Mostly because you go to movies like this—and so do I. I love trailers like 300 had going for it. But as much as I’d like to like this film it didn’t quite do it for me. The battle scenes, although compelling at times, were too many and too ridiculous in the end. Yes, the visuals were very compelling (loved ‘em) but the movie was basically lame.

An interesting part about the film was the potrayal of the Persians riding in on their mutant beasts (modern day SUVs?) with slave armies while the God/King was engaged in corrupt hedonistic pleasures. Seemed like a reverse metaphor for the Iraq war—with the Spartans coming off as mostly reasoned and rigtheous. I’m not sure if this was an intentional comment on modern events but it seemed so.

Oh – and the crunch guitar battle scenes were what I was most looking forward to (I’m a sucker for it when well executed) and unfortunately by the time they arrived I was already battle weary and ready for some decent drama to tie the whole thing together. Damn you 300!

I loved this documentary which I saw a couple days ago at 2007 South by Southwest (SXSW). Highlights included Tim Martin (world single jump rope champ) do his thing toward the beginning of the film. Unbelievable! Up to 6 rope revolutions in one jump. The Harlem double dutch teams were incredible, the Japanese teams were even more amazing. And the back story worked well. Loved it.

My brother and sister-in-law recommended this to me and I really enjoyed it. As a documentary it was rough around the edges—and the fellas making it admit that it’s their first movie and when the opportunity came to travel to Tuva they just dropped their day jobs and went for it. The story by itself it interesting, but it’s the wonderfully flawed Paul Pena that makes it a compelling film.

If they’d had a better film crew the Tuvan Throatsing performances could have been much more dramatic and musically affecting, but it’s scrappy and that’s mostly okay in this flick. I also liked the fact that the two biggest claims to fame in the documentary are a 20 second clip of B.B. King talking about Paul and the fact that Paul wrote a “Big Ol’ Jet Airliner” which was eventually covered by Steve Miller Band. The rest is just a story about a mostly forgotten blind blues musician making a trek to Tuva to meet the people who sing from their throats and compete in their annual throatsing competition.

Half the battle with a film like Inland Empire is making it through the film. It’s long. It’s disjointed and for the first hour my brain was jumping back and forth trying to connect characters and plot that aren’t supposed to connect. This can be frustrating and exhausting and also dreamlike. Somewhere between marriage, infidelity, hollywood and rabbits there are themes. I wouldn’t see this movie again, but I’m glad I saw it. I think.

I’ve seen The Cops twice in Seattle. The first time rocked my world. The second (this past weekend) was a respectable show with a crappy house sound system. I look forward to greater shows in the future, but these guys are great. The album pales in comparison with a great Cops live show, but I still enjoy it.

Mostly I just liked the actors and watching it all unfold—it was a fun film to watch.

I recently rented this to lend it to JP—so I spent some downtime (I’ve a cold right now) watching the miniseries over. It’s really a great bit of work. Having watched through the beginning of Season 3, revisting the miniseries shows how carefully the writers setup the plot and character interplay. I think the miniseries may be my favorite part of the entire 3 seasons.

test

The first 30-40 minutes of this documentary was great. Then it petered out. Josh was correct—the filmaker should have treated like a hardcore song: all killer, no filler. If they would have stopped after 35 minutes it would have been perfect.

It’s a delicious, stiff drink. I hereby offer a fresh Manhattan to users who’ve endured our site performance issues this past week. Cheers!