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• "Red" envelope indeed: Netflix just delivered Soderbegh's 42-hour "Che" biopic. If I haven't finished it by Friday, send the CIA to kill me. #
• Rob Zombie is an interesting movie director. I'd even say "good." His main problem? Too much "Rob Zombie." Also, not so good as a writer. #
• Can Rob Zombie be less "Rob Zombie" without losing that "Rob Zombie" feeling? (He being Rob Zombie, he already has it in spades.) #
• Enduring Z's Halloween 2 (with sick baby sleeping on my chest) before I get to start "Che." Now, Zombie's "Che" – that I would pay to see. #
• Halloween2 is not good, of course, but still hints at Zombie's promise. When he shows restraint: wow. When he doesn't: overkill. Literally. #
• Yes, it takes me 4 hrs to get through a single movie. Crying baby + work + ADD. No kidding the impending Che-a-thon will be epic at my rate. #
• Our Constutional-Law-Professor-in-Chief's SOTU Supreme Court flub, explained: http://bit.ly/9YwN3j via @addthis #
• Watching original Parent Trap with daughter. Haley Mills in short hair looks like an alien, or Mena Suvari. #
• Finally making time to watch Soderberg's two-part Che biopic. The interminably slow opening map sequence does not bode well for pacing. #
• Castro's 1957 invasion of Cuba looks like it was filmed on the island from "Lost." Will Batista get eaten by a cloud of black smoke? #
• Half hour in, Che is quiet, compassionate, and a somewhat bumbling soldier. It's a bloodless revolution! #
• This is more of the same VH1 treatment as in Motorcycle Diaries. Expect Soderberg to put some edge in here at some point. #
• Ah, becoming a bit of a ball-buster now. (diificult to tweet and keep up with subtitles). #
• 1st good scene: Che bemused by Manhattanite socialites fawning over him at 60s cocktail party. Probably looks a lot like film's wrap party. #
• Finally a gunfight. This revolution was starting to resemble a particularly joyless nature walk. #
• First peek at Che the executioner, but the circumstances weren't unreasonable: he passes a death sentence on a rapist. #
• He's a champion of literacy, natch, earning his future cred with bookstore hipsters. #
• About 1/2 way thru PT. 1, feels too sober so far. Was it wrong to hope 4 "Out of Sight"-like style, or Luis Guzman as foumouthed rebel? #
• "Baader Meinhoff Complex" set a high standard for edgy, stylish depiction of Marxist revolutionaries. Che suffers from solemn reverence. #
• First Che movie I saw was arthouse doc about Bolivia days. Boring. MC Diaries, listless. Convinced now Che was simply a dullwood in camo. #
• Nearing Havana, and no real illustration of how Castro's rebels continue to dominate Batista's armies. Godfather 2 nailed it with 1 scene. #
• Battle scenes in Che are sterile like GI Joe combat: lots of gunfire, few casualties. Only empathetic rebels get close-up injury or death. #
• Che is a chronology stripped of thematic or narrative substance. Few characters, little tension, not even caricatured villains. The point? #
• First empathetic characters are the Batista underlings left dangling in Santa Clara as their superiors desert them while demanding loyalty. #
• He's so principled, but moments earlier a man was trembling at the sound of his name. Why? End of PT1 and Che's reputation is an enigma. #
• Not watching pt2 tonight. Match of the Day beckons. Maybe the revolution continues tomorrow. #
• FWIW, for pure Castroite propaganda, I'll take the beautiful I Am Cuba any day. Soderberg's first half is so aimless, not even provocative. #

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