BASEBALL

It's Monday, baseball begins on Thursday. Thank GOD! Now that everyones bracket has been busted to hell, its time to focus on something with a little more stability. The greatest game on earth. The Cardinals begin the season with the light hitting padres. Ludwick will get one last taste of what an opening day in STL can be like. Essentially its a holiday around town. People are expected to take off work and celebrate the greatest day in spring. I'm really looking forward to meeting you Dr. Oppenheim. I've already been warned to bring my A game as far as downing $8.25 buds. Fortunately my wallet will keep me in check! Now its time for our predictions for the year.

AL East- Boston

AL Central-Detroit, that city needs a winner more than anything

AL West-Texas

Wild Card-Jankees

NL East-Atlanta

NL Central-Milwaukee

NL West- SF

Wild Card-Philly

WS Matchup is looking like Boston vs philly, Pitching will be key this year.

HBO Boxing

Well, I settled in to watch some boxing this evening after a full day of basketball. Congrats UConn, you have punched your ticket to losing before the sweet 16. There is no way to come back from 5 games in 5 days. Anyway, I was all excited to see an early battle between two young light middleweight fighters who wanted to make a name for themselves. And then I watched the fight between Andy Lee and Craig McEwen I was bored. I was glad that I had gone out and played some trivia and drank a few beers because it looked one sided from the second round on, and then a miracle happened. Boxing came to life the way it is supposed to! Craziness occurred  and the end of the fight was actually watchable.

Also while watching HBO boxing, I am aware that Miguel Cotto is fighting Ricardo Mayorga on PPV this evening. I have no idea how that fight will play itself out, but come on. Once upon a time I remember buying EVERY PPV fight. Now you are trying to get me to buy a fight against a guy that has lost every time he has been in a big fight (Mayorga) against a guy that has dominated every big fight he has been in (Cotto). And at the same time as I can get "free" boxing on HBO. Come on idiots.

OK, on to the main even between Martinez and Dzinziruk for, well... nothing. They own some worthless belts that are not on the line tonight. First note is that Martinez thinks he is Roy Jones Jr. in the ring (and Roy agrees, however I do not, he is just cocky and lazy). It was a pretty action packed fight where it was one sided by Martinez. But hey, action packed is what I am looking for or a regular basis, I do not mind it being one sided or not. Let us all hope that being one sided means you are going to be a dominant fighter for years to come. We need that.

Boxing

Saturday Night I was lucky enough to get to go to the Golden Gloves Omaha Area Fights! What a true Joy to watch boxing in the puriest form! The place I was at, The Tip Top Ballroom" in downtown Omaha was jammed packed for the fights! It was good to see there are still people out there that love to see some good boxing matches. There were 17 fights total, each lasting only 3 rounds. It was great to see the kids use the fundementals that they had been well taught, such as using a jab and moving thier heads side to side and most importantly keeping thier heads up. There was one kid who thought he was Muhammad Ali and tried to shuffle his feet thinking he was cute, but it was a desperate attempt since he was soundly beaten by a fighter who stuck to the basics. The 123 and 132 pound kids came out swinging and went back and forth for all three rounds in thier fights. It felt kinda like watching a Rocky film. The most fun fight of the night cam when a kid who looked like Butter Bean was fighting in the heavyweight division. He mostly used his head as a punching bad for the other guy but the kid just kept on coming! All in all if was a fun evening and great to see some of the good amatuer boxers that Omaha has. With all the bad professional fights as of late it was good to see some good ones.

Red State Boston MA

Well, as to be expected for an audience of a Kevin Smith movie it was filled with mainly 25-35 year old males, many of whom had the physique of Mr. Smith himself. The crowd arrived early and stood in line to grab beers before the main event. Sadly I was driving and unable to drink. Anyway, on to the movie.

The movie starts with a group of three teenage boys who have been invited to have a three-way with a much older woman. Pretty much sounds like the beginning of a Kevin Smith film. It is at this point the film takes an extreme right turn into an action-horror movie dealing with some fanatical, right wing, gay hating, god fearing crazies that are loosely based on the God Hates Fags guys in Kansas, and the Branch Davidian's in Waco TX. The crux of the film is that there are so many things you do not ever see coming. When my wife and I watch horror movies one of the first things to do is to figure out which one of the main characters is going to survive till the end. While certainly some of the main characters survive in this exciting horror movie, you will definitely guess incorrectly. Another major twist in the movie comes with about 20 minutes left in the film when the movie not only changes tone, but the way the storytelling is presented is completely different as well. This works flawlessly in order to take the edge off a VERY intense movie.

While I explained to my wife going in that this was not a typical Kevin Smith movie, she just could not wrap her head around what she was in for. I think she was expecting Scream or Scary Movie. This movie is not at all like those comedy horrors. While there is certainly plenty of comedic breaks throughout, the movie is much more along the lines of Saw or Halloween in its intensity. So if you are planning to see something like Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back you are not even in the ball park, this is so much different it is like Rob Zombie directing the next National Lampoon movie!

On to my review. This is by far the crispest, best looking of Kevin Smith's indie movies. He takes his $4 million dollar budget and makes it look like there was about $40 million to spend. So what is the bad side of this movie? There is a long, very long, preachy scene early in the movie. And by long I mean like 15 minutes and it really feels like it drags, but right after this all hell breaks loose and the film instantly draws you in. Ok, that is about it for the negatives what was good about the movie? One, it is a very original idea for a horror movie. While it takes some formulaic approaches, it quickly yanks you in another direction every time you think you know what is going to happen next. Plus each kill is unique and rarely seen coming, or at least in the way you would think it is going to happen. There are also great little touches that will remind you of other Kevin Smith productions strewn throughout the movie such as flashing the time in white letters with a black background ala Clerks and the horns of the apocalypse so similar to Dogma you are almost prepared to see Ben Affleck come to earth with angel wings. Lastly, the final 20 minutes of the movie are not only different from the rest of the movie, but they are a new way to wrap up a story, and it is well executed. John Goodman is just fantastic at this and everything else in the film.

So while I am quite certain to be biased due to watching the movie in a setting full of unabashed Kevin Smith fans who were able to yuck it up and clap and yell when the movie required it, I am giving a great review to the movie overall. I would say as a movie on the whole I will give it 4 out of 5 stars, it was damn good, but that is not the whole story. As Smith has pointed out, he is not trying to make the new Citizen Kane or anything, this is a horror movie and as horror movies go he nailed it. The intensity was palpable in the theater and the plot twists were extremely welcome in a very formulaic genre. So as horror movies go I give it 5 out of 5 stars and anoint it into one of my top ten horror movies of all time. It may be in my top 5, but that will be decided as it holds up over multiple viewings. Highly recommended everyone!

My Evening with Kevin Smith plus Red State

Sunday I am headed to Boston to watch an early screening of Kevin Smith's new movie Red State (release date October 19th). There are a few things to notice from the trailer. One, Smith is known for all sorts of witty dialog in his movies and the trailer has absolutely none, just some ramblings of a preacher. And two, this is certainly NOT a typical Kevin Smith movie. While comic actors John Goodman, Stephen Root and Ralph Garman (who was freaking fantastic as the host of The Joe Schmo Show) are in the movie, it is certainly not a full on fart and penis comedy, this is a horror thriller! I even hear that Garmin does not even have a line in the movie, but still has plenty of screen time... I wonder how that is pulled off. Do I think this will be some groundbreaking movie of our times, no. But I do expect to be entertained and look forward to seeing a new side to Smith.

I am an unabashed big fan of Smith since watching Clerks about 60 times my Senior year of High School. Since then I have enjoyed all of his films and listen weekly to a couple of this podcasts (Jay and Silent Bob Get Old and Smodcast). And now look forward to seeing what he can do outside his cushy element. Plus, I love me some horror movies. After the show there is a live Q&A with Smith and I suspect at least one of his other regular cronies (Jason Mewes, Scott Mosier aka Snowball from Clerks, Malcolm Ingram or Jeff Anderson). From watching An Evening With Kevin Smith I am quite sure this will be an entertaining evening of events. I will be back to give my opinions and impressions from MY evening with Kevin Smith