jwallis's Blog

I grew up with Press Your Luck before it became Whammy. My grandmother and I used to watch Wheel of Fortun and Jeopardy when Sajak and Trebeck had believable hairpieces. The game shows out now are a completely different caliber than those of yesteryear (read: 1980s). Here's a couple of the newer shows and what they compare to from back in the day:

Deal or No Deal: People choose a briefcase filled with up to $1,000,000 (represented on a piece of printer paper). Howie Mandell, fresh off his Bobby's World fame tries to convince the contestant to take a much smaller amount of money. The person believes they have the $1,000,000 case and they say no and end up with anywhere between $1500 and $40,000.
Old School Equivilent (OSE): Let's Make A Deal
Better? Old School. Nothing beats the look of a middle aged housewife find out she turned down a Jamacian vacation for a pile of lint.

The Rich List: An exorbitant amount of money is offered (up to $10,000,000). The catch? An exorbitant list is requested. The example i saw recently: Name forty animated Disney films. FORTY. My significant other and i hit 21 before we went to IMDB for help.
OSE: Closest i could find was 50 Grand Slam from 1976. 2 people face each other in isolation booths. They take turns answering 4 questions. Whoever answers more wins that level. 8 levels=$50k While its not $10 million, still for 1976 that's not anything to scoff at.
Better: $10 mill is hard to pass up the chance at. And its you against your brain, not you against someone else's brain. Rich List Wins

Random Game Show Facts:
*The show with the most revivals in history is Pyramid, which has had 10 incarnations since its debut as The $10,000 Pyramid in 1974.
* The longest consecutively running show (no revivals or cancellations) is The Price is Right, which has been out since 1972. However, Spanish game shows hold the record with Sabado Gigante (which is Giant Saturday, i think) with 44 years of production consecutively.
* Fifty-Nine shows have been cancelled in the same year they were created/ revived/ began. Most of those were quiz shows, and very few were spin offs (those usually lasted two seasons).

Everyone's favorite psycho is finally announcing the date for his upcoming wedding... kinda. Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes have announced that they will be wedding next month. Sometime. No date has been released as of the publishing time for this.
Lack of caring is also at an all time high... what is a scientology wedding LIKE anyway? IF anyone has any objections, submit a form and we'll respond in 3-5 weeks? Pictures of the wedding will be held for ransom until a movie is coming out and THEN be released to hype it (if Cruise can GET a movie anymore).

I'd write more about it, but what's the point? No body cares about your life anymore. You are washed up. Lets move on with our lives now.

I don't remember who released the memo telling every big production company to start playing Magic tricks as plots, but it was received and followed. After Edward Norton's low key release "The Illusionist" disappeared, Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale, Michael Caine and the director of Batman Begins, Christopher Nolan, pulled a rabbit out of their hat with "The Prestige."

Couple things they have going for them over "Illusionist." Lets start with cast: JAckman, Bale vs Ed Norton. There is no competition. Norton is a man who works well off other characters: "Fight Club," "American History X," "Death To Smoochy"... All were good performances by Norton with phenomenal performances by other people. In movies he has done with himself as the main lead ("25th Hour, to name just one'), the movie was lackluster and blah. With Blae and Jackman, from their very first big movies ("Newsies" and "X-Men", respectively), they showed they can build a character and hold it, bring an audience and entertain them.

Plot is a big question mark with two movies of the same subject matter as well. "Prestige" involves conflict, battle, one on one drama between Jackman and Bale. "Illusionist" is a love story. Guy wants girl, so he makes her inhibitions (and probably clothes) vanish. Its a chick flick with a card trick. If I wanted a chick flick, i would have rented "Steel Magnolias" and stocked up on Kleenex. If i wanted a magic show, Mindfreak should be in syndication soon. I want something new. Dueling Magicians gets my vote here.

Maybe its because I think Ed Norton is the most overrated actor of all time or because Christian Bale is drop dead gorgeous. But if you have to choose one, I'd go for the Prestige, as about 1.4 million people did this last weekend.

Daniel Radcliff is an established movie actor. He has been the star of Harry Potter movies in the title role since like 1950 (or whenever the first movie came out). Its a safe bet to say that when Harry turns 30 or dies (probably the latter, as people in his 'lifestyle' often do), Daniel will still always be known as the Lightning Bolt Clad lad of magic.

Unless his next endeveour works.

Radcliff is taking on a role as a "troubled young man with a religious-erotic obsession with horses." Ripped straight from the Enumclaw headlines, Radcliff will also be performing a scene in the naked. While I personally don't think I would enjoy watching Harry get it on with a horse, i can think of hundreds of thousands of fan fic writers who have pictured it in their head and their writing already (except replace "a horse" with "Draco Malfoy").

His reasoning is that he wants to mix up people's idea of what he's capable of. I jest about the bestial aspects of this part, but I have no belief that he will be boning a horse. Someone may want to release a statement about that sometime soon though for people who don't watch the Tony's or follow London's production schedule. The wrong idea may be received about young Potter. And i'd hate for him to be typecast in magic and animal roles.

I was raised in eastern Washington in a Pentecostal household (can i get an amen) where my family raised animals and barns as well. In this time, I was exposed to many things that helped drive me to the city: cows, hay, and country music. I still enjoy some country, especially the newer artists. This week, the Country World's sexiest Man and Woman of Country, however, showed that even down home values burp occasionally.

Keith Urban was checked into rehab on Tuesday for alcohol abuse. He and wife Nicole Kidman released a statement that he was sorry for the pain he caused. Now, coming from a rock star, rehab is seen as normal. But for a redneck, a large amount of beer consumption is almost in the contract. Agent gets 20%, cowboy hats/guitars are necessary, drink lots of beer. he also admitted to having a past run in with cocaine. I had never heard of a country star using hard drugs. I know Keith Richards is probably like "That's all?" but country fans aren't used to that type of behavior.

Nor are they used to sleeping around. Sara Evans recently left her stint on Dancing with the Stars to deal with the divorce she filed for when her husband found out she was having an affair. With another guy. While married (just to make sure we all understand what the harlot did). I Am a HUGE Sara Evans fan, but i'm in shock. I had always had such a high image of her and now its like, ugh, whore.

I realize crossover artists are more and more a popular thing, but this is an outrage. Where are the conservative redneck bible thumpers going to get their religiously laced moral packed music from now? The country world is becoming more and more secular.

I can't wait till Sara's next album comes out. Now that she's off the "Holier Than Thou" pedestal, i can appreciate her music from a standpoint of someone who is real and screws up too.

"Grey's Anatomy" stirred up some mild publicity yesterday when one of its stars, T.R. Knight, revealed through a press release that he is a homosexual. Apparently, an argument erupted between two co-stars that contained the phrase "at least I'm not a fa##ot like T.R." or something along those lines, and Knight felt he needed to quell any rumors and keep speculation out of the picture by confirming any suspicions.
His hope is that people will not look at his character differently. My hope is the same. But the reality is that his character's on screen romance with Ellen Pompano's character will constantly be met with skepticism. Many people can only suspend disbelief to a point, so while aliens attacking Tom Cruise will keep people watching and eating popcorn, a known gay actor having an on screen romance with a female will make people scoff. That's why you don't see Ian McKellan playing opposite... well.. anyone in a romantic relationship. He'd rather have people look at hi.s acting, not his personal life. Which is what Knight wants. However, McKellan also has a bit more street credibility than Knight.
This may or may not impact his career. It very likely won't impact ratings for 'Anatomy,' as current viewers won't change the channel because Knight does it from behind (get it? rogues? ugh, never mind). The gay community won't take up arms in support and all start watching the show if they didn't before. Sadly, unlike Lance Bass coming out of the closet (that had the bright arrows telling everyone where he was), this will end with a small splash and everyone will forget about it in about 20 minutes.

Many movies coming out in the coming months have a very indie film feel to them. The direction of the film world is against the big budget, special effects bonanzas that may bring in millions but make little to no profit as the costs are going up exponentially (and George Lucas has ruined it for the rest of the industry). The two movies I will be looking at both fit into the indie-turned-mainstream concept; Running With Scissors and Stranger than Fiction.

Brian Cox in my mind will always be Stryker from X-Men 2. The idea of his playing something other than that (especially a shrink) will take some getting used to. However, looking at the cast of Scissors (Alec Baldwin making a huge comeback of late), Annette Benning (Oscar hopes since Hilary Swank isn't doing anything big this year?), Gwyneth Paltrow (welcome back to the acting world) and many many more name stars, makes me excited to see what they can do. I am a firm believer that a cast when properly used can make a movie and make it work wonders. And a cast with this much talent? Ryan Murphy, the director, would have to be a paraplegic retard to not get an amazing movie out of this.

As for Fiction, my rule has always been Will Ferrell in anything other than a supporting role is a mistake. Don't argue with me on this, he annoys the hell out of me. But in this movie, he plays the subject of a story being written by Emma Thompson, a struggling writer determined to kill Will Ferrell (something I've wanted to do forever), unaware that he is a real person. Again, a movie with a strong supporting cast (Maggie Gyllenhall, Queen Latifah, Dustin Hoffman, to name a few) and a really great concept. This movie will sink or swim based on one factor and one factor alone: can Will pull off serious? If he can make it believable, he can do it.

I'm going recommend both of these movies. I have faith in the cast, in the stories, and in the crews.

A Filipino friend and I were discussing the recent Reality release by fox, Celebrity Duets. Of the cast, I had picked Lucy Lawless to win, as the choir i'm in performed with her 2 years ago and she has an incredible voice. Mikey put his money on Jai Rodriguez because he's hot (oh yeah, and he has the most incredible voice ever).

I have never seen an Asian not behind the wheel of a car get as angry as he did when Jai was eliminated by the "votes" received by callers. He went from having the most votes every week to the least. Both Mikey and I cried foul. It seemed oddly like the producers got tired of the token gay contestant and eliminated him despite the fact that his voice was better than just about everyone there.

It brings up a good point though: how are we supposed to know the votes are being calculated correctly? Every reality show that has public voting uses a computer program to tabulate, but programs can be altered. And when we see Ruben Stoddard beat Clay Aiken, we start to wonder who's running this show. ESPECIALLY 3 years later when Ruben is off the map and Clay is releasing his third album.

If the public is voting, then my battle cry will change: STOP VOTING FOR PEOPLE WHO SUCK!!!!! Otherwise, if the producers want people to keep watching, they will need to make sure they are very careful about what they will do for ratings, because loss of trust of the show=loss of viewers=cancellation. Just ask Jennifer Garner and the cast of Alias.

Hinder released their first single a little bit ago, titled Lips of an Angel. It was a hit instantly. I heard it and was like "This sounds cool" even though i thought it was Constantine from American Idol.

Then i listened to it. This song is about the guy sneaking into the room next to his bedroom and talking to his ex-girlfriend about how much he misses her and thinks of her, and how if his girlfriend heard, he'd be in trouble, but he wishes he was back with the ex girlfriend.

Um, ew?

I understand the rock star image of different girls every night and all that is prevalent. But do we have to hear about it ever 90 minutes (the standard rotation time of a popular song)? Teen boys have enough time not being complete schmucks in relationships without superstars enforcing it.

This tuesday American Dreamz comes out on DVD, among other things. I'm so excited about this for a couple of reasons. Firs and foremost, Dennis Quaid has always been a favorite actor of mine. Second, Mandy Moore aces the concept of an Idol... er.. "Dreamz" contestant. Hugh Grant has comedic timing and a wit that makes him seem so believable as the bitter jaded judge. I remember when i saw this in theatres it was pretty close to the top of my list for movies for 2006 (it raised a point or two when X-Men 3 turned out to be the most horrible garbage ever). If you have seen American Dreamz, pick it up. If you haven't, rent it THEN buy it.Totally worth it.
Other movies being released this week: The Omen, The Break Up, Over the Hedge and Charmed Seasons 1-6 (!!!)
Thats all for today. Let me know what movie you are excited to buy in the next few weeks.

Today was greeted with one of the most sad news stories I've had to read in awhile. Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle was killed when the single-engine plane he was flying crashed into a Manhatten Building Wednesday. He is survived by his wife Melanie and his son Christopher.
Lidle had been playing Major League Baseball for 9 seasons, enjoying stints with the Devil Rays, the Athletics, the Mets, the Reds, the Blue Jays and the Phillies before joining the New York Yankees, recently eliminated from post season play. While he was not an All-Star caliber player, his personality garnered praise from just about every player who took the field with him.
Lidle is the third well known MLB player to be killed in plane accidents. Roberto Clemente was also lost in a plane accident in 1972.
Thoughts, comments and prayers are definitely in order if you have any or all.

This weekend, two movies were released to the entertainment bloodstream for the masses to indulge in; The Departed and Employee of the Month. I sat through the first one, and heard reviews from the greater Seattle area of the latter.

I'm not a reviewer, because I've never worked in the industry, and people are to make their own opinions. But I am so tired of Jessica Simpson, who did an interview on Friday with a local radio station. She spoke leagues about how funny the movie is, how people would "have to see it more than once to get all the jokes they laugh over the first time." I know celebrities are supposed to pimp their movies and such, but an outlandish statement like that is bound to get people to never see your crap movies again. She would have been wise to say "It's a fun movie with a lot of humor." Period! If people don't like it then, great. But if you set yourself up with, "OMGZORS! It'z the gr8est EVAH!!!," you will not only make you sound like an egotist but make people respect your opinion less.

If you saw the movie, tell me your thoughts on it.

PS: The Departed was very bloody. Not quite Kill Bill bloody, but close. Good for action fans, chick flick viewers beware.