The staff of American Madness would like to thank the 
100 Best Movie Lines in 200 Seconds
(Hat tip to Elliot Jacobs!)
Produced by Liquid Generation Group. Website here. Smart folks! They seem to have figured out how to sell ads. If only Hollywood could understand! So far, this video has only 327,410 views, but I predict this will be in the top 100 youtube videos of all time. Or maybe I just think that because I know a lot of movie lovers.
Revisiting The Lord of the Rings films
I’ve spent the last two days not feeling so great, formatting my hard drive and re-installing Windows on my computer (what a big pain in the ass that is!). So to help ease the time and boredom while installing drivers and software and trying to figure out how the hell to reconnect to my WiFi router I’ve finally listened to 1 of the 4 (!!) commentary tracks on The Fellowship of the Ring. I’ve only owned this DVD for 6 1/2 years.
The first track is by co-writer/director/producer Peter Jackson, co-writer Philippa Boyens and co-writer Fran Walsh. Among the usual blather about the actors, technical aspects of shooting particular scenes and adapting the novel, I learned some surprising facts about the FX. Many things that I always thought were brilliantly executed CGI were actually miniatures. Of course the film is loaded with CGI and although I thought at the time and still believe today that it’s among the best CGI I’ve seen in a live-action film, many of the seams are still visible.
But it’s the use of miniatures that pleases me so.
The week in brief
Several exciting things happened this week! First of all, the Obama Administration released “Memos of Law,” written by the Bush “Justice Department.” We can all decide for ourselves how just and legal those memos are. As for this lawyer, those memos are a perfect example of what whores lawyers can be when they forget that they are not just representatives of their clients – in this case the Bush Administration – but Officers of The Court, charged with protecting and defending the Constitution of the United States and of the State in which they practice. The men who wrote those memos might as well have practiced in a fascist state. They completely forgot where they lived and what our ethos, ethics, morality, and constitution require of us as Americans. What is tragic is the wild numbers of lunatics who have written to defend the use of torture against our enemies.
Next the administration has extended a hand of friendship to Cuba, something that would have been done decades ago is it wasn’t for the formerly fanatic anti communist former Cubans living in Florida and their intense political lobby. Fortunately, those people have grown old and their children aren’t fixated about what Cuba was like over 50 years ago. This could have been done by either Clinton or Bush but they were both terrified of losing the votes of the former Cuban refugees and their children. Thank G-d for the passage of time.
I have also been shocked, shocked, to learn that an investigation into the dealings of former New York State Legislator, Alan Hevesi, has revealed the degree to which companies must pay off politicians to do business with the State of New York. LOL.
Ah yes, it is obvious that the markets are recovering and they are getting fat and happy. Also LOL. The lemmings that reside in the market will shortly spook when additional bad news comes out of the economy, but for now the band on the Titanic is playing for all its worth. The big banks (note the intentional small case letters) are making money again due to humongous infusions of the peoples money and they are still being run by the crew that raped America in the first place. What a nutty country this is.
There are some good things: Paul McCartney is still playing the guitar in public.
Wanted: Matrix Lite – not the same great taste, less filling
A young man works day in and day out in a soul-crushing office job. He’s thoroughly dissatisfied with his life, which he views as devoid of any meaning. One day he’s visited by a mysterious stranger in the form of a beautiful woman. He is saved from someone who seems to be after him and brought to meet a ragtag team led by a wizened black man who will give him spiritual guidance while training him to free his mind and become a highly skilled fighter and assassin.
If this sounds remarkably similar to another film you’ve seen that’s because Wanted, from Kazakh director Timur Bekmambetov in his Hollywood debut, is an action thriller that borrows quite heavily from The Matrix. Call it “Matrix Lite” in the sense that not only are the story and the visual effects inferior (and by no means do I want to imply the effects are bad), but the attempt at infusing the story with philosophical trappings is a laughable mess. Read more »