That’s right! Today is Dazzling Erin’s birthday! One of the reasons why I love working on this site is because I get to work with my sister. Not only has she always been there for me (which is not as easy as you might think) but she’s always willing to listen to my ideas, no matter how crazy they are, and I know I can always depend on her to either help me make those dreams come true or to patiently explain to me why it might not be a great idea to try to schedule a new film review to post every minute over a 24 hour time period. (That was originally my plan for Halloween until I was gently reminded that would amount to 1440 posts in one day.)
I picked today’s music video because it’s for a song that’s prominently featured in a film that Erin and I absolutely love, 2002’s Bend it Like Beckham. The video for Inner Smile features Sharleen Spiteri, the lead singer of Texas, doing her best Elvis Presley impersonation. The video itself is disguised to look like one of those Elvis documentaries that occasionally pop up on PBS but, if you watch it carefully, there are hints that we’re not actually seeing Elvis. (Keep an eye on the belt that Sharleen holds up at one point.)
This video was directed by Vaughan Arnell, who has been directing videos since 1984! (On the imvdb, he’s credited with 49 videos in total.)
As is noted at the end of the video, this video was actually filmed in front of a live audience with Sharleen in full Elvis costume.
Also, I know someone’s going to say that the main reason that I like this song is because the group is named Texas. Well, sure, that’s definitely not a bad thing. However, the band itself is Scottish.
Apparently, the most difficult thing in the world is to try to find a good music video for Thanksgiving!
Seriously.
First off, there really aren’t that many Thanksgiving songs and those that do exist don’t have music videos. If there had been an official music video for Arlo Guthrie’s Alice’s Restaurant (which Gary wrote about yesterday), I would have shared it. But, as far as I can tell, there isn’t.
I nearly went with Alanis Morrisette’s Thank U but then I realized how much that song annoys me so I decided not to. If Natalie Merchant’s song, Kind and Generous, had been called Thank You, I would have used it but, unfortunately, it’s not.
I eventually went with God Only Knows because it’s the type of song that can bring tears to your eyes and I recently rewatched Boogie Nights and I love how the song is used in the film. And, to be honest, it’s a song that captures the feeling of Thanksgiving, even if it’s not really a Thanksgiving song.
So, I used it. I can’t really tell you much about this video, other than music videos in the 60s and 70s were considerably more straight-forward and less flashy than what we’re used to today. It’s a simple video but it works for the song, I think.
Hi, everyone! Lisa here with today’s music video of the day!
Today’s video is Calvin Harris’s Acceptable In The 80s. This song, which appeared on I Created Disco, was Calvin’s first hit, reaching the number 10 position on the UK Singles Chart. I like the song and I like the video, which features big hair, bright colors, and some memorably weird imagery that I’m not even going to try to interpret.
“It was acceptable at the time…”
Hmmm, that’s something we’ve all been hearing a lot this year.
What happens when you take a pill in Ibiza? Well, to start with, you get a big head and you start to resemble papier-mâché…
There’s actually two videos of this song. There’s a video for the original version, which is largely acoustic and kind of boring, as acoustic songs often are. And then there’s this video, which is for SeeB’s remix of the song. The remix is definitely the superior version, though many people refuse to admit it.
(There’s a tyranny of thought that the acoustic version of a song is going to superior to any other version. It’s simply not true. Acoustic often equals boring. At the height of American Idol, there was a rival singing competition called The One, where the whole gimmick was that every performance was acoustic. Only four episodes aired and every single one of them was painful to watch.)
Anyway, as for the song, it’s very much autobiographical. Yes, Mike Posner actually did take a pill in Ibiza and yes, he actually was trying to impress Avicii. In much the same way that Turkish tour guides still tell people that Midnight Express was not a fair representation of the Turkish legal system, tourism official in Ibiza have repeatedly complained that the song’s popularity has led everyone to assume that Ibiza is some place where you only go to get high.
Personally, I’ve never been to Ibiza but I did once take a pill in Capri and that was quite a night.
(Hi everyone! Usually, my sister — the Dazzling Erin Nicole — tracks down and selects the images that we feature in our Artwork of the Day feature. However, Erin is taking the week off — and November 24th is not only the day after Thanksgiving but her birthday as well!, so be sure to wish her a happy one! — so, for the next few days, I’ll be selecting our artwork of the day! — Lisa Marie)
Look at those bricks fly!
Listen, I really can’t tell you a thing about whether or not Pay or Die is a good movie or not. All I know is that the film was released in 1979, it was rated R, and this was the poster. It’s a tremendously effective poster, though. I don’t know if it’s a fair representation of what happens in the movie, of course. But I hope it is. I hope there’s at least one scene featuring two men and a woman kicking the Hell out of a brick wall.
Posters like this are actually a huge reason why I enjoy researching grindhouse films. Just looking at it is enough to inspire you to create your own movie in your head. Why are they kicking through the wall? Why are they even working together? Why is the movie called Pay or Die? Do they own someone money? Does someone owe them money? Maybe they’re kicking through the wall of a bank. The possibilities are endless!
I will say this, though. If I ever did use my bare hands to smash through a brick wall, I’d probably try to make sure that my boobs were a little better protected when I did it. Seriously, I imagine breaking through a wall, especially one made of bricks, is not as safe as they make it look in the movies. Considering all of the kicking that appears to be involved, I would also probably not wear open-toed sandals while doing it either. That just seems like common sense to me.
Hi everyone! Lisa here, with today’s music video of the day!
Ironically, when Moby first recorded Porcelain, he felt that it was such a weak song that he didn’t even want to release it. According to an interview that he gave to Billboard, the song was inspired by a real-life relationship, one that did not end well. Perhaps the subject matter was too personal for him to hear the song objectively but Moby had to literally be talked into including Porcelain on Play.
Of course, it went on to become one of his signature songs, perhaps the song for which he will always be remembered.
How many movies and advertisements have featured Porcelain? I’ve lost track. Danny Boyle made good use of it in The Beach. I remember I once even heard it playing in the background of a commercial for a local jewelry store.
As for the video, it’s simple but effective. It was directed by Swedish director Jonas Åkerlund, who directed his first video in 1988 and is still directing them today.
Could it be that I just watched a Negan-centric episode of The Walking Dead that wasn’t terrible?
It’s true! I’ll admit that I rolled my eyes a bit when I saw that tonight’s episode was going to be about Negan and the Saviors. Last season, though there were a few exceptions (particularly the episode where Eugene was first taken to the Sanctuary), the Savior episodes were my least favorite. But tonight’s episode was actually pretty good.
That doesn’t mean that it was great, of course. To be honest, I’m not totally sure that you could ever have a truly great Savior episode. Whenever I watch the Saviors, I always find myself thinking about The Others on Lost. One reason why the Others were such a fascinating group was because they weren’t just one-dimensional villains. Whenever one of the Others would say something like, “We’re the good guys,” you could actually see their point. There’s never been that type of ambiguity when it comes to the Saviors. Negan is an asshole. He has chosen to surround himself with other assholes. They were all probably assholes before the zombie apocalypse and they’ll continue to be assholes until Sanctuary is eventually overrun by walkers.
With all that in mind though, this was still a pretty good episode. If nothing else, this episode made it a little bit clearer why people started following Negan in the first place. Even when Negan was trapped in the trailer with Father Gabriel, he did not allow himself to show any fear. Instead, he was actually able to persuade Gabriel to make a run with him for the Sanctuary. Even his confession to Gabriel about his first wife mostly served to reveal that Negan is a master manipulator. He shared just enough to keep Gabriel intrigued. After spending almost all of previous season bellowing, Jeffrey Dean Morgan dialed things back just enough to make Negan interesting again. For that matter, tonight’s episode finally gave Seth Gilliam to show what he’s capable of when he’s actually given a decent line or two.
In the trailer, Negan told Gabriel that the Saviors would undoubtedly end up killing each other if they thought he was dead. That may have sounded arrogant at the time but it quickly turned out that Negan was correct. I think that’s also going to be the Saviors’s downfall. By literally setting himself up as the strongest man in the Sanctuary, Negan has also ensured that the Saviors are lost without his presence and direction. While all of his lieutenants may go out of their way to imitate Negan’s style, none of them have his leadership skills. It doesn’t matter how much Simon and Regina insist otherwise. They may say “I am Negan,” but everyone know that they’re not. That said, Negan’s sudden appearance after everyone had assumed he was dead will probably leave him in an even more powerful position. All messiahs return from the dead and Negan even returned with a man of God!
As for the rest of the episode, I didn’t really get the whole point of Rick/Darryl fight. (It did, of course, remind us of the difference between Rick and Negan. Rick forgave Darryl, something Negan would view as being a sign of weakness.) Josh McDermitt is obviously having a blast as Eugene. Eugene may be a traitor but McDermitt’s performance still makes me smile every week. And then there was weaselly Gregory, of course. I think we’re all ready to see a bunch of walkers pounce on Gregory.
As I watched tonight’s episode, I found myself making a few more predictions about the rest of season 8:
There’s no way that Gabriel is still going to be alive at the end of this season. He is so being set up for martyrdom.
If they get Dr. Carter back to Hilltop, does that mean that Maggie will finally have her baby?
Judging from the flashback/flashforward structure of this season (and the fact that they’re going to have to explain why Carl no longer looks like he’s 13 years old), I’m going to guess that there will be a considerable time jump between season 8 and season 9. Either that or Zombie Carl’s going to show at some point soon…
Yesterday, as soon as I saw the twitter reaction to the passing of Malcolm Young, I knew that there was no way today’s music video of the day wouldn’t come from AC/DC.
As I looked through all of the AC/DC videos that were available on YouTube, the main thing that I noticed was that there was not an ounce of pretension to either the band’s music or their videos. The majority of the videos that I saw were simply made up of footage of the band performing on stage. There was no attempt to pretend that they were anything other than a hard-working band that played fast and loud. How could anyone not respect that?
Highway to Hell was probably an obvious video to pick, as it seems to be the song that everyone knows. Well, that’s okay. Sometimes, the obvious choice is the right choice. Since the video is pretty straight forward, here’s a little background on the song, courtesy of Songfacts:
The title is often attributed as a phrase AC/DC guitarist Angus Young used to describe touring in America. There is a much more literal explanation, however. “Highway to Hell” was the nickname for the Canning Highway in Australia. It runs from where lead singer Bon Scott lived in Fremantle and ends at a pub/bar called The Raffles, which was a big rock ‘n roll drinking hole in the ’70s. As Canning Highway gets close to the pub, it dips down into a steep decline: “No stop signs… speed limits… nobody gonna slow me down.”
So many people where killed by driving fast over that intersection at the top of the hill on the way for a good night out, that it was called the highway to hell, so when Bon was saying “I’m on the highway to hell” it meant that he was doing the nightly or weekly pilgrimage down Canning Highway to The Raffles bar to rock and drink with his mates: “Ain’t nothing I would rather do. Going down, party time, my friends are gonna be there too.”
The Emoji Movie is basically Inside Out, except instead of taking place inside of an awkward teen’s head, it takes place inside of an awkward teen’s phone. Instead of sharing a universal story about the pain of growing up, it shares a universal story about the pain of having too many lame apps on your phone. Instead of featuring a melancholy voice performance by Richard Kind as a forgotten toy, it features an annoying voice performance from James Corden as a forgotten emoji. Instead of being really wise, funny, and sad, the Emoji Movie is dumb, stupid, and idiotic. Otherwise, it’s just like Inside Out.
Gene (voiced by T.J. Miller) is a Meh Emoji. He lives in Textopolis. His job is to look like he’s always meh but instead, he’s always full of emotion and positivity. His boss, Smiler (Maya Rudolph), says that Gene must be a malfunction and therefore, he has to be deleted. Gene says, “No, I must discover who I actually am!” With the help of the forgotten hand emoji, Hi-5 (that would be James Corden), Gene flees from app to app. (It’s kinda like The Lego Movie but not funny, touching, or clever.) They track down a hacker named Jailbreak (Anna Faris) and, at one point, they’re all rescued by a blue bird that comes flying over from the Twitter app. They’re all chased by a bunch of bots and I have to admit that I liked the bots just because they were trying to destroy Gene and Hi-5. Anything that would have ended James Corden’s lameass Ricky Gervais imitation would have been fine with me.
Nobody (or, at the very least, nobody who writes for this site) is as enthusiastic a capitalist as I am but the naked commercialism of The Emoji Movie really tested my patience. Essentially, it’s just an 86-minute advertisement with a vapid “Be yourself!” message tacked on. (If The Emoji Movie was sincere in its message of individuality, it wouldn’t celebrate the idea of people communicating exclusively in emoji.) Early on, when Gene and Hi-5 escaped into Candy Crush, I rolled my eyes. Later on, when an awed Gene said, “This is Spotify?”, I nearly threw a shoe at the TV.
(I did enjoy the scene where the Just Dance app got deleted, just because the dancer — who was voiced by Christina Aguilera — let out a terrifying scream as the app collapsed around her. I’ve always imagined that’s what happens whenever I delete anything.)
Usually, I try to force myself to come up with at least 500 words for every review that I write but the really does seem to be more effort than this movie deserves. (I was actually tempted to write this review exclusive in emoji but then I realized I was just be playing the movie’s game.) I will say this: children will like The Emoji Movie because children are stupid. Ask them again in five years and this will be their response:
In Mudbound, Jonathan Banks plays one of the most hateful characters to ever appear in a motion picture.
We never find out the character’s given name. Everyone just calls him Pappy. He’s the patriarch of an unimpressive family, a wannabe king who has no kingdom over which to rule. Pappy never has a kind word to say to anyone. He even tends to be brusque with his grandchildren. When one of his sons returns from serving in World War II, Pappy only wants to know if he got laid in Europe and how many men he killed. Pappy only killed one man in World War I but he did it face-to-face. He’s proud of that.
As much as Pappy dislikes the members of his family, it’s nothing compared to how much Pappy hates people who aren’t white. Pappy is the type to demand that, when he dies, he not buried anywhere near anyone black. Pappy is also the type who takes it as a personal insult if a black man uses the same door that he uses. When he sees Ronsel Jackson (Jason Mitchell) using the font door of the local grocery store, it doesn’t matter that Ronsel has just returned from serving his country and is still wearing his uniform. It also doesn’t matter that Ronsel’s mother is helping to raise Pappy’s granddaughters. What matters is that Ronsel is defying the social norms of 1940s Mississippi and Pappy takes that as a personal insult.
There are six narrators in Mudbound, all of whom tell us their story and share with us their thoughts. Pappy is not one of those narrators and, for that, I was thankful. I would have been frightened at the thought of entering his hate-fueled mind. All we have to do is look into his hateful eyes or listen to his scornful voice and we know what’s going on in Pappy’s head. He’s a man who has accomplished nothing in his long life, whose only happiness comes from making others miserable, and who fears the change that he secretly knows is coming. It’s not just hate that makes Pappy demand an apology when Ronsel Jackson uses the front door. It’s fear.
Mudbound tells the story of two families in Mississippi and the farmland on which they both live and work. (Early on, when a skull with a bullet hole is discovered, we’re informed that an old slave cemetery is under plowed fields.) Pappy’s oldest son, Henry McAllan (Jason Clarke), owns the land. Desperate for his father’s approval, Henry hopes to succeed as a farmer but he soon proves himself to be rather clueless. Henry’s wife is Laura (Carey Mulligan). Laura was a 31 year-old virgin when she met Henry. She tells us that she married him because she didn’t want to be alone. She stays with him because she loves their children.
The Jacksons live on Henry’s land. They’re tenant farmers and Hap (Rob Morgan), the family patriarch, dreams of one day owning his own farm. While Pappy openly hates the Jacksons, Henry treats them with a patronizing condescension. (Whereas Pappy knows that he’s hated, Henry actually thinks that the Jacksons look up to him. There’s not a lot of humor to be found in Mudbound but I couldn’t help but smile at Henry’s cluelessness about how little Hap thought of him.) Henry and Laura even hire Hap’s wife, Florence (Mary J. Blige), to serve as a housekeeper. Henry and Laura think they’re doing Florence a favor, never considering that they are essentially asking Florence to neglect her own family so that she can take care of their’s.
The Jackson and the McAllans do have one big thing in common. They both have sons serving in the army. Ronsel is a sergeant who is both surprised and happy to discover that white Europeans are not the same as white Americans. Henry’s younger brother, Jamie (Garrett Hedlund), is a captain in the Air Force. When the war ends, both Ronsel and Jamie return to their families. Jamie returns with a severe case of PTSD and a drinking problem. Having experienced freedom in Europe, Ronsel is angered to return to a country where he is still expected to sit in the back of the bus and cheerfully accept being treated like a second class citizen.
When both of them are caught off guard by the sound of a car backfiring, Ronsel and Jamie immediately recognize each other as returning soldiers. A friendship develops between them, one that goes against the racist norms of their society. Violence and tragedy follows.
Mudbound is a Netflix film. It’s currently getting a one-week theatrical release so that it’ll be Oscar-eligible. (If it is nominated for best picture — and many think that it may be — it’ll be the first Netflix film to be so honored.) That said, the majority of the people who see Mudbound will see it via Netflix. That’s a shame because, visually, Mubound is a film that should be seen on a big screen. The imagery — the farmland that seems to stretch on forever, the storms that always seem to roll in at the worst possible moment, the scenes of Ronsel and Jamie in Europe — is frequently beautiful and haunting. (The comparisons to the work of Terrence Malick are justified.) Even when viewed on a laptop, Mudbound still looks good but I fear that the small screen will rob the film of some of its epic scope. Since Mudbound is a leisurely paced film, I fear that many members of the Netflix audience are going to be tempted to hit pause and then not return to the film for an hour or two, therefore robbing Mudbound of its cumulative power.
Over the time that I’ve spent writing this review, I’ve come to realize that I actually liked Mudbound a lot more than I originally thought I did. As opposed to many of the films that I’ve seen this year, I have a feeling that Mudbound is actually going to stick with me. Carey Mulligan, Mary J. Blige, Jason Clarke, and Rob Morgan all give wonderful performances, though the cast standout is Jason Mitchell, playing a man who, having tasted freedom, refuses to silently go back to the way things were.
Mudbound is a very good film. I wouldn’t necessarily call it a great film, though many other critics and viewers are. Director Dee Rees captures some beautiful images and some wonderful performances but the film itself has some pacing problems. The first part of the film is occasionally too slow while a few of the final scenes felt rushed. I haven’t always been a huge fan of Garrett Hedlund in the past and, when the movie started, I had my doubts about whether or not I’d be able to accept him as Jamie but, by the end of the movie, he had won me over. In the past, I’ve found Hedlund to be a little stiff but, having now seen Mudbound, I have to say that he’s grown as an actor. I’m looking forward to seeing where his talent takes him next.
Even if it does have flaws, Mudbound is a powerful film and one that I recommend taking the time to watch.
Through the Shattered Lens 