HEY HEY HEY! Set your TiVos, because HBO has now added Fat Albert to its rotation. As to why I have disproportionately strong feelings about the movie, click here and here.

Also, for what it's worth, Alex isn't the only one around here having published pieces outside the blog.

THANK YOU FOR SMOKING: George Clooney's Good Night, And Good Luck is, among many things, a cautionary tale about the dangers of nicotine addiction. There is a serious amount of cigarette usage in this movie, and if one took a swig of scotch every time a puff was taken on-screen, one would be seriously drunk by the end.

The movie makes incredibly effective usage of the original kinescopes of Edward R. Murrow and Sen. McCarthy. David Strathairn makes for an excellent Murrow, and Clooney sets the mood well with the black and white photography.

But beyond that . . . there's not much of a story. I just wasn't gripped by the movie dramatically, and didn't feel any of the intra-CBS tensions with Paley, Friendly and Murrow.

Maybe it's just because that story, of the conflict between journalistic integrity and the needs of a corporate-run media, was told so much better in Michael Mann's The Insider, which still stands for me as one of the most underappreciated films of the past decade (and I say this despite the fact that it was nominated for seven Academy Awards).

Good Night isn't an actively bad movie, and may be worth seeing just for the historic footage. It's just not the great movie it could have been.

WORTHY CCAUSE ALERT: In order to secure continued status as a tax exempt organization The Creative Commons is in the midst of it's First Annual Fall Fundraising Drive. These are the fine folks that bring you CCMixter and the flexible licensing scheme that is slowly working to free up media (just a little) from the lowest-common-denominator whims of money and marketing.

If you're wondering "what's in it for me", here are 10 concrete (digital) examples free for immediate download and enjoyment.

If you do not crave such concrescence, but would like an extended theoretical explanation of why the Creative Commons movement is vital and necessary, you might check out Prof. Lessig's book on The Future of Ideas. And if you're thinking "okay, I'm curious but that's more than I really want to read right now", then just hit his blog. (Please, hit his blog!)

THE MOVIE WAS RATED "G," BUT THE SHOUTING WAS AN "R:" I finally got around to Wallace & Grommit this evening, and I echo all the good things that have been said about it elsewhere. What was truly bizarre, however, was the moviegoing experience. I had two empty chairs on either side of me, on which were coats and the like. Trailers rolled, as did the reasonably cute Madagascar short that preceded our main feature. Then the movie proper started. About 5 minutes into it, and about 30 minutes into the show, a family of four noisly wanders in to the theatre. First, they ask me (quietly) if the seats are taken. I respond that they're not, and remove my stuff. I was not asked to move over.

Children lumber over me as the parents take one of the seats. The mother proceeds to stand directly in front of me and talk loudly to her child. I then whisper that I'd like to watch and hear the movie. The mother then launches into a profane tirade (joined by the father) about how I "hate children." The couple on the other side of me angrily stares at them and "Shhh!"s them. After a moment, they calm down. The children are remarkably well-behaved, not fidgety or talky through the whole movie, though mother spends much of the movie staring daggers into me.

At the conclusion of the film, I remain in my seat and let the kids out (I'm a credits-watcher). Daddy then proceeds into a lengthy, profanity-fueled tirade directed toward me ("tough guy") as he's walking out of the theatre, inter alia, claiming that I needed to go home and look at porn on the Internet like a "good faggot." I took the smile and nod technique and attempted to ignore him. I'm actually still a little shaken, and actually spent my whole trip home looking over my shoulder to make sure daddy wasn't around the corner to beat me up. Just me, or was that perhaps a bit of an overreaction?

ISN'T IT ICONIC? Variety is marking its 100th anniversary by naming the 100 top entertainment icons. By the looks of it, it appears the list is one of those rare ones in which actual thought went into making it. Topping the list are the Beatles, followed by (in alphabetical order) Louis Armstrong, Lucille Ball, Humphrey Bogart, Marlon Brando, Charlie Chaplin, James Dean, Marilyn Monroe, Mickey Mouse and Elvis Presley.

TO ADD TO THE INVENTORY ON CRAPHOLE ISLAND: ONE ACCORDIAN, ONE TUBA: Well, if nobody else is going to post it, I'll point you all to the pitch-perfect hyper-literal flash animation of Lost, set to Weird Al's version of Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody (I had forgotten how much I loved this song -- the original version -- before it was coopted by Mike Myers). Favorite line assignments -- "I don't wanna die/Sometimes wish I'd never been born at all."

Edited to reflect T. Jaxon's clarification re the version of the song used. I guess I could have figured out that it was Weird Al, what with the accordian and nasal whine, but it never occurred to me that anybody would actually own a Weird Al album.

NO DOUBT SPICE WORLD WAS NO. 51: I've been a little busy doing actual for-profit list-making (in this case a list of the 50 worst moments in Chicago White Sox history since their last World Series victory), but wanted to point out that I added a few new links to the side over there you should be checking out and also to mention that Mike Leigh's Naked has been picked as the greatest London film of all time, topping a list of the 50 best movies made in and about the Seat of the Her Majesty's Empire that appears in this week's Time Out UK.

Also, I've got Tivo backlog like you wouldn't beleive, but I want to put my plug in for the American version of The Office on the Must-Flee network. The first episode of the season, which revolved around the annual recognition awards ceremony, the Dundies, was the funniest episode I've seen of a show this side of Arrested Development, since the salad days of The Simpsons.