Just a Quick Recommendation: See Rudy

Rudy (1993) is a good film about a kid with heart.  It is rather inspiring, real, and a very well told story.  The acting is solid.  The soundtrack is good.  You will like it if you haven't seen it yet.  It is hard not to like it.

I give it a solid 8 ramheads out of 10.

Awake to a Complementary Continental Breakfast at Super 8!

It turns out that one of my most anticipated movies of the summer, next to Harry Potter 7.2, has to wait until the end of summer to be seen. I had to wait almost 3 months, but I finally saw it. Super 8 did not disappoint.

The story is set in 1979 small town Ohio and stars 14ish year old kids. And these kids are kids. They talk like kids, mess around like kids, and really do a great job. They don't look like they are acting. This is important when the whole movie is based on kid character driven story.

The kid actors are all pretty much newcomers, Elle Fanning (Dakota's younger sister) has been in some stuff, but not too much. The adult actors are mostly no-namers, aside from Kyle Chandler (TV's Friday Night Lights and Early Edition). The absence of the "Star" quality actor really helps make this film work. (Unlike the similar situation in 10,000 BC.) No performance overshadows the other, yet all really work for the film.

These particular kids are into movie making. They are making a Zombie film for an amateur film festival when they witness the derailment of an Air Force train. I won't spoil the plot for you, but it was very well written. J.J. Abrams wrote and directed this film with Steven Spielberg as a producer. It was the best original screenplay I've seen since Inception. It was emotional, entertaining, funny, and sci-fi-y.

The cinematography in this film was also very good. Similar to the film's marketing scheme, the way J.J. Abrams doesn't let you see what is going on all the time really adds to the intrigue and awesomeness of this film. He and the actors really put their hearts into this film and it shows. It isn't the throwaway, CGI-packed 3D hunk of crap a lot of movies are lately. Sure, they use CGI to create the awesome explosions and the stuff I won't spoil for you, but the actors and the story really drive this film. Plus Simon from 7th Heaven plays a stoner, who is quite entertaining.

Super 8 runs 112 minutes and is rated PG-13. For the most part this film is pretty family oriented, though there is a little language (and drug references) at times. Kids under 9 probably don't need to see it. I was thoroughly entertained and was not let down. I give it 10 ramheads out of 10.

Taking the First Amendment too far?

After reading the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's article about the recent recall elections in Wisconsin, I scrolled down to the comments.  What I saw was extremely disappointing.  Both sides of the issue posted comments and most of these comments were slanderous, rude, and garbage.  They did not have facts to back their claims and they were not even polite.  There are about 350 of these comments.  Let's read a couple:

YouAgain300 - Aug 13, 2011 8:10 PM

The rottenness that is the demorat party can no longer be denied, you have to be morally bankrupt to vote for this party of marxists. Lies and deception are there only outputs, why even have a debate with such rottenness. Its nice that the urinal/sentanal can join in the rottenness.

This one is obviously from a conservative who insults the newspaper for reporting the news.  Here's one from the other side:

BruceSpringsteen - Aug 13, 2011 10:12 PM

MEpublicanism is a social disease sure to ruin America. Death to the tea party!

I would wager that the amount of comments added to this article would be much less if jsonline.com used real names for commenting, like the Facebook comment system.

After seeing an "infographic" on Mashable.com and having a discussion about it in one of my college communications classes , the battle between online anonymity and transparency rages inside of me.  In this case anonymity is provoking behavior from "adults" reading and reacting to the news that many would expect from troubled children.  I would argue that if those commenting were accountable for their actions--at least by putting their names on their expression--JSOnline and other websites may get a decent dialogue going in the comments.  Sure you would still have a couple nut-jobs who don't care what others think, but it sure wouldn't be the majority like it is now.

There are many good comments on many JSOnline articles, but whenever a political article is written, this happens.  This one time is not an isolated occurrence.  I'm all for the First Amendment right of free speech, but I don't think our founding fathers had this in mind.  I think transparency is the obvious answer to this problem.

What do you think about this issue?

The Amazing Spiderman HD Trailer Officially Released

It looks a lot better in HD...

The Harry Potter APOCALYPSE

Read my paper, The Harry Potter Apocalypse on how Harry Potter is apocalyptic from a Christian perspective.