Category Archives: Movies You Missed

06/14/2016 · 5:04 pm

Animation Analysis: The Transformers: The Movie

For the past ten years, one Rhode Island company has made me so deliriously happy, I’ve considered corporate personhood, so I could ask for its hand in marriage.

Hasbro.

They even threw in a rubsign. Hasbro is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.

They even threw in a rubsign. Hasbro is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.

2006 was the year this little toy company had a subline of their Transformers toys called “Classics”; new figures of favorite characters from the 1984 cartoon. And a funny thing happened- these robots from an old show sold very, very well. Characters like “Bumblebee”, “Megatron” and “Optimus Prime” were familiar to a enviously broad range of people. They had staying power equal to Superman or Batman. The world was on the cusp of finding this out.   Continue reading →

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06/11/2016 · 1:07 pm

Yello

BIUL_Yello

30 years ago, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off came out. If you build a time machine and go back to 1986, you might just enjoy that movie.

Continue reading →

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05/17/2016 · 3:27 pm

Why I Love Jar Jar Binks

As the venerable Star Wars imprint slowly transforms into an empowerment series for little girls who wear costumes and bitter old fanboys, one of my favorite aspects is being scrubbed from the narrative:

Weird, stupid aliens.

He attempts to eat that dead monster.

He attempts to eat that dead Woodring monster.

I’ll never comprehend the segregationist nature of the “Star Wars fan”. Watching the fandom dismiss George Lucas, the creator of everything they care about, has been like observing a schism of zealots. Since general audiences weren’t born in the 80s, when ripoffs of Star Wars abounded, they gladly accepted a ripoff from J.J. Abrams.  Continue reading →

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05/08/2016 · 6:39 pm

The Thing With Smails

Caddyshack is a rare film for me, in that I’ve been afforded a relationship with it since childhood, based purely on the timing of my birth, and the easy-going nature of my parents. When I was 8, and parties at the public pool were as common as skinned knees, one scene from this 1980 comedy was legend.

The doody scene.

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I’m not here to talk about that scene, and how it changed the way the world looks at a Baby Ruth, however. I’m talking about that other thing.

The thing with Smails. Continue reading →

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04/30/2016 · 7:42 pm

Bad Cinéaste

I have a confession to make. Though I consider myself quite the erudite film scholar, in many ways I have no cause to place myself above the average lumpen moviegoer.

  • I confuse the name ZaSu Pitts with Zuzu Petals, a minor character from the execrable Andrew Dice Clay comedy The Adventures of Ford Fairlane.badcin1
  • I am inexplicably incensed at the sight of the cover of the film Metropia, and Audrey Tautou’s picture on the front of Amélie. To date, I have not seen Amélie, even though it’s from a director I like, thanks to its coy, nauseatingly precious cover shot.
  • I haven’t seen Precious, except on YouTube, because apparently I laugh at the wrong things.
  • I can’t stand whispering in movies any more than I can in the theater. A notable exception would be 1982’s Poltergeist. M. Night Shyamalan has abused whispering so much his actors should be forced to use air horns.
  • I’ve never seen Avatar. Any movie that uses a default computer font for its title isn’t worth a billion dollar budget, let alone my attention.
    Continue reading →

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04/26/2016 · 12:54 pm

Inherent Vice

So one of my favorite directors made an adaptation of a novel by my favorite writer. That’s a big deal.

In fact, it’s a huge deal. There was a time when I and friends who also read Thomas Pynchon thought that Mason & Dixon, his masterpiece from 1997, was his final effort. Then we figured the swan song was his sublime Against The Day, from 2006. Inherent Vice came along in 2009, and we finally realized that we were witness to a thriving, percolating phase in the lifetime of a literary master.

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Director Paul Thomas Anderson read Inherent Vice in 2009 and rightly deduced that it would be the most filmable of Pynchon’s oeuvre. Oh, how I long for a Terry Gilliam adaptation of Mason & Dixon, with a big budget and perfect casting, but this does just fine for the time being. Besides, now it’s on record that audience interest in Pynchon adaptations exists. Maybe someday we’ll get Against The Day, or, since I’m really blue-skying here, Gravity’s Rainbow*. It’s now in the realm of possibility. Continue reading →

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04/23/2016 · 2:02 pm

“Dental Hygiene Dilemma”

Thanks to the generous social programs in my fair city, I recently got my teeth fixed, ending over a decade of busted-molar jokes and references in my work. In essence, I no longer feel like I have a mouthful of bloody razors. Once everything healed up, I couldn’t believe how much better I felt overall. Not that I consider myself a lion, but I couldn’t keep from thinking of that old fable with the thorn in the paw. Now I can chew food with my entire mouth, instead of just a small section, gingerly. It’s the little things in life.

If your teeth don’t hurt, or you have easy access to a dentist, thank your lucky stars. I’ll let you in on a little secret; us artists are merely holding on to whatever choppers we can before we croak. There is no “insurance” or “healthcare” for us; it does not exist. These are the breaks. If you want security, you go into insurance. Not drawing cartoons.

Wanna watch a dental hygiene movie?

Wanna watch a dental hygiene movie?

Unless, you know, you sell out, to a company. Continue reading →

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04/21/2016 · 4:16 pm

Lao Che

Lao Che (1885-19??) was a Chinese crime lord, who made several attempts on the life of archaeologist Indiana Jones in the 1930s.

Lao Che (c.), with sons Kao Kan (l.) and Chen (r.)

Lao Che (c.), with sons Chen (l., Chua Kah Joo) and Kao Kan (r., Ric Young)

Lao’s nightclub, the Club Obi-Wan, was a front, and the headquarters of his criminal empire. The Manchurian government hired Lao to secure an urn holding the cremains of the first Manchu emperor, which had been stolen by thieves in 1903. Jones brought the urn to Club Obi-Wan, trading it with Lao for a huge diamond, but Lao double-crossed Jones by poisoning his drink. Thus begins a thrilling action sequence as pandemonium and balloons overtake the club, while Jones flails to recover the antidote Lao had taunted him with. Continue reading →

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04/14/2016 · 1:31 pm

When Mike Replaced Joel

By the year 1993, I was hooked something fierce on a cable show called Mystery Science Theater 3000. It combined everything I adored about weird television; puppets, obscure humor, cheesy sets and B-movies. One could learn about the golden age of TV from the well-rounded cast and writers, through their rapid-fire gags and “riffs”. Nobody knew it was a show that would shape the world of entertainment, and become a household word. It was just this wonderful thing we all watched for two hours on Sunday morning, instead of church.

Then word began to spread that the host and creator of the show, Joel Hodgson, was leaving.

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04/12/2016 · 5:02 pm

Chevy Chase

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It really gets my goat when people talk shit about Chevy Chase. Not just as a fan of his work, or as an admirer. I think some people judge Chevy Chase unfairly, with a scrutiny they do not apply to other comedians or entertainers.

Okay, you read an article relating an incident where Chevy Chase was a jerk. So what? Did he come to your house and fuck with you? Did he push your mother into the street? This is Chevy Chase we’re talking about. I give him absolute carte blanc to be as big a jerk as he likes. Continue reading →

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