Rex Quondam Rex Futurus

I'm an admitted King Arthur nut. I've read Mary Stewart's books, T.H. White's classic The Once and Future King (including its oft-forgot final chapter, The Book of Merlin), and yes, even slogged my way through some of Malory's Morte D'Arthur. I own Boorman's Excalibur, which is a mostly excellent film, and even "borrowed permanently" Dad's copy of the 2004 film King Arthur.

I still have to read Marion Zimmer Bradley's stories, but Mists of Avalon is near the top of the To Read List.

Having hopefully established my bona fides, I can say without reservation that the best Arthur stories I have ever read or seen remain Bernard Cornwell's Warlord Chronicles, three books consisting of: The Winter King, Enemy of God, and Excalibur.

Cornwell is a consistently fantastic writer. His stories are vividly descriptive without being flowery; poignant without ever dipping into sentimentality; and sheer, visceral, rollicking good fun without ever turning campy.

I have read many of his other books, which are all good, but the Arthur books in my humble opinion are a cut above the rest. In these tales, Arthur is the king in all but name; Mordred is not his son but rather his half-brother; Lancelot is a gutless, manipulative, vain, back-stabbing, power-hungry cad; and the narrator and unabashed hero of the saga is a Saxon-born man named Derfel, raised by Merlin.

All three stories are thrilling, gripping adventures. If you've never read Cornwell before, his bread and butter is his ability to draw realistic battle scenes. Cliche as this is going to sound, you feel like you're standing in the shield wall with Derfel as the barbaric Saxon hordes, outnumbering Arthur's men by the thousands, charge. Life, even outside of the battlefields, can be nasty, brutish, and short, to steal a phrase. His characters are real people, heroic, flawed, often well-intentioned, and fighting to carve out a happy existence.

I can't recommend these three books enough. I consider them one of my two favorite trilogies, the other being Adrian McKinty's kick-ass Dead Trilogy, which I've posted about before.

2012? No Big Deal. We've Got Bigger Problems!

In anticipation of Roland Emmerich's upcoming latest mega-disaster flick, 2012, I give you the most depressing website ever.

Okay, depressing might not be the right word for it, but Exit Mundi is a fairly expansive catalogue of the diabolical ways the world/the Universe might come to an end. Here are some of my favorite theories from the web site:

-The Universe is just a computer program, which at any time, and for whatever reason, could simply be switched off by the programmer.

-We are going to turn into the Borg. (I kid you not! Check this page out.)

-The Earth's magnetic field is flipping over and will someday disappear entirely.

-The fundamental constants will reach their critical values, and everything will just get all screwy.

What say you? How do you all think this will end?

The Long And The Short Of It

Last weekend, we surprised the wife with a baby shower. Family and friends were all extremely generous - I've never seen so many presents in my life - and Jenna spent the better part of four hours just opening everything. Thanks again to everyone!

One of the more interesting gifts was a copy of War and Peace. I thought it was a pretty cool gift, being something Baby Girl O'Rourke wouldn't use until she's a bit older.

War and Peace is notorious for its length. Rick Reilly, famous sports writer, once described how far John Daley hit a golf ball by saying, "He's longer than Tolstoy." I have yet to read WaP, but I did enjoy Anna Karenina, which itself is not short by any means.

Anyway, I found a wiki link to the world's longest novels and was amazed to find this. Marienbad My Love, a self-published work, spans over 17 million words. I will never even attempt to read this book, but here's the blurb for it:

Coppell, TX - Texas writer Mark Leach has published an expanded edition of "Marienbad My Love," the world's longest novel, that tops 17 million words and also sets new records for the world's longest word, sentence and book title.

The Coppell, Texas, writer has been making a run at the record books with his still-growing story of a Christ-haunted filmmaker who believes he is called on by God to bring about the end of the world by producing a science fiction-themed pastiche of the 1961 French New Wave classic, “Last Year at Marienbad.”

And here I thought my book, The Unearthed, was a bit long-winded at 80,000 words!

The Signs Point To An Invasion!!!! And More On The Legend of Zelda

First, I find out that Captain Lou Albano passed away. Then I read about this strange cloud hovering over Moscow.

Are the two connected? Absolutely. How couldn't they be? What do they mean? Well, I'll tell you: an alien invasion is imminent. Either that or it's just a meaningless coincidence. But one can never be too prepared, right?

For those of us who don't remember or never knew of the Captain, he was a fixture in the WWF in the 80s and also appeared in the Super Mario Brothers Super Show, a strange hybrid of live action and cartoon. The best part of SMBSS was, once a week (usually Fridays), they would air an episode not about the Mario Bros, but about the continuing adventures of Link, our hero from The Legend of Zelda. On The Legend of Zelda TV show, Link divided his time by going toe-to-toe with the evil wizard Ganon and his minions and trying to score with the Princess, who just wouldn't give it up, no matter how great the heroic deeds he performed.

For more on Zelda, check out my previous post, The Greatest Video Game Ever Made.

Anyway, back to this invasion...

I Kept My Appointment With The Wicker Man, But He Wasn't That Cool

Sorry to be so flip about what is considered a cult classic, but I can't help but wonder why this flick is held in such high regard. And no, I'm not talking about the remake with Nicolas Cage, I'm talking about the original movie that so many people love, venerate, and ironically worship with a religious fervor.

This movie falls into "the hero is so stupid that I don't even care what happens to him" camp. Why we're supposed to like the policeman protagonist is beyond me, as every step of the way he's dumb, not the least bit cautious considering the circumstances, and appropriately pig-headed. The defenders of this movie will retort by saying, "Ah, yes, but we're not supposed to like him." To which I respond, "If we're not supposed to like him, then why do I care if (SPOILER) he's burned alive at the end of the movie?"

Huh? Why do I care? That's right. I don't.

In all fairness, this movie may have been overhyped for me. A few people previously told me it was the scariest, most terrifying movie they'd ever seen. But I found very little about it scary. The plot essentially evolves around this policeman trying to locate a young girl who a) is missing, b) doesn't exist, c) is dead, d) may not really be dead, e) who is alive, and f) who may be sacrificed in a pagan ritual. The cop reaches the summit of his stupidity when, in an audience head-smacking moment, he divulges his findings and his plans to Lord Summerisle (played by Christopher Lee), the man who at least the audience is smart enough to know must be at the center of everything.

The score doesn't help. A 70s soft-rock, easy-listening melody plays at various points, which seriously undermines any tension or creepiness, and which calls attention to itself in all the wrong ways.

Like I say, maybe this was a case of a film being overhyped. Though, I think much of the male admiration of this movie has to do with the fact there's a lot of naked women dancing and/or fornicating throughout. Christoper Lee and the lead (as unlikeable as the character is) turn in solid performances, but on the whole this movie is just okay.

Making Fun Of Men Who Drink Cider Is UnAmerican

Hard cider currently enjoys, at best, a so-so reputation in the United States. Ordering cider at the bar will lose you macho points almost as quickly as ordering a Shirley Temple. You might as well ask the guys at the bar around you to kick your ass and then politely thank them for it.

It's a travesty that cider isn't held in the same regard as beer, for cider is delicious, it does not dull the taste buds as many beers do, and it packs quite the alcoholic punch, usually just as much as beer. So where did this beer is better than cider idea come from? It's my belief that cider (along with many other good drinks) actually tastes too good to be taken seriously. After all, real alcoholic beverages are supposed to be difficult to drink, right? Beer is good, and I probably prefer it to cider, but let's be honest, beer's an acquired taste. The first beer you had as an underage youngster didn't taste all that great. Nor did the six-pack of Natural Light you sucked down every night during college.

And liquor is even more of an acquired taste. Downing a shot of whiskey or scotch or tequila, even over ice, is rough going despite however many years you've been drinking the stuff. However, in that strange universe where machoism meets masochism (coincidence those words are so close?), the tougher to drink, the better the liquor.

The good news is, this anti-ciderism seems localized to the United States; across the pond, cider is an acceptable, often preferable, alternative to beer. Why is that the case? I don't know, but it's time cider got the recognition it deserves. It's time we returned to our roots. Today, I came across this great article on Slate.com. For you Yanks out there that scoff at the notion of cider being an acceptable drink for a man, scoff no more, ye bastards, and the next time you're at one of the few bars in the States that offers a cider on tap, drink up, admit to the error of your ways, and repent.

As it turns out, cider was the "favored beverage among America's founding generation." Yes, men like George Washington and John Adams enjoyed this great drink, and apparently, in great quantities. Revolutionary war soldiers drank it to fortify themselves between battles. Children enjoyed a diluted version called "ciderkin." The Slate article does a great job at exploring the history of cider in America, so I won't rehash it all here. Instead, I'm going to issue this call to arms. I'm going to be so bold as to declare this America's first War On Anti-Ciderists. It's time we resurrected our forgotten American tradition of drinking lots of cider and imbibe this fabulous concoction the way the founding fathers did. And as it was the drink of the original patriots, I think it appropriate here to propose this amendment to the US Patriot Act:

"To enhance patriotism and bolster the sense of community in these United States. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled that,

TITLE XI - The Consumption of Hard Cider

Sec. 101

Henceforth all Americans, males included, shall be lauded for drinking hard cider and encouraged to do so on a daily basis.

Sec. 102

Any individual who maliciously and wantonly ridicules any individual for drinking hard cider shall be subject to criminal and civil penalties, including five (5) years in prison and up to $1000 in fines for each offense."

Please impress upon your friends and family the importance of this proposed legislation. We will need all the help we can get to have this enacted. And make sure to drink cider whenever you get the chance.

FOIA!

Every now and then something work-related leads to something humorous and shareable with non-work colleagues and friends...

One of my job duties is to serve as Privacy Officer. You might think that means keeping the company's secrets secret, but in fact it means safe-guarding sensitive and protected information about individuals that comes into the company's possession. Though that might sound glamorous, it's really not and amounts to little more than "reviewing voluminous documents" (a favorite catchphrase among lawyers regardless of specialization or practice) and redacting, where necessary. I recently had to do some research on the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and, on a lark, I "wikipediaed" FOIA.

It's a fairly long, fairly dry entry about this otherwise important legislation. But if you scroll down to the subsection on Barbara Schwarz, you're in for a real treat.

Apparently, Ms. Schwarz maintains the dubious distinction of having filed more FOIA requests than any other person on this Earth. Why? Ms. Schwarz claims that, instead of being born in Germany in 1966, she was actually born in 1956 in a "secret government submarine" base under the Great Salt Lake. If you didn't think the story could get any weirder, it does, as Ms. Schwarz also claims she is the daughter of L. Ron Hubbard.

Ms. Schwarz has managed to tie up the docket of a U.S. District Court or Court of Appeals since 1993 with her requests for information, and much to no avail. I could go on and recount every single fact mentioned in the wiki article, but that would make for lazy writing. (And let's just ignore the fact that's all I've really done here.)

Memo to JJ Abrams

To: JJ Abrams
From: Brian O'Rourke, A Moviegoer Of Little To No Importance
Date: 9/20/09
RE: Mission: Impossible IV
______________________________________________________________

There's been a lot of buzz recently about two sequels: Star Trek 2 and Mission: Impossible IV. Mr. Abrams, you are no doubt receiving more advice, ideas, and feedback than you know what to do with regarding Star Trek 2, so I won't burden you with more of the same. I was wondering, however, if you'd care to listen to some advice on how to make the next installment of the bumpy and uneven series that is Mission: Impossible into a really good movie.

To begin with, let's recap the series thus far. 1996's Mission: Impossible turned the concept of the TV series on its head. In the first twenty minutes of the movie, Ethan Hunt, our hero, watches helplessly as each member of his team dies pretty a horrific death while on a very important mission. To make matters worse, after Hunt has seen all this happen, the brass accuse him of the murders and of being a double agent, selling secrets on the side. I say this movie turned the series on its head because Mission: Impossible the TV series had always been more of a team show. The better episodes employed intricate plotting, where each character had an important role in the mission, and thus the stories had many moving parts. This really amped up the suspense and the fun of the show. By virtue of killing off Hunt's team in the beginning of the 1996 film, the movie necessarily became more of a one-man show. On the whole, the first film is well-shot (of course it is, because the underrated Brian DePalma directed it) and well-acted, and the opening thirty minutes of the movie create a real sense of paranoia in the spy world of smoke and mirrors. There is a great set piece in the middle of the film, too, where Hunt manages to break into the CIA, which has been parodied time and time again in the ensuing thirteen years. It's a decent film that comes off the rails toward the end because of hopelessly convoluted plotting and the ridiculous final action set piece.

Without exaggeration, MI: II is one of the worst movies I've ever seen in the theater. The sequel essentially turns Hunt into an American James Bond, a somewhat roguish agent who bickers with his handler, and who of course manages to find the time while on a mission to meet and fall in love with a beautiful woman. John Woo sticks to his own rule of having at least three chase scenes in every movie he makes, and really does little else. The mask trick is overused in this movie and that unfortunately carries through to the next film. And gone again is the team aspect that made the series so cool: Hunt, a larger-than-life super spy, braves it mostly alone throughout. and the usually cool Ving Rhames is along for the ride only to remind us of how dangerous and cool Hunt is.

MI: III is the best of the series. Its plot is more plausible than the first film; the action, while over-the-top, isn't overblown like in the second film; and Abrams allows most of his characters to develop into people with real interpersonal relationships. Philip Seymour Hoffman and Laurence Fishburne make the most of relatively small parts, and the plot has some really good turns. Still, though, Cruise dominates the story, and much of the plot is devoted to Hunt balancing the demands of his career with a normal married existence. The film could have been called Family Life: Impossible, and the title would have been just as appropriate.

So, what do I have by way of advice for MI: IV? If you haven't already guessed it, here it is: go back to the concept of the TV show. Make the mission the most important thing going on in the plot and allow it to dominate the second act. Make this next film into more of a team effort, where every character has an important job to do, as opposed to just waiting around for Hunt to work his magic and scrambling to keep up with him while he's working. Put all of the characters in danger. Make us think the mission could go wrong at any juncture, not just when Hunt is involved. Make it so the mission really does seem impossible.

Each movie so far has shown Hunt at odds with his administration. Let's not go there again. Let the focus be on the enemies from without, as opposed to the enemies from within. A good old-fashioned good guys versus bad guys scenario will actually be a breath of fresh air in this series.

Finally, you transformed super spy Hunt into a seemingly real person in MI: III. Bravo, well done. That was a nice counterpoint to the cartoonery of MI: II. But we don't need any more of that. If you want to continue the spy managing a real home life thread, by all means do so, but don't make it the point of the movie. If you want, turn Hunt into the next Jim Phelps, a character the series has been sorely missing, a true leader, not a maverick agent who occasionally needs help from other spies.

Or, just go ahead and do what you want because you seem to know exactly what you're doing, if Star Trek's box office is any indication.

Wikipedia's 16th Biggest Blunder

Contrary to what the Brian O'Rourke wikipedia page may claim, I am not an Irish lord from the mid to late 16th century. I have never offended Queen Elizabeth (and it's a good thing too), and I have also never been extradited within Great Britain for treason "over the seas"...

Okay, obviously the wiki page is not about me but about someone much cooler, Lord Brian na Múrtha Ó Ruairc, an Irish dude who apparently did all these things. According to the article, he was a fairly learned Irish chieftain, though also addled by the sin of pride and brazen enough to assist the Spanish friggen Armada after one of its battles with the Royal Navy.

The O'Rourkes were the historic rulers of Breifne, and I've heard the old castle is still over there, somewhere in County Leitrim. On our sole trip to Ireland, the wife and I did not make it to Country Leitrim unfortunately. But, according to a very drunken Irish fella who once stood at the urinal next to the one I was using one night in Union Jack's Pub in Glenside, PA, "Leitrim? There's f----ng nothing up there." So apparently I wasn't missing much. The merry fella had a good laugh at his quip, and by the time I figured out exactly what he said (the accent coupled with the alcohol made his speech nearly incomprehensible to me), he had already exited the bog.

But now I'm rambling. Anyway, the title of this post refers to this article, which lists wikipedia's greatest blunders of all time. It's pretty funny. I especially enjoyed the eighth entry, which claimed that "The University of Cincinnati's former president is a whore." Wow.

Bill Gates Owes Me Money

And with the baby girl on the way, it couldn't come at a better time!

As part of some marketing tool, Microsoft and AOL are running an email beta test. I received the email in question today and discovered that for every person I forwarded it to, I would receive $245.00. For every person I forwarded the email to who later forwarded it to someone else, I would receive $243.00. Etc, etc.

So what did I do, you ask? Promptly, I forwarded the subject email to 20 friends. Yes, that means I have at the least $4900 coming to me. Pay up, Mr. Gates, I want my money. Baby Girl O'Rourke will be here soon...

__________


Yes, this isn't real. Nate Green, one of the unfortunate souls I sent this to on a lark, was quick to send me this link explaining the origin of the hoax.

Am I dupe? Yes. Did it give me something to blog about? Yes. Fair trade. Matter of fact, I think that puts me ahead.

Thank you, Bill Gates and all you Internet pranksters out there.

1 Equals 0.999....

This post concerns the weirdest, and possibly the coolest, thing I ever learned when studying math in high school and briefly in college.

Did you all know that the number 1 equals the repeating decimal 0.999...? Or, another way of saying it, did you know that the repeating decimal 0.999.... denotes a real number equal to 1?

I'm not making this up. For a more detailed (and better) explanation, check out the wiki article.

If you haven't clicked through to the link yet, here's the short-hand explanation.

1/3 = 0.333...
3 x 1/3 = 3 x 0.333...
Thus,
1 = 0.999...

Yikes.

You may be asking why I'm writing about this. Truth be told, I've always been fascinated by this "problem," and I encountered it recently during some research I was doing for a sci-fi novel. I won't begin to try and explain the real-world ramifications of this wonderful puzzle. As a matter of fact, I'm not sure there are any. What could it mean? Is this a problem inherent in our base-10 system of mathematics, or would this appear in all mathematical systems?

It's always cool to reexamine things taken for granted in a new light. Good fiction does this in many ways, one of them being the plot twist. A good plot twist is a plausible turn of events that forces us to reevaluate everything we've seen.

Still though, it's just crazy to think of the number 1, one of the very first things we learn, as being the same as 0.999...

Promote Whatever You Want On My Blog

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, dogs and cats, it's that time again! Promote yourself, your best friend, your favorite Olympic ping-pong star who isn't Asian, your business, your local public-access TV station, your crazy new-fangled religion that worships Gore Vidal, your old BetaMax machine, your comic bo--er, graphic novel I mean--your favorite pair of underwear...you get the idea.

We've had some interesting comments in the past. Famed NI crime writer Adrian McKinty once left a comment promoting his brother in the armed services - I'm not sure it has happened yet, but I hear the paperwork is going through. Just kidding. On another occasion, Darkin Inc promoted a full cast audio drama podcast. Last but not least, Don Luis once stopped by to pimp his tattoo inspired clothing line.

Thanks for stopping by.

____

The wife and I will be on vacation for a week starting tomorrow. Not sure I'll get online that much while we're away, so apologies if I don't respond to every single promotion.

"I had a rough night, and I hate the (Philadelphia) Eagles, man."

Those of you familiar with the quote above will recognize the slightly altered words of none other than Jeffrey Lebowski, a.k.a. The Dude, from the Coens' masterpiece, The Big Lebowski. It's a great movie that I had the pleasure of seeing on the big screen recently. I've talked about this movie at length (or, ad nauseam) on this blog and on other blogs before, so I'm not here to talk about it more (unless any commenters want to).

What I would like to discuss is how I now hate the Philadelphia Eagles. I've never been much of a football fan - no dig here, it's just not my thing - but, I never minded the Eagles. Matter of fact, I always supported them as my home team and wanted to see them succeed. Coach Andy Reid and quarterback Donovan McNabb seem like good guys all in all.

But I will not watch them play a game this season.

As most of you have probably heard, in a move that surprised a lot of people, the Eagles picked up Michael Vick.

Yes, they hired the same guy that operated an illegal dogfighting operation for SIX YEARS. It wasn't much of a prediction, but as I previously said, "someone is going to pick him up eventually and he'll make more than enough money to forget about his time spent inside." As it turns out, the Eagles of all teams decided to hire him.

I hear a lot of people say, "Everyone needs a second chance." And yes, that's true. Throughout my relatively short life, I myself have needed a lot of second chances. But Vick got off way too easily. If I had been caught running a dogfighting operation, I would have been disbarred and never allowed to practice law again. But not Vick. No. After all, he's an professional athlete. He's somehow not subject to the same rules as the rest of us.

Sure, he had to endure a lot of bad press and a two-year stretch inside, but at the end of the day, he's right back to playing in the NFL and earning more money in a couple of seasons than most will see in a lifetime. And besides, he has an agent, a PR rep, and probably countless other handlers who will help him restore as much of his image as they can.

If you still feel bad for Vick, consider this: he was caught doing this. This didn't come to an end because he turned himself in. Oh no. We can be almost certain that, if he hadn't been found out, the dogfighting would still be going on.

Forgetting for a moment the moral objections to allowing such a person to play for your team, I still wonder why the Eagles did this. Before this move, they were projected to make a run at the Super Bowl. But bringing Vick on board is going to alienate a lot of die-hard fans. Maybe some teammates. And wherever they go, whatever town they play in, this controversy is going to rear its ugly-head. It will follow them everywhere this season. Why would they willingly choose to face such distractions when their team was arguably good enough to make it to the Super Bowl in the first place?

I don't know the answer to that question, but obviously Andy Reid thinks this was a good idea. I have always supported Philadelphia sports, but I will no longer continue to do so with the Eagles. It's really a shame for the other players on the team, who will be forced to deal with this all season long.

The Eyes In The Sky

The National Academy of Sciences released a report on Wednesday that was troubling: apparently, NASA was never given enough money to build the telescopes it needs to complete its absolutely vital mission of locating 90 percent of the potentially deadly rocks traveling through space.

There will come a day when the human race no longer walks the earth, though we should strive to ensure that day remains in the very distant future. This is exactly the sort of mission, despite being very costly, that we shouldn't underbudget. According to the Academy's report, the US government's effort has been "relatively little;" however, what's more startling is the fact that the US is "practically the only government doing anything at all." Our existence is balanced on a knife's edge, as they say, but this mission is one way we can increase our chances of staying on that edge. We need more eyes in the sky.

___

It's a good thing Earth isn't the biggest planet in the solar system. That distinction, thankfully, remains Jupiter's, and with significantly more gravity, the gas giant attracts a lot of these dangerous rocks flying through space. Just last month, a comet or an asteroid collided with Jupiter, and scientists estimate the object was the size of several football fields. Because of the collision, there is a new, expanding spot on Jupiter.

Horror Films of the Last 20 Years Have Been Pretty Ho-Hum..

...if you agree with EW's 20 Top Horror Films of the Past 20 Years.

As if you cared in the least, here's my take on EW's list from start to finish.

20. Dead Alive. Never saw it.

19. Darkman. As much as Liam Neeson is the man, I have to say, this is a so-so revenge flick that has faded into utter obscurity. A decent movie, worth a watch, but it won't stay with you and you won't feel the need to see it again when you're done.

18. Event Horizon. Okay, this film is admittedly one of those "love it or hate it" flicks. I happen to love it. It did poorly at the box office, and the critics bashed it upon its release, but it has since grown a cult following. Now, we all know that cults are bad, but when it comes to movies, sometimes they're right. Don't believe me? If it weren't for cults, chances are you would have never heard of The Big Lebowski or Office Space, two incredible movies.

17. The Kingdom. Never saw it.

16. The Descent. This is an excellent, excellent, excellent movie. Neil Marshall, who also directed the great horror flick Dog Soldiers (which should be on this list too), wrote and directed this movie about a team of female spelunkers exploring caves in the Appalachians. Yes, it's a very scary movie, but it's so much more than that, as (oh my god) there is character development and a very interesting exploration of insanity. Make sure to check out the UK ending and compare it to the US ending. See which you like better.

15. Shaun of the Dead. Thank God for this movie, which brought some respectability back to the zombie genre (as did the remake of Dawn of the Dead). This one is both a spoof and an homage to the zombie movie, and it's also a clever rom-com, so it has something for everybody. Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, and Edgar Wright teamed up again to make Hot Fuzz, the same concept applied to action movies, and it worked beautifully. I hear they're going to make a third movie in the sci-fi genre, to complete what could be one of the best trilogies ever made.

14. Hostel 2. Didn't see it. Hostel was basically just torture porn, and I heard this was more of the same.

13. Misery. Good flick.

12. From Hell. Didn't see it.

11. Planet Terror. To say this was the better film of the Grindhouse experience really isn't saying much. There were a couple of laughs, one or two okay scares, but overall, this one was disappointing.

10. Ringu. I only saw the American remake - which I loved - of this flick starring Naomi Watts, so I can only assume its source material was just as good and probably better.

9. Alien 3. Okay. It pains me to say this, because David Fincher is one of my favorite directors working today (Seven, Zodiac, Fight Club, Benjamin Button), but Alien 3 was a huge letdown after the terrifying brilliance of Alien and the sheer visceral awesomeness that was Aliens. Alien 3 was basically a rehash of the first movie, and way, way, WAY too dark. If you haven't seen it, I won't spoil you with the particulars, but I will metaphorize the first ten minutes of the movie - Imagine you've just been through another chemotherapy treatment. On your way to your car, leaving the hospital, you trip on a crack in the sidewalk, breaking your leg. As you look up, you see a random stranger hovering over you. You think this stranger is going to help you up, but no, HE'S JUST THERE TO KICK YOU IN THE NARDS and steal your money. Yes, my friends, that is what the first ten minutes of Alien 3 feel like. The universe is a terrible, terrible place that will kick you every way it can while you're down. (In all fairness to Fincher, I've heard there was a lot of studio interference, so I don't know who's to blame.)

8. Drag Me To Hell. I've heard good things but haven't seen it.

7. The Sixth Sense. Great movie with great acting and a great twist. It's a shame Shyamalan hasn't gotten better than this, but that's like complaining that Orson Welles's first movie was Citizen Kane. Cinema is better with these movies than without them.

6. What Lies Beneath. Ehhhh. An okay movie, directed by Robert Zemeckis of Back to the Future fame.

5. 28 Weeks Later. Really? This movie made the list, but 28 Days Later, which is vastly superior in just about every way, didn't? There were some major internal logic problems with this film that I couldn't get over, the biggest one being that the zombies were suddenly both intelligent and could hold grudges against certain individuals. No such thing existed in the universe of 28 Days Later.

4. Scream. Okay, this is another great movie. It works on so many different levels: as meta horror, as horror, as comedy, and as a mystery. Very clever, very funny, and very scary.

3. The Blair Witch Project. I fell prey to this movie's clever viral marketing strategy and went in thinking it had been edited from real footage. Yes, I was actually that stupid, but it worked.

2. The Silence of the Lambs. A dark horse that won big at the Oscars. Good flick, but having seen it a couple of times, I don't think I'll ever need to see it again.

1. Audition. Haven't seen it.

So there you have it. Aside from The Silence of the Lambs and The Sixth Sense, none of these movies were nominated by the Academy in any major categories. Now, the Academy doesn't always get it right, and usually doesn't (Gran Torino, anyone?), but the lack of nominations is pretty telling.

Oh, and time for a shameless plug. My better half wrote a post about how Bill & Ted should have visited libraries on their excellent adventure.

Come back in a few days for my Top 5 Sodas of All Time List. You think I'm kidding...