Da Dominion: Home of DOMINIONCAST!

With the arrival of 2009, we take this time to reflect on our progress so far - look forward to future growth - and drink (maybe a little less than Santa here). In doing, so we’ll be taking this week off to not distract you from your holdiay’s entertainments - hopefully not including seeing Valkyrie starring Colonel Crazy McLefty here. Dominion Cast 21 will be going up Friday to save you from curious temptation.

You citizens and lurkers of the secret army have our thanks for your readership, listenership and feedback. We resolve to become bigger yet sleeker, expansive yet focused, insightful yet ridiculous. Some tweaks to the site will become evident. You’re free to peek and comment as they’re made.

You are wished luck on your own resolutions, until you give them up February first. HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Egg Nog and Japanese beer fueled ramblings about holiday movies, Oscar season and snatch. If there’s any cast to put the parental locks on, it’s this one. Rib, Hunin, The Chocolate Lady, Felicia and myself have a merry time in this our last recording of the year. Hope you enjoy! … and forgive us.

Dominion Cast 20 download: 67 mins. & 61MB

Music from Les Stances Sibyllines by Niconoclaste and fragments of stories by Wasaru
Snatch for the Holidays
Favorites: Elf, Friday after Next, Home Alone, Dick in a Box
The Gift of Roots (Rutz)
Who the hell is Elizabeth Pena
Feliz Navidad
Oscar Buzz: Furry Aussie, bub.
Cadillac Records? Mos Def is the other one, playing Chuck Berry
The Spirit of the Season
Lady Blockbusters
Make bread, not Guiness
Four Christmasezzzzzzzzzz

“The Trinity goes to War”
from Bender’s Big Score

and Happy Holidays to all

Christmas reveals the consolidated final guest list for the celebration/get-together you plan to attend. You’ve got the A-listers, family and friends, covered - hopefully - but what about those friends in-law that are showing up too? The sister’s fiancée, your brother’s college buddy from the broken home, or your aunt’s long-time “friend” that dresses butch and likes football more than you. All of these people don’t really mean much to you, but the spirit of the holidays should be spread: indebt them with a gift they’re not expecting to reap gifts from them next year.

Here are the top three “You really shouldn’t have” gifts:

Fourth Runner Up:

3. Gasoline. Gas stations are open, on the way to your destination or just around the corner so it’s great for the last moment, a gallon gift certificate. The prices are pretty low now - and they know this. Mention some news report you saw on BBC news - or some other channel few watch - about how the Oil Companies are waiting to jack back up prices once Obama gets in office and the economic crisis levels out. Remind them of Mad Max; it‘s not lying it‘s probable. Cheap, sure, but what did they get you? Co-signing the “From” tag on the gift from your real family pales next to good old Texas tea.

2. Donate in their name. Tis the season when PBS and NPR interrupts their normal informative program to beg for your support and offer DVD’s of their programs which you’ve already downloaded from the internet. Still, ya feel guilty. Kill two turtle doves with one stone by giving your usual $5 donation in their name. Now every elderly viewer that has on PBS as background noise and kids doing reports on the plight of the endangered California red-legged frog can know that they give generously. Any thank you gifts PBS sends, you keep it … nah, give it to them. It’s a cheap gift already and you have Absolute Zero: The Conquest of Cold on TiVo for yourself anyway.

1. A Vintage Book. By “vintage” I mean the oldest copy of your favorite book - the one you’ve read a dozen times already and own several different editions. This really communicates sincerity cause you actually are sharing something you’ve enjoyed - if they read similar literature. If they don’t, now is the time to introduce them to the pioneering genius of Frank Herbert’s Dune. It may open up a whole new avenue of entertainment if they don’t chuck it on the lowest level of their bookshelf or use it to level out a wobbly table. Should either of these two outcomes be likely, out of respect for the author gift them your least favorite oldest book. Demographically speaking, those that don’t like Dune may deeply love Waiting to Exhale.

Failing all these, booze works every time - but, ironically Colt 45 wouldn’t in this instance.

When I write about a movie with nerdy appeal, like The Transporter or Kevin Smith’s latest, it’s done wearing the metaphoric cloak of a geek that likes movies. Other times when I write about just good or bad movies, it’s done donning the cap of movie geek - a cinephile that’s foaming about some new celluloid submission. The immediate question one may ask is: How many articles of role clothing do I own and wear? Lounging in my boxer shorts of casual nonchalance, I’m not sure of the exact number.

In previewing the newest Clint Eastwood drama Gran Torino, I wear the cap of cinephile. If you thought this was about the racing game Gran Turismo, I’m sorry but I haven’t played that yet. Patronize our sponsors and I’ll be sure to get it, or send me a copy and I’ll review it - pinky swear. Until then, I’ll point out that a 1972 Ford Gran Torino is the prize possession of Eastwood’s protagonist Walt Kowalski - the most grizzled old racist and embittered Polock war vet you may ever grow to admire.

I’ve long held that Eastwood can’t make a bad movie and this one fulfills my claim yet again. It’s like the Karate Kid in reverse actually. Old white man teaches misfit Asian nerd how to be an American man - complete with racial epithets for friends and ballsy bravado. The remarkable thing is the distance he covers from his start as gook hating Korean War veteran that just wants to be left the hell alone.

Tao is played sufficiently by newcomer Bee Vang (first I’ve ever seen him, but he could be the Haley Osment of his native land, Fresno, California). The young fellow has problems with a neighborhood gang ran by his cousin - a chigger, like a wigger but Chinese. Actually they’re Mung, but Eastwood just calls the slopes the whole movie so fuck if I’m going to make a distinction. He doesn’t come to Eastwood to learn boxing of course, these dudes got guns - not to mention Clint’s penchant for euthanizing injured young athletes. He tries to steal the car to impress the thugs but ends up getting caught, dishonoring his family and getting called a pussy for the entire movie while doing chores to atone.

I like most their relationship that grows in a very realistic way. There’s no grandfather/grandson sappiness, but lots of insults and posturing that are a welcome relief from the apparent feminization of dudes in media. He becomes a neighborhood hero for his take no shit from anyone grit, but still wants to remain a solitary figure in his declining years. There is a conservative amount of ass kickage, but it’s satisfying when it occurs in defense of his young buddy Tao - and not buddy in a Brokeback way. We learn that Kowalski is moved by his execution of a young Korean prisoner and is making amends for a burden he’s carried for forty years. In the end, his efforts to protect Tao lead to his dramatic redemption, which one could see coming but is nonetheless moving.

What Unforgiven was to the typical western, Gran Torino is to the Death Wish series.