The movie is everything they say it is.  The three hours flew by.

Since everyone else has already reviewed Avatar by now, it doesn’t seem a good use of my time to post another review, so I’ll just say that it is definitely worth seeing.  The CGI is amazing, the 3D is a blast and the movie is action packed without going over the top.  The story has been done before a whole bunch of times, but what story hasn’t.  If you go to see it, make sure you see the 3D version.  Although the movie would stand up well without 3D, you’d still be missing a whole lot of the experience.

Before it leaves the theaters, I think I would like to see it one more time at an IMAX theater.  I’m not a big fan of IMAX, but I suspect in this case it might be worth doing.

Code appears after the break…

I didn’t have a whole lot of hope for Scott Brown being successful in this election.  My wife had been talking about him for some time and was pretty impressed by him.  Feeling like Charlie Brown with Lucy holding the football, I refused to get my hopes up, fearing that once again my heart would be torn out. 

I was wrong.

Brown was the right person in the right place at the right time.  People have been frustrated with the arogance of the Democrats.  The taxpayers (as opposed to the leaches) have let them know that we did not want the Democrats vision of health care.  We warned them.  We showed up at teapartys.  We wrote letters and e-mails but we were ignored and looked down upon.

The arrogance of Obama is astonishing.  The man has accomplished little in his life yet he still believes that he’s smarter than us and we should just shut up and do what he says. 

That’s not the way that it works Mr. President.  Consider this a warning from the people in charge.  You work for us.  We don’t work for you. Remember that.

Congratulations to Scott Brown.  You had the courage to take on the Democratic Machine in Massachusetts when the rest of us had given up.  Thank you.

A few days ago, it looked like it was over for the USA as we knew it.  Tonight, that has all changed.  Who would have thought that the Second American Revolution would begin in Massachusetts.

Timescapes Timelapse: Learning to Fly from Tom Lowe @ Timescapes on Vimeo.

If you haven’t already seen this, you should check it out.  It’s a really cool timelapse nature video set against some music by Pink Floyd.

Don’t forget to turn up your sound!

Before I make any major purchase I do a lot of research and for the price we were willing to pay, this appeared to be the best model available.  People that owned it seemed to think highly of it.

The unit has worked well.  On average, I probably use it two or three times a week and although I still weigh more then I’d like, it has done a pretty good of keeping me fit.

Tonight, I was about half way though my thirty minute session when I heard a strange noise coming from the bottom of the pedal arm.  I didn’t stop immediately, as I probably should have, but it didn’t matter because within a few seconds, the pedal arm had jumped out of the track and was moving on the floor.  I got off the unit and knelt down to see what was going on and found that the axle on the inside right wheel had sheared off.  Bummer.

I’m not surprised that something is broken on the unit, because it does take a lot of abuse in it’s day to day operation, but I am surprised by the part that did break.  It seems like it shouldn’t be a high stress area.  The wheel just moves back and forth in the track and shouldn’t really be taking a lot of abuse.  I suspect the part was just defective.

I’ve sent an e-mail to the company to see if that part is covered under the warranty and also inquired as to how much it will cost if it is not.  Hopefully I’ll get a response tomorrow and have the thing fixed in the next week or so.

It must be my day for breaking things.  Shortly after the elliptical broke, I was attempting to cut off a piece of cheddar cheese with a knife an the wooden handle snapped in two.  Maybe I’m just getting too strong from all the work I’ve been doing on the elliptical.

It’s quiz time. Which of the following best describes the reason that Steven Spielberg’s War of the Worlds was produced:

A. The original movie wasn’t all that good and the new version improves on it.
B. The original movie was good but the director has a new take on the film
C. The original movie was good, but If we put out a new version we’ll make a lot of money

Let’s see it’s not A because the original version of War of the Worlds was actually a pretty good movie and the new version didn’t improve on it one bit.

And it’s not B because the new version tells the same story as the old version; the new version breaks no new ground.

So it must be…

You guessed it C. Dollar signs were apparently foremost on the mind of Spielberg and his DreamWorks buddies when they decided to produce this picture.

It’s not really a bad movie, it just wasn’t really needed. The 1953 movie had already told this story quite well and the 2005 version does absolutely nothing to improve on it.

In the original version, Gene Barry plays the part of scientist Dr. Clayton Forrester, who has been sent to investigate a number of meteors that have crashed on the outskirts of a small town in California. While investigating, he meets Sylvia Van Buren, the daughter of a local minister, who is played by Ann Robinson. While waiting for the meteors to cool sufficiently to allow them to be analyzed, the meteors hatch and reveal alien ships that rise from the ground and proceed to attack and kill all in their path.

Forrester and Van Buren flee to Los Angles, gathering information about the aliens along the way in hopes of finding a way to stop their onslaught. While the military discovers that their most advanced weapons are useless against the aliens. Just when it seems all is lost, the aliens begin dieing on their own because they are not resistant to the microbes on our world.

In the Spielberg version the characters of Forrester and Van Buren are replaced by a dead beat dad Ray Ferrier, played by Tom Cruise, and his two kids, Rachel (Dakota Fanning) and Robbie (Justin Chatwin). All three are trying to find their way back to Boston so the children can reunite with their mother and step-father during the alien onslaught.

Instead of arriving in meteors, the aliens are transported to Earth in “lighting bolts” which inserts them into their ships that have been hidden within the Earth for millions of years. Like in the 1953 version, the aliens start killing all in sight and are once again brought down through the mysterious magic of microbes.

As you can see, the two films a pretty similar.

The acting in WOW 2005, was decent. Cruise does a pretty good job with his character as do Fanning and Chatwin but it’s not much of a stretch for any of them; these are pretty one dimensional stereotypical characters so there is only so much that can be done with them.

Special effects were good, with the early sequences involving the rise of the aliens from the Earth being the most impressive. The scene taking place in a New York neighborhood with the people coming out into their yards to watch the massive lightening storm was actually quite terrifying. I found myself anxiously waiting for the characters to get back into their homes because I knew the worst was yet to come.

The trek to Boston, that made up the majority of the movie allowed Spielberg to showcase a lot of special effects but beyond that it didn’t add much to the movie. During the trip, Ferrier and his daughter are befriended by a man, played by Tim Robbins, who in the end turns out to be a right-wing survivalist nut case, which once again demonstrates that Spielberg will leave no stereotype unturned.

The end was pretty much anti-climactic with the family reuniting in Boston as the alien ships start falling from the sky accompanied by a voice over letting us know that the invaders couldn’t stand up to our microorganisms.

There were a couple of things that really annoyed me with this film.

First, the aliens apparently had scouted out Earth millions of years earlier and had buried their attack ships in preparation for the invasion. This just seems plain stupid.

Why would they be planning this so long?

Does any species really have the patience to wait a million years and if they did would they remember where they planned to attack?

And if they had visited here in the past, wouldn’t they have figured out the whole microbe thing already?

Next, what was the purpose of vacuuming people up, grinding up their bodies and spraying their guts all over the Earth?

Since Spielberg gave no explanation for this, I will assume it was just to add a gross out factor and make the movie a little scarier and bring in the teens. I just found it annoying.

If Spielberg really had to make this film, I would have hoped that he would have changed the ending in some way to make the payoff better for those of use familiar with the original. I had two controversial ideas that I think would have made this a much better film:

1. The aliens die, not from the naturally occurring microbes, but from all of the pollution that we’ve added to our to our planet. They could be sensitive to hydrocarbons, and the fact that we now have billions of cars on the Earth renders our planet useless to them. Oh the irony!

2. And this one is real controversial. During the trek to Boston Cruise’s character is abducted by the aliens and he finds he is able to destroy a ship from the inside, using hand grenades. What if to rid their planet of the alien menace, people start strapping explosives to their backs and become suicide bombers. (I told you it was controversial) Alright, given the current political climate this probably wouldn’t fly, but unlike Spielberg, at least I was trying to be creative.
So here’s my advice. If you really want to see War of the Worlds (2005), then by all means do. It’s not a great movie but it’s somewhat entertaining. While your at it, make sure that you rent the 1953 George Pal version; although the special effects aren’t in the league with Spielberg’s version, the movie has a lot more heart and in my opinion is the definitive War of the Worlds movie.

6 out of 10 Stars

White Heat is one of those rare old movies that actually lives up to the hype. I don’t know how many times I’ve heard great things about an old movie but when I finally get to see it, I end up disappointed. This isn’t the case with White Heat however; it’s just as good as everyone says it is.

The story is about a psychopath, tough as nails gangster, Cody Jarrett, who has a weird, child-like attachment to his mother. Jarrett thinks nothing of robbing trains, stealing payrolls and killing people, but when times get tough, he needs the love and encouragement of his mom.

The story begins with Jarrett and the boys staging a train robbery during which Jarrett brutally kills the train engineers. During the heist, one of the gang members is seriously injured and his later death gives the Feds the ability to link the train robbery back to Jarrett. Jarrett sensing that the Feds now have the evidence needed to put him in prison for a long time confesses to another crime that he did not commit, but which serves as a alibi that prevents him from being implicated in the train robbery.

Jarrett later escapes from prison, and goes on to plan and execute a payroll heist that ends the movie with a spectacular finish.

The movie is much more involved but I’ve left out a lot of details so as not to spoil the movie for you.

James Cagney does a masterful job playing Arthur ‘Cody’ Jarrett. He mixes brutality, insanity and charisma in just the right proportions. I know of Cagney mostly through the various impressions I’ve seen done of him over the years and although the impressions are pretty much spot on and comical, when he does the act he is totally believable.

Another great performance comes from Margaret Wycherly who plays Cody’s mom, Ma Jarrett. She comes across as a cold, calculating evil women who totally loves her son and wants what’s best for him. Unfortunately her view of what’s best for him involves robbery and murder.

Virginia Mayo also does a fine job playing Cody’s cheating wife Verna. She’s a self-absorbed glamour girl, who gives no indication of being in love with Cody but hangs around to reap the rewards that result from a life of crime.

This movie is filled with memorable scenes and tag lines and for these alone it is worth the price of admission. The DVD is currently available for under $20 dollars but if your willing to wait you might be able to catch it on Turner Classic Movies as I did.

“Top of the world, Ma!”

Highly recommended.

10 out of 10 Stars