The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green (2005)

This is probably not a crossover hit, I don't think. The sex scenes aren't really explicit, but straight guys might still not find its generosity of male flesh something to go out of their way to see.

But as a gay film, I really liked it. The idea of romantic relationship self-sabotage is intriguing, though it obviously has nothing to do with my relationships. (Those don't need self- or any other kind of sabotage.)

The comic which the movie is based on isn't pretty to look at, but the movie is, with a number of young, cute, believably gay acting guys in the cast. Gay movies typically are low budget: and some can have horrific acting (Regarding Billy comes to mind), but the acting here is quite good and the story moves along well.

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A reasonably good movie with a similar (romantic self-sabotage) theme, but completely different story line: Boy Culture.

You Don't Mess with the Zohan (2008)

I actually found this movie funny, and I was surprised it got such a bad rating on imdb. It does have a point of view: leans towards Israel. I am guessing that Adam Sandler is at least part or entirely Jewish. The Israeli directness is entirely truthful, at least based on my very small personal experiences and from what other people say. I didn't know that recent Jewish immigrants to the US run electronics stores in NYC.

Burn After Reading (2008)

Another Coen brothers movie with a fast moving/multi-point of view plot/action line. A big ensemble cast with lots of big names. Still, I found the film dissatisfying. The goal -- which is similar to all Coen films -- seems to be to take all that big starpower and put it into as ugly and shocking a wrapper as possible. The story is ugly and so are the characters. A bit of a waste to have pretty boys Brad Pitt and George Clooney in such an unattractive movie. Okay, well it is darkly funny in parts.

[Actually though, Pitt and Clooney are getting old, so actually this movie might be a good choice for them.]

The Dark Knight (2008)

There are quite a lot of visual effects in this film, most of them done well, but some fall a little short and look clearly artificial, especially in the two-face villain. An extreme but diverting application of Prisoner's dilemma in one plot point to very memorable effect -- "I'm going to do what you all should have done ten minutes ago..." Heath Ledger does an fine, almost unbelievable, job as Joker. He breaks the spooky/crazy meter with his voice in delivering the line: "Whyyy sooo seeerious??!"

Kings of Leon: Only by the night

I must be getting old: I like this group's very mellow and relaxing sound. They're so mellow they hardly qualify as alternative ("rock") which is listed as their genre. 80's classic rock would probably be a more correct classification. My favorite songs on this album: Sex on Fire, Manhattan and Notion.

Windows 7 Beta

Beta download link (until Jan 24). So far okay. I'm not sure how long I'm going to be saying that, but it hasn't crashed yet. 7's Aero is prettier than my el cheapo but low graphics requirements Vista Home edition. It did force me to uninstall (not just disable) McAfee before upgrading. You can also install the Beta on an empty partition instead of upgrading from Vista (i.e. multiboot on XP system). Had a little problem with my Microsoft Intellimouse Optical where it would periodically stop taking input from it, but unplugging it and replugging it seemed to make that problem disappear.

Microsoft is onto something with the included desktop themes. I wonder why previous Windows was so light on nice pretty backgrounds. It shouldn't cost much to buy rights to some nice eyecandy. It makes a big difference, I think.

Desktop preview, which hides your windows temporarily (actually makes them transparent, but keeps an outline) is also a good idea.

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I'm just now realizing what I'd been missing as far as Windows Premium/Ultimate versus Basic. Premium has Windows Media Center with the fancy Chess and Mahjong games and music player with cover animation. It's slick. I was able to win at chess on easy and with several undo. Okay, yeah, that's cheating, but it still feels like an accomplishment.

Jesse McCartney: Departure

I have no idea who Jesse McCartney is, aside from some baby faced guy I had vaguely heard of on the web. I had to do a search for him on Wikipedia, and even then nothing rings a bell: All My Children? But anyway his third and latest album, Departure, has a number of catchy tunes on it. My favs: Leavin' and How do you sleep? That said, his high pitched voice can be a little rough on the ears.