What song does Willie sing in the opening scene of Temple of Doom? It's been bothering me all day.

Anything Goes

Oh, thankyou so much. What a relief.

The Batman Begins DVD extras are pretty cool. Lots of props given to all the behind-the-scenes folks. And an easter egg where you see lots of stunt-folk bounding around on wires while wearing a cape, which is fun.

All the behind-the-scenes info is actually interesting. And occasionally, astonishing. I'm somewhat reconciled to the interminable Batmobile chase now that I can spend it admiring the set.

Plus, very little of Katie Holmes, and lots of Christian Bale. Often shirtless.

Okay, the Superman Returns trailer snippet they showed during Smallville tonight actually made me excited about the movie. Not that even really showed anything, but whereas before I was just kind of "Yay, Superman. I'll guess I'll see it when it comes out." actually seeing some footage is making me look forward to it.

I have seen 2 movies this week.

Last night was a perfectly dreadful Bollywood epic called Taj Mahal. You know how most Bollywood movies have the one really boring sex scene/love song that's only really there to give the audience time to go to the bathroom, and maybe sell a few soundtrack CDs? Well, in this film, it's all that scene. I have never been so tempted to walk out of a movie in my life. The only reason we didn't is DH was reviewing it. It was so. fucking. boring. Not to mention all the bad CGI and worse wigs and fake beards. And the CGI deer. Oh lord, the deer...

Anyhoo, tonight we saw Mrs Henderson Presents, which was absolutely delightful. Judy Dench and Bob Hoskins are terrific, and it's got a great period feel to it. It's glamorous period rather than gritty period, but it commits to the style without making it about the style, and allows the actors to give wonderfully honest performances.

I finally saw Ginger Snaps.

It was neither as good nor as bad as I was expecting. Ultimately, I think the idea of lycanthropy as an allegory for female puberty just doesn't work. Also, major Stupidity Factor. I'm just no longer tolerant of scenes or plot points that require Stupidity Factor to happen.

But still, not too awful, esp. for a werewolf flick.

So today is the day that Harry Potter and the Blitz of Marketing gets released, right?

Yep--I'm heading over to the 6:00 show in a few minutes.

I know we've got a handful of gamers about, so I figured I'd share this.

I just watched the new D&D movie that was on Sci-Fi last month. ("Wrath of the Dragon God" or "The Elemental Might." I've seen both titles used.) While you can tell it had zero budget (the special effects are decent for the spells, but creatures, whether CGI or make-up, are really bad) and the writing, acting and directing are shaky in parts, it's still a decent cheesy fantasy movie, especially if you're actually familiar with D&D and can catch all the little references peppered throughout. It actually stays fairly true to the game and there weren't any moments where my inner rules lawyer went "Wait, that shouldn't happen!"

There is some annoying exposition, but mostly they just expect the audience to either have played D&D or be smart enough to figure out what’s going on. There’s also a subtle side effect of a detect magic spell that made me go "Hey! Cool!"

It's also surprisingly grim for being a cheesy fantasy movie based on a game. The heroes get their butts kicked and have bad things happen to them with surprising frequency.

That said, there are plenty of parts that deserve to MST3Ked. One that stood out is the heroes find a village of goblins who’ve been slaughtered. One of them looks around and says “Who could have done this?” and my first thought was “Quick, look for a group of 1st level adventurers !”

So, overall, I wouldn’t bother paying $18 or whatever for the DVD, but it’s definitely worth watching for D&D geeks if you can get ahold of it in some other fashion. The usual places had it when I got it earlier this week.