I Smell A Rat

Note: This DVD review was originally published on Blogcritics.org.

Since the debut of Toy Story more than a decade ago, few tunes have become as familiar as the song of praise so often directed toward the formidable team known as Disney/Pixar, and for good reason. Few studios have been as consistently innovative, in animation and in storytelling, as this now legendary pairing. Pixar seems to bring a sweet simplicity to things that should be extraordinarily difficult, and it’s this ease of execution that makes their movies instant classics.

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Blogiversary

It was four years ago today that, “jealous” of people in a theatre group I was part of who posted humorous highlights of rehearsal, I signed up for LiveJournal. Since then, I have bounced from TypePad to Blogger, from semi-private to semi-popular, from the now-defunct minutiae31.com back to LiveJournal and now here, hopefully to stay. Many thanks to all those who have read my site in any of its incarnations and who continue to do so today.

Listen to the Music?

As excited as I am for the upcoming film version of Sweeney Todd – with Tim Burton and Johnny Depp on board, it’s hard to resist – I can’t help but be a little disappointed that the trailer includes almost no music. The backbone of the show – indeed, the reason it is so brilliantly dark – is the music of Stephen Sondheim. Clearly, this December will be filled with Sondheim’s devilishly good lyrics, but it’s such a tease not to include more of it in the trailer.

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Wide Awake and So Alive

It’s Friday, and that means time for another video from Movie Hawk. Enjoy the music video of “Car Crash” by Matt Nathanson. Anyone who reads this site with any regularity needs no explanation for why I’m posting this.

Edit: Whoops, looks like they aren’t allowing embedding. Here’s the link.

Signs of Life

As early-season loss to a young team, featuring more turnovers than I’d like to see and disconcerting trouble at the foul line, is something that, last year, would have shaken my confidence in the Hawks. But Tuesday night’s 72-69 loss to Syracuse didn’t disappoint me so much as it did show promise for the coming months. Though sloppy play did the Hawks in, they also showed improved team defense and more shooting and passing confidence when facing a zone defense. Pat Calathes, who has taken his share of hits from me, played one of the best games of his SJU career, and newcomer Tasheed Carr (a transfer from Iowa State with sophomore eligibility) and sophomore Darrin Govens provided a much-needed leadership boost. Sure, 1-1 is not as good as 2-0, but seeing the strides the Hawks made, even in a loss, I’ll take it.