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                        Letters to Hell - June 2001

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Contents
========

  o The Doctor Will Eat You Now
  o Not Edited For Clarity
  o You're a Strange One, Mr. Grinch
  o Diminutive Returns
  o Obsession For Women
  o Memento Bori
  o Bombs Away
  o Yearly Dose


The Doctor Will Eat You Now
===========================

[ From: Lisa ]
[ Re: 101 Memorable Moments in Hannibal ]

> Hi!  Just read that page again.  I had it saved on my computer and  
> just ran into it again.  Absolutely love it!  I've seen the movie 25  
> times and then they took it out of theatres.  *sniffle*  

[ Take heart, the DVD is due soon... ]


Not Edited For Clarity
======================

[ From: Amanda ]
[ Re: BABY'S DAY OUT (1994) ]

> Who  Is  in Side OF The Baby Make Him So  Smart  ?  9 Month Old  
> Baby 
 
[ Now, now, you know better than to play with your parent's Universal
  Translator ]


You're a Strange One, Mr. Grinch
================================

[ From: Kim in Cary ]
[ Re: BRIDGE JONES' DIARY ]

> Grade: B
> 
> See, this review *reads* really positively, but ends with a "B."
> You are a strange fish, Mr. Legeros.

[ One fish, two fish, red fish, or blue fish? ]


Diminutive Returns
==================

[ From: Derek ]
[ Re: SHREK ]

> > Walt's empire gets a game roasting in the guise of this good-na-
> > tured, broad-humored, even-multiple-fart-jokes-are-okay road pic- 
> > ture.
> 
> Yep, Revenge of the Little Midget.  So, now we'll get Disney making 
> Katzenberg jokes in *their* next movie, and more Eisner jokes in the  
> next Dreamworks, and the mindless cycle of eraser-throwing continues.

[ Mindless, but *fun*... ]


Obsession For Women
===================

[ From: Sherron in England ]

> I'm a journalist doing an article about people obsessed with differ- 
> ent eras.  I have stumbled across your page and as you mention you 
> know a lot of people who are obsessed with the sixties and talk and 
> dress like that.  I'm looking for a woman that fits the Mary Quant 
> mode.  You know bobbed hair do, long boots, short skirts who dresses 
> like that all the time and has her house done in a sixties style.  
> Know anyone?

[ *I* mentioned this!?  Or did you stumble upon an AUSTIN POWERS re- 
  view?? ]


Memento Bori
============

[ From: G ]
[ Re: Memento ]

> You're one of the very few critics who saw the hollow core of this 
> film.  The ending made me so mad for wasting two hours of my life.
> UNBREAKABLE had the opposite effect on me-- the ending had me saying: 
> "YES!"  If anybody ever studies MEMENTO they won't be able to figure 
> it out because it doesn't make any sense:
>
>   o Did Teddy kill Leo's wife? 
>
>   o If so, why didn't he get as far away as possible from Leo?
>
>   o If the final scene was true, why did Teddy, a cop, follow
>     Leo around and let him kill people?
> 
>   o When Leo meets Natalie, why doesn't she say, "Where's Jimmy 
>     and why are you wearing his clothes and driving his car?" 
>
>   o Why didn't anybody care about $200,000.00 in the trunk of  
>     a car? 
>
>   o What's the deal with the final scene of Leo in bed with his  
>     wife, with his tattoos, one saying, "I did it."  Did what?  
>     The murder, or got his revenge?  (Thought the wife was sup- 
>     posed to be dead). 
> 
> No two people have come up with the same explanation for this movie.
> It's a dishonest, nonsensical put-on, and not deserving of all the  
> rave reviews.  Bottom line on any film is it has to make sense and it  
> has to be honest with the audience.  This film did neither.

[ My answers to the above questions:  I don't know, I don't know, I 
  don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know ]


Bombs Away!
===========

[ From: Dan'l ]
[ Re: PEARL HARBOR ]

> I have *not* seen the movie but have been reading a lot of reviews.  
> Having noticed you deferred, I think you have a chance to step back 
> and let the venom fly a bit more accurately than some of your peers. 
> Please make sure any rant you undertake is accurate. For example: Mr. 
> Cranky gave a typical bitchy review of the audience (fun, most of
> the time) and then ranted at the horrendous and blatant use of a 
> black actor in an all white movie. He missed an important point that  
> makes his rant an embarrassment, rather than the cornerstone of some 
> sort of ethnic championing: there actually *was* a black cook at 
> Pearl Harbor who took control of one of the deck guns and shot down a 
> number of Japanese airplanes. The historic importance of this act is 
> that the U.S. military did not allow black soldiers to use guns and  
> his act of heroism has a bitter irony to it in that he was defending 
> a country that would not trust him.  Bruckheimer and Bay missed an
> opportunity to really showcase African-American patriotism, and Mr. 
> Cranky climbed on the wrong soap box.   
>  
> Another example of egregious errors comes from (of all people) Rog-
> er Ebert, who slammed Yamamoto's "awakened a sleeping giant" dialogue
> as contrived and "rewritten with the hindsight of history."  Yamamoto
> actually said that!
> 
> I'm not saying you have some sort of sacred responsibility that you  
> have been entrusted with, I am saying credibility is a fragile thing  
> -- especially when you put your thoughts in such a black-and-white-
> no-middle-ground manner. (c.f., Jimmy Swaggart, Jim Bakker, for exam- 
> ple.)  Be careful of the facts when you rant.  I read with measured 
> respect until such errors show up, and then I complete the read with 
> an attitude of "what an a**hole." I think others do, too.

[ Good points! ]

--

[ From: Rebecca in Raleigh ]

> Dude, I can't believe I even went and saw it...  It was double terri- 
> ble... awful... really awful...
> 
> I actually laughed out loud during the second part, when [someone]
> dies and then, of course, [someone else] names their kid after [that
> person] and [everyone] walks off into the sunset. 
> 
> Rushed home to put *anything* in the VCR to get the taste of that  
> movie out of my system!  Watched THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK.  It helped.

[ Wise, this one is ]

--

[ From: Kevin and Lisa ]

> You asserted in your review on the Internet that the insertion of  
> Cuba Gooding Jr. into the Pearl Harbor movie was a breach of histor- 
> ical correctness. Actually, the sailor that Gooding portrays was one  
> of the only real people depicted in the movie. There were liberties  
> taken with his character, Mess Attendent Second Class Doris "Dorie"  
> Miller, but Miller did take the gun and shoot down at least one Jap- 
> anese plane. He was the boxing champ of the West Virginia, and he did 
> receive the Navy Cross.

[ Notice, in the review, the word "correctness" is in quotes ]

--

[ From Bob in Mobile, AL ]


> > Plus cutaways to the politicos, Jon Voight's President Truman on  
> > one side--the e veteran actor wheelchair bound, of course, and dis- 
> > guised underneath puffy prosthetic jowls-- and Mako's Admiral Yama- 
> > moto on the other.
>
> Mike, Mike, Mike *shakes head*.  Send my $1 to..
>

[ D'oh! ]


Yearly Dose
===========

[ From: Darth ] 
[ Re: SPY KIDS ]

> Well, I've gotten my annual yearly dose of sarcasm from this post.
>

[ Sarcasm?  Moi?  The offending review... ]

> SPY KIDS is an entirely cute, sometimes self-aware, and, alas, all 
> too draggy kid's pic that blends the higher-tech James Bond movies 
> with, well, WILLY WONKA AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY.  Antonio Bander-
> as and Julia Roberts lookalike Carla Gugino play retired, married-
> with-children secret agents, called back for a bonus mission and 
> subsequently kidnapped by an inventive children's television host 
> turned megalomaniacal weapons designer (Alan Cumming).  (With the 
> help of Tony Shaloub's Dr. Evil-dressed, Coke-bottle bespectacled 
> assistant, he's building an army of robotic surveillance devices 
> that resemble little children.  The product line?  "Spy Kids"...)  
> Off schelp Mom and Dad, in comes Cheech Marin's "uncle," and faster 
> than you can say "wasn't he in FROM DUSK TILL DAWN?" (he was), the 
> the two children-- plucky pre-teen daughter (Alexa Vega) and bum- 
> bling little brother (Daryl Sabara) are heading headlong into ad-
> venture, first to a safe house and then to Cumming's character's 
> island lair.  (To rescue mon mere and pere, but of course.)  And 
> with way-cool gadgetry galore, some supplied by the film's version 
> of "Q" (craggily-and-even-more-so-than-Tommy-Lee-Jones character 
> actor Danny Trejo, who *also* appeared in FROM DUSK TILL DAWN).  
>
> What results-- sorry, what *ensues*-- is an infectious blend of ac-
> tion sequences, child actors who *act* like actual children, some 
> sly self-references (as much about merchandising as spy-movie con-
> ventions), and a fair amount of exceptionally colorful whimsy.  (I 
> daresay the film needs ten to twenty-percent *more* of those fairy 
> tale-like flourishes to offset the darker, more-drab angles.)  And 
> the whole thing's innocuous as Hell, and probably the film's most 
> pleasant surprise.  (Compared to, say, THE GRINCH, it's as unforced 
> an amusement as Ron Howard's film wasn't.  Isn't.  Wasn't.  What-
> ever.)  The director (and writer) is Robert Rodriguez (DESPERADO, 
> FROM DUSK TILL DAWN), which is good news for his dynamic directing 
> style, but not so good for the filmmaker's renowned penny-pinching.  
> This is a lower-budget movie and the seams show.  Often.  Worse, 
> the narrative flow is equally as clunky and thus turns this ninety-
> minute trifle into a *far* longer-feeling affair.  (Notice, for ex-
> ample, the flashback-containing opening sequence.  Shouldn't the 
> tale-teller's identity have been concealed until *after* the story 
> was finished, for maximum effect?)  Don't imagine the wee ones will 
> notice such stuff, tho.  And that's quite a bit of the battle right 
> there...  With Daryl Sabara, Teri Hatcher, and Robert Patrick, who 
> did *not* appear in FROM DUSK TILL DAWN, but *did* star in FROM 
> DUSK TILL DAWN 2: TEXAS BLOOD MONEY.  (Rated "PG"/90 min.)
>  
> Grade: B-

[ And there you have it. 

  Good night, everybody! ]

Copyright 2001 by Michael J. Legeros
Movie Hell is a trademark of Michael J. Legeros