Monday, October 30, 2006
Will Rogers once said, "Thank goodness we don't get all the government we pay for."
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
The advertisements for "World Trade Center" describe it as our "defining moment," one of heroism rather than terrorism. There is heroism in the work of the rescuers, but in the depiction of danger amid the debris we're reminded again of the awful cruelty of the terrorists. Our defining moment will be what we do about them. –Suzanne Fields
Friday, October 20, 2006
And now, a few words of truth from John Stossel: "A free and competitive economy -- meaning free trade and no tariffs -- is the best deal for consumers. So let's get the politicians out of the way. If they have no privileges to dispense, no special interests will be lining up to influence them. "
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
from the Dilbert blog, by Dilbert creator Scott Adams:
SADISTIC MUMBLE MOVIES
Have you noticed that it takes at least two people to watch a movie lately? It usually goes like this:
Movie Actor: Mumble, mumble, mumble
You: What did he say?
Other Person: He said he's going to kill the dwarf, or something about oatmeal.
Movie Actor: mumble, mumble, mumble
Other Person: What?
You: He said he loves ostriches, or maybe something about revenge.
Worse yet, over the course of the movie, the actors tend to become beat-up, exhausted or drug addicted. And that means even MORE mumbling. The difference is that the lips no longer move at all.
That's called acting. Am I the only one who continues to turn up the volume about ever five minutes for the entire movie?
And don't get me started about the TV show 24, which should be subtitled "Bad Things Happening to People Who Whisper."
Last night I watched an award-winning movie on DVD. And by award-winning, I mean that horrible things happen to mumbly people in the beginning of the movie and then things continue to get worse for the next three hours. Film makers know that if they let the audience feel happiness or hear dialog, the Oscar will slip through their fingers.
So there I sat, watching this DVD and feeling as if someone were slapping me in the nuts with a rake handle. The performances were spectacular, unfortunately, because that made the pain all the more real. And because the movie was well-made (in the same sense that the Boston Strangler was thorough) I felt some obligation to stick it out to the end.
There's some sort of unwritten rule that the worse a movie makes you feel, the longer it must be. Comedies and animated movies are generally well under two hours. But a movie about well-dressed people drowning in ice water is going to threaten the four hour mark.
The strangest part about the movie I watched last night is that virtually all of my friends recommended it. Apparently I need to get more specific when I ask about movies. Instead of asking "How is the movie?" and getting "It's great," I should ask "How did you feel when you watched the movie?" in which case I would get "I felt like an SUV was parked on my chest and starving rats were duct taped to my torso. The acting was great!"
[Update: After that blog entry appeared, dozens of people left comments saying they watch DVDs with the subtitles on because otherwise they can't tell what the actors are saying.]
I agree with Mr. Adams about the quality of sound in modern movies. It's not the actors' fault, though; it's the sound mixers' who need to be drug out and shot. The music and the background noises are too loud and the dialogue is too soft. You can watch a movie where two actors are walking along talking to one another, and you can hear their every footfall but not what they're saying! And the roar of the "background" music is the reason I know I'm not just getting deaf and blaming the film industry for my constant adjustment of the volume.
SADISTIC MUMBLE MOVIES
Have you noticed that it takes at least two people to watch a movie lately? It usually goes like this:
Movie Actor: Mumble, mumble, mumble
You: What did he say?
Other Person: He said he's going to kill the dwarf, or something about oatmeal.
Movie Actor: mumble, mumble, mumble
Other Person: What?
You: He said he loves ostriches, or maybe something about revenge.
Worse yet, over the course of the movie, the actors tend to become beat-up, exhausted or drug addicted. And that means even MORE mumbling. The difference is that the lips no longer move at all.
That's called acting. Am I the only one who continues to turn up the volume about ever five minutes for the entire movie?
And don't get me started about the TV show 24, which should be subtitled "Bad Things Happening to People Who Whisper."
Last night I watched an award-winning movie on DVD. And by award-winning, I mean that horrible things happen to mumbly people in the beginning of the movie and then things continue to get worse for the next three hours. Film makers know that if they let the audience feel happiness or hear dialog, the Oscar will slip through their fingers.
So there I sat, watching this DVD and feeling as if someone were slapping me in the nuts with a rake handle. The performances were spectacular, unfortunately, because that made the pain all the more real. And because the movie was well-made (in the same sense that the Boston Strangler was thorough) I felt some obligation to stick it out to the end.
There's some sort of unwritten rule that the worse a movie makes you feel, the longer it must be. Comedies and animated movies are generally well under two hours. But a movie about well-dressed people drowning in ice water is going to threaten the four hour mark.
The strangest part about the movie I watched last night is that virtually all of my friends recommended it. Apparently I need to get more specific when I ask about movies. Instead of asking "How is the movie?" and getting "It's great," I should ask "How did you feel when you watched the movie?" in which case I would get "I felt like an SUV was parked on my chest and starving rats were duct taped to my torso. The acting was great!"
[Update: After that blog entry appeared, dozens of people left comments saying they watch DVDs with the subtitles on because otherwise they can't tell what the actors are saying.]
I agree with Mr. Adams about the quality of sound in modern movies. It's not the actors' fault, though; it's the sound mixers' who need to be drug out and shot. The music and the background noises are too loud and the dialogue is too soft. You can watch a movie where two actors are walking along talking to one another, and you can hear their every footfall but not what they're saying! And the roar of the "background" music is the reason I know I'm not just getting deaf and blaming the film industry for my constant adjustment of the volume.
