Tag Archives: Steve Martin
Time for another round of notes — bits and pieces too small for a post and which, for whatever reason, don’t seem likely to ever grow into a post (or even a Brain Bubble con carne). Best of all, from the perspective of many readers, not one single shred of math or contentious ideas!
These notes posts generally have an undercurrent of “spring cleaning” — the whole idea is to help reduce my ever-growing pile of scraps of paper with half-baked ideas. Actual spring cleaning is upon us, so I’m even more vested in seeing how much I can clear away. I even have some notes devoted to the very idea itself.
So without further ado…
Continue reading
14 Comments | tags: A Christmas Carol, Archer (TV series), Little Big Town, Little Feat, Paul Beatty, Steve Martin, William Shatner | posted in Friday Notes
The Solstice has passed, but Christmas Day is tomorrow, and New Year’s Eve lies just ahead. Another year behind, and 2020 awaits. May it be a good one for you and yours!
My small annual gift, here’s a little Christmas Music for you:
Continue reading
8 Comments | tags: Alison Krauss, Christmas, Christmas Eve, Steve Martin, The Piano Guys, The Wexford Carol, Yo-Yo Ma | posted in Life
Nope. Never liked’m.
Watching the Thanksgiving episode of the rebooted Murphy Brown on CBS, where Murphy decides to cook dinner with easily anticipated and well-worn results, it struck me exactly why I don’t find the show very funny. And why I really don’t find any of the CBS comedies since the 1990s very funny: Idiot Clowns.
In general, it’s why I don’t find a lot of comedy very funny. Idiot Clown comedy requires an idiot clown — someone so stupid they are unaware of basic reality, a blindness forced on them to enable a (typically) lame joke. I find it cheap and easy and without much value.
More to the point, I just don’t like idiots or clowns in my entertainment.
Continue reading
13 Comments | tags: Adam Sandler, clowns, Dave Chappelle, George Carlin, idiots, LA Story, Melissa McCarthy, Northern Exposure, Robin Williams, Sarah Silverman, Seth MacFarlane, Steve Martin, Tracy Morgan, Will Ferrell | posted in Movies, Opinion, TV
Yesterday’s post was a rant; this one counters with a rave. The bad news is that it’s my even earlier writing chops from three years prior to the Stargate review, plus — as this was essentially an email — the writing is especially informal and unstructured.
The original plan was to write a new piece on Grand Canyon, because it’s one of my all-time favorite films, and I wanted to do it proper justice. The “review” you’re about to read I wrote shortly after seeing the film for the first time, so it lacks any thoughts I have about it after 25 years and many viewings since then.
But I’m all about clearing my weblog backlog (the blog bog), so here it is in all its informal gushy glory.
Continue reading
5 Comments | tags: Alfre Woodard, Danny Glover, Grand Canyon, Grand Canyon (movie), Kevin Kline, Lawrence Kasdan, Los Angeles, Mary McDonnell, Mary-Louise Parker, Meg Kasdan, modern life, Steve Martin, violence in movies, violent society | posted in Movies
“Far Less” what?
Yesterday I wrote about a TV commercial with a bit of a design flaw (and, yet, without that flaw the commercial wouldn’t work). I generally go to great lengths to avoid having to see television commercials, but sadly one cannot avoid all of them. Still, as a former TV and film student, they fascinate me as much as they annoy me.
Advertisers have under a minute to tell you a story that pushes their product. Some are straight-forward about it, others are more oblique. (Generally, the more real substance a product offers, the greater the chance the commercial is straight-forward.) Some commercials can be real works of art. One of these days I’ll write about some that I find very striking.
Today I want to talk about Toyota Jan. And Bacon.
Continue reading
12 Comments | tags: bacon, Bebe Neuwirth, commercials, Jodie Foster, Kevin Costner, Laurel Coppock, Lawrence Kasdan, Lilith Sternin, Lisa Edelstein, Steve Martin, Toyota Jan | posted in Brain Bubble, TV
I wrote in last night’s post that I had a bet riding on today’s college football game between the Minnesota Gophers and the Iowa Hawkeyes. That’s particularly weird, since: (a) I generally never gamble, especially on sports; (2) when it comes to football, I’m pretty much a “superbowl-only” kind of guy; and (iii) I know nothing about college football [apparently a bronze pig, named Floyd, is involved somehow].
Well, weak from the week, I crashed on the couch all morning and missed most of the game. But I did wake up in time to catch the final 58 seconds (actually a rather long time in football). Final score: Minnesota 13, Iowa 31. That means my former boss and I get beer! [Yes, that’s right, I was betting on Iowa.]
Last night I mentioned it was a long story that I’d tell you later. What I didn’t mention was that it involves a great Humphrey Bogart movie, rotary phones, a prolonged discussion of point spreads and a parody of a famous quote.
Continue reading
2 Comments | tags: Body Heat, college football, Florida noir, Gophers, Hawkeyes, Humphrey Bogart, Key Largo, Lauren Becall, Rachel Ward, Steve Martin | posted in Life, Movies
I was on a supply run to the grocery store this morning and was stuck behind a Toyota Camry for most of the way. My trip takes place on two-lane roads that are hilly and curved enough to prohibit passing, so I was trapped. It was a mellow Sunday morning, and there’s no use (ever) letting other drivers get to you. I’m not one to play the tailgating game, but the four vehicles stuck behind me were stacked up tightly.
In fact, once I realized it was a Camry, I started laughing. For a long time now, I’ve had a perception that when you’re stuck behind a particularly bad driver — one that stands out from the usual bad drivers — there is a good chance the car is a Camry. I’ve discovered that I’m not the only one with that perception; I’ve heard others make the same rant.
But it is a fact that there are a huge number of them on the road, and they age well, so odds are high on any car in front of you being a Camry.
Continue reading
4 Comments | tags: bad drivers, drivers, horrible drivers, LA Story, slow pokes, speed limit, Steve Martin, Toyota Camry | posted in Life, Rant
Logos con carne 