Batman: Arkham Asylum

This game came out of nowhere, at least on my radar. How many Batman games have there been, that have just been complete trash? Really, you could say the same thing for any comic-based game. In the early nineties, I was heavily into comics; I was also heavily into video games. So combine the two and you have greatness, right? I must admit that the SNES (and to a lesser degree the Genesis, incompetent as it was) was chock full of side-scrolling super hero romps. Unfortunately I thought they were all mediocre at the time and really didn't get into them.

Indeed, the big X-Men arcade game that supported a plethora of multiplayer goodness was so good that I actually brought $10 worth of quarters from the bank to the mall to play all day. That dream was crushed, but I did have a bucket load of quarters. The same excitement could not be reproduced on the home systems. I tried Spider-Man games, Wolverine, X-Men, etc and they were just a big collective meh.

So superhero games were ignored, rightfully so, through the 32 and 64-bit years, until Batman: Vengeance came out for the Cube. Why did this game get me excited to the point where I actually paid money? One thing: cape physics. Really. I'm not kidding; perhaps I was a bit dull, or the urge to play as Batman after so many years of pitiful games got a hold of me. We can't be certain except that I only played for a short time: this game was wretched. 

So back into the abyss of superhero games, and I was fine with that. Then people start talking (and by people I guess we refer to the internet) about this new Batman game, but as the internet goes as an often unreliable hype machine, I pay no heed. I don't even understand what type of game it's going to be: I don't care. But then it starts hitting me, and I download the demo. I refuse to play it. It's childish, but I wasn't about to be disappointed.

Then Cale, bless him, starts ranting about this game, describing it in its detail and I must play it. I still don't understand how the game plays: I hear murmurs that you slowly walk through the Asylum and just dispose of guys. What? Arkham is not big enough to do that for an entire games-length. Well, I could describe my confusion on how the game mechanics would be, but then I played the damn thing and I was sold in a heartbeat. We played for hours, and it was so detailed, so in-depth, so gripping, I didn't want to stop.

He let me borrow the game then my life was game over: every night for hours, until I conquered this game. I threw the controller in rage, I sat on the edge of my seat, I cowered during the Scarecrow's mind bending nightmares. After finishing the game, and with exhausted breathing I watched the credits roll, I knew, this was the superhero game I had waited for. 

Youth in Revolt, Last House on the Left (2009)

A couple of movies in the past week, one of which I watched on the spur of the moment and the other one I watched because I finally worked up the nerve to do so. I'll leave it up to you to decide which was which.

I saw a great graphic online that was kind of a build our own Michael Cera movie. You choose a few elements, move down the flowchart and choose some more Cera-cliches and you have yourself a movie. The terrible thing is they would all make decent movies. Youth in Revolt was decent, but nothing more. Perhaps I'm getting too old and can't relate. Sheeni is the object of desire in this movie and quite frankly, she's a bitch. I was almost expecting to find out at the end of the movie that she was the figment of Nick's imagination, as she was his perfect fantasy girl.

Nick's alter-ego was a great way to advance the plot, make the movie interesting and to give Cera a little more to do. Also, did they have to call him Nick? Wasn't he Nick in Infinite Playlist? Some of the other characters were memorable but nothing to write home about; I would give this movie a 5.5 out of 10.

The other is The Last House on the Left, which I honestly thought was a horror film, but was more of a thriller without supernatural elements. Not sure why I would be scared to watch either one: this was a thriller that made you hang on until the end to see some real nasty vengeance take hold. And you have to enjoy it, right? I'm going to have to go ahead and say revenge flicks seem to be picking up more steam in the past few years. And not just simple revenge, but revenge of the nature where Liam Neeson can spend two hours busting up bad guys in the most horrific way possible and we eat it up and want more. We don't even care if his daughter is ok...indeed, we know she is because Liam is in charge here.

So, I spent most of Last House waiting for the revenge to go down but it did take a while and I'm sure it's a better movie for it. Disturbing scenes abound and the bad guys get what they deserve...I think? Spoiler alert, of course, but the last guy's head explodes in a microwave. What? Nothing more to add to this really: it was a disposable film that was entertaining and did what it needed to do. It did not leave a bad taste but will not be very memorable.

Great Lake Swimmers

Well this has certainly been a while in the making, or waiting, but I felt like the movie "reviews" could use a little rest on the site. The idea of sharing thoughts on music albums is great, but I find it incredibly difficult to write about. I'm in awe when I peruse the reviews on sites such as Pitchfork or Stereogum: those writers are talented and I am not. They are passionate about their subjects, and then you realize that it's also a job for them: I'm an amateur who writes without an editor or even a grammar check. Most of the time my brain sloshes onto the keyboard and the end result is what you are reading now.

So going back to the music: it's tough to write about. I can't go into much detail except to say simple things such as "I really love it" or "I really...feel indifferent." If I'm going to make an album recommendation it's going to be a quick shout-out, hardly worth an entire multi-paragraph blog post.

So the Great Lake Swimmers? They are really great: mellow and warm. There is depth in the lead's voice, and some really fantastic instrumental work.

See?

Alright, this post is more about going to see this group in concert a few months ago. My friend Jay introduced me to the band and it did not take long to get into all of their albums. When the opportunity to see them in concert came up, it was a quick decision of executive-level execution. Buying the tickets was a different experience as I've had in the past: no specific seating, and they were playing in a church. I'm trying to find the name of the place but it's eluding me on their page right now, and I just noticed that they played in Wolfe Island, and for any of you familiar with the region, you know how small that place is, and isolated. This group rocks. I see now the place is Trinity St. Paul, in Toronto.

So, we try to get to the show a bit early, but of course, being a small venue, we were forced to stand outside for about an hour in the freezing cold. It was February and we were not fully prepared for this. We were also not prepared to be sitting in the pews for the concert: this was a real church, and not a big hall or anything; the acoustics were great. I'm glad we got there early as we got some great seats in the lower level. But you couldn't go wrong: this was an intimate setting and really, a treasure. We also could not take off our coats for the entire show: it was cold.

The Swimmers did a really fantastic job, of course. At the end Dekker went solo and acoustic. He managed to fill the entire venue...it was truly something else.

I'll leave it up to you now to go listen to some of their music, if you haven't already. This was definitely one of the best "concerts" I've been to. www.greatlakeswimmers.com

9

It's not often that I get an urge to watch a movie randomly and then follow through with those actions. Typically I get an urge to watch a movie, in general, and find nothing in my 400+ collection. How many times I skipped over 9, I can't be certain of. What I could be certain of last night, though, was that this movie needed to be seen, and seen it was.

And it was great. This movie probably popped onto my radar because Tim Burton's name was attached to it (he produced it). How much fanfare or reception it had I couldn't tell you; but I'm glad this movie exists and was wonderful. The first thing to come to mind is to say this movie does not screw around, and it is so concise I think other movies need to take a clue from this. A part of that is because it's animated: they probably don't waste a lot of CPU cycles processing film that ends up on the floor. With a traditional, live action movie I would imagine you would end up with a lot of extra footage and that somehow makes its way into the movie, as evidenced by some comedies that are about an hour too long (re: Knocked Up). It could be that, but right now I'm more inclined to say it's the screenplay that deserves kudos.

So continuing with the concise angle, this movie gets right to the point and does not inundate you with character setup, information and back stories. No, it lets all that flow out naturally over the course of the movie. You aren't given a flashback on why the title character is so important or is a proven leader. No, they don't shove all that down your throat: they put him in situations where he develops (important) and proves his character through his actions. These little characters have some big character.

The world that they are in is fantastic too: the war-torn post-WWII European city and time gets even better as they mix in these little technical marvels. The Matrix-esque robotic domination of humans is given a brief history, but gets more depth added is later in the story.

One more thing to add is that this movie was shockingly dark.While it was not really scary, exactly, I was surprised by some of the imagery. Definitely not for kids; this movie got darker and the characters more hopeless before seeing the light, and even when that does happen, it leaves things open (for slight interpretation).

I'll close by starting where I left off: considering most movies are too lengthy these days, this is one where I would be happy to see more of. But, I hope that a sequel is not in the works, as sequels do, it could tarnish this little gem.