Smarmy Jerkface Dot Com

I’ve started renting from Blockbuster stores again, even though I have a Netflix membership.  It seems that I need deadlines and limitations in my life, because the open-ended nature of Netflix means that movies I rented in August are still sitting on my coffee table.  But if I know there’s a due date and a late fee, I’m sure to watch what I’ve got.  I’m a walking question mark, I know.

So here’s some recent stuff:

If you took the "Studio 60" stuff out of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip and just focused on Jordan’s character and her job as network head, you’d get something like The TV Set, a fine little movie about one man’s attempt to get his TV pilot on the air.  David Duchovny plays the writer attempting to get his show "The Wexler Chronicles" through the pilot process, while fighting studio idiocy at every turn. 

The film was written and directed by Jake Kasdan (Zero Effect), who has had extensive experience in the pilot realm.  And I have absolutely no doubt that this is *exactly* how it works in television.  I don’t doubt for an instant that great ideas and great stories are constantly squashed because the network head’s teenage daughter simply doesn’t like the title of the show, or something else equally as stupid.  If you’re as weary of network television as I am, this is a must see.  Rating: 4 out of 5 stars.

Luke Wilson stars, wrote and co-directed The Wendall Baker Story, a comic misfire that never saw any kind of theatrical release.  You’ll probably wonder why until you see it.  The core story of a reformed scoundrel going to work in a retirement home and eventually saving the day could work, but it’s just not executed properly.  If the script had been given one more pass and the pacing issues worked out, this would have made a nice little movie.  Instead, everyone in the cast (including Luke’s brother Owen) is wasted.  Co-star Eva Mendes, while lovely, seems to be sleepwalking through her role as Wilson’s love interest.  Even a cameo from Will Ferrell doesn’t help.  Rating: 2 out of 5 stars.

Luke Wilson fares much better in John Dahl’s You Kill Me, even though he doesn’t have a lot to do in it.  Ben Kingsley plays a hit man whose alcohol problem has started interfering with his work, so his employers send him to San Francisco to dry out.  There he meets Tea Leoni, and the two strike up a relationship.  Meanwhile, back home, his employers are being squeezed out by the competition.

You Kill Me is an odd mix of both conventional and unconventional ideas, which works well actually.  Kingsley’s performance is bizarrely interesting, and even though you’re not surprised where things end up, it’s still a good time getting there.  The screenwriters also wrote the two Chronicles of Narnia movies (!)  Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars.

Planet Terror is Robert Rodriguez’ entry in the ill-fated Grindhouse double feature, and it’s definitely more entertaining than Tarantino’s talkfest Death Proof.  It’s not great… it’s From Dusk Till Dawn redux with a heavy John Carpenter vibe, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing either.  The cast is superb (Michael Biehn and Jeff Fahey still have the goods), the music is excellent, and it doesn’t require much thought.  And at least the look of the film remains constant throughout, unlike Death Proof.  On the down side, the film never even tries to be remotely scary, opting instead for the gross out factor by making everything all gooey and squishy.  The film could have been even better with a just a hint of atmosphere.

The movie also tries to convince us that Rose McGowan is hot, but I’m sorry… she slept with Marilyn Manson.  Ewwww.  Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars.

This online video breaks down exactly what it is the writer’s want and why.  My threat level remains the same.

USA Today had some more nuggets of info about how the current writer’s strike will affect your favorite shows…

* South Park – To my surprise, the South Park writers are not members of the writer’s guild, and so the show is therefore unaffected.  Of course, next week is the season finale, so it doesn’t really matter much anyway.  Comedy Central should throw a ton of money at them to get them to crank out a few new episodes.

* Nip/Tuck – The current run of 14 episodes are completed and will air as scheduled.  Production on the remaining 8 episodes of the season was to begin in January, but that will now be delayed.

* Lost – ABC will go ahead and air the eight episodes already completed.  The producers say that episode eight ends with a mini-cliffhanger.

* The Office – Next week’s episode is the last one remaining.  Co-star Jenna Fischer, in a blog post, said that it’s a shame they couldn’t film the episode that was scheduled to shoot this week, because it would have been the best one they’d ever done.

The 1988 writer’s strike left Moonlighting‘s season finale woefully short.  So they had to do something to fill the rest of the hour.  This was what they came up with.

Moonlighting was always so great at these kinds of winks to the audience.  I wonder what happened to that Bruce Willis guy…

Here’s an interesting look at things from the writer’s point of view of the strike.  It’s the staff writers of The Office giving their take on the issues of the strike from the picket lines.

Those of you who read Pockets of Sanity regularly know that after the cancellation of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, I pretty much abandoned network television.  There were other factors, don’t get me wrong… blind devotion to one show is not the main reason I decided not to watch much of anything this year.  But it was a big part of it.

But there are shows that I do follow, and now the writer’s strike (in its fourth day) has essentially destroyed them.

Family Guy – Reports from Variety say that this Sunday’s upcoming episode is the last episode that’s been completed.  Nothing new is available to air after that.

Lost – TV Guide is reporting that if the strike moves into 2008, season four might not premiere until 2009.  There are only eight episodes completed, and the showrunners aren’t that thrilled at the thought of running another mini-season like last fall’s six episode run.

24 – Season seven is postponed indefinitely from its January start date, probably until next season, so it can run uninterrupted as per usual.  If the strike is over by then, that is.

Look, I pretty much side with the writer’s with their demands here, as do much of the general public.  But public opinion is going to turn against them (and violently) as everyone’s favorite shows begin to royally get screwed with.

After the last writer’s strike, television viewership took an 8% drop.  8% of the viewing audience simply didn’t come back.  They found better things to do with their time.  Right now that sounds like a pretty good idea.

Kinda makes it even worse when you see the people you like to watch each week out there on the picket lines.