Wednesday, August 09, 2006

Who is Dr. Lobotomy?

Wherein The Ken Jenning's quiz or 3 out 6 is bad


Last week I printed all seven questions along with my guesses. This resulted in plenty of search engine hits as many other people were googling the exact questions. Leading me to think that their search strategies aren't too creative and they're not taking the honor system too seriously. Perhaps, like me, they're playing along but not recording their scores.

About the questions, Ken Jennings wrote the following in one of his forums:
I may not make them available either, since those questions might be "re-purposed" for something else at some point. But maybe I should post them anyway.

Since they are his questions, I'll refrain from reprinting them in full.
  1. Serious bah! I should have known this.
  2. I had no knowledge of this.
  3. Turns out Dr. Lobotomy was a bad guess.
  4. Yea! An easy one.
  5. No idea why I knew this, but I guessed correctly.
  6. I knew this, because Where the Suckers Moon: The Life and Death of an Advertising Campaign is one of my favorite books.

For question 7, eight movies in chronological order. Half of them I haven't seen, so this might take some time. Perhaps something about undercover agents, deceit, or chess pieces.

I think I have #7 solved, or at least partially solved. Too much time spent in IMDB to claim a point, but then I'm not really playing. For anyone else playing who wants a clue: look for something in common with a member of each film's cast.

5 Comments:

Blogger XWL said...

My results varied
1. I remembered, blame Fellini, or Audrey Hepburn

2. Missed it too, but I think Sopwith Camel was a good bad guess.

3. I knew this, largely cause I had a grandmother who suffered from his namesake ailment.

4. Yea! Twas so, though I hate that I think of United Airlines as much as Gershwin with reference to that tune (though not nearly as much as I hate Carnival Cruises for using Lust for Life in their ads)

5. I blame Joan Collins for remembering who Bess was.

6. Best. Cars. Ever.

7. I went with the, films not screened in my kitchen, answer, probably not going to pass muster with that.

If your guess about #7 is correct, then a large chunk of Woody Allen pictures could be added to this list, or Ishtar.

Chinatown could be on the list twice, are there any films that have three or more qualifying actors?

8/09/2006 04:40:00 PM  
Blogger bill said...

I still need to doublecheck the other movies, but I think for Cinatown there's only one--Huston.

8/10/2006 06:04:00 AM  
Blogger XWL said...

Depends if you consider a cameo as counting. Then Chinatown counts twice, otherwise no (unless Roman's role is more than a cameo, don't recall).

Also, found a film I've never heard of with three qualifying actors.

A less obscure Casino Royale hits for a triple, too.

Also, the absolutely last movie you'd ever probably think of that has four qualifying actors.

8/10/2006 08:08:00 AM  
Blogger bill said...

By the wording of the question, I'm thinking there's more than each movie has a director as an actor.

Here's where I was going. For all five films, the five directors have won Best Director Oscars. AND each film has a director has an actor. My initial scan led me to think that each of these actor/directors also recieved an Oscar; unfortunately this doesn't seem to be the case with "Five Graves to Cairo." Erich von Sroheim was nominated, but I don't see a win.

8/10/2006 09:33:00 AM  
Blogger XWL said...

There is more to it, from Ken himself (or at least someone emailing from his blog and signing as Ken)

It's actually a little more specific than that, but you're very close.
Never heard of The Stupids.

Ken



I emailed him that awesome bit of trivia about 4 oscar nominated directors in the film The Stupids.

8/11/2006 08:10:00 PM  

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