Am I missing something?
This blog will address anything culture-related, from movies and video games to attitudes and trends. If you'd like to see us address a topic, a TV show — whatever — let me know by e-mailing mcuppett@prerogativemagazine.com.
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
best picture
I've put up our first poll at the Prerogative website (scroll down a bit; it's on the right). The question is this: Which of 2006's top grossing films is the best? A few of my favorites from the year are in there. I would ultimately choose "Pirates of the Caribbean" or "Casino Royale," though I'd like to rewatch a few to be sure. It reminds me that I'm considering a "my favorite films of 2006" list, which is easier now that I've caught a few more on DVD. Lots of the critical favorites — "The Queen," "Children of Men," "Pan's Labyrinth," etc. — have yet to become available via theater or Blockbuster, so I may end up having to revise the list.
What do you think makes a movie worthy of accolades? Is it enough to be entertaining, or do you look for something with a message? Are you most interested in the artistic and creative quality, the actors, the story? Or everything?
What do you think makes a movie worthy of accolades? Is it enough to be entertaining, or do you look for something with a message? Are you most interested in the artistic and creative quality, the actors, the story? Or everything?
Monday, February 26, 2007
to the faithful undeparted
Sorry about the unexplained hiatus. I was on vacation last week and had planned to still write a few entries here, but as we can all see that didn't happen.
During my vacation I did manage to watch a few Oscar-nominated films, so I'd have at least an inkling of an idea about who/what should win in a few categories. I was really happy "Marie Antionette" got the costume Oscar; I think the costumes were referred to as "eye candy," which really is a good description. The whole movie had a kick to it from the colorful clothes and music you wouldn't expect.
If Martin Scorcese hadn't won last night, I think I would've left the Oscars telecast with the image of King Al Gore looming in my mind as the man of the hour (or, as it were, 3 hours and 45 minutes). Hollywood LOVES Al Gore. Today, while looking through some potential stories for the newspaper's lifestyles pages, I kept happening upon the phrase "go green." I opted not to rent "An Inconvenient Truth" during vacation but maybe will get to it sometime.
I'm a little surprised at myself for staying up to watch the entire Oscars show. I'd actually seen the three front-runners for Best Picture — "Babel," "The Departed" and "Little Miss Sunshine" — and since none were obvious winners (unlike Helen Mirren) I was definitely curious to see who'd win. I don't know if I've ever seen that many Best Picture nominees for one year. I think "The Departed" was the best choice, even with all the shooting and the words we won't use in this blog (or elsewhere) and the more shooting, particularly in the head.
I generally liked the non-awards parts of the show, from the "nominees" video at the beginning to the shadow people morhping into symbols of movies to the random and funny Will Ferrell-John C. Reilly-Jack Black musical number. I say cut most of the montages and give presenters a much shorter walk to the microphone/podium. And what's the deal with starting at 8:30 p.m.? Meanwhile, doesn't Helen Mirren have really pretty hair? I haven't seen "The Queen" yet, so for now I'll just be impressed with the (real-life) hair. Also, for a man who makes such harsh, violent, profanity-laced films, isn't Martin Scorcese such a cutie? I wanted to squeeze him.
Oh, and one more thing: this Oscars was notable for being so diverse, and for being the one when Scorcese finally won, etc. Something else I noticed was that a handful of winners mentioned God in their acceptance speeches, among them Forrest Whittaker and Jennifer Hudson, who really said it when she opened with something along the lines of, "Look what God can do." Am I just imagining that there was a time when this was less common, within the past few years? And did any non-black winners thank God or ask him to bless the crowd?
During my vacation I did manage to watch a few Oscar-nominated films, so I'd have at least an inkling of an idea about who/what should win in a few categories. I was really happy "Marie Antionette" got the costume Oscar; I think the costumes were referred to as "eye candy," which really is a good description. The whole movie had a kick to it from the colorful clothes and music you wouldn't expect.
If Martin Scorcese hadn't won last night, I think I would've left the Oscars telecast with the image of King Al Gore looming in my mind as the man of the hour (or, as it were, 3 hours and 45 minutes). Hollywood LOVES Al Gore. Today, while looking through some potential stories for the newspaper's lifestyles pages, I kept happening upon the phrase "go green." I opted not to rent "An Inconvenient Truth" during vacation but maybe will get to it sometime.
I'm a little surprised at myself for staying up to watch the entire Oscars show. I'd actually seen the three front-runners for Best Picture — "Babel," "The Departed" and "Little Miss Sunshine" — and since none were obvious winners (unlike Helen Mirren) I was definitely curious to see who'd win. I don't know if I've ever seen that many Best Picture nominees for one year. I think "The Departed" was the best choice, even with all the shooting and the words we won't use in this blog (or elsewhere) and the more shooting, particularly in the head.
I generally liked the non-awards parts of the show, from the "nominees" video at the beginning to the shadow people morhping into symbols of movies to the random and funny Will Ferrell-John C. Reilly-Jack Black musical number. I say cut most of the montages and give presenters a much shorter walk to the microphone/podium. And what's the deal with starting at 8:30 p.m.? Meanwhile, doesn't Helen Mirren have really pretty hair? I haven't seen "The Queen" yet, so for now I'll just be impressed with the (real-life) hair. Also, for a man who makes such harsh, violent, profanity-laced films, isn't Martin Scorcese such a cutie? I wanted to squeeze him.
Oh, and one more thing: this Oscars was notable for being so diverse, and for being the one when Scorcese finally won, etc. Something else I noticed was that a handful of winners mentioned God in their acceptance speeches, among them Forrest Whittaker and Jennifer Hudson, who really said it when she opened with something along the lines of, "Look what God can do." Am I just imagining that there was a time when this was less common, within the past few years? And did any non-black winners thank God or ask him to bless the crowd?
Sunday, February 11, 2007
grammys 101
Prerogative correspondent Anna Marie Fuda won a contest to attend the Grammys, which air tonight. Her name was put in a drawing after she correctly answered this question: In what category did Frank Sinatra win his first Grammy? The answer is something like Best Recording Package or, according to Wikipedia, Best Album Cover (which the category was once called).
Best Recording Package is a category today — one of a snappy 108 this year.
Even better-known Grammy categories don't stand out as well as Best Picture, Best Director or Best Supporting Actor. For example: Who again is up for Record of the Year, not to be confused with Album of the Year (albums are what some old-fashioned folks still might refer to as "records," which in the case of Record of the Year actually refers to what laypeople call "songs")? And don't forget Song of the Year. Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group With Vocal is another you might see tonight (if you're planning to watch the broadcast on CBS), as well as Best Pop Vocal Album and Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album. The Grammys break up music according to many genres -- going much farther than the Oscars or even Emmys, which does break nominees up according to drama or comedy (leaving combo-shows like "Monk" and "Ally McBeal" in a tiny bit of a pickle). I could make a case here for not limiting nominations for bands like, say, The White Stripes (full closure: The White Stripes may be my official favorite band) to genre-related categories while music groups of greater radio pull but arguably less innovation or quality get nominated for major awards.
Rather than arguing that being popular doesn't make you award-worthy (and also doesn't mean you don't deserve a nomination, either), I'm going to go with a list of some of the categories that I'm guessing won't be getting as much press coverage in mainstream stories:
• Best Polka Album
• Best Album Notes
• Best Historical Album
• Best Hawaiian Album
• Best Surround Sound Album
• Best Classical Crossover Album
• Best Country Instrumental Performance
• Best Tejano Album
• Best Norteo Album
• Best Banda Album
• Best Native American Music Album
• Best Spoken Word Album (Includes Poetry, Audio Books & Story Telling)
• Best Boxed Or Special Limited Edition Package
• Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical
• Best Engineered Album, Classical
• Best Orchestral Performance
I wonder how the categories are chosen. Who decides what to include? Is that based a lot on what's popular? It looks like they also want to honor people from various facets of the music production, from engineers to art designers. That strikes me as pretty cool.
Lionel Richie isn't the only old-schooler to be nominated this year. I for one didn't know these folks had anything new out this past year, unless I've forgotten:
• Enya
• Bruce Hornsby
• Peter Frampton
• Pet Shop Boys
• The Temptations
For a complete list of categories, visit this page.
Friday, February 9, 2007
love stories
Over at Entertainment Weekly's website, staff members have shared their picks for movies to watch for Valentine's Day. Among the 20 choices are "Lady and the Tramp," "Pride and Prejudice" (the one with Keira Knightley), "Heathers" and "The Incredible Mr. Limpet." Getting into the spirit, I've decided to compile a list of my own (limiting the choices to more standard romance fare), in no order:
1. "Pride and Prejudice" (BBC version)
2. "Sense and Sensibility" (the one with Emma Thompson)
3. "Emma" (with Gwyneth Paltrow and, more importantly, Jeremy Northam as Mr. Knightley)
4. "Never Been Kissed"
5. "While You Were Sleeping"
6. "Much Ado About Nothing"
7. "Just Like Heaven"
8. "The Princess Bride"
9. "Serendipity"
Coming up with a list is harder than I thought. Lots of films are likable at about the same level, like "Just Like Heaven" and "Serendipity," and movies like "Sleepless in Seattle" and "You've Got Mail." Some I've sort of burned out on. But the tops for me are the British ones. My ultimate list would be:
1. "Pride and Prejudice" (BBC version)
2. "Sense and Sensibility" (the one with Emma Thompson)
3. "Emma" (Jeremy Northam as Mr. Knightley!!)
4. "Much Ado About Nothing"
5. "The Princess Bride"
None of these are exclusively about the romance, though. They're also about tone and mood and, sometimes, being really funny.
What are your picks?
1. "Pride and Prejudice" (BBC version)
2. "Sense and Sensibility" (the one with Emma Thompson)
3. "Emma" (with Gwyneth Paltrow and, more importantly, Jeremy Northam as Mr. Knightley)
4. "Never Been Kissed"
5. "While You Were Sleeping"
6. "Much Ado About Nothing"
7. "Just Like Heaven"
8. "The Princess Bride"
9. "Serendipity"
Coming up with a list is harder than I thought. Lots of films are likable at about the same level, like "Just Like Heaven" and "Serendipity," and movies like "Sleepless in Seattle" and "You've Got Mail." Some I've sort of burned out on. But the tops for me are the British ones. My ultimate list would be:
1. "Pride and Prejudice" (BBC version)
2. "Sense and Sensibility" (the one with Emma Thompson)
3. "Emma" (Jeremy Northam as Mr. Knightley!!)
4. "Much Ado About Nothing"
5. "The Princess Bride"
None of these are exclusively about the romance, though. They're also about tone and mood and, sometimes, being really funny.
What are your picks?
Monday, February 5, 2007
30 seconds of fame
Even if you sit and watch the entire Super Bowl, you still manage to miss a commercial or two. I didn't see everything, but my favorite among the many competent entries was the mischievous Robert Goulet, mostly because of the unexpected notion that "some say Robert Goulet appears, and messes with your stuff." Which no one says, because the idea that Robert Goulet is like a gremlin who sneaks in and knocks files to the floor is absurd and therefore hilarious.
I also liked the Kevin Federline Nationwide commercial. The familiar tag line "Life comes at you fast" appearing with an image of K-Fed working the fries at a fast food restaurant (following the hyped-up music video that presents an image of Britney's ex that the nation never bought) was a fun moment. This ad is the only 30 seconds of Federline fame I wouldn't mind reliving.
My favorite commercial that I didn't see until today online is E*Trade's "one finger" spot.
You can watch many of the Super Bowl ads at this YouTube page. This site offers lots of links to stories about the ads, such as a rundown of the best and worst ads according to one woman, and an article taking a different angle on the topic — how brain scans reveal that the ads this year failed to connect with viewers and even scared them. Interesting.
I also liked the Kevin Federline Nationwide commercial. The familiar tag line "Life comes at you fast" appearing with an image of K-Fed working the fries at a fast food restaurant (following the hyped-up music video that presents an image of Britney's ex that the nation never bought) was a fun moment. This ad is the only 30 seconds of Federline fame I wouldn't mind reliving.
My favorite commercial that I didn't see until today online is E*Trade's "one finger" spot.
You can watch many of the Super Bowl ads at this YouTube page. This site offers lots of links to stories about the ads, such as a rundown of the best and worst ads according to one woman, and an article taking a different angle on the topic — how brain scans reveal that the ads this year failed to connect with viewers and even scared them. Interesting.
Friday, February 2, 2007
a sixth sense about these things
The Colts will win Sunday, say the experts in the 18th annual Scripps Howard Celebrity Super Bowl Poll. I wonder how these folks are chosen? In any case, I think it's pretty impressive that Haley Joel Osment has picked the winners correctly for the past seven Super Bowls.
get lost, already
Wednesday after Wednesday, I've had to recall again what the date is and whether it's time yet for "Lost" to return. I am happy to welcome it back next week. I don't mind that more questions hang in the air than I can remember to ask. I hope they do get to set an end date so the writers can have some guidance about when to wrap up all the mysteries I've forgotten about as more have been piled on.
In the spirit of unveiling mysteries, here are a couple places you might find helpful should you seek hints about what's to come: Is it goodbye to Haywire on "Prison Break"? Is Matt going to shoot Claire on "Heroes"? Learn the scoop on upcoming episodes of popular TV shows at Spoilerfix and TV Guide's Ask Ausiello.
In the spirit of unveiling mysteries, here are a couple places you might find helpful should you seek hints about what's to come: Is it goodbye to Haywire on "Prison Break"? Is Matt going to shoot Claire on "Heroes"? Learn the scoop on upcoming episodes of popular TV shows at Spoilerfix and TV Guide's Ask Ausiello.
Thursday, February 1, 2007
tuning in
Today on the way to work I got to thinking about TV show theme songs. Two I've recently discovered (both for shows I've only seen regularly during this TV season, though they've been on longer than that) are "California" by Phantom Planet ("The O.C.") and "We Used to be Friends" by The Dandy Warhols ("Veronica Mars"). These are two songs I can imagine liking far after the shows disappear, which will actually be the end of the month for "The O.C." "California" in particular is pretty fun to sing along to in the car.
Back in college, two TV theme songs that rode a high, fast wave of popularity were "I'll be There for You" by The Rembrandts, from "Friends," and the Bodeans' "Closer to Free" from "Party of Five." These two were marred a bit by the popularity of the shows — especially "I'll be There for You." It's hard to think of the song apart from the opening credits. Clap-clap-clap-clap.
Not every memorable theme song is a pop song, of course. The Joss Whedon trio of shows — "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," "Angel," and "Firefly" — have songs that really fit the mood of their shows well, and I like hearing "Buffy's" and "Firefly's" when I get a chance. Other songs aren't necessarily ones I'd listen to apart from the show, but they serve their mood-setting purpose well: "X-Files," "Medium," "The Office." Still other shows benefit from the lack of a theme song: "Lost," "Heroes."
Among all the likable and well-chosen songs, of course, some mediocre ones slip through. I'm not so fond of those from "Gilmore Girls" and, topping the list, "7th Heaven."
What do you think? What are your favorites, or least favorites? Have you ever bought a soundtrack to get a show's theme song, or downloaded one from iTunes?
Back in college, two TV theme songs that rode a high, fast wave of popularity were "I'll be There for You" by The Rembrandts, from "Friends," and the Bodeans' "Closer to Free" from "Party of Five." These two were marred a bit by the popularity of the shows — especially "I'll be There for You." It's hard to think of the song apart from the opening credits. Clap-clap-clap-clap.
Not every memorable theme song is a pop song, of course. The Joss Whedon trio of shows — "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," "Angel," and "Firefly" — have songs that really fit the mood of their shows well, and I like hearing "Buffy's" and "Firefly's" when I get a chance. Other songs aren't necessarily ones I'd listen to apart from the show, but they serve their mood-setting purpose well: "X-Files," "Medium," "The Office." Still other shows benefit from the lack of a theme song: "Lost," "Heroes."
Among all the likable and well-chosen songs, of course, some mediocre ones slip through. I'm not so fond of those from "Gilmore Girls" and, topping the list, "7th Heaven."
What do you think? What are your favorites, or least favorites? Have you ever bought a soundtrack to get a show's theme song, or downloaded one from iTunes?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
