Today is an exciting day here at work. Change is good and there’s plenty on the horizon for me. Officially beginning tomorrow I have a new job and a new title: Web Services Product Manager (Training & Support). I still have the same boss, but we’re both moving into a new organization. We both move to a new building on Tuesday and for the first time ever I’ll have my own office! I’m really excited about that, too. There’s going to be lots of cool stuff that I’m going to be working on and I think the future is bright.
Last night Jen and I took a break from the unpacking/building entertainment center hoopla and walked to the theater to see Signs, the latest flick by M. Night Shyamalan. (It’s still such a cool feeling to walk out the door 5 minutes before a movie starts and not have to worry about arriving late or finding parking!) Ever since The Sixth Sense, there’s been this inflated hype around Shyamalan, whom Newsweek recently touted on its cover as the next Steven Spielberg. Riiight. The guy who’s had one good movie (Unbreakable was so bad i can’t believe I didn’t walk out of the theater) compared to a master of film. Although, as Jen pointed out, not all of Spielberg’s movies are good. Many of them appeal to the masses (Jurassic Park and its too many sequels come to mind).
But back to Signs. The movie was OK to watch and mostly entertaining and funny, but pretty ridiculous overall. It was nothing special, was designed to appeal to the masses, and depicted every played-out extraterrestrial stereotype that humans have ever dreamed up (UFOs, lights in the sky, ubiqutous crop markings, and, of course, the requisite green alien). There was even the tell-tale scene common in every dumbed-down movie that makes it clear the filmmaker has no faith in his audience: Zoom in a small clue then do a flashback to the scene that refreshes our memory just to make sure we get it (in this case, think alien with no fingers and flash back to Gibson cutting them off).
We get it, Shyamalan. Now get this: Your first movie was good. Your next two weren’t. Better luck next time, when I’ll wait to see your movie on video.
