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The Squid and The Whale
A Divorce Is a Divorce, Of Course, Of Course!
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Bar none, one, of, THE, best, films, I, have, seen, all year!!! Everything about TS&TW is so darn commendable, that I’d almost offer a money-back guarantee, but alas I am semi-funemployed, and can’t even keep up with my own Magic Shell addiction. As with the Constant Gardner, this is ‘purty much as perfect as perfect can get‘. The only blip on the radar of negativity is that the ending may be a bit too unfulfilling for some. But everything else is more gold than a Simon Ammann ski jumping celebration (sorry, but I could not find the video of him yelping ‘YAAA GOLD!!’), hispecially: Jeff Daniel’s beard, Anna Paquin reprising her 25th Hour role, William Baldwin as a philistine, Jesse Eisenberg’s awkward relationship with Sophie Greenberg and her freckles, Jesse Eisenberg criticizing books he’s never read, Jesse Eisenberg thievery of Pink Floyd, Kevin Kline and Phoebe Cates’ son sorta paying homage to Judge Reinhold’s self-reliefdom in Fast Times at Ridgemont High (I think they even used the same Cars song, but don’t quoth me raven on that), being shot on location in the Slope (former home to the Thigh Master for 2 years), the cast’s vibrant wardrobe that any hipster would DIY for, and mos importantly, a killer killer killer soundtrack that is killer. I know the info I’ve supplied isn’t much to go on, but yer gonna have to truss me and the Rotten Tomato meter on this one.

Recommended for those who like: parking in Park Slope, Ilie Nastase, and things that are Kafkaesque

Possible Porno Name: The Squid IN The Whale

Unsatisfied with this? Netflix The Royal Tenenbaums, which is =ally as brills, but more of a unrealistic, idealized TS&TW with Adidas track suits

Further Fun: visit the real squid and the whale

Bee Season
Wabbit and Duck Season Have Some Competition!!
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If yer looking for a simple heartwarming story about kids, parents, and the ultimate goal of winning large at the Scripps Howard Spelling Bee, then feel free to czech out Spellbound, or hold off, if you can, for Akeelah. But if you desire something a bit more complex and spellbinding (had to use it cause it’s kinda punny), then get yer a$$ to the theater and see Bee Season. The bees here serve as a backdrop for the real drama, a gorgeous family on the surface who’s slowly being torn apart by favoritism, kleptomania, and religion. And what a family it is, consisting of pushy Jewish mysticism professor Richard Gere (doing his usual great work as… Richard Gere), his distant and delusional wife Juliette Binoche (who I always get confused with Julia Ormond, who did appear in First Knight with Gere-head), their heavily eyebrowed lost souled son Max ‘Anthony’ Minghella, and the queen bee glue who keeps them all together, Flora Cross, who chips in the greatest child performance I’ve seen since Dakota’s work in I Am Sam. To BEE bluntly honest, I wasn’t eggspecting much from a movie all about a lil cleft-chinned girl and the letters that spewed from her mouth. So it came to me as a great sirprize that we not only get the pronunciation, definition, use in a sentence, and the language origin of words, but how they define us as who we are and our place in universe. Did I mention that Kate Booozeworth is it and it doesn’t B-L-O-W?

Recommended for those who like: kaleidoscopes, Joe Isuzu in Airplane, and Kabbalah, without all that infedel Madonna red string bs

Possible Porno Name: On Your Knees Season

Unsatisfied with this? Netflix Pi

Further Fun: How well can you spell? + IMDB ruins the ending of the movie by simply listing the cast and the roles they played

The Passenger
Stop This Train, I Want To Get Off
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After taking in this udder borefest, where I witnessed three old ladies walk out, while crust was forming over my eye lids, all I can say is WHY WAS THIS SNOOZE-O-RAMA WORTHY OF A RE-RELEASE? Sure, it’s got Jack right in the prime of his career, and sure it was helmed by the dude that brought us Blow-Up, but isn’t that one of the most overrated movies you’ve ever did done seen with a hyphen in it? So sayeth me!! And I still can’t believe how uninteresting it was considering the plot revolved around Jack switching identities with a dead man, assuming his role as an arms dealer, while running all over the most scenic parts of western Europe, and finding time to fall in love with a free spirited gal. But all of that is lilo and stitched together with zero suspense, zero thrills, zero chills, and zero NOTHING… not even enuff nudity to make any movements in yer pants!! And don’t even get me started on that much ballyhooed 7-minute tracking shot that closes the movie. It is mos def technically brilliant, but like the movie as a whole, is juss so darn gratuitous and pointless. I agree with the old dude who sat behind me as the closing credits started to roll, ‘Thank gawd.’

Recommended for those who like: Antonio Gaudi, that evil dude from Beverly Hills Cop, and that hairy bizatch Brando poon-tangoed with in Paris [NSFW]

Possible Porno Name: The Passage-intomyanus-r

Unsatisfied with this? Netflix The Talented Mr Ripley

Further Fun: Top 5 Tracking Shots

…until next time, the balcony is clothed