Didn't see Bond, but saw Catch me if you can, which was very good. Tom Hanks is brilliant, and the music is quite good. I'm not a big Leo fan, but he did ok, though he spent too much of the movie as an unpleasant person for me to actually like him. There are also a lot of very memorable lines, and some nice Harvard references.

Yeah, the main page is finally working!

Yes i've seen the Two Towers, my favorite line: "That doesn't make any sense to me, but then again, you are very small." Anyway i liked it, but not as much as the first one. The level of acting in this one wasn't nearly as high, probably because Boromir is dead, and Gandalf isn't around much. Gollum was surprisingly good, thought they nailed the whole frodo-sam-gollum-ring dynamic. Eowyn has some great dresses... Well those are my random observations. Oooo, my favorite crazy special affects observation: in helm's deep the valley is surrounded on three sides by mountains, two sides are real, and one side is not. I didn't notice this the first time i saw it.

Gotta run, more later

Yup. I'm going to try to persuade Robby to see Bond tonight. (He's seen it and I haven't.)

Haven't seen any Two Towers discussion here yet. Have we all seen it?

Speaking of Tolkein, we rented Fellowship on DVD a few weeks ago, and while watching it, I was struck by the most unintentionally hilarious line in the entire series thus far: the description of the Ringwraiths as roaming the countryside "disguised as riders in black."

Because those riders in black don't look the slightest bit suspicious....

Saw The Godfather for the first time tonight, with my Dad and his wife. The running commentary kind of got on my nerves: "This is a famous scene." "Who's that actor?" "The car's going to explode." I managed to remain silent.

My theory is our cutting-edge social and political commentary threatens the traditional media establishment and so they brought us down. Are other blogs working?

Anyone more tech savvy than I have any idea why this hasn't been publishing for the past week or so?

My brother AJ, the hot one who is 14, has the Sims on his computer so i decided to try it out. My first shocking discovery is that it isn't heteronormative. I'm also told you can marry multiple people. The best story though is that my friend Ben (from high school) founded a Sims orphanage by inviting families over and then locking in the parents with furniture until they died and then raising the kids, so he had two dozen orphaned kids. Sick and twisted, yes... But also brilliant.

Terrific article from the Globe and Mail about Daniel Day-Lewis, who gives what is easily the performance of the year as Bill "the Butcher" Cutting in Martin Scorsese's Gangs of New York. The highlight of the article, for me, is the scoop that Day-Lewis prepared for the role by listening to loads of Eminem...which, if you've seen the movie, rings absolutely true. The bit about his apprenticeship to a Florentine shoemaker is interesting, too.

As for the movie itself...on an emotional level, admittedly, it never quite connects, and DiCaprio doesn't provide much of a heroic center...but if you just sort of sit back and let those ripe images of decay and bloodshed wash across you, after an hour or so you may find Gangs slowly exploding and expanding inside your head like a mushrooming bullet. I was vaguely disappointed throughout much of it, but after it was over, I couldn't wait to see it again (and I probably will, before the weekend is up). At the heart of it all is Daniel Day-Lewis's amazing performance, which seems to have sprung full-formed from some twisted Zeus's brain: part Thomas Nast cartoon, part Dickensian silent villain, but weirdly human and affecting. For all its problems, Gangs of New York is more of a movie than anything else I've seen all year, even if it's easier to admire than to love.

Everyone, please let me know when you've seen the Two Towers so I can start talking about my likes and dislikes.

Regarding Yao, it's too early to tell. He could snap his knee next week.

Now, as for the article in the Weekly Standard saying that this Lott thing actually helped conservatives, I have to say I'm very suspicious. Yes, it was the conservatives who fanned the flames to get him out of there, and some of that was probably righteous outrage at his comments. But they still don't have a clue about minority identity politics. If black people still think they're being discriminated against in this country, which they do, there's no reason to expect them to flock to the Republican party, especially the neoconservative wing, which is basically telling them: "there's no discrimination in this country, we've created a level playing field, if you don't succeed then it must be because of some problem on your part, so stop whining." I think that the Lott thing gives Democrats a tremendous opportunity to shore up their black base if they get out the message that they are actually in touch with the problems that black Americans face today.

Incidentally, I think a big part of Bush's (and Reagan's) edge with white voters is his ability to play identity politics with them -- they don't agree with (or really understand, for the most part) many of his policies, but they identify with him as an honest, patriotic guy and he gives them a sense of pride with his bold stance on terror, so they support him.

I'm going to have some courage and step out and say i was wrong: the rockets were right to take Yao over J Williams.

So, I hope this doesn't sound disrespectful or anything, but...is Strom Thurmond completely senile yet, or what? I'm honestly curious as to whether his silence on the whole Lott issue (now in its second week) is the result of political prudence, or of genuine mental enfeeblement. (He certainly didn't look too well in the recent Onion infographic that preceeded the controversy.) If there's been a sound bite or statement by Thurmond that I've missed, by the way, please let me know.

For those interested, The Smoking Gun has a copy of the actual Dixiecrat plaform on which Thurmond ran in 1948. It's basically what you'd expect.

An Onion-caliber article on the situation.

Here's a great post of Matt Yglesias on balistic missile defense. Of course you all already read him every day, so there really wasn't a point to my posting this.

Here's an interesting article in the Daily Standard (link from instapundit) on why this Lott situation was such a good one for conservatives, and why the right wing jumped on him so quickly.

Oh dear...only four months, and already California has become synonymous with America in Noah's mind. I'm pretty sure that most states do not have laws prohibiting smoking indoors.

"The happy, flexible clique with an undertone of sexual tension." A totally foreign concept...

One funny story from the concert... Right after the Counting Crows came on i saw this huge puff of smoke a few rows in front of me and thought "they're smoking indoors? How rude... This is america, you can't do that!" and then a few seconds later as the smoke wafted about I realized they were smoking pot and my first reaction was "oh, that's not nearly so rude"...

The odd thing is I think this reaction is relatively common, it is also somewhat strange.

Matt Yglesias posts on this article from the Weekly Standard on the sociology and dating ethics of Ivy League students. This article does have a lot of astute observations and is roughly correct. Having read the Two Towers today, this article really gets me thinking about whether there's some epic battle going on between good and evil as to whether love really matters or if we should just all devolve into selfish transactions... And I find that there are fewer and fewer willing to fight and be hurt for love. And I find myself wondering whether the wounds are really worth it or whether I'm about to turn traitor to the enemy...

I saw the counting crows with toad the wet sprocket tonite in san francisco. Toad was not quite as good as I'd have hoped, however, any show that ends with the line "we don't even have pictures, just memories to hold, that grow sweeter each season, as we slowly grow old" has my stamp of approval. The Counting Crows were great as always. The first half of the show they did acoustic which was great fun. Adam was in a great mood, and they were clearly glad to be back "home" in northern california. I wonder whether Adam Duritz being happier than I is something i should worry about, but at any rate tonite was a great time.