Where pop culture meets geek culture and they make out a little.
Posts tagged Actors, Actresses, Assorted Celebrities
I bow down to the genius that is Sacha Baron Cohen
Apr 17th
As much as I love that review being at the top of the blog (I think it’s well written…so what if I wrote it) I had to share this…it’s just too damn awesome, and anyway, I only have a few minutes left before I go back to the mining of books.
So it appears that Sacha Baron Cohen, as Bruno, was able to lure Ron Paul into a radio studio that had been made to look like a bedroom, at which point Cohen pulled his pants down. There’s audio at the link. The most telling moment comes as Paul grudgingly admits “But, if he makes a lot of money, I have to permit the market to do this.”
That’s the best.
On a scale of one to “9”
Apr 16th
Stoker here folks. So I was reading Kilian’s article on “Krod Mandoon” and “Harper’s Island” when his comment about the last film he saw struck home. Kilian made mention of the fact that the last movie he saw was “Monsters vs. Aliens” and that he would likely see “Up” next. This is all fine and dandy, I have absolutely no problem with taking the family out to see a kid friendly cartoon but I am a bit concerned that things have gotten a bit too friendly in the past years.
When I was a wee child, I remember going to cartoon movies and seeing things that kept me up at night sweating in terror. How many of us cowered in fear at the thought of characters like Maleficent, Scar or Jafar? These were characters of true terror; murderers, thieves and schemers. It now seems, though, that all of the villains in cartoons have to be incredibly over the top, they no longer posses that evil which so permeated the cartoons of the past. A look at the winner for the Academy Award in animation this year proves my point. The villain in “Wall.E” was nothing more than a castrated version of HAL. I think that the time has come to bring the fear back to children.
Apocalypse Sweet: Enrolling the Umbrella Academy.
Apr 15th
Hey everyone out there in the world of wide web, Stoker here. It has come to my attention that the Hollywood wheels are turning on an adaptation of Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba’s incredibly intense comic book series The Umbrella Academy. The film is set for release in 2012. So, before too much has gone into the production of the film, I would like to throw my hat in the casting ring. For those who have read the comic, you already know that all of the lead characters in the Academy were born on the same day. Since it is a relative impossibility to cast actors born on the same day, I have attempted to do the next best thing by filling the cast with actors all born in the same year. The one exception of course is Number Five who, for various reasons, is still physically younger than the rest of the characters. All of the following actors were born in the year (1980) except for the one born in 1993. I hope you all like these casting choices.
Meet the Padawan
Jan 10th
This post was supposed to go up Wednesday…
Funny thing happened on Wednesday, though. OK, not funny really, but what happened was my new DC power jack came in the mail. See, the power jack on my laptop has been only half working for a few months so I ordered a new one. When I got home Wednesday I thought, hey I’ll just throw that bad boy in there and then my laptop is back in fighting condition. Won’t take longer than 30 minutes.
Three things prevented this from being a quick installation. First, my awesome soldering iron (read: crappy) is only 15 watts which is about powerful enough to burn your skin but not powerful enough to do much else (and I’m just going to stop exsulis right here from mentioning that he has a 3000 watt soldering bazooka…where were you on Wednesday, huh?). Second, my awesome desoldering tool (read: totally crappy) is good for…I don’t think anything, honestly. Third, the average of three hours of sleep a day for, what, six months now, means that when I’m concentrating on something small like, say, a circuit board my vision gets blurry and I start to get dizzy.
Anyway, long story a little bit longer, the power jack is now installed.
So, now what you’ve all been waiting for, pictures of Lucas Daniel Skywalker Pyle.
Yeah, that’s right, Skywalker bitch!
And now, some overly due news bits.
Did you know that AMC is remaking The Prisoner and it is gong to star Jim Caviezel and Ian McKellan?
The Watchmen movie is…what…not dead, but not really alive.
I like this quote from Malin Ackerman:
You know, sh– happens,” Ackerman told MTV. “It is what it is. As long as the film gets released and people get to see the work that we’ve done, that we’re so proud of, I think everyone will be happy.”
“I’m not so sure the studios feel the same way,” she added.
But, then just today (just a few minutes ago) I read this article about how the two studios are talking and have asked the judge presiding over the case to postpone a hearing that was scheduled for yesterday so that the two sides could continue talks this weekend. I know I’ve said before that the whole Fox stance of “never letting the film see the light of day” was all posturing. They know as well as WB that the movie is going to be a cash cizow and they were taking a hard line to further their claim to some of said moneys. I’m absolutely sure the film will be released in theatres, it’s just a matter of when.
Lastly, now that I’m officially done with school I’m hopeful that site updates will be more forthcoming. I think that, all things considered, 2008 turned out to be reasonable for NR but 2009 should be so much better.
This week has started better…plus an apology to Gilgrim.
Aug 18th
Let’s start with the apology…
Gilgrim, I totally meant to call you Saturday but when I got home from the kid’s gymnastics class I spent the whole afternoon and night in bed with a migraine. OK, I woke up at around 9 to wash the dishes but then went back to bed. Sorry about that.
I did attempt to send you several text messages yesterday but was thwarted each time by my phone. I’m not sure what exactly it says about me that when I match wits against an inanimate object I lose miserably. Well, I’m sure I could figure out what that says but I don’t want to.
It will no doubt prove to be as mesmerizing and disturbing as a car crash.
Aug 13th
Am I alone in feeling that the “coolification” of geek culture has just as much downside as it does upside?
On the one hand, if graphic novels (hipster for COMICS) never got into mainstream popularity we would have never gotten Hollywood to produce something as good as The Dark Knight. On the other hand, if comics had stayed “uncool” I seriously doubt that Paris Hilton would have had any interest in them at all. In this plane of existence, however, where comics are slowly taking over Hollywood, Paris Hilton is developing, with the help of Stan Lee, a superhero based on herself.
An Awesome Moment at CC
Jul 28th
While I didn’t actually go since I had other plans, I did however get random updates such as this golden little nugget. Felicia Day made a slight slip, which I’m sure the rest of you will find enjoyable.
Felicia Day Twitters from hacksaway on Vimeo.
While I would suggest Kilian add her to his stalkable list, I think Tyco might have beat him to the punch with today’s PA comic.
Late
Gilgrim’s Machinations…and Other Thoughts
Jul 25th
I’ve done it. Against my better judgement I finally “twitted” (is that the proper past tense of ‘to twitter’…i’m not sure). I originally signed up soon after gilgrim did, but actually did nothing with the service(?) due to my fondness for annoying people by not doing what they ask…in this case, not “twitting” because gilgrim said I should.
See also: the copies of Green Street Hooligans and Firefly sitting in my house, unwatched and with only each other’s company to keep them warm at night.
One of the best headlines I’ve read in at least a month!
Mar 28th
No joke, but an article up on abcactionnews.com, the Tamba Bay ABC affliate, actually reads “Boozy Bosworth has no memory of sex scene.” Now that’s journalism!
You know what? It’s a short article so I’ll just excerpt the whole thing…
Actress Kate Bosworth has no recollection of her love scene with co-star Jim Sturgess in new gambling film 21 – because she was so drunk.
The Superman Returns star drank to calm her nerves before the revealing scene – but admits she overdid it.
She says, “We were both so drunk. Jim and I became such good friends, we decided to have a couple of drinks, loosen up and go for it.”
Sturgess adds, “We were on Grey Goose (vodka), I think. It was brilliant for about half an hour. As we continued to drink, it just became sloppy and messy. I couldn’t stand up at one point.”
In 21, Bosworth and Sturgess play college students who use their brains to break the bank in Las Vegas.
My question is, how is that experience any different then 95% of all one night stands in this country?
Anthony Minghella has died.
Mar 18th
No, this isn’t a joke. He has, in fact, died.
Not sure who he is?
He directed, among other films, The English Patient, for which he won an Oscar, Cold Mountain, one of my all time favorite movies, and The Talented Mr. Ripley, one of the few films I’ve actually walked out of even though everyone else seemed to love it.
It is, I think, a big loss for Hollywood.
Second Post Today….Lohan Nude, Thoughts?
Feb 21st
At this point, unless you do not own/turn on a television, radio, or internet capable computer (and, if you don’t have that last, what ARE you doing reading this) you have no doubt, at the very least, heard that Lindsey Lohan posed nude for a photo shoot in this week’s New York Magazine…
and here’s your link…and yes you are welcome….
My initial reaction was, mostly, apathy. I mean, I like seeing naked girls as much as the next guy (unless that next guy happens to be gay, in which case I like seeing naked girls way more than him…), but other than that I really didn’t have a reaction.
Then I start reading stuff like this, an entire article devoted to a bunch of PR people saying what a bad career move it was. And then this, which I’d rather just excerpt…
Yes, it’s the height of taste for a young, reckless actress to imitate the patron saint of young, reckless actresses in a copy of that iconic last photo shoot before Monroe died of a drug overdose.
Now let us back up for just a moment.
The photo shoot in question, according to what I’ve read was actually Bert Stern’s idea. Bert Stern, by the way, was the man who took the original pictures (of Marilyn Monroe) that this new set is a recreation of. Stern was the one who approached Lohan.
And as she admits in the accompanying New York article, Lohan’s response was, basically, when will I ever get a chance like this again?
Never.
OK, so now we have the factors surrounding the shoot, what about the pictures themselves? If you read that Radar article, you might think she’d posed for Hustler. First off, any quasi-savy interwebz search will reveal both boob and crotch shots of Lohan, so it isn’t as if people all over the world didn’t already know Lohan’s anatomy in an intimate way.
Secondly, it’s a photo shoot with a well known and respected photographer appearing in a well known and respected publication. Why would that be a bad career move in any context? Oh, right, you can see her nipples. I forgot that, in this country, nakedness automatically equals bad.
The quality of the photos is another conversation. The originals are, without a doubt, amazing. These ones…maybe not so much. There is, I think, one good shot from those posted by NYM, and the best is actually one of the “behind the scenes” shots….
The Deciever post that I excerpted basically said, well, what it says. It was poor taste for a reckless celeb to “rehash” something already done by a reckless celeb. Well, I’d say that makes it more poignant, myself. Look, it would have been tasteless if, say, Mandy Moore (or some other, more squeaky clean celebrity) had done the shoot to “show off her Marilyn” side. Lohan, being who she is, was a much more inspired choice because of what she could bring to the shoot from her own experiences….didn’t really pan out that way, I don’t think, but hey they tried.
Basically, my point here is, can’t we just separate the tabloidy crap from the equation and really consider what is (I think) the important question; are the pictures good?
Heath Ledger is dead.
Jan 22nd
That’s not a clever title.
Thanks to Fritz at PMJA Newswire, and I have to agree with his assessment that, “As I grow older, these things hurt me more and more.”
Maybe it’s a stupid connection, but just two nights ago I was watching Batman Begins on FX (instead of writing) and I was reminded how much that movie rocked. Which, in turn, led me to consider that the next installment might be the greatest comic movie ever in no small part because of Ledger taking on the role of my favorite all time comic book character…
I’m not a HUGE Heath Ledger fan, but I’ve enjoyed him in every movie he’s done. And even though it was heavily hyped, Brokeback Mountain really was poignant as hell and one of my favorite films from the last few years.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but I’m older than Heath Ledger…
Amusing bits of internetz stuff for a Thursday Part Deux: We need $3,000 people!
Dec 6th
Considering that she previously had a $26,000 appearance fee, and now it’s all the way down to 3 grand, it’s likely that you could get her to do all sorts of things for 3 large.
Think of the possibilities…and I’m not talking in a sexual manner.
For 3 grand I bet she’d wash your car, vacuum your house, and wash your dog all in a clown suit.
That’d be money well spent!
That’s fantasy done right people!
Dec 4th
Re-imaginings are nothing new, especially in the world of Sci-fi and Fantasy…a world in which I toil most happily. Case in point, the last book I attempted to read for pleasure was one such re-imagining…
And if one were to grade a re-imagining solely on, say, inventiveness the The Looking Glass Wars would definitely deserve an A. I tend to judge books on actual writing ability, though, and this one probably rates a C- where that’s concerned. The idea is great, and I was very spirited in my reading for 100 pages or so…at a certain point, regardless of how much I wanted to ignore it, the plain fact that the book is not written well just became too much of a hurdle, and I put it down about 2/3 of the way in. Thanks to work, school, the kid, the website, and my own attempts to scratch out what fiction I may, my time for reading is limited and I just can’t devote energy to something that isn’t enthralling. I’ll likely finish it at some point, since I’ve never left a book unfinished indefinitely, but that time is not now.
Besides which, there is a wholly amazing re-imagining taking place right now on the Sci-fi channel, Tin Man.
While the special effects aren’t quite what I’d like…granted, it is a Sci-fi original, I understand that the budget probably wasn’t great…the writing is very good. I think for a re-imagining to be successful, it needs both a fresh take on the original content, and the writer (or writer’s) needs to be committed to actually creating something wholly new. In this way, the source material becomes a framework on which the actual (new) story is constructed. Broadly speaking, this is how Shakespeare worked.
And I think that Tin Man is a very good representation of this. By the end of the first episode, we had already seen nearly all of the “source” material used up and evolved, and the series was moving into its own creative territory. Plus the line by line writing is very, very good. This, in my mind, is the ultimate lynch pin. It is where The Looking Glass Wars fell short, in fact. All the imagination in the world cannot save a writer who is unable to construct a compelling sentence.
And it doesn’t hurt Tin Man that both Zooey Deschanel and Kathleen Robertson play the heroine and villain respectively…
There’s a couple of women that would definitely be on my stalking list if I still did that sort of thing…which I totally DO NOT…seriously, I’m completely cured…
