28 weeks later?

My wife Laura wonders why Dick Cheney doesn't just "slink away" and leave us all alone. I would no more expect Dick Cheney to slink away than I would expect one of those infected guys in 28 Days Later to do the same. They just keep snarling and coming at you. Here he is again, offended that the Obama administration is taking some baby steps toward investigating our homegrown torturers. Well, at least we can all agree that there is something offensive here.

Harry Potter and the...

... Half-Blood Prince, I believe. Saw it on IMax, with 3-D for the first ten minutes or so. What I can say about 3-D is that the technology is quite improved from what I remember. It no longer makes you nauseous, and some of the effects are fairly striking. Still, most of the time it reminded me of looking through a View-Master, with the obvious discrete foreground and background. I.e., still a gimmick.

The movie? Not bad overall, but not worth the $14 I spent. Too much teen angst and snogging for my taste. The new Dumbledore pales in comparison to Richard Harris. The memory pensieve is quite cool: Harry sticks his head in a toilet bowl and trips out. The journey across a lake straight out of Dante to retrieve the horcrux is poorly done, not nearly as intense as it is in the book (yes, I read it). Biggest problem: the vivid three-dimensional characters that J.K Rowling created in her excellent novels are portrayed by, alas, appealing kid actors who grew up to be second-rate young adult actors. What can you do?

Best man for the job

The President on reappointing Ben Bernanke:

“As an expert on the causes of the Great Depression, I’m sure Ben never imagined that he would be part of a team responsible for preventing another. But because of his background, his temperament, his courage, and his creativity, that’s exactly what he has helped to achieve.”

Like, what he said.