The Most Totally American Movies Ever: Our Top 9
Happy 232nd birthday, America! Along with baseball, Britney and oh so many flavors of Doritos, you’ve given the world an uncountable wealth of movies to enjoy. On this momentous holiday weekend, let’s focus on nine films that most fully embody the American spirit, plus a 10th to be determined by Online readers. (See, that’s some freedom of choice right there!)
O say can you see…our list:
1. Die Hard: Our boy Bruce Willis leaps across five decades of American Westerns in a single “yippee-ki-yay, motherf–ker.” The lone hero, the Twinkie-gobbling cop, the terrorist Eurotrash…it’s all there.
2. The Godfather: Part II: As if crafting the best-ever American crime drama weren’t enough, Coppola ups the ante?and anoints the blockbuster sequel?with an immigrant backstory, drugs, gambling and primo De Niro.
3. South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut: Crude, lowbrow Internet vid grows up to become crude, lowbrow animated epic. Saddam Hussein canoodles with Satan. “Blame Canada” earns an Oscar nod. U-S-A!
4. Do the Right Thing: Vibrant New York streets, simmering racial tension and a huge friggin’ radio. As complicated as America’s real-life race relations and as effective as a pummeling Public Enemy track.
5. E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial: Spielberg spun a Disney-style parable into a sci-fi classic with kickass effects, intrepid suburban kids and a killer product placement for Reese’s. America cried in its popcorn.
6. Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle: Postmodern stoner epic puts the “bud” back in buddy pic. Slider-seeking antiheroes shirk the dull expectations of a morally bankrupt society and party with Doogie Howser.
7. Titanic: How much to turn a harrowing maritime disaster into a three-hour Celine Dion video starring Billy Zane? Only $200 million? Sold! Only the planet’s hottest capitalist democracy could produce this so-bad-it’s-Best-Picture masterwork.
8. Friday Night Lights: If this emotionally charged ode to high school football in western Texas doesn’t get your Yankee heart pumping, you’re probably already on a Homeland Security watch list.
9. Forrest Gump: This much is true: Tom Hanks is America. Gump crystallizes U.S. propensity to put oneself at the center of every important cultural moment. Also the film that launched a thousand real-life shrimp restaurants.
10. [YOUR CHOICE HERE]: What, no Terminator? No Tom Cruise? Do Girls Gone Wild videos count?! Cast your vote in the comments for the red-white-and-bluest movie you’ve ever seen.
Kevin Smith Reviews The Dark Knight; New Zack and Miri Photo
Last night was EPIC. I had one of those movie experiences that only happens once in a long long time, where you leave the theater completely blown away by what you just experienced. Folks, this isn’t hype - The Dark Knight is a movie will destroy your expectations.
Not only did I get to see The Dark Knight, but I got to see it with one of my favorite directors / one of my idols - Kevin Smith was my guest. How cool is that? I honestly didn’t plan to name drop, but it seems like Smith talked about it in his latest blog entry. And as cool as that sounds, and was, Nolan was some how able to completely overshadow that fact with his new film. I’m under embargo not to review the movie until release (not that Warner Bros would shoot me over the completely glowing review I plan on posting), but Smith gives his breif spoiler free review which almost completely echos my own thoughts.
“Without giving anything away, this is an epic film (and trust me: based on the sheer size and scope of the visuals and storytelling, that’s not an overstatement). It’s the “Godfather II” of comic book films and three times more earnest than “Batman Begins” (and fuck, was that an earnest film). Easily the most adult comic book film ever made. Heath Ledger didn’t so much give a performance as he disappeared completely into the role; I know I’m not the first to suggest this, but he’ll likely get at least an Oscar nod (if not the win) for Best Supporting Actor. Fucking flick’s nearly three hours long and only leaves you wanting more (in a great way). I can’t imagine anyone being disappointed by it. Nolan and crew have created something close to a masterpiece.”
Smith also released a new image from Zack and Miri Make a Porno.
The director says a theatrical poster and trailer are on the way as well. I’m guessing they will hit the first week of August with Pineapple Express.
Family Guy to vie for comedy series Emmy nod
Due to the complicated and apparently outdated Emmy Awards nomination rules, prime-time animated shows like Family Guy, The Simpsons, American Dad, South Park and others have had to choose which Emmy category they want to compete in, animated or comedy series. Then, that decision impacts eligibility for writers and animators on those shows in other categories. Well, Family Guy is in a unique position this year, as their “Blue Harvest” Star Wars parody was classified as a special. And as the animated category looks at single episodes, Family Guy can submit “Blue Harvest” to the animated category, and the show itself, to comedy series.
I’d say it’s a tremendous long shot that an animated show can be nominated over the live-action comedy series it will be facing. But there’s always a first time for everything; when Disney’s animated Beauty and the Beast picked up an Oscar nod for “Best Picture” it was groundbreaking in the same way. It’s a tough debate. These shows compete with prime-time comedies every week and yet get put up against the likes of Spongebob Squarepants come awards time. How do you compare The Venture Brothers and Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends?
Just like our own Adam Finley Award for excellence in animation, there’s such a wide diversity of animation on television these days, maybe one award just isn’t good enough. So what do you guys think? Should animated shows be competing in the comedy series category, get another category of their own; maybe breaking up the “Adult Swim” class of shows from the “Nickelodeon” grouping; or just keep things the way they are?
Surviving Ben Affleck: A Career Not Gone, Baby, Gone
The following is an editorial by correspondent Zach Lawrence.
Like many of you Slashfilm enthusiasts out there, I have just read the article on Gone Baby Gone by Peter Sciretta, and watched the cool trailer. While he makes all the right points in all the right places, he lacks a few aspects to what I like to call the “mythology of Ben Affleck”. You see, some time ago at the end of the “Bennifer” era, and with the barrage of shoddy films Affleck had been releasing he went into hiding. Some people are fan boys for Star Wars or Transformers, but being from Boston I had happened to be an Affleck Fan boy, and this vanishing of my hero hit me hard.
Last year sometime I had written an article of Hollywoodland and Surviving Christmas and I thought that with the upcoming release of his new flick so would an upswing in his career. I was correct, if only slightly, I thought he deserved an Oscar nod for his supporting role but the snub fairy had struck again. We all can admit, Ben has a knack for awesome SNL performances and knows how to makes fun of himself. Did Jennifer Lopez have to disappear when this all happened? No. Ben took it all to the chin like a champ and I believe, will come out stronger for it. When the Hollywood Goldenboy did films like Gigli and Surviving Christmas he was crucified for them, but I’m sorry, they both were pretty damn good flicks. Fresh and original takes on the Gangster and Xmas genre.
So why, you ask? It’s an easy enough answer. At that point in time, it became a cool thing to rip apart Affleck. I share the same affinity for Good Will Hunting as Pete Sciretta does, being myself a Bostonian, and we both cringe with delight when Affleck feebly attempts to reenact his non existent Boston accent. The things we loved about Matt and Ben were what everyone had loved originally; they were branded the messiahs of Hollywoodland and were supposed to usher in the new era of what it was to be a star. Then there was. “Naw-uh, fuck that. Nick doesn’t do anything until Nick gets something for Nick. I want some hot chocolate. You want to hear about some Indian casino, I want to see some goddamn hot chocolate! And a piece of pecan fucking pie!”
For a fan it doesn’t get much better than that, but sadly Reindeer Games was just the slopes of the mountain for Affleck to ascend before his fall from the top down the other side. You forgot about his scene stealing characters in “Shakespeare in Love”, and seeing myself in the torment of Holden McNeal in “Chasing Amy”. The brilliance he gleamed with there as an actor was tear evoking, it was the only movie I believe I have seen where the protagonist was both hero and villain. “The girl?” Jason Lee asks on the couch, and he nods with tears streaming. And he meant that shit! You could see in his portrayal that as the “Good Guy” he was charming and funny, but he couldn’t bite his tongue and lashed out verbally as Darth McNeal when he felt inadequate. It was realistically acted for him to be bi-Affleckual in that flick, and that right there should have been the bar to which his acting chops were always judged.
So did he take the low road, while Damon took the high? No. Ben was just at the time, cool like gigipets and pogs and at some point needed to become lame to the public. So now with the Gone Baby Gone trailer impressing this writer, I will say what I have never abandoned Ben, and just sat in the wings eating my feelings waiting for his triumphant return. And while I shouldn’t hold out for “The Revenge of Shannon Hamilton”, I don’t know if I will be satisfied with this new Affleck behind the lens. Which raises another question, is he not crediting himself in the trailer for a reason? Does he believe it will attract negative attention to it, and he won’t be taken seriously as a director? It’s hard to say. But hey, I’ve got Matt and Ben possibly inking it up again, a new film coming my way, and anytime Kevin Smith does anything I can count on getting a glimpse of Ben which should be enough Affleck heroin to stop the itching in my veins until he headlines another flick. So here is the second wind, the upswing, the second coming, the resurrection of Affleck, and I’ve got my hot chocolate…And my piece of pecan fucken pie.