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Week of March 13, 2006 |
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You can take "The Peacemaker," "Deep Impact," and "The Tuxedo." We'll take "Gladiator," "American Beauty" and anything else that didn't suck.
Emilio's 17
Yeah, like he needed all that overpriced crap anyway...
This lawsuit's going to make 'House Party' look like 'House Party Two!'
I told you... don't call me SENIOR!!
Maybe this is all a bad dream too?
Thanks Sharon, but I think I'll wait until this one comes out on DVD (so I can freeze frame of course)
There is absolutely, positively no nepotism in Hollywood. None.
You're good, baby, I'll give you that... but me? I'm magic.
This band will go down like a lead balloon
Well, Goodbye there Children...
They can't sell the Capitol Records building! What will be left to destroy in the next crappy 'end of the world' movie?
Same old Courtney - still sponging off Kurt
Panic on the streets of Austin
You're a fat, Botox faced, wig-wearing ninny! Oh yeah? Well your band has a dirty H addict as a lead singer!
Black Sabbath, Blondie, Miles Davis, The Sex Pistols, Lynyrd Skynyrd Enter Rock Hall
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01 |
THE BREAK-UP |
$39.17
$12759/av |
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02 |
X-MEN: THE LAST STAND |
$34.02
$9159/av |
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03 |
OVER THE HEDGE |
$20.65
$5170/avg |
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04 |
THE DAVINCI CODE |
$18.61
$4953/avg |
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05 |
MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE III |
$4.68
$1756/avg |
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06 |
POSEIDON |
$3.49
$1283/avg |
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RV |
$3.20
$1469/avg |
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SEE NO EVIL |
$2.04
$1607/avg |
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09 |
AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH |
$1.36
$17615/avg |
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10 |
JUST MY LUCK |
$855K
$892/avg |
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E-MAIL THE AUTHOR
THE BOTTOM OF THINGS
By Michael Sampson
September 17, 2003
We’ve all felt a little under appreciated at times. I remember one time I was writing for this popular internet site and didn’t get paid a dime for all my hard…ummm, never mind. But I think we can all remember the times (some of us not having to remember too far) working at a shit job for shit pay and busting our asses for very little thanks.
My first job was working at a local bagel shop…at 5:00 in the morning. Not a whole lot of people looking for bagels in a small New Jersey town at 5am but if they were, I was there, ready to slice it up and apply their spread of choice. This usually got me a grunt at best or a long-winded scolding for putting the garlic bagels in the same bag as the plain bagels by a Linda Richman look-alike at worst.
From there I had uneventful jobs at such fine establishments as Six Flags where I –- and I shit you not here –- was splattered with vomit flung from a ride spinning in a circle at about 50 mph. The thanks I got? Get a mop and some paper towels and clean this mess up in your still-puked-on lederhosen costume. Everyday I prayed for Dee Snider to come busting through a wall and kick my boss’s ass “We’re Not Gonna Take It”-style.
This column is devoted to those performances in the movie world that often go forgotten and aren’t appreciated for what they bring to their respective films. They may have been overshadowed by co-stars or their films simply never got the attention they deserve. In some cases, they were eclipsed by other performances in the actor’s career. In any event, I’ve broken the list up into two parts – bit parts and lead characters. I should also add that this isn’t a “Top” list like VH1 likes to put together. These are in no particular order and are the sole opinion of myself. I didn’t go out and poll my friends and colleagues partly because I have no friends and my colleagues won’t return my calls.
Supporting Roles –- These are the actors you see for a few minutes here or a few minutes there, or maybe even barely a minute in some films. But for some reason you remember that part, that role, that performance, when otherwise it would’ve been a throwaway character. When the film comes on cable you stick around just to see one of their scenes. You never really know their name and, as they are unappreciated, rarely make it beyond that role. But we’re here today to celebrate them.
Kali Rocha –- MEET THE PARENTS
After being relentlessly harassed by his intimidating future father-in-law, Ben Stiller is just trying to fly back home. It’s been a long few days and he’s just come from ruining a wedding and potentially ruining his relationship with his future wife. So he’s already a little testy. Then at the airport he meets a flight attendant who knows how to get on Stiller’s last nerve. Rocha, who stars as the attendant determined to follow the rules and regulations no matter how ridiculous, delivers a subtle performance that’s a hilarious way to end Stiller’s day. She’s got the smug professionalism of airport workers down pat and that look-to-the-left-look-to-the-right move to see if there are any boarding passengers – in a desolate airport – still cracks me up.
Denise Cheshire –- JAWS
It’s important to get out to a running start in a horror movie. Establish fear and build suspense early on and you’re well on the way to scaring the shit out of people. Few movies have done it so well and so simply as JAWS. A young girl goes out for a little after-dark swim in the ocean while her paramour falls on the beach and passes out. She swims out nude, unaware her man is eating sand. Treading water, she feels pain from her legs. The poor girl then becomes the violent victim to a shark we never see. Because we don’t see her attacker, the terror must derive from performance and direction. Of course, Spielberg did an amazing job with this scene (he reportedly was underwater pulling her legs) but let us not forget Cheshire whose screams, flails and futile attempts to hold onto that damn buoy still stick in our minds.
Thomas Jane –- BOOGIE NIGHTS
When BOOGIE NIGHTS was first released, Thomas Jane was a virtual unknown. Since then he’s starred in a number of films in more leading man type roles including 61*, THE SWEETEST THING and now in Marvel’s THE PUNISHER. Before all that he was a gay porn star leading Dirk Diggler down a path of drugs and violence in NIGHTS. The credit in the “Sister Christian” scene usually goes to Alfred Molina and rightly so. He rules that scene. But Thomas Jane holds his own as the increasingly desperate addict looking for drugs and money – and he’ll do anything to get it. Now that Jane has moved on to greener pastures you likely won’t see him in this type of gritty role again and that’s a shame considering how well he did it.
Leading Roles –- For whatever reason, these roles weren’t as celebrated as they should have been. Here’s hoping in retrospect they’ll get the respect they deserve:
Jack Lemmon –- GLENGARRY GLEN ROSS
Under-appreciated, you say? He was after all lauded for the performance when the film came out. But I bring this performance up for a few reasons. One obvious reason being the lack of an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor. Al Pacino was nominated as Best Supporting and while he was good in this film, was he really better than Lemmon? Another reason being after Lemmon’s passing, his performance in this film was overlooked and overshadowed by other higher-profile “great” performances in his career. GLENGARRY was barely mentioned. But his portrayal as the down-on-your-luck Shelly “The Machine” Levine is one that should never be forgotten. Watch him in a phone booth, in the rain, doing everything he knows how just to make a sale and be able to pay his bills and tell me this performance didn’t deserve more credit than it got.
Reese Witherspoon –- ELECTION
Like Thomas Jane above, Reese has moved on to try and become heir to the Julia Roberts throne. Gone are movies like ELECTION and FREEWAY and are replaced with SWEET HOME ALABAMA and LEGALLY BLONDE. But before the films for which most people know Reese today was the role of Tracy Flick in ELECTION. A perfect blend of perk and jerk that had you sympathizing with poor Matthew Broderick.
Philip Baker Hall –- HARD EIGHT
Even before he showed us that Adam Sandler can actually act, P.T. Anderson knew how to get the most out of his actors. In his first feature-length film, Anderson took character actor Hall and directed him to the finest performance of his career (except maybe his turn as library policeman Bookman on SEINFELD). The father figure with the checkered past we’re never fully aware of, he says more with a squint of his eyes than most do in a full-page monologue.
Tom Wilkinson –- NORMAL
I’m guessing not many people have seen this film about a father and husband who decides to have a sex change but the next time it comes on HBO, where it made its debut, I suggest you check it out. Wilkinson gives a painfully believable performance as a man who struggles with the woman inside. He deals with his wife, his teenage daughter and his desire to wear earrings to his job at an auto factory. It could’ve been a bad “Benny Hill” sketch but Wilkinson puts an earnest spin on a man in drag.
Holy crap, it’s the return of the Brain Dump! The long-thought-dead part of this column that was supposed to be reccurring feature but reccurred once then disappeared.
Sorry for the delay this week. My computer pulled a HAL, went a little crazy and the long and short of it is, it had to go. So I got a Dell. Thought about making the “Dude, you got a Dell” joke just there but wisely thought against it. But I lost a lot of data in the whole transfer progress, one of which was my archives of all my columns since the beginning of the year…including this week’s. It wasn’t until I was all set up again on Tuesday that I was able to get back to rewriting a column I had already rewritten. And, of course, it’s never as good the second time around. You just can’t get everything worded the way you had it before and it’s always a little off. Anyway, I’ll make the delay up to you by adding a little more than I usually would. Plus I’ll post a Britney Spears pic from ROLLING STONE.
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UNDERWORLD, which opens this Friday, is a film I have to admire. Not because it’s a great film, ‘cause it’s not – it’s barely a mediocre film. But it’s a film made primarily for fans of the genre from a guy, co-writer/director Len Wiseman, who’s spent his whole life around comic-books and sci-fi, horror films. Unfortunately, a geeky fanboy director does not a great movie make (i.e., DAREDEVIL). For every step in the right direction (animatronic creature effects as opposed to CGI) there’s two steps backwards (c’mooooon already with the full leather MATRIX outfits!). Ultimately the film isn’t the geek fantasy it should be –- Kate Beckinsale in a vampires vs. werewolves film? Slam dunk! –- but provides hope that Wiseman can evolve into a director that can treat us fans right. An UNDERWORLD sequel/prequel is already in development and maybe with more time, more money and more experience Wiseman craft a film that will have our hands clapping more than our eyes rolling.
I’d like to point out that after Week two, yours truly is currently undefeated and standing atop the other 9 teams in the Movie Poop Shoot Fantasy Football League.
Is anyone else waiting for the other shoe to drop on Christopher Nolan’s BATMAN just out of habit? It’s a WB superhero film and it’s moving along WAY too good to be true. Something awful is going to happen soon…my Spidey sense is tingling.
Excuse the blatant pandering, but is anyone willing to part with White Stripes tickets for Roseland in NYC? My life will not be complete until I hear “Ball and Biscuit” or “Jolene” live.
The saddest death news of the week besides Johnny Cash? Chris Latta, voice of both Starscream from TRANSFORMERS and Cobra Commander from GI JOE died of a heart-attack…in 1994. And I’m just hearing about it now.
Dittmania continues with this article - http://www.cnn.com/2003/SHOWBIZ/Movies/08/28/movie.quotes/index.html -- from CNN profiling our favorite quotable critic from Wireless Magazine.
Run, don’t walk, to the official “24” website and download the preview for the upcoming season of the Jack Bauer Power Hour. Is that Kim working at CTU along her pops?!? Will wonders never cease? They should cut this thing down to about two minutes and run it like a trailer in theaters.
Musical blast from the past: “Lucas With the Lid Off”
The Bottom of Things is going on the road! All kinds of exciting, crazy adventures! The Big Easy! The Secret Stash! The basement of the Alamo! OK, the Alamo doesn’t have basement but I promise I’ll be back with some exciting stuff over the course of the next two or three columns. Then it’s back to the usual crap I write.
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