THE WEBLOG OF KEVIN C. MURPHY: CONJURING POLITICAL, CINEMATIC, AND CULTURAL ARCANA SINCE 1999

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News you can use: How to unlock all the titles in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. With my strict gaming regimen freed up until WoW's Cataclysm expansion comes out, MW:2 has been getting a lot of run lately in Casa Berk (as have Left 4 Dead 2, NBA 2K10, the GTA IV expansions, and Batman: Arkham Asylum.) Then again, given the millions of copies sold on opening day, I guess I'm in good company.

Several trailers of note over the past week: Aragorn continues his History of Violence and returns to the unsettling world of Cronenberg in the new trailer for Eastern Promises, also with Naomi Watts, Vincent Cassel, and Armin Mueller-Stahl. Shopgirl Natalie Portman looks adorable facing up against stiff-suit Jason Bateman in the otherwise cloying trailer for Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium, also with Dustin Hoffman as Willy Wonka, uh, Magorium. Nicole Kidman tries to stop her sister (Jennifer Jason-Leigh) from marrying Jack Black in this look at Noah Baumbach's Margot at the Wedding. (Not usually my bag, and Jason-Leigh can be a huge red flag, but Baumbach has earned a look after Squid & the Whale.) A bit-player in the Russian mob and a recent emigre to Liberty City (you) tries to move up the ranks of his organization in two new trailers for Rockstar's eagerly-awaited Grand Theft Auto IV. (I may have to break down and get a 360, just for this game.) And, finally, a Kramerfied, really poor quality version of may very well be the teaser for Chris Nolan's The Dark Knight has emerged online. (I'll reserve judgment until a higher quality version emerges, but for now I like the laugh.)


"Worse, today's progressives fail to tap into America's collective unconscious through spectacle, which Duncombe defines as 'a way of making an argument...through story and myth, fears and desire, imagination and fantasy.' Republican Party leaders don't hesitate to derive inspiration from Madison Avenue and Hollywood. George W. Bush's 'Mission Accomplished' photo-op may have backfired, but it demonstrated an impressive commitment to spectacle. In this way, Republicans are actually far more populist than the New Democrats."

World of Demcraft? In a review of Stephen Duncombe's intriguing new Dream, Slate's Joshua Glenn argues that progressives need to liven up their image, perhaps by taking a cue from games like Grand Theft Auto: "'If a game offers power, excitement, and the room to explore, people will play evening after evening after evening, almost regardless of the results,' he writes. 'Perhaps the problem is not that people don't want to get involved in politics, but rather that they don't want to take part in a professionalized politics so interested in efficiency that there is no space for them, or they don't want to spend time in a political world so cramped that there's no freedom to explore and discover, to know or master.'"

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