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Where in the World is Osama bin Laden? Vegas? Chicago?


This Week's DVD Releases / The Pajiba Staff

Chicago 10: Inexplicably, Bret Morgen’s documentary Chicago 10 slipped under the radar here — we don’t actually remember it getting a theatrical release. At any rate, Dustin saw it at Sundance in 2007, and wrote, at the time that it “was daring, radical, engrossing, and only tangentially educational. Basically, Morgen weaves together archive footage of the ‘68 Chicago riots with an animated recreation of the trial of the Chicago Seven, focusing largely on Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, William Kunstler, and Bobby Seale. In doing so, Chicago 10 provides a brilliant counter-illustration to our relative passive opposition to the current war, in the hopes of inspiring this generation to do something about it other than mutter under our fucking breaths. It’s effective, too; I was ready to march on the capital steps myself, at least until the next movie started and I forgot all about Chicago 10.”

Made of Honor: Of this Patrick Dempsey wedding film, Agent Bedhead wrote, “Take every wedding-oriented romantic comedy that you’ve ever seen and pluck out each well-worn cliché that you can possibly imagine. Then, use a shiny, pastel ribbon to tie all of them together into a fragrant, utterly extravagant bouquet, and, while standing directly in front of the most pathetic bridesmaid, toss the bouquet right over your shoulder. See what sticks, and you’ll somehow end up with a more interesting story than the latest romcom from a cast member of ‘Grey’s Anatomy.’ Made Of Honor manages to shuffle awkwardly through a predictable, seemingly endless laundry list of cinematic bridal stereotypes — the Scottish wedding theme complete with bagpipes and haggis, the fat bridesmaid (Emily Nelson) who squeezes into a size 8 dress, and the last minute horseback ride to the church — without any sense of imagination. It’s just yet another fairy tale where no one learns a lesson, yet all live happily motherfucking after.”

Redbelt: Prisco was high on this David Mamet penned and directed mixed-martial arts film, writing “Instead of a spectacular flashbulb crackling knockout in the third round, we get a technical slugfest that leaves both fighters standing at the end of the twelfth and a split decision from the judges. The ending falters, but never once veers from the path set out by Mamet. It’s a complicated movie that sticks and moves around the idealistic Mike Terry, and the audience, not with power blows but kidney punches, the kind you feel days later. Despite the definite lack of action, Mamet pins you to the mat with tension, locking an arm against your windpipe and holding you until you can barely breathe. The intensity of the performances wraps around your midsection and you pass out. Some folks will walk away from this one shaking their heads, feeling they got gypped on their tickets, but those who pay attention will feel like they just saw a warrior rise to greatness.”

What Happens in Vegas: Ah, hell. Another one of Dustin’s insufferable gimmick reviews, this one entitled, “Five Easy Steps to a Financially Successful Romantic Comedy!” ostensibly written by Joseph M. Caracciola, Jr. He hated it. Let’s leave it at that.

Where in the World is Osama Bid Laden: Ted writes of Morgan Spurlock’s follow-up to Super-Size Me: “Half of a good documentary exists in Where in the World Is Osama bin Laden?, about 45 minutes of good-natured but pointed material designed to lead a largely blindered American public to the simple reality that the vast majority of Arabs and Muslims bear no ill will toward us. A skilled documentarian would distill this concept into a key theme in a better, more ambitious documentary about our refusal as a culture to focus on or care about what really matters in international relationships. Instead, Osama delivers a steady stream of contrived scenarios essentially designed to provide opportunities for Spurlock to dish out ersatz witticisms and smirking one-liners. He’s 75% me-monkey and only about 15% filmmaker. (In fairness, the remaining 10% is a pantheon-level porn star moustache.)”


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Comments

Bin Laden is with DaVinci, in a limo, naked, having microwave sushi?

Posted by: BarbadoSlim at August 26, 2008 12:38 PM

Story of my life: first to the party where nobody else shows up. Could be the big pile of "meh" (well, really just the noxious cloud of "meh" emanating from Made of Honor and What Happens in Vegas obscuring everything else in its vicinity).

So Spurlock went from documentarian to starring in American Apparel ads, eh?

Posted by: Che Grovera at August 26, 2008 12:42 PM

My Life Story 2: Beaten to the Party by the Guy with the Hudson Hawk DVD

Posted by: Che Grovera at August 26, 2008 12:45 PM

What the hell is Hudson Hawk? Why do I know the name of that movie? Is it about the whiney space marine from Aliens going birdwatching? Because I'd see that.

Posted by: Julie at August 26, 2008 12:53 PM

the google says use me.

Posted by: twig at August 26, 2008 1:00 PM

Hee, the Google can suck it, I imdb'd it. Bruce Willis + stolen artwork - "Ho ho ho, now I have a machine gun" x my ambivalence = me watching Willow for the 129th time instead.

Posted by: Julie at August 26, 2008 1:08 PM

Willow fucking rocks. I am totally adding that to my list of "The Best Fuckin' Movies Ever in the History of Fuckin' Ever" for future reviewing purposes.

Posted by: TK at August 26, 2008 1:13 PM

Willow = Joanne Whalley

'nuff said.

*at the Pajiba East-German border*

Youz not zeeen Fillow? YOUR PAPERZZZ!

Posted by: BarbadoSlim at August 26, 2008 1:20 PM

TK, is Clue on that list? It better be.

Posted by: Sarina at August 26, 2008 1:21 PM

I must have been a bi-curious toddler, I still have a crush on Joanne Whalley Kilmer. I would wear her like a hand puppet.

As a young lass I also had crushes on Adam in Beetlejuice, Egon Spengler, Brand from The Goonies, ANDY from The Goonies, and Atreyu. Geez.

Posted by: Julie at August 26, 2008 1:27 PM

"Da da da da da da! I. Am. Your singing telegram...! "

Posted by: Julie at August 26, 2008 1:32 PM

Hee, the Google can suck it, I imdb'd it. Bruce Willis + stolen artwork - "Ho ho ho, now I have a machine gun" x my ambivalence = me watching Willow for the 129th time instead.

Ok, now I owe you a kidney, or something. It will be fresh but it won't be mine.

... and I totally do not have the 'best of Willow' themes on my iPod or anything.

Posted by: twig at August 26, 2008 1:33 PM

Willow fucking rocks. I am totally adding that to my list of "The Best Fuckin' Movies Ever in the History of Fuckin' Ever" for future reviewing purposes.

Also the "What the Fuck Happened, George Lucas? I mean seriously what the fuck!?"

Posted by: twig at August 26, 2008 1:35 PM

See that picture at the top of the article? That's what Hell looks like...get used to it folks, it ain't goin' away.

Posted by: Mike R. at August 26, 2008 1:40 PM

See that picture at the top of the article? That's what Hell looks like...get used to it folks, it ain't goin' away.

Julie, *BLAM* (reference continued :) )

Posted by: Mike R. at August 26, 2008 1:41 PM

'best of Willow'
Posted by: twig at August 26, 2008 1:33 PM

Ok, THAT just made me laugh out loud, because now I'm trying to figure out what would encompass the "best of Willow."
1. Definitely the time Mad Martigan called Willow a peck...or that other time he called him a peck.
2. The guy who played Airk overacting to the point where I ask myself "Why do I get the feeling that he was a Viking in a past life?"
3. Any close up of Sorsha's eyes because damn. So pretty.
4. "I stole the baby from you Daikini, while you were taking a peepee!"
5. Kilmer in drag rejecting Lug's advances..."Wanna breed?" is my favorite pickup line.

Now I need to go home and watch this.

Posted by: Julie at August 26, 2008 1:42 PM

"Tempting, but.... no."

Have used. More than once.

Posted by: Megan at August 26, 2008 1:49 PM

Sarina, if it ain't on TK's list it's on mine. And its eleventy seven endings.

Julie, all I ever wanted to do when I was young and still filled with joy(that's a lie), was to braid Atreyu's hair...so silky...so smooth. I would've given him what I call "the turban" or what my mom called "the rat's nest".

Posted by: jM at August 26, 2008 1:52 PM

mmmmmmm Atreyu

Can somebody please murder me in the face if I attempt to rent What Happens in Vegas. THings like this have been known to happen.

thank you.

Posted by: Anna von Beaverplatz at August 26, 2008 2:08 PM

Hmm. Maybe I need to see Willow again. It has been years.

"Tempting, but.... no." One of my absolute favorite lines!

Posted by: tamatha at August 26, 2008 2:22 PM

Mike R.: hee!

jM, I wanted to pet his chest. So silky...so smooth. I would've given him what I call "the best blow job ever" or what my mom calls "JESUS Julie, you don't have to tell me everything!"

Posted by: Julie at August 26, 2008 2:28 PM

"And monkeys' brains, while popular in Cantonese cuisine, are not often to be found in Washington, DEE SEE!"

Ahhhh, one of my all-time favorites. Colleen Camp's boobs in that movie are nothing less than works of art.


Posted by: Kolby at August 26, 2008 2:36 PM

You know, I've never watched "Willow" the whole way through. My sister took my little brother and left me at home. That didn't endear me to it either, plus it was George and Wicket doing Not-Star-Wars and also Not-Excalibur.

No criticisms from me against Mizz Whalley(-Kilmer) though. Certainly not.

On the other hand, I don't think I've seen one bit of "Hudson Hawk". But it's notorious, Julie! I'm not that much older!

"Beetlejuice" is slightly disturbing if you happen upon it on TV now, because you have to think "No, that's Alec. Not another Baldwin, that's Alec, but twenty years ago". And that spring there was the question going around of "Bruce Willis is gonna be in an action movie? What the fuck?"

I distinctly remember two newspaper articles. One was a sort of spring-summer preview with a photo of Beetlejuice that mentioned "Die Hard" and said "audiences are already booing the trailer". And then the opening day review's headline was "Oh the shame: 'Die Hard' is fun!"

Posted by: Jay at August 26, 2008 2:39 PM

This is why I love you people and so rarely have the urge to rip off your limbs and beat you with them. Out in the wild where the rabid people roam, if you say your favourite movie is Clue, you get a lot of "Say what now?" because the world is a cold, dark, sad place.

Posted by: Sarina at August 26, 2008 2:42 PM

WHAT?! People booed the Die Hard trailer? Blasphemy.

The world would be a better place if John McClane were in every movie. Can't you imagine him going on a wine country vacation with Sgt. Powell or saying "yippie ki yay, motherfucker" to Anton Chigurh before using his bolt pistol on him?

Posted by: Julie at August 26, 2008 3:01 PM

People booed the Die Hard trailer? Blasphemy.

Well, that's what the Miami Herald critic said, and even then I thought he was probably exaggerating with his own bias, but kooky komedian David Addison was certainly an unknown quantity for kicking Gudonov's ass. Nine years later he's on "Ally McBeal" and it's like "oh, weird, Bruce Willis is doing comedy".

Posted by: Jay at August 26, 2008 3:15 PM

I once watched Clue six times in one week. It fucking rules. I love you Pajibans more than ever now. Communism was just a red herring, btw.

Posted by: Elfrieda at August 26, 2008 3:16 PM

Sarina - I thought about you today while I was shoveling cherry pie into my gaping maw. I said to myself, "Sarina would be so totally grossed out right now."

Posted by: Kolby at August 26, 2008 3:44 PM

I thought about you today while I was shoveling cherry pie into my gaping maw. I said to myself, "Sarina would be so totally grossed out right now."

Awww! That is so damn heartwarming! Pajiba is such a big, happy family. A family full of felons and sexual predators and alcoholics who kill their parents and eat their young and build a cult out of rage, smut and a cartoon octopus... but a family just the same, goddammit!

Posted by: Sarina at August 26, 2008 3:58 PM

but a family just the same, goddammit!

Let's not forget the lurking,lecherous, creepy guys with cameras and night-vision goggles with branches and leaves all over them - why hello, Uncle Shadows!

Posted by: lordhelmet at August 26, 2008 5:19 PM

'Made of Honor' doesn't come out until, like, mid-September :-/

Posted by: Mimi at August 26, 2008 7:42 PM

Sarina would be so totally grossed out right now."

Posted by: Kolby at August 26, 2008 3:44 PM

-----------------------------------------------

Yeah, she would be.

I heard she's also a ....communist.

Posted by: BarbadoSlim at August 26, 2008 8:11 PM

Thanks to you all, I am watching Clue now.

I'M NOT SHOUTING! ALL RIGHT, I AM! I'M SHOUTING, I'M SHOUTING, I'M SHOU-

Posted by: Elfrieda at August 27, 2008 1:40 AM

So what you all are basically saying is, this is a place where I can interrupt someone saying "Long story short" with a perky "Too late!" and no one will stare at me as if I had just farted in the elevator? Because I get that a lot.

Posted by: AdaHaze at August 27, 2008 4:33 AM

I'm only slightly embarrassed to admit that I often respond to myself with "too late" after I've said, "...to make a long story short." No one ever gets it, which kind of makes me sad for them, you know?

Posted by: Kolby at August 27, 2008 7:02 AM

I dare all of you to watch this movie Thursday night:
http://www.lmn.tv/movies/details.php?id=MOVE+4180

Posted by: grumpyoldman at August 27, 2008 8:03 AM

"It went away."

"I dwell in darkness without you and it went away?"

Posted by: slower lower at August 27, 2008 10:59 AM

"Just like the mounties...we always get our man!"

"Mrs. Peacock was a man?"

(Slaps)

Posted by: Mike R. at August 27, 2008 1:04 PM

HA HA HA! Mike R., that is in my top three favorite scenes in Clue. Michael McKean is so amazing, he should be in every movie.

Posted by: Julie at August 27, 2008 1:07 PM

Tell me about it, Julie. When I saw him in a 30 second cameo in The Producers, it just made the movie that much funnier.

"Bialystock, Bloom, Liebkind...good news! This just came from the Governor:

"Gentlemen, you are hereby granted a full pardon for having - through song and dance - brought joy and laughter into the hearts of every murderer, rapist, and sex maniac in Sing Sing! You're free!"

Of course, his X-Files guest spot was pretty funny too. (The one where he and Mulder switch bodies.)

Posted by: Mike R. at August 27, 2008 1:49 PM



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