Special Guest Reviewer: Shannon Ward: Contagion

Oh, Hello there. Didn't see you come in. Please, have a seat. Yes right there. Next to the Doritos. What brings you by this lovely blog this evening? A movie review you say! Well, I'm flattered that you came to me for your critical movie analysis jollies! However, I have not written one as of late. Because I have very little time for anything other than rehearsal, (sometimes) eating, going to class, sleeping and crying. But I now have new impetus! For it is quite clear that my dear friend and fellow blogglet (This is it. It's happening. Fuck bloggers. We will not be silenced!) Shannon Ward is significantly more bust than I am, yet she has time to watch a movie and inform as to whether you have good taste or not. 

So let us give her a round of applause! She has climbed out of the dusty book cellar into the blinding light of modern mediocre cinema! So please... enjoy.... SHANNON MOTHERFUCKING WARD.

Last Friday night I was working late, but I really wanted to see a movie. Two minutes before Contagion started I was running down Pearl Street in cheap loafers not meant for running, clutching my huge purse, which was not meant for clutching, and wishing I’d taken off my denim jacket before leaving. Fun fact: hauling ass down Pearl Street in Burlington at 9:30 on a Friday night seriously diminishes your chances of ever being thought of as “cool”.

I made it to the Roxy, bought a ticket for Contagion, and also a bottle of water.

The cashier scrutinized my ruined complexion, my sweat-greased ponytail, my denim jacket; “yeah,” she said. “You need it.”

Me and my denim jacket found a seat in the theatre and looked forward to seeing a movie which we had literally heard nothing about.

And then I see Gwenyth Paltrow’s face.

What? She’s in this?

Yeah, she is. And guess who else? Matt Damon. And Kate Winslet. And Laurence Fishburne. And Marion Cotillard. And Jude Law. And Bryan Cranston. And Elliot Gould,And (I swear I’m not shitting you here) Demetri Martin.

Why had I not heard of this?

Now, before you put down this paper and sprint pell-mell to the Roxy to see this, I need to tell you: It wasn’t worth the run. 

That’s right my fellow movie-goers. This movie failed to deliver. What I wanted was a blockbuster, edge of your seat, action-packed science fiction movie and what I got was a thought-provoking commentary on human nature.

I know, right?

The basic gist of the movie is that a new unidentified virus is spreading fast throughout the world, creating an epidemic similar in proportion to the Black Death. The World Health Organization tries to find a vaccine, Jude Law tries to make a few bucks off of the rising hysteria, and I was fucking bored.

Honestly? I wanted more looting.

Grocery stores, banks, hospitals, daycares, high end pet grooming salons, you name it, I wanted it looted. But no, this movie had to take the high road and focus on the politics and social consequences of a world wide epidemic. In other words, there was minimal looting, and that is never a good sign.

I mean, after a long week of figuring out my schedule, applying for jobs, and surviving hurricanes, I just want to let loose a little. And by “letting loose” I mean “watching people die in interesting ways on a big screen”. And yes, a lot of people die in this movie but in lame, thought-provokey ways. Coughing, sweating, fainting, seizures, you know. Pretty standard. Couldn’t someone have their eyes fall out or a building explode or someone walk in front of a bus?

Oh wait, scratch that, someone totally walked in front of a bus.

So maybe this movie did have it’s merits. For the most part it was well acted,although I really can’t take anything Demetri Martin does very seriously. He was just really distracting. Demetri Martin dressed in one of those inflatable quarantine suits doing tests onRheses monkeys with a somber expression on his face is just hilarious to me, which is why I started laughing, and why the girl behind me got mad but come on lady you’ve been coughing through the whole thing, I think that’s a little bit more distracting when you’re stuck in a small crowded room watching a movie about a highly contagious, killer flu.

But though the movie was well acted, I didn’t get attached to any of the characters because there were just too many goddamn storylines! SPOILER ALERT Marion Cotillard gets kidnapped in the first ten minutes and then we don’t see her again until the very end of the movie! At that point I don’t fucking care about her anymore. END SPOILER ALERT. If they could have chosen a main character and followed them I probably would have been more upset if they died. Or at least more interested.

My main qualm is that I had to think too much during this movie. And normally I’m all one for thinking but when I’m at the movies I am just not in the mood.

So I recommend this movie to people who are interested in seeing how the world might react if we were faced with an epidemic of this nature, and to those who have always wondered what Gwenyth Paltrow looks like with her scalp cut open and folded over her face. I hope no one reading this identifies with the latter party.

So I definitely thought this movie could have been more entertaining, but I guess it was thought-provoking. Definitely not worth the run. I’ll give it a six out of ten. My denimjacket gave it a nine (although he’s biased because he loves Jude Law movies).

Oh and the soundtrack totally sucked.

I was going to have my guest write the link joke, but I forgot:

http://gemsofthegenre.blogspot.com/

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/contagion_2011/

Bewildering Madness "From Dusk Till Dawn!"

I’m really fucking glad I can’t remember most of the nineties. Or rather, I’m glad that my memories of the nineties largely subsists of Power Rangers, Gargoyles, Pokemon and a funny feeling in my belly every time I saw the girl bunny in “Space Jam.” (Go ahead. ACT like you don’t know what I’m talking about.) Because the nineties gave us a lot of things I’d rather not know about: The Gulf War, The Cancellation of the Star Wars program, Chumbawumba. One of those things is Quentin Tarantino’s “From Dusk Till Dawn.” My childhood would have been less idyllic if I even knew this movie existed. While I was fucking watching "We're Back: A Dinosaur's Story," somebody was actually thinking that it would be a good idea to have a movie where Quentin Tarantino acted. Directed by Robert Rodriguez, this movie seemed like it had a pretty straightforward concept… until it didn’t.

THERE. Right THERE.

The first hour of the movie is your basic “badass motherfuckers steal money and try to get it across the border and take a family hostage in the process” plot line, with a few notable exceptions (I’ll get to that later. Boy, howdy, will I.)

The movie follows the exploits of two brothers. This Guy: 

And this guy:

Quentin Tarantino and George Clooney. As brothers. And that’s not even the most unlikely aspect of this movie.

Anyway, they have a buttload of money (Where’d they get it? Who the fuck cares? Are you seriously asking me that question? This is a movie about VAMPIRES, who gives a flying fuck about the money? Jesus, stay with me, folks!) and they’re trying to get to Mexico so they can escape the coppers. But they meet Harvey Keitel and his daughter and son (Momma’s dead… of course…. Plot point later? What, are you stupid? Of course it is… Jesus, folks…) and so they kidnap them. They make it over the border, no thanks to Quentin Tarantino (Seriously, the guy’s sociopath. And I’ll get to that later. Boy, howdy, will I) and everybody is happy. So they go to the rendezvous point…. A little bar called “The Titty Twister.”

Okay, there is nothing “little” about it.

So here’s where shit starts to get… terrifying. My first clue was the crazy Mexican guy shouting at everyone going into the bar. (Okay, it was my second…. Technically my third….).

His rallying cry is: “If we don’t got it, you don’t want it!”

And if you’re unstable, that makes sense.

So he promptly gets kicked by Quentin Tarantino (of course) which pushes the movie into a cesspool of bewildering nonsense.

Let me take you step by step, so you won’t get lost. Because holy fucking Christ if I don’t, you will get lost.

At 51 Minutes and 17 seconds, this happens:

His name is Sex Machine. I kid you not.

It was at this point, I had to pause the movie. I had become mildly worried. Because before this moment, the weirdest thing that had happened was that Quentin and Clooney were supposed to be brothers. Hard to swallow, but not as hard as hard to swallow as a penis gun. So I had to make a decision: If this was going to be what the rest of the movie was going to be like, did I really want to finish watching it? Was I going to see ironclad vaginas? Grenade launcher boobies? The truth, as it often is, was far more unsettling:

At 57 minutes and 44 seconds, Salma Hayak pours whiskey down her leg in Quentin Tarantino’s mouth.

Yeah, that picture captures exactly why that should NOT have happened.


That is Santánico Pandemónium. Supposedly the most evil... I don't know, stripper, I guess, to ever live? I'm not entirely sure, all I know is that she's supposed to be evil and sexy.

Look! She's got a snake! Which is vaguely phallic! But snakes are evil? But she's giving me "come hither" eyes! But that snake would probs get in the way.... My penis is confuuuuuused! Also, while she's doing her sexy dance, there's another stripper in the background, apparently way to excited to not dance... even if no one is looking at her.

"She's dancing!? OMIGOD, ME TOO!!!!"


So, yeah, okay, Salma Hayi'msupersexy gets a non-speaking role in which she basically tries to turn Quentin Tarantino in a drooling, horny, fanboy (which is waaaay easier than it should be. But I'll get to that later. Boy, howdy, will I). At this point, the guy Tarantino kicked gathers his friends together and decides their going to beat the shit out of Tarantino. Needless to say, he gets stabbed in the hand. Then we get a fun little sequence where Salma Holycrapwhyisshesosexy stares at Tarantino's bleeding hand like it's the last Krispy Kreme doughnut sitting on the counter but that motherfucker Ted from accounting is standing closer to it and you know that if you take one step, he will snatch that puppy right up and you'll be standing there empty handed so the only course of action is to wave excitedly and look just past him so he turns around and you grab that motherfucker and you stuff it in your mouth (the doughnut, not Ted) and run away gleefully casting only one backwards glance to see the shambles of a broken man staring dumbly back at you. 

God damn, Krispy Kreme... it's like glazed sex.


Anyway, she sees the blood and gets super-duper hungry and at 1 hour, 1 minute and 14 seconds this happens:

"Whaa.... whaaaa... HOLY FUCK!!!!"


That's fucking right. Salma Holyfuckingchristi'mnowagoddamnmotherfuckingvampire has become an unholy demon of hell. And holy tits, does she go to town on Quentin Tarantino. It is now when everybody and their mother turns into vampires. Even the fucking live band turn into vampires.

Yes, that is a guitar made out of Borat.


After three solid minutes of some of the most gruesome bullshit I've ever seen, Salma gets stabbed through the heart and at 1 hour, 3 minutes and 45 seconds, this happens:

If you listen closely, you can hear the sound of every wet dream ever dying.

Now, after the first wave of unholy demons has been demolished, Quentin turns into a vampire. Annnd is promptly murdered. To which Clooney responds by pouring himself some whiskey and looking just as handsome as can be. 

"Damn, those vampires sure were feisty. Too bad I just brutally murdered my brother. How bout a drink?"


Clooney is just as smooth as can be. Nothing phases him. If you throw a horde of vicious vampires, all he does is shout angry insults and shoot them in the face.

Never has the phrase "satanic cocksuckers" been applied so liberally or cavalierly.

Now, of course, it's time for a George Clooney pep-talk. Harvey Keitel is an ex-preacher (he quit after... that's right, after his wife died. Like in "Signs"... except, you know... instead of aliens... vampires...) and he has LOST HIS FAITH, MY BROTHER!! WE MUST RENEW HIS FAITH!!! WE MUST REKINDLE HIS LOVE FOR GAA-UD!! WE MUST....!
Okay, so it's not nearly as inspiring or... church-y as that. In fact, Clooney convinces Keitel by asking him this one question: Are you a faithless preacher, or a mean motherfucker servant of God?

WHY ARE THOSE THE ONLY OPTIONS??


So Harvey responds with "I'm a mean mmmm-mmm servant of God" (not if you can't say motherfucker, dude) and the obligatory second coming of holy fucking shit ton of vampires arrives. 
A moment of seriousness: this movie actually does a really good job of introducing the idea of lost faith. First his wife dies, then his family is taken hostage, then he's attacked by vampires. It's enough to shake anyone's faith, and the preacher is no different. It's put most elegantly by George Clooney's character: "I didn't believe in heaven before. But now that I've seen Hell, I figure there has to be a heaven." It's kind of a beautiful idea, really. In order for this man to understand there is a God, he has to look the Devil right in the face. This is truly a movie about coming to understand the only reason there's evil in the world is because there's so much good.
...
...
NAW I'm just fucking with you. It's about vampires, asshole. Besides, Keitel gets his face melted off.

Faith rewarded, jackass.


Here's a fun transition: remember Sex Machine? Let's talk about him.
He's this guy.

He goes through the awesomest transformation of anyone in the movie. He starts as some dude with a gun penis (dude, c'mon, he's the shit). Then, he moves onto some badass with a whip (pictured above) and then at 1 hour, 15 minutes and 23 seconds, my bro gets bit. And he does a little of this:

Sexy vampire machine HOO- HA!


Then he goes fucking apeshit and sneaks up on Black Guy (he's a secondary character who helps fight the zombies. I don't know his real name, and at this point, I'm far to lazy to look it up on wikipedia. I think it's "Frost" or "Icicle" or "IceBone" or something like that. I don't know, maybe I'm thinking of Ice Cube... or Ice-T.... jesus, what is it with black people and Ice?) and proceeds to bite the shit out of him. Sex Machine goes through all of his crazy transformation shit while Black Guy is telling a very longwinded vietnam story, allowing Sexy Vampire Machine to sneak up on him.

Okay, seriously, Black Guy... this is, like, literally, the worst time for war stories.


Then, Sexy Vampire Machine turns into... this:

I... I just don't know anymore...


Now, a bit of housekeeping: what the fuck is wrong with Quentin Tarantino? Does anybody know? I'm serious, does somebody have a diagnosis? Let's just take a brief look at the character Tarantino plays (a character, I might add, he wrote and one probably wrote for himself). Richie is a sociopathic, psychopathic, perverted, fucking crazy person. During the first leg of the movie, he murders a little old housekeeper cuz she looks at him funny and murders a cop because a store attendant scratches his nose (Don't make me explain, just watch the movie. Or don't. Seriously, I have already spent way too much time on this). He then hallucinates that the young girl they kidnapped asks him to eat her out, creating a very, very awkward conversation later.

"You know, if you want, I can totally do that thing you asked me to do."

"What thing?"

"You know, that thing you asked me earlier to do..."

"....what?"

"..."

"..."

"Eat your..."

"Tarantino, what the fuck is this bullshit?"

"..."

"..."

"We'll talk later..."
Fucking creep...
This whole movie feels like it's punishing you for watching it. You know what the last frame of the movie is? This:

Yeah, your guess is as good as mine.


Fuck you, Tarantino. I'm gonna go watch "Nosferatu."






1.8/5 


[Insert stupid link joke]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_Dusk_till_Dawn
http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/From_Dusk_Till_Dawn/526264?trkid=2361637
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/from_dusk_till_dawn/