Movies We Been Watchin'

22. Happy Birthday to Me (1981)

2010-09-09T07:24:00.000-07:00

this movie was pretty fucking awesome. members of "the top 10", the richest kids at the richest prep school circa 1981 (in canada? i think this movie's canadian... they're all in highschool and they all drink beer... so... i'm thinking... well whatever...) start getting murdered one by one in the most entertaining and gory ways imaginable. deaths so ridiculous you have to laugh but not cartoonish enough to not squirm. they give everyone a motive to kill just about everyone else and there are so many good fake-outs and tripping balls moments you can't quite put it together... and the twist at the end is truly bizarre.

the budget for this isn't that bad. they wreck a few good cars, have some truly cinematic shots, stage a disco party, there's buckets of blood delicious blood...

y'all should see this one. curtis from alien father got it from best buy for a mere $5. SLASH IT UP.

21. Jesus' Son (1999)

2010-07-03T23:21:00.000-07:00

drugs, booze and cute girls dancing to 60s hits. deranged sped-up sock-hop. sweet ass on purple pants and turqoiuse nipples. blue balled on a horse farm. this is a movie about a guy everyone calls FuckHead. do us both a favor & rest, in peace. don't look too close. heroin in the morning with the morning cartoons. that's not even your kitchen. he just wants some cornflakes. much simpler process. kid friendly process, not one that most adolescents couldn't pull off. dancing octopus. holiday in long term. somebody shot somebody. vw bug like a german toy car gettin rust in the american country. style and function. throw the dead guy out of the car? probably should. FUCKHEAD. lousy birthday. everybody needs an upright piano in their home and all those who HAVE one and don't play it should donate it to some junkies and hear their songs. junkie chicks who puke WILL TURN ON YOU and then you're out. two feet get you pretty far. how far have you walked? steal a car! use the jukebox at the diner. waitresses never forget. wayne shakes. money. dope. nodding out. making money. "you know you're bleeding from the nose?"

new jersey's so dense. pennsylvania sucks...

even more frontier, where this must take place - with lower income. more practical people by heart, by brain muscle memory. rip the copper out the walls.

THIS MOVIE HAS ONE OF MY FAVORITE SONGS OF ALL TIME IN IT WHILE BILLY CRUDUP SWINGS A HAMMER DANCING AROUND A ROOM with trippy old wallpaper. PUKE. "all this work is messin with my high can't we find an easier way to make a dollar?"

and then some absurd. and then some straight. the man in the cowboy hat and the moustache means seriousness.

and then... JOE TEX - THE LOVE YOU SAVE MAY BE YOUR OWN (way before they used it in Death Proof)

i mean it baby -- through the rain and the desert. who are you? i'm the soul for your soul. i'm your man. now meet Jack Black the orderly, often stealing pills from the cabinet. what's he gonna do about those shoes squitching? stabbed in the eye with a steak knife? really? woooah. rhetorical questions from the nervous nelly in charge cause he's LIMITED. patient complains of knife to the head. stabbing headache? but back to the popping pills all night in the hospital. in the hospital. while you're working. here's ANOTHER movie where jack black gets to say "I save lives." wilco. "she begs me not to miss her"ambiance happening... dope fiends are romantic too. they can be mad cute too. maybe that's their problem. perhaps it's related. JAMES BROWN REFERENCE. "i wanna go to church" "you should go to the county fair"

this isn't one of those movies about drugs where it's about how shitty the drug makes you feel and the vomiting and all that. it's not dramatized with heavy orchestras synchronized to the belt and the spoon and the needle and the squirt and the high. it's not as simple as "aaaah dat junkie did himself in" law & order shot of a OD'd corpse. it's not about the sad junkie ruining his life. it's not even about fiending, or withdrawal. it's past that.. we've seen it. we're building relationships here. the audience with the characters and between the characters themselves. we're having good times popping hospital pills! driving aimlessly! we will continue to have good times and raise these baby rabbits! not morbidly beautiful LOOKING things... talkin straight up beautiful things happening. it snows a lot in the movie, but not all the time. it just SEEMS like it snows a lot. WE'RE TAKIN' THIS DAY BY DAY.

fingertips all yellow from smoking. and everything DickHead touch turns to shit. then he musta laid a pinkyfinger on his optimism. SNAP. the turningpoint(s). maybe this IS gonna be a bad drug movie about how shitty drugs are. i think i've seen this before. does it always have to end this way? well we're not there yet... and obviously he was supposed to be tripping mushrooms to zeppelin right now but they totally couldn't get the rights so it's that lame movie thing where they substitute with some bs. now the movie looks like it's just going to disappoint... but then..... DENNIS HOPPER. with bulletholes in his cheeks. makin friends in rehab, makin friends at AA. and it all comes around. at least in nondisappointmentsway.

ANYWAYS. I recommend it. It's a pretty good one. It feels good too. here's the trailer ::

20. Naked Lunch (1991)

2010-07-01T06:32:00.000-07:00

this is a film based on a book i haven't read by william s. burroughs (apparently the S is significant... i call bullshit...)

the (semi-autobiographical?) protagonist Bill, who's something like a junkie Tom Waits with less gravel in his voice, played by Robocop from Robocop 2 apparently, winds up in I THINK north(?) Africa after he plays a game of William Tell with his wife and shoots her in the head (for the first time at least). his wife was shooting up yellow bug killing powder like heroin (Bill had a stable job killing bugs) and he gets hooked on that before getting hooked on BLACK MEAT (think giant non-existant black centipedes unsanitarilly pumped through a meat grinder lookin like diseased ground beef then dried up, powderized and injected.) Will trips face running from the cops after getting detained and talking for a while with a giant beetle that spreads its wings to reveal its mouth-orifice (yeah, it talks) which looks more like a big hairy anus than a mouth.

the beetle with the anusmouth returns again later as his talking type-writer and officer to report to for the seemingly non-existent Interzone (which is some kind of agency Bill has to report to via this talking anus beetle typewriter, and is also what Bill refers to his new locale in Africa). Interzone the PLACE (which is really a town in Africa) is a haven for arabs with typewriters, drug manufacturers and incredibly rich (or at least relative to the African economy) white folks who like to have sex with young arab boys (lots of homosexual undertones, and as it progresses, overtones).

it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. I've heard the book makes even less sense. it's directed by David Cronenburg (eXistenZ, the Fly with Jeff Goldblum) so as you can imagine, there's some insane leaking disturbingly human fleshy pussing spitting dripping sexualized bugs and mugwump alien being things.

this is really a story about a writer who pursues an extreme diet of drugs that may not even exist in the fictionworld of "Naked Lunch" and most probably not in our real world either. He's tripping on drugs not yet synthesized. He's tripping on drugs that he made up in his own head because he's tripping so hard. He trips so hard on irrelevant things that he forgets writing his book, also titled "Naked Lunch." but he's written it. and he's got to stay in Interzone to finish it -- hopefully before he hallucinates another game of William Tell or loses any lasting grip on reality.

I watched this movie sober. here's the trailer ::

19. Rush, Solitary Man, Falling Down

2010-06-22T08:51:00.000-07:00

Rush (1991)

i was in tre(n)-eh very early in the morning yesterday being the opposite of the Man in all sorts of mannish glory & when i came home mid-afternoon I had the pleasure of catching this silly fucking movie on the cable television before crashin hard (livin with parents gets that "rich people tv")

actually, it's not very silly. it's pretty fucked. people fuck up. people die. people do drugs! people die because of drugs. people go undercover and do too many drugs. all the drugs. they buy all the drugs. they do ups and downs and they try to catch Gregg Allman. he was the one who fucked Cher in the 80s, right? at least until shit starts to seriously go down it's too cheesy to really worry about the characters. it's 80s cheesy. except i think it came out in the early 90s. yeah. 1991. let's edit this post title. there we go.

so there's Corey Haim's older brother in Lost Boys looking like the bearded avaiator-ed Joaquin Phoenix (wasn't that supposed to be some undercover movie prank bullshit happening sometime with some kind of little Affleck involved? what happened to THAT movie?) except more 80s, then there's Allega from eXistenZ (read Alec's droolings about that one here) bein all Jodie Foster except putting dope in her arm as part of her police duties instead of catching buffalo bill and whatnot. and not as dykey. totally cuter.

did i mention Gregg Allman's in it? how stupid is that? this is a great pic for a mid afternoon hot summer day. It's set in the south. Texas south. just be sure to leave some daylight buffer so you don't disappear into the night with thoughts of withdrawl. The only downside to this movie is that Eric Clapton did the soundtrack (a very poor decision, even & especially for 1991) and there's a terrible terrible instantiation of 'Tears in Heaven' that just makes you go "wow, this is really... really... really... terrible." It pretty much ruins the entire movie. then you realize that Sam Elliott plays Dodd, the mofo police boss. and Sam Elliott was the narrator in the Big Lebowski. the goddamn stranger. and he was in Mask! not the Jim Carrey one. not the sequel(s?)... the one with CHER and the kid with the fucked up face. ROCKY DENNIS 4 LYFE. but seriously... fuck Eric Clapton.

trailer ::

Solitary Man (2010)

after my nap and some outdoor laxing, i spontaneously walked into a small theater and saw this one. total butterlap. Michael Douglas plays an old man who fucks a different woman every night and tries to hide his age from all the 18 year olds he lures into his bed. you don't see MD naked, which is a plus. He had a lot of money, now he doesn't, but i think he's got a pretty good outlook on life... whether or not it's healthy. he comes around in all the necessary ways, his logic is irrefutable, and stable healthy less-sexually-deviant people (ex. his daughter, who's played by Pam from the Office. fuck the british one) start fuckin with his shit because they're MAD JEALOUS. or however you want to interpret it. and the bank bro starts fuckin with his shit cause all the sudden he isn't making bank. and you know what MD tells em? he interrupts the bro as he seals the deal on a milf for the night from across the room then tells the bank bro to go fuck himself. he wakes up with the milf's clothes all over his pad and the milf milfin all over and he's like GTFO, DUMBASS. the fall of the honest car salesman. he does a good job in it, but christ is it depressing in the weirdest of ways. WHY CAN'T WE ALL LIVE AS RECKLESSLY. oh, and Danny DeVito's in it saving mikey's ass and makin sandwiches all over the place. yknow that milf from Weeds? she's in it. MD makes that situation a FAMILY AFFAIR. oh snap. yeah, it's crazy. Imogen Poots is involved. and i didn't even know she existed, but she's got a real fuckin giggleworthy name and is mad cute to boot.

but really you should just skip this one and go watch Falling Down. Here's that trailer instead... ::

Hans Richter

2010-03-31T08:21:00.000-07:00

18. Hope You Enjoyed Intermission, Brothers and Sisters

2010-02-07T14:22:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone. Sorry i haven't made a post in a long-ass time but i've been detoxing from DRUGS... and i don't mean ibuprofin! or motrin, tylenol, acetaminophen, or advil. (or aleve.) i won't tell what i do mean, in case i relapse and ask you for some! i've been learning to live sober! and let me tell you.. it's killing me!! talk about irony! ironing?! no! irony!

but. all i've been doing is watching movies. so lemme bang out a bunch (like an angry orgy in a field of wildflowers):

1. District 9 (2009) A

This was one of the best sci-fi movies i've scene since i saw Alien in 5th grade and didn't sleep for weeks. (and, now that you mention it, due to detox, i watched district 9 and then slept for several weeks...)

Millions of aliens end up stranded on earth. The government puts them all in one place... District 9.

It starts out almost like Borat... it's funny and silly and ridiculous and has that same hand-held camera style going for it (which works well with the CGI Aliens, who in many films look fake due to the camera's insistence on them being the focus), but District 9 finishes with just as much intensity as when Ripley goes back for Newt at the end of Aliens. (and if you dont understand this reference, fucking suck my dick, you uncool piece of shit*)

* I shat a white turd about a month ago. (I KID YOU NOT, WHITE). I christened it "The White Widow". I also decided to stop doing drugs for a while.**

**And, ya know, it's funny... it was right adjacent to a perfectly normal brown turd. the two of them just sat there in the toilet looking at eachother for a while. It was beautiful... a post-race world, all in one bowl.

i shed a white tear and wiped.

District 9 really did rock my world... no one famous in it, action, comedy without jokes (i fucking hate jokes.)

2. Pineapple Express (2008) D -

Couldn't even get though this one. It sucked my dick with teeth. It had too many "jokes". FUCK STONER HUMOR. WHAT HAPPENED TO GETTING STONED AND WATCHING APOCALYPSE NOW? AND, YES... MAYBE... LAUGHING AT IT (between tears and moans of horror.)

3. Apocalypse Now (1979) A

Easy there... of course i had already seen it. but i rewatched the directors cut and... shit goddamn, just watch it. Completely immersing. Laurence Fishburne is in it at like age 18. (In the credits he is "Larry Fishburne".) How did he turn into morpheus? Whoda thunk it? First an actor and then a leader of the revolution against the robots in the REAL WORLD!

Anyway. Vietnam, the Doors soundtrack, playmates, and just a lot of fucked up shit in a war we should have never been a part of... just like all other wars... (please watch Zeitgeist, if you believe we should have been involved in any war since the civil one)

4. Zeitgiest, the Movie (2007) A -

Incredible documentary. There is no God, and we are being turned into slaves by the media, the government and it's lies, rich white men, banks, and motherfuckers who just want power. it will explain better than i can, especially in my sad state of meat-eating, agitated, unsure, horny, hopeless, faggity, sobriety.

5. Avatar (2009) B

I hate having to use these words but... ok, if i'm gunna be a sober fuckass anyway... "amazing cgi". i give it a B. characters were all pretty 1 dimensional. But, i'm not gunna lie, i wanted to bang the chick Alien creature for SURE. DAT ASS WAS MOS DEF CGI SUPREME 3D BOOTYBOOTY. Worth seeing. First movie i saw in 3D. Eyes hurt, wished i had acid. Father found this amusing.

6. The Tracey Fragments (2007) C +

Ellen Page (that girl from that movie Smart People which is okay but mostly i just looked up ellen page cause i want to bang her then saw this movie in her resume)

In this movie she's 15 and totally INDIE ROCK and sad and self-loathing!!!! i know you all love that INDIAN ROCK shit i see on the MTV. what? theres no indian rock on MTV? then what's with all them colored people and their tribal songs?

I even gave it a C+... a totally indie rock grade.

sidenote* i am sorry i am talking so much about banging this and banging that... it's the sobriety... it's giving me a woody!

Anyway, The Tracey Fragments is cool.

7. Doubt (2009) A -

Philip Seymour Hoffman is fucking incredible in everything he is in. This one is no exception. He is a priest accused of touching a boy. Please watch. No, this one did not make me horny.

Although that younger nun was kinda hot.

8. Happiness (1998) B +

The Hoff is in this one too (i have been off drugs and bingeing on Hoff instead... not to mention the online RPG Diablo 2, a habit i had kicked since the 8th grade, THANKS SOBRIETY). it's a bunch of interweaving stories. the Hoff plays a lonely loser.

9. Boogies Nights (1997) B

Movie bout the porno industry in the 70's. Hoffs in this one too.. as a loser... (Hoff Hoff Hooray!) Worth checking out. Sucked to watch when detoxing, everyone is always doing blow.

blow.

I wil maybe do some more posts like this if i'm feelin funky in the future. keep your dicks hard your abs hard, your balls moistened and your fingers on the nipples. (YOUR MEATBALLS, FREAK.)

As you know, the future is funky,

Alec

17. The Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009)

2009-12-02T11:48:00.000-08:00

GO SEE THIS.

The story for this film was written by Roald Dahl (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, James and the Giant Peach.)

Although the books were intended for children the movie is aimed at the young adults that had the opportunity to enjoy the book years ago. The humor is most definitely aimed at adults, many of the motifs could never be understood by children. For example, Mr. Fox and his wife have a turbulent relationship because although he is a father and a husband, he is a wild animal (sounds a bit like Where the Wild Things Are). Mr. Fox is a clever little guy, quick witted, and sneeeaaakky and ends up getting himself and his family into some dangerous hi jinx while trying to live out his wild side. It's a "family man" story too but really wonderfully portrayed, almost "anti".

All of the animals, dressed in modern clothing, attempt to civilize themselves. All of the underground/forest community aknowledge their animal nature but strive for the civil life.

Lets step away from this story line for a second. It doesn't really matter. Aside from the heartwrenching realization that they ARE animals, everything is fluff ... adorable, humurous, giggly fluff..
What REALLY matters is the stop motion animation. This movie is amazing to look at, every thing you see is a miniature and every setting places you in somewhere wonderful. The Wallace and Grommit movies are just as amazing, visually.

All of the puppets, props, sets, are small scale designs, every frame individually controlled in order to replicate a motion picture. COME ON,--- THAT IS AMAZING.

Every twitch of the ear, grin, wink of the eye done by Badger (Bill Murray), Mr. Fox( Clooney), Ash (Jason Shwartzman) Kristofferson (Eric Anderson) has been individually manuvered.
All of the voice overs are outdoor recordings, and all of the audio comes from natural sounds. Which is efffective in bringing the animation to life.
Basically, i need not say more.
if you just want to see something beautiful, go for it.
hate it, if you want.
want to call something "pussy shit"?, go ahead.
want to love nature? instinct? go.
wanna laugh alot? especially at the opossum superintendent. go.

-K. Hall

16. Cube (1997)

2009-11-15T13:54:00.000-08:00

Cube is in my top ten favorite sci-fi movies. The premise is amazing :: 7 very different people wake up in an infinite universe made entirely of identical-looking cube-shaped rooms, each with entrances on every side (you could hit it from the back, top, side, etc... just watch out that your johnson [penis] ain't flappin in the breeze or it may get beheaded by a LASER... [if you have a vagina, make sure your labia, flip-flaps, etc., are all properly stowed.]) No one has any memory of how they got there, or any idea why they are there, or any idea how to escape. (You can also hit it "doggy-style," which is where you act like west-coast gangsta-rapper Snoop Dogg while you do it; try saying things like "my shizzle is off the hizzle forizzle, bizzle," which translates in english to "girl, my dick is the shit" in ancient ghetto, and "I do believe my wanker is quite splendid today" in British.)

Cube gets super fun when the you come to know that, although every room looks identical, many are booby-trapped with lethal killing devices of all sorts :: lasers, noxious gases, smelly rotting corpses of those who never escaped, ugly women, hot women with teeth in their vaginas*, Carlos Mencia on big screen TVs 24/7...

*Aside :: Teeth is a great movie. It's about a girl with teeth in her vagina. Fuck condoms -- just watch Teeth once a week and you'll be abstinent for years. Unless you are a girl, then you may wish you too had teeth in your vagina.

"OH YEAH? WELL MAYBE MY COCK HAS TEETH TOO"

lemme check.

nope, how sad. now I can't literally "fuck a bitch to death."

"OH YEAH? WELL MAYBE MY COCK HAS TEETH IN ITS VAGINA"

...

Cube. On the door into each cube-room are a collection of numbers. A way to beat the system? I won't tell you! I can't! No... don't tickle me! Okay fine i'll tell give you a hint :: the autistic kid is good at mathematics! See :: Rainman -- a classic film in which Tom Cruise is actually quite tolerable, although still very short in the height-sense.

Do not see the sequels to Cube. There were never meant to be sequels according to the original director. There is only one true Cube.

Aside :: "I will take the ring, though I do not know the way." - Frodo

...

Characters include an autistic boy (excellently played by the way,) a computer designer nerd-type and an angry black control freak, who I think is a cop (go figure...)

This movie is a metaphor a for a godless world. No one is there for seemingly any reason, no one seems to be in control, no one seems to be watching. The cube is just there. There is no creator, there is no answer, there is no God. No one is listening to you complain, either. The 7 chosen rats in the maze have only themselves to bicker to. And as is the tendency of humans, they are not always very helpful to eachother. The world of cubes is only a simplified version of the world we all live in -- we are all just here. We didnt ask for it, we dont always want to be here, we don't kill ourselves (mostly because we dont have enough guns or drugs,) we can't run away, we are not able to fly. We have only eachother. It's sad, it's beautiful, we all die. Crazy.

The whole movie was shot in a single cube-shaped room, even though in the movie there are seemingly never-ending cube-shaped rooms in every direction, each with its own hidden death-a-ma-jigs and killtraps (some without... the tension!)

This is the type of movie that could have been horribly executed (as many sci-fi films tend to be) because the progression of the movie is reliant on characters alone. There are no props, no setting changes, only the never-ending system of cubes, and 7 unlucky people. What's great is the acting is damn decent. You care for the characters, and better yet, they arent movie-stars -- so you are dropped into the cube not knowing anyone, just the characters as they are.

It's so simple! It's too brutal! It's a shape! It's a one-syllable word! It's a box without a lid! It's a square in 3-d (sort of)! It's a mystery! It's fun! It's sexy! It's atheistic! Diabolic! Anti-septic! Good fun for the whole family! On sale! Buy it now, take it home, wash it off, put it back on! Let bygones be bygones and be gone! Fuck the shire! This is Cube, motherfucker! Fuck Dildo Baggins and Carlos Mencia (especially Carlos Mencia!)! Up with Dave Chappelle and big skies and CUBE!

I first saw Cube when I was in a phase of seeing movies with one word titles that don't include "the" at the beginning ::

Cube

Sphere

...

It's math without class! It's violent! Did I mention it's sexy?! Lo-fat! HIGH FIBER... so you can poop real good, all one piece, send the snake deep into the lake, wake 'n' bake, toys R us, we IS you.

Don't be a boob... go see Cube!

And now a brief poem ::

my brain is a lake

in which fish don't have gills,

but lungs...

swimming faster

i look for some lunch

but tis nothing to eat

for the fish have all died

cause they couldnt fucking breathe

underwater

lub,

alec g

15. Natural Born Killers (1994)

2009-11-11T23:58:00.000-08:00

To say that you must watch this movie on mushrooms or entirely stoned is probably too much... the movie is a trip in itself :: a big circus with its weirdo angles and color filters... i won't even dare to use the term "special effects" because they are basic, crude, and poorly done. nonetheless, they're wonderful.

But [being fucked up] does make it a lot better --
You can feel ( and of course, envy) their demented killing spree and you don't even feel bad about loving it... if you're stoned.

Played by Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis are Mickey and Mallory Knox :: infamous, rebellious, sick, sexy, disgusting. heartless, but with a dangerously passionate love for one another -- and that is all that matters.

If, in real life, anyone fucked the police as hard as Mickey and Mallory Knox I'd be a total fan, no matter how many innocent bystanders they massacred.

Both of them are very potent characters, strong headed and totally insane. Mallory not so much in the beginning but that's part of her charm. it's... the classic idea of the boyfriend lover sweeping the young girl off of her feet and away from the domestic imprisonment of her fathers home. but way more hardcore. we get to tap into the seemingly endless acceleration that is the thrill of being on the run, in love, and fucked up. where is the end to this ride? route 666 stops somewhere...right?

After falling in love with their destruction you forget about every moral and value you might have clung to at any point in your life and all you want is for these lost yet determined souls to overcome every force which attempts to keep their freedom and love away from them. it's a beautifully demented story. a twisted journey. and most of all, a good time.

Btw :: included for only $3/mo. are Rodney Dangerfield, Edie McClurg, Robert Downey Jr., Tommy Lee Jones... if that doesn't get you I don't know what will.

14. Stranger Than Paradise (1984)

2009-11-04T02:32:00.000-08:00

Stranger Than Paradise is in black and white.

black and white movies as an artistic choice are a tricky thing. i sort of hate "film noir", especially if it's put out recently. (for clarity: stranger than paradise is NOT AT ALL film noir). it seems like the actors are acting like the actors from past... in other worse... worse, sort of. newer film nourish stuff just seems too cheeky (a british word meaning "resembling ass cheeks") or something. picture george clooney, if her were british, wearing a suit, staring in the mirror laughing at how good-looking he is, in black and white, with really hot women who really know how to dress well (covering up is sexy, instead of bikini's or titties swinging loose) but are horribly annoying and slutty, or at least they kiss a lot of dudes and then the scene cuts and it's implied they did it doggie, without a rubber.

maybe film noir is just fun for the actors.

stranger than paradise is great in black and white.

Stranger Than Paradise is a minimalist film.

in other words, there ain't a whole lot of shit going to happen, ain't a whole lotta fluff (or maybe it's all fluff.)

i find minimalist films, whenever i recognize them to be so, are the closest films come to portraying "real life" (a thing i imagine, and am told about, although am not sure if i have ever seen myself, especially since the epic film dan in real life). real life is minimalist. you drive the car, it's quiet in the car. in minimalist film, the big things become small. small movements of objects in a room, or a mumbled three words after minutes of silence, become bigger, more... "meaningful". watching, you become sensitive to small changes, so the small changes become just as big as the big changes in a big movie, where big things happen (bank heists, orgies, bombings of small towns, etc.)

look at it this way: I'm listening to recording artist the books right now and they use an audio sample of a woman singing "you get used to hangin' if you hang long enough." if you watch silence for long enough, it becomes the norm, your brain gets into a rhythm with it, you start to breathe its pace. this might be why it took me a few minutes of "trying" to watch, before Stranger Than Paradise stopped feeling a tad... slow. then you slow down with it. it goes at the pace you normally go at, just ya know, living. you get in the groove. (too be watched in company of wine, not cocaine)

sidenote: i wish people went to the bathroom on camera more often, and almost "randomly", in movies. like in a serious movie when someone's got some heavy pondering to do... maybe an early thirties woman choosing between two men, one to become her romantic, fuck-everyday, eventually do her-in-the-butt, get married, get kids, stop fuckin', renew their vows in hopes of jump-starting their sex-life, failing, cheering V for Viagra, and then dying holding someone's hand instead of... not. the one not chosen by our indecisive woman gets their dick chopped off at the hand of a weak midget with a dull knife in a dungeon, and right before he dies, he's told that the matrix is real and that they are in it.

anyway, why not cut to the perplexed woman taking a shit? what if she "DROPS THE KIDS OFF AT THE POOL" and then "REALIZES WHICH DICK WENT DEEPER"?

Stranger Than Paradise has three main characters, 2 guys and a girl.

i find this amount of people, in this gender ratio, to be one of the most interesting small groups in both real life and movies. 3 is the smallest "group". one can die and ya still got two, enough for them to not have to masturbate or commit necrophilia, but to simply do it out of the kindness of their hearts, wide-eyed spewing the beauty if simply-being-alive out of all orifices (a juicey substance resembling the popular beverage "kool-aid" if it came in a flavor called "soul of the poet").

The female character in the film comes from Hungary to new york and carries around an audio-cassette-tape-player that always has the same tape in it: screamin jay hawkins.

"it's screaming jay hawkins, he is a wild man."

minimalist movies become about the details, about the tiny strange things that make real, real. normal movies have a box of cheerios, minimalist movies have screamin jay hawkins on tape from Hungary. and i would argue, this is why it can feel so real. for instance, my buddy conor has a "screamin jay hawkins" t-shirt (which is, if i remember correctly, black and white). he's had it forever, i know it well, and it is really the only relationship i have with the name "screamin jay hawkins". specifics are easier to personally pocket and organize than... having to imagine being part of an oil-drilling team which gets chosen by NASA to land a space ship on an ASTEROID and blow it up with NUKES. (see armageddon, on TNT nightly.)

and when stranger than paradise is all over, you care about the characters as if you saw horrible things happen to them, as if they saved little timmy from being killed by a bus (launched by an asteroid), as if they were bruce willis in die hard, barefoot, bloody, mp5 automatic machine gun in (one) hand, right after he's saved an entire building of hostages from some foreign terrorists with bad morals, bad hair, bad fashion. i like to think you simply like these three characters cause they are people. people you could meet. (nevermind about caring for them as much as bruce willis in die hard, he went through that whole movie with no shoes...)

i dont actually know much "fact" about minimalism... anyone know more? off the dome?

but be sure to catch stranger than paradise. it is moving without moving too much, twisting my nipples without too many plot twists, jerking me off without jerking me around (or causing undue chafing)... you get the picture.

love,

Alec

do watch the preview. it's "epic".

13. Leaving Las Vegas (1995)

2009-10-25T18:10:00.000-07:00

Hello hello Hello...

Sorry about the lack of movie posts... I have no excuses! Good thing I don't need them because this is not school. If this was school I couldn't say "DILDO" like I did right there for no reason without some kind of awkward repercussions.

That's why I don't go to school... because I want to say "dildo" whenever I please.

If that makes you uncomfortable... fuckin go to school or shit.

Leaving Las Vegas is my favorite movie. I do not say this jokingly, or in a "yeah yeah it's my favorite" type of way. It really is my favorite movie. Ever. Of all time.

It's about a man (Nic Cage) who goes to Las Vegas to drink himself to death.

For me, this movie goes into several categories that other's don't ::

First :: It goes into the "If - It - Comes - On - I - Have - to - Watch - It - In - Its - Entirety - No - Matter - Who's - Dying/GivingBirth - Around - Me" category. There are others in this category -- just ask the dying -- but there aren't many.

Second :: The world stops turning when Leaving Las Vegas comes on. All other things become meaningless, like a previous life thought of in the midst of an acid trip -- there is only the present.

Third :: When the movie comes on, I always make it a point to be drinking hard liquor, without a mixer or chaser or any of that other "pussy-shit."

Fourth :: This movie is an event to me. A few months ago, I was at a loss for what myself and a friend should do while drinking our 40 ounces of malt liquor. As we sat in the car, drinking them, I realized Leaving Las Vegas was coming on television within the hour.

We drank through the movie in silence... with every scene becoming more and more inebriated... sinking deeper and deeper into the sad beauty of a man determined to die from the very substance that was so making us warm and delighted and dark and distant.

We took one smoke break, and had little to say... (40 ounce containers of malt liquor usually give me a lot to say, but) Nic Cage said it for me. Something along the lines of "damn, I like drinking..."

At one point his character says he forgets why he's drinking but knows he must continue. THIS is balls. This is a man with will power, with grace, with dignity.

His wife and child leave him, his work fires him. He cannot function in a normal society. So instead of getting help, instead of adjusting himself to society -- conforming to some place in which he is not welcome or wanted -- he makes his own rules. He burns most of his possessions and with a smile on his face, a bottle in his hand (and a shopping cart full in the car,) he drives to Vegas with the goal of dying... of drinking himself to death.

And it gets interesting where he meets a hooker named Sera... his "angel."

Obviously they fall in love. But, strong of a man as he is, he tells her his one rule :: "You can never tell me to stop drinking."

The pace of the movie is beautiful, the acting and characters perfectly caressed into something greater than a film, but an idea of life. Death and life are whatever we want them to be. If we want to die, we can. We can indulge to the fullest, as long as we know the consequences. And, maybe, if we welcome those consequences with open arms, we are doing the right thing for ourselves. Maybe we have to do it too much, take it too far, maybe even 'til death.

If Nic's character in this movie isn't "punk," I don't know what is.

There are basically two characters in the movie, which makes it even more amazing than it is so well acted through and through.

The soundtrack is incredible. And I don't usually say so about movies with saxophones and jazzy horns going in only a few parts.

It's also hilarious, as most good, horribly sad, depressing movies about drinking are.

"We do not kick the bar, we lean into the bar."

I also love this movie because fuck symbolism. Fuck analyzing what it all means. It all means nothing cause it's drunk and it wants to die. And it makes a rule and follows it and all you do is watch that rule be carried out -- What an amazing expedition to undertake as a film maker :: No real plot twists, no special effects or action sequences... only a simple idea... one that could have ended up as a stupid, horribly acted piece of trash.

Nicolas Cage is truly one-of-a-kind in this movie. This is the Cage we used to know. The Face-Off Cage. Drunk Cage... (he does play a great drinking man.)

And you'll notice in even his current films about the end of the world and such (why's he doin all these stupid ones lately?) he always seems to have a bit of a problem with the dranky danky. And always likes the hard stuff over beer.

You cant go wrong with this one. Take a seat, pour yourself a glass of bourbon (but have the bottle close by) and sink deeep into your seat. Time to watch a genius play a punk in one of my favorite films of all time.

relax,

Alec

Just watching the trailer gives me the tingles...

12. The Running Man (1987)

2009-10-22T01:47:00.001-07:00

a poem.

arnold schwarzenegger...

yes he was the terminator

and now, the gods require, that he's the governator.

cause in all of his many films

he never, not once, says "cya later"...

but always he'll "be back."

and although we know it's best

terminator sits with the rest...

cause im prepared to take a stand

to vote for running man

as the best arnold movie ever

not depending on the weather

nor daytime/nighttime treasures.

the setting is a game

it's a show, in a future american flame

like a soaring, falling paper plane

where the convicts, seen as lame,

fight the "good-guys" to the death

in a game called running man.

and although he was convicted

he was wrongly - (feds hand picked 'em)

he must fight the fight,

that no one's ever won... but he just might.

it's the future and the tv's

are as big as yoda's "maybes"

which are huge

(cause he never guesses)

he wears spandex through the cold

and the battle scenes are bold

no one has ever won the game

the running man...

but he swears to take a stand,

find the rebels,

start a band,

and he'll never die before the score is settled.

watch this movie

it will be groovy

then hock a loogie

touch a boobie

and move on.

the end

basically, it's the future, and there's a very popular game show called the running man where convicts are brutally killed by all sorts of different "hero" type characters on national television.

it's my favorite arnold schwarzenegger flick... only a possible second to...

the terminator

kindergarten cop

eraser

commando

terminator 2

end of days

the 6th day

yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah.

love,

Alec

11. Batman Returns (1992)

2009-10-18T09:42:00.000-07:00

Batman in 1989 was way different than the current Christian Bale interpretation. Jack Nicholson's Joker was way different than dead Heath Ledger's. But it was 1989... Prince wrote/produced/performed/etc. an additional soundtrack to the movie (much like Jay-Z did with American Gangster) including the hit song "Batdance." It was simply a different time. Batman was a decent movie, and still much better than George Clooney's late-90s version (when asked if Clooney had ever played a gay or closeted role, he responded "yes, Batman.")

1992's Batman Returns was better than the first... Tim Burton's directing again and here we've got Danny DeVito (known from the hit television series "It'S AlWaYS SuNNEE iN PhILAdELPhIA," which, by the way, I think blows...) playing the orphan Oswald Chesterfield Cobblepot (the Penguin,) and Michelle Pfeiffer as a bat-shit insane milk-chugging latex-stitching Batman-humping version of Catwoman that beats the christ out of Halle Barry's take (note :: i did not see Catwoman in theaters. I DID, however, buy the DVD for $2.99 and I couldn't get through the first 10 minutes of it. It's bad. Really bad.)

Unfortunately, Michael Keaton plays Batman again. He was good in Beetlejuice, but as Bruce Wayne he's kind of a silly motherfucker. Not that Bruce Wayne isn't a silly motherfucker -- I mean, the whole concept of "The Bat-Man" is really fucking silly... but somehow in the comics (where Batman was intended to live, folks) he comes off as a real serious motherfucker who seriously fights serious bad guys and the serious problems Gotham City faces... it's a haven for crime, poverty, and overall economic-meltdown-steampunk SHITE. Nobody's ever really happy in Gotham until maybe the end of the movie or maybe a huge ritzy gala up until the point where a villian barges in to make a political statement (which only becomes a political statement... really they're just tripping balls)... it's not like Superman's Metropolis and it's really not like Spidey's Forest Hills, NYC. It's just a crappy overgrown, dense-as-fuck, absurd, definitely-east-coast, dark, dirty, disturbing place. Why don't they ever show the suburbs of Gotham? Where's Gotham's New Jersey? It seems like once you enter Gotham, you never leave... and you have to deal with really insane people dressed up as penguins, cats, clowns, etc. with mechanical midget voodoo skeletons on motorcycles and robotic-equipped sewer penguins, whom the city considers "common" criminals. Tim Burton does a great job at creating this fictional world... this is not a headtrick like the Matrix... Your savior is really just a dude dressed in a bat suit. Suspend all belief and just enjoy the action and the campy dialogue and the goddamn beautiful scenery. Did I mention it was Christmas? DID I MENTION CHRISTOPHER WALKEN IS IN THIS ONE? You can't really argue with that...

Also, I owned this video game, and it was really hard ::

That's some poor-boy's Gameboy shit right there. I don't even know if Gameboy was out in 1992... thanks to the internets, I could find that out right now if I decide to give a shit... Anybody else remember those Tiger games? They had one for everything. No? Ok.

I eventually got a Gameboy and eventually Christopher Nolan took over (/restarted) the Batman film series and then Heath Ledger died and maybe there'll be another one and who knows, nobody reads the comics anymore anyway. If anybody wants to talk comic books or trade paperbacks, don't be scared. Transmetropolitan is the best "book" I've read in a long time and it just so happens to have REALLY COOL PICTURES TOO. Jamesey Mamesey can offer you good suggestion on which Batman titles to pick up... I, myself, would recommend Frank Miller's the Dark Knight Returns. It's so fucking good.

Oh, and here's the real trailer for the movie... check it out. It really doesn't even look that dated so long as you aren't watching it on VHS n whatnot... ::

10. The Matrix Trilogy (1999, 2003, 2003)

2009-10-17T10:51:00.000-07:00

i was sitting with my friend mamesey jay ("mamesey jay, he's the one for you and me... mamesey jay, we could grow a mamesey tree...", as the song goes) watching the 2nd movie in the Matrix series (entitled Matrix: Reloaded, obviously an ode to the amount of guns used in the trilogy, regardless of almost every character's ability to avoid bullets without even the smallest amount of mental strain, or possibly a reference to neo's much improved sperm count) when i realized that, even though i had seen the film at least twice before, i had no idea what was going on. no clue. i mean, cmon, im not a n00b... i knew whether they were in the matrix or not (you can tell cause of their clothes!!! matrix = cool clothes!!) but i didnt know who some of the characters were, or really how they were involved at all with the one they call "the one". ("dude, which one? dude, the oonneee."

so mamesey and i broke it down old school and watched the whole trilogy again. and, i think, figured it all out.

neo is jesus christ.

morpheus is john the baptist.

james and i are never going to college cause it would make us too sad.

at least 2 of the characters in Reloaded are what we in this world know as "vampires". they are "notoriously hard to kill". i missed this the first 2 times round. all that action involving Trinity and her tight leather batgirl getup must have distracted me. although, the word "vampire" is never said, so it is kindof hard to catch. it's in the subtits, i mean text.

2 other characters are what we in this world know as "ghosts". they... do what ghosts do and can turn all see-through-like and go through walls and such. they also have dred-locks, as do most ghosts that i've seen lately. then again, you never know when you've been hanging with mamesey jay, in jamaica (where i assume everyone has dred-locks and is very into bobsledding and fat white men.)*

*this is a reference to Cool Runnings. if you haven't seen Cool Runnings please get a refund for the life you have. try one that envolves watching Cool Runnings at least once a year. try visiting your local bestbuy. try a yard sale. try wall-mart for fucks sake. (fuck it! try old country buffet!) may the lord have mercy on your soul.

both the ghosts and vampires mentioned above are programs, not humans. these programs are referred to as exiles, because they are no longer useful in the machine world, or in the matrix. they have no purpose and therefore must hide and be independently good or bad, their own decision. cool idea.

'nother cool idea :: i slap around many movies because, although the action heroes may look cool in their black, leather, tight gear, what they are often wearing is impractical, in any version of a real world, to a very high degree (although arnold shwartzennegar is never really guilty of this due to his way of looking austrian and sexy in cargo pants/shorts... something about grenades and testes and man-shit). examples may include tomb raider... and a lot of action movies that i cannot think of currently. the Matrix is not guilty of this. within the matrix itself, neo and his friends are not dependant on the physical, but their mental prowess and ability to fight and function. they can wear sunglasses inside, in dark places because they don't really need to see with their eyes at all. it is all in their heads. i like it. an excuse to look too damn good. morpheus likes reptile skins, neo's more of a western-take-on-an-eastern-idea type guy.

and dont we all loooovvee the idea of "residual self image"... the way your brain imagines you to look, subconsciously ofcourse, depicted in the matrix. what does my brain think is the ultimate cool for me? awesome idea. "spandex... it's a privilege, not a right."

thought: why arent there any fat people who have come out of the matrix? is it because they dont pick the fat ones cause they hate the fat? what if "the one" was fat? would they be like "fuck it, fuck zion, he's fat"? or does the body in the pod in the real world not get fat when that same fat person in the matrix gets fat off the fatty-foods (potato chips, etc.)? but why are they all so phat? like phat farm? where they grow ghetto people from nutrient rich soil since the late 20's, all natural organic, ghetto people, fat free, always phat, hold the jelly, take a number and pass it on, play by the rules, be independent, be true, be yourself, be me, phat farm, all natural, herb enriched, fertilizer free, free trade ghetto people, straight from the back yard, fenced-in till ripened perfectly and bagged in easy-store freshbags resealable even though you'll eat all them phat people real fattin' fast cause your fat and dont ever need to reseal anything, you know what they say, once ya' fat ya' cant get fatter, once ya' pop you start eatin more...

what, really, is the difference between phat and fat? and fad? for that matter.

does any idea how long the 3 movies take place over? could be days...a few months... im not sure.

yes, i may have a fat-complex (known in the underground phat-zone [which lies deep under the phat farm fields, fresh pickin] as a "cimema-plex") (hope you caught that.) but fuck it! butt-fuck it! ima get phat and fat and warm. feed me chicken, i'll watch dem matrixes many times over, looking endlessly to identify with one fat person that is not in the matrix itself, but the real world. fuckin hollywood, godamn fat-jealous. "the larger the waist-band, the deeper the quicksand." - from Spinal Tap

anyway, just though i should note i "revisited the matrix" (you'll get that one if your hardxxxcore matrixxx style like neo and shit) and found it is pretty awesome if you actually follow it. otherwise it's just a bunch of awesome action and cinematography (which is cool too... if YOU'RE GAY...)

my son is gay, gay! (if you don't understand this reference, please search youtube for "my son is gay". or go back to the asterisk. if you (still) havent seen Cool Runnings OR this video i'm going to have my little brother beat the shit out of you. he goes to COLLEGE outside of CHICAGO and is built like AN ATHIEST VIN DIESEL. (also watch out he may fuck your ugly sister somewhere where i can hear it. kill me.)

thanks for playing

fat ALEC (falic)

The Book of Terror

2009-10-15T12:26:00.000-07:00

"The essential beauty of the emotion of fear is the way that it can reduce the self to a single sensation that is at once formless and personal. We speak of being frightened out of our minds, and it is an apt metaphor. Out of our minds and into our bodies. In the adrenalin rush that comes with terror, every cell iin the body recalls its ancient duty to freeze, flight, or run. In the real world, in the presence of physical danger, fear make sensatualists out of us all and turns the entire self into a pillar of attention. Once we have killed the saber toothed tiger, or escaped from the embrace of the boa constrictor, the memory of that sensational moment, framed now by the relief of our escape, can seem beautiful. That terrifying beauty is what draws us to the literature of fear whose pages we are reconnected, time after time, to the electric charge of instinctual life. People in terror tales still face primordial dangers. Disregarding the advice of Satchel Paige, they look back to discover that something is gaining on them.”

- Preface, The Book of Terror, anthology.

9. The Legend of Hell House (1973)

2009-10-15T10:27:00.000-07:00

Scary movies!!! The classic formula that's been done and re-done several hundred times. You'd think we'd all be entirely desensitized by the numerous failures... most horrors now-a-days borderline on hilarity without meaning to. But somehow, sometimes, films are made that truly terrify us. They frighten grown men. They cause an easy dreamer to have nightmares for nights on end. They're rare, but they exist. Ah-ha! And I found one: The Legend Of Hell House.

Trust my judgment or not, I'm sure everyone will put this movie as one of their top ten... might be a stretch but at LEAST they'll say it was "fucking great, man" and I mean.. at the least. Even though it's filled with the clichés and typical "meant-to-scare" situations, it has a hell of a twist and features many experiences with the paranormal that we all would prefer to think of as impossible but are displayed all too realistically here.

We all can imagine the classic blueprint for the haunted house :: beginning with the creaky front gate, it's a haunting dilapidated structure that casts a shadow over the overgrown landscape. Inside, it's a musky high-ceilinged mansion with cobwebs coating the chandelier and that mysterious covered furniture. But with The Legend of Hell House it is more than just a scary façade -- true forms of evil saturate every inch of the house. It is un-dead.

Let's note here that this movie didn't exactly have a huge budget. The special effects are limited, the cast is of no more than ten (including an animal...) but great things are possible, even with limited resources, when you have the right idea.

"What did he do to make this house so evil, Mr. Fischer?"
"Drug addiction, alcoholism, sadism, bestiality, mutilation, murder, vampirism, necrophilia, cannibalism, not to mention a gamut of sexual goodies... Shall I go on?"

Mr. Fischer, a timid physical medium that in some lights resembles the serious side of Jim Carrey, is referring to Mr. Belasco, who is of course the perverse original owner of the "Mount Everest of haunted houses" and he proves himself to be the epitome of all things twisted. You do not want him in your bedroom. Let's just put it this way :: a rich scientist wants to understand the bizarre force that the house exerts and so he sends some five specialists/guests to the hostile home -- one of which is an almost mad scientist that rejects all possibilities of the house being haunted by an actual personality... instead he thinks it's a case of bad energy. The fact that the snooty scientist attempts to textbook something so evil is almost humorous. Everyone but he can see that it is something much larger than them all and it's quicker, smarter, and most importantly it's aware of them. It's shapeless, faceless, damned to hell, and wants to fuck their day up. They can't even see it, they can't even fight it. It can be everywhere at once... truly inescapable. Victims must be had... it is, after all, a horror film.

These "experts" come armed with some fancy gadgets that might have been advanced for 1973 but to us they look like bulky, metallic, ancient toasters and washing machines.

In the midst of slamming doors, floating household objects, and a literal cat fight, we see the potential for this film to be just like the rest. But the film exceeds expectations in unexpected areas. It follows the guidelines for an average scary movie but takes the risks and dives necessary to make it one of the best.

What is going on? --- something frighteningly unseen, unknown, and ages old. It manages to electrify each and every single one of its visitors with physical phenomena like an uncontrollable seizure or, it could bring on a psychotic frenzy of nymphomania. It turns on the darkest parts of minds, turning its victims on to the evil. By paying them all visits it goes to every length to turn all of the guests against themselves, or each other.

We all want control over the way that we feel. You lose though -- you have no control what so ever. The shadowy unknowns come out -- the ones that have the power to entice, expose, defile, and kill you. It's like the house is teasing everyone with this "I can see you but you cant see me" type of (t/h)aunting. The whole purpose for them being there is to "figure it out" but truly, there isn't anything to figure out. It's just evil. Simple. It wants you scared... fucking mentally insane... it doesn't care who you are or what you want, it's an entirely separate force and will invade every sense, sensibility, and ounce of self-control you have. You have no chance. That is real terror. And that's what people get off on. This movie was filmed, scored, and written so well that we fear Mr. Bolasco coming to fuck with our own minds. It will, too. It'll get in a car, drive on over, and wreck havoc in your house and in your mind. The House on Haunted Hill, both the early and 1999 versions (along with other movies in the vein of haunted houses,) create prisons for its characters... they are all tortured by the trickery and evil of the environment. But with this film, it's not all about the characters, or all about the scary shit that happens to them. What matters is how it amazes you with its gigantic questions and horrors, takes you through the experience step by step. It brings out your own fears, your own basic instinct to escape, and then you are not laughing at the suckers stuck inside of the Hell House -- you empathize, sympathize, fear, and sweat for them.

All of the personal tensions amongst the strangers come from inconsistencies that science and spirituality constantly grapple over.

The force makes special friends with the mental medium -- a bright-eyed, naïve young girl who's also the best in her field. She's so average looking that she's beautiful... no one in the movies looks like that any more, sad fact. The house focuses the most energy on this girl. She becomes so involved with it that she sometimes seems to be on its side. Sometimes it seems like she's being played with, flirtatiously, almost like a game of chasing tail. Ms. Tanner has the most personal relationship with the spirit, and Ms. Tanner's whom it tourtures the most. Eventually, the force really gets into her. It not only possesses her, but begins to exist inside of her... eek, yes... inside of her. It comes to her at night. It comes to her more than once and attempts to frighten her, dominate her, and create in her mind a prison much more confined than the physical walls of the house.

It demands you sacrifice yourself to it. Give yourself to it and be damned to hell just like the tormented spirit that haunts the place. No amount of money could ever make me enter the Bolasco house.

In honor of the "day of the dead," Halloween, fright nights, October, and every farm ground that opens its doors to flocks of teenagers to enjoy their freak fest haunted house/hayride, I suggest everyone rent it, get comfortable in the safety of their potentially possessed homes, and get ready for the "fear from within..." because this thing will get in your mind.

Good luck.
k.

8. Magical Mystery Tour (1967)

2009-10-15T08:51:00.000-07:00

This is not a good movie. This is not a good film. This is not even a half-way decent attempt at creating moving images in any way. This is a one-hour made-for-TV flick that the Beatles made as an obligation to their fans to make up for their ceased touring. The result is a train wreck that they were obligated to their fans to apologize for making in the first place. It was all Paul's idea (and the cheeky bastard has the stones to deny it too...)

Really this movie is a love story. That is, if you were to try and derive any kind of conceivable "plot" from it. The lucky couple is the Auntie of Mr. Richard Starkey (played by Ringo... using his real name...) and Mr. Buster Bloodvessel (played by Ivor Cutler.) Auntie Jessie is fat. Really fat. And Buster is insane. Out of his gourd. Completely... Maybe. He's taken the tour more than once and each time he believes himself to be working for the tour company. The tour hostess and tour conductor let him believe this.

Ringo's in a pinstripe suit. He looks dapper as hell. He and his Auntie bicker the entire time they're on the bus together and the only reason this works is because obviously Ringo didn't want to be doing this film at all. It's almost as if he's bickering with Paul the whole time, but Paul is a fat old lady (well done, Starr.) This is kind of like how John is sleeping for much of the beginning of the movie and George sits silently looking completely uninterested. In the opening "performance," George doesn't even play the guitar lines right. He ain't tryin'. John and George appear to have come on the bus together while Paul came with a really plain looking English girl who he doesn't give enough attention to because he's too busy looking at the camera trying to be cute. He's an asshole.

There are, however, a few redeeming parts to the film. The part where they're all wizards in space is not one of them. In one dream sequence, John plays an absolutely demented waiter/servant dressed as a tripped out bell-boy with slicked back hair and a pencil thin mustache... The entire scene he's literally shoveling pounds and pounds of spaghetti from underneath a table onto the fat Aunt Jessie's dinner plate while an elderly man looks on and hands the camera napkins and bites into REALLY LOUDLY CRUNCHING lettuce. John continues to pile the spaghetti even after Aunt Jessie gets up to leave. This scene is really, really pointless and bothersome, but at least it's humorously demented. It's a nice contrast to Paul's bit, where he's walking around cliffs and mountains and fields of France looking longingly into the camera like we're supposed to give a shit.

Another good scene is in a strip joint :: The Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band ("Urban Spaceman" anyone?) imitating some kind of Elvis on acid singing a song called "Death Cab For Cutie"... (now you know where that really uninspiring unoriginal boring miserable band's name came from. "Congrats.")

But really, these two scenes aren't enough to save the film. The rest of the movie is a bus full of people literally on a tour where each stop is a fucked up acid trip one of the Beatles thought up. Somehow the Beatles dressed up as wizards are affecting the trip, and for some reason they decided to make a fat lady and an old crazy man falling somewhat-in-love the only real piece of plot you can find during the whole hour you're watching.

It is short though. And it is the Beatles. And maybe I would have thought it was much better if I were on the right combination of drugs. Or if I were one of the Beatles in 1967. Or maybe just if I were Paul McCartney... but I wouldn't wish that upon anybody.

This is the third film of the five the Beatles made... I'm gonna try to get around to doing all of them, but it just so happened I watched this one last night and I'm bored enough at work to ramble about it for a minute on the internets. With all this Beatles Rock Band bullshit hype going around (this is what... the fourth Beatles revival since they broke up?) I just want to set the record straight on some of their lesser known works (at least to people in my generation) before everyone goes around thinking "John Lennon" is simply a video game character akin to Crash Bandicoot or Sonic the Hedgehog. Paul would be Princess Peach.

See it, hear it, laugh at it, learn from it and then you never have to see it again. But you can't go through your whole life ignoring it. It is the Beatles after all... and in case you haven't figured it out yourself yet, they wrote a lot of the rules for this whole music tip. Check it out.

-Conor

7. Pitch Black (2000)

2009-10-14T12:34:00.000-07:00

Pitch Black is Vin Diesel's earliest big movie that I can remember. It came to us in the year 2000 (and can we take a minute to note how strange that is? "what year?" "the year 2000"...) after we didn't die from some Y2k disaster, no computers exploded and the power didn't even go out. We were desperate -- looking for an apocalypse wherever it may lie. And so, in our time of need, we got Vin Diesel. And ain't he a cutey-pie.

I remember watching this years ago and noting I had never seen Vin Diesel before. He was a new shape to me, a new Arnold Shwartzeneggar (geuzundheit!) for a younger, less Austrian generation. We craved American muscle, not the body-builder-from-Europe stereotype which had become the standard for action movie progress. And I don't just mean Arnold. There's also Jean Claude Vandammnm (from great films such as Bloodsport and Universal Soldier.)

And you could compare Vin Diesel in Pitch Black to Arnold in Terminator for days and days (if you had enough cookies and milk to go 'round.) The muscles, the man-of-few-words, the subtle humor in the way they see the world, the robotic-ness, the all-powerfulness, the pragmatism of each character. Terminator made Arnold big and I'd argue this film made Vin Diesel big, at least in that underground sense... (your sister never saw Pitch Black, but that hefty cousin of yours from the boonies definitely has a signed poster.)

Aside: my right nipple, in all seriousness, really itches right now. Does anyone know what that means? Am I lactating? I hope so... I love milk and I'm thirsty. I also enjoy the idea of being able to give milk to others, wherever I may be. Thirsty? Suck my nipple. No, the right one.

Lets break it down.

It is the undefined future. A space ship carrying a motley crew of people crashes on a foreign, alien planet, with seemingly no way to get home. Vin Diesel was a convict being transported on this flight, but after ship crashes the others realize they may need this insane, buff, balding-in-a-young-way man to get them home safely. But how do they trust a man who's been in prison most of his life? I mean... how do you trust a man that buff? Motherfucker could break you in half...

The planet is a wasteland. It seems the human life that was there before has all been exterminated by... something. Buildings are boarded up, no bodies are even found.

It is always light on this planet. Very sunny, indeed. But the crew (of about 15 survivors) notices a model of the planets, found in one of these creepily empty buildings, which indicates a total eclipse occurs every 22 years for 1 full day. That day happens to be tomorrow for the unlucky survivors. Hoorah for us!

So it's going to be dark for one hellish day. What could happen? Oh no! Anything but giant bats that are afraid of light coming out of the ground and looking to eat for the first time in 22 years! Anything but that! How will we see at all? We are running out of flash-lights!

We won't see, but Vin Diesel will see better than ever! During his time in jail (which we can assume was quite a long bout of making people his bitches,) Vin Diesel had his eyes surgically adjusted to be able to see in the pitch dark... (apparently in these futuristic jails, you are locked up without light for years at a time, which doesn't explain his decent full-body tan, but maybe they have tanning salons in the jails... I mean if you have surgery...) So Vin Diesel, the mysterious convict no one knows about, is their only hope.

If you didn't know already, Pitch Black is the last movie in a series called The Chronicles of Riddick. They made at least one of these movies but they really aren't very good, sort of like Terminator 3... (Terminator 2 is the shit.) It's just not serious or believable enough. Chronicles is too much focused on Diesel's character, Riddick. Pitch Black is so great because the focus is on all of the surviving crew, and how each handles this hopeless situation :: the European guy drinks and talks about Paris, the religious man has his faith, Vin Diesel is buff. And that's what's great about Vin not yet being famous. We like him so much because he is not the focus.

But not all of the characters are all that like-able. Each has good and bad sides which constantly surprise the viewer. No boxes, no cells. We outta jail and into Hell.

And, obviously, the whole film could be seen as a dark, convincing, unpredictable metaphor for... whatever; walking through the dark valley with your worst enemy, who you need to survive... etc. but, to be honest, there are some movies I really hate putting metaphor onto, and this is one of them. Its a great action, horror, sci-fi flick starring a star who isn't yet a star... so they don't slut him around all cocky-like. You learn to love him, you aren't supposed to love him.

Similar movies include The Terminator, Road Warrior, Mission to Mars...

I love movies where people come across remains of civilization with no explanation of why they left or where they went. Horror = mystery with aliens/monsters.

Since Pitch Black, I feel Vin Diesel has been typecast a bit and only plays the caricature of a character that was the incredible Riddick in this film. This was his best. He's funny and almost soft-spokenly wise. He's honest. He's cute. Gotta love him. I love it when the good guy's the bad guy, when everyone is good and bad.

Lately I've been thinking "comedy" movies are some of the least funny movies around. It's movies that are so serious from the get-go that have the most opportunity to be funny; that nervous laughter, that giggle in the horror of it all.

So enjoy... it's definitely a wild ride on some crazy-ripped shoulders.

Alec of the GAS STATION writers' club.

6. The Rules of Attraction (2002)

2009-10-13T14:37:00.000-07:00

If college was this bad, in this way, I just might revisit collegeboard.com and give the whole thing another go.

Sorry about the several day hiatus. Long story short, I blacked out, took a piss in the middle of a living room, got my head shaved while crying like a toddler on my knees on a bathroom floor, and now I'm back in the comfort of Yardley, alternating between chips (cheddar sun chips to be exact) and cookies (the kind the grocery store makes and sells in those see-through plastic containers -- so irresistible, so exciting, because they are slightly different every time, like mom's meatloaf... how does she do that?)

But I'm back. Parked on the couch, my head's cold, and I'm watching Erin Brokovich, starring Julia Roberts, for the kabillionth time. She's gorgeous, yet older than young, and taking on the man himself, using whatever means she has. Erin Brokovich is the Norma Ray of our generation. Hot, working, uneducated chick with children and a busy life takes on the muilti-million dollar company who has ruined the lives of all her friends.

The Rules of Attraction is what I would categorize as a "teen movie." I love teen movies. (Breakfast Club, 16 Candles, Say Anything... the list could go on forever and ever, thank God.) You know a movie is a teen movie when you would feel uncomfortable watching it around your own parents, or you grandmother -- in this case because the movie resembles your life a little bit too much. Or at least mine, or at least what I wish my life was, was I to be a bit less caring, or a bit more caring. (The last time I put this movie on in front of my parents I said "I love this movie" and within 10 minutes the movie showed flirting gay men jumping on a bed, cocaine use -- nosebleeds included -- naked titties, and James Vaderbeek fucking a gorgeous girl as he trips on mushrooms. Talk about great timing.)

But that's why this movie is so good. It's the type of movie you would watch when you were 12 years old at 11:45 pm on a school night with that great feeling that you were not supposed to see this. That feeling alone makes a Playboy magazine seem like sand in your crotch on a Monday. The movie reminds me of that show that used to be on MTV called Undressed, a show about very good-looking college teens having sex but never showing any actual sex... What could turn on a 12 year old more? Remember how there's nothing scarier than a monster you never see? Well there's nothing more sexually pleasing than sex involving the best looking teens in our world that you aren't aloud to see. Except this movie shows it all -- every drug, every condom, every secret. We are the generation that must see. (Thank god for CGI special effects! Some of the tittes in this film are too nice to be real!!)

The Rules of Attraction is the ultimate stylized teen movie. The way it's filmed and the way it all unfolds is amazing. You are immersed in a world of drugs, sex and style in a college setting like never before. College is depicted as both a place I'd love to be and a place I never ever want to see again. It's very real, though. It's very unreal, though.

It follows James Vanderbeek (Dawson's Creek) -- an angry, shroom-eating, laughingly suicidal college student who starts really not giving a fuck about anything. I dont think there is one scene in this movie where anyone is in class. But that's what's great. This movie is everything about college that is idealized and perfect and beautiful and wrong and isolated, but that doesn't necessarily mean it shines a happy light on the whole ordeal -- in fact, quite the contrary.

It's as if the movie decided to show us what we all thought of when we pictured that perfect college life-style, but then turned it around on us to show us how truly horrible that perfect image could be.

The women in this movie are gorgeous and slutty, the drugs grow on trees, the parties are epic, the confusion is massive. The men have incredible abs and expensive clothing. You can smell their expensive, to-each-his-own cologne. It does a great job of showing the viewer how small you feel in college; how alone, how angry , how depressed... and yet you still want nothing more than to have that one great connection with that one girl you've been seeing around lately, where you talk about how much it all just sucks, or ignore how much it all sucks for the first time ever. You want to kill yourself in this world, so you try to, you fail, and yet its funny... even though you really wanted to die. You couldn't even succeed at suicide in this world. You crave attention and even that won't give you any. You are invisible. Nothing matters. It's all just meant to look right, to satisfy our every vain and child-like desire.

Every scene taps into ideas that are key to properly satirizing the college life-style :: a women waits for her lover to come back from his semester abroad, and when he gets back he has no idea who she is, and the part which sums up his time in Europe is one of my favorite parts of the film; "I came on her tits even though I was wearing a condom..."

The plot is about a love-triangle. Everyone thinks someone else is in love with them and the confusion will not end well :: During one scene in which a girl commits suicide, my father stood up, anounced he'd "seen enough" and went to up to bed... I continued watching for the 6 kabillionth time. The film, like many great ones of our recent/short time, shows everything. Every detail :: from slitting of the wrists with a razor-blade to the very faces the kids make as they orgasm while tripping on mushrooms. It's a bold movie visually. You will want to watch it in HD, with the lights off, without any old people around.

And it's a hilarious one, especially with the innocent James Vanderbeek of Dawson's Creek (a show in which saying the word "shit" is like butt-fucking a nun during church on easter sunday, launching semen across several pews, nailing a crying old widow in the head...) who does nothing but drugs, make drug deals, have sex, and generally try to satisfy every one of his hedonistic desires before each day is out. It's a great contrast to Dawson and he pulls it off with flying colors. (And thank GOD he changes his hair cut as well.)

Visually stimulating, never boring, hilarious, and stylized to a point of beauty, The Rules of Attraction is a must see for those of our prescription drug, close to suicide, attention loving, attention deficit, bored, lonely, beautiful, stylish generation of "kids for kollege!" with a kapital K.

Leave your parents at home.

Bring out your presciption drugs and combat boots.

love,

ALEC "blacks-out-and-pisses-wherever" Gaybin

5. The Brave Little Toaster (1987)

2009-10-10T05:55:00.000-07:00

I am not the kids' cartoon movie watching type (although I did recently revisit the Nightmare Before Christmas and was mildly excited for around a half-hour, when I realized it was Tuesday and I had forgotten to record the previous day's new episode of House. I panicked, calmed down, and went to sleep) but I did recently re-watch all of The Brave Little Toaster, and I must say, what seems only to be an innocent children's movie is... a lot to swallow. I feel as if I learned about homosexuality, alcoholism and the Holocaust, all from this movie -- maybe this explains both my low grades in Health class and my inability to become a serious Jew.

But I guess even as a little kid I knew how serious it was. I remember being horrified of a specific scene where an angry air-conditioner gets louder and louder, enraged by something (maybe the whole being immobile and stuck is a wall for eternity thing gets to ya.) But I also remember watching the movie repeatedly anyway, and almost being too scared to skip the scene -- as if it would know I'd avoided it and come back at me with twice the rage. I had to get through it each time. The Brave Little Toaster may have been the first movie I, in some way, enjoyed being scared of. Maybe even the first thing. And I don't mean "enjoyed" in the way that I enjoy a roller-coaster these days, where I am all-at-once frightened and elated, and then satisfied afterward, but in the way that I was just so thankful when the horrifying air-conditioner scene was over. The scene was meant to be scary, the air conditioner was meant to be scary... and I was scared. Doesn't happen quite like that anymore.. (although I did watch Eraserhead, a '79 Lynch film, and it was horrifying. Several other people I talked to agreed we were, as good of a film as it was, simply glad when it was over... it is an accurate depiction of a nightmare.)

The Brave Little Toaster is a cartoon in which each character is a different household item, each, in countless ways, representing a certain type of person, a human characteristic, a disorder, a condition, a personality type, an astrological sign. One's paranoid, another old, another has Attention Deficit Disorder (and yet another is taking the ADD one's pills...), each with his or her own fears, dreams, IQ's and apparent genders -- some of which are unclear. The Brave Little Toaster itself has never really called out a specific sex to me., yet the vacuum is clearly male, and older.

The names of the characters are simply the names of the objects themselves, and they refer to each-other this way. Ingenious, I say. Lamp, Blanket, Toaster, etc. This is not a superficial movie, made by Pixar, about aliens and robots and monsters shaped like boogers who travel through doorways to dreams, which float light-blue in the oceanic heads of boys, all to save the planet from mutant alien/human crossbreeds from the past. This is a movie about a lamp and a toaster.

The film follows Toaster, Blanket, Vacuum and Radio (it's about a group of 5) on their quest to get back to their master, a kid who is in the process of moving to a college dorm as a freshman, whose mother throws out his desk lamp, toaster, etc. thinking he will need new ones for the beginning of his new life at school. What better to make you feel at home in the early days of college than a new desk lamp and vacuum? The gang will not have anything of mom's attempt to trash them and they begin their treacherous journey (at times literally through the woods) to find their master. The amount of metaphor, symbolism and depth that can be extrapolated from this idea alone is enough to write an entire "blog" about... (I dare someone to get on that -- you could call it "the brave little blogger"... although that sounds a bit like the harrowing story of a turd that had a tough few minutes getting all the way to the bottom of the bowl...)

In true cartoon fashion, the master does not know his objects can speak or think... (e.g. Toy Story :: the idea of God not knowing that we even have the capacity to know of his existence, or maybe the realization that we can never truly know God fully because we are not worthy, only humans, striving to reach a power we could never handle if we possessed. Anyone who thinks they have reached God obviously has brought the old guy down a few pegs, or is on meth). These objects are on a quest to once again have a purpose -- to be used by their Master, remaining quiet and still and submissive when doing so, for a theoretical eternity. The lamp wants only to be switched on, and then off, to shine brightly on the master's books as he studies, and to remain steady in the face of gravity and draftiness. The movie could be looked at as the quest to have a sound mind, to be zen, or knowing you are serving a higher purpose -- one that makes you obsolete and silent and yet so useful and vital to the big picture (at least in the master's universe.) And there are no reasons for that definite higher power :: the master (the, ehem... college kid...) being supreme. He simply is. It is known, truth, fact and reality to each character, on an arguably sub-intellectual level. Their souls call out to him and long for his approval. It's about the journey to have a true purpose in which the means is the end. An absolute goal. Enlightenment. Heaven. Take your pick. Pick your take.

And I don't necessarily mean to say that the Master is symbolically "God." In fact, I'd make a case for him not being God at all. The master is a human being. The objects who so crave his company (a bit too much like a drug at times...) are his things. He is the "Master" of his domain. He is his own God, ruling his own world, consisting of a lamp, vacuum and radio... ah, college...

Or, it's a cartoon about a lamp and a toaster on a magical adventure.

Either way, it's funny and exciting and almost undeniably deep. Many sequences are surely about death, bravery, money and porn addiction.

Okay, maybe not death...

And if you say you've already seen it, most likely when you were small, watch it again, hopefully this time feeling sightly less horrified by the air-conditioner (or maybe more, depending on drug-intake, mood, sleep patterns and time spent watching Intervention on TV.)

Note :: the whole movie could also be seen as an "allegory of the cave" type deal. Simplified to an extreme, we are the objects, God is the master, and we have no idea that there is a whole world beyond us. We do not have the ability to perceive it... (it's a stretch, but I think worth bringing up. You're fucking stoned anyway.)

Another note :: I think I remembered the existence of this movie around 6 months ago in a subconscious daydream which left me very unsettled. There are some movies we must have watched so many times over and over as small kids that they must be a huge part of who we are, how we see every movie, or how we see... everything. Anything scary to me is that goddamn air conditioner. I also listened to too much Queen as a young chubby boy.

I could go on forever about this one. You get the point.

In the end, God loves bravery, even if you are a motherfucking toaster

Alec GEE of YardLEE

This movie is horrifying ::

4. Red Dawn (1984)

2009-10-09T17:33:00.000-07:00

Patrick Swayze stars in this movie. Please take a moment of silence for Patrick wherever you may be.

I don't know about you, but Swayze's death had way more of an impact on me than Michael Jackson's, probably because of my intimate relationship with this movie and another great one of his called Ghost, which co=starred Whoopi Goldberg. Plus, Jackson, talented and amazing as he was, had been dying for years. First black, then white, then dead. (Or you at least gotta say he had been looking "kind of pale" lately.) Swayze's character is dead almost all of Ghost. He plays a man trying to communicate with his lover, who is still alive and mourning, with the help of Whoopi Goldberg, who plays a woman with the ability to contact the dead -- or at least fakes it -- until she literally starts seeing and hearing Swayze as if he were alive. He bugs the shit out of her... (white dudes bothering 30+ black women is a common theme of life.) It's a hilarious, touching flick, with an almost 6th Sense feel at times (think 6th Sense plus Sister Act 2.) I saw Ghost for the 2nd time and Swayze passed on about a week later.

Red Dawn takes place in the aftermath of World War III. Yes, Three. Russian Communists (with the help of Cubans) attack the U.S. on our own soil and begin beating us by a landslide.

The film is such a keeper because it takes place on a small scale. This is not Saving Private Ryan. No epic, thousand-soldier battle scenes take place (although there is definitely plenty of guerrilla warfare type action,) and as the movie-watcher you have little idea as to what the rest of the world is up to, only Patrick and his friends as they fight for survival.

The film follows a group of high-schoolers who escape to the mountains (the movie takes place in the grandest wilderness of Colorado) as the Russians conquer more and more of the small town (and surrounding areas) in which the kids used to live. All the male characters in this group had been on their high school football team, called the Wolverines, and so the band of brothers (and two very cute sisters I might add) call themselves the Wolverines. They tag every tank they take out with their "team-name," and put fear into the hearts of the Russian Army, who know the rebellious kids by name.

And the Russians fear them indeed, even though they are but 8 to 12 kids hiding in mountains, attacking sporadically with Guerrilla warfare, just trying to survive what is realistically, a post-apocalyptic Colorado. And it especially seems like the end of the world in a place as rural and breath-taking as the one they roam, frighteningly ignorant of what the rest of the world is doing. You know only their story, similar to the way 28 Days Later is constructed... dare I say, realistically. You aren't shown a CIA computer displaying in clip-art who has control of what land -- you don't read a history of why everything happened as you might in a modern day flick.

This theme of modern movies telling us everything about what's going on -- leaving no stone unturned -- keeps coming up in my face. It seems today we feel uncomfortable leaving things up to our lazy imaginations. We have to see it all, know it all and, frankly, be God -- watching the movie from the Moon (where God obviously lives, which explains why he isn't around much, cause he's having too much fun golfing and fucking around with low-gravity, like we have so much fun playing Halo 2 feeling light-as-a-feather as we get fat and play Halo 2.) In Red Dawn, we are not God on the Moon. We are one of the gang. the Wolverines. Ex-football kids taking on the Russian army one tank at a time.

American, high-school age, football players vs. Russian Kommie bastards. How can you lose?

Some movies have a premise so good it seems like Tom Green, Andy Dick and Pauly Shore could all co-star and it would be great regardless (but I assure you Pauly Shore is nowhere to be seen, so go back to your Bio-dome, or better yet, go see In the Army Now if you want some of that dude up in your game.) Waterworld, the Kevin Costner epic about a post-apocalyptic world where there is no more dry land, has this same thing going for it... what a cool idea! I just want to see it, regardless of who wrote the script and who stars.

Disclaimer: I love Waterworld, but seeing as you may not, I promise this movie to be "better" than it.

Swayze and his rebellious buddies are shown several times actually taking a break from Kommie-killing and playing football in beautiful mid-west America. It always adds realism when happy things are shown in movies that could be all one depressing, overcast day. The kids playing football reminds me of the scene in 28 Days Later when they break into a store and go shopping, happily being the last people on Earth. There is something so gut-wrenchingly beautiful about people having fun post-Armageddon. I guess you would really need to let off some steam. You have to play football, End of Days (a great Shwartzeneggar ["Im da pardy poopah"] flick) or not. In fact if the world is ending it may indeed call for a game of tackle football in rural Colorado... without pads, don't tell mom or I'll steal all your friends.

At the end of the world (this isn't technically the end of the world, but it is in a lot of ways, for the Wolverines... families missing, no communication among survivors) everyone becomes a squatter, a punk -- a homeless, penniless soul living day by day and not expecting to live any longer. It is, in a lot of ways, a great dream. All of the sudden you realize how much it all means, fighting with your closest friends against people who killed your family, destroyed your way of life, your freedom and, in this case, your goddamn Ford-driving, Marlboro-smoking, gas eating, incredible America. You depend on each-other, you love each-other, you need each-other. You learn by failing, you adapt because you have to. I think there is a part of us (me, at least) that wants things to be this way; you have to spend your day finding food and water, not figuring out how to best schedule flossing into an already busy day of sucking government dick and generally being a flamer of the modern post-hallucinogenic, prescription drug saturated world. It's the dream of being an animal -- a Wolverine, if you will.

The theme of the small, unlikely gang attacking the powerful, gigantic army, and actually doing some damage (at least morale-wise) is a popular one. In the new Tarantino film Inglorious Basterds (I cannot stress enough how good it was,) a small band of Americans puts fear in the eyes of the Nazis (and Hitler himself.) In this great old, maybe mid-60's, movie I cant for the life of me remember the name of, a group of soldiers all to be either hanged or jailed for life for crimes of war is selected to go on what is basically a suicide mission in WWII. It is always great to see the little guy doing some damage. How bout the Revolutionary War? (which for some reason I still feel great about winning. Probably because the Revolutionary War, in one respect, could be seen as the Colonies going "We hate your accents and are breaking away from you to get rid of them, y'all sound like you got various fruits in your butts, and we really don't get why you spell color with a "u." we also are sick of tea, tea time, and cricket. we're working on a new game which is similar to cricket but, I'm sorry "old chap," has no tea-time scheduled into the game, tea-related rules, references to going off to "University" [translated to American it means something along the lines of our word "college" -- I looked it up,] or involvement with using the word "then" at the end of a sentence, like in the British example sentence "Cup of tea, then?" It makes no sense to end a sentence with "then," and it almost seems passive aggressive to do so.)

But I digest.

The Wolverines could probably live forever, hiding in the mountains of the mid-west, eating off the land, and avoiding Kommies; but the film really gets interesting when they realize it just wouldn't be right to do so forever. They decide they they need to face-the-music* and get back at the force that has ruined their world (their football team before the war was probably amazing, and if the several girls in the gang are any example, the women in this town were mighty fine looking. One of them is played by the mother of Marty in Back to the Future, and she's a total hottie, which must have been confusing for Marty, being her son and all.)

*Sidenote: I have recently taken an interest in the saying "face the music." First, let's use it in a sentence (in American): "I had dreams of being a professional flautist, but I had to face the music." Shouldn't the expression be more of something like "turn off the music"? Why does facing reality, biting the bullet, as they say, have to mean FACING the music? And okay, assuming it does make sense in that respect, why is the music a negative thing that we must face? Bah, goddamn big brother newspeak Kommunist bullshit.

Red Dawn is perfect for the Kommie-hating American, and even more perfect for the Kommie-hating America-loving anarchist.

In short, the way Red Dawn leaves the viewer realistically ignorant of the world state in WWIII, juxtapizzozed (that's gangsta for "compared to when next to each-other") with Patrick Swayze's ability to play a leader, football player and high-school kid, make Red Dawn a classic for anybody with a goddamn soul.

Endnotes:

Similar movies: 28 Days Later, Saving Private Ryan, the Dirty Dozen (referred to above as the movie whose title i cant, for the life of me, think of, props to ma Mom on that,) Inglorious Basterds, and Suburbia

Other Swayze favorites of mine: Ghost (Whoopi!) and Point Break (with Keanu Reeves as a surfer! "dude, brah... that new dude Neo is, like, totally gettin' gnarly height on some waves! it's almost like he can control shit with his miiinnddd."

("Brahhhhh! You're totally the one! Bodacious!")

givin' up,

ALEC of LAND

3. Phantasm (1979)

2009-10-08T15:45:00.000-07:00

Late '70s horror seeks 2009 degenerate. Must be tired of sequels to Saw (did you see saw? no, just the swings...) and sick of movies that end by blaming the Lord Himself for the existence of angry, dead little girls with big eyes and black hair who don't like obnoxious white people in their house.

There is something about the late '70s that has always called me; Post-punk music, Joy Division, Alien, the Fall, cocaine availability, and the fact that the late '70s come right before the early '80s, and... what the fuck caused them? Must have been too good to beat... time started eating itself and wearing very bright colors...

In the late '70s, or as I remember them (it's a bit foggy, I'll admit... and could someone that hasn't left yet look around and see if my septum is lying somewhere?), there began to exist a certain darkness to things, an exploration of real people in bizarre, evil and never before presented circumstances. LSD was old news, pot had been around, but cocaine was booming, and people were have horrifying experiences coming down off it it without aid of a Xanax (tm) (but they were possibly on acid, writing scripts for movies.) In '79 the anger of punk started to dance a bit more than mosh. You could have a great time partying to music about death and how gosh darn beautiful it is (the most beautiful things seem to be those no one has ever experienced... how beautiful) (sidenote: Joy Division was originally going to be called "music about death" until Ian Curtis said it was lame to have "music" in the title of the band. No, not really. But yes, maybe.) (you know their drummer was thinking 'jesus, this guy is really fucking emo... all the punks are gunna think we're wankers...)

And I find the movies of the late '70s tend to carry this same dark weight. "Everything fuckin' sucks I wanna die I cant stop laughing but ohhhh wait it's not funny yes it is we might die wouldn't that be happy/sad." It's that same suicidal laughing... the way The Fall's Mark E. Smith screams joyfully "I've got shears pointed straight at my chest!!!" in the first track of their first album "Live at the Witch Trials", entitled very appropriately "Frightened." But this suicidal laughter is at once both relatable and horrifying. We are as scared of ourselves as we are of a poltergeist. "Oh my gawwwd it's gunna kill me! I can't live this scared! I'll do it first!"

The music and film of this era (that I'm talking about too much, with absolutely no knowledge of it because I had to learn about the Pilgrims for 12 years of education, the '70s just never came up. Well, I guess the '70s were fairly recent at the time... maybe no one had written it down yet, and you know how schools feel about learning without a book...)

Let's try again :: The music and film of this era also share those same colors, faded grays and browns. Everything almost appears as if it used to be shiny, even sparkly and metallic, but has turned rusted, faded, old and ruined... like a punk show in an old opera house. The rich were here and now it's our turn. So start pissin'. Don't gotta? Start drinkin'.

In the last season of Seinfeld, there were cell phones. How depressing. I believe this relates. You know what they say... no neither do I, that's why I do not like them.

Phantasm is nothing like the shocker horror movie of today. When the film ends, everything will not be explained (as it is most often done today by blaming our Lord, who surprisingly enough, seems to know about the existence of aliens, oh smite me mighty smiter, and is, in fact, in cahoots with them!) At the end you will not feel complete. You may even feel (get this!) disturbed by this incomplete feeling. The monsters you never see are truly always the scariest (except for that spider in Lord of the Rings, but that shit was originally a book, and Tolkien totally never watched Phantasm.)

You do see the monsters in this movie, but nonetheless, the point stands -- too much is explained in the movies these days. By the end of the flick, it's all got a reason ("ohh i get it, god did it, how inventive.") Phantasm is just bizarre and godless and on that perfect sweetspot between "whatthefuck" and "maybe..." It runs like an old home video in a lot of character-related ways. Time is not spent on introducing Nicholas Cage's character, showing him happily with his family, telling about his friends, his job, his car, just so that you care about him later in the flick. Phantasm throws you in going "Who the shit? What the fuck? Put away that dildo."

There are no famous people in this movie, no one I've ever recognized there or anywhere else, ever. Talk about refreshing. Like a goddamn Junior Mint (tm).

Interesting object alert! :: A flying metal sphere, about the size of a grapefruit, that drills into your brains and sucks them out, spraying them willy-nilly around the room! How efficient! How late '70s post-punk of Phantasm!

If you like this sort of horror flick try Alien, Evil Dead, Eraserhead and the old black and white Night of the Living Dead, one of the first films to star a black man as the hero. Alien was one of the first films to have a woman star in an action-role (Sigourney Weaver.) Horror movies don't give a fuck about the color of your skin or the length of your penis... YOU ARE GETTING YOUR BRAIN SUCKED OUT, REGARDLESS! (unless your penis is big enough to fight evil! Then I'm totally jealous!) Point is, if you can believe in brain-sucking balls from hell, you can believe in the equality of the brains that are being sucked (even if that equality puts us all equally between chocolate ice-cream and Lassie, keeping in mind Lassie isn't even a real dog.)

One of the good guys in Phantasm is a shotgun-wielding ice-cream man. How the fuck do you beat that? Saw XXI doesn't have a flying fuck of a chance. "He helped me" is on the newest billboard for Saw. No he fucking didn't help you! He tortured you and almost killed you! You obviously have pre-existing issues and are in need of... punk rock!!!!

Phantasm has 3 sequels, the 4th entitled Phantasm: Oblivion. Gunna need to strap on your strap-on and get fuckin' that chicken. You got lots to do, and the last one will have going to see the big thing in the sky. I have all four videos on VHS if you'd like to borrow them. Leave your strap-on at home when you come to pick them up. We can use mine.

Happy brain-sucking!

ALEC of LAND

OH MY GAWD OH MY GOD! I forgot! the soundtrack is fucking AWESOME. Just remembered when started watching the preview. YES YES YES.

totally came, brah!

check it ::

2. eXistenZ (1999)

2009-10-07T14:12:00.000-07:00

"eXistenZ. Capital X, Capital Z."

Hope you got some moist towelettes handy! Cause you're gunna need to clean off that Gamecube after you totally cyber-fuck all the MANA out of this flick's Necromancer (between games of D&D and episodes of Stargate SG1, while your mom bakes cookies downstairs and tries figure out the best way to tell you that you need to go outside and get "fresh air" and "exercise" on this "beautiful day," as she also ponders how to inquire as to your sexuality in the most casual way possible..... [she doesn't care, she just needs to know]).

Here's the rundown ::

Fuck the Matrix. Pussy-shit compared to this. Trinity ain't nothin' but a skanky, pale computer nerd compared to Allegra Gellar -- the rad-hot, mad-fine and.... very talented... video game designer.

And it's sexier than the Matrix by far. There is a scene in this movie that rivals any for hottest make-out scene ever -- and, I know, "hottest make-out scene" makes me sound like I'm 12 and it's morning and I have to wait till my mom leaves the room to get out of bed lest she see "me mighty pirate snake" (argh!) reaching out for a breath of fresh morning air. But I swear, you'll see what I mean... and you'll thank me in the morning.

It's set in an implied future. There's a video game called eXistenZ, the creator's a famous hot chick. The game system itself that eXistenZ is played on is fully immersing -- in other words, it's like the software that makes up the Matrix itself in the movie the Matrix. In even other words, for those of you built like Karl; Nintendo 64 = totally immersing, and Mario Kart = eXistenZ. When in the game, you cannot tell that it is not real. (unless you're as emo as Neo and just "like totally feeeeelll it deep down inside... there's just something about everything that's a bit off!")

This is one of those "how do you know what's really real?" movies. But I'd claim it's one of the best. Ever. And again, there is something so erotic about the whole thing. I recommend watching it with someone you want to fuck and then totally stickin' it to 'em afterwords. I would say do it during, but you need to not miss a moment.

It's also a hilarious movie, which brings it even further above the Matrix, which is the Schindler's list of "how do you know what's really real?" movies. Keanu is a pale cyborg of emotional depth. Even in the 3rd Matrix, when Trinity and Neo finally do the dirtydirty, I was underwhelmed. Computer nerds just don't do it reverse-cowgirl I guess. Bummer.

Now don't get me wrong -- I love the Matrix. It's just a very straightforward movie, mood-wise. This one's much harder to feel out. It doesn't let you shove it into one folder or rule or mood. I've seen it 3 or 4 times and really got the full gist on the 3rd trip. (Although the first time through I had to pause it because I ejaculated on myself).

WHO: The gorgeous Jennifer Jason Leigh plays Allegra Gellar, the game designer/inventor.

Jude Law plays the innocent "virgin-gamer" who is put off by the way you physically have to jack into the game system to play. You will see why -- the process involves a hole that goes directly into your spinal cord called a "port," in which you stick a... thing I cannot even explain... It turns me on, that's all I know.

This is all sounds a bit sci-fi-faggy I know. You picture it being like of of those made-for-tv Sci-fi/Syfy channel movies where you see the zipper on the tail of the weird gorgonticus-man's (or is it a woman? or...both? no wait, that's a dick I think...) costume and the acting makes that of Days of Our Lives look like a video of real people in real life. (sigh...I miss when the Real World was good...)

I digress.

Jude Law is a great character in Artificial Intelligence as well. That's the one with the boy from the Sixth Sense as a robot who everyone feels sorry for anyway cause he acts so damn real. That always confused me. Some trees look very sad on acid... and you don't see me making movies about it. But Jude Law is excellent. His character is different for him. He's... a bit of a weiner.

Enjoy. Follow closely. Notice details. It really is a trip. If you don't smoke pot, now's the time to start. if you do smoke pot, now's the time to stop (cause it will be trippy to NOT be stoned!), or move up in life onto something like psilocybon, mescalin or Nyquil (tm).

and P.S. :: the Director is David Cronenberg, who loves fucking with reality in his films. His others include the famous the Fly (starring the infamous Jeff Goldblum, who is, by the way, watching you poop, and if you don't understand the reference, fuckoff) and a movie called VideoDrome which I borrowed from a friend who lives in Connecticut. But I have yet to watch it. I just don't know if I trust someone who chooses to live in a state that screws like a fat suburb with deflated tits cause they botched the boob-job on the elder.

No offense if your tits are deflated.

love,
ALEC of LAND
alecgabin@gmail.com

lemme know what ya'll think of eXistenZ.

and yes, I know, the title sounds a lot like a penis-enlargement product. No, those don't actually work (unless you are just trying to become a more self-depricating person) but, funny you should ask, this film will, in fact, enlarge your penis -- even if you don't have one. So BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEWWWWAAAAAAREEEEE (women).

1. Sling Blade (1996)

2009-10-06T10:34:00.000-07:00

Sling Blade is in my top ten movies of all time, regardless of genre or era. It is a simple movie and goes at a small-town pace. It's sad. It's funny. It's spiritual. I've seen it at least four maybe more times in full. If it comes on, I gotta stick. Every scene is worthwhile. I'm starting this "blog" with a sure thing... [someone please come up with a new word for it, i fucking hate the internet, i know that is what it's called at this point, but... still, really? The word "blog" makes me feel like i am writing and it's turning into weird purple snot from people who are "bloggers" and dripping all in my nether-regions]... if you, at all, enjoy watching very talented people pretend to be other people and get paid a buttmonkey for it, Sling Blade will not disappoint. Billy Bob's a pro.

Who: Billy Bob Thornton wrote it, starred in it and directed it. Karl (Thornton) is a character like none other I have ever seen. You can bet Thornton just started acting weird one day and just took it all the way; the vibe of Karl, few characters needed, story of a simple man.

The acting is great. Even the little boy (see the trailer above) is excellent. Very often those kids ruin these types of movies. He's right on. Someone find out where he's at and hand him a guitar.

Takes place in a small town in the South. Great accents, there ain't nothin to do but sit at the lake.

"Not funny ha ha, funny queer."

"I reckon I like them french-fried potaters mmmhmmm."

Very often I think the movies that finish the cleanest, ride the best, and overall feel the most uniformly presented are those that are -- in a lot of ways -- a one man show. For this, Thornton gives us the rare triple threat. I know Mel Gibson Directed and Starred in Braveheart (but did not write it), and that movie is excellent. When one man is really in charge and always the known lead, the presentation can almost be more of a cartoon -- not in any kind of negative way. Thornton so clearly stars in this and the movie is presented at such an even keel, working up so warmly like you're meeting your new family and you have a kind-of-slow-working brain, that Thornton can speak so softly and put his words in real time, not line-delivery in the least. He can pause long. He is not competing for oxygen with George Clooney. The movie is more like one image from one page in the director's head (ie: the Matrix) and less like 1000 people talking all at once, sort of screaming-with-their-eyebrows about whose character you should be talking about after it's all over and the plot has "twisted" fucking "mad" times. (Some Coen Brother's movies do this sort of famous people orgy thing. and i ain't hatin, just sayin.)

Anyway I havent slept so I'm rambling.

Bill Bob plays the mission control guy in Armageddon, which is a great flick all around. Tear jerker, on the real, and Steve Buscemi's supporting role steals the show (as usual).

If you like Sling Blade, try Fargo, another one set in a rural town, but this time in...Wisconsin i believe? Wherever they talk like "Oh Gawsh Gawlly Gee Dontcha Know there aye Margey?"

hmmm. brains shot. I'll add more later. Nobody cheat and use IMDB! I didn't! Except for the trailer! The point of this is to connect shit based on gut, not genre.

I think I may have just done this the exact way I didn't want to?

I don't know. if you are reading this, see Sling Blade. I own it on DVD, come borrow it.

WHAT TO DO

ALEC of LAND

p.s. email me if you'd like to review anything you want. post any comments you'd like. let me know how this is to read. pop popcorn and then throw it at women on bicycles screaming "fuck helmets you bitch!" i dont care. we can do whatever we want, it's great. go see Inglorious Basterds. best Tarantino film yet, and i dont mean that lightly.

Do Not Forgot !

2009-10-06T09:43:00.001-07:00

Hello hello hello. We are we are the youth of the nation and music is movies is sex is drugs and rock and roll is Waterworld is Mad Max and Mel Gibson and Conspiracy Theory and Changing Lanes and Gone with the Wind and all these things we love to sit through commercials for Vagisil (tm) for.

::::

Some ideas for this list:

Give a trailer.

Don't give us a huge summary, don't spoil any plot-lines, endings, etc. Set the scene as if you want to suck me into the gaping void of a beautiful film that is the World According to Garp (starring Robin Williams in the '80s).

Most importantly tell us why it kicks ass. When did you see it? Were you fucked up? Would being fucked up affect your opinion of the movie? Do you like to fuck movies? How bad is your porn habit? etc.

Space things out and tell us what other movies we' d like if we liked the one you posted about. We can all go to IMDB and look up what percent of my asshole enjoys Kevin Costner with gills behind his ears in Waterworld this week. That movie is considered one of the ten worst of all time. Fuck that. In all honestly, Waterworld's in my top 30 probably. The premise alone could melt some shit you'd previously thought unmeltable.

Tell us who's in it, and what else they are in that is just as anarchyXXXcore and shit. Like I said, this isn't IMDB. If all you remember is that "that really cute girl from Juno and Hard Candy" is in it, fucking great. Or look it up. Or give us a fine nude pic! (only if its tasteful, of course..)

But I digress.

Tell us what ya know, don't be allmovie.com

Lets watch every movie made after 1975. That's my plan for the rest of my life.

And remember: Time doesn't exist, it's just gravity weighing us down, giving us wrinkles, sucking us closer to the ground so we can decompose and be recycled into the testicles of an alaskan chipmunk or the testicles of a lawnmower or the labia of a snake.

do the drugs, don't let the drugs do you.

Alik

here we are...

2009-10-04T09:11:00.000-07:00

"it stinks!"

a place to rant/rave/plainly articulate your feelings/trash/revere/shit on/hype up any movies y'all have been watching. new, old, it don't matter.

feel free to start posting...

-Conor

(c/o tamur records)

P.S. if you see this and want to get involved, write to ALECGABIN@GMAIL.COM cc: conormeara@gmail.com