Watching The Watchers

Ooooooh how the times have changed. In the past the major newspapers would expose things like the Pentagon Papers or the occasional Watergate break-in. Now they’re ripping the covers off… our DVD rental habits?

Seriously: in major city by major city, postal code by postal code, the New York Times tells the United States the top films it’s borrowing from Netflix .

Here’s how things break down in the 90026. With three of the top five unseen by Susan and me clearly our viewing tastes differ somewhat from our Netflixing neighbors (films in bold are discs we’ve spun):

  1. Rachel Getting Married
  2. The Wrestler
  3. Burn After Reading
  4. Twilight
  5. Vicki Cristina Barcelona
  6. Milk
  7. I Love You, Man
  8. The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button
  9. Pineapple Express
  10. Changeling

Without checking out our queue, I’m pretty sure the only film of the four unseen on our list is Rachel Getting Married, but I’d be surprised if its lurking anywhere higher in our Netflix purgatory than, say,  Syriana , Babel or Infamous. If there’s a “Hell No!” option Twilight would get it from me. As to the other two? Meh. If they show up streamable through my PS3 via my Netflix on-demand list I might give ’em a play — like we did the fascinating James Toback documentary about Mike Tyson last night.

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Will

Will Campbell arrived in town via the maternity ward at Good Sam Hospital way back in OneNineSixFour and has never stopped calling Los Angeles home. Presently he lives in Silver Lake with his wife Susan, their cat Rocky, dogs Terra and Hazel, and a red-eared slider turtle named Mater. Blogging since 2001, Will's web endeavors extend back to 1995 with laonstage.com, a comprehensive theater site that was well received but ever-short on capital (or a business model). The pinnacle of his online success (which speaks volumes) arrived in 1997, when much to his surprise, a hobby site he'd built called VisuaL.A. was named "best website" in Los Angeles magazine's annual "Best of L.A." issue. He enjoys experiencing (and writing about) pretty much anything creative, explorational and/or adventurous, loves his ebike, is a better tennis player than he is horr golfer, and a lover of all creatures great and small -- emphasis on "all."