This Is Just The Lead Off…

For an advanced peek at where this trail is likely to be leading to, it’s recommended that you first click on the link and view this video, it’s long but it’s a great fundamental history lesson:

<http://freedocumentaries.org/teatro.php?filmID=243&lan=en&size=big&gt;

And, here’s a quote that as far as I’ve been able to determine has often been attributed to the former Governor of Minnesota, Mr. Jesse Ventura.

“You control our world. You’ve poisoned the air we breathe, contaminated the water we drink, and copyrighted the food we eat. We fight in your wars, die for your causes, and sacrifice our freedoms to protect you. You’ve liquidated our savings, destroyed our middle class, and used our tax dollars to bailout your unending greed. We are slaves to your corporations, zombies to your airwaves, servants to your decadence. You’ve stolen our elections, assassinated our leaders, and abolished our basic rights as human beings. You own our property, shipped away our jobs, and shredded our unions. You’ve profited off of disaster, destabilized our currencies, and raised our cost of living. You’ve monopolized our freedom, stripped away our education, and have almost extinguished our flame. We are hit… we are bleeding… but we ain’t got time to bleed. We will bring the giants to their knees and you will witness our revolution!”

If that’s actually the writing of Jesse Ventura, then I’d be happy to be on board that bus, it’s one of the few in existence with a driver that I can trust to get us out of the ditch.

A few other non-owned politician’s names besides Jesse Ventura come to mind, ones that I think are worthy of your consideration: Ohio Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, and that’s about it. Truly sad how short that list is

If I’ve piqued your curiosity, this is just the start, stay tuned!!!!!

Take My Idea, Please!

There’s so much crap on t.v. now that I thought maybe I should join the crowd and be doing my part to help create yet one more piece of bandwidth clutter that would be based on some old show from the pre-rap, pre-tatoo era. This era is best to consider because most of today’s slow thinking prized demographic examples wouldn’t catch on to the theft.

So, how about if I do a lift from from the dated Tom Hanks / Peter Scolari classic, “Bosom Buddies” from the early 1980’s, except this time it’s about two college girls who decide to pose as guys so that they can move into a frat house when the sorority they want to join has maxed out on new members?

We can call it “Dick’s Friends”, and see where it goes. And I suppose that we can find a way to have Holland Taylor do something similar to her role from the original show, since her work (along with many others) on “Two And A Half Men” may end up going down with that recently “torpedoed” ship.

And if you really want to steal my humble and (as yet) not copyrighted idea, please try to keep me in mind when you’re putting the crew together, things are getting a little slow out here.

Sorry about this drift, I’m about to go political again. Way, way far political.

Stand by, it’s in the works!

Want Sauce With That Goose?

In a high level meeting that took place a while ago, President Obama had asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if it was possible to have Israel go back to their 1967 borders with the Palestinians.

Hmm, o.k., I suppose that it’s well within the scope of his office to ask that.

However, I can also easily imagine a response from Netanyahu, one in which Netanyahu said that Israel would agree to do that, but that it would take place exactly a day after the American government agreed to return to their borders that were in place in, let’s say, 1621 with the “Indians”, as they were mistakenly referred to.

The first “Swap Meet”, results: Pilgrims 1, Indians 0

N.B., The ownership of any and all photos, opinions, and/ or quotes above (including those of my own) belong to the material’s creator(s). Credit is given when it’s known, but as always, success usually has a million parents and failure is an orphan.

Feel free to ignore any ads that are shown below this advisory, I don’t get to choose them and even more sadly, I don’t make a penny off any of them, so in the holy name of capitalism I rebuke and don’t endorse or support any of them, unless of course they’re made of funny stuff…..  

P.S., check back for occasional updates and rewrites….

FAIR USE NOTICE: THIS SITE CONTAINS COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL THE USE OF WHICH HAS NOT ALWAYS BEEN SPECIFICALLY AUTHORIZED BY THE COPYRIGHT OWNER. I AM MAKING SUCH MATERIAL AVAILABLE IN MY EFFORT TO ADVANCE UNDERSTANDING OF ENVIRONMENTAL, POLITICAL, HUMAN RIGHTS, ECONOMIC, DEMOCRACY, SCIENTIFIC, AND SOCIAL JUSTICE ISSUES, ETC. I BELIEVE THIS CONSTITUTES A ‘FAIR USE’ OF ANY SUCH COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL AS PROVIDED FOR IN SECTION 107 OF THE US COPYRIGHT LAW. IN ACCORDANCE WITH TITLE 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107, THE MATERIAL ON THIS SITE IS DISTRIBUTED WITHOUT PROFIT TO THOSE WHO HAVE EXPRESSED A PRIOR INTEREST IN RECEIVING THE INCLUDED INFORMATION FOR RESEARCH AND EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES. FOR MORE INFORMATION GO TO: HTTP://WWW.LAW.CORNELL.EDU/USCODE/17/107.SHTML.  IF YOU WISH TO USE COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL FROM THIS SITE FOR PURPOSES OF YOUR OWN THAT GO BEYOND ‘FAIR USE’, YOU MUST OBTAIN PERMISSION FROM THE COPYRIGHT OWNER.  

 

 

 

Hey, Look At Those Smoke Signals….

Lately, it seems that people will not call and talk directly with anyone on the phone if they can email or text them instead. I know that this is within the realm of normalcy, but it’s getting to be such a daily experience that I’m beginning to suspect it’s a movement. I find that when I send my location sound mixer resume to a film production office for an upcoming project, even though my phone number is prominent on the top of first page, whoever is in charge of responding to such things will send me an email with no other contact information for them asking for my rate, to which I’m forced to respond back to them via email, saying that “it depends on a lot of details, could you please call me so we can quickly sort them out?”, or sometimes I will request a phone number from them for me to be able to call them back.

Waiting for a call from some heel?

When I have no choice except to continue this exchange via email or text, the conversation then pingpongs back and forth with more questions from them, responded to by more answers from me that in turn generate more questions from them, maybe you’re starting to get the picture?

Me, keeping my balls in the air

Did you ever see a scene in an old western movie where an Indian had a campfire that he covered over with green plants and then he intermittently waved a blanket over the top of it to create puffs of smoke that somehow, someone else far away was able to translate into a statement, one that they in turn would then reply to using a similar technique. To me, that’s about the same as trying to do my business via email, only maybe a little more organic.

Kemo Sabe, smoke signal say heap bad news coming our way!

If only the people I deal with in production offices were to pick up a phone and call, we could get things completely worked out in a few minutes, and the conversation might go  like this: Yes, I do have a rate but there are factors that may affect my rate. Some of the details that I need to know are; how many days will you be shooting in total (they tell me), where will you be shooting (they tell me), how many hours a day do we plan on working (they tell me), what kind of camera will you be shooting with so I know what, if any special equipment I’ll need to bring along (they tell me), will we be shooting days or nights (they tell me), and most importantly, what do you actually have in your budget (eh, maybe they tell me) for sound?  So basically we could be done in just a few minutes and I’d be able to give them a rate for their production, and either we haggle back and forth a bit and reach a deal, or we would go off on our different ways, scored as “no harm, no foul”.

The producer told me it was a student film….

Those are the sort of questions that help me to shape an answer, an answer that would take at least 20 to 30 back and forth emails or texts to get to and very likely still not be resolved in a day. I don’t have (no smoke signal pun intended) a blanket rate as I want to factor in my comfort level. You could bank on the fact that I’m going to be more expensive if you’re shooting in Montana in the winter than I will be if you’re planning on shooting at the same time of year in Hawaii. Further, I’m going to want to get paid a lot more if you have a first time director, no matter how many student competitions and festivals they’ve won. Further, you’d have to again at least double that rate if you also have an award winning film school graduate director of photography, since I know the on set hours will be endless as they will tweak and re-tweak their lights on every shot as they work on building their demo reel, ignoring everyone else on the crew that are working on a flat rate.

As an afterthought, I’ve noticed over the past few years that there are very few projects that I work on that actually have a true director of photography, most are just video camera owners or operators that were hired because they own a camera, the kind of people who will show up for work for free or very cheap with their camera, looking to build the aforementioned reel. It should be noted they also do not ask for an additional camera rental cost or require equipment insurance to be paid for by the producer, nor charge to pick up or return the camera. And once again, most of the producers that I work for would be hard pressed to be able to produce a shadow on a sunny day, but I digress…..

And don’t even get me started on the cast they plan on using, I’ve done more than enough (and that would be one) films or t.v. shows with, in my opinion, dangerous psychotics like Gary Busey, Teri Hatcher, Shannen Doherty, Marjoe Gortner, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Debra Messing, William Devane, Kirstie Alley, and so many more, enough for this lifetime. It’s not that I’m averse to working with loons, in fact over the years I’ve worked with Alan Alda, Michael Ironside, Ron Perlman, Penny Marshall, Bronson Pinchot, Ray Sharkey, Cloris Leachman, Robin Williams, Sean Young, Tim Allen, Brad Davis, David Carradine, and such, all my kind of loons of one sort or another. Again, in my opinion, they are all somewhat batshit crazy folks, but all brilliant and an absolute pleasure to work with. Simply put, I enjoy watching true genius at work, psychotic or otherwise, and despise the posers who are famous for being famous or having worked on something that was great, not because but in spite of their presence on the set.

“Loons” and “True Genius” in one photo

Now, if you were to call me to work on a production that featured Dana Delaney or Marlee Matlin in a lead role you’d find that I’m far easier to negotiate with. And going back a paragraph to the subject of loons, if you were to add Tina Fey, Illeana Douglas, or Judy Tenuta to the mix, I’d bring my own lunch and provide my own craft services. Yeah, I roll that way.

N.B., The ownership of any and all photos, opinions, and/ or quotes above (including those of mine) belong to the material’s creator(s). Credit is given when it’s known, but because success usually has a million parents and failure is an orphan, blame will not be so attributed. 

Feel free to ignore any ads that are shown below, I don’t choose them and (sadly) I don’t make a penny off any of them.

P.S., check back for occasional updates and rewrites….

FAIR USE NOTICE: THIS SITE CONTAINS COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL THE USE OF WHICH HAS NOT ALWAYS BEEN SPECIFICALLY AUTHORIZED BY THE COPYRIGHT OWNER. I AM MAKING SUCH MATERIAL AVAILABLE IN MY EFFORT TO ADVANCE UNDERSTANDING OF ENVIRONMENTAL, POLITICAL, HUMAN RIGHTS, ECONOMIC, DEMOCRACY, SCIENTIFIC, AND SOCIAL JUSTICE ISSUES, ETC. I BELIEVE THIS CONSTITUTES A ‘FAIR USE’ OF ANY SUCH COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL AS PROVIDED FOR IN SECTION 107 OF THE US COPYRIGHT LAW. IN ACCORDANCE WITH TITLE 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107, THE MATERIAL ON THIS SITE IS DISTRIBUTED WITHOUT PROFIT TO THOSE WHO HAVE EXPRESSED A PRIOR INTEREST IN RECEIVING THE INCLUDED INFORMATION FOR RESEARCH AND EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES. FOR MORE INFORMATION GO TO: HTTP://WWW.LAW.CORNELL.EDU/USCODE/17/107.SHTML.  IF YOU WISH TO USE COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL FROM THIS SITE FOR PURPOSES OF YOUR OWN THAT GO BEYOND ‘FAIR USE’, YOU MUST OBTAIN PERMISSION FROM THE COPYRIGHT OWNER.  

 

Latest CBS Clone Attempt, An Epic Fail

Monday evening, CBS proved that not every clone is worth the work.

The network has two very funny programs

Number 1 is “The Big Bang Theory”, probably the funniest show on t.v.,

Number 2 is called “How I met your mother”.

Alternate title, 4 yeahs and an eh?

I’m leaving “Two and a half men” out of this equasion since it’s still in limbo until Charlie Sheen returns to earth, or not. A new episode of “How I met your mother” is on each week, and there are re-runs running daily in syndication on many local stations. This show has an outstanding (with one major exception…. more on that below) cast working on well thought out scripts with great direction and editing. So CBS did what any poorly educated parent would do, they tried to come up with an exact copy of their successful and funny program to add to their lineup.

Nicer table,  just missing a David Spade clone?

For now, we’ll call this copy “Mad Love”, since that’s how it shows up in the television listings, and I’d consider that it’s more or less a clone because they use the same central casting collection of character types, very similar locations (a regular table for 4 or 5 in a bar), almost identical apartment set up, nice looking boys and girls, and most notably the use of voice over narrations to clarify and move the story along. Mad Love isn’t a bad show, it just gets lost in the shadow of its older big brother, and the horse’s ass that conceived it.

To recycle an old joke, one could try calling “How I met your mother” Juan, and then refer to “Mad Love” by the name Ahmal. So, when you’ve seen Juan, you’ve seen Ahmal.

I’m – so – very – sorry…..

The above mentioned actor exception? All I can say is this guy peaked as “Doogie Howser, M.D.”, sort of floundered as the Uber Mench Macho Jackbooted SS type officer in “Starship Troopers”, and is an overacting total fail in “How I met your mother”. It’s like watching the offspring of a mash up of Jerry Lewis and Jim Carrey, basically the Modus Operandi sine qua non of “Leave no scenery unchewed” at work. Part of the rub is that in spite of the fact that he openly came out of the closet, he now goes against that reality by playing a womanizing, bang anything with a pulse playboy. And, I’m not that sure about that “with a pulse” thing.

You’ve come a long way, Dougie

Maybe they could try adding Max Casella to the cast of Mad Love? He’s always been working but hasn’t had that much screen time stuff since “DH,MD”, and he would appreciate the air time.

N.B., The ownership of any and all photos, opinions, and/ or quotes above (including those of my own) belong to the material’s creator(s). Credit is given when it’s known, but as always, success usually has a million parents and failure is an orphan.

Feel free to ignore any ads that are shown below this advisory, I don’t get to choose them and even more sadly, I don’t make a penny off any of them, so in the holy name of capitalism I rebuke and don’t endorse or support any of them, unless of course they’re made of funny stuff…..  

P.S., check back for occasional updates and rewrites….

FAIR USE NOTICE: THIS SITE CONTAINS COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL THE USE OF WHICH HAS NOT ALWAYS BEEN SPECIFICALLY AUTHORIZED BY THE COPYRIGHT OWNER. I AM MAKING SUCH MATERIAL AVAILABLE IN MY EFFORT TO ADVANCE UNDERSTANDING OF ENVIRONMENTAL, POLITICAL, HUMAN RIGHTS, ECONOMIC, DEMOCRACY, SCIENTIFIC, AND SOCIAL JUSTICE ISSUES, ETC. I BELIEVE THIS CONSTITUTES A ‘FAIR USE’ OF ANY SUCH COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL AS PROVIDED FOR IN SECTION 107 OF THE US COPYRIGHT LAW. IN ACCORDANCE WITH TITLE 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107, THE MATERIAL ON THIS SITE IS DISTRIBUTED WITHOUT PROFIT TO THOSE WHO HAVE EXPRESSED A PRIOR INTEREST IN RECEIVING THE INCLUDED INFORMATION FOR RESEARCH AND EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES. FOR MORE INFORMATION GO TO: HTTP://WWW.LAW.CORNELL.EDU/USCODE/17/107.SHTML.  IF YOU WISH TO USE COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL FROM THIS SITE FOR PURPOSES OF YOUR OWN THAT GO BEYOND ‘FAIR USE’, YOU MUST OBTAIN PERMISSION FROM THE COPYRIGHT OWNER.  

 

Bush And Cheney Should Be Walking On Air…

Following the execution and subsequent dumping in the ocean of the key guy that could have fingered (in a nice way of course) both them and the members of their cadre, the hidden cave dwelling pair of Bush and Cheney must have given a huge collective sigh of relief. And it must be said, with great risk to his stone face, Cheney may have even cracked a smile. Most people would describe it as an improvement from his usual twisted grimace. Perhaps this is the first smile like expression for him since he got his 5th deferment from the Viet Nam era draft.

Demonstrating the difficult “Double Reach-Around” maneuver

It’s certain that there are others who could name names and provide the dates and amounts of aid given to Osama/Usama and his gang, but no one with a higher  world wide recognition factor attached to his name than the one Faux News often refers to as Obama bin-Laden.

Res Ipsa Loquitur

Wait, did they really say “Obama” Bin Laden?

So now that bin-Laden is blowing dust farts, enjoying his virgins, and wishing he had received a Lexan iPad (survey says less than 30% of you will really get that joke), we find that our former best possible source of more information now (in more ways than one) grows cold. The most interesting thing I’ve since found to read about (in chronological order) is the progressive changes in the wording of what the actual definition of the mission plan was. It goes from trying to take him alive, to orders to Seal Team 6 to defend themselves if it’s thought that he might have an explosive device on his body (basically, requiring a nude bin-Laden to agree to a Git-Mo style body cavity search), to just shoot the mo-fo in the head and dump his body in the ocean, and then explain that last part as being an old Muslim tradition.

 If you believe a criminal will return to the scene of the crime,
why were these guys not at the May 5th Ground Zero memorial?

N.B., The ownership of any and all photos, opinions, and/ or quotes above (including those of my own) belong to the material’s creator(s). Credit is given when it’s known, but as everyone knows, success usually has a million parents and failure is an orphan.

Feel free to ignore any ads that are shown below this advisory, I don’t get to choose them and even more sadly, I don’t make a penny off any of them, so in the holy name of capitalism I rebuke and don’t endorse or support any of them, unless of course they’re made of funny stuff…..  

P.S., check back for occasional updates and rewrites….

FAIR USE NOTICE: THIS SITE CONTAINS COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL THE USE OF WHICH HAS NOT ALWAYS BEEN SPECIFICALLY AUTHORIZED BY THE COPYRIGHT OWNER. I AM MAKING SUCH MATERIAL AVAILABLE IN MY EFFORT TO ADVANCE UNDERSTANDING OF ENVIRONMENTAL, POLITICAL, HUMAN RIGHTS, ECONOMIC, DEMOCRACY, SCIENTIFIC, AND SOCIAL JUSTICE ISSUES, ETC. I BELIEVE THIS CONSTITUTES A ‘FAIR USE’ OF ANY SUCH COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL AS PROVIDED FOR IN SECTION 107 OF THE US COPYRIGHT LAW. IN ACCORDANCE WITH TITLE 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107, THE MATERIAL ON THIS SITE IS DISTRIBUTED WITHOUT PROFIT TO THOSE WHO HAVE EXPRESSED A PRIOR INTEREST IN RECEIVING THE INCLUDED INFORMATION FOR RESEARCH AND EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES. FOR MORE INFORMATION GO TO: HTTP://WWW.LAW.CORNELL.EDU/USCODE/17/107.SHTML.  IF YOU WISH TO USE COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL FROM THIS SITE FOR PURPOSES OF YOUR OWN THAT GO BEYOND ‘FAIR USE’, YOU MUST OBTAIN PERMISSION FROM THE COPYRIGHT OWNER.  

A tough break for bin-Laden

It’s too bad for Osama bin-Laden that even with all of his family’s oil industry corporate pawns  lobbyist friends doing their overpaid best, he wasn’t able to get them to pressure (some might call it pay off) the corporate owned United States Supreme Court in time to vote to cut off the funding for the military action that finally found him.

I guess plan “B” for him could have been to go and  incorporate himself as “Osama bin-Laden Goyim Youth Network LLC” (NYSE listing: OBGYN), after that, the government would have not bothered him at all. In fact, given the recent Supreme Court Citizens United decision, he might be even allowed to donate to election campaigns, just like the rest of his family has always done. You still don’t think so? Please explain then how all of those major Saudi players managed to get flown en-masse and unquestioned out of the U.S. on September 12, 2001, that was a day when there were supposed to be no flights taking off anywhere for anyone?

You know who I’m talking about when I say Osama? He was that six foot four inch tall guy that roamed the hills of West Bumfuckistan for almost ten years in search of dialysis treatment every other day. The same guy that George W. Bush used the full might of the U.S. to chase after for what must have been about a full week, before he used the power of his office to grab Americans by the nose
and lead them by it over to Iraq, so he could finally kill off the guy that his ex-president father couldn’t. Yeah, that’s the Osama I’m talking about.

Osama indicates how many Supreme Court Justices his family owns

How many hours do you suppose will elapse before Donald Trump, the world’s most famous certified asshat, shows up on Fox News (you may as well pronounce it “Faux News”) and screams for someone to produce DNA evidence and a death certificate, and by that I mean the notarized long form original copy?

Just askin….