There was an amusing Fark thread on people giving vague but accurate (or correct but misleading) movie summaries, and people guessing the movie. I enjoyed it enough that I thought I would offer it up here with my own vague summaries. A good number of these are science fiction, fantasy, or horror.
Post your answers below.
Here’s Tears Run Rings, a shoegazer band from America’s west coast, with their very Slowdive-esque “Waiting for the End.”
From Dwight comes the sad news that Tank McNamara creator and Houston Chronicle movie reviewer and columnist Jeff Millar has died at age 70. To have some idea of his stature in Houston in the 1970s and 1980s, imagine that Mike Royko and Roger Ebert were the same guy.
His regular humor column was really funny. I remember one about an IRS agents showing up on the doorstep of a nuclear war survivor’s doorstep to conduct an audit. “That whole ‘end of civilization as we know it’ excuse may pass muster with other government agencies, but not the IRS.”
Tank McNamara was one of my favorite comic strips as well. He had a hilarious sport trial series presided over by an English-barrister sounding Dennis Rodman. (“Mr. Sprewell, please be so kind as to remove your fingers from the panelist’s throat.”) And I loved the strips with the mad sports scientist Dr. Tszap, with his frizzed-out hair, coke-bottle glasses and hula girl tie.
I met him once, at CollegeCon at U of H, the first science fiction convention I went to in 1980. I have his signature on the back of the program book along with those of Harlan Ellison, Robert Sheckley and George Takei.
He also had a story in Damon Knight’s Orbit 17: “Toto, I Have a Feeling We’re Not in Kansas Anymore.” I haven’t read that, or his mystery novel Private Sector.
RIP.
I know the Chiefs are sucking pretty bad this year, but shooting up the place won’t help.
Arrowhead Stadium is on lockdown and one player has reportedly been shot.
Putting this up mainly because I’m not seeing anything on Google News yet.
Live updates at the Arrowhead pride blog.
Update: Police are saying it was a player killing his girlfriend, then committing suicide at the facility. Unconfirmed reports are that player was linebacker Jovan Belcher.
Update 2: Confirmed? “A team source tells Jason La Canfora that LB Jovan Belcher was involved in a shooting at the team’s facility.”
Update 3: Confirmed: ” A player on the Kansas City Chiefs shot and killed his girlfriend early Saturday before shooting and killing himself at the team facility, according to police. The Kansas City Star, citing police, identified the player as 25-year-old linebacker Jovan Belcher. FOXSports.com’s Alex Marvez reports that a Chiefs source has also confirmed Belcher as the player.”
Update 4: There’s a lot of strangeness to this murder/suicide. First, Belcher reportedly killed his girlfriend overher her staying out late at a concert. Second, Belcher reportedly drove to Arrowhead stadium to thank coach Romeo Crennel and general manager Scott Pioli for everything they had done before killing himself in front of them. I know some things should be said in person, but I think in this case both of them would have preferred an email.
Only good news? Belcher and his girlfriend’s infant daughter is safe, though obviously orphaned.
You know, just in case you were considering doing that.
While there’s no end to fail video on the Internet, I’m posting this one because: A.) It was such an obviously, amazingly stupid thing to attempt in the first place, and B.) I tried to find this a while back to show friends, but had forgotten the actual conveyance (bike? skateboard?), which made finding the video difficult. So this is more of a bookmark for myself than anything else. As well as an abject lesson in what not to do.
John Picacio ‘s Kickstarter for his 2013 art calendar only runs through noon on November 28, so if you want in, you better hurry up.
He’s already at $25,000, and his next stretch goal is at $30,000.
Spider-Man, Spider-Man
Did you arrest the right Spider-Man?
Get the one for assault?
Outstanding warrant? His own damn fault.
Oh yeah! You got the right Spider-Man!
Were it not for Slowdive’s Just for a Day, I wouldn’t being doing these Shoegazer Sunday posts in the first place. Poking around YouTube, there seems to be a lot more Slowdive songs that never made it onto their three studio albums than I realized. “Losing Today,” a sad, echoey, moody piece perfect for teenage girls to mope around to on cold, rainy days, is off their Blue Day compilation album.
Vampire Effect
Directed by Dante Lam and Donnie Yen
Written by Hing-Ka Chan and Wai Lun Ng
Starring Ekin Cheng, Charlene Choi, Gillian Chung, Anthony Wong Chau-Sang, Edison Chen, Jackie Chan, Mickey Hardt
If you like Hong Kong supernatural martial arts films, you’ll probably enjoy Vampire Effect (AKA Twins Effect, since the two female leads are evidently in the same pop band). Modern-day vampire hunter gets cute new partner who clashes with his cute sister, who just happens to be dating an Emo vampire prince whose essence a vampire king wants to eat to unlock a vampire grimoire. Martial arts ensue.
You know, the usual.
Jackie Chan has an extended supporting role that’s pretty much unnecessary, except you get to see Jackie Chan fight vampires. He’s third-billed and gets about 15 minutes of screen time, so it doesn’t even make Top Ten Most Dishonest Uses of Jackie Chan’s Name on the DVD Cover list. (I’m looking at you, Drunken Fist Boxing.)
This hasn’t gotten great reviews, and it’s not a patch on the best work in the genre by the late, great Ching-Ying Lam. The romance subplot drags a bit. The pace and style of the film does rip off the Blade movies…which in turn were ripping off Hong Kong action films, which ripped off everything they could lay their hands on, so par for the course. But it’s funny, and the action scenes work, which is pretty much all I ask as a threshold for enjoyment for this kind of film.
The “sequel” Twins Effect II is evidently a historical martial arts epic with much of the same cast, but none of the same characters.
Supposedly the American DVD (I saw it on-demand) has some scenes chopped that hinder the continuity. When it comes to Hong Kong action films, continuity does not rank high on my list of requirements. I saw the version with lots of martial arts.
November 16 next year, there will be a UT home football game (against OSU) and a Formula One race in Austin on the same weekend.
What could possibly go wrong?
The biggest winner? Hotel and motel owners in Bastrop.
If you plan on attending either of these events, you might want to make your reservations now…