Category Archives: Unhappy Media

Multimedia malaise: TV, movies, music, print.

Get in the Cage

Posted on Wednesday September 2, 2009 | Leave a comment

heart

For those Time Warner Cable customers with some free time and a hankering for the Cage, this one’s for you. Tune in to channel 700, HD OnDemand, for your choice of 19, that’s right, folks, 19 Nicolas Cage movies.

  1. Ant Bully
  2. City of Angels
  3. Con Air
  4. Face/Off
  5. Gone in 60 Seconds
  6. Kiss of Death
  7. Knowing
  8. Leaving Las Vegas
  9. Lord of War

    Buy this.

    Buy this.

  10. Matchstick Men
  11. Moonstruck
  12. National Treasure
  13. Racing with the Moon
  14. The Rock
  15. Valley Girl
  16. Vampire’s Kiss
  17. Wicker Man
  18. Windtalkers
  19. Wild at Heart

By “your choice” I obviously mean that it’s fully your choice in what order to watch them all. Incidentally, I’m sure they’ll put Ghost Rider on the list as soon as Ghost Rider 2 starts production. (It’s currently “in development.”) And if you’re craving a classic as I am, I believe you can find Raising Arizona on one of the pay on demand channels.

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Michael Jackson to Play Casino Showcases (w/ Garth Brooks and Other Special Guests)

Posted on Monday August 31, 2009 | 2 comments

Tell me that if you’re driving up I-84 and you see a billboard with these photos on it you’re not risking a major collision.

I’m not sure what’s the most disturbing. A concert — Legends in Concert, to be exact — that includes Bette Midler, Elton John and Gwen Stefani, the fact that at 65 mph it’s impossible to distinguish these impostors from the genuine articles, or that Michael Jackson is already performing his own memorial shows. Too soon, MJ.

I get why people go to tribute shows. You know what you’re getting. You like a certain artist, or entropic melange of disparate artists, but you can’t afford their shows, or they don’t come to your town, or they’re dead, so you head to the nearest casino for a night of covers. It does make sense. Still, do we really need these people to dress up and pretend they are the singers whose songs they’re singing? I know it’s a longstanding tradition and that many a man has made his career emulating the gyrations, sideburns and, depending on the era, jelly rolls of Elvis Presley, but isn’t there something inherently creepy about the whole thing? Frankly, it reeks of desperation. And cultural simplicity: You look and sound like Gwen Stefani, and that’s good enough for me! (ps, can we take a moment for the fact that there are Gwen Stefani impersonators?)

For my money, I’m going to wait til science gets reanimation up and running.

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Tyler Perry’s Next Bad Thing

Posted on Monday August 31, 2009 | 5 comments

Oh, Tyler Perry, you make it too damn easy. So his new movie is coming out next month. Its title speaks volumes. Because it’s volumes fucking long. I Can Do Bad All By Myself. Pretty catchy, right?

So what’s the perfect website for a movie with a title that’s seven words long? ICanDoBadAllByMyselfMovie.com? No. It’s so much better than that.

ICanDoBadMovie.com

Yes, Mr. Perry, yes you can. You can do bad movie. You seem to do bad movie every four to six weeks. Most people can’t even get a bad haircut with that frequency.

To be clear, I haven’t seen any preview screening of this highly anticipated film. But I have read the synopsis. And it’s brilliantly dreadful. Try to keep up.

When Madea catches sixteen-year-old Jennifer and her two younger brothers looting her home, she decides to take matters into her own hands and delivers the young delinquents to the only relative they have: their aunt April. A heavy-drinking nightclub singer who lives off of Raymond, her married boyfriend, April wants nothing to do with the kids. But her attitude begins to change when Sandino, a handsome Mexican immigrant looking for work, moves into April’s basement room. Making amends for his own troubled past, Sandino challenges April to open her heart. And April soon realizes she must make the biggest choice of her life: between her old ways with Raymond and the new possibilities of family, faith … and even true love.

If you dare to IMDb, be aware that this is the second T-Per release called I Can Do Bad All By Myself. In 2002 a DVD came out of the original stage version of ICDBABM. Don’t worry, apparently you can see both and get two completely different stories. At least he kept the ellipses…

Playwright Tyler Perry plays Madea, the matriarch in this filmed version of Perry’s hit play. Madea’s niece, Vianne, has been handed a curve ball by life: Her husband seems ready to flee the marriage, and little does she know that he’s actually seeing her sister. When Madea falls ill, the secrets surface, tearing everyone apart. Vianne’s faith tells her to accept the chain of events and move on, but letting go isn’t easy. …

Seriously, Tyler Perry, you’re just making it way too easy. It’s not even fun anymore.

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Posted in Information Stupor Highway, Unhappy Media

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E(nnui)Mail

Posted on Friday August 28, 2009 | Leave a comment

MELANCHOLY WALLPAPER BWhen you care to send the very true, check out Melancholy Greetings. In the vein of the biting, often hilarious canned salutations of someecards.com, Melancholy Greetings offers punchy one-liners that punch you right where it hurts the most, wherever that may be. Take, for instance, the basic category:

general malaise

Are you having trouble articulating that vaguely nonplussed, out-of-sorts feeling that dogs your waking hours? Perhaps one of these all-purpose, melancholy-inspired cards will do the trick.

But wait, get this: they’re actual, physical cards. Remember those? Go crazy, go analog! Pick up a card (I found them at Barnes & Noble), pick up a pen, and pick a friend to dazzle with your magic-like Pony Express abilities. It’s OK if you need to facebook him for his address.

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Spin, Store a Yarn

Posted on Friday August 21, 2009 | 1 comment

Saw this classified posting on mediabistro.com a journalism/media website this morning:

Yarn Coordinator job in New York, NY at SoHo Publishing Company

I’ve had plenty of editors say I need to spin a yarn, but I’ve never been in the position of having to coordinate one. I tried to imagine what that job would be like. You’d sit in your cubicle eight hours a day looking musingly up and to the right, conjuring tales. When one comes to you, you center yourself in front of the computer and enter it into a database. Or better yet, you write each idea down, slip it into a canister, and arrange it on a towering wall of cubbies. Train robbery? Transportation column, row crime.

Just when I was ready to file my own yarn under “I” for Ideal Job, I clicked on the description:

Publisher of consumer knitting publications seeks a passionate needleworker with excellent verbal and written communications skills…

Oh, how disappointingly… literal. Still, I liked the idea of looking for a “passionate needleworker” with “excellent verbal” skills and read on. Here are the choicest of the job requirements:

  • writing yarn updates and other yarn-related copy for magazines
  • answering yarn-related consumer mail
  • Must be extremely well organized and able to juggle multiple projects with aplomb

Do let us be clear, all updates, copy and mail you would be responsible will be YARN-RELATED. Juggling ability preferred. Ok, that’s a pretty common way of saying “multitask,” but to me, it’s hilarious juxtaposed with yarn, something one could literally juggle. C’mon, that’s funny.

By the way, this job pays “under $35,000” a year. And I’m not qualified for it.

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CNN Nearly Sparks Interesting Conversation

Posted on Thursday August 20, 2009 | 1 comment

When I heard that CNN had polled their viewers for a discussion on overused words in the current parlance, I was thrilled to think that people were engaging in thoughtful analysis of the way we speak. Unfortunately, the responses selected for the “Words you love to hate” video served only to reinforce my already steely conviction that most Americans just don’t talk good.

Figure these excerpts present a somewhat inflated representation of the public, as they were submitted by CNN watchers who would take the time to craft an iReport. Then factor in that these answers were probably the cream of the crop. The fact only half of them were coherent, only one was remotely insightful, and one of them was straight up laughable (Your kids, like, say, like, “I know” a lot? You should, you know, like, rant to CNN about it.) really disappointed me. That’s what I get for succumbing to a flash of faith.

By the way. What the fuck is an iReporter? According to the site:

iReport.com is a user-generated site. That means the stories submitted by users are not edited, fact-checked or screened before they post.

(They do note that “Only stories marked ‘On CNN’ have been vetted for use in CNN news coverage.”)

So basically an iReporter is any schmo who feels like playing journalist with absolutely no shred of accountability or verification? F that. I paid my dues interning and fact checking to earn the right to pretend to be a journalist. What have you done?

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Hating on CDs? Well, see deez nutz.

Posted on Tuesday August 18, 2009 | 3 comments

This story by my good friend Peter Kafka over at All Things D shows that the compact disc format hasn’t sounded the digital death knell just yet.

Ready to toss dirt on the old, unloved CD? You’re going to have to wait a while. Compact discs are increasingly hard to find (at least in physical stores), but someone out there keeps buying them: The ancient format still makes up the majority of music sales in the U.S.

Here are the data for the first half of the year, via the NPD Group consumer-tracking outfit: CDs made up 65 percent of the music market, while paid digital downloads accounted for 35 percent.

Really all I care about is that I’m not the last person on Earth who still buys CDs. Wait, did I just lose all my tech cred? Shit. Scratch that like a Blind Melon disc with no jewel case. I love downloading!

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Posted in Gadgeteering, Unhappy Media

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Keep Your Hands off My Copy

Posted on Wednesday August 12, 2009 | Leave a comment

Gosh, I know the feeling. I once wrote a letter like this one from NY Times restaurant reviewer Giles Corem to a few subeditors who changed his copy…

Chaps,

I am mightily pissed off. I have addressed this to Owen, Amanda and Ben because I don’t know who i am supposed to be pissed off with (i’m assuming owen, but i filed to amanda and ben so it’s only fair), and also to Tony, who wasn’t here – if he had been I’m guessing it wouldn’t have happened.

I don’t really like people tinkering with my copy for the sake of tinkering. I do not enjoy the suggestion that you have a better ear or eye for how I want my words to read than I do. Owen, we discussed your turning three of my long sentences into six short ones in a single piece, and how that wasn’t going to happen anymore, so I’m really hoping it wasn’t you that fucked up my review on saturday.

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Analog Files: Twitter Taken Down, Tweaking Twats Take to the Streets, Titter in Micro-Pidgin

Posted on Thursday August 6, 2009 | Leave a comment

When some ingenious hacker brought the Tower of Twitter crashing down for two hours this morning, micro-bloggers, their MacBooks and iPhones rendered useless, stumbled bewildered into the streets groping blindly in the sunlight for a way to express their distress. Overheard at a Williamsburg coffee shop, a few reactions to the tweet heard round the world:

  • at anybody! can u hear me? can’t twitter! can’t feel! hold me!
  • at barista, coffee is cold, i’ll tell, people not come here!
  • twitter is down, is Iran ok?
  • Yeah, I know you’re at this coffee shop right now. I’m here, too, and I can fucking see you. Now take that noodly arm and pass me the simple syrup, douche.
  • I’ll text you.

If this hullabaloo has got you reconsidering your allegiances, let Dave show you whatfor.

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Late Night with Cognitive Dissonance

Posted on Thursday August 6, 2009 | Leave a comment

Would I accept an ice cream cone from Hitler? A back rub from Beelzebub? I reckon it would depend on how hot/stiff I were. But in either case, I’m sure I’d feel really awkward about it.

These were the questions rolling through my head as I watched Late Night with Jimmy Fallon last night. It was bad enough that I was watching Jimmy Fallon in the first place. (Sorry, guy, but you sort of suck.) Joe Scarborough made an unlikely guest, especially following Chris Kattan. They briefly talked about his primping regimen before he begins his daily mugging on Morning Joe, and I was surprised to hear no discussion of Starbuck’s new dark roast or the perfect marketing synergy of two iconic brands.

Youve got a touch of Frappuccino right there, Joey.

You've got a touch of Frappuccino right there, Joey.

I was more surprised, however, when Joe, handed a Fender, started singing Elvis Costello’s “Mystery Dance.”

I was thrown into a state of utter confusion. I wanted to tap my toes — but I also wanted to stomp my foot and wag my finger. Hey, Scarborough, where the hell do you get off liking something I like? How am I supposed to feel about myself now? My attempts to reconcile my loathing and love were futile.

I tried and I tried
But I’m still mystified
I can’t do it anymore
And I’m not satisfied

I hate it when bad people do good things. Remember when Sarah Palin was kinda awesome on Saturday Night Live? Wait. Wasn’t Jimmy Fallon on SNL back in the day? Note to self: if Fallon offers you a back rub, run.

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