Movies that scared me when I was a kid (and I was a wuss)

Now that Halloween has come, I'm sure you all have been reading lists of the scariest movies ever. I'm going to switch it up and tell you the scariest movies that were not supposed to be scary, but freaked me out.

1. E.T- Say what you want about it being cute, when I was little this movie had me bugging out, cockroach style. That part where those dudes come to his house, and they are wearing space suits, and take ET in Quarantine had tweaking out first grade style.

2. Contact- Jake Busey plays some religious nut job who doesn't want "these scientists talking to our God." He sneaks into the recently constructed alien machine and looks at the camera smiles like only a Busey can and blows himself up. My young impressionable mind was fried like eggs in that moment.

3. Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory- Boat Trip. Tunnel. What. The. Shit. I saw this movie and was loving all the candy, and then, we go into a tunnel and all hell breaks lose. Millions of kids are scarred for life after this scene. Don't remember, check it out below, and enjoy the wonderful trip down memory lane.

4. Flight of the Navigator- Since they got this from the public library, my parents figured it would be safe for kids. Well, this movie is a total time travel mind warp that had me thinking I was going to get stuck in a alien spaceship, come back to earth and all my friends would be withered and have no memory of me.

5. The Truman Show- I saw this flick when I was in seventh grade and I haven't been the same since. The film is not scary, but the idea, that everyone around you is just acting and your life is TV show is enough to make a middle school kid more paranoid that kids getting high for the first time. "I'm tweaking out man, my life is a TV show."

Oh yes, if you were missing the usual post, "Zack and Miri Make A Porno" comes out today and it could be worth seeing. Don't bother with anything else.

The Great Candy Exchange

Americans are feeling very ghoulish about the economy. Stocks are down, foreclosures are everywhere, and there is a credit problem. However, there is hope because starting on Friday, there will be a booming Candy Economy. Any trick-or-treater, from young kids with plastic pumpkins to middle school pros with pillow cases (trash-bags if that's your thing) will tell you a crucial dynamic of Halloween is the post trick-or treat-trade. I'll break down the value system.

1. The King Size Bar- In a land of cotton candy nothing competes to the sweetness that is a king size bar. It is the Google of Candy Stocks, chances are if you were trick or treating you already knew what houses meant big time goodness and which houses gave you health food garbage. Anything, I mean anything, can be traded for a King Size.
2. The Rarities- After the King Size Bars come the a rarities, I'm talking strange foreign, but delicious sweets that the new neighbors with the silly accents had their butler import.
3. The Surprise- A surprise would be anything that breaks the mold, a candy you know, but were not expecting to get. A great example is Nerd Rope, it's not a rarity, but it commands some power on the exchange.
4. Quantity- Here is where things get crazy. Probably have a candy portfolio that includes Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, Snickers, Skittles, you know, the works. It all matters how much you have and how much you can part for. I once knew a dude who traded all of his M & M's for one little pack of skittles. Hey, you can't hate on passion (or is it addiction).
5. The Health Foods- This is the worst possible thing, anybody who's giving this out should just go away for the night and leave out a please take one of dental vouchers. Seriously, if someone tried to trade me raisins for anything, regardless I would point them to whole foods where they could maybe exchange the raisins for cash and then send them to a store where they should buy some a king size Charlestown Chew. Then we can talk business.

However at the end of the day, the candy market is all in the sell. If you can convince someone that raisins are better, well I guess you have a future in stock markets and bailouts. Go get em, guy.

This Jack O Lantern Life

I see Pumpkin carving as a essential part of Halloween and a way for the inner artist to bloom in a burst of orange and yellow artistic brilliance. Let me break down pumpkin carving and why it is the "Red Dawn" of holiday traditions.

1. Pumpkin Selection- You trying to get that tall-ass pumpkin so you can get that creepy Frankenstein (THIS LINK IS WILD!!) vibe. Or you going for that wide open mouth that seems to be waiting for some Almond Joy. It does not matter, just decide well. And forget about getting pumpkins with scratches, they ruin the face of the carving surface.

2. Gutting- Some people would prefer the world "hollowing", but reaching inside a pumpkin and pulling out that nasty shit is a cost that the artist must pay for glory. Think of it as some sort of test to see if you are worthy. It's as if the pumpkin is saying "yeah cut me up, do it, but first, reach inside take out my guts" It's like an offering to the Pumpkin Gods.

3. To Stencil or Not To Stencil, That is the Question- Some people love stenciling the pumpkin design and then creating something truly amazing. See the ridiculous pumpkin of Obama. However, I view stencils as cheating, on par with plagiarizing papers and performance enhancing drugs. You gotta do it all by yourself, you owe to the pumpkin and your self to carve on your own.

4. Pumpkin God- While doing some temp work for a local talk show, I went on an errand to the Pumpkin God. This dude's carvings are mind melting in their power. He is is so damn nasty, that when October ends he starts carving Watermelons.

Have a Happy Halloween, I'll be back to tomorrow with some classic Halloween stories.

Girl Talk in LA (It aint about Gossip)

This past weekend I was getting primal in Hollywood. I mean primal like "Congo" style. I was at the "Girl Talk' concert and it was something wild. If you don't know, Girl Talk is a DJ who has rocks parties by creating mash-ups of popular songs. In one song you could hear Kanye West, The Band, Blackstreet.

Girl Talk is a perfect example of what music can be in the 21st century. His songs are made up of samples, but they are elaborate works of music, check out how many songs are put together in the link posted above. For his latest CD, most fans probably did not pay anything, effectively reducing the need for a record company, but those fans did pay for concert tickets.

And finally, one of the staples of a Girl Talk show, is that he lets people on the stage. For someone who is part of the generation who missed the golden era of rock and roll, this decision to let the fans rock out on stage, made the concert even more insane. Gone where the security guards that crushed any fan that tried to get the stage. At this concert, everyone was welcome to partake in reverting to back in the day. Back to the day where concerts were massive parties. Back to the day when we were animals.

Sunday Trailers: Gears of War 2

This is the trailer for the new video game "Gears of War 2" for xbox 360. This is a brilliant trailer that shows what video games are capable of. In this brief trailer the characters are established, the general mission is presented, and the stakes are defined. The music is from a band called Devotchka, who's big claim to fame is that they did the music for "Little Miss Sunshine."

Saturday Nerd Post: Nightwatch & Daywatch

The concept of good and evil has fascinated mankind for eternity. Whether it is a talking devil and a talking angel on John Belushi's shoulder in "Animal House" or the book of Genesis, good and evil is everywhere. It's a theme that flows in the pages in the greatest novels, fills the frames of the most powerful movies, and resonates in the conflicting tones of great musical pieces.

Film Director Timur Bekmambetov (who recently made "Wanted") has made two wonderful movies that capture this conflict between good and evil: "Night Watch" and "Day Watch." I will not even try to explain how bananas these movies are, let's just say they are about the struggle between light and dark, and they are Russian.

The fact that the films are Russian is the most interesting part for me. Something about the films is just different in a way foreign films have never been for me. The characters speak differently (I'm not talking about language), the sense of humor is warped, and the direction is heavily stylized.

So check out these movies if you want to have your mind blown, but I'm warning you, you may feel inclined to turn it off because it's so different. Not bad, just not what you are used to.

Friday Movie Dance Off

High School Musical 3
This is a film about High Schoolers who randomly break out into song. The songs are about everything from getting into college to playing basketball. And now I must confess, out of all the pop culture trends of the past couple of years, this is the one I know the least about, and I'm cool with that.












SAW V
It took me a while to realize that that one dude is wearing the other dude's face as a mask in the poster. Since this will be a SAW movie expect tons of gore, diabolical traps that would fascinate Rube Goldberg, and a nice little twist ending. To this day, SAW 1 is the only film I couldn't finish because all the gore, and I haven't looked back since.












Pride and Glory
"You're either with them or with ya family." "I'm a cawp and you own brotha, you really gonna kill me" "We'ya talking about cawps killing cawps here" I guarantee one if not all of these lines are in this film. On a different note, both Farrell and Norton have been in comic book movies, so if we are lucky, perhaps Norton will Hulk out and Farrell will become Bullseye again.







Changeling
When her child is kidnapped, Angelina is crushed, however she gets even more flattened when the LAPD bring her back a child that she believes is not hers. Directed by Clint Eastwood, you might as well print Oscar Contender on every ticket printed.

Jack Sparrow J-Walking

While its true, driving in LA can be a process that can be as frustrating as a Rubik's cube, sometimes little things happen that make it bearable. For example, yesterday I was driving home on Hollywood Blvd and Jack Sparrow cut me off (on foot, not in a pirate ship), I guess when you are a pirate you are allowed to do anything you want: chase down pirate booty, maintain gnarly dreads, and jay-walk around Hollywood. This just the way things go in LA.

We have people making money to play characters for the camera that other actors get paid to be in front of the cameras. It's some type of meta-actor conundrum that would make a psychology professor's head explode under the weight of it.

But alas, street actors is just part of living thislalife. I see them everywhere, whether they are trying to go to Davey Jones locker by walking in front of cars or taking pictures with strangers. It was weird that I saw Sparrow the day they announced Pirates of the Caribbean 4. And even crazier that High School Musical star Zac Efron is apparently going to be in it. Either way, check out this classic video of street performers who cross the law.

Manu Chao is the World.

I have always known the world is smaller to me but it was not apparent to me until I was cruising down the Sunset Strip blasting "Merry Blues" by Manu Chao. The lady next to me looked over, recognized I was playing an international artist who happens to be my favorite musician of all time, nodded her head and smiled. She knew about Manu Chao, the question is: Do You?

Manu Chao was born to Spanish parents who were living in France to escape persecution under Franco. He grew up in Paris where he started his first band Hot Pants, after that band broke up he moved to Madrid where he played in a band called "Mano Negra." That band split and he become simply Manu Chao, his band was called Radio Bemba. They have released three studio albums and one live album.

Listening to Manu Chao is like listening to the pulse of the world. He sings in English, Spanish, French, Arabic,Portuguese, and Portunol (a Spanish Portugese hybrid). His music styles range from Caribbean rock, hard punk rock, salsa, meringue, jam band, and plain just rock and roll. Check out this beautiful song below.

I have seen Manu Chao in concert once, and it was an experience. The crowd was global, every race you could imagine was there. So in this world, where a country's borders are just lines on a map, Manu Chao is what is really really good.

Welcome to the future says TWITTER

I am happy to say that thislalife, will now be providing content for all you twitter users out there. For those who don't know what twitter is, first off, don't worry, in due time, you will know what it is, it's like one those things (facebook, myspace, tamagotchis).

Basically twitter is like a mini blog update. You can subscribe to a twitter feed of your someone, something, or anything and get quick short updates throughout the day. So if you could subscribe to President Bush's twitter feed you'd get updates about biking, chilling with Laura, jogging, and how pleased he is about his great new movie. Check out this movie below if you need more explanation.

I will be updating it as much as can, and I will not be talking about what I'm actually doing, I'll try to keep posts upbeat and funny, with the primary intention of making you smile. Fear not readers, I will not be drowning you in LA life. We don't want to become like this guy.

So enjoy it, twitter will be huge in the future, so enjoy it because for a brief moment you can live the future in the present. It's kind of like Terminator, minus Judgement Day.

Waiting for the Red Dawn

"I looked into Mr. Putin’s eyes and I saw three things — a K and a G and a B."
-John McCain, October 2008

If you don't know of it's existence, "Red Dawn" is 1984 action film that is one of the wildest ever made. The plot is simple, Communists (or is the current buzz word socialists) attack the United States. Luckily for us, eight kids retreat into the mountains in Arizona, and thanks to great leadership by 80's superstars Patrick Swayze and Charlie Sheen, they lead the resistance and go by the name "Wolverines."

If you haven't seen this movie, I would recommend watching it. It is a fascinating piece of 1980s cold war paranoia. And since John McCain and Sarah Palin keep talking about the Russians, a film where they are the blood thirsty invaders must be in heavy rotation at the campaign Head Quarters. The movie is full of red state policies, for example, if you don't support the "Wolverines", they will kill you regardless of if you are pro-America. See the scene where they execute a fellow "wolverine" who switches sides on them. Why? "CAUSE WE LIVE HERE!"

But enough politics, let's talk about why this movie is so damn ill. Check out this clip

1. 80's Swayze
2. In Red Dawn, all American youth have amazing throwing arms and accuracy for tossing grenades. Thank you little league.
3. The battle cry is awesome. I will now do it every time I do something that requires effort.

So next time I do the dishes, I'll look into their food encrusted eyes and yell "WOLVERINES!"

After discussing "Red Dawn" with friends for about a month now, let this post be the moment I work to stop talking about the film. wait, something that requires effort: WOLVERINES!

Sunday Trailers: Push

So here we have the trailer for "Push" the new movie starring Dakota Fanning and Chris Evans. The film is directed by Paul McGuigan, who directed "Lucky Number Slevin. "I don't have much to say about this trailer except this: this is what NBC's "Heroes" should be. Cool superpowered figures engaging in combat with enhanced abilities. That being said, this movie looks pretty bad, but I know I will end up watching it when it comes on Action Cinemax.

Saturday Nerd Post: Halo 3 Recond

Above is the trailer for the new Halo expansion pack: Halo:Recon. It's the next chapter in the HALO universe, but the protagonist of the game is not the Master Chief. It could be cool, but it sure is risky having a whole game not based around the central character of your series. That would be like if you made a whole Batman movie with Alfred instead of Batman.

The Sex Drive of Presidents who want Max Payne on Bees (Friday movie Wrap Up)

W

This is a movie about hard partying southerner who somehow becomes President, and gets in way over his head. No, it's not a comedy, or maybe it is a comedy, I guess it depends on how you look at life in the United States now. Anyway, directed by Oliver Stone and starring Josh Brolin as the man who is so infamous he now is referred to be one letter: "W." Kind of like Zorro with the "Z." By the way, some right wingers say this film was funded by shady Chinese investors. So thrilling!

Sex Drive
This is a movie about a guy who goes on a cross country odyssey to score a young girl. I have heard this story a million times before, and it usually ends with Chris Hansen, a TV crew, and a serious jail sentence.

















Max Payne
Adapted from the video game of the same name, this is a movie about cops, guns, and slow motion. Wahlberg plays the cop with nothing to lose, who kills everyone who gets in the way of the investigation of the murders of his family. While I'm a big fan of the game, this looks bad. Go rent the forgotten classic "The Big Hit" if you want some badass Wahlberg.

















The Secret Life of Bees
This movie is about a young girl, played by Dakota Fanning, who goes to live in the country with her caregiver. I won't be seeing this movie, except, as I usually mention, if it comes on an airplane, and the person next to me is extremely annoying. It's not that I think that this will be bad, it's just that I'm not into bee movies. But since we are talking about them, check out this classic clip from "The Wicker Man."

Verdict for the Week: Go see "W", or rent "The Big Hit."

"And some t-shirts"

Last night in the debate, John McCain mentioned how he was offended by certain t-shirts worn by Obama supporters at his rallies. These t-shirts could be the ones referring to Sarah Palin as a "c-word" or ones similar to the one I found above (you can buy it here). And finally, one of the greatest things about this campaign has been recognized: ALL THE COOL T-SHIRTS. And it is obvious, that the real issue here is that McCain is furious that his supporters are not making fly gear with him on it. Check out this shirt (buy it here)

In case you were wondering that is Obama "teabag" dunking on McCain. I mean that guy could be President, and there he is throwing it down like he's Paul Pierce in Game 7 versus Lebron. I can see why McCain is heated, no one likes getting dunked on, whether you're a politician or that foreign dude that Vince Carter destroyed back in the day. Another Obama shirt that I love is this one (buy it here).
Everything the Obama campaign represents is on one T-Shirt. I'll break it down right here.
1. Obama is cool- he's on the ones and twos, scratching records, cutting, mixing, whatever you want can imagine. In real life, he is a nasty basketball player and a big Jay-Z fan.
2. Obama is a leader- DJ's are literally the leader of the party, Obama is the leader of the democratic party.
3. Obama knows technology- Obama has been running the most technologically advanced campaign ever, so therefore he knows how to make magic a turntable.
4. Obama is cultured- Good DJs drop science with hot beats from a wide variety of genres. Obama is multi-cultured candidate who relates to people across racial, cultural, and class divides.

So McCain is pissed about T-Shirts, this is the best one he has running right now.

If he wants to win, he better get on that T-Shirt design committee, and have those mavericks come up with some cool ideas.

Can a city exist if it doesn't have an accent?

When people find out I'm from Boston, the next question is usually, "Where's your accent?" I explain to them I grew up in the suburbs, and I don't have an accent, but I know people who have wicked thick accents. And then they get excited that I said wicked, and before you know I'm turning on the accent, talking about packies, staties, and bubblas. They are dismayed when I don't talk about parking the car in the Harvard yard, yet to this day, I have never heard anybody say that. The Boston accent I know usually is something like this.

"Yeah me and my boy Sully came up from Revea, stopped at Dunkies, gawt a lage turbo with extraa cream and suga guy, had to see Youk and the sawks"

But here in LA, there is no accent, at least none than I can hear. I guess you have the prototype surfer accent.

"Yeah, me and mon Sullivon, came up from Huntingtong Beach Brah, stopped an got some green laatees mon, and went to the banks, and got straight pittied, mon, it was righteous"

I hear no one talking like that here, if I did, I would lose my mind in excitement, because it would confirm that I all the lessons I learned from "Point Break", are true. Alas, there is no accent, maybe this is because this seems to be a city lacking in natives. A city full of dreamers who are seeking glory, and also a city full of people hiding their accents, waiting for their moment in glory:

"First off, I wanna thank the Academy, and all my boys up in Kwinzee. Gotta thank my naybiz who used to moah the Jawn. Thank my loya, and my wife, she's ben with me for ova 25 yeaahs"

The Ecstasy of Sweet Commercials

So on Sunday, I watched the Patriots get tortured and destroyed the by the San Diego Chargers, but one positive thing came out of the loss; I saw an amazing commercial for Nike Football. Check it out below.

The music playing here is the "Ecstasy of Gold", by legendary film composer Ennio Morricone. Of course, it has a sick break beat playing with it, something which is not new, Jay-Z sampled this track on the Blueprint 2 album on a nas dis track called "Blueprint 2."

The video is very similar to the previous "take nothing" spot, which was directed by the legendary Michael Mann. I don't know if he directed this one, but it is very similar.

The generally concept, from the womb to the, um, confrontation on the football field is very cool and unique, some sort of pigskin Destiny. I guess Nike is trying to say that both of their lives built to that moment, which is pretty deep on psychological, philosophical, existential level. But when they collide, they are children again. What does it mean?

I don't know, my football side of the brain and my deep philosophical side of the game are not programed to work together.

LA Disasters

Woke up to hear about the fires in LA this morning. I could see the smoke from my internship this and it was gigantic. My heart goes out to the people affected by the fire.

Back in the East people worry about blizzards and Nor'easters. Other disasters don't really effect us. We haven't had a hurricane since I saw "The Island of Doctor Morreau" at the theaters in 1996. And I can't remember the last major "aw shucks, I'm going to be shoveling snow for hours" blizzard we've had either. I've been in some crazy thunderstorms, but nothing compares to LA disasters.

If the disasters back home are "Island of Doctor Morreau", then the disasters in LA are "Citizen Kane". First you have fires, which are biblical in their power. No one in the Bible is talking about Nor'easters coming through and torching the land. Then you have earthquakes, where the ground trembles and all hell breaks loose. Once again, extremely biblical.

It's nice that it does not snow in LA , it's nice that it is always bright and sunny, and it's nice there are heavenly beaches nearby. But the price is you gotta deal with some forces of nature. Let us hope the fires stay contained.

Sunday Trailers: Defiance

Here is the trailer for "Defiance", the new WWII flick from director Ed Zwick. Zwick has made some great action dramas in his time including "Glory" and "The Last Samurai." The film is about three brothers (Daniel Craig, Liev Schreiber, and Jamie Bell) who hide out in the woods and fight the Nazis. It should be noted that theme of badass jews killing nazis is hot in Hollywood right now. Quentin Tarantino's next film is "Inglorious Bastards" and it's the same thing, badass jews killing tons and tons of nazis. I'm into this new theme, nazis are the best villians of all time. "Defiance" will get the ball rolling, just wait.

Saturday Nerd Post: Little Big Planet

Quick post today, just climbed one of the many mountains behind my house. Hike was enjoyable, felt pretty alive when I was doing it. It was nice considering that I was sucked into the video game vortex of HALO and Gears of War for about 3 hours this morning. Anyway this video is from the new sandbox game for PS3 called "Little Big Planet." Basically in the game you can create anything you want. Here we see someone has created a simple computer. So to break it down.

Man Creates Computer to do Math--> computer becomes a gaming machine that allows young gamers to eat mushrooms and jump on turtles-->gaming machine creates game that allows man to create a computer on gaming machine to do math.

Friday Movie Wrap Up: The Express

The Express- This is a film about legendary Syracuse running back Ernie Davis. It's a true story and I'm personally guaranteeing that it will deliver the goods. Of course, the goods vary on what you seek. But if you want an amazing story that happens to be true, this is the one.







Body of Lies- Judging by the fact that Leonardo DiCaprio has moody sunglasses and looks like he just stepped off the set of "The Departed", you know he's going to be a badass in this flick. Basic story has Russell Crowe playing supervisor to Leo terrorist hunter who may or may not be based off of Jack Bauer, Jason Bourne, or even the grand terrorist hunter himself: our current president.








City of Ember- This is a film about a future world underground that's power supply is dwindling. Two teens have to find a way to start up the city's generators. Of course this whole movie is a giant metaphor for the failing economy and the two teens are metaphors for the Jonas Brothers and Hannah Montana.











Quarantine- This is a film that claims it is the recovered footage of a news team who was stuck in a quarantined building that contains flesh eating zombies. I swear, these news crews, also getting themselves stuck in bad situations and then sticking around to record it all. At some point you gotta turn the tape off and stop thinking about the Emmy and start thinking about getting out alive.

Weekly Verdict On What You Should See: The Express

Favorite Book: Of Mice & Men

Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck is my favorite book of all time. I remember, when Mr. Morton, my 7th grade English teacher, who looked like Mr. T gave it to me. Let it be known that Mr. Morton once erased the board with a kid.

Of course he did not tell me about the intense ending or the rabbits, but that did not matter. The writing was simple, Steinbeck is not an author who gets caught in gigantic words. He does not need complex language to wow you, just raw human emotions.

Such a great story, just two men seeking the American dream and all the crazy roadblocks that get in the way. Of course these roadblocks can get pretty huge, how huge, how about one of the main characters "shaking" someone to death, huge.

I do not re-read books like some people do. While I have seen "Bad Boys II" multiple times, I have only read Of Mice and Men once. I don't care of the story in "Bad Boys", I care about Mike Lowrieeee smoking fools. Yet with this book, I care about the emotion that Steinbeck conveys, I really feel for George, Lenny, and the rabbits.

Favorite Movie: The Lion King (I'm proud of it too)

"The Lion King" is my favorite movie, and I'm not afraid to say it. If you are thinking I'm some sort of super wuss because my favorite film is a Disney film, I also like "The Godfather", but who cares they are basically the same movie. Let me break down why this movie is still the best.

1. Simple yet compelling story- The story follows the classic theme of facing one's destiny. This theme is everywhere in literature and films. Luke Skywalker, Michael Corleone, Batman, and my main man Simba all suffer setbacks and then rise up to meet their destiny.

2. Classic Animation- PIXAR is great, but there is something to be said about old school animation. It's like going to an art gallery and watching the paintings move inside their frames. PIXAR is just like watching a video game.

3. Hakuna Matata- In case you haven't realized it Timon & Pumba are the headiest characters in a Disney movie. They don't do anything except chill out and eat. They are the Cheech and Chong of Disney movies. They're just a bunch of bro's living the good life.

4. Lions- Tell me one reason why lions are not cool. This story would never have worked if it was the "The Deer King."

Favorite Song: This Must Be The Place (Naive Melody)

This is the best song ever. For me it, the pick was easy. I'll break down why this is best song ever made.

1. The Mood- No matter what setting you play this song, it will deliver to the emotion that you need. If you put it on at a party, people will be like "Oh man, this song totally captures the communal mood of the party." If you play it solo, you will remember good times when you were in the communal zone of a party. It's like a chameleon, always changing to match the mood you desire.

2. The Groove- The groove is tasty like homemade pancakes and real maple syrup that was recently pulled from a tree in your backyard.

3. The Lyrics- Spot on for capturing the mood of a place close to your heart

Favorite Week: Youtube Video

This week I will be going over my favorite things, a.k.a. the things that make TPG happy. We begin today with my favorite youtube video of all time.

After careful consideration, I have realized that this is my favorite youtube video of all time. Here is why.

1. Unlike "My New Haircut", this video is real. These are not actors, this is not reality TV, this is real life. They are going to a real place that is apparently the most majestic place on earth. This place is called Belmar, and I have never been there, and if these clowns are going, I need to go.

2. Quotability- I quote this clip at least 3.8 times a day. It is part of the TPG vernacular, and most of the people who hang out with me, also quote it, not because I quote it, but because they love the clip as much as I do.

3. Repeat Factor- I have watched over 100 times, it never gets old. Ever.

4. Group Enjoyment- Get some friends together in the car, someone record the video and do your best to re-create the magic that these guys have.

Sunday Trailers: Seven Pounds

Here is the trailer for the new movie starring the man, a.k.a Will Smith. It's directed by Gabriele Muccino, who directed the highly enjoyable "The Pursuit of Happyness" and looks to have the same general theme taking control of your life. It also has rain running, and if you did not know rain running, equals moving drama. I can make fun of it all I want, it's a great trailer, and Will Smith always delivers.

Mark Millar, Nerd of the Moment

While this picture is not nerdy, the man on the left, is the most sought after nerd in Hollywood as of late. His name is Mark Millar and while he looks like some type of study abroad leprechaun, he is the biggest comic writer around.

He wrote the comic that "Wanted" was based off. His next movie "Kick-Ass" based off one of his comics comes out next summer. He just sold another comic series "War Heroes." He's riding high now, and even rumored to be writing the new "Superman" which is going to be more like "The Dark Knight" than the last one (which was pretty
"Mama Mia" like).

That's about all I gotta say, he's just a comic nerd who is making some great stuff. I'll be back tomorrow with a new trailer.

Friday Movie Shake-Down (The Fall Gets Going)

Beverly Hills Chihuahua
This movie is about talking chihuahuas in Beverly Hills, which is surprising because the poster makes it look like Indiana Jones with Chihuahuas. I won't be seeing it, but I hear rumors that people you know (who don't have little kids) will be seeing it, and that is something to worry about.








Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist
Michael Cera and Kat Dennings listen to sweet Indie Rock songs while falling in love. And while, it's easy to make fun of this cliche movie, I'll let my guard down and little and say this looks pretty funny and a great date movie. I mean I'd rather see this than "Nights in Rodanthe"










Flash of Genius
This is a flick about the man who created the windshield wiper and the corporate scandal that follows. If that isn't a hell of an idea for a flick, I don't know what is. However, the general theme of the little guy sticking to the big corporate fat cats who try to squash the average American is a pertinent one, in fact a little too pertinent.








Blindness
I just realized how cool this poster is, it's like your at the eye doctor, get it. Anyway this film is about an epidemic of blindness and the one woman who can see. Fernando Meirelles is one of my favorite directors, Julianne Moore is a great actress, and Mark Ruffalo is a highly underrated actor. It's a great team, but the buzz around this is decent.

THE RECOMMENDATION FOR THE WEEK IS: Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist

The Foot Fist Way

People depend on movies to provide them quotes for their lives. Whether it's "Show me the money", "You talking to me", or "I'll be Back", movie quotes are crucial.

This is why every year new movies come around to re-up our quotes supply. And if you are looking for new quotes look no further than the ridiculously awesome movie "The Foot Fist Way."

It's a simple story about a Tae Kwon Do instructor who goes through his ups and down. It's raunchy, funny, and bizarrely touching. It also will replenish your quote bank, so when you find yourself in a situation where a quote is needed, you'll be the hippest one in the room.

Here's a sampling of the quotes:

"I was so drunk - like, Myrtle Beach drunk"


"I don't think you're going to like how this ends hotshot"


"Your weakness is disgusting to me"

Big Stars, Small Dogs

When I was young, my family took a trip to New Orleans. It was a great time, we saw alligators, museums, and ate lots of seriously tasty food. I also saw the Cash Money Millionaires, which for a seventh grader was pretty much the coolest thing in the world. I was walking down the street and A Bentley pulled up to a gate, which opened to reveal a huge mansion with about five massive dogs in the yards. How massive you ask? I'm talking Beethoven massive. And there in that fateful moment, I equated the size of the dogs to much you were big bossing it, a.k.a, how much money you have. As you can see this dude with his cowboy hat is clearly the boss.

Now, I'm not a very materialistic person, but I can clearly see that LA is a materialistic town. I realized this was true when I repeatedly got cut off by Ferraris, Lambo's and while driving on Rodeo drive. So I figured that in LA, there would be plenty of big huge dogs. I was so wrong. Almost all the dogs I see in this town look like this
And I have no problem with perros pequenos, I'm just wondering where all the big ones have gone. Perhaps the big dogs aren't allowed on the streets of LA because they will go beast mode on the small dogs. Either way, I have human politics to worry about, I can't be stressing about canine street issues. So like many strange things about LA living, I'll just accept this one and keep living this LA life.