I just saw Hot Fuzz for the first time yesterday--very funny! In poking around the internet for reviews of the film, I saw this description of Nick Frost, which just nails him perfectly:

Frost is a burly Saint Bernard of a man whose infectious enthusiasm will leave you torn between wanting to rub his ears or dive for cover from the flying slobber.

it bugs me in much the same way Star Trek did

It's probably both late and redundant of me to ask how Star Trek bothered you. I mean, I get how SH can bother one, but I don't see what it has to do with NuTrek.

I like to think of this one Holmes movie as having to balance out most all of the others in making Holmes more athletic. So, really, he needs to be a decathlete (originally I typed Iron Man, meaning like the race, but too much) ninja. In the sequel he can be just a heptathlete. Samurai.

I mean, I get how SH can bother one, but I don't see what it has to do with NuTrek.

I can see it. They're both updates of old stories with a lot more whizz-bang and explosions, almost thumbing their nose at how stuffy their previous counterparts must have been.

Speaking of Alan Arkin movies, I really should seek out a copy of Wait Until Dark for a rewatch. Love that movie, and Arkin is amazingly creepy as Harry Roat. If you've not seen it, make sure you watch it with all the lights out for full effect.

Oh dear lord. THIS was the first movie I remember seeing Alan Arkin in, and to say that it's quite a discrepancy from his later career is I think a huge understatement. Stephen King, in his horror literature/tv/movie survey Dance Macabre, claimed that Arkin as Harry Roate from Scarsdale was one of the most evil characters he'd ever seen on film, and I agree. It's colored ever Arkin role I've seen since, and this is NOT the note he usually played over the years.

Plus - you're terrorizing (blind) Audrey Hepburn for two hours - that's evil INCARNATE!

thumbing their nose at how stuffy their previous counterparts must have been

You get that from Star Trek, really? I thought it was quite content to co-exist in the same universe as the rest of the stories. Yes, it's whizzbangier because so are we, but I didn't feel it was at all critical of what came before it. I thought it was very inclusive of the past.

Holmes, on the other hand, is positioning itself to be the only Holmes story ever told, and therefore better than everything that came before it. I can't say without seeing it if it's thumbing its nose at its predecessors, but it's surely trying to supplant them entirely. That's its job.

Haven't seen "Blacksnake Moan". But a movie where a guy decides the best help he can give an assault victim is to keep her chained (semi-nude) to a radiator? Maybe something more than prudishness keeping people away. If that is not problematic or if it deals well with the problematic issue, you need to explain before I'll lend it my eyeballs. And no "deeply spiritual" is not enough of an explaination.

I was pleasantly surprised by this film. The premise sounded really awful and foul, but it actually was a healing, well-made story at its heart. We rented it because we'd read some good reviews, but were prepared to turn it off. It was very good.

You get that from Star Trek, really?

I didn't, but I think the marketing seemed to take that stance with all the "This ain't your papa's Star Trek" business. I also came at the movie originally as someone generally unfamiliar with the old series, so I had a different perspective than Strega.

I also came at the movie originally as someone generally unfamiliar with the old series, so I had a different perspective than Strega.

I'm not yet sure what Strega's opinion was, but I came at it from the perspective of someone who's seen all of Trek except Enterprise, and I didn't get a superior attitude from it. Did anyone else?

I'm not sure how I would describe Blacksnake Moan, but "man chains woman" isn't it. That definitely wasn't what I came away thinking about the movie.

The air of "We're going to do Star Trek right!" that I picked up from the marketing really annoyed me. I've always felt that all the alternate universe stuff was put in to prevent the legions of original Trek fans from confiscating and destroying all the prints.

No, I didn't like it. Trek: 90210.

Edit: Because if the original story line was good enough, they could have set up a new bunch of cadets following in the old guard's footsteps, then they could have the young, pretty, hop-in-the-sack kids to play with.