she would say something like, "You did a great job with that character dear. He's very scary. You are so not like that."

Then he would say, "Well, I am an actor." Then they would go to bed and they'd snuggle together and he would say, "I have a confession to make. The acting part is how I am with you, I'm really T-bag."

Then her eyes would get real big and he would hug her and say, "Just kidding, Ha, Ha, Ha."

Then she would say, "That wasn't funny."

He'd apologize, "Yeah, bad joke. Sorry."

He'd roll over and go to sleep. She'd be wide awake and sneak out of bed, snatch her purse. Tiptoe and wake up the kids and whisper, "Kids, get in the car. Quiet now. No daddy's not coming. Shh,shh,shh, I'll explain once we're safely in a hotel."

Prison Break Season 4

Well, well, well. The final season of Prison Break is non-compelling to say the least. It starts out pretty good, (3 stars) but dwindles down to 2 stars. I would give Season 1 and 2 five stars because those seasons are worth seeing again.

The first season of the show was absolutely phenomenal. I don't think I've ever seen better TV programming. What is aggravating, is they didn't need to break out of prison so quickly. Season 1 could have been the first attempt that failed. Perhaps Sara unlocked the door, but someone else locked it back. Linc's attorney manages a stay long enough for a second Season 2 they're still in prison and Scofield uses his tatooed blueprints to figure yet another way out.

There was plenty to work with the prison to maintain the intensity and drama for two seasons within the prison. Linc could have gotten a stay right at the end of season one allowing him to escape execution until the end of Season two. More could have been developed with the mafia-guy (aka my Swede) and I could have enjoyed watching him for two seasons instead of one. Who he was and what he was doing didn't make a lot of sense and that could have been clarified.

More could have been done with Bellick. Wade Williams was perfect in that role and it would have been interesting to develop his character more. Here's this big, bully guard on the take, acting all macho and living with his mother. Do something with that. Don't treat him like a cartoon. Let us meet his Bellick's mother and let us learn more why he can't cut the apron strings.

When Linc's lawyer got stuck in that house with the VP's brother, she was immediately killed off. Wait a minute. A house that you can enter and not leave is an interesting concept. Explore it a little bit. Let her be in there for a few episodes trying to get out. Wouldn't the VP's brother be horny and try and rape her? Or would he not do that, but seriously enjoy the company? Would she be able to convince him to do the right thing? Maybe they would try to escape together. See the title of the show is Prison Break, and prisons don't always have to be actual prisons.

Season 2 brought in the brilliant FBI agent Alex. He was able to second guess what Scofield had planned. This was fascinating. Yet, they didn't work with that, they just quickly moved all the cast into Utah (which didn't look like any part of Utah, I've ever seen and I've seen a lot of Utah) and made Alex a dirty cop and a drug addict. It would have taken at least two days of heavy driving of 10 hours or more to go from Chicago to Salt Lake. Yet, these guys seemed to magically arrive in a matter of hours and still have time to start a romance, have a hand sewn back on, and other exciting adventures.

It would have been just as thrilling to allow them a normal amount of time to get to the destination. Come on, these guys are wanted by the law. Some people would recognize them, many wouldn't. They would be leaving a trail, Alex could systematically sniff them out. A few are dangerous, Sara's having a nervous break-down and losing her job. Oh, yeah, and the crazy guy, he was great. I loved him, he could caused all kinds of problems and befuddled the cops because he had no logic. Why didn't they milk this stuff? No, they decided to drag out season 4 which was predictable, cliched and unexciting. Okay, it was a little bit exciting. But the only real reason to watch Season Four is because the characters were so good and interesting we had to find out what happened to them, which was almost exactly how I predicted.

My guess was "Can't hurt a Fly" Scofield was going to kill T-Bag. It didn't quite happen like that.

Probably because I watched Season 4 through Netflix, sans commercial four shows a night, it was easy to catch all the flaws in logic. Scofield has almost superhuman powers in determining his next move, which gets kind of old. Does he really have to be perfect?

Here's some things in Season 4 I didn't believe:

That Self would kill his partner then be good again.

That Bellick would give his life for the cause.

That T-bag cared so much for his mother, when it seemed like she was never really in his life.

They seemed to really contrive some situations in order to keep T-bag in the picture.

That the General would be unguarded with all this stuff going down at the end.

That Scofield's mother would have that much antagonism toward Linc.

That Linc would be 5 hours near death, and then with a little patchwork from Sara be ready to go.

That Kellerman and those two other guys would magically reappear to save the day.

I had problems with Gretchen in Season 4. When she first appeared (Season 3?) she started out as a weak actress and I didn't believe for a minute she was a mean person. Then her acting improved dramatically and I was entranced by how wicked she could be. Although too contrived in putting Gretchen and T-Bag together, their pairing was fun. I wanted to understand their relationship better. Then Self comes on the scene and it was like Gretchen lost her evil edge. Were they goofing off between scenes and she couldn't get back into character?

Neither the General or Scofield's mother were interesting characters. Their quest for world domination and with Michael's super-brain power made this seem more like a Batman movie gone wrong.

This final season dragged on and on, and they decided to milk it some more with the Final Break, which I have not seen, but read about and it sounds stupid. First, I can't believe that given the circumstances Sara would end up in prison for killing Scofield's mom. Didn't she sign a release that gave her immunity from all that anyway? Oh well, it's somewhere down my queue and comes when it comes.

Movie Nerd and the Secret of Roan Innish

A long time ago, I met this guy who I can't remember his name, but he was a real dweeb and a movie nerd, which was wonderful because I like dweebs and movies.

The best part of watching a movie, is going out for coffee and cake (or, in my case, tofu and bottled water) and analyzing the film. Most people don't do that. Usually, after a movie, it's like this:

Me: Did you like the movie?

Them: Yeah, did you?

Me: Yeah, what did you like about it?

Them: What do you mean what did I like about it? I liked the movie, okay.

Me: Yeah, but what made it good? The plot? The way the actor played the part, the...

Them: We're not in school, okay. It was good.

But Movie Nerd was the type of guy to analyze movies even more than I do, and he had seen like every movie in the world. What's more, he was an Alfred Hitchcock fan and had memorized every single movie script. It was amazing. I don't even think actors actually remember their lines when they're done saying them.

So, we were at this party, and it turned out he was Movie Nerd, and talking about -- what else -- movies. So I started asking him about various movies, and he had seen every single one I asked him about, and what his opinion was regarding the movie. He responded with well thought out reasons about what made a movie good or bad. I was in heaven, then I asked him about "The Secrect of Roan Innish."

You see, I didn't like that movie. I hated that movie, and I guess I'm the only person in the world who hated that movie. I went with my girlfriend and the movie started out okay, then it got terrible. The little girl just grated on my nerves and there was all these stupid stories, and sat through the whole movie inwardly groaning.

Have you ever been to a really bad movie and someone in the audience starts ad-libbing lines to the movie that actually make it funny? I wanted to be that person in Roan Innish, but all I could come up with was, "Oh, no, not another story." Which isn't funny, and would have gotten me killed since I was the only one in the crowded theatre who was gagging at every line throughout the film. I think that is the worst movie I've ever sat through in my life. There are movies I refused to see because I knew I would hate them, there are movies that I have walked out on or stopped the DVD player. I would have walked out on this one, but it would have left my girlfriend stranded who was absorbed and thrilled throughout the entire film. For me it was like two hours of tedius, fingernails clawing a chalkboard type movie.

My girlfriend was just enthralled by the movie so was everyone else in the audience. Afterwards she was, "Oh, that was so wonderful." Unfortunately I couldn't share her enthusiasm and I didn't want to dampen her mood, but I still had to be honest, so I gave a cool response. She didn't want to hear me rag about a movie she adored, so we changed subjects discussed something else.

When I brought up Roan Innish to Movie Nerd he also sang its praises. Now was my chance to trash the film and I did. We got into a fight.

Him: How could you not like that movie?

Me: It was boring. I did not find the children believable, the stories were tedious and it was not a thriller. It had the word secret in the the title which to me suggested a mystery, and the only mystery I found was how anyone else could like this movie. (Or something like that, it was a long time ago.)

He was actually offended that I didn't like this movie and the likelihood of him asking me out to the movies had decreased by 100%. He said: Your negative reaction to the movie just proves my point that it was a fantastic movie as it created a strong emotion which all good movies do.

Since we were never going to be friends, I should have said: No, I would have walked out and demanded my money back on this one but I was with my girlfriend and she liked it.

He would have said: Can I meet your girlfriend?

That was it, we parted on cool terms and Movie Nerd was forever out of my life. Darn, why couldn't I have liked that stupid movie? I'm really, really attracted to geeky, nerdy guys. But they are so not attracted to me, I have to settle for dating good-looking, handsome men, who are lacking in brilliance. Oh, the irony. I'm sure Movie Nerd would appreciate that.

Movie: The Island

Is it possible to combine cerebral with action-packed adventure? That's what the movie The Island tries to do, and succeeds in making a long-ass, boring movie.

The basic concept is fascinating and deserving of exploration. Rich people are paying big money to clone themselves to harvest body parts for a longer life. They are told their clones are kept in stasis and never are conscious. What the administrators discovered however, was the only way to keep the clones (product--as they are called in the movie) viable is to allow them to have consciousness and to live their lives. The administrator created a controlled environment for them to thrive. They are programmed with childhood memories and told they are survivors of a global contamination and must stay within the enclosed community. There is only one place outside the underground city that is free from deadly contamination called the island. The winner of the on-going lottery will allow them to live the rest of their live on the tropical paradise.

This is all a lie, of course, the winner of the lottery is going to have their body parts harvested for their genetic look-alike who had them cloned to insure a longer life.

Naturally two of the clones find out about this and discover the outside world is not contaminated after all. They must be brought back into the fold and eliminated. Here come the long tedious chase scenes, car crashes, smashed buildings, the destruction goes on and on.

Yawn. There are three of these ad infinitum chase scenes and another boring sex scene without any real sex. Snore.

Rather than bore us with the same-ol' smash 'em up/tear it down; there were to aspects of the movie that needed exploring. The first was that as the clones became older (they were cloned at the same age of their adult payee, but were basically children) they started picking up more and more human attributes such as curiosity. What's more, they seemed to start knowing aspects of their DNA contributor's lives. The second was when the hero and heroine escape to the real world with adult bodies but the minds of children. Watching how they adapted from a confined, protected world to one where anything goes could have been very interesting and funny. No, we got cars flipping over instead.

TV: Criminal Minds, Numb3rs, Without a Trace

These crime television shows are repeats of the same mindless and predictable crap that Hollywood puts out on a regular basis.

Here's where these shows went wrong. They each had an interesting premise, but they didn't run with it.

Criminal Minds: criminal profiling

Numbers: use of math in solving crimes

Without a Trace: following missing persons rather than murder

Instead it was the same ol', same ol'. The crime is solved at the end of the hour, everything is right with the world again.

The real problem with these shows lay in the 1-dimensional characters. Ah-hem...all you script-writers, producers, directors out there -- 1-dimensional characters are BORING and that makes the show boring.

These shows don't give us anyone to care about. Yes, we don't like the idea of a victim getting shmiced and we want the bad buy getting double shmiced, but they don't give us anyone to hate, or to be afraid of. Rather than giving us a character, they create these horrible, unimaginable crime scenarios, possibly even based on real-life events. However, we mystery lovers have already seen it all, read it all, and been to enough gory movies, it is impossible to come up with any more hideous crimes. You don't need creepy crimes, you need creepy criminals.

I think all 3 of these shows need to be reworked. Part of the problem was these shows had too many characters most of them working on the case. Wait a minute. In real life are there that many people working on one single case? Worse, every single one of these characters are completely focused on their job, nothing else. Hmm, don't these people have lives outside of work? Don't most of them actually hate their jobs? Aren't they getting cynical working with really sicko cases.

Here's a term we learned in high school that people who are going to put out any type of fiction should keep in mind: character development. From scene one, you need to start developing your three main characters, and if the actors aren't up to it, then find some who have enough brains to flesh out a complete person instead of merely speaking someone else's lines.

One of the things that makes 24 so good is to see how the bureaucrats mess slow everything down and mess everything up.

Oh, read the books, Snakes in Suits and the Sociopath Next Door. Apparently not all psychopaths are serial killers. A lot of them find regular jobs and simply lie, cheat and make life miserable for all the other employees. Yet on these TV shows everyone is working smoothly to solve the crime. Come on, bring complexity to these shows, make us care about the victim they're trying to save, love and hate the ones trying to solve the crime and fear the criminal. If the case isn't solved in an hour...well there's another term we learned in highschool and it is called: cliffhanger.

Movie: "Water"

According to Hindu scripture and widow must not remarry. So in the olden days of India (a practice which may continue to this day) widows were sent to live with other widows in an ashram. They cut their hair and wore only white, which might not be too bad if you were a woman sixty or older. But if a girl became a widow at say, age 7, because you were married off even before meeting your husband, she would spend her life without seeing her parents again or having any real companionship or opportunity in life.

They must support themselves in the ashram and do so by begging. One of the women in the group acts as a leader and sends some of the younger women out to prostitute for them. This woman actually reminded me of my friend's sister-in-law. It wasn't her, of course, but every scene she was in, I was thinking, "that's my friend's sister-in-law, no, no that's not her."

Oh, back to the film.

The movie "Water" takes place in India circa 1930's and shows this disturbing aspect of Indian culture. Much of the movie is seen through the eyes of a precocious seven year old girl who doesn't understand why she is there. She meets another young widow in her mid-twenties who takes the child under her wing. This young woman meets a man who has been educated in England and is a follower of the teachings of Gandhi. He has no use for the practice of ostracizing women simply because their husband has died.

As to be expected, the young woman and young man fall in love. He wants to marry her and she is ready to forsake her beliefs and be with him. Because of this trouble erupts, that and the fact the woman who looks like my friend's sister-in-law has been sending her out as a prostitute for her beau's father. What kind of coincidence is that?

Overall, this is a very good movie. For others who like it there is a lot to discuss. The cinematography is phenomenal and makes it worth seeing for that aspect alone.