Have you ever gotten a paper cut on your finger, the kind that doesn't really hurt but just stings? You think to yourself, 'Ouch... ah well, it's nothing,' and try to ignore it, but it just keeps on stinging and aching, and won't stop annoying you while you're trying to do other stuff?

That's the way I feel about something I read a couple of days ago. I was looking up some info on an author I've long admired, one Steven R. Boyett. He's not famous, nor does he have any bestsellers under his belt - his main claim to fame seems to be that he worked on an early draft of 'Toy Story 2'. He's not prolific, either... I've only ever ready two of his five published books, plus one short story. That short story in particular, 'Emerald City Blues', remains one of my all-time favorites. It's a dark tour de force apocalyptic cold war fantasy/satire which imagines what happens when a nuclear warhead is detonated over the magical city of Oz... far from being the gimmicky one-note joke it sounds like, in Boyett's hands it's poignant, funny and heartbreaking, a bravura bit of fiction that influenced a lot of my own early stabs at writing.

In furry circles, Boyett's probably best known for a pair of mid-80s novels. 'Ariel' is a strange fantasy tale of a sexually frustrated young man and his unicorn companion as they journey across a magic-ravaged United States, while 'The Architect of Sleep' is the first third of a proposed trilogy about a man from Earth who finds himself transported to a world where sentient raccoons have evolved as the dominant race.

Personally 'Ariel' never did much for me, but 'Architect' was one that I quite enjoyed, and I've always wondered when and if the remaining two books might come out. So, imagine my pleasant surprise when I found a link to Boyett's personal webpage, which promised news about the 'Architect' saga. Now imagine my less pleasant surprise when I followed the FAQ link and read this:

"Where's the rest of 'The Architect of Sleep'? In a box in my closet. For the longest time I've had every intention of finishing it, but thanks to the existence of (and the kind of mail I get from) furries, I've changed my mind."

The word 'furries' in that paragraph is a hyperlink that takes you to the official Wikipedia entry on the furry subculture... presumably we're meant to follow it and share in Boyett's amusement and/or disgust. At first I tried to just roll my eyes and tsk-tsk away this snarky little dig - after all, furry bashing is nothing new, and it's not like it should come as any kind of surprise. I mean, come on, everybody makes fun of furries... we're used to it by now, yes? No harm done.

Still... I found his comment getting unpleasantly under my skin, long after I should have been able to shrug it off. Somehow it doesn’t seem so harmless, no matter how understanding I try to be. I dunno, maybe it's the fact that, once again, we're being cast as some kind of sicko fetish group, a punchline for scoring a cheap laugh. Mostly, though, I think it's just that the insult is coming from somebody I've always looked up to as a writer. I have to believe that he's not being serious - surely he isn't holding back publication just because of us. But does that make the 'joke', or the sentiment behind it, any less unpleasant? Honestly, who does this arrogant prick think he is, contemptuously dismissing an entire group of potential fans? Personally, if I were in his shoes, I'd be grateful to anyone who bought and enjoyed my work, regardless of why.

Regrettably, from now on, I won’t be doing either of those things.

Y'know, if there's one thing I've learned as a film buff, it's never to get too snooty about a movie before it's released. Heck, my DVD library is littered with flicks I was just sure were going to blow, at least until they came out and pleasantly surprised me. 'Happy Feet'? One of my faves. 'Over the Hedge'? Love it. 'Lion King 1 1/2'? I watch it all the time. The new 'Star Wars' trilogy? No, that still sucks, but at least I gave it the benefit of the doubt, even after 'Attack of the Clones'.

Which is my roundabout way of saying that a small part of me doesn't want to condemn this new CG 'Alvin and the Chipmunks' movie as the life draining hydrogen bomb of suck that it appears to be. Sure, Alvin and his siblings seem to have been force fed into some berserk marketing hay baler that sucked up their little rodenty souls, mangled them, and spat them back out as grotesque hip hop parodies of themselves, but hey, it could still work, right? After all, the 'Munks were never meant to do much more than offer up helium-pitched cover tunes of popular music, so it's not like there was a whole lot of artistic integrity there to violate, right?

It's just... well, there's no delicate way to put this, but Alvin eats a piece of shit in the new teaser trailer. I'm not kidding, he literally picks up a chunk of feces and pops it into his mouth. See, he's trying to convince Dave that it's a raisin, and... aw, heck, you get it, and anyway that's the only joke the trailer has to offer. Are your sides splitting with glee at the thought of Alvin and his brothers chugging poop like they're in some psychotic scheisser video? Mine aren't, but maybe I've got it all wrong. I've been completely ass-backward about movies before, and it's perfectly possible that one day I'll be declaring this new 'Chipmunks' movie to be one of the year's best. I honestly do want to be fair, even in the face of what seems to be a clear-cut case of a once-popular franchise being cynically gutted in an effort to bleed a few more dollars out of it before its corpse is chucked into the pop culture landfill.

It's just that it's really, really hard to square these new scatalogically-minded 'Chipmunks' with the ones I remember singing wistfully about finding model airplanes and hula hoops under the Christmas tree.

For those of us old enough have enjoyed the 'Transformers' cartoons and toys back when they first debuted in the 1980s, the prospect of a live action movie always seemed kind of exciting. Sure, the whole thing was never anything more than an elaborate merchandising blitz, but there used to be a goofy charm to the idea of a race of alien robots who could presto-changeo themselves into tape decks and VW beetles while pummeling each other into scrap metal. It would have been impossible to do ten years ago, but hey, CG is awesome now, right? Plus, it's just 'Transformers', for Pete's sake... all you need are good guy robots vs. bad guy robots and tons of shit blowing up. How could they screw it up?

How, indeed? Enter Michael Bay.

Now, let's be fair. Michael Bay is not the worst director alive today – that title probably belongs to Uwe Boll, or maybe the guy who just squeezed 'Evan Almighty' out. I'm not a Bay-hater. He's a savvy craftsman, he's got a keen cinematographer's eye, and he really seems to care about what he's doing... but holy crap, does the man have horrible taste. Virtually every film he's made (even 'The Rock', which I rather like) is a mad scramble of slick action, pretty visuals, knives-on-a-blackboard comic relief and blend-o-matic editing that renders many scenes incomprehensible. He's like a talented chef who could make you a nice omelette, but instead feels compelled to dump in sixty different spices and then set the thing on fire because it'll look really cool.

Even still, Bay could have pulled this movie off, if only because 'Transformers' only needed to be a simple, breezy escapist fantasy in order to work. Unfortunately, producer Steven Spielberg seems to have encouraged all of Bay's tackiest tendencies, the worst of which is his endless fascination with shallow characters doing obnoxious things. I thought the characters in 'Armageddon' were assholes, but he tops himself here by giving us interminable scenes of the human hero arguing with his parents, who come across like characters from some boorish, failed sitcom pilot. Bay never met a cheap gag or stereotype he didn’t think was hilarious, so instead of the promised robots-in-disguise fighting it out, we’re mainly treated to a chihuahua who wears ‘bling bling’, a pudgy computer hacker who chugs donuts and literally screams most of his dialogue, and a creepy sequence wherein the hero’s mom bursts into his room and eagerly demands to know if he’s been masturbating.

Not that the robots fare any better. Not only does Bay satisfy what he apparently presumes was the fanbase’s longstanding desire to watch a Transformer go wee-wee, but he also tries to plug into the ‘urban market’ with a ‘yo yo, wassup?’ jive-talking Autobot who would have been groan-inducing fifteen years ago. Apart from their designated ‘good guy’ or ‘bad guy’ roles, the robots are devoid of personality... everyone more or less converses in chunks of bald-faced exposition, with nary a hint of backstory or believable motivation. As a result, even the occasional death of a major character elicits little more than a shrug.

Given that the story and characters in ‘Transformers’ are a write-off, it would have been up to the action scenes alone to carry the show, but again Bay trips over his own feet in the one area he should have gotten right. Between his hyperactive editing and a compulsive tendency to stage the combat scenes as extreme closeups of unidentifiable thrashing robot limbs, it’s like watching your childhood toys spinning around in a blender. Even more frustrating is the fact that, despite all the bombastic explosions and grinding metal, many key fights sort of wander off screen and conclude out of sight.

The biggest problem with ‘Transformers’, however, is its basic lack of anything resembling a sympathetic point of view. In Bay’s world there are simply no characters who aren’t shallow or stereotypical, no conversations that aren’t shrill or grating, and no dramatic moments that can’t be goosed up with inappropriate comic relief. I’m sure nobody was expecting a masterpiece, but for crying out loud, even a movie about giant robots from outer space needs at least a tiny spark of humanity.

These days, it's getting pretty old hat to praise a Pixar movie. After all, their track record has been nearly flawless, and at this point people just sort of expect that anything they do is going to be a masterpiece. It's not a stretch to say that Pixar now occupies the same warm place in peoples' hearts that Disney once took for granted (and long ago frittered away).

While each new Pixar film raises the bar in terms of what can be done with computer animation, the real secret of their success is their uncanny ability to meld their jaw-dropping visuals with clever, sweet-natured storytelling. Where Disney typically tries to browbeat the audience into submission through manic pacing, forced humor and shallow conflict, Pixar seems to intuitively understand the simple enjoyment of a good story, well told.

Though head honcho John Lasseter often gets much of the credit for Pixar's winning streak, in my opinion it's writer/director Brad ('The Iron Giant') Bird who is currently their brightest star. With just two films, 'The Incredibles' and now 'Ratatouille', he's all but single-handedly perfected the Pixar blend of wit, spectacle and enchantment, while simultaneously downplaying the corny puns and artificially snippy banter that have sometimes marred Lasseter's films.

'Ratatouille', a story about an epicurean French rat named Remy who dreams of one day becoming a five-star chef, is an expectedly gorgeous and crowd-pleasing affair, but thankfully the execution is anything but predictable. Though Bird (again serving as writer and director) dishes out the requisite humor, pathos and heart-warming life lessons, he does so while spinning the story in enjoyably unexpected directions - and as in 'The Incredibles', he isn't afraid to let things get dark when they need to.

If the concept of a rat mixing up your soufflé seems like a queasy prospect, 'Ratatouille' should quickly win over all but the most rodent-phobic. Remy and his kin are uniformly adorable (even when chugging garbage out of a compost bin), and they occupy a hidden ratty world so imaginatively realized that it conjures up memories of Don Bluth's 'Secret of NIMH.' Though the rodents are the stars of the show, the human characters are equally well-realized, particularly a lanky and lovably hapless garbage boy named Linguini, who finds himself partnered up with Remy through a wonderfully choreographed string of plot twists.

'Ratatouille' masterfully exploits the comic potential inherent in its premise, but it balances the humor with refreshingly sincere moments of drama. It's to the film's credit that it never falls back on cheap gags or trumped-up conflict, nor does it provide easy answers for any of its characters. Adding greatly to the appeal is the gorgeous animation, which gives a vivid luster to everything from faintly shimmering droplets of water in the background to lushly colorful closeups of copper skillets popping with flaming chili peppers. (You will be hungry by the time the credits roll.)

Visually the film is a banquet of rich color and sumptuous design - everything on display is dazzling, from Linguini's cramped Montmartre apartment, to the rats' subterranean sewer hideout, to an almost fairy-tale beautiful, light-gilded Parisian skyline. While the CG razzle-dazzle is undoubtedly a plus, what really makes 'Ratatouille' stick is Remy. Charmingly voiced by Patton Oswalt (who heads up a strong cast that includes Ian Holm and Peter O'Toole), Remy is the sort of wide-eyed dreamer who's impossible not to root for, even when he's sticking his paws in beurre blanc or taking an unexpected dip in a pot of soup au pistou.

Like the best cooking, 'Ratatouille' is exciting, delightful and deeply satisfying, the work of master artisans at the top of their game.

If, like me, you are currently coughing and sniffling and feeling thoroughly not-great, here's a little home remedy I just made up. Into a regular-sized drinking glass, pour:

One part brandy (I like Korbel, but that's just me).
Juice from one key lime (or half of a regular lime, but key limes are best).
A spoonful of honey.
Three parts boiling water.

Stir well and sip. It's not only soothing, it's surprisingly tasty. My particular mixture's probably already been invented, but whatever it's name is, it should be called an Otter Toddy, so that's what I'm calling it. Mmm, Otter Toddy.

As I write this, it's almost Easter time, and do you know what that means? Jelly beans, maybe? Dyed eggs? Chocolate peeps? Hah! How about some giant killer bunnies? Seriously. Giant. Killer. Bunnies. If that concept doesn't exactly strike fear into your heart... well, that's exactly the problem facing the makers of the 1972 creature feature 'Night of the Lepus', which is about a plague of lapine terror that strikes a cozy desert backwater town somewhere in rural America.

Just try and imagine it - you're out in the middle of the desert, you've parked your 70s-era RV and set up the grill so you can cook up a nice hot dog BBQ for the kids and the missus, when suddenly, from out of the darkness of the night... what's that sound? That weird, rhythmic thumping? That high-pitched cacophony of gerbil-like squeaks? Oh dear lord, it can't be... it's... it's...

It's a bunch of bunnies. That's it. That's all this flick has to offer in terms of blood-curdling chills... just lots of shots of fluffy rabbits twitching their noses and skipping around, accompanied by scenes of esteemed actors like Rory Calhoun, Janet Leigh and DeForest Kelley going "Arrrrgh!" while the director presumably goads them with instructions like "Scream! Run! The bunnies are coming! They're going to tear your faces off! They want your blood! Scream for your lives, damn you!"

Not that the filmmakers don't try. Let's give them credit, they do everything in their power to make these puff-tailed critters seem menacing. Unfortunately, merely filming rabbits in slow motion while they pounce through miniature sets designed to make them look roughly the size of Siberian tigers while playing what sounds like slowed-down bongo music on the soundtrack (is it supposed to be the heavy thumping of their gigantic, terrible feet, perhaps?) doesn't generate horror so much as an oddball David Lynchian surrealness.

With a story that's more giggle-worthy than scary, 'Lepus' follows the struggles of a rancher (rugged leading actor Stuart Whitman, who sports a grand total of one facial expression throughout) who finds his desolate strip of desert jeopardized by a rabbit population explosion. Given that his 'ranch' seems to consist largely of barren dirt and tumbleweeds, it's difficult to imagine just what threat the rabbits pose to his livelihood... but no matter. Enter brilliant scientist Rory Calhoun, who has an ingenious plan to save Whitman's farm by injecting random chemicals into rabbits. "I wish I knew what the effects of this serum would be," he intones while he sticks a syringe into bunny. "Let's hope it works." Now that's science.

Through a ridiculous set of coincidences, the injected rabbit is set loose to breed with the local population of bunnies, and within what seems like a matter of minutes there's a swarm of thousands of Winnebago-sized, flesh-eating Peter Cottontails ravaging the countryside. Why the rabbits have turned carnivorous as well as gigantic is just one of those scientific mysteries that man will never understand, but the real question is, what can a weather-beaten rancher, an incompetent scientist, his annoying family, and 'Star Trek's Dr. McCoy (here sporting a slick gameshow hairdo and matching 70s-porno mustache) do about it?

The answer, not surprisingly, involves lots of running around, screaming, and getting eaten. Fortunately, the entire local population, from the local sheriff to dozens of people at a drive-in to the national guard itself, need virtually no convincing of the threat posed by a squadron of giant meat-eating bunnies. "Killer rabbits are coming this way!" shouted through a bullhorn is apparently all it takes to persuade people that their lives are in danger, and it isn't long before the town's survivors have banded together to try and save themselves from a final onslaught of furry fury.

You may not be left with a deep-rooted phobia of bunnies after watching 'Night of the Lepus', but ultimately this is a film that raises a lot of questions, questions that need asking. What, for instance, is the price of man's meddling with things he doesn't understand? What chemical is it, exactly, that makes rabbits grow big enough to literally eat a horse? Can guns and dynamite really stop an eight-foot bunny? And what made the director think that smearing cherry pie filling on a bunch of rabbit's faces would make them seem scary? Regrettably, we may never know the answers.

'300' is a movie that tries very hard to paint the history behind the Battle of Thermopylae as a clear-cut conflict between the evil, mutant forces of Persia and the noble, rippling heroes of ancient Sparta. To that end, director/co-scripter Zack Snyder deploys a literal arsenal of cinematic razzle-dazzle onto the screen, as well as a generous dollop of war movie cliches and histrionic melodrama. The final result, as might be expected, is a film that may be visually exciting, but plays out as a shallow, crass exercise in audience manipulation.

Destined to be over-praised by those who are stunned (literally stunned... halfway through the movie a guy sitting a few seats down from me in the theater had a seizure and passed out) into submission by the slick fight choreography and Snyder's impressive attention to visual detail, '300' charges at you like a CG rhino in full battle regalia, and it's ultimately as artificial as one too. Where other, better war films take the time to flesh out the context between the opposing sides, '300' can't seem to offer much more than grotesque villains who are motivated purely by degenerate greed, heroes who are so righteous they practically sweat honor out of their heaving pectorals, and repetitive bluescreen-enhanced battle sequences punctuated by manly-man grunts and flying ejaculations of arterial blood.

It's a beautiful film to look at, but it's also an ugly one too, rife as it is with nasty stereotypes of literally monstrous brown-skinned bad guys who nail innocent villagers to trees for fun (and presumably chow down on doe-eyed babies while they're at it). '300' also takes more than a few pot-shots at gays, depicting many of the villains as androgynous and/or effeminate... for example, the evil Persian king Xerxes, with his arched, pencil-thin eyebrows and layers of candy-ass jewelry, resembles nothing so much as the love child of the Rock and Elizabeth Taylor. (Just to hammer the point home even further, Xerxes stocks his private pleasure tent with gyrating transvestites and also tries to give the Spartan king a back rub at one point.) None of that creepy faggotry for the virile Spartans, of course - when they're not engaged in manly bouts of torturing their children (in a kind and paternal way, of course... nothing helps a young boy grow up big and strong like a daily caning), they're busy watching their wives' bosoms bounce around in slow motion as they make hetero, hetero love.

In fact, for a movie this homophobic, there's an odd, even disturbing eroticism to the violence of the battle scenes. Maybe it's the way the Spartans keep giving each other knowing smirks while they dodge flying body parts and squirts of blood, or maybe its just the leather thongs, shiny spears and bronzed nipples on display, but there's something about '300' that feels like gay porn with the sex simply replaced by thrusting weaponry and pierced flesh. The groans sound the same, really, and in the end, when fallen Spartan he-men lay side by side, grinning with heroic satisfaction at a job well-done as they bleed out into the dirt, you can't help but expect them to spoon up and light a post-coital cigarette.

Much speechifying is inserted in between the battle scenes, most of it about freedom and the need for real men to defend their country, wives, and children from the forces of evil. This would ring a bit truer if the film didn't establish right from the beginning that the Spartans themselves practiced the wholesale murder of their own children (babies born with 'inferior' defects were chucked off a cliff) and kept slaves. That '300' remains blissfully unaware of these ironic contradictions while it chugs full-bore ahead in its drive to eulogize the Spartans as noble, freedom-obsessed proto-Americans simply underscores why it ultimately rings so false as both drama and history lesson. In the end, its only real plus is its fight choreography, and that's simply not enough to make it a good movie.

My cat passed away this evening. It wasn't unexpected... he was 19 years old, which is pretty ancient in cat terms. He'd also suffered a stroke last summer which had left him shaky unsteady on his feet, and on top of that he'd developed a liver problem that meant he'd needed an intravenous saline injection twice a week for the last year or so.

So it wasn't unexpected. I'd known he was on borrowed time... really, he'd been lucky to have lasted as long as he had. I'd done my best to steady myself for the inevitable, but I still find myself startled and dismayed at how quickly it happened.

I'd come home from work today and seen him resting on the sofa (one of his favorite places). He seemed fine, greeting me with a cursory sniff at my hand to make sure I was who I appeared to be. I reciprocated with a quick scratch at the top of his head and promptly retired for a mid-afternoon nap.

When I came down several hours later to see about some supper, I was informed that he'd just had a seizure and had apparently collapsed next to his water bowl. He was panting and convulsing, his eyes wide but not really seeing anything.

For the next several minutes my folks and I did our best to comfort him, though I don't believe he was really aware of what was happening. I could feel his heart fluttering madly behind his ribs like a trapped moth while I petted him. He curled himself up and kicked at nothing with his hind legs, then suddenly straightened himself out and went limp as though he'd fallen into a deep sleep. I felt his heart slow, and slow, and finally stop. He was gone.

We wrapped him up in a towel and moved him out into the garage... we'll take his body to the animal clinic tomorrow so they can cremate him. My grandfather said that he'd given him a few of his favorite chicken-flavored cat goodies not minutes before the seizure happened, which I'm immensely glad of... at least he got to enjoy one last treat before his time was up.

Vlad was our cat since I was 14 years old, and he's been a fixture in my life for well on 19 years. It's going to be hard coming home to find that he's not here, but I don't want to dwell too much on his passing. I'd prefer to remember all the things I loved about him.

I'll remember the young black cat who one day marched into our house unannounced as though to say, "Okay, I'm your cat... let's get started with a few treats, shall we?" I'll remember how he used to chase after his cat toys, and later, the family dog. I'll remember how he used to go berserk every year when we'd bring in the Christmas tree (pine needles = catnip, apparently), and who jealously guarded his turf from the other neighborhood cats by yowling and puffing his tail out in the most threatening manner he could muster. I'll remember the cat who used to affectionately bury his head in my armpit while I was eating dinner in hope of enticing a bit of chicken off my plate (a tactic that usually worked). I'll remember the cat who changed his mind on a weekly basis about what kind of cat food he liked, and who used to grace me after dinner by curling up in my lap while I watched tv. I'll remember that he was, in every conceivable way, an impeccable and consummate feline.

Goodbye, beloved old friend. I'm better for having known you.

Hooray for chain letters... looks like I've been 'tagged'. Apparently the idea is to describe six things that are either 'weird habits' or 'things you hate about yourself'. Whee!

Let's start with something I dislike about myself: like most people my entire existence is nothing more than an artificial shell of projected ego and my own desired self-image. The harsh realities of living life in a rigidly-enforced social paradigm caused me at an early age to develop a psychological 'armor' consisting of both a powerful drive to try and 'fit in' as well as a seething resentment of that very same drive in myself (a contradiction which ultimately created some colorful neuroses like self-loathing and an instinctive dislike of authority figures). I'm often subverted by the feeling that my whole life is simply an artificial reflection of who I've tried to become in order to feel like I'm surviving in this world.

I guess that pretty much covers what I don't like about myself. Let's move on to weird habits.

Habit #1: I put maple syrup on my bacon.

Habit #2: I like to slightly burn my popcorn until it's kind of smoky-tasting. It's better that way.

Habit #3: I am a wickedly sore loser. I often choose not to engage in competitive activities with people out of the fear that I'll start acting like an unlikeable prick.

Habit #4: I am sometimes cripplingly self-aware and indecisive. It can take me up to fifteen minutes just to pick out a box of cereal at the supermarket.

Habit #5: I sometimes use self-deprecation in an attempt to circumvent the pain of having somebody else point out my flaws and failings first. (This does not actually work, by the way.)

I'm supposed to send this 'tag' off to six other people now, but in all honesty I can't think of anybody to tag who hasn't been already. Ah well.

It wasn't all bad, mind you. Today my friend  blackberrydragon and I found a local place that has spiffy poached eggs and princess cake for breakfast. Later on we had ice cream and waffles at a nice little spot called Penguino Treats (the decor is all penguin stuff, including a large poster of the Adelie Amigos from 'Happy Feet' that I very much covet.)

The real fun started this afternoon after I drove BBD to the dentist so he could have a wisdom tooth extracted (hey, it was only about 15 years late growing in). It was a quick procedure, and they even let him keep the tooth in a little plastic bag. I was driving us back home in a light rain when I pulled up to stop at a red light. Looking into my rear view mirror, I was startled to see a car zooming toward me, going way too fast to stop in time to avoid a collision. "My God, I think that guy's going to hit us," I said (or something similar) over the squeal of tires as they skidded over wet pavement, growing louder and louder. BBD and me could only brace ourselves and wait for the impact, which seemed like a long time coming... maybe that was just the adrenaline. Wham! I didn't hear any breaking glass, but the force of the hit and the loud bang of metal on metal made it clear that real damage had been done.

I put on my blinker and moved to turn off the main road onto a side street. The guy who hit me did likewise, so I started to head around the corner. I looked back to make sure he was still following, just in time to see him suddenly zoom back onto the main road and disappear in the rush hour traffic. I'm not sure what was more dumbfounding... watching the guy pull a hit and run, or realizing that I'd just been rear-ended by a long white Sedan-style limousine. "Son of a bitch," was all I could think to say.

BBD, bless him, had something infinitely more useful on his mind: the limo's license plate number, which he'd managed to memorize not two seconds after the hit. I parked and assessed the damage. It wasn't too bad... my rear bumper is toast, but at least I was driving a nice sturdy truck rather than the jaunty little hybrid I fortunately haven't bought yet. (I can only imagine what the front of that limo must look like... my bumper is solid steel.)

The traffic cop who finally showed up to take my report was spear bald and looked kind of like Michael Berryman. He told me that the limo company in question is already on their watch list for some kind of shady dealings, which might explain why the driver fled the scene.

So, to recap... here's BBD, who not an hour prior to the accident was having his wisdom tooth pulled, standing next to me in the rain, talking through a mouthful of gauze as he helps me explain to Michael Berryman that I've just been in a hit and run with a white limousine that's apparently owned by criminal sleazebags.

After that, the rest of the day just sort of drifted by in a surreal blur. Now that the adrenaline has finally faded, I'm starting to realize just how badly I could use another waffle.

Another year, another pile of torn ticket stubs. Time now to reflect on the cinematic highlights of 2006. I freely admit that this is far from a comprehensive list. You won't find Stephen Frears' 'The Queen' here, nor Scorsese's 'The Departed', or even that precocious critic's darling 'Little Miss Sunshine'. No props for 'United 93' or Almodovar's 'Volver'. Not even a thumbs-up for Robert Altman's swan song, 'A Prairie Home Companion'.

Why? Because I didn't see them. My bad. Here then are my personal highlights:

'Slither' - Take an appealingly retro-cornball story about slimy brain-sucking killer slugs from outer space, give it a snappy varnish of dark comedy and populate it with a crackerjack cast that clearly gets the joke, and you've got one of the most enjoyable monsters-amuck oozefests to come down the pipe since they glory days of the 1980s. Writer/director James Gunn not only delivers the creepy goods with this one, he even manages to atone for the cinematic atrocity that was 'Scooby Doo'.

'Over the Hedge' - By all rights this movie should have landed in the multiplexes with a sickening thud, fired off a few uninspired fart jokes and then slunk off into the undergrowth to die a slow death like all the other soon-to-be-forgotten Pixar-wannabe CG roadkill that's been choking up our theaters as of late. Instead, 'OTH' came as a pleasant surprise - a vibrant bit of comic satire by turns genuinely funny and poignant. (I’ll admit the movie gets bonus points from me for including some of my fave critters. Steve Carell is perfectly cast as uber-squirrel Hammy, but who knew Bruce Willis could give such good raccoon?)

'Borat - Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan' - Another pleasant surprise. What could have been a lazy exercise in sub-par slapstick and celebrity navel-gazing ends up being the year's smartest comedy. Sacha Baron Cohen and company demonstrate an uncanny knack for zeroing in on the absurd hypocrisies of modern culture and hilariously skewering them. Comedy is rarely this merciless, nor is it often this rewarding.

'The Descent' - Technically a 2005 film, this UK-lensed fright-fest wasn't released in the States until this year, so it makes the list. Director/writer Neil 'Dog Soldiers' Marshall puts himself near the top of the list of horror directors to watch with this almost unbearably tense and claustrophobic cave-set thriller. The basic plot might sound like yet another 'Alien' clone, but Marshall's smart, stylish direction ratchets up the tension to razor-wire tautness and never lets it go slack, even when the film by all rights ought to be getting silly. A bloody good antidote to the glut of over-produced, under-inspired horror remakes that have been flooding theaters as of late.

'Happy Feet' - I'm hard-pressed to think of another animated film that's ever exceeded my expectations as much as this one did. George 'The Road Warrior' Miller's follow-up to 'Babe 2' seems to promise little more than cute-as-a-button tap-happy penguins and yet another plot about believing in yourself. What it delivers, though, is a spectacularly ambitious adventure that flawlessly melds crowd-pleasing fun with unexpectedly dark and challenging undertones. Visually it's a beautiful film, but 'Happy Feet' really surprises by delivering a poignant, clever, and moving story. (On a side note, if you have the opportunity to catch this in IMAX, please do so with all haste.)

'Pan's Labyrinth' - Easily one of the best movies of the year, writer/director Guillermo del Toro has crafted a haunting fairy tale/war drama that effortlessly dances along the line that barely separates dark fantasy and horrifying reality. Few filmmakers understand the inseparable link between fear and wonder as well as del Toro does, and 'Pan's Labyrinth' is perhaps his masterpiece. By turns haunting, cruel, bloody, hopeful and awestruck, it's a truly ravishing experience.

I'm probably missing a few, but by and large these were the ones that made an impression. Thinking back on it, 2006 was a pretty good year at the multiplex.

Just a quick heads-up for those who tried to view the bear pic before and just got a whole lot of nothin'... I finally sussed out a way to fix the problem. You should be able to see it now. :P

Like a lot of furries, I've always had a sweet spot for ol' Robin Hood, the dashing Disney red fox who swoops from treetops and slings arrows like a vulpine Errol Flynn... and like a lot of furries, my interest was recently perked by the announcement of a new DVD release.

Billed as the 'Most Wanted' edition, this is apparently meant to replace the now out-of-print 'Gold Collection' disc. As an enticement, they touted a new digital transfer, cleaned-up audio, and oooooh... a 'new ending'. So, drawn like a moth to a sparkly, magical Disney-fied flame by the promise of a new and improved version of a beloved movie, I bought my copy today.

Why do I keep failing to heed those nagging little doubts that gnaw at the back of my head whenever I get too close to the Disney magic? This new 'Most Wanted' edition completely sucks, and not just because the 'new' special features are a combination of repeats from the 'Gold' disc and a few lazily assembled trivia games and singalongs. (Seriously, at a time when even obscure Italian zombie movies from the 1970s are getting the triple-disc box set treatment, Disney's half-assed DVD extras are looking more and more anemic with every passing 'enchanted edition'.)

No, what really sucks about this disc is that it's widescreen. 'So what's wrong with that?' I hear you ask. 'Isn't it better to see movies in widescreen?' Ordinarily, I'd wholeheartedly agree... unless the movie in question was never widescreen to begin with, as is the case here. 'Robin Hood' was produced with an aspect ratio of # that's essentially pan and scan, and that's the way it was designed, layed out, and animated. In order to achieve the new 'enhanced' widescreen of 1.75:1, the good folks at Disney simply painted black bars over the top and bottom of the picture.

This means that roughly 25% of the movie isn't there anymore. To get a true comparative understanding of what this has done to the film, take a pair of long, two-inch deep strips of black construction paper and tape them to the top and bottom of your tv screen. Now watch an episode of your favorite non-widescreen format tv show... hey, the tops of everyone's heads are cut off! And what happened to their feet? And the framing's all funny-looking, too! (If you think I'm exaggerating, I invite you to check out my good friend Blackberry Dragon's livejournal at http://blackberrydragn.livejournal.com/4909.html for some comparative screencaps between this edition and the 'Gold' edition, which was released in the original aspect ratio of #

Yes, the patented Disney magic essentially boils down to coughing up anywhere from $20 to $30 for a special edition DVD that consists of 25% LESS movie, a poorly-interfaced trivia game, and a 'new' ending consisting of about 1 minute of old concept art accompanied by a voiceover. This isn't just a little insulting... the good folks at Disney are essentially saying 'we don't care' to all the fans whose devotion built their empire in the first place.

To those who would argue that I'm making a mountain out of a molehill, I'll say this... I understand. Not everyone is as much of a film buff as I am, and maybe you simply don't care that much about aspect ratios and special features. That's okay, and I don't blame you if this issue doesn't rile you in the same way that it does me. But I'll also ask you to take a few moments to think about what it means when a company that trades in magic and wonder cares so little about cutting corners in the name of making a profit. Can you imagine paying 50 dollars to visit Disneyland and finding that the Matterhorn has had its top cut off, the Indiana Jones ride now runs 1 minute shorter and the Dumbo ride has been replaced by a tilt-a-whirl with elephants painted on the side? Ask yourself, at what point does the magic start to fade?

Yep, I did Horrorfest last weekend. For those not in the know, it was a special screening of 10 horror flicks that were given a chance to play theatrically rather than go the usual direct-to-DVD route. Here's a spoiler-free (but opinionated) breakdown of the flicks I ponied up my hard-earned cash to watch in the comfort of a local theater that often played Coke commercials upside down (and backwards), had screwed-up audio and was full of drunk people. Whee!

UNREST: What starts off as a nicely directed, cleverly written quasi-supernatural thriller about a group of med students who begin to suspect that their dissection cadaver is projecting some kind of malevolence into their lives makes an unfortunate slide into ridiculousness about halfway through and never fully recovers. Nice atmosphere, but the plot's a dud.

PENNY DREADFUL: One of the most relentlessly unpleasant horror flicks I've seen in a while, mainly due to its claustrophobic setting (the inside of a derelict car, wherein the titular waif is being menaced by a creepy psycho killer who lurks in the surrounding woods). For most of its running time, this is a genuinely tense and cruel little gem, but (as so often happens in genre flicks) it too takes a nosedive toward the end with a perplexingly unsatisfying final act.

THE GRAVEDANCERS: Sigh. So much potential, so much of it wasted in the service of a story full of unbelievable characters doing unbelievable things. The film manages some truly creepy thrills early on, but quickly devolves into a string of annoyingly trite setups and laughably over-the-top effects sequences. Horror movie rule of thumb: it's always better to merely hint at the beasties lurking in the dark than to render them in full-blown CG and have them smashing through walls like Hulk Hogan.

THE HAMILTONS: Proof-positive of what you can accomplish with a troupe of dedicated actors and some skill behind the camera, this is one seriously rough and nasty little flick that suggests a contemporary 'Last House on the Left' in its relentless cruelty. Only in its final act does it take an unfortunate 'twist' that renders the horror null and void, but until then its an effectively grim little flick.

REINCARNATION: J-horror cliches abound, but at least they're done with a certain amount of skill. Undead kids, past lives, gruesome murders, vengeful ghosts and one of the creepiest dolls since 'Poltergeist' make this one an enjoyable enough time waster, though the story ultimately doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

DARK RIDE: Cheesy slasher thrills like they don't hardly make anymore, this one is a genuine throwback to the mid-1980s with its story of a mutated psycho in a mask hacking his way through a cast of thoroughly unpleasant young losers. Moderately stylish and featuring a few memorable kills, its the sort of numbskull flick you're embarrassed with yourself for having gotten a kick out of.

THE ABANDONED: For my money, this was the true highlight of the fest. A beautifully executed ghost story that's more concerned with sustaining a mood of lurking dread than with hiking up a body count, this one gets under your skin in ways that few horror films do. Nacho 'Aftermath' Cerda, the writer/director, is one to watch.

WICKED LITTLE THINGS: Probably the best flick you'll ever see about undead zombie coal miner children who bludgeon their victims to death with pickaxes and then eat them. Probably the only such flick you'll ever see, actually. Some nice Appalachian atmosphere early on, but again, this is one of those movies that slowly unwinds under the weight of its own preposterousness.

SNOOP DOGG'S HOOD OF HORROR: You either just grinned at the title, or you rolled your eyes and snorted. The latter group need not apply, but those in the former group will doubtless enjoy this surprisingly snappy, rough-around-the-edges little treat, which features jaw-dropping amounts of gore, a sense of cruel irony which harkens back to the old EC horror comics of yore, and an exploding chihuaha. All this plus Snoop Dogg as your zombie pimp host. You know you want to see this.

Unfortunately I wasn't able to catch the 10th flick, a sneak preview of David Arquette's comedy slasher THE TRIPPER (they cancelled the damn showing in my area). Ah well... even though it was a mixed bag, I'd still do Horrorfest again next year.

Greetings to all you fellow Americans out there... I'm going to throw a hypothetical political concept at you right now, and it is this: 'Without the strong leadership of conservative Republicans to guide this great country, we as a nation are under direct threat from terrorists, runaway spending and gradual moral decay. Liberal Democrats despise the values that true Americans hold dear. Don't let liberal activists harm our nation. Vote Republican.'

Okay, I'm willing to bet that about half of you just shook your heads and snorted in annoyance, while the other half nodded and smiled in agreement. I most likely became either a voice of reason or a complete tool in your eyes. So now I'm going to shift gears on you: 'Actually I was kidding. Only the strong resolve of liberal Democrats can steer our country toward a future of prosperity, justice and social equality. Conservative Republicans are lying, war-mongering hypocrites who undermine the democratic process whenever it suits them. Don't let corporate toadies harm our nation. Vote Democrat.'

Yeah, I know, you get it already - same reactions, only switched. (And no, I'm not going to tell you which one of those proclamations is closest to my own beliefs, so you can stop worrying about that right now.) 'All right', you're probably thinking. 'Politics are divisive. So what? What's the big problem?' Well, the problem isn't about Rep vs. Dem, it's that, regardless of individual political allegiance, nearly every American who read the above statements most likely knew - just KNEW right down to their bones - that one of them was true while the other was false.

But in actuality, neither statement was true OR false... they were both only a matter of opinion. And therein lies the real problem as I see it - that we no longer want to distinguish between what is mere speculation and what is incontrovertible truth. We've become a nation that equates supposition with fact, rhetoric with validity, and faith with incontrovertible evidence of our righteousness - all based on nothing more than what we're more comfortable believing. We've abandoned reasonable discourse in favor of an endless cycle of patting ourselves on the back for being so 'obviously' right while belittling our naysayers as fools.

We no longer listen. Now we tilt at windmills and hack at straw men. We decide for our 'enemies' what they really think, regardless of what they actually say. How, I ask, can we claim to make informed choices when we refuse to hear all sides of a debate? How can we 'know' that we're right when we've dismissed the other side without even listening to them? And how can we share our ideas when we're too busy endlessly drowning each other out with insults and accusations?

I hate to say it, but political debate is effectively dead in this country. I say this not so much because of the glib 'I-know-you-are-but-what-am-I' nature of most of the political discussions we've reduced ourselves to having, but because on every facet of the political spectrum, we as a divided nation have decided to shun opinions that do not coincide with our own. We attack and dismiss those who do not agree with us, often by attributing thoughts and motives to them that they may not, in reality, have. We choose to give ourselves over to the smug speculations of those whose business is to tell us what the 'other side' thinks, so that we may be spared the effort of having to open our ears and truly listen.

I'm not immune. I'd love to tell you how you ought to vote this November. I'd love to explain to you about how I'm right, and how those whom I disagree with are wrong. Instead, I'm going to ask you to consider tuning out the propaganda and the rhetoric for the next few days. Listen, really LISTEN to what is being said, on ALL sides of the debate. Don't be so quick to judge those who disagree with you, and don't be persuaded simply because someone is telling you what you want to hear. Ask yourself if what you 'know' to be true can, in fact, be seen from other points of view. And above all, try to remember that sometimes having the courage of your convictions isn't as important as having the courage to question them.

When I was a wee tyke, Disney's 'Three Caballeros' was one of those videocassettes I would just... watch. Over and over. The routine would be; home from school, peanut butter sandwich, 'Three Caballeros'. For those not in-the-know, during the early 1940s the Disney company produced not one but two animated features designed to improve relations between the U.S. and Latin America (the other being 'Saludos Amigos', which introduced the perky green cigar-chomping parrot Jose Carioca to act as a frisky buddy and possible love interest for Donald Duck. You think I'm being snarky about Jose, but read on.)

Both 'Amigos' and 'Caballeros' celebrate (in that colorful but whitewashed and kid-friendly way that is Disney's stock in trade) the music, cities, art and peoples of South America. Not that I cared much about international goodwill gestures when I was a kid... I just liked the vibrant animation, tuneful songs and funny characters. Now, having re-watched it again for the first time in many years, I've come to realize something else about 'Three Caballeros', and that is that the entire movie is fucking crazy.

In a good way, mind you. After all, there's no denying the genuine entertainment value in watching a trio of cartoon birds going berzerk on a sex-and-possibly-drug-fueled orgy across South America's most colorful locales. That may have been largely lost on me as a kid, but now I can see 'Three Caballeros' for what it really is - a document of Donald Duck's hedonistic 'lost weekend' with a couple of his wild-n-crazy South of the Border buddies. This is Donald's version of a Spring Break bender in Tijuana, and the only thing missing is footage of him waking up bleary-eyed behind some garbage cans in Sao Paulo with a half-empty bottle of cachaca in his hand and all of his clothes gone except for a string of purple party beads and a pink straw sombrero with 'Brazil's #1 Boy-Toy' stitched into the front.

Not all of the movie is like that, of course... there are some adorable segments involving a too-cold penguin named Pablo who wants to move to a tropical paradise, and also one about a young gauchito who finds a cute flying donkey while eagle hunting in the mountains. Mostly, though, the story follows Donald Duck as he enjoys his birthday by traveling (via a magic pop-up book) across South America with Jose Carioca - who for some reason is only a few inches tall when he arrives - and his new friend Panchito, a hyper-excitable Mexican rooster with a spiffy gaucho ensemble and the disconcerting habit of randomly firing his pistols in all directions.

There's not much more to the plot than 'party time, amigo!' as it's mainly an excuse to send Donald and his pals flying off to various colorful places (on a magic serapi, no less) so they can dance, sing, and (presumably offscreen) imbibe enough hallucinogenic substances to induce the film's last twenty minutes, which unfold as a kind of free-form, multi-colored psychedelic freakout. Donald experiences dancing flowers that mutate into floating, disembodied heads, friendly buildings that shimmy and jiggle in the background like Jello, and neon-colored doppelgangers of his friends which torment him by singing in double-speed at inopportune moments. At this point it's difficult to tell whether Donald is still enjoying himself or not, especially when Jose pops up out of nowhere and inexplicably jams what appear to be two lit sticks of dynamite into his ass.

Which brings me to Jose's apparent homoerotic attraction to Donald. Say what you will about the film's rampant vibe of aggressive heterosexuality - after all, much of the running time is devoted to Donald and Jose's (but not, interestingly, Panchito's) lustful desire to bed as many Latina women as possible - but to me there seems to be an odd, subtle flirtation going on underneath the surface. For the record: Number of times Donald and Jose embrace each other - lots. Number of times Donald 'accidentally' kisses Jose, causing him to laugh playfully - once, but he gets in several smooches before Jose stops him. Number of times Jose shows Donald how to 'get bigger' by 'blowing' on his 'finger' - twice. Not that I'm criticizing, mind you. They make a cute couple... though you could argue that any relationship based on getting hammered in Baia and partying with trigger-happy gaucho roosters is probably going to be a stormy one.

Well, you 'Firefly' fans out there might get a kick out of this. I just watched for the first time the (brilliant) pilot episode of Joss Whedon's sci-fi cowboy space soaper, and to kick things off right I brought about two fingers worth of Ng Ka Py to sip along with Captain Mal and company.

Ng Ka Py is Chinese brandy, and it's not an easy thing to find. I had to go to three different Bay Area Asian markets to score myself a bottle... to give you an idea of how pleased with myself this made me, you'll just have to picture me (I look like Brad Pitt circa 1998) standing in line and cradling my soon-to-be-purchased bottle of booze like a beaming father holding his firstborn child. "Mal drinks this," I wanted to blurt to all the nice people around me. "You know, the hero from 'Firefly'. It's his favorite. I have all the DVDs. Yay!"

(For the record, I bought the 'Firefly' box set sight unseen after catching 'Serenity' on a whim and deciding that it's one of the single best sci-fi flicks ever. Seriously, watch it if you haven't already.)

So, for all of that, how is Ng Ka Py? Well, it's got a very fruity bouquet, a bit like fresh apricot pits. The first sip is rather harsh, but the burn quickly fades to a strong flavor of anise seed that is reminiscent of burnt black licorice. At first I didn't think I was going to like it, but by the third or fourth sip I found that it was going down pleasant. It wasn't long before I'd gone back for a refill. Ng Ka Py may be an aquired taste, but if you give it a chance you might just find that you like it. Kind of like 'Firefly', actually.

Well, I think it's a new drink. (Odds are that somebody, somewhere, beat me to it already.) Anyhow, pour a shot of chilled limoncello onto an equal-sized shot of chilled kirschwasser (cherry brandy), then set in an ice tray for about 20 minutes until it's icy cold. Stir and sip. I call it 'otter pee'.

(No, it doesn't really taste like otter pee. I think.)

Variation #1: Add a dollop of grenadine syrup into the center of the glass after mixing. That's a 'candy otter pop'. I was going to call it 'bloody otter pee', but frankly that's rather disturbing, don't you think?

Variation #2: Double the proportions of both limoncello and kirsch (grenadine syrup optional), then mix with chilled ginger ale for an 'otter cooler'. Nice summer drink.

Variation #3: Mix two parts limoncello and one part kirsch (grenadine syrup optional) and add crushed fresh mint leaves. Steep for a half hour, then chill and sip. 'Otter julep', natch.

Variation #4: Mix equal parts limoncello and kirsch (grenadine syrup optional), then add a dollop of heavy cream and stir. Now you're drinking 'otter spooge'. Yay!

If you're a horror buff like me, odds are that at some point you've had somebody ask you (with a mildly concerned look on their face) just why it is that you enjoy being scared.

It's a good question. Honestly I haven't the foggiest, save a few half-baked notions about confronting one's own mortality and fears in a safe, escapist environment. No, what I can offer up with much more confidence are the moments that solidified my love of the genre. The ones that made me appreciate being scared. The ones that kept me awake at night. The ones that royally screwed me up.

Now, this isn't one of those lists of the top 10 horror movie moments in general. If you're a fellow fan, do you really need me to tell you for the umpteen bazillionth time that the exploding head in 'Scanners' is an amazing effect, or that 'Alien' is a dark and scary flick? No. No, you do not.

What I'm offering up is something more personal... a list of the stuff that scared me, personally, regardless of whether or not it's something classic. Most of these are from my formative years, when I was but a wee and easily traumatized lad. Here goes:

10) 'Darby O'Gill and the Little People - The Banshee'. Yeah, cute Disney flick. Yeah, Sean Connery. Yeah, G-rated. I haven't seen it in years, but I can tell you that I practically wet myself in fear when it came time for the midnight appearance of the hideous banshee. I was 8, and I clapped my hands over my eyes. To this day I don't even know what the dang thing looked like. It's probably like something out of 'Dr. Who'.

9) 'Dr. Who - The Stones of Blood'. Okay, so in this cheesy episode of 'Dr. Who', a pair of hikers find themselves confronted by a rock from Stonehenge... literally. Somehow it's followed them to their campsite. So this lady reaches out and presses her hand to it, and suddenly it begins to pulse with a low, thumping heartbeat sound. Then all the flesh dissolves from her hand, leaving behind a skeleton arm as she screams in horror. Fade to black. I can't tell you how many nights I stayed awake, listening for the creepy heartbeat noise that would be my signal that there was a giant flesh-eating rock coming my way.

8) 'Jaws - The Dead Underwater Guy'. I'm 10, maybe 11 years old. I'm watching 'Jaws' for the first time, really late at night. I'm horrified by the sudden appearance of the underwater boat corpse... you know, the chewed-up guy who's missing an eye. Immediately after the movie, my friend and I go for a swim in his backyard swimming pool. With the lights out.

7) 'Star Wars - Luke's BBQ'. 'Star Wars' was one of the first movies I can ever remember seeing, and one of the things that really stuck out for me was seeing Luke's Aunt and Uncle's roasted, skeletal corpses smoking away on the ruin of their desert hut. Skeletons freak me out to this day.

6) 'Poltergeist - The Entire Musical Score'. Maybe I'm cheating a bit with this one, but it strikes me that, for as deliciously creepy as this movie is, it's all the more effective because of Jerry Goldsmith's pitch-perfect musical score. Without it, it's a slick early 80s special effects movie. With it, it's the stuff of young nightmares.

5) 'The Cutty Black Sow - The Kid Gets It'. This was an episode of a late 80s horror show called 'Tales From the Darkside', and it was all about a kid left alone in his house who finds himself traumatized by the ancient Scottish legend of the Cutty Black Sow, a monster that comes for you on All Hallow's Eve. The story keeps you guessing all the way through as to whether or not there's anything supernatural going on... until the last few moments. That's when the kid's Dad comes home and gives him a reassuring hug, only to transform moments later into the title beast, which proceeds to loom close and presumably devour him. Fade to black as every kid's most primal fears are realized.

4) 'Indiana Jones - Melty Guy'. For years I clapped my hands over my eyes every time I watched this flick and listened to the ghastly death gurgle of the evil Nazi guy as he melted. As it turned out, what I imagined was a lot worse than the actual effect, but that didn't stop me from being too scared to watch this movie all the way through until I was, like, 12.

3) 'Maximum Overdrive - The Steamroller Kid'. So, this Little Leaguer gets squashed by a steamroller at one point in this otherwise laughably bad movie. Up until this point in my development, I'd been under the impression that little kids, Moms and pets were exempt from getting violently killed off in scary movies. Thinking back on it, it's kind of a silly gag, but back then it really dropped my jaw in a 'wait, did that just happen?' kind of way.

2) 'Akira - Plushie Attack'. This one got to me even though by this point I was a jaded teenager. It's the moment when Tetsuo finds himself under attack by a trio of little animated plush toys that suddenly turn nightmarishly malevolent, and it still gives me the creeps to this day.

1) 'The Long Weekend - Zombie Seal'. This one makes the list even though I only saw this flick for the first time earlier this year. There's something almost unbelievably creepy about a seal, shot by the movie's 'hero', that keeps creeping closer and closer to his beach campsite even though it's clearly dead. We never see it move... but it keeps getting nearer all the time, and the payoff, when it finally comes, gave me a case of shuddery chills like I haven't felt since I was a little kid, laying awake at night waiting for the monsters to come.

Exec. 1: "Okay, so Bob over in development says the remake of 'NIMH' has to go on the back burner for a while. It looks like we're gonna greenlight that other one, the one with the spider and the dog."

Exec. 2: "Pig. It's a pig, like that 'Babe' thing."

Exec. 1: "Uh-huh. That's good, kids always go nuts for that magic barnyard talking animal shit. Who have we got lined up to direct? We need somebody who can give us a kinda slick fairy-tale look but also deliver the hip, 'with-it' attitude that today's savvy youngsters demand."

Exec. 2: "All right, don't go all marketing department on me, I read the trades too."

Exec 1: "Sorry. Reflex."

Exec 2: "Anyway, I'm thinking Spielberg..."

Exec 1: "No dice. He wanted $230 million."

Exec. 2: "Damn. Okay, so there's Peter Jackson..."

Exec. 1: "Nope, we tried him, and he says talking pigs give him the horrors."

Exec. 2: "Michael Bay?"

Exec. 1: "Rehab."

Exec. 2: "Shit. Well, we'll find somebody, maybe that guy who did that Jen Garner flick a couple of years back. You know, the one with all the weenie and boobie jokes."

Exec. 1: "Perfect. So, this'll be all CG, right? Kids eat that CG crap with a spoon."

Exec. 2: "Well, half-CG, half live action. You know, like 'Babe'. Plus we'll keep the budget down."

Exec. 1: "Yeah? So who'll we cast? Can we get Farmer Hoggett? I like Farmer Hoggett."

Exec. 2: "You mean James Cromwell, and no. We're saving all the big talent for the talking critters... except we'll get Dakota Fanning for the kid."

Exec. 1: "I thought she WAS CG..."

Exec. 2: "Tell me more about these talking critters. Can we have some penguins? Everybody's shitting themselves for penguins these days."

Exec. 1: "I don't think we can, no. See, it's set on a rural farm..."

Exec. 2: "Oh, great! Chickens, sheep... um... turtles... that kinda thing, right?"

Exec. 1: "Yeah, and cows. Lots of cows."

Exec. 2: "Cows, yes! Perfect. Cows fart."

Exec. 1: "And we've already lined up Steve Buscemi to play the rat, we got Oprah in there somewhere, John Cleese..."

Exec. 2: "How about the spider? I'm thinking hip, urban, someone who can cover the soundtrack. How about Raven?"

Exec. 1: "Rehab. Actually, we're going with Julia Roberts. You know, to bring in all the WASP-moms."

Exec. 2: "Meaning that Queen Latifah was booked, right?"

Exec. 1: *sigh* "Yeah."

Exec. 2: "Hey, I just had a great idea! Let's get McDonalds on the horn to do a sandwich tie-in. Get this... the 'Charlotte's Web All-Bacon Pork-B-Q Special'."

Exec. 1: "Fuckin' A! I'm lovin' it!"

Exec. 2: "Yeah, I love the smell of frying bacon."

Ah, the giallo. That's Italian for 'yellow', but in movie circles it usually doubles for 'brutal murder, lurid ladies and a mysterious killer wearing black leather gloves'. The genre is still around today, but its heyday was the 1970s, when knife-wielding crazies did their thing before a backdrop of eye-searing pop art and cool, jazzy soundtracks.

Typically stylish, violent murder mysteries, the best of the gialli (Dario Argento's 'Deep Red' and Pupi Avati's 'House With Laughing Windows' spring quickly to mind) blended pulpy psychodrama with grand guignol murder setpieces.

Then there's Andrea Bianchi's 1975 opus 'Strip Nude For Your Killer', a garish, even laughably repulsive little thriller that, if nothing else, cannot be accused of having a misleading title. Starring Nino Castelnuovo and Edwige Fenech, 'Strip Nude' promises nakedness and death, and it delivers those in spades. What it also dishes out in thick, rancid dollops is an atmosphere of pure sleaze and what could charitably be described as overwhelming misogyny.

Fairly or not, most slasher movies that feature women getting killed face some amount of criticism, but let's not mince words - 'Strip Nude' is a movie that hates the ladies. Hates them with a passion that borders on hysterical.

The story, such as it is, has something to do with a killer (the inevitable black gloves are accessorized this time around with an all-leather ensemble and matching motorcycle helmet) stalking and dispatching the various employees of a modeling agency. There's the usual mysterious clues (earrings left at murder scenes, stolen photographs and quick-cut flashbacks to a failed illegal abortion), but in the end they don't matter - not least because the mystery, when finally revealed, doesn't make a lick of sense. Nor are the bloody but unimaginative killings really the thing that makes 'Strip Nude' stand out from the pack.

No, what you'll take away from the film when all is said and done is its spectacularly crude attitude toward all things female, particularly as embodied by Castelnuovo's loathsome photographer 'hero' Carlo.

Carlo is the sort of guy who picks up random women by verbally berating them and then putting his hands all over their unwilling bodies until they relent to his charms. In real life his 'hands-on' approach would probably get him arrested. Fortunately for him, though, in the world of 'Strip Nude', ladies go crazy for any and all sorts of abuse, including attempted rape. It makes them horny, see. Carlo is a veritable chick magnet thanks to his time-tested application of crude smarm, sexual harassment and constant abuse. Oh yes, and sometimes he tries to strangle his girlfriends if they piss him off (don't worry, though... they love it.)

All of which would be forgivable if the film were in any way aware of just how over the top its attitude towards women is, or how much of an unlikeable prick Carlo is... maybe then it would have played as a satire. As it stands, though, 'Strip Nude' is a movie that aims low (straight at the crotch) and still misses the mark. It may not be scary and it may not be sexy, but as a grimy little window into the heart of all things unabashedly chauvinistic, it's jaw-droppingly hilarious.

Okay, so I thought I'd do some quickie little movie reviews for those bored enough/movie-geek enough to want to catch up on some offbeat and interesting (to me, anyway) flicks. I'm kicking off with they Maysles Brothers' infamous 1970s Rolling Stones documentary 'Gimme Shelter'.

"None of that Pennebaker shit," Albert Maysles (brother of co-director David Maysles) recalls being told by Mick Jagger at the beginning of filming on what would turn out to be one of the greatest and most infamous rock films ever made. Flush with success and riding high on a wave of charming, devil-may-care arrogance, Jagger was likely bitching about director D.A. Pennebaker's earlier, sunnier filmed documents of mid-60s musical happenings like Bob Dylan's British tour and the Monterey Pop Festival.

Given the dark, violence-tainted film that 'Gimme Shelter' turned out to be, Jagger got his wish, though he may have regretted it. If Woodstock '69 represented the pinnacle of the 'peace and love' generation's lofty ideals, then the Stones' disastrous concert at San Francisco's Altamont Speedway later that year likely represented the death rattle.

300,000 blissed-out Stones fans descended on Altamont for a poorly-planned free concert four months after Woodstock. Four of them died, three more or less accidentally. The fourth was stabbed to death after pulling a gun on a Hell's Angel. That shocking act of brutality capped a day rife with violent outbursts and uneasy tension between the fans and the Angles, who were given the task of acting as unofficial 'security' at the concert and paid with $500 worth of free beer.

Armed with lead-weighted pool cues and often openly contemptuous of not only the fans but the bands as well, the Angels in retrospect were a thunderingly poor choice to be the guardians of order at a concert where flower-power idealism and acid-fueled freakouts were the order of the day. Beatings and scuffles broke out with alarming frequency, and even one of the members of opening act Jefferson Airplane ended up getting knocked cold by an over-enthusiastic Angel.

It's not all gloom and doom, of course. Given unprecedented access to the Rolling Stones, the Maysles crew films the band as they take the stage in New York for an electrifying performance, and also as they rehearse 'Brown Sugar' at the Muscle Shoals music studio (the song would debut at Altamont). Ultimately, though, it's the concert footage that gives the film its haunting power.

The Maysles' remarkable film not only documents the music and charisma of the Stones at their peak, it also perfectly captures the grim tension that seemed to hang in the air over Altamont. "Who is fighting, and why?" asks a bewildered-looking Mick Jagger to the crowd, not too very long before one Meredith Hunter, stoned out of his mind and armed with a pistol, is knifed to death not 20 feet from the stage (the murder is chillingly captured on film). Put into historical context as the moment when the era of peace and love may have symbolically met its bloody end, it's a remarkably valid question, though as 'Gimme Shelter' troublingly demonstrates, there may not be any answer.

(Do yourself a favor and watch the Criterion DVD edition of 'Gimme Shelter'. It comes with hours of outtakes, radio interviews and commentary that helps put the film into a rich historical context. It's also been beautifully remastered.)

So, who's the otter? That chocolaty-brown one sitting in the center of the darkened theater watching a badly-dubbed samurai zombie space alien movie and licking popcorn crumbs off of his butter-besmirched fingers? That'd be me, and that's pretty much who I am in a nutshell. No, really, it doesn't get much deeper than that.

No, I can't draw, much to my regret. I can write, though thus far nothing's been published outside of a few fanzines and one small-press poetry rag. My online stuff has pretty much been limited to a single (count it) cartoon fanfic. It was about Chip 'n' Dale (the mystery-solving Indiana Jones versions from the '80s, not the ones who used to mutilate Donald Duck), and it was quite well received by those few people who actually care about such things.

(For those of you who are old enough to know what 'Rescue Rangers' is; no, my fic wasn't a porno, and no, it wasn't about Gadget. Sorry.)

So, what to expect from me? What shall I babble about? I had to stop and scratch at my chin while puzzling over that one. Write what you know, they say, but what do I really know about?

Answer: movies. And food. Movies and food (but not, strangely, movies about food, because those tend to be unbelievably dull). After several years of film school, I may not know much, but one thing I can tell you with absolute certainty is that the French New Wave was very important, and also that Orson Welles was a cinematic genius of some kind. I still have no idea how to actually make a movie of my own, but by crikey I can sure appreciate somebody else's, and isn't that what higher education is all about?

Anyhow, like I said I guess I'm a bit of a film buff, so that's probably what I'll be rambling on about most of the time. Either that or cooking.

Eventually I plan to put some of my furry fiction up here for all to applaud and admire, or at least to skim through while you scan for the important bits like 'otter' and 'cock' and 'buggered in the shower by ten inches of throbbing kangaroo'. You know, the artistic parts. In cinema we call it 'frisson'.