January 2008 Archives

I just finished reading Vanity Fair's February 2008 cover story on Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and got much more intrigued about seeing the film. I am a big fan of the previous Indiana Jones movies but am not so sure that at sixty five, Harrison ford is still up to the challenges of the role. In the interview with V.F.'s Jim Windolf, George Lucas says, "I know the critics are going to hate it. They already hate it."

Lucas is probably right, but projects like the Indiana Jones franchise have never been about critical raves; They are fun, adventurous popcorn movies for the masses. Lord knows, Lucas and Steven Spielberg, two men who have made thirteen of the top one hundred grossing films of all time, know how to please the movie going public.

Writer/director Jeffrey Blitz first gained public notice with his 2002 documentary Spellbound, a fascinating look at contestants at the Scripps-Howard National spelling bee. For his follow-up, Blitz has gone the fiction route, with Rocket Science, a story about a boy with a terrible stutter and a chaotic home life who joins the debate team in hopes of dating the popular girl in school.

I had heard Rocket Science described repeatedly as quirky. As a result, I resolved to do everything I could to see the film differently. But alas, Rocket Science is just plain quirky. Quirky like Little Miss Sunshine, Rushmore or any Wes Anderson film, but with disappointing results.

The first teaser trailer for JJ Abrams Star Trek film that is slated for a Christmas 2008 release. Ah, the voice of Leonard Nimoy....It will be good to see Nimoy again as an elder Spock, but I'm not sure learning about Spock's youth is going to be that exciting. We'll see.

In this age of 500 channel, cable, satellite and HD TV, it's easy to forget that television itself is just over eighty years old. Originally invented by Philo Farnsworth in 1927, television took more than twenty years to become a staple in American homes.

In 1945 there were fewer than 7,000 working television sets in the country and only nine stations on the air, three in New York, two each in Chicago and Los Angeles, and one each in Philadelphia and Schenectady, N.Y. Grainy programming was available only a couple of hours each day. As the fifties began, televisions were becoming a common household appliance. By 1958 when the population of the United States was just under 175 million, there were 525 cable TV systems serving 450,000 subscribers in the United States.

Just A Little Lovin' finds Lynne taking on songs from Dusty Springfield's 1969 classic, Dusty in Memphis. Ranked number 89 on Rolling Stone Magazines list of the top 500 albums of all time in 2005, Dusty in Memphis is considered by many (including me), to be one of the greatest R&B records off all time. Needless to say, Lynne gave herself big shoes to fill.

Kid Rock’s Attorney, Kenneth Montgomery, issued a statement today on Rock’s behalf and his statement reads:

Having suffered through the train wreck that was the movie version of Xanadu so many years ago, I expected Xanadu On Broadway: The Original Broadway Cast Recording to bring back bad memories of kitsch and the sad, downward trajectory of Olivia Newton-John’s career. Xanadu was supposed to make Olivia a movie star for the ages. She was coming off the success of Grease and the great Gene Kelly was her co-star in Xanadu. What could go wrong? In short, everything. The acting was bad, the story was strange and the movie bombed. Olivia Newton-John’s film career never fully recovered.

As the Grammy® awards get ready to celebrate their fiftieth anniversary with its annual awards show to air February 10, 2008 on CBS, Shout factory has released the 7 CD Ultimate Grammy® Collection.

The set consists of Contemporary R&B, Contemporary Pop, Classic R&B, Classic Pop, Contemporary Rock, Classic Country, and Contemporary Country. Each of the artists featured on this 100 plus song compilation is a Grammy® winner. One thing is for sure, there isn’t a real dud in the entire set.

Heath Ledger Found Dead: Actor had received an Oscar nomination for his role in Brokeback Mountain. Here he talks about playing "The Joker," in the upcoming, The Dark Knight. Is it Just me, or does it seem like he is in terrible need of a fix?

During its first season on CBS, Gunsmoke wasn't in the top thirty in the television ratings. It was during the series second year that that the show caught on, eventually becoming the year's seventh most popular program. From then on, Gunsmoke became one of the most popular westerns in television history, running for twenty seasons from 1955-1975.

Matt Dillon (James Arness) is the Marshall of Dodge City. He does everything he can to prevent the use of guns in the town. Instead, he prefers to show the townsfolk other alternatives for solving their differences. While many westerns of the time focused on shoot outs and saloon brawls, Matt Dillion regularly uses his smarts and quickness to capture the bad guys and have them punished for their crimes. Occasionally there are action scenes involving gunplay, but those moments are few and far between.

Based on the Neil Simon Play and the 1968 hit film, in 1970 Garry Marshall and Jerry Belson developed The Odd Couple into a successful television series. Tony Randall plays the proper, fastidious photographer Felix Unger and Jack Klugman portrays the gruff, sloppy Oscar Madison, sportswriter for the New York Herald. Felix is a compulsive neat freak; Oscar views the floor as his personal dumping ground.

The Odd Couple was never a huge ratings success during the series initial run. The show was never in the top twenty of the Nielsen ratings and occupied six different time slots during the series five year run. In syndication, The Odd Couple gained a loyal following and became a fan favorite.

Hawaii Five-O which ran from 1968-1980 on CBS remains one of the most popular police dramas in television history. Jack Lord's steely portrayal of Five-O's man in charge, Steve McGarrett, makes the show worth watching. Played by Jack Lord, McGarrett combines intensity with coolness.

McGarrett is a bachelor who obviously enjoys the company of island ladies--a self assured man with a staccato delivery. He is always polite when dealing with his subordinates, Danny "Danno" Williams, Kono Kalakaua and Chin Ho Kelly. However, Steve has little patience for constitutional civilities--"Gentlemen, I want you to turn this place inside out"--finding the crook is always the most important thing.

From the time of her first album back in 1992, Mary J. Blige digs into the deepest corners of personal emotion on every song. She takes listeners through her struggles with addiction, depression and finding love. Now, happily married and content with her place in life, Blige has a new well of emotions to draw from.

After eight studio albums, the singers latest offering, Growing Pains reveals an artist finally comfortable in her own skin and ready to take the next step in her musical development. Blige shows a newfound confidence and wisdom throughout Growing Pains and is not afraid to expose some of her faults. However, Blige still shows some signs of the needy, unsure singer the public has come to know.

Rivers Cuomo comes across like the ultimate music nerd.

Since his band Weezer garnered mainstream success back in 1994 with their self titled debut, Cuomo has seemed uncomfortable with the notoriety. While many musicians would have reveled in the rock n’ roll lifestyle, after a yearlong tour to support Weezer (The Blue Album) ended, Cuomo began studies at Harvard University. Between albums and tours, Rivers graduated from Harvard with a B.A. in English in 2006.

Armed with a five octave voice, Mariah Carey burst on to the music scene in 1990 with her self titled album. At that time, she became the first singer to have her first five singles reach #1 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 charts. She continued to record hit after hit, making her the best selling artist of the 1990’s. She was named the bestselling artist of the millennium at the 2000 World Music Awards.

However, after the failure of her 2001 film Glitter, a series of strange messages Carey left on her website and a bizarre appearance on MTV’s Total Request Live, where the singer passed out popsicles to audience members and performed something resembling a striptease, many thought her career was over.

Movie trailers can make or break a film. Trailers are the marketing tool that can make an audience rush out to see a film or forget about it instantly. A great trailer can give birth to a tagline or catch phrase that becomes part of the pop culture lexicon. A trailer can evoke curiosity, happiness, fear or sadness but above all, the trailer must be memorable. Here are my top five movie trailers of all time:

I have to admit that having watched the first few minutes of Rob & Big when it debuted on MTV in 2006, I thought, what the heck is this? Watching a 30-something professional skater named Rob Dyrdek and his 400 pound bodyguard, Christopher "Big Black" Boykin didn't seem like it would hold much interest for a 30-something non skateboarder such as myself but Rob & Big are just crazy enough to be interesting. Why exactly does a skateboarder really need security anyway? He probably doesn't but what the heck.

Brighton, England’s The Pipettes were formed in 2004, by a local promoter named Monster Bobby who wanted to bring the Phil Spector sound back into the 21st century. By early 2005, Monster Bobby had put together a line up of Becki, Rose and Gwenno to make up the group. With hooks borrowed from ‘60’s girl groups like the Ronettes, Shangri-Las and the Angels, the Pipettes were ready to bring back the fun, melodic girl group of yesteryear.

The late 1960's was a tough time in California. In 1969, Charles Manson and his family systematically murdered seven people, including actress Sharon Tate. Around that same time, during an eleven month period in 1968-69 an individual who identified himself only as the "Zodiac," murdered at least seven people in Northern California. Given the location and the subject matter, it is not surprising that Hollywood has had a fascination with the Zodiac killer from the start. The case spawned the 1971 low budget thriller The Zodiac Killer and is said to have been in part, the inspiration behind Dirty Harry (1971).