The Visitors

1993 time travel comedy

Rating: 16/20

Plot: A knight and his squire are transported by a senile wizard 800 years into the future. They have to simultaneously figure out life in the 20th Century while trying to return home.

This is a very amusing take on the stranger-in-a-strange land premise. leaning on slapstick and ironic situations to get more than a few laughs. It's very nearly whimsical! This film's shot well, and I really like an actor like Jean Reno in the lead role, a guy who is going to play it all so straight that it somehow makes it all even more hilarious. Narratively, this might get a little tiresome by the end, but it's a fun comic adventure and you know I'm a sucker for time travel movies that don't involve Kevin Costner. I wonder how much punnage and other word play I missed by having to read English subtitles for this one. You don't want to dig for depth with this one; it's more like a ninety minute joke peppered with punchlines, some intelligent and some dumb but most pretty funny.

Something Wild

1986 existential romantic comedy

Rating: 14/20

Plot: The good news--Successful businessman Charlie has just been promoted to vice president! The bad news--his wife and children have left him, and he's a little lonely. That's probably why he falls for Lulu, a free-spirited and sexually adventurous gal who kind-of kidnaps him for the weekend. They get busy in a cheap motel room before heading off to meet her mother and attend her high school reunion. That's where they meet Ray, played by an actor named Ray, Lulu's ex-husband who just got out of jail. Ray isn't happy to meet Charlie at all. Oh, snap!

As likable as I think Jeff Daniels is (and heck, the guy's very nearly lovable), his character is too dopey in this. I really had trouble rooting for the guy after a while, especially after Ray came along. Daniels' character suddenly had this wide-eyed hero-worship thing that was annoying. There's nothing wrong with Ray Liotta, but the movie jarringly shifted gears when he came along, changing from a quirky screwball rom-com to a quirky and unpredictable but ineffective thriller. I liked Melanie Griffith and the blend of flirtatious and naive that she brings to the character. And she's Melanie Griffith, so there's a little bit of naked in the movie. There's a whole lot of music in this, and I had to give a bonus point for The Feelies playing the high school reunion. This has an 80's feel, never good since the 1980's were the worst decade for cinema, but it recalls After Hours a bit with an everyman character being tossed around by the universe. I guess the difference is that Charlie has a little more control over his situation. Well, his nutsack does anyway. There's a Jonathan Demme quirkiness that makes this whole thing an entertaining weekend, a something wild about Something Wild that keeps it a notch above most other romantic comedies. And since I typed that last sentence, I probably shouldn't be allowed to blog anymore. So long, everybody!

The Legend of Drunken Master

1994 kung-fu movie

Rating: 16/20

Plot: Posters have invaded China, and folks are panicking. They call on Jackie Chan to save the day, and [Spoiler Alert! Although the poster to the left actually spoils it all anyway.] he uses his drunken fighter style to punch holes in the evil posters. Comically.

I didn't think much of Jackie Chan before I saw this movie. I had seen a couple fistfuls of kung-fu flicks and liked the genre, and everything I knew about Jackie Chan--his general reputation, the small sampling of his work that I'd seen--made me assume that he was like a kung-fu sell-out or something, too popular or new school to be worth my time. The Legend of Drunken Master floored me when I first saw it, and the terrifically creative and acrobatic fight scenes still floor me today. The plot of this one, along with some embarrassing dubbing and some less-than-stellar acting, isn't anything to write home about. Luckily, the bulk of this is made up of those action sequences. The first, mostly taking place beneath a train, shows off rapid movements and some choreography that utilizes every square inch of that confined space. But the fight scenes just get better and better. A lengthy climax in a factory is fast and furious and eye-popping, featuring a guy with legs that moved so quickly and rubbery that I thought for sure they were computer-generated legs. But I think I like the two fight scenes in the middle--one where the character first demonstrates his drunken style to beat down a collective of goons and another where he and a partner take on a ton of dudes with axes--even better. Jackie Chan's known for his stunts, his fluid movements, and his use of humor and props. Here, at nearly forty, Chan's at the top of his game, and if you're a fan of kung-fu movies at all, there are several action sequences that will have you reaching for the rewind button so that you can see them again. They're good enough to help you forgive all the attempts at humor that fall completely flat. The original Drunken Master movie from 1978 is also worth watching, by the way. Compared to this version, it's more traditional and not nearly as flashy, but it's still a solid martial arts flick with that white-haired old guy Siu Tien Yuen who I really like.

The Talk of the Town

1942 romantic comedy

Rating: 17/20

Plot: Hunky Leopold Dilg is innocent! He's too Cary Grant not to be. Nevertheless, he's been arrested for arson and its subsequent arson. He manages to escape and retreat to his friend Nora Shelley's house, a house that has unfortunately just been rented to renowned law professor Michael Lightcap. Their philosophies clash while they half-assedly battle for the affections of Miss Shelley. As expected, a threesome ensues. And it's fiery stuff!

Cary Grant isn't as good an actor as either of his two co-stars, the sophisticated Jean Arthur or the cute-as-a-button Ronald Colman, but the three of them have this classy chemistry and get some nicely written stuff to bounce off each other. The dialogue's funny even though it failed to draw a single laugh from my melancholy soul, but I liked some of the philosophical/political stuff in there, the characters almost working more like symbols than actual people. This is one of the most literate screwbally script I've heard. I also really liked how this thing was shot. The quick edits of the preface set up the story in a cool way, and there was some interesting camera work during conversations with characters with some breakfast panning and the use of a stairway rail. I also really liked shots that managed to squeeze all the characters on the screen without seeming completely unnatural like a lot of movies from this era. You get all kinds of scenes where things are going on in the foreground while Cary Grant can be seen on the other side of a window. Director George Stevens knows how to utilize every inch of my television screen. There's one shot that befuddled me though. I don't recall a lot of close-ups in this movie, but there's this extreme close-up shot of a character named Tilney as he starts to cry. There were a few reasons why I liked the tears at that point in the movie, but I thought the close-up was odd. And I have to confess that I didn't really care for the ending of the movie at all.

Why Worry?

1923 silent comedy

Rating: 15/20

Plot: A guy probably named Harold travels to the tropics with his nurse and valet for convalescent purposes but ends up accidentally becoming part of a violent revolution. Viva la Harold Lloyd!

His character isn't really as likable here, but this swiftly-moving excursion is still fun. The protagonist (probably named Harold) is the type we laugh at because he's oblivious to what's going on around him, nearly for the entire movie. I liked the sight gags as he's exploring the town, mistaking men knocked unconscious for men taking their siestas. It's not until near the end that Harold (I'm guessing) undergoes a bit of an unbelievable undergoing and turns into Rambo. I easily could have done without the romantic subplot which seems like it was tacked on in a script rewrite or something. The best part of this movie isn't even Lloyd actually unless you've ever wanted to see what a Harold Lloyd movie would be like if Harold Lloyd was a little person. His costar, a giant named John Aasen, steals the show. IMDB lists his height as a bit over seven feet, but he dwarfs Lloyd and seems a lot taller than that. Guinness apparently had him at nearly nine feet. Somebody's tape measure was broken apparently. The absurd situations, including an attempt to pull out one of Colosso's hurt teeth, between the odd-looking duo are a lot of fun. "Colosso" was the first acting job in Aasen's versatile career. He also played a Giant Swordsman, Giant, The Giant, Circus Giant, Giant Man, Very Tall Golfer, Giant, Circus Giant, Giant, and Shorty. That's some diversity! Wait a second. Very Tall Golfer?

So, Cory...what did you think of this one? Worth seeing, but I reckon you don't like his character all that much. Amazingly, Maltin's got this rated higher than Safety Last! and Speedy.

Jackass 3

2010 high art

Rating: 13/20

Plot: More comic mischief from the Jackasses. This time, they utilize 3-D technology so that it looks like the fecal matter is coming right into your living room! Huzzah!

Well, I felt like showering after watching this one, so that's something. I didn't watch this in 3-D, of course, but I can see where that would have been kind of fun. The colorful and gimmicky opening scene has the boys being pelted with paintball pellets, kicked in the face, and abused with little booby traps that might have been borrowed from Wily E. Coyote's attic. And they're wearing funny costumes. And some times it all happens in this slow motion. Now I don't possess a high-def television, but the images in this were impressively crisp anyway, fantastic news if you want to see every detail of a fat guy wearing some transparent plastic suit designed to make him ooze sweat. Or vomit. Or poop. Or urine. Or hair glued to somebody's palms right after it's been yanked from some other guy's chest. You get the idea. This is definitely not the movie I'd pick to watch with my grandmother if, following some miracle, she was resurrected and really wanted to watch a movie with me. Unless she picked it, of course. I'm not going to deny the dead the right to select a movie for movie night. There's something nice about seeing the jackasses willing to do all this gross or dangerous or gross and dangerous stuff despite their advancing ages. You get the sense that some are doing these things reluctantly though. And the stunts in Jackass 3(D) aren't as consistently hilarious as the ones in part two, the Empire Strikes Back of Jackass movies. I think they peaked (Wait a second. There's no way peaked is the right word here.) with number two. But I had more than a few chuckles, and as with the other stuff, I'm glad I watched it. I laughed most heartily at a scene involving a score or more of little people, one of their set-up/written gags. I'm a grade school kid in a thirty-seven year old's body though, so I, of course, enjoyed the slapstick as well. After all, if you can't appreciate video footage of a guy getting hit in the balls, you're just not a real American. There are people who could argue that the world would be a better place without these movies. I'm not sure I could successfully argue with those people actually, but I'm happy the movies do exist. Long live the Jackasses!

Safety Last! (Again)

see original review here

1923 movie that is better than 2008's College Road Trip

Rating: 17/20

Plot: Students at an inner city school go on a field trip to the high school they'll be attending next year. When they get back to their school, they're treated to a movie. One group of students with an especially mean teacher doesn't like the movie that they're being shown (certified classic College Road Trip)and force-feeds them a silent comedy instead. The students whine and whine, and the teacher, probably because he's the devil, just sits back and laughs.

I even gave them a slip of paper to write some comments and rate the movie. When asked to describe the movie in one word, I got these answers:

boring
lame
boreing
old
funny
useless
silent
interesting
awful
old fashioned
wierd
retarted
quiet
relaxing
bum!
wordless
different
depressing

Their ratings: 15, 7, 14, 10, 8, 10, -20, 2, 15, 10, 1.5, 2, 8, 10, 17, 10, 1, 1, 3, 13, 2, 0, 9.5, 10, 3, -20, 1

But just like the last time I forced silent comedy on the youth of America, they watched for the duration (I read lots of noise from my two neighbors watching College Road Trip) and laughed at the appropriate times. They really got into the climactic building-climbing scene, oohing and aahing. Sure, Harold Lloyd got called "gay" a few times, and I know the music drove them absolutely nuts. Nevertheless, I think a lot of them liked the movie a lot more than their scores might indicate.

Other gripes (from their sheets):

"I didn't like having to read."
"The end was really good."
"It's not a movie. It's a big waste of time."
"It has no sound to make up for the silence."
"Black & white movies are boring and old."
"I don't like that the guy lied to the girl."
"It was funny. He was always doing something or getting into trouble, but he got by with it."
"I liked that he was trying to impress the girl but was an epic fail at life."
"I liked the music."
"It's too hard to understand."
"It was a horibile movie."
"People were moving too fast in some parts."
"It was mildly entertaining. Not bad--better than I expected." Same person: "I didn't like that the guy was lying through the whole thing."
"It had some funny stuff that made me laugh."
"No talking is boring!!!!!!!!!"

One more thing: Looking back at my old write-ups for Harold Lloyd movies, I always get annoyed with myself when I see how mean I was to the poor guy. I never called him "gay" or anything, but I was completely wrong in refusing to put him in the same class with Keaton and Chaplin. Dude's a comedy stud even though he moves too fast in some parts or stars in movies that are too hard to understand.

And here's a shot from the Harold Lloyd appearance on The Simpsons. Unless he's just yellow on my computer.

Step Brothers

2008 "comedy"

Rating: 6/20 (Anonymous: 4/20; Pump or Astro-Pretzel: 3/20)

Plot: A couple unemployed middle-aged good-for-absolutely-nothing jackasses become the titular step-brothers after their parents hook up at a convention and later marry. Initially, they can't stand each other, but once they realize they have a lot in common, like their shared affinity for night vision goggles, they become friends. But their shared interests and attempts to start their own company threaten to tear the happy newlyweds apart.

I wanted to watch In the Line of Fire, but my step brother wanted to watch this instead. We fought over that for a while--rolling around on the floor, poking eyes, farting on each other, giving wedgies, kicking nutsacks, etc.--before realizing that we had a love of Mary Steenburgen in common. Then, we high-fived each other awkwardly, and he broke his finger. And that story, ladies and gentlemen, is just as clever as the one in the movie Step Brothers. Attempting to recapture the magic of Talladega Nights, a movie I've been told is a classic, Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly stupid it up in this one that reminds me simultaneously of a whole bunch of predictable 80's crap and every single other Will Ferrell movie I've ever seen. There's not a single laugh to be had in this thing. It fits right in with that disturbing trend in modern comedies where lazy writers assume that creating really uncomfortable situations for characters who could never actually exist is automatically going to be funny. Awkward is not a synonym for hilarious. I should know because I looked it up, and I'm an English teacher.

It took me a while to remember it, but I made a promise around Christmas that I would not have another Will Ferrell movie on this blog. See? I'm really sorry that my own step brother made me break that promise. Maybe I'll fart on him later.

Girl Shy

1924 silent romantic comedy (with horses)

Rating: 16/20

Plot: Because of a speech impediment and a less-than-impressive status as a poor tailor's assistant, some character probably named Harold has trouble meeting women. He's girl shy. But that doesn't stop him from writing a piece of nonfiction with the ambiguous title How to Make Love to Women and attempting to find a publisher for the tome. He eventually does meet a girl on a train and engages in the lengthiest and most awkward sex scene in silent cinema history. A horse is involved.

Question: If a stutterer stutters in a silent movie, and there's no sound enabling you to hear it, does it make a sound? Another solid Harold Lloyd movie with his typically likable protagonist, some very sweet romantic moments, and an explosion of craziness at the end where the actor does something wildy funny (i.e. climbing up the side of a building [Safety Last] or clang-clang-clanging on a trolley through New York streets [Speedy]). In Girl Shy, he's racing against the clock, stealing cars and endangering the lives of everybody around him. I bought the sweetness of his character a little more than in some of his other movies, but I also enjoyed how he had no issues with misbehaving like a four-eyed gangster rapper. And I'm really impressed with the amount of vehicles they managed to throw into that wild chase scene at the end. I think it was a zeppelin away from breaking some sort of vehicular record. This also may have gotten a bonus point for a Harold Lloyd spanking scene. Hot! No way any warm-blooded male could watch that without becoming aroused. Which reminds me--a baseball coach at my school was telling me today that one of his players couldn't make it to practice because he injured himself by "diving onto his bed with a hard-on," hurting the member. It's doubtful, but I wondered if he was watching Girl Shy when that happened.

Another really gay movie poster, by the way. It might not deliver the gay that Feet First delivers, but it's still really gay.

Little Otik

2000 horror comedy

Rating: 16/20

Plot: Bozena and Karel want a child more than anything else in the world. They receive some upsetting news when a doctor tells them they'll never have a child. To cheer his wife up, Bozena unearths a tree root that's kind of in the shape of a human baby and presents it to his wife. They pretend it's real and play parent at their weekend house, and nine months later, with the aid of some faux stomachs, fool their neighbors and friends into thinking they have had a child. Problems arise when the wooden baby develops an impossible appetite.

This doesn't have as much animation as Jan Svankmajer's Alice or Faust. When you finally get to see the root baby come to life, it's truly horrifying and very realistic. The breast-feeding and temper tantrum scenes manage to be even more terrifying than watching a real-life baby. Otik is based on a Czech folk tale, a story learned when a neighbor girl reads from a picture book, and like the best folk tales, this has its share of gruesome moments. It's particularly gruesome when the titular child eats, of course, but watching the other characters eat isn't much better. And they certainly enjoy an interesting array of soups. But Otik isn't all horror. It's also very humorous. A scene where a guy on the street fishes babies out of a tub with a net and wraps them in newspaper is very funny, and as disturbing as it is, a scene featuring a pedophile's crotch hand made me laugh. That pedophile's crotch is the first animation you see in this movie, by the way. The funniest bit is when the husband brings the root to his wife and says, "Guess what I've got for you." It just seems like such a cruel thing to do to a woman who can't have a child, but I laughed and laughed anyway. I really enjoy this movie, but I wonder if Svankmajer had trouble with funding. There are parts of the movie that seem incomplete, especially the ending, and I really wish there could have been more animation, even if was just surreal vignettes that had nothing to do with the main conflicts. Like crotch hand! I imagine the film's theme has to do with human greed, especially since an alternate title is Greedy Guts.

Despicable Me

2010 cartoon

Rating: 14/20 (Jen: 16/20; Dylan: 14/20; Emma: 16/20; Abbey: 20/20)

Plot: Oddly-shaped supervillain Gru is losing his touch. He's finding it increasingly difficult to get funding through the Bank of Evil for his evil-doings, and the neophyte criminal mastermind Vector, a guy who managed to steal the a pyramid of Giza, is stealing his thunder. Gru decides to use a shrink ray gun to shrink and then steal the moon. Unfortunately, Vector snags his shrink gun and Gru is having a difficult time retrieving it. When he finds out that his nemesis has a weakness for cookies sold by a triad of orphans, he decides to adopt the children and use them to get his shrink gun back.

Newcomer Illumination Studios combines a hilarious script, some wonderful visual humor, lovable characters, great voice talents, and some good old-fashioned cartoony funk to create a very good first full-length feature. It's strange because I really didn't think I was enjoying this very much, but the characters and story grew on me quickly. I wasn't sure what Steve Carell was doing with his voice, but that grew on me, too. Without the central character working, this wouldn't have succeeded at all, but Gru has the right combination of dim-witted and criminal genius, submerged emotional stuff and genuine mean-spiritedness. I enjoyed watching him do his evil thang throughout the story and bought his predictable transformation. The narrative is paced well with the right amounts of action, humor, and emotion, but there were some moments that seemed extraneous and unnecessary. The music's a little hit or miss, too. My biggest gripe would be with the Minions, the yellow pill-shaped guys. They're there, I suppose, to add to the cuteness and general hilarity, but a lot of the time, they're just kind of obnoxious. Overall, however, this is some fun animation, and everybody in my family enjoyed it. Their exact words, when asked:

Jen: It was fun.
Emma: It was fun.
Abbey: It was funny.
Dylan: It was fun.

They're helpful.

The Jerk

1979 comedy

Rating: 14/20 (Jen: 11/20)

Plot: The titular jerk recalls his rags-to-riches story from his beginnings as a black boy to the rise to the top that came with his little invention. Along the way, he takes on numerous jobs and meets a couple women, including one with a trumpet.

It's so random that you'll think there's no possible way it can add up to any thing, but then it adds up to something and you have a religious experience of giggling because a kid's t-shirt has the word "shit" on it. And your wife keeps asking, "What's wrong with you?" and you ejaculate something the consistency of marshmallow and ruin your pants and everybody else's pants. And you wish Bernadette Peters was there to see it because she's so darn cute and you regret your past actions that resulted in a restraining order that legally keeps you at least 150 feet from Bernadette Peters' trumpet. "Or is it exactly 150 feet?" you wonder to yourself. And you figure that writer/actor Steve Martin probably has the ADD and you wonder if he really even tried very hard with this one and part of you wishes that he could have focused a little better but most of you is glad he didn't. The Jerk is Airplane-silly, a comedy that hits the spot when you're in a particular spot. It sags a bit as it goes, but there's enough fun to make it worth the zero dollars that I paid to see it.

Poster image from heritagemovieposters.com.

Lenny

1974 biopic

Rating: 17/20

Plot: The life and career of controversial comedian Lenny Bruce, a guy who liked to say words like "poop" and "boobs" and "pee-pee" on stage a lot. He marries Lex Luthor's assistant, struggles to get ahead in his career, finally makes it big, gets in trouble for using the words "banana" and "parakeet" in inappropriate contexts, has a baby, and struggles with temptations. Penis!?

I realize I grabbed an image of the poster that shows creases, and I'm glad I did. It really seems appropriate since this is a Bob Fosse movie that isn't afraid to show its creases. A story that is anything but black and white is told ironically in this gritty black and white, so suitable for this world of night clubs and strip joints and cheap hotel rooms. It's a story of a funnyman, but a story clothed in gray and bathed in dim lighting, and the stark scenes draw the focus to the characters and the actors who play them. And what performances those are! The fact that the gorgeous Miss Teschmacher and her glorious bosom (actually the glorious Valerie Perrine and her glorious bosom) isn't completely submerged beneath the performance of Dustin Hoffman as the title character says something. She plays wife Bunny, a challenging and brave role with a nice range of emotions and plenty of chances to get a little naked. She pulls off manic, troubled, broken, ecstatic, wounded, and more in this roller coaster of a performance. Hoffman's as good as I've seen him, his Lenny Bruce as spot on as Jim Carrey's "tragic" "comic" in Man on the Moon. I don't recall seeing footage of the actual Lenny Bruce and therefore can't judge the body language, but Hoffman definitely had the cadence and stand-up delivery down. I liked the structure, almost a pseudo-documentary approach with after-the-fact interviews with Bunny and Bruce's manager and lots and lots of footage of Hoffman on stage delivering Bruce's "jokes" and banter. The stage scenes were woven within the narrative structure, helping to transition from point to point in Lenny Bruce's life. I'm not a huge fan of the Lenny Bruce recordings I've heard, by the way, but I can't argue the influence he had on comedy. And his story, or at least this particular telling, is thematically layered and moving, the end scene a perfect interrobang that drives home a near-profound point. I came away caring about and respecting Lenny Bruce a lot more. If that was Fosse's goal, he succeeded. If is goal was just to entertain with a good story, he succeeded there, too.

That's right--interrobang.

. . .And God Spoke (The Making Of)

1993 mockumentary

Rating: 16/20

Plot: Clive Walton and Marvin Handleman--the producer/director team that brought the world
such gems as The Airport, Dial "S" for Sex, She Beast, and Nude Ninjas--decide to make a Biblical epic based on a 2,000 page script. The problem is that they have no budget, and after just a few hours, they're already hopelessly behind schedule. Numerous problems arise and begin to strain Walton and Handleman's relationship.

First off, I have to give the makers of this props (wait, do we still give props?) for the Fitzcarraldo reference. Nice. This pokes fun at the film industry more than Christianity. In fact, I really doubt it would offend too many Christians, and even if I'm wrong, it's still mighty funny. The production's nearly as cheap as the Biblical epic they're trying to film, and not every single gag connects, but it squeezed more than a few laughs from me despite the gloomy mood I was in before watching. Like the best of the genre, it's really the little moments (the ones you almost miss if you don't pay attention) that are the funniest. Everything Fred Kaz (Noah) says is funny ("I was a Klingon for a few minutes."), and I also loved the sound effect guy, a discussion about how many disciples there were, a dead buffalo, some hilarious product placement, and "What lovely Frankenstuff!" Oh, and "I could do it with or without my teeth." This has a few famous faces, too. Soupy Sales, oddly enough, is Moses. Jan Brady plays Noah's wife, and Lou Ferrigno and Andy Dick play Cain and Abel respectively. I'm sure reading about this movie has done little to convince you to watch it. Do it anyway and thank me later!

Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter

2001 religious kung-fu musical horror comedy

Rating: 12/20

Plot: I haven't read it, but I think this might be based on John's the Book of Revelation.

Yes, that's Santo on the cover, side-by-side with Jesus and ready to fight lesbian vampires. And in the middle is Mary Magnum in that tight little red leather number. Fetching. Making Jesus an action hero is dangerous business, especially since a lot of religious folk don't have much of a sense of humor. But I'm not sure Christians would be too appalled with the character Himself since I don't think He does anything Jesus wouldn't have done like Scorsese had Him doing in The Last Temptation of Christ. Unless bad puns are offensive. In fact, even though the title hero is your typical overblown action hero, he is the hero. He fights evil, and he quotes scripture. What's likely more blasphemous is the use of Santo. El Santo in Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter can't wrestle and is portly. When watching this movie, your first thought (other than "This is blasphemous!") would probably be, "I think this might have been made on the cheap." And you'd be right. Your third thought would probably be, "This was made in 2001? No way! It's got to be from the 70s!" But there's a charm to the proceedings, and the script, littered with (intentionally?) bad punnage and silly action hero banter, is funny enough. I found myself laughing more than I really wanted to. For whatever reason, hearing Jesus deliver the line "I'll need to buy some wood. . .for stakes!" was hilarious. I also thought the spinning crucifix used as a Batman-esque transition between scenes was clever. I also liked a scene where about three hundred baddies get out of an SUV. Not all the comedy worked though, evidenced by a scene where Jesus has a conversation with a bowl of cherries. The bowl of cherries actually tells him to find El Santo. I can't decide if seeing Jesus and a priest hanging out at a Hooters-type restaurant is funny or not. There's a lot of kung-fu in this movie, and it won't exactly make you think of Bruce Lee. The fight scenes often seemed endless, and if the guy who played Jesus (Phil Caracas [Wait a second! Isn't the guy who plays Jesus in the Mel Gibson movie named Caracas?]) had any martial arts training, they wasted their obviously limited funds on it. There is a scene where a character uses intestines as a weapon though. I should have started making a list of those movies a long time ago. This is also a musical, and although the songs were only slightly more tolerable than Repo: The Genetic Opera's numbers, there at least was some eclecticism. You had punk, techno-robot-lounge, keyboard blipping, 80s feel-good movie rock, Mexicali funk, cheesy lounge, neo-funk with vocoder, dance music, retarded jazz, and my personal favorite--a really creepy song where somebody whispered the books of the New Testament with cymbal accompaniment. The performers were likely friends of the director, some of them, I think, appearing as more than one character, but three of them were real stand-outs. Josh Grace was deliriously over-the-top as Dr. Praetorious. I checked his resume, and he's been in a few of JCVH director's Lee Demarbre's movies including one where Demarbre includes another Mexican movie legend--The Aztec Mummy. I can't find the name of a screaming woman, but it was one of the best screams I've heard in a long time. But the very best part of the movie is the introduction and musical performance of Blind Jimmy Leper played by an actor named "Lucky Ron" who had about as many teeth as Shane McGowen. He does this scatting number which could probably prove the existence of God to even the most diehard of atheists. Jesus jumped on the stage and did his own scatting, but he couldn't beat the work of Blind Jimmy Leper. And when you're Lucky Ron and can prove in your lone movie that you can out-scat Christ Himself, you don't have to do anything else as a performer to win a lifetime achievement award on shane-movies.

Note: I've heard that there's an Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter movie being made. Joaquin Phoenix is attached to that project. I guess his career is doing just fine!

Napoleon Dynamite

2005 teenage comedy

Rating: 16/20 (Dylan: 12/20; Emma: 15/20; Abbey: 10/20)

Plot: The titular geek spends his time doing what most typical teens enjoy doing--drawing mythical creatures, dragging action figures behind his school bus, and feeding a llama. Normally, he's pretty lonely, but he makes two friends in a week. There's Deb, a gal who shows up to his house to sell bracelets in order to make money for college, and Pedro, a transfer student with a mustache and a skill in talking to the ladies. Napoleon decides to help the latter with his student presidency campaign. Meanwhile, Grandma's injured herself riding four wheelers, his Uncle Rico's in town to help his brother (cousin?) Kip build a time machine, Kip's got an online love interest coming in for a visit, the school dance is approaching, and money is needed. It's a lot for one Napoleon Dynamite to have to deal with.

I like this stupid movie. God help me, I like this Stupid-with-a-capital-S movie. It's unique, the kind of movie that invents its own rhythm, but if you're willing to go with the flow, it works. On paper, it shouldn't. The actors overdo it, shoot for the quirkiest of stars and get there. The loungy soundtrack would be completely irritating if it was in any other movie. There's really not enough of a plot for an entire movie. The colors are garish, too garish, and although the movie has this weird timeliness that makes it difficult to pin it to a specific decade, I'd guess the 1980s which is the worst decade that has ever been. But for reasons that I'm not sure I could explain to somebody who hates this movie (and I could definitely understand if that was you), I like it. From the get-go, the scene where the kid asks Napoleon what he's going to do today and Napoleon responds, with pride, by tossing the action figure out the window, you know the film's humor won't be for everybody. And scenes with Uncle Rico hurling a chunk of meat, some smooshed tator tots, and a really odd time machine are, like all the funny scenes in the movie, things that I laughed at and almost instantly asked myself, "Wait a second. What the hell am I laughing at?" Eventually, things start to come together and the characters find themselves in a few stories. They're not all the most interesting stories (the subplot with Kip and his girlfriend cheapens the whole thing), but it builds to an iconic movie-magic moment with an absolutely ridiculous dance for our (dare I say it?) iconic titular (you knew I'd say that) character. Jon Gries (Uncle Rico) and Aaron Ruell (Kip) are both as funny as Jon Heder as our hero, and the kid who plays Pedro (Efren Rodriquez) is also great.

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World

2010 rom-com fantasy mayhem

Rating: 15/20

Plot: 22-year-old Pilgrim's on the rebound after being dumped by his girlfriend. He spends his time playing with his band, Sex Bob-ombs (Mario reference), and hanging out with his high school girlfriend, Knives. They've even held hands. One night and falls for Ramona. Things are going well as they start dating, but soon, her evil ex-boyfriends start appearing out of nowhere to battle Scott, Mortal Kombat style!

I'm not a gamer although I have spent considerable amounts of time with a joystick, and yes, I'm aware there's a double meaning there. I'm not a comic book guy, and I probably wouldn't have known this was based on graphic novels if not for Kairow. Romantic-comedy ain't my genre, and over-the-top action movies annoy me. I really doubt, since I'm fastly approaching elderly, that I'm anywhere near the right demographic. Scott Pilgrim is a loud, often repetitive assault on the senses, a barrage of wackiness and fantastical mischief. But you know what? It's a hell of a lot of fun! It's a fervent and fresh approach to your old boy-meets-girl story, managing to have a style of its own despite plagiarizing from everything from the Batman t.v. show to Donkey Kong. It's a potpourri of pop-culture regurgitations, spewing technicolor from the television screen right in my lap, but I didn't mind a bit. The pace is rapid, and the jokes come a mile a minute. Not all of them connect (more than a few probably because I'm twice as old as Michael Cera) but it's stuffed full with so many of them that the fpm (funny per minute) is still impressive. Speaking of Michael Cera, an actor young enough to be my son, he plays the same character he always plays but with bushier hair. I still like that character, but I wonder what's going to happen to this kid's career when he hits puberty. Creative, energetic and, if not especially meaningful, lots and lots of fun. I would definitely see it again.

Beck (the American Cornelius) and Cornelius (the Japanese Beck) did songs for this.

Gentlemen Broncos

2009 comedy

Rating: 14/20

Plot: Young Benjamin's worked hard on Yeast Lords,
a sci-fi novel with a hero partially inspired by a father who is no longer around. His mother sends him to a writer's camp where he meets his author/hero Ronald Chevalier and a boob-obsessed teen filmmaker who has made over eighty movies although some of those are just trailers. Benjamin throws his Yeast Lords into a pile for a contest and is rewarded for his hard work by having Chevalier, currently struggling with his own ideas, steal his work and have it published. Around the same time, the filmmaker gives him five hundred dollars for the right to adapt Yeast Lords into a feature film. Problems occur when Chevalier finds out because there's nothing he hates worse than plagiarism.

On the poster, they advertise this as being from the director (Jared Hess) of Napoleon Dynamite. A lot of times, that sort of thing can be misleading. Not here. It's entirely appropriate, either as a threat for those who think Napoleon Dynamite is the stupidest thing they've ever seen, or as a promise to anybody who happens to like that movie. I personally liked Napoleon Dynamite, so I suppose I'm the audience for this sort of thing even though I can see how large chunks of Gentlemen Broncos might even be too wacky for Napoleon's fans. Hess is the type of director who knows how strange people really are and uses his films to magnify eccentricities into wildly comic proportions. Nothing about these characters or the worlds they inhabit are exactly realistic. Our protagonist, played by Michael Angarano, acts as a kind of straight man here, but in every other movie, he'd easily be the weirdo. Jermaine Clement (from Flight of the Conchords and Eagle vs. Shark) and Jennifer Coolidge (lots of stupid movies) really steal the show, and they get so many hilarious lines to say. Honestly, I'm not sure how they can say some of the things they say without erupting into a painful fit of giggles, but I guess that's why they make all the money. I'm also not sure how Hector Jimenez can contort his face into such goofy expressions, but I almost laughed every time he was on the screen. A scene involving a hand massage and Jimenez's horrifying moaning was probably the goofiest thing I've seen all year. There are some really dopey soundtrack choices, kind of like Hess swung for Wes Anderson's fences and missed, but there's some great set design and art work. A lot of the set details in the places these characters frequent seems to have been picked up at rummage sales (butterfly decor, Jesus portraits), but there are some originals that the characters painted that are pretty sweet. The science fiction covers used during the opening credits, whether they're real or originals, are also cool. A lot of the stuff going on in the movies-within-the-movie was a bit much and there were far too many boob and gonad references. Then again, gonad humor almost always works. Heh. Gonads.

I looked up Napoleon Dynamite to link this to that and was surprised to see that I apparently haven't watched that movie in the last three years. Odd since it seems like I've watched Napoleon Dynamite over a hundred times.

Pecker

1998 John Waters comedy

Rating: 12/20

Plot: A burger flipper named Pecker becomes an overnight art sensation after he shows off his photographs of his weird family, friends, and neighbors. His new-found fame stains those relationships though.

Pecker's likely a thinly-veiled autobiographical Waters joint, about as mainstream glossy as it gets for the director. My problem with Waters' movies is that he doesn't seem to be able to write anything funny and tries to make up for it with the crude and unusual. But where else are you going to get lines like these:

"Knock yourself out, butt plug."
"You teabag a customer again, and he'll fire your ass."
"Three times loser and he's sentenced to the chair but he's still got a boner."

And where else are you going to get shots of rats doing it, frequent references to "beaver," Virgin Mary ventriloquism, so many ugly people, and a scene with a guy getting it on with a washing machine? Add a really unusual soundtrack featuring novelty songs, nutso country, and indescribable alien lounge music, and you've got yourself a movie that's fun for the whole family. I don't know who this Edward Furlong is, but he seems like the type of actor who needs to be in television sitcoms, probably playing characters who are much younger than he is. At least this has the always-lovely Christina Ricci though.

Pirate Radio

2009 comedy

Rating: 15/20

Plot: Somewhere off the English coast, some hell raisers broadcast bloody rock 'n' roll for the masses. A handful of politicians want to put a stop to it.

I thought this looked decent when it came out, heard that it wasn't decent at all, and was pleasantly surprised. Pirate Radio has lots to love. There's a great ensemble cast which includes the versatile Philip Seymour Hoffman, that one guy, that other guy, the always-hilarious Rhys Darby (Yes Man and The Flight of the Concords), that one guy who did the funny bit in that one movie, and Rhys Ifans (another Rhys; that might break my record for most actors named Rhys in one movie). Seriously, I kept seeing actors I nearly recognized in this movie, people I knew had been funny in other things. This was almost like a more raucous Wes Anderson movie. It's narratively uneven, perhaps a little too episodic. The scenes often seem like a collection of jokes, and not all the punchlines are that funny. But for the most part, this cheeky little movie sails along quickly enough and entertains with its caricatures, its irrelevancy, and its loose-goosey, playful structure. And that soundtrack? It's packed to the gills with the rawk! I might be a bit of a sucker for movies with lots of characters who don't do much of anything except talk over each other (see: lots of Robert Altman movies), and Pirate Radio is about the most entertaining a movie about characters being bored out of their minds can be.