Here is a picture of a physics class in Spiderman 3.
In real life most of the class would be Asian or Southeast Asian men. Asian guys can't even cut a break in nerdy movie scenes (thanks to my friend CY for pointing this out and his helpful graphic).
I think that Phillip Pullman's Dark Materials trilogy is pretty much one of the best set of books ever written. Take that Harry Potter! I was very excited when I heard that a film version of the Golden Compass was being filmed. I was somewhat less excited to learn that the director was going to be Chris Weitz of American Pie fame...
Anyway, I have been watching the genesis of this movie avidly and was a little broken-hearted when Mr. Boo left his company that was working on the movie. Luckily, New Line has created a fancy website whereby individuals can take a quiz to ascertain their daemons.
My daemon is a male osprey. I have to admit I was a little disappointed by this 
because I don't really see myself as a bird.
However, I think I did better than Mr. Boo. His 
daemon is a female jackal named Ariel (like the little mermaid). According to Dictionary.com, a jackal is:
1. any of several nocturnal wild dogs of the genus Canis, esp. C. aureus, of Asia and Africa, that scavenge or hunt in packs.
2. a person who performs dishonest or base deeds as the follower or accomplice of another.
3. a person who performs menial or degrading tasks for another.
I'm a little worried about the state of Mr. Boo's soul...
Seeing as how I had the day off today and Ms. Boo was working, I decided to see Hot Fuzz. If you've seen Shaun of the Dead, then you know what to expect. The same kind of humor, only this time in a more Stepford Wives-type plot rather than a zombie flick. The film stars Simon Pegg (who also wrote it) as Nicholas Angel, a kind of super-cop with the London metro force. He is "promoted" to serve as Sergeant in a country bumpkin town because he makes everyone else look bad (with an arrest rate 400% higher than any other cop on the force). There, he meets slovenly partner Danny Butterman (Nick Frost, who was also Pegg's sidekick in Shaun). They quickly become man-friends, with Butterman learning something about being a true cop, which Angel learns to chill out and enjoy stupid cop movies like Point Break. All while townspeople myteriously die in suspicious accidents. The final act of the movie is a pure B-movie campy mayhem, unapologetically wallowing in gory FX and corny lines of dialog (bad guy with a spike in his throat says, "Oww, thith really hurtth" while the audience laughs).
The pacing is a bit slow at first, and it isn't until the movie reaches it reckless and silly climax that Pegg and director Edgard Wrights' style of film making shines. However, they really have a handle on intelligent "meta" movies that appeal to the fanboy in all of us, with beautiful tales of platonic man-love saving the day against unspeakable evil. All while winking at convention and bringing the audience along with them into the realm of pure silliniess. Overall, this is on of the most intelligent dumb movies I've seen in a while.
Overall Grade: B
