Movies We Saw This Weekend and The Fog.

Ms. Fog shown through the lens of my inabilities.

On Saturday, while wandering through Noe Valley with Toby, I tried to take a picture of how weird it really is especially given the angle as to how we often see it, spewing in overtop our town, coming in as if it’s telling us to Go. To. Bed. Now. I’d like to take this moment, before I babble on and on about the number of movies we watched this weekend (again), to somewhat miserably try and capture just how weird this fog really is. I mean, it’s REALLY weird. I could live here a million years and still probably never get used to its weirdness. And for those few folks who are actually FROM here and who may have never seen life through unfogged eyes, I’m here to tell you that Weather? She ain’t normally like this. She ain’t totally mystifying (in more ways than what’s obvious) she ain’t this predictable yet at the same time so unbelievably mind-boggling and spooky.

And now for the movies.

1). Gerry: This was definitely not the feel-good movie of 2002. If you can “gerry the rendezvous” long enough to get through it, the film will haunt you for days to come. I still can’t get the sounds out of my head. It’s like the scene in the Utah salt flats has been literally BURNED on my brain. This movie is to brain what garlic is to mouth.

2). The Cooler: Why is it that William H. Macy plays the roll of the “down-on-one’s-luck” guy all the time? Throw the brother a bone! Give him a place to put that love! And then there she was. Billy Baldwin hires the sexy blond from NBC’s ER into giving him some Vegas Vagina in order to keep his best cooler from leaving the now-failing Shangri La. Knees were broken, as well as hearts and wallets, deals and debts, arms and mirrors. The movie was just below o.k. Especially because of the last 2 minutes.

3). Open Water: First, I must veer off track. I recently noticed that this movie has a great number of movie posters tied to it. There’s this one and this one. There is this one and this one as well.

Now for the movie. The conflict is oddly similar to the one in GERRY. Replace sand with saltwater, video games with career, and a marriage with friendship and you have the same plot-line. Both parties willingly put themselves into said position. Both parties find themselves stuck in the middle of nowhere with no idea which direction as to is out.

OPEN WATER combined my fear of of the ocean (which I have nightmares about constantly) and my fear of waking up alone. And I don’t think I really began to appreciate it until later that evening at 4 in the morning when I found that I couldn’t sleep within the comforts of my bed, beneath the sound of wind and fog beating outside my window. In then end, regardless of the many negative words written by the nation’s most respected critics, I genuinely liked this film. I really did.

4). Porn Star: After feeling totally helpless and sort of sad, I figured Ron Jeremy and his 9 and 3/4 inch schlong would cheer me up. So we rented PORN STAR. It was entertaining. I feel sort of bad for the guy, I have to admit. And I don’t care how many girls he had to have sex with in less than 4 hours, nothing could be more terrifying and impossible and daunting than being surrounded by a hundred drunk frat boys. That scene was truly x-rated.

5). The Magdalene Sisters: Girls who are considered to be “whores” in a correctional convent. Give me jail any day. Money-hungry nuns driven by the rules of Catholicism can scare the Jesus out of or into anyone. This movie is about being trapped as well. It was only o.k. It’s hard when you’ve seen so many movies new ones start to seem formulaic. Even the ones that are based on true events. Excellent acting, however.

6). Veronica Guerin: Like peanut butter and jelly, two things that go well together, Joel Schumacher and Jerry Bruckheimer pair up and become the cinematic wonder-twins. But leaving all CSI and Prime Time jokes aside, VERONICA GUERIN was a great film. Truly. The acting was superb.

And here’s a picture of a dude taken from a bus on our way to see OPEN WATER.

10 Comments

  1. Dubstyle and I saw the preview for Open Water at the theatre on Saturday. Those two minutes freaked me out more than M.Night Shayamalan’s four movies put together.

    The Village was gay.

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  2. We considered sneaking in to see The Village after Open Water ended because I don’t want to give M. Night Mcshittypants any more money to further his movie-making career. But we didn’t. I would like to think that I will never ever see that movie, but I know that I eventually will. Because I have no will power. I’m such a follower.

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  3. while I’m curious about the village, Ebert’s review of it makes me extra skeptical.

    if you read nothing more of it, skip to the last two paragraphs.

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  4. Holy shit! I’m two sentences in and already I’m like “No, he di-hnt!”

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  5. That is funnier than anything I have read or seen all day. It’s funnier than Will Farrell pretending to be Bush on whitehousewest.com. (Ok, maybe not that funny, but really funny). Out of all honesty, this guy bugs me so much that this weekend I told Toby that I am seriously considering starting a petition asking that M. Night Shitasticman NOT be allowed to make LIFE OF PI. Who’s with me?

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  6. we’ve seen it, and if nothing else,
    it’s pretty. so is bryce howard.

    but the story is …eh.

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  7. Now THAT – would give me nightmares.

    I just can’t bear to think of what he’ll do with Life of Pi. He’s so bloody heavy-handed with the subtlety, and all.

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  8. Did he put himself in this movie as well? I’m curious. Anyone? Cameo? Anyone?

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  9. I think he’s a lousy writer, but he does set up some pretty shots. I have hope that he would find an interesting way to tell “Life of Pi.”

    But yeah, I fear it will suck. Especially if it’s marketed as “M.Night Shayamalan’s Life of Pi” or even more preposterously “M.Night Shayamalan’s The Lifeboat” with tiny letters saying “based on Yann Martel’s Life of Pi”

    I’m wondering if Ebert’s review has some subtle clues in there about the secrets he’s not supposed to reveal … for example, the way “Those We Do Not Speak Of” is increasingly abbreviated, and that trope about going backwards/rewinding. There’s some sort of motife of wasting/returning in his review. It would be too funny if he were in fact mocking the movie with its own secret.

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  10. Yep, he’s in it. But I think that’s all I should say about that. I’m good at spoiling stuff, without realizing I’m spoiling stuff.

    It’s the appearance we do not speak of.

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