Lost Girl

I was flipping through the streaming services and I came across this independent movie called "Lost Girls" which turned about to be pretty good. I am usually not much for serial killer stories but this one took a different approach.

You see it looked at the Mom of one of the victims. Mari Gilbert is the Mom of three girls one of whom was prostitute who went missing on Long Island. They live in Ellenville New York which is a real upstate shit hole. This show gives one of the best depictions of working class life I have ever seen on film. The way they are on the edge. Working three jobs just to keep things level. How young girls get exploited.

Anyhoo this movie is really well done. The star this actress Amy Ryan who was from "The Office" is really vulnerable. They film her without makeup wrinkles and all. Very impressive star turn.

I was vaguely aware of the case but didn't know the details. The kicker is in the final coda of what happened to Mari Gilbert after the events depicted in the film.

Highly recommended.

If you want to see a cool new movie....

Check out "Chef" which should be for free on Netflicks and pretty cheap on pay per view. It was written, directed and stars Jon Favreau who seems to have been locked in a bakery since he made "Swingers." I feel for this guy because he is like me and he loves to eat. So he made this great movie where you can actually see him making food. He is establishing a relationship with his son as he drives his food truck across the country after he got fired. He was fired after an epic blow out with a blogger and it was really cool.

What is different is you see the mundane issuses of running a restaruant. Getting produce. Changing the menu. Instructing the staff. The conflict between the front of the house (finance) and the Kitchen. It is really good.

Five stars from me.

Plus it has the chick with big tits from Modern Family and some great Music. Worth a look see.

"A Walk Among the Tombstones" is dead to me.

To pick up the discussion in another thread blake said he would recommend "A Walk Among the Tombstones" as a current movie I might enjoy. Here is his review in his own fine blog "The Bit Maelstrom."

As I had mentioned I thought this adaptation of Lawrence Block's novel was horrible but then that's me. I am generally pissed at movie adaptations because they almost always suck. Especially detective or crime novels which always lose their tone or feeling when transcribed to the screen.

Here are the problems with this adaptation. The essence of Matt Scudder in the Block novels is his alcoholism. It is a presence in the books. It really got short shrift here. The keep a lot of the set ups from the book but they are just poorly executed. The only thing they did right was the "origin story" you know where he got bit by the radioactive spider. In this case it was when his errant bullet killed Estrellita Rivera in Washington Heights after a bar shoot out. That part was well done. As Pete mentions in the comments at Blake's joint the character of TJ was really misplayed. He was much more resourceful in the books and helps Scudder with Computer hackers who get him the phone numbers. They really should have made it a period piece instead of trying to update it to the year 2000. All in all it is a misfire.

Not as bad as the last translation of a Scudder book into the movies. That was an abortion called "Eight Million Ways to Die" starring Jeff Bridges made in 1986. In that they move the scene to LA instead of New York. It is just about the worst adaptation I have ever seen from book to movie.

It really pisses me off when they kill a good book like this. I mean I have seen some great adaptations lately. The Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones are two examples of exemplary translations from book to screen. An even better example is "Justified" where they really captured Elmore Leonard's sensibility. You don't care about the details when they get the feel right. But if they can't capture the sensibility then you start to nitpick. Or at least I do.

A real misfire. I am just ecstatic that they did not make my favorite Scudder book "When the Sacred Ginmill Closes." At least I have that to hold on too while I watch TV.

Why don't you watch movies?

I don't have all that much free time and I don't like to invest all that much time in a movie. Every once in a while we start one and it sucks and we are pissed that we wasted our time.

Now I make an exception for big time science fiction movies like The Avengers and Captain America. Or the Hobbit movies. The new Cinderella movie looks pretty good. But most of the movies that come out these days kinda look like they really suck.

What we have been doing is binge watching on NetFlicks. We check out a series and if we like it we catch up by watching an episode every night until we have seen it all. It beats out movies because you basically know what you are getting.

Still I might make an exception for Cinderella. The cousin from Downton Abbey plays Cinderella you know?

They craves it!

So we are going through the Amazon Prime on my Smart TV and they have a bunch of free old movies available to watch. All of the Dukes best are available. Fort Apache. She Wore a Yellow Ribbon. The Searchers. Liberty Valence. Sons of Katie Elder. Red River. Angel and the Badman. Star Packer. Pittsburgh. They are all there.

So we went through and chose some as our favorites so we could download them quickly without searching through everything. And what do if find. "Mandingo."

"Mandingo" is one of my favorite movies of all time. With Ken Norton, James Mason, Susan George and the incomparable Perry King! This is the original that Tarrentino ripped off for "Django." It is the best southern plantation, sex with slaves, fight to the death movie of all time.

If you get a chance you should check it out.

Highly recommended.

AH-CHOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!

No this is not a post about the time Cedarford was running after ricpic at the Althouse commenters meeting. It's about this stupid movie I saw yesterday.

Every so often we play hooky with our good friends and go to a movie and dinner. Since it was my birthday this week they treated us which was very nice of them. We went to Astoria to the Kaufman Studios as we usually do and saw "Contagion" which is the epidemic movie. Now the movie was really true to live since it was all Gwyneth Platrows fault. She caught a deadly disease in China and spread it throughout the United States. There were heroic doctors and UN Health Care Workers and nasty businessmen and horrible bloggers. You know the usual liberal bullshit.

But I did get to see them rip off Gynnies scalp and cut open her skull. If only they could do that in real life!

The dinner was superb at our favorite joint in Astoria. We didn't have a reservation so they sat us in the wine bar which was actually a lot better as it was much quieter and they had wide screen TV's with the Yankee game. It was a lot of fun.

More Men in Black Bullshit!

So they filmed a scene last night. What they filmed was a chase scene as a bunch of sixties vintage cars rolled down Court St and two stunt men on a motorcyle went the wrong way up Court St. For some reason they are setting in Queens. I think because they had filmed in Flushing Meadow Park.

Here they set up a phony subway stop on the corner of my block. It says "Elmhurst" station and has sixties era signage. It is made out of wood and the blue paper is for the CGI to put something in ....maybe some aliens?

Here is the funny part. As we were walking down the street to the Mexican restauarnt after we closed the store they kept stopping us as they filmed. Which I didn't like too much and I gave them a hard time. Now they has a bunch of people hanging around on the street wearing period costumes. They doubled as crowd control and as extras. One black dude was there all dressed in a sixties style with a hipster sixties hat and all. So I go to him "Dude who is the technical advisor on this flick...he fucked it all up." He goes 'What do you mean?" " I go "Dude ....in the 1960's ....you weren't allowed on Court St. Just sayn'"

The wife punched me for that one.

Hey we can't wait to go see Bridesmaids

We can't wait to go see Bridesmaids. Well I can wait but the wife went with me to Thor so I have to even it up. Plus Melissa McCarthy is in it and got great reviews. She is one of our favorites. So next week it will be back to Astoria to check it out.

More Men in Black bullshit!

Well it looks like they are shutting down Court St for two nights to film this movie. The location scout came by and offered $400 to turn on the lights and an additional $200 to have someone stay in the store to keep the gates up. They are going to digitalized the fronts of the stores anyway so it is all bullshit. I am leaving my gates down but I will leave the lights on.

The problem is of course that no one can park anywhere or the cops will tow you away. They are starting that at 4pm so that screws with my customers who might want to drive by on Saturday. It is just unnecessary bullshit. They said they have already spent $500 million on the movie and they are just getting started. What a mess.

Movie Memories Number 7

God Bless those puppies.

Movie Memories Number 6

You will be between the Mormons and the Midgets. To be sure.

Movie Memories Number 5

I have my eyes on you M.

Movie Memories Number 4

Sgt. 'Mac' MacChesney: It just goes to show you what a piece of dry goods will do

Movie Memories Number 3

First Sgt. Festus Mulcahy: [after Co. Thursday has told the soldiers to destroy the contraband "whiskey"] "Destroy it," he says. Well, boys, we've a man's work ahead of us this day.

Movie Memories Number 2

Captain Nathan Brittles: You got a breath on you like a hot mince pie.
Top Sergeant Quincannon: Ah, Captain darlin'. As you well know I took "the pledge" after Chapultepec.
Captain Nathan Brittles: And Bull Run, and Gettysburg, and Shiloh, and St. Patrick's Day, and Fourth of July!

I was totally wrong...again!

The Warriors Three were a huge part of the new Thor movie. Along with the goddess Sif they played major roles. And my man Volstagg was played by Ray Stevenson the dude from "Rome." Way cool.

We had a "Ferris Buellar" day yesterday where we took off and played hookie all day. Our good friends came over for lunch and we decided on the spur of the moment to go to the movies. I had wanted to see Thor so we went to see it in 3D and it was great. It is amazing with computerized special effects can do these days. All of your favorties were in it like Loki and Hemidal and the Warriors Three.

Now I can't wait for the Captain America movie.

The ducks won't take off their glasses?

They loved Thor in 3D but they don't want to take off the glasses. Plus they quacked through the whole movie. I hate when they do that.

But he's the mighty Thor, God of Thunder!

I can't wait to catch the "Thor" movie. Thor was one of my favorite comics when I was a kid and I never thought they would be able to make it into a movie. I hear that they kind of changed the origin story which sucks because I thought that was one of the best ones in comic history. When Odin put Thor's memories into Donald Blake and he found the walking stick/hammer it was pretty cool. They seem to have kept some elements of it but discarded others.

I especially loved the Jack Kirby version of the "Tales of Asgard" which were just about my favorite comics of all time. I even tried my hand at some fan fiction when I was in my early teens. But there wasn't the outlets like they have now with Baen books and what not. Who knows if I could have pursued that things could have turned out really different.

Anyhoo, check out our valued friend and commenter Blakes's review of the movie. He knows his movies.

Oh and he knows that pose.

Captain America Calling......

He's gonna be here soon. Can't wait. I hope the Red Skull and Baron Zemo make an appearance as well.

I never ever go to the actual movies but I am making an exception for the new Thor movie.

I can't wait.

Mel Gibson Comeback Movies You Don't Want to See.

"Turner and Cootch: I Should Have Fisted a Beaver Instead of Marrying That Russkie Bitch."