"The Road" - Telluride Film Festival award winner possible Oscar contender

 

Viggo Mortensen  and Kodi Smit-McPhee in The Road

The Road is a gripping drama film starring Viggo Mortensen and which is in wide release November 25th. I mention The Road because first, I saw it this Summer and, second, it was a Silver Medallion honoree at the 36th Telluride Film Festival, of which I've served on the screening group for more years than I can remember, third because now that it's screened at the Festival and is about to be shown to the public, I can write about it, and finally because I think it's Mortensen's best performance worthy of "Best Actor" nominee consideration.

(As a note, I don't know anyone connected with the making or distribution of the film.)

The Road is an epic tale of survival based on Cormac McCarthy's 2008 and concerns Viggo Mortensen's character and his son played by Kodi Smit-McPhee who don't really know who to trust among Charlize Theron, Guy Pierce, and the many people they encounter who are also trying to stay alive in a post-nuclear America. And its about how his son keeps Mortensen from becoming more "animal" than human in the process.

The Road is not a pretty or easy film to watch. It has a realistic look at what one experiences in the conditions presented in the film. But its how Mortensen plays in that "place" which makes his role so great to experience. He's always on edge and you're not sure what he's going to do next but feel for him in the process.

I saw a raw version of the film this summer and not the finished product at Telluride but the entire story was complete.

Kareem Abdul Jabbar - LA Lakers great has leukemia

One of my favorite all time great LA Lakers and the inventor of "The Sky Hook", the great center Kareem Abdul Jabbar has leukemia. According to the Associated Press, Kareem has been receiving treatments for a rare form of it, called "chronic myeloid leukemia", and is progressing well as of this writing.

Kareem Abdul Jabbar

Chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) is a kind of cancer of the blood cells. In Kareem Abdul Jabbar's case it showed up during a checkup as his white blood cell count being much higher than expected. CML is a clonal bone marrow stem cell disorder but its highly treatable and the survival rate is such that Kareem can expect to live a normal life.

My prayers are with him as he deals with this illness.

Zennie Abraham part of YouTube Community Roundtable

I'm happy to announce I've been invited to my first YouTube Community Roundtable this week in San Francisco.

The YouTube Community Roundtable is an event where YouTube Partners like myself (Zennie62 on YouTube) are gathered together by YouTube to talk about how to improve the user experience.

I'm also excited to learn about YouTube's new features we will be introduced to and meet my fellow YouTubers and tell them about my planned YouTube Meetup,  December 12th, 2 to 5 PM at Oakland's Lake Chalet Restaurant on the Patio.  

If you're reading this and want to have me express your desire to see something changed or improved, please send an email to me today, Tuesday, November 10th at Zennie@Zennie62.com

YouTube Meetup at Oakland's Lake Chalet Saturday, December 12th

I will host Oakland's first YouTube Meetup Saturday, December 12th at 2 PM to 5 PM at Oakland Restaurant Lake Chalet and out on the Patio.



I'm really excited about this event and want to thank the owners of Lake Chalet for allowing me to have this first-in-Oakland YouTube Meetup.

But what's a YouTube Meetup?

It's a simple gathering of YouTubers and in this case with a twist: rather than just come with our camcorders and film each other, we will also be the focus of a "video scavenger hunt contest" where the most viewed video that gets all of the elements of the hunt wins a prize.

But the idea is for San Francisco Bay Area YouTubers to meet each other and enjoy great food and people in the fantastic setting that is Lake Chalet.

Also, I will have another segment of Zennie62 Live on Thursday at 4 PM on the Patio at Lake Chalet this Thursday, November 12th.

Elizabeth Lambert and Rhode Island Girls Soccer Fight - why the violence?

All of a sudden we have an outbreak of female soccer sports violence with New Mexico Women's Soccer player Elizabeth Lambert pulling hair and hitting members of BYU's team during their playoff game last Thursday and now this video of a Rhode Island Girls Soccer Fight that was so heated it triggered another fight in the stands.

Reportedly, the scene was a Providence, R.I girls soccer team state championship on Sunday.



But the LA Times also reports that New Mexico Soccer Team player Elizabeth Lambert is from Lancaster Paraclete High School and was a standout player there. Here's a more complete video containing most of the six different assaults Elizabeth Lambert carried out against BYU.



But also notice that she's not doing all of the elbowing. Not to excuse what she did, but this video does show how violent Women's Soccer really is. Elizabeth Lambert's not an abnormality but really more a very good example of what does happen in Women's Soccer games. That she was considered a high school standout simply means that her tactics were applauded and refined for years until last week's video-captured performance where Lambert was literally beating the tar out of BYU.

Oh, New Mexico lost the game.

Why the violence? It's part of what I see as a social trend. I was at the San Francisco 49ers v. Tennessee Titans game Sunday and was struck by the number of men who were just walking around and seemingly drunk and looking for a fight.

All of the men who were doing this were walking in that "I'm a weight-lifter and pretty stupid" way and some of the women they were with looked just as ridiculous in their own way. Yes, a number of fights, one large one, started. I've never seen a football game so full of people who weren't there to watch the game but to get "in the face" of other people.

After the game the fans in Titans colors were rude, mean, classless, and awful. Yes, their team won, but to openly taunt Niners fans was just terrible and reminded me of Boise State's Byron Hout all over again.

How we got to this point of "knee-jerk" violence is a new concern of mine, so stay tuned.

FOX News Red Eye with Greg Gutfeld has World's Dumbest Guy

Greg Gutfeld

I don't normally do this but in flipping channels Monday night I happened to stop on Fox News show Red Eye with Greg Gutfeld and was treated to the ruminations of one who must be the World's Dumbest Guy in Greg Gutfeld.

Dumb because his hate-filled monologue, or what he calls a "Greg-a-logue" was nothing more than a several-minutes-long hate-filled rant against Muslims in the wake of the Fort Hood Shooting Scandal. I didn't watch the rest of Greg Gutfeld's show because I felt just plain dirty after listening to his sorry excuse for a sensible comment.

Using a tragedy like Fort Hood as the basis for the expression of racial and ethnic hate is the stuff of stupidly evil people like Greg Gutfeld. In my view he should have enough courage to apologize for his actions. Implying that all Muslims or even radical Muslims are dangerous and should be the target of hateful statements like his own only pours fuel on a burning fire for the hope and prayer of ratings.

Smart people can express themselves without installing words of hate or even seeking to drive a wedge between racial and ethnic groups by encouraging hate-speech against them.  I say Greg Gutfeld is the World's Dumbest Guy because he's not shown he can do this. I've seen his show before and always come sway feeling like I need to take a shower.

Instead, I think Greg Gutfeld should wash his mouth out with soap.

Oakland parking problem: City of Oakland's Karen Boyd is just plain wrong on tickets

More evidence that the City of Oakland does not care about the needs of residents or their economic position and how it's being negatively impacted by the economy and Oakland's new predatory parking policy.

According to a CBS report, a woman in downtown Oakland who commonly parks in front of her own driveway got a ticket for the first time, causing her to have a fit and claim that the City of Oakland is issuing more tickets.

Moreover, Oaklanders in the area of Adams Point at Oakland Avenue and Harrison were really upset over the increased parking enforcement practices.

"It seems like an overall hike in the level of aggressiveness," said Garcia. "I have paid $1500 in parking violations in 18 months."

But for some reason Acting City Communications Director Karen Boyd had to step in and make a typically defensive (for the City of Oakland) and totally wrong statement regarding Oakland parking tickets issued, as well as fail to apologize for the troubles the Oaklanders was facing. Karen said:

"There's been a perception that the ticket-giving is up. In fact our records indicate that in fact it's actually slightly down," said Boyd. CBS writes, "According to Boyd, the city is issuing an average of 39,000 tickets a month compared to 43,000 a month last year."

Nothing personal, but Karen Boyd forgets that number of tickets issued should be much lower than that for 2008 and not "slightly" lower than in 2008. Why? The economy. Many more Oaklanders are unemployed and thus not using their cars. Almost one of every five Oaklanders are unemployed; that was not true in 2008.

Moreover, with the City of Oakland's parking tow sting in force, tow truck drivers have told me that they're taking cars off the road and are worried about their market drying up!

The bottom line is that for Oakland to be so close in tickets issued to what were given out last year proves that the City of Oakland's being more aggressive in giving out tickets and towing cars in 2009.

How does one spell relief from the City of Oakland's nasty treatment of Oaklanders just for raising a buck? I-n-i-t-i-a-t-i-v-e. The City of Oakland has officially upset so many people that there's an active movement to do for parking tickets what Proposition 13 did for property taxes.

If I were reading this and I were Oakland's City Administrative Officer, I'd be very concerned. Change is coming.