Fill 'er Up!

With gas prices where they are right now, I'm finding it pretty hard to even get a laugh at some of these... but what the hell. They say laughter is the best medicine (although I've always though Ibuprofen was really... and just who is this "they" anyway?). So here are some gas funnies. Or not so funnies maybe, depending on what sort of gas mileage your car gets.

New StoneRider Video

I've been listening to this Atlanta band, StoneRider, quite a bit this year so far. Their music is sort of that old school straight-up rock n roll that was missing for a while but has had a pretty good comeback lately. It feels a little like old Aerosmith maybe with a heavy groove. Their latest video is for "Juice Man". Check it out and make your own opinion I guess.

Movie Review: Indiana Jones... Crystal Skull

Famed archaeologist/adventurer Dr. Henry "Indiana" Jones (Harrison Ford) is called back into action when he becomes entangled in a Soviet plot to uncover the secret behind mysterious artifacts known as the Crystal Skulls.

I think my first descriptor for this movie would be "over the top". It seemed there were a whole lot of scenes where you just had to suspend believe so much, as if a truck full of guys shooting machine guns from 10 feet away couldn't hit any people in another truck, that it never was really grounded in any sort of reality. At that point I never really felt like the lead characters were in any sort of peril. Sure, the other Indiana Jones movies were the same way but I think some of their scenes were at least a stretching of reality that you could maybe swallow. In this film, you know right away what you're in store for as Indy survives an atomic blast and gets thrown hundreds of feet... all because he was hiding in what must me some sort of magic refridgerator. Of course all this is not to say this movie is not entertaining as hell.

It's a typical Indy adventure, with a plot similar to all the others and some bad guys (and girl) following him at every step trying to get their greedy mitts on the "treasure". To keep things fresh they added a son, played by the excellent Shia LaBeouf. Karen Allen is back as Marion but I must say she looks like what you think a woman would look like if she really could drink men under the table chugging whiskey as in the earlier movies. But there are a lot of exciting chases, fun fights, light-hearted laughs and ridiculous situations to escape from that made me sit through all 2 hours and never once glance at my watch. Sometimes that's all I ask, but be sure to check your brain at the door.

Not great by any means, but a big, dumb, fun flick.

7/10

A Few More Vegas Pics

Here's a few more pics of us with various people we begged to pose with us this past weekend in Vegas:


Mark Coleman at autograph session

Me with Chuck Zito

Phil with Martin Kampmann

BJ Penn, Sean Sherk staredown

Hofbräuhaus Las Vegas... great place for beer and brats

Me trying to look cool

Movie Review: Frontier(s)

A gang of young thieves flee Paris during the violent aftermath of a political election, only to hole up at an Inn run by cannibalist neo-Nazis.

First a couple of warnings... this is in French and it's sub-titled so be prepared to read the bottom of the screen. You should also know it's gory and brutal as all hell. You've been warned on both counts.

This movie is sort of a mix of Hostel, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and High Tension (minus the stupid end twist). It's extremely brutal, gory and bloody. One of the problems with these films that fall into a category I like to call "gornography" is that often times that's all their really is to them... gore. They tend to lack stories and this one isn't that much different. There is a bit of backstory with some social commentary about riots in France, but after 30 minutes or so it's a straight-up "chase and kill" film only. Not a whole lot of originality as far as the plot goes.

But if you are a fan of gore you've come to the right place. Once they get to the Inn the dread, suspense, cruelty and excitement is pretty much non-stop. The characters are all very colorful and wild and it's just one "holy crap" moment after another. A band-saw, shotguns, scissors, pliers, knives and various other items come into play and you wonder just how far director Xavier Gens will take things. You never really get an answer, but I can tell you for sure the guy is definitely deranged.

Sure it borrows heavily from the films I mentioned above, but it's the style that makes this one a little different. In a word... savage. It's the sort of film that if you tell people you like it, they'll probably question your mental state.

It's like a French kiss that leaves you without a tongue.

7/10

Tired Tuesday

Man am I tired. Too much traveling lately and then nothing but yardwork and housework the rest of the weekend. Well, I did work in a few beers in the hot tub, but not enough. I'm dedicating the rest of this week to catching up on some TV and movies, since it's supposed to be rainy the whole time anyway. I should be recharged by the weekend. The year is fairly young still and I've been to Vegas (twice), Paducah (Ky), Metropolis (Il), Cayman Islands, Cozumel and Fort Lauderale already. Screw the gas shortage!

I'll post some more pics from the Vegas, for anyone who cares, later. If you don't care... well, I'll post some comics tomorrow or something for you.

Wow, Indy Jones did $297.5 mil worldwide already? Not too shabby. I will get out to see it tonight or tomorrow. Tonight is free popcorn night for card holders at my theater if you wonder why I wait for Tuesdays. I figure if I'm dropping $8 on a movie, might as well sneak in a bottled water and eat free popcorn. I'm cheap like that.

New stuff out today worth mentioning:

36 Crazyfists - "The Tide and its Takers" CD
Underoath - "Survive, Kaleidoscope" Live CD/DVD
Ian Gillan - "Live in Anaheim" DVD
Rambo DVD (reviewed here)
Dario Argento Box Set DVD (Phenomena, Card Player, Trauma, Tenembre, Do You Like Hitchcock?)

Cool bands on TV this week:

Wednesday:
Journey on “The Ellen DeGeneres Show”
Bon Jovi on NBC’s “Late Night with Conan O’Brien”

Thursday:
Serj Tankian on NBC’s “Last Call with Carson Daly”

Speaking of TV... what a run for fans of mixed martial arts (me!!) coming up in the next few weeks. Fresh off the massive UFC 84 card come these televised events:

May 31 - EliteXC on CBS I (CBS)
June 1 - WEC 34: Faber vs. Pulver (Versus)
June 7 - UFC 85 (PPV)

It's MMA heaven!

Book Review: The Good Guy

The Good Guy
by Dean Koontz

Tim Carrier is a quiet stone mason having a beer in a California bar who meets a stranger who mistakes him for a hit man. The stranger slips Tim a manila envelope containing $10,000 in cash and a photo of the intended victim, Linda, then leaves. A moment later the real killer shows up and assumes Tim is his client. Tim manages to distract Krait from immediately carrying out the hit by saying he's had a change of heart and offering Krait the $10,000 he just received. This ploy gives the stone mason enough time to warn Linda before they begin a frantic flight for their lives.

I found this to be another very enjoyable thriller from Mr. Koontz. It starts out quickly and the pace never really slows down, like a lot of his better novels. He leaves a couple of good carrots dangling out there in the form of the secrets of the 2 lead characters trying to escape the bad guy. One is just who is this "good guy" and the other is why the killer wants the girl dead in the first place. The bad guy, Krait, is a very memorable, strong character that reminded me a bit of the bad guy in No Country For Old Men... a very bizarre killing machine type of guy in his own little world. Koontz does a great job of letting us peek inside his delusional mind.

There's nothing supernatural about this story, it's just a good old-fashioned thriller. This book isn't really a horror novel either. It is however very riveting and suspenseful. I found it to be a fun read and would recommend to fans of a good cat-and-mouse story.

8/10

UFC 84 Weekend Recap

Just got in from Vegas and figured I'd whip up a quick blog with some pics and recap of the weekend at the UFC 84 event. They didn't have WiFi in the MGM Grand for some reason (that reason probably being that they wanted you to pay per day to hook up to their network). Cheap bastards. Anywho though... unbelievable weekend in Vegas! Every where we looked there were fight posters and commercials and fighters and trainers and anything else to do with mixed martial arts. No way you could count the number of Tapout, UFC, Team Punishment, BJ Penn or Affliction merchandise walking around. Every tattooed guy there had something on.

We ate at Nine Fine Irishmen in New York New York before going to the autograph session on Friday, but the line was about a mile long and we were standing outside and it was cold (seriously) and then it started to rain, so we bailed on that. We did get in for the weigh-in though and it was quite an event. Thousands of people and we saw Evan Tanner, Chuck Zito, Mike Goldberg, Mark Coleman, Clay Guida and many others in addition to all the fighters obviously and the ring girls and Joe Rogan. It was awesome. Tito wore a shirt that said "Dana is my bitch" and the place was very rowdy throughout. BJ Penn got the biggest roar and Sean Sherk got the most boos I'd say. We had a blast. Afterwards we went to the Haufbrau beer joint for dinner and brews, then the Monte Carlo Brewpub and finally just back to the MGM Grand to hang out. UFC fighters were all over the place and we saw Tyson Griffin, War Machine, Jason Tan and Manny Gamburian among others.

Saturday we goofed around on the strip all day waiting on the fights to start. We got in right at 4:30 for the first fight so we could see every fight on the card. The environment was unreal with thousands of rabid UFC fans yelling for blood and going nuts. For the first 3 or 4 fights it was about half full but it filled up easily by the time the televised card go going. We saw lots of people such as Denise Richards, Shaquille O'Neal, The Rock and David Spade and many UFC fighters like Matt Hammill, Shonie Carter, Diego Sanchez (he sat about 3 rows in front of us) and Chuck Liddell.

The fights themselves were everything I'd hoped they'd be. I've been to plenty of sporting events, from NFL games to Final Fours to loads of baseball at all levels to SEC football games and this environment was as crazy as any. The crowd would go nuts on every big punch or kick and cheer wildly for action the entire time. Boos would reign down anytime it got slowed down for more than a few seconds it seemed. When BJ Penn knocked Sherk against the cage and began reigning down fists that place was so loud I thought the roof would blow off. Wanderlei Silva's beatdown on Keith Jardine was almost as loud and it was crazy though Tito's entire match, even without much action. Rameau Sokoudjou got a loud response as well (the guy behind us yelled that he wanted him to have his baby for some reason).

UFC matchmaker Joel Silva was in the lobby of the Grand as we checked out and in the airport today we spotted (or I should say Phil spotted... he's really good at picking these guys out) fighters Nate Marquardt and Kazuhiro Nakamura.

For the record, Everybody we asked for pics this weekend was just super cool.

It was an unbelievable weekend. I'll probably post some more pics sometime, but here's a few to chew on:

Me with Evan Tanner

Phil with Clay Guida

Tito Being Tito at Weigh In

Joe Rogan and the Ring Girls at Weigh In

Phil with Tyson Griffin

The Octagon!

Nakamura vs Sokoudjou

Me with Mike Goldberg

Me showing Phil the Proper "Fist Pose"

Vegas at Night

Back To Vegas!

At this very moment of this posting, I'm (hopefully) somewhere in the air between Arkansas and Las Vegas. Through the magic of post-dating blog entries, I'm throwing you some comics for a T.G.I.F. bonus.

We're going to try to get in some UFC autograph signings and also catch the UFC 84 weigh-ins today. Other than that, we'll probably do a bit of gambling and perhaps partake in some beer. OK, leave off the perhaps part. Then tomorrow it's the big show, UFC 84! I'm taking the trusty laptop and camera, so maybe I'll get to post some pics and stuff. If not, I will on Sunday when we get back.

Anyway, here's some funnies for your Friday:

Movie Review: Diary of the Dead

A group of young film students run into a real-life zombie uprising while filming a horror movie of their own. They continue to roll their cameras, capturing the horror and uploading it to the Internet to let their version of the truth be told.

George Romero's fifth installment in his zombie series is part Blair Witch Project, part Cloverfield and part Night of the Living Dead. This movie doesn't pick up where any of the previous "Dead" movies left off, but it's set in the modern day and the zombie infection is just beginning, so there's really no connection to the other films other than the fact that the dead are rising, stumbling around and trying to munch on the living again. A bullet (or other piercing objects of course) to the noggin and it's bedtime for Zombo.

As usual, Romero mixes politics and social commentary with gore. The real underlying context of the movie is about modern day video blogging and news media vs "the truth". They touch on YouTube, MySpace and other Internet age buzz words. The characters film the footage themselves, but it's not all that motion sickness inducing shakey-cam like Blair Witch. There is narration and music also, so it comes across more in motion picture format than a "found footage" movie like so many of late (since The Blair Witch Project).

I didn't think there was enough action really, but it's never boring. The movie is entertaining with enough gore and freaky moments to keep it moving along. It's by no means subtle. It's cheaply made and it shows, with no frills or bit special effects, but that's the whole point really.

In the end it didn't blow me away, but it was fun and a worthy addition to the Romero collection.

6.5/10

Buzz-B-Q 2008

I went to the annual Buzz-B-Q sponsored by 103.7 The Buzz last Saturday and had a huge time. Lots of good food, good music, cool folks and cold beer. Figured I'd share a few pics, cause that's what I do I guess. I mean how interesting would the blog be if I never did anything? I'd post pics of me sitting on the couch, and nobody wants that.


Arkansas Lobster

Stage

The Always Smiling Lindy Blackstone

Jeff Coleman and the Feeders

Buzz Babes in the Hot Tub

New Sevendust Video

For about the last decade Sevendust has been one of my 3 or 4 favorite bands. I've seen them about half a dozen times, most recently less than a month ago, and I own every studio CD, compilation CD, live CD and DVD they've put out. They're out of Atlanta, Ga. and this track is from their 7th studio album called Chapter VII: Hope and Sorrow. The name of the track is "Prodigal Son".

Hump Day Ownage