YOU'RE WASTING MY TIME (I'd like to see you try to give it back. Yeah.) I saw Paycheck. . . . and that's more than anyone should say about Paycheck. It is a movie about a guy who is paid not to remember the work he's done. Wishful thinking on the part of those responsible, if you ask me.

Paycheck gets: 1 point for being premised on technology that predicts the future, 1 point for Uma Thurman, 1 combined point for reminding me to wonder about John Woo again (but only briefly) and for not giving Paul Giamatti enough to do, for a total of 3.

Why would I go to see Paycheck? Because I'll see anything that looks like it might be a sci-fi/action flick.

Timecop? Yes.

Timecop 2? Oh, yes.

Virtuosity? Regrettably.

The Net? Please, be serious.

MegaForce? I begged and begged, but Mom said "no".

As an aside, can't you just picture the conversation with the esteemed Mr. Washington's agent?

Agent: Look, I cash in favors to get you work. You've been doing great work, and now I need you to do something for me.

DW: Wait, okay. Okay, fine. What's it called again?

Agent: Virtuosity.

DW: Oh. Okay. Virtuosity. Okay, so it's about a . . . violinist? Or what?

Agent: Actually, it's about a computer-generated serial killer.

DW: So, shouldn't it be, more like Virtual-icity? Or Virtual . . . Homicidal-ocity? Something?

Agent: That's not the point.

DW: But "Virtuosity". . . I mean, that's from the root for virtuoso, not virtual.

Agent: Right. Right! Exactly. He's really good at killing people, see?

DW: Who is? I am?

Agent: No. No, no.

DW: Who?

Agent: Uh... says here, "Russell Crowe". I dunno.

DW: The guy from Romper Stomper?

Agent: Oh, yeah. I guess.

DW: Shhhhi. . .

And so the wheels of commerce turn on and on, to this very day.

To qualify the quantification above, I should specify that Paycheck scored 3 on a scale from 1 to a much, much better movie. It was so bad that if you had access to a friend's blog, and you got it in your head to write about it when you were feeling guilty about not having posted anything, you'd be tempted to hyperlink it's title to promotional material for some better movie just to avoid any too-close association with it after the fact.

By way of comparison, The Return Of The King gets, like: 10 points for orc warfare, 10 points just remembering the ent warfare from The Two Towers, 10 points for siege warfare, 10 points for 3-story cgi uberelephant-based warfare, 5 points for epic themes, 5 points for epic scenes, 5 points for Good, 5 points for Evil, 3 points for a complete all-around cast, 3 points for near-seamless cgi, 2 points for EILTFs, 2 points for EMGFWLTFs (even though she didn't like him as much in Pirates Of The Caribbean), 2 points for souls of the damned, 1 bonus point for a minimum of moon-faced longing for the Shire, 1 bonus point for the all-but realized giddy hobbit pillow fight towards the end, and 1 bonus point for gratuitously marrying Sam off so we didn't think too hard about the all-but realized giddy hobbit pillow fight towards the end, for a total of 75(ish).

Tomorrow: The Triplets of Belleville. (No, really.)

OH, YEAH. THAT: I'm on personal hiatus from blogging for a spell until I can resolve more pressing issues than determining the grammatically correct title for the new Nicholson/Keaton film (my call: "Something Must Give"), telling you what to order at Shopsin's, or bashing that disgusting opportunist by the name of Rose.

I do want to take a moment to remember Tug McGraw, a truly decent man deserving of the adulation we fans gave him. And, anyway, how can you not love a man who, when asked how he'd spend his 1973 World Series share, said, "Ninety percent I'll spend on good times, women and Irish Whiskey. The other 10 percent I'll probably waste."

I'll be back.