The second week of President Barack Obama's (yeaaaaah, it feels good, doesn't it?) tenure in Washington left a few less casualties than usual in Hollywoodland. Unless you count Steven Adler, but his exploits on Sober House were technically filmed a few months back.
It was mostly a week for celebration, as Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie unveiled their finest work yet, two nauseatingly adorable children, to the entire graduating class of a Japanese photography school.
But it was also five days of serious social commentary, courtesy of Ashlee Simpson and Kim Kardashian.
So without further drawn-out teasing of content that will ultimately be more succinctly stated than its lead-in, here are the top five things we learned this week:
5. Whether Tyler Perry's films offer something unique for an underserved demographic or actually pandering nonsense is debatable. But what's not up for argument is that someone should raise Jim Varney from the dead and give him some of Medea's royalties.
4. Jennifer Aniston likes to pretend getting naked on the cover of a magazine that sophisticated men jerk off to is somehow more noble than displaying airbrushed areolas for a publication less discreetly aimed at teenage boys and male divorcees. Then, again, what do you expect from a woman who's first major film role was in Leprechaun?
As that gleaming behemoth Hollywood slouches towards irrelevance, the winds of change must begin to blow in from somewhere. And where better than the so-called blogosphere? Like the polit-o-blog revolution, the great pitches of tomorrow ain't going to flow from the bloated butthole of some Hollywood hack, but rather from the proletariat. So welcome to NCDSUV's newest feature, The Slow Pitch, where we play a little game of would-be screenwriter wish-fulfillment. And viva la revolución!
Gentlemints, today I have an idea for you that's so funbelievable, that's so fuckcredible that you'll be shitting your brains for a millennium. Now, this being tax season and all, I've been having my CPA look over the books. Here's the thing: Did you know that after you ignore all the creative accounting, the only flicks that made bank last year were all those Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer joints? You know, [Blank] Movie, and you can fill in the blank with whatever: Disaster Movie, Epic Movie, Date Movie, Meet The Spartans,uh, Movie. And so on.
When I got the news from the number freak, I flipped my lid collection. But right as I was about to pass out, an idea so monumental came to me that it can only be the product of divine intervention. Or a combination of orgasm and a lack of oxygen. But, you know, either or. And that idea is:
Guy Ritchie may have made out like a cockney-accented pulp-movie bandit during he and Madonna's divorce settlement. But she's heading back to the States with their two little tots, Rocco and David.
Or at least that's the word on the street. But it's been raining all morning and the sidewalk-chalk isn't really legible anymore, so who knows.
But presuming this information is accurate, one hopes Ritchie will be making occasional custody visits to ensure the safety of their tiny innocents. Because although it's a little known fact, Madge maintains her tightly wired figure and muscularity by draining the life's blood out of cute young boys in a scared Kabbalah ritual.
What do you think explains her relationship with Justin Timberlake?
Welcome to one of NCDSUV's favorite daily features,
where we acknowledge another turn of the calendar for a member of
Hollywood land, even if it's a celebrity who often goes overlooked by
the rest of the blogosphere, and regardless of whether we have a huge
affinity for their body of work.
Yesterday, we did some private investigating and discovered Tom Selleck turned 64, and today we made good on our French connections and unearthed it to be the big day for a guy with great acting genes who's anything but a hack.
Here we go with another ridiculous Films From The Cable Afterlife. As usual, we scour the cable movie listings and turn up some diamonds, and lots of the rough. For best results, watch both. Your life may improve! 8. Mystery Of Monster Island (1981) Fox Movie Channel, Wednesday, February 3, 4am Unbelievable pile of crap by Juan Piquer Simon, one of the worst directors of the 20th century (he's also responsible for X-rated chainsaw slasher Pieces, MST3K fodder Pod People and K-Tel Films release The Supersonic Man). How a major studio found their way around distributing this one is anybody's guess (a series of blowjobs, perhaps), but you will never see Terence Stamp look more embarrassed. Watch if you dare.
7. DOUBLE FEATURE ALERT Pumpkin Karver (2006) The Movie Channel, Saturday, January 31, 12am Pumpkinhead (1988) IFC, Saturday, January 31, 1:35am The stars have aligned: two pumpkin-related horror movies back-to-back on the same night. Different networks, but still, work with me here. Friday Night Lights' Minka Kelly stars in the serial killer/Juggalo-style horror dumper Pumpkin Karver, while Lance Henriksen conjures up a demon to kill bikers in Stan Winston's minor classic Pumpkinhead. It's "Pumpkininny!"
6. Booty Call (1997) Cinemax (@MAX), Sunday, February 1, 8:05pm; Cinemax (WMAX), Monday, February 2, 6:50pm; Cinemax, Tuesday, February 3, 8:30pm Boisterous, offensive and couthless, Booty Call is actually one of the funnier comedies of the late '90s, and deserves another look. Jamie Foxx and Vivica A. Fox (playing characters named Bunz and Lysterine, respectively), join Tommy Davidson, a fake Indian guy, a dog that barks "Nigga Please!" in subtitles (and one Gedde Watanabe, willing to take any role no matter the stereotype, saying "Nigga Preese" in a Chinese restaurant), some hilarious orange pants, an incident with Saran Wrap as dental dam and some dude named Ug Lee. There's no one who won't be upset in its 79 minute runtime, but I don't think it'd work any other way. Watch it and pick your jaw up off the floor.
5. Ladies And Gentlemen The Fabulous Stains (1981) Turner Classic Movies, Saturday, January 31, 2am I hope that now this one has finally made it onto DVD, and not from some bootleg version that's been duped a thousand times from a Betamax that caught it on Showtime in the '80s, that we can see this legendary unreleased film for what it is: kind of a stinker. Still, there's never been anything like it before or since, and it's a fun time with a message. Teenagers Diane Lane and Laura Dern start a makeshift punk band that lands an opening spot for the fake real punk band The Looters, featuring Sex Pistols Steve Jones and Paul Cook, The Clash's Paul Simonon and fronted by actor Ray Winstone. They create a media circus and have it all collapse on them within days, but it's a good enough time, also starring Fee Waybill from The Tubes and a special (awesome) appearance from Black Randy and the Metrosquad. Join the professionals!
The rumor runnin' round the old cherry-blossom tree today is that Jennifer Aniston turned down $4 million dollars, with built-in sales incentives to pose for Playboy. Because the Viagranator himself, Hugh Hefner, dug her semi-nude airbrush fest in GQ late last year.
Of course, the news that Hughey missed is that the former Mrs. Brad Pitt will apparently only undress under the naughty guise of faux-sophisticition. Hence the subtly positioned tie around her abusively spray-tanned frame.
And am I the only one who occasionally stares at tabloid covers of America's reigning sweetheart and wonders how we come to romanticize one-time desperate Hollywood scream queens so quickly?
(And as an aside, notice how blatantly that hyper-linked trailer for Leprechaun rips off the promotional campaign for cult classic Evil Dead.)
Welcome to one of NCDSUV's favorite daily features,
where we acknowledge another turn of the calendar for a member of
Hollywood land, even if it's a celebrity who often goes overlooked by
the rest of the blogosphere, and regardless of whether we have a huge
affinity for their body of work.
Yesterday, we swore we weren't no joke to hip-hop legend Rakim, and today we whip out our Magnums for a steamy night of celebration with a mustachioed '80s sex god.
It is because I am filled with love and gratitude for David Cross that I must savage him like a wild beast tearing apart a carcass. Yes, call me a cruci-verbalist, because I've got some cross words for this actor/comedian. As Freud notes, we must kill the ones we love in order to overcome them. And the ever-watching paternal eye of Cross gazes out at me from the screen as I watch Mr. Show and Arrested Development. Or when I hear the Daniel Stern-like lilt of his voice as it whispers out to me from the Nick-At-Nite reruns of Oliver Beene, the greatest entry in Cross' oeuvre, a shining... wait. What the fuck. Oliver Beene?
OK. Cross has been in a stinker here and there: Alvin And The Chipmunks, School For Scoundrels, She's the Man, Men in Black II, Scary Movie II, Dr. Doolittle 2, Small Soldiers, etc. He's a working actor, and as I've detailed before, unless one is independently wealthy, one takes shit jobs to survive. The problem with Cross isn't so much that he acts in crap, but rather that he's so brutal in his criticism of other Craptors ™. No. That's a terrible portmanteau. It sounds like feces-contaminated dino DNA from Jurassic Park.
I haven't seen this much fervor over the glimpse of a newborn baby since Jesus emerged from a pile of divine afterbirth. But alas, the regally christened Knox and Vivienne, kin of ones Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, have surpassed the fascination with Suri Cruise and become a point of obsession for paparazzi and pop-culture obsessives.
And finally, the little tots were unleashed before the salivating lenses of crafty cameramen.
You can view the pics here. Some folks are saying they're adorable. I personally don't get suckered into the ideology of infant adorableness by default. You gotta work for my kiddie kudos. Or at least develop into a toddler without regressing into something akin to, well, the father himself toward the conclusion of Benjamin Button.
As the kind of white, bourgeois jackass so famously captured in Weird Al's "White & Nerdy," I'm about as much Tyler Perry's demo as Gleeb-Kra, my tentacled friend from Dimension 12. Yet, cynical hucksterism and naked commercialism transcend race and class lines like a love of fudge or mozzarella sticks, or fried fudge sprinkled with cheese bits. And when as in the case of Medea Goes To Jail, when your most iconic character Medea starts sharing movie titles with the Ernest franchise, something has definitely gone beyond the pale enough where pale pieces of shit like myself feel the eternal critical duty to stand up and scream into the void. Know what I mean, Vern?
Like the Bush Administration, I ignored all the signs of terror... until it was too late. As Perry flew his latest vehicle into my eyes, the aesthetic center of my brain collapsed. And yes, conspiracy fuckwads, the melting temperature of aesthetic cognitive modules is consistent with the NIST reports of my neuro-meltdown. However, as my brain fell apart, the history of black cinema flashed across the horizon, and while I can understand Perry's ascent, I cannot condone the shape it's taken.
