Today, in honor of Labor Day, I am very proud to present a very special edition of Lisa Marie’s Favorite Grindhouse and Exploitation Film Trailers! I have selected six trailers for six films about six very specific jobs. Your next career might be found below!
The Principal (1987)
Do you want to make a difference in the lives of your students? Why not follow the path of Rick Lattimore and become …. The Principal!?
2. The Gardener (1972)
Do you like working with plants? Do you have a green thumb? A career in gardening might be for you!
3. The Soldier (1982)
Do you love your country? Do you want to protect your nation from enemies, both domestic and international? The Soldier knows how you feel!
4. The Exterminator (1980)
Do you want to protect your community and help clean up the neighborhood? Consider pursuing a career as an urban vigilante, just like The Exterminator!
5. Moonrunners (1975)
Are you a good driver? Do you feel that the government needs to stay out of people’s personal decisions? Moonshine runner might be a career for you!
6. American Ninja (1985)
Do you have a truly unique set of skills? Were you born in the United States? Consider a career as an American Ninja!
By that, I mean the music that puts us immediately in the mood to create. It’s the music that helps us to clear our mind and to focus on figuring out how best to say what’s on our mind. I think, like most writers, I have a lot of different writing music. The music that I listen to depends on what I’m trying to write. If I’m writing about my boyfriend, I’ll listen to EDM. If I’m writing about my health, I’ll go with the Run Lola Run soundtrack. If I’m writing my childhood, I often tend to use Britney Spears and Coldplay as my background music. If I’m writing about current events, I’ll use Muse. If I’m writing about something fun, I’ll go with Saint Motel. Both Moby and Bob Dylan work for when I’m writing about history. I’ll listen to Adi Ulmansky if I’m writing about my best friend. When writing about Texas, I’ll listen to someone local, preferably from Denton. When it comes time to write about Canada (and by Canada, I mean Degrassi), I go with Jakalope. For any movie about New York, it’s Blondie. If I’m trying to impress everyone with my maturity, I’ll listen to something classical.
And if I need to listen to something that I know will make me feel happy and that I know will leave me feeling as if there’s nothing that I can’t accomplish, I’ll listen to The Chemical Brothers. And 9 times out of 10, I’ll probably listen to their 2007 performance at Glastonbury.
Originally airing on BBC Three, The Chemical Brothers At Glastonbury 2007 captures Tom Rowlands and Ed Simons at their best, energetically performing in front of a enthusiastic audience that refuses to allow a little torrential rain to keep them from experiencing The Chemical Brothers live. Towering over the stage is an astounding graphics display and, as the duo moves from song to song, the images on the display tell a hypnotic story of their own. Colorful shadows of men with guns and overcoats appear to stalk each other before dancing. 3-D shapes spin with the music. Strobe lights briefly illuminate the night sky. At one point, a clown appears and repeatedly orders the audience to “Get Yourself High,” and occasionally it seems like a suggestion and other times it seems like an order. Sometimes, the clown appears to be friendly and other times, he appears to be almost threatening. The clown is my favorite part of the show, though I’ve had others tell me that they find the image of it to be creepy and disturbing. My friend Jason shouts, “GODDAMMIT!” whenever I present him with the Get Yourself High Clown and, as you can probably guess, I usually find just about any excuse I can to trot the Clown out.
But the graphics wouldn’t mean anything if not for the music and, as always, Tom and Ed put on an amazing show. The frequent cuts to the overjoyed (and soaked) audience only adds to the communal feel of it all. The transition for Get Yourself High to Hey Boy Hey Girl to Song of the Siren to All RightsReserved represents everything that makes The Chemical Brothers great.
As I write this, there are apparently a lot of people trapped by the weather at Burning Man. I hope the best for all of them but, for me personally, I think the only festival I need is Glastonbury, especially if The Chemical Brothers are on the bill.
Based on a true story, Lifetime’s Abducted By My Teacher opens with a situation that I related to all too well.
15 year-old Elizabeth Thomas (Summer H. Howell) is the newest student at the local high school. She’s starting school in the middle of the year and she doesn’t know anyone at the school. Everyone is wondering why she’s enrolling so late in the semester. No one wants to run the risk of being the new girl’s friend. Elizabeth can’t even find a table where she can eat her lunch. Now, when I was growing up, my family moved frequently. I started and left a lot of different schools and that meant that I got used to being the new girl. I got used to people asking me questions about my past. I got used to having to fit into a social system that had been established long before I arrived. I learned how to make friends without becoming so close to them that it would hurt when I inevitably had to leave and go to a new school. It never became easily but I do think I managed to handle it about as well as anyone could. (Fortunately, I also had three older sisters to help me out.)
Elizabeth, however, has a problem that I never had to deal with. She’s not only the new girl but the high school is also the first one that she’s ever attended. Previously, Elizabeth was home-schooled by her unstable mother. Now, her father has custody of her and Elizabeth is experiencing public school for the first time. All of the teachers and her classmates know about Elizabeth’s past, leaving Elizabeth feeling like a freak.
However, things start to look up when one of her teachers, Tad Cummins (Michael Fishman), invites her to join the group of students who eat lunch in his classroom. Tad is one of those self-consciously cool teachers who insists that his students refer to him by his first name. He takes an immediate interest in Elizabeth and he even invites her to attend church with him and his wife. At first, Elizabeth isn’t sure how to react to Tad but, eventually, she comes to trust him. After all, he’s the only person at school who seems to care about her and he even helps her to get a job at a restaurant. (Elizabeth’s boss so respects Tad that she’s willing to hire Elizabeth on his recommendation alone.) Eventually, Elizabeth’s father (Gino Anania) grows suspicious of Tad’s interest in his daughter but, by that point, Tad has Elizabeth so in his thrall that he’s able to convince her to run off with him.
It’s a disturbingly familiar tale of grooming and abduction, one that features a sympathetic lead performance from Summer Howell and a memorably creepy one from Michael Fishman. From the minute that we first see Tad, we went to tell Elizabeth to stay away from him but, as this film show, things often look different when they’re actually happening to you than they do when you’re on the outside looking in. Tad is eventually reveled to be a messianic lunatic but, at the beginning, he’s simply the only person willing to give encouragement to someone who desperately needs it. Having no experience with public education and the outside world at all, Elizabeth is easily manipulated but eventually, she reveals an inner strength that even she didn’t know she had. Summer Howell does a wonderful job portraying Elizabeth’s transformation from being meek and easily manipulated to being strong and confident enough to face down her abductor in court.
This film was executive produced by Elizabeth Smart and Smart introduces the film. Elizabeth Smart is someone who has survived a trauma that most of us couldn’t even imagine but she’s since spent her life helping others who have been in similar situations. She deserves all the credit in the world.
For today’s Labor Day music video of the day, we have one of the earliest videos from Van Halen.
Jamie’s Cryin’ first appeared on Van Halen’s debut album and it was the third released single to come from that album. Though it didn’t chart, it was a favorite of both Eddie Van Halen’s and David Lee Roth’s. Eddie would later say that he regretted that Jamie’s Cryin’ was not the first single to be released from their debut.
Through the Shattered Lens 