Wednesday, March 21, 2012
CRAWL
This was pulled out of the creek next to my work a few weeks ago. The atmosphere only added to it.
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
DIARY
I have a thing for notebooks.
I buy them, find them, get them as gifts and start writing in them. The plan is usually to use one for one thing and another for a different thing, but soon after I start, I forget which is which and just grab whichever one I feel like carrying that day.
The best part about having all these random, half-filled notebooks? That I still have them all.
I have the spiral notebook with a sacred heart on it that I bought from Hot Topic when I was 19 where I recap a trip I took to Portland where all of my vegan friends decided we were on "road trip rules" and could eat anything they wanted. A few pages later I write about having seen Converge for the first time and how in awe I was. Thing is, I was still a little in awe the last time I saw Converge in 2009, too. Some things don't change.
There's the red U of U notebook that has a partial outline/notes and reading parts from the first screenplay I wrote back in 2005 and a first person narrative story that I never finished.
I have four different notebooks with GCA podcast notes, SLCFF suggestions, movie review slug lines and Comic Con notes.
There's the notebook in which I used to outline every issue of the second half of Red Pulse back when I was the editor.
A little black one with a "Sharks Are Scarier Than Terrorism" sticker on the front has pages and pages of different line breaks and the formations of the poems I wrote back in 2007. Those were later typed up neatly for my poetry class and I think I still have the critiques I got from my classmates that were too scared to leave their names.
All of them rest on the top shelf of the bookcase right behind my desk, that way, every once in a while I can grab a random notebook and see what I was thinking at any given time over the past 13 years.
I can't bear to part with them. For damn good reason, too.
Monday, March 19, 2012
PROMETHEUS
This is the movie I'm most looking forward to this year. I re-watched the entire ALIEN series (minus RESURRECTION, because I remember it being awful) over the past couple of months and still think that Ridley Scott's original is the best of the bunch.
I cannot wait for this movie.
I cannot wait for this movie.
PUBLISH OR PERISH
I didn't write this. I stole it from the Trip City website, but every word of it is true and more people need to see it, so I'm re-posting it here.
Written by Dean Haspiel for Trip City -- Comics writer/artist/publisher, Jimmy Palmiotti, recently Tweeted, “Publish or perish.” Maybe it was end-of-the-year blues but I was feeling particularly bleak about my career and was struck by Jimmy’s charge and asked if we could discuss the origin behind those three ominous words and what I got was a pep talk for a lifetime.
Securing work from franchise publishers is harder than ever before and very few other publishers pay livable advance wages anymore. Most deals are made for royalties and back end rewards based on sales. Print is competing with digital and profits are questionable. Readers want archives and new stories but making money at publishing has become a challenging and schizophrenic mess. The risk for a corporation to launch something new has become greater and all the bean counters want to know before they gamble on your idea is the sales of your last three books and whether or not your comic book idea has multimedia legs and if you have a strong fan base. In other words, publishers hardly publish what they “like” and franchise publishers would rather update 75-year old icons every five years [which they've worked hard to maintain] than build and grow new ideas that inspire writers and artists today. I understand why that is but it’s paranoid, lazy, and shortsighted.
Frankly, pitching proposals sucks right now. What if you don’t have three books and your new idea doesn’t translate to a movie or toy? Worse, what if you do have three books and the numbers didn’t inform the zeitgeist and thrill Hollywood? Why does one thing need to yield the other in order to make a cool comic book? Because comic books don’t sell like they used to. I get it. While the internet leveled the playing field it also made everything a niche. However, the comix industry does have a strong fanbase. I’ve seen them and they are us.
Now is the perfect time for a cartoonist to manifest his or her own industry. We have the DIY tools. We have the social networks and viral know how. We have proof that crowd funding works and community is key. We have a cranky comedian like Marc Maron rise from the ashes of every bridge he ever burned and make his own rules with his WTF podcast, and popular acts like Radiohead and Louis C.K. making affordable, direct deposit products; offers no one in their right mind could refuse, and venues like Etsy and Kickstarter changing the ways we consume by supporting work with our wallets BEFORE it’s made so that it can BE made sans corporate fear and scrutiny.
But, what about us? Viva la Michel Fiffe for self-publishing ZEGAS, a print-only experience that reminds us why magical efforts like Los Bros Hernandez’ LOVE & ROCKETS were punk yet vital and stand the test of time. All hail Alex De Campi for recognizing the virtues of the old self-publishing model while implementing new rules with the understanding that in order to hawk your wares you must show up to the party and build sound relationships with the people who produce, distribute, and purchase your wares. Rock out with your cock out Jimmy Palmiotti for having the talent and acumen to keep your feet firmly planted in all ponds while knowing how important it is to be different.
Bottom line: I’m sharing these thoughts to rally myself, too. I count myself lucky to have been paid to make comix and I owe a lot of people my perpetual gratitude. I would love to continue to get hired and occasionally play with the toys I grew up with but I can’t allow over-worked editors to ignore me or my talented friends, anymore. It doesn’t champion creativity and it doesn’t pay the bills. Indifference only engenders ill-will and I won’t be banished to that bitter cabal of disgruntled cartoonists.
“Publish or perish?”
In 2012, I’m excited to see comix auteurs bring their A-game and step up to the plate with a hit in their mind and a home run in their heart.
–Dean Haspiel
Written by Dean Haspiel for Trip City -- Comics writer/artist/publisher, Jimmy Palmiotti, recently Tweeted, “Publish or perish.” Maybe it was end-of-the-year blues but I was feeling particularly bleak about my career and was struck by Jimmy’s charge and asked if we could discuss the origin behind those three ominous words and what I got was a pep talk for a lifetime.
Securing work from franchise publishers is harder than ever before and very few other publishers pay livable advance wages anymore. Most deals are made for royalties and back end rewards based on sales. Print is competing with digital and profits are questionable. Readers want archives and new stories but making money at publishing has become a challenging and schizophrenic mess. The risk for a corporation to launch something new has become greater and all the bean counters want to know before they gamble on your idea is the sales of your last three books and whether or not your comic book idea has multimedia legs and if you have a strong fan base. In other words, publishers hardly publish what they “like” and franchise publishers would rather update 75-year old icons every five years [which they've worked hard to maintain] than build and grow new ideas that inspire writers and artists today. I understand why that is but it’s paranoid, lazy, and shortsighted.
Frankly, pitching proposals sucks right now. What if you don’t have three books and your new idea doesn’t translate to a movie or toy? Worse, what if you do have three books and the numbers didn’t inform the zeitgeist and thrill Hollywood? Why does one thing need to yield the other in order to make a cool comic book? Because comic books don’t sell like they used to. I get it. While the internet leveled the playing field it also made everything a niche. However, the comix industry does have a strong fanbase. I’ve seen them and they are us.
Now is the perfect time for a cartoonist to manifest his or her own industry. We have the DIY tools. We have the social networks and viral know how. We have proof that crowd funding works and community is key. We have a cranky comedian like Marc Maron rise from the ashes of every bridge he ever burned and make his own rules with his WTF podcast, and popular acts like Radiohead and Louis C.K. making affordable, direct deposit products; offers no one in their right mind could refuse, and venues like Etsy and Kickstarter changing the ways we consume by supporting work with our wallets BEFORE it’s made so that it can BE made sans corporate fear and scrutiny.
But, what about us? Viva la Michel Fiffe for self-publishing ZEGAS, a print-only experience that reminds us why magical efforts like Los Bros Hernandez’ LOVE & ROCKETS were punk yet vital and stand the test of time. All hail Alex De Campi for recognizing the virtues of the old self-publishing model while implementing new rules with the understanding that in order to hawk your wares you must show up to the party and build sound relationships with the people who produce, distribute, and purchase your wares. Rock out with your cock out Jimmy Palmiotti for having the talent and acumen to keep your feet firmly planted in all ponds while knowing how important it is to be different.
Bottom line: I’m sharing these thoughts to rally myself, too. I count myself lucky to have been paid to make comix and I owe a lot of people my perpetual gratitude. I would love to continue to get hired and occasionally play with the toys I grew up with but I can’t allow over-worked editors to ignore me or my talented friends, anymore. It doesn’t champion creativity and it doesn’t pay the bills. Indifference only engenders ill-will and I won’t be banished to that bitter cabal of disgruntled cartoonists.
“Publish or perish?”
In 2012, I’m excited to see comix auteurs bring their A-game and step up to the plate with a hit in their mind and a home run in their heart.
–Dean Haspiel
Thursday, March 15, 2012
BEST OF 2011
There's an inherent problem with making a "Best Movies of 2011" list while living in Salt Lake City. We're a small market and a lot of the best movies (or the ones getting Academy Award pushes, anyway) get released on platforms. Most of them have smaller budgets which means they get released in a few cities at a time in order to rely on strong word of mouth, reviews, blog posts, etc. so they don't have to shell out millions of dollars on advertising campaigns.
Salt Lake is usually right in the middle or towards the end of that platform cycle. Something that opens in New York and Los Angeles in late November/early December might not play theaters in Salt Lake until February of the next year, as was the case with movies like THE ARTIST and SHAME.
I've always loved making "Best of" lists for movies and I've always held off until I've seen most things before making it. Right now it's February 13 (at the time I'm writing this, anyway) and I just barely saw SHAME. I feel that was the last one I needed to see before I could make my list for 2011. But at the same time, we're now two months in to 2012 and I've just barely seen everything I wanted to see before making this list. Kind of feels like cheating a little, doesn't it? I kind of have to, though. It's one of the perils of living in a small market.
Ideally, my list would run from mid-February to mid-February, but that causes a problem if I see something that blows me away at Sundance. I'm spending entirely too much time thinking about this, but that's kind of what I do. I over think and over analyze a lot of things and write about them. It's why you keep coming back to read this, isn't it? Too share my inane observations about life in general? That's what I thought.
Now enough excuses. Let's get to the best—and by best, I mean my favorite—movies of 2011.
1. DRIVE
Sure, it was more mood than plot, more style than substance but that's what I loved about it. In a year when so many movies tried so hard to be ambitious and meaningful but just came off as pretentious and boring (yes, I'm talking about you, TREE OF LIFE), DRIVE was a breath of fresh air. Ryan Gosling was just a bad ass. Albert Brooks does an awesome evil. Bryan Cranston does a great everything and Ron Pearlman, Carey Mulligan, Christina Hendricks added little bits of greatness here and there and the score/soundtrack took it to the next level. I don't care what anyone says, DRIVE was just cool, and it's been far too long since somebody made as cool of a movie as this. My hat is off to you Nicolas Winding Refn.
2. I SAW THE DEVIL
It's a rare occasion these days that I see a movie that reminds me why I wanted to be a filmmaker when I was younger (and I wrote about that after I saw it). DRIVE did that to an extent, but I SAW THE DEVIL did it to a masterful degree. The performances were spectacular all the way through and I watched the whole thing with a wide-eyed wonder. That doesn't happen often, but I wish it happened more.
3. YOUNG ADULT
It might be because I have enormous aspirations of being a writer that I loved this, but I think it's more than that. I love Charlize Theron and Patton Oswalt and they both kill it in this movie. It's also the least Diablo Cody of Diablo Cody's movies, which is a compliment. I like her ideas more than her execution usually, but she showed restraint with this story and that was the most impressive part. I agree with the people that said it didn't seem like Jason Reitman brought much to the table when directing this when he was probably capable of doing more, but at the same time, it felt like he did the perfect amount. He got out of the way and let the script speak for itself and that was a great decision.
4. THE ARTIST
As much as everyone says that HUGO was all about the magic of movies (it was, but in a very esoteric way, I thought), THE ARTIST did it much, much better. Not only did it have two of my favorite actors in it—John Goodman and James Cromwell—but the two leads were totally unknown to me and made the story that much more compelling. The fact that it was a silent movie and everyone had to rely on facial expressions and subtlety more that they otherwise would have made it so much more enjoyable. I totally see why everyone was bashing the "gimmick" aspect of it and praising HUGO instead, but HUGO was in 3-D, so that knocks it down a few pegs in my book. THE ARTIST cleaned up at the Academy Awards last month, but how the dog didn't get nominated for any awards is beyond me.
Honorable Mentions
These are some of the other movies I loved, but couldn't quite crack the Top 5 and there were too many for a Top 10.
THE MUPPETS - Loved it, but a few strange choices towards the end hurt it.
X-MEN: FIRST CLASS - A great origin with killer performances from Fassbender and McAvoy.
MIDNIGHT IN PARIS - Still think Owen Wilson is a weird choice, but I went home loving Hemingway even more than I already did.
RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES - "Why cookie Rocket?" made its way into pop culture lexicon for a very, very good reason.
ATTACK THE BLOCK - Even though I couldn't understand what they were saying half the time it didn't matter. The movie was still epic.
50/50 - I almost cried.
MONEYBALL - I love baseball, but more than that I'm fascinated by the behind the scenes aspects of professional sports so this was thrilling for me.
POINT BLANK (A BOUT PORTANT) - Kind of like TAKEN, but with less Liam Neeson and more subtitles, but just as good.
MARTHA, MARCY, MAY, MARLENE - A haunting look at cult life that I still don't forgive for ending so ambiguously.
THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO - I liked the Swedish version better, but Rooney Mara is so fucking hot that she gets the movie on this list for that alone.
Salt Lake is usually right in the middle or towards the end of that platform cycle. Something that opens in New York and Los Angeles in late November/early December might not play theaters in Salt Lake until February of the next year, as was the case with movies like THE ARTIST and SHAME.
I've always loved making "Best of" lists for movies and I've always held off until I've seen most things before making it. Right now it's February 13 (at the time I'm writing this, anyway) and I just barely saw SHAME. I feel that was the last one I needed to see before I could make my list for 2011. But at the same time, we're now two months in to 2012 and I've just barely seen everything I wanted to see before making this list. Kind of feels like cheating a little, doesn't it? I kind of have to, though. It's one of the perils of living in a small market.
Ideally, my list would run from mid-February to mid-February, but that causes a problem if I see something that blows me away at Sundance. I'm spending entirely too much time thinking about this, but that's kind of what I do. I over think and over analyze a lot of things and write about them. It's why you keep coming back to read this, isn't it? Too share my inane observations about life in general? That's what I thought.
Now enough excuses. Let's get to the best—and by best, I mean my favorite—movies of 2011.
Sure, it was more mood than plot, more style than substance but that's what I loved about it. In a year when so many movies tried so hard to be ambitious and meaningful but just came off as pretentious and boring (yes, I'm talking about you, TREE OF LIFE), DRIVE was a breath of fresh air. Ryan Gosling was just a bad ass. Albert Brooks does an awesome evil. Bryan Cranston does a great everything and Ron Pearlman, Carey Mulligan, Christina Hendricks added little bits of greatness here and there and the score/soundtrack took it to the next level. I don't care what anyone says, DRIVE was just cool, and it's been far too long since somebody made as cool of a movie as this. My hat is off to you Nicolas Winding Refn.
It's a rare occasion these days that I see a movie that reminds me why I wanted to be a filmmaker when I was younger (and I wrote about that after I saw it). DRIVE did that to an extent, but I SAW THE DEVIL did it to a masterful degree. The performances were spectacular all the way through and I watched the whole thing with a wide-eyed wonder. That doesn't happen often, but I wish it happened more.
It might be because I have enormous aspirations of being a writer that I loved this, but I think it's more than that. I love Charlize Theron and Patton Oswalt and they both kill it in this movie. It's also the least Diablo Cody of Diablo Cody's movies, which is a compliment. I like her ideas more than her execution usually, but she showed restraint with this story and that was the most impressive part. I agree with the people that said it didn't seem like Jason Reitman brought much to the table when directing this when he was probably capable of doing more, but at the same time, it felt like he did the perfect amount. He got out of the way and let the script speak for itself and that was a great decision.
As much as everyone says that HUGO was all about the magic of movies (it was, but in a very esoteric way, I thought), THE ARTIST did it much, much better. Not only did it have two of my favorite actors in it—John Goodman and James Cromwell—but the two leads were totally unknown to me and made the story that much more compelling. The fact that it was a silent movie and everyone had to rely on facial expressions and subtlety more that they otherwise would have made it so much more enjoyable. I totally see why everyone was bashing the "gimmick" aspect of it and praising HUGO instead, but HUGO was in 3-D, so that knocks it down a few pegs in my book. THE ARTIST cleaned up at the Academy Awards last month, but how the dog didn't get nominated for any awards is beyond me.
5. 13 ASSASSINS
Sometimes the best movies are the ones you know absolutely nothing about. I don't follow a lot of foreign cinema and I pay even less attention to Samurai movies, but this movie was just great. The last 45 minutes in particular, in which an enormous battle sequence is staged in a small town with makeshift booby traps and wall to wall combat is amazing. I was doing karate moves in my apartment into the early hours of the morning the night after I saw it.
Honorable Mentions
These are some of the other movies I loved, but couldn't quite crack the Top 5 and there were too many for a Top 10.
THE MUPPETS - Loved it, but a few strange choices towards the end hurt it.
X-MEN: FIRST CLASS - A great origin with killer performances from Fassbender and McAvoy.
MIDNIGHT IN PARIS - Still think Owen Wilson is a weird choice, but I went home loving Hemingway even more than I already did.
RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES - "Why cookie Rocket?" made its way into pop culture lexicon for a very, very good reason.
ATTACK THE BLOCK - Even though I couldn't understand what they were saying half the time it didn't matter. The movie was still epic.
50/50 - I almost cried.
MONEYBALL - I love baseball, but more than that I'm fascinated by the behind the scenes aspects of professional sports so this was thrilling for me.
POINT BLANK (A BOUT PORTANT) - Kind of like TAKEN, but with less Liam Neeson and more subtitles, but just as good.
MARTHA, MARCY, MAY, MARLENE - A haunting look at cult life that I still don't forgive for ending so ambiguously.
THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO - I liked the Swedish version better, but Rooney Mara is so fucking hot that she gets the movie on this list for that alone.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
JOHN CARTER
I'm already in trouble.
I promised myself I'd do something on this blog each and every day. I wanted to keep up with a week's worth of movie related posts (which were already written) to kick things off again, but Wednesday was the day I needed to fill in and I'd planned on using it to start back up my Half-Assed Review column with whatever I saw this week.
Then one thing led to another and I ended up not having the day off as I'd planned. So instead of this being a Half-Assed Review of JOHN CARTER, it's going to be a 1/4-Assed Review because it's late and I'm tired.
I really liked this movie. It was big, epic, fantastic and Bryan Cranston was in it for about six minutes.
The thing that I think hurt it the most was John Carter. I didn't really care about his arc, though I'm glad at the end it was called by its actual name, JOHN CARTER OF MARS.
But what I really wanted, but didn't know until about halfway through the movie, was that I wanted it to be called A PRINCESS OF MARS and I wanted Deja Thoris to be the focus of the movie. She was awesome. She threw herself so into the role that no matter what crazy scene was happening on a green screen behind her, she killed it the entire time. Lynn Collins (who was the best part of season 1 of TRUE BLOOD, which I just finished) was the best part of this movie.
Taylor Kitsch, on the other hand... He was just okay. He's not the best actor in the world, didn't go for it with the gusto that Collins did and I still just see Tim Riggins every time he's in anything. I think he'll be okay in the long run, but he's got a few hurdles to get over before I stop seeing good old 33 whenever I see him.
Andrew Stanton showed that he's as good of a director of live action as he is of animation and it makes me admire him even more. He's got a bright future in this game.
JOHN CARTER was a fun movie and I hope there's more like it. I also hope Collins gets that PRINCESS OF MARS movie, because I'll be there opening night.
I promised myself I'd do something on this blog each and every day. I wanted to keep up with a week's worth of movie related posts (which were already written) to kick things off again, but Wednesday was the day I needed to fill in and I'd planned on using it to start back up my Half-Assed Review column with whatever I saw this week.
Then one thing led to another and I ended up not having the day off as I'd planned. So instead of this being a Half-Assed Review of JOHN CARTER, it's going to be a 1/4-Assed Review because it's late and I'm tired.
The thing that I think hurt it the most was John Carter. I didn't really care about his arc, though I'm glad at the end it was called by its actual name, JOHN CARTER OF MARS.
But what I really wanted, but didn't know until about halfway through the movie, was that I wanted it to be called A PRINCESS OF MARS and I wanted Deja Thoris to be the focus of the movie. She was awesome. She threw herself so into the role that no matter what crazy scene was happening on a green screen behind her, she killed it the entire time. Lynn Collins (who was the best part of season 1 of TRUE BLOOD, which I just finished) was the best part of this movie.
Taylor Kitsch, on the other hand... He was just okay. He's not the best actor in the world, didn't go for it with the gusto that Collins did and I still just see Tim Riggins every time he's in anything. I think he'll be okay in the long run, but he's got a few hurdles to get over before I stop seeing good old 33 whenever I see him.
Andrew Stanton showed that he's as good of a director of live action as he is of animation and it makes me admire him even more. He's got a bright future in this game.
JOHN CARTER was a fun movie and I hope there's more like it. I also hope Collins gets that PRINCESS OF MARS movie, because I'll be there opening night.
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
SUNDAY NIGHT MOVIE - 2012 VERSION
In 2011, I saw 58 movies in the theater. 41 of those were on a Sunday night.
I'd say that makes a pretty damn successful Sunday Night Movie run for the year. On top of that, of the 11 Sundays that we missed, it was usually only due to people being out of town. It's become a pretty solid tradition that I don't see slowing down any time soon.
Late last January, I went through and found all the movies that had release dates scheduled for the coming year and made sort of an unofficial "most anticipated" list, and yesterday, I went through it again and compared it to what I'd seen. It was fun to do, so I figured why not do it again.
Early next year, I'll come back to this list and see what I loved, what I hated, what I missed and what I stayed away from all together.
I'm starting in March this year, because I've fallen a bit behind in posting these (even though I'm writing this on 2/9, it won't go up for a couple of weeks).
MARCH
JOHN CARTER - Andrew Stanton directed WALL*E and he's making the jump to live action with Tim Riggins in tow. His Pixar buddy Brad Bird made the jump with MI:4, and it was great. I really, really want to like this.
21 JUMP STREET - I'm torn on this. I think I'll see it, but I have very, very low expectations.
THE HUNGER GAMES - The only thing I know about this movie is that both Twilight and Harry Potter fans love the books. That doesn't exactly fill me with excitement or confidence.
JEFF WHO LIVES AT HOME - Ed Helms and Jason Segel together. I expect it to be funny, but it's a Duplass Brothers movie and sometimes what they think is funny and tragic just ends up being boring as shit.
APRIL
AMERICAN REUNION - I grew up with the AMERICAN PIE movies, so I have to see this by default. I expect one really funny part and the rest will be a whole bunch of alright.
CABIN IN THE WOODS - A horror movie that supposedly isn't anything you'd expect. I know just about every horror movie ever says that, but Joss Whedon (BUFFY, THE AVENGERS) wrote it, so I kind of believe it.
THE FIVE YEAR ENGAGEMENT - The guy that directed FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL, with Jason Segel and my two celebrity crushes right now, Alison Brie and Emily Blunt. Sold.
MAY
THE AVENGERS - Cautiously optimistic and have been since they announced it. It has to be awesome, right?
BATTLESHIP - I'd be way more willing to give it a fair chance if it wasn't named after a god damn board game. But, Peter Berg and Liam Neeson with some FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS alum along for the ride? I'll roll with it.
MEN IN BLACK III - I'm not excited, I'm genuinely curious why they're making it. Not like Will Smith needs the money.
MOONRISE KINGDOM - Not the biggest Wes Anderson fan. I feel he gets more pretentious with every movie, but I'm willing to put that aside to see what he's been up to.
JUNE
PROMETHEUS - Might be my most anticipated movie of the year. I just want it to be awesome.
BRAVE - I skipped both CARS movies, because I want to pretend Pixar's track record is impeccable. From what I've read/seen, this should be pretty great, keeping the streak intact.
G.I. JOE - RETALIATION - I didn't see the first one because it looked awful. This one looks like a very different kind of awful. A really, really fun kind of awful.
JULY
THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN - A brooding punk rock Peter Parker turns into a gritty Spider-Man. I think of all the super hero movies this year, this one has the most at stake for starting over so soon and retelling an origin that not only everyone knows, but was done very well by Sam Raimi barely a decade ago. I still don't know what I think.
THE DARK KNIGHT RISES - I've stopped looking at anything related to this. I don't want to know anything else. I just want to bask in the glory of the last chapter. Very high on the list of things I'd like to see.
AUGUST
THE BOURNE LEGACY - I liked all three of the Matt Damon movies and I'm totally on board with Jeremy Renner taking over. Should be awesome.
TOTAL RECALL - Just to see what kind of bullshit Len Wiseman has in store. Bryan Cranston is in it too, so at least he'll be awesome. The rest of it will probably suck.
SEPTEMBER
ARGO - Ben Affleck has been killing it from the director's chair, so I'm all in.
LOOPER - Right up there with PROMETHEUS and DARK KNIGHT RISES. The director of BRICK making a time travel, bounty hunter movie starring Bruce Willis. It's going to be awesome.
OCTOBER
GANGSTER SQUAD - They've been trying to get this made for a while now, and I'm always skeptical of that situation, but I have high hopes for this one.
NOVEMBER
WRECK-IT RALPH - Disney movie about a video game character trying to redeem himself. Everything I've heard so far has been great. Really hope it stays that way.
GRAVITY - Any time Alfonso Cuaron (CHILDREN OF MEN) makes a movie, I'm seeing it.
SKYFALL - Bond is back, and hopefully Sam Mendes can make a more interesting movie than QUANTUM OF SOLACE, because that movie was boring as shit.
DECEMBER
WORLD WAR Z - Another long gestating project that finally came through. Hopefully not everyone is sick of zombies by then.
THIS IS FORTY - Judd Apatow's sideways sequel to KNOCKED UP. Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann were great together in that, but Apatow has a knack for letting his movies run too long. Hopefully he fixes that, otherwise get ready for a dearth of headlines that read THIS IS FORTY... MINUTES TOO LONG.
THE GREAT GATSBY - Leo, Toby, Carrie Mulligan and Baz Luhrmann can hopefully do this book justice. At least Vinnie Chase isn't the lead, right? But I just found out that it's in 3D, so I've already got one foot out the door.
DJANGO UNCHAINED - Tarantino's spaghetti western. I'm already in line.
THE HOBBIT - I felt I had to put this on the list even though I don't care if I ever see it. I've never been a Tolkein fan. I've tried, but just can't do it. THE TWO TOWERS was great, but I didn't care for RETURN OF THE KING at all and I've been sick of hearing about this movie for three years already. Can't imagine I'll be less sick of it by December.
Release Dates To Be Determined
SEVEN PSYCHOPATHS - The writer/director of IN BRUGES makes another movie is all I need to know.
ONLY GOD FORGIVES - After BRONSON and DRIVE, I'll watch anything Nicolas Winding Refn does.
THE MASTER - Paul Thomas Anderson has an awesome track record, and this movie is apparently about Scientology. I expect great things, even if I have no idea where it's going to go.
COGAN'S TRADE - The guy that made CHOPPER with Brad Pitt as a mob enforcer? Where do I sign up?
Anything I miss that's for sure coming out this year? I know there will be some Sundance/Cannes/Toronto Film Festival movies that come out of nowhere, and those are usually the best ones because of the surprise factor.
What are you looking forward to?
I'd say that makes a pretty damn successful Sunday Night Movie run for the year. On top of that, of the 11 Sundays that we missed, it was usually only due to people being out of town. It's become a pretty solid tradition that I don't see slowing down any time soon.
Late last January, I went through and found all the movies that had release dates scheduled for the coming year and made sort of an unofficial "most anticipated" list, and yesterday, I went through it again and compared it to what I'd seen. It was fun to do, so I figured why not do it again.
Early next year, I'll come back to this list and see what I loved, what I hated, what I missed and what I stayed away from all together.
I'm starting in March this year, because I've fallen a bit behind in posting these (even though I'm writing this on 2/9, it won't go up for a couple of weeks).
MARCH
JOHN CARTER - Andrew Stanton directed WALL*E and he's making the jump to live action with Tim Riggins in tow. His Pixar buddy Brad Bird made the jump with MI:4, and it was great. I really, really want to like this.
21 JUMP STREET - I'm torn on this. I think I'll see it, but I have very, very low expectations.
THE HUNGER GAMES - The only thing I know about this movie is that both Twilight and Harry Potter fans love the books. That doesn't exactly fill me with excitement or confidence.
JEFF WHO LIVES AT HOME - Ed Helms and Jason Segel together. I expect it to be funny, but it's a Duplass Brothers movie and sometimes what they think is funny and tragic just ends up being boring as shit.
APRIL
AMERICAN REUNION - I grew up with the AMERICAN PIE movies, so I have to see this by default. I expect one really funny part and the rest will be a whole bunch of alright.
CABIN IN THE WOODS - A horror movie that supposedly isn't anything you'd expect. I know just about every horror movie ever says that, but Joss Whedon (BUFFY, THE AVENGERS) wrote it, so I kind of believe it.
THE FIVE YEAR ENGAGEMENT - The guy that directed FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL, with Jason Segel and my two celebrity crushes right now, Alison Brie and Emily Blunt. Sold.
MAY
THE AVENGERS - Cautiously optimistic and have been since they announced it. It has to be awesome, right?
BATTLESHIP - I'd be way more willing to give it a fair chance if it wasn't named after a god damn board game. But, Peter Berg and Liam Neeson with some FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS alum along for the ride? I'll roll with it.
MEN IN BLACK III - I'm not excited, I'm genuinely curious why they're making it. Not like Will Smith needs the money.
MOONRISE KINGDOM - Not the biggest Wes Anderson fan. I feel he gets more pretentious with every movie, but I'm willing to put that aside to see what he's been up to.
JUNE
PROMETHEUS - Might be my most anticipated movie of the year. I just want it to be awesome.
BRAVE - I skipped both CARS movies, because I want to pretend Pixar's track record is impeccable. From what I've read/seen, this should be pretty great, keeping the streak intact.
G.I. JOE - RETALIATION - I didn't see the first one because it looked awful. This one looks like a very different kind of awful. A really, really fun kind of awful.
JULY
THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN - A brooding punk rock Peter Parker turns into a gritty Spider-Man. I think of all the super hero movies this year, this one has the most at stake for starting over so soon and retelling an origin that not only everyone knows, but was done very well by Sam Raimi barely a decade ago. I still don't know what I think.
THE DARK KNIGHT RISES - I've stopped looking at anything related to this. I don't want to know anything else. I just want to bask in the glory of the last chapter. Very high on the list of things I'd like to see.
AUGUST
THE BOURNE LEGACY - I liked all three of the Matt Damon movies and I'm totally on board with Jeremy Renner taking over. Should be awesome.
TOTAL RECALL - Just to see what kind of bullshit Len Wiseman has in store. Bryan Cranston is in it too, so at least he'll be awesome. The rest of it will probably suck.
SEPTEMBER
ARGO - Ben Affleck has been killing it from the director's chair, so I'm all in.
LOOPER - Right up there with PROMETHEUS and DARK KNIGHT RISES. The director of BRICK making a time travel, bounty hunter movie starring Bruce Willis. It's going to be awesome.
OCTOBER
GANGSTER SQUAD - They've been trying to get this made for a while now, and I'm always skeptical of that situation, but I have high hopes for this one.
NOVEMBER
WRECK-IT RALPH - Disney movie about a video game character trying to redeem himself. Everything I've heard so far has been great. Really hope it stays that way.
GRAVITY - Any time Alfonso Cuaron (CHILDREN OF MEN) makes a movie, I'm seeing it.
SKYFALL - Bond is back, and hopefully Sam Mendes can make a more interesting movie than QUANTUM OF SOLACE, because that movie was boring as shit.
DECEMBER
WORLD WAR Z - Another long gestating project that finally came through. Hopefully not everyone is sick of zombies by then.
THIS IS FORTY - Judd Apatow's sideways sequel to KNOCKED UP. Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann were great together in that, but Apatow has a knack for letting his movies run too long. Hopefully he fixes that, otherwise get ready for a dearth of headlines that read THIS IS FORTY... MINUTES TOO LONG.
THE GREAT GATSBY - Leo, Toby, Carrie Mulligan and Baz Luhrmann can hopefully do this book justice. At least Vinnie Chase isn't the lead, right? But I just found out that it's in 3D, so I've already got one foot out the door.
DJANGO UNCHAINED - Tarantino's spaghetti western. I'm already in line.
THE HOBBIT - I felt I had to put this on the list even though I don't care if I ever see it. I've never been a Tolkein fan. I've tried, but just can't do it. THE TWO TOWERS was great, but I didn't care for RETURN OF THE KING at all and I've been sick of hearing about this movie for three years already. Can't imagine I'll be less sick of it by December.
Release Dates To Be Determined
SEVEN PSYCHOPATHS - The writer/director of IN BRUGES makes another movie is all I need to know.
ONLY GOD FORGIVES - After BRONSON and DRIVE, I'll watch anything Nicolas Winding Refn does.
THE MASTER - Paul Thomas Anderson has an awesome track record, and this movie is apparently about Scientology. I expect great things, even if I have no idea where it's going to go.
COGAN'S TRADE - The guy that made CHOPPER with Brad Pitt as a mob enforcer? Where do I sign up?
Anything I miss that's for sure coming out this year? I know there will be some Sundance/Cannes/Toronto Film Festival movies that come out of nowhere, and those are usually the best ones because of the surprise factor.
What are you looking forward to?
Monday, March 12, 2012
BACK IN ACTION
I put this blog on pause back in January with the idea that I'd "re-launch" by the beginning of February. Well, February came and went and nothing ever happened.
The plan was to get a new banner, a new logo and clean up the layout a little bit. I had a lot of things planned for trevorhale.com this year and I just wanted to kind of get off to a fresh start. Only, the problem is that I'm not a designer, nor am I very web-savvy so I had to outsource to get a new banner/design. And since the person I reached out to has a full time job, a family and I wasn't paying for anything, I couldn't really ask them to drop everything and do that for me. So I just kept waiting and hoping that I'd get home from work one day and have an awesome e-mail waiting for me and I could get back to it.
But now it's March 12 and I decided I should just start and the changes will trickle out as they come.
Also, I've been writing a bunch of posts in my spare time and just saving them as drafts—stockpiling for the new beginning. Problem with that is that a few of them became outdated and worthless and I had to scrap them. Just a few though, and I was able to fill in the spots with other things.
So here it is. The new-but-not-quite-new trevorhale.com. This first week is dedicated (almost) solely to movies, next week will probably be comics, then I'll start rolling out the new features like weekly columns and videos and maybe a podcast. Not quite sure about the last one, but we'll see. That one might even become a weekly "Countdown to Casey aka The Big Dogg's Out Of Control Wedding" podcast where he just tells us all the crazy things he has planned one week and then the next week tells us how that all fell apart shortly after setting it in motion. That would entertain us all the way to September.
Anyway.
Welcome back. I'm sure you've missed me as much as I've missed you.
First post of a "bold, new direction" is right below and it's everything you never knew you wanted to know.
The plan was to get a new banner, a new logo and clean up the layout a little bit. I had a lot of things planned for trevorhale.com this year and I just wanted to kind of get off to a fresh start. Only, the problem is that I'm not a designer, nor am I very web-savvy so I had to outsource to get a new banner/design. And since the person I reached out to has a full time job, a family and I wasn't paying for anything, I couldn't really ask them to drop everything and do that for me. So I just kept waiting and hoping that I'd get home from work one day and have an awesome e-mail waiting for me and I could get back to it.
But now it's March 12 and I decided I should just start and the changes will trickle out as they come.
Also, I've been writing a bunch of posts in my spare time and just saving them as drafts—stockpiling for the new beginning. Problem with that is that a few of them became outdated and worthless and I had to scrap them. Just a few though, and I was able to fill in the spots with other things.
So here it is. The new-but-not-quite-new trevorhale.com. This first week is dedicated (almost) solely to movies, next week will probably be comics, then I'll start rolling out the new features like weekly columns and videos and maybe a podcast. Not quite sure about the last one, but we'll see. That one might even become a weekly "Countdown to Casey aka The Big Dogg's Out Of Control Wedding" podcast where he just tells us all the crazy things he has planned one week and then the next week tells us how that all fell apart shortly after setting it in motion. That would entertain us all the way to September.
Anyway.
Welcome back. I'm sure you've missed me as much as I've missed you.
First post of a "bold, new direction" is right below and it's everything you never knew you wanted to know.
2011 HALF-ASSED YEAR IN REVIEW - FILM VERSION
If you'll remember last January, I compiled a list of all the movies I wanted to see that already had set release dates.
It's time to go back to that and list all the movies I saw this year, month by month. I'm doing kind of a then and now type thing. You might get bored. I'll try to keep you interested.
JANUARY
I LOVE YOU PHILLIP MORRIS
THE KING'S SPEECH
THE DILEMMA
THE GREEN HORNET
THE DETAILS
BEATS, RHYMES & LIFE (Tribe Called Quest doc)
BLUE VALENTINE
Summary: None of those were on my list because half of them were *technically* 2010 movies that didn't get released in SLC until January, two of them were Sundance movies and I didn't make that initial list until the 26th of January. So...
FEBRUARY
THE MECHANIC
What I said then: "Ben Foster, Jason Statham in a shitty action movie? Of course I'll see it."
What I say now: "Yep, pretty much exactly what I thought."
NO STRINGS ATTACHED
UNKNOWN
HALL PASS
MARCH
CEDAR RAPIDS
What I said then: "Because I think Ed Helms is hilarious"
What I say now: "Stick by it. I thought this movie was great."
BATTLE: LOS ANGELES
What I said then: "Could be awesome, could be a laughable train wreck. Either way, it's a way to spend my Sunday night."
What I say now: "This movie was terrible. Not even laughably bad. Long and boring, it was like watching someone play a shitty video game."
THE ADJUSTMENT BUREAU
What I said then: "Matt Damon is great, Emily Blunt is pretty and Philip K. Dick was awesome."
What I say now: "Way too many religious undertones. Really wanted to like it, but was kind of silly."
THE LINCOLN LAWYER
LIMITLESS
APRIL
SUCKER PUNCH
What I said then: "Just to see if Zack Snyder is who I thought he was. Plus over the top action, way too much slow motion and out of nowhere sex scenes? It can't be all bad."
What I say now: "He is exactly who I thought he was and I was wrong. It was all bad. The whole thing was just awful."
I SAW THE DEVIL
YOUR HIGHNESS
What I said then: "It's either going to be hilarious or it's going to miss on every level."
What I say now: "I had no idea there was going to be THAT much weed humor in it. I don't smoke weed, so didn't do it for me."
HANNA
SCREAM 4
What I said then: "Curious to see whether they can make something good or if they should have just left it alone."
What I say now: "Probably should have just left it alone."
SUPER
MAY
FAST FIVE
THOR
What I said then: "I have faith in Kenneth Branagh."
What I say now: "My faith paid off. I loved THOR."
BRIDESMAIDS
13 ASSASSINS
JUNE
X-MEN: FIRST CLASS
What I said then: "Matthew Vaughn hasn't made a bad movie yet."
What I say now: "Still hasn't. It was awesome."
SUPER 8
What I said then: "Neither has JJ Abrams."
What I say now: "Still hasn't, but maybe he shouldn't try quite so hard to be Spielberg."
TREE OF LIFE
MIDNIGHT IN PARIS
THE HANGOVER: PART II
What I said then: "This movie will be so overhyped that there's no possible way for it to live up to the expectations. It'll still have one or two really funny parts."
What I say now: "It was exactly the same as Part I. No one tried, no one cared. It was just boring."
JULY
BEGINNERS
HORRIBLE BOSSES
TABLOID
CAPTAIN AMERICA
What I said then: "I don't have faith in Joe Johnston, but I'm hoping he surprises me."
What I say now: "He surprised me. Not great, but a fun Cap movie was all I wanted and that's what I got."
COWBOYS & ALIENS
What I said then: "Daniel Craig and Harrison Ford together will get me into the theater to see just about anything."
What I say now: "I wish they'd gotten me into the theater to see a better movie."
AUGUST
CRAZY, STUPID, LOVE
RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES
What I said then: "James Franco and John Lithgow battling super intelligent monkeys? Sold."
What I say now: "So much better than I thought it would be. So, so good."
30 MINUTES OR LESS
What I said then: "Reuben Fleischer (ZOMBIELAND) alone will get me in to the theater just to see if he can give me another fun hour and a half."
What I say now: "Fun, short and sweet. Really enjoyed it."
FRIGHT NIGHT
OUR IDIOT BROTHER
SEPTEMBER
ATTACK THE BLOCK
CONTAGION
What I said then: "Steven Soderbergh and Matt Damn. Don't need to know anything else."
What I say now: "Decent. Not great, but had some fantastic moments. Didn't scare me as much as it did other people."
DRIVE
What I said then: "Nicolas Winding Refn tells a story of a Hollywood stunt driver. I already bought a ticket for this."
What I say now: "Everyone should have bought a ticket for this. Might be the best movie of the year."
OCTOBER
50/50
WHAT'S YOUR NUMBER?
MONEYBALL
What I said then: "I love baseball movies and this seems like it has potential."
What I say now: "Potential fulfilled. Maybe a bit too long, but I really, really liked it."
THE RUM DIARY
POINT BLANK (A BOUT PORTANT)
NOVEMBER
TOWER HEIST
MARTHA, MARCY, MAY, MARLENE
MARGIN CALL
A VERY HAROLD AND KUMAR CHRISTMAS
THE MUPPETS
What I said then: "Jason Segel was handed the reins of the Muppets franchise based off Dracula The Musical in FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL. Absolutely nothing can go wrong."
What I say now: "Knocked it out of the park. It was the perfect reintroduction to The Muppets and I loved every second of it."
HUGO
What I said then: "Martin Scorsese. Enough said."
What I say now: "Glad I saw it, didn't think it was as amazing as it was made out to be."
DECEMBER
THE SITTER
MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - GHOST PROTOCOL
What I said then: "Brad Bird (THE SIMPSON'S, THE INCREDIBLES, IRON GIANT) makes his first live-action feature. Cautiously optimistic."
What I say now: "So much fun. Best MI movie yet and I didn't hate Tom Cruise at all. Which was shocking to me."
THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO
What I said then: "David Fincher. Enough said. Plus Daniel Craig. And Rooney Mara looks great."
What I say now: "Took me about half the movie to stop comparing it to the Swedish version, but still really liked it. And I'm totally on the 'I now have an enormous crush on Rooney Mara' bandwagon."
THE ADVENTURES OF TIN TIN
What I said then: "Because it's the only movie anyone will be talking about come December. 'Spielberg and Jackson working together?!?!?! I HAVE TO SEE IT NOW!!!!!'"
What I say now: "Waaay better than I gave it a chance to be. Really fun movie."
On the initial list that I never saw because they didn't look remotely appealing after seeing the trailer or I heard/read enough bad things to stay far away:
GNOMEO & JULIET
PAUL
SOURCE CODE
THE BEAVER
PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: ON STRANGER TIDES
GREEN LANTERN
CARS 2
HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS PT. 2
NOW (retitled IN TIME)
IMMORTALS
SHERLOCK HOLMES 2
WE BOUGHT A ZOO
WAR HORSE
All in all, I saw 58 movies in the theater in 2011 and none of them immediately stick out as the frontrunner for BEST OF THE YEAR. I'll probably narrow it down to a TOP 5 sometime over the next few days, and also go through the 2012 releases so keep an eye out.
What did you see last year that you absolutely loved? Anything?
It's time to go back to that and list all the movies I saw this year, month by month. I'm doing kind of a then and now type thing. You might get bored. I'll try to keep you interested.
JANUARY
I LOVE YOU PHILLIP MORRIS
THE KING'S SPEECH
THE DILEMMA
THE GREEN HORNET
THE DETAILS
BEATS, RHYMES & LIFE (Tribe Called Quest doc)
BLUE VALENTINE
Summary: None of those were on my list because half of them were *technically* 2010 movies that didn't get released in SLC until January, two of them were Sundance movies and I didn't make that initial list until the 26th of January. So...
FEBRUARY
THE MECHANIC
What I said then: "Ben Foster, Jason Statham in a shitty action movie? Of course I'll see it."
What I say now: "Yep, pretty much exactly what I thought."
NO STRINGS ATTACHED
UNKNOWN
HALL PASS
MARCH
CEDAR RAPIDS
What I said then: "Because I think Ed Helms is hilarious"
What I say now: "Stick by it. I thought this movie was great."
BATTLE: LOS ANGELES
What I said then: "Could be awesome, could be a laughable train wreck. Either way, it's a way to spend my Sunday night."
What I say now: "This movie was terrible. Not even laughably bad. Long and boring, it was like watching someone play a shitty video game."
THE ADJUSTMENT BUREAU
What I said then: "Matt Damon is great, Emily Blunt is pretty and Philip K. Dick was awesome."
What I say now: "Way too many religious undertones. Really wanted to like it, but was kind of silly."
THE LINCOLN LAWYER
LIMITLESS
APRIL
SUCKER PUNCH
What I said then: "Just to see if Zack Snyder is who I thought he was. Plus over the top action, way too much slow motion and out of nowhere sex scenes? It can't be all bad."
What I say now: "He is exactly who I thought he was and I was wrong. It was all bad. The whole thing was just awful."
I SAW THE DEVIL
YOUR HIGHNESS
What I said then: "It's either going to be hilarious or it's going to miss on every level."
What I say now: "I had no idea there was going to be THAT much weed humor in it. I don't smoke weed, so didn't do it for me."
HANNA
SCREAM 4
What I said then: "Curious to see whether they can make something good or if they should have just left it alone."
What I say now: "Probably should have just left it alone."
SUPER
MAY
FAST FIVE
THOR
What I said then: "I have faith in Kenneth Branagh."
What I say now: "My faith paid off. I loved THOR."
BRIDESMAIDS
13 ASSASSINS
JUNE
X-MEN: FIRST CLASS
What I said then: "Matthew Vaughn hasn't made a bad movie yet."
What I say now: "Still hasn't. It was awesome."
SUPER 8
What I said then: "Neither has JJ Abrams."
What I say now: "Still hasn't, but maybe he shouldn't try quite so hard to be Spielberg."
TREE OF LIFE
MIDNIGHT IN PARIS
THE HANGOVER: PART II
What I said then: "This movie will be so overhyped that there's no possible way for it to live up to the expectations. It'll still have one or two really funny parts."
What I say now: "It was exactly the same as Part I. No one tried, no one cared. It was just boring."
JULY
BEGINNERS
HORRIBLE BOSSES
TABLOID
CAPTAIN AMERICA
What I said then: "I don't have faith in Joe Johnston, but I'm hoping he surprises me."
What I say now: "He surprised me. Not great, but a fun Cap movie was all I wanted and that's what I got."
COWBOYS & ALIENS
What I said then: "Daniel Craig and Harrison Ford together will get me into the theater to see just about anything."
What I say now: "I wish they'd gotten me into the theater to see a better movie."
AUGUST
CRAZY, STUPID, LOVE
RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES
What I said then: "James Franco and John Lithgow battling super intelligent monkeys? Sold."
What I say now: "So much better than I thought it would be. So, so good."
30 MINUTES OR LESS
What I said then: "Reuben Fleischer (ZOMBIELAND) alone will get me in to the theater just to see if he can give me another fun hour and a half."
What I say now: "Fun, short and sweet. Really enjoyed it."
FRIGHT NIGHT
OUR IDIOT BROTHER
SEPTEMBER
ATTACK THE BLOCK
CONTAGION
What I said then: "Steven Soderbergh and Matt Damn. Don't need to know anything else."
What I say now: "Decent. Not great, but had some fantastic moments. Didn't scare me as much as it did other people."
DRIVE
What I said then: "Nicolas Winding Refn tells a story of a Hollywood stunt driver. I already bought a ticket for this."
What I say now: "Everyone should have bought a ticket for this. Might be the best movie of the year."
OCTOBER
50/50
WHAT'S YOUR NUMBER?
MONEYBALL
What I said then: "I love baseball movies and this seems like it has potential."
What I say now: "Potential fulfilled. Maybe a bit too long, but I really, really liked it."
THE RUM DIARY
POINT BLANK (A BOUT PORTANT)
NOVEMBER
TOWER HEIST
MARTHA, MARCY, MAY, MARLENE
MARGIN CALL
A VERY HAROLD AND KUMAR CHRISTMAS
THE MUPPETS
What I said then: "Jason Segel was handed the reins of the Muppets franchise based off Dracula The Musical in FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL. Absolutely nothing can go wrong."
What I say now: "Knocked it out of the park. It was the perfect reintroduction to The Muppets and I loved every second of it."
HUGO
What I said then: "Martin Scorsese. Enough said."
What I say now: "Glad I saw it, didn't think it was as amazing as it was made out to be."
DECEMBER
THE SITTER
MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE - GHOST PROTOCOL
What I said then: "Brad Bird (THE SIMPSON'S, THE INCREDIBLES, IRON GIANT) makes his first live-action feature. Cautiously optimistic."
What I say now: "So much fun. Best MI movie yet and I didn't hate Tom Cruise at all. Which was shocking to me."
THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO
What I said then: "David Fincher. Enough said. Plus Daniel Craig. And Rooney Mara looks great."
What I say now: "Took me about half the movie to stop comparing it to the Swedish version, but still really liked it. And I'm totally on the 'I now have an enormous crush on Rooney Mara' bandwagon."
THE ADVENTURES OF TIN TIN
What I said then: "Because it's the only movie anyone will be talking about come December. 'Spielberg and Jackson working together?!?!?! I HAVE TO SEE IT NOW!!!!!'"
What I say now: "Waaay better than I gave it a chance to be. Really fun movie."
On the initial list that I never saw because they didn't look remotely appealing after seeing the trailer or I heard/read enough bad things to stay far away:
GNOMEO & JULIET
PAUL
SOURCE CODE
THE BEAVER
PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: ON STRANGER TIDES
GREEN LANTERN
CARS 2
HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS PT. 2
NOW (retitled IN TIME)
IMMORTALS
SHERLOCK HOLMES 2
WE BOUGHT A ZOO
WAR HORSE
All in all, I saw 58 movies in the theater in 2011 and none of them immediately stick out as the frontrunner for BEST OF THE YEAR. I'll probably narrow it down to a TOP 5 sometime over the next few days, and also go through the 2012 releases so keep an eye out.
What did you see last year that you absolutely loved? Anything?
Monday, February 27, 2012
A FORMER LIFE
I'd played bass in Aftermath before, but that was back in 2005 when we went on an ill-fated two week trek up through the Northwest and down to Phoenix. Beyond that, they broke up in late 2006, resurfaced as XVictimsX for a bit in 2007/2008 and have been playing sporadic reunion shows ever since.
Needless to say, I wasn't terribly excited at the prospect of an Aftermath show. But, I figured that it would be kind of fun to hang out with all the friends I don't see very much anymore and make a little vacation out of it. After all, Phoenix in February is way nicer than Salt Lake in February, so I was on board.
Originally, the plan was to leave Thursday, spend the night in Vegas, head to Phoenix on Friday, hang out, play on Saturday, drive back to Vegas after and drive the rest of the way home on Sunday. Sounded good to me. But then things started to change. Tyler couldn't get work off on Friday, so we couldn't leave until late that night and Richard had to be back to drive to Wyoming for work on Sunday afternoon. Sounds like fun, doesn't it?
Ultimately, I think it was kind of a waste of time but there were a few bright spots here and there. The brightest was probably Green Vegetarian Restaurant in Phoenix. It was awesome. It may have been better than it really was because it was the first and only actual food I ate the entire time I was gone. I was the only vegan (no one else was even vegetarian) in the van and outnumbered 11-1 and the only places everyone else wanted to eat was fast food chains that we don't have in Utah.
The plus side was that I got to hang out with some people that I never get to see anymore, but that was about it.
It's hard to believe that I used to love doing that kind of thing as much as I did. It was fun while it lasted.
Rest of the pictures are after the jump. Check them out. Most of these I took, but a few were stolen from the Instagram feeds of @assholegonerogue, @xgenocidex, @sleepyxpanda, and @drewdavenport. Follow them. It's what they're there for.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
WOLVES & MARTYRS: THE ORIGIN OF VALENTINE'S DAY
Let's talk a little about Valentine's Day. If you want to get all comic book-y, we can call this kind of a "Year One" type story.
Shall we?
In 3rd or 4th century BC, The Parentalia and Feralia Festivals of Purification were celebrated from February 13-18 to coincide with the Fertility Festival. The latter was a ritual not unlike the "Casual Encounters" section of CraigsList. All of the willing females would enter their names into a box and one by one, eligible men would step up for their turn. With a name in hand, the two would go off and what happened next was reffered to as a "rite of passage." Use your imagination for that one.
Before that began however, there was the LUPERCALIA (from the Latin lupus meaning "wolf"). During this day, priests—known as Luperci—from two colleges (Quintillii and Fabii) would meet at the Cave of Lupercal in the Palatine Hill, where a she-wolf was said to have nursed Romulus and Remus, the twin founders of Rome. There, Vestal Virgins would offer holy salt cakes and the priests would sacrifice a dog and a goat, smearing the animal blood onto the foreheads of youths of noble birth. Clad only in a goatskin thong, those same youths would later lead a band of revelers known as the luperci in the performance of such antics as whipping fields of crops and bystanders with a goatskin strip (known as the februa). Women gently lashed in such a fashion were thought to become fertile—even those known to be barren. The act of such lashings or whippings was known as februatio. Both this word and the word februa come from the Latin meaning "to purify." The naming of the month, February, is believed to have originated from these meanings.
Basically, February means "to purify by beating with a goatskin strip."
No flowers or candy hearts yet.
When Christianity was eventually formed, it was attempted to replace the rituals with something a little bit more uplifting. Pope Gelasius outlawed the Lupercian Festival, but kept the name drawing part—just slightly tweaked. Instead of available women, the names of Saints were written on the papers and it was believed that the recipient (boys and girls participated in the drawing) would emulate the life of whichever Saint was chosen. This new system, while much more noble, was a lot less fun. Eventually, it was abandoned and the old "rite of passage" returned.
Those are the ones you don't hear too much about. This one however, is the most widely known part of the origin.
In Rome, 270 AD, Claudius II passed an edict that abolished marriage. He felt that married men made poor soldiers because they were loath to leave their loves ones for battle. The emperor craved a strong army far more than he cared about popularity and banned the act of marriage all together.
Valentine, a bishop of Interamna, disagreed with the Emperor and invited young lovers to come to him in secret to be joined in the sacrament of matrimony. Claudius soon learned of this "friend of lovers" and had the bishop brought to the palace. The Emperor, impressed with the young priest's dignity and conviction, attempted to convert him to the Roman gods to save him from otherwise certain execution. Valentine refused to renounce Christianity and imprudently attempted to convert the Emperor. It didn't work and he was sentenced to death. While Valentine was in prison awaiting execution, he fell in love with the blind daughter of the jailer, Asterius. Through his unswerving faith, he miraculously restored her sight. He signed a farewell message to her "From Your Valentine."Soon after, on February 14th (or so history claims) Valentine was clubbed, stoned and then beheaded.
To recap, in case you got bored: Valentine's Day is essentially the celebration of blood, sacrifice, random sex, wolves and martyrs.
I want a card with that on it.
(*Note - I wrote this after reading a few different histories relating to Valentine's Day on the Internet. Warren Ellis is responsible for me looking further into it. He has some cards and such available on his site if you're interested. Also, it's entirely possible that none of this is true or historically accurate at all. But it's far more entertaining.)
Thursday, February 9, 2012
SLIP IT IN
Black Flag has long been one of my favorite bands and this super DIY music video from 1984 only adds to the list of reasons I love them.
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
BONES BRIGADE
I don't usually get star struck. I've seen rock stars, famous actors and NBA legends in person before and I always think to myself "Hey, there's so and so. That's pretty awesome."
Then they're gone and I forget about it a few minutes later.
Last night was different.
The Sundance Film Festival is in town this week. I didn't have tickets to anything and I hadn't even looked to see what was playing, so I just kind of figured I wouldn't be going to anything and I wasn't too bummed. Everything was already sold out anyway. I checked Craigslist and KSL, but all the tickets had already gone up to more than double the original price, so I didn't think too much about it.
Then my friend Casey texted me.
"I got you a ticket to Bones Brigade."
"I don't know what that is."
"Stacy Peralta's new movie about the Bones Brigade."
That's when I got excited. I was never huge into skateboarding because I was always afraid of hurting myself and I never had anyone to skate with. Most of my friends were far more into baseball and basketball than skateboarding, but I did have a few that were. I watched the Bones Brigade Video Show more than a few times and even managed to get a second hand Powell - Peralta board that I rode up and down the street, maybe to the nearest store—which was only a few blocks away. I never had the guts to try any of the tricks in the video, but that didn't stop me from watching it.
Last night Casey, Brook, Brandon, Andy, Dan and I lined up in the basement of the Rose Wagner theater downtown. We joked and had fun like we always do, then one of the Sundance workers came down with an announcement.
"We have some people from the film here and they'll be signing posters for anybody that would like one."
Everyone in our group kind of looked at each other and shrugged. We didn't really care about getting an autographed poster. What are we? 12? We didn't have any room in our homes for autographed skateboard merchandise from one or two random people in the movie.
We joked around a bit more and then we looked up the stairs just as the entire Bones Brigade made their way down. Stacy Peralta was in the front followed by Lance Mountain, Steve Caballero, Mike McGill, Rodney Mullen and Tommy Guerrero.
"Holy shit," said Brook, "that's all of them."
We were star struck. Every single one of us.
Five minutes before, none of us wanted anything to do with a free poster. Now we all wanted one and we wanted it signed by everyone at that table.
One by one we made our way through the line shaking hands, getting autographs and talking to our childhood heroes.
It was like we were twelve years old again and we didn't stop smiling the rest of the night.
Oh, the movie was great too. Funny, touching, heartbreaking and amazing all the way around.
But that 20 minutes before the movie started was the best part of the day.
Monday, January 9, 2012
CATHEDRAL TATTOO
I've written about these fellas before—because they are all gentlemen, scholars, fine tattooers and also good friends of mine.
It's good to see them getting a little press here and there and they've just finished an interview with Gavin Sheehan—himself a fine gentleman that I've worked with a time or two before—for his City Weekly blog called Gavin's Underground.
You should all read it.
Gavin's Underground -- Eleventh St. Electric Gallery came to an end back in 2010, a lot of the patrons of the shop were curious what would become of their favorite tattoo location. The business essentially split in two, one-half continuing on as Yellow Rose Tattoo (whom we'll try to chat with down the road), while artists Tyler Densley, CJ Fishburn and Jake Miller formed a new place under the name Cathedral Tattoo. They took up shop along 400 South across from the Main Library and a major Trax station, welcoming all former clients as well as new downtown walk-in traffic, becoming one of the fastest-growing tattoo shops in years.
Continue Reading...
Tuesday, January 3, 2012
GOALS
I don't like New Year's. I mean, I don't like it as a holiday. Generally, I have no feelings about a new year, but New Year's is silly.
That's why I spent my New Year's home sick, watching 30 Rock, writing and thinking. I did a lot of thinking.
I thought about things I accomplished in 2011 and I don't really feel like I accomplished much. I worked a lot, which made doing things I wanted to do much easier, but it also left me tired and without energy for much else. There were some things here and there that I got done, but nothing I'm immensely proud of.
2012 will be different.
I'm not big on New Year's resolutions, because I feel those are too easily forgotten and a resolution implies that you need to change who you are. I like who I am. I don't need to change, I just want to focus on doing more of the things I love to do already. That's why I want to set goals instead. Goals for myself that might seem lofty, but shouldn't be and aren't. I spent far too much time sitting around my house watching TV on DVD or bullshitting at coffee shops last year instead of getting things done. I'll still have time for both of those things, but I need to get other stuff done, too.
And rather than make these goals in my head or on a little piece of paper that I'll misplace (or more likely that Harley will steal because it moves slightly when the heater blows on it), I'm going to do it here. I'll just throw it out on this blog, because there's probably only like 8 people still paying attention to it since it never gets updated (see goal Number 4 below).
Here they are in no particular order.
1. Write/produce comics - I can't draw for shit (as we've covered before), but I have incredibly talented friends that can. I've got two in the works. One is scripted and (almost) ready to draw and the other is in outline form that I'll hopefully get to this week.
- Untitled Space Adventure with Gardner Seawright
- Grudge City with Candace Jean
2. Art show at Cathedral Tattoo in July - Gardner and Candace are going to have pages from the books on display and we'll have the books to sell. It's part of Gallery Stroll that month and already booked. Now we've just got to get it ready.
3. Read more - Pretty self-explanatory. I'm setting a goal of one book every two weeks. That doesn't include comics. I think I can do that.
4. Take better care of trevorhale.com - I just want to do more stuff on here. I don't know what exactly, but there needs to be more of it.
5. Make a movie - Andy, Casey and I have been kicking around ideas about how to make a 8-12 minute short over the summer. Well, Andy and I started talking about it and Casey pointed out that he has exclusive rights as my producer, so he has to be involved. We have no idea what it will be about or where we're going to show it, but we're going to to do it.
6. Make a Zine - Not only do I have a lot of very talented artist friends, but I have a lot of very talented writer friends, too. I want to make an old school, punk rock style, DIY zine. Haven't figured out the content yet, but that will come.
7. Craft Lake City - This kind of involves numbers 1, 4, maybe 5 and 6 from the list above. Craft Lake City, if you don't know, is a DIY craft show put on by SLUG magazine every August. Since I don't craft, I'll have zines, comics, buttons and t-shirts at the trevorhale.com booth. I haven't applied yet, since it doesn't open until March, but I have a good feeling.
I think those are the big ones. I may add more throughout the rest of the week, but those are the ones I've been thinking about a lot for the past few days/weeks/months.
There are a bunch of other little ones, like stop eating dinner after 10 PM—which I've already broken several times and it's only January 9th—and take better care of myself by getting out and going to the gym more and things like that, but those are small potatoes compared to the big 7.
2012 is the year that I bring my punk rock/hardcore Do-It-Yourself roots back full force. It's going to be a good year.
That's why I spent my New Year's home sick, watching 30 Rock, writing and thinking. I did a lot of thinking.
I thought about things I accomplished in 2011 and I don't really feel like I accomplished much. I worked a lot, which made doing things I wanted to do much easier, but it also left me tired and without energy for much else. There were some things here and there that I got done, but nothing I'm immensely proud of.
2012 will be different.
I'm not big on New Year's resolutions, because I feel those are too easily forgotten and a resolution implies that you need to change who you are. I like who I am. I don't need to change, I just want to focus on doing more of the things I love to do already. That's why I want to set goals instead. Goals for myself that might seem lofty, but shouldn't be and aren't. I spent far too much time sitting around my house watching TV on DVD or bullshitting at coffee shops last year instead of getting things done. I'll still have time for both of those things, but I need to get other stuff done, too.
And rather than make these goals in my head or on a little piece of paper that I'll misplace (or more likely that Harley will steal because it moves slightly when the heater blows on it), I'm going to do it here. I'll just throw it out on this blog, because there's probably only like 8 people still paying attention to it since it never gets updated (see goal Number 4 below).
Here they are in no particular order.
1. Write/produce comics - I can't draw for shit (as we've covered before), but I have incredibly talented friends that can. I've got two in the works. One is scripted and (almost) ready to draw and the other is in outline form that I'll hopefully get to this week.
- Untitled Space Adventure with Gardner Seawright
- Grudge City with Candace Jean
2. Art show at Cathedral Tattoo in July - Gardner and Candace are going to have pages from the books on display and we'll have the books to sell. It's part of Gallery Stroll that month and already booked. Now we've just got to get it ready.
3. Read more - Pretty self-explanatory. I'm setting a goal of one book every two weeks. That doesn't include comics. I think I can do that.
4. Take better care of trevorhale.com - I just want to do more stuff on here. I don't know what exactly, but there needs to be more of it.
5. Make a movie - Andy, Casey and I have been kicking around ideas about how to make a 8-12 minute short over the summer. Well, Andy and I started talking about it and Casey pointed out that he has exclusive rights as my producer, so he has to be involved. We have no idea what it will be about or where we're going to show it, but we're going to to do it.
6. Make a Zine - Not only do I have a lot of very talented artist friends, but I have a lot of very talented writer friends, too. I want to make an old school, punk rock style, DIY zine. Haven't figured out the content yet, but that will come.
7. Craft Lake City - This kind of involves numbers 1, 4, maybe 5 and 6 from the list above. Craft Lake City, if you don't know, is a DIY craft show put on by SLUG magazine every August. Since I don't craft, I'll have zines, comics, buttons and t-shirts at the trevorhale.com booth. I haven't applied yet, since it doesn't open until March, but I have a good feeling.
I think those are the big ones. I may add more throughout the rest of the week, but those are the ones I've been thinking about a lot for the past few days/weeks/months.
There are a bunch of other little ones, like stop eating dinner after 10 PM—which I've already broken several times and it's only January 9th—and take better care of myself by getting out and going to the gym more and things like that, but those are small potatoes compared to the big 7.
2012 is the year that I bring my punk rock/hardcore Do-It-Yourself roots back full force. It's going to be a good year.
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