Predictability Principle

Well, turns out that sometimes I do know what I’m talking about, and my box office predictions were pretty spot-on (save for a $600k difference between “Up” and “My Sister’s Keeper”).

1. The Jazz Singer Transformers 2: The Revengening
2. The Proposal
3. The Hangover
4. Up
5. My Sister’s Keeper

And indeed, “Transformers” grossed over $100m this week ($108.9m to be exact, and a ridiculous total opening gross of $201m), even with the scathing Metacritic average of 36%, and the even more realistic Rotten Tomatoes average of 20%. Needless to say, Transformers, no one likes you! Go away! Even Ebert describes the experience as “unbearable” (which he–of course–nicely contradicts in the same sentence by saying it had a few enjoyable moments), so I mean, really. I do have to correct myself from Friday’s post in that I didn’t read an article right, and I guess the “redneck stereotypes” actually turned out to be “black stereotypes” (complete with gold teeth and hip-hop lingo) in a move that pushes it from ignorance to good ‘ol fashioned racism. Ah, Michael Bay, is there nothing that will stop you from making the most offensive movies ever made?

Michael Bay (pictured above) presumably high-fiving God after blowing $200 million on coke and sunglasses.

“My Sister’s Keeper” (a drama starring Cameron Diaz ala “In Her Shoes”, or, say… “What Happens in Vegas”?) placed a noble 5th opening with $12 or so million, which is nothing if not lucky considering the market into which it was opening. Of course that’s about all the money this movie will make considering that next week we have a new drama to replace it (“Public Enemies”), and the real show-stopper, “Ice Age 3”. Now, the “Ice Age” series may be fucking stupid, but I can’t help wanting it to steal the #1 spot away from “Transformers” only a week after its debut.

I did happen to see two limited-release movies over the weekend though up in Highland Park. One was “Moon”, a sci-fi set on a lunar base in which Sam Rockwell is in charge of mining mysterious lunar materials that will save Earth’s energy crisis. It was director Duncan Jones’ first movie, and sadly this becomes pretty apparent when you notice the awkwardness of his pacing and editing. So yeah, “Moon” borrows heavily from “Space Odyssey” and also tries to delve into the over-stimulated themes of what it means to be sane and what it means to be human. He succeeds to an extent, but ends up falling flat in a lot of areas. I also saw Woody’s new “Whatever Works”, which was, you know, pretty much what I thought it’d be. Without Larry David it would’ve been pretty hard to watch, and sadly the long standing tradition of poor Woody comedies since “Small Time Crooks” continues to hold fast.

Actually probably the best running gag in the movie, if'n ya see it.

Also, apparently the Japanese manga creator of the original “Oldboy” story is suing “Show East” (production company of the original Korean “Oldboy”) to stop development of Steven Spielberg and Will Smith’s upcoming abomination of an adaptation of the original manga. This would be great news if Spielberg actually cared, and apparently production is continuing anyway, despite the gods’ best attempt at thwarting his diabolical plan.

Man, you’d think with as much as I hate movies I wouldn’t talk about them so much. Hm. Anyway, see you guys Wednesday.

Basement Tapes and Campfire Songs

Hey everyone, as promised I’m here bright and early to dust off the registers, draw the blinds up, flip that “CLOSED” sign over and officially declare this Friday post officially open for business.

Truth be told, I’m not actually selling anything, but I suddenly like the idea of “the glass city blog” being some sort of convenience store of the future in which everything is free and somehow related to box office predictions.

BOX OFFICE PREDICTIONS:

1. Year One
2. The Proposal
3. Up
4. The Hangover
5. Whatever Works The Taking of Pelham (1 2 3)

Jesus, that is one ramshackle list and I want you to know right now that I take no credit for how inaccurate it will be, unless of course it’s spot on the money, somehow. “Year One” has been getting an indecent amount of exposure lately, and it seems like a pretty sure bet for the #1 spot. “The Proposal” is that Russian date movie I was talking about on Monday, and considering that there are literally no other date movies out right now (with the exception of whatever “My Life in Ruins” is, and the new zombie Nazi thriller “Dead Snow”) I’m betting that it’ll rank like, #2 I guess, but surely in the top 5 somewhere.

I wasn't joking about that zombie Nazi movie.

Indeed, “Whatever Works” does get released this week on some unannounced amount of screens and if it happens to be playing anywhere around here I might try and catch it, although I am rather tempted to just wait until it goes to the $2 theater by my house. I know, I know, Woody Allen + Larry David in a “dark comedy” originally written in the 60’s for Zero Mostel seems like it all adds up, but Woody hasn’t made a descent comedy since “Small Time Crooks” which was almost a decade ago. And, I actually went to the theater for both “Anything Else” and “Melinda & Melinda”, so I have every right to be wary. On the other hand, he’s been on a sort of roll lately with “Matchpoint”, “Cassandra’s Dream”, and “Vicky Christina Barcelona”. Now, if only any of those were comedies…

I’ve recently uncovered a ridiculous plethora of rare Jeff Tweedy/Wilco tracks that’s kind of blown my mind an overwhelmed me, lately. I should explain that I’ve been on a bit of a Wilco kick lately after hearing their new album (which streets ON A WEEK FROM TUESDAY), “Wilco (the album)” so at some point this week I decided to finally complete my Wilco collection in the same way that I spent ridiculous hours searching for every single song that Uematsu or Bob Dylan or The Decemberists ever had anything to do with. This approach has always been trouble for me, as it becomes a never-ending project that consumes my entire life. At least with Wilco, so far, it’s paid off rather well. I ended up downloading a 60 track collection of every song of theirs that’s ever been featured on a CD single anywhere, and there are some pretty astonishing gems in there including American Folk Music Festival tributes, acoustic live duets with Jay Bennett, demo tracks from early albums like “A.M.” and “Being There”, and a song that the band did immediately after the break with Uncle Tupelo that was their demo to get them signed as a new band. It’s all very intense, but it doesn’t stop there. I also realized that they released a few EPs overseas that no one apparently knows about, so I had to track those down as well. On top of all that, there was an entirely separate 18 track demo album for “Yankee Hotel Foxtrot” aside from the 21 track demo album that already exists. And one for “Summerteeth”, too. And “Mermaid Avenue”.  Goddam. The good news, though, is that (aside from “Summerteeth’s promotional CD single being titled “Summerteeth and Sum Aren’t”) it seems like minus about a half dozen individual songs, I’m about done with all this (which is about what I could say for the aforementioned other artists’ collections as well). I fully realize that only maybe 3 of you out there reading this might be vaguely interested in any of this, but TO THOSE OF YOU WHO ARE, let me know because I’d be more than glad to share these extremely organized and good quality rare tracks with you. Congratulations, you brave, brave three!

The camel's name is Alfred, by the way.

Along those lines, I get to follow along this musically inspired route this weekend where I’ll be playing a solo live show in Rock Cut State Park. It’s part of a mini-tour which I’ve entitled “Woodland Tales & Domestic Ales”. Not really. Anyway, I haven’t quite figured out the tracklist, but I think I’m being paid in appreciation, so, it doesn’t really matter I suppose.  So any of you who haven’t bought tickets don’t worry, they’ll be on sale at the event pretty cheap and there are still some seats available. See your local vendor for details? The venue actually seems rather rustic, so my phone might not even work there and I won’t even be able to hook you up unless you get at me ahead of time.

On a related note, have you seen these commercials for the crazy special one-hour Jon & Kate plus 8? Neither have I, but apparently the media everywhere has been holding their collective breath to see what on earth this special episode that promises a “big announcement” could possibly be. Yeah. I’m hoping for some sort of crossover, like with George Lopez or something (like they did on “Freddy”). Maybe the announcement is that there is A SURPRISE MUSICAL GUEST like U2 or Susan Boyle or something. Boy, that’s gonna be one hell of a show.

The truth is out there.

OK, well that’s it for now. I’ll see you all Monday with the recap.