You Can Imagine Where It Goes from Here

For the new Movie Of The Month series @ The LAMB, I had to watch The Big Lebowski, which I did. Ridiculously awesome movie. Of course (duh), I thought Julianne Moore was the best part. ACTRESSEXUAL. But... in typical fashion, I forgot that I had to review the film by yesterday. In fact, I only remembered it this morning when I was at Marcy's blog, LOL! I'll be more responsible with The Conversation next month, promise.

BTW, the movie I submitted was Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. (I think I just broke a record for being so consistently unsurprising!) I really hope it gets picked eventually, because it's definitely a film everyone should see. Plus, she's now officially the patron saint of Valley Dreamin' -- which is very unsubtly inspired by her. I'm fanatical.

One day, my love, everyone will know your greatness! One day!

What's On My Mind At The Moment

Still. In. Fucking. Shock.

I Wanna Post Screencaps of Moulin Rouge!

So I will!

Ladies and gentlemen, I must announce two new revisions for the 2001 Chloes -- Donald McAlpine takes Best Cinematography in a landslide, making it's sweep of the arts and techs all the sweeter, and... Nicole Kidman wins Best Actress.

A statement released from Naomi Watts' publicist this morning:

I want a [bleep] RECOUNT. Nic, this isn't your fault, so no worries. But you, J.D., YOU [bleep] SLUT... UGH!!!!! This is like when that squinty-eyed [bleep] stole my nomination FOR THE VERY FILM IN WHICH YOU'VE DENIED ME SATISFACTION! Which reminds me, why was Judi Dench nominated every time I was noticably snubbed? WHAT THE [bleep]?!?!

Eep. Discuss.

Subtlety

Nicole Kidman Sucks

I should probably say there are MAJOR SPOILERS in this post, but I really don't care.

Nicole Kidman Cruise Urban was born on June 20th 1967 (OLD COW) in Honolulu, which makes her an American-by-birth, which sucks for us. Terrorism, that's cool, but Nicole Kidman born on American soil? STAB ME PLZ. Ew. She was probably an ugly baby too, like a newborn naked mole rat. Then she moved to Australia or something. IDK.

Her suckage started all the way back in 1983, when at the age of 16, she starred in BMX Bandits, a superbly-made film about a trio of teenagers who sex each other up on awesomely bright bicycles and steal from corpses. It actually was a pretty great film, and she was surprisingly adequate, but in some of her scenes you can easily see her future of unparalleled horribleness. It was somewhat off-putting.

She's good in The Stepford Wives as well. Probably in The Invasion too, but there are some scenes where she sucks big time, so for the benefit of the doubt, she's kinda good. And despite that everyone seems to think she's good in The Interpreter, I can assure you she's offensively unpleasant. Ugh, that performance.

Back to her megawatt suckitude. And movies she dies in! Yay!

The Others is such a bad bad bad bad movie, people. Not even Tom Cruise's brilliant producing talent could save that trainwreck. Oh, and THEY WERE ALL DEAD THE ENTIRE TIME. You're welcome.

In To Die For, she played Suzanne Stone, a now-long-forgotten martyr. She died for what she believed in - the power of television, but that damnable David Cronenberg (who directed the underrated A History of Violence and the overrated Eastern Promises) had to kill her 'cuz Richard Nixon told him to. Lame.

Then there's The Hours, in which she played obscure theatre costumer(?) Virginia Woolf and had a prosthetic nose. The movie's absolutely horrible and she's just as bad in it (as is everyone else except Ed Harris, he's good). And you just know there's nothing wrong with her - she's just being an overdramatic twit. Christ, lady, GET A JOB!

I'm so sad, 'cuz I suck.
But the coup de grâce of her epic suckage is easily 2001's Razzie-winning Moulin Rouge! -- pretty much the worst film I've ever seen -- as Satine, the soulless fucktard whore. Thankfully, she got tuberculosis and died, something I couldn't be happier about. That bitch needed to die, toying with the glorious Duke's heart like that. Speaking of which, what the FUCK was up with her turning him down for that penniless writer bohemian douchenozzle? He didn't even have money! Idiot.

So, in short, Nicole Kidman: YOU SUCK.

Part of the 2nd Annual Bizarro Blog-a-Thon.

ETA: (src)

A Stern Warning

Tomorrow, some of you might be tempted to buy or rent this movie.

Don't.

That is all.

TV Can Suck It

If you looked at how little network TV I watch, you'd think that's my attitude. But it's not, I swear! I rarely get a chance to catch shows I want to watch, and I usually end up missing an episode or two of shows I do catch later and just stop watching completely, and the damn strike didn't help this habit much. Pushing Daisies is a great example of the latter. I suck.

But I do watch a helluva lot of stuff on cable, mostly my Holy Trinity - Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, and the Disney Channel. So, with the Emmys not that far away, I've decided to bring to your attention someone I feel absolutely deserves praising and endless adoration that she has yet to receive, especially since the idiots on her show didn't submit her (and probably never will). For your irrelevant consideration...

Emily Osment
as Lily Truscott on
Hannah Montana
No, I'm not joking. I watch the show pretty damn regularly - I'm not ashamed to admit it! - and I always manage to be impressed by Emily's incredibly airheaded brilliance. She's the best part of the show. Yeah, I said it. Emily > Miley, Emily > the music, Emily > GOD. Okay, probably not that last part, but damn it if it doesn't feel true. *HIGH-PITCHED SCREAM* That reminds me.

What's that? A hat?
Crazy, funky, junky hat!
Overslept, hair unsightly
Tryin' to look like Keira Knightley
We've been there
We've done that
We see right through your funky hat!

I can be such a teenage girl sometimes.

Poll Results

With exactly half of the vote, 'Yes' wins, with the other half divided between "My eyes hurt" and "I miss JMC" - which kinda surprises me. Well, at least no one flat out doesn't like the look. I think. If you want, you can tell me which you voted for if you did in the comments.

On 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days...

*silence*
*fidgets*
*light noise*
*pours water*
*breathes*
*cars pass by outside*
*looks to the camera*

Yeah, um, that's all I got.

“Shut Up And Let Me Go”

A.W.E.S.O.M.E.
ETA: LOL.

A Princess Who Dreamed of the Human Project Lives Forever OMG ♥

I watched Pan's Labyrinth this morning for only the 2nd time - not sure why it took me so long to do so again, but it was even more incredible than I remember. Well, in the midst of trying to creating a review for it, I couldn't stop thinking about how it, and indeed everything from 2006, is so monumentally inferior to Children of Men.

Before you even think it, NO, this isn't about that unfortunate decision the Cinematography branch made. Well, it's not the most important part. Actually, Pan's is pretty great in that attribute, and the bitterness has just lasted a long while. No, what I'm talking about is how CoM is just so much better than everything else ever made in a very general and all-encompassing sense. I'm sorry, but it is. I'm also dragging The Fountain into this, and not just because it's my blog and I can do whatever the hell I want. I'm doing so because it regularly battles to the death with Pan's re: which is better. Especially now, with it extremely fresh in my mind.

All three are extremely artistic films, I think... but in different ways, of course. CoM because it's an awesomely depressing ecosystem of post-apocalyptic mayhem, The Fountain because it's an epically misunderstood mess of hyper-symmetric, overtly-romantic, existential stylism, and Pan's because it's light and dark, good and evil, reality and imagination incarnate combined. They're all brilliant, beautiful, moving, challenging movies, and all are considered eternal classics here at VD.

I forgot what my point was. Oh, right.

CHILDREN OF MEN IS BETTER THAN YOU.
BUT THE FOUNTAIN IS INCREDIBLE CINEMATIC ART.
PAN'S LABYRINTH AS WELL. VERY MUCH SO.
AND THEY'RE PROBABLY BETTER THAN YOU TOO.
AT LEAST BETTER THAN BABEL.

Crying and Screaming and General Obviousness

Or, in other words, Actress in a Limited or Cameo Role is up.

Place Your Bets Here!

Bit by bit, piece by piece, the Chloes are getting done. It's taking way longer than I hoped, but I promise you, they will be done by the end of the month, and yes, I recognize that's 6 full months after 2007 actually ended. But right now, maybe to try and motivate me, lets make this a forum of figurative gambling. Place your bets in the comments of what you think I'll nominate for categories I haven't put up yet, and/or what you think will win. Use your knowledge of my histories and ramblings, here or at JMC or anywhere else, to act like you know me, a random teenager on the internet, better than somebody else, probably equally as random. This should be interesting...

The Age of Innocence

What is it about epic, tragic, period romances that turn me into mush? It seems to happen a lot, and this is most assuredly not an exception.

It's, for lack of a better term, perfect. Everything in it and about it is on a level that feels odd to witness, at least for me. It's beautifully elegiac and poignant, two things I have seen in films, but never in this manner. Also, I could never understand how this was apparently automatically deemed lesser Scorsese and never talked about, and now I'm even more confused. Same thing with The Last Temptation. Just because they're different to most of the rest of his filmography, how does that make them not on the same level as them, especially when they seem to be two of his most excellent films? I don't know, maybe I'm being too naive about it, or I'm focusing on reasons that aren't the cause. But whatever those actual reasons are, they're very stupid.

The way it was made is it's shining glory, I think. The costumes, the art direction, the cinematography, the editing, the writing, the direction are ALL completely excellent. They're all looped together too, and they create a very delicate visual extravaganza, but it's never obvious enough in the ways you would expect a film described as such to be that you'd ever say it was one. But it is.

Then there are, of course, the performances. OMG?! Day-Lewis and Pfeiffer, always excellent, are EXCELLENT. And Ryder (the only person nominated for this WTF?) is, like, unimaginably subtle, and it works beautifully. That she almost won for this has always made me giggle, but DANG IT, she would've deserved it immensely. Never thought I'd say that...

In short, I loved it. A lot. So, so much. An incredible amount. I WANT TO HAVE IT'S BABIES. Srsly.

VD Grade: ★★★★★ (out of five)

That Ain't Right

Somebody tell me how this person --

-- equals this person --
-- ugh. Still, thank you Rachel for not doing this. You have an Oscar!

And it's the most deserved acting Oscar of the decade. There, I said it! And it feels gooooooooooood! TESSA QUAYLE FOR LIFE!!!!!

Go to hell, Maria Bello.

In Which I Ask For Your Cinematic Suggestions

In the 5,574 days I've been alive, I have seen approximately 660 films - well, somewhere around there (maybe?), and if you don't count TV movies - so, averaged (thank you calculator!), I've seen a film for the first time about every 8.44 days. I think that's good, right? I'm only 15, you know, so I think a total like that is seriously impressive -- and, like, almost a third of them in the past year. I'm growing! Plus all the films I've fallen absolutely in love with that time, especially the classics! Ugh, it makes me feel all giggly inside. But it's not enough. It's never enough! LOL, I'm such a whore.

I always feel that, despite my age, I can do better. That, like, I shouldn't be anticipating stuff like Narnia and Wanted more than I should be watching stuff like The 400 Blows and Network, you know? If I ever want people to take me seriously, I have to prove that I deserve to be. So...

I've put up a suggestion box! With Children of Men lettering, no less!

What I want you :: my faithful, loving readers :: to do is fill this box up with the names of films you'd like me to see. Anything. But keep in mind my age and intellectual level, plz. Nothing, like, insanely hardcore, or something. So, what do ya got for me???

Happy Birthday, Leelee Sobieski!

Now, please, I implore you - start doing good movies again.

Can Anybody Find Me Somebody To Love?