And I'm gonna get my abs in shape

I went to see I am Legend tonight, and came to the realization about one of the archetypes of disaster films. You know the characters who are always the first to give up? In PG movies, the other characters rally them until they realize their potential. In PG-13 movies, they attempt suicide. In R rated movies, they're the ones that jump into the East River to escape the monster.

If I were faced with the end of the world as we knew it, that'd totally be me.

First off, I'm a total pessimist. I'm sorry, but if a giant spaceship/alien/virus is coming towards me, I'm not really having a "I'm gonna live to fall in love another day" attitude. And two, I don't really have a lot to give society. I couldn't come up with a cure, or fly a shooting spaceship. I'd pretty much be done with life as soon as the coffee ran out.

But I think there might be one plot twist that would keep me from being the wife in Cormac McCarthy's The Road. The concept is: the only way the United States can beat the aliens/terrorists/virus is by giving a twenty-something idiot savant directions on how to work their vessel. In order for the awkward hipster--who only responds to witty prose that connects with his generation--to understand the dry, scientific directions of the military manual, someone has to edit it.

I'll get from Brooklyn to DC by stealing a horse from the Kensington Stables and riding her over the Verrazano Bridge.

Hollywood: Alcoholic Homeless People Aren't Funny Anymore

Like most of you, I was gathered around my christmas tree + tv (they're so delightfully close to each other!) tonight watching AMC's airing of "Santa Claus: The Movie," that 1985 gem starring Dudley Moore as Patch, the elf gone bad.

During a scene where Patch disappears with a sprinkling of magic dust and the drunken hobo next to him is the only one who sees, I realized something: movies don't have rummy bums as foils anymore!

A staple since the times of Charlie Chaplin, the lovable, confused homeless alcoholic arguably hit his stride as a archetype in the 1980s, where he appeared as the only witness to unbelievable events in Back to the Futures I and II, Big Business, and the aforementioned SC:TM. In addition, lovable bums (the very same ones!) appeared in Coming to America and Trading Places.

But at some point, for some reason Hollywood decided that alcoholic homeless people are NOT delightful, if not utterly undependable, bearded dudes who drink out of brown paper bags on city benches, shrugging their shoulders at the results of our foibles. Freaking liberals...because of them we'll never get to see Owen Wilson as a lovable wino who lives by a trash can.

Is anyone else...

...as confused and disturbed as I am by the fact that Steve Carell looks sorta hot in this movie poster? Is it the pancakes, or just lots of airbrushing?

For Big Lebowski fans

Via popwatch.com, Here's an essay Jeff Bridges wrote for the foreword to a new book on the Big Lebowski: Zen and the Art of Dudliness. If you're a fan of this movie reading this essay will make you like it even more.

Afternoon Movie Review: What Matters Most

I was really disappointed to flip to the Lifetime network today only to find I had missed all but 4 minutes of "Alone with a Stranger," described by my on-screen channel guide as: Willaim. R. Moses, Barbara Niven (2000) A woman holds identical twins at gunpoint while trying to determine which is her husband and which, his murderous brother. Myst./Susp. [TV-14) D, V [CC]. I turned it on just as the woman had to decide which identical twin not to shoot. The scruffy one ultimately saved himself by saying, 'It's like Lindsey said, 'It's broken, Mommy.'"

Maybe it was the disappointment of missing this gem, or perhaps there is some truth at the only intelligent thing National Enquirer EIC David Perel told me, "Lifetime is like crack for women," but I was soon sucked into the next feature: "What Matters Most."

This movie stars My Two Dads' Chad Lowe as a high school basketball player who gets a girl from the wrong side of the tracks pregnant. But they really love each other! You can tell because Chad's character, Lucas, plays the guitar for the girl. She says:"Lucas, you wrote that? It is sooo beautiful." And he replies: "My daddy don't think so."

To be exact, his daddy said (and I quote): "If you think I'm gonna let you go off to college to play the gee-tar like some homo hippie fag, you gotta 'nother thing coming. You're gonna have my grandchillin' and marry some girl, you hear me?"

After the Dad beats Lucas several times and Lucas and his girl have a Zack-and-Kelly's-prom moment and do some bubble-blowing, the young lady (who also happens to be a genius who works at a diner), confesses her news and Lucas proposes.

OK, so at this point I'm about to change the channel, but then Lifetime took ahold of me as~Shock!~in an Everwoodesque plot twist, Lucas gets hurt at a BB-ball game and goes into a coma.

When he awakes, he is unchanged except he walks with a crutch and talks like he has a giant jawbreaker in his mouth. Oh, and he has a baby his father is refusing to admit is his. The movie takes several completely weird and therefore unexpected turns as Lucas tries to kill himself, yells "don't loooook at meeee!" a few times (ok, that was expected), tells his parents he's going to marry the girl they want him to (I guess parents in the South are real keen on their kids getting married at 18), then there's a little switcheroo at the altar and the baby mama marries him instead. You see, it was all a ploy to get around the father's psychotic classism.

At the end of the movie, the Dad that had been beating his son for trying to call the mother of his child and so forth has the baby on his lap and is cooing, "Who's the greatest Grandpa?" And we all learn that it's OK if you brutally beat your child, as long as you allow your wife to drag you away from the wedding procession your crippled son just sprung on you.

Crack, indeed.

Which one of these men will play Howard K. Stern in the TV movie?

If you can't decide, you're in luck: they're all Chris Devlin, who will be portraying Howard K. in The Anna Nicole Story. He did tell TMZ that he imagines Howard's time with Anna was like "being in a hot tub full of whip cream -- on the Titianic." (Is that spelling mistake on purpose? Titty-anic?" Wow.)

WARNING: DO NOT ATTEMPT TO WATCH "SWEET HOME ALABAMA"

Dear Readers,

Perhaps you've seen the advertisements on the Lifetime network for 3 nights of the movie Sweet Home Alabama. "Reese Witherspoon is marrying McDreamy!" it proclaims. This sounds promising. Could be good, you think. That Patrick Dempsey is awful handsome, and Reese is so cute.

That's what I thought, and I watched this movie in its entirety, waiting and waiting for even one scene I could enjoy. But it's bad. It's so bad I rated it only one star ("I Hated It") on netflix, a rating shared only with What Women Want, Batman & Robin, Rocky V, Coyote Ugly, American Pie 2, and Little Man (another movie I was forced to watch on the bus to Boston). Patrick Dempsey doesn't even get the girl at the end. And Reese as at her most annoying. The only good reason to watch this movie is if you've seen that Johnny Cash movie, so you can marvel at what a better actress Reese is now than when she first started out. Because she (and Dempsey, for that matter) are both horrible is this boring, unheartfelt film filled with every stereotype in the book.

I know it's raining out, but stay away from Lifetime people, for your own good.

Afternoon Movie Review: First Knight

I'm sure you've all seen at least a small bit of First Knight at one time or another. It's that movie where Sean Connery plays King Arthur and Richard Gere is Lancelot? It also falls into the category of the perfect Afternoon Movie, one that I would never rent or buy but when it's on The Superstation on a Saturday afternoon I will sit and watch it from beginning to end.

Of course, what I'm doing throughout most of the movie (besides fucking around on myspace and eating lunch) is wishing that I had Richard Gere and Sean Connery fighting over my love. If two guys ever loved me at the same time, they'd probably be more like the guy whose red stapler keeps getting stolen in Office Space and Horned-Rimmed Glasses on Heroes. And I don't think either of those guys would be positioning forest leaves in a pattern so that the rain will drip from one to the next and then into my mouth, or proclaiming "Camelot is yours!" Sigh.

Now I'm not saying I don't totally secretly adore this movie, but unfortunately it really hasn't stood the test of time, thanks to American's favorite racist's elaborately staged war scenes in Braveheart, the Patriot, and Lord of the Rings (he directed that, right?). The ones in this movie look so unimpressive you're just like, yeah, whatever, the American Gigolo just jumped off his horse and now he's shoving a sword into someone, blah blah blah. Also, enough with the elongated facial close-ups, Director Jerry Zucker. I mean, I know your last movie before First Knight was Ghost, but c'mon, Goldfinger was a good movie because Connery was running around shooting people, not because we kept looking as his hurt look every time Pussy Galore made a cutting remark.

But seriously, this is one of those movies that's perfect for killing time...the type of movie they should show on the bus to Boston (NOT City Slickers 2: The Search for the Golden Curls, which I was forced to watch last time. Peter Pan Buslines, WTF?!). If you've never seen it, sit down with a bag of Doritos and a desire to put off your weekend chores and enjoy.

Afternoon Movie Review: The Bodyguard

There are some movies you don't rent, you don't buy, you don't even think, "gee, I'd like to see that." But then they come on TV on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon and you sit in your sweatpants a d watch them in their entirety. You know the ones I'm talking about: Ghost, Three Men and a Baby, Happy Gilmore. Kevin Costner stars in a lot of these movies, like Bull Durham, Field of Dreams, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, and the subject of today's Afternoon Movie Review: The Bodyguard.

The Bodyguard follows a perfect Afternoon Movie plotline. Man meets woman and they don't like each other; Woman realizes man secretly has a hard-on for her; Woman unsheaves man's sword (in this case, the silk-cutting samurai kind); Man decides their night of passion can never happen again and woman gets pissed; Man decides he's leaving but gets drawn back because of a sense of duty; Man saves woman; woman stops plane and runs out and kisses him; brief "5 years later" scene; the credits roll in about 3.5 seconds so the network can cram more ads in.

Kevin Costner is perfect in this role. He's the unassuming guy who you tell yourself you don't think is hot but really you're totally willing to sit around to wait for him to get laid. And there's no denying this is Whitney Houston's best role ever. The movie even has the "creepy, almost albino-looking" character, and the hardened-man-is-actually-quite-good-with-kids theme. The only thing that could have made this movie better was a little more making out (only three scenes in the entire 2 hours), a tad more hand-to-hand combat (who doesn't want to see Kevvy punching someone out in the name of love?), and a scene where someone gets drunk and confesses something.

The best part about The Bodyguard was that it kept me from vacuuming. Now that it is over I will start the productive part of my day, sucking up cat hair and thinking about becoming famous so I can hire a sturdy man with a gun to protect me.

Ted Danson doing nude yoga

Everyone's been making such a fuss about Danny DeVito's drunken confession on the View about banging Rhea Pearlman in the Lincoln bedroom. But am I the only one who, for some reason, finds Ted Danson and Mary Steenbergen grosser? I think it's because I see her kind of like an aunt, ever since she played Doc Brown's awkward love interest in BttFPIII.

A funny guy pops his Star Wars cherry

Whether you like Star Wars or not, check out this article by Michael Morrison, who actually watched more TV than me this weekend. If only because he not only references Spaceballs, he references Full House, too.
p.s. he has a blogspot blog just like me! I can only hope that some day I, too, will be headed towards online television commentary fame

Ultimate LAKE HOUSE quiz!

Over the weekend I saw the movie The Lake House. It's true; I did; and I'm not going to apologize for it, even though it was one of the worst movies I have ever seen. But for all you Keanu/Sandra fans, here is THE ULTIMATE LAKE HOUSE QUIZ! Try to see how many you can get right without having seen the movie.

True or False?
1. The Lake House is made entirely of glass.
2. Sandra describes herself as having “gentle, unguarded eyes.”
3. Keanu describes himself as having “wavy, untamed locks.”
4. One of Keanu’s many powers is planting a tree on a city sidewalk that quadruples in size in two years.
5. In a wink to their past, the characters reference the movie Speed by debating the merits of bus travel.
6. Much of the film takes place in Chicago, so every time the characters refer to the house “by the lake,” everyone assumes they’re talking about Lake Michigan.
7. Female doctors like Sandra are always lonely, because they have no time for love!
8. At some point, Keanu sneaks into Sandra’s apartment building as it is being built, figures out which apartment will be hers, and hides a copy of a Jane Austen novel under her floorboards.
9. When Keanu cries, it’s really embarrassing, both for him as an actor and for filmdom as a whole.
10. The person who wrote the screenplay for The Lake House is a Pulitzer Prize–winner.






Answers: t, t, f, t, f, f, t, t, t, t