Well, its Super Bleh weekend, the time of year when everything is just football, football, football! And Lisa says, “A bleh on both your houses!” Still, because I love theme posts, here’s the latest edition of Lisa Marie’s Favorite Grindhouse and Exploitation Trailers — 6 Super Trailers For a Super Weekend! Yay! 8)
1) J.D.’s Revenge (1976)
He came back from the dead to possess a man’s soul, make love to his woman, and get the vengeance he craved!
2) Texas Adios (1967)
Starring the best, the one and only Franco Nero!
3) H.O.T.S. (1979)
Trailers like this prove that it was apparently a lot easier to be considered attractive back in the 70s.
4) Inglorious Bastards (1977)
I think this film features a former football player so it goes with the whole Super Bowl theme. Plus, the title was borrowed for Quentin Tarantino’s super Inglorious Basterds.
5) Wild Orchid (1990)
This film was directed by the super Zalman King who passed away on Friday. R.I.P.
6) Roadhouse (1989)
The film co-stars the even more super Ben Gazzara, who also passed away on Friday. R.I.P.
A few days ago, I set the DVR to record the 1976 Best Picture winner Rocky off of TCM. Last night, I finally got a chance to sit down and actually watch it.
Why Was I Watching It?
I’ll be honest here and admit that I wasn’t watching it because I’ve ever had any great desire to see this movie or, for that matter, any other Sylvester Stallone film. (Though, for the record, I thought the Expendables was vaguely entertaining.) However, this being Oscar season, my mind right now is pretty much dominated by 1) a mental list of all 493 best picture nominees and 2) an obsessive need to see every single one of those films.
And since we’re focusing on reviewing best picture nominees this month, I figured why not take this opportunity to watch Rocky. After all, I thought, this is the film that managed to win best picture over Network, Taxi Driver, and All The President’s Men. How bad can it be?
What’s It About?
So, there’s this guy named Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) and he’s got to be the nicest Mafia goon alive. He spends his time collecting debts for the local loan shark (played by the Maniac himself, Joe Spinell) but he refuses to break anyone’s thumbs while doing so and even offers up helpful advice like, “Yo, you got to start thinking.” Spinell’s all like, “Rocky, why aren’t you breaking anyone’s thumbs?” and Rocky says he doesn’t want to and Spinell’s all like, “That’s okay,” because oddly enough, Joe Spinell is the only guy in the Mafia who is nicer than Rocky.
Anyway. Rocky is also a boxer who fights “bums” (as his trainer Burgess Meredith is fond of bellowing) and who is sweetly courting Adrian (Talia Shire), a shy girl who works in the local pet store. Adrian’s brother (played by Burt Young) is named Paul but since everyone in the film is Italian, he’s called “Paulie” instead. (I can say this because I’m a fourth Italian and if your name is Paul, I’m going to call you “Paulie” whether you like it or not.)
Anyway, there’s another boxer (played by Carl Weathers) and he’s named Apollo Creed. Apollo is the champ because when you’ve got a name like Apollo Creed, you better be the best or else you’re just going to look silly. For publicity reasons, Apollo gives the unknown Rocky the chance to fight him for the championship. Apollo is expecting an easy fight but he hasn’t taken into consideration that Rocky is not only willing to run every morning but he’s willing to run up steps as well!
What Worked?
(WARNING: SPOILERS BELOW.)
The love story between Rocky and Adrian was kinda sweet, largely because Talia Shire and Sylvester Stallone both had a very genuine chemistry and Shire gave such a good performance that Stallone (who spends most of the film coming across like a parody of a method actor) gives a better performance when he’s sharing the screen with her. I spent a lot of this movie rolling my eyes at just how shamelessly manipulative it was but I have to admit that the final scene — with Adrian going “I love you, Rocky,” and a bloody and kinda gross-looking Rocky replying with a heartfelt, “I love you!” — brought tears to my multi-colored eyes.
What Didn’t Work?
Rocky has got to be one of the most shamelessly manipulative films ever made. Director John G. Avildsen (who won best director while Martin Scorsese wasn’t even nominated for Taxi Driver) pushed every obvious button and used every technique at his disposal to force the audience to root for Rocky. Hence, we get the famous training montage set to soaring music and the subtle appeals to racism that are inherent in the portrayals of Apollo Creed and his entourage. Admittedly, one reason that a lot of these scenes fell flat is because I’ve seen them duplicated in thousands of other sports films. I know its possible that the reason I’ve seen them duplicated is because of Rocky’s success but still, it doesn’t make those scenes feel any less obvious and vaguely silly.
Do you know how sometimes you just watch a movie and you go, “There is absolutely nothing in this movie for me to relate to and I really should be watching the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills right now?” Well, my reaction to Rocky wasn’t that extreme but it was pretty close. I watched this film — which I’ve seen described as one of the most emotional films ever made — feeling oddly detached from everything I was seeing on-screen, my attention only being held by a clinical fascination concerning just how shamelessly manipulative this film was. Try as I might, I simply could not get emotionally invested in what I was watching. Some of that, undoubtedly, has to do with the fact that I’m not into sports films in general. However, I think most of it comes down to the fact that I have a vagina and, quite frankly, the appeal of Sylvester Stallone is lost on me.
Speaking of the appeal of Sylvester Stallone…
“Oh my God! Just like me!” Moments:
None. It’s rare that I say that because I can usually find a way to relate any movie I see to my life but Rocky was just too alien to me.
Last night, as I was laying in bed and waiting for sleep to come, I turned on Lifetime and watched a movie called Sexting in Suburbia.
Why Was I Watching It?
Because it was on Lifetime and seriously — how can you not watch something called Sexting in Suburbia? That’s like the greatest freaking title ever.
What Was It About?
So there’s this popular, out-going, bright futured high school student named Dina (Jenn Proske) and, on the same night that she’s crowned homecoming queen, she’s also sends her boyfriend a naked picture but she accidentally sends it to the wrong phone as well. So, of course, the picture goes viral and soon, everyone at school sees it and they get all judgmental and soon, everywhere Dina goes, she’s seeing graffiti that reads, “Dina is a slut!” Plus, Dina gets kicked off of the Girl’s Field Hockey Team because apparently, there’s some sort of morality clause that goes along with being on a high school athletic team or something like that. Seriously, is that like a real thing? Anyway, Dina loses her college scholarship as a result of being kicked off the team so she goes home and kills herself. Now, it’s up to her mom (Liz Vassey) to find out who is responsible for that picture going viral and get some justice for Dina.
Oh, and by the way, this all takes place in…suburbia!
What Worked?
The film had a good anti-bullying message to it and it definitely captured how everything in high school is such a drama. It also made a good point about just how messed up society is when it comes to dealing with sex in general and how quick everyone is to judge girls as opposed to boys. Whereas guys are applauded for “acting like men,” girls are expected to meet someone else’s standard of perfection and the minute we deviate from that standard in any way whatsoever, we’re condemned and called nasty names and expected to live the rest of our lives being punished for not living up to someone else’s ideal.
However, ultimately, what really worked as far as this film is concerned is the title. Seriously, I love that title! Sexting in Suburbia. Say it a few times and you’ll see what I mean. It’s just so melodramatic and Lifetime-worthy.
What Did Not Work?
This movie, like a lot of Lifetime Movies, had a strong bias in favor of brunettes and against redheads. Seriously, if you spend a week watching nothing by the Lifetime Movie Network, you will discover that 9 times out of ten, the movie will feature a smart brunette, a naive/or spoiled blonde, and a sociopathic redhead. Seriously.
Speaking as a redhead, I have to say that this has always bothered me.
“OH MY GOD! JUST LIKE ME!” Moments
Seriously, who among us can say that they haven’t accidentally sexted the wrong person? It’s just a part of growing up.
The newly released film Man on a Ledge is about a man (played by Sam Worthington) who checks into a hotel room in New York City and then climbs out on a ledge and threatens to jump off unless a specific hostage negotiator is brought in to talk him off the ledge. We quickly discover that Worthington isn’t just a depressed jumper. Instead, he’s got a really lengthy and overly complicated back story. It turns out that he’s a former detective who used to moonlight for a venture capitalist and then one day, he was accused of stealing a priceless diamond and destroying it. This resulted in him getting sentenced to 25 years in prison but when his father is reported to have died, Worthington is released from jail for a day so he can attend the funeral. So, Worthington escapes and then ends up out on a ledge as part of a massively complicated plan to prove his innocence. His name, by the way, is Nick because people named Alvin are never the stars of action movies.
Meanwhile, the cop that Nick demands to speak with is a hardened, veteran hostage negotiator and she’s played by Elizabeth Banks. Yes, you read that correctly. Anyway, Nick asks for her because he knows that the last guy she tried to talk out of jumping apparently jumped off a bridge. Since Banks failed her last time out, her efforts to talk Nick off the ledge are cautiously observed by another detective, this one played by Edward Burns. Banks is totally and completely miscast here and she has next to no chemistry with Sam Worthington. However, she does have really good chemistry with Edward Burns. Seriously, they would make a really cute couple and I would buy any issue of Us Weekly that had them on the cover.
Meanwhile, the guy that Nick is accused of stealing from just happens to be in a building across the street where he’s conducting some sort of generically evil business deal. He’s a painfully thin, almost sickly man and, whenever he was on screen, I found myself wondering how his head managed to stay balanced on his body. At first, I thought maybe it was the Red Skull waiting for the sequel to Capt. America to start filming. However, on closer inspection, he turned out to be respected character actor Ed Harris. In this film, Harris plays a ruthless capitalist who would have gone bankrupt if not for the insurance money he got as a result of Nick supposedly destroying that diamond. Anyway, Harris appears to be enjoying playing a bad guy and he’s so over-the-top in his evil that you don’t really mind that he’s another one of those “I-should-kill-you-now-but-first-we-talk” type of villains.
Meanwhile, there’s two other people who are taking advantage of all the chaos caused by the man on the ledge to break into Harris’s building. They’re played by Jamie Bell (who looks a lot like Casey Affleck in this film) and telenova veteran Genesis Rodriguez. As you watch Bell and Rodriguez sliding down heating ducts and scaling elevator shafts, you can’t help but marvel at just how overly complicated everyone is making things. Still, Bell and Rodriguez have a lot of chemistry and they’re fun to watch.
Meanwhile, NYC television reporter (played by Kyra Sedgwick) is running around the streets of New York, asking random bystanders how they feel about the prospect of Nick jumping. Apparently, she is an old enemy of Elizabeth Banks’ though that whole plot line is dropped as soon as its brought up. Still, the audience in my theater chuckled when Sedgwick dramatically rolled her r’s while introducing herself as “Suzie Morales.”
Meanwhile, there’s a bearded guy watching Nick up on the roof and he suddenly decides to go all Occupy Wall Street on the movie’s ass and starts shouting, “Attica! Attica!” before then blaming it all on the 1%. Unfortunately, he doesn’t put on Guy Fawkes mask at any point during all of this.
Meanwhile, the entire city of New York is obsessed with the man on the ledge and, if nothing else, they all end up acting exactly the way that people who have never been to New York City (like me) assume that people in New York act. By that, I mean all the extras are all like, “Yo, Paulie! There’s some man on a ledge! Stop breaking my balls!”
Meanwhile, there’s one final twist to the film’s plot that I can’t share without spoiling the film. So, I’ll just say that it involved someone working at the hotel and I figured out the twist about 3 minutes after this character first appeared. This is one of those twists that if you can’t figure out on your own then you need to hang your head in shame. Seriously.
This film packs a lot of plot into 90 minutes of screen time and, not surprisingly, the end result is a bit of a mess. This is one of those films where every single character attempts to solve his or her problems in the most needlessly complicated and implausible way possible. Still, almost despite myself, I enjoyed Man on a Ledge. It’s just all so silly and stupid that it becomes oddly likable. The film also has two nicely done chase scenes and some of the scenes where Nick attempts to manuever about on the ledge made me go, “Agck!”
When we went to see Haywire earlier tonight, one of the trailers that played before the movie started was for an upcoming horror/mystery film called The Raven. I have to admit that I have mixed feelings about the trailer. The idea of Edgar Allan Poe as a detective is one that is either going to be campy fun or else it’s just going to be an annoying gimmick. To be honest, the trailer leads me to suspect the latter because it definitely has a wannabe Sherlock Holmes feel to it. That said, I do have some hope for this film if just because it looks like John Cusack is having a lot of fun with this role. Cusack is one of those “serious” actors who can be very watchable when he’s finally allowed to just cut loose and go totally over the top.
January is the time of year that you look at what’s being released into theaters and you think to yourself, “Oh my God, is it summer yet!?” This is the time of the Devil Inside and Joyful Noise. This is also the time when we find ourselves watching trailers and previews of upcoming films for just a little bit of hope that maybe things are going to get better.
And, on that note, here’s the trailer for Wes Anderson’s upcoming film, Moonrise Kingdom. I don’t know much about Moonrise Kingdom but, seeing as it’s directed Wes Anderson, it’ll either be very clever and unappreciated or else it will be so self-consciously quirky that I’ll end up having a seizure halfway through the film.
The Directors Guild has announced their nominees for the best of 2011 and I guess it’s time for the folks at AwardsDaily and David Poland and Jeff Wells and all the others to do their annual “Everyone Agrees With Us So Fuck Anyone With An Independent Mind” posts.
Here are the nominees:
Woody Allen — Midnight in Paris
David Fincher — The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
Michel Hazanavicius — The Artist
Alexander Payne — The Descendants
Martin Scorsese — Hugo
Unfortunately, Fincher’s The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo has been deemed a box office disappointment which, I think, has given it an undeserved reputation for being an art film as opposed to just an example of establishment cynicism.
Anyway, congratulations to all the nominees and especially congratulations to all the little fanboys out there. You can loosen the noose and hop off of the step ladder now. David Fincher has gotten some love.
Here’s the final post in my “Best of 2011” series, my picks for the best 26 films of 2011. I’m just going to let this list stand for itself but I do want to make clear that these are MY picks and they do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the writers and editors on this site. You can read Leon’s picks right here and I’m sure that my fellow writers will be posting their own picks over the upcoming weeks. I’d also like to point out that I have limited my picks to films that I’ve actually seen this year — as opposed to just blindly jumping on the bandwagon of assumption as so many other film bloggers have done this year.* I have yet to see War Horse, Albert Nobbs, The Iron Lady, or We Need To Talk About Kevin, for instance. However, I have seen both The Descendants and The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo and no, neither one of them is on my list because, regardless of what the jack-booted thugs of professional criticism may insist, I didn’t feel either one of them deserved to be listed as one of the best films of the year. Ultimately, watching a movie is an individual experience and every individual opinion is legitimate.
(By the way, I’m doing a Top 26 list because Lisa doesn’t do odd numbers.)
Without further ado, here are my top 26 films of 2011:
I actually watched several things last night, including the season premieres of The Bachelor and Intervention. However, neither one of those is an Oscar contender. The Help is, so I decided I better take the time to watch the film via OnDemand.
Why Was I Watching It?
I wasn’t planning on seeing this movie when it first originally opened in theaters because, just based on the trailer, it looked like it would be your typical, terribly self-congratulatory mainstream films. I’ve seen far too many films that promote the same old stereotypes in the name of progress and tolerance, as if good intentions can make up for bad filmmaking. But, so many of my girlfriends came to me raving about how much they loved this film and then my Aunt Kate just about disinherited me when I told her I hadn’t seen the movie (or read the book that it’s based on) and eventually I realized that I had to see the film. Add to that, chances are that this film is going to be an Oscar contender.
What Was It About
In segregated Mississippi, aspiring writer Skeeter (Emma Stone) decides to write book about the life of the African-American maids and nannies who work for her best friends. After some initial difficulty, she wins the trust of two maids (Viola Davis and Octavia Spenser) and gets down to exposing the truth.
What Worked
First off, The Help is a perfect example of a well-made, entertaining mainstream film. I laughed at the funny parts, I cried at the sad parts, and I thoroughly enjoyed the film, even though it kinda fell apart during the 2nd hour. There’s a lot of very legitimate issues that you can raise about how the film portrays life in the segregated South but the film itself is entertaining and well-made.
It’s also one the best acted films of 2011 with Viola Davis, Octavia Spenser, and Emma Stone all giving great performances. Jessica Chastain is funny playing a clueless newlywed and Bryce Dallas Howard does a typically good job playing the type of bitchy Queen Bee that we’ve all know and have all secretly hoped would end up fat and divorced. I also thought Allison Janney, who plays Stone’s mother, gave an excellent and underrated performance.
This film was directed with a perfect eye for the details needed to make even the most minor of characters memorable. If nothing else, I enjoyed watching it just to see what everyone would be wearing from scene to scene.
The film’s first hour is probably as perfectly paced and tonally balanced as any film I’ve seen. However, things fall apart during the second hour (more on that below). Luckily, the film’s ending is powerful and partially redeems the film’s uneven tone.
What Didn’t Work
The film is moves along pretty well until the 2nd hour, at which point it smashed into a wall created by the inability of mainstream film to truly honestly deal with racism. At the start of the second hour, civil rights leader Medgar Evers is assassinated by a member of the Ku Klux Klan and I found myself waiting for some sort of expression of anger (or really, any emotion other than stoic suffering) on the part of “the help.” Instead, we get a scene where both Viola Davis and Emma Stone are watching Evers’s funeral together and both are impressed to see John F. Kennedy show up. In the next scene, Davis has put a picture of President Kennedy up on her wall next to a picture of Jesus. So, in other words, this film reacts to the murder of a black man but deifying a white man. After showing us a clue of violent reality, it’s as if the film can’t figure out how to balance out the ugly realities of racism with the film’s need to appeal to the widest possible audience. As a result, the next hour of the film feels rather disjointed and uneven. Even though the film partially redeems itself with one of the best endings of the year, it’s still hard not to feel as if we’re watching a feel good film about something nobody should feel all that good about.
Like a lot of mainstream films about racism, a good deal of this film centers on the friendship between blacks and a few white people who, magically, don’t appear to have a shred of prejudice within them despite the fact that they were raised in the same racist culture as every other white person in the film. As a result, the racism seen in the film doesn’t really seem like it’s an ingranied part of culture as much as it just seems like the result of a couple of bullies acting like jerks. As a result, despite its very good intentions, a film like The Help will often unintentionally minimize just what a struggle the fight for civil rights was and is.
“Oh my God! Just like me!” Moments
Needless to say, I totally related to Emma Stone’s character in this film.
Lessons Learned
It’s difficult to make a feel-good movie about racism.
Now that 2011 is finally over, we here at the Shattered Lens can finally get around to listing our individual picks for the best and worst of 2011. Pantsukadasai, Necromoonyeti, Leon Th3 Duke, and Dazzling Erin have already posted some of their picks for the best of 2011 and over the next five days, I’ll be risking your scorn by listing some of my own choices.
I’d like to get things started today by listening my picks for the 16 worst films of 2011. As always, these choices are mine and mine alone. So, don’t go harassing Arleigh just because you think Another Earth wasn’t a pretentious and silly film. Instead, harass me so I can harass you back. 🙂
16) Battle L.A. — It takes a special type of film to make Skyline look like a work of art.
15) Cowboys and Aliens — Meh. This should have been so much more fun than it actually was.
13) Shark Night 3-D — Another film that should have been a lot more fun.
12) Season of the Witch — The first film I saw in 2011 was also one of the worst.
11) The Ides of March — Hey guys, did you know that politics is a dirty business!? Oh my God, consider my fragile mind blown. Thank you for clearing things up, George Clooney!
10) Another Earth — Honestly, Another Earth probably wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for the way that so many of the toadsuckers out there get so superior and condescending whenever they’re telling me that I should love this movie. If you read the comments under my linked review of the film, you’ll find a very good defence of the film from Leon and then you’ll find a more typical response from some idiot named Naresh Raj Shrestha. Unfortunately, Naresh seems to be a fair representation of most of the people who take to the Internet to defend this film. All I can say to those people is “Fuck off, kids. I’ve got real movies to worry about.”
