Pulled from MetaFilter: Conan O’Brien’s speech to the Harvard graduating class of 2000.

I didn’t even go to my own graduation from UCLA, but I would’ve if Conan was speaking. Christ, Harvard kids get all the luck. One of my favorite parts to follow:

So what can you expect out there in the real world? Let me tell you. As you leave these gates and re-enter society, one thing is certain: Everyone out there is going to hate you. Never tell anyone in a roadside diner that you went to Harvard. In most situations the correct response to where did you to school is, “School? Why, I never had much in the way of book larnin’ and such.” Then, get in your BMW and get the hell out of there.

You see, you’re in for a lifetime of “And you went to Harvard?” Accidentally give the wrong amount of change in a transaction and it’s, “And you went to Harvard?” Ask the guy at the hardware store how these jumper cables work and hear, “And you went to Harvard?” Forget just once that your underwear goes inside your pants and it’s “and you went to Harvard.” Get your head stuck in your niece’s dollhouse because you wanted to see what it was like to be a giant and it’s “Uncle Conan, you went to Harvard!?”

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So I dragged myself to the second blockbuster of the season yesterday, Pearl Harbor. What was I thinking? I knew it would be fairly lackluster going in, but I went anyway. The three hour running time actually isn’t that bad, as the movie picks up the pace considerably once the pyrotechnics start. The first hour is ridiculously painful though. About 30 minutes in I was rooting for the Japanese to come in and bomb the smiles off of Affleck and Hartnett. I don’t know if this was the intent, but that’s how it ended up playing out to me.

The actual bombing of Pearl Harbor and the subsequent Doolittle Raid are both exciting enough to justify the film. Unfortunately, the night before I watched the superior Tora! Tora! Tora! I say unfortunately only because it makes Pearl Harbor look utterly ridiculous. While “Tora!Tora!Tora!” is 30 years older, the special effects are competent enough to tell its story. The even-handed documentary style approach to the events of December 7th also lends the film an air of credibility and accuracy that “Pearl Harbor” desperately lacks.

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Oh yeah! UCLA’s performing arts department has announced it’s fall schedule for concerts.

David Sefton, the new coordinator has done a great job putting together concerts since he’s come on. His first show was the Harry Smith Project concert that I went on and on about a few weeks ago. For the upcoming season, he’s named Elvis Costello (my personal favorite solo performer) to direct four shows personally.

The schedule includes Elvis Costello, Ladysmith Black Mombazo, Sonic Youth, Stereolab, Buena Vista Social Club, Eric Bogosian, Spalding Gray, David Sedaris and Diamanda Galas. There’s also a Halloween tribute to Edgar Allen Poe coordinated by Hal Willmer, who handled the Harry Smith project. If he gets the same kind of big name acts to show, it should be very, very good.

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The fabricated life of Mr. Stipe.

Apparently this fully annotated profile of R.E.M.’s lead singer is half-truth and half-fiction. After reading the article, it’s quite apparent what’s real and what isn’t, but I find it fairly skeevy that anyone would actually do this. I do have to wonder if Stipey approved any of this. It really wouldn’t be beyond him, considering his penchant for ambiguity. This is a man with a big question mark tattooed on his hand, after all.

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Weezer. R.E.M.

That’s what I forgot.

Buy these.

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Guh. It’s been two weeks. I could be sued for negligence at this point, no?

I haven’t done anything terribly interesting, although I did go to E3. That was reasonably amusing, although in my haze to get there, I stepped on my Palm and shattered the damn thing. So it was a win/lose kind of day. There’s plenty of random coverage at all the game sites, so I’ll keep my E3 observations short:

Nintendo: By far, best company at the show. Rogue Leader looks especially good.
Sony: There were some interesting games in development. I’ll need to buy one eventually, if only to play Tony Hawk 3.
X-Box: Big disappointment. Not one good exclusive game, and the controllers are far too big for my hands. (I do not have small hands, either).

I should’ve blogged more. There’s been lots of stuff going on. Guh.

Perhaps when I have my wits about me.

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One of the most pathetically funny things I’ve ever seen on the web: 1001 Reasons Sarah Boness Should Go Out With Me by Don Campbell.

I only have one reason why a woman should consider dating me: I’m not Don Campbell.

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I’ve been on a major Pearl Jam kick lately, spurred on by my recent purchase of their new live DVD, Pearl Jam – Touring Band 2000.

I’d kind of lost touch with Pearl Jam over the years (I didn’t even bother to pick up Binaural at all), but this DVD has brought it all back. The DVD has 28 songs from different sites on the tour, compiled into one long concert. It’s a solid setlist with good hard efforts on all the songs. I really like their cover of Dead Moon’s “It’s Okay,” which they tack on to the end of “Daughter.”

No fancy light show, no dancing… just hard, serious rock and roll. Eddie and the boys have always taken themselves a bit too seriously, but I find their effort to please their fans and stay slightly below the radar to be quite refreshing. Barely any singles or videos, a bunch of concert CDs that are sold for practically cost and stripped down concert performances at relatively small arenas. Pearl Jam broke a little too big a little too early to be like Fugazi, but it sure didn’t stop them from trying.

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After a few months of waiting, I finally got to see the new remaster of Akira. Twice.

The new translations work wonders for this film. I think this is the first version of the film that really made sense and was entertaining from start to finish. Before, a lot of the exposition was snooze-inducing. The new dub was able to carry those longer scenes of just people talking a lot better, often injecting humor that just wasn’t there in the previous versions.

From a technical perspective, Akira remains an absolute masterpiece. Quite frankly, you’ll never see a movie quite like it again, since nobody would be crazy enough to hand draw, paint and animate something of this kind of scale and detail again. You will likely see better animation (although I haven’t really seen anything blow me away like this since) but it will be helped heavily with CGI and computer coloring.

The new print is remarkably clean, aided and abetted by the digital projection system at the AMC Burbank. Not one speck of dust or hair to mar the image. It was just gorgeous. The sound was a new 5.1 mix… bone-rattling and deathly quiet at the same time. The score in particular sounds better than ever.

Watching the film itself, I was a bit surprised at just how brilliant it is. I hadn’t seen it in a few years and I was sort of expecting it to seem a bit underwhelming in light of the last few years of insane live-action special effects and action. Instead, what I saw were cinematic techniques that are still cutting edge. The angles, the camera motions, the exaggerated physics, the constant time shifting in the action sequences… it’s all stuff that’s just starting to show up lately into live action. Really astounding stuff.

I don’t know if the print is circulating across the country, but everyone should AT LEAST buy the DVD when it comes out later this month.

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Memento Mori, the short story by Jonathan Nolan that the film Memento is based on.

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