Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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DECEMBER 24-30, 2014 UCW 17 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM The trailers did not make Horrible Bosses 2 (108 minutes) seems very funny. In fact, my body itself rejected sitting through it, as I seized with a coughing fit every time a joke fell f lat. I spent most of the movie doubled over and gasping for air, which will tell you is exactly how unfortunate I found the whole "comedy." At least part of the problem is attributable to the fact that when you make a sequel to a comedy you risk turning funny people into caricatures by failing to leave even the smallest modicum of subtlety on the table. By way of example, consider the actor played by Jack Black in Tropic Thunder, or 90 percent of Eddie Murphy's roles since the nineties. At the conclusion of the first film, Nick Hendricks (Jason Bateman), Dale Arbus (Charlie Day, who I love less now), and Kurt Buckman (Jason Sudeikis) had vanquished their ene- mies. David Harken (Kevin Spacey) is going to jail and Dr. Julia Harris (Jennifer Aniston) has been blackmailed back to her rightful place in the world. The sequel picks up with the three dumb-keteers promot- ing a new product on a morning show while visual gags try to make me laugh. It doesn't work and I start checking my watch and calculating exactly how young a brain you would need to have to find a joke rooted in the appearance of two heterosexual characters engaging in a sex act with each other. I'm figuring about ten. Since most of the film is written for that level of sophistication, perhaps I am judging the movie too harshly. Maybe I should consult with a ten-year-old. Of course, the constant stream of jokes related to rape and misogyny make that a hard sell … I wouldn't let my ten-year old anywhere near this trash, lest they decide to embrace this form of "comedy." The racist jokes don't help, either. While jokes based on making fun of racists and calling attention to racism have their place in comedy (South Park is funny. So was Borat), racist jokes that are positioned to generate comedy by reinforcing racist stereotypes don't do it for me. Anyway, Rex Hanson (Chris Pine) solicits the idiot triplets to sell their product through his direct-order catalogue. The deal almost falls through when his father Burt (Christopher Waltz) gets them to sign an even better deal. Montage of stuff happening, racist jokes, sexist jokes, cue next act. Surprise, surprise. The Hanson's MMM-bopped their way over the stupid heroes and double-crossed them. Because in movieland, suits with money are evil and small business owners are earnest and trustworthy. I just realized what I wrote, and, if for no other reason, I hate this for making me sarcastically observe that not all corporate types are bloodthirsty idiots. Hungry for revenge, instead of pursuing legal options, they return to the murder well and end up with a kidnapping-based solution that puts them into the office of one Dr. Julia Harris (Jennifer Aniston) for some more homophobia and rape-based humor. Overall, I really have to wonder what Waltz, Bateman and Day were thinking — unlike Sudeikis, they probably didn't need the paycheck. Spacey and Aniston probably did somebody a favor, and Chris Pine will star in any piece of waste he comes across. I have to wonder if his career is based on producers getting him drunk and shoving piles of money at him. The film may have done good box office, but don't bother. If you want to watch popular nonsense, save your money for the Annie remake. It will also probably suck, but there's a bunch of musical numbers with which to sing along. Now playing at Wynnsong 7, Market Fair 15, Carmike 7 and Patriot 14. Twice as Much Racism, Homophobia and Mysogyny Horrible Bosses 2 (Rated R) by HEATHER GRIFFITHS HEATHER GRIFFITHS, Contributing Writer. COMMENTS? Editor@ upandcomingweekly.com. 910.484.6200. Dear EarthTalk: What is biochar and how can it help reduce my carbon footprint? — William Jarvis, Bethlehem, PA Biochar is a naturally occurring, fine- grained, highly porous form of charcoal derived from the process of baking biomass — and it's been associated with fertile soils for some two thousand years. "Biochar is found in soils around the world as a result of vegetation fires and historic soil management practices," reports the International Biochar Initiative (IBI), a trade group representing the world's burgeoning biochar industry. "Intensive study of biochar-rich dark earths in the Amazon has led to a wider appreciation of biochar's unique properties as a soil enhancer." Indeed, researchers have been hard at work perfecting their own methods for manufactur- ing biochar by baking biomass in giant oxygen- free kilns. The resulting biochar can then be used as a soil amendment to help restore tired, compromised farmland, not to mention con- taminated industrial sites, all the while taking carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. A liquid by-product of the biochar production process can also be converted into a carbon-neutral "biofuel" that can displace other carbon inten- sive fuels. Farmers can layer biochar into their fields where it becomes part of the soil matrix and helps retain water and essential agricultural nutrients like nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium. "You can basically think of it as a soil reef upon which abiotic and biotic phenomena happen," says David Shearer, CEO of Full Circle Biochar, one of a handful of U.S. based biochar start-ups working to com- mercialize the age-old "technology." Farmers like the fact that using biochar can lower their water and fertilizer bills as well as yield more and better quality agricultural products — leading to better market performance overall. "This is really a hedge for farmers," reports Shearer. "It really helps them manage their financial risk and it helps them manage risk into the future around production." Beyond agriculture, biochar can also be used to clean up polluted land. "For example, if you have a mine that has con- taminated soil adjacent to it, biochar ... will allow you to remediate soils," says Shearer. He adds that biochar also makes for an excellent filtration medium: "We know that activated charcoal has been used for millennia as a filter mechanism, and so there is discussion in the biochar community that maybe the first step is we'll use it as a filtration media, and then we'll move to agriculture as the cost of pro- duction of biochar comes down." As far as environmentalists are concerned, the greater the demand for biochar the better, given the fact that it is a potent storage mecha- nism for carbon dioxide that would otherwise head into the atmosphere and contribute to climate change. "The carbon in biochar resists degradation and can hold carbon in soils for hundreds to thousands of years," reports IBI. "We can use this simple, yet powerful, technol- ogy to store 2.2 gigatons of carbon annually by 2050. It's one of the few technologies that is relatively inexpensive, widely applicable and quickly scalable. We really can't afford not to pursue it." CONTACTS: International Biochar Initiative (IBI), www.biochar-interna- tional.org; Full Circle Biochar, www.fullcirclebiochar.com. Written and edited by Roddy Scheer and Doug Moss and is a registered trademark of E - The Environmental Magazine (www.emagazine.com). Send questions to: earthtalk@emagazine.com. Reusing Grey Water at Home Environmentalists hail biochar, a form of charcoal derived from baking biomass, as a savior of soils damaged by agricultural over- use and pollution that can sequester significant amounts of car- bon dioxide in the process. Credit: Marcia O'Connor, Flickr CC