Please Give (2010– 90 mins) K. Keener, O. Platt, A. Peet

   Please Give is another one of those little known movies which is really hard to put into one or another category and also hard to flesh out the entire plot. It centers around 2 sets of people who are connected by a 90 year old woman. One set are Cathy (Keener) and Alex (Platt), a couple who own an antique furniture store and live next door to the elderly Andra. They have purchased her apartment so that when she dies they can knock out some walls and make their house bigger and more luxurious. They have a teenage daughter Abby, (S. Steele) who is your typical teen dealing with the world, her skin, and her parents.  The other set of people are a pair of sisters Rebecca (R.Hall) and Mary (A. Peet).  Rebecca is the caring sister, who takes care of her elderly grandmother. She’s a Mammography tech who spends the majority of her time not on herself, but taking care of her grandmother. She has yet to realize there is a great world out there to live in, metaphorically explained by her not ever going to see the beautiful changing leaves upstate.  The other sister Mary, is a bit more self centered and caring only about her skin, and obsessing about her ex-boyfriend and his new lover.

  The film really centers more around the lives of Cathy and Rebecca. Cathy and her husband are glorified Hearse chasers who find the majority of their goods to sell from families of elderly people who have no idea what the items their family members are worth. They just want to get rid of that and generally will take any amount of money, thinking anything is better then what it’s really worth. Here is where Cathy’s real guilt is. She tries to tackle this guilt by giving money to people on the street. She tries to hand out money to everyone she thinks is homeless but she’s blind to how clueless she truly is. She has very little social skills when communicating with people and can’t wrap around the irony of her trying to do good with 5$ is frivolous when taking thousands of dollars advantage of people for their loved ones furniture.

   Rebecca is trying to take care of the one last semblence of am other figure in her life. She has no life of her own and doesn’t know what it is to truely live. She goes thru the routine of work, grandma, and dinner with Mary so much it has made her a zombie of herself. She finds how to live when she gets a man in her life, and you see it instantly in her glow and her dressing. It’s a happy part of the movie for her and we share in the joy she finds in it.

(Minor spoilers to explain my thoughts…. skip to verdict if you want to know if you should see it) Please Give is hard to put a tag on b/c it almost seems like a movie about nothing. We follow these people’s lives, they all have some problems and go about it, and then it’s over. There’s not really any “conflict” here and the only real plot point that brings some in just simply goes away with not a whole lot of resolution. Cathy’s guilt is still there, Alex is still bored with his life,and Mary is still a bitch.Sure Cathy/Alex find that they should pay more attention to Abby and thus their family comes a bit closer together as seen by her getting her new jeans she has been pining over, but everything is still there. The only one who truly has any closure is Rebecca. Just as she breaks from the dependence on taking care of her grandmother, she dies, and thus Rebecca can now live her life for herself. This may be the only happy (or any) closure we truly get. It often seems like we are just watching a snippet of these 2 families lives and that’s all. And that is what is truly the head scratching part of it all.

Verdict—> While I was watching it, it was pretty entertaining, and kept me interested. The only negative I have is it doesn’t contain much closure or a real complete plot. You will finish watching it and think, well what next? What now? Almost an empty like feeling. That said it’s not bad and people who like smaller indy films and the people in this might find it entertaining. Not a top of the line rental but if it’s a weekend night and a lot of other things are gone, grab a blockbuster and this could be a nice standby for movie #2.

Get Him to the Greek (2010– 109 mins) R. Brand, J. Hill

 The last time we saw Aldous Snow (Brand) he was a rock star,  on top of the world despite breaking up with the beautiful yet neurotic Sarah Marshall. Well, it’s been 10 years since then (In movie time) and Snow has both fallen off the wagon, becoming a lush, and has begun to throw his talent into the toilet. L ast time we saw Jonah Hill in this series he was playing Matthew the Waiter at the Hawaiian resort, but now we see him here as Aaron Green an employee of the record company. Continuity boo boo a bit but hey, that’s a bit nit picky so I’ll just go on. Green, trying to impress his boss Sergio (P-Diddy), comes up with the idea that for them to spruce up their bottom line, they should have former king of the world rocker Snow perform an epic concert at “The Greek”. The venue in which he launched the greatest album of his career. The problem is since then, Snow has gone off the druggy rocker deep end and is not exactly easy to round up. The 10th anniversary of this epic concert is 3 days away and it’s Aaron’s job to get Snow there.  What we get is some hillariously funny hi-jinx as they go on benders and travel across country leaving chaos in their wake.

   The movie, as a co-worker (We’ll call him Morty) described it best, is a cross between The Hangover and Almost Famous. Crazy things happen under alot of different influences and Aaron is following and trying to help his idol. It’s a real funny movie like Sarah Marshall was, and also has an underlying semblance of heart as well. It kept me rolling basically the whole time. As good as these two guys are the REAL star of the movie was P-Diddy. He was great as a farce of himself and suits inthe record industry. He plays the part with reckless abandon and just gives it his all. His stealing of the show reminds me of how unexpectedly great Tom Cruise was in Tropic Thunder, just hilarious.

Verdict–> I would say get this movie if you liked the comedy of Forgetting Sarah Marshall. It’s funny as hell, and just truely a fun story. Not for the bible beaters out there as there is a ton of sex,drugs and rock n’ roll, in the same fashion that Sarah Marshall had it.  If nothing else grab it from the red box just to see P-Diddy give it his all and crack you up.

Love & Distrust (2010 but not really see below– 94 mins) R. Pattinson, S. Worthington, J. Franco, A. Adams and a host of others…

   Love & Distrust really is just a compilation of 5 short films ranging from 2000 to 2008. I don’t have as much of a problem of the idea of seeing short films as I do the marketing of them as a “movie”. Let’s look at what they even list in the RedBox and on IMDB as the description

   Tale of the passions and perils of love in all its forms. Split into five stories that focus on the lives of a group of beautiful yet troubled twenty-somethings, this film explores the dark heart of romance, the secrets we can never tell and the heartache it can cause. Battling temptation and the pull of seduction, the fight for love can never be easy.

This is fairly laughable as a description. It makes it seem like these short films have some way of intertwining or making sense of each other. Well, they don’t. If you look at this film looking for some way to put them all together to make sense of it you won’t like it at all. A few of these shorties are a bit too short and bit devoid of story, but then a few of them when you get down to what they are, are actually decent. None of them really give you the satisfaction you get of a good feature film tho so the whole thing tends to leave you unsatisfied as a whole. They all look like film students made them and b/c of the amount of star power, as if they called in a  few favors as well. 

Now I say the description they have of the film sucks, but to have a descreption of the shorts in it helps a ton for the enjoyment. It might be spoilerish, so bare with me and skip to the verdict if you don’t want any spoilers.

• The Summer House (2008)- The first short of the film is possibly the worst of the 5 in my mind. It centers around a young french woman in 1969 (T. Riley). She has apparently has been wronged by a boy (Pattinson) and comes to a crossroads when she encounters him at a social party on the night of the moon landing. It’s an ok story but entirely too short and entirely too devoid of a real story.
• Blue Poles (2004)- The second film is also one which takes place in a past time frame. It centers around a young woman who isn’t entirely sure what her life has been through and what it is becominning. It isn’t until she gets a ride from a farm man (Worthington) who writes his observations of her in his diary that she gets an outsider’s prospective of herself. It’s a bit slow and confusing but after digesting it a bit it’s not too bad. This one like a few others might be a bit better on a second watch to take it in again.
• Grasshopper (2006)- Grasshopper is a heady tale of two people who are grasshoppers in their own worlds. Travis (JAmes Franco) is a successful-type traveling businessman who hops from town to town with his only communication being his smart phone. Terri (R. Miner) is hopping in an opposite way. She seems to hop to avoid a past life she would rather leave behind. They intersect on a train when Travis loses his phone and it brings them briefly together. What happens next will change them both. It’s a real heavy tale that will just make you think and make you wonder. I have a hard time really putting my finger on if it’s good or bad, which itself is prob a good thing. It will definitely make you feel something, what that is I will leave for the watcher. To me one of the good shorts here.
• Pennies  (2006)-  In this one, Charlotte (Amy Adams) must come up with an amount of money to a shadowy figure on the other end of the phone for something for her daughter. We don’t initially know what it is, but we know she will stop at nothing, and do anything to make sure she gets the money and see her daughter’s smile again.  It’s a good short a decent story with some good humor involved. Anyone who has waited tables before will recognize and laugh at the characters she encounters while working.
• Auto Motives (2000)- The oldest and one of the better shorts of the bunch is directed by Loraine Bracco, thus it includes some A-listers like James Cameron, Robert DOwney Jr., Michael Imperioli, and Allison Janney. This one moreso then any other makes alot more sense when we learn the whole movie concept. It’s a story of people and how they have, live, and use their cars. If you don’t think about that you think it’s just a random story with random characters doing random things. But if we think about it the way it’s intended we enjoy taking it all in as an interesting take on people and cars.

Verdict—> Being a collection of short stories it’s not for everyone. People who enjoy film making, aspiring actors, and film nuts will like it more then the average person. I also have to repeat that this might be a better watch if you do so more then once. Once you take in the whole beginning to endings of all the different shorts, you will be able to understand/enjoy them better. If you are one of those types I mention above then pick it up you will likely enjoy 3 or more of these, but if you are looking for a good entertainment movie then you won’t like it.

Anyone who has tried to sink a close putt on Wii sports resort golf knows that motion control, well, sucks. Anyone who also has tried to swing the controller like a sword in jousting or Lego Star Wars, also knows it’s clunky at best. I have tried these on multiple machines and multiple set ups of the Wii and all I can conclude is, the gimmick is just that, a gimmick. It’s there for kids to have fun dancing and swinging and having fun while doing it. Don’t get me wrong, my kids do simply love it, but I just don’t like it. I don’t want to be frustrated while I play a game b/c of controllers not picking up motions. This is completely different from the frustrations of learning a game and not being able to do something. The difference is you will eventually know how to play the game and perform correctly, where-as with the motion control it won’t get any better. This is precisely why I prefer my gaming with a real controller with my XBox 360 or my PC. Sure Wii has some games like Super Mario Wii which are just controller based vs motion control which is much better to me, but still not enough of these good games exist. 

The Wii already has made a crap-ton of money in the market being the little kid and family money maker, and the other big 2 (Sony, and Microsoft) want their extra slice of the pie. So here we have XBox Kinect, and PS3 Move coming out now. Both console accessories seem obviously rushed out to benefit off of the holiday madness. They want to make some money, which I cannot really complain about but, they should have  more titles available at launch then the handful they currently both have.

Kinect is the most recent to launch and Microsoft seems to have a bevy of excuses to why some people have had problems getting it to respond at times. The first thing they say is not enough free room in the area and not enough lighting in the area. Apparently they want us to have our consoles in a gymnasium with the lighting of a baseball field. They say for one person you need 3-4 feet of open space around you , and for 2 people you need to double that. So to fully have some fun you need in the neighborhood of 8 feet! of space to play. Who really wants to be moving around furniture to play a game? And if you happen to have an ottoman or a coffee table, have fun moving those things every time you play a game. If people can get it calibrated to work and the lighting is right well then they will likely enjoy not having to have anything in their hands at all to play. I am skeptical as well about the voice recognition in games and such but would love to see this all succeed.  I have no doubt the software to set it all up is good but I think this perifferal is not going to be ideal in the majority of households to be very effective.

As for PS-Move…. It is likely to have a bit more responsiveness in some areas then kinect and also Wii but this is mainly due to the controller. I am sure the bulbs on the end of the controllers are much easier for the eye to see and pick up and you are mainly  being seen by this in the game, even if it’s not completely lit up to the naked eye. LEt’s remember something when I bash Wii, it is afterall nearly 5 years old. Taking the initial product and improving on it isn’t too novel of a concept, but this coupled with an advanced graffical capability could give PS move a leg up on both the Kinect and Wii. (And this is coming from a stubborn Microsoft appologist). Don’t go running out just yet and getting one however, as you will likely have to have 2 of those main controllers for the most complex of the games, and that can rack up the price as well.

All in all, to both of these peripherals, all I can say is 1) I won’t be getting em anytime soon 2) I would either wait to try it at a friends house to make your final decision 3) wait for whichever one to come down in price.

My main point tho, which won’t be received well by most, is the idea of motion control at this time is a formula for disaster. True gamers just don’t care anymore. We don’t want to play the same old sports games or play with cutesy little animals on the screen. We like action games, shooters, rpg’s etc. Sure these companies are looking to cash in with the 300lb soccer mom crowd who already has a Wii Fit gathering dust in the corner in hopes that THIS will finally be the way they can lose weight in 2 mins a day! But like most things give it a week and this will be gathering dust in the corner. What about those of us who already get our exercise the old fashioned way, by actively moving. We don’t want to mix exercise gimmicks with our games. We just want to play the damn games. We want responsive controls, so that when we click a button the zombie blows into a million pieces. We play games to be relaxed on a couch, eyes glued to our target, with eye popping graphics. Please Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft, use the incredible technology available to us now in the world to give us lighter more responsive killer graffical machines with games at a decent price, and stop trying to create a fad. We want thrilling gameplay and intuitive design. Honestly we just don’t need another ping-pong and dance player.

First let me get the record straight on the following. A) I am a Canes season ticket holder and lost my voice after the loss to Pitt the other night b/c of how bad the officiating was in the 3rd period and B) I wore my Islander jersey to the game tonight.

I guess the Canes fans among us can thank me for the win as well. Last week I wore my Canes jersey…Shutout… I wore my Jets jersey Sunday… Shutout. So basically the stage was set for the Isles to get blasted. But don’t blame too much on me since the Canes really were due to break out of the scoring drought. They have too many legit scorers and have been buzzing too much not to have a breakout game.

To look at this games score of 7-2 you would think that “My God DiPietro was baaaddd”. Well not so much. I am not sure I have seen more lack of hustle out of a 5 man unit on the ice as I did for many times the Isles were on the ice tonight. I have to think that only Sutter’s goal where Ricky didn’t pay attention to the puck as he was covering it, was truely his fault.

Let’s recap a bit. Early in the 1st the Isles were out skating the Canes a bit. Even after the lackluster fight between Jay Harrison and Konopka which was stopped pretty quick either b/c they were so close to the boards or b/c Konopka had Harrison’s jersey over his head, neither team really pulled much momentum off this. The Isles had much of the zip until the interference call on Mottau at 7:46 of the 1st. Basically Ruutu slipped the puck past him down the right side and Mottau gave him the usual shove as he was going by and Tuomo fell down. He went down a bit easy if you ask me but the contact was so after the sliding of the puck that the whole call/no call debate could be had. The Canes didn’t score on the pp but they did get some good shots and were flying around the net, as the Isles seemed slow and non caring on the kill. Shortly after the penalty expired Rick pushed the puck out from behind his net and 2 of his own players picked him out of getting back to the crease and he had to dive back in just as Joe Corvo was firing a shot from the point which found it’s way to the back of the net. 1-0.  Five minutes later the Canes had a bang bang play down low where Sergei Samsonov found a streaking Jon Matsumoto who tapped in the nice pass for the 2-0 lead and Matsumoto’s 1st career NHL goal.  This was a pretty lazy goal b/c it wasn’t a 2 on 1 and the defenseman really should have put more of a body on Matsumoto here, so the laziness was just starting… As was the crowd who, after 6 periods of no goals at home just got 2 in five mins, were going crazy.

And then the breakdown begins. With just under 2 mins to play in the 1st period the play was, as usual, in the Isles end and the Canes were cycling the puck on the LW side. The defense for the Isles and the LW on the far side were COMPLETELY asleep. The best player on both of the two teams, Eric Staal, was able to come from the bench and skate all the way down the middle of the ice UNSEEN and Samsonov slid the puck to the high slot and Staal put an absolute ROCKET to the back of the net. The only one who even moved on the play was DiPietro, and he really had 0 shot of making this save. 3-0. The Islanders were dead and buried at this point. They didn’t give a crap and weren’t skating at all, and they still had 40 mins left to play.

In the 2nd period I was getting even more annoyed that the Canes were playing lackadaisical hockey. They were only up 3-0 but they were playing like it was 2 mins left inthe 3rd period. It was annoying b/c you have to stay on the team and push the play. Against the other teams in their own div. the Canes cannot do this or else the teams will make them pay and a winnable game will become an L. However, even more frustrating (if that’s possible) is the point that the Isles cared even less and just let the Canes control the lack of tempo and play their game. Brandon Sutter (son of Isles great and one of my fav all time players Brent Sutter), got on the score sheet next on a play where the puck took a nasty bounce off the back wall onto DiPietro’s pads and he went to cover it but he didn’t even remotely have it covered. It squirted free, Sutter grabbed it and sent it into the twine. 4-0.

The 5th goal was one which should have been waived off completely and ended up being the nail in the coffin. With Sutter coming in on net and banging with a D man he went into DiPietro and he was somewhat able to recover but it was too late as the puck rolled to Jiri Tlusty who found the back of the net. 5-0. Now I don’t want to hear any crap that Sutter was pushed. Push or not he was 10 feet out when he was hit and you have to make an attempt not to contact the goaltender. In the past week I have seen this happen multiple times where the offensive player was CRUSHED into the goalie point blank and he was the one who got the call. Here Sutter had all day to “try” and avoid contact and he just did not. No Goal, bad no call stripes, but when you don’t hustle and can’t get out of your own way sometimes you just don’t get calls like those.

The 3rd period was much more of the same. The only time the Isles actually histled were 1) when they were Short Handed and the Canes were real lax with the puck and 2) on their own PP’s when the Canes looked like they were just trying not to get hurt in a blowout. Rookie sensation Jeff Skinner scored a nice goal onthe PP in the 3rd for the Canes. He broke in on goal and took a good shot which Ricky came up with a quick save but let the puck just sit infront of him and Skinner’s quick hands were able to poke it 5-hole for the nice PP goal.

Both Isles goals inthe period Grabner and Parenteau, were hustle goals. Yes, I used the “H” word. They only happened b/c they sensed the Canes were playing prevent and I think they knew deep down they could get one or two easy goals as well. The blood was still in the water late in the period as time was winding down. Masumoto got another nice pass from Samsonov, and he rifled a one timer top shelf to make it 7-2. Normally, a good goal. Here? Here it was salt in the wounds and piling it on, which is just not done in the game. Less then a min left in the game, and I think he might have been the only guy trying to score on the ice. Rookie mistake, and he might see a few punches to the head by Konopka when the game is up on the island next time.

A few observations.

First this is the type of game that gets coaches fired. The Isles didn’t want to be here, and when you fight for every single point you get you simply cannot have this. The Isles are up the creek anyway with all the injury woes right now so they need to do the little things right, and they just aren’t… might be time for a change.

Second, the Canes defense still sucks. They need to do a few things better. They need to keep the puck in at the blue line better. And second for the love of God HIT SOMEONE. I am sick and tired of this corps being the biggest wusses in the enitre league. Gleason can hit but he doesn’t do it enough and only about 50% of the time tries to clear the crease. Pitkanen (hurt again as usual), has a slight mean streak but that only means he gets a penalty b/c he doesn’t know how to have a mean streak. Corvo isn’t here to hit people just shoot the puck mostly on the PP, so I will kindagive him a pass. Babchuk is the biggest puss of a 6’5″ mam I have ever seen. Harrison, well he blows but he seems to try, but he still can’t and won’t hit anybody hard. And finally the anointed next coming of Coffey by the team, Jaime McBain, needs to be sent down. He needs some confidence and some maturity on the back end. Sure he was great for the 14 or so games last year but he’s just not playing well at all. He’s out of position, coughs up the puck , charging at the complete wrong time.  McBain needs a 10 or so game stint in Charlotte, let him get 5 goals and 10 assists in those games and come back and realize what he needs to do. The extra few months Sutter had in the minors after his initial break in did him wonders, it’s time to try the same thing with McBain.

And finally, I am wondering where Roloson was tonight. Usually at the RBC center the visiting back up goalie will sit right off the ice where the opposing team comes on the ice from the locker room (Just happens to be right below where my seats are). There is enough room for the visiting teams goalie to sit the bench and handle door duity but the majority of teams have them site out here. Anyway, he wasn’t there at all tonight. I didn’t see the pre-game skate so I don’t know if he was there or not. This can be the only reason why Rick came out to play the 3rd period of this laugher. Nothing is written in the recap at all about no backup being available but I will keep an eye on it in the next day or so.

Let’s hope this both helps the Canes get some momentum into this weekend’s home and home vs Fla, and also wakes up the Isles to get off this schneide they are on.

Ok Happy Halloween all. I have had a busy weekend so I am sorry this has been a bit delayed… I have a few posts going up in the next day or so (this one a WoW diary-ish type and a Canes recap from Sat night’s game) so stay tuned!

So today was the day I have been waiting for, Halloween! The main reason is I just love how my daughter gets so into dressing up and loves trick or treating almost as much as she loves to just give OUT the candy. Her brother tho, he has been a bit under the weather so he was not too into it just wanted to be in a bad mood and say how he didn’t want to wear the costume, he not even 2 days ago said he “loved”. But his little touch of a cold has him in a poopy mood so eh life goes on. Oh and she was Sleeping Beauty and he was a Dinosaur. Other then for some reason, there was a lot less kids coming around this year, it was pretty uneventful. But I wanted to share a few observations and minor rants I had tonight.

First, if you are going to go out for candy, parents please make sure your kids have some sort of REAL costume please. It’s not hard to come up with SOMETHING creative, and these days the costumes at the stores really aren’t all that expensive. Sure, some are, but if you look you can do many things on the cheap. I don’t even care if the kids wear the same thing every year, I just don’t want to see your kids wearing their in house baseball uniform that has our town’s name on it. Or wearing their school uniform. SLACK, just simply slack (please spare me the people don’t have money crap, I know these families and know their houses and they have 0 excuse). Ok the next pet peeve of mine, is just being a general greedy cheap person. My meaning of this is the people I saw this evening who were out trick or treating with their kids to other houses but them, themselves had NOTHING on their porch and they did not give out candy! WTF spare the 5$ and get a damn bag of candy to give out. I fully understand if you both want to take your kids out and you leave the bowl on the porch for kids to take one themselves. Sure by the time you get back it will prolly be all gone but hey you tried. I saw this twice tonight. One time the couple was out with their kids and no bowl out and the other the husband STAYED HOME, and he just didn’t answer the door, had the porch light out and gave our jack squat. Um give me an egg or 12 please! (Yes I was part of a group of “those” kids when I was younger.. but we only egged houses of people who deserved it. Not the nice people… you know who you are)

Back to a happier note, the other thing I love is for people to see the pumpkins we carved. I know it’s kinda patting myself on the back or some other bad word for it that is escaping my mind right now, but hey like I have said a million times, I have 0 artistic tallent and I cannot even draw a stick figure! So when I finally get something artistic done that actually looks good, well I like to show it off and love it when people compliment it. It gives ya the warm fuzzies! So it was a ton of warm fuzzies tonight when family after family gushed over the pumpkins we did this year. They especially loved the Yoda one which was one of my fav’s as well.

Friday night my best friend The Redheaded Pharmacist and I carved a few pumpkins and then today Mrs GeekJock did a killer one as well (I’ll have to get that pic uploaded tomorrow not sure where the lovely Mrs. has the camera hidden right now). Bellow is the 3 I did, Yoda, Wolvering and Minnie Mouse. Red did Sleeping Beauty and the kick ass Clone Wars Trooper. I hope you like this year’s batch and hope I can find some good stencils for next year as well. If you know of a good shop or site to find good ones please let me know! Enjoy the pics and if you like them by all means please tell me/us. We all could use the warm fuzzies some more!

Robin Hood (2010— 140 mins) Russell Crowe,Cate Blanchett, M. Strong

   Most of the Robin Hood tales that have been made into movies in the past are those of the band of men robbing the rich giving to the poor, or foiling King John’s rule at every turn. Sure they usually have the little opening sequence where some of the band meet each other, the fight with little John, the meeting of Marion, but it’s usually a tale of their deeds and then unseating the dastardly king and his own band of idiot sheriff and right hand man Godfrey. The difference we see with this years update is that it’s all a prequel. It’s a total backstory of how the legend became an outlaw and how the lands came to hate the new king.

  We do get some of the pieces we want in the back story. The meeting with little John and some other men, and also how Robin meets Marion, but instead of forwarding ahead a few years to when they are in the midst of their deeds this tale keeps going with the back story. It’s a unique take on it and it really keeps us interested. It’s a legend not too unlike that of King Arthur. We know what we have been told in movies and plenty of bedtime tales boys and girls have been told over the ages, but neither man has 100% concrete story to point to as the real man. The writers and director have done some due diligence to get some info and try and base this as much as possible on some historic events and instead of some boring tales of the time period (See the multitude of snoozefest Elizabeth movies), they deliver a cross between a history lesson and Gladiator. Sure the fact that it’s a glorified story wrapped up with some action fight scenes and a pep talk/speech straight out of Gladiator or Braveheart, might turn some people off. BUT NOT ME! I say bring it on Ridley Scott! I want more. I don’t think we have reached our saturation point of these type movies. As long as you give us a great story, and great actors in these type tales then I will continue to enjoy them and shell out my money to see them. I can only hope they can find a way to continue the story after the events of the movie to where we can take what we have learned and bought into as the back story, and give us another well written fun ride into the life of Robin Hood and his band.

Verdict—> It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize the GeekJock was going to like this movie. It’s got a great cast and the source material is awesome. It’s worth the price of admission and if you haven’t seen it go ahead and grab it this weekend!

Leaves of Grass (2009–105mins) Edward Norton, S. Sarandon, Kerri Russell

   This is the lesser known indy of the night. Usually every Red Box night has one of them when we watch 3 movies at work. Leaves of Grass is a funny well written comedy which is a bit all over the place and has elements of the absurd. I tend to think that Tim Blake Nelson was doing an ode to the Coen brothers type of movie b/c the story reminds me of a Fargo quite a bit. Norton plays a pair of twins, one an Ivy league professor, the other a pot growing drug dealer back in their home state of Oklahoma. With a kid on the way the drug dealing brother Brady hatches a scheme to get out of the business for good. He needs his twin brother’s help in the scheme so he tricks him into coming home but home isn’t what he thought it would be.

   Now and then you need a movie like this to break from the norm. We tend to watch a ton of blockbuster action movies and a lot of romantic comedies as well, but sometimes you need some off the main path movies to enjoy. On main gimmick of the movie is Edwarn Norton playing the main characters Bill and Brady Kinkaid. I thought he did a great job playing off himself with the dialogue. Sometimes you see people playing multiple roles in these movies but they just fall flat, and seem like there is the planned pause. Here Norton is able to make it all seem seamless and often fools us into thinking they are really twins. It would be even more seamless if not for some bad film effects which in some scenes just look like norton is infront of a projection screen, the only thing missing is a script in his hand. Of course this is both nit-picking for the fun of it and also could be contributed to the increased quality of TVs these days. The better they get the easier it is to find flaws in some effects.

I like little movies like this that throw rediculous premises at us and then proceed to throw guest cameo’s in there as well. We get Keri Russell,Susan Sarandon and Richard Dreyfuss all in small parts but all putting in good performances here. The thing about indy’s is they might be a bit weird have unusual premises or not the best made movies around, but they always seem to wrap it all up at the end of the movie. They don’t tend to leave us hanging wondering WTF when the end credits are rolling, and that’s a big plus in my book.

   Verdict–> It’s a funny movie with actors doing things you prolly wouldn’t normally think of them doing. (Keri Russell Noodling!) If you like wacky premises and the Fargo type of movie you will like this. If you take things a bit too serious and can’t take ridiculous ideas in movies then it won’t be for you. I do recommend this movie, it’s light on thinking and will make you laugh. If you get a bit uneasy on pot references then be careful, but it’s not a “stoner” movie in the typical sense at all.

Just Wright (2010– 100mins) Queen Latifah, Common

   Just Wright is another romantic film with Queen Latifah which is a heartwarming fantasy tale. Leslie Wright (Latifah) is a physical therapist who ends up getting a pro basketball player as a client whom she subsequently falls in love with. This is another cutsie love story which stars Latifah ( Last Holiday, Valentine’s Day). If that sounds like a bad thing, well it’s really just not. Latifah has a beauty and charm about her that just makes you like her and makes her seem utterly genuine. She pulls off the every woman nicely and the story is predictable but well written. It’s paced nicely but still comes in about 10 mins longer then it’s needed to be. It doesn’t matter much tho b/c it’s still not too long and it’s enjoyable anyway. I am sorry I can’t say much more about the movie, but for a romantic movie it’s straight forward and an easy story to follow.

Verdict–> It might be simple and predictable but it’s a good movie. Another good date movie for a movie night with the Mrs, but if you miss it I am sure we will see it on TNT for the next 1000 years.

Well Blizzcon came to an end on Saturday. Not a whole lot came of Blizzcon as a whole in the area of groundbreaking info. We got some info on changes coming to the 2-D maps for dungeons. We got a cinematic for Worgen (Ill post that below). We also got to see the log in screen for Cataclysm. And outside of WoW we got some updates on Starcraft 2 modes, and the final Diablo 3 class. 

I don;t want to label Blizzcon ’10 as an Epic Fail, b/c I am sure that if you were there you had a blast. Yet, I am glad I am not one of the people who paid to watch it on direct TV and am also glad I didn’t pick this year as the 1st year to go to Blizzcon. Mainly for those people I think it would be a colossal let down. Sure we love to celebrate all things Blizzard but when you look at the past you expect a lot more announcement excitement, and presentation goodness. This is what I have been saying for about 5 months now. If Cataclysm is not released before BLizzcon then we are due for a enormous letdown. And IMHO we got it.

Ok now I am going to get into my final thoughts on the latest patch. The last thing I want to talk about for it is the UI. Blizzard has a long history of being real good at being accepting of mod’s/add ons for the interface. They ALSO have a long history of stealing some of the best ideas in the community and adding there own take on it and putting it into the stock UI. Most players probably don’t remember the days when we didn’t have big yellow ! or ? on the mini map. If you didn’t know where to go for a quest or to turn it in, you had to find it yourself. OR if you didn’t know what those herbs looked like on the ground without the  mini-map you didn’t have a sparkling cloud around them either (sorry that wasn’t a UI thing but hey it wasn’t always there!.. and yes I had to walk 2 miles uphill in the snow to get from IF to SW also!).

Anyway, now we have a great tooltip that pops up as 2 semi circles glowing in the middle of the screen when insta-use skills proc from our talents. Yes, I am sorry I don’t know which add-on this was stolen from but I thank you none the less. Gone are the days when I would say “Crap I missed the words “SLAM” coming up the screen” or before that I missed the icon up on the top which would clue me on the insta-slam. NOW when things proc like Lock-N-Load or Dark Transformation you REALLY cannot miss it. I for one love this b.c as an admitted clicker (for the most part) I tend to look all around or move and sometimes I just miss these procs, and now I just cannot.

The other big change in the UI is the complete overhaul of the character sheet and spell books. These are waaayyy nifty. Everything on your charactersheet is nice and easy and right there with no need for drop downs. Yet, you can drag alot of the panes around in the sheet to keep what you really want to up top. The spells tab rocks mostly b/c it tells you when you need to go see your trainer and also for skills you don’t have it is greyed out and tells you when you will be getting said skill. (And thank God there is no more skill points for weapon skill!!! About damn time).

Yep the patch is here and I love every aspect of it. Like I mentioned Friday, it has totally and completely re-invigorated the game for me and I am hoping this new life keeps it all real fresh until that faithful Dec 7th day. Now I just hope I can get to Target early enough after work to get a collector’s edition since no one has the pre-order for it going on right now. Hope you liked my little views on the Patch and blizzcon I can’t wait for more info on whatever BLizzard is cooking up in there… and one last time I will beg and plead with the peeps at blizz… PLEASE GET DIABLO 3 OUT SOOOOOOONNNNNNNN!!!!!