Scooter Chronicles

On Sunday afternoon, thanks to my Mother-In-Law babysitting Nigel, Marcia and I snuck out to see the movie version of “Get Smart” starring Steve Carell, Anne Hathaway, Alan Arkin, Dwayne (”The Rock”) Johnson, and Terence Stamp.

The plot is pretty basic. Control is trying to stop KAOS from, well, creating chaos. This time it’s nuclear bombs distributed to different countries by Siegfried (Stamp). Maxwell Smart (Carell) is Control’s top analyst, and though he has recently passed the test to become an agent, doesn’t get the promotion because the Chief (Arkin) doesn’t want to...

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On Saturday Marcia and I watched “Scarecrow” starring Gene Hackman and Al Pacino. (Yes, our “Pacino-Fest” is nearing it’s end … still need to watch “Serpico”.)

The movie was done in 1973, between Pacino’s appearances in the first two part of “The Godfather”. It follows Max (Hackman) and Frances, aka Lion (Pacino) as two drifters thumbing their way from the western US to Pittsburgh and Detroit. Max has money in Pittsburgh to start a car wash after serving six years in jail, and Lion is heading to Detroit to see the child he has never met after spending...

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The only reason this has really caught my attention is because we have been watching a lot of episodes of Thomas the Tank Engine narrated by him the past couple of weeks. (He is better then Ringo Starr or Alec Baldwin … though Baldwin isn’t really bad, just not as good.) Marcia got a couple of collection for Nigel this weekend and made a point of getting at least one that was done by Carlin. Strange how things like that happen.

Over a month ago we had been watching another train video with Nigel and there was a folk song at the end of one of them that had been growing on me. I looked the song up only to find out that the songwriter had died the week before.

I can’t say I was a huge fan of Carlin, but always...

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On Father’s Day Marcia and I watched “Dark City” starring Rufus Sewell, Jennifer Connelly, Keifer Sutherland, William Hurt, and Richard O’Brien.

Thanks to Chris Makrozahopoulos and IMDB for the plot description:

John’s life has become a nightmare. He (Sewell) is hunted by the police (Hurt) for a series of murders he knows nothing about, a woman (Connelly) who claims to be his wife is after him, and so is a mysterious “doctor” (Sutherland). But his worst trouble is the Strangers, a series of vastly powerful beings who seem to manipulate just about everything in the...

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Back on Saturday afternoon Marcia and I watched the movie “Strangers With Candy” starring Amy Sedaris and Stephen Colbert most notably.

For those that don’t know, this movie is a prequel for the TV series. Sedaris plays Jerri Blank, a 46-year-old ex-junkie, ex-con, that goes back to high school to start her life over. In the movie she is spurred on to do this because her father is in a coma that was brought on by trauma, and the shock of her doing something good with her life may bring him out of it.

I never watched the series, though I knew what it was about. And...

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Over a week ago Marcia and I watched “The Kite Runner”, a movie based on the BOOK by Khaled Hosseini. The movie stars Khalid Abdalla, Homayoun Ershadi, Shaun Toub, Atossa Leoni, Zekeria Ebrahimi, and Ahmad Khan Mahmoodzada.

From Amazon.Com, here is the plot description:

Amir is a young Afghani from a well-to-do Kabul family; his best friend Hassan is the son of a family servant. Together the two boys form a bond of friendship that breaks tragically on one fateful day when Amir fails to save...

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On Sunday afternoon Marcia and I went to the theater (amazing, I know) and saw the new Indiana Jones movie starring (obviously) Harrison Ford, Shia LaBeouf, Karen Allen, Ray Winstone, John Hurt, and Cate Blanchett.

Let me first say that I am not a big fan of the Indiana Jones movies. That’s not to say that I hate them. I can take ‘em or leave ‘em. Marcia, however, is a HUGE Indy fan. So that is why we went.

This time around, Dr. Henry “Indiana” Jones, Jr. gets caught up with the Soviets in 1957 trying to uncover the secret behind a crystal skull. Winstone plays Mac, a former...

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Over the weekend Marcia and I watched Mel Gibson’s “Apocalypto”.

The following is the synopsis of the movie, written by Anthony Pereyra, posted on IMDB:

In the twilight of the mysterious Mayan Kingdom, a young warrior known as Jaguar Paw has been captured and taken to the great Mayan city, where he faces a harrowing end. Driven by the power of his love for his wife and son, he makes an escape to rescue them and ultimately save his way of life.

Given Gibson’s work on “The Passion of the Christ”, I wasn’t sure what to expect...

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On Sunday afternoon, Marcia and I watched “Death at a Funeral”, a British comedy directed by Frank Oz.

Thanks to Guy Bellinger and IMDB for the plot description (with a few changes):

Daniel is a decent young man, married to Jane, still living with his parents. When his father dies, it is up to him to organize his funeral. On this painful morning, with a suitable grave expression on his face, Daniel is ready to welcome his father’s friends and relatives. But preserving the dignity inherent in such circumstances will be a hard task. Particularly with an...

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Over the course of a week, Marcia and I watched “Scarface” starring Al Pacino, Michelle Pfeiffer, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, Steven Bauer, and F. Murray Abraham. Yes, this is the first time I watched. And yes (again), I realize how lame I am for taking so long to finally see this.

For those that don’t know, “Scarface” is an update (of sorts) of a movie by the same name from 1932. However, Oliver Stone (who wrote the screenplay) changed a few things. Pacino plays Tony Montana, who leaves Cuba along with his friend Manny Ribera (Bauer) after Castro opened the harbor at Mariel. To secure a green...

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