Music Quiz (aka Shannon is crazy!)
Current mood: relaxed
Category: Friends

I saw this posted on my friend Shannon's blog, hence my subtitle to this post.  I love Shannon, but she is crazy (in the best way possible)!

Open up your media player. Load up all your MP3s. Set it to random/shuffle. List the first 20 songs that play. No cheating. Bold the one you find the most embarrassing (if there is one).
Italicize your favorite.
Underline your least favorite.
Post your list so everyone can laugh at your sad music taste.

1. Time After Time - Cyndi Lauper
2. Don't Leave Me Now - Pink Floyd
3. Silent Legacy - Melissa Etheridge
4. Original Of The Species - U2
5. When You Really Love Someone - Alicia Keys
6. Nothing Compares 2 U - Sinead O'Connor
7. MFC - Pearl Jam
8. Green Horney Theme - Al Hirt
9. If That's What It Takes - Celine Dion
10. E-Mac (Interlude) - Outkast
11. Strawberry Fields Forever - The Beatles
12. Girl, You'll Be A Woman Soon - Urge Overkill
13. Taylor - Jack Johnson
14. Could I Be You - Matchbox Twenty
15. Build It Up, Tear It Down - Fatboy Slim
16. Tomorrow Is Today - Billy Joel
17. Sing - Travis
18. The Whole Shebang - Grant Lee Buffalo
19. One Piece At A Time - Johnny Cash
20. The Ballad of John & Yoko - The Beatles

It was really hard to choose a favorite one... not so much with the least favorite and most embarrassing (of course, they're the same song. I have to admit that I own a Celine Dion CD).

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Happy news! :)
Current mood: excited
Category: School, College, Greek

Some of you may know that I have been languishing at the College of Staten Island, biding my time until I raised my grade point average to acceptable levels.  Well, today, I was informed, via writing, that all that all that hard work paid off.  No more Saturday classes for this lass.  As of the end of this semester, I will no longer be matriculating at CSI.  Yes, ladies and gents, I have finally been accepted to Hunter College in Manhattan!!! I'm so excited I can hardly stand it.  And I just had to share my happy news with everyone.

Currently listening : FutureSex / LoveSounds By Justin Timberlake Release date: 12 September, 2006

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King Kong (2005)
Current mood: tired
Category: Movies, TV, Celebrities

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Why I Hate Remakes
Current mood: frustrated
Category: Movies, TV, Celebrities

        Let me start right off by saying that I am a hypocrite.  I am going to tell you why I hate movie remakes, and yet one of my top five favorite movies of all time is The Maltese Falcon, which had been previously made in 1931 and 1936 (under the title Satan Met a Lady).  I am looking forward to seeing Peter Jackson's King Kong.  And I absolutely love Ocean's Eleven.  These exceptions to the rule of hating remakes fall into three distinct categories, of course.  First off, The Maltese Falcoln is a classic film.  Most people you ask don't even know that they attempted to translate the book to screen twice previously.  I have read the book ,and I must say that John Huston did a fantastic job of faithfully translating the story.  Since I have never seen the predecessors to this version, I can't say if it was a film that needed to be remade, but I sure am thankful for Huston's vision.   
        Speaking of movies that need to be remade, Ocean's Eleven starring George Clooney and Brad Pitt is a ton of fun and a movie my friends and I quote often- even the little throw away lines ("I'd never been to Belize.").  I have seen the original with Frank Sinatra and the rest of the Rat Pack, and I must say that it looks like that movie was made as an excuse for the gang to hang out in Vegas when they weren't working at the casinos.  It's not a good movie, but they sure do look like they're having fun.  George Clooney, Brad Pitt and company also look like they're having fun, but the movie is also a hoot with wonderful, if not fully realized, characters.  Seriously, who wouldn't take Don Cheadle's Basher over Sammy Davis Jr's underused counterpart in the original? (Although he does have the best line in the movie.)    
        As for King Kong, my reasons for wanting to see it are two-fold.  One is because it has obviously been a passion for Peter Jackson to make this movie.  As a fan of the original he obviously has no designs on destroying the story.  I think his reasoning for remaking the film might have something to do with my second reason for wanting to see it.  King Kong is an interesting movie that had an idea that was hard to show in it's original conception.  There is a beautifully tender moment near the end of the movie in which Kong faces death rather than risk harm to Ann Darrow.  The fact that they were able to get that emotion across with the animatronics they utilized is amazing.  The fact that we have such advanced technology for realizing unbelievable creatures is also amazing, and I am curious to see wether the story is advanced or harmed by the use of new technology.  Certainly the use of Andy Serkis in motion-capture technology can't hurt.  This, remember, is the team that brought us Gollum, perhaps the most fully realized an complex character in all of the Lord of the Rings trilogy.  He was a breakthrough character in terms of technology, and I am actually hoping Jackson, Serkis and the team at WETA are able to keep up the good work.   
        Now, on to the reason I (generally) hate remakes.  Nine times out of ten, a movie will be remade simple to make money and will have no real cinematic value.  If a movie is remade that does not improve somehow on the original production, what is the reason for making the movie?  I am reminded of Gus Van Sant's Psycho.  While I have not seen it, I have heard tell that it is a shot-for-shot remake of Alfred Hitchcock's masterpiece, which I have seen.  Why bother?  Most of the movies that studios are choosing to remake are good movies.  Remaking Capra's classic Mr. Deeds Goes to Town as a vehicle for Adam Sandler's inane comic stylings?  Why?  Please God, why?    
        Ironically, I am also a theater fan, and I have absolutely no problem with revivals.  Why?  Because there is no way to go back in time and see Zero Mostel in Fiddler on the Roof.  (Harvey Fierstein sure made a great Tevye, by the way). I can't take a trip in the wayback machine for an engagement of Yul Brenner in The King and I.  Not to mention that the theater is a singular experience that changes each time one attends a show, even if the actors are the same.  I have seem Rent on Broadway a total of five times, and I come away from the show with a different experience each time.  I can't say that I have a different experience each time I watch the same movie.  And movies are preserved in their entirety for future consuption.  My nephew will be able to see the same movies that I saw in the exact same way that I saw them, and we will be able to discuss them with a common point of reference.  There is no reason to remake good movies when the films are out there for us to view on home video. And if the movie isn't released on home video of any kind, the responsible studio should consider releasing it post-haste.   
        Seriously, I understand that there are few original ideas out there.  People have been telling stories since the beginning of time, and it's pretty hard to try to come up with something new, but if you can't come up with something new, can't you at least come up with something orginial?  The movie-going public is not stupid.  We do not need to be condescended to.  And we are certainly capably of going out and renting a movie that was made ten, 20, hell even fifty years ago.  We do not need you to make a new version with a certified box-office draw to alert us to the fact that this story is out in the ether.   
        And don't even get me started on the American remakes of foreign films.  I didn't even know this happened until I was sitting at home watching TV and saw a commercial for Point of No Return.  We had HBO in those days, and we had quite enjoyed watching La Femme Nikita every time it was on.  I didn't need a bright shining sign to tell me that this was the same movie, and I thought from the get-go that not only did it look horrible, but there was no point in making the film.  I didn't think that an American audience would shy away from the French original.  And granted, I haven't really seen a lot of this lately, or, at least, I have been less aware of it, but when I see an American version of Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon you can be sure that you will have to endure another rant from me.

Currently listening : Christmas Eve and Other Stories By Trans-Siberian Orchestra Release date: 15 October, 1996

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King Kong (1933)
Current mood: impressed
Category: Movies, TV, Celebrities

King Kong (1933)
Directed by: Merian C. Cooper
Starring: Fay Wray, Robert Armstrong, Bruce Cabot, Frank Reicher
Watched: Alone at home on DVD
Distractions: Minimal - I tried to get some crochet done while watching the film, and I had to go back a couple of times and put the closed caption on to understand some dialogue.
1001 Movies page 115

        I can certainly see how this film might be a watershed moment for a future filmmaker.  It is impossible and unfair to judge films based on today's technology.  In order to truly understand and appreciate a film's visual artistry, one must always keep in mind the time in which the film was made. While an audience raised on Star Wars and Lord of the Rings might scoff at the obvious effects of King Kong, for 1933 it must have been an amazing sight to see such a thing on the big screen.  I can only imagine the awe of the audience of that day.  I might imagine it to be something like my own awe when I first saw Star Wars at a drive-in theater when I was four years old.
        The film centers on filmmaker Carl Denham, who is famous for making adventure pictures in far-off locales.  They may be dangerous, but he points out early on that he's never failed to bring everyone back alive.  No talent agent in New York is willing to find him an actress for his new film, especially since he hasn't told anyone what it's about or where he'll be filming it, so Carl heads out in search of his leading lady before the ship is set to take off.  He finds poor, out-of-work Ann Darrow at a fruit stand when she almost steals some fruit to eat.  This is depression-era New York, and Denham's offer of work is not something Ann can turn down.
        The real action of the film heats up when the crew makes it to their mysterious locale.  Denham finds something of much more value to him than the film he was planning to shoot in Kong, the gorilla that the natives fear and appease with a bride.  There is nothing in the film to state how often this ritual is carried out, but one might guess that this is an annual "sacrifice."  When the natives see Ann, they decide to offer her to Kong and kidnap her from the ship.  Half of the crew follows Kong into the jungle to rescue Ann.
        This is a relatively familiar story at this point in history, especially with Peter Jackson's high-profile remake coming out this week.  After viewing the film, I can completely understand how it could have been the moment a young Peter Jackson decided to make movies.  That he was aware of that decision is something of which I envy.  I wish I had been aware of the switch that had been flipped at the tender age of four.  It took me a bit longer to figure it out.  Even though it is apparent at many points in the film that the human characters are watching the "monsters" on a screen, it is none the less stunning to see what the visual effects artists of the time were able to accomplish with the available resources.
        The only real complaint I have about this movie was the opening, which consists of nothing more than a screen with the word "Overture" printed on it while music plays in the background for a full four minutes.  I don't know why that bothered me so much.  I love Broadway shows, and almost all of them open with an overture while the curtain is down.  The film version of West Side Story opens with the overture, but that is played over an engaging title sequence, so maybe it was the minimal nature of the screen shot, and the fact that it spelled out what was happening that really irked me.  I guess even I am not immune to judging things by today's standards.
        However, even by today's standards, the original King Kong stands up as a film to be watched and enjoyed.  Sure the dialogue is minimal, and the running time short.  Not to mention that I get the feeling that they auditioned actresses for the part of Ann Darrow by just having them scream.  This is not to say that Fay Wray is a horrendous actress, but once the crew of the Venture gets to the island, she isn't really given much else to do.  Well, she is also asked to look stunning in a dress I envy.*

*I was going to make a comment about Tim Curry's line in Don't Dream It, Be It from The Rocky Horror Picture Show, but I didn't think everyone would get that, and I still have to write about that film.  Believe it or not, it did make it into the book 1,001 Movies You Must See Before You Die.

Currently watching : King Kong (2-Disc Special Edition) Release date: 22 November, 2005

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