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Apr. 8, 2006 Most of the movies Hollywood makes these days range from the unoriginal and boring to total junk. This year's Oscar winner, Crash, was an incoherent piece of garbage with racial stereotypes that didn't ring true and children as victims of gratuitous violence. It was quite possibly the worst movie I ever saw in my life and I've seen somewhere between fifteen and twenty-thousand. Yet, this sewage overflow was voted best movie. Not all movies Hollywood makes are bad. Cinderella Man was the best movie of 2005 that I saw but was not even nominated for best picture--probably because a boxing move won last year. Cinderella Man was better than that movie. I suscribe to Netflix and would rather watch a good movie over anything except college football. I find most of television dull and stifling. But since Hollywood puts out so few quality moves because they invest so much money in dregs like Star Wars #447, I've turned more toward television lately, and I've found some good stuff. I'm not interested in reality shows, but I've discovered one exception--Survivorman on the Science Channel (Fridays 10:00 pm). Every week the crew drops survival expert, Les Stroud, off in some remote region with a few odds and ends and he has to survive for a week. For example last week they left him in the desert of Utah with half an energy bar, a bicycle, and a few stale corn chips. He cannibalized the bike and along with some rocks and tree bark built a competent shelter for the first night, but there was no water in the vicinity so the next day he had to move on. The only thing he ate the entire week was a ground squirrel he caught (and crushed) with a rock fall trap baited with the energy bar. He used the corn chips as torches though that was not how he started his fire. He hiked out a day early and seemed pretty miserable because of the lack of food and water, the latter of which he only found in a couple puddles skirted with mouse droppings. On another episode he paddled to a spot off the coast of Costa Rica. This was a paradise compared. There were coconuts, fish, shellfish, and freshwater. But he must have felt this was too easy because after a few days he hiked into the surrounding jungle and met his old buddy--misery. He couldn't sleep that night after he realized he was in the path of an army ant swarm, and he even admitted, "this is horrible." The science of survival is fascinating and I never miss an episode. I've also never missed a first run episode of the Sopranos (HBO various times). David Chase has created a world rich in characters starting with Tony Soprano, the bully kingpin who rules with a homicidal iron fist. His many weaknesses give the audience a sense of his humanity, if not our sympathy. This season began with a surprising bang in the final scene of the first episode and Mr. Chase hasn't let us down yet. Every week I sit addicted to the unexpected plot turns, excellent acting, exciting dialogue, sudden violence, and the interesting hypocrisy that the criminals espouse in justifying their immoral actions. I'm under the thumb of a new addiction--Big Love (HBO various times). The show is about a Mormon department store owner with three wives, and like almost all HBO series is a quality production. The way the male characters accumulate wealth and wives is disturbing, but especially creepy is the father of the main protaganist's second wife. He's an aged man who runs some kind of religious empire, and he demands part of the department store profits as a tithe. He's a villian to watch. The stress of managing three wives is on display here and provides rich fodder. The man has a house for each of his three wives, and they share a single backyard. One night, he stripped down to his undies and got in bed with one of his wives, but she reminded him it was his other wife's night. Though it was a cold night, he didn't bother getting dressed; he just wrapped a blanket around himself, raced across the lawn, and was promptly rebuffed by that wife who told him she wasn't feeling well and had traded her night with his other wife. He raced across the lawn once again only to find that wife sound asleep and sharing a bed with their daughter. Three wives, and he ended up sleeping on the couch. Too bad Desperate Housewives (ABC, Sunday 9:00 pm) is on the same time as The Sopranos. I'll have to catch the rest of the season as summer reruns, but I'll be sure to watch it. This is black comedy and I love it. Black comedy is a specialty of mine, and I aspire to write this kind of material. After only two years, the series already may be running our of gas (they've done storylines differently than I would have), but it's still worthwhile. WB has a couple well written shows--Superboy and Supernatural (Thursday 8:00-10:00 pm). They are for the teenybopper crowd and at forty-three I feel my age when I watch these shows, but I still appreciate quality writing and deep down inside...I still like superheroes and horror. David Chapelle (The David Chapelle Show, Comedy Central, Daily 9:00 pm) is a genius. He plays with the N-word like a couple of California boys hotdogging on a surf board. You must see his skit about the black white supremist. It's simply the funniest portrayal I've seen in years. In the skit David Chapelle is a blind black man raised in an orphanage and never told he's black. He grows up to be a famous white supremist and becomes rich selling racist books. His fans don't know he's black because he wears a hood over his face. If you've got nothing to watch weekdays at 9:00, make sure you catch this show. You might even see the black white supremist. ------------ About the author Mark Gelbart: My book, Talk Radio, is a black comedy about a radio talk show host who gets kidnapped and psychologically tortured by a loser. www.mark-gelbart.com Email: agelbart@aol.com Comment on this article here! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com and are not allowed to be posted on other websites. ARTICLE THIEVES WILL BE PROSECUTED! |
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