No Quote Whore this week. Instead, how about a salute to three
critics who are a fuck load better at movie critique than me,
and I wish I was as smart as them.
Hey whore,
how's the whoring?
David Denby of
the New Yorker
James Berardinelli
Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times
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©2001 by
Randy Shandis Enterprises. All rights fucking reserved.
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This week:
Glitter
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Filthy says:
"The movie Mariah Fans justly deserve." |
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Note: This review may be biased by the fact that I
am the President of the Arvada Chapter of the Mariah Carey Fan
Club.
It takes balls. It takes big fat hairy crotch rocks, the kind
that are so big they're thrust out in front of you when you walk,
the kind that are an easy target when you wear your Speedos,
the kind that chafe against even the loosest Levi's. It takes
monster balls to make the movie that we Mariah fans demanded,
a movie that refuses to show Mariah in colflict, in tension,
or less than perfect lighting. That is, a movie like Glitter.
This story is the untold story of so many celebrities: the
rapid, conflict-free rise of an almost impossibly dim and dull
jerk to the heights of fame and fortune. Think about how many
times you've watched television or a movie and wondered "How
did that fucking asshole get to be so famous?" Now, thanks
to Glitter, we know the answer. It is by smiling a lot.
Glitter is a salute to all that makes Marah a super-duper
star. It is mundane, trite and boring. It doesn't once suggest
that the rise from a New York orphanage to world's biggest singing
star is exciting or interesting. Rather, it dares to say such
a story is silly and hackneyed and totally predictable. It doesn't
pretend that this journey is complicated or that to achieve success
requires much talent, shrewdness, planning, scheming or intrigue.
You simply warble in a throaty voice, bobbing up and down the
scales like a whore's mouth on a cock. And success doesn't require
that you be surrounded by interesting people. In fact, you can
surround yourself with stereotypes stolen from much more involving
rags-to-riches stories. The story of Glitter dares to
dream of a world devoid of anything that would make us give a
flying fuck. And that's the way we Mariah fans like it.
Of course, megastar Carey deserves the bulk of the credit
for her sublime performance as a girl who isn't bright, has no
discernible personality, and no control of her own career. She
has the strength and conviction to stand statically in the foreground,
smiling numbly while secondary characters sweat to move the plot
around like a heavy boulder. It's phenomenal, really, that she
had the courage to take a role that reveals to the world what
her fans have known all along: behind her chipmunk smile and
inside her slightly-soft body is nothing of substance, absolutely
nothing. Kudos, Mariah!
But let's not forget the little people who support Carey like
Oakland Raiders hoisting John Madden circa 1976. Max Beesley
is top-notch as "D. J. Dice," a deejay who discovers
and nurtures Carey's rising star. Try to imagine a film that
consistently reaches the level of creativity shown by naming
the deejay "D.J." and you will overestimate Glitter.
Beesley almost hides an obvious English accent under what might
be generously called by the most devout member of his fanclub
as a Brooklyn accent. But that's part of the film's beauty, you
see. It says, why try to get such a little detail right when
a good performance or original character would only detract from
the film's message: talent and integrity are not necessary for
success.
Beesley's character is just a little strange. Is he a Svengali,
a saint, or arbitrarily whatever the movie needs at any specific
time? If you wonder this, you need to fucking relax and just
sit there and whack your prick while Mariah sings, just like
the rest of us fans do.
The unobserving moviewatcher might think that Carey's sassy
friends from the orphanage days are shitty sidekicks. They are
given nothing to do, provide no levity and are about as "sassy"
as an instant-coffee commercial. To those critics I say, fuck
you and stop saying bad things about Mariah's movie!!! If this
movie wanted these gals to actually be sassy or funny, they would
have been. But it didn't. It wanted flat and dull ladies that,
by contrast, let Mariah, with her limited acting ability and
weird looks, sparkle and shine like a God damn rhinestone in
a tawdry ring on the Home Shopping Network.
Director Vondie Curtis-Hall gives the movie the movie the
perfect level of "what the fuck are we doing" incompetence.
Knowing what Mariah fans expect, he gives the story a dull finish
usually found on old linoleum floors. He makes New York nightclubs
circa 1983 look like the most uninteresting places ever. And
that gives us fans solace about our own miserable living conditions.
Curtis-Hall makes the movie plod from pointless scene to pointless
scene. It leaves us Mariah fans delightfully scratching our heads
in the sort of dumbfounded confusion we can only imagine Mariah
feels every moment.
Curtis-Hall produces some scenes that will be forever remembered
as classic examples of mid-level achievement. A few favorites
include a brilliant sequence where Mariah first tells Beesley
that she loves him and she wouldn't even want success without
him. One scene later she says, as she storms out, that he's ruining
everything she's worked so hard for. Wow. For some people it
takes years to come to such realization. With the help of a bad
script, Mariah learns in minutes. And when she leaves Beesley,
she does so with her cat, which the film had ignored since a
very early scene when Mariah is nine. I assume Mariah fed it
in the ensuing 13 years. It's like seeing an old friend again
when the cat suddenly reappears. The audience laughed aloud because
they were so happy that Mariah still had the fucking cat.
Another beautifully set scene is after The Breakup. You know
that despite their fight, Mariah and Beesley love each other.
Otherwise, how could they be in different buildings, psychically
collaborating on a song? The power of love, I swear to God.
Mariah fans cannot afford to let sadness into their lives.
We're all already on the edge of a deep chasm of despair, loneliness,
long nights with gallon tubs of generic ice cream and 120-proof
liquor. Sadness is just the bully who shoves us in. So, when
Beesley is killed in a ridiculous subplot, it is not a loss.
It's a fucking victory! His death does not send Mariah into a
psychiatric clinic. No, it makes her a better, more successful
and happier singer.
And that's the power of Glitter. Five Fingers.
Want
to tell Filthy something?
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