I recently went on a spree of watching all those twisted horror movies banned in country after country, such as "Texas Chain Saw Massacre," "I Spit on Your Grave," "Cannibal Holocaust," and "Cannibal Ferox."

I concluded these films are twisted and gross--but not bad for you.  Provided you can distinguish between campy cinema gore and reality, you're mind is in no danger.  For instance, when the savages cut the explorer's penis off in "Cannibal Holocaust," the depiction was horrifying, but I knew it was just a movie.

What is the real creeping terror of cinema?  Romantic comedies.  That's right, Hugh Grant is the problem, not Alfred Hitchcock. 

A Heriot Watt University study on the subject recently affirmed my own longstanding frustration with the "rom-com" genre. 

The difference is Leatherface is a hideous subhuman freak in a cheap nightmare flick.  Nobody would aspire to seek out any such thing in real life.  Yet TCSM is pushed underground and called bad for society.

On the other hand, Sam Baldwin and Annie Reed ("Sleepless in Seattle") are held up as a desirable ideal giving rise to notions of how the world of romance should be populated with beautiful rich people with problems easily solved in 90 minutes. 

I would not want my hypothetical 13-year-old to see a sadistic splatterfest such as "I Spit on Your Grave" because kids that age are too impressionable to appropriately process scenes of rape and murder.  However, I think a boatload full of "Notting Hill" and "You've Got Mail" might give the same teenager a candyass rose-colored-glasses ideal of love and relationships.  It all should be sweet and sponaneous with no real work involved and even the tears are made of sugar water.  The latter might be more digestable than the former, but in the end more insidiously poisonous. 

In my dating experiences, I found too many women whose ideas of how relationships work were shaped by Hollywood dreams.  They didn't know how to maintain an interpersonal homeostasis after the infatuation faded.  I suspect women are more vulnerable to the cornball ideals the romantic comedies represent (not to mention the cynical sewage of "Sex and the City"), but this is not to suggest men are any less vulnerable to pop culture influences.

I recently went on a spree of watching all those twisted horror movies banned in country after country, such as "Texas Chain Saw Massacre," "I Spit on Your Grave," "Cannibal Holocaust," and "Cannibal Ferox."

I concluded these films are twisted and gross--but not bad for you.  Provided you can distinguish between campy cinema gore and reality, you're mind is in no danger.  For instance, when the savages cut the explorer's penis off in "Cannibal Holocaust," the depiction was horrifying, but I knew it was just a movie.

What is the real creeping terror of cinema?  Romantic comedies.  That's right, Hugh Grant is the problem, not Alfred Hitchcock. 

A Heriot Watt University study on the subject recently affirmed my own longstanding frustration with the "rom-com" genre. 

The difference is Leatherface is a hideous subhuman freak in a cheap nightmare flick.  Nobody would aspire to seek out any such thing in real life.  Yet TCSM is pushed underground and called bad for society.

On the other hand, Sam Baldwin and Annie Reed ("Sleepless in Seattle") are held up as a desirable ideal giving rise to notions of how the world of romance should be populated with beautiful rich people with problems easily solved in 90 minutes. 

I would not want my hypothetical 13-year-old to see a sadistic splatterfest such as "I Spit on Your Grave" because kids that age are too impressionable to appropriately process scenes of rape and murder.  However, I think a boatload full of "Notting Hill" and "You've Got Mail" might give the same teenager a candyass rose-colored-glasses ideal of love and relationships.  It all should be sweet and sponaneous with no real work involved and even the tears are made of sugar water.  The latter might be more digestable than the former, but in the end more insidiously poisonous. 

In my dating experiences, I found too many women whose ideas of how relationships work were shaped by Hollywood dreams.  They didn't know how to maintain an interpersonal homeostasis after the infatuation faded.  I suspect women are more vulnerable to the cornball ideals the romantic comedies represent (not to mention the cynical sewage of "Sex and the City"), but this is not to suggest men are any less vulnerable to pop culture influences.




http://i149.photobucket.com/albums/s78/AL-B_photos/applause.gif

Right on! You said exactly what I hoped you were going to say.  ;)

Not only do you get karma for that, but this post is so awesome that I'm going to recommend it to be a highlighted topic.

Absolutely!!!  I have often thought that love songs, also, are the worst things to play to anyone under the age of 30.  The best advice my father ever gave me was when Touch Me by the Doors was playing.  The line "I'm gonna love you 'til the heavens stop the rain" came on he turned to me and said, "don't believe when a man says anything like that to you".  My Dad wasn't a talker, or prone to advice,  that must have hit a chord.

http://i149.photobucket.com/albums/s78/AL-B_photos/applause.gif

Right on! You said exactly what I hoped you were going to say.  ;)

Not only do you get karma for that, but this post is so awesome that I'm going to recommend it to be a highlighted topic.





I agree.

PROTIP for men:  if she ever wanted you, she'd already be with you.

There's a word for guys who pull up outside a woman's house, take out their boom boxes, and start playing love songs with the volume cranked to 11, and there's a predictable response that any sensible woman ought to have towards a man who makes these, or similar, romantic gestures.  The word is stalker, and the response is a restraining order.

If this is you,

http://blog.newsweek.com/photos/levelup/images/original/John-Cusack-in-the-1989-film-_2200_Say-Anything_2c002200_-courtesy-EW.com.aspx

You're Doing It Wrong.

Romance existed way before Hollywood flicks.
I find it a bit insulting to my gender thinking that women are these dumb creatures who believe in fairytales while men are the victims expected to be knights in shining armor.

We can believe in love without being fools, what i see as silly are the cynicals of this world who are dying to fall in love but don't know how to 'cause they're too busy analysing everything and feeling nothing :P

I see where you're going with this idea Max, and to a certain degree, I can agree with you.  But I have to say, that I am disturbed with the prevalence of violence in our culture today.  Like you said, you wouldn't want a 13 year old to see a movie like some of the ones that you mentioned, but the problem is, so many of them do.  Add that to the fact that in our puritanical society, sex is so taboo, and so frowned upon by parents, churches and government.  We are raising a generation of kids that are seeing violence at every turn and learning that it is far more acceptable than sex.  I can't tell you how many debates I've had with parents who would be horrified if their children saw a woman's naked breast, but have no problem allowing their kids to play violent video games.  What message does this send to kids?  I know, I know, violence has been around forever.  Kids have been playing cops and robbers or cowboys and indians since the beginning of time.  But they didn't have access to the same images that kids today do.  I don't know.  It just scares me to think that there is a whole generation of children growing up thinking sex = bad, ass kicking = good.  I realize this doesn't exactly tie in to the evils of "When Harry Met Sally," which in itself is a valid point.  But to me, it's a scarier notion. 

Absolutely!!!  I have often thought that love songs, also, are the worst things to play to anyone under the age of 30.  The best advice my father ever gave me was when Touch Me by the Doors was playing.  The line "I'm gonna love you 'til the heavens stop the rain" came on he turned to me and said, "don't believe when a man says anything like that to you".  My Dad wasn't a talker, or prone to advice,  that must have hit a chord.


Your Dad sounds like a wise man of few words!

I too confused infatuation for true love and was ill-prepared for the labor of being in a relationship, and I got hurt so terribly because of my own naivete that it sting to this day.  And I was never a fan of Hollywood romances. 

Does pornography cause rape?  Do war movies encourage violence?  Do horror films densensitize kids?  People write PhD theses on this stuff nowadays.  I'm not going to dissect it all here.

Some posters seemed to miss my main point about images versus ideas.  The reason "The Shining" is terrifying to me and "I Spit on Your Grave" is not has to do with the ideas in "The Shining" and the paucity of ideas in "I Spit on Your Grave."  In the latter you've got a bunch goony hicks raping a Cosmo writer in the woods.  It's got nothing to say to me.  In the former, it's frustration and anxiety that drive Jack Torrance to madness and mayhem.  Well, I can relate to frustration and anxiety.  I can feel for the character Jack Torrance and the misery that's eating him up, so it is indeed quite frightening when he wigs out.  However, it is certainly nothing I covet.  Hell, nobody wants that!

Love sweet love, on the other hand, is what we all want, don't we?  We're wired for it.  We covet it.  How many pop songs are about falling in love? Most.  How many pop songs are about cannibalism?  None that I can think of (Hall & Oates' "Maneater" is a metaphor, I looked it up!)

So these light romances coming out of Hollywood are like love commercials.  If we don't have a lover, we want one even more.  If we do, we want a better one!  The intention might not be there on the part of those who make these movies, but the product sells a kind of personal longing and discontent that other film genres do not.


Romance existed way before Hollywood flicks.
I find it a bit insulting to my gender thinking that women are these dumb creatures who believe in fairytales while men are the victims expected to be knights in shining armor.

We can believe in love without being fools, what i see as silly are the cynicals of this world who are dying to fall in love but don't know how to 'cause they're too busy analysing everything and feeling nothing :P




Precisely.  I see this all the time.  Men are even more lost about relationships than women.  You ask me what they want, and I'm tempted to say something crass and stereotypical, like a Comedy Central stand-up routine!


PROTIP for men:  if she ever wanted you, she'd already be with you.

There's a word for guys who pull up outside a woman's house, take out their boom boxes, and start playing love songs with the volume cranked to 11, and there's a predictable response that any sensible woman ought to have towards a man who makes these, or similar, romantic gestures.  The word is stalker, and the response is a restraining order.


Nah, the Cutting Crew boombox serenade has never been my style.  Just the occasional guilt-tripping birthday card, and a little drunk-dialing now and again.
;)

Love sweet love, on the other hand, is what we all want, don't we?  We're wired for it.  We covet it.  How many pop songs are about falling in love? Most.  How many pop songs are about cannibalism?  None that I can think of (Hall & Oates' "Maneater" is a metaphor, I looked it up!)

So these light romances coming out of Hollywood are like love commercials.  If we don't have a lover, we want one even more.  If we do, we want a better one!  The intention might not be there on the part of those who make these movies, but the product sells a kind of personal longing and discontent that other film genres do not.


I guess it all depends on how easy influenced you are. That is true for every movie genre,e.g if a film glamorises drugs then drug addiction will rise. And with this predicament comes movie rating, censorship and protesters blaming movies for all the problems in our society.
My point is how can anyone use romantic comedies as the main reason for an unfulfilled love life? How silly it sounds ::)

i for one thought Cannibal Holocaust was very romantic.

My point is how can anyone use romantic comedies as the main reason for an unfulfilled love life? How silly it sounds ::)




I agree with Dizzy here. 

Besides that, most romantic comedies are about falling in love, not staying in love.  And not to defend romantic comedies, and as trite as it might sound, Hugh Grant was broken hearted throughout most of Notting Hill.  I mean, Julia Roberts pretty much stomped on him.  I know, I know, Max, I'm missing the point again.  But I'm not.  I get what you're saying.  I just don't really agree with it.  My point was that our society has bigger problems than Notting Hill and You've Got Mail.

i was thinking a lot about action movies -- a genre i love -- and how dangerous many of them are. their main aim is usually to stir up bloodlust and thirst for revenge -- the hero is usually tormented by villains throughout, and then usually gets payback in the end in a way so brutal you wouldn't feel comfortable identifying with him unless the bad guys had been so loathesome throughout. and then of course there's the matter of how often the villains are people of color, foreigners, or the like.

i was thinking a lot about action movies -- a genre i love -- and how dangerous many of them are. their main aim is usually to stir up bloodlust and thirst for revenge -- the hero is usually tormented by villains throughout, and then usually gets payback in the end in a way so brutal you wouldn't feel comfortable identifying with him unless the bad guys had been so loathesome throughout. and then of course there's the matter of how often the villains are people of color, foreigners, or the like.


That's pretty much what I was getting at.

i was thinking a lot about action movies -- a genre i love -- and how dangerous many of them are. their main aim is usually to stir up bloodlust and thirst for revenge -- the hero is usually tormented by villains throughout, and then usually gets payback in the end in a way so brutal you wouldn't feel comfortable identifying with him unless the bad guys had been so loathesome throughout. and then of course there's the matter of how often the villains are people of color, foreigners, or the like.


Action flicks present situations you'll never be involved in.  Romance movies present situations you can personally relate to...and makes them all dreamy and magical compared to your life.

Please, I'm not saying people shouldn't watch them.  I was just making an observation.  If we want to worry about whether cinema is bad for society, Sleepless in Seattle shouldn't get a free pass while Rambo and Bordello of Blood get maligned. 

Do we have more important things to worry about?  I should say so, yes.

Action flicks present situations you'll never be involved in. 


you never had a run-in on the subway? had someone walk in front of you without excusing himself? never been mugged? etc. etc.? and wanted to kick that mother fudger from here to the stone age? those are the sorts of real-life situations action movies tap into, i think. that anger and feeling of being affronted, having your dignity questioned. and just like rom-coms, they exaggerate the real-life antecedent almost beyond recognition but they definitely relate to experiences we actually have, otherwise we probably wouldn't bother to watch them.

and i love rom-coms almost as much as i love action movies. (the difference is, i often like action movies even when they're bad. rom-coms have to be good. that's probably a boy-girl thing.) i almost think the flaw is with the user, not the product. if rom-coms didn't present idealized versions of realities we have trouble accepting, what would be our emotional investment? same in a different way in action movies. if they didn't take us to a place we would love to go, and that at the same time we hate because we know we can't actually go there, and if we weren't so dissatisfied with our actual lives as to seek them out in the first place, we wouldn't ever find poetry in them, either. what makes them moving is also what makes them dangerous.

I'd say that the most toxic movie genre (at least for teens or early frat boy age) would be whatever you would call the genre that the movies such as Jackass fall into or the ones that frequently feature pranks that make the victim spend hours on the toilet with explosive intestinal issues.  8-P 8-P 8-P

Personally, I needed romantic comedies in my youth, as an example (but not a be-all ideal) of romantic love.  I certainally had no examples of it in real life with parents that were cold to one another and no particular couple in my family being overly fond of each other in front of anyone else.  I needed to see that romance is a normal and desired part of a relationship and it isn't all about sex or procreation and friends with benefits.  :\'(  At some point in my maturity, I did understand that most of these went over the top in their "I'll move heaven and earth for you, baby", and I really just wanted to find some guy who I didn't make physically ill or would just use me for financial support.  I really just wanted someone to become a "team" with.  For what it's worth, that's what I got and enjoy now.  :)  In the end, I've managed to merge my parents example of a relationship with those silly romantic comedies and end up with something that satisfies all those dangerous examples.  :P

aw, i'm cryin'. that was a great post, bookmiss, thanks for the great story.

the new years hats on the emoticons in your post are just the icing on the cake.

you never had a run-in on the subway? had someone walk in front of you without excusing himself? never been mugged? etc. etc.? and wanted to kick that mother fudger from here to the stone age? those are the sorts of real-life situations action movies tap into, i think. that anger and feeling of being affronted, having your dignity questioned. and just like rom-coms, they exaggerate the real-life antecedent almost beyond recognition but they definitely relate to experiences we actually have, otherwise we probably wouldn't bother to watch them.



The movie "Falling Down" with Michael Douglas is a perfect example of this.  Here we have a seemingly normal guy who goes through a bad divorce.  He has a bad day, and one by one, things keep piling up on him until he just loses it completely and takes everyone out that gets in his way.  This movie is disturbing because it isn't that hard to imagine.  I know a LOT of people that could go off the deep end just that easily.  And the entire movie, we're rooting for him.  The psycho-killer. 



and i love rom-coms almost as much as i love action movies. (the difference is, i often like action movies even when they're bad. rom-coms have to be good. that's probably a boy-girl thing.) i almost think the flaw is with the user, not the product. if rom-coms didn't present idealized versions of realities we have trouble accepting, what would be our emotional investment? same in a different way in action movies. if they didn't take us to a place we would love to go, and that at the same time we hate because we know we can't actually go there, and if we weren't so dissatisfied with our actual lives as to seek them out in the first place, we wouldn't ever find poetry in them, either. what makes them moving is also what makes them dangerous.


Beautifully put. 


I'd say that the most toxic movie genre (at least for teens or early frat boy age) would be whatever you would call the genre that the movies such as Jackass fall into or the ones that frequently feature pranks that make the victim spend hours on the toilet with explosive intestinal issues.  8-P 8-P 8-P

Personally, I needed romantic comedies in my youth, as an example (but not a be-all ideal) of romantic love.  I certainally had no examples of it in real life with parents that were cold to one another and no particular couple in my family being overly fond of each other in front of anyone else.  I needed to see that romance is a normal and desired part of a relationship and it isn't all about sex or procreation and friends with benefits.  :\'(   At some point in my maturity, I did understand that most of these went over the top in their "I'll move heaven and earth for you, baby", and I really just wanted to find some guy who I didn't make physically ill or would just use me for financial support.  I really just wanted someone to become a "team" with.  For what it's worth, that's what I got and enjoy now.  :)  In the end, I've managed to merge my parents example of a relationship with those silly romantic comedies and end up with something that satisfies all those dangerous examples.   :P


I have to second Tia there, Patty.  Very nice.

How many pop songs are about cannibalism?

Motorhead, Eat the Rich, but only when taken in the context of the theme to the movie of the same name.  Otherwise, it's also (albeit by a technicality) a "love" song :)

You're sort of onto something, though.  I never really enjoyed love songs.  Too slow, too danged hard to dance to.  Impossible to code to.  During those all-nighters in college, an instant "fast-forward" on tape, or changing of the radio station.  I had 242 "Front by Front" on continuous loop, and all the songs were about robots, stealth fighters, forensic pathology, Star Trek, the Jonestown massacre, and harvesting DNA from people for use in genetic research. 

The only song on that album that could remotely be considered a love song was "Until Death (Us Do Part)"...

"Now you have me, now I'm there,
Now I have you, now you care,
Now I got you, now you care,
Now you have me and now I'm there.

(CHORUS:  "Now we're tied - until death do us part")

Now I'm making my way inside,
Now I'm feeding myself with you,
And the more I grow, the more you decline,
Now we're tied - until death us do part.

( each character/spacebar pressing read aloud, in staccato )
L-O-C-K-space-T-H-E-space-D-O-O-R-space-F-O-R-E-V-E-R... (F-o-r-e-v-e-r!)

Now it's time for you to be sure,
That the life we share will be long,
That what can't be cured is to be endured,
So we're tied - until death us do part.
  - Front 242, Until Death, from "Front by Front", 1988

Not exactly a ringing endorsement of marriage, but I'm gonna claim the cannibalism reference, at least metaphorically.


Besides that, most romantic comedies are about falling in love, not staying in love. 


Reminds me of something... About the same time as I was going through my heavy F242 kick, I dated a larval-stage Bridezilla.  Fortunately (with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight), she dumped me and some other poor sucker got saddled with the ensuing trainwreck of a divorce (surprise surprise, she found some other sucker!) less than a year after her special day. 

It's not about the wedding, it's about the fracking marriage.

The movie "Falling Down" with Michael Douglas is a perfect example of this.  Here we have a seemingly normal guy who goes through a bad divorce.  He has a bad day, and one by one, things keep piling up on him until he just loses it completely and takes everyone out that gets in his way.  This movie is disturbing because it isn't that hard to imagine.  I know a LOT of people that could go off the deep end just that easily.  And the entire movie, we're rooting for him.  The psycho-killer. 


I'm gonna stick my head up in defense of D-FENS (pun intended), because I think it's particularly aproppriate given the Psycho Santa thread we've just had.

D-Fens didn't put on a santa suit.  And he didn't shoot 8-year olds in the face.  And if it matters, his divorce settlement didn't let  him keep a house with $100K equity in it at a cost of a mere $10K in back alimony, about 3-6 months of after-tax salary. 

D-Fens did a boatload of property damage while trying to get his breakfast, but the only people he actually murdered were random thugs and a neo-Nazi, and (if you include death by neglect, but not by intention) a guy on a golf course whom he failed to help after watching the guy have a heart attack.  D-Fens is still nuts, still guilty of homicide, and still deserved what he got in the end, but compared to most people who go postal (and I'm looking at you, burnt corpse of Psycho Santa), D-Fens was the very model of judgment and restraint.

Obligatory pop culture reference:  Front Line Assembly's Vigilante, first track on 1994's "Millennium".  First off, it features the best use of samples from "Falling Down" ever, and secondly - and in a rarity for FLA - lyrics that actually convey some sort of social message. 

But most importantly, because this track is absolutely mandatory listening for anyone who has ever played first-person shooter.  To this day, whenever I hear this track, I can still see myself running through the corridors of a Martian base, carving my way through imps and demons until I was knee-deep in the dead.  Go on.  Grab a copy from the usual sources.  Don't listen to it yet.  Fire up your favorite FPS.  Go player-versus-computer.  You know where all the bad guys are hiding.  Now listen to it as background music.  Thank me later ;)

Nooooooo.....

It's the crappy parody films.  Not Airplane, Top Secret, Hot Shots, Hot Fuzz, Naked Gun, Scary Movie, Blazing Saddles, or I'm Gonna Git You Sucka.

I reffering to Epic Movie, Date Movie, or Disaster Movie.

Now those are toxic films.

I just took the survey offered in the link in the original post of this thread.

One movie genre not covered yet here, nor covered in the survey, is my favorite--the musical.  Most musicals are romantic by definition, though many don't have happy endings (like opera) and quite a few cover heavy topics.  My favorite movie, and favorite stage musical, is West Side Story, a romantic musical drama with a tragic ending.  I also like Porgy and Bess, Sweeney Todd, Fiddler on the Roof, Oliver!, and the Rodgers & Hammerstein musicals (The King and I, South Pacific, The Sound of Music, etc.).  I prefer the serious musicals with some thematic meat to them.

What say you about musicals and musical movies?

Most movies of any genre have some sort of romance or sex going on.  It's part of life.  For example, even though the first "Star Wars" had no overt romantic pairings, there was the fairy-tale undertone of the princess rescued by the dashing heroes.

I'd say over ninety percent of our Top 40 tunes are love songs, and here is my big beef.  It seems to me that the songs of the past had the guy telling the gal "I love you".  Even in seduction songs like Marvin Gaye's "Let's Get It On", the guy tells the girl he loves her and takes time to make her feel special.  I feel too many of today's songs speak the equivalent of "Get into my bed, bitch!"  There is not even the pretense of love, just an animalistic demand for sex and servitude.

What do you guys think?

After my first marriage ended and before I started to date Carlos, I watched many romantic comedies and read many romance novels. It wasn't that I had any kind of illusion (or delusion) that things like that happened in real life. I just wanted to escape from the realities of life and dream that maybe things like that do happen. Even as I was trying to convince myself that it would NEVER happen to me-it did. For many years, my life could have been a romantic comedy-complete with a happy ending.




Cat

I'm gonna stick my head up in defense of D-FENS (pun intended), because I think it's particularly aproppriate given the Psycho Santa thread we've just had.

D-Fens didn't put on a santa suit.  And he didn't shoot 8-year olds in the face.  And if it matters, his divorce settlement didn't let  him keep a house with $100K equity in it at a cost of a mere $10K in back alimony, about 3-6 months of after-tax salary. 

D-Fens did a boatload of property damage while trying to get his breakfast, but the only people he actually murdered were random thugs and a neo-Nazi, and (if you include death by neglect, but not by intention) a guy on a golf course whom he failed to help after watching the guy have a heart attack.  D-Fens is still nuts, still guilty of homicide, and still deserved what he got in the end, but compared to most people who go postal (and I'm looking at you, burnt corpse of Psycho Santa), D-Fens was the very model of judgment and restraint.




Sorry for the delay in response here - I meant to reply before but I guess I just got distracted.  I really didn't mean to rip on "Falling Down" at all.  To be honest, I think it's a pretty great movie, though it's been a while since I've seen it.  But I have to say, I was one of the ones rooting for Michael Douglas the entire time.  I was just trying to make the point that it isn't very far-fetched.  Tia was saying that action movies aren't as far-fetched as one might think, and I was trying to use "Falling Down" as an example of that.  I can see that my use of the term "psycho killer" may have implied that I don't like the movie, but I was more trying to illustrate a point with that term.  If that makes sense.



After my first marriage ended and before I started to date Carlos, I watched many romantic comedies and read many romance novels. It wasn't that I had any kind of illusion (or delusion) that things like that happened in real life. I just wanted to escape from the realities of life and dream that maybe things like that do happen. Even as I was trying to convince myself that it would NEVER happen to me-it did. For many years, my life could have been a romantic comedy-complete with a happy ending.




Cat



Awww...  http://www.inthe00s.com/smile/01/1luvu.gif

  I meant to reply before but I guess I just got distracted.  I really didn't mean to rip on "Falling Down" at all.  To be honest, I think it's a pretty great movie, though it's been a while since I've seen it.  But I have to say, I was one of the ones rooting for Michael Douglas the entire time. 


You and me both :) 

(And for the record, I wasn't going after you specifically... at the time I posted it, I'd just come from a different place, where a lot of folks had completely missed the point of Falling Down.  Wanted to put a stop to that here just in case it began.)

It's not about the wedding, it's about the fracking marriage.


That's exactly what I'm on about.  We're a country that loves weddings and hates marriage. 

Love songs are great.  The problem is, in contemporary pop music 95% of all songs are about love/lust/sex.  That's what attracted me to artists that chimed in on other subjects, from Kraftwerk to Dead Kennedys, from The Clash to Front 242.

I'm not even against romantic comedies.  I watched a classic one tonight, "Goodbye, Columbus" with Richard Benjamin and Ali McGraw.  I was responding to an increasingly generic storyline, usually having "wedding" in the title and shown on TNT/TBS

"Jackass" is toxic in a different way.  Those bad ideas have immediate and tangible bad results.  If you jump off a fifth floor balcony trying to plunge into a swimming pool the damage is right there...not like pining for Mr/Ms Right like in the movies.

Oh, I was channel surfing yesterday morning and I saw they were playing early Tom Hanks' "Bachelor Party."  I always thought the teenage sex romp movie, from Porky's to American Pie, aided youth in vacuous and vulgar views of sexuality.

However....if some blue nose from Focus on the Family calls for censorship, I'll fight it to the teeth.  You don't like it, don't buy a ticket.  One of the risks of living in a free society is the allure of sh*tty ideas.  The age old question is how to make the good ideas more attractive.  I ain't gonna be happy with no Amy Grant CD neither!
:P

You and me both :) 

(And for the record, I wasn't going after you specifically... at the time I posted it, I'd just come from a different place, where a lot of folks had completely missed the point of Falling Down.  Wanted to put a stop to that here just in case it began.)


Sweet.  Now let's go have a beer.

   I hate to do this again, but this very subject "fake love" is covered eloquently in Chuck Klosterman's "Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs" (2003).  He calls it "media transferrence"...

   "It appears that countless women born between the years of 1965 and 1978 are in love with John Cusack.  I cannot fathom how he isn't the #1 box-office star in America because every straight girl I know would sell her soul to share a milkshake with this motherf***er.  They don't love John Cusack.  They love Lloyd Dobbler.  When they see Cusack, they are still seeing the optimistic, charmingly loquacious teenager he played in Say Anything, a movie that came out more than a decade ago.  That's the guy they think he is..."  "All his female fans knew he was only acting...but they assumed, when the camera stopped rolling, that he went back to his genuine self...which was Lloyd Dobbler and someone who continues to have a storybook romance with Diane Court...And these upwardly mobile women are not alone.  We all convince ourselves of things like this - not necessarily about Say Anything , but about any fictionalized portrayals of romance that happen to hit us in the right place, at the right time.  This is why I will never be completely satisfied by a woman, and this is why the kind of woman I tend to find attractive will never be satisfied by me.  We will both measure our relationship against the prospect of fake love..."

   "Pundits are always blaming TV for making people stupid, movies for desesitizing the world to violence, and rock music for making kids take drugs and kill themselves.  These things should be the least of our worries.  The main problem with mass media is that it makes it impossible to fall in love with any acumen of normalcy.  There is no "normal" because everybody is being twisted by the same sources simultaneously.  You can't compare your relationship with the playful couple who lives next door, because they're probably modeling themselves after Chandler Bing and Monica Geller.  Real people are actively trying to live like fake people, so real people are no less fake.  Every comparison becomes impractical..."

                                                                                                                                             From "Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs", Chapter 1: This is EMO...

   Storybook romances are for storybooks.  I've always had a vague notion of this transferrence, but Chuck K. nailed it.  I've experienced relationships that fell flat because I cannot compete with "Lloyd Dobbler"...

   I hate to do this again, but this very subject "fake love" is covered eloquently in Chuck Klosterman's "Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs" (2003).  He calls it "media transferrence"...

   "It appears that countless women born between the years of 1965 and 1978 are in love with John Cusack.  I cannot fathom how he isn't the #1 box-office star in America because every straight girl I know would sell her soul to share a milkshake with this motherf***er.  They don't love John Cusack.  They love Lloyd Dobbler.  When they see Cusack, they are still seeing the optimistic, charmingly loquacious teenager he played in Say Anything, a movie that came out more than a decade ago.  That's the guy they think he is..."  "All his female fans knew he was only acting...but they assumed, when the camera stopped rolling, that he went back to his genuine self...which was Lloyd Dobbler and someone who continues to have a storybook romance with Diane Court...And these upwardly mobile women are not alone.  We all convince ourselves of things like this - not necessarily about Say Anything , but about any fictionalized portrayals of romance that happen to hit us in the right place, at the right time.  This is why I will never be completely satisfied by a woman, and this is why the kind of woman I tend to find attractive will never be satisfied by me.  We will both measure our relationship against the prospect of fake love..."

   "Pundits are always blaming TV for making people stupid, movies for desesitizing the world to violence, and rock music for making kids take drugs and kill themselves.  These things should be the least of our worries.  The main problem with mass media is that it makes it impossible to fall in love with any acumen of normalcy.  There is no "normal" because everybody is being twisted by the same sources simultaneously.  You can't compare your relationship with the playful couple who lives next door, because they're probably modeling themselves after Chandler Bing and Monica Geller.  Real people are actively trying to live like fake people, so real people are no less fake.  Every comparison becomes impractical..."

                                                                                                                                             From "Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs", Chapter 1: This is EMO...

   Storybook romances are for storybooks.  I've always had a vague notion of this transferrence, but Chuck K. nailed it.  I've experienced relationships that fell flat because I cannot compete with "Lloyd Dobbler"...


Howard Beale said something similar in the 1970s movie Network: "You dress like the tube, you eat like the tube, you raise your children like the tube, you even think like the tube..."

As an aspiring playwright and screenwriter, I can't agree with Beale's answer to this problem--"Turn them off!"  (Well, we can turn it off more than we do.)  The answer is to keep a grip on reality, and on possibility and probability.  For example, women, do you expect to weigh Size Zero?  Men, do you expect your girlfriends to weigh Size Zero, and do you "lose interest" when your wives don't keep their girlish figures after shooting out a couple of kids?  Why do you want your woman to be girlish at all?  And people, do you think the "real America" is blonde and blue-eyed, or urbane and sophisticated?  Yes it is, but the real America is much, much more than that.

Why feel you have to compete with Lloyd Dobbler.  He's the guy with the radio outside the window, right?; I never saw that movie.  To the best of your ability, be kind, be wise, be willing to learn, and be true to yourself.  You probably won't meet your true love in high school, but probably by the time you're 25 most of you will find someone who can, at least to a degree, appreciate you for who you are.  (I didn't--no, maybe I did, briefly--but I'm a really tough person to match and I'm afraid of intimacy anyway--but that's another issue--or is it?)
 

Klosterman is right.

It's not literally competing with Lloyd Dobbler, but the idea of fake love he represents. 

The most toxic media, of course, is advertising.  It promotes a psychology of constant want, envy, and dissatisfaction and it gets to everybody.  I sure wish I thought of eHarmony or Match.com first!  I'd be a billionaire!

Are men as spoiled by the media Frankenstein of the perfect female body as you women think?  Yes.  Not all of us, but far too many.  It makes me totally sick.  It creates loneliness and sorrow.  The worst are pudgy guys with the "no fat chicks" mentality. 
::)

Klosterman is right.

It's not literally competing with Lloyd Dobbler, but the idea of fake love he represents. 

The most toxic media, of course, is advertising.  It promotes a psychology of constant want, envy, and dissatisfaction and it gets to everybody.  I sure wish I thought of eHarmony or Match.com first!  I'd be a billionaire!

Are men as spoiled by the media Frankenstein of the perfect female body as you women think?  Yes.  Not all of us, but far too many.  It makes me totally sick.  It creates loneliness and sorrow.  The worst are pudgy guys with the "no fat chicks" mentality. 
::)


I agree with you about advertising being the most toxic of media.  Yes, plenty of advertising is enjoyable; for example, the TV ads keep up the Christmas spirit long after the radio has dropped it.  I like the ads that wish people "Happy Holidays" with winter and Christmas scenes and enchanting music.  I like the ad with "Silent Night" and the babies sleeping.  A good ad will inform you of the product and why you might need or want it.  A good ad can also provide an entertaining mini-movie for the viewer. 

However, much advertising creates false desire, envy, discontent, and even shame.  For example, one recent ad showed a husband disappointed over gift after gift from his wife, but when he received the advertised product--an electric razor--he beamed.

I also agree over the hypocrisy of the pudgy guys who can't stand fat chicks.

BTW, here's an article about the movie Network and toxic TV:

Why Network Is The Greatest Anti-Television Movie Ever Made
by Ron Kaufman
http://www.turnoffyourtv.com/reviews/networkreview.html

BTW, the article disses the movie Broadcast News, which I've never seen, and which is coming on WNET-TV Channel 13 (PBS) tonight at 9pm on the station's Reel 13.
http://www.thirteen.org/reel13/

"Network" blows my mind! It's more relevant today than it was 30 years ago!  The styles are dated but the message keeps getting stronger. 

I would have to say that over all romantic comedies (when done right), are actually pretty ok. It's ok, to watch evey once in awhile, a film that is light and fluffy, to take your mind off of the harsh day to day realities.

Just as long as you don't find yourself, comparing your life, or life in general, to films.

I think that why people watch them, is because they want to feel better about themselves.

I know, that when I'm in a crummy mood, I like to watch a film, that light, and not too heavy; case in point The Princess Bride, or Sixteen Candles.

Oddly enough I like action and horror films, especially the really chessy ones.

By the way...

Most toxic film ever is The Last House On The Left.

I love horror films, but after watching The Last House On The Left, I felt like I was violated, uneasy, uncomfabtly, nauseous, and vmiting in the nearest bathroom.

It was that horrible of a film.

I never want to watch it, ever again.

By the way...

Most toxic film ever is The Last House On The Left.

I love horror films, but after watching The Last House On The Left, I felt like I was violated, uneasy, uncomfabtly, nauseous, and vmiting in the nearest bathroom.

It was that horrible of a film.

I never want to watch it, ever again.

Oh yeah, "Last House" is a disturbing one for sure!  I seem to remember there's no redemption at the end, it's just shocking and miserable!
:o

last house has those goofy keystone cops in it. it sorta lost credibility with me because of that. but yes, the violent scenes are pretty nasty. mostly, it's because of good acting, though.

Oh yeah, "Last House" is a disturbing one for sure!  I seem to remember there's no redemption at the end, it's just shocking and miserable!
:o


Say what you will about Say Anything, but I would ratch watch that than Last House On The Left.

i was pretty disappointed in last house. i'd heard a bunch of rumors that it had actually made people die in the theater from fear (i hadn't wised up yet that this is a common marketing gimmick) and that it was the most heart-stoppingly terrifying movie ever made. so imagine my disappointment when it was just a nudie roughie that, if anything, was jsut agonizing and sad. little known fact: last house on the left was actually based on an ingmar bergman film, "the virgin spring," that is actually quite excellent. said movie is in turn based on an old medieval myth, scandinavian, i think, where travelers ravage and murder a beautiful virgin and then by sheer coincidence seek shelter in her parents' home. there's something about the coincidence in the story that smacks of divine justice, which is probably why the outlines of the story are so perenially popular.

and "say anything" isn't nearly as good as "the sure thing."

and "say anything" isn't nearly as good as "the sure thing."


I always loved this bit of dialogue:

Lady in Car: What are you gonna name it?
Alison: What?
Lady in Car: The baby.
Alison: Well, if it's a girl, Cynthia, and if it's a boy, Elliot.
Lady in Car: Those are lovely names.
Gib: Elliot? You're gonna name the kid Elliot? No, you can't name the kid Elliot. Elliot is a fat kid with glasses who eats paste. You're not gonna name the kid Elliot. You gotta give him a real name. Give him a name. Like Nick.
Alison: Nick?
Gib: Yeah, Nick. Nick's a real name. Nick's your buddy. Nick's the kind of guy you can trust, the kind of guy you can drink a beer with, the kind of guy who doesn't mind if you puke in his car, Nick!

(thanks imdb)

I always loved this bit of dialogue:

Lady in Car: What are you gonna name it?
Alison: What?
Lady in Car: The baby.
Alison: Well, if it's a girl, Cynthia, and if it's a boy, Elliot.
Lady in Car: Those are lovely names.
Gib: Elliot? You're gonna name the kid Elliot? No, you can't name the kid Elliot. Elliot is a fat kid with glasses who eats paste. You're not gonna name the kid Elliot. You gotta give him a real name. Give him a name. Like Nick.
Alison: Nick?
Gib: Yeah, Nick. Nick's a real name. Nick's your buddy. Nick's the kind of guy you can trust, the kind of guy you can drink a beer with, the kind of guy who doesn't mind if you puke in his car, Nick!

(thanks imdb)
I remember "how do i look, nine months?" "more like fifteen." and when he suggests that the cop also write them up for having a load not properly tied down. and the pinball machine alien monologue. just so much good stuff in that movie.

Just got The Sure Thing on DVD.

Just for the record, my favorite romantic comedies are:

1)  The Wedding Singer

2)  There's Something About Mary

3)  When Harry Met Sally

4)  Big

5)  13 Going On 30

6)  Working Girl

7)  Jerry Maguire

8)  Say Anything

9)  High Fieldility

10) Sixteen Candles

"High Fidelity" is a great move, but it's too personally painful for me to watch...way too close to home! 
:\'(

id go with sure thing, bringing up baby, when harry, princess bride, annie hall, a little romance, goodbye girl, garden state, notting hill, the apartment, adam's rib, the sabria with audrey hepburn, last house on the left, and i spit on your grave are all outstanding examples of the genre, in my opinion. (well, okay, maybe not so much the last two.)

i guess listing favorite romcoms is sorta to miss the original point of the thread but hey...

I would have to say that over all romantic comedies (when done right), are actually pretty ok. It's ok, to watch evey once in awhile, a film that is light and fluffy, to take your mind off of the harsh day to day realities.

Just as long as you don't find yourself, comparing your life, or life in general, to films.


  But that's the thing.  When you're raised in the media age the line can become blurry.  Doesn't mean a person is bat-whacko.  I wonder how many people here look at their lives, or any aspect thereof, in terms of a garden variety movie...

  Eh...maybe none...



I think that why people watch them, is because they want to feel better about themselves.



  No, people watch Jerry Springer to feel better about themselves...

I don't get that, how?  ::)

I don't get that, how?  ::)


    In a college sociology class I was first introduced to a book called The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (Erving Goffman, 1959).  The book was pretty awesome and practical....

  Can you think of any situation in which you responded to a cue from another person almost automatically?  Maybe you felt an impulse that you had to react in a certain way right then.  Have you ever asked yourself why in the world you act a certain way in some places and then pick up another "act" somewhere else that is completely different?  Maybe our life consists of several dramas that we have chosen to be characters in, sometimes for a lifetime (marriage) and sometimes for a very small period of time (a day at work/school)...

  If not, please disregard and have a good day... :)

    In a college sociology class I was first introduced to a book called The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (Erving Goffman, 1959).  The book was pretty awesome and practical....

  Can you think of any situation in which you responded to a cue from another person almost automatically?  Maybe you felt an impulse that you had to react in a certain way right then.  Have you ever asked yourself why in the world you act a certain way in some places and then pick up another "act" somewhere else that is completely different?  Maybe our life consists of several dramas that we have chosen to be characters in, sometimes for a lifetime (marriage) and sometimes for a very small period of time (a day at work/school)...

  If not, please disregard and have a good day... :)
here's another book that was totally on the same subject...

http://www.amazon.com/Life-Movie-Entertainment-Conquered-Reality/dp/0375706534/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1231244694&sr=8-1

"In Life the Movie: How Entertainment Conquered Reality, Neal Gabler traces the evolution of high and low culture in American society through the 19th and 20th centuries, and describes how low-brow entertainment became so influential in the United States. This is his central argument: "It is not any ism but entertainment that is arguably the most pervasive, powerful, and ineluctable force of our time--a force so overwhelming that it has finally metastasized into life." Although Gabler uses the word "metastasized," he doesn't seem to regard infotainment as a cancer that is destroying our society, but rather as something that grows rapidly and certainly worthy of close study.

The scope of Gabler's investigation extends far beyond the movies to publishing, television news, paint brands, fashion--anything that seems to have been transformed by the national passion for low-brow entertainment. Along the way, Gabler raises a series of intriguing questions: Why do some people feel more passionately about celebrities than about their own loved ones? Why is Donald Trump a celebrity? Why was the broadcast of the 1996 Olympics packed with so many biopics that the sporting events seemed afterthoughts? Why does Ralph Lauren call the blue paint he sells "Lap Pool Blue"?

Movies promote the fantasy that there are simple narrative solutions for all of life's problems. Movies are full of sex, scandal, gossip, and action. If our lives were movies, they would be more full of what Zsa Zsa Gabor once called "enchanting make-believe." In this book, Gabler demonstrates how this fantasy has shaped our society. --Jill Marquis --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title. "

The Donald is a celebrity because he said he is a celebrity and bought his way in.  If Trump's pop was a plumber, not a real estate mogul, Trump might be able to work his way up to Joey Buttafuco-level celebrity at best.
::)

    In a college sociology class I was first introduced to a book called The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (Erving Goffman, 1959).  The book was pretty awesome and practical....

   Can you think of any situation in which you responded to a cue from another person almost automatically?  Maybe you felt an impulse that you had to react in a certain way right then.  Have you ever asked yourself why in the world you act a certain way in some places and then pick up another "act" somewhere else that is completely different?  Maybe our life consists of several dramas that we have chosen to be characters in, sometimes for a lifetime (marriage) and sometimes for a very small period of time (a day at work/school)...

   If not, please disregard and have a good day... :)


Ani said it best:
"Life is a B Movie: it's stupid and it's strange,it's a directionless story,the dialogue is lame but in the he said she said sometimes there's some poetry if you turn your back long enough and let it happen naturally."

Ani said it best:
"Life is a B Movie: it's stupid and it's strange,it's a directionless story,the dialogue is lame but in the he said she said sometimes there's some poetry if you turn your back long enough and let it happen naturally."


Or as I'm fond of saying in cynical moments:

Life is just like the movies, only everybody's ugly and the bad guys win!

Ani said it best:
"Life is a B Movie: it's stupid and it's strange,it's a directionless story,the dialogue is lame but in the he said she said sometimes there's some poetry if you turn your back long enough and let it happen naturally."



Life is just like the movies, only everybody's ugly and the bad guys win!


Upstarts and rogues, all of them.  I'm kickin' it old-school tonight.

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death.  Out, out brief candle.
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more.  It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
  - Shakespeare, Macbeth, (V.v.18-27, for the pedantic)

Obligatory pop culture reference:  The best rendition I've ever heard of the Macbeth soliloquy was in ST:TOS during some verbal jousting between Q and Picard.  Patrick Stewart, a Shakespearian actor in his pre-Trek life, gave a rebuttal every bit as fierce and eloquent as Q's condemntation.  One of the high points of the series.

macbeth's always been pretty much my favorite. very odd, very dark, and not actually tragic in that macbeth and his wife pretty much have it coming, the crazy fudgeers.

Upstarts and rogues, all of them.  I'm kickin' it old-school tonight.

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death.  Out, out brief candle.
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more.  It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
  - Shakespeare, Macbeth, (V.v.18-27, for the pedantic)

Obligatory pop culture reference:  The best rendition I've ever heard of the Macbeth soliloquy was in ST:TOS during some verbal jousting between Q and Picard.  Patrick Stewart, a Shakespearian actor in his pre-Trek life, gave a rebuttal every bit as fierce and eloquent as Q's condemntation.  One of the high points of the series.



You should hear Carlos doing the soliloquy with a Puerto Rican accent.  ;) :D ;D ;D ;D



Cat

Upstarts and rogues, all of them.  I'm kickin' it old-school tonight.

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death.  Out, out brief candle.
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more.  It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
  - Shakespeare, Macbeth, (V.v.18-27, for the pedantic)


Good show old boy, and Karma to you!  That's the stuff that cheers me up; it's Pastor Rick Warren who makes me wanna snuff myself!
8)



You should hear Carlos doing the soliloquy with a Puerto Rican accent.  ;) :D ;D ;D ;D



Cat


Sounds kind of sultry, I'll bet!
;)

macbeth's always been pretty much my favorite. very odd, very dark, and not actually tragic in that macbeth and his wife pretty much have it coming, the crazy fudgers.


Yeah, but once he knew his goose was cooked, Macbeth went out in the 16th-century equivalent of LEROY JENKINS.  Ya gotta give 'im credit for that. 

Go to DEFCON one, blow wind, come wrack!
At least they'll all forget about Iraq.
  - Macbush, farewell address, 1/19/09.

I recommend that all the Shakespeare readers get a hold of a little book called, "Twisted Tales From Shakespeare" by Richard Armour.  If you've read all the major plays, this book will have you rolling on the floor.

  How many pop songs are about cannibalism?  None that I can think of 

"Timothy", The Buoys. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGNdvKvbxYQ. Hit #17 on the pop charts in 1971.

"Timothy", The Buoys. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGNdvKvbxYQ. Hit #17 on the pop charts in 1971.



I remember that song.



Cat

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4O1A-mmBWw Total Coelo (or Toto Coelo), "I Eat Cannibals".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4O1A-mmBWw Total Coelo (or Toto Coelo), "I Eat Cannibals".


Karma for Coelo.  How did I miss that one?  I've got on the New Wave Hits of the '80s CDs. 

Shriekback's "Nemesis" is not about cannibals, but it mentions them:
"Priests and cannibals, prehistoric animals, everybody happy as the dead come home!"

Then there is one of my favorites, from the L.A. art-rock band The Fibonaccis, "Old Mean Ed Gein," which is about Wisconsin murderer/graverobber Eddie Gein who also practiced cannibalism.  Both "Psycho" and "Silence of the Lambs" drew inspiration from Ed Gein.

"Timothy", The Buoys. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGNdvKvbxYQ. Hit #17 on the pop charts in 1971.


:o  I'm surprised I forgot about that one!  :o

I'm sure there are others that mention cannibalism--oh, yeah, "Dinner at Drac's", right?

"...but I choked on my wine/When I heard that the main course was me!"

The boys in the jungle had me on the run
When something heavy hit me like an atomic bomb
When I woke up and my head started to clear
I had a strange feeling I was with cooking gear
I smelled something cookin' and I looked to see;
That's when I found out they was a-cookin' me...
Great Cuckoo let me outta here!

--The Cadets
(1956)