Mystic Pizza

I watched this with my friend about... two weeks ago?  I didn't find it particularly memorable then and I remember it even less now.  So why not attempt to write about it?  Excellent - glad you're with me.  Also, the font on the captions changes mid-post.  Just let it happen.

Short Review
Julia Roberts (Julia Roberts) and her friend Jojo (Lili Taylor) and sister Kat (Annabeth Gish) are besties and they have wacky adventures where drama happens, but nothing too dramatic.  It opens with an almost wedding, but oh no, Jojo the bride faints!  And it ends with Jojo saying 'whatever' and finally marrying Bill (Vincent Phillip D'Onofrio).  In between they love and lose and have shenanigans and sometimes serve pizza because this is called Mystic Pizza.  Julia is a brazen hussy who falls for a rich guy while Kat has relations with the guy she works as a babysitter for.  They live, they learn, they laugh and the movie ends woo.

Long Review
Julia Roberts is the sassy sexual rebel and she is pretty okay with that.  Kat is going to Yale and everyone is impressed about it.  Jojo (who will forever, in my mind at least, be Jojo the dog faced boy) ditzes around trying to figure out what to do about her fiance, Bill.  The movie opens with the wedding of the fainting bride and then pizza.  We learn about the ladies personalities - Kat is quiet and Julia is sassy.

Later, Julia catches herself Charles von Gordonham Windsorsmith, Jr. (Adam Storke) and they make sweet lovins all over the place.  Julia also shows her sassiness while Charlie is clearly using her to be rebellious... or is he?  Kat has FOUR jobs already, guys, and has been accepted to Yale, but she also wants another job.  Also she thinks she's better than everyone in her tiny town.  And she drives a Vespa.  The girl is an enigma.

Adventures in babysitting and she immediately bonds with the demanding fetus in question.  She also bonds with nerd dad, Tim (William Remington Moses), who also went to Yale, but is, alas, married.  This, as I suspected, will not stop them.  They bond over stargazing and being 'nerdy'.  Jojo and Bill have shenanigans all over the place, but she still doesn't want to marry him.  Bill gets sassier as the movie progresses because he loves her dangit!  Also, he names his boat 'Nympho' after Jojo.  So sweet.

Julia and Charles also have their goings on and Julia often acts a little crazy.  Like the one time they get drunk, steal Bill's truck (because he and Jojo are in a fight) and drive to the country club.  That jerk Charlie is there with another girl.  Julia flips out, gets in the truck, nearly hits Charlie's car and then dumps all sorts of fish stuff in it.  Turns out it was Charlie's sister.  Oh wacky misunderstandings.  Charlie doesn't think that it's insane to do that and immediately forgives Julia because she just loves him so.  Other stuff happens probably, but it's hardly dramatic at all so skip it.

Kat makes mistakes in love and makes love with the Tim.  But oh no his wife comes home!  More drama in the tiny town of Mystic.  She cries and cries because her heart is broken I guess.  Classes clash at a dinner party with Charlie's parents where Charlie makes an ass of himself while pretending to defend Julia's honor.  Jojo decides to get married and Julia makes poor life choices as usual.  The end!

The biggest downfall of this movie is that there is hardly enough pizza.  It is called Mystic Pizza and I do not feel that I have experienced Mystic and its pizza.  Another major, major problem is that any time something dramatic can happen it's like the writers decided 'actually no let's do the boring thing'.  So many times I saw potential for stuff to happen and then nope, nothing happens.  Bill gets caught with his pants down and Jojo near his naughty place!  What happens?!  Jojo's dad chases him for five seconds and then Jojo recaps it to us.  We just watched it, Jojo - we don't need you telling us again.

I get that it's a coming of age tale, but it just seems like no one grew.  Jojo gets married, but she doesn't seem that much more okay with it than before.  Bill just won't give in to her sexual needs unless she marries him.  That's hardly maturity.  And Kat gets her heart broken by sleeping with a married man and then cries about it and the movie ends before we see what became of that.  Julia ... I forget what happens to her.  Charlie apologizes for being a jerk at dinner maybe?  At any rate - she's still got nothing other than a rich guy now.  The minute he leaves her she'll be back to square one.  Bah!

Overall I give it: 3 poor life choices

Agree?  Disagree?  Something else entirely?  Tell me in the comments!

Titanic 3D

I hadn't planned on it, but I ended up seeing Titanic 3D on Tuesday.  There wasn't a huge difference between 2D Titanic and 3D Titanic, but I still enjoyed it.  When the movie was over, we saw young kids leaving with their parents.  Kids who were not alive when Titanic first came out.  Do not like.  I also learned that I saw it with my mom in theaters when it first came out, but she had been hesitant to take me because there was nudity.  Anyway - you've all seen it so I'll do my best to be brief, but the movie is so long.  Also, I ran out of time for captions because it's already after midnight so it's technically Friday.

Short Review
Expensive necklace that present day treasure hunters are trying to find.  They don't, but instead they find Rose Something-Something's (Kate Winslet) breasts.  They bring Rose and her breasts to their ship and she tells the story of her time on Titanic.  The story: Rose and Jack Dawson (Leonardo DiCaprio) fall in love on the doomed ship Titanic.  She lives a life of privilege, but is being forced to marry Caledon Hockley (Billy Zane) who is devilishly handsome, but also an asshole.  Jack is poor and full of good feelings and being poor-ness.  Rose and Jack meet after her failed 'jump off the back of the boat because I have so many feelings' suicide attempt and then fall in love over the course of several hours.    Anyways.  Sassy drama and people going outside their comfort zones and into other classes when the ship strikes an iceberg.  The Titanic sinks and Rose lives while Jack freezes to death in the icy waters.  Also, old Rose throws the necklace off the ship and dies.  THE END.

Long Review
Treasure hunters are looking for the Heart of the Ocean necklace which is a blue diamond and very expensive.  They find a safe where they think the diamond is so they bring it to the surface.  They find a drawing of naked Rose because somehow paper survives for 84 years underwater even though there was clearly water in the safe.  Anyway - Rose sees herself on TV and within a day gets in touch with the boat on the ocean and gets a helicopter ride out there.  Being old, she tells her entire story of her time on the ship, instead of just the part the hunters are interested in.  Also, she tells parts of the story she has absolutely no way of knowing since she's nowhere near them when it happens.

Her story: her family lost their money so she is being forced by her mother to marry Cal so they can stay rich.  Cal is a dickhead who treats her like she's a silly woman.  She dislikes this so decides to hurl herself from the back of the ship.  Jack saves her, they bond, she's captivated by him.  Jack is invited to dinner and borrows a tux from the Unsinkable Molly Brown who is completely awesome.  He never returns the tux to her which I think is a pretty dick move.  Anyways - they have an awkward dinner and then dance with the third class passengers.

Rose is told not to see Jack anymore, but he can't stay away so they have wacky adventures on the ship and also he draws her naked.  Spicer (Spicer?!) Lovejoy (David Warner), Cal's creepy bodyguard is sent to disrupt their fun adventures and he does so by being a jerk.  Also, Rose and Jack run around the ship and have sex in a car.  BUT THEN!  A surprise twist!  An iceberg strikes the Titanic!  No one saw this coming!  Seriously, though... some people apparently had no idea that the Titanic was an actual ship so I guess the whole 'iceberg' thing was pretty surprising for them.

They go to warn the others, but instead Lovejoy frames Jack for the theft of the sparkly diamond necklace and Jack gets locked in a random room on one of the lower decks.  They try to get Rose on a lifeboat, but instead she runs off to find Jack.  One fire axe to the handcuffs later and he's free.  Freezing water is getting everywhere as the ship sinks and everyone splashes around in it like it ain't no thang other than a few 'wow the water is cold' comments.  Lots of running around and almost getting on lifeboats before jumping off to get back on the boat.  Also, the coat with the diamond necklace in the pocket is put on Rose.

Running around running around and water everywhere.  They hang out on the back of the ship while waiting for it to sink.  The Titanic goes down and they swim for the surface.  Freezing water and everyone's freezing and drowning.  Rose and Jack climb on a door to stay out of the water, but it starts to tip so only Rose gets on.  She promises Jack she'll live and then he freezes to death and she's saved by a returning lifeboat.  Later, on the Carpathia, she sees Cal looking for her, but hides.

Back to the present and everyone's crying because her story is so sad.  She goes to sleep and you see pictures of her living her life and doing things she promised Jack she'd do.  She dreams of the grand staircase where Jack is waiting for her at the top and they're both young and everyone is clapping and the movie ends.

Thoughts
Full disclosure: I got really choked up when the Strauses were holding hands on the bed and the little kids are being read to sleep and had a badass Xena-esque single tear.  Then, when they showed the pictures of her living her life at the end I cried til the movie was over.  That being said... I'm meh on the movie.  I was interested in the Titanic before the movie came out (my favorite musical is Titanic, guys) and I really enjoy the parts of the movie that have actual passengers, but I never had much of a connection to Rose and Jack.  Rose pissed me off mostly.

So there's a ton of stuff, but I'm running out of Thursday.  Here's a tiny quibble really.  Why, when they flip the door once, do they not try again!?  Get one of them on the door, their weight will stabilize it, and then the other person gets on.  Easy peasy.  And what the hell is Rose doing just lying on her back, watching the stars, while Jack freezes to death in the water next to her!  Why the heck doesn't she talk to him to try to keep him focused and alive?  She turns away from him in his final moments! Gross.

Overall I give it: 8 half full lifeboats

Agree?  Disagree?  Something else entirely?  Tell me in the comments!

Death Race

I was at dinner with friends and Death Race 2000 and Death Race were brought up.  They sounded horrible.  I decided to watch the newer one because I figured it would be worse.  I don't know what the original was like, but it would need to be horrifyingly awful for it to be worse than the new one. 

Short Review:
Former racer Jensen Ames (Jason Statham) is recruited to replace the deceased Frankenstein (David Carradine) in the Death Race - and by recruited I mean they murder his wife and frame him for it.  Frankenstein has one race left until he gets his fifth victory and freedom so Jensen is offered Frankenstein's last race.  Exposition and gangs and looking at cars and guns.  Then racing!  They dangle his daughter, Piper, as bait - when he's free he can have his kid back!  The final race goes all crazy pants and they blow up the Warden.  Everyone escapes and they move to Mexico.  The end! 

Long Review:
It's the future and some text about prisons being privatized and gladiators while badass music plays.  I guess fighting to death wasn't enough and they had to use cars.  Are the sponsored by Combos, the official snack of Nascar?  Unclear.  Frankenstein is driving with Case (Natalie Martinez) navigating.  A super epic (not really) car race happens and he gets exploded while Case ejector seats to safety.  Then we're in a foundry where Jensen works and then he's attacked by the police for reasons unknown!  And then his wife is murdered and he's cleverly framed for it. He is having a very bad day.

He goes to prison and finds out from Warden Hennessey (Joan Allen) that Death Race ratings are slipping without Frankenstein driving.  Jensen, the washed up racer, must replace him so the prison makes money.  Also there's a scene with them trying to explain away the fact that they're arming cars by saying something about 'electronic kill switches' and the guards have bigger guns.  People escape prison with spoons!  I'm sure they could find a way to use some of these weapons.  Whatever.  The rules: something something get to the finish line and you have a navigator because this is a movie for men and there aren't enough skanky women in it.

Racing racing they're all racing when suddenly spooky manhole covers are enabled!  Swords, shields and skulls.  Drive over them and you enable weapons in your car!  More racing and drivers start getting killed in increasingly gross ways.  Stage 1 ends with Jensen in last.  Also he finds out his daughter has been placed with a nice looking adoptive family.  If he wants her back he must win the Death Race!  Blah blah back to racing.  Case sabotaged the old Frankenstein because Hennessey told her she'd go free if she did.  Jensen kills Pachenko (Max Ryan) because Pachenko killed his wife.  His biggest rival, Machine Gun Joe (Tyrese Gibson), then tries and fails to kill Jensen.  Also, the Dreadnaught is released and it's a giant 18 wheeler covered in guns.  Pew pew.  Also a super gross scene with spike-y wheel bits and 14k (Robin Shou) gets exploded.

Dreadnaught explodes blah blah snarky comments from the pit crew - I stopped paying attention.  Speech by Hennessey and Jensen realizes he won't be given his freedom.  Shock.  Last stage - it's a Machine Gun Joe and Frankenstein showdown.  70 million are already watching!  I doubt that very much!  Race starts and the Warden is cheating, lighting manhole covers for Joe after Jensen passes over them.  Driving driving, intense looks and more driving, and also missiles just because.  And then they escape somehow!  Police chase!  Then oh snap the big reveal - Machine Gun Joe and Frankenstein are working together to escape!  Hennessey does not like that one bit!

Everyone is friends now and working together to get out of the prison.  How sweet.  Jensen jumps out of the speeding car while Case pretends to be Frankenstein because she also knows how to drive I guess.  It's okay, though, she got her release papers already and obviously Hennessey isn't the kind of person to go back on her word.  Then Joe and Jensen hitch a ride on a train and put on flannel PJs and are besties.  Hennessey gets a package and is snarky and then opens the package and explodes because that's all that happens in this movie - cars and explosions.  And then Jensen, his daughter, Case and Machine Gun Joe open a chop shop in Mexico and live happily ever after.

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Why?  WHY?!  This has to be one of the stupidest plots in movie history.  Why is anyone ok with whoever kills the most and best in a car going free?  What part of this seems like a good idea?  And why did they need to murder his wife?!  I feel like there are so many ways that they could have gotten him to race - like asking nicely!  Putting aside the whole 'Death Race' concept being ridiculous anyway... framing him for murder was their best plan?  And what's up with the pit crew?  The one 'nerd' guy clearly doesn't belong there.  Did they frame him too?

And then the happy ending in Mexico!  Because there are absolutely no repercussions for escaping prison on national television and then blowing up the Warden.  Just what the hell in so many ways.  I had to force myself to keep watching this movie - it's absolutely awful.  I like saying Machine Gun Joe's name, though... so that's something!

Overall I give it: 1 kerploded Death Race car

Agree?  Disagree?  Something else entirely?  Tell me in the comments!