Scott Von Doviak Reviews “The Kilborn File”

It’s clear that Craig Kilborn never looked in the mirror and asked himself, “What would Jay Leno do?” Kilborn sent industry pundits into a tailspin of confusion by voluntarily ending his reign as the host of CBS’s The Late Late Show in 2004 after a successful five-year run, but what looked like madness at the time may have been the shrewdest move possible, now that we’ve seen the late-night wars go thermonuclear. Six years after walking away, Kilborn is back behind the desk, but his return may cause even more confusion than his departure.

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Open wide for some soccer!

by Paul Clark

I passed Il Duce on the left-hand side last night, and scribbled down a few thoughts right over here.

Meanwhile, it’s World Cup time again, and right on schedule, the entire world has been seized by futbol fever. Well, the parts of the world that aren’t predisposed to hate a sport in which few points are scored and ties are commonplace. Seriously, folks- you’ll go nuts over American football, which alternates 45 seconds of boring waiting for 5 seconds of play, but you whine about a sport in which the ball stays in almost constant motion? What gives?

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Hayden Childs’ Record Collection: Matthew Friedberger to Matthew Sweet

Matthew Friedberger – Winter Women/Holy Ghost Language School (2006). Friedberger is the brother half of the Fiery Furnaces.  On these albums (the plural seems unnecessary because this is really one album with two parts), Friedberger makes music that is sometimes annoying and sometimes inspired and really in bad need of an editor.

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Nick Schager Reviews Grown Ups

Adam Sandler spends more time laughing at jokes than making them in Grown Ups, perhaps the slackest, shabbiest comedy in the star’s increasingly dreadful oeuvre. Putting Couples Retreat to shame in the film-as-studio-funded-vacation department, director-par-crapcellence Dennis Dugan’s film teams Sandler with his old SNL mates Chris Rock, Rob Schneider, and David Spade—as well as Kevin James, here baldly subbing in for the late Chris Farley—in a tale about zero, zilch, and not a single freaking thing. The setup is that, 30 years after winning a youth basketball championship, the five friends and their families reunite at a lakeside cabin after the funeral of their beloved coach. And, um, that’s it.

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Top One Movie of the Week (6/24/10)

by Scott Von Doviak & Andrew Osborne

SCOTT: We’re not quite at the halfway point of 2010, but already the debate is raging: is this the worst movie year in the history of cinema? I’ll reserve judgment on that question until at least Thanksgiving, but it can’t be a good sign that it’s now considered news when studio executives put the call out to agents desperately seeking some of this “original material” they’ve heard about. Hell, even Entertainment Weekly recently took a break from humping the Twilight franchise long enough to bemoan this summer’s parade of creatively bankrupt retreads. But things must be looking up, because this week brings no sequels or remakes of any kind! It’s all original stuff, beginning with this comedy teaming SNL veterans Adam Sandler, David Spade, and Rob Schneider. Whoa, we’ve never seen that before! Chris Rock is also on hand, making a total of one actual funny person in the cast, although you’d never know it from his dismal big-screen track record. And then there’s Kevin James as the fat guy who got an invite because Chris Farley died twelve years ago. How about it, Andrew? Are you laughing yet?

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Wasted Words Show 75: So, How Are Things?

Leonard Pierce joins Andrew, Stephen and RJ to just talk about how everyone is doing. Also- Ask the Bartender tackles the important issue of wedding cash gifts. Very simple. Deceptively so.

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The Fall vs. Whatever It Is That Is Encroaching

by Hayden Childs

Best of all is to be idle,

And especially on a Thursday,

And to sip wine while studying the light:

The way it ages, yellows, turns ashen

And then hesitates forever

On the threshold of the night

That could be bringing the first frost.

- Charles Simic

“They are always different; they are always the same” was how the legendary DJ John Peel described The Fall, and he would know. I agree with John Peel (and who wouldn’t), but one who listens through the whole discography, as I did recently, will hear that there is a definite trajectory to their sound. It’s significant that the first Fall single was the song “Repetition,” which stated “we’ve repetition in the music, and we’re never going to lose it.”

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Screengrab Archive: Prologue

by Andrew Osborne

So, while writing up this week’s Top One Movie feature for Nerve, I went to link to an old Screengrab article and discovered the entire fabled archive has apparently been deleted.  (You know, what with ones and zeroes being so expensive to store that WordPress gives ‘em away free for blogs like this one.)

Fortunately (and, it seems, presciently), I saved many of the old Screengrab articles, which I’ll eventually get around to posting here…but for now, I’ll start with the Titicut Follies write-up I wanted to link to in the aforementioned future Nerve article…

Screengrab Archive #1: Titicut Follies

by Andrew Osborne

TITICUT FOLLIES (1967)

Before I got my driver’s license, the only way to get to Boston from my hometown of Middleboro, Massachusetts (besides a ride from Mom & Dad) was a local bus that stopped at a prison in the neighboring town of Bridgewater to pick up the newly released ex-cons and ship ‘em home (or the nearest equivalent). Years later, I discovered the prison was actually the notorious state hospital for alcoholics, sex offenders and the criminally insane profiled in Frederick Wiseman’s controversial documentary Titicut Follies, a movie even more disturbing than all those long-ago bus rides.

Unwatchable #35: Santa With Muscles

by Scott Von Doviak

As those of you who check this blog on an hourly basis are all too aware, I was forced to skip #35 on our little countdown because I could not come up with a copy of the 1996 Hulk Hogan rarity Santa With Muscles at the time. But in this wondrous age of ours, YouTube always comes through eventually, and I knew it was only a matter of time before some Hogan completist posted the movie in excruciating 10-minute increments. As it turned out, the impetus for making this lost Christmas classic available was the release of a similar “wrestler-turned-actor plays beloved childhood icon” feature earlier this year: The Tooth Fairy starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. Yes, The Rock’s latest ill-advised career choice made this column possible. There’s nothing left to do now but look in the mirror and ask ourselves: Was it truly worth it?

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