April | 2009 | Groundlings Review 2009 April | Movie, Television and book reviews for common folk, by common folk.

April, 2009

American Idol Final 5, Songs From The Rat Pack

April 29, 2009 by Dennis West

Tonight’s American Idol on Fox focused on songs from The Rat Pack and the Big Band Era. This theme always bugs me a little because they always keep the songs in the original genre. The problem with this is that the big band sound most definitely isn’t going to be the kind of music they’ll perform once their career starts, so it’s not a very good gauge of what they will record once they are released into the wild. Besides, I like hearing covers that twist songs into other genres.

The Mentor for tonight’s American idol was Jamie Foxx and since he’s not a regular in the music industry, so I wasn’t sure what kind of advice he was going to be giving. After all was said an done, I thought that his advice was pretty productive and was a good addition.

Kris Allen sang, “The Way You Look Tonight” to open the show. I really like Kris’ simply sincere vocal and this song was a good showcase for him. While listening to it I wasn’t a big fan of the way the tempo picked up toward the end of the song, but given the mellowness of the next two ballads, it was the fastest the songs got for quite a while.

Newly 17-year-old Allison Iraheta was up next and took on the song, “Someone To Watch Over Me.” This can tend to be a rather boring song if it’s not done right. I think it was a good choice for her to go into the bridge of the song early on because that is the more interesting part of the song. This was a good showcase of her vocal talents, but I didn’t find it overly thrilling.

Matt Giraud chose to sing yet another ballad, “My Funny Valentine.” I was thinking that he’d be singing “Georgia On My Mind” again which was one of his breakout performances in the preliminary auditions. I think he did a good job with the song, but with this being the third ballad in a row I thought that no matter who ended up being the first to sing a fast song, either Danny or Adam, they would bring the house down.

I think that Danny Gokey’s voice sounded really good for this genre, and although he sang another ballad with “Come Rain and Come Shine,” by the end of the song he had picked it up into a very big jazz song that made full use of the big band and, just as I thought, brought the house down. I really enjoyed him tonight.

Last one up tonight is Adam Lambert who sang “New Dawn, New Day.” I was hoping that Adam was going to change it into more of a rocking song, but instead it was a very energetic big band song. I liked his performance and think he’s in a league of his own. He definitely has the confidence that it takes to make it big in the music industry and I feel a little sorry for the other contestants.

After the three ballads, it’s no surprise that the powerful performances Danny and Adam brought the house down. In my opinion, it’s a competition for third place because I think that Adam already has first place locked up and Danny Gokey a virtual shoe-in for second.

Even thought Matt’s performance was very good, I’m thinking that out of the 5 finalists, he’s generally the weakest. Of the other two, I think that Allison will go after Matt and then Kris will be the third.

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American Idol Final 7, Double Elimination

April 23, 2009 by Dennis West

Thanks to Matt Giraud’s save last week, tonight’s American Idol on Fox came complete with two eliminations and David Archuleta. After over 45 million votes, here’s how it played out.

Tonight’s filler material started out with a video that showed Paula Abdul choreographing the contestants for their group song. I actually found this a little more interesting that I thought I would. It was nice to see Paula actually do something other than stutter and stammer through a critique. Anyone who’s familiar with her work in the 80s probably saw many of the same moves she’d use in her own music videos and work she did with other artists like Janet Jackson as they danced to their version of Michael Jackson’s “Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground).” I say “danced” because I’m pretty sure they were just lip-synching to a previously recorded track.

The first batch of results revealed to us quickly that Lil Rounds is not only in the bottom three, but is actually one of the two being eliminated tonight. Big surprise that they revealed it so soon and I’m actually surprised that she really was eliminated. I really thought it would be Matt Giraud and Anoop Desai tonight. I think she used the emotion and energy from her elimination to do a really good version of her song from last night, “I’m Every Woman,” by Chaka Kahn.
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American Idol Final 7: Take Two

April 22, 2009 by Dennis West

>Tonight’s American Idol on Fox had a traditional theme that is usually quite a challenge for vocal and dance competitions alike, and that is Disco. The missing element of tonight’s show was that there was no mentor to coach the contestants in their song choices. Either someone had a head cold or the producers are trying to keep the masses from revolting by ensuring that they don’t go overtime like they have the last couple of weeks. With how many people sang from the Donna Summer songbook, she could have been the coach, though.

Lil Rounds started out singing a predictable song, Chaka Kahn’s “I’m Every Woman,” for Disco night in a traditional way that didn’t show much originality. I think the problem is that there have been so many R&B/Soul performers that there isn’t much that someone with the singing style of Lil has that can be much different from Latoya London or Fantasia.

Kris Allen picked what seemed like an odd song, Donna Summer’s “She Works Hard for the Money,” and did one of my favorite things with it, which is to take it into a totally different genre in a way that transforms it into something entirely different. I absolutely loved it. This just goes to show that “Disco Night” doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to be able to dance The Hustle to it.

Bringing the Disco beat back into the show was Danny Gokey singing Earth Wind and Fire’s “September.” After Kris’ performance I couldn’t help but be disappointed by how close to the original Danny’s version of this song was. Yes, he had very good vocals, but he might as well have been singing with the original band. I actually don’t think he did much better than Lil.

Allison Iraheta rocked it up with Donna Summer’s “Hot Stuff,” which I loved as well. I can see a real division forming between contestants who will be content to perform other people’s music and those who will make their own unique mark in the music industry.

Adam Lambert was up next with another transformed song with his version of “If I Can’t Have You” by the Bee Gees. I liked the way it was going for the most part, but I wasn’t crazy with the chorus—I wanted it to speed up a little. But all in all, I thought it was good and justified his continued presence in the competition. I love the unique takes on these well known songs!

Hoping to stay alive, Matt Giraud chose to sing the Bee Gee’s “Stayin’ Alive.” For his version he chose to do a funkier version of the song that I liked quite a lot, but I doubt if it was earth-shattering enough for him to shake the cloud that’s over him from his near-elimination last week.

Finishing up the night was Anoop Desai singing Donna Summer’s “Dim All the Lights.” At first I thought he was going to sing it as an altered version like Kris, Allison and Adam—which might have been good because then it wouldn’t have been so similar to the original, but by the time it was over I was feeling pretty bored.

I think that tomorrow we’re going to see a rerun of last week’s show with Lil, Matt and Anoop being in the bottom three. This time I think Matt Giraud will finish what was started last week and will go home, and I think he’ll take Anoop Desai with him.

In the end I think that the three who will finish out the competition will be Kris, Adam and Allison with the possibility of Danny and Kris swapping places. My favorite tonight was Kris. What did you think?

PS, if you’re inclined to buy the performances from iTunes, please support Groundlings Review by clicking on the iTunes links before you make your purchases. Thanks!

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TV Review: Lost, "Some Like It Hoth"

April 16, 2009 by Dennis West

>

“Let’s face it… the Ewoks suck, dude.”

Ok, I have a confession to make. When it was revealed that the main characters on ABC’s Lost were sent back in time to 1977, one of the first thoughts that came to my mind was, “Hey! That’s the year Star Wars came out in the theaters!” So tonight’s scenes that featured Hurley (Jorge Garcia) scribbling in his Dharma Initiative composition notebook his own script for George Lucas’ next cinematic epic, The Empire Strikes Back, were some of best fun I’ve had watching TV for a while. I figured out what he was doing when he asked Miles (Ken Leung) how to spell Bounty Hunter in the beginning of a van ride they were taking together. Since the title of tonight’s episode was, “Some Like It Hoth,” it probably wasn’t much of an investigative feat on my part.

In tonight’s episode we got to learn a lot about Miles who is one of my favorite minor characters. I’m really interested in his ability to speak with dead people and I’ve wished for a long time that they’d do more with him. I like the actor who plays him too. Ken Leung has had minor parts in a few movies that I’ve really enjoyed—mostly the Brett Ratner productions Rush Hour, The Family Man, and X-Men: The Last Stand.

We learned from the flashbacks that Miles discovered that he had the ability to speak to dead people at a very young age as his mother was trying to make a life for herself and him in the absence of his father whom he never knew. With all of his emotional baggage being left unresolved by his mother who wasn’t forthcoming about his father and their past, he attempted to fill the empty spaces in his life with money that he could earn by hiring out his services as someone who speaks to dead people for profit… whether or not he actually makes contact with the deceased.

By the end of the flashback, we see Naomi Dorritt (Marsha Thomason), recruiting him to be part of the freighter team being put together by Charles Widmore in an attempt to find the island and remove Benjamin Linus from power. You’ll remember Naomi as the first member of the freighter who was found by the Losties who fooled them into thinking that she was there to rescue them.

Before embarking on his journey to the island on the freighter, Miles was kidnapped whilst eating a fish taco by a group of guys offering him an alternative to working for Charles Widmore. I can only assume that these guys were actually working for Benjamin Linus, but who knows what Ben’s motives would have been for trying to recruit Miles other than to keep him from helping Widmore. It could be that the information that Miles can get from the dead bodies on the island will actually be very important in the grand scheme of things.

Back to the main timeline in 1977, Miles is asked to fill in for Sawyer (Josh Holloway) who is busy trying to cover up what he and Kate (Evangeline Lily) did with the recently shot, young Benjamin Linus. As we see Miles and Hurley on a top secret mission to transport a mysteriously killed person, we discover that Dr. Pierre Chang (François Chau) is none other than Miles’ long lost father who is the leading scientist on the island and is living there with his wife and 3-year-old son who is, of course, Miles. Miles now has the opportunity to get to know his long lost father who appears to be very different from someone who would abandon his wife and child the way his mother had depicted him. It’ll be interesting to see where this storyline takes us.

I realized tonight what a genius move it is to have the main characters go back in time like they have in this season. What better way to show a large amount of the history of the island than to have the main characters travel back to that period and live when that history happened? It’s interesting to see the main characters involves as the history of Dharma unfolds and it’s making me wonder if they’ll even travel farther back in time to see the history of the island during the period when the four-toed statue was in its prime. I’m guessing probably not as much as what they’re doing with Dharma, but it was interesting that one of the guys who abducted Miles in his flashback asked the question, “do you know what lies in the shadow of the statue?” as a test of whether or not he was prepared to make the journey to the island. Perhaps the history of the statue will turn out to be an important element in the grand scheme of things.

One final note, I’m very intrigued by the reappearance of Daniel Faraday at the end of tonight’s episode. They were never very clear about what happened to him, only that he wasn’t with them anymore, so we’ll see!

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American Idol Final 7, Results Show

by Dennis West

>It’s results night on American Idol and even though they could just come out and tell us who’s going home, they have to stretch it out into an hour long show with tons of hype and made-up drama with a couple of guest performers thrown into the mix.

The show opened with the group singing Michael Sembello’s “Maniac” from the 1983 movie, Flashdance. Of all the music from movies, I wouldn’t have thought that particular song would be high on the list to be featured on results night, but what do I know?

After a little cross-promotion of the new movie, 17 Again, starring Zac Efron we got right into revealing the results where we were quickly informed that Allison Iraheta and Adam Lambert were declared safe, but Anoop Desai was the first shuffled into the bottom three.

Following the bad news for Anoop, we were presented with a quick bio of Jennifer Hudson followed by her singing “If This Isn’t Love” from her self-titled album. She’s definitely a great vocalist, and while it’s not the kind of music I get excited about, I can see why she’s had so much success.

It seemed a little silly for Ryan Seacrest to try to get the judges to say whether or not Anoop “deserved” to be in the bottom three. Really, at this point they’re all really good and the only one left who has a history of being consistently bad is Anoop, so it only makes sense that he’s there.

After dragging it out a while longer it was revealed that Kris Allen was safe but Lil Rounds was in the bottom three as well. Immediately after that, they revealed the last member of the bottom three is Matt Giraud and Danny Gokey was safe.

As we were watching, my wife observed that they could wipe out this bottom three of Anoop, Matt and Lil and it we could just happily go on with the competition. None of these three really have a chance of winning, ultimately.

The first member of this three declared safe was, surprisingly for me, Anoop Desai. I suppose it’s because he got high marks for his song choice last night, but I thought it was time for him to go.

Miley Cyrus came out next to fill in some of the extra time by singing her song, “The Climb.” I was hoping that this was going to be a cover of No Doubt’s song by the same name, but no dice. That’s fine, it probably would have been terrible anyway. I guess I’ve never really heard a song of Miley’s—does she normally not enunciate her words? There were some phrases that just sounded like she was slurring. Oh well, I guess her music isn’t really my cup-o-tea either.

After all the delays, they finally revealed that Lil Rounds was safe and Matt Giraud had to “sing for his life” in hopes that he’d receive the judge’s save. From how giddy Kara and Paula were being during his performance it was clear that he had earned the judge’s save and so he’ll be in the competition for another week. The twist with the save is that next week two people are going home no matter what—and it’s Disco Week!

I’m pretty happy with this result. I really like Matt Giraud and I’m hoping he can improve on some of the things that are holding him back. While I do think Matt will have a successful post-Idol music career, I agree with Simon that his chances of winning the competition are pretty slim. Still, I’m happy to have him around for a while longer.

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