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FLICK PICKS: Politics, Hollywood style
September 3, 2008 10:34 AM
With this year's presidential race shaping up fact to be wilder than fiction, perhaps the scripted stuff offers more true insight than reality can.
Hollywood political films play Wednesday nights through September on Turner Classic Movies, starting with such on-screen campaigns as 1958's The Last Hurrah with Spencer Tracy and 1972's The Candidate with Robert Redford -- a savvy double feature this Wednesday (Sept. 3) at 8 and 10:15 p.m. ET.
They're followed by Henry Fonda and Cliff Robertson in 1964's The Best Man (Wednesday at 12:15 a.m. ET), Robert Altman's 1975 Nashville (2 a.m. ET, photo above) and the 1932 Guy Kibbee-Bette Davis comedy The Dark Horse (4:45 a.m. ET).
Congress is at the heart of such Sept. 10 titles as Advise and Consent and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. On Sept. 17, it's presidents in action, both real and imagined, from Raymond Massey's Abe Lincoln in Illinois [right] to James Coburn's '60s romp The President's Analyst. Corruption comes into play Sept. 24, in All the King's Men and Preston Sturges' The Great McGinty.
See all the titles and times at TCM's rich American politics minisite here, along with some fun vintage movie trailers.
FLICK PICKS: Cinerama lives! (Sort of)
August 28, 2008 11:32 AM
How the West Was Won debuts on Encore Westerns Saturday at 8 p.m. after a six-year frame by frame restoration of the original three-strip Cinerama print of the 1962 epic.
John Wayne, Henry Fonda, James Stewart, Gregory Peck and Debbie Reynolds head an all-star cast, directed by John Ford, Henry Hathaway and George Marshall, in a sprawling three-part saga chronicling four generations of a 19th century pioneer family. The film won Oscars for best writing, editing and sound, and earned five other nominations, including best picture.
But an even bigger draw back in 1962 was the surround-screen Cinerama process, which wrapped the picture around moviegoers in specially equipped theaters in large cities. Cinerama films were shot with three cameras and projected with three projectors, all interlocked and overlapped, after being specifically designed to be seen on a curved screen. (Click on Cinerama for an informative Wikipedia explanation of the process. And then go here to read about filming How the West Was Won in three-strip Cinerama.)
This Is Cinerama premiered the process in 1952 at New York's Broadway Theatre, and most succeeding Cinerama titles were also travelogue-type documentaries created to exploit the wrapped-view screen (much as 3-D films tended to emphasize making objects move outward, more than making sense). How the West Was Won and The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm were the only story-driven Cinerama features.
Three-strip Cinerama didn't last long, being so expensive and cumbersome, but the brand name was applied through the 1960s for such single-lens ultra-widescreen films as It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World and even 2001: A Space Odyssey. Surviving Cinerama theaters include Seattle's Cinerama and Hollywood's Arclight Cinerama Dome. They just don't have many Cinerama movies to show.
So find the biggest TV screen you can this weekend and tune to Encore Westerns (click the link to see a preview), while pretending you've landed a road-show ticket to a 1962 Cinerama presentation that's bending the screen around you. (Or try the same trick with the Sept. 9 DVD/Blu-ray release.) That's the closest most of us 21st century folks will get to the mind-bending Cinerama experience.
Above: Cinerama frame from Swedish print of How the West Was Won, seen at in70mm.com.
WEIRD & WILD: 'True Blood' vampires ooze onto the web
August 26, 2008 3:23 PM
True Blood is so much fun on the internet, who cares if it ever premieres on TV?
OK, I'm getting carried away there. HBO's new Grand Guignol vampire drama/comedy/character study is pretty tasty in hour episodic form, too, which viewers can see next week when the juicy action debuts Sunday, Sept. 7 at 9 p.m. Hot sex, blood-drinking, meaty romance -- what's not to love?
But why wait? HBO's viral promo campaign is already online. While not as lurid as the series itself -- you'll see! -- it's a hoot and a half of a teaser.
There's bloodcopy.com -- with its pseudo-news reports chronicling "the amazing days we live in as vampires attempt to integrate with humans." That introduces the core theme of HBO's moody Louisiana bayou saga: broody, hot and bothered 173-year-old vampire dude Bill Compton (Stephen Moyer) trying to assimilate, perhaps personally, with mind-reading human waitress/loner Sookie Stackhouse (Oscar-winner Anna Paquin).
There's also trubeverage.com -- which "reminds vampires to drink responsibly" when it comes to that new synthetic blood that's freed them of their fury and allowed them to emerge above-ground, so to speak. To access the site's arch ads -- "This blood's for you" (!) -- you have to enter not your age but the date/century you were "turned" (as in: "into a vampire"). It's "all flavor, no bite." Nice. I'm partial to Type O myself.
And then there's lovebitten.net -- "the site created exclusively for vampires and the humans who love them. Hungry for love? Get a taste at lovebitten.net."
HBO's own True Blood series site hosts graphic novels with a definite blood-red tinge, along with the usual character descriptions, interviews, show trailers and behind-the-scenes videos. It's also got links to even more viral sites, like the American Vampire League ("Vampires were people, too").
They're all deliciously tongue-in-cheek, yet subtle, trusting viewers to get the wit without being hammered over the head. Or staked through the heart.
They speak accurately of this latest HBO offering from Six Feet Under creator Alan Ball. The flamboyant action in True Blood may be truly over the top -- neither the violence nor the sex are for the faint of heart -- but the scripts' underlying character study resonates with full-blooded humanity.
Pun intended. But true, too.
TV DVD: Digital copies, ringtones, text-back freebies
August 25, 2008 4:20 PM
DVD is soooo 1998. TV studios aren't just releasing discs now, they're pushing free iPod copies, ringtones and other goodies to keep consumer dollars flowing in a time of lagging DVD interest.
At least that's how Heroes, The Office, One Tree Hill and even Adam-12 are currently trying to get us engaged.
Here's how to grab some DVD-related freebies:
Heroes Season 2 (out Aug. 26) -- Fans can text "SNEAK" to 62288 now to get a 45-second reply video teasing the upcoming Season 3, starting on NBC Sept. 22.
The Office Season 4 (out Sept. 2) -- Fans can text "SCENE" to 62288 now for a reply that includes a deleted scene from the DVD.
One Tree Hill Season 5 (out Aug. 26) -- Buying the DVD gets you a promo sheet explaining how to download digital copies of all 18 episodes from iTunes for free. (The included code can be used only once, so don't expect to supply your friends.) That would otherwise incur an iTunes cost of $35.82, so it's an easy, inexpensive way to watch episodes across different formats.
Adam-12 Season 2 (out Sept. 30) -- Buying the DVD gets you a promo sheet giving info for text or web access to obtain a free ringtone (for use with certain providers).
REALITY CHECK: 'Dancing With the Stars' cast
August 25, 2008 11:47 AM
No deaf people or amputees this time. Just Erica Kane and Olympic athletes. And Cloris Leachman. Gloriously fun and foul-mouthed 82-year-old Cloris Leachman!
ABC will reign her in, of course, on Dancing With the Stars. (You can watch her here, unleashed, if bleeped, getting blue about Jack Benny and John Stamos in her latest Comedy Central roast rant.) But Leachman is still a blast, as anybody who's seen her from Young Frankenstein to Malcolm in the Middle can attest. And she'll be testing new DWTS professional Corky Ballas, dad of Mark (winner last time with Kristi Yamaguchi).
Good luck keeping up with that, Susan Lucci. The All My Children star does, however, get to trot with Tony Dovalani. ABC also announced Monday that hot bod Maksim Chmerkovskiy will return after a season off to lead Olympic beach volleyballer Misty May-Treanor.
It's names like that -- and gay *NSYNC-er Lance Bass and hulking NFL lineman Warren Sapp and comic loose cannon Jeffrey Ross -- that make Dancing With the Stars my big exception to the reality/competition rule. Watching "real" people backstabbing and badmouthing doesn't do much for me. Neither do talent contests with "adorable" 4-year-olds or "real-life" makeovers/swaps so obviously orchestrated by producers.
But Dancing With the Stars is a feel-good show of considerable spontaneity that features contestants truly trying to master new skills. They're people who've already accomplished something (except, perhaps, for Hollywood hanger-on Kim Kardashian), and now they're putting themselves on the line in unfamiliar territory. Unlike most folks in reality TV, these celebs really do risk something. Of course they also grab another 15 minutes in the limelight.
DWTS benefits from the genre's best host, Tom Bergeron, who gets off sharp and funny retorts -- live -- while still making the stars feel comfortable, even when they're fainting (just ask Marie Osmond). He has a deft touch that doesn't often get its due. And then there's Samantha Harris, the second-banana fashion-plate we love to hate, a perky grinner just a couple degrees removed from the Paula Abdul model. At least she doesn't babble.
So here's the full lineup of stars for the DWTS season kicking off on ABC Sept. 22:
LANCE BASS - Former *NSYNC heartthrob teams with 2006 U.S. Youth Latin Champ and 2007 World Swing Dance Champ Lacey Schwimmer, in her series debut.
TONI BRAXTON - Grammy-winning singer (Un-Break My Heart) and actress (Beauty and the Beast, Aida), who's been battling heart disease, is partnered with Alec Mazo.
BROOKE BURKE - TV host (Rock Star: INXS) and actress (Miss Guided) dances with Derek Hough.
ROCCO DISPIRITO - Celebrity chef (The Restaurant), promoting his fall A&E series Rocco Gets Real, teams with Karina Smirnoff.
MAURICE GREENE - Sydney Olympics track gold medalist dances with two-time champion Cheryl Burke.
KIM KARDASHIAN - E!'s Keeping up with the Kardashians babe is led by defending champ Mark Ballas.
CLORIS LEACHMAN - Emmy, Golden Globe and Oscar winner gets newcomer Corky Ballas.
CODY LINLEY - The show's youngest-ever contestant, Jake Ryan on Hannah Montana, teams with two-time champ Julianne Hough.
SUSAN LUCCI - La Lucci, a three-decade daytime faves as Erica Kane on All My Children, dances with Tony Dovolani.
MISTY MAY-TREANOR - Beach Volleyball gold medalist now partners with Maksim Chmerkovskiy.
TED MCGINLEY - TV stalwart (Married…with Children, Hope & Faith, Happy Days, The Love Boat) dances with newcomer Inna Brayer, U.S. Amateur 10 Dance Champion.
JEFFREY ROSS - "Roastmaster General" comic gets to hold hottie Edyta Sliwinska.
WARREN SAPP - Pro Bowl defensive tackle teams with Kym Johnson.
FLICK PICKS: Laurel & Hardy on TCM, plus other vintage stars
August 22, 2008 7:03 PM
Turner Classic Movies' Summer Under the Stars month of daily film festivals may be winding down, but it's winding up with some powerful stuff.
Saturday's 24-hour salute to Laurel & Hardy begins with early sound shorts. (Sorry, no silents this time.) The 1930 fave Night Owls (6 a.m.) kicks off three hours of quickies, also including Blotto, Brats, Hog Wild, Be Big, Laughing Gravy and Our Wife. That leads up to their feature debut in 1931's Pardon Us (9:15 a.m.), followed by a fun mix of features and shorts. Top picks include the Oscar-winning short The Music Box (8 p.m., photo above), the classic convention feature Sons of the Desert (8:35 p.m.), Way Out West (9:45 p.m.) and more, concluding with one of the team's final features, 1943's anti-Nazi comedy Air Raid Wardens (early Sunday at 4:30 a.m., all on TCM).
Other late August honorees 6 a.m.-6 a.m. on TCM (with personal daily picks):
Sunday, Aug. 24: Henry Fonda (The Best Man at midnight)
Monday, Aug. 25: Ingrid Bergman (two Hitchcock films: Notorious at 8 p.m., Spellbound at 10 p.m.)
Tuesday, Aug. 26: Janet Leigh (Touch of Evil at 8 p.m., Psycho at 10 p.m.)
Wednesday, Aug. 27: Tony Curtis (Some Like It Hot at 8 p.m., Sweet Smell of Success at 10:15 p.m.)
Thursday, Aug. 28: Charlton Heston (Soylent Green at 1:30 a.m.)
Friday, Aug. 29: Marlon Brando (three-hour docu/bio Brando at 5 p.m.)
Saturday, Aug. 30: Katharine Hepburn (1973 interview The Dick Cavett Show at 11:15 a.m., Bringing up Baby at 2:30 p.m.)
Sunday, Aug. 31: Spencer Tracy (Bad Day at Black Rock at 4:30 a.m.)
OLYMPICS: NBC isn't the only one
August 15, 2008 11:57 AM
Nobody can say NBC's Beijing Olympics coverage doesn't root for the home folks. The network is hyping how it'll lead Friday night's 8 p.m. ET network coverage with a 20-minute recap of the women's gymnastics triumphs of American gold medalist Nastia Liukin and silver medalist Shawn Johnson.
So is this ugly American-ism? Bigfoot NBC execs stomping out coverage of other countries?
Not so fast, yankee. They're not the only ones. After years of bemoaning American TV's nationalistic Olympics coverage, I'm getting the chance this time to check out hours of Canadian tube coverage. A good friend in the great white north gave me online access to his Slingbox, allowing me to watch his Alberta cable channels over my broadband-connected New Jersey computer.
So what do you think Canadians could see Thursday night as NBC was showing swim phenom Michael Phelps heading live toward yet another world-record gold medal? Canada's CBC had its cameras trained on homegirl gymnast Elyse Hopfner-Hibbs finishing 16th in the women's all-around.
That's far from the only example. While gold medals were being won all over the place by all nationalities, Canadians had heavy CBC coverage of their countrymen/women, even as they failed to show in swimming (they did grab a fourth), failed to show in fencing (not even making the medal round), failed to even score against the U.S. after resuming a rain-delayed women's softball preliminary. Here's a typical newspaper headline this week up north where they're never hearing their national anthem on the Beijing medal stand: Woe Canada.
It's not like CBC isn't also showcasing the global glamour events in prime time -- swimming and gymnastics, same as NBC. But they cut away from much of what NBC showed Thursday night to offer the start of track and field qualifiers where Canadian athletes were competing. 
(That's shot putter Dylan Armstrong at right.) Actually, you can argue this decision two ways. Did CBC really think local-interest qualifiers were more interesting than world-record finals? Or was it NBC that was off-base by virtually ignoring the busy track and field start to saturate us with replays of Americans winning other preliminaries -- especially if they happened to involve women in bikinis? (Yes, I know beach volleyballers Misty May and Kerri Walsh are dominant athletes, too. But I'm not sure NBC would be quite so enthusiastic if they were wearing burkas.)
In other words, you can argue almost every broadcast decision two ways, or three. Or seven. It's become almost another Olympic sport to decry NBC's coverage for national bias, tape delays, and blackouts of other media outlets until the network deigns to "premiere" action that happened hours earlier. And yes, I'd rather see it live, as it happens.
Which, to a large extent, we now can -- NBCOlympics.com's new live online streams are superb opportunities to watch uninterrupted and un-blabbed-over action from two dozen sports, with at least a half-dozen often running simultaneously. All you need is access to a broadband-connected computer using a recent operating system (and downloadable streaming software that's free at the NBC site).
Choices streaming live simultaneously Friday morning included Venus and Serena Williams in tennis doubles, Rafael Nadal's live singles' match, Japan men in baseball, equestrian show jumping, women's basketball, and two women's soccer quarterfinals, including the U.S.-Canada match. The morning also offered live streams of badminton, fencing, field hockey, handball, judo, table tennis and weightlifting.
And it's all action -- no commercial breaks (only a short pre-roll ad), no tearjerking profiles with syrupy music, not even audio commentary other than the live event public-address announcements. Some streams do have running text commentary available in a box below the video window. Or, even more fun, you can choose four streams to run at once in NBCOlympics.com's amazing Live Video Control Room (just click Enlarge Video). It was easy Friday morning to follow the action in both the Williams sisters' doubles and Nadal's singles, while also keeping an eye on the two ongoing soccer quarterfinals. (Only the main window has audio, but you can swap among the four at any time.)
Is it more effort to get the streams going than to turn on the TV? Sure. But it takes less than five minutes for the computer-savvy to download the software, check the online listings, and get four choices clicked in at the Control Room. Luddites are less lucky, obviously. NBC wasn't offering the Williams sisters' doubles match live on TV at all, apparently holding this "marquee" event to "premiere" later in the day for higher viewership.
But still -- Friday morning did offer more than a half-dozen regular TV options on broadcast/cable/satellite channels, some carried live but most pre-packaged. (Get TV listings here.) Well-equipped HD homes could choose from a wealth of high-definition wonders -- three widely available HD options (NBC, USA, Universal HD) and two more temporary HD channels (Olympics Soccer and Olympics Basketball, on many cable/satellite systems).
One big remaining complaint against NBC: Prime-time coverage is limited to the big bad broadcast network. All those other cable options are blacked out from 8 p.m. to midnight ET when the majority of Americans are able to watch. Though plenty of events are simultaneously ongoing then -- say, swimming and gymnastics finals -- NBC only wants you watching the network mothership with its million-dollar commercials.
Not fair? No. But somebody's gotta pay the bills for that billion-dollar TV rights fee. And that somebody is the expanded prime-time audience. Maybe by London 2012, there'll be such big-time broadband that we'd be able to at least premium-pay our way to seeing more events live. Of course, for those games, ET prime time will coincide with a London local time of 1-5 a.m. So not much will be going on anyway.
Guess you really can't win. Even if you're not Canadian.
OLYMPICS: Online live quadruple-screen streams!
August 9, 2008 9:36 PM
I'm becoming a quick fan of NBC's online Olympics video. Like a kid set loose in a candy store, you get to taste whatever you want.
Live equestrian dressage? There it is, streaming full-motion in a window half the size of my laptop screen Saturday night. (And no blabby announcers! Just the competition itself! Woo-hoo!)
On-demand highlights of the previous evening's opening ceremonies? Click the As Seen on TV monitor among the icons on the left side of the streaming-video window; then pick your part, choosing from little picture windows lined up translucent over the ongoing dressage video. The parade of athletes/nations? Anytime you wanna see it. Cauldron lighting? Cool. Or maybe Li Ning's awesome dangling/sideways "walk" across the stadium-top scroll toward that big lighting moment? OK, that first.
NBC's streaming application (Microsoft Silverlight, a free download for Windows or Intel-powered Macs; just click NBC's online video link to be guided through installation) lets you switch videos on the fly, with an icon menu that offers choices of live streaming, as-broadcast coverage of past events, highlights of specific sports, and clips ranked most-watched by other users.
Click the left side's top icon for Live Video Control Room, where you can watch one live event widescreen in a main window, with three other live events 1-2-3 on smaller screens down the right side. Four at once! Saturday night, I had water polo on my main screen, with smaller screens of fencing, weightlifting and tennis. (NBCOlympics.com promises to offer as many as 20 simultaneous live streams.) Or watch one live, three on-demand from taped coverage (choose from dozens). Switch at will. Pretty great!
While you're watching a live event in the big video window, you can choose to include picture-in-picture of other clips. Keep watching dressage or water polo, with an optional text commentary window, while the opening ceremonies repeat in the tiny PIP space. See something in PIP that begs a closer look? Click the "swap" button to switch 'em out.
Just don't try clicking out of those GE pre-roll ads (not so long, less than 30 seconds). Isn't it strange how the menu icons/buttons seem to be disabled while commercials run?
And don't think you'll watch events at work Monday afternoon, lining up four screens of live coverage on your desk computer. Remember, Beijing is 12 hours ahead of New York time (ET). While you're at work in America, they're asleep in China.
For once -- at least with NBC's live online coverage -- night-shift workers get the best deal.
Check listings for both TV coverage and NBCOlympics.com's online streams here.
GONE TOO SOON: A toast to 'Bernie Mac'
August 9, 2008 5:31 PM
Bernie Mac, gone? At 50? Even more surprising than the comedian's early death from pneumonia (he'd been battling the immune disorder sarcoidosis for years) is the fact that his fine Fox sitcom The Bernie Mac Show doesn't seem to be repeating nationally anywhere.
At least the 2001-06 series can be found syndicated on local stations, like New York's WWOR and WNYW (sometimes seen as satellite "superstations"). The comic plays a fictionalized version of himself, a standup serving as foster dad to his druggie sister's kids -- "old school" stern to their new school scams -- weekdays at 4:30 p.m. ET on WWOR and weeknights at 1:30 a.m. ET on WNYW.
The sitcom was a pioneering breath of fresh air when it debuted on Fox in 2001, sort of a neo-Cosby Show, where dad knew best, or insisted he did, even when he didn't. Bernie weekly took us into his confidence as the wise narrator confessing to the camera, ensconsed in his poker room with cigars and wit, taking refuge from kiddie chaos he couldn't quite cope with.
This coming week's syndicated episodes (check your local station listings) have the kids going on strike from chores, with Bernie then hiring neighborhood "scabs," and depict Bernie coping with pet competition among the siblings.
The Bernie Mac Show may not be one of the all-time classics, but it truly made its mark as this decade started, paired with Malcolm in the Middle as a pioneer in the single-camera sitcomedy that has since come to dominate prime-time humor.
It's also worth noting that the show's cocreator with its star was Larry Wilmore, now making another kind of mark, on camera, as the tongue-in-cheek "senior black correspondent" on The Daily Show.
Take another look. At both of them.
OLYMPICS: Watch 2,200 hours online
August 8, 2008 2:27 AM
Since you never know when you're gonna wanna see North Korea play Nigeria in a pre-Olympic women's soccer match, you should go now -- NOW -- to NBCOlympics.com and download the Silverlight plug-in, so you can watch live streaming Olympics video on your computer. (Both Windows and Mac, though only Macs running on Intel chips.)
What are you waiting for? Go to this page -- click on any video, and do what the download protocol tells you to.
Because on Friday and over the weekend -- once the Beijing Olympics begin -- everybody will be heading there. And you know what those internet traffic jams are like.
In addition to the 1,400 hours of tube time NBC promises on its broadcast/cable networks (USA, Oxygen, Universal HD, et al), NBCOlympics.com is set to stream an additional 2,200 hours of events unlikely to get TV love -- archery, badminton, fencing, handball, judo, water polo. Even early matches in basketball and tennis are on this weekend's online schedule of 20 simultaneous streams. (And that doesn't count the 3,000 hours of on-demand web access to video recaps, profiles, highlights, et al.)
The streaming video quality is pretty swell, in my early experiments with a MacBookPro (2008 vintage) on a wireless connection via Comcast home broadband. Of course, there aren't 15 million people trying to access the site yet. But NBC's interface is sleek, offering tabs to click to additional pages of text info about the sport you're watching, while video continues running in its own window. You can also click to photo galleries, athlete profiiles, trivia and more.
Now is also the time to localize NBCOlympics.com's TV listings to reflect your city's NBC affiliate and cable/satellite channel locations, quick to do when the site offers you zip-specific choices (and remembers you via cookies when you come back). You can sign up for listings alerts, too, or print out selected grids.
Also online -- lots of those video "up close and personal" packages where athletes show you how to pole vault and platform drive or discuss their coaches and families. The video page lets you browse by channel (over in the right side box), with choices including all the various sports as well as Olympic trials or Beijing info. Telemundo, too -- the NBC-owned Spanish-language network offers its own video and text features en Espanol.
Start exploring now, so you'll know where to go to find what you want when you want to.
And let us know what your online experience turns out like.
