daines'n around

The new year has started off much like 2006 ended. I'm in Utah, it is cold. But I'm doing very well in my first week and a half with firsts. What do I mean by firsts? Something that is so important it can only be immortalized in photograph... and video.

Saturday I went to a monster truck rally. More specifically, the Steel Thunder tour in Salt Lake City. Went with some friends and a girl. Round about the time we stepped into the pit I was excited. Gigantic tires, loose dirt and the smell of exhaust seemed much more exhilarating than a simple college parking lot or underground Hollywood parking structure.

Chanson wanted desperately to be photographed next to someone with a mullet. I was discreet.

This was the opportunity that the real fans wanted. The pit is where you could get anything autographed, ask any personal questions of the drivers and bikers. Perch on the side of a monster truck and live the seemingly carnival type life style of a touring driver.

This motocross driver was not bruised and broken from riding, but rather getting a little tipsy and angsty at a party where, he said, he was ganged up on by three or four military guys in Salt Lake the night before. He still performed very well on the death-defying stunts.

The show started off like a second-rate circus, but one that you can't help but look at. Long periods of silence between ear-obliterating muffler-less engine roars. Each driver was introduced and yes, there were hometown favorites.

The racing began. It was enthralling, but I'm not sure why. It wasn't because I paid for the ticket, or was sitting in an arena surrounding the action. I could have easily talked with the girl sitting by me all night long... except when it was too loud to possibly do so.

The arena filled with exhaust and soon the fans were turned on. A bitter cold blew through the arena, it was snowing outside. It reminded me of Los Angeles. The subtle layer of smog settling on the unsuspecting people in the valleys.

We moved to a lower position and discovered the action was a bit more intense when you ran the risk of having a tire fly off and smash you where you sat.

The freestyle motocross riders were certainly the most entertaining. There was no excruciating downtime while you waited for the monster truck driver to figure out how to reverse out of an impassable situation.

Amateur "tough-truck" drivers brought their gutted-out pickups and sedans to try their chance at winning the $100 prize for having the best time around 6-jump track. This competition looked painful as many of the drivers missed the speed calculations to make it down the jump and ofter ran chassis-first into the front of a jump stopping them in the middle of their tracks.

And the freestyle finale was entertainingly free. Two trucks broke. One truck did several doughnuts spitting mud at everyone in the first few rows. This truck almost flipped over.

Oh, and this morning, I spent the day on the slopes before work rather than vegging in my living room. There are some steep areas at sundance.

But i handled it like a pro who hadn't boarded in more than two years. My muscles don't react like they used to. I need some conditioning for sure. I'm off to limp to work now.

Brick
The Last King of Scotland
Little Miss Sunshine
Superman Returns
The Departed

The Science of Sleep
Who Killed the Electric Car?
Why We Fight
Jesus Camp
The Devil and Daniel Johnston (dvd release)
Temporada de patos
L'Enfant

There are so many movies I missed living in Provo.

I saw Dreamgirls on Saturday, and left somewhat unfulfilled. I was terrified that that Eddie Murphy might turn into a man in a fat woman-suit, and play seveteen characters. I was relieved when he didn't ... but it wouldn't have made the movie any worse.

With so much talk of performances and awards I had at least decent expectations of the film. The cinematography was raw, shaky and seemed to take more cues from a made-for-tv movie rather than a cinematic presentation. The acting was dry, at best. Each character was a conglomeration of cliches from the tormented civil rights era. The film made a half-hearted attempt to draw social aspects into the plot. The half-hearted effort to tell an inspiring story fell short when no character engaged, inspired or brought about any credible emotional reactions. Jamie Fox played a very decent record executive, but fell short when the depth of the script limited him to cliches and moody glances. Jennifer Hudson never became more than a two-dimensional character, but she put so much of herself into the part it almost made me sad.

Two parts of Dreamgirls as a whole bother me. Producers, media and fans tout itself as a dazzling and inspiring musical. It falls short of dazzle and just spins like mobile of famous people above a society of drooling Americans looking for their next idol. Eighty million people can't be wrong? Yes. They can.

It also falls short of inspiring. It simply perpetuates widely mistaken values of determination to the point of selfishness. There was no moral of the story, aside from a third and rarely visited throughline of a drug problem that lead to death.

It wasn't a bad movie. The music was entertaining, the actors beautifully cast and the costumes tasteful. The writers should have spent as much time on character development as the producers spent hyping it around the country.