11 Things Maxim Learned This Week: Randy Lanier, ‘Left Behind,’ and Jim Harbaugh
Angry coaches make good television; Michael Keaton makes good movies; Dogs make good viral reservoirs.
1- Football fans like to watch angry coaches. According to a study, the three coaches shown more often than any others are Jim Harbaugh (91 times a broadcast), Bill Belichik (89 times a broadcast) and Chip Kelly (88 times a broadcast). To be fair, Kelly isn’t really that angry. He’s more voluble. He looks like he’d give great hugs. Harbaugh doesn’t hug. He winks.
2- The next big Ebola threat is your dog. Obama is considering appointing an Ebola Czar and infected NBC medical correspondent Nancy Snyderman is probably roving the countryside, but the most frightening news is that a Spanish dog named Excalibur has tested positive for the disease. If this thing gets going, you’ll want to avoid the dog park.
3- The internet is good for men’s style. The latest high-end brand to go direct to consumer through a spare, appealing retail site is name The Arrivals and they know their way around a leather jacket. A decade ago, a company like this would have had to follow a longer path (stocked in boutiques, stocked in department stores, local brick and mortar, national) whereas today they can nail three pieces and have at it.
4- Serbia v. Albania soccer is appointment viewing. A Euro 2016 qualifier devolved into a brawl earlier this week when a drone flying an Albanian nationalist flag descended on the field. Given that Albanian fans aren’t even allowed in the Serbian stadium – there might be fights – the ensuing brawl was a come-from-behind victory.
5- Randy Lanier is back on the streets. The racecar driver turned marijuana smuggler turned convict was released from a Coleman, Florida prison after a district judge signed a motion highlighting the nonviolent nature of his offense (moving a million pounds of the good stuff). He’s 60 and he’s got a bad hip, but we’re guessing the dude can still drive – and probably wants to.
6- Anyone who wants to see a “Left Behind” movie will see it opening weekend. After Nicolas Cage’s weirdest movie since whatever the last thing he was in debuted with a strong $2,398,396 box office showing on Friday, a stronger Saturday and a (not terribly surprisingly) weaker Sunday, the viewing public moved on to other apocalyptic fair. The adaptation of the wildly popular rapture-inspired series of novels is like HBO’s “The Leftovers,” but worse on every single level. Cage plays a guy cashing a check.
7- The elephant is the only mammal with four knees and the only mammal that can’t jump. Not a timely or actionable bit of information, but there you have it.
8- If you give video game developers enough rope they’ll hang themselves (and probably some other people as well). The aptly named Polish company Destructive Creations is set to release a new mass-killing simulator called “Hatred.” But don’t worry, it’s worse than it sounds. The game let’s you kill innocents with a knife if you get tired of your automatic. There is a trailer online, but we’re not linking to it.
9- Google isn’t invincible. The internet behemoth’s stock plummeted (roughly 3%) after it announced that it’s paid click growth has slowed. Don’t know what that means? Let us sum up: Google is in the advertising business and business is merely excellent. These are, literally and figuratively, rich people problems, but it also represents an apparentAchille’s heel. You can see it right there through the sandals made of gold and cash.
10- DC Comics wants to take on Marvel. Starting with 2016’s “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice,” the second biggest name in comics will release 10 films, including Aquaman, Flash and Wonder Woman vehicles. They’re already breaking out the colons so you know they’re serious.
11- Michael Keaton is good at movies. Whether you actually enjoy it or not – it’s a pretty exhausting ordeal – Alejandro González Iñárritu’s “Birdman” is entertaining, coarse, psychotic, edgy, funny, and bizarre all at the same time. The question remains: Could the director have achieved this effect by simply filming Michael Keaton’s spastically emotive face? Probably. Long live Beetlejuice.
Photos by Fox Searchlight