Octo-Butt-Numb-A-Thon 12/9-10/06
“An idea is a better monument than a cathedral.”
It’s that time of year again. Time for Harry Knowles to throw the best birthday party a geek could ever have. Damn him for having so many connections that I don’t have.
Every year we try to figure out what’s going to be playing and every year we’re completely surprised. (Ok, not every year. Anytime Peter Jackson has a new movie coming out, we know it’s going to be there. And apparently everybody knew at least one of the movies this year.) I’ve learned to not even try to guess. It’s best just to go with it and enjoy the ride.
This year Harry started the festivities early. Friday night he showed everybody Pan’s Labyrinth. Since I had already seen that, I decided to forgo it and go see one of my favorite bands from high school, Twang Twang Shock-A-Boom (which I hope to be reviewing soon…it’s been a long weekend).
So my BNAT-ing activities started like they always do: rushing to the Alamo Downtown to make sure that I get in before all of the stand by’s try to get my seat. After parking in a spot that I was a little bit concerned about, running to the Alamo with my pillow (always fun to do in downtown Austin), getting in the wrong line and grabbing my goodie bag (lots of books this year…weird) I was finally in theatre and ready for 24 hours of geekiness. Well, sort of. I was really freakin’ tired from Twangin’ out the night before. But it’s all worth it, right? You only live once.
Twice, if you’re lucky.
Harry takes the stage (sort of) and tells us that he’s turned the schedule on its ear. We usually start off with some classic and then go into a big bang with a premiere. Then, around 4am, we get some movie that’s just plain wrong and it will disturb us into staying awake for the rest of the day.
This time, though, he was starting us off with two new ones.
Directed by: Craig Brewer
Written by: Craig Brewer
Last year, Craig Brewer kind of took the world by storm with Hustle & Flow. It’s all about a Memphis pimp who wants to be a hip hop artist.
Now he’s hoping that lightning strikes again with the story of Lazarus (Samuel L. Jackson) a Memphis man whose wife left him. He sings the blues like nobody’s business and has every reason to do it. When he finds the town slut, Rae (Christina Ricci) bloody and beaten outside of his farm one morning, he takes her in and decides that it’s his mission to rescue her from her own life.
Rae is in love with Ronnie (Justin Timberlake), but he joined the National Guard to get money for college. Unfortunately for him, Rae is the Black Snake Moan. She’s gotta have dick every once in a while to take away her own pains and troubles. It actually hurts her to not get the dick. So she goes out drinking and fucking every night.
What’s a couple of town outcasts to do? Well, Laz has a few tricks up his sleeve.
This is a really strange movie, but I liked it a lot. Just like Hustle & Flow was all about hip hop, this one is all about the blues. From the music down to the story. Every thread has some basis in a hyperbolic blues song from back in the days when men sold their souls to the devil for guitar chops and women weren’t no good.
The acting was, for the most part, very good. Sam was better than ever and Christina was awesome. Justin was Justin. He’s a better actor than he is a musician, but that’s really not saying a whole lot. (I had no idea that he has such a wussy voice!) But he did get to rub up against a naked Christina, so he’s got that going for him. Bastard.
Speaking of which, as my buddy Greg said, the costume designer of this movie should win an Oscar. Christina was running around in a pair of panties and a shirt that barely covered her for most of the movie. And she looks amazing. She’s hiding her five-head a little bit and she’s lost a lot of weight. But, then again, I thought she looked great with the weight, so I dunno. It’s a toss-up.
Definitely check this one out. It’s worth the weirdness. It’s probably one of the most misogynistic films made in a long time, too. But, hey. That’s the blues, man!
Craig was at BNAT with us (at least, until 6am) and he said that he’s got a few movies in the works right now. He said something about a soul movie, but I don’t know if he was serious or not. That would be pretty awesome.
But now it’s time for a musical of a different kind.
Directed by: Bill Condon
Written by: Bill Condon
Based on play by: Henry Krieger/Tom Eyen
Back in the early 60s, Barry Gordy started a record label that would change the way white people saw black music forever. He would actually get the music on the top of the pop charts, which was a pretty damn big feat back then. And he did it by controlling the singers with an iron fist.
Now, let’s fictionalize the whole thing and Barry Gordy becomes Curtis Taylor, Jr. (Jamie Foxx), a small time music promoter who happens onto a group of girls who have a good look and a great sound. The Dreams are Effie White (Jennifer Hudson) on lead vocals and Deena Jones (Beyonce Knowles) and Lorrell Robinson (Anika Noni Rose) on backup. Effie has an amazing voice and Curtis falls for her almost instantly. But does he love her or her voice?
He also helps to represent the biggest name in black music, James “Thunder” Early (Eddie Murphy). Jimmy is huge, but he’s never been on the pop charts. Curtis sees a way to finally do this, but he’s gotta be a cold-hearted asshole to do it. And he has to pay off a few DJs.
Things go right. Things go wrong. Deena replaces Effie as the lead singer of The Dreams (because Effie’s a big girl and her voice is TOO distinctive) and in Curtis’ life (ditto). Jimmy gets rid of his original manager (Danny Glover). Jimmy and the house writer/Effie’s brother, CC White (Keith Robinson), try to make more topical music. Curtis shoots them down. The 60s come to a close.
Everything about this story screams Motown, which I love. What I didn’t love was the tonal shift in the middle of the movie. The first half was pretty good. The music was all onstage or record. It was a good facsimile of the old Motown sides that The Supremes and Marvin Gaye were recording in the early and mid-60s.
Then things got weird. People started singing offstage when they weren’t before, including Curtis and CC. (I’m surprised Danny didn’t have a song.) Effie starts taking more of a center stage than she had before, as if the filmmakers decided mid-way through production that she was the star. She was amazing. No doubt about that. The fact that she lost “American Idol” pretty much proves that that show needs to end. Fuck Simon and his crew of evil Svengalis. Especially since he actually told Jennifer that she needed to find another line of work. Obviously, she’s better than the chick who won.
But here’s something that I haven’t been able to say about a movie since 1988: Eddie Murphy was the best part. He was absolutely amazing. Not only was he a great performer onstage, but he was a great actor. It was really weird. I hope he gets a lot of notice for this one and we were all hoping that this role wakes his ass up to his potential. We all know he can do it. He just needs to believe that he can again.
Not a great film, but it is kind of fun. If it ends up winning Best Picture as a lot of people have been talking about, I’m going to be pretty pissed off. We’ll know then that we are back in a time when only musicals can win again.
[Rating:.5/5]
Directed by: Don Jurwich
Written by: Don Jurwich/Joel Seibel
Now it’s really time to shake things up. Harry had said that he was changing the line-up quite a bit, so he threw the “just plain wrong” movie in when he knew that we would all be awake.
This one, however, wasn’t quite the level of wrongness as a Teenage Mother or a Toys Aren’t For Children. I was actually a little disappointed in the level of wrongness, actually.
Once Upon A Girl is about Mother Goose (Hal Smith who used to do Owl’s voice in the old Winnie The Pooh cartoons) being put on trial for obscenity. She tells the jury (mostly full of hot chicks in pretty skimpy outfits and lecherous looking dude with big moustaches) her stories and the movies go into animated shorts done by Hanna-Barbera folks in their off time. And, from the looks of it, they didn’t change their style much. They still think that repeating actions over and over again is really funny.
Here’s why the movie is so wrong: you not only have Owl talking about how “Jack fucked her real good!”, but you have Hanna-Barbera cartoons actually showing all of the action. This is a porn cartoon. Jack gets used as a dildo by the Giant’s wife. A naked Little Red Riding Hood runs into a gay troll collecting tolls on a bridge. Cinderella is a virgin, so the Prince has to fuck all of the girls in the kingdom to find out who is truly a virgin.
I’m not opposed to cartoon porn. It’s usually pretty funny, actually. But this was just lame. And, unfortunately, boring. It was the first of a few movies that I fell asleep during and didn’t feel like I missed very much.
Apparently, this is on DVD. I would avoid it, though, unless you really want to listen for the voice of Megatron (Frank Welker). I couldn’t find him. We’re thinking he may have been the flashing troll, though.
Blech.
Directed by: Stanley Kramer
Written by: Nedrick Young (as Nathan E Douglas)/Harold Jacob Smith
Based on play by: Jerome Lawrence/Robert E Lee
From Mother Goose on trial to intelligence on trial.
This is one of those classics that, for some reason, I had just never seen. Call me an idiot, call me what you will. I always wanted to see it, though.
Bertram Cates (Dick York) is caught teaching free thinking…er…evolution in his class. The moment he starts his lesson, he is arrested by the police in his tiny little town of Hillsboro. The case goes to trial and the City brings in ace lawyer Matthew Harrison Brady (Fredric March) to prosecute Bert. Fortunately, a big city newspaper (I forget which one), got wind of the trial, sent one of their best reporters, EK Hornbeck (Gene Kelly) and hired Henry Drummond (Spencer Tracy) to defend Bert.
And that’s when the fireworks start. The team of Kelly and Tracy is fucking amazing. These guys are so cynical and tired of stupidity that it’s hard to believe that they’re based on real characters from the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial. (The names of all participants were changed. Not sure why.) Kelly gets just about every funny line, usually on his exits. (“You’re the stranger, ain’t ya? Are you lookin’ for a nice, clean place to stay?” “Madam, I had a nice, clean place to stay. I left it to come here.”)
This is an amazing film that needs to be seen today. It needs a wide re-release so that people can see what life is supposed to be about. We should be allowed to think for ourselves without the influence of the government. We should be able to believe what we want to believe. If you don’t believe in evolution, so be it. Just don’t tell me that I can’t believe in it. “Then this man wishes to have the same privilege as a sponge. He wishes to think.”
Another line that I think needs to be used more often these days is one of Gene’s lines: “Mr. Brady, it is the duty of a newspaper to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.” So many news folks need to take that line to heart. We seem to have forgotten what the news was originally for. It wasn’t to trumpet the coming of a new rich man on the rise. It was to show that that man had no clothes. The he was corrupt. That he might not be so good for us.
But, I digress. Inherit The Wind is one of the best courtroom dramas ever made. It should be taught in schools just before evolution is taught.
Directed by: Sylvester Stallone
Written by: Sylvester Stallone
So, now it’s time for a big confession: not only had I never seen Inherit The Wind, but until today, I had never seen a single Rocky movie. Not even the first one. You know, the one that won Best Picture right out from under All The President’s Men, Bound For Glory, Network and Taxi Driver? Yeah. Never seen it. I’m borrowing them all from a buddy, but I haven’t watched them yet. I figured that I would watch them and then, if I still liked the character enough after the debacle that was Rocky V, I would go see Rocky Balboa.
Well, Harry beat me to the punch. Hell, he even had Sly Stallone himself in a video introduction telling him “happy birthday.” It was actually a pretty damn classy intro and made me respect Sly a little. Just a little, though.
Before the movie started, we saw trailers for all five of the other Rocky movies. Well, all of them but V. The projector actually caught on that one and burned it. Tim League got on the mic and said that they had installed the new Dolby Digital Shit Detector and it wouldn’t allow them to play shitty stuff anymore. On to the movie!
Rocky (Stallone) is in his 50s and running a restaurant named after his now dead wife, Adrian. His son, Rocky, Jr. (Milo Ventimiglia from “Heroes”), has a job at some marketing firm or other and doesn’t have a lot of time for his dad. Rocky is happy, but something is missing. Something big.
Then Paulie (Burt Young, one of only three people to be in all six Rocky movies, the other one being Tony Burton who plays Duke) shows Rocky a sportscast where they pit him against the current heavyweight champ, Mason “The Line” Dixon (Antonio Tarver, an actual light heavyweight champ). When the computer Rocky wins, it starts the real Rocky to thinking. Maybe he can come back. Maybe he can do a few small, local fights. What else does he have?
So, come back he does. He fights with the Boxing Commission to get his license back and finally gets challenged by Dixon’s promoters. He’s reluctant at first, but he finally sees it as a chance to prove to himself that he’s still a man.
He has a possible romance in the works, too. He runs into Marie (Geraldine Hughes), a girl that he knew years ago when she was a little girl. It’s a little creepy, but Stallone (who also wrote and directed this one), manages to keep it from being too Woody Allen.
There’s no way that this movie should be good. Not only is it the sixth in a rapidly declining series, but it’s been 16 years since the last one. And it’s about a 50-something year old man starting to box again. Where’s the good?
Fortunately, Stallone is able to keep everything light and makes it entertaining. I can’t really say that it’s a great movie, but it is very fun to watch. Even when Sly is fighting a real-life champ, it doesn’t seem too outlandish. And we were rooting for the guy! Rocky is a charmer in a palooka sort of way and we want him to win.
If you’re a fan of the series, you’ll definitely want to check this out. If not, it’s still a decent movie. It’s definitely better than what I hear about most of the sequels.
FANBOYS CLIPS
This is the only clip show or trailer that we got this year. Weird, huh?
This is actually a movie that Harry was going to show to us, but the filmmakers pulled it because it just wasn’t ready. Instead, he got the next movie.
Fanboys is the story of four guys (Sam Huntington from Detroit Rock City and Superman Returns, Chris Marquette, Dan Fogler from the upcoming Balls Of Fury and Jay Baruchel from Million Dollar Baby) who decide to go to Skywalker Ranch to see Episode I before it opens because one of them is dying.
This looks really fuckin’ funny. I reminds me a little bit of Detroit Rock City, but, since it’s about Star Wars geeks, I think I’ll relate to it a little bit more.
And Harry has a cameo! Sort of. The guy who plays him, Jordan Gelber, sounds exactly like Jack Black. It was hard to tell that it wasn’t him under all the red hair. It’s a pretty funny scene. And watch for a lot of geek cameos. Can’t wait to see how this one turns out.
Directed by: Judd Apatow
Written by: Judd Apatow
So, instead of Fanboys, we get Knocked Up. It’s a fair cop.
Seth Rogen (“Freaks And Geeks,” The 40 Year Old Virgin) is starting to be everywhere. And good for him. He’s a really funny guy that just about everyone can identify with. When he gets into weird situations, you feel like you could actually be there.
This time he plays Ben Stone, a guy who has nothing going for him and he’s fine with that. That all changes when a one night stand with Alison Scott (Katherine Heigl) turns into a baby. Eight weeks after, Alison finds out and tells Ben. They try for the rest of the movie to be compatible with each other.
The movie wasn’t quite finished yet and you could tell that they had some tightening up to do. But it was really funny. Almost as funny as The 40 Year Old Virgin, actually. (Judd Apatow wrote and directed both of them.) Of course, most of the cast of that movie is back including Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann (as Alison’s sister and her husband) and Steve Carell in a cameo. Ben’s buddies are really funny, too. Jason Segal, Martin Starr (both from “Freaks And Geeks”), Jay Baruchelel and Jonah Hill are awesome. Also watch for Alan Tudyck (“Firefly” and Serenity) as an E! TV studio exec.
Check this one out when it comes out next June. It’s pretty awesome.
TEEN WOLF (1985)
Directed by: Rod Daniel
Written by: Jeph Loeb/Matthew Weisman
Remember this one? One of Harry’s buddies kept bugging him to show this one, so he finally relented. At first I thought, “Oh, man. Well, at least I can get a little bit of sleep.” Then I thought, “Naw, this could be fun. Screw it. I’ll watch it. Look! There’s Styles!”
Then the film broke and burned. And Tim got back on the mic and said, “Oh, I forgot about the Dolby Digital Shit Detector. Harry, you just want to go on to the next movie?”
And they did.
Directed by: Paul Verhoeven
Written by: Gerard Soeteman/Paul Verhoeven
Why they would do that on purpose before THIS movie, I have no idea. No one was very excited about this one. It’s not like they needed to fake us out. Oh well. I guess they were faking out that one guy. Whatever. (How do we know it was a fake? Well, we still ran over time at the end of the day, so obviously we didn’t skip a 90 minute movie.)
When Harry and Tim said that Black Book was the new Verhoeven movie, I knew that we were in store for lots of sex and violence. What I didn’t realize is that that sex and violence would be wrapped in a story about Jews running from Nazis in WWII Holland.
Rachel (Carice van Houten) is a young Jewish girl in Holland. When the Nazis take over, she goes into hiding and changes her name to Ellis so that people won’t guess that she’s Jewish when she does get caught. Eventually, she becomes a member of the resistance and goes undercover to try to release more Jews from the clutches of the evildoers.
Verhoeven and his writing partner, Gerard Soeteman, spent about 30 years writing and re-writing this script. They finally decided that they got it right when they changed the main character into a woman.
This movie is no Schindler’s List. Hell, it’s not even really Life Is Beautiful. But it is a very good movie. Except for the sex and violence (which really wasn’t excessive, just more than you would normally see in a movie like this), this doesn’t feel at all like a Paul Verhoeven movie. It feels like a movie made by someone who truly cared about the film he was making, not someone who just wanted to show lots of tits and blow some heads apart. I’m glad he’s done something worthwhile again. It’s been a long time since Robocop.
The Dutch think so much of this film that they’ve entered it into the race for the Oscar. They even paid more to make it than they’ve ever paid before. Hopefully that risk pays off for them.
Rating reserved on account of sleep
Directed by: John Ford
Written by: Dudley Nichols
Based on book by: Liam O’Flaherty
Now it’s time for a couple of “classics.” And, unfortunately, Harry chose to program these towards the end of the day.
The Informer is actually a classic John Ford film that I have hardly even managed to hear of before. It’s the story of an ex-British rebel fighter (Victor McLaglen) who is so poor that he turns in his buddy for 20 pounds. When his buddy is killed while trying to escape, he is racked with guilt at every turn. Even his girlfriend seems to be a source of guilt.
This movie was incredibly slow and I couldn’t really see where it was going. And, because I was so fucking tired at this point, I fell asleep and can’t really tell you what happens past the first 20 minutes. Maybe I’ll rent this someday and write a real review for it. Until then, I’m chalking it up as boring. And I hate to do that because I think John Ford is one of the greatest directors of all time and I’ve never seen a film of his that I didn’t love.
I guess I have to give it another chance.
Directed by: Edward D. Murphy
Written by: Edward D. Murphy
Early on in the day, Harry and Tim showed us a preview of this movie. It had boobs, bullets and Samurai zombies. What the fuck more could you ever fucking want?!
Well, a plot would be nice. And some fun would be great, too.
This is another one that I fell asleep somewhere during the first 20 minutes. And, seeing as how it hasn’t made it to DVD yet (big surprise), I may never get to see this exploitation “classic” ever again. Oh well. I guess I’ll just have to live with myself. Let’s move on.
Directed by: Joe Carnahan
Written by: Joe Carnahan
For the last two films of the day, Harry gave us a couple of big ones. The first is this highly kinetic gangster movie from Joe Carnahan (Narc; Blood, Guts, Bullets And Octane).
It’s hard to sum this one up, but let me try.
Buddy “Aces” Israel (Jeremy Piven) is an up and coming mobster/magician in Las Vegas. He’s managed to come up right under the real Vegas mob boss’s nose. Of course, this isn’t a good thing for either of them. The real boss is pissed that he’s losing his power to this asshole and Aces now has about 50 hitmen after him.
So he made a deal with the FBI. He informs on the boss and he gets a reduced sentence. When they catch wind of all of the hitmen on Aces’ ass, they send Agents Carruthers (Ray Liotta) and Messner (Ryan Reynolds) to save him. But it’s going to take more bullets than a Tarantino flick to save him.
If you think that ol’ Quinten can serve up some violence, you ain’t seen what Joe can do. This movie is so violent that it at times becomes hard to watch. But it’s such cartoonish violence (for the most part) that it’s also fun to watch. The story is a little convoluted and it’s a little hard to keep track of who’s who, but that doesn’t matter. I loved every minute of it.
The cast is pretty amazing. Besides the three leads, there’s also Ben Affleck, Common, Alicia Keys, Peter Berg, Jason Bateman (in probably his strangest role this side of Teen Wolf, Too) and Andy Garcia among many, many others.
Some people cried that it tried to hard for it’s Tarantino-ness. I gave it credit for at least trying. And from now on I’ll always give Joe Carnahan the benefit of the doubt.
It ain’t no award winner, but it’s awesome nonetheless. Check it out. You won’t regret it.
Directed by: Zack Snyder
Written by: Zack Snyder/Kurt Johnstad/Michael Gordon
Based on graphic novel by: Frank Miller/Lynn Varley
And this was the big one. The one that everyone kind of figured Harry would somehow get…or at least hoped that he would.
It’s based on a Frank Miller/Lynn Varley graphic novel which, in turn, is based on the story of 300 Spartans who stood up against (reportedly) one million Persians who were invading their land.
In this version, the Spartan king, Leonidas (Gerard Butler in his best acting ever…but he really doesn’t have to do much) takes 300 of his men, against the wishes of his Congress, to meet these Persians before they ever get to Sparta. He leaves his queen, Gorgo (Lena Headey) and goes to what everyone thinks is certain death. Meanwhile, Gorgo is embroiled in an investigation to find out if a member of the Congress is a traitor.
300 is not one of those movies that you go to looking for great acting or a perfect storyline. Fortunately, it has decent acting and a very interesting storyline. But, first and foremost, it looks really, really cool. Director/co-screenwriter Zach Snyder (Dawn Of The Dead) managed to make the film look just like Miller’s artwork without Frank being on-set the whole time. It’s mostly done with CGI backgrounds (and blood) and looks absolutely beautiful.
He also managed to, somehow, make a bunch of British guys workout rigorously for about 6 months to get them in Spartan shape. I could have sworn that THAT was all done with CGI, too. But apparently not. Who knew that Mr. Cardboard, Gerard Butler could look like Lou Ferrigno?
Great flick and a great way to end a day of movies. It had its moments of being a bit slow (and, as Snyder said, it was 99 percent done, so there were probably a couple of special effects that needed to be added in), but it was a lot of fun.
So, that was it. After giving away a few light sabers (damn them for not giving me one!), they sent us on our tired-ass way. It was an awesome day and I can’t wait to do it again.
See you at the movies, Harry.
