George Clooney‘s Ides of March is a behind the scenes look at the days before the Democratic primary election in Ohio between a fictional US Senator (who looks surprisingly like Vladimir Putin) and a middle of the country Governor (played by George Clooney). In similar films from the past, the stages were filled with smoke filled rooms, while now, smoking has been cordoned off to only blind alleys and parking lots and instead of smoke filled rooms, the rooms are filled with stone cold staring contests and conversations between the likes of the intense characters played by Ryan Gosling, George Clooney, Paul Giamatti and Philip Seymour Hoffman. As my friend Sara put it, the film had a few too many of these intense stare downs, to the point where it was almost comical.

The film sports strong performances, but especially by Gosling and Giamatti (as a character so slimy and jaded, it feels like melted kryptonite), but one can not forget the performances of Marisa Tomei and Evan Rachel Wood who provide pivot points for the main players to play off each other.

The film seems to live in a fictional present day that references overtly the former US Presidents from George H.W. Bush through George W. Bush, while also covertly paying reference to the recent message of “hope and change.” At the same time though, the film also reflects back exactly how most Americans feel about politics, especially if you take just how low Americans polled recently have been rating their favorability of Congress below 20%, by showing that behind every strait arrow politician is a room full of dirty tricks and hustling sessions. This film is a far cry from the idealized Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, but instead brings shades of grey into this top notch game of political brinkmanship.

The film does a good job of keeping the audience in to loop with the plot except for one conflict point that became far too obvious as to how it would unfold about 3/4 through the film, which came as a surprise to the main character, which was surprising considering how the entire script leading up to that point in the film praised Gosling’s character as being the smartest man in the room, yet allowing the audience to pick up on the trick before he could figure it out. I won’t say anything more specific, in case it actually is not as clear to anyone else seeing this film as it was to this reviewer.

I fully enjoyed this film overall and I look forward to the next film slated for George Clooney in the director’s chair.

Thanks to Teaser-trailer.com for the above pic.

Enjoy

Dany

Filed under: movie reviews, movies, politics, Washington, Washington DC ]]> http://raad.wordpress.com/2011/10/22/the-ides-of-march-review/feed/ 0 master1228 http://raad.wordpress.com/2011/05/30/the-hangover-2-review/ http://raad.wordpress.com/2011/05/30/the-hangover-2-review/#comments Tue, 31 May 2011 03:17:55 +0000 master1228 http://raad.wordpress.com/?p=1631 ]]>

I was glad that even with the pending legal battle over the facial tattoo made famous by Mike Tyson that was also featured plastered on the  face of Ed Helms (see above) in The Hangover 2, that the film actually was released on time for this holiday weekend.

The film itself though, is none too different from the original Hangover. So, you can take that two ways, if you loved the original, you will enjoy what is basically the same movie, just this time replace the backdrop of Las Vegas with Bangkok, Thailand. There is a lot that was not necessary in this film, like why was there a car chase in this comedy or why is this group (wolf pack) of guys actually friends with each other (Galifianakis not included)?

I know I will not remember much about this movie’s plot or many of the jokes, but just as with the first film, I will definitely remember the montage during the credits that actually chronicles the bachelor party night and how impressed I was with that trained monkey (on a side note, probably the most memorable on-screen monkey since Friends).

Regardless though, I know I had a lot of fun just watching the film unfold with all its one-off jokes. I enjoyed just letting the madness flow over me for 100 minutes.

Thanks to Hangover 2 trailer for the above pic.

Enjoy

Dany

Here is a great montage that shows just how formulaic Sandra Lee‘s Food Network show is. Watch for an extra special moment that seems to come from nowhere as well.

Thanks to Pearl for sending over that montage.
Enjoy

Dany

I love the juxtaposition between Common and Ted Nugent that Stewart makes. There sometimes is just no way to square the circles that FoxNews creates on a weekly basis.

Jon Ronson has a book The Psychopath Test (buy it here). After just a couple of years of medical training, I sometimes forget what psychology knowledge isn’t common knowledge for the public. Watching this interview was a lot of fun for me.

Annie Jacobsen authored a book on the goings on at Area 51 (buy it here) over the years. First off, no aliens, but President Clinton did have to petition for access to their records after being denied access… wait, I forgot, officially, Area 51 does not exist…

Watching the depth and breadth of Newt Gingrich‘s fall from grace amongst his Republican peers after he pooh poohed Representative Paul Ryan‘s budget and Medicare plans was amazing to watch.  The sheer gall of him trying to blame Meet the Press and then later saying that using that appearance in advertisements against him or Republicans would be considered lies was just stunning.

After the  extensive interview with David Barton earlier this month, here is an extended interview with Constitutional Scholar Richard Beeman to provide a different perspective on the history of how the Constitution has changed over the years though amendments and legal judgments over the years in America.

Thanks to Jeff for finding the hilarious Onion article. Thanks to The Onion for the above pic.

Enjoy

Dany

I love the comparison between politicians Ron Paul and John McCain here, I just wish more of the media would cover Ron Paul more seriously and on a different note, who had heard of Herman Cain?

Here is a great clip extravaganza that takes us back, all the way to President Reagan for the Presidential credit mongering for who deserves credit for killing Osama bin Laden.

Wow, Common and Ice-T have FoxNews and FoxNews.com all tied in knots, the corporation is a mass of mixed emotions when it comes to the music community. I guess it’s OK by FoxNews to have violent lyrics against the police, as long as they are old lyrics, you know, at least as old as from the early 1990′s…

Here is a very funny interview with Albert Brooks, promoting his new book 2030: The Real Story of What Happens to America (buy it here). Just as a side note, if you have never seen his film Defending Your Life, stop right now and get your hands on it ASAP, it is one of the most comedic and well done hilarious movies of all time.

Please don’t give Asbestos, Canada ANY of your business, they are CRAZY people that want to sell you MORE asbestos even though it causes hundreds of thousands of cases of lung cancer per year.

Enjoy

Dany

Now THIS is the news media I expected, just 3 days after the bin Laden killing announcement, there’s tons of footage of politics as usual again… how fun to be back to normal, it’s great to get the political horse race back.

Here is a look behind the scenes of the 24-hour media, showing that basically any media event will be debated as to whether it is the defining moment of the presidency… especially if you watch The Ed Show, which explains why I never like watching his show.

This Jon Meacham interview mixes the history of the Civil War (buy his Civil War Trilogy book set here) with the potential impact of bin Laden’s death (buy Beyond Bin Laden: America and the Future of Terror here) along with the importance of Pakistan in world affairs.

Is it wrong to LOVE it when religious zealots get caught in a steaming pile of their own propaganda BS? Watching this zealot getting tongue-tied when he can’t believe seeing a New Jersey mosque offering their prayer space up for Christians to pray in was GLORIOUS!

Here is an interesting extended 5-part-interview of David Barton on American history and the role, along with his view of the role of, religion in the US. I LOVE that they can agree that they both love open conversations that accomplish nothing! That’s how I feel after every political debate I ever have, even with nothing accomplished, I feel that much better after.

Enjoy

Dany

Here are the remarks from President Obama for the 2011 White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner, I must say, it has one of the best and most unexpected openings I would ever think a President would have, I felt like I was back watching wrestling back in the 1980′s.  Obama also makes fun of himself and his Vice President, Joe Biden, with a funny movie trailer.

Seth Meyers headlines the same dinner and in his 20 minutes he hits on things like a lack of birth certificate jokes, Arianna Huffington, Jon Hamm and Zach Galifianakis.

If polls of Republican and Democratic candidates 18 months prior to the election are so useless at predicting who will actually win the ultimate election, can we stop referring to them now? I guess we could fill all that dead airtime on all the 24 hour news networks with more footage of crazy cat videos.

It’s interesting to see how the different protests during the local town hall meetings are shaking out, while some prominent Republicans are getting booed, some democrats have to sit through a protest with people who ultimately sing that they love the President… by the way, I am VERY confused by that last one.

I heard about this interview with Gigi Ibrahim from No Agenda (subscribe here). I can’t believe that the story isn’t getting more press that Ibrahim was taught to do this from the American University in Cairo!

Here is a nice tirade over the latest news regarding funding 9/11 first responder health treatments. My only comment is that if we are checking 9/11 responders on this, instead of getting mad about it, just check any group the government gives money or aid to against the terrorist watch list, so that we never get any scandals in the news about terrorists receiving aid money from the US government. Shouldn’t THAT be what we are avoiding?

Elizabeth Warren comes back to explain again why she feels her new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is necessary and what has been happening since the agency was created. Currently, the agency takes effect this summer. You can track what her agency is doing at ConsumerFincance.gov

William Cohan chronicles the history behind Goldman Sachs and how they are the best financial company to make money by exploiting everything possible that is legal.

Thanks to the AP for the above photo.

Enjoy

Dany

A little bit of time has passed since Helen Thomas has left the White House Press Corps and recently Playboy wanted to get her side of the story about what happened, along with that though, they got a great retrospective of her time at the White House covering almost 1/4 of the Presidents of the United States (the last 10 Presidents). I don’t know what to think about Helen Thomas, she is a great reporter who said some things that I didn’t agree with, but I still think she should be sitting up front in the White House Press Corps asking the tough questions that no one seems to ask anymore. Sadly, I agree with her view of the current state of journalism in the US.

This is a great in depth interview with her, check out the Playboy interview here (or here).

To get an idea, here are of my favorite exchanges:

“PLAYBOY: So is this how you pictured retirement?

THOMAS: I’m not retired! I was fired. In fact, I’ll die with my boots on. I’m still writing and I’ll continue to write and ask hard questions. I will never bow out of journalism.

PLAYBOY: Take us back to the White House courtyard on May 27 when Rabbi David Nesenoff pointed his camera at you and asked for your comments on Israel.

THOMAS: He pulled that thing out like a jackknife. I mean, he started out very nice, introducing me to these two young boys who wanted to be in journalism. He said, “Got any advice? Go for it.” I didn’t know it was Jewish Heritage Month, which is why he was at the White House and also why he asked “So what do you think of Israel?” That’s when I said, “They should get the hell out of Palestine.”

PLAYBOY: Did you realize how controversial those words were as you spoke them?

THOMAS: I knew I’d hit the third rail. You cannot say anything about Israel in this country. But I’ve lived with this cause for many years. Everybody knows my feelings that the Palestinians have been shortchanged in every way. Sure, the Israelis have a right to exist—but where they were born, not to come and take someone else’s home. I’ve had it up to here with the violations against the Palestinians. Why shouldn’t I say it? I knew exactly what I was doing—I was going for broke. I had reached the point of no return. You finally get fed up.

PLAYBOY: What was life like in the immediate aftermath as millions started viewing the video on YouTube?

THOMAS: I went into self-imposed house arrest for two weeks. It was a case of “know thyself.” Isn’t that what Socrates said? I wanted to see if I was remorseful—and I wasn’t.

PLAYBOY: Did the phone ring off the hook?

THOMAS: No. Nobody called. But I still have some friends in the White House press pool, who reached out to me. I understand they formed Jews for Helen Thomas at one point.

PLAYBOY: That’s interesting.

THOMAS: I also heard from Jimmy Carter. He called a few weeks later.

…

PLAYBOY: Has there ever been an honest press secretary?

THOMAS: Jerry terHorst. He lasted one month. He was President Ford’s press secretary. He had covered Ford in Washington. He had been here for 29 years as a reporter from the Grand Rapids paper and then The Detroit News. He understood the press. But he was incapable of lying, and he quit when Ford pardoned Nixon, on the very day. He couldn’t take it. Poor Jerry Ford. He just wasn’t ready to be president. He had prepared himself to be Speaker of the House and stepped into those shoes okay, but he just wasn’t equipped for the big job. We saw that Betty Ford struggled too, of course.”

Thanks to Playboy for the above pic, to Firetown for the pic below of Helen Thomas Image by © Bettmann/CORBIS and to No Agenda (subscribe here) for informing me about this interview.

Enjoy

Dany

When it comes to unions, any deal where it becomes virtually impossible to fire workers is bad, just look at the NY teacher rubber rooms where bad teachers just sit in rooms away from students all day and wait years before their disciplinary hearings… but that doesn’t mean that unions are bad and should be abolished and if you can’t reneg on Wall Street bonus contracts, why is it rational to do just that with union contracts? If you want to join a union, you should have that option. Unions for the public sector though are a bit tricky because the government can’t really fold and the money the workers get paid are not the politician’s money, it belongs to the constituents of the state, so any deal an official makes to increase longterm benefits only comes into play years after they are no longer on the hook for making the deal, while in the private sector, the owners that agree to these contracts are on the hook if they make a bad deal because the business could fail and have to close its doors.

Here is an interesting interview with the Jordanian Ambassador Prince Zeid Ra’ad. King Abdullah has already dismantled the previous government, but I don’t think anyone yet knows what will come of his changes. The prince brings up some interesting possibilities, like what happens if the region unfolds into a battle between the Sunni‘s and Shia‘s on top of between the middle eastern countries that have already modernized vs the more conservative countries.

Here’s just a bit of the absurdity what’s going on in Libya. With Muammar Gaddafi seeming to have lost his mind, although I don’t know how recent an event that actually is.

Allison Stanger tries to explain just how much money is flowing from the US government to military contractors for her new book One Nation Under Contract. One point she brings up is that because there was no military draft, that changed the political discussion over going into Iraq and how we probably would not have gone into Iraq like we did if a draft was a possibility.

Diane Ravitch talks about how complicated the issue of education is. How we stack up worldwide and what poverty does to education. Her book is The Death and Life of the Great American School System. I still think there needs to be a better way in a lot of these school districts to get rid of bad teachers, but it’s hard to put all the blame on them without dealing with the issues behind why the kids are doing badly in school. Teachers can’t make kids go to school and they can’t make them do their homework, sometimes the blame for why children do poorly in school is because of their family or their family situation.

Lastly on a different note, thanks to the 404 episode465 (subscribe here) for letting me know about the new Dead Island video game trailer. I know the game won’t end up looking like this ultimately, but it certainly has piqued my interest.

Enjoy

Dany

January Jones (who does a great job on Mad Men, but I still have yet to see their latest season) is just cute as a button as she promotes her new movie Unknown (and you know how that worked out for me from my last post when I went to see the preview for it).

So far, proposals to cut the budget have only dealt with non-defense and non-medicare/medicaid/social security. The problem is that when you combine all those spending programs, that makes up over 80% of all federal government spending, so any cuts in spending not related to those programs, is just shaving off the top layer of snow from the iceberg that sunk the titanic. Until both parties get together and start talking about real spending cuts to the rest of the 80% of government spending (like how congress just voted to cut a military spending program on the F-35 fighter jet that the military did not even want anymore), all this is just one big kabuki theater. Although I must say, John Hodgman‘s got some interesting fiscal ideas!

John interviews Republican State Leadership Committee Ed Gillespie. I think I will miss Michael Steele being the spotlight Republican organizer, because even though I don’t agree with some of Mr. Gillespie’s conclusions, he is much more measured and interesting to listen to.

David Albright attempts to explain to Colbert the Stuxnet program, the damage it caused and what it could mean in terms of potential war… with a lot of help from Christiane Amanpour.

It is time to celebrate another edition of Tip of My Hat/Wag of My Finger. Colbert tackles such issues as the sale of the Huffington Post to AOL, wales and trash tv.

I love when secret memos get leaked out, especially when it makes news organizations seem petty and stupid. Thanks Fox News!

Clarence Thomas is again in the news, he has an illustrious history of scandal in the news, but any time a high profile lawyer/judge has problems filling out legal documents, it makes the news.

Jeffrey Leonard tries to explain how many big businesses are increasingly paying their small business contractors for their services anywhere from 30-90 days later than the small businesses have to pay for their own costs and how this change is really hurting the ability of small businesses from running efficiently, growing and hiring new people themselves.

Enjoy

Dany

Tonight was an interesting and unexpected night. A friend and I were originally going to a sneak preview of Unknown, with Liam Neeson, but once we got to the theater and got onto the end of the line that was literally around the block, five minutes before showtime a representative from Fox Searchlight came around the corner and announced that the screening we were to go to was full up beyond a point ahead of us and if we wanted to see the film he was screening, Win Win, we could get in to see that instead… so we decided to give that a go instead.

The film stars Paul Giamatti as a family man and New Jersey lawyer, who is in trouble and throughout the beginning of the film makes one bad decision after another and then he needs to spend the rest of the film trying to untangle himself and possibly actually make a good decision or two on the way. Especially since the film is not even released yet, I do not want to give any more of the plot away, but Amy Ryan and Jeffrey Tambor also bring strong performances, while Bobby Cannavale provides some quirky comic relief moments and Alex Shaffer‘s muted performance was very believable.

What is funny is that I really enjoyed the film, I had a great time watching it, but I went in not knowing anything about the film and not having seen any trailers for the film. After seeing the film though, I can not imagine a trailer that Fox could put together that would entice me to see this film… and now that I JUST found the trailer online (which I do not want to share here), my advice is SKIP THE TRAILER and just watch this movie once it comes out. It is a film that anyone that doesn’t mind a bit of cursing will enjoy, so I was surprised it received an R-rating, but it must have just had too much profanity to pass with a lower rating, although I feel like a broader audience would enjoy this film because the story ultimately speaks to family life.

I don’t know if our original movie we were supposed to see was really sold out, but either way, I don’t mind, I had a good night with a small movie that I was not expecting tonight.

Thanks to OnlineMovieHut for the above pic.

Enjoy

Dany

The above is an inspiring video, with all the news… all the time about war, violence and strife worldwide, it is refreshing to see an uplifting look into the future, no matter how long it takes for us to achieve. Thank you Jefferson for spreading the word my way, I needed that.

I am also adding a couple of followup videos, watch as Carl Sagan humbles us with just how much could have happened… all on a lonely pale blue dot in our obscure corner of the galaxy:

Enjoy

Dany

It took the Obama administration the weekend to decide how to handle the situation in Egypt. Before the weekend, it looked loose support for the government structure, but after the weekend, once numerous reports came out about violence against the protesters, the rhetoric shifted.

I am not sure sure, but I think that Jon Stewart was channeling Glenn Beck by mock insinuating that Sarah Palin may be a Russian spy sleeper agent, but whatever he was doing, it was a funny game of connect the dots. I think what is more important about that clip is that most Republicans try and claim that it was President Reagan who beat the Soviet Union, but this is the first I have heard them claim that they just spent themselves into bankruptcy. That is usually the argument made by Democrats.

Bill Gates comes on to promote the eradication of polio from India, Nigeria, Pakistan and Afghanistan, the four countries that humanitarian aid has never been able to erradicate polio from.

Michael Steele is a great sport, after numerous episodes with Stewart and Wyatt Cenac making fun with a mini-puppet, he came on this week to talk about the current situation the Republican party is in.

Who knew there was rape and then there was rape-rape? Thanks Kristen Schaal for clearing that one up! Republicans are trying to draw a line in the sand between what types of rape the federal government would help fund abortions for.

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mike Mullen, explains just how close a relationship the US government and military has had with Egypt over the past 30 years.

Paul Offit, MD talks with Stephen Colbert about his new book, Deadly Choices: How the Anti-Vaccine Movement Threatens Us All, where he talks about how important vaccinations are and about the half million Americans who medically can’t get vaccines that depend on everyone else to get vaccinated to protect them.

These government approved wingless wynz seem very scary, even if they are just white meat wyngz.

Here is another segment in Bill O’Reilly‘s sayings that don’t make any scientific sense.

Enjoy

Dany

This may be the saddest piece on the Daily Show, that the historic town of Turkey Creek could only gather enough political power to appeal to the government once they got the bird lovering Audubon society on their side. Oh and shame on you Al Sharpton for not helping more with the issue or at least even seeming sympathetic about this issue.

I disliked most of the Spider-Man movies, but I have liked James Franco in Pineapple Express, I have not gotten to see 127 Hours yet though. Here he talks about how he heard about his Oscar nomination.

Jonathan Alter has a new book, The Promise, that looks at the first year of the Obama administration. Alter talks a lot about jus how badly President Obama and staff were at communicating to the public during that first year in office.

T. Boone Pickens talks in this extended interview about his plan to get the US off of OPEC oil with his 10 year plan, even though he thought 2 years ago it was the same 10 year plan. He wants to get the US off OPEC oil with natural gas, two years ago he talked a lot more about wind power though. I just don’t know how he can say that he’s never seen any sort of damage coming from fraking though, he never gives a solid answer to the documentaries with flamable water in local faucets after fracking. Pickens does not seem to make sense, he says everyone is in and that it’s a non-partisan issue, but no one in the US government seems to be talking about it. It takes til the end of the 20+ minutes to get to the meat of the issue, one big reason nothing has moved forward with his energy plan is that energy companies are not yet convinced to give up their golden goose just yet.

Stephen Colbert absorbs Keith Olbermann‘s audience and power after finding out that Keith’s show is over… only to experience some deleterious effects.

Hey, you can move to Utah now and kill any suspicious animal wandering around you, by clubbing it to death, decapitating it or shooting it, as long as you have a reasonable belief that it is feral… sounds like a great way to spend Saturday night and possibly build a personal history of conduct disorder leading to a future payoff of antisocial personality disorder! THANKS State Rep. Curtis Oda.

Daryl Bem‘s recent study shows that when people are being shown erotic images, they can predict which window that image will reveal said erotic image, at a rate of just over 53% compared to just under a 50% prediction for a neutral image.

If you didn’t have a reason to avoid fast food. Here’s Taco Bell defending their beef taco filling even if it contains less than 35% meat, instead of the government mandated minimum of 40%… I guess in the future you might see Taco Bell selling their new beefoid burrito. Who wouldn’t want the non-harmful but also non-advantageous silicon dioxide (sand) in their food? Just don’t inhale it, it’s bad for the lungs, but so would other foods.

I hope Brian Greene‘s new book, The Hidden Reality, explains how I could be “a bag of particles governed by the laws of physics.” The idea that math describes the possibility of alternate universes is intriguing. We still need some sort of experimental evidence, but I have no idea how we would go about obtaining that evidence. I wonder how this compares to predictive porn research, don’t you?

Enjoy

Dany

After the State of the Union, Rep Paul Ryan gave the Republican Response to the President’s speech, you can see that video below if you did not get a chance to see that as well.

After watching both speeches, it is clear that the two men have different views of what makes America strong, but I have to hope that with all the areas that they agree, in the end, good laws and reforms will come from it. I do not believe that in the end, the entire 2010 health care reform bill will be repealed, but the most egregious sections of it will get changed. Reducing our deficit will not be easy, but cuts to research will only handicap our future and any reform to seriously cut spending will have to deal with both military spending and entitlement spending like Medicare, Medicaid Social Security and other healthcare related programs, since those programs alone already account for over 80% of our federal spending(image below) which come from this federal spending breakdown (image below).

Enjoy

Dany