No Country For Old Optimus

So, I was watching Transformers the other day and, okay, well, I wasn't watching it. I was thinking about it. I was thinking about how shitty it is that it lost the VFX Oscar to that bullshit movie with Daniel Craig NOT being Bond and a bunch of polar bears who, for whatever sad reason, don't look much better than the ones from the coca-cola commercials of my youth. As I said, bullshit.

Anyway, I had Autobots on the brainpan and started thinking about subtext, the things not said in a film. Even popcorn films are loaded with subtext. Like how Top Gun is really about homosexuality or how Deja Vu is about Apartheid. Viewed with the right perspective, Michael Bay is no different than Federico Fellini.

The other thing mudding up my thought processes is all of the Iraq-commentary themed films that graced our screens in the latter half of the last year. Rendition, Lions For Lambs, In The Valley Of Elah(elah...elah...ayy...ayy). There was no shortage of topically opinionated uber-dramas geared to get you thinking in your armchairs and to get slender, golden statuettes into actor's mansions.



I'm all for poliltical themes making it into art films, but the thing I noticed about this trend is that an art film just isn't built to carry any semblance of an opinion. Without the structure and dramaturgical stability a more mainstream film brings, a politically preoccupied filmmaker tends to veer off into onanism around the 1:15 mark. A director like Gavin Hood or Paul Haggis knows what he is doing and is plotting every step of the way. A director like Michael Bay lacks that level of self-awareness. He just wants to blow shit up.

This is why I was more intrigued by Transformers than any of the other movies highlighted for their relevance and "controversial" imagery. Let's say you don't like political films. You see a poster with an American flag and Robert fucking Redford, you pretty much know whats in store and ignore it entirely. These films are just preaching to the choir. No one expects global introspection in a movie about big fucking robots, and that's the beauty of it all.

To be honest, Transformers has always been a politcally subversive property. The toy line was rife with Cold War-era implications: robots that weren't what they seemed. What were they hiding behind those Detroit-steel exteriors? Better dead than red, motherfucker. Then you had the cartoon. Just listen to the premise, and try not to picture the cartoon imagery you're oh-so familiar with.

A race of aliens emigrate to Earth, fleeing from what could best be described as religious persecution and an energy crisis over a substance called "Energon," basically crude oil. They hide out in the suburbs, blending in and hiding out while preparing to further their holy war on their hated rivals, who are also surreptitiously roaming the countryside.

Autobot. Decepticon. Sunni? Shi'ite? Red state. Blue state. Little bit country? Little bit rock and roll?

Superheroes like Superman always represented the jewish immigrants of the early 20s and 30s, a sort of hopeful metaphor displaying the best other countries have to offer us as a whole. Todays immigrants are from closer to the border, and people see them more as a threat, but think about this: The Autobots come here from another planet and hide out in garages with your children, and when they have "gang violence" they blow up buildings and kill innocent bystanders by the hundreds. When's the last time that El Salvadorian guy who works at your Kohl's got into a fight with a Jet that turned into a big, metal machine of death and killed your dog?



Don't discount the uber awesome Jesus-Superman-Neo Christ imagery in Optimus' self-sacrifice in the animated feature either. Go back and watch the movie, with new eyes. You'll see what James Carville doesn't want you to.

Overheard At An Open Mic -- Eddie English

I don't know if you've ever been to an Open Mic Nite at a bar, or "comedy club" but they are hilarious. Most people who enjoy stand-up comedy presume that all people who stand in front of brick walls with microphones are inherently hilarious individuals. Not true.

They all start out as desperate, needy, barely humorous beta-males puking up vitriol and heartbreak with the occasionally clever reference to a popular situational comedy from the mid-to-late 1990s. The ones that aren't like that are worse. Picture the guy that used to make fun of everyone in high school, only now he works at a local Shell and he's the guy who likes to make fun of everyone at that one bar across the street from Wal-Mart.

Regardless, these people can be funny, if not intentionally. They're certainly intriguing, if not entertaining. This is a rant I overheard one night. I can't speak to the validity of the story, or the accuracy of my transcription. Jim Beam does that to a man.

Anyway, here's Eddie English.

*real name withheld*

"...so, I was recently seeing this girl...feel free to highlight my foreboding use of the past tense...was seeing this girl. She was a singer-songwriter, which is like, the female equivalent of some random twentysomething dude being a 'comedian.' You know, the mental blank slate that sees a chalk sign for open mic night as a fucking 'career opportunity.' I, uh, actually met her at an open mic night at this bar in the burbs called the fedora, which is just a bad, bad hook-up spot. My best friend met his wife there, and, yeah, that place is like the relationship hellmouth. The fucking backyard from that Stephen Dorff movie. Anyway, I met her at this bar, and she's not that attractive, which is bad considering my herculean lack of standards, but, she was standing on stage with a guitar and black framed glasses, which is like, fucking Kryptonite to a schlubby twenty year old. She seemed so much smarter and more aware than me, and I just loved that. Double underline 'seemed,' because, hey, three dates and backseat Honda sex do not a true perception make. For weeks I couldn't figure out why this 'seemingly' smart and attractive girl would be dating me, then it, uh, dawned on me. I had finally discovered the key difference between men and women. I've beaten every other comedian-cum-psychoanalyst to the punch, if you will, and I've fucking got the key to modern civilization. Women, for a lack of a better, more intellectual analogy, are like The Predator.

Yes, the one with the dreadlocks from the movie. I know men are always painted as these predatorial hunter-gatherers and I respect the historical basis for that. Because of our physical superiority, it makes sense. But, since women are so clearly emotionally superior, it makes sense that they'd be the ones with the dreadlocks chasing Danny Glover on this one. It connects all the other scattershot dots on the subject. Women don't seek men out for emotional stability and the search for happiness. That's like picking up Stevie Wonder at a rest stop for directions. They do it for one fucking reason. Because they can, and they're BORED. It's as if, at the dawn of time, there was a whole fucking soft-core porn looking planet of them, women, and they got bored and came to Earthland and began plucking us off one by one. I know this comparison might be fucking with some people's heads, but I ask this: Haven't you, kind sir, at one point or another had the urge to cover yourself in mud on the patio to hide from your significant other? "Do it! Do it!" I'm serious.

Women in a relationship can be so brutal, that I think, in running with the predator thing, that after surviving a blatant psychological attack from a woman, a fucking armored Rav4 should pull up to your apartment filled with drunken blondes and they all come and grab their fallen comrade and like, leave you with a golden scrunchie or some shit as a trophy. Like. all your friends were alienated and all your shit's got bleach on it from her fucking your shit up while you were at work and all you get to show for it is some artifact from some other poor fuck's bad relationship.

I know the imagery I'm using is a little extreme, but you didn't date Fiona fucking Apple's more menstrual cousin over here, and let me tell you something, fellow shlubby hipsters: I don't care how good her songs are or how drunk you manage to get her, don't fucking date a singer-songwriter. Ask Alanis Morisette's past beaus. Nothing is worse than an angry, pissed off woman with an acoustic, okay? She'll make an LP about how you never bought flowers, despite your having mentioned being allergic, and win a shitload of Grammys. Guess who's not getting mentioned in the acceptance speech?

My ex, whose name I'm purposefully omitting, thanks to her landing a record contract, was one acidic chick, man. I won't rehash the whole relationship, because it'll feel like watching a bad Friends rerun. You've seen one, you've not only seen them all, but they'll haunt you to your grave. I will, however give away the ending. We were at my apartment, which, for the better part of two and a half months, had been annexed as 'our apartment,' and she was playing me this new song she'd written. Considering that she was passionately objective to the most minute shit, you can imagine the number of hastily scribbled torch songs I'd been subjected to. I think she once sang me a song about cashiers at Safeway not double bagging Pepsi 2-liters. Fucking anal. So, this song, which was ominously titled, 'ediquette.' Not ominous because I'm frightened of Dickensian manners, no. Ominous because my best friend's name is Ed and on her napkin/lyrics sheet, it was with his first name the word was spelled.

She went on to belt, in varying keys, how grating it was to try to reach me at Ed's house only to have him be curt with her upon answering. One verse actually rhymed, unironically might I add, the word 'rude' with 'dude.' Now, Ed's not a dick. He's a raging pothead. He smokes more kind bud than Snoop Dogg in Willie Nelson's trailer. If he seems rude on the phone its because he's FUCKING PARANOID. When she finished the song, I was quiet for a moment.

I suppose if I was smart enough to offer a concerned squint, an apology and a musical comment to my then-girlfriend, she'd be my now-girlfriend. Instead i just laughed in her face, which is how I came home to a bathtub full of whiter than white vintage led zeppelin t-shirts. My stoner friend answers the phone wrong and my wardrobe turns into a fucking clorox commercial. To add insult to injury, she decided to break-up with me at an open mic night on my birthday. She wrote a new tune, titled "dick." I won't elaborate on the song, needless to say it wasn't congratulatory.

But, my ex, clever hunter though she may have been, had forgotten one thing. On the call sheet, i was up three slots after her. Never go on stage first when war is at hand. Sadly, I got food poisoning from some bad pastrami and had to cede my stage time to some Jewish kid who looked like napoleon dynamite's illegitimate son, and I never saw that cunt again.

Not until she was on mtv2.

So, since I can't really get on television, my revenge will have to fill the space of a 100 capacity club, and for my trophy I'll have to take awkward silences from the crowd, and if I'm really lucky, a hummer in the back alley from a drunk blonde with a Lenny Bruce fetish."

Multi-racial Baby Making Movement -- Apply Within

Anyone ever walk down the baby aisle at the supermarket, or better yet, watched those pediphile oriented diaper commercials on network television in the afternoons? I've done both and it amazes me that there is such a wealth of individuals willing to sexually exploit their disgustingly photogenic progeny for some quick cash.

Look at those fucking kids. Do you honestly think their parents give a shit how weird that is, so long as a check is involved?

It's interesting to me, because every other media thing involving kids goes the model un route, where there's an asian kid, a black kid, a white kid, a spanish kid, a freedom hating terrorist kid, et fucking cetera. Baby products, all the kids they use are these strange, genetically mutated multiracial babies. They look like what kids look like in bad cyber punk novellas, where the writer imagines a healthy society built on interracial breeding that not only strengthens the gene pool, but irradicates racial prejudice, replacing it with plain old regular prejudice.

Now, I'm biracial, and my mom wasn't exactly growing money in my youth, and I was one sexy fucking baby, but she never threw my aesthetically pleasing ass in front of a camera with some pampers to pay the rent. That's because she was a decent human being. I, on the other hand, fucking love money. Far more than I love babies. So I've devised a plan.

Every girl I meet who has a different racial background than myself, I will offer this proposition. Chicks love babies. Its their little thing. They love babies nearly as much as we love pussy. My plan is to convince a bevy of diverse women to breed with me, then we can go half on some hot biracial babies, and sell them to pampers, or huggies, or whatever baby product brand is willing to give the most cash. In addition to no longer having to sprain my wrist giving handjobs behind Home Depot to pay the bills, I will no longer have to pilfer portions of that same hard earned cash to pay prostitutes for what passes for love in this cold, modern world. I'm not sure just how many women will go for it, but if Girls Gone Wild is still at its twelve hundredth installment, then it wouldn't surprise me if the race mixing baby making movement becomes a multicultural phenomenon.

Don't even worry about STD's. My studies have shown that the superhuman offspring of my ingenius plan may produce antigens in their bloodstreams powerful enough to cure any disease, even that one Rob Thomas had in that shitty Matchbox 20 song.

"You, miss, what are you? Filipino? Ecuadorian? Cool. Cool. Hey, you, uh, you wanna make a baby? No, no rush. I don't want to put you on the spot like that. It's a hard decision. So, take this pamphlet, and if you're interested, call me later. Uh, if an asian woman answers, hang up, because thats a four and not a nine. I know, my handwriting is shitty. But my studies have also shown that bad handwriting isn't genetic so our little Tiger Woods should be alright."

A Day Late - Films Oscar Forgot...Or Ignored More Than Logic Would Dictate

I fucking hate the Oscars. It's 3 1/2 hours of AFI-style clip shows and Jon Stewart making occasionally humorous remarks, with alot of crying (from nominees, not Jon Stewart...usually.) Oh, I watch them every year without fail, but they still irk me. The criteria for what makes an "Oscar" movie is so laughably predictable than any reasonably knowledgeable film goer can figure out the nominations in the summer just from looking at the goddamn trailers.

I get so annoyed at knowing who is going to win that I cheer for an upset or a surprise even if its for a movie I didn't watch. (Thank you, French Chick From La Vie En Rose!) This year's winners were actually pretty good to great flicks, so I don't really have too many qualms, but there were a whole host of Oscar-bait movies I've only recently had the chance to watch and I felt that some of them were sadly cast aside. Here, in Top 5 style:

1. IN THE VALLEY OF ELAH (elah...elah...ayy...ayy..)

Tommy Lee Jones got his deserved Best Actor nod, but what about director Paul Haggis' script? The film is far from flawless, and its gets a little inconsistent about midway, a problem with alot of the better movies out this year, but Haggis should get some cred for turning a fucking magazine article into a dramatically effective amalgam of A Few Good Men and Chinatown.

2. 3:10 TO YUMA

Action movies are always relegated to the editing categories, but Christian Bale and Russell Crowe were both amazing in this pitch-perfect western. Didn't super-love the end, but overall, a very enjoyable, well-crafted piece. At least give Bale something. A handjob if not a Best Actor nod. He was this year's Matt Damon, delivering awesome performances in this and Rescue Dawn and getting zilch, like Damon last year with The Departed and The Good Shepard.

3. THE KINGDOM

Another action movie that didn't even get any Best Editing love. The script is tight, the acting is superb (although a little too "popcorn" for the Oscar crowd) and the camera work is stunning. Peter Berg, as a director, is really coming into his own. Between this and his work on Friday Night Lights (the show and the movie) he's definitely one to watch. The last thirty minutes or so of this film were every bit the thrill ride The Bourne Ultimatum turned out to be, but Oscar is only allowed to slum with one semi-political action thriller per year, and Paul Greengrass looks more directorly.

4. RENDITION

Not a perfect movie, by any means, but the acting was fantastic. Not the kind that stands out and gets applause, but that cohesive, quiet ensemble feel that more movies need. I guess my qualm here would be with the SAG Awards, but I also felt like Dion Beebe should've gotten a Cinematography nod.

5. THE ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES BY THE COWARD ROBERT FORD

Since they don't have a category for Best Uselessly Long Title, and the Best Actor category was too crowded for my man Brad Pitt, who delivered a top 5 performance in his career. I'm glad Casey Affleck was recognized. The kid is eerily good in the movie. The rest of the cast stands out as well, particularly Sam Rockwell. Roger Deakins got his deserved double Cinematography nod for this and No Country For Old Men but I still felt this movie was overlooked. I guess I feel like Andrew Dominik should've gotten Jason Reitman's spot in Best Director. I loved Juno but we all know* Reitman's nod was a "pat on the head" nomination, to encourage future work. He did a damn good job and definitely deserved it, but watching the oddly fabulist lyricism of Dominik's post-modern, western ballad, its hard not to want to give the Aussie his own pat on the head.

Also, what the fuck? Nick Cave and Warren Ellis get screwed for the score? It's like all the composers in the Academy got together and were like "Fuck those rockers, trying to horn in on our territory." I just know John Williams had something to do with them and Jonny Greenwood getting the shaft. Overpraised prick. While we're on the subject of music...

BONUS ROUND

ONCE

I loved this movie, and I'm glad it won Best Original Song. If one of those insanely vapid songs from Enchanted had won, I'd've turned the telecast off right then and there. This movie was the real little indie that could of the year, so for it to have one song up against three bullshit tracks from that wouldn't make the cut on a straight-to-DVD animated Disney sequel was kind of pathetic, but what a live performance.

8 More Movies To See In '08

After recieving copious complaints from friends about movies I "forgot" to mention, I've decided to do a sequel. Like I Love The 80s: Part Deux, only, you know, not. Same deal as last time, trying to cast a wide net.

8. IRON MAN

This is the main reason for this post. I don't know why, but I forgot about what has the potential to be single, coolest, comic book to movie adaptation ever. Actor turned director Jon Favreau is extremely savvy and looks to have a handle on things. Also. Bobby Downey Jr., who, after Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang can do no wrong in my eyes. The cast is superb, the suit looks awesome (thanks Stan Winston) and there's a hot rumor Sam Jackson has a cameo as S.H.I.E.L.D. superspy Nick Fury.

What more could you want? A peak you say? Look no further.



7. SMART PEOPLE

I'm not familiar with the director, or the screenwriter, and to be entirely honest, the story is fairly run-of-the-mill indietastic pseudo-intellectual family dramady, but ELLEN PAGE IS IN IT. You know, Ellen Page...cut off a guy's dick in Hard Candy (sorta), wasted months of her life on X-Men: The Last Stand, totally eye-fucked me throughout Juno (dude, she wants me.) Plus, Dennis Quaid...with a BEARD. Thomas Haden Church keeps Wings alive with the plucky comic relief. It could be this year's little-indie-that-could or it could be a low-budget version of The Family Stone. I'm gonna give it a shot, and so should you.



6. X-FILES 2

Yeah, I know nothing about the plot or anything else about it really, but I'm not gonna be able to say no. David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson back together is worth the price of admission.



A bunch of screaming nerds at Wondercon can't be wrong. Plus, if it sucks, it'll be really fun to make fun of.

5. THE CHANGELING



The plot doesn't zhing me at all. A woman's son goes missing or something and comes back but they think he's an alien. It sounds like some shit the Sci-Fi Channel would hesitate to air. However, it's written by Babylon 5 creator J. Michael Strazcynski and directed by CLINT EASTWOOD, so yeah, I don't care if the main cast is actually puppets and the sets are miniatures, I'm gonna see it. Clint's on a streak and I don't foresee this ending it. If he saw something in a movie that sounds this lame, it's gotta be interesting. And who needs puppets and miniatures when you've got Angelina Jolie's Africa-saving lips?

4. SPEED RACER

Another movie that has a fairly high suck probability, The Wachowskis adaptation of the beloved anime just looks like alot of fun. The action looks intriguing, even if the whole film's overall style looks like Spy Kids on crack. John Goodman as Pops Racer. Matthew "You Know What's Interesting About Me? Nothing." Fox is Racer X. At least the car chases will be cool.



3. SYNECDOCHE, NEW YORK



Pint-sized, indescribably brilliant screenwriter Charlie Kaufman, the man that took us inside John Malkovich's head, gave himself a fake twin brother, and then took us inside Jim Carrey's head, is making his directorial debut in this film about a theatre director, Philip Seymour Hoffman, who deals with the women in his life while trying to recreate New York City inside a warehouse for his new play. Sounds adequately Kaufman-esque to me. Here's hoping he's got some camera skillz.


2. MY BLUEBERRY NIGHTS

This movie has one major thing going for it that I love and one major thing going for it that I hate. I LOVE writer-director Wong-Kar Wai. Even when he's not entirely on the ball (2046) he's still an immensely talented storyteller who directs the way some men paint. Emotionally evocative and sumptuous images set to poetic words and haunting music. He's an auteur if ever there was one. This is his first English language movie and it stars Norah Jones.

Yes, that Norah Jones.

Why? Wong-Kar Why?????

It got 'eh' reviews at festivals, and Jude Law is in it, which never helped anyone, but so is Natalie Portman, playing the kind of part I'm sure Faye Wong would've got had this film been made in China. The trailer's got me on the fence, but it looks pretty enough to warrant my dough.



1. QUANTUM OF SOLACE



After Casino Royale I will follow Daniel Craig and this reinvigorated Bond franchise into the bowels of hell. I don't care that Marc Forster is directing it and the closest he's come to action is Billy Bob Thornton tearing Halle Berry's ass up in Monster's Ball. I don't care that this is the first Bond film that doesn't follow an original Ian Fleming story. I also don't care that the title sounds like an Outer Limits teleplay Harlan Ellison would've written fucked up on absinthe trying to break a contract. It's Bond. James Bond. Recognize.

Porn Star Vs. Indie Songstress: Volume 1

I love porn. That's a ridiculous understatement. I'm a guy. We ALL love porn. Its just so...prevalent. For me, porn is right up behind a stack of pancakes after a night of drunken debauchery and right above that moment in 300 when that one guy is all "Then we will fight in the shade."

So, yeah, porn.

The other thing I love is indie music. Right behind nostalgic early 90s grunge tunes but right above synthy 80s new wave. Specifically I love indie girls. Like, all of them. Even weird looking ones like Regina Spektor, because she sounds so, so, cute. She's like a carebear with a recording contract. Quasi-plump, offbeat non-traditionally alluring girls with pianos or guitars haunt my dreams.

Hence the title. Every week or so I'm gonna match up a favorite porn star of mine with an indie singer I'm nerdcrushing on. The victor is irrelevant. In this Thunderdome, everybody wins.

COMBATANT NUMERO UNO. representing the adult film industry...

JULIA BOND



STATS: (all stats approx and probably stolen from wikipedia)

DOB: 2-26-87
HT: 5'0"
WT: 100lbs
MEASUREMENTS: 36C-27-41
ORIENTATION: Bisexual
ASS: for days

You may have seen her on an old episode of The Jerry Springer Show. You may recognize her from the last time you watched Frat House Fuck Fest. You may have been masturbating to video files of her on redtube for months and never known her name. Regardless, Julia Bond is a fuck flick starlet of the highest order. She's fairly new to the industry and not as name-checked, but if you've ever seen her in Big Wet Butts she's pretty hard to forget.



Every porn star is essentially interchangeable. They're all sexed up sluts doing things on camera for money that alot of girls won't admit to doing in real life. What sets them all apart (aside from bust, hair color and ethnicity) is their personality. Remember what I said about Regina Spektor being a care bear? Well, Julia Bond is a care bear who occasionally gets DP'd by two black guys. So, I guess that makes her a Stuffed Bear.

COMBATANT NUMERO DOS, representing the blogosphere...

LYKKE LI



STATS:

totally unknown. Pssst. She's Swedish.

I've been head-over-heels in love with Swedish Indie-pop girl Lykke Li for about two or three months now. At first, all I knew about her was that Bjorn Yttling (of Peter, Bjorn & John, the guys who made you whistle through all of 2007 on commercials and Grey's Anatomy) was her producer and that her lead single, "Little Bit" was infectious in ways I was wholly unprepared for. On rough estimate, the first weekend I discovered the track I listened to it some 2,814 times.



I don't know much about her now, either. I know I can't pronounce her name. I know she doesn't mind, which is nice, because I HATE people with difficult to pronounce names who demand you waste extra effort playing guess-the-phonetics just so they can feel placated. I also know that within about six months she's gonna be super-hot shit and probably a nominee for Best New Artist at the Grammys next year.

I don't quite know what it is about her I like so much. Julia Bond's easy. She's cute , buxom and has a fat ass. That, and I've seen her naked on several occasions. Lykke's different. I've seen her naked, too, although I've never seen her disrobe. Her honey-throated renditions of poppy-soul tunes scratch through my typically jaded exoskeleton and mollify the aches in my soul I had heretofore never deemed worthy of a second thought. To watch her doe-eyed gaze and her rhythmless swivel and want to reach out and play with her never-quite-kempt-in-that-bun hair is as ethereal and gentle as watching Julia Bond deep throat an 11inch cock is visceral and dirty.

I've seen Julia Bond's cooch, but I've seen Lykke Li's heart.

WINNER: Lykke Li. Sort of.

Michael Bay Is A Rock Star

If you're a film nerd, then you know what its like to covet the seemingly awesome lives of your favorite filmmakers. No self respecting cinemaphile lies awake at night, watching a Turner Classic Movies rerun of Goodfellas dreaming of being Robert Deniro. That motherfucker is crazy. No one wants to be badgered on the street by random people quoting dialogue from a movie you barely enjoyed working on. Real die-hards want to be Martin Scorsese, but the real die hards are lying to themselves.

The rationale behind the director fantasy is that it seems like a fun life. Paparazzi don't follow directors around. When you get recognized, it's because of your talent and skill, not your weirdly cultivated persona. Even an uber-famous director can probably eat more peacefully in a restaurant than Ryan Reynolds. Directors even seem to get more hot actress tail than actors, but that may just be some residual social ephemera from the 70s film scene. All in all, it seems like a sweeter set-up. There's just one problem with that:

Directors aren't rock stars.

I know. We're not even talking about music, but we are. You see, all fame fantasies are based in the rock star paradigm. Every man alive wants to be a rock star. I don't mean like, Alternative Press, Myspace famous rock star, or critically-acclaimed, Pitchfork-endorsed indie rock star. Every man wants to be David Lee Roth. Not now, obviously. That motherfucker is crazy, too. But in the late 70s/mid 80s.

Intellectual adoration aside, Woody Allen is not a rock star. I'd love to be able to meet someone and casually mention how difficult it was to write Annie Hall or innocuously mention what Diane Keaton tastes like (well, in the 70s anyway.)

However, I wouldn't want to actually be Woody Allen. I love Stardust Memories as much as the next guy but, he plays the fucking clarinet. THAT'S NOT ROCK AND ROLL.

Luckily enough for the modern film nerd, there is one director they can fantasize about being who IS a rock star, and luckily, is NOT Brett Ratner. That man is Michael Bay.



See?

That motherfucker leads a fun life. Don't give me any of that bullshit about how that video is just a commercial for a media service. That's about as much a documentary as any D.A. Pennebaker film ever was. You just KNOW that's how he rolls in real life. Blowing shit up. Exotic animals. Sure, he looks like he used to play bass in Winger and sounds like Spike Jonze's older brother, but he directed Transformers!

If I was gonna live my life a famous director, I'd want to be that level of badass. I don't want people asking me about all the coke I snorted in the early 80s (cough Marty cough) or why I hate the nazis so much (Hello, Spielberg) or why the latter half of my career sucked so hard (Sorry, Orson Welles' ghost. So sorry.)

No, I want to be Michael Bay. This is the same guy who, frustrated with the never-ending writer's strike, sat down in his expensive Eames chair and fucking wrote Transformers 2 his DAMN SELF. You gotta love it.

The Amazing Spider-Man Vs. Emo

FADE IN:

Then.

In the months prior to last summer’s release of Spider-Man 3, the geek inside of me found himself with an addiction to anti-anxiety pills, so rife was he with anticipation for the third (and some thought final) installment in director Sam Raimi’s film adaption of Stan Lee and Steve Ditko’s iconic Marvel Comic. I recall seeing a teaser trailer for the film before Superman Returns (a comic book adaptation I’d much rather not discuss) and for pretty much every other twenty-something beta-male in the audience making an uncommon appearance in the light of day (or din of a movie theater), the experience has no real equal. I imagine that if a Mega-Church full of devout Christians got some sort of promotional video with clips and snippets of a heroic looking Jesus Christ tussling with hordes of the damned, brandishing a flaming sword, thirty seconds of righteousness followed by text telling them all to “Look out for The Rapture on 5-4-09”, perhaps we’d be in the ball park of “analagous.”

For nerds and geeks, the premiere of a hotly anticipated superhero movie trailer before the premiere of a hotly anticipated superhero movie is like manna. It’s like getting to eat a cookie before getting to eat a whole cake. It offers a look one year into your otherwise lackluster existence, giving you ample time to plan your days accordingly. The teaser itself promised to be triply awesome in the same way Spider-Man 2 promised to be doubly more awesome than Spider-Man. This was a preview that said “Hey, guess where your ten dollars are gonna be in a year?” This was a trailer that made me not think about how disappointed I was in Superman Returns. This is why Sam Raimi is a god.

Raimi, with the help of a bevy of talented screenwriters (most notably David Koepp and Alvin Sargent), had succeeded in making one of comicdom’s most enduring and lovable characters into two films that were entertaining, profitable and (horror of horrors) not pieces of shit comic geek apologists like me would have to defend to their intellectually elitist friends. Put simply, everyone (old, young, straight, gay, boy, girl) enjoyed the Spider-Man movies, except formerly pony-tailed painter Alex Ross, but he’s a gump-ass chooch, so fuck him. Raimi had agreed to make Venom, a character born of the darkest period in comic book history (the 90s), the chief antagonist. This was remarkable because a) Fans fucking LOVE Venom and b) Sam Raimi (and myself) fucking HATES Venom. The man put his own artistic integrity aside to repay the fans who, in a weird way, are responsible for the nice house he no doubt shares Mimosas with Bruce Campbell in. He had already conquered the superhero origin story. He had slaughtered the sophomore slump, Wrath Of Khan/Superman II paradigm that a lot of genre directors were incapable of handling. Now, he was going to take a pretty mediocre character (one that he actively despised) and make cinema gold.

CUT TO:

Now.

If I were to re-read every review of Spider-Man 3 searching for the phrase “cinema gold” I’d come up emptier than an Act II of Behind The Music-era MC Hammer’s bank account. Sure, people liked it. It made over 300 million fucking dollars. It was definitely cool. I liked it. It just didn’t zhing the way I thought it would. This can be attributed to any number of facts: the film’s length, Tobey Maguire’s increasingly unemotive acting, the uninspired third act. There is, however, one reason I’ve heard cited more than pretty much any other. Within three days of seeing the film, no less than eleven people who I’d discussed the film with said “The action was cool, but I don’t know why they made Spidey so emo.”



I wholeheartedly disagree with this notion. Oh, I agree that giving Tobey Maguire bangs and a dancing sequence was an ill-advised attempt at visual metaphor, and I agree that this film was a little more down-note than its predecessors at times (when it wasn’t being totally laughable) but “emo?” Sam Raimi didn’t make Spider-Man emo. Stan Lee did that forty years ago when he created the character. Forty years before assholishly arrogant gen-Yers even coined the often derrogatory term, Stan The Man invented the world’s first emo superhero, and God bless him.

When Spider-Man 2 came out, a lot of people were surprised to see that Dashboard Confessional had a song on the soundtrack. “An emo band on a superhero movie soundtrack?” I guess they missed that Nickelback guy who sounds like Tony The Tiger and the fat guy from Saliva I last saw selling Terence Howard pot in Hustle and Flow. In point of fact, I couldn’t think of a band more perfect for writing songs for ol’ Webhead to sling to (with the possible exception of Weezer.) Peter Parker is pretty fucking emo.



Now, when I say “emo” I’m not making some broad criticism of a musical genre I personally couldn’t give two fucks less about. I’m referring to “emo” as some sort of post modern character trait. A lot of people I meet use the term to describe someone who is needlessly dramatic, socially introvertive or just especially whiny. It’s kinda like a few years ago when people used the word “goth” instead of “sociopathic” or “suicidal.” I suppose if enough of one personality type adopts a certain social persona, then anyone else adopting said persona better get used to being compared to that particular personality type.

I don’t share the same disdain for emo kids that most people do, (including, weirdly enough, other emo kids) but if we’re going to stick with the term, then let’s not pretend that this emo-transformation is recent. It’s been in Spidey’s blood forever. A nerdy, beta-male gets bitten by a radioactive spider and gets superpowers. Naturally, he attempts to use said powers to be cool and get laid (why he chose the profession of wrestling, I’ll never know) and in doing so, forgets the teachings of his wise Uncle, a caregiver he loses as a roundabout result of his own douchbagery. Rather than continuing to use his powers for personal gain (and, oh, I don’t know, help his apparently helpless aunt pay a bill or two), Peter decides that he must use his great power to be greatly responsible, stopping the city from being attacked by a myriad of animal and reptile themed psychopaths with axes to grind.

There isn’t really anything inherently emo about being a vigilante. In fact I always assumed that fighting crime went better with heavy metal music. I personally don’t picture The Punisher ventillating mafia dons with bullets to Armor For Sleep. What makes Peter so emo is the life he leads. His primary concerns aren’t really fighting crime. It’s paying his rent, getting a girl to not dump him, taking care of his aunt, sitting alone on rooftops and ruminating on why life continues to suck. His pasttimes are that of pretty much every sad sack twentysomething guy with a shit job, a broken relationship and a knack for being melodramatic. Peter Parker is basically Zach Braff with spider powers.

Some might argue that Superman is more emo than Spider-Man, but that’s pretty much bullshit. Superman is like a starting quarterback in high school who feels alienated by his good looks and physical prowess. That guy just needs some paxil. Batman’s pretty emo. He’s still wrestling with the death of his parents he witnessed at age eight. The only difference is he’s fucking rich. He deals with his issues by beating the shit out of guys like The Penguin and when he gets bored of that, he fucks supermodels and buys companies. He’s like if Patrick Bateman, Henry Rollins and John F. Kenndy Jr. had baby, and any thing related to Henry Rollins cannot also be considered emo. That’d just be fucked up. I suppose Wolverine is kinda emo. The whole “I’m the best there is at what I do, but I don’t remember who I am” thing is kinda bothersome, but in his defense, he’s fucking WOLVERINE. The only comic book character who gives Peter a run for his money in the emo department is Spawn. That dude has been bitching up a storm since the early nineties, and, further proof that God isn’t real, or that he at least likes Todd McFarlane too much, people continue to read the book anyway. McFarlane, however, used to draw Spider-Man before he created Spawn, so…winner.

Peter Parker is the second most important emo character in literary history (the first being Prince Hamlet, a guy who takes up four hours of the audience’s lives pondering the end of his own before laying waste to that of his enemies.) The only reason this trait seemed so annoying in Spider-Man 3 is because Tobey Maguire forgot the funny. The one thing that stops Spidey from becoming a cloying self-obsessive who bitches too much is his sense of humor. (This is also why Scrubs Zach Braff is always gonna be cooler than Garden State Zach Braff, no matter how many times Natalie Portman makes him listen to “New Slang”) Yeah, he whines a lot when he’s alone, but if The Juggernaut tries to stomp his ass, he quips him into submission. Everyone knows a guy who is constantly in turmoil over some pseudo-emotional bullshit, but he’s tolerable because in public, he makes people laugh and feel comfortable. That’s Peter Parker. Mary Jane dumps him. Fourteen pages of him swinging through the city with thought balloons full of what could easily be lyrics to a Fall Out Boy song. The Green Goblin back in town? Five pages of two guys in funny costumes trading one-liners and laughing the very real prospect of death in the face. If Tobey had pulled that off, I might’ve forgiven his four-minute homage to Bob Fosse.

Pineapple Express - Early Draft

One fantastic aspect of being dangerously bored is that sometimes you find shit like this. The fine folks at Simply Scripts have posted an early draft of The Pineapple Express written by Seth Rogen & Evan Goldberg.

The thing about Judd Apatow produced comedies is that much of the best humor comes from on-set rewrites and ad-libs. If you've ever read early drafts of Knocked-Up or The 40-Year Old Virgin then you know that alot of the most quotable lines and memorable set-pieces weren't on the page.

That being said, this script is fucking hilarious. I lost the laugh-out-loud count around page 40 and having seen the redband trailer and the preview on the Superbad DVD, I can say this movie is going to be fantastic.

Seth Rogen's comedic sense differs from Judd's in that Apatow is more interested in characters than situations. He likes the humor to come from the people and their relationships, which is why his films' best scenes are guys sitting around. Seth is very similar, except he goes for a wider scope, like the fantasy sequences in Superbad and the stuff with the cops.

This is very apparent in even this early draft, as the film is basically a funnier, post-modern version of the plot of every Shane Black-penned 90s movie ever: Two guys, comedically matched, end up in a plot with guns, twists and car chases. Oh, and pot. Lots of pot.

If you feel the film won't be spoiled by reading the script, you can find it here
Otherwise, I hope you can wait until August.

8 Movies To See In '08

Yeah, it's almost fucking March, but who cares? There are always an assload of awesome flicks to see, even in slow movie years. The trick is that they're all spaced out in their own special corners of the multiplex calendar. Blockbusters in the summer, Oscar bait in the fall, indie gems on dvd because you can never find them whenever they are in theaters, and random bullshit you shouldn't waste cash on during the in-between seasons.

Here is a mixed bag of cinema goodness coming out this year, with trace amounts of pretension, vitriol, and geek jizz.

8. TAKEN

Remember Commando, with Arnold Schwarzenegger? Of course you do. "Remember when I said I'd kill you last? I lied." Well, this is like that, only instead of Arnie, we've got wise mentor playing, jew-freeing extraordinaire Liam Neeson and instead of a barely there plot by Jeph Loeb and Steven De Souza, we've got a script by Luc fucking Besson, best known for being french, showing the world Natalie Portman (b-t-dub, thanks Luc) and for churning out cool action movies the way White Castle makes burgers.

Liam Neeson plays a former black ops guy (my favorite stock character occupation, ever) whose daughter (Maggie Grace from Lost) is kidnapped. Mr. Neeson chases down random guys with guns and deals death in a singular minded fashion reminiscent of a David Mamet movie. In short, go fucking see it.



7. REDBELT

Speaking of David Mamet, he's back. Now, if Mamet had made a movie about talking animals trying to save a zoo for Dreamworks, I'd still see it, so the fact that he wrote and directed this new movie is nearly negligible. Its about mixed-martial arts, which I could give a fuck less about, except the movie stars Chiwetel Ejiofor. You may remember him as the awesome Operative in Joss Whedon's Serenity or his fantastic turn in Dirty Pretty Things but more likely you know him as that cool black guy who seems to be following Don Cheadle and Denzel Washington around for the past two years.

He plays a MMA instructor who--you know, what? Just watch the trailer.



Mamet's movies have more twists than a pretzel, and if for whatever reason the presence of Tim Allen makes you uneasy, then check out The Spanish Prisoner where Mamet gives Steve Cheaper By The Dozen Martin room to act. Believe it.

6. SHUTTER ISLAND



I like Dennis Lehane's books, and I like Martin Scorsese's films. Well, more accurately, I read one Lehane book (Mystic River) and own a copy of another (this one in question) and I've seen nearly all of Marty's films multiple times. He's like a surrogate father to me, except we've never met, and if we did, he'd probably have me thrown out of the Tribeca Film Festival.

I'm not super in love with the Scorsese-DiCaprio tandem, but The Departed was fantastic and I'm betting that even if this sucks, it'll be at least watchable. Plus, Michelle Williams and Mark Ruffalo are in it.

5. BURN AFTER READING



This is a no-brainer. Brad Pitt, George Clooney, The Coens. I'm there. You're there. Oscar is waiting.

4. HELLBOY II: THE GOLDEN ARMY

Guillermo Del Toro is the godfather of my unborn babies, so of course I'm gonna see the sequel that plans to melt my eyes with awesome visuals and blow my mind with theater shaking action and fun one-liners from Ron Perlman's pitch-perfect Hellboy. Plus, Luke Goss, the villain of Blade II and a guy who looks kinda like Tom Cruise in the right light, will be the newly created for the film villain.

Plus, Johann!!! Now if only they can get Lobster Johnson and Roger The Homunculus in on this...



3. PINEAPPLE EXPRESS

If you saw Superbad or any other comedy Judd Apatow and Seth Rogen had their hands in, then you don't need me to tell you about this movie. You don't need to know its a stoner-buddy comedy about a man and his dealer who witness a murder and are on the run from unsavory criminals and the munchies. You don't need to watch the totally awesome redband trailer with the uber-hip inclusion of my favorite M.I.A. song. You don't need to put ten dollars in your overpriced piggy bank for this August to enjoy what will basically be the comedy of the year. If you haven't, then you can go suck a bag of dicks.



2. INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL

I'll admit. I was skeptical. It's been ages. Harrison Ford is old. Shia Lebeuf is moderately cool. The project has been written and re-written by everyone from M. Night Shyamalan to Frank Darabont and Sean Connery apparently isn't coming back. Of course, that was all before I saw the trailer.



Yeah, I'm there. They could call it Indiana Jones and The Colostomy Bag and they'll still get my money. Curse you, Spielberg.


1. THE DARK KNIGHT

Heath Ledger's last performance. Aaron Eckhart as Two-Face. The best young director in the industry with a $200 million budget. This is the way movies are supposed to be.



'Nuff said.

Wrestling + Midgets = Populist Torture Porn

I love midgets. Now, I've never met or befriended one, nor have I (for lack of trying) courted and fucked one. I don't have a tawdry shorty fetish. In all of my accumulated pornography viewing, I've never laid eyes on a vertically challenged cutie getting impaled on a pork spear or seen a micro-mini John Holmes thrust and parry his way through a top-heavy Keebler elf. There's no real strong basis for it, but, for whatever reason, right behind my patented, proto-nerdy affection for monkeys, bears, robots and zombies, midgets fascinate the fuck out of me.

They're like super-cute, SD anime characters, only corporeal and not fictitious! This is one of the many reasons I continue to despise Vince MacMahon.

Being a "smart mark" (wrestling jargon for an enlightened fanboy, one who knows how fake wrestling is but watches anyway) I am more than versed in the PT Barnum aspect of the biz. I understand how the rather wide umbrella of "sports entertainment" allows professional wrestling to operate as a bastard amalgamation of full-contact physical combat, low-brow theater, and subversive circus high-wire act. I've long since gotten used to the WWE's owner ingratiating himself into his own product with incessant ease. It's like if you were to take that moment at the end of a football game when the usually off-to-the-sidelines coach is victoriously doused with a huge gatorade dispenser, only chopped into sashimi thin slices and systematically replacing the meat of the pro-wrestling burger.

(Yes, in this sandwich metaphor, actual wrestling matches are burger meat, event-pumping promos are condiments, and the prurient vignettes of stripper-cum-"divas" dry humping each other in mud-covered non-title bouts is the melted cheese.)

For years, Vince has turned dealings with his family and employees into an episodic and half-baked soap opera. His wife "divorced" him. His son "fought" for control of the company. His daughter married his top star, quotation marks purposely left out because it really fucking happened. He even wrestled fellow overpaid, under-coiffed megalomaniac Donald Trump. Just because something is sort of funny and incites an inexplicable ratings bump doesn't mean you should recreate it on a weekly basis, a note that could be taken to heart by pretty much anyone who produces television for a living. Irregardless, The Vince Show trudges on.

Lately he's been embroiled in a storyline involving Hornswoggle, his illegitimate son who is also a leprechaun.

The angle involving MacMahon's mysterious offspring was supposed to end with up-and-coming wrestler Ken Kennedy being named the new heir to the faux-Shakespearean throne, but internet leaks demanded a new ending. (Familiar territory for anyone who remembers DC Comics changing the end of an early 90s crossover to reveal that maniacal maestro Monarch was really...Hawk from Hawk and Dove???) Now, Vince spends a half hour every week humiliating and abusing his Irish, gold-guarding, midget son.

He puts him into matches with full-sized wrestlers.



He forces him to kiss his bare, wrinkled, white ass.



He even put him into a steel cage match and proceeded to let John Bradshaw Layfield (a wreslter who most recently resembled a post-Saw Cary Elwes on a cheeseburger bender) toss his tiny ass around a ring.



The abuse is humiliating and the humiliation is abusive. Unfortunately, both are basely hilarious.

Wrestling taps into a part of the male psyche, one that overrides any erudition and breeding in favor of that which is undeniable. No matter how smart or sensitive the guy, a monkey flinging shit at someone is funny. IQ has nothing to do with how cool a zombie movie looks, or how hot Jessica Alba is, and, loathe as I am to admit it, my yin for midgets doesn't make one getting heaved into the wall of a steel cage any less amusing.

In a World...

There are very few things you need to know about a person that you can't superficially guesstimate from the things they choose to like. Good people are concerned with your actions, your motivations, your intentions and the way you treat your fellow man. Other people, like me, would rather make up things about you based on how you felt about the latest Gnarls Barkley single. So, we could start this thing off talking about my upbringing, my beliefs, or the easter basket of social malaise that was my adolescence, or we can do this the right way.

I hate adult contemporary radio. I love vh1. My favorite Legionnaire is, was and always will be Rokk Krinn, aka Cosmic Boy. Law & Order rules, both as a semi-decent crime fiction series and as pop cultural juggernaut. If you were to put Bruce Willis into a film about eating dead babies, I would watch it three times in theaters and buy the special edition DVD. Also, I love cupcakes. Life is a basketball.