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John Tucker Must Die (2006)
Teen Schlock
I just paid $2.50 to see this movie, only because I was passing time. Sadly, it looked better than the other options at the dollar theater. "John Tucker Must Die" follows formulaic teen romantic/comedy stock plots about makeovers to become popular and manipulation of relationships. I've seen it before in the likes of "Mean Girls", "Clueless", "She's All That", and I've seen it done much better in other films. "JTMD" features actors who are much too old for high school, which was vaguely reminiscent of "Beverly Hills 90210" for me. The acting is mostly poor or mediocre. It lacks emotional nuances. Even with the most flaky characters, better teen comedies succeed in making you at least cheer the movie's characters on in their misadventures. Think of the endearingly awkward heroines of John Huges fare. Instead, we are left with inconsistent and vapid characters in "John Tucker Must Die". The main character, for example, is mostly a straight laced and thoughtful student, but she yells at her mother played by too-young Jenny McCarthy for "messing her up". It doesn't follow during the course of the film that she is experiencing angst at all, unless you consider her chosen low social profile to be a desperate and pathological act. Damaged characters need to be more than just shy and poetic. They need to have visible anger and frustration, which the protagonist never displays. We aren't privy to her angst, and it leaves the viewer feeling ambivalent about her. Also, the cheap turn from high school social manipulation to moral confession to food fight toward the end of the movie comes across as pointless, ridiculous, and absurd. The romantic development of the two main characters comes across as forced and improbable. I wondered how John Tucker could actually fall in love with a heroine with the personality of stale toast, especially when she is surrounded by more colorful characters who only make her appear more two-dimensional and boring. We see John Tucker, high school womanizer on dates with sassy, ambitious, and open-hearted young women, but then are supposed to believe he really falls in love with the girl who is attempting to pull the wool over his eyes by alternating between silence, diverted eye contact, and constipated facial expressions? As well, many other emotional displays in the film aren't contextual with the narrative or congruent with other scenes, leaving one with a sense of in-credulousness about the characters' integrity. All in all, this movie is clumsy and a waste of time.
The other quality that is sadly lacking is any relevant pop cultural references. Cool teenagers today aren't bragging about liking Elvis Costello or Cheap Trick, which is what we see in this film, and the entire soundtrack of Blink-182 sound-a-likes leaves much to be desired. One of the fun things about teenage cinema is seeing what is trendy with teenagers right now, and "JTMD" doesn't even deliver that bare minimum standard.
The only comedic moments for me were when I was laughing at this film for it's occasional stumbles into schlock territory. Unfortunately, most of "JTMD" is just mediocre and forgettable.
My other criticism of this movie is related to the fact that I am a feminist. I watch movies, using my feminist analytical lens. I had a few politically-charged criticisms of this film: First, when John Tucker is humiliated at the movies with the suggestive ad saying he has genital herpes, I thought that really contributed to general ignorance about sexually transmitted diseases and infections. Herpes is not a fatal disease. While it can complicate child-bearing and can be cosmetically unpleasant, it is not that big of a deal. The other thing that is worth being fearful about genital herpes is that it increases chances of catching HIV. However, John Tucker's date is seen getting up in disgust and running away from him. After all of the grassroots activism for AIDS and demystifying sexuality and STD's, it is unethical to present genital herpes as something you should RUN AWAY, SCREAMING from. That is misinformed and stigmatizing for people who live with herpes. One in five adults in the U.S. has genital herpes.
Second, I thought it was misogynist and trans-phobic when John Tucker unwittingly takes estrogen and is reduced to an insecure, crying, chocolate-eating wimp. Is that what it means to be female? What the hell? And this scene presents a problematic view of what it means to be a male-bodied individual taking estrogen. Hollywood isn't shy about ridiculing women and trans-gendered people, and I felt that this scene was no exception.
An Inconvenient Truth (2006)
Mobilizing to Action
Aside from stock narratives (such as the nationalist segment about American inventiveness at the end of the film or the reductive comparison between humans-facing-global-warming and complacent-frogs-in-water-heated-to-boiling-temperature), this movie is compelling, mobilizing to action, and powerful. I did concurrent research on the Kyoto Protocol treaty in 2003 for my bachelor's degree in Political Science, and many of the findings are overlapping.
After seeing this film, I am finally motivated to transform my lifestyle and house into an environmentally responsible one. There are many recommendations online of how to reduce one's carbon emissions in daily living. My partner and I switched our regular incandescent light bulbs to compact fluorescent light bulbs, which should cut down our electric expenses by 75%. I also decided to quit flying on airplanes. Both of us don't even drive cars.
As well, Al Gore offers us an optimistic call to action that will make even jaded liberals feel hopeful about the future of this planet. He also offers connections between the global warming issue and other political issues on both the liberal and conservative sides of the political discursive field.
One Hour Photo (2002)
Someone Watched "The Shining" Too Many Times
"One Hour Photo" is a great thriller that unabashedly borrows tactics from Stanley Kubrick's "The Shining": the tracking shots, the "linear" cinematography, the Black guy who can't wait to help the white family, a sensitive child character, and the overall weirdness. I read in the IMDb trivia that Jack Nicholson was originally asked to play the role of "Sy", but that would have made this film into too obvious of a "Shining" rip-off. Robin Williams' convincing and compassionate acting as "Sy" bent the film in a different direction. He is much more subtle than Nicholson, who we can imagine as being constantly at the boiling point in many of his other roles. Williams delivers a feminized performance, where even his victims, being held at knifepoint can't seem to be dominated by his weak persona. This movie is full of thriller genre clichés, yet is still very engaging and likable.
Frailty (2001)
A Mix of Good and Bad
The story is narrated by one of the sons (Adam or Fenton Meiks?). He describes growing up in a small Texas town with his father and brother and watching his home life transform into a paranoid religious cult, as his father becomes gripped by religious hallucinations instructing him to kill people. I thought it was an average movie borrowing from the thriller/horror formulas and outstanding classics like "Sleepers" and "Usual Suspects". There is such a mix of good and bad in the film, but mostly I felt irritated while watching it.
Pros: Could be an interesting interrogation of the construction of white masculinity cast against black absence (for the Bhabha-reading postmodern viewer). Disturbing inclusion of child abuse, which makes this film seem bolder and more important than others in the genre. Retrospective narration & voice-overs. No gore. Clever manipulation of what is really happening. I wasn't entirely sure who was good and who was the victim throughout the movie.
Cons: Bad overacting at times. The pacing seems pretty slow for over an hour. Vapid dialog that requires voice-over narration to compensate. A plot twist sort of along the lines of the plot twist in "Usual Suspects", except it was more fun when I saw it in that movie ten years ago. No gore. Criminality that is inconsistent with DSM-IV. Costuming? What's that? Considering that most of the story-telling should be happening in the 70's, why does everyone looked like they got their clothes in 1995?
Prey for Rock & Roll (2003)
Riot Grrrl Fairy Tale
They finally made a Hollywood film about Riot Grrrl!
"Prey For Rock & Roll" was written in part by Cheri Lovedog, front woman for Lovedog, an L.A. all-woman punk band with no major record releases. They opened up for more distinguished punk bands like X and the Descendents. It is a moving story about being an aging punk rocker woman in L.A., and I have a feeling that Lovedog probably imbued this story with much of her own life story.
Warning: Plot Spoilers: The part of this film I am most interested in, of course, is it's function as a feminist fairy tale. The narrative is structured around Clam Dandy, an all-woman (with two lesbians and one bisexual woman) L.A. punk band. The singer, Jacki (Gina Gershon) is often the solid figure the other members depend on. Jacki, despite being beautiful for her 39 years, expresses consistent insecurity about what is socially appropriate for 39 year old women and how valuable she is, as a 39 year old woman to society. This is a very real set of doubts for most women in the Western world, and I imagine living in L.A., even if it is the seedy underbelly, has to intensify those concerns. Despite her worries undermining her self-esteem, Jacki supports her three band mates through trying ordeals. Tracy (Drea Matteo) is a messy-headed drug addict. Tracy confesses toward the end of the film, that she is addicted to narcotics and alcohol. Lori Petty (from "Tank Girl") plays Faith, a bleached blonde lesbian, who rings for Anne Heche in her Ellen heyday. Faith, like Jacki is a relatively solid character, although her lack of experience with personal tragedy alienates the other characters as they experience their own personal horrors. I felt that this interpersonal dynamic is a very common, real one in real life, so the introspection of the script definitely works in "Prey"s favor. Sally (Shelly Cole), the drummer for Clam Dandy, looks younger and hipper with her retro styling ala "Grease", but she endures the most sexualized violence out of any of the leading female characters. She expresses her frustration that her girlfriend Faith looks at her as though she will "shatter", giving the viewer an idea of her own internal strength. The character development here is rich, and I especially appreciated the attention paid to the dynamics of female friendships. Even more, I appreciated the complex web of feelings between subjects that emerges within groups of women. I think these qualities are really important for a movie to function as a feminist consciousness raising film, but in the milieu of female clichés, it is increasingly difficult to construct female characters who don't reconstitute existing clichés. It helps that the character who goes down at the end is not "the junkie whore" or "the rape victim", otherwise "Prey" would descend into the fodder of after school specials. The interpersonal conversation is really what adds contextual depth to the subjects in this film.
The content of the plot explores sexual objectification, aging, rape, incest, and many other issues explored by similar bands like L7, 7 Year Bitch, and Bikini Kill. During the 1990's, Riot Grrrl really was a climactic punk rock feminist movement. As a person who fervently existed in that environment as a music fan (and fanzine writer), I almost feel like this film is a thinly masked one about that time. The piles of tragedy Clam Dandy endure seem melodramatic, but in this case, it is art imitating life when we remember Kathleen Hanna's (of Bikini Kill) assertions that her brother used to rape her, when we remember the horror of Mia Zapata (of The Gits) being raped and murdered, when we remember that Stefanie Sargent (of 7 Year Bitch) and Kristen Pfaff (of Hole) died of a heroin overdoses. The overwhelming shared pain within a circle of people is immeasurable, and that makes the "plot twists" in "Prey" convincing. However, unlike real life, where Mia Zapata's sympathizers had to wait a decade for her killer to be caught, Jacki and her sensitive" boyfriend Animal, who went to prison for killing the stepfather who raped his sister, Sally, exact vengeance on Nick, a rapist character who was dating Tracy. Rapist revenge films can be feminist ("Girls Town") or exploitive ("I Spit On Your Grave"), and in this case, I feel that "Prey" operates as the former.
The other dimension of this film concerns it's plausibility as an adequate representation of musicians and their lifestyles. Arguably, Clam Dandy (despite having assistance from Joan Jett on the set) are not the greatest rock band. Gina Gershon's singing isn't moving or even good. They can't even get a recording offer over $2,000 despite having a decade of experience as a band. Arguably, Clam Dandy spends more time negotiating their personal drama than practicing. This aspect of the film seemed to infuriate people in other reviews, although I think they really are missing the point.
Nine 1/2 Weeks (1986)
Queer Content & The Rape Scene
Overall, I think this movie is sexually inventive, especially by 1986 Hollywood standards. The suggestive cues imbued in sounds, textures, and food, combined with actual nudity, is so hot. Basinger and Rourke are still hot, despite a radically changed fashion landscape. It's not the best movie of all time, but it wasn't painful, either. There's a few points that caught my attention: 1. First, there is a scene in the film that definitely queers heterosexuality. Kim Basinger's character Elizabeth in one scene is dressed in (shabby) drag, and as she and John (Mickey Rourke) leave the restaurant, they are gay-bashed. The suggestion that straight people can be victims of homophobia, or that straight people involved in BDSM defy notions of normative heterosexuality, is a radical suggestion for a 1986 Hollywood film. In the following scene, a flamboyant man is talking, and he seems really gay, also, so again, there is another subtle suggestion...
2. What's up with the little girl sitting on the stairs at the Chelsea Hotel? What does she symbolize? Someone on IMDb.com thought it meant Elizabeth was pregnant, but I took it as an expression of Elizabeth's power position in the relationship. She kind of became "a little girl", but not so much that she was below patting an actual little girl on the head.
3. When John throws Elizabeth down on the table, is he raping her? The ambiguity here is frustrating to me, especially considering that the 1980's were still full of actual cases where women were blamed for their rapes. It is frustrating to me that we cannot discern whether or not Elizabeth is being raped (and that ambiguity is projected as acceptable to an audience who might not otherwise be sympathetic to rape victims). It is also frustrating that if Elizabeth really is being raped in this scene, it ends with her "enjoying it". Again, not the most socially responsible scene. For people who adhere to the "safe, sane, consensual" ethos of BDSM, it might be a hot rape play scene, but I think it's not really socially responsible to just sneak it in a movie that Joe Date Rape might go see.