trinityvixen | Entries tagged with no nutritional value

This may be the first movie in this series to really, truly earn the "no nutritional value" nomenclature, seeing as saccharin is an artificial, zero-calorie sweetener and romantic "comedies" never seem to be sweetened with anything else.

Leap Year is a movie I remembered only after I started watching it. What I remembered was a review--either in the NYT or by Roger Ebert--that could not make sense of why the movie doesn't quite work but can't really be considered a failure either. It hits its marks, the leads have decent enough chemistry, and the premise is suitably flimsy that it is promptly forgot (until the requisite boy-loses-girl moment) when the two leads get thrown together.

Perhaps the problem is that in an effort to justify the bad qualities of the romantic pairing, the film offers realistic, heart-breakingly underplayed backstories for both characters. Amy Adams runs through her take-charge, make a perfect and empty life for herself stereotype with her usual piping vigor. Matthew Goode (who I hadn't seen playing a straight character ever, so it was nice to see him in another role where he could) is the slouch, uncouth driver with no sense of the border between frankness and rudeness. You're supposed to cheer for him teaching her to loosen up and appreciate the rough-and-tumble pleasures of life. You're supposed to cheer for her to bring him out of his self-imposed exile from a lot of humanity. True love! Conquers all! Closing Credits!

The only trouble is that both characters have not unreasonable pathologies considering their pasts, and the changes that need to happen for both of them are so gradual and small that they can't be properly contained in your typical Romantic Comedy Formula (TM). The film also seems to want to shy clear of melodrama, so it brings up these background goodies and then dismisses them for the RCF(TM) staples of the "oops, they think we're a couple and now we have to act like it" variety. Amy Adams has one of the best, most intelligent means of determining which of her two suitors is the better person that I have ever seen in a film, and it is ruined by the one boyfriend's over-the-top reaction when the simplicity of Matthew Goode's reaction would have sufficed to show up the other man.

That aspect of the movie--of the tropes of romantic comedies past bearing down on an otherwise small and sad story--keeps Leap Year from being great. We have to have the Hair-brained Scheme, the constant requirement that one or both of the prospective couple behave like a crazy person/asshole for no reason (but not to such a degree that we fear they won't make it 4-ev-ahs!), the original boyfriend who seems nice enough until we learn he's a total douche-drinking scuzz, etc. etc. It didn't need these aspects to be charming--part of Matthew Goode's characters woes are resolved in a very British-blue-collar movie way--and it's a pity that they didn't trust their own work enough to let it just be charming.

So, Leap Year. Worth a watch--Matthew Goode's Irish accent and exceedingly easy-on-the-eyes screen presence are worth the view alone--just remember that that's not sugar you're tasting.

Favorite line/scene: Amy Adams and Matthew Goode are caught in a hailstorm, and they're running into a church for shelter. He's stunned by the hail, bursts in shouting...
Declan: Jesus Christ!
[Entire congregation, including the minister and the two people getting married turn around at the outburst.]
Anna: ...is Lord!

Because Netflix threatened to remove it from my Watch It Now queue today, I watched Weekend at Bernie's last night.

Why, other than the fact it's expiring on my queue, would I watch this? Well, curiosity for one thing--Weekend at Bernie's seems to be a movie that lots of people reference but few have actually seen. Also, 1980s screwball comedies are just...they're a genre unto themselves, you know? They're frequently not laugh-out-loud funny, and although the better ones (Coming to America, Better Off Dead) have some memorable lines, it's really all about the absurdity of the set up in a way that modern comedies...aren't. Modern comedies want you to laugh at a sight gag or a punchline. 1980s comedies expect you to go along for the ride and get your amusement out of going, "Why? Why would anybody react to this situation like this???"

And that's what I got out of Weekend at Bernie's. Instead of immediately calling the police upon discovering a corpse, the two dudes decide to fake like the guy's alive and hope they'll get away with it long enough to figure something else out to do with it when it stops being a passable prop. Because it's a 1980s screwball comedy, the straight man drops the call-the-police plan every time the girl of his dreams walks into the room. What follows is an hour of antics with a corpse, many of which are less funny than the fact that the murderer is in fits because he thinks he keeps failing to kill the dead guy. Who behaves this way!?

Another thing: some of these comedies wait an awful long time to deliver on the premise that seems to be their sole source of amusement. "Antics with a dead guy" would seem to be the whole point of the movie, but Bernie's still alive 40 minutes into a 100-minute movie. That kind of build up is nowhere in comedies today, possibly for the better, seeing as 40 minutes of Andrew McCarthy's "acting" outside of the screwball setup is worthless.

Weekend at Bernie's is ultimately fluff--nothing you need to see to get the aforementioned references but nothing that it harms you to see either. Unless 80s fashions hurt you--there was a shot of men in business suits where the pants were shorts, gro-oss--it's harmless.

Of course, I object on principle to any movie that makes any zombie seem sympathetic in any way. However, My Boyfriend's Back is worth a view, not because the zombie lead is sympathetic but because his family, friends, and neighbors are surprisingly unaffected by his refusal to stay dead. The entire-town-is-indifferent-to-the-monster-in-their-midst was done before in Teen Wolf (and, sorta, previous No Nutritional Value entry, My Best Friend Is A Vampire). I didn't really care for Teen Wolf. Can't say why, just didn't strike a chord with me.

But the Dingle family--particularly Mama Dingle--and their willingness to pick up stray children and corpses to feed to their recently departed son/brother is all kinds of hilarious. Apart from them and Zombie Johnny Dingle's constant harrumphs of harassment over people's assumptions about his zombism (which are awesomely funny), the movie is deader than its lead. (Okay, so, the brief scene with Saint Peter was giggle-inducing, too.) I was hard-pressed to pick a favorite line. There are so many. (Mama Dingle being at the center of most of them.) But I think I'll have to go with:

Johnny: I'm just dead. It's not like I'm an asshole or anything.

Oh, okay, one more.

Johnny: I almost took a bite out of my friend Eddie, and it was such the wrong thing to do. He's very mad.

I feel sort of bad equating a documentary with a C-level tween vampire flick from the 1980s, but Constantine's Sword is (pardon the pun) so toothless and obvious as to be the documentary equivalent of unflavored rice cakes. Documentaries can be calorie-free, too.

The basic premise is a disillusioned former priest discovering the history of anti-Semitism within the Roman Catholic Church and trying to make sense of it. Where did it come from? What kept it going? Except that he never does get into the whys and wherefores of anti-Semitism, he just gives a lot of examples of its manifestation in Catholic and Protestant societies. So the effect is less an uncomfortable examination of the basis of one of the most long-lived and vile prejudices ever to afflict men and women and more a summary of the unpleasantness and evil the Jewish people have endured over their many millenia of worship. "HOLY CRAP, THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH IS ANTI-SEMITIC" is hardly news. I bet this guy would keel over and die if anyone pointed out that there are anti-Semitic Jews.

Heart's in the right place, but the film and the author/narrator goes nowhere fast. It's one noteworthy contribution was in demonstrating how much of an utter douchebag Ted Haggard is. On the subject of men and women forcing Protestant values on cadets at the Air Force Academy, Haggard, that Constitutional scholar (and serial homophobic closet case and abuser of authority) of note, says something to the effect of freedom of religion = freedom to have to put up with his church's bullshit all the time whether you like it or not. Way to miss the point there, Pastor Ted. Ted Haggard wants you to know that it's totally cool to believe what you believe, but he and his are free to harass you about what they believe and you can't do anything about it and they're not going to stop short of you setting fire to them. In which case they would probably forget their principles and start taking Christ's name in vain as their rubber skin melted off to reveal the lizard/plant/pod/alien underneath.

I can't believe anyone ever listened to this ratfuck little taint. He's got this bug-eyed aspect and a smile so permanently fixed to his Crypt Keeper-face that even the Joker would appear to be frowning next to this dicksmack. Not surprised at all to hear that he got his jollies on drugs and male prostitutes. Ted Haggard just looks like the guy who spends his free time sniffing powder out of any available asshole. Jesus.

Current Music: Bachman-Turner Overdrive - Takin' Care Of Business

I was relating to people only this past weekend how I had, at that point, watched as many movies as there were days in the year, and how my ambition is to, one day, become such a couch potato that I do watch 365 movies in the space of a year. Consequently, it was pointed out to me that it would be much easier to do that by watching mostly terrible movies as many of the sort I'd be likely to watch (horror movies, bad sci-fi) would be short. Between my parents' TiVo and Netflix's questionable selection of streaming video, I'm all set. So here I go!

My Best Friend is a Vampire is your typical 1980s monster movie--the monsters aren't scary, just misunderstood minorities! It's explicitly campy in its references to vampirism=puberty, STDs, homosexuality, etc. The protagonist gets himself into trouble after a one-night-stand with a woman he doesn't know. Use protection, you kids! But if you really love your friends, you won't hate them for being different.

Robert Sean Leonard looks to be all of twelve. (Cusack syndrome!) It stars the worst actress in the world as the love interest/Molly Ringwald rip-off. (

feiran took one look at her and went, "That's a girl?"; then after exactly one line of dialogue, "That's the worst actress in the world, right?") This guy is having way too much fun being an absolutely queer vampire mentor. The theme song is "The Future is So Bright, I Gotta Wear Shades." My "Starz presents" Netflix streaming video had breaks that seemed suspiciously like commercial breaks and curious silences where curse words ought to have been. Truly, this was the ABC Family version of Teen Wolf. Only vampires! Totally different!

Worth it for exactly two lines of dialogue:
Vampire Teen's Dad: Our son is gay. How do you feel about that?
Vampire Teen's Mom: I really wanted grandchildren.