77 hours. 77 hours until the lights will fade, the previews will begin, and the theater will roar as The Dark Knight, Heath Ledger and all, rolls onto the screen. Anticipation is high… in fact, amazingly high. In order to subdue my hype, however, I went searching for bad reviews, and, of course, went straight over to RottenTomatoes.

The reviews did not help in crushing my hopes. The movie only has an 88% fresh rating based on 20 reviews, and the snippets from the bad reviews include:

This movie is grim and jammed together. The narrative isn’t shaped coherently to bring out contrasts and build toward a satisfying climax. The Dark Knight is constant climax; it’s always in a frenzy, and it goes on forever. -David Denby, New Yorker

Why do comic-book movies want to be serious literature? That’s the problem with this movie the same way it was with 2006’s “Superman Returns.” Instead of being exciting pop-culture entertainment that forces the viewer to take it seriously, the movie takes itself too seriously – and misses the fun in the process. – Marshall Fine, Star Magazine

But then the novelty wears off and the lack of imagination, visual and otherwise, turns into a drag. The Dark Knight is noisy, jumbled, and sadistic. Even its most wondrous vision—Batman’s plunges from skyscrapers, bat-wings snapping open as he glides through the night like a human kite—can’t keep the movie airborne. There’s an anvil attached to that cape. – David Edelstein, New York Magazine

Actually, those are all of the rotten reviews thus far, and the first two don’t strike much confidence in me. Denby’s review is scathing, to say the least, but he loses me when he bashes Bale, Batman Begins and everything else I know I’ll like. I can’t pre-judge someone else’s movie review until I see The Dark Knight myself, but when someone hates a movie for being “perverse” and sounds like they hated the first one, too, credibility goes right out the window. After all, Batman Begins is the best comic book movie made, and so it’s unlikely I’m going to agree with him here.

Fine, who still gives the movie 2.5 stars, complains that the movie isn’t fun enough, and points out that comic book movies shouldn’t take themselves too seriously. That’s fine, but one gets the sense he doesn’t like realistic comic book movies, and again, we have a severe difference of opinion. I feel most comic book franchises, from Spider-Man to X-Men, would be best served by being grittier and adult-oriented.

The Dark Knight movie review by Edelstein is the most sobering, as he seems the most unbiased by Christopher Nolan’s approach. If I were to end up being disappointed by The Dark Knight, his review is what I’d write. He complains there’s too much dialogue and that the movie is too smart for its own good; could Nolan have gotten too caught up in the drama of it all that he forgot to make an exciting action movie? I doubt it, but we shall see.

More dampening are the fresh movie reviews that fall short of calling the movie a classic; they liked it but didn’t love it. I didn’t go on to read the movie reviews beyond the snippets in RottenTomatoes, but if The Dark Knight isn’t everything I wanted and more, it will probably fall in line with these reviews. After all, if you hype a movie up so much, you’re bound to be disappointed.

Of course, most of the Dark Knight movie reviews rave about the film; some call it a masterpiece; others a classic. At the very least, they say it’s an excellent film. Damn. My hype has not gone away.

The Dark Knight is one of the most anticipated movies of the year. Fandango is reporting that so many midnight showings have sold out that theaters are having to add 3am and 6am showings (although I just went and bought tickets for a midnight showing at the best theater in town without any problem). More importantly, though, employers should expect a worker shortage on Friday, July 18th, or at least a lack in productivity among their employees.

After all, a Fandango survey of 3,000 customers (presumably 3,000 of their customers that like to pay their high fees over and over again) revealed that a whopping 37% of people are planning to go see the new Batman film late Thursday night, and that 38% plan to take some or all of Friday off to recupurate.

You can read more at my original employee productivity post.

Things have changed since September 11th. Security at airports is more of a pain in the ass in the ever. For some reason, we still have to take off our shoes, as if the terrorists are really that dumb to put C4 in their shoes anymore. The United States is set at a constant state of Orange Alert, whatever that means. Countries can be attacked even without doing anything to the U.S. Our government can spy on us without a court order. However, we’re still looking for WMDs in Iraq.

But what pisses me off almost as much as having to take my shoes off at airports is listening to the song “God Bless America” during the 7th inning stretch of Major League Baseball games. The policy was implemented the day baseball returned to the airwaves after the attacks, and that is fine. The policy continued through the playoffs and World Series. OK.

Then “God Bless America,” if memory serves, played during the 7th Inning Stretch of every MLB game in 2002. A big baseball fan, I go to a lot of games. Maybe not as many as some, but I’d say 25 games a season is more than most people go to. That’s a lot of times to hear “God Bless America,” and think of the players – they have to hear it at least 162 days a year. Sure, the National Anthem and Take Me Out to the Ballgame are played every game, but one is our national anthem, and other is a pure baseball tradition. “God Bless America” is just something Bud Selig added to appeal to patriotic sensibilities, and presumably NASCAR fans.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m patriotic. Yes, I’m liberal AND patriotic (I don’t view the two as being mutually exclusive, at all). No, I don’t wear American flag underpants or burn Dixie Chick records or take everything (or anything) our President says at face value; in fact, I question most things our government tells us, and even what the national media tells us. But I love America and am proud to be an American, despite everything we do to the world.

So, when I say I hate the song, “God Bless America,” I am not being unpatriotic; I am simply saying that it is an overly used, annoying, biased and ultimately offensive piece of music.

Why should MLB not play “God Bless America” at its baseball games anymore? Here are a few reasons:

• As an atheist, it mildly offends me. OK, in reality, I just don’t like hearing the song, but being forced to listen to “God Bless” stuff is just nauseating.
• On that note, though, whenever I hear, “God Bless…” I think Christian. Which is fine, except baseball is a sport for all people and all religions, not just Christians. What do Muslims think? Hindus? Buddhists? Most don’t care; they live in a country based on Christian principles. Fine. But in an age of political correctness, shouldn’t the MLB be a little more… politically correct? (see, I actually suggest being PC when it’s in my best interest)
• Furthermore and foremost, “God Bless America?” Isn’t that a little self-centered, a little pre-globalization. Patriotism and a little bit of nationalism is fine, but how about “God Bless the World?”I’d find that a lot less offensive, as we shouldn’t be concerned about whether God blesses this country but rather the world as a whole? “America” implies the United States, but a good chunk of baseball players are from other countries.

Why this random post? It has nothing to do with movies, though arguably it has to do with entertainment. But really, I just got really annoyed when, after listening to “God Bless America” at the baseball game, the Gasworks Park fireworks show on 4th of July (the biggest show in Seattle) did their finale to Celine Dion’s version of the song. Isn’t Dion a Canadian, for starters? And two, really? That song of all songs to do your finale to? No!

I just Hancock, the superhero action-comedy starring Will Smith as a drunken bastard of a superhero. While the guy stops crime and saves people, he does so with complete disregard for his reputation and city property, often causing millions of dollars in damage every time he shows up to save the day.

The movie is pretty good and always entertaining, with lots of laughs and some good action. That being said, the movie isn’t without its flaws, and while I was able to look past them for the most part, there are some people that are not going to like the direction the movie takes at all. For a spoiler-free movie review of Hancock, click here. For a list of what I would have done differently to make Hancock one of the most solid films of the summer, read on.

Note, this list does contain major SPOILERS, as there is a pretty surprising twist in the movie that you won’t see coming.

Here are five ways Hancock could have been better:

1. Keep the laughs going in the second half in the movie, or deliver some major action.
   After the big twist is revealed, the movie loses a lot of its laughs and it focuses more on character back story. This is fine – if there were some giant, Transformers-size action sequences waiting for us. There are some good action scenes, but not explosive ones; Peter Berg and his writers seemed to have forgotten that they were making an action-comedy.
2. Have a central villain.
   The movie doesn’t have one. Enough said.
3. Improve the special effects.
   While not great, they really didn’t detract from the film too much. Still, when the tornadoes show up and Will Smith and Charlize Theron start wailing on each other, things don’t look very realistic; nor do they make much sense. Why are there tornadoes again?
4. Drop the back story.
   The back story for Hancock isn’t terrible, but isn’t necessary. I would have sacrificed an explanation of where he came from and how he got his powers a killer villain or an onslaught of huge action sequences. Learning that Hancock has been alive for thousands of years and blah blah blah is interesting and unique, but hardly necessary for a film like this.
5. Make Charlize Theron the main bad guy.
   If you’re going to have the super hot Charlize Theron be a super-powered being as well – which in itself is a questionable move on the writers’ part – at least make her the villain. Have it revealed that she killed off everyone else like them so she could be a God, or something like that. Either way, make her one crazy bitch.

I finally got around to updating the Hancock image gallery today; I added over 15 new movie pictures for the superhero action movie Hancock, starring Will Smith, Jason Bateman and Charlize Theron. Check out the Hancock movie pictures.

The movie is about a drunk of a man (Will Smith) who just happens to be the only superpowered being on Earth. While he saves people at times, he is pretty careless about his actions, leaving people to become frustrated with the so-called hero. After he really gets himself in trouble, though, his newfound PR agent (Jason Bateman) convinces him to turn his act around and become the person everyone expects him to be. That synopsis is based on what I’ve seen from the previews – I’m not going to go see Hancock until tomorrow unfortunately.

On January 25, 2008, shortly after Heath Ledger’s death, I conjectured on whether the actor would win an Oscar posthumously for his portrayal of the Joker in the upcoming movie The Dark Knight. The Heath Ledger Oscar post is here, and examines the chances of actors winning awards after their deaths. It’s a rare feat indeed.

Now, six months later, on the eve of the release of The Dark Knight, critics are echoing what fans have only guessed based on 20 seconds worth of footage, that Heath Ledger should and will receive an Oscar nomination for his role as the Joker. In this article, AP writer David Germain drills into the what-if’s, James Dean and the cautious marketing approach Warner Brothers is taking to tout Ledger’s performance and get him a nomination.

The Dark Knight movie reviews I’ve seen so far for have been just short of heavenly, and Ledger is getting immense praise. At this point, it’s almost certain that Ledger will receive an Oscar nomination. The bigger question is whether he can defy the odds and actually win an Oscar more than a year after his death?

Seattle is not a huge city. It’s no Manhattan or Los Angeles. But it’s not a small city. In fact, it’s the largest city among several states in the Northwest. In other words, it is not a team that should be without a professional basketball team.

Yet, today, the city of Seattle struck a settlement with Clay Bennett and the other Oklahoma City owners who bought the Super Sonics last year. Seattle makes some money, but Bennett and Oklahoma City gets the Sonics. Starting next year, the Sonics, or whatever they will be called, will play in Oklahoma City, a place I’m pretty sure that will never have a fan base or market equivilant to what Seattle has or will have. How is it right for a place like Oklahoma to have an NBA franchise and Seattle not to?

Let’s face the facts:

• Seattle no longer has a basketball team. That just sucks. It’s embarrassing and just plain messed up. I don’t even like basketball, have only been to one winning Sonics game ever, but as a sports fan – and a Seattle sports fan at that – I cannot believe we just lost our team.
• We no longer have rookie of the year Kevin Durant. He could be great. Too bad we don’t get to keep him.
• Clay Bennett and his group are a bunch of sleazebags. It’s bad enough to go into another state, buy a company and then move the company, as you’ve always planned, without thinking about the negative ramifications for those left behind. It’s an entirely different thing when that company is a professional sports franchise that has had deep ties in the community for decades.
• David Stern cannot be trusted. It just doesn’t make sense to move the Sonics away from Seattle to Oklahoma City (though I see the city has a population of 1.2 million, amazingly). This was political from the beginning.
• Seattle no longer has a championship-winning team. The Sonics won in 1979. That was the last time Seattle got to celebrate a championship victory.
• And most importantly, Starbucks should be banned. Perhaps stores should be burned, and not just the ones that are getting closed down. Howard Schultz, despite his legal campaign to “save the Sonics,” had to know that Bennett and his crew wanted to move the Sonics. In fact, one can hardly blame Bennett when Schultz, a Seattle guy, the CEO of Starbucks, either so maliciously sold the Sonics to out-of-town owners – or did so in idiocy.

Yes, there are some positives. Seattle gets to keep the colors, the name and so on and so forth, pretty much guaranteeing that we will see the Supersonics back in Seattle at some point. But that’s at least five years down the road, and then there are the years of rebuilding, et cetera. We may have a good ten years – a whole frikkin’ decade – before Seattle has a decent basketball team again.

So, all I can say is ban Starbucks now.