Saturday, November 29, 2014
Three Days Of Ritual Retail Orgy Gives Me The Right To Rant
Well, retailers opened on Thanksgiving again this year. Hell, the retailer I (still) work for decided to open two hours earlier than last year. The trend is set. Nothing is sacred to Americans anymore. Is Christmas itself next? You've spent weeks buying shit for this day, now go out and spend MORE on this day! Spend more. And more. And more. Spend money on useless shit that you will never, ever need. Spend money on ephemeral, cheaply manufactured junk that will bring relief and shallow fulfillment to your miserable little life for just a few more seconds. Spend until you can't shit another cent out of your wallet. Spend more and more of your hard earned cash until every billionaire in this country can afford to buy his cocaine-addled blonde bimbo of a mistress her own island... or two. Spend. Spend. Spend.
Sunday, November 23, 2014
Shameless Plug
I normally don't shill for big corporations or indeed any corporations (in fact, I even refuse to run ads on this blog even though it would net me a teeny bit of scratchola) but I have to give some advertising space today to Netflix (which I have actually kinda written about before, reviewing movies I had seen on their site).
See, I watched David Cronenberg's first movie Shivers on the site last week, and it was a movie I had wanted to see for a long time. The DVD had been out of print and I had been furiously searching for it in the used bookstores and online and such. Well, I'm glad I didn't end up actually paying money (especially at the prices some of these online sellers wanted, yeesh) for it, because Netflix had it on their site and I of course immediately watched it.
And it sucked.
Other than some nudity from the ethereal Lynn Lowery, there was really nothing worth noting about Shivers. Oh, sure, the concept was neat, and it was amusing to see Ivan Reitman (!) in the credits in an early gig, but you can really tell that it was Cronenberg's first attempt at a feature-length film. Apparently it was a huge development to even get to the point of Scanners (now I guess I have to see Rabid and The Brood, which are hopefully better).
What I'm getting at is that I'm glad Netflix saved me from paying a lot of money for a movie that sucks. For only $8.99 a month you get to see a bunch of movies and TV shows with no commercials and decide whether they are really worth shelling out money for. Why get cable or satellite and pay over 80 dollars a month for 500 channels of crap and endless ads? If Netflix got more licences and expanded their library to include more classic movies they would be perfect.
Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaay, Netflix.
See, I watched David Cronenberg's first movie Shivers on the site last week, and it was a movie I had wanted to see for a long time. The DVD had been out of print and I had been furiously searching for it in the used bookstores and online and such. Well, I'm glad I didn't end up actually paying money (especially at the prices some of these online sellers wanted, yeesh) for it, because Netflix had it on their site and I of course immediately watched it.
And it sucked.
Other than some nudity from the ethereal Lynn Lowery, there was really nothing worth noting about Shivers. Oh, sure, the concept was neat, and it was amusing to see Ivan Reitman (!) in the credits in an early gig, but you can really tell that it was Cronenberg's first attempt at a feature-length film. Apparently it was a huge development to even get to the point of Scanners (now I guess I have to see Rabid and The Brood, which are hopefully better).
What I'm getting at is that I'm glad Netflix saved me from paying a lot of money for a movie that sucks. For only $8.99 a month you get to see a bunch of movies and TV shows with no commercials and decide whether they are really worth shelling out money for. Why get cable or satellite and pay over 80 dollars a month for 500 channels of crap and endless ads? If Netflix got more licences and expanded their library to include more classic movies they would be perfect.
Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaay, Netflix.
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