Ticket Stubs #27: A Village of Phones, Photogs & Forgetful Fockers

As you might have gathered from the title of today's post, there are numerous movies up for review in this issue of Ticket Stubs; the horror-ish selections being M. Night Shyamalan's The Village and The Forgotten, starring Julianne Moore. I have nothing particularly clever to say, so let's just allow the past to speak for itself.

FROM February 1, 2005 (SW@ Ticket #31: Catch Up & Throw Down): Meet The Fockers was hilarious. I don't care what that tightass critic at the San Diego Reader says--Robert DeNiro, Dustin Hoffman, and Barbara Streisand make a great cast. The extreme opposite polarity of the two families is obvious but comically necessary, from the cat that has been trained to flush a toilet and the dog who humps everything in sight to the true moral point of the movie: the openness of the Fockers regarding their son (Gaylord "Greg" Focker) vs. Greg's need to lie to his wife's ultraconservative CIA spyhunter father about pretty much everything. Taking the Focker joke to its limits, the writers introduce such aptly-named relatives as Dom Focker, Randy Focker, Ornie Focker, and (the wife's decision to do this to herself and the Little Focker on the way in part three) Pamela Martha-Focker. Typical 21st century comedy, ergo not a kids' movie, but you're a focking cucksocker if you miss out.
B+

The Forgotten is something best forgotten as soon as possible.
Julianne Moore is a woman who loses her children in a plane crash, mourns, and then is told by everyone she knows that her children never existed.
The fading-memory effect on the credits was a nice touch, but otherwise, the movie was early-Dean-Koontz-predictable. Following a series of Prometheotic plot twists (that means you can see them coming from an epic Greek tragedy of a distance that makes you wish a giant eagle would come eat your liver with farva beans and a nice chianti), Moore's character is revealed to be the anomaly in an experiment conducted by godlike aliens who can heal themselves T-1000-style and use cheesy special effects to suck unforeseen interlopers into the sky. The ending was cool enough, though.
D-

Cellular was a good action movie starring Kim Basinger as the heroine, William H. Macy in his usual timid but surprisingly kickass police guy role, and Transporter Jason Statham in a slightly-elevated getaway driver/main villain role. Basinger's character puts together a smashed telephone and gets a reluctant hero with a cell phone (Chris Evans, Fantastic Four) on the other end of the line. The villains' motives are well concealed and the action (although seemingly written hazard-by-numbers) is well layered with comedy and suspense so that we are compelled to watch. Even the cell phone has a greater role than a mere modus communicatum (if my fake Latin is right). My only complaint is that despite the obvious expensivity of the hero's phone, he refuses to use caller ID to locate the villains' hideout and thus shorten the film by at least an hour. Subscribe to Cellular, but decline the Extra Bullshit plan.
B

Paparazzi is producer Mel Gibson's pathetic attempt to argue subtly against the presence of the Paparazzi. The assigned villain (Tom Seizmore) is little more than a stubborn asshole extortionist going through the bitingly sardonic motions as only Seizmore can do, and the so-called hero (Cole Hauser) is a deranged action star who engages in more villainous activity than the afore-mentioned asshole. Who is this overacting schmuck, anyway?
The Punisher-type you-killed-my-family-and-thought-you-killed-me-but-now-I'm-going-to-kill-you crap is watered down and reused here to no effect in Gibson's post-Passion-self-seclusion argument. Good cameos by Daniel Baldwin, Dennis Farina, Kelly Carlson, and others, but the bulk of the movie is ass-fodder.
F-

The Village was not up to par with M. Night Shyamalan's other works.
An all-star cast portrays a community erected in a former history professor's wildlife preserve and secluded from the modern world outside by fake but scary-looking monsters played by the town elders and given scary growls by subwoofers and looping animal noises. I came close to guessing the twist before I even saw the damn movie, so I just wasted it for you. However, the special features were pretty good and the movie was put together well so that I was jerked around and made uncertain in some places. I won't fail The Village, but I pretty much rendered it unworthy of viewing anyway. Sorry (almost).
C-

Quotes of the Week:
"Do you suffer from long-term memory loss? I don't remember"
-Chumbawamba, "Amnesia," Tubthumber

"Do me a favor; don't ever call me again!"
-Chris Evans, Cellular

"I think you and your mom are the hottest chicks I've ever seen. By the way, I banged the maid and fathered a child. Focker, out."
-Ben Stiller as Greg Focker, Meet the Fockers

On that loosely interpreted note, included free of charge is a Piece Offering from someone else who "banged the maid and fathered a child": Arnold Schwarzenegger. Hailing from the distant temporal land that was August 7, 2008 (when my current mood on MySpace was silly), this post was titled Piece Offerings #1: Vurds.

I thought I'd share a piece of what random insanity runs through my mind when I'm not doing much of anything at work. Tonight, I offer my reader (is that all? One?) a few phoenetically spelled words as they would sound coming from the lips of Governor Schwarzenegger. Enjoy.

1: Kullyfwornyia - the state where he is Governor.
2: Da Chyerminayduh - the movie he is best known for; also the cyborg he plays in the first three installments of the series.
3: Chyerminaydit - past-tense of the verb "to chyerminate." (as in "You have been chyerminaydit.")
4: Groan - past-tense of the verb "to grow." (as in his slogan for locally cultivated products: "Buy Kullyfwornyia groan.")
5: Nah-ting - the exact amount of useless crap I have left to offer tonight. (as in "I can offer you nah-ting else.")

And so, live from San Teeayko, Kullyfwornyia:
SWAD,
oud.

Next issue will be a look at the film that launched a bloody franchise with the horrible acting of Cary Elwes, but first, we'll take a trip through that great American horror story that is small-town high school football. Sday Doont, Dicketkholduhs!