Quick Review: Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

This is probably one of those movies that younger audiences will get, while the elders who dare to go might sit there scratching their heads. I think "Kick-Ass" had a similar problem, which is part of the reason it didn't do as well at the box office as some thought. And the same thing has happened to "Scott Pilgrim vs. the World," which is, like "Kick-Ass," based on a graphic novel series. Fortunately, as I am sometimes (but not always) more able to adapt to the ways of the youth than other cranky 48-year-olds, I rolled with it. It was like watching a cartoon, a video game, an action flick, a comedy and a romance all rolled up into one. Scott (Michael Cera) is the slacker 23-year-old bass player for the band "Sex Bob-omb" and, while he's all Michael Cera-y with that soft voice and gawky boyishness, he's also kind of a cad. An ex-girlfriend is the band's drummer, and he's currently dating a 17-year-old girl, and then starts cheating on her when he meets, and falls for, Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead). Then Scott learns that Ramona has seven evil exes -- among them, movie heroes Chris "Human Torch" Evans and Brandon "Superman" Routh -- and that he must defeat them in battle in order for Ramona to keep dating him. Throughout the movie, but particularly in the fight scenes, there's a variety of graphic additions on-screen, from little pop-up notes about characters to TV-Batman "K-POW!" blasts during the fight scenes, to video game graphics and sound effects. It's funny and moves quickly, although there's a bit of a lack of logic now and then that even I can't completely overlook. And then there's the fine performance by Kieran Culkin as Wallace Wells, Scott's sarcastic (and gay) friend and roommate -- Wallace may be the funniest part of the movie. He's not the typical gay best friend by any means. He's a much more fully-formed character, and he has a love life. Which is interesting, since Wallace's and Scott's small apartment has only one bed. My grade: A-minus.

Quick Review: The Other Guys

In "The Other Guys," Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg are NYPD detectives Allen Gamble and Terry Hoitz, who don't get to do anything exciting, while other cops (Dwayne Johnson and Samuel L. Jackson) are in wild car chases and shootouts, and get all the hero worship and media fawning over them. Allen doesn't care, but Terry wants the action. (His career derailed after an unfortunate -- at least if you're a Yankees fan -- incident involving Derek Jeter.) Allen and Terry stumble upon a huge financial fraud scheme in progress, and try to prevent the crime before it takes place. Basically, "The Other Guys" is a somewhat smarter version of "Cop Out." It falls into the action-comedy-mismatched partners genre but plays around with the formula a little. It also has Michael Keaton as the precinct captain, whose name is...Gene Mauch (baseball fans will get it); and Eva Mendes as Allen's wife, and a running joke about how she's incredibly hot while he insists she's not. Will Ferrell can be annoying when he goes really gonzo, but he was a good fit here. I'm not quite yet sold on Mark Wahlberg as a comic actor, particularly compared to his small role in "Date Night," but perhaps he'll develop  more comedy chops. My grade: B.

Quick Review: The Kids Are All Right

Well, I now have four movies to write about. I really should start using the camcorder on my phone to record instant video reviews and put them up on YouTube...oh, wait...

So, "The Kids Are All Right." Annette Bening and Julianne Moore are Nic and Jules, partnered lesbians. They each gave birth to a child, using the same anonymous donor's sperm. Nic is a doctor but kind of uptight, Jules sort of goes between "careers" and is more the crunchy-granola earth-mother type. Their daughter Joni (Mia Wasikowska) has just turned 18 and is headed to college, and her 15-year-old brother Laser (Josh Hutcherson) has a request for her: he wants to meet their dad, the anonymous sperm donor. Joni can get the records because she's now 18. She isn't really interested but decides to do so for her brother, and thus the kids' father, Paul (Mark Ruffalo) comes into the lives of this family. It's a sweet, funny little film, it's well-acted (particularly by the kids) and Mark Ruffalo is dreamy. (And briefly naked! Yay!) There's some relationship drama but it doesn't get too overwhelming except near the end. I especially liked the fact that a lesbian couple with two kids isn't made into a big deal. They're just a family dealing with family stuff. My grade: B-plus.

Let's Talk About Twitter

Since I seem to do my best work in the early morning hours -- to be more precise, since I tend to post in the early morning hours -- here's a blog post. My original intention (since I keep putting off the posts about the three movies I've seen in the last 2 weeks) was to just write about some random stuff in my head at 2:30 a.m (the time I began this). However, it's turned into a whole Twitter thing.

As of now I follow about 275 Twitter accounts. (I have about 180 followers of my own and am always looking for more, so tell your friends!) While I really like Twitter, there are things about it that I dislike immensely, and it's not posts about the weather or people's lives that some get worked up about -- they see tweets (or Facebook status updates, for that matter) like "Going out to dinner..." as boring. I don't mind them, though. They're little looks into people's lives.

Following 275 accounts, though a few aren't really active at all, it takes time trying to read through the timeline. That makes me want to try and save time by dropping some of those I currently follow. I don't want to unfollow anyone who's following me back, though, and of those who don't follow me back, I always seem to find various reasons to keep them, whether they're really entertaining or just because they're a favorite of mine (like Annie Lennox).

I finally dumped a couple today, one being ESPN's Jayson Stark. Why Jayson?

My Week In Comics 8-11-10

Another pretty light week. Of course, if I stopped buying some of the series I seem to be complaining about regularly, every week would be a lot lighter...

Superman 702: The Superman Across America walking tour continues. This issue has him, according to the very first caption, "somewhere in Detroit..." -- so he walked from Philadelphia to Detroit and nothing of importance happened in between? Anyway, he gets to Detroit and, without giving away much of the plot, manages to get some long-closed factories reopened, help save a dying man's life, deal with some aliens (bonus: this plot features a couple of jabs at both the illegal immigrant issue and the finale of "Lost"), and help out a kid whose friends won't let him play basketball with them because he's not good enough. Oh, and there's a cameo by Metropolis Daily Planet reporter Clark Kent! Haven't seen him in forever!


Rawhide Kid: The Sensational Seven 3 (of 4): Our flamboyant hero and his group pick up the final member of the posse -- Billy the Kid, who doesn't exactly go along voluntarily -- and the Sensational Seven head to Mexico to rescue the Earp brothers from Cristo Pike. But Pike has seven counterparts to deal with them. Plus we have a flashback to the Rawhide Kid's childhood that, if it doesn't lead to a certain revelation in the final issue involving the old man in the cell with the Earp brothers...well, if it doesn't I'll eat my hat. (Disclaimer: no actual hat-eating will occur.)

Our National Anthem (And Why YouTube Blows)

Back on the 4th of this month my friend Kurt sang "God Bless America" during the seventh-inning stretch at the Camden Riversharks game. Today, before the game, he sang our national anthem. Both times I used the camcorder on my phone to record his performance. Both times I uploaded it to YouTube, seemingly successfully -- except that the video has no sound when played in YouTube. The sound exists, and you can hear it, but for some reason when it's on YouTube it doesn't work. This was not a problem with the previous videos I posted on YouTube -- the ones from the Riversharks' Gay Community Night and my report on the feeding habits of local ants. Suddenly the videos I upload to YouTube don't include the sound, I have no idea why -- and there seems to be no way to contact any kind of tech support at YouTube.

This is truly pathetic. If you have a website, you should have a way for people to submit reports of problems. I've searched and searched and can't find anything. YouTube has support staff of some kind -- they're certainly quick to pull videos because of copyright issues. I want to be able to upload videos to YouTube with audio included!

So here's the video, uploaded to Facebook -- with audio...

The Not-So-Perfect Fit

Yesterday I had an emergency. I went to the multiplex at Franklin Mills Mall to see a movie and, before the show started, went into the restroom. As I was finishing up, I was adjusting my pants because the buckle had gotten caught up in one of the loops on my shorts. Suddenly, the buckle broke apart. It is...or was...one of those reversible belts, and the screw (or whatever it spins around) somehow snapped. The belt became useless.

Now, this was an emergency because the pair of shorts I was wearing was one I had from before I started my diet in 2007 and lost weight. They're a 48 waist. My waist is closer to 42 now (my size-40 waist pants are a bit snug, since I've gained back some of the weight I had lost). The shorts were not staying up on their own -- they nearly fell down once when I wore them the day I was flying somewhere and had to take the belt off before going through security. So I had to hold my pants up while I was standing or walking.

After the movie ended, I went out into the mall, intending to go into the Marshall's or J.C. Penney outlets. I really didn't want another belt. I have belts here at home. But I wasn't holding up my pants all the way home. Then, I spotted the store that sells all of the "As Seen On TV" stuff like the ShoeDini and the Slap Chop...and the Perfect Fit buttons.

Phillies Are Oscar-Worthy

Websites such as Philly.com need to be a little more careful when they update their home page for breaking news -- or breaking sports, in this case...

Perhaps it was intentional, though. Tonight's comeback win would make for one epic movie. (No, not Epic Movie. God forbid.) Down 9-2 going into the bottom of the 8th the Phillies scored 4 runs in the 8th and had the potential tying run at the plate before the inning ended. After Danys Baez pitched a scoreless 9th (that's a shock in itself) the Dodgers brought in their closer, Jonathan Broxton. You may remember Broxton from such spectacular choke jobs as 2008 NLCS Game 4 and 2009 NLCS Game 4. Broxton proceeded to hit a batter and walk the next two to load the bases. Two runs scored on an error by Dodgers third baseman Casey Blake, and Carlos Ruiz hit a two-run double off the fence in deep left-center -- the only base hit of the inning -- to win it.

The Phils have now won 16 of their last 20 to move within 2 games of Atlanta in the NL East and 1 game of San Francisco in the NL Wild Card race (although a fourth straight division title is greatly preferred). Shane Victorino is back from the disabled list. By the end of the month both Ryan Howard and Chase Utley should be back as well. They still need better work out of the bullpen (Brad Lidge's recent resurgence is very important) but things continue to look up.

Really, Twitter? Really?

Twitter has copied a page from the Facebook playbook and has begun recommending other accounts for you to follow. Here's what just popped up on my page:

Ironic? (Alanis?) Or just an example of some dumb computer using keywords and such?

Eagle Todd Herremans' "Barrage Of Homosexuality"

If you believe that beautiful people or jocks are generally stupid, here's one example to support both theories. Eagles player Todd Herremans (this is the "jock" part), a 2008 Philadelphia Daily News Sexy Single (here's the "beautiful" part, although that is, of course, a matter of taste), had this to say about the HBO series "True Blood" on his Twitter feed:

"So ... caught up on Trueblood last night .... Not a fan of how they get u hooked with the 1st 2 seasons then bring on a barrage of homosexuality."

The original post has been deleted, which is why I don't have a screen capture, but the text was quoted by both Philly.com and CSN Philly.com. As for the rest of this, as far as I can tell, this is the correct chronological order. First, Philadelphia Inquirer columnist John Gonzalez tweeted at Herremans:

Herremans' reply is not on his feed, but was quoted by Philly.com: "I have no issues with homosesxuality, to each his/her own... Its just not for me.. #jussayin." Gonzalez' nest tweet: