TV review: Modern Family

Somehow I have forgotten to talk about THE best show of the season - Modern Family. The show is a look into an extended family with a sort of reality show spin to it. There are three separate households that are related to each other. There's Jay's (Ed O'Neill) house where he lives with his second wife, Gloria (Sofia Vergara), and her son, Manny (Rico Rodriguez). Then there's Claire's (Julie Bowen), Jay's oldest child from his first marriage, house. She lives with her husband Phil (Ty Burrell) and her three children, Hayley (Sarah Hyland), Alex (Ariel Winter), and Luke (Nolan Gould). Finally, there's Mitchell's (Jesse Tyler Ferguson) house. He lives with his partner Cameron (Eric Stonestreet) and their adopted baby girl, Lily.

The three households interact, much like any family would, but each is punctuated with a dialogue directed at the camera/crew. This gives the show a better look into the family dynamics. Instead of just showing the tense relationship between Jay and his out-of-the-closet son, Mitchell, there will be a scene focusing on how the pair interacts, but then the camera will cut to a monologue with each character separately telling how they relate to either each other or the situation. While this sounds like it could be boring, it's often the funniest part of each episode.

This mockumentary way of telling a story isn't particularly new. Christopher Guest does it in all of his movies. However, it is new to a weekly television series. It can be rather difficult to get the storyline across to the audience without getting distracted by the various monologues. Yet it works here. Both the writing and the acting is absolutely brilliant. The show airs on Wednesday nights at 9PM on ABC. I'm not sure if it's available on Hulu, but ABC often reruns episodes. You definitely need to catch this one!

Movie review: The Proposal

After a long day of running errands, my husband and I loaded up Netflix to see what looked interesting. Interestingly enough, they recently added The Proposal - a movie we both wanted to see but were too cheap to pay more than our monthly Netflix fee to see it - to the online streaming queue. So we snuggled up and clicked Play.

Andrew Paxton (Ryan Reynolds) is the young executive assistant to chief editor Margaret Tate (Sandra Bullock). Tate is a hardworking, pushy woman that is the target of much of her office's hatred. When she finds out that her visa has expired and she is about to be deported back to Canada, she forces Paxton to marry her. Knowing that she needs him, Paxton agrees...as long as she gives him a promotion and promises to publish his manuscript. The pair take a trip to Paxton's hometown in Alaska to break the news to his family during his grandmother's (Betty White) birthday party. Tate, who had been orphaned at 16, finds the heart that she had deeply hidden from everyone.

Yes, it is pretty much your standard romantic comedy. However, I firmly believe that this genre is where Sandra Bullock excels. And besides, the term "romantic comedy" doesn't automatically mean the movie will suck. Both my husband and I enjoyed the movie a lot. I thought that the on-screen chemistry between Reynolds and Bullock was amazing. Not only were they able to fight well, but they were also able to show that sexual tension that can exist between a man and a woman that argue constantly. Meanwhile, Betty White was fabulous as Paxton's grandmother. There needs to be more roles written for this brilliant woman. On the down side, I wasn't particularly fond of Mary Steenburgen as Paxton's mother or of Craig T. Nelson as his father. Despite knowing what these two actors are capable of, both of their performances came off wooden and bland. They are seriously just there to round out the "perfect family." Luckily, Nelson's character is barely there and Steenburgen's gets overshadowed by White so it's rather easy to ignore them altogether.

If you have about an hour and a half to kill, The Proposal isn't a terrible way to spend your time. Just don't expect to come away with a whole new look on life or anything. Enjoy it for what it is - a really good romantic comedy.

Jmovie: Kamen Rider Decade: All Riders vs Dai-Shocker

Title: Kamen Rider Decade: All Riders vs. Dai-Shocker Release date: 8/8/09 Genre: Tokusatsu Cast: Masahiro Inoue, Kanna Mori, Ryouta Murai, Moe Arai, Ryuichi Oura Plot: The worlds are merging together, destroying each other. Only by killing all of the Riders from all of the various worlds can one world be saved. Or is that the real solution? What is good: Watching the Kamen Riders fight was interesting. What is bad: Gackt's cameo was awful. Letter rating: B- Overall: I've never watched Kamen Rider in any of its forms. As a matter of fact, the only reason I wanted to watch this was for the Gackt cameo. Unfortunately, the Gackt cameo was terrible. Despite not knowing anything about the series, the movie wasn't too bad. I was able to keep up with the plot, for the most part, and it was kinda cool to see all the various incarnations of the Rider. The main downside was that the movie was only 66 minutes so it was more like a special episode then a full-length movie. They probably could have spent a little more time fleshing out some things or let the battles go on a little bit longer. As a whole, I had a decent time watching it.

Another Video For You

Here's another video for you. They scan a temporary barcode tattoo with a barcode scanner. I think it's kinda funny. And just in case you don't know...RTFM means Read The F*$%ing Manual. So not only is it funny that it actually scans, but it's also funny that it pretty tells you that you're an idiot for scanning it in the first place. I wonder if the software would work with actual tattoos too.

I want a home theater!

A few months ago, my mother, my sister, and I were looking at houses. My sister is thinking about buying a house in the nearish future and she wanted to get an idea of things she would like. Since we are also rather silly people, we decided to look at houses way beyond our means. A lot of those houses had mini movie theater rooms in the basement, complete with stadium home theater seating. I would absolutely love to have something like that in my house, but it wouldn't work in our current house. It would be nice if we could get to a position where we could afford something like that. If anyone wants to give me a $500,000 house, I'll gladly accept!

A Little Scary

Every day, I drive down a fairly major road on my way to work. People frequently drive around 60 miles per hour, even though the posted speed limit if 45 on most of the road. On my way home last night, there was a rather major accident. Surprisingly, it was not at the blind intersection. (If you are making a right or left turn off of one of the side roads, you cannot see if anyone is coming at you on the major road. You have to just take a deep breath and hope.) It was merely a person not yielding the right of way while making a left-hand turn. One act of stupidity sent four people to the hospital and had the possibility of seriously injuring two children. Luckily, the children were safe. I got stuck in the traffic build-up that resulted from the accident. (I showed up about 15 - 20 minutes after the actual crash.) Everyone had to turn around and find an alternate route to their destination. I, somehow, managed to get to my daughter's after-school program about one minute before they closed. *whew*

So here is my public service announcement: Drive carefully. I won't say "Obey the speed limit" because you won't. (I know I don't.) But do it cautiously. Keep tabs on what other drivers are doing. If you don't think you have enough time to make a turn before an oncoming car gets there, wait. There is nothing so important that you can't wait another 10 seconds for a car to pass first. And check your insurance quotes. Make sure you are properly covered in case something terrible does happen.

A new hobby?

I can tell that I'm starting to get better, no matter what my sinuses say. How can I tell? I'm getting bored enough to read dumb websites on quick trim reviews and celebrity gossip. Maybe I need to find a new hobby. Something that is mind-numbing enough that I don't have to really think about it, yet entertaining enough that it doesn't bore me. Any suggestions?