Best thing ever

I haven't seen The Social Network yet. I know I need to, but on the weekends I always go back and forth between absurdly busy and embarrassingly lazy.

But that's not the point. The point is that apparently, the guy who plays the Winklevoss twins is named "Armie Hammer." Armie Hammer. When I read that, I thought "No way," because that has to be a typo, right? Or a stage name like "Ethan Tremblay"?

So I wikipediaed him (is there a good way to past tense "Wikipedia" as a verb?), and his real name isn't Armie.

It's Armand.

Armand.

Armand Hammer.

HIS NAME IS ARM AND HAMMER. That is AMAZING. It's like that time that Bart prank called Moe's and there was an actual guy there named "Hugh Jass."

It's like the example line on a form. It would say, Mr. Armand Hammer of 12301 Deodorizer Way, Anytown USA.

It is one of the most awesome names I've ever heard. I sit in awe of it.


Though I bet, when he was a kid, his parents would say thing like "with a name like Armand Hammer, you think your room would be a little cleaner." And then they'd laugh, and laugh, and laugh.

That probably got old fast.

Also, they have pencil-thin mustaches

Two men are sitting at a table in an outdoor café. Both are wearing turtlenecks and smoking. The Eiffel Tower is visible somewhere in the background of the shot. They say things like, “Jean-Pierre, it is vital that we stick to the plan!” But it sounds like “Zhon-Pierre, eet eez vital that we steeck to zee plahn!” A mime mimes by on the sidewalk

Later as the argument becomes more heated, Jacques (the speaker from earlier) will gesture with a glass of red wine, a cigarette, and a large piece of cheese, simultaneously.

Jean-Pierre will jab at Jacques angrily with a baguette, or emphasize a point by donning a beret.

All of this is so that you, the viewer, will understand – it may sound like they’re speaking English, but they’re actually speaking Movie French.

Movie French is a unique language with its own unique culture (though it sounds very similar to Movie Italian, Movie Russian, and Movie Arabic). You can recognize Movie French by its similarity to English, its random nods to a cartoonish French accent, and the fact that why the hell would these people be speaking English right now?

Movie French helps when your audience is too young to read subtitles, or when you’re worried they could distract from your cool explosions. But I think the main reason for movie French is that you can’t just take an English script, pop it into Babel Fish (do the kids today still use Babel Fish?) and get a French script. You have to hire people to make sure that it actually makes sense, and that you’re not using phrases that don’t even exist in the other language. Then you need actors who speak the language. With Movie French all you need is a vague understanding of French pronunciation and a can-do spirit. As someone who just barely has either of those things, I can accept that sometimes, Movie French is the way to go.

The thing about Movie French that drives me crazy is that at some point in all off this, Jean-Pierre will remember that before they can carry out their big plan, he needs to take little Colette and Nannette to ballet. Then as he and his friend part, Jacques will say “Au revoir, my friend.”

What the hell?

If we were supposed to pretend that that entire conversation already took place in French, then what are we supposed to think they’re speaking when they speak actual real-ass French? Are we meant to assume they're now speaking some arcane, long-forgotten Mega-French? Or maybe if the English was French, then the French is English?

Or maybe, like that one a-hole in your college dorm, they figured it would class up the joint to pepper in the five to ten French words that everyone knows?

Also, do they do this in other countries? If they do, what are the English words that pop up in the middle of a ten minute conversation in like, Russian or Cantonese? I have a sneaking suspicion that either "Buddy" or "Dude" is on the list when the characters are American.

Poor, Scary Mark.

I've been thinking about Mark Strong, lately.
For those of you who don't think you know who he is (but you probably actually do), here he is:

Remember him now? Basically if you've been to a movie with a bad guy in the past few year, it may well have been him. If you went to a movie in the past few years and found yourself thinking of the bad guy "damn, when did Andy Garcia get so scary?" then it was almost definitely him. Mark Strong is, as near as I can tell, always a bad guy. You know why? Because he has mean-face.

And he's not the only one. You know those actors that you know are the killer the second they appear on screen? They've got it, too. And suddenly (despite the fact that he probably makes more per movie then I make per decade) I feel weirdly bad about it.  I mean, the guy is great, and he certainly gets work, but there will never, ever, ever be a pitch meeting in which someone says "It's a story of a loving father who loses his wife, but slowly learns to love again with the help of his daughter's second grade teacher. We're thinking Elle Fanning for the daughter, Kate Hudson for the art teacher if you want it light - Winslet for dramatic - and Mark Strong will be the kindly, gentle, open-hearted, completely non-sociopathic father." Unless, half way through the movie it turns out that the hole thing was just a set-up arranged Kate's corrupt government official/crime boss ex-husband - from whom she's been running for years - to get in close enough to her to discreetly poison her in small doses over several weeks. And then she would realize what was going on and then everything gets all harrowing and the music cues get way more intense, and she'd have to rescue Elle Fanning who is actually someone else's daughter, or is Mark Strong's daughter but is scared of him, or was just a hallucination the entire time, or is actually Kate Winsson's (Hudslet's?) own daughter with a dye job or colored contacts or something.

Actually, I would totally watch that movie.

Never mind, Mark Strong - you keep on doing what you do.

You're pushing it, Affleck (with bonus sadness)

Over the weekend I caught up with the rest of the world and saw Inception and, along with it, the trailer for Ben Affleck's new movie, The Town. It looks good, it's just...

Look, I've nearly trained myself to suspend my disbelief enough to accept the idea that all good cops and federal agents are well-coiffed, attractive and stylish ("I may have a murderer to catch, but not before I get my roots done"), and I rest just this side of finding the whole "I traumatized her/I love her" thing kind of ridiculous. The casting is mainly what saves it for me - Jon Hamm as the federal agent and Jeremy Renner as the friend who won't let Affleck leave his life crime is enough to make me forgive the more melodramatic stuff. Plus, Renner's character name is Jem, which makes me wish I could get drunk at a party and ask him if the script was "truly outgeous...truly, truly, truly outrageous." Which is why I shouldn't meet famous people.

Anyway, I've done some major digressing. The point is, I can more or less accept all of these components of The Town, and I was ready to give it a shot but...Blake Lively? Seriously?

I have nothing against her as an actress. I don't. But no quantity of cheap tank tops, heavy eye makeup, bad lighting, and really long fake nails can change the fact that that is Serena Van Der Woodsen. Maybe in the movie itself she'll totally surprise me and really embody the role, but so far...no. I can't look at her and say "yes, this is clearly Ben Affleck's hard living, wrong-side-of-the-tracks ex-girlfriend or possibly hard-living, wrong-side-of-the-tracks younger sister. Well, hopefully younger sister because she's like half his age which is kind of gross." 

Oh -as I was trying to figure out how to close this out, I came across this unrelated A.V. Club article.

Fox, please just stop it. The Jersey Shore is very popular and funny, in a tragic sort of way, but that doesn't mean you need to get yourself a piece of the action. Or even if you must, does The Situation actually have to be there? Why not just do a show about the whole "Guido culture" without the awkward cameo? Just...stop with all the crossovers. Bones is a really fun show, when no one's consulting The Dog Whisperer, or camping out for Avatar tickets, or solving Constantine's murder. In their new Sienna minivan. While Motley Crue performs in the background.

You don't make Hugh Laurie do this crap.

And here we are, again

Sorry for my absence the past few days. We moved over the weekend, so I spent last week packing, and I've spent this week studiously avoiding unpacking. I fully expect to have my butt in gear by this weekend and to be shamelessly promoting my soon-to-launch Etsy shop by Monday.

But from now until Friday, I'm mostly going to loll about, read the new Scott Pilgrim (!), make French flashcards, and re-watch Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, and seasons 1&2 of Veronica Mars.

Saturday I'll be productive. Right up until the Doctor Who season finale, which has potential to be awesome.

But Sunday, I'll definitely be a useful part of society.

I'd say it "get's my goat," except I would NEVER say "get's my goat"

I've developed a new pet peeve. Developing pet peeves is really something of a hobby of mine, and this one strikes the perfect balance of being fairly reasonable and kind of nit-picky at the same time.

I'm currently really annoyed with TV/Movie fashion. I've long since accepted the fact that the leads on any given TV show aimed at young people will dress in an improbably cool/hip/of-the-moment way, even if they're supposed to be drunken slobs. Further, I've had to embrace the fact that (in order to be fully make-over ready) nerds will often be beautiful people with their super-flattering haircuts artfully mussed to imitate a severe need for conditioner. Fine. I get that. That's just the reality of the situation.

But I've inexplicably decided to draw the line at all of these people dressing in $70 button-downs under $120 sweaters. I mean, if the person in question has a great job? Fine, I'll take it. But when it's a random high school student in the middle of Kansas (I'm looking at you, Lana Lang) it gets a little absurd.

Now it's possible that my parents were just wildly under-investing in my wardrobe, but back in my day if I wanted a $22 t-shirt from PacSun (shut up, we all have our phases), I was paying for that shit myself. If I had wanted the 60-some-odd-dollar t-shirt that the blonde girl of Secret Life of the American Teenager (the one who's always in the clips on The Soup) apparently wore last week, my mom would have laughed in my face. That's not even hyperbole. She would have looked at me, laughed, and walked away. And that would have been her WHOLE ANSWER.

Plus, though I'm loathe to even suggest this, isn't it kind of a missed opportunity on the part of the networks? As prevalent as product placement has become, why not outfit the cast of Glee in Gap, Banana Republic and Old Navy, then air ads every episode offering the chance to dress just like Quinn Fabray for $20 per piece? Sure, it smacks of old 1950s television, where shows would have a full-on commercial as part of the plot, but that's basically come back anyway. Spending the first 30-seconds of a commercial break hearing about how Rachel put some pep in her step with Piper Lime ballet flats is no worse that Angela and Hodgins taking a fresh-off-the-lot Sienna Mini-Van to a crime scene, or Chuck Bartowski eating a $5-footlong while under fire from rogue spies. And it would have some pretty solid logic behind it.

I'm not suggesting that Blair Waldorf start wearing clothes from Kohl's (please, CW, don't make Blair Waldorf wear clothes from Kohl's), just that maybe characters' clothes should actually reflect things about the characters. Like age. Or employment level. Or income. Or whether they even care about their clothes.

Oh, and also? I wear the same jeans twice in a week so maybe shirts could pop up more that once per season.

Reasonably Related Title

There's a TV... thing that bothers me. I can't really call it a trope, because my extensive research (2 hours on tvtropes.org, most or which was spent clicking links from the Supernatural page) only turned up two actual examples, though I know I've seen it more than that. I cannot stand it when people in shows/movies/books/what have you demonstrate what a social pariah they are by eating their lunch in the bathroom. My issue with it is threefold:
1) I've been the new kid. Unless you smell, making at least one friend by lunchtime isn't really that hard.
2) You know what's not a good way to make new friends? Becoming the girl who eats on the toilet. "Does she have some sort of intestinal issues?" your new peers will wonder.
3) People. Poop. In. There. I don't bring open containers of food into the bathroom. Seriously. If I buy a soda, take one sip and have to pee then that soda is over. Because there are some things you just don't come back from, and drinking toilet soda is right up there getting vomited on by an adult.

Additionally (and I recognize that I should have counted this as one of my issues, but I couldn't pass up a chance to say "threefold"), how small does a school have to be for there to be no viable empty table, or floorspace, or anywhere where someone isn't peeing within two feet of your snack pack?

I could go farther with this, but not without veering directly into "crazed germaphobe" territory. Instead I'll just close out by saying, if you've never been to tvtropes.org, go now. search for any show of movie, start clicking links and watch the day slip away.

Oh- and the thing with the hairspray? Fantastic!

My deep and abiding love for Buffy the Vampire Slayer is well documented, by which I mean "is on my Facebook page." I love the show, I love the comics, and at some point I'll probably start a semi-tragic collection of Buffy-related memorabilia and novelty items. Last night, that love was tested like never before.

Last night, I watched the Buffy movie for the first time in seven years.

Oh y'all. Have you watched this movie lately? It's ridiculous. Like super-ridiculous. Paul Rubens spends like, 30 minutes dying. Someone apparently decided that really slow front walkovers were totally practical moves when fighting for your life. Oh, and the vampires fly. Well, more accurately, the float. Not in fights. Mostly just to freak people out. Or help with awesome jump-shots.

I just want to make sure you caught that last part: a vampire uses his super-powers to play varsity basketball. Against Ben Affleck. Which is neither here nor there, but it seemed worth mentioning.

You need to go watch this movie. Right now.

If you won't do it for me, do it for Kristy Swanson.

Sometimes it's just best not to think about it

Something just occurred to me.

You know, in "Be Our Guest" (from Beauty and the Beast) when Lumiere says the food is delicious, and if you don't believe him you should "ask the dishes?"

That's actually super gross.

And then, of course, there's the whole "servant who's not serving" bridge, which is disconcerting for entirely different, more social justice-y, reasons.

Yay!!!

I know what I'm doing next Christmas. That is all.

Career Placement

My current job has an expiration date. In about a year and a half I will become unnecessary and I'll be out on my ass. Since I'm a former English major and, let's be real here, a bit on the flaky side I have zero clue where to go from here. The mere thought of trying to figure out a new career path (since my current administration/secretarial situation isn't a path so much as a cul-de-sac) has been known to send me into fits of anxiety.
But no more. Because over the weekend, I saw Iron Man 2, and now I know just what I want to be: a Movie Scientist.
Seriously, think about it - it's the best job EVER. As long as you make sure you're a lead, not some side character who ends up as collateral damage in some explosion, the wonders are endless.

Benefits are as follows:
1) You get to be really hot, but never have to go to the gym.
2) You are likely to be inexplicably wealthy.
3) Massive Scientific Breakthroughs just pop into your head. Seriously. You need a freaking perpetual motion machine, all you've got to do is twirl around in your chair a little, let your gaze fall on some random object, have a "Eureka!" moment, do a brief montage, and it's done.
4) Knowledge of math (which I find a little boring) and Chemistry (which I loathe) are implied, but you're never called upon to prove them.
5) Despite being wildly devoted to your work you'll find time to ensure that you always look fantastic and have awesome clothes (see also TV Cops, female).

I'm going to start today. And by "start today" I mean get a hair cut and a well-cut lab coat and wait to be declared a genius.