Film Review: “The Foot Fist Way”

As a film reviewer for public radio, I keep aware of what’s upcoming in the world of films. To a fault. I check out advanced previews on the www. I read reviews and updates on films in progress. I listen to the buzz about projects.

All said and done, it’s not a good thing.

Like any human, my perspective, my predisposition about a movie, is swayed. I am inclined to look forward to a film, and thus my review will be skewed by those expectations. If it doesn’t hold up as I had hoped, I’m likely to dismiss it more than if I hadn’t any advanced feelings. And vice versa.

Like I said, it’s not a good thing. But it’s human nature.

Which is why I crave those situations when I can see a flick about which I know nothing at all. Every once in awhile one will open that I haven’t even heard of. I cherish the moments. They’re like cinematic blind dates.

Such was the case with “The Foot Fist Way.”

Apple Bites Man

The Film Babe and I were married a few weeks back. During the tumult and tension a few days before the ceremony, she asked — the polite verb to use — that I burn a CD of favorite love songs to give to the guests.

As if there wasn’t enough other preparation going on.

(I won’t even mention the fans with our photo on it standing with the Sydney Opera House in the background she conscripted me to make the day before the nuptials. So our guests wouldn’t swelter in the humidity of our backyard.)

So I proceeded to gather love ballads to transfer to my PC, then burn onto a master CD, from which we’d burn enough copies on a stand alone CD copier for each and every attendee.

Which process has led me to a major change. I now reside in the world of Apple. After years of fighting the urge, after months of laughing at the hugely effective advertisements in which Microsoft Vista is dutifully and deservedly skewed, it was only after I couldn’t get my boutique PC to recognize the E Drive to burn the wedding CD that I made the switch.

Movies I Love, Part VII: Woodstock

The other night out to dinner with friends we got to talking about films that changed people’s lives. Obviously the discussion was fostered by the Idea Festival’s summer endeavor, a film festival showing a number of such films submitted by the public. The chosen movies to be culled from suggestions submitted.

One of our dinner gang mentioned “The Harder They Come” and “Gandhi.” He thought both flicks taught him the same lesson about perseverance in the face of oppression. Legit topics which can be discussed at another time. That’s not my purpose here.

Another mentioned “Woodstock.”

The suggestion resonated. Since hearing of the Idea Festival’s challenge I hadn’t really come up with any movie that I could say with any legitimacy changed my life. ( I do remember being fascinated with Red Skelton in “Excuse My Dust,” saw it any number of times. But, hey, I was only six. And I don’t think it changed my life.) But the mention of Michael Wadleigh’s 1970 documentary of the seminal music festival in upstate New York the summer before struck a chord.

Movies I Love, Part VI: “Galaxy Quest”

I ran into my buddy Will Russell the other day at Heine Brothers.

You gotta love a guy who, along with a pal or two, turned obsession with the Coen brothers’ The Big Lebowski into a reasonably lucrative cottage industry. Annual festivals across the country, paraphernalia, a book for heavens’ sakes. Such Achievers, those boys.

So while we were each waiting for our actual coffee companions to arrive, we shot the shit. I asked if any actors from the film have actually showed up at any of these festivals. Yes, several. And Will explained as how Jeff Bridges, who played The Dude himself,posted at a festival in L A. Brought his band too. “Really nice guy,” advises Will.

Which conversation got me to thinking about these types of gatherings which attract myriads of obsessed aficionados from hither and yon. I guess the biggest cult of these sorts involves Star Trek. But, given that Lebowski Fests are centered on bowling and White Russians, they’re obvious looser and more fun.

JazzFest ‘08 — It’s Too Late To Stop Now

It is the quietest day of the year around here, isn’t it? The first Monday after the first Saturday in May. All the hoopla, juleps, bed races, hair coifs, visit to the milliner’s shoppe, hair appointments, celebrity sightings, last minute alterations to that apparel you must wear to the Derby or Oaks or both, discarded tickets . . . all gone to bed until we arise to Thunder again in ‘09.

Well, it’s about the same in New Orleans. JazzFest, the world’s premier music festival, always ends the day after Derby, and the tired, somewhat empty feeling in the Crescent City is similar to that here in Derbyplace USA. (Okay I know that Ash Wednesday at Mardi Gras epicenter also invokes a major sigh of relief, but work with me here. I’m trying a new segue on my annual New Orleans during JazzFest update and the metaphors aren’t coming through cleanly.)

Trevor Tops Tiger — Tres Disappointment!

Competitive professional golf is a curious spectator sport. It’s the only one that I can think of where the fan without a genuine emotional rooting interest cheers for the favorite rather than the underdog.

Which means if there’s no guy in the hunt who grew up down the street or working in the pro shop at your country club, you tend to root for . . . Tiger Woods.

It is so odd.

Yo, Cards Fans: Cut The Rick Some Slack

Some Louisville Cardinal fans won’t give it up.

Rick Pitino was once Big Blue. And once a Cat always a Cat is a mantra for many.

So, in some red & black households, the U of L’s coach remains unloved, his coaching prowess in question. Especially when he’s compared with his beloved predecessor Denny Crum. The Rick’s strategic bench art — or lack thereof, according to this segment of Cardinaldom — remains a sore point.

The Best Film You’ve Never Seen

I thought I read the words of my title — The Best Film You’ve Never Seen — in a review somewhere of Romance & Cigarettes.

But, after watching this incredible and incredibly unique masterpiece on DVD which the Film Babe got from NetFlix, I went back and read the reviews where I thought I’d viewed the line. Ebert perhaps. Stephen Holden in the New York Times. Salon maybe.

But no. They weren’t there. Though those salient film observers all agreed with each other. And me. That this film never got a serious studio release, that you’ve probably never heard of it, is a major travesty.

Vanilla Fudge - A Welcome Blast From The Past

The song blasted from the box in my car like a welcome punch to the solar plexus. God bless those New Albany High School deejays for continually foisting such chestnuts on us. A gem a day keeps the doc away. I couldn’t stop smiling during the entire seven-and-a-half minutes.

At the bombastic faux seriosity.

At the simplistic yet soaring riffs from the Hammond B-3. It’s rock’s greatest instrument, you know?

At the sitaresque guitar licks, Bronx Italoharmonies and Carmine Appice’s thunderdrumming.

At the stolen moments from The Supremes, Berry Gordy’s signature Motown girl group.

At the band’s telling yet effective moniker, Vanilla Fudge.

“You Keep Me Hanging On.” Indeed.

Hope Returns For The U of L

Forgive old-time Cardinal fans if it all seemed a flashback. Old-timers meaning those who not only know about Peck Hickman but saw him coach. This was Ed Kallay time one more once.

Not Ed Kallay, the former U of L radio play-by-play announcer, but Uncle Ed Kallay in the Magic Forest with sidekicks Tom Foolery and Sylvester the Duck on “Funny Flickers.” Because playing out before these fans was Keystone Kops befuddlement, guys aimlessly running back and forth, seemingly devoid of direction.

Super Bowl Is A Chip Shot Away

We will gather. Yes, of course, we will.

It is our annual rite. Our right inalienable.

We will eat chips. Tons of chips. Corn. Potato. And dips. Guacamole, lots of guacamole. So much that one of us, the guy in the corner with green dribbles down his sweater, will mention how there’s more avocados sold this weekend than the rest of the year combined. Or something like that.

Cards Go “Extreme Makeover: Defense Edition”

When it comes to adding value, nothing fills the bill like an Extreme Makeover. Ask the family of Patrick Henry Hughes.

He’s the locally renowned, blind and disabled member of the U of L marching band. Thanks to “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition,” the family is enduring extreme tax addition. Their real property assessment is thrice what it was before Ty Pennington and his phalanx of hammer wielders showed up for the redo.

Hughes’ beloved Cardinal pigskinners, looking for a similar bump, took notice.

Call it “Extreme Makeover: Defense Edition.”