GT,

Have you seen Beasts of the Southern Wild? If not, do so when you have a chance. I think you'll be back here to report that it's mo better than Silver Linings Playbook to the same extent that Silver Linings was better than Argo. I saw those three in that order - Argo, Silver Linings, Southern Wild - and there's no question in my mind Southern Wild was the most daring and exciting. And that's even though it featured a couple of plot points even more preposterous/ludicrous than those in the other two. I found a lot to like in Silver Linings, up until it turned into Saturday Night Fever in the final 30 minutes, and although the two leads gave impressive performances, I thought De Niro mailed in one the flabbiest turns of his career.

FWIW, I just spent the last couple of days supervising a film crew making a commercial for a cell phone company in Manhattan - they used my old loft as a location. Interesting to see, even on a piece that will likely run no longer than 45 seconds, the creative fluctuation between the narrow mood requirements of the genre and the improvisational fortuities that arise even with on-camera talent as innocuous as those on a commercial shoot. Also cool to see an all-digital photography set-up - they used the ARRI Alexa, the camera that killed film - and fascinating how multinational film crews have now become.

Speaking of impressive, a huge tip of the hat to Baalke for leveraging low round picks so well this year. So far he has traded away a 5th, a 6th and a 7th round pick and in return gotten Anquan Boldin, Colt McCoy and a better 6th round pick.

Add on the Alex Smith trade for a 2nd and possibly another 2nd next year, as well as the signings of Phil Dawson and Nnambdi Asomugha, and we're talking about one hell of a flea market haggler.

Somewhat interesting that this offseason the team is adding "name" players rather than some of the relative unknowns of the past couple of years. Let's hope the names make as big an impact as those unknowns.