The state of AI right now...?

Apparently there is "a new Michael Crichton novel" coming out in a few days. What that means is that it is a novel that he had done a lot of work on but did not finish, and now James Patterson has completed it and polished it up for him. Good enough for me. I am looking forward to it.

Does anybody here have a strong sense of how close we are to AI being able to just churn out content in the styles of various deceased authors? I bet they can do it already, but I have no idea how good the results are. I'm sure they are improving every day...

I'm just trying to picture a day, sometime soon, when we can literally get an app on our phones that creates works of fiction or nonfiction prose, of any length you want, in the style of Michael Crichton, Dr. Seuss, Isaac Asimov, Ray Bradbury, Philip K. Dick, Shakespeare, Dickens, Thomas Jefferson, etc.

Movies with Great Sound

My work had a 5.1 surround sound setup on clearance for $160. I saw it yesterday and figured I'd give it a day to mull it over. In that day, it dropped down to $120, so I took it as a sign. I set this fucker up and it was relatively painless, and it works.

What are some movies that really shine in surround sound? Probably some action movies where the bullets fly from every direction, but anything that helps with the immersion.

Thoughts?

I felt like Randall Flagg

Well, that subject line should grab people's attention (one would hope).

I just wanted to mention that I went for a walk last night, and felt a little like Randall Flagg. I was just out getting some fresh air so I could think more clearly about stealing a nuclear device to destroy a community of good people in Boulder, Colorado.... hey, maybe THAT'S why I felt like Randall Flagg! I didn't even think of that. Wow!

No, I was reminded of that character because of the stuff about him being The Walking Dude, and how it felt just walking down a long empty street alone at night, "clocking along," as Stephen King said. I kind of felt like that. It isn't necessarily a GOOD feeling, exactly, in the sense of being part of a community. It could be seen as a little scary, just that you're out walking with no social context, and there is a feeling of freedom and anonymity that could easily go down some dark path, if you were crazy in that particular way.

Anyway, just something about being out walking at night, with the wind in the leafy branches of the trees overhead... we have only had leaves on the trees for a little while where I live, this spring, and it still feels new. It just made me feel like a character in a book, in general, and also more specifically like Randall Flagg. Soooooo that was scary.

One thing that was actually good about me going for that walk was that I went out there at all, at that hour (which wasn't THAT late... maybe 10:30 to 11:30). You guys might remember that three years ago, in the spring and early summer of 2021, I got accosted TWICE in the space of just three or four months. Once it was just a bunch of local teenagers who were probably going out of their minds from all the Covid lockdowns... they stopped me when I was out for a jog, and really got in my face, for no reason at all. That sucked, but it wasn't too hard to deal with. I just find other roads to jog on. (I STILL don't jog or walk through the area where they live, there are a whole bunch of them and several of them are bigger than me). The other time I got "accosted" that spring was when I actually got mugged, right on a major traffic artery in the Boston metro area. It was very late at night that time, like 2:00 AM, and I was just finishing up a jog that I went on at that hour just because it was too hot to exercise during the day. I got "accosted" (mugged) by a bunch of guys with some kind of Middle Eastern accents who had stolen a bunch of mopeds, and were just riding down my street mugging people. I felt lucky they didn't knife me.... anyway, I have not gone out at night too much since that spring, so it was probably a good sign that I am feeling somewhat recovered from 2021 that I even went for a moderately long (maybe three miles) walk at that hour.

Sorry, none of this has anything to do with anything, I just thought it was interesting that I felt like I got a glimmering of that kind of mindset that Stephen Kiing might have been trying to capture when he made up the Randall Flagg character. Had to share.

Jolene Blalock

I know many of us have fond memories of her. I haven't even heard her name in ages... anyway, I recently watched Shadow Puppets (2007), in which she played the main character, so I ended up google stalking her. Apparently she is married to Michael Rapino, CEO of Live Nation and possibly in some kind of very high-up position with Ticketmaster, if I have this right.

He has been in the news a bit lately, and probably will continue to be there, because of Ticketmaster's generally grotesque and obscene profiteering off making concerts almost totally inaccessible to all but the top... maybe the top 5% of the population.

If there is any upside to his behavior.... well, there isn't any upside. But with a little luck, maybe Joe Bob Briggs or somebody like him will take the opportunity given by Rapino being in the news to do some kind of retrospective of films in which Jolene Blalock is hot-looking. Shadow Puppets is worth viewing, in that way. (It is largely a rip-off of Cube, with some ideas stuck in there from Resident Evil, the 1986 The Fly, and a little supernatural stuff that felt like they might have borrowed from some creepypasta. But for seeing Jolene Blalock, it is a pretty good movie).

Texas Frightmare Weekend 2024

I went on Saturday and after the always cofusing admittance process, I went straight to Matthew Lillard's line. Hey, my nephews love Five Nights at Freddy's, so I wasn't going to bail out on that. Besides, I hadn't met anybody from Scream yet, can you believe that? I've met just about all the other big deal horror guys, but nobody from Scream. Since his FNaF venture, Lillard's fame kinda blew up at these cons, so his line was pretty long, but he handled it well, and since I had children with me, I got to cut in the VIP line... only to have to wait another hour as he bailed for a Scream panel.

Despite being pretty expensive, he was very friendly and took a pic with the nephews and signed all their plushies. After that, the kids had no real reason to stay, since I can never seem to get them to watch any actual horror movies. I made sure to ask him real quick what it was like to work with John Waters and David Lynch. He said, "Amazing," for both.


There were a few people I wanted to meet, but Lin Shaye's line was quite long. I guess people love those Insidious movies, but I've never seen any. I just love Detroit Rock City, but that was a no-go. Eli Roth's line was long and expensive, so that was also a no-go. Sean Cunningham and Adrienne King were only there when I was about to leave, so that was a no-go also. My buddy wanted to meet Juliette Lewis, but she was arrogant and had a private area on the top-floor with some Lost Boys guys and you needed virtual tickets to meet her. WTF? Who does she think she is? Someone popular and relevant?


I did, however, meet Adam Green. His line was empty, but he was cool as hell. He was telling us how Hatchet 5 has been hindered by covid and the strikes and all this hoopla. He also had the book written by Parry Shen's character from Part 4 about his survival story. Yeah, that was a real book and Adam Green wrote it! 😄 It apprently covers the 10 year gap between 3 and 4 and is filled with embellished falasies, which I thought was a nice touch.

And next to his table was Danielle Harris, who didn't have a line this time, but she was still looking great. I snapped a picture of her from afar and zoomed in it. I've seen some great shirts with her on it and was hoping I could find one from one of the vendors. I would have asked her to sign it. Or spit on it. Or spit on ME. @der said I should have asked her to stick it in her pants, rub it around, and then give it to me. I would have paid good money for that.


Shit, that place was crowded. I hate getting stuck behind people who stop randomly as if there aren't a hundred people behind them trying to squeeze through the narrow spaces, so I was ready to beat it. But to get my money's worth, I did weasel in a short line to meet Michael Ironside. He was basically exactly as you'd expect him to be. Angry looking, but not a jerk. I'd forgotten he was in Turbo Kid, and he mentioned that they're making a sequel. Of course, it is also being held up by the strikes, go figure. I told him I loved his intensity, and he seemed to enjoy that.

I've gotten pretty efficient at not wasting too much time at these cons. The lineup this year wasn't exactly new or thrilling, but I always get something good out of it.

The Monkey (2024)(probably)

Some of you reading this must already know about this. I just found out about it. This movie is an adaptation of an old Stephen King story! I have read the story, it's pretty good. Anyway, yah, had to share.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Monkey_(film)

The Phantom of the Opera (1989)

The Phantom of the Opera is like Dracula or Frankenstein. They're all in the public domain, so there are a lot of them. Any other notables besides the following?

1925 - Silent film, iconic, Lon Chaney's weird makeup, colorized ballroom scene, solid old school stuff.
1943 - Universal one with Claude Rains. He was cool, though always more renowned as The Invisible Man. Not bad, but not as memorable.
1963 - Hammer one with Herbert Lom, one of Hammer's less boring entries.
1998 - Dario/Asia Argento version, because you knew he needed to make one. I don't think I've seen this.
2004 - Shoemaker musical with Gerard Butler and Emmy Rossum. I haven't seen this.



Today, I'll be rambling for a moment on the 1989 version. This one is directed by Dwight Little right after he did Halloween 4. Robert Englund is the phantom and he's a real slimy prick. His face is disfigured, and he actually stitches flesh onto his own and covers it up with makeup. Pretty gross idea, huh? If I wasn't so jaded, this stuff would have probably grossed me out had I seen it back in the day.

An alternate title for the movie is "Freddy: The Musical", which makes me laugh. Fortunately, this movie isn't a musical, but Englund does come across quite Freddy-eque. He's ugly in both characters, and funny enough, he's also got super strength in this movie. I drew a parallel to Darkman with a theory on that, like how they severed some nerve and it resulted in his super strength from adrenaline or some crap like that. Like Phreddy^{The Fantom} straight-up punches into a guy to rip his heart out, and clean-cut decaps a guy with a knife. This shit is stupid, but it's fun.

And then you have the greatest ending trope of all time: It was all just a dream. Well, basically. It has a slight continuation, but most of it was a dream. Maybe? And they killed the phantom. Or did they? Don't know, don't care. Still a decent version of the story.

#Review

The Strangers: Chapter 1

The original 2008 film was a highly praised home invasion slasher when it came out. I was incredibly disappointed with that movie. The direction was terrible, the characters were lame as fuck, but at least the killers looked cool.

About 10 years later, they did a sequel, which was a hell of a lot better. If you've seen that movie, then you'll know that the strangers die at the end, so where can we go from here? Not just a prequel... but 3 prequels?

Renny Harlin is no stranger to the horror genre. For some reason, he decided he'd raise this franchise from the dead and he already filmed three movies out of it that he plans on shitting out within this year or next. And that's what I really mean, "shitting" them out, because what is this "Chapter 1" movie? It's basically a remake of the first movie with only a few minor differences. Otherwise, it hits the same beats. Yes, even the cliche and eye-rolling ones. It even steals the ending, as well as accidentally shotgunning an innocent person.

Obviously, we don't want a backstory for these stranger characters because we don't want to ruin the mystique. So instead of fleshing any of that out, they decided to try to make us care for our protagonists. Yeah, our generic cookie-cutter dull heroes that have "victim" written all over their foreheads.

When the action finally hits, I was a little too bored to care. I'd find myself laughing at their misfortunes and hoping the movie would have ended sooner, even if the runtime already isn't very long. All I can say is I hope the next ones don't suck, because what was the fucking point otherwise?

Also, this movie features Richard Brake. He plays a sheriff in a diner who has no lines and doesn't do anything, and we don't see him ever again after his cameo. I guess he'll be in the sequel(s)?

Fuck this movie.

#Review

Is this a sign, or what?

So a little over a year ago, this video popped into my recommendations. I was intrigued, so I checked it out.




Obviously, this is the kind of shit I live for. So I had to check more stuff by the Toxhards. I was a little confused at first, as the rest of their stuff sounded fairly normal by comparison, and apparently that wasn't even their regular lead singer, but their drummer, singing for that song. But then this song really grew on me, hard.




I've been following them ever since, and well, a week or so before I asked out my girlfriend, they came out with The Coffee Song, sung by yet another singer.




After I had asked her out, but before we had been on our first date, knowing she was a big coffee drinker, I sent her a link to The Coffee Song in the middle of the night. I knew she had to be asleep at that time, but I was drunk, and thought she wouldn't see the text until she woke up. But then she texted me back a couple minutes later, and I was mortified that I had accidentally woke her up. But she took it all in stride, and didn't seem to be bothered by the incident at all. She also said that she really liked the song.

A few months later, The Toxhards announced the tour dates of their first big tour across the great American west. They would be playing in Austin...on her birthday. I asked her if it was cool that we went to their show on her birthday, she said it was fine, as long as I also asked off work the day after, so we could have more personal time... 😬

After seeing the opening band, I went to fetch us a couple beers while she held down our spot, when I come back, I see she's talking to the Toxhard's frontman, Alan. He already knows my name, apparently, and is all set to take a picture with us.





She's already told him that I had introduced her to them, and that I had taken her there for her birthday.

The second song of the night that they played, was The Coffee Song. They had a coffee machine up on stage brewing, and part way through the song, Alan invited my girlfriend up on stage, and gave her his bass. He announced her name and told everyone it was her birthday. He showed her where to put her fingers for the one chord she needed to play, so she could hold it down while he came out into the audience and poured coffee for everyone.













I guess this can only mean The Coffee Song is OUR song, even though I don't really drink coffee.

All in all, it was actually a pretty awesome show. It was sad that there was only about 25 or so people in the audience, but I actually like it that way. It's kind of a catch 22. On the one hand, I want the bands I like to be successful, but on the other hand I much prefer smaller shows. But if they become successful, I will no longer get to see them at smaller shows.

But they write such great songs, and they put on such a fun, lively, entertaining show, that I really have no doubt that if they keep at it, they will be selling out arenas some day. They're currently working with Hopeless Records on their debut album.

Roger Corman appreciation thread?

We should do some kind of thread about him. If he doesn't get a little love here, then where will he? I mean, come on. I am in a rush right now, but if anybody thinks of any good stuff to post about him, please do.