Compassionate Curmudgeon

Bumper Sticker

Just saw a bumper sticker that made me smile:

Republicans for Voldemort

A quick search on Google shows that a lot of places are offering variations on that theme.

A Private Screening

I attended a private screening of Sweeney Todd this morning.

Just kidding. I went to the 10:15 showing and the only people in the auditorium besides me were a middle-aged couple. This was a disappointment, because I was most curious to see how an audience would react to the movie. OTOH, it meant that there was not a single distraction from an audience member, which might be a first. Before the fifteen minutes worth of trailers, there were three, count 'em, three separate requests to turn off cell phones. Is this normal these days?

As to the movie itself, I was expecting to like some things and dislike others, but overall I was very pleased with the whole thing. Of course, the "singing" is awful, so I won't get the recording, but I'll probably spring for the DVD when it comes out.

Johnny Depp, whom I've never liked, did his usual impersonation of an oak tree, and it worked better in this film than usual. Helena Bonham Carter did a terrific acting job, although her voice was sometimes drowned out by the orchestra.

Casting Toby as a youngster was an excellent decision, and it made "Not While I'm Around" a genuinely moving and affecting number. And even creepier once we realize what Mrs. Lovett has in mind.

I have to concur with others who have noted that the gore content was nothing like what the advance reviews led me to expect. This was cartoon violence. The blood was an impossible shade of red. For the life of me I don't think this deserved its R rating. I'd have no hesitation in taking children to see this film, and I'm normally hyper-critical of violence in films aimed at kids.

It seems to me that Burton was going for the scare factor, which is why he de-emphasized the comic elements. Overall, I'd say that he succeeded.

BTW, the fact that the orchestral music during the opening and closing titles had no instruments carrying the tunes of the songs leads me to think that these arrangements were made with the expectation that there would be vocals. It was actually fun to hear the music played that way.

And to close on a mild *SPOILER*:

The decision to have Sweeney leave Johanna alone, rather than having her escape, was interesting. It indicated that Sweeney thought that with the Beadle and the Judge dead, his work was done. It also gives him just a wee bit more sympathy going into the final scene, especially given that earlier he had intended to kill Toby on two different occasions.

My Favorite Christmas Song

My favorite Christmas song was written by Bob Wells and Mel Tormé and is called, appropriately enough, "The Christmas Song".

And here's my favorite story about my favorite Christmas song as told by Mark Evanier.

And here's Nat King Cole singing my favorite Christmas song.

You Can't Fool Me!

I was curious about a comment left on my blog in response to my post congratulating New Jersey for being such a great state for eliminating the death penalty.

It wouldn't have intrigued me so much except that it appeared just a few hours after I made the post, which implied that it was from someone who was a regular reader (I don't have many of those), rather than someone who found the blog through a search engine or link from some other site.

So I decided to check the logs.

I noticed right away that it was indeed someone who came directly to my blog's main page, as there was no referrer entry, so presumably he has a bookmark to my blog. His ISP is Verizon, and he's running Firefox 2.0 on a Windows PC.

He came to the site at about 9:50pm, and within 25 seconds clicked on the link to add a comment, indicating a fairly spontaneous and maybe even impulsive act. Then he took nearly 20 minutes to compose his message, at which point he posted it. His post was rejected; I'm guessing because he didn't include an email address. He fixed that (probably with a bogus address) and then double-clicked the Post button, which resulted in two identical comments (I later deleted one of them).

Then he returned the following morning at 6:26am to check his comment, perhaps see if it had gotten any responses.

The comment is quite idiotic, but it is carefully composed in reasonably literate English, and it seems designed more to provoke than to make a coherent point. It is signed "Jesus", another indication that it was designed to be provocative.

So when you add them all together, I can think of only one person who fits the profile. He's a former co-worker of mine.

Ed Hagan, you've been outed!

The Best State in the Union

Today New Jersey abolished the death penalty.

As far as I'm concerned, it is now the Best State in the Union!

Congratulations, New Jersey!

Oh, no! Not KO?!

Among Keith Olbermann's Special Comments, last night's is one of his best, as he takes President Junior and his minions to task over the latest revelations to the effect that the shrub knew about Iran's shutting down of its nuclear weapons program at least since August and has been lying about it ever since.

But when KO, who is usually pretty sharp in his historical references, includes President Ulysses S. Grant in his list of worst presidents, he is wrong. Contrary to popular opinion, Grant was actually one of our greatest presidents.

I'm waiting for a retraction.

On another note, even though Olbermann's Countdown is one of the few good places to get news on the airwaves these days, he is still hampered by the stable of hack "journalists" he has to deal with. Case in point, when KO asked Newsweek's Richard Wolffe about the contrast in the coverage that the news media gave to Clinton's lie about sex versus Bush's lies about far more serious issues, Wolffe's answer was what the lawyers would call non-responsive.

Winter Dreams

I'm enjoying my tradition of listening to Chaikovsky's Symphony #1 in g minor, "Winter Dreams", at the first snow of winter.

While I know it technically isn't winter yet, a tradition is a tradition...