Saturday, July 28, 2007

Relationships Are About Compromises

This weekend, the Fiance and I both had our sights on movies we wanted to see. We agreed that Friday we would go to his, and Saturday to mine. That way, if the movie was horrible, at least the other person got to see the movie they had their heart set on.

The Fiance wanted to see Sunshine. This Sci-Fi flick is about our dying sun, and seven astronauts on a mission to "restart" it with a bomb, thus saving Earth. Cillian Murphy was the lead, and was pretty believable as a pale physicist. I enjoyed that they didn't do any character development. I usually I require it, but because the plot was about saving all of humanity, I didn't really need to know the backgrounds of each freakishly young scientist. The themes were appropriately set-up, the actors were fantastic, and the special effects were amazing. I thoroughly enjoyed this film, even after it took kind of an odd and creepy turn at the end. Things came around full circle and I left feeling The Fiance had spent his money well.

Tonight we saw mine - I Know Who Killed Me. WOW, that was a HORRIBLE movie. The Fiance could not have said it better than when he said, "Until tonight I thought Battlefield Earth was the worst movie of all time...now I know that it's not".

We had a strange encounter on the way in. The guy taking our ticket smirked and said inappropriately loud, "Oh, you're seeing I Know Who Killed Me?". When the movie was over, it was clear he had said this for his co-workers benefits. The theater employees screen the movies ahead of time, and he KNEW we were going into a train wreck. I guess he needed to share the pain of being forced to see it by mocking those of us who paid for the privilege.

The movie began abysmally. The acting was terrible and Julia Ormond had a mustache. Do I really need to say more? Yes, I do. This film was an opportunity for graphic torture and gratuitous stripper scenes with Lindsay Lohan, who was barely out of her teens (she was actually 19 when filming began). Her parents had to be super proud when they saw her gyrating on a pole and humping the floor in garters. This is really hard to write about because it would be easier in list form...there's just so much!
  • The torture scenes were made more disturbing than they already were by Ms. Lohan making her "oh my gosh, I'm in a lot of pain" sounds more like sex noises.
  • The torture tools were made out of blue glass, which broke when dropped on the floor, yet Lohan used it to hack off the killers hand in about 15 seconds.
  • Everything associated with the killer was blue...but then again so were the high school colors, and her boyfriend kept giving her these ugly blue roses. The Fiance said his mind kept thinking the killer was auditioning for the Blue Man Group. He was wearing a blue mask, but it wasn't obvious there was a mask until the end...so he just looked blue.
  • I don't have the stomach to go into this in detail, but there was some cheese ball story about twin stigmata...which, like most aspects of the storyline, was not adequately explored and explained (thank goodness, it would have made the movie longer).
  • Lohan's characters answer to her finger mysteriously falling off was to proclaim that "only rich people go to hospitals", duct taping it to a sink and then sewing it back on with thread.
  • The FBI agents were SOOOOO hokey - screaming at her during their investigation, "TELL US WHO CUT YOU!" (This after she had been tortured for three weeks and had her arm and leg cut off).
  • The FBI was unable to link very clear similarities between the teen aged murder victims, yet this 18 year-old hooker/stripper solved the case in about a week...and, incidentally, she also learned to walk on a prosthetic leg in one day (come on...please just put a different shirt on her so we don't realize how improbable it is for this to happen...but then again...she's also a crime-solving genius, perhaps she's skilled in learning to use prosthesis as well).
  • The Main character's alter ego, Dakota, tracked the original character by following the noises of an owl, who happened to sit in the same spot for 4 or 5 hours while the killer was digging, and then while the chick with a prosthetic leg tromped through the woods.
  • The title is I Know Who Killed Me...yet oddly enough, nobody actually got killed.
I can't do this any longer. It's late, and I don't want to waste any more time on this film than it deserves...oh, that would mean that when the ticket taker smirked we would have gotten our money back and scurried across the street to Oberweis for ice cream (which we did after the movie).

Some alternate titles to I Know Who Killed Me:
  • I Know Who Took My $17.50 (Lionsgate Entertainment)
  • I Know Who's Not Getting An Oscar (Lindsay Lohan)
  • I Know Who Watched The Last Screening Right Before She Relapsed (Lindsay Lohan)
  • I Know Who's Parents Exploit Her (Lindsay Lohan's)
  • I Know Who Feels Betrayed By The Film Industry (me, The Fiance, and the other 10 people who were in the theater with us)
  • I Know Who Doesn't Believe Blue Glass Can Cut Off A Hand (me)
  • I Know Who Really Wishes She'd Waxed Her Lip (Julia Ormond)
Sadly, the most exciting part of the film is when we saw the credits, and I gleefully proclaimed, "oooh, they had puppeteers!"

Monday, July 23, 2007

Celebrity Sex Tapes

I was reading on a shameless celebrity gossip blog today that Kate Moss (supermodel) is scared that her recent ex, Pete Doherty (cracked out rocker and troll) is going to sell their sex tapes for money/drugs.

Here's my question - will there ever come a time that celebrities realize that if there is a tape of them having sex, it WILL find it's way to the public? Also, it's slightly repulsive that after a sex tape is released the "victim"/performer is catapulted to stardom.

A brief list of the celebrity sex tape "scandals" (again, I say this loosely because these scandals are often the best thing to ever happen to these B-listers).
  • Pamela Anderson and Bret Michaels
  • Rob Lowe and two 16-year-olds (gotta give the guy credit for making a comeback the way he did)
  • Pamela Lee and Tommy Lee (Pam will not learn her lesson. It's ironic that her future husband, Kid Rock, is on the list, but not with her)
  • R. Kelly and a 14-year-old (which did not catapult his career, but he also didn't do time)
  • Paris Hilton and some dude and a bunch of chicks
  • Colin Farrell and a random Playboy bunny
  • Kim Kardashian (not famous, but rich because she's friends with Paris and her dad is loaded) and Brandy's little brother
  • Kid Rock, some chicks, and Scott Stapp (the lead singer of a kinda Jesus rock band that beats his wife - clearly, an all around classy guy)
  • Tom Sizemore (but he probably leaked it and I don't think anyone really cares)
So yeah, some of those people were already stars, and some of the tapes were released with little fanfair. Setting aside the grossness of these tapes being great PR, I return to WHY would you make a sex tape if there was a risk of it being watched worldwide? Go have sex, or make a tape and then destroy it IMMEDIATELY if you really need to validate yourself by watching it.

Ok, I think that's all I needed to say.

Thursday, July 19, 2007

Back In Action

I'm back. I finished my class and have decided not to go to law school. It really came down to me not wanting to be a lawyer. The experience was hugely formative and has helped me gain a lot of confidence in my giant brain. :)

Anyway, a couple things on my mind...
I am distracted beyond reason over this NFL player that got busted for dogfighting. I've purposely not looked at any news stories and have accidentally seen a couple pictures that were quite upsetting. Seriously, who does this? I realize it's a huge business, but how could someone have a soul and treat an animal this way? I don't really have much more to say on this subject because it's too upsetting for me to delve into further, and that really doesn't make for an interesting blog entry.

I bought a scooter (or, as the fiance would say, a death rocket). I've always wanted one since I was a kid, and this law program made me appreciate life a lot more (ever want to work down a list of things you want to do in your lifetime? Law school will get you started because you have no life while there...a red scooter was on my list).

I finally got the final approval from the fiance the night before taking him to the airport for a 10 day conference/trip. I called him at 7 pm that night to let him know I had found one. His response: "I haven't been out of town for 12 hours and you've already managed to make this scooter thing happen!" Yeah, well, when I put my mind to something...

That's the exact model to the right. It's kind of funny, I met a new neighbor today and he asked about the scooter. He said he noticed I'd gotten one because I was bent over working on it (probably the back storage compartment installation. I usually don't read directions and am quite successful, but this thing was impossible...I spent an hour on my own, then 15 minutes following the manual). He was driving with his wife and said out loud, "Niiice". She thought he was referring to me bent over my scooter...but then he explained he was talking about the shiny red bike. Yeah, can't wait to meet her.