As promised, for parents and grandparents, here’s Kate on It’s a Small World. We pick up halfway through the (best for people Kate’s age) ride, after Joel has shot some photos with my phone. (I’ll post those to Flickr or something soonish.)
(The second video is taking a while to process by the site. If you can’t see it, come back later.)
This fourth Spike Lee/Denzel Washington collaboration in many ways is the most conventional and the one that has the least to do with Spike’s own voice — he’s operating off a thriller script he did not create — but there are still signs that “Inside Man” is still a Spike Lee Joint.
There’s the signature shot of a protagonist moving down the street on a rolling cart instead of walking, an off-hand discussion of the damage done by videogames that glamorize the gangsta lifestyle and, as always, a lot of Spike’s signature camera work and camera shots. For big Spike Lee fans, this might not be as much Spike as they want, but the film is still definitely worth watching.
It’s a smart thriller, not so much a “whodunnit” as a “what, exactly, did they do?” Clive Owen appears at the very beginning of the film, laying out what’s happened in the film, with an implicit challenge to the viewers to figure out exactly what they’re about to see. The bank robbery that follows is mysterious and more clever than it at first appears to be and the entire affair takes on extra realism thanks to an extremely good cast, including a number of lower-tier character actors putting in solid work, and especially Christopher Plummer and a surprisingly disquieting Jodie Foster, playing against type.
The final resolution doesn’t have quite the emotional pop that may have been intended, but it’s an intellectually satisfying one.
“Inside Man” could have used more of Spike Lee’s signature style to spice things up, but it’s still a very solid little caper movie and well worth seeing for fans of such films or Spike Lee Joints.
Here’s a terrifying little story: Marketers (and, later, a scientist) have figured out the formula on when people stop having a sense of adventure, whether it’s about music, food or body-piercing.
Robert Sapolsky, a distinguished neuroscientist in his 40s, had a young assistant who played different music every day, from Sonic Youth to Minnie Pearl. That made Sapolsky crazy — and curious about why his aging ears still crave the music he loved in college. Is there a certain age when the typical American passes from the novelty stage to utter predictability?
Getting my iPod actually spurred me to break out of my comfortable nest of music that I listened to in college and willfully seek out new music and experiences. The realization that I was about to fill an iPod with music 5-15 years old was a chilling one, as though I should be buying myself a spot in an assisted living community.
Hmm, I guess this means I need to try sushi at some point.
Strange-but-true: My mother (who was born and lived much of her life in Memphis), was born on the day that Elvis Presley would later die. My mother-in-law was born on the day Elvis was born.
No idea what the significance is of that, but it’s my mom’s birthday today.
You were born on a Friday
under the astrological sign Leo.
Your birthday falls into the Chinese year beginning 2/2/1946 and ending 1/21/1947.
You were born in the Chinese year of the Dog.
Celebrities who share your birthday:
Vanessa Carlton (1980)
Emily Robison (1972)
Timothy Hutton (1960)
Angela Bassett (1958)
Madonna (1958)
James Cameron (1954)
Kathie Lee Gifford (1953)
Lesley Ann Warren (1946)
Eydie Gorme (1932)
Robert Culp (1930)
Frank Gifford (1930)
Ann Blyth (1928)
Fess Parker (1925)
Charles Bukowski (1920)
Menachem Begin (1913)
Your age is the equivalent of a dog that is 8.57729941291585 years old. (You old hound dog, you!)
OK, I’m in the process of setting up my computer, again, right now, and I’ve gotten my phone hooked back up. So here, as promised to Joel, is the video of his daughter Kate on the teacups at Disneyland, as shot by my Treo 650.
I don’t imagine these videos will be of a lot of interest to anyone but Kate’s parents and grandparents, but this one is kind of neat to watch because of the shadows. (The two-part It’s a Small World extravaganza will only be for the really serious home movie audience to watch.)
