Scott Pilgrim: Good, also: Not Sexist

I'm late, because of the new job, but still!, I got something to get off my chest. I'm not angry, just not so sure what all the fuss is about with Scott Pilgrim.

I saw the movie a week or two ago, at a non-franchise theatre because it was no longer playing in any major theatre in my city for whatever reason. I went in with some serious trepidation. SP had been getting some mediocre reviews, and many critics had taken issue with the whole women as objects to be won thing. First the vote, then they want to be treated like people in cinema. Which actually strikes me as funny because this issue doesn't come up when almost every other film centers on a male character fighting for a woman whom improves his life/solves all his personal issues. But whatever.

I watched the lil' fucker though and I came out damn impressed. My favourite movie of the year impressed. I saw multiple articles on the possible reasons for its failure, and I can see the whole, a movie for hipsters thing issue. The movie is for people that are nostalgic for 8-bit, and who are also twenty something. I'm sorry, but that is not a real demographic outside of nerds and hipsters.

I saw some people posting on boards that the movie isn't about hipsters because it makes fun of hipsters. You know what is the favourite past times of hipsters? Making fun of other hipsters. ESPECIALLY scene kids. This movie is for and about hipsters.

Okay, so I get that this is a small audience, and so this probably didn't help the movie's numbers at all. I mean, when I was watching the trailers for this movie, it looked like it was going to be fantastic and I couldn't imagine anyone not wanting to see this film. I guess that's because it was made for me. Too bad I don't have more friends. Who cares though, this movie will get lots of love on DVD and its not like Edgar Wright is going to stop making movies.

Another issue is the backlash against Cera. I can't speak to this issue because I'm an ardent defender of the boy and I only wish he was in better films. Yes, he often plays similar characters, as does Bill Murray, George Clooney, and for heaven's sake Robert Fucking DeNiro. But I digress. I think he plays a different character in SP. A teenager who is over-confident, weak, and a bit of a prick, instead of just the nervous, shy, and all around nice boy around the corner who has a crush on his cousin, maybe. But that doesn't matter, ppls is haters. But check out Youth in Revolt if you want to see some funny non-Michael-Cera-ish Michael Cera.

But, onto the women thing. Some critics took issue with how the film sets up Scott Pilgrim as the boy that finds a girl that fixes his world and that he has to fight to obtain. From the appearance of the film, that would seem to be the structure of the plot, and indeed a fear that I went to the theatre with, but one however that is severely complicated by the actual film. Both Romana and Knives are strong female characters, with Romana in particular with a complicated past that makes her getting together with Pilgrim more complex than a forever-after (in the rom-com sense) ending. They have complicated pasts and those interfere with the relationship.

Indeed, the film is, in some sense, in some slight spoilery sense, a movie about the problems of past relationships on new ones, and the troubles of becoming a person outside of those, in this case, past mistakes, and really about entering into relationships that are automatically complicated by the unavoidable baggage that everyone comes burdened with. SP just handles these complex issues in terms of videogame fight sequences. Metaphors people! Metaphors.

Screw it all though. SP is a movie made for me, and I enjoyed the shit out of it. I think if you like Wright's previous films, or if you have a fond spot in your heart for classic games but you still consider yourself a younger member of your society, you'll probably like this movie as well. And if you don't, then this movie wasn't for you.

I'm trying to actually place the reference for that reference. This movie wasn't for you. I think someone said something douchey like that once to excuse his or her shitty artistry. Hmm.

Truck, truck, truck!

Fiddy Twitter, Voiced

Well obviously someone made a movie of Fiddy's twitter posts. I'm sure there's a reason this video was made, and I'm sure there's a reason why it's a fake conversation between Fiddy and Rain Wilson, but I don't care. What I do care about is laughter. Your laughter.

You're welcome. Also, thank you Boing Boing. You bring me so many random joys.

I'm with Team Evil

I haven't posted anything about Daily Show in a bit. I've shown restraint? Also possible I haven't felt pressed by those shining moments.

Well, Monday's segment gets filed under those spectacular moments.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
The Parent Company Trap
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

Canadian link.

Mind blowing stuff. TDS succinctly sums it up though, either unfathomably stupid or inhumanly evil.

Potatoes with mouths.

More Rap Twitter Comedy

Are all super star rappers' Twitter accounts this entertaining? I mean, Kanye is funny, but then I read some Fiddy excerpts on Boing Boing.

Realistically, I bet I'm safe.

TT: Danny Glover is Ahab for Dragons

If you watch the below trailer you will see a few strange things. Danny Glover as a crazy old man obsessed with killing a dragon, that this movie is based on Moby Dick, and that this sort of combination requires both hard rock and Vinnie Jones.

There are various things that puzzle me about this movie.

• First, does it take place in the future? If so, is it vying for the greatly sought after title of best futuristic dragon movie, previously held by Reign of Fire.
• Secondly, does this movie take place in some alternate universe where the Tenenbaum family gets eaten by a white dragon, and Henry Sherman must avenge their murderer/consumer? If so, why is Pagoda not helping?
• Most obviously, Moby Dick with dragons? Moby Dick by Herman Melville? How, in God's good greatness, did this get made? Unless it was all Danny Glover's idea, this all seems like one of those joke movies you see in other movies, like Snake on a Plane.
  
• What's with dragons and hard rock? Just off the top of my head:
  1. Reign of Fire/Mad at Gravity
  2. Dragon Age Trailer, and let's not talk about the advertising/credits song
  3. Trogdor

Is this Dragonforce's fault?

THATCHED ROOF COTTAGES!

Christian Onions

Been busy this week after starting the new "job", and with the strange hours I've been a negligent blogpanion. Apologies my blogpartners.

Anywhoo...!, Meg showed me this article that she found on some dude's facebook: "Is My Husband GAY?" ChristWire lists several good signs to spot a homohubby

4) Overly fastidious about his appearance and the home
Natural men have a certain amount of grit about them. They sweat and they smell. Homosexuals often abhor this sort of thing and will also be incredibly particular about the cleanliness of the home. Does your man tweeze his eyebrows, trim his pubic hairs or use face moisturizers? Is he picky about brand name shampoos? Does he spend more time getting ready for a night out than you do?
...
13) Extroverted about his bare chest in public
Does he go shirtless in the back yard or at picnics when other men are around? Does he wear a speedo at the beach? Does it seem like he’s purposely standing right in the middle of a crowd to show off his chest and arm muscles, peppering people with questions about how strong he looks? He may be craving physical affirmation from other men and desperately looking for hints of shared desires in those around him.

You can read the rest here, and I highly recommend you do so, it is highly enjoyable.

What the issue was however, is that after reading the article, it seemed too ridiculous to be straight (har har). I read it at first thinking it was serious, but the bordering on satirical tone made me wonder if this was a joke. Then I read the writer's profile: "Stephenson Billings is an Investigative Journalist, Motivational Children's Party Entertainer and Antique Soda Bottle Collector all in one special, blessed package!"

Hmm. And so yeah, heading to the main site I saw this image capture


Yeah, joke site.

It's unfortunate that the site isn't serious, I mean it loses some of the superiority humour element, but whatever, as a christian Onion, I think it will amuse me greatly.

I haven't read much so maybe it's not so hilarious but I'm going to be hopeful dammit!

"Excuse me, are you the Judean People's Front?"
"Fuck off! We're the People's Front of Judea!"

Darjeeling Limited Finally gets a Decent DVD Release

I have to say, I love The Darjeeling Limited. I don't understand why it gets so much hate. I know people started to slag Wes Anderson off about the time he came out with this movie. All the critics wrote it off because it was just another Wes Anderson movie for people that like Wes Anderson movies. Well, I do and so I don't see anything wrong with it.

That said, I found something very wrong with its DVD release. It contained nothing of interest--especially a commentary track. Anderson commentary tracks are always informative and entertaining and when I found out Darjeeling on DVD wasn't going to have one (or anything of real substance I decided not to buy because I knew eventually they'd put out a better edition. Fast forward to now, and they're FINALLY releasing a Criterion Collection edition of the movie.

Above is the lovely cover art which seems to want to make up for the minimalist cover design for the Criterion Collection edition of Life Aquatic. Anderson movies are full of details, so I have nothing against a detail laden cover, especially when it features Adrian Brody, whose performance really steals the movie (skip to 5:00).

And yeah, the commentary has Anderson and co-writers Jason Schwartzman and Roman Coppola. For the rest of the features hit up The Rushmore Academy.

Did you just fuck that Indian girl? Sweet Lime.

Cera and Schwartzman Confuse Atlanta

For some reason, Cera and Schwartzman ended up on Atlanta Fox News doing the weather. Schwartzman tries to actually read the stuff behind him while Cera just looks like he's on an local news fueled acid trip. Oh, at some point I think somebody off screen says something about Scott Pilgrim.

Considering the other interview I saw with the two where Zach Galifianakis just walks in, I imagine the marketing department for Scott Pilgrim is reconsidering the focus of the pair's promotional outings. Either that or they told them to just go out and fuck around.

Lesbians?

Tarantino Doesn't Work at Disney for a Reason

Well it looks like one of those days, an aggregate sort of day.

I saw this clip on /Film and quite enjoyed it. Ironically enough, Meg is presently playing Kingdom Hearts, so this doesn't even seem at all random at the moment. NSFW btw.

I never really cared for Mickey anyways, and we all know that you don't try to fuck Marsellus Wallace like a bitch.

That first moment when Samuel L. Jackson speaks as Donald Duck might be the funniest thing I'll see all week. Here's to looking down.

This is a tasty burger.

The More You Know: Graboid Edition

Wow, I never thought I'd get to use the Tremor tag again but here we are. The below video is an educational wildlife video on the graboid species. It contains information that, sadly having seen much of what counts for Graboid cannon, was ignorant of, meaning I wasn't paying close enough attention to some of those terrible movies/episodes, or they're just making shit up.

Which I'm completely cool with. The more I know about graboids, the safer I am when venturing into the harsh cruel outside world.

Enjoy:

Monstrous Wildlife from Frank Robnik on Vimeo.

telegram...

The Switch, Funniest Rape-Com of the Year

At least I suspect it is, I haven't done much research into the area *pulls collar away from neck and makes comedy noise*, but let's go ahead and say it's a valid claim.

So, Meg and I were waiting for a movie with a friend, bitching about whatever us MA lit-students bitch about (Mexicans), casually glancing at the multitude of TVs scattered throughout the lobby playing the same cycle of seven trailers interspersed with Skittles commercials ("blue is back!"), when our friend asks Meg, "do you think this is rape?" gesturing at the screen. We watched:

Did you catch the rape? Neither did I at first, but Meg thinks about it for a second and says "yes.". The issue is essentially: Anniston plans to get pregnant and Bateman spills the sample from the man she had actually selected and then, just as a quick and easy solution because what's it really matter, fills the thinger with his own *ahem* sample. He essentially inseminates her without her knowledge/consent."

At first I didn't buy it. Rape is violent and physical. The dude may be a dumb douche for doing what he does, but that doesn't mean he rapes her... does it? This is just some neo-feminist poppycock construing this bad thing as the extreme worst as a necessity of its politics-ideology... right?

But it is rape. He impregnates her without consent. While it may not be the violent form of rape we all know and abhor, it certainly falls under the same category. And what's strange, is that this movie uses this sort of thing casually, as a madcap rom-com premise. It's like if the setup was Bateman killing Aniston's mother, and through the investigation their initial antagonistic relationship blossoms into Hollywood love. I just don't get it.

I haven't seen the movie, and I probably won't, so maybe I'm wrong and the film deals with the severity of the issue, but from the trailer it looks like a typical rom-com. My projected plot is the initial "switch", then flash forward to when the kid's older and Bateman meets the kid and feels like he wants to be a part of his life. Then, when the Anniston finally finds out, she's pissed but eventually gets over it because she loves her son so much and wouldn't want him to be any different. This would and be how she falls in love with Bateman, she would recognize the qualities she sees in her son in Bateman (like the apparent ability to think quick on his feet).

I seriously don't know why either Bateman or Goldbloom are in this stupid movie. I do expect better of both of them. I mean there are paydays and then there are bad movie concepts, and this is the exemplar of the latter.

I just hope my titular prediction is correct and that I'm not forced to swallow my words when Sam Worthington and Katherine Heigl star in Once Upon a Time in a Dark Alley.

Co-starring Zach Galifianakis and Queen Latifah.

Yogi Bear is Probably not a Pedophile

Just a guess.

Alright, /Film is having a little fun with the new Yogi Bear poster. Take a look:


You can click to make it larger... if you want...

But yeah, I don't see the pedophile thing. Granted, the poster is CREEPY AS FUCK, but I don't immediately get the sense that Yogi Bear is having sex with his lil buddy. /Film points to the positioning, the expressions, and the tagline "Great things come in bears", as proof of the entendreness. I guess I can see it if I'm trying, like squinting at one of those bullshit 3D images, but I think all we got here is terrible poster design, with closeups of already terrible character designs and a really stupid pun.

Seriously, how far do you have to stretch to get "great things" = Yogi's penis, "come" = ejaculate, and "in bears" = Boo Boo? Strangely enough, the article says nothing of the "coming soon" thing, which I personally think is funnier than the tagline when read in the dirty sense.

Fuck, who cares about Yogi Bear enough to post about it twice. Christ almighty.

Those eyes are going to haunt me.

All the Pilgrim Promotional Material You'll Need to See

Update: So that cool trailer is also pretty frickin annoying just sitting on the page playing its little title screen music. It's now after a jump.

Some weird and new fangled sort of trailer came out for the forthcoming Scott Pilgrim vs The World. It certainly is an interesting new take on trailers and seems to fit in well with the flavour of the movie, but kwiest is the beep noise that sounds every time you activate a feature annoying as hell. I think it's almost worth turning off the sound entirely so you can't hear it. I didn't though, because I wanted to hear the soothing cadences of Cera's voice as he says "Lesbians?".

A Beautiful Springtime Sentiment

I know, it seems like all I do nowadays is post things that I read on other sites. And what would it be to you anyways. Huh? Jerk.

Belligerence aside, here's some funny:

Do a roundhouse!

My Favourite Thing I've Read Today

From an io9 roundup of this week's comics.

In this issue, the British mycological Supergod Morrigan Lugus (who has the fungal power to make people spontaneously masturbate, not making this up) squares off against India's bio-computer Krishna.

Enough said. The full context doesn't really help but it's here if you want it.

Kanye + Twitter(New Yorker Humour) = Actual Humour

Apparently Kanye just got on twitter. A) Who gives two fucks, but B) someone took some of his tweets and made them captions for New Yorker comics.

Link to the collection.

via Boing Boing.

The New Yorker is stealing my ideas.

TT: Yogi Bear and the Worst Idea of the Last Decade

Okay, they're making a Yogi Bear movie. Why you ask? Well, it's beyond both me and common sense (I asked her). To make matters worse it also is going to be one of those mixed live-action CGI deals, so it's going to look like ass in terms of both visuals and art direction.

The director has second unit directed a bunch of movies I hate, done special effects for a list of movies I didn't care to read, and has most notably directed on his own an unknown amount of Xena: The Warrior Princess episodes.

There are a bunch of odd things about the movie though that could go either way, but that I'd put a great deal of money on going the wrong (worst) way.

First, Dan Akroyd is doing the voice for Yogi Bear. Part of me wonders if they hired him solely because he looks like Yogi himself. This is of course a mistake when all he's lending the film is his voice. Also, Justin Timberlake is Boo Boo, which is really really weird but not necessarily damning. Then rounding out the cast is Tom Cavanagh as the ranger and Anna Faris as what I assume is the token female love interest Yogi will embarrass Cavanagh in front of.

While I don't mind Cavanagh, I'm not sure I know anyone else that feels the same--every one seems to hate the guy. And while Faris isn't my favourite actresses, I've really only seen her in Scary Movie so... that was a while ago admittedly.

Oh, also in the cast are Nathan Corddry and Andrew Daly, a pair of potentially funny nobodies that could steal the show, or just be terrible set dressing for Dan Akroyd's set chewing.

Trailer, if you dare:

So, we're all agreed this looks terrible right? Can they just stop making it now? What bugs me is how Akroyd essentially sounds like he's doing a terrible Rodney Dangerfield impression (no respect even in death, yeesh), which isn't really what Yogi Bear sounds like.

Seriously, just scrap what you already have and start in with both Yogi and Boo Boo as Akroyd and Timberlake themselves. I'm not even sure if they need costumes. You can use the same script and footage you've already shot with the rest of the cast, plus be able to save on all that expensive CGI. I'd see this movie with just the two of those dudes running around the forest doing the hardest to ACT those characters. It'd be nice and surreal, also the only reason anyone would see this movie.