Posts tagged “entertainment”

A musical retelling of *A Midsummer Night's Dream* about a gay boy with a potion that turns people gay. Singing, dancing, hot boys in glitter pants. It's my perfect film and I can't find it playing anywhere, not even in San Francisco.

Television isn't dying, it's fading like radio did before it. The real problem is that TV as a delivery mechanism is obsolete: no on-demand, no two-way feedback, no personalization. Bandwidth won't save cable companies. The future is one internet-connected box in the living room, probably built by Sony.

I'm late to the party, but What Would Tyler Durden Do is the funniest celebrity gossip site on the internet. It's to gossip what The Daily Show is to news.

Adorable, clueless, and pretty: Kyle XY is Smallville minus the kryptonite nonsense, plus plenty of homoeroticism. Perfect brain-off TV. I burned through all of season 1 in four days and I'm ready for season 2 tomorrow.

Two Dr. Tran videos that have been cracking me up lately. Watch them both.

Watching the Oscars on the West Coast with a room full of competitive gay men is basically Eurovision without the voting. Highlights: Beyonce's barely concealed fury, the three-way diva-off, too much Jack Nicholson, and Forest Whitaker's inexplicably hot wife. Also, my back is finally better.

Saw The Host, a Korean monster movie with a refreshingly unsentimental take on the genre. Great creature, oddly political plot, and a realistic portrayal of how people would actually respond to a giant monster. More black humor than schmaltz. Worth seeing.

Five months of hype vindicated: Snakes on a Plane is gloriously, unapologetically awesome. Samuel L. Jackson, snakes, a plane, B-movie clichés cranked to 11. Go see it.

Snakes on a Plane opens today! I can't see it until tomorrow, but I'm excited nonetheless. Snakes on a Plaaaaaaaaaane!

The *Snakes on a Plane* music video is here, complete with an original song literally about snakes on a plane and a Samuel L. Jackson cameo. This meme shows no signs of stopping.

Samuel L. Jackson predicts Snakes on a Plane wins Best Movie at the MTV Awards. Who am I to disagree? He's Samuel L. Jackson. I am nobody.

X3 opens Friday and I'm seeing it opening day at Vue Leicester Square, evening showing. 8 tickets booked for the 7:30pm show. Text me or comment if you want in.

Snakes on a Plane is five months from release and already a cult phenomenon. The trailer is everything I hoped for, including Samuel L. Jackson loading a gun mid-sentence. It's going to be magnificent.

Roller Disco is the greatest thing to happen to Thursday nights. I didn't get it until I tried it myself, but now I'm sold. So sold, in fact, that it's where I'm having my next birthday party.

Season 2 of Beauty and the Geek is back and I'm hooked. Equal parts hilarious and genuinely sweet, with great one-liners flying in the first few minutes. Less annoying host this season too.

Brokeback Mountain was well-acted and believable but ultimately boring. I think I just don't care about ordinary people in fiction. Give me science fiction. Real or fake, mundane people and their mundane problems don't interest me, and I make no apologies for that.

A massive fuel depot explosion rattled our windows at 6am, leaving a huge smoke cloud drifting over the house all day. Also saw the Jon Stewart show (disappointing), have a cold, and am possibly overdosing on mince pies. West Wing season 6 is keeping me up past my bedtime.

Inflation-adjusted, Cleopatra (1963) cost more than King Kong. And Kong isn't even the priciest recent film -- Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire cost $308m, more than all three Lord of the Rings combined. None of which diminishes my desire to see the giant monkey movie.

Keira Knightley had an early role as Queen Amidala's decoy in Star Wars Episode One. The makeup was so convincing that nobody recognized her.

It's freezing, I'm settling into Yahoo!, and my new boss returns next week to shake things up again. Send me somewhere warm. Currently reading the Economist, playing with Konfabulator, and stressing about Christmas gifts.

Jon Stewart is coming to London on the 11th. I've grabbed 4 tickets for the 7pm show, but they're all spoken for now. Call 0870 850 9176 to get your own.

Davina McCall might enter the Celebrity Big Brother house. This would be completely amazing, obviously.

Small crowd, loud music, 10 feet from the band. Perfect gig.

Loved the Burton visuals, hated the saccharine family subplot they grafted onto Dahl's perfectly subversive story. The oompa-loompas were brilliant, even the songs weren't cringe-inducing, and thank god they ditched the orange skin and green hair. And Gene Wilder. Did I mention Gene Wilder?

Sexy, fun, and surprisingly cliche-free despite being both an action movie and a romantic comedy. Brad is hot, Angelina is hotter, and the whole thing feels deliciously naughty. Two thumbs up for pure fun.

I never watched Doctor Who growing up in Trinidad, but I've caught up now and realize it's not really sci-fi. It's a comic book: mysterious villains, cliffhangers, continuity obsession, and characters who die only to return more powerful. That finale was pure Phoenix. I'm hooked.

Saw *As You Like It* at the Wyndham with A. Beautifully spoken Shakespeare, 1920s costumes, folk songs and big-band numbers, slapstick, and unsubtle innuendo. Theatre at its best: unpretentious, slightly silly, a little dirty, and entirely fun.

Saw Derren Brown live. Entertaining but too obviously trickery for my taste. Also my eyes went severely cross-eyed for half an hour tonight, followed by a headache from hell. If I die of a stroke tomorrow, you've been warned.

Looking for people to see Revenge of the Sith with me. Reviews are good and I suspect it's worth multiple viewings. Who's in?

A quick list of life's recent highlights: iPod everywhere, new washing machine, dinner, cuddles, good flatmates, National Theatre plays (especially the gloriously self-referential ones), tea, and sleep.

Hollywood's shit-dial is cranked to 11 this summer with terrible team sports movies and a Lindsay Lohan Herbie reboot. At least Fantastic Four looks promising.

Give me your top five artists or bands you're loving right now.

I got an advance copy of the new Doctor Who. The first 20 minutes are rough, but it redeems itself spectacularly. Eccleston is brilliant, Davies' writing is sharp, and Billie Piper actually acts. It's quintessentially British, low on FX but high on character. Consider me a total fanboy.

Went to the dogs at Walthamstow for a friend's birthday. Thought we'd be in the posh enclosure. We weren't. Instead: frozen scampi, 1970s decor, and wall-to-wall Essex. Never again.

I'm Stewie. Obviously.

Saw "By the Bog of Cats" tonight. Excellent, though the Irish accents sapped the lead's energy and her madness came across as stupidity rather than derangement. Still, she was really hot, so that helped.

Gwen Stefani's debut solo album is out. Go get it immediately. Review coming soon.

Saw a revived Noel Coward play this week with friends. Amusingly, we nearly walked out at the end of the second act thinking it was over. Mortified, we grabbed ice cream and returned for the actual finale, which was much better.

Stunning visuals and Angelina Jolie in an eye patch, but it never surprised me the way I hoped it would. I'd over-hyped it to myself. Too ill with London's communal cold to say more.

Smalltime Smallville season premiere recap, line by line. Naked Clark, flying effects, cheesy dialogue, questionable plot holes, and Lois Lane's hair color all get the treatment. Overall B+ mainly for the flying. May do this every episode. It's too much fun not to.

Good popcorn movie with excellent gothic effects and surprisingly decent acting and dialogue. The plot is predictable and fumbles its climax, but the dark mythology is nicely fleshed out and there are some genuinely giggle-worthy moments. Go in with low expectations.

I've been obsessing over this boyband cover of Def Leppard's "Pour Some Sugar on Me." It's either brilliantly layered parody -- hairbands inside boybands inside a TV set, Beatles costumes and Hey Mickey references -- or it's just terrible. I've watched it three times and still can't decide. Neither can you, now.

I took a quiz. I'm Raver Bear. Nobody's shocked.

A scattered collection of links: Reagan trivia, Transformers motion capture, censored album art, Murphy's Laws, the new Superman, a blog-themed song parody, TiVo for radio, and more Reagan-adjacent oddities than you can shake a stick at.

Manic week: saw the brilliant Ben Wishaw in Hamlet, attended the London blogger meetup, finally stalked Tom in person, caught a glimpse of Cory Doctorow, and watched Eternal Sunshine. Also something mysterious happened Monday. More soon, maybe.

Ignore the terrible reviews. Van Helsing is a gloriously over-the-top monster movie that never pretends to be anything else. Great effects, genuine surprises, good acting (mostly), intentional and unintentional humor, and obscure B-movie references. Leave realism at the door and you'll love it.

Got my DVD copy of Camp this morning. Awwww yeah.

A massive backlog of links covering Rice's testimony fact-checks, movie trailers, gay rights, crime math, the Sheikh Yassin moral tangle, London's skyline, and a one-legged DDR player. Something for everyone.

Filthy link dump: cars with cheat codes, bunnies re-enacting The Exorcist, Mars rovers on LiveJournal, a talking vibrating Hello Kitty USB hub, and more. The iGrill may be humanity's greatest achievement.

I get all my movie news from Apple's trailer site. Trailer editing is an unsung art form, and judging by how entertaining even the obvious bombs are, my attention span may be shot. Here are my five-words-or-less reviews of upcoming releases, based solely on their trailers.

A fun weekend with Mikey yields scattered observations: Popstarz good, O'Neill's not Irish, Tate Britain Turner-heavy but decent, Lord of the Rings would be shorter with mobile phones, Paycheck entertaining, London movie prices absurd, and Mary lives impossibly far from Central London.

Vacation countdown to Trinidad sunshine, plus links: Hitler vs. Bob the Angry Flower, global dimming, gay romance comics, the gorgeous Sky Captain trailer, cheap web hosting, and IT graduates still royally screwed.

Saw Return of the King. It was incredible. Go. Now.

Sick with a cold, so here's a raw link dump: BBC was least impartial on Iraq war coverage, a cool snowflake builder, Peter Jackson confirmed for The Hobbit, Defective Yeti's packing peanut baby quote, and my Smallville fixation that's definitely not about Lex and Clark's tension.

A brain dump of half-formed thoughts: UI is the only problem that matters, the internet isn't evil, Wal-Mart is, apples and oranges are totally comparable, and someone please remind me to download the Postal Service.

A guy greased his shoes with butter, and the BBC is running topical limericks. The internet remains a strange and wonderful place.

I watched the Smallville season premiere and have many, many plot hole complaints. But let's be honest: I watch it for Tom Welling, who appears to be trending increasingly shirtless. No complaints there.

TV looks terrible this fall, but at least Smallville is back October 1st. Small victories.

Shamelessly noting Madonna's kiss with Britney and Christina for the publicity stunt it is, while admitting the Google traffic won't hurt either.

Catching shows at the Edinburgh Fringe: a mixed bag of musical comedy, sketch shows, pretentious Americans, a brilliant Guards! Guards! adaptation, and a stoned stand-up who kept losing his train of thought. Terry Pratchett gets five stars; know the books first.

TheFunny.Org is hit or miss, but this TATU parody ("I'm a lesbian, she's a lesbian...") is worth a listen despite the terrible singing. Also check out the Super Mario theme on classical piano, complete with underground music and the frantic speed-up at the end.

Jewel's back with "Intuition," a catchy, danceable pop song that's a welcome change from her meandering hippy phase. The video cleverly plays commercial sellout for laughs, contrasting "real" camcorder footage with glossy video world. She wimps out a little, but it's fun and self-aware. Go download it.

Michael Jackson isn't a paedophile, just profoundly broken about childhood. But after settling a lawsuit for £18.5 million, doing it again is both unbelievable and sad. He needs to grow up, but he's too rich for anyone to tell him that.

Two links worth your time: an alarm clock that can literally kill you, and a chance to take out Barney and the Teletubbies in surprisingly slick flash animation.

The Harry Potter Nimbus 2000 toy broomstick vibrates. You stick it between your legs. The Amazon reviews are priceless. Also, I scored 0/10 on the BBC culture quiz, so there's that.

Two fun links: ogle attractive men at MostBeautifulMan (feminism!), and check out Fark's hilarious photoshops of legalized weed advertising. Plus, automated shopping carts are coming to replace cheap labor. The weed.com/switch campaign is my favorite.

Celebdaq is a BBC celebrity stock market game where you trade fake money on famous people's fame. It's totally addictive. Start with £10,000, win £100 real money weekly. Play now and buy Beckham.

The Dow is my favorite spectator sport right now. Will it crash or rocket skyward today? Either way, the breathless financial coverage is pure entertainment. Also: check out Typorganism's ASCII art generator. Upload your face, see yourself in print.

2 exams down, 9 to go, and my brain has checked out. HCI is mind-numbing. Martian FM is the opposite: brilliant. Cowboys, Big Brother lookalikes, shoot-outs over plastering disputes. These people are wonderful.

Highlights from the Scientific American Web Awards: Living Internet is a fantastic resource for internet newbies, ALICE the AI bot is surprisingly lifelike, there's a cool X-Men retrospective gallery, and Schedler Shebeen offers jokes and viral clips galore.

Sharing a grab-bag of links: Sanskrit lyrics to Duel of the Fates, Ken Perlin's cool HCI Java applets, Edgar Rice Burroughs' Martian Tales, and updates on Charlie Hunnam post-Queer as Folk. Undeclared is awful but he's cute, and the US QAF is enjoyably Americanized fluff.

Memepool led me to Sam the goat, who dies repeatedly. Also: go see Lord of the Rings, then check out the Orlando Bloom fan site. Bring a drool bucket.

George Harrison's death is sad, but front page news? With a war on? News outlets have forgotten their responsibility: instead of reporting what matters, they manufacture importance, and readers let them. That's dangerous.

Pig Brother is Big Brother but with actual pigs in a luxury sty, streaming 24/7. I'm voting for Widdecombe. Also, a strange German person linked to me, so here's my reciprocal link. Long live internet back-patting.

Boxing's pre-fight theatrics are embarrassing enough, but the homophobic trash talk is worse. Not that it matters -- I don't care about boxing anyway.

Hooked on Big Brother again, only seven days in and already despising most of the housemates. My revision is suffering, but Channel Four has done it again.