$81.3 million was pretty close; it actually hit $85.85 million. Not too shabby, although still somewhat behind Spider-Man and the Harry Potter flicks.

Bill Condon’s next movie will apparently be Dreamgirls. I’m quite happy that I won’t have to wait another six years for his next. It’ll be a remake of the stage musical, which I know nothing about; the storyline isn’t terribly compelling to me. But hey, it’s Condon.

A while back I pointed to the University of California’s online academic text archive. Robin Laws put this to good use, discovering a collection of Hollywood screenwriter interviews. I’m gonna read just about all of those.

Screw it — while there are three or four 2004 movies I want to see that I could see if I was willing to delay this puppy another couple of weeks, I’m gonna go with what I’ve got. The rules, as per last year: This is the list of my ten favorite movies of 2004. I didn’t see every movie I wanted to see, so I can’t claim it’s the ten best movies of 2004. I’m also being a little liberal about foreign flicks; if it was made in 2003 but was released in the US in 2004, or if it hasn’t been released in the US yet but I saw it in 2004, I’ll count it as a 2004 movie within reason. E.g., Days of Being Wild was released in the US in 2004, but was made in 1991, so it doesn’t get on the list. ...

My Boston Angel campaign will, of course, be called Whitey’s Angels.

Andrew Sullivan passes on extensive quotes from a Stratfor report on Iraq. I’m not entirely sure you can characterize Stratfor as “pro-war,” but they are a significant private intelligence agency and their conclusions bear examination. From the quotes, it boils down to the insurgency having become self-sustaining and the US not having enough forces to contain it.

“I’m blogging your T-shirt.”

The biggest reason I value David Neiwert’s reporting is the simple, matter-of-fact way he reminds us that yes — the rhetoric of the right is extreme and unacceptable. His latest post on the subject is a great example. It’s so obvious: “I say start executing the leftists in our country, soon.” That’s flat out ugly and it’s not an exceptional case.

Interesting factoid: Alberto Gonzales, nominee for the post of Attorney-General, apparently believes Gavin Newsom, as an elected executive of the government, has the right to take a stand against laws he considers unconstitutional: MR. GONZALES: Senator, I do believe there may come an occasion when the Congress might pass a statute that the president may view as unconstitutional. And that is a position and a view not just of this president, but many, many presidents from both sides of the aisle. ...

For Sean Stewart fans, there’s an eight page comic book (original) featuring Perfect Circle’s DK up on the web. Steve Lieber illustrated it. It’s good.