Pithy quips

Above: Korean poster for Sunshine Cleaning

Three million years ago and eons before texting, the New York Times TV listings were known for their allegedly witty two- or three-word movie descriptions. I don’t know if the Times is still doing it, but occasionally my Netflix friends will receive similarly sketchy and smarmy witticisms from this keypad late at night if I’m feeling giddy or bored. How this warrants a blog entry is anyone’s guess, but read on:

World’s Greatest Dad (2009): “If something so hip, so irreverent keeps telling you it’s so hip, so irreverent, can it then be either hip or irreverent?”

10 to Midnight (1983): “Everyone’s naked except Charles Bronson. There’s even a nude serial killer!”

Youth Without Youth (2007): “With all the personnel involved, didn’t anyone have the nerve to inform Coppola his movie was unnecessarily confusing and incredibly boring?”

The Last House on the Left (1972): “It’s actually worse than I remember it. Nothing works.”

Sexo con amor (Sex with Love, 2003): “It’s like the inside of my head on film.”

Lemming (2005): “Half of this is excellent. The other half reminds me that I no longer have patience for ambiguous French thrillers.”

Clean Slate (1994): “This is where Memento got its amnesia plot!”

For Alexandre Bustillo’s À l'intérieur (Inside, 2007), my Netflix friend and I began a brief dialog:
    Him: “A unexpected surprise considering how tepid and tired this genre’s become. Check it out.”
    Me: “Does the doctor know you stopped taking your meds?”
    Him: “Don’t get ‘Hostel’ with me.”

Orphan (2009): “Totally fucked up but quite compelling. When the little girl gets dressed up for daddy, I nearly fell off my chair!”

Another dialog opened up between a friend and I over I Love You, Beth Cooper (2009):
    Me: “It makes Nick & Nora’s Infinite Playlist look like Citizen Kane, but Hayden Panettiere’s a frikkin’ knockout. Great ass, great thighs.”
    Him: “Did you actually think I put this on the queue for any other reason?”
    Me: “Of course not. I mean, when’s the last time you saw a movie where no one died?”
    Him: “You’ve been at the rum candy again.”

Above: Monika Malacova in Hostel: Part II, click to enlarge.

Hostel: Part II (2007): “I gotta admit, not only did I think this was pretty funny, but the bloodbath scene gave me a woody.”

Extremities (1986): “Alternately preposterous and compelling!”

30 Days of Night (2007): “The cinematic equivalent of Chinese take-out.”

Prime Cut (1972): “The quintessential 70s movie. Almost worth four stars. And it’s got Gregory (Plan 9) Walcott as ‘Weenie!’”

Sunshine Cleaning (2008): “It’s official — ‘Indie’ is its own genre.”

Don’t Raise the Bridge, Lower the River (1968): “There’s only one thing worse than bad goofy Jerry Lewis or bad maudlin Jerry Lewis, and that’s bad boring Jerry Lewis.”

The Love Guru (2008): “Expecting the worst, seeing the worst is not as bad as you’d expect.”

10,000 B.C. (2008): “So ‘mammothly’ bad that I actually had to kill myself while watching it. I’m writing this from the Great Beyond.”

Confessions of a Shopaholic (2009): “Woof.”

Upon seeing Roger Ebert’s four-and-one-half star rating for the Jodie Foster movie, The Brave One (2007):
    Me: “It’s official — Ebert’s an asshole.”
    My Netflix friend: “How many reviews did it take?”

Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium (2007): “Now you finally know someone who’s seen it!”

A brief exchange over All That Jazz (1979):
    Me: “All I remember about this movie is, a) it took forever for him to die, and b) I couldn’t wait for him to die.”
    My Netflix friend: “Yes, and he died to three entire musical dance numbers.”

Yella (2007): “Does Herk Harvey get a percentage of the gross?”

The Curse of the Fly (1966): “How original, a ‘Fly’ flick with no fly. Did Don Sharp ever make a good movie?”

Appaloosa (2008) “Laid back to a fault.”

In Bruges (2008): “High drama for the dribble generation.”

The Assassination of Richard Nixon (2004): “For most of this I sat shaking my head, thinking ‘Oh no, that’s me!’”

Eagle Eye (2008): “Alternate title, Hal 9000 — the Forbin Project.”

More crosstalk between my friend and I on The Mist (2007):
    Me: “The dimestore material clearly didn’t warrant the Greek Tragedy ending. That and a whole lot of unbelievable dialog ruined a fairly decent premise.”
    Him: “The ending didn’t work for me, either. Appeared forced and ineffectual.”
    Me: “I may write something about it on the blog — director Frank Darabont gave a pretentious, self-congratulatory interview on the DVD that shouldn’t be ignored.”

The Dark Knight (2008): “Chop off the last 45 minutes and you might have something here.”

Sharky’s Machine (1981): “Unsane! Absolutely Unsane!”

Next (2007): “My two-star rating applies to Jessica Biel’s fleshy beauty alone. This movie sucks... and it makes absolutely no sense.”

My friend and I on Speed Racer (2008):
    Me: “Virtually unwatchable.”
    Him: “I couldn’t make it through the trailer.”

The Mirror Crack’d (1980): “Too much cocaine in the editing room. They forgot to reveal Geraldine Chaplin’s killer... and this in an Agatha Christie thing where exposing the killer is the high point!”

Crash (2005): “The funniest script since Michael Bay’s Pearl Harbor!”

Shark Attack 3: Megalodon (2002): “This is the only movie I know of where, for the ‘hot’ lead actress, they hired someone with a botched plastic surgery job.”

The Skull (1965): “As empty-headed as that title implies.”

The documentary The God Who Wasn’t There (2005) prompted this discussion between your gentile host and his Jewish friend:
    Him: “It’d make a perfect double bill with The Mind Benders.”
    Me: “You Christ killers are all the same.”
    Him: “You know that isn’t true because He never existed.”
    Me: “Of course He existed. Why else would I have screamed out his name fifty times during that prostate biopsy I got last week?”
    Him: “Are you certain it wasn’t my name you screamed out?”
    Me: “That’s true. In all the excitement, I think I did scream out, ‘You fucking asshole!’”
    Him: “I’m afraid it was your fucking asshole.”
    Me: “Go chase after Edward G. Robinson and his golden calf…”
    Him: “Jesus walks into a motel and says to the clerk, ‘Can you put me up for the night?’ So the clerk nails him to the wall.”
    Me: “You’re forgiven. Jesus loves you.”
    Him: “More than you do?”
    Me: “I just want to fuck you.”
    Him: “I’ve got two tickets for San Francisco. I’ll pick up the ring on Friday.”
    Me: “What? No premarital whoopie? For a Jew, you’re being terribly Catholic about all this.”

More may follow in the future…