Category Archives: Film & TV

Comedy Central’s Motherload Net coming November 1st

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“The Motherload Net will consist of five video-based channels featuring a mix of clips from Comedy Central’s programming as well as original content produced specifically for the broadband network.

“We’ve taken everything that is great about Comedy Central and shifted it into broadband,” explained Comedy Central president Doug Herzog. “They can program it themselves.”

The channels, offering more than 450 video clips at launch, are: Originals, TV Shows, The Daily Show with John Stewart, Comedians, and Cult Classics. Each channel will be updated five days a week, with a total of 50-80 new clips being added each week.”

Bad movies reduce movie attendance

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“A study by LA-based research firm OTX found among young men 13-25, 24 percent saw fewer movies than they did in 2003 and have shifted that leisure time to IMing and playing video games. Of course, unsurprisingly, it’s also due to only 35 percent saying there’s an “excellent selection” of movies as opposed to 60 percent two years ago. Cost was also cited as a factor as well with 68 percent claiming movies have become too expensive.” [AdRants]

Shitty movies that cost too much. Crappy theaters. Endless ads for karate studios and overweight real estate agents with bad hair. We were planning to see Serenity and Mirrormask in a theater but, you know what? Screw the theaters. Not another dime. I’m gonna wait for the DVDs.

Richard Dreyfuss was in The Graduate

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Richard DryfussI have no idea how many times I’ve seen that movie (1967) but I never spotted Dreyfuss. He’s only on screen for a few seconds, peeking around Norman Fell, but that was enough for Barb. For those who have seen the movie or care, it’s the appartment house scene and it really looks like Dreyfuss pushes in front of the other extras to get his face front-and-center. And since we’re knee-deep in trivia, I have to wonder if this tiny part for Norman Fell (the apartment manager) contributed in any way to his casting as Mr. Roper in Three’s Company.

60 Minutes is podcasting

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A few weeks ago I had lunch with some lads in the Missouri Senate information office and we talked about podcasting. They’d heard about it but didn’t think it was anything “the members” would be very interested in. They emailed me today to say that some of the members are eager start podcasting. Whoosh.

And all my MSM buds keep asking, “Are they making any money?” Uh, no. And they’re not paying us to distribute their programming either.

Jon Stewart on the Internet

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Why is Jon Stewart so much funnier than anything on “real television?” From Wired.com interview with Jon Stewart and Ben Karlin (The Daily Show’s executive producer):

It’s the idea that the content is no longer valued by where it stands, in what neighborhood it lives. What matters is what you put out there, not its location. I think that’s what people have come to learn from the Internet – it doesn’t matter where it comes from. If it’s good, it’s good.

The Internet is just a world passing around notes in a classroom. That’s all it is. All those media companies say, ‘We’re going to make a killing here.’ You won’t because it’s still only as good as the content.

Good Night, and Good Luck

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“Good Night, And Good Luck.” takes place during the early days of broadcast journalism in 1950’s America. It chronicles the real-life conflict between television newsman Edward R. Murrow and Senator Joseph McCarthy and the House Un-American Activities Committee. With a desire to report the facts and enlighten the public, Murrow, and his dedicated staff – headed by his producer Fred Friendly and Joe Wershba in the CBS newsroom – defy corporate and sponsorship pressures to examine the lies and scaremongering tactics perpetrated by McCarthy during his communist ‘witch-hunts’. A very public feud develops when the Senator responds by accusing the anchor of being a communist. In this climate of fear and reprisal, the CBS crew carries on and their tenacity will prove historic and monumental.

Produced by George Clooney, GN&GL opens in October. Won’t be a dry eye in the newsroom.

LAPD Blue

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NYPD Blue co-creator Steven Bochco is developing another cop show, this time for the WB. Variety.com describes it as “a young-skewing hourlong cop/mystery show revolving around two Hollywood homicide detectives at the LAPD.” Bochco says the untitled project will be “a little lighter in tone. It’s not heavy-duty or long on procedural. It owes more to ‘Columbo’ than ‘CSI.’ “

Bochco wrote a pretty fair Hollywood mystery novel a couple of years ago (Death by Hollywood) but I’m wondering if what I liked most about NYPD Blue came from the (then) tortured mind of David Milch.

Remembering The Bomb

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The Sundance Channel will air a documentary film tonight (7pm) titled Original Child Bomb that features portions of footage shot by U.S. military crews and Japanese newsreel teams, in the weeks following the atomic attacks on Japan almost 60 years ago. The public did not see any of the newsreel footage for 25 years, and the U.S. military film remained hidden for nearly four decades. I’ve got the Tivo set to record.

Anyone who grew up in Kennett, Missouri, in the 50’s has memories of B-52 bombers roaring overhead on their landing approach to the Strategic Air Command (SAC) base at Blytheville, Arkansas (about 30 miles away?). They were undoubtedly hundreds of feet up but it felt like you could throw a rock and hit them. Even as children, we knew they carried The Bomb. As we got a little older, we came to understand that a Russian ICBM was almost certainly targeted for our little corner of the world. But we certainly had no understanding of what it would mean to get “nuked.”

The atomic bombing of Japan probably avoided an invasion that would have cost countless lives. I seem to recall my dad (in the Navy, in the Pacific Theater) telling me he might have been part of that. So, I’m glad we ended it when we did, the way we did. Shit, I might never have been born if pop had bought the farm invading Japan.

But that was then and this is now. And George Bush has his finger on The Button. Is there anyone I trust less? Maybe.

30 movies I can watch again

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Alien
Aliens
Black Hawk Down
Blade Runner
Jeremiah Johnson
Last of the Mohicans
Manhunter
Marathon Man
Midnight Cowboy
Mississippi Burning
No Way Out
Platoon
Pulp Fiction
Saving Private Ryan
Speed
Terminator
Terminator II
The Good, The Bad and The Ugly
The Commitments
The Getaway
The Matrix
Three Musketeers
Four Musketeers
The Professional
The Road Warrior
The Verdict
Three Days of the Condor
Time Bandits
True Romance
WarGames