Category: entertainment

If you feel that your life is sadly lacking in the karaoke department, you should visit River Selkie’s pet project, the Sing-a-Long Karaoke blog. That’s right! At last, you can sing and blog at the very same time!

Although I’m allergic to karaoke myself and break out in itchy spots when I get near a microphone, I’d encourage anyone with a microphone and vocal cords to join the fun. Best of all… it’s anonymous!

Read the karaoke FAQ to find out how to post your vocal stylings.

I visited Black Dog Video yesterday to pick up a couple of movies. Black Dog is one of the few remaining independent video rental shops in Vancouver, and have managed to stay in business by keeping in stock a stunning number of art and foreign films. This places them in a niche market with little competition from the low-brow megastore, Blockbuster, which stocks only hit movies, and whose clientele tends to get confused if the title contains one or more polysyllabic words. Black Dog customers are film connoiseurs who appreciate the true art of filmmaking.

So as the clerk checked out my copies of Ocean’s Twelve and Ladder 49, something strange and wholly unexpected happened. “You have a late charge,” she said, adjusting her black-rimmed glasses to peer at her computer screen.

It was true. It was true: I had returned a movie an entire day late last week. Upon being caught, I was almost overwhelmed with guilt. I lowered my eyes, and felt the flush of shame creeping into my cheeks, edging around my ears, and leaking out my scalp in the form of sweat.

But then something remarkable happened.

“But… I’ll forgive you,” she said simply, as if it were nothing. But it was everything! I was forgiven! She forgave me. I could barely contain my relief. I wanted to shout out loud! I wanted to reach over the counter and embrace her with joy, but fortunately I stopped myself because the last time I did that — well I won’t get into that. I thanked her, and left Black Dog feeling purified in spirit. I had been forgiven.

It had happened so quickly, and without ceremony, in dramatic contrast with the early days of video rental, where late-fee forgiveness often required penance, the presence of a priest or rabbi, and on occasion a bout of self-flagellation. Times change, I suppose, and as is so often the case, tradition falls by the wayside.

Is it my imagination, or has Nick Cage played the exact same character in every single movie he’s ever appeared in?

Warning: Contains possible Revenge of the Sith spoilers.

I’m a big enough man to admit when I’m wrong. Actually, I’m a big enough man to get winded walking up a flight of stairs too, but that’s another issue. The point is, I totally trashed Star Wars before I went to see it, and then George Lucas smacked me in the face with a great movie.

Alright, sure we have to overlook little details, like the fact that Padme dies in childbirth, despite the fact that in Return of the Jedi, Leia tells Luke what their mother was like. And the fact that R2-D2 and C3PO perform vital roles in Obiwan’s life, yet when Luke brings R2 to him in the original Star Wars, Obiwan says, “Strange. I don’t remember ever owning a droid.” I’d better stop there, because the list of massive plot holes can fill pages. Besides, that’s nit-picking. For the sake of willing suspension of disbelief, let’s ignore the fact that Annikin is about 6 years old in The Phantom Menace (and building pod racers!), yet he’s about 16 only a few years later in Attack of the Clones, and then by Star Wars, apparently he adds about a foot to his height and develops a gravelly, bass voice.

Setting all that aside, I have to say that I enjoyed the show very much. It wasn’t deep, or particularly thought-provoking, but its pacing moved the plot along quickly, without dallying on the mysteries of life, the way the previous two movies did in such depth. And the movie sprung so many surprising plot twists on the audience too. For example, at one point, a woman nearby leaned over to her husband to ask, “No way… Annikin is Darth Vader?”

Oh. I hope I didn’t spoil the plot for anyone there.

If I have a serious complaint, it’s that Luke Skywalker was a bit flat in his performance, and the actor was, I believe, a little too old for the role, and didn’t bear even the vaguest resemblance to Mark Hamill.

In the end, I left the theatre feeling that I’d gotten my money’s worth. My dollars had been far better spent on The Revenge of the Sith than on, say, food for a couple of days. George, I was wrong to doubt you.