I grade movies hard, kids.  I try to support films and undermine them depending on what side of the political spectrum that I know they are on.  For example, I won’t be buying Leonardo DiCapricock’s “J. Edgar” liberal gravepissing off Instant Demand any time soon.

However, that can get me burnt sometimes.  I’m looking in your direction An American Carol and Atlas Shrugged (Part 1).

Act of Valor is something else though.  Currently, the liberal critics sampled at Rotten Tomatoes are scoring it 31% while the users are rating it 85%.  Quite a disconnect.

No, these critics want Hurt Locker-ish nuance.  The kind of nuance that wins Oscars.  Deep thoughts that portray our military as mindless adrenaline-fueled killbots who gleefully abandon their families and risk the lives of their fellow soldiers for the thrill of murdering some brown people because life so is like so pointless in America because we have 250 different kinds of breakfast cereal to choose from.

Seriously.  Hurt Locker blows a syphilitic donkey named Pedro.

They need a film where the good guys swim in the gray and the bad guys really are justified in their hatred of us – like they are.  Moreso, that they would prefer Real Actors ™ faking Real Soldier action rather than Real Soldiers pretending to be Real Actors ™.  Because that’s just degrading to see the kind of people Obama handpicked to kill bin Laden prostituting their profession this way:

It’s undeniably reverent of the real-life heroes in its cast, but Act of Valor lets them down with a clichéd script, stilted acting, and a jingoistic attitude that ignores the complexities of war.

What?  Some of the acting and script is a bit stilted.  No more than say the script and dialogue of Aliens.  But for a first outing, the directors did a fine job of addressing the complexities of war albeit from a vantage point traditionally ignored by Hollywood.

As far as “jingoistic attitude” goes, critics are correct that Act of Valor did not produce such heroic nuance like Matt Damon’s “Green Zone” where the audiences were supposed to be cheering when US soldiers were killed.  The critics loved that one and the people left it like an ugly baby on the steps of every movie house it played.

From the Damning With Faint Praise Dept., Rolling Stone’s Peter Travers, frags:

And it’s hardly the fault of these commandos that their acting deserves no salute. In truth, they’re a lot better than Charlie Sheen was in the 1990 crapfest that was Navy SEALs. I don’t know what to make of Act of Valor. It’s like reviewing a recruiting poster.

Frankly, I’m surprised Travers can claim to have seen this movie at all given his field of vision at his advanced age from that far down the end of his nose.  This isn’t a recruiting poster any more than “Alive” makes you want to join a Uruguayan rugby team.

This offering isn’t Apocalypse Now, it’s Apocalypse Eventually.  Kick in the door waving an M4.  A first person shooter with some of the best action sequences I’ve ever seen.  At moments, the tension is as tight as a tourniquet. While the scenes between the Seals and their families isn’t as bad as anything Michael Bay has ever done, the Tom Clancy-like attention to technical details makes up for the lack of Delta Strike Force diaperchanging at home.

There were moments in the theater that were so silent you could hear a shell casings drop.

Definitely worth a look.

7.5 out of a possible 10 sausage links.

Blake, Glengarry, Glen Ross

David Mamet, The Secret Knowledge

Separated at birth?

Steven Crowder, the conservative humorist who produces great videos for Big Hollywood and The National Center for Public Policy Research, may have gotten his first taste of entertainment industry thuggery.

Strange that the outrage doesn’t center on the fact that the Daily Show shuns conservative pundits as a matter of policy, but rather that Crowder didn’t shut up about it. I guess Bugsy Lieberman doesn’t like people violating the Code of silence.

If this is new to you, here is the backstory. Crowder, through his manager, was informed by the Daily Show producers that he wasn’t really welcome on the show. Crowder released the private email between his manager and the Daily Show senior producer in this video:

It’s open mic night at the sanitarium! Dr. Mothersbaugh will make some brief announcements before Dr. Casale does impressions from the Broadway smash Phantom!

But their music was contagious. Even now, I have at least 10 of their songs in my MP3 library including a real bitchin’ rarity.

Which is why this is disappointing:

I can’t say I’m really that disappointed. Ninety-five percent of the music I listen to is performed by unreconstructed lefties.

Do read through this pompous interview and see how they position themselves as above-the-frackas watchers of society. You’d think the might have something more insightful to offer than “Sarah is Stupid.” How are you different than any other entertainment industry boob?

Also gleaned from this article is just how seriously they took themselves and their message.

Good lord man, you weren’t the reincarnation of Alexis De Toqueville. You had very catchy tunes and musical creativity. Your lyrics were pretty much in line with mainstream pop. Besides, we already had Michael Stipe and Bono covering the deep socio-political crap.

Here is a palate cleanser.

(sirloin tip Big Hollywood headlines)

How’d you get life insurance, Lana?  Don’t they know you’re in the Danger Zone?

If it makes you feel any better, 99% of those corn cobs vote Democrat.

Don’t worry, Li’l Davey.  The state’s going to provide this Kernell all the butter and salt he needs.

A federal judge has shot down a former University of Tennessee student’s bid to have tossed out convictions in the illegal access of Sarah Palin’s personal e-mail account during the 2008 presidential election.

[...]

Davies argued it was nothing more than a college prick prank by a rank assbag computer amateur. Federal prosecutors assigned a more sinister motive, arguing Kernell, the son of long-time Memphis Democratic state Rep. Mike Kernell, went searching for politically damaging information but came up empty-handed.

The feds slapped Kernell with four felony charges. At his trial in April jurors rejected a wire fraud charge outright, reduced a felony illegal e-mail access charge to a misdemeanor, deadlocked on an identity theft count and convicted Kernell of the felony charge of anticipatory obstruction of justice.

It’s always the “cover-up” that gets you.  It has dibs. But after the cover-up gets you then Jamal does.

Riddle me this:  If Li’l Davy gets his ass kernel popped in Cell block 6 will it make a sound?  I’m guessing yes.  First a wimper, followed by some open weeping before Big Bear’s squeaky bed springs gently rock him to sleep.  Maybe that will be more “his type”.

Night, night ya jag.  It’s a real shame that a few of your unscrupulous supporters can’t go with you in a show of solidarity.

Where we once had coffee and laughs, there is only another cookie-cutter  Walgreen’s.

When the show’s intro stopped playing he would be looking dead into the camera like a happy hunter.   The first guest was forever his quarry and the first question invariably was a felling blow.  The question of the week that, somehow, no one else had asked yet.  No politician or flunky has been intimidated by a reporter since Russert’s death as the vast majority of the so-called journalists remaining only want an administration job as Professional Notetaker / Water Carrier.

In light of David Gregory’s abject failure at even resembling a Tim Russert cover band, I hereby throw my support to Jake Tapper to take over Meet The Press as we officially enter the silly season.

Though I have never forgotten Tapper’s notoriously liberal bent while a columnist at Salon back the Internet’s heyday, he has earned a shot at the big chair and we need a watchdog who, if he’s not doing it for his country, can at least feign integrity for personal aggrandizement.  We all deserve better than what we’ve been getting.

Thank you to all our service people who put their lives at risk for us daily. And Gene Simmons, you’re the best. I can forgive you for what you did to Rock music in the 70′s

Rumpshaker wants to take my salt shaker.  Think Globally, Don’t Be Globally, oh, Thunder Thigh Master.

When’s Malia gonna ask her Daddy to plug that piehole?

Now, who’s lecturing who about needing to exercise?

Put it out of it’s misery.

“If we’re not careful, if you don’t field the strongest candidate — frankly, like Arlen Specter — they’re going to take over,” Specter said of the tea parties. “Beating the tea party gang is more important than who does the beating.”

Fool, you were primaried by your own party and lost.  Who excludes who exactly?  So much for the Big Tent of the Democratic Party.  It speaks volumes for the Specters of the world who complained to the very end about how far to the right the Republican Party had gone (as if!) to be done in by how far to the left the Democrats have gone.

Once a figurehead of “moderates” in the Republican Party, he evolved after decades in Washington to see average citizens who want limited government as greater enemies than Democrats and in need of a beating no less for the crime of wanting someone to represent them.

Let that be a lesson to you other traitors and turncoats.  There is no honor among thieves.