Hey, it’s LaGrange time!

What were my choices?

What Happens In Vegas – Y’know, I’m sure I’m as starstruck as many of my non-celebrity brothers and sisters out there. That being said, if Ashton Kutcher and Cameron Diaz came to my house and offered to put on this show in person in my backyard, I’d be hiding out in the bathroom until they left. They would leave, wouldn’t they?

Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian – I didn’t like the original Narnia movie when I watched it on a washed-out bootleg DVD a couple years ago. Also, I am prejudiced against talking lions.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall – STILL NO!

Iron Man – Okay!

So, I was feeling a little Paranoid. I felt the Hand of Doom upon me, the War Pigs were on TV, and the night was buzzing like an Electric Funeral. I was wearing sneakers, as everyone knows Fairies Wear Boots.

Agh! Out, Black Sabbath’s second album track listing! Trouble this review no more!

Let me start off by saying Iron Man’s director Jon Favreau annoys the bejeebus out of me. I haven’t seen any of his other movies, but I have seen far too much of Dinner For Five, his questionable series on IFC. I was going to try and find a choice clip on the YouTube of Dinner For Five to assist me in conveying the essence of this show that rubs (actually, scrapes) me the wrong way. But by searching for a clip I was watching Dinner For Five. My eyes burned. They burned! In short, no clip for you.

I don’t like Dinner For Five, and I don’t need to justify my strong dislike of Dinner For Five to you chuckleheads. Okay, just a little. Dinner For Five is a horrible Hollywood circle jerk (usually taking place, appropriately enough, at a round table) full of pontifications and fuckhead cigar smoking. There are lots of people who have appeared on this show that I respect and/or admire. These people are not the problem, although they may have made the questionable decision to appear on the show. The show is the problem. And Jon Favreau is at Ground Zero of the show. He calls movies “pictures”. He smirks. He smokes cigars. He calls movies “pictures” while smoking cigars and smirking. I DON’T CARE IF I AM COMING ACROSS AS UNREASONABLY HATEFUL TOWARDS JON FAVREAU. Fuck that guy (but in a nice, back-handed Hollywood kinda way)!

In Favreau’s defense, a friend of mine saw an interview with John Frankenheimer from a couple years ago where Mr. Frankenheimer talked in a very similar manner to Favreau. So, perhaps it’s not Favreau himself that I find issue with, but some sort of shitfuck Hollywood filmmaker archetype that grates on me.

Deep breath.

Okay. Iron Man. It wasn’t a badly-made movie, so kudos to Mr. Favreau for that.

I got into the theatre early and saw the Hi – I’m – Samuel – Jackson – and – we’re – going – to – be – coming – out – with – an – Avengers – movie – in – 2011 little teaser at the end of the earlier showing of the movie, so I didn’t need to wade through fifteen minutes of end credits to see it again. I did stick around for the end of the film for the little bit of Black Sabbath, but from what I could discern there was no Ozzy singing! It was just the “I AM IRON MAN” thing followed by the instrumental end of the song. What a gyp.

I did not like this movie. Bob Downey was fine in the lead (I call him “Bob” when I do impressions of Favreau speaking about making the Iron Man “picture” — yes, Favreau annoys me enough that I mock him by doing ongoing impressions of him with a buddy of mine). I do love me some Jeff Bridges, though he had the unfortunate burden of playing a likable character that illogically morphs quickly into a Snidely Whiplash kinda guy. Yes, Gwyneth Paltrow, Terrence Howard and Stan Lee were all in this movie. Do you want me to list the stuntmen, too?

I dunno about the movie. It’s just, man this movie was so militaristic. That shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone, I guess, given the trailer with Iron Man shooting rockets, etc. But still, the whole movie felt like weapons porn. The only solution to violence is making something that is more efficiently violent. The bodycount surprised me. The destruction surprised me. Some of the antagonists were centered in Afghanistan. Hey, don’t *we* have ongoing military operations in Afghanistan? I don’t know, the whole movie felt kind of shitty. I didn’t like it.

I never really liked Iron Man in the comics, but I had nevertheless wanted to see the film. I was into the Marvel comics as a boy, and definitely had a fair amount of Iron Man issues that I had read. The villains were often boring, and an indirect expression of American xenophobia or paranoia. There was the Mandarin (China), and Titanium Man and the Crimson Dynamo (Russkies!). The only Iron Man issue I remember wholeheartedly liking was when he went back in time somehow with Doctor Doom. Do I need to remind you of the huge pile of shit Doctor Doom was turned into in a previous Marvel comics film adaptation? I certainly I hope I don’t.

What is Tony Stark? Tony Stark is Bruce Wayne without the craziness. What is Iron Man? Iron Man is Batman without the theatrics.

What is The Dark Knight? The Dark Knight is the summer movie that will shove a rocket down Iron Man’s tin pantalones. ka-BOOM!

A person such as myself is always looking for the Citizen Kane of shitty movies. I thought I had a decent chance to hit Rosebud tonight at the LaGrange.

What were my choices?

Forgetting Sarah Mar…

Oh, forget about it. I was here to see one movie, and one movie only.

88 Minutes!

You may or may not know the plot of this film. Al Pacino plays an extremely wealthy, poofy-haired forensic psychiatrist that is constantly badgered on his cellphone, where some voice-modulated knucklehead says he has eighty-eight minutes to live. Pacino’s character is also a professor who does not have the common courtesy to set his phone on vibrate during class when he is getting menaced by voice-modulated knuckleheads.

Apparently the knucklehead is not aware that most cellphones usually come prepackaged with some form of timekeeping mechanism, and that’s it not necessary to constantly remind Pacino of the time as it elapses.

“You have seventy-six minutes.”
“Sixty-four minutes.”
“Sixty-six minutes. I’m sorry, I mean fifty-six minutes.”

At the start of any cheap movie I subject myself to, I’m usually poised for the first sign that a movie is undeniably bad. This sign came rather early in the film, when an attractive woman, a conquest of Pacino’s from the night before, is shown brushing her teeth. Naked. While doing some sort of yoga pose with one of her legs pulled over her head. Hubba hubba?

Now there’s good bad and there’s bad bad. I’d say 88 Minutes falls squarely in the middle of that range.

I don’t mind the premise of the film:

1) Something bad is going to happen to a character played by Al Pacino
2) It will only take 88 minutes of time for that bad thing to happen

When you set up an impending catastrophic event within a limited timeframe, that can immediately create a sense of urgency and excitement for the viewer. For example, the Johnny Depp film Nick Of Time operated within a limited timeframe where Depp’s character had to accomplish something or a terrible thing would happen. The running time of the film actually corresponded to the events transpiring in the narrative. Wait, wait. I’m giving a bad example. Nick Of Time was terrible. Did you know that Johnny Depp’s character *wasn’t* named Nick O’Time? How much cooler would the movie have been if that were the case?

So here’s the first problem with this movie. 88 Minutes has a running time of… 108 minutes. I see some dork has posted on the Trivia section of this film on the IMDB that from the time Pacino gets his first threatening phone call, it’s eighty-eight minutes until the end of the film, including the end credits. Including the end credits? What the fuck — you think you can count the end credits? The guy who wrote this horseshit is the same stoner who bugs you to watch The Wizard Of Oz with Dark Side of the Moon in the background. Give him some Cheetos and send him on his way.

This film reminded me of Michael Mann’s Heat due to the appearance of some common actors. Amy Brenneman reminded me of her shitty romantic subplot with Robert DeNiro’s bankrobber character, and Al Pacino reminded me of the shitty parts of Heat with Al Pacino in it.

There were many, many red herrings, with a multitude of tired characters cycling through implausible motivations and actions. Why again did that motorcycle leather guy appear in Pacino’s apartment stairwell, pull a gun, and promptly get shot by the killer who was also in the stairwell for no particular reason? Oh, because it was in the script. I get it now.

Why did the killer blow up Pacino’s Porsche before the eighty-eight minutes had elapsed, which could have very well resulted in him dying before he was supposed to? Oh, because it was in the script. And trailers are better with explodey things. I get it now.

I was hoping Al Pacino would get more and more Pacino crazy as the movie progressed, but I was sadly disappointed. The most scenery-chewing thing he did was angrily throw a cellphone. But damn, what a fine cellphone thrower he is.

I decided I’d head out to the LaGrange on this cool yet ridiculously humid night to see a movie.

What were my choices?

Forgetting Sarah Marshall – That’s okay, I don’t know her to begin with.

Shine A Light – A documentary on the Rolling Stones by Martin Scorsese. I have a strict rule. I only watch documentaries on the Stones where-

• Someone is stabbed by the Hell’s Angels
• The Stones sue to prevent its release because they are embarrassed by their behavior
• They are upstaged by the Who.

Sorry, Marty!

21 – I think I first saw the trailer for this back in early 1992. After the forty-seventh time of seeing the trailer I got so excited about the hijinx of Kevin Spacey and his merry band of MIT pranksters, but then when I saw it thirteen more times my interest finally waned.

The Forbidden Kingdom – Let’s go!

For the record, I have no idea what the hell that big scary face is supposed to represent.

Okay, first, some setup.

I don’t have any bills on me, so I stuff a handful of quarters into my pocket and hop in the car. I drive into LaGrange and am surprised to see a carnival setup in the downtown area. Carnivals make me happy. I like all the pretty lights, what can I say?

I mosey up to the theater and see the price is $3.50. I think, “Did they raise the price?” I had thought the new price was $2.50 — I knew the price had gone up, I just remembered wrong. I didn’t have enough quarters with me. I feebly asked the guy in the ticket booth if I could charge the ticket (I couldn’t!). I then sprinted up to an ATM, got some cash and managed to still get back in time before the film started.

Were you worried just then? That was not just dramatic license on my part. That whole series of events actually happened.

Anyways… The Forbidden Kingdom. I knew very little about this. As the credits start rolling, I see the Action Choreographer is Woo-ping Yuen. Woo-ping Yuen has choreographed a lot of Hollywood movies (Crouching Tiger, the Matrix trilogy, etc.). Even if Forbidden Kingdom turned out to be rather chokey, I had some confidence that there would be some nicely-done fight scenes.

Incidentally, Woo-ping Yuen is also an excellent director – he has directed one of my all-time favorite action movies, Wing Chun. He’s got plenty of other good ones as well — Drunken Master, Twin Warriors, etc.

So Jackie Chan and Jet Li are the big names in this movie. From what I can tell, they haven’t really worked together before, so I’m assuming this was a coup to someone somewhere. I was interested in seeing how the goofiness of Chan would mesh with the more matter-of-fact style of Li. At about the middle of the film, there’s a nice, extended fight scene between the two. I thought to myself, “It’s all downhill from here.” And I was right!

Chan and Li each play two roles in the film. Chan is an old geezer who runs a pawn shop in the present day, and also plays a drunken kung fu master in Ye Olden China. I appreciated the nod to his Drunken Master films.

Li plays a monk, as well as the Monkey King, an immortal being who lost his staff, which must be returned to him. Li had some pretty styling hair as the Monkey King, making him look like a primped-up Captain Kangaroo.

Oh, I neglected to mention the star of this movie. Hold on. Lemme look up his name. Ahhh. Michael Angarano. He plays a kung-fu movie-obsessed dweeb in the present day who finds a staff in a pawn shop, is told he needs to return the staff to its rightful owner, then falls off a building into ancient China.

When he gets to China, Chan and Li accompany him on his trip to get the staff back to the Monkey King, and improbably teach him how to fight along the way.

There’s a little problem. The actor looks like a young Sean Astin (y’know, Rudy). The audience is meant to identify with him. As the group nears their destination, his character starts sporting a little ponytail.

Think about it. Sean Astin with a little ponytail. Rudy with a little ponytail. Samwise Gamgee with a ponytail. This is who I am supposed to identify with?

Fuck the Monkey King and his staff, I don’t want any part of this stupid adventure.

Hey, hey, hey, let’s visit the LaGrange.

What’s on tap for the 9:00-ish shows?

Juno – Seen it!

The Bucket List – Seeing this movie isn’t on my bucket list, nor will it likely ever be.

Fool’s Gold – Ooh, another Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson romantic comedy. I think the fact that I watched How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days on an airplane with the sound off gives me the right to skip this one.

The Bank Job – Sure, let’s go!

So there’s a few plot threads being woven in and out throughout the duration of the film, but essentially The Bank Job is a story about a group of people led by Jason Statham who rob a bank in England, and then proceed to extricate themselves from several sticky situations that arise from robbing the bank. It is based on a true story, or as the movie’s tagline puts it, “The true story of a heist gone wrong… in all the right ways.” YEAH!!!!! (that YEAH was sarcastic, by the way).

Based on the previous movies I had seen with Statham (the mind-numbingly goofy Transporter movies, the sort-of okay Jet Li vehicle The One), I was a little surprised that this movie was rather understated, with little violence or action. But there were lots of boobies. Plenty of boobies.

Statham sported probably the most comprehensive set of facial stubble I have seen since the films of Sergio Leone. Unfortunately, I did not sit through the end credits to see if a Stubble Wrangler had been employed.

An actor who played a cop in the first couple seasons of the British series Prime Suspect has a reasonably large part in this movie as, um, a cop. But he’s a bad cop! Take that, pigeonholing casting directors!

Overall, this movie was a little long, a little overcomplicated, a little light on action. But everyone talked British, so that’s something, I guess.

Cheers!

So this was my first trip back to the LaGrange since the ticket prices were raised a staggering seventy-five percent. Having only three single dollar bills in my wallet, I reached for quarters out of our change jar (okay, I had a twenty dollar bill too, but I didn’t want to break it).

With the stakes raised so high now, what were my choices tonight?

Untraceable – Looks like another crappy torture porn movie. Plus, it wasn’t playing tonight at the 9:00pm show, because Theater 2 was featuring “Live Comedy”.

The Bucket List – You’re not expecting me to sit through this, are you?

27 Dresses – When I was contemplating seeing a movie last week, I would have chosen this over Untraceable — which honestly isn’t saying much.

Juno – Woo, an Oscar-winning “indie” comedy!

It was nothing but the best for Juno — Theater 1, in all its curvy splendor. Live Comedy had to suck it in Theater 2 tonight.

So, I actually sat down for this movie with some trepidation. Was there a Diablo Cody backlash still in progress? Would I be another screeching voice in the anti-Diablo chorus if I criticized the movie? Or had the backlash recoiled already, and we were in the midst of a backlash to the backlash — a Diablo Cody resurgence, a Diablo Cody Renaissance?

I didn’t know, but I felt like I should be sensitive about the crap I would be saying. Then several minutes into the movie, this line is uttered by a cashier played by Rainn Wilson:

“This is one doodle that can’t be un-did, Homeskillet.”

Thank you for this shitty line of dialogue, which completely absolves me of any snarky thing I spew about this movie.

It’s not like the script was awful or anything. It just wasn’t good. The dialogue really ventured into overcutesy unrealistic pop culture nonsense from time to time. And there was a really terrible scene where Juno gets an ultrasound, where the technician makes some out-of-the-blue ridiculously offensive statements and Juno’s stepmother responds in an unrealistic diatribe that would never be uttered by a person on this planet.

I’ll say that Diablo Cody deserved an Oscar for the screenplay in the same way that Crash deserved its Best Picture Oscar a couple years ago. They both deserved the awards because the Oscars are in no way an indicator of excellence. I’m sorry if I’m being unfair to Crash — I did see only a few minutes of it, a horrendously acted scene between Brendan Fraser and Sandra Bullock. Perhaps all the other minutes of Crash were manna from heaven.

Anyways, I’m happy to report that the screenplay, which again wasn’t awful, and which again wasn’t remotely good either, was not the most annoying thing about Juno.

Oh lord, the music. The music wouldn’t stop. And they used so much music I liked. “I’m Sticking With You” by the Velvet Underground; The Kinks’ “A Well Respected Man”. They used some Belle and Sebastian songs, a Buddy Holly song, even an Antonio Carlos Jobim song. These songs were UNEARNED by the filmmakers. Because you have a boring movie where little happens does not give you the right to paste over every goddamn transition with a catchy song. You didn’t earn it. You didn’t EARN it.

I was actually hostile to the lesser-known songs of Juno, just for the fact that I felt the songs that I *did* know were treated so shabbily. Now see what you did, Juno? You turned me against indie rock! For shame, Juno. For shame.

There are only a few more days left before the LaGrange Theatre mercilessly jacks its ticket prices from two dollars to three fifty. So, I thought I might as well try to squeeze one more cheap movie out of them before the next time I want to patronize their establishment, when I will have to choose to either feed my family or celebrate le cinema.

What were my choices tonight for 9-ish features at the LaGrange?

No Country For Old Men – I actually saw this in a first-run theater, and didn’t feel like watching it again.

I Am Legend – I saw this one at a first-run theater too! What the hell, am I a cinematic butterfly or what?

National Treasure: Book of Secrets – Alright, I’m game!

Wow, is Nicolas Cage looking sexy or what?!! No? Okay, sorry.

So, I must confess I was actually looking forward to seeing this movie a bit. Despite my self-loathing, schmuckish self, I actually kind of enjoyed the first National Treasure movie. I mean, it was kinda silly stupid, and I wanted that Riley Poole dweebo sidekick to get hit by a meteor, but I had fun watching it.

In addition to this, a major role is played by Jon Voight, who was something like a patron saint at the Davis Theater, the cheap moviehouse in my old Chicago stomping grounds. Don’t believe me? Hey, the truth is out there — I even made a bar graph about the man.

There was actually a brand new Goofy cartoon that preceded the movie. Guess who hates Goofy? Yes, you’re right! It’s me! Now please don’t misunderstand me — I greatly admire a movie studio willing to devote time and resources to bring the public an original work of animation. It’s definitely an artform to be cherished. But… I hate Goofy! Eff you, Goofy!

We then slide into the movie, which starts in the past, in the days following the end of the Civil War. We see an ancestor of our protagonist Ben Gates translating a page from John Wilkes Booth’s diary, and blah blah blah, Lincoln is shot, Gates’ ancestor realizes the person he is translating for is a member of some nefarious treasure-hunting organization (it was called Kentucky Fried Chicken, or something remarkably similar to KFC) and tries to destroy part of the diary, only to be shot by the KFC man.

Back in the present day, Ed Harris shows up with a page of the diary to interrupt Ben Gates’ (Nicolas Cage) stupid lecture about Lincoln, brandishing a missing page from Booth’s diary. Because the name of Gates’ ancestor is written on the diary with other Lincoln assassination co-conspirators, people immediately assume that Gates was the mastermind behind the assassination. This is supposed to be the motivating factor … y’know what? I’m done recounting the plot. It’s stupid. It’s a stupid, stupid plot. Do you want to know how stupid the plot is? The screenwriters that are attributed to this movie are listed in the credits as “The Wibberleys”.

So, in the end after a lot of hokum and nonsense, they end up finding a golden city under Mount Rushmore. Somehow this proves that Gates’ ancestor didn’t help kill Lincoln. I’m sure it’s all very logical when you diagram it all out.

Here’s some random observations.

Ed Harris is the bad guy in this movie, but he seems to wildly vacillate from being a noble man and a dickhead. I realize there are noble dickheads out there, but his nice and dickish parts didn’t seem to fit together well — it was more like the director said, “Ed, in this scene you are Jackson Pollock on a bender!” Or, “Ed, you’re in mission control talking to the guys up in the Apollo 13, and you have a styling flat-top haircut!”.

Ed Harris has some henchmen that follow him around for part of the movie. One guy’s sole purpose seems to be to pull people from their car so he can get in, drive and crash into things.

In this movie, we get to meet Ben Gates’ mom (and the elder Gates’ ex-wife). So, Gates’ dad is played by Jon Voight. Who are they going to get to play the mom? Why it’s none other than Helen Mirren, celebrated British actor and star of Prime Suspect, a detective series I have been frantically Netflixing! I didn’t know whether to feel happy or sad for her role in this movie, so I chose to feel nothing. I FELT NOTHING.

Harvey Keitel, who had a relatively small part as an FBI-agent-who-is-also-a-Freemason in the first film, also makes a small appearance in the sequel. In the original movie he flashes a little subtle Freemason jewelry, but as he is introduced in this movie, I believe the man is wearing Freemason suspenders. I’m not kidding.

So the movie ends and I decide to sneak over to catch the last few minutes of No Country For Old Men. When I had seen it the first time, the ending kinda confused me. It seemed a bit abrupt and stupid. I did confirm, yes, the ending is a bit abrupt and stupid.

The next review I do from the LaGrange will cost me $3.50! Please donate any spare quarters to the Two Buck Schmuck fund, to allow us to continue the richly entertaining commentary you have come to expect from this hallowed blog.

Excelsior!