I saw an ad for a drug that treats “Restless Leg Syndrome” last night and I was already laughing before they got to the side-effect disclaimer:

patients . . . have reported problems with gambling . . . and increased sex drive. . . . If you or your family members notice that you are developing unusual behaviors, talk to your doctor.

The country’s best sportstalk station–610 WIP–is now broadcasting from . . . wait for it . . . the Tastykake Studios.

Ever wonder what it would be like to have dinner with Joss Whedon? Find out here.

From Galley Friend J.E. comes this awesome piece about two of America’s Finest:

Two Beverly Hills real estate agents indicted for their alleged participation in a mortgage fraud scheme have been suspended by their employer, Prudential California Realty, and ordered not to conduct any real estate transactions until the federal case has been resolved. . . .

Last week, the U.S. attorney’s office in Los Angeles indicted the real estate agents, along with two licensed appraisers, on multiple counts of conspiracy, bank fraud and loan fraud.

The foursome allegedly participated in a complicated scheme that involved inflating the price of several homes in order to trick banks into funding mortgage loans that were hundreds of thousands of dollars higher than the properties actually cost, according to court documents.

If Babajian and Grasso are convicted, they also could be subject to disciplinary action by the California Department of Real Estate, including the revocation of their real estate licenses, according to state law.

Egads! Losing their real estate licenes! What is this, Saudi Arabia?

Saw the Bourne Ultimatum last night and have some thoughts about the movie and the series in general, but first a couple of observations about pre-movie trailers:

The Kingdom looks really, really promising. And I know it’s Peter Berg directing, and Michael Mann is only producing, but from the footage they show it looks like DP Maruo Fiore is doing a heck of an impersonation of Dion Beebe.

And then there was the teaser for the NBC show Bionic Woman. (You can see it here.) I haven’t been this excited about a new TV series in a long time. Not only is BSG demi-god David Eick running it, and its got Katee Sackhoff, but it’s also got Miguel Ferrer, too. Ferrer is a real talent, one of those actors, like Scott Glenn, Peter Coyote, and even the ’90s Fred Thompson, who adds value to every project, no matter how small their role. With Ferrer, it’s because of that voice and his quiet, kind of dangerous intensity.

David Strathairn is one of those guys, too. I’ve loved him since Return of the Secaucus Seven and I can’t think of a performance that I don’t like (“Now, I sense you’re on your best behavior, but that’s all I’ll give you.”).

All of that said, he’s miscast as Noah Vosen in Ultimatum. The role of CIA heavy played previously by Chris Cooper and Brian Cox, doesn’t fit him because he’s not heavy. A snake, maybe, but not heavy. Which is what this role needs to be in order to have a worthy adversary for Bourne.

As for the rest of the movie, it’s okay, but I can’t understand the critical raves, which have been nearly unanimous. (David Denby actually sounded like he was day-dreaming about Matt Damon. Can’t blame him, I suppose.) Maybe critics were trying to make up for missing out initially on how very, very good the first two entries in the series were.

I like those first two, Identity and Supremacy a whole lot and as a pair of action movies will put them up against any other pair you want to name from the last 20 years. Ultimatum, however, left me a little cold.

For me, the movie had two problems, one structural, one technical. The structural problem was the rampant anti-Americanism. I hate being predictable, but here goes: I get that the Bourne movies are anti-imperial; I get that the U.S. government is doing shady stuff at Langley and that Treadstone is a scary program; but the first two movie handled these worldviews with some real artfulness. Ultimatum has none of that. We’ve got Noah Vosen running around New York shouting for assets and agents–even analysts–to kill, kill, kill–Bourne, journalists, other CIA officers, whoever. He does all of this with the goal not of protecting national security or even his bureaucratic turf, but simply, as he puts it, “to win.” Win what? Oh, I get it, that’s the point. What a silly imperialist I am.

In the course of trying to win for no reason, the CIA executes innocent people with black bags over their heads and uses bombs to blow up cars in the street. Any of this sound familiar? At all? Like from the recent past? There’s something peculiar about a culture which, faced with a terrible enemy, makes movies depicting the enemy’s wretched crimes, but ascribing that behavior instead to their native land.

Everything about Ultimatum screams conscientious objector–right down to the end where the totally neutered Pam Landy character whimpers about how this wasn’t the CIA she signed up for and Bourne shows another asset just how fracked up all this nonsense really is. Again, it’s not the premise that bothers me, I think, it’s how ham-handedly it’s realized. The Pam Landy character was fantastic in Supremacy–a super-tough, crafty infighter who obviously knows how to throw down and is comfortable trading punches with the big boys. Here she’s reduced to moping around and playing peacemaker in the service of the film’s broader message. When your agenda starts wrecking you characters, there’s something wrong. And Ultimatum‘s message, screamed from every stedicam, is, “The America I love would close down Guantanamo Bay!”

And then there are the technical problems. Part of the power of the first two movies was the novelty of Bourne’s physical presence. Watch him working his way through the U.S. Embassy in Switzerland in Identity, for instance: He’s deliberate and decisive to the extreme. That’s what makes him so interesting. In action scenes, he actually looks like he’s moving slightly slower than the people around him. His physical edge comes from his ability to move deliberately and with no wasted motion. In Ultimatum that economy of force is gone. He runs here, he runs there, he looks like any other action hero. After he leaves London, he becomes such a generic action movie trope that he might as well be in The Last Boyscout.

(Also, and maybe I’m showing my age, I had trouble at times keeping the logistics of the action straight–who’s punching what, which car is going where, etc. The other two movies are so spare and are cut so cleanly that that’s never an issue.)

This all sounds more unhappy than it’s meant to–again, I liked Ultimatum alright, although I probably won’t need to buy the glorious HD DVD. (Identity and Supremacy were the first two discs I bought for the new player.) And I want to make sure to give Greengrass (and whichever screenwriter(s) and Julia Stiles) this credit: The scenes between Bourne and Nicki are handled so artfully and beautifully that you can barely believe you’re in the middle of a summer action franchise. With this material, they understand that not all questions need answers and not all motivation needs to be explained with words. That’s great stuff.

The New Republic is in all kinds of trouble, but in the midst of this they’ve scored a really nifty coup–getting Jane Espenson to write for them:

It’s difficult to sell a show with hard sci-fi or fantasy elements. It doesn’t matter that the biggest summer movies (Spider-Man 3, Shrek the Third, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, Transformers, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix) and book (Harry Potter again) are sci-fi or fantasy, or even that “Heroes” was the highest-rated new show on TV. Try pitching a purely sci-fi/fantasy show with a spaceship or an elf and see how it goes over. Put an elf on your spaceship and you might never recover. Even the SCI FI Channel seems reluctant, as they look toward a post-“Battlestar Galactica” era, to dive too deeply into Asimovian or Tolkienish waters. Non-cable networks are even more wary. And their reasoning isn’t terrible. Networks are still in the business of broadcasting, not nichecasting. You simply cannot make a hit show by attracting only viewers who also attend Comic-Con . . .

It’s a nifty little piece and comes with this kicker–Espenson even has a blog. Yay!

A daring art heist in Nice nabs a Monet. Sounds kind of awesome.

I can’t really say why, but I find stories about art theft incredibly comforting.

Apologies for not having blogged for quite some time. Over the last few months I’ve been up to my eyeballs in food writing. As a result, I have no idea what is happening around me and get my news and pop culture fix from my colleague’s postings. (There was a Transformers movie?) This also means I have nothing au courant to contribute, unless anyone cares to hear my take on The Devil Wears Prada and Miami Vice, the most recent movies I’ve seen. (Alright, fine: Anne Hathaway is so hot. I turned to the Mrs. and said, “Have you ever seen Havoc?” to which she replied, “No, but you keep mentioning it.” Good thing she didn’t roll a 12. Loved Vice but would like to more about the firearms used in the film–for instance, what sort of shotgun did Jamie Foxx use in the final shootout?)

The fruits of my labor, so to speak, won’t be seen for a couple of weeks (but will ultimately appear in The Weekly Standard). There were whole chunks of interviews I was unable to fit, so if there are any foodies out there, I’ve copied below an excerpt of my interview with Anthony Bourdain, which you might find entertaining:

VM: Do you watch Hell’s Kitchen by any chance?

AB: I’m good friends with Gordon [Ramsay]. I really loved Boiling Point. I think Kitchen Nightmares in England, the British show he made, is really the best show of its kind. I was really hooked on the last season of Hell’s Kitchen. This one is just awful. It’s embarrassing. None of these bed-wetters would be a viable candidate for employment in any restaurant I’ve ever heard of.

AB: If he started crying his first hour, I’m saying, “Listen, you know, I’m real sorry things haven’t worked out, clean out your locker, and get the fuck out.” It’s an alternate reality show. It’s not a reality show. Again it suffers by comparison with Top Chef, which I think is an excellent show. I’m on it, by the way, I’m one of the judges. But I really enjoyed doing the show, I really enjoy watching the show. I think it’s fair. I think it’s all about the food. For every success of a dumb competition show, a reality show, it opens the door for somebody to do something better. I mean, if it wasn’t for all the dumb shows on Food Network, I probably wouldn’t have one on Travel.