Established A.D. 2000, March 19. Now in our ninth calendar year! Number 408 (Vol. 9, No. 3). This edition is for the week of January 14--20, 2008.
Whoa, Nellie! The 2008 Homepage is Here!
TOP 10 Weekend Box Office, Friday through Sunday(January 11--13, 2008) 1. "The Bucket List," $19.5 M 2. "First Sunday," $19. M 3. "Juno," $14 M 4. "National Treasure: Book of Secrets," $11.5 M 5. "Alvin and the Chipmunks," $9.1 M 6. "I Am Legend," $8.1 M 7. "One Missed Call," $6.1 M 8. "P.S. I Love You," $5 M 9. "The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything," $4.4 M 10. "Atonement," $4.3 M
JANUARY BIRTHDAYS Art Brown, Jan 2, 57 yrs. Lisa Ciurro, January 3, 38 yrs. Patty G. Henderson, Jan 6, 57 yrs. Matt Drinnenberg, Jan 9, 47 yrs. Nicholas Castellano, Jan 13, 8 yrs. Scott van Sickle, Jan 14, 45 yrs. Tedd Webb, Jan. 29, 59 yrs.
After weeks and months of thinking about it and a two-week delay recently while I got 2008 under control, it's finally here: this year's Crazed Fanboy & PCR homepage. I hope you all like it.
This year's resolution was two-fold: First, simplify it. Reduce some of the clutter, cluster links where they'll be out of the way, but easily located. And secondly, make it so the page expands to automatically fit various browser window resolutions and configurations. I hope both of these concessions to occasional comments made about the Crazed Fanboy website makes for a more effective and pleasurable surfing experience.
One thing that hasn't changed on my end, at least not yet, is the need to spend at least two days updating this page! I'm still working on that.
In any event, let me know if there are any technical problems experienced with the new fancy-schmancy linking architecture.
Vampira, RIP
One thing that I wanted to acknowledge right away is the recent passing of the one of the very first TV horror hosts, Maila Nurmi, aka, "Vampira". Based out of Los Angeles, she was recruited by Ed Wood to co-star in Plan 9 From Outer Space, Bela Lugosi's last picture.
Weirdly, I did not see any mention of this on the internet, nor on television or radio, so I owe a debt of thanks to FANGRRL, Lisa Ciurro, for bringing it to my attention in last week's Readers' Comments. Lisa has done a fascinating write-up on Miss Nurmi, please see it in this week's FANGRRL.
Also, Andy Lalino has a few memories to share in Oddservations.
UFOs Over Texas
This has been a really interesting case and one which has stuck around newspaper headline sections for a couple days, where normally this topic gets short-shrift.
Apparently, several dozen people - including a pilot, county constable and business owners - in and around the small farming community of Stephenville, Texas, insist they have seen a large silent object with bright lights flying low and fast. Some reported seeing fighter jets chasing it.
Of course this is Bible-belt country and more than a few saw it as a sign of the "End Times", but the great majority just want to know what it is. The local airforce base says they had nothing in the air at the times cited.
Generally, the descriptions are of a large, low-flying, but speedy object with bright lights that seem to change configuration spontaneously.
Mona Lisa, ID'd at Last
This one I'll make short and to the point as I thought this had been solved satisfactorily ages ago. Well, "satisfactory" and "proven beyond doubt" are two separate distinctions, I suppose!
Lisa Gherardini, the wife of a wealthy Florentine merchant, Francesco del Giocondo, has long been seen as the most likely model for the sixteenth-century painting.
Seems that at the time of Da Vinci, a Florentine city official named Agostino Vespucci, an aquaintance of Da Vinci, made some margin notes in a book detailing what he knew about the Mona Lisa. These notes were recently discovered by experts at the Heidelberg University library and compare to letters written by Greek artist Apelles who said Leonardo was working on three paintings at the time, one of them a portrait of Lisa del Giocondo.
She has been named as his subject before, but the suspicions were mostly based on speculation. These latest findings prove to the experts that Lisa Gherardini del Giocondo is, in fact, the Mona Lisa.
Chess Master Bobby Fischer Dies at 64
This came in just as I was putting PCR "to bed" for this week. Bobby Fischer, the reclusive American chess master who became a Cold War icon when he dethroned the Soviet Union's Boris Spassky as world champion in 1972, has died. He was 64. His tirades and idiosyncracies eclipsed his chess genius dring the period of his celebrity, unfortunately. He came out of seclusion/retirement to play Spassky again in 1992. He won and disappeared again soon after.
Chris Woods on TFR's Fourth Anniversary
The 4th anniversary of The Tampa Film Review was a great night. They rolled out the red carpet and had a who’s who from the Tampa film scene as guests. It was an impressive event. With three screens and an awesome attendance, it was a great way to kick off 2008. I just wanted to congratulate all the winners, all well deserved. I thought it was very cool that Joel D. Wynkoop got the lifetime achievement award. Congrats to Joel. Also I want to congratulate Paul and Pete Guzzo for putting on an excellent film event for the past four years. I was at the very first one back when it was called Coffeehouse Film Review and been to almost all of the CFRs and TFRs through the years and looking forwarding to many more. I had an awesome time at the event and congratulations to everyone on all their success.
--Chris
Please consider making a donation to help support Crazed Fanboy! Click on the "donate" link below and give whatever you can. I sincerely thank you for any and all consideration.---Nolan
