week 2:
for love of mixtapes; god is a dj (and his name is fred); wyclef returns; A-HA RETURNS (!); the twenty greatest songs ever scientifically determined by a three man panel consisting of me, myself and i; oh, and, boobs.

week 3:
get drawn to the magnetic fields; three movies that are grossly overrated; some of the greatest movies...ever; xtc murders love...again; james brown breaks out in a "cold sweat"; morrissey and springsteen...separated at birth?; i bare my soul...again; and MORE!

week 4:
gladiator slays me, eminem and xtc reviews, a new look!, i poke fun at my own writing, the inmates take over the asylum, and MORE!

other blogs i like:
(because they're out there, you know)
nylpm
blue lines
josh's blog
westernhomes
log.nu
skykicking
pearls that are his eyes
catherine's pita
public blog
i drank WHAT?
cultural artifacts of the moment
frytopia

GLADIATOR - dir. ridley scott

---

the post over at pearls reminded me that i never spoke my piece about this movie. there were two poor reviews that i've seen for gladiator: pearls nails one with roger ebert; the other was from the village voice who wrongly compare it to titanic (in richard harris alone you had more better actors in gladiator).

yes, the dialogue is often poor, but it's never really embarrassingly bad. besides, russell crowe has such presence in this film, that he could make the phonebook sound vaguely threatening. this movie is about action, and boy, does it deliver! the whirling opening battle, despite probably bringing back bad memories for those whose stomachs were turned by the blair witch project, accurately captures what one might imagine it to be like in the middle of a fierce war. the fighting just gets better and better from there.

at first, like ebert, i thought the digital effects looked rather poor, but i do believe they got better as the movie progressed and i eventually found myself swept away by the visuals. (he also goes on and on about how the visuals pale in comparison to titus: he sounds like the film elitist who's annoyed that no one went to see the artier film, but are going in droves to see gladiator.)

if you're looking for depth and meaning, you really won't find it here. but if you're looking for the summer movie, you'll get it in gladiator. as peter travers said in rolling stone, this is the movie the "thumbs-up" was invented for, despite ebert's protestations. the huge opening-night audience we saw it with clapped twice during the movie: once at a pivotal scene, and once at the film's end. it's exactly that kind of movie -- by the closing, you feel like you are in that colosseum, and that kind of escapism is rare commodity in today's world.