Life of Smiley

Apparently the people want snakes on a plane. As film backstories go, this one is fairly serpentine. This month, New Line Cinema's "Snakes on a Plane," which wrapped principal photography in September in Vancouver, went back before the cameras for five days of additional shooting at the Lot in Los Angeles. In this case, it wasn't the usual reshoot, hastily assembled to fix a nagging story problem. Instead, the studio decided to create new scenes that would take the movie from PG-13 into R-rated territory. The second round of filming also came about because of intense and growing fan interest in the movie, which was directed by David R. Ellis and is not scheduled to be released until Aug. 18. "Snakes" stars Samuel L. Jackson as an FBI agent who has to fight a planeload of snakes unleashed by an assassin bent on killing a witness in protective custody. Sight unseen, the movie has grown from something of a joke into a phenomenon slithering untamed throughout t...

In the future, the humanoid robot sitting next to you at the bar may be drinking alcohol in order to work the next day," said Ray Baughman, the research team leader and director of the NanoTech Institute. Full story

Careless human driver walks away A human road, near the woods -- A 500-lb moose was seriously injured the other night when it mistakenly wandered into the path of a human death-carriage. The human driver was quoted as saying she saw the moose standing in the road, and then he was sitting in the front seat of her car. The driver did not explain why she chose not to slow down or take evasive action. The human was treated for minor scrapes and bruises, then released back into the wild. The moose was seriously injured in the crash and was put down. Tragically the moose did not have health insurance.

Sharon Stone in Israel

In case you missed what was inarguably the most important sports story of last week (labor, schmabor; we've had work stoppages before) the wife of Utah Jazz forward Andrei Kirilenko told ESPN The Magazine that she has given her husband an allowance of one woman per year. Once-a-year allowance

I've seen all the movies in each category unless otherwise noted. Supporting Actor: GEORGE CLOONEY in "Syriana," Matt Dillon in "Crash," Paul Giamatti in "Cinderella Man," Jake Gyllenhaal in "Brokeback Mountain," William Hurt in "A History of Violence" I would have given this award to Jake Gyllenhaal, if only because I feel bad for him after Jimmy Kimmel noted, "Neither Heath Ledger nor Jake Gyllenhaal won their awards, so apparently they made out for no reason at all." In all seriousness I thought he did a good job and deserved the win over Clooney. Looking over the other nominees I think this may have been the strongest field. Supporting Actress: RACHEL WEISZ in "The Constant Gardener," Amy Adams in "Junebug," Catherine Keener in "Capote," Frances McDormand in "North Country," Michelle Williams in "Brokeback Mountain" I didn't see Gardener or Junebug. In fact I'...

Why Jon Stewart isn't funny The tragedy [is] that the students who abandon politics out of a naive self-consciousness often represent our country's most idealistic minds. Stewart's daily dose of political parody characterized by asinine alliteration leads to a ''holier than art thou" attitude toward our national leaders. People who possess the wit, intelligence, and self-awareness of viewers of ''The Daily Show" would never choose to enter the political fray full of ''buffoons and idiots." Content to remain perched atop their Olympian ivory towers, these bright leaders head straight for the private sector. The author make an interesting point and this article is worth reading. Although I would argue that if we in our ivory towers are drawn to "The Daily Show", it is because we are already disillusioned by politics, not the other way around.

Round 1 Results Congratulations! Patterson wins Round 1 handily. Stay tuned for Round 2 where the scores can really change!* Quote Character Movie Winner imtheasshole.mp3 Trent Swingers Oge wolf.mp3 Jules Pulp Fiction Patterson funny.mp3 Tommy DeVito Goodfellas Patterson nipples.mp3 Jack Byrnes Meet the Parents Patterson ugly.mp3 "Dutch" Predator Bomber brokemyheart.mp3 Michael Corleone Godfather II Patterson jobu.mp3 Pedro Cerrano Major League Oge destroy.mp3 Darth Vader Empire Strikes Back Patterson * Not really