'A Short History Of Stupid'
I picked up this book when I was in Melbourne:
It's pretty cool. There are moments where I feel they've been reading my blog. :)
If you want arguments more coherent and in better depth than what I write here on this blog as to why our public discourse has given way to so much stupidity, then this book is for you!
They cover a lot of ground in Traditional and Modern philosophy as well as TV shows from the 1990s, exclusive for the express purpose of damning the stupidity of the public discourse - not with faint praise but - with surgical precision. You hope the US drones strike this well where it hurts.
Of course the problem with Stupid is no brain, no pain. Abuse as they might, the people who need to be abused by this book are not getting the message. 'Twas ever thus.
'Transformers: Age of Extinction'
This franchise gets sillier each time out. Even without the redoubtably silly Shia Leboeuf, the antics in this film is firmly in the silly camp. Except they're dead serious when they show you cars turning into robots and robots turning into dinosaur-inspired robots. There are CIA black ops, there are aliens, there are wonderful moments from Stanley Tucci who plays a kind of a crooked Steve Jobs type; but mostly it's fluff and guff.
Michael Bay is a strange film maker who is obviously very talented but allows himself to be slack with the heavy-handed in-jokes and not quite precise with story logic. But there's a lot of flash and thunder and CGI marvels to make up for any shortfalls so the thing tends to fly along even if it is a colossal 2hours and 40 minutes. (Yes, it's like a 'Lord of the Rings' movie but with much less emotional finesse).
We know he can be great from films like 'Armageddon', 'The Island' and 'Pain and Gain'. It amazes me that he can stand lobotomising his higher talents and go and apply himself to the task of making movies with Hasbro toys as the defining concept. He could be sculpting marble with the best but he wants to play with play-dough. It might be exquisite work with plasticine but is it art?
'22 Jump Street'
You know what's not art? This film.
Yes, I did laugh. No, it's not profound in any way shape or form. But there's nothing wrong with that. The most novel thing about this film might be that the number that gives away a sequel is at the start of the title and not the end. Other than that, it's Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum playing a pair of idiots.
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