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Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby (2006)

A seemingly winning combination of the Anchorman team with NASCAR is even more hit-and-miss than its predecessor. The problem here is the time spent on straightforward, non-comic storytelling that just doesn't jibe with the more ridiculous comedy highlights (e.g. the cougar, which is awesome). Product endorsement jokes start out slightly amusing and become overwhelmingly irirtating by the climax of the film (which is interrupted by an Applebee's commercial). Still, it's great to see John C. Reilly in a film like this, and they manage to pull off a few things here (no spoilers) that make me positively gleeful this managed to hold onto the number one slot for several weeks.

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005)

A black-comedy/neo-noir/Hollywood spoof starring a sober Robert Downey Jr. and Val Kilmer as "Gay Perry." Overall this was an okay movie, but it was way too "shocking" to qualify as genuine escapist entertainment (unless you're into that sort of thing). I just about shut it off when a character "accidentally" pees on a woman's corpse...you know, it just really isn't funny...but sticking through it turned out to be an okay move. Unlike Crash it didn't make any pretentions of import or relevance to the real world, which I appreciated, and everything basically came out okay in the end rather than going gory and cliched like The Ice Harvest. Well, still cliche but in a different, funny way.

Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004)

"Aspen, Colorado. Mark. Florida, pancake. Astronauts are on the moon. There's astronauts everywhere. Watch out for the astronauts." I've gotten kind of obsessed with this movie, despite all it's many flaws, and it's actually led me into an unexpected Will Ferrell fixation. Unfortunately, we tried to watch the "sequel," Wake Up, Rob Burgundy (pieced together from outtakes, deleted scenes, and dropped subplots) but couldn't stay awake. I'm trying to fight the urge to buy the two-pack at Best Buy but I'm not sure how much longer I can hold out. "The Human Torch was denied a bank loan."

Scoop (2006)

Very much a companion piece to Match Point, although lighter in tone (it also recycles from Allen's Oedipus Wrecks). Scarlett Johansson is fairly adorable as a "frumpy" journalism student. Her delivery is mannered and not at all believable but Woody (returning to the screen) helps carry her through. Hugh Jackman is charming as always. Overall I'd call it a pleasant distraction, though nothing memorable.

Electric Dreams (1984)

Ah, the old standby. Bascially a feature-length music video about a love triangle, co-starring Lenny von Dohlen, Virginia Madsen and Bud Cort as a computer. In love. Sweet tunes from Jeff Lynne/ELO and Giorgio Moroder.

Lady in the Water (2006)

A quick history: saw The Sixth Sense on a whim at a big mall theater, didn't really know much about it, was totally blown away, loved it, was not at all surprised by "the big secret"; highly anticipated Unbreakable, tried to see through it to guess what the twist was going to be, never saw it coming, loved it, thought it was a brilliant take on the superhero origin story; can't remember much about Signs, except that I didn't like it, the "twist" was a pointless collision of coincidental nonsense, maybe the characters were believable but I doubt it since Mel Gibson starred in it; skpped The Village entirely due to bad reviews and obvious plagarism, finally got around to it on video and was pleasantly surprised, I think it benefitted from low expectations; got pretty excited by the first teaser trailer for Lady in the Water, was pretty into the film for the first half or so but became increasingly disappointed and generally underwhelmed. Too much like Signs in that the characters are two-dimensional and only exist to serve a somewhat pointless plot. Too bad, because this one had the makings of something magical. On the bright side, it did get me out of the unbearably hot weather in July.

Jail Bait (1954)

It's not what you think it's about. Classically mediocre Ed Wood, with a few good laughs and an inexplicable racist stage number.

Go See This Film!

A straightforward, solid documentary about a fascinating subject; a movie that absolutely needed to be made (and could be made several times over); hilarious and heartbreaking, Downtown Locals is showing 5pm on Sunday, August 20 at Bryant-Lake Bowl. Part of Sound Unseen '06.

Aeon Flux (2005)

I nodded off at the end of this, but then I actually slept through more of Walk The Line. It's a little too much like the cartoon, which looked cool but was completely devoid of plot or character; here they give you a little bit of character (as much as you can expect from this sort of thing) and eventually a plot, but you kind of have to just go with it until nearly the end before it begins to have any kind of meaning. The DVD looks and sounds great. I guess if you were looking at a video to rent and your choices were this, Ultraviolet, or The Island, I'd go with Aeon Flux. It's kind of like a better-looking, less-funny, action-heavy version of Zardoz, with a zeppelin-like craft instead of a giant floating stone head. And no rape scenes, thank gosh.

Date Movie (2006)

I could make a better parody film with a sock puppet and a broken flashlight. There were approximately three laughs in this whole (eighty minute long?) film; although in their defense I did fast-forward through several scenes, like the extended cat-shitting sequence and the cat-munches-on-corpse-then-shits-on-it sequence. Whoo-hoo: comedy! So, so, so bad. Not even Fred Willard is particulary fun to watch, though Jennifer Coolidge (that poor woman) does a really good, if pointless, Barbara "Focker" Streisand impression. I would rather just watch two hours of Alyson Hannigan trying on different outfits. Aw, yeah, dat would be a good movie.