Kiss Me Deadly

Glenn will no doubt have a good comment to this post.

I'm a huge fan of film noir- in fact, I may have to claim that as my favorite genre. Kiss Me Deadly is among the finest, and is my favorite. Many of these movies involve the McGuffin, which is an object that is an integral part of the plot - usually something that the characters are trying to locate - and KMD has the mysterious box as its mcguffin. Yet by the end it is no longer a simple film noir about an amorous detective trying to locate a box- presumably for more selfish reasons- but becomes a bizarre almost sci-fi element with a great ending. The scene in which the detective is able to fist open the box only briefly is one of my favorite scenes in all of movies. I give it 89%.

To Kill a Mockingbird (film)

One of the most beautiful movies ever made. One of only two movies that can make me cry (Field of Dreams, cheesily enough, is the other). Everything about this movie is pure perfection. It's a movie that deserves to be adored and cherished. And it touches on some wonderful and touching and bittersweet themes of life. I give it 97%.

Fawlty Towers

The best sitcom ever made. Period. It surpassed every sitcom that came before it- and there are some great sitcoms from the 60s and 70s- and no sitcom afterwards has come close to touching it. The only complain I'd have is that it's only 12 episodes long, but I never get tired of them. I give it 99%.

The Big Lebowski

One of the greatest movies ever made. I'm serious when I say this- it's right up there with Citizen Cane and Casablanca and whatever. I've seen it countless times and I never cease to get a huge kick out of it and could watch it anytime. It has a wonderfully convoluted plot and some of the most memorable scenes and lines in any movie. It's perfect in every way I can think of. The most quotable movie ever. I give it the rare 100%.

Love

Love sucks. It's maddening and it's something that in the front of my mind I always want to avoid, but I get sicked in. It's the emotional version of the Mafia. I had been single for a while. Just when I thought I was out, it pulled me back in. And does time and time again. It's horrible and painful and destructive, and beautiful and wonderful. It makes life worth living and it makes life too painful to deal with. It's heartbreaking and heartfilling. It can make life feel as if it's not worth living and it can make life feel as if it is totally worth living. It is said to be the point of life and one of the most important experiences of humans; it also causes murders, mental diseases, bad music, bad movies, bad books, bad art in general, wars, depression...

Love: 50%

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (recent film)

I've always been a fan of the books. I even loved the old British TV series that they did based on the book. I was hesitant going in to the newer movie. But it is great. They certainly held true to many of Adams' ideas and themes. The movie was great and I loved it. It looks great, it's funny, it's touching, it touches on some important themes Adams' put forth in his books and whatnot. I'd give it 90%.

Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon

Any movie Matthau and Lemmon have done together is great. EXCEPT for Out to Sea. That was pretty godawful. But it still have some degree of watchability due to the fact that those two are in it. I could watch the original Odd Couple any time anywhere. Just a few that I can think of off the top of my head.

The Odd Couple: 95%
Grumpy Old Men: 80%
Grumpier Old Men: 75%
The Odd Couple II: 65%
Out to Sea: 30%

There's more that I can't think of now I'm sure.

Lost

In the realm of mythology-centered shows (Alias, The X-Files, even the Star Trek shows perhaps), Lost is the best. I've loved the show since the second season, but only after watching the 4th season so far have I decided that it may be the best mythology show ever. Well, it'd be neck and neck with The Prisoner (and the finale of The Prisoner certainly screws up that show for me). They changed the game in the 3rd season, and this new season has been fast paced and finally providing lots of answers. And the thing about Lost that makes it so much better, besides the amazing twists and great character studies and allegories, is the fact that you can feel that the writers know exactly how this whole thing will play out. I was an X-Files fan, but by the end, it was obvious that it was being made up as they went along. Lost: 90%

Sub Rosa

This is widely considered to be one of the top five worst Next Generation episodes of all. I have to say, it sucks, but it's got some ok parts. Jonathan Frakes directed it, and despite the fact that the two TNG movies he did sucked, his episodes were usually pretty good. The plot is that Dr. Crusher's grandmother dies, but then she falls in love with this ghost that apparently her whole family has loved since the 1600s. Turns out the ghost is an alien, though, and is kind of evil, although not really.

RATING: 41%

Orange Juice

Orange juice is pretty much the best drink in history. I like it with lots of pulp, because then it's like I'm drinking and eating an orange simultaneously. Maybe if I threw some chopped up steak into my milk that would make it better. What I want to know is whatever happened to Orange Julius? Those were great.

RATING: 92%

Homeward

This episode of Next Generation is good and also incredibly stupid. It is good because Michael Dorn gets to act a little differently and not be in his usual Worf Klingon makeup when he meets up with his step brother on a planet, and it is bad because it makes little to no sense. The plot is there is this dying primitive world that Worf's brother is observing. He summons the Enterprise to help, but they say no dice, we are not allowed to help because of the Prime Directive - but this is fucking ridiculous because the Prime Directive is just there to stop the Federation from messing up other cultures, it doesn't turn them into Marvel Comics' Watchers. Anyway, Worf's bro tricks the Enterprise into helping out and there's some interesting tension and a neat plot about the holodeck, so it's not all terrible.

RATING: 53%

Richard III

This movie is really boring. Basically it is the story of Richard III, Shakespeare's famous play about a big douchebag, but it is set in a fictional 1930s fascist England. Ian McKellan plays Richard III, so that is good, but Robert Downey Jr. and Anette Benning ruin the movie even worse than it's incredible blandness. Anyway, I should have found a way to teach Titus Andronicus in retrospect because this one didn't work out.

RATING: 36%

Doing One's Taxes

Ha ha, get it, because the IRS is mean and just wants our money? Just playing - I'm all for high taxes and government programs because I'm a socialist. On the 0ther hand, it's just a pain to organize my taxes and get all my forms together, and also this year I'm way late because one of my jobs ordered the wrong form and another one forgot to send me my W-2. Also, I should point out that come tax time I've never owed the government any additional money because I am poor.

RATING: 50%

Spider-Man/Wolverine

This team-up was a four issue limited series penned by Brett Matthews and drawn by a blind man apparently. The story is entirely mediocre, with some good jokes for Spider-man, which is all Spider-man really needs (see reasons why the first Spider-man movie wasn't that great). Anyway, it's way out of print, so I don't know why you would try to track it down because it doesn't make any sense (Nick Fury hires Spider-man to track down Wolverine for some reason) and isn't good.

RATING: 36%

this photo (or: shiny hot pants for adolescent boys)

This photo brings up an important point we have yet to address outright here at Reviews. How do you rate things that are completely awesome because of their utter badness? Like do I rate it low because there is something fundamentally WRONG about adolescent boys in shiny tight pants or do I rate it high because I can't stop looking at it. I'm going to go with high because God I love the way that one in the middle wears his shiny pants with such attitude.

Rating: 69%

Replicas by Tubeway Army

Everybody knows that Gary Numan (pretty much the sole creative force here - after this album he would just release under his own name) is a great pioneer for post-punk/industrial/goth/blah blah blah. Anyway, this album is a lot of fun and sort of sci-fi. A lot of the songs on it, probably because of the synthesizers used, remind me of the Doctor Who theme song. Well why not take a listen to some of the hits that you probably already know.

RATING: 71%

Marvel Zombies

Marvel Zombies, started in the pages of Ultimate Fantastic Four, imagines a world in which every super powered individual on Earth (well, I guess that's already an imagined world to begin with) has been transformed into a flesh eating zombie. They retain their personalities (except for the morality part), so they're not the mindless slugs of Romero's films. Anyway, the interior art is gorgeous, and Arthur Sudyam's zombification of famous Marvel covers is also a lot of fun. Robert Kirkman is the writer, and he is pretty capable when it comes to the Marvel Universe and/or zombies. So check it out I guess, it's got some great turns.

RATING: 67%

The Dana Carvey Show

I guess it's a big trip back to like 10th grade or something here, because now I'm reviewing this show that aired in its entirety (8 episodes) back in 1996 and then was canceled. Anyway, I thought at the time that this show was hilarious, but I was 15, and other than brief clips here and there on youtube I haven't seen full episodes until the whole show was recently put online at hulu.com. The opening monologues Dana Carvey does are pretty painful, but with a writing staff that included Charlie Kaufman and Louis CK, and a cast that included, in addition to Carvey, Steve Carell and Stephen Colbert, the show is pretty consistently hysterical. I guess it just wasn't prime time material or something.

RATING: 81%

Astro Creep 2000 by White Zombie

In high school my friends and I all used to love listening to Supersexy Swingin' Sounds, the remix album for Astro-Creep 2000. We listened to it a lot, especially whenever anybody got a new stereo or speaker in their car, because there was a really clean bass drop in the More Human Than Human remix (which reminds me of the time my friend Striebel put a 15 inch speaker in the back of his barely functioning Renault, which was pretty hilarious). So basically when I bought this album last year it was like I was buying a remix album to the remix album, since I was most familiar with all the remixes if that makes any sense. White Zombie seems like the perfect band for me, because they are obsessed with bad old horror movies and constantly sample and quote them in their songs, and this album is pretty great for all of that and then they broke up. Some songs you can find on youtube if you'd like to check them out include More Human Than Human, Super Charger Heaven, and Electric Head Pt. 2 (The Ecstasy).

RATING: 80%

Ben & Jerry's Peach Cobbler

Ben & Jerrys was two for $7 this week at Key Foods here in Brooklyn so of course I bought two. Therefore, everyone gets the treat of two ice cream reviews from me this week. (And I do love how lately tons of our reviews have been of junk food.) While this flavor is in a different taste realm from the Cheesecake Brownie, I also really like this one. Given, I do have a very bias opinion since I love peach flavored foods (must be the Southern girl in me), but I think this is a really innovative ice cream flavor. It's made up of a sort of peachy vanilla-y base with pockets of peach compote and pie crust bits. And there's a subtle cinnamon flavor, especially in the pie crust bits. So yeah, it's really delicious. Thanks Willie Nelson! I always knew he was awesome.

Rating: 85%

Fresca

As you might expect from somebody who loves grapefruit so much, I also like grapefruit flavored soda. And by that I mean Fresca, since it's the only grapefruit flavored soda there is in the United States. It's tart and has zero calories so you might as well drink it unless you don't want brain cancer since it does have exactly one buttload of aspartame in it.

RATING: 80%

(I'm clearly in a good mood, handing out all these high scores tonight)

The Low End Theory by A Tribe Called Quest

Look, nobody thinks this album is bad and that's because it is fucking great. The beats are solid (great use of the stand up bass), the rhymes are amazing (especially on What?, my favorite track, although there's no youtube video to link unfortunately) and for a rap group the songs are a surprisingly manageable length. My only complaint is I bought this off of amazon and half of the tracks are censored, whereas the other half are not censored at all. It makes no sense, and the same thing happened when I bought a Pharoahe Monch album off amazon too, so that place sucks. Anyway, everybody knows and loves Scenario, but other available videos on youtube include Check The Rhime and Jazz.

RATING: 85%

Black Jellybeans

I have never met anybody who just likes black jellybeans, only those who hate them (probably most of you) and those who love them (me, so fork 'em over). The reason behind this is probably because if you only just liked them ok back when you were a kid, everybody who hated them probably unloaded them on you whenever they were eating jellybeans. So because you got more jellybeans as a result of everybody else's distaste, you grew to like them more. As for those of you who hate them, your loss motherfuckers.

RATING: 81%

Calenture by Kent Shaw

I have to be honest and admit that this book is by a friend of mine, so I would feel a little weird giving it a percentage rating. But I am being totally honest when I say that it is a fantastic book of poetry and you should buy it now. I have read few books more like an intricately woven map in which landscape, faith, and love are dissected through phrasal leitmotifs in a way that is completely satisfying, natural, and moving. Cities jut against fields against vast bodies of water in this book, manipulated by a speaker who is internally wrestling with faith and attempting to turn that struggle into something representatively external. Only the vast can deal with such metaphysical concerns, but rather than losing control of the environment created, he deftly controls it and allows us to exist within it which is great and I'm out of sentences so buy it like I said.

RATING: N/A

Pinkerton by Weezer

When this came out when I was in high school I totally hated it. For some reason, despite the fact that Sonic Youth was (and still is) my favorite band, I considered the sound of this Weezer album to be too rough. Over time though it has really grown on me, and I might even like it as much as the blue album, but definitely not more than. My favorite tracks are probably Why Bother?, Pink Triangle, and Tired of Sex.

RATING: 78%

Ben & Jerry's One Cheesecake Brownie

Now this is some seriously amazing ice cream. It's basically ice cream cheesecake with brownie chunks in it, and I am actually considering making this my new favorite flavor (it would replace Edy's Peanut Butter Cup) because it was so damn good I want to cry. So yeah, if you like cheesecake and brownies you should get yourself some of this.

Rating: 86%

Clerks: The Comic Books

Clearly I am just going through all my old comic books in little order. This book is a collection of three one shots starring Dante and Randall from Clerks. It's not particularly good, and I can really hear the bad acting of all the dialog Keven Smith writes. Thumbs down. Also, I thought dialog was spelled dialogue, but clearly I am wrong.

RATING: 29%

Pears

I really like pears, although I don't know if I can say I like them as much as apples because they lack the versatility. Anyway, when I was a kid I was often forced to pick apples for some reason, and every apple orchard had like one or two pear trees. I always wanted to pick and eat the pears, because that was like a rare treat, but instead I had to pick and not even think about eating a bunch of apples. At least it wasn't as bad as picking strawberries.

RATING: 75%

My new governor

As most of you who don't live in caves probably already know, we have a new governor here in NY. I for one, love this guy. Wife cheating aside (and any of you who have ever read my blog know how I feel about cheating), I still really like this guy. He seems to really have his shit together, I loved his joke about the lobbyists the other week, and despite Larry Wilmore's claims that the blindness doesn't count, you have to love a diversity twofer. I mean, this whole Spitzer hookerbangin thing really would have pissed ppl off a lot more if we hadn't gotten this great new gov out of the deal. For example, can you imagine how pissed we would all be if Bush was caught hookerbangin and then Cheney took over?

Rating: 75%

Stuff White People Like

As much as it pains me that some other person's blog gets a billion more hits than me, it's still pretty hilarious and accurate, although it seems as though it should be called "Stuff Yuppies Like."

Stuff White People Like

RATING: 82%

Superunknown by Soundgarden

I used to have a really tough time getting through this album, because I thought it got boring after track 11 or so (there are 15 tracks, which is kind of a lot). But as the years have gone by, I find I like the slower later tracks more and more. The faster songs are still what I find most appealing, but probably by the time I'm 50 I'll think 4th of July is my favorite song. Anyway, it's a great album from a great couple of years of grunge and then unfortunately it tried to keep going for 8 more years. (PS - the 4th of July video is just some dude's homemade thing, so you don't need to watch it if you don't want to).

RATING: 71%