What are you looking at?


I enjoy a good film.  As it turns out, a lot of the time I enjoy a bad film, too (although not just any bad film).  I never saw all that many movies in theaters,  partly because of the price (which now is probably around 17 bucks a head), partly because of the ambience (sticky floors, noisy strangers, buzzing cell phones, etc.).  But the real advantage of the video and DVD delivery methods is the ability to review the films.  Repeatedly.  If it's not worth seeing twice, it probably wasn't worth seeing the first time.

We finally slipped into the modern convenience of Netflix.  I remain confident, however, that we will not end up survivalists.

The Internet Movie Database is a great resource for trying to figure out what else the actron you are watching has been in.

And then, since I'm watching my movies on the small screen anyway....

I watch some TV.

Really not all that much.  (Who has the time?)  But there are a couple of shows I kinda follow.

I used to watch The Shield.  More grit than NYPD Blue (aka "Naked Cops"), although less Sipowicz.  But more Michael Chiklis. But the show airs in an inconvenient time (on the satellite, which wants us all to pretend we're on the East Coast), and our VCR has been pretty flaky when we've tried to record it.  So I don't really watch it anymore.

I'm always up for Frontline.  Even the reruns are good.  (Part of that may be that the same crap keeps happening even if it has already been exposed.)  But I almost never know when Frontline is going to be on.  It's usually an undeserved jackpot from aimless channel surfing.

Something I do try to catch regularly is The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.  Wickedly funny "fake" news that is generally truer than what you catch on the "real" news the networks and local affiliates produce.  The interview segment at the end is hit-or-miss and not always well-motivated, but I can deal with it.  Reruns of The Daily Show are actually less satisfying than reruns of Frontline.  

And then there's the show I got hooked on quite by accident, a show that we manually tape every time a new episode airs, a show whose episodes should each be watched at least twice:  The West Wing.

Maybe it's that the show assumes some intelligence in its viewers (and spawns websites devoted to continuity issues on the show).  Maybe it's because the dialogue is somewhere between '30s screwball comedy and the family dinner table of my childhood in terms of witty banter.  Maybe it's because the show can almost make me believe that this country could elect a real statesman rather than just another politician.  Who can say?  It's a good hour.

Bar none, the best website I've seen for TV viewers at all stages of addiction is Television Without Pity.  Their recappers pull no punches.  If your VCR conks out, this is the site to hit.


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