Bear Interrupted

The naughty teddy- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
I’m at KFC today, waiting for my wheels to heal next door at Pep Boys. It’s 102 degrees outside, and KFC’s a/c is on the fritz. Wonderful setting… I do enjoy the people watching, and I did just have an unforgivably fattening 3 piece meal. I will survive. I have a couple of topics on my mind -- one a movie review, and another is something more personal …

A NOBLE EXPERIMENT
I started this blog in January 2005 with high expectations, borrowing hip phrases at the time like “Web 2.0” and “eZine”. I was sure it would catch fire and have a lot of readers. Over the course of 7 and ½ years, I have these observations:

o My readership fell from the giddy heights of 25 people down to about 2
o My ad revenue fell from pocket change to zero
o My ideas started to become stale and repetitive
o Et cetera

This year will probably be the last one for Strange Fascination. I have written about a lot of things, across many weird topics. If nothing else, I’ve educated myself in doing some of the article research. Wikipedia (aka ”the font of all knowledge”) has been immeasurably helpful.  :-)   I still have a creative writing impulse -- the spark isn’t completely snuffed. I may start a new blog with different stipulations…

o I’ll still host it with blogspot, but use one of their new templates
o It will be less commercial, more of a spare look
o Will post maybe once a month -- I’m not as prolific as I used to be.
o The URL won’t be sent to family or coworkers (important)… I’d like to explore ideas and issues that are more personal or introspective. I can’t really cut loose if my boss or my aunt is reading what’s there.

I probably would’ve gotten more traction if I specialized in a few topics, instead of trying to cover every subject area known to man. My interests cover a wide range but not my wisdom and expertise. I will leave my postings indefinitely -- maybe someday I’ll comb though them to fix grammatical errors and “sudden” transitions. I could probably delete some of the more embarrassing entries. This is just a heads up … I don’t want my last two readers to experience shock at the last posting.

TED
I saw a movie over the July 4th holiday, TED, which had me rolling in the aisles. TED is the brainchild of bad boy Seth Macfarlane, the wunderkind cartoonist who is now one of the highest paid actor-director-writers in Hollywood. I’ve already blogged twice about Macfarlane, and have decidedly mixed feelings about him. He’s brilliant and insightful -- a secular, humanist liberal who informs us with his bold political satire. But then his humor also takes him to very dark places where animal cruelty and violence to women is acceptable and “hilarious“. Macfarlane’s TV shows, Family Guy, Cleveland Show and American Dad are super popular with young men ages 18-24. The class clown “jackass” aspect probably draws in all the young men.

TED is a comedy starring Mark Wahlburg (playing against type) as a nebbish nerd and Mila Kunis as his (highly unlikely) knock-out girlfriend. TED is a childhood toy whom Wahlburg “wished” to life when he was 8. The fantastic aspects of this are minimized and it’s just treated as a cool, trivial aside -- “teddy bear comes to life“. The teddy bear is dubbed Ted. He’s a foul-mouthed, sex-crazed, ne’er do well who is Mark’s roomie even in adulthood. Mila feels that Ted is preventing Mark from reaching adult goals and she decides to send Ted packing.

Ted surprises everyone by becoming a supermarket manager and dating hot chicks. He also captivates a local father-son pair who covet a live, talking teddy bear. I won’t divulge the entire plot but the humorous “humanity” of Ted steals the whole show. He can eat, smoke, drink, drug, cuss, fornicate, laugh and fight with totally credible movements. The special effects are excellent. For people familiar with Family Guy, Ted’s voice is about half Peter Griffin and half Bryan the Dog. Ted has a lot of Bryan’s logical thought with Peter’s Boston crassness mixed in.

I will say that the AMC theater was sold out when I saw this movie. Ushers had to squeeze strangers together in uncomfortable combos just to accommodate all the ticket buyers. It’s very much to Macfarlane’s credit that his less-touted, less-than-blockbuster movie has made a very strong box office showing. If you’re not easily grossed out, and like over-the-top gags go see this movie. It will help if you’re that category of adult who hasn’t completely let go of adolescence. That would certainly be me.

© 2012 blogSpotter

76 Trombones Led the Way

A slice of American pie - Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
I’m enjoying my 5 day July 4th weekend. The Texas sun has relented and we’re having a mild high temperature of 95 degrees – it’s a cold spell! Am sitting in Starbucks and happened on the last available inside table. It gets pretty competitive.

But enough small talk, let’s discuss my movies. In the last couple of days I watched 2004’s The Anchorman with Will Ferrell. How I missed seeing this silly but hilarious 70’s satire I don’t know. My favorite scenes are the animated “Pleasure Island” sequence, and the dog talking sense into the Kodiak bear. As with all Will Ferrell movies, approach it with a high tolerance for over-the-top nonsense. I have that tolerance and laughed my a** off.

Today, I watched The Decoy Bride, a 2011 Scottish import on Netflix. The movie’s title almost gives you the romantic plot line and predictable resolution in its three words. But – it has stunning visuals of the Hebrides Islands, beautiful music and fun people. Its plot is as obvious as a knock-knock joke, but the visual escapism makes it well worth watching. In all of moviedom there are probably 5 basic plot lines, and this is certainly one of them – well done none-the-less.

The movie at my “centerpiece” is 1962’s The Music Man, which I watched on TMC Tuesday night. In a discussion a couple of years ago, I was in agreement that Music Man is probably among the top 3, best ever American musicals. That’s saying a lot considering what all there is. Music Man was a Broadway hit just before it found greater permanence on celluloid. It’s a joyful slice of 1912 Americana – Meredith Wilson’s retelling of his childhood in small-town Iowa. It calls to mind a Mark Twain boyhood remembrance or maybe even a Norman Rockwell painting. It’s a snapshot of a wholesome era that maybe never actually was but we still reach back to it fondly. The song “Ya Got Trouble” warns of the evils inherent in billiards games and expressions like “Swell” or “Gee whiz”.

The movie plays out across summertime, and culminates on July 4th – a perfect dessert for this holiday week. Music Man is a romance which paired Robert Preston as huckster Harold Hill and Shirley Jones as Marian the spinster Librarian. It’s said that the studio bosses wanted Frank Sinatra or Cary Grant in the role of Harold Hill – thank heavens they kept Robert Preston (Frank and Cary turned it down out of respect to Preston). He channeled Harold Hill in a way no others probably ever could. The movie also gives us Buddy Hackett as Harold’s friend and Ron Howard as the adorable Winthrop. Music Man is a mixing together of veteran actors and new faces all in one incredible film set.

Most of the zany, love struck madness takes place on one summer night, with characters running in circles of confusion and desire. There is something almost Shakespearean about it – maybe A Midsummer Night’s Dream recast in early 20th century America. The songs are memorable and hummable and the overall message is one of hope and innocence (maybe even innocence regained).

How does one gauge the cultural impact of one movie? It was remade in 2003 as a Mathew Broderick vehicle. The “Shipoopi” dance number was meticulously recreated by the animators of Family Guy in recent years. The movie is shown frequently and almost always around July 4th. If you’re overfed with hot dogs and ice cream, give yourself another kind of treat – watch The Music Man and you too will hear the bells on the hill.

© 2012 blogSpotter