+: etcetera :+

Asides

¶ LA Times looks at why it's been so difficult to come to an agreement in the on-going writers strike: no one has a clear understanding of what entertainment is worth, so no one really knows what they're negotiating about. Are YouTube clips stopping us from watching TV shows or are they making us fans of them? If you can't agree on that, you can't agree on their value. Go read.
¶ NYT reviews “Conversations With Woody Allen”, the new book featuring a collection of interviews with the prolific director.  The verdict: "It may not be fashionable to say so, least of all in Woody Allen’s house, but the man, when he’s on form, is as capable as ever of delivering pleasure." Amen to that. [Link]
¶ Time's running out on scripted shows, my fellow TV addicts. Here's a handy chart you can look at as you prepare yourself for either giving up TV altogether or resign yourself to realty shows (shudder) - The Office is all out, 2 episodes left of 2.5 Men, 3 each of Grey's Anatomy, Heroes and How I Met Your Mother, 5 of House - get the complete list here.
¶ What do the following TV shows all have in common: Brothers & Sisters, Journeyman, The Wire, Bionic Woman, House M., and the Riches? No, we're not talking of nominations - they all have Brits pretending to be Americans! [Link]
¶ The next time you feel good about yourself when reading about Ms. Spears or her ex, remember this.
¶ No fewer than three movies about the cocaine cartel and its kingpin, Pablo Escobar, are in the works. One is based on an adaptation of “Killing Pablo: The Hunt for the World’s Greatest Outlaw,” Mark Bowden’s best-selling 2001 book; Antoine Fuqua (“Training Day”) plans to direct another film, based on “Mi Hermano Pablo,” a Spanish-language memoir by Escobar’s brother and associate, Roberto; and the third is to be directed by Alexander Witt (“Resident Evil: Apocalypse”), based on original research. And Ari & Co couldn't sell an Escobar picture in this market ;) [Link]
¶ If you're one of those people who didn't like the new Bond, prepare for some heart break. MGM has signed Daniel Craig for another four movies. [Link]
¶ LA Times reviews John Updike's new collection of pieces published in the New Yorker. The heart of "Due Considerations" consists of 60 book reviews and 10 essays published in the magazine during the new millennium. As always, the author has ranged widely: There are pieces about Orhan Pamuk and Peter Carey, Muriel Spark and Mo Yan, J.M. Coetzee's wretched youth and Michel Houellebecq's sexed-up maturity. The roster is heavily tilted toward the contemporary novel, especially toward those loose-and-baggy monsters that emulate their Victorian forebears. ("Nineteenth-century novelists," Updike observes, "catered to a more generous, less nibbled attention span; they breathed with bigger lungs and naturally wrote long, deep, and wide.") [Link]
¶ One knew this was coming, but it hurts to be reminded nevertheless. Yes, Tom Hanks is to reprise his role as Robert Langdon in a follow-up to The Da Vinci Code for the original film's director, Ron Howard.This time around Langdon investigates a secret society that threatens the existence of the Catholic Church. Yes folks, make way for Angels And Demons. [Link]
¶ So far, 2007 hasn't had any breakout hits like "Little Miss Sunshine," "Brokeback Mountain" or "The Queen." Ther've been plenty of movies which received good reviews - not all of the ones listed in this article - "A Mighty Heart," "In the Valley of Elah", "Lars and the Real Girl", Richard Gere's "The Hunting Party," Kenneth Branagh's "Sleuth" or Mark Ruffalo / Joaquin Phoenix's "Reservation Road" - are still playing. But here's your chance to show some Netflix love for Indiewood.
¶ LA Times compares the student and the master, but refuses to draw any conclusions. Colbert's way ahead of Stewart on the online poll at the site. Go read and vote for your favorite.
¶ Some lucky devil who got to attend a test screening of "Sweeney Todd" insists that it is "absolutely fantastic, one of the best things Tim Burton has ever directed!" Even if that hadn't been said, there are plenty of reasons to look forward to this horror-musical-comedy: Johnny Depp, Alan Rickman, Helena Bonham Carter and Sacha Baron Cohen. [Link]
¶ 'Office' fans have apparently been making pilgrimages to Scranton, PA to check out real-life landmarks referenced on the show. With Scott-style enthusiasm, the city is now hosting a weekend blowout for thousands of fans.  It starts Friday with the "Today" show's Al Roker broadcasting live from the University of Scranton and continues through Sunday. About 2,000 tickets ranging from $25 to $250 have been sold so far -- 70% of them to out-of-town fans. [Link]
¶ The year after I graduated, my high school in Madras started making boys and girls eat their lunch in different rooms. They even had them use separate stair cases.  If I though that was crazy, this article makes me feel practically grateful. One school's banned hugging and hand-holding. Apparently it's OK to hug, but only under dire circumstance - as in the loss of a loved one. Wow.
¶ The latest poster boy for the horror genre, Eli Roth, recommends a virtual 24-hour horror-film festival. Entries are mostly classics (in horror, this is apparently circa 1970+)  - The Thing (1982), The Vanishing (1988), The Wicker Man (1973), Who Can Kill A Child? (1976), etc.  Go check out the complete list here.
¶ Tom Perrotta, whose novels "Election" and "Little Children" were made into films by Alexander Payne and Todd Field, respectively, is now most of the way through adapting his new novel, "The Abstinence Teacher," for directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, the couple behind last year's hit "Little Miss Sunshine." The novel, which looks at a small-town culture war between a liberal sex-ed teacher and a group of evangelical Christians, was published last week. [Link]
¶ Al Gore is the only man to have won an Emmy, an Oscar, and a Nobel. The only award that he has to win to make what Mo Rocca calls "The Gore Crown" is the Tony. Go vote for what musical you think Gore should star in for that missing Tony. [Link]
¶ According to the 2007 U.N. World Drug Report, the percentage of Europeans who use illicit drugs is about half that of Americans. Europe also has fewer than half as many deaths from overdoses. Rick Steves examines how they have managed to do that. [Link]
¶ Doris Lessing wins Nobel for Literature. She was praised by the judges for her "skepticism, fire and visionary power." [Link]
¶ LA Times talks about how the EU has made it easier for McNations to crop up all over Europe. As the EU assumes more of the responsibilities of states -- regulations, the economy, currency, possibly even defense -- the cost of independence becomes lower. Even if the author's glee at Europe's troubles is a bit disturbing, it's worth a read. [Link]
¶ Leonardo DiCaprio and George Clooney are to star in a film loosely based on the rise and fall of presidential hopeful Howard Dean. The Warner Bros production will be based on a stage-play written by Beau Willimon, a former assistant on the Dean campaign. [Link]
¶ And another shortlist - this time for the National Book Awards. Link via Prufrock Two
¶ Other Ollywoods divert limelight from Bollywood, says the W'Post. But what really matters is what they say about Sivaji and its star. If this ever reaches the desi press, it should be so much fun. Go read the rest. (Unfortunately one is reqd. to log in)
¶ You have to read this - an Indian entrepreneur has come up with the ultimate low-cost airline: one that doesn't fly anywhere. Bahadur Chand Gupta, a retired Indian Airlines engineer, bought an old Airbus 300 from an insurance company in 2003, rebuilt it, and it now sits in a Delhi suburb where people pay $4 per "trip" so they can experience what it must be like to fly. [Link] Update: Understand this was posted on Uberdesi a while ago. Apologies. Clearly, going away for two weeks has its consequences.
¶ As you may have heard, a movie version of Love in the Time of Cholera is due for release next month. The movie starring Javier Bardem and Benjamin Bratt is directed by Mike Newell ("Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire"). As Hollywood's marketing machinery puts its weight behind the movie, the book is picked up by Oprah. Yawn. [Link]
¶ LA Times reviews an interesting new book by Susan Hitchcock, in which she explores the culture and content behind the Frankenstein monster. "Hitchcock's book surveys an entire genre. Moving gracefully from novel to film to metaphor, she spends little time theorizing. Her "cultural history" is so lively that at first you may decide it lacks scholarly ballast and slant. Soon, however, one sees that the author's admirable restraint serves to advance and streamline the text." Read the rest.
¶ NYT reviews Anupama Chopra’s “King of Bollywood”, mostly likes it.  Calls it a "sprightly biography of the Indian film superstar Shah Rukh Khan; a concise history of the development and sociology of Bollywood film; and a convincing argument for how India’s growing economy has changed its films, and how Bollywood stands to play a larger role in the world film market". Read the rest.
¶ The Telegraph's published a three part series of Ted Hughes's letters. I can't help feeling guilty - this is voyeurism, after all. But then again, he is a celebrity...So if you don't feel too bad about it, go read. Part 1. Part 2. Part 3.
¶ DVRs, those convenient little boxes, are wreaking havoc among television networks and advertisers. Last year, "live+same day" viewing was the industry standard for ratings discussions with Madison Avenue. That is, the average number of viewers who watched a program the same day it was initially broadcast on the network. This year, with DVR penetration what it now is, "Live+7" may be the more relevant number for industry navel-gazers interested in figuring out how many people were attracted to a show. This is a much harder number to arrive at. Starting this season, advertisers are buying commercial time based on a so-called "C3" stat. - the rating for the commercial breaks in a TV program, and it includes people who watched the program up to three days after its initial telecast. Here, too, most advertisers will be looking at the "C3/18-49" stat. Even worse, it takes Nielsen three weeks to put out a C3 figure. [Link]
¶ For those of you who feel good about every new desi face on prime time, here's some good news - Kal Penn's joining 'House' as series regular.  He plays Lawrence Kutner, a young doctor who comes up with unorthodox ways to diagnose patients. [Link]
¶ Soda makers and sports fans prove that they can sink lower than even you thought possible. Jones Soda Co is launching  a new set of er, reality flavored sodas. A sip of Sports Cream Soda for instance, conjures up the experience of rubbing ointment into an aching muscle, while Natural Field Turf Soda is like "playing tackle football, and you get tackled really hard, you're down on the ground and you get a little bit of the grass in your teeth". If you think that is bad, there's more - "Perspiration Soda" is kind of salty tasting with a slightly higher sodium content than the average soda, with a smooth, "stinky football sock" finish. Ewwww.
¶ Movies get put on the back burner for all sorts of reasons. But this is a new one - Francis Ford Coppola's South American drama "Tetro" starring Matt Damon now faces an uncertain future since someone stole a laptop containing the screenplay. Coppola has offered a reward for the return of the missing laptop. [Link]
¶ NBC is bringing back "Knight Rider".  The success of "Transformers" apparently inspired NBC Entertainment chief Ben Silverman to revive "Knight." The thinking is that smallscreen f/x have advanced to the point where it'd be feasible to have a weekly series in which cars shift shapes.There's also huge potential for advertiser integration. General Motors was all over "Transformers," and it's easy to see NBC striking a rich deal with a single automaker to serve as the exclusive auto brand for the new "Knight." It's understood preliminary talks have already begun. [Link]
¶ One is back from vacation and for what? To hear that India has nominated Ekalavya to the Oscars. Ouch
¶ Joseph O'Neill profiles Beyond A Boundary - the C.L.R James book on cricket and the Carribean - in The Atlantic. Yes, cricket. Yes, in The Atlantic. No, you are not dreaming.
¶ The Telegraph likes Atonement, with particular praise for Knightley - "jejune and clumsy in so many of her earlier films, shows welcome signs of maturity here as a young woman who is both haughty and disciplined - and able to use the veneer of hauteur to mask her tremulous feelings."
¶ The Los Angeles Times plans to run a “scratch and sniff” advertisement in a 32-page section about fall films scheduled for next Sunday. One of the ads, for a family movie called “Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium,” uses a scented ink meant to evoke the olfactory pleasures of frosted cake. In another case of a weird ad, CBS plans to give TV viewers a flavor for its new fall show, "Cane," with ads consumers can actually taste. The network is rolling out an unusual magazine ad that tastes like a lime mojito to promote its prime-time series about a powerful Cuban-American running a rum and sugar business in South Florida. Eww to ads you have to lick...
¶ Taking politics out of it, which actor (or actress) do you think would make a good President, asks Mo Rocca. Watch the video.
¶ If you want a break from your Booker reading list, you might want to try some of these: Gadsby: an English-language novel consisting of 50,000 words, none of which contain the letter “e.” 2004 French novel Le Train de Nulle Part (The Train from Nowhere) by Michel Thaler was written entirely without verbs. Cadaeic Cadenza - a short story by Mike Keith that uses the digits of pi as the length of words. Never Again - novel by Doug Nufer in which no word is used more than once. Alphabetical Africa by Walter Abish in which the first chapter only uses words that begin with the letter "a," while the second chapter incorporates the letter "b," and then "c," etc. Once the alphabet is finished, Abish takes letters away, one at a time, until the last chapter, leaving only words that begin with the letter "a." Mary Godolphin produced versions of Pilgrim's Progress and Robinson Crusoe Words of One Syllable. [Via Marginalien]
¶ Sex and violence during the early prime-time slot have increased significantly during the last six years, according to a new study by the Parents Television Council. It found that instances of violence had soared 52.4% since a similar study in 2000-01 and that sexual content had increased 22.1%. Use of foul language dropped by 25.4%, but Timothy Winter, president of the group said the figure was misleading. Although milder words, such as "hell" and "damn," decreased, the use of bleeped words increased 40%. Those words are more offensive and often easy for children to figure out. "If you hear an 'F' and you hear a 'K,' it doesn't leave much to the imagination," he said.  No kidding.
¶ Leonardo DiCaprio could star in a big-screen version of I, Claudius after the rights to Robert Graves's novel were obtained by veteran producer Scott Rudin.
¶ And the shortlist is out:
• Darkmans by Nicola Barker (Fourth Estate)
• The Gathering by Anne Enright (Jonathan Cape)
• The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid (Hamish Hamilton)
• Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones (John Murray)
• On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan (Jonathan Cape)
• Animal’s People by Indra Sinha (Simon & Schuster)
¶ The next time you travel Southwest Airlines, be sure to cover up. They apparently have problems with clothes that they consider to be, er, "lewd, obscene or patently offensive” to ensure the comfort of children and “adults with heightened sensitivities.” Passenger Kyla Ebbert was escorted off a Southwest Airlines flight two months ago for wearing an outfit that Southwest flight attendants considered to be too revealing. Read the rest.
¶ If you are so obsessed with New Yorker you'd even read stuff rejected by them, you can do so now. Go here to read rejected Talk of the Town pieces, called Silence of the City, of course.
¶ Mo Rocca asks people if they could have one bionic body part, what would it be and what would they do with it. Watch this video.
¶ First come the viral videos. Then the opinion pieces. Far be it from the minions in Stochastica to buck a trend. So here you go: Salon on what all the laughing we've been doing at Ms. South Carolina this last week tells about us, the laughers...
¶ This tip comes from our own Manoj - Film critic Roger Ebert has banned the use of the "Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down" catchphrase until his contract negotiations are finalized. Ebert owns part of the copyright to the phrase and he's not happy with what he's being offered to return to his show, At the Movies with Ebert & Roeper. [Link]
¶ Director Ridley Scott turned grumpy old man at the Venice film festival, declaring 97% of modern films "stupid" and claiming mobile phone and other modern technology was killing cinema. Hear, hear! [Link]
¶ The long-neglected 50-plus audience might eventually have its day, or at least a place to call its own in a ruthlessly youth-oriented TV landscape.  AARP Publications inked a multiyear deal with WGBH Boston to create TV programming "relevant to the 50+ demographic" for public television, with the first special planned for next spring. But before you get your hopes up for "quality programming", remember these are TV execs we're talking about, people whose brain cells have long been killed by prolonged and direct exposure to reality TV participants. TV Land announced a series searching for the next great supermodel "35 and older". Yaay for grandma? Somehow I think not. [Link]
¶ Julia Louis-Dreyfus has one. Sandra Bullock had one. So did Jennifer Garner and Katie Holmes. Jennifer Love Hewitt has had two. Calista Flockhart took hers dancing. Kate Walsh had one, lost her, and got another one with a different face but the same name. And Scarlett Johansson got her first one last weekend. If you haven't already figured out what - we're talking of Black Best Friends. Read the rest.
¶

China is the latest imperialist on the African block, says the Telegraph. China now buys about one third of its oil from Africa, mainly from Angola, where an £800 million deal to develop a new field was signed last May, and from Sudan, where Beijing built a 900-mile pipeline and invested at least £8 billion. China is spending another £1.2 billion on a new offshore oilfield in Nigeria.Meanwhile, Beijing has acquired mines in Zambia, textile factories in Lesotho, railways in Uganda, timber in the Central African Republic and retail developments in almost every capital. [Link]

¶ Youtube videos featuring Miss South Carolina are so last week. For this week, go vote on Mo Rocca's Miss South Carolina scramble contest - contestants had to rearrange her words into a passage that more or less makes sense, and extra points for those who used all the words, including the uh's. Mo has chosen 6 finalists from 750 entries (which gives us great relief, for we occasionally feel guilty about being a tad vetti (vela for you non-Tamils), but clearly we're a green horn in these matters)
¶ OK, someone finally did some counting - out of the 133 authors of features under the New Yorker's Shouts and Murmurs banner (in the modern, post-1992 era), 17 have been women. One way to look at that number is that men are represented in the section at a rate 8 times that of women. [Link]
¶ 'Fact-based' stories of journalists discovering ex-savants now homeless sure are getting popular. First there was Resurrecting the Champ. Now, it's The Soloist, where Downey Jr. is set to play a newspaper columnist who discovered Nathaniel Ayers (to be played by Jamie Foxx), a downtown L.A. homeless man who was a skillful violinist, until schizophrenia made it impossible to continue. [Link]
¶ Tourists are flocking to the U.K. locations that were used for films such as the “Harry Potter” series, “The Da Vinci Code,” “Pride & Prejudice” and “Gosford Park,” according to a new report. [Link]
¶ In an article that brings out an unexpected similarity between Kollywood and Hollywood, LA Times talks of films bleeding talent to television at an alarming rate - Glenn Close, Helent Hunt Holly Hunter, Mary Louise Parker, to just name a few. Challenging roles for women over 40 have been few and far between since Joan and Bette faced off at the box office, but now, with blockbusters and male-oriented sex comedies ruling the big screen, women under 40 are having a hard time. Television has become the think tank of performers who couldn't find enough work in film, including Ellen Pompeo (whose breakout role was with Sarandon in "Moonlight Mile") and Madsen's "Sideways" companion, Sandra Oh. [Link]
¶ As a treat for surviving Monday - an Alan Alda interview, in which he talks about his experience with working with Woody Allen and Martin Scorsese and M*A*S*H and the West Wing and - oh, just go read it already.
¶ Remember that Hollywood ROI list from Forbes? Here is Peter Bart's take on the list, "should the numbers dictate a studio's decisions in casting its slate of pictures? Clearly it's instructive to know who's hot and who's not, but Leonardo DiCaprio wasn't high on the Forbes' charts before "Titanic," Seth Rogen wasn't on anyone's radar before "Knocked Up" and Jonah Hill couldn't even get cast in a school play before "Superbad"...That's why movies are so terrifying to the moneymen: Numbers don't tell you anything about the future; they just remind you about things you already should know, but conveniently manage to forget."
¶ NYT magazine profiles Nobel winner José Saramago. Read.
¶ The next time you see a movie poster at Starbucks, remember that Starbucks wants you to "go see" the movie, and the poster isn't just something to stare at as you wait for your latte. The two movies that had a Starbucks tie in - Akeelah and the Bee and Arctic Tale haven't exactly created B.O history. For Arctic Tale, Starbucks said it didn't go further and create a themed Frappuccino, for example, because it didn't want to overly commercialize the tie-in. Perhaps they're simply better at selling DVDs - it pushed a healthy number of "Akeelah" DVDs. It's also sold other studio titles like Warner Bros.' "Happy Feet" and Sony's "The Pursuit of Happyness." [Link]