Gregory Harbin, Foreigner

If you’ve been following me on Twitter tonight, you’ll know that I’ve been TwitPiccing a few features I found in iPhone OS 3.0 that I’ve not seen mentioned in the press or by Apple. I’ll just present those same tweets here, with some expansion:

When you click the home button to bring up controls on the lock screen, iPhone shows more information. Very helpful!

When you play an audiobook or podcast, iPhone gives two new options. Press the ‘1x,’ and it switches to 2x, and plays at double speed. Press again, it becomes .5x, and plays at half speed. Press again, and it’s back to 1x. The button in the middle quickly skips back 30 seconds, a helpful feature when you’re distracted.

Clicking the mail button currently does nothing. I assume when the final version of 3.0 ships, you’ll be able to send a link to the podcast or audiobook to a friend.

This is not completely unsung, but a little undercovered. You can now have finer control over scrubbing through audio or video files. Press down on the timeline, and then the further your finger is towards the bottom of the screen, the finer is your control.

The new Voice Recorder app (which works fantastically, by the way—here’s my first recording) lets you play back your audio over the speaker, even if you have headphones plugged in, as does the voicemail app.

Not really a feature, but Update has been moved out of the toolbar in the App Store app, in favor of a More button, which brings up a screen with Updates and Redeem on it. Redeem can be used to redeem iTunes gift cards. Update can be moved back into the toolbar with the screen found below, after hitting Edit.

My favorite new feature: clicking the microphone from a dead stop (as when a podcast finishes, or you first unlock your phone, now actives Shuffle play, rather than the horrible practice before of playing Alphabetically from the As. If I’d heard The Abduction of Margaret one more freaking time….

The camera app has been slightly revamped with some different UI. I find the camera much, much faster. It was a little slow when activated from an app such as Tweetie before, but no longer.

This is not a feature at all, but in fact a petty gripe. The Twitter application Tweetie needs to be update to work with OS 3.0. The copy function is quite broken, making it almost impossible to use to select less than an entire tweet. I’m sure this will be fixed, but it goes to show that copy/paste isn’t as easy to implement as you may have assumed.

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Making an (increasingly seldom) blog post to go ahead and state that Katy Perry’s single ‘I Kissed A Girl’ is Summer Song 2008. And deservedly so. I’ve been jamming ‘One of the Boys’ since the beginning of June, and it really is a great record. I’ll be interested to see if the single can stay on the charts deep into August, but her hard sales and iTunes sales seem to be showing no signs of declining.

The Dark Knight? Yeah, best superhero film ever. I saw it at the IMAX Dome theater in Charlotte, and am planning to see it in a regular IMAX theater in Raleigh next month. I’m not sure if I even want to bother with the film in 35mm, as the experience in IMAX was so mind-blowing.

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Background: Frank Darabont (Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile) was hired by George Lucas to write a script for the fourth Indiana Jones film back in 2003. He was one of I believe six writers to do so between 1992 and 2007, a list which includes Chris Columbus (Harry Potter), M. Night Shyamalan (Sixth Sense), and Jeb Stuart (Die Hard). The finished film, written by David Koepp, was a mashing-together of all the previous scripts into a kind-of cohesive whole.

(Darabont’s thoughts on the experience can be found here: http://www.mtv.com/movies/news/articles/1557263/story.jhtml )

Okay, so I finished reading Frank Darabont’s Indy 4 script. I’ve also read the Jeb Stuart script (…and the Saucer Men From Mars), which I really liked, but understand why Steve and Harrison didn’t want to do it. I would link to the script, but the site hosting it has been brought down by the hosting company. E-mail me if you’d like to see it.

In the end, City of the Gods feels like an Indy fan film to me. Too many call-backs to earlier films (TWO times Yuri references the TAG-LINE from ‘Doom’!, the idol/sand bag swap, etc.). The first two acts seemed like Darabont was just interested in winking at the audience rather than telling a story.

Until the climax. Once they get to the Ciudad de los Dios, I’m TOTALLY with the script. Indy shooting the skull between the eyes has to be the most awesome thing ever. I think I prefer this climax to that of any of the other films, including Raiders.

Still, Yuri was a weak character, the fifty villains were awful, especially compared to Blanchett’s amazing Spalko. And I really missed Shia’s Mutt, especially for the long stretch of the film where Indy is wandering around by HIMSELF.

And there were a ton of things stylistically wrong, such as subtitled dialog, and scenes which Indy wasn’t there to witness. You almost wonder if Darabont had ever seen an Indy film before in his life, until he references ‘Temple’ again on the next page.

But in all, I think this script could have made a better film than the one we ended up, which for the record I do like. Darabont, given the following notes, could have written another draft that would be phenomenal.

1. Indy needs a sidekick. Maybe a son?

2. Reduce the villains. Give us a single interesting one that we can cast as name as.

3. Maybe have Indy visit the hanger from ‘Raiders’ at the beginning?

4. Rewrite Yuri as less annoying.

5. Lessen the fantastical bits, such as Oxley swinging from ropes and Indy being eaten by a snake (and keep Indy afraid of snakes, it’s part of his character).

6. Keep references to the earlier films down to one or two. Remember that the audience is there to see THIS film, not the earlier ones.

Gregory Entertainment frank darabont, george lucas, harrison ford, indiana jones, kingdom of the crystal skull, steven spielberg

Wow, sorry I haven’t posted in a while. I’ve been Twittering, though, so set me to ‘Follow’ and you can get daily updates. (http://www.twitter.com/gregoryharbin). It seems that Twitter actually manages to cut down on the number of actual blog posts I feel like putting up, which I guess is a good thing.

Anyway, my Iron Man comments are a bit too long for Twitter, so here we go (spoilers):

1. First off, great, great film. Five of five stars, A-doubleplusgood, go see immediately. I’ve now seen it twice.

2. There’s POSITIVELY a prototype Cpt. America shield on Stark’s desk in the workshop. It’s on the left side of the screen when it’s pointed at Pepper when she enters the lab as he’s trying to get out of his suit. It’s got half the star, but it’s red, white, and blue, and it’s IT. Great easter egg.

3. Is it just me, or does reporter Zorianna Kit look exactly like Alison Mack (Chloe of Smallville fame)? A quick Google tells me she’s an actual reporter, but the resemblance is striking.

4. For those of you looking for some more emotional connection for Stark for the village he saves from Ten Rings (which I don’t think we need), I’m 100% sure that the village is where Yinsen, his sidekick in the cave, was from. Gulmira was its name. So, he was saving the lives of the people who are related to the guy who saved his life earlier in the film. Seems like enough justification, if destroying his weapons wasn’t enough for you.

5. Director Jon Favereau’s character, Hogan, kind of disappears halfway through the film. Kind of strange. Maybe there’s more to his story that got cut out, that’ll be in an extended DVD cut.

6. I got a nice stable clip of the Nick Fury scene after the credits, in case someone missed it (which judging by the swarthes of people leaving the theatre, that’s most of you). Clicky: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGgLZFdINpg.

Gregory Entertainment, Iron Man, Movies Iron Man, Nick Fury, Robert Downey Jr

The new Weezer single, ‘Pork & Beans,’ dropped earlier tonight. On a couple listens, I’m enjoying it.

I’m a bit sad that America sent Kristy Lee home, but it was going to happen sooner or later. David Cook has continued to impress from week to week. I hope he can beat Archie for the win.

Gregory American Idol, David Archuleta, David Cook, Entertainment, Kristy Lee Cook, Music, TV, Weezer American Idol, David Archuleta, David Cook, Entertainment, Kristy Lee Cook, Music, TV, Weezer

My DVR didn’t pick up Idol last night, so I didn’t see the episode until this morning.

WHAT.

WHAT.

No, seriously, what on Earth is going on? Mike Johns was clearly the best performer on Idol, and his performance on Tuesday was easily the best of the night. Did people not vote because they assumed no one would be sent home?

I’m seriously mad right now. You can’t send home the best people on the show, or there will be nothing left to watch. If David Cook leaves, I just won’t watch anymore, and he’s got to start impressing me more to keep me watching at all.

Gregory American Idol, David Cook, Entertainment, Michael Johns, TV American Idol, David Cook, Entertainment, Michael Johns, TV

I was so bored by Tuesday’s show that I can’t bring myself to post a whole blog post about it. Brooke should go home, but if it’s Carly, won’t break my heart.

Top five is David Cook, Mike Johns, Kristy Lee Cook, David Archuleta, Jason Castro.

Gregory American Idol, David Archuleta, David Cook, Entertainment, Michael Johns, TV American Idol, David Archuleta, David Cook, Entertainment, Michael Johns, TV

For the first half of tonight’s Idol, I thought it was going to be another Beatles Wk. 2. Happily, a few good performances pulled us out of the slump.

My bottom two are positively Rami and Carly, whose performances were dull, lifeless, and just a little bad. Simon’s right, Carly needs a new wardrobe. She either needs to sing tattoo songs, or cover them up. I don’t know who her audience is supposed to be. Rami really needs to stop bouncing, and connect with her songs more. Her voice isn’t bad, but I have no desire to ever hear her sing, which isn’t a good sign.

Nos. 6 and 7 are Sayesha and Brooke, respectively. I just didn’t like Brooke’s performance, and her mannerisms, while cute(ish), are now annoying me. I haven’t been able to forget her yellow dress song, and not in a good way. Sayesha was actually kinda good for some of her performance. She hit some Whitney notes that I didn’t think she could do. She’s not higher up because I didn’t believe the performance until the very end, and because I don’t think she can be anything more than a Whitney-wannabe.

Crossing over into my Good Book is Jason Castro. At #5, I actually liked what he did tonight. He still sang softly, and picked a safe song, but he didn’t look out of breath, didn’t look goofy, and I was grooving along to the song. I felt his guitar wasn’t intrusive for once, and he actually looked like he was up on a stage singing for millions of people, which is good for someone that is.

David Cook is a star. He will have a record contract. I will buy his CD. I’ve already bought three of his singles on iTunes. But this wasn’t his night. I don’t know what of Dolly he could have picked that would have made me happy, but that just wasn’t it. Not that he didn’t do a good job, just, not his night. I did like that he did his own arraignment rather than co-opting someone else’s. That was cool.

My top three are 3. Archie, 2. Kristy, and 1. Michael. Archie didn’t blow me away, but it was my favorite of his performances so far. I won’t buy any of his CDs, but he deserves to be as popular as he is. Kristy! Kristy did great! I kind of liked her last week, although I wasn’t a fan of the (rather obvious) song choice, but this week was great. And that dress!

Michael Johns had me with his first phrase. By far the best performance of the night. Not his best performance (download his ‘Day in the Life’ studio single from iTunes NOW), but a solid, solid performance. The man is a genius.

To recap: 9. Ramiele Malubay 8. Carly Smithson 7. Brooke White 6. Sayesha Mercado 5. Jason Castro 4. David Cook 3. David Archuleta 2. Kristy Lee Cook 1. Michael Johns.

Gregory American Idol, Brooke White, David Archuleta, David Cook, Entertainment, Kristy Lee Cook, Michael Johns, TV American Idol, Brooke White, David Archuleta, David Cook, Entertainment, Kristy Lee Cook, Michael Johns, TV

I’m honestly surprised that Chikezie was voted off. I thought Rami would be gone weeks ago, and every week, I’m surprised when she’s not in the bottom three.

Carly belonged in the bottom three after her performance, but she shouldn’t be sent home just yet. And neither should Sayesha.

The correct bottom three would have been: Chikezie, Ramiele, and Jason, with Ramiele gone.

The top two are consistantly Michael Johns and David Cook. They both will have terrific careers. The rest of a theoretical top five is more difficult, but I’d put it this way: 1. Michael Johns 2. David Cook 3. Brooke White 4. Carly Smithson 5. Kristy Lee Cook.

Yes, I’m not putting Archie in my top five, even though I think he’ll be around for a while. He’s cute, and he can sing okay, but he has no stage presence at all. The only thing I remember about his performance on Tuesday is that it was forgettable.

On another note, the Studio Performances that are being put up on iTunes are fantastic. I’ve bought all the ones Michael Johns and David Cook have done. It’s great to hear what they’d be (kinda) like when they’re actual recording artists. The tiny snippet of a song they’re allowed to sing on air is not nearly enough. Johns’ ‘Day in the Life’ is finally not a choppy mess, but actually a rather good cover. I’d highly reccomend checking it out.

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How did the press get a hold of the new Raconteurs album just this morning, and already have time to turn in negative reviews?

I’d beware of any reviews until a few days have passed for a reviewer to let the album sit a spell. For my part, I think it’s pretty good.

Gregory Entertainment, Music, The Raconteurs Entertainment, Music, The Raconteurs