Dear Reader,

I've been a horrible blogger. I have been watching so many amazing things during the past 5 months and totally selfishly not writing about them. Why? Because I'm lazy. Sorry.

The fact that most of my readers come here to read about The Room is still abundantly clear. Since you all love The Room so much, read this. In addition to being one of the most amazing articles I've ever read, there is a bit of Wiseau info in there that literally made me scream when I read it. So stoked.

There are going to be some changes around here. My boyfriend is interested in giving this blog a serious makeover. I am considering branching out into writing about TV. And most importantly- I'M ACTUALLY GOING TO UPDATE! Please send your movie recommendations to tinydrinks@gmail.com. Thanks in advance.


Love,
Erin

The Limits of Control (2009) Jim Jarmusch
By: Joe Y.

I went into this film with high hopes, which in all honesty might of been the reason why I felt the way I did after the film's conclusion. Jim Jarmusch's new film Limits of Control is a story about a loner embarking on a journey across Spain, to complete an act unbeknownst to the viewers until the film's conclusion. The film's star Isaach De Bankolé (Night on Earth, Ghost Dog, Coffee and Cigarettes) delivered a remarkable performance on screen, despite the fact that his character only has a handful of lines. The majority of the dialogue is delivered by the film's supporting cast including Gael Garcia Bernal (Amores Perros, Y Tu Mambien, Babel), John Hurt, Tilda Swinton and Bill Murray among many others. Each character the Loner meets on his journey engages him with existentialist conversations regarding music, film, science, etc. While I think that the film is beautifully shot, and for the most part beautifully acted, I couldn't help but feel unsatisfied by the film. It seems like only a small segment of what could be a miraculous story. Maybe I missed the main point of the story on my first watching but I can tell you that I am not rushing to see it again. Possibly the most depressing aspect of the film was Bill Murray's role. Only appearing on the screen for less than five minutes, Murray manages to deliver, imho, one of his worst roles ever. Visually I believe this film is remarkable and I have no complaints, but content wise I feel the film is not a right fit for me. As a huge Jarmusch fan I have to say overall I am disappointed.

Grade: C

New Contributor Alert!

When I posted about The Room, I discovered (thanks to statcounter) that I actually have many RSS subscribers! Oh happy day! Thanks guys, I hope you stick around. (And don't forget to tell your friends!) I thought no one read this blog, but I've now realized that I need contributors. So I want to take this opportunity to welcome my first contributor, Joe!! He's a great guy and a huge film buff, so expect some variety and more frequent posting around here.


Observe and Report (2009), Jody Hill
By: Joe Y.

I am almost at a loss of words when it comes to this movie. I assumed going into it that is was going to be another writer/director trying to profit off the Apatow cast/trend and I wasn't completely off. Observe and Report is a story about a mentally unstable mall security guard, with dreams of grandeur, who invests himself in a case working against the police to find a local mall flasher.

I consider myself a fan of Seth Rogan, seeing as I have liked just about every film that he has starred/co-starred in, but I can't tell you what he was thinking when he took on this role (Or better yet what the producers and executive producers were thinking while funding it). The movie has a weak story structure and consists of crude humor and cheap laughs. That being said I did have my fair share of laughs while watching it. The funniest parts are few and far between though, leaving you waiting for the next big one. About halfway through the film it takes a turn from goofy summer comedy to an odd dark comedy. The whole mood of the film changes and it leaves you feeling mildly amused and disturbed at the same time. The film finally concludes with one of the most unbelievable and absurd endings but I would be a liar if I said I did not laugh. I would advise against spending any money seeing this film but it is worth a watch at least once.

I want to give this movie a D but I can't help but give it a C+.

The Room (2003), Tommy Wiseau



If you live anywhere other than LA, chances are you have never heard of The Room. In the past 5+ years, this film has taken on a life of its own. It's our generation's Rocky Horror Picture Show. Perhaps that is a bold statement, but it's certainly not an exaggeration. People show up at midnight screenings dressed as their favorite characters, throw things at the screen, yell out insults directed at the film, and act out their favorite scenes. This film has a pretty impressive list of celebrity fans: Paul Rudd, Jonah Hill, basically the entire cast of The State, Tim Heidecker, Eric Wareheim, Kristen Bell, Edgar Wright, and David Cross, to name a few. It's about to blow up, thanks to Adult Swim. Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job! had Tommy Wiseau direct and star in a recent episode, and they showed the film as an April Fool's joke all day last week, with the rampant nudity censored by large black boxes.

So where do I begin with this movie? It seems to be a vanity film gone very wrong. Or right, depending on how you look at it. A friend recently described it as "either the best or the worst movie ever." Tommy Wiseau serves as the director, writer, star, executive producer, and financier of The Room... does that tell you anything? Most of the cast doubled as crew, and it's rumored the cast/crew turned over about 3 times during shooting, probably due to everyone in the world being confused as hell by Tommy Wiseau as a person, not to mention as a boss. Somehow, Wiseau wrangled a mysterious (as in he won't divulge his sources) $6M to make this movie, yet it looks like it was made for about $6.

Though this movie was made in 2003, the costuming puts it at roughly 1998. The frumpy hair and dark, unkempt eyebrows of the "sexy" (read: kinda chubby, with weird boobs and ugly clothes) femme fatale character certainly don't help. The soundtrack is awful, generic R&B crap ("I will stand in the way of a bullet/I will run through a forest of flames," for example) that burns itself into your subconscious, preventing you from ever being able to get it out of your head. The acting is on par with your average Skinemax movie, with the exception of maybe "Chris-R," the crazy drug dealer guy. Yes, this movie "deals" with such serious topics as drugs, infidelity, terminal illness, and home decor (placing your TV behind a chair, or putting up countless framed photos of spoons).

There is no way Tommy Wiseau is 40 years old (I'm thinking 50+), or from New Orleans, as he likes to claim. I'm not even sure that he's of this planet. Wiseau has an odd presence, like the antithesis of charm, but it somehow works for him. "A half-drunk, Croatian cyborg," is probably the most accurate description I have come across. Based on watching The Room as many times as I have, there are a few things you can deduce about Tommy as a person:

• This man has never seen a nude woman. (He is clearly having sex with Lisa's mid-torso region throughout the film. This is not Videodrome. That is probably why she prefers his best friend, Mark.)
• This man hates women. (The casual misogyny of this film is acknowledged by LA fans screaming "BECAUSE YOU'RE A WOMAN!" after practically every sentence.)
• This man has never had an alcoholic beverage in his life. (That is the only way "scotchka" and the awkward drunk scene can possibly be explained.)
• This man genuinely sees himself as a Christ-like figure. (Paying Denny, the possibly autistic man-boy's rent and tuition, bringing Lisa roses every day, the position in which he dies. Oh, did I spoil it for you? Oops.)
• This man is a genius. (He had the terrific idea to purchase billboard space advertising the film on an extremely busy LA freeway for 4 years, probably where most of that $6M went to. I would recommend watching interviews with him to see how he skillfully deflects any questioning of his motives in the making of his film. I almost thought about maybe believing that he so casually dropped the subject of Claudette's breast cancer on purpose.)

This is a movie that you simply cannot watch alone. It practically begs to be watched with lots of other people, preferably strangers. If you get really into it, here's a guide on how to view it interactively. Everything I want to say about this film has probably already been said, and said better, so I am going to direct you to a few articles that will convince you to see this film if I haven't already:

Entertainment Weekly- The article that introduced the rest of America to The Room!

NPR- Pictures AND video!

LAist- An interview with Wiseau himself!

So Much Fun It Hurts- Another blogger's obsession! (Bonus: The Room in NYC, complete with David Wain appearance!)

Cult Media Studies- A more academic review.

Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job!- An episode directed and starring Tommy Wiseau!

If you'd like to submit your own The Room review, please do so at tinydrinks@gmail.com. I'll post it.

The Jerk, Too (1984), Michael Schultz



In a perfect world, Steve Martin would be my older, wiser, charming, intelligent, and HILARIOUS boyfriend. We would eat dinner at 4:00 with a senior discount. He could introduce me to Tina Fey, maybe even Bill Murray. So what if he's old enough to be my grandpa? Have you seen him lately? He's still a babe. It's no secret that I worship Mr. Martin, and that The Jerk is my all-time favorite comedy. So, a few weeks ago, I noticed that Cinemageddon had a featured torrent entitled "The Jerk, Too." Without even reading about it or thinking twice, I downloaded it. Bad choice, my friends. Very. Bad. Choice.

The Jerk, Too pretty much, for lack of a better term, donkey-punches its predecessor. Navin Johnson goes from being a sheltered, naive jerk in the original film, to being a mentally handicapped, possibly autistic man-boy in The Jerk, Too. Navin is played lethargically by Mark Blankfeld, whose IMDb reads like a "Worst Movies Ever" list. He does somewhat resemble Steve Martin from certain angles, if you glance at him via your periphery when you're drunk or hanging upside down from your ceiling. He pretty much phones this one in anyways, so I wouldn't recommend going to the trouble.

I understand that this was intended to be a "reworking" of the original, but it's not even in the same spirit. It seemed as though, judging by the cutesy theme song and opening credits, that this was intended to be some kind of pilot? Thank your lucky stars that it never got picked up. It was kinda like a comedy, but someone forgot to write jokes. This "movie" insulted my intelligence and sullied my already outrageously high opinion of Steve Martin, due to his credit as executive producer. One can only assume that my Stevey had some alimony payments to make or something. This was TORTURE to sit through. This abomination is the kind of thing that the devil has playing on a loop in hell. Maybe this should be my new tagline: "I sit through shitty movies, so you don't have to."

Grade: Z

Watchmen (2009), Zack Snyder

The most anticipated film adaptation of a comic of the past 25 years has finally arrived. The graphic novel, which just happens to be my favorite book of all time, has been deemed unfilmable even by Terry Gilliam's standards, not to mention caught up in litigation and Hollywood bullcrap pretty much since the book came out. Even this version of Watchmen was nearly doomed to never see the light of day at the last minute. Although this adaptation is sufficient, in my opinion, I can't help but wonder what it would have been like in the hands of Darren Aronofsky? If I were him, I'd have taken directing this over The Fountain any day. But I digress.

It's a good thing that this movie was not made before 2009, simply because the technology we have now makes it possible for Dr. Manhattan to look the way he should look, and for Archimedes to fly. And maybe because comics are now beginning to be seen as more than merely "kid's stuff."

The movie could not possibly have looked more like the book. Why use storyboards when the entire comic practically is a storyboard? You could pick out specific frames of the comic in some scenes, which is pretty much the most exciting thing ever for a nerd like myself. The costuming was pretty good. Rorschach's certainly stole the show, with his constantly morphing mask and an outfit to match his noirish demeanor. Too bad I hated his stupid Christian Bale voice. Dr. Manhattan was pretty much mind-blowing. He could not have looked more perfect. Jeffery Dean Morgan was shockingly good as The Comedian. Why do I only ever see him playing dead people? Malin Akerman was just awful- wooden, and most certainly nowhere near old enough. The music was a bit obvious, sure. But what do you want? Subtlety in a comic movie? Surely you jest. All things considered, I'd say Snyder did the best he could with a comic that NEVER should have been turned in to a movie. It was much more a superhero movie than the book was a superhero book. Snyder lost a lot of the Alan Moore's subtle social commentary in the translation from page to screen.

This is very much a fan's movie. That's not to say that the uninitiated won't enjoy it. In fact, my mom went with me to the midnight screening. She followed the story pretty well, and liked it enough to ask me if she could borrow the comic. But to get the full experience, it helps to be familiar with the book. I am super excited for the director's cut. I heard that it is possibly going to be released in theaters this summer? I can't really see non-fans lining up for that one, considering it will like be 4 hours long. This is not something that I'd want to see on a TV screen, so I'd like to see it a few more times before it goes out of theaters.

Meet Wally Sparks (1997), Peter Baldwin


Holy crap, this movie sucks. It actually kinda blows my mind how much it sucks. (Wait a minute- no, it doesn't.) I don't even really feel like going into the suckage specifics but I suppose you, the reader, have the right to know.

I'm very much a fan of Rodney Dangerfield but this movie was cheap (I'm talking both budget and jokes here), completely nonsensical (in a bad way), and was so boring that I ended up pausing it and researching other movies I could wash the taste out of my mouth with for about 20 minutes at one point. There is a ridiculous amount of cameos in this movie, from Michael Bolton to Tony Danza, none of which are interesting or funny enough to really perk up the movie though.

If anyone would like to take this piece of crap off my hands, I will mail it to you, free of charge. Contact me at tinydrinks@gmail.com if you're interested.