expect more as we get closer to the election:

Obama Campaign Co-Chair Eva Longoria Promotes Vulgar Attack on Romney

Threats to Assassinate Republican Explode on TWITTER After Debate...

NFC?  Who doesn't wanna see a Giants / Niners rematch?  Not ruling out the Bears at this point either.

AFC?  Nobody wants to win it it seems.  Patriots?  Texans?  Broncos?  Ravens are done btw, even WITH Browns/Bengals on the schedule.

and my Saints will lose to a resurgent TB team this w/e

Here's the deal.  When lost in the wilderness, IF you come upon a watercourse of ANY kind, follow it downstream.  Don't cross it.  Don't follow it UP stream.  Dowstream.  Every time. 

The Blair Witch Project.  Progenitor of damned near every "found footage" film to flounder about in the last dozen years or so.  But it DOES have some actual scary moments.  And it spawned a cottage industry.  Actually, the sequal is almost watchabl.  So's this one - and worth it, if you can watch without giggling.

Now for a truly GOOD movie:  The Others.  (Not The Other, although it's good too - what withUta Hagen and butterfly kisses and creepy kids and all).  No - the 2001 Nicole Kidman vehicle.  Not usually a big fan of Ms. K - she's pretty and sexy and all and a talented actress, just not as big a deal to me as to the rest of the world.  Anyway.  

from IMDB: Rarely does a scary film come around that isn't schlocky and obvious. 'The Others', directed by the great Alejandro Amenabar (Abre los Ojos) is a stylish, spooky and fun film to watch that doesn't cheapen itself like so many in the genre. It is 1947 on the island of Jersey in England, and Grace (Nicole Kidman) is the mother of two small children, Charles (Christopher Eccleston) and Anne (Alakina Mann) who are allergic to the sunlight, so they are not allowed to go outside. Moreover, any room they are in has to be locked with the curtains shut, a cumbersome task in their mansion with its 50 doors. Mysteriously, the mansion's staff left the week before, which precipitates the arrival of three new servants; a gardener and two housekeepers who are promptly hired. Further complicating matters is the fact that Anne keeps talking to an unseen child, and unexplained footsteps, opened curtains and doors opening and shutting are starting to wear thin on the already uber-fragile Grace, until the occurrences threaten their lives.

With 'The Others', Amenabar gives us a truly spooky and stylish thriller. The foggy atmosphere outside of the mansion, the dark rooms lit by candles within the house, both of these are just many of the beautiful stylistic areas of the film. Kidman is great as the incredibly brittle and mentally frayed Grace. While she puts on a cool, haughty façade, the circumstances she finds herself in are clearly eating away at her sanity. The actors who play her children are actually quite good themselves, particularly Alakina Mann, who holds her own in her confrontational scenes with Kidman and others. The screenplay, also written by Amenabar is quite intelligent, and if you haven't heard the 'twist' at the end, it is pretty ingenious. It is ingenious and well-written regardless, but the impact upon discovery is pretty decent.

Realization this week when dealing with all the argy bargy of the various tax / economic plans. 

Donks believe that all money's theirs (Gubmints) ... that they should decide how much to spend on what, then set tax policy to bring it in.

Elphs believe that txx policy should be established to promote growth, investment and development, and whatever money it generates should be spent however the Gubmint sees fit.

The Omen.  Carrie.  The Exorcist.  Jaws, Young Frankenstein, Close Encounters, Suspiria.  Quite a spate of genre films in a narrow frame.  Not putting in there with the Universal Horror (which spread pretty much from 1931 through 1941)

Our two for tonigh (sorry - I get behind during the week and need to multi-post to get caught up) will do two VERY good examples, The Omen and Carrie.

I HATE Carrie.  And I love it.  Never liked Sissy Spacek.  Travolta glorified stupidity.  But.  This movie was shown at the GREAT "Midnight Movie Marathon" back in 1980 @ ONU.  A very memorable weekend.  So it has that.  I could stop watching after the credits.  Amy Irving in the locker room is enough.  But it gets better. There's Nancy Allen.  Should be enough, right?  Nope.  Top it off with P.J. Soles who gets killed by Michael Myers.  Gym class.  Working out.  Short 70's shorts.  To HELL with the prom.  Bonus points for Betty Buckley who doubled as the mom in Eight is Enough.  MILF.  I shorts.  And knee socks.  With a 'tude.  Not QUITE making the cut is the very caable Piper Laurie.  Never liked her, even though she was SOLID in The Hustler.  

And there was a Prom.  With Pig Blood.  And at the end we're supposed to sympathize with Amy Irving??  Never got that.  But it belongs in October.

The Omen.  The original, although the remake wasn't bad.   Lee Remick was ALWAYS gorgeous but NEVER sexy.  David Warner loses his head in the BEST decapitation scene on film.  Jack Palance's daughter hangs herself shouting "it's all for you, Damien."  And little Damien.  Three movie cresits.  This one, the part of Emil in Gaugin the Savage, and a walk on as a reporter in the '06 remake.  

from IMDB: On a grand scale the film was efficiently catered with well established cinematography and polished set-pieces that had penetrating might, which director Richard Donner handled with precise skill. Even when there wasn't much happening he knew how to keep things compellingly tight with good pacing and impressible imagery. Though, when it came to the essential thrills, he caps off some remotely tense (dogs' attack) and macabre moments (infamous decapitation) that display bite and flair. The climax is great and the ending is a fitting imprint too. The plot is filled with shocking revelations, interesting characters and it emits a glorious amount of excitement and dread from it mysterious outset.

See them both

from Arizona, the media this morning is seizing on a new poll showing Obama up 2 in generally safe Republican Arizona, 44-42, among likely voters. 

Get out your pencils.  Hispanics make up about 30% of the population in Arizona. But, only 20% of registered voters in the state are Hispanic. In 2008, a record year for Hispanic turnout, they made up just 16% of the overall electorate. The poll being hyped by the media, from Behavior Research Center, does a shifty thing, its weights its sample of interviews based on each demographic's share of the population. In the polling memo, they even admit this may alter the actual results:

If Latinos turn out in numbers proportionate to their population, which has never been the case in the past, they could help send a Democrat to the U.S. Senate and revitalize the once long tradition of Arizona having one Democrat and one Republican in the Senate. But if the Latino vote is disproportionately low, the Arizona Senate delegation will almost certainly stay in the GOP column.

So, yes, if the Hispanic community does something it has never done in the past, then, yes, Arizona might be competitive this year. But, this poll also begs a large question. If it is weighting Hispanics proportionate to their share of the population, then why is Obama only in the low 40s?

There are several small conferences out there with a batch of interesting nicknames.  How they ended up lumped together is anybodies guess but I find it interesting that that they all play each other.  No schedule full of Eagles and Bulldogs and  Tgiers for them, nosir.

My old HS conference had eight schools.  There were the mundane Braves, Bobcats, Vikings and Falcons.  But we also had Monarchs, RoughRiders, Rangers,  and Shamrocks.

So this week I'm celebrating the Division III Centennial Conference (from the South Region.)  Mundane?

Juniata Eagles, Ursinus Bears

Boarderline: Johns Hopkins Blue Jays, Dickenson Red Devils, Susquehanna Crusaders, Moravian Grayhouns.

the kickers:  Gettysburg Bullets,  Franklin & Marshall Diplomats, McDanial Green Terror, and the Muhlenberg Mules

Will start with the off-list oldie.  One of the earliest haunted house movies: The Old Dark House.  Let's start with the director, James Whale.  One of the big three of early horror (FW Murnow and Tod Browning being the other two and if you're following my list you've already seen thier stuff).  Casat:  Boris Karloff fast on the heels of his portrayal of The Monster, Melvyn Douglas, Charles Laughton and the scene opening creepy looking Raymond Massey.  The rest of the cast is stellar if not memorable.  An IMDB reviewer sez it best :

Truly one of Universal greatest unsung horror films, The Old Dark House is a unique blend of gothic setting, quirky characterizations, wicked black and dry humour, a great ensemble cast, and the workings of the mind of James Whale. Whale made the film the year after Frankenstein. He was again paired with Karloff. But unlike their first association, Karloff's star is far less brighter in this film as his performance, although good and servicable, is over-shadowed by atmosphere, Whale's direction, witty dialogue, and a cast of scene stealers.   The story is based on a novel by J. B. Priestly. The plot is somewhat antiquated now, but Whale's direction puts a lot of life into it. And let's not forget Karloff, however small his part, still turns in a great menacing performance as a lecherous, drunken servant named Morgan ogling Gloria Stuart from the moment he sees her. The Old Dark House is a great film, and it should be more highly touted by Universal!

 Y'all know I like my old stuff.  THIS is old stuff.  And fun.

Thirty six years later, 1968, we get Rosemary's Baby.  Never liked it.  Haven't seen it in years.  HATED Mia Farrow.  Still do.  Dropped it in my rankings after this.  But it IS notable.  From a novel by Ira Levin, directed by the baby raper (Roman Polanski).  Starring Ms. Farrow-Previn-Allen, John Cassavetes, Ruth Gordon (before she worked with Clyde) Maurice Evans (of Bewitched "fame"), my favorite gunsale Elisha Cook Jr. (see Maltese Falcon) and a small appearence by Charles Grodin.  Critics rave.  It's 215 on IMDB's top 250.  But to me it's dated.  If you haven't seen it you should.   If you have seen it, once is enough.

Occasionally an oldie pops up that I haven't seen in a while that I get to revisit and re-evaluate.  Ghost of Frankenstein meets that catagory.  GREAT cast (forthe era/genre): Lon Chaney Jr. as the Monster, Cedric Hardwicke as the Doc, Bela Lugosi as Igor, Evelyn Ankers as Elsa.  Also wandering throug the scenery is Ralph Bellamy, Lionel Atwill and a flashback shot of Colin Clive.

This was the fourth in the series and it was starting to show its age.  "Bride" rocks and "Son" was the most literate.  This one still has that great Universal touch, it's light (as in deft) and watchable.  Dropped in my rankings but still worth a look.

As an aside, I also watched Dario Argento's Phenomena.  Not bad.  Typical Argento.  Jennifer Connelly in her first lead and Donald Pleasence with a Scottish accent, being waited on by a monkey.  Can't recommend it but watchable.