Wednesdays Movie Mashup No. 34

Rachel increased her lead last week with movies she's never seen, but often gets confused - I'll have to get her to explain that one.  

Last week's clue:  Two air traffic controllers battle to see who's the best while a washed-up pro athlete gets 

encouragement from one of his students to try again.   

Answer: Pushing Tin Cup

 

Leaderboard

Hatter - 14

Rachel - 5
James - 4

David, Nick - 3
Dylan - 2
Sebastian, Andrew, Andy  - 1

New clue: A crazy scientist is sucked through a vortex and emerges in the time of the dinosaurs where he meets a young married girl, unhappy to be stuck in Japan while her husband takes pictures. 

 

The goal is to figure out the two movies who overlap in some words creating a new movie described by the clue.  Leave your answer in the comments. Good luck! 

King of Pain Blogathon: Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants

Over at The Dark of the Matinee, Hatter's been watching some movies from his wife's "shelf of doom" (which since I probably like most of them, I take issue with his choice of description).  One of the original movies to be voted on was the tween-film The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants somehow didn't make the final cut, despite my trying to cram the voting box.  So I thought I'd add a short review, though definitely not as painful as perhaps Hatter might have found it.

First, though a story about a dress in college.  I had a really diverse group of friends, and among the seven of us, we broke down into the tall and the small.  It didn't really break down along ethnic lines and was more of a continuum, but it would be damn near impossible for the same pair of jeans to fit two of us, let alone four of us like in the book/movie.  One day, Alexa's mom mailed her a cute stretchy black dress from a chain store.  When I got home from class everyone was throwing the dress around trying it on and it looked TERRIBLE (really terrible) on everyone.  So of course I had to take my turn and try on this awful dress.  In a strange twist of fate, it was made for my body shape and height, and hangs in my closet still.  This is to illustrate that I don't find the premise of this movie - that a single pair of jeans (not even a stretchy dress) could fit four different girls - even a little bit believable.  However, I don't think it matters to the actual story of the movie.  It's just a gimmick to show you the four girls in different places during their summer vacations.   Writing letters might have done the same thing, but they sent each other the pants and documented the stuff that happened while wearing them (Oh, and they didn't wash them, ewwww!).

The movie stars Alexis Bledel, pre-"Gossip Girl" Blake Lively, Amber Tamblyn and a pre-"Ugly Betty" America Ferrera as friends whose mothers were once in a lamaze class together and thus their children become friends.  They're now in high school and going separate ways for the summer - Bledel to family in Greece, Lively to soccer camp in Mexico, Ferrara to visit her Dad's new family in the south and Tamblyn to stay home, make a movie and work at a dollar store.

Bledel falls for an unsuitable boy and blames it on not learning to speak Greek. Lively sleeps with a coach at camp and blames it on an absentee father and deceased suicidal mother.  Ferrara hates her white dad's new family and blames it on her ethnicity.  Tamblyn makes her film, falls for a cool guy, makes a new younger friend who is also sick.  Only Tamblyn's story is interesting and worthy of screen-time, but even then it's barely better than an afterschool special.  The others are all just whiny teenage angst, some sluttier than others.

I know this movie wasn't made for me.  However, I have read all the books, also not meant for me, and there was some good source material that did not translate to the screen well at all.  The girls come across as whiny rather than lonely, slutty rather than screwed up emotionally, and mostly just annoying.  The sequel is almost exactly the same, though they did solve some of the problems of the first one, but created more problems for the sequel.  Thankfully they won't be making a third.  Yes, painful if you're an adult.  Probably pretty great if you're a tween girl.  I loved The Baby-sitters Club in my day, but I'm sure my parents would have HATED it. Same thing here.

Reel Insight Episode 52: Frances McDormand and Nick

Nick from Random Ramblings returns for a terrific guest spot.  He caught up on all the Lynchian goodness that is Twin Peaks, as well as bringing a pretty great knowledge of McDormand's films.  Check it out and let us know what you think at reelinsight at gmail.com

New Movies with Frances McDormand:

City by the Sea - I really liked Robert DeNiro in this one as a cop whose estranged addict son, James Franco, kills a drug dealer.  McDormand plays his distant girlfriend who's ready to call it quits, but he needs her to get through the crisis.  3.5/5 stars/lambs

Johnny Skidmarks - No, this doesn't involve poo in underwear, but rather crime scene photography and creepy mysterious McDormand.  She plays a not quite all there recovering alcoholic who befriends Peter Gallagher's Johnny.  He thinks she's the one who put a head in his freezer, but it is much more complicated than that.  Not good, but closing in on so bad it's good.  

Primal Fear - This was one of those movies that I avoided because the title sounded scary.  It's just a legal drama, and a damn good one with a pretty terrific twist.  Richard Gere plays a defense attorney who is all about the money and being famous, but something about Edward Norton gets under his skin and he wants to defend the innocent.  McDormand has a small role as the psychiatrist trying to figure out if Norton is crazy.  Great movie.  4/5 stars/lambs

Paradise Road - This was one Netflix has been recommending for ages and ages.  Makes me wonder what Netflix thinks of me.  It's a very sad and depressing movie about women trying to survive the Japanese occupation during WWII.  They go through very rough conditions, and McDormand plays a German Jewish doctor who escaped the Nazis but found the Japanese.  Glenn Close and Jennifer Ehle also star.  It's got lots of good moment of strength and optimism during war, but it's also determined to show the brutality of their captors which was hard to watch, even though it's based on a true story.  3/5 stars/lambs.

Wednesdays Movie Mashup No. 33

Last week James raced to the win, moving up with Rachel at 4 correct answers.  Well done James.  


Last week's clue: A group of high school students live out a Shakespearean comedy while their older counterparts discover the secretive matchmaking ability of the internet.


Answer: 10 Things I hate About You've Got Mail

Hatter - 14

Rachel - 4
David, James, Nick - 3
Dylan - 2
Sebastian, Andrew, Andy  - 1

New clue:  Two air traffic controllers battle to see who's the best while a washed-up pro athlete gets encouragement from one of his students to try again.   

 

The goal is to figure out the two movies who overlap in some words creating a new movie described by the clue.  Leave your answer in the comments. Good luck! 

Reel Insight Episode 51: Tom Hanks

 This week was a lot of fun, and brought back a lot of memories of 80s comedies and movies I loved as a kid/teen.  Oh, and then it turns out we were also reviewing a two-time Oscar winner.  We also finished the first season of Twin Peaks (next week Episodes 9 and 10), and discussed Super 8.  Enjoy!

New movies with Tom Hanks this week:

The Man with One Red Shoe - this is a strange but really funny spy movie.  Dabney Coleman is a CIA agent who had a mission go wrong in Morrocco.  His boss, Charles Durning, wants to kick him out, but he needs proof he screws up.  So Durning gives him a red herring of a "spy" coming to town who can expose what happened in Morrocco.  Tom Hanks becomes this spy and we follow him and look at his life - but Coleman's a really bad agent and keeps ALMOST giving it all away (he changes all the fixtures in the bathroom and in a very funny moment we watch Hanks attempt to brush his teeth with shampoo and flush the toilet with the shower).  Good, if dated, comedy.  4 of 5 stars.

The Ladykillers - There's not a lot to say about how bad this movie is.  The Coens had an epic fail remaking a movie about digging through a tunnel to rob a bank, and having such baffoons (Tom Hanks as Col. Sanders?) trying to do it that it all goes wrong.  Terrible.  If you want a good bad bank robbery, try Mad Money.  1 of 5 stars/lambs

Bonfire of the Vanities - I've been told this is a terrific book, but if you like the book, you hate the movie.  I've never read the book, but this wasn't a terrible movie, just a really really complicated one that didn't need to be.  Hanks is a banker having an affair with Melanie Griffith (who is awful).  They're in a hit and run that Bruce Willis exposes and gets Hanks arrested as a white defendant in the Bronx to prove equality.  It's NOT a funny movie, and there are lots of characters that don't really matter, but watching Hanks' moral dilemma about going to the police is pretty great.  3.5 of 5 stars/lambs

Guys of the 90s: It's a TIE!

I'm going to leave it as a tie too - because choosing will cause the universe to implode (says Hatter) and I don't want to intrude on Kano's bracket starting tomorrow so I'm going to declare a tie.  Leave a note in the comments if you think one of them seriously deserves it more.  Otherwise, the Guys of the 90s most iconic are:

Brad AND Leo!!

Congratulations guys, and thank you to everyone who participated in the voting, and thanks to Dylan and Mrs. Fletch for all their contributions to the choices and seeding!  

Happy Father's Day!

In honor of Father's Day, I thought I'd post a little list of the most memorable movie dads from my movie-viewing experience.  They're neither great men but all make for interesting parents. (Yes, I stole from a list I made several years ago).

1. Clark W. Griswold - National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation - This is one of my family's favorite movies. And very few of the lines we like are Clark's. However, I'm always struck watching it how much Clark loves his family and wants them to have a "Big Old Fashioned Christmas".

2. George Bailey - It's a Wonderful Life - George had his moments as a bad father, yelling at his daughter to stop playing the piano, but we all know that ultimately he came to appreciate his family and being a dad.

3. Don Corleone - The Godfather - He's not just a Godfather, he's also got 4 children of his own. He definitely has favorites and really shouldn't have spoiled his daughter the way he did, but he still puts family first.

4. Lester Burnham - American Beauty - Lester may not have realized he had the chance to be a good father until it was too late, but at least he realized that his daughter was pretty amazing and that the last images that when through his head as he died were about being a dad.

5. Henry Jones - Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade - Perhaps an uninvolved dad at the beginning, he helps his son find the Holy Grail and eternal life. What more can you ask for in a dad?

6. Marlin - Finding Nemo - Marlin swam the seas to save his son from an aquarium. He learned new things about himself and things that would interest his son (sea turtles live over 150 years!). He came through and ultimately proved he could be a good dad, without being too controlling or smothering.

7. Mac MacGuff - Juno - There aren't too many dads that would take in a teen pregnancy without yelling and being disappointed in the daughter he raised like Mr. MacGuff. He still asks how his daughter is doing and helps her choose people to take the child. I admire him each time I see the movie.

8. Darth Vader - Star Wars Episode IV,V,VI - Definitely one of the most memorable fathers, even if his part in raising the children was zero, he ultimately make huge sacrifices for his children.

9. Atticus Finch - To Kill a Mockingbird - Probably the best representation of a father that cinema has ever shown us. He's honest, caring, honorable, and intelligent. It doesn't get much better than Atticus Finch.

10. Richard Hoover - Little Miss Sunshine - I know this one is kind of a stretch, but I liked that the dad decided to support his daughter's ambition to be in the Little Miss Sunshine pageant. He even cares enough not to let her compete. He's the overzealous dad that supports even when he should be a better dad and say no from the beginning, but at least he gets there in the end.

Guys of the 90s - FINALS: Brad Pitt (1) vs Leonardo DiCaprio (2)

Well this is it.  The final match up.  Seems fitting - the NBA finals and Stanley Cup were both played this week - only appropriate that we'd decide which Guy of the 90s had what it takes to be our Champion.  Will it be half of Brangelina?  Or will it be Martin Scorsese's muse?  Neither of which were true in the 90s.  Think back and dwell upon who was the "IT" guy of the 1990s.    I'll announce the winner Sunday morning!


Leonardo DiCaprio - 90s Highlights: What's Eating Gilbert Grape, Romeo + Juliet, Titanic

Brad Pitt - 90's Highlights: Thelma & Louise, Legends of the Fall, 12 Monkeys, Fight Club

poll by twiigs.com

Reel Insight: Episode 50 - The Anniversary Episode

I can't believe I didn't post an update about this - please forgive my forgetfulness in the midst of birthday shenanigans.  This was so much fun to record and prep for - lots of talk about what we've learned and where the show has gone in the past year.  We get through three more episodes of Twin Peaks and talk about X-Men: First Class.  But then the real retrospective starts.  Also, the surprise for this episode is no Quoteable Quotes, but a game with prizes - send us your guesses by June 30!!!

Oh, and how awesome is our new logo?  Rachel's friggin' amazing!

Guys of the 90s - FINAL FOUR: Leonardo DiCaprio (2) vs Johnny Depp (1)

As expected, Pitt made it to the finals!  Now we get to see who joins him.  I was hoping this match up would occur since I just saw Who's Eating Gilbert Grape for the 49th episode of Reel Insight, and they co-star.  They've both been nominated for Oscars, without a a win, but who is the icon of the 90s that could stand up to Pitt?!


Johnny Depp - 90s Highlights:  What's Eating Gilbert Grape?, Edward Scissorhands, Benny & Joon, Donnie Brasco

Leonardo DiCaprio - 90s Highlights: What's Eating Gilbert Grape, Romeo + Juliet, Titanic

poll by twiigs.com

Wednesdays Movie Mashup No. 32

Nick's moving up the leader board!  Well done.

Last week's clue:  Two couples investigate

 a long ago homicide which parallels their lives which luckily means they don't have to find dry land in the f

uture, like some other kooky characters.

Answer: The Weight of Waterworld

Leaderboard
Hatter - 14

Rachel - 4
David, James, Nick - 3
Dylan - 2
Sebastian, Andrew, Andy  - 1

New clue: A group of high school students live out a Shakespearean comedy while their older counterparts discover the secretive matchmaking ability of the internet.
 

The goal is to figure out the two movies who overlap in some words creating a new movie described by the clue.  Leave your answer in the comments. Good luck! 

Guys of the 90s - FINAL Four: Brad Pitt (1) vs Keanu Reeves (2)

We're almost at the end - this is the first of two final four matchups.  Pitt has defeated Billy Crudup, Michael J. Fox and Denzel Washington.  Reeves has taken down Guy Pearce, Matt Damon, and Will Smith.  Pretty even matchups to reach this point - but who will emerge as the Guy of the 90s for the final?


Brad Pitt - 90's Highlights: Thelma & Louise, Legends of the Fall, 12 Monkeys, Fight Club

Keanu Reeves - 90s Highlights: Point Break, Speed, The Matrix

poll by twiigs.com

Guys of the 90s - Round Three: Johnny Depp (1) vs Patrick Swayze (6)

Well, in a bit of a surprise our second number one seed gets knocked out and Jack Dawson advanced.  I think Castor called it correctly - Titanic was a HUGE film.  Today's matchup is the last of round three and will fill out the FINAL FOUR.  Will Reeves Point Break co-star join him in the finals or will it be Gilbert Grape?


Patrick Swayze - 90s Highlights: Ghost, Point Break, To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar

Johnny Depp - 90s Highlights:  What's Eating Gilbert Grape?, Edward Scissorhands, Benny & Joon, Donnie Brasco

poll by twiigs.com

Guys of the 90s - Round Three: Tom Cruise (1) vs Leonardo DiCaprio (2)

It took a little longer but Keanu eventually took out Mr. Smith.  Thanks for coming back and clearing up the tie - who knew that would happen?!  Today matches up two men who couldnt' be more different on the screen, but both definitely have achieved some sort of icon status to be remembered.  What does their 90s catalogue say to you?


Leonardo DiCaprio - 90s Highlights: What's Eating Gilbert Grape, Romeo + Juliet, Titanic

Tom Cruise - 90s Highlights: Mission Impossible, A Few Good Men, Jerry Maguire

poll by twiigs.com

A tie!

I'm going to leave the voting open for one more day in the Smith/Reeves match since it ended on a tie.  Go make it worth it!

Guys of the 90s - Round Three: Will Smith (1) vs Keanu Reeves (2)

Brad Pitt becomes the first in our FINAL FOUR round of the Guys of the 90s.  So far Smith has taken down Clooney and Tim Robbins while Keanu took down Guy Pearce and Matt Damon.  Pretty impressive 90s resumes both, but who will make it to the final four?

Will Smith - 90s Highlights: Bad Boys, Independence Day, Men in Black

Keanu Reeves - 90s Highlights: Point Break, Speed, The Matrix

poll by twiigs.com

Guys of the 90s - Round Three: Brad Pitt (1) vs Denzel Washington (3)

Another blow-out, and Patrick Swayze takes down Eddie Murphy.  Sorry this is a day late - my shifts have been changing at work without control.  The first contest of the third round pairs two of the best actors on the list (in my humble opinion).  And they're damn fine-looking men.


Denzel Washington - 90's Highlights: Malcolm X, Philadelphia, The Hurricane

Brad Pitt - 90's Highlights: Thelma & Louise, Legends of the Fall, 12 Monkeys, Fight Club

poll by twiigs.com