Substance Smubstance.

Wha-wha-what? That was my first thought upon reading the latest news involving Roger Ebert today. No, it has nothing to do with the curious events surrounding his new movie review show. I am referring to his review of Tron: Legacy, in which he writes "the plot...is a catastrophe, short-changing the characters and befuddling the audience." So he gave it one star, right? **? Zero stars? Nope. This movie merited three stars. Now, I'm trying to think of a movie whose visuals were so good that they overcame immense shortcomings in other areas. I give up. Maybe I'm just overcritical, but there is not a movie worth recommending that can be that bad in the story department. Maybe this Tron sequel is different? It currently has a fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, so it's not like Ebert is by himself on this one. And it looks like a real winner compared to the other movies opening this week.

Speaking of Ebert, I've heard of feuding newspapers, but this is almost beyond belief. You know it's going bad at newspapers when they can't get a story straight, even when focused on the most famous contributor for the same newspaper. Is anyone editing this stuff? Anyway, here's the story. Ebert responded with the following tweet: "To set the goddamn record straight: Elvis and Christy had great chemistry, as anyone could see who bothered to watch the pilot we posted." Other newspapers (like the Tribune) posted the news, only without the rumor and innuendo.

Blogging on Facebook by a Twit.

I've been too distracted lately to mess much with the social networking stuff. I wasn't sure what services I should use, but Facebook and Twitter both appear to be too firmly entrenched to go away anytime soon. Facebook is flawed, but almost everyone uses it, so it is hard to ignore. Twitter has been having problems keeping its site running. People will turn to another service if it doesn't right the ship in the next year. So what is on the horizon? I don't know. But I would be shocked if the landscape of social networking isn't dramatically different five years from now, when everyone will be carrying around an advanced smart phone and/or an Ipad type device.

Development Arrested

I wonder how a show like Running Wilde made it onto the schedule. Despite an uneven first episode, it's actually a great show. Not as good as the masterful Arrested Development, which goes without saying, but it has the same tone along with characters that could have been part of the A.D. world. The question is, why did Fox think that it could do any better in the ratings than A.D.? The fact is, this type of comedy is too sophisticated for mainstream audiences. Just look at the lowbrow stuff playing to much undeserved success on CBS.

Hopefully we'll see the entire 13 episode order. By the way, lead-in Raising Hope isn't bad, but it feels a little too much like a retread of My Name is Earl. And, waddya know, Jason Lee is going to be on an upcoming episode of Raising Hope. It's too bad that they aren't the same network, because they could have a cameo by Earl.

Out of Gas

New car technology is almost here. Wait, what? This technology has been around for more than ten years? What happened?

Well, you don't have to watch Who Killed the Electric Car to know that without proper investments of time and money, technology goes nowhere. $.99, and even $1.50 a gallon gas was at the root of the problem ten years ago. California pushed for it, but even its efforts were eventually overcome by a board of fools. Special interests were trying to push hydrogen power instead. Ten years later, no one is talking about hydrogen, and no one will be until the costs have been greatly reduced.

So now, finally, the electric car is here. The cost seems reasonable for a first generation product. So far, Nissan is the only manufacturer with a pure electric car, slated to make its official debut before the end of the year. The catch is that its battery is only rated to last about 100 miles per charge. That's a big problem if your family only owns one car. But how many families only own one car? A "green" family will probably already own a Prius, a car that does 50 mpg for trips. Add in a Leaf for driving to work/outings to the store, and you've got all your bases covered.

The first year you can be sure that quantities will be limited. There has been talk that dealers are going to gouge prices several thousand over list price. That, combined with typical first generation problems, and the thought of purchasing one of these cars becomes a whole lot more pleasant by the time 2012 rolls around.

A solid review of the Nissan Leaf, along with this one. Oh, and by the way, for all the morons out there-an electric car powered by coal energy is much more efficient than an internal combustion engine powered by gas. It's not even close. It's also another reason for the adoption of solar panels and/or wind turbines as a power source at your home.

Three Colors

To interlopers she epitomized antisocial behavior. Her one acceptable devotee was Christy, but it was always under august roving terms. My long-spurned advances would be embraced after a long duration marked by desperation, far from Christy's presence and always under protest. Bites were signs of affection, most of the time. A mouse was her bat signal, and a repeated wail beckoned the unseeing. Now it is quiet.

Sprinkles 1997-2010

Construction Time Again (Redux)

The massive restoration of Lincoln Hall wasn't enough. Now the Natural History Building is undergoing emergency repairs due to faulty construction of the 1892 building's 1908 addition. Which begs the question, in 1908 were people complaining that "they don't build them like they used to?"

But wait, there's more. A $250,000 study has been approved to determine what can be done to Altgeld Hall. I have very little personal connection to Altgeld, thanks to one math final and an occasional trip to the post office. It's an amazing building without even considering the bell tower, which provided my four year college soundtrack.

Antediluvian Lasciviousness

Ed O'Neil finally comes out of the shadow of Al Bundy.

Dumb and Dumber

Do people in the south really possess lower intelligence than other areas of the country? One would think so, from the demands coming out of Louisiana to continue deep sea oil drilling. So, your two big industries are fishing and oil, and when oil kills off your fishing, you take the side of oil? Lives lost, with an ongoing environmental disaster, and you take the position that "you'll take your chances" that further unregulated deep sea drilling will be safe? If oil meant so much to your economy, maybe you should have demanded guarantees about the safety and effectiveness of this drilling in the first place. You didn't, because all you cared about was the easy money grab, and now YOU are going to pay, in terms of lost jobs and the like. I feel bad for the fishermen, who were there a long time before the oil industry. But as for ANYONE who profited from deep sea drilling, whether it's a bigwig or a little guy, you took your chances, and now you are paying for it.

It reminds me of the most recent South Park episode, where the same mistake is made over and over again, with no ability to learn from said mistake. Handicapped indeed.

Ebertfest 2010 Part 3

Since Ebert lost his ability to speak, the festival has needed extra help to fill in for Ebert, primarily for the after film discussions that he used to lead. Chaz Ebert took over the introductions. While she was a bit shaky at first, she has become adept at the job, aside from dropping the Golden Thumb award this year. It's a testament to the build quality of the award that it did not break when it landed with a thud onto the stage.

People like David Bordwell and Michael Phillips were pros at taking over the discussions when Ebert fell ill. But this festival likes to present a lot of viewpoints, and this year's festival saw the welcome additions of Kim Morgan, Christy Lemire, and Elvis Mitchell, and even the inclusion of the far flung correspondents worked for the most part. The after film discussions and the generally less interesting morning panel discussions are available here. The Synecdoche panel is available on YouTube.

I find it astonishing that some people with festival passes skipped the Apocalypse Now screening. You wouldn't know it from the packed Virginia, but a couple people indicated in their writings that they didn't attend the showing of one of the great achievements of the cinema. What a waste.

Ebertfest 2010 Part 2

While this was the twelfth consecutive "Roger Ebert Film Festival," it was my tenth. With this anniversary of sorts in mind, I became reflective about those ten years. Some of the attendees go to the festival year after year, and it is hard not to observe how they have changed over that time. Some changes are trivial like hair styles, and others are more serious like a limp. Festival conspirator Dusty Cohl died. Roger Ebert has lost the ability to speak. Festival favorite Warren York, who played the organ before every movie, became very sick about three years ago and so far has been unable to return. You would think that I would know a lot of people at the festival by now. Well, there are a lot of recognizable faces, but curiously the attendees seem to come and go. I personally know of very few people out of the 1,000 pass holders who have attended every festival since my first one. Just when I think someone is becoming a festival regular, they don't show up the next year. Whether it is health problems, money problems, time off problems, or a disinterest with the festival, I don't know.

Other changes involve the theater itself. Much reconstruction work has been done on the theater since I first started attending the festival back in 2001. This summer the front lobby/concession area is going to be redone, thanks to a generous donation. This will leave only a few things left to repair/improve. The most important potential upgrade is new seating. If they put in new seats, along with somehow spacing out the rows in the balcony, attending the festival would be cinematic nirvana. Maybe I would no longer have to stand in line hours before opening in order to reserve a "good" seat. Maybe.

Ebertfest 2010 Part 1

A few links to get you started-
Mark Pfeiffer's blog and Tweets from the festival. Unlike nearly all of the "professional" writers at the festival, Mark provided coverage for the first four days. Don't miss his April 24th picture of the view from the men's room urinals. It is a better view than the picture indicates. Considering the tight confines and the crowded nature of that area, being able to open the windows is a godsend.

At first it was unclear to me what I should do with Twitter. I don't even text on my cell phone. But the film festival provides the means and the motivation to tweet. Plenty of downtime between movies (and during some of the less compelling q&a's), to go along with plenty of material. Now I need a new phone!

Iamamiwhoami

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Boo Who

Is there a more overrated band than The Who? I think not. Their music sounds incredibly dated, with arrangements that have been bested by the likes of The Blue Man Group. Roger Daltrey can sing, but that strength is obscured on the studio recordings. I suspect that were it not for live performances The Who would have faded into obscurity much sooner. What was Pete Townsend thinking with that whole child porn "investigation?" Add to that their propensity to sell out (the wrong kind) again, again, and again, and words like embarrassment and sad come to mind.

Outfoxing the Competition

The late night landscape has been nothing to brag about for the last 10 years. Saturday Night Live has been awful. Leno has been in cruise control, adding an occasional stolen bit to freshen up the show. Letterman has similarly had very few notable moments. The Palin exchange was vintage Letterman, but then things were back to normal until the sex scandal hit. People thought this would damage Letterman, but in fact I believe it actually helped. Finally one of these hosts was exposing some kind of reality on his show. Feelgood stories about his heart operation and his fatherhood failed to sustain the interest. Now Letterman seems a little dangerous, and the recent late night wars episodes have further invigorated him with an anything goes attitude.

Leno's failure at 10:00 really amounted to one thing-Leno was a success because of his monologue. That monologue wasn't going to drive his show at this earlier time slot. Instead of having the option to watch Leno's show for the first 15 minutes before falling asleep, now they were forced to find something entertaining for the entire hour, something that Leno's show has never provided. With that in mind, there is no way that Leno was going to grow his audience at 10:00, which is what he needed to do if it was going to successfully lead in to the local news.

Conan's "failure" occurred for many reasons. Leno's lousy ratings at 10:00 led to a domino effect for the NBC shows later in the night. Never mind that Conan had to compete with Leno for guests. The guests that were booked on Conan were often exactly the type that were booked on Leno's Tonight Show-vapid starlets with nothing interesting to say. The edge was gone, replaced by a vanilla coating.

Leno's return to the Tonight Show might prove disastrous for NBC. A month after his return we will know what damage has been done to the Tonight Show viewership. A big fall in the ratings will receive a lot of press, and a loss to Letterman would be devastating. Even if Leno manages to recapture most of his viewers, it is still going to be a steady decline from here on out, as the lionshare of his viewers are over 50.

Most people are saying that it is a done deal that Conan will go to Fox. That might very well be true, but I don't know that this is the best move for him. First, the 11:00 slot will not be available on many Fox affiliates, as they already run lucrative shows like TMZ and Everybody Loves Raymond. Second, the lead in is not going to be that good at 11:00, thanks to an awkward prior hour where the news starts at 10:00 and a random syndicated show is sandwiched between the news and Conan. Why not go to Comedy Central? Conan would fit well with that channel's targeted demographic. Stewart and Colbert would have to air an hour earlier, but I think their ratings would hold up against the broadcast network dramas. The problem with Comedy Central is that they might not have the budget for this type of show. But this would be the most well known two hour block of programming outside of the broadcast networks and the news channels. I think it would work.

The Dancing Waters, aka The Prancing Fluids

I must have seen his show at a friend's house, because I don't remember my parents ever watching Late Night with David Letterman. It was around 1986/87 when I started regularly watching Letterman. I say regularly, but at first that was probably only during the summer, as I had to get up at a ridiculous time to go to school. At some point my Letterman viewing became an every night occurrence, as did after-school naps. The genius of the show was its irreverence, whether it involved Chris Elliot coming out as Marlon Brando or having Teri Garr take a shower. Guests were not worshiped, as Shirley MacLaine and Cher could attest. When Letterman moved to 10:30 at CBS, things were different. The show was watered down, and Letterman was not his cantankerous self. I had better things to do while in college anyway, so that was one more hour in which to do those things. Meanwhile, Leno had taken over The Tonight Show. Leno's monologue was strong, probably a result of Leno's mastery of standup comedy. Letterman, on the other hand, only did two or three throwaway jokes in his Late Night monologue. It was pretty clear that Letterman did not like standup comedy, even though he had done it for a few years back in the 1970s. Nevertheless, Letterman started doing a Tonight Showesque monologue as soon as he took over The Late Show. The differences in the monologues I think was the main reason that Leno eventually commanded a larger audience. Meanwhile, people looked past Leno's horrible interviewing skills and his inability to come up with original comedy bits.

Conan O'Brien was awful when he first started at Late Night. But then he developed a rapport with Andy, and the strong writing overcame the other deficiencies. I thought Conan was in trouble when Andy left, but he held on well enough to command a shot at The Tonight Show. To be cont.

Get Another Guy to Direct!

I'm not sure what happened with Sherlock Holmes. Was the screenplay really this bad, or were the action scenes added in/expanded? The original Holmes stories were more drama than anything, and definitely not action stories. To have Holmes (and Watson, for that matter) duking it out with criminals is ridiculous, and worse than that, boring. I'm watching for the mystery, for the suspense, for the genius solution to the conundrum. Even the solution was weak. I would have enjoyed those two hours much more by reading a couple Doyle stories for the third or fourth time.

Reading is Bad.

I'm probably going to sound like an elitist snob, and this is not the first time. Twilight is not meant for me. I realize that. That doesn't mean I can't be annoyed by its popularity, especially when it is unwarranted popularity. I'm not sure what fad is worse-the Jonas Brothers or The Twilight Series. I'm going to say The Twilight Series, because it has older devotees and has yet to be skewered by South Park (unless I missed that episode). Are the books really that bad? I guess I'll never know, because I will never read them. Why, other than the fact that I am a heterosexual male? Because the writing is just awful. Certain standards should be followed, whether a book is meant for teenagers or adults. For example, take a look at the following passages, and consider how wretched the author's writing must have been before the editor fixed the worst parts-

I was about to take advantage of the fact that he hadn't gotten around to setting me back on my feet and that his wits-scramblingly beautiful face was only inches away when he said, "We're lucky Esme thought to add an extra room. No one was planning for Ness—Renesmee."

I could really appreciate him now—could properly see every beautiful line of his perfect face, of his long, flawless body with my strong new eyes, every angle and every plane of him. I could taste his pure, vivid scent on my tongue and feel the unbelievable silkiness of his marble skin under my sensitive fingertips.

They came in a rigid, formal formation.