Let's say you have a million dollars. You get a speeding ticket on the way home to your palatial Dublin estate. The good driving award costs you somewhere north of three bills. Money's money, so it kind of sucks. It means you can't buy that golden cabinet handle you've had your eye on, at least not right now...Now you can because the interest on your money has made up for the lost funds.
Now let's say you live paycheck to paycheck. You get a speeding ticket on the way home to the room you rent in a crackhouse on the Hilltop. That three hundred dollar fine stings, no tranny for you this weekend.
But Matt, I thought this was about why the BCS is fucked not your personal rant on the foibles of the rich. It is, and here's why...
When rankings are done many factors are taken into consideration, not the least of which is who you've played to this point and how you've faired. Take the example of THE ohio state university and The University of Wisconsin. One is a storied academic institution which has had a fair amount of success in the football realm, the other is a school represented by a poisonous nut. Up to this point in the season both schools have identical records, both in and out of conference. (It is important to note here that when considering opponents what they are ranked at this moment is the weighted factor, not what they were ranked when you played.) After this weekend's American collegiate football contests Tosu had played a grand total of one ranked opponent (Miami is no longer ranked), and this opponent was ranked 17th or 18th when they beat your ass (soundly). Wisconsin on the other hand had played two ranked opponents, losing to the 13th ranked team and defeating the number one ranked team. No matter where these teams fall in the rankings, certainly Wisconsin would rate higher than Tosu, correct?
Of course not. Tosu is ranked one position higher. Why? It's not strength of victory, strength of schedule or anything else, it's strength of history, which is bullshit.
If Tosu, Michigan, Notre Dame, LSU, Miami, USC (if they're eligible) and several other schools were to post an undefeated season they would definitely be in the National Title game. Michigan State very likely will run the table and will most likely not get a seat at the big table. Why? Because they are not historically a football powerhouse. Boise State is an even better example. They most likely will fall out of the title game unless teams BEHIND them lose. If Boise State loses a game, there are no title hopes. The same can't be said for Tosu.
And that is why the BCS system is fucked.
Monday, October 18, 2010
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps review
Wall Street is a fantastic film. A film that captures the right attitude at the right period in history. While I wouldn’t grant it ‘classic’ status, it is good. Damn good. Strong performances across the board from a great cast make this a film that vies for the title of Stone’s best. It’s not perfect, and there are a couple of miss-steps, but overall it is a much better film than I expected when I went to see it…Unfortunately that is a brief tidbit about Wall Street, not the FSM-awful mess that is Wall Street: The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
You might ask why I wouldn’t use the more 2nd installment appropriate subtitle of the now cliché Electric Bugaloo. You could rationally assume it is due to the presence of the riveting Shia LeBouf, but that is not why. I’ll explain. When I heard that there was going to be a second Wall Street, the first thought in my head was, “that is a terrible idea. It is a self-contained story, and Stone should let sleeping dogs lie and make a different shitty movie instead of sullying the name of one of his few good films.” A wise-man (Brian Watson) once said, “If you’re conflicted, go with your gut.” Or something like that, I wasn’t really listening to him at the time. The I saw the trailer. Specifically the part where GG is getting out of prison. It worked. It raised anticipation. It looked good. It reminded me of the trailer for Indy 4, where the shot of the silhouette of Indy picking up the hat made me have high hopes. Much like the alien film of a few years ago, this movie did not live up to my expectations.
The Trailer
The problem with this movie starts with the trailer. First of all the trailer made the film look good, but you really can’t fault them for this. If the trailer showed how awful the film was nobody would see it, but the trailer is for a film that isn’t in the theaters. The trailer revolves around GG. He isn’t in the first 3rd of the movie. Also the trailer does the all too common mistake of giving away way too much of what happens (I’ll expand on this in the mental illness portion of the review). It isn’t as bad as Quarantine, a movie that actually shows the last shot of the movie in the trailer (along with having the image of that shot on the poster), but there is one twist to the movie, which is obvious if you’ve seen the trailer.
The Cast
This is one of the worst acted films I’ve seen in a long time. With the exception of one scene towards the end of the film, Douglas is not firing on all cylinders. Shia is Shia. The girlfriend sucks (and not in the way that girlfriends should), Frank Langella is laughably bad, Charlie Sheen has a worthless cameo. It is worth noting that that Sheen cameo does have a unique dynamic do to real-world stuff, in that he is now the major star and Douglas is on the decline, where in the original Douglas was the star and Sheen was on the rise. The big bad is played okay, but he shows symptoms of shitty actor syndrome towards the end of the movie as his world is turned upside down. Rounding out the cast is Susan Sarandon whose character serves no purpose.
Mental Illness
A good film will have a character arc which will change character(s) over the course of a film with actions causing results, etc. There are dramatic shifts in Gecko’s character, because apparently while in prison, Gordon Gecko became schizophrenic. It is the only explanation of his characters actions and responses through-out the film. To make it more obvious which of his personalities is currently active, Stone made the artistic choice of changing Douglas’ hair style depending on which personality is currently ‘in control.’ There are three separate GG characters that appear in the film, two of which are somewhat fleshed out. You could make the argument that it is actually not disparate personalities, but actually just one Machiavellian personality that is present through-out the film, subtly twisting the actions of others until he gets what he wants. You could say that, but his actions and what are shown do not mesh with that theory. Perhaps a better filmmaker could have made this work, however Stone could not, which leads to…
The Filmmaking Prowess of Oliver Stone
He sucks. I could leave it at that, but I won’t. This film is disjointed, and it has a very inconsistent style. It is cut together very sloppily, and some of the artistic choices are stupid. Cut-aways for no reason in the middle of a conversation are distracting. The buildings reflecting the changing levels of the stock market was cute, once. It popped up several times, with no consistency. Use it once, use it consistently, or don’t use it all. The way you did it, you just look like an asshole. The movie reminded me of a film from a first-time (or at least not very experienced) filmmaker. For someone who has been doing it for as long as Stone has is unacceptable. The music didn’t work either. So, basically, in as few words as possible, he sucks.
The Plot
The beauty of Wall Street (the original) was that it had a fairly straight-forward plot and it was lean and tight. The sequel is a mess of sub-plots upon sub-plots, none of which you care about, and most of which add little to no value in the long run. The swerve was obvious, believable, expected, and shown in the trailer. The second swerve was dumb, hackey, and unbelievable. At least it wasn’t in the trailer.
Overall
This film was shitty. I had the choice of seeing this or The Social Network. I chose poorly. It is one of the few times that I literally leaned over to the person next to me in the theater (about 40 minutes in) and whispered, “This is awful.” The fact that there was no argument speaks volumes.
You might ask why I wouldn’t use the more 2nd installment appropriate subtitle of the now cliché Electric Bugaloo. You could rationally assume it is due to the presence of the riveting Shia LeBouf, but that is not why. I’ll explain. When I heard that there was going to be a second Wall Street, the first thought in my head was, “that is a terrible idea. It is a self-contained story, and Stone should let sleeping dogs lie and make a different shitty movie instead of sullying the name of one of his few good films.” A wise-man (Brian Watson) once said, “If you’re conflicted, go with your gut.” Or something like that, I wasn’t really listening to him at the time. The I saw the trailer. Specifically the part where GG is getting out of prison. It worked. It raised anticipation. It looked good. It reminded me of the trailer for Indy 4, where the shot of the silhouette of Indy picking up the hat made me have high hopes. Much like the alien film of a few years ago, this movie did not live up to my expectations.
The Trailer
The problem with this movie starts with the trailer. First of all the trailer made the film look good, but you really can’t fault them for this. If the trailer showed how awful the film was nobody would see it, but the trailer is for a film that isn’t in the theaters. The trailer revolves around GG. He isn’t in the first 3rd of the movie. Also the trailer does the all too common mistake of giving away way too much of what happens (I’ll expand on this in the mental illness portion of the review). It isn’t as bad as Quarantine, a movie that actually shows the last shot of the movie in the trailer (along with having the image of that shot on the poster), but there is one twist to the movie, which is obvious if you’ve seen the trailer.
The Cast
This is one of the worst acted films I’ve seen in a long time. With the exception of one scene towards the end of the film, Douglas is not firing on all cylinders. Shia is Shia. The girlfriend sucks (and not in the way that girlfriends should), Frank Langella is laughably bad, Charlie Sheen has a worthless cameo. It is worth noting that that Sheen cameo does have a unique dynamic do to real-world stuff, in that he is now the major star and Douglas is on the decline, where in the original Douglas was the star and Sheen was on the rise. The big bad is played okay, but he shows symptoms of shitty actor syndrome towards the end of the movie as his world is turned upside down. Rounding out the cast is Susan Sarandon whose character serves no purpose.
Mental Illness
A good film will have a character arc which will change character(s) over the course of a film with actions causing results, etc. There are dramatic shifts in Gecko’s character, because apparently while in prison, Gordon Gecko became schizophrenic. It is the only explanation of his characters actions and responses through-out the film. To make it more obvious which of his personalities is currently active, Stone made the artistic choice of changing Douglas’ hair style depending on which personality is currently ‘in control.’ There are three separate GG characters that appear in the film, two of which are somewhat fleshed out. You could make the argument that it is actually not disparate personalities, but actually just one Machiavellian personality that is present through-out the film, subtly twisting the actions of others until he gets what he wants. You could say that, but his actions and what are shown do not mesh with that theory. Perhaps a better filmmaker could have made this work, however Stone could not, which leads to…
The Filmmaking Prowess of Oliver Stone
He sucks. I could leave it at that, but I won’t. This film is disjointed, and it has a very inconsistent style. It is cut together very sloppily, and some of the artistic choices are stupid. Cut-aways for no reason in the middle of a conversation are distracting. The buildings reflecting the changing levels of the stock market was cute, once. It popped up several times, with no consistency. Use it once, use it consistently, or don’t use it all. The way you did it, you just look like an asshole. The movie reminded me of a film from a first-time (or at least not very experienced) filmmaker. For someone who has been doing it for as long as Stone has is unacceptable. The music didn’t work either. So, basically, in as few words as possible, he sucks.
The Plot
The beauty of Wall Street (the original) was that it had a fairly straight-forward plot and it was lean and tight. The sequel is a mess of sub-plots upon sub-plots, none of which you care about, and most of which add little to no value in the long run. The swerve was obvious, believable, expected, and shown in the trailer. The second swerve was dumb, hackey, and unbelievable. At least it wasn’t in the trailer.
Overall
This film was shitty. I had the choice of seeing this or The Social Network. I chose poorly. It is one of the few times that I literally leaned over to the person next to me in the theater (about 40 minutes in) and whispered, “This is awful.” The fact that there was no argument speaks volumes.
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