Reviews: More Assorted Books and Movies
Books:
- After Dolores by Sarah Schulman
- Please Kill Me by Legs McNeil, Gillian McCain
Movies
- Roadhouse
- Magnum Force
- Friends With Money
- Batman
Books
After Dolores: A
If I were to place this book in a list of the Sarah Schulman books I’ve read so far, in order of my favorite to my least favorite, it would go as follows: Rat Bohemia, After Dolores, People in Trouble. I Rat Bohemia so much that I started reading it again as soon as I finished it. People in Trouble disappointed me. Maybe because Stark told me it had been nefariously plagiarized by Johnathan Larson when he wrote Rent and then… it really wasn’t the same thing at all. So there was that expectation, but still I wasn’t a big fan. I found the characters quite irritating. But After Dolores was fantastic and a very close second to Rat Bohemia.
The book follows the narrator, a depressed, chain smoking, hard drinking coffee shop waitress around New York. She’s been dumped by Dolores, a terrible person, and yet she can’t get over her. Dolores rarely makes an appearance. Instead, the book deals with the narrator’s interactions with a series of characters, from a woman with a gun pretending to be Priscilla Presley, to a young Punkette having an affair with an experimental actor. It manages to shift between funny and sad and scary and angry without even one misstep. It also hits several of my kinks:
1. Lesbians
2. Greasy coffee shops and dive bars
3. Being poor in New York in the Eighties
4. Lesbians
Please Kill Me: A+
After so many years of reading glorified vanity pieces masquerading as the unbiased history of the punk movement in the Seventies, this book was a bit of fresh air. Structured as an oral history, with decades worth of interviews from everyone from artists, to writers, to record label staff, to musicians, to groupies, this book tells the amazing warts-and-all story of the rise of New York punk. There is no kiss-assery or attempts to forgive bad behavior on account of genius, it is just all there. Iggy sleeping with 14 year old girls, Johnny Thunders beating his girlfriends, Dee Dee Ramone turning tricks on the street, years and years worth of drugs and violence and egos. Not to be read by anyone wanting to preserve their hero-worship of any punk star except for Debbie Harry, who comes off smelling like roses.
Movies
Road House: A+++
Hahahahaha. Why have I never seen this movie before?? Oh my god, what an incredible entry into the “Everything and the Kitchen Sink” school of movie making. This movie is like every awesome movie of the Eighties rolled into one and starring Patrick Swayze. Patrick Swayze with a mullet. Patrick Swayze with a mullet playing a renegade philosopher/academic/Tai Chi master/glorified bouncer/lover of the century. I love how this movie basically invents the idea of a “cooler” that would be so famous as a BOUNCER that everyone across the entire country would know him by sight. This movie hits so many of my kinks:
1. Patrick Swayze. Shirtless constantly. In leather. With a mullet.
2. Sam Elliott
3. Patrick Swayze and Sam Elliott being so clearly IN LOVE WITH EACH OTHER, I was tempted to write fanfic before the movie was even over.
4. The myth of small town America
5. Roadhouse bar full of rough and tumble, yet lovable characters.
6. Evil corporate villain that improbably controls everything, is in love with the hero’s girl, and thinks he can never be defeated! Plus, he has homoerotic henchmen. And a cool pad full of weird Eighties crap. And angsty memories of WAR. Hahaha. Endless fun.
7. A taxidermied bear.
8. Semi-decent Eighties music.
Magnum Force: B
We spent the big bucks on fancy-ass cable (okay, we got a deal where we would only be spending 10 more dollars a month) and scored AMC. The very first day the cable took effect, what should be on but day two of a Dirty Harry marathon. I was very excited. Magnum Force proved to be worth my two hours for sure. First of all, there was the awesomeness of San Francisco in the Seventies – decrepit, corrupt, full of dealers and pimps and dirty cops, and with the added bonus of muscle cars. The plot was completely and totally predictable, but whatever, what matters is the journey. Dirty Harry going home and being randomly propositioned by the Hot Young Thing who lives upstairs. Dirty Harry getting propositioned by his ex-partner’s naughty ex. Dirty Harry getting checked out by the gay guy from upstairs while defusing a bomb. Dirty Harry brandishing his big, phallic gun. Dirty Harry taking down an entire ring of vigilante cops and just wandering off into the sunset. Sadly, we missed the rest of the entries in the series, but knowing AMC, they’ll be on again next month.
Friends With Money: B+
I was happy to watch this movie for a second time because of the dream cast: Joan Cusack, Catherine Keener, and Frances McDormand. I also always enjoy Nicole Holofcener’s particular blend of social satire, critical commentary, and comedy. I love how this movie treats class differences without vilifying any of the characters. It’s not about the evil rich person and the poor unfortunate poor person. The rich people are a spectrum, with class distinctions of their own, and the poor unfortunate poor person is shown to be luckier than the poor unfortunate poor Hispanic woman. Plus, Joan Cusack, Catherine Keener, and Frances McDormand.
The Dark Knight B-
Pros:
1. Heath Ledger as the most awesome Joker since Frank Miller was writing the comic
2. Replacing Katie Holmes with Maggie Gyllenhaal
3. Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine being snarky
4. Fantastic action sequences.
Cons:
1. No visual connection between the dark, expressionist Gotham of the first movie and the sequel. What’s up with replacing Gotham with Chicago? And what was up with all the product placement. Gotham doesn’t have a Starbucks and a CitiBank. And everyone knows Gotham is NEW YORK. Superman lives in Chicago, not Batman. EVERYONE KNOWS THIS, RIGHT?
2. They went too far with Two Face’s makeup. Every time they showed his open wounds and gaping eye socket I thought – wouldn’t he be dead from an infection by now?
3. Female characters existing only to be helpless and to be rescued and/or betray everyone.
a) Commissioner Gordon used to have a loyal cop he could always count on. She was a brave Hispanic woman, a lesbian, who was a complex character. Interestingly, Commissioner Gordon in The Dark Knight also has a Hispanic woman as his cop assistant. But not Montoya, no, it is now Ramirez and she has absolutely no character development or personality, basically exists to listen to everyone else talk, and in the end betrays Gordon in favor of the Joker. Great.
b) Commissioner Gordon also had a daughter who was inspired by her father and Batman to become Batgirl and later Oracle. But in the movie, the focus is all on Gordon’s son. The Joker tries to kill his son, Batman needs to save his son, his son is the one who knows Batman is still a hero. The daughter just sorta hangs out in the background and is ignored. Great.
4) The movie was just way too long. Way, way too long. I was bored. I thought maybe the end of Two Face could have been saved for another sequel.
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