I’m sorry, but I just really like this commercial:

If you don’t, you’re a horrible person.

Previously, I made a bit of fun of the new film The Raven. And I didn’t follow through on my promise to be the first person in line on opening day. It got away from me; it wasn’t exactly well publicized. But I saw it today.

First the bad news: my reading of the film based upon its trailer was totally wrong. The idea is that this film takes place in the few days before his death on 7 October 1849. His wife died two years earlier (this is briefly mentioned, but if you didn’t know anything about his life, you would have missed it). He is in love with another young woman. His wife was 13 years younger and the actor playing Emily (Alice Eve) is 15 years younger than John Cusack. So that all works. Another criticism of the trailer was that the works Poe is most known for were written in the couple of years before his death. But given I was wrong about the time of the film, this is all perfectly fine.

Last the good news: The Raven is surprisingly good.

The Raven is getting mostly bad reviews and it hasn’t been all that successful commercially. And I can see why! The Raven doesn’t suck. The screenwriters, Ben Livingston & Hannah Shakespeare, clearly know Poe well. It isn’t just all the references to his work, either. It is that the serial killer’s notes sound just like Poe’s horror fiction.

One great surprise is that Poe does not get the Sherlock Holmes treatment: he is not an action superhero. There is one scene where he tries to follow the murderer over the swinging walkway over a theater, but even in this scene he falls and drops his gun. What’s more, the denouement[1] depends entirely on Poe as a writer. How about that? Screenwriters actually honoring their subject!

Making this film was a brave act, because I’m sure I was not the only Poe fan watching it. I was just waiting for the film to get something really wrong. And it was flawless. Of course, others probably don’t like it that Poe dies at the end of the film.

This is not to say that the film was great. It’s an entertainment. James McTeigue directed it, and it is certainly as good as his V for Vendetta. But the whole serial killer thing has so much baggage that there is no way it couldn’t clutter up the film. The script has problems too. The opening of Poe in a bar trying to get respect is tone deaf. The behavior of the killer is often ridiculous. And the film takes what would have been a really good (unsettling) ending and makes it pat.

Otherwise: not bad. I thought the film was a bit dark (I worry what it will look like on video). But there’s no doubt that Danny Ruhlmann set the right mood. This was helped with the post-production sound, which interacted effectively with the music. John Cusack was about as good as you could expect. Alice Eve seemed quite good, but it could be just that I think she’s so lovely. And it is a thoroughly professional film, of course.

You are far better off seeing The Raven than Marvel’s The Avengers. But best of all would be to go straight to the master:

[1] For fans of Adaptation, that’s de-nu’-ment if you’re Donald and de’-nu-ma if you’re Charlie.

Like Michael Steele, I like the word kerfuffle. Unlike Michael Steele, I know how to pronounce it:

Yes, as a matter of fact, I am a pedant.

I wasn’t surprised to hear that Richard Dawson had died.

I have been surprised up until now that he had managed to live longer than almost everyone else in the cast of Hogan’s Heroes.

To quote a bad movie, “There can be only one!” And that one is Robert Clary.

At 5’1″, Clary shows that it really is best to be short. And French. And look absolutely fabulous in a beret.

I used to have a friend—a smart and funny guy. He is kind of an archetype to me, however. Because of his emotional unavailability, people really wanted to be around him. It was often commented that wherever he was around, you could tell he was calculated whether he might be having a better time somewhere else.

We often had arguments about art. He hated anything that had the faintest whiff of sentimentality. During one conversation he told me that he hated Pete Townshend’s third solo album, All the Best Cowboys Have Chinese Eyes. It took me years to figure out what he didn’t like. It was songs like this:

And The Sea Refused No River.

The truth is that over the years, I’ve become very much like my friend. I think it is all about fear—the fear that people might see into your soul and know what you do: you’re a wreck. Over time, it becomes easier to live with yourself as you are, because you just don’t have the energy to hide. But as an artist, the temptation to hide yourself in clever craft and intellectual flourishes is strong.

This is why All the Best Cowboys Have Chinese Eyes is so important. It reminds me that I not only can be utterly naked but that in order to do great work, I must be. Of course, that doesn’t mean I am able even to succeed with the first part of this equation.

I’d like to believe that.

Liberals can be silly; I’ve written about this recently. But conservatives are really the kings of talking out their asses. I’ve been amazed by the recent attacks on funding for solar panels (Solyndra) and electric cars. The argument seems to be that the government should only invest in sure things—like it is a very conservative venture capitalist. A big argument on Fox News has been that electric cars are not ready for prime time, so the government shouldn’t be investing in them. These kinds of arguments show a shocking ignorance of how the government has traditionally invested in science and technology.

Media Matters has an excellent article about this newest line of conservative talking asses. The arguments being used to attack electric cars are the same as the arguments that were used 15 years ago against hybrid cars:

I’ve thought about this a lot. In fact, it seems I am forever writing about conservative amnesia: they seem to be totally unaware of the opinions they held 20 years earlier. When reminded of past conservative opinions, it is always the same: yeah, those conservatives were wrong but this time—This time!—the liberals have gone too far and the conservatives are right. Sure, it was wrong to stop African Americans from voting before, but these new voter ID laws really need to be done! Sure, it was wrong to oppose the Clean Air Act before, but this global warming stuff in nonsense! Sure, it was wrong not to give the elderly health insurance before, but, oh, wait…

As Corey Robin argues, ’twas ever so. Conservatives always think that things are just perfect the way they are, and fight against any improvement. I know that liberals have loads of blind spots in their view of the world. I know that, as a radical, I do. What distinguishes liberal minded people from conservatives is that the liberals don’t know what their blind spots are; they at least are trying to make the world more perfect as far as they can see. It must be strange to be a conservative, knowing that not only will history prove you wrong, but you yourself may look back and wonder, “Why was I so foolish?”

Thursday, the Romney campaign sent a bunch of protesters to heckle David Axelrod’s event in Boston. When asked about this, Romney said, “Sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.”

What’s interesting about this is that most commentators (especially on MSNBC) are focusing on the goose line rather than what it means. Romney was saying, “Sure, I sent a bunch of people out to heckle, because Obama’s people do it to me.” As far as I know, the Obama campaign has never bused people to a Romney campaign to hackle him. Instead, Romney opponents may spontaneously disrupt his events. They may or may not be Obama supporters, but I know of no evidence that the Obama campaign has anything to do with these people.

So the Romney campaign is saying that because it doesn’t like spontaneous hecklers, it—The Romney campaign!—is going to heckle the Obama campaign. This should be big news. But it isn’t.

Instead, the “liberal” media are sniggering about the line “Sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.” How out of touch Romney is! We all know it is supposed to be “What’s good for the goose is good for the gander”! Except, you know, they’re wrong.

The original quote is from Aesop, who had a thing about aphorisms involving fowl—The Goose With the Golden Eggs and so on. It is only recently that the line has been changed. And even still, written it is more common than the new version. So with all due respect to my “liberal” friends: you’re embarrassing yourselves!

Atrios writes:

Right:

“Oh no, my dear; I’m a very good man; I’m just a very bad wizard.” Unfortunately, it is the opposite for the elites of this country. Bernanke is a very good economist; he’s just a very bad man.