I love a good courtroom movie, so today I'm bringing you my All-Time Courtroom Movie List.
#5 12 Angry Men
You may think it unfair of me to include a movie in which not a single scene takes place in a courtroom. The entire film (and the play on which it's based) goes on inside the jury deliberation room. All I can say in my own defense is that my criteria for "courtroom movies" should probably be called "court movies," but that lacks a certain something.
This classic could very easily be ranked higher, but I've only ever seen it a couple of times (the most recent being years ago), and it hasn't stuck with me as the most intense of cinematic court battles. Still, it's a fantastic film that has a lot to say about the art of persuasion and the dangers of being completely close-minded.
#4 Rules of Engagement
Samuel L. Jackson is on trial for ordering his Marines to fire into a hostile crowd demonstrating against the U.S. in Yemen. Tommy Lee Jones defends him. Really great stuff.
#3 From the Hip
This is a little known film from the 80s, and I'm tremendously thankful for my dad who got me started on it. It stars Judd Nelson, Elizabeth Perkins, and John Hurt. The movie covers two trials. For the first one, Nelson's character, fresh out of law school and desperately wanting to argue a case, pulls some questionably unethical strings to put himself in position to defend one banker guy who punched another banker guy. This trial (roughly the first half of the movie) is quite comical and light-hearted. After his success in the first case, he gets assigned a no-win murder case in which he is supposed to defend an obviously guilty murderer. The second half of the movie is much more dramatic, and not nearly as funny. Both halves, though, are excellent, and putting them together makes for a very good, though not terribly popular film.
#2 A Time to Kill
Look at the cast of this movie: Matthew McConaughey, Samuel L. Jackson (on trial... again), Sandra Bullock, Oliver Platt, Kevin Spacey, Donald Sutherland, Kiefer Sutherland, Charles S. Dutton, and Chris Cooper. Even if the storyline was awful, that group of actors would make it pretty good. Of course, the storyline is not awful. It's based on John Grisham's most popular novel. I tend to enjoy Grisham's books quite a bit more than the movies made based on them, but, ironically enough, I think this is the exception. The book is great, no doubt, but I think the movie beats it in this case. (The money line from Jackson comes at about 2:14 in this trailer. Fantastic movie.)
#1 A Few Good Men
Speaking of impressive casts: Tom Cruise, Demi Moore, Jack Nicholson, Kevin Bacon, Kiefer Sutherland, Kevin Pollack, J.T. Walsh, Christopher Guest, Wolfgang Bodison, Noah Wyle, Cuba Gooding Jr., and even Joshua Malina. The movie was directed by Rob Reiner (The Princess Bride, anyone?) and written by Aaron Sorkin (who even makes a cameo appearance). Given just the information in this paragraph, I'm not even sure it would be an earthly possibility for this movie to be something less than spectacular. Sorkin has an unbelievable knack for writing serious dramas about deadly serious topics while still including some of the funniest jokes I've ever heard. This movie is more hilarious than most comedies I've seen in my life. It's got fantastic acting, an incredible script, beautiful cinematography, and of course, one of the most iconic quotes in the history of cinema: "YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH!" I watched this movie two nights ago, and this trailer makes me want to turn it on again right now. Unbelievably good movie.
So there you have it. My Top 5 Courtroom movies. Did I miss any big ones? What are your favorites?
June 12, 2011
Ready for the... week?
As you may have noticed, I've been posting (what I think are) funny videos every Friday to get you laughing as the work week ends.
I couldn't wait another second to share this one with you, though. It is absolutely priceless. (For the record, I hate cats.)
<a href="http://www.bing.com/videos/browse?mkt=en-us&from={from}&vid=ed102a58-b2f2-453f-ab08-fa749f85a8ab&from=dest_en-us&fg=dest" target="_new" title="Dating Site Bio Gets Weird">Video: Dating Site Bio Gets Weird</a>
I couldn't wait another second to share this one with you, though. It is absolutely priceless. (For the record, I hate cats.)
June 10, 2011
June 9, 2011
Boerboel
I have officially decided, once and for all, what kind of dog I want to own someday (someday = when I have a big enough yard to let it run around in).
This is a South African Mastiff, also known as a Boerboel (Dutch for "farmer's dog").
The following is the description of this breed's temperament from dogbreedinfo.com:
The Boerboel is reliable, obedient and intelligent, with strong watch and guard-dog instincts. It is self-assured and fearless. The Boerboel are very playful and affectionate toward their owners. Their favorite pass time would be to play a game of fetch loving every minute they spend with their master. Their jaws are strong and they will most often pop the ball they are playing with. Not to fret, they will just play with the popped ball! They are very gentle and good with children they know. Allowing them to ride on their backs like a horse, loving every minute of the attention they are getting. Boerboel will do okay with other dogs, cats and other non-canine pets, letting birds come down and snatch from their food bowl! They will guard their family, friends and property with their life. When the owners are not home they will not allow anyone to enter the home, unless they know them very well. When welcomed visitors arrive they will accept them after being properly introduced. This breed requires a dominant owner. The authority the owners project over the dog should be so strong that the dog will not bolt out the front door when it is opened. The objective in training this dog is to achieve a pack leader status. It is a natural instinct for a dog to have anorder in their pack. When we humans live with dogs, we become their pack. The entire pack cooperates under a single leader. Lines are clearly defined and rules are set. Because a dog communicates his displeasure with growling and eventually biting, all other humans MUST be higher up in the order than the dog. The humans must be the ones making the decisions, not the dogs. That is the only way your relationship with your dog can be a complete success. If one does not understand this concept 100% and have confidence that they can handle such a large guard type breed then this is not the dog for them. With the right owners the Boerboel can make wonderful pets.
I just thought you all should know the kind of dog you can expect to see running around with us in the future.
This is a South African Mastiff, also known as a Boerboel (Dutch for "farmer's dog").
The following is the description of this breed's temperament from dogbreedinfo.com:
The Boerboel is reliable, obedient and intelligent, with strong watch and guard-dog instincts. It is self-assured and fearless. The Boerboel are very playful and affectionate toward their owners. Their favorite pass time would be to play a game of fetch loving every minute they spend with their master. Their jaws are strong and they will most often pop the ball they are playing with. Not to fret, they will just play with the popped ball! They are very gentle and good with children they know. Allowing them to ride on their backs like a horse, loving every minute of the attention they are getting. Boerboel will do okay with other dogs, cats and other non-canine pets, letting birds come down and snatch from their food bowl! They will guard their family, friends and property with their life. When the owners are not home they will not allow anyone to enter the home, unless they know them very well. When welcomed visitors arrive they will accept them after being properly introduced. This breed requires a dominant owner. The authority the owners project over the dog should be so strong that the dog will not bolt out the front door when it is opened. The objective in training this dog is to achieve a pack leader status. It is a natural instinct for a dog to have anorder in their pack. When we humans live with dogs, we become their pack. The entire pack cooperates under a single leader. Lines are clearly defined and rules are set. Because a dog communicates his displeasure with growling and eventually biting, all other humans MUST be higher up in the order than the dog. The humans must be the ones making the decisions, not the dogs. That is the only way your relationship with your dog can be a complete success. If one does not understand this concept 100% and have confidence that they can handle such a large guard type breed then this is not the dog for them. With the right owners the Boerboel can make wonderful pets.
I just thought you all should know the kind of dog you can expect to see running around with us in the future.
June 6, 2011
How to Care for Introverts
A friend tweeted this a few weeks ago, and as an introvert, I think it's worth sharing.
How to care for introverts:
See the original here.
How to care for introverts:
- Respect their need for privacy.
- Never embarrass them in public.
- Let them observe first in new situations.
- Give them time to think. Don't demand instant answers.
- Don't interrupt them.
- Give them advanced notice of expected changes in their lives.
- Give them 15 minute warnings to finish whatever they are doing before calling them to dinner or moving on to the next activity.
- Reprimand them privately.
- Teach them new skills privately rather than in public.
- Enable them to find one best friend who has similar interests and abilities; encourage this relationship even if the friend moves.
- Do not push them to make lots of friends.
- Respect their introversion. Don't try to remake them into extraverts.
See the original here.
June 2, 2011
Catching Up: Highlights from the last two weeks
- I had scheduled my last two posts to post on Friday, May 27, and Monday, May 30 - both really early in the morning. They didn't actually post (or at least they didn't show up in RSS feed readers) until sometime in the afternoon on Tuesday, May 31. I don't know what's up with that, but I apologize for two untimely posts this week. I'll try to get to the bottom of that.
- From May 19 until May 28 we were extremely fortunate to be visited by my brother, Jaron. It was absolutely fantastic having him around for more than a week. He's a hassle-free houseguest, and I love his idea of "fun." We spent a lot of time at the park playing with his super-long-distance frisbee. After I threw it into the tree once (and he had to climb up and pull it down), we managed to have a really fun time with it. What we learned is that to play with that kind of frisbee, you need a field about the size of 10 football fields that has NO ONE else playing on it.
- Tuesday we checked out Red Rocks Park and amphitheater, which is one of the coolest sights to see around here (I think Jaron would agree). After that we headed up to Evergreen and did a mild hike that Elizabeth and I have enjoyed numerous times. When we got back to the city Tuesday night we went to a Rockies game. The Rocks lost the game, but we all had a fabulous time (it was $1 hotdog night... and the dogs were Hebrew National, which totally made it worth it).
- Jaron took me golfing. First time I had swung a club in over four years. I had a really good time. I birdied a hole for the very first time in my life. Jaron was a bit disappointed, because the 9-hole course had just two par-4s and the rest were par-3s. We both felt a little silly for having rented a cart. It felt like the equivalent of riding the escalator up 3 stairs.
- Last Friday Jase and Rachel arrived from Des Moines. They were here to pick Jaron up and bring him back to the Motherland, but they drove through the night Thursday so they could be here for all of Friday and spend some time with us. It was a fantastic 24+ hours. We went out to Red Rocks Park to run around a little bit. Later, we pulled out the Saint Louis Cardinals-themed cornhole set that Joel built for us last year. It was the first time we'd ever used them. They are AWESOME and we had a great time playing. Jase, Rachel and Jaron took off on Saturday morning. Spending time with my family always makes me want to move back to Iowa as soon as we possibly can!
- Monday (Memorial Day) Elizabeth had the day off work, and was signed up to run one of the biggest and most famous 10k races in the country - the Bolder Boulder. So we headed up to Boulder early in the morning for her to run. It was a really fun race. A lot of people put on goofy and funny outfits to run it, and there are bands playing all along the race course. Elizabeth finished well below her goal time, even without ideal training conditions the week before with family here and everything. I'm really proud of her.
- Today I had two wisdom teeth pulled. It was an interesting experience. They gave me an IV and I was "consciously sedated" during the procedure. I was told that after the surgery I probably wouldn't remember much of it because the sedative gives you a mild form of amnesia when it wears off. I remember it pretty well, though (I think). It didn't hurt at all at the time, but since the numbing stuff has worn off, it's gotten pretty painful. Fortunately, I've got a bottle of vicodin to keep me company. I can't really eat solid food, though.
That's the last couple of weeks in a nutshell. Now it's June.
- From May 19 until May 28 we were extremely fortunate to be visited by my brother, Jaron. It was absolutely fantastic having him around for more than a week. He's a hassle-free houseguest, and I love his idea of "fun." We spent a lot of time at the park playing with his super-long-distance frisbee. After I threw it into the tree once (and he had to climb up and pull it down), we managed to have a really fun time with it. What we learned is that to play with that kind of frisbee, you need a field about the size of 10 football fields that has NO ONE else playing on it.
- Tuesday we checked out Red Rocks Park and amphitheater, which is one of the coolest sights to see around here (I think Jaron would agree). After that we headed up to Evergreen and did a mild hike that Elizabeth and I have enjoyed numerous times. When we got back to the city Tuesday night we went to a Rockies game. The Rocks lost the game, but we all had a fabulous time (it was $1 hotdog night... and the dogs were Hebrew National, which totally made it worth it).
- Jaron took me golfing. First time I had swung a club in over four years. I had a really good time. I birdied a hole for the very first time in my life. Jaron was a bit disappointed, because the 9-hole course had just two par-4s and the rest were par-3s. We both felt a little silly for having rented a cart. It felt like the equivalent of riding the escalator up 3 stairs.
- Last Friday Jase and Rachel arrived from Des Moines. They were here to pick Jaron up and bring him back to the Motherland, but they drove through the night Thursday so they could be here for all of Friday and spend some time with us. It was a fantastic 24+ hours. We went out to Red Rocks Park to run around a little bit. Later, we pulled out the Saint Louis Cardinals-themed cornhole set that Joel built for us last year. It was the first time we'd ever used them. They are AWESOME and we had a great time playing. Jase, Rachel and Jaron took off on Saturday morning. Spending time with my family always makes me want to move back to Iowa as soon as we possibly can!
- Monday (Memorial Day) Elizabeth had the day off work, and was signed up to run one of the biggest and most famous 10k races in the country - the Bolder Boulder. So we headed up to Boulder early in the morning for her to run. It was a really fun race. A lot of people put on goofy and funny outfits to run it, and there are bands playing all along the race course. Elizabeth finished well below her goal time, even without ideal training conditions the week before with family here and everything. I'm really proud of her.
- Today I had two wisdom teeth pulled. It was an interesting experience. They gave me an IV and I was "consciously sedated" during the procedure. I was told that after the surgery I probably wouldn't remember much of it because the sedative gives you a mild form of amnesia when it wears off. I remember it pretty well, though (I think). It didn't hurt at all at the time, but since the numbing stuff has worn off, it's gotten pretty painful. Fortunately, I've got a bottle of vicodin to keep me company. I can't really eat solid food, though.
That's the last couple of weeks in a nutshell. Now it's June.
May 30, 2011
Future Me: About coupons
Dear Future Jake,
Is your wife still a couponer? Let me remind you of the funny story that started all this. You'll enjoy it—it's about dad.
A couple of months ago this new show started airing on TV called Extreme Couponing. This show documents people around the country who spend hours and hours collecting coupons and analyzing prices at different grocery stores. It's ridiculous. I watched a woman today who rang up almost $2,000 in groceries, and then handed over her coupons. She paid $44. Pretty cool, right? Well, the downside to these "extremists" is that to be that kind of couponer, you have to stock up on food. BIGtime. They all have guest bedrooms and garages overflowing with 75 bottles of ketchup and 150 years' worth of deodorant. It's quite silly, really.
Well, after seeing this show, dad kicked it into gear. As you well know, he's always been a "coupon-clipper,"* but after seeing this show, he got much more serious about it. According to mom and Jaron, he went online and signed up for numerous offers to receive coupons by e-mail (poor mom—she has to wade through all the spam now). He also called up every store within a 30-mile radius to find out if they double their coupons. Fortunately, after his knee-jerk reaction, mom got him hooked up with a couple valuable websites about couponing and saving for normal people.
Dad's response to the Extreme Coupining show had a kind of trickle-down effect. Your lovely wife thought it would be fun to buy a Sunday paper and see what this was all about. You both discovered that there really is a lot of money to be saved with a little bit of work and a paper full of coupons. So a week ago, you subscribed to the Sunday paper. Now, skype calls with mom and dad regularly include a few minutes of coupon-collecting conversation with dad. It's really pretty funny.
So, I was just wondering if you two have continued to "coupon" over the years, and if it's still saving you money. We're pretty early in the process right now, and I'm curious as to whether this'll last. I just hope you haven't turned into someone who might be on that TV show. They're a little bit cuckoo.
Jake (2011 version)
*Here's a story that illustrates dad's life-long couponing habits. You remember, don't you? Once when dad was at the store he went to buy a food item for which he had a coupon. When he found the item, he discovered that it was on sale for the amount of the coupon, and it said, "No Coupon Needed." Dad wouldn't buy the item because, in his own words, "I didn't feel like I was getting a deal." Goof ball.
Is your wife still a couponer? Let me remind you of the funny story that started all this. You'll enjoy it—it's about dad.
A couple of months ago this new show started airing on TV called Extreme Couponing. This show documents people around the country who spend hours and hours collecting coupons and analyzing prices at different grocery stores. It's ridiculous. I watched a woman today who rang up almost $2,000 in groceries, and then handed over her coupons. She paid $44. Pretty cool, right? Well, the downside to these "extremists" is that to be that kind of couponer, you have to stock up on food. BIGtime. They all have guest bedrooms and garages overflowing with 75 bottles of ketchup and 150 years' worth of deodorant. It's quite silly, really.
Well, after seeing this show, dad kicked it into gear. As you well know, he's always been a "coupon-clipper,"* but after seeing this show, he got much more serious about it. According to mom and Jaron, he went online and signed up for numerous offers to receive coupons by e-mail (poor mom—she has to wade through all the spam now). He also called up every store within a 30-mile radius to find out if they double their coupons. Fortunately, after his knee-jerk reaction, mom got him hooked up with a couple valuable websites about couponing and saving for normal people.
Dad's response to the Extreme Coupining show had a kind of trickle-down effect. Your lovely wife thought it would be fun to buy a Sunday paper and see what this was all about. You both discovered that there really is a lot of money to be saved with a little bit of work and a paper full of coupons. So a week ago, you subscribed to the Sunday paper. Now, skype calls with mom and dad regularly include a few minutes of coupon-collecting conversation with dad. It's really pretty funny.
So, I was just wondering if you two have continued to "coupon" over the years, and if it's still saving you money. We're pretty early in the process right now, and I'm curious as to whether this'll last. I just hope you haven't turned into someone who might be on that TV show. They're a little bit cuckoo.
Jake (2011 version)
*Here's a story that illustrates dad's life-long couponing habits. You remember, don't you? Once when dad was at the store he went to buy a food item for which he had a coupon. When he found the item, he discovered that it was on sale for the amount of the coupon, and it said, "No Coupon Needed." Dad wouldn't buy the item because, in his own words, "I didn't feel like I was getting a deal." Goof ball.
May 27, 2011
Ready for the Weekend
A bit lengthy for a youtube video, but worth your time. Enjoy your weekend, everyone!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)