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Had a reader pass this along. SNL returned last night with Tina Fey returning to host. And if this sketch is any indication it didn’t return with a bang.

Here we have Daniel Plainview hosting his own Food Network Show, I Drink Your Milkshake, wherein he travels around the country visiting different ice cream parlors and drinking people’s milkshakes. Sounds like a pretty obvious set up. You know, if you’re going to lampoon something that has become lampoonable, then why go for obvious?

But we take offense to this not funny sketch for several reasons. One, it’s just not funny. Using Daniel Plainview in a sketch has the potential to be incredibly funny and full of biting social commentary. Two, the guy playing Daniel Plainview does a pretty awful impersonation. It’s um, okay. Midling at best. Three, and this is hee-yuge, anyone who’s ever lived in Maine or visited Maine knows that there are no black people in the state. Next to Salt Lake City, it’s probably the white-est place on the Earth. Just saying.

Only moment of inspiration is when Tina Fey shows up as Juno. Even an appearance by Anton Chigurh can’t liven things up.

David Spade hasn’t been funny, or even mildly amusing, since Chris Farley was prowling the streets. But there was a time when he was funny. His schtick of being the schmarmy know-it-all had a good run. Even on his sitcom Just Shoot Me, it was clear he was the star of the show even though the show wasn’t about him (yup I’ve been watching the reruns).

So it’s always nice to see Spade show up and amuse us once again with his impersonation of Daniel Plainview from There Will Be Blood. He does a pretty decent job. Let’s be honest though, the real champ here is Radiohead guitarist Johnny Greenwood’s score for the film, which is used in this Funny or Die clip.

Not to be outdone, Epicurious has put out an Oscar-themed menu for a bevy of nominated films, including There Will Be Blood. Feeling ambitious? Why not try to make Atonement’s Beef Wellington with Gorgonzola. Other movies represented inlcude Michael Clayton (think bagels, steaks, etc.), Juno, and No Country For Old Men (some good ole Southwest barbeque).

And, yes The Oscars will go on. Producers are saying that regardless of the strike, the ceremony will not be cancelled. So does that mean we can expect Daniel Day-Lewis to take home the Oscar for best actor? We can only hope so. Dude was scary.

Daniel Day-Lewis has never been considered a movie star, the choices he makes as an actor are far from glamorous, but ever since watching his 1-2-3 punch of My Left Foot, In the Name of the Father and The Age of Innocence as a child he’s been one of my favorite actors around.

Curiously, I’ve still never seen The Last of the Mohicans in its entirety. Go figure. Judging by the early buzz and these interviews below we can’t wait to see P.T. Anderson’s There Will Be Blood.

Paramont Vantage has supplied interviews with stars Daniel Day-Lewis and Paul Dano. Dano, you may not have heard of but he was the philosophy obsessed mute kid in Little Miss Sunshine. This role seems to be a major step up for him as an actor. As for Daniel Day-Lewis, we’re told this is perhaps his most intense and frightening role to day - not faint praise for the man who brought us Bill “The Butcher” Cutting.

There Will Be Blood strikes for oil on Dec. 26 in limited release.

Lots of trailers have surfaced recently for a bunch of must-see flicks. Rather than do an individual post for each one, since there are a few, we’ll lump them into one gigantic super-deluxe packaging post. Afterall, it’s the first awesome day in Boston, weather wise, so not that we want to stay in doors.

We’ve got I’m From Barcelona’s Let Me Introduce My Friends, blasting out the speakers and you can imagine the mood around here is sky high. The 29-member Swedish twee pop band is like instant Kool-Aid, perhaps the Purplesaurus Rex variety. Instant seratonin once it hits your eardrums. But we’re not here for music. We’re here for trailers.

First up is James Mangold’s 3:10 To Yuma. Yes, it is a remake. But this one stars Russell Crowe as the baddest outlaw around. He’s so bad that once captured no one wants to transport him to the train station. One very good man does, portrayed by Oyster favorite Christian Bale. Of course, Crowe’s gang doesn’t want him to go to jail so they make an attempt to intercept the caravan. Riveting stuff. The trailer is perfect in that it makes you wish the movie was coming out next week, but doesn’t give much away as well.

Next, is the latest Coen Brothers flick No Country For Old Men. Paramount Vantage is releasing the movie, which generated a ton of buzz from Cannes this year. Of course, it’s the Coen Bros. and even their missteps are worth noting. And this one is based on the acclaimed Cormac McCarthy novel of the same name. The story is about an illegal drug deal gone awry at the Mexican-US border. Love that the Coen’s are going back to the feel of Blood Simple.

Audiences get an early sneak peak at Pixar’s Wall E. It’s a nice trailer, in that, by taking a look back at all the old Pixar films they tie in the excitement to the new movie based on the nostalgia for those first few Pixar films. It’s brilliantly done in that respect.

And finally, the reclusive writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson, who hasn’t been heard of since 1999’s Magnolia has a new film in the works. It’s called There Will Be Blood. It stars Daniel Day Lewis and focusses on the early American oil tycoons. The trailer comes courtesy of Cigarettes and Red Vines - a P.T. Anderson resource. Anything with Daniel Day Lewis is a-okay in these parts.

So that’s that. Go enjoy the day folks!