• Hannibal Rising (pictured)
• The Hawk is Dying
Spotlight on: Absolutely Nothing
People occasionally ask me whether I see everything that is released to DVD. The answer is: absolutely not. I have too my respect for my time and too many things I want to accomplish outside of a theater and while not on my couch to spend an endless parade of days and nights watching things like Dr. Dolittle 2, Meet the Fockers and The Messengers. Frankly, I’m still angry at the fact that I saw William Friedkin’s The Hunted and Chris Rock’s Head of State three years ago. That is four hours of time that I will never get back. Making the whole situation that much more pathetic, is that I’ve probably spent (read: wasted) another four hours of time since my screenings of The Hunted and Head of State contemplating what I would have been better off doing than seeing those movies. It’s a tortured world I live in.
There is a very specific, complex and detail-oriented process that I go through when determining what movies going to screen: I stare at the press release, e-mail or DVD box and think to myself, "Do I want to see this?"
When the movie in question in Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, the answer is no. Several weeks back, I was primed to see Peter O’Toole in Venus. I had heard excellent things about his performance and the quality of the movie as a whole. My interest level was high until I read the press release and stumbled onto the following sentence:
Venus is the tale of a May-December romance between veteran actor Maurice (O’Toole) and flighty young woman Jessie (Jodie Whittaker) who, through their unexpected relationship, learn valuable life lessons that transcend all ages.
THEY LEARN VALUABLE LIFE LESSONS!!????!? Several years ago, I, myself, learned a valuable life lesson: watching other people learn valuable life lessons is an activity that I should try to proactively avoid. The reason for this is simple. The life lessons that people learn (whether it be on-screen or off) tend to be things that I first picked up at age three.
Wait, I shouldn’t make fun of that other person and put him down? I should treat other people with respect and dignity? I should take some time out from my busy schedule and spend a portion of it with my kids? I shouldn’t take my wife/girlfriend for granted? Slow down, here, I need to write these down…
So this week, I spotlight nothing because I couldn’t bring myself to watch a once glorious character, Hannibal Lector, played by someone other than Anthony Hopkins (or Brian Cox) in Hannibal Rising, nor could I stand the thought of watching a movie whose plot features an unhappy man matching wits with a defiant bird in The Hawk is Dying. And I’m a happier man because of it.
A Minor Thing About The Revenge of the Nerds
I was throwing out some old press releases that were on my desk and stumbled onto one for the March DVD release of The Revenge of the Nerds. And, unfortunately, it’s come to this. The latest DVD of The Revenge of the Nerds is out and it’s titled The Revenge of the Nerds: The Panty Raid Edition. Apparently reasoning that titling the new DVD the Special Edition of The Revenge of the Nerds wasn’t funny (or stupid) enough, Fox gives you a "newly dorked-out DVD… [of] the Geek Revolution:" The Revenge of the Nerds: The Panty Raid Edition.
Also available is a box set of all four of the Revenge of the Nerds movies, tastefully called The Atomic Wedgie Collection. I know what you’re thinking, "Wait, there’s more than one?" The answer is yes… although the last two were made for TV, marking the first instance I can think of where made-for-television movies are packaged with feature films in the same box set.
And you might not be thinking this, but the point should receive valid consideration nonetheless: How do the nerds end every movie stealing the stunningly hot girlfriends of the preppy asshole athletes and having the jocks begrudgingly recognize them as being cool in their own way and then start the next movie being compared unfavorably to publicists, attorneys and Eric Roberts?"
A Minor Thing About the Promotion ofThe Revenge of the Nerds
Kudos go out to the Fox home entertainment publicists for crafting the following sentence in their press release announcing The Revenge of the Nerds: The Panty Raid Edition:
…Revenge of the Nerds was highlighted by the Adams College yearbook of such Hollywood A-listers and cult favorites as Anthony Edwards, Robert Carradine, Timothy Busfield, John Goodman, James Cromwell, Bernie Casey and Curtis Armstrong.
What Fox’s publicists did was a wonderfully artful trick that can well be illustrated here: prior to this week, only multiple Oscar winning actors, National League MVPs and Chris Neumer have contributed to the Ten Minute Guide.
Budding PR people, take note: by including the phrase "Hollywood A-listers and…" before the phrase "cult favorites", the listing of actors in the movie, the positive notion was planted (namely that Hollywood A-listers were in fact in the movie) and the publicists could truthfully name the cult favorite actors who actually were in the film.
Carradine, Busfield, Casey and Armstrong have never been as happy as this.
Hollywood A-listers? Half those actors are best known–check that–only known for their work in The Revenge of the Nerds; quick, name something that Carradine, Busfield, Casey or Armstrong were in besides this movie.
The only possible answers to this are I’m Gonna Git You Sucka for Casey and Ray for Armstrong. If you know the filmographies of Carradine and/or Busfield off the top of your head, take it as a sign that maybe, just maybe, you should start tweaking your viewing choices.
The Revenge of the Nerds: The Panty Raid Edition is currently available on DVD.
(You can read Stumped?'s interview with Curtis Armstrong here.
Quotes of the Week
