Jaws Returns
 I was discussing with my east coast attorney David Coleman the merits and demerits of Superman Returns and he told me that the movie was actually the natural successor to Superman 2 that posited the existence of a world in which the disappointing Supermans 3 and 4 never existed.
What other 70's movie that grew into a four-installment series could benefit from the removal of numbers 3 and 4 from its catalogue?
Jaws.
In Jaws Returns, Bruce the Shark swims back to Amity Island, having never said a proper goodbye to Chief Martin Brody. In the first half hour, a spectacular sequence reminiscent of a scene from the first movie, in this case the July 4th parade, is amped up and updated. Jaws makes it onto shore and eats the high school marching band.
"You're gonna need a bigger float," he quips, in the movie's one adjustment to the shark's character (he can talk!) a la Superman now being able to catch one in the eye.
I picture a faithful portrayal and dead-on impersonation of Brody by Steven Colbert and a check-cashing interpretation of Quint by Johnny Depp. James Marsden plays Hooper, again squeezed out of the love triangle formed by himself, the Chief, and my friend Christy Kallhovd as Ellen Brody.
Jeffrey Kramer, the original movie's Hendricks, makes a sympathetic stunt casting cameo as a calligraphy instructor.
"I'll do the printing," he says to the cheers of five percent of the audience that gets it.
My team has already worked up some graphics at great expense. I think we could open big with this.
At the end of the movie, Jaws swims away again, establishing territoriality - just a theory I happen to agree with - around Amity Island. He becomes a Christlike protector of its people, even as he sacrifices his love for Brody in the bargain.
"Will I see you again?" Brody asks from the prow of a sinking ship.
"I'll be around," Bruce says. "I'm just going into the pond."
Between Clark and Hillsdale
 I went to the Arthur Lee benefit concert at the Whisky a Go Go last night.
Arthur Lee, the genius behind 60's psychedelic band Love, is battling leukemia and has no insurance, so a benefit was put together.
The Whisky, where the Doors and hundreds of other bands first played the Sunset Strip, is located "between Clark and Hilldale" Streets, and that is the title of one of Love's songs from the 1967 album "Forever Changes", which is a glorious record.
I was sad to find out that Love afficianados Calexico, Cake, and X were asked but did not agree to participate in last night's benefit.
When Lee got out of prison in 2001 (he had done six years for gun possession), he toured the country with an excellent backup band called Baby Lemonade, who played last night with original Love members Johnny Echols (pictured on the left) and drummer Michael Stuart Ware.
Baby Lemonade were a very tight band, and they even brought along a trumpet player for songs like "Alone Again Or". Seeing Johnny Echols was great, too. He now looks a little bit like a kinder Felix Barbosa from Deep Cover (or Chano from Barney Miller).
The opening band was Vince and the Invincebles. Vince Flaherty fronted the band, which was made up of two older female backup singers, one of whom kept trying to be the yenta for various audience members during the long sessions when the band was getting its shit together onstage, two younger dudes with dreadlocks, a drummer and an older guitar player. The band itself was fairly solid, though, as a unit, their personalities were all over the place.
It was announced that Spencer Davis was in the audience.
"We love you, Spencer," the dreadlock white guy guitarist said, and started to noodle "Gimme Some Lovin'". Embarrassing.
Lead singer Vince Flaherty was a mess. I polled various older folks in the audience, people with gray or white hair and tie-dyes, about who this guy was and what right he had to waste our time.
"I think he knew Arthur before Love, or played on the same bills with him," one man said.
Flaherty dropped the microphone so many times that his younger bandmates started making fun of him. Flaherty was surly and forgot his lyrics. He shambled around the stage. The white-haired sound tech for the Whisky kept crawling onstage to retrieve dropped microphones and stands, looking like he wanted to kill Mr. Invinceble.
Flaherty had the attitude of someone who gets more and more angry with the audience the more he screws up. It was painful.
I'd read that Baby Lemonade announced they would no longer perform with Arthur Lee the crazier he got. I wonder how long the Invincebles will stay around. I saw one of the Invincebles outside.
"We're kind of the de facto backup band for people from the 60s," he said, but was interrupted before I got any more information.
Somebody was videotaping the show for Arthur Lee and the camera would occasionally pan the audience during the numerous breaks in the Invincebles' set. "We're sorry, Arthur," one audience member said.
Baby Lemonade, both by contrast and on their own, were fantastic. They played the entirety of "Forever Changes" and came back for an encore with Echols and Ware.
It was good to be in a truly all-ages audience at the Whisky. I hope Lee recovers, but I hope he doesn't shoot Vince.
UPDATE: Both the sound technician and Mr. Invinceable himself have responded to this post. Vince pointed out that the street in the title does not have an S in it - it's Hilldale, unlike what I originally wrote. I'm leaving the subject line the same because that is how many sites link to each other.
· Arthur Lee
· Arthur Lee fan page
· Love at AMG All Music Guide
Watch the bulge, Mary
 ...was what my gay friend advised me when I told him I was going to see Superman Returns last night.
Like King Kong, this movie suffered from too much money. Less money means smarter choices. Superman Returns cost about $300 million and the only thing that showed it was a spectacular plane crash sequence; I mean, they already got a break on the music.
Isn't Superman supposed to have hearts like cows have stomachs? If so, this movie had a lot of heart, but director Bryan Singer seemed less adept at paring down the story to the things that are actually important than he did with X Men 2.
Singer also seeems to have something against James Marsden, who has now played cuckolds in two of his movies.
In a film that is two hours long, things shouldn't seem forced, yet Kevin Spacey's violence as Lex Luthor and a revelation about Lois Lane's son are both a little jarring. The latter issue is even more disappointing because it is the one plot point Singer introduces but seems to abandon.
Brandon Routh is a dead ringer for Christopher Reeve and does a good job. But he only gets to impersonate Reeve; there is nothing new about the character (other than he can take a bullet in the eye, which was cool).
The Elizabeth Banks of this movie is Sam Huntington, who plays Jimmy Olsen. The TV show Jimmy Olsen (Jack Larson) also makes a poignant appearance as an elderly bartender.
I see that a sequel to Superman Returns is slated for 2009. If Singer directs it, I hope he will make it more effective and significant, the way he improved on the first X Men in his followup.
Two previews, one for Spiderman 3 and one for Hollywoodland, the George Reeves story, looked promising.
This weekend's meat
 In my lifetime I have been fortunate enough to go to several churrascarias, Brazilian restaurants that serve a meat buffet called a rodizio.
At a churrascaria one sits at a table armed with a small disk that is painted green on one side and red on the other. When he is ready to eat, the customer flips his disk from red to green and prepares for a carnal onslaught.
Seeing green, specially-trained waiters are deployed from the kitchen with mini broadswords skewered through with many different kinds of meat. Every five minutes someone will show up to one's table threatening to carve off a chunk of steak, lamb, sausage, chicken, or something else which once grazed, pecked, or lactated.
Turning the disk back to the red side indicates surrender.
In Brazilian communities of Boston and New York I ate at churrascarias that featured what is known to scientists as weird-ass meat. There were chicken hearts and turkey parts and liver in addition to the steak and lamb, etc. When I went to Brazil, I encountered even more elaborate set-ups.
This weekend I went to the Beverly Hills branch of Fogo de Chao, a restaurant I'd visited in Sao Paulo. The place was opulent, with a buffet that featured Brazilian favorites like yucca and plantains.
The meat, though excellent, was very limited. There was nothing crazy. No deer or boar or chicken hearts or Xiuxsia. I couldn't help feeling that in Beverly Hills they liked the idea of ethnic but not the reality of it.
With dinner I had a caipirinha, a drink I hadn't had since 1999. I remembered how good they were.
One major difference between the Beverly Hills churrascaria and everywhere else was the ridiculous parking situation that greeted us once we finished. It took an hour for the valets to return our cars. I've never waited half that long, even in Hollywood, which is stupid with bad valets.
The next night I went to a little place in North Hollywood called the Steak Joynt. I parked on the street. The owner greeted us personally, the dinner was similarly excellent, and the server bent over backwards to accommodate complex doggy bag demands.
The moral? Meat does not have to be murder.
I no longer normally eat that much meat, because I find the smell of fear too exhilarating. This was a special weekend.
"I can smell your lunch."
 Everything one says at the Munch Box (founded 1956) in Chatsworth is unintentionally dirty.
Competition
 My daughter already has better teeth than I do.
"What's with the teeth?" I asked.
"What?" she said.
"You think you're better than your old man??"
"Whatevs," she said.
"Don't give me your MySpace talk. That doesn't work around here."
"Would you rather I texted you?" she asked.
"No."
"OK then."
"Nice teeth."
"Nice face."
The way we talk to each other
 Two examples, plus one, of unpleasant exchanges came up recently.
The first is a conversation between David Brinkley, William Buckley, and Gore Vidal on the legality of the demonstrations surrounding the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, and the second is the attempt by an AOL customer to cancel his account.
The second is more immediate, and I feel like I've met the AOL customer service rep before, most recently in the people I pay rent to, but also because I've had conversations like this one with AOL before.
Finally, here's grieving parents Matt and Ruth Fowler (played by Tom Wilkinson and Sissy Spacek) from 2001's In the Bedroom:
MATT
Everything he did was wrong. Well, what was wrong with him, Ruth? You're... you're so unforgiving. You are. That's what he said. And you're pulling the same shit with me. And that's a horrible way to be. It's horrible. You're bitter, Ruth. Point your finger at me all you like...but take a damn good look at yourself.
RUTH
I just wanted to talk about what happened, Matt.
MATT
You want me to be open with you, embrace you? You scare me. How can I talk to you? Sometimes I...Sometimes I can't even look at you.
(screenplay by Robert Festinger based on Andre Dubus' original work)
 Friends of mine recently went to Italy and came back with some very detailed pictures.
The Pope, being German, did not say "stugots" once.
There is a photostream here.
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