Microsoft Office 2010, The Movie

What a hoot!  Why doesn’t Redmond put this stuff on TV. I know it is supposed to be for an online ad campaign but this would even put Apple to shame.

 

Donald Trump Fires Miss California USA

By John Rogers, Associated Press

Los Angeles (AP) – Miss California USA Carrie Prejean, who stirred up a hornet’s nest of controversy when she expressed her opinion that gays shouldn’t be allowed to marry, got the word from pageant poobah Donald Trump on Wednesday: "You’re fired."

Trump and other pageant leaders said Prejean was being sacked not because of her controversial remarks but because she hadn’t been holding up her end of the agreement she signed when she entered the pageant.

"This was a decision based solely on contract violations, including Ms. Prejean’s unwillingness to make appearances on behalf of the Miss California USA organization," the California pageant’s executive director, Keith Lewis, said in a statement.

Lewis had complained at a news conference last month that Prejean was skipping Miss California USA events while speaking out against gay marriage at unsanctioned appearances.

There are two sides to every story though?

Inkheart

Today Robin and I went to the movies and saw Inkheart.  We both enjoyed it.  It was good to see a movie without profanities sprinkled throughout and decent enough for kids to enjoy too.

Kind of of a fantasy adventure.  As always full of the standards; good guys, bad guys, misunderstood guys, wackos and of course the evil bad guys and a the very few good guys who may conquer.

If like this kind of movie its worth the admission price, but if the previews looked stupid to you it probably will be.

Paul Bettany is very good as he most always is and Brendan Fraser is good with some OKs as he most always is and yes I wrote it that way.  But that’s just my opinion.  Brendan Frasier’s high point (or low if you didn’t like it) was “George of the Jungle” and I don’t think he’s reached that since.

The Last Templar – starting Sunday night

The Last Templar looks like it could be good…the only problem I see is that it may interfere with Jack Bauer on Monday night?!

I read the book several years ago and I believe I remember it as being pretty good…although the books are always better than the movies, we will see.  (If I remember to record it.)

No Country for Old Men

Well OK, I was talking to my brother and his son around New Year’s day and a conversation about movies came up.  I was commenting that my wife talked me into going to see “Marley & Me”.  The first half was pretty good, the end hideous.  I was saying that movies I like usually involve things blowing up and bad guys getting shot, etc.

A conversation ensued where everyone but me thought “Mama Mia” was good.  Now I haven’t seen it…yet, so I could just say that it looked like a looser to me.  My wife loved it (nope I didn’t go, she and a girlfriend did).  My nephew, Jim, who also likes blowups and shoot-ups said that “Mama Mia” was good.  I was dumbfounded but decided to let it slide.

Jim suggested I order two other movies from Netflix to go along with MM so that I could get my fix, my wife could get her happiness fix and he also guaranteed I would like MM; doubtful, but I’ll watch.

So he said to get “No Country for Old Men” and “Eastern Promises” along with Mama.  I only get one at a time and received NCFOM last week.

Well to all of you and Jim I have to say, “I have a list of about my 10 top least favorite movies and I think this one is 11th or higher.”

Why? 

1. No dialogue.
2. Not much of a story.
3. Violence for no real reason.
4. Characterization must have been low since I didn’t even care when the girl gets it in the end.
5. Speaking of the end, the Cohen brothers must have been on crack when they did this one…it didn’t have an end.
6. Boring.

The only positive thing I can say about it was that Tommy Lee Jones was in it.  I usually like anything he does but he must have had some slow time and decided to do this one for a bad charity or something, he wasted his time.  But he is always fun to watch.

Finally, we got “Eastern Promises” the other night but haven’t watched it yet – I’m worried Jim but don’t worry we still love you.  And the final finally, my wife raves so much about “Mama Mia” I bought it for a birthday present for her (tonight, 01/16), so I bet I get to see that several times.

Pretty exciting isn’t it.

Oh wait, the third finally.  The Academy Awards are (IMO) always given to looser movies and to prove my point look at this:

 BEST PICTURE are you kidding me?

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UPDATE –>

Oh man…”Eastern Promises” must have been even worse, Jim you scare me.  I got tired of it right after we met Vigo, maybe 15 minutes into the movie and pulled it out of my machine before I had to have it condemned.

I can hardly wait for Mama Mia…ewwww.

It’s back…

OK, due to writers’ strike and a stint  in jail for Agent Jack Bauer, 24 has been out a while, slightly over a calendar year I would guesstimate.  But tonight another 24 hour day starts for him all over again.  (OK, I’m ignoring that poor little time killer from several weeks ago – 24 Redemption, I figured they had some $, time and tape to kill.  Now don’t get me wrong since I went out and bought it I must have liked it but it was nowhere near as entertaining as the series, ok, other than the boring 3rd season.

So tonight between 8pm & 10pm I will be shutting down my brain to watch the mayhem.  I’ll let you know what I thought about it tomorrow if/when I get a chance.

If you are a 24 fan let me know what you thought too.

As a fan of TOS I couldn’t resist posting these…enjoy

Teaser #1

Teaser #2

OK, one last one with the original Captain Kirk of TOS (The Original Series for all of you noobies).  I hope he can make it to another one although old and out of shape…so are all of his fans!

The new movie’s trailers look pretty decent, I hope they are even better than that.

Australia

We went to see “Australia” last night at the local Regal 14.  I have only a couple of comments.

I had read online reviews saying basically if you want to see this movie, make sure you are going for the scenery and not the characters, story or plot.

We pretty much DISagreed with that.  Keep in mind these are our opinions so you may certainly disagree with us.

The characterizations were good.  I personally have never cared for Nicole Kidman since most movies she is in have just been plan weird to me.  Nicole also doesn’t appear to be aging too well either.  And can’t the Hollywood types at least keep from shooting close-ups where you can’t see her contacts, which we noticed several times.

Story good and plot about the weakest and a standard movie fare—>unskilled women takes on the man’s world, has a group of helpers, task is impossible, but she pulls it off, finds love and it is all happily ever after.  Gee, sounds like the Wizard of Oz doesn’t it?

On the other hand Hugh Jackman is usually interesting and was here too.

The story was partly historical, parting love, partly war, your standard dastardly bad guys … a good mix.  And I checked a few facts about Australia during the war and I don’t think they were worried an awful lot about historical accuracy but hey, it’s a movie.

Now, the brightest part of the movie, Brandon Walters, the kid star.  Cute kid played it well.  He is native to Australia as are Nicole & Hugh.  You only have to watch about the first minute of the video below to see about him.

I recommend this one as hard as it is for me to believe that I would.  The previews weren’t all that bad either.

And no we didn’t see and don’t plan on seeing Keanu Reeves in the Day the Earth Stood Still for two reasons.  Keanu’s movies are usually junk, with two exceptions, both with Sandra Bullock and 2) the first DTESS was horrible back when I was a kid.

Eldest

Since this is the first book I have mentioned here you may be wondering why did I start with #2 in a series of supposedly five.  Well the main reason is that I read 1 and 2 when they first came out several years ago and need a refresher to catch up with #3 which came out several months ago before I move on to #3.

I thought these have been good reads.  Not perfect but good.  And yes, I have heard that they are mearly a ripoff of Star Wars, but hey, I liked those too so if they are similar, why not enjoy them again with a differnt face and slant.

I highly recommend reading the series, well at least 1 and 2 so far.  When I finish #3 in a few weeks, months or quarters I will give you a short blurb on that one too.

Also, if you saw the 2006, movie Eragon (the first of the series) don’t judge the book by the movie.  The movie was just fair and if not for the voice of Rachel Weizs and the acting of Jeremy Irons it wouldn’t have been that.

Give them a read and let me know what you think.

I vote

Quantum Of Solace

Well the new Bond movie, number 22 I believe, “Quantum Of Solace” was in my opinion, a good movie.

However, that being said it wasn’t the Bond that we are used to and neither was Daniel Craig’s first Bond flick, “Casino Royale”.  There were however, Ian Fleming’s original Bond.  The tongue-in-cheek, cavorting, jocular, witty Bonds of the past were started by my favorite, Sean Connery years ago. 

Being an avid reader from childhood I have read all of the original Bond books by Fleming and they were darker without the wit we became used to in the past.

One problem I had with the movie which most adventure movies are all starting to have is that all of the fight sequences are shot poorly.  They apparently use handheld cameras without stabilizers of any sort.  This means a jumpy, claustrophobic, too close in fight usually performed in a the dark place.  This means all you can hear are the punches of great sound effects but can’t really see who hit who, with what and if you could see it was out of focus, off center  and just plan sloppy.  I believe they film fight scenes this way today because we have already seen all of the cool moves the human body is able to give and take in the past so now they make it a mish-mash so you don’t have to watch another boring fight.

This was a good “real” Bond movie but not a very good pre-Craig Bond movie.  Maybe they should have just named it “Bob the Spy” and started a new; more serious series.