UP PERISCOPE!

I was asked again the other day about the status of my blog.  My computer is being fixed and hopefully will be back on my lap soon.

Something about a video card.  Yes.

Much has happened since I last posted something:  My good friend Greg Woods has gotten his blogging groove back -- so good to see.  His treatise treats are always fun to nibble on.  Greg's knowledge of off-the-path or 'obscure' cinema is impeccable.  As a matter of fact, he taped his first few installments (live-to-tape) of ESR Late Nite.  I look forward to this one.  Not since Julian Grant and Rogers Cable 10 has Toronto had a like show.  (Check out Greg's blog at www.screening-room.blogspot.com for more details.)

Another happening in my life is the fact that I have yet again another, different job; one in the video biz, but nothing exciting to write home about.  Some of us are caught endlessly in the vortex of what trivial Film & TV jobs there are in this town.  If you know what buttons to push on any given video machine then, well, there is a job for you/us.  Oh, the excitement is overpowering.  The good news is, people like Greg Woods are giving it their shot.  An attempt to break the vicious cycle of the mundane Toronto -- broken and all but non existent -- video machine.  (As Greg can tell you, it ain't what you know in this town, it's what you look like and how little you know so you do not threaten anyone.)

Hey, this feels good... have to do it more often.

A BORROWED COMPUTING DEVICE

As per my posting from mere seconds ago, my current blog comments are being keyed into a friend's lovely laptop computer. I gotta get one of these devices.

"Tim, I've been using, and very much like, yur computair sis-tem."

APOLOGIES AND EXCUSES

Hello faithful readers. Within a couple a days I received a flurry of questions asking what happened to my (highly entertaining) blog. I have a couple of good excuses: First of all, I have been busier these last few weeks than at possibly any other time in my many years on Sol 3. Also, my computer decided to go on the blink. The computer problem can be fixed by throwing money its way. As for the lack of time... here comes the TARDIS.

I hope to be up and running my blog again soon.

CLERKS II

I was not expecting much from Kevin Smith's 2006 follow up feature to his original Clerks (1994). Not that he was incapable of coming through with the goods, but rather this one felt to me like an expected more than requisite title. Until I watched it, of course.

The characters are all well drawn -- Jeff Anderson, in particular, is a standout -- and the story arc and narrative drive are silky smooth.

GOOD NIGHT, AND GOOD LUCK

Brilliant!

(George Clooney's 2005 film on Edward R. Morrow's efforts to take out 'Red Scare' Senator Joseph McCarthy during the mid 1950s.)

GRINDHOUSE - PLANET TERROR

Considering that I grew up watching some 'grindhouse' pictures -- and certainly the trailers before the main event -- it took me a long time to get around to checking out one half of the Quentin Tarantino/Robert Rodriguez co-pro, Grindhouse. The two filmmakers made each a film done in the style of a so-called grindhouse flick from the 1970s. The total presentation in theatres when these were released ran a little over three hours.

No need for me to regurgitate what is out there about the genesis of the two films. All I can say at this point is that Planet Terror -- Robert Rodriguez's contribution -- is a bad movie. It is fine to argue that a lot of the original flicks mimicked here were bad themselves, but you must add something to the equation or it isn't worth doing anything. The only element added to the mix is the fact that this film looks as though it was made now; references to what is happening overseas makes it clear when this movie was made. My question is, what is the point of mucking up the print to make it look like it has been around for a while?

There is a standout ingredient in this Planet: Rose McGowan. She looks and acts like she's in the right time and place. But her director couldn't follow her lead.

Rodriguez was a director with much promise. I was there when El Mariachi was first released back in 1992. This director has been a big disappointment. And Planet Terror reminded me of that loser film, From Dusk Till Dawn (1996). Why is Rodriguez so in love with boring mass zombie scenes?

STEADY AS SHE GOES

Regular readers have noticed that I am not posting in my usual manic and obsessive way. It is a conscious decision that I post every couple of days or so, even though I am brimming with things to say; too much to say. (I have a small backlog to put up.)

At the end of any given month, a count of 15 or 16 is what I hope to see as opposed to one for every day. Yes, I do have a life. Blogging to me is a way for me to keep the pencil sharp.

Thank you, pencil sharpeners.

TREKKIES AND TRACKIES

Attention all Trekkies and Trackies: This coming weekend, the TSO (Toronto Symphony Orchestra) will be playing selected pieces of music written for the various Star Trek incarnations. The best of the hours of background music written for this franchise thus far would be anything from the original series, the first feature film, and the frequently joyous tunes for the "one about the whales". Unfortunately, the bulk of the evening will feature pieces of interest only to the average fanatic. (I do not know what the program is highlighting, exactly.)

So, Trekkies and Trackies, set your phasers on stun, this concert is going ahead at warp factor nine!

("Trekkies" are the die-hard Star Trek fans -- as everyone knows -- and "Trackies", my own term, are those who spin their soundtrack albums somewhat obsessively with little or no regard or interest in the music as something designed to accompany a visual element... like a movie or television series.)

HISTORY OF CAT DOMESTICATION

I was reading an article this morning titled, "The History of the Cat". It talked about the history of the cat and how it became our friend.

I have my own story: Late one night, after a hard day at work, I accidentally left the kitchen door open. Half asleep, I was standing before a counter, peeling potatoes. Suddenly, I felt a warm furry thing rubbing up against my left leg. Thinking it was one of the local raccoons, without looking, I reached down to pet the late night visitor. "That's a pretty skinny little raccoon", I thought. My lazy and tired eyes decided to lock on. It was a cat. I wondered what it wanted...

To make a long story short, I pulled out the tuna and fed the animal. (The cat went squirrely when I applied the can opener to the tinned goods.)

And that is how I was domesticated.

SOAKING WET

Last night I went to do an errand. It was about 9 p.m. when I left the house and before I flew out the door I did the dance: "Should I take the umbrella? No... maybe I should. The sky is looking pretty mean."

Finished; time to go home. I'm walking down Bloor Street when it starts to trickle rain. Yaa... I am on top of the game. As I get within about 15 minutes of my house -- I was walking -- it started to really come down. And there was thunder and lightning. The umbrella is one wonderful little instrument, even if they are designed to be replaced in short order -- how short, I was to be educated. And then some. I turned onto the street leading to my own. (This street runs east-west). In case you have not experienced a fire-crew spraying water right at you as you walk, and a film-crew blowing one of those wind machines two feet from your face, well then, you have not experienced what I did last night. Never have I been caught in such a driving, raining windstorm. The rain was attacking me in an almost horizontal plane. My umbrella was slowly but surely collapsing into a primitive form as I made my way. What should have been a three minute walk easily turned out to be double that. I was soaking wet. In case I did not understand that, I was instantly and continually reminded. My shoes became squishy from being waterlogged many times over. It was funny... I was laughing all the way. The sky was glowing with the constant flashes from lightning bolts. With the same sense of humour which kept me in good, albeit, damp spirits I periodically looked up and around at the sky, knowing that the lighting would make a nice background to a funnel cloud. There were tornado warnings for the Toronto area, and I had not forgotten. And would not been surprised if I thought I was looking at a rear projection screen from that certain scene in The Wizard of Oz.

I made it to my stoop. My umbrella had the look of a former umbrella. As the water unwrapped from my body, I stood there... watching the sky.

It was great.