Well of course it is. It's a 1500 page book condensed into a several hour performance, with singing and dancing eating up precious minutes.

Who thought this was a good idea? Is there a big overlap between musical lovers and Tolkein geeks? It calls the mind the old Onion article about dorkwads and gaywads forming a wad alliance.

Which, of course, can never happen. Dorkwads and gaywads are hopelessly divided on key issues, like bathing and personal grooming (whether or not to).

The "Lord of the Rings" musical, touted as the most expensive stage production yet, met mixed reviews on Friday as critics applauded its leaping orcs and menacing dark riders, but got lost in the tangled plots of Middle Earth.

The 55-strong cast slipped into 500 costumes and engaged in fight scenes and acrobatics atop a 40-ton, computer-controlled stage floor featuring 17 elevators, which spun and rose amid magic and illusion.

For all the feverish activity at Toronto's Princess of Wales Theatre, the show based on J.R.R. Tolkien's epic trilogy drew only one standing ovation in more than three hours, but many in the audience called it breathtaking and spectacular.

The C$28 million ($24 million U.S.) show's technology was of little help to a "largely incomprehensible" musical version of Tolkien's masterpiece, said Ben Brantley of The New York Times, one of several out-of-town critics who flew to Toronto to see the show that is expected to move on to London and Broadway.

"Everyone and everything winds up lost in this ... adaptation of Tolkien's cult-inspiring trilogy of fantasy novels," Brantley said. "That includes plot, character and the patience of most ordinary theatergoers."

Charles McNulty of the Los Angeles Times said, "Pity the production can't be judged exclusively on its design, it would be roundly considered a hit."

Some liked it, though:

But he added that despite the show's shortcomings and desperate need to be cut, "The good news for investors is that commercially the project will surely pay off.

...

Time magazine declared the show a "definitive megamusical" while the Times of London branded it "A stirring triumph of theatrical magic." "With some fine tuning, this tale could hold its audience in total thrall," wrote the Times' Sam Marlowe.

Good Lord. First Spamelot, now this. Geeks have invaded Broadway.

Coming soon -- Your Collection Of Old Avengers Comic Books And Steve Austin Action Figures -- The Musical.

Thanks to Craig.

Posted by: Ace at 12:18 PM | Comments (16)
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This may sound sarcastic, but it's not: Kerry is to be praised for having the integrity to admit the obvious, against his partisan interests. Not many Democrats are going to endorse his assessment.

A former Democratic senator and 9/11 commissioner says a recently declassified Iraqi account of a 1995 meeting between Osama bin Laden and a senior Iraqi envoy presents a "significant set of facts," and shows a more detailed collaboration between Iraq and Al Qaeda.

In an interview yesterday, the current president of the New School University, Bob Kerrey, was careful to say that new documents translated last night by ABC News did not prove Saddam Hussein played a role in any way in plotting the attacks of September 11, 2001.

Nonetheless, the former senator from Nebraska said that the new document shows that "Saddam was a significant enemy of the United States." Mr. Kerrey said he believed America's understanding of the deposed tyrant's relationship with Al Qaeda would become much deeper as more captured Iraqi documents and audiotapes are disclosed.

A 9/11 Commissioner, too. And he seems to believe the document changes the known facts about Al Qaeda and Saddam.

Thanks to Allah.

Posted by: Ace at 12:08 PM | Comments (60)
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The Council On American-Islamic Relations has been using the lawsuit to silence its critics, claiming defamation and the like.

A critic stood up to them, and the lawsuit has been "settled." There's not much indication of what the settlement consisted of, but all the challenged statements -- that CAIR was founded by Hamas, that it receives some funding from terrorist-related organizations, etc. -- are still up on the critics' website, and aren't coming down.

PowerLine's Scott comments:

I infer that CAIR caved. What might be the reasons? One reason suggested in [a NY Sun article about the case] is discomfort regarding information CAIR would have had to disclose in discovery. Another might be the proposition that truth is a complete defense to a claim of libel.

Posted by: Ace at 12:04 PM | Comments (4)
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I said no more on this, but when the author of the book the movie's based on pans it this badly, I have to quote him:

"V for Vendetta" was specifically about things like fascism and anarchy.

Those words, "fascism" and "anarchy," occur nowhere in the film. It's been turned into a Bush-era parable by people too timid to set a political satire in their own country. In my original story there had been a limited nuclear war, which had isolated Britain, caused a lot of chaos and a collapse of government, and a fascist totalitarian dictatorship had sprung up. Now, in the film, you've got a sinister group of right-wing figures — not fascists, but you know that they're bad guys — and what they have done is manufactured a bio-terror weapon in secret, so that they can fake a massive terrorist incident to get everybody on their side, so that they can pursue their right-wing agenda. It's a thwarted and frustrated and perhaps largely impotent American liberal fantasy of someone with American liberal values [standing up] against a state run by neo-conservatives — which is not what "V for Vendetta" was about. It was about fascism, it was about anarchy, it was about [England]. The intent of the film is nothing like the intent of the book as I wrote it. And if the Wachowski brothers had felt moved to protest the way things were going in America, then wouldn't it have been more direct to do what I'd done and set a risky political narrative sometime in the near future that was obviously talking about the things going on today?"

The "pussyboy" angle hadn't occurred to me. Thanks for that, Alan.

The "impotent American liberal fantasy" is what bothers me about this. It's just pure pandering to a certain sort of soft-headed, unhinged mass of partisans. It's not "brave" to pander to like-minded idiots.

And it's not smart or insightful, either.

I didn't like Moore's original book much at all, but at least he seemed to be trying to explore more than the notion that "Margaret Thatcher sucks." But that crude formulation is as complex as the film V for Vendetta gets (substituting "George Bush" in for Margaret Thatcher, of course).

Via Anarchangel, thanks to WesS.

Posted by: Ace at 09:37 PM | Comments (52)
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So claims one of Australia's "most experienced" journalists.

His evidence?

The words "Arab" and "Muslim" are often associated in stories with terrorism, backwards attitudes and sometimes violent behaviors towards women, etc.

These people really do seem to think that words can change the world. It's not the objective, sad reality that Arabs/Muslims are frequently involved with terrorism, atrocities, throwing acid in women's faces, gang-raping girls, etc. It's just the words we use. If we used different words, we would change reality.

I'm reminded of a story of a man kicking a stone.

Posted by: Ace at 08:03 PM | Comments (11)
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NRO is looking through past reviews like The New Republic did in l'affaire Glass.

I don't get this, really. Reviews are a pain in the ass to write -- obviously, my V for Vendetta needs a lot of editing and organization -- but for crying out loud, you just saw the movie. Don't you have something of your own to say about it?

I guess it gets difficult when you have to review crap films like Pay It Forward. I saw that too, but I'd never voluntarily write a review of it, the same way I don't immediately spring to write a 700 word review of the last Twinkies I ate. What the hell can you say about either, except they're mass-produced, sickly-sweet and ephemeral as a ghost's fart?

So I guess that's why you crib. I could not for the life of me manage to properly review some of the really empty crap I've seen. Not the bad stuff; it's fun to review something that's really bad. But the middle-of-the-road inoffensive pap movies like 10 Ways To Lose A Guy. What the hell do you say about a movie like that?

I think that's when reviewers start writing crap like "the stars have no chemistry" and other empty, vague criticisms. You have to find a more specific-sounding, analytical way to say "Eh, it just didn't grab me."

Pretty much the only thing you can say about any Kate Hudson movie, for that matter. (Well, except for Almost Famous, which a lot of people seem to like a lot, though I really don't get that. Oh-- and Skeleton Key was okay. They don't make enough voodoo movies anymore.)

But still. I don't know. Stealing lines for something as easy to write as a movie review seems, what's the word, pretty f'n' stupid to me.

Thanks to Allah.

Posted by: Ace at 07:08 PM | Comments (86)
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Here's political beliefs:

(holding my hand about waist level)

Here's common decency, natural empathy, and respect for one's fellow human beings:

(holding my hand up about at my head)

Get it, assholes?

The heartbroken family of a fallen Bay State soldier was devastated yesterday to find his memorial defaced by callous anti-war vandals who scrawled “Oil” and “Christian Crusade” on a sign commemorating his sacrifice.

“I was enraged,” said Lou Petithory, whose son Daniel, 32, was killed in Afghanistan Dec. 5, 2001. “My main concern is that my son’s memory was attacked.”

It is a memory that Green Beret Sgt. Daniel PetithoryÂ’s parents have struggled to preserve amid the politics over the war on terror. They have stopped reading newspaper editorials and watching TV news shows; not because they disagree with debate, but because they believe the truth about their son and his service is lost in the middle of it.

“He had been in the military for 14 years, so he was one of the older guys on his team,” Lou Petithory recalled after scrubbing the vandalism off his son’s memorial. “They made military history. They were 200 Green Berets inserted into Afghanistan, and within two weeks the Taliban was gone.”

“I’m so proud of my son for being part of that,” he said.

Daniel Petithory became one of AmericaÂ’s first combat deaths in the war when an errant B-52 strike hit his position near the Taliban lines north of Kandahar.

A nature trail through his Berkshires hometown of Cheshire has three brown-and-white signs dedicating the trail in his name. Only one sign was defaced, but it wouldnÂ’t have hurt his family any less had it been only one letter.

I don't get it. There are people I strongly disagree with. I find their positions repugnant. But I would not stoop to harming them, harrassing them, or, God forbid, protesting a family member's funeral or desecrating a memorial to a fallen child.

It's just pure sociopathic egotism. These bastards are so filled with self-love they imagine that their every belief must be vindicated by whatever means necessary.

Thanks to Craig.

Posted by: Ace at 06:59 PM | Comments (45)
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Caspera posted a long review in the comments. He hit a lot of points I meant to hit but didn't, and some that just blew by me. (Like, for example, V's gallery of "banned art" seems to include a lot of absolutely inoffensive landscape paintings-- what the hell?) more...

Posted by: Ace at 06:12 PM | Comments (21)
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I'm sure you know, but Ben Domensch, writer of the WashPost blog "Red America," has resigned over accusations of plagiarism advanced by leftwing bloggers.

He offers rebuttals to the charges at RedState, but some seem unconvincing. His editor kept inserting material from other reviews into his movie reviews? Why would he do that?

Michelle Malkin isn't convinced. And she's biased in his favor -- he was her editor at Regnery.

Still, a lot of these charges go back to his freshman year at college. Seems, um, a little far back to go for dirt.

Posted by: Ace at 12:59 PM | Comments (37)
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Hollywood serves up a murderous metrosexual morality play that clumsily strokes every erogenous zone on the leftist body politic

I went to see V for Vendetta last night for two reasons: 1, I've written about it a lot, so I should see what I've already criticized, and 2, I like superhero movies and I also like fascist dystopia movies, so, really, if you've got both of those together, how bad could it be?

Let's cut to the chase. Even ignoring all the brain-dead ham-handed sledgehammer-subtle political text-messaging in the film -- white male Christian conservatives are just plain evil, gays are lumious beings strong with the force whom the Sith want to eradicate, terrorism is often justified, but there is actually no external terrorist threat at all, as the government did it all -- this is just witless, dreary, clumsy, amateurish and, most inexcusably of all, flat-out dull movie. It wins the award for the both the worst superhero movie and worst furture dystopia movie I've ever seen, and I've seen both versions of the The Punisher (including the one with Dolph Lundgren and Louis Gosset Jr.) as well as Soylent Green.

I want to stress that this is a bad movie. I was ready to ignore its politics, because I do in fact like the idea of Zorro-like revolutionaries/vigilantes running around thrwarting a corrupt government. And I figured-- future dystopia? Well, certainly there's a lot of interesting stuff in such movies. The depiction of pure misery, fear, and coercion is often an exciting one, in artistic terms. Set design and costume design alone are often worth the price of admission -- 1984 was dismal-looking by design, but in an interesting manner, Brazil was nothing but eye-candy, the fascist modern-dress version of Richard III was sumptuous in its depiction of a Nazi-esque 1950's England. So surely there would be enough nicely choreographed action, cool 1940's-styled high-collared leather longcoats, and fascistic iconography and statuary to hold my interest, at least in visual terms.

Nope. There's hardly any action at all -- there is one brief fight scene in the beginning one one slightly longer and better one at the end -- and the future, apparently, looks almost precisely as it does now. I don't believe that choice was out of a lack of budget, or costume and art designers with a lack of imagination. I think that choice was quite deliberate, made in order to further suggest the fear-based fascist theocratic dystopia shown in V is in fact occurring right now.

As a political statement, that may work for the lefties, but as a cinematic and artistic choice, it's an abysmal one. What is the point in seeing a movie set "in the future" when everything, from clothing to fluorescent lights to London's skyline to computers (they didn't even bother making the computers look a little more advanced and compact!) look precisely the way they do at this moment?

[More coming; just wanted to put this up right now as I compose my criticisms. If I can prevent one person from seeing this abortion by putting up a half-written review now, it will have been worth it.] more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:53 PM | Comments (383)
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