This Dad’s Life? (video blog)

Dads come in all shapes and sizes, full of crullers and weed. They can be negligent or deadbeat, abandoning or abusive. Perhaps, a few, even turn out well. Of course they do. And for them, Father’s Day should be a celebration of that rarest breed, the man who strives to raise a family responsibly. For those brave souls, The Warren Report — in conjunction with Kim Ricketts Book Events — is proud to offer two special editions of Words & Wine, at The Pan Pacific Hotel, that honor these best men and their greatest achievements. Watch today’s THINK! piece for a taste of tonight’s treat with author Michael Lewis (tickets may be purchased at the door), then read on to discover who’ll join me on Monday the 15th.

Michael Lewis Next up in Words & Wine is an evening with Michael Lewis. The bestselling author of Liar’s Poker, Moneyball, The Blind Side, Coach and others, Lewis now turns his journalist’s eye on his own brand of modern fatherhood.  Home Game: An Accidental Guide to Fatherhood is the written record of what actually happened after the birth of each of his three children. It is maybe the funniest, most unsparing account of ordinary daily household life ever recorded, from the point of view of the man inside. And, as Malcolm Gladwell writes: “Lewis is the finest storyteller of our generation.” Join us on Thursday night, June 11 at the Pan Pacific Hotel, 6:30 pm for an evening with Michael Lewis. Andre Dubus III On Monday, June 15: Words & Wine welcomes Andre Dubus III for a conversation about his new novel, The Garden of Last Days. Following the amazing success of House of Sand and Fog (both as a novel and a film), Dubus ventures again into the dark side of our modern world, where desperate characters are caught up in a plot thundering toward catastrophe.  It is a tense psychological thriller, “muscular and disquieting and turn-the-pages-so-fast-you-tear-them good.” (Esquire) Join us for a night of conversation with Andre Dubus III on fiction, film, family and everything in between onJune 15 at the Pan Pacific Hotel, 6:30 pm.            All Words & Wine evenings are $45 per person, which includes a copy of the author’s new book, all wine and appetizers.  Reservations can be made via our website: www.kimricketts.com/wordswine.html.  The Words & Wine series is sponsored by the Pan Pacific Hotel Seattle, Ste. Michelle Wine Estates, The Warren Report, Seattle Magazine, and Theo Chocolate .

Yo, buddy, are you friggin’ nuts?!? (video blog)

I am not an animal. I am a human being. With the  memory of an elephant, man. But when I go the movies, I consider the possibility that many other members of the audience belong in the zoo. At a recent screening of THE COVE — perhaps the best doc at SIFF, along with WE LIVE IN PUBLIC — I encountered a creature in my natural habitat that redefined our species and may indicate we have reversed our evolutionary course. Watch today’s THINK piece below for a taste of the horror that is… the modern movie-goer! Then, tell me what we ought to do about this off-camera chimera. Lop off the cowardly lion’s head or gut the voracious ’scaped goat?

Johnny Weir: Skating on thin ice? (video blog)

Even before Stan asked Cartman, “what would Brian Boitano do?,” I was inspired by figure skating. There’s just something about the graceful athleticism blanketed in bad Bob Mackie wannabe onesies that makes me smile… and clap… and cry. Thus, I was thrilled to learn that this year’s Seattle International Film Festival would include POP STAR ON ICE, a documentary focused on Johnny Weir, the sport’s most fun, flamboyant and independent spirit. Bad boy or grand champion… you decide.

And I suppose it is in keeping with Johnny’s maverick spirit that I offer today’s THINK piece below, a conversation-starter about how often films and folk heros are pigeon-holed because of the general public’s discomfort with any ambiguities.

Please, let me know where you stand, then watch my interview with filmmakers David Barba and James Pellerito — recorded at Seattle’s first-class Pan Pacific Hotel — to be posted on The Warren Report in the very near future.

We Live In Public and the rent is going up (video blog)

Dive down the rabbit hole of social media and you’re bound to encounter two virtual ninnies, Twitter-dee and Twitter-dum. Avatars for the masses, they represent the increasingly popular absurdity of concision, the insane notion that any relevant discourse can be generated in exchanges of fewer than 140 characters. Of course, if the absence of wisdom were my only regret, I could denounce myriad media — television for its induction of passivity, video games for their introduction to addictiveness. (Damn you, PopCap, for getting me hooked on Bejeweled! Yes, I am 12-year-old girl.) However, it is social media’s home invasion of privacy that scares the bejeezus out of me. We share our secrets on our computer screens, taking liberties with our intimacies in ways that would make Larry Flynt shudder. 

WE LIVE IN PUBLIC documents the origins of social media through the cold, dead eyes of one of its most charismatic pioneers, Josh Harris. Watch today’s THINK piece below for my take on Ondi (DiG!) Timoner’s film, then click here for my interview with the whip-smart and statuesque director and her debt-defying subject shot on location at Seattle’s posh Pan Pacific Hotel.

Next step: Confess how often you check your Facebook page or tweet over the course of a single day. Do so right here on The Warren Report. Or, text #345AREYOUEFFIN’KIDDINGME?  

Warren, The DVD Chaser? (video blog)

Must I go to Somalia to find a good pirate? Need I recruit Baretta to keep an eye on/out for Jack Sparrow? I am desperately seeking someone — most assuredly not Susan — who can make an illegal copy of a film that The Warren Report screened recently. The movie’s a comic gem based on a Charles Willeford novel — famed for all of his protagonists’ risible misanthropy — and it’s unavailable on dvd, damnit! It’s just not fair. So, if you have some shady friends, watch the THINK piece below and instruct them to set about their copyright-infringing thaumaturgy.

Before you deliver the dvd to me, though, take a look for yourself, then listen to my conversation with the director, recorded at a FILM RAP session held in conjunction with TheFilmSchool just a month ago. Or, I’ll be forced to heave you by the legs with a running bowline.

As always, I encourage to share your thoughts right here.

The World’s Number One Fan!?! (video blog)

Lydia, o Lydia, o have you seen Lydia? Groucho Marx was always on the lookout out for his illustrated lady. Well, no telling where Lydia is, but now she’s got competition for a new generation of stars. Watch today’s THINK piece (below) for my take on a woman whose pursuit of celebrity may be wilder than a crank-fueled Cloris Leachman in the mosh pit at an Anvil concert. I’ve got to wonder how the bumptious David Caruso might respond to Zoe Wade’s, er, indelible request.

Your thoughts? Share them here. Just sign on the dotted line…

Have I become comfortably numb? (video blog)

A critic’s job is akin to a forty-niner’s; both spend their days panning for gold. The veteran reviewer does so in two way: by cherry-picking the best films from amongst the detritus and getting rewarded for those efforts that could only be seen as gold by fools. (All that glitters may just be… GLITTER.) Trust that the critic’s stick is brandished more than the karats are uncovered.

I stumbled upon a substantial nugget a year ago on the festival circuit. Despite a name lead — a well-loved sitcom star! — a solid supporting cast and a smart, sensitive script, this romantic comedy did not receive a proper theatrical release. The Warren Report screened it in conjunction with TheFilmSchool and the audience embraced it. Now, you, too, can fall in love with this overlooked gem. Just watch the THINK piece below for the movie’s identity and a brief analysis of its maker. (Click here for my extended interview with the immensely talented and immensely neurotic writer-director.) Then, rush to your local video store, rent it and draw your own conclusions. I’ll wait for your Report here.

Mother! Oh god, mother! Bon-bons! Bon-Bons! (video blog)

For Mother’s Day, I sent my mom the Universal Legacy edition of PSYCHO (Alfred Hitchcock’s classic, not that ill-reasoned recreation by Gus Van Sant). The movie speaks to our relationship, close, yet twisted… though I am unlikely to cross-dress to keep her memory alive.

For those of you with a more conventional bond, why not celebrate your very first landlord — she sold you a womb without a view, after all — with the special screening I am hosting tonight at Theo Chocolate. Even if you aren’t feeling sentimental, contextually, she’ll think you’re the sweetest! And isn’t that what’s important? Scoring brownie points with Mom just in case you need to move back in with the folks someday? (Given the economy, never say sever.)

To find out which of the all-time funniest, family films we’ll present this evening, watch today’s THINK piece below. To reserve seats for yourself and your favorite mother, click here. And if you can’t make, at least order some Theo Chocolate on-line so that she’ll know you’re thinking of her, so everyone will know “Why, she wouldn’t even harm a fly…”

Honing in on The Good Life (video blog)

What if you could improve your life simply by changing one fundamental part of your behavior? Would you do it? If you could make yourself happy simply by seeing a glass half full rather than half empty, could you do it? Tonight, I welcome a special guest to The Good Life whose latest book, Rapt: Attention and the Focused Life, promises answers for all of your life’s problems. Much like looking down and realizing your ruby slippers serve as a more successful teleportation device than Jeff Goldblum’s pods in THE FLY, you’ll be amazed that the solutions have always appeared… right before your eyes.

Watch today’s THINK piece for the identity of tonight’s guest. To reserve your seat at the event, click here.

This week’s dvds? Why not take a SHINE to last week’s? (video blog)

A broken clock is right twice a day which is a much better average than these contestants on Hollywood Squares. (God bless Gilbert Gottfried!) Like the malfunctioning timepiece, my chronological sense is duller than Garrison Keillor reading from a Barbara Cartland novel. Thus why I offer tips for last week’s dvd releases… today. My apologies for the delay.

If you absolutely must rent a brand new release today, consider WENDY AND LUCY, the second feature from Kelly (OLD JOY) Reichardt that traces the sorry steps of a young woman, and her title-sharing dog, whilst trekking to Alaska, virtually penniless. Car troubles, money woes and petty justice impede their so-so-laid plans; their unraveling the essence of the film’s “plot.” WENDY AND LUCY doesn’t meander. Michelle Williams may mosey, but her introverted performance is so compelling that it is a pleasure watching her do so very little. Her character is enigmatic though perhaps less so than imagined and in no way the script is willing to reveal. Maybe she is just a member of another lost generation, minus the Francophilia and the literary aspirations, yet nevertheless, a woman without a country… or much hope for the state’s she’s in. (To watch the trailer for WENDY AND LUCY, click here.)

Now, make time for the THINK piece below. And, if you’ve already seen my selections, do share your opinions right here on The Warren Report.

Screw you, Herve Villechaize? (video blog)

What do R. Kelly, H.R. Giger, Sarah Jessica Parker, Chad Michael Murray and Kim Jong-Il have in common? No, they are not all appearing on the next edition of Celebrity Apprentice. Instead, they all share a fear that Erica Jong immortalized in the title of her most famous work. While some stars may seek solace in the fact that so many of their fellow luminaries share the phobia, another is taking a bold step, recruiting The Rebel Billionaire to cure her.

Will it work? Watch today’s THINK! piece and draw your own conclusions. Then, help me contact Bill Gates, Warren Buffett or T. Boone Pickens. Or, send Xanax.

(Bonus! Billy Bob Thornton’s another big name susceptible to mile-high panic attacks. His solution: Get Pat Boone! Read all about his unusual coping mechanism here.)