More Movies
My youngest brother Enoch is in town which is great for a number of reasons (I like hangin out with him, my kids love him, he motivates me to play ball, and I could go on and on) but for this post, the most relevant reason I'm glad to have Enoch around is that I get to watch more movies. In my house, we can either watch movies upstairs in the living room or downstairs in the basement.
After moving into my current house I took over the family room in the basement. The "family" moniker was removed and the room is now known as "man room." It's not just a place for men, but it was created by a man....Me and on occasion, manly stuff happens down there like football games, pool, darts (the sharp kind), wolverine wrestling, bare-knuckle boxing, flatulence, hysterical laughter about flatulence, lying about how great we are or once were at _____ (fill in any activity here), etc. You know, that kind of stuff.
The Man room houses the home theater. The living room boasts the TiVo. So, when it's just Tanya and I watching, we tend to watch something we've recorded off TV rather than a movie. Enoch, however, thinks most of what we record off TV is "rubbish" and will often only watch after making a series of objections and unsightly grimaces making the whole experience less than pleasant. Enoch prefers movies, so when he's around we tend to watch more of them. Also, when we watch movies, I always want to watch them in Man room, whereas Tanya generally prefers to stay upstairs.
Because we live in Oregon, and not the arctic, I see no real reason to use the money burning furnace someone wastefully placed in our house and since man room is in the basement, it can at times get a touch cooler than say...Dana Carvey's career. The refreshing temperature, among other factors, can make it difficult to convince my wife that leaving the comfort of the living room to watch movies in the basement makes good sense. However, when Enoch is in town and staying with us, my wife is outnumbered and so, again, we watch more movies.
Tangent alert. Tangent alert. Tangent alert.
While we're here, I love man room. Since I've been married, my wife has been the person primarily in charge of the appearance of our house, what kind of stuff and furniture we have and just generally what you see when you come to casa de stump. This makes perfect sense for a variety of reasons including the following:
1. My wife is brilliantly creative, has some kind of freakish 6th sense that allows her to see into the future and know whether various colors, shapes and textures will fit together in a room, and would lead the league in "knows-what-looks-good-ness" if there were such a league...or stat. If there is, let me know and I want to start a fantasy league based on that league just so I can draft my wife and dominate the league for years and so provide myself yet another reason to brag about something that really has nothing to do with me.
2. My most useful decorating suggestion in our last house was to put a pool table in the dining room that could be covered by a piece of plywood and double as a dining room table. For some reason this, like many of my suggestions is now a punchline among my wife and her friends.
3. I have a really bad track record from the days when I was living on my own. I exhibited an affinity and proficiency in only two decorating styles: (a) completely wallpaper the walls with sports related pictures, posters, memorabilia, etc. as if I were still 8 years old and (b) a style I perfected and titled "ignore-sheik" which is to say, I ignored the appearance of my surroundings to a point where people actually became convinced that I had placed that bowl of rotting, half-eaten salsa on the table as some sort of artful expression. Why else would I leave it there for months? Why? I was trying to start a decorating trend by simply ignoring things.....it didn't take anywhere outside the men's dorms on college campuses across the country, where it flourishes even today.
Anyway, for those and many other good reasons, my wife is in charge of the appearance of our living space. To her credit, she has always gone out of her way to consult me and try to make our space something that appeals to both of us. Apparently, though, I never lost the urge to have my own space (nor has she of course as demonstrated by the sewing room in our house). Thus, when we moved into a bigger house, the decision was made that I could have the downstairs family room and do with it what I please so long as my decorating did not harm the health and welfare of our Children or houseguests.
Man room was born. Now I have a pool table, a dart board (a real one not one of those wussy plastic electronic things), a shrine to the 49ers on the wall and a media projecter that makes a giant 5X10 TV/movie screen appear on one of the walls. With the added surround sound, and the home popped popcorn that neither requires a line of credit to purchase nor leaves a thick filmy, buttery residue on everything that comes near it, I pretty much never need to go to the theater again....though I still do because apparently I hate having money and long to give it to the underprivileged that populate the movie industry.
Anyway, thankfully my lovely wife has touched this room with her magic here and there so it is not completely rebarbative to outsiders, but for the most part, it's a place for me to put my toys and hang out with "the guys" (i.e., my sons). Though, while we're here, I should point out that the title "man room" is merely a description of the target audience and not at all meant to infer that women and/or children are not welcome. It's a come one come all thing, but only if you like bar games and/or movies....or sports...or whatever else I like.
Whew, that was too long. Now back to the purpose of this post, which was to review a movie. Anyway, since Enoch is in town, I've been watching more movies. I've decided to try to at least comment on every movie I watch here. I'm sure I will fail at that task, but I'm going to give it a shot.
This last week/weekend, we watched: North Country, Family Stone, Fun with Dick and Jane, and Good Night and Good Luck. We watched Dick and Jane last so I'll start with that one and save the others for other posts.
Fun With Dick and Jane, starring the less and less funny Jim Carey and the generally delightful Tia Leone (probably not how she spells it, but I don't feel like looking it up).
The general premise is that a suburban couple is living the good life when they lose everything in an Enron type collapse. To continue to keep up with the Jonses, they turn to a life of crime. To borrow a word from the English, adopted and overused by me and my brother, the movie is RUBBISH. It seems like a laughed a few times, but I can't remember why. You know how you spend every Pacino movie after Scent of a Woman wondering why he is always yelling and over acting so much in every scene? That's Jim Carey for his last 20 movies or so. What was funny in Dumb and Dumber or Liar Liar (barely), or the Mask, is now over the top over acting. I'm going to try to rate all movies on the following scale from 1-10. This one will not get a high number.
10. Transcendent. Leaves you amazed and immediately wanting to watch it again or make others watch it. True brilliance. This category would include The Godfather (I and II), The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Love and Death, American Beauty and Raising Arizona among others.
9. Great and completely satisfying, but with some noteworthy flaw. Good examples include: The Untouchables, Raiders of the Lost Ark, the first 3 Star Wars movies.
8. Very good and entertaining, but not likely to win any awards. Examples: The good James Bond movies (For Your Eyes Only, Octupussy, Diamonds are Forever), Desperado, Fight Club, Anchorman, Pitch Black, The Karate Kid.
7. Ok. Worth watching, but had some significant issues. Sadly, most "good" comedies fall here. Enjoyable movies like Wayne's World, So I Married and Axe Murderer, even Old School maybe, still have long chunks dedicated to the love story, or that are really just extended music videos or basically just take you 20-30 minutes at a time between really funny stuff.
6. I didn't hate it, but it disappointed. This may be where I have to put the most recent 3 star wars movies, though the last one may get a 7. I was excited by the movies coming out and the effects were amazing, but the acting, story, directing, writing, etc., were awful. In fact, I'm still too angry to discuss this, so let's move on.
5. A couple good scenes, but over all a bad movie and not worth watching. A startling number of Hugh Grant movies in this category. Also a favorite ranking of sports movies.
4. Had promise, but so lost its way that it became painful. Our movie of the day with Dick and Janes fits here and that may be generous.
3. A complete failure and waste of my time. Charlies Angels might hit the mark here.
2. Makes me angry that I watched it. Just really awful. Most Drew Barrymore movies will go nicely here, but also a number of sequels (Chronicles of Riddick) and super hero movies like Fantastic 4 and Daredevil.
1. If I go to Hell I will get 2 hours off my sentence for time served because I watched this movie. This is reserved for the worst cinematic efforts like Battlefield Earth, anything starring Madonna, The Cat in the Hat, or anything with Keanu Reeves where he isn't an action hero.
As mentioned, Dick and Jane is about a 4. A bad movie, not worth seeing. Not horrible to watch, but with very few redeeming qualities. What's sad about this movie is that the premise is kind of fun. They could have cleverly attacked the Enron and Worldcom baddies and could have had fun with the comic tension of trying to live out the "American Dream" in the suburbs as common criminals. They could have attached the polished exterior of suburban life by showing how hollow it is and how moral bankruptcy often lies beneath idyllic homes and families.
Instead, we got virtually no story, Jim Carey overacting like a buffoon without doing anything funny, Tia made ugly, no great point or moral, no quotable lines, and no "remember that scene where he..." scenes. The more I think about it, the more I think 4 might be too high, but I'll leave it at 4 because there were a couple times I laughed, but they were separated by a wasteland of missed and overly obvious jokes.
Take a pass on this one. If you need a Jim Carey fix watch Dumb and Dumber again. I think it actually gets funnier the more you watch it. Enoch's watched it around 10,000 times and nearly wet himself watching it again the other day on cable. And Enoch, for all his lack of appreciation for my TV watching habits, does know funny.
More later.
After moving into my current house I took over the family room in the basement. The "family" moniker was removed and the room is now known as "man room." It's not just a place for men, but it was created by a man....Me and on occasion, manly stuff happens down there like football games, pool, darts (the sharp kind), wolverine wrestling, bare-knuckle boxing, flatulence, hysterical laughter about flatulence, lying about how great we are or once were at _____ (fill in any activity here), etc. You know, that kind of stuff.
The Man room houses the home theater. The living room boasts the TiVo. So, when it's just Tanya and I watching, we tend to watch something we've recorded off TV rather than a movie. Enoch, however, thinks most of what we record off TV is "rubbish" and will often only watch after making a series of objections and unsightly grimaces making the whole experience less than pleasant. Enoch prefers movies, so when he's around we tend to watch more of them. Also, when we watch movies, I always want to watch them in Man room, whereas Tanya generally prefers to stay upstairs.
Because we live in Oregon, and not the arctic, I see no real reason to use the money burning furnace someone wastefully placed in our house and since man room is in the basement, it can at times get a touch cooler than say...Dana Carvey's career. The refreshing temperature, among other factors, can make it difficult to convince my wife that leaving the comfort of the living room to watch movies in the basement makes good sense. However, when Enoch is in town and staying with us, my wife is outnumbered and so, again, we watch more movies.
Tangent alert. Tangent alert. Tangent alert.
While we're here, I love man room. Since I've been married, my wife has been the person primarily in charge of the appearance of our house, what kind of stuff and furniture we have and just generally what you see when you come to casa de stump. This makes perfect sense for a variety of reasons including the following:
1. My wife is brilliantly creative, has some kind of freakish 6th sense that allows her to see into the future and know whether various colors, shapes and textures will fit together in a room, and would lead the league in "knows-what-looks-good-ness" if there were such a league...or stat. If there is, let me know and I want to start a fantasy league based on that league just so I can draft my wife and dominate the league for years and so provide myself yet another reason to brag about something that really has nothing to do with me.
2. My most useful decorating suggestion in our last house was to put a pool table in the dining room that could be covered by a piece of plywood and double as a dining room table. For some reason this, like many of my suggestions is now a punchline among my wife and her friends.
3. I have a really bad track record from the days when I was living on my own. I exhibited an affinity and proficiency in only two decorating styles: (a) completely wallpaper the walls with sports related pictures, posters, memorabilia, etc. as if I were still 8 years old and (b) a style I perfected and titled "ignore-sheik" which is to say, I ignored the appearance of my surroundings to a point where people actually became convinced that I had placed that bowl of rotting, half-eaten salsa on the table as some sort of artful expression. Why else would I leave it there for months? Why? I was trying to start a decorating trend by simply ignoring things.....it didn't take anywhere outside the men's dorms on college campuses across the country, where it flourishes even today.
Anyway, for those and many other good reasons, my wife is in charge of the appearance of our living space. To her credit, she has always gone out of her way to consult me and try to make our space something that appeals to both of us. Apparently, though, I never lost the urge to have my own space (nor has she of course as demonstrated by the sewing room in our house). Thus, when we moved into a bigger house, the decision was made that I could have the downstairs family room and do with it what I please so long as my decorating did not harm the health and welfare of our Children or houseguests.
Man room was born. Now I have a pool table, a dart board (a real one not one of those wussy plastic electronic things), a shrine to the 49ers on the wall and a media projecter that makes a giant 5X10 TV/movie screen appear on one of the walls. With the added surround sound, and the home popped popcorn that neither requires a line of credit to purchase nor leaves a thick filmy, buttery residue on everything that comes near it, I pretty much never need to go to the theater again....though I still do because apparently I hate having money and long to give it to the underprivileged that populate the movie industry.
Anyway, thankfully my lovely wife has touched this room with her magic here and there so it is not completely rebarbative to outsiders, but for the most part, it's a place for me to put my toys and hang out with "the guys" (i.e., my sons). Though, while we're here, I should point out that the title "man room" is merely a description of the target audience and not at all meant to infer that women and/or children are not welcome. It's a come one come all thing, but only if you like bar games and/or movies....or sports...or whatever else I like.
Whew, that was too long. Now back to the purpose of this post, which was to review a movie. Anyway, since Enoch is in town, I've been watching more movies. I've decided to try to at least comment on every movie I watch here. I'm sure I will fail at that task, but I'm going to give it a shot.
This last week/weekend, we watched: North Country, Family Stone, Fun with Dick and Jane, and Good Night and Good Luck. We watched Dick and Jane last so I'll start with that one and save the others for other posts.
Fun With Dick and Jane, starring the less and less funny Jim Carey and the generally delightful Tia Leone (probably not how she spells it, but I don't feel like looking it up).
The general premise is that a suburban couple is living the good life when they lose everything in an Enron type collapse. To continue to keep up with the Jonses, they turn to a life of crime. To borrow a word from the English, adopted and overused by me and my brother, the movie is RUBBISH. It seems like a laughed a few times, but I can't remember why. You know how you spend every Pacino movie after Scent of a Woman wondering why he is always yelling and over acting so much in every scene? That's Jim Carey for his last 20 movies or so. What was funny in Dumb and Dumber or Liar Liar (barely), or the Mask, is now over the top over acting. I'm going to try to rate all movies on the following scale from 1-10. This one will not get a high number.
10. Transcendent. Leaves you amazed and immediately wanting to watch it again or make others watch it. True brilliance. This category would include The Godfather (I and II), The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Love and Death, American Beauty and Raising Arizona among others.
9. Great and completely satisfying, but with some noteworthy flaw. Good examples include: The Untouchables, Raiders of the Lost Ark, the first 3 Star Wars movies.
8. Very good and entertaining, but not likely to win any awards. Examples: The good James Bond movies (For Your Eyes Only, Octupussy, Diamonds are Forever), Desperado, Fight Club, Anchorman, Pitch Black, The Karate Kid.
7. Ok. Worth watching, but had some significant issues. Sadly, most "good" comedies fall here. Enjoyable movies like Wayne's World, So I Married and Axe Murderer, even Old School maybe, still have long chunks dedicated to the love story, or that are really just extended music videos or basically just take you 20-30 minutes at a time between really funny stuff.
6. I didn't hate it, but it disappointed. This may be where I have to put the most recent 3 star wars movies, though the last one may get a 7. I was excited by the movies coming out and the effects were amazing, but the acting, story, directing, writing, etc., were awful. In fact, I'm still too angry to discuss this, so let's move on.
5. A couple good scenes, but over all a bad movie and not worth watching. A startling number of Hugh Grant movies in this category. Also a favorite ranking of sports movies.
4. Had promise, but so lost its way that it became painful. Our movie of the day with Dick and Janes fits here and that may be generous.
3. A complete failure and waste of my time. Charlies Angels might hit the mark here.
2. Makes me angry that I watched it. Just really awful. Most Drew Barrymore movies will go nicely here, but also a number of sequels (Chronicles of Riddick) and super hero movies like Fantastic 4 and Daredevil.
1. If I go to Hell I will get 2 hours off my sentence for time served because I watched this movie. This is reserved for the worst cinematic efforts like Battlefield Earth, anything starring Madonna, The Cat in the Hat, or anything with Keanu Reeves where he isn't an action hero.
As mentioned, Dick and Jane is about a 4. A bad movie, not worth seeing. Not horrible to watch, but with very few redeeming qualities. What's sad about this movie is that the premise is kind of fun. They could have cleverly attacked the Enron and Worldcom baddies and could have had fun with the comic tension of trying to live out the "American Dream" in the suburbs as common criminals. They could have attached the polished exterior of suburban life by showing how hollow it is and how moral bankruptcy often lies beneath idyllic homes and families.
Instead, we got virtually no story, Jim Carey overacting like a buffoon without doing anything funny, Tia made ugly, no great point or moral, no quotable lines, and no "remember that scene where he..." scenes. The more I think about it, the more I think 4 might be too high, but I'll leave it at 4 because there were a couple times I laughed, but they were separated by a wasteland of missed and overly obvious jokes.
Take a pass on this one. If you need a Jim Carey fix watch Dumb and Dumber again. I think it actually gets funnier the more you watch it. Enoch's watched it around 10,000 times and nearly wet himself watching it again the other day on cable. And Enoch, for all his lack of appreciation for my TV watching habits, does know funny.
More later.
Comments
I doubt my brother will go back and check the comments on this blog, but I get notified, when someone posts something. First, welcome to the blog. Second, how do you know Enoch? How can he reach you?