Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Buddha Sam



This is our cat Sam and how he sits Buddha style...

Monday, June 26, 2006

REVIEW: Superman Returns


Bobbie hooked me and Amy up with a sneek peek screening of Superman Returns on Friday at 2pm, a full 5 days early before it comes out on Wed. Can you say excited? Well here we go. After 15 years of trying to get this movie off the ground, it is finally here. I am a huge Superman fan as most of you know. My grandfather took me to see Superman: the Movie in 1978 at the Ridglea Theater on Camp Bowie. I still remember where I sat, what it smelled like, how I felt. All of that. It's all very vivid to me what Richard Donner's movie did for my generation a year after Star Wars came out. We believed a man could fly. It was after this movie and the sequel that I started watching Superfriends, then started reading Superman comics. My favorite was Batman and Superman teaming together. I was real hesitant about this movie, because Warners was intent to capitalize on the Death of Superman comics that had been so successful. I read Kevin Smith's draft and liked it as a story, but a s a movie it was too talkie in that Kevin Smith kind of way. Then Tim Burton was gonna do it with Nick Cage in a black and blue Superman suit. Istar. Then McG was gonna direct, then Brett Ratner. They were all gonna do a total remake of the character. In the back of your mind you were always fantazing about a "what if" they did a sequel to the originals. But you always thought that was so long ago, who would have the balls to do that? Well they found someone, named Bryan Singer. I thought his X2 was a perfect Superhero movie, and when they fired Brett Ratner and offered it to Singer I was so happy. Sad for the X-peeps though. So Singer decided to rock it out and do a sequel to Superman 1 and 2, but kind of ignore 3 and 4. Sounded great to me.

Superman Returns is not just another superhero action piece. It is a grand loving tribute to the first two films, and surprisingly touching character study of someone who has every power in the world, but not the one thing he wants, love. Yes it's a love story, but its also not a bad guy vs. good guy story so much as it is a story about Superman vs. his past and himself. He can stop a plane from crashing, a bullet, and all that stuff, but the moral of this movie is you can't stop life, so make the best of it, and don't take it for granted. Anyone can screw it up including Superman. I knew going in that this was a part of the story but I was really stunned at how well Singer was able to keep that theme throughout the 2 and ahalf hour running time. The film is beautiful to watch. The flying scenes don't come close to artist Alex Ross' comics but they are pretty damn good. The story is Superman has returned to Krypton to see if he is indeed the only person remaining from his planet. By the time he returns five years later, Lois has moved on with a kid and fiance. Supes/Clark has a hard time with this. Upon returning to Earth the only survivor of his kind he looks to find solace in Lois. But even that is gone, and that triggers one of the best scenes in the movie to me, where Superman bordering on stalker sees Lois with her new family at home professing to her fiance that she never loved Superman. Superman flies into space above the Earth holding back his tears and hovers over the Earth as the most powerful being, but emotionally the size of a flea.

The action in this film is big. Its not as crazy as you might think, but the Space Shuttle sequences are jaw dropping. Lex Luthor returns to muck up the proceedings as he returns to the Fortress of Solitude to figure out what makes Superman tick and how he can create a world in which Superman can never live. This part of the movie is maybe the weakest and the big surprise of the movie will either make you love it or hate it. I liked it, but Im scared of where it may lead to in the sequel. Parker Posey steals the movie from Kevin Spacey though. Her part is almost identical to Valerie Perines in the original, but with much more humor than sex appeal. Jimmy Olsen is OK, but not my fave. Brandon Routh is a great Superman but not so great as Clark Kent. Chris Reeve owns Clark Kent in my book. Lois by Kate Bosworth is serviceable but weak overall.

Overall this is a great Superhero movie told with character development over action. I am going to see it again in Imax 3-D this week, so I'll have some more time to digest this sucker in full. But at first glance it was a grand epic and another great chapter in what hopes to be more in a tradition of wonderful character over hero movies by Singer and co. Oh and the music is good when it's John Williams original theme, and lacking with Ottman's original score. I thought the Ottman parts were way too over the top in spots. But not even in the ballpark of John Williams greatness. More later....

One and not done....


Well with the Dallas Mavericks season now over for another year, it must be noted that this was a hard pill to swallow sports fans. I did not write on my blog about the Mavs in the playoffs cause I did not feel the need to jinx them, but after all the changing jerseys at halftime to help, flip flops instead of shoes, etc, etc. it didn't seem to help much at the end. Here are my thoughts on each series in the playoffs:

Grizzlies: The Grizz are a good team. I think defensively they are tremendous. And I was really nervous playing them in the first round. How the Mavs swept them is hard to see, but I think it just came down to one thing, not enough weapons offense wise to stop the Mavs. There were some close games, and I think without this series as prep the mavs would not have defeated...

The Spurs: Amazing team the Spurs are. Tim Duncan was incredible. However, he is now without doubt the honest bitch in the NBA when he does not get a foul, and it hurts his team a lot. With all the complaining he did as we were fast breaking he may have been able to get back and stop a bucket or two. And this series really was that, a bucket here and you win. What a series, easily the best of the playoffs. And to dethrone the World Champions was a big step up for the little Mavs. I felt horrible for my Fin as he walked off the court with his head down. But hey Fin look up, you can go wherever you want, just don't go here...

The Suns: I now officially hate this team. I like the way they play at times, but that's why they will never win a championship. The coach of this team is really nuts. I mean I know he only has 5 players on his team, but Raja Bell can't defend every person on the court. He tries and does a good job, but give him some help if you ever want to go deeper. You can shoot all day long, but at some point your gonna have a bad night, and when the Suns have an off night, they have nothing else to bring to the table really. And that's why they lost this series. Love the Steve, but gotta keep moving. And Raja you need to get over yourself...

The Heat: I watched this team all year, and saw nothing I was afraid of. The only thing I worried about was Dwayne Wade. But Josh said before the series started that he could cover him, he did it in college, yada yada, yada. Well that didn't happen Josh. But you can't blame on just Joshua. The first two games were easy, and the third looked like a lock, then something happened. Someone on the sidelines put on a pair of slippers and we turned into the old Mavs from 2003. The next few games we settled for 3's instead of drives. Dirk decided to take jumpers instead of going into the lane. The refs decided to help out the NBA commissioners dream of never giving Mark Cuban a trophy. (For the record the calls in this years playoffs were at an all time low) And as we dropped 3 straight in Miami, we came home hopeful. I felt great about game 6, then with a double digit lead, the Heat chipped away at the lead by going to the hole. And what did we do shoot 4 three pointers in a row to get back in the game, including the final one at the end of the game to clang off the rim to become the death call and ultimate choke in Dallas sports history. A season wasted perhaps, only next year will tell.

A few things I learned from this season: Defense is a great thing. Avery rules. 3 pointers are good when they are going down, but stay in dating stage, don't ever get married to it. TNT is officially the biggest piece of shit biased network covering the NBA. ESPN is a close second. I lost most of my respect for Charles Barkley. Kenny Smith is beginning to ware on me. But Ernie Johnson still has some class thank God. Tim Thomas is pinhead from the movie freaks. Dwayne Wade is the second coming of Christ apparently. Shaq is the Heats new Mascot, cause he can't play much anymore. Pat Riley is playing Skeletor in the new He-Man movie. Stackhouse is a tank. Dirk went from God back to Dirk. Randy Galloway proves he is an absolute moron. Laura Miller needs to plan parades in her head only. The Ticket still rules. Dan Patrick wears more makeup than Johnny Depp in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Cuban needs to relax and take a back seat during the games. All said, Mavs rule.

REVIEW: X-Men III:The Last Stand


I must say I never read Marvel Comics as a kid, so my back knowledge of the X-Peeps is limited. (I was heavy into DC Comics) Having said that my enjoyment of this series lies solely on what I know from the movies and a few episodes of the cartoon series I've seen here and there as a kid. I did have a yellow Wolverine action figure when I was a kid. I don't think he had claws though.... Onto the the review... I really liked the first X-Men movie. When I first saw it, it really didn't do much for me, but the second and third times I viewed it, it kind grew on me as a character piece instead of a blowhard superhero flick. Then I saw the 2nd one, X2: X-Men United and I was floored with what director Bryan Singer did. I consider X2 to be almost a perfect Superhero movie, and he did it by having restraint with the he first film and letting the characters breath and develop beyond a 30 second scene. Thus leads us to the main problem inherit within X-Men 3. In this adventure the good mutants are up against a cure made by humans from a special mutant that will turn them back to normal. Some are for it and some are against. Magneto and Captain Picard discover that the thought dead Dr. Jean Grey has come back but this time as Dark Phoenix, a hidden personality hidden within Grey's brain. Anyway she joins the dark side and whacks a few good mutants including two key characters. The mutants all fight each other at the end on Ellis Island and fun times ensue. I have heard from X-Men fans that the Dark Pheonix saga is a huge deal in the comics, and that it as handled wrong here in more ways than one. But not knowing Adam from Eve in the Marvel universe, it didn't bother me so much.

X3 is by all means a cool summer action movie with flying peeps and shit, but the characters are weak and the character scenes are so quick that you never get the chance to live with these mutants for too long before you are rushed away to the next scene. The action is great and I'm not dissing the movie by any means but the character development and the respect Singer had for the characters is pretty much gone. I missed that touch very much. There are new mutants introduced but never discovered and explored. The new characters just show up, blow some shit up and leave. So what director Ratner held over from Singers previous two still proves entertaining it just lacks the heart and soul of the first two movies.