RIP Arthur Lazere

Arthur was the founder and editor of culturevulture.net, and the first guy to publish my movie reviews. If not for him, I might never have gotten my gig with the Star-Telegram, or had a book published, or purchased my three mansions and seven yachts. I knew he was in failing health but not the full extent of it, and though I meant to send him an email of thanks, I never got around to it. So instead, as a sort of tribute to the culture vulture himself, here are a few of my favorite CV pieces:

American Movie

Any Given Sunday

Battlefield Earth

Dancer in the Dark

Jaws

Mulholland Drive

The Sopranos

Here's my review of The Royal American Beauty and the Whale...er...Running with Scissors. Also these offerings of highly variable quality:

The Genius Club

13 (Tzameti)

Conversations with God

Somehow I'm on the uplifting Christian movie beat all of a sudden. It's just a natural flow, I guess. Teen movies, talking cartoon animals, lefty documentaries and now this. I'm sure I can't be making many friends among the Jebus people up in DFW.

A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints

One Night With the King

49 Up

Gabrielle

Love's Abiding Joy

Playoff Predix



No Red Sox post-mortem yet – I need some distance – but I might as well throw my playoff predictions up here:

ALDS

Yankees over Detroit in 4

Detroit spent the last weekend of the regular season getting swept by the lowly Kansas City Royals. The Yankees lineup is the most fearsome legion of supervillains money can buy. I’ll give the Tigers one win at home to salvage some pride, but the Yankees are gonna chew em up and spit em out.

Twins over Oakland in 5

I’ve gotta stick with this even though Oakland has a 2-1 lead in the first game as I type. Oakland has a long, storied tradition of losing in five games in the first round, so why should that stop now?

NLDS

Padres over Cardinals in 4

I guess the Padres are something of a rooting interest, in that their roster is something like 45% ex-Red Sox. And the Cardinals barely survived the biggest September collapse in recent memory.

Mets over Dodgers in 5

The Mets don’t have Pedro, but they managed to put together the best record in the National League with minimal contributions from him anyway. Also, Grady Little is managing the Dodgers, so you know he’s going to leave his starter in too long in the pivotal game.

ALCS

Twins over Yankees in 7

In which my inner Yankee hater overcomes my inner rational being. I just can’t fathom the notion of Alex Rodriguez, world champion.

NLCS

Mets over Padres in 6

I dunno, the Mets have been the favorites all year. I really don’t follow these teams, so I’ll just go along with that.

World Series

Twins over Mets in 6

Because the National League is silly and will lose again.