If you haven't heard of this movie, you've probably been living under a rock.
Slumdog Millionaire was nominated for 10 Academy Awards and won eight of them, including Best Picture and Best Director. It also won Best Film at the BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) Awards, Best Drama Film at the Golden Globes, and bunch of other awards it didn't deserve.
Yep, I said it.
"Best Picture"? No. It was simply the best picture of the five that were nominated (Benjamin Button, Frost/Nixon, Milk, and the Reader were the other four). Quite a few movies from 2008 weren't even nominated. Heck, The Dark Knight was better than all five of the above nominations, as was WALL-E.
Slumdog also won "Best Sound Mixing," which was a farce. Again, WALL-E or the Dark Knight should have won this hands down.
In fact, the only Academy Award that Slumdog should have won, was Best Cinematography. I'll give them that. The camera work was outstanding.
The biggest disappointment of this movie was that it didn't deliver what almost everyone promised. After hearing its hype for over a year and having this film recommended by several friends, it was pretty much a flop.
The plot in summary: a boy named Jamal and his brother Salim are orphaned early, and live a tough life in the slums of India. Early on, Jamal falls in love with Latika and never falls out of love with her. His whole life is a search to find her again and keep her safe, while avoiding the clutches of Indian gangsters. It's all told from the perspective of an adult Jamal, who works in a telemarketing firm and is now a contestant on the Indian version of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" (which was never once correctly pronounced in the film). Basically, Jamal does well on the show and is accused of cheating. He's taken to a police station, where he recalls his life in broken chunks and tells his story to the police officers.
The acting by Dev Patel and Freida Pinto was the best part of the movie for me, but acting is one thing the movie was not awarded for.
There was nothing startling, groundbreaking, or mesmerizing about Slumdog Millionaire. If you've seen a documentary about any developing country, then the scenes in the slums will be familiar to you. If you've seen any film that follows a character from poorness to greatness, or watched any well-played love story, then Slumdog Millionaire won't be that exciting.
And how clichéd is it that a person from India works at a telemarketing firm? How is that original?
It absolutely confounds me that the film won so many awards and so much critical acclaim. The only thing I can think of is that every once in a while an underdog movie captures the hearts of a ton of critics at the same time, and this one just happened to be that underdog this year.
Roger Ebert called it "a breathless, exciting story, heartbreaking and exhilarating." I'm guessing he watched The Dark Knight by accident and then rated the wrong movie. Some idiot in the Wall Street Journal called it "the film world's first globalized masterpiece." Any way you decipher that sentence, it's untrue.
I've only been so harsh because everyone else was so glowing in their praise for Slumdog. It's not a bad movie, I promise. It's just not nearly as good as everyone said it was.
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IMDb: Slumdog Millionaire
Wikipedia: Slumdog Millionaire
Rating: R
(some violence, disturbing images, and language)
Length: 120 min (2:00)
Director: Danny Boyle, Loveleen Tandan
Genre: Drama / Romance / Crime
My Rating: 7 of 10
Family Friendly: More so than you'd think from the rating
(much of the "violence and disturbing images" are inferred rather than explicit)
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MAIN STARS:
Dev Patel, Saurabh Shukla, Freida Pinto
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More of My Movie Reviews
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Saturday, July 11, 2009
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Fat Oklahoma
According to the newest report (.pdf file) from Trust for America's Health, Oklahoma is the sixth-fattest state in the nation.
(Click the photo above to see a larger, more readable version.)
The list above shows the 10 states with the highest obesity rates:
1. Mississippi
2. Alabama
3. West Virginia
4. Tennessee
5. South Carolina
6. Oklahoma
7. Kentucky
8. Louisiana
9. Michigan
10. (tie) Arkansas
10. (tie) Ohio
Oklahoma's also ranked fifth in the nation in the rate of diabetes, third in "physical inactivity," and eighth in hypertension.
(West Virginia is first in diabetes, while Mississippi is first in physical inactivity and hypertension. See a large chart with all those numbers.)
So, while we're not the worst state in the nation, we're pretty close. One good sign is when it comes to children's health. When ranking the states with the most obese people aged 10-17, Oklahoma is 33rd out of 51 states (the report includes D.C.) I guess that means Oklahomans don't get fat until adulthood. Possibly because of the huge emphasis on youth and high school sports.
If you're wondering where your state falls into the lists, view a screenshot here, or see the original report (.pdf).
Just in case, here are the states with the lowest rates of obesity:
42. New Jersey
43. Montana
44. Utah
45. D.C.
46. Vermont
47. Hawaii
48. Rhode Island
49. Connecticut
50. Massachusetts
51. Colorado
So, congratulations to Coloradans and the residents of other skinny states. Keep up the good work. To the rest of you, quit eating so much and exercise once in a while.
(Click the photo above to see a larger, more readable version.)
The list above shows the 10 states with the highest obesity rates:
1. Mississippi
2. Alabama
3. West Virginia
4. Tennessee
5. South Carolina
6. Oklahoma
7. Kentucky
8. Louisiana
9. Michigan
10. (tie) Arkansas
10. (tie) Ohio
Oklahoma's also ranked fifth in the nation in the rate of diabetes, third in "physical inactivity," and eighth in hypertension.
(West Virginia is first in diabetes, while Mississippi is first in physical inactivity and hypertension. See a large chart with all those numbers.)
So, while we're not the worst state in the nation, we're pretty close. One good sign is when it comes to children's health. When ranking the states with the most obese people aged 10-17, Oklahoma is 33rd out of 51 states (the report includes D.C.) I guess that means Oklahomans don't get fat until adulthood. Possibly because of the huge emphasis on youth and high school sports.
If you're wondering where your state falls into the lists, view a screenshot here, or see the original report (.pdf).
Just in case, here are the states with the lowest rates of obesity:
42. New Jersey
43. Montana
44. Utah
45. D.C.
46. Vermont
47. Hawaii
48. Rhode Island
49. Connecticut
50. Massachusetts
51. Colorado
So, congratulations to Coloradans and the residents of other skinny states. Keep up the good work. To the rest of you, quit eating so much and exercise once in a while.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Recycled Television
No, "recycled television" isn't referring to re-runs. I'm talking about where to take your old TV when you're ready to part with it.
According to an article in the NY Times, 18 states now have laws requiring manufacturers to take their old equipment and recycle it. The story doesn't list the states, so I don't know if my state is among them.
One estimate says there are 100 million old TVs sitting around houses and apartments in the U.S., waiting to be trashed. In most places, it's against the law to simply dump your old TV in the trash, because it contains so much metal, glass, and plastic that won't biodegrade.
Here's a tip, though. If your old TV still works, someone might want it. My wife and I took our old set to a pawn shop and got $10 for it. That's more than we would have gotten for throwing it away, and now we don't have to worry about it. The same went for our old VCR and our old DVD player.
It's worth a shot, especially if your sets are still operating.
One person I know, who had an old TV as well as old computer, solved his dilemma by buying an $8 cable. Now the old units sit in the basement, connected to each other, and the old computer plays a slideshow of his favorite photos constantly. It's an eerie reminder of electronics of the past and a good use of materials that otherwise would end up in a landfill.
According to an article in the NY Times, 18 states now have laws requiring manufacturers to take their old equipment and recycle it. The story doesn't list the states, so I don't know if my state is among them.
One estimate says there are 100 million old TVs sitting around houses and apartments in the U.S., waiting to be trashed. In most places, it's against the law to simply dump your old TV in the trash, because it contains so much metal, glass, and plastic that won't biodegrade.
Here's a tip, though. If your old TV still works, someone might want it. My wife and I took our old set to a pawn shop and got $10 for it. That's more than we would have gotten for throwing it away, and now we don't have to worry about it. The same went for our old VCR and our old DVD player.
It's worth a shot, especially if your sets are still operating.
One person I know, who had an old TV as well as old computer, solved his dilemma by buying an $8 cable. Now the old units sit in the basement, connected to each other, and the old computer plays a slideshow of his favorite photos constantly. It's an eerie reminder of electronics of the past and a good use of materials that otherwise would end up in a landfill.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009)
Thinking of going to see Transformers 2? (Also known as Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.)
Think again.
After two-and-a-half hours of mayhem, crude jokes, boob shots, and confusing robot fight scenes, I came away with an okay feeling. Just okay.
But, after a movie has been hyped this much, and that cost this much (reportedly $200 million), you'd think I would have been blown away.
Not quite.
This second Michael Bay excursion into the world of transformers didn't disappoint when it came to action scenes, romantic lighting, sunset silhouettes, slow motion walks away from explosions, camera angles rotating around a stationary subject, and all the other clichéd moves that we've come to expect from Bay.
I'm one of the few that actually love this style of filming -- that's why I keep going to see Michael Bay movies. But even I'm having to admit that they're becoming a tired cliché.
The action scenes, especially one midway through where Optimus Prime defends Shia LeBeouf's character against several Decepticons, and the climax battle scenes at the end were pretty well done. My only complaint would be that all the Decepticons are a uniform shade of silver and looked pretty much alike (while the good robots are brightly colored and easily distinguishable).
But aside from the battle scenes, the movie fell flat for me. Here's why:
(** attention: spoiler alert **)
1) It took too long to get to the action.
The last half of the movie is almost non-stop fighting, but the first half was pretty slow, and punctuated with long stretches of crap that should have been cut without second thought.
2) The whole "college scene."
As you know from the previews, there's a whole scene in the movie where LeBeouf's character goes to college. What the previews don't tell you is that these scenes are like something out of a Tom Green movie, replete with low-brow sex-humor and a completely unnecessary scene where the Mom character gets high by accident and wanders around the campus stoned.
3) Dogs humping.
Dogs humping are never a good idea in a movie. Never. Not even in a Tom Green movie. But especially in a blockbuster sci-fi action flick. Twice in five minutes we see a chihuaha humping a bulldog. Incidentally, there's also a scene where a small robot humps Megan Fox's leg. While I can assume that many movie-goers actually want to do this, I doubt that any of them want to see a CGI robot do it.
4) Language.
Don't get me wrong; I like Pulp Fiction, which uses the "F-word" over 200 times. Things like that don't bother me. What bothered me is that the first hour of Transformers 2 is packed with unnecessary foul language from the mother, robots, roommates, and others. Yes, it's PG13, so we knew going in that there would be language. But it was really poorly written, and felt gratuitous, especially coming from Julie White's character.
5) Robot Testicles.
For some odd reason, the giant enemy robot near the end of the film has two huge wrecking balls hanging underneath his massive body. And of course, one of the characters has to point this out audibly, in case anyone in the theater missed the swinging balls.
There are other problems, but these are the main ones.
The movie is flashy, at times powerful and romantic, and it's difficult to ignore the intrinsic beauty of someone like Megan Fox, or the feel-good humor in Shia LeBeouf screaming like a little girl as he runs from a robot that had almost killed him.
But it just doesn't stand up to the hype.
----------------------------------------------
IMDb: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
Wikipedia: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
Rating: PG13
(intense sequences of sci-fi action violence, language, some crude and sexual material, and brief drug material)
Length: 150 min (2:30)
Director: Michael Bay
Genre: Action / Sci-Fi
My Rating: 6 of 10
Family Friendly: Not as much as you'd think
----------------------------------------------
MAIN STARS:
Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, Josh Duhamel, Tyrese Gibson, John Turturro, Ramon Rodriguez, Kevin Dunn, Julie White, Isabel Lucas
----------------------------------------------
More of My Movie Reviews
----------------------------------------------
Think again.
After two-and-a-half hours of mayhem, crude jokes, boob shots, and confusing robot fight scenes, I came away with an okay feeling. Just okay.
But, after a movie has been hyped this much, and that cost this much (reportedly $200 million), you'd think I would have been blown away.
Not quite.
This second Michael Bay excursion into the world of transformers didn't disappoint when it came to action scenes, romantic lighting, sunset silhouettes, slow motion walks away from explosions, camera angles rotating around a stationary subject, and all the other clichéd moves that we've come to expect from Bay.
I'm one of the few that actually love this style of filming -- that's why I keep going to see Michael Bay movies. But even I'm having to admit that they're becoming a tired cliché.
The action scenes, especially one midway through where Optimus Prime defends Shia LeBeouf's character against several Decepticons, and the climax battle scenes at the end were pretty well done. My only complaint would be that all the Decepticons are a uniform shade of silver and looked pretty much alike (while the good robots are brightly colored and easily distinguishable).
But aside from the battle scenes, the movie fell flat for me. Here's why:
(** attention: spoiler alert **)
1) It took too long to get to the action.
The last half of the movie is almost non-stop fighting, but the first half was pretty slow, and punctuated with long stretches of crap that should have been cut without second thought.
2) The whole "college scene."
As you know from the previews, there's a whole scene in the movie where LeBeouf's character goes to college. What the previews don't tell you is that these scenes are like something out of a Tom Green movie, replete with low-brow sex-humor and a completely unnecessary scene where the Mom character gets high by accident and wanders around the campus stoned.
3) Dogs humping.
Dogs humping are never a good idea in a movie. Never. Not even in a Tom Green movie. But especially in a blockbuster sci-fi action flick. Twice in five minutes we see a chihuaha humping a bulldog. Incidentally, there's also a scene where a small robot humps Megan Fox's leg. While I can assume that many movie-goers actually want to do this, I doubt that any of them want to see a CGI robot do it.
4) Language.
Don't get me wrong; I like Pulp Fiction, which uses the "F-word" over 200 times. Things like that don't bother me. What bothered me is that the first hour of Transformers 2 is packed with unnecessary foul language from the mother, robots, roommates, and others. Yes, it's PG13, so we knew going in that there would be language. But it was really poorly written, and felt gratuitous, especially coming from Julie White's character.
5) Robot Testicles.
For some odd reason, the giant enemy robot near the end of the film has two huge wrecking balls hanging underneath his massive body. And of course, one of the characters has to point this out audibly, in case anyone in the theater missed the swinging balls.
There are other problems, but these are the main ones.
The movie is flashy, at times powerful and romantic, and it's difficult to ignore the intrinsic beauty of someone like Megan Fox, or the feel-good humor in Shia LeBeouf screaming like a little girl as he runs from a robot that had almost killed him.
But it just doesn't stand up to the hype.
----------------------------------------------
IMDb: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
Wikipedia: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
Rating: PG13
(intense sequences of sci-fi action violence, language, some crude and sexual material, and brief drug material)
Length: 150 min (2:30)
Director: Michael Bay
Genre: Action / Sci-Fi
My Rating: 6 of 10
Family Friendly: Not as much as you'd think
----------------------------------------------
MAIN STARS:
Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, Josh Duhamel, Tyrese Gibson, John Turturro, Ramon Rodriguez, Kevin Dunn, Julie White, Isabel Lucas
----------------------------------------------
More of My Movie Reviews
----------------------------------------------
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Running Out of Food?
The science news website Science Daily posted a story today about how the world's increasing population will soon outpace our ability to grow food and produce other items necessary for life, like fuel.
But hasn't this scare been going around for 30 years or more? I know I've been hearing it my whole life. When I was a kid, in the 1970s, I read a propaganda book trying to convince me the world would be out of oil by the late 1980s.
When I was in high school, in the late 1980s, we still had plenty of oil, but our teachers told us of a new scare: the world would run out of food, because populations were growing so quickly around the world.
I just want to point out one little thing: it's not the food production that's the problem. It's food distribution. Because there are already people starving around the world, but there's no lack of food. Go to any restaurant in the United States and see how much food is thrown away every day.
Seriously, just order a cup of coffee, sit in the corner, and pretend to read the newspaper. Look around. Watch what people leave on their plates when they're done.
Also, if you've ever worked in a restaurant, especially fast food, you know all about food waste. Because fast-food restaurants keep a certain amount of meat cooked all the time (so you can get your meal more quickly), they're also throwing away quite a bit. Because they're not supposed to serve meat that's been held longer than a specified amount of time, they end up having to throw quite a bit away.
They even have "waste charts" and rules about how much waste is acceptable.
So, seriously, don't tell me we're running out of food when I see so much wasted every day.
But hasn't this scare been going around for 30 years or more? I know I've been hearing it my whole life. When I was a kid, in the 1970s, I read a propaganda book trying to convince me the world would be out of oil by the late 1980s.
When I was in high school, in the late 1980s, we still had plenty of oil, but our teachers told us of a new scare: the world would run out of food, because populations were growing so quickly around the world.
I just want to point out one little thing: it's not the food production that's the problem. It's food distribution. Because there are already people starving around the world, but there's no lack of food. Go to any restaurant in the United States and see how much food is thrown away every day.
Seriously, just order a cup of coffee, sit in the corner, and pretend to read the newspaper. Look around. Watch what people leave on their plates when they're done.
Also, if you've ever worked in a restaurant, especially fast food, you know all about food waste. Because fast-food restaurants keep a certain amount of meat cooked all the time (so you can get your meal more quickly), they're also throwing away quite a bit. Because they're not supposed to serve meat that's been held longer than a specified amount of time, they end up having to throw quite a bit away.
They even have "waste charts" and rules about how much waste is acceptable.
So, seriously, don't tell me we're running out of food when I see so much wasted every day.
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