If you have a second and want to read something nutty, consider the kind of insane legal saga of Joe Francis, the creator of Girls Gone Wild, who is currently in jail on a tangled web of multiple charges that include civil suits, tax evasion, and “introducing contraband into a detention facility.”

Mr. Francis’s troubles started nearly five years ago when he included Panama City Beach, a Panhandle city of white-sand beaches on the Gulf of Mexico, in a highly publicized pay-per-view event from three Spring Break locations. “Girls Gone Wild” camera crews, who usually film college women at bars, parking lots, hotel rooms and other party hangouts, had been to Panama Beach City before, but in 2003 they arrived with unusual hoopla.

Mayor Sullivan took exception and law enforcement officials cracked down on acts of lewd behavior, which interfered with the filming. Mr. Francis sued the officials, claiming violation of his First Amendment rights, and got them to settle and back down. But Mr. Francis and some of his crew were arrested when the father of one of two women filmed in a shower scene at the hotel room the filmmakers had rented contacted the county sheriff’s office, saying the girls were minors.

The officials came down hard: They confiscated Mr. Francis’s Ferrari and private jet, announcing cocaine had been found on the plane. Mr. Francis was charged with more than 70 counts, including racketeering, drug trafficking, prostitution and promoting the sexual performance of children.

A judge ended up throwing out all but six of the criminal counts, which revolve around the use of minors in a sexual performance, because of a flawed search warrant. And as it turned out, no cocaine was found on the plane.

The best part of this article, by far, is the testimonial from Quincy Jones. Bonus wtf points!

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One of the main purposes of KFR’s existence is our continuing quest for “good garbage,” which is, in short, any aspect of pop culture that is surprisingly interesting. A movie, song, video game, TV show, comic, piece of graffiti, commercial, or anything that has a bit more going on underneath its disposable exterior.

A great, obvious place to look for this kind of quality trash has historically been B-movies, but there aren’t too many true wide-release low-budget flicks anymore; one of the reasons being that there seems to be fewer workmanlike directors who set out to make a cheap but solid, fun, unassuming flick with some style that doesn’t pretend to be anything else but entertaining. The question arises: where are the Roger Cormans of today? The Budd Boettichers? The Sam Fullers? Are guys like Richard Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino too self-aware to fall into this category?

I don’t want to oversell John Stockwell by putting him up there with that estimable company — he’s not nearly as innovative, artistic, or skilled. But still, he is one of the few working directors that can make a cheap, satisfying entertainment that doesn’t aspire to be anything beyond cheap and satisfying, and benefits from that attitude. That might be damning with faint praise, but at the end of the day, this is the thing: when a movie of his arrives on cable, I inevitably watch it, and inevitably I am surprised to find myself distracted and entertained.

In 20-30 years will the next generation of film nerds be reevaluating Stockwell’s catalog like they do Larry Cohen’s or Mario Bava’s? It’s tough to say. Stockwell’s films are very watchable, commendably economical, briskly edited, appealingly modest, never boring, and not stupid. He makes a legitimate effort to create real movies.

However, they’re also insidiously dopey, crassly commercial, and exist in a world that involves no chest hair and wet hard bodies (mainly women) in skimpy clothing. Then again, his movies seem aware of all this, and maybe that’s part of why they’re so fun to watch. There are much bigger Hollywood movies that are far worse and far more forgettable.

Anyway, let’s evaluate what the former actor — anyone remember My Science Project…? — turned director’s done so far (with the exception of Crazy/Beautiful, which I’ve never seen) using a special ratings scale/checklist we tailor made for this particular piece.

I recommend all three of these movies by the way. They’re above-average weekend afternoon or weekday night distractions. Read about all of ‘em right after the jump.

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Mi madre has towed the Masterpiece Theater line for decades. True story: Sunday night ca. 1977-1990 was always a bit of a TV drag for my brother and I. When that classy brass music came on WNET to accompany the video camera panning over leather-bound volumes of books, and then Alistair Cooke showed up, we knew what followed would be pure, delirious boredom. Oh TV, we put our trust in you — why did you betray us!?!

The funny thing is I’m guessing that a lot of the old school Masterpiece Theater programming was probably quite good, and most likely far ahead of its time; perhaps something of a low-budget precursor to the sharply produced, serialized TV narratives we enjoy today.

So next year Masterpiece Theater is splitting its programming into three differently themed “seasons.” Masterpiece Classic (period dramas) will run in the winter and spring. Masterpiece Mystery! is scheduled for summer. Finally, Masterpiece Contemporary will air during the fall. Each different season will have its own host. The announced host for Masterpiece Classic is none other than Gillian Anderson, who at this point must be Nimoy-level irritated with her close ties to the eternally geekariffic X-Files.

I guess the question is whether the programming has changed since we were kids? Well, Masterpiece Classic’s first offering is — I’m not making this up — The Complete Jane Austen. Zzzzzz. This one’s still for the ladeez, folks.

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Don’t see too many commericals these days with the DVR and whatnot, but just from having the local news on in the morning I’ve noticed a small but strange and notable advertising trend: older british women hawking household products. It caught my attention because there were two laws of American TV ads (and in most U.S. media) that I thought were set in stone: A) Americans don’t understand foreign accents so they should be avoided at all costs, and B) accents are HIGH. CLASS. (Exhibit A). No longer!

Anyway, first there’s the cockney-accented (I think?) charms of the Cheer laundress Rose Spires (”the dingies”).

And now there’s these Air Wick commericals — I think produced by Aardman…? — with the elephant married to the centipede, which is maybe more creepy than funny, but ok. It deserves points for eccentricity.

Most interesting I think is the unusual and somewhat brilliant Cheer campaign, which seems to be successfully making a bid to create a new mascot for adults — something we haven’t seen in advertising for a while (R.I.P. Mr. Whipple)…unless you want to count Mucinex’s unnerving Brooklyn-accented goober Mr. Mucus.

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Variant covers on issues of TV Guide are nothing new, so it’s not really a surprise that they’re doing it again with Heroes. However, this time they’re dipping directly into the nerd pool by having art by Jim Lee, Phil Jimenez, Tim Sale and Michael Turner slapped on the covers. They’re actually pretty nice looking, Sale’s aside, but with the new oversized format, obsessive collectors are likely to have conniptions trying to find and maintain a copy in mint condition. It’s too bad the series is going off the rail this season, or these might have actually been big sellers.

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So I’m watching Sesame Street with my daughter last week, and I notice a few easter eggs thrown in for the adult viewers. A taxi driving muppet is made to look just like a mohawked Travis Bickle in one episode, another features a CSI parody complete with a David Caruso muppet, etc. The most amazing adult bit I’ve seen so far just had to have been thrown in there for the dads.

As you know, they always pick some random word to assign a bit too in order to teach kids what the word means. On this particular episode, that word was “struggle” and they gave it to celebrity guest Tyra Banks to illustrate. So, for about a minute or so, I had Tyra Banks on my TV screen laughing about how much of a struggle it was for her to put on a sweater, all the while fighting and pulling and twisting to get this too-small bright yellow sweater over her head an on her body. Then, once she’s finally squeezed herself into the damn thing, she takes a breather, repeats the word “struggle” for the kids and then laughs about how much fun it’s going to be to take the damn thing off as she starts writhing about again just as the show cuts to the next lesson.

I really, really wish I hadn’t deleted this episode from my DVR, but it’s gone and oddly enough, a search online is turning up no copies of it. So my verbal description will have to suffice, though it most certainly doesn’t do the segment justice.

God bless the Children’s Television Workshop.

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The publicists for the new Sopranos: The Book have hit upon a goldmine for instant publicity: David Chase’s thoughts on the controversial ending to the series.

The interview, included in “‘The Sopranos’: The Complete Book,” published this week, finds Chase exasperated by viewers who were upset that Tony didn’t meet explicit doom.

Chase says the New Jersey mob boss “had been people’s alter ego. They had gleefully watched him rob, kill, pillage, lie and cheat. They had cheered him on. And then, all of a sudden, they wanted to see him punished for all that. They wanted ‘justice’ …

“The pathetic thing — to me — was how much they wanted HIS blood, after cheering him on for eight years.”

If anyone wants to argue the ending until we’re blue in the face, I’m here for you. But here’s my stance: it was brilliant.

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Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles is set to premiere on Fox January 14, 2008, at 8p.

“We came around thinking this is a golden opportunity to make ‘The Sarah Connor Chronicles’ part of the huge surge of excitement in January,” said Fox scheduling chief Preston Beckman, referring to the network’s January rating surge from the return of “American Idol” and “24.” “Fortunately, Sunday night is doing fine with our animated comedies, so we could do that.”

“Terminator: Sarah Connor” stars Lena Headey (”300″) as Sarah Connor, who, along with her son John (Thomas Dekker), battle attackers from the future. Linda Hamilton played the role in the first two features.

Huh. Pretty smart programming move, actually.

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