POPWATCH: At the Oscars

This year, I attended a very swanky Oscar event at Universal Studios.  It was very very exclusive but as long as you could afford $200 and a suit or a dress (whichever was appropriate), then you were exclusive enough.  

The money raised went towards MEND which helps people get out of poverty in Los Angeles so you didn't have to feel too guilty about spending an evening oogling stars who are much better looking than yourself.  

I had a great time and I would do it again.  

So here's my rundown of my random observations about the event and the movies that surrounded it.  It was a depressing year for movies, wasn't it?  Except for Bridesmaids.  I'm sooooo looking forward to some good ol' popcorn movies.  Anyone going to see The Hunger Games?  

Anyhoo, here we go ...

*Have you seen The Artist?  I think most people are saying that it’s a good but not a great movie.  Is it Best Picture material?  Well, if you compare it to The Descendants, then you’re comparing Godiva chocolate to shit-on-a-stick. 

*Yes, I will admit it that Angelina’s posturing was a little strange but in my books, she can do no wrong.  She is talented, beautiful and a great humanitarian and she can stick out any body part she wants wherever she wants.  And as someone else said, maybe she was just trying to air something out. 

*Meryl Streep had the funniest line of the night with her “whatever” acceptance speech.  She obviously has a great sense of humor even if “Iron Lady” didn’t. 

*Billy Crystal is a great host.  Everyone knows that.  He is far better than Ricky Gervass who is a mean-spirited fat British unfunny dwarf.    (You can dish it out Ricky but can you take it?)  I think Billy should host every year but occasionally let NPH do it for variety’s sake. 

*For the first time ever, I watched the shorts.  Most of them were good but I can’t understand why something like “Time Freak” made it onto the list.  It looked like something a bunch of drunk college students put together which, I suppose, is not necessarily a bad thing.  My choice for the Live Action Short was Tube Atlantic about a dying guy shooting up seagulls.  No, it definitely wasn’t PETA friendly but it was very bizarrely amusing. 

*Hugo is a little overrated.  I know I’m being picky when I say that it didn’t make any sense that NO ONE in this PARISIAN movie spoke French.  They all had British accents and sometimes very bad ones.  And Hugo didn’t know whose story it was telling.  Was it about the old man?  Or was it about the little kid?  It wasn’t a family movie.  If I were eight, I would have fallen asleep after the first ten minutes or peed in my pants so I got to go home.  In fact, at my age, I nearly did the latter but I didn’t want to clean up the mess. 

*Okay, I’m going back at The Descendants.  Not sure what the point of this movie was except give me the desire to stick needles into my eyes.  And if they wanted to make it more depressing, they really couldn’t have.  They even threw in a confused old Iady who thought she was off to visit Queen Elizabeth instead of her daughter who was in a coma.   I did like the stoner surfer dude.  He made the movie watchable. 

*Mara Rooney should have won for Best Actress.  This was a very complex violent role and she pulled it off perfectly.  And she wasn’t afraid to really bare it all (literally).  The movie was good too but I have a hard time believing that you can put on a wig and sunglasses and waltz into a bank and withdraw several billion dollars no matter how tech savvy you are. 

*Bridesmaids.  Yep, it was a good one and actually ENTERTAINING which a lot of the Best Picture nominees failed at.  Potty humor is really undervalued in our society.  We should have more films where women do disgusting things.  And I think Kristin Wiig is pretty damn amazing.  I was first introduced to her in Knocked Up and she had the funniest five minutes even with very few words.

*They really should have had the dog from The Artist up on stage at the Oscars.  Hollywood people are suckers for animals and in my profession, that’s a good thing. 

*Why does Jennifer Lopez always think she is attending the Miami Beach Hot Body contest?  As much as I admire the heavy lifting that her dresses do, I still don’t think it’s appropriate to pull that kinda shit at the Oscars.  Cover up a little bit, there J.Lo.  We know you have the boobies but you’re distracting us from what comes out of your mouth.  (Is that the point?) 

*The older kid from The Tree of Life should have won something.  I don’t care what they needed to call it.  Young Actor’s Award or something?  I don’t know how old he was but he did a remGarkable job in a very haunting movie that everyone seemed to love or hate.  I loved it but I think I could have done without the dinosaurs and the cosmos and other ridiculous imagery that only made the movie feel pretentious. 

*I don’t think anyone got “played off” by music at the Oscars this year.  I wonder what the Academy told the winners so that they kept within their allotted time.  They must have threatened them with winged monkeys or something.  I was impressed that they kept the show running right on schedule. 

*Doesn’t it suck when you defy million to one odds and receive a nomination for Best Supporting Actress and then you show up on the red carpet wearing something that looks like a billowing tent?  Melissa, you really needed to talk to Joan Rivers before you made that choice.  That plastic old bitch would have told you like it is. 

*How many times did the cameras cut to George Clooney during the telecast?  Yes, he is good looking but so are the hundreds of other people in that room.  

*My favorite for Best Picture was the quirky Midnight In Paris.  It had a quiet charm and I thought it was far more magical than the heavy handed Hugo.  I didn’t entirely trust the set-up; there is no way that the main characters would have ever gotten engaged in the first place (he was a dreamer and she was a raging bitch) but I was carried away about the romance and Woody Allen did for Paris what he has done for New York in his previous pictures. 

*Whatever happened to the musical numbers?   Sometimes it’s good to have something really disastrously bad so that people have something to talk about the next day other than the women who tried too hard on the red carpet. 

*I like Emma Stone.  I really really like her.  She looks like she is enjoying her time in the spotlight and she isn’t afraid to act her age.  The Help was just a so-so movie but perhaps the fact that I watched it on an 8 inch screen while flying over the Pacific had something to do with my attitude.    

And last but not least, I didn’t do very well with my voting ballot.  Trying to think like an old white guy is actually very difficult.    

Can't wait till next year.  

Until then, we should all make love in the firmament.  

Ciao baby!  

The incredible street art of San Francisco

On a recent trip to the city by the bay, I did a couple of walking tours and snapped a couple of pictures along the way.

I can't really remember where I walked.  I think I was down in the Mission District and the Haight-Ashbury area.  I do remember how painful my feet were at the end of the day.  Six hours of straight walking in lousy athletic shoes takes its toll.

So here's my portfolio.  

The opening of the Savong Student Center!

I'm very pleased to announce that the students are finally moving in!

The Savong Student Center (or Centre if you're English, Canadian or Cambodian or pretty much anything else besides American) will be a home for ten older students who are attending the local high school or university.  These are great kids and they are blessed to have such an opportunity.

Only five out of the ten students have sponsors to cover their living expenses so we are still looking for generous donors.  $40/month will cover the basic expenses such as food.  If you are willing to donate more, then we are always looking for sponsors willing to cover the cost of education which is about $360/year for a high school student and about $400/year for a university student.  The university students are also given a laptop which costs about $600.

But I assure you, even the smallest donation will be put to good use.

The best way to donate is through the Razoo page:

www.razoo.com/story/savongfoundation

Here is a video which was taken of the center while it was still under construction in November 2011. 

Thank you everyone.  The Savong Foundation is very pleased to be a part of these students' lives!  

In San Francisco

For a couple of days, I'm up at the city by the bay.

Today I walked three billion miles. No exaggeration. My feet are tingling and my knee hurts like hell. Where is the Advil damnit.

I'm not sure why homeless people enjoy talking to me. Maybe it's because I stop and listen when they call out. Even though I don't give them money, they wish me a good day and sometimes I get a "God bless" which is really funny coming from them.

I saw a homeless person dragging a suitcase. I thought that was much more tasteful than a shopping cart. And it's probably easier to organize all that homeless stuff. How did I know she was homeless? No one that dirty is gonna be taking a trip. And even if she had a ticket, there would be no way that Southwest Airlines would let her on a plane.

I made it to the Haight-Ashbury district. This place has really seen its day. Tourists and wasted looking poseurs with dreds. Get a freakin' job. The hippie life didn't work. And no, I don't want a bud.

I did like the Red Victorian though. The universal center of peace love and happiness. Maybe one day I'll stay there and listen to "me and Bobby McGee". Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose.



Overall I like San Francisco. I don't like the fact that the museum of modern art is closed on wednesdays but that's because I tried to go there on a Wednesday.

The gift shop was open. You can browse books and buy artistic egg holders. And I learned about Banksy.

Exit through the gift shop.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

The BEBE Billboard

I was out walking my dog and I came across this bus billboard advertising the clothing line bebe.

Strangely enough, the two women started talking to me.  I know, weird huh?  But strange things happen in North Hollywood.

And this is what they said.

Movies that SHOCK!

What does it take for a filmmaker to shock an audience these days?  Well, it depends on the audience of course.  I was shocked by that crazy documentary Jesus Camp which is about youngsters learning about  scriptures but I suppose there are people who could watch it and wonder what all the fuss was about.  Toddlers and Tiaras, the show on the TLC cable station, shocks me when I take the time to watch it but if you’re a mother of one of those toddlers, it obviously seems quite normal to dress a five year old up like a dimestore hooker.

So, I still get shocked and some of my favorite movies are the ones that have shocked me the most.  I have put together a list of these movies and why, at least from my perspective, they seem so memorable.  The list is in no particular order.  If you haven’t seen some of the titles, I caution that you need an open mind even to get through some of them.  They are definitely NOT for all tastes.  You have been warned. 

Blue Velvet (1986) 

This used to be my favorite movie of all time.  It still is on my top ten list and bounces around on that list depending on my random cinematic moods.  It’s a story revolving around a severed ear, some very bad gangsters, two innocent teenagers (who don’t really look like teenagers) and a beautiful nightclub singer who gets abused (and sometimes likes it).  The best part about this movie is how the director David Lynch directs the clash between the innocence and evil.  And it’s pure evil.  The kind of evil that makes you think that something very very bad is going to happen to the main characters.  Favorite scene:  Isabella Rossellini makes Kyle MacLachlan strip naked while she threatens him with a knife.  Not exactly shocking by itself but what comes after certainly is. 

Pink Flamingos (1972)

If there is one movie that should get the most shocks per minute of screentime, I would like to vote for this one.  John Waters created this low budget masterpiece by using a cast of friends who apparently weren’t afraid of doing anything.  Pervert with a turkey neck tied to penis?  Got it.   Singing asshole?  Got it.  Drag queen eating dog shit?  Okay, hasn’t everyone scene that scene?  Even Mr. Waters is apparently tired of explaining that yes, that scene did actually happen and Divine did call up a doctor’s office just to make sure that he wouldn’t die of some sort of canine parasite.  I am amazed that I can’t think of another recent film that has this many jaw dropping moments.  There is even bestiality.  Strangely enough, none of it seems gratuitous.  In some ways, it just looks like a group of friends got together and shot a lot of crazy shit with a camera.       

Hustler White (1996) 

This film seems like a documentary but isn’t; the film borrows its beginning from Sunset Boulevard where the narrator is face down dead in the water.  This film follows the journey of a Hollywood hustler who is part of a very seedy, twisted and most of the time, outrageous underbelly of LA’s sex scene.  Extremely graphic, this is the type of film that you would only dare your most open and closest friends to watch because anyone else would probably never talk to you again for suggesting it.  The star is Tony Ward, who seems strangely comfortable in this strange world. 

Henry:  Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986)

We see so much violence on tv and in the movies these days that it takes A LOT of brutality to get through our jaded exteriors.  But this movie seems to do it.  Based on the true story of serial killer, Henry Lee Lucas, we follow Henry as he casually kills people without any real motive.  He simply seems compelled to do it.  And he does it without any sense of regret.  The opening scenes of the dead bodies in macabre tableaux are bad enough (especially the one of the half naked girl at the sink with a glass bottle embedded in her head) but it only gets more shocking with the torture of a naked woman while her husband and son are unceremoniously killed.  And the whole scene is filmed by Henry’s accomplice, Otis.  Such raw evil is chilling; these victims could have been your mother or your father or your child.  Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer shows us how cheap human life can be.  To add to the horror, Henry gets away with it in the end.  His real life inspiration wasn’t so lucky. 

A Clockwork Orange (1971) 

I saw this movie for the first time with a church group.  Admittedly, it wasn’t an older church group, we were all “youths” and someone brought along this gem for a “movie night”.  Obviously, we didn’t have any older supervision that night and I suppose all of us were too shocked or intrigued or at that age, turned on, to turn the blasphemy off.   If you’re not familiar with the story, it tells the tale of a very bad adolescent who is part of a violent gang and in one of the more gruesome scenes, they rape a woman and permanently maim her husband all to the joyous melodies of “Singing in the Rain”.  Weird indeed.   The leader subsequently enters therapy—pretty much desensitization to violent images while his eyes are held open—and you might think that he would be cured.  But you would be wrong.  Sexually and violently graphic, the acting and directing elevate it beyond a simple exploitation film.  Why is called A Clockwork Orange?  I have no idea.  One of the great movies of the Golden Age of cinema.    

Anatomy of Hell (2004)  

And now we have a little French film.  A little French film that is filled with such disgusting and nauseating images that it’s best if you haven’t eaten a meal for several hours.  I’m not really sure of the plot.  I suppose it revolves around a woman who tries to kill herself but then is rescued by a gay man who is intrigued and repulsed by her sexuality.  Makes sense so far, doesn’t it?  Oh well, it’s French and that explains a lot.  To its credit, it pushes a lot of boundaries that most filmmakers wouldn’t even want to approach and in my opinion, doesn’t deserve the 4/10 rating on the IMDB website.  If anything, this film will make you realize that there is always something out there that will shock an audience, no matter how open minded they are.  And believe it or not, this filmmaker is a woman, the one and only, Catherine Breillat.  

musical me

You could say I'm in photoshop training.

I'm giving myself an E for effort.  The right ideas are there but it just didn't come together the way I wanted it to.

Oh well.  Next project!