Thursday, January 01, 2009
My best of 2008...
Explanations may come later. Note that this list is made up of things I saw/read in 2008, as opposed things that were released in 2008.
Movies
1. The Dark Knight
2. There Will Be Blood
3. The Rules of the Game
4. In Bruges
5. Once
6. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
7. Pineapple Express
Honorable Mentions:
Into the Wild, The King of Kong, Rescue Dawn, Rififi, Son of Rambow
Television
1. The Shield
2. Generation Kill
3. Mad Men
4. The Wire
5. The Office
6. Battlestar Galactica
7. Spaced
Honorable Mentions:
30 Rock, Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations, Carrier, Dexter, How I Met Your Mother, My Boys
Music
1. Stay Positive / The Hold Steady
2. Brighter Than Creation's Dark / Drive-By Truckers
Books
1. Tree of Smoke / Denis Johnson
2. Watchmen / Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons
3. Stalingrad / Antony Beevor
4. Game of Thrones / George R.R. Martin
5. Downtown Owl / Chuck Klosterman
Honorable Mentions:
Too many to list; see my Goodreads page.
Movies
1. The Dark Knight
2. There Will Be Blood
3. The Rules of the Game
4. In Bruges
5. Once
6. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
7. Pineapple Express
Honorable Mentions:
Into the Wild, The King of Kong, Rescue Dawn, Rififi, Son of Rambow
Television
1. The Shield
2. Generation Kill
3. Mad Men
4. The Wire
5. The Office
6. Battlestar Galactica
7. Spaced
Honorable Mentions:
30 Rock, Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations, Carrier, Dexter, How I Met Your Mother, My Boys
Music
1. Stay Positive / The Hold Steady
2. Brighter Than Creation's Dark / Drive-By Truckers
Books
1. Tree of Smoke / Denis Johnson
2. Watchmen / Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons
3. Stalingrad / Antony Beevor
4. Game of Thrones / George R.R. Martin
5. Downtown Owl / Chuck Klosterman
Honorable Mentions:
Too many to list; see my Goodreads page.
Labels: books, movies, music, TEG, TV
Thursday, January 03, 2008
My best of 2007...
Movies
1. Children of Men
2. Zodiac
3. Knocked Up
4. The Darjeeling Limited
5. Army of Shadows
TV
1. 30 Rock
2. The Shield
3. John From Cincinnati
4. It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
5. Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations
Music
1. Sound of Silver / LCD Soundsystem
2. Neon Bible / Arcade Fire
3. Sky Blue Sky / Wilco
4. American Gangster / Jay-Z
5. Wincing the Night Away / The Shins
Books
1. No Country for Old Men / Cormac McCarthy
2. The Black Swan / Nassim Nicholas Taleb
3. And Then We Came To the End / Joshua Ferris
4. The Savage Detectives / Roberto Bolano
5. Up in Honey's Room / Elmore Leonard
1. Children of Men
2. Zodiac
3. Knocked Up
4. The Darjeeling Limited
5. Army of Shadows
TV
1. 30 Rock
2. The Shield
3. John From Cincinnati
4. It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
5. Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations
Music
1. Sound of Silver / LCD Soundsystem
2. Neon Bible / Arcade Fire
3. Sky Blue Sky / Wilco
4. American Gangster / Jay-Z
5. Wincing the Night Away / The Shins
Books
1. No Country for Old Men / Cormac McCarthy
2. The Black Swan / Nassim Nicholas Taleb
3. And Then We Came To the End / Joshua Ferris
4. The Savage Detectives / Roberto Bolano
5. Up in Honey's Room / Elmore Leonard
Labels: books, movies, music, TEG, TV
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
P.J. O'Rourke interview...
When I can't fall asleep (which is at least once or twice a week) I late-night channel-surf for an hour or so until I get tired. Occaisonally I'll find something interesting which will counteract the TV's intended purpose, like the one time I got to the Weather Channel (my trusty falling-asleep stand-by) and it had a what-if type program on a tornado hitting downtown Dallas, which scared the shit out of me. Anyway, on Sunday night/Monday morning I flipped through to C-SPAN2 and found the tail end of a sit-down interview with one of my favorite authors, P.J. O'Rourke. Luckily for me (and you), C-SPAN streams everything they produce for free. The P.J. interview is here, and it's three hours long, and awesome.
Labels: books
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Parcells article by Michael Lewis...
What Keeps Bill Parcells Awake at Night
Michael Lewis the best nonfiction writer going; well, maybe equal with Malcolm Gladwell. I personally like Chuck Klosterman's work better, but almost every article he writes is essentially about him, so I can't really include him in the discussion; I personally respond to it better, but I can make a distinction between the quality of the two. It's like the difference between Bill Simmons and a sportswriter like Gary Smith of Sports Illustrated. Film discussion works this way for me as well. The films I've liked and responded to the best over the past few years are The 40 Year Old Virgin, Kicking and Screaming (Noah Baumbach, not the Will Ferrell abortion), and The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, but I can recognize that they aren't "great" films in the sense that say, Citizen Kane or whatever is. (The Third Man is one that combines both; it resonates with me personally and it's "great".) This is probably a false dichotomy that I'm creating here, but whatever. The point is that despite my love for them, I can recognize their flaws.
Michael Lewis the best nonfiction writer going; well, maybe equal with Malcolm Gladwell. I personally like Chuck Klosterman's work better, but almost every article he writes is essentially about him, so I can't really include him in the discussion; I personally respond to it better, but I can make a distinction between the quality of the two. It's like the difference between Bill Simmons and a sportswriter like Gary Smith of Sports Illustrated. Film discussion works this way for me as well. The films I've liked and responded to the best over the past few years are The 40 Year Old Virgin, Kicking and Screaming (Noah Baumbach, not the Will Ferrell abortion), and The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, but I can recognize that they aren't "great" films in the sense that say, Citizen Kane or whatever is. (The Third Man is one that combines both; it resonates with me personally and it's "great".) This is probably a false dichotomy that I'm creating here, but whatever. The point is that despite my love for them, I can recognize their flaws.
