Thought for the day

Isn't it funny how the people who can improve your day can just as easily wreck it with seemingly the same amount (or lack) of effort?

Yeah, HA HA HA

YUCK; Feeling Lonely Today; but at least I am not being eaten by sharks

And yes that's the kind of teeter totter I go through sometimes. Even last night I was marvelling at what a great mood I've been in the last week, and wondered when it would swing around, and it looks like maybe today's the day. I must have sent like 4 emails yesterday and I got no replies, and even though its totally petty I still kinda go, aww, poor me, so sad, blah blah blah ...

So let's talk about sharks.

Who has seen BLUE WATER, WHITE DEATH? Yeah, that's right, NONE A Y'ALL have. Cept for me. And it rules. Made in 1971, when apparently Great Whites were infrequently-photographed, it has a bunch of (apparently) famous divers (and a folk singer) tooling around the world looking for trouble in the form of the famous MAN EATER. And I can't tell you how many times I yelled at the screen "You fools are crazy!" These clowns kept getting out of their cages to "swim amongst the sharks." While they are feeding. With blood in the water. I'm sorry, but did someone just say 'death wish?' Maybe it s a WHITE DEATH wish!

This kind of thing just really floats my boat. I like all those fakey shark movies like DARK WATERS and MEGALODON, but the REAL DEAL is just so damned primal. A shark seems like some inescapable attack engine. Its one of the few things that truly frightens me; I just don't know what I'd do if I ever found myself in the water with a shark. More than likely, I'd just die of fright. Well, maybe. Maybe pee my pants first. The thought is just so utterly horriffic that I can't really get my head around it. I can imagine being mugged (scary). I can imagine getting set on fire (not fun, really hot). But being IN PROXIMITY to a shark, never mind being actually ATTACKED, is something akin to pondering the edge of the universe. It seems beyond reality, something so awful and unknown that you pray you never really know any more about it. So I got my fingers and toes crossed on this one folks. Dear God: keep Lee away from them damn fine killing machines of yours. He's a bit ascairt of em. Something about their Dedicated Objective, their lack of Reason, their Focused Malevolence, or, even scarier, a total void of any GooD OR Evil, just impassive savagery.

Brrr. Kinda terrible, really.

But the movie's really something special. The print I got is so ragged-out that it reminded me of some old unknown Kung Fu movie. Its so scratched and dirty, filled with sprocket damage and jump cuts, you'd think it had been dragged by a truck. It's a rare thing of beauty. A testament to its coolness --- its been shown A LOT. "Where" and "to whom," who knows. But somebody showed this guy some love over the years. Mostly stagey, with piles of rehearsed dialogue, and punctuated by infrequent renditions of sea-themed folk songs, it comes dangerously close to being kinda silly, but the whole time you get the feeling they are just winding you up for the payoff. And it comes, in spades. In fact, there are PLENTY of payoffs. The ugliness of a whaling vessel, the gruesome appetites of sea-based carnivores, the flat-out oddball life forms that populate the seas ... its like a National Geographic special on Crack. When the sharks appear you can hear the childlike glee in the divers' voices, as if they weren't actually in the very presence of the grim reaper himself. Their post-swimming dialogues are even more flummoxing. "You just have to keep a general air of well-being about you," one says. "You have to just tell yourself that you aren't in any danger, otherwise you'd go crazy," another says, after having miraculously kept his cool in a swarm of these devils. Just astonishing.

You know all of that stock footage you always see of shark attacks? THIS IS WHERE IT CAME FROM. This is the original, the progenitor. Heck, one of the divers is that guy you always see photos of, well, photos of his ravaged body at least, the one where you really have to wonder if you are looking at a cadaver, because the guy seems like he's just BARELY HANGING TOGETHER. How can a person's body be so savaged and still survive? And yet, here he is, blithely "amongst them" again, like some sad victim of Stockholm Syndrome who can't draw himself away from this mysterious being who holds the key to mortality in its grasp. Or fins or whatever. Just amazing. I don't even call it 'bravery.' And it isn't 'foolhardiness,' either. Its like faith in God, even though you know God can take you at any time. Maybe its more like being in the presence of God. Whatever it is --- it's something undefinable, something I don't ever plan to explore.

I'll just watch it on TV, thank-you-very-much!

***

Oh, and by the way, my day got a lot better :) There's people in the world that can really do that to you, without even knowing or trying, they can just turn a lame day right on around and you go home smiling.

NOTE TO SELF

Lee, nobody reads your drivel. So maybe you might wish to consider just cutting loose a bit. Censoring curse words? Why? If nobody reads it, nobody can be offended, right? This is a serious existential crisis I have on my hands here. I need to determine an audience, but I think I am my own audience. Either that or I suck so fuckin bad that people are embarassed to admit they've read this shit. Hm.

Anyways, what did I watch this weekend?

1. DEADLY PREY; hilrious ripoff of FIRST BLOOD and RAMBO. A little bit gay if you ask me. The star runs around in teeny tiny cutoff hotpants the whole time. Cool ending though. He kills the shit out of EVERYBODY.

2. DARK AGE; recently shown at QT6! An Aussie JAWS starring a bigass crocodile. Rather well-made and interesting throughout. Croc looks kinda fake, but aside from this I was into it. Does NOT go in predictable directions. Refreshing turnabout in the middle has all the protagonists trying to SAVE the croc from poachers, and relocate him as opposed to destroy him! Great little movie.

3. CHUD; or maybe its C.H.U.D.? Silly 80's monster drek. Daniel Stern is awesome, however, as the impassioned soup kitchen owner out to expose the toxic-waste-dumping-in-New-York conspiracy. John Heard also gets the job done. Script is actually somewhat witty! Unfortunately the movie falters a bit and fails to resolve much of anything. A truck blowing up serves as the big finale. Yawn. Note: early appearance by John Goodman as "Cop in Cafe #2."

4. GO TELL THE SPARTANS; early Nam flick that everyone has heard about but hardly anybody has seen. Its not real hard to come by or anything. I guess when I think "Burt Lancaster" I don't get images of "Barnes and Elias" in my head. Its OK I suppose. Not too much suckage to be fair; the majority of it seems to have "made for TV" production values, but the last 40 minutes finally gets going with a big firefight and all the great "the kid's got a grenade" nihilism that makes Vietnam so exciting. Great supporting cast! Craig "Body Double" Wasson is the idealistic Charlie Sheen character who volunteers, but by the end is so disillusioned he just goes home. Marc Singer is the Exec Officer, all piss and vinegar before THE BEASTMASTER turned him into a big fat gay icon. The guy who plays "Palmer" from THE THING is a crazy Psy-Ops dude, and the Chinese guy from KENTUCKY FRIED MOVIE is the hard-bitten native tracker with a penchant for torturing "communist peoples." Oh yeah and "Chew" from BLADE RUNNER (aka "Lo Pan" from BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA) is on-hand to make pithy statements and also make The Noble Sacrifice. Come to think of it, its kinda funny how many known Chinese actors are playing Vietnamese here. Then again I've seen a few Nam flicks shot in the Phillipines and those dudes tend to read Mexican, so I guess Chinese is at least a little bit better.

Feel free to not comment, bitches!

10 Things That Suck

1. People who *still* use the phrase "one of those movies that's SO bad it's GOOD!" as if it were even the slightest bit original.
2. People who talk on cel phones while driving. Stupid under any circumstances, but the ones that *really* get me are the ones that turn left or right while on the phone. MORONS!
3. People who turn right on red when the signs clearly state not to. Double points if on their cel phones.
4. People who come to a stop in pedestrian crosswalks. And then glare at you when you walk too close to their faggy new Benz.
5. People who talk on their cel phones in public places, like the Post Office or a Pizza joint. STFU bitch!
6. Cel phones in general but that's just my jealousy talking :(
7. Members of your own family that steal from you. How low can you get? I thought I knew the answer as a teenager when I had to deal with a cousin who'd steal from me. I thought that was pretty low. But then he would rob my grandparents in order to pay off drug debts. THAT was pretty low. But then this was topped by a cousin of mine who stole a lot of my collectibles from storage --- on THANKSGIVING! But even this was still not as low as a "person" can go. I know a girl (if human terms even apply) who stole her mother's entire life savings --- AND her retirement money. Simply astonishing. It does indeed SUCK.
8. Anyone who thinks it is politically insightful to call someone "a liberal" as if it were some sort of insult.
9. Anyone who thinks it is politically insightful to argue that "Hitler was bad." Really? No shit? What a challenging, thought-provoking notion! (These people also probably tell their friends about all the air they breathed yesterday, as if it were some grand revelation or something.)
10. People who don't reply to blogs they read. They suck almost more than anything.

Stage fright in dreamland!

OK dreamtime now. Last night in a dream I get cast in a major role in a high school stage production. Except its like this enormous production, with gimbels and moving light rigs and musical numbers and stuff. At first I'm all flattered, like WOW, I am an actor! But as time drags on I kinda lose interest and I never really study. Oh yeah and I am my current age as well, not high school age. So its like the day before premiere and I feel guilty as I've never told the director she should replace me cos I really don't know my lines or anything. So I start cramming but I can't remember anything at all. She tells me "not to worry about it," and I kinda go crazy, like "what do you mean?" And she says, well, "Its just a high school play." She doesn't seem to care that obviously, hundreds of thousands of dollars are invested in this, and I stand an almost guaranteed chance of wrecking the thing. Again, she says, "nobody cares, its just high school." And I'm like, yeah, "but its not about the high school or even the play, its about ME, looking like an ASSHOLE on stage in front of thousands of people." She says "hey, just fake it, say the main idea." After reading the pages I have again, desperately trying to figure out what the main idea is, I realize all my scenes have been read in reverse order! Then I realize that I don't even know the plot! So the "main idea" is completely lost on me! I don't think I ever actually made it to the stage, but I was on dangerous ground there for a while ... Especially considering that apparently without ME, there was nobody. So the play may not have gone down at all. Great. I betrayed all my dreamime classmates. Oh well. Bloody primadonnas. Where was my understudy anyway???

The 10th Victim (and the 11th, 12th, and 13th too --- the audience)

OK this is a seriously overrated and under-entertaining movie. To all of you who said "its a lot like DANGER DIABOLIK," I kindly invite you to go f*ck yourselves. Although to be fair, I suspect that these same individuals may not have seen what this movie desperately wishes it was: Jean-Luc Godard's ALPHAVILLE. And anyone who knows me knows that I passionately loathe Jean-Luc Godard (who most famously got me the stinkeye from a video store customer when I told her that "Jean-Luc Godard is anathema for those who like entertainment.") In any case the movie is for the most part unremarkable. Unless you count the oddly prescient future fashion of Showing the Ass Crack, Ursula Undress keeps the movie solidly in mild-PG territory with the awkwardly-posed "loose shirt" routine that prohibits any other fan appreciation whatsoever. (An audience member was heard to remark, "What, you'll get 'em out for the cannibal movie, but not this piece of crap?") Marcello Mastroiani marks his debut to my eyes in a sluggish role better suited to Udo Kier (or, at the very least, Klaus Kinski). The movie's "pop" sensibilities positively PALE in comparison to DANGER DIABOLIK; hell, classic STAR TREK is hipper than this. For God's sake, Adam West's BATMAN is groovier. Mired in ponderous dialogue meant to evoke sympathy for middle-aged men contemplating bachelorhood vs matrimony, the entire affair is a tedious bore from start to finish, except for a minute sampling of bits that seem to have inspired AUSTIN POWERS. Which is no damn classic either.

As usual, the reparte of the audience was a bit more choice than the movie itself. Best bits were the roundtable denigration of Jean-Luc Godard when my man Paul said that CONTEMPT, boring and pointless as it is, is basically "the RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK of Godard films," with "Jack Palance's death as the truck chase." I assume this is funny as I've never bothered watching the piece of shit. I thought it was a Fellini film.

Luckily the viewership of THE 10TH VICTIM (which, by the way, had its premise ripped off almost verbatim by the superior SERIES 7) were afforded the opportunity of an unwasted evening with the near-genius VICTORY THROUGH AIR POWER, a gorgeous 1943 Disney propaganda film urging the adoption of an Air Force and "Super Fighter" planes to defeat Japan. Devoid of the racism in most wartime propaganda, we do get a heaping helping of the fetishization of Japan's impending destruction. While the Incendiary Bomb is lovingly detailed as if it were nothing more than a cool fireworks display, more conventional bombing is rendered in protracted sequences of destruction and annihilation, chiefly after the bombing of Pearl Harbor is depicted. You'd think it was a Mobile Infantry recruiting film for the assault on Klendathu! Also on the menu this evening was the classic DER FEUHRER'S FACE, starring Donald Duck --- as a Nazi! Its so obvious! Why didn't *I* think of that!

Other items viewed this weekend: ENTOURAGE (Season One), a series so devoid of tension that it kinda reads as a Hollywood fairy tale. Entertaining enough, I guess, but I found myself more interested in the suporting characters than the leads, because the supporting characters have actual TROUBLES in their lives. Its kinda boring watching pretty rich people decide which Rolls to buy or what cute girl to f*ck.

Well, KINDA boring :)

Some changes!

OK, now you can respond EVEN IF YOU HAVE NOT REGISTERED OR HAVE A BLOG. So you truly have no excuses. (But do me a favor and at least make up a silly name so I can get a laugh. Or, use your real name so I can come punch your clock if you talk too much shite.)

Also, you'll need to go thru another "word verification" step before you respond. This is to prevent automated spam. From douchebags. (Apparently non-automated spam is still possible, but at least it will also be from douchebags, and I can tell them so, instead of insulting a low-grade AI.)

PS if I find out you have read my blog but never replied I will kick your ass. I mean it --- ass kicking in your future. Foot-to-ass genre incoming. Sore Bottom genre is imminent.

It has been suggested ...

... that I consider abandoning the "Nazisploitation" genre in favor of the "Lesbian Matricide" genre. Opinions? Because I don't know if I can ever get enough tits, ass, and swastikas. I mean I may as well just go to sleep forever because all the fun would then be gone.

Weekend's bounty

No time for effluvient prose today my little dummies, just the facts. What did I watch this weekend!!! Bet you can't wait!

THE 40 YEAR OLD VIRGIN: Hilarious from start to finish. Really glad I saw this in a theatre. It was nice to hear lots of people laughing together!

GUNSLINGER'S REVENGE: Abysmal Italian western made in 1998 starring --- brace yourself --- Harvey Keitel and David Bowie! But its so lousy I can't even begin to describe it. Avoid it at all costs, unless, like me, you just like seeing David Bowie do *anything.* Like feign a Texas accent and pretend to be an outlaw and wear anachronistic sunglasses and an earring. Although I should qualify "anything" by saying "well, 'anything' so long as 'anything' does not include 'getting shot by the village idiot.'" Which is what happens. What a letdown. Terrible film. Bowie kicks ass.

ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13 (remake version): I was really on board with this movie. Its exciting and pretty and has a great cast and a ton of surprises. The cast attrition happens in completely unexpected order. Characters die that I felt had a free pass from day one. It truly tricked me! For such a consistently entertaining b-movie, its sad to report that the ending is completely anticlimactic. I was like "Hey wait! Y'all ain't done yet! Come back it's not over!" But alas, it was. Too bad. Maybe they just wanted to leave room for a sequel. But up until the very end it was pretty good! You could do a lot worse (see previous reviews).

BLACK HAWK DOWN: gave this one a spin last night. Holds up really well. People complain about Ridley Scott's track record and say he has "only 2 truly good movies, ALIEN and BLADE RUNNER." But ya know, I really dig GLADIATOR and I have to say that BHD is a damn good movie too. Plus its funny to see Orlando Bloom in his whopping 3 minutes of screen time and Ewan McGregor perfecting his American accent before wowing us in THE ISLAND. Maybe Ridley just makes a HANNIBAL every few years so his other movies look really good in comparison? Didn't see KINGDOM OF HEAVEN yet but I really want to now.

BEYOND JFK: THE CASE FOR CONSPIRACY: Just got a wild hair and wanted me some Kennedy. Its hilarious to see Gary Oldman carry on about how "Oswald didn't have a shot" and Kevin Costner call Jim Garrison a "true patriot." Otherwise, a kinda boring puff piece designed to promote Oliver Stone's movie.

Aside from this I mostly just watched a lot of CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM (SEASON 4). When Jeff's wife calls Larry "Mr. Jew Face" I thought I was gonna choke to death laughing. Oh yeah and Cheryl David makes marriage look like something not so bad.

Ladies and gentlemen ...

... I get lonely sometimes with no replies. C'mon, just register, you don't have to maintain a blog or give a CC#, your profile can have no info in it if you wish ... And then you can share your pearls of wisdom with the other 2 dickheads who actually read this thing. Won't that be GREAT?! Sure it will! Plus you can cook up noxious aliases and masquerade as deviants if you so desire. This way I can play the "who the f*ck is that" game!

Jesus Christ, Spencer, that was a stupid movie. Thanks!!!

Thanks a bunch for SHARK ATTACK 3: MEGALODON! What a piece of crap. I loved it. But for the life of me I can't figure out why someone can't make a *decent* shark movie. Why are they all so corny? And why do they all rip off JAWS so blatantly? That movie was made like 30 years ago! We've all seen it! We know when you are ripping it off so stop pretending! Anyways MEGALODON is really cool. Yeah its filled with stock footage that has been seen 1000 times before; but at least MEGALODON digitally alters this old footage to make something original out of it, even if they repeat the same shot like 3 times, only with a different object being swallowed each time. That, and the always-welcome unnecessary nudity managed to liven up what was essentially another notch in NU IMAGE's belt of hackneyed, predictable straight-to-video knockoffs. At least they are CONSISTENT. I'm pretty sure RAGING SHARKS is a NU IMAGE production.

Oh yeah, you were right: MEGALODON does have what is the single-most inappropriate seduction line EVER in cinema. I about fell out of my chair. I loved the cast, too. I can see the call sheet now: "Do you look like Tom Cruise, only with worse teeth? Are you a blonde with tight abs but a so-so face? Can you say things like 'it's coming back!' or 'we're sinking?' Then come on down to our next non-union, shot-in-Mexico MOS production called SHARK SOMETHING."