An interview with Tina Fey.

My mom is very, very dry. If she's out and she sees a woman in a reeeeeally ugly hat, or a crazy ugly Christmas sweater, my mom will go out of her way to be like: "I love your sweater! That is be-autiful! Where did you get it?"

Back in high school, I would try to control people through shame. I only learned how to stop doing that like two years ago.

On TV, I'm used to writing within boundaries, but the standards are tougher in the movies. The things they made us take out of the movie are definitely said on TV. The rule we go by in TV is if a little kid wouldn't understand it, it's probably OK. But they said "absolutely not."

-- Why do men like mean girls?
-- Some people confuse meanness for passion.

So, will the DVD be unrated?

If this film flops in theaters, can we attribute it to a lack of guns?

Frozen hot dogs are no substitute for cold steel.

The New Queen of Mean

Tarantino's movies are about loss and betrayal, and "Kill Bill Vol. 2" is a double-burger helping of those motifs. It is rich, substantial and sustained, yet also greasy kids' stuff, a wrapper filled with an extra large order of chili fries, stained with ketchup, salt and cheese.

I think Elvis likes it.

Vengeance Still Mine, Saith the Lethal Bride

"Kill Bill" ... a glorious, crazy, rousing, and finally quite poignant meta-movie.

Charting the Tarantino Universe

Book-ends for tax day.

On April 13, go to Borders for a second helping of Neal. On April 16, go to AMC for another course of Quentin.

Revenge is a dish best served cold.

After having killed the first two on her death list, O-Ren Ishii and Vernita Green, The Bride continues in her journey of vengeance to hunt down and kill the remaining victims, Elle Driver, Budd, and ultimately, Bill. However, matters become complicated when The Bride learns that her daughter, whom she presumed dead, is still alive.

Form 1040, line 42: Would you like to donate $10 to Miramax?

Kill Bill: Volume 2

Coffee and Cigarettes is a comic series of short vignettes that build on one another to create a cumulative effect as the characters discuss things as diverse as caffeine popsicles, Paris in the twenties, and the use of nicotine as an insecticide, all the while sitting around sipping coffee and smoking cigarettes. As Jarmusch delves into the normal pace of our world from an extraordinary angle, he shows just how absorbing the obsessions, joys, and addictions of life can be. Filmed in black and white, Coffee and Cigarettes made its world premiere at the Venice International Film Festival, then screened to a sold-out crowd at the Toronto International Film Festival.

This film will be shown on April 15 at the San Francisco International Film Festival. See

http://www.sfiff.org/fest04/titleDetail.asp?title_id=58

for more details.

Coffee and Cigarettes

In a way, movieoke is a means to allow people whose personalities are basically a pastiche of pop-culture references to get together, drink and put some of that hard-won knowledge to good use.

Can you picture sake-sated Japanese office workers, katana in hand, trying to re-enact scenes from Shichinin no samurai?

Amateur Celebrities Pick a Movie and Join In

A tidbit from the AP wire story on the weekend box office numbers:

Worldwide, "The Return of the King" has earned $771.5 million, putting it on track to cross the billion-dollar mark, especially if it fares well at the Golden Globes or Academy Awards.

How does that sound, David Goldstein?

A major movie studio releases a "gross-out" comedy about the improbable romance between a carefree, "attractive young everywoman" and a risk-obsessed nerd.

In a sign of the times, it says to the public, "Lighten up!" and wonders aloud, "See? Isn't risk funny?"

Unfortunately for those carefree enough to risk $10 on this film, the answer is ... no, according to NYT's Stephen Holden.

One might be inclined to take comfort in a tasty bucket of buttered popcorn, but even this simple pleasure is denied by an awareness of the implications of massive overproduction of corn.

Is ignorance bliss?

A Romance Battles the Odds: Risk Assessor Woos Daredevil

The trouble for these monster corporations is that an America of niches doesn't always play to their strengths. Top-heavy conglomerates are geared up for producing mass-common-denominator products, but when that mass common denominator disperses, they can be flummoxed.

What Ails Hollywood

"How to win a battle against terrorism and lose the war of ideas," read the flier.

Lessons of the Pentagon's Favorite Training Film