rantlust

Posted by anupcs on January 17th 2008 in Celebrity, Entertainment, Television
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As the reality TV season gets well underway with new Sanjayas in American Idol and the tired antics of a bald billionaire in The Apprentice, there is a new kid in town. It’s called American Gladiators and I happened upon it while flipping channels the other day. The show is a revival of a not so hot show from the early 90s. It pits contestants against each other (two at a time - separate rounds for men and women) in a hard competition of strength and agility. En route, they have to also overcome the show’s real stars, the “gladiators.” The new (actually on its second season) show seems to be a big hit according to Nielsen despite (or maybe because of) its obvious cheesiness. The lovely Laila Ali (Muhammad’s offspring) and the hulking Hogan play genial hosts.

The show might be yawn inducing for the reality TV deniers (you know who you are). But I was hooked enough to watch a couple of episodes though not enough to Tivo the show. It’s not the competition or the contestants that intrigued me but the gladiators with exotic names concealing their real personae. With names like Wolf, Justice, Hellga, Mayhem, they try to stop the hapless contestants from completing their tasks. Among them stands out 25 year old Gina Carano aka Crush. She’s a Muay Thai fighter and will be equally at ease at the Playboy Mansion or an Ultimate Fighting event. The word kickass best describes this superwoman. The cheers are loudest when she faces a contestant on the show. One of the audience-held signs on a recent show declared a crush on Crush. It’s not too hard to feel a crush yourself.

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Posted by anupcs on September 06th 2007 in Celebrity, Entertainment, Music
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As you have definitely heard by now, the man who made opera accessible to the masses, Luciano Pavarotti, died today morning in Italy. With his passing, we lost a larger than life legend. I have never been much into opera and (unfortunately) never been to a performance but I do have a few CDs of Pavarotti (notably his “Three Tenors” series with Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras).

The ever reliable Youtube obviously has many performances by Pavarotti for me to embed here but this one strikes me as particularly awe-inspiring… it’s a duet with the late great James Brown singing Brown’s “It’s a Man’s World.” May both men rest in peace.

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Posted by john on August 03rd 2007 in Entertainment, Humor, Internet
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Barats and Bereta are a popular YouTube duo who have posted many humorous clips on various topics including several on college life. I first came across them on YouTube about a year ago and became an instant fan of their humor and social commentary. The duo met at Gonzaga University which features prominently in many of their videos. After building up a huge fan following, I heard that they were supposedly getting some kind of TV deal to create a comedic show or act or something. Their YouTube creative output has conspicously dropped leading me to believe they actually have graduated and have less time on their hands with real jobs instead! Well hopefully we’ll see more of them and their works in the future. Anyway, the following YouTube video is one of my personal favorites where they poke fun at stereotypes of American suburban life and attitudes. There used to be a longer bookended version of this which for some reason they have removed from YouTube but the essence of the video is still here:

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Posted by anupcs on July 28th 2007 in Art, Entertainment, Photography, USA
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Posted by anupcs on July 09th 2007 in Earth, Entertainment, Environment, Music, Science, World
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Thanks to TiVo, I was able to watch a lot of footage of the Live Earth concerts on July 7. The gigs were held in all seven continents in nine cities (New York, London, Johannesburg, Rio de Janeiro, Shanghai, Hamburg, Sydney, Tokyo, and Adelaide Island in Antarctica) to highlight the inconvenient truths regarding global warming. A large number of music stars ranging from Metallica to Madonna and some newly revived oldies such as The Police and Genesis (sans Peter Gabriel) participated. Eco St. Gore appeared as well with his hybrid driving buddies Leo DiCaprio and Cameron Diaz though there were no PowerPoint slides this time.

This is all good but as Ricky Gervais (of the British “The Office” fame) cynically hinted at Wembley while introducing an act, all these celebrities came to these concerts from all over the world, some of them with their entourages in private jets and is that a good message to convey when dealing with carbon offsets and the like? The BBC’s coverage of the concert ended with the following telling paragraph:

“Thousands of plastic cups were left on the Wembley Stadium floor at the end of the London concert, despite organisers urging the audience to put them into recycling bins provided.”

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Posted by anupcs on July 06th 2007 in Celebrity, Entertainment, Movies
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Say what you’ll about the ’80s, it did spawn a few badass super cops in movies taking off from where Dirty Harry left off. Among them were Mel “I hate Jews” Gibson as Riggs in the Lethal Weapon franchise and Bruce Willis as John McClane in the Die Hard franchise. I previously talked about this year being a year of sequels in Hollywood and I especially mocked Willis for doing another Die Hard. He was always my favorite of the action superstars of the ’80s (others being Stallone, the Governator, Seagal, and Van Damme - let’s ignore the older Eastwood and Harrison Ford for now) but even so, I thought he shouldn’t have returned for yet another installment of this franchise. I am happy to say that I was wrong. A bruised and battered Bruce is back with a vengeance in the role that made him a superstar. And he’s looking good.

This is not a movie for who Hitchcock once referred to as “The Plausibles” — you know who you are. This is an old fashioned action movie with limited computer generated effects and some real Hong Kong style action (pre-”Crouching Tiger,” I mean). This is the best movie since the original. The plot is so ridiculous that it enhances the movie rather than diminish it. The chemistry between Willis and Justin Long (he’s the Mac in the famous Mac vs PC ads) is fun and we have a menacing villain in the form of the stunning Maggie Q. In my opinion, she should have been the main villain rather than the girlfriend slash henchperson of the real villain, played by Timothy Olyphant. The story line is not important; suffice it to say that none of it makes sense but you are in for a treat if you leave your brains in the lobby and go to enjoy some kickass stunts and things being blown apart. The cast also includes Kevin Smith (the director of movies like “Clerks”) and Cyril Raffaelli (the French stuntman who was responsible for the incredible French movie, “District B13“). As for Willis, he is at his minimalist best not seen since “The Sixth Sense.”

It’s good to have Bruce Willis back. Demi who?

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Posted by john on April 04th 2007 in Commercials, Disasters, Entertainment, India, Sports
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A funny but rather true view of what ails Indian cricket today. Enjoy!

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Posted by anupcs on March 30th 2007 in Celebrity, Entertainment, Music, Television, USA
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Even if you won’t admit that you watch “American Idol” like 35 million other Americans, you must have still heard of the cult phenomenon who is Sanjaya Malakar. The 17 year old hula dancing, shaggy haired, half Indian, half Italian, effeminate dude who will single-handedly bring down the show if he wins it. A few weeks ago, such an eventuality would have been scoffed at (Simon Cowell famously quipped that he won’t be back if Sanjaya wins Idol this season) but now it’s not looking that unrealistic. He’s the underdog that has become a strong wild horse and not because he’s a fantastic belter of songs… far from it.

Due to the efforts of his many tween fans, Howard Stern, and the web site votefortheworst.com the erstwhile shy teenager has beat all odds to make it to the top 9. On the other side of the coin, this Darwin award potential is on a hunger strike till Sanjaya gets booted off. Of late, he has become emboldened and seems almost carefree while on stage. From causing young girls to bawl uncontrollably (original here; SNL spoof here) to confounding the judges, Sanjaya has brought life to an otherwise boring season. While he is no Frank Sinatra, I don’t think he’s William Hung either. He’s definitely better than your average Karaoke singer. And no matter what Simon Cowell thinks, Idol is not just a singing competition. It’s about the whole package.

I have never voted for a contestant on Idol before but I think this year, I am going to join Stern and the purveyors of votefortheworst.com and start calling in my votes for Sanjaya.

A whole new vocabulary has sprung around Sanjaya now: if you are his fan, you are a fanjaya; if you are his mom, you are momjaya; if you start copying his wacko hairstyles, then you have been sanjaya-ed; and now, if you are a supporter of him on rantlust, you are a rantjaya.

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