Tuesday, February 10, 2009

You Are Going to Die Alone. Want Popcorn?

OMFG! Valentine's Day is coming!!!!! Do you have a date yet? I do, because I am better than you. You are probably a sad, loveless old spinster who fritters away her precious childbearing years doing things like "working" and "making friends" and "discovering a cure for cancer." Ha ha ha, you are pathetic.

No need to worry, though: even though you are a woman, and therefore totally suck until the precise moment that you meet a man who is willing to admit you might suck a little less than others of your kind, there is no need for you to be alone. You have the movies! Yes, for a mere $10 or $12 bucks a pop, you can haul your sad ass into a theater full of anonymous strangers to watch your narrative surrogates (who suck - just like you!) realize how awful they are and find sweet, sweet redemption at the hands of various blandly handsome men. They find love, these women! Just like you never will.

Now, I do not see these movies. God, no. I've seen some posters, though! So put down your Haagen-Dasz or whatever it is you dopes use to replace the sweet touch of a man, and listen up, for I am about to demonstrate my reviewing skills. This is why I get the big bucks, people! (SPOILER: No, it is not, I do this for free.)

#1:

Delightful! A quirky computer-animated romance about two stick figures who meet whilst posted on the doors of adjacent restrooms! It's like WALL-E, but with more jokes about public urination. Oh, wait, I am totally wrong. Here's the plot summary [via]:
A romantically challenged morning show producer (Heigl) is reluctantly embroiled in a series of outrageous tests by her chauvinistic correspondent (Butler) to prove his theories on relationships and help her find love. His clever ploys, however, lead to an unexpected result.
... he gets devoured by sharks?

No, no, that's probably not it. They probably fall in loooove, despite/because of the fact that he is so adorably "chauvinistic" and treats her like a pile of dog poop that he somehow stepped in on the way to Hooters. Then she discovers that he is a dinosaur and has a secondary circulatory system in his hindquarters. Romance!

#2:
Terrifying! An innocent woman is accused of being a witch by the elders of her pastel village, and is condemned to be hung about with bags of expensive consumer products and thrown into the river! She screams, silently, from the poster - appealing to us, or to God, or to ANYONE, to spare her this agony. How did she come to meet this dark fate? Let's check the plot summary:
In the glamorous world of New York City, Rebecca Bloomwood (ISLA FISHER) is a fun-loving girl who is really good at shopping - a little too good, perhaps. She dreams of working for her favorite fashion magazine, but can't quite get her foot in the door - until ironically, she snags a job as an advice columnist for a financial magazine published by the same company. As her dreams are finally coming true, she goes to ever more hilarious and extreme efforts to keep her past from ruining her future.
Ah, women. Not only do they suck at love, they really, earnestly suck at having jobs. Imagine: a woman, writing, for a magazine that is not about fashion! Why, she'd be completely unqualified! Ho ho ho, what would she do, manipulate the keys of the laptop with her vagina? Turn in an article written entirely with her eyeliner pencil? This is a situation rife with comedic potential! All jokes aside, however, I can only hope that this confused young lady meets some sort of blandly handsome gentleman - her boss, I am thinking, or at the very least a more senior co-worker - who helps to set her priorities straight and teaches her that life is, yes, about more than shopping. It's also about learning to give the perfect BJ.

#3.


Ah, the Brady Bunch: all grown up, still creepily trapped in alternate dimensions, from whence they can only stare at each other in an ultimately futile attempt at communication. Or, you know, not. Ultimately, this poster is so bland (that dude from Alias! That lady from Friends! Some other lady! That guy who is not John Hodgman!) that I can only turn to the plot summary - which, holy Jesus, is long:

Gigi just wants a man who says he'll call - and does - while Alex advises her to stop sitting by the phone. Beth wonders if she should call it off after years of committed singlehood with her boyfriend, Neil, but he doesn't think there's a single thing wrong with their unmarried life. Janine's not sure if she can trust her husband, Ben, who can't quite trust himself around Anna. Anna can't decide between the sexy married guy [the one from Alias! - Ed.] or her straightforward no-sparks standby, Conor, who can't get over the fact that he can't have her. And Mary, who's found an entire network of loving, supportive men, just needs to find one who's straight.

If you've ever sat by the phone wondering why he said he would call, but didn't [you are a lousy lay - Ed.] or if you can't figure out why she doesn't want to sleep with you any more [you, also, are a lousy lay - Ed.] or why your relationship just isn't going to the next level [you are both lousy lays, and why do you even try squishing your sad old privates together any more, seriously? - Ed.]... he (or she) is just not that into you.

There! Now all you wretched griping feminists can stop your wretched griping! He, OR SHE, is just not that into you. They've acknowledged that women may not all be ready to glom onto the first man who shows them the slightest bit of interest (in parentheses). They've indicated that women are at least partially responsible for the direction that their relationships take, and that boys are not the only ones who call the shots (in parentheses). They've positioned their movie as one which is not intended solely for female consumers and/or part of an industry in which rich old men greenlight sub-par entertainments for women based solely on their stereotypical and frankly insulting ideas of what women care about (in parentheses). If that is not part of the title - if, that is, the title indicates a movie that is only about women responding to male desire, rather than acknowledging that almost every single person on this planet attempts sexual relations with other people and will therefore necessarily experience some kind of rejection sooner or later, and also that women have desires of their own which are autonomous and not entirely dependent on those of men - that is only because it would be too hard to make that point (in parentheses)!

I see no problems with this movie. It will be delightful. It will teach us to laugh about love. It will have that dude from the Mac commercials, possibly in his altogether. Go see it. God knows you don't have anything else going on.

3 comments:

  1. LOL Love it!!

    Your reviews were far funnier then the movies could possible be, even if I was a masochist.

    ..unfortunately you have now left me with only Ben&Jerry(yay! for threesomes!) Carmel-Sutra to make sweet love to me on Valentines Day.

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  2. What's with that poster for the ugly truth? Her heart is in her head, but his is in his crotch? What kind of weird anatomy do these people have? (Dinosaur anatomy?)

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