Let's All Go to the Lobby!

On Tuesday, I attended a screening of George Clooney's new film, "Leatherheads."  This was a throwback to the early professional football days in the 1920s.  The film is similar to "The Natural" and some other sports movies from that era that escape me at the moment.  The script was quick witted and pretty funny.  It reminded me a lot of films from the late 40s and 50s, flicks like "His Girl Friday," one quick pun after another.  A fun romp.

This has been a hectic production week as I've met with Dax and Rhonda to discuss and begin work on both of their projects (shaving and antiquing).  It's nice to actually get started on that stuff rather than dreading the project beginning.  The wheels are in motion.

I ordered a new wide-angle lens for the super special gift David gave me.  When it arrives, that shall be a most magical time.

I ate at Atomic Cowboy for the first time the other day.  It was during lunchtime and it was nice and empty.  The food was tasty and save for the one time the waiter filled my Sprite with water, the experience was quite enjoyable.  I blew mud like you wouldn't believe when I got back to the office, though.

Today I spoke at Rohan Woods Elementary.  This was a lot of fun.  I was nervous going in because I really didn't have anything prepared.  I knew a general outline of things I wanted to talk about and I had some short films to play, but I was a bit nervous that I would be stumbling all over myself when the kids came in.  Luckily, things went very smoothly and the kids had a good time.  I talked a little about the fest, a little about myself, showed "Splash" many times as well "Steamboat Willie," "Purple and Brown," and "Shaun the Sheep."  The best part was the kids' reactions when I showed them the special present David gave me.  They were pretty awestruck.

I suppose I may have a few skeletons in my closet, but who doesn't.  Recently, while I was going through a desk drawer filled with short films, I came across "Pretty Little Jellybean," an NFC contest film that I thought I had destroyed all evidence of.  There are several folks out there who want to see this film and now it seems like they may have their chance.  Regrettably.

Tomorrow I am having my wisdom teeth pulled.  All four of them.  I'm a little nervous but mostly ready to have them yanked out of me.  I've got a nice stockpile of movies to keep me company over the next three days.  Several are from Dax and seven are from Family Video.  You'll be reading my snippets of them soon enough, if I survive.  Wish me luck.

I'm looking forward to reading this.

I know, I'm a dork.

Yea!

Happy birthday to my great pal, Rich Lamberty!  I hope it is a blast.

Home Theatre (Live Theatre, too!)

I rented a nice little crop of films last week, including "Southland Tales" and "Vacancy." Southland was much anticipated, much delayed, and only somewhat liked. It's a film that requires multiple viewings, but I'm not sure I can wade through the litany of B-List celebrities again. Vacancy was mildly surprising. Aside from the traditional Hollywood ending (how does Luke Wilson survive, seriously?), there were several tense moments and a rather creepy performance from Frank Whaley. Good to see Whaley still out there and acting. Over the weekend I also watched "Harsh Times" and "The Hoax." "Harsh Times" is a film about the ramifications of war and the return home. Christian Bale plays the lead and turns in another fine performance. It's strange to me the amount of Iraq war based films that have been coming out. Most of the films don't fare that well and that's mostly because we are currently living in that situation. We live out the war every day and watching a film about it isn't always our first choice for movie-going. "The Hoax" was better than I expected, but I'd recommend "F is for Fake," which partially covers the Clifford Irving story. 'F' is a documentary by Orson Welles about the art of deception through film, art, music, and any other medium you can lay hands on. A great film and a great soundtrack.

On Friday, Kara and I went to see "Assassins" performed by New Line Theatre in the beautiful Ivory Theatre. The Ivory is an old church that has been renovated and transformed into a great space for live theatre. Kara and I were both pretty excited for the performance, but I found myself pretty bored during parts of the performance. The acoustics were great and some of the characters were really engaging, but the musical numbers didn't really wow me and Kara didn't laugh as much as she wanted to. Regardless, there are a few shows on the slate for the Ivory that pose to be really interesting, namely the rock musical version of High Fidelity.

I went to see "Meet Bill" on Monday. This movie was horrible. Don't see it.

I met with Sharlene Kindt on Monday evening to discuss the upcoming screenings of the Idaho Avenue Film Festival. There will be a best of screening at the Feasting Fox in South City. This screening is done in conjunction with FrontYard Features. It will be held on May 31 at 8pm. Then in September, there will be another screening at my house, the original IAFF site.

I have a few exciting film and film related projects coming up in the next couple of months. I recently went out to Lindenwood to judge a few pieces for the upcoming Lindy awards. I will be speaking at Rohan Woods on Thursday, the make up date from the snowed out event a few months ago. This is for their Fine Arts Day and I have the honor of talking about filmmaking and my duties at work. Later this month I will venture over to Webster University to speak to a couple of Thomas Crone's classes about short film scriptwriting/production. This summer I will be helping with a film camp for kids from Reed Elementary from Ladue. They will attempt to recreate the Pirates of the Caribbean into a 5 to 7 minute short film. That should be interesting.

I want to give a special thanks to Dave Callahan and his most generous gift. It is truly a thing of beauty. I look forward to using it and creating new, exciting, and wonderful projects with it. This is a huge step for Meatloaf Productions on our journey to production greatness and soaring to new heights.

I also want to send a hello to Jason Braun. Jason is covering St. Louis with his delicious sounds through his experimental hip-hop under the guise of Jason and the Beast. He will be performing at the Bluebird on April 25th. Check him out if you can.

Feeling Romantic

This is the love of my life.

Reflections

I'm writing an email to a kid interested in interning at Cinema St. Louis. It really zaps me back to the times when I would interview for different positions. That really creates a feeling of loneliness or the world against you mentality. There you are, in the hot seat, bombarded with questions about things you normally don't think about or at least don't express out loud. For some reason, emailing this kid reminded me of the time I went to Philadelphia to spend a few days with my good pal, Gerald. I flew in alone and waited for a train to take me out to where he was staying with his sister. For whatever reason, those moments alone on the train platform were like drowning in a state of in between. No one to talk to, no where to go, nothing to do but wait. I had a phone in my pocket and a bag on my back and I just sat there. Wanderlust or something similar. I had a great time in Philly once I hooked up with Gerald, but for the few minutes on that platform, I didn't really exist to anyone but myself.

Let's All Go to the Lobby!

Some sweet, sweet activity has been taking place since I last blogged.  I went to see "21" on Friday.  It was okay, standard fare for a poker/gambling flick.  I think there are a few movies coming out soon that center around Las Vegas, but it seems the Vegas buzz is starting to wear off.  "21" features Kevin Spacey.  This guy is weird.  He was huge after "Seven" and "American Beauty," but started cranking out duds like this film, "Superman Returns," and "Fred Claus."  Just about always fun to watch, though, and his good far out weighs the bad.

On Thursday, Kara and I went to ciné16 at the Missouri History Museum.  This was our first experience with ciné16 since the Mad Art days, nearly three years ago.  It's nice to see it back on the map, and hopefully it keeps going strong.  Kara and I were near regulars at Mad Art, but the program changed hands, changed locations, and lost most of its loyal following.  The nights theme was films from around the world.

Before grocery shopping tonight, Kara and I stopped by The Record Exchange for a little indulgence in guilty pleasures.  I've been wanting to purchase audio cassette tapes for my car.  It is a 1989 Buick Park Avenue.  It doesn't have a CD player, I don't listen much to commercial radio, and NPR is getting really depressing as our world continues its downward spiral.  The tapes I picked up were Ella Fitzgerald, Al Hirt, the Beatles, and Miles Davis.  I also picked a Talking Heads tape off of eBay last week.  There are a few other jazz tapes I'm interested in picking up, as well as maybe "Thriller" by Michael Jackson, but that will be the extent of this nostalgic trip, as cassettes are somewhat costly for their dated appeal.

Things have been really picking up at work as submissions continue to pour in to the office.  It's a lot of fun opening the envelopes up and looking at the packaging people send their films in.  Sometimes it can be really eye catching, other times it's the equivalent of a student's work in his junior year video class.  I'll be bringing some shorts home to start in insurmountable, Mark Bielikesque (~Herculean) task of putting together the short subjects program for the St. Louis International Film Festival.  Wish me luck!

Psst...He's the king!

Joy!

I've been really lazy about posting lately and I'm sorry for that. The post from Friday was actually just finished up a few minutes ago. I really haven't had much motivation for posting recently, but today I came across something that made me really excited. More on that in a minute.

Earlier today I went to a screening of "Paranoid Park." The film was sleepy and the main character was pensive and confused. A good flick, especially for a rainy day like today. Not my favorite Gus Van Sant film, but still a better movie than most of what's out in the megaplex.

I worked the comic book show yesterday and it was a moderate success. I got rid of a few things, cut some decent deals, and enjoyed my time spent with Jeff Elden and Matt Kindt. Big props to Jeff for helping out during the entire day, hopefully he has spread the love with his new mini, "Vicious Robot Tuesday."

I just read on Newsarama that Tim Sale has signed an exclusive contract with Marvel Comics. Exclusive contracts for writers and artists are not a new thing, but it's exciting because Sale will once again collaborate with Jeph Loeb on a Marvel hero: Captain America. I've always enjoyed the work the two have done, both separate and together (especially together). After conquering Spider-Man, Daredevil, and the Hulk, the two team up to take on the guy who is arguably Marvel's biggest icon. I'm really looking forward to it.