The people who are of the opinion that this film is trying to be "too hip" are totally missing the point. Yes, Juno is too hip for her own good, but the whole point of this is to set up a parallel between her and Jason Bateman's character. Juno and Bateman are really on the same path and I think the whole point of the film is that Juno realizes just how frivolous her current path is. Yes, she could continue as she is on her "honest to blog" path but she realizes in the end that isn't how she want's to end up. She could follow the more childish path but unlike Bateman she has realized that that path will bring her nothing but heartbreak. No matter how "square" she may have found Garner's character to be in the beginning, she realizes that that kind of love is what is needed to raise a child in this world.

Limited of course to the movies I've seen.

The Best of 2007:
1. Once
2. There Will Be Blood
3. Juno
4. No Country for Old Men
5. Charlie Wilson's War
6. Atonement
7. 3:10 to Yuma
8. Across the Universe
9. Michael Clayton
10. Paris, je t'aime

The Worst of 2007:
1. 28 Weeks Later
.
.
.
2. The Ex
3. License to Wed
4. Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer
5. Shrek the Third
6. Hot Rod

Once again it's time for the annual list of movies from the previous year which I've seen, timed with the Oscars to give me a chance to see the films that take some time to make their way to Ohio.

January 26	Catch and Release
February 9	The Lives of Others
February 16	Bridge to Terabithia
February 16	Breach
March 9	300
March 30	The Lookout
March 30	Meet the Robinsons
April 6	Grindhouse
April 20	Hot Fuzz
May 4	Paris, je t'aime
May 4	Away From Her
May 4	Spider-Man 3
May 11	28 Weeks Later
May 11	The Ex
May 16	Once
May 18	Shrek the Third
May 25	Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End
May 25	Angel-A
June 1	Knocked Up
June 8	Surf's Up
June 8	La Vie En Rose
June 8	Ocean's Thirteen
June 15	Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer
June 22	1408
June 27	Live Free or Die Hard
June 29	Ratatouille
July 3	The Transformers
July 3	License to Wed
July 11	Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
July 27	The Simpsons Movie
August 3	The Bourne Ultimatum
August 3	Hot Rod
August 10	Stardust
August 17	Superbad
September 7	Shoot 'Em Up
September 7	3:10 to Yuma
September 14	Across the Universe
September 14	In the Valley of Elah
September 14	Eastern Promises
September 28	The Kingdom
September 29	The Darjeeling Limited
October 5	Michael Clayton
October 12	Elizabeth: The Golden Age
October 19	Gone, Baby, Gone
October 26	Dan in Real Life
November 2	American Gangster
November 9	No Country for Old Men
November 16	Beowulf
November 21	Enchanted
November 21	The Mist
November 28	The Savages
November 30	He Was a Quiet Man
December 5	Juno
December 7	Atonement
December 7	His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass
December 14	I am Legend
December 21	Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
December 21	Charlie Wilson's War
December 21	Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
December 26	There Will Be Blood

That's 60.
2006 2005 2004

"X" marks the movies I've seen.

BEST PICTURE
X - "Atonement"
X - "Juno"
X - "Michael Clayton"
X - "No Country for Old Men"
X - "There Will Be Blood."

ACTOR
X - George Clooney - "Michael Clayton"
X - Daniel Day-Lewis - "There Will Be Blood"
X - Johnny Depp - "Sweeney Todd the Demon Barber of Fleet Street"
X - Tommy Lee Jones - "In the Valley of Elah"
X - Viggo Mortensen - "Eastern Promises"

BEST ACTRESS
X - Cate Blanchett - "Elizabeth: The Golden Age"
X - Julie Christie - "Away From Her"
X - Marion Cotillard - "La Vie en Rose"
X - Laura Linney - "The Savages"
X - Ellen Page - "Juno"

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
   - Casey Affleck - "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford"
X - Javier Bardem - "No Country for Old Men"
   - Hal Holbrook - "Into the Wild"
X - Philip Seymour Hoffman - "Charlie Wilson's War"
X - Tom Wilkinson - "Michael Clayton"

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
   - Cate Blanchett - "I'm Not There"
X - Ruby Dee - "American Gangster"
X - Saoirse Ronan - "Atonement"
X - Amy Ryan - "Gone Baby Gone"
X - Tilda Swinton - "Michael Clayton"

BEST DIRECTOR
X - Julian Schnabel - "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly"
X - Jason Reitman - "Juno"
X - Tony Gilroy - "Michael Clayton"
X - Joel Coen and Ethan Coen - "No Country for Old Men"
X - Paul Thomas Anderson - "There Will Be Blood"

BEST FOREIGN FILM
   - "Beaufort" - Israel
   - "The Counterfeiters" - Austria
   - "Katyn" - Poland
   - "Mongol" - Kazakhstan
   - "12" - Russia

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
X - Christopher Hampton - "Atonement"
X - Sarah Polley - "Away from Her"
X - Ronald Harwood - "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly"
X - Joel Coen & Ethan Coen - "No Country for Old Men"
X - Paul Thomas Anderson - "There Will Be Blood"

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
X - Diablo Cody - "Juno"
   - Nancy Oliver - "Lars and the Real Girl"
X - Tony Gilroy - "Michael Clayton"
X - Brad Bird, Jan Pinkava, and Jim Capobianco - "Ratatouille"
X - Tamara Jenkins - "The Savages"

BEST ANIMATED FEATURE FILM
   - "Persepolis"
X - "Ratatouille"
X - "Surf's Up"

BEST ART DIRECTION
X - "American Gangster"
X - "Atonement"
X - "The Golden Compass"
X - "Sweeney Todd the Demon Barber of Fleet Street"
X - "There Will Be Blood"

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
   - "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford"
X - "Atonement"
X - "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly"
X - "No Country for Old Men"
X - "There Will Be Blood"

BEST SOUND MIXING
X - "The Bourne Ultimatum"
X - "No Country for Old Men"
X - "Ratatouille"
X - "3:10 to Yuma"
X - "Transformers"

BEST SOUND EDITING
X - "The Bourne Ultimatum"
X - "No Country for Old Men"
X - "Ratatouille"
X - "There Will Be Blood"
X - "Transformers"

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
X - "Atonement" - Dario Marianelli
   - "The Kite Runner" - Alberto Iglesias
X - "Michael Clayton" - James Newton Howard
X - "Ratatouille" - Michael Giacchino
X - "3:10 to Yuma" - Marco Beltrami

BEST ORIGINAL SONG
X - "Falling Slowly" from "Once" - Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova
X - "Happy Working Song" from "Enchanted" - Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz
   - "Raise It Up" from "August Rush" - Nominees to be determined
X - "So Close" from "Enchanted" - Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz
X - "That's How You Know" from "Enchanted" - Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz

BEST COSTUME
X - "Across the Universe"
X - "Atonement"
X - "Elizabeth: The Golden Age"
X - "La Vie en Rose"
X - "Sweeney Todd the Demon Barber of Fleet Street"

BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
   - "No End in Sight"
   - "Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience"
   - "Sicko"
   - "Taxi to the Dark Side"
   - "War/Dance"

BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT
   - "Freeheld"
   - "La Corona (The Crown)"
   - "Salim Baba"
   - "Sari's Mother"

BEST FILM EDITING
X - "The Bourne Ultimatum"
X - "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly"
   - "Into the Wild"
X - "No Country for Old Men"
X - "There Will Be Blood"

BEST MAKEUP
X - "La Vie en Rose"
   - "Norbit"
X - "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End"

BEST ANIMATED SHORT
   - "I Met the Walrus"
   - "Madame Tutli-Putli"
   - "Meme Les Pigeons Vont au Paradis (Even Pigeons Go to Heaven)"
   - "My Love (Moya Lyubov)"
   - "Peter & the Wolf"

BEST LIVE ACTION SHORT
   - "At Night"
   - "Il Supplente (The Substitute)"
   - "Le Mozart des Pickpockets (The Mozart of Pickpockets)"
   - "Tanghi Argentini"
   - "The Tonto Woman"

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
X - "The Golden Compass"
X - "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End"
X - "Transformers"

Updates
--Added In the Valley of Elah
--Added Surf's Up
--Added Elizabeth: The Golden Age
--Added The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
--Added La Vie en Rose
--Added Away From Her
--Added The Savages
--Added Eastern Promises

Best way I can describe it is that it's half American Pie, half 40 Year Old Virgin, and half Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle.

So I just saw 28 Weeks Later and... I... honestly... hated it.

And it's weird how the hatred has grown. Halfway through the movie it was "this is a great movie that, because of incompetent direction is just a good move". Then 3/4 of the way through it it was "this is a good movie that, because of incompetent direction is just an ok movie". Then leaving the theater it was "I... kinda... hated that...." Then by the time I got home it was "I haven't hated a movie this much since Million Dollar Baby".

Every bit of good directing in this movie was a direct ripoff from Danny Boyle's directing of the first movie. None of that good directing was used in the scenes featuring The Infected, those were 100% Fresnadillo crap.

------------SPOILERS BELOW------------

Then you've got the fact that the movie ends a good half hour too soon. The escaping group accomplish absolutely nothing. They fight the Infected a grand total of 4 times and aside from being monumentally, earth-shakingly, APOCALYPTICALLY stupid the people in the group itself do absolutely nothing! Sniper guy shoots one soldier and pushes a car. Medical Lady gets her head bashed in. At no point in the chase did you actually have a moment of jeopardy because the bleeping fight scenes were cut so that you had no bleeping clue what was going on. You couldn't even tell whether the bleeping Infected father had managed to break into the room with the thousand civilians and even if you assumed he did you still couldn't tell whether he was attacking his son or some other person. People in the escape party just randomly disappear. Suddenly the shots are being cut every 12 frames and when you come to you're missing 3 more people but because there was no way for you to see how they bit it you don't give a flying bleep. They needed another half hour or so just to make it seem like they had done something.

And then the kids... the kids are the bad guys in this movie and yet they never get their bleeping comeuppance! They are SOLELY responsible for every death that happened in this movie. The moment they bleeping left the bleeping safe zone they bleeping deserved to die, but no.... And they're not bleeping satisfied with being responsible for the deaths of fifteen-bleeping-thousand people, no, they go ahead and kill 5 BILLION! If anybody on that bloody island deserves to die it's these two but they bleeping live through it. I can deal with a downer ending where the good guys die, but nobody involved in this movie seemed to realize that these bleeping kids aren't the good guys and that they deserve every bleeping thing they got and tons more.

0/4

Limited of course to the movies I've seen.

The Best of 2006:
1. Stranger Than Fiction
2. The Departed
3. V for Vendetta
4. The Queen
5. Dreamgirls
6. Children of Men
7. Pan’s Labyrinth
8. Thank You For Smoking
9. Letters from Iwo Jima
10. Brick
11. The Last Kiss

The Worst of 2006:
1. Pulse
2. Date Movie
3. Failure to Launch
4. Employee of the Month
5. Click
6. Tenacious D in: The Pick of Destiny
7. The Break Up

I give myself until Oscar time to close out the books on the previous year's movies. So, without further ado, this is the list of the 2006 movies I've seen sorted by release date.

February 17	Date Movie
March 10	Failure to Launch
March 17	V for Vendetta
March 17	Thank You For Smoking
March 24	Lonesome Jim
March 24	Inside Man
March 31	Brick
April 7	Lucky Number Slevin
April 28	United 93
May 5	Mission: Impossible III
May 19	Over the Hedge
May 19	The Da Vinci Code
May 26	X-Men: The Last Stand
June 2	The Break Up
June 9	Cars
June 16	The Lake House
June 23	Click
June 28	Superman Returns
July 7	A Scanner Darkly
July 7	Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
July 21	Monster House
July 21	Clerks II
July 26	Little Miss Sunshine
July 28	Scoop
August 4	Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby
August 11	Pulse
August 11	Half Nelson
August 18	The Illusionist
September 15	Jesus Camp
September 15	The Last Kiss
September 30	The Queen
October 6	The Departed
October 6	Employee of the Month
October 20	Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas 3D
October 20	The Prestige
October 27	Babel
November 3	Borat
November 3	Volver
November 10	Stranger Than Fiction
November 17	Casino Royale
November 22	Tenacious D in: The Pick of Destiny
December 1	The Nativity Story
December 8	Blood Diamond
December 8	Apocalypto
December 15	Dreamgirls
December 15	The Pursuit of Happyness
December 20	Letters from Iwo Jima
December 20	Rocky Balboa
December 25	Children of Men
December 29	Pan’s Labyrinth

That's 50 (If we're counting The Nightmare Before Christmas 3D.) I'm actually a little surprised that that's a bit less than last year and the year before.

Really liked it.

Terrible, terrible job of marketing.

Worse marketing than even Serenity. With Serenity you just had no clue what it was about, with this movie they actually convince you it's something that it's not. From the commercials you would think it was The Chronicles of Narnia or Lord of the Rings. I'd read the book in 4th or 5th grade so I knew what it should be about but after seeing the commercials I was certain they had screwed it up. Were it not for the critics' ravings I wouldn't have even bothered with it.

Saddest movie I've seen in theaters since The Green Mile.

"X" marks the movies I've seen.

ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE

   - Forest Whitaker - "The Last King of Scotland"
   - Peter O'Toole - "Venus"
X - Will Smith - "The Pursuit of Happyness"
X - Leonardo DiCaprio - "Blood Diamond"
X - Ryan Gosling - "Half Nelson"

ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE

X - Eddie Murphy - "Dreamgirls"
   - Jackie Earle Haley - "Little Children"
X - Alan Arkin - "Little Miss Sunshine"
X - Mark Wahlberg - "The Departed"
X - Djimon Hounsou - "Blood Diamond"

ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE

X - Helen Mirren - "The Queen"
   - Judi Dench - "Notes on a Scandal"
   - Meryl Streep - "The Devil Wears Prada"
X - Penelope Cruz - "Volver"
   - Kate Winslet - "Little Children"

ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE

X - Jennifer Hudson - "Dreamgirls"
   - Cate Blanchett - "Notes on a Scandal"
X - Abigail Breslin - "Little Miss Sunshine"
X - Adriana Barraza - "Babel"
X - Rinko Kikuchi - "Babel"

ANIMATED FEATURE FILM

X - "Cars"
   - "Happy Feet"
X - "Monster House"

ART DIRECTION

X - "Dreamgirls"
   - "The Good Shepherd"
X - "Pan's Labyrinth"
X - "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest"
X - "The Prestige"

CINEMATOGRAPHY

   - "The Black Dahlia"
X - "Children of Men"
X - "The Illusionist"
X - "Pan's Labyrinth"
X - "The Prestige"

COSTUME DESIGN

   - "Curse of the Golden Flower"
   - "The Devil Wears Prada"
X - "Dreamgirls"
   - "Marie Antoinette"
X - "The Queen"

DIRECTING

X - Martin Scorsese - "The Departed"
X - Stephen Frears - "The Queen"
X - Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu - "Babel"
X - Paul Greengrass - "United 93"
X - Clint Eastwood - "Letters From Iwo Jima"

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE

   - "Deliver Us From Evil"
   - "An Inconvenient Truth"
   - "Iraq in Fragments"
X - "Jesus Camp"
   - "My Country, My Country"

DOCUMENTARY SHORT SUBJECT

   - "The Blood of Yingzhou District"
   - "Recycled Life"
   - "Rehearsing a Dream"
   - "Two Hands"

FILM EDITING

X - "Babel"
X - "Blood Diamond"
X - "Children of Men"
X - "The Departed"
X - "United 93"

FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM

   - 'Water' - Canada
   - 'The Lives of Others' - Germany
   - 'After the Wedding' - Denmark
   - 'Days of Glory (Indigenes)' - Algeria
X - 'Pan's Labyrinth' - Mexico

MAKEUP

X - "Apocalypto"
X - "Click"
X - "Pan's Labyrinth"

MUSIC (SCORE)

X - "Babel"
   - "The Good German"
   - "Notes on a Scandal"
X - "Pan's Labyrinth"
X - "The Queen"

MUSIC (SONG)

   - 'I Need to Wake Up' - "An Inconvenient Truth"
X - 'Love You I Do' - "Dreamgirls"
X - 'Our Town' - "Cars"
X - 'Patience' - "Dreamgirls"
X - 'Listen' - "Dreamgirls"

BEST PICTURE

X - "The Departed"
X - "The Queen"
X - "Little Miss Sunshine"
X - "Babel"
X - "Letters From Iwo Jima"

SHORT FILM (ANIMATED)

   - "The Danish Poet"
   - "Lifted"
   - "The Little Matchgirl"
   - "Maestro"
   - "No Time for Nuts"

SHORT FILM (LIVE ACTION)

   - "Binta and the Great Idea (Binta Y La Gran Idea)"
   - "Eramos Pocos (One Too Many)"
   - "Helmer & Son"
   - "The Saviour"
   - "West Bank Story"

SOUND MIXING

X - "Apocalypto"
X - "Blood Diamond"
   - "Flags of Our Fathers"
X - "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest"
X - "Dreamgirls"

SOUND EDITING

X - "Apocalypto"
X - "Blood Diamond"
   - "Flags of Our Fathers"
X - "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest"
X - "Letters From Iwo Jima"

VISUAL EFFECTS

X - "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest"
   - "Poseidon"
X - "Superman Returns"

WRITING (ADAPTED SCREENPLAY)

X - "Borat"
X - "Children of Men"
X - "The Departed"
   - "Little Children"
   - "Notes on a Scandal"

WRITING (ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY)

X - "Babel"
X - "Letters From Iwo Jima"
X - "Little Miss Sunshine"
X - "Pan's Labyrinth"
X - "The Queen"

--1/30/07 - Added Little Miss Sunshine
--2/03/07 - Added Babel
--2/11/07 - Added Jesus Camp
--2/11/07 - Added Dreamgirls
--2/17/07 - Added Blood Diamond

I really can't recommend The Departed enough. Probably the best film I’ve seen in two and a half years.

The AMC Dublin Village 18 on the other hand... boy... Even though I saw the movie there I'm still not sure how you're supposed to get there.

A little background... Pulse was one of the movies I was most looking forward to this year based on its trailer. That was back when it was scheduled for a March release. Then it got pushed back to August, and then I didn't end up seeing it in a first run theater. Today I finally got around to it on half-price day at the dollar theater.
...
And I don't know what to think.
...
It's a horror film so it's supposed to scare me/creep me out. It did that quite well. The scary parts got the adrenaline going and I left the theater... in a mood...

The problem is, the parts in between the scary parts aren't... good. The visual look is fine but the editing seems choppy, the dialogue stilted... (For the record, I don't blame the actors. I think the problems with this one were much farther up the chain of command.)

Sooooo...

As a horror movie it gets the job done. It's scary/creepy. But the ride to get there is very, very bumpy.

1 1/2 out of 4 stars.

Postscripts
1) I'd be quite interested to hear the story of how this got made, I get the feeling there's a winding story there.

2) The difference in quality between the trailer and the final film is quite striking. They could have stood to let whoever slapped together the trailer have a crack at the final film.

3) A half tank of gas will not get a pickup truck from Columbus, OH to the desert.

For the most part I can't complain about who won. I suppose I would have preferred that Terrence Howard had won best actor, but Hoffman was good too. None of the pictures nominated really seemed "Best Picture" worthy to me but I suppose Crash came the closest. I would have ranked them Crash > Good Night, and Good Luck > Capote > Munich > Brokeback.

With the Oscars being last night here's my annual "last year's movies I've seen" list, by release date.

January 19	Assault On Precinct 13
February 11	Hitch
February 18	Schultze Gets the Blues
February 18	Constantine
March 4	Gunner Palace
March 4	Jacket, The
March 4	Be Cool
March 11	Hostage
March 11	Millions
March 18	Melinda and Melinda
March 18	Ring 2, The
April 1	Sin City
April 8	Sahara
April 8	Kung Fu Hustle
April 8	Fever Pitch (2005)
April 22	Lot Like Love, A
April 22	Dallas 362
April 22	Interpreter, The
April 29	Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy , The
May 6	Crash (2005)
May 6	Kingdom of Heaven
May 13	Layer Cake
May 19	Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith
May 27	Longest Yard, The (2005)
June 10	Mr. And Mrs. Smith
June 15	Batman Begins
June 24	March of the Penguins
June 24	Bewitched
June 29	War of the Worlds, The
July 8	Fantastic Four
July 15	Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
July 15	Wedding Crashers, The
July 22	Hustle & Flow
July 22	Island, The (2005)
August 12	Grizzly Man
August 19	Red-Eye
August 19	40 Year-old Virgin, The
September 16	Lord of War
September 30	Capote
September 30	Serenity
October 7	Good Night and Good Luck
October 21	Stay
October 28	Weather Man, The
November 4	Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Prices
November 4	Jarhead
November 18	Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
November 23	Syriana
November 29	Havoc
December 9	Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, The
December 9	Brokeback Mountain
December 14	King Kong (2005)
December 21	Fun With Dick And Jane
December 23	Munich
December 28	Match Point

That's 54, a few less than last year.

I could not have asked for anything more from Serenity. Simply awesome.

Go see it or the *insert beloved item* gets it!

The New York Supreme Court has ruled that AMC (which supposedly stands for "American Movie Classics") isn't classic enough.

It's sad to see how far AMC has fallen. It used to be a good channel but now it's filled with movies of dubious classicicity chopped all to hell with commercials.

Luckily Turner Classic Movies stepped up to take its place. (And isn't that ironic given Ted Turner's efforts to ruin classic movies?)

I saw Phantom of the Opera yesterday and I'll just say this... There wasn't anything wrong with it that couldn't have been fixed by eliminating Andrew Lloyd Webber and Joel Schumacher from the equation.

Just got out of Dallas 362, the film starring, written and directed by Scott Caan. It had its world theatrical premiere here at The Neon last night. I enjoyed it. The tone brought to mind Clerks and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. I'll flesh this out later but for now I have to get back into the theater, Gunner Palace is about to start.

The film stars Caan as Dallas. He and Shawn Hatosy's Rusty are two twenty-somethings living in California and basically waiting for their lives to make a turn either for the better or the worse. As things stand they're two hard-drinking guys who collect for a bookie and get into a LOT of bar fights. Dallas seems happy with this and is looking to make the move to full-blown criminal. Rusty on the other hand isn't so sure. Trying to work things out he starts seeing Bob, a therapist and the boyfriend of his mother (Kelly Lynch).

Dallas 362 is a snappily written coming-of-age story. It takes the growing rift between Dallas and Rusty seriously but doesn't get overly dramatic or bogged down in the woe-is-me-where-do-I-go-from-here aspects of it. Caan manages to get very solid performances out of his actors and the still-photo montages, which could easily be overused, work and add a great deal to the film stylistically.

Overall Dallas 362 is a very solid first feature from Scott Caan.

3 out of 4 stars.

Selecting only from movies I've seen and ranked according to an arbitrary amalgamation of "Best", "Favorite" and "Most meaningful to me".

1.	Garden State
2.	Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
3.	Spider-Man 2
4.	Closer
5.	The Aviator
6.	The Passion of the Christ
7.	The Incredibles
8.	Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
9.	Hotel Rwanda
10.	The Dreamers
11.	Man on Fire
12.	Saved!
13.	Finding Neverland
14.	Sideways
15.	Ray
16.	Shaun of the Dead
17.	Kill Bill: Volume 2
18.	Collateral
19.	The Terminal
20.	The Butterfly Effect

The 2004 movies that I have seen, sorted by release date:

January 16	Along Came Polly
January 23	Butterfly Effect, The
February 6	Dreamers, The
February 13	50 First Dates
February 20	Eurotrip
February 25	Passion of the Christ, The
February 27	Broken Lizard's Club Dread
March 5	Hidalgo
March 12	Spartan
March 12	Secret Window
March 19	Dawn of the Dead
March 19	Taking Lives
March 19	Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
March 26	Jersey Girl
March 26	Ladykillers, The
April 2	Hellboy
April 9	Whole Ten Yards, The
April 9	Shade
April 9	Alamo, The (2004)
April 9	Ella Enchanted
April 9	Girl Next Door, The (2004)
April 16	Kill Bill: Volume 2
April 16	Punisher, The
April 23	13 Going On 30
April 23	Man on Fire (2004)
April 30	Mean Girls
April 30	Godsend
May 19	Shrek 2
May 28	Saved!
June 4	Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
June 18	Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story
June 18	Terminal, The
June 23	Fahrenheit 9/11
June 30	Spider-Man 2
July 9	Anchorman
July 16	I, Robot
July 23	Bourne Supremacy
July 28	Garden State
July 30	Village, The
July 30	Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle
July 30	Manchurian Candidate, The (2004)
August 6	Collateral
August 6	Little Black Book
August 20	Without a Paddle
August 27	Jet Li's Hero
September 10	Cellular
September 10	Resident Evil: Apocalypse
September 17	Wimbledon
September 17	Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
September 24	Shaun of the Dead
October 1	Celsius 41.11
October 22	Sideways
October 29	Ray
November 5	Incredibles, The
November 12	Finding Neverland
November 26	Very Long Engagement, A
December 3	House of Flying Daggers
December 3	Closer
December 15	Million Dollar Baby
December 17	Spanglish
December 17	Aviator, The
December 22	Hotel Rwanda

Total Movies 62

I think that's a complete list if my memory doesn't fail me and the list at The Numbers is right.

Well that pretty much sucked.

Why was there a cartoon character saying "Holy Sh*t Dude!" in the first 3 minutes?

Rock should have avoided the politics. His minute mocking President Bush immediately followed him saying he wouldn't mock President Bush. His John Kerry-Oprah thing brought back memories of Oprah... Uma... Uma... Oprah. Note to future hosts... Oprah is Oscar comedy death!

Giving out the awards at the back of the theater? Bad idea.

Bad directing of the show. Glitch after glitch after glitch.

Too much Beyonce. One song, fine. Two songs, maybe. Three songs? There's just no excuse for that.

Should Yo Yo Ma really be pulling attention away from the people who passed away? These people died but they have to make sure he gets recognition for performing something that could just as well have been done by the huge orchestra they already had on hand.

A glut of boring acceptance speeches. One laundry list of thank-yous after another. The closest they got to a good/memorable acceptance speech was Foxx and that simply pales in comparison to former winners.

Million Dollar Baby winning Best Picture was just a major disappointment. I didn't think any of the other 4 nominees were a clear winner, but I thought MDB had MAJOR screenplay problems in the last third of the movie.

It's hard for me to really root for anybody when the only noms my personal top two films of the year (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Garden State) picked up are Winslet's Best Actress nom and Eternal Sunshine's Screenplay nom.

Oh well...

Looked at the 2004 box office totals and it occurred to me that Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Garden State combined made $9 million less than White Chicks.

That's just depressing.

Orson Scott Card on Million Dollar Baby. If you've seen it or don't care about the spoilers read his whole section on it.

The summary:

So by all means, see it. Since it's probably going to win the Oscar for everybody who touched it, you should know what all the hooplah is about. And I guarantee you that you'll admire it and even, at times, be moved.

But please don't lose track of how shallow and stupid and pretentiously bad the script and story are.

--Uncle Orson Reviews Everything

Hotel Rwanda is an absolutely heart wrenching movie. You simply can't imagine that kind of hatred. About the only thing more heart wrenching is that in 10 years they'll be able to make almost the exact same movie about what's currently going on in the Sudan as the world fiddles.

ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE

Don Cheadle - HOTEL RWANDA
Johnny Depp - FINDING NEVERLAND
Leonardo DiCaprio - THE AVIATOR
Clint Eastwood - MILLION DOLLAR BABY
Jamie Foxx - RAY

I suppose Foxx is the favorite here, but I wouldn't count anybody out. DiCaprio and Eastwood are probably the next most likely followed by Cheadle and Depp. Giamatti really deserves to be there too though.

And though I'd put him as the least likely of the 5 nominated to win, I have to wonder how Depp has managed to not win an Oscar yet. He's never Johnny Depp playing a character, he's just the character.

Jim Carrey was robbed for Eternal Sunshine.

ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE

Alan Alda - THE AVIATOR
Thomas Haden Church - SIDEWAYS
Jamie Foxx - COLLATERAL
Morgan Freeman - MILLION DOLLAR BABY
Clive Owen - CLOSER

Ok, I just don't think Foxx should win here. A) I think he really had the lead role in Collateral so putting him up in the supporting category is just an effort to get him two noms. B) I don't really think he gave a better performance in this role than just about anyone else could have.

Personally I'd give it to either Church or Owen, and I think I lean a little more towards Owen.

ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE

Annette Bening - BEING JULIA
Catalina Sandino Moreno - MARIA FULL OF GRACE
Imelda Staunton - VERA DRAKE
Hilary Swank - MILLION DOLLAR BABY
Kate Winslet - ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND

In my opinion it's a choice between Swank and Winslet and I'd give it to Winslet.

ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE

Cate Blanchett - THE AVIATOR
Laura Linney - KINSEY
Virginia Madsen - SIDEWAYS
Sophie Okonedo - HOTEL RWANDA
Natalie Portman - CLOSER

Portman. Blanchett and Madsen seem to be the favorites though.

ANIMATED FEATURE FILM

THE INCREDIBLES
SHARK TALE
SHREK 2

Shark Tale isn't actually in the race and I think The Incredibles beats Shrek 2 hands down.

ART DIRECTION

THE AVIATOR
FINDING NEVERLAND
LEMONY SNICKET'S A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS
THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA
A VERY LONG ENGAGEMENT

Of the 5 I'd give it to Neverland, but Eternal Sunshine not getting at least a nom is just a joke.

CINEMATOGRAPHY

THE AVIATOR
HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS
THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST
THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA
A VERY LONG ENGAGEMENT

Eternal Sunshine by a mile, but of these five I suppose I'd go with Aviator.

COSTUME DESIGN

THE AVIATOR
FINDING NEVERLAND
LEMONY SNICKET'S A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS
RAY
TROY

I'll go with Neverland here.

DIRECTING

THE AVIATOR
MILLION DOLLAR BABY
RAY
SIDEWAYS
VERA DRAKE

It's probably a tossup between Marty and Clint. I suppose I'll go with The Aviator, but I'll fess up to not having had a chance to see Million Dollar Baby yet.

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE

BORN INTO BROTHELS
THE STORY OF THE WEEPING CAMEL
SUPER SIZE ME
TUPAC: RESURRECTION
TWIST OF FAITH

The race is probably between Super Size Me and Tupac, and I imagine it goes to Tupac.

FILM EDITING

THE AVIATOR
COLLATERAL
FINDING NEVERLAND
MILLION DOLLAR BABY
RAY

I'd give it to Aviator

FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM

AS IT IS IN HEAVEN
THE CHORUS
DOWNFALL
THE SEA INSIDE
YESTERDAY

A little surprised at the lack of House of Flying Daggers and A Very Long Engagement, but I have no idea whether there are release date issues or anything like that... I have no opinion of the 5 nominated. The Passion should have been allowed in this category though.

MAKEUP

LEMONY SNICKET'S A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS
THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST
THE SEA INSIDE

I imagine The Passion gets it here.

MUSIC (SCORE)

FINDING NEVERLAND
HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN
LEMONY SNICKET'S A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS
THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST
THE VILLAGE

Eh, I'd give it to Neverland.

MUSIC (SONG)

"Accidentally In Love" - SHREK 2
"Al Otro Lado Del Río" - THE MOTORCYCLE DIARIES
"Believe" - THE POLAR EXPRESS
"Learn To Be Lonely" - THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA
"Look To Your Path (Vois Sur Ton Chemin)" - THE CHORUS

Pick one, I couldn't sing a note of any but Accidentally In Love and don't really think it should win.

SHORT FILM (ANIMATED)

BIRTHDAY BOY
GOPHER BROKE
GUARD DOG
LORENZO
RYAN

SHORT FILM (LIVE ACTION)

EVERYTHING IN THIS COUNTRY MUST
LITTLE TERRORIST
7:35 IN THE MORNING
TWO CARS, ONE NIGHT
WASP

DOCUMENTARY SHORT SUBJECT

AUTISM IS A WORLD
THE CHILDREN OF LENINGRADSKY
HARDWOOD
MIGHTY TIMES: THE CHILDREN'S MARCH
SISTER ROSE'S PASSION

Yeah right, like anybody has a clue on these...

SOUND EDITING

THE INCREDIBLES
THE POLAR EXPRESS
SPIDER-MAN 2

I'd call it a toss-up between Incredibles and Spidey.

SOUND MIXING

THE AVIATOR
THE INCREDIBLES
THE POLAR EXPRESS
RAY
SPIDER-MAN 2

Ray's probably got a good shot at this one being so acoustically oriented.

VISUAL EFFECTS

HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN
I, ROBOT
SPIDER-MAN 2

Spidey.

WRITING (ADAPTED SCREENPLAY)

BEFORE SUNSET
FINDING NEVERLAND
MILLION DOLLAR BABY
THE MOTORCYCLE DIARIES
SIDEWAYS

Sideways probably has the edge here with Baby and Neverland following behind.

WRITING (ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY)

THE AVIATOR
ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND
HOTEL RWANDA
THE INCREDIBLES
VERA DRAKE

I'd probably narrow it down to either Eternal Sunshine or Hotel Rwanda.

BEST PICTURE

THE AVIATOR
FINDING NEVERLAND
MILLION DOLLAR BABY
RAY
SIDEWAYS

The big category... Ray doesn't belong there. Million Dollar Baby probably wins with Sideways and Aviator having shots.

He's claiming Alexander flopped because of "raging fundamentalism in morality".

Hey, when Roger Ebert, a pretty liberal guy himself, can only muster two stars you've got problems other than the public oh-so-parochially sticking to their moral guns. (Boy, that last sentence can't decide whether it wants to be sarcastic or not...)

A man who was a student at Columbine High School when the shooting occurred died in Iraq Saturday.

It's sad that he died and all, but it should just barely be news in Littleton, CO, it certainly isn't big enough that it should be on the front page of CNN.

"Greg made us so proud, but he never wanted to be recognized for his actions," said the statement from his family. "Neither Columbine nor Iraq was to define him."

So what does the family do? They issue a statement to the press using Columbine and Iraq to define him. He never wanted to be defined that way and yet there he is on the front page of CNN only because he's a Columbine survivor that died in Iraq.

Mike Nichols' Closer is a heartbreaking film. It's a film filled with people doing stupid, hurtful things, but that's ok. Like House of Sand and Fog (and unlike John Q) the stupid decisions are completely believable. When people do stupid, irrational things simply because the writer thinks the plot needs more conflict it doesn't work. In Closer this isn't the case. Being an outside observer you want to just grab the characters by their shoulders, shake them and tell them to wise up before they screw things up even worse but the characters are making their messed up decisions because they're messed up people. Natalie Portman's Alice wants Jude Law's Dan to let her love him, but at the same time she can't open herself up to him. Julia Roberts' Anna wouldn't know what to do if she were happy and so she ends up sabotaging her relationships, including with her husband, Clive Owen's Larry. Everybody is hurting everybody else, nobody really has a real right to get too upset about what is being done to them, they're giving as good as they get.

The movie was adapted by Patrick Marber from his own play, and you can really tell that it evolved from the stage. In the entire film I believe there are seven speaking roles, the four main characters plus a taxi driver, a customs officer and a receptionist. (And none of the latter 3 have more than 1 line of dialogue.)

All in all the movie just works.

3 1/2 out of 4 stars.

Seeing trailers and/or commercials for Flight of the Phoenix and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory got me thinking. So many movie remakes disappoint. (Please no comments on how Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a new adaptation of the book and not a remake.) Like cover songs, they rarely seem as good as the original.

I figure this is because only the good movies get remade. People just don't look at a crappy old movie and think "Hey, let's do that again." I think this instinct causes a lot of opportunities to be missed. We already have a good version of the good movies. Let's see if we can craft a good version of a crappy movie. I'd love to see a really good director try to rebuild on the foundation of Gigli and make a good movie. I think it could be achieved, it would be a total tear down, but I think it's doable. Now THAT would be an interesting remake.

Welcome to "How to screw up a film adaptation 101". Please take your seats. Today we have some special guests, the makers of the Doom movie.

Screenwriter Dave Callahan claims "everyone was keen to keep the game's atmosphere", though there are some "minor" changes done to the film's concept: The monsters have nothing to do with hell, the plot is not taking place on Mars and "space marines" are not well "space marines" as their outfits are more like SWAT team members.

The story follows eight marines, teleported into a command centre of a secret base on a remote planet. There, they learn that something strange is happening and soon monsters start to appear. The monsters aren't from hell, but rather people mutated by some nasty super-virus although the monsters look very similar to those in the game.

One character is a technician called "Pinky" who has a cybernetic wheelchair thanks to a bad teleporting accident. Pinky later mutates into something remotely resembling a creature from Doom 3. Producers claim that the film will be more of a horror than an action shooter.

--Dark Horizons

Watched Errol Morris' The Fog of War yesterday. A very good documentary, it's a travesty that this and Fahrenheit 9/11 are even considered to be in the same genre.

The good: Watched Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind tonight. Excellent, excellent movie, better the second time around.

The bad: That sinking feeling when "This film has been formatted to fit your screen" pops up and you realize you made a mistake at the video store. D'oh! Stupid Pan & Scan!!!

Finally saw Fahrenhype 9/11 tonight. It's an excellent rebuttal to Fahrenheit 9/11. A better documentary than Fahrenheit, but that isn't hard, it has the advantage of actually, you know, documenting facts. You subtract from Fahrenheit what FahrenHYPE rebuts and you're pretty much just left with the credits. It exposes the lies and deceptions. It shows the people Moore hurt with his film. It's the movie that everyone who was hoodwinked bye Fahrenheit must see and the movie that those who weren't should see.

See if your video store has it, I know the local Family Video does.

Wow. Yes, it's Japanese. Yes it's animation. But this is just a great, wonderfully imaginative, unimaginably creative, totally engrossing, uplifting, beautiful, sweet film which I completely recommend.

And there are a few elements of its style which probably would have freaked me out as a kid. None of the actions, or dialog, or situations are really scary, but the look is just odd enough to have thrown me. But that's probably just me, I had a very similar, though very much more intense, reaction to James and the Giant Peach (boy was that movie ever creepy).

4 out of 4 stars

A very funny movie if you don't mind its brand of comedy. It's kind of in the same vein as Dude, Where's My Car? but a lot less weird and not nearly as stupid. I could have done without the boil guy and the bathroom stall bits, but all in all it's a very funny movie, especially towards the end.

It's a shame nobody's seeing it. At the 3:20 matinee today there were 10 people in the theater at the peak, and two of them were theater employees, three of them looked so young that I'm almost certain they snuck in and I was using a free ticket from accumulating so many points on my Regal Crown Club card.

On a quick trailer related note, Shaun of the Dead looked very funny and the Exorcist: The Beginning trailer seemed very out of place in front of Harold and Kumar.

Michael Moore's contentious film Fahrenheit 9/11 has opened in Poland, with some film critics likening it to totalitarian propaganda.

Gazeta Wyborcza reviewer Jacek Szczerba called the film a "foul pamphlet".

He said it was too biased to be called a documentary and was similar to work by Nazi propaganda director Leni Riefenstahl.

But politicians opposed to Poland's involvement in the US-led occupation of Iraq have urged people to see the film.

"In criticising Moore, I have to admit that he has certain abilities - Leni Riefenstahl had them too," Mr Szczerba said in his review.

"Michael Moore will not convince Poles with his film," the Rzeczpospolita newspaper said in its review.
...
"People are very sensitive to aggressive propaganda, especially when it pretends to be an objective documentary or a work of art."

--BBC NEWS

Believing in Bush’s perfidy gives some people the same comfort and emotional nourishment others get from believing in Jesus. It validates them, cements their view of the world – venal, conspiratorial, run by capering chimps who are somehow ten times less intelligent than Usenet posters but somehow able to yank strings on a global scale. A commenter on a Fark thread called Bush “The Unelected Murder Monkey,” for heaven’s sake. Not all the opponents are unhinged, of course. Of course. There are many levels of opposition, from the serene and reasonable to the char-broiled nutburgers who haunt the comments sections of my favorite blogs. Or my favorite talk shows. Today I heard a caller describe how “Fahrenheit 9/11” affected him; now he believed that the Bush administration attacked the Taliban and Iraq because the Saudis wanted it. The host pointed out that the Saudis didn’t want it. The caller said “well, that’s your opinion.” Movies are facts, you see. Facts are just opinions.

Ooooh! You’re really spooked by F911, musta struck a nerve, eh? Scared that Chimpy McDeath is gonna go down? I love that: Moore’s on the cover of Entertainment Weekly and Time and who knows what else; he's the big magilla of the month. But respond to his assertions and you’re acting out of frantic panic. Right. I admit, I don’t like Mr. Moore; I don’t share his contempt for the American people, and I think he’s a dishonest polemicist.

--James Lileks - The Bleat

Oh, there's tons more there, go check it out.

The problem with Moore's approach isn't what he presents, or even what he believes. Although, I think his approach of just piling on whatever he thinks smokes like a gun is lazy and disservices any focused attack. My real problem with the approach is what he leaves out. It's obvious even to me--a guy who gets his political news from "Peanuts" reprints (and only the color ones on Sunday)--that he ignores all facts and evidence that might counter the argument he's determined to make. The result is propaganda for people who already agree with him, but won't change the minds of anyone whose mind you'd want to change. The people who disagree will continue to disagree, because Moore does nothing to counter their arguments. The movie would be a shitload more effective if it were focused on disproving conservative myths instead of creating a whole slew of liberal ones via implication.

That's what I'd like to see. A movie that doesn't pander to the NPR totebag crowds shuttling edamame home to their mud-compact homes in V-4 Saabs. One that has an answer every time the SUV-driving, fried-children-eating, baby-seal-beating Republicans say "But what about..." In stead we get a movie meant to make liberals feel good about themselves.

Now if I hear one more jackass say "Everyone should see this movie," I'm gonna kick him (or her) in the nuts. What they mean is, "Everyone should see this because I'm right and you should be forced to agree with me. Oh yeah, and I'm an asshole." Sure, everyone should see this, and everyone should read Bill O'Reilly's books too. You're a pompous ass if you think everyone should see it just because its what you believe. Only people who want to should see it. And they should see it as part of a much larger curriculum. You should know enough to make up your own mind, not let Michael Moore do it for you.

--The Filthy Critic

Once again Spinsanity blows holes in one of Michael Moore's films.

[I]t appears to be free of the silly and obvious errors that have plagued Moore's past work, such as the claim in Stupid White Men that the Pentagon planned to spend $250 billion on the Joint Strike Fighter in 2001, a sum that represented over 80 percent of the total defense budget request for the year.

However, "Fahrenheit 9/11" is filled with a series of deceptive half-truths and carefully phrased insinuations that Moore does not adequately back up.
...
During a recent interview on "Late Show with David Letterman," the host identified the problems with the circumstantial argument of the film in a series of probing questions to Moore:

When you look at the film in total, are there things there - if I were smarter, could I refute some of these points? Shall I believe you that everything means exactly what it looks like? I mean, the presentation is overwhelming, but could a smarter man than me come in and say, "Yes, this happened, but it means nothing," "Yes, that happened but it means nothing"? But put together in a puzzle it creates one inarguable, compelling circumstance.

Moore's response to Letterman (after a joking aside) sums up the problem with his work. Despite proclamations that the film is satirical and represents his opinion, Moore still makes strong claims about its veracity:

You can't refute what's said in the film. It's all there, the facts are all there, the footage is all there.

Sadly, as with most of Moore's work, this is simply not true.

--Spinsanity

The commercials are currently touting it as the #1 movie in America. That's not true. According to the most recent numbers Moore's movie fell $37,092,604 short of being the #1 movie in America.

Just finished the first 5 episodes of Penn & Teller's Showtime series Bullsh!t. They're quite entertaining and straightforward at detecting BS; and just knowing that Penn is interviewed in Michael Moore Hates America has actually got me looking forward to that film more.

...spending the two or so hours sitting through Fahrenheit 9/11 is sooooooooooo worth it when that liberal you're arguing with oh so arrogantly lays out the old "You obviously have not seen it. You're reading reports on it from blogs and your right-wing sources. See it and state your real opinions, like an ADULT" and you can smack him upside the head with the fact that you have seen it and are stating your own opinions. It's the trump card. They only lay out that line when you've beaten them into submission and the only way they can get out of it is to make you out as some right-wing automaton.

Note that I'm just saying the time spent seeing it is worth it, I never actually said anything about actually sending money Moore's way.

Dave Kopel has an excellent piece exposing 56 problems with Moore's film.

The first two:

2000 Election Night
Deceits 1-2

Fahrenheit 911 begins on election night 2000. We are first shown the Al Gore rocking on stage with famous musicians and a high-spirited crowd. The conspicuous sign on stage reads “Florida Victory.” Moore creates the impression that Gore was celebrating his victory in Florida.

Actually, the rally took place in the early hours of election day, before polls had even opened. Gore did campaign in Florida on election day, but went home to Tennessee to await the results. The “Florida Victory” sign reflected Gore’s hopes, not any actual election results. (“Gore Campaigns Into Election Day,” Associated Press, Nov. 7, 2000.)

The film shows CBS and CNN calling Florida for Al Gore. According to the narrator, “Then something called the Fox News Channel called the election in favor of the other guy….All of a sudden the other networks said, ‘Hey, if Fox said it, it must be true.’”

We then see NBC anchor Tom Brokaw stating, “All of us networks made a mistake and projected Florida in the Al Gore column. It was our mistake.”

Moore thus creates the false impression that the networks withdrew their claim about Gore winning Florida when they heard that Fox said that Bush won Florida.

In fact, the networks which called Florida for Gore did so early in the evening—before polls had even closed in the Florida panhandle, which is part of the Central Time Zone. NBC called Florida for Gore at 7:49:40 p.m., Eastern Time. This was 10 minutes before polls closed in the Florida panhandle. Thirty seconds later, CBS called Florida for Gore. And at 7:52 p.m., Fox called Florida for Gore. Moore never lets the audience know that Fox was among the networks which made the error of calling Florida for Gore prematurely. Then at 8:02 p.m., ABC called Florida for Gore. Only ABC had waited until the Florida polls were closed.

The premature calls probably cost Bush thousands of votes from the conservative panhandle, as discouraged last-minute voters heard that their state had already been decided, and many voters who were waiting in line left the polling place. In Florida, as elsewhere, voters who have arrived at the polling place before closing time often end up voting after closing time, because of long lines.

At 10:00 p.m., which network took the lead in retracting the premature Florida result? The first retracting network was CBS, not Fox.

Over four hours later, at 2:16 a.m., Fox projected Bush as the Florida winner, as did all the other networks by 2:20 a.m.

CBS had taken the lead in making the erroneous call for Gore, and had taken the lead in retracting that call. At 3:59 a.m., CBS also took the lead in retracting the Florida call for Bush. All the other networks, including Fox, followed the CBS lead within eight minutes. That the networks arrived at similar conclusions within a short period of time is not surprising, since they were all using the same data from the Voter News Service. (Linda Mason, Kathleen Francovic & Kathleen Hall Jamieson, “CBS News Coverage of Election Night 2000: Investigation, Analysis, Recommendations” (CBS News, Jan. 2001), pp. 12-25.)

Moore’s editing technique of the election night segment is typical of his style: all the video clips are real clips, and nothing he says is, formally speaking, false. But notice how he says, “Then something called the Fox News Channel called the election in favor of the other guy…” The impression created is that the Fox call of Florida for Bush came soon after the CBS/CNN calls of Florida for Gore, and that Fox caused the other networks to change (“All of a sudden the other networks said, ‘Hey, if Fox said it, it must be true.’”)

This is the essence of the Moore technique: cleverly blending half-truths to deceive the viewer.

--Dave Kopel

Thanks to Not Todd for the heads up.

Mike Wilson's new anti-Michael Moore and kinda anti-documentary documentary is nearing completion and is close to getting a distributor.

Meanwhile David Brooks in the NY Times lays out some of Moore's more damning anti-American quotes.

"[Americans] are possibly the dumbest people on the planet . . . in thrall to conniving, thieving smug [pieces of the human anatomy]," Moore intoned. "We