DH in HD

Coincidental with the broadcast stations dropping their analog signals I finally got an HD-TV. What took me so long? It wasn’t the price, it was the weight. My previous TV was a huge Sony Trinitron that got as good a non-HD picture as you could get… and it weighed a fucking ton. Recently one of those big chain stores offered great prices, free delivery and installation, and here was the kicker – they would take away your old TV. I’d sell it or donate it but no one from the Jewish Council of Women was going to show up with a crane.

Buying one of these HD suckers introduced me to a whole new world of confusion. LCD vs. Plasma? Response time? 1081 or some other number? LCD vs. LED? Sony or Samsung or Fuzijurutakiaki? Number of pixels. Energy savers. How black are the blacks? Generic cables or Monster brand cables? 4’ or 6’ or 120’? Every time the sales person would explain something I’d nod and say, “but you’ll pick up the old TV, right?”

I finally settled on one, had to wait ten days for it to be promptly delivered. And they made the mistake of only sending two guys instead of ten. How heavy was that old Sony? The two installers looked like the burly delivery guys in the Miller Beer commercials. Just sliding the TV out of the cabinet and setting it on the ground almost gave both a hernia. But eventually they set up the new one and wheeled the old meteor out. There was nothing in the news about any freeway bridges collapsing so I guess they arrived at their final destination.

I was sooo thrilled to see it go.

Once I finally turned on the new one I couldn’t believe I lived this long without it. And for the last few days I’ve been watching anything that’s on as long it’s in HD. Give me a documentary on carbon dating with shots of the Muir Woods and I’m there! MLB-TV replayed game seven of the 2008 ALCS. I watched eight innings even though I knew who won. And was rooting for the other team.

It’s like when I was a kid and our family finally got a color TV. And by color I mean faces looked purple and everything else was bright green and red. But it was a revelation. For days we all just camped in front of that thing watching whatever was in color. I sat mesmerized at the Osmond family singing on the ANDY WILLIAMS SHOW. “Wow! Look at those blue sweaters they’re wearing! This is the greatest entertainment EVER!”

So it was with that mindset that I turned on HBO-HD a couple of nights ago to watch LIVE FREE: DIE HARD. I figured, this is going to be fun. I loved the original DIE HARD, it’s an action movie – okay Bruce Willis is too old for this by twenty years – but the visuals alone should be eye-popping enough to warrant my time.

WRONG!!

What an unbelievable piece of shit. Maybe the single stupidest action movie of all-time. Who knew you could hack into someone’s computer on-line and blow it up? And that’s just in the first ten minutes. The stunts were so off-the-charts absurd that a Road Runner cartoon was stark realism by comparison.

And then there’s Bruce. Superman in a suit of indestructible titanium armor couldn’t survive the falls and crashes and explosions that Bruce weathered with relative ease. Sure, he suffered a few minor bruises and his back stiffened the way it might if someone his age reached down to pick up a penny without flexing his knees first. Otherwise, he’s hitching a ride on a moving F-35, beating the shit out of a woman while in a truck suspended precariously in an elevator shaft, and flying a helicopter after maybe one lesson.

Television was an amazing invention; color television, a startling advance: and high-definition, an absolute wonder. But the technology has not been invented nor ever will that would make LIVE FREE: DIE HARD be worth sitting through. As I slogged through this mess I kept wondering, is there anything in the world that could kill Bruce in this movie? And then it hit me. Yes! My old TV could fall on him.

Suddenly I longed for that old Sony.