Audience Member
I saw the Spike and Mike "Sick and Twisted" show tonight with Elissa. This was my third or fourth time to see it, and it was a lot of fun as usual. I didn't see anything new that really knocked me out, though. They showed two of my favorites, "Rejected" and "Here Comes Dr. Tran", but no "Beyond Grandpa" or "South Park" stuff. Anyway It was a lot of fun. There was a cartoon about urinal etiquette that was probably my favorite new clip this year.
I also watched "Rabbit-Proof Fence", which is based on the true story of some Aboriginal girls who were taken from their home by the government in the thirties and escaped from a bording school/concentration camp to walk 1,500 miles home. It was an amazing story and taught me a bit about a history I'm completely ignorant of, but the script could have used a little more awareness of the characters. The three girls seem to be fine actors, but they aren't given much to say or do except advance the plot, leaving me wondering what kind of little girls could actually survive this.
It also got me thinking about one of my favorite things about independent movies: filmmakers are more likely to step back from the demands of the plot and develop characters through dialogue and evoke dense layers of thematic meaning. This relates to "Traffic", which I saw last night, and liked, but it illustrated two things: what I don't like about Hollywood, and why I think stars get paid so much. The problem with Hollywood is that the characters are always just functions of the plot, with no "lives" outside of the immediate action on the screen. This is opposed to characters whom the plot derives [i]from[/i], and though they may only be on screen for 90 minutes, suggest that they will continue on after the lights go up; as Hemmingway put it, what we get from the story is just "the tip of the iceberg", but much more depth is inferred. I think that "specail something" idiot Hollywood reporters are always talking about is the ability of a star (like Mike Douglas in "Traffic") to apply so much personality to an essentially underwritten role that a casual viewer thinks they are seeing a real character, rather than short-hand for one.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
01/15/23
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Audience Member
Well Nate was here since last night. We went over to my friend, Joe's place for movie night. They grilled out, so I just brought pasta and ate that. Nate grilled out with everyone though. The DVD that Joe chose was this [b]Spike & Mike[/b] film festival of animation shorts. Three of us girls hated it!! I had to look away for most of them. They were all way beyond gross, lots of bathroom humor and people getting their heads loped off. Anyway, I wanted to leave early, but Nate wanted to stay even though he was super tired. So I went in the kitchen with Alison and hid out there until they were done. Then we all sat in the kitchen & talked about [b]Harry Potter[/b] and [b]South Park[/b]. So the rest of the night was fun.
Today it was 80f! So perfect! We mostly walked around the neighborhood, enjoying the day. We wanted to rent a movie but we couldn't decide. Does anyone have any suggestions? We almost got that new Steve Martin movie, [b]Cheaper by the Dozen[/b] but for some reason we didn't remember we wanted to see that until we got back home. Has anyone seen that?
Rated 0.5/5 Stars •
Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars
02/14/23
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