three nights of catch-up

Sunday, August 15, 2004, at 12:04PM

By Eric Richardson

Time to catch up on a couple nights' worth of events...

Thursday evening we made our way over to Amboeba and were not disappointed. PJ Harvey played a short but focused set, and covered a good range of albums with her song selection. Thanks to traffic we missed the very beginning of the set, which I'm going to guess she started with The Letter, but that was the only disappointing part of the night. Sound was infinitely better than last time I saw an in-store there... I don't know what changed for that.

Friday night Kathy and I went to the Hollywood Bowl to see the the Tchaikovsky Spectacular. Now, I'm not really much for the symphony but it was cool none-the-less. I think that it's safe to say after Friday night that the new Hollywood Bowl shell is completely fireproof, as if not the fireworks (many of the spinning showers of sparks variety) would definitely have burned it down.

Last night Miggles, Kathy, and I made our way over to Hollywood and saw Collateral at the Arclight. It was only my second time seeing a movie in the dome, and I think I've come to terms with the fact that paying a little more is no excuse for seeing a movie there. It really is incredible; the sound and picture are both perfect. Collateral was cool since it was largely set downtown. A couple LA related things that I noticed:

  • Why did they pretend the Gas Company building (where the attorneys' office was set) was on Spring? When Jada Pinkett Smith first gets in the car she gives Jamie Foxx an address in the 300-block of Spring, but then their actual destination is the Gas Co, with a Grand street sign easily visible. It's one of those things that doesn't matter at all, which is why it's confusing. Why not just say it's on 5th or Grand or whatever street the building officially fronts?

  • When Jamie Foxx speeds up at the end he really speeds up. He's whistling through the above-ground/below-ground bit of 4th St, and then all of a sudden he's down south by Staples Center flipping his car.

  • Related to that scene... It's interesting that Collateral chose to date itself a bit by keeping the big Playmakers ad on the side of Hotel Fig. That would have seemed to have been a perfect spot for a little digital painting and a product placement.

  • I loved when Foxx runs by The Standard and steals the guy's cell phone. I sat there thinking, "Stupid Standard yuppy... Now he'll go complain about how unsafe downtown is."

  • Of course right after Foxx runs past the Standard (6th and Flower) he runs up the parking garage at "777 Tower". The logo for 777 was really familiar, and I couldn't place it for a second. Then I realized the parking garage is the one for 7+Fig, where Kathy and I parked Wednesday night on our way to CPK.

  • I'm sure the MTA wasn't all that thrilled about their placement in the film. "Call us Metro and we'll take you anywhere." Yet Cruise twice calls it the MTA. And then he dies on the Blue Line, which has enough image problems of its own without that help.

None of these really affect the movie, but I just found them interesting.