For all of you science-fiction fans, here’s Bruce Willis doing his thing in 1997’s The Fifth Element. Click here to watch it for free.
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I don’t understand how Amanda Seyfried keeps landing big parts in major motion pictures. OK, let me rephrase that: I don’t understand how Amanda Seyfried keeps landing speaking parts in major motion pictures – she certainly has the requisite looks. Luckily, this 2010 thriller also stars acting pros Liam Neeson and Julianne Moore. Read my review here, or watch it for free by clicking here.
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11Nov
It’s not easy being a “butt man” in a boobies world. When it comes to flesh and the female form in movies, the breast has always reigned supreme and, as a result, the butt man is often left behind.
So it was with a combination of cautious optimism and scholarly interest that I watched Cheeky!, Italian director Tinto Brass’s homage to the perky posterior. The movie was okay, but Brass’s comments in a DVD behind-the-scenes interview were heartening to all devotees of the derriere.
“I would like to propose myself to television with a program,” said the 67-year-old auteur. “There are some who read your palm. I’d like to go there [television] and read your ass. I would like to call it Not Just Vagina. Can you just imagine the success?”
Like any connoisseur of the caboose, Brass gave a great deal of thought to the subject of his movie before the cameras rolled for Cheeky! The director cast Ukrainian actress Yuliya Mayarchuk in the pivotal role of Carla, a young Venetian who learns that cheating on her boyfriend adds spice to their previously lackluster love life. In Mayarchuk, Brass found a willing accomplice toward his goal of shedding light on the psychology of modern women.
“Each woman is the ass that she has,” Brass says. “Actually, in addition, the ass is the mirror of the soul; in this specific case, it’s the mirror of that gorgeous Slavic soul, Yuliya Mayarchuk, who’s the lead actress of the movie.”
Although Mayarchuk was an acting unknown when the film was released in 2000, Brass had a hunch that her moon was about to rise. “She’s very good-natured, she has a great temperament, and she has a very cute little ass,” said the aesthetically minded filmmaker. Brass’s intent with Cheeky! was, first and foremost, to advance the cause of feminism through the character of Carla: “She’s a modern woman who is fully aware of her sexuality and sensuality, and of her right to enjoy it without subduing herself to a chauvinist mentality,” he said.
Just as that other cinematic giant, Alfred Hitchcock, inserted himself into his own films via cameo appearances, Brass inserted himself, and his finger, into both the movie and his young starlet. This occurs during a scene crucial to the plot in which … well, all right, perhaps the scene isn’t crucial to the plot. But Brass was intent on exploring bigger issues:
“It’s an old habit, a fixation of mine, a belief that in order to discover women’s lies, all you just have to do is look at their ass. Because, as opposed to the face, which is a hypocrite mask capable of faking and lies, the ass doesn’t lie.”
Or, to paraphrase the Eagles, you can’t hide your lying ass. Grade: B
Director: Tinto Brass Cast: Yuliya Mayarchuk, Jarno Berardi, Francesca Nunzi, Max Parodi, Mauro Lorenz, Leila Carli, Chiara Gobbato Release: 2000
Above, director Brass gives star Yuliya Mayarchuk a pointer on method acting.
Watch Trailer One (click here) or Trailer Two (click here)
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11Nov
by Cyril Hare
A gathering of hoity-toity Brits is cut off from the outside world by a snowstorm, trapped in a decrepit manor house as a clever killer picks them off, one by one. Thank goodness an eccentric little “foreigner” is on hand to save the day. If that sounds a lot like Agatha Christie, well, that’s because it is. But if you find this kind of piffle irresistible – and I confess that I do – you can do much worse than An English Murder.
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Post-election thoughts, because no one else has an opinion about politics, and the world is dying to hear mine:
- I’m not so much thrilled for Democrats — they are full of crap on too many issues — as I am relieved at the prospect of no Mitty Rich. Republicans now know how I felt in 2004, when it became apparent that there would be four more years of Bush.
- Fox’s Bill O’Reilly and Charles Krauthammer blamed the hurricane for Romney’s “momentum halt.” Since hurricanes are deemed acts of God, I assume that means God wanted an Obama win.
- O’Reilly, who claims solidarity with “the folks,” can’t understand the little guy’s temerity: “Obama wins because it’s not a traditional America anymore,” Bill lamented, adding, “People want things.” Imagine that. The “folks” apparently harbor a radical belief that Romney and the super-rich shouldn’t own everything.
- Big business, which for years has been whining that “uncertainty” prevented it from adding jobs, can finally stop fretting. Now it has certainty: four more years of Obama.
- It was nice to see Florida still undecided when the election was called. If ever a state deserved to be irrelevant in an election, it’s Florida.
*****
HLN’s Clark Howard and Ryan Smith discussed the recent hurricane and the hardship it caused East Coasters who were temporarily forced back to the “Stone Age” of telephone landlines. “It felt so old school,” New Yorker Christy Claxton told the New York Times, “like we were back in 1998.”
I don’t own a cell phone. Never even used one. Just call me Gwump.
*****
“It’s what Denny would have wanted.”
*****
We here at Grouchyeditor have a soft spot for the female derriere. Apparently, American Horror Story creator Ryan Murphy, who is gay, has a related weakness.
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I didn’t care for this movie (read my review by clicking here). I thought it had an intriguing premise, mixing science fiction with social commentary, but then degenerated into typical, teen-oriented action fare. But hey, what do I know? It was, after all, nominated for Best Picture. Click here to watch it for free.
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Office Space For anyone who works — or worked — in the soul-sucking confines of a corporate cubicle, this Mike Judge comedy is a must. Its deadly accurate depiction of the white-collar workplace has the makings for one depressing movie, but thanks to its ensemble of instantly recognizable office drones (standouts are Gary Cole as an unctuous, passive-aggressive boss, and Stephen Root as a mumbling milquetoast), it’s much more likely to make you laugh than cry. Release: 1999 Grade: B+
*****
The Bay What’s great about the movies is that the good ones suck you in and make you forget that everything you see is make-believe. The problem with most “found footage” movies is that the jerky camera, grainy film, and improbable edits are jarring reminders that everything you see is make-believe. So it is with The Bay, which is unfortunate because its premise — pollution-generated, flesh-eating parasites invade a seaside Maryland town — is timely and believable. Director Barry Levinson, who knows a thing or two about making movies the old-fashioned way, should have done so with this one. Release: 2012 Grade: C
*****
Kids An “after school special” from hell, Kids depicts one day in the life of some NYC teens who drink, drug, and screw their way through life, spreading AIDS and respecting only peer pressure. The lone role model on display is a grizzled taxi driver; other adults are either apathetic or missing in action. Kids was heralded as a wake-up call to society back in 1995; I have no idea whether anyone actually woke up. Release: 1995 Grade: B+
*****
Gut This low-budget horror film poses a provocative question: Can television viewing habits lead to actual violence? Nicholas Wilder, playing a disturbed loner who introduces his only friend to the lurid attraction of snuff movies, gets my vote for Creepy Friend of the Year. But there is a fine line between building suspense and moving at a snail’s pace, and Gut, with too many lingering close-ups and a plodding story, is undermined by its sluggish momentum. Release: 2012 Grade: C-
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“Why do you have to put [CNN’s] Ali Velshi in Atlantic City hour after hour after hour after hour, with him being blown around by the wind? I think it was a CNN executive, off-camera with a gun to his [Velshi’s] head.” — Michael Moore to Piers Morgan
I’d be less than honest if I didn’t admit to experiencing a bit of schadenfreude watching TV reporters clinging to lampposts and getting drenched during hurricane coverage. It’s especially fun to see big-name anchors like Anderson Cooper and Erin Burnett take a soaking. And who could forget Al Roker’s memorable reporting during Hurricane Wilma (below)?
In related news, CNN relied heavily on “iReporters” — a term I have come to loathe — for storm reports. Hey, “iReporter,” you are not an Apple product and you are certainly not a journalist. You are just some schmuck with a camera.
Mitt Romney was also concerned about storm victims. I’m sure Romney has rich pals who suffered damage to their multi-million-dollar vacation homes, and that is certainly tragic.
*****
I recently watched something called Twins of Evil, a 1971 horror flick. I am convinced that the main vampire was played by Jimmy Fallon. Yes, I realize that the movie is 40 years old, but you be the judge: In the pictures below, which is Jimmy and which is the movie bloodsucker?
*****
Just in case you haven’t yet seen this little girl doing a superb job of expressing America’s mood, click here.
*****
I don’t do much tweeting. I don’t really understand the appeal of Twitter. Several years ago when I first registered at the site, I posted a tweet that mentioned, in passing, Justin Bieber. Apparently my reference popped up on a Twitter search engine because on the following day I got my first group of “followers” — a gaggle of teenage girls. I figured that was better than no followers. Alas, when the teen girls somehow wised up to the fact that they were now following a middle-aged doofus (me), they promptly unfollowed me. I can’t explain why, but this abandonment depressed me.
*****
Meanwhile, on Survivor …
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02Nov
by Sarah Caudwell
Caudwell’s characters inhabit an odd-but-arresting literary universe. Time-warp a clique of Edwardian aristocrats to 1980s London, engage them with casual sex and lots of snarky-yet-sophisticated banter, and you have a good picture of Caudwell’s protagonists, a quartet of young barristers who decipher a murder mystery under the tutelage of “Hilary,” their middle-aged mentor. In real life, you’d likely want to deliver a swift kick in the pants to these self-satisfied twentysomethings, whose every comment is cloaked in irony, sarcasm, or snobbery. But in Caudwell’s clever hands, they’re amusing, rather than annoying.
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