Friday Fun: Dysenchanted - 1 Day to Halloween!

I put a spell on you: 2 days to Halloween!

Here's a scene from one of my absolute favorite Halloween movies:



And my favorite line from the movie:



Okay, now go run AMUCK!!

Wed Pic: 3 Days to Halloween!

My top 10 (or so) vampires - 4 Days to Halloween!

A few weeks ago, Entertainment Weekly listed the 20 Greatest Vampires of All Time. I disagreed with at least half of the list - after all, if I've never heard of them, how great can they be? And Edward Cullen? Don't get me started...

In response to EW's list, here are my top 10 (or so) most interesting vampires, in no particular order:

• Dracula - has to be near the top of everyone's list. In my mind, Dracula will always be Frank Langella's version. I remember sneakily watching this late at night when I was really too little to be seeing such things. So now you know where it all started... I liked Gary Oldman as Dracula, too, but nobody holds a candle to Langella for me. I remember this scene in particular:
  
  
• Lestat -I like him much more in the books than the movies, and I like Stuart Towsend's version in Queen of the Damned better than Tom Cruise's in Interview with the Vampire (although if you want to know how I really imagained Lestat - despite the description of him as blonde - watch Farinelli)
  
• Eric Northman from "True Blood" - He's new to my list, but ooooh, la la! (I hope you won't beat me up if I admit Bill Compton just doesn't do it for me)
• Selene from Underworld -She's a kick-ass heroine first, vampire second. Bella could certainly learn a thing or two from her.
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• David from Lost Boys- My first bad-boy hot vampire (Michael doesn't make the list on a technicality - he was never a full vampire)
• Claudia from Interview With The Vampire - Forever a child in body, but not in mind, and that makes her very interesting
• Jessica on "True Blood" - From an ultra-restritive environment to vampire - she went through a total "no rules" phase and then has done a lot of growing up very quickly. 
• Spike from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer"- yummy! Bad boy with sensitive interior (and a really bad poet!)
• Harmony  from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" - went from whiny spoiled human to whiny spoiled vampire and was a hoot to watch
• "Naughty Willow" - Willow wasn't usually a vampire, but in the "Buffy" episode "Doppelgangland," a vampire version of Willow from an alternate reality comes to Sunnydale.
  
• Godric - I wish he'd had a longer story arc on "True Blood." I want to know more about his backstory. I haven't read the books yet - is there more on him in there?
• Angel - Yummy. 'nuff said
• Drusilla from "Buffy" and "Angel"- A good girl gone mad

So, who are your top vampires? Have I forgotten anyone I should have included?

Five Days to Halloween!

Friday Fun: This, Jenn, is the Internet

After the Friday Rant (which was really supposed to be the Thursday Rant, but I forgot to hit "publish") here's your regularly-scheduled Friday Fun.

Here's another clip from one of my favorite shows, The IT Crowd. Jenn, head of IT (even though she knows nothing about computers), has gotten Roy and Moss to write her speech for the company shareholders meeting and the boys decided to have a bit of fun. I wish I could embed it here, but I can't, so here's the link to This, Jenn, is the Internet. Enjoy!

I keep hearing this over and over...

As posted at FlickFilosopher: Question of the day: Is ‘Where the Wild Things Are’ too dangerous for children?: "I wondered in my review of Where the Wild Things Are whether the film wasn’t the beginnings of a shift away from overprotecting children from themselves and the world. After all, it offers a very dark portrait of the most secret workings of a child’s imagination, and it fully embraces of the fact that children are people and that they can be angry, resentful, and bitter." (You can read the rest at the link above)

My answer: As with any movie, I keep saying "You've got to know your child." LilGirl was watching the Lord of the Rings movies when she was three and was fine with those (and proceeded to explain the Balrog to her uncles one day). She also liked Hellboy, but when we watched Hellboy II (on video), she excused herself about 15 minutes in because "It's creeping me out." I have to admit I was a little surprised by that reaction, but I noted it. Besides the cost, we tend not to go to many movies in the theater for exactly that reason. At home, she knows if anything in the movie is too scary we can talk through those parts, or she is free to go to another room and find something else to do (this happens if the movie just bores her, too).

If we do see something in the theater, it's generally something we know is pretty innocuous, or something we have familiarized ourselves with enough to attempt to prepare her for "the worst." We tried to do that for Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, but a classmate had already revealed the Big Bad Moment to LilGirl, so when we mentioned it she waved it away with "Oh, I already know about that." Occasionally there will be something we didn't know about or that she reacts to unexpectedly, but the key is to keep an eye on her reactions throughout the movie. Most of the time, just an arm around her shoulder is enough. Once or twice, a well-timed "bathroom break" was a good idea.

Obviously, this is just my experience of what works with my kid. Every kid is different. You have to think about YOUR kid, not kids in general, when choosing a movie to see. This is Basic Parenting 101, folks, which is part of why the whole "Is it too scary for children?" thing bugs me.

All this said, I'm still on the fence about Where The Wild Things Are. I don't think it will be too scary for her. I have heard it may be a bit depressing, and that worries me. Scared is one thing, brokenhearted is another. But I think my biggest hang-up may not be about LilGirl's reaction at all. It's about mine, which I've blogged about before.

Photo by  http://www.flickr.com/photos/uaeincredible/ / CC BY 2.0

You won't hear me say this often, but...

I can't wait until Monday!!!

Actually, I guess I do say it fairly often in reference to The Big Bang Theory...but especially this week.

Signed, Geeky McGeekerson  ;)

Wednesday Pic: Just Keep Swimming

Taken at the Henry Doorly Zoo

Where the Wild Things Might Be

I don't know how soon I'll get to the theater to see Where the Wild Things Are but I'm half holding my breath. It's one of my favorite books and I soooo want the movie to be good, but there's always that fear that the filmmaker's vision is nothing like your own.

I came across an article in the LA Times which talks about how different from other children's books Where the Wild Things Are was when it came out. I figure I probably first encountered the book 12-15 years after it was published, at which point it seemed (to me) to have always existed, to always have been accepted, and I was initially surprised now to hear that it was considered controversial when first published.

I think director Spike Jonze "gets" the book, at least, and seems to come at it from a similar childhood view of it. In the LA Times article, he says

"How crazy is it that he invented those monsters?" Jonze asks. "Those creatures seem like they always existed. They seem like they were always there."

and

"As a kid, you gravitate to things that feel true. I didn't know what it was about, but I knew what it meant."

Exactly.
 

I hope against hope the movie will be good, that I won't sit there seething that the filmmakers "ruined" the book. Sadly, the best I'm even hoping for is a solid "Eh, it was okay." I'm not even remotely expecting that my reaction will be "OMG that was sooo good!" (That would be a nice surprise, though. Here's crossing fingers, toes, eyes and anything else I can.)

Maurice Sendak rewrote the rules with 'Wild Things' -- latimes.com (Posted using ShareThis)

Wednesday Pic: Happy Fall!

In case you were curious about The Rules

Finally! ReadWriteWeb has clarified The Rules of social media (please note "The Rules" (with caps) should be spoken in a loud booming voice).



Are you ready?



Are you sure?




Okay, here they are...

"Blogging? You should be posting twice a day. No, actually that's too often; it abuses people's attention. Wait, actually that's not often enough; other people will eat your lunch. Actually, blogging's dead, so move to Twitter, where you absolutely must follow everyone who follows you, unless you absolutely mustn't, so don't, unless you do. And when they do follow you, sending them an automatic direct message will either lift you into the Twitter elite or damn you to eternal ridicule. Possibly both."

If you're still confused, here are Chris Brogan's rules (which ReadWriteWeb was nice enough to remind me of).

Okay, everybody clear now? :)

Banned Books Week: Map of banned books

View Book Bans and Challenges, 2007-2009 in a larger map

Friday (Not So) Fun: 100 Banned Books

Banned Books Week: Author speaks out, Part 2

She has some very good points, especially near the end. I like the football analogy.



via Kids' Right to Read Project