Mrs. Diesel and I watch a lot of movies.
We have the Netflix plan that allows you to have three DVDs simultaneously, and since it generally takes 2 days for the movie to wend its way to and from the fabled land of Netflixia*, this essentially means that we can watch a different movie every day of the year. Add to this equation the forty or so DVDs that we own, the occasional decent movie that pops up on basic cable, and every movie based on a Marvel or D.C. comics character that I drag my wife to see in the theater, not to mention the dozen or so shows we regularly Tivo, and you end up with way more crap than we can possibly watch.
Despite this fact, Mrs. Diesel engages in a weekly ritual in which she compulsively scans the pay movie channels to see if they are having a free movie weekend. Every few weeks this activity will result in squeals of delight as she discovers a potpouri of free offerings on HBO or Showtime. She then pages painstakingly through the weekend's offerings, finding maybe a half dozen movies to record, most of which were in our Netflix queue anyway. Occasionally, though, she'll find some flick that slipped under our radar, which then languishes on our Now Playing list until some lazy Saturday evening when we've gone through every episode of every other program we record and neither one of us feels up to the monumental task of getting our asses out of our chairs to put a DVD into the player, and we end up watching one of these gems.
That's how we end up watching crap like The Brave One, which stars Jodie Foster as a vigilante who goes around killing street punks after her husband, the guy who plays Said on Lost, is brutally murdered. It also stars Benjamin Bratt as the lone cop who suspects that there is more to this meek but beautiful woman than meets the eye, and ends up discovering her dark secret only to become her accomplice in the end. Wait, I'm thinking of Catwoman. It's Terence Howard, not Benjamin Bratt. Terence Howard is the lone cop who suspects that there is more to this meek but beautiful woman than meets the eye, and ends up discovering her dark secret only to become her accomplice in the end.
I meant to write a review of this movie right after I watched it, but unfortunately I was too busy for a few days, and now I find virtually no remnants of it in my long-term memory. Looking it up on IMDB, I see that it was directed by Neil Jordan, who is known for directing The Crying Game and a lot of other movies that are about as dull as The Crying Game would have been without the surprise penis. Anyway, all I have left are some vague impressions:
First, it occurs to me that playing Jodie Foster's husband in a movie is about as close as you can get to a cinematic death sentence. I gave Said 19 minutes, and I don't think he even lasted that long. Think about it: Flight Plan, Panic Room, Contact, Nell... she's always either an orphan or a widow. I think the last co-star who survived an entire movie with Jodie Foster was Christy MacNichol. Somebody needs to make a movie starring Jodie Foster and Mel Gibson as husband and wife just so the world will know which actor's costar-killing mojo is stronger. "If you die, I shall avenge you!" "Not if you die first, bitch!"**
Second, this movie taught me that if your significant other is murdered by street punks, you should NOT go out and get a handgun. Jodie Foster's character lives her whole life in New York without incident, but once her husband is murdered and she gets a gun, thugs and lowlifes start coming out of the woodwork. The poor woman can't walk three blocks without running into a mugger or rapist who needs to be shot dead. There is one scene where she's running from a murderer, trips over a mugger and flies headlong into a den of rapists. Wait, is it "den of rapists" or "herd of rapists"? "Pack of rapists"? Whatever. It doesn't really matter, because I made that scene up. Still, the point holds: Don't buy a gun. If this movie has taught me anything, it's that guns are like bug-zappers for petty criminals: sure, you can kill them with it, but they wouldn't be hanging around in the first place if you weren't attracting them.
Third, let's all agree that we've all seen enough movies where a character says grimly to another character at the movie's climax, "You have to shoot me to make it look like there was a struggle. It's the only way." No, dumbass, it's not the only way. Another good way would be to leave the scene before anybody shows up and then play dumb about the whole sordid business. You'd be surprised at how well that works, in all kinds of situations.
Fourth, did I mention that a movie should have a point? No? Well, it should.
Fifth, if you don't have a point, please for the love of all that's good in cinema, do not attempt to cover up your lack of a point by playing a maudlin Sarah McLachlan song during the denouement, in which the protagonist wanders, stoic and alone, down rainslicked city streets, giving us hope that maybe, just maybe, things are going to be okay. I like Sarah McLachlan about as much as a heterosexual male can, and I'm telling you that shoveling that mush in where the climax was supposed to go will only make things worse. I can't really explain why. It's like watching a godawful fantasy epic featuring Oscar winner Jeremy Irons as the bad guy. You keep thinking, "This should be good, but instead I just want to vomit."
I hope this belated and somewhat muddled review has been of use to you. Next week, I'll be reviewing whatever forgettable crap-biscuit I watched last night.
*Not to be confused with the cognitive disability that causes 1.4 million Americans to watch DVDs backwards.
**That's Jodie Foster calling Mel Gibson a bitch.
We have the Netflix plan that allows you to have three DVDs simultaneously, and since it generally takes 2 days for the movie to wend its way to and from the fabled land of Netflixia*, this essentially means that we can watch a different movie every day of the year. Add to this equation the forty or so DVDs that we own, the occasional decent movie that pops up on basic cable, and every movie based on a Marvel or D.C. comics character that I drag my wife to see in the theater, not to mention the dozen or so shows we regularly Tivo, and you end up with way more crap than we can possibly watch.
Despite this fact, Mrs. Diesel engages in a weekly ritual in which she compulsively scans the pay movie channels to see if they are having a free movie weekend. Every few weeks this activity will result in squeals of delight as she discovers a potpouri of free offerings on HBO or Showtime. She then pages painstakingly through the weekend's offerings, finding maybe a half dozen movies to record, most of which were in our Netflix queue anyway. Occasionally, though, she'll find some flick that slipped under our radar, which then languishes on our Now Playing list until some lazy Saturday evening when we've gone through every episode of every other program we record and neither one of us feels up to the monumental task of getting our asses out of our chairs to put a DVD into the player, and we end up watching one of these gems.
That's how we end up watching crap like The Brave One, which stars Jodie Foster as a vigilante who goes around killing street punks after her husband, the guy who plays Said on Lost, is brutally murdered. It also stars Benjamin Bratt as the lone cop who suspects that there is more to this meek but beautiful woman than meets the eye, and ends up discovering her dark secret only to become her accomplice in the end. Wait, I'm thinking of Catwoman. It's Terence Howard, not Benjamin Bratt. Terence Howard is the lone cop who suspects that there is more to this meek but beautiful woman than meets the eye, and ends up discovering her dark secret only to become her accomplice in the end.
I meant to write a review of this movie right after I watched it, but unfortunately I was too busy for a few days, and now I find virtually no remnants of it in my long-term memory. Looking it up on IMDB, I see that it was directed by Neil Jordan, who is known for directing The Crying Game and a lot of other movies that are about as dull as The Crying Game would have been without the surprise penis. Anyway, all I have left are some vague impressions:
First, it occurs to me that playing Jodie Foster's husband in a movie is about as close as you can get to a cinematic death sentence. I gave Said 19 minutes, and I don't think he even lasted that long. Think about it: Flight Plan, Panic Room, Contact, Nell... she's always either an orphan or a widow. I think the last co-star who survived an entire movie with Jodie Foster was Christy MacNichol. Somebody needs to make a movie starring Jodie Foster and Mel Gibson as husband and wife just so the world will know which actor's costar-killing mojo is stronger. "If you die, I shall avenge you!" "Not if you die first, bitch!"**
Second, this movie taught me that if your significant other is murdered by street punks, you should NOT go out and get a handgun. Jodie Foster's character lives her whole life in New York without incident, but once her husband is murdered and she gets a gun, thugs and lowlifes start coming out of the woodwork. The poor woman can't walk three blocks without running into a mugger or rapist who needs to be shot dead. There is one scene where she's running from a murderer, trips over a mugger and flies headlong into a den of rapists. Wait, is it "den of rapists" or "herd of rapists"? "Pack of rapists"? Whatever. It doesn't really matter, because I made that scene up. Still, the point holds: Don't buy a gun. If this movie has taught me anything, it's that guns are like bug-zappers for petty criminals: sure, you can kill them with it, but they wouldn't be hanging around in the first place if you weren't attracting them.
Third, let's all agree that we've all seen enough movies where a character says grimly to another character at the movie's climax, "You have to shoot me to make it look like there was a struggle. It's the only way." No, dumbass, it's not the only way. Another good way would be to leave the scene before anybody shows up and then play dumb about the whole sordid business. You'd be surprised at how well that works, in all kinds of situations.
Fourth, did I mention that a movie should have a point? No? Well, it should.
Fifth, if you don't have a point, please for the love of all that's good in cinema, do not attempt to cover up your lack of a point by playing a maudlin Sarah McLachlan song during the denouement, in which the protagonist wanders, stoic and alone, down rainslicked city streets, giving us hope that maybe, just maybe, things are going to be okay. I like Sarah McLachlan about as much as a heterosexual male can, and I'm telling you that shoveling that mush in where the climax was supposed to go will only make things worse. I can't really explain why. It's like watching a godawful fantasy epic featuring Oscar winner Jeremy Irons as the bad guy. You keep thinking, "This should be good, but instead I just want to vomit."
I hope this belated and somewhat muddled review has been of use to you. Next week, I'll be reviewing whatever forgettable crap-biscuit I watched last night.
*Not to be confused with the cognitive disability that causes 1.4 million Americans to watch DVDs backwards.
**That's Jodie Foster calling Mel Gibson a bitch.
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Labels: Movies
| posted by Diesel at Wednesday, October 15, 2008 |
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