Pun Salad

I didn't have very high hopes for this movie, but I put it in the Blockbuster queue on a lark. It is a yarn about professional thieves, who need to pull off two insanely complex heists, the second in response to a murderous double-cross after the first. Even with low expectations, I was disappointed.

Although there are some pretty neat driving scenes, that's about it. Everything is utterly predictable. (Watch for the loose end. You'll know exactly how the movie's climax is "surprisingly" resolved.) The dialog is clunky and unmarred by cleverness. No actual acting talent is involved. (OK, well, I'll bump it up a half-star for Seth Green, who has a funny episode when he imagines what Jason Statham is saying to a pretty cable tech.)

You also need to not think very hard about thorny questions of relative morality between (a) the "good" crooks who endanger countless innocent lives without apparent thought during their capers, and (b) the "bad" murdering double-crossing crook.

I view Christmas as a concrete wall. And I'm headed toward it at 80 MPH on a ice-covered street in a gasoline truck with no brakes.

Yes, it's only a week away.

• Movie fans will not want to miss Iowahawk's sneak preview of upcoming Hollywood flicks, guaranteed to shake off this year's box office doldrums. Sample:

  Lunch Lady: poignant story of school cook-turned-playground strangler has generated advanced Oscar buzz for star Jennifer Lopez, who reportedly gained 400 pounds, facial tatoos and gum disease for the role.

• The Club for Growth blog has recently been added to the ol' blogroll, as they seem to be on the side of the angels, and have not as yet been caught taking cash from Jack Abramoff. A recent entry points to yet another sad sign of business as usual, disguised in a bill to mint yet another version of those pain-in-the-butt dollar coins:

  The dirty little secret about this bill is that it would force every single vending machine on federal property or on the premises of an entity receiving federal funding to accept these new coins.

  Yes, friends, happily Your Federal Government has solved all the bigger problems than the spectacular unpopularity of dollar coins, and hence now issues decrees concerning the inner workings of vending machines. I note that my own Congressman Jeb Bradley voted for this idiocy. A stern rebuke is on its way via his web page.
• And, via Dartblog: What is the answer to life, the universe, and everything? The Google knows!