Bing's Last Sing

Every year I try and find some YouTube clips of classic Christmas songs performed on television in the 50's...these clips seem to be few and far between. Perhaps if I was looking for clips of cats falling off kitchen counters I'd be more successful. However, here's a holiday cheer filled clip I found - Mr. Christmas himself Bing Crosby singing his signature tune, White Christmas. Bing Crosby Christmas Specials were a holiday staple for many years, this show is from 1977 and was called Bing Crosby's Merrie Olde Christmas. It was to be his last holiday special.

Ice Age 4: Continental Drift

As some of you must be aware I have started making vLogs (Video Blogs) with my daughter for the films that she watches. As is the case with Ice Age 4, there are a number of films that I might not watch, but she does. So I figured that it might be best to get the viewpoint of the target audience for these films.

Fourth in the successful series, Ice Age 4: Continental Drift follows the adventures of Manny, Diego, Sid, and Squint as they work their way through changes in their lives and the environment.

Here is what Saanvi thought of the film which she viewed in 3D. (At the time of the "interview" she was suffering from a cold, so do keep that in mind :-)

Batman - Knight Off (Web Series)

Batman: Knight Off is a web series by the up and coming duo of movie-makers Arse Crayon whose mantra is "films of no artistic merit".

You can view the first and second episode of the series below, both of which have a certain subtle humor that tickles the bones at the right spots.

Episode 1, wherein Batman goes shopping on his "Knight Off" has a certain comic charm to it even though the 9 minute short makes you feel sorry for Batman from the moment he arrives in his carrier van and gets his cape caught in the door.

The makers state that "The locations Batman visits were not in anyway prewarned and as such all interaction between the public and the Dark Knight are genuine", which in all honesty is what brings about a certain authenticity to the entire film.

Episode 2 is more of an "exposé" of sorts where we discover during a drive how it is that Batman actually goes about doing his work as a cape crusader keeping the streets clean. While the comedy is once again perfect, the tone of the second installment is slightly on the darker side, which further adds a layer that I look forward to seeing being explored by the makers in future episodes.

My only criticism about both the episodes would be that the scenes shot outside in the car-park and inside the car are sometimes a tad too dark. Considering that they are using a "Canon MV20 camera which is about 15 years old" (I checked with Chip Thompson who is the journalist in the webisodes) I think it is a small aspect of the film that can be overlooked. Moreover, the comedy keeps the audience occupied enough not to pay attention too much to such small matters.

I've been following Chip Thompson on Twitter for about a year now and am a huge fan of his movie reviews that he posts on YouTube. His comic timing, which is very British, and should be since he is British, is always spot on. Playing the unseen "reporter" in the web series, Chip is the common sense to Batman's absurdity. The real star of the film is Gavin Finn playing the title character. He plays his role with such conviction and a straight face that the entire setup doesn't seem like a parody even for a moment.

Arse Crayon has almost a dozen different videos on You Tube which are a bit of a hit and miss. But, comedy is such a diverse genre that everyone will have their own views on these videos. Nevertheless, it is always fun watching cinema admirers taking on a camera and doing original stuff and presenting it for the audience's enjoyment for free.      

All the best to Arse Crayon on their future endeavors and here's to a successful web series that is Batman: Knight Off.

BATMAN: KNIGHT OFF Episode 1

BATMAN: KNIGHT OFF Episode 2

Briefcase (Short)

The first thing that struck me about this 6 minute short was the camera angles used throughout the film. Stepping aside from the conventional angles, the film plays around with low angle shots, tilt shots, in a subtle way without making a gimmick out of it. That, considering the length of the film, works rather well and brings about freshness in the film.

The story of Briefcase is about a man on the run with a briefcase whose contents remain unknown to the audience till the very end. In short (no pun intended) it's a chase film, but mysterious enough to keep the audience guessing as to what actually is happening. Once again, since it lasts only 6 minutes, it manages to capture the audience in the right frame of mind, and ends in a way that leaves space for discussion. The fact that the film is not clear about its ending (at least after the first watch), and also has a pretty shocking end, on one end can be disappointing as the audience might leave confused, while on the other, to my liking, it encourages exploring the different possibilities.

I thoroughly enjoyed this six minute adventure and look forward to future projects by the makers of the film. The filming, production, and overall feel of the short are quite exceptional and reflect the work that went into the making. Since it's only six minutes of our life, but many hardworking hours for the makers, I highly recommend that you watch this film.

Briefcase

(Please click on the link to view the film on YouTube)

SPOILER ALERT

Since I had the opportunity to email the maker of the film, Nate Golon, he was kind enough to send me the story of the film and the "mythology" behind it. I strongly recommend that you view the film before reading the blurb below, as Briefcase is all about discovering and guessing what's going on, on your own first.

      "In this film's universe, right before you die, a briefcase is left near you for Death to pick up. This briefcase has a picture of you at your moment of death. Death comes into the world momentarily in human form in order to collect the briefcase. If Death does not come and get the briefcase in time (which happens very rarely), "miracles" occur, where a person comes back to life after being pronounced dead. When Death is in human form (most of the time it is just for a few moments), he follows the same rules as a normal human does. He takes many human forms - a doctor, paramedic, onlooker at an accident, or in this case, a cop. His only heightened sense when he is in human form is his sense of where the person he is going to collect may be. But he must still follow human rules in order to get to that person (and the person's briefcase) he is after. It is only after he successfully obtains the desired person's briefcase that he is free to leave the human form. 

Carter cheats death by seeing the briefcase and seeing the contents inside. The gunshot goes off right as he looks at the picture, and at the end, when the cop is looking at the picture of Carter dead, he sees what should have been Carter's moment of death, next to the car. The scene at the very end with the mom and daughter is what happens normally when a person dies, where people never see the briefcase. Inside that briefcase is the picture of the little girl."


Photo Courtesy - Nate Galon

Can You Guess Why I'm Going To Watch This Season of Celebrity Apprentice?

One question: What's an Aubrey O'Day?

He-Man + She-Ra + Christmas = Awesome

One of the crown jewels of my VHS collection has always been He-Man & She-Ra: A Christmas Special, which I taped one random Saturday afternoon off Baltimore's WBFF 45 long after He-Man & She-Ra were a thing on any kid's radar. I was more than stoked to find this great Christmas special released to DVD and sitting on the shelf for me at Wal-Mart for a mere $7.50! Of course I picked it up and now it will be a treasured keepsake of Christmas memories for our family to share for generations to come!

If you've never witnessed the pure holiday magic of He-Man & She-Ra: A Christmas Special...it's about 40 minutes of the muscle-bound duo fighting creatively named creatures like The Snow Beast, The Beast Monster, and the Manchines. He-Man tosses off his one liners which aren't really puns, he just kind of says things with the delivery of a joke, even though there is no joke to be had. I'm not sure how She-Ra managed to fight so many bad guys in her show and this special seeing as how her outfit is skimpier than stripper. I spent hours watching the She-Ra show when I was a kid and perhaps that is why later in life I developed an affinity for strippers....but anyhow...Orko ends up getting beamed to Earth and then he brings back two kids who share the traditions of Christmas with everyone on Eternia. Nasty ol' Horde Prime doesn't like Christmas so he sends Skelator and Hordack to find the kids. When the kids end up with Skeletor..what happens is possibly the greatest couple of minutes in all of filmed Christmas entertainment history...You gotta click here to see it!

The Greatest Financial News of the Decade

More Vintage Kings Dominion

Oh, Ed! Will you ever stop scouring YouTube looking for old videos of your beloved Virginia amusement park Kings Dominion? The answer, my friends, is no! Feast your eyes on this spiffy 8mm film I dug up on the YouTube featuring tons of great old 70's style amusement park fun.

First off you'll see the Rebel Yell with some great shots of Lake Charles and the King Cobra roller coaster by it's side. The lake has since been filled in to make way for the water park and the King Cobra...it was at Jolly Roger in Ocean City, MD for a while. I'm not sure where it is now, I bet I could find out. (And will!) There's also some neat footage of the sky ride and the view of the park from said sky ride. You just don't see bucket-style sky rides like that anymore! And there are some gorgeous shots of the Lost Mountain as well as some footage of KD's Giant Slide. And it's a really big Giant Slide. Enjoy!

Dutch Wonderland on the News

The local Fox affeliate was live at Dutch Wonderland Thursday morning to show off the new rides.

Summer Movie Preview III

My kids are super excited about this one...


And speaking of animals...

Summer Movie Preview II

This looks fun...


...and this looks really good...

Summer Movie Preview I

Loved One, hated Two, sat-out Three, Number Four has mermaids...I'm in!



Great cast!

Happy Easter!

It Looks Like I Picked A Bad Week To Not Speak Spanish

Read This Post You Hockey Puck

It's long been a dream of my buddy Kevin and I to see legendary comic Don Rickles perform live. Tonight we're heading up to Atlantic City, NJ to finally make that dream a reality. What would be the icing on the cake is for Mr. Rickles to direct a couple of his hilarious insults in our direction. And with 5th row tickets, we're hoping we've got an above average chance of making that dream also a reality.

Here's Rickles on Late Show with David Letterman Wednesday night, obviously in the area for his gig this weekend in NJ.

There's tons of great clips of Don Rickles online. Below is the video for Mr. Warmth performing at Ronald Regan's second inaguration in 1985.

Herbie The Lego Bug

I'm sorry folks, this is only ten seconds long but it's pretty darn cool...

Ready To Go Surfing Again

I loves me some Blue Crush, the 2002 movie about female surfers. I also loves me some crappy made-for-DVD sequels to movies I love. So, I'm all in for this upcoming flick... Agee!

15 Minutes, I Say 15 Minutes Son

The fine folks at Geico Insurance have produced some fine commercials. What do they, put out like 8 new commercials a week, or something like that? It's always cool when they bring a classic animated character into the mix. Check out Looney Tunes star Foghorn Leghorn getting into the act. This spot features some really nice animation too!


Since we're talking about Geico, let me also run one of my favorite commercials in a long time. The timing in this spot is so dead on! There's also a :15 second version of this commercial and it totally ruins the pace. Both the actors in this spot are so good.

Goofy For Disney Cruise Line

This is a piece of animation done to promote a new feature with the Disney Cruise Line check in process. It was done in the style of Goofy's "How To" cartoons from the 40's & 50's. Very brief, but Big Fun!

Bizarro Flintstones

This video got some attention this week on various sites and we feel it's our duty to present it here for our All Things Flintstones archives. This is a 1986 commercial...for something...featuring teenaged Pebbles and Bamm-Bamm along with Dino, who apprently now has a job as a soda jerk. Oh yeah, and did we mention it's from overseas...