the lightweight skull

Marlin and I caught the latest installment of the Indiana Jones movies last weekend: The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. I purposely avoided any reviews before going, but after checking out the metacritic score, I’d say it’s right about on target: 55/100. I would give it a thumbs up, but just barely. It’s great to slip back into this iconic action movie character, and it’s an enjoyable ride. But there are far too many truly awful groan-inducing moments. Not only do you have to suspend disbelief, you have to suspend logic as well. For instance, a crystal skull of that size would surely weigh a good bit, yet Karen Allen is tossing the thing around like it’s a basketball. I don’t think so. All in all, the best thing I can say about this outing from Indiana Jones is that it’s much better than the Temple of Doom.

We’re going to another movie this evening, and I look outside and look at the movie listings and cannot believe it’s the first weekend in June. The high temperature today was only in the 50s! And where are the good summer blockbusters? Our choices at the local theater tonight:

• Sex and the City: Mediocre reviews (at best) and 2.5 hours long (that’s like watching 5 episodes in a row). Plus they don’t serve cosmopolitans at the megaplex … um, I think I’ll wait for PPV/DVD.
• You Don’t Mess With the Zohan: Not a big Adam Sandler fan. Not a big fan of mainstream comedy, most of which is silly or stupid.
• What Happens in Vegas: When Ashton Kutcher does a porno, let me know. Otherwise, no interest.
• Kung Fu Panda: I’ve outgrown cute animal animations. Perhaps that’s not a good thing, but it’s the truth.
• The Strangers: Touted as a terrifying suspense thriller … which is code for formulaic drivel that is anything but suspenseful. The first one that screams will die, I’m sure. How’s that for suspense.
• Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull: see top paragraph.
• Chronicles of Narnia – Prince Caspian: I didn’t see the first movie, and still I get it mixed up with The Golden Compass (which I did see). I could probably find a quick summary online of the first film, but I’ve already sat at the computer long enough today, and I’m a completist so I don’t like seeing part 2 of anything before I’ve seen part 1.
• Iron Man: Marlin’s already seen it twice.

The winner is: Iron Man. I hope that means it’s really good, because Marlin seems very happy to see it for a third time.

And a followup from yesterday: the poppy bloomed this morning! Unfortunately, the weight of the bloom was too much, and the stem snapped. I propped it up to take photos, but the big bloom is now sitting in a salad bowl in the kitchen, mystifying the cats.

Heath Ledger, RIP

I grabbed this image off the web a week or two ago to write a post about this year’s upcoming Batman movie — The Dark Knight. Watching the movie will be bittersweet, however, as actor Heath Ledger — who played the role of The Joker in this upcoming film — was found dead this afternoon in an apartment in New York City. He was 28 years old. Early reports indicated a drug overdose, but it’s unknown at this point if it was an accident or suicide and his family insists it was accidental while also revealing that he had been suffering from pneumonia.

Ledger is probably best-known for his role as Ennis del Mar, a cowboy who enjoys a long-term closeted gay relationship with another cowboy (Jake Gyllenhaal) in the film Brokeback Mountain. The role earned him an Oscar nomination, but he lost the Oscar that year to Philip Seymour Hoffman (for the film Capote). Ledger was engaged to his Brokeback co-star Michelle Williams, but they called off the engagement last fall. Ledger and Williams have one daughter, Matilda Rose, who was born in October 2005.

Any death is sad, but this is just terrible, terrible news. Ledger was an extremely talented actor, with a young daughter, and a bright future ahead of him. Godspeed.

hand me my alethiometer, I’m lost

This review at wired.com — The Golden Compass Gets Hopelessly Lost — pretty much nails the way I felt after seeing The Golden Compass. I have not read the book(s) nor was I familiar with the story before seeing the film, and I was a bit lost at times. The ending is totally lame. Some of the effects seemed indulgent. We could have done with a little less of the polar bear. And most disappointingly, Daniel Craig was barely to be seen. I would estimate he had a scant 10 minutes of screen time. Sigh.

I am, however, intrigued enough to possibly read the book. This story, plus all the character development, plus the original anti-religion message, plus the original tragic ending. That sounds much more entertaining and provocative than this limp film.

[Note: The cool alethiometer icon is by Dave Brasgalla and is currently a free download at The Icon Factory.]

no spoilers here

This will make me sound like a huge Harry Potter fan, but here’s how I spent the weekend: woke up late Saturday morning with a bit of a Manhattan-induced hangover, got some coffee, checked out the news online and got my email, then went downstairs and got the physical mail, which included my copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I opened it and started reading. I read until early evening, then took a quick shower and headed out with Marlin to see Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (in IMAX *and* 3D, no less, but only about 20 minutes of the climatic chapters were in 3D and I found it all a bit disconcerting with all the apparating and disapparating going on). We got home after midnight, and it was back to Deathly Hallows for me for a couple more hours. I woke up mid-morning on Sunday, got coffee blah blah blah and had finished the Deathly Hallows by mid-afternoon.

Now I’m not as much a huge Potter fan as I am a reader wary of having a good story spoiled. Rowling creates a fantastical world, but it’s not the most elegant prose, and her overall themes borrow heavily from tales, myths and legends that are centuries old. But the story was always the best part of the Harry Potter novels, so I wanted to finish the final book ASAP before any chance of running into spoilers. And it’s surprisingly easy to do. For instance, early Saturday evening I was doing a mental inventory of the horcruxes and was missing one, so I referred to Wikipedia which had already been updated with ALL the horcruxes. A detail there was a minor spoiler for me because I had suspected it long before I started reading the final novel. But still … mere hours after the release date it was all documented. And after finishing the novel I browsed through more of Wikipedia, and it’s CHOCK FULL of spoilers. Fair warning if you are in spoiler avoidance mode.

With Deathly Hallows out of the way, I will now return to reading Absurdistan, which I picked up during a long delay slash cancellation slash rebooking slash delay the previous weekend flying home from Philadelphia. And during that whirlwind weekend, I stayed a night with our friends Noel and Vic where we finalized some plans for our Alaska Gay Cruise in September, then spent Saturday at my friends Nick and Debbie’s annual summer party/reunion (here’s a pic), and on Sunday had a wonderful lunch, chat, and cigar with Drew, who I’ve bumped into many, many times online through the years but this is the first times our paths have crossed in the offline world.

Just don’t ask me how much progress we are making with the living room/parlor renovation. Friends, parties, absorbing novels … it’s no spoiler the renovations have been stalled now for a few weeks. If only I could wave a wand to finish it. Paintiscoveris Tin Ceiling!