War

Jet Li cannot act.
I want back those one hundred
minutes of my life.

This is what happens
when you let your personal
trainer write a film.

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The Invasion

Nicole Kidman was
perfect for this role because
she married Tom Cruise.

A great metaphor:
Church of Scientology.
“Would you like some tea?”

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Superbad

A pile of d*ck jokes.
It kicks five flavors of ass!
This year’s top movie.

Emma Stone: “It Girl.”
Jonah Hill will win awards.
Two words: McLovin.

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The Bourne Ultimatum

Bourne Ultimatum:
Better than the second film.
Jason Bourne kicks ass.

Though she’s 51,
Joan Allen is a hottie.
She made the movie

The Simpsons Movie

Laughed so hard I peed,
though the plot was kind of lame.
Frontal nudity!

High definition.
Funnier than TV shows.
I love “Spider Pig.”

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It’s no doubt that Web 2.0 can often be categorized by sites with pastel colors and rounded edges, but there’s a ton of cool technology that has developed amongst all the pretty designs. Some of the coolest new stuff profiles you as a user and compares it to all sorts of data (including your friends and random strangers) to come up with a breakdown of stuff you know you like, as well as stuff you didn’t know you’d like (or at least, that’s the point). Here’s a few of my favorite music-oriented sites I’ve discovered:

- This site used to be known as “AudioScrobbler”, but changed it’s name and then was sold to CBS. You run a small program (for all OS’s) on your computer, and it watches the music you listen to. It compares your music listening habits to those of all the other users on the site, then provides internet radio (free!) of not only your music, but other artists that you’ll probably like. Here’s my profile (for a sample of what it looks like).

- This site pools together all the mp3’s posted on various music blogs across the web. Do a search for one of your favorite artists and you’re bound to find some new tracks - covers and live versions in particular. You can also snag the RSS feed for an artist, import it into iTunes, and voila - instant free downloads of those tracks.

LivePlasma - Utilizes the Amazon database of “User’s who bought this, also bought…” to give you a map of artists related to your entered artist. This one works for movies as well - be warned that it’s not very forgiving of misspellings, and a lot of the more obscure artists don’t show up at all. Definitely fun to play with, though.

- This is for the lucky iPhone owners out there, although it works on a normal browser as well. Similar to HypeMachine, this pools together all the mp3’s it can find on the web and offers full listens through the interface. The iPhone version looks amazing on the phones with an interface emulating the iPhone iTunes almost exactly.

Please feel free to share your favorite Web 2.0 music sites in the comments section!

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This is an interactive post, sort of a musical S.L.A.M book. Instead of trying to review some new music, I thought I’d list a few new ones I like, and find out what everyone else is listening to lately. So please respond in the “comments” (or ‘Dillas, as a post if you’ve got a big list!). Maybe we can broaden our collective musical taste (I need to help mine). I didn’t want to write about music that sucks, but if there are any CDs you’ve bought lately that you wish you hadn’t, feel free to warn us (ya know, Pirates of the Caribbean 3 style).

New-ish Stuff:

• Shapes and Sizes, “Split Lips, Winning Hips, A Shiner” – sounds like The Thinking Fellers Local Union 282 mixed with, uhm, I-have-no-freaking-idea, it’s unique (thank god)

• Ex-Boyfriends, “Dear John” – fun sing-along pop, a la Weezer style! Super cute S.F. boys, got a song on HBO’s “Big Love”

• Broken Social Scene, “Beehives” – I can’t get enough of them

New Stuff From the Old School:

• Sonic Youth, “Rather Ripped” – the ‘pop’ album their daughter dared them to make, I love “Incinerate”

• White Stripes, “Icky Thump” - I like guys masturbating with guitars, what can I say

• Bjork, “Volta” – I told you that bitch was crazy!…crazy-cool

• Beastie Boys, “The Mix Up” – instrumental=sweet, now this would have been a great soundtrack for Ocean’s 13 instead of that regurgitated mess they used

• Paula Frazer and Tarnation, “Now It’s Time” – alt-country songstress, it’s real purty

• The Fucking Champs, “VI” – (this one’s for my husband) instrumental, flying V guitar sound, 70’s metal, hesh, guys really masturbating with guitars

Old-Old School:

• Elvis Costello and the Attractions, “The Best of Elvis Costello: the First 10 Years” – you can’t go wrong here

• Dee Dee Sharp, “The Best of Dee Dee Sharp 1962-1966” – good summer music, gotta love “Mash Potatoes” and it’s b-side “Gravy”

(gracias al Timbotron por el cuadro)

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The folks over at Mingle² have put together a little algorithm to rate blogs on their content, and I am proud to announce that Blogadilla has earned an “R“ Rating… Just like Tijuana, it’s not safe for youth!

Interesting to note, we moved up from a PG-13 rating last week to an R this week, which may have had to do with Great White Snark’s post on Water Butt Pumps.

Actually, they explain that we got our rating based on the appearance of the following keywords:

• hell (6x)
• sex (3x)
• suck (2x)
• sexy (1x)

[editor commentary by Timbotron]:
I can’t believe that we only got a crappy R rating! Man . . . I’ve been sitting around on my hot teen ass nearly every weekend writing Blogadilla posts about juicy sex and forbidden pleasures . . . and all we get is a crappy R!?! This rating systems sucks like hell! (And by the way, part of our feeble rating came from the use of the word “bomb.” Bomb?!? What if I wanted to say something is “THE bomb“?! Why does that count?) All of us at Blogadilla need to work harder: an NC-17 . . . now that’s respectable!

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Rating: I give it 8 out of 10. Worth seeing in theaters.

Some points to know:
•It’s almost 2.5 hours long; 90 minutes of which are Shia LaBeouf acting like a distraught spaz and Megan Fox showing-off her midriff (Megan Fox’s midriff may win an award for its appearance in this film).

•This movie has more products than a grocery store: keep your eyes peeled for the transforming Mountain Dew vending machine and the numerous Apple appearances.

•Coincidentally, Shia LaBeouf is also the name of a savory French beef stew.

•”Transformers” perpetuates the old trope: (even among robots) the black guy (Jazz) always dies. Also, no (identifiably) female robots in the film.

•The movie was too Spielberggy - too many madcap shenanigans, not enough robot ass-kicking.

•Michael Bay’s website has a few wallpaper-worthy production images of the robots.

•”Transformers” made $27.4 million on its debut, last Tuesday - setting a new record.

•The visuals and effects were stellar, the robot ass-kicking was great.

[update, by Timbotron]:
Take a look at the photo gallery of Alex Kubalsky - designer of Transformer toys (and the only foreign toy designer in Japan).

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Apple is set to release the much-hyped iPhone Friday, June 29. Here are some of its most highly anticipated features:

(via TheOnion - June 20, 2007 | Issue 43•25)

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Behold “The Doritos X-13d Flavor Experiment.”
Firstly, congratulations to Doritos for an exceptional marketing strategy: let the consumers think they’re actually participating in product development research. Their packaging and (overdesigned) X-13d website offer a plethora of hints to the flavor that you as the consumer are invited to guess. I don’t want to give away the surprise, but here are some hints:

•It’s an “All-American Classic” (bulemia?).

•The ingredients include: artificial beef flavor, tomato powder, three kinds of cheeses, beef tallow, and “spices” (prison lunches?).

•The “d” in X-13d just might stand for:

“dear God, it’s like licking a picnic table!”
“did I just throw up in my mouth?”
“dammit, enough with the dill already!”

•These chips taste like David Hasselhoff’s mouth:

•If these clues aren’t enough, here’s a big hint.

The Doritos X-13d website also offers the chance to make your own commercial for this wonderful new flavor - the commercials are already filmed, you create the dialogue. I was only able to produce loud gagging noises. This “make your own commercial” concept is brilliant - as you may remember, it worked so well for Chevy Tahoe last year*.

Looking forward to Flavor Experiment X13e - fried chicken and gravy flavor.

*It looks like Doritos has managed to keep these commercials off of YouTube.

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Summer is here and Conn and Hal Iggulden’s “The Dangerous Book for Boys” is the perfect guidebook for entertainment in the great world outside of Xbox, television, the internet, and DVDs - for both children and adults, boys and girls. This entertaining children’s manual is nicely illustrated with 1950’s-1960’s textbook graphics and contains how-to instructions for countless fun things: crystals, go-carts, tree forts, how to play poker, codes, juggling, bows and arrows, dog tricks, make your own flashlight, et cetera. This book also contains a cornucopia of interesting short essays and information tables on subjects that are sure to entertain young and old kids: insects and spiders, tying knots, pirates, famous battles, first aid, dinosaurs, a history of artillery, navigation, clouds, the Seven Wonders of the World, etc.

All of my friends’ kids are getting this for Christmas and birthdays (though I had to buy a copy for myself first).

A nice video from the publisher, demonstrating the range of materials in this book.

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Men of all ages would love to get Katherine Heigl accidentally pregnant.

This week’s new film “Knocked Up” offers great performances by Katherine Heigl (a.k.a. - Drew Barrymore 2.0) and Seth Rogen (”the puffy 20-something everyman“), but supporting actors Leslie Mann and Paul Rudd are truly the highlight of the show. Though this movie is littered with hilarious dialogue and entertaining characters, the plot itself is fairly underwhelming. “Knocked Up” does not have the same impact as writer/director Judd Apatow’s previous work “The 40 Year Old Virgin.”

On a “40 Year Old Virgin” scale, I have to give this film only 30 out of 40 Year Old Virgins.

Good Points:
•Continuous facial hair and stoner jokes
•Katherine Heigl
•Pregnancy jokes
•Leslie Mann was funny as hell

Bad Points:
•We never get to see Katherine Heigl naked, but we do get to see the unsettling opposite of a “Sharon Stone” shot - Katherine Heigl’s “Heigl” with a baby is coming out of it. Yup. Baby head. Crotch. It wasn’t magical.
•Though the plot isn’t necessarily cliché, it’s not that engaging either. The movie’s peripheral topics (such as “what it means to be a spouse”) are far more interesting than the title premise.

Warning: DO NOT do a Google search for “Knocked Up” with the “family filter” turned off. Dear God.

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[This is not so much a movie review as a warning]
Ahoy! Set sail for deus ex machina!
“Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End” is a treasure-trove of lame tropes and plot loopholes big enough to sail ships through. The words “sea sick” sum it up well. This film was not on par with the previous two. Watching it was like being subjected to a three hour Renaissance Faire with eyepatches and greasier hair. After the first hour, it made me want to mutiny. By the second hour, I would have voluntarily walked the plank. It was the “Phantom Menace” of The Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. I was amazed to learn that Joel Schumacher was not involved in the making of this film.

I wish I wore an eyepatch to the movie - two of them.

The only redeeming items in this Johnny Depp cluster-f*ck:
•Geoffrey Rush with hepatitis-yellow contact lenses
•Cameo by Keith Richards (his hepatitis-yellow eyes were real)
•Davey Jones with the cool octopus tentacles

Super-double irony: an anti-piracy sign at the movie theater.

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I love Lily Allen. I know, I’m kind of late on the Lily Allen train, but here’s why I love her music and you should too. A shit-talking British accent, blown out dance hall beats, horns (in case you miss the Specials), Holly-Golightly-meets-Pink ensembles, and she has the most annoying background ever on MySpace.

Anyone who’s not a rapper and says fuc$ing in the first stanza, on the first song, of their first album, is my new best friend. Who doesn’t want to sic a bunch of British dirt bags on their ex-boyfriend and then “Smile” about it? She’s vicious and adorable. Oh, and who doesn’t love that “old school” cd loading sound that seems to be so popular now.

Here’s the downside. Listening to her gives me hopeful chicken skin just like Liz Phair used to. Ah, I loved Liz Phair. Scary loved. Liz Phair had those two excellent albums and then, she got happy, or married, or whatever, and started to SUCK. I was lost. Whenever a new, talented, smart-mouthed, female artist comes along I fall in love all over again, BUT now, I can’t help but think, “Just don’t disappoint me bitch.”

Anywho, there are some cool little mp3’s at the bottom of this Pitchfork interview where you can also read more about how supremely awesome she is.

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No doubt the top-selling Xbox game this week is “Crackdown.” The game itself is nothing special . . . other than with the purchase comes the free beta download of the eagerly awaited “HALO 3“. Last night I got the chance to play.
Mother of God. It is beautiful.
Unfortunately, the beta is limited to online multiplayer matches. And they are fun. Very, very fun. Apparently “campaign” play won’t be available until the full release in Sept. “Full release” being the operative term.
I give “HALO 3″ five stars out of five: *****

The pros of HALO 3:
•New loud weapons - alien rifles, missile launchers, landmines, and the Spartan Laser (a.k.a. - the “Freud Cannon”).
•New portable objects such as “gravity boost” personnel launchers, “bubble shields,” and shield-depleting bombs.

The downside of HALO 3:
•Getting schooled online by a 13-year-old named “/ILuvSlutz666/”

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