Edgy MD

Didney synergy is what that is.

Wait a micron. Yours and mine are the only two actual reviews?

Gavin appeared in the 2006 LLWS.

I aint adopting him, because that would be akin to adopting a strapping and powerful 16-year-old a few weeks before his 17th birthday and then demanding he go out and support the family when he turns 17. But the Mets are supposedly very high on him. Considering he's got 68 games at AAA behind him, and the Mets have Wilmer Flores in front of him and Gavin Cecchini behind him (and Amed Rosario behind Cecchini, I wonder if the team will continue to not look outside at shortstop and will instead double down in the outfield with whatever funds they have or make available this offseason.

What an amazing spread of votes!

I found it mostly tedious when it wasn't goofily ridiculous. At the top, the movie represents the fall of man, showing a silhouette grabbling the forbidden fruit, and then a comically voracious SCRUNCH! takes place off the screen. It makes it hard to take what follows seriously, as much as it demands to be taken seriously. The visuals, like most epic films of the last decade, owe obvious debts to Lord of the Rings. Noah interacts with a race of giant creatures briefly referred to in Genesis, and they end up playing a large role, very much like the ents of LoTR. An inscrutable villain is also made of Tubal-Cain, a biblical figure who also warranted only a single biblical verse, apparently credited as the father of metal smithing. And based on this lone reference, the story seems to take place in some proto-Iron Age. Methuselah for his part, is a reclusive wizard. There ain't nuttin' in the Bible about no Level 10 magic users. They use cheap devices to deal with the obvious challenges of depicting the story. Noah's wife is depicted as some sort of magical herbalist, so they confront the question of how they spent all that time feeding the animals and mucking the stables by having her whip up an incense concoction and having the family walk dramatically and elf-lik around the stables and cages with censers until all the animals (but not the humans, somehow) fall asleep. This frees the family up to have internecine spats. Noah seemingly draws a lot of inspiration from The Mosquito Coast, it would seem, in that being a prophet of doom and the father of the future puts a lot of weight on one man's shoulders, and turns a body into a real asshole. The film tries to be about fatherhood, in that regard, in that being your family's protector forces you to do a lot of horrible things to keep the burden of sin from the rest of the brood. But doing those things turns you from your family's hero to your family's monster mighty quick. Obviously, the story is short enough that extra-Biblical stuff needs to fill in some of the blanks to flesh out the story, but most of these choices are to indulge the visual whims of the production --- the Watchers, the flood bursting from the ground in giant geysers. Or alternatively, to set up boilerplate conflicts --- much is made as the deluge approaches of the obvious plot hole that Ham and Japheth don't yet have wives. That's not extra-scriptural, that's counter-scriptural. And it's just an excuse to place brooding sons against crazy dad. The visual effects don't always fail --- the cartoonish serpent is goofy, but an extended ILM sequence depicting the seven days of creation is really good stuff. It would have made a cool-assed Peter Gabriel video, but in this film, it's just a vacation from the tediousness of the main narrative. Noah has already become a horror at this point, so he's telling you this story, invoking all these beautiful images depicting an evolutionary creation, and you want to say, "OK, here's his redemption," but you look at your watch and you know it's not to be. They try and get in some meaningful themes. Noah is raising his family as vegans as opposed to the sons of Cain, represented by most of humanity, tearing at the flesh of slaughtered beasts. This is actually scripturally based. Noah is also suggested to be a pastoral naturalist, standing in opposition to the industrialists drawing society into cities. OK, but i got the idea that the flaming moral ambiguity/moral disintegration of the asshole patriarch is what they really want to sell you. Maybe they wanted to make an Old Testament Breaking Bad.

Oh yeah! Yeah, yeah! Now God said to Noah, "I don't want no sinnin'!" Oh yeah! Yeah, yeah! "I've been telling you this since 'In the beginnin'!" Oh yeah! Yeah, yeah! "You gotta round up your sons and all of their women!" Oh yeah! Yeah, yeah! "Because you're going on a big boat ride! (Boat ride!) Now gather all the animals by the pair Build a big ship about a million square And put all the animals right in there And sail away on the tide!" [fimg=600]http://timeentertainment.files.wordpress.com/2014/01/noah-poster.jpeg[/fimg]

Sure a lot of actor get themselves locked into an action franchise and wax about how they're above it all, but the steady paycheck allows them to do Ibsen or something, but Chris Pine is taking a page out of Harrison Ford's book and turning that paradigm on its ear. Not content to merely be the linchpin of the red hot Star Trek franchise, he's now the fourth Jack Ryan, in the latest reboot of a series that has been trying to gain some traction for 24 years. Jack's a wounded Afghanistan War vet who gets recruited into the CIA by James Earl Jones, played by Kevin Costner, to go to Wall Street and look for financial irregularities that might indicate terrorist funding. That's it. He's an analyst. But when he stumbles over the big kahuna, the financial nexus of big-time terror action, he quickly gets... operationalized. Seriously operationalized. And it's a good thing he's got Keira Knightley along as his physical therapist/doctor/girlfriend/American-who-inexplciably-talks-British, because he goes from a seriously wounded guy barely able to walk to a guy who gets up and just wipes his nose after a lot of bad falls. Really bad falls! Kenneth Brannagh directs and villianizes. [fimg=450]http://static.squarespace.com/static/51b3dc8ee4b051b96ceb10de/t/52b86f63e4b0675cb7ea3994/1387818853426/tv-spot-for-jack-ryan-shadow-recruit.jpg[/fimg]

I thought this was threaded already. Five Hollywood actors play themselves at an awful Hollywood party at James Franco's new home. When the Rapture strikes during a convenience store run, the runners/protagonists (Jay Baruchel and Seth Rogen) head back to the party, everything goes pell mell, and the boys try and hold out as demons run loose and anarchy breaks out among the sinners left behind.

Who is Kevin Canelon? Kevin is one of those non-prospect/prospects that grind away at a probably-going-nowhere career in the minors. He got signed at 17 out of Caracas, Venezuela and has been pitching his heart out for four summers. But that hasn't gotten him too far. Three of those summer got him nowhere beyond the Dominican Summer League. So he's only gotten one go stateside, and because he was signed at 17 and not 16, he's already eligible for the Rule 5 draft. And he's almost a mathematical certainty not to be drafted, because who picks a guy who has one (short) season in US ball in the Gulf Coast League? No one, that's who. Maybe the minor league portion of the draft, but unlikely. But here's the cool part. In that one short season, he appeared in 12 games, five of them starts, and pitched 37 1/3 innings. Not much of a workload, but not a meaningless sample either. In that 37 1/3 innings, he struck out 30 batters... and walked one. And it was intentional. I found that pretty cool. His SO/BB ratios by season 2011 (DSL): 1.25 2012 (DSL): 2.00 2013 (DSL): 3.125 2014 (GCL): 30.00

A Mumbai housewife packs lunches for her emotionally distant husband, and has them delivered to him at work. An inexplicable mixup occurs, and lunches begin landing at the desk of a lonely widower on the verge of early retirement, while her clueless husband receives the third-rate luncheonette fare the widower is used to. As the housewife and the widower accountant realize the mistake, they begin writing short notes to each other, delivered in the lunchbox, and the story unfolds in epistolary form, as their conversation grows from naan to the dramatic developmental (but alienating) changes in India, to the disappointments in their lives. I think the widower guy is played by the same actor who was Kal Penn's father in The Namesake, and he's good, but like in that movie, he doesn't seem as old as he's supposed to be playing. [fimg=450]http://www.mybikemyworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/lunchbox-movie-poster.jpg[/fimg]

I did a search and found any number of articles about cassettes making a comeback, but the why part is almost invariably fudged. They report on why physical formats in general (LPs, CDs, and cassettes) are preferable to some, but they shoot blanks on why some go for cassettes specifically. I did find this story also arguing about the fumbled opportunity that was Awesome Mix: Volume 1. Good for you, Chris Wade of Slate!

So my wife went out and purchased the "soundtrack," which in fact was presented as a clever package representing Peter's mixtape. It's actually just called Awesome Mix Volume 1. And I hate myself for saying this, but they totally fuck up that small little appeal. 1. Why don't they release it on cassette? Cassettes throwbacks are totally a thing now. They could have used auto-sign machines to mark up the packaging with Peter's mother's handwriting. 2. Why do they include "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" and "I Want You Back"? You see the film, you know that these two tracks are clearly tacked on the end as representative of Awesome Mix Volume 2. They could have padded out the mix with three or four tracks not used in the movie under the premise that these were tracks from the tape that we didn't hear. 3. (or 2b.) It totally violates the spirit of the enterprise. "ANMHE" and "IWYB" are songs from the late sixties, the implication being that his mother filled the first mix with songs from the '70s and the latter with songs from 60s. While they are far less cheesy, they scrape away the authenticity of the whole. Of the whole! I'd blame marketers not getting down with the spirit of the artists, but the director and screenwriter are listed "Soundtrack Executive Producers," so I don't know.

Well, it's probably more standard that the high-end prospects won't see opening day, but if the Eric Campbells win a job in camp, bam! it's theirs. But lookie d'Arnaud, he got to start the season. If you get September, you get April too, I guess.

Yeah, I stayed the heck away. It's either a clickbait trap or questionable for general circulation. I couldn't imagine coming out of that click hole in better condition than going in.

I was looking for something --- ANYTHING --- to watch on a transatlantic flight, and I couldn't get through the first act on this.

Yeah, I included Dead Again and Munchausen on a secondary list, but these Cranepoolers, they cheat. They cheat like hell. Sheesh, nobody's even touched on Jakob the Liar. It's like it doesn't exist. I haven't seen it, but it seems like just the most lost decision-making process ever. > Robin, I know this is big, but only you can do it. It's a film about finding our humanity... in the midst of the Holocaust. >>> What do you mean only I can do it? Roberto Begnini just did it, and it won a pile of awards. > But this will be... KINDA different... and... >>> And The Pianist. They gave an Oscar to Roman Fucking Polanski! > So, you'll be, like... the third in four years to... you know... go there! >>> What kind of money are we talking?

A country day school and Julliard guy, he seemed ever-rooted in the humanities and gravitated toward humanist roles --- philosophers, psychiatrists, professors, musicians. Almost all of his characters could pull a Plato or Shakespeare quote out of his ass, and then ground it from seeming too high-faluting by coming up with a sophomoric retort on top of it. (A lot like seventies Woody Allen in that last regard.) was an anthropologist/philosopher. With his broad hairy chest and his mental quickness sharpened to go right back at somebody, he often played brawlers, righteous ones --- the dockside avenger in Popeye, the suburban avenger in Garp, the firefighter burned out by urban decay and dysfunction and bullshit in Club Paradise, the pub-brawler in Good Morning Vietnam. Even in Good Will Hunting, his genial mood suddenly turns as he throws a kid half his age and well built up against a wall and threatens to kill him for ungentlemanly comments about his wife, and the kid (and the audience) believes him. Always willing to throw down in defense of the exploited little guy, but it's notable that he never played a lawman or a soldier (except as far as you can call Adrian Tarnauer a soldier). He'd do bits as John Wayne or a type A football coach, but I imagine he couldn't find any depth beyound the surface joke playing a guy who took on violence or enforcement as a liftestyle.

The Robin Williams film festival: 12 weeks of double features! Dead Again Good Will Hunting He's a psychiatrist... at a crossroads. And he's never had a case like this!

For nine fucking innings?! [youtube:1om2svha]U3ZUPR1mPeQ[/youtube:1om2svha]

Of course, Hook had an appropriate role (another man-child) and a good director and it still missed. It's real alchemy, the filmmaking business. Sometimes all (or most of) the elements can be there, and they just won't mix.

Well, two things you need in assessing Robin is the hyphenated noun "man-child," and a specially designed scale built for balancing madcap comedy with pathos. He was bearing all of our sins in a lot of films.

I think that last line is fair. You always knew that, paired with the right film and director, he could paint the world any color he wanted. But what director could possibly channel his act without dulling it? Alladin, I guess, was the perfect vehicle for him. Just let him improvise everything, and you can rewrite and edit around what he gives you. He could totally subvert the film without throwing the other actors because they could just get the other performers' readings and dub them in separately. Made forgivable stupid anachronisms like doing Ed Sullivan imitations in medieval Arabia for an audience of kids who mostly had no idea who Ed Sullivan could possibly be. My wife had a voice coach who had him at Juliard. Said he was completely un-containable. Scripts, blocking, fourth walls, costume changes... they were all just humble suggestions to him.

Your mileage may differ. In fact, I hope it does. Take this with the usual caveat of "based on what I've seen... ," along with a healthy realization that I haven't seem much of his from the last 15 years, during which he's scarcely slowed down. The Fisher King (1991) Dead Poet's Society (1989) Awakenings (1990) Aladdin (1992) The World According to Garp (1982) Moscow on the Hudson (1984) Good Morning, Vietnam (1987) The Birdcage (1996) Club Paradise (1986) Toys (1992) Supporting Roles Good Will Hunting (1997) Dead Again (1991) The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988) Hamlet (1996) Jumanji (1995) Nine Months (1994) I thought my choice inclusion of personal favorite Moscow and guilty pleasure Club Paradise would look pretty controversial, but there just isn't a lot of quality from the beginning of his career. And then, smack in the middle, he pulls down four best actor Oscar nominations in four years (Vietnam, Dead Poets, Awakenings, and Fisher King). He was considered a real contender all four years, but somehow got shut out, finally winning his lone Oscar in a supporting role. I don't know what it means, probably nothing. Just a funny time to be a young adult for me and mine, to see the funniest TV actor from our childhoods suddenly an unstoppable force for carrying weighty and ambitious films. Could you imagine, I dunno, Jonathan Winters suddenly asked in the early seventies to do Jane Eyre or Save the Tiger or something?

What a waste.