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grrgoylI went to Hollywood Video last night with but two goals....Young Adam (recommended by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
bohemiancharm because of all the Ewan hotness) and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (recommended by everyone else on the planet I know). I went to Hollywood rather than Blockbuster for a couple of reasons: 1) you get the movies for 5 days instead of 2, and given how Blockbuster is shamelessly copying NetFlix with its new online rental program I don't understand why they don't adopt Hollywood's policies as well, cuz who can enjoy a movie with a big clock ticking over their head? and 2) every time I go there the place is a ghost town, and it should be a surprise to no one I am a big fan of seeing as few other people in my day-to-day life as possible.
Alas, that second part was not to be. The one thing Hollywood does not have over Blockbuster is a clearly delineated checkout line (being a ghost town most of the time). There is a large rack of snacks directly in front of the register with no indication of where is the right place to stand. This was only an issue last night as I stood to the left of the rack, waiting behind the woman being helped and a family of outsized breeders (the stack of five children's movies was the giveaway), already bellied up to the counter. After about five minutes I looked to the right of the snacks and realized there was a guy who most certainly was not there before blithely creating his own line. I edged forward nervously, and that's when he noticed me and edged forward himself a lot more aggressively. The lone cashier looked up at us halfway through the breeders' transaction and I briefly hoped she knew I was there first and she would do something to motion me forward as the rightful next person in line. Alas again, her customer service skills weren't nearly that finely honed, and I was relegated to the end of the line. Which didn't stop me from shooting white-hot spears of hate through the back of his head with my eyes. Okay, Mr. Man. If you need to be rude to others to get just a little bit ahead in life, be my guest. You are the one who has to live with yourself. HateHateHateHateHateConsumingHotHateOfAThousandSuns on you. I tried to console myself with the fact that I was holdinga steamy Ewan sex rompYoung Adam, which would be enough to brighten anyone's day.
(Of course, Tery rightfully asserts that nothing compares with her Blockbuster story of trying to rent The Butterfly Effect for me the Friday after its release, waiting in the enormous line patiently for her chance to inquire at the desk since the shelves were empty, only to have an especially loutish customer march through the front door and, ignoring the 10 civilized people in line, immediately holler at the counter people, who gave her the sole copy in the return pile behind the desk. I don't want to live in a world where annoying, overbearing people always win, but sadly, I do. I think Tery was given a raincheck for a free copy later, so there was at least a happy ending, sort of.)
So, onto the reviews:
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind: I guess I need to face facts. I hate Charlie Kaufman (the writer). In fact the only other movie maker I can think of that I hate as much and as consistently would be David Lynch. This now makes his third film that I unwittingly watched, but now I know his name and can avoid him in future. I really enjoyed Adaptation, that is until the end when it became more of a drug-induced nightmare. I could stomach Being John Malkovich a lot longer, until the end when it became a drug-induced nightmare. Unfortunately Spotless Mind spends the entire running time feeling like a drug-induced nightmare (do we see a formulaic theme here?) I see from IMDb.com he is also responsible for Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, so don't think I'll be renting THAT any time soon.
This makes me sad. I really enjoy Jim Carrey's more serious acting attempts (okay, I missed The Majestic. I guess I should say I really enjoyed The Truman Show and Man on the Moon). And all I heard from everyone was how great it was, including my sister, whose opinion I value greatly. It was a clever idea and had its bright moments (like Jim Carrey as a 4-year-old being bathed in a scaled-out kitchen sink), but in the end I was just left feeling....empty. I liked how it came full circle and the end was the beginning. I don't want to be accused of too much linear thinking, I enjoy the occasional curveball in a movie as much as anyone, but Christ, this movie was nothing BUT curveballs. It is absolutely impossible to relax while watching it because every scene progression seems specifically designed to be jarring and make you feel disoriented. And I wanted to feel for Joel, it was really sad that he was fighting so uselessly to save his memories of her, but I was so unsettled by the drug-induced nightmare quality that I couldn't muster even one (normally readily available) tear. My only satisfaction was that Tery's smug announcement just before the opening credits that she'd figured it all out (I HATE when she does that) proved to be wrong....she thought Clementine was imaginary. Tery couldn't understand my intense dislike, citing my love of Buffy dream sequences. I clarified that I love well-written dream sequences, and in my experience Joss Whedon writes the meanest dream sequence in town (and yes, I am aware the movie takes place in memories, not dreams, but this difference changes my feelings not the tiniest jot). Try as I might, I can only give this a 2 out of 5. My apologies to all the people who loved it.
Young Adam: Okay, so "sex romp" was a bit premature. Inbohemiancharm's defense, she did say this wasn't one of her favorite Ewan films, and boy howdy do I agree. Somehow someone managed to make a movie with my beautiful Scottish lad having lots and lots of sex at regular intervals (with even a full frontal), and speaking in his natural-born accent, that I couldn't wait to be over. Joe is a lodger on a barge who finds a dead woman in the river in the opening scene. As the film progresses, we gradually realize the girl was his lover who accidentally fell into the water and drowned during an argument and he covered it up because she was pregnant with his child. What's more, her other nice guy boyfriend who never got as far as second base is accused of her murder. In between these wacky hijinks, Joe does it with everyone he meets with breasts, most notably a bony and very unappealing Tilda Swinton. Joe attends the innocent boyfriend's trial and stays silent; his only attempt to make things right comes in an anonymous note to the judge that ultimately is futile and the poor shmuck is found guilty. So Joe leaves town, unredeemable, amoral and completely unlikable. The End.
I had a few problems with this movie, apart from the sweeping generalizations I've already made. For one, Cathy falls into the river and sinks like a stone. Even people who can't swim manage to thrash on the surface for a few seconds. Second, Joe shovels coal for a living in 1950s Scotland...I think the odds are fairly slim that he could even write at all. And don't even get me started on why the film is called "Young Adam" when his name is Joe. The one positive thing I can say is that Ewan is plain enough to convincingly play a working-class stiff, while still being heartbreakingly gorgeous under layers of coal dust. And god I love his accent. But this film just left me feeling....empty. And pissed that I stayed up until midnight to finish it.
I have seen most, if not all, of Ewan's movies (okay, not Star Wars: Attack of the Clones yet, but we don't even want to go there), and I have to say this is one of the worst. I preferred The Pillow Book to this, and that one is pretty out there. I vastly preferred Nightwatch, a film that Ewan himself says he wishes he could forget. I would put this more on a par with Serpent's Kiss or Eye of the Beholder, two movies I can barely remember they were so bad (okay, now I might be just name-dropping. The point is, I've seen just about every Ewan movie there is). When I realized it was made as recently as 2003 I just shook my head with my face in my hands. Maybe Ewan lost a bet with the director in a drinking game or something. Don't lecture me on arthouse movies, I enjoy plenty of them. I also don't necessarily need a sugarcoated happy ending to love movies. I'm no mainstream Hollywood moviegoing drone. But this was just....feh. The reviews on IMDb.com calling this a "gorgeous, sexually-charged masterpiece" baffle me. Did we see the same movie? The disc comes with two commentaries but I don't think I could bear to sit through this even one more time. Ewan, baby, I love you with all my heart and soul, but surely there were other scripts offered to you last year? It pains me, but 0.5 out of 5
Love,
Lainey
bohemiancharm because of all the Ewan hotness) and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (recommended by everyone else on the planet I know). I went to Hollywood rather than Blockbuster for a couple of reasons: 1) you get the movies for 5 days instead of 2, and given how Blockbuster is shamelessly copying NetFlix with its new online rental program I don't understand why they don't adopt Hollywood's policies as well, cuz who can enjoy a movie with a big clock ticking over their head? and 2) every time I go there the place is a ghost town, and it should be a surprise to no one I am a big fan of seeing as few other people in my day-to-day life as possible. Alas, that second part was not to be. The one thing Hollywood does not have over Blockbuster is a clearly delineated checkout line (being a ghost town most of the time). There is a large rack of snacks directly in front of the register with no indication of where is the right place to stand. This was only an issue last night as I stood to the left of the rack, waiting behind the woman being helped and a family of outsized breeders (the stack of five children's movies was the giveaway), already bellied up to the counter. After about five minutes I looked to the right of the snacks and realized there was a guy who most certainly was not there before blithely creating his own line. I edged forward nervously, and that's when he noticed me and edged forward himself a lot more aggressively. The lone cashier looked up at us halfway through the breeders' transaction and I briefly hoped she knew I was there first and she would do something to motion me forward as the rightful next person in line. Alas again, her customer service skills weren't nearly that finely honed, and I was relegated to the end of the line. Which didn't stop me from shooting white-hot spears of hate through the back of his head with my eyes. Okay, Mr. Man. If you need to be rude to others to get just a little bit ahead in life, be my guest. You are the one who has to live with yourself. HateHateHateHateHateConsumingHotHateOfAThousandSuns on you. I tried to console myself with the fact that I was holding
(Of course, Tery rightfully asserts that nothing compares with her Blockbuster story of trying to rent The Butterfly Effect for me the Friday after its release, waiting in the enormous line patiently for her chance to inquire at the desk since the shelves were empty, only to have an especially loutish customer march through the front door and, ignoring the 10 civilized people in line, immediately holler at the counter people, who gave her the sole copy in the return pile behind the desk. I don't want to live in a world where annoying, overbearing people always win, but sadly, I do. I think Tery was given a raincheck for a free copy later, so there was at least a happy ending, sort of.)
So, onto the reviews:
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind: I guess I need to face facts. I hate Charlie Kaufman (the writer). In fact the only other movie maker I can think of that I hate as much and as consistently would be David Lynch. This now makes his third film that I unwittingly watched, but now I know his name and can avoid him in future. I really enjoyed Adaptation, that is until the end when it became more of a drug-induced nightmare. I could stomach Being John Malkovich a lot longer, until the end when it became a drug-induced nightmare. Unfortunately Spotless Mind spends the entire running time feeling like a drug-induced nightmare (do we see a formulaic theme here?) I see from IMDb.com he is also responsible for Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, so don't think I'll be renting THAT any time soon.
This makes me sad. I really enjoy Jim Carrey's more serious acting attempts (okay, I missed The Majestic. I guess I should say I really enjoyed The Truman Show and Man on the Moon). And all I heard from everyone was how great it was, including my sister, whose opinion I value greatly. It was a clever idea and had its bright moments (like Jim Carrey as a 4-year-old being bathed in a scaled-out kitchen sink), but in the end I was just left feeling....empty. I liked how it came full circle and the end was the beginning. I don't want to be accused of too much linear thinking, I enjoy the occasional curveball in a movie as much as anyone, but Christ, this movie was nothing BUT curveballs. It is absolutely impossible to relax while watching it because every scene progression seems specifically designed to be jarring and make you feel disoriented. And I wanted to feel for Joel, it was really sad that he was fighting so uselessly to save his memories of her, but I was so unsettled by the drug-induced nightmare quality that I couldn't muster even one (normally readily available) tear. My only satisfaction was that Tery's smug announcement just before the opening credits that she'd figured it all out (I HATE when she does that) proved to be wrong....she thought Clementine was imaginary. Tery couldn't understand my intense dislike, citing my love of Buffy dream sequences. I clarified that I love well-written dream sequences, and in my experience Joss Whedon writes the meanest dream sequence in town (and yes, I am aware the movie takes place in memories, not dreams, but this difference changes my feelings not the tiniest jot). Try as I might, I can only give this a 2 out of 5. My apologies to all the people who loved it.
Young Adam: Okay, so "sex romp" was a bit premature. In
bohemiancharm's defense, she did say this wasn't one of her favorite Ewan films, and boy howdy do I agree. Somehow someone managed to make a movie with my beautiful Scottish lad having lots and lots of sex at regular intervals (with even a full frontal), and speaking in his natural-born accent, that I couldn't wait to be over. Joe is a lodger on a barge who finds a dead woman in the river in the opening scene. As the film progresses, we gradually realize the girl was his lover who accidentally fell into the water and drowned during an argument and he covered it up because she was pregnant with his child. What's more, her other nice guy boyfriend who never got as far as second base is accused of her murder. In between these wacky hijinks, Joe does it with everyone he meets with breasts, most notably a bony and very unappealing Tilda Swinton. Joe attends the innocent boyfriend's trial and stays silent; his only attempt to make things right comes in an anonymous note to the judge that ultimately is futile and the poor shmuck is found guilty. So Joe leaves town, unredeemable, amoral and completely unlikable. The End.I had a few problems with this movie, apart from the sweeping generalizations I've already made. For one, Cathy falls into the river and sinks like a stone. Even people who can't swim manage to thrash on the surface for a few seconds. Second, Joe shovels coal for a living in 1950s Scotland...I think the odds are fairly slim that he could even write at all. And don't even get me started on why the film is called "Young Adam" when his name is Joe. The one positive thing I can say is that Ewan is plain enough to convincingly play a working-class stiff, while still being heartbreakingly gorgeous under layers of coal dust. And god I love his accent. But this film just left me feeling....empty. And pissed that I stayed up until midnight to finish it.
I have seen most, if not all, of Ewan's movies (okay, not Star Wars: Attack of the Clones yet, but we don't even want to go there), and I have to say this is one of the worst. I preferred The Pillow Book to this, and that one is pretty out there. I vastly preferred Nightwatch, a film that Ewan himself says he wishes he could forget. I would put this more on a par with Serpent's Kiss or Eye of the Beholder, two movies I can barely remember they were so bad (okay, now I might be just name-dropping. The point is, I've seen just about every Ewan movie there is). When I realized it was made as recently as 2003 I just shook my head with my face in my hands. Maybe Ewan lost a bet with the director in a drinking game or something. Don't lecture me on arthouse movies, I enjoy plenty of them. I also don't necessarily need a sugarcoated happy ending to love movies. I'm no mainstream Hollywood moviegoing drone. But this was just....feh. The reviews on IMDb.com calling this a "gorgeous, sexually-charged masterpiece" baffle me. Did we see the same movie? The disc comes with two commentaries but I don't think I could bear to sit through this even one more time. Ewan, baby, I love you with all my heart and soul, but surely there were other scripts offered to you last year? It pains me, but 0.5 out of 5
Love,
Lainey
