Now in our sixth calendar year!
PCR #289. (Vol. 6, No. 40) This edition is for the week of October 3--9, 2005.
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Hello, gang! A quick one this week. Shall we begin?
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PASSING ON
This week saw the passing of three men whose talent I greatly admired. Actor Nipsey Russell, playwright August Wilson and former Baltimore Oriole Pat Kelley. Due to work on another project I will eulogize them next week. I'd rather be a little late then to give them short shrift.
SUPER HERO NEWS
This week in an interview with zap2it.com, Jessica Alba related that her Sue Storm character in the "Fantastic Four" will marry Ioan Gruffudd's Reed Richards in the next film. Not that the news is very surprising to fans of the comic. Thankfully, while promoting her new film, "Elizabethtown," Kirsten Dunst told reporters that Thomas Haden Church will play Venom and Topher Grace will appear as Sandman in "Spider-Man 3."
In a kind of related story, the man who could have been "Superman" welcomed a little caped wonder this past week. Nicolas Cage and his wife, Alice, welcomed new son Kal-el Coppola Cage on Monday. For those of you with no knowledge of pop culture, Kal-el was the character Superman's given name on his home planet of Krypton.
THE TOP 10 LIST
Great to see quite a few submissions. Here are mine, in no particular order:
"Get Right Back To Where We're Starting From" by Maxine Nightingale and "Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word" by Elton John, both from "Slap Shot." One of the first films that had to deal with song copyrights when it appeared on home video, the producers cut corners by replacing the original songs with similar sounding, but very inferior, tunes.
"I Say a Little Prayer" from the dining karaoke scene in "My Best Friend's Wedding." I always picture the waiters with the giant lobster claws leading the sing along and keeping time with the music.
"You're Having My Baby" by Paul Anka and "Nashville Skyline Rag" by Bob Dylan, both featured in "Jaws."
"Bye Bye Love," adapted and performed as "Bye Bye Life" by Roy Scheider in "All That Jazz."
"One Tin Soldier" by Coven. When I hear this song all I can see is hundreds of kids lining a dirt road and saluting the jail bound Billy Jack in "Billy Jack."
"Suzie Q" by Creedence Clearwater Revival, accompanying the dancing USO playmates in "Apocalypse, Now!"
"Jessie's Girl," played during Alfred Molina's long, drug fueled night in "Boogie Nights."
"Layla", the coda (the piano part), played during "Goodfellas."
"For What It's Worth" by Buffalo Springfield. When I hear this I immediately think of the trailer for "Born on the Fourth of July."
"In Dreams" makes me think of Dean Stockwell and "Blue Velvet."
SPEAKING OF SCIENCE FICTION
Wow! In case you didn't hear Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes are expecting a baby. Let me tell you, not since the blessed Virgin Mary had her little boy has an act of conception been so mysterious. I hope Kate (as Tom calls her) realizes that a good Scientologist is not only supposed to be calm and collected during childbirth but also that the religion prohibits any kind of drugs during the delivery. A friend of mine pointed out that obviously Holmes won't suffer any post-partum depression, since that is obviously just a "hormonal thing," as Cruise suggested when talking about his "Endless Love" co-star Brooke Shields. And great timing on the news, what with the DVD release of "Batman Begins" only two weeks away. And, assuming she's about a month pregnant, we can all look forward to the little bundle of joy arriving the first week of May 2006, along with "Mission Impossible 3."
THE STORY OF JAWS: PART 36
Recently someone on the CFB message board said that "Jaws" was only a "good" movie at best. So I looked up some reviews of the film at the time it opened and was pleased to discover that "Jaws" was almost universally praised. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun Times calls "Jaws"...a great adventure movie of the kind we don't get very often anymore." Boxoffice magazine, which touted the film as the sure moneymaker it turned out to be, had this to say about Bruce the mechanical shark..."the illusion of reality is so great that even veteran reviewers at a recent screening made audible gasps at each appearance of the shark." Posters on the Internet Movie Data Base declare it the 21st best Adventure film of all time, the 42nd greatest thriller and the 7th greatest horror film of all time. On a list of all films ever made, "Jaws" is ranked as the 95th greatest of all time on the Imdb, while the American Film Institute declared it the 62nd greatest film ever. As a reviewer I would love to see my quote show up on a DVD case some day:
"The greatest Goddamn movie ever made!"...Michael Smith
Well, that's all for now. Have a great week. See ya!
"Mike's Rant" is ©2005 by Michael A. Smith. Webpage design and all graphics herein are creations of Nolan B. Canova. All contents of Nolan's Pop Culture Review are ©2005 by Nolan B. Canova.
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