Historically, I really commit to my favorite TV shows. In 8th and 9th grade I liked Miami Vice and by “liked” I mean an unhealthy obsession, couldn’t miss it, must dress like Don Johnson even though I’m 14 years old and not a cop in Miami. I am horribly embarrassed about that time and hope that there is little photographic evidence. Eventually, I learned to appreciate programs without diving in head first at the shallow end. For instance, I quite enjoyed Seinfeld but never once felt the urge to become a Jewish comedian. See! Healthy! OK, present day. My newest, bestest show in the whole wide world is LOST! I do NOT hate it! This guy, JJ Abrams, who started his TV life with Felicity, of all things, is my hero! He thought up another favorite show, ALIAS, and instead of sitting back and basking in the glow of a successful series, he took on a couple new projects. One of which is LOST. What, at first, sounded like a Gilligans Island remake has become an interesting drama about redemption, failure, drug abuse and boar meat! LOST uses the flashback masterfully. Most screenwriting instructors will tell you to stay away from the flashback, but it’s used SO well on LOST to illuminate motive and character and to tweak stereotypes. With such a large cast, LOST doesn’t put all it’s eggs in one basket like a Nash Bridges, for example. Sorry, I had to throw another Don Johnson show in there. LOST does a nice job of diversity without cramming it down your throat like every Mtv show ever. There different people dealing with things differently. Good drama! For the geeks, there are all kinds of crazy things going on with numbers and comic books and stuff. I know there are detractors that can’t stop asking when the Globetrotters will show up on the island. The answer is NEVER you detractors. That would be lame. What would be cool is if Crockett and Tubbs showed up in Crockett’s badass racing boat to save everybody! Cue Jan Hammer music!

The summer before 1st grade, I saw Star Wars. Then the toys came out! My mom was gonna buy me 2 action figures, but then I got chicken pox so she bought me 5 of ‘em! Sweet! I mean the toys were sweet. Chicken pox sucked! I had those itchy things everywhere. EVERYWHERE! Yes, even there. I grew up on Star Wars. It was torture waiting the 3 or 4 years between movies. I was miserable. Not “Chicken Pox in my crack” miserable but close. I saw Empire Strikes Back the summer before 4th grade. It was probably the coolest thing I’d ever seen in my short life. My older cousin, Tim Hay, was so excited after seeing it that he screamed to his mom (waiting in the car)as he ran past the line waiting to get in, “MOM! Darth Vader is Lukes father!!!!” The summer before 7th grade I saw Return of the Jedi and the trilogy was complete. Star Wars was very influential during my formative years. I even remember one of the fights my mom and step-dad got into. It was pretty bad. I worked up the courage to go plead with them to stop. “If Luke and Darth Vader can get along then so can you!”, I said through tears. It didn’t work, my step-dad was a drunk a-hole. Man, if anyone deserved chicken pox in their crack, but I digress. In my 7th grade class photo, I’m wearing a Return of the Jedi t-shirt with a scout trooper on a speeder bike. Clearly, girls were not in the picture at that point. As you can imagine, when I heard that George Lucas was making a prequel trilogy, I was stoked! And, just like most 34 year old comic book collectors still renting out moms garage, I was sadly disappointed by Episodes 1 and 2. Maybe I was different? Perhaps, I was less innocent and less willing to suspend disbelief to really recapture the magic? Or maybe, just maybe those movies were craptastic. Most likely the latter. They did have elements that were terrific, but the overall impression I got was that movie making technology was the star of the show. Anyhoo, I could go into WAY more detail, but then Matt Steele and I would have half as much stuff to talk about at lunch tomorrow. After seeing Star Wars Episode III Revenge of the Sith, I am happy to report that I DID NOT HATE IT! It was pretty dang cool. Of course, I have my nerd criticisms but it really was some good drama set in an incredible looking universe. I just knew that the magic was still there. Some say that these are kids movies and are worse for adults, kinda like Chicken Pox. Man, I can’t imagine that stuff in my adult crack. Ouch!

I, Chris Mundell, had never been to a U2 show until this week. Since a-hole@ebay.com bought up all the tickets, Kevin Grose told me that we should call people with connections. Now, being Chris Mundell has it’s perks, but I can’t just show up at Brad Pitt’s and hitch a ride. I mean, I COULD, but then his people would call the cops… again. The only guy I could come up with was photographer Mike Martin in Denver Colorado. He shoots the Denver Nuggets games. He pulled through with a private press box at the Pepsi center!!! So I spent all my frequent flier miles and joined Kevin and Greg Lawler on a rock and roll adventure! We got a bonus event in the Nuggets vs Trail Blazers game Tuesday night. Good times! It was a cross-cultural experience for Greg. Being from South Africa, he knows ALL about rugby, but not so much with the hoops. OK, back to U2. We’ve had a couple of friends see U2 in LA and San Jose. BOTH groups got to meet Bono before the show. So, naturally, we felt it was our destiny to meet Bono in Denver before the show. Mike confirmed a sound check time of 4pm. We joined about 30 other fans to wait for the band to drive up. After an hour standing in the cold and, eventually, rain the band drove up AND right on by:( We felt like chumps. Then we had pizza. We came back and found our private press box was very private. Kevin immediately dropped his pants to illustrate this fact. It was WAY up at the top of the Pepsi Center. Dang far but it gave us a full view of the whole experience. The show was incredible. U2 really knows how to move a crowd. We were singing along even though, I’m pretty sure, U2 couldn’t hear us. But it felt like they could. We had a great time. Although, I did leave with a new goal of getting closer seats for the Staples show in November. I want to be down in there with the common folk! I did NOT hate this show! Go to One.org to help end poverty. Keep rockin’.

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Hi movie fans! I got to check out an early screening of The Interpreter! It was a fun trip to the hills of Beverly. Roger paid for dinner and we saw Brooke Shields. Not in the movie. She was eating pasta. So, in this film, Nicole Kidman comes out of acting seclusion to play Silvia Broome. Silvia is a white African who lives in New York and works as an interpreter at the UN. OOOO! Roger was a translator at the UN too!! Perfect! Anyway, Silvia really believes in the UN. You can tell by the handful of inspirational monologues she gives on the UN’s noble goals. I was curious about her being African and white. Lucky for me, I’ve got a white, African friend, our web host, Greg Lawler. He has agreed to a little interview… CM.com: Greg, you are African and you are white. How the hell did that happen? Greg: hmm, interesting question, I checked online and apparently “one or both parents need to be white” which is 100% correct. Man the internet is amazing! Oh, and I was born in Zimbabwe. CM.com: Why don’t you guys like black people? Greg: Chris, just because I grew up in South Africa doesn’t mean I have negative feelings for people of color. God created all people in his image. I don’t support Apartheid. CM.com: Come on Greg, I saw Lethal Weapon 2. What’s this Apartheid? As you can see, there is a lot of lying in the world. So, it’s good that there are places like the UN and movies like The Interpreter. Oh, yeah, Sean Penn plays a Secret Service guy. He’s good! I did not hate this movie!!

I can’t tell you how relieved I was when I discovered that this movie had NOTHING to do with Michael Jackson or his compound in the neighboring Santa Ynez Valley. I had a Great Great Grandma named Inez. She was a Native American woman, Osage tribe. My dad is 1/8th Osage. That makes me 1/16th. Not enough to go to college for free or to have ANY concept of the Native American experience. Oh yeah, I’m reviewing a movie!
Finding Neverland is sort of a Shakespeare In Love take on the guy that wrote Peter Pan. It’s sort of unfair to narrow it down to that. It’s actually quite a touching tale of friendship and imagination. Wow, I sound like a doofus. It’s true though. There have got to be a bunch of Oscar nods in there. Johnny Depp is great, as always. Kate Winslet. Hmmmm. Don’t rush me. Kate Winslet. She should be in more stuff. Dustin Hoffman was nice too. Not as strong as in Meet The Fockers, but I digress. The real stand out to me was this kid, Freddie Highmore who played Peter Davies. He will rule the world one day. OK, fine, the UK at least. I didn’t hate this movie at all!
I know that I don’t do many negative movie reviews, but I have a family and few movie going opportunities. I can’t just throw my limited movie watching time at every Fat Albert film that comes around. Besides, my people did not struggle against the white man’s Manifest Destiny and centuries of poverty on reservations so that I could see “Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle”.

Sometimes, it’s good to be Chris Mundell. For instance, when a good friend let’s you tag along to an advanced screening of The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou!!! I saw this film over a month ago and I can still feel the love. This is the latest from writer/director, Wes Anderson. He did Bottle Rocket, Rushmore & The Royal Tenenbaums. You either loved those movies or you are a boob. His movies feel like classic 70′s movies we all should have seen when they came out. Seriously, Anderson is quietly creating this body of work that we will one day look back on and go, “Hey, baby! You got some fries with that shake! Yeah, I said it!” In the rediculously touching adventure that is Life Aquatic, Bill Murray delivers HUGE, again. His ability to show years of regret on his face is uncanny. Everyone in this movie is great! Even the ship, The Belefonte, is terrific. Anderson’s movies are so full of interesting detail and original characters. He’s like the king of quirk. Many people try quirk, but he’s got it. As funny as this movie is, it really has heart. I cared about the characters. I laughed, I cried and I did not hate it!