15 posts tagged “pop culture”
Oh hey, I finally found it — last summer I wrote a short item for the News & Observer in response to a challenge from their film critic Craig Lindsey. He wanted a list of my 10 All-Time Favorite Cult Movies, with "Cult Movie" broadly defined as 1) any genre film you have seen numerous times and will watch again at the drop of a hat and 2) any film you are passionate enough about to go out of your way to get others to watch it.
Obscurity, inaccessability or oddity — the usual parameters for slapping the "cult" label on a flick — didn't have to come into play in putting together one's list (though it didn't hurt).
Anyway, I thought I lost the text to my original unabridged submission (the N&O cut the heck out of the print version), but I just found a copy — so here it is:
The cachet of this distopian sci-fi film improved after the truly awful 2002 remake left fans nostalgic for the original. Sure, the futuristic sets and clothes look cheesy now, but the action scenes showcasing this fictional death sport are still riveting -- and the warnings about a corporate-controlled society are even more relevant today.
2. Slap Shot (1977)
Speaking of great sports movies, this Paul Newman comedy about a minor league hockey team just gets funnier and funnier the more you watch it. The childlike ultraviolent Hanson Brothers are a highlight: 25 years after it came out they were still popular enough for a toy company to make them into action figures.
3. The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984)
Who ISN'T in this quirky New Wave flick about a superhero who's a rocket scientist/brain surgeon by day and rock 'n' roll star by night. Throw in hip fashions, dimensional travel, alien invaders dressed as Rastafarians and a lot of gun play — it shouldn't work but it does.
4. Repo Man (1984)
This time it's punk rock and UFOs, as Emilio Estevez wanders the wasteland of modern-day LA repossessing cars under the tutelage of Harry Dean Stanton, and pursued by government agents looking for alien invaders. Equal parts social satire, nihilistic shootouts and philosophic contemplations on the mysteries of life.
5. Serenity (2005)
Wow, and you thought the Trekkies were bad: they got nothing on the "Browncoats" (as fans of this series call themselves.) "Serenity" is the theatrical release that wraps up the storyline of the brilliant but short-lived sci-fi TV show "Firefly."
6. The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)
The cultiest of cult movies, this rock opera paean to cross-dressing goths, B-movies and audience participation can still be found at midnight showings in some theaters. Be sure to bring your umbrella.
7. Escape From New York (1981)
8. Big Trouble in Little China (1986)
It's a John Carpenter/Kurt Russell double feature! Bring the popcorn and leave your disbelief at the door!
9. Big Night (1996)
In this small yet star-studded film, two immigrant brothers struggle to save their little Italian restaurant in 1950s New Jersey. Stanley Tucci's heartfelt celebration of food and family is a favorite of chefs and restaurateurs everywhere.
10. A Christmas Story (1983)
Like another holiday nostalgia-fest ("A Wonderful Life"), Jean Shepard's dead-on comedy about childhood bombed at the box-office before finding an audience decades later on TV.
11. This is Spinal Tap (1984)
Because my list goes to 11.
Well it may have sucked for Elvis, but in my timeline it still remains one of the Best Summers Ever.
I mean, this was the summer that Star Wars came out ... the first time I kissed a girl, the first time I got stoned ... the summer when both punk AND disco were at their blazing best.
1977 was the year my brother and friends and I made our biggest 8mm movies, launched Estes rockets from the big hill in our neighborhood and swam in Rusty's pool. This was the summer I went to the massive Boy Scout Jamboree (and the last summer being in boys scouts was even remotely cool)... the summer I discovered Dejah Thoris and John Carter, Warlord of Mars, and -- at the end -- when my brother and I were first introduced to Dungeons & Dragons (please see previous sentence about the last summer I was even remotely cool).
Yeah, I might have been a pizza-faced spaz, but this was the last summer where my youthful enthusiasm overcame any awkwardness, the last summer where I wasn't fully aware of my limitations, and the full weight of adolesence had yet to crash on my head.
Did I mention Star Wars?
30 years already since Elvis slumped over? Wow ... what's really scary is that he will make more money today than I will make in my entire life.
(Oh yeah, and the next reporter who tries to be clever and use "Blue Suede Shoes" or "Heartbreak Hotel" in a story on the 30th Anniversary of the Death of Elvis should be beaten severely about the head and neck with a copy of "Viva Las Vegas." Speaking of which, Turner Classic is running Elvis movies all day today. Yee-ay.)
I'm thinking the best way to celebrate this occassion is to rededicate the black velvet Elvis painting we have hanging in (where else) our bathroom. And you?
I blame August ...
Weekly World News faces own apocalypse
August 1, 2007 — Supermarket checkout lines are going to seem a whole lot longer.
Weekly World News is giving up the ghost.
No more space aliens in the White House. No more Bigfoot, Elvis or Bat Boy sightings.
Owner American Media Inc. has
announced that the tabloid's Aug. 27 issue will be the last. Its brief
statement blamed "challenges in the retail and wholesale magazine
marketplace that have impacted the newsstand."
The company said it will continue an online version, weeklyworldnews.com, but its future is uncertain.
Things certainly will not be the same for readers who found strange creatures, incredible events and amazing prophecies of plague, depression, invasion and apocalypse in the "hot sheet" that was hailed for the "best damn investigative reporting on the planet" by the alien-hunting "Men in Black."
Entire article here
UPDATE: The Ashville Citizen-Times has an appropriate eulogy here
Ahhh fug nuts -- my perfect record of never having watched a reality show is now shattered. (Trust me, I am suitably appalled as well). Now my wife has me following Hell's Kitchen on FOX with just as much enthusiasm as the dorkiest Survivor fan.
Of course, it was hard not to be lured in by their use of "Fire" by The Ohio Players as a theme song, but I always left the room after the credits. Alas, the siren call proved too strong and I eventually found myself crashing upon the shoals of my couch for the whole show ....
I have to agree with my wife though: this is the funniest damn sitcom on TV in years.
And as far as "reality shows" go, I suspect Hell's Kitchen has one real advantage over all the other offerings. Unlike the rest, where contestants have contrived "team-building" tasks to perform (balance on this object, build this thing, eat this bug), Hell's Kitchen has the same test each and every week: cook good food for a restaurant full of hungry people.
That's it.
And it works. Of course, the insults hurled by Chef Ramsey (and constantly bleeped by FOX), the sneering haute of maitre'd Jean Phillippe and the pitch-perfect voice of the all-knowing narrator just make it all the more entertaining. (Like a vengeful god sending fall after pride, he is always delivering lines like "Julia is having her best night ever —" just before Julia's stove catches fire.)
Finally, since the grand prize is the job as executive chef at a Las Vegas resort, I can't think of a better way for a big company to interview prospective candidates than by putting them thru this amusing meat grinder.
March Badness returns! Sort of! Two years ago, I set out to determine once and for all what is THE WORST SCI-FI FILM OF ALL TIME. It was a dangerous task that nearly left me a gibbering vegetable, but dammit -- someone had to take the chance so that others may be saved !
Rather than simply pick and choose and argue over which film sucked more, I pulled together a list of "worthy" contenders and forced them to compete against one another in a single elimination March Madness-style bracket, with the "winners" chosen by vote.
The contest ran from March to May of 2005 with pool of voters that included friends, geeks, scientists, cartoonists, fanboys, and utter strangers who had read about it online and wanted to participate. Recently I got a couple of requests to repost the results -- including my running commentary on each head-to-head fight and the PDF of the bracket -- so here once again is MARCH BAAAAAAAAAAAAADNESSSSSSSSSSSSSS!
You've been warned.
The Hunt for THE Worst Sci-Fi Movie of All Time
1. Introduction
2. Round 0: The Wildcard games
3. The Bracket: in Flash
in boring old print
4. Handicapping the matchups
5. Round 1
6. Round 2
7. Round 3 Preview
8. Round 3: The Suck 16!
9. Round 4: The Awful 8!
10. Round 5: The Fatal 4 + THE FINALS
11. PDF of the brackets leading into the Fatal 4
A few thoughts on Ghost Rider, just in case your bomb detectors haven't already gone off
I got to see it for free last Thursday as a guest of the Indy's critic, and let's just say the price was right. It didn't hurt that I went in with negative expectations, so what little entertainment the movie had was a bonus. Basically we laughed our asses off at how awful it was.
I will say Ghost Rider was better than The Fantastic Four ... which, I know, is the very definition of damning with faint praise. (Ironically enough, the single best moment of the movie for me was the FF trailer attached to the beginning. As that is now available online, you can watch it now and save yourself 2 hours. No need to thank me.)
Granted, it's not as if I had a lot vested in the character. I only recall ever buying one issue of the comic book, when he went to some nuclear plant soon after Three Mile Island to fight something ... atomic power? Mutant squirrels? Who knows. All I remember is Ghost Rider using the conning tower as a ramp to launch himself at the villain, which, admittedly, was kinda cool -- in 9th grade. However, the fact that Marvel was willing to exploit TMI as a plot point in a second-tier comic book tells you all you need to know about the series.
Clearly I can't recommend anyone pay to see it -- though the script *does* raise some very interesting metaphysical and theological questions:
1) We are told the Ghost Rider is the Devil's "bounty hunter," whose job it is to bring back those souls that have escaped from hell.
Question: Is hell really that leaky? I mean, are so many people slipping out of the eternal flaming pit that you have to hire someone to round them up? Sounds more like an infrastructure problem to me and Mephistopheles would be better off hiring a contractor than a bounty hunter.
2) At no point does any Ghost Rider in the movie actually do what's in their job description. In fact, Mephistopheles ends up using Johnny Blaze to go after his errant evil son, Blackheart, and fight his clique of delinquent elementals/fallen angels who are apparently trying to bump off dear ol' dad and take over the company -- er, Hell.
Question: Now this is definitely a personnel issue. Not only is Satan sending new, inexperienced employees to do work they aren't trained for, GR has to make his own weapons, trick out his own evil bike and steal his own bad-ass clothing. You'd think a minion of darkness would at least get an expense account so he could look the part. Seems more "Dilbert" than "Devil" if you know what I mean.
Followup: And what, the Ultimate Evil is run like some two-bit mob from New Jersey? If Junior gets a hold of some contract before Pops Satan does, he gets to run the biz? I think this was handled much better in season three of The Sopranos.
3) Finally, GR's crusty old cowboy sensei tells him that, since Ghosty didn't sell his soul out of greed but for a "good" reason (to save his father from dying of cancer), that means that God is on his side.
Question: Uh, hello? That is a HUGE oversight and believe you me, the folks down in Legal are going to catch hell for missing THAT little loophole. Come ON people, I think the Devil would have a FEW lawyers in hell that would have caught this before the contracts went out.
Then again maybe not -- for throughout the movie, the Ghost Riders (spoiler alert!: there are more than one) are constantly disobeying Mephistopheles and running off with the office stapler and other supernatural superpowers he bestowed upon them. What boss would put someone under contract they couldn't "fire" (Get it? Fire? Flaming skull? Get it?) Is that any way to run a business? No wonder Hell is going to, umm, hell in a handbasket!
Just sayin'
P.S. -- oh yeah, I like totally lifted the art above from this drop-dead funny site. Elijah Brubaker's "50 Superheroes" is infinitely more entertaining than Ghost Rider.
So we watched "Before Sunset" again last night ... what an incredibile, incredible film. So simple and straightforward, yet filled with a depth and honesty most films trying to be "romantic" lack.
Of course, anyone who knows anything about my personal history -- and has seen both "Before Sunrise" and "Sunset" --- knows both films hit waaaay too close to home for me. That fact is also a bit annoying for me in a professional way.
After my brief reunion with Genevieve in Chicago back in 1999, I considered writing a two-person stage play about the day (or a screenplay ... though the material seemed more suited to the theater). Now, of course, any effort to the effect would immediately be pegged to Linklater's films.
In fact, this is the 2nd time that prolific bastard has scuttled one of my ideas. Since college I had been mulling over doing a story on the group of stoner friends at Derry Street I spent much of my adolescence with playing games and beating each other up. It would have been set during one of our marathon All-Night D&D sessions in the late '70s and involved this cast of characters cascading through the neighborhood
I ditch any idea of it after seeing "Dazed & Confused."
Damn you Richard Linklater! Damn you and your brilliant dialog and insightful scripts and relentless work ethic! All I want to know is -- when is your next movie coming out?
Ok, maybe I didn't come out of Mike & Des' Roller Disco Wedding in one piece ... it seems I've done something to my shoulder ...
Never the mind -- here is my "music video" of last week's wedding
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzHSGr05Ws4
This one reminds me of an old girlfriend from a January long ago ...
Violet Vector and the Lovely Lovelies
