Karl 
WAR OF THE WORLDS: Given my daily chronicling of the foibles of Tom Cruise, it's only fair that I report that I thought the movie was a fairly solid popcorn movie. The AP reviewer may think it shortchanges character, but I think that's inherent in the original story, let alone Spielberg's version. After the war starts, things move a bit fast for further character development. The AP complains that in the broad sweep of humanity, Cruise and his two kids are the only characters that matter in the movie; Ebert's two-star review says, “The movie adopts the prudent formula of viewing a catastrophe through the eyes of a few foreground characters.” Rock, hard place. The AP finds the alien ships “refreshing,” then derivative; Ebert dislikes them entirely. The AP suggests that some of the f/x shots seem unfinished, but later prefers that we don't see the aliens full-on (as does Ebert). I think Spielberg learned from Jaws that your mind is often better than a special effect and chose not to show certain things. Ebert wonders, “What happened to the sense of wonder Spielberg celebrated in Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” but I would argue that sense would be entirely misplaced in a movie about the mass extermination of humanity. Ebert is upset that we do not know why the aliens invade — as if there's some greater explanation in the book or in similarly themed flicks like Independence Day or even Alien. Indeed, Ebert's review, when not filled with spoilers, is filled with questions I think he believes are rhetorical instead of merely pointless. The other day, I quoted a review saying the first 100 minutes were great and the last 17 were terrible. I would say the last two or three minutes bugged me a bit, but the other 15 will not disappoint anyone familiar with the Wells book or the George Pal production. It's not Spielberg's finest hour, but I would give it more than two stars, probably three.
THE POSIES talk to Aversion about their reunion and new album, which was released Tuesday. The short version: “Just when I thought that I was out… they pull me back in.”
LIVE 8: Stereogum has the nine-city lineup, with corrections in the comments. The New York Times has an article skeptical of celebrity politics.
SHINE ON, YOU CRAZY DIAMOND: on the cusp of a Pink Floyd reunion, Syd Barrett (a/k/a Roger) remains a recluse.
THE GREENHORNES is a wonderful garage band I have dug since their Dual Mono album — when Craig O'Neill, Ken King and I drove to the Pate reunion, I put a track on the road trip discs and Craig asked who it was. Since then, the band has recorded with Loretta Lynn and Jack White on Van Lear Rose, as well as with Brendan Benson, Karen O and Kim Deal. Now you can call them the opening act on The White Stripes' tour. The band is streaming a new song and an old one at the official site and you can strem clips from Dual Mono at Tower Records (I'd try “Satisfy My Mind” and “There Is An End,” which features guest vox from Holly Golighty).
BLOC PARTY: PopMatters makes the most of 15 minutes with the band.
BRIGHT EYES: Conor Oberst apologizes for making disparaging remarks about John Peel and the Make Poverty History campaign at the Glastonbury music festival, though New Musical Express won't say what they were.
WE LOVE THE '90s: Prof. Althouse's son asks: If you could go back in time either to the 50s or the 60s, what songs would you bring to convince people that the 90s was a great decade musically? Althouse readers answer.
HARRY SHEARER reacts to the news that Oasis' Liam Gallagher once thought the 1980s spoof rockers were a real band.
TOM-KAT UPDATE: Cruise is angering the Incredible Hulk. Paramount Pictures reportedly pressed NBC to edit 20 minutes out of Cruise's wacky interview with Matt Lauer. Heather B. says “He can't handle the truth. FemaleFirst headlines a story “Tom Cruise's 'confusing' sex.” The Superficial again baits Cruise's attorneys, all the while stressing that “the story is based on conjecture and hearsay.” Page Six adds a twist with the claim that elite Scientologists are not allowed to breed. Which doesn't make this any less funny or creepy. And don't miss The Borowitz Report.
LI-LO LOWDOWN: Lindsay Lohan — who has lost a great deal of weight in a short period of time because she's learned how to be healthy — reportedly collapsed at her LA gym and was unconscious until revived by friend and gym partner Kimberly Stewart. The folks behind “FreeKatie.net” launch FeedLindsay.com.
BOBBY BROWN: Video vixen Karrine Steffans' tell-more-than-you-wanted-to-know book says she never saw Whitney Houston's husband take drugs. But he did claim he was a member of Al Qaeda and that President Bush was looking for him.
EDU-BLOGGING: The latest Carnival of Education is online.
FLORIDA DEMOCRATIC BOOKKEEPER takes the blame for the state party's failure to pay its Social Security and payroll taxes. Debbie Griffin-Bruton also said she never informed her boss, gubernatorial candidate Scott Maddox.
DEMOCRATIC DIAGNOSIS: Political scientist Henry Farrell analyzes an essay comparing the Democratic Party to Boeing to examine the difference between long-term and short-term strategies. Matt Yglesias responds that it's more like Starbucks. Megan MacArdle (whose day job is with The Economist)argues that even as a discussion of business strategy, the original essay is naive.
VANITY FAIR: International and national buzz has had little or no effect on the mag's slumping newsstand sales. The exception is pictured here.
GOT BOTULISM? The National Academy of Sciences is proceeding with publication of a study outlining how terrorists could contaminate the U.S. milk supply with botulism — despite complaints that the article is a “road map for terrorists.”
IRAN: An Iranian lawmaker reveals why US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is so tough on his country — she had her heart broken by a young man from Qazvin while they were students.
IRAQ: The Washington Post marks a year of sovereignty with “Another Year of Living Misery in Baghdad.” In contrast, The New York Times finds “Some Iraqis Optimistic About Sovereignty.” Jeff Jarvis points out that the story leads with an unhappy butcher and you have read eight more grafs to find this: “But perhaps more striking, considering the huge gap between the hopes stirred when American troops captured Baghdad in April 2003 and the grim realities now, were the number of Iraqis who expressed a more patient view. Among those people, the disappointments and privations have been offset by an appreciation of both the progress toward supplanting the dictatorship of Mr. Hussein with a nascent democratic system and the need for American troops to remain here in sufficient numbers to allow the system to mature.” But that's still an improvement over Ed Wong's version of the same story in the International Herald Tribune, which ran without the contributions of John Burns. The AP noted a split in Iraqi opinion over the issue of a timetable for U.S. withdrawal.
RUSSIAN PRESIDENT PUTIN accidentally gets a SuperBowl ring.
IN SEARCH OF PRO-AMERICANISM: Although the title suggests narration by Leonard Nimoy, author and WaPo Anne Applebaum breaks down the Pew Global Attitudes Project and gets interesting results. There's a shorter version at the WaPo, but the longer one doesn't require registration.
NORTH KOREA has cut most of its international phone lines since late March over concerns that sensitive information about its society will flow out of the isolated country, South Korea’s spy agency reportedly said Tuesday.
CULT OF THE iPod: The new product line-up is analyzed at the iPodlounge.
MINNESOTA MADNESS: The state Commerce Department is accusing Midwest Oil of Minnesota of undercharging for gas. A state law apparently requires stations to charge at least 8 cents more per gallon than they pay.
DEMOCRACY IN EAST ST. LOUIS: A federal jury on Wednesday found five East St. Louis Democrats guilty of vote fraud. one defendant, Kelvin Ellis, a top city administrator, will also be tried for the attempted murder of a government witness who had threatened to expose a prosititution ring Ellis was running out of East St. Louis City Hall. Gateway Pundit rounds up the coverage.
THAT OL' BLACK MAGIC had a girls soccer coach in its spell. At least that's his defense to eleven counts of committing lewd and lascivious acts with a child and one count of continuous sexual abuse of a child.
ZAMBONI OPERATOR BUSTED FOR DUI in New Jersey.
GIANT CATFISH: It weighs 646 pounds and is the size of a grizzly bear… but you shoulda seen the one that got away. That joke is normally like shooting a fish in a barrel, but not this time.
250 STARVING GOATS get aid from a towing company in Ohio.
IOWA TEENS videotaped themselves setting live possums on fire.
SHRINKAGE: Apparently, there are men who don't know about it, either. Better to get the info from a doctor than a book by Austin Powers.
SHRUBBERY STOLEN from a Norwegian family's yard. Børre Botnmark, has a few theories: “Someone clearly is trying to profit on this.” Clearly, he has not considered that the thieves may be on a quest for the Holy Grail.
LUTON: The English town uses a story about aliens choosing Luton as an ideal landing spot to improve its image after it was voted “crap town” of the year last year. Why do they need aliens when they have Spiny Norman out at the airport?
