XyzzyB - recently

Crazy Itch Radio

2008-05-18T14:40:00Z

Listening to Crazy Itch Radio

Basement Jaxx’s “Crazy Itch Radio” is my latest album obsession. I listen to my obsessed albums (or songs) multiple times per day. This album is following in the footsteps of Elliot Smith’s “Figure 8” and Josh Rouse’s “1972”.

No review for albums, don’t know how to quantify them and if I don’t like it, I don’t listen (a rare occurance given that I left music radio behind a few years ago).

Watched: Iron Man

2008-05-03T03:54:00Z

Watched: Iron Man

Review: 5/5

A most excellent and fantastic film. I say it’s the best Marvel film yet.

Watched: The Forbidden Kingdom

2008-04-19T02:20:00Z

Watched: The Forbidden Kingdom (功夫之王)

Review: 4/5

Not the best martial arts movie I’ve ever seen, but highly enjoyable. This was a movie that did not set out to surprise. We know exactly where it is going and it’s a fun ride to get there.

Watched: Ocean's Thirteen

2008-03-23T03:17:00Z

Watched: Ocean’s Thirteen

Review: 3/5

Pretty decent. Of course it was nowhere near as good as Ocean’s Eleven and not nearly as bad as Ocean’s Twelve. While it was great to see the team back in Vegas and the heist was fun, there just weren’t as many smooth and delicious layers to the puzzle as in Ocean’s Eleven.

Watched: Resident Evil: Extinction

2008-03-23T02:27:00Z

Watched: Resident Evil: Extinction

Review: 2/5

While it does look great on blu-ray, RE:E never comes close to the awesome action of the first Resident Evil movie. It is much better than the second, but that isn’t saying much. There is almost no true zombie action. The big action scene is the rag-tag group fighting domesticated zombies that look like crazed janitors with their matching blue jumpsuits. I guess there wasn’t a budget for zombie costume design.

The rag-tag group are apparently the dumbest people still alive on the planet. Their plan for survival is to drive around the US taking leftover gasoline and food. And not just the US, but the desert southwest! They have no air conditioning, so their vehicles they stay in all day (with the windows up) are just mobile death traps. Are you kidding me? I can only guess that they were hoping to die somewhere warm, but miscalculated.

Many subplots are started then forgotten. There is a pointless exposition about how the Earth has dried up, but then the movie is set in what was already a desert so I’m not sure what the movie is trying to do there.

It is fun to see Alice using her magical powers, but there’s only one really cool scene. Still, at least she used her power for more than knocking over one droid at a time in a totally ineffective manner. Star Wars prequels, I’m looking right at you.

Watched: Semi-Pro

2008-03-01T03:07:00Z

Watched: Semi-Pro

Review: 3/5

It never hit the soaring highs of Anchorman, but this is still a worthy additon to Ferrel’s retro-70s comedy lineup.

Watched: The Eye (US version)

2008-02-03T18:14:00Z

Watched: The Eye (US version)

Review: 1/5

Meh. While I sound like a snob, this was not nearly as compelling as the Chinese original. Instead of the cute relationship between the protagonist and her mildly inept therapist in the original; we have a bitter, sniping relationship between the two in the US version. Why would he risk his license for that? Mexico was an obvious replacement for Thailand, but why (and how?) would the American medical system get the eyes of a girl who died there? The biggest change was the ending, which I won’t spoil here.

Watched: Cloverfield

2008-01-20T02:57:00Z

Watched: Cloverfield

Review: 5/5

Apparently a very polarizing movie. I loved it from start to finish. I surprisingly caught up with the character story, so much that I was actually shocked when the monster action started. The movie really is presented as though filmed from a single camera. The special effects were amazing, most especially for how tightly integrated into the movie they were. It really looked like incredible things were actually being filmed by a hapless guy with a camera. So great! I loved that the camera guy was a character. Some people dismiss this movie outright because of the shaky camera, but it seriously didn’t bother me at all. I was actually expecting it to be worse than it was. There was also some wonderfully surreal intercutting between the monster movie and a film that everything was being recorded over.

Read: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

2008-01-11T15:51:00Z

Read: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Review: 3/5

More interesting than Prince Caspian, but what story still suffers from C.S. Lewis’ writing. Like Prince Caspian the plot is very straightforward and unsurprising. All of the characters are completely flat, although Reepicheep is amusing. Eustace is the only character that changes at all, and he only in a very predictable manner.

Read: The Playboy Book

2008-01-10T15:04:00Z

Read: The Playboy Book: Fifty Years

Review: 4/5

A fascinating retrospective of Playboy from the fifties to the new millennium. Before this book I didn’t know that Playboy has contributed so much to our literary culture. A small list, Playboy: discovered Shel Silverstein; published The Fly, Fahrenheit 451, and much else; published Ron Kovic’s memior Born on the Fourth of July; helped Alex Haley (who was a longtime contributer) compile his widespread research into the epic work Roots; assigned Cameron Crowe to review The Who (which got him his job at Rolling Stone) and later published his Fast Times at Ridgemont High; conducted the last interview with John Lennon.

Unfortunately (in the case of the articles) this book is a pictorial retrospective and so contains pictures of the first page or artwork for the article and a description of it, but not the full text.

Read: The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger Born

2008-01-08T14:12:00Z

Read: The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger Born

Review: 2/5

Beautiful artwork, but the writing and storytelling were unfortunately lacking.

Read: Fight Club

2008-01-01T16:39:00Z

Read: Fight Club

Review: 4/5

Practically an antithesis to Atlas Shrugged. The writing style in Fight Club is much more readable than in Atlas Shrugged, engaging and exciting instead of dry and tedious.

Read: Ramayan 3392 A.D.

2007-12-28T00:57:00Z

Read: Ramayan 3392 A.D.

Review: 5/5

A fantastic retelling of the epic Ramayana set over a thousand years in the future. The story is exactly as it should be from the brooding Rama to the terrible Asuras. Very well done.

Read: The Principles of Beautiful Web Design

2007-12-28T00:27:00Z

Read: The Principles of Beautiful Web Design

Review: 4/5

A great book on the theory of design for webpages. The book covers key design principles for layout, color choice, textures, typography, and imagery.

Finished: Assassin's Creed

2007-12-23T16:56:00Z

Finished: Assassin’s Creed

Review: 4/5

Absolutely superb graphics. The game world is fully realized with three sprawling cities (Acre, Damascus, and Jerusalem) as well as miles and miles of connecting countryside (explored on horseback!) in the year AD 1191. With each cities tumultuous streets packed with citizens going about their business (giving loud speeches against this or that public figure, hawking wares, carrying goods, begging for money, etc.) the game does a great job of creating the illusion that the game world doesn’t revolve around the player/character. You truly feel as though you are an intruding outsider, a sword in the crowd waiting for the chance to strike. The assassinations are tense and exciting but for me the true fun is the exploration of the vast game environments.