Review of: Strange Wilderness

Talk about an absolutely terrible movie. Strange Wilderness had every element in its favor to succeed. It was a Happy Madison production, which if nothing else guarantees some laughs. It had an amazing supporting cast consisting of all of Adam Sandlers cronies, plus Jonah Hill, plus Justin long. The latter two absolutely stole the show. I pretty much only rented this one cause hill and long were in it. Well, I'm also a huge Grandma's Boy fan and Alex from that movie was the main supporting actor here. So as you can see, this movie could have been a classic.

The problem though stems from their choice for lead actor, Steve Zahn. While I don't actually dislike Zahn, (he was awesome in Saving Silverman) he just couldn't hold his own against all the comedy heavyweights in this one. It just seemed like he was trying way too hard to keep up and it was just way over the top. Absolutely none of his comedy was believable and for this movie to succeed you had to actually think these other actual funny guys would be friends with Zahn and he never pulled it off. The late 00's fraternity of comedians is a pretty tight knit group and whenever you have someone like Zahn try to infiltrate it usually just never works.

I wont even go into the plot because i really implore you guys not to waste your time. If they made like an outtake of just Longs and Hills scenes, then and only then would i recommend having anything to with this movie.

In other words:

Strange Wilderness verdict - NOT GUILTY!!! (avoid at all costs)

Review of: Kickboxer

Bringing it old school with a flick i watched this morning. Kickboxer to my surprise came out almost 20 years ago and that makes me feel old. However, Jean claude movies just do not age. The music alone carries this movie. Here's a test for anyone bored enough to try anything. Sit in a pitch black room and let someone play movie soundtracks from every different decade from like the 1950's to the 200'0's. I'm willing to bet that most every movie lover will be able to recognize the 80's flick much much better then any other decade. The music is just that recognizable. You also have Van Damme dancing like a freak while drunk. This just adds up to a straight masterpiece.

The plot of this movie is that JC's bother gets paralyzed by the scary looking Tong Po. For anyone that knows Panopticon, he wishes his hair was like Tong Po's. Tong Po is obviously the guy on the left. Interesting fact, the guy who played Po was also one of the fighters in Bloodsport. JC takes it upon himself to learn Muay Thai kickboxing and avenge his brothers injuries. He meets Mr. Miyagi and in the best piece of dialogue in a JCVD movie explains that he is from America by way of Belgium. Explains that horrible accent of his and makes the movie that much more believable.

Anyways, if you guys are just looking for some great 80's fare and JCVD awesomeness i suggest queuing this one up on Netflix. Enjoy.

Kickboxer verdict - Guilty

Review of: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Gonna hit you guys with some quick reviews on this Saturday morning, I want to try to hit the park and play some ball before the rain comes.

First up is the new Indy movie. To begin, I'll let you guys know that I'm a fan of the original trilogy of Indy movies. But I'll also tell you that I'm a huge opponent of all these movies that revive the characters of all these actors that just shouldn't be playing them anymore. For example, Rocky Balboa and Rambo. Are you serious?! Were these two movies necessary? And now I hear that Steroid Stallone is thinking of doing another Rambo. I think the title should be "Rambo: The Raid of Eggers Nursing home".

With that being said, I'll say that Indy is not a bad movie. The nostalgia of hearing the songs and seeing the whip alone make it a must rent movie. However I'd much rather have waited for this one to come out on DVD.

As for the plot, it basically deals with Indy being approached by the new star of the millennium Shia Leblanc (yes that was on purpose, his career could easily go the JOEY route), who asks him to travel somewhere in South America to find his mom and some mysterious crystal skull. I know the movie takes place in the 50's but did we really have to bring it back to the 80's with the terrible Russian stereotypes? I mean been there done that bad guy. Cate blanchett really phoned this one in. I won't give too much more away in this one except to say that Aliens play a prominent role. Yes, I said ALIENS. We are always suspending our belief for movies, and I've always been a proponent of that one fact, but cmon, does Indiana Jones really need aliens? I think Harrison Ford thought he was remaking Blade Runner Or The Empire Strikes Back instead.

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull verdict - NOT GUILTY (save your money for blockbuster)

Weekend review part 2: Before the Devil Knows You're Dead

Before the Devil Knows You're Dead was a very pleasant surprise to watch. I had actually suggested this one to my fellow critic Panopticon about 2 weeks ago. It was a suggestion based strictly on the actors involved since I had not yet seen the movie. I figured anything with Ethan Hawke, Philip Symour Hoffman and Albert Finney in a starring role had to be somewhat watchable despite what the critics and movie going public had decided.

Without giving away too much, this is a story about two brothers, both down on their luck, but for different reasons. Both wanting to make a change and both having some sort of deep rooted family problems. The dynamic between the older brother Hoffman and the younger brother Hawke was actually the best part of the movie. I wasn't sure that they were going to be able to pull that off since its usually Hoffman that plays the down on his luck guy, but they both played their roles to perfection.

Quick aside, for some reason Marisa Tomei is nude in 90% of the scenes she is in. I'm not saying this as a bad thing AT ALL, haha, but it just seemed like a weird role for her. And you'll know what I mean from the first shot of the movie.

Albert Finney is another one of those actors that seems to elevate whatever little role is given to him. Here he plays the distraught father of the 2 main characters and his despair and sadness permeates every scene he is in.

The style of this movie though is what really elevates it from just good to very very good. Essentially you are given a chance to explore each scene of the movie through each persons role in that scene. Now what I mean by that is, the director uses flashbacks to show every scene from every characters point of view. My only complaint is that sometimes it was hard to keep track of where we were actually at in the movie, but that usually resolved itself pretty quickly.

My favorite scene, and Panopticon can argue this, is right near the end when Hoffman takes control of things at his drug dealers apartment. The desperation of both him and Hawke in that scene was amazing and really showed their range as actors.

Panopticon and I had discussed the ending and he was concerned that there really was no redemption for any of the characters. And I guess in a way her was right, there is definitely nothing close to a happy ending for anyone involved, but in the grand scheme of the movie, I think that's what the director was really going for. He just wanted to show that sometimes there are things or situations that happen in our lives that really affect us deeply and its hard to escape the person that these "situations" build. In the end I really took away the importance of family and how our parents really shape who we become. While not saying it outright, we can infer that Finneys dad in the movie at some point in time neglected one or both of his children which led to a lifetime of resentment by at least one of them.

All in all this was a great movie with some real innovative direction and I highly suggest you guys netflix it or take a trip out to blockbuster to rent it.

Before the Devil Knows You're Dead verdict - GUILTY

Weekend review: The Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer

So I woke up sunday morning and I wanted to just lounge on the couch and watch some tv. Unfortunately, there was absolutely nothing on. Then i remembered that I had DVR'd the Fantastic Four sequel, The Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. As unappealing as that may sound, on a lazy sunday, it actually hit the spot.

The acting was as bad as you could imagine, but the story was actually pretty decent. Coupled with the fact that the Silver Surfer was one of my favorite characters when I was younger, I actually enjoyed watching this movie.

It starts out with the celebrity wedding of Mr. Fantastic to Sue Storm. In this version of the story, they are pretty much the Brangelina of the world. The wedding gets interrupted by what turns out to be the Silver Surfer flying in from out of space on an earth-destroying mission.

(Spoiler Alert) Being a fan, I knew the Surfer would eventually turn good and do something heroic and I was actually pretty satisfied about how they portrayed him on screen. Thought the effects were actually exactly what I would have imagined for his character.

This is by every definition, a popcorn movie, but for those times when you just want to kick back and watch a decent comic book flick for an hour and a half I definitely suggest giving this one a shot.

The Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer verdict: HUNG JURY (not an instant classic, but well worth a rental)

Guest Review - Transformers

Yes, that’s right. Your eyes are not deceiving you. I am giving a review of half of a movie. Half because it was that bad, so the Verdict is: Not Guilty (its not like you would be surprised by the verdict if the undertone of the synopsis is negative/positive). But let me just say that I was very much disappointed. I cannot say that I was a huge Transformer fan as a kid. I didn’t believe in Transformers. I believed in characters like those special armed forces formed from an underground government conspiracy against an evil empire that is headed by a man with a silver head. I believed in an event that happened a long time ago in a galaxy far far away. But I could never grasp the concept of a world where humans and transforming robots co-existed, they were just too big and it would be just too dangerous.


Firstly I will say that the characters killed the movie. The acting was bad and the plot was bad. The movie was so PC typical and again non-believable. Firstly, and in no particular order, Megan Fox is hot; do we really believe that she would fall in love with the dork Shia Lebouf. Of course the movie makes her out to be a good-looking girl but hates her popularity. She had to shed her mechanic background because of the pressures of high school. Does this remind us of another movie character? I believe so. How about Marissa Tomei in My Cousin Vinny, hot chick who is a mechanic. Works in that movie, not this one! Secondly, does it have to be the beautiful blonde who is surrounded by all geeks that cracks the code of the aliens? Why? Only thing worse than that was that she had to get help from the fat funny black friend. Don’t mistake me for being a bigot but a girl who looks like that doesn’t parade in circles with doughnut eating black guys. I'm sorry, it just doesn’t work. I especially loved the part when the FBI raided the house four minutes after she got there like they were removing Elian Gonzalez from a closet in Miami.


Even the robots themselves were pathetic. The first words that come out of Optimus Prime’s voice box is “are you eBay user ladiesman217?” The movie was one big advertisement for eBay and Chevy.


The other thing that bothered me was brought to my attention from The Critic when he reminded me that some of the transformers were misrepresented. For example, Bumble Bee in the movie was the car that the guy buys for $4,000 (another thing, how do you sell a car to someone with no registration, title, etc…ok maybe im reaching here but its still ridiculous). Bumble was in fact a punch-buggie, not a camaro. Megatron was a gun, not a plane. I did think that they looked quite realistic in the scenes with human society however they were a little too bulky in my opinion. It was hard for me to see the detail of the robots as they fought each other. Everything went too fast and all the robots were dark metallic, which made it confusing to see who was who. One thing I remember about Optimus Prime was that he was red and blue. On the cartoon and the action figures his colors were really pronounced. In the movie, they were faded and couldn’t be seen too well.


Overall I thought the movie was bad enough to shut in the middle. Maybe there was too much hype behind it and my expectations were too high. Maybe I just didn’t have a real interest in the characters because I am a huge fan of Spider-man albeit I didn’t enjoy the third one too much. All in all…..A BOMB!!


-The Gaoler

Transformers verdict - NOT GUILTY

Thanks to The Gaoler for our first guest review

Review of: Speed Racer

OK, OK, This movie was probably supposed to be for 4 year old kids only. I get it, men my age aren't supposed to see this movie. I get it when all my friends say "this is such a "you" movie. Every critic gave this movie zero stars and said it was terrible. I get all of that. But you know what, that has never stopped me from seeing a movie. My feelings have always been that each person is different and each persons tastes are definitely different.

With all that being said, this movie was as close to terrible as you can get. My main gripe was the plot or lack thereof. If there was a plot, I'm not really sure i could tell what it was.

Let me digress for a second, before i go any further I should say that me and my wife were the only 2 people in the theater, literally! And this was on opening night no less! It seemed like a bad omen at the time, but I kind of shrugged it off. (i really wanted this movie to be good)

Back to the review, let me just say that Speed Racer was one of my favorite cartoons when I was younger and that was the main reason I was dying to see this movie on opening weekend. It totally lived down the hype. The acting seemed totally forced, the humor was bad at best, and the villains were more than predictable.

As for the actors themselves, John Goodman has been good at nothing in my eyes besides playing Roseanne's foil Dan Connor. Susan Sarandon was a waste as the mother, I can't even remember one line of hers, Christina Ricci who has been one of my favorite younger stars and I believe shined in last years Black Snake Moan totally mailed this one in and Emile Hirsch, fresh off a spectacular turn as Chris Mcandless in Into the Wild, was simply wrong for this part. There really was no need to have speed played by an actor who's talents are best suited for more dramatic roles.

All those poor performances pale in comparison to how disappointed I was in the Wachowski Brothers. Obviously the Matrix catapulted these 2 brothers to super stardom and the seeming ability to do anything they wanted on the big screen. I guess they thought they had the magic touch where they could take a one joke cartoon and put it on the big screen using all their magic. It just didn't work.

Without being totally negative I will say stylistically, this movie was unmatched. I've never seen a better use of the color spectrum before and that alone saves this movie from winning the Razzie next year for worst movie of 08.

Therefore:

SPEED RACER verdict - NOT GUILTY!!!

The Kite Runner Film compared to Novel

Plot Summary in Brief (Spoilers omitted)
Based on Khaled Hosseini’s best selling novel, The Kite Runner depicts the life of a young Afghan coming of age. Born in Afghanistan, shortly before the Russian invasion, Amir enjoys a privileged life with his father (Baba) and loyal friend, Hassan. While Amir’s mother died shortly after (or during) his birth, Amir has little strife besides his inability to truly please his father. Amir spends his days playing with and reading stories to Hassan, watching American movies, and Kite Running. Amir’s life is inexorably altered after witnessing a tragic event happen to Hassan, of which he does nothing. Shortly after this occurs the Russian invasion takes place, which eventually forces Amir and Baba to flee
to Pakistan and finally America, where they begin a new life in California.

I’ll say upfront that my viewing of Kite Runner was perhaps “tainted” by the novel. While viewing the film with a friend who did not read the novel, I often found myself (much to his chagrin) pausing, saying things like, “O.K. in the novel it happens like this….” Or, “At this point in the novel you’d already know this…” and explain something the film left out. Annoying, I know. Yet I felt compelled to do this as I felt he may have missed much of what made the film so powerful. In this sense, while the film retains the basic story line and plot, it often fails to exact the same emotional intensity… even a redemption borne of agony that the novel so brilliantly inspires.


Kite Runner is essentially a story of courage, forgiveness and redemption. Concepts and words easily expressed although much more difficult under real-life circumstances. Amir must atone for his past. He must find courage under heart-wrenching circumstances and in doing so forgive both those from his past and most importantly himself. In this way the film does a so-so job at intertwining the personal trials of Amir…umbrella-d within the political circumstances occurring in Afghanistan.

In terms of characterization the film inadequately depicts the emotional connections which Hosseini’s novel so painstakingly develops. While the film audience “gets” that Amir is not the boy his father desires, that Hassan is a loyal friend to Amir, that Rahim Khan supports Amir’s artistic endeavors, little is done to show exactly how such relationships are forged. This narrative-lack loses the emotional gravity that the novel beautifully uses to suck the reader in. Simply stated it is difficult to care, for example, when Ali (Hassan’s father) decides that they must leave Amir and Baba or to truly empathize with the older Amir and his wife when we learn that they do not have children. The film takes little time to engross the audience in Amir’s internal monologue. Where the novel uses (Amir’s) first person narrative, the film approaches Amir from a third person, over-the-shoulder perspective. Again, my point here may be tainted by the reading of the novel, but the film might have done well for itself by using voice over at certain intervals.

The “I” is unfortunately omitted. In this way we might have been more engaged with certain decisions he makes throughout the film. Thus while we “get” that Amir must redeem himself and thus atone for his past “sins” we ultimately are not truly engaged with his “becoming good again.” When called by Rahim Khan after many years to “return home,” Amir’s going seems like a narrative snap- of- the- finger decision employed simply to move the plot along. Unlike the novel, the film audience may find this unexpected. While a film translation certainly cannot mime a novel in its entirety, I found certain omissions inexcusable. I may be nitpicking here but the film’s complete deletion of Amir’s hospital stay after Assef beats him to near death as well as the difficulty he faces in attempting to adopt Ali’s son, Sohrab, were most difficult to swallow. The latter omission negates the importance of Sohrab’s emotional vulnerability when arriving in America.

We “see” neither the guilt Amir has lived with for so long nor the strengthening relationship he had with his father while in America. At best, Kite Runner, while occasionally offering goose-bump moments seems like another rushed version of a spectacular novel, a la The Da Vinci Code. The Kite Runner film seems to rely on the fact that its audience has already read the novel and in so doing risks loses that same audience in the process. It is true that a film must remain (and be viewed) as an independent artistic piece, separate from the novel upon which it is based. Yet the paradox for films like Kite Runner, screening shortly after a popular novel’s publication, is that it will be indelibly associated with that novel. Often, the only place to go is down and this Kite comes close to crashing. But Because I love the overall "message" of the story the Kite Runner remains a HUNG JURY

who knows, but you may love it, especially if you haven't read the novel.

Review of: Gone Baby Gone

So for my first real movie review I just picked the movie that I saw most recently. That would be Gone Baby Gone. Let me just say that Casey Affleck is slowly growing into one of my favorite actors of this young millennium. He also shone through in his brief appearances in the Oceans movies and his breakthrough role in the Jesse James flick really made me eager to see anything Casey Affleck. I kind of put aside the fact that his brother is Ben Affleck who would be in my top 5 least favorite actors. With that being said Ben had a huge hand in the making of this movie and should be somewhat commended for it.

Casey Affleck is one of those actors that doesn't fit the leading man, Brad Pitt, George Clooney Mel Gibson, traditional role. He's not the 6'2" chiseled Adonis body actor that will star in any action flicks but he definitely proved in this one that he has the acting chops to handle a starring role.

Let me just briefly add that I will also watch anything and everything that has OMAR in it and if you don't know who OMAR is you better look him up...ha ha.

As for the flick it has the same style and feel as Mystic River, and I'm pretty sure it was shot in roughly the same small town. Brief plot description without giving away anything is this - Affleck and his wife in the movie are small time detectives that are hired to supplement a police investigation into a missing girl. The girls mother is played by Amy Adams, another Wire star, who surprisingly does a 180 from her Wire character and plays a strung out coke addict in this one. If I'm not mistaken she was also nominated for Best Supporting Actress for this role. The cops who are "in charge" of the operation are played by Ed Harris, Morgan Freeman, and one of the ultimate "that guys", Taggert from Beverly Hills Cop. I probably haven't seen him in a role since then and it took me a second to figure out where he was from. The movie follows your standard kidnapping plot for the most part, even including some weird pedophiles and cool drug dealers. I won't give away anything else and I'm sure the ending will surprise some, as even I didn't predict what would happen at the end.

All in all a very decent flick and I would recommend you guys go out and rent/buy it.

This movie gets the first official REEL JUDGES verdict. As a reminder the way it works is this:

guilty - go and see it, 2 thumbs up, guilty pleasure
not guilty - avoid at all costs, 2 thumbs down
hung jury - 1 thumb up, go see if you're bored, you may like it


Gone Baby Gone is = GUILTY

Some of Panopticon's Favorites

I apologize in advance for the lengthy post. Like The Critic I wanted to begin by introducing some of my favorite actors, television shows, and films. More "favorite lists" will come later. As for the length, I promise future posts will be shorter.

Favorite Actor
I have to agree here with The Critic. Daniel Day-Lewis is riveting in every role he plays. His emotional range is a work of genius, reaching depths I’ve rarely seen in many actors. I liken great acting to this—the ability to allow the audience to “forget” that one is acting. Simply stated, while watching Day-Lewis work, one “disremembers” that acting is being done. I have to say this is a talent that even the best of our time often do not exhibit. For example, while I love Jack Nicholson and Robert De Niro I am almost always conscious of the fact that it is Nicholson and De Niro on screen. This is not the case with Lewis. I’m sure I’ll have more to say on his work later on. I will say this—I would love to see him attempt to do some comedy as I am sure he has the emotional range to do so. This might be something that often gets overlooked in the depth of his work—the subtle humor of some of his most intense characters, i.e., The Butcher in Scorsese’s Gangs of New York as well as P.T. Anderson’s There Will Be Blood. I’ll reserve specific examples for future posts.
Other Favorites include Sean Penn, Al Pacino, Clive Owen (a new favorite)

Favorite Actress Julianne Moore
Hands down she is magnificent in every way. Subtle, understated, beautiful, graceful, raw. Like Lewis she has a range unseen in many at her craft. My favorite performance of hers is hands down P.T.A’s Magnolia. I am thinking specifically of the scene where she begrudges the pharmacists for judging her while picking up the “cocktail” of various drugs for her dying husband… as well as for herself. That “shame on you. Shame on both of you!” still gives me goose bumps.

Favorite TV Show(s): Lost, Seinfeld, Dexter, House...
Admittedly I do not give most television shows the time of day. After much pressing from the Critic and others I finally gave Lost a try last year. I watched the first 2 and a half seasons in about 2 weeks time, taking breaks only to…well usually only to switch disks. I am essentially a “what happens next” kind of audience member. If I do not care “what happens next” I lose interest pretty quickly. Suffice to say, Lost is the cream of the crop where I am concerned. I am also biased towards plots w/ twists, bends and turns, but also open up a philosophical dialogue. Lost never manages to disappoint in this regard. I’m sure the Critic and I will have a bunch of things to say about Lost in the coming weeks.

Seinfeld: This would be considered 1A on my list. I can watch any episode and break out into gut-wrenching laughter. I have a soft spot for George as I identify with him on many, many levels.

A perhaps not so distant second is Dexter, which I also caught onto recently and also watched rather swiftly. The writing in Dexter is top notch and the acting is excellent as well. Although I am curious to see where the third season will go. It will certainly be a testament to great writing if they can hold our interest past the second season.
For those who have not watched the show but plan to I urge you to skip this next section:
I am curious to see what season three will bring. It was kind of predictable during season one that Dexter’s sister will in some way end up unknowingly hunting her brother. But what the heck will they do for season three? What’s left? This is where the creative brilliance will enter.

House: Amazing show combinging mystery with great acting and dialogue. I wonder what doctors think of this one? Do patients enter a hospital thinking, "what would "house " do?"

Other shows of interest” Friday Night Lights. It is more than just a football show. This show probably suffered because of its name. Most people think it is strictly about football, which is not the case. I also loved Journeyman, which probably suffered from lack of patience and bad advertisement. The Critic and I mourn its death. (weep)


Favorite Film?? Forrest Gump
This is a difficult task. However unlike the Critic I will not take the easy way out on this one. For now I’ll simply say Forrest Gump is my all time favorite with Magnolia coming in a close second. Yes it is difficult to decide—it can depend on any number of variables, not to mention that we can all decide favorites based on genre. I will say this about how I rank my top-lists. It is admittedly a shaky system, but if I can watch it over and over and over again, discovering something new at each viewing, it will probably end up as an all-time favorite. I’ll have more to say on why certain films get to that top list later.
Other films on my “Tops List”—off the top of my head: Usual Suspects, The Last Temptation of Christ, Natural Born Killers, Shawshank Redemption, The Sixth Sense, Rear Window, Vertigo, and Citizen Kane. OK, so maybe The Critic was right… I can’t decide either. Perhaps It’ll be easier to make a top 25 list and go from there.

First Post with some real content

So I thought long and hard about what my first post should be on the site. Finally i decided to just add all my choices into one. Therefore i present my favorites in the following categories:

Favorite Actor - DANIEL DAY LEWIS.

While is body of work is not extensive, according to IMDB he has acted in only 25 movies since 1971 http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000358/ (which is low for an actor), the quality he puts into them is unmatched. I'm just going to talk about my two favorite roles of his for now.

The first is Bill the Butcher from Gangs of New York. I know most people hated this movie, but I for one, loved it. Most of that love stemmed from DDL's portrayal of the old gang leader. He just totally became Bill the Butcher and watching him, you can appreciate what a skill it is to be an actor.

Secondly is his role as Daniel Plainview in There Will be Blood. Another example of DDL just totally becoming his character and giving us the viewer the opportunity to get lost in his world for the over 2 hr run time. he was in almost every scene of this movie and for some that might be overkill, but at the end of this movie you just wanted more. And I'll give credit to my co-blogger Mr. Panopticon when he says that the ending to this movie is probably one of the best of all time.

Favorite TV show - Present -LOST Past - The Wire

Don't know how to decide between these two shows as my favorite of all time, but there is no denying the similarities between the two that make them classics in their own right. When it comes down to it, both are character driven shows that try their hardest to show you as much as possible about every character on the show time permitting. 5 seasons of The Wire gave us so many characters to discover that I don't even know where to begin. I will say that Chris and Snoop were probably my favorites if i had to choose. They may differ in style in that Lost is pretty much a mystery and The Wire is more of a straight narrative, but they both give us the viewer the opportunity to take everything in and make our own decisions about things. In The Wire that decision had to do with what is really right and what is really wrong. While Lost doesn't claim to be as deep as that, there are questions that Lost asks, maybe not on the surface that are just as intriguing. Probably for me, that is best shown by Sawyer, here's a guy who at the beginning of the show helped build a raft to go home, and now that he has had time to think, he is seeing that maybe the island is a better home for him. Brings a great dynamic to the show, is the island this utopia where you don't have to worry about things like bills, and government, something that some people may be better of with. I know I'm going off on a tangent here, but let me just say if you've never watched these two shows before, then i implore you to go buy the box sets.

Favorite Movie - ????

This is a very tough one and ultimately i couldn't decide...yet

So, thats my first real substantive Post. My next one is most likely going to be a movie review, and i know you'll all be holding your breath.

Introduction

I'm going to make this short and to the point. My friend and I have had a longstanding love of films (and TV shows). The other day we decided to start this blog thinking we'd have a place to put our thoughts on these films and shows to the archives of the Internet. A brief intro for the 2 main contributors:

The Critic - Avid movie watcher and wanna be professional athlete. I really don't love one genre of film more than another, but I'm a sucker for indies. There's something great in the way these independent directors could do so much with such a small budget. It usually brings the best out of actors also. Another genre I'm a fan of is the Biography. Few of my favorite movies are The Doors, Stand by me, and a new addition to my all time list is The Assassination of Jesse James... As for the TV side of it, Im a huge fan of Lost and the recently departed "The Wire". I'll also pretty much give any new show a chance, but with the networks cancelling everything nowadays, that gets harder.

Panopticon - Also avid movie watcher, wanna be 1960's beat poet and college professor. He also is a big fan of a wide range of film and tv genres and sometimes doesn't give some of The Critics suggestions the light of day, but he's becoming more of a well rounded tv and movie viewer and being the English major will probably be able to write a lot better then I. Some of his favorites include Magnolia, Forrest Gump, and his new addition, There Will Be Blood. He's also a huge Lost fan and watched The Wire in a matter of 2 days, i think he stayed up in his room for 48 hours with no food or water before finally finishing it.

As for what we will be writing about:

• Reviewing new and old movies alike and giving them our guilty, not guilty or hung jury verdict
• Guilty is much the same as two thumbs up, Not guilty means stay away and hung jury is sort of like one thumb up.
• We'll also do periodical episode recaps for some shows like Lost, Dexter, etc...
• From time to time we'll add new features like a current top ten, all time top ten, discuss some actors and actresses.
• Pretty much anything film and tv wise you could think of we'll try to incorporate.
• The main thing is that we're flexible and definitely open to suggestions.
• Feel free to add in the comments anything you'd like to be seen on this blog.
• Most of all we love movie suggestions and we will do our best to review as quick as possible.
• Hope we don't bore anyone to death.

Thanks