Quickie DVD Reviews

MEAN GIRLS
Rated: PG-13

One of the funniest performers (and writers) on SNL right now is clearly Tina Fey of "Weekend Update" fame. So when I heard she had written a movie, I knew I had to see it. Unfortunately, it was a teen-girl movie which meant if I wanted to see it, I would be resigned to see it with hordes of screaming 13-year-olds. So I stayed well away from the theater that month. But luckily, the film has just come out on DVD and I can tell you it is a winner. The film is centered around Cady (pronounced like Katie, played by Lindsey Lohan) who has spent her entire life up until now living in Africa with her biologist parents, and learning through home schooling. Now, her parents have come back to America for a cushy university job, and Cady needs to enter the new jungle of the American High School. Along the way, she adapts her experience in studying animals and primitive socieities to the cliques and cliches of teen life, and winds up in a conspiracy to dethrone the cruel popular !
girls of the Junior Class. Unfortunately, while attempting to infiltrate the clique, she winds up becoming just like them, and is horrified to realize she is now exactly what she hates.

This is a great film, and surprisingly has Tim Meadows in his first EVER believeable role in a movie. Despite a dumb running gag about carpel tunnel syndrome, he manages to come across as a completely real high school principal, while also inspiring laughs at every turn. Fey is also golden in every scene, and the rest of the cast is pitch-perfect. Not every scene is funny, and not every move is believeable. But on the whole this film is a keeper.


SUPER SIZE ME
Rated: Unrated

As a teenage boy who never needed to worry about his weight, one of my dreams was to be able to eat McDonald's food for every meal. As a 30-something man who is clearly overweight, it is more of a nightmare these days. In this documentary, the filmmaker sets out to find out what would happen to him if he ate McD's food 3 meals a day, every day, for 30 days. Living and working in New York City, he is never more than a couple of minutes from a pair of golden arches and many of them deliver. Without much fear of giving away the ending, things get so bad, so fast that the documentarian is quickly advised by his 3 doctors (hired specifically to track his health during the experiment), a nutritionist, and a "health lifestyle advisor" to quit before he does irreversible damage to his liver and heart. I won't say much more, except to note that within only a week or so of starting off on this diet, he actually has heart palpitations and chest pains.

Now, to be fair, this film is more of an anti-processed-food-and-the-fast-food-industry piece than any kind of a fair or scientific look at the issue. And it should be noted that the documentarian is living (and eating) with his Vegan girlfriend prior to and during the film. So he is not a regular guy going from eating at McD's about once a month (amidst other fast or short-order-cook food) but a guy living on an almost 100% vegetarian diet suddenly changing to a carnivore's dream. It is not surprising that his body showed some signs of extreme shock. Any extreme change in eating habits is likely to do this. But the movie is full of thought-provoking data and raises questions that every consumer should consider. For example, the "yougurt parfaits" that McD's introduced a few years back to encourage "healthy eating"? Well, unless you are eating the tiny snack-sized portion, you are getting more calories and sugar in the parfait than in one of the infamous hot fudge sun!
daes!

This is an excellent film, worth seeing. But as with all such documentaties, beware. If you like fast food and simply will not change your diet, sometimes ignorance is bliss.


ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND
Rated: R

I am no fan of Charlie Kaufman. I think his film BEING JOHN MALKOVICH is one of the most morally-reprehensible films I have every seen. And combining the terrible Nicolas Cage with similar material for ADAPTATION ensured that I stayed out of theaters and DVD stores whenever I knew it would be around. But the trailers for ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND intrigued me, and looked almost like a Philip K. Dick novel put onscreen. (And any regular readers know I am a fan of PKD.) So I decided to pick this one up on DVD and see what it was like. The verdict? Still not sure what to think.

The plot involves two societal misfits, who find each other and realize they fit with each other perfectly. Joel (played by Jim Carrey) is an introverted antisocial geek who spends most of his time working, reading, or writing/drawing in his journal. Clementine (played by Kate Winslet) is an extroverted freak who makes sure people know her from across the room by dying her hair vibrant (and decidedly unnatural) colors, while drinking, smoking, and doing whatever else is required to stay loud and obnoxious. And alive, which is what captivates Joel. After a short romance, they have a fight and Clementine goes to Lacuna, Inc where she has her memories erased (yes, that can't really happen) of Joel. He is furious and decides to have her erased from his memories in relatiation. Bizarre images ensue.

The film is a structural maze as you start at the end, the middle is the beginning, and then the end is either the same as the beginning or a new ending, depending on how you look at it. The film left me unsure of how to react to it, which I am sure is what Kaufman was looking for when he wrote it. As a writer, I admire the clever dialogue, structure, and imagery. As a philosopher, the morality of the whole thing is horrible. But then, unlike BEING JOHN MALKOVICH, the characters are forced to deal with the immorality and consequences of their actions. This is probably a film I will either come to love or to hate, upon rewatching. At the moment, though, I think I need to watch a mindless adventure picture to cleanse my palate, so to speak.


QUICK DVD NOTE: STAR WARS Trilogy DVD Set
Rated: PG

If you haven't watched the set yet and don't want to know about all of the changes Lucas made, stop reading now. Seriously.

Still here? Good. One of the big changes that is creating a ton of controvery is the decision to replace the classic "Old Anakin" in the ghost scene at the end of ROTJ with Hayden Christiansen. People are quite up in arms as it is made to look like the good Jedi (OB1 and Yoda) are forced to live as forever old men, while the bad Jedi (Vader/Anakin) is allowed to regain his youthful looks. Having watched the scene a few times now, I must say that people have been making a tempest in a teapot on this one. The Anakin that appears in the end of ROTJ is NOT the same Anakin we see in Eps 1, 2, or (it appears) 3. They made up Christiansen to look older and wiser than he actually is. It is simply Lucas's idea about how Anakin MIGHT have looked, had be not turned and been borgified into Darth Vader. This is NOT a big deal, and should NOT be a deal-breaker for anyone who might buy this set, unless you are simply part of that small group of passionate critics who hate anything !
from the prequel trilogy on principle.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled BLog.