Summer of Sam, or, I can't get enough of this man
So Tery seems determined to fan my "thing" for Adrien Brody, quietly simmering on the backburner, into a full-fledged flame. One-third of the way through Dummy, she insisted on going to Blockbuster on the spot (i.e. 15 minutes before closing time) to rent Spike Lee's Summer of Sam, one of his best roles in her opinion.
I dimly remembered trying to watch this movie once before. I suspect I might have fallen asleep, and I certainly have no memory whatsoever of Adrien being in it. Not so this time, thanks to his performance I was riveted through the entire 2 hours and 20 minutes. It didn't hurt that in his first scene he is most scantily clad indeed
, and only got better from that point on. First he appears in adorable shock spikes
, then later in a not-so-cute-but-I-could-live-with-it yellow mohawk
. At some point in between, in a scene Tery rightly assumed I would enjoy, he writhes his lithe body around on stage a la Emcee for some dirty old men
Grrrr, baby, very grrrr (but the dirty old men part I could have done without). Oh, how I love my lean, muscular men.
Interspersed with the Adrien hotness was actually a very excellent and gripping movie, not so much about the Son of Sam himself but more about the effect his killing spree had on a close-knit community in the Bronx. Not unlike The Village, it was an interesting study in the power of fear in manipulating people, but also a very authentic peek into the decade (1977) with outstanding performances by John Leguizamo and Mira Sorvino. Of course, all I remember from my first viewing was the scene when the dog comes into the room and orders Berkowitz to kill. I expected to be disappointed by the effect in light of all the CGI improvements made since its original release, but no, apparently they could make dog mouths move convincingly even way back in 1999. Freaky. All in all the film gets 4.5 out of 5 from me, except for the complete lack of extras, and the fact that it seemed everyone else in the film got to get their freak on except Adrien. What's up wit dat?
The movie inspired a different sort of conversation than probably intended by Spike, though. Tery is perplexed by my extremely faulty, sometimes downright nonexistent, memory. She finds it inconceivable that I can't remember things that happened last month, let alone what I was doing back in 1977. She pointed out that I am a very intelligent person, yet the extent of my hard drive storage seems to end with knowing not to touch a hot oven. She, on the other hand, can recall her entire wardrobe from any given year, every lunchbox she ever carried, what day and time "Cagney and Lacey" was on, her haircut, everything. She figures I have some synapses gaps in my brain or something. My theory is that I only remember important things (and not touching a hot oven certainly ranks high in that category) and don't clutter up my brain with every trivial bit of minutiae I experience. Perhaps this isn't the best way to be - she is easily hurt when I don't remember what to her are important details of our first months together, for instance - but I am at a complete loss how to remedy the situation. Maybe this is why I started keeping a journal.
On a completely different note, a quick word on the state of rental DVDs today, what is becoming my fastest growing pet peeve. My player of late has become very twitchy and very much a prima donna; the smallest fingerprint on the playing surface of the disc is enough to pixelate the screen and even freeze up the movie completely. The occasional fingerprint I can maybe understand. However, when this happened during SOS I pulled out the disc, and it looked like Jesus' lacerated back in Passion of the Christ. What is going on?? Are people using these things for dinner plates? Or maybe frisbees? A DVD is not a dog toy, people. I don't understand how discs can get this scratched when it is quite simple to handle them correctly, by the edges. Fortunately I have a second player that doesn't care what I put into it, it plays without a hitch (but it's not hooked up to our DTS Surround). This baby could probably find a way to play a hubcap if I asked it nicely enough. But today's civic message is: Please be a bit more respectful of rental DVDs. Today's rental disc could be tomorrow's previously-viewed purchase.
Here endeth the entry.
-=Lainey=-
I dimly remembered trying to watch this movie once before. I suspect I might have fallen asleep, and I certainly have no memory whatsoever of Adrien being in it. Not so this time, thanks to his performance I was riveted through the entire 2 hours and 20 minutes. It didn't hurt that in his first scene he is most scantily clad indeed
, and only got better from that point on. First he appears in adorable shock spikes
, then later in a not-so-cute-but-I-could-live-with-it yellow mohawk
. At some point in between, in a scene Tery rightly assumed I would enjoy, he writhes his lithe body around on stage a la Emcee for some dirty old men
Grrrr, baby, very grrrr (but the dirty old men part I could have done without). Oh, how I love my lean, muscular men.
Interspersed with the Adrien hotness was actually a very excellent and gripping movie, not so much about the Son of Sam himself but more about the effect his killing spree had on a close-knit community in the Bronx. Not unlike The Village, it was an interesting study in the power of fear in manipulating people, but also a very authentic peek into the decade (1977) with outstanding performances by John Leguizamo and Mira Sorvino. Of course, all I remember from my first viewing was the scene when the dog comes into the room and orders Berkowitz to kill. I expected to be disappointed by the effect in light of all the CGI improvements made since its original release, but no, apparently they could make dog mouths move convincingly even way back in 1999. Freaky. All in all the film gets 4.5 out of 5 from me, except for the complete lack of extras, and the fact that it seemed everyone else in the film got to get their freak on except Adrien. What's up wit dat?
The movie inspired a different sort of conversation than probably intended by Spike, though. Tery is perplexed by my extremely faulty, sometimes downright nonexistent, memory. She finds it inconceivable that I can't remember things that happened last month, let alone what I was doing back in 1977. She pointed out that I am a very intelligent person, yet the extent of my hard drive storage seems to end with knowing not to touch a hot oven. She, on the other hand, can recall her entire wardrobe from any given year, every lunchbox she ever carried, what day and time "Cagney and Lacey" was on, her haircut, everything. She figures I have some synapses gaps in my brain or something. My theory is that I only remember important things (and not touching a hot oven certainly ranks high in that category) and don't clutter up my brain with every trivial bit of minutiae I experience. Perhaps this isn't the best way to be - she is easily hurt when I don't remember what to her are important details of our first months together, for instance - but I am at a complete loss how to remedy the situation. Maybe this is why I started keeping a journal.
On a completely different note, a quick word on the state of rental DVDs today, what is becoming my fastest growing pet peeve. My player of late has become very twitchy and very much a prima donna; the smallest fingerprint on the playing surface of the disc is enough to pixelate the screen and even freeze up the movie completely. The occasional fingerprint I can maybe understand. However, when this happened during SOS I pulled out the disc, and it looked like Jesus' lacerated back in Passion of the Christ. What is going on?? Are people using these things for dinner plates? Or maybe frisbees? A DVD is not a dog toy, people. I don't understand how discs can get this scratched when it is quite simple to handle them correctly, by the edges. Fortunately I have a second player that doesn't care what I put into it, it plays without a hitch (but it's not hooked up to our DTS Surround). This baby could probably find a way to play a hubcap if I asked it nicely enough. But today's civic message is: Please be a bit more respectful of rental DVDs. Today's rental disc could be tomorrow's previously-viewed purchase.
Here endeth the entry.
-=Lainey=-