I have a new favorite restaurant in State College, now. Herwig’s Austrian Bistro (voted #1 ethnic food in State College three years in a row!) starts with a verbal assault from the owner or his son as they direct your eyes to the chalkboard menu — which changes everyday — and instruct you to order from the board in Austrian or you will be hit with the large red wooden spoon…as is supposedly traditional. I don’t know about that, but the food was amazing and the jovial haranguing from the owner and son made me comfortably full.

The chalkboard menu that changes daily.			The kitchen counter — that’s the owner over the stove and his son on the left.			This sign on the table should clue you into the experience you will have at Herwig’s.			The infamous red spoon.
Vegetarian fare is limited at Herwig’s but Becky had this stunning three cheese sandwich.				Evie went with the other vegetarian option, potato cakes.				I went with the rib special. The ribs were an unfamiliar, but tasty, difference from what I expect on ribs but they were as tender as they should be, showing a perfect cooking technique. The sauerkraut and potatoes were rich and delicious.

So, up here in Cult-Land, Sunday afternoon was supposed to be stormy, so we opted for the $5 matinee at the 3-screen moviehouse in town. The boys are napping today before heading into town to paint pottery, so I figured I’d steal a bit of wi-fi while Missy headed into town for a little bit of peace.

WALL-E was the matinee, and I’ve got to say we enjoyed it. If anything, though, I was much happier with the bits that were just WALL-E and EV3. While the dialogue was fine, the bits without talking were a bit more creative.

The boys loved it. The roach, especially, was a big hit.

It’s a tough movie to review, especially the first week, without giving away any spoilers. Good, good, flick, but honestly a bit depressing when you get right down to it. The kids didn’t really didn’t understand the dark bits, which is good. But if you can, as an adult, make it through the movie without squirming at least a little bit, you’re an unfeeling hulk. Made me want to run, recycle, and dig in the dirt.

Is it a sign of age that many of my trips include visiting key grocery stores, and that my friends/family do the same when the come to see us? We have the headquarters of both Whole Foods and Central Market in Austin that have become (for reals) top tourist destinations. In several cities we visit a stop at Trader Joes is in order, but when we’re in State College it is Wegmans or bust! The product selection is always interesting and different than what we get in God’s blessed Dixie.

      
I’m still baffled by the concept of Birch Beer, I mean what-the-heck was wrong with sarsaparilla or plain ol’ root beer? Did we really need the yanks to invent a new tree-based beverage?; Green Tea Canada Dry was new to me, but I’m guessing it’s out somewhere in Austin without my knowledge.; Shrimp on special from my favorite equatorial locale.; This particular cake is the Wegmans prize winning ultimate chocolate cake which Becky was obliged to consume (and it’s pretty darn good.)

Most compelling was this old-school-fonted advert for a ground-breaking idea: a one-piece hamburger called, without presumption, the Incredi-Burger. You know that if it is junk food related then I will test the heck out of it. Now in my unending quest to save your gastronomical health, I give you the Incredi-Burger unboxing.

From the common plastic food container comes the burger wrapped in its own bun with instructions to place in the oven at 375° for 35 minutes. It comes out of the oven sizzling, and when you slice it open it is steamy…and that’s where it starts to go bad. The image of steaming mustard, ketchup, mayonnaise, and pickles is…well, unappetizing. The Incredi-Burger isn’t as disgusting as it looks, but for the required 35 minute investment it is definitely not worth the wait — not to mention the fin I dropped on it.

Yes, I am a couple days behind thanks to Tivo, but \/\/()\/\/…

I give credit to Bunim/Murray for making reality TV an accessible reality, but Mark Burnett is unquestionably the master. Many of you abandoned “Survivor” after season one, and while even I have spent a few seasons only half watching while I blog and surf, you missed out on a big whopper of a show. The girl power bonanza of season sixteen — Fans vs. Favorites — delivered an all female final 4, 3 non-tribal-council health-based removals (2 excruciating physical, 1 whack-a-mole mental), 4 amazing car-crash blindsides, and a major volcanic jaw-dropping hand-off of an immunity necklace at tribal council. Then to top it all off, Burnett’s editors had me fooled into falling in love with the girl who eventually placed second. Congratulations to Parvati, but I still think Amanda and Cirie were more deserving.

I can’t wait for next season. It is improbable to be as exciting as this one, but seeing Gabon in HD alongside the “Survivor” microcosm of Dawinian competition should be stunning.

Becky and I caught a few films at Tribecca Film Festival. Here’s the scoop on our favorite:

My guess is the marketing for a US release of Fighter will focus on the excellent fu choreography but chop-heads should read the fine print before rushing out to see this Danish film about a teenage Muslim Turkish immigrant girl who just wants to practice martial arts. The core of the film is a story as old as Footloose, Aicha loves kung fu more than anything else including boys and school but all her father cares about is the family’s image. Her brother is trying to get engaged to a woman whose father is a man of means…well, more means than Aisha’s family has. Just when her father tells her to quit fighting and prepare her grades for med school she is offered a spot to train with the best kung fu team in town.

Natasha Arthy (director), Master Xian Gao (fight coreographer, and actor), and the actor who played the movie’s foil were in attendance. They discussed the parallels of Copenhagen’s growing right wing conservatism (and its impact on the Turkish immigrant community) alongside the Muslim ideal of family honor. Master Gao answered questions about his coreography and the wirework that was used sparingly in the film.

In Danish and Turkish with a little Mandarin and English, the film is an excellent cross cultural story about identity and girl power. (Becky can’t wait for the chance to take her BBBS mentee to see it.) The fight choreography is amazing. Master Gao commented that this was the first film he worked on where the fight scenes were really integrated into the story line, and I agree that the fight sequences were well mixed with the family drama and coming of age storylines.

The film’s star was simply perfect for the role, equally believable in poignant scenes with her father and in the numerous scenes where she is kicking serious ass. She is an untrained actress (studying to be a pahrmacist — wth?!?) with a blackbelt in karate. She should give up her dreams of dispensing pills, but I don’t know how profitable the field of action film acting is in Copenhagen.

There are certainly better kung fu movies, but this is a great mixed genre film with some fantastic moments.

There’s a lot of things to discuss with TAL lately. Even though TSOTAL only yielded a couple dozen episodes, I remain an ardent fan. I’m preparing for the second TAL Austin Brunch Club, and just as I return from a vacation in The Big Apple, a live TAL theater event will be broadcast around the country. Most recently — just this morning as a matter of fact — I’m pondering episode #353: The Audacity of Government.

Ira and Jack Hitt take us through a number of disturbing events in the government/legal realm of late, and it reveals a disturbing trend. Repeatedly the Bush Whitehouse has decided to sign away laws, create rules that don’t exist, or ignore the rules altogether. What were formerly binding agreements with the US, are now worthless. Why does any foreign country trust us, except their obligation to our massive financial powers…and what will they do when that goes away? (Sidebar: Yes, Alex P Jones is a nut but you should listen to what he has to say about our flailing economy and follow the trail of Alan Greenspan’s investments outside the US.) Where the Justice Department once relied on the justice system, now they invent their own rules when necessary and redact the ones they dislike. How can the people of this country trust the JD when the say “we can decide to do whatever we want without explanation on our part or recourse on yours”?

Jack and Ira spend the last few minutes of the episode discussing the fact that the now meaningless boundaries of the legal system are the real issue of this election year, and how the potential candidates have responded to Bush’s abuses. I feel it is not enough to have the lip service of the candidates. Watching Horten Hears A Who today I felt immense empathy for the poor Whovillians — helplessly tossed about in a world they can no longer control. We must stand together in the face of our government and make as much noise as possible.

We are here! We are here! We are here!

Horton Hears A Who is not the return of Toy Story days, but it is very well done and quite funny. Be careful that your children don’t see it or they may start to question authority.

p.s. Is it silly to lay the seriousness of our dire political situation alongside the animated adventures of an elephant? Dr. Suess, the Lorax and even the Onceler would say it is not.

p.p.s. Do we refuse to vote for John McCain because he will carry with him many of the same advisers that have stolen justice from us in the last 8 years — a form of punishment to show the GOP that what has transpired on their watch is unacceptable? or do we trust that he is somehow the anti-GOP within the GOP that will return it to a path of sensible government FTPBTP?

During the summer between my senior year of high school and freshman year at college I worked at Watertown, USA. Late on Saturday nights as the park was approaching closing time, someone would volunteer to drive to the nearest liquor store and grab a box full of bottles. We would bury them in the ice machines, slip the occasional sip, and by the time we closed the gates and drove away, we were all three sheets to the wind¹. I worked the “canteen”, earning my tan from a massive burger machine with flames shooting out the ceiling during the lunch and dinner rushes, and I had a crush on the hottest little lifeguard with big brown eyes and the kind of mechanically straight hair you could only find in the 80’s. One night, high on Boone’s Farm, I told her I loved her and she gave me the “your sweet, but creepy” look. When she ran away at the end of the summer² with a wanna-be biker, I was ready to move on.

The Wackness may be set in 1994, but it touched a place in my head that reminded me of that summer, and several other times in my life where I was in love with a girl who would just give me the time of day, but nothing more. (It, also, reminded me of a year or so of my life _¡ when I was invincible _¡, smoking inappropriate things at inappropriate times without a care in the world.) Josh Peck (formerly of Nickelodeon’s “Drake and Josh”) makes a clear break from his family-themed roots, playing new high school graduate pot dealer, Luke Shapiro, in NYC who trades some of his stash for counseling sessions with Ben Kingsley’s psychiatrist character, Dr Squires…who is, also, the father — step father — of Olivia Thirlby’s Stephanie, the girl that Shapiro is in love with. Everyone is performing at Oscar levels here, including all-too-brief cameos from the lovely Jane Adams, and excepting an all-too-annoying cameo from Mary-Kate Olsen. It is especially nice to see Thirlby step out of Ellen Page’s (va)ginormous shadow, achingly portraying the enigma that is blossoming young women. The story is beautifully, slowly paced (as any story should be when they smoke as much as Shapiro and Squires do) with several brief moments of hilarity (see previous parenthetical statement). I am betting that Sony Pictures holds onto this Sundance-buffed gem until closer to Oscar Season in hopes of snagging the annual Little Miss Sunshine media frenzy. Try not to forget about it, because it is worth seeing.

Oh!, and the soundtrack is a great mix-tape of 1994 rap cornerstones from the Shapiro character with classic rock from the Squires character. Oh, baby !you!….you got what I nee-eed…

¹ Keep in mind: this was the late ’80s. 18 year olds could buy alcohol in Louisiana, and it was _¡ ok to drive drunk _¡ .

² That girl — how sad is it I don’t remember her name — had an older brother who really was a biker, and he called and threatened me because he found my number pitifully written down on a scrap of paper but never called. There was something twisted going on that Dr. Phil and Jerry Springer would’ve made money from, but when I left for college I decided to let that story go.

³ There is no footnote 3, btw. I’m just learning how to use them…inappropriately…so I thought I’d add another one.

Yeah, I’m one of those Austinites who came here _¡ all the way back in 1992 _¡ and I was sick of “SouthBy” before it even started last week. You wouldn’t believe how many skinny boys in pencil jeans with 80’s hairdos were wandering around downtown yesterday evening looking so much cooler than me. Still, if you are doing that kind of thing this weekend I am obliged to recommend some shows that friends are involved in that are noteworthy.

The kid who taught me how to beat¹ Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out is all grown up and playing “four-string guitar” for Chris Denny who is in the Billboard showcase tonight. Denny is, also, on the new cover of Billboard magazine which some might say is a pretty big deal. If you go to the showcase, throw your panties or boxers at this guy on the right.

Wednesday night I attended a screening hosted by Chicken Ranch Records — run by my college radio buddy, Mike Dickinson — of J.D. Wilkes’s premiere film Seven Signs. It’s a top notch indie doc that is a perfect parallel to the eclectic kind of neo-anything-revival bands that Mike likes to sign. His regular showcases have already happened, but you can still catch his day party at Bull McCabes tomorrow from 1-5pm.

¹ This lesson on the original 8-bit NES set the stage for learning patterns in a way that I previously had never seen/grasped in video games. If not for the young Chris Atwood, I would never have completed future Zelda, Mario and other games…much to my wife’s chagrin.

Baghead has been making the festival rounds since Sundance and it may be the perfect festival film. There are a few brief moments where things don’t work quite right, but overwhelmingly this simple independent film works perfectly. It is one of those movies that you will be glad you saw “cold” (without any ideas about what it is or what you might compare it to) and if you love independent film — any kind of independent film — you will love this movie. If I say any more I might spoil it for you, so I’ll leave you with the plot outline from IMDb:

The Duplass Brothers explore the minutiae of relationship dynamics in this in-depth study of a group of desperate actor friends. And a bag […on] a head.

Stephen Chow is one of my top 5 favorite directors (and actors), as much for his effervescent delivery as the diversity of stories he has overlaid with his kung-fu parody base. From celebrity chefs and wanna-be actors to soccer training and twisted 1940s dance-sequence versions of Seven Samurai, his consistency of laugh-out-loud frivolity and heart-warming characters is unmatched in cinema world-wide, not just Hong Kong. His new movie CJ7 is another step into unfamiliar topics and genres wrapped in his comfortingly familiar trappings. As an uneducated dirt-poor father of a young boy he struggles to pay for his son’s private schooling, picking the bulk of their food and lifestyle in their airy hovel from the garbage dump. When he brings home a green rubber sphere from the trash heap in hopes of compensating for not being able to buy the latest electronic robo-dog, it reveals itself to be an advanced dog/toy/tool from outerspace. Conflict, hilarity and even a little bit of kung fu ensues much to the viewer’s delight.

It is difficult to market foreign family/children films to the US because of the breadth of cultural differences and acceptances, not to mention that, if American adults are so afraid of subtitles, how can they be expected to teach their children the joy of foreign cinema. With words like d—-head and bull—-t spelled out clearly in the subtitles (once for the former, twice the latter), some parents will find themselves having to define/explain them…hopefully after the movie. However, with the introduction of Ni Hao, Kai-lan maybe we are seeing a shift to accept even more cultures into kid-fare entertainment and more parents will want to expose their children to warmth of this touching movie that is, in the end, better than most US family fare.

The Oscar Pick ‘Em system is done and I’ll be updating it live on Oscar night. At 6:30pm Central, there will be a new stats page showing the Oscar winners as they are announced plus the Rollerfeet.com Oscar Pick ‘Em players by rank, and the voting page will change to showing your pick against the Oscar Winner. Until then here’s a summary of the things I’ve seen lately…including a new (obviously) non-Oscar nominee.

The Drafthouse — our favorite theater in the world…in case you haven’t noticed — was one of the lucky theaters to show all of the Oscar nominated shorts. The first thing that strikes me is there is only one film in each category that could be considered American and the animated one is considered Canadian while the live action is a Western based on a US short story shot in the UK. My belief is that Americans have stopped making movies simply for the sake of connecting to the audience at a personal level. Michael Bay, Quentin Tarantino and Eli Roth are the icons of American cinema, feeding on the visceral appetites of their LCD audience. Upcoming American filmmakers want to make an action movie, or a zombie movie, or a whatever movie. No one here wants to just make a movie and it’s sad to me.

Here’s a breakdown of the Live Action Short nominees and why I think the do and don’t have a chance at winning an Oscar.

Here’s a breakdown of the Animated Short nominees with the same treatment.

This week’s escape from Oscar was the chick flick Definitely, Maybe, and I use the term “chick flick” because the power behind this film definitely lies with the women, even though the draw for women in the crowd maybe Ryan Reynolds. The media (and his publicist) want you to think of Reynolds as the new Tom Hanks, but he’s just not that good. Isla Fisher, on the other hand, is the next Meg Ryan — funny, talented and beautiful — and Abigail Breslin demonstrates that she’s good for more than one movie. Great film, especially for families that need to explain to their children about divorce.

…but not in that order. I figure I should hit you with the unpleasant, almost shocking, revelation then I will tell what I think of In Bruges.

My wife doesn’t allow musicals to be played in our home because I love them and can’t stop myself from singing along. When Moulin Rouge was released, I’m sure she dreaded seeing it with me but at the time she liked it more than I did…and I actually didn’t like it at all. It was hard for me to get past the stink of Baz Luhrmann. Last night during the previews at the Drafthouse, they played a trailer for their Moulin Rouge! sing-along and I was suddenly struck by the Broadway-esque stylings of Nicole Kidman and Ewan McGregor. I actually got little chills at the idea of singing along loudly.

I just felt the need to confess that.

In Bruges — which oddly rhymes with Moulin Rouge! — has been taking a lot of flack for it’s lack of blending. At times it is a dark soul-searching tragedy, then a wide-eyed romance, and even a Tarantino-esque absurdly funny talk-fest. It is true that these pieces don’t transition smoothly but I really enjoyed the script and all the performances. It was funny, thought-provoking, and surprising. Colin Farrell, standing in the shadow of three Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire actors (not to mention the 10 crew members also in common), is the least of actors in the cast but he doesn’t detract from what I consider a brilliant film.

I gave Sprial a great review when I saw it last September, and now you get a chance to see it. Director Adam Green, actor Joel David Moore, and (my secret girlfriend) actress Amber Tamblyn may have assembled the Psycho of modern disturbing film-making. It is showing at Alamo South and if you like the scary tension, then you need to high-tail it down there this weekend to wash the Academy taste from your mouth during the pre-Oscar rush.

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• +3:10 to Yuma – I’m actually a fan of the modern westerns, like Silverado and Open Range, so when I say that 3:10 was “meh”, it comes from a place of love. If you like westerns (or Russell Crowe or Christian Bale), you’ll like 3:10. Russell Crowe and Christian Bale are adequate actors and do a fine job. The film doesn’t slip into cliché despite temptations (which is probably a testament to James Mangold’s direction). The only real highlight of the film is Ben Foster’s role as Charlie Prince — he could’ve stole the show. Oh, and (tiny spoiler alert) will Alan Tudyk spend the rest of his career doing something heroic and then immediately getting killed? Will it win an Oscar? I didn’t even really notice the music score, so for me that means it wasn’t memorable. Sound mixing was not bad, but The Bourne Ultimatum, No Country for Old Men and Transformers were all better.
• Away From Her – The evolution of the horror genre was predictably “torture porn”. What else is there to do but take the most uncomfortable moments of horror and make a movie that is almost solely that emotional attack on the viewer’s senses? Sarah Polley feels the same way about the Hallmark© genre. What else is there to do with it but take the most uncomfortable moments of loss, grief and personal sacrifice, and make a movie that is almost solely an attack on your tear ducts and outlook on life and relationships. People who defend this as a great film need to go stand with Eli Roth’s fans. Julie Christie gets a nomination and she is really good, but Gordon Pinsent is the one who makes you cry. Oscar chances? Ellen Page is better, but the Academy loves to sequester women in their place: either wearing Elizabethan corsets, or breaking hearts behind a vasoline-smeared lens so I think Christie has a chance.

I was sure that at this point I would have seen several more movies from the big 10 categories but Sarah Polley had other plans. Becky and I were so distraught after seeing Away From Her we made ‘Topher and Carolee come over and cheer us up — more on that later — Saturday night. Then on Sunday we went to see current-release material:

• How She Move – maybe I’m the wrong age group or racial demo, but I couldn’t identify with any of the characters, except the mother and father. The script was overly complicated and it didn’t really create a sense of empathy, and the decent acting/directing wasn’t enough to overcome the twisted plot. The dancing is the best I’ve seen in the stomp/dance genre, though, so you could see it for that part. You’ll see most of these actors in better roles in the future, I hope.

p.s. Something is rotten at Rotten Tomatoes. The system isn’t working as well as iMDb’s rating system. How She Move is sitting at 71% freshness while iMDb is at 3.5 stars after 2,594 votes. Maybe that’s an indication of the complexity of judging a film with a 1 dimensional system.

Thanks to the Austinist for pointing out that MovieMaker Magazine named Austin as the #1 place to “live, work and make movies”. Initially, I think “Oh, that’s great! We’re almost done with our latest film project, contributing to the coolnes.” Then I think “But wait, we still haven’t made our own film, unprodded by the fine folks at the Drafthouse.” So, all you Morte dal Disegno people need to start looking for adaptable content. Focus on things that could be shot cheaply and have optimally just a couple days of filming. (Planning, rehearsals, construction, etc. can take longer but I would like to keep the actual shooting of the film to a longish Saturday/Sunday schedule.)

Also in the article you will note that Shreveport, La — hometown to several regulars here at the Backporch, including myself — showed up at the #3 slot…mostly thanks to all the films that were wrapping up productions that moved north after Katrina.