1. Dream Scenario Nicolas Cage gives the best performance of recent memory as a regular guy who becomes famous for being in people’s dreams until it all goes wrong. A brilliant film is every way. 2. The Holdovers Paul Giamatti, Davine Joy Randolph, and Dominic Sessa are the ensemble of the year in Alexander Payne’s new Christmas classic. 3. Oppenheimer Christopher Nolan’s opus is the Hollywood studio film of the year. A masterpiece political thriller, where the true tension stems from the internal battle to create something so drastic it changes the world and our protagonist. 4. The Iron Claw Sean Durkin’s ode to territory wrestling, the Von Erich wrestling family, and true independent cinema is the surprise of the year. Zac Efron has arrived. 5. Theater Camp The funniest comedy of the year is a mockumentary about a struggling theater camp filled with big laughs and a brilliant satirical musical worth applauding! 6. Poor Things A true visionary feast for the eyes. Emma Stone is a 30 year old woman given the brain of a baby, and forced to deal with the patriarchy from a fresh angle. This is what brave filmmaking is all about. 7. American Fiction Another satire makes my list. This one attacking well meaning white liberals who think they know what being black is all about. Jefferson Cord writes and directs a near perfect film. 8. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3 James Gunn wraps up one of the best science fiction/comic book trilogies of all time. This is the Star Wars Kathleen Kennedy couldn’t deliver. A funny, exciting, heart breaking, joyous film that will be cherished for years. 9. Freud’s Last Session A rare intellectual film filled with ideas and theories about life, death, free will, God and sex. In this fan fiction about the meeting of Sigmund Freud and CS Lewis, the story is about facing fears and fighting for truth. In the vein of Doubt and The Two Popes, this is the film I hope you’ll seek out. 10. Super Mario Brothers The most pure fun I had all year in the movies. While not inherently deep, this animated rollercoaster of a film digs deep into 40 years of nostalgia and gives us the Mario Brothers film us 80’s kids always wanted. Runners Up: Here are some films that tied for 11th. To be honest, I could have put any of them at number 10 and felt good about my list. All of them were funny, smart, and wildly creative in their styles. The Color Purple Past Lives Godzilla Minus One May December Air TMNT: Mutant Mania Others worth watching: These are the more experimental or niche films that will have both fans and haters, but I really enjoyed. This is a mixture of documentaries, true stories, and classic Hollywood tales of woe and redemption. What I can promise, is none of these films will bore you. Defending My Life Blackberry Saltburn Dumb Money The Burial Next Goal Wins Creed III
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This gig to Oregon is very special to me because two of Eugene’s most famous former residents literally saved my life without ever meeting me. They are Steve Prefontaine and Bill Bowerman. In 1998 I was a senior varsity wrestler at Simi Valley High. I got injured in pre-season and it looked like I was never going to wrestle. I had a literal nervous break down panic attack. I couldn’t get off the floor. This was about 25 years ago to the day. My grandma had to come over to house, after I called my mom to tell the school I was sick, so I wouldn’t be truant. My grandma told me we should go see a movie. I saw that the film Without Limits had one showing at the United Artists theater in the Thousand Oaks mall. That film stared Billy Crudup as the famous long distance runner Steve Prefontaine and Donald Sutherland as the beloved coach and track coach and co-founder of Nike, Bill Bowerman. The message of the film was not to focus on winning or being the best. The purpose of the damn race was to challenge yourself. To just be better. That film resinated in my soul my entire senior year, as I battle two injuries and only wrestled 9 matches. I lost them all. I only practiced a few times that year. But every time I thought of quitting, I thought of this film. These men. Those warriors. The actual mighty Ducks. Bowerman’s career became an obsession with me. He inspired me to start coaching wrestling, even though I had no business doing it. But after winning 8 league titles with 3 teams, plus having numerous state qualifiers, and being the head coach of 6 all star teams, a few that won 1st or 2nd place medals at state dual tournies, I think I understood what those men preached. Life is a long game. It’s a marathon. Not a sprint. Everyday we have to challenge ourselves and the human heart. People say things like “I loved that movie” or “it was great!” But Without Limits isn’t just great. It literally saved me and then changed my life. Also, for the record. The film had been out of theaters for two weeks by this point. It was a Thursday they had one showing. It was probably a filler from a reel that never got picked up. The next day,, Friday is was out of theaters. It only made $700,000 at the box office. It’s as if the film was made for me. And stayed in the area just for me. And I’d like to believe that too. So I got to visit the University of Oregon today. I got to see the shrines to these two men. I won’t lie. I cried in the museum dedicated to them on Haywood Field. I had to hide from the college kids watching the door. But what a lovely day for me. To think 25 years later, I finally got the chance to see the home of Pre and Bowerman. And in the words of the poet, it has made all the difference.
It’s not the ghosting that hurts. It’s the lack of reason. Whether it’s friendship or dating, just tell people why they aren’t cool enough for you. Who knows, it might help them in their endeavors. Here’s a gender neutral template with fill in the blank options to text or DM to future people you plan to hurt and leave in a state of confusion:
Hey ______, I can no longer (date, hang out with, parent) you. Nothing personal but you and I aren’t clicking. You’re (not good looking enough, not making enough money, not interesting enough to have a conversation with). I understand I led you on by (hanging out with you, texting you, sharing my every thought for like two straight weeks, having dinner with you in romantic settings strictly reserved for people clearly forming a sexual relationship). For that I apologize…that you couldn’t see the future gaslighting. While I hope you enjoy your life without me, I understand we can’t be friends, so I hope we can be like neighbors. We’ll never actually talk, but we can wave at each other at social events. On another note (you should shower more, lose weight, read a book, invest in crypto, join a church or cult) if you’d like to have more friends on my level. But as for me, I’m ghosting you now. I’ve found better (dating options, coworkers, family members). I’ll be blocking you on everything and then unblocking you in 3-6 months to see if you’re cooler or sold a script or got a project I’d be perfect for. Please don’t share this message with our mutual friends. I plan to tell them you just made it weird. Love, Ghosty McCasper Due to studios having until late February to release their Oscar contenders, I finally caught up on all the major films of 2020. Here is a list of the best films I saw from January 2020 until March 2021. Only a handful of films made it into the theaters. This is based on a mixture of films I saw in theaters, streaming, and on demand. So the pricing and screen and sound were drastically different, which I’m fully aware may make me biased. With that said, 2020 had a lot a real gems. With no big blockbusters outside of Tenet, this year the independent film reigned supreme with a lot of wonderful stories dealing with issues like sexuality, poverty, race, political ambition, and other topics that deserve to be addressed. Below are the top ten I saw. 1. Trial of the Chicago 7Aaron Sorkin’s true story of the protestors in front of the DNC convention of 1968 is a powerful and wildly entertaining drama that challenges our ideas of freedom of speech and justice. Filled with great performances, Sasha Baron Cohen stands out as hippie Abbie Hoffman, the pot smoking freethinker who leads this eclectic band of liberal misfits against a conflicted prosecutor and strict judge. 2. Ma Rainey’s Black BottomAugust Wilson’s play about a famous black female singer named Ma Rainey (Viola Davis) and the rebellious trumpet player played by Chadwick Boseman is another four star masterpiece after Fences. The film takes place during one day in a 1920’s recording studio, following a multitude of characters, including the band, the music producers, and Ma’s secret lover and nephew tag alongs. Dealing with hard systemic racism as well as musical integrity, the film is a glorious showcase for two of the finest performances of the year. 3. Promising Young WomanEmerald Fennell’s directorial debut is a sharp, dark, perspective look at rape cultural across the campus and corporate world. Carey Mulligan’s performance is a literal tour de force, as she caries out a variety of methods in making “nice guys” reveal their more sexually depraved nature by pretending to be drunk, being driven by men to their place, and her turning the tables of power on them. With sharp writing and an excellent supporting turn by Bo Burnham, the film looks at the female revenge thriller from a psychological point of view more than a violence dominated point of view. 4. SoulLeave it to Pixar to be the film dealing with existential meaning through jazz music in a year where we all asked questions about who we are. When Joe, a frustrated substitute teacher, slips and falls into a pot hole, he ends up in the after life heading toward the light. But with his big break as a musician finally coming through on earth, he fights his own death to return home to give himself the shot he never had. But to complicate the story, soul 22 needs a mentor to figure out her place in the universe. With a rich and beautiful score, Soul tackles the issues of life and death most great films never would or could, but also reminds us that life is what we make of it. 5. The FatherA heartbreaking and deeply moving film about Anthony Hopkins’ Alzheimer’s induced father, battling the figments of his imagination and places of his mind, as they begin to blur, causing much confusion and desperation. Olivia Coleman plays his daughter trying to take care of him, but we grow weary with her as Hopkins goes deeper and deeper into his unawareness of the world around him. The film is a Masterclass in acting, editing, set design and score. 6. MinariThe beautiful story of a Korean family moving to the deep South to pursue the American Dream, this film took the festivals and critics by storm, becoming the winner in multiple foreign language categories, and earning Oscar nominations for Best Picture, Director, Actor, Supporting Actress, and Screenplay. With a beautiful score and intimate cinematography, director Lee Isaac Chung looks at his own life through the eyes of a five year old Alan Kim and the father played by Steve Yuen, to find the joy of family and cruelness of nature. 7. Sound of MetalThis hard hitting slice of life film looks deeply into the deaf community through the eyes of Riz Ahmed’s newly deaf drummer about to lose everything unless he can get an operation he believes will save his career and relationship. Paul Racci gives the performance of his life as the rough but loving leader of a deaf commune, and the film uses silence in a way unused in film before. A rare film not afraid to tell a difficult story without trying to tie a happy Hollywood ending to its tail. 8. News of the WorldPaul Greengrass’s brilliant episodic western staring national treasure Tom Hanks as a man who goes from town to town reading the news in a post Civil War Texas. Along the way he finds an abandoned girl (Helena Zengel) raised by Native Americans and speaks no English. The film abandons cliches and becomes a showcase, showing a world not too different from our own with mass sickness, political opportunists, and child traffickers. But at the heart of this methodical western are two lonely people who build a family and life together. 9. Judas and the Black MessiahThe true story of how Black Panther Fred Thompson was brought down by the CIA and a black informant played by LaKeith Stanfield, in an amazing performance highlighting his shame and guilt. Daniel Kaluuya gives the performance of his career as Thompson. The film takes a real intimate look at how America wrongly tried to paint the freedom fighter as a terrorist and fills the screen with many fascinating and complex characters. 10. NomadlandChloe Zhao directs, produces, writes, and edits this quiet poetic film staring Francis McDormand as a nomad who states, “I’m not homeless, I’m houseless” to define her new minimalist lifestyle. Beautifully acted, the film uses real life nomads inspired by the book of the same name. The film challenges the way we think capitalism and materialism will make us happy by showing another world beyond our rat race mentality.
I like to consider myself the most famous least accomplished wrestler of all time. For a guy with no real wrestling accomplishments to have the influence I did in the California wrestling scene from 1999-2016 is quite something.
My career started in 1995 at Valley View Middle School. Thinking this was the first step to professional wrestling, I tried out for the junior high wrestling team. In 1995-96 I went 4-5 in the Simi Valley Middle School season, taking second in the league, only because my semi-finals my opponent had an asthma attack and I pinned him while he couldn't breathe. I was majored in the finals. My only other accomplishment that year was I lost 15 pounds. The next year at Simi Valley high school, I lost my pigtail at the 1996 Thousand Oaks novice tournament and then pinned the other loser. But I did take third at the Rio Mesa Frosh/Soph that year. I still thank Rio Mesa’s coach Todd Stoke when I see him for having that tournament. And I still mention it when I run the seeding meeting at Newbury Park Invitational. Got promoted to Varsity at the end of my sophomore year because we needed the carpool drivers. That is not a joke. The regular varsity wrestler was a sophomore who went JV to win the league title. He pinned a kid in the finals I beat three days earlier. So I made myself a certificate as the “unofficial” JV Champ at school on Monday. I threw it away on Tuesday. My two year varsity career was more uneventful than a Biden press conference. I went 0-6 at Marmonte Varsity League Finals over three years at Simi High. I won two actual matches. I beat a kid from Santa Monica who pinned himself, and I pinned a kid from Agoura who went o-7 in league. I went a much more impressive 1-5 that year in league, and 2-11 overall, losing in the first round of most carry tournaments. I was injured most of my senior year, but filled out brackets better than any stat girl in the country. Humble brag - I was in honors English. I finished my illustrious career with a 13-15 JV record and 2-18 varsity record. Lettered twice. Didn’t get any awards at the banquet. So the team gave my an honorary Team Spirit Award for not missing a practice in two years, even when injured. I was Rudy. My college career was even less impressive. I wrestled one day at Moorpark College in the summer of 1997 as a junior in high school, thinking it would be good to get beat up by college kids. My carpool partner quit after a day, so I wasn't able to go back. Still got a B in the class because Head Coach Paul Keysaw had no idea who I was, as I was on the roster for the summer class but never went. Easiest B I ever earned. My coaching career started at Simi High (1999-2006) and then Royal (2006-2008) where I helped Royal win two league championships. I won one league title at Simi Valley in 2001 with a group of wrestlers in which half became ineligible after league finals. At Royal I helped them reach new heights, even though one of dads turned assistant coach made my life hell. Eventually we had to kick him off the staff. His kid was the only CIF State qualifier. That was awkward. I was fired after leading the team to a league title and top three finish in CIF, because the coach who brought me on said “I don’t want people thinking you’re the reason for the success of the team.” I ended up coaching at Moorpark College in 2008 and after that they canceled the program. So I went to El Camino Real, where I was part of three LA City Titles. During 2004-2010 I was one of the head coaches for the TCWA All-Star teams. Mostly because the President and Treasurer knew I wouldn't take the petty cash to a strip club or buy alcohol, which I guess had happened in the past. Adults, am I right? As the Team Leader we placed top 5 in Freestyle Duals every year and in 2010 took 2nd in the state in both Greco and Freestyle. With the coaching assistance of Buck Blakeman, Terry Fischer, Anthony Califano, Paul Clemente, Scott Yvarra, and many more, we overcame crappy seeding and hours of travel to succeed. From 2009-2016 I was part of a few CIF committees because of the committee seeding data I collected when they switched from an all coaches meeting to a league rep seeding meeting. And a few times I was brought in to run CIF seeding meetings. But that was only because I was the SS Ranking dude for the TCW. And a lot of dads would send me nasty emails about how their son should be ranked in the SS because he took 4th at a 5-Way. Dads ruin sports. Never forget that. In 2016 I won a LA City Title with my good friend Terry Fischer. As we left the Roybal High School gym, he looked at me and said, “We won the championship tonight, and no one in China cares.” That might be the best way to define my career. |
Paul Douglas Moomjean Blog's About What's on His MindBlogging allows for me to rant when there is no stage in the moment to talk about what's important and/or funny to me. Archives
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