Doug's Sounding Board

I think I’m going to consolidate my movie posts to Tuesday.

Nacho Libre – Nachooooooooooooooooooo! It’s fun. It’s rediculous. It seems like it wanders aimlessly from time to time like every idea was thrown in and not enough of them were taken out again, but I don’t care. It was fun!

Scary Movie 3 – The first of the Zucker style Scary Movie movies. Why aren’t the Wayans brothers on this anymore? Their versions tend to push a little more while the Zuckers fall into their groove. Their groove is still funny, but I liked the change. If you like Airplane/Naked Gun style humor you’ll like this. It’s not as consistently funny as those and I think that could have been helped a great deeal by losing the 8-Mile parody. That was just boring.

If the dryer’s heat is working but things aren’t getting dry it’s because exhaust air isn’t working. I knew that already. That’s bad because it can start fires, but that didn’t happen here and I knew that too. The likely culprit was the flex hose (knew that) but amazingly there was very little in there.

The problem was the vent opening on the outside of the house. It has a screen inside of a mesh just small enought oprevent a bee from gaining entry and just small enough apparently to gather up enuogh lint over time to become completely blocked. More likely is that lint formed little clumps over time that were then caught up and blown to the screen where they got stuck. Anyway, some cutting pliers to remove the screen fixed the problem. I’m not really worried about critters getting in there. Hopefully I don’t regret saying that.

Waiting… – This movie wanted to be Clerks, it even says so in the credits. It has the same problem for me that Road Trip had. The characters themselves were fun but their interaction fell flat. There were a few good scenes but mostly it was a lot of not caring.

Wallace & Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit – This is now my second favorite Wallace & Gromit after The Wrong Trousers. I loved all the small visual jokes, and that the rabbits say “whee!” a lot, and the general silliness. Definitely one to check out if you haven’t yet.

They weren’t forgettable, I was just forgetful.

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe – This goes high on the list of good adaptations of books to movies. The look was great, the characters came out very well, and nothing was left out. One thing I would have added was a little more of Edmund being a snot and being a slave to the Turkish Delight. It wouldn’t even take much more film… a line or two to try and convince them to head towards the witch’s palace, some more agitation shown in the beaver’s den, some complaining to himself and saying how he’s going to get some more Turkish Delight when he gets to the witch.

Keeping Up With The Steins – A Bar Mitzvah comedy movie! I think it’s good for people who haven’t been through one as well since Nicole liked it, but if you were there you’ll enjoy it more.

I’d have it play the music from Frogger.

The Break Up – An unromantic darkish comedy that I think works fairly well. I bought the relationship as feeling real which is what lets this work. It’s also the only film I’ve liked Jennifer Aniston in.

The Omen (the original) – I haven’t seen the new one yet, but I wanted to refresh on the old one first. It was the first time I had seen it in widescreen and it’s very wide screen. The cinematography felt like a more modern film and it still manages to be a good creepy film.

Horatio’s Drive: America’s First Road Trip – The is a cool documentary about the automobile drive across the country. 1903, no coast to coast roads (let alone paved), and cars averaged 20 miles before a breakdown. It seems like a fantastic and nightmare trip all at once.

Over the Hedge – This was a fun movie overall. There was never a moment that I felt was dragging, but the finale made the earlier parts seem not as good. Like there wasn’t a steady building but more of a slow up hill with the end being a huge increase in slope.

Watermarks – Another documentary about the women’s swim team at the Hakoah sports club in Austria before and through Hitler’s takeover. A lot of it focused on reuniting the remaining members that are still alive and I think it would have been better with less of their daily lives.

It’s the new Weird Al song, but it’s not going to be on the next album (which will appear some time this year). You can get it at this mirror or just go to weirdal.com.

I know you’re all wondering what’s for dessert. Hello Dolly Cake is the answer.

“Crimes Against Nature: How George W. Bush and His Corporate Pals Are Plundering the Country and Hijacking Our Democracy” is the full title and it’s the best non-fiction book I’ve read in a long time. Though at times it seems like conspiracy theory ramblings. I’m aware of a lot of environmental problems over the years, moves by the religious right, corporate influence in government, this book details that and more and then connects the dots to show that it’s all the same problem. The main focus is on the environment, but it also hits on national security, the myth of the liberal media, and how Gorge W. Bush got elected. All of the sources to back it up are cited. I say check it out.

I brought in a set of magnetic poetry to work since it wouldn’t work on the new stainless steel fridge at home. It looked like a few people made use of it before it disappeared today. My guess is that the poems turned naughty as can happen and someone complained. I saw a few that were starting to lean in that direction but they didn’t really seem bad so I guess some finally leaned too far.