Catfish

Catfish (2010)

When one thinks of all the great movies within the "psychological thriller documentary" genre, not many movies come to mind. In fact no movies come to mind. This is one of those things that perhaps in a few days it'll suddenly come to me that I forgot one but at the moment there are no movies in this category. Except for the new documentary "Catfish".

We all know that the internet is a place where fiction and reality can be hard to discern. It's a hard and fast rule for instance that the attractive lady you're chatting to in chat rooms is really an overweight 40-year-old man who works as a part-time accountant. But can you be sure either way? And wouldn't you like to find out the stark naked truth (NOT LITERALLY)? This is "Catfish".

"Catfish" is a low-budget indie documentary that only recently came out on DVD and (I assume) if anyone is to find out about it, it will only be via word of mouth. In it a 24-year-old photographer from New York strikes up a friendship with a family in the Midwest over facebook. Through social networking, email, pictures, texts, videos and phone conversations he starts a relationship with the 19-year-old oldest sister and things progress steadily from there. As the relationship starts to get more serious, a series of strange clues cause him to begin to question whether he's actually interacting with a real person. And if he wasn't talking to a real person, what is the alternative possibility? Hoping to finally uncover the truth he decides on an impromptu visit and finds that the reality of the situation is beyond strange.

Obviously, getting at the truth is exactly the point of the movie and I won't spoil anything here. I only suggest that the building mystery is as fascinating as any mystery/fictional movie you're bound to see and the slow descent into the fictional (real) world is absolutely creepy. In fact the creepiness combined with the low-budget one-camera style at one point brought up memories of "The Blair Witch Project". Except this documentary is real (I think) and truth is stranger than fiction. Definitely recommended.

Oh yeah, and don't read or watch anything about the movie beforehand because, like "The Sixth Sense", a large part of the interest of the movie is finding out how it ends. That is, don't read anything about it starting now.

Beavis and Butthead In 2011

Beavis and Butthead are coming back for a new season of shows to air on MTV this Summer. Yes, you read that sentence correctly.

Not much else is known about the show other than that Mike Judge will still do the voices, the two protagonists will still be in high school, it will still be on MTV and they'll be mocking current music videos. It's unclear how the music video data will actually be pushed through the MTV channel system but sources in the scientific community assure me that the technology exists.

This article about the comeback was written in July of 2010. How am I only hearing about this now?!

SNL - Dana Carvey

This week was a special event for Saturday Night Live. The guest host was Dana Carvey. The show saw the return of "Church Chat" and special cameos by Mike Meyers and John Lovitz.

Oh yeah and a little something called THIS:

Also, this one isn't so much funny as I just like this song and wish to buy the record album.

And I thought this was pretty funny too.

It was nice to see him back and it was one of the better episodes of the past few years. You can watch the full show here.

Super Bowl of Serenity

After a week of contemplation, trying to figure out how to fill my Super Bowl hours, I finally settled upon the idea of a "Joy of Painting" with Bob Ross marathon.

Using the power of the internet I was able to get a multitude of episodes and at 30 minutes each it was enough to cover the 8 hour (or whatever) span of overpriced commercials ("The Super Bowl"). The show was on the air for 30 years so there are A TON of episodes to choose from. I tried to sample one episode in each season across different seasons but even with that I didn't even get to Season 10.

And what a Super Bowl it was... there were almighty mountains, happy little trees, little rascal squirrels, clouds who had other cloud friends, trees that were sons of guns, bravery tests and plenty of happy accidents.

Some of the episodes were pretty unusual. One had a predominantly purple motif which I enjoyed and in another episode a woman came on and taught us how to paint saw blades. Turns out it's exactly the same as painting on a canvas... except on a saw blade. That's one of the great things about painting; it's your own little world. When you buy your first tube of paint, you get your Artist's License which allows you to do anything you want within the boundaries of your painting.

The whole experience added up to ultra-relaxation. It wasn't the most exciting Super Bowl ever, it was the most peaceful. ARE YOU READY FOR SOME CONTEMPLATIVE RELAXATION?! Yes.

Super Bowl of Avoidance

It occurred to me as I watched the Pro Bowl today that this will be my last chance to see the NFL until next season. This made me sad for two reasons. 1) Nothing that happens in the Pro Bowl can really be described as "football" and 2) due to the current collective bargaining agreement, the wait will probably be longer than "next season". "Next season" will start at least a month late (my estimate) if there's even a season at all.

"But what about the Super Bowl?!", you say, quite harshly. A little too harshly, frankly. If I'm going to write a blog, I really don't need that level of sass and I'm not going to take it. Well, to answer the question, the Super Bowl annoys me. It barely has any more to do with football than the Pro Bowl does. Between the people watching just for the commercials, the halftime show where 'NSync does half a song with Aerosmith, the indifferent crowd and the fact that the public at large watches just because everyone else is, I couldn't care less. If my team were in the game, I'd watch and I'd watch harder than anyone else but until that happens, it's banned.

The question now is how to fill my time. I'd like to do something that stands out so that it can be remembered fondly in the future. Past Super Bowls I've:

• Watched "Follow That Bird"
• Watched "Puppy Bowl I" (play-by-play by Harry Kalas) (the winner was all of us)
• Watched "Muppet Treasure Island"

And even though I had a blog during last years game, I don't remember what I did. If I had to guess, I think I was watching a movie of some sort.

So what to do this year? Not sure. It's something to think about this week. The only rules are that it has to be something slightly off the beaten path (or simply ridiculous) and has to be as "opposite" of the Super Bowl as possible. A couple of the frontrunners so far:

Storage Wars Marathon

Watch "Wayne and Garth's Music A-Go-Go" (if I can get it in time)

Read

Watch "Trading Spaces" (I'd have to find that as well)

8-bit Nintendo Night

That's really all I have so far but I have a week to think about it. I'm sure I'll figure something out. Suggestions welcome.

The good news is this: two weeks until aces and catchers.

Wax Conan Revisited

Conan visits his wax figure made by Madame Tussaud's about a year ago.

This is great because Conan goes in with no material to work with but still improvises a full 6 minute bit. He is to comedy as B.A. Baracus is to machines.

No sign of Wax Tom Cruise and Wax Fonzie.