March what?

Hey devoted readers!

So I feel like first things first, I should address my predictions blog, and make a change. For Best Actress, I wouldn't mind seeing Helen Mirren take the statue, she was pretty fantastic in the Last Station, and after having struggled through All About Steve, Sandra Bullock should never win an Oscar. I'd like to think the Academy will award actors who consistently turn out good performances, not just for a blip in their career. Bullock was good in Crash, but more times than not she's doing films that are pretty awful and forgettable. It was interesting when I read an article describing how the Oscars exhibit trends in who they honor. They claimed that actresses that are viewed as "sweethearts" or are popular who turn out their first big performance tend to take home the prize (Reese Witherspoon in "Walk the Line" or Marisa Tomei in "My Cousin Vinny") and that actors have to be nominated multiple times and be more consistent to earn their prize (Sean Penn "Milk", "Mystic River"). I found these "trends" to not really be definitive, because this would mean that Anne Hathaway should have take the Oscar last year for "Rachel Getting Married," her first nomination, instead, it went to Kate Winslet who was long overdue. Mo'Nique will undoubtedly win for "Precious." What an intense and powerful film with some great performances, but it's definitely not something you'd want to watch over and over again. Anyways, my point is that I really would like to see George Clooney win, but I think he'll have to churn out another good performance because this is Bridge's fourth or fifth nomination, so it seems he's next in line.

I also pulled a double feature this weekend following The Last Station and got a chance to see Shutter Island. The more I reflect on the film the more I really, really enjoyed it. I won't go into much detail to avoid spoilers, but I'll it's definitely a really cool picture and another great performance by Leo. Scorsese is just the man and this is definitely worth a look at least. I read a review that I agreed with stating that when you leave this movie you'll either love it or be too cool to enjoy the final act of the film. I loved it. I'll probably go back to see it again soon.

In other exciting, rumor filled news, there has been speculation and what not that a reunited Soundgarden will headline Lollapalooza this year, as well as rumors of Pearl Jam, Them Crooked Vultures, Green Day, Lady GaGa, the Arcade Fire, the Strokes, and many others. Obviously it's all speculative, but the thought of a PJ and Soundgarden headline is just fantastic. There's no way we don't get some Temple of the Dog songs at some point in the weekend. It could lead to the best Lollapalooza ever, and they are pretty great to begin with.

The weather is getting nicer, but I'm not convinced it'll stick. I'm waiting for the late March dump of snow and cold weather that we've had in the past. I feel like the seasonal months were shifted back a month each. Warmer into December, colder into April, hotter into October. It's weird. I'm no weatherman.

Apologies to the faithful who've been pining for more poetry. I've turned in a couple good ones here and there, just haven't had the opportunity to post more up. I wasn't all that thrilled with the last batch I posted, oh well.

So I watched this stand up comedy dvd, The Comedians of Comedy: Live at the Troubador, this weekend, and it was okay, a stretch 3 star rating on Netflix, but I had some opinions after watching it.

So as for comedians, and stand up material and jokes and what not, I enjoy people like Jerry Seinfeld, or Dave Chappelle, or Zach Galifanakis, or Ricky Gervais, and so on. People who's act is simple, satirical, dry, dark, goofy, relatively clean or not, but whatever. Anyways, Patton Oswalt's stand up was pretty great, until he started ranting on about Bush and how torture's legal and blah blah blah, politics, blah blah, terrorism, blah blah, my political views are correct and I'll make dumb jokes about other peoples, blah blah. Aside from this, I feel using Bush jokes at this point are a sign of lack of creativity. He's been out of office for over a year now, we get it, you can do a great impression and not be that funny at all because it's all you can and your show was complete garbage(Frank Caliendo). This is the reason why I don't watch the Daily Show, or that I take any news source with a grain of salt, because everybody is pitching some angle, whether it's Jon Stewart cutting up the news to make it funny and laugh at people, or it's Fox doing the same to push their point, every medium of news has an agenda. I just find it lazy when people/comedians doing stand up can't use their sense of humor and be creative. Yeah sure, Chappelle makes cracks like that all the time, and what you have to love about that guy though is that he's not afraid to make fun of anyone. Racially he made fun of African Americans on his show more than any other race. I don't know where I'm going with all of this, but I just got turned off when Oswalt starts going off on political tangents that aren't funny. I'm not a huge Dane Cook fan, but you have to admire the fact that he's relatively clean and super creative and inventive. His films are absolute shit but his stand up is entertaining.

To wrap it all up, just not a fan of people soap boxing during their stand up, or their rock concerts, or their interviews. There is an appropriate and effective way to successfully executing a political agenda, just ask Bono, he's got AIDS. So shut up about Bush, he's out of office, there's plenty to laugh at Obama about, God forbid we make jokes about our liberal black president, that is if you have to resort to that kind of thing for laughs. Also, religion jokes aren't that funny. Go watch Religulous with Bill Maher, and yeah he finds some blindly following religious types, but when countered by intelligent people he looks like a fool. Yet, he's got his own show on HBO simply because he's controversial.

Wow, I am ranting. Got to keep it rolling.

Seriously, I'm a pretty big fan of Ricky Gervais. His recent film efforts have been disappointing, but the Office, Extras, and his new show are just down right funny stuff.

New White Stripes live DVD/CD comes out March 16th.
Just got bought (500) Days of Summer, great movie.
As of this post I still have 6 Oscar nominees to see in order to be fully prepped for Sunday evening. Looks like it's going to be a busy weekend.

Okay, I think that's all I've got for this post.

Oh, this morning I pulled a plastic water bottle of the garbage. Can't understand why people don't recycle, just does not compute in my mind. (Yeah, I'm talking to you Pasha.)