Tuesday, January 24, 2017

Lara Croft rides again, prison dining in style and bank robbery v. ball and chain


- When you’re staring down a life of retirement filled with lots of time at home with the ol’ ball and chain, formerly unpalatable options suddenly begin to look a lot better. At least that’s the outlook of Kansas resident Lawrence Ripple, who pleaded guilty in Kansas City, Kansas, to a federal bank robbery count and is now staring down up to 20 years in prison, but that’s not the real attention-grabber here. No, that would be the logic Ripple used when explaining to law enforcement why he, seven decades into his time on Earth, chose now to launch himself headfirst into a life of crime. According to an FBI agent, Ripple had argued with his wife earlier and told her in writing he'd "rather be in jail than at home." See, this is why they tell you to never drive angry, text or tweet while angry or go to a bank, give the teller a note demanding cash and warning you have a gun and then grab $3,000 before taking a seat in the lobby before informing a security guard that you’re the "guy he was looking for” while angry. You’re bound to do things you regret and once you calm down, it might occur to you that you could have done a lot saner things, such as moved out, filed for divorce, had an affair or even gotten into a bar fight to blow off steam, none of which are going to land you 20 years behind bars. Even with the hate-filled explanation Ripple gave to the FBI, his wife still accompanied him to court, although maybe the experience was a dose of revenge porn for her………


- It would be fair to say that new University of Oregon football coach Willie Taggart’s human resources skills need improvement. Taggert was hired in December to lead the suddenly downtrodden Oregon football program and coming off a double-digit win season at South Florida, he looked like a good hire. It’s his own hires that aren't exactly panning out for the Ducks, a fact driven home over the weekend as Oregon co-offensive coordinator and tight end coach David Reaves was arrested by the Eugene Police and charged with driving under the influence. That came literally four days after Reeves was officially hired and subsequently, the process to terminate his employment with cause has commenced, according to the school. "University of Oregon assistant football coach David Reaves was arrested last night and charged with Driving Under the Influence by members of the Eugene Police Department," Oregon athletic director Rob Mullens said in a news release. "Reaves has been placed on administrative leave and the process to terminate his employment with cause has commenced. The University has high standards for the conduct of employees and is addressing this matter with the utmost of seriousness." About the whole high standards part….where were those standards a week ago, when the Oregon athletic department suspended strength and conditioning coach Irele Oderinde for a month without pay after three Oregon football plays were hospitalized following offseason workouts? Taggart needs to start hiring people who a) don’t get arrested within a week and b) don’t pose a significant threat to the general well-being of his players……….


- In Colombia, one has to be willing to go anywhere to enjoy a good meal, even if that anywhere is an all-female prison that’s less “Orange Is The New Black” and more “Master Chef.” It’s the ladies-only location of San Diego prison in the popular Caribbean tourist town of Cartagena, where the city’s trendiest new restaurant has been serving up gourmet meals since December and packing in the hungry customers even though the people serving the meals spend much of their time locked inside 8-by-8 cells, cleaning toilets and trying to avoid fights in the exercise yard. Yes, it’s a unique experiment intended to promote the inmates' rehabilitation while also shining a much-needed light on Colombia's neglect of the country's soaring prison population. The restaurant is called Interno — Spanish for "inmate — and it’s a South American take on the InGalera restaurant at a penitentiary in Milan, Italy. Interno serves up dishes such as seabass ceviche and a tabbouleh salad made of Andean quinoa, with some of Colombia's top chefs serving up recipes for the inmates to make. Patrons dine on a patio at the minimum-security prison, the same patio where inmates used to consume prison gruel on disposable foam trays. To spice up the atmosphere, there’s a wall-sized mural and pink tassels hanging from metal bars, all accented by meals served by inmates who must sleep on the floor due to overcrowding. The jail's director, Ramiro Cuadro, credited outside funding for enabling programs like the restaurant, which is an initiative by Teatro Interno, a Colombian foundation led by TV actress Johana Bahamon that holds theater workshops in prisons across the country. Famous chefs prepped inmates for the experience by running workshops teaching them how to make bread and whip up fancy desserts. Twenty inmates stuck with the program and now, they’re brought fine dining to cell block D……..


- New decade, new leading lady, same damn Hollywood. In other words, time for another sequel in an existing movie franchise, one that requires no new concepts and can subsist on more ass-kicking, stilted dialogue and subpar acting. Yes, it’s a new Tomb Raider film, which has officially begun production. It’s the third adaptation of the successful video game franchise, which debuted in 1996, and it’s slated to hit theaters next March. This third take will follow two Tomb Raider movies that saw Angelina Jolie play the main character in 2001’s Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and 2003’s Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life. There is no officially announced title for the new film, but Norwegian director Roar Uthaug, who also directed the 2015 catastrophe film “The Wave,” confirmed the start of production with a photo on his Instagram account. He posted a picture of a clapper board from the set, where Alicia Vikander, who won an Oscar last year for her role in “The Danish Girl,” will play Lara Croft. She beat out Star Wars actress Daisy Ridley, who was considered the frontrunner to play the title role. Add in “The Hateful Eight” star Walton Goggins as the main villain of the film and Daniel Wu, who previously starred in “Into The Badlands,” as a ship captain who helps Croft in her mission to find her father, and you have a cast that can take what won't be a great script and turn it into a hunk of rote, canned action move excess………

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