All I Want to Say today is I Love Sudoku, and oh yeah, HO HO HO Merry Christmas

The 2005 JMA Winners

Since 1999, I have done my own version of the Grammy Awards mixed with the Video Music Awards where I pick my favorite album, follow up album, video/song, and new artist in music for each year. This should not be taken seriously, these are just based on the albums and music(from the artists I know and love) that I bought or listened to this year. Artists like Coldplay, Foo Fighters, or Beck are not included on this post because I didn't even listen to their latest albums. So here are the 2005 winners, according to me.

ALBUM OF THE YEAR
MESMERIZE- SYSTEM OF A DOWN
JMA Award winner- Best New Artist 1999




















FOLLOW UP ALBUM OF THE YEAR
(Albums that are somewhat better than the last release)
t.A.T.u.- DANGEROUS AND MOVING
JMA Award Winner- Best New Artist of 2003





















SONG(S)/VIDEO(S) OF THE YEAR
TRAPPED IN THE CLOSET Chapters 1-12
R. KELLY




















BEST NEW ARTIST
????
I'll think about this one later because it seems that no new group came out and totally amazed me like others in the past years. With most new artists, or at least artists new to me, I only heard one song such as:
Different- Acceptance
Gravity- Embrace
Slide- Mark de Clive-Lowe
There are a couple artists I would highly consider.
1. Fall Out Boy- I can tell they didn't come, or start, out this year, but probably a lot of people didn't know them before 2005 either.
2. James Blunt- I like the current single "You're Beautiful" but another song named "Goodbye My Lover" totally had me wanting to burst into tears, which I like, after hearing him perform it on SNL.
So I don't know about which one should be the choice, I'll just have to see what these artists do later and then I'll decide the 2005 Best New Artist.

Along with System of A Down & t.A.T.u., here are the other nominees for album of the year.



311's Don't Tread On Me- Excellent album, but I don't want to be too biased on my favorite group every year. 311 has won several JMAs in the past including 1996, 1999, and 2003 Album of The Year.

Family Guy Live In Vegas- Very funny and it's cool to include a comedy album in the category. What a year it's been for Seth MacFarlane and the creators of the popular FOX show: the show comes back funnier than ever and this CD is released.

Daft Punk's Human After All- Probably would of won Album of the Year if it was longer and it had better songs. It absolutely doesn't measure up with their previous release, Discovery from 2001 which won Best Album for that year. I think they made it too quick, it does have two really amazing songs: Human After All & Robot Rock

My Favorite Film of the Year- This Divided State

I did not include this film on my post named "The Best, Middle, and Worst Films of the Year that I Saw" (a couple posts down) for a couple reasons.
1. I have huge reasons for loving it which include witnessing most of the events of the film as they were happening, going to the school that the film takes place, being obsessed with the story from the start, and finding myself on one of the special features on the DVD after I bought it on the September DVD release date.
2. On that post I wanted to list major motion pictures that played in theaters all over the country and save this film for a separate post.

Now that I have that out of the way. I was excited about this movie ever since I read that director Steven Greenstreet was making it in my campus newspaper. I RSVP'd and attended the February 3rd, 2005 premiere at the Ragan Theater @ Utah Valley State College. It was a very enjoyable experience because I got to laugh and get extremely pissed off at the whole story all over again.

If you don't know the story or what the hell I'm talking about, here's a very good summary.
A raw and riveting examination of the heated "red versus blue" rift in the nation, This Divided State begins in September 2004 with the presidential election fast approaching and the State of Utah ready to declare itself "Bush Country" once again. However, this complacent state of Republican majority was rocked when Utah Valley State College announced that liberal filmmaker Michael Moore would speak on their campus two weeks before the election. Within 24 hours of the announcement, a media frenzy descended upon the school as angry community members and religious leaders shouted protests, pointed fingers, and quoted Mormon scripture. Some even claimed Mooreπs arrival would bring the Apocalypse.
The student body representatives who had invited Michael Moore soon were inundated with hate mail, death threats, and claims that they had committed "treason." An effort to Other students who supported Mooreπs right to speak were labeled "liberal," "anti-Mormon," or just simply "evil." Spearheading the anti-Moore campaign was Kay Anderson, local millionaire, Sunday School teacher and self-appointed community spokesperson. Mr. Anderson made local headlines when he attempted to bribe the college administration, during a public forum, with a personal $25,000 check in order to cancel Michael Mooreπs speech.
Attempting to calm outrage, the college invited FOX News pundit Sean Hannity to speak a few days before Moore. But this was to no avail. The controversy continued to explode into a full-blown war of political and religious differences and, within days, lawsuits were filed, resignations occurred, and friendships were torn apart.

My personal story about the whole thing is that I love Michael Moore and what he does. When I heard from my parents that he was coming to my school, it was like hearing my favorite music group was coming to my city to do a concert. So immediately I got my free student ticket to Michael Moore's speech which was funny cause the ticket lady said to me "Are you sure this is what you want?" All the events between getting my ticket to going to the speech was pure chaos at its best. I saw the "Anti-Moore Rally" and the "Anti-Hannity Rally" take place luckily because I was on my lunch break at school. Without getting into every scene, my opinion on the whole story is it was a big deal over nothing. The school lost donations, the enrollment went down, and most other major changes to school were slightly blamed on the incident. On the other hand, the end of the world didn't come and it brought attention to the school, and at the time it made school a very cool place to because people had something to talk about. Ever since then, school for me has been sort of boring.

Anyway, here's my little review of the film. I wish they put more of the "Anti-Hannity Rally" in the DVD special features first off. This is because there was a guy who said fuck a few times and then a guy came up and said something like, "You should be ashamed of yourself," which was funny. I was sort of disappointed in how they changed the ending from the screening at the premiere to the DVD release. I liked how the filmmakers orignally put a clip of Michael Moore on The Tonight Show telling Jay Leno that Bush won the 2004 election because "Bush got more jokes." Not that I'm conservative, because believe me I'm not, but the whole way he said it was funny.

About Kay Anderson (The obvious antagonist in the film). The guy is not the Mayor of Orem City, my father, my church bishop, the President of Utah Valley State College, or President of the LDS church. So I think he and his wife should move next to Brigham Young University, have a Caffeine Free Diet Coke with a smile, and shut the mother fucking hell up. He had only one good point throughout the whole thing which was that the school would likely lose donations.
I really like how the film showed how much of a dick Sean Hannity is and how polite and tolerant Michael Moore is because he probably did research on the mormons who make up most of the population on location. Oh by the way, free speech works because we know when not to keep our mouths shut and something should definitely be said.

And about Sean Vreeland, the guy should not be doing a "controversial" petition in the middle of the UVSC student center if he's not ready for people to ask why the hell he's doing it. "Read it and sign if you agree" is not good enough. He needs to discuss the reasons why the petititon is such a brialliant idea or go do something else. I remember Vreeland at the time saying that people shouldn't listen to Michael Moore because he's not a college graduate. Well neither was he at the time so that comment just plain sucks ass.

The film captured all the different events very well and not leaving any huge details out. I also love the little scenes outside of the school about a Michael Moore look-a-like and talking to a guy who was in the U.S. Army dressed up as a stormtrooper which makes me laugh because a proud soldier ends up being a Star Wars character. I thought the visit to a place called "Moore Pizza" was good because the guy look so excited to have somebody actually being there. Those and the numerous other shots of places around Utah Valley show what kind of place it is very well.

The film is supposed to be unbiased but in a way it isn't. Yes, both sides get their say and there's no narration in the film but the filmmakers did pick what things to put in it and the questions asked by the director to Kay Anderson and Sean Hannity were to trap them and make their "side" look dumb in my opinion. Not that I hate that but it's good to point out. I loved that a montage of newspaper clippings and other items in the press was displayed in one sequence.

I love the choice of music which is very important in my book. The music was strong in getting the emotions out whether it be calm, angry, or sad. The editing and sound don't bug me cause as long as I can tell what's going on and what people are saying, it's all good to me. The film has plenty of memorable lines. My favorite quote is, "This guy's not evil," said at the public discussion panel portion of the film about Michael Moore as a person.

So as you can see, I have a huge bias for this movie and I recommend it to anyone that is interested. I bought my sister who lives near Washington D.C. a copy and I'm pretty sure she enjoyed it. For more details and a bunch of other stuff, go to the film's website.

RICHARD PRYOR- Dec. 1, 1940--Dec. 10, 2005

I'll Post More Stuff Later (I Promise)

Peanut Butter Jelly Time

Movie Review- Mobsters & Mormons

NOTE- This will be the first and LAST Mormon Movie of any kind I will review on this Blog

I put that note there because I hate to see these movies but I see them anyway because I'm curious about what they have to offer. One reviewer said that this movie was a step up compared to the other mormon flicks. Still, I don't like mormon movies (especially the comedies) because they are highly stupid and very embarrassing because of the place that I live. What's worse, especially with this movie, is the people in the theater talking throughout the movie about how each stupid ass line reminds them of a particular person or thing.

Judging from this movie and the trailers before it, mormon movies are starting to star actors that most people will actually recognize from something else. In this case, it was lead actor Mark DeCarlo who I recognize from an episode of Seinfeld right off the bat. That was one little good thing about the movie.

The jokes suck big time. Most of them have to do with how the Mormons (and Utah) are so different than the "Mobsters" and where they come from. (fry sauce, little or no caffeinated beverages, multiple wives, etc)

The scenes that I actually enjoyed were ones between the "Mobster" son (sitting down on the left) and the chick on the right that sort of looks like an Olsen Twin. It took a break from the crappy Mafia and Mormon stereotyping and just got down to good scenes about two young people interacting and just hanging out without doing a bunch of stuff. It made me think of making fun of The OC televison show and instead call it "The UC" (Utah County).
But since it's a mormon movie, the two don't get involved romantically which sort of sucks.

It started out really bad. Then all of the sudden, it got better as it went along. There's actually parts that were really interesting. (Explosions, chases, etc) The ending is alright, thank God it wasn't really cheesy or crappy like other movies in the genre.

On a 1 to 10 scale, I would give it 6. Of course, I wish there was cursing but what the hell. It didn't leave a shitty taste in my mouth. I liked to see the numerous locations because they are in my area.

__The Best, Middle, & Worst Movies of the Year __(That I Saw). The List Is In No Particular Order

COOL MOVIES
Sin City

Batman Begins

Star Wars Episode III
The Transporter 2
Red Eye
Crash
The Longest Yard

Cinderella Man

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants
Coach Carter

ALLRIGHT MOVIES
Fever Pitch
The Interpreter
Flightplan
White Noise
Rebound
The Honeymooners
Hitch
Sahara
Monster-In-Law
Hostage
Are We There Yet
The Amityville Horror
Into The Blue
Just Like Heaven

DUMB MOVIES
Deuce Bigalow European Giggilo
Man of the House
The Brothers Grimm
Charlie & The Chocolate Factory
Mr. & Mrs. Smith
Kicking And Screaming
The Pacifier
Guess Who
The Perfect Man
Sky High
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy