Going the Distance

It's no secret that I love romantic comedies. I'm pretty sure I've started other blog posts with that exact sentence, so it's also no secret that I know it's not a secret. Ever since I saw the trailer for Going the Distance, I knew I had to see it as soon as possible. Rarely do movies come out that are so made for me.

Firstly and most importantly, I LOVE Drew Barrymore. I love everything about her. Mostly I love that, no matter what movie she's in, it seems like she picked out her own wardrobe. Her clothes are so wacky! She dresses like a five year old whose mother is like, "I'm tired, wear what you want" and so she just piles on the sparkle and camo with stripes or whatever.
All of the other things I love about this movie are summed up really well in Owen Gleiberman's EW review, which you can read here if you so wish. I agreed wholeheartedly with the Gleibs (as I do about half the time) when he wrote this:

Going the Distance is a light and tasty morsel of a romantic comedy in which two smart, funny, and basically sweet people try to conduct a cross-country relationship. The movie, which sounds like it was spun out of an advice column, is very high-concept, except that it has a gently authentic tone, a flavor rooted in its affection for the shrewd innocence of the 1980s. For the first 15 minutes or so, I actually wondered if it was set in the '80s....After two love montages set to the Cure's ''Just Like Heaven'' and the Pretenders' ''Don't Get Me Wrong,'' I began to think: Between this feel-good '80s jukebox and the fact that no one in the film has yet sent a text message, which year is this?...As it turns out, Going the Distance is quite contemporary, but the wistful retro vibe is no accident. The director, Nanette Burstein, is...out to take us back to an earlier vibe — to a time when pop music was optimistic, and so were movie romances. Erin and Garrett don't just fall into glorified lust. They fall in love because they like each other's company.

He's right; this is VERY much like an 80's romantic comedy. The montages are so montage-y it's almost laughable (I mean, they are dancing on a beach!), which I really like. If you're going to do a montage, you might as well go whole-hog and just do it up right. There's no such thing as a subtle montage, anyway.
Going the Distance was also a lot more realistic than most romantic comedies, which is both a pro and a con. H did not like that the movie's humor skewed blue (this movie is like 95% made up of dick jokes) because he thought it seemed out of place in what he called a "chick flick." I didn't agree though, and not just because I don't use the term chick flick (barf, sorry). The characters talked to each other basically like real people talk to each other. My friends and I spend about 50% of our time talking about sex and the other 50% talking about our jobs, and I think that's pretty typical, so I found those relationships to be accurately depicted. The relationship between Justin Long and Drew Barrymore's characters was believable, too, and not just because Justin Long's character reminded me so much of H (without all the womanizing).
I loved this movie. It has some of my favorite romantic comedy conventions (including the whole "How can this person have their brilliant career AND the love of their life??" conundrum) while also being genuinely funny and believable. And I can't leave out the importance of Jason Sudekis, Charlie Day, Jim Gaffigan, and Mike Birbiglia, who all took the movie to the next level (the next level being the funnier one).
And MOST importantly, one of Drew Barrymore's New York friends is played by Natalie Morales, the girl who plays Aziz's girlfriend on Parks and Rec. H tried to tell me I was wrong but I knew I was right. Suck on that.

This blog post had to happen.

Netflix's recommendations are a mixed bag. Sometimes they recommend categories that are so right ("Romantic Comedies Starring Goldie Hawn" is specific, but very sculpted to my personal interests!), and sometimes they just do not get me. I mean, no, the fact that I like The Devil and Daniel Johnston does not mean that I will watch a documentary on Anorexia. And I definitely don't want to see Did You Hear About the Morgans. But recently, for the first time, Netflix recommended a movie I'd never even heard of but knew I would love. This trailer pretty much describes the plot, whether or not you should see it, and how necessary the movie is.

After I watched this, I had no choice but to make it number one on my queue. I mean, if Ice-T says I must see it, who am I to disagree? I don't know if this movie had to happen...it certainly wasn't well made, and doesn't seem to be particularly passionate. I'm so glad I saw it, though. For one thing, the rapping was terrible. It's all very "Rippity rap rap rap raptastic!" Also, the lead actor is Mario Van Peebles, who is in charge of having the least raptastic name ever as well as not doing any actual rapping, because he was overdubbed by Ice-T (according to IMDB). Ice-T is uncredited in the film and only shows up for one transplendent scene, wherein he prances about stage like a young Mick Jagger. The song "Snack Attack," which I can't find anywhere, makes the movie worth it. I don't want to ruin anything for you, but I'll just say this: someone stuffs their face with cake while everyone raps in some sort of food distribution warehouse.
This doesn't exactly fall under our Dance Movie project (because, after all, it isn't called Dancin'), but it kind of does because there was a significant amount of dancing in this movie. Worth watching!

Here you go.

Even though this blog has fallen into a state of disrepair this summer (example: we used to have two followers and now we only have one. Our readership has decreased by 50% just because of a lack of Alex/any posts at all!), sometimes I see things I just need to post immediately. This Tumblr about Rosanne fashion is one of those things. Yer welcome. Everytime I get upset about what the internet is doing to our lives, something like this comes along and reminds me why it's so important.

Something That Used to Scare Me

If you know me even a little, then you know I have a long, long list of fears, neuroses and anxieties. It's a little comforting to know that even as a child I was irrationally fearful. Take, for example, the one thing that scared me most as a kid (besides tornadoes, fires, rollercoasters and bicycles, that is): the intro to You Can't Do That on Television.

As an adult, I can look at that rationally and see it for what it is: an unashamed Monty Python rip off. But even now just seeing that gives me the nervous jitters. It's a combination of the sickly, washed-out color scheme, the unsettling noises, and the speed of everything. Sometimes at night I would lie awake, just thinking of that guy's terrible face cracking up (I wish I was kidding). When this came on TV, I would run out of the room and go hide in my parents' room behind their bed. Whatever, this is terrifying. Shut your mouth.

I Can't Even Tell You How Funny This Is

We're back, nerds! Just kidding. We won't resume frequent posting until whenever Alex goes back to school, but I hope to at least keep this thing plodding along until then. Also, that was a joke because no one is reading this and no one is waiting for updates. I refuse to even believe that Lauren is reading at this point and she is like our one true constant. It's like the old saying goes: If you post on your brother-sister blog and La-duh-loo doesn't read it, does it...zzzzzz. Sorry, I fell asleep in the middle of my super lame new-fashioned proverb.
I just found something that I HAD to share with you guys, however few of you there may be! You've probably already seen this, but I hadn't. Comedian Elaine Carroll stars in this web series about the life of Mary-Kate Olsen. See you losers later, I have to go watch all of these in one sitting now.

Philip Zimbardo/Something Only I Care About

Ever since I was a small child, I've been interested in abnormal psychology. I used to read my dad's old college copy of a psychology textbook that probably wasn't terribly accurate, seeing as it was from the late 70's/early 80's. For a brief while, I even thought I wanted to be a psychologist. Then I figured out that psychologists actually had to learn things about science; they didn't just get to look at pictures of cats that schizophrenic people drew, which was what I was getting out of that textbook.
But oh man, did I love that textbook. It was written by Phillip Zimbardo (or else it just featured pictures of him, not sure!), who is famous not only for conducting the Stanford prison experiment, but also for looking kind of weird.

As a kid, I didn't know that Zimbardo was famous; I just thought he was a weird dude in an old book. Imagine my surprise when he showed up in my high school psychology studies as well as my college classes. Also once I saw him on The Daily Show, which was a super-weird surprise. My best friend and I always thought he kind of looked like Satan, or at least an actor who would be playing Satan in a made-for-TV movie.
Anyway, I found this video...the best of Philip Zimbardo.

This is worth watching. The part where he's holding the baby made me laugh AND cringe. ALSO, I found the pictures of cats that a schizophrenic man drew! You can see why I was drawn to them.

Book & Film Clubs

It's June 1st, which means we let the entirety of May go by without mentioning our Book & Film Club picks. You were probably so worried! Well, you didn't have to be, because Book Club solidered on (this is a joke, later it will makes sense, I promise)and Film Club kind of limped along sadly.
Our May pick for Book Club was The Barracks Thief by Tobias "Toby" Wolff.

It made me cringe a lot, and it made me sad, and I read it in the course of one night. I had a difficult time picking something for Film Club, so we are going to double up when Alex comes home and watch two month's worth of films in one month. I ended up choosing Douglas Sirk's Magnificent Obsession, which begins the way I like all my movies to begin...with a magnificent speed boat crash. Yeah, I'm making Alex watch this.

This is basically how Film Club will go from now on. Alex will pick something intelligent, and I will pick a film that features lines like, "I didn't ask for your resuscitator!"
And Book Club for this month is a doozie. Something I've wanted to read for a long time...

East of Eden! This breaks the only rule of TTWF Book Club, which is NO OPRAH. We got close enough with our first pick. But oh well. Sometimes rules are meant to be broken. John Steinbeck agrees.

"Like my jacket?"- John Steinbeck