Girl on a Motorcycle

1968 drama


Rating: 9/20


Plot: A leather-clad woman sneaks loudly away on her motorcycle while her husband slumbers because she'd rather be with another lover, a guy whose hair doesn't sit nearly as high. Along the way, she drives recklessly and, when not writhing on her seat with a goofy expression on her face, thinks way too much.


aka Naked Under Leather, this erotic psychedelia has a few moments as exhilarating as I imagine either riding 120 mph on a motorcycle or wearing leather or a combination of the two would be. Most moments unfortunately are just dated--the use of superimposition and acid colors made it seem like I was looking at the backdrop of a Jefferson Airplane concert at times. There were also too many scenes in which characters drove through Sillyland, very obviously in front of a screen and not on an actual moving motorbike. The story should be simple enough, but it's clunked up with flashbacks and fantasy and sometimes flashbacks within flashbacks and flashbacks within fantasies and fantasies within flashbacks. There might even be a fantasy inside of a flashback within another fantasy. The narrative is also dominated by an annoying voiceover that eventually made me wish Marianne Faithful would crash head on into something and fly through the air into the windshield of an oncoming car. Admittedly, I was a little cranky after a circus dream sequence near the beginning that ended much too soon. Actually, I would be very interested in watching a 91-minute prequel called Girl Standing on a Horse, but I'm not sure I want to see the current Marianne Faithful naked.



On second thought!

Here I am, bored with the movie and wondering if I should get my own motorcycle:

Die Hard

1988 action adventure

Rating: 16/20

Plot: A tough New York City cop flies to L.A. on Christmas Eve to spend the holidays with his wife and children. He's dropped at a 40 story skyscraper by his crazy limo driver because that's where the Super Ultra Fun Classical Music Christmas Extravaganza is being held. While washing his armpits, terrorists led by Professor Snape bust in with a too-elaborate plan to steal some things from the building and then go spend time talking about the time they came up with an elaborate plan to steal some things from the building. They break in, kill a couple people who may or may not have even gotten their names in the credit (Guy Who Died After Silly Dialogue #1 and Guy Who Died More Painfully After More Painful Dialogue #2?), shut down all the elevators, take an elevator to floor 30, begin shooting unnecessarily, and take hostages. Meanwhile, John McClane finishes washing his second armpit. He sneaks away, forgetting his shoes, and then causes all kinds of problems for the terrorists. Professor Snape gets mad. There are lots of explosions. They decide to settle things the way all men should settle things--a quip off! The antagonists exchange witticisms via walkie-talkie until one gives up and commits seppuku. Then everything explodes!

Silly fun and thrills, probably top shelf action movie stuff but nonetheless big and dumb. A lot of this just doesn't make sense, and the script is peppered with that typical 80's action movie banter and one liners. An adrenaline rush, and I had popcorn by the fistfuls. More popcorn than you can shake a machine gun at, motherfuckers! There wasn't much at all realistic about this, but at least John McClane is neither flat or invincible. The static setting of the 40-story building, partially incomplete, adds tension, and the special effects help make this as ridiculous as a movie should be allowed to be.

Here I am wondering if Bruce Willis's character is going to survive the movie (Spoiler alert! He does!):

The Saddest Music in the World

2003 dramatic comedy

Rating: 16/20

Plot: It's 1933 in Canada, and a legless woman has hopes of selling lots of beer. A contest to see which country has the saddest song is announced, and hopefuls flock to Winnipeg to induce tears and try to win 25,000 depression dollars. A World War I veteran and his two sons are reunited as they represent Canada, the United States, and Serbia in the contest. The father longs for the legless woman, a woman whose legs he amputated (one by mistake) following a car accident. One son happened to be driving that car, wrecking after the beer baroness was through pleasuring him orally. The other son mopes around because his wife disappeared after the death of their son. He carries that son's heart in a jar and whines a lot. The countries have their battle of the bands, the winners receiving a thumbs-up from the host before taking a slide into a giant tub of beer. Happily, the beer baroness gets a new pair of legs fashioned entirely from glass and filled with beer. Unhappily, the father and sons find it difficult to discover happiness in their attempts to produce sad tunes.

It's all about the images, the tone, and the texture with this one. Guy Maddin pays homage to the silent era with his films, filming this one with ancient equipment and forgotten techniques, mixing fuzzy black and white with tempered color scenes and blueish or sepia tones. The result is startling, and along with a jarring soundtrack and perverse camera angles and oddly rich and rhythmic backgrounds, this manages to remind you of Metropolis and exist as something entirely new at the same time. This forces you to watch carefully, sucking you in with absorbing imagery and constructing this odd little dreamlike world around you. There are some campy moments, but the dark humor and quick pacing make this something that I almost want to immediately watch again. I've only previously seen one other Maddin movie (Tales from Gimli Hospital which, after reading my notes, I didn't seem to get), and this retains the weirdness and personal filmmaking touches but has lots more story. Nobody makes movies as ridiculous and ridiculously beautiful as The Saddest Music in the World. Special note: Maria de Medeiros is stunning and has the perfect face for a 1920's silent movie. I think it's the eyes.

Here I am, just as stunning:

Knocked Up

2007 romantic comedy

Rating: 7/20 (Jen: 11/20)

Plot: A woman gets knocked up by a loser. Lives are changed.

I didn't like this movie at all. I do sort of like Seth Rogan as an everyman, but he doesn't have enough character to sustain a movie that is far too long. There wasn't much that even scratched the surface of funny, and topical material will keep this firmly in the late oughts even with the timeless subject matter, subject matter, I might add, that is ALWAYS hilarious. I believe this might have worked for two and a half seasons as a television sitcom, but only if it came on right after and right before shows that people really like to watch. This idea of making 'chick flicks' with vulgar humor to appeal to male undergrads is probably a good one though.

Note: Tom Waits makes an appearance on Paul Rudd's character's shirt. It's the cover of Raindogs, the same picture used in one of Jim Carrey's memories in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. That movie is referenced with a movie poster that Seth Rogan's character hangs in his apartment. It's the circle of life!

Me and part of Jen's head:

Grandma's Boy

1922 romantic comedy

Rating: 12/20

Plot: A lily-livered nerd likes a girl. His childhood nemesis, a bully, likes the same girl. In the small rural community in which that title character lives with his grandmother, a tough old bitch, there's a fugitive robbin' and murderin' miscreant on the loose. Cowardly Grandma's Boy joins a group of men who set out to capture the tramp but can't overcome his fear. His grandmother tells him the nutty story of his Civil War hero of a grandfather and gives him a special amulet, and then the movie ends exactly how you think it will.

This is far too typical, and the gags seem at least 85 years old. Gags, like bread, can't survive for 85 years. Harold Lloyd pulls out the whole step-on-a-rake-and-hit-yourself-in-the-face gag. And if I find out that this is the first film that used the step-on-a-rake-and-hit-yourself-in-the-face gag, I will deduct 13 points from my rating and give this a negative rating. This was made a couple years prior to the only other Harold Lloyd movie I know (Safety Last! with the brilliant skyscraper stunts), and seems leagues away and doesn't have any memorable scenes or images like classic silent-era films. Some 1920's charm, but far too much 1920's predictability. It's entirely possible that I'm being too harsh here. This could be better than I think it is. I just can't get that scene with the rake out of my mind.

Here's my right eyeball, laughing hysterically:

Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters

2007 animated comedy based on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim stoner nincompoopery

Rating: 8/20

Plot: French Fry Man, Mister Shake, and Meathead have to combine their talents to stop a destructive piece of exercise equipment threatening the very existence of our world. Along the way, there is are aliens, rap music, more aliens, a sinister guy with bad hair, attempts to woo, roller coaster rides, time travel, and Satan.

Ok, I'm not the audience for this one. For the first 15 minutes, I laughed, especially digging the fake theater public service announcement at the beginning featuring cartoon food both wholesome and hard core. The lyric "Did you bring your baby here? Throw your seed outside!" made me laugh. I also laughed later when one character shot another and said, "Now you're going to hell. Feel the sweet embrace of Satan's hoof across your face." But when I nudged my friends watching the movie with me, I found nobody to nudge. I was completely alone, in a darkened room, an artificial hand down the front of my pants. It was a bitter experience. I injected Diet Mr. Pibb into my jugular, and after feeling no effect whatsoever, injected some between each of my toes. I felt more alone, wept bitterly, put the scissors away. I turned to Bronson Pinchot beside me (sitting a little too closely beside me, but who's complaining) and said, "Feel the sweet embrace of Satan's hoof across your face, Balki Bartokomous!" Alas, only a hallucination! Perhaps the Diet Mr. Pibb was having an effect after all. I paused and leaked and ate everything in the house. The neighbors knocked on the side of my house and yelled, "What's going on in there?" There was a penis joke, and I almost laughed but was too sad to laugh. At least audibly. Despair. Ennui. I drank the rest of the Diet Mr. Pibb and belched loudly. And audibly.

I sort of like the television show, a show which I have never actually seen because I do not have cable television. The spurts of dadaist humor blended with cheaply animated potty jokes works well for ten minutes. The main problem with this is it's nine times as long as the television show. I was entertained for that ten or fifteen minutes. Then, boredom. How about that movie poster though? That's a good one.

Here I am, probably right before I got bored:

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

2006 action

Rating: 12/20 (Dylan: 14/20)

Plot: All of the characters from Pirates of the Caribbean: Give 'em the Rum so's He'll Stop 'is Whinin' return and huddle up to try and remember what had happened to them at the end of the last movie. A wedding is interrupted by arrest, and Captain Jack Sparrow has to find a squid-faced guy's heart so that he can pay off a debt. Then everybody else decides they might as well look for squid-faced guy's heart, too. A giant tentacled sea creature rapes a boat. Sparrow is diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome, but that doesn't stop the cannibals from trying to eat him. In the middle of the movie, the characters have to again conference to attempt to figure out what's going on, and following that, they decide to have a swordfight. CGI-pirates frolick and gesticulate, sometimes in that order and sometimes in the opposite order. The movie ends just in time for the third part of the trilogy--Pirates of the Caribbean: Where'd You Park the Boat, Matey?

I enjoyed the first of the trilogy more than I thought I would and possibly more than I should. I still like Depp's character and visually, this was a lot of fun. The computer effects don't get in the way, used more effectively to paint artistic artificial sets than the action scenes with the giant sea creature or Davy Jones' and his mutants. The story's sort of a mess, really loopy and goopy and scattered and battered, and this lacks some of the charm and fun and creativity of the first movie. Subplots and sub-subplots emerge and muddle things up. Honestly, I'm not even completely sure what's going on leading into the third movie because one character's actions seem contradictory and I couldn't even understand what another character said half the time. The stunts and action scenes in this were over-the-top (the hour-and-an-half sword fight, the escape from the cannibals), but there's enough excitement in this, as well as more than enough attractive imagery, to make this worthwhile.

Note: There are a pair of pirates used for comic effect in this. They're sort of the R2-D2 and C-3PO of the Caribbean. I looked up the one with the artificial eye because he seemed familiar and remembered that he was the guy from The Office (the boring English version, not the superior American one). His first film credit is something I absolutely have to see--The Man Who Fell in Love with a Traffic Cone. Come on!

The Haunting

1963 horror

Rating: 14/20

Plot: Dr. Markway, a researcher in psychic phenomena, gathers together a group to spend several nights in the supposedly haunted Hill House. It's a house with a violent history, described as one character as a "house that was born bad." Skeptical Wally (Beaver's brother), a lesbian with esp, and a woman who may have had experience with poltergeists meet so that they can overact and say witty things to each other. Paranormal activity ensues which gives the four actors an excuse to overact even more. Seriously, just check out the poster to the left. It's motionless overacting. That can't be easy! Based on a Shirley "The Lottery" Jackson novel.

Let me start with this--I hated every single character in this. I hated their voices, their facial expressions, their rapport, their gestures, and (in the case of one woman) their audible thoughts. The story was dopey, and the music score and pacing dated this considerably. In fact, I would have guessed this was produced five to ten years earlier than it was. I'm not good at guessing people's ages either. All faults can be nearly forgiven, however, because of two things: the technique and the setting. The latter, a creepy mansion shown in exterior shots against eerie blueish clouds (note: the movie is not color), is almost a character itself, and camera tricks--puzzling angles, artistic effects, and swooping movement--add to the creepiness of the characters' situation. There's plenty to see in the architecture and decor of the house, and the director Robert Wise takes advantage of all the available sights both exterior and interior. The source of the haunting is never really palpable. The characters and audience never see anything concrete, although I guess they do hear noises and see a rubbery door and feel cool breezes or, in one scene that should have been great, feel something else. So I suppose there's palpability, but it's not the typical scare tactics of traditional horror flicks. Nothing jumps out at you or bleeds or oozes or growls. I don't have much horror film background, and I wonder if The Haunting is unique in not showing the ghosts or monsters or martians or murderers or what-have-you that is threatening the characters. This is psychologically intriguing but ultimately misses. Also important to note: There was a subplot involving lesbianism. No nudity though, Jen.

Here I am with my own special effect:

Woman in the Dunes

1964 drama

Rating: 18/20

Plot: A teacher with an interest in entomology takes a three-day excursion to the dunes to find desert insects and hopefully discover something that will get his name in a book. He misses the last bus and is persuaded by the desert inhabitants to stay with the title character. She happens to live in a rickety shack at the bottom of a sand pit. Upon waking up the next day, he realizes he's fallen into a trap and since he can't get out of the sand pit, has been effectively tricked into having what amounts to a marriage with this woman. Along with the woman, a widow who refuses to even attempt to leave because her husband and daughter are buried in the sands nearby, he has to shovel sand to be lifted out of the pit in baskets. Apparently, it's being sold by the neighbors. He plots various escapes using bondage, futile climbing, and birds, taking breaks only to get himself a little somethin'-somethin' or to get sand out of his crevices.

This isn't erotic or even romantic as the cover seems to suggest. Instead, this works (I think) as a rich, dark, cynical allegorical/metaphorical take on marriage. There's plenty of despair, and I'm not even sure if the ending qualifies as a happy ending. Director Hiroshi Teshigahara ends indeterminately, in a way, and doesn't spell much out. The majority of this is driven by symbols (sand, lots of water, masks, flesh, soap, ladders, birds. . .all working as metaphor), but it doesn't come across as pretentious at all. Instead, it's completely beautiful and engrossing filmmaking. This director's got himself some eyes! Almost every shot in the 2 1/2 hour film is crisp, interesting, beautiful, and at least nearly perfect. The shots of gently moving insects, skin smooth and rough, and especially drifting and shifting sands are breathtaking. It was really difficult to want to move the eyes down to read the subtitles half of the time. Absolutely fantastic cinematography, and I honestly can't imagine a black and white film looking better than this one. "Slow" moments also force reflection like many Japanese pictures seem to do.

Note: I seem to be watching a lot of movies with deserts and/or kidnapping. Simon of the Desert, El Topo, Black Snake Moan, The Collector (this was nearly a reversal of that one except the kidnapee was the collector of insects), The Edukators, The Mummy.

Here I am watching the best movie I've seen this year:

The Beastmaster

1982 fantasy

Rating: 12/20 (Dylan: 10/20 although he said he liked this. I'm not sure the boy understands the rating system. I mean, didn't he see the breasts?)

Plot: A trio of hideously deformed women who apparently left their pants on the set of Macbeth warns Rip Torn and his evil eyebrows that a baby is about to be born that is gonna get all up in his bidness. Rip Torn sends a witch to perform a forty-seven step abortion involving blue Jello, a cow, a fire, cackling, and fingernails. A nosey guy interrupts, awkwardly kills the witch, and adopts the boy as his own. At some point, he's named Dar which, I should note, is Rad backwards. That's not a coincidence because Dar has a truly radical talent--he can communicate and control animals. After his village is slaughtered by Rip Torn's thugs, Beastmaster takes a journey seeking revenge. Well, that and finding some animal pals to accompany him. Oh, and checking out the breasts of naked slave girls.

This was a likable, but dated, fantasy flick. There was so much (especially with the script but also with the set design and cinematography) that keeps this a product of its time. I thought the pre-CGI special effects were great, and the work with the animals was really good. Moments annoyed me (see: the cute ferrets) and moments were unintentionally funny (I had to pause every time he introduced himself with "I'm Dar" so that I could laugh for twenty minutes. . .during some scenes, I had throw in my own "I'm Dar"), but for the most part, this was a fun little movie. Creativity (those cannibalistic robed things and the eye ring were cool) and some interesting shots (mostly exterior stuff but also some interesting mood-aiding set design) make this worth watching.

Note: My wife claimed after hearing about this that I have an obsession with breasts and only watch movies because of the boobs. Little does she know, I actually have a (probably unhealthy) sexual attraction to Dar. Can't fault me for that though! Dar!

I'm not Dar:

Dylan is hiding.

Simon of the Desert

1965 Luis Bunuel half-movie

Rating: 16/20

Plot: Ascetic Simon, after spending six years, six months, and six days standing on a pillar in the desert, comes back to earth into the arms of adoring locals and his mother. He immediately ascends a ladder to another nearby, taller pillar where he continues his prayers, his fasting, his lifting of hands, and his deliverances of words of divine wisdom, sometimes while battling temptation from Satan's breats and/or tongue, and sometimes while standing on one leg. Locals come and go, and a third tempting leads to a startling denouement.

Bunuel, I believe, ran out of money and wasn't able to finish this in a way that would match his artistic vision, hence the brevity. Too bad, because this is an intriguing, predictablably satiric and pessimistic look at religious devotion. Simon, despite appearances and wonderfully portrayed by whoever it is who portrays him, isn't a figure used by Bunuel to make direct attacks at organized (or disorganized) religion, but a complex figure torn between his sometimes fuzzy ideas and the ideas of a modern world. The temptation scenes--Satan incognito as a female, bearded Christ; a moving coffin opening to reveal a right breast--are surreal. The dialogue between Simon and the public is revealing. The humor is typical of Bunuel's work, sort of a subtle wittiness, funny more on the inside than out. The juxtaposition of the final scene with the rest of the movie (a final scene, I'll admit, made me think, "Yikes! This is really stupid!") unfolded into a thing of complete genius. Great use of a bowlegged midget, too! I could easily have watched another forty-five minutes of this one.

Shane of the living room:

The Terror of Tiny Town

1938 midget musical western extravaganza

Rating: 6/20 (But as you know, I apply bonus points for certain features--puppets, nudity, Klaus Kinski, etc. This one got all kinds of bonus points for having handlebar mustaches and midgets. With the bonus points, I'd actually have to give this a 34/20. That is, if I counted it all up correctly.)

Dylan's rating: 12/20

Plot: Bat Haines, a midget villain, is wreaking midget havoc as he plots to take over the midget town called Tiny Town. In midget cahoots with the midget sheriff, he attempts to take advantage of a midget feud between two midget families. It's sort of like a Hatfield and McCoy thing. But a midget version. Meanwhile, the lovely Nancy Preston arrives in town to stay with her midget uncle. The hero, one Buck Lawson (a midget) shares a midget picnic with her shortly after saving her from certain midget death by stopping her out-of-control midget stagecoach. The midget uncle and Buck's midget father gets all up in his midget grill (sort of like a Romeo and Juliet thing...but a midget version) and the midget Bat Haines gets a chance to put his midget plan in action.

The plot, sets, acting, dialogue, action scenes, musical numbers, and almost every other aspect of this movie is typical of really bad, B-Westerns. The only difference is that the film's cast is made up entirely of midgets. And maybe some children. It was hard to tell. The only other movie I've seen with a cast of all little people is Even Dwarfs Started Small which, for my money, is a superior all-midget movie. Most of this one is straight-shootin' although there are some really terrible puns and some sight gags (two midgets playing a bass, midgets walking under saloon doors, Dylan's favorite scene involving a midget chasing around a duck). It's worth the investment just to see the midgets riding Shetland ponies around and for the midget fisticuffs during the edge-of-your-seat climax. Trust me. Movie magic!

Note: The title credits called the cast "Jed Buell's midgets". I wondered if this guy traveled around with a midget entourage. Picture that in your head for a moment. Pretty intimidating stuff.

Note: It seems that almost all of the cast of The Terror of Tiny Town were Munchkins in The Wizard of Oz which came out the following year. At least one midget had a fairly distinguished career. Billy Curtis, who played the hero, acted in over 90 television shows and movies. According to Wizard lore, Judy Garland made reference to the Munchkins as "little drunks," partially because Curtis wouldn't stop flirting with her. I don't know for sure (and neither are around to verify or discredit), but I bet he hit that.

Here's a chronological list of Billy's cinema and television credits: The Hero, Hercules the Midget, Munchkin, Midget, Midget, Midget Judge, Papoose, Bodyguard (in Hellzapoppin'), Midget, Melinda the Chimp, Major the Midget, Midget driver, Eddie a Midget, Midget in Wings, Newsboy, Vaudeville Midget, Midget, Midget, "Baby" Joe (midget), Midget musician, Dugan, Man, Midget Barker, Little Man, Captain Rudolph del Nemo, Mighty Mite, Billy Curtis (midget), Little Man, Makuba (Jungle Jim in Pygmy Island), Midget in Deli, Mole-Man, Midget in Agent's Office, The Laughing Badman, Gino, Clown, Slim (Midget Carinival Employee), Tut, Big Executive, Circus Midget Clown, Damu, One of Hermine's Midgets, Midget at county fair, Midget (The Incredible Shrinking Man), Harry Earles (Midget Actor), Super Pup/Bark Bent, Harry, Charlie McCarthy, Captain Borcher, Martian, Colonel Petite, Mascot, Monk Carter, Danny, Newsboy, Big Mike the bartender, Midget, The Man from Flush, Midget (The Monkees), Augie, Spaceman #3 (The Beverly Hillbillies), Gypsy, El Lobo-Ito, Jack O'Lantern (Bewitched), Small copper-skinned ambassador (Star Trek), Child Ape (Planet of the Apes), Edmund B. Ratner, Johnson, Lucy and Ma Parker (?), Toy cowboy, Arizona (Gunsmoke), Mordecai (High Plains Drifter), Slick Bender, Toulouse, Secret Service Man, Charlie P., Roger Robot (Laverne and Shirley), Menchkin, General Voomak, Little Person, Barnaby, Jack, Elf 2, Teddy's Voice, Reverend Lynch, and Creature. It should also be noted that Billy Curtis was the only person who ever played McDonalds' Mayor McCheese. They got rid of the character after Curtis's death in 1989. I'm thinking very seriously of trying to see as many movies with Billy Curtis in them as I possible can.

Here I am (regular-sized person):

Children of Men

2006 futuristic apocalyptic action flick

Rating: 16/20

Plot: It's the year 2027, and things are looking bleak. There have been no births in over 18 years (which, honestly, might not be such a terrible idea), and the world is collapsing under the weight of all those terrible things doomsayers have warned us about. It's probably the fault of our SUV's and doughnuts and bottled water and the election of a female president and homosexual Teletubbies. Clive Owen's ex-girlfriend, Maude Lebowski, wants him to use his connections to transport a pregnant girl to what might be safe hands in a place that might still have daisies. Along the way, he experiences problems, among them an inability to find a good pair of shoes.

My expectations weren't incredibly high with this even with the recommendation from somebody I trust implicitly. And I generally have mixed feelings about these kinds of futuristic things anyway. With the same cast, budget, script, etc., this could have been absolute junk in different hands. It wasn't exactly flawless anyway (the story is a little clunky and there's too much cleverness), but for the most part, I was floored. The action scenes are among the most realistic and naturally tense I've ever seen. I have no clue how some of the extended, one-shot action scenes (one involving a car, another involving a bus, another involving a siege) were filmed. I don't think CGI is the answer. The choreography, attention to detail, teamwork, and artistic vision involved is mindboggling and really made the movie something special. The bleak landscapes and London's disarray created was stunning. The cinematography draws the audience into the film, and (for better or worse) parts of this almost seem like a video game. I could definitely understand somebody's gripe if they claimed it was too video-gamey. I, however, leaned in and soaked it all in.

Note: I had to turn this one way up due to a combination of a running dishwasher and English accents. I might have hearing problems.

Here I am watching Children of Men:

Zigeunerweisen

1980 avant-garde B-movie

Rating: 17/20

Plot: An intellectual befriends a nomad who may have murdered a woman. They meet and, I believe, fall in love with the same woman. As the years pass, they may or may not get involved with each other's wives. They may even be the same person. If you've ever seen a Seijun Suzuki film, you'll know why I'm having trouble with this one. It's either difficult or I'm a complete idiot. Or both.

As expected, a stylized effort from Suzuki although it isn't the same stylization that made those oddball 60's films (Branded to Kill and Tokyo Drifter) so brilliant. This is so slow moving and so completely Japanese, and it sort of sucks you in, forces you to look around its meticulously-constructed strange new world, and almost hypnotizes you, setting you up for a knockout ending. It's chaos unfolding in slow motion. There are surreal touches (crabs emerging from the private parts of a woman washed up on a beach, all of the characters in the film watching a fireworks show that doesn't seem to exist, rocks falling onto the roofs of houses), but for the most part, everything seems realistic on the surface. Beneath that surface, however, is an entirely different matter. This sort of hit me like a Japanese David Lynch movie. As a matter of fact, the opening scene is a close-up of a record playing (the song is the title of the movie) during a creepy conversation between unseen characters (a conversation that is perfectly duplicated later on) which reminded me of Inland Empire. I believe Suzuki's modus operandi is to keep things open to interpretation; in fact, I think I remember reading something about how he doesn't even want to understand his own movies. In this one, he seems to be toying with the characters a little. It seems to me that the two main male characters might be two sides of the same protagonist, and I'm not sure how many actual female characters exist either, especially since one woman plays at least two different characters. The whole movie could be an allegory that has to do with a clash between East and West cultures. The intellectual and his wife seem more American/European; the wanderer and his wives and lady friends seem more Asian. And then they die or don't die. I'm sure it means something. And that's the beauty of this lovely, sometimes chilling, movie--it's the kind of movie that you can't stop running through your mind. It'll even force you to turn off the cd player in the car on the way to playing disc golf.

Note: This is considered the first of a trilogy (thematic or style rather than characters/plot) filmed after Suzuki was fired from his studio for not making movies correctly. I can't wait to see the others.

Me, directly after my cerebellum was extracted:

Strangers with Candy

2005 comedy

Rating: 10/20

Plot: A prequel to the television show, this follows Jerri Blank from prison as she meets her step-mother, finds out her father is in a coma, returns to high school, tries to fit in, and joins the science fair team in an attempt to get her father out of the coma.

More silliness than you can shake a stick at, but as I feared, this is more like a Strangers with Candy episode stretched into 90 minutes. It's thin. There are a lot of funny moments, mostly (just like the television show) involving Colbert and Dinello's teacher characters or flashes of absurdity (the doctor sliding down the bannister, anything involving the donkey mascot). Unfortunately, I'm not sure this science fair premise would have even ended up being one of the better episodes of the television show. The whole thing seems thrown together and too much like a reunion of a television show instead of a stand-alone movie. There was no time for real character development, and there wasn't nearly enough screentime with the minor characters. Principal Blackman didn't seem himself although the line "We've got over 3,000 students and 12 teachers" was funny. Three episodes of the television show...much funnier. I have to admit though--I could watch the scene where Jerri is watching monkeys on television over and over again.

Here I am mid-laugh: