Saturday, July 21, 2012

Score!!!!!!!

I got the "Tryouts" piece from Rudy stuck in my head when that commercial for Dick's Sporting Goods came on this morning.  Got me to thinking about a few favorite pieces of movie music:

First, the mentioned "Tryouts" by Jerry Goldsmith.  Goldsmith's score is the best thing about Rudy, and bear in mind that I like the rest of Rudy quite a bit....



Promontory, from the Last of the Mohicans soundtrack, by This is another that gets in my head, and another one that's popped up advertising--Nike used it in a Leave it on the Field type spot.


Danny Elfman's work on the 1989 Batman flick is fantastic, and the whole score is definitely worth a listen.  I always like the Finale, though.  Maybe it's where it wanders into the John Williams heroic brass toward the end....


Speaking of Mr. Williams.... there's a lot of I love, but for some reason, this one from Return of the Jedi stands out.  Just has the right energy for moment.  Plus, it helps that Billie Dee Williams has one of the single greatest acting moments in the history of cinema....how can they be jamming us....if they don't know we're coming?


I don't care what you say.  I love David Arnold's score to Independence Day.  It's just as cheesy as the flick, and this is my favorite part:


Ecstasy of Gold is always a favorite.


I felt like the one thing Marvel truly missed out on was having strong, identifying scores for all the characters in their movies, perhaps from one composer.  As it stands, Alan Silvestri's work on The Avengers is fantastic, and when the billion dollars worth of dust settles, I think the soundtrack may end up being one of my favorite bits from the movie.


Another favorite, from an all time favorite flick, To Kill a Mockingbird


Another Goldsmith.  The music for Gremlins is spot on....

Thursday, July 19, 2012

Minor Thoughts on The Fifth Element

Popped in The Fifth Element yesterday while doing some cleaning, which meant I cleaned for fifteen minutes, and then stood transfixed by the television for the last 2 hours of the flick.

Just a couple thoughts:

I have movies that become non-apology movies for different actors.  They are roles or performances that I enjoy so much, for any variety of reasons, that they flip the needle over to "I love them, and they'll never need to apologize for any performance ever again."  The Fifth Element has that for a couple different folks.

The first is Gary Oldman.  And let me say this:  I appreciated Gary Oldman before Fifth Element.  He's a chameleon, and an incredible actor.  But for me, Fifth Element cemented in my mind that as much of a tremendous artist Gary Oldman is, he's still able to go out and be silly.  And Jean-Baptiste Zorg is a cartoon villain made real.  He is funny, and terribly silly.  And from the looks of things, amazingly fun to play.  Had a conversation with my buddy Alex, one time, in which we were talking about comic actors taking dramatic roles, and saying "if you think it's not a gift to be funny, go watch De Niro try to do comedy."  And I think it ties a little bit into the ability to be silly.  De Niro's never really done silly well (he gets close in Stardust), but Oldman does silly incredibly in The Fifth Element.  It's hard to think of Oldman having a bad outing, but Fifth Element makes it so that he gets a pass.

The other is Chris Tucker.  I love Chris Tucker in Fifth Element.  Again.  Silly.  Outlandish costumes that he just owns 100 percent.  Loud.  Screaming.   Bug eyes that are bigger than life.  He just makes me laugh.  Now, at first glance, I was thinking that Tucker might have greater potential for making material to apologize for than Oldman, but looking through his IMDB file, there's not a lot bad there.  Add to that his decision to head for the house after a couple huge paydays?  Highly respectable.  (Dude's made 2 Rush Hour movies in the past 11 years, and nothing else.  It's not high art, but they're enjoyable, and he's not leaving a bunch of other crap lying around...I kinda like that).

So.  Yeah.  Milla Jovovich, Ian Holm, Tiny Lister and Bruce Willis are all fun in the flick, but those two guys listed above?  Never have to apologize for another role.

Let me finish this post that while their performances are fun, they're not on the level of Val Kilmer in Tombstone.  After playing Doc Holliday, Val Kilmer could run my family over with a lawnmower, and given his performance, I think I could probably forgive him....

Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Tommy Lee Jones

Minor obsession, here lately, is the movie The Fugitive.

I would very much like to be Tommy Lee Jones in the Fugitive.

Sadly, I think the best that I could muster, on my very best day, would be Tommy Lee Jones in Batman Forever.

Goals.  Gotta have them.

Friday, July 13, 2012

Boring Shopping Post

Hi!

I went to the local drugstore today!  Because it's close, and I know where most of the shit is!  And I'm a rock star!  That's what rockstars do!  They go to the drug store on a Friday night!!!!


I went to the drugstore for three things.  First, I was buying Valerian Root, which I take for my occasional sleeplessness, and for the kickass dreams it gives me.  (Last night's excursion to dreamland included getting fired from writing on Saturday Night Live by Tina Fey because all my sketches were about necrophilia.  My defense was that they weren't about necrophilia.  They just had something to do with it, because it's funny.)  I also bought a can of Tinactin.  Your old pal Tommy has had a minor recurrence of ye olde Athlete's Foot, which is as ironic an affliction as ever I could get.  I also bought a bottle of water, because I was thirsty.


It's a Friday night, so there aren't a lot of people visiting the apothecary.  At least, not the legal one.  It was me, and another fellow who bought a gallon of milk, and a lady who was SHOPPING THE HELL OUT OF THE CVS!!!!


I work retail, as some of you know.


I am irked by couponers.


I get the concept.


But Coupon people can be troublesome.  


There is a sense of entitlement that many of them (not all...I try not to lump people together, unless they can turn their eyelids inside out, because those motherfuckers are the Devil!) carry with them.  They can wipe out an inventory on a product simply because they have 9 two-dollar coupons for the orange bottle of Herbal Essence shampoo that your store also has on sale for 2.50 this week.  They're so amped that they're going to be buying a gallon of shampoo for the same price as a gallon a milk that when we have to impose a store-sanctioned limit of 2 bottles per customer, their minds break, and they become Murder Maniacs.


Three of my best workers have been killed in the past year by Couponers.


Tragedy.  Bee Gees Style, yo.


I don't know.  I've used a coupon or two, in my time.  I get it.  I guess my own personal free time is so rare that I just don't feel like spending even a half-hour perusing the sale papers and online ads and emails and circulars for that 75 cents of a bottle of Kaopectate coupon.  

And I grant you that maybe I should.  I drive a 10-year-old car, and am pinching pennies to buy a house, and I go through Kaopectate like I think I'll win a prize for it.

But still.  I'd rather spend that time with my girlfriend, or my family, or reading a book, or watching TV, or clipping my fingernails, or updating my Will and Grace blog, or watching pro wrestling, or telling ghost stories, or listening to ghost stories, or watching Jack Osbourne hunt for ghosts on the SyFy Channel after pro wrestling goes off.

Or eating bacon.  Because, well, there isn't a whole lot I'd rather be doing than watching bacon.

But, there is one thing I'd rather do less.

And that's stand behind a couponer at a drugstore on a Friday night when I'm buying three things and want to go home to watch that Jack Osbourne ghost-hunting show.

Not really.  It's just on my TV, and it's awful.

But I digress.

I took my Valerian Root, Tinactin and water to the counter, only to have a lady with two carts of crap get in front of me.

It wasn't a foot race, and she didn't jump.  But she did make sure that she got to the counter first.

Let me say this.  I wasn't exaggerating when I said she had two carts of crap.  Food.  Toilet Paper.  Shampoo.  Anything else you can think of.

And she was in front of me.

And it was then that I saw it:

The notebook.

Maybe it's the organization of the couponer that bothers me.  They have these notebooks, with baseball card sheets for the coupons.  They are categorized and sectioned and cordoned and organized according to price, alphebetically by size.

While my own personal organization style tends toward "slob piles," I recognize organization and appreciate it.  But when it's taken to extremes...tedious extremes...blech.

Also?  It doesn't work.  People misplace coupons.  They don't realize coupons have expired, or have limits, etc.

So, I asked:  "Do you mind if I go ahead of you?"

Three things, I had.  Three.  She had easily 75.  I had 3.

"I do mind," she said.

I don't know what I said.  Maybe "Really?"

The cashier (and I dearly wish I'd caught her name, because she is my hero) didn't miss a beat.  She moved to her left, my right.  She moved to the next register, the one I was standing at.  She said to me:  "I can get you over here."

"Ok," I said.

"I was in line first," said the lady.

Neither of us said anything.  8 seconds later, my items were rung up.  I paid cash.  My transaction was done in less than 30 seconds.

"Have a good night," the cashier said.  And moved back to her right.  As I left the store, I heard her telling the lady she can set her stuff on the counter.

She is my hero.

Good Customer Service.

Don't Be a Dick.

I'm tired.

G'night.