Movie Mon. - Coffin Filled With Chaos

Wizard of Gore: Disappointing sub-par remake of the semi-classic cult film about a stage magician who hypnotized his audiences so they don't realize that the deadly deeds he does on stage are real. Long-time blog monkeys might vaguely recall how excited I was when I first heard about this film due to the director having cast The Creepiness Trifecta, a.k.a. Crispin Glover, Jeffrey Combs, and Brad Douriff, who turned out to play the killer magician, his geek (in the original "bite the heads off of live animals" definition of the word), and the shady dealer in alternative medicine who is somehow involved in all of the crazy business, respectively. However, Glover comes off more goofy than creepy; likewise Douriff is more of a thug, and Combs is so totally hidden in wig, fake beard, and makeup that I wasn't even sure until the end that it was him and not Glover in a double roll. Grnted, all three did a good job with what they were given, but sadly, what they were given wasn't all that much to go on. Add to this the fact that there's not a semi-likable character in the whole film (including nominal "hero" Kip Pardue) and a pretty incomprehensible and pointless plot, and you have a film that I could have gone without.

Automaton Transfusion: So-so super-speed-zed-word flick focusing on a group of high school students who are on the run from a town filled with the ravenous un-dead. Annoying characters and shakey/jerky camera-work made this one a big turn off for me.

American Crime: True life story that was more disturbing and horrifying to me than the previous two reviewed films put together; heck, it was more disturbing than just about any horror film I've seen, period. The movie tells thereal story of Sylvia Likens, a 16 year old (Ellen Page) who in 1965 was imprisoned and tortured by the unbalanced woman (Catherine Keener) who her parents were paying to look after her. And when I say "torture" I don't mean calling her names and making her go to bed without supper, although those did happen; no, I mean out and out physical abuse including brutal beatings and burning . . . and that was by far the least of it. The film is not overly graphic, leaving most of it to your imagination, but just the realization that this woman not only did such horrible things to this poor girl, but also recruited her children and their friends to join in . . . well, let's just say that the reminder that such evil really does exist in the world made for a compelling film, but one that, much like with Schindler's List I never really want to subject myself to again.

Next Avengers: Animated film that tells the story of the children of The Avengers who have been in hiding for over a decade after their parents were slain by the evil Ultron, who is well on his way to taking over the world until the super-powered kids come out of hiding to avenger their folks. Pretty entertaining film which I enjoyed more than I have most of the recent Marvel straight-to-DVD animated fare -- particularly the previous two Avengers films -- but what really got me excited was the behind the scenes looks at the upcoming DVDs of Hulk vs. Wolverine, which will also feature the animated debut of Deadpool, and Hulk vs. Thor, which is actually more like 'Hulk vs. All of Asgard" Looking forward to both of those.

Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day: Enjoyable comedy about a down-on-her-luck nanny (Frances McDormand) in pre-WWII England who bluffs her way into a job as the social secretary of the flighty would-be starlet Delysia Lafosse (the always awesome Amy Adams) who is busy juggling three different men in her attempts to make it on the London stage. A fairly predictable film to be sure, with a very obvious and traditional three-act structure, but neither of those are really detrimental to the enjoyment of the film, as they act to conjure up the spirit of an eariler time which the film strives to capture. Plus, while its plot may be predictable, its still a fun ride getting to the end. Plus, did I mention that Amy Adams is always awesome? She is, y'know.

Rock and Roll High School: Over-the-top but nonetheless entertaining anarchic 1979 film about the power struggle between a domineering new principal at Vince Lombardi High and the rock and roll loving student body, a struggle that takes place largely to the musical stylings of The Ramones. Sort of wish I'd saved this one for an Odd Squodd movie night; the odd-ball humor of this one fits right in with our sensiblities. Have been really wanting to buy some Ramones music ever since I finished this one.

Gremlins 2: Sequel to one of my favorite movies as a kid. Despite having a ton of cool varaitions on the Gremlin design, this vastly different take on the misadventures of Gizmo and his malevolent off-spring didn't really rate high on my list back when I first saw it due to its more tongue-in-cheeck, satirical tone, but coming back to it as an adult I could much better appreciate what director Joe Dante was going for, and enjoyed it much more. Plus, that scene with Kate's speech about her hatred of Lincoln's Birthday which blatantly rips on her speech about her hatred of Christmas -- a.k.a. my least favorite scene in the original -- cracks me up just as much now as it did the first time I saw it. Saddened that it's not available on YouTube.

Son of Rambow: Another "Should have been an Odd Squodd selection" film, this quirky British comedy tells the story of two outcasts boys -- one the school troublemaker and the other a quiet boy from an overly protective religion -- who are inspired by the new smash hit film First Blood to make their own film about Rambo's son. Loved this movie, highly recommended to one and all.

In the Land of Women: Serio-comic film about a heart-broken young writer of soft-core porno* who escapes from L.A. to take care of his ailing (and possibly crazy) grandmother and becomes involved with his new neighbors, a stay at home mom freshly diagnosed with breast cancer, and her rebellious daughter. Li'l Random and I watched this one together, and subsequently whenever I think of Olympia Dukakis' role I will forever remember how Li'l Bro compared her to the hissing possum he had to expell from his garage a while back; every time she's pop up on screen he'd do his possum impression, and I, of course, would die laughing. So, kind of hard to give this one an objective review, seeing how tied in it is to my Odd Squodd viewing experience; still, overall think it was a pretty good flick.

Django: One of the prototypical Spaghetti Westerns -- recently sorta-remade by Takashi Miike as Sukiyaki Western: Django -- this film centers around the steely-eye anti-hero Django, a man in torn up Army gear who drags around a muddy casket** on his quest to find revenge on the racist Major Jackson who was responsible for killing the only woman Django ever loved. Think I safely say that most people agree this is the best Spaghetti Western made by someone not named Sergio Leone and scored by someone not named Ennio Morricone. High praise, there, right? Seriously, though, an interesting and fairly well-made example of the birth of a sub-genre.

*Yeah, that tidbit somehow never made it into any of the press for the film, did it?
**Or as the florid prose of the Netflix synopsis described it, " a coffin filled with chaos"

Fragmented Friday - Argentinian Warlord!

I hadn't been at work for very long this morning before one of the ladies in my unit came over to tell me they'd found a snake in the mail room -- guess PigPen won't be dropping by my office to visit ever again . . .

Despite already having head a generous helping of chocolate, sugar and caffeine this morning, I am still not quite awake. I blame the strange dreams I've been having all week long; very vivid, and often very stressful, filled with people yelling and fighting and dying and such. So, even though I've been getting plenty of sleep, it hasn't been all that restful.

I am currently addicted to the Word Twist game application on Facebook where you're given random letters and try to make as many words as possible before time runs out. Bonus points come for any word that uses all the letter. Think my favorite bonus word so far is a toss-up between "jujubes" and "bumbag," the latter of which is the British name for a fanny-pack; if you know your British slang, you'll know why they avoid saying "fanny" in polite conversation. Anyway, as often happens when I play a compute game obsessively, it's now gotten to the point that when I close my eyes at night I see the letters swirling around in my mind. I would try to draw a connection between that and my disturbing dreams, but so far neither jujubes nor bumbags have made an appearance . . . so far . . .

Miss ArkanSass has made plans to head to Denton for a visit in a few weeks, and has requested to take part in The Odd Squodd Mostly-Regular Dark and Twisty, Strange and Unusual, Off-Beat, Quirky, Movie Fest. She has also requested that I be the one to pick out the film, since she's "seen what sort of movies Li'l Random picks*." She seems to be overlooking the fact that Li'l Random and I do share a brain, with our two halves actually being joined at the movie-choosing portion of the cerebellum.

Li'l Random has renamed Firestorm, the Nuclear Man as "Dr. Fantastic." Why? No reason that could be understood by anyone not named "Li'l Random." On a related note, everyone's favorite random nickname magnet has acquired yet another nick: The Argentinian Warlord. Now, there is a reason for this one, but not one I can relate in a family-friendly blog; despite this, Li'l Brother insisted that I title at least one blog post with the new name, and, fearful that he might live up to the horrible implications of the name, I have acquiesced.

I'm about ready to remove MSN Messenger from my Trillian settings thanks to the endless stream of spam messages I've been receiving for the last couple of weeks: "Hi, my name is [insert random female name here]. I really want to chat with you, but I can't get MSN to stay logged in. Come visit my blog at [insert doubtless pornographic and virus laden link here]"

One of the more interesting of my recent vivid dreams had me attending Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, except, instead of the Westchester campus as seen in any X-men comic, cartoon, or movie, the campus was actually good ol' Wyandotte High School, and when the plot of the dream required me to head to the living quarters of the school it was the bedroom of my childhood home, where I found my favorite pet cat, Itty Bitty, sleeping soundly on my bed. In the dream I was hiding from the bad guys and had to decide if I was going to take Bitty with me or not, but then decided that he would be safe because the villains had a strange affinity for cats, an idea that came from the book I'm currently reading, Curfew. I wonder if Bitty appeared because of that book, or if the book logic only appeared because Bitty did. The subconscious is a funny thing, no?

My CD/MP3 player at work has been acting progressively more wonky over the last month or two, which, coupled with the fact that my home computer's CD burner is no longer wanting to burn CDs, has made me more and more determined to break down and get an iPod when my raise goes into effect on my October paycheck. However, the fact that the CD player refused to play my Lostprophets CD this morning, thus denying me of my "Shinobi vs. Dragon Ninja" fix, has made my iPod jones that much stronger.

During the aforementioned X-men dream, as the other students and I prepared for an attack on the campus, who should come running up the front steps of the school but Li'l Random, yelling that we should take cover. I looked past him to see a ginormous fireball flying through the air, and so quickly scrambled into my mom's old classroom for cover. Li'l Random, however, kept running down the hallway past me as the fireball hit the ground outside the school and the resultant shockwave shattered the front windows, hurling shards of glass in Li'l Bro's direction. I yelled at him to get down, but instead he did what Li'l Random always does when faced with a situation that's too much for him in real life: retreated into the standing fetal position. When I related this story to him, he asked "Did it work?" Indeed, I said, he escaped with barely a scratch. "That's my mutant power," he exclaimed, "super fetal position!"

And last but not least, a quick congratulations to Super Fetal Position Lad, who has just gotten a very nice promotion at work; in addition to being a great opportunity for him, the change in positions also means that the possibility of him being relocated to Washington D.C. for a year come October no longer exists, which is a big relief for all those who compete for The Argentinian Warlord's company.


*Quoth Miss ArkanSass: "He made me watch Cube." Which made me exclaim incredulously "You didn't like Cube?"

What a Crazy Random Happenstance

This weekend after an impromptu Odd Squodd Movie Afternoon, I was finally able to introduce Li'l Random to the wonder that is Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, and was pleased that not only was he highly impressed by the genius of Joss and company, but also that all of the small touches that made me laugh hysterically the first time I saw it struck him the same way, further proof of our shared brain.

While looking into when the promised DVD might be released, I stumbled across two improtant facts. First of all, all three acts are available for free again, courtesy of Hulu.com. The best part of this isn't that it's going to be much easier to get folks to give this a watch now that it's free again; now, the best part is that, thanks to Hulu's special embedding structure, I can now selectively highlight a few of my favorite moments to post here, like Dr. Horrible's thoughts on the importance of the Evil Laugh



or his letter from the Evil League of Evil



or the introduction of my favorite new catchphrase.




The second important fact is that as of yesterday the soundtrack is available for download from iTunes, with the official lyrics finally up on the main Dr. Horrible site. Yet another incentive for me to get that iPod I've been wanting, huh?

Movie Mon. - The French are a Riot

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian: Second installment of the big-screen adapation of C.S. Lewis's fantasy series finds the Pevensie children called back to Narnia over a thousand years after they left to help the human Prince Caspian save the remaining Narnians from the advances of the savage Telmarines. It's been a looooooooooong time since I read the book, so I spent most of the film going "I'm not sure, but I thought Caspian was much younger in the book, and what's with all this Susan/Caspian romance going on? That wasn't in the original, was it?" But adaptation issues aside, I really enjoyed it. They did an awesome job with the character of Reepicheep, the mouse knight, both in terms of animation and voice-work (thank you, Eddie Izzard), and Peter Dinklage was night unto unrecognizable as Trumpkin.

Frontier(s): French horror film about a group of young crooks taking advantage of riots to pull a job, and then hiding out at a hostel, only to find that their hosts are sadistic, blood-thirsty neo-Nazi's with an insane breeding program. Not a bad little film; interesting concept, a couple of fairly gruesome sequences, and not too much in the way of "Oh, come one, nobody in their right mind would do that!" scenes. Was a bit slow to get going, though, and few of the protagonists were all that likable, so I had a bit of trouble getting into it early on; really picks up once you meet the bizarre Nazi clan.

Inside: Another French horror film set during a time of riots -- what are the odds?-- except this one centers on a pregnant widow who is attacked at her home the night before her planned delivery date by a crazed woman who wants to claim the baby as her own. Dang, was this movie intense! Found myself squirming in my seat more during this movie than pretty much anything else I've seen in I don't know how long. Sure, the last third of the movie suffered greatly from stretching my suspension of disbelief to the breaking point (why didn't she keep the gun? Why oh why oh WHY didn't she keep the gun?), but on the whole the tension and suspense of the cat and mouse game played by the uber-creepy stalker lady kept me enthralled. Not for the squeamish at all.

Vision Quest: Mid-80s film about a high school wrestler (Matthew Modine) who decides he wants to drop several weight classes in order to wrestle the best guy in the state, a quest that gets derailed when he and his dad take in a independent (and sexy) border (Linda Fiorentino in her big screen debut). Li'l Random has been referencing this a lot recently, so I picked it up at the Media Library for our Odd Squodd Mostly-Regular Dark and Twisty, Strange and Unusual, Off-Beat, Quirky, Movie Fest, although in this case I think we might want to add the word "cheesy" in there somewhere. Honestly, though, this was a pretty good movie; a bit dated, to be sure, but it had plenty of quotable lines that will be sure to entertain Li'l Brother and myself for weeks to come, as well as some nice fashion ides -- the Random One is adamant that we find matching work-out suits like the main character wore to lose weight, due to their space-man like design. . Would kind of like to watch it with PigPen just to hear him critique the wrestling sequences.

Filmtastic Friday, Odd Squodd Edition: Obsession, Light and Dark

Generally speaking, Li'l Random and I take turns making the selections for The Odd Squodd Mostly-Regular Dark and Twisty, Strange and Unusual, Off-Beat, Quirky, Movie Fest, picking out strange films that we love but the other hasn't seen. However, there are times when the choice is made for us due to a new Odd Squodd worthy film coming out, either at the movies or on DVD. Last week Li'l Random's turn to choose got bumped back a week due to the DVD release of a film whose description practically screamed "ODD SQUODD!!!!!!!" at the top of its lungs. After getting confirmation from Li'l Random that the new release would be an acceptable selection, I began to think about another film I had seen a while back with similar subject matter treated in a much darker way. So, I stopped by the media library and checked out this earlier film so that Li'l Random and I could have an Odd Squodd Double Feature of films about lonely guys who become unhealthily obsessed with life-like sex dolls they bought online.

The first film which explored the lighter side of the theme was Lars and the Real Girl, starring one of my favorite actors, Ryan Gosling, as the titular Lars, a lonely, reclusive man who lives in the garage of his childhood home, which is now occupied by his brother and pregnant sister-in-law. The sister-in-law is worried because Lars has become even more reclusive and anti-social than usual, and is overjoyed when he knocks on their door one evening to say that he has a female visitor who he met online; she and her husband are more than a little nonplussed, however, when the female visitor turns out to be a life-like sex doll which Lars insists is alive. Concerned, they trick Lars into visiting with a local physician who also has a degree in psychology, and she advises them to humor Lars in his delusion until they can get to the root of his problems. Soon, the whole town is drawn into the plan, treating the faux girl as if she were as alive as Lars believes she is.

Now, despite the fact that the object of Lars' affection is a sex doll, this is actually a pretty wholesome film overall; as part of regular church-goer Lars' delusion, his "girlfriend" Bianca is highly religious, and doesn't believe in premarital sex, so their relationship is rather chaste. The same cannot be said for the second part of our strange double-feature, Love Object.



A far cry from the feel-good Lars, eh? Love Object is much darker and more horrific, with a protagonist whose relationship with his doll Nikki is much more perverse than that of Lars and Bianca, especially once he tries to move to a real girl and finds that Nikki is apparently a jealous little hunk of plastic. Where Lars brings Bianca into the light and is embraced and loved by his whole town, Kenneth hides his new obsession from one and all, until it becomes even darker, more twisted, and, worst of all, deadly.

Naturally, Li'l Random and I laughed our butts off all the way through it.

And not in an MST3K sort of way either; no, Love Object is intentionally funny, in a dark and twisty, make you squirm in your seat sort of way.

While I enjoyed the heck out of both movies, there's a reason why Li'l Random and I watched Lars and the Real Girl with Cap'n Shack-Fu and PigPen, but kept Love Object as a strictly Odd Squodd viewing experience; the quirkiness and oddity of Lars is of a sort that's more palatable to the masses, leaning towards the light side of the oddity spectrum, while the black humor and uncomfortable oddity of Love Object is geared towards a much darker and off-beat mindset which L'il Random and I have in spades.

So, I highly recommend Lars and the Real Girl to one and all as one of those rare Odd Squodd approved films which could actually have appeal beyond our warped little minds, but am going to suggest that most of you blog monkeys would find Love Object a bit of a hard pill to swallow.

Odd Squodd Mostly-Regular Dark and Twisty, Strange and Unusual, Off-Beat, Quirky, Movie Fest

Despite being best friends, honorary brothers, movie soul mates, and co-owners of the same brain, thanks to all of the different commitments in our lives -- be they related to work, church, family, or friends -- my Li'l Bro Li'l Random and I rarely get a chance to hang out. So recently, we decided to accept the fact that randomly deciding to get together wasn't going to cut it, and actually implemented a plan to give us a chance to not only hang out and let the two halves of our shared brain synch up, but also to indulge in our common interest in strange, off-beat, off-the-wall, dark-and-twisty motion pictures without having to suffer through the griping, bellyaching, and general ridicule that comes when we watch these films with those of more mainstream tastes. And so, we have designated Thursday nights as The Odd Squodd Mostly-Regular, Dark and Twisty, Strange and Unusual, Off-Beat, Quirky, Movie Fest.* The hope is that we can not only indulge in the dark and twisty films that we both want to see, but also that each of us can introduce the other to some weird and wonderful cinema which we have fallen in love with but which has slipped by the other's weirdo-radar. In other words, I make him watch Living in Oblivion and The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra and he makes me watch The Beach and Wise Blood. It all evens out in the end.

Anyway, I was planning on making a special post-Odd Squodd Mostly-Regular Dark and Twisty, Strange and Unusual, Off-Beat, Quirky, Movie Fest** blog post each Friday to explore in-depth what it is that has given a film the Odd Squodd Stamp of Approval -- or Disapproval, even. After all, not all quirky films are created equally, and many try too hard and fall short of the mark. But, we'll discuss those if and when we come to them. But I'm afraid that I got distracted while composing this post, and then had too many things going on Friday to finish it up, so I decided I'd just do my inagural Odd Squodd Mostly-Regular Dark and Twisty, Strange and Unusual, Off-Beat, Quirky, Movie Fest post on a Movie Monday, and strive to do better about more timely reviews in the future.

So, without further ado, here are my thoughts on the first of what I hope will be many, many, many Odd Squodd Mostly-Regular Dark and Twisty, Strange and Unusual, Off-Beat, Quirky, Movie Fest selections: The Darjeeling Limited.

The Darjeeling Limited is the most recent film from Odd Squodd favored director Wes Anderson, the mastermind behind such films as Bottle Rocket, Rushmore, The Life Aquatic, and, my favorite, The Royal Tenenbaums. Anderson is one of those directors that generates a lot of strong feelings, both positive and negative, especially as his oeuvre expands in size, but not necessarily in scope and style, or so say some detractors. There is also a camp who insists on labeling him as "pretentious," and telescope that onto his fans, claiming that Wes Anderson fans only like his stuff because it's "cool" or "indie" to like Wes Anderson.

And if I may take a moment to get up on my soapbox, I positively hate it when someone dismisses anyone's love for a particular artist of show or song or what-have-you as merely a byproduct of a mindless, follow-the-pack herd mentality. If you want to talk about pretension, to me real pretension is condemning another person for their tastes while simultaneously denying that they have any individuality. And yes, I have been accused of only liking certain things because they were popular; I have been accused of disliking things because the were popular; and, as a far of quirky and off-beat media, I have been accused for only liking things because their "pseudo-intellectual" nature made me feel smarter than those around me. And while I'm sure there are those out there who do feed into this last accusation, claiming that those who don't enjoy the same sensibilities that they do are obviously dense or misguided or downright idiots, that has never been a factor for me. Heck, I gave Bubble Boy and Kung-Pow: Enter the Fist four stars on Flixster, so it's kind of hard for me to be a full-on film snob. I can't say that enjoying the work of any "indie" director has ever made me feel smarter than those who didn't, mainly because, unlike others, I'm smart enough to realize that IQ and taste don't necessarily have a direct correlation***. I enjoy films like The Darjeeling Limited not because they make me feel smart, or special, or elite, but because they make me laugh.

But, I digress . . . a lot.

The Darjeeling Limited is a story of three brothers (Anderson regulars Owen Wilson and Jason Schwartzman and Anderson newcomer Adrien Brody), estranged and out of contact since their father's funeral a year earlier, who have now come together at the request of the eldest brother on a train in India to embark on what he terms a "spiritual journey," a journey that is hampered by the brothers' dysfunctional relationships with each other and those around them.

This film is a bit of an odd duck, somehow managing to feel like a typical Wes Anderson film and yet not at the same time. Like his other films, this one has a bit of a timeless feel to it, modern technology such as an iPod seeming almost incongruous with the retro styles surrounding it. And it does touch on same of the same themes as his earlier films, with family dysfunction running rampant. But the claustrophobic atmosphere conjured up by the cramped setting of the train kept the characters in such close proximity that they were never able to break away from each other for long, heightening the tension for not only the characters but for the viewers as well. And at times there is a greater sense of tragedy in this film than in Anderson's earlier work; about halfway through the film the brothers the serio-comic film took a huge shift to the serio side of things, almost jarringly so. But the tragic scenes served a greater purpose in the film than just tugging at the heart-strings, serving as a catalyst of the brothers to grow closer and move past the loss of their father.

In the end, all I can really say about this film is I liked it a lot; not as much as Rushmore or The Royal Tennenbaums, but a bit more than The Life Aquatic.

This one gets the Odd Squodd Stamp of Apprvoal; do with that what you will.

*Name subject to change as soon as I come up with something better
**Boy, that name practically rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?
***Although I will admit to often questioning the intelligence of people who find Larry the Cable Guy or pretty much anything starring Shawn and Marlon Wayans funny, but that's mainly because I can feel brain cells being killed off every time I see their stuff and have to assume that anyone who can sit through a full movie with them would have to be brain dead by the end . . .