Beltmann

I'm passionate about Fitzcarraldo and Grizzly Man, but I agree that Aguirre is his best--it's a mad vision about madness. And I love how Kinski is such a limping, tilting snake. The discussions above are very good, but I'd like to add that I think Invincible is quite underrated. I felt like I was watching a modern-day silent film, with all the melodramatic glory and visual grandeur that implies. The settings, which are often elaborate palaces of trickery, are marvelous, and so is Tim Roth's performance as a bogus, power-hungry hypnotist.

Sounds good. I still haven't listened. I pre-ordered, and don't want to spoil it...

Summerfest? In terms of both melody and lyrics, FoW is a terrific pop band, nothing more, nothing less. (I'm a big fan of all of their albums, with the exception of Out-of-State Plates--for the most part, those were castoffs for a reason, in my opinion.) I have to believe the widespread, aggressive loathing for "Stacy's Mom" is mostly related to its overexposure. When I first heard it--long before it ever reached radio saturation--I thought it was a pretty good pop tune, but I grew pretty damn sick of it, too. I understand that nobody wants to be seen as jumping on the Top 40 bandwagon,

Care to elaborate?

Once I was helping a high school freshman study for her Earth Science exam. I asked her to define El Nino, and she replied, "Um... the guy who invented weather?" She was serious.

For me, I guess the plot was just about the least interesting aspect of the film. There are so many other things going on in terms of character and theme that the actual plot--which essentially amounts to a chase film--was secondary.

Is this the consensus? If so, maybe I'll check it out. I wasn't impressed with the previous albums and had been planning to sit this one out.

This sounds fantastic. How did I miss this when it came out?

You just may be the coolest dad alive.

I vote yes.

I would be ecstatic about an Edwards/Obama ticket. To my ears, that sounds an awful lot like "16 years."

Bird By Bird is really great, Kate. If you like her stuff in general, then that one is worth picking up again.

I am not a Shins aficionado by any means, but I will say that I was completely bored by their SNL appearance last night.

That looks like the landscape of my soul.

Same here. It's precisely because I have the studio version memorized that I enjoy a fresher live version. If all Wilco aimed to do was offer a note-for-note replica of their CD, wouldn't that essentially make them a cover band? That would become stale fast, both for them and for us. I agree, but maybe the band got tired of wanting to collapse after playing "Spiders."

Stacy and I are seeing Old Joy tonight. I've been looking forward to it for months, and it's finally playing in Milwaukee.

So what

Like I said, bad. Granted, it wasn't full-time work, but I was still a staff member with a weekly column.

Am I alone in feeling underwhelmed by Little Miss Sunshine?

No--it's so bad that I canceled our subscription while I was still writing for it.

There is no rhyme or reason to the ones I post in there. I dunno. Anyway, I did see Children of Men over the weekend, and I loved it. It's very rare for me to walk out of a movie completely convinced that I just witnessed a masterpiece. The last time I felt so positive was Before Sunset.

I saw Children of Men yesterday. If I had time today, I'd go see it again.

Battle in Heaven / Carlos Reygadas / Mexico / 2005 Much better than Reygadas' Japon, but still too mannered, too doctrinaire, too not very good. Incidentally, that poster has clearly been doctored for public consumption. In the movie, her hair is, um, much shorter.

Although this series was a defining one for my childhood, I haven't seen it for many years. I'm a little surprised by how well they hold up. Still funny, especially the first episode.

The first and third aren't great movies--they aren't even good movies--and the second one isn't a chore at all. For me, at least.