I’ve put up a new teaser page over on Opiumfield.
I’m just on the phone to AppleCare (again). The connector for my MagSafe power adapter is falling apart after only a few months of not-at-all-excessive use. Apple really needs to spend more on QA and testing - the hardware they’ve sent out to people this year has been shockingly sub-par.
A year later, still not quite plugged in right.
This time last year, I put together an essay exploring Christian movie review websites. Here are a few extra things I’ve found. Take this from Plugged In’s review of Bridget Jones 2: The Edge of Reason:
The Brit counterpart to the f-word, “shag,” is used repeatedly, usually in reference to the physical act.
Oh, yes, our counterpart to that strange Americanism ‘fuck’. Because in British (pseudo-)gangster rap, we really say things like “I want to shag this shit up, shoot the shag out of those shagging fools on the Eastside [of Bracknell] for disrespecting my poo-poo [or, erm, shit]” etc.
Bridget has a serious addiction to cigarettes, and she smokes throughout the film despite several pledges to quit (her resolutions never last more than a few minutes).
For crying out loud, it wouldn’t be Bridget Jones if she didn¹t try and give up smoking throughout the movie. It¹s supposed to be about a certain type of young-to-middle-aged chronically single women. The fact that she smokes ciggies is hardly a damning complaint.
Imagine how differently Bridget’s would have read if, instead of a trio of well-meaning friends as lost and confused as she was, she had one friend willing to tell her the Truth.
New plot, guys: she suddenly finds a Chick tract and reads how the Catholics, lesbians and D’n’D players are colluding with those damn secular humanists to take over the world and instead dedicates her life to Jesus and starts wearing, well, this stuff and nodding along to Duane Gish. That would have made a riproaring movie!
What about this shocker from The Incredibles:
Mr. Incredible consumes (or is about to consume) wine and a mixed drink. One of Syndrome’s henchmen opens a bottle of champagne while playing a sadistic drinking game with his comrades.
Drinking wine? Evil heretic! I bet he used his evil witchcraft powers to turn water in to wine thus undermining the alcohol market! Doesn’t he know that we live in a Christian Nation?
This little nugget from the review of Simple Plan’s Still Not Getting Any is interesting too:
This five-member Canadian band is terrific when railing against injustices and misplaced priorities or setting its jaw in the face of opposition. But the vitriol gets tiresome. And, as Proverbs 12:1 points out, patently rejecting good advice is foolish. The question is, Which of these thoughts will teens internalize?
Where’s the evidence that teens will internalise it? Oh, yeah, that’s right. If you don’t raise them to think, they will interalise any damn thing that comes on the cultural conveyor belt. As Bertrand Russell said, there is no Bible verse praising intelligence.
I have to close on a review of Kelly Clarkson’s Breakaway album:
These lyrics aren’t exactly offensive, but they may compound emotional strife in moodier teens.
Oh, yes. Terrible. Teenagers might get influenced by a Kelly Clarkson album. Think of the emotional strife that could cause. Perhaps we ought to set up a gothic poetry LJ community to help them express this terrible pain. They can copy paste lyrics from a Kelly Clarkson fan website to ease the suffering.
Nothing much has changed. They have loosened up with the venal ticklist - the Bridget Jones 2 review shows it. But they are still holding fast to the theory that watching a movie will turn kids in to raving lunatics. Still, we need to focus on the family*. At the expense of anyone with a brain.
* As long as that family accept the bodily resurrection of Christ and confess that Jesus Christ is their personal Lord and Saviour, reject the theory of evolution, don¹t support the right to choose on abortion, vote Republican, have no time for those pesky gays and would quite like to go atheist hunting. With a mortar.
Reason Magazine have a great interview Kirby Dick who has produced a documentary on the failings of the MPAA’s rating system. I’ve said nasty stuff about alternative rating systems, but however silly the alternatives are, the MPAA’s rating system really sucks. As does the BBFC - our version of the MPAA rating system.
