District 9

By Michelle Patterson

A car windshield splattered and smeared with the guts of bugs and men and swirls of dust and haze appears in front of the camera, doubling as a means to lessen the intense sun of South Africa. The bloody spray of horror married with the vroom-vroom of the action film—all in the midst of a bleak near-future within the science-fiction genre. It adds to the grime of this particular dystopia.
(more…)

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly: Film Remakes, Part Three

By Michelle Patterson

Read Parts One and Two of this series.

Ahhh, it’s time to close the final chapter to the film remake saga. Such wonderful memories have been created in the past few months as a result of devotion to this glorious torture. Boring bears on the baseball field, terrible tweens taking on the Disney vault classics, and Nicolas Cage punching a series of women in the face—I can’t say that it’s been complete misery. The ability to admit when I’m wrong has never been something that I’ve shied away from; there is concrete proof that on rare occasion Hollywood can get it right when they take another crack at a story that has already been told. Ironically, this trilogy of articles ends on a bitter note right when it’s supposed to be time to laugh and adore one another.
(more…)

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly: Film Remakes, Part Two

By Michelle Patterson

Read Part One of this series here.

In the previous installment, I explained what separates the good film remakes from the bad and the ugly. There should be a lot of care taken to avoid any of the mistakes of the past, or in the case of a particularly artistic original film, one should not overdo what made that film so good in the first place. Bludgeoning the audience to get a message across won’t make them roll over like kittens and beg for their bellies to be scratched; it will leave them numb and confused, desperate to go home and crawl under the covers to make it all just go away.
(more…)

Top Five: TV’s Female Role Models

By Michelle Patterson

I want to lavish praise upon a few of my new favorite strong female role models on the small-screen. More realistic than the perfectly-tousled china dolls of Gossip Girl (although dammit, do I love me some Blair!) and much smarter than the featured bad actress of the week on Supernatural, I’m relieved to know that young girls can and do attempt to be like the women they see on their televisions when these types of characters exist. Ladies who have the required sass and the ability to kick-ass, but who also bring across the most poignant and heart-breaking moments are my favorite kinds. The following are my top five female role models on television.
(more…)

Prince and The Revolution, Purple Rain

By Michelle Patterson

Squealing at the top of our lungs, we sprinted to our softball coach’s station wagon, desperate for cover from the pouring rain. All of us wiped down our dirt-streaked legs with the towels meant for cleaning out the bottoms of our cleats and seriously mulled over what type of Bubble-Yum to have on the way home. As we chomped down hard in frustration at not getting to play a game, and popped piercingly loud bubbles, coach gave us a glare. He clicked on the radio to drown out our sullen chews. A gospel-tinged, country-flavored song with a soaring guitar line in the background roared to life. All the other girls in the car immediately started singing along. It didn’t take long until I figured out the simple loop and repeat of the lyrics, so I was screaming with them in no time. It was a thrill; I felt like I belonged and was a real part of something. And now we were singing, howling together with the ridiculous passion usually reserved for cheers of victory after winning a game or stealing second base. This “Purple Rain” song was painting real grins of satisfaction on our faces.
(more…)

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly: Film Remakes, Part One

By Michelle Patterson

La belle et la bête, 1946

I had what I thought to be the perfect metaphor for this article series. It started out well enough and soon became an epic flowchart in the grand tradition of Barney Stinson (Neil Patrick Harris on How I Met Your Mother), complete with elaborate examples and explanations, some even color-coded, and most of them flimsy enough to fall apart upon closer examination. Then, it started to become creepier and more in poor taste. It just made me too uncomfortable to continue. Finally the thought hit me that the exercise itself—trying to find the ultimate way to explain just why and how remakes are usually not a good idea at all and leave you feeling devastated and empty—had actually turned into the real metaphor I was looking for. This was followed by the realization that the explanation of the explanation had become just what I needed: a way to prove why remakes are mostly bad, sometimes good, but usually ugly. I’ll start and maybe you’ll understand what I mean.
(more…)

Popshifter‘s Secret Garden of Crushes

By Less Lee Moore

Pizzazz of The Misfits

WFMU’s Beware of the Blog is a fabulous resource for discovering music, movies, and art that I would likely never know about if left to my own devices. Sometimes, however, my favorite blog entries are the first-hand accounts of the often-perverting effects of pop culture.
(more…)

Play Me I’m Sick

By Michelle Patterson

Sunday is the day that I clean: when I secure my ear-buds into my ears, put my iPod into shuffle mode to zone out the surroundings, and just focus on the tasks at hand. Dust bunnies be damned! Suddenly, a song begins and I feel nauseated. I just want to forget about cleaning and focus on how to get the room to stop spinning. (more…)

Those Old Melodies: Songs Rediscovered

Intro by Less Lee Moore

Recently I was listening to The Vines’ Highly Evolved album again. My history with this album is intriguing, and proves my theory that some music needs to be fully digested before you can appreciate it.
(more…)

Ron Howard: Who Loves Ya Baby?

By Michelle Patterson

Ron Howard is a gem of a human being. And when I use the word “gem” I’m referring to his acting and voiceover work. The Andy Griffith Show was many things: charming, sickeningly sweet, funny, and surprisingly open-minded about parenting habits and the courtship of a widower. Most of all, though, it allowed children of the time (and even today for those kids who, like me, were prone to dabbling in Nick at Nite‘s lineup) the opportunity to project themselves into the role of Opie Taylor.
(more…)