Movie Reviews

Wow, tough job: talking about every movie I've seen in the past month.



Weird Science: This movie was... really weird. It is about two teenagers who create their own sexpot using a computer. There are all sorts of cheesy special effects and the oddest things happen. However, there were some good laughs in there and it had a happy ending. ***



Stephen Bizer's Otto: A 15-minute sci-fi romp that sets up its own rules for existence, and it doesn't care what you think! It has a complex plot, but if you can follow along, you'll find it enjoyable. ***



Stephen Bizer's Illegal Aliens: Also a short film, and also lots of fun, but this one is animated, and black-and-white too. The drawings are noirish and humorous and the plot fits the style perfectly. ****

Pretty in Pink: Incredibly '80s, Pretty in Pink is a romance tale that is well told through a great script, a talented cast (especially the otherwise-nobody, the guy who plays Ducky), and solid directing and producing work. The story is a classic, but the '80s were really the worst decade ever (except the 1340s or maybe the 1350s), and the film's pop culture is really dated. ***

Men At Work: A comedy about garbage men. The premise is really funnier than the jokes, which I suppose is a good thing because that makes the jokes all the funnier. Definitely a good choice. ***

The Bourne Ultimatum: Probably my favorite action movie ever. The plot twists are great, Matt Damon is awesome and the action is phenomenal. Loose ends are tied up with a pretty bow. It's a climactic adrenaline rush end to a great action series. It's definitely not a problem that they reworked some of the ideas from the first one. My beef is with the directing that overemploys the "raw" camera style. Almost perfect, but not quite. ****

Fletch: Chevy Chase is great in this comedy about a Los Angeles investigator-reporter who digs just deep enough into a drug-trafficking problem to uncover a gusher of mystery, bigamy, and Utah. He has jokes and quips by the gross. The plot and the direction are enough to make you see it again, just for fun. ****

Transformers and Speed are coming tomorrow when I'm not so tired.

I'm Back from my Poconos trip

Yesterday I returned from Pennsylvania and the annual Hoberg family reunion. First I flew to Philadelphia, then drove to my aunt and uncle's house, where I spent two nights before driving to my great-uncle's lodge in the Poconos, where I stayed for a week with some of my extended family, whom I'm sure you would love to hear about, so I'll give you a quick rundown of the tree. ROSA Present at the Poconos were: Jan and Mark Gingold with identical twin daughters Sara and Beth and son Daniel (Beth brought her boyfriend Jeremy and Dan brought his girlfriend Janelle), Rick and Jeanne Hoberg with son Matthew and daughter Mellissa (Mellissa brought her friend Kim), Peter Hoberg with son William (me) and daughter Becca, Chris and Ron Bizer with sons Stephen and Tim and daughter Kate, my father's parents Shirley and George Hoberg, Shirley's brother, Bill Kieser, his daughter Valerie, and Don and Jane, whom I don't really know. ROSA Not present were: bunches of other Hobergs, Areharts, and Harrisons.

The lodge overlooks Silver Lake, of which a picture can be found in the upper right corner of this post. The lake is great for swimming and for catching fish. This year I landed three rather large fish, of which I am very proud, a pickerel and two bass. It has long been tradition for the entire family to converge on this site and cause havoc from sheer numbers. This year had a relatively small crowd compared to other years, but there was still lots of havoc. What was really awesome was that all week long there was a chance of thunderstorms, but it didn't so much as rain until the one night our cookout was planned.

There was a dilapidated pool table there, and I played just about everyone on it. I'm not very good at pool. I was introduced to a new game called Pictionary-Telephone, which is exceedingly fun. I visited two waterfall parks, which were both fun, and managed to skip a rock 4 times. I found out that the fish in Silver Lake are attracted to sunscreen the hard way (they chased me out of the water). And I joined The Woodbumz, my cousins' white-rap group. Their names? Ginga Snapz, Bredd Loaf, 20-Inch D, Ju-C Juice, and Vanilla Bean Speck (Matthew, Tim, Daniel, Stephen, and me). They featured me on the track "Damn, it Feels Good to Be a Woodbum," which I believe will be on their album of the same name. Stick around for rhymes to be published on this blog.