the dredwerkz - nothing is written

don't see this

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so you got roped into going to an animated disney movie with your twelve year-old sister, and you're expecting singing sealife, talking teapots, and maybe, just maybe, an evil villain like the horned king in the black cauldron or a funny bad guy like james woods in hercules.

in the back of your mind you remember the posters depicting some round hawaiian girl and a rather ugly creature and you try and hope that maybe it won't be as crappy as you know it could be. please, please. not the lion king. not even going to link to that!

the lights dim, the trailers end, and while you're munching away on popcorn, the first gun shot is fired. that's right. gun shot. except that it's a sci-fi, souped up ray gun that shoots some sort of explosive goo that destroys everything it touches. um, are we in the right theater? welcome to the world of stitch.

as you can tell, i found this film to be one of the best disney animated adventures ever. from the cell animation (last of its kind) to the dark, foreboding elements, it managed to carve out a unique spot in the animated field. action packed, yet sweet, cruelly manipulative, yet strangely deep. it may not be as trendy as the powerpuff girls movie, or as poorly sketched as spirit, stallion of the cinammon buns or something like that, but l&s combines a powerful story with the sort of humor that has broad demographic appeal.

the setup is simple, and yet devastating. stitch, a six legged alien created to wreak havoc and destruction (he's completely fabricated - a genetic frankenstein designed to be evil) escapes his galactic captors and crashes on earth. hawaii, to be precise. there he encounters the seriously dysfunctional family of lilo and her older sister. will stitch turn out to be good? will lilo and fellow humans figure out he's an alien? will the interstellar bounty hunters capture stitch in time without alerting the humans?

it sounds a little basic and disney, but the touches are anything but. from stitch's creation evoking the recent cloning debates to lilo's sister coming dangerously close to abusing lilo, this film walks the tightrope between funny and dangerous. you could almost call it subversive, but that is what makes the touching parts so effective. it would be like watching some hyperviolent japanese anime (as a detached twenty something, of course!) and then seeing the characters actually deal with the pain of losing a family member. not effective in anime land, but here, amongst the lush watercolors of tropical bliss, the destruction cuts pretty close.

that's why lilo and stitch works so well, because we want stitch to be good. he's the ultimate bad-ass, a six-legged freak who's practically indestructable, and yet when he starts singing elvis, you can't help but be won completely. join the revolution. free stitch!

posted at: 2002-07-15 21:58:28 with 0 comments

black and blue and white | edward

shopping, pool, fight, shopping, pool.

as brad noted, my weekend was a little hectic, leaving me to barely stumble into work today. as bad as i feel though, it's nothing like the hell of being the token black republican whose own father once said that a black man voting republican made about as much sense as a 'chicken voting for colonel sanders'. watts' candor is refreshing, especially the line that republicans would be accused of tokenism or racism depending on whether he became conference chair. however, as he notes, despite the GOp needing to show a more diverse face, they must also think more diversely. this, it seems, is the crux of the problem with both race and economics and the republican party. as tnr notes here bush likes to put forward plans that appear to be what the public wants (much like the GOP convention where a diverse group of faces were exhibited to the audience including colin powell and condi rice) but in reality are not. this is the sort of electoral pandering that gets both sides, liberals and conservatives, incredibly angry: one for covertly messing up good legislation, the other for a betrayal of principles. how did the party of lincoln and teddy roosevelt reach such a deplorable state? just ask the bull moose. he may not have all the answers, but he shoots straight, and in the end, perhaps recognizes that the grand ole' party is too far gone for rehabilitation. nothing like the sound of an inevitably doomed republican party to put me in a better mood post saturday night excitement.

posted at: 2002-07-15 08:57:58 with 0 comments

twenty four hours ago | brad

it has been a pretty crazy twenty four hours. and yet the dredwerkz goes on. sometimes though, you feel like jumping through a portal, stealing the bfg and then blasting the life out of some hapless newbie. maybe that was just me. where to begin? well it's less than a month to quakecon so get those questions answered and then you can come join some fools in texas who want to kill each other. yeah. pizza is definitely allowed.

seriously though. while helena was cleaning up chinese food in the 'werkz, brad was learning how to play 'the ice game', and edward...let's just say that while fighting is fun, going to the hospital assuredly is not. apparently someone was not satisfied with just picking up phone numbers and stumbling home.

which confirms my suspicion that people are incapable of truly recognizing the fruitlessness of their own lives. if you want proof, watch the mindnumbing cliche-fest called serendipity with john cusack and kate beckinsale...it will make you realize why most thinking people understand that fate is a cruel hoax perpetuated by a minority of rich, attractive people. then again, most of the enlightened believe in free will, so maybe everybody has a weakness. chaos and randomness never get their due...

naturally the only choice, when confronted with destruction, despair, and the ultimate realization of the emptiness of materialism, is to embrace that emptiness and strive to become it. remove all that is unnecessary - approach completion, and i'll see you at the beach this week. in the meantime, check out my review of road to perdition and remember that i am every person you need to be...

posted at: 2002-07-14 22:14:58 with 0 comments

untouchably good | brad

the beauty of 'road to perdition', is that it is both unmistakeably gorgeous, and incredibly american at the same time. a real 'american beauty'. okay, okay, it was not necessary, but director sam mendes manages to capture a slice of american lore that no one before or since has done as well.

high praise? surprisingly not - for to tell the truth is not to compliment a piece at all. let's stick with the truth for a minute. big name actors (hanks, newman, tucci, and [ugh] leigh in a blessedly short role) plus big budget equals what exactly? a summer movie with lots of explosions? um, no. how about an oscar-worthy film with pretentious silences, lots of talk, and human emotions times four? not really.

enough parrying. the thrust of this film is that it combines a great artist's eye with a great writer's wit. there is simply nothing about the film that is delivered in less than a superb way. so here's the breakdown.

tom hanks is a bad guy who wants to protect his family. so far life has been pretty good, with a wife and two kids - he just kills a few people for his adopted father paul newman and keeps the crime quiet in gangster controlled 1931. problem? his older son witnesses a murder, invokes the wrath of newman's sadistic son, and so pop and son must hit the road in order to stay alive. oh yeah, and they need to beat up some bad guys along the way.

sounds simple? i guess the premise is kinda clean at first. but since the whole thing is adapted from a comic book, you know there are going to be some twists and turns. there is a ton that's unexpected, but all pleasantly so. best of all is the cinematography. most gangster movies feature hushed talk contrasted with the ratta-tat-tat of a tommy gun, but 'perdition' takes it to a new level. it's like comparing 'lawrence of arabia' with 'road to morocco'...there's really no comparison at all. mendes makes chicago and the plains of the midwest seem like faraway lands, plopped down in the middle of america.

in the end 'perdition' is not so much a morality tale as a beautiful story about the sheer majesty of gray. hanks is not a good guy who does bad things (as so many reviewers seem to accuse him) but rather a complex character that does not progress so much as retreat into a more cynical shell, while at the same time discovering the joys of family that he apparently never appreciated. that is why this movie is the best flick i've seen in the past three years - it combines a love for adventure with a moral ambiguity that is compelling, while it delivers this knockout blow with a stylistic beauty that makes you love the cinema and everything it represents. go grab some popcorn, an ice cold coke, and see 'road to perdition'...

posted at: 2002-07-13 17:12:21 with 0 comments

my 2� | edward

to quote the esteemed mr. bat, "grr." nothing roils me more than phony accounting, and it seems the omb is attempting to do it again. check out the details here. now, i may not know much economics, but just like Bill HOagland at the end of the article, i understand the effects of lowering taxes: revenues go down. why people continue to insist that accounting should be fuzzy, or take into account subjective determinations like "the effect on the economy and consumer mindset" is beyond me. well, maybe it's not beyond me: there is a political gain the president can make if he claims the economy isn't as far in the red as it would be otherwise. want to know how much more the government fell into debt for june? check it out at www.nationaldebt.org. Divided up per person, we each could pay the goverment $370 and it would still lose money on the national debt. that's absurd. the solution, according to omb? change the accounting method to be fuzzier. this is almost like me justifying going to the movies because i won't be hungry for dinner afterwards...never mind that i'd spend more money than if i ate at home and watched a dvd. it makes sense only if one is tired or very, very, stupid. it makes about as much sense as the homestead exemption does, which is to say, none at all. in the post this morning, the editorial board gives a pass to bush's harken transgressions, saying that they shouldn't interfere with the legislature's duty to improve accounting. partly true, but at the same time, bush is advocating that what he once did is now no longer cool...if people (including the washington post editorial board) didn't realize that it was a problem, that doesn't mean the problem didn't exist. if we were unaware that giving elderly relatives cheap gifts for the holidays increased their likelihood of a heart attack, we wouldn't be culpable for killing anyone, just for being chintzy. likewise, bush isn't guilty of causing the worldcom meltdown (through his harken actions, that is!) but he still got a loan at an attractive price far below the regular rates from the company he worked for. if it wasn't for millions, so what? much like the fascination with the trade center/pentagon body counts...evil doesn't have a finite point at which it becomes mundane. companies shouldn't loan investors money to their board members, especially if they're also paying those same board members consulting fees for no work. although this ny times headline "bush calls for end to loans of a type he once received" translates into "ny times to president: you're a hypocrite", our president is not a hypocrite for condemning these loans (like the post editorial says), he's a hypocrite for believing that corporations need less oversight and yet implying that he wishes to get tough on them (which the post editorial conveniently forget). he's a hypocrite for nominating the industry defending stalwart mr. pitt to head the sec and later coming out in favor of a tougher department. mr. pitt stands for less regulation, not more. finally, the post editorial suggests that no one is accusing the president of trying to sneak an accounting trick in during harkin. they are correct: the suggestion being made is that our president, who frequently lauds his business acumen, is actually a dithering idiot. no one is accusing our president of being bernie ebbers...but tnr is accusing him of being oblivious. Hardly the person we want to be the 'steward of the economy'.

posted at: 2002-07-12 08:45:08 with 0 comments

cool in the city | edward

today is absolutely perfect temperature wise...despite the mixture of blue/grey skies, it's still one of the best days in the district so far this summer. combine that with a red swingline stapler and you have all the signs of a great day at work. now if only i had a window...

posted at: 2002-07-11 12:17:33 with 0 comments

maggie's farm | edward

why do i have maggie's farm running through my head this morning? well, it's a combination of listening to a little rage the other day and the growing noise of people waking up to realize they've been fined in the night, by a bunch of greedy ceos who spout off about god and law. it may not be wage slavery, but i'm getting tired of all this nonsense. investors clearly agree and aren't willing to put up with such shenanigans from people, even if they are the president. if only the head of the sec were as zealous as investors to discover the truth, we might have been able to prevent at least some of these disasters. investors like a good return on investment: maximizing roi is a method that ensures everyone's happiness. yet in the war to crack down on corporate graft, those at the top seem to think that a re-organization will do, as long as it is coupled with harsher words than actions. as someone who has seen re-orgs, let me tell you, they won't do any good if they're not backed up with larger budgets. simply shuffling bad apples around makes the whole basket stinky, instead of simply throwing away the rotten ones and making sure to scrub the rest. but that sort of effort takes money, and as we all know, there's a war on. let's see, we first passed a tax cut for the rich, then their stock crashed after they made off like bandits, so that they can defraud us again at their leisure. am i missing anything? much like the loans from harkin: harkin loans bush money to buy harkin stock, stock rises, bush repays harkin, both bush and harkin have more money: capital is always in flux. it must just be a coincidence that it seems to flow from investors and to the boards that manage the ceo's, all of whom get nice loans from the company. hell, i own one share of microsoft: does that mean i can take a small $40 million loan out? After all, ms has the largest cash reserves of any company in history. come on bill, just a few mil! i got a head full of ideas that are drivin' me insane...

posted at: 2002-07-11 08:17:41 with 0 comments

go postal | edward

yeah, that's right, us postal is doing well right now in the team time trial...they're in third (overall) past the first time mark, but they still have all 9 riders and have topped 70kph! go postal!

posted at: 2002-07-10 10:30:01 with 0 comments

edwardian morning | edward

each morning i have a fairly set schedule...check the servers, check the headlines at washingtonpost.com as well as a few choice cartoons, check tapped for anything i missed the day before, check tnr and maybe even ha'aretz. oh, and waferbaby too. after all this reading and monitoring (our servers occasionally need to be babied a bit), i feel like i've got a good grasp for what's going down during the day. i might even throw up a blog post afterward, like this one. what caught my eye so far? this cartoon by aaron magruder. probably one of the best boondocks ever...more as i keep reading, of course.

posted at: 2002-07-10 07:12:49 with 0 comments

tap this | edward

tapped is back up! plus, they're hiring! talk about my dream job...in the past, tapped has always linked to articles on average about thirty minutes after i have, probably because i don't edit for content the way that they do. that said, i think i'd make a pretty good prospect, pun intended. plus, i would be working for the good guys for once, instead of the current administration. i wouldn't have to endure any more jokes about the bloated farm bill either. (the cool part of the usda may get spun into homeland security anyway...) i'd probably add some more links to tapped from the tour de france while i was at it.

posted at: 2002-07-09 13:49:14 with 0 comments

before bedtime | edward

i was unable to finish this review of the new powerpuff girls movie. so i completed it this morning. it's short and sweet, like the film. enjoy!

posted at: 2002-07-09 09:47:38 with 0 comments

fat | edward

i've said it before and i'll say it again: low calories are the issue, not fat. read this and nod your head in approval. i mean, come on, cows eat grass all day and they have tons of fat in them. i'm no atkins diet booster...i simply believe that people should run off whatever they eat, and they shouldn't worry about what they eat. eat what you want and just exercise regularly...hell, if a double-cheeseburger gets you outdoors three times a weeks, then eat up! your heart will thank you.

posted at: 2002-07-09 08:01:42 with 0 comments

from the mouth of babes | edward

in today's washington post, a great article that ends with this line from our prez about ubl: "He may be alive," Bush said. "If he is, we'll get him. If he's not alive, we got him." brilliant. nice try to distract us from the ongoing scandal... as always, toles managed to put it best. the point about harkin is simply this: after harkin insiders sold part of the company to themselves to mask a huge loss, bush sold his stock which was flying high. later, after the company was forced to restate its earnings by the SEC, the stock dipped, in effect allowing bush to steal money from the company's investors, who didn't know about the illegal transaction. in addition, he forgot to report the sale to the sec, who despite failing to convict him, warned him that letting him off didn't mean that he was guilt-free. here's the full transcript of yesterday's conference. i report, you decide. yeah, whatever.

posted at: 2002-07-09 07:16:15 with 0 comments

go back a week...

...go forward a week