Boy oh boy, that joke really sucks cock. I mean, it could suck the chrome off a trailer hitch at high noon in Houston. I bet you could quit your day job if you shoved that joke out onto a street corner at $10 a blow job.

My first roommate, in my freshman year of college (Fall of '83), had a large poster on his side of the room. It was basically the album cover from "London Calling" with the addition of "The Only Band That Matters!" I remember at the time thinking "Riiight. The only band that matters is The Beatles, man!"

Then my roommate played "London Calling" for me and all I could say was "Holy SHIT!!"

For a brief moment there, way back when, The Clash really were the only band that mattered.

Frankenrodents.

Could you just have Stephanie do these from now on? Please? PRETTY please??

Try Stanley Kubrick's entire career, starting with THE KILLING. Every single one of his movies was based upon a very good book. The irony is the one movie that wouldn't have been based upon a book never got made. That would be his great unmade film NAPOLEON. I got a copy of the script, and that in itself is a masterpiece. I can only dream of what the movie would have been like.

Yes, and 98.9% of it is even WORSE than the "real" stuff, if you can possibly imagine that. Obese German men filming their liasons with little Ms. "Me-Love-You-Long-Time"s in some shithole on Pat Pong Road. No thanks.

It is always important to actually WATCH the content of a web site before you trounce it. The rate at which new careers are being created by YouTube is accelerating. A twenty-year-old, insanely talented kid named Brandon Hardesty is, at this very moment, shooting "Bart Got a Room" in Florida along with William H. Macey and that actress who plays Larry David's wife. He has no website (yet); he was discovered on YouTube. And he's not the only one. There have been many, many others. It's now an open secret that D-Boys and D-Girls (aka Creative Executives) at the major studios and various prodcos are searching through YouTube for new talent, and so are most of the major (and minor) agencies.

Yes, there is an astounding amount of crap on YouTube. But there is also a rich vein of EXTREMELY talented people doing great work. I'll give you a few examples:

1. WaverlyFlams (check out their movie "Puppet Rapist" - it's inspired)

2. Picnicface

3. Iggy35

4. GiR2007

5. MardDayComedy

I could offer up dozens more just from my own subscription list. But check these folks out and I think you'll change your mind.

And by the way, my own stuff isn't in the same galaxy as these folks, let alone the same league.

Regarding abortion, he pointed out that the Catholic Church in particular and all the mainstream Protestant churches adhered to Thomas Aquinas's view of human conception versus human life (paraphrase, but close):

"When conceived the life is vegetable animate. As it progresses it is animal animate. Only upon birth and the awarding of a soul by God does the infant become fully human."

The Catholic Church and all other denominations held to this idea until the moment abortion became safe and legal in more and more Western liberal democracies. Then, suddenely, life and the infusion of a soul happened at conception. This is not revelation but politics, an attempt to stick religion's nose in the everyday lives of people who may not have religious beliefs.

While I can understand that as a doctor who has delivered so many healthy babies Ron Paul might find abortion personally repellant, that does not give him the right to attempt to foist his views on every woman in this country by legislative fiat. I understand he is currently changing his tune. Politicians do this all the time.

So much for Ron Paul's "principles."

"The Artist Formerly Known As a Resident of Planet Earth."

My God what a horse's ass.

YEESH!!

...that he got his first big break working crew on Stanley Kubricks first two or three movies, which Kubrick pulled from distribution and willed never to be shown again. There's a great picture of (and a nice interview with) Mazursky in "Stanley Kubrick: A Life In Pictures." It's on the set of "Fear and Desire", and a VERY youthful Mazursky is kneeling next to a seated Kubrick (looking not much older than 14), operating a camera.

This was a fun essay. But it's a shame that Mel can't direct anymore, and has to keep cannibalizing his own great movies to turn into mediocre musical comedies. The public? They don't know any better.

Stephanie is married to former Salon critic and culture writer Charles Taylor.

That statement was actually made by an actual studio head. James Wolcott has written about it in his blog. Not long after saying it, the studio head in question denied having said it. That would explain Stephanie's reticence regarding specificity.

C'mon Farhad, what are you thinking? That seeing your earnest visage will somehow alter the illogic of your original argument? You put too much faith in television, so to speak.

Male or female, young or old, they are all vicious, nasty beasts. Of course, this makes it easy to see them coming.