Water Cooler Topic #3
An easy ride to the top
The Nicolas Cage comic book vehicle Ghost Rider blazed into the top spot at the box office last weekend, pulling in a hefty $52 million for the four-day holiday break. The film led the way to a record-setting gross for films opening during President’s Day weekend.

Adam’s take: Ghost Rider is quite the unique film, in that it follows a lead character that is straight from hell. Ironically, sitting in a theater watching it makes you feel like you are actually in hell (that has to be by design). Cage is one of our country’s finest actors, but nobody is going to ever accuse him of not taking a film for a pay check. Speaking of which, if hammy motorcycle-filled movies are your thing, you are in luck; Wild Hogs, a dud starring John Travolta, Tim Allen and Martin Lawrence, opens the first weekend in March.

Pete’s take: Remember when Nicolas Cage was the biggest actor in America? He’d just won an Oscar for Leaving Las Vegas and bulked up into a physical beast. Taking a look at his Imdb.com page, the guy who once played a stoner in Fast Times at Ridgemont High starred in Con Air, The Rock, Face/Off, and City of Angels back-to-back-to-back in the late '90s. If that’s not a murderer’s row of mega-budget, huge grossing hits, I’m not sure what is. And now, a decade later, we get Ghost Rider, which -- to my great dismay -- is not based on an early ‘90s PBS program about pubescent kids who solved mysteries. Sadly, there is apparently no Ghostwriter movie coming out anytime soon.

Water Cooler Topic #4
Pre-March Madness
With the college basketball season about to tip off conference tournaments, two perennial March Madness teams find themselves in unfamiliar bubble situations. Neither Duke nor Arizona are surefire locks to make the field of 64.

Adam’s take: Unless you‘re a Duke alum, I can’t imagine anyone not being giddy at the outside thought of Coach K and his Blue Devils missing the Big Dance. It is almost impossible to take any of the joy out of March Madness, but if anyone has the chance to ruin it, it is those annoying Cameron Crazies. Talk about a bunch of Adam Banks-esque cake eaters. Of course, my desire to see the Dukies knocked out in the first round of the NIT would have nothing to do with the fact that I graduated from Maryland. Nope, nothing at all.

Pete’s take: This will serve as a good test. Just how die-hard are these Cameron Crazies? Sure, it’s easy to paint your face and go nuts when your school has the No. 1 team in the nation, going up against UNC. But what about when Florida State is beating you on national television? Will the Crazies be pitching tents and lining up outside Madison Square Garden, waiting on lines to get NIT tickets come the last weekend in March? Do they still travel with their team as they do the NIT postseason circuit to schools like DePaul and Sienna? Sure enough, watch Duke sneak into the tournament as a fifth seed, catch a few breaks and make the Final Four. After that George Mason run last year, anything is possible. And yes, I just put Duke and George Mason in the same breath. How times have changed.

Water Cooler Topic #5
Britney in Wonderland
Former pop star/icon Britney Spears continued her fall from grace (and sanity) this month, by shaving her head with a pair of electric clippers. Spears followed the shoring by checking herself in and out of rehab, all while her parents tried to help their lost daughter through tough love, by freezing all of her credit cards.

Adam’s take: As jarring as Britney’s new hairdo might be, it’s still not as ugly as the mother of two’s parenting skills. While Spears is out self-medicating with drugs and turning herself into a cue ball, her two young toddlers are being neglected about as much as the 12th man on the Atlanta Hawks. Somebody needs to get Angelina and Brad on the phone, and see if they can adopt and rescue this endangered duo… yeah, don’t bother calling K-Fed either.

Pete’s take: My favorite rumor is that Britney panicked after K-Fed was going to have her hair tested for drugs, and then shaved her head to get rid of all the evidence. Couldn’t they do the same tests on her fingernails? Has she clipped all those too? Do we need to get in touch with a salon that does manicures in lovely Tarzana? All in all, this is just another chapter in what will be the greatest E! True Hollywood Story ever. Well, behind the one on the Barbie Twins, of course.

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