Thursday, November 20, 2008

Make Fun of My DVD Collection...If You Dare!!!

I don't really know why I'm doing this. I think it has something to do with the conversation about DVD collections that took place a few days ago at Cinema Styles, which got me thinking about my own collection, and what I like and don't like about it. Also, just yesterday I was over at DVD Panache, Adam Ross's joint, and I saw this picture in his sidebar. I assume the picture was taken because it's a cute picture of Adam's dog, but I'm sure Adam is also aware that the photo exhibits at least a portion of his own DVD collection. One of the features of my personality is that if I'm watching a movie, and a scene happens to take place near bookshelves, I will become distracted trying to read the titles on the spines of the books.

So. That brings us here. All of the above combined to convince me that posting pictures of my DVD collection on my blog was a good idea. I'm no longer sure that I'm right about this. But here goes...

First up...TV!!


Next...box sets!!


And what's this? What are these movies?? Not pictured: some very good movies that the flash obliterated.

And now, the Filmmaker Section!


Horror and such!!


That last picture kind of sucks, doesn't it? Oh well. I know, you can make a game out of it! Who can correctly guess the most titles? And what prize will the winner receive? Honor, my friends.

Honor.

62 comments:

  1. I can't see any of them because the pictures don't enlarge. But quantity-wise, nice collection.

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  2. Well, how do I fix that, for God's sake! Plus, I can read them. Some of them...

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  3. Here's what you do in the future: Any center, large pics you download at once. So on my recent player cigarette card post I downloaded all 17 pics first (last one first, going backwards so it would be at the bottom) and then added the text. It's a funny glitch with blogger. A real knee slapper. I think it thinks since they are centered and large that no one would want to make them any larger, which is stupid.

    That's Rick's cue to come tell us all how great Wordpress is. Take it away Rick!

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  4. Well that's bullshit. Maybe I can fix this some time tomorrow night...

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  5. Whoa, it's kind of weird to read a blog post where I'm prominently featured in the opening paragraph. Kind of like walking into a bar and seeing the bartender holding up a pair of your underwear (even stranger, being able to recognize the underwear as your own). Feel free to use this last part in your next monologue.

    I own all the box sets you listed, and they're all among my favorites. I haven't brought myself to watch "Fando y Lis" in the Jodorowsky set, but the other movies in it are excellent.

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  6. I was going to say that you had a very big collection, then I remembered that if I photographed all the movies my family has at home, it would probably be similar.

    Anyway, this post inspired me to post my own movie collection in my blog if anyone is interested.

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  7. YEAH! Why don't your pictures enlarge!?!?

    Still... you've humbled me with your collection there. Mine is puny in comparison.

    But at least I don't own Borat!?! Oh, you know I love you Bill.

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  8. Yeah, the whole fun is that they don't enlarge (tip, bill: edit your post to include this, then everyone complaining about it looks damn foolish). You get to try to work out the title from your own memory of the colours of the spines of different DVDs. I do it all the time in newspaper shots of famous faces in front of bookcases. Fat hardback with three coloured spine? UK Harry Potter. Etc. Simple.

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  9. Adam - Sorry to freak you out like that, but you were key in bringing forth this post. I must be honest about my inspirations. And I actually don't like Jodorowsky, but that boxset was kinda sorta almost free.

    Krauthammer - Your pictures are better than mine! Son of a b.! I thought about taking more close-ups, but I didn't think they'd come out... Maybe it's my wife's camera that's the problem.

    Fox - So what if I own Borat. What, do you want another punch in the mouth!?

    John - Actually, you're not wrong. That was intended to be part of the fun. I just wish the pictures were a little bit bigger. I know what the movie are, and even I have trouble figuring some of these out.

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  10. Nice, tiny pictures Bill. Your devious plot to give us all eyestrain is working at last. Wahhh-ha-ha.

    Ahem. I've got all those box sets too (except the one that I can't really make out), great stuff. I see a bunch of Hitchcock in the filmmaker section, and did you file Kurosawa under A rather than K? How very Japanese of you.

    I wish that my DVD collection wasn't scattered around in various ugly piles and cardboard boxes, so I could take pictures of it. Someday, I'll have more space for some decent shelves.

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  11. Ed - No, there's no alphabetization at all in my collection. I just try to keep directors together, so with Kurosawa, the only two films of his I own -- Ran and Seven Samurai -- I just keep them together with the rest of my Criterions. And keeping all my Criterions together really gets in the way of keeping my directors together. So does trying to unify my horror dvds. I need a new system, is what I'm trying to say.

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  12. Did I see Oceans Twelve in there? (eyebrows raised)

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  13. You can see my cat and Rod's dogs on my site now.

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  14. Yes, you do see Ocean's 12 there. My wife and I think those movies are fun, and we (I) buy a lot of previously viewed DVDs, so we therefore own a lot of films we wouldn't buy for the retail price. Even some of my Criterions are used. All hail Movie Stop (which is a DVD store near my apartment...)!

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  15. By the way, tonight I'm going to take another crack at this, and see if I can put up a post that just has larger versions of these pictures. And I don't care if nobody gives a damn.

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  16. Damn, Marilyn is one nasty leopard!!!

    Having said that, I'll gladly come build a little compost fire in your DVD room to get rid of those Christopher Guest movies.

    This kind of feels like a roast of Bill R.!

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  17. Fox, if you don't like Christopher Guest, then I'll happly show you the door. Right after I punch you in the mouth!

    But really, are you telling me you don't like Guest??

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  18. I don't mind him in other people's movies, but I can't stand the movies he makes. (NOTE: I haven't see For Your Consideration).

    The other three movies I find unfunny and aimed at easy targets. Kind of like Sacha Baron Cohen, but much MUCH less irritating in that Guest doesn't prey on real people.

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  19. For Your Consideration isn't very good, so don't bother. But you're so far off the mark on the other Guest movies that I don't know where to begin. There is real heart to those films, especially A Mighty Wind.

    Half of what's funny about Borat is the character. I'm not saying it's without flaws, and you do have a point, one which I've made in the past when discussing the movie, but the film -- and this may not have been Cohen's intention -- shows how gracious people can be as often as it shows their flaws. But you can't defend the frat guys, or the guy who likes the idea of putting gay people in prison.

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  20. It's not about defending the frat guys (or the gay prison guy) it's about flicking away the ridiculousness of people condemning them b/c a goofy guy in a mustache got them to say something off color to the camera.

    Is the rodeo guy a homophobe? Maybe. Are the frat guys prejudiced. Perhaps. But Borat's not gonna convince me of that. For all we know, the guy at the rodeo was just placating Borat b/c he sees this odd fella asking odd questions. He played the part Baron Cohen wanted him to play.

    This type of social probbing is backwards and anti-human.

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  21. Fox, I must agree with Bill. If you don't like Waiting for Guffman there's something wrong with you.

    Bill told me to say that, but I still agree.

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  22. Well, I'm not one of those people who went to see Borat for its social commentary, or claimed it had anything to say in that regard after the fact. I went to laugh, and I did.

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  23. Parker Posey makes my teeth hurt. Though I thought she is getting better as she gets away from comedy. Or, at least, more dramatic/less comic.

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  24. She is brilliant in Waiting for Guffman! Man, you really have a screw loose.

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  25. Also, I'm going to create a comic book superhero team called "The Anti-Humans".

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  26. Wordpress is just fantastic. You don't have to do anything like that with the pictures. You just download whatever size you want.

    And I love Parker Posey. Have I said I want to have her children?

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  27. And I love Parker Posey. Have I said I want to have her children?

    You mean like that Man/Woman on Oprah that's pregnant again?

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  28. Do not denigrate my peeps, fox.

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  29. Oh, no disrespect intended Rick. In fact, I'm thinking of starting an adult website dedicated to your kind called Hybrid Hotties.

    Mind you, I'm not into that sorta thing, but I'm a eagle-eye'd capitalist at heart.

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  30. "Hybrid Hotties" sounds like a site for automobile fetishists. To each her or his or its own thing, is my motto.

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  31. We're riffing, bro! Me and Rick are riffing! Do you not like the way we riff?

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  32. Oh no, it's great.

    Meanwhile, according to you, Christopher Guest isn't funny.

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  33. Oh... you want a knife fight, huh? You want by blood spilled on this here floor!!!

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  34. No, no...that would be anti-human.

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  35. Oh Mother of Tears, please come down and help me ease this boy Bill off of me for chastising his precious Borat y Cristobal Guest.

    And by ease... well, you saw Mother of Tears Bill. She was pretty smokin', right?

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  36. I did see Mother of Tears. You probably thought that was a good movie, didn't you?

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  37. Bill, this may be your first out of control comment section via Fox riffing. It's exciting isn't it?

    And Fox, I really have to now strongly agree with Bill - If you are being serious, and can't see the brilliance of the humor in Waiting for Guffman then you really do have a screw loose. Who the hell doesn't like Waiting for Guffman?

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  38. Well, I concede that I might be retarded or have some other type of mental problem, but all I can do is speak my truths and that is that Waiting For Guffman is a bomb.

    This opinion comes with a cost though. I once "dated" a girl (I " " that b/c it was in it's very early stages) who I very much wanted to kiss and she recommended Waiting For Guffman to me. I told her I thought it sucked and, well... we never sucked face.

    But hey, I still have my pride and she still has a 4th grade sense of humor, so I can live with a little physical rejection.

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  39. It's true - 4th graders can't get enough of Waiting for Guffman.

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  40. Yeah, improvisational satire that works off the knowledge of small town theatre and mechanics of daily life in middle America is huge with fourth graders.

    It's the phd's that like the really sophisticated stuff, like Rob Schneider movies.

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  41. They share the same sensibilities: cultural snobs and 4th graders. They resolve manners of disagreement and bitterness in similar ways.

    I mean, spoofing a Dairy Queen worker is just brilliant. Wow. Well done, Chris Guest. What's next? A cheeleader? A jock? Harmless people that obsessively groom their pets? Oh wait... Yeah, that's some piercing humor there Guest.

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  42. At what point does Guest "spoof" a Dairy Queen worker? Parker Posey plays a full character in that film, and "spoof" doesn't enter into it. Have you seen these movies?

    Plus, don't get all ornery because we call you out for implying our senses of humer are grade-school level.

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  43. Also, I would disagree with you, but think that you at least had a sound opinion, if I didn't think that you had never once laughed at the incompetence on display in an Ed Wood movie.

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  44. had NEVER laughed at the incompetence...etc.

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  45. Ornery? I'm not mad at all. You take these things too seriously Bill.

    I mean, I didn't take you saying I need a "punch in the nose" or I "had a screw loose" seriously. It's just some playful slapping around, that's it.

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  46. They share the same sensibilities: cultural snobs and 4th graders. They resolve manners of disagreement and bitterness in similar ways.

    That seemed less than playful.

    Saying someone has a screw loose is the same as telling someone to "sit on it". It's impossible to take seriously. And it was a punch in the mouth, not nose.

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  47. "Cultural snobs" was aimed at Christopher Guest and Baron Cohen and the type of humor they produce, not you guys. I can see how you would think I was calling you snobs, but I wasn't.

    I got into a similar dust-up with friends who took it personally when I said the humor of Borat pleases "odious hipsters". They thought I was pointing my finger at them. I DO think hateful hipsters like Borat, but I don't think you necessarily are one if you like it.

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  48. Hey I'm comment number 50 on Bill's first ever 50 comments post.

    Everybody - For he's a jolly good fellow, for he's a jolly good fellow, for he's a jolly good fellow, that nobody can deny.

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  49. Oh, yes, and Fox, seriously, if you think they're spoofing Dairy Queen workers you really didn't watch the movie.

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  50. Did Parker Posey not work at a Dairy Queen and did they not make her look like a moron?

    Granted, it's been over 10 years since I've seen the movie - and I don't plan on seeing it again - but I remember them making a caricature out of her character that as far AS I remember, worked at a Dairy Queen.

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  51. See? I probably wouldn't have gotten a third of these comments if the pictures were big enough!

    And just to spite Fox, I'm going to watch Waiting for Guffman tonight, while angrily gritting my teeth.

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  52. Well, if anything, we have another DVD that we can do the dueling commentary track for.

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  53. Yes, she worked at Dairy Queen, and she wasn't what I would call bright, or talented. She also wasn't a moron, nor was she in any way a caricature. Yes, I laughed at her. I also liked her, and rooted for her.

    Anyway, why does one character who works at a Dairy Queen have to represent all Dairy Queen employees everywhere?

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  54. I just read it as Guest and Posey smirking at the small-town ambitions of that character. A kind of riffing (riffing!) on the fast-food track to fame that a Anna Nicole Smith took. It just rang snooty to me, and not loving.

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  55. Well, you're wrong.

    Ha ha, but seriously. I saw it completely differently from you. And honestly, if I thought for a second that's what Guest had in mind, I'd hate the film too, but this is like when Ed Burns got mad at the Coen brothers because he thought the murder of the state trooper in Fargo was supposed to be funny. If that scene had been played for laughs, I'd be pissed off, right alongside Burns, but it didn't play like that for me at all, and I don't remember anyone in the theater laughing, either.

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  56. So I guess with Fox, only white collar characters with sizable incomes are acceptable as comical characters. I'd be willing to bet there are plenty of comedies that Fox likes in which that isn't always the case.

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  57. Jonathan-

    Of course that's not the case. As I said, I felt a snideness coming from Guest and Posey. Class snobbery. That's why I dislike it.

    To use the Coen Bros. again, Raising Arizona is a comedy that I love which has "blue collar" characters. They are rich and deep, yes, and off the rails too - as with Goodman and Forsythe's characters - but not for once do I feel a mocking of that region of the country they I feel it in Guests work.

    I equally dislike Best In Show, and there are white collar characters in that movie. Parkey Posey's if I remember correctly. So it doesn't fall along those lines at all.

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  58. Hey I'm comment 60 too. I'll be back for 70 after I pick up a hand dipped cone from those morons at the Dairy Queen.

    [Jonathan snickers to self, "heh, heh, that oughta rile up Fox."]

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  59. I'm really offended by the smugness with which you imply in that picture that people who use laptops get frustrated easily. I never, ever get that feeling from the Coens.

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