(Sort of) Movie review: Magic Mike

(Things get a wee bit ranty up in here, but I tried to keep it somewhat light after venting off all The Rage in my first draft. Enjoy!)

After a day of stuffing film theory in my head, I got a text from the roomie: "Was thinking Magic Mike, tomato soup, tuna melts."

My response: "OOMG YES PLS." (sic.)

Much amazing food was had and I even managed to get a bit more studying in during the snore-inducing "plot" scenes. I also became kind of curious about the movie, so popped onto IMDb to check it out, which was when I stumbled onto a thread honking about the "double standard" of the movie.

Seriously you guys. I could not stop laughing.

Basically the arguments against the film and the primarily female audience's reactions were made by men crossing their arms and HRMPHing something about how if someone made a movie about female strippers and they made such a big deal about seeing it, women would have an absolute snit.

First of all, at least three movies about female strippers spring immediately to mind. Showgirls, Striptease, and Dancing at the Blue Iguana. Those are just off the top of my head. Already these poor men are losing the battle.

Second, cry me a river. For real. If there isn't a single man out there decrying this film as the direct result of a bruised ego, I'll eat my laptop. They can wave their double standards! flag all they want, but if they conquered their discomfort long enough to watch the film they'd see how misogynist it is. Women are portrayed as either pathetically screaming and waving money around or ready to leap into bed with the object of their lust without a single thought. The male strippers in the movie love their jobs, because they spend their working hours having their egos stroked and their off hours having their dicks stroked, both by slathering fangirls. The one "normal" woman in the film is so shrewish in her rejection of the lifestyle that she swiftly becomes intolerable.

Does this detract from my enjoyment of the film? Hell no. Especially with the DVD release, which allowed me to skip right past all that pesky plot and just watch the dance scenes. I did see it in the theater as well and although I did not witness any of the screaming exuberance that seems to irk so many of these harping men, my friend and I joked throughout about throwing quarters at the screen and get to the damn dance sequences already. And also Matthew McConaughey because he is fucking hilarious in this movie. Alright alright alright indeed.

Most guys I know probably do not feel this way. I'm sure most of them are perfectly fine with the women in their lives, be they wives, girlfriends, sisters, or friends, appreciating the, er, aesthetics of the movie. They may be a little threatened by our attraction to the film's stars, but most of them understand that we women feel the same way when our significant others' eyes start to fall out of their heads during trailers with Angelina Jolie in them. And if we women celebrate the existence of Magic Mike a little more vocally than men are "allowed" to cheer on the lovely Ms. Jolie's topless scenes, it's because women have spent so much time in the passive, "looked at" role and men in the active, "looking" role. If you don't believe me, I have reams of film studies essays to back me up. When this position is ever-so-rarely reversed, we get a little excited.

We shouldn't have to apologize for that. Or for this:

You're welcome, my male-enamored friends.

Geek Weekly: Movie review – Paul

Spoilers ahead!

So you may have noticed that I'm a fan of the Pegg-Frost-Wright oeuvre. It might have come up before, is all I'm saying. So naturally I'll be reviewing Paul with all the objectivity of a seasoned, professional writer.

OMG I LOVED THIS MOVIE YAY!

Well, you know you're going to love it when it starts by following Simon Pegg and Nick Frost around ComiCon. I mean, dude. What makes this movie so great (much like “Spaced”) is that it's so clear that they're well and truly fanboys, just like the audience. It's brilliant. I even love their ridiculously kitschy rented camper, complete with shag carpeting and little lampshades on the interior lights.

I was really nervous about Seth Rogan as the title character... but he managed to add an endearing charm to the movie that I really wasn't expecting. Probably in part because he's a CGI alien who manages to be far more adorable than he has any right to be when tossing f-bombs around. Paul edges up to the line of schmaltz, but manages to avoid crossing it just in time to keep the audience.

Then there's Jason Bateman, who is completely amazing as always. And yes, his twist at the end totally surprised me, whether because I was distracted by the triple-play awesome of Pegg, Frost, and Rogan or I'm just not too bright sometimes. Or maybe because Bateman pulls off the cold asshole so well that you never for a moment think he could actually be a good guy.

Sigourney Weaver as a badass in a ballgown. 'Nuff said.

I was a bit worried that Paul wouldn't be a proper Pegg-Frost-Wright flick, since it's actually a Pegg-Frost flick directed by Greg Mottola (of Superbad and Adventureland fame... two movies I have to admit I haven't seen). And it does have a distinctly different feel that could probably be summed up by describing it as an Americanized bit of Pegg-Frost-Wright-ery. However, I wouldn't say that's a bad thing... although there were moments I missed the Britishness of the Wright element, I thought it was fun to see the uniquely Britsh sensibilities brought to the movie in the writing (penned by Pegg and Frost, naturally) placed against the quintessential American West backdrop, surrounded by American actors and helmed by an American director. The two cultures, rather than clashing, melded beautifully... and the movie's humor did not suffer a bit for it.

Geek Weekly: Movie review – Paranormal Activity 2

I do realize that it's Sunday. The Life Sundays post is coming too, hopefully tomorrow. If you know me at all, the fact that I've gotten a bit behind is no surprise. The shocking thing is that it took an entire month for it to happen. But enough bluster, on to the main event!

I originally watched the new Nightmare on Elm Street movie intending to rip it to shreds (ha ha), but it was actually so bad that all I could do was seethe and rage. I also happened to rent Paranormal Activity 2 just for my own enjoyment, so I've decided to talk about that instead. We may revisit That Other Movie later, if I'm desperate for topics and feel the need to vent.

On to the fun movie!

SPOILERS AHEAD!

I went into this sequel with no real idea of what I was getting into, so I was very pleasantly surprised by the appearance of Katie and Micah from the first movie, and rather devilishly pleased when I realized how the timelines of the two movies wove together. You can watch almost the entirety of the second movie, then stop it and watch the whole of the first movie, then the last few minutes of the second movie again, and the story is seamless. One thing that did bother me was the inclusion of the backstory, since giving an explanation for Teh Evil weakens it somewhat; the scariest stories are the ones where there is no reason for the victims to be targeted (i.e. The Exorcist or The Grudge). That said, I really liked the dark turn it took as the family makes the decision to transfer the haunting to Katie, thus setting the events of the first movie (and the subsequent results at the end of this one) in motion.

What this movie does so well (like the first one) is the slow build... ramping the tension up so high that it's almost a relief when the scare finally comes. For me, the hallmark of a good horror flick is how many times I end up hiding behind my hands, and it happened over and over again during this film. There's a delicate balance to that crescendo; if you get off too quickly, there's no satisfaction, but if you take too long to stretch it out, it can become boring and you barely even care when the scare does come. (Yes, like sex. I see wot U did thar.) The scene when all the cupboards slam open in the kitchen was so loud and startling that it sent my cats scrambling under the nearest furniture. It was the most fun I've had watching a horror movie in a long time.

Another thing that works really well is that you never see the demon. Horror movie monsters rarely live up to their hype, and more often than not once you see the monster, it becomes less frightening. The monster in Paranormal Activity 2 exists purely in the viewer's imagination, and is so much worse there than it could ever be onscreen. And the fact that the protagonists themselves eventually become the monster makes it all the worse, because how do you fight someone you love? How do you stop yourself from becoming the monster?

The sequel has a lot of similarities to the original, a lot of the same kinds of scares and tactics. I think this is a strength rather than a weakness, because it makes sense in the context of the films... after all, they are the same haunting. There is just enough of a difference to give the their own unique twist, and make both worth watching. If you liked the first one, there's no reason you shouldn't like this one as well. And if the first one scared the pants off you, this one should do the same. If it didn't scare the pants off you, you're lying. It totally did.

Geek Weekly: movie review - Black Swan

At some point I decided it would be cool to do a monthly movie review here on Geek Thursdays, so this is the first of many. At least twelve a year. NICE. Of course, that's going to require that I actually get out of the house and see a movie at least once a month. Which, considering the last three movies I saw were Black Swan, Half-Blood Prince, and Avatar(the first release) is going to be quite an interesting challenge. If all goes as planned, next month's review will be The Rite. (Yes, I know I'm not trying very hard to be SUPER CURRENT but at least I'm reviewing while they're still in the theater...)

WARNING: CONTAINS SPOILERS!

After eleventy Oscar nominations and so much hype, I was a little worried that Black Swan wouldn't live up to expectations. In a way, it didn't... it blasted my expectations right out of the water.

What impressed me the most about this movie was how scary it was. I really wasn't expecting to spend so much time hiding behind my scarf. The slow build of tension was effective every time, but the movie also startled the crap out of me more than once when I was not expecting it. And as a veteran horror movie watcher, I'm usually pretty good at anticipating a scare. Nearly a week later, I'm still getting creeped out in the dark. Unlike, say, The Grudge, it isn't a specific image that haunts me but just a feeling. Like something's waiting for me in the dark. As far as I'm concerned, that's the sign of a great horror movie.

One of the things that made this movie so difficult to watch at times was the truly under-your-skin visceral feel of some scenes. The scratching, the focus on the damage these dancers can suffer to their feet, the vomiting... all added up to give the movie a distinctly squirmy feel. The worst was a scene which takes place in the bathroom (really, a lot of scenes take place in bathrooms)... Nina (Portman) is picking at a hangnail and ends up pulling up a long strip of skin, a bone-deep chunk halfway up to her elbow. It turns out to be a hallucination, but even so it left me feeling nauseous. Which I would rarely consider a compliment, but for this movie, it works. This visceral element pays off beautifully in her eerie transformation into the Black Swan near the end of the movie.

Of course I can't say enough about Natalie Portman's performance. She portrays the trembling, on-the-edge fragility of Nina so perfectly that I expected her to shatter into a million pieces at any moment. She does a beautiful job of making Nina's slow dissolution very understandable as she wilts under her mother's clinging attention, quails under the show director's gruff instruction, and boggles as Lucy (Mila Kunis), her self-proclaimed rival, does so easily what she cannot, despite throwing every ounce of herself into her craft. Mila Kunis is also wonderful in her role, as she effortlessly flips between the dark temptress of Nina's delusions and her friendly, laid back opposite.

And I'd be remiss as a bisexual woman if I didn't mention the love scene between Nina and Lucy after their night of drinking and standing up to Nina's mother. It's really startling and beautiful and terrifying, not to mention HAWT. And although both characters are clearly heterosexual, it was very natural and organic. It made perfect sense somehow that things would turn sexual between them in that moment. So much so that the revelation that it happened only in Nina's mind was a complete surprise to me.

Black Swan is a haunting and beautiful movie that gets under your skin and stays there. Do yourself a favor and go see it if you haven't already. You'll never look at ballerinas the same way again.