Gnumoon's Stuff

Let the Wild Rumpus Start!

When I heard there was to be a live-action Where the Wild Things Are movie, I was kind of pissed off. Fine, Hollywood. Between this and the Transformers movie and the "hipping up" of Strawberry Shortcake, go ahead and exploit my childhood some more. But then ... I saw the trailer. And I teared up. Seriously. I almost cried (and I don't even really like the Arcade Fire, but that song is perfect).

Here it is if you haven't seen it yet.



I grabbed one of the production stills, and made a quick photoshop with my little Wild Thing, too:
And yes, she does have a wolf suit. And yes, she often makes mischief of one kind and another.

You remind me of the babe - a goblin babe

Since I found out I was pregnant, I’ve been on the lookout for a red and white striped outfit like the one Toby wears in Labyrinth. I’ve googled it, I’ve searched online and in stores, I’ve asked, but to no avail. Toby’s cute little costume was not to be found.

Then yesterday I was perusing the local Osh-Kosh store, and lo and behold, what did I see? I red and white striped outfit, right there on the sale rack. Fools! I though. Just because something looks like Christmas colors doesn’t mean it can only be for Christmas! So I bought it (a steal at $3.99) and brought it home.

When I got it out of he bag I was dismayed to find that, embroidered across the rump in dark green 2-inch letters, it said “LITTLE ELF”. So that was the Christmas part. Gotcha. But I was not deterred- I am a semi-professional un-embroiderer. When you support a program with wonky colors that are not readily available in baby clothing, sometimes you have to improvise. I’ll buy a bright gold onesie with a fire truck embroidered on it, use a seam ripper to remove the truck, and then sew an ASU logo patch in its place. Easy, cheap, whoo-hoo.

So I got out my trusty seam ripper and set to work. I have to give it to the Osh-kosh people: those damn letters were REALLY on there. That is some quality work I had to destroy. And it took forever. Like over an hour. By about halfway through I had to switch to my eyebrow tweezers to get the tiny threads out. (Really good tweezers, too. Expensive ones. My eyebrows are my one beauty, like Jo’s hair in Little Women. I take care of them.)

By the time it was all said and done I was exhausted. I marched back to the laundry room and chucked the stripey garment into the wash with a growl. I slammed down the machine lid (after adding no-perfume-no-dye-all-natural-organic-baby-safe-enviro-safe detergent, of course), and let out a victorious whoop – “Who’s embroidered now, you stupid farker?!” I yelled at the laundry. In all, it was a truly pathetic way to spend part of one’s Friday night.

All because of my unnatural love for Labyrinth. Behold:

ps- Googling for this photo "labyrinth toby" brought me the first link in a long time that has made me laugh out loud.

A V-Day movie suggestion

(This is the best piece of V-Day WTH? clipart I could find to go with this post. Enjoy.)

I promised the other day I’d provide a write-up on my favorite romantic movie. So here it is…I’m not going to reveal it immediately, because some narrow-minded folks may have this fine piece of cinema in the wrong genre and wouldn’t give it a chance as a love story unless it’s presented a certain way (with the distracting elements stripped out). But from the time I first saw it, at age 11 or so, the love story was undeniable.

The basic plot involves a carefree and naïve young woman who is unaware she is in imminent danger. She is saved from almost certain death by a handsome, rugged stranger who says he has come to rescue her from this almost certain death.  She doesn’t believe him, even after he explains the gravity of her situation, and she gives him up to the police. Shortly thereafter she realizes her mistake and has to be rescued by the stranger again (to avoid almost certain death).

They flee to the countryside, where he tells her stories of his life- his struggles to survive in a harsh world, how he came from afar to find her, and how he can never go home again- that he sacrificed his life to be with her. Later on, she asks if there was ever another woman in his life, and he replies no. Then he admits that she is the only woman he has ever loved and that he volunteered to protect her, even facing almost certain death, for the chance to be near her, if only for a short time.

She is overwhelmed by his naked honesty, and 80’s-style big-haired roadside motel Lovemaking ensues.

A short time later certain death returns and he dies protecting the woman he loves. She is forced to go on without him, with only the memory of those two 48 hours to keep her warm for the rest of her days.

But their love endures: she bears his child, a child born with the promise of being a great leader, a man who will one day lead the people of the world to freedom. 
All because of the greatest love story ever filmed.

This is Sparta! (OK, chattanooga. Whatever)

Here it is...the excellent trailer for the new Frank Miller film 300. I've been excited about it since I heard it was being made. Hopefully it will be as good as it seems. (Note the sweet NIN song in the trailer as well)

We're in Chattanooga this weekend for fooball, so I'm going to make the most of my morning off and hit Barnes & Noble. I know that's exciting for everyone.

Hope all is well out there- y'all have a great weekend.

Random & quotable

Entertainment Weakly (see what I did there?) has just released a list of “Top 10” cult movies. The film experts here agree with two of their choices (Bladerunner and Spinal Tap), and have decided to compile their own list. The only criteria for inclusion on the list are 1.When you mention the film in a roomful of people, at least one person will say, “Oh, wow, I’d forgotten about that one!” And #2, just to up the difficulty for me (what, you didn’t know that “film experts here” are all me? It’s my site.)  is that the movie cannot have appeared on my List of Halloween Movies. So here we go…
(Monty Python has been left off the list because they rule all cult movies, and to include them is unfair to other films. Mr. Creosote said so.)

1. Heathers – Wynona Ryder and Christian Slater at Westerburg High, murdering the A-group in a classic that would NEVER be made these days. 
Veronica: “My teen angst bullshit has a body count.”
2. Explorers – Three misfit boys (including a young bespeckled River Phoenix) build a spaceship out of a Tilt-a-Whirl (The Thunder Road) and go visit aliens.
Heinlein the mouse: “I would like…cheese. Go to hell.”
3. UHF – Weird Al inherits a TV station in one of the funniest movies ever made. Michael Richards will always be Stanley Spadowski to me, not Cosmo Kramer. Also the movie that made me love the standup of one Emo Phillips.
Spatula City jingle: “Spatula City, we sell spatulas… and that’s all!”
4. Stand by Me – The lone Stephen King entry. Four boys set out across the countryside to find Ray Brower’s dead body. This movie taught me the fine art of creative cursing.
Voiceover: “Finding new and preferably disgusting ways to degrade a friend's mother was always held in high regard.”
5. Blazing Saddles – Some will argue that “Young Frankenstein” is the finer Mel Brooks film, but Blazing Saddles wins for me based tollbooth in the desert scene and the line: “Someone's gotta go back for a shit-load of dimes!”  Also, the “They said you was hung!” part. Rent it, you’ll laugh. Or be appalled. Or both simultaneously. It takes a special film to do that to a person.
6. Pee Wee’s Big Adventure – Tim Burton’s first film (besides the wonderful “Frankenweenie.”). This was one of my favorites as a kid and I’ve just recently rediscovered  it and realized how bizarre it is.
Large Marge: “On this very night, ten years ago, along this very stretch of road in a dense fog just like this. I saw the worst accident I ever seen. There was this sound, like a garbage truck dropped off the Empire State Building... And when they pulled the driver's body from the twisted, burning wreck. It looked like this..."
7. Raising Arizona/The Big Lebowski - Coen Bros twofer
8. Princess Bride/Labyrinth - Gnumoon’s childhood twofer
9. Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me – The Twin Peaks saga wrapped up in a single film. Bob = freaky, is really the bottom line here. 
Log Lady: “When this kind of fire starts, it is very hard to put out. The tender boughs of innocence burn first, and the wind rises, and then all goodness is in jeopardy.”
10. Ties between: Gift, A Clockwork Orange, Little Shop of Horrors, Donnie Darko, Cry-Baby, Dead Again.

Anyone have any to add?

Currently Listening to: Bullet with Butterfly Wings, by Smashing Pumpkins (Is this considered old skool now?)
Greatest Product Reviews Ever: The Supersoaker Oozinator Amazon keeps cleaning out the review queue, but the posts just keep oozing in.

The "Spinal Tap" review of "Silent Hill."

Here are my two-word reviews for “Silent Hill”:
Mindnumbingly mediocre.
Artisic, tedious.
Yawn, stretch.
Not scary.
Shit Sandwich.

This movie suck-diddly-ucked, Flanders.
The only tension or interest for the audience was found in wondering when the hot girl-on-girl action with the no-nonsense butch cop was going to happen. (I found myself humming that old RHCP song Sir Psycho Sexy every time she was onscreen.)

And it was boring, the final nail in any horror film’s coffin. Although the sets were cool and the camera angles mimicked the video game reasonably well, the film just plods along, not really even bothering to throw in the occasional cheap “jump” scare to keep the audience awake. 

Not even having a few drinks before this movie made it entertaining, except in a “let’s laugh at that unintentionally amusing dialogue” way. And that’s saying a lot, because I love bad horror movies. And I also love having some drinks and then watching bad horror movies. Sadly, this one made me wish I’d drunk so much that I vomited on myself in the theater and had to leave to clean it up and was then too embarrassed to return, thus sparing myself two hours of unabating celluloid shittiness.

***
Well, it’s another full evening on the mountain, so I’d best get to it. First it’s baseball, then the end-of-the-year BBQ and afterparty, then it’s on to the saloon to watch Possum Jenkins rock the night away.
Hope you guys all have a great S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y…NIGHT! S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y…NIGHT! 

Currently listening to: No Way Back, by Foo Fighters. Head FFer Dave Grohl and his wife had a baby the other day, but sadly did not name her Cindy Lou Foo.

Ugh.

Well shit. Nevermind- that was a horrible movie.
Anything that makes Evil Dead 2 look like it has the plot of the decade deserves a special place in cinema history. That place is out back in the dumpster, underneath the surplus blueberry pie projectile vomit from the "Lardass Hogan" scene in Stand By Me.

No, seriously. A character named "Pyramid Head" really can be scary.

It is reviews like this that give me hope that Silent Hill is going to be exactly my kinda movie...

Luckily, “Silent Hill” is the kind of screwy epic that has those particular qualities in abundance and the result is perhaps the most perversely entertaining bad movie I’ve seen since “Constantine.”
...
In fact, I would guess that about 95% of those of you still reading this are likely to regard it as one of the worst movies ever made. However, that other 5%, the 5% who, God bless them, revel at the sight of a film that revels in gleefully pushing the boundaries of sanity and good taste, are going to have a blast watching it.
(Here's the full review from hollywoodbitchslap.com)

I also tend to push the boundaries of good taste in my life, but not the same way Pyramid Head will. I've played the game. And I do worry about myself because when I saw the Pyramid Head version of the poster, my first thought was, "Ooh, nice arms."

And for the record: Pyramid Head and Buckethead are not even vaguely related. Not even the raping, murdering, damned undead will go anywhere near Axl Rose these days. One has to have standards.

Currently Listening to: Outshined, by Soundgarden

We've been expecting you.

As bad as movie versions of video games can be (Super Mario Brothers, anyone?), I’m getting pretty jacked about Silent Hill. It could work because- and this is important, pay attention- the game had a compelling PLOT. Storylines are normally overlooked in video games in favor of getting straight to the action for the ultimate gratification of the end user (same principle as in porno flicks, but with more splattering gore and generally less splattering Ron Jeremy).

Movies made from games that all are action/no story have been complete crap: Doom, Mortal Kombat, House of the Dead, Alone in the Dark, Wing Commander, Street Fighter...etc. etc. etc.* (see footnote)
Basically the only good gaming film ever made was based on a survival horror game with a good story: Resident Evil. (This is the original, not the shit-tastic sequel.) And in that same vein, we have Silent Hill. (At this point, the only games left movieless in the S.H. genre are probably Parasite Eve and Phantasmagoria. I would pay to see a decent version of the former; the latter, notsomuch. Ick.)

The original game featured a high creepiness factor (lots of fog, spookiness) coupled with general human ineptitude on the part of the main character (not good with a gun, indecisiveness, etc.). I think I was initially drawn to the game because the fictional village of Silent Hill seemed not unlike the real freakass town of Centralia, a place I've been long-obsessed with.

So I was already hopeful about the potential for this film, and then I saw two teaser posters (#1 & #2) and am just sold. (Warning: semi-disturbing images ) These stills look like Todd McFarlane/Clive Barker's Tortured Souls action figures dropped some acid and then staggered onto a soundstage where Mark Romanek and Anton Corbijn were shooting a video. awwww, yeah.

Watch the trailer here.

ps- Not SI-related, but NOTHING is more disturbing than this. I'm not even going to talk about it, that's how disturbed I am. (And forget that crowning bs, Mr. Pervosculptor. She went c-sec- not like the whole world didn't read about it.)

*- It is important to note that even really bad video game movies often feature really fantastic, ass-kicking, “workout-until-you-puke-and-fall-down” soundtracks. This is due to the 13-24 year old male target demographic. Also, Rob Zombie manages to appear on almost all video game soundtracks. Honestly, anything that keeps him from making movies of his own is probably a good thing.   

Currently Listening to: Evil Woman, by ELO.

I have seen the top of the mountain, and it is good.

A public service announcement to screenwriters:
Note to those screenwriters who might try to piggyback onto the success Brokeback Mountain and make spin-offs, sequels, or blatant rip-offs of said film: when making a film about gay cowboys, it might not be advisable to name your main character “Ennis.” Even people who are neither Beavis nor Butthead can easily make the mental jump to “anus” or “penis” from that.

(PS- This movie is overrated. If I were a cheerleader, I would chant “O-VER-RAY-TED” clap clap clapclapclap)

(NOTE: This is not an actual cartoon movie poster at all. I just threw it together in Photoshop to complement the post. Fear not.)