Things I Missed Pt. 1

I'm am going to do a mini wrap-up of all the things I meant to write about over the last couple months, but never got around to. I hate having something to say but not getting the chance to say it just because I didn't get to it in a timely manner, so I apologize for my extreme delinquency on most of these topics. Part 2, containing most of the stuff I missed in December, will be forthcoming.


*The Happening: After the endless critics and bloggers denouncing this as the dud of the year I was expecting a turd of massive proportions. Unexpectedly, I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. This doesn't mean the film doesn't have some pretty spectacular flaws. Case in point: the acting. Now I think Zooey Deschanel, Mark Wahlberg and John Leguizamo are quite frequently terrific actors - so why did they stink so magnificently in this movie? They were awkward, stilted, halted, obtuse, unintentionally creepy, and the camera tended to linger on bizarre facial expressions meant to convey....fear? unease? conflicted emotions? I must confess, I'm at a bit of a loss. Obviously the subtext ultimately intended to convey the distance in the marriage of Wahlberg and Deschanel's characters, but the way the relationship was written, filmed and acted kept me expecting a revelation that Deschanel had had an affair with Leguizamo, or that she and Wahlberg had tried out a "furry" sexcapade that left them mortified beyond the telling of it. It was very disconcerting. Which is really too bad considering that subtext between characters has always been one of my favorite aspects of Shyamalan films (like in The Sixth Sense, Signs and The Village).


That said, the random and deliberate suicides really did freak me out. Perhaps Shyamalan could have been a little less graphic at times, and the film was peppered with way too many examples (seriously, we had to sit and watch in horror as yet another person committed atrocious suicide past the one-hour mark), but I won't deny that watching person after person just up and kill themselves wouldn't freak me out. My favorite section of the film was the car ride containing Leguizamo and assorted strangers trying to do math problems to calm themselves down while waiting in dread for the tainted air sneaking in through the ripped roof to infect them. Yikes! And then, of course, the car stops, restarts, and drives directly into a tree, killing all the passengers except for Leguizamo, who picks up a piece of glass and promptly slashes his wrists. I had a nightmare about that scene for sure. Special congratulations must also be given to the "Yeah, well I flirted with the girl at the drugstore when I didn't even HAVE a cold!" scene. It's odd, again strangely acted, but still managed to crack me up. Well played...?

• Tinkerbell's Movie: Call me crazy, but Tinkerbell just shouldn't sound like a regular person. I haven't actually seen this movie yet (I wouldn't lower myself, queen of the snobs and abstainee of all direct-to-video Disney sequels that I am), but the previews they played for all of October just drove me batty. For starters, the entire thing looked like those horrible "Barbie" movies I hate to hear about; all animatronic, stiff animation and horrible storylines. But the topper was her voice. Tinkerbell is a fairy - she shouldn't sound like a girl at the mall. Her voice should be magical and reeeeeeeeally high pitched and have a little bell sounding in the background. SHE'S A FAIRY!!! And she's got a nasty temper and a lot of spunk as well - did the makers of this movie never see Peter Pan???

• Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist: When I first saw this movie (approximately 2 months ago) I was torn. In the pro column we have: excellent music soundtrack, stars Michael Cera and Kat Dennings - cute, funny, real, awkward - love them, and a romance that happens in one night, reminding me of Before Sunrise, my favorite romance ever. However, in the negative column: the tone of the film can't seem to choose between teen fluff comedy and potentially compelling peek into the life of real teens today. I read the book (yes, it's a teen novel, but I read it anyways!) and that really helped clear up the problems I had with the movie. While the leads are compelling, almost every other character is a light caricature of some sort, whereas in the book all the characters are treated as fully realized characters. For example, both Tris and Tal, Nick and Norahs' respective exes, are written in shallow, one-dimensional portrayals that dumb down the entire film, not to mention make Nick and Norah look stupid every time they go back to them, and they should have more backbone than that. But the pace of the movie works, Nick's gay band and Norah's drunk friend are at least likable and amusing, and the leads do have charming chemistry. I've seen the film more than once since (can you blame me when the $1.50 theater's playing it?) and it's really grown on me. I just wish the screenwriter had trusted the source material and then we might have a teen romance really worth watching. (It might even be rated R - in the book these characters really cuss it up, but of course, the movie about teens has to be rated PG-13 for most teens to actually see it.) The reviews were frequently at odds: Ebert only gave it 2 stars, while Entertainment Weekly gave it an A-, but both reviews have valid points. Read them here: Ebert, Entertainment Weekly.
  
• R-Rated Comedies: Maybe I'm immature but my new genre of choice is the rated R comedy set starring all the former stars of "Freaks and Geeks" and Paul Rudd. I know the Judd Apatow and Kevin Smith ouevre is regularly accused of pandering to the gross-out humor, man-child set, and rightly so I guess, but that doesn't stop these movies from consistently cracking me up. Maybe it's my unrequited crush on Seth Rogen (no judgment people!). All I know is my favorite comedies of the past few years have been Superbad, Knocked Up, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, and The 40 Year-Old Virgin. (And Wedding Crashers - not Apatow, but I don't think Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn are out of the man-child stage either.) This November I fell in love with the acerbically bitter Paul Rudd in Role Models (also featuring winning performances from Seann William Scott (Stifler!), Christopher Mintz-Plasse (McLovin!) and scene-stealer Bobb'e J. Thompson as a foul-mouthed kid.) It's funny, unique (how many movies have plots that revolve around Live Action Role Playing), and actually kind of heartwarming in the end. Rudd doesn't get nearly enough credit for his acting chops. Plus it utilizes KISS in a kick ass and creative way (not to mention hilarious). I also loved Zach and Miri Make a Porno. It's got ten times the cussing and I wasn't particularly into the extended porn shoot sequences, but I love Seth Rogen, the sex scene between him and Elizabeth Banks is actually really intimate and sweet, and I don't know anyone who can write such crassly poetic dialogue as Kevin Smith. It's often innapropriate, but there's an edge of really intelligent argument always present. Combine that with the delivery of Seth Rogen, and I was falling out of my chair laughing. (His tirade on the double standard that censures men for using sex toys while women are free to openly embrace vibrators was a standout for me.) Don't miss the cameo by Justin Long (of the Mac vs. PC commercials) as a porn star - his voice alone steals the scene.
  

*Entertainment Weekly's List of the 50 Sexiest Movies:

There's a difference between a hot sex scene and a sexy movie. Lists that merely point to the hottest nude and sex scenes miss the point of what makes a movie sexy and whether a sex scene is relevant to the film. Watching movies only for sex scenes between hot actors is only a step or two higher than watching soft-core porn - simulated sex only! I came across an excellent list compiled by IFC of the 50 Greatest and 50 Worst Sex Scenes. (Beware, some of the pics accompanying this list do show some nudity.) The criteria for the list is not what looks the hottest, but what helps the movie tell the story. I also read a great blog by the always great and insightful Jason Bellamy about the place of sex in the movies, entitled "Sex and the Cinema: When We Have to Watch." (This followed a great review of the film Lust, Caution, a movie teeming with sex scenes that, he argues, tell the story and are essential to the film, despite the rampant nudity and more than usually graphic sex scenes. Both are great reads.)

This brings me to Entertainment Weekly's November list of the 50 Sexiest Movies. I won't pretend that I can speak as intelligently as any of the articles I have previously mentioned (which is why I linked them first, so you can read about this issue from writers who know their stuff), but I'm aware enough to know that a film that turns you on isn't always a film that uses sex for story, rather than exploitation and titillation. The EW list contains some hits and misses on this score. For example, would How Stella Got Her Groove Back ( at #48) be worth mentioning without the hotness that was newcomer Taye Diggs? I don't think watching his sculpted backside is really necessary, although you could argue that Stella's decisions in the film would be ridiculous if we the audience weren't also suffering intense lust brought on the by handsome boy. What about Basic Instinct (at 21)? The sex scenes do play largely for suspense as we wait for Sharon Stone to whip out the ice pick and stab Michael Douglas mid-coitus, but seen today, they seem rather ridiculous. (As does the iconic 9 1/2 Weeks (at #24).)

I was pleased to see some of my favorites such as The Fabulous Baker Boys (at #12), Love & Basketball (at #28), Secretary (at #38), and Once (at #11), films that have a wide range of different sexuality on display. And I can't argue with the top 5, with Out of Sight and it's memorable, intercut love scene landing at #1. (I like that His Girl Friday, my blog's namesake, placed #2 showing that sexy can be entirely about wit, and Bull Durham at #5, one of the sexiest films around.) Check out the entire list here. I'd love to hear if there are any films you think should have made the cut that didn't - the list is rather prosaic in a lot of ways, despite the obvious inclusion of certain independent films to make the it more well-rounded.