Sunday, November 18, 2007

Comm PSA

If anyone is doing a PSA on anti-smoking, there is a little contest open until December 17th for a 30 second PSA that could air on TV in California:

http://www.beareelhero.com/

The grand prize is a chance to get your work on TV and/or on the web, which is still a great thing.

Tuesday, November 6, 2007

Indiana Jones and that crazy girl

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I just watched my first Indiana Jones movie yesterday - Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. I wasn't the kind of child that enjoyed action flicks... the closest I ever ventured towards the genre was Help! (yeah, being randomly chased around the world is action, too!) and reruns of The Monkees.
All I can say about this movie is that I was terribly disappointed by it. I was already expecting little from it before the play button was pressed: not only was I watching a VHS from 1984, but the movie did come out in 1984, and visual effects were nothing like what we are treated to today. I've also never held George Lucas' work in high esteem, though he is the first to admit that his movies aren't known for having anywhere near engaging dialogue. The character development was extremely shallow.
What most frustrated me about this film was the female lead, Wilhelmina (eww) "Willie" Scott, played by Kate Capshaw. Why did it not surprise me to find that she is currently married to Steven Spielberg, and that this is the film set they met on? All I can say is that I was insulted from the first moment she spoke. She was whiny, bitchy and needy, not to mention incredibly easy. When she's not verbally degrading Dr.Jones ("I'd rather sleep with snakes than with you" - we all know how Indiana hates snakes), she's screaming her head off. Here's the trailer for Temple of Doom -- it gives you a glimpse of her acting prowess:



Sure, women in action films (that is, when they are not a lead character, as in Tomb Raider, or The Mummy) were meant to have roles that amplified the men's heroic actions. Willie truly has no purpose in the film; she is merely a budding actress trying to get her career started by working at an upscale bar (called "Obi-Wan".... get it? oh haha you're so cheeky Mr. Lucas!) in Shanghai who gets tagged along as a hostage by Dr.Jones, whom she nicknames "Indy." As she's taken along for the ride, she only gets worse. Somehow Indiana's clothes fit her perfectly enough that she can parade around in them for several days. At one point, while they are riding elephants through the jungles of India, she pour perfume on the animal... where that bottle came from, I HAVE NO CLUE! She snubs foreign cultures and screams at everything - bugs, snakes, Indy, high speed out-of-control vehicles, human sacrifices - that it totally amazed me that Indy would still want to have sex with her. Never once does she ever paint Indy with praise, with the exception of the last scene in which she smooches his amongst Indian villagers. What's worse is that Short Round, Dr.Jones' sidekick, is never thanked by her either.
It's no wonder that this is the biggest credit (aside from spawning 5 children with Spielberg) to her name. She was shredded in reviews, and the film was banned in India (lucky them). The following is an excerpt of the May 1984 review by Leonard Maltin, in which he gave the film 3 out of 10:
"The leading lady, played by Kate Capshaw, is a silly outmoded, dumbbell stereotype."
If aliens were to find this DVD and base upon it the nature of all human beings, they would find women to be stupid, shrill, powerless and useless (except as sex toys). I'll save for another blog what Indiana Jones teaches us about men.

Saturday, November 3, 2007

Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader - UPDATE!

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Yay!

From theFutonCritic.com:

"On Thursday [11/01/07], two celebrity episodes of ARE YOU SMARTER THAN A 5TH GRADER aired back to back. The 8p telecast [Clay's show] of ARE YOU SMARTER THAN A 5TH GRADER posted its highest delivery among Adults 18-49 and Adults 18-34 so far this season and outperformed its prior season average by +13% among Adults 18-49, +21% among Adults 18-34 and +5% in Total Viewers."

too cool!


From Variety.com:

"Fox was deep in fourth place on the night with a pair of celebrity editions of "Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader" that averaged a 2.5/6 in 18-49, 8.5 million viewers overall. Despite lagging the competition, Fox was the only network to improve upon its performance of a year ago, rising 40% above opening night of the November 2006 sweep (1.5 rating in 18-49) when it finished fifth, behind the CW."

Awesome!

Thursday, November 1, 2007

Check Me Out!

Did you catch me on TV last night?

Yes, it's true! I was in the audience for an episode of "Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?" with guest Clay Aiken, and it aired on Fox earlier tonight! I'll edit this post with screen caps as soon as I get them! I got TONS of airtime! yay! I'm a star, momma!


Whatever Happened to Halloween?

Last night a coworker of mine got me to start thinking... what has the media done to Halloween?

ABC7 ran a story in the afternoon featuring tips on how to keep your child safe while trick-or-treating, not only by making sure you keep a watchful eye on your child (unless you're Britney, you're doing this anyway) and by imposing curfews on convicted sex felons by not allowing them to celebrate the holiday at all.

I'm not saying we shouldn't keep pedophiles from our children, but do we need to be reminded of this? Isn't this a good time for a "no news is good news" mentality? Reporting a story like this is a double edged sword - you're telling the parents that their kids will be safe (yay!), but you're then enlightening them to the fact that there could be a sexual predator ready to steal your little ballerina or power ranger (not yay). This just sucks the unadulterated (no pun intended) fun out of Halloween!

And from razors in the apples... to lead in your teeth! Haven't people learned to just NOT buy anything from China any more? Gee, do you think the company perhaps withheld the recall information until Halloween day on purpose? People don't watch news on holidays (I know I sure don't) and store owners sure as heck didn't have enough time to take these items off the shelves... And it's a well known fact that recalls are voluntary and the products almost always remain in the stores. So now parents have to make sure their kids didn't get poisoned when they should already be making sure they didn't get any new cavities.

Why can't Halloween just be fun anymore? Just dress up! You're a regular person every other day of the year! Can't we let one day exist for a plain ol' good time?

And you know what else I learned? American tradition of Halloween was actually brought to the States by the Irish!

Wednesday, October 31, 2007

It's Halloween!

Imagine if people gave out deep fried Snickers for Halloween?! Yum!


My first entry!

As a class assignment, I'm making a blog! Isn't this grand?