Ramblin' with Roger

Guilt or Innocence

You are not allowed to explain anything unless someone messages you and asks!

The rules of the game:

RULE 1- You can only say Guilty or Innocent.
RULE 2- You are not allowed to explain anything unless someone messages you and asks!
RULE 3- Copy and paste this into your notes or blog, delete my answers, type in your answers and tag to your friends to answer this.

The Questions:

1. Asked someone to marry you? Guilty
2. Ever kissed someone of the same sex? Guilty
3. Danced on a table in a bar? Guilty
4. Ever told a lie? Guilty
5. Had feelings for someone whose feelings you can’t have back? Guilty
6. Kissed a picture? Guilty
7. Slept in until 5 PM? Innocent
8. Fallen asleep at work/school? Guilty
9. Held a snake? Guilty
10. Been suspended from school? Innocent
11. Worked at a fast food restaurant? Innocent
12. Stolen from a store? Guilty
13. Been fired from a job? Innocent
14. Done something you regret? Guilty
15. Laughed until something you were drinking came out your nose? Guilty
16. Caught a snowflake on your tongue? Guilty
17. Kissed in the rain? Guilty
18. Sat on a roof top? Guilty
19. Kissed someone you shouldn’t? Guilty
20. Sang in the shower? Guilty
21. Been pushed into a pool with all your clothes on? Guilty
22. Shaved your head? Innocent
23. Had a boxing membership? Innocent
24. Made a boyfriend/Girlfriend cry? Guilty
25. Been in a band? Guilty
26. Shot a gun? Guilty
27. Donated Blood? Guilty
28. Eaten alligator meat? Innocent
29. Eaten cheesecake? Guilty
30. Still love someone you shouldn’t? Innocent
31. Have/had a tattoo? Innocent
32. Liked someone, but will never tell who? Guilty
33. Been too honest? Guilty
34. Ruined a surprise? Guilty
35. Ate in a restaurant and got so bloated that you couldn’t walk afterward? Innocent
36. Erased someone in your friends list? Innocent
37. Dressed in a woman’s clothes (if you’re a guy) or man’s clothes (if you’re a girl)? Guilty
38. Joined a pageant? Innocent
39. Been told that you’re handsome or beautiful by someone who really meant what they said? Guilty
40. Had communication with your ex? Guilty
41. Got totally drunk on the night before exam? Guilty
42. Got so angry that you cried? Guilty

***
The Beatles – Not Guilty

30-Day Challenge: Day 2: Favorite Movie

I wish I could pull out a Marshall McLuhan to shut down an arrogantly wrong comment.

Considering all of the movies I’ve seen, all the GREAT movies I’ve ever seen, it is surprisingly easy for me to pick my favorite:

Annie Hall (1977).

It was my touchstone picture for a number of years. I saw it four times in the movie theater, and it was one of the first films I purchased on VHS.

It’s the roller coaster in Coney Island, which I loved as a child. It’s early Christopher Walken, bizarre as he would later become.

The opening of the film was more story, fewer jokes, my kind of humor. It reminded me of seeing Woody Allen on Ed Sullivan in the 1960s. The film also features Paul Simon, one of my music icons of that decade.

I related to Alvy Singer. Many is the time I wish I could pull out Marshall McLuhan or an equivalent person to shut down an arrogantly wrong comment. I have an aversion to driving. I hate going into a movie after it’s started. I came to believe that, “A relationship, I think, is like a shark. You know? It has to constantly move forward or it dies. And I think what we got on our hands is a dead shark.”

Annoyingly, I used to say “la-di-dah, la-di-dah, la-di-dah” a lot. Incidentally, Diane Keaton won an Oscar for this role, though I always thought it was REALLY for her acting in that same year in Waiting for Mister Goodbar.

But mostly, in Annie Hall, it’s the split screenshot of Annie and Alvy with their respective therapists:
Alvy’s Therapist: How often do you sleep together?
Annie’s Therapist: Do you have sex often?
Alvy: [lamenting] Hardly ever. Maybe three times a week.
Annie: [annoyed] Constantly. I’d say three times a week.

It defined how two people can experience the exact same events, yet see them very differently. This is a useful lesson when dealing with most human interactions. For instance, a Protestant and a Catholic can both take communion; for the Protestant, it’s representational of the body and blood of Christ, while Catholics believe that transubstantiation takes place. still, it’s the same act, for presumably the same God, and the chasm that exists over this seems unnecessary.

Other contenders: Groundhog Day, West Side Story (not a great movie, but a great musical), Young Frankenstein.

Oh, and one other: Star Wars, with the retronym Episode 4: A New Hope (meh). The Empire Strikes Back may be the better picture, but this one started it all. Star Wars lost the Academy Award for Best Picture to…Annie Hall.

Two long-running television shows end Monday night.
24 (FOX) will be over after eight seasons, and I’ll be happy about that. I fear that people have confused the fiction of the former CTU operative with real life. the United States Attorney General just recently was compelled to say, “We’re not Jack Bauer.” The TV Guide article about the show’s ending asks cast members, “What’s your favorite scene?” I watched the first season, but as the writers/producers decided how much more Jack can take, and deliver, I bailed.

Law & Order is gone after 20 years, after NBC failed to get a cable company to purchase reruns of season 21. I must admit I pretty much stopped watching it when the late Jerry Orbach left about eight years ago, but I’ll watch one more “ripped from the headlines” vignette.

Spoilers QUESTION

I haven’t been watching LOST, but I have it on good authority that the island is really…

As usual, I was watching JEOPARDY! recently, and the show had a whole category devoted to spoilers! In an unJEOPARDYlike fashion, I’ll give you the questions, but NOT the answers, until the end. Planet of the Apes (2001), The Sixth Sense, Chinatown, The Usual Suspects, The Crying Game.

So when is the RIGHT amount of time to give away the “spoiler” ending of a TV show or movie? In early 2005, noted critic Roger Ebert wrote about this regarding Million Dollar Baby when critic Michael Medved and faux critic Rush Limbaugh revealed the crucial plot point because they didn’t LIKE the crucial plot point. (I STILL haven’t seen the movie but learned that plot point at the time. Now I’m feeling the need to rent it.)

With LOST coming to a close, how long can someone recording the program to watch later expect NOT to hear the details? Will it be in the newspaper the next morning? Will it have a spoiler warning, and will that matter? (I haven’t been watching LOST, but I have it on good authority that the island is really little Tommy from St. Elsewhere.)

On a NORMAL show – one that isn’t getting near Super Bowl money for its ads – I think a week is about all one can reasonably expect before its common knowledge. (How long did it take before the greatest ending in history, Newhart, which is celebrating its 20th anniversary this month, become revealed?) Although I recall a critic being taken to task because the viewer was waiting to see the program when it was released on DVD. How does THAT work in the equation?

For movies it’s different. Films have two lives: in the theater, and then on DVD, et al. (There’s a third, on broadcast TV, but that may be years out.) It seems that 13 weeks after the release date of home release might be a standard. Of course, if home release becomes simultaneous with theatrical release, as may be coming to pass, that creates an awfully small window.

But what do YOU think about TV shows and movies? What should be the spoiler expectation, Rosebud?
***
Those JEOPARDY answers.
SPOILER ALERT:::SPOILER ALERT

Show #5868, aired 2010-03-03 MOVIE SPOILERS $200: There’s a Washington, D.C. memorial to an ape general when Mark Wahlberg returns to Earth in this 2001 film
#5868, aired 2010-03-03 MOVIE SPOILERS $400: Bruce Willis is dead & doesn’t know it in this 1999 thriller
#5868, aired 2010-03-03 MOVIE SPOILERS $600: Faye Dunaway’s daughter is also her sister in this Jack Nicholson classic from 1974
#5868, aired 2010-03-03 MOVIE SPOILERS $800: The disabled Kevin Spacey seems to be the killer Keyser Soze in this 1995 film
#5868, aired 2010-03-03 MOVIE SPOILERS $1000: In this 1992 IRA thriller starring Stephen Rea, the “girl” is really a guy

Now (Don’t) Cut That Out!

I was ALSO watching Heidi Bowl.

Today is the 20th anniversary of the classic last episode of the TV series Newhart, which the local CBS in the Albany-Schenectady, NY area cut off 30 seconds too soon. Watch Bob Newhart talk about The Last Newhart.

It got me thinking about TV events that were interrupted. Surely, one of the most significant is the so-called Heidi Bowl, which I was ALSO watching.

It was an American Football League regular-season game between the New York Jets and the Oakland Raiders, played on November 17, 1968. the Jets were leading 32-29 with only 65 seconds left, and NBC-TV ended the football coverage at 7 pm in favor of broadcasting the premiere of Heidi, a made-for-TV version of the classic children’s story. Meanwhile, the Raiders came back and scored 14 points, winning 43-32. Ultimately, the NFL’s television policies were amended, requiring games to be broadcast in their entirety in the markets of the teams involved.

Lately, I’ve been having difficulty for more prosaic reasons. I hardly ever get a chance to watch a TV show live. I record almost everything to the DVR to watch later. And I’m usually an episode or two behind. So it wasn’t until recently that I discovered that the results show of American Idol on FOX has been running two to four minutes long, the effect of which being my recording of Glee cuts off early. I DO have the ability to extend the recording of the later show and have. But it seems weird that a RESULTS show can’t end on time.

Any shows cutting off for you?

30-Day Challenge: Day 1 – Favorite Actor

Who would I pay to go to see in most anything they were in?

I took on this 30-day challenge because I thought it would be interesting. And, just as important, quick and easy. But I got stuck on the first question.

I assume “actor” is gender-neutral in this case.

Starting to parse the category, I began with theater actors. But I don’t really see stage actors that often, though in fact, this year’s Tony nominations feature a lot of familiar names from TV and movies.

Favorite television performer: I could pick actors I watched in more than one series: Bob Newhart (Bob Newhart Show, Newhart); James Garner (Maverick, The Rockford Files); Mary Tyler Moore (Dick van Dyke Show, MTM Show); Jimmy Smits (L.A. Law, NYPD Blue). There are others who qualify because of other functions, such as Alan Alda (writer/director). I might have to go with Betty White, game player extraordinaire, who’s been on TV longer than I’ve been alive, because not only did I record a new Saturday Night Live for the first time in forever, I might even check out her new series on TV Land called Hot in Cleveland.

Still, when I thought about it further, it was always the movies that defined the question in my mind, fairly or not. Which is to say: “Who would I pay to go to see in most anything they were in?” I recognized that the leading males in this category were Robert Redford, Paul Newman (a couple of times together), Dustin Hoffman, and Denzel Washington. It might be Philip Seymour Hoffman or Paul Giamatti down the line.

But there were two actresses for whom I saw a large majority of their films in a particular stretch.

One was Jane Fonda. I saw well over half of the movies she was in between 1969 (They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?) and 1985 (Agnes of God), even the truly dreadful Rollover (1981), filmed partly in Albany, NY.

The other is Meryl Streep, whose output between 1977 (Julia, starring Jane Fonda) and 2009 (the mediocre It’s Complicated) I’ve seen maybe 70% of.

Eventually, Laura Linney will likely be in this category.
***
All pictures from LIFE magazine from the 1990s.