lonelysandwich

“Dream System” My home-theater-in-a-box has a mic...

Thu, 29 Jul 2010 18:45:00 -0700

“Dream System”

My home-theater-in-a-box has a mic you can plug in and put where your head goes in the room, and it’ll throw itself into AUTOCALIBRATE mode by playing these tones and adjusting its speakers accordingly.

And it plays them LOUD, and my dog gets scared and leaves the room, but to me, they are pure bliss. I think this what a brain sounds like when it’s eating cereal.

“Woody says: Ice a bro!” A Smirnoff Mule party? See,...

Tue, 27 Jul 2010 09:00:00 -0700

“Woody says: Ice a bro!”

A Smirnoff Mule party? See, they’ve been pulling this shit since the sixties. From the copy, ca. 1966:

“When it comes to entertaining, this is the drink that is. For a cool, refreshing Mule, made with Smirnoff and 7-up, is a delicious treat you can start with and stay with. Only crystal clear Smirnoff, filtered through 14,000 lbs. of activated charcoal, blends so perfectly with the subtle flavor of 7-Up. So never forget the rule for the Mule. Make it with Smirnoff!”

UPDATE: My pal Scott Jackson tracked down some precious audio of Woody telling the story of his ethical uncertainty doing this ad.

Mad Men, Season 4 Episode 1: Joey’s Haircut Okay, first...

Sun, 25 Jul 2010 23:51:00 -0700

Mad Men, Season 4 Episode 1: Joey’s Haircut

Okay, first off, fantastic episode. I shake my fist at the gods that I can’t watch the whole season tonight, and all the rest of the seasons tomorrow night.

That said, three things stood out to me as anachronistic for 1964:

The new character Joey, Peggy’s copy boy (played by Matt Long who you may not remember as Jack on “Jack and Bobby”) dons a haircut I don’t believe you’d see in ‘64. All I know of 1964 is from stuff I’ve seen on movies about the sixties, but I never saw a haircut like that in ‘64 is all I’m saying. So I call bullshit.
When Roger Sterling tells Don “You turned all the sizzle from Glo-Coat into a wet fart!” I just don’t believe that people farted in 1964, and certainly not in downtown ad agencies, and if they did, you’d better believe they were dry or they’d have Don Draper to answer to.
As Peggy justifies/apologizes to Don for the Sugarberry hamfight debacle, she says this: “It was going great, until it wasn’t.” What a very 20xx way of putting it. Very self-conscious, very Internet. I’m not buying it, Olson. Get back to work.

But then again, I’m just a butthead who puts far too much trust in the show’s creators to transport him psychically into a world where nothing is out of place. So never mind me. God, what a fucking great show.

Mad Men, Season 11

Fri, 23 Jul 2010 18:36:00 -0700

Mad Men, Season 11

Remember when consumer electronics used to look like...

Thu, 22 Jul 2010 13:32:00 -0700

Remember when consumer electronics used to look like this?

Yesterday I was walking the dog and this slitscan monstrosity of broken dreamscape was sitting on the curb. You’ve seen this before, you probably had one ten years ago. You’d turn it on and the thing would light up like it was controlling air traffic at JFK. And then you’d turn it off and it would start bumping out silent patterns of light and magic like a disco time machine in a color palette that could only be described as post-Soviet exuberant.

Thing is, I need a tape player. (It’s for a bit. Okay, I have a tape of my high school garage band I’m dying to listen to and self-flagellate over.)

But of course, it was a no-go. The tape servos cease to be. But the lightscapade keeps on going, as bright as it will long after our culture is dead and buried and future civilizations unearth it and make certain assumptions about the mechanics of our reproductive organs.

This guy, Dr. Marc Abrams, the Silver Lake Walker passed away...

Thu, 22 Jul 2010 00:42:00 -0700

This guy, Dr. Marc Abrams, the Silver Lake Walker passed away today.

He’s been an institution in my neighborhood since the 80s, the fittest middle-aged dude I know. He lent a unique spirit to this corner of LA, and it’ll be way less cool here without him.

UPDATE: Please go and watch this exquisite multimedia tribute to the Walker, by Mel Melcon at the LA Times.

Permit me this one bit of self-congratulation. Being that...

Wed, 21 Jul 2010 21:13:00 -0700

Permit me this one bit of self-congratulation. Being that Creativity is the trade mag for the ad industry, Pick of the Day is a nice bit of recognition.

Okay, I’m done. Jesus, man, get a grip.

UPDATE: #1 of Creativity Top 5 for the week of July 26, 2010. Neat.

Sho Kôsugi spars with Cathy, who has forgotten her pants: A love...

Wed, 21 Jul 2010 16:17:00 -0700

Sho Kôsugi spars with Cathy, who has forgotten her pants: A love scene

Screw it. I linked to this clip from “Revenge of the Ninja” (1983) at the end of my previous long-ass post about Sam Firstenberg, but honestly, it needs the room to itself.

Cho: Cathy, you help me so much. I really think I should pay you.

Cathy: No, really! I love doing things for you, Cho. Besides, my karate training is more than enough. I just want you to teach me the way.

Cho: Well, if you want to work out, you forgot your pants!

Sam Firstenberg directs Shabba Doo and Lucinda Dickey on the set...

Wed, 21 Jul 2010 16:11:00 -0700

Sam Firstenberg directs Shabba Doo and Lucinda Dickey on the set of Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo

You should know the name Sam Firstenberg because here are some highlights of his filmography, all properties of The Cannon Group:

“Revenge of the Ninja” (1983)
“Ninja III: The Domination” (1984)
“Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo” (1984)
“American Ninja” (1985)

This image comes from a Firstenberg fansite with some firsthand stories such as the one about how Sam, a 22-year-old from Poland, approached Menahem Golan, a titan of Israeli cinema who would go on to purchase The Cannon Group, about working as an unpaid PA, and soon would work his way up through the ranks to make his first feature, a Western-style action flick about ninjas, which he knew nothing about:

Golan got involved as a producer and director of the first of a new breed of action movies. It was “Enter the Ninja” the first martial arts movie to introduce the Ninja phenomena to western viewers. The idea to make a western style Ninja movie was presented to Golan by Mike Stone, a prominent American karate champion and formerly Elvis Presley’s personal trainer.

So here I was, ready to tackle the challenge of my first big action flick. I was handed the script and introduced to Sho Kosugi, the tallest Japanese person I had ever met. Sho was the spirit behind the project, an accomplished martial arts fighter and Ninjitsu expert who had come a few years earlier to Los Angeles with Hollywood on his mind.

He was the Ninjitsu advisor and in this capacity he made sure that every known Ninja weapon and every Ninja fighting trick, method, custom, ceremony, and accessories, would be included in the script. It was exciting and I understood it was important to the success of the movie, but my first decision right away was not to follow in the steps of the Hong Kong flicks, but rather to approach the movie as a straight Hollywood action movie with a martial arts slant, and the Ninjitsu mysticism the icing on the cake.

And my favorite part, on casting the role of Cathy:

The actress cast to play the lead was not able to come from Los Angeles to Utah and we were forced to cast the part locally. Unfortunately the pool of actresses in Utah is considerably smaller than the choices in Los Angeles, and our top choice was a local model, Ashley Ferrare. I called Golan to inform him of our decision and to let him know that her acting abilities left a lot to be desired. “Never mind her acting,” he replied, “how is her body?” As a model she was clearly well built, although, as I told him, “Her breasts are clearly inflated with foreign substances.” All he wanted to know was whether she would be considered sexy on the screen, and when I said that I thought she probably would, he replied “Then she is hired.”

Please, PLEASE watch this short clip as evidence of Ashley Ferrare’s performance. And I quote:

Cho: Cathy, you help me so much. I really think I should pay you.

Cathy: No, really! I love doing things for you, Cho. Besides, my karate training is more than enough. I just want you to teach me the way.

Cho: Well, if you want to work out, you forgot your pants!

This is my Flipboard. That’s what I’m calling this...

Wed, 21 Jul 2010 08:49:00 -0700

This is my Flipboard.

That’s what I’m calling this little video I made to demonstrate the elegance and ingenuity of a new iPad app called Flipboard. I think you’ll agree, it looks nice. I also think you’ll find, once you download the app, that it feels amazing.

Here’s the effect it’s had on me in my couple of months using it in beta: I tend not to follow too many people on Twitter for the content they share, and in a typical Twitter client, I tend to gloss over links and images. Flipboard gives me such a nice way to read this stuff, I use it as an auxiliary client, just for the linked content. Turns out there’s some interesting stuff hidden behind all those ugly short URLs and yfrogs.

Big thanks to the talented and illustrious Peter Atencio for his work behind the lens, and to my handsome and kindhearted nephew Wes who knows how to swing.

AT&T: Same as it ever was. Recalled and watched the movie...

Mon, 19 Jul 2010 19:32:01 -0700

AT&T: Same as it ever was.

Recalled and watched the movie “Crazy People” (1990) last weekend. Some of the ad satire is pretty on-point. This one, pitched by Daryl Hannah, rings true even today.

I wouldn’t normally self-promote like this. I mean, I...

Fri, 16 Jul 2010 13:27:08 -0700

I wouldn’t normally self-promote like this. I mean, I self-promote, but not like this. In this case, though, I’m asking you to consider shifting over momentarily to this Fashion Blog contest and clicking the Put This On button because a vote for our blog is a vote for all the tremendous work my partner Jesse Thorn puts into it.

Honestly, I have less than .15% of anything to do with the blog. The video stuff is my bag. But Jesse puts so much care into curating a great source for style inspiration, he writes with such a strong voice, he exhibits such unimpeachably distinguished taste, that my plea is for you to show him you appreciate the fine work he does.

Plus, the winner gets like a full year supply of Details Commemorative Edition Axe Crotchspray in a flavor called Endangered Eagle(?), so you know I’m not about to let this die.

putthison:

Congratulations to Us

I just received an email from the good people at Details Magazine, informing us that we’d been nominated in the category “Style Curation” in their First Annual Fashion Blog Awards. We’re proud to be nominated alongside many of our favorite blogs (though we’d like to have seen our pals Street Etiquette, A Suitable Wardrobe, An Affordable Wardrobe and Sartorially Inclined get nods, especially considering a few perplexing inclusions like the interior design blog The Selby). We feel this will be our shining moment: a time for us to rise above the consistent mediocrity we’ve perpetrated upon the American people, and an opportunity to prove once and for all to the world how amazing we are through the one test more foolproof than any other: internet votes.

The voting period for this thing runs for a month, and voting is incredibly easy. We considered taking the high road and not shilling for your votes, but then we realized: when have we ever taken the high road? If we win this thing, we will know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that we are the best Style Curation Blog in the world! Can you imagine? It’s like when Casey beat Dan in that internet poll about who was cooler on Sports Night, only we won’t even have to get Jeremy to rig it for us!

So: CLICK HERE AND VOTE! VOTE! VOTE!

Beavis and Butt-head are returning to MTV Cha-cha-cha. (via Erik...

Wed, 14 Jul 2010 11:26:28 -0700

Beavis and Butt-head are returning to MTV

Cha-cha-cha.

(via Erik Price)

“The Experts” (1989) Summary from IMDb: When Travis...

Thu, 01 Jul 2010 11:49:20 -0700

“The Experts” (1989)

Summary from IMDb:

When Travis and Wendell are kidnapped while on their way to opening a nightclub in rural Nebraska. The KGB spy Cameron Smith takes them to the U.S.S.R. instead with the intention of teaching KGB agents to be hip like Americans.

Near the eastern edge of the USSR is a village populated by Russians who speak and act American, where KGB trainees go to practice. The town is mired in the 50’s, and the new KGB hotshot fears his agents will fail to learn real US culture. He goes to New York and hires two young hipsters to come to “Nebraska” to open a nightclub. He drugs them en route to Russia, and they think they’ve awaken in the Midwest. There they turn a tiki lounge into a hip club, teach townies to dance, and introduce pop culture. Both flip for local chicks. Things get dangerous when the townsfolk taste freedom, a KGB faction tries to kill our heroes, but will the guys figure out they’re not in Nebraska?

That’s right, two American sho-lo hipsters are drugged and planted in a Russian town of Russian spies impersonating Americans. I remember this false-world inside a false-world with creepy fondness. This movie was “The Truman Show” and “Synecdoche, NY” before those stages were built. It’s where John Travolta met Kelly Preston and they fell in love (be still our hearts). Yet I can’t find the damn trailer on YouTube. How often does that happen?

Smells a bit like KGB-style information suppression. Now more than ever.

Movieparts.biz Issue #7 Includes movieparts...

Mon, 28 Jun 2010 13:37:00 -0700

Movieparts.biz Issue #7

Includes movieparts from:

“Torque” (2004)
“Punch-Drunk Love” (2002)
“Youth in Revolt” (2009)
“Code 46” (2003)
“L.A. Story” (1991)

See past issues of Movieparts.biz.

Just dawned on me I called this shit three years ago. And if...

Sat, 26 Jun 2010 00:07:00 -0700

Just dawned on me I called this shit three years ago.

And if reblogging myself calling this shit three years ago is wrong, then tough titties for you, fishface.

lonelysandwich, 2007:

don’t these guys (the winklevoss twins on either side and divya narendra in the middle) have the makings of great movie villains? if ever there were a reason to write the story of facebook and the triumph of zuckerberg 6 years prematurely, these faces would be it.

I trust Fincher. But I can already tell in the teaser by the audio alone, the character could’ve used someone a little less self-aware and a little more aspy than Eisenberg. I can’t wait to see who plays the Winkelvoss twins. Please oh please oh please let it be Chris Klein in dual roles. Or for that matter, Eddie Murphy in dual roles. Fuck it. Let’s make it the Winkelvoss triplets.

UPDATE: Here’s who’s playing the Winkelvosses, posing with the twins at a party last week. Two unrelated guys, four years apart in age. One is Armie Hammer, who has been on Gossip Girl and is great-grandson to oil tycoon Armand Hammer. And the other is Josh Pence, a model.

Here’s more on the cast, which includes Timberlake.

Oopsie on the descender, iPhone. UPDATE: Neven helped me submit...

Fri, 25 Jun 2010 13:55:00 -0700

Oopsie on the descender, iPhone.

UPDATE: Neven helped me submit my first bug to Radar! Problem ID 8132574. So proud.

UPDATE 2: Now this is interesting. The descender only gets cut off if you access Contacts through the Phone app. If you access Contact info through the Messages app (by scrolling to the top and tapping “Contact Info”, or the Contacts app (which I never use), the descender is rendered correctly.

Local anchorman John Beard reports on a new coffee drink...

Fri, 25 Jun 2010 11:08:00 -0700

Local anchorman John Beard reports on a new coffee drink (1979)

Maybe my favorite-to-quote Arrested Development line. Always good in a Starbucks.

Face/OffTime “Cameron, I want to try something.” So...

Thu, 24 Jun 2010 21:18:00 -0700

Face/OffTime

“Cameron, I want to try something.”

So Cameron and I are facing a half hour ago. It’s my first FaceTime and I’m completely mindblown. Steve and Jony’s demo at WWDC didn’t even begin to convey the magic of this thing or the radical shift it represents. But that’s aside.

We’re chatting, cracking jokes, switching to the back-cameras and giving each other tours of our places. Things everyone is going to do their first few times facing. (Incidentally, it’s called facing. If you use SMS, you text someone. If you use FaceTime, you face them. Cameron called this earlier in the day.)

Around my house, to fill any silence, we’ll just call out “FaceTIIIIIIIIIIME”. Try it on. Instant cool attitude.

It turns out it’s okay to look away from the camera while you’re facing. Not discouraged. Go ahead and check your Twitter. The other person won’t be offended. The rules of FaceTime etiquette will be written quickly, and then we’ll all be good.

One hundred million smile points to the first person who rigs one of these for facing on an iPhone. Double when the rig is business-appropriate and we start seeing them in stock library photos of pretty office ladies.

“Cameron, I want to try something. Yeah, cut off half your face. No, the other half. Yeah, that’s it. Okay, look at the camera. This is gonna be great.”

So yes. FaceTime is a new thing, and it doesn’t suck in all the same ways as the things that tried it before. I feel like I’ll be facing a lot. Face me if you want a facejob and we’ll face back and forth forever.

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Nine Deaths of the Credit Sequence Clearly, this was an attempt...

Thu, 24 Jun 2010 19:04:00 -0700

Nine Deaths of the Credit Sequence

Clearly, this was an attempt at some sort of a Bond-esque intro to the 1985 Shô Kosugi suckfest “Nine Deaths of the Ninja”, what with the sexy(?) leotard dancers Vaselined to within an inch of their lives, the budget fog machine, the best pop ballad $350 could buy, the delightful(?) interplay between weaponry and the female form (which, would it have killed them to rehearse first?).

Shô Kosugi was a hero to me as a kid. But had I seen this, my life might’ve gone in a completely other direction. And not into ninjutsu. Like it did. Because I practice the art of the stealth assassin. I’m a pirate. Now I’m a wizard. Now I’m a sexy leotard dancer.