The Killer Isn't the Only Thing in this Movie that Blows

Sometimes you overhear or are told something so funny that you have to share it for that person, lest the originator be too modest or be trampled by wildebeests or something equally prohibitive.

Last night we went to see M. Night Shyamalan's latest movie, "The Happening." I'd go into why it was so painful (Did she just say, "What color is love?") and why it wasted so much talent (Betty Buckley, did you really need this paycheck? John Leguizamo, when you heard that Marky Mark signed on were you so blinded by his Oscar nomination that you didn't read past the first three pages of the script?), but I'm afraid I'd ruin the movie for you. Oh wait: M. Night did that for me. How considerate.

But my fury at being suckered into trusting M. Night again is not why, after almost a year, I've restarted my self-indulgent little blog. I'm here to share what might be the most brilliant reaction to having just sat through 90-minutes of George Lucas-worthy awkward speech. As we were walking up the aisle, giggling over the movie's final moments, the guy behind his turned to his date and said, "I wish I had the Sixth Sense to not see his movies."

Maybe this is a recycled comment, maybe it's not. Either way: y'hear that, M. Night. Now THAT'S how you time dialogue.

PS: Before you think I'm too pretentious, know that I liked "The Village." A lot. So there.

Cubs in 2008

I am a Mets fan. Nowadays that's not too shabby, but it wasn't so long ago (oh, like, 1987-last year) when that admission earned a tongue cluck and a shoulder pat from total strangers. But I can't even peek in the windows of the pity party that is being a Cubs fan. Seriously: in 2000 I had a "Bill Bradley for President"decal AND a "Let's Go Mets!" sticker plastered to the back of an '88 Civic with no muffler and mildewed seats and I didn't have the room to complain that Cubbie fans have. Catching a Friday night screening of Chasing October (visit http://www.cubsmovie.com/index/)just drove that point home like a bat to the brain.

This movie--made by the dear friends of a dear friend--was fueled by credit card debt, watered down beer, and despair. And it was magical. Not only is it a funny, nail-biting doc of the infamous (thanks for fielding the ball, Bartman!!!) Cubs 2003 season, it is an example that--yes, sports fans--people you've actually met (kinda, sorta, once or twice) DO make movies. Good movies. Great movies about having your heart trounced once a year every year just because (a) they're your Cubs and (b) it feels so good when you stop. And as a person who lives and breathes movies, nothing tops that. The envy and excitement churning in my stomach while we watched this movie was nearly painful. Why couldn't I work up the gumption (who says "gumption???") to make a real, live movie? Maybe it takes genuine trauma, genuine pain. Maybe it takes being a Cubs fan.

My belly-aching (again, with the weird expressions...is it 1940?) aside: visit the Chasing October website, catch a screening near you, and support these guys. The only thing sweeter than being part of a grass-roots movement to promote a cool project is laughing your ass off at some yahoos enjoying the hell out of themselves on the streets of Chicago. Well, the Mets winning the series this Fall just might be sweeter....and not entirely unlikely. Sorry Cubs fans: maybe next year.

Bison, Show Choir, Hostages, & Pirates

Who knew that so many (okay, two people...but they're very important people) were so deeply affected by the most famous of all creepy bison-saving-juvenile-delinquent movies: Bless the Beasts and Children. On the heels of my last blog, two brave readers owned up to painful memories of having had to play or sing the love theme to Bless in middle and high school concerts. Now, I did my time in show choir--six years in white character shoes, lightning bolt belts, sequined green dresses, tied-dyed shirts, and poodle skirts (not all at once, but that would've been a solid costume)--and, yet, I was never subjected to this punishment. Having to sing Bless the Beasts and Children? That tops every show choir story I have...a few of which I will share with you now [in the interest of taking up space]:

(1) Singing Proud Mary and doing a soulful choo-choo dance with seven other tone-challenged white Appalachian teenagers.

(2) Learning the Roger Rabbit from my future-optometrist and then-show-choir coach, Mr. French. We did it during our show-stopping Paula Abdul medley ("Co-co-co-cold-hearted! Ooo-Ah-Ah! Co-co-co-cold-hearted...sssssssssssssssssssnake!").

(3) Making a long, loud, death-smelling boa out of garbage bags to swing around during a passable cover of "Hey, Big Spender." (The minute you walked in the joint, I could tell you were thinking "My God, what IS that smell?!?!")

(4) Learning the sign-language for the lyrics to "Let There Be Peace on Earth" and finding out later that we just kept signing "bird, bird, ground, love, eyes, me" over and over again.

But enough of show choir prattle...there are enough other blogs for that. Let's give a little love to Blog Commentator Larry--which is now his official title--or reminding us of two other celluloid gems that HBO showed when they weren't looping Bless the Beasts and Children: Savannah Smiles and The Pirate Movie. When I read Larry's comments...well, the shock of remembrance was like standing up after having your legs crossed for a week straight.

Savannah freaking Smiles?!?!? I can't remember a slumber party between the years of 1983 and 1987 when we didn't watch that movie. And when you break it down to its core plot points, it strikes me as a kind of creepy choice for kiddie viewing. If you've never seen the movie, here's the long & short: a poor-little-rich-girl is kidnapped for ransom. Her captors appear to have been sidelined on their way to join the law enforcement community in Hazzard County and their bumbling ways immediately endear them to their bratty little hostage. We eventually learn that she's better off with and better loved by Smokey and the Bandit or whoever they are. So it's, basically, Stockholm Syndrome for the second-grade set.

As for The Pirate Movie, I don't recall being force fed it at slumber parties. I do, however, remember being dazzled by the daily airings of the swashbuckling love story. I also recall Pirate star Kristy MacNicol lending her sweet pipes to a song about drowning deep-sea divers. Or it might have been a love song. I guess I was never clear on that.

I've lost my sense of direction as to where, exactly, this blog was headed. I think it might be best to end it here. But I don't know how. Wow. [Rocking on heels, hands in pocket] This is awkward. [Whistling Off-Key] Sooooooo...time to end the blog... [Slowly backing out of the room and then turning and breaking into a mad dash]

We're gonna score-ore-ore tonight...

You know what movie really stands the test of time? Grease 2. Even though I backed out of the front door and double-checked the house number upon coming home last night and finding my husband watching it , I still sat down to watch it and had a blast. Mind you, what technically sucked about it 20+ years ago still sucks, if not more. And, yeah, that means most of the movie. In its defense, though, its incoherence and sex ed advocacy (those of who of a certain age will remember the song "Reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeproduction") were cutting edge. And I like seeing the parade of B-listers (Adrian Zmed, anybody? Those eerie twins from "Double Trouble?") strut around Michelle Pfeiffer like she, the no-name, had no business stealing their thunder. You can almost see the sneering thought bubble over Adrian Zmed's head : "'T.J. Hooker.' Ever heard of it, BITCH?!"

Again, I fall into the lame and obscure trap: Adrian Zmed references aren't going to win me any blog fans. Unless Ma Zmed happens to be reading. And she might. It's not like her son's doing anything ELSE these days that she can watch. Ooooooooooooooo! BURN, Zmed. Burn.

Anyway, Grease 2 is one of only six movies HBO ran when I was growing up. Just seeing it last night made me want to spray myself in the eye trying to open my Capri Sun while waiting with baited breath for the fifth showing of Bustin' Loose or Six Pack or some movie about an unlikely father figure with a bunch of kids on a bus/in an RV/and so on. If SuperFuzz was on? Forget about it. I was glued. (BLOGGER'S NOTE: you don't know you remember SuperFuzz, but you do...he was a superhero whose only weakness was the color red.)

There are only two movies that were in serious '80's HBO rotation that still make my blood run cold: Dot the Kangaroo (there was a cartoon monster named the Bunyip...eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! don't even get me started...just by typing 'Bunyip,' I've denied myself sleep for a month) and Bless the Beasts and Children. My memory is seriously fuzzy on the latter, but according to IMDB it's a 1971 drama in which "a group of adolescent boys, placed in a summer camp by their otherwise too busy parents, find themselves unable to fit in...after their counselor exposes them to what they perceive as a cruel slaughter of corralled bison, these misfits are soon drawn to a common purpose to break free of their camp and free the bison." (Thank you, Patrick, for summing it up just so...just so I'll never be free of this freakin' movie.)

Now, this movie--let's pretend we're incredibly busy and important and call it Bless for short-- came out six years before I was even born. I remember about three minutes in all. But, I promise you, I see it when I close my eyes. Seventies hair, a little ringleader who--in my brain--looks like Tattoo from "Fantasy Island," and dead kids. Oh, and buffalo. Oh, and a maudlin little ditty that I'm fairly certain would be listed on the singer's resume as "Love Theme from that Creepy Buffalo Movie."

*sigh* Okay, now I'm all freaked out. I'm going to go watch Grease 2 to get the taste out of my brain. I suggest you do the same.

"I took my lucky break and I broke it"

Good God (no pun intended), run right out and rent The Devil & Daniel Johnston. The last documentary that knocked the wind out of me (Capturing the Friedmans) made me an instant pest/bully to everyone I know: "See it. See it now. Seriously. Now. Have you seen it yet?" Commencing pestering. This documentary is freaking unreal.

If you don't know much about him--and aside from his track on the Schoolhouse Rock Rocks tribute CD I didn't-- Johnston is a singer-songwriter-cum-cartoonist from New Cumberland, WV who's seriously manic depressive. Not in an "I'm an art school drop-out who needs some cache" way. This is an apparently sweet guy tangled in a real, violent, dark knot. The documentary tracks Johnston's weirdness and the wonder it inspires in everyone around him, from the runaway success of his handmade tapes in Austin, TX to being chased all over NYC by Sonic Youth to stays in state hospitals. It shows Johnston, with his tiny voice--the kiddie-ness of Adam Sandler with a little lispy alt-folk whine--doing everything from appearing on MTV to being strapped down by the State Police. SPIN magazine interviews him while he's on a break from wiping down McTables.

I can't describe, even, one of Johnston's breakdowns because it would rob you of all the hang jaw moments in this film. I can't even quote any of his better diatribes (Johnston captured his decline on audio cassettes and Super 8) because you might write it off as self-indulgent, manufactured crap. You have to hear this stuff from the horse's mouth to believe it. I don't know if Daniel Johnston is a real genius or just a nice guy with a horrible illness and some clever lyrics in his pocket. I just know that his life story makes for one Hell of a moving, funny, upsetting, important movie. We should all be so [un]lucky.