The Voices in Frank's Head

Some nut case posted a comment on one of my YouTube videos , claiming that I would be dead in 7 days unless I re-posted that comment on 10 other videos within the next hour. I promptly deleted it as spam. I'm not at all worried about my health or longevity. However, if by some weird fluke, I actually do leave this world on August 7, 2007 then I ask all of my dear readers to watch The Ring in my honor.

The National Weather Service is calling for rain tomorrow in Detroit. Maybe it will happen. Maybe it won't. The one thing that I know for certain is that Cinema D: The Detroit Film Festival will go on as planned regardless. In fact, the entire 4th Fridays with Ford program is a go - rain or shine. We have a spacious tent reserved for tomorrow that will encompass most of the north lawn of Campus Martius Park . No matter what Mother Nature has in store for us, Cinema D will once again celebrate indie filmmaking in Detroit. Our features this month are Human Achievement , a feature-length drama by Dan Jones that won "Best Feature" at the East Lansing Film Festival, and Selitoya , a dramatic short film by Tim Krynicki that won "Best Short" at the Moving Media Festival earlier this year. In addition, we have free concerts from Lola Morales and Maxi Priest as well as the Black Bottom Collective. Really. How much better can it get? Oh, and let's not forget ...

I was scrolling through the Detroit Fashion Pages this afternoon, checking out their photos from recent events, and what do I see? Lil' ol' me. That's me in the charcoal gray suit talking with Stacy, a jewelry designer from Pontiac, and her bartender friend. We were on the veranda of the Detroit Yacht Club at sunset. My friend Dan's face is just barely visible to the right.

A little over a week ago, my brother Mark got a summons for jury duty. I took it as a opportunity to give him an inordinate amount of grief. Mark, of course, just smiled. Normally, I would feel guilty about making fun of someone misfortune - even if the "misfortune" is nothing more than jury duty. However, this is my brother. We've been given each other grief like this since he was still in diapers. But here's the thing: guess what I just got in the mail today. If and when Mark finds out, I am never going to hear the end of this one.

Today is Melissa Theuriau's 29th birthday. On the (very) remote chance that she ever finds her way to this blog, I wish you on the best on your birthday! You make me wish I paid more attention in French class.

Ann Marie Weinert , the kick ass narrator from my documentary on the Book-Cadillac Hotel in Detroit, made this short film called Strip Poker . It's funny as all heck. If only the video kept going for another few seconds.

I have to admit, there are moments when I didn't think it would arrive. But it's almost here. Just a couple more hours. And then it's the weekend. Tomorrow, I'm heading to Ann Arbor for a meeting with producer of my next film. It's also gives me a chance to grab some tacos from Tio's. (I don't know what they put in those things but their tacos are absolutely addictive.) As for the rest of my weekend, thanks to the folks at Netflix, I'm having a Godfather marathon; watching all three of "The Godfather" movies in a row. It's something that I've always wanted to do, but never got around to.

It was almost 700 years ago, on Friday, October 13th, 1307, that King Philip IV of France ordered his royal officers to arrest every member of the Knights Templar . Henceforth, whenever the 6th day of the week (Friday) was also the 13th day of the month, it has been considered a very bad omen. Of course, I have my own tradition for Fridays the 13th. I run out and buy a lottery ticket. I've always had reasonably good luck on this occasion, just not good enough to win the lottery - or at least not to date since today's drawing hasn't happen.

It was three years ago today that my father, also named Frank Nemecek , left this world after a long battle with asbestosis and pneumonia . Where ever you are, Dad, I miss you. July 12th will never again seem like just another day.

The old proverb insists that a picture is worth a thousand words. In some cases, like the one to the left, it's also worth a thousand laughs. Kudos to my friend Kim for posting this photo over on her MySpace page .

There was so much to do this past 4th of July weekend (and what a long one it was). I made a brief appearance at Cityfest on Saturday. For the most part, though, I just watched a lot of movies. Jessica Alba was amazing in Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer . (I almost wrote that she was "fantastic" in that role, but saying that would just be too easy.) The movie really had everything you could want in a summer action flick including, well, Jessica Alba. Thanks to Netflix, I also saw: Who Killed the Electric Car? It was a great documentary about the EV1 , a battery electric car produced by GM and then abruptly pulled off the market. Whale Rider I've been meaning to see this movie for a couple of years now and I finally got a chance to. It was so good that I'm kicking myself for not renting it sooner. I also saw John Tucker Must Die . It's not a surprise that this one didn't pick up any Academy Award nominations, but it was still a fun movie to...

One of the great things about the web is that anyone can set up their own site. With a few million people doing it, you get a lot of stuff that's a waste of your time and some that just plain crack me up. Enter: Hot Chicks with Douchebags

To all of my neighbors south of the border: Happy Canada Day! To all of my fellow Detroiters: isn't it great that we're the only people, besides Santa Claus and his elves, who get to call Canadians our neighbors to the south?

I laughed so hard from watching this video that I out of my chair. The Dangers of Oral Sex!

I was working on the set for a local band's music video the other day. It's been awhile since I've done one. I figured it was about time. Anyway, the band had some fans show up to be groupies for this video. The interesting thing is that one of the young women who came clearly had more stuffed into her tube top than just herself. At first, I didn't think much about it. She wasn't the first woman to try such a thing and I doubt she'll be the last. The problem was that after an hour or so, whatever was in her top started to fall downwards. It wasn't long before her "boobs" were extending almost to her abdomen. (How it was that she didn't notice herself is beyond me, but that's another subject all together.) I knew I couldn't put something like this in the video, but I really wasn't sure how a gentleman could possibly tell a woman something like this. I called one of my friends, Lee Runchey , hoping to get some advice on how to ...

It looks like I'm not the only person who is a fan of Keira Knightley . Ever since the two of them started working together in the upcoming movie The Edge of Love , Sienna Miller simply cannot stop singing Keira's praises according to a recent published report . I have to say, though, after reading more about The Edge of Love , I'm really looking forward to seeing it. Not only does it have Keira Knightly and Sienna Miller; it's also being directed by John Maybury , who directed Keira in another cool indie flick The Jacket . Plus, as if that's not enough, the screenplay for The Edge of Love was written by Sharman MacDonald - Keira Knightley's mother. With all of that tying things together, life on the set of The Edge of Love must have been interesting.

In the spirit of the PC/Mac commercials, someone has posted a series of DC/Marvel comics commericials on YouTube. They simply crack me up. This is the most recent one. The rest of them are available here .

There are something that I simply can't believe when their forwarded to me by email. I'm not talking about the ones that claim I'll make oddles of cash by forwarding some stupid email to 10 of my friends. I know enough not to fall for that cyber-garbage. I'm talking about the news stories that I get. The ones so odd that they make me do a double take. Saks Fifth Avenue is a perfect example of this. The Associated Press reported recently that the U.S. Postal Service had issued the shoe department at Saks. A shoe department with its own ZIP code? Granted, it's an impressive shoe department: 8,500 square foot showroom; VIP room for private shopping; Shoe repair available; Spacious seating; and Refreshments (to prolong the dropping in "shop 'til you drop"). Of course, in hindsight, I shouldn't be too suprised that Saks convinced the post office to issue a ZIP code for its shoe department. It all goes back to what Seth Godin talked about in his ...

Memorial Day Weekend 2007 is now in the history books. 4th Friday was an unqualified blast. The press conference went off without a hitch. After it, I managed to sneak over to the Ren Cen to see Keira Knightley in Pirates of the Caribbean . The movie was so good that I would have been happy to watch even if it didn't have Keira in it. Of course, the fact that it did have her in it just made things that much better. Later that night, Mitch Ryder proved that he can still rock just as hard as he did years ago. I was introduced to The Flask , a new rock band that includes Kid Rock's former lead guitarist Kenny Olson - they were scary good. Take a look at their MySpace page for a list of upcoming shows and samples of their music. If any of them are near you, I definately recommend checking them out. Oh, and after all of the concerts, there was some guy who showed a few indie films in Campus Martius Park. After that ended at around 1 in the morning, Nicole and I headed...

I wondered, in a post last week, what would happen if I included a reference to both Melissa Theuriau and 1731 Seminole in one post since those were the two most common keywords to be used when people found this blog in one of the various internet search engines. I even went so far as to wonder what would happen if I started the rumor that Melissa Theuriau was now living in 1731 Seminole or, better yet, that she was starring in a porn that was being filmed at 1731 Seminole. Well, thanks to Google Analytics and a week's worth of results, I now have the answer to that question. Adding a reference to 1731 Seminole in my most recent post brought eight new people to my blog via Google and the other search engines. I didn't get any new traffic by mentioning Melissa Theuriau's name, but that might have been different if I spelled her name correctly the first time. Opps!