I Like Movies!

Nate Kavanaugh

So, I assume you are all aware that at Pitchforkmedia.com head Editor extraordinare and great polo player Ryan Schreiber takes it upon himself to re-tool the work of his staff before publication, sometimes even going as far as to, hmm, how shall we say it, "put words in their mouths"? Yes, that's about right. I am just glad we here at Astro Train are above that sort of thing. Anyway, my name is Nate! And I fucking like movies! I like movies so much I think I would marry them if I could!

Here are three movies that you watch while fucking a girl! Or a lot of guys! Enjoy!

Head
"Hey hey, we are The Monkees/We've said it all before/The money's in, we're made of tin, we're here to give you more!"
In 1968, the T.V. rock group The Monkees (Michael Nesmith, Micky Dolenz, Peter Tork, and Davy Jones) released their first and only (so far anyway) feature film, named "Head", after the series was cancelled. It flopped at the box office. Since then, it has become a cult classic, and rightly so. Few films are as original, inventive, delightfully psychedelic, or as fun as "Head". The film conveys, through symbolism, the boys' desire to break away from their manufactured image. There's no plot really, but the film flows with a stream-of-consciousness style, going from scenes that depict a fight with a Coke machine, to the group getting sucked into a vacuum. The film was co-written by Jack Nicholson (who has a cameo in the film), with the director Bob Rafelson (The group also co-wrote the film, but were uncredited). Rafelson and Nicholson would later work together on the classic "Five Easy Pieces". The soundtrack is great, and there are a number of cameos, including Frank Zappa, Annette Funicello, boxer Sonny Liston, San Francisco stripper Carol Doda, Teri Garr, and Victor Mature in a memorable performance as "The Big Victor" (if you look really hard, Dennis Hopper's in there too). This is sort of hard to find in video stores, but you can buy it at some places. If you have the means, Monkees fan or not, this is well worth watching.

Slacker
"I may live badly, but at least I don't have to work to do it."
I consider this movie to be one of the first great independent films of the 1990s. Slacker is the feature debut from Richard Linklater, the guy who made the already classic "Waking Life", and the stoner favorite "Dazed and Confused" (I could name all his films, but I'll save that for later). Slacker takes place throughout 24 hours in the campus town of Austin, Texas; where pseudo-intellectuals and conspiracy theorists roam the streets. The film flows from character to character, never going back to a previous one; there is no real plot, but rather a series of interesting and often very funny conversations and monologues. The cast consists of non-professional actors, who all do fairly well, particularly Charles Gunning (who had acted before this film in the Coen Brothers' "Miller's Crossing") as a jaded hitchhiker, a role for which he gained cult fame; and Louis Mackey (a philosophy professor at the University of Texas) as an "Old Anarchist" who finds a man robbing his home and invites him to stay for coffee. The film has simple pieces of wisdom laced throughout (if you look for them), and is, altogether, just plain great. If you have the means, check out some other Linklater flicks: "subUrbia", "Tape", "Before Sunrise", and coming out this Fall, "The School Of Rock" with Jack Black. Maybe "The Newton Boys" too, though I've heard it wasn't his best.

Spun
I started to watch this movie with mildly high expectations. It got poor reviews when released, but a friend told me that it was good, and another friend of mine wanted to watch it with me. I knew what to expect anyway. The film "Spun" is a drug movie, and there have been many great drug movies(this one documents methamphetamines, or "crystal meth"). That being said, this one is a rehash of nearly every drug movie in recent memory. It blatantly rips off Requiem For A Dream (a far far better film chronicling drug addiction) by using the "hip-hop montage", a technique where there is a series of sped-up shots and emphasized sounds(specifically, the infrared eyeball close-up was directly stolen, many times over, throughout the movie). There are some good things about Spun, very few, but they're there. It has an exceptional Billy Corgan soundtrack, and Jason Schwartzman plays the lead, even if it's not his best performance(Wes Anderson's Rushmore has that). Scwartzman plays Ross, a college drop-out who gets a job being the driver for a guy named The Cook(who makes meth in motel rooms) played by Mickey Rourke. For his services, Ross gets free drugs. The distributor of The Cook's meth is Spider Mike(John Leguizamo), who lives in a shithole of a house with a grimy looking Mena Suvari, playing a girl named Cookie. The characters also include another buyer named Frisbee (Patrick Fugit, the kid from "Almost Famous"), The Cook's girlfriend Nikki (Brittany Murphy), "two bumbling cops" trying to bust Spider Mike, and a green dog named Taco. Basically, if you want a good drug movie, see Requiem For A Dream; if you want a great Schwartzman performance, see Rushmore; a kick-ass Mickey Rourke movie, see Rumble Fish or The Pope Of Greenwich Village. Ultimately, for me anyway, this movie was too pretentious, cliche-ridden, hyper-stylized and over-loaded with shock value. Although, I must say, if it had been made years ago before everything it was too heavily-inspired by, I probably wouldv'e liked it a little more.

Just remember, wear a rubber while you are doing it! You only live once and you'll only get AIDS once cause when you get it you will die! This has been a Public Service Announcement by Nathan Horatio Kavanaugh! Sleep tight ladies and gentleman!

p.s. my name is Nate Kavanaugh.