Another One Bites the Dust

How important is it to you to believe your newscaster? A half generation ago the most trusted man in the country was Walter Cronkite the nightly broadcast news anchor for CBS. Now news casters have become the laughingstock of the internet.

Brian Williams “misremembering” of events while covering the Iraq War may well cost him his job. And believe me, it is one of the best jobs in American media. There is currently only room for three anchor positions in nightly broadcast news. His position has earned Brian Williams a net worth of $40 million and salary of $13 million per year.

Here may be some of the last words you will hear from the NBC News anchor, “In the midst of a career spent covering and consuming news, it has become painfully apparent to me that I am presently too much a part of the news, due to my actions… As managing editor of ‘NBC Nightly News,’ I have decided to take myself off of my daily broadcast for the next several days.”

You can read more about Brian Williams’s debacle in the NewYork Times.

By the way, according to a nationwide survey the most trusted person in America is now Tom Hanks.

And the Losers Are.....

With the academy awards approaching, we all have our favorite for the best picture of the year, but what were the really, really bad movies of the year. To decide that we have the Razzie® awards, now in their 33^rd year. Not surprisingly the big winner was TWILIGHT SAGA: BREAKING DAWN PART 2. It won seven Razzies® including Worst Picture, Worst Actress (Kristen Stewart) Worst Supporting Actor (Taylor Lautner), Worst Screen Couple (Lautner and 12 year-old Mackenzie Foy) and Worst Screen Ensemble.  You can read more about the Razzies® here.

Film Links

People love to compile lists of their favorite things; movies, novels, rock bands etc. They then proceed to argue about what was left out, what was included and how the order you listed them in is all wrong. Here is my short list of lists of what some critics and viewers rate as the best movies of all time.
First a list of lists - http://www.filmsite.org/greatfilmssummary.html

This one is by the American Film Institute
It is one of the most quoted and well thought of, but it concentrates on American film. Here is a totally slanted list by the voters on Internet Media Database – people had their favorites and stuffed the ballot box, and here are the results.
This is also from IMDB. If money talks, then these are the two lists for you.
http://www.imdb.com/boxoffice/alltimegross
http://www.imdb.com/boxoffice/alltimegross?region=world-wide
This list is adjusted for inflation.
This one is a list of lists from Channel 4 in England.
Here is a list by of all things, George Clooney’s dad. Unlike Spinal Tap, it goes all the way up to 20.
Here is another truly bizarre list from Merry Olde England. When I say bizarre I mean that “There Will be Blood” is not number two on any list, with the possible exception of a list of over the top Daniel Day Lewis roles – “Gangs of New York” would of course be number one.

This one is also oddly skewed because it is the work of only two people: Richard Corliss and Richard Schickel of Time Magazine. The best thing about this list is that it includes many foreign films and list all films alphabetically, therefore listing Aguirre: the Wrath of God as the greatest movie ever made.
A great place to go for movie reviews and info - http://www.rottentomatoes.com/
One of my favorite film critics Roger Ebert - http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/

In the Heat of the Marketplace, Media Conglomerates

With the economy swirling away down the toilet, Iran enriching uranium to 20% and the nation surrounded by terrorists, perhaps news of yet another media merger does not do enough to pin the fear meter to make it to the top of the news cycle. One of my favorite media critics thinks differently though. Lisa de Moraes, who writes ”The TV Column” for the Washington Post, took on the exciting job of covering a Senate subcommittee hearing on the proposed merger of Comcast and NBC. Yes that is correct; the cable delivery system wants to be your primary content provider. What could go wrong? You can learn more on Ms. Moraes' take on the proposed merger.

My favorite part is when Comcast CEO Brian Roberts says with a straight face, “Our success will stimulate our competitors to be more innovative, too. So this joint venture should be good for consumers, innovation and competition”. Translated from CEO to English that reads - “by buying out our competitors we hope to make even more money, forcing the other media moguls to do the same and leaving the consumer with even fewer choices.”


Wasn't this all settled by the Paramount decision of 1948, when the United States Supreme Court declared it illegal for movie studios to own the theaters in which the movies that they produced were shown?

Tom Shales on the Muck and Mire at NBC

When I was a young lad growing up watching the world in black and white on the RCA console TV, there aired a poor man's version of Abbott and Costello. The show was called "Mack and Myer for Hire". Now as the NBC television Network settles into the "Muck and Mire" of its own design, NBC threatens to become a poor man's version of a television network.

Read what my favorite television critic, (Tom Shales) has to say about NBC by clicking on his name at the top of the post.