Over the past few days, it has been interesting to see how a particular incident was reported on, and how the nature of the changing face of film writing from print to the web has been a factor.
The incident in question: At a film festival in Oxford, Mississippi, various film bloggers were invited out by the fest to be on a panel. One of them, Jeffrey Wells, was so dissatisfied with his accommodation — due to the lack of reliable wi-fi — that he blew off the panel, went home early, and blamed the whole thing on his bad mood. Pretty much every other blogger there reported on his behavior, with the vast majority of the coverage declaring that he was in the wrong.
I wasn’t there, but I think all the coverage gave me a pretty good sense of it. What struck me, however, is what a change this makes from the way things used to be. For 40+ years, the LA Times had a staff critic named Kevin Thomas, who was notorious for throwing tantrums if screening circumstances were less than 100% to his liking — publicists have been reduced to tears by his yelling when press notes haven’t been available before screenings, or if a movie started before he arrived (never mind how late he might be), or started late if he were there early.
I don’t know of any print film writers who ever called him on his behavior. The general attitude seemed to be that “that’s just Kevin being Kevin.”
Well, the Oxford incident was, in a way, “just Jeff being Jeff” [I should note that I like Jeff, but he is definitely an eccentric; which is exactly what some of my friends and colleagues say about Kevin]. But it’s interesting how print film writers used to have the philosophy of protecting their own, while bloggers are happy to expose bad behavior by their counterparts.
I think the new approach is probably better overall…but it’s eye-opening to see how things change.
One of my favorite headlines ever in The Onion was “Taco Bell combines same five ingredients in completely new way!” It is so true. Most new items on the menu are simply creative re-assemblages, though they’ll frequently come up with some new “limited-time” sauce. Over the past decade, though, one substantial contribution to the usual roster of stuff was spicy chicken. Unlike standard Taco Bell chicken, which is compressed product not unlike McNuggets, formed into the shape of breast slices with fake grillmarks…Taco Bell’s spicy chicken is shredded and cooked in sauce. It is perhaps the best thing they do, and their spicy chicken burritos and tacos are arguably the closest things on the menu to actual Mexican food.
Which brings us to the newest variation. Now, enchiladas used to be the Bell’s biggest omission (and they still don’t have anything like ‘em at Del Taco, for what it’s worth), and when I would go to generic Taco Bell clones in the South, long before “the border” penetrated the Bible belt (sounds dirty, and it is, in a “dirty underwear” kind of way), I would always get enchiladas. But Taco Bell remedied that a few years back with something called the Enchiloco. Decent idea in theory, but they relied on too much diced raw onion, which tends to dominate. Also, Taco Bell only provides one type of cutlery — the spork. And a knife would be useful for an enchilada. This is still an issue.
So now we have proper enchiladas, though they only come on a platter. Five bucks for that, and six for the platter plus a large soda, which is a decent deal considering a small soda by itself is $1.39. And Taco Bell’s smalls are really fuckin’ small.
Before we get to the food, I have to note the packaging. First issue: Taco Bell has replaced their standardized fast-food trays with these big plastic bowls. I don’t know why, but they suck. One enchilada platter fills the tray, so if you want something else (and I always have to get nachos), you get a second tray. These bowl-trays have sloped edges, so you get in trouble if you try to push them together for ease of carrying, since they are likely to slip against each other, especially if you’re holding a soda too…well, let’s just say it’s a good thing these bowls can hold a lot of spilled soda, because for me, they needed to.
Now to the packaging of the platter. I don;t understand why, if you design a tray specifically for this combo, you then have to have removable sub-trays within it. So much wasted plastic. The tray is divided into sections for the rice, chips, refried beans, salsa, and enchiladas, yet the salsa and enchiladas have their own separate trays that fit within these divisions. Wasteful and stupid.
The enchiladas themselves are standard Taco Bell spicy chicken inside soft taco flour tortillas, with red sauce and cheese on top, and sour cream (but I always ask for it without). Not bad, but again, hard to eat with just a spork. Knives would help, but maybe the bosses are afraid we’d go hijack an airplane afterwards.
The beans have a big handful of grated cheese on top, which is good. The rice is generic, but somewhat flavorful. Chips are Taco Bell’s usual wonderfully crispy and totally unhealthy bleached fried things, and the dipping salsa isn’t great (Jack in the Box’s salsa for chicken pitas is better, for example, but that’s because Jack in the Box is just generally cooler anyway), but nor is it terrible. Taco Bell could stand to develop a salsa bar like El Pollo Loco has, with several varieties.
All told, it’s a filling combo for five bucks, but you’re most likely to tire of the rice before finishing it. Points off for annoying packaging and the stupid new trays, but points on for doing enchiladas before Del Taco, which I generally prefer.
A full belly on five bucks is gonna be useful in the years ahead, y’all.
UPDATED CORRECTION: The Taco Bell variation on the enchilada was not called the enchiloco, but the Enchirito(TM). And it’s still on the menu. I regret the error.
Been feeling nostalgia lately, what with Rob Liefeld having recently announced a movie version of Youngblood to be directed by Brett Ratner, and Alan Moore in the news again due to the imminent movie version of Watchmen.
About a year and a half ago, I interviewed Rob for a cover story at OC Weekly. It’s now the sort of thing they don’t cover, but that issue was in huge demand due to a unique Liefeld cover, and the blog post I did afterwards, in which Liefeld shoots on Moore.
And I did it without deliberately baiting anyone; Rob himself volunteered the topic. When an AICN talkbacker actually mentioned this blog post the other night, I figured it might be time to give it another link…
Editorial note: My Grandfather is not the most tech-savvy guy in the world, as one might expect from a grandfather. However, I sent him a link to the comments that ensued here after his last column, and he responded in depth. Herewith, I share it with all of you…
Many thanks for your invitation to look at your weblog, which of course
I have now done.. I can’t possibly provide adequate responses to all
the fascinating comments, so I thought it might be helpful if I just for
the moment did one thing: namely send you a copy of the notes I used
when introducing the God topic at our local philosophical society’s recent meeting when I had to introduce the question:”What do we mean by the word “GOD” and does it matter. [Continue reading My Grandfather’s Column BONUS...]
In spite of the help of scientifically minded friends I have yet to be convinced that it is possible to discover any simply rational scientific answer to this basic question WHY? I think it’s equally absurd to suppose that there can be a simple scientific answer to the question of the origin of the universe (by which I mean all that exists or ever has existed). Of course scientists can tell us a great deal about the way things are and how they came to be what they are. They tell us now that it is virtually certain that life exists in other parts of the universe. They rightly maintain that Darwin’s theories about evolution form an excellent working hypothesis much preferable to the literal interpretation of the creation stories in the first two chapters of our Bible. What they can never do is prove the non-existence of God (or of anything else).
I want to show that it’s perfectly rational to believe in God and later, I hope, that even without any backing from the natural sciences the probability of God’s existence is overwhelming.
First then the atheistic argument, as I understand it, is that the existence of an intelligent designer – God – is neither testable nor refutable. Therefore it does not fulfil the criteria for a scientific theory. Therefore God is redundant. Science doesn’t need God; therefore to entertain the God hypothesis makes no sense. I accept that we have no scientific proof of God’s existence but the crucial point is that up to the present time nobody has produced a more rational hypothesis to explain why there exists anything at all. I’d be grateful to hear any alternative explanation. Meanwhile I can’t help imagining (most unscientifically) how God must be laughing at all this stuff, much as we might laugh as we observe two dogs talking to each other and perhaps discussing the possibility of the existence of minds superior to their own.
Peter Graham (e-mail:peter.graham[at]bucklandnewton[dot]com)
LYT adds:
Upon reading this column, I sent my grandfather the following response…
You say:
“but the crucial point is that up to the present time nobody has produced a more rational hypothesis to explain why there exists anything at all. I’d be grateful to hear any alternative explanation.”
Why must there be a “rational” explanation? Most atheists believe the cosmos is chaotic and irrational.
You undoubtedly know the hypothesis that if one is given infinite time, 100 monkeys with eternity to work with, at 100 typewriters, would ultimately crank out every combination of letters that ever existed. I don’t personally think 100 monkeys would exhibit true randomness, but the point is that randomness plus infinite time equals every possibility.
Why, then, could we not infer the same for the cosmos? Perhaps we are but one of many possibilities that has been tried, given infinite time and every existing element. Certainly we don’t seem to be the most perfect combination that could have occurred — maybe there were worse prior, and in the face of infinity, maybe there will be better.
Listen, I’d love to believe there’s a creator who actually listens, and if you can convince me, that’d be great. I just don’t see it from here.
I’ll update with his rebuttal when I get it.
And he has responded. Here…
Many thanks for your message. I’m always delighted to get responses,
especially when they are challenging.. I’ve already done some
preliminary thinking about my next article, which was precisely about
the non-rational case for belief in God.
Perhaps I should have directly quoted from an article I was sent
recently by an atheist friend in Buckland Newton.. It’s by a bloke
called Alan Longstaff and is published by the journal /Astronomy Now/.
The atheist argument I used in the March article was taken almost
verbatim from that source. He clearly doesn’t go along with the
irrational chaotic theory, which I guess has quire a lot to be said for it.
I doubt if I could ever produce an adequate explanation of my own views
in the sort of space to which I’m necessarily restricted when I compose
my stuff. Nor indeed would I now have time to attempt what I might have
attempted 30 years or so ago. What I did write in the recent article was
a direct response to the one by Alan Longstaff, who clearly believes
that there must be a rational explanation of everything. We both know of
course that that is a questionable position even among atheists.
