Hitchhikers Guide To The Celluloid

Movies that leave me clapping at the credits like an idiot while sitting alone in the living room are few and far in between. As a member of your run-of-the mill jaded movie audience, I find that my tolerance for mediocrity gets lower every year. To keep from wasting money on 90 odd minutes of visual/aural torture, I follow a formula when deciding on a particular film. It goes as follows (and in random order):

1. If the trailer fails to sweep away my indifference towards what I’m seeing, you can forget about my contribution to the box office earnings. A surfeit of special effects will not always do the job.. uhmm.. makers of Transformers 2. Plus the idea of robot heaven? No thanks!

2. It has to come out on a weekend when I have money to spare (very important). Here’s a tip: payday comes every mid and end of the month. That’s when I feel more generous than usual.

3. The basic premise of the film is something I’ve looked forward to seeing on the big screen, i.e. movies based on the life of a person of interest and/or historical event. Of course,  the slightest hint of an anachronism and the odds will sway against it.

4. Is not downloadable online. I know. To some it’s an evil practice but what comes for free, comes for free if you get my drift. Also, I’m not squeamish when it comes to screen size. My 14-inch laptop LCD will do just as well as the IMAX. And for godssakes, don’t read too much into the last two sentences.

5. Does not involve people getting sliced and diced every 5 seconds. No, I have not seen Saw, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre or The Hills Have Eyes. For good reason: my constitution is not as tough on the teeth as my opinions are.

6. On occasion I will pay to see rom-coms. But only if  A. The cast is composed of tried and tested comedians and B. There’s nothing else on the “Now Showing” roster that shows the  slightest  hint of potential and I’ve already bought popcorn.

7. I have enough energy to drag my lazy carcass out of the house to even see a movie.

Fairly simple movie-going bylaws. Not always impervious but just the same, at least I have them.

 

It’s About Freakin’ Time!

In the eternity I had my eyeballs glued to the LCD, there was a big truckload of nothing. And then in the two weeks my internet was out, it ironically turns up online (along with a plethora of curiosities, i.e. How in the name of Mother Nature are Michael Jackson’s kids white?!).

This is something I’m imploring the high heavens to not disappoint. Also I’m hoping it would save me from having to explain the tattoo on my back. Strangely enough, a lot of people are having difficulty reconciling Hillary Swank with the role. I don’t agree with that at all. Had they picked Jessica Simpson, you’ll recognize me at the movies as the lunatic aiming an AK47 at the celluloid. Enjoy.

 

Post Script

To those of you who remain unconvinced, here’s what I perceive to be the best line in the movie Juno:

Oh, and she inexplicably mails me a cactus every Valentine’s Day. And I’m like, “Thanks a heap, Coyote Ugly. This cactus-gram stinks even worse than your abandonment”.

Classic.

It’s climbing my personal chart of “Greatest Comebacks Written for Film”, sitting pretty on top along with this bit from the animated film Robots:

Fender: I told you not to talk to strange men.

Piper: I talk to you. What can be stranger than that?

Honorable mention is this scene from When Harry Met Sally:

Sally: The story of my life isn’t even going to get us out of Chicago. I mean nothing’s happened to me yet. That’s why I’m going to New York.

Harry: So something can happen to you.

Sally: Yes.

Harry: Like what?

Sally: Like I’m going to journalism school and become a reporter.

Harry: So you can write about things that happen to other people.

Sally: That’s one way to look at it.

Harry: (all in one breath while chewing a mouthful of grapes). Suppose nothing happens to you. Suppose you live there your entire life and nothing happens and you never meet anyone and you never become anything and you die one of those New York deaths where nobody even notices for two weeks until the smell drifts out into the hallway. (He then spits grape seeds out the window.)

Scriptwriting. An art that has not even so much as breathed in the direction of many local mainstream moviemakers. They’ve only managed to recycle lines that we’ve had to listen to for the past five decades. I guess it’s not that essential since one can still satisfy audiences with antedeluvian circa “The Three Stooges” slapstick comedy.