Movies and Music of 2008

I wrote this a while ago, but for whatever reason never actually posted it. I want to get the monkey off my back, so here goes.

My 10 favorite movies of 2008...

The Wrestler
I love everything that Darren Aronofsky has ever done (including The Fountain), but this is just through the stratosphere. It's equal parts uplifting and heartbreaking, with the most perfectly ambiguous ending of any movie this year.

In Bruges

It's sharp and witty, and never holds back a single punch. The cast is stellar, and it's incredibly well-written, too.

The Dark Knight
What can I say about this one? I've watched it 4 or 5 times and I am consistently shocked at how well it holds up for repeat viewings. There's a lot of complexity and depth - the Batman franchise has come a long way in 12 years.

Role Models

This is exactly what a mainstream comedy should be. A lot of the great comedies that have come out over the last few years (Superbad, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, etc.) mix a good heart with a sick mind. For my money, Role Models does that better than anything else.

The Good, The Bad & The Weird
The director of The Host made a western. Not just any western, but a big, fat, beautiful homage to the greatest western of all-time. What else do I need to say?

JCVD
Mickey Rourke has some major competition in the comeback department this year. I hesitate to simply say that Van Damme proves he can act with this movie. He's exorcising demons. The biggest complement I can give this movie, though, is that it doesn't buy into the ironic action hero bullshit. Plus, it has two of the most amazing single-shot moments I've seen in a long time - the opening credit sequence and Van Damme's wall-breaking monologue.

Synecdoche, NY
It's so distinctly Charlie Kaufman, it's no wonder that it didn't really catch on. It's bleak and hopeless, yet funny the whole time. I can relate.

Tropic Thunder
I wasn't crazy about this movie the first time I saw it. Then I saw it again. And again.

Let The Right One In
The best fucking vampire movie in a long time. It gets so quiet and serene that I wasn't expecting the full-on holy shit moments - and that's EXACTLY what you need from a horror movie.

Doomsday
If somehow I hit my head and then started thinking that every movie I love was actually just one movie - that movie would be Doomsday.

And now for the music...

The Cardinals - Cardinology
When I was a kid, I went to Florida with my family and took a walk out in the ocean with my cousins. I got hit by a large (well, large for my six-year-old body) wave and it knocked me stupid. I was completely under the water. But my cousin Leslea was right there and valiantly reached into the (three-foot-deep) water and pulled me back up. That's kind of how I feel about Cardinology. While I do love the music, I put it here more for its self-help qualities. Great music is timeless, but the stuff that really sticks with you is the stuff that gets you through the hard times.

Butch Walker - Sycamore Street
After losing most of his earthly possessions to a California Wildfire, Butch Walker made a great record about taking stock of the past and contemplating the future. It packs an emotional wallop and still manages to be hooky as hell.

Army Navy - s/t
I love every second of this album. From its fuzzy guitars to the melodies, there's not a thing on here I could do without. This is where you'll find my favorite song of the year - Snakes of Hawaii.

Jeff Bruckner - Take Me To The West Coast
My favorite straight-up power pop album this year. It's catchy and clever, with bits of darkness mixed in. Kind of like a musical marble cake.

Marching Band - Spark Large
I've found myself putting this on when I'm in an especially great mood. I've also found myself putting it on when I'm a mopey sad bastard. It's rare that I find an album that's multi-mood playable.

Sloan - Parallel Play
Sloan. Doing what they do, and doing it well. I need nothing else.

The Raconteurs - Consolers of the Lonely
Jack White and Brendan Benson continue to be greater than the sum of their parts. They each take the driver's seat on a mind-blowing track: Carolina Drama for Jack, and Many Shades of Black for Brendan.

Julie Ocean - Long Gone and Nearly There
This was the first domino to fall in the power pop surge I experienced this year. It reminded me of why I love power pop: simplicity, power chords and handclaps.

Matthew Sweet - Sunshine Lies
I wouldn't directly call this a comeback, but Matthew Sweet's been mixing it up over the past few years and it's extraordinarily comforting to know that he's still got it. It rocks and it soars, all the while carrying the vulnerable swagger of his best work.

Couple - Teenage Disc Fantastic
Malaysian power-pop at its absolute finest.

And that's it. I didn't bother with TV or comics, since I've mostly been sticking with my old standbys in those arenas. Lost was great, Scalped was great, etc. Yawn!

SkyMall Christmas List

I just realized that Christmas is tomorrow and I haven't really put any kind of list together. I realize that this is terribly short notice, but I've tried to simplify the shopping process by only selecting gifts that can be purchased while traveling. Every item on my list is available directly from SkyMall.

Litter Robot



I don't own a cat, nor do I ever intend to own a cat. HOWEVER, if a cat came with this amazing space robot of a litter box, I might reconsider. I mean, look at that little fucker. I'm not sure if he's telling me that he just took a huge shit or that he's a go for launch. Either way...

Embellished Bible



An embellished bible. Well, at least they're admitting it now. If nothing else, the photo makes it look like you could raise the dead and fight vampires with it, too.

Super Sized Safari Animals

My personal choice would probably be the giraffe. You would think I'd go for the chimp, but it looks too much like something out of a Kubrick film. I look at the picture and I'm just waiting for it to move - not a desired quality in a stuffed animal.

Solar Powered Mole Repeller



I get the impression that this thing fires laser beams at intruding moles. If that doesn't work, though, I bet you could at least use this to beat the shit out of a mole or impale it. The possibilities are only limited by your imagination.

Gravity-Defying Boots

You think people look ridiculous on Segways? Wait 'til you see me hopping down the road with these on my feet, defying the shit out of some gravity.

Elephant Sculptural Sconce



Can elephants really do that? I would actually prefer having a real elephant follow me around with a candle, but I will settle for this. I suppose.

Forget-Me-Not Heart Pendant



Michael Phelps can fuck off, because eight gold medals don't even come close to one of these.

Toothbrush Razor UV Sanitizer

For $17 bucks this actually seems quite useful. I'm not sure that I would sanitize my shaving razors along with my toothbrush, though.

Embossed Denim Jackets



I can't think of a better way to display my patriotism or my love of country music than by wearing one of these bad boys. They're classy and tasteful - and not all denim jackets are.

NoseAid



I thought the price seemed a bit high for this, but then I realized that it had been reduced from $29.95. Score! I haven't had a nosebleed since I was 10, but you can never be too careful, right?

See, that's not a lot. Really not too much to ask for by tomorrow. I'm going to have trouble sleeping tonight for sure. Santa can fuck himself, though, because this year I'm leaving cookies and milk out for the SkyMall delivery man.

Sleep all day, party all night...

It's fun to be a vampire, right? I'm sure a lot of people watched The Lost Boys back in the day and wanted to be one of the undead. Likewise, many people have probably watched Lost Boys 2 and just wanted to be dead.

Despite being warned, I still subjected myself to Lost Boys 2: Your Sister's a Suck-Monkey. My hopes weren't high. At best, I thought it could be a fun, nostalgia-driven throwaway. Sadly, It's not fun at all. The only bits of nostalgia are regurgitated lines from the original. It does, however, succeed in the throwaway department. I sent the disc back to Netflix, but I would rather have just thrown it in the trash.

Power-pop goodness...

I can't seem to get enough of Julie Ocean. Their new album, Long Gone and Nearly There, is in constant rotation on my iPod. It's a perfect power-pop gem. I blame this album for sucking up all my eMusic downloads; after listening to it a few dozen times, I had the insatiable appetite for more. Power-pop is like that - the better it is, the more you want.

Here's a video of the band listening to (and clapping along with) one of the tracks from their record. Oh, and they're holding their breath through the whole thing, too.



And if that's not enough, one of the members is also a reporter for CNN and got tased for a story. Watch that here.

We have a happening event...happening

Finally got around to seeing The Strangers last night. I liked it. The end was a bit unsatisfying, but overall it was pretty tense. A good alternate title for it would be: Look Behind You, Bitch! - The Movie. I haven't had such a strong and frequent urge to yell at a movie in a long time - probably not since Dragon Wars.

Also saw The Happening. It's worth seeing just for Zooey Deschanel. Also, if you've ever wanted to see a guy commit suicide by feeding himself to lions, it has that.

Finally going to watch The Signal tonight. I was shaving my back the three seconds it was in theaters, so I missed it.

The Way I See It #326

Starbucks needs to start printing “The Way I See It” on the sleeve, not on the cup. I end up reading half the story and never find out how it ends. I suppose I could slide the sleeve down, but I’ve usually got it wedged in just the right spot for my grip. They could throw the entire “Way I See It” out the window and start printing poker cups like instant coffee machines. I’d probably just spill it all over myself trying to see if I won, though. Maybe they can find a way to put the Starbucks mermaid on the cup wearing a bikini, and then have bikini disappear when hot coffee is poured in. I’d buy that for 5 dollars.

No Country For Infected Men

Doomsday was completely off my radar when I saw a trailer for it a few months back. I liked Neil Marshall's two previous movies, Dog Soldiers and The Descent, and I thought this looked like a nice little John Carpenter homage. Nothing amazing, but worthy of a late movie after a few beers.

My expectations were blown completely out of the water.

Yeah, the movie is heavy on the Escape From New York influence, but it doesn't stop there. There's touches of Mad Max, The Warriors, Excalibur and even Apocalypse Now. The list could go on. Doomsday is an unbelievable mash-up of a movie. The blurb below describes it well:

"Neil Marshall cobbles together his third feature, in the manner of a junk-food glutton topping a pizza with French onion dip, ice cream, and four bags of Cool Ranch Doritos."
- Jim Ridley, LA Weekly

That's actually from a negative review. I don't see how, when you're dealing with a b-movie premise to begin with, that's a bad thing. It's not thrown together as the blurb implies - with the laziness of just grabbing whatever ingredients are around and adding it to the pile. There's a streak of deliberate chaos that drives this movie. It is all over the place and that is what makes it great. Just when you think it's settling down it shifts entirely. Just when you think you've seen it all, you haven't. I gave up trying to figure out where it was going and just let the movie kick my ass. And kick my ass it did.

It is so over the top that I forgot where the top even was in the first place. Never once, though, does it offer a self-aware wink-wink, nudge-nudge moment. The movie practically feels like it could've been made in 1984. It's wonderfully ridiculous - and it's also the most purely entertaining movie I've seen in a long, long time.

Unfortunately, it's not doing to well at the box office. It's will probably be on video by early summer, I would guess. I'm sure it'll be on DVD and Blu-ray, but it'd be just as at home on a VHS tape.