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I’m on a Firefly high!  I know I’m more than a little tardy to the bandwagon, 7 years tardy to be exact, but I’m so glad I jumped on.   Scott has been wanting me to watch this show ever since he set his eyes on it, but honestly I wasn’t interested.  And then, I fell in love with Nathan Fillion.

It pained Scott that I would identify Fillion as Richard Castle when talking about his career (yes, I’ve seen Dr. Horrible, but didn’t fall in love with him then).  I’m very glad that I have finally met Captain Malcolm Reynolds.

The show is awesome!  I’m not a huge fan of westerns, or most sci-fi, but Firefly has captured my heart.  I went into it hesitantly, mostly because of all the hype I’ve heard from various people. I was afraid of disappointment.  The only disappointment I have is the fact that it got cancelled.  The show is hilarious, I found myself laughing out loud in various episodes. The suspense and action scenes got more and more complex as the season went on.  I loved the characters and the show felt honest about people who live in cramped quarters, with death never far away.

Now here is where the spoilers enter the picture. So if you haven’t seen the show I wouldn’t recommend reading any further. Instead, go watch it!

***SPOILER ALERTS***

I have two favorite episodes – the first being “Our Mrs. Reynolds”.  Scott told me that their was a special guest star and I was really excited to find out who it was.  Low and behold, it is none other than the sexy Christina Hendricks.  I found myself laughing throughout the episode.  The chemistry between Hendricks and Fillion on screen was papable.

I also loved the last episode, “Objects in Space.”  Jubal Early was an excellent character   River was fantastic in this episode and was consistent throughout the series, always creeping me out while also being intriguing.

I have to say that after the 14 episodes I was feeling content with the series, but I’m very thankful that Serenity exists.

Serenity was fantastic.  I was worried throughout about who they were going to kill and who would be allowed to live, I’m glad they stopped the killing when they did.  Also, thank you Joss Weadon for finally putting Kaylee and Simon together, that is one thing I would have been highly disappointed if it didn’t happen.  Though I was saddened with Wash dying, I assumed going into it that both he and Zoe weren’t both going to live.

I’m curious about the Shepard’s past as I would love to see what happens next in the lives of the characters.  But I know one thing – Nathan Fillion will no longer be Rick Castle to me, instead he’ll be Captain Castle.

I’ve already written about this before (briefly), and Emily plans to write about it very soon. So, I’ll just point out that this is easily one of the best gorram sci-fi movies ever made. I may have been really late to the party, but it will forever be a fixture in my ‘at least once a year’ movies.

Perhaps some time soon I’ll write an ode of greater length.

1. The Head and the Heart – The Head and the Heart

This one is a little obvious, based on previous posts this week.

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2. Radiohead – King of Limbs

I don’t want to say anything bad about this album, because I really do love it. It’s just hard to be Radiohead. So many of their albums have been revelations. They have had so many utterly brilliant albums, and this one is just really, really, really good. Even though one song sounds like they’ve been listening to a lot of TV on the Radio, and even though King of Limbs feels a lot like a really good appendix to In Rainbows (as opposed to something truly new as we would expect from Radiohead), this will still make my ‘favorite albums of 2011’ list.

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3. Childish Gambino – EP (aka – Dopeness) [download this for free, here.]

Donald Glover keeps doing what he does… being amazing. My friend Matt asked me the other day if I’d listened to this album yet. It was delightful for two reasons: 1. That he thought I probably listened to Childish Gambino. 2. That the Donald Glover movement is still growing.

We have tickets to see the I Am Donald tour here in Seattle at Neumos, which is the tour I’ve been waiting for him to do for a year. He’ll be performing stand-up AND hip hop. The small venue maybe even makes it possible I’ll have the chance to meet him. Then again, I already had a chance to walk up and say hello during the five minutes he was at the Raveonettes show at Bumbershoot, but it seems with Donald Glover I’m Troy to his Lavar Burton.

At least I can keep listening to this EP, you can’t disappoint an EP.

Video is NSFW [lyrics].

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4. Tapes ‘n Tapes – Outside

The music video is lame, but the song is still worth it.

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5. The Civil Wars – Barton Hollow

Again, another obvious one based on recent posts.

My friend Josué sent this to me, and it is far too awesome to be neglected here on the blog.

The Portland Cello Project, performing Kanye West’s ‘All of the Lights.’

It’s not surprising the song generates this sort of homage, because I am still amazed by how good this album is.

Well, my previously mentioned idea of picking several genres and then watching 30 films from each by the end of the year is underway. The fact that Moon was expiring on the ole’ Netflix ‘Watch Instantly’ feature made an easy decision as to what the first genre and film would be.

This was my second time watching this one (which was true for my viewing partner, Brian, as well).

Let me tell you folks, I love this movie. Sam Rockwell just acts my fucking socks off. Rockwell’s perfect portrayal of the same man at the beginning and end of three years alone in space is stunning. This is made even more impressive by the fact that often he isn’t acting with anyone else, playing alone or opposite the Hal-like robot, voiced by Kevin Spacey (who gave a fantastic performance as well).

This movie is proof enough that the Academy ignores far too many deserving films each year. Not only was Rockwell ignored, but a wonderful directorial debut by Duncan Jones, and a brilliant script. Meanwhile, The Blind Side was nominated for Best Picture that year.

In Moon, Duncan Jones and company got everything right. It’s one of those select films where I wouldn’t change a single thing if given the chance. The script, the score, the direction, the acting. Everything is so well crafted.

The film is in rarified air in its attention to small details, especially in terms of the development of the story and the character(s). The nuance is so pitch-perfect that it takes scenes which, in most films, would be throw-away scenes, and transforms them into profound moments in the film.

This movie is perfect. It’s easily 80% of the reason I’m excited for Duncan Jones’ upcoming film Source Code (Michelle Monaghan makes up the other 20%).

Oh yeah, and can anyone tell me how the hell they filmed the ping pong scene?

The Head and the Heart, that’s who.

Just another gift from Seattle, to the world.

[photo via Creeping Elm]

This is by far the most brilliantly crafted and affecting of the films so far. There isn’t a close second. Time of the Wolf is a dark, quiet, terribly real film about what the western world might actually look like in the wake of a truly and completely catastrophic event.

The film has no music, the dialogue is sparse, the cinematography is simple and beautiful. We never discover what caused the apocalypse, we don’t even really know if it was worldwide or just French; we simply see the effects on ordinary people trying to move away from city centers and survive in the country. The film has moments of troublingly ordinary violence, but never in frame. There is no gory voyeurism. Whatever voyeurism may be at play is purely emotional.

It’s a difficult film to watch. It is one of those films where you are always tense, always waiting for something terrible to happen again. In that way, it is masterful in helping the viewer enter into the world inhabited by the characters on screen.

The world depicted is so ordinary, so like our own. The small kindnesses and cruelties are our own. I watched, wanting to believe that people wouldn’t really behave this way, when the chips were down. Yet, we do. Every day, all over the world, we kill and rape and destroy. I became aware watching this film that many times the violence of humans in extreme situations is simply a violence that has always lived in them, finally given a reason and opportunity to manifest itself.

While, as I say again, this is a hard film to watch, I recommend it as highly as I can. This film should have been hopeless. I expected it to be, even many times during the viewing. Instead, I found myself feeling a profound hope when all was said and done, with a powerful message for me, in my day to day life, pre-apocalypse.

Throwing ourselves on the fire cannot have any hope of redeeming a broken and bleeding world. Only loving each other can do that.

Another ‘post-apocalypse’ entry will be up later today, but I am thinking about perhaps changing the format a bit of ‘Another Day, Another Movie’ to make it easier, but still awesome.

I want to start the ‘Movies in Space’ edition of ADAM, but I also have a ton of non-space related movies at the top of my Netflix queue that I am really looking forward to. Also, it looks like I’ll be having people over every week or so to watch a different samurai movie. That makes it impossible to do a normal Samurai ADAM. So, what I’m thinking is, I’ll pick a few genres, and commit to watching 30 films from each genre between now and the end of the year.

Again, a good name for this entire blog could be, ‘In case anyone cares.’ In case anyone does, that is the immediate future of ‘Another Day, Another Movie.’ It seems to me it will actually help me even more to immerse myself in certain genres over the rest of the year, because I won’t have to figure out how to free up 10-30 nights in a row for a certain genre. I can just get rolling right away. It would also make it easier to incorporate movies coming out this year, as well as relevant television series and video games. For this year that would include, to name a few: Battlestar Galactica, Samurai 7, Red Dwarf, Cowboy Bebop, and Doctor Who: Series 6.

So, I’m thinking, 30 movies this year from: Samurai, Kung-Fu, Movies in Space (maybe including alien invasion? maybe invasion should get its own?), maaaaybe doing 30 more Westerns? What say you, good citizens? Anyone? Anyone?

Or, maybe everyone hates these and wishes I would stop doing them. Which, would also be welcome criticism, not that it would necessarily stop me.

Mad Max: Part III. I’d watched two Mad Max movies for this ‘ADAM’ already, why not a third? Sure, Tina Turner gave me pause, but at the very least I’d finally know what Pac was referencing in the ‘California Love’ video.

I’m assuming it’s due to the fact that they’ve most probably nearly run out of gas altogether now, but Mad Max doesn’t have a car anymore, he rides around with a camel-drawn wagon instead. His shit gets stolen by our friend, the pilot with the terrible teeth, from The Road Warrior. Somewhere in the post-apocalyptic landscape of Australia, the pilot has managed to find an orthodontist and now has pearly whites.

Max follows the trail of his wagon to Bartertown, a small city that runs off of methane (in this case, it comes from pig shit). Tina Turner tells Maxwell that if he kills her primary political rival in single combat, she’ll make sure he’s made whole from his recent losses.

So, Aunty Entity’s (Tina Turner) chief rival is actually two people who function as one, they’re called Master Blaster. They consist of a little person, Master, who functions as the brains; and a giant, Blaster, who acts as the muscle. Aunty wants to keep the brains around, while crippling him without his muscle. All Master, no Blaster. That’s the setup, and the action stems from there.

There are certainly some glaring weaknesses. For one: Tina Turner was teeeeerrrrrrible, godawful even. Ugh. Two: why, in the name of all that is reasonable and logical in the world, does the “genius,” Master, have the vocabulary of the Incredible Hulk? I mean, sure, I’ll suspend disbelief all you want, but there has to be some reason why. “Me order. Me Master. Me run Bartertown.” What the fuck?

As far as the cheesiness factor goes, it really wasn’t so bad. I mean, cheesy, sure, but no worse than, say, Willow or other similar movies. With the introduction of a Lost Boys-esque tribe of kids, and a PG-13 rating, they basically made the third movie a family film. I know, I know, it’s sacrilege, but I liked the movie anyway. I thought the tribe of kids was actually really well executed and entertaining. They never pushed the kids over the edge into annoying territory, I found them likable and emotionally engaging throughout.

Go ahead, call me a lame-ass, but as long as Tina Turner wasn’t talking, I really liked this movie.

I’m not going to lie, I think this looks awesome.