Pineapple Express
Posted by Fleeceman on January 6th, 2010 filed in Entertainment, Movies2 Comments »
[Note: I wrote this over a year ago, then sat on it because it seemed trivial. However, since this blog has been incredibly glitchy for quite some time and I can't find the fricken code I need to contact my host, you'll just have to read a belated review, sans pictures, because hey, that's part of the glitch.]
Normally I refrain from writing movie reviews, primarily because I’m not getting paid for them, but Pineapple Express deserves special attention.
There is the phrase “so bad it’s good,” but this movie does not fall under that description. It borders on unbearable, and a friend of mine who went in stoned (to a stoner movie, natch) came out uncomfortably sober. The movie borrows heavily from genre traditions, much like Simon Pegg’s attempt with Hot Fuzz, and much like Fuzz, Express takes the heterosexual love between the two protagonists to ridiculous levels: to the point where there’s a fully-clothed gay sex scene as the heroes try to escape. The scene is only funny because you know what they’re trying to do, not because it’s actually funny.
Another major shortfall is the lack of chemistry between any of the characters. Most good comedians have the sense to riff off other comedians. The truly gifted ones cast actor/comedians who are funnier than they are, and give them free reign to do their thing. There’s so much wasted talent in Express it’s embarrassing. Gary Cole, (of “Did you get the memo? fame) doesn’t even get a hint of reference to that iconic role. If it was in here, maybe with a coffee cup, or a look, I missed it, and trust me, I was looking for anything beyond what was actually on screen.
Another buried talent was MAD TV’s Bobby Lee, whose first screen appearance is in a darkened room with three other ninjas as they plot death and destruction. He might as well have been billed as Generic Asian #3. He’s got maybe one line, then gets shot in the head. The dude is funny, and he gets tossed aside because Seth Rogen’s absurd rise to “star” power has currently reached Supernova status.
Rogen has moments, but he is a color character, much like Jack Black before he became a lead. Color characters are good as small samples of sorbet between the main course, but when forced down your throat for an entire movie, he gains the undesirable presence of being too much frosting on a cheap cake: you want to take the plastic fork and scrape him off and fling him into the trash. The editor must have thought Rogen was a riot, because from the looks of it, not one second of footage was cut. The scene where Rogen and James Franco (very likable with his moist eyes, indicating gaily at all times that he’d like to jump in Rogen’s lap and become a lap monkey) are stuck in the woods plays out like two junior high friends who found their dad’s video camera. It plays like it was written as a serious scene, but then acted “funny.”
Pineapple Express immediately jumps into the top-ten list of the worst movies ever made. I can’t even name the other nine right now, so let’s just put it at the number one slot until I can remember what’s worse. It’s exhausting in so many ways, mostly because you’re forced to laugh, because hey, it’s a comedy.
The BBQ Puker
Posted by Fleeceman on October 15th, 2009 filed in Absurd, Entertainment, Personalities, PigeonholedComment now »
In the foothills northeast of Santa Barbara sits a posh, gated community, where if you happen to be working within, you must first sign a contract, the small print of which states you must not even look at the pool once you’re on the property you’ve been assigned to. Dogs aren’t even allowed in your vehicle, even if they never get out. The gate guards, one chubster, one on who knows how many Oxycontin (who gets a look like he’s relearning English every time you speak to him) and one with about eight percent Down’s Syndrome (who most likely masturbates to fetish porn depicting huge-titted fat chicks greasing bowling balls) are instructed not to nod or wave in your general direction. As well, the owners are not allowed to own or drive trucks within the confines, so as to distinguish between owners and peons.
Besides all that, it’s a pretty nice place to work.
On the first Wednesday of every month the grounds keepers have a BBQ back by the tractors, lawnmowers and fertilizer. Big deal, you might be thinking, a simple BBQ behind the eight-foot hedge with the hired help. Yes, but this particular BBQ is sponsored by various contractors, businesses, and those in the know. Only those who know, know of this BBQ. The waiting list to sponsor this monthly shindig is three years long. Among people who like tri-tip, chicken legs, beans, rice, salad, and tortillas, this is the lunch to attend.
One such attendee at the most recent First Wednesday was a mailman. With his faux Lyle Lovett pompadour, his shorts pulled up past his ass crack, and his nervous, bouncy walk, he was doomed from the beginning. He admitted upon sitting at our table that he’d asked to reschedule his lunch hour weeks prior just so he could make it to the Q.
At our table sat me, my boss, the chef/head gardener, a groundskeeper, a guy from the pro shop, and the mailman.
Mailman immediately horked down a big chunk of tri-tip, wrapped in a perfectly steamed bite of flour tortilla, and followed it with a schlarg of Coke. Seconds later his eyes watered, he sat bolt upright, punched his solar plexus with the inside of his closed fist, barely made it from the table, stumbled ten feet, grabbed onto a tractor tire, and puked.
Barely having wiped his mouth, he sat back down. The chef returned with some water. Mailman sipped, then quickly scrambled from the table, puking the water and a bit more.
“Are you okay?” the Pro asked.
“Yeah,” Mailman responded, sitting back down. “I think that first bite went down wrong.”
The Pro went into a lengthy diatribe about his CPR recertification he’d gone through just the day before, which had included the Heimlich maneuver.
Mailman got up and puked again, this time mere feet from the table. At this point we at the table, and a few curious dudes at the next table, quirkily smiling, all telepathically decided we would keep eating, despite this guy’s continuing need to puke. It was as if he’d spilled his beverage: kind of a bummer, but no major inconvenience—especially nothing to hinder the eating process.
The Pro got up and Heimliched the mailman, who puked through his nose and mouth, twice. They both sat back down. I stifled a laugh into my hand. My boss stole a glance at my plate—he was almost done—I had about five minutes left.
“Swine flu?” my boss asked.
“I guess this is what they mean by “going postal”? the chef said.
“Did some Anthrax finally make it through?” I asked.
Mailman didn’t make it up the next time. He’d still only been sipping water. He almost fell backwards as he puked over the side of the table, a few microscopic splatters hit The Pro’s sideplate of tortillas, which he drew in closer. His gentlemanly decorum was waning.
“You sure you’re alright?” the Pro asked.
“Yeah,” Mailman replied, lightly punching his chest and wiping spittle from his mouth with the back of his hand. “I can tell it’s almost out.”
Almost out? we all wondered. Almost out? Fucking Christ, man, if you’ve got something lodged in your throat you can’t breathe, let alone speak, and if it’s stuck as long as his supposedly was, you’d be turning purple at this point—regardless of the freshness of the Pro’s Heimlich training.
Mailman went to get some paper towels. He schlooged one pile up, and returned it gloppily to a trashcan. As he returned to mop up another pile, he puked again, this time mere feet from my boss, who had finished his plate and was crouching at the head of the table talking to the chef. He gave me a look.
“We gotta go,” he said. “I’ve got a lot of meetings today.”
We briskly sauntered off, me with my last chicken leg lodged in my mouth. Once we were in his truck we laughed all the way back to the site, and then continued. We laughed for almost half an hour. Because, seriously, puke once and return to the table. Maybe. Not even making it from the table? Dismiss yourself—if not out of self-respect, then at least out of embarrassment. Go hide in the bushes until you’re done.
Next time we’ll be sitting down with the tractor boys, or maybe even up on a tractor, well away from the return of the Persistent Puker. All I know is he’d better sponsor a First Wednesday—I don’t care how long the wait list is.
What’s On TV?
Posted by Fleeceman on July 11th, 2009 filed in Pigeonholed1 Comment »
There’s usually a time to turn off the cable TV, and that’s when you turn it on.
TALKING HEADS. No, not the band. With basic cable especially, nothing is ever on. Sure, you’ve got the golf channel, constantly cycling reruns of great shots at The Masters, where putt after putt wanders across the green and woh!, into the hole! The golfers are then shown in succession rambling on about birdies and what a tough shot the ninth hole was. Seriously, what the hell is there to talk about? The fit of their shirt? The fact that the brim on their hat is an inch too long? That whatsisname’s pants are pink?
The Speed Channel is also wonderful for watching NASCAR talking heads ramble on about cars and stuff. MSNBC had a story about the “greening” of the “sport,” where Goodyear, for one, is taking the tons of discarded tires and actually recycling the things. The oil, too, the hundreds of thousands of gallons, is being recycled. Amazing, that after all this time, the sport that consumes massive quantities of petrofuel with their 850 horsepower engines getting five miles to the gallon so they can rev around a track in one cacophonic traffic jam is finally reusing their blatant excess.
THE CHARCOAL-BASED FART FILTER. The Discovery Channel had a show called Pitchmen, where bearded Billy Mays and British coseller Anthony Sullivan sit in an Invention Convention for 14 hours while a line of wannabe millionaires wait for a chance for the two master pitchers to glom onto their product and sell ridiculous quantities to housewives and retired workers in the Midwest.
It’s a fascinating show if you like watching things and people that should not be.
One such amazing product was a little maxi pad-like cloth insert that one would put into their underwear to protect against fart smell. Most likely not a loud fwaaap! Because by that time everybody knows who farted, regardless of smell. But those sneaky SBD’s? Perfect remedy. Just stick the deodorant infused patch onto your underwear and fart away.
Yeah.
The show then drives along with the bearded Billy Mays in his Bentley, and over to his house which is way bigger than yours.
Later, you change the channel to the QVC. Awesome, only here can you hear people selling, with the utmost intensity, rings and clothes and googahs that are quite possibly the worst products you’ve ever seen. I’m serious when I say this: the QVC is the best channel on television. It is the epitome of “nothing on.”
Turn the shit off. I’d rather listen to 311 than be subjected to another episode of Rachel Ray (who healthied up, by the way).
Dangerous Music
Posted by Fleeceman on July 7th, 2009 filed in Art, Movies, Music, PigeonholedComment now »
Itunes recently promoted some Library of Congress podcasts, one of which was about composing with the Devil.
Apparently, a musical interval called the tritone consists of starting on C then jumping up to F sharp, which is somehow tied to physics (and our brain). If you have a string for each note, the ratio of those strings is the ratio of the square root of two to one. Throughout history, the square root of two has been an uncomfortable phenomenon in numbers and also in sound.
The church in medieval Europe apparently executed those who did not accept the ban on the note.
In the discussion, they mention the two drunk individuals in Las Vegas who were listening to Judas Priest’s “Beyond the Realms of Death” and decided to commit suicide by shotgun in a playground. The first blew his head off. The second, due to the gun being bloody, couldn’t quite kill himself properly and ended up dying after years of reconstructive surgery. Strangely, and completely off topic, the song’s riff sounds the same as “Feel Like Makin’ Love” by Bad Company.
Bad Co., if we’re to go with album release dates, beat Priest by three years in terms of “owning” the creation of the riff, but this is also where the podcast begins to lose credibility. This is not to say that incorporating the square root of two into a conversation about music is uncredible, but moreso implies a certain level of inanity. The song the two morons shot each other for was “Better By You, Better Than Me,” not the aforementioned “Beyond …”
I was hoping for better from the Library of Congress. I mean, isn’t that pretty much the Smithsonian equivalent of a library? Shouldn’t the subject matter and the ensuing conversation be nothing short of amazing? Instead, they falter considerably in laying down facts. If you’re going to bring up a couple suicides linked to so called “evil” music, get the song right. Especially because Judas Priest won the case, proving yet again that music and guns don’t kill people, people kill people.
Speaking of evil, I’m willing to bet the one note that Hans Zimmer came up with for the Joker in The Dark Knight is the demonic tritone. The mini feature showing how Zimmer worked for hours in his multi-million dollar studio to come up with the right sound doesn’t go in to the deeper semantics of the concept (I dare you to read the Wikipedia entry for the concept), but I’m willing to bet it is the Diabolus in Musica. One ascending note, which elicits the feeling of “Yes. The Joker is going to do something. We know this because he is insane. And this music, Christ, hah!, someone’s going to die.” Interestingly, the Bat Cycle’s engine has one ascending note that never peaks. Hmm. Is it, perhaps, the tritone?
Everybody seems to agree the note is unsettling, eliciting a sense of dread and foreboding. However, one site takes a different approach, claiming that the musical notes, if put on a pie chart, look just like the astrological chart, so the tritone ends up in Libra? The site also claims that a slow ascending pitch creates optimism, but if played faster creates suspense. By this rationale, the Joker’s note creates optimistic suspense.
I’d say that’s just about right, despite their argument hinging on studies done to a Siberian hamster that had the nerves between his pineal gland and hypothalamus cut.
The phenomenally annoying thing about this podcast, despite introducing fairly interesting concepts such as the combination of music, the devil, physics and suicide pacts, is that the three learned individuals talking never quite go beyond the “topic” level of the conversation. The square root of two is tied to the C and F notes, and boy, that’s uncomfortable. The Devil helped many composers. Two dudes shot themselves listening to “evil” music. But that’s it. No discussion. No depth. Just points.
It’s obvious then, that the square root of two, particularly when applied to music, is entirely irrational. This begs the question: What would Spock do?
Estrogen
Posted by Fleeceman on July 6th, 2009 filed in Absurd, Pigeonholed1 Comment »
It has long been known in the scientific world that frogs are the harbingers of doom.
I watched a frogumentary the other night on Hulu, where one group of scientists were taking some of the remaining amphibians from one area and—by helicopter—relocating them in hopes that they’d propagate in the new area.
That’s one hell of an expensive endeavor on behalf of frogs.
Another group was studying the effluent from farm and urban runoff. Among the fertilizer, pesticides, herbicides and other human schwag was estrogen, which, it was determined, came from human women peeing out excess amounts from their birth control pills.
We are, as Stephen Colbert put it, drinking women’s pee.
The effect this has on the environment is species wide. Frogs, never knowing the Jacuzzi’s getting hotter, while simultaneously being unwitting little spongy indicators, are the first to experience abnormalities. Multiple legs, lack of legs, tweaked heads, or male frogs with eggs, who actually giving birth to offspring that can reproduce. Fish, too, are morphing—it ain’t just mercury anymore.
At the high end of the food chain, human male embryos are also hybridizing. They too, carry eggs, along with their bits and pieces.
Years ago DDT came along and got rid of that pesky fruit fly, but the pesticide had the annoying side effect of weakening the shells of pelicans. Then we introduced genetically modified crops that were impervious to certain insects. This strain of plant morphed into the weeds, and the weeds hybridized to become Super Weeds, inviolable to the current methods.
Now, Monsante, which essentially owns the concept of corn and soy, are genetically modifying their seeds so that by 2030 they crop yield will triple. They’re doing this by incorporating bug genes, most likely flies, for their rapid gestation period, and maybe spider genes for their “unbreakable” exoskeletons. Impervious corn on the cob every seven days within 20 years.
There’s nothing wrong with eating that, though, is there? I mean, all this other “safe” stuff, released at incredibly high volumes was fine. Dying pelicans, gestating males, and tortillas that are mold proof for up to six months.
So the birth control corporations didn’t know about this excess estrogen in women’s pee? We’re only just now discovering it never leaves the system? Estrogen makes it all the way through the sewage treatment plants and back into the water system that we end up drinking. I always knew that women were crazy strong warrior humans (primarily because they are infused with their natural levels of estrogen) but now we’re going to have a whole generation of hybridized shemales. I suppose we could use them to increase the ranks of new soldiers. With a few modifications they could give birth to impervious, egg holding marines every seven days.
What do the Global Warming naysayers counter this one with, that the frogs are stupid and should get out of the water? All I know for certain is I won’t be taking that male birth control pill anytime soon.