Lee's movie was a weird mixture of the ridiculous and sublime.  For every acutely intelligent character insight or good performance (Bana, Connelly, and Sam Elliott were all quite good), you'd get a mutant poodle or Nick Nolte Nolte-ing it up.

Wow … called it.  Also, I appear to be way more in tune with T&E's inner processes than anyone should feel good about being.  P.S.: thanks for everything, Rabin, and best of luck!

Well, you don't have to wear a black turtleneck while reading it or anything.  And the books aren't full of obscure symbolism or anything like that—they're "literary" to the extent that O'Brian's characters are not only authentic-feeling naval combatants, they're authentic-feeling human beings.

Me too.  Russell Crowe and Paul Bettany could scarcely have been worse physical matches for their characters  … but my God, their performances were 100% spot-on.

Not to mention, between a spotted dog and a boiled baby!

@avclub-22cfdce02d35728058686d49fc89a63b:disqus : I'd compare it to the difference between Heart of Darkness on the one hand, and Tarzan and King Solomon's Mines on the other.  Kent, Pope, & Forester's books are superior genre pieces—a highly honourable & worthy thing to be, and nothing to look down on—but O'Brian's…

Launching my THIRD go-round through the Aubrey-Maturin novels: halfway through Master and Commander now.

For some reason, I feel morally certain that young Tim & Eric saw this movie, and the intricately meshing, layered wheels of its perfect misconceivedness kindled some sort of dark spark in their souls.

You can still bonk in America.

Telis incauto appositis invitatur ruina.

For me, that whole argument didn't humanize Pete so much as mercilessly illustrate another of his flaws: he's one of that nigh-infinite crowd who thinks that being a terrible person is somehow mitigated or balanced by holding the right abstract principles.  As someone once said, "Loving humanity is cheap; loving your n…

A fine observation.  I don't know whether it's cause or effect, but "chronic ellipse syndrome" almost perfectly reveals a writer's inability to make firm syntactic OR logical connections.  It's scatterbrained rambling that self-consciously announces itself.

I, for one, welcome our new Zooeyesque overlords.  Not even remotely joking.

Guy Fieri's Fondue-A-Go-Go.

Meanwhile, Harry and Ken both shave their heads and grow goatees.  Linda Cardellini doesn't change a thing, but she starts doing it ironically.

"Mr. Draper, putting 'Z's in the middle of every product's name is not an ad campaign."

Yeah, I've seen the type.  You spend a few decades never standing up for yourself, you lose all your instincts for HOW to do it. So when the time comes and you finally snap, it's likely to be in some highly awkward and self-destructive way.

Stan had a bodystocking on his finger.

FIRE STICK ON ME

As a caricature of a right-wing nutjob, I take offense to that.