And that’s why they pay off the peasants

Capitalism: A Love Story

I finished up watching Capitalism: A Love Story last night.  It is a decent flick,  assuming you consider Michael Moore movies good.  I dislike the man, but I love his work.   He is too far into a socialist philosophy for me,  but his tactics and hatred for the bullshit that is the Government of the USA and major corporations is right on mark.

The movie is flawed, like all of his movies.  It lies, it simplifies and it is a work of propaganda.  He takes on Wal-Mart for using peasant insurance and does not include the fact that they quit the practice in the early 2000′s, before this movie was made.  I think it illustrated the point wonderfully though.  Many people that see the movie cannot identify with a family or person that sits in an office all day,  but most people know someone that has worked for a Wal-Mart or similar store.

The thing this movie did best though was to place the blame on both sides of the Two Party Dictatorship.  It showed how both sides are owned by the banks and corporations.  This was the part of the movie that should have been expanded.  There are few things in the world that interest and depress me as much as this.  How the fuck did we get to this point?  We have a government lead by corporations and foreign powers.  Fuck William Gibson for being right.

There is one quote from the movie I really liked,  and I hope to get it right.  When talking about the backlash of the bailout money,  “.. when it gets to the point where all people have to do it protest, that’s called revolution.”  I think that is the key and that is what the money in this nation fears.  I also think that is why checks were written to the people and  benefits keep getting extended.  I just hope people are not fooled for much longer.  (Wait.. maybe that song by the Who means something)

James Cameron is full of shit

I just read this blurb on yahoo!  It is about Fox wanting some of the Tree Hugging out of Avatar.  I cannot blame them,  it was a bit over the top at points (like from the 2 minute mark to the 3.5 hour mark or how ever fucking long that movie was).

Anyway I will not get into the self righteous bullshit Cameron says,  but there is one part that struck me as funny.

James Cameron’s environmental concerns can be attributed to being a parent of three young children and the fact he would like them to have a world to grow up in. “I think there’s a way to live and raise your kids with a set of values that teaches them the importance of hard work, the importance of respecting other people and the importance of respecting nature. And that it’s not this consumer society where you buy something and then throw it away when you get the next new thing, filling up huge landfills with plastic and electronics.”

Filling up landfills with plastic and electronics… how many copies of Terminator and his other movies are in landfills?  That is his past though,  I am sure he has learned his lesson and is going to keep plastic and other crap with a limited lifespan out of landfills.

Avatar Toy

This toy and it’s box were, I am sure,  made from recycled materials in a factory that is as green as Kermit The Frog.  I am also sure they were not made and shipped to the US in huge fossil fuel burning ships.  Furthermore I assume they were made to never break so that kids would not need to throw them away.  I looked and could not find anything about them being anything other than typical toys online.  I will check the store the next time I am there,  but I do not expect to be surprised.

I am also sure Avatar will only be made available as a digital download, and not on DVD, Blu-Ray or any other plastic format that will end up in the landfill at some point.  But they are already talking about cut scenes and things on those formats, so dammit I guess those will one day ruin the planet also.

Cameron needs money.  His kids need ponies and I am sure his 20 ex wives take a good bit of income away from him.

I really can’t figure out Transformers Reviews

Stories like this perplex me: http://movies.yahoo.com/feature/smg-transformers-10-questions.html

This is a list of the top ten flaws (as the writer sees it) of Transformers:Revenge of the Fallen.  I cannot say the guy is out of line on most of these flaws.  Each one is either 100% correct or correct enough that you have to get geeky to explain it away.  The problem with stories and reviews like this are they are calling people stupid.

This article basically plays off calling people stupid by doing the old, “What do I know, people gave it a B plus?”  You spent half a page taking a shit on the movie and then go on to say,  you must be wrong because other people like it.  What you are saying is “I just called all of you fucking morons for not noticing these flaws and I think this movie is pure shit, but I am going to say I am wrong even though I just said you were wrong.”  To me the idea of a list like this for anyone other than a blogger is lazy writing, it is filler because he had nothing to write today and needed a word count to get paid.

These type reviews (I know it is more a bitch session than review) almost always say “Now I can get into suspension of disbelief.. blah blah blah.”  No you can’t.  If you can than you can accept the ten things in your own list.  Except for the end of the movie when I had to piss I was into this movie without a thought of  anything else.  I just went along for a fun ride.  This fucker went into the movie thinking “This is going to suck and I am going to not like it”, and he looked for things to dislike.  Fine, post it on your personal blog,  god knows I bitch about things I hate here,  but if I was writing for Yahoo or some other place I would like to think I would be a bit more objective.

I admit, I used to go to movies thinking “This is going to suck, I will hate it.”   Usually I ended up hating it,  now I watch movies with blinders on.  I try and go in with as little knowledge as possible, watch it and not expect to like or dislike it before seeing it.  Certain exceptions exist.  GI JOE I think will be a shitty movie, but I also expect to like it a lot.

Anyway, back to why Transformers is getting bad reviews.  The critics were not not supposed to like the first one, so when it came to the sequel they had to pan it.  “I mean it is Micheal Bay for gods sake, he sucks right?  And this is just a fluff action movie that will make money anyway,  lets trash the fucker. ”

Oh and I am also guessing the genius that wrote this list also thought “The Sixith Sense” had an amazing secret at the end.

The stuff of the weekend

This past weekend went well.  I am forced to take a day of vacation each week in June.  I find that I can get a lot done in three days.  Most of it it is the common weekend things like yard work and contract work but this weekend had some fun things also.

Friday night we rocked the horror movie marathon in my living room.  We watched a Masters of Horror short, then on to the great Return of the Living Dead followed by the fun Eight Legged Freaks.  The most interesting thing to me was a young Scarlett Johanson in Eight Legged Freaks.  It was a good night and we also ate some expensive but good pizza.  The only thing that made the day better was finding a nice bowling shirt, for those nights when I want to dress all retro hip like.

Sunday Melissa and I headed out the a farm in Knightdale for a shindig a caterer she uses for work was throwing.  Green Planet Catering was the host with the most.  The idea behind their services is they try and use local, organic produce (they have their own farm now, which they were showing off on sunday) and they try to leave as little impact on the environment as possible.  They use biodegradable (made from corn) silverware and cups,  they recycle and all of that good crap.  It is a great idea, the food was very good and I had a great time.  If you need something catered give them a call and give them your business.  They also served Big Boss beer, which is good,  if you are in Raleigh check out Big Boss beers, they have some goodness to them.

I also have to heap praise on Californication, the showtime series.  Some of the best writing I have seen/heard in a long time.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture was better than Star Trek

Well it was if you wanted to take a nap.

Star Trek delivered in a big way.  It has everything that is Star Trek plus it was updated with some decent music and fresh ideas on the same themes.  You cannot have Star Trek without time travel.  I have no fucking clue why this is,  but you have to have it in a Star Trek movie.  This one used it as a minor plot point and it was not explored to the gills like the other movies.  No Butterfly Effect type explanations,  they actually make a bit of a joke about it towards the end.

The cast was great.  No one was miscast.  Simon Pegg is fucking brilliant as Scotty.  I like Pegg, I like Scotty, so to me it was like watching some mutant super Scotty.  Really I don’t many other peoples names from the movie and I am too lazy to look them up, so I will refer to them by screenname.  Kirk was good, full on cocky without Shatner-esque overacting and need to be the only hero.  Sulu was great, although he came closest to being miscast as I really do see him as Harold before all else.  Chekov was good, as was Uhra(sp?).  No one was bad, no one except Pegg was great though.  In a movie like this, it is probably a good thing.

Minor annoyances?  Just google “Star Trek Lens Flare” and you will find links to this annoyance.  I will wait… ok back?  Good.  You see it was used just a bit too much,  there is no sense in justifiying it or discussing it.  It was just used too much.  My only other annoyance was the need to get girls into their undies,  the scene was there only for the undies.  They looked fine half naked,  and while I like girls in undies and less, in movies I like it to make sense.  We knew Kirk was a womanizer,  no need to show us this outright.