7.5.2001
The Brunching Shuttlecocks amused me, especially their quizzes, including:
Perfume or Marvel Supervillain?
Exotic Dog Breed or Medical Cure Found in the Wild?
Italian Sports Car or Impotence Drug?
Porn Star or My Little Pony?
Beanie Baby or G.I. Joe?
Elvis Movie or Cocktail?
See how well you score here.
7.3.2001
Twins:
Title: The Experiment
Log Line: A man meets another man who seems to be his identical twin and discovers that, as a child, he was part of a cloning experiment that the government and a group of scientists are trying to keep under wraps.
Title: Dating Nick McBride
Log Line: A shy woman must take over for her identical twin sister, a popular TV personality, in order to interview the world's most eligible bachelor.
Criminals:
Title: Scary Poppins
Log Line: A con man tries to escape the law and other con men he has angered. In order to hide himself, he poses as a nanny and ends up in charge of two very spoiled children.
Title: Truck 44
Log Line: A group of New York firemen plan to rob a prestigious apartment building, but when they accidentally set it on fire they must prevent disaster.
Unlikely Duos and Rag-Tag Bands:
Title: Boys Town
Log Line: A "macho" DEA agent investigates the murder of his gay brother. In order to solve the case, the DEA agent must team up with a gay activist who has ties with both the cops and the gay community.
Title: Liberty Street
Log Line: Two girls, one a ballet dancer from Beverly Hills and the other, a teenager from South Central, are ordered to serve time at a community service program, on Liberty Street, which helps get troubled youth off the streets. They learn that pain is relative and strength comes from within.
Title: The Inferno
Log Line: A rag-tag group of men must travel through the gates of hell and close them before all hell breaks loose on earth.
Can't We All Get Along? (Learning Life Lessons from Minorities):
Title: The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint
Log Line: A young half-Apache boy's life is forever changed when he is run over by a mail truck. Once out of the hospital, the boy begins to live with a Mormon foster family.
Title: Shining White
Log Line: A man in search of wealth becomes addicted to gambling and alcohol. After losing his family and his job, he rediscovers what life is all about through the eyes of a Native American boy and his horse on an Indian reservation.
Title: Black and Blue
Log Line: A black basketball coach takes over a Yeshiva high school team and tries to turn these guys into winners.
(See also Liberty Street, above).
Sex:
Title: Sex Talk
Log Line: A sports reporter finds fame by applying sports terminology to solve people's sex lives.
Title: The Girl Next Door
Log Line: A straight laced high school senior falls in love with his new neighbor, the girl next door. When the school discovers that she is an ex-porn star, he must risk everything, even his future, for her.
Title: Buck Wild
Log Line: Centers on male strippers and the double lives they lead -- normal workers by day, strippers by night.
Title: Two Sisters, One Brother
Log Line: A straight-laced accountant must team up with her estranged twin sister, a porn star, to rescue their kidnapped brother by pulling off the heist of the world's largest diamond. They turn to a wise-cracking black safe cracker for help, and learn that they're not so different after all.
OK, so I made that last one up. Just seeing if you were paying attention.
The best movie I have seen in quite a long while happens to be A Change of Habit, Elvis Presley's last film, starring Mary Tyler Moore. Mary plays one of three nuns who, for reasons that are never quite made clear, decides to go undercover as a social worker in some bombed-out neighborhood of Chicago. The three nuns wear high-hemmed costumes designed by Chanel and their dingy basement apartment is transformed, overnight, into the kind of bright place you might see in a Better Homes and Gardens magazine. The silly, naive nuns soon learn that they have to use sex to get what they want. In a harrowing scene, Elvis saves a girl from her own autism. Originally rated "G," the movie has enough racial, homophobic, and sexist material (Mary is raped by a stuttering, knife-wielding Puerto-Rican dude) to generate an "X" today. Elvis, contrary to rumor, does NOT sing, "In the Ghetto," however. Alas.
Next time: "Orgy of the Dead."
-- Alex Joseph
[NB: If you liked this film, maybe you'd also like Two Mules for Sister Sara. Similar setup: Tough Guy (Clint Eastwood) meets Nun (Shirley MacLaine) in Dangerous Territory (Southwestern Desert) with Armed Latinos (Mexican Revolutionaries).]
I posted a review of Tsai Ming-Liang's Vive l'amour at my blog ::
http://members.toast.net/lazlokovax/blog.asp.
Also, another blog to check out :: http://www.textism.com/
Tk
7.2.2001
If you want to get the insight on how "edgy" "counter-culture" or "bad credit risk" women raise their children, check out Breeders, available at Barnes and Noble and the website Hipmama.com. This easy to read collections of short stories and essays describes what it is like to care for newborns, babies and toddlers without stability, stereotypes or health insurance. Makes a great shower gift (although not for us, we already have one)!
Chris Molanphy writes:
Slate did a nice job investigating some plot holes in Memento-- don't peek if you haven't seen the movie yet (though I imagine most Ishbadiddlers have by now):
http://slate.msn.com/culturebox/entries/01-06-27_111073.asp
While the short article does call director Christopher Nolan on the carpet for several inconsistencies, the author patiently tries to offer plausible explanations, however farfetched. In any case, the article actually, oddly, ends up *enriching* one's appreciation for the movie somewhat. The fact that Nolan came up with a plot that tracks as well as it (mostly) does remains in itself an accomplishment.
Andrea Moed sez:
Try this experiment next time you're in a subway car plastered with the new Bud ads. Observe the darkly lit, candid-er-than-candid photograph of the pretty boy or girl (your choice) bathed warmly in twilight or maybe red neon, longneck bottle held loosely in his or her gesturing hand, eyes meeting those of a close pal just outside the frame. Note the stately caption: "TRUE." Letting the cynicism rise in your craw, contemplate the promise this picture is really making. Maybe it's that once you've got your beer goggles on, your own barmates will look this cute. There y'go, Bud's own truth. God's, meanwhile, is directly below, in the seat you could have nabbed a few stops back. Now ask yourself, why ever did Bud's agency design this ad, knowing where it would appear? Why did they choose to juxtapose commercial "reality" with the empirical, honest candidness that can only be displayed by persons on their way somewhere else to impress someone else? Makes even that "Waaazzupp??!!!" thing look downright logical by comparison.
