Scribblerchick's Movie Dish

Hangover II

There's a school of thought in Hollyweird that says if you make one huge blockbuster movie, you need to rush a sequel into the theaters as quickly as possible. The first weekend, all the people who LOVED the first film will flock to the sequel, before they read the reviews. I read the very lukewarm reviews and went to see Hangover II anyway.

Here's my excuse: Thor 3-D was not playing at the time we wanted to go to the movies.

We couldn't talk Michael into seeing Super 8.

My daughter also wanted to see Hangover II. I could tell this by the way she squealed when we were talking about movie choices.

My son had already seen it and wanted to see it again. I thought what the heck, it's playing at the cheap theater.

Next time that same sequence of events happen, instead of seeing a movie I am pretty sure is going to be bad, I will simply grab a board and hit myself in the head repeatedly. Why? Because that will be more fun than sitting through such a godawful BAD movie.

Hangover I was bad, but it was fun. Hangover II is just bad. I think I laughed twice during the whole film.

Here are the main differences between this and the first movie. Ready?

Instead of Doug getting married, Stu is getting married.

Instead of las Vegas, they are in Bangkok.

Instead of carrying around a baby, they carry around a capuchin monkey.

Instead of losing a tooth, Stu gets a face tattoo.

Instead of having a horrible, witchy fiance, Stu has a horrible, mean future father-in-law.

It's like the screenwriters took the first film and did a mark-thru of the first script's nouns and replaced them with new nouns. I'm sure someone then said well, this isn't great. Let's up the ante. Let's get really shocking. Let's cut off someone's finger. Let's have lot of male frontal nudity.

Oh yeah, and let's get Mike Tyson back for another cameo! And let's let him sing again!

I will hear Tyson's singing in my nightmares for the rest of my life. It was so off-key it was painful.

And the crazy little Asian guy, Mr. Chow - let's have him pop out of an ice machine instead of a car trunk!

And just let me say a word about Zach Galifianakis. I have now seen him in several movies. He is a horrible actor. He plays himself in all his movies, basically. Don't believe me? Rent Due Date, or Dinner for Schmucks. Terrible films, both of them. Zach plays pretty much the same character in everything.

I want to slap him, very hard. Then I want other people to slap him. Finally, I want to send him to prison so he can never be in another movie, ever again. Ever. I despise him that much.

It was interesting seeing Bangkok, I will admit that. Looking at Bradley Cooper is fairly pleasant, except he looked like he had BO through the whole movie.

If you still think maybe you might want to see this huge waste of time, check out this site, where you can see clips from the movie.

Watch the clips. Go ahead. I'll wait.

Laughing? Then go see it, by all means. Looking puzzled and disgusted? Then skip it.

Or go hit yourself in the head repeatedly with a heavy board. That will be more fun.

The Way Back

I became a fan of director Peter Weir years ago after seeing The Year of Living Dangerously - a terrific film made in the glorious days before Mel Gibson had lost his mind. Weir has an amazing ability to make you feel like you are inside a movie. I also loved his films Green Card and Witness.

Weir takes you into a world and compels you to stay there.

The Way Back is a different sort of movie, and yet it's not. There's no romance. It starts out in Poland in 1940, surely a harrowing time. A young man is sent to a Soviet prison in Siberia, for political prisoners. There he meets Ed Harris and Colin Farrell and various other assorted folks. Weir draws you into that world brilliantly, with a look, a tiny gesture, a tidbit of dialogue. (As I was watching those prison scenes, I kept thinking wow, it's cold in here. Ironic, since I live with my mom and we keep the air downstairs on 78-80 all summer.)

I must confess right now, Ed Harris is one of my all-time fave actors. He is amazing. I would sit in a theater and watch him read the newspaper for two hours, even if he only read 2 articles aloud! He would NOT be boring!

If Ed were not already married I would have to track him down one day and ask him to go out to dinner. Even with a goofy bow tie on he's adorable.

Anyway, I digressed.

Ed, Colin, and particularly Jim Sturges, are compelling to watch. The men escape and walk across Siberia, eventually getting to Mongolia, and China, and finally into India. I was able to discuss Russian geography, Chinese politics, and several other interesting factoids with my son, who was captivated by the movie.

Since I have been to Siberia and Kazakhstan, the movie was particularly riveting to me. Now, as in the early 1940's, that part of the world has vast stretches that are completely uninhabited. No roads. No phones, No villages for hundreds of miles. I spent a day in 2004 flying over it in a rickety old plane, looking down, and you go for HOURS without seeing so much as a telephone pole. It's truly the back end of nowhere. I cannot imagine trying to walk through there.

You should see The Way Back. The story is told without sentimentality, and yet by the end of the movie you care about the characters as much as they care about each other. It's another incredible journey into a different world, courtesy of Peter Weir. Brilliant movie.

 

I Hate Quentin Tarantino

The kids and I were watching Inglorious Basterds last night and I was reminded why I don't like Quentin Tarantino's movies. They are all talk and flash and no substance.

I only ordered Basterds from Netflix last week because I thought it might amuse my older brother to watch it while he was here. I had taken the kids to the movie one Saturday last year when I had nothing better to do and there were no decent movies out. I figured Bro hadn't seen it but I was wrong. 

So when my brother got here I simply said "Have you seen Inglorious Basterds?" and I was unprepared for the resulting tirade. "Yes. Well, I went to the theater, and I walked out after half an hour, it was so bad. It had NOTHING to do with reality. What a bunch of crap. That is the WORST movie ever." [He actually said a lot more than that but my eyes glazed over after a minute]

I thought OK, well, I'm not going to suggest we watch it then...

I remember seeing Pulp Fiction years ago and hating it. I walked out of the theater thinking "I hope NOBODY else ever goes to that film. It's horrible. I think Tarantino had to have been using drugs when he wrote it because it's so inane and stupid."

I was in the family room one day a few years ago while Alesia watched Kill Bill on TV. There was such a complete lack of humanity in that, I remember thinking a good comic book would be more insightful. I can sum it up like this: a beautiful woman who looks sexy and is very violent. That's it.

Tarantino's movies are filled with meandering, meaningless dialogue.

His films are also filled with graphic violence. You almost wish for the violence after a while because it's at least something happening, as opposed to the idiotic dialogue which sounds like it was written by a stoned 12 year old.

His films are all about posing. In Basterds, there is a lot of dialogue about what one character thinks of another character. Reputation is everything.

The only good thing I can think of to say about Tarantino is that Pulp Fiction revived the career of John Travolta, and I like Travolta, despite the idiotic Scientology obsession.

Oh wait - there's one more good thing - he has no children. Let's hope that never happens because we don't need any little Tarantinos in the world.

I think the reason Basterds did so well at the box office is partly because there's a wonderful sense of psychic justice in seeing Jewish hit squads brutally killing Nazis. What a great marketing gimmick. What the movie fails to address is that by doing that, the Basterds are putting themselves on the same level as the Nazis, or maybe even lower - killing just for the sake of killing, not because of any particular philosophy or belief system, however warped.

I Googled Tarantino and spent some time reading about him. Apparently I am not the only one who cannot stand him. He is accused of ripping off other movies, and being racist. He publicly told Spike Lee to kiss his ass. Nice. What a role model.

If you look at the biographical information about Tarantino on imdb.com, which is a great movie resource site, you find a billion words describing him - it's the longest one I've ever read on there. It's like his press agent wrote it. What an egomaniac. What a poseur.

I am going to make a point to NEVER go see his movies again, and I will urge my kids not to watch them either.

The Sublime and the Ridiculous

I took my 14 year old son and his best friend to seethe new Harry Potter film about a week ago, and I was stupified by one of the trailers. I seriously thought it was a spoof, some crazy Will Ferrell nuttiness, or perhaps even a little film about turning off your cell phones in the theater.

The trailer featured Daniel Craig in the old west wearing a high tech wrist thingy.

[Harrison Ford played a mean old guy. After seeing Morning Glory I have come to the realization that he went from Hunk to Cantankerous Old Man very quickly. I missed the in-between movie.]

So the trailer for this space cowboy was for a new movie called Cowboys and Aliens. I can hear the pitch meeting now: "It's The Quick and the Dead meets Independence Day!"

When the trailer was over everyone in the theater laughed.

What really amazes me is that Steven Spielberg executive produced this thing, and it stars Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig. It also features some great character actors like Clancy Brown, Keith Carradine and Sam Rockwell. Did everyone involved with this drink the Kool-aid?!?

If you're an old fogey like me you remember Dustin Hoffman and Warren Beatty in Ishtar. That one had people walking out of the theaters in droves.

It looks that ridiculous. Craig and Ford are going to be cursing the day their agents talked them into that disaster, trust me on that.

THE SUBLIME

OTOH, I am afraid not enough folks will go see Morning Glory, a truly funny film. I loved it. It was comedy built around characters, and it was filled with whip-smart funny dialogue.

I do NOT like Rachel McAdams. I've never liked her. Despite that, I like Morning Glory.The situations were not formulaic. The story seemed plausible even though it was farcical. [I know that sounds contradictory but just go see the movie and judge for yourself.]

And yes, even though I griped about Harrison Ford, the character he played in Morning Glory was a Cantankerous Old Man with some depth of character. He seemed plausible. The bad guy in Cowboys and Aliens looks like a cartoon. [I hope they paid him a lot of money for that nonsense!]

Another film I saw recently was Red. Loved it. It's very smart and funny, and Bruce Willis takes his standard action guy hero and makes him seem fresh and interesting.

John Malkovitch plays crazy in a fresh new way.

Helen Mirren plays a sexy older woman who loves "wet work" - a/k/a killing folks for money.

Morgan Freeman plays a new character, Not God, clearly - a retired CIA guy.

Red doesn't try to tell us any great truths, but it's a fun ride. Even my brother [retired Army major] thought most of the weapons stuff was reasonably plausible, and he's usually highly critical.

So go see Red and Morning Glory, and if the Cowboys and Aliens trailer comes up, enjoy a good laugh and shake your head at the idiocy that is Hollyweird.

 

Movies I LOVE

I don't have much time to make this pretty, but just for fun, here is a list of movies I love. It's not comprehensive or in order, but these popped into my head first:

Bowfinger - Steve Martin plays a wily, conniving movie director - a great satire on Hollyweird

Leap of Faith - Steve Martin plays a wily, conniving traveling evangelist. Awesome gospel songs too!

The Green Mile - Sad and powerful story, allegorical and moving.

Shawshank Redemption - It's about hope. Beautiful story.

Braveheart -Mel with big hair and a skirt. Celts with blue faces. What's not to love?!

Being John Malkovich - Twisted little story, with Cameron Diaz as a frumpy lesbian. Never boring.

Harold and Maude - Classic story: young boy falls in love with senior citizen. Totally cool wardrobe, 1971 chic. Awesome Cat Stevens soundtrack.

Dragon, The Bruce Lee Story - Great true love story. Also powerful treatment of racism, faith, and skewer of Hollyweird.

Reds - Oldie but a goodie. Warren Beatty rocks as John Reed, the man who publicized the Russian Revolution.

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang - I still know every word to every song. When I die, my version of heaven will be to live in Truly Scrumptious' mansion. But I don't want her corsets. Yikes.

School of Rock - Jack Black teaches kids how to rock. It's his legacy for the ages, the definitive Jack Black.

The Color Purple - When I need a good cry, I have to watch it. Awesome music and cinematography, too. Only Spielberg could make rural life looks gorgeous.

Whale Rider - A little girl gives an amazing performance and we learn about the Maori tribe in New Zealand. Beautiful, magic film.

Field of Dreams - Another movie that makes me cry, every time. Watching Kevin Costner in his prime makes this one of my favorites, too.

Ferris Bueller's Day Off - I love Ferris. He rocks. A timeless classic.

The Quiet Man - John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara in one of the first films made on location - Ireland. A terrific story.

My Fair Lady - A sentimental Favorite of mine from childhood. I also love Hello Dolly and South Pacific - don't tell - it makes me sound really OLD. [OK, I am old. I just don't like to admit it. Then again, 45 is the new 25, without the tattoos...]

Murphy's Romance - Sally Field plays a plucky little horse keeper before anybody thought to whisper to them. Funny and endearing. A classic.

So analyze it and see if you want to keep reading. I can see the Enquirer headline now: Movies You Like Reveal Your Personality!