J. D. Salinger Is Dead

Dwayne Johnson: Crusher Of Dreams

So... Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson.

What the fuck happened to this guy?

He's built like a brick shithouse. He has charisma to spare. He has at least twice as much acting talent as the Austrian Oak in his prime. So why all the bullshit family movies?

Arnold didn't start down that path until "Kindergarten Cop" in 1990, 20 years after his debut in the immortal classic "Hercules In New York". And "Kindergarten Cop" hardly counts, because it manages to be occassionally funny, and a harder edge creeps into the film from time to time.

Same thing with "Twins". And the less said about "Junior", the better.

So let's say the 1996 cinematic travesty "Jingle All The Way", most fondly remembered by me for the scene where my 80's television late-night weekend sketch comedy hero Phil Hartman had an orgasm eating Rita Wilson's delicious homemade cookies.

Poor, poor Phil Hartman.

My point is that the delightful former "Mr. Universe" waited until he was established as an action icon before dipping his muscular toes into the kiddie pool.

But The Rock (I refuse to call The People's Champion "Dwayne Johnson") only lasted four years between his big screen debut in Peter Berg's highly entertaining "The Rundown" and the mediocre family-friendly football drama "The Game Plan", directed by "Anaconda" associate producer Andy Fickman.

So what the fuck happened to The Rock?

Well, "The Rundown" underperformed at the box office. "Walking Tall" sucked. And the ill-fated video game adaptation "Doom" was just a crippled mess.

How the fuck do you take a relatively simple action movie concept like "space marine on Mars kills many demons with BIG FUCKING GUN 9000 (patent pending)" and screw it up so badly?

I blame Rosamund Pike. Christ, she's boring.

Don't even get me started on "Southland Tales". The tragic story of Richard Kelly's "trainwreck on LSD" shit-storm of a movie is something I can't afford to get into right now, for the sake of my sanity. Suffice to say The Rock was probably the least cringe-worthy member of the "all star" cast.

Plus Eli Roth gets murdered by Jon Lovitz while taking a shit. The prick deserved it for "Cabin Fever".

Anyway, now it seems as though The Rock is doomed to headline mediocre PG-rated dreck. And it's all because audiences were too stupid to recognize "The Rundown" as a fun, action-packed thrill ride. Because of that misstep, the good action scripts never made their way to The Rock's desk, and he had to settle for shit like the "Walking Tall" remake.

Filling Joe Don Baker's shoes is a fool's quest.

"Race To Witch Mountain" (thanks again, Fickman!) was balls. "Planet 51" was digital balls.

And that brings me to "Tooth Fairy".

The family movie. Not "Darkness Falls", which was originally called "The Tooth Fairy". That's another barrel of suck, right there.

I saw "Tooth Fairy" because my mother wanted to see it. Don't ask me why she wanted to see it. I'll never really know.

I bite the bullet from time to time and see a movie I absolutely do not want to see because of my mother. It's a guilt thing. She birthed me, so I feel obligated to endure these nightmares. She dragged me to see "The Da Vinci Code" and its demon spawn "Angels & Demons".

She also dragged me to see "Race To Witch Mountain" last year, as retribution for seeing "Watchmen" the week before. That movie really ticked her off.

Do you see a connection, here? Whenever Tom Hanks or The Rock make a shitty, shitty movie, I will see it. Because my mother secretly hates me.

What the hell am I supposed to say about this "movie"? Recap - GO!

The Rock is a minor-league hockey player who bloodlessly knocks the teeth out of the mouths of opposing players during play, earning him the nickname "the Tooth Fairy" by his inbred Michigan fans.

He used to be an NHL bigshot. Then he injured himself, got dropped down to the minors, and has carved out a niche for himself as a bruiser on the ice. He busts jaws, then spends his time in the penalty box smiling like a fool and making endless tooth puns.

Seriously. He makes maybe thirteen of these awful fucking puns in less than a minute. I wanted to set fire to the theatre less than five minutes into this fucking atrocity.

He also hates dreams. He shatters the self-esteem of an 8-year-old admirer early on with some diatribe about adjusting his expectations, which is fine in theory.

But The Rock goes out of his way to break this kid, telling him that there are 7-year-olds out there with more skills and more drive to succeed, and that the kid should really just give up and kill himself before his balls drop. It's overkill.

And it's just the first occassion of many in this movie that sledgehammers the "I hate dreams" thing into your grey matter. Gee, do you think The Rock will learn his lesson and realize that following your dreams is just great before the credits roll?

He's dating Ashley Judd, who is looking fucking haggard these days. She's saddled with two kids, a little girl, and a guitar-strumming tween son.

The little girl loses a tooth, and Double Jeopardy puts a dollar under her pillow. The Rock later steals this dollar from under her pillow because he ran out of money during a poker game with his nameless friends.

The Rock is a douchebag.

The little girl wakes up and freaks out because her tooth is gone, and there's no money. Kiss The Girls sneaks another dollar under her pillow while The Rock distracts her, trying to explain to the young lady that there is no real Tooth Fairy.

Normal Life looks at the man like he's a child rapist, and assures her spawn that the Tooth Fairy is very real.

The Rock is summoned to Fairy-fucking-Land while he sleeps, where Julie Andrews informs the bastard that he must perform some lame magical community service as a Tooth Fairy for being such a dick. That's all in the trailer. That awful trailer.

Billy Crystal shows up to remind me that he hasn't been relevant since "Mr. Saturday Night".

Then British comedy genius Stephen Merchant comes around, playing The Rock's wingless fairy case worker, and makes me question my sanity. Why the fuck are you in this movie, Stephen? Why?!

Although, truth be told, he's the best part of the movie. He's the only actor in the movie that doesn't embarass him/herself by the time it ends. And a Stephen Merchant moment is one of only two in the film that actually made me laugh.

That gangly bastard, standing atop a zamboni in a crowded stadium, manning an amnesia cannon, singing "Don't You Forget About Me". God help me, it was funny.

Where was I?

The Rock does not perform admirably as a Tooth Fairy, at first. Hilarity ensues as he attempts to extricate loose teeth from various homes. He eats some toothpaste and shrinks. He gets chased by cats. He uses too much amnesia dust on one hapless family, making them forget who they are. Amazing stuff.

He also screws up his private life, as well. He convinces the tween guitar prodigy to enter a school talent show in order to show off his panty-melting six string skills. There's after an extended practice montage, featuring The Rock's drumming talent.

Later, he has a bad day in Tooth Town and tells the poor kid that he'll never be the next Steve Vai and that he should just run out into traffic to spare his mother the shame of bombing at the talent show. The angry young man smashes his guitar and cries and Where The Heart Is tells The People's Asshole to stay the fuck away from her children.

Some stuff happens. I'm not sure exactly what, because I kinda blacked out after the guitar-smashing bit.

I remember the six string kid telling The Rock that he wanted to be just like Jimi Hendrix or Stevie Ray Vaughan at one point in the film. That seems like a poor decision, considering the rather tragic ends to their respective stories. That was a head-scratcher.

I know that Stephen Merchant stares creepily at the wings of all the other Tooth Fairies, then he earns a Tooth Fairy Learner's Permit. Which I guess was his life's dream. And this brings The Rock his Moment of Clarity.

He realizes that dreams are awesome, and that he should pursue his own dream of returning to the NHL. He convinces Norma Jean's son to pursue his own dream of dying in a helicopter crash at age 35, fixing the little dude's guitar with his shitty magic wand and flying him to the talent show with his fake-as-fuck Tooth Fairy wings.

The Rock impresses Julie Andrews with his newfound tooth-stealing skills, as well as his newfound belief in THE POWER OF DREAMS, and she tells him that his Tooth Fairy time is over. She uses the all-powerful amnesia dust on him, so that he forgets all his time in the magical FairyLand.

This is supposed to be a rather sad moment in the film, but I couldn't muster enough emotion to give a damn. I was too busy being hypnotized by Stephen Merchant's massive bug-eyed stare projected onto the 40-foot high screen.

Somehow The Rock winds up at the talent show, with no memory of how he got there. Luckily, he arrives just in time to catch Joe Satriani Jr's Amplifier-Exploding rendition of "Sunshine Of Your Love". The kid is so fucking good, that the young instrumentalists from the previous act decide they have to come back onstage and jam with him.

Truly, the Power of Rock is Supreme.

The Rock proposes to A Time To Kill as the crowd goes nuts over the transcendant musical moment they all just shared, and the film mercifully ends.

There's some bullshit sequence during the credits with Billy Crystal and Julie Andrews attending one of The Rock's games as a member of some NHL team, but I don't remember any of the particulars. But hey, The Rock followed his dreams, and made it back to the big leagues!

It was awful. That's all that matters.

Painful. That's what "Tooth Fairy" is. I have devoted much more time writing about this movie than it possibly deserves.

Remember the scene in "The Rundown" when The Rock runs into Arnold Schwarzenegger in some seedy bar and Arnold passes the torch to his heir-apparent, telling him to "have fun"?

I want that guy back.

Somebody cast The Rock in the inevitable "God Of War" movie. Please.

God Hates You: Messiah 2.0

I saw "Legion" yesterday afternoon. I have some stuff to say about it.

It was a lovely Saturday afternoon. The Sun was shining. The birds were singing. With the outside temperature a balmy 53 degrees, a rarity for this time of year, I left for the cinema with my brother without a coat.

We arrived at our destination with plenty of time, bought our tickets, and stopped at the concession pavillion for a large popcorn (my brother) and a Dr Pepper (me). Two seconds after we tell the clerk what we want, the computer network goes down. The whole network.

So now there are a dozen concession clerks standing around with their thumbs up their asses, unable to do basic math in their heads. Hey Corky, you do realize that the tax is included with your concession prices, right? You don't need to cross that percentage hurdle today!

After five minutes waiting for the God of Windows to grant the clerk's wish and make the magic box work again, I hand the man ten dollars and we just walk away with our stuff. This problem was never my concern.

We make our way to the theatre and take our seats, behind a gaggle of preteens escorted by their hillbilly trucker hat-wearing father.

Shortly before the movie begins, one of the Boxcar Children spills his entire large beverage on himself and runs out of the theatre screaming.

Nobody follows him. Daddy's too busy eating nachos and watching the 3 year-old and tired-as-hell THX "Plant Orchestra" intro projected on the silver screen before his bloodshot eyes.

My brother and I both thought it was rather funny.

So the feature presentation begins with some narration by that girl who got killed by the Yellow Eyed Demon in the pilot episode of "Supernatural", rambling about how her mother used to tuck her in and tell her that God loves her every night when she was a little girl.

Until her father skipped town and left them high and dry. After that night, when she tucked her daughter in, she told her little girl that one day a real rain is gonna come and wash the scum off the streets. It's pointless.

And more pointlessly, this exact same soundbyte plays again at the end of the movie. The same fucking narration. It doesn't change one bit, which is stupid, given how the events of the film obviously change her worldview.

But that's not important, because this is just one of the many ways in which "Legion" steals from the "Terminator" series. But I will get back to that.

Now I recap the film's plot:

Archangel Michael, played by Paul "that albino guy who tries to kill Tom Hanks in 'The Da Vinci Code' " Bettany, comes to Los Angeles, chopping off his wings and stealing a shit-ton of guns before stealing a police car and driving out to a quaint gas station/diner in the middle of the desert to protect the young, boring and pregnant waitress played by the girl who gets killed by the Yellow Eyed Demon in the pilot episode of "Supernatural" (She's also in the 'Friday Night Lights' TV shot, I guess) from an army of angels.

Jesus, that's a long run-on sentence.

It seems that God got bored playing in this sandbox, and he decided to go all Old Testament on the world again, cleansing the globe of the sinful talking monkeys with a plague of angry angels, who curiously manifest on Earth by possessing the weak-willed.

This is illustrated by a "Jacob's Ladder"-esque head-shaking effect, which actually reminds me more of the sequence in the brilliant "Innerspace" where Dennis Quaid (connection!) stimulates Martin Short's facial muscles to make him look like Robert Picardo.

And once possessed, by an angel of the Lord, these people now have evil black eyes, and evil sharp teeth, and their eyebrows tend to disappear. This looks more like demonic possession to me. But what do I know? I didn't direct this masterpiece.

Meanwhile, some old lady comes into the diner, says "your baby's gonna fucking burn", chews on some dickhead's throat, then gets shot by Tyrese. Everybody freaks out, and Paul Bettany shows up in his hot cop car, sheet music tattooed all over his rebellious ass, ready to fuck shit up.

So the world is besieged by angel-possessed feeble-minded douchebags, and Kyle Reese, I mean Michael is here, dressed in a trench coat to save the pregnant girl, because her baby (does she name the baby "John"?) is destined to save mankind.

Everyone else in the diner, Michael could give less than a shit about, including such fine actors as TV's Kate Walsh, TV's Charles S. Dutton, and "The Alamo" star Dennis Quaid. Oh, and that guy Lucas Black, who most people probably remember from "The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift", but I'll always know him as the son of the evil Sheriff from the sadly canceled 1995 series "American Gothic".

There's a huge cloud of flies buzzing toward the diner early on, but when the plague of insects reaches the diner, they just fly by and Dennis Quaid stares at all the little bugs as they zoom overhead.

So this scene accomplishes nothing.

Early that first night, as Michael and the angel fodder stand guard on the roof, an ice cream truck pulls into the parking lot.

Doug Jones, Guillermo Del Toro's favorite "man in suit" prosthetics guy, steps out of the ice cream truck, roars like a retarded lion with a digitally extended jaw, stretches out his arms and legs and comes galloping toward the diner like a clumsy gazelle. Then everybody shoots him, and he dies.

So this scene accomplishes nothing.

A little later on, a big gaggle of cars approaches the diner, being driven by people apparently being angel-possessed en route, with their heads shaking behind the wheel.

This seems a little dangerous to me, because it's hard to keep your eyes on the road when your head is shaking relentlessly back and forth. But whatever.

So Michael and his angel-slaying crew spot this great big convoy driving through the night, and they open fire on the hapless head-shaking bastards, killing most of them. The ones that make it through don't really attempt to break into the diner, either. They just kinda hang out.

So this scene accomplishes nothing.

Then maybe 30 minutes of nothing happens, with all the characters pairing up and talking about their pasts and I don't fucking care.

Fox television's "Roc" gets killed when the throatless dickhead blows up outside the diner, covering him with acid, I guess. Dennis Quaid blames himself, and drinks some warm beer.

Lucas Black stares longingly at Sarah Conn--Charlie, but she's too busy smoking in the bathroom to notice. Then she gives birth. Then "Private Practice" freaks out and tries to give the baby to the angelic monsters playing Uno outside. She dies.

Then Kevin Durand shows up. He plays (the Terminator) the Archangel Gabriel. He's come to do what Michael swore not to do, and kill that fucking baby. He has a big mace and bulletproof wings. Walking in the diner, all badass.

Michael shoots at him, which accomplishes nothing, because he has bulletproof fucking wings! Gabriel beats him up, then Michael shoots at him again. You'd think this moron would learn his lesson by now, but no. Gabriel impales him with a retractable blade in his uber-mace, a mortal wound.

This is a scene I actually enjoy, here. Kevin Durand brings some real emotion to his performance. You can see the conflict in his eyes. He doesn't want to kill his brother. He hates his brother for defying God's will, but he still loves him. And when he watches Michael die, he cries. It really works.

Then Michael just dissolves into beams of light. Gay.

Tokyo Drift and Friday Night Lights drive the fuck out of there, and Dennis Quaid, drunk and dying, blows up the diner with the Gabriel-Nator inside it. It's not a gasoline tanker, but it'll do.

Gabriel catches up to their car, in true death from above style, wings furiously flapping as he tries to kill that fucking baby. But wait! Michael comes swooping down from the skies, sword in hand, and he saves the day!

You thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. He got better.

I guess Michael's actions convinced God that maybe humanity is worth saving, after all, so he gave the poor guy his wings back. That's all well and good, but you already started the fucking Apocalypse, you wishy-washy psychotic Supreme Being!

And don't give me that "mysterious ways" bullshit. This is just God on the rag.

Michael spares Gabriel, who flies off in one of his infamous "black moods". Tokyo Drift notices that his body is now covered in the same fucking sheet music that's all over Michael. The angel calls them "instructions", and that he must learn to read them. Then he tells the young man to "find the prophets". That's all a little vague. But thanks for stopping by, pal.

Then Michael flies away, back to REM's "Losing My Religion" video, and we leave our surviving heroes as they drive through the desert. Charlie's holding the baby, wearing a fucking headband, and Jeep (yes his name is Jeep) is wearing a leather vest, smiling like a retard as he drives... to find the prophets, I guess.

Maybe he's headed to Alcatraz to hook up with Malcom McDowell. Maybe when he gets there, he'll meet Mila Kunis and dump the chick with the kid.

Oh yeah, and I forgot to mention that the film takes place in late December. So the baby is born on Christmas Day. That's right. Jesus is back, baby.

This movie isn't great. When it works, it's ripping off the "Terminator" franchise just as much as "The Prophecy" movies, and when it doesn't work, it's just fucking boring.

I don't give a damn about any of these characters. Except for Gabriel.

Kevin Durand manages to bring more emotion and pathos to his small role in the film's third act than anybody else in the film. He kills as the loyal Archangel to Paul Bettany's rebellious Michael.

But that didn't surprise me. He was the best part of the 20th Century Fox nightmare "X-Men Origins: Wolverine".

So "Legion" is entertaining at times. But mostly it sucks.

I think I've wasted enough time on this movie.

Dennis Quaid In: Adventures In Sitting!

I've been getting all faux-creative this past week, or so. Working with the digital camera, screwing around with my collabo-cuz Ky, making more of these worthless photoplays.

I've already completed two, and have ideas for at least two more. We just do these because it's fun for us. We make these photoplays for our own amusement. I post them to YouTube as an afterthought. Nobody watches them, and it doesn't matter.

The online versions aren't the originals, anyway. I cut the plays to a lot of licensed music, whatever I can to find to illustrate the fractured themes of the "narratives". And when I upload them to YouTube, I have to replace the licensed tracks (for the most part) with whatever suitable music I can find with their AudioSwap service.

The only photoplays that YouTube allowed on the site intact are "Hat Lander" and "The Christmas Miracle". And hardly anybody watched them. Oddly enough, "Invasion!" still has the largest number of views, at 238. And that one has a horrible-sounding AudioSwap version of Fats Domino's "Blueberry Hill" for a soundtrack. Go figure.

But hey, if you do want to view any of these mediocre attempts at entertainment, once again I direct you to my YouTube Channel here: http://www.youtube.com/uncleoflies . Watch something, leave a comment, tell me I'm a humorless monkey and that I should stop wasting my time with this trivial nonsense... whatever floats your boat.

Moving on...

I watched "Pandorum" on DVD the other evening. From the producers of "Event Horizon"!

Whatever the fuck that means.

I'm not sure exactly what to say about the movie. I wanted to see it in theatres when it opened last September, but that was a bad month for me, so I never got the chance. Hindsight being what it is, I am now glad that I missed the theatrical opportunity.

It's not that "Pandorum" is a bad movie. It's just... mediocre. And that's worse that being bad. You can mock bad. You can laugh at bad. Mediocre just pisses you off.

I like Dennis Quaid, and I like Ben Foster, and they're both wasted, here.

Dennis Quaid spends 90 minutes sitting in a chair, talking to himself (spoiler!), and then he drowns. Ben Foster crawls through some ducts, meets Norman Reedus, watches Norman Reedus get eaten by mutants 30 seconds later, wanders around with some boring feral scientist chick, and then he doesn't drown.

The NTEs from James Cameron's "The Abyss" make a cameo appearance, which is fun.

SPACE MADNESS: The Movie isn't particularly entertaining.

I guess I could recap the plot, or something...

Planet Earth is dead. The whole planet. Apparently, it blew up. But that's not important.

The starship Elysium is traveling through the cosmos, acting as an Ark for the flora and fauna of the poor, doomed planet Earth, traveling to the Earth-like planet Tanis on a 123 year mission. Thousands of human beings are in hypersleep, with a handful of flight crews being thawed out in succession to man the bridge for extended tours of duty.

Ben Foster's Corporal Bower wakes up from with hypersleep-induced amnesia, and rouses his flight commander, Lt. Payton, played by Dennis Quaid and his beard. Together, they try to figure out where they are, what their purpose is on this ship, and why the ship's reactor is slowly shutting down.

Payton sends Bower out through the ventilation system of the massive Elysium, to get the reactor back online. Bower's adventures begin with the ill-fated Norman Reedus and a pale, mutated human with a blowtorch strapped to his arm. He meets a boring feral scientist, and some warrior fella with a spear who doesn't speak English.

They decide to follow the Yellow Brick Road to the Great and Powerful Reactor. The warrior will ask the Reactor for a shiny new knife. The feral scientist will ask the Reactor for talent. And Ben Foster will ask the Reactor to get him the fuck out of this movie.

On their way to the reactor, they all meet a crazy old man who seems to know a lot about the dark history of the Elysium. He tells them that after the last flight crew learned of the destruction of the Earth, one of the crew members lost his shit, succumbing to "Pandorum", and killed his superiors.

He then decided to wake up a bunch of the crew members, releasing them into the Elysium, and over time, the unleashed humans tranformed into pale monsters.

Their transformation came about because of some vague mutagenic fluid they were all exposed to while in hypersleep, administered to the crew in order to help them adapt more quickly to the alien environment of Tanis. But set loose in Elysium, they all evolved to survive on the ship, instead.

Yeah, it doesn't make a lot of sense.

After Bower convinces the crazy old guy not to kill and eat his new friends, they all set off to reset the reactor together.

Meanwhile, Dennis Quaid is slowly losing his mind, talking to some crazy young man named Gallo, played by Cam Gigandet. I hate that name. The guy seems like a decent actor, and I have nothing against him. I just hate that name. Gigandet. Jesus.

Bower fixes the reactor with his super reactor-fixing skills, and he makes his way back to Payton...

Or should I say Gallo? Bwa ha ha ha!!! That's right, kids!

It seems that Dennis Quaid is the young Corporal Gallo, the man who lost his mind and iced his superiors, loosing a plague of ravenous ship-mutants upon the Elysium! This whole time he's been talking to himself. And I guess when Dennis Quaid was a young man, he looked like Cam Gigandet.

Gallo decided to put himself on ice once more, when he got bored with his mad little experiment, and it took him a while to remember who he really was. But now that he does remember, he's craaaazy! Not "entertaining" crazy. Just kind of "boring" crazy.

Bower confronts Gallo, and Gallo opens a big window on the flight bridge, dropping the second twist on your already-boggled mind.

Elysium is underwater!? Whaaaa?

Yeah, the ship landed on Tanis centuries ago, but the flight computer fudged the landing. So the Elysium crashed into the ocean.

At this point, the mutants catch up to our heroes, the warrior duels with one of the brutes, survives, then gets killed by its bastard spawn in a perfect example of why you should never get distracted by big puppydog eyes. It just gets your throat slit.

Dennis Quaid just kind of gives up and sits back in chair while Ben Foster shoots the big window, cracking the glass and sending the alien ocean spewing forth into the Elysium. Quaid drowns, but he's too busy thinking about what he's going to eat for lunch to care.

Foster grabs his girl, jumps into his hypersleep pod, and it is jettisoned to the surface. Foster and Boring Feral Scientist smile as they watch the beautiful alien sunrise, joined by thousands of other jettisoned pods bobbing to the surface of the ocean.

Pan to a picturesque waterfall and... cut to black.

Christ, this movie is just not good. It pained me to type that little plot synopsis. The film is too fucking dark. Many times, it was almost impossible to make out what was happening onscreen. The sets are drab and unispiring.

The monster designs are lazy. They look too much like the villains in "Ghosts of Mars", and that is not a good thing. The plot is thin at best, and it plods like nobody's business.

The film is 1hr 48m, but it felt so much longer than that, at least to me. I was glad when those credtis rolled.

I had such... middling hopes for you, "Pandorum".

Tales Of The Nuclear Jesus

"The Book Of Eli".

I caught the latest directorial effort from the Brothers Hughes on Sunday with mein brother. We liked the trailer, we like Denzel Washington, and we're both fans of the Hughes Brothers's "Menace II Society" and "Dead Presidents".

"From Hell"? Eh. It's not bad, but it takes too many liberties with the source material. It's nowhere near as bastardized as that other Alan Moore adaptation, "The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen", but it's certainly not a great film.

As far as "The League" goes, I do somehow find Sean Connery's little metatextual asides amusing. Mentions of Phileas Fogg and such. When someone mentions the name of the film's big bad, "The Phantom", Connery quips "How operatic." I laughed.

Apparently, I am an idiot.

But why am I talking about this? I come here today to discuss "The Book Of Eli", and here I am getting sidetracked, again.

My local theatre of choice has a massive main auditorium with a balcony restricted to patrons aged 21 and above. The fortunate folks who sit in the balcony get the whole restaurant experience, what with the food and drink and the helpful wait staff.

When a big release plays in the main auditorium, the theatre usually concocts a few special alcoholic beverages with clever names related to the film. "The Dark Knight" had the massive pitcher dubbed "The Utility Belt", and most recently "Avatar" had the "Dr. Augustine".

Odd choice, there.

Maybe some of you imaginary folks out there living in the major sprawling metropolises of the world have had this theatrical experience your entire lives. But not me. Our wonderful, state-of-the-art theatre opened in 2002. So perhaps we're a little behind the times.

But damn you, I enjoy the balcony experience.

It made "The Da Vinci Code" bearable. I had to drink a lot to make it through that boring, pointless film, but I did it. And without the helpful wait staff with their magical alcoholic concoctions, it would not have been possible.

Unfortunately, I decided not to drink during "The Book Of Eli". A decision I came to regret.

I knew coming into "Eli" that it would have a religious bent to it. The trailers hardly kept the contents of Eli's coveted book a secret. I'm not a religious person, but I can watch films with religious themes and enjoy them, as long as they don't beat me over the head with their message.

I had problems with "Signs", for example. "Swing away"? Thanks for fucking up your third act, Shyamalan. Jesus in his divine wisdom orchestrates an alien invasion, possibly killing millions of hapless people, to make you a minister again. Fantastic.

Anyway, I'm gonna spoil this "Eli" movie, in case anyone who bothers to actually read this doesn't want the secrets of this amazing film ruined for them. Fair warning.

So Eli is carrying a Bible, apparently the last one in existence, through a post-apocalyptic American wasteland, headed West. Why West? Because God told him to head West.

30 years ago, the world descended into a religion-driven global conflict, culminating in a nuclear war (I guess). And after the bombs dropped, the survivors decided to gather all the remaining Bibles and have a good old-fashioned literary bonfire.

Because religion is evil.

Don't ask me why the survivors of a nuclear war decided the first thing they needed to do was burn a bunch of Bibles. Thanks to those damned Gideons and their relentless hotel chain crusade, the remaining humans must have had their hands full for quite some time.

So this Eli fella has been heading West since the war ended, walking "the path", as he says. He's been doing this for 30 years. It's taken him 30 years to cross the United States.

Even taking into account that the film doesn't tell us where Eli was when the mushrooms sprouted, and the completely wrecked infrastructure, I still find it hard to believe that it would take this guy 30 years to make it to the Pacific Ocean. But that's neither here nor there.

Eli shows his badass skills with the machete in an early fight with some gamey bandits, and listens to some killer tunes on his MP3 player, before wandering into a lovely little village run by gary Oldman's Mr. Carnegie.

Carnegie's got his goons scouring the countryside, looking for a book. But not just any book! Carnegie wants to use this very special book to control the masses with its words of salvation and damnation. I guess some people didn't learn any lesson from the big-ass nuclear fucking war that ended civilization.

Eli visits Tom Waits (what?!) to get his old battery charged up, and then saunters over to the local tavern to get his canteen filled. He gets in another fight, and gets Carnegie's attention, who sends Mila Kunis to Eli's room because he thinks the old wanderer needs to get laid.

Of course, Eli is a righteous man, and instead of boning Jackie from "That '70's Show", he leads her in a touching prayer before they share a meal.

Mila then leads her blind mother Jennifer Beals in a similar prayer the next morning, in the presence of Carnegie, who apparently owns them both, like Watto in "The Phantom Menace".

So Carnegie figures Eli's got a fucking Bible in his possession, and is being a greedy douche who doesn't want to share the word of God with him, and the hunt begins.

On a side note, it was nice to see Jennifer Beals again. I know she's been working regularly, but the last thing I saw her in was "The Prophecy 2". Angel Russell Wong knocked her up with a Seraphim, and Christopher Walken wanted to abort that abomination.

Eric Roberts was there, too. But he didn't do anything. He just stood around in an old refinery and stared intently.

I liked the film's ending, with Walken's fallen Archangel Gabriel being cursed by his brothers, made into a filthy talking monkey. He's standing on a street corner, holding his legendary trumpet, with his long hobo hair, rambling about a phone call. Brilliant.

I guess I'm trying to say that I like "The Prophecy 2" more than "The Book Of Eli". I actually like "The Prophecy 3" more than "The Book Of Eli". But not those other two Kari Wuhrer-starring sequels "Forsaken" and "Uprising". Those two flicks suck.

Where was I? Oh, right. Jennifer Beals.

She played the blind slave mother to Mila Kunis in "Eli". She looked gorgeous. But she always looks gorgeous. I never saw "The L Word". I wonder if she ever appeared topless in that show. Hmm...

Anyway, Eli has a heart-to-heart with Mila Kunis after he saves her from being raped by some wasteland predators. He tells her that after the war, a voice led him to this miraculous Bible, and told him to head West.

This is where the unremarkable-yet-entertaining movie lost me.

Eli keeps heading West, and Mila Kunis follows him, like a stray dog. A stray dog with perfect hair and teeth in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. And perfect, sculpted eyebrows. Carnegie organizes his Bible Thumper Mercenary Convoy and they set off after the Westward Wandering Badass.

More fights ensue. Michael Gambon pops up as an elderly cannibal with a hidden arsenal, then he dies. Gary Oldman shoots Denzel in the gut and leaves him to die in the desert, taking his precious security-locked Bible with him back to Bartertown. Mila Kunis kills Punisher 3 then finds Eli easin' on down the road to ruin, bleeding from his belly.

They head to San Francisco's famous Alcatraz Island, now a cultural archive run by Malcom McDowell with a shitty wig. Back in Carnegie-ville, Gary Oldman shakes and sweats as he watches Tom Waits pick the Bible's apparently very complicated lock.

I'm not sure why the man didn't just grab the key from Bleeding Guts Washington, but that's a minor nitpick.

After the lock is picked Mr. Carnegie pops open the holy tome only to find that the pages are in braile.

That's right, folks! Old Eli is a Blind Biblical Badass! It's "Zatoichi meets Fallout".

Eli didn't need the Braile Bible anymore, you see. He's read it so many times, he knows it by heart. So while Carnegie's little empire descends into anarchy, Eli holds on just long enough to dictate the entire fucking Bible to Malcom McDowell's magnificently awful wig.

Christopher Walken's wig in "The Prophecy 3" was more convincing.

Eli dies, and Malcom McDowell asks Mila Kunis to stay with the hippies at Alcatraz, but she declines, choosing instead to take up Eli's mantle of "Badass Wanderer" and return to Gary Oldman-burg to... Save her mother? Spread the Good News?

I don't know. I couldn't stop laughing at this point, watching little 5'3'' Mila Kunis trying to exude "cool" with her distressed regulator duster and hand-me-down machete. It was too much.

That's the movie, I guess. Not a satisfying experience, to say the least. I don't ever want to see this movie again. There's no point.

At least I can still watch "From Hell" every now and again. I own "From Hell" on DVD. I won't buy "The Book Of Eli".

The Hughes Brothers made a bad movie.

A Single Man Sees "A Single Man"

I used to watch the Golden Globe Awards. I would sit down and sit through the whole bloated spectacle.

I'm not sure why. Maybe as a Film Fan, it felt like an obligation. I had to sit through the damn show, because I felt like I had to.

Now, not so much. I jumped in and out of the program last night, in between washing dishes and feeding the dogs.

I noticed that for being billed as "the host", my close personal friend Ricky Gervais was hardly in the show. I laughed quite a bit at his introduction of Mel Gibson, however. "I enjoy a drink as much as the next man... unless that man is Mel Gibson." I'm pretty sure that's what he said. Mel reacted well enough.

I like Mel Gibson. I know he hates Jews, and he's a fundamentalist Catholic lunatic, but I can't bring myself to hate the man. I'm glad he's getting out there, acting again. I missed the man.

I remember when I saw "The Passion" in the cinema. It was a Sunday afternoon, and the auditorium was full of True Believers, fresh from their church services.

For some reason, I decided to dress like a Mormon missionary: white dress shirt, black slacks, black tie. All I was missing was the 10-speed bicycle and "the good news".

I sat through the film, marveling at the cinematography (Caleb Deschanel is fantastic), and giggling quietly at the over-the-top violence.

(Spoiler!) When the Jesus died at the end, after Longinus stabbed his Holy corpse with his spear, and the hermaphrodite Devil freaked out, screaming to the heavens because Christ slipped through his/her fingers, I cracked up. I couldn't help it. I had reached a tipping point, and I simply could not control myself.

Everyone, and I mean (Stansfield) EVERYONE!!! (Stansfield) was weeping into their "I 3> Jesus" handkerchiefs, and I couldn't stop laughing.

I remember wearing a similar outfit to a family funeral a few years ago. After the funeral was over, I traveled with my brother and collabo-cousin Ky to a drunken family remembrance function.

On the way, we stopped by a convenience store to buy cigarettes. I walked into the place, and as I approached the counter, the clerk looked me over and said "How's the Good Lord treating you?"

I still laugh about that.

Now what did this massive diversion have to do with anything? Absolutely nothing. But this is nothing new. I mean, the title of this little screed is "A Single Man Sees 'A Single Man' ",and I haven't even mentioned the damn movie, yet.

Hmm... I saw "A Single Man" on Saturday. By myself. Because nobody I know wanted to see a "gay movie".

Fuck them. The film was fantastic.

Colin Firth deserves a Best Actor Oscar for this movie. Hands down.

I was surprised by Matthew Goode. I remember not really liking his Adrian Veidt in the "Watchmen" movie, and I will never see "Leap Year". Never. But his performance here was damn fine.

Julianne Moore was unsurprisingly good.

And that kid from "About a Boy" fucking grew up. That was momentarily distracting.

Tom Ford and cinematographer Eduard Grau shot a beautiful fucking movie. These days, it's rare for me to be really amazed by a movie's cinematography.

Too many films simply look routine. Competent, but not artistic. And then there are the directors who get flashy, trying desperately to impress and failing miserably.

Those fucks remind me of this lame comedian I saw at The Loony Bin some years back. I have thankfully forgotten his name.

He ended his cringe-worthy routine with a bit where he pours an O'Doul's over his head and makes a "funny" face.

Roll on snare drum.

I found it off-putting and pathetic. He made a point to get a separate near-beer from the bartender, so he wouldn't have to pour his precious Bud Light over his empty head.

A real comedian would pour his own beer over his head. And then he'd break the bottle over said forehead and scream relentlessly while his lifeblood streams down his face.

Those mouthbreathers Bob and Tom love this guy.

Look, what I'm trying to say is that visually, "A Single Man" is beautiful. I lost myself in many of the sequences, falling in love with the color choices and composition. I was also surprised by how funny the movie was.

I kinda fell in love with this movie.

(Here's a spoiler) Plus, I love any movie that ends with a suicidal college professor deciding not to off himself, then dying of a heart attack with a naked student sleeping on his couch.

Not since "Pig Fucker" has a film ended so bravely.

Wait, I remember why I started off with the Golden Globes. Colin Firth lost the Best Actor award to Jeff Bridges.

The Dude won.

That's all.

Movie Day: The Sequel - God's Perfect Asshole

Do you like fried chicken? I do. It's just good.

And I'm not talking about KFC. I'm talking about old-fashioned, home-made fried chicken. Add some mashed potatoes and gravy, and you've got a great meal.

That has nothing to do with what I'm talking about today.

Today, I talk about yesterday. Remember yesterday? It was a Sunday.

Sunday... and Movie Day.

I know what you're thinking: "But I thought Saturday was Movie Day? Isn't that what you called yesterday's two-part rambling blog entry?" You're not wrong.

Sure, Saturday was movie day. But Saturday ended, and Sunday began. And on Sunday, I returned to my local cinema with my brother to watch "Youth In Revolt". So... Movie Day 2? Nah. I guess I could just call it "Movie Weekend".

Either way, I saw "Youth In Revolt". With my brother.

Maybe I should just get on with the story.

The day began with a journey to the cinema. My brother was keen on seeing "Youth In Revolt", as I'm sure you're already aware, so we bought our tickets and found our seats.

I have never read the novel upon which the film is based. Truth be told, I had never even heard of the novel before I scrutinized the theatrical poster and realized that the film was, in fact, based on a novel.

I understand that the novel is beloved in some circles. I'm sure the folks who love the novel will have many problems with the film, as is always the case with book-to-film adaptations. I know this all to well.

Example: "Christmas With The Kranks". Yeah, I know.

I'm not a big John Grisham fan. I just never got into his legal thriller sub-genre. But my mother bought the John Grisham book "Skipping Christmas" as a gift for me some years ago. I was a little hesitant to read it, but eventually I got bored and decided to give it a shot.

I won't defend the book as some work of genius, because it's not. But I must say, I very much enjoyed the story. If you don't know the story of "Skipping Christmas", here's a quick synopsis:

After their daughter leaves for the Peace Corps or some shit, Luther and Nora Krank decide to... Skip Christmas... and go on a nice tropical cruise. Their creepy, gentrified neighborhood is pretty into Christmas, and so these pod people give the Kranks a hard time. But Luther and his bride stick to their guns and ready themselves for their non-Christmas vacation.

Unfortunately, their hippie daughter decides she wants to come home for Christmas... with her new fiance. She's so excited about showing her Peruviaan paramour a real American Christmas. Selfish brat. So now, Luther and Nora have to organize a big Christmas blow-out at the 11th hour, all to please their dear daughter.

It's hokey, but I really enjoyed it. Maybe I'm just a sucker for holiday stories. I mean, I really enjoy "Santa Claus: The Movie". John Lithgow is great in that movie. "Christmas 2!" Gets me every time.

Anyway, when I heard "Skipping Christmas" was being made into a movie, I was a little excited, I suppose. I thought it would be pretty difficult to fuck up the book's rather simple story.

Boy, was I wrong. Director Joe Roth, Screenwriter Chris "Nine Months" Columbus, and Tim Allen all came together to turn a lovely confection of a book into a slap-sticky, humor-less nightmare of a movie, called "Christmas With The Kranks".

Grisham wept.

So I know the pain of a bad adaptation. An odd, and somewhat lengthy diversion, but I feel a necessary one.

"Youth In Revolt"... damn funny movie.

Michael Cera is fantastic in his dual role as awkward, nerdy pushover Nick Twisp and vulgar, empowered delinquent Francois Dillinger. The way he plays Dillinger, with the wispy, pubic hair moustache and icy blue eyes, all self-assured swagger... he's hilarious.

"I want to tickle your belly button from the inside", and "I want to wrap your legs around my head and wear you like the crown you are" are lines that kept me laughing like a maniac. It's all in the delivery, and Cera's delivery is great.

The rest of the cast did a fine job. It was nice seeing M. Emmet Walsh again. He keeps showing up to remind me that he's not dead, and I welcome the reminder.

I was very surprised by Adhir Kalyan as Vijay. He just popped up midway in the film with his sophisticated accent and made me laugh.

The sequence where Nick and Vijay go to visit Nick's dream girl Sheeni and her loose friend Taggarty at a French Prep School was a highlight. Nick wandering around, asking everyone he sees if they know where Sheeni is, growing increasingly irritable as everybody responds to him in French... priceless.

"Speak English to me" is such an innocuous-looking line, but the way Cera delivered that line... I can't remember the last time I laughed that much.

Justin Long didn't annoy me. Steve Buscemi made out with a hot young woman in a bikini, which I didn't need to see. Jean Smart looked attractive, which I didn't think was possible.

And hey! Ray Liotta!

I didn't really have any problems with the film. I was entertained from beginning to end. The odd animated interstitial bits were quaint.

I recommend "Youth In Revolt".

Now I guess I need to read the book.

Movie Day Part 2: Tom Waits For No Man

After "Daybreakers" ended, I had a little time on my hands before the next feature, "The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus", began. So I chose to spend that time in the arcade.

I miss arcades.

My town used to be infested with them. Then, one by one, they died a sad, slow death.

Most of my youth was wasted in these arcades, playing "Tron", "Dragon's Lair", and "Galaga" in the early days.

As I matured, the age of the fighting game began. Many hours were spent in these chaotic and noisy video game dungeons, humiliating numerous strangers at the "Street Fighter", "Mortal Kombat" and "Tekken" cabinets, a stack of quarters balancing next to the well-worn joystick.

"Joystick"... heh.

Shooting games and skee ball. Nervously feeding the change machine my folded and torn dollar bills, frustration mounting as the mechanical bastard spat out my half-ruined money time and time again. So many memories.

Ah, nostalgia.

The "arcade" at my local movie house is a rather depressing hole in a wall, populated with battered old machines that are clearly on their last legs.

The arcade used to have "Galaga". It used to have a kitschy old "Elvira" pinball machine. I would gravitate toward those old workhorses every time I dared to venture into this place.

Then one day, some drunken douchebag decided he hated fun, and he had a nervous breakdown in the arcade. He smashed up the "Elvira" pinball machine, and pushed over the vintage "Galaga" cabinet, before being hauled away by the local police.

Rather than invest in repairing these games, the management decided to junk them. They were replaced with a half-broken "Gunblade" cabinet, and one of those "insert your coins to win a stuffed animal" claw machines.

The days of wine and roses were over.

But I had time to waste this day, and an old dollar bill in my pocket. So I inserted my money into the bastard change machine. Then I tried again. And again. And again.

Finally, four quarters were shat out into the dented steel bowl. My eyes wandered around the garish sights of the arcade.

I eventually decided to "play" a quick game of "Gunblade". The rear projection screen barely functioned. The game lasted barely one minute, because I couldn't see a fucking thing. It was a complete waste of my coveted 50 cents.

The nerve of these people, charging 50 cents to play a game that doesn't really work. I suppose I am the fool for actually attempting to play the fucking thing.

After the "Gunblade" debacle, I decided to play it safe and spend my last four bits on a rousing game of "Star Wars Arcade". I still enjoy this game. And I had a good time playing it.

I managed to burn a good ten minutes blasting TIE Fighters before I finally succumbed to the damned Death Star's laser turrets.

Time sufficiently wasted, I bought a Dr. Pepper (they got my letters!) and made my way to the theatre to watch Terry Gilliam's latest movie that nearly wasn't, "The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus".

Fewer people showed up to this movie. The many available seats in the auditorium didn't stop an elderly couple from sitting next to me, however.

Not right next to me; I placed my coat on the seat at my left. But during the movie, the old fella sitting on my left kept touching my fucking coat.

His hand just kept wandering to the right, gently slapping the unoccupied seat.

Slapping my fucking coat.

After maybe the tenth time he did this, I turned to him and told him to stop touching my fucking coat.

He stared at me, mouth gaping, acting as though he didn't understand a word I had just said. His watery eyes looked right through me, as if I were some kind of asshole ghost.

Finally, he turned his head and folded his hands in his lap. His hands remained in his lap for the remainder of the film.

So, "Doctor Parnassus"... Terry Gilliam is one of my very favorite filmmakers. I wrote an extensive article about his titanic struggle with the studio system over his masterpiece "Brazil" during my school days. I got an "A". Hooray for me!

But I love all of his films. From "Time Bandits" and "Baron Munchausen" to "The Fisher King", "Twelve Monkeys", and "Fear & Loathing In Las Vegas". I love them all.

Even "Tideland". And nobody likes "Tideland".

I remember seeing "Twelve Monkeys" with my good friend Scott when we were dickish little teenagers. In a small, crowded theatre on a cold, snowy Winter evening. I cherish that memory.

I think I'm getting too wistful.

I always wait for a Terry Gilliam film with some trepidation, however. The man seems to have the worst possible luck. For every film he has successfully unleashed upon the world, there are at least two that never made it.

And after his film "The Man Who Killed Don Quixote" collapsed less than a week into princple photography, seemingly because God himself wanted to piss on Gilliam's dreams, I began to wonder if the poor, talented bastard was well and truly cursed.

When Heath Ledger died during production of "The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus", I no longer wondered.

But the movie refused to die. Gilliam talked Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell into playing his role in the as-yet unfilmed sequences within the good Doctor Parnassus' magic mirror. Then I saw a trailer for the film. It looked good. It looked real. And it was coming soon! Yippee!

The film played the festival circuits. Mixed reviews trickled in. People called it a confusing mess. That didn't bother me. "Confusing Mess" is a term many people use to describe any given Terry Gilliam film.

Finally, the movie opened in my hometown, and I sat down to see it in a darkened theatre.

With an old git who wouldn't stop touching my coat.

Bottom line: I loved the movie. I didn't see what was so confusing about the story. I had no trouble following it.

Parnassus made a bet with the Devil. He won the bet, and became immortal. The catch: if he ever has a child, that child of Parnassus becomes the Devil's property when he or she turns sweet 16. Parnassus obviously doesn't want his daughter Valentina to become the Devil's jailbait slave, so he makes another bet with the Horned One to save her soul.

That's basically the plot.

Heath Ledger's mysterious Tony is introduced hanging from a bridge, seemingly dead. That reveal actually made several people in the audience gasp. They were shocked to see the late Heath Ledger dangling from a rope under a bridge. "Poor taste", someone muttered.

Grow the fuck up. It's a movie.

Besides, it's not like Heath Ledger was found dead in his New York apartment, hanging from a ceiling fixture. Now if the Doctor's entourage found poor Tony in a swank apartment, cuddling with an Olsen twin, stuffed to the gills with prescription medication, that would have been in poor taste.

Anyway, Tony has a secret: He ran a charity for kids called "Suffer The Little Children" that apparently dealt in black market child organ harvesting. He also stole money from Russian mobsters, who dangled the prick by his child-hating neck over the bridge.

The Doctor's entourage helps Tony, and he stays with the group. He revamps the Doctor's show, bringing in some actual money, while he lusts after the underage Valentina and hides from the Russian mafiosos who want to finish the job.

I don't want to synopsize the whole damn movie. Besides, I just spoiled a pretty big plot point. I think that's enough about the story.

The cast was aces.

Tom Fucking Waits as "Mr. Nick" was fantastic. His relationship with Christopher Plummer's Doctor Panassus was the best part of the film. Mr. Nick sees Doctor Parnassus as the closest thing he has to a friend, and it's clear that despite him being the fucking Devil, Parnassus kinda likes the evil bastard, as well. They both love a good wager.

Lily Cole does a fine job as the immortal Doctor's young daughter. She has a very exotic face, with big expressive eyes.

Andrew Garfield's lovestruck "Anton" is really the anchor of the film.

Between the aloof, constantly drunk Parnassus and the self-serving douchebag Tony, Anton is the character who's really only trying to do the right thing. He has no motive, aside from wanting to protect Valentina from Tony's advances. He knows there's something wrong with the fella, and doesn't trust him from the start.

Verne Troyer's wise and angry forever-dwarf "Percy" was a highlight for me.

Depp, Law, and Farrell all did an admirable job playing Tony in the dreamworld beyond the magic mirror.

Heath Ledger played a fine scumbag.

The film's ending actually made me mist up a little.

I'm glad Gilliam managed to finish this film. "The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus" was worth it.

Of course now, Terry Gilliam is once again trying to make "The Man Who Killed Don Quixote".

I wish him luck.

Movie Day Part 1: Day Breaks Over The Lonely Blogger

"Bein' human in a world full of vampires is like barebackin' a five dollar whore." -Willem Dafoe

Saturday was a lazy day. High Temperatures in the single digits, with the sun deceptively shining down upon the flat, Kansas landscape.

So I decided to spend my day at the local movie hole, gorging myself on the latest new releases: "Daybreakers" and "The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus".

"Daybreakers" was up first, and I arrived in the theatre with 20 minutes to kill. Now I tend to sit away from others, in the rows closer to the screen. The rows that tend to fill out after the "choice" seats behind me are taken.

I do this because I want to be left alone, and it usually works. If the movie I happen to see is a big release, I resign myself to the fact that these noisy mouth-breathers will violate my personal space. And truth be told, "Daybreakers" was no different.

By the time the lights dimmed and the movie started, the theatre was only half full. Unfortunately, most of the audience must have forgotten their prescription lenses, because they all had to sit very close to the screen.

Maybe they wanted to scrutinize the visible pores on Ethan Hawke's face. Perhaps they were writing a collective college thesis on Willem Dafoe's rockin' facial hair.

And the children! My god, the children. What better way to spend your Saturday quality time with your dear, dear children, than to bring them to an R-rated vampire movie?

Young children. Five years old and under. Whining, seat-kicking, screaming, crying, "the monsters made me piss my Pull-Ups" children. Delightful.

A pair of greasy young men sat at my left, seemingly obsessed with Krispy Kreme doughnuts. They talked about these pastries as if they had never tasted something so delicious in all their lives.

I was confused.

The one who sat next to me was playing Scrabble on his iPhone until the trailers started. He was really into that game. A thirty-something married couple sat on my right, talking about their kids.

At least these folks had the decency to leave their spawn with a babysitter, rather than drag them to an R-rated horror film.

On the down side, the wife was apparently mentally retarded and had to have every major plot point of the film explained to her by her patient, understanding husband. This got old rather quickly.

The only trailer I vividly remember before the feature was for "The A*Team". The fact that the trailer made the movie look... entertaining... shocked the hell out of me.

I didn't know what to expect when I heard 20th Century Fox was making a feature film out of "The A*Team". Part of me thought it was just some kind of weird joke. But the trailer I saw was proof of its existence.

And God help me, I want to see it.

I was a little thrown off by Sharlto Copley's southern accent. I didn't think the fella from "District 9" with the very distinctive South African drawl would attempt to portray Howlin' Mad Murdock with the good ole' boy tone.

That alone makes me want to see this movie yesterday.

But there needs to be a scene where B.A. Baracus refuses to get on a plane, only to have the team drage his heavy ass onto said plane after Murdock drugs his delicious glass of milk.

Otherwise, disappointment will ensue.

I suppose I should talk about "Daybreakers". I like the Spierig Brothers. I was a big fan of their first feature, "Undead". It had a nice, home-made charm to it. Plus the oddball explanation for the zombie outbreak (Aliens Fucked Up) was fresh.

Zombie fish didn't hurt.

I was a little surprised that it took these obviously talented siblings six years to make their second film. But "Daybreakers" was worth the wait, I believe.

The world created by the Spierigs seems fleshed-out and inhabited. There are always things happening in the fringes of the frame.

One of my favorite recurring gags in the film is the repeating shots of vampire commuters waiting for the subway, with the camera panning down below the tracks, revealing the monstrous "Subsiders" dwelling just beneath the veneer of their ordered civilization.

Each time this shot repeated, there were fewer civilized vamps waiting for the train, and more starving monsters fighting beneath the tracks. It's not subtle, but it works.

I liked the ever-popular coffee-with-blood. Nice to know that sweet, sweet coffee doesn't disappear in a vampire-infested world gone mad.

Ethan Hawke did a fine job. Willem Dafoe and his shaky country boy accent were quite entertaining. Sam Neill needs to be in more movies.

The method of curing vampirism devised by the Los Bros Spierig was a bit vague. You expose yourself to the burning rays of the sun, dunk yourself in water, and Shazam! Beating heart, no fangs, no problem.

Also, if you've been cured of vampirism and a vampire drinks your blood, it cures them, as well. That led to a nice climactic sequence involving a whole bunch of vamp soldiers in an ever-expanding chain reaction of ravenous feeding.

The first group of soldiers feeds, and becomes human. A larger group of hungry soldiers turns on the poor cured bastards, like desperate junkies in need of a fix.

This culminates in a wonderful slow-motion tableau, all biting and gushing blood and severed limbs tumbling through the air. I smiled.

"Daybreakers" might not be a great movie, but I had great fun watching it.

Is It January, Or Is It Hoth?

The land is trapped in the cruel, icy clutch of Winter.

The current temperature is 23 degrees. The temperature hasn't risen above freezing in nearly two weeks. Snow on the ground. More snow in the forecast.

My world is a frozen wasteland.

I know I've blogged about this before (Jesus, I used the word "blogging". I don't recognize myself, anymore.), but I love this season. I would never move to a region that doesn't enjoy a few bitterly cold months every year.

This is my kind of weather. I like the stillness. The lack of insects. I like venturing outside and not being assaulted by the aroma of a freshly-mowed lawn. The bare, leafless trees lift my spirits like a sunny Spring morning for most people.

Fuck the sun. I like the cold, dark Winter months.

And because the season has put me in such a good mood, I have uploaded a brand-spanking-new photoplay on my lonely YouTube account. It is entitled "Unfinished Business!", and it's the gentle and heartwearming story of three young, masculine gym buddies who decide to take a few short-cuts to achieve physical perfection.

It stars my frequent collaborator Ky, as well as my dear brother Matt, in his first appearance in one of my delightful photoplays. I think it's pretty good. It's better than "Curse Of The Bad Touch", at any rate.

I'm going to try and shoot a few brand-new photoplays in the near future. I keep meaning to, but every time I get together with Ky, we end up watching Univision and playing Star Wars: Battlefront for hours.

We don't mean to do this... it just sorta happens. But it will happen. Eventually.

Hell, the gap between shooting "The Christmas Miracle" and our previous photoplay was over two years. I'll try and make the next one in a more timely fashion.

Anyway, if you want to watch "Unfinished Business!" just follow the link to my YouTube Channel here: http://www.youtube.com/uncleoflies/ or watch it on my embedded player, on the right side of this very page.

Watch it. Leave me a comment. Maybe rate the video.

I need to get the fuck off the Internet.

Something For The Discerning Reader

The following was originally written by my pal Scott years ago on our shared Maxpages site. I am reposting it here, because I think it's hilarious. I hope you, Dear Imaginary Reader, enjoy it:

Kevin Bacon Sucked Dick In The Summer Of '76

Do you people read books? I just finished reading "High and Low on the Summer Breeze: The Autobiography of Kevin Bacon".

I must tell you, it is an inspiring read for actors and anyone interested in the craft of film making. Not only do you get insight on Kevin's life, but he shows you his secrets on getting into the mind of a character.

Take for instance, the chapter "Kevin Bacon Sucked Dick In The Summer Of '76".

In 1976, Kevin was preparing for his role in the Alan Rudolph film, "Black Medusa". He played a young tennis player who is unsatisfied with his marriage to a young German woman. So he goes to a cozy sleep away camp in the Appalachians to relax and brush up on his tennis skills, to show his wife that he too can have the strength of her Aryan father.

But there is a twist in the story. Kevin's character, named Oscar, falls in love with the camp tennis instructor, a 17 year-old boy named Dennis Allen. Oscar grows from morose and sullen at home with his wife, to carefree and happy when he is sweating on the tennis court with Dennis Allen.

He is secretly playing two different characters, and so Kevin Bacon had his 13 year-old identical twin brother do all of the physically demanding tennis sequences.

There is one crucial scene in the story where Oscar and Dennis make mad, passionate love on top of a log down by the river. It is a riveting scene.

What I like most about it are the ambient sounds: the sound mixer used a tape recorder to capture the sounds of Chad Lowe, the young actor who played Dennis, sleeping. The sound of Dennis's gentle snoring plays throughout the passionate scene.

It's the best sound design I have heard since "The Exorcist".

In order to prepare for the scene, Kevin Bacon did a little research. He stayed at an actual summer camp in Indiana for several months and wrote down his experiences in a journal, to use as notes on-set.

Here is a passage:

"Bathed in blue light, young Jimmy's come-hither legs spread open wide like the hungry mouth of a young starling in his passion, ready to take in the fruits of his mother's labor.

Jimmy was the hungry and desperate baby bird, eager to be fed, and I was the compassionate mother, ready to give baby what baby needs.

As though his manhood was full of oxygen and I was suffocating, I took the entire length of his shaft into my mouth. Like a man who could not breathe, I sucked the sweet life out of Jimmy and restored my own.

I became a new man. His sweet seed had created for me a new life, much like when a man plants his seed in the fertile valley that is woman.

But this was different because only a masculine and awe-inspiring creature like Jimmy could give me life the way only men could. I was reborn.

Semen is the foundation of existence, and the existence of Kevin Bacon, the man I was before, became something else."

A note to actors: Learn your craft well. You may never be a Kevin Bacon, but take these words and let them run through you and inspire you.

You will be a better person.

I Hate Flying

"Did you ever have one of those days where you just want to drop a bomb on the whole world?" -John Lithgow

So I saw "Up In The Air" on New Year's Day. Not a great experience.

My sleep schedule is all messed up. The past few weeks have kept me sleeping during daylight hours.

I would rouse sometime after dark, like some kind of vampire. I prefer it that way. The Sun is no friend of mine.

But the past few days, circumstances kept me from getting any real sleep. Maybe an hour at a time. That gets annoying.

My dear mother asked me if I wanted to see "Up In The Air" on New Year's Day. I wanted to see it, too, so I agreed. Let's go to the cinema, and watch George Clooney attempt to earn 10,000,000 frequent flyer miles as he flies across the country, firing people for pussified CEOs in this shit economy.

Sounds like fun.

My mother takes a long nap, and we get to the movieplex with little time to spare.

In the rush, I forgot to grab my coat. Bad decision. 17 degrees at 1:15 pm.

And the wind! Don't forget the fucking wind. 5 degree wind chill. And I'm stuck without my coat.

We get to the box office, with two couples in front of us in the queue. The first couple is buying 20(!!!) tickets to a later 3-d screening of James Cameron's delightful "Avatar". This takes far longer than it should.

Finally, they sod off, and only one thick couple stands between us and a 1:20 screening of "Up In The Air".

Unfortunately, these people want to see "The Blind Side". And "The Blind Side" is sold out, much to the surprise of the thick couple in front of us.

But not to anybody else, because right underneath the display card featuring the start times for "The Blind Side", clearly visible to ANYONE WITH EYES, is a very large and easy-to-read sign saying "SOLD OUT".

But apparently the homunculi in front of us can't read. So they take a few minutes to decide what else they want to see. Finally, they decide to see the latest "Alvin and the Chipmunks" atrocity, and they waddle off to their final destination.

1:22 pm. Shit.

Finally, we buy our tickets, and we're off to the theatre, right? Wrong. Mother wants popcorn. She never sees a movie without popcorn.

So we go to the concession pavillion, where we find ourselves behind a particularly stupid father, and his particularly stupid young son. The concession clerk is clearly having a bad day, wandering around aimlessly in search of emtpy popcorn tubs and soft drink cups, looking surly.

The little boy keeps staring at the LARGE popcorn tub in front of him, repeating: "Daddy, is this a large popcorn?" He literally says this twelve times in ten seconds. Finally, the clerk barks "Yes, it's a large popcorn!" as he hands the father his change.

At this point, with the transaction completed, a previously unseen second young and stupid son materializes at his father's knee and starts screaming.

Apparently, daddy forgot to buy the little ghoul his Raisinettes. So the empty-eyed father buys the monster his candy. Then the "Idiocracy" trio disappears into the bowels of the cinema, and out of my life.

1:27. SHIT.

Finally, it's our turn at bat. Mother orders her popcorn and Diet Pepsi. I decide since I am so tired, a medium Dr. Pepper might help keep me awake.

The clerk starts wandering throughout the whole concession area, looking for a soda fountain with Dr. Pepper. Finally, he informs me that the cinema is OUT OF DR. PEPPER.

Great. Just finish the fucking transaction, so we can get to the fucking movie.

1:31. Motherfucker.

The only obstacle standing between us and our movie experience is a very elderly couple arguing with the usher about the location of their screening of "Sherlock Holmes".

The usher keeps pointing to the main auditorium, directly in front of them. They don't seem to understand that the main auditorium is playing the movie they paid to see. This is a complete mystery to them.

After about 30 seconds, I grab our tickets, tear them myself, and hand the stubs to the usher before walking past the bickering old retards, to see fucking "Up In The Air".

I did notice the usher giving me an odd look, but he said nothing to stop me. Fuck him.

We get inside the theatre as the Paramount logo fades from the screen. The theatre is packed. The only available seats are in the front row.

There should be no front row in any respectable cinema. It's some kind of sick fucking joke.

So I spend the next 2 hours staring directly up at a massive screen, trying not to fall asleep. Luckily, the rather large Ox sitting behind me was more than willing to help keep me awake by kicking the back of my seat every ten minutes.

How thoughtful of him.

It's January 1st, and I highly doubt I will have a more thoroughly miserable movie-going experience this year.

"Up In The Air" was really good. I was pleasantly surprised by Vera Farmiga's nude rear end twenty feet high and directly in front of my face about twenty minutes in. Danny McBride's beard distracted me.

Everyone in the auditorium was so tickled by the "Wichita" sequence in the middle of the film.

People always love it when their hometown is depicted in a movie. Well, almost always.

As I recall, nobody in the audience was terribly thrilled about the depiction of Wichita in "The Ice Harvest".

I love that movie.