Bloggish

[Ed. note: this story was updated on 7/1 with Nos. 39-29.]

A few weeks ago, Stylus posted a list that was at once entertaining and utterly underwhelming. This is our response to that list.

The list, "The Top Ten Musical Moments From Film" presented a selection of great moments in the use of in-film sound in the movies. As one person's selection of ten moments, the list is not bad at all (in particular, much respect for the choice of using Anna Karina's dance in My Life to Live over the equally great, but better-known dance scene in Band of Outsiders.)

However... ten is just not enough for a list of this sort. There are entirely too many great uses of diegetic sound in film to count. In fact, given certain cinematic trends, we could easily make entire top tens consisting of scenes from films by Quentin Tarantino, P.T. Anderson, or a number of their derivatives.

Thus, we present you with 57 58 59 of the Best In-Movie Music Moments, starting with an alphabetical list of 59-11, and the top ten to follow soon.

Nos. 59-50
Nos. 49-40
Nos. 39-29

It's been a while since the last Cosmodrome mix. Here's some tunes for summer...

1. Electronic: "Soviet" (Electronic)

2. Tornados: "Blue, Blue, Blue Beat" (The Complete Tornados)

3. Desmond Dekker: "Fu Manchu" (Action!)

4. Althea & Donna: "Uptown Top Ranking" (Story of Jamaican Music: Tougher Than Tough)

5. David Bowie: "Sorrow" (Pin-Ups)

6. Mick Jagger: "Sweet Thing" (Wandering Spirit)

7. Ol' Dirty Bastard: "Shimmy Shimmy Ya" (Return to the 36 Chambers)

8. Bill Callahan (Smog): "Diamond Dancer" (Woke on a Whaleheart)

9. Hi-Tek: "Keep It Moving" (f. Dion, Q-Tip, & Kurupt) (Hi-Teknology 2)

10. Lloydie and the Lowbites: "Rough Rider" (Adults Only!, Vol. 2)

"The Conversation" Russian movie poster, on sale for only $450 at Posteritati Movie Posters in Manhattan.

And another reason to love David Bowie.

While the Federal Government has more than its share of bad moments, this morning we had the rare opportunity to see all three branches at their worst.

The Legislative branch, once again showing an incredible ability to do nothing and get paid for it, struck down the bill to overhaul the immigration system. The bill, while flawed, had the support of Ted Kennedy and President Bush, who are basically polar opposites (except for their love for the bottle). It's disheartening to see this complete inability of Congress to find a compromise on this matter - especially given the amount of time, money, and vocal strength spent on it.

Meanwhile, over in the Judicial branch, Scalithomas and Co. continued their string of recent victories for conservatives, striking down race placement in public schools and allowing companies to set minimum prices on products.

Read more...

Frau Merkel on the cover of conservative Polish weekly Wprost, suckling everyone's favorite prime minister/president identical duo, those adorable Kaczynski twins. Machocha means stepmother.

Wprost ("directly") editor-in-chief Stanislaw Janecki sums it up pretty well:

RE-UPPED as of 6/27

Here is a look ahead at 2007... not everything that is coming out, just everything that might actually be worth your $12. These are the movies that you can expect people to be talking about, critics to be putting on their year-end lists NEXT January, and Cosmodrome to be regretting having missed. I'll continually update the list throughout the year, as release dates get changed and as new things pop up.

If you live anywhere near Brooklyn and write a blog, chances are you went to the Mermaid Parade to shoot some really great photos of some really freaky people.

In the words of a wise friend, this year was the shark-jumped Mermaid Parade. Hordes of smelly youngsters looking for a view of some chubby bare chested females, without any of the charm of what the event's organizers call New York City's largest art parade. In my opinion, the Mermaid Parade has become a stand-in for the sleeze the city used to be known for, something like a last gasp of the porny grit that's been erased from a sanitized Times Square. And I mean that as more of an observation, I think, than a criticism.

GOP Presidential Candidate Fred Thompson has scored the support of an important demographic: his ex-girlfriends. Ordinarily this might be a minor victory, but Thompson's list of former paramours reads like a "Women of the Republican Party" calendar.

Ex-No. 1: Country singer Lorrie Morgan called Fred, "every woman's fantasy." Morgan thinks Thompson has a great chance of cornering the women's vote because, "He’s a soft, safe place to be and that could be Fred’s ticket. Women love a soft place to lay and a strong pair of hands to hold us.”

[On a side note, I'm starting to understand every day, a little more, why the women of the USA aren't supporting Hillary.]

Ex-No. 2: 1st Wife Sarah Knestrick. Knestrick married Thompson at 17 and divorced him 26 years later. I believe this is called a "Starter Wife." Ms. Knestrick holds no grudge though, as she intends to campaign for him.

Ex-No. 3: Georgette Mosbacher, who seems like one heinous bitch; she's the author of "Feminine Force," and co-chairman of McCain's 2000 Presidential campaign. Ms. Mosbacher likes Fred's ability to appeal to “traditional women who will like the Southern gentleman in him."

More Fred Exes