"Screeners" Movie Marathon

So I woke up and turned on the TV and of course Lifetime channel was on and again got addicted to their Christmas specials. Since yesterday I have done nothing but watch these specials. They have gotten me into the Christmas spirit so much that I decided to pull out my Christmas stuff and put it up early (maybe tomorrow).

Because I have so many screeners and have nothing planned for this weekend, I couldn't work on painting the outside of the house as planned because of the rain, I put out a request on twitter and facebook and asked if anyone wanted to join me and watch some of my screeners. I had one taker.. my buddy Aaron.

He got to my house around 11:30 (he drove up from San Diego), when he got here we went out to El Pollo Loco for some lunch before returning home and starting our movie marathon. I left it up to Aaron on what he wanted to watch. I had only seen two of the movies from my selection of screeners so anything he choose would be fine. After he choose five movies I asked him to put them in order of viewing. So for today we are going to watch The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Frankenweenie, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, Beasts of the Southern Wild and finally Moonrise Kingdom.

First up The Perks of Being a Wallflower. I remember when this came out and was interested in seeing it because it starred Emma Watson, who play Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter movies.

Here's a synopsis: Based on the novel written by Stephen Chbosky, this is about 15-year-old Charlie (Logan Lerman), an endearing and naive outsider, coping with first love (Emma Watson), the suicide of his best friend, and his own mental illness while struggling to find a group of people with whom he belongs. The introvert freshman is taken under the wings of two seniors, Sam and Patrick, who welcome him to the real world.

My Review.. I loved this movie, well written, acted and a twist at the end that I never expected. It made me laugh, cheer and cry. Maybe because I could identify with the main character as being an outsider in high school. I didn't expect to love this movie like I did. Emma, the reason I wanted to see this film was so good, no signs of Hermione and with her short hair I never once thought of Hermione when watching her. The main character "Charlie" is just so dame adorkable, you can't help but fall in love with him. This movie is based on a book, I now what to read the book. I can't wait to watch this again. I give this movie a solid A.

Next was Frankenweenie, synopsis: When young Victor's pet dog Sparky (who stars in Victor's home-made monster movies) is hit by a car, Victor decides to bring him back to life the only way he knows how. When classmates find out how he did it, they all bring back dead pets of their own with a monstrous outcome.

My Review.. Tim Burton is a hit or miss with me and I'm sad to say this was a miss. I found the story to be good, but the characters were boring, the animation is okay, maybe the B&W had something to do with me not enjoying it, I understand why they did it but I just didn't think it worked. Glad I watched this but won't watch it again. I give this movie an C+.

We then watched The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, synopsis: A group of British retirees decide to "outsource" their retirement to less expensive and seemingly exotic India. Enticed by advertisements for the newly restored Marigold Hotel, they arrive to find the palace a shell of its former self.

My Review.. This was a very enjoyable movie. It's a who's who of older British actors. It was lighthearted, funny, sad and sweet. I loved seeing the various lives of these older people and watching how each one deals with growing old. Of course Maggie Smith is my favorite character of the bunch, but each one was special and brought their unique take to their characters. I give this movie a solid B.

Now it was time for Beasts of the Southern Wild, synopsis: Hushpuppy, an intrepid six-year-old girl, lives with her father, Wink, in the Bathtub, a southern Delta community at the edge of the world. Wink's tough love prepares her for the unraveling of the universe; for a time when he's no longer there to protect her. When Wink contracts a mysterious illness, nature flies out of whack, temperatures rise, and the ice caps melt, unleashing an army of prehistoric creatures called aurochs. With the waters rising, the aurochs coming, and Wink's health fading, Hushpuppy goes in search of her lost mother.

My Review.. I did not enjoy this movie, that's not to say I hated it, but it was just to bizarre for me. I was completely confused by the story, the acting was great but the majority of the time I was just thinking to myself.. "wow this is such a bizarre movie". Am I glad I watched this? I don't know.. but I do know that I won't be watching it again. I'm not saying it's a bad movie.. just not a movie for me. I give this movie a C-.

And for our final movie we watched Moonrise Kingdom, here's a synopsis: Set on an island off the coast of New England in the 1960s, as a young boy and girl fall in love they are moved to run away together. Various factions of the town mobilize to search for them and the town is turned upside down -- which might not be such a bad thing.  

My Review.. This movie was okay.. just okay. I heard so many great things about this movie so maybe the hype got to me. I mean lots of great actors are in this film. And I'm into quirky kind of things but this was a bit to quirky for me. Again like Beasts I just don't think this is my type of movie. I'm glad I watched it and it was enjoyable but I won't ever watch it again. I give this film a C+.

Thanks Aaron for sharing this movie marathon experience with me.

Screeners

This past week has been a good week for screeners. Besides Beasts of the Southern Wild that I got last week I now have screeners for Dr. Seuss' The Lorax, Madagascar 3, Moonrise Kingdom, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, Frankenweenie, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Brave, The Impossible, The Dark Knight Rises, Argo and Cloud Atlas.

I normally get about 30 or so screeners so I still have quite a few to go, if it's the same as years past. Some ask me why I get these and it's because I am a member of the Producers Guild of America (PGA) and I vote on the PGA awards every year so the studios make sure I get to see all their award worthy movies. It's always a hit and miss on what I get. Some years it's huge blockbusters and other years its small independents films. So far this year I have gotten a nice mix of both.

Lifetime Christmas Movies & Wraith

After the interview I cam home and turned on the TV and started scrolling through the channels. I saw the Christmas special "12 Men of Christmas" with  Kristin Chenoweth was playing. I saw this last year as I'm a huge fan of Ms Chenoweth so I decided to watch it again. After that special there was another Christmas special with Amy Acker (from Angel) who I also enjoy so I watched that one. The next thing I knew I was obsessed with these Lifetime Christmas specials. They are just so heartwarming and Christmasy. I know it's not even Thanksgiving yet but these special really put me in the Christmas spirit. I watched another few specials before pulling myself away as I had returned my Magic Mike DVD and rented Wraith of the Titans.

I am a huge fan of the original Clash of the Titans, so when they did the remake I was excited to see it. I know many "hated" the remake but I actually enjoyed it, I liked the characters, story and special effects so I was looking forward to this sequel .

Here's a synopsis: A decade after his heroic defeat of the monstrous Kraken, Perseus-the demigod son of Zeus-is attempting to live a quieter life as a village fisherman and the sole parent to his 10-year old son, Helius. Meanwhile, a struggle for supremacy rages between the gods and the Titans. Dangerously weakened by humanity's lack of devotion, the gods are losing control of the imprisoned Titans and their ferocious leader, Kronos, father of the long-ruling brothers Zeus, Hades and Poseidon. The triumvirate had overthrown their powerful father long ago, leaving him to rot in the gloomy abyss of Tartarus, a dungeon that lies deep within the cavernous underworld. Perseus cannot ignore his true calling when Hades, along with Zeus' godly son, Ares, switch loyalty and make a deal with Kronos to capture Zeus. The Titans' strength grows stronger as Zeus' remaining godly powers are siphoned, and hell is unleashed on earth. Enlisting the help of the warrior Queen Andromeda, Poseidon's demigod son, Argenor, and fallen god Hephaestus, Perseus bravely embarks on a treacherous quest into the underworld to rescue Zeus, overthrow the Titans and save mankind.

My Review: Once again the special effects were pretty amazing, the acting was good and the story was well done but there was something missing and I can't put my finger on it. I'm a huge fantasy lover and there are so few fantasy films out there that I hate complaining about one. Maybe I enjoyed Clash so much that I was hoping for the same with Wraith and it wasn't. I'm not saying that I didn't enjoy the movie as I did, it's a fun popcorn action packed special effect movie and I would watch it again but it definitely isn't on my list of top favorite fantasy movies. I would give Wraith of the Titans a B-

Job Interview

Today I had a job interview with a company down in Hollywood. They produce reality based shows so it's right up my alley. I had heard about this job from my friend Jonathan who recommended me to Tiffany. She contacted me via Facebook and we chatted a for a bit. I got some info about the company and the position. It was for a Post Supervisor (of course) for their current show but what they were hoping it would lead into would be a permanent post super position for the company. This sounded liked the perfect job for me. Only issue was that they needed someone to start mid December and I was leaving town on Dec. 18th and not returning until Jan 2nd. She asked me to send her my resume anyways just in case the start time was pushed. I sent her my current resume and figured that would be the end of it.

Well yesterday I got a call from the production manager asking me if I could come in for an interview tomorrow (which is today). He knew of my start time so I figured they pushed the start date.

I got ready this morning and left my house around 10:45am. I had to be there at Noon and it normally takes about an hour to get there. Well I arrived at the offices at 11:30am, a half hour early. I sat in my jeep and checked emails and such waiting for 11:45 as I figured it would take a few minutes for me to park and then go upstairs. I got to the office around 11:50 and went in.

For the next hour I spoke with four different people (including the show runner) about various aspect of post and this show I would be working on. This was by far the longest interview that I have done but it all went very well (in my opinion). When I left the office I felt good about the interview. They are suppose to call me early next week with their decision as they still had a few more people to interview...

So now I wait... fingers crossed.

Redbox & Magic Mike

I use to have Netflix (DVD service) and found that I would get a DVD and let it sit on my table for three months.. by the time I would watch it I'd have paid the same amount if I would have purchased the blu ray. So I stopped getting Netflix. I had heard of Redbox when they first came out but didn't pay much attention to them since I had Netflix.

I signed up to the service about a year ago but never actually rented a DVD/Blu ray until today. Though I have a ton of TV still to watch I feel like I'm falling behind with movies I want to see. One movie that I wanted to see was Magic Mike, yes it has cute guys who are strippers but I had heard that the storyline was good. So this would be my first rental from Redbox.

Here's a synopsis: Magic Mike (Channing Tatum), an experienced stripper, takes a younger performer called The Kid under his wing and schools him in the arts of partying, picking up women, and making easy money. As he keeps at the top of the game in the clubs, Mike struggles with trying to develop a relationship with a girl he really likes. The dramatic comedy screenplay was inspired by Tatum's work as a 19-year-old stripper before he made it in Hollywood.

My Review: I think I had high hopes going into this film because of all the hype I heard when it was released. I have to say I did not enjoy it overall. The eye candy was nice but half naked men does not make for a movie great. I felt the story just kind of dragged, it was described as a comedy/drama.. there is very little comedy in this movie.. I felt it to be very dramatic and maybe that's why I didn't enjoy it as much as I was hoping. I did enjoy the last half hour of the movie. I liked the relationship Mike had with The Kid's older sister. I thought the acting was pretty good, was one of the best parts of this movie. Overall I'm glad I saw it, but I don't plan to see it again. I would give this film a C+

MASH 4077 Podcast Episode 43

Download from itunes http://tinyurl.com/MASH4077itunes or listen/ get direct download http://MASH4077Podcast.com

Show Notes

Kenny Mittleider from Knights of the Guild, Alien Nation: The Newcomers Podcast & Confessions of a Fanboy Podcast, Simon Meddings from Waffle On Podcast, & Al Kessel from Tales from the Mouse House, Fast Forward & Just Because Podcast discuss one of the most successful and longest running television series in history.. M*A*S*H

Today we cover Season 2, Episode #19 - The Chosen People

43rd Episode Overall

Directed by Jackie Cooper
Written by Gerry Renert, Jeff Wilhelm, Laurence Marks, Sheldon Keller & Larry Gelbart
Production code K419
Original air date January 26th, 1974

Set during the Korean War in the 1950’s

Plot Summary: A Korean woman shows up with a baby she insists is Radar's, which surprises everybody, especially Radar. A Korean family moves into the compound and claims the land is their farm.

Hope you enjoy it, Kenny

One Tattoo To Rule Them All

It's been over a year and a half since I got my last Tattoo (R2D2) and I've been wanting this one since the beginning of the year. My buddy Moose (who I have known since I was 11 and he was 8) is the tattoo artist and he's been super busy and our schedules haven't meshed. Then I'd forget about it and months would pass and then we'd try to get together again and nothing. Finally a month ago we booked today to do it... finally.

You might ask why not just go to another tattoo artist, well he did my Hogwarts and R2D2 and he is fantastic. I only trust him to ink me. This is permanent and it needs to be right the first time.

So the other big thing is that he lives in Hemet which is 2 1/2 hours from my place. So I left my place at 3pm in order to get to his place by 6pm (I wasn't sure how traffic was going to be). My GPS took me through the back way and I avoided all traffic.. it was great. Got his place around 5:30 and grabbed some dinner before heading to his place by 6pm.

This tattoo represents my love for Lord of the Rings. I've enjoyed the books since I was a kid and with the movies it's elevated my love to that of Star Wars and Star Trek. When I was thinking of a LOTR tattoo I knew I wanted "One Ring To Rule Them All" saying in elvish. My first thought was to have it like a band running around my upper arm. Then I was looking at pictures online and saw it in a circle and actually liked the look of that better, the only thing it left alot of space in the middle. I thought about putting Hobbit feet in there since Hobbits are my favorite characters from the story. But having chopped off hairy feet in the middle of the circle didn't appeal to me...  I noticed that best friend Josh had J.R.R. Tolkien initials on his shoulder, it's a great combination of all four letters into one symbol and I thought it would look great in the space in the middle of the circle... so that's what I went with.

First thing we did was put some numbing get on my arm. This was the first time Moose and I were trying this stuff out.. it said it needed to wait and hour to get the full effect. We waited until 7 and then proceeded with the tattoo. Certain parts of my arm were somewhat numb but I felt about 85% of the needle and as the night went on I felt more and more of it. Still my arms (Hogwarts & LOTR) didn't hurt nearly as much as my leg (R2D2).

Both of my previous tattoos took a little over 3 hours, this one took almost 4 hours. I'm afraid what my next one will take :)

I'm extremely happy with the outcome, it's not exactly what I imagined but I think it's fantastic. I was looking for it to be burning out of my skin and though that's not exactly happening, it does look red hot and raised out of my skin.. which I love.

Next up will be Star Trek.. still working on what I want..

Buffy & Bros Resumes

It's been a good three weeks since Robert and I watched some Buffy. So as soon as he was back in town he booked some time to hang. First ate some yummy dinner at Taco Bell then went back to his place and started Buffy. For those who don't know, I am doing a Buffy re-watch, I've seen the entire series and loved it. Robert has never scene the series so we started at the beginning and it will take us months to finish but we're having a great time.

We made it to Season Three on our last visit, but was only able to watch the first episode. So tonight we started with S3, Ep2 "Dead Man's Party", not one of my favorites, I'm not a huge fan of emo Buffy. I know this episode had to be done to get the gang back together and the good thing is that this storyline didn't linger for episodes.

After that we moved on to S3, Ep3 "Faith, Hope & Trick" Now this is when the season and series starts to hit it's stride.. at least in my opinion. I'm not a huge fan of Faith but I think her addition added so much to Season 3 and I can't wait to show Robert where it goes.

And our last episode of the night..  S3, Ep4 "Beauty and the Beasts" We get the return of Angel, again not a favorites but really good, that's what I love about Buffy.. even there okay episodes are better then almost anything else on TV. I really like Seth Green's character Oz and he was brought to the for front of this storyline. Robert thought this one was really tense with the Jekyl character attacking Oz then Oz changing and attacking the Jekyl character before Angel comes in and snaps his neck.

Glad to be watching Buffy again and Robert seems to be really enjoying it well.

Mail Thieves

I stopped by my mailbox to get my mail, as I do everyday but something was different. First of all those who haven't been to my house my mailbox (along with the other 14 houses in my area) are located at the entrance of the dirt road leading to our houses about a mile away. Anyways went to the box and opened it with my key and noticed that light was coming in from the other side (not normal)... I walked around to the back and noticed that both doors were torn open and everything was gone.

My first thought was crap someone stole my mail and I wondered what was taken. I called Doug who is like the neighborhood watch guy and asked him if he was aware of the situation and he informed me that he heard about it this morning. He thinks that they broke into them last night. He has already contacted the post office and the police to file a report. 

Good news is I collect my mail everyday, and it was Veterans day yesterday (Monday) and mail service did not happen. So if it indeed happened last night as suspected then there was no mail in there.. at least not in my box. So that made me feel a bit better... still sucks though.

So now we have to wait for the post office to either replace or fix the boxes and until then we have to drive 30 minutes into town to get our mail at the local post office... hope they fix it soon.

Firefly 10th Anniversary Special

10 Years Ago

So I heard about this during comic con. Firefly recently started airing on Science Channel and it's doing really well so they decided to do a 10th anniversary special and filmed alot of it at San Diego comic con.

I've been a fan of Firefly since it first air (out of order) on Fox. From the first episode (The Train Job) I loved it. I loved the characters, the writing, the ship, the look and everything about it.  I followed it as it's bounced around the schedule and was devastated, but not surprised when I heard it was cancelled. I had most episodes recorded on some VHS tapes and would watch them over and over. Then found some bootleg DVD's on Ebay.

A few years later I was thrilled to hear that Firefly was coming to DVD and that they were finishing the effects and such on the 3 unaired episodes. I was there the day the box set came out and spent alot money to buy it. I came home and for the next day I watched every episode in order and was in heaven when I watched the brand new episodes. I was super excited to hear that boxset was selling out everywhere and they had to print more DVD and create more boxsets.

Today

Then a few years later there were rumors that Universal picked up Firefly and was going to create a movie based on the Firefly universe. Well those rumors were true and we got a sort of conclusion to the Firefly saga with Serenity. I was blow away by this movie. I saw it six or seven times in the theater and loved it.

Now ten years later I watch this special with tears in my eyes seeing these actors reminisces about being on set and how much fun they had. Watching them being brought to tears talking about fellow cast members and their fans. I knew I loved Firefly but after watching these special I realized that Firefly is and will always be one of my all time favorite sagas of all time. It joins the ranks of Star Wars, Star Trek, Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings. If we never get another TV series, movie or comic book, I'm perfectly content as I have 16 hours of awesome, awesome entertainment to enjoy over and over again.

Thank you Joss Whedon and the entire cast and crew of Firefly/Serenity for giving me something that has touched my heart in so many ways. I'm proud to call myself a Browncoat.. now and forever.

Confessions of a Fanboy #11

Download from Itunes: ow.ly/ek0nn or listen, get direct download ow.ly/ek0no

Hey all you Fanboys and Fangirls, it's time for another installment of Confessions of a Fanboy. This episode I sit down with Robert as he talks about being a Fanboy of Gaming.

Here's a quick bio for Robert.  Robert is a 28-year-old gamer and connoisseur of geeky things. He's gamed almost his entire life and likes all sorts of other things, such as Doctor Who, Firefly, Star Wars and even sports (gasp!). He's currently a software engineer on internal projects for a social & mobile video game company.

If you want to confess your fanboy or fangirl-ism to me send me an email at ConfessionsofaFanboy@gmail.com

You can also follow the podcast on Twitter @FanboyPodcast, or the Host Kenny @Geekyfanboy and today's guest Robert @RFLudwick

Please go to our podcast page on Facebook and "Like" us.. just click HERE

Happy Birthday Mom & Welcome Home Robert

Today is my Mom's birthday, planned to have dinner with her and the family. I left my hour around 2pm as I needed to get gas and then pick up some flowers for me mom's birthday. Went to Costco for gas and it was packed, about fifteen minutes later I was driving over to Stater Brothers for the flowers. I found two bouquets that I liked and asked for help combining them together. The florist wasn't around so one of the check out ladies came over and said she would do it. I appreciated her doing that but I'd be better off if I did it by myself in my car. Luckily they didn't charge me the $3 they charge to combine flowers.

Once I had the flowers I was ready to go, it was close to 3:30 and I needed to be at my moms by 5. Luckily for me traffic wasn't bad so I got to her place exactly at 5pm. My brother, sister-in-law, niece, nephew and grand mother were already there. I said my hellos and we were off to the Spaghetti Factory for dinner, they didn't make a reservation. We drove in three separate cars and when we got there it was packed. We were stuck in line just to get out car parked. After about fifteen minutes Mom came over and said we were going to a different place and gave my brother the directions (I was following him). We drove to another Italian restaurant right down the street from my Mom's place.. don't know why we didn't go there in the first place. That place was dead.

Mom and Chuck go to that place often and know the owner. We were seated at once, the service was extremely slow, I guess it was a reason why we didn't go here first. Our waiter was great, he also sang to us, I guess the waiting staff sings Monday through Saturday but since it was Sunday we didn't expect them to sing but he did on and off. Dinner was very good and it was nice hanging with my family. We finished eating around 7:30 and I went back to my Mom's and hung out for a half hour.

I left her place at 8 and headed to the Long Beach Airport to pick up my buddy Robert who was flying in from Montana, he was up there visiting our friend Chris. I got to the airport around 8:30, parked my jeep and went inside. I've only been to LB airport one other time and I flew into that airport so I knew it was very small. I wanted where I thought Robert would be coming through. He arrived at 9pm and was out by the baggage area by 9:15.

We hugged out hello and grabbed his suitcase and headed back to my Jeep. Traffic wasn't bad and I had him home by 10:15pm. He was tired and had to get up for work tomorrow so I didn't stick around. We said our good nights and then I headed home and got in around 11pm.

When I got home I was exhausted. It felt like I had been driving all day. I immediately crashed and went to bed.