Throughout the 2000s and going back to the ’90s there was a popular soul/R&B type band in Seattle called Maktub. They had a few locally popular albums and performed all the time, I think I saw them open for George Clinton, maybe The Roots or somebody, and most years they’d be at the annual music festival Bumbershoot. Their singer Reggie Watts also had a solo album which had heavy street promotions and won awards for best local album and all that type of thing. They were a tight band and he was a good singer. I never really followed them closely, but it was hard not to run into them occasionally. In fact, I remember one night I was walking home around 2 am (no buses running) and I was waiting to cross at an intersection. A car stopped and waved me across. I looked at the driver and thought well I’ll be damned, that’s Reggie Watts. I guess he’s a nice guy. (read the rest of this shit…)
Local boy made good: Reggie Watts
The Tracker
Kris Kristofferson is… THE TRACKER. He’s like Tommy Lee Jones in THE HUNTED, except this is the Old West so it’s probly both a more common skill set and a more useful one. He’s a guy who can glance at some footprints in the dirt and tell you how many people were there, their size, what kind of horses they had, how long ago it was, possibly their political beliefs and religious backgrounds. There’s a part where he points out where a horse is leaning to the right on every fourth step and that means the rider is holding his gun a certain way which means he’s left handed. (Which I don’t think turned out to be important, it was just showing off I guess.) Man, I couldn’t even tell which one was the fourth step, but this guy’s so used to knowing this shit he thinks it’s easy to explain. His name is Noble Adams and he’s famous enough that the guy he’s after is honored and almost star struck when he finds out who’s tracking him. (read the rest of this shit…)
Freedom Road
Time for a little history lesson. Not about the American post-slavery period known as Reconstruction (which is what this movie is about) but about TV movies. It’s hard for young people to wrap their heads around now, but there was a time when TV movies actually could be big events, a major shared element of our culture. This was when there were only a few channels, and none of them were SyFy, and movies about giant komodo dragons or snakes were not yet common. Believe it or not there were even sometimes TV movies where the people making them actually tried to do a good job. In fact, there were honest to God movies on TV that put some theatrical films to shame, like Spielberg’s DUEL and Carpenter’s SOMEONE’S WATCHING ME. Of course, most of them weren’t as good as that, but alot of them were at least memorable. In the ’70s and ’80s there were true crime movies to creep the shit out of us, like THE HILLSIDE STRANGLERS, THE DELIBERATE STRANGER, I KNOW MY FIRST NAME IS STEVEN. Or if you want to get real frightening there was the nuclear war movie THE DAY AFTER.
1979’s 4-hour mini-series FREEDOM ROAD fits into the Important Historical Epics category like ROOTS or SHOGUN or I WILL FIGHT NO MORE FOREVER or some James A. Michener type shit. It’s about a man who goes from a slave to a soldier to a delegate to an educated black man to a senator and freedom fighter uniting former slaves with lower class whites to stand up against racist politicians and thugs and create a stable life for themselves. But the main reason to watch it is the star: Muhammad Ali. (read the rest of this shit…)
Soul Power
SOUL POWER is kind of like a prequel to a favorite documentary of mine, WHEN WE WERE KINGS. Remember how there was that music festival at the Rumble in the Jungle, it was supposed to be the same week as the fight, but Foreman cut his eye and the fight got delayed? Well, they were shooting footage of the festival too, so here’s a separate movie about that.
The star of the show is James Brown (with mustache). Also on the bill are Bill Withers, The Crusaders, The Spinners, B.B. King, Celia Cruz, Miriam Makeba and some African musicians. The movie shows about 1 song per performer, but it’s also about setting up the show. There is priceless footage of a party held back in the states before they all leave for Zaire, James Brown making a speech and everything. On the plane they’re all singing and playing guitars, drums and flutes. I didn’t notice JB or any of the big icons during these scenes, but it’s still amazing to see a plane full of people having so much fun. Then when they arrive there’s a ceremony set up for their arrival. The highlight is the huge smile on Muhammad Ali’s face when he goes up to shake JB’s hand. (read the rest of this shit…)
Facing Ali
FACING ALI is a great new documentary about Muhammad Ali (out on DVD last week) that tells his story through the eyes of 10 of his opponents. You still get clips of the champ talking, training, fighting, but you hear about these legendary fights from new interviews with the other guys.
Each of them tell a little about their backgrounds, so they have their own interesting stories. Then they tell about the lead up to the fight, what happened, how they felt about it. Some have nothing but respect for Ali, they admire him, even idolize him. Some are still bitter about the way he insulted them, thought he was too mean. But more than one cries when talking about Ali’s Parkinson’s. (read the rest of this shit…)
Normal Life
or NOTHING’S WORTH THIS SHIT
I think NORMAL LIFE is a good movie, but I’d sympathize with somebody for hating it. It’s a true crime story about a husband and wife bankrobbing team, but mostly it’s about their fucked up relationship, and it’s like it drags you into the whole mess when you watch it. It’s about as pleasant and fun as you’d expect from the director of HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER if you didn’t know he’d go on to direct WILD THINGS. (read the rest of this shit…)
Invictus
So Mandela (Morgan Freeman) has just been elected president of South Africa. The headlines ask, “He can get elected – but can he run a country?” Mandela says it’s a legitimate question.
Apartheid ended a few years earlier, but the white Afrikaners still aren’t ready for this. In his first day as president he has to make a speech explaining to the white people in his office that no, contrary to rumors they are not fired. Whatever they did in the past is in the past. If they don’t want to work with him then fine, pack your shit (paraphrase), but otherwise he needs you so stay and do what’s right for the country.
The mistrust goes both ways. Mandela’s head of security (Tony Kgoroge) knows this is gonna be a tough job, but when he asks for more men Mandela gives him a bunch of white South African cops, the enemy of the African National Congress. He has every reason to believe these scary motherfuckers could plan an assassination themselves, but Mandela wants them for their symbolic value. If he goes around with an integrated security team then that says something. What else can he do, really? Somebody’s gotta put their toes in the water. (read the rest of this shit…)
The Mystery of Bearded Harold
Not too many people use Hotmail these days, so I don’t know if any of you guys’ve seen these before, but there are a series of strange ads that show up on the Hotmail pages alot.
The second thing you’ll notice about these ads is their weird tendency to word their sales pitches like propaganda, as if your country is telling you it’s your duty to use whatever their service is. But the first thing you will notice is the crazy ass photos they choose to represent the sort of person they are trying to sell to – i.e. you.
At left is the first one I noticed, and I think you probly have some of the same questions that I do:
What’s up with that? Who is that man with the giant nerd glasses and cartoonish overbite? Why does his face have the waxy look of a caveman dummy at a history museum? Is he organic or digital? Why does his open collar and string necklace suggest a laidback, comfortable surfer dude when his head looks like a hideous monster? Is that a fake nose, and if so is it attached to the glasses? What does he want from us?
I mean, this is weird. Somebody made this ad, and somebody purposely chose that picture to appear on that ad. What were they trying to make us think? Who was he supposed to represent? Is he one of the 9 out of 10 homeowners who fail to take advantage of government refinance plan? I don’t think so. Judging from his smile he must be the tenth guy, the guy who succeeds to take advantage of government refinance plan. That means he’s the person who is supposed to respond to this ad. That means he’s us. He’s how they see us seeing ourselves, isn’t he?
2010
I read somewhere that there’s a movement and websights trying to make sure people pronounce it “twenty ten” and not “two thousand ten” since it will save you ONE GOD DAMN SYLLABLE, and God knows how many crucial twitterings and texts we could spend those extra milliseconds on if we would just call it”twenty ten” every time. I mean, in retrospect maybe if we had been saying “twenty one” instead of “two thousand one” for that whole year maybe we would’ve had time to look into that intelligence briefing about Osama bin Laden determined to carry out attacks inside the United States.
Sorry, I don’t buy it. In protest I will only and always refer to this year by its full Christian name, TWO THOUSAND AND TEN, THE YEAR WE MAKE CONTACT.
Happy New Year everybody.
American Yakuza
“Viggo Mortensen is… AMERICAN YAKUZA.” That’s what it says on the trailer. This is a rare early Viggo lead role and it’s pretty much a straight up action/crime movie. In the tradition of AMERICAN NINJA, AMERICAN KICKBOXER, AMERICAN SAMURAI and AMERICAN BEAUTY, Viggo is an American white guy who earns the trust and acceptance of the Yakuza, complementing their traditions and rituals with his own American spirit. When they drink sake he drinks Bud Light or Wild Turkey. But don’t worry man, he’s cool. I’ll explain. (read the rest of this shit…)
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