Ah, January. How sad your box office is.

Expanding to wide release after a limited Christmas Day opening is “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus,” now famous for being Heath Ledger’s last movie. It’s also Terry Gilliam’s latest Weird Thing That Only Terry Gilliam Understands. I was not fond of it.

I was even less fond of “Leap Year” (review at Cinematical), which follows the tradition of terrible movies aimed at women being released in January. So far, it’s the worst movie of the decade, but it probably won’t hold that title for very long, not with “Tooth Fairy” on the horizon.

In limited release is “The Young Victoria” (review at Film.com), a rather sumptuous and pleasant account of Queen Victoria’s early reign, and her marriage to Prince Albert. Emily Blunt plays the young queen splendidly, and there has been some talk of her getting an Oscar nomination for it.

“Youth in Revolt,” a dark comedy starring Michael Cera as a dweeby teen who creates a studly alter ego, was screened for critics way back in November. For some reason I missed that screening, probably because I figured there’d be another one before it opened. I was wrong. Review to come.

“Daybreakers” — about vampires, and Ethan Hawke — is one of Hollywood’s Shameful Secrets®, not screened for critics before opening. It’s a new year, but a lot of things are still the same.

In case you missed them, here are my end-of-2009 pieces: The Best and Worst Movies of 2009; and Eric’s Media Inventory: What I Watched and Read in 2009.

And hey! Remember how the Online Film Critics Society announced its awards a couple days ago? Well, we also did a video presentation, which you can see below. It’s split into two sections. I appear at the beginning of the first section and the end of the last section, and I employ sophisticated special effects.

To sign up for the “In the Dark” e-zine, which brings you all the new movie reviews, DVD releases, and other pertinent info in one handy weekly e-mail, visit this page.

Briefly, here are some items of interest that may interest you if you are a fan of items.

This week’s edition of Eric’s Time Capsule at Film.com celebrates “This Is Spinal Tap,” which turned 25 yesterday. Happy birthday, brilliant movie comedy! Like “Waiting for Guffman,” I view this as an excellent litmus test of whether someone has a sense of humor that is compatible with mine. If you don’t think these movies are funny, we can maybe still be friends, but not very good friends, like maybe we talk every few months is all.

Also, I reviewed “Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li” over the weekend, also for Film.com, and found it to be not very good! Not very good at all!

Finally, here’s a clip from “Late Night with Conan O’Brien” in which Louis C.K. indicts a generation of spoiled whiners: “Everything’s amazing, and nobody’s happy.”

If you have somehow not seen the commercial for the Snuggie — the blanket with sleeves! — watch it first.

Then watch this parody, which has some PG language, by Jack Douglass.

Sure, we’re sequestered in Portland, unable to spend Christmas with the family in Southern California, but that’s no reason to be gloomy! Here are four videos that will spread good cheer throughout the land.

First of all, while I was disappointed by Mother Nature’s recent treasonous acts, at least I wasn’t quite as devastated as these girls were when David Archuleta lost on “American Idol”:

Next, did you know that if you take a video of Jeff Goldblum and slow it down to half-speed, he sounds totally drunk? Here is the evidence. Imagine getting this phone call at 2 a.m. some Saturday night:

Continue reading…

I neglected to tell you that “Dear Zachary,” one of the year’s best films and an extraordinarily moving documentary, was airing last Sunday on MSNBC. I totally forgot. Did MSNBC promote it? Would someone who never watches MSNBC have had any way of knowing it was coming up?

Anyway, we are in luck, because MSNBC is showing it again this Sunday at 1 p.m. PST (4 p.m. EST). Set your DVR and steel your emotions for an engrossing true-crime drama, a touching tribute to a murdered friend, and a gut-punching story about good’s attempt to triumph over evil.

In the meantime, avoid reading too much about the film. My review is safe, and so is the trailer (below), but some reviews and YouTube comments have been careless about spoilers. The less you know beforehand, the better.

P.S. I’m told that while the theatrical version has some swears — and you’d swear too, in these circumstances — they’ve been bleeped for MSNBC’s broadcast.

Clips of people accidentally saying naughty words on live television are a common theme on YouTube. But here’s one from a couple days ago that’s extra-noteworthy. It’s Joe Scarborough dropping the F-bomb on his MSNBC program “Morning Joe.” (The clip is uncensored. Do not listen to it if you don’t want to hear the F-word.)

It’s funny first of all because, like Ron Burgundy before him, he doesn’t even realize he said it. He has no idea that anything is wrong. It’s also funny because Joe Scarborough looks like Bill Pullman.

But then it’s also a little bit like rai-ai-ain on your wedding day because as it happens, Scarborough has been one of the main proponents of heavy FCC fines for exactly this type of slip. This Salon article (which also uses the F-word once) quotes him railing against the FCC for letting Bono go unpunished when he dropped the F-bomb during an awards show. He also spent several minutes ridiculing Barbra Streisand for using the word in a concert. Scarborough went so far as to say that he, personally, never uses such language. [Whoops, I misread that. See my correction in the comments.]

It’s a good thing the FCC only has jurisdiction over broadcast networks and not cable. If Scarborough’s show were on broadcast TV, then by his own reasoning he’d have to be in favor of the FCC fining him. OH SNAP!

Rejoice, “30 Rock” fans! The season premiere won’t air on the old-fashioned televisions until next week, but it’s on the Internets NOW! You can watch it! Not next week, but NOW!

Why would you want a doll that laughed incessantly? And why would you make a commercial THIS creepy unless your real intention was to terrorize children? (Not that I oppose the terrorizing of children, mind you. I just want advertisers to be up front about it.)

The only thing worse than a stupid person is a stupid person who thinks she’s smart. This woman, a crazy-eyed Virginia voter who is basing her vote on whoever “has the most faith in the Lord” (and that’s just the tip of the iceberg), has a smug, self-righteous look on her piggy face that makes me want to slap her.

[UPDATE: The video has been removed from YouTube. It was from a PBS segment, and you can watch it here. This woman comes on at about 8:30, but start at 6:10 to see her husband discuss his own views much more rationally.]

A transcript:

PBS: What’s the most important issue for you in this election?
TRACY KERLEE: The one that has the most faith in the Lord.
PBS: That’s make-or-break for you.
TRACY KERLEE: That should be make-and-break for everybody.
PBS: And when you hear people saying, “Well, we understand your faith, but what if you’re gonna vote against your husband’s interests as an American worker?”
TRACY KERLEE: The Lord will take care of us. That’s the way I look at things.
…
TRACY KERLEE: I can’t imagine having a president of the United States named “President Obama.” I really have a problem with that. And I am not the only one.
PBS: Because that means what to you?
TRACY KERLEE: His background. A mother that was a atheist. Oh! That really gets to me. A father that was a Muslim. That should get to EVERYONE.
PBS: And when Barack Obama and his wife Michelle say, “But we’re faith-based, we’re Christians”?
TRACY KERLEE: The church they were members of? That’s not the Christianity I know. That’s not the Christianity that’s in the Bible.
PBS: And so for you, you are firmly decided.
TRACY KERLEE: Definitely.
PBS: And what do you say to your husband, who is still on the fence?
TRACY KERLEE: I will pray for him. He knows what the right decision is.

Have you heard of Tally Hall? Well, you have now. I stumbled across this performance on a rerun of Craig Ferguson the other night, and I was instantly a fan. Visually, their gimmick is that each band member wears a specific tie, and they refer to each other by tie color. Musically, they’re catchy, clever, whimsical, and bizarre. (They also have an Internet sketch show that’s hit-or-miss.) This is their introductory song, “Welcome to Tally Hall.” I particularly enjoy the high-pitched screaming at about 3:15, and I’m sad to report that he doesn’t do that on the album version of the song.