Friday night!

Jimmy, I have to agree with you that 'Trinidad'was very fascinating and emotional, though I felt it ran about 10 minutes too long with what felt like too many false endings. I was particularly touched by the commitment made by Sabrina and I think it was Laura's children. I also found the part religion and small town life plays in the film to be interesting. I asked the director P.J. Raval about it and he said that he's not religious but he put all the talk about religion in there because Sabrina is Catholic as is most of the town.

Another funny thing was I asked him if there were ever any hate crimes committed while he was filming. And aside from a group of churches and pastors railing against the sex-change operations in the local newspaper, the biggest thing was Fred Phelps himself showed up in town after filming was completed, and the townspeople asked him to leave! Awesome. Apparently director Raval said that the references to religion and the lack of hate crimes in the small town were put in to not only reflect Sabrina's religious nature but to go against the stereotype of close-minded small towns.

Interestingly, the talk of Fred Phelps invading their town after filming reminds me of something that happened last year. I had just seen the movie 'The Keeper: The Legend of Omar Khayyam', a well meaning if mediocre movie about the ancient Muslim astronomer Omar Khayyam and his quest for tolerance and understanding amidst the rise of intolerant zealotry, and was asking director Kayvan Mashayekh some questions when the audience was told that someone outside was passing out comic strip pamphlet by hardcore conservative Christian nutjob 'Jack Chick' (he who wrote that Dungeons & Dragons leads to Satan worship and not abstinence and geek status, and I say that lovingly). Oh the irony.

I'm dying to see 'Let the Right One In'. I've heard nothing but great things about it and can't wait. I also want to see 'Vexville', being a fan of more out there anime (the works of Hayao Miyazaki, Satoshi Kon, etc).

Though Kristian I have to disagree about 'Sunshine Cleaning', of course that may be because indie dramas like it are absolutely not my thing at all. In fact the movie gave me a new rule: if a movie's soundtrack is more than 75% made up of acoustic guitar and it isn't a western, I will not see it. Man I can barely stand those plodding, self important, dreary cry fests. I can get drama like that for free on Thanksgiving; don't feel like paying for it at the movies.

I'm also looking forward to what the Weekly's latest after party is like tonight at the Longhorn is like. Hopefully I'll see more actual people from the Weekly there (*wink wink*).