::Saturday, June 08, 2002::

BAD COMPANY, REALLY BAD COMPANY - I saw Bad Company tonight at the theater. Thank God, I get to see movies for free. Otherwise I would be demanding my money back.

I want to go on and on about how bad this movie was. I need to wonder what Anthony Hopkins smoked when he read this script (not to get it, but to ban it from use for the safety of the movie going public), and you need to know (if you didn't already) how much of a hack director Joel Schumaker is (I can't believe they give this guy millions of dollars to make movies! Give Ed Havens 10% of that and he'd bring home an Oscar). But I'll spare you tonight (The Braves won big time so I'm in a good mood). I'll leave my review in firmer hands with a quote form James Berardinelli that sums up the film perfectly, "If viewers played a drinking game identifying logical flaws, the participants would be passed out before the halfway point." Said drinking game would be more fun then the movie itself.
:: Posted by Citizen Ryan | 4:14:28 AM| Link This ::

IS THE FORCE WITH YOU?




:: how jedi are you? ::



SCHILLING VS. GLAVINE - Whose better this year? It's Glavine (what did you think I was going to say) but for an interesting anaylsis (that picks Glavine in the end :)) check out Schilling vs. Glavine. It is an article written by the brillant David Schoenfield on ESPN.com. Glavine is on pace for 28 wins...not bad at all.
:: Posted by Citizen Ryan | 1:28:52 AM| Link This ::

WHAT A WEEK TO LOVE SPORTS - Starting today it is going to be an amazing seven days in sports. In those seven days we have the following events:

Mike Tyson vs. Lennox Lewis (Boxing)
Belmont Stakes (Horseracing)
LPGA Championship (Women's Golf)
U.S. Open (Men's Golf)
French Open (Tennis)
World Cup (Soccer)
Inter-league Play (Baseball)
World Series (NCAA College Baseball)
NBA Finals (Basketball)
Stanley Cup Finals (Ice Hockey)

All this is on top of biggest car race in America, the Indy 500, which we had just last weekend. It's going to be a fun seven days either way. It's just an amazing time when you consider all the events that are going to take place in such a short period of time. The real wonder here is that the NBA Finals and the NHL Finals are taking place at the exact same time. This is really bad marketing by the two leagues. Since the finals are always the most visible entity of any sport you would like the masses focused on your sports. Unfortunately that's not the case for the NHL and NBA this year. The focus of society, sports programs and fans are divided between the two sports. Both will suffer as a result. The reason for this mess is the two weeks the NHL took off to allow some of its players to participate in the Salt Lake Olympics. The enter idea of a hockey season whose preseason starts in September and whose Playoffs end in June is itself ridiculous.

Still for some fans it's great to be able to watch the NBA and NHL finals on varying nights. Throw in be able to watch the US Soccer team try something impossible, Tiger Woods go for another Grand Slam and the New York Yankees face-off against the New York Mets and the TV is going to be a busy place. It may in fact be too busy with all the sports programs to watch. It's going to be fun anyway you cut it though. I'll be posting my thoughts on this wacky week in sports as it happen...stay tuned.
:: Posted by Citizen Ryan | 1:05:27 AM| Link This ::

BONDS, BARRY BONDS - Tonight Barry Bonds passed Frank Robinson on the all time career Home Run list. Now only Willie Mays, Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron stand between him and immortality. The question of course is whether or not Barry Bonds can get there. The way he is hitting homeruns right now there is no question, but the man is 37 years old. Even hitting 60 homeruns a year would still mean Bonds would have to wait till he was over 40. Now hitting 60 homeruns isn't exactly an easy thing to do. Only five players in baseball history have ever done it:

Babe Ruth - Did it and when he was 32 in 1927. He finished with 714 homeruns.
Roger Maris - We all know he hit 61 in '61 but he never approached that total again.
Mark McGwire - We know he did, twice, but he was also 35 when he did it just three fours years ago and now he's retired.
Sammy Sosa - Sosa is the good sign for Bonds. Even though Sosa is 5 years younger, he does play in the same era and has hit 60 or more homeruns three times in the last four seasons.

It seems obvious that Bonds will not be able to hit 60 or 70 homeruns a season for the next few years. Since his career high before last year's 73, was 49, in the year prior so we can assume that 73 is the anomaly. Still it is obvious that Bonds has bulked up and is hitting more homeruns then he did even two years ago. Still, even 50 homeruns in a season is an amazing stat and Bonds would have to maintain that for 4 seasons to break Aaron's record.

So what if Bonds hit just 40 a season? That is foreseeable. Since Bonds moved to San Francisco in 1992 he's averaged 42 homeruns a full season (not counting the 73 last year). If Bonds could keep that pace he would break Aaron's record sometime in the spring of 2007 (five seasons from now). Barry Bonds would be 42 going on 43. If Bonds is hitting 40 bombs when he is 43 it be nearly unprecedented in baseball history. But as you've heard before, if there is one guy who can do it, it's Bonds. My money is on him doing it in June of 2007, almost five years from today. Time, as always, will tell all...
:: Posted by Citizen Ryan | 1:15:31 AM| Link This ::

IT'S TIME FOR MR. BALDWIN TO SHUT UP - A survey conducted by Encino, CA-based E-Poll found that upwards of 44 percent of those surveried would refuse to see a movie starring a politically outspoken star whose views they disagree with. No wonder Susan Sarandon hasn't had a hit film in years! Someone get Rob Reiner on the phone and tell him to finally leave the country. The surprising result of the survey is that 76 percent of those polled were interested in seeing a movie about the herioc passengers of the hijacked planes. This may sound surprising at first but if actually makes sense.

What is the one aspect of 9/11 that we haven't seen? It's what happened on those airplanes. I mean we have footage of everything else, including what it was like inside the Trade Towers, but we have no pictures or images of those planes. The truth of what happened only exists in our imaginations based on the accounts that we've heard. Every other aspect of 9/11 can be seen. What happened on those planes cannot. It appears people are interested in seeing dramatized what happened on them. For many it would fill in that missing gap. Right now I think Hollywood is too cautious to do anything concering 9/11. They will shun the idea saying, "It's too sensitive of a topic," but just wait a few years and we will hear the phrase, "Enough time has passed that we can begin to look at this tragedy in another light," then you will see a tragedy of a movie. I can't wait.
:: Posted by Citizen Ryan | 4:44:44 PM| Link This ::

HARRY RETURNS -

There is your first look at Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. The second of the Potter series was my favorite of the novels and it looks like the movie is coming along quite well. The book and the upcoming movie have gotten a lot of knocks so far. Most people consider the book to be the weakest of the series, so far, and others are looking forward to the mystery and scope of the 3rd and 4th movies in the series. Yet for me I like the rich story of Secrets and the subtly terrifying concluding showdown. Entertainment Weekly has a massive cover story on the movie this week. I suggest you check it out for more pics and plenty of info on the movie the continuing adventures of Harry and friends at Hogwarts.
:: Posted by Citizen Ryan | 12:44:07 AM| Link This ::

INDIANA RETURNS - "Harrison Ford can still kick the sh-t out of most people half his age. I think he's in great condition to put the fedora and the ... leather jacket back on and crack that bullwhip a few more times." -Steven Speilberg

The uncharacteristic cursing aside, that is great news to hear. It appears that writer/director Frank Darabont (The Green Mile, The Shawshank Redemption) has been hired to write the script. "The status is that Frank Darabont is starting—he's writing the screenplay," Spielberg said. "We just made Frank's deal two weeks ago. We have the story, which is a story George Lucas wrote. It's a wonderful story. We have Harrison Ford, who's approved the story. He's ready to perform in the movie." I don't quite understand why Frank Darabont of all people would pen an Indiana Jones script. Shawshank and Mile, while both nominated for Best Film, are not exactly action adventure films in the role of Indiana Jones. Still it's unfair to put Darabont in a box as an artist. Perhaps he has a knack for writing adventure stories. It is in the end the stories and originality that made Indiana Jones fun. All the adventure came from exciting tales focused on races against the Nazi's to find and control the Ark of the Covenant or the Holy Grail. Let's hope Darabont doesn't dumb the story down to the level of say The Mummy. Looking at the situation again, perhaps it's a good move to have someone with the obvious intelligence to make Green Mile and Shawshank pen a smart, crafty screenplay for Spielberg and company.

Spielberg also added, "The movie's going to be shot probably in May of 2004. When I say probably, it could be April or May of 2004, and the movie's going to come out probably for the July 4th weekend of 2005, because the last Star Wars is going to come out the week before Memorial Day 2005. So we're coordinating this to be a one-two punch, with the last Star Wars coming out in 2005 in May and Indiana Jones IV coming out 2005, probably June 29th or July 4th." My God, what a summer that is going to be at the movies.
:: Posted by Citizen Ryan | 12:38:46 AM| Link This ::

THE SUM IS GREAT - Episode II finally faded from the top of the Box Office as Ben Affleck's version of author Tom Clancy's, Jack Ryan in The Sum of All Fears (which was better then I expected), replaced it. My review of The Sum of All Fears and Insomniawill be up on Tuesday.
:: Posted by Citizen Ryan | 9:56:52 PM| Link This ::

SMALLBALL BASEBALL - Now's your chance to name, train, and manage your own baseball team thanks to the folks at Smallball.
:: Posted by Citizen Ryan | 9:53:54 PM| Link This ::

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