Troy

I've now seen Troy twice - once with Ben, and once with Carley, Ben, and Nad - and, I will say, I liked it better the second time, and while it was quite good, I was expecting much more both times.

Nad put it very well in his blog, where he said that it is an epic only in length (close to three hours). It's directed by Wolfgang Petersen, who also did Das Boot, Air Force One, and, I think in this case, most importantly, The Perfect Storm (he didn't do Pirates, I thought he did, but that was Gore Verbinski). The reason that Perfect Storm is important here is that it porves that he is able to make a big movie. Perfect Storm wasn't that great, but it was big. There were a lot of wide angled shots, which huge landscapes and great shots.

With Troy, you kind of had the impression that everything that he was filming was much smaller than it should have been. For example, when he shows what should be a majestic shot of the city of Troy, he focuses far too much on the foreground, making the background look much less important and much smaller in scope. Whereas in a movie like Lord of the Rings, you know the models of the city are huge and extravagant, in Troy you get the idea that they only built enough of the city so it would look good on camera, and didn't finish anything off. That's hard to explain, but I'm sticking to it.

One last point about the direction - he used one of the most amateurish, 1970s TV show, villain shots ever. When Odysseus (Sean Bean, booyeah) and Achilles (Brad Pitt) are discussing whether he will come along to Troy, the camera begins panning up and, once again, you expect a majestic shot, but nope. Petersen zooms in over Achilles' shoulder to a close-up of Odysseus. You kind of expect to hear "Duh-duh-duhhhhh" in the background. Bad shot.

But the movie wasn't all bad, like I said, I liked it a lot. The acting is top-notch (Pitt, Bean, Eric Bana, Peter O'Toole, Brian Cox), with the exception of two - Orlando Bloom (Paris) and Diane Kruger (Helen). The two fall in love, and I've gotta say, whatever kids they had would be the most vacant beings on the planet. They're both cardboard, for Christ's sake. They have absolutely no emotion in their faces, and it looks like they're made of porcelain.

All in all, a good movie with very good fight scenes, and, for the most part, outstanding acting. It left a little to be desired in the "epic" category, and if you haven't seen it already maybe you'll want to wait until Tuesday to see it.

The Insurance Debate

The cost of my insurance has finally been determined, and, while I'm not particularly pleased about it, it's much less than what it was going to be three months ago. Instead of the $18,000 a year it was going to be (and we're still not sure where they pulled that number from), it's now about $8,000 a year, so my cut is about $545 a month (up from $90, gah).

Apparently, I'm a "high-risk" driver. This, because of a speeding ticket (ooooh...15 over), and two weather-related accidents. I mean, yes, that's bad, two accidents, but, really, I would have thought the 50,000 km I've driven in the past four years might account for something, but no. Getting high marks in school lowers your rates, but driving 100 km both ways every day doesn't. And, for the record, the kids in my class who were getting high marks, were also the knobs having a couple of drinks at lunch, then driving to the mall.

Really, the entire setup is messed up. I got my G licence, and the insurance actually went up $12 a month. Why? Because, "Well, the rates changed. They change a lot.".

The long and the short of it, really, is that insurance companies really don't want young people driving. I'm not saying they're biased towards teenagers/young adults, etc. (I leave that up to the police), but when your rates don't go down until you're 25 and they're astromonical before that, you've got to kinda wonder how much my insurance would be 10 years from now, but with the exact same criteria. Much less, I don't doubt.

My Cousin's Wedding

On Saturday, my cousin Brandon got married to his girlfriend of about 7-1/2 years, Alisa Lorenz. They got married at 4:30 in the afternoon and, thank you United Church, the actual ceremony was over in about 30 minutes. Brandon plays professional lacrosse (as does one of his groomsmen), so a lot of the ceremony and pretty much every speech revolved around lacrosse.

My cousin Kyle was his best man, and gave a very emotional speech. You see, Brandon had a malignant tumour at the base of his spine removed when he was just a baby, and, last year, Kyle was diagnosed with bone cancer in his leg and had to have part of his femur replaced. He also talked about their parents' divorce, and my Aunt Sharon's car accident.

His speech wasn't all sad, though, as he told stories of when they were kids. Stories such as the one about a game they used to play called "Who's Coming Down?", which they called "HCD" for short. It was only a couple of years ago that they realized that HCD is not short of "Who's Coming Down?".

Other than that, it was just a very very fun night. All the guys were dressed great, although I'm not too sure about the bridesmaid's dresses - they were a very nice shade of blue, but they dresses themselves weren't that great. Alisa looked lovely, though; her dress was beautiful.

I got to dance with Carley (who, as always, looked absolutely beautiful, and made me not want to take my eyes off of her all night) to "Unforgettable" by Nat King Cole and "When a Man Loves a Woman" by Michael Bolton (they were right after one another, we got up for Nat and stayed up for Mike).

Anyway, we were there until about midnight when we said goodbye to everyone. Well, we technically left at about 12:15 because the car was so insanely fogged up that we sat and waited for it to defrost.

So, congratulations Brandon and Alisa, and thank you guys very much for inviting us!

Oh, one last thing, the food was pretty darn good, too. Mmmm....sweet corn, mashed potatoes, broccoli and chicken. Booyeah. And the catering staff did brilliantly.

Iraq

Very rarely will I make a serious post here, as, well, this is a blog, and you really shouldn't take anything in a blog seriously (unless it's about movies or baseball).

But, of course, this is about the mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners by US Military Police, and the subsequent beheading on American Nick Berg on video.

First, let me say that every incident involved with these things is absolutely despicable. What really gets to me though is that, all of a sudden, the Iraqis have gone and crossed some imaginary line here, whereas while the Americans treament of prisoners is regrettable, I mean...come on...they're just prisoners. How can you possibly compare two such heinous acts of evil? Neither is better than the other, and neither is worse.

I would also like to point one thing out which I noticed right away - the American soldiers committed all of their acts on their own. There was no way that anyone high up in the chain of command could possibly have ordered such a thing - it was all them, and they will be punished. Yet, according to reports, the masked man who decapitated Nick Berg was Osama bin Laden's second-in-command. Apparently in Arabic, there is no word for "delegation". And I don't mean that in a sarcastic or light way, but in a "Yeah, right, like someone with that much power and importance would risk exposing himself like that; get your head out of your ass Rumsfeld."

Thank you.

Baseball!!!

I went to the first tryout of the year for Little League on Monday! (I'm coaching, not playing). Yay! There were quite a few players there, probably enough for about four teams in the league - which really isn't bad, assuming when I coached before there were barely enough kids for three teams.

Anyway, it was all 8- to 12-year-olds (I coached 8-10 before, and want to move up to the older kids), and, I must say, a lot of the kids were quite good. And there were a lot of girls, which is a great sign as girls aren't really being signed up for sports anyway, and no one signs up for baseball.

I missed the second tryout on Wednesday, will be going to the one next Monday and then hopefully might be able to swing the final one next Wednesday. So, within two weeks, I should have my team!

Kill Bill Vol. 2

Finally got a chance to see Kill Bill Vol. 2, with Carley, Ben, Nancy, Meaghan, and Nathan (the same group that saw Vol. 1, so it worked out well).

What...a...movie. Better than the first one, and that's a feat. Tarantino turns down the blood and turns up the story - as would be expected from having to cut a three-hour movie in half to make...two two-hour movies. You learn what happened to Elle Driver's right eye (and then see what happens to her left). You learn of Pai Mei and the five-finger palm exploding heart technique - the deadliest move in martial arts. Oh yeah, and The Bride's real name (HINT: Bill's been calling her it the whole time).

Now, let's not forget, this is Tarantino, and it wouldn't be a Tarantino movie without excessive violence. The Daryl Hannah/Uma Thurman fight is excellent (you really can't go wrong with samurai swords), and there definitely is a fair share of blood.

The real difference between Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 can be found in the dialogue. Tarantino's a notoriously bad writer of dialogue, and while there aren't all that many gems, there are many more than in Vol. 1. The Bride's daughter, for example, is terribly cute and gets some incredibly cute lines (even if they are things like "Impervious to bullets, mommy!" and "I stepped on him..."). The young lady (Perla Haney-Jardine) was very good, albeit for a short time, and will hopefully make a few more appearances before her cuteness runs out.

The only negative I could find was that the eventual showdown with Bill is, ultimately, a letdown. An appropriate end, but an anticlimactic one. Which, I suppose, illustrates the difference between the two movies - blood bath versus...well...more like a blood hot tub.

So, all in all, a fantastic movie, at the moment, the best of the year (although it is only April, and the Academy Award winners are usually out from October on). Better than the first, and a very satisfying conclusion.

Go see it.

Georgian

Carley and I visited Georgian College in Barrie today, which meant a crappy drive along the 400 as it was raining on and off the whole time. I must say - comparing this tour to the one I went on at Humber all those years ago - Georgian has actually got their act together. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't perfect - it started off with one lady doing a very long extended metaphor on how a kid's life is like a car (it needs oil changes, spark plugs, etc.). Read my poetry, I'm not at all fond of extended metaphors.

But, getting to the tour, we actually got broken up into groups depending on what programs we were in (and Carley and I were two of probably only a dozen people who didn't have their parents in tow, God I feel old).

At Humber, some girl just kinda vaguely pointed to the various wings of the school and told us that if we were taking Program X we'd be down that hall, and etc. It really was a waste of time.

I'll give them credit, the sessions were quite informative, especially as both Carley and I will have co-op terms to deal with. That's assuming I can even afford to go to school what with my being a "high-risk driver" and whatnot.

The day wasn't all good, though, as Carley and I did lose one another for a while (about 10 minutes for me, an hour for her). She got out much earlier than I did, and walked around the Registar's office and the bookstore. I, however, wound up at the campus restaurant. Eventually, Carley called (thank you cell phones!) and we discovered we were not really anywhere near eachother, and, what's more, we didn't really know how to get to the other. But, everything turned out all right, and we were reunited! It turns out we were actually fairly close but, of course, on the first day in a new school, you pretty much are left with absolutely no idea where you're going.

So, all in all, a good, albeit rainy, day. And lunch at East Side Mario's is always good. Boo-yeah. Let's just hope I'm not spending $18,000 a year on insurance come July.

Crap

Manny

Remember those stupid commercials at the beginning of movies (when you saw them in theatres) featuring people like a set painter (David Goldstein) and a stuntman (Manny)? You know the ones, that were preaching how piracy was bad and us downloading movies from the Internet would negatively impact movies and, in turn, their careers, despite the fact that we were watching these ads while we were at the movies. Total crap, right?

Well, I have some startling news for you. It appears Manny was right! I haven't seen him at any of the films I've been to recently, and I can only conclude that it is due directly to Internet piracy.

So, for you Manny, I'll stop downloading movies. I'm sorry. We're sorry. Rest in peace (I assume he's dead. Piracy kills, doesn't it?).

Always remember that I will always love you. And, short of "You're a disease and I hate you", there isn't anything you can tell me that I can't handle.

I love you sweetie.

Sleep well.

Flyers 3, Leafs 1 - End of the First

So, the Leafs scored on their first shot of the game. The only problem with that was that it came with less than one minute left in the period! And, to make matters worse, two horrible giveaways by Bryan McCabe and another by Brian Leetch resulted in three Flyers goals. Except for maybe their elimination game against New Jersey a couple years ago where they managed a total of six shots all game, that might have been the worst period of Leafs hockey I have ever watched. Wow.

Oh, and in the course of the period, the Leafs played 4-on-4 and were on their second powerplay before they were able to give Robert Esche something to do.

Hopefully that last goal will get them a little energized and they can come back. Or I'll see you at game 7.

On a last note, what a terrible jacket, Don!

Rain delays

Is there anything sadder than a rain delay in a baseball game?