TV And Films

The shows and movies I like (or don’t).

Ascii-pr0n!

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Deep ASCIIOkay, sure, so I’ll freely admit that i’ve been curious about seeing Deep Throat for a long time. Somehow, I never thought that my first chance would be through the magic of ASCII animation! Curiously engrossing, I’ve got to admit.

Also of note: asciipr0n.com, a collection of ASCII-generated pinups, nudes, and artwork. I remember being at mom’s office years and years ago, discovering, and printing out some of these on the office computer system — it gave me no end of amusement, though I’m not sure what either she or her coworkers thought of me stumbling across them…!

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Cybersodomy?

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There’s a page for everything on the ‘net these days — even gay robots:

Data — Starfleet’s first official Android, Lt. Comdr. Data has been a valuable part of the Capt. Picard’s crew aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise. “Gay-ta” and his high-profile are no surprise, since Star Trek has always been a leader in expanding society’s tolerance of issues previously considered taboo. (Women’s rights, Interracial romance, etc.) Although his first intimate experience was with a woman (Lt. Tasha Yar), Data has always exhibited curiosity toward many human customs. His first experience with emotion occurred after he choked a strong male enemy (Borg) to death. Data admitted feeling pleasure, indicating a fondness for S&M activities. Other homosexual characteristics include: neatness, good grammer, shiny hair, and an unwillingness to use violence unless necessary.

(via MeFi)

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Eight Legged Freaks

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The Itsy-bitsy spider…

…isn’t so itsy-bitsy, and is more likely to be climbing up a television tower than a water spout.

I just got back from seeing Eight Legged Freaks.

Was it a good movie? Well…honestly, no, it wasn’t.

Was it worth the money? Definitely! Movies like this aren’t supposed to be good movies — they’re supposed to be fun! Which ELF definitely qualifies as. A silly premise, scientific accuracy thrown out the window, sterotypical characters, and cheezy lines, all add up (in my world, at least) to a very enjoyable couple hours at the movies.

It’s not, however, as good as either of the two movies it immediately invites comparison to — Arachnophobia for the creepy-crawly spider jitters, or Tremors for the pesudo-50’s horror movie homage. Arachnophobia had better (though, of course, still questionable) effects, and the more realistically sized spiders in that one were much more freaky for me than the oversized beasties in ELF, and Tremors has a slight edge in the sense of humor — ELF wasn’t bad or humorless, but wasn’t quite as tongue-in-cheek witty as Tremors managed to be.

Still — quite enjoyable, and I had a lot of fun watching it.

HIV-positive muppets?

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Aside from the many, many obvious jokes than can be made about this (and, admittedly, I could come up with quite a few without even trying), I think this may be one of the coolest news reports I’ve read in a while. According to an AP story on Yahoo! News, “The first HIV-positive Muppet will soon join the cast of ‘Sesame Street’ in South Africa to educate children about the deadly virus that infects more than 10 percent of the country.”

The report goes on to say that “…the Muppet will associate freely with the show’s other characters as a way to fight stereotypes and dispel myths about people living with the virus, said Yvonne Kgame of the South African Broadcasting Corp., which airs the program.”

I could easily see this as being one of the best and most effective ways to get some real HIV education out to children — and I can also, unfortunately, fairly easily assume that there is absolutely no way this would ever happen in the US. Can you imagine the uproar that would hit if news of this happening on Sesame Street in the US? Too bad, too — I think this is a great step.

Creepy, and very interesting

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A series of quotes from something I just watched:

History has shown us that strength may be useless in the face of terrorism…

These aren’t people we’re dealing with here. They’re animals. Fanatics, who kill without remorse or conscience…who think nothing of murdering innocent people.

I guess the event that really opened my eyes took place only a few days after my arrival. A terrorist bomb destroyed a shuttlebus…sixty school children. There were no survivors. [They] claimed it was a mistake. That their intended target was a police transport. As if that made everything all right. That day I vowed to put an end to terrorism…. And I will.

Don’t you know? A dead martyr’s worth ten posturing leaders.

That shuttlebus I told you about…the bomb was set by a teenager. And in a world where children blow up children…everyone’s a threat.

“…the difference between a general and terrorist is only the difference between winners and losers. You win, you’re called a general. You lose….”
“You are killing innocent people! Can’t you see the immorality of what you’re doing? Or have you killed so often, you’ve become blind to it?”
“How much innocent blood has been spilled for the cause of freedom in [your] history…? How many good and noble societies have bombed civilians in war? Wiped out whole cities. And now that you enjoy the comfort that has come from their battles, their killing, you frown on my immorality? …I am willing to die for my freedom. And, in the finest tradition of your own [history], I’m willing to kill for it too.”

“…it appears that terrorism is an effective way to promote political change.”
“I have never subscribed to the theory that political power flows from the barrel of a gun….”
“In most instances, you would be correct. But there are numerous examples where it was successful…. Then, would it be accurate to say that terrorism is acceptable when the options for peaceful settlement have been foreclosed?”
“…we cannot condone violence.”
“Even in response to violence?”
“These are questions that [we have] been struggling with since creation.”

“They’re mad.”
“I don’t know any more. The difference between a madman and a committed man willing to die for a cause…it’s begun to blur….”

…there’s a hint of moral cowardice in your dealings…. You do business with a government that’s crushing us. And then you say you aren’t involved. But of course you are. You just don’t want to get dirty.

“You didn’t have to kill him.”
“As a prisoner he would have been a focus for violence as his followers tried to free him. Now, he’s a martyr, but the death toll may be lower — at least in the short term. An imperfect solution for an imperfect world.”

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Rocky Horror what???

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Here’s a fairly disturbing idea — celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Rocky Horror Picture Show by remaking it as a made-for-TV movie, keeping the original music and lyrics, but updating it to a more modern setting.

Okay, so maybe there’s a small chance it could work — but I don’t think i’m too optimistic about that. I do, however, like some of the ideas on casting that Rebecca Blood proposed.

Mulholland Drive

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Okay — so I rented the latest effort from David Lynch, Mulholland Drive. I was a little unsure about it, since the last new Lynch film I’d seen was Lost Highway, which I could not get into at all, and chalked up as two hours of my life that I wouldn’t get back.

After watching Mulholland Drive…

…I give up on David Lynch. Now I need four hours of my life back from him, instead of just two.

Maybe if I got it, I’d know if it was good or not — but Lynch is just too wierd, even for me.

Scooby-Doo

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I just got back from seeing Scooby-Doo. It was a mildly entertaining way to waste a couple hours when I had nothing to do, but I can’t really say much more than that about it.

Plotwise — well, it’s Scooby-Doo — not exactly a subject known for its in-depth plots. The effects were passable, but barely. I was a little surprised at some of the more adult-aimed humor that was tossed in — enough that I got a giggle (or at least a smirk) from time to time, but not enough that most parents would have problems taking their kids to see it.

I can say that while most of the cast didn’t really impress me, I was really surprised with Matthew Lillard as Shaggy — he became Shaggy just as much as I thought Hugh Jackman did as Wolverine in X-Men.

All in all — well, a rental if you’re curious, but I can’t give it much more than that.

‘I drank what???’

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It’s been a while since I did this, but two DVDs have come out recently that I knew I had to get, so I went ahead and splurged a bit before heading off to work. My most recent additions to my movie library are….

Legend: the last of the ‘three ‘L”s’ of fantasy from my childhood (the other two being Labyrinth and Ladyhawke) that I needed to pick up. While it doesn’t seem to be for everyone (I think that, like Star Wars, you need to have grown up with it to be as obsessed about it as I am, and seeing it for the first time as an adult doesn’t work as well), it has always ranked as one of my favorite films. Tom Cruise before he got mega-superstar-cocky, the gorgeous Mia Sara, and my all-time favorite Tim Curry role as Darkness, together with the visual splendor that Ridley Scott is so well known for (assisted by what must be a record for “most amount of glitter used in a motion picture”). Too cool.

Real Genius: one of my all-time favorite comedies of all-time — quite possibly my single all-time favorite comedy, in fact. A script that seems to be almost entirely a series of one-liners, all strung together with just enough plot to make it work. I really don’t know how many times I’ve seen this movie — and I’m always willing to watch it again. In the words of Chris Knight: “It’s a moral imperative.”

Incidentally, each of these movies has the distinction of having one of my first “movie star crushes” — Mia Sara in Legend, especially in the black dress given to her by Darkness, and Michelle Meyrink as Jordan in Real Genius. No real point to that fact — it just popped in my head.