* Like me, my movie buddy Jason Adams tries and fails to review Crank: High Voltage. It’s review-proof if you’re trying not to ruin it for your readers. All I can do is promise that its opening sequence is more entertaining than Terminator Salvation‘s entire duration.
* Speaking of which, Harry Knowles spends most of his hilariously stereotype-fulfilling “review” of Terminator Salvation talking about the movie shitting directly onto his eyeballs, but I actually think he’s onto something in comparing it to the lifeless, insight-free Alien Resurrection, and his line about Bryce Dallas Howard is dead-on.
* I’m going to link to Jason’s post containing some images from and links about Lars Von Trier’s new horror movie Anti-Christ just so I can say I’ve done so. Having seen Dancer in the Dark I believe I’ve plumbed what passes for Von Trier’s depths as much as I need to–I think he’s a phony, I think his misanthropy applies to everyone but himself which is incredibly dull (I mean, just contrast the Von Trier quote Jason reprints with the Roger Ebert quote he reprints and see if Von Trier himself doesn’t give lie to Ebert’s entire point about the film’s “despair”), and just like Jackie Treehorn I think he treats objects like women, man. There’s not much I’ve read, pro or con, about Anti-Christ that makes me feel like I need to reevaluate this. Still, I’m a sucker for beautifully composed shots of severe genital mutilation, so who knows.
* There’s some fun footage from the upcoming remake of V popping up here and there: here are two clips and here’s a longish trailer. I’m catching a Battlestar Galactica vibe here and there, in particular an echo of the Baltar/Six relationship during one of the clips, which is nice; I’m also pretty happy about the casting for reasons that I’m not going to go into here for fear of it coming across as a spoiler for another show, but you’ll probably know what I’m talking about when you see it. This is not to say that there’s no “network TV does alien invasion” hokum in there, because there’s plenty…I dunno, man, it’s lizards under human masks, that’s rad.
* I’m bookmarking Ben Morse’s thoughts on the Gossip Girl season finale until I’ve seen the episode, which should happen tonight in between Adam Lambert fixes.
* Tom Spurgeon’s review of Jason’s Low Moon collection may be the closest thing to a pan I’ve ever seen a Jason book get.
* Torture Link of the Day: The notion that the Guantanamo detainees will waltz out of prisons in the continental U.S. like the Joker from Arkham Asylum is indeed one of the most bizarre and ridiculous contentions to become the default position for the political and media establishment in quite some time.
* A Grant Morrison documentary? Sure, I’ll eat it. (Also, after seeing what they did with Bai Ling in Crank 2 I couldn’t help but chuckle about the subtitles they use to help the viewer decipher Morrison’s accent. I wonder who he considers to be his shiny lunchbox?)