The Loehdown

Poets of the Fall recently released a note on their facebook page about a band that they will be performing with called Phoenix Effect. Poets of the Fall also happen to be helping with the production and songwriting of Phoenix Effect's first album, so I decided to give their first single, 'Broken Promises,' a listen. (You can listen yourself here or here).

The lead singer, Janne Kärkkäinen, is a former member of Sunrise Avenue, who has had recent success with their album On The Way to Wonderland in Europe. 'Broken Promises' is a little edgier than most of Sunrise Avenue's work, but it's also a whole lot better.

'Broken Promises' is full of strong guitar riffs, but it also has some excellent lyrics (Poets of the Fall's Marko is participating in the songwriting, so who would expect anything less?) and "power" to it without being screamy or overdone. Hopefully Janne and Phoenix Effect can carry the effect on to the whole album while still keeping it fresh, because it is a sound that works. 'Broken Promises' instantly catches you and begs to be played over again and again.

Undoubtedly, 'Broken Promises' is a song about Kärkkäinen's ousting from Sunrise Avenue, but it may just be the best thing that has happened to him. The album is set to be released sometime in early 2009. You can find more about Phoenix Effect at their webpage. 'Broken Promises' is available for $0.89 at Amazon as a DRM-Free MP3 download. Check it out!

Max Payne: The Movie is not Max Payne: The Video Game: The Movie. If you are looking for a two hour recap of the video game, which was released in 2001, then your best bet is to use the ticket money for the movie to go grab a copy and play it again.

For those unfamiliar with the series, this may be a better movie for you than those who loved the game. Max Payne is a NYPD detective whose family is brutally murdered in his home (don't worry, I'm not going to give away any spoilers here). The unsolved case leads to his thirst for vengeance and a whole lot of shooting, dreary weather, and dark New York streets.

What the Max Payne movie does well is the effects. Although some denounce the Valkyries used in the movies because they didn't even exist in the game, their ability to show the effects of the drug in the game. The shots in the game look amazing, both during the Valkyrie scenes and the shooting scenes. The gunfighting, no matter how brief, is also well done and is one part of the movie that pays homage to the game. Also, the acting in the film are well done, and the cast includes an interesting mix, from Mark Wahlberg and Mila Kunis to Nelly Furtado, from Ludacris to Chris O'Donnell, all who play their parts well. Yes, I said Ludacris can act.

Unfortunately, what the movie doesn't get right is a long list of important characteristics. Max Payne is a game about shooting, yet there is almost none until after an hour into the movie. You're basically stuck hearing a differentiated version of the original Max Payne: The Video Game storyline for the first hour or so of the movie. While the adaptation of the storyline from video game to big screen is an okay attempt, it adds in too many side tracks which never even existed and fails to really boil down the plot from the Max Payne video game into a cohesive movie. While some of the story getting lost in translation is understandable, the differences here are far too great to be forgiven.

Bullet time, one of the stand-out features of the Max Payne series, makes a small appearance here, which is in good taste since any grand amount of it would make the movie look like an attempt to redo the Matrix. Also, fans of the video game will be happy to know that many of the locales have been transported from video game to Max Payne: The Movie (Ragnarok, anyone?). However, there are some notable omissions in the character category, including many of the main characters, which is probably due to the shift in storylines.

The Max Payne movie is an average mix of story and bullets for most viewers. However, if you come from the video game then the balance is likely to throw you, as is the adaptation. Unfortunately, the movie feels more like an attempt to make money than it is an attempt to please fans of the series. An average film, but nothing too spectacular, save a few of the shooting scenes.

(P.S. For those of you who do go to see the movie, you may have heard about an extra scene after the credits. In my opinion, don't bother, the credits themselves are more worth watching than the scene.)

I eat a lot of Thai food. It’s easy to make substitutions, the dishes are usually made per order, the ingredients are fresh and flavorful and it’s usually reasonably priced. I have certain dietary restrictions, so eating out can be a definite challenge. As Nathan’s review said, Thai Kitchen is pretty standard fare/atmosphere. I enjoyed our Tom Kha Gai, however it was overfull of fresh button mushroom slices. I’m all for fresh ingredients, but they were raw and I prefer the straw mushrooms normally used. Also enjoyable are onions in this flavor combination but except for two stray pieces, it was oddly absent. The broth was rich with an excellent lemongrass flavor, however I have had better at several other places. We ordered this with three stars and unfortunately as a lot of thai restaurants count on the peppers added that sink to the bottom, the spicy was missing from this dish.

My entrée was the garlic chicken. It was that…garlic and chicken with cabbage. For ordering 3 stars, I was very disappointed as there was no heat at all to the dish. I thought the menu description also listed rice, but I was apparently incorrect. They lost points with me for not including rice with an entrée, which seems a normal assumption that they would have included it. Service lagged a bit for having only 5 tables full and three waitresses working. While our server was polite, she seemed to be rushing us through our orders. After seating she immediately asked us for a drink order without giving us time to peruse the menu—unfortunately an annoyance to me.

All in all, I’m sure we’ll go back since it’s 2 blocks from our apartment, but I’ll definitely be seeking out some of the other dishes (and possibly trying four to five stars) on the menu in hopes there may be a hidden treasure somewhere.

Thai Kitchen is not that much different from any other Thai restaurant you have previously visited. The dishware is a little less authentic, using colorful fiesta-ware style plates in place of what I would consider traditional Thai dishware. The setting is a little more well-lit than other establishments, but it could have been just about any other Thai restaurant otherwise.

The Tom Kha Gai soup we started our meal off with immediately made me think that Thai Kitchen was a level above other Thai restaurants I had visited. It was full of flavor, perfectly spiced, and had a wealth of mushrooms and chicken in it. I was blown away.

Unfortunately, I can't say the same thing about the Bangkok Chicken. Their menu lists it as a "Thai Kitchen Specialty." It consists of breaded chicken sauteed in a garlic sauce and garnished with basil. I hope that the regular chef was off that night, because the meal was absolutely bland and uninspiring. I could see the garlic, I could see the basil, I could see the spices, but I couldn't taste it, anywhere.

I'm willing to give Thai Kitchen another shot based on the possibility the Tom Kha Gai showed, but I can't recommend the Bangkok Chicken.

If you're expecting a variation of Polar Express, I hate to break it to you, but Pineapple Express is not a movie about a train to Hawaii. It is however, a comedy worth your theatre dollar, including popcorn.

The premise behind the movie is that Seth Rogen witnesses a murder committed by cop and a drug lord, and thus is on the run. Along the way Rogen is joined by his pot dealer, played by James Franco, and they enter a number of humorous situations, from living in the woods to a cop-car chase, and an epic fight in a secret abandoned government testing facility.

The mix of action-comedy in Pineapple Express is similar to that in spoof movies and comedy franchises such as Austin Powers, where it mocks the genre, but is also compelling in its own right. The scenes were well-choreographed and even brought some empathetic pain to the audience, and the requisite car-chase scene was filled with laughs and stunts.

If there was one downside to the movie it was probably the semi-romance storyline introduced with Rogen's teenage girlfriend (she is 18, at least). After Rogen forces her family to flee their household, they are forgotten, leaving you wondering just where they went and what they did. Except for the comedy it brought in, Pineapple Express would be better-off without the added storyline. Also, if you're not wild about drug references then you should definitely skip this movie, since it's really only about two things: comedy and weed (the title of the movie gets its moniker from a "strain" of weed named Pineapple Express).

However, those are only minor glitches in the otherwise enjoyable Pineapple Express. While it is probably not going to win any Oscars, and with all the great movies that came out this summer it may get lost in the shuffle, Pineapple Expres is satisfactorily funny that you won't feel as though you've wasted your money. If you have the extra 2 hours to spare, I'd recommend you see it.