It was a Dark (and stormy?) Knight

OK, so I was apparently the only person who liked my Mr. Movie Person Dave Barry homage, so I'll consign it to the past.

It could also be that no one really cared that much about the opinions Mr. Movie Person expressed, but if people who wrote blogs stopped writing unless people cared about their opinions, we would have maybe four blogs total in the whole world.

Anyway, I'm pretty sure I'm leaving out any real spoilers, but I may still cross the line the way some people see it. If you're a nervous type about that sort of stuff, by all means wait until after seeing The Dark Knight before reading this.

I'm not as negative as the man at the urinal next to me who flipped open his cell phone and in the midst of the Flushing Chorus told his friend, "It sucked. (Whoosh!) But at least now I know." But I was disappointed. On the one hand, the Second Coming couldn't live up to this level of hype (I thought the Last Trump went a little flat, didn't you? No breath control). On the other, even if I spot the movie a few points to make up for the mandatory over-marketing, I still walked out with a shrug and a "meh."

The Dark Knight isn't bad -- too many talented people involved, all working pretty hard at stuff they're good at. But it did meader murkily for more than two-and-a-half hours, creaking under the weight of multiple plotlines and digressions to make Important Philosophical Points. It featured some pretty neat action set pieces as well as some of the blitzkireg-cut fight scenes that directors have been in love with recently. It needs some serious cleaning up, in other words.

The late Heath Ledger makes a fine Joker, although people who talk about giving him an Oscar for this should probably have their own heads examined. He's in no way as cartoonish as Jack Nicholson in Batman, but Christopher Nolan lives and works in the real world a lot more often than Tim Burton does. Christian Bale is also good, drawing the line between his Bruce Wayne and his Batman down to every detail, including vastly different voices for each set of lines.

Maggie Gyllenhaal is head and shoulders above Katie Holmes. Her character of Rachel Dawes has to carry some heavy dramatic weight in the movie that Holmes could never have pulled off. It's kind of a shame that those scenes and Gyllenhaal's greater talents are used in service of what amounts to little more than the same kind of girlfriend-in-jeopardy role that can be seen in any Fall Guy rerun. Aaron Eckhart takes on the role of Harvey Dent and -- well, it's hard to see why. Dent may be supposed to be some kind of mirror to Batman, or something, but we've turned around in so many circles with him that by the time he reaches the place where all good Batman fans know Harvey Dent is headed, he's a tacked-on afterthought with another character's monologue shoe-horned into his scenes to try to give him some structure.

As long as 1997's Batman and Robin exists, it will be impossible for anyone else to make a "worst Batman movie." And The Dark Knight is nowhere near the mess Tim Burton made in 1992's Batman Returns, his second Batman film. But it doesn't really deliver on the promise of Nolan's 2005 Batman Begins, and it leaves hopes for a quality third movie (if one is made) relying more on crossed fingers, knocked wood and rubbed rabbit's feet than one might wish.

All hail Whedon...

On the one hand, I love this!

On the other, it reminds me to call down plagues of boils on the television mouth-breathing knuckle-draggers who canceled Firefly.

I have to be a dean at a camp next week and I think my warning phrase prior to getting medieval on some miscreant will be, "Don't make me bust out the death whinny."

The Eiffel Tower and the Taj Mahal, I can see 'em clear as day...

This sounds like it would have been fun to see.

It's kind of interesting to me that some of the most fun uses of modern technology come about when it's employed to do the simplest things or make good on long-ago ideas. A webcam in my living room? Boring (and all too revelatory of my lack of housekeepin' skills). A webcam at the edge of the ocean? Cool!

(H/T Sherri Blossoms)

It was twenty years ago today...

Sgt. McClane taught the baddies how he played...

(Technically it was 20 years ago yesterday, but I had meetings...)

Ich bin ein Boss?

I take a back seat to my friend Philip when it comes to being a fan of Mr. Bruce Springsteen, but not to very many others. I've really appreciated his willingness to include a perspective of faith and belief in his music, particularly recently.

But this is just silly. The Reuters writer, who had enough synapses fire to leave his or her name off this, suggests that Springsteen's 1988 concert in East Berlin helped fuel (or, according to the headline at the time I first read the story, "helped fed") discontent amongst the East Germans. A few months later those same Ostdeustche picked up and left when their government finally granted them a right lots of people elsewhere had enjoyed for years -- the ability to walk, drive, swim or fly where you want to without having to cross minefields or dodge bullets.

A lot of people smarter than I am have pointed out that one of the Communist bloc's greatest failings was to provide provide its people with what they wanted. That included everything from basic consumer goods to decent luxury items to the ability to speak their minds on what occurred to them. As worldwide communications technology improved, lots of those people began to notice everything they didn't have. And among the things they wanted was western popular music, such as that performed and recorded by Springsteen. The influx of popular culture through music, movies and even television increased their dissatisfaction. Springsteen and his concert were another drip in a long process of erosion.

But the dissatisfaction wasn't new, or else there wouldn't have been a Berlin wall in the first place. East Germans, Poles, Czechs, Slavs, Russians and a host of other folk who woke up in the middle of Mr. Lenin's nightmare had wanted out for a loooooong time. The Chinese, Cubans and North Koreans still do.

And the article ignores the Springsteen comments it quotes -- he says he's come to East Berlin to play some rock and roll "in the hope that one day all barriers will be torn down," and that he's "not here for or against any government." Which fits well with the Springsteen of the 1980s, who was certainly an activist for many causes but still shunned official politics. His closest tango with that business up until then had been his pointed rejection of Ronald Reagan's attempt to co-opt his songs during the 1984 presidential campaign.

So, did Bruce, as the headline asks, help bring down the Berlin Wall? Well, no more than Levi Strauss did. But he did accurately describe what happened to much of the old Soviet bloc afterwards when he sang this line from "Thunder Road" on Born to Run: "It's a town full of losers, and I'm pulling out of here to win."

Votes for sale...

A college student in Minnesota tried to auction his vote on eBay (minimum bid $10). The eBay people put a stop to that before he had any takers.

Now a county attorney has decided to charge him under an 1893 bribery law originally used to keep corrupt political workers from coercing votes out of drunks. The prosecutor said he understood the satire behind the student's offer, but he made up his mind to file charges after watching a disabled veteran march in a 4th of July parade. In essence, I guess, you could say that the attorney wishes the student to learn what combat taught that veteran back when he probably wasn't much older than the student is now: Votes do cost, one way or another.

The young man in question understood modern politics pretty well, actually, although he did commit the sin of clumsiness. He didn't understand that while many of us consider our votes for sale, we let the people who want it make us an offer, rather than the other way around. They do that by promising benefits from government programs or other forms of largesse from the public treasury. "Vote for me, and I'll make sure you and yours get a break from the same rules everyone else has to follow."

I've over-simplified and expressed it crudely, of course, but I think the point is clear. If you'd like a longer (and funnier) explanation, I invite you to check out P.J. O'Rourke's 1992 book Parliament of Whores.

So I hope the young man learns his lesson. Selling your vote is, unfortunately, well-accepted practice in our nation. What's not acceptable is admitting to it in public.

Supercon-geek-tivity

I've already admitted I'm a big geek, so you'll have to forgive me if stuff like this brings a smile to my face...