after the trainwreck that was the first transformers movie I will happily skip this one. and then I saw this review by roger ebert:

for those who weren’t aware, project runway packed up and left bravo for lifetime.

so in an ironic twist, bravo was given a task (much like the weekly challenges on project runway) of quickly throwing together a fashion reality show and what they hastily stitched together was the fashion show. it premiered tonight.

there’s only so many things you can try to do differently with this format, so it’s perfectly fine that this show is very much like its predecessor. but in many ways project runway is the hotter, well put-together older sister to the awkward younger sister fashion show going through puberty. project runway’s execution is just more elegant while the fashion show seemed too intent on doing anything to differentiate itself. I’m certain the fashion show will find its niche and come into its own but that’s not going to happen overnight.

but let’s talk about the “you’re fired” equivalent for this show… are you ready? it’s we’re not buying it. uh, are you KIDDING me? you’re sending someone home with THAT?

now that I’ve been playing GHWT for two days straight, I want to give a rundown on my thoughts thus far:

• very, very wide selection of songs. for all you debbie downers who complain they don’t like any of the songs on previous guitar hero games, if you can’t find something on this one you probably don’t enjoy “music”
• great new features to boost game play. finger tapping? are you serious??
• customizable characters and guitars. it’s a bit of a time investment but hey, if you can put yourself on a basketball court and dunk on kobe, why not rocking out with travis barker?
• moving away from the linear game play of previous games. it’s taken the focus off of “you are a singular guitar player playing these songs” and became a lot more social, more about interactivity with bandmates

if there’s one thing I wish they could have done, was to do something about that extra long load time.

so I caught the aforementioned remake at a matinee. you know what, it’s not horrible. perhaps it was because my expectations were set to snooze, but I didn’t think it warranted the 20% (at present) approval rating on rotten tomatoes.

there’s this one amazing shot of a football stadium getting vaporized that’s in the trailer that really pumped me up seeing it on the big screen. giants fans, you might want to avert your eyes when you see it coming.

this movie is matinee-worthy, but I wouldn’t pay full price for it.

if I had to summarize it in one quip I’d say “if you’ve seen one indy movie, you’ve seen ‘em all. in a good way.” but that would make me a dismissive, snarky internet asshole (even if it is a positive thing I’m saying). so I won’t.

although the story is as simplistic as you can write one, it’s as fun and action-packed as you remember all the others being. it’s a summer blockbuster, what do you want?

ps- cate blanchett in a bowl-cut brunette wig is hot as hell. meow.

today I caught the chicken, the fish and the king crab at the film festival. I made sure I ate before catching it because I figured I’d be bombarded with shots of food that would encompass my entire field of vision.

this film follows one spanish chef, jesús almagro, and his quest to compete at the bocuse d’or, an olympics-like culinary competition between 24 top chefs from around the world.

chefs train years to compete in this, not to mention spending over $100,000 in materials to practice with.

but you know what? the type of miniscule, surgically crafted miniature square morsels did little to fuel my appetite. it was much like a fashion show where everything looks pretty but you wouldn’t really see yourself wearing anything coming down the runway. same thing here — I can’t imagine eating the kind of foods they were judging.

it just wasn’t that exciting to me.

the final scene was of the spanish chef helping his mother prepare a big pan of paella while talking to the camera about his experiences at the bocuse d’or. the paella looked good. really, really good. and it made me wonder, was there a message that this was REAL cooking — preparing meals for your family and friends? the paella, with big chunks of chicken and shrimp tumbling around in the big metal pan, couldn’t have been farther from the intricately delicate sculpture-foods at the bocuse d’or.

not to run this message into the ground, but to me, the shot of the paella was much more appetizing than anything else I saw in the film.

it would have been nice had the final message in the film been a big fuck you to the competition.

the film itself was very enjoyable as jesús almagro is a lovable underdog who you really want to do well. is this the karate kid of the culinary world? you’ll just have to watch and see if jesús delivers a crane kick to the french chef at the end of the competition.

for those of us who don’t speak swedish, that translates to “let the right one in” and it’s the title of a fantastic film I just saw at the tribeca film festival. it’s a tender tale of a young bullied boy who falls in love with the girl next door, who happens to be a vampire.

as much as I strongly urge you to go see it, I just as strongly urge you not to watch the trailer online because it doesn’t come close to doing justice to the beauty of this film. in fact I feel it can be misleading, not to mention it giving away key scenes that’s best left for you to see for the first time on the big screen.

is it a coming of age story? is it a horror movie? there’s no categorizing this film.

the two leads appear to be in their early teens, and according to the director’s q&a after the screening they had little to no prior acting experience. that to me was mind blowing. to get such performances out of these actors must require so much skill and patience by the director. wow.

I don’t know what kind of u.s. distribution they have lined up but it needs to be seen by many people. in the meantime, if you’re in the nyc area you need to get off your ass and see it before it’s too late.

I walked out of cloverfield a half hour into it.

an entire feature length movie shot from the viewfinder of a guy running with a camcorder just isn’t cool.

in fact it’s the worst thing I’ve ever paid money to see in a theater.

I saw tonight the king of kong: a fistful of quarters. if you haven’t heard of it, it’s a documentary of one man’s drive to beat the world record in donkey kong.

it’s easily in the top 5 films I’ve seen this year. this film is to donkey kong as spellbound is to the national spelling bee. it’s so gripping, full of human drama and emotion.

I mean, come on, how often do you see a 98% rating on rotten tomatoes? (other than the two movie links I have in this entry…)

if there’s been any movie this year worth every bit of its hype it’s superbad. I lost count of all the hilarious lines half way through and that was okay because there were tons more to come.

not to say they weren’t memorable, I just couldn’t remember them all.

it’s honest to goodness bust your gut laughing kind of movie. go see it.