I have been insanely busy at work, so this will serve as a catch-all of observations.
An almost violent altercation broke out when discussing the behavior of George during this week’s Grey’s Anatomy. In recent weeks, he’s been extremely difficult in the aftermath of the Meredith Incident. I grant you that he is behaving like a bit of an ass, but I still love him. Okay, he is being an asshole and he ought to grow up. But each of the four main characters has very deep flaws. If you want to pick on someone, what the hell is Izzie doing with Denny? The preview for next week seems to indicate that the bill will come due on that matter shortly. Hey, my blog and I’m backing up my man George.
I saw V For Vendetta a few weeks ago. Not as good as it could have been, better than it has any right to be. It almost goes without saying that it’s not as good as the book, which is amazing. As they said in the Eighties, one man’s Terrorist is another man’s Freedom Fighter; it’s pretty incredible that a film like this got released at all. The ending is a little silly and overblown, but the adaptation is generally pretty good.
Thank You For Smoking is unusual in that it’s a fairly sympathetic portrayal of a professional liar. However, at his best, Nick Naylor is not a liar or a propagandist. He believes in forceful debate. He believes in the free market of ideas. He believes that you should be able to argue articulately for what you believe in and if you do a good job, then you win. There is much to admire in this and I was not expecting to find myself liking this character at times.
I spent time with Dan Dorman recently. While we split on the merits of The Ice Harvest, we both agreed that the ending is weak. The original (comically bleak) ending, available as an extra on the DVD, is much stronger. We also discussed Love Actually; I’ve noticed I keep running into people who really like this movie. I said that I thought that Richard Curtis — who also wrote Four Weddings and a Funeral and Notting Hill — had about eight ideas left for romantic comedy scripts and decided to blow ‘em all out at once. Dan said the movie was “Robert Altman and Nora Ephron had a baby.” We agreed that the two strongest segments are the one with Hugh Grant as the Prime Minister and the one with Alan Rickman and Emma Thompson as a married couple facing infidelity.
It’s been almost a month since I told you to watch The Sopranos. Oh My God, this season is so good. I never even would have imagined the thing with Tony and the way that situation has played out has been incredible. I say we just give Edie Falco the Emmy right now.
I’m leaving for Atlanta on Thursday, so I’ll be reporting from the road shortly.