Tom Charman

USATODAY.com — Are networks losing young-male appeal?

“They’re watching television when they want to watch television,” says ABC Entertainment president Susan Lyne. “If you look across the network schedule, they are probably not the most well-served audience.”

Cop shows and family dramas tend to appeal to older viewers and women…

Here’s hoping that we get some more decent shows from the US soon then. As I’ll be in the area early next year, I might pop by and explain to them why seventeen spin-offs from CSI and Law & Order might be overdoing it just a tad.

In other news: I like JB Hi-Fi, I really do. Good prices, brilliant selection, bright yellow… it’s all very nice. Except, the people who serve you in the Melbourne DVD section have never once managed a convincing smile, and the man there doesn’t even seem to think he has to try. Grumpy bums, the lot of them.

There is of course the possibility that they’re holding back their scorn for my DVD selections.

4.00pm: Get to work. Tuck in shirt, put on tie. It’s a big, greek wedding. But not fat. In fact, the bride is pretty hot. All the brides at these weddings seem to be hot. I suppose the ugly girls just don’t bother. Turn brain off. Do what I’m told.

6.30: Cute girl working with me says something to me, but by the time my brain has powered up again, she’s already gone away. Irritated, I turn my brain off again in a fit of pique.

7.30: Power on again to find a parent complaining that the children don’t like the pasta sauce in their entrée. Looks delicious to me, so I’m unsympathetic. We’re not a restaurant. Find boss, make it his problem, turn brain off.

9.00: Oh the agony. Plate after plate that these losers haven’t quite finished/started gets chucked out. And I HAVE TO WATCH. It’s cruel and unusual punishment. The little shits (kids) haven’t eaten their hamburgers either. Quickly turn my brain off before I begin to sob.

9.20: Speeches. This means food for me. Am told to eat it all in 5 minutes as we’re pressed for time. I make it in 3 as I’m starving and the food is delicious.

12.00am: Packing up time. Many of the drunker guests haven’t quite managed to leave yet, so we pack up around them in the hope of getting the point. Again I managed to be completely ignored in a conversation where everyone else is asked what course they’re doing. Losers. They only ever talk about sport anyway. I’ve never heard anyone talk about TV at these jobs.

1.15: Sweeping. Brain’s off again at this point, and remains largely off until I drive home. At end of night, have beer stains on my elbow, with another small trickle down the side of my shirt, big gravy stain on right, mystery stain on right elbow. Assorted cuff stains. Have broken only 3 glasses, in an incident that wasn’t completely my fault. Must try harder.

2.00: Read Andy’s log, decide: ‘I can do that’.

2.38: Realise catering just isn’t as funny as pizza delivery. Estimate brain has spent only one of the last 8 hours operating, a personal best.

I have the new Mac OS, 10.3, and it’s just lovely. Much faster, much easier file navigation, smooth as you like and some better keyboard navigation too. The latter point has always been somewhere where Macs have lagged behind Windows, but now they seem to have got the idea.

Less than a month ’till it’s Canada time. Awfully exciting. Now if someone could just go do all my work for me, so that I can see some movies instead, that would be nice.

Ew. Last night’s MDA had the WORST ACTOR I’ve seen on TV since Matthew Waterhouse. Anyone who knows what I’m talking about there will understand the severity of the claim.

She talked in monotone, with awful occasional attempts at inflection. She occasionally looked at the camera. She didn’t really manage a facial expression. And it looks scarily like she’s here to stay for a few episodes.

I still want to know what happened to poor old Caitlin. Of all the episodes to miss.

Working in a family business wasn’t easy for Sydney when only her father was involved. Now, her Mum is starting to get in on the action, and it’s clear that they’re all having issues. On the surface they appear a happy group — especially when in disguise in foreign countries — but there’s always the little things that give it away. Like jumping out of planes to settle arguments, the daughter bossing the parents around, and Mr Bristow giving his ex-wife an explosive necklace.

These secret agents are crazy.

While Sydney and her folks go off to save the world from nuclear danger, there’s a cat amongst the pidgeons at SD-6. Sark quite rightly thinks that the team’s all a bit dumb for not spotting that every mission they pursue has a distinctly terrorist, arms-dealing side to it. But Sloane won’t have any of it. He probably likes to think that his team are really clever, and therefore that he’s really clever, because he’s pulled the wool over their eyes.

And in somewhere that vaguely approximates the normal world, not-really-a-drug-addict Will has gone and gotten fired from his job for the CIA. And yet he’s still doing the work, for free. I truly admire this character’s dedication to getting into episodes. On shows like Buffy, Xander hangs around for season after season waiting for some plot point or another to come for him. He must have thought he was a shoe-in for some super powers. But lazing about’s all fun and games until somebody loses an eye. On Alias, Will is getting out there and demanding a plotline. That’s willpower for you.

But the main thrust of this episode remains the jolly old Bristows, so let’s say a bit more about them. I’ve been noticing something for a few episodes, but now she’s stripped down to her underwear I can’t hold back any longer. Irina is pretty hot for a 40-50 year old. But then they’re all at their best this week. Mr Bristow is smiling and telling stories, and Sydney’s giving those winsome smiles that mean she wishes she was a normal girl, with a normal life. Best of all though, is the willingness of the Alias music person to let it rip with the trumpets. How long till the next James Bond film?

This episode doesn’t manage a clear bill of health by a long shot sadly. Though everything I’ve mentioned has been absolutely delightful, things can get serious in Alias. And when at the end of the episode, it’s time to fight for their lives against indian rebels, this is one of those serious times. I’ve never seen Sydney kill before (remember, I’ve only seen the last seven episodes). And it’s never fun to kill. But it’s ever so slightly peculiar to kill minority political groups to the dulcit tones of Bono and U2. Let’s not do this again, hmmm? It’s rather on the sick side. If you want to play the episode off with music, don’t organise a hideously violent ambush. It’s only polite.

It’s not often these days that I go to a film and have no idea what I’ll be watching. Usually the process begins a year before the release date, and goes something like this:

“They’re adapting [FAVOURITE TEXT]!!! [FAMOUS BUT ARTISTIC DIRECTOR] is in charge!!”
“They’ve cast [HANDSOME YET CHARISMATIC ACTOR] and [INSANELY HOT YET INTELLIGENT SEEMING ACTRESS]…”
“The trailer’s coming out in a month, should be awesome…”
“They’ve changed WHAT??? I suppose it’ll be alright…”
“Jeez, cool trailer. [ACTOR] looks perfect. [KEY SCENE] not quite as I expected…”
“I suppose I can live with changes to the text, as long as they make sense movie-wise.”
“Woah, new trailer!”
“Seems to have gotten decent reviews in the US. Oh bugger, I read a spoiler. Can’t be important…”
“Ah, the film. Hmmm. Well. That all went pretty much as I expected.”

This of course is completely irrelevant to Matchstick Men but I just thought I’d share. In this case, all I knew was that a bunch of reviewers had enjoyed it, and that Nicholas Cage was in it. No trailers, no plot details, nothing. The sensation was refreshing, but frankly I suspect that having known a bunch of stuff about it wouldn’t have changed it, since Matchstick Men is one of the freshest and brilliantly directed films I’ve seen in a while.

Having been one of the six people who didn’t enjoy Gladiator particularly, Ridley Scott’s name didn’t thrill me, but almost as soon as I saw it I was shushed by the beautiful direction obvious even in the titles. I found the film completely immersive — a key scene where Roy Waller (Cage) is flummoxed by a sliding door open to the buzzing, hot and bright outdoors completely conveyed all the reasons why our obsessive compulsive conman would rather be inside.

Of course, the more obvious factor in explaining Roy’s foibles and character to the audience is the actor, and Nicholas Cage doesn’t disappoint. After this and Adaptation, I’m just about ready to forgive him for making Con Air. While we feel the suitable pathos for a man in his position, Cage also manages to show a genuinely kind and charismatic personality at the same time as presenting horrendously irritating tics.

While as with any crime film, there’s exceptionally cool criminal dealings and clever little twists, this film works as well as it does mainly due to the strong but never shmaltzy relationship between Roy and his daughter Angela (Alison Lohman). Cage is at his best in his scenes with Lohman, and the two strike up an engrossing relationship, despite running through the sort of father-child arguments that we’ve seen a hundred times before. At times I was disturbed to sense a kind of sexual layer to the relationship — but I’m willing to accept that this might just be my attraction to Miss Lohman translating onto the screen. As it turns out, the actor is 24 and not 14 — a cause for relief amongst men everywhere.

The supporting characters work well also, especially Sam Rockwell as Roy’s wisecracking partner Frank — do partners come in any other variety? The script is tight across the board, especially in representing the peculiar morality that Roy applies to his work — his final comment on the matter is succinct and brilliant in that way that you’d usually never find in the last five minutes of a film.

I’ve probably gone overboard with my praise. But Matchstick Men falls into that category of movie that is so refreshing — a movie that won’t change your life or wow you, but is near-perfectly put together, and gets you thinking a little more than normal.

How can I be expected to pull an all nighter of lab reporting if there’s no freakin snacks in the house???

I normally have a house rule against opening packets of lollies, but frankly those raspberies will be lucky to last the night.

What maybe, one day back in the mists of time, started off as a serious question must now have gone through so many ironic re-statements that I’m not sure people know why they ask any more, or even if they’re being ironic themselves.

Anyhow, I don’t. Just for the record that I hope is beeing amassed somewhere, so we can clear this up once and for all.

The TV guide this week said the following about Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon:

Overhyped subtitled martial arts period piece with flying stunts in which the actors look like they’re hanging from a clothes line.

Jeez. Now I know how Andy feels when he reads… every bit of critical opinion ever written about The Matrix Reloaded.

Ah, it’s been a big week on Australian television. Well, not really. But I’ll say it is, because this is my new column and what I say goes. This time, it’s Monk, Alias, Doctor Who and Six Feet Under.

This week’s premiere was Monk (Ten, 7.30pm Sunday), an american detective show with an obsessive compulsive hero consulting the police force that he was kicked out from. Tony Shalhoub gave a heartfelt performance, but could do with just a little more personality showing through in places. When his nurse, Sharona, was ready to quit, so was I. But the dialogue between the two leads was good, and made the show worth watching. The actual mystery felt a bit obvious from the middle of the episode. Still, I’ll be watching this again next week. I’ve always been a sucker for shows with near-impossibly clever heroes. It must be a viewer identification thing.

I was desperate to watch Alias (Seven, 8.30pm Mon) this week after the series-shaking events of last week. It was something of a disappointment not to see Dixon or Marshall’s reactions to the SD-6 takedown, but that was made up for by an appearance from the latest in a long line of film stars with dwindling careers — Ethan Hawke. An awfully shocking opening led into a decent episode, though Mr Hawke was actually very good, and helped create a very tense story indeed. It remains to be seen what the show will replace it’s double-agent intrigue with. I’m thinking… triple-agents! It sounds like a guaranteed success to me.

Thank goodness for shows completely changing their stripes though. This year I suffered through one of the most painful reminders of what can happen if this doesn’t occur regularly — Buffy the Vampire Slayer‘s season seven. It doesn’t look like Alias will be taking the same road. Or, for that matter, Angel — but I’ll have more to say about that next week. Another good example of a show that was happy to change itself completely is of course the currently repeating Doctor Who (ABC, 6pm Mon-Thurs). Although today’s episode was aptly named ‘The Ordeal’ and was a huge pile of padding — the highlight being when a character gripping a rocky cliff ripped off a part of it to reveal white polystyrene, and had to go on with the scene. Probably best if everyone waits a few months before watching this one. Though it has become apparent that any special effect looks better in black and white. I must remember this for the next NTGF film…

Finally, Six Feet Under this week saw the return of Rachel Griffiths as Brenda — Nate’s attractive, world-weary and until recently, sex-obsessed ex-fiancee. Which was good. Sadly, it also featured young adults who should know better really ballsing up their chances at relationships. Which is realistic, but irritating to watch sadly. I enjoy it more when it’s someone like Xander Harris having relationship problems. Claire’s new artist friend looks like the suicidal type, however, and he’s making me nervous.

Anyhow, see you next week, when I’ll come up with an hilarious catchphrase to sign these columns off with.

What it says on the tin.

The ultimate position of stupidity is when you’re too lazy to work, and too guilty about it to organise to do anything instead of working.

Result: doing almost nothing. I’d like to thank the internet, without which none of this would have been possible.