Stephen Colbert's Nineteenth Nervous Breakdown

In Crocodile Tears news, California Representative Randy "Duke-Stir" (sic) Cunningham (R) was caught taking bribes, at least $2.4 million worth! It does beg the question, when is enough enough? Is it enough to get into the Guinness Book of World Records? Did he save enough for the children's college fund? Why wasn't he more careful? Why didn't he just take gratuities from fitness magazines like everybody else? And Ah-nold?
Well, looks like ol' Jessica and ol' Nick finally split up. Too bad, they toughed it out pretty good through some turbulent waters. Perhaps this is all part of Ashlee's master plan. Maybe after a suitable period of alone time, Nick and Ashlee will hook up! In the meantime, Jessica will still appear on the covers of God knows how many Star magazine knock-offs, cataloguing her Tectonic cellulite with the finest university instruments available. Maybe we can learn something from our White Trash First Lady, and add to the Body Science just as she has added her body to ... ah, skip it. Too tired to complete the metaphor. Incidentally, I think I know why Jessica and Nick split up. I mean, who's that girl in this here photograph here? Oh, Nick, you dog!

Rest in peace, Pat

Man, how time flies! This was the best picture I could find of Miyagi. You may still be able to check out Slapstick of another Kind from your local video store, but we'll always have The Karate Kid.
Not much happening on this end. Daily Show/ Colbert Report's back from joint hiatus. They covered the Macy's Day parade. The balloon that exploded this time was an M&M balloon. I guess it was too tasteless to say that next year they should just have a NASCAR balloon and crash that into a light pole. We've got a nation to heal, people!
What else... oh yeah, Box Office report. Potter's still Boffo, gobbling it up at the Box Office, while Walk the Line is walkin' the Bottom Line, baby! Riding Harry Potter's shadow's coattails for all it's worth!!!! YM&O going strong; let's face it, no one expected it to do anything, not even the cast & crew. Chicken Little is Box-Office Big! Still kinda paltry for a Pixar-esque production, not counting Valiant. And we won't count it. Meanwhile, skipping right to the bottom half, Derailed is pulling out of the station, and the Ice Harvest? Yeah, more like Suck-Ass Harvest!
Oh dear, this blog is no longer for the kids...

Let The Transformation Continue!

Life imitates art: I think I smell that sequel to Single White Female after all! Oh wait, there is one. Who decides when these things get made, anyway? 2005 will go down in the annals of movie ledger history as a banner year for direct-to-video sequels, now filmed on digital video.

Anyway, yes, I think Ashlee Simpson finally gets it. Tired of being the reigning Queen of Mall Goth, she is now halfway on the path to becoming a clone of Jessica who, with all respect to Nick, will still always be my Ozark Goddess, as will all the current and future readers of Star and Us, with the occasional appearance on the likes of Maxim. Meanwhile, what about Aguilera? She just couldn't get any naked-er on the cover of Rolling Stone and gave up, and gone completely into hiding apparently! Come back to us.

So there Ashlee was on Letterman flogging her new CD, "I Am Me". Well, not as inspiring as, say, "Pieces of April" or "I do not want what I haven't got", and she's probably smarter than "I Am Sam". All she needs now is that pesky nose job and Jessica's got an identical twin! Clooney was on pushing Syriana. Wasn't he just on last month? Anyway, he was a little less Life Is Good this time as he was about Good Night & Good Luck, but as far as I'm concerned, he's still the current Gold Standard of what a movie star should be. Note the hair, for example, as compared to the old clip Dave trotted out. It's probably bad luck to say it, but the Oscar campaign is on, and honestly I can't think of anyone more deserving in any category he nabs. But if GN&GL and Syriana go head-to-head for Best Picture, then like Soderbergh before him, either way he loses. Okay, Mr. Clooney, rest on your laurels a little, but let's get cracking on Hail Caesar, huh?

Okay, some actual movie news. Yours, Mine & Ours is the latest from Dennis Quaid et alia as Quaid's Second Coming continues unabated. Rather than going on to Scooby Doo 3 editor-turned-director Raja Gosnell helms this one, and couldn't've picked a worse time. Not only does he have to compete with Harry Potter that his old boss Chris Columbus started, but he has to compete with Rent as well! Man, even I can't deal with that kind of stress...

Dayton Peace Accord 10th Anniversary

Just a brief shout out to the Dayton Peace accord signed in Dayton, Ohio ten years ago today! Let's hope all those guys get their act together... the Serbs, etc. Another country with three states trying to find stability. Hmm! What does that remind you of? ...IRAQ! Anyway...
There was some movie news, but I forgot already. But how about that box office? Harry Potter 4 at least opened stronger than the third one did, maybe because they opened HP3 in summer, hardly a time one thinks about ghouls and goblins and the Cato Institute. HP4 crossed the 100 million barrier faster than Chicken Little, who knew.
Oh yeah! Saw the cover of Premiere magazine with Naomi Watts and the new Peter Jackson! Oh, Pete, we hardly knew ye. What's Fran gonna say? Gone Hollywood after all, my friend, even though he insists on staying in New Zealand. If King Kong doesn't make a profit, you can at least sell us on your amazing diet plan. Make a book of it. Chapter 1: Spending day and night at WETA without eating...

SNL: Quickie review - Jason Lee 11/12/05

Opening bit: A different tact with the Democrats on Darrell Hammond's Hardball. Apparently, now it's: no matter what the Dems do, they're hated. Funny! And all this time I thought that was the Republicans.
As for the rest of the show, it was an unfortunate example of what happens when the host constricts the writing staff with narrow talent limitations. It's all about the moustache and the skating! And the promoting of My Name is Earl. There's a little more on the line when you're producing the show as well. Alas, Jim Carrey wasn't on hand to interrupt the Foo Fighters this time.

John Sayles in 'Mathnet' on Square One Television

He used this appearance to help fund Eight Men Out, which featured John Cusack, who today is starring in The Ice Harvest, which I fear may end up falling through the cracks harder than the Bedazzled remake. The audiences are so fickle these days. Is it just me, or are Robert Benton and Richard Russo the same person these days? One last razz: the last time Cusack and Billy Bob were in a picture together, we got Billy Bob-gelina. Maybe this time Billy Bob and Connie Nielsen will tie the knot, who knows. It could happen!
What else? Mouth-breather Keira Knightley was recently on the Daily Show plugging her latest flick Pride and/& Prejudice, wisely side-stepping the recent Domino. Sorry, Tony, but it's a fact; besides, Donnie Darko wasn't a box-office smash initially either. In the end, it's all just projects in-between Pirates sequels. Same thing happened with the Matrix movies. Whaddayagonna do?
What other movie news... Oh yeah. Derailed! Humph! Someone declared that this is Aniston's first strike in a new campaign to be a big movie star, post-Brangelina, I guess. (back to her again, oy! Well, she is pretty hot. And lippy.) From the ads, it's Death Wish-style antics of the Attractive People vs. the Butt-Ugly people, some with the One Bad Eye. Oh, why can't the Danny Trejo-types ever be the good guys? Or is it too late for his life story to be put on film? Get on it, Spy Kids man!
Man, I exhaust myself! Over and out, good buddies.

Mike War, Not Love

So Mike Love has finally announced his political leanings and appeared on Fox News, your one stop shop for evil. In particular, the ol' Bill O'Lielly show. Bill and Mike talked about Mike's pending lawsuit against Brian Wilson in regards to the release of Brian's "Smile" album. In short, Mike needs some more money to make his monthly alimony payments. Notice how they didn't talk at all about any of Mike's new projects. I think he's got a new album out that I'm never going to hear, and he certainly isn't going to make the kind of money off that than he will off any future lawsuits against Brian. I hope he loses them all.
Oh but there's so many others to beat up on. Schwarzenegger's suffering another defeat. The graft he's taking just isn't enough these days. So there you go. If a guy as rich as Schwarzenegger takes graft even though he says he won't, what hope is there for any of us? I do have an idea for 'Terminator 4' if Jonathan Mostow's interested. This time we focus on CyberDyne Industries itself, which is now under new management. The new management tries to find a way to make their Terminators cheaper with more plastic parts instead of metal. They try to ship jobs overseas to India and China, but the unions start getting up in arms. A Terminator is sent back in time to frame the heads of the unions, but as it turns out, Terminators aren't made for espionage, just blowing stuff up really good. That's all I got so far, I figure the third act will write itself, just like it did in T3. Maybe it's time to let James Cameron do his cinematic explanation of time travel as he wanted to do in T2. Or was it The Abyss? I just don't know.
Over and out.

Simpsons 17.4: Treehouse of Horror XVI

Well, they still got it as far as I'm concerned. Starting with an homage to the beginning of 'Contact' and the end of Men in Black, the Simpsons stay on the cutting edge of sit-com writing. We'll just have to wait til 2008 to see what the movie offers.
B.I.: Bartificial Intelligence - Spielberg must've got a chuckle out of that. It follows the arc of the movie pretty faithfully up to a point, and then it becomes Robocop 2!! Now I can't get that damn Eagles song out of my head.
...can't remember the name of that second one. SURVIVAL OF THE FATTEST (had to look it up) Some good jokes: a reincarnated Apu screaming "Help me, Jesus!" and of course the bit with Moe, impaled on a cruel weather vane saying "Ah, well, might as well check my lottery ticket.... a million! Wow! I've won! Now if I can just get off this weather vane......"
I've Grown A Costume to your face... I bet Pixar wishes they thought of that. Does sound a little like a variation on the conceit of Monsters, Inc. Another good use of the massive Simpsons ensemble.

p.s. Isn't it episode 17.3? I think there were only two Simpsons last month. I hope, since that's all I taped.

Alzo Spracht Zathura

Oh, what a paltry box office weekend! The highest total grosser is Flightplan coming in at number 10, with just a shade under 100 million. Figures that family entertainment would trump Jarhead for the #1 spot, but still pretty damn good considering. No, the #1 spot goes to Chicken Little, Disney's F.U. to the departing Pixar. They may have the animation without Pixar, but word on the street is that the writing's not up to Pixar's par. Or did everyone else already forget about Valiant?

Not much else to report. Looks like Good Night and Good Luck might make a profit yet. Oscar buzz so far: Jarhead, Capote, Clooney? Will 2005 be for Clooney what 1994 was for Zemeckis, or 1997 was for Cameron? I'll get that ball rolling. Never mind, just did.

Meantime, what about Shopgirl? Maybe it's making money overseas. Steve Martin must not need the money.

Comparative Cinema 101: Fargo vs. North Country

In other news, we've gone from PG to PG-13 in the Harry Potters. Will we get to R by the seventh one? Goblet of Fire due in November. Why, I haven't even seen all of the third one! From what I saw, there's a hostage-style scene with Gary Oldman and David Thewlis, and for a second I thought I was watching Prick Up Your Ears.
Just saw a TV trailer for Syriana, or as they say on the Simpsons, Saudi Israelia. Glad to see Stephen Gaghan sobered up long enough to direct this Traffic-style saga. First drugs, now oil. Next thing you know they'll be attacking our American dependence on bananas, or chocolate.
So, Joe Wilson was on the Larry King show tonight. I'm telling you! If this was a Tom Clancy novel, Jack Ryan or Op Center- take your pick, everyone involved in leaking Plame's name would be taken care of in a Godfather-style, or Godfather 2-style, ending in which everyone gets whacked. Or maybe, whisked away to The Prisoner... I mean, the Island.
Meantime, Jeff Daniels' new movie was pointed out on The Colbert Report: The Squid and the Whale. Jeff must've thought he was making You Can Count on Me. And Noah Baumbach must've thought: this'll be just like Zissou except I'll get the profits this time!