My Worst Films of 2009

Before 2009 is out, I will have seen 80 films or more at the theater. I'd be lying if I said every movie I saw was worth the money spent each time on the price of a ticket and concessions. If there is any consolation in knowing that I wasted up to $400 to watch lousy movies, it's that I get to do an article like this - bashing them at the end of the year. The following are what I deem the worst films of 2009, which fell into four categories.

One Note Performance Movies

I define the term, "one-note performance movie" as 1) the type of film, which is all about the actor/actress in the leading role. Nothing else matters, be it the plot, the screenplay, or any of the other supporting characters. I also define it as 2) a movie so bad the actor/actress knows it, yet they make the best of their leading role by giving a stand-out performance. This year, the top acting honors, in the worst movies, went to Dakota Fanning, Sienna Miller, Seth Rogen and Hillary Swank.

“Amelia”: Oscar winner Hillary Swank is no doubt a dead ringer for real life aviatrix Amelia Earhart in terms of appearance. Screenwriters Ron Bass and Anna Hamilton Phelan, who base their script on the biographical books, “East to the Dawn” and “The Sound of Wings”, along with director Mira Nair know the notes. They captured Earhart's private life with publicist George Putnam (Richard Gere) and her brief affair with TWA founder Gene Vidal (Ewan McGregor). In between these dramatic moments is the black-and-white newsreel footage showing the real Earhart's successes and sometimes failures as well as her publicity stunts promoting various products inspiring women everywhere. The filmmakers just don't know how to put any of this into music. Swank's character is so emotionally distant, it's like spending almost 40 years with someone you've fallen in love with and by the time they have unexpectedly passed on, you are unable to shed any tears because you haven't really gotten to "know" them.



“G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra”: The two words that best describe G.I. Joe is "no imagination." I am not even going to address the plot except to say the characters here are as soulless as the plastic ¾-inch and 12- inch Hasbro action figures you see littering the store shelves of Toys R' Us. The only saving grace is Sienna Miller's leather-clad Baroness villain who chews up the scenery, firing machine guns in both hands, struts around in leather boots or expensive black pumps, engages in catfights with a female redhead "Joe" named Scarlett O'Hara (Rachel Nichols), and utters lines like "Nice shoes," as she throws a woman out of an elevator at a Paris mall. She'd make a great James Bond villainess should she ever want to venture into other action-adventure roles. I wonder how Miller would react if I told her I didn't agree with her comment, "G.I. Joe is not going to be the best acting work I've ever done."

“Observe & Report”: Midway through Observe & Report is a scene where anti-hero Ronnie Barnhart (Seth Rogen), a mall security guard with dreams of joining the police force. He is set up by a detective into thinking he passed the police exam when in fact, he failed. The joke backfires when another detective hiding in the closet walks out saying, "I thought this was going to be funny, but this is just sad." Therein explains the mood of the entire film. “Observe & Report” is a humorless, racist, raunchy dark side of “Paul Blart: Mall Cop,” the hit box office comedy earlier this year that starred Kevin James as a lovable, overweight mall security officer who takes on terrorists. By comparison, Rogen's Ronnie Barnhart is anything but lovable. There is nothing funny about a loser who suffers from bipolar disorder and lives with his alcoholic mother who makes it his mission in life to track down a male flasher who's been running around the local mall showing off his private parts. In fact, there is nothing funny about mental illness.

“Push”: The advertisement makes one think this might be a fun rendition of NBC's “Heroes” about people born with exceptional powers wanted by rogue government agents. “Push” is anything but fun, though it is laughable. The heroes, led by Chris Evans and Dakota Fanning, might as well be called Jedi Knights from the Star Wars prequels since they can perform telekinesis and predict future events. Fanning, now 15, who has been in a number of popular television shows and box office hits like “War of the Worlds” (2005), provides a show-stopping performance of her own, getting laughably drunk on Sake and drawing pictures of dead people. I wonder if she is the long-lost sister of the character Haley Joel Osment played in “The Sixth Sense” (1999) who often said he saw dead people.

Out of This World Premises

“Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant”: Don't be fooled by the talented cast of Freak Circus characters that include Willem Dafoe as a decades old vampire, Salma Hayek as a Bearded Lady, Ken Watanabe as the circus conductor, Mr. Tall, who boasts an incredibly large forehead, and John C Reilly as Vampire Larten Crepsley. I didn't care one bit about the story in which a young kid (Chris Massoglia) chosen to be Crepsley's "Vampire's Assistant" gets into a war between the circus freaks and another group of vampires called "Vampanzees." The only saving grace here is the film's dark, macabre production design. Otherwise, this might just be the first vampire movie where I wished a coffin was around so that I could crash for an hour and a half after losing interest. When it comes to trying to hold my attention, “Cirque Du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant” sucks the life blood out of you.

“The Fourth Kind”: Milla Jovovich branches out from her Resident Evil movies playing Dr. Abbey Tyler, a psychiatrist who interviews patients who may have experienced being abducted by aliens while sleeping. The trouble is director and screenwriter Olatunde Osunsanmi know nothing about how to tie facts into fiction and make it into a compelling thriller. Instead, he combines actual interviews with the "real" Dr. Abbey Tyler and her patients with reenactments featuring the cast. The sequences don't work and what's especially insulting is the way each cast member is introduced in the reenactments that say "Will Patton - actor" playing Sheriff August and "Elias Koteas - actor" playing psychiatrist Abel Campos. It's as if Osunsanmi thinks the audience is so stupid that he feels he needs to tell us when a reenactment is happening. Like we can't figure that out for ourselves. The bottom line is that the film is a complete fake and raises three times more questions than it answers. The Fourth Kind offers no solid proof that there even was a Dr. Abbey Tyler to begin with, much less an incident where her blind daughter was abducted by aliens.

“Where the Wild Things Are”: I get skeptical when every film critic in America embraces a children's movie like this and I can find absolutely no one out there in the entertainment media who dislikes it (remember how much they loved “The English Patient” - 1996). I think the only reason critics loved this movie is not so much as it is their love for its director, Spike Jonze, whose previous movies “Being John Malkovich” (1999) and “Adaptation” (2002) received Oscar nominations. Just because “Where the Wild Things Are” is based on Maurice Sendak's nine-page children's story about a bratty little kid named Max who conjures up a fantasy world of his own where he is king doesn't mean it's for kids, much less adults. I have read how some young ones below age 10 feared the creatures and I can't say I blame them. From a kid's perspective, the creatures in Where the Wild Things Are really do look scary. From an adult point of view, I found them all incredibly ugly, annoying and repulsive. Seeing these furry characters, I could not help but be reminded of Sid and Marty Kroft kid's show from the late 1960s called "The Banana Splits," which featured a group of adults dressed up as ugly-looking adult dogs named Fleegle, Bingo, Drooper. and Snork.

Sequels That Wore Out the Franchise's Welcome

“Halloween II”: Michael Myers, the masked indestructible, inhuman, towering serial murderer of director Rob Zombie's unnecessary remake of John Carpenter's “Halloween” (1978) continued his bloody mayhem in this sequel to Zombie's 2007 follow-up. Like the 2007 predecessor, “Halloween II” is not scary, suspenseful, or fun. The film is instead a disturbing, tragic take on what happens all too often in real life murder cases. An echo on the life of twisted serial murderers and a tabloid take on how authors make money writing best-selling crime books about the subject without any thought for the victims.



“Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen”: I will not be surprised if “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” goes down as the number one worst reviewed film of 2009. The film deserves the honor so much that I actually hope it gets nominated for several Golden Raspberry Awards at next year's Razzies and wins. This sequel to the 2007 summer blockbuster wasn't made for movie critics. The picture was made for dumb, slow-witted audiences who have no sense of adventure and imagination, and for kids whose idea of adventure is to watch a lot of things blowing up. Whereas the original was kid friendly, which I considered a good thing, Revenge of the Fallen is just annoyingly loud, vulgar, and filled with sexual innuendoes that are not funny.

The I Want to Put A Bullet Through My Head Award Goes To:

“The Informers”: Now I understand what a friend of mine meant when after sitting through “Leaving Las Vegas” (1995) that starred Nicholas Gage as a suicidal loser who drinks himself to death, he felt like putting a bullet through his head. Based on Brett Easton Ellis' book about the early 80s sex and drug culture, which was also chronicled in his books, “Less Than Zero”, and “Bright Lights, Big City”, both of which became movies in 1987 and 1988, The Informers is a depressing, sleazy exploration into the drug addicted, rich, sordid, unhappy lives of several Los Angeles residents. Kim Basinger, Mickey Rourke, Winona Ryder, and Billy Bob Thornton have supporting roles. When the spoiled young rich kids are not busy engaging in threesomes, sometimes with the same sex, they're doing drugs, talking about some strange disease affecting the gay underworld before the illness was called AIDS, and asking themselves why their friends have begun noticing strange cancerous scabs on their skin. If this isn't the immoral abyss of Hell, it's got to be Purgatory.

Two-star movies that weren't the worst but were forgettable nonetheless: “Confessions of a Shopaholic”, “Friday the 13th”, “Ghosts of Girlfriends Past”, “The Haunting in Connecticut”, “Jennifer's Body”, “Knowing”, “Obsessed”, “The Taking of Pelham 123”, “Terminator: Salvation.”

Close But No Cigar: Two-and-a -half star movies that almost won me over but still failed: “Fanboys”, “Fast & Furious”, “Public Enemies”, “The Hurt Locker”, “The Informant”, “Law-Abiding Citizen”, “Race to Witch Mountain”, “The Twilight Saga: New Moon.”

©12/31/09

Not yet ready to endorse Sarah Palin for president in 2012

The mass media hype over the release of Sarah Palin's book last month sent chills up my spine. I can't exactly say they were 100 percent positive feelings.

Watching an ABC News story reported by Kate Snow, seeing fans waiting in line outside a bookstore in Grand Rapids, Michigan to meet Palin, who was there to sign copies of her new biography, "Going Rogue: An American Life," reminded me of the mass-marketed hysteria last January when Barack Obama was sworn in as president.

The same mass media/mass marketed hype that surrounded Obama that is now focused on Sarah Palin worries me. Palin, a former Alaskan governor, rose to prominence as John McCain's vice-presidential running mate. She doesn't know if a 2012 run for the presidency is in the cards for her.

"That certainly isn't on my radar screen right now," Palin told Barbara Walters in a Nightline interview. "[But] when you consider some of the ordinary turning into extraordinary events that have happened in my life, I am not one to predict what will happen in a few years."

"My ambition if you will, my desire, is to help our country in whatever role that may be, and I cannot predict what that will be, what doors would be open in the year 2012," she said. "If people will have me, I will."

Apparently, the people waiting at that mall in Grand Rapids have already made up their minds. Some had buttons that say, "Palin 2012." "Sarah! Sarah! Sarah!" was the chant yelled by some as they waited in line.

"She is very down to earth," said one woman waiting in line. "She can handle all the politics, all the media, all the press, and still be able to raise her family of five kids. Awesome. Strong woman."

"If the news media leaves her alone, she can win," said another woman when asked if Palin could be the next president of the United States.

I am not about to jump on the Palin bandwagon just yet. All Americans did, when they voted for Obama, was moronically judge a book by its cover and toss aside all the questionable issues. They thought of him as a new African American version of JFK with socialist stances.

Some people voted for him because he has a great personality, a beautiful wife and two wonderful children. Obama is, however, definitely no JFK. By comparison, Palin is no Ronald Reagan. I am beginning to think the only reason people want Palin for president is simply because she is a woman and they think it's time for a woman to run the White House.

I am all for an African American or a female president running the country. So long as they are the right person for the job, and they aren't voted in on the sole basis of their good looks.

Granted, I have no love for CBS' Katie Couric, whom I don't consider a real journalist but, instead, see her as an attractive talking head. The fact is Palin screwed up the Couric interview late last year when she was asked what newspapers and magazines she reads regularly and failed to give a straight answer.

"It wasn't my best interview," she said.

All right. At least Palin admits she messed up.

But what about her sudden decision to leave office as Alaskan governor last summer saying it was in the best interest of the state?

"I was heading into a lame duck session, that final year in office, and most normal politicians, what they do, knowing that they're not going to run again, they're in that lame duck ... that, that situation, they milk it. They collect the paycheck. My administration was inundated and paralyzed by those who were filing these frivolous lawsuits, and, and, um, ethics violation charges. And it was unfair to Alaskans. So, I knew that what we were doing was right," Palin said.

So here are my questions for Palin: Let's assume you are elected president of the United States in 2012 and upon your fourth year in office in 2016, you decide not to run a second term. Am I to assume you might do what you did in Alaska - decide to call it quits and let your vice president take over? Can you take the huge media scrutiny you are going to get if you decide to run in 2012?

The media coverage Palin would draw in 2012 would be nothing like what she got when she was chosen as McCain's running mate.

Don't misunderstand me. Palin is close to winning me over. I like a lot of the stuff she has said so far, especially when it comes to her criticism of Obama's track record in office so far. If the Obama administration isn't scared of her, why then do they keep spouting off negative comments about her?

I have no love, for example, for any of Palin's critics. I think the only reason McCain staffers are speaking out against her is more out of jealousy that she actually helped boost voter turnout for McCain.

Some of her critics are getting their comeuppance. I never liked David Letterman and that was before the late-night talk show host made tasteless remarks earlier this year about Palin's daughter. For years, I could never pin down why I never liked Letterman. Then the talk show host's sex scandal broke out and I finally got my answer.

As for Bristol Palin's ex-boyfriend and father Levi Johnson's claims against the former governor that she called their son, Trigg, who has Down Syndrome, "retarded," I am not going to listen to someone who reduces himself to doing nude spreads in Playgirl magazine for money.

Then there is that recent eye-opening picture on the cover of Newsweek showing Palin in a sexy shot that was already used in The Runner's World magazine. Don't tell me that ploy wasn't used to get people to buy their magazine. Kudos to the Newsweek staff. Thanks to that photo, I am not renewing my subscription and have high hopes their lousy revamped publication that now consists of essays meets a quick, well-deserved death.

You hear that, Newsweek?

As much as I would like 2012 to get here quicker so we conservative and independent Americans can choose a better leader than the one we have now, three years is still a long time.

For now, I'll stick to what one woman said as she waited in line to meet Palin at the book signing.

"I am not sure she is qualified to be president quite yet, but she is a heck of a lot more qualified than Barack Obama."

©12/8/09

My search for the perfect burger

I have eaten many hamburgers in my lifetime – some grilled, others mostly grease burgers. Unfortunately, I have yet to encounter the thrill of eating a one-of-a-kind hamburger that is nothing like you get at your local fast-food restaurants.

I have literally begun boycotting places such as Wendy’s and McDonald’s, which no doubt makes my doctor and the weight loss experts at Medifast happy. Other than the obvious reason that they aren’t ideal for one’s health, the other reason why I’ve stopped eating them is because I am sick and tired of all those commercials that show a nice juicy hamburger with steam rising from it. That is a far cry from the one you actually receive, the one that comes with dried meat that looks like it sat there for hours.

Why else did D-Fens, the gun-toting unemployed defense contractor Michael Douglas played in “Falling Down” (1993), pull out an AK-47 upon receiving that dried up flat piece of meat in between two cold buns at the local Whammyburger? It’s because of the deceiving mouth-watering advertisement.

“Can anyone tell me what’s wrong with this picture?” D-Fens asks the patrons comparing his burger to the ad,

When I order a hamburger, I want it to be something I can’t get every day, like when I go to Chicago every few years to see friends and family. I go there to eat what I can’t get here in Texas: Italian beef sandwiches; stuffed pizza from Giordano’s or any for place for that matter that is not Pizza Hut, Dominos, CiCi’s or Papa Johns and “real” Italian pastry.

My search for a one-of-a-kind hamburger has been in vain. I have tried watching those specials on the Travel Channel profiling the nation’s top burger joints. The same went for that Texas Monthly article in their August 2009 issue profiling the 50 greatest hamburgers in the Lone Star State.

Seeing those hefty guys late at night stuffing their faces and saying, “You don’t want to eat this every day,” does me no good when I am on a Medifast diet of powdered drinks, eggs, puddings, bars, eight glasses of water and am only allowed one meat and veggie meal a day.

I could not get past the magazine’s front cover without wanting to order a Big Mouth Burger from Chili’s.

My repeated emails and phone calls to Audrina Partridge, Padma Lakshmi and Paris Hilton asking their opinions about those charbroiled burgers they have advertised for Carl’s Jr over the have gone unanswered.

All I want to know s if they think the burgers are any good. I am story, a but a sexy commercial ad and a quote from a customer in an article on the company’s website who, after eating their $14 Prime Rib - $6 burger says, “It’s like an orgasm” is not enough to convince me.

I hate to think the only one-of-a-kind burger to check out is The Heart Attack Grill, located in Chandler, Arizona, which I first heard about on Paul Harvey a few years ago.

It’s here, according to their website, www.heartattackgrill.com, where patrons called “patients” can chomp down on “All-You-Can-Eat Flatliner Fries” that are cooked in pure lard. They have the choice of burgers ranging from one to four patties and are cooked with a half-pound to two pounds of beef packed with cheese (don’t forget the lard), all of which are named after heart operations.

The Quadruple Bypass Burger is reportedly 8,000 calories. To help wash all this down, one can drink a full sugar Jolt Cola. It looks like such heart and diabetes medications at Crestor, Coreg, Januvia and Metformin will be no match for this intake of saturated fats that by the time you are done has got to be around 20,000 calories plus.

As an added bonus, those who are over 350 pounds and overeat for free. Should one live through finishing off The Quadruple Bypass Burger, he (or she) would be escorted out to their car in a wheelchair by a sexy nurse of his (her) choosing who would put the Hooters’ girls to shame. These young ladies are dressed in over-the-knee skirts, stockings, and feels. You don’t get this kind of service at Hooters.

I’ll visit The Heart Attack Grill one of these days. When I am suicidal, that is.

My search for the one-of-a-kind burger almost ended last December when one of my coworkers ordered lunch from a local joint called Burger Island. I figured there is a place that probably serves a hamburger you don’t normally eat every day and although they have a handful of restaurants in the Dallas area, they are not the corporate equivalent of McDonald’s or Whataburger. Up until recently, they didn’t even have a website.

Sure, I could have ordered their Big Island Burger which comes with sauteed onions, jalapenos, American and provolone cheese, mayo, mustard, lettuce, tomatoes and pickles or the Double Joint Burger, which comes with the same condiments, but the double meat is one pound. I wasn’t in the mood to be adventurous, nor was I in the mood for leftovers.

So, I just ordered their simple $4.20 hamburger. When the food arrived, my heart sank. The burger looked like your average Whataburger. Then I took a bite and the meat tasted different. It had a tangy taste that reminded me of those Italian beef sandwiches in Chicago.

I thought to myself I finally found the perfect hamburger where the secret to how it tastes lies in the meat cooked!

If only my joy had lasted longer. When I returned to Burger Island a few weeks later to order the same thing, gone was that tangy taste I encountered the first time. The hamburger was the same as one gets anywhere else. It was just a plain old grease burger.

And so, my search for the one-of-a-kind hamburger continues.

©11/24/09

News Flash: The world will not end on 12/21/12

December 21, 2012.

If this date means absolutely nothing other than you have three days left to buy Christmas presents, then I applaud you.

If the date, however, means you believe this is when the world ends, you belong in that insane group of conspiracy nuts who claim our government agents actually piloted those jets into the World Trade Center on 9/11. That bombs placed inside the Twin Towers caused their collapse, not the heat from burning jet fuel that weakened the buildings’ steel structures.

If you haven’t already noticed articles in magazine about 12/21/12 or the slew of books in the New Age & Spirituality section at bookstores, it’s a good bet you will know the meaning of the date when Hollywood’s big budget disaster movie, “2012”, is released.

Originally set to open last summer, “2012” stars John Cusack and Amanda Peet and is directed by Noah Emmerich, who unleashed Mother Nature’s fury in “The Day After Tomorrow” (2004) and gave aliens inside giant pancakes carte blanche to incinerate landmarks from the White House to the Empire State Building in “Independence Day” (1996).

“2012” opened in theaters Nov. 13, 2009. Friday the 13th to be exact, perhaps the perfect date to release a movie about humanity biting the big one. The only other time studios look to cash in on the superstitious date is when they release a slasher pic about a guy in a hockey mask named Jason who around knocking off young college kids at a campground called Crystal Lake.

Perhaps you’ve seen “2012’s” big promotional cardboard display at theaters showing what resembles a continent of cities and suburbs falling into the ocean. I wonder if it’s that part of America that’s been referred to as “The Blubber Belt”; the juncture where we will finally pay the price f0r being so obese because the land we live on can no longer sustain our increasing weight.

Watching the trailer, I couldn’t help but laugh seeing the aircraft carrier, the U.S.S. John F. Kennedy, being flipped over by a giant tidal wave that washes away the White House.

This brings me to the subject of entertainment, which when you get down to it is all “2012,” the movie really is. It’s not about the Mayans, though their unseen presence does play a significant role in the film and the main reason for Mother Earth’s destruction. Leave it to the doomsayers to twist what is nothing more than an end date of the Mayan calendar.

“There’s going to be a whole generation of people, who, when they think of the Maya, think of 2012, and to me that’s just criminal,” said David Stuart, director of the Mesoamerica Center at the University of Texas at Austin in an article on CNN’s website. “There is no serious scholar who puts any stock in the idea that the Maya said anything meaningful about 2012.”

Even “2012” director Roland Emmerich doesn’t believe the world is on collision course with Doomsday.

“I’m a pretty down-to-earth guy,” Emmerich said on Yahoo! Movie Talk earlier this year. “Even though I made movies about aliens, I don’t believe in aliens. And I don’t believe the world will come to an end in 2012, but it’s a great scenario.”

The idea we will all perish on Dec. 21, 2012, is becoming as much a mass marketing fad, if not a fraud, the way businesses capitalized on President Barack Obama’s inauguration last January with hundreds of trinkets being ridiculously referred to as collector’s items. Obama was even seen in a Marvel Comics issue of Spider-man aptly titled “Election Day.”

Go to AOL.com and type in “2012” under the search bar and you get 19.6 million articles. Yahoo’s search engine reveals 712 million. At Google, you get 191 million searches. Type in “2012” at amazon.com and you’ll find 67,359 books on just the year alone versus the 245 “all products” listing on the subject at Barnes and Noble’s website.

This is just in 2009. How many more falsehoods will flood the Internet, bookstore and the entertainment industry before the “fateful” date hits?

All things must come to an end, much like the mass-marketed, so-called “positive” change honeymoon that was Obama’s inauguration. Eventually this senseless controversy surrounding 2012 will subside but not until after doomsayers wake up the morning of Dec. 22, three years from now, to find out, much to their dismay, that we’re all still here.

So much for the $100 I was hoping to save that Christmas on gift cards for family members. As usual, that’s money I will never see again.

I hope before this so-called apocalypse hits, I meet a doomsayer so I can ask him such questions as “Why do you want to die?” Where is the celebration in seeing the world go up in a series of catastrophes? Don’t you realize that if some asteroid the size of Texas hits us or the Moon collides with Earth, or we get into some kind of nuclear Armageddon that’s not just “us” who will perish but you, as well?

I am not denying that an afterlife doesn’t exist where things for people will be far better or worse for them in the next world, depending on their religious beliefs on God, Heaven, Hell, and eternal bliss and damnation. When our world ends, however, that’s it.

Then again, anyone who has read the Bible should know there is no date or time predicted when the world will end, despite all the bad things happening right now (the Swine Flu outbreak, world disasters, the collapsing economy, the continuing confrontation with North Korea, Iran, and al-Qaeda, and humanity’s immoral compass that goes against God’s laws) that some die-hard religious zealots say are signs we are living in “The End Times.”

So, excuse me if I play devil’s advocate and say I think all this stuff about the world ending in 2012 is a load of crap. Recall the scene in “2012” where John Cusack laughs off the idea with his kids saying, “What are the odds” before being bombarded with meteors as they’re driving through Yellowstone National Park? I don’t foresee meteors raining down on me as I’m driving down I-635 on my way to work at 3 p.m. three days before Christmas, three years from now.

But look at this way, doomsayers. There is hope for you 27 years from now. Astronomers say that’s when the 880 megaton Apophis asteroid will supposedly hit Earth.

The date will be April 13, 2036. Do you doomsayers have that already marked on your future calendars?

©11/18/09

Fort Hood was the most important story President Obama should have addressed Nov. 5

Like most, if not all Americans, who whenever a national tragedy hits home looks to their president for consolation that things are under control and that we, as a country will prevail, I was actually proud of President Obama responding so quickly to reporters in the hours after the Nov. 5 massacre at Fort Hood that left 42 wounded, 12 servicemen and one civilian dead.

That pride lasted less than 24 hours.

Those who know me, and know how fed up I am with President Obama and his socialist agenda would probably call that a world record in terms of how long I spent not criticizing his actions and decisions.

That all ended around 10:30 a.m. Friday morning when a military serviceman called in to WBAP’s The Mark Davis Show to say how embarrassed he was at the President’s remarks Nov. 5. The serviceman said President Obama didn’t even address the shootings late Thursday afternoon until two minutes into his speech at The Tribal Nations Conference.

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. The moment I got home I immediately went to youtube.com to see if there was any videos of the entire press conference.

Watching the Thursday news conference, I couldn’t believe my ears. There was President Obama at 5:02 p.m. EST opening his comments from the transcript I got off a website saying, “Let me first of all just thank Ken and the entire Department of the Interior staff for organizing just an extraordinary conference. I want to thank my Cabinet members and senior administration officials who participated today.”

“I hear that Dr. Joe Medicine Crow was around, and so I want to give a shout-out to that Congressional Medal of Honor winner,” President Obama said. “It's good to see you.”

This was followed by applause in the audience.

“My understanding is, is that you had an extremely productive conference. I want to thank all of you for coming and for your efforts, and I want to give you my solemn guarantee that this is not the end of a process but a beginning of a process, and that we are going to follow up.”

More applause.

“We are going to follow up. Every single member of my team understands that this is a top priority for us,” the President went on to say. “I want you to know that, as I said this morning, this is not something that we just give lip service to. And we are going to keep on working with you to make sure that the first Americans get the best possible chances in life in a way that's consistent with your extraordinary traditions and culture and values.”

It is after these comments that President Obama discussed the Fort Hood shootings. The serviceman who called in to The Mark Davis Show Friday said he almost expected the Obama to start giving high-fives.

If you check out any online news article written Nov. 5 about the shootings, you will find the President’s consoling remarks saying “These are men and women who have made the selfless and courageous decision to risk, and at times give, their lives to protect the rest of us on a daily basis. It's difficult enough when we lose these brave Americans in battles overseas. It is horrifying that they should come under fire at an Army base on American soil."

Now if I were editor or a writer for that matter covering this story, I definitely would have put in there somewhere about how Obama didn’t respond immediately at the conference about Fort Hood until two minutes later. This is the equivalent of those mock news conferences I attended for the Texas Intercollegiate Press Association years back when I was serious about pursuing journalism. I signed up to cover a fake news conference and sometime during that conference, something unexpected would happen that would make everyone go cover that instead. Why? It’s because that was the more important story.

Fort Hood was the most important story here Mr. President!

I guess I should not be surprised about President Obama’s delayed response to the Fort Hood incident, nor am I the least bit surprised at how the Obama controlled state run media are not reporting much about it, if at all. They love this guy and to the drive-by’s, he can do no wrong.

If former President Bush had opened up with remarks about a Tribal Conference when this happened, the drive-by media, late night talk show hosts, and the entertainment industry would have had a field day. It would be the My Pet Goat incident on 9/11 all over again and all the untruths many people, the young in particular liberal high school and college students stupidly embracing Michael Moore’s 2004 laugh fest riot, Fahrenheit 9/11, which I call the funniest film since Airplane (1980).

I have heard a lot these past few months from the hard right who have said President Obama is a narcissist. Up until Nov. 5, I refused to believe it. Now I believe otherwise. Even if he isn’t a narcissist, he sure as Hell doesn’t know how to cover it up. Not when he fails to address a national tragedy immediately. Not when he is off in Denmark in hopes of landing Chicago the Olympics when the Derrion Albert incident was making national headlines at the end of September.

Not when he promised during his presidential campaign last year that the situation in Afghanistan would be top priority and he has yet to commit to anything. In the meantime, we have soldiers there in harm’s way, the death toll is rising and the American people, most of who now say they are not for the mission, have forgotten the entire reason we’re there to begin with started on Sept. 11, 2001. Somewhere in that region, Osama bin Laden is loving every minute of this.

If I were president and this had happened on my watch, I would have immediately been on the phone to the top military officials at Fort Hood to find out how soon I could visit the base, the troops, the wounded, and perhaps even the families of the dead on that Friday, maybe even Thursday night if possible. President Obama, however, was too busy to do so. He spent the weekend staying on top of Congress making sure his health care bill was passed and then went off to Camp David for some much needed rest and relaxation.

So who visited Fort Hood in the hours following the tragedy? President George W. Bush and former First Lady Laura Bush that’s who. But don’t worry America. President Obama did delay his trip two days in Japan so he can attend the funeral services for the Fort Hood victims Nov. 10 and as an added bonus ordered all American flags to half staff through Veteran’s Day, which is something any president would have done. There is nothing extraordinary about this unless you call him signing a $24 million bill to extend jobless benefits a good thing, which I DO NOT.

If this is how the President of the United States handles a national tragedy where over fifty people are killed or wounded, I can’t help but wonder what his response will be if terrorists hit the new Dallas Cowboys Stadium in Arlington during a Sunday football game where hundreds are killed.

Will he start out his press conference on the golf course thanking his staff for the opportunity for some recreation that was ruined by another terrorist attack worse than 9/11?

©11/11/09

Blockbuster Video - the go-to place where everyone knew their name

“The Times They Are A-Changin.”

Such was the title of that famous Bob Dylan song. When it comes to the variety of options consumers now have to rent movie, the times really “are a-changin” especially for Dallas-based Blockbuster Video.

If the video retailer’s announcement Sept. 15 that it may close as many as 960 of the more than 4300 stores Blockbuster operates in the country as a result of continuing low profits and the massive beating from competitive rivals Netflix, Inc. and Redbox is any indication, it looks like “the Buster” is well on its way to becoming a dinosaur.

Of course, it wasn’t always like this.

Working for “the Buster” from 1988 to 1996, I can’t tell you how many times I heard the comment that Blockbuster’s days of being one of the top video chains were numbered thanks to upcoming technology that would make renting movies easier.

What amazed me was every time someone made such a comment the Blockbuster CEOs and executives managed to prove the naysayers wrong.

I equate working for Blockbuster those eight years to being a member of a successful, long-running sitcom. I looked at Blockbuster like working at a popular bar, like on the show, “Cheers” (1982-1993).

At the Town East Blvd. location, where I worked, which is no longer there, we had our regular customers who were the equivalent of Norm Peterson, Cliff Claven, and Frasier Crane. You could almost set your watch as to when they’d show up. If they didn’t, you knew something was up. They’d gather at the front door t 9:45 a.m. every morning, especially Fridays and Saturdays. Their lives depended on them getting their hands on that copy of “Die Hard” or “Bull Durham” from 1988 or that only copy of “Millenium” (1989) the rental giant stupidly ordered when demand for lousy box office flops was always high.

One customer named Howard McGinnis rented over 3,000 movies. When he passed away in 1995 the priest at the funeral said the one question Howard will ask St. Peter as he passes through the pearly gates, “Where is the nearest Blockbuster?”

When the company was big on protecting children from sexual predators by offering parents the opportunity to bring their kids in to have identity videos filmed of them to be given to the police to help in disappearances, one customer had one of the employees set up the video camera to propose to his girlfriend.

She said yes.

In addition to the Norm Petersons, there was even a Carla Tortelli, behind the counter, who didn’t get off being chained to the first register for eight hours checking out customers. She referred to customers as cattle and it was her responsibility to get the herds out of the door by any means necessary. Customer service was not high on her list.

What the clientele weren’t standing outside waiting for the doors to open, they would hang around at the drop boxes, whether they were inside or outside. Sometimes they’d bother other renters near the outside drop box, asking them what movies they were returning. Inside of serving drinks, the clerks were serving movies.

The last time I stepped inside a Blockbuster Video was last summer to return some late DVDs I had in the car for two weeks. I didn’t pay the late fee either. Sure, there are several movies I’d like to see that I missed at the box office this year such as “Defiance,” “He’s Just Not That into You,” or “Revolutionary Road.”

What do I need Blockbuster for when I’ve got a wireless Internet/cable service provider and can order the titles from them or off their Video-On-Demand stations, record them on DVR and watch them later?

Or, if I want, I can just drive to the local Walmart and get the titles from their Redbox machine. Walmart I now the new Blockbuster. With such websites at YouTube, Hulu, and IMDB making older movies and television shows available for download off the net, all one needs to do is just open up an account. Since they show R-rated movies at no cost, who needs Blockbuster?

I predict the day will come when that video store I referred to as the place “where everybody knows your name” will play out a scene similar to the one in the last episode of “Cheers.” Except in this case the store will never reopen.

Instead of a patron eager to get a drink at 10 a.m. the moment the doors open, there will be a customer either hoping to get the DVDs they rented out checked in before the midnight deadline or get their hands on some new release that’s been out for weeks. Like Ted Danson’s bar owner, Sam Malone, the video store manager will come out of his back office for the very last time to say, “Sorry. We’re closed.”

©11/10/09

I do love a good joke, and this was the best ever!

Despite my growing fascination with supposedly real-life supernatural events, thanks to my reading such magazines as Fortean Times and Paranormal and watching documentaries on the Discovery, History, and Travel channels, I remain skeptical on whether ghosts exist.

That’s not to say I don’t believe in the afterlife. I know when my aunt passed away in 2000, after being in a coma for several weeks, I was told she had a smile on her face, thus proving to me where her spirit went. That is provided you believe that upon death and having lived a good Christian life, your eternal award awaits you in Heaven.

On the flip side, I don’t believe the story my grandfather told me a few years ago. He said he awoke early one morning to see his bedroom completely illuminated with a very bright white light lasting several minutes.

No lamps were on, he said. He told me he thought it was my late grandmother trying to tell him something. Still say it was probably a porch light from next door that shined through the bathroom window from across the hall to the bedroom.

I have, however, experienced a few strange things at work while alone. But in the three years there, the occurrences haven’t bothered me to the point I think the place is haunted. A couple of coworkers have told me that when they’re alone working in the building, they’ve felt like they heard voices.

I can explain every occurrence that’s happened. The ticking noise I hear coming from one side of the office sometimes is probably a computer or alarm system resetting itself. The reason I heard a loud bang, which was my manager’s metallic name tag hitting the floor one night, was because the plastic clip holding it broke on its own.

I could not find what fell on one coworker’s desk one Saturday afternoon, since my cubicle s in the opposite end of the office. I assumed whatever it was rolled under the desk somewhere. I wasn’t about to go looking for it. I am not maintenance.

I am certain the sounds I hear on the roof at night are either squirrels or raccoons or just the building settling. The wasps I have seen buzzing around sometimes are not something out of the “The Amityville Horror” (1979) where masses of flies milled around a bedroom window. The wasps either go in through the vents or got nests inside. God help them should they see me.

Granted, when I am in the men’s restroom, I have sometimes heard the women’s restroom door open like someone was in the building. I continue to assume security was there at the time and used the restroom before leaving, though I never bothered to see if their police car was parked outside.

Even if I had learned there was no one in the building at the time and that door opened on its own, I still wouldn’t believe the place is haunted. I can understand, though, how some could make that assumption. My dad did on Nov. 1, 2009. The incident happened one month after my grandfather passed away.

My dad awoke to find the living room is disarray like maybe the house had been robbed. The lounge chair my grandfather sat in when he came over was in an upright position as though someone was there facing the television. The television set was to a Christian cable station my grandfather watched in the early morning hours. Several pictures were lying face down while in the kitchen one of the chairs my grandfather sat in was on the table similar to that kitchen scene in “Poltergeist” (1982). The cabinet doors were also opened.

My dad was convinced at that moment my grandfather had come back as a spirit and was trying to tell him something. He even spoke to the parish priest at the church he attends about the “supposed” supernatural occurrences he saw that weekend. The priest gave him sage leaves spiritualists use to cleanse “haunted” homes of ghosts and/or negative energy.

I could not keep a straight face when my parents questioned me about whether I had something to do with it. After all, it’s always the quiet ones people most suspect.

To quote Conal Cochran, the Irish toymaker in “Halloween III: Season of the Witch” (1982), “I do love a good joke, and this is the best ever.”

I admitted to everything my dad wrote on a notepad of the different “occurrences” he noticed during those two days with the exception of two things he listed. He wrote the cabinet doors in the bathroom were left open and the soap was moved.

I didn’t do that. Perhaps it was my grandfather who as a spirit saw what I was doing and decided to join in the fun. Not that I believe that sort of thing.

To this day, whenever I see my sister’s in-laws on the holidays for dinner, they dare me to put the dining room chairs on the table before my parents get there and blame it on a “ghost.”

©10/27/09

My Personal Worst Films: Amelia (2009)

Amelia «½
PG, 111m. 2009

Cast & Credits: Hilary Swank (Amelia Earhart), Richard Gere (George Putnam), Ewan McGregor (Gene Vidal), Christopher Eccleston (Fred Noonan), Cherry Jones (Eleanor Roosevelt), Mia Wasikowska (Elinor Smith),William Cuddy (Gore Vidal). Screenplay by Ron Bass and Anna Hamilton Phelan based on source materials from the books East to the Dawn and The Sound of Wings. Directed by Mira Nair.

"Amelia," much to my dismay, falls into that category I refer to as the “one-note performance movie.” If such a term exists in "Websters," I am sure the definition is much different from the negative one I define.

The “one-note performance movie” could be 1) the type of film where it literally is all about the lead actor/actress in the leading role and nothing else matters, be it the plot, the screenplay, or any of the other supporting characters. I also define it as 2) a movie so bad, the actor/actress knows it, yet they make the best of their leading role giving a stand-out performance of their own.

I have seen less than a handful of “one-note performance movies” this year and that is not a good thing. If the Razzies ever came up with such a category for the first time next year, I would add Dakota Fanning from "Push", Sienna Miller from "G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra", and Seth Rogan from "Observe & Report." Add Hillary Swank’s performance as “Aviatrix” Amelia Earhart to the list of competitors of which there can be only one winner for a Razzie Award in the “one-note performance” category, and I predict Swank would win by a landslide. At least that’s who I’d vote for.

Swank is no doubt a dead ringer for the real Amelia Earhart in terms of appearance so much so I find it eerie. We even see her freckles, which is something “the vagabond of the skies” didn’t want captured in pictures and newsreel footage of her. Her publicist and eventual husband George Putman (Richard Gere) agreed.

I am amazed sometimes at how actors are made to look exactly like the actual people to the point you could almost be fooled into thinking you are watching the real thing. Val Kilmer looked exactly like singer Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone’s "The Doors" (1991). The same went for Denzel Washington in his role as controversial African American leader Malcolm X in Spike Lee’s 1992 film.

"The Doors" and "Malcolm X" offered substance. Amelia offers up everything but. Screenwriters Ron Bass and Anna Hamilton Phelan who base their script on the biographical books, East to the Dawn and The Sound of Wings, along with director Mira Nair know the notes. They capture Earhart’s private life with Putnam, her brief affair with TWA founder Gene Vidal (Ewan McGregor) and her relationship with his young son, Gore Vidal (the kid doesn’t like his name).

In between these dramatic moments is the black and white newsreel footage showing the real Earhart’s successes and sometimes failures as well as her publicity stunts promoting various products and being an inspiration to women everywhere.

Swank provides a few memorable scenes. I especially liked the moment where she takes First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt (Cherry Jones) on a flight. If the incident actually happened, Earhart allowed her to take the plane’s controls without anyone aboard knowing it. I also liked the moment where Earhart showed her vulnerable side and didn’t like how she looked. In a scene that could almost hint that perhaps Earhart was a closet lesbian, she tells Gene Vidal how she admires the young, elegantly dressed women sitting at a restaurant commenting on their nice legs, versus her own boyish-like appearance.

There is even a surprise revelation or two. We learn, for example, that her navigator Fred Noonan (Christopher Eccleston) is an alcoholic, which is something I did not know, if true. It’s obvious the filmmakers attempted to stay faithful to the biographical material right down to the model of the ill-fated plane Earhart and Noonan flew in, the Lockheed L-10 Electra. They just don’t know how to put any of this to music. The film and Swank’s character are so emotionally distant, it’s like spending almost 40 years with someone you’ve fallen in love with and by the time they have unexpectedly passed on, you are unable to shed any tears because you haven’t really gotten to “know” them.

A movie like this should make us hope Earhart will reach that lone island before fuel runs out on her much publicized flight around the world July 2, 1937, despite the eventual tragic outcome. Instead of making me shed any emotion for the character, all I saw from the film’s final few moments was just another scripted scene that was part of her life.

A big screen adaptation about Amelia Earhart should not only have the word “epic” written all over it but “Oscar” worthy as well. On one level, Amelia could be considered an art house film that you’d find playing in theaters that show only independent movies. Amelia should have been the kind of film critics would have not only embraced but small crowds as well; enough to still give it a chance at Oscar nominations.

It is instead the equivalent of a forgettable 111-minute TV movie of the week with aerial cinematography that is far from any of the exciting flying shots done in "Top Gun" (1986) or "The Right Stuff" (1983). Gabriel Yared’s musical score is nothing more than a pale imitation of the memorable slow moving, inspirational, sometimes sad ballads John Barry churned out for a number of the James Bond movies, "Frances" (1982) and "Chaplin" (1991) to name a few.

Even more annoying is how I often had a hard time hearing what the characters were saying. I know I am getting old but I’ll blame the theater’s sound system where the technicians know nothing about making the dialogue stand out and drowning out all the other unnecessary noise going on in the background before I assume I’m having hearing problems.

Instead of being an independent success, "Amelia" will probably go down as an expensive, if not embarrassing flop for Fox Searchlight Pictures. The film reportedly cost $100 million to make and failed to hit the top ten box office hits opening weekend grossing just a paltry $4 million. If it had been good enough to attract the critics and exhibited Oscar potential, that might have given the film some better financial success.

So much has been discussed in the seventy plus years since her mysterious disappearance on whether or not Amelia Earhart actually survived. The aircraft she flew in was reportedly never found. There is speculation maybe she and Noonan were taken prisoner by Japanese soldiers and tortured or that she was a spy working for the United States government and that her final trip around the world was just a cover. The most interesting one I saw discussed on a National Geographic episode was that she actually returned to the states but under a different identity altogether. None of that is discussed or proposed here which would have probably made the storyline more interesting. What we get is just how her fate played out that day.

When movies are based on biographical books or any book whether it be fiction or non fiction, I have always heard they are better than the films. Amelia Earhart’s life story deserves a better adaptation than the one released. The only thing "Amelia" does is make me want to read those two books about her life on which this film is based.

©10/26/09

Parents' accountability should also be called into question when their kid commits the most heinous of crimes

Two recent news events really disgusted me.

First, in late September there was the unnecessary death of 16-year-old sophomore honor student Derrion Albert from Christian Fenger Academy High School in Chicago, who got caught in the middle of a fight between two groups of teens from different neighborhoods.

Chicago prosecutors charged four teenagers from ages 16 to 19 in the Albert killing.

Then on Oct. 14 came the news about 15-year-old Michael Brewer being set on fire by a group of juvenile delinquents, not only because Brewer reported one of the suspects to police days before for stealing his father’s bicycle, but because Brewer owed one of them a lousy $40 for a stupid video game!

The way President Obama responded to the Albert killing and the response of a lawyer for one of the suspects in the Brewer case infuriated me.

Given that Chicago is Obama’s hometown, I would think he would have addressed the Albert case head-on and speak to members of the drive-by liberal Obama controlled state run media during a press conference that day or that week.

But, Obama had more important issues that week. That didn’t include the health care debate, the rising numbers in unemployment, the war in Afghanistan, or the “Derrion Albert” incident. Instead, he made an emergency trip to Denmark, in hopes of landing Chicago the 2016 Olympics.

To manage the Albert case, the president sent Attorney General Eric Holder and Education Secretary Arne Duncan to the windy city the week after to meet with school officials, students, and residents to discuss school violence.

Way to go, Mr. President!

It’s as though such discussions will help curb the city’s spurt of fatal student shootings. Before 2006, according to an Associated Press story Sept. 28, 10 to 15 students were fatally shot each year: The number climbed to 24 fatal shootings during the 2006-07 school year, 23 deaths and 211 shootings in the 2007-08 school year, and 290 last year. What will Chicago’s magic number in student deaths be when the 2009-10 school year ends?

Then on Oct. 16, I read on www.truecrimereport.com of lawyer Steve Melnick pleading for the release of 13-year-old Jeremy Jarvis, one of the suspects who took part in the Brewer attack, explaining how his client was traumatized and needs to be at home with his parents.

"He is a 13-year-old child," Melnick said. "I don't know of his involvement in this case, but from reading just the police reports, it appears that his involvement was on the periphery and wasn't directly involved in this horrible attack on Michael Brewer. And if so, he needs to maybe be home with his parents and begin counseling and therapy because he witnessed a horrible attack."

Melnick, your client, the no-good piece of s--- he is should have thought about that before he took part in this heinous act! To quote a priest I had who taught Social Issues class in high school, “You do the crime, you do the time.”

Jarvis is one of five suspects arrested in the Brewer incident and according to Broward County Police Sgt. Steve Feeley in a CNN article said only one of them “seems genuinely sorry about it.”

That person, however, is not Jarvis according to the truecrime.com article but Jesus Mendez, the kid who actually lit Brewer on fire.

The others, Feeley, said upon their arrest laughed about the incident.

"In my 31 years -- I always say, 'it's the most heinous crime I've ever seen,' " said Broward County Sheriff Al Lamberti to reporters earlier that week. "This one fits in that category. The fact that a person would intentionally ignite another child on fire -- it's indescribable."

I get sickened whenever I hear of defenseless dogs being abused and set on fire by kids with nothing better to do. Then I hear about a kid being set ablaze and I can’t think of any words to say how disgusted I am. My ideas of vengeance are things only Satan himself could produce for an eternity in Hell and are too gruesome to publish here.

I have always believed when people commit such atrocities, and I don’t care how old they are, even if they are aged 5 and they knew fully well what they were doing when they committed the act, they need to be locked up for 25 years or more.

Now, however, I am beginning to believe the responsibility should not just be on the youths who committed the acts, but on their parents as well.

It breaks my heart at how far and how low society has stooped to when it comes to today’s youths having targets of unnecessary violence. When I attended grade and high school, my worry was either being bullied or coming home with D’s and F’s. I knew I’d be yelled at by my parents, who’d make me do the assignment over.

Today, kids living in violent suburbs are more afraid of not coming home from school at all. I look at my two young nephews and I can’t help but worry about whether they might be the next Derrion Albert, Michael Brewer, or the target of some psychotic classmate out to unleash their pent-up rage on the entire student body with gunfire. Now it’s not just coming home safe from grade school and high school parents have to worry about, but college as well.

"Someone said he (Derrion Albert) was in the wrong place at the wrong time," said student Annette Holt of Chicago. "No, he wasn't. He was in the right place. He was coming from school."

The one and only solution, to keep such incidents from happening, must start in the homes with parents.

"It is our problem. We have to take control of our children," said Dawn Allen, who attended a vigil for Albert last month in Chicago.

"Our country, our world, needs to wake up and see what is going on with our children," said Michael Brewer’s mother, Valerie. "They need to do something. This has got to stop. It's not just my son. It's everybody's children. This could happen to somebody else, and God forbid -- I don't wish this agony and torture on anybody. We have got to do something to make this violence stop today."

When are parents going to stop being preoccupied with their own lives and start paying more attention to what their kids are doing?

©10/21/09

SEX SELLS! Publications entice readers to buy!

News Flash!

The campus newspaper will be publishing an exclusive all-nude issue featuring male and female staff writings writing and copy-editing articles in the buff!

That’s right! You read it right here!

Actually, no, they aren’t. That was all just one big tease for you people who have probably never picked up a copy of the college newspaper here on campus. I wouldn’t be surprised if the only reason why you might be interested in getting your hands on an “All nude” issue published by the college newspaper staff is so you can do what you normally do in private when you gaze at female centerfolds found in Playboy or in the yearly edition of Sports Illustrated. And when I am talking “private,” I am not talking about “drooling.”

Sex sells. Such is the attitude magazine publishers, and, in some cases, newspaper editors have in a print industry hard hit by the recession. Publications are so desperate to win over readers that their concern is not in providing content but offering up slices of female cheesecake as an attempt to get readers to buy something they’d normally wouldn’t.

If you buy into the reason the New York Post published photos of ESPN reporter Erin Andrews nude in her hotel bedroom because ESPN outed her as the one seen in the infamous Internet video taken by the peephole pervert last August, you’re nothing more than a born sucker.

The New York Post did it to sell newspapers.

As a kid growing up in the 70s and 80s, when I frequented the bookstores, or maybe I just didn’t pay attention to what was sitting on the magazine racks, I didn’t recall various periodicals flaunting front covers of celebrities with either a tie or string bikini like I see now.

I always thought nudity was relegated to the just the pornographic magazines, all of which came equipped with that sealed plastic bag.

Not so anymore. On Oct. 9, ESPN magazine, which is published by Disney, unveiled their first ever “Body Issue” featuring various male and female athletes in either the nude or seminude positions.

I guess Mickey Mouse has no problem showing supposedly tasteful photos of martial artist Gina Carano, tennis star Serena Williams or major league baseball’s Ivan Rodriguez in the buff. How ironic. They embrace nudity, and yet they won’t release ABC’s “The Path to 9/11” out of fear the film will ruin former President Clinton’s legacy as America’s leader who claims he tried to kill Osama bin Laden during his eight years in office.

I have nothing against magazines publishing nude photos of celebrities with either little or nothing so long as the publication or article printed has something to do with the images.

There is a reason why Shape magazine has former “Seinfeld” star Julia Louis-Dreyfus showing off her trimmed abdominal muscles in a bikini. The picture is not just to show off how good looking she is at 48. Somewhere in that issue is an article explaining how she got herself to look that way.

That does not, however, explain the reason actress Jennifer Aniston’s appearance on the front cover f GQ magazine in only a tie. What does she have to do with a gentleman’s fashion magazine? I have to wonder about the decisions some actresses make when it comes to losing the robe for the cameras. The minute Playboy publisher Hugh Hefner offers a top Hollywood actress like Aniston, Lindsey Lohan, or singer Britney Spears to pose nude for half a million, they say no. Yet when some non-pornographic publication calls asking if they’d lose the clothes for an upcoming issue, they say yes.

I can’t help but laugh at how bookstores today attempt to make certain publications inaccessible to the kids by placing them on the top magazine racks. Just because 8-year-old Mikey, Jr. can’t quite reach the top rack for a closer look at the front cover of Out magazine that caters to the gay/lesbian community showing singer Lady Gaga with nothing on doesn’t mean the kid’s blind.

I might as well start calling Allure magazine “Playboy Lite” judging from the nude spreads I saw of comedienne Chelsey Handler, actress Eliza Dushku, and TV chef Padma Lakshmi in their April 21 issue which was promoted by the entertainment media.

The answers they gave in Allure are the pornographic equivalent of what centerfolds in Playboy or Maxim say.

“My boobs are good,” said Chelsea Handler, when asked what body parts of which she is most proud. “They’re real and perky. Even if you can’t see them, the important thing I that I know about them, and the guys I’ve slept with know about them.”

“I tend to sleep in the nude,” said Padma Lakshmi. “I’m an innately tactile person and a very sensual-leaning woman. You have to use the word ‘leaning’ or it sounds like I’m boasting! When I’m in my own private space, I do spend time with very little on.”

Seeing them in the buff with hands over their breasts and private parts, I have to ask, why don’t they just let it all hang out for Playboy? These pictorials are nothing more than their way of saying, “Look at me, loser. Sit there and dream about what you not only wish you could have but will never ever look like no matter how much you diet and exercise.”

The content readers are supplied with today is not journalism. Writers and photographers are not working the journalism profession. They are instead working in the business of publishing soft-core pornography.

In today’s print industry, the editors and publishers are the pimps, the female celebrity icons who strip down are the prostitutes, and the readers are the johns, who shell out their hard-earned money to gaze at something they’d normally never buy much less read just to get a cheap thrill.

I don’t happen to be one of those people. Are you?

©10/6/09

Guess what I just learned!

Guess what I just learned!

I am a racist, not only because I do not support President Barack Obama and the miserable direction he is taking this country, but in particular because I said no to a Facebook question, “Should President Obama be allowed to do a nationwide address to school children without parental consent?”

At least that’s what one person, who is a white liberal, wrote in on my Facebook page. This is the same accusatory, dimwitted, finger-pointing mentality most people have been thinking recently. Former President Jimmy Carter and comedian Bill Cosby among them, especially if they are white, who say they are against President Obama.

“It’s clearly a case of conservative, white, (if not completely racist) idiots in Texas,” wrote this person on my Facebook page. “They wouldn’t mind if it were Bush, who advocates torture, or talking to their kids, but it really eats them up that we’ve got a black president. Let’s face it. The real issue is racism hidden in the cloak of avoiding a so-called “socialist message.”

As of this writing, the results of that Facebook poll question are extremely close, with 48.3% saying yes and 47.9% saying no.

It never ceases to amaze me at how the minute someone says they are not “for” something, if the person they disagree with happens to be of a different color, it means that person is “a racist.”

Angie Harmon

Earlier this year, former “Law & Order” actress Angie Harmon had to stand up for herself against accusations of being called racist because she was against President Obama.

“If I have anything to say against Obama it’s not because I’m a racist. It’s because I don’t like what he’s doing as president and anybody should be able to feel that way,” Harmon said in a March 2009 article on Fox.

“But what I find now is that if you say anything against him, you’re called a racist. But it has nothing to do with it. I don’t care what color he is. I’m just not crazy about what he’s doing, and I heard all about this, and he’s gonna do that and change and change, so okay…I’m still dressing for a recession over here buddy, and we’ve got unemployment at an all-time high and that was his number one thing and that’s the thing I really don’t appreciate. If I’m going to disagree with my president, that doesn’t make me a racist. If I was to disagree with “W”, that doesn’t make me racist. It has nothing to do with it. It is ridiculous.”

My point exactly.

When people criticize President Obama and his policies, it’s not about race. It’s about being against the direction he has taken this country so far. His stimulus package is not going to work and has likely already failed. Cash for Clunkers failed as well.

The unemployment rate that President Obama promised he was going to fix stands at over 9 percent, and it will go into the double digits next year. He wants to stop CIA officials from carrying out water boarding on terror suspects when in fact, such procedures kept this country safe in the eight years since 9/11. He thinks we can have sit downs with the country’s enemies, like Iran, as though such discussions would have worked if only, we sat down with Adolf Hitler and Japan during World War II.

His decision last week to scrap former President Bush’s plan for a U.S. missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic basically sends a message to our allies, such as Israel, “Screw you.” If the time ever comes when we need those countries’ support, they are probably going to say no and, honestly, give we just stabbed in the back last week, I can’t say I blame them.

When it comes to his government-run health care proposal, President Obama told Congress and the nation Sept. 9 that it will cost $900 billion over 10 years.

“Less than we have spent on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars,” he said.

It doesn’t take a brain surgeon to figure out who is going to be fronting that $900 billion bill if government-run health care passes.

This country is in so much debt now that the one thing this administration has in common with most, if not all Americans, is they have no idea how to control their spending.

So, tell me, all you accusing racist finger-pointers who dare call me racist, where in the above few paragraphs did, I say I am against the president because of his skin color?

It doesn’t matter if the president is male, female, white, black, conservative, liberal, Muslin, Asian, an alien from outer space, cat or a dog (though I am convinced a dog can probably run the country better than any human).

If I don’t like the direction he is taking this country, then I, like anyone else who is for or against this person, have a right to my opinion. This is America with a “c.” Not Amerika, with a “k,” though I feel that will be what this country will be called before President Obama’s term is up, with the socialist agenda he keeps pushing with the help of the biased liberal drive-by media.

I have two words for such people who, every time they hear someone say something negative about this president that they don’t agree with, they feel compelled to reach into their wallet and pull out this little thing called “The Race Card.”

GROW UP!

©9/29/09

A sexy "micro-budget" vampire indie with bite

Bloodwine «««
NR, 99m. 2008

Cast & Credits: Melissa Johnson (Andrea), Lora Meins (Brandy), Vanessa Leinani (Carmilla), Heather Whitsell (Mercedes), Christina DeYoung (Nicole), Michael Lunday (Professor Kendall), Chad Holbrook (Brian), Corey Cleary-Stoner (Wine Shop Clerk), Richard Gray (Uncle Walter), Zalika Thomas (College Nurse), Mallory Carrick (Waitress/Customer), Stacey Girard Morgan (Tattoo Patron), Sandi Sharp (TV News Reporter), Eric Malloy (Space Rogue), Mandi Mazey (Tentacle Victim), Nicole Godwin (Lady Malicent), Vicky Morgan-Keith (Doom Bunny). Screenplay by Patrick Keith and Vicky Morgan-Keith. Directed by Patrick Keith.



I am not a fan of vampire films, though I can understand the apparent infatuation horror fans have with the undead. I got to admit, other than going out at night to find some young necks to sink their two sharp fangs into and then have to worry about concealing the evidence, being a vampire is probably not that bad. You get to sleep all day, never have to see the doctor (you’re dead already) and you never age.

To quote the tagline from “The Lost Boys” (1987), “It's fun to be a vampire.”

A bloodsucker can live a long eternal life provided he/she does everything in their power to avoid sunlight, a stake, cross, or holy water, which given the number of vampire films I have sat through over the years, doesn’t always work.

Although I think the most faithful, though not necessarily the best adaptation about the Prince of Darkness to date was director Francis Coppola’s “Dracula” (1992), I have always held the same belief. You’ve seen one vampire film; you’ve seen them all. I am not talking about the predictable storylines. I am talking about their supernatural characteristics.

I am amazed, for example, at how vampires are able to get from place to place in a matter of a second and yet, they can’t manage to get themselves out of a pair of handcuffs as the sun is coming up. You see them staring at you one minute from afar, only to be gone the next. Sometimes they will call out their prey’s name though they never make their presence physically known.

That’s exactly what happens in “Bloodwine,” a sexy, low-budget, or to put in more precise words of first-time director Patrick Keith, who also wrote the screenplay along with his wife, Vicky Morgan-Keith, a “micro-budget” horror film.

I say “sexy” because this is a female vampire movie. I may not like vampire movies in general but I do think women vampires are sexier, maybe more domineering than the male ones. Maybe it’s that same kind of arousal men sometimes get seeing two good looking women kiss and make out.



Early on in the film when at the cemetery visiting the grave of her boyfriend, Brian (Chad Holbrook), recently killed in a car accident, Andrea (Melissa Johnson), a young Gothic college student, often thinks she is being watched as when she sees a female stranger (Vanessa Leinani) looking at her from afar. When she is alone in her dorm, sometimes she’ll hear a feminine voice calling her name though no one is around.

When it comes to visual effects, a filmmaker/screenwriter would be breaking the cardinal rule of vampire flicks if their lead character/villain didn’t become a fireball and get reduced to ashes at sunrise. Or at the very least, briefly writhe in pain the way Andrea’s best friend and college roommate, Brandy (Lori Meins), does when she is awakened by the burning sensation of her pale white, blue veined skinned left-hand smoking as the morning sun peaks through the blinds of her dormitory shower window. As if she didn’t have enough to go through given she spent much of the night before hugging the toilet and passing out on the floor of the bathroom; the aftereffects of a strange drink she took a few gulps from that Andrea bought for her as a birthday present.

Echoes of Good Movies Past

I wasn’t shocked by the number of scenes which brought to mind memories of countless other horror/suspense films like the shower scene in “Psycho” (1960) and “Return of the Living Dead” (1985) (paramedics trying to figure out why someone's heart isn't beating yet they are still alive). There is even an Elvira-like Mistress of the Dark named Lady Malicent who hosts cheaply made scary thrillers with the help of her co-host puppet, Doom Bunny (the film’s studio logo),which when brought to life, is a gray bunny rabbit with bulging, psychotic, uneven eyes and a severed right ear that wields a scythe for a weapon.

Director Keith, who admits on the couple’s website, http://www.bloodwinemovie.com/, that his love for making movies occurred when he first saw “Star Wars” in 1977, seems to make no qualms about what films he got his inspiration from to make this picture. A dream sequence, for example, between Andrea and her dead boyfriend brought to mind the deleted scene in James Cameron’s director’s cut of “Terminator II: Judgement Day” (1990) between Linda Hamilton’s and Micheal Biehn’s characters. At one point, Keith even imitates Hitchcock making a quick cameo appearance. When we’re not hearing the hard rock music of Dallas band, Slick Lady Six and the Transistor Tramps, whose voice of the lead singer sounds a lot like Chrissie Hynde of The Pretenders, we get a musical score that sounds like something director John Carpenter scored for his first independent box office hit thriller, “Halloween” (1978).

I am certain it wasn’t Keith’s intention but I got the feeling as though he was channeling the format director Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez took with “Grindhouse” (2007), going for not just an independent level, but leaving in some minor kinks or flaws watching it to give one the feel this is a low budget production. Watching it on my 37’-inch flat screen television, I found some scenes, dream sequences in particular to be fuzzy. When I viewed the film in parts; however, on my personal computer, the picture quality was actually crystal clear. I suspect the smaller the screen you see on, the better the picture quality. There were also times where the “suspenseful” music overtook the dialogue to where I couldn’t hear what the characters were saying.

“Not all just a quick bite on the neck with two fangs”

The big surprise and perhaps the best thing “Bloodwine” has going for it is it offers us a different twist on the vampire genre. For all I know, “Bloodwine” might just be the Keith’s way of saying, “There are other ways you can become a vampire. It’s not all just a quick bite on the neck with two fangs.”

Watching “Bloodwine” is like being at a film festival in Dallas or Sundance and reading film production material to catch a few trailers. You have no idea if what you’re seeing is going to be considered by a major studio or go straight to DVD/Blu-ray or cable.

When “Bloodwine” made its big screen debut at Indie Fest USA 2008 the film won an award for Best Makeup and received nominations for Best Feature, Best Effects, and Best Costumes. The indie-horror film could be the Keith’s “Clerks” (1994) or “Juno” (2007) both of which were picked up by independent studios. This may be their first venture, but I have no doubt the public will want to see what other bag of unpredictable tricks the Keiths have in store for future filmmaking projects.

I will not be surprised if years from now, perhaps sooner, if when browsing the trivia section of IMDB under “Bloodwine” if I see such comments as how their production logo is cleverly used in different ways throughout this movie and in probably several of their projects be it for the big or small screen.

All About Transformation

Like “Ironman” (2008), where the one thing the superhero film had going for it was not so much the predictable story as it was the characters, “Bloodwine” succeeds in making us care for the two leads. The underlying theme of the screenplay is about “transformation.” The underlying theme of the screenplay s about “transformation.” Meins’ Brandy goes from a concerned college nerd with glasses to a vengeful, sexy, scantily clad goddess thirsty for the red stuff. The minute she took off her glasses and let her hair down, she had an uncanny resemblance to actress Andrea Bowen who plays Terri Hatcher’s daughter on ABC’s “Desperate Housewives.” In fact, I think she is a dead ringer.

The most prominent transformation happens with Andrea, who becomes the opposite of what her rival dormmates warn Brandy about in the beginning.

“They say she curses her roommates and nobody here has lasted an entire semester with her,” one tells her. “If I were you, I’d plan on stocking up on crucifixes and holy water.”

Seeing Johnson's Andrea with the long dark hair, heavy black eye shadow, and sometimes dressed in a black trench coat, combat boots, and a belt held together by handcuffs, she proves that just because she dresses differently, doesn’t mean she is anymore different emotionally. The ending, though I have a feeling the Keiths probably didn’t plan it this way, suggests the possibility of a sequel.

I know the Keiths have other projects they want to pursue before even considering a follow-up to Andrea’s further adventures in the world of the undead. If they even give it a thought that is.

Personally, I’d welcome a sequel – Hell, even a trilogy. “Bloodwine could just be the kind of motion picture series fans would have embraced if the continuing adventures of Sarah Michelle Gellar’s “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” (1997-2003) were brought to the big screen.

Call it “Andrea the Gothic Vampire Slayer.”

©9/29/09

Despite uncalled for outburst, Republican Congressman Joe Wilson was right

Like most, if not all Americans, I found South Carolina Republican Congressman Joe Wilson's “You lie” comment during President Obama's Sept. 9 address to be rude and disrespectful. It doesn't matter whether you agree with the president or not.

I felt that way, AT FIRST, that is. I think Wilson’s comment is another reason why the Republican party is not in power right now and the Democrats control not just the presidency but all of Congress.

Then something happened less than 24 hours later after the “shout heard round the country” was said live on television.

House Republican Leader John Boehner came to Wilson’s defense on "substance" in an article on politico website while still condemning the South Carolina Republican congressman’s outburst. Boehner offered reporters proof from the Congressional Research Service (CRS) report that illegal immigrants would receive health care benefits under the Democrats’ reform bill.

The article states, “On the one hand, the report says the bill 'reiterates current law that unauthorized aliens are not eligible for full-benefit Medicaid coverage'.” The article, however, quoted from the CRS report saying also that some undocumented immigrants “would be eligible for emergency Medicaid” and that some families of illegal immigrants would qualify for subsidies if other members of the household are eligible for those benefits.

So, Wilson was right on “substance” that is, even if his outburst was condemned by congressional members of both parties. It’s one thing if the guy was dead wrong but he wasn’t. Wilson, who told Fox News Sept. 13, that he was not going to apologize again for his inappropriate comment, was speaking what some Americans wished they could say is wrong with President Obama’s health care plan.

“The American people are fed up with the political games in Washington, and I refuse to participate in an effort to divert our attention away from the task at hand of reforming health insurance and creating new jobs,” Wilson said.

The backlash Wilson is getting demonstrates yet another example of how, when a Republican says something against a Democrat, the liberal drive-by media go out for blood but when a Democrat steps out of line, the media says nothing. Things would be so much better if people would quit resorting to the good old double standard.



II didn’t hear anyone disapprove in 2005 when President Bush was booed by Democrats when he spoke before Congress about how Social Security would be bankrupt by 2042 unless steps were taken to prevent it.

Where was the protocol then?

I had to laugh when ABC news anchor Charles Gibson and commentator George Stephanopoulos had never heard such a comment come from the House floor during a president’s address until Wilson uttered those fateful two words.

Take a journey with me now down memory lane back to Feb. 2, 2005, after “Dubya’s” State of the Union address in which he said social security will be exhausted and bankrupt, according to quotes from mediamatters.org.

ABC host Ted Koppel said:

“When the president talked about the bankruptcy of Social Security, there were clearly some Democrats on the floor who thought that that was taking it too far. And they did something that, apparently, no one at this table has ever heard before. They booed.”

CBS White House correspondent John Roberts said:

“At a couple points in this address, it looked more like the British Parliament than the United States Congress. I've never heard the minority party shout at the president during the State-of-the-Union address.”

Former President Bush was merely speaking the truth back then on the issue of Social Security and the truth was something the Democrats didn’t want to hear. Social Security, which is a joke, is the Democratic Party’s baby.

So, too, is this health care bill.

Wilson spoke the truth and because of it, he is taking heat and could even lose his seat next year to Democratic opponent, Rob Miller, as a result in the 2010 congressional elections. I wouldn’t be surprised if some are saying Wilson is racist, which he is not, because he spoke out against a president who happens to be African American.

Up until now, I had absolutely no respect and no faith in Congress. Their approval ratings are worse than the president’s.

In a September 2009 article from Reuters, one in five Americans (21%) give Democrats in Congress positive ratings while 47% give them negative ones and one-third (32%) say they are not familiar enough to have an opinion.

The same goes for Republicans, according to Reuters.

Even lower numbers (12%) give Republicans in Congress positive ratings and over half (52%) give them negative ones while 37% are not familiar with them.

The American people put these men and women in office to work for us. They are our voice. On Sept. 9, 2009, one person in Congress was working for us, and that was Joe Wilson.

So, while the rest of you utter that infamous phrase said by a young kid to baseball player “Shoeless” Joe Jackson after he was banned from the game for his participation in the Black Sox Scandal during the 1919 World Series, “Say it ain’t so, Joe,” I have three words for Republican Congressman Joe Wilson.

“You go, Joe!”

He’s got my vote in 2010, and I don’t live in South Carolina.

©9/17/09