Roger misses Don.
Betty misses her sandwich.
Harsh stipulations.
Category Archives: Haiku
Haiku: Mad Men, Season 7, Episodes 1 & 2 – “Time Zones” & “A Day’s Work”
I totally forgot about these until the second week. We missed you, Mad Men.
Time Zones
Joan versus in-house.
Peggy on the floor, in tears.
Don via Freddie.
A Day’s Work
Peggy’s sitcom rose.
Dawn and Joan’s musical chairs.
Sally’s Lou surprise.
Punisher Grandpa, Killer Drive
 |
Punisher: War Zone (2008)
Bad guys, you’ve been warned. Guns, guns, and more guns! Jimmy McNulty sports an even worse accent than his Baltimore one, but it’s all in good, violent fun. His brother “Loony Bins Jim” is just as hilariously bent. The Punisher actor reminds me of a handsomer and younger version of Mr. Bates from Downton Abbey, and the widower is a Kate Beckinsale knockoff. The movie is supposed to take place in NYC, but they do a pretty terrible job of faking it; it was actually shot in Toronto. Recommended. |
 |
Jackass Presents Bad Grandpa (2013)
Spike won the Oscar Yes, it’s stupid and crass and sophomoric to the nth degree, but I haven’t laughed this hard in years, possibly decades, and it couldn’t have come at a better time. The boy who plays the grandson should get a movie of his own — he’s talented way beyond his years. Highly recommended. |
 |
Killer Joe (2011)
After watching this Thank goodness for Thomas Haden Church, who provides the much needed humor to lighten up this super nasty movie. I don’t quite get why this film was so lauded — it’s not really anything special. McConaughey is nutso, but it’s not anything we haven’t seen before (i.e., Gary Oldman in The Professional, Michael Madsen in Reservoir Dogs, etc.). Not recommended. |
 |
Mulholland Dr. (2001)
Betty or Diane I’ve been meaning to see this film for almost a decade, and wow, was it worth the wait. Lo and behold, the movie works completely within the framework of Lynch’s weirdness! The Straight Story is the movie most people mention when they talk about Lynch and accessibility, and it’s true, the title of that movie describes it in more ways than one. But the reason why Mulholland Dr. is such a career triumph is because all of the things that make Lynch’s movies Lynchian — weird-ass angles, the threat of terrifying wackiness at any moment, dwarves and identity-shifting and lounge singers and red lampshades — they’re here, and they actually contribute both thematically and narratively to the movie. Massive kudos to Naomi Watts — no wonder the studios took notice after this. Still, I’d be amiss if I didn’t mention that there are still some pretty far out-there scenes here. But also absolutely hilarious ones — the one that involves a large woman and a vacuum cleaner is maybe the funniest thing Lynch has ever done. I do hope he gets back to making feature films. Highly recommended, but with a caveat: I’m continuing to write this mini-review after spending a rather restless night of sleep. Lynch’s movies have a way of burrowing into your brain like nothing else, so do yourself a favor and watch this either on a Friday or a Saturday night, so you’ll have time to recover. One last thing, and something probably so obvious that it doesn’t need a mention, but…a beautiful woman is so much more interesting to look at on screen than a handsome man, no? Maybe it’s just my hetero-male bias, but I don’t think so. I believe there are many studies that have suggested that women also would rather look at other women than men, and who can blame them? Women can glam up like no man can (minus Jared Leto?), and it’s such a visual advantage. One of the reasons why Mulholland Dr. makes such an impression is because you just can’t take your eyes off either of the leads. So when Lynch juxtaposes their great beauty against his unsettling ugliness, the effect on both sides is that much stronger. |
The Saga of The Shield
If you have never seen The Shield, which ran from 2002 to 2008 on FX, and you have plans to see it at some future point, then I’d highly recommend skipping the rest of this post and not waiting another day. Fire up your Amazon Prime or Netflix or just plain ol’ DVDs and plunk yourself into the world of the Strike Team, Byz Lats, and vending machine machinations.
Mackey has done worse
with or without the Strike Team:
Shane, Lem, and Ronnie.
“Good cop and bad cop left for the day; I’m a different kind of cop.” – Vic Mackey
And this is a different kind of a cop show. There are 90 episodes to The Shield, and without commercials, they each run about 45 minutes long. So that’s 67.5 hours of television. Seems like binging TV shows has become the new in-thing to do, but binging my wife and I did not do. I think we started in October last year and tried to see an episode or two a night. With the holidays and Oscar-nominated movies to watch, our steady Shield viewership took a vacation in December and January, but there was no stopping us this month. We blew through the final two seasons in February, and boy, were they ever worth it.
I think the most impressive thing about The Shield is how the shocking event in the very first episode reverberates throughout its entire run. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a show that did this. Usually episodic television runs in cycles of seasons — the two shows that The Shield is most compared to, The Sopranos and The Wire, both ran this way, especially The Wire (Avon/Stringer, stevedores, Avon/Stringer, kids, newspaper). In short, The Shield held its characters terribly accountable, and each paid for it.
The Shield is a highly entertaining series and I have no problems recommending it, but as a whole, I feel it is less than either of those aforementioned shows. I have two theories why. One: we know so little about the characters in The Shield outside of the present timeframe. Even Vic, with whom we see his home life and his extracurricular activities, there’s no real room in the plot-heavy story structure for him to reflect on anything. Vic is like a machine, bouncing from arrests to kills to betrayals. This is in stark contrast to Tony Soprano, whom we feel like we know intimately through his sessions with Dr. Melfi and those funky dream sequences. And two: The Shield only deals with the side of the law. With The Wire, we spent as much time with Avon Barksdale and Stringer Bell as we did with Jimmy McNulty and Bunk (even if we actually didn’t, it certainly felt like it). So the world that David Simon and Ed Burns created feels more complete and richer.
Again, this is not really a knock against The Shield, because it never purported to be anything more than what it was. Just like what we recently witnessed in the Winter Olympics Women’s Figure Skating finale, there are skaters who attempt to gain more points by making more jumps (not a fan of this, but alas, that’s for another day and another post). The Sopranos and The Wire went for more points and landed them, while The Shield was content at expertly executing its more limited maneuvers.
One thing I’ll never understand is how Walton Goggins, who plays Shane, was never nominated for a Golden Globe or an Emmy for his work on this show. From season five and onward, he was the shining star of this tragic drama.
Incidentally, there’s a great essay that came out this past Sunday in the Times that talks about whether TV is the new novel. Worth a read.
Haikus & Reviews: Blue Jasmine, Enough Said, All Is Lost, Her, Captain Phillips, Wolf of Wall Street, Pitch Black
The 2014 Golden Globes are about to start. Many movies were seen in the last few days…
Blue Jasmine
Queen, Elf, Bob Dylan
Here as a Madoffed Blanche, she
shines in delusion.
Cate Blanchett is so good in this movie that she makes everybody else in every movie ever made an amateur. Yeah, I know, it’s a bit much of a compliment, but lord, this is a performance to behold. Blanchett is a magician without any tricks. She actually gets us to root for this sad, bewildered sack of a woman! Sandra Bullock will probably win the Best Actress Oscar, but we all know who did the best work this year.
Enough Said
Three’s-Company-like
plot hinders this fine movie
but Jim saves the day.
Who knew that Gandolifini could play such a soft, warm-hearted character? He’s a revelation, and now he’s gone.
All Is Lost
Man lost on a boat
Silent, stark, meditative
Could have used Wilson…?
There have been comparisons of this movie to Gravity, which I can sort of see, but the biggest failing of this film is that we don’t know why the Redford character does what he does to save his ship. For example, there’s a sequence when the boat encounters a storm that he fights his way to the top of the boat with something in his hand. Why is he out there, and what is he trying to accomplish? Because we don’t understand, we’re not as emotionally involved as we could be. In Cast Away, Tom Hanks had Wilson the volleyball to talk to, which seemed a bit silly in the beginning, but it strengthened our connection with him because we had better access to his thoughts.
Her
It’s a movie that
shows a lot more than it tells
yet I feel nothing.
I was really looking forward to seeing this, so the depth of my disappointment was pretty severe. It’s a gorgeously shot film, with set design that should pick up some gilded hardware, but I just couldn’t feel what Joaquin Phoenix’s character was feeling at all. And the whole conceit of the movie was lost on me. Why would anyone want an operating system that didn’t want to work? What happens in the end — do the users get a refund? Was any of this stated in the EULA? Perhaps it’s because I’m too much of a techie, but the sci-fi concepts felt so rudimentary that it got in the way. And the silent scenes of Theodore’s memory of his ex-wife and their past became a bit too precious as the film went on.
Captain Phillips
Tom’s Boston accent
Pirate’s American dreams
Dizzy hand-held cam
I like my camera to stay steady, so I’m never a fan of the hand held, but it’s a solid movie. You won’t be disappointed.
Wolf of Wall Street
Greed is very good
for Jordan/Stratton Oakmont
until it isn’t.
Last year, Leo was Gatsby in Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby. I didn’t think it would be possible for him to star in a film that was even more gaudy and excessive than that one, but here it is. He’s great in it, of course, and so is Jonah Hill. The movie probably could’ve been an hour shorter, but there are plenty of laughs.
Pitch Black
Extra Cheesy B
with a side of Diesel beef.
In Riddick we trust.
Not Golden Globes related! This is a film I’ve been meaning to see for years. Yes, the effects are now incredibly cheesy. They were probably sufficiently cheesy even back in 2000. But Vin Diesel is excellent as Riddick, and really, he’s not a bad actor at all. And Rahda Mitchell — I didn’t even know she was in it. This movie is not going to impress you in any way, but it knows what it is and delivers two hours of entertainment.
Haikus and Reviews: Saving Mr. Banks, American Hustle, 12 Years a Slave
Cinema award season is upon us, which means there are lots of good movies to watch — supposedly. Here are three I recently saw.
 |
Saving Mr. Banks Colin Farrell is Emma Thompson and Tom Hanks are both excellent, but that’s par for the course. The film cuts back and forth between the present and P.L. Travers’ childhood, and the transitions are pretty rough in the beginning. They get better as the movie progresses, but the film does not. |
 |
American Hustle epic comb-over Outside of Christian Bale, everyone was overacting in this film. The movie isn’t convoluted, but it feels convoluted. The last fifteen minutes is fun, but it does not excuse what has come before it. Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised at the massive critical love for American Hustle, since it features many fine actors and a director recently feted, but the fact is, it’s just not that good. |
 |
12 Years a Slave This is not a film. I’ve been a fan of Chiwetel Ejiofor since Dirty Pretty Things, and this is a fantastic showcase of his talents. But this is just a grinder of a movie, with one agonizing scene after another. Of course this is the way it should be, since we’re dealing with the very bleak subject of slavery in its most unfiltered form, but if there was any way to inject humor (just a bit here or there), it would’ve gone a long, long way. Be on the lookout for Amish Brad Pitt. |
Haiku and Review: Prisoners and Seven Psychopaths
 |
Two girls go missing |
I’ve read a couple of reviews for this film, and one thing I find strange is that most critics think that the police officer played by Jake Gyllenhaal is the only one in the precinct with brains. I beg to differ — I think he’s just as incompetent as the rest of the uniforms. He grills Paul Dano’s character for hours on end to no avail, and it takes Hugh Jackman literally 10 seconds to get him to talk? And Jackman also finds the killer before Gyllenhaal does.
And by the way, I feel bad for Dano. Seems like every movie, he gets the crap beaten out of him (or worse). It’s like he’s the Jesse Pinkman of the big screen.
 |
Film about a film |
I had high hopes going into this movie, because I adored In Bruges. This film had its moments, but it really isn’t very good. I wished I’d seen The Player again instead.
Haiku and Review: Before Midnight
Jesse and Celine
walk and talk and…fight and cry?
Next: Before Divorce.
A date movie this is not. Look out, really. If you and your significant other are having some difficulty in your relationship, I’d say steer clear of this movie, because it might be enough to doom you. The first of this series of films was without question one of the most romantic ever made. The second one wasn’t so far off, especially with that cute and promising ending. But this one? Midnight has never been a darker time of night.
Don’t get me wrong. It’s a fine flick all around, but unlike Before Sunset, there’s not enough lift at the end, at least not for me. Sure, Jesse and Celine make up, and there is hope and humor in that final scene, but it can’t balance out the awful things they’ve said to each other for the last hour and a half. I know that’s the point, that these two are now in the mature/spiteful part of their relationship and it is a mighty struggle to stay together, but jeez, I almost don’t want to see what happens to them in the next installment.
Haiku and Review: Gravity
Yes, an astronaut…
In dreams I walked on the moon.
After this, no thanks.
You don’t watch Gravity — you experience it. Much of this is because of the way it is filmed — every so often, the camera gradually moves away from the usual third-person perspective and into first-person territory. Our intrepid avatar is Sandra Bullock, playing a scientist trying to fix the Hubble Telescope with George Clooney…until all hell breaks loose. And when I say “hell” and “breaks loose,” I really mean it.
How wonderful it is to see a film set in space with no aliens or time travel or Sherlock Holmes–channeling–Mr. Roarke type of nonsense. Gravity is a movie that must be seen in the theater, in 3D. It’s an adventure of both mind and body, and it left me supremely satisfied. I haven’t been this happy after seeing a movie in a long, long time.
Haiku: Breaking Bad, Season 5, Episode 16 – Felina
Please, just get him home.
Walt must end what he started.
Let blue and red fade.
*
A pair of red dots
turns Elliott and Gretchen
into White trustees.
*
It’s Tuesday morning.
Lydia, my Stevia…
goodbye, fake sweetness.
*
Not for family
but for Walt himself, always.
He was good at it.
*
Walt says he wants this.
Jesse says do it yourself.
Time to walk the walk.