WEAKEND PLANNER SPRING
FILM & TV SPECIAL

CALENDAR
Friday, April 20^th
6:00pm
Jagermeister Music Tour featuring Stone Sour w/Lacuna Coil, Shadows Fall and Six @ House of Blues Las Vegas

Sick Puppies @ Harper’s Ferry, Allston, MA

Madina Lake w/Halifax @ El Corazon, Seattle

6:30pm
The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus and Saosin, plus Kaddisfly @ House of Blues New Orleans

7:40pm
Pirates vs. Dodgers @ Chavez Ravine: Jim Tracy returns to Chavez for a three-game set against the red-hot Blue Crew.

8:00pm
Street Dreams Tour featuring Young Jeezy, Lil' Wayne and friends @ Smirnoff Music Centre, Dallas

8:15pm
Jamie Foxx, "An Evening of Music, Comedy and More," @ Gibson Amphitheatre

9:00pm
Trans Am @ The Troubadour, West Hollywood

Bullet for My Valentine @ Clutch Cargo, Pontiac, MI

10:00pm
Josie Aiello’s premiere party and performance for her new video “Venom” @ The Elbo Room, Chicago. More info at www.josieaiello.com.

Saturday, April 21^st
6:00pm
Flyleaf @ Kemper Arena, Kansas City

8:00pm
Type O Negative @ Ventura Theatre, Ventura, CA

10:00pm
The Cauze @ The Pitcher House Hermosa Beach, CA

The Romonas (female tribute to the Ramones) @ Harper’s Bar & Grill, Northridge, CA

Warner Drive @ The Viper Room, West Hollywood

Sunday, April 22^nd
1:10pm
Pirates vs. Dodgers @ Chavez Ravine: Afternoon game at the ballpark; what better way to spend a Sunday than taking the family to the game?

6:00pm
Ok Go @ Cornell University Ithaca, NY

8:00pm
Ice Cube @ House of Blues Las Vegas.
Celtic Frost & Brand New Sin @ House of Blues (Downtown Disney) Anaheim

9:00pm
Goo Goo Dolls @ Frostburg State U., Frostburg, MD

JE-C’S NEW-MOVIE RUNDOWN
Fracture
Starring: Anthony Hopkins, David Strathairn, Ryan Gosling, Billy Burke, Rosamund Pike
Synopsis: The good news: The man who killed his wife confesses instantly, seemingly making a young Assistant District Attorney's life much easier. The bad news: The arresting police officer (Billy Burke) was having an affair with the dead wife, which complicates matters a wee bit, especially since there's no evidence that the murderer even did the job.
Thoughts: Part of me wants to believe this movie will be good, but they’ve been using third-rate reviewers in their ad campaign, which doesn’t bode well. Could this be a quick cash call for Gosling and Hopkins?

Vacancy
Starring: Kate Beckinsale, Luke Wilson, Frank Whaley, Ethan Embry
Synopsis: A young married couple is hoping to spend a romantic getaway together, but instead they find themselves trapped in a creepy motel room and the stars of a soon-to-be-made snuff film.
Thoughts: Luke Wilson in a terror movie? Come on, now. Jim Carrey attempted to do a terror movie earlier this year, and it didn’t go over well at all—and he’s a much bigger star than Luke.

Also Opening this week:
In the Land of Women: CHICK FLICK ALERT!! I hear, though, that Kristen Stewart steals the movie and is the next young star.

LENNY BEER’S THOUGHTS ON THE MOVIES
The Namesake and Some Others: The year in films has so far been unimpressive. The top movies so far include The Lives of Others (which is actually last year's stunning and brilliant Foreign Language Academy Award winner), Zodiac and The Lookout (both prominent more for their masterful screenplays than any cinematic wonderment) and Indian director Mira Nair's The Namesake, my first contender for a Best Picture nomination this year. Oh yes, a movie can come out in the first half of the year and continue to resonate long enough to survive; we've seen it in recent years with Crash and even more significantly with Fargo (which gets better and better with each viewings). The Namesake is a universal look into the interrelationships of family, told through the eyes of an American-born youth who travels back to the homeland of his parents to understand his roots and how they affect his own future. Its cast is spot-on across the- board, the story is both touching and meaningful and the scenes in India are breathtaking in their beauty. A winner.

JE-C’S RANT OF THE WEEK
Ok, so last year my team “tanked” some games at the end of the year to position themselves better in the playoff seeding. This year a bunch of teams have tanked games, including the Minnesota Timberwolves. Minny owes the Clips their draft pick if it’s not in the top 10, so they decided to sit out Garnett the last month of the season. They ended up losing their last seven by an average of 20 points. That doesn’t annoy me as much as what the Mavericks did the other night in Golden State in a game that had major playoff implications. Dallas decided to rest their whole team against the Warriors and then played them on Wednesday against Seattle. Now, I can understand looking out for your team’s best interests, but come on—what Avery and his staff were doing was blatantly obvious. If you’re going to rest your guys for the playoffs, then why play them the last night against a Seattle team that has nothing to play for? What if Dirk or Howard got hurt in that game. Yeah, yeah, I know—in the grand scheme of things, had the Clippers just played better throughout the season, and had Dunleavy not had his little tiff with Maggette, it wouldn’t have come down to this, but it’s ultimately about the integrity of the game. I mean, they might as well not have played the game at all and just given Golden State the win. I think David Stern needs to fix this for next year, so that teams continue to play hard throughout the season. They owe it to their fans, who are the ones spending the money, whereas the players have millions. Do the fans get reimbursed if their team sucks and doesn’t make the playoffs? No! So why not play with some pride and at least give the fans something for all the money they’ve spent. Wednesday night was fan appreciation night, and even though the Clips knew by halftime they were eliminated, they still should have come out in the second half and played with pride and energy and given the fans something to look forward to. Instead, they shut it down and lost to the injury-plagued Hornets. It left me with a sour taste in my mouth. I guess the only good thing that came out of it was that I won a year’s subscription to Netflix…some reward for being a season ticket holder for 18 years.

IDLE THOUGHTS:
Yosh Katz (The Gary Group) and I have been talking for a week now about American Idol and the politics behind it. I asked him if he could give me his take on Sanjaya being given the boot and what we should expect in the final weeks. I encourage anyone who has an opinion about anything written in the planner to please email me at [email protected] and I will post your opinions if you allow. I want to make the planner as interactive as possible. I also welcome any calendar additions from people who may know of something in their area that they think people would be interested in.

We all could tell from the beginning of the show it was Sanjaya's week to leave. It was a sense of relief for most people who work for or watch the show. It'll be interesting what this leads to. Haley's leaving the week before helped Chris and Jordin the most.

I think Lakisha is in a lot of trouble this coming week. I don't think she'll get a lot of Sanjaya voters moving over to her, and when you combine that with her bottom-two finish this past week, she needs to seriously step up to survive. I see most of the Sanjaya votes going to Phil and Chris, and maybe Jordin. Blake has lost a lot of steam in recent weeks as many have realized he doesn't have the best voice, and has relied most of the competition on beat boxing. Chris had a bad week, but still has the most current pop feel to his singing, which will get him a lot of the teen Sanjaya voters. I think the "vote for the worst" supporters of Sanjaya will likely move to Phil, who seems like a nice guy, but has tortured some watchers as much as Sanjaya over the last few months.

Jordin really stepped it up this week and is emerging as a dark horse to win it all. Melinda keeps putting on a great show, but it’s hard for me not to think she peaked too early. Melinda is going to be in a lot of trouble in the final two, especially if it’s with Jordin. America likes the underdog, and I could see a huge shift of votes over to whomever that is this year.

Here are my current rankings based on a mix of marketing, talent and reality going into the top six:

1. Melinda
2. Jordin
3. Chris
4. Blake
5. Phil
6. Lakisha