Tag: Guilty Pleasure

Guilty Pleasures: Lit – A Place in the Sun

by Saintmort

This summer there was a tour that was so full of nostalgia that I was genuinely angered by my lack of job and the high price of admission. The Tour was the Summerland Tour which featured a literal who’s who of 90’s alt-rockers. Everclear, Gin Blossoms, Sugar Ray, Marcy’s Playground and Lit all toured the united states reminded people in their late 20’s-early 30’s how much fun the 90’s music scene used to be.

Three of the 5 bands are undeniably some of the most successful bands of the decade. Everclear had 5+ hit singles, Gin Blossoms had at least four and Sugar Ray had about the same. It’s hard to really understand why the extended an olive branch to one and two hit wonders like Marcy’s Playground and Lit… unless of course for the fact that they’re amazing bands, particularly Lit.

In a recent interview with the Kidd Chris Show, Sugar Ray singer Mark McGrath was asked “Who’s the band that impresses you the most on the show?” and he quickly said “Lit”. The band exploded in 1999 with their catchy single “My Own Worst Enemy”. Even 10+ years later I still hear this song covered by many a local band and it almost always gets the crowd screaming along, it’s just one of those rock songs so perfectly constructed with memorable hooks and lyrics that it’s hard to become excited when you hear it.

The band had two moderately successful follow-up singles “Zip-Lock” and “Miserable” before falling into obscurity. I picked up my copy of their platinum selling record A Place in the Sun for $1 at a used CD store a few years ago. What stuck out/shocked me the most was how the record holds up.

Lit managed to craft and relatively genreless record. They put together a mixing pot of music ranging from Pop Punk, Metal, Alternative Rock and even a Ska song which lead to a record that accapulates all of 90’s radio (minus rap) in a 12 song time capsile. While that lack of focus lead to many average to negative reviews, I think it’s the very thing that allows the record to hold up now.

The opening track Four (the song is called Four, it’s the first song, it’s weird). Feels like a modern day arena rock song just exploding into heavy rock with a sound so full you almost forget that it’s all being created by 4 dudes (hey… maybe that’s what the song title means?).

Songs like Lovely Day (my favorite track) and Miserable (my least favorite track) both show off guitarist Jeremy Popoff’s ear for good guitar hooks and using guitar pedals to create truly unique and bizarre guitar solos.

It’s a shame that A. Jay Popoff isn’t more recognized for his vocal styles. He has a strong and unique voice and while his songwriting could always use some work (look no further than Perfect One which may be one of the cheesiest love songs the 90’s had to offer… and that’s saying a lot) he can really sell the cheesiness by having a real sincerity in his singing.

I’m going to be honest, I love Ska music. It was my favorite genre for years and still remains the genre I go to when I need to cheer up. That being said Lit’s “ska” song Happy isn’t a Ska song as much as it’s just a rock song with horns (Like Chicago) that being said.. I appreciate Lit’s effort at trying to do Ska, thankfully this was their only attempt.

It’s not shocking that I love 90’s one-hit wonders. Almost all the past guilty pleasures that are music related are one-hit wonders (see Harvey Danger, The New Radicals and Ugly Kid Joe for example). However unlike those artists who had moderately decent records beyond their one big hit (except New Radicals who only released one album) I’ve never bothered to purchase other Lit records. Not really sure why not since I love this album from start to finish.

All in all if you’re a fan of 90’s radio and strayed away from Lit’s massive record A Place in the Sun assume there’d only be one or two good songs I suggest you give the record a shot. Chances are you can find it in your local thrift shop for a buck or two.

Guilty Pleasures: Vanilla Sky

by Saintmort

This weekend people will be excitedly seeing the remake/re-adaptation of Philip K Dick’s We Can Remember It For You Wholesale (aka Total Recall). Like most of Philip K Dick’s book the movie asks the ever popular question “What is Reality”

One of my favorite movies to pitch this question was Vanilla Sky, Cameron Crowe’s remake of the (admittedly superior) spanish film Open Your Eyes. The first time I heard of this movie was in Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs by Chuck Klosterman (my favorite book ever). In the chapter “The Awe-Inspiring Beauty of Tom Cruise’s Shattered Troll-like Face”, Klosterman recalls a particularly rough night of digestial issues forcing him to read a review of the movie in an old issue of Entertainment Weekly.

Klosterman basically says exactly what I’d end up thinking about the movie; that question of What is Reality? “might be the only valid reason for loving it”.

The movie follows Tom Cruise (his name in the movie is David Aarmes but let’s face it, he’s Tom Cruise… just a owner of a publishing firm instead of an actor). Tom Cruise fills his day with booze and casually banging Julie (Cameron Diaz). However when his best friend Brian (Jason Lee) brings Sofia (Penelope Cruz) to a party he falls head over heels in love.

The film is intercut with David in a prison cell wearing an emotionless mask being interviewed by Dr. Curtis McCabe (Kurt Russell). Apparently he’s being charged for murder. We are hearing David’s version of the events that took place.

It seems Julie can’t take David moving on to a new girl and drives them off a bridge. Julie dies in the crash while David survives but is left horribly disfigured. David begins hiding behind an emotionless mask (the one we’ve seen him wearing in the prison) and getting plastered to deal with the pain.

Sofia tries to bring David out of his slump and eventually motivates David to have his face repaired. Things are great for David until reality starts to slip away. David continues seeing his deformed face, Sofia continually turns into Julie. Eventually David attempts to suffocate Julie only to discovered his murdered Sofia instead.

David sees a commercial for Life Extension and requests Dr. Curtis take him to the offices as he finds them important to the case. There David is explained about the Lucid Dream program which allows someone to live in a continuous dream state until a cure for their sickness is found.

David realizes he’s in his own lucid dream and has been for 150 years.

Critics hated this movie. Rotten Tomatoes has a 40% rating which is second lowest in Crowe’s career (just above Elizabethtown… another future Guilty Pleasure). I feel like the attack on this movie has more to do with Tom Cruise than the movie itself.

This was released in 2001. By this point Tom Cruise had produced 6 movies (and starred in 3 of them). All the critics refer to the movie as Tom Cruise’s ego-trip and a vanity project. The fact is that very little of the plot line has changed from the spanish original (including Cruz playing Sophia in both films).

It seems like Hollywood likes to pretend that Tom Cruise has gone crazy. Rewatch some of his interviews in the 90’s, he’s always been crazy. However, around 2000 he started producing more and more of his own movies. When he started to not need the Hollywood system anymore; suddenly he’s crazy.

I think Vanilla Sky was the unfortunate victim of being releases at the beginning of a media attack on a public figure. The movie isn’t perfect (the original however is) but it’s still a solid movie. 2001 was a year filled with uninteresting blockbusters like Planet of The Apes and Zoolander (yeah I said it).

Crowe and Cruise followed the original plot line closely while interjecting elements of themselves. At the end of the day the film is successful in causing us to question our reality and making a film filled with emotional moments.

Plus the movie makes you believe that Penelope Cruz is far more fuckable than Cameron Diaz (kudos Mr. Crowe). Give this remake another shot before you go see this weekend’s (sure to be blockbuster) remake and this time Open Your Eyes.

Guilty Pleasures: Scary Movie 3

by Saintmort

There are two films that are typically looked at as the perfection of the “Parody Film”. 1974’s Young Frankenstein and 1980’s Airplane. Mel Brooks had always been a satirist in his comedy. The Producers and Blazing Saddles are praised as some of the finest comedies ever made and while they both have elements of parody in them Young Frankenstein is where he made a direct parody to some pre-existing source material (Universal’s Frankenstein films).

The direct parody became what Brooks was known for (with High Anxiety, Spaceballs and various other films). Meanwhile Airplane! presented absurdist over the top and crazy comedy. In ways never before seen. Absurdist comedies continued to be part of the Zuckers and Abraham filmography but rarely did they come close the quality of Airplane!

This brings us to the dark days of Parodies. They started with Scary Movie. From we started getting films like Date Movie, Meet the Spartans and various other pieces of garbage. Trapped in the middle was Scary Movie 3.

I’m not going to say Scary Movie 3 is a perfect film. It’s not, it’s not a great comedy, it’s not even a great parody, I can admit that. What Scary Movie 3 is though is a huge improvement on the previous films. The Wayans brothers are gone and replaced with David Zucker. Unlike the films that would later come out the film does the simple task of focusing on a plot… sorta.

The parody combines plot elements of The Ring and Signs to tell a really alien/ghost story. Sure there’s also elements of Sixth Sense, 8 Mile and The Matrix scattered throughout but they genuinely try to stick with those two main movies. I appreciate that since this was the time that movies like Disaster Movie were coming out basing the script on movie trailers instead of watching the films they were parodying.

The film definitely has things at are terrible. The opening credits sequence with Jenny McCarthy and Pamela Anderson, awful and dated parodies of commercials that I forget existed until I re-watched this movie and plenty of moments that feel like they would be better suited in Scary Movie 1 or 2. This film is more light-hearted and feels like a Zucker film (absurd, sex jokes, Leslie Nelson), those are the elements that keep the film entertaining.

Here’s what works in the film: Simon Rex and Charlie Sheen are casted well. Sheen has proven his comedy chops in Hot Shots and if you’re a fan of those films you’ll find just as much to enjoy in his performance here. Simon Rex meanwhile, has done the Horror Parody genre previously with ‘Shriek if You Know What I did Last Friday the 13th‘. The biggest laughs however come from comedy veteran Leslie Nelson and (at the time) new comers Anthony Anderson and Kevin Hart.

Zucker’s eye for a good sex joke or quality sight gag are still there. The parody of the actual Ring video is packed with humorous sight gags. The film also contained rewrites by Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg (the men behind Harold And Kumar). This film could be better obviously… but it could have been much much worse.

Writers Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer (Epic Movie) wanted to parody Star Wars, Harry Potter and Lord Of The Rings (yet still call it Scary movie 3). What I’m trying to say I guess is Fuck Friedberg/Seltzer.

Scary Movie 3 won’t ever be better than the classic parody and spoof films of the 70’s and 80’s but it’s still a massive improvement on the other parody films that we’ve been exposed too since the Wayans brothers gave us Scary Movie in 2000.

Guilty Pleasure – Mac & Me

by Saintmort

Kids are idiots.

There I said it. We were all thinking it. Every single one of us at one time was a kid and at that time we were an idiot. Some people try to pretend they weren’t idiots. They say things like “That movie is terrible, even when I was a kid I knew it was bad”. No you didn’t. You’re a liar. At that time you enjoyed the taste of your own boogers and walked around with your bowel movements swimming around your ass. Your ability to have ‘taste’ in things was weak at best.

I’m not exempt from this “kids are idiots” thing. Because when I was a kid I thought Mac & Me was a better movie than E.T. I want to say that I don’t still feel this way (because I really don’t) but I’ve also realized that I own Mac & Me on both DVD and VHS yet I own no copies of E.T. so… maybe I do still believe that. Some people never stop being an idiot.

Mac & Me isn’t so much a movie as it’s a 90 minute commercial for McDonald’s starring a Mysterious Alien Creature (aka MAC) and a boy in a wheelchair. But I’m getting ahead of myself right now, let’s break this down a little better.

The movie opens on MAC’s home planet. Mac and his family are transported to Earth while searching for food and immediately break free from the laboratory that captured them. Mac gets separated from his family and ends up in the car of the Cruise family as they are moving into a new home.

Eric (a handicapped boy) discovers Mac and makes it his goal to help Mac reconnect with his family and return to their home planet. Actually I’m going to stop explaining the plot, if you’ve never seen it just think of the plot of E.T. it’s basically the same plot. Just with MAJOR product placement.

You see, remember that iconic Reese’s Pieces moment in E.T.? Well , imagine if that scene happened every 5 or 10 minutes and you’ll start to understand how bad the produce placement is. I mean for starters the alien is named after a McDonald’s sandwich, he survives off of Skittles and Coca-Cola and best of all there’s a giant dance sequence (while MAC’s disguised as a bear) in a McDonald’s (featuring Ronald McDonald).

This Always Happened at my McDonalds

I’m not saying that subliminal messages like this work. But I just took a break from writing to pick up chicken McNuggets. People will say this wasn’t product placement because the filmmaker says they never received payment from any of the products that appear in the movie. That’d be easier to believe if you didn’t have this trailer.

You see this film has bad reputation, but much like Joan Jett I don’t give a damn. I love and embrace this movie, but not just for the so bad, it’s good quality (although it helps). I remember always loving the design of Mac, even though he’s terrifying looking and has DSL constantly puckered on his face.

I guess it’s impossible for me to not mention the cliff sequence. If you’re not familiar with the scene I speak of, you’ve definitely never seen the movie. As I said earlier Eric is in a wheelchair, when he first sees Mac he chases him (well… wheels at him) suddenly he loses control and begins wheeling down a cliff. Without warning we get this incredible shot of a manniquinn strapped to a wheelchair falling into the water below. Mac of course saves Eric and their friendship begins to bloom. Don’t believe me? Here’s the infamous moment

The clip has developed a cult following when it became a running gag on Conan O’Brien’s show to play this clip whenever Paul Rudd was on (Even though he has absolutely nothing to do with the film, the biggest name in the film is either Jennifer Aniston as an uncredited extra or Ronald McDonald as himself). Perhaps if Paul continues doing this we’ll eventually see the Mac & Me sequel since the movie does promise that they will be back!

Guilty Pleasures: Adam Sandler – What’s Your Name?

by Saintmort

That’s My Boy seems to be keeping with Adam Sandler’s recent career decision of making us feel sorry and hatred for the once untouchable comedic god. When I was in Elementary School and Junior High I can’t think of a single boy in my grade that didn’t worship Sandler and Farley. In the 90’s Sandler was a hero to a generation. That generation who grew up knowing Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison by heart. That generation who knows all the famous Jews thanks to all 3 Chanukah songs. It’s also that generation who gets completely confused when we see Sandler starring, writing or producing movies like Grown Ups, Bucky Larson, Jack & Jill and That’s My Boy.

The SNL alumni also managed to make a name for himself in the 90’s as a musician. His first album They’re All Going to Laugh You is a critically hated but commercially massive comedy album that is one of the funniest records the 90’s had to offer. It’s follow up What the Hell Happened to Me? did a record high and continues to be the best selling comedy album since Nielson Soundscan began tracking in 1991. Ironically “What the hell happened…” was the question on many fans’ lips the following year when Sandler released What’s Your Name?

After an album heavy on long vulgar skits (like The Goat, a skit that many a teenage boy quoted to each other when parents weren’t home) Sandler released a record of all songs. The record sold well enough (over 500,000 copies) but in general the album was greeted with mostly shoulder shrugs and scratched heads. For me though, even at 12, I loved this album immediately.

Sandler is a musician. He’s not the greatest singer in history nor is his guitar playing earth shattering, but he’s always been someone who loved music. Many of his classic SNL segments were based on music (including Red Hooded Sweatshirt found on this record). Listening to his songs you hear another side of this comedian Adam Sandler. While in film he’s typically a short-tempered man screaming about “something” and in his skits he’s usually spouting as many four-letter words and potty humor humanly possible in songs he can suddenly become someone you sympathize with.

This doesn’t mean that the four-letter words and potty humor doesn’t find their way into songs (look no further than Bad Boyfriend, Dancin’ and Patsin’ and The Goat Song for plenty of vulgarity) but mostly the songs come from the perspective of the outcast.

This is the key-element in my mind to people’s immediate rejection of this record. It’s definitely a rug being pulled out from you. You go out and pick up an Adam Sandler record you expect something that will make you laugh out loud. Some of the songs do that (Voodoo, Corduroy Blues) but you’re completely side swiped when a song like Pickin’ Daisies comes on.

Pickin’ Daisies tells the story of a young boy (I always imagined him about 10) who gets picked on mercilessly by kids at school. His dad is ashamed by him but he finds comfort with his mom. He doesn’t care that he has to do girly things with her. She provides him with comfort. The song ends with him thinking about years down the line when him and all his classmates are in an old folks together and he’ll have memories of his mother to comfort him. Sandler tries to make the song humorous with his “mother voice” and a few of the things the mother says, but at the end of the day the song is delightful mix of sweet and sad.

Even elements as something as ridiculous and vulgar as The Goat Song leaves you wanting to sympathize with the battered and abused goat. When he sings ‘Thank you old man for saving my life, thank you again and again/You could have let them barbaque me, instead you acted like a friend’ have a strange sweetness to them. However it’s in Lonesome Kicker (the lone single) where Sandler’s sympathetic comedy shines through strongest.

Sandler wears Bruce Springsteen’s sound better than the (so-called) Boss himself. The song tells the humorous but sad life of a field goal kicker Andre Kristacovitchlalinski, Jr. While there are plenty of short jokes and lyrics about his lack of respect there’s also lines like “I hope that the cameras don’t come in to close or they might see the tears in my eyes” that are sung with such sincerity that you can’t help but feel a little bad for this fictional foreigner

I think Sandler wanted to prove to the world that he was a musician as well as a comedian. You don’t write a song like Listenin to the Radio without having a love and desire to play music. But he made a fatal mistake in performing under his name. People see Adam Sandler they think “comedy”, it’s the exact same reason why Donald Glover raps under the alias Childish Gambino. People have an Adam Sandler expectation and when rapid-fans don’t understand why that expectation isn’t being met they’re unhappy. Regardless of how great the product may be (read some comments on the Punch-Drunk Love thread on IMDb for proof).

I can defend What’s Your Name? and I can explain why I think Sandler made the choices that he did… but I still can’t explain Jack & Jill to you. Sorry

Guilty Pleasures: Alien 3

by Saintmort

WEEEEEEEER WEEEEEEER WEEEEEEEEER

Can you believe after all this time Prometheus is finally coming out? I feel like we’ve been hearing about this movie for 2 years. Throughout all the waiting there’s always this debate of “Is it in the Alien Universe” or not. I don’t have a clear cut answer (mostly because I’ve been avoiding spoilers) but just in case I figured Guilty Pleasure better be Alien 3

Both Aliens sequels are kind of depressing. They both had so much potential. Nowadays people hate whenever a sequel is announced. This isn’t really something too new. I’m sure in the 80’s when they were on the 8th Friday the 13th people were like ‘Do we really need ANOTHER one? Are we that out of original ideas’ blah blah blah (we’ve been out of original ways to bitch about the lack of original ideas)

But as a kid I remember EVERYONE being pumped up about Alien 3. There were advertisements in all the comics and magazines I read and they released an Aliens action figure line as a tie-in. I mean this was a hard-R sequel to another hard-R sequel and everyone was going crazy for it (and advertising to kids… the 90’s was a weird time)

I believe we all remember the Snake Alien

However the movie opened to almost a resounding WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT. This maybe have been in part due to false advertising. Check out this trailer about how the aliens come to Earth.

The alien’s do not make it to Earth. They don’t make it there in the 4th entry either. They didn’t touch down on our planet until they wanted to brawl with the Predator.

Alien 3 picks up where Aliens left off, except it immediately kills off everyone that we loved (except Ripley). The ship crash lands on a colony inhabited by male inmates with violent backgrounds.

An alien explodes from a local dog (mixing with the dog DNA) and begins to attack members of the colony. Ripley also realizes she’s carrying an alien baby and must sacrfice herself to save the rest of the inmates.

What makes me sad about both Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection is that they’re both decent ideas, from talented people but for some reason the pieces of the puzzle just didn’t fit together properly. Alien Resurrection was written by Joss Whedon who almost always at least presents and entertaining script with fun turns and was directed by Jen-ierre Jeunet the director behind visually fascinating films like Delicatessen, City of Lost Children and Amelie’.

Regardless of a talented screenplay writer and visually gifted director Alien Resurrection still fell flat on it’s face and in a painfully bad way.

Alien 3 however isn’t that awful! It doesn’t live up to the hype of Alien/Aliens or the overwhelming advertisements, but David Fincher’s camera work is well placed, the new alien design is a welcome change and the story contains plenty of mother-symbolism to keep the film interesting. The Alien birth sequence is gruesome, eerie and dark and the kills throughout are top notch. Ironically despite the negatively this movie has recieved it actually contains one of those more iconic moments in the Alien franchise.

Alien 3 is worth giving a second shot!

Guilty Pleasures: Home Fries

by Saintmort

This weekend you have some pretty weak movie options. When What to Expect When You’re Expecting is the best option you know it’s a bad week. I almost always hate comedies about being pregnant. The obvious exception is Knocked Up but that’s still one of my least favorite Apatow films. However I have always loved Home Fries. The Demented Dark Comedy starring a pregnant Drew Barrymore (as opposed to Riding in Cars with Boys which is a bland romantic comedy starring a pregnant Drew Barrymore)

 Sally Jackson is in a pickle. She’s pregnant with the baby of Henry Montier. When she became pregnant she didn’t know that Henry was married. However Sally’s problems have just doubled. It seem’s Henry’s wife isn’t too happy with the affair and has her sons Angus (Jake Busey) and Dorian (Luke Wilson) ‘Scare Henry to death’ knowing about his heart condition.

However why flying their Helicopters (they’re pilots… I should mention that) their radio crosses frequencies with the local fast food burger joint. Angus becomes obsessed that the employees ‘heard too much’ and will report them to the police, meanwhile Henry’s ex-wife Beatrice (Catherine O’Hara) wants to find the girl Henry cheated on her with.

Dorian gets a job at the fast food place (where Sally happens to work) and slowly falls in love with Sally. Dorian pieces together that Sally is the girl Henry was cheating on Beatrice with. Knowing that Beatrice has driven Angus to murderous levels of revenge Dorian does everything in her power to keep the family from knowing.

The film did poorly in the box office and managed to get a minor 31% on rotten tomatoes. That being said the film is a fun dark comedy. Obviously everything feels a little too convenient but when you shut off your brain and enjoy the movie you stop caring.

Luke Wilson is an actor who always looks like he doesn’t care meanwhile Jake Busey is always such an over the top actor that the two of them arguing provides some legitamite laughs and interesting sequences.

Few romantic comedies would aim so hard towards the female demographic (like this film did) but provide a film about murder and infidelity. It’s not the best film in the world, nor is it one of the best films of 1998, but it’s a good entertaining film that is worth your time.

Matt Kelly also writes in his blog Pure Mattitude, Tweets, and hosts a podcast called The Saint Mort Show

Guilty Pleasures: 17 Again

by Saintmort

Every once and a while a movie gets a bad rep strictly do to an actor’s past career. I mean after Batman & Robin did anyone really trust George Clooney? Not really but his career since has been paved in great performances and memorable movies. Zac Efron at this point was only known as the kid from High School Musical. So before this film even came out, the demographic who’d probably laugh the hardest already had turned their back on this film. None of this actually mattered as the film grossed 136 million dollars and only cost 20 million to make.

Most of the movies I pick for Guilty Pleasures tend to have awful rotten tomatoes ratings, 17 Again rests at a 55%, not great but not terrible. The reason I’m defending this one is that as I already said most of the people who would laugh the hardest at this movie have already written it off.

17 Again DVD

The movie begins in 1989 (you know because they’re playing Bust a Move by Young MC) as Mike O’Donnell prepares for the big basketball game. Mike is the star player and there are some talent scouts in attendance. However when he finds out that his girlfriend Scarlett is pregnant he leaves the game in order to be with her. The movie begins like a typical 80’s comedy ends.

We just two twenty years later. Scarlett is preparing to divorce him and Mike is forced to live with his nerdy best friend Ned Gold. He then loses his job and the respect of his children Maggie and Alex. When he’s life seems at it’s worse a mysterious janitor turns him into his 17 year old self.

Mike takes advantage of this chance to restart his life and attends his kid’s high school under the alias Mark Gold (posing as Ned’s son). Mike befriends his kids in order to be near Scarlett. Maggie begins to fall in love with him which creates some of the strangest potential incest in recent history.

This all seems like cliche’ high school teen flick/fantasy, and for the most part it is. In fact the film should be mediocre at best, but it’s not and it’s not because of one man, Thomas Lennon. The former member of The State plays Ned Gold, Mike O’Donnell rich but nerdy best friend.

Thomas_Lennon_Landspeeder_17_Again
Thomas Lennon Sleeps in Style

His character is everything that we wish to be as nerds. A Landspeeder bed, every video game system and well… loaded. Any second he’s on film is absolutely hilarious and thankfully they packed the film with him. Unlike a show like Big Bang Theory there’s never a point where he feels like a mocking of geekdom, his character is smart and successful (though slightly socially awkward).

If you’ve been avoiding this movie assuming it’s High School Musical 4 then you’re wrong and need to give this movie a chance.

Tell use about your guilty pleasure in the official thread

When he’s not watching Zac Efron movies Matt Kelly is writing in his blog Pure Mattitude, Tweeting and hosting his podcast The Saint Mort Show.