Don't be crabby: HERE'S that new Lauryn pic already!!

Awright awright... I KNOW that it's been since March that The Knight Shift has had a new photo of my exceptionally beautiful, sweet and inspirational (can't say enough how much she has encouraged me in my walk with Christ) second cousin, Lauryn. Yes in case you don't know already, this blog has an official (more or less) pin-up girl! Okay, maybe "pin-up girl" isn't quite the right terminology, but you get the idea.

So here's a new one, and this one demonstrates that Lauryn looks downright gorgeous no matter what it is that she's doing... including feasting on crabs in Maryland!

Remember guys: Lauryn is a taken gal. And even if she wasn't, you'd have to get through me. You get through me, then you'd have to deal with her father Bob... and you don't wanna mess with Bob :-P

So now that that is done, I've got The Knight Shift's beautiful quotient filled for the next good while :-)

Read More

Bachmann and Romney mad at each other or something about pro-life "pledge"

sigh...

Every time I come across a story like this about how inane our "political process" has become, I can't help but think of that line from Battle for the Planet of the Apes: "Ape has killed ape!!!"

So newly-announced candidate for President of the United States Michele Bachmann is feigning righteous wrath (I know of no other way to put it) at fellow candidate Mitt Romney because he hasn't signed something called the "Susan B. Anthony pro-life pledge".

Here's what the pledge is about, according to the story at LifeNews.com:

The pledge has the candidates promising to support only judicial nominees who won't interpret the Constitution in a way that supports Roe v. Wade, select pro-life Cabinet members on positions affecting abortion policy, supporting legislation to stop taxpayer funding of abortions and Planned Parenthood, and to support a fetal pain bill that would ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy.

Y'know, every single item listed here, I agree with. In a lot of ways my personal beliefs about abortion are even more legally stringent. For one thing, Roe v. Wade is atrocious legislation from the bench, and not even something that should have reached the Supreme Court. It should have always been a states issue... and that is why so many abortion "rights" supporters have done their damndest to keep this a federal matter. Because they know that left to the individual states, that abortion would go down in flames in this country. But I digress from my line of thought...

It just seems to me that if a candidate knows what he or she stands for, then that candidate won't need to sign any "pledge" at all. Congressman Ron Paul has apparently signed it. But even if he didn't, it wouldn't bother me: having read his record for myself, I know he has an adamant pro-life position. That's something that can't be "earned" by the stroke of a pen on a pledge that at election time are a dime a dozen.

Here's what I'm getting at, folks: a person's values and virtues, ultimately aren't something that can be defined or not defined by whether or not that person signs this or that statement. That only serves to cheapen the candidate and it even cheapens the impact of such statements when they can be instruments of weight and worth.

And they cheapen us and what we should be expecting and demanding from those who offer to serve us in public office. If I vote for a man or woman for President, I don't want to be voting for a party automaton. I will and always shall vote for a person, not a product. Y'know: someone who can think and hold on to a position and understand why that position is held!

Or maybe I'm just asking for a little too much enlightenment from our political process...

Read More

Remember last year when the planet Jupiter underwent stellar ignition?

Here's a reminder in case you missed it...

Y'know, 2010 - Peter Hyams' follow-up to Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey - is by now a horribly dated film: the Soviet Union was long gone by the time this movie's eponymous date rolled around, and we've yet to return to the Moon, much less have manned missions to Jupiter...

...but so help me, I positivalutely love this movie all the same. And that scene, where the planet Jupiter is forced by the monoliths to ignite into a new star, is on my very short list of all-time favorite science fiction moments in film. Everything about that scene is orchestrated perfectly together.

Anyhoo, fellow blogger Scott Bradford has compiled a neat list of "past" science-fiction "history". As in, events that sci-fi foretold but somehow never quite seemed to pass (or did they?). Like, back in 1996 when Khan Noonien Singh mysteriously vanished in the aftermath of the Eugenics Wars that devastated much of the world. Or the year before that when Dr. Sam Beckett was forced to use himself as the test subject of Project: Quantum Leap.

Great list, Scott! But if I might make a suggestion, it's probably a good thing that we never got the 1997 that John Carpenter envisioned in Escape from New York...

Yeah, another horribly dated movie by now. But that soundtrack is still a beast! And Isaac Hayes absolutely ruled as the Duke of New York. 'Twould be neat to see that rumored remake finally happen (maybe with Josh Holloway as Snake Plissken)...

Read More

Review of GREEN LANTERN: A mis-focused but fun movie!

Maybe I should disclaimer this by admitting that before going to see the movie, that I bought a Kilowog action figure just so I could have a Green Lantern power ring to wear while watching this flick. Well, that and to also have an action figure of Kilowog to pose on my desk, 'cuz he's my favorite member of the Green Lantern Corps.

But I don't think that would be enough to subjectively color my perception of this movie when I say that I for one enjoyed the heck out of Green Lantern: the live-action adaptation of one of the most classic and revered superheroes in the DC Comics stable, which opens today. But I would also have to admit that this movie is far from perfect, or what it should be at a minimum.

Green Lantern is mis-focused far too much for the film that it should be: about a high concept cosmic mythology. Thor pulled that trick off beautifully when it opened last month. Unfortunately the high concept mythos is there in Green Lantern but doesn't get played up nearly as much as it ought to be. The scenes on Oa, and our glimpses of the Corps and of the Guardians of the Universe and the bits about how green is the color of willpower and yellow is the color of fear, etc... I loved that stuff!! Heck, I could have sat for the entire 114 minutes of this film's running time with nary a glimpse of Earth...

...because we get Earth too dang much in this movie about Green Lantern. That's my biggest beef with this film. And it's sadly ironic: that for a story about choosing to be fearless, director Martin Campbell (who also directed Casino Royale a few years ago for the James Bond franchise) and his crew were afraid to let their baby take off and soar out into the larger universe where Green Lantern belongs.

Ryan Reynolds as Hal Jordan, the human entrusted with the Green Lantern ring by the dying Abin Sur (Temuera Morrison, perhaps best known for playing Jango Fett and his zillions of clones in the Star Wars prequels) pulls off the role admirably, if also with a touch of clunkiness. The thing about Jordan's fear after the freak accidental death of his father, resonated with me with all the grace of a rusted cowbell. It was definitely something that could have benefitted from some rewrite and better editing (or being excised completely). Come to think of it, quite a bit of this film could have been edited away and it would have felt much slicker. I also liked Blake Lively as Jordan's girl/boss Carol Ferris. Tim Robbins also appears as a United States senator and Angela Bassett plays Amanda Waller (a DC Comics character and I'm wondering if Waller's turning up here is helping to set things up for the Justice League movie I'm hearing whispers about, much as Samuel L. Jackson's Nick Fury has been crashing almost all the Marvel movies of late).

But by far the worst of the human characters, and the single most distracting element of Green Lantern, is Hector Hammond, played by Peter Sarsgaard. I don't necessarily blame Sarsgaard himself but... well, there's no way around it: Hector Hammond sucks. He's a character more at home in a David Cronenburg film than in a blockbuster comic book adaptation. But that Sarsgaard plays him like he's channeling Seth Brundle from The Fly doesn't help matters any. At best Hector Hammond comes across as just too powerful for his own good and at worst, like Rick Moranis' nerdy accountant in Ghostbusters after becoming the Key Master. Too much crap like this and not nearly enough of the Green Lantern legendarium...

...but when we do get pure-D Corps, the movie is an absolute hoot to behold. Michael Clarke Duncan is firing on all cylinders as Kilowog, the Green Lanterns' drill instructor. And for Sinestro, I really can't see any better than Mark Strong as the Corps' respected warrior, soon to become worst enemy. That doesn't happen in this film, but the setup is there (stick around during the credits). I'm looking forward to seeing Sinestro going full-tilt against the Guardians in the sequel (which, based on this film I do believe is merited).

The special effects in Green Lantern are CGI intensive, and at times a bit cartoony... but given that this is a Green Lantern movie, I can forgive that and even say that it's about what I expected. James Newton Howard turns in a fine score. Conceptually, the scale of this film is vast. It's just not exploited to the fullest hilt. As I said, Thor made it work and there's no reason why it can't in a Green Lantern movie. Maybe in the follow-up we'll see Hal Jordan hanging around on Oa more and on Earth less (and speaking of Oa, I thought the Guardians were handled magnificently: elder beyond reason and yet a vital and breathing component of the Green Lanterns' realm).

Green Lantern isn't the best superhero movie that I've seen, and it's somewhat frustrating that it's not the film that it could and should have been. But neither is it the train wreck or the bomb that I'm seeing too many other critics panning it as. I went in to see it braced for anything. Coming out, I realized that it is what it is: a fun summer popcorn flick. I won't say that I'm gonna give it my highest recommendation, but I will say that Green Lantern is worth considering plunking down some coin at the box office to see.

Read More

Ya see, THIS is where wacko environmentalism is taking us...

Japanese researchers have announced that they have created a meat substitute... manufactured from human excrement.

The laboratory sample is even labeled... may the Lord forgive me for ever having to write this... "SHIT BURGER".

Darn. This stuff makes Soylent Green sound downright palatable!

Read More

RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK came out thirty years ago this week

In 1973, around the same time that he was putting ideas together for what would become the Star Wars saga, George Lucas came up with a rough outline for "The Adventures of Indiana Smith". Nothing came of it until a few years later, when Lucas was vacationing in Hawaii... and happened to run into fellow director Steven Spielberg building a sandcastle on the beach in Maui. It was Spielberg who suggested changing the name from "Smith", and Lucas thought up "Jones" instead.

Four years later, their new hero swashbuckled onto movie screens and forever into popular culture...

Raiders of the Lost Ark came out thirty years ago this week, on June 12th 1981.

Incidentally, this is my all time most personal favorite movie! I could literally watch it all day, all week, and not get tired of it. No other film ever influenced my life more. Raiders of the Lost Ark is what ignited my love and passion for history. I still remember pulling down the "A" volume of the World Book Encyclopedia as a seven-year old on the day after I saw this movie, so I could read up about the real Ark of the Covenant. And that led me to going all through our family Bible to read even more (guess you could say that the Ark was my very first research project).

Anyway... Happy Thirtieth Anniversary to Raiders of the Lost Ark and to everyone who made this movie happen!

Read More

Chris sees SUPER 8 and struggles to understand why he's so madly in love with it

The most singularly consistent quality possessed by Super 8 that I've heard from friends who have seen the film is that it is like a Rorschach test: different people are going to see different things in this movie. And always those friends pick a movie from Steven Spielberg's long career to describe Super 8: a film executive produced by Spielberg and written and directed by J.J. Abrams.

"It reminded me of E.T." "It was as scary as Jaws and Jurassic Park!" "Didn't you get a Close Encounters vibe?"

Yes to all of those and more. But having seen this movie two days ago and with it getting better and better the more that I think about it, I've come to the conclusion that I absolutely love Super 8 because, to me anyway, it gave me a feeling that I haven't felt watching a movie in a theater ever since The Goonies in the summer of 1985.

This is definitely a J.J. Abrams/Bad Robot movie. But it is also a film that has Steven Spielberg's handiwork all over it... and it is a beautiful thing to watch this story unfold and work its magic. When I saw that Amblin Entertainment logo, the one with Elliot and E.T. flying in silhouette, my inner geek started jazzing up like it hasn't in way too long. Because, this is a movie that many of us wondered if Spielberg was even capable of pulling off again.

Let me explain that. I met Steven Spielberg once. It was at the National Boy Scout Jamboree in 1989. Spielberg was there to inaugurate the Cinematography merit badge, and he also produced the jamboree's opening night show. I was our council's media correspondent: sending reports to newspapers back home and such. There was a press conference with Spielberg and we got to talk with him and... the guy was just a big kid. He even wore his Boy Scout uniform complete with Eagle Scout badge! And there was this light in his eyes as he talked about what was coming up with the Back to the Future trilogy and then how he first got into filmmaking. It was really quite something: the most successful movie director of our generation, bouncing up and down and off the walls like a kid in a candy store... and could anyone really blame him?

That was the Steven Spielberg that gave us E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial and Gremlins and Goonies, and later on Jurassic Park.

And then, Spielberg made Schindler's List.

He hasn't been the same as a filmmaker since. And I don't know how anybody could really blame him. Now, he did not get "worse" by any stretch of the measure. There was no decline in his creativity or artistic execution. But doing Schindler's List... and I don't know of any other way to put it... scarred the man. Broke something inside. It frightened that sparkly-eyed kid and made him run away. I thought that I could see that kid coming back when A.I.: Artificial Intelligence came out ten years ago... except for that ending. Spielberg before Schindler's List would have found an entirely different ending for that film. Spielberg after Schindler's List however...

...Well, as I said: nobody can blame him. And I'm not going to demand that Spielberg not grow as an artist. This, the man has certainly done, often literally right before our eyes. He should grow into his own, as each of us must with our lives.

But I gotta tell you: when I heard about how Spielberg was scouting locations in Poland for Schindler's List and how he found a gray puddle of debris near one of the death camps, and casually put his hand into it before realizing that those were the ashes of human bones...

...Just reading that, I knew that this most celebrated of American filmmakers had been made to lose a lot of innocence. And that nothing would be the same for him again.

Not I, or anyone else, should ask Spielberg to go back to "the way things were". We don't have the right and, I don't know how that's even possible.

But even so, just the same: I have missed the old Steven Spielberg. The man who made us believe that childhood friendship would always triumph over the bad guys, whether they be government agents or hostile creatures or both. The man who let everyone else know what those of us who grew up in the late Seventies on through the Nineties already knew: that there was always an adventure awaiting, right around the corner or down the street or even in the dark recesses of our own home.

Super 8 is a J.J. Abrams movie. But this is also a Steven Spielberg film. The kind that we haven't gotten in way, way too long.

Super 8 is a homage and a tribute to everything that we loved about Spielberg's movies back in the day. If there was one word that I would have to use to describe the tonal quality of this film, it would be "innocence". Joe and Charles and their friends: here we've a bunch of middle-school kids who spend their time making zombie horror films with Super 8 cameras and jury-rigged lights and audio and lots of schlocky make-up. They share a dream. Kids at that age, they can do anything and they know it and don't get in their way! For Joe Lamb (played by Joel Courtney) this is more than a collaboration with friends: it's how he loses himself from the grief of his mother, who dies in a work-related accident at the beginning of the film. For Charles Kaznyk (Riley Griffiths, who seems to steal the scene every time he's on-camera) it's about showing up older teenagers in a film competition. And for both it is a feeling of affection toward Alice Dainard (wonderfully played by Elle Fanning), for whom this Super 8 project is a brief escape from her hated father. Then there is pyrotechnician/pyromaniac Carey (Ryan Lee) and Preston (Zach Mills) and Martin (Gabriel Basso). And they all wind up at a train station on the edge of town late one night to shoot a scene (and also hopefully, as Charles is constantly demanding, "PRODUCTION VALUE!").

And by that point, I was so involved with these kids and their good-natured plot that I didn't remember that Super 8 is a movie about something going horribly wrong in a small Ohio steel-mill town. Indeed, it comes almost as complete surprise when an Air Force train speeding past the station hits a truck and derails, in what has to be the most spectacular train wreck in cinematic history.

And then...

No, I'm gonna hold off on saying much more. I only saw one trailer in the past several months leading up to Super 8's release. I went in with a mind totally innocent to what I was about to witness.

And so should you.

This is a movie that they just don't make anymore. And I keep thinking back to the scene in Joe's bedroom, when Alice sneaks out to see him and comes in through his window. That scene, too many movies in this day and age would have had it turning into something far too more between a boy and a girl on the verge of young adulthood. Super 8 takes the high ground without being pretentious about it. I thought that scene was incredibly sweet and tender and pure.

Wow. Just now realizing how much I've written about Super 8. Even though I don't know how much of this could sincerely be called a "review".

This is the kind of movie that I grew up wanting to make. And now that I'm a little older and have seen J.J. Abrams do it, and that it is possible to do it... well, maybe that has reinvigorated me. It certainly has made me respect Abrams all the more, and the man already had that between Cloverfield and Lost and 2009's Star Trek: still the finest re-launch of a franchise that I know of. And no doubt, Super 8 is going to inspire a lot of kids out there.

Just as Spielberg inspired us and still inspires us to this day.

Super 8, I cannot possibly more urge this blog's readers to see this movie. DON'T wait until the DVD and Blu-ray release. Absolutely do not watch it for the first time in streaming video on a teeny tiny monitor screen. If you can at all, you owe it to yourself to see this movie right now, on a big screen, with lots of other moviegoers around you. And preferably, in the company of good friends. I saw it with one on Sunday afternoon and I'm looking forward to seeing it with another this coming Friday (along with Green Lantern). Yes, this is a movie to see and celebrate with friendship, just like we did with The Goonies.

One last thing: does this movie have "PRODUCTION VALUE!!"?

Oh yeah. Big time. You'll see :-)

Read More