Midnight Run
The movie: A couple years ago when I worked at CAPE, a particular co-worker of mine would always yell out the words "Serrano's got the disks!". We knew that it was from a movie, but I had no idea what movie it was. Fast forward to about two months ago -- I was flipping through TV channels and I saw Robert DeNiro on my scree, so I stopped to see what it was since I'd never seen this movie before. He appeared to be some sort of policeman or something, doing some kind of sting in the airport in Las Vegas.
About three minutes into it, his wire goes dead and he must alert the other agents by yelling out "Serrano's got the disks!" A ha! I finally knew where the line came from! Well, that was pretty much the end of the movie, but I did find out that the movie was called Midnight Run. So what did I do next? I put it up on my Netflix queue, of course! Well it came about a week ago, but I didn't get a chance to watch it until today.
As it turns out, Robert DeNiro's character in this movie is a bounty hunter, and he's supposed to find this guy in New York and bring him to Los Angeles, and the movie is all the trouble and trials and tribulations along the way. This movie is a little bit of action and a little bit of comedy, and overall I found it to be highly entertaining. Plus, the end of the movie takes place in Vegas, so how could it go wrong? Also the guy who plays Cypher in The Matrix and Teddy in Memento is in this movie.
The DVD: This DVD has the movie on it, and that's it. Pop it in and after the FBI warnings and junk, the movie starts right away. Hit the "menu" button on your DVD player and all you get is a chapter selection screen. It's encoded in letterboxed 1.85:1 widescreen format, but the transfer is preetty clean and clear... although I suspect it's just a recycled film transfer from a Laserdisc. I should also add now that I don't believe that this DVD is currently available, as I can't seem to find anyone selling it. But if you can find it to rent and you're a fan of Robert DeNiro, I'd definitely check this movie out!

Tuesday, 8 January 2002 11:59pm

W

elp, last night Cami and I took down the Christmas tree. It's kind of sad that it's gone, but it's also nice that we got that little bit of space back, and it adds a little piece of mind that there's one less fire hazard in this apartment. Earlier today I was cleaning my room for the first time in a really long time, mainly cleaning my desk, actually. I filled two trash bags full of trash from the top of my desk, believe it or not!
Over the course of cleaning my room I discovered that I have a disturbing number of music CD jewel cases without the CD's in them. Where did they all go? Very, very strange. Oh well. At least I have space on my desk to do stuff now. It was getting pretty ridiculous for a while there! Tomorrow I'll be hosting a little low-limit poker game here. Should be fun!
Oh yes no update would be complete without the DVD review, and today I bring you two! First, Heat, which I had for a while, then loaned to someone, never got it back, so I bought another one, and then the original 1960 version of Ocean's 11, which came out on DVD today.

Heat
The movie: Heat is one of my favorite movies of all time. I saw it at least five times when it was showing in the theaters, acquired a copy on video cassette long before it was released on video, and have owned the DVD, twice. But what's not to like? This movie has great action, great characters, great acting... and stars both Robert De Niro and Al Pacino!
I'm not going to break down the story to you, I'm just going to say you should invest the three hours it will take you to watch this movie. Someone on the riceboypage message board noted that one thing they really liked about this movie was the realism of the gun play -- noting that the actors looked like they really knew how to handle the weapons, and that the sounds were spot-on perfect, not just canned gunfire sounds.
Yes, it is a long movie, but it isn't in a way that makes you feel like it's dragging at any point. In fact, for me, the longest part of the movie is at the very beginning where Al Pacino's character is making out with his wife... I didn't really want to see that so close up hahaha. But yeah, it's a great movie, filled with a lot of really great quotable lines. I like it :)
The DVD: This DVD features a 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen presentation of the film, which is of above average quality. I've seen better, but I've definitely seen a whole lot worse. Where this DVD really shines though is in the 5.1 soundtrack... it's obvious that a lot of attention was paid to the soundtrack and the surround soundstage is rich with depth and detail.
Special features include three theatrical trailers (all in anamorphic widescreen, woohoo!), and I think that's about it. This DVD is all about the movie, and what a great movie it is.

Ocean's 11 (1960)
The movie: 2001's remake of Ocean's 11 was a big box-office draw that I enjoyed very much. I thought it would be a great idea to see the original movie, made in 1960, starring Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack. Not only to see the differences between the two movies, but also to get a taste of that old Vegas style.
Overall, I think the new version ended up being more entertaining, with much better pacing. The old version is over 2 hours long, and it really feels like it. I thought that the movie took forever to get going, but once it did, it was pretty entertaining. Or maybe it was just the fact that they finally got to Vegas and I got to see all the sights as they were back then. And oh yes, it was kind of cool seeing Dean Martin sing "Ain't That A Kick In The Head"!
Differences and similarities with the new version:

But yeah, overall, it's an okay movie. It's mostly all about the Rat Pack galavanting across the screen, and it gets a slow start, but after it gets going, it is entertaining, and has a really great surprise ending that I won't reveal for those of you who haven't seen this movie yet. And it's full of old Vegas style -- check out this shot down Freemont street from in front of the Plaza hotel! Super old school! But that Golden Gate sign still looks exactly like that! That's one of the reasons why I love Downtown Las Vegas... even if this movie is mostly set on the Strip.

The DVD: The film is presented in a 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen format with a mono soundtrack. And although it is in mono, the sound quality is good. The film transfer is also pretty clean, as far as artifacts, dust and scratches go, but it certainly does have that "old" quality of color to it. There are a few special features, including two theatrical trailers, and an excerpt of the Tonight Show which had Frank Sinatra guest hosting and interviewing Ocean's 11 co-star Angie Dickinson.
It also features a "Las Vegas Strip Map" which looks like the map used in the movie showing the five casinos they rob (Sahara, Riviera, Desert Inn, Sands and Flamingo), and when you click on each casino, you see short features on each of the casinos and the changes they've gone through between then and now, including interviews with people who worked in those casinos, often for 30 years or more! However, I think this section of the DVD could have been done much better, and most of the interviews consisted mostly of "yeah I'm an old lady and I liked the old Vegas better"... the featurettes, short as they may have been (less than 5 minutes each) could have been much more in depth, even for their short time length. Also, the interface is totally messed up and it's hard to navigate the menu on this part of the disc. So yeah, this part could have been a lot better, although, I may just feel that way because I am a big fan of Vegas and already know alot about the history, in which case I'm just being a big nerd.
But overall, it's a decent DVD, with decent video and audio, and OK special features. One last thing to note about the movie -- It's kind of cool knowing that these guys made this movie in the day time as they were still performing two shows a night in the show rooms in Las Vegas, but the only hint that you really get of this in the whole movie is at the very end when you see them walking in front of the Sands and see their real names up on the marquee.

Saturday, 12 January 2002 7:40pm

S

omehow every trip I take to KFC becomes an adventure. I want to note that I still love Church's chicken, but dammit, 11 miles is a long way to drive for some fried chicken, and often times I'm just too damned hungry to wait when I get the urge. Now the first thing I want to say about this particular trip is that the guy who always messes something up in every order he's ever taken from me and then somehow became a manager... didn't mess anything up in my order today.
Anyway, the place was deserted. I was the only one in there, and nothing really interesting (aside from my order being filled quickly and correctly) but that would change soon enough. A mother and her two children walked in the door, and before she could even make it in the door, her son (probably around five years old) ran through the door straight for the little vending machine with the gumballs, stickers and rubber balls.
"Mommy, I want this ball, buy me this ball," he cried out, but his mother flatly said no as she was ordering. She first ordered the two meals for her kids, then started deciding what she wanted for herself. Meanwhile, her son is opening and slamming shut the opening from the vending machine, making loud clanging noises. Ugh. Sometimes kids can be so horrible.
At the same time, her daughter (probably around 11 or 12 years old) sits down and places her purse with "CUTIE" written on it in rhinestones on her lap while making googley eyes at me... oh brother. After about three or four minutes of googley eyes and clanging noises, the mother was still standing there at the counter trying to decide what she wanted. Does she want the three crispy strip meal? Or does she want the two white pieces of chicken meal? What does each one come with? What's the difference between a combo and a "meal"?
Finally the daughter stands up and tells her mom that she's going to go to the restroom. The brotehr stops his clanging and says ME TOO and tries to run into the women's bathroom at the same time as the daughter. The daughter protests and shoves the boy out of the bathroom and slams the door shut while the mother instructs her to take her brother with her. So the son decides to run into the men's restroom. I can't even see how this kid could reach either the toilet or the urinal in that bathroom, and I have no idea how he is going to manage.
About two or three minutes pass, the mother still hasn't ordered yet, and I hear a shrill "MOM!!" emanating from the men's restroom. She's still struggling with the order and ignores him and about 30 seconds later the kid comes running down the hall with his pants and underwear around his ankles and says "MOM!!" while standing there fully exposed. She still ignores him and continues trying to order, until he notices the vending machine and says "oooh, ball! Mom! I want this ball!" and starts clanging the the opening again. She finally looks and notices that her son is standing in the middle of this KFC with his pants and underwear down.
All in all, I think it was nearly 10 minutes before she decided what she wanted to eat, and then, when her order came out (three crispy strips) she decided she didn't want that anymore and had the guy take them back and give her a two piece white meat chicken combo instead, all the while complaining about the "horrible service" that she'd been getting. Yes, things like this can only confirm my belief that on the whole, people only care about themselves. The KFC employee patiently waited while she changed her mind back and forth for ten minutes (even after the order came out), while her son ran around the restaurant half naked... and she has the nerve to complain about the poor service she's been getting. How do people live like that? It really boggles my mind.
I'm sure that by now you've noticed the reorganized index to my updates section. I was originally going to redesign the whole thing, but I've been using that cheesy spiral bound notebook background for so long, I just couldn't bare to let it go. So instead of a full redesign, I just rearranged some thigns, cleaned some things up, and added a little image at the top to go with the spiral bound notebook theme.
Wednesday night I hosted my very first poker night, and it was fun. I bought way too much beer, soday, chips and cookies, and almost none of it was actually consumed. Now I have a whole bunch of leftovers... although that's not a particularly bad thing. And finally... today's DVD review.

The Good, The Bad And The Ugly
The movie: Ahh, the classic "spaghetti western" directed by Sergio Leone, starring Clint Eastwood. I'm not really sure how to describe this movie. It's got three guys (the good, the bad, and the ugly), and they are all after $200,000 that is buried somewhere in the desert. This movie has more twists, turns and strange settings than anything I can think of, especially when about two thirds of the way into the movie, these guys get mixed up in the American civil war. It's full of drama, comedy, and displays of super hero-like skill, and is thorougly entertaining to watch.
This movie was very artfully made, with beautiful settings and some really damned cool camera shots. It also had a huge budget (for the day) and it really shows... as Cami noted... they sure blow a lot of stuff up! The civil war battle scene is nothing short of spectacular (and pretty damned huge). One kind of weird thing though... the movie was shot in the deserts of Spain, and if you didn't know that, then there might not be anything strange to you, but if you go into it knowing that... you start to notice some very spanish and italian looking guys that seem to be popping up in random places in the American west... particularly in the battle scene where almost all of the extras used were actually Spanish and not Americans.
But anyway. It's a great movie, and certainly worth seeing in a widescreen format if you never have before... because there are some really great shots in this movie that would not be as effective in a pan-and-scan format, or even, completely ruined. And if you've never seen this movie and you're not convinced, maybe you should see it just to see where that little whistling music sound thingy that has become such a cliche of "Western" stuff came from.
The DVD: The movie was presented in a 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen format, and boy does it look great (for its age)! The audio is in fabulous Dolby Digital mono, and sounds... well, probably about as good as it could get considering the original source material. Special features about 10 minutes of deleted footage. This footage was in the original Italian release of the film, but was cut out of the international release for time reasons. Since it was never used in any English versions, this deleted footage only has audio in Italian, but there is the option to view it with English subtitles.
There is also a "behind the scenes" section that is just plain text (about two pages), as well as a screen with some text about the origins of the "Spaghetti Western". Finally, there is the requisite theatrical trailer, which for some reason, has the faces of "the bad" and "the ugly" switched. All in all, it's not a DVD I'd want to get for the special features (but really, how many DVD's are?), but this is a truly classic movie, that I won't say everyone should own, but I have seen it heavily discounted in many stores, and I will say that it is worth owning to anyone who enjoys this movie already.