The Summer Of '80s Movies: 'Ghostbusters' And 'Gremlins'

by Linda Holmes

Today's big question is this: As between mid-'80s special-effects monsters and mid-'80s puppet monsters, which are more menacing?

Ghostbusters, of course, has more of the former. While you get some "real" monsters as well (mostly in the "Okay, so she's a dog" depictions of the gargoyle-ish creatures), you get a lot more of the straight-up drawn-on-the-screen guys, like the one Bill Murray encounters around the five-minute mark here.

Gremlins, on the other hand, has primarily puppets. And they're very puppety-looking puppets, too. About half the time that Zach Galligan, who plays Billy (a weirdly ageless character who has a job as a bank teller but still lives at home and acts like he's fourteen), is carrying around little Gizmo, they look quite a bit like a ventriloquism act from Star Search.

It also must be said that the gremlins in Gremlins are a lot meaner than the ghosts in Ghostbusters. In spite of all the damage done to a perfectly nice Central Park West apartment building when the (to put it generously) perplexing plot of Ghostbusters leads to the opening of the pathway between Sigourney Weaver's refrigerator and the Temple Of The Demonic Aerobics Instructor, the ghosts aren't really that malevolent. In fact, it's kind of quaint, the way their opening gambit consists of, "I am a GHOOOOOST! I will go to the library and PULL ALL THE DRAWERS OUT OF THE CARD CATALOG BOOGEDA-BOOGEDA! I will EAT ALL YOUR HOT DOGS NOM NOM NOM!"

The gremlins are worse.

Puppet-on-human violence, a Santa tragedy, giant men made from marshmallows, dogs and cats living together, self-defense with a canister-vac, and more, after the jump...

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The Summer Of '80s Movies: A Possibly Terrifying Look Back

Ghostbusters: Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis will be welcoming us (and you) to The Summer Of '80s Movies. Courtesy of Sony Pictures

 

by Linda Holmes

One of the advantages of living in the D.C. area is access to the AFI Silver Theatre And Cultural Center in downtown Silver Spring. They run current movies, but also old movies, and this summer, they're running a series called "Totally Awesome 3: More Films Of The '80s," which I'm taking advantage of for a summer-long nostalgia explosion called The Summer Of '80s Movies: A Possibly Terrifying Look Back.

Interestingly, this third installment is the first one I'm in town for, but it's also the one I'm happiest to get to see, having looked at the previous lineups. They've now sort of burned through the most overexposed and overdiscussed movies (This Is Spinal Tap, The Breakfast Club, Say Anything, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, etc., all of which many of us have discussed to death) and are moving along to ones that, in some cases, haven't been so ubiquitous on cable.

Tonight, I'll be seeing a double-shot of adorable monsters: Ghostbusters and Gremlins. Over the rest of the summer, I intend to revisit River's Edge, Footloose, Edward Scissorhands, Heathers, Some Kind Of Wonderful, and others.

(I withhold comment on Breakin' and Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo, for the sake of my dignity. I mean, even if I were going to do that, you wouldn't want to know now, would you? It might keep you from taking me seriously.)

So come back tomorrow, when I will tell you all about cute monsters and Bill Murray, and will undoubtedly make some seriously ridiculous jokes involving the question, "Who you gonna call?" Because I'm pretty sure that's the law.

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Neil Patrick Harris > Seacrest + Probst + Klum + Mandel + Bergeron

by Linda Holmes

After last year's very bad decision to turn the Emmy telecast over to the five nominated reality-show hosts -- all of whom flopped, with the exception of the always-lovely Tom Bergeron -- the show planners seem to have regained their senses: Reports say they're trying to make a deal with Neil Patrick Harris to host the show in September.

While he didn't get to do as much at the Tony Awards as I was hoping -- with the exception of the fantastic closing number, which you can watch above -- Harris was a lovely host and would undoubtedly make the Emmys a whole lot more watchable.

He also probably won't be upstaged this time by a guy who gets clocked by the scenery, so that's good news.

Make that deal, Emmy planners! If I have to liveblog three hours of Ryan Seacrest, I will be very upset.

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Somewhere, A Reporter Is Bored. (That Somewhere Is Cleveland.)

by Marc Hirsh

It's a slow news day in Cleveland. How slow? Slow enough not only to spend a solid two minutes (out of what, 22 minutes of newscast?) on a non-story about a non-attack by a non-bear, but to take the time to make props and costumes. Who knew that WJW even had an arts and crafts department? Special kudos to Cleveland Metroparks naturalist Carly Martin for her insights into bear scat, and to the reporter who provided such an enthusiastic simulation of ursine climbing.

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Culturetopia: Must-Listen Arts & Entertainment (Eighties Edition)

by Neda Ulaby

NPR's weekly arts podcast takes a turn towards the 1980s this week, with a couple of reflections upon important anniversaries. And you can listen right here.

Spike Lee's seminal film Do The Right Thing turns 20 this summer, and the classic Prince tune "Purple Rain" celebrates a quarter of a century. We take a moment to reflect on both, assisted when it comes to Prince by an appreciation from Maroon 5 members Jesse Carmichael and Adam Levine.

Meanwhile, Nate DiMeo helps us remember why exactly we should respect big cartoony movies designed around Hasbro toys. Sure, little about the new Transformers movie, or the upcoming G. I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra may appeal to aesthetes, but the two films will probably be among this summer's top moneymakers. The first Transformers movie made nearly three-quarters of a billion dollars at the box office. Boom!

(Linda also mentions a conversation that took place at Monkey See last week about potential new movies based on toys; you can find that one here.)

We'll also learn about a Princeton sociologist's sobering findings about the status of women playwrights in the American theater and hear a review of the gripping new movie The Hurt Locker.

And that tootle you'll hear comes from an instrument made of vulture bones and mammoth tusks. It's the oldest musical instrument ever found.

Finally, there's no denying that the most talked-about pop-culture event of the week was the death of Michael Jackson, and Linda talks this week about finding something to say about a guy who's so hard to talk about.

Check out Culturetopia right here, or subscribe to the podcast, to hear all of the pieces.

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Let There Be Bike Shorts: A Profile In Comics-Geek Courage

Supergirl: Doesn't she look happy about the news that she gets to wear pants now? DC Comics

 

by Glen Weldon

Last week, we learned about a man possessed of a bold and praiseworthy vision. With a single editorial edict, this brave iconoclast dispensed with venerated tradition and blazed a new path, knowing only too well that his decision might unleash a frothing nerdstorm of outrage.

The man in question: DC Comics editor Matt Idleson. The pronouncement he issued was just eight words long, but such is its paradigm-shattering power that it will surely stand one day in the annals of comic book history, alongside "With great power comes great responsibility," "Truth, Justice and the American Way," and "Shazam!"

Thus spake Idleson:

"I never want to see Supergirl's panties again."

And with that, the character of Supergirl — in a stark departure from many years of institutionalized cheesecakery — started wearing red shorts under her skirt.

It's not a big deal, but it's a pretty big deal, and here's why:

1. The decision suggests that superhero comics may at long last stand ready to evolve beyond the adolescent objectification of the female form in which they have so gleefully wallowed for long decades; and

2. Supergirl flies, duh. She hovers over people's heads. In a skirt.

After the jump: Hot pants, headbands, belly-shirts and other petty indignities foisted upon the Maid of Might over her long and storied career.

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'The Daily Show' Gets Serious About International Human Rights

by Linda Holmes

On last night's edition of The Daily Show, Jon Stewart spoke to Mike Kim, the author of Escaping North Korea: Defiance And Hope In The World's Most Repressive Country. Kim spent four years helping North Korean refugees who were leaving the country through China, along a "modern-day underground railroad" that stretches 6,000 miles from Pyongyang to Bangkok, Thailand.

It's not uncommon for Jon Stewart to have interesting guests, or guests with great stories, but I think from the show's perspective, this particular conversation was almost a Platonic ideal of a Daily Show interview.

Why getting your news from The Daily Show is more complicated than it sounds, after the jump...

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The Strange Things People Do To Plumbing, Outlets, Ductwork...

by Linda Holmes

I first came across the site There I Fixed It via Metafilter, and then through the comments there, I found the Home Inspection Nightmares section of the site for This Old House, and then I spent about an hour there, looking at stuff like this home repair, which is -- spoiler -- not an approved use of a two-liter Coke bottle.

Both sites are lovely afternoon-brightening bursts of silliness. They will also make you want to be really careful about any homes you might purchase in the future, because people are not to be trusted.

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PBS Nerd Television Returns And Auto-Tunes Neil deGrasse Tyson

by Linda Holmes

Tonight marks the return of PBS's Nova scienceNOW (hey, that's how they type it; I don't know), the science magazine show featuring host (and astrophysicist, and Stewart/Colbert favorite) Neil deGrasse Tyson.

The season premiere includes a discussion of synthetic diamonds; a visit with Luis von Ahn, the computer scientist who developed those little pictures of squiggly letters that you have to type in to prove you're not a robot; a look back at the anthrax attacks of several years ago; and -- best of all -- a close-up look at AutoTune, including the AutoTuning of Tyson's own very bad singing. The von Ahn and AutoTune segments are both utterly charming, and Tyson is a marvelous sport.

Check your local PBS listings, but Nova scienceNOW is generally airing alongside the regular Nova season premiere, "Musical Minds," which Oliver Sacks discussed on The Daily Show last night. I haven't seen "Musical Minds" yet, but I have read the Sacks book Musicophilia on which it is based, and The New York Times, while expressing some reservations, calls it "full of fascinating information."

So if you're the kind of person who likes to sit down for a little nerd viewing, this might be your lucky evening.

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'My Dinner with Andre': The Antidote to Summer Movie Overdose

My Dinner With Andre: Are you finding it a little loud at the multiplex? A good conversation might be just the thing. Courtesy of the Criterion Collection

 

by Glenn McDonald

If the world were at all fair, or even moderately discerning, Michael Bay would not be a movie director at all. Instead, he would be where he belongs, as technical supervisor of an industrial demolitions crew, blowing stuff up for a living. As is stands, however, Mike is still making "movies" such as the new Transformers sequel, which if I have my notes right, is actually titled Transformers: Assaulting Your Senses for 147 Minutes.

Summer action blockbusters, with their aggressive FX and frantic editing, are migraines waiting to happen. If you're looking to go the other way for an evening, may I suggest the new Criterion edition of My Dinner with Andre, director Louis Malle's 1981 indie triumph. Here's a movie that more or less does the impossible: It consists entirely of two friends having a quiet conversation over dinner, and it's riveting.

What the new release can give you, and what's been in the movie all along, after the jump...

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