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Where's Beeks? Where in the Hell is Beeks?!
Just My Luck / Dustin Rowles
It’s ironic that the studio release schedules would follow up a movie starring the mainstream media’s favorite whipping-boy (Mr. Cruise) with, arguably, the blogosphere’s favorite female target for scorn and ridicule, 20-year-old Lindsay Lohan, whose coke-fueled antics, sleeping arrangements, and family squabbles have kept many a blog’s traffic flowing on those days that Paris Hilton wasn’t pissing herself, slipping in her own vomit, or getting her stanky on the hang-low of some billionaire offspring. I have to hand it to Lohan, though; perhaps I’ve just been preoccupied with other matters this week, but it seems that she has kept a relatively low-profile, considering that she was set to release her first “adult” movie into theaters this weekend, well … except for an unannounced walk-in on STD swap-mate and hack auteur Brett Ratner and speculation that she’s now dating Ms. Hilton’s former socket-filler Stavro Niarchos.
But all of that is irrelevant and otherwise outside of the purview of a review website, where we are charged with critiquing a performer’s work onscreen with complete disregard to one’s nausea-fueled ass-baring episodes on a nationally televised kids’ award show. And, as to those on-screen matters, Ms. Lohan’s latest, Just My Luck, is the cinematic equivalent of the designated driver to Lohan’s off-screen activities, forced to sit alone at a barstool sipping on a flat ginger ale while her civilian persona gets ripped to the tits, dry humps a chair leg, and passes out in the coat-check room with a random passerby wearing a T-shirt bearing the slogan, “My other ride is in your pants.”
Indeed, not to keep playing the same chord here (my God, it’s a beautiful chord, with all the power of a three-note AC/DC rock anthem at last call in a small-town whiskey tavern) but, given the modicum of credibility that Lohan built in the deliciously Heathers-inspired Mean Girls (“That is so fetch!”) and opposite Jamie Lee Curtis in Freaky Friday, you’d think she’d take more care when reading her scripts. Here, the only way Lohan could’ve found anything redeeming in a screenplay written by a team of writers formerly responsible for — among other movies — Max Keeble’s Big Move and Larry the [Fucking] Cable Guy: Health Inspector, would’ve been to read the goddamn thing on top of a washing machine while experiencing the euphoria that comes with coke granules bleeding out of your ears while the spin-cycle is doing its magic. Sample bit of dialogue: “Meet me tonight. I’ll be the redhead that looks like this.” And by “this,” presumably Ms. Lohan’s character, Ashley Albright, means: The skank who ditched her adorable baby-fat for skin that is stretched so thin you can actually see her dinner (half-pack Tic Tacs, three pkgs. honey, 4.5 French fries, martini chaser) snake its way through her digestive system.
So: Lindsay Lohan (post-binge/pre-purge, i.e., with breasts) plays Ashley, an administrative assistant for a PR operation. She also happens to have a streak of good luck, herein characterized by scratch-ticket success and the ability to catch a cab, avoid red lights, and find random $5 bills lying on the street; you know, the stuff that really gets you through life. As the movie opens, Ashley’s luck lands her a promotion and the responsibility for planning a masquerade ball for a Disneyfied Biggie-Smalls character (Faizon Love). Meanwhile, Jake (Chris Pine) is the sad-sack extraordinaire who, stealing a page from She’s All That, wears glasses and clothes made of sweat-pant fabric to signify his unluckiness. Jake, unlike Ashley, has a penchant for finding excrement-covered $5 bills and landing his ass in jail because of “Three’s Company”-like mishaps, e.g., having his pants fall down in the middle of Central Park after he trips and falls on an attractive woman. He’s also a janitor at a bowling alley and the manager for a struggling bubble-gum band, McFly, who are supposed to be a cross between the Beatles and Blink-182 but sound more like a cross between Hanson and a homeless guy singing for a second gallon-box of red, red wine.
So, on the night of the masquerade ball, Jake sneaks in as a dancer, mistakenly cavorts with Ashley to avoid the boot, and slips her some tongue on the dance floor, which — as we all know by now — is a popular locale for metaphysical reversals of luck. Here, Jake is the new recipient of Ashley’s kismet, while she gains his misfortune, resulting in a case of Chlamydia and spontaneous silicone explosion, or — more accurately — her heel breaks, her dress rips, and she lands in the hoosegow after she learns that she inadvertently set her boss up with Deuce Bigelow.
And so, in a series of lethargic scenes that borrow heavily from 30 Going on 30, Big, the Hillary Duff oeuvre, “I Love Lucy” and, most prominently, Trading Places, Ashley sets about making out with half of Manhattan in an attempt to regain her karma until she ultimately reconnects with Jake, who by now has risen the ranks of the music industry under the tutelage of the Disneyfied Biggie Smalls, setting up a finale embezzled straight out of the last scene in Can’t Hardly Wait, which speaks volumes about the quality of Just My Luck. All the while, Ms. Lohan — who usually injects at least a flicker of charm to her material — exudes all the magnetism of a 6 a.m. interview with Matt Lauer the night after going on a magic-marker huffing bender and suffering the insults of a group of Ebonics-speaking white guys from MTV’s “Yo Momma.”
So, my advice: Skip the movie, and go straight to the STD; you’ll thank me in the morning.
Dustin Rowles is the publisher of Pajiba. He lives with his wife in a faux-Marxist college town in upstate, NY. You may email him, or leave a comment below.
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Comments
Fantastic, I can't wait to see this now!
Posted by: H8 at May 13, 2006 1:55 PM
Oh god, wait 'till the 6-14 year old Brit girls hear what you said about McFly. They are going to tear you apart, man! I'm not going to tell them because I love you but you better hope they don't find out...
My cousin in the UK said they are crap and nearly got bitten by a younger, thinner Vicky Pollard for her trouble.
Still, even with the biting it's safer to rag on a boy band than the president apparently... Glad you're back!
Muddy
Posted by: Muddy at May 13, 2006 2:32 PM
Glad you're able to put your personal feelings for the performer aside, there, Dustin.
Posted by: Patrick at May 13, 2006 2:55 PM
Gor. She looks like a troll doll there. Eegh.
I almost feel bad for her, because I really did like Mean Girls, and now she's putting out crap like this.
I'll just wait and see with that upcoming Meryl Streep movie she's in.
Posted by: Mara at May 13, 2006 5:06 PM
Unfortunately, thinking "Mean Girls," I actually saw this movie. Everything he says is true, except he doesn't mention the enjoyment that can be extracted from watching Lohan get repeatedly hit in the face and even bite on the tongue (in her quest to make out with all of Manhatten). If you must take a tween to see this, the outlook isn't completely bleak.
Posted by: Anne at May 13, 2006 5:13 PM
So last time I checked, this was a blog. Due to that fact alone, I assume that most Pajiba readers have deigned to read Defamer or GFY or IDLYITW and therefore understand Dustin's use of the young actress's recent "activities' to explain the decline in her choice of scripts. But then again, I'm just a bitch who likes to read exteremly sarcastic gossip and criticism.
Posted by: Frisky Biscuit at May 13, 2006 7:02 PM
Don't you hate it when you find a typo in an otherwise coherent comment? Exteremly does not equal extremely. Many apologies.
Posted by: Frisky Biscuit at May 13, 2006 7:07 PM
I got a laugh out of the reference to Yo Momma. Sadly, and very unfortunately, I have seen about 10 mins of the show, and about 9 and a half of that time was spent in convulsions. Long story.
I'm not sure if that reference was intentionally ironic or not, due to the fact that Lindsay Hohan (I couldn't resist, ok!) bent the host of the show over a counter top in an LA nightclub in front of the audience (who paid a respectable fee, by the way) and -- ... what, no one else reads the same blog?... Sigh, I'm wasting my talents on you people.
Anyway, I can't say I'm not surprised that this movie sucks ass. Somehow, though, I almost thought for a second that it just may be semi-ok. Too bad, Lindsay. I can hear the clock ticking down to the end of her career.
Posted by: Gina at May 14, 2006 2:45 AM
It's pretty tragic when an actress lowers herself to the point where the line between sarcasm and summary is blurred in a pajiba review.
Posted by: KEvin at May 14, 2006 3:34 PM
Okay, all of you Lindsay Lohan fans, I don't mean to disrespect you people, but just in my opinion, she isn't cut out to act, her movies don't amuse me in any way, but I guess it's just me. All these movies come down to the same thing, nowhere. Not to mention other BS, like her music? We have a musician now, that's just what the World needs, another... Unlike her movies, I thought this comment would be a good waste of time. And to end, something strange I happen to find right now: http://socialitelife.com/2005/03/25/lindsay_lohan_doesnt_think_before_she_speaks.php
Posted by: Lead at May 14, 2006 4:42 PM
Coming out of lurkdom just to say this review was exquisite.
Posted by: mimsie at May 14, 2006 5:42 PM
ok, i dont mean to sound like a pre-pubescent teen because i am not. im at university studying for a degree so not THAT stupid. think you need to review the film a bit more instead of focusing on the very troubled, bitchy, skinny lohan. BUT mostly im just here to defend Mcfly, who ARE NOT BUBBLEGUM, i feel the need for capitals to stress my point there. They are extremely talented musicians who, write their own music, and sing live and so deserve far more credibility than they usually get. and yes wait till the 14 year old girls get a hold of u!!! Iv seen them, it can be nasty!
Posted by: loz at May 14, 2006 7:22 PM
So I've never heard (of) McFly, but honestly, what self-respecting (or even real) rock band would prostitute itself in a LiLo vehicle? Sigh. Rock n roll IS dead.
Posted by: cinekat at May 15, 2006 3:13 AM
Movies like this are the reason I don't believe in god.
Posted by: mutterhals at May 15, 2006 10:46 AM
Frisky Biscuit, you have another typo in your original post: "activities'. Presumably, you meant to put a double quote after the "s" and not a single quote.
Posted by: DDT at May 15, 2006 12:20 PM
Is anyone else dissapointed that someone can assume a crack habit, star in a couple ok movies and a couple flops, be a media-whore party darling for a couple years and all of a sudden END UP ON THE COVER OF W MAGAZINE NAKEDLY EMBRACING A NAKED MERYL STREEP?
Posted by: TheIdleReceptionist at May 15, 2006 1:52 PM
[quote]who are supposed to be a cross between the Beatles and Blink-182 but sound more like a cross between Hanson and a homeless guy singing for a second gallon-box of red, red wine.[/quote]
Wow, i got a real good laugh from that line.
Posted by: Anonymous at May 15, 2006 1:59 PM
Dustin Rowles-Haha, I'm an Ithaca College student and that "faux-Marxist college town in upstate, NY" HAS to be Ithaca, NY.
Posted by: Anonymous at May 15, 2006 3:24 PM
MTV really missed out on a goldmine when it opted for claymation instead of live action for "Celebrity Deathmatch." I'm just sayin'.
Posted by: Craig at May 15, 2006 6:22 PM
Oh, and Lindsay, dear? Let me help you pick out your next script, since you're obviously not up to the task yourself: the word "snuff" is actually Hollywood code for "Oscar-caliber."
Posted by: Craig at May 15, 2006 6:24 PM
When I saw the trailer the first time, I thought it would be in the spirit of Mean Girls. But up to this review, some months later, I know it's only an additional bag under Lindsay's hollow eye sockets.
Oh, and *Stavros.
Posted by: duckandcover at May 15, 2006 10:50 PM
Haven't seen it, don't plan to. The overly clichéd "look how clumsy I am, I've run into a closed door!" scene in the trailer sent me into conniption fits, and I'm not quite sure I've quite recovered enough to see an entire movie filled with such humorous and cutting edge slap stick gags.
Posted by: McGeek at May 16, 2006 3:05 AM
I just have one question about Lindsay Lohan, why and how is she getting all this fame, and prestige, when, in the bottom of it, her ''works,projects(whatever)'' aren't interesting at all, I mean, is she only loved by her looks? And/or ''talent''?
Can anyone answer?
Posted by: TvPutsASmileOnMyFace at May 16, 2006 1:17 PM
working link for the video of my fav coke fiend here.
Thanks for giving me a good review to convince my li'l sis she did not want to see this awful film
Posted by: Nora at May 16, 2006 2:14 PM
grrrrrrr..... that link doesn't work for mac users. curses, microsoft. any other links (not requiring ie 6 and media player 10--which they didnt update for apple).
Posted by: FluzeMuffin at May 17, 2006 3:16 PM
ya i know guys, just gimme a break arent you tired of the celebrity teens with their fake boobs spilling out?
or of talentless people getting all the fame and money? Shes a publicity stunt whore (im just sayin how it is)
Posted by: Lolo at May 17, 2006 6:25 PM
Lindsay Lohan = Talentless fool who brings shame upon us redheads
McFly = Talentless fools, enough to make me throw up!
What the hell has happened in the world!? Where are all the good actors and musicians!? I'm sick of boybands turned actors and actresses turned singers (YES that's you, McFly and Lindsay!)
Posted by: Chels at May 17, 2006 6:49 PM
crack is back!
Posted by: dirkadirka at May 18, 2006 12:15 PM
i keep reading loads of you guys slating off McFly. sure maybe they can't act - but they aren't actors. they are musicians and good ones at that. those guys are huge over here (the UK) and are not talentless fools!
Posted by: miss ashleigh at May 18, 2006 12:37 PM
My little sister had wanted to see this movie so badly that I caved and took her, like a good big sister. At the end of it, she looked at me, sighed and said "Where'd the plot go?" that was the best laugh I had through those 2 hours of torture.
Posted by: Corrine at May 18, 2006 4:08 PM
thank you jesus someone finally said that mcfly is gay.
i work at a movie theater and am lucky to hear the new mcfly song, the youngest band since the beatles to reach the top 10 in the uk, every other 10 minutes on a looped video.
THANK YOU BRITAIN!
Posted by: wil at May 18, 2006 7:51 PM
There aren't words to describe how awful the preview of this movie looked...And I'm not sure what looks or talent people are referring to when Lindsay Lohan comes up with a new film, music video, boob popping, ass showing, legging wearing event. She needs to go into hiding and reinvent herself before she O.D.s at the Playboy Mansion...
Posted by: Gina at May 20, 2006 2:17 PM
I so agree.
Posted by: Jackie at May 22, 2006 11:05 PM
I saw this movie and I agree, it really had no plot. It's really sad that the pinnacle of Lindsay's career was the Parent Trap when she was 11.
Also, I love McFly. Except for the fat blonde alcoholic, they're pretty hot.
Posted by: Nikki at June 4, 2006 3:23 PM
Who exactly was this film marketed to? 14 year old suburbanite princesses who relate to Lohan's flair? 35 year old pedophiles, who pretend Lohan is 16 again? The Hispanic guy from That 70's show, who has to shore up his spank bank? Lohan your career is dead, pose for Playboy already, and start hanging out with Sharon Stone/Elizabeth Shue/Julia Roberts, at the "Prettier in my Younger Days and now I'm a Hack" Festival in Aspen.
Posted by: C.J. at June 7, 2006 5:16 PM
Ee, the acting will be so crap. I'm only going to see it for McFly. I'd just like to say that their balls have dropped now, their music sounds better.
Seriously. Try and find a clip of 'She Falls Asleep Part One'. I wish I could compose that well.
Posted by: Emma at June 11, 2006 10:45 AM
This was an OUTSTANDING movie! Probably one of the best I've seen in years. It out does Braveheart, Scarface, Good Fellas, The LOTR trilogy and yes, even Howard the Duck.
Someone hurry up and give Lohan an oscar! wait...has anyone seen my penis laying around?
Posted by: Master Zen at June 14, 2006 3:10 PM
mcfly are brilliant so wat there nt gd actors their singers nt actors and tom is nt a fat blond alcholic 4 ur info so jst shut up and the film waz brilliant all u peepz r sad saying there crap jst because its nt ur thing
Posted by: dee at September 30, 2006 12:42 PM
mcfly are brilliant so wat there nt gd actors their singers nt actors and tom is nt a fat blond alcholic 4 ur info so jst shut up and the film waz brilliant all u peepz r sad saying there crap jst because its nt ur thing
Posted by: dee at September 30, 2006 12:43 PM
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