Stuff You Gotta Watch's
(Or: Pure Skill,
Annoyance and
Retribution) |
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Serenity... Kiran Chetry... Battlestar Galactica... The King of Queens... The Sopranos... Kurt Vonnegut... Evangeline Lilly... Harry Potter in 3D... Bob Dylan... Kitty Carlisle... Neve Campbell... More 3D... Stan Laurel... Paul Newman... Tony Curtis ... Christopher Lee.... Rupert Grint... Jessica Alba... Sean Connery... The Sopranos Finale... Oprah Winfrey... Peace and Quiet... Mike Nelson (MST3K)... AFI's Top 100... Other News
PEACE THROUGH SERENITY
April 3rd, 2007
In a recent
poll taken by the UK's SFX
Magazine, Joss Whedon's 2005 movie Serenity
(starring Nathan Fillion) was named the Greatest Science Fiction Film
of All Time, beating out
such classics as Star
Wars, Blade
Runner, Planet
of the
Apes and 2001:
A Space
Odyssey. While Stuff
You Gotta Watch's John B. gave this film four stars, it is
still
surprising to see this film named as the all-time top sci-fi flick
because (a) it failed at the box-office and (b) it was based on a
cancelled television series (Firefly)
that nobody watched. However, Firefly
did become a hit on DVD and the film Serenity
is intelligent, fun and filled with memorable characters and actors,
just like everything else Joss Whedon has created (Buffy the
Vampire Slayer, Angel),
so this news gives us a big smile. Congratulations to
Captain
Mal and the crew!
For the record, here is the list of the Top Ten, courtesy of thisislondon.co.uk:
1) Serenity
2) Star Wars
3) Blade
Runner
4) Planet of
the Apes
(original)
5) The Matrix
6) Alien
7) Forbidden
Planet
8) 2001: A
Space Odyssey
9) The
Terminator
10) Back to the Future
LET'S OVERTURN THESE TABLES, DISCONNECT THESE CABLES
April
5th, 2007
Last year, in one of our fluff pieces called Gratuitous Filler Photo, I reported a personal sighting of Fox News weekend morning host Kiran Chetry in NYC and mentioned how pretty she is. (Yeah, nothing but hard-hitting news here at SYGW). Since then, Ms. Chetry got herself fired from Fox News for supposedly demanding, as part of her contract negotiations, that the channel dump newbie Gretchen Carlson from the weekday morning spot and fill it with (the much preferable presence of, he added parenthetically) Chetry herself. In essence, Ms. Chetry wanted Ms. Carlson fired, and instead, she herself was canned toot sweet. CNN, looking to beef up their own ratings, snapped Chetry up the next day, where she worked as a fill-in host for the vacationing Soledad O'Brien on their own American Morning. Now, in a simple twist of fate, Soledad O'Brien will soon be removed from American Morning, (probably shouldn't have taken that vacation) and replaced full time by none other than... Kiran Chetry. My point is not to harp about whether Fox News leans to the right or CNN leans to the left - let's leave that to political sites - but to show that cable news is a jungle, folks! One minute, you're interviewing senators, diet specialists and Hayley Duff, next minute, you're standing on a New York City corner wondering what the hell went wrong with your career! As for Soledad O'Brien, she still works at CNN, but, hell, when you are replaced, that either means that (a) your bosses aren't too happy with you or (b) Curly had a stroke. Oh, yeah, the CNN morning guy was replaced by a CBS guy. But this is all about Kiran and Soledad, so shut up. By the way, Kiran Chetry was born in Katmandu, and you know what they say - Batman don't play with balls of yarn, but Katmandu. (P.S. This may be the longest "news" story yet on this site, and on such an insignificant subject, but you know what - I am my own editor, and now you see how dangerous that is). - JB
BEAM ME UP, HOTTIE
For
a long time I
resisted watching the SciFi Channel's updated version of the 70s series
Battlestar Galactica.
Cheesy Star Wars
ripoff
though it may have been, the original series was campy enough to be
must-see for me each
week. When news of the re-imagined series first came out, I
was
annoyed that
they had changed some of the characters like Starbuck and Boomer to
females. It just seemed like a slap in the face to... well,
whoever the hell played them in the original series. But,
thanks
to a Christmas gift and later birthday gift from my brother, I now own
the first two seasons of the new Battlestar
Galactica and I
have seen the error of my ways. The people behind the new
series took the premise and the characters from the old one and created
their own sci-fi world, one that is richly fascinating, filled with
great
characters and actors, and addresses political and social issues of our
time without preachiness or easy answers. Aside from starring
Edward James Olmos as Commander Adama and featuring Richard Hatch (the
original Apollo) in a semi-villainous role in which he shines, the new
and shiny Battlestar
Galactica
offers up the beautiful Grace Park ("Boomer"), pictured above, who
makes me denounce my
previous allegiance to Seven of
Nine from the otherwise truly innocuous Star Trek: Voyager.
- JB
LONG LIVE THE KING AND QUEEN
April 9th
CBS's The King of Queens
is
wrapping up its run after nine years. Not bad for a
comedy
show that never won an Emmy and lived
most of
its life in the shadow of the more critically and culturally praised Seinfeld,
Frasier and
Everybody Loves
Raymond.
Not only has it managed to stay on the air through the turbulent
2000's,
when reality shows, serial dramas and Law
and Order/CSI spinoffs have
taken over the orthicon tube landscape, but The King of Queens
has also been
getting discovered by new fans in syndication. (Sitcoms never
die
- they just go out to pasture on TBS.) Here's to the lovable
Kevin James and the lovely Leah Remini, who made Doug and Carrie
Heffernan of Queens, New York the closest thing we have on TV now to
Ralph and Alice Kramden. And here's to The King of Queens,
the last of the
'90s sitcoms.
BADA BING, BADA BYE
The more famous show coming to an end now is HBO's The Sopranos.
Last year, we ran
a story about
how
boring the current season was,
implying the show had run out of steam. That may or
may not
be so (we shall see over these next nine episodes) but it does not take
away from what The
Sopranos
brought to television. In the wake of this mob drama,
broadcast
television starting producing more quality dramas to compete with those
running on cable stations. Today, there seems to be more of
an
emphasis on
intriguing characters, and stories that run through an entire
season, making individual episodes of television series often more
entertaining and intelligent than your average movie these
days.
Not all of this has to do with The
Sopranos, but it was one of the
catalysts, and at its best, The
Sopranos was riveting television. Ciao, Tony and
company!
GOD BLESS YOU, MR. VONNEGUT
April 12th
"We
know
how the Universe ends --" said the guide, "and Earth has nothing to do
with it, except that it
gets
wiped out too."
"How -- how does
it end?" said Billy.
"We blow it up, experimenting with new
fuels
for our flying saucers. A Tralfamadorian test pilot presses a
start button, and the whole Universe disappears." And so it
goes.
"If you know this," said
Billy, "isn't there
some way you can prevent it? Can't you keep the pilot from
pressing the button?"
"He has always
pressed it, and he always will.
We always
let him and we
always will
let him.
The moment is structured
that
way."
- Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five,
1969
"When I think of my own
death, I don't console
myself with the idea that my descendants and my books and all that will
live on. Anybody with any sense knows that the whole solar
system
will go up like a celluloid collar by-and-by. I honestly
believe,
though, that we are wrong to think that moments go away, never to be
seen again. This moment and every moment lasts forever."
- Kurt
Vonnegut, "Reflections on My Own Death", 1972.
Kurt Vonnegut, a favorite author of the writers of this site. 1922-2007.
GRATUITOUS FILLER PHOTO: Evangeline Lilly
April 16th
We needed a news item to keep things fresh, but we didn't
feel
like wasting space reporting about (1) The Don Imus Debacle (2) The
Anna Nicole Smith DNA Test Sweepstakes or (3) The Unfathomable Mystery
That Is Sanjaya, so we figured it was time to bring back a
purely gratuitous filler photo and build some lame news around
it. So here is actress Evangeline Lilly, who hails
from
deepest, darkest Canada. Not only is Ms. Lilly lovely and
talented, but she possesses the greatest name ever.
Seriously. "Evangeline Lilly". It could easily
conjure up
visions of the pure virginal girl waiting for her soldier boy to return
home, or, just as easily, the whore with a heart of gold who falls in
love with John Wayne. Meanwhile, Lilly's TV show, Lost, seems to
finally be back on
track after a year and a half of gazing at its own navel.
Long-standing questions are almost
being answered (it's something about babies), and the show actually
feels like it is going somewhere again. The recent episode
that
focussed on the death of two very minor characters was irritating until
the final five minutes, when until it suddenly turned into the greatest
episode of The Twilight
Zone
that wasn't hosted by Rod Serling. Anyway, let's just hope
they
can clear everything up before low ratings force the show's
cancellation. If that happens, we will never know what it was
all
about, unless they do a reunion TV movie. Lost Meets the Harlem
Globetrotters,
anybody?
HARRY POTTER AND THE BLOOD SUCKING MONKEYS
FROM WEST MIFFLIN, PENNSYLVANIA
Hey, kids! Count Floyd here! Coming in July in IMAX
theaters near you, Harry
Potter and
the
Order of the Phoenix - in 3D!! Well, not all in
3D, but
the final
20 minutes, only in IMAX theaters. Sure, you can go to any
other
theater and see this film in conventional 2D, but who wants that when
you can have... 3D!!! Oooh, it's gonna be scary,
kids! Can
you imagine Dumbledore coming right at you? Brrrrrr, I
get chills just thinking about it! That Michael Gambon guy,
running
around like a nut with that beard! Now, you probably won't
need
Count
Floyd's special 3D glasses to see this one, but, just in case, be on
the safe side - send me 27 bucks and I'll rush a pair
right out to you just in time for the ultimate 3D experience!
Now,
let's roll a clip
from Harry Potter and
the Order of
the Phoenix to see just how scary it
will be.... what?.... what's
this?.... Four for Texas?....
Where's the Potter movie?... whattaya mean we don't have the
rights?... Oh, well, kids, maybe we can get a clip next
week! Maybe Dr. Tongue will be here too! Until next
week,
kids, this is Count Floyd saying the only good D is
3D!!!
Heh heh heh... Owoooooooo!
The character of Count Floyd was created by Joe Flaherty for Second City Television and is owned, we presume, by Mr. Flaherty and/or SCTV. This actual news item intended as a loving parody of the character.
DOWN IN THE GROOVE
Who would have thunk
that Bob Dylan, a man who floundered through most of the eighties and
whose recording career was near-dead through much of the nineties,
would have yet another comeback left in him? Not only did his
most recent album Modern
Times
reach number in the United States,
making Dylan the oldest living artist to have a number one
album,
but now XM Satellite Radio has renewed his show Theme
Time Radio Hour. On the show, Dylan plays an
eclectic
variety of other artist's songs, many of them obscure, based on a
weekly theme such as
"mother" or "baseball", and spices things up with humorous and
intelligent commentary between tracks. The man who
revolutionized
popular music with his lyrics and his attitude described Theme Time with
these words: "We're
not here to play hits - we're here to play good songs." Now that's a
revolutionary concept
these days!
GOODBYE KITTY
April 19th
Kitty Carlisle
Hart has passed away at age
96.
She was famous
as a panelist on the classic game
show What's My Line?,
as a
great
Broadway star, as a celebrity who
lived up to the true definition of the word, and as one of the
classiest ladies in all of show business. But Stuff You
Gotta Watch remembers her most fondly as Rosa Castaldi,
the
beautiful
young singer who loved boy
tenor Ricardo Baroni and spurned the oily affections of the hissable
Rodolfo Lasparri in the movie A
Night at the Opera. Of course, like any true
fans
of A Night at the Opera,
we
cared not a
whit about the troubles of Rosa, Ricardo and Rodolfo, since
their
love triangle took precious time away from the real
stars, Groucho, Harpo and Chico Marx. But in a
thankless
role, Kitty Carlisle projected grace, dignity and likability, three
qualities that would stay with her through the rest of her long life.
A MOMENT OF
SILENCE...
... to allow webmaster John B. to absorb
the fact that
Neve Campbell done went and got hitched.
There. I feel much
better now.
Congrats, Neve. - JB
PAGING
COUNT FLOYD
Dreamworks honcho Jeffrey Katz believes the future of movies is
3D. In an article in the New York Times, Katz says that in
the
near future, "a significant percentage of the big mainstream
films will be made and exhibited in this format", and considers that it
will be the biggest thing to happen in movies since Marlon
Brando
in The Island of Dr.
Moreau.
(Actually, Katz said "since color", but
we've got to joke these news stories up a it, you know). 3D
will
also help theatrical movies compete against home video as well as
bootleg DVDs, since 3D movies would be hard to replicate by piraters.
But weren't they saying all this stuff back in the fifties, when 3D was supposed to compete against television? And what was the result? The thrill of seeing somebody playing with a ball and paddle in The House of Wax, and then, rather quickly, the disappearance of 3D movies. There has to better ways of making movies more attractive, such as making better movies.
LAURELS FOR STAN
Christies in NYC will be auctioning off movie memorabilia on May 30th,
including several items from the Stan Laurel estate. Among
the
Stan stuff is one of his bowler hats, expected to go for between 10 and
15 thousand dollars. By comparison, Captain Kirk's chair from
Star Trek
is expected to go
for between 8 and 12 thousand dollars. It warms our hearst
that a hat worn by a comedian from the 1930s is expected to
bring
a better price than a chair from the most famous sci-fi franchise not
named Star Wars.
Especially since Star Trek can still be seen everywhere, and, in the
U.S. at least, Laurel and Hardy movies are, unfortunately, hard to come
by.
WHY WE LOVE PAUL NEWMAN
Somebody Up There Likes
Me, The Hustler,
Hud,
The Sting, The Color of Money, Road to Perdition... heck,
even Cars.
Why wouldn't we love
Paul Newman? Sadly, Newman recently told ABC's Good Mornng America
that, after
acting for 50 years, he has given it up. While we respect
his right to do whatever he wants with his life, we hope this
self-imposed retirement is about as serious as the one announced by
Anthony Hopkins several years ago. At 82, Newman
may feel
that he cannot give the
kind of performances that used to, but let's be serious: Paul
Newman
at 80 percent has got to be better than half of Hollywood at 100
percent, right? Come home, Paul - all is forgiven.
WHY WE LOVE CHRISTOPHER LEE
Because somebody has to. Several years
ago, the great horror icon was uncermoniously cut from Peter Jackson's The Return of the King,
in which
Lee played evil wizard Saruman. Now, scheduled to appear as a
ghost in Tim Burton's upcoming Sweeney
Todd, he has been informed that his character has been
dropped
from the film. This time around, at least Lee didn't waste
any
time actually filming scenes for the new movie, but really - can't
anybody in Hollywood find a role for this man? Unfortunately,
the
roles of Dumbledore and Voldemort are already filled in the Harry
Potter series, but there's gotta be something out there for
him.
Anybody? Anybody?
WHY WE LOVE TONY CURTIS
Taking a page out of Lauren
Bacall's
book,
Tony Curtis wishes to work until he dies. After recovering a
near-fatal bout of pneumonia during the 2007 Christmas season, the
81-year-old actor has signed on for a new movie, David and Fatima.
Says the
star of such films as Some
Like It
HotHoudiini:
"I
still love acting. I'll die working. But hopefully it won't be anytime
soon." Stuff You Gotta Watch seconds that emotion.
WILD ABOUT RON (AND HARRY, AND HERMIONE)
In a little over one month, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix will be released all over the world, generating yet another round of Pottermania throughout the Universe, as well as more too-lengthy Harry Potter movie reviews on this site. After all the recent Potter news - Daniel Radcliffe receiving gazillions at 18, the hysteria surrounding the Emma Watson signing or not signing story a while back - it occurs to us that we've never had any stories about Rupert Grint. Which is probably a good thing for him, given our penchant for snooty comments.
ABLE WAS I ERE I SAW ALBA
For the past two years, Jessica Alba has been
on the
receiving end of several wisecracks both in our movie reviews and our
news stories for our perception, right or wrong, that, pretty as she
may be, she's not really all that strong when it comes to,
you
know, acting. But we have found a reason to honestly praise
her,
and ye gads, we are going to. Preparing for her
upcoming horror movie The
Eye,
where she plays a blind violinist, Alba actually learned how
to
play the violin. "I had to learn in six
months how to play Beethoven and Mozart," said Alba. "It was
so
hard. I
had to practice for hours!" Okay, it's not De Niro
putting
on
60 pounds to play Jake La Motta, but it is admirable to see this from
one of the
younger crowd in Hollywood - dedication to the craft. In
fact,
we've edited out at least two good wisecracks from from this
story
and grant the lovely Miss Alba a three-month reprieve before we ever
say something not nice about her again. Seriously.
We will
purposely not see Fantastic
Four 2 just to avoid the temptation.
(That's not a wisecrack... well... maybe a little.)
NOBODY DOES IT BETTER
June 7th
Dash it all! Sean
Connery is not going to reprise
his role as Indiana Jones' father in the upcoming fourth installment of
the popular series. Connery recently explained that although
he
gave it considerable thought, in the end, "Retirement is just
too
damned much fun!". Wait a
sec? Sean Connnery retired? When did this happen?
No
more Sir Sean on film, ever? The man who WAS James Bond and
went
on to be the man who was so good, people no longer thought of him as
James Bond, retired? Oh, well... in honor of Sir Sean, we
have reformatted the James Bond
section, with some new comments and pictures.
"WOKE UP THIS MORNING, CANCELLED HBO..."
For those of you who have recorded the
final episode
of The Sopranos
for viewing later, I won't spoil the
end. Not for nothing (as members of Tony's crew
might say)
but I didn't even see it myself. I gave up on The Sopranos
after watching five of the ten episodes from last year. For
me,
the show had become boring. Endless dream sequences, not
enough
cursin' and killin'. But I was interested in how it would all
end, and so after 10 PM on Sunday June 10th, I searched this thing
called the Internet to find out. And from everything I've
read,
David Chase, creator of The
Sopranos,
pulled a fast one. He went for artsy and got fartsy
instead.
Some people are too clever for their own good.
There's a
reason ratings go down on popular shows, Mr. Chase. Pictured
above is Jamie-Lynn Sigler, the actress who plays Tony Soprano's
irritating daughter Meadow. I used her because she's prettier
than James Gandolfini. Than again, so am I. - JB
Addendum, June 11th - okay, by now everybody probably knows how it ended. I've seen the final scene of last night's Sopranos and I can understand why many fans are upset. Had I followed this last season (I stopped watching after Season Five) I might be upset too. Ambiguous endings can work (City Lights) or not (They Might Be Giants) but fans who sat through the entire run of this show deserved something better than watching Tony order onion rings, Meadow parallel park for five minutes and a final black screen that made many fans suspect their cable service was having technical difficulties. I resent the attitude of some fans who think that if you didn't "get" the ending, you are stupid. You know what? I'm rubber, you're glue, okay? I "get" the ending and I think it was a copout. And Tony Soprano choosing Journey over Tony Bennett on the diner jukebox? Jeez, if ever there was a reason to get whacked...
Addendum Part Deux, June 15th - It's the story that doesn't go away. Now cast members have admitted they don't know what the ending means. At a charity event, James Gandofini said he didn't know if Tony Soprano lives or dies, and Jamie-Lynn Sigler stated she didn't know why Meadow had such trouble parellel parking but she did it because it was in the script (SYGW's favorite method of acting, by the way). Some have conjectured that the black screen signified Tony's death, while other have suggested the ambiguous ending allows us to use our imaginations. Fah! Imagination is for people who can't handle television!
HAIL TO THE O
June
15th
According to Forbes Magazine, Oprah Winfrey is
the most
powerful celebrity in the world. We're not exactly sure what
that
means but we do know this: we will not mock her. Why?
Because she's the most powerful celebrity in the world,
that's
why! We could make a simple joke, launched against The
O with the same affection as all our celebrity jokes, and yet,
The
O could possibly be in a bad mood that day and come to our houses and
twist us into pretzels with her super-strength.
(It's
rumored that she has the strength of ten Rosies... plus two!).
Angered by one of our random loving witticisms, she could fly
around the world backwards until the Earth begins spinning in the
opposite direction and time reverses itself, so that we would
eventually all cease to exist. So, no thank you, we will not
mock
The O. We suggest you adopt the same policy, just to be on
the
safe side.
UNDER THE ARBOREAL DELL
June, that magical, mystical month when spring
begins to
turn into summer, peaceful summer. Birds chirping in the sky,
the
pitter-patter of raindrops on the roof. Listen
to the
babbling brooks and the gentle ocean waves. The wind rustling
the
leaves in the trees. Can you hear it? That is the
sound of
silence. Peace, serenity. All is calm.
Yep, it sure has been kinda quiet since
Rosie left The View,
huh?
WE'LL STILL MISS THE ROBOTS
June 19th
Back when Comedy Central still aired shows that
were
funny rather than "edgy", no show was more
beloved than Mystery
Science Theater 3000,
on which one human and two robots were trapped in an evil experiment in
space and forced to watch bad movies every week. The only
thing
that saved them was their uncanny ability to make wisecracks throughout
every film. Well, now, human Mike Nelson and two of his
former
MST3K cohorts (also human) Kevin Murphy (aka Tom Servo and/or Professor
Bobo) and Bill Corbett (aka Crow
T. Robot and/or Brain Guy) are back in the wisecracking business
with Rifftrax,
where you can download mp3 "commentary" tracks for popular films and
television shows and play them along with your DVD, and The
Film Crew, a new series of DVDs featuring the three
unleashing their wisecrackery once again on some very bad movies such as Hollywood After Dark
and The Wild
Women of Wongo.
The robots are gone (shucks!) but judging from some samples
of
their commentary that can be heard on both sites, the jokes are still
very funny. Welcome back, guys!
SAME AS IT EVER WAS
According to the American Film
Institure latest 100 years, 100 movies list, the Greatest Movie Ever is
still Citizen Kane,
followed by The
Godfather and Casablanca.
The Top 10:
1. Citizen Kane
2. The Godfather
3. Casablanca
4. Raging Bull
5. Singin' in the Rain
6. Gone with the Wind
7. Lawrence of Arabia
8. Schindler's List
9. Vertigo
10. The Wizard of Oz
Newcomers to this updated 100 Greatest American Movies list include Buster Keaton's The General (18), Griffith's Intolerance (49), The Marx Brothers' A Night at the Opera, and Pixar's Toy Story. The 50th Greatest movie: The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. The 100th Great Movie: Ben-Hur. Not on this list at all: Dude, Where's My Car?, The Day the Clown Cried, Manos: The Hands of Fate, or any movie made since 2001.
NOT ENOUGH TIME, NOT ENOUGH JOKES
We're at the end of another news quarter and as
usual
there were some prominent stories we didnt get around to covering.
Don Imus, for instance (doesn't that seem like a thousand
years
ago now?). Most of the stuff surrounding Rosie O'Donnell.
(Can anything actually surround
Rosie O'Donnell?). Paris Hilton (she said being in jail was good for
her. It was good for the rest of us too, honey).
The
one story we wished we covered was Gary Oldman hinting at retirement.
Please, Gary, don't. Hollywood has so few great
character
actors left, and besides, you can't retire until you officially play a
villain in a Bond or Die
Hard flick.
http://thestuffyougottawatch.com
Copyright © 2008 John V. Brennan, John Larrabee