AND SUNDAY COMES AFTERWARDS! It's Friday! (Yes, I know we're behind, but didn't make sense to post on Wednesday or Thursday.)
On a related note, for the first time in a long while, there's a plethora of new film options for folks this weekend, including Frost/Pegg alien comedy Paul (which our friend Linda Holmes loved), a pair of adult-oriented thrillers in Limitless and Lincoln Lawyer, a limited release of the new Tom McCarthy film Win Win with Paul Giamatti and Amy Ryan, and the widening of a new version of Jane Eyre starring Mia Wasikowska and Michael Fassbinder. How are folks planning on spending their entertainment dollars this weekend? For me, Paul is a sure thing (Frost and Pegg haven't made a bad film yet), and maybe one of the new adult thrillers or Adjustment Bureau.
"Friday" is remarkable in its awfulness.
ReplyDeleteI have a weekend mostly free of any obligations to anyone else, so tonight I'm taking in "Adjustment Bureau." I might also pack in "Cedar Rapids" and "No Strings Attached" sometime this weekend. (I was surprised by the number of female authors I follow on Twitter who REALLY liked No Strings Attached, so now I'm curious about it. And, it's at the second-run theater, so it will cost me exactly $2 to see it.)
ReplyDeleteOur local art house cinema is doing a once-an-afternoon matinee of "The Muppet Movie" which is also tempting. I can't remember the last time I saw that movie all the way through - I tended to be more of a "Muppets Take Manhattan" fan.
I will be spending most of my weekend preparing for my own entertainment production--a play reading of an original work about the boudaries of art and identity that will be read in an art gallery in Noble Square here in Chicago. Wednesday night 7:30pm at Betty Dare Gallery 1319 W Chicago Ave, Chicago IL (also the play is called Installation and is written by Jeffrey Bouthiette and I have a role in the reading) with optional feedback for the playwright to follow.
ReplyDeleteBUT if I can smash it in, Jane Eyre.
I made it through almost 40 seconds of that. Yikes.
ReplyDeleteI have no idea what I'll be doing this weekend, as the w has prepared a surprise. All I know is that I have to pack for a 3-day weekend, and the dog is coming with us.
I should note that for "Friday," I levy almost the entire blame not at the singer, but to the songwriter/producers. Black's voice is adequate (if over-processed) in that Miley way, but it's the godawful songwriting and production that really makes it ludicrous. I mean, the lyrics "Partyin' partyin' hard" have no place in a song by anyone other than Andrew W.K.
ReplyDeleteHow can you even tell about her voice? She sings essentially one note through the entire song.
ReplyDeleteThe boyfriend and I want to see Adjustment Bureau.
ReplyDeleteAlso, we watched the entire Muppet Movie last year, I believe.
Good luck!
ReplyDeleteI'm going to try and make it to the movies for the first time since Iron Man II (I know, I know), so I think Win Win if it's playing around here or Paul.
ReplyDelete(Jane Eyre? I must have missed the Bronte gene somewhere. Give me Austen, where the characters know how to have a good time.)
I'm checking out Cedar Rapids. I'm interested to hear others' thoughts on Adjustment Bureau - I'm still not sure how I feel about it.
ReplyDeleteI have to work this weekend, but by work, I mean ride a zip line, climb a rock wall, meet & have dinner with Andrew McCarthy, Rick Steves, Samantha Brown and a bunch of other travel experts. So in this case "I have to work this weekend" should end with "WOOOOHOOOO!"
ReplyDelete(P.S. and blatantly promotional, if you're an L.A. based Thing Thrower, and this stuff interests you, join me!
I want Maret's job.
ReplyDeleteAndrew McCarthy being a travel writer now never ceases to crack me up (along with a healthy dose of "Hey, good for him!")
ReplyDeleteHeather, what's the admission fee?<span> </span>
ReplyDeleteI felt it somehow took this cool concept and took the drama out of it. In the final chase scene, I was expecting twists and turns and a dramatic finish, but it's basically over in a minute. I felt there was so much unexplored territory (giving us more of the Inception-like door visuals, not having Damon's character leverage their desire for him to be President into changing his fate, etc.) that would've served the film better.
ReplyDeleteAlso I didn't buy the chemistry b/t Damon & Blunt (which really hurts when the whole plot is centered on two people who love each other so much they'll die for each other).
Singer? singing?
ReplyDeleteI know, I'm entertained by it as well. He is also super nice. And he won what is the equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize for travel writing last year. But he's always going to be Blane to me.
ReplyDeleteRe "Friday," don't blame the 13-year old. She has no talent, no presence, and a terrible voice that sounds flat even when autotuned, which is really something. But she's just a 13-year-old girl. The Ark Productions team is a vanity production house that writes songs and shoots videos for anybody who has the money to support it. Black's parents are the ones who presumably put up the money for this travesty. You can't blame a 13-year-old for having unrealistic dreams, you can't blame the production house for being willing to provide a service for a reasonable fee, and those of us who are parents probably can at least sympathize with parents who don't want to be the ones to crush our kids' dreams and have enough money that they can't plead economic reality as an excuse for not doing this. It is true that somebody should have come in and put a stop to this tremendously pointless exercise, but I've yet to find the rational self-interested actor who stands to gain from doing that. The parents more than anybody else, sure, but if you have the money to support your kid's hobby, who are you to tell her she should take up something she enjoys less?
ReplyDeleteI might feel differently if this song were as bad as "We Built This City," but it's not.
It is a suggested donation of $10 which is VERY suggested.
ReplyDeleteSo I'll get the stinkeye and have to sit behind Wally Who Never Washes if I only pay $5?
ReplyDeleteI agree with most of what you said, but we all have to realize we're raising our kids in the Facebook/Twitter/YouTube era and that's a total game-changer. When we asked our parents for permission to do something and they asked themselves, "will this put my child in physical danger?" we have to ask ourselves, "how will this play out assuming it gets on the internet?" Black's parents, despite knowing this would go online, may not have thought that issue through, or maybe they did but figured that the song would either a) be a hit and get their daughter a record deal; or, more likely b) be ignored, without really pausing to think about c) what if it gets a ton of attention and is then mocked brutally by thousands of people?
ReplyDeleteNope. You will get free wine and sit wherever you like. The donation is mostly to cover cost of free wine/snacks the tiny amount we are paying actors to perform/rehearse and the fee to rent chairs.
ReplyDeletedoes anyone really assume for c? I mean even if they know/think/figure it will be bad, does anyone ever assume that c would happen over b? Because the odds for c have got to be pretty small. Like winning a really terrible lottery.
ReplyDeleteIn this Star Wars Lightsaber Kid day and age? We should assume that there is well above a non-zero likelihood of c.
ReplyDeleteAlso for your Friday consideration, I give you this minor bit of grammar nerd action, which will save us all 1 character on Twitter.
On the other hand, I bet the experience could make for a great college essay for Wesleyan.
ReplyDeleteI actually thought Ark Productions was slightly different than what you purpose.
ReplyDeleteMy impression was that they do thus stuff with hired actors and songwriters and minimal production budget in order to cast a wide net out on the internet in the hopes of finding, or rather making, the next Justin Beiber, or getting a song/artist/group/etc picked up by a major label. In which case I'm not blaming anyone involved in the "Friday" video. (ok, maybe the songwriter. Yikes!)
Now that you bring the up the "vanity project" angle, the video seems even worse than I remember it.
I think that's what Ark Music Factory (not Ark Productions, as I originally described them) would tell you, and it's clearly the line they're using in stories about Black. But look at their videos and make your own call as to whether that's true or not. If that were the case, then you'd expect either (a) at least one success resulting from their business model, which doesn't seem to exist (despite a ton of videos, usually starring young white girls); or (b) aggressive promotion. It's pretty hard to look at the evidence and see anything but a place that will give you content and production in exchange for a fee. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. If I woke up tomorrow morning with ten million dollars and a burning desire to make a song and a video, I would hope that there would be somebody out there to make my dreams come true for a reasonable, competitive price. I mean, we don't complain about it when the buyers are high school orchestras or college a cappella groups, do we? Tommy Whatshisname got The Room made; why can't Black have a souvenir of her awkward teen pop phase?
ReplyDeleteI stand corrected. After watching a minute or so of the acoustic version, it's clear that Rebecca Black has a 7th-grade talent show caliber voice....which is exactly where she should be showcasing that particular talent.
ReplyDeletehttp://community.livejournal.com/ohnotheydidnt/57380493.html
Just as this, by my friend Martin, is remarkable in its awesomeness:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/v/XKUOJZKklbM" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="170" height="140