CB2

The first CB2 furniture store (one of my favs) opens on the west coast in SF and I have been dying to get here. I'm starving with a headache so the obvious solution is to hit this furniture store. Priorities lovely, know your priorities.

My hotel room for the week

My hotel room...this is not the CB 2 store, my crackberry got a fugged-up. No, friends, this is my actual hotel room. And yes, that is a sink in the corner. Now i am currently in San Francisco, my old stomping grounds, attending the Intel Developers Forum. Fun Fun, and decided to stay close. Good idea. However, this simple room, as cute and stylish as it may be, is less than 10 x 10 without a closet and I ain't in NYC! This is crazy! plus, before you get to the room, you cross over the 'hall bath' and 'hall WC'. That means toilet. yes, there are hall baths and toilets in this hotel. I am staying in a hostel. But my room has a private bath...that means a tub and toilet, but again the sink is in my room. This tells me the bathroom doorknob is the most disgusting thing i have ever touched. Luckily i have the olympics to watch to take my mind off my own silliness. :)

MOVIE REVIEW - DEATH RACE

Men being men; driving fast cars. Gorgeous women riding in fast cars. Weapons being used on fast cars. Oh, and did I mention fast cars?

DEATH RACE is the remake of the cult film, DEATH RACE 2000. And much like its original, DEATH RACE takes a lot of liberties when it comes to cheesy dialogue, excessive gore, and a winking eye at the state of our world. You wouldn’t think a movie starring Jason Statham driving hard and fast would do that, but hey, it was a slow day at the Multiplex for me.

Directed by Paul W. S. Anderson, the movie revolves around an ex-con, Jensen Ames, played by an incredibly rock-hard and ripped Statham (even my ego got a pounding after seeing him do the iron cross in the film), who is forced by the warden of an infamous prison, played by Joan Allen, to compete in a race where the driver can win his freedom, or meet his death. *ooooohhhhhh* Sounds so serious.

Anderson, who some of my friends in the ‘industry’ like to call ‘Milla baby daddy’ goes all out when it comes to directing this crazy post-industrial view of our world. Allow me to be frank; Anderson directs some of the bloodiest, most violent stuff I’ve recently seen, like half-dead people getting up just to have their heads whacked off by another weapon. Is this necessary? When you’re dealing with a bleak world where unemployment has reached an all time high, economy sucks and these men are just ‘being men in prison,’ I don’t really expect them to be weaving baskets and growing flowers on a mountainside. But wow, the amount of violence seemed like overkill, and honestly the direction was heavy-handed. Just to be fair, I have to admit I don’t play ‘Grand Theft Auto’ on a daily basis, I don’t own THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS DVDs, and I don’t race cars on the streets of LA. Although I did have an incident where I did rev up to a Mini-van. All’s I’m gonna say is I smoked that b*tch!

Now let’s talk about casting. This is one motley crew of actors! Sure, I can understand Statham in the lead, but how did they convince Joan Allen to play the warden?! I can understand wanting to play against type and all, but this just seemed like an odd choice. She plays this manipulative, powerful, money hungry warden with as much skill as she can, but considering some of the fromage-heavy lines she had to deliver, I am not sure how she said, ‘yes! I’ve got to do this film!’. So I stepped up and asked her point blank at the press junket of DEATH RACE. I sat with Allen and asked, ‘what drew you to a movie like this? You’re usually the moral pillar in a film.’ Her answer? She really wanted to play a villain. Too bad she chose this movie to exercise that wish.

Tyrese Gibson adds an air of hardness as ‘Machine Gun Joe,’ however with few lines, and many hardcore fistfights, you don’t really get to know Joe, or care about his and Statham’s character’s rivalry.

Ian McShane plays Coach, but lacks a mean edge that would send a man away to the worst jail in America. Oh and then there’s the oddest member of the crew, Ulrich, a corpulent, nerdy, glasses wearing number cruncher with a stutter played by Jason Clarke. Now if I’m complaining about how Coach got sent to this jail, I have no words to describe why Bill Gates Jr. would end up here as well, unless he channeled Lizzy Borden, then kicked a litter of kittens in the face, the judge’s kittens, while she was nursing them herself, from milk she collected from their ailing cat mom.

To sum it up, I found the movie loud, gory, violent for the sake of violence, and the dialogue laughable. But honestly I went to this movie with my sister, the loveliest and smartest human being I know, and she thought this movie was a really fun ride. And yes, she used those exact words. Ok, maybe she didn’t but the gist was clearly there. There you have it - An audacious race car movie where lives are as important as toe nail clippings finds a home on the silver screen. Silver’s gonna cry tonight. Unless you play lots of FPS or GTA, you can probably skip this one.

And notice, not one car pun...I'm a classy lady.

MOVIE REVIEW - THE DARK KNIGHT

This summer has been full of comic book heroes and not so comic book, but heroes, hitting the big screen. And when I say ‘hitting the big screen’, I mean bringing it so hard to the silver screen your popcorn jumps out of your hand.

Case in point, THE DARK KNIGHT. Yes, everyone and their mother have heard that this sequel to BATMAN is something to behold. And the reasons are simple. First off, let’s talk about the late Heath Ledger’s phenomenal turn as a psychotic Joker. I know I am not making any huge leaps by saying that Ledger made some really interesting and strong choices as an actor in this role, playing the Joker as a man whose brain is as chillingly screwed up as Alex in A CLOCKWORK ORANGE. I feel like Alex and Cruella Deville got together for one night of lust and all of a sudden The Joker pops out, full grown and ready for mayhem. There has been much talk about a posthumous Oscar nod to Ledger, and in my opinion, he totally deserves it.

Now with so many acting props being given to Ledger for playing The Joker so perfectly, I wouldn’t have been surprised if the rest of the cast were lackluster, but to my surprise, Christian Bale played a good mature, confidant, and almost cocky Bruce Wayne. His Batman, however, I have an issue with. Now when I first saw BATMAN RETURNS, I thought this is a definite upgrade from George Clooney. And then I heard him talk. Allow me to lay this out for you. I understand that Batman is a mysterious man who has to have a raspy voice, but this time around, the raspy is walking a fine line between acceptable and ridiculous. And honestly, with his mouth breathing and open bite talking, I could barely keep my palm from constantly smacking myself in the forehead and eye long enough to hear Bale speak in his rubber suit. And Maggie Gyllenhaal, although a GREAT improvement as Rachel Dawes when compared to Katie Holmes, really needs to stand up straight. And saying lines with a little more emotion to make me care about her would have helped, but hey, this movie is more about the man in the rubber suit, right? Yes, I am that judgmental.

I have to admit one of my favorite things about this film is that it tells an incredibly fun story with great stunts, practical stunts! I am a fan of action and love great stunt choreography, and was smiling from ear to ear during the Bat Pod sequence. Why this particular scene, you ask? Honestly, this is one of the most magnificent scenes because it isn’t CG, it’s a stunt guy, riding a motorcycle through a building, all shot extremely well. Real stunts like that inspire a certain adrenaline rush in me…when I first started watching movies, most action scenes were done for real, with stunt men. Seeing this being done in THE DARK KNIGHT was like remembering a first kiss was, or holding the hand of that guy in 7^th grade I had a huge crush on. It was that good.

And the goods don’t stop there; Christopher Nolan did great jobs with the Director and Screenwriter hat. The story keeps you interested with its twists and turns, and Nolan isn’t shy about exacting the right emotion in the right location for a certain scene. Two of my favorite movies in recent years have been MEMENTO and THE PRESTIGE, so with those movies under his belt, you know to expect more than just a comic book movie for the sake of satisfying a comic book fan, you know you’re in for a full story, and no doubt this movie delivers it.

And although it has taken me a few weeks to post this review (do I really need to with everyone saying how good it is?) I did see it at the midnight showing, the night it opened. Yes I am one of those. I hope you don’t mind.

MOVIE REVIEW - Wanted

I know, I haven't stopped talking about this movie, but I really liked it.

And...Let's just get this out of the way. A fraternity of assassins who take a 'nobody', open up his pandora's box of killing, turning him into a 'somebody' with gore all over the place doesn't exactly send a great message to the audience, but we go to the movies to lose ourselves, not judge our psyches. Otherwise, I'd probably be institutionalized by now, and only allowed to read Judy Blume books.

'Wanted' is a movie that is bloody, action-packed and chock full of great performances by both James McAvoy and Angelina Jolie. Russian director, Timur Bekmambetov, of both 'Day Watch' and 'Night Watch' fame, makes his first big budget American blockbuster exactly that, a blockbuster movie brimming with amazing special effects, seamless action sequences, a pretty solid story, and big name actors.

James McAvoy stars as your run of the mill office drone who becomes “wanted” when he hooks up with Angelina Jolie’s character, Fox - and in six weeks flat, he’s transformed from a pencil pusher into a deadly assassin - this is every guy's fantasy right? And while it might seem odd that the producers didn’t cast a 6-foot tall, barrel-chested Adonis in the lead role, the movie stays true to the original graphic novel and McAvoy does a bang up job. Watching McAvoy morph physically and mentally on-screen is fascinating. This is also the sexiest and deadliest role I’ve ever seen Angelina Jolie play. Though I could watch her read the yellow pages and be enthralled. And while the film’s plot has a number of twists and turns that make the story compelling, the real stars of the film are its special effects. With bullets bending, rippling through the air, heart-thumping choreographed car chases and fight scenes, this movie surpasses all my expectations.