09-24-2005

741) Hustle and Flow. It got kind of "feel good" at the half way point and lost something, but up til then it was brilliant.

742) 8 Seconds. Sarah is such an Okie sometimes...

742 down, 258 to go.

Alabama 24 - Arkansas 13

Ugly ugly ugly win. This trap game had me nervous but, no thanks to the receivers (WTF? CATCH THE DAMN BALL) and Christensen (ALL YOU DO...ALL WEEK LONG...IS PRACTICE KICKING FIELD GOALS! WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU MISSING THEM?) we managed to pull it out. I'm too stressed out to watch anymore football so I'm headed to the movies to try and get this tingling in my left arm to subside.

09-23-2005

739) Slash. When you hear the band, you'll root for the scythe wielding maniac.

740) Lord of Illusions. This came out right after In the Mouth of Madness and I really wanted to see it because I thought it would be another one of those screw with your mind horror pictures. Instead it's more like a neo-noir, Phillip Marlowe if written by H.P. Lovercraft instead of Chandler kind of deal. Weird, but pretty good.

740 down, 260 to go.

Rocky Top, you'll never be...

As if we didn't need more reasons to think the Vols are douche bags....

Like a bat out of hell...

...I'll be gone when the morning comes...

God bless, did I just quote a Meatloaf song? So...dirty...won't...wash...off...unclean...UNCLEAN...

So Bama kicks off at 11:30 AM tomorrow morning and that makes me nervous. First off, I have a bad tendency of thinking "yeah, I'll be awake by then, no need to set the alarm" when we play in the morning and then 12:30 rolls around and I turn on the TV to find us down 14 points against Ole Miss with Peyton Manning on the sidelines visiting his little brother and doing the whole smarmy "this is a good Alabama team, they always have good players, the key isn't to get comfortable on the lead" thing and the whole time you know he's thinking "I'm Peyton Manning, bitch!" Sorry, bad memories from two seasons ago. So...dirty...Wait. Anway, like I was saying, I'm a little nervous about tomorrow's game. Logically, we should straight up murder the Razorbacks. I'm talking "5 in the chest and Mike Shula screaming "Riverside, motherfucker!" at centerfield" murder, but my inner pessimist is cautioning me not to get too eager. We've lost the last two. Arkansas always plays us tough. Despite their bottom dwelling status in the SEC the series is at 8-7 Bama. Orson picked us to win. It's on JP Sports, and only in the weird alternate universe of Jefferson Pilot broadcasting can Mississippi State beat Florida. Nutt might decide to throw out the playbook, find out if Robert Johnson's bargain with the devil was a good one, and give him the Matt Jones treatment, all "well, it's the 4th quarter and we're down. Here's the ball, just go do something." You can't defend that sort of random playcalling. So I'm setting my alarm for 11:00 and hoping for the best. Roll Tide.

09-22-2005

737) Kids. I'm going to go with exploitational trash on this one. You can use the gangsta rap "this is real, it's happening every day" excuse and claim it forces parents and kids to acknowledge the dangers around them, but give me a break. Kids that do this kind of stupid shit are going to do it no matter how their parents feel because they think it's cool. It's like that anti-drug commercial where the girl takes the egg and cracks it in the frying pan and is all "this is your brain" and then she takes the frying pan and smashes up the kitchen and is all "this is your brain on drug" and the marketing research showed that it made kids want to do drugs because smashing up a kitchen with a frying pan looked like fun. Same with this. But wait, Chloe Sevigny (sp?) gets HIV and Telly has it and is spreading it around and then his asshole friend gets it because he rapes Chloe so it's really a warning, you say? Bullshit. That Korine kid wrote the script because he thought that shit would make him look cool all "check this out, this is my life man, doing nothing but smoking dope, drinking beer, hanging out and bagging sluts" and the scumbag that directed it just wanted to film a bunch of young girls getting it on. Seriously, can we please get another incredibly long and uncomfortable sex scene between two minors? Is that possible? You maybe could have squeezed in a few more if you'd just cut out all that pesky dialogue, fucking pervert. Watch Thirteen if you want a message movie. HATE.

738) Four Faces West. Ah, westerns....eases the pain....

738 down, 262 to go.

CAAAAALLLLIIIIFFFOOOOORRRNNNIIIIAAAAAAAA!!!
The Dean of Discipline has to be the worst character in a show EVER. Be a stage hand for the drama club or I'll kick you out of school? WTF? He can't do that. And that whole Taylor deal, you know they are going to have Seth and Summer finding out that she and The Dean of Discipline are doing it. And for real, I just can't get over this douche bag Dean of Discipline. I hate that guy.

No apology necessary...

Seriously, how else was she supposed to maintain that figure?

09-21-2005

735) Bad Taste. Dork that I am, I was always proud to say that I had seen Meet the Feebles before anyone had ever heard of Peter Jackson. I rented it when I was 11 at the Movie Gallery when it was still in the Palisades (that's life growing up in the 'wood right there) and when I watched it I was like "how did they let an 11 year old kid rent this?!" That movie was messed up, people. But now that I'm thinking about it, that was a shady place anyway. I remember always wanting to rent Ilsa - She Wolf of the SS from there, but I was always afraid to, not because I thought they wouldn't let me, but because I was really actually a little scared of the movie. It looked so insane that I had to see it, but I never have gotten up the nerve and I've never seen it in a movie rental place again. So yeah, the fact that they had Ilsa - She Wolf of the SS in with the regular library selections should tell you something. Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, they had a ton of movies like that. That place was insane. So anyway, I would always get film snobby about having seen Meet the Feebles and then I would always get "well have you seen Bad Taste?" and my gigantic, egotistical head would shrink back to normal size and I'd have to say no. But NO MORE! I'VE SEEN BAD TASTE, BITCHES, AND IT'S APTLY TITLED! Really though, it's a great movie. Not for the faint of heart, because the gore and gross out level on this one is high, but as a first movie it's astounding. It reminded me of Sam Raimi's The Evil Dead a lot. Both are purile, boyhood fantasy, slapstick splatterfests, but they both are helmed by first time director's with obviously immense talent who use deft camera work and inventive homemade effects to create a movie that is way better than it should be. Disgusting, but hysterically funny at times, and well visualized. I'm impressed.

736) All the Real Girls. On 16 Horsepower's recommendation. He was right, they nailed the accents. Most movies really try to play up the southern but for some reason speech coaches and producers never seem to realize that 95% of the time everyone talks alike while it's the other 5% that stands out. So you can tell them to talk slow and elongate their vowels all you want, but if you don't also tell them to reign it in and make sure to get the regional colloquialisms down pat they just sound like assholes trying to do an impression instead of a real southerner. Anyway, the accents were nailed, the only thing keeping Zooey Deschanel from overtaking Cate Blanchett in the who will be Todd's favorite actress contest is my inability to pronounce her name (It's not you Zooey, It's me), and the storytelling was well done. Sarah and Charity were bored to tears, but they're like that. I liked the idea of telling a longer story in smaller vignettes so you get the overall feel of the thing instead of concentrating on the details.

736 down, 264 to go.

09-20-2005

733) A Time for Killing. I was almost kind of pissed about the Union getting Glenn Ford and Han Solo while we get stuck with George Hamilton, but then we also got Harry Dean Stanton and JETHRO! Seriously, Jethro was a psycho in this one. If the CSA had an air force, or even reasonably strong birds, they could have dropped in the middle of the Army of the Potomac with a knife in each hand and he would have gutted half their forces before they brought him down. He was THAT psycho. Anyway, am I wrong in getting a mixed message from the director here? Isn't the idea of making a movie about the futility of war set during the war that ended slavery a little off somehow?

734) Last of the Comanches. This had the weirdest dialogue of any western so far. Broderick Crawford always played kind of a tough guy in noirs and so they wrote his part like that, so he's talking to the indians all "Are you on the level?" and using fifties hard-boiled slang. It's crazy. Also, I might have to rethink my whole drowning would be the worst way to die stance. Flaming arrow through the stomach? Has to suck.

734 down, 266 to go.

- I don't know why Hot Corn, Cold Corn is stuck in my head but it's driving me crazy. I literally haven't heard the song in years but the other day at work I kept having to go upstairs and then back downstairs and I started thinking "upstairs, downstairs, I'll be in the kitchen..." and ever since then...

09-19-2005

732) Stranded. It's a Spanish production, so the dubbing makes sense, except that the actors were clearly speaking English when it was shot. Their lips completely match up to their words so the effect is like a cross between Spaghetti Western dialogue and Anime voice overs. "I am talking normally now...HEY! SOMETHING IS FUNNY! HAHAHAHAH! Again I shall speak normally..." And besides that, the movie just sucked. Did they have a script at all? Cause Gallo seemed like he was just making up his lines. Which, knowing Gallo, that's quite possible but everyone else's dialogue was so terrible and "I might be a waiter now, but I just joined an improv acting troupe to hone my skills! Big things are a coming!" All of the acting was horrendous too, but that was really the product of the terrible scripting and the weird effect of the dubbing. Plus, it just didn't go anywhere. I mean, I don't think I'll be spoiling a lot if I say that "they find something" but then it's just like "okay, we found something, don't know what it is, probably never will, roll credits." It was just dumb. Whatever.

732 down, 268 to go.

- Arrested Development is back, baby!

"I think I'm going to stay out here and watch that famous Reno sunset."
"Isn't that behind you?"
"Yes, but there are mirrors. It will actually look bigger."

Brilliant.

09-18-2005 2: And the Legend Continues...

Since 16 Horsepower (wasn't that a band?) called me out on not doing reviews yesterday, here's your updated version.

726) The Real Blonde. Again, Dennis Leary is the exception that proves the "All Indie Comedies Suck" rule. Plus, look at this cast: Bridgette Wilson-Sampras, so hot, want to touch the heiny. Catherine Keener. Christopher Lloyd. Daryl Hannah. Pre-Comedy Central Dave Chappelle. Dennis Leary. Elizabeth Berkley (remember that Newsradio where Jimmy was going over the reasons he had dumped some people off his wife candidate list and he says "...and I found out that sweet girl from Saved by the Bell did a dirty movie."? Remember that? That was awesome). Kathleen Turner when she could still pass as a woman instead of Chandler's drag queen dad. Seriously, she used to be gorgeous, have you seen Body Heat? Marlo Thomas, yet another Friend's parent. Something fishy is going on here. Matthew Modine, an all star "that guy". Steve Buscemi, the other exception to the indie comedies suck rule. There's just no way this could have been bad.

727) Bride of Re-Animator. Still, too much gore. I get how the Re-Animator series could have a cult following, but I'm not ready for the Kool Aid just yet.

728) The 40-Year-Old Virgin. In honor of Brick Tamland's defeat of the Evil Genius. It didn't really live up to the hype, but only because I had just watched said defeat with a guy who couldn't stop carrying on about how incredibly funny it was and how I HAD to see it. It was in fact, hysterically funny. Funnier was the fact that two little old ladies (one of them had a cane, people) entered into the theater and the few of us youngsters looked at them like "oh crap, this is not a movie they should see" but the little old ladies wound up laughing harder than anyone. On the way out I was right behind them and they were still laughing and one of them said "oh, that was cute!" Little old ladies. Awesome.

729) The Constant Gardener. I would probably like the book better on this one. Probably I just wasn't in the mood for a very deliberate, slow developing, HOT INTERNATIONAL POLITICAL INTIGUE ACTION! kind of movie at the time. It was good though, if you like that sort of thing, which I usually do. Like I say, probably just wasn't really in the mood for that kind of picture.

730) Lord of War. I did like this one though. Reminded me a lot of Blow at times, but much better.

731) Red Eye. I probably would have liked this more if there hadn't been a FUCKING CRICKET IN THE THEATER CHIRPING ITS HEAD OFF THROUGH THE ENTIRE DAMN MOVIE TO THE POINT WHERE IT WAS ALL I COULD HEAR AND WANTED IT DEAD AND DEAD AND DEAD UNTIL IT WAS COMPLETELY DEAD DEAD DEAD DEAD DEAD. That was Part the Second of why I was so pissed off when I got home last night. Part the First involves worlds colliding and the death of Independent Todd, which I found out about right before the movie. So I actually probably wouldn't have cared about the Cricket, except that I was already mad and it just stoked the flames. Oh, but that Cricket. If I ever meet him I'll dip is little green ass in chocolate and mail him to wherever it is that that's considered a delicacy.

09-18-2005

726) The Real Blonde.
727) Bride of Re-Animator.
728) The 40-Year-Old Virgin.
729) The Constant Gardener.
730) Lord of War.
731) Red Eye.

731 down, 269 to go.