Well, dear readers, it is Friday, a time for short notes. Yes, you heard it here, dear readers, after the endless notes of Thursday we have the short notes of Friday. Man, the joint was jumpin’ yesterday. Could you believe how jumpin’ this particular joint was? One thing that was mentioned in passing yesterday (whilst the joint was jumpin’) was the fact that our very first haineshisway.com interview will be going up in our brand spanking new handy-dandy Unseemly Interview Section one week from this very day. Yes, you heard it here, dear readers, are brand spanking new handy-dandy Unseemly Interview Section will be unveiled one week from this very day. Isn’t that exciting? Isn’t that just too too? As I’ve mentioned, our very first interviewee is Miss Kerry Butler, who is starring in the brand spanking new musical, Hairspray, which is about to go into previews on Broadway. It’s quite an interview and Miss Kerry Butler holds nothing back from my searing and pointed questions. In this interview you will, for example, find out the never-before-revealed answer to the question Does Miss Kerry Butler Actually Use Hairspray? She holds nothing back, let me tell you. I know this because “nothing” contacted me and told me she was holding “nothing” back and that “nothing” was none too happy about being held back. What the hell am I talking about?
Last night I went to an actual motion picture theater, the Cinerama Dome, to see an actual motion picture entitled Minority Report. It is the only film currently playing that I had any desire to see. I’d seen on the Internet that the usual suspects, the idiots on Usenet newsgroups, were doing their usual thing – bashing Spielberg and his film, because they are a) idiots, and think what they’re doing is cute or b) they’ve seen other idiots bashing and have joined the fray. My take on this is simple: If Mr. Spielberg’s new film was the first Indiana Jones film, and/or ET and it came out now instead of when it did, they would do the same thing – bash it. Because now these idiot kids have an outlet that idiot kids didn’t have before. For example, when I was an idiot kid (and let’s face the fact, we were all idiot kids at one time or another) I’m sure I was as insufferable as today’s idiot kids, but I didn’t have this outlet – a good thing, in my opinion (IMO, in Internet lingo).
The fact is that Minority Report isn’t a masterpiece, but it’s so much better than anything else that I’ve seen that it’s not even a contest. Mr. Spielberg is a good director – he has always been a good director and he always will be. That doesn’t mean he hasn’t made some bad films – all good directors have made inexplicably awful movies. It happens. Movies today are, for the most part, simply terrible. They all follow Screenwriting 101 or ape the latest hit which, of course, was aping something from twenty years ago. And the studios pandering to their target audience is worse than ever and its why movies are so terrible.
Prior to the movie, there were three trailers – one for a new Robin Williams movie called One Hour Photo. That is, perhaps, the worst movie title in history. The movie looks silly and standard. I can’t remember the second trailer, but I’m sure it was a thriller of some sort. The third was mind-boggling in its awfulness – something starring someone named Vin Diesel. I don’t know what a Vin Diesel is but I will not be seeing the film, which looks horrid. They actually brag about the fact that it’s from the makers of The Fast and the Furious. Oh, boy, that will get me in the theater. All three trailers were narrated in that same nauseating way that all trailers today are narrated, and by that same nauseating voice – it sounds like the guy is trying to pass a very large stone.
Anyway, I enjoyed Minority Report – it’s not brilliant, but it’s always interesting and moves right along, despite its length. There are some wonderful scenes in it (some very Kubrickian moments – the eye replacement scene is very A Clockwork Orangesque) and some of the futuristic touches are great and funny. I’m not certain that a mere forty years from now all the freeways will have been redesigned in the way this movie imagines, but who would have thought in 1918 that Southern California would be the city it was a mere forty years later – in other words, anything’s possible. The only thing that really annoyed me throughout the film, was that Mr. Spielberg allowed too many actors to chew gum. That is just a cheap actor trick and I hate it. One actor chewing gum I can live with, but there were three or four in this film and it was too much gum chewing. I hate the sound of gum chewing and I especially hate it in Dolby Digital or DTS sound. There was nothing especially interesting about the “twists” in the film – they were quite obvious – but Mr. Spielberg’s direction is, as always, very professional and good. I’m not sure I like this cameraman he’s been working with – I do get a bit tired of all the smoke and the slip-framing. The performances are, for the most part, fine and there is one great performance from the extraordinary Miss Samantha Morton. I’ve only seen this woman in two films, this and Mr. Woody Allen’s Sweet and Lowdown, but she’s a wonderful actress. The most shocking thing in all of Minority Report is Jessica Harper. What on earth has happened to this woman? She looks so haggard and so much older than she really is (I should think she might even be younger than me), I just don’t get it really. In fact, I did not know it was Jessica Harper until the end credits. I recognized the face, barely, but could not place the name. Anyway, I recommend the movie, period, the end.
What am I, Ebert and Roeper all of a sudden? These are short notes? Well, tomorrow I’ll write short notes – that will be it – Friday’s notes will be medium-length notes and Saturday’s will be short notes. Did anyone notice that yesterday the joint was jumpin’ here at haineshisway.com? Over fifty posts and very lively. I would say more, but I do believe it is now time to click on the Unseemly Button below.
Has anyone noticed that these here notes are not short? At least thus far they aren’t. I’ll keep this section very short. I picked up two DVDs on Wednesday that I forgot to mention – I don’t think these come out for a few weeks, but I got Curse of the Demon and Revenge of Frankenstein. Despite the lurid title, Curse of the Demon is a wonderful little chiller from 1958, starring Dana Andrews and the lovely Peggy Cummins. It was originally titled Night of the Demon in England and in the UK the film ran ten minutes longer than its US cut. This DVD thankfully includes both cuts – and the film looks great, enhanced for widescreen televisions. Haven’t looked at Revenge of Frankenstein yet, but it’s the Hammer sequel to the tremendously popular The Curse of Frankenstein, so I’m sure it’s enjoyable, and given that it came from Columbia/Tri-Star, I’m sure it looks great.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must get in my automobile and drive places, see people, eat foodstuffs. But I shall check in from time to time to see what is going on here at haineshisway.com because there is always something going on here at haineshisway.com. The joint is always jumpin’ here at haineshisway.com, isn’t it? We are Internet be-boppers here at haineshisway.com, we are with it, we are part of the In Crowd, we are happening, we are today, we are now, we are where it’s at, we are the fast and the furious and also the cool and the crazy. Don’t forget, tomorrow is our Unseemly Trivia Contest, and Sunday Donald will have a brand spanking new radio show up, and perhaps he’ll even deign to tell us what it is. Otherwise, we shall deign to bitch-slap him from here to eternity. Today’s topic of discussion: I am fascinated by movies – especially the badness of most of today’s films. Name five films of the past two years that you thought were truly excellent and then tell what you think is generally wrong with movies you don’t think are excellent. For example, I thought A.I. was excellent (most people didn’t), truly excellent. You know what I think is wrong with most films. Your turn.