Inglourious Basterds Review: Nazi killing for fun and profit

At some point in his career, Quentin Tarantino decided he was done with making
regular movies.
Instead, he developed a crush for making movies about other movies. With Kill Bill it was kung fu and samurai epics, and this carried on into Death Proof as an homage to classic 70 B-movies.
He’s continuing the trend with Inglourious Basterds a film that is a love letter to classic cinema.
Basterds is an intentionally misspelled fantasy WWII movie where a group of American GI Jews, led by Brad Pitt’s Lt. Aldo Raine, infiltrate Nazi occupied France with the goal of killing said Nazi’s in ludicrously graphic ways.
The story is told through separate acts, or vignettes, that focus on the Basterds as they go about terrorizing the Third Reich, as well as a few segments that don’t seem to directly relate with Nazi scalping.
At first this seems to be the fatal flaw of Basterds; the segments give the film a disjointed feeling, and with it a weird flow.
The movie moves past this awkward phase, however, and comes together to form a story that is Tarantino at his best; violent, overblown, and brilliantly hilarious.
The story feels like a modern day propaganda film, with Hitler being exaggerated to the point of being a cartoon character and the Basterds, as cruel as they may be, only doing what their country feels is absolutely necessary.
Featured is also polished writing that revels in long scenes of dialogue that seem to have no point to the main story, reminding us how rare it is to see a scene where two characters just talk amongst each other. No quick cuts. No action. Just dialogue.
Its impossible not to fall in love with Pitt’s Aldo “The Apache” Raine, with his thick Tennessee accent and charismatic gruffness. His speech is even more intense and strangely humorous then what is featured in trailers, and he most definitely gets his scalps.
Christoph Watlz’s Col. Hans Landa is the only other performance worth mentioning, but it’s for a good reason. He absolutely steals the show, showing an energy and aloofness that he manages to maintain even when speaking French, German and Italian. He has an unpredictability to his character that makes one act of violence towards the end downright shocking.
The direction is just as polished as the writing, with Tarantino holding back on the flourishes and dramatically epic shots that would make a movie such as this feel cheap.
It’s important to note the “fantasy” before WII, as this movie has as much historical accuracy as the Lord of the Rings. Tarantino doesn’t take liberties, he takes entire parts of our second World War history and throws them out the window.
Despite this, Inglourious Basterds manages to be one of Quentin Tarantino’s best movies in years.

Geek Culture: A salute to James Whitmore

James Whitmore, veteran actor of the stage and cinema, passed away recently from lung cancer. He was succeeded by his many sons and eight grandchildren.
I’m one of those eight grandchildren. My grandfather had a tremendous influence on our family. His passing was a slow one, as he was ill for 10 weeks after being diagnosed.
It still had a pretty severe impact when he finally left us, but not before the stalwart Obama supporter could watch the inauguration, and remark on how we may finally start getting it right from here on out.
The reason this is a column, and not a tribute article, is the fact that James Whitmore has contributed a great deal to the classic world of science fiction, and it only seemed right that this geek scholar took a minute to recognize that.
He would tell me how he enjoyed his work on the “Twilight Zone”, in an episode called “On Thursday We Leave for Home.” He also had a hand in the original “Planet of the Apes”, where he played the head ape of the assembly. Other then a genuine interest in the script and concept of the film, I honestly believe he took on the role (and grew to loath that decision thanks to some stuffy costume design) to have the opportunity to dress up as a bipedal primate.
Most importantly, he was in the movie that arguably kick started the genre of B movies that focused on mutated insects and animals wreaking havoc on civilized society, the aptly titled “Them”.
In the film a series of gargantuan ants make life difficult, and my grandfather played the soldier type of character who does his damndest to make life difficult for the ants.
The thing that I thought was interesting about my grandfather was that he wouldn’t turn his nose up at script if it had all tell tale signs of science fiction.
He also was one of those actors who never really sold out. He was an Obama supporter because he truly believed the man could bring change, and while a good number of people may know Mr. Whitmore as the Miracle Grow spokesman, he took on that role after discovering a passion for gardening on his own time.
James Whitmore embodied what made early science fiction movies like “Them” and “The Day The Earth Stood Still” so remarkable, an honest examination of mans follies, but with a tinge of optimism for the future.
One of his most memorable sayings, which I believe he said at a Thanksgiving a few years back spent in Mammoth, was “Lord knows we’ve made some mistakes, but I like to think we can change.”
This echoes early sci-fi movies, which condemned us for our use of nukes or reliance on warfare, but usually ended with a step towards realizing a way to abolish these facets of our culture.
It’s possible this was just an idealism that permeated the 50’s after the victory of our involvement with World War II, which eventually fell apart with the Vietnam War and the onset of the 60’s.
James Whitmore never lost that viewpoint however, and that’s why even though there has already been a good deal written about him already, this grandson wanted to honor one of the original kings of science fiction.

A call to imagination (still waiting)

So I haven't updated this blog in a few days. That is a fact that I have acknowledged, ever so painfully, as I attempt to begin the new semester at Moorpark College and attempt to pass my classes to become the gay and lesbian farm life journalist the world has been waiting for.

The monstrous amount of classes (apparently I need to know how to fly a biplane to cover gay farmers) has made keeping track of nerdy enough news for this valley a tad bit hard.

I've also met the unnatractive and yet seductive lady that is writers block, so even coming up with fake news has become a chore.

That's why I'm going to just shill two publications I currently work for.

Student Voice: If you go to Moorpark, Oxnard or Ventura, this is a student run newspaper you should be familiar with. If you don't, it's still an impressive paper and news site that manages to be fair and unbiased.

The Acorn: I've only written for the Simi Valley branch of The Acorn, but the others are just as well written and informative. The Acorn, no matter where you live, is a must if you want to keep up with the news in your community.

Ventura County Community College Spotlight: Moorpark College

Here's the Moorpark College arcade as previously noted, brought to you in gloriously crappy Ipone-o-vision.

The arcade, compared to others at community and (gasp!) UC colleges, isn't too shabby. Granted a lot of the cabinets are in less than ideal condition and one of the games, Marines Training, is not only cheesy as hell but also completely borked.

There are seven machines total, with two of them being devoted to the digital fighting arts and the rest what you would expect in this kind of establishment.

They are Street Fighter Third Strike, Marvel v. Capcom 2, the shittacular Marines Training, a cabinet that has a wide variety of games loaded onto the motherboard, an SNK machine that a few of their finest offerings, and lastly a Blitz machine.

It also has a relatively new trackball bowling game, but that bastard replaced the cheesey brilliance that is Area 51, so I'm not a big fan of that particular one.

Also, this arcade wins and makes most nerds salivate for Third Strike.


For those backwards mouth breathers who aren't familiar with Third Strike, I have nothing but sympathy. Because ironically anyone who hasn't heard of the brilliance that is Street Fighter: Third Strike will probably remain a virgin forever.

Thankfully this person doesn't exist, and everyone knows that Third Strike is the greatest fighting game of all time.

Sadly this machine has seen better days, with most of the buttons having an unidentifiable grime around them and a few of the buttons replaced with convex ones, as opposed to the western standard of concave.

The sticks also don't work quite as well as they should, with stiffness that can make it hard to pull off a semi circle move and a serious lag in responsiveness.

The Capcom v. Marvel 2 machine has the same problem, except to a much lesser degree. And of course the entire machine has a coat of that wonderful grime.

The rest of the cabinets work as expected, with the SNK machine being particularly noteworthy. The sticks and buttons all have a tight responsivness to them, making Metal Slug 3 just a little bit less hellish.

The arcade, as a whole, is in better shape then other places, with most of the machines in working order. The Third Strike and Capcom machines are too beat up for serious competitive play, but that's to be expected considering the kind of sweaty attention these two gems get.

Rise of the ghetto arcade machines

The Spring semester for most colleges has finally started, meaning other than enduring class cuts and the wonderful system that is public transportation, sweaty freshman and seniors will once again cram themselves into a run down remnant of an on campus arcade like clowns in a small car.

The Moorpark College arcade, which is where I am currently finishing up my education to become a Gay and Lesbian Farm Life Journalist, is in better condition then other colleges.

Still, it's disheartening to see the cracked paint and loose joy sticks on cabinets that haven't been mass produced in some time. Arcades are where a section of nerdom was born, and after those finally limp off into that sweet release of death, what will become of us who just want to spend $.25 and waste a few minutes?

A Mushroom Kingdom we can believe in.

You had me at hello.

This is probably older then dirt at this point, but I just stumbled upon Super Obama World.

Basically the game is a clone of  Super Mario World, but with Mr. Barrack Hussein Obama in place of video gamedom's favorite Italian stereotype.

Not exactly mind blowing stuff, but enough fun to at least waste an afternoon. Also, it's important to note that this isn't as heavy handed as other political flash games, barring the fact that most of the enemies in the game are pigs with lipstick.

http://superobamaworld.com/

Obscure Ancient Porn Parody Review-o-rama: Edward Penishands.

I have had a friend who throughout my life who would occasionally bring up a movie, in mixed conversation, that just about every part of my brain that is hardwired to coincide with reality completely rejected, thereby preventing me from even allowing myself to consider the possibility of it's existence.

This movie, with the kind of title that captures all the brilliance of a work with a few skillfully chosen words, was Edward Penishands.

Finally the functioning parts of my brain shorted out not long ago, allowing me to do a torrent search and see once and for whether this movie actually existed.

And it did.

Against all odds, all sanity, all taboos and social structure put in place to keep such a thing from possibly manifesting, Edward Penishands was a reality.

And it might just be the greatest thing our species has ever managed to accomplish.

Before we get into the actual review, let's just get one thing out of the way:

There he is, ladies and gentleman; Edward Scissorhands. Except with two cheap dildo gloves in place of scissors.

I can't get over it, really. An entire studio decided not only to create a parody of Mr. Burton's opus, but they actually replaced the scissors with male genitalia.

Somebody pitched this idea. Then an entire production team stopped laughing long enough to consider the idea seriously. Then they made this idea a reality.

This fact alone gives Edward Penishands a decent shot at dethroning Citizen Kane as the greatest film touched off by the hand of person.

The story to the film is something I won't dare spoil, if only for the fact that it follows the original source material surprisingly well.

The only major difference being that the kindly middle aged women selling door-to-door cosmetics is replaced with a kindly middle aged porn star selling door-to-door dildos.

She finds Edward in a drawing of a castle, wherein Edwards seemingly sentient mandibles get to work on the purveyor or marital aids, which of course leads her to bring him home with her and set about the events that would change the face of porn parodies with $14 budgets FOREVER.

The only problem with this film is that it utterly fails at being truly "arousing" in any way. Watching a women caress a man with a dildo glove kills any chance of attaining a "nerdrection."

This permeates the entire movie, almost as if Edward's wrist monsters are constantly watching over the actors from the scenery.

Still, Edward Penishands will probably stand as one of those porn parodies that not only overshadows the original work, but manages to make the rest of man's accomplishments look pathetic in comparison.

Take this humble woods man of the wild nerd plains advice, and torrent this movie. It may just change your life.