I just recently saw Fast Food Nation. Until it actually opened on the screen, I was under the impression that it was a documentary. It should have been a documentary. After all, it was based on a non-fiction book.

Now, I know that you can make a great movie based on true events, but apparently not everyone feels the need. Why would you, when you can just throw a few scenes that spout the facts from the books down in a script, as if they actually make for interesting dialogue?

Even little Chrissy Seaver from Growing Pains couldn’t make me feel nostalgic enough to stop me from wondering what the fuck I was watching.

Seriously. What a disaster.

With this, I note that Richard Linklater has two movies on this list.  The Newton Boys and this. I have to admit that his ability to make two drastically different terrible movies is impressive in its own way.

I should also point out that I really like School of Rock, Dazed and Confused and Waking Life. I remember reading that people walked out of Waking Life when it was in theaters, though.

Must have been too psychedelic for some people.

Different strokes, eh?

Everything M. Night Shyamalan
Between The Sixth Sense and Devil

I’ve, sadly, seen enough of them to make this proclamation.

Unbreakable, I saw with enthusiasm, because The Sixth Sense is actually a very good movie. Though, I will say that I still think the wife looked more angry than sad in most scenes. I would also like to add how kick-ass Donnie Wahlberg’s acting is at the beginning. And he’s not even my favorite Wahlberg. See below*

Having found Unbreakable a barely watchable movie that should have been far better with its cast, I also chose to watch Signs anyway, because I have a little heart-spot in which Patricia Kalember resides, and no one told me (SPOILER ALERT) that she was going to spend her entire sequence of flashbacks rammed against a tree. Of course, to be fair, I still would have watched it, tree and mushed insides or no tree and mushed insides, and she was, by far, the best thing about that movie.

Now, I know that not everyone hates these movies. I watched Signs, for instance, at my brother’s house, because he owns it on DVD. So, there you go. Someone who doesn’t think that Signs sucks.

Of course, a lot of people don’t think that Steven Spielberg screwed the pooch with the ending of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull either. But he did. Big time. And also the ending of A.I., which really wasn’t a terrible movie until they had to weirdly over-happify the ending. (SPOILER ALERT) Should have ended at water’s bottom. That’s all I’m sayin’.

Hm, apparently I’m going to be pissed off at both M. Night and Spielberg in this post. Oh well, how often does one get to rail against Spielberg? Normally, when I start to, I get all Schindler’s List, ET, The Color Purple, and I can’t maintain my anger. So, take it while I’ve got it to give Spielberg. Every once in a while, edit the fucking aliens OUT!

Anyway, back to Shyamalan.

I saw The Happening – yes, I went in knowing how ridiculous the plot was – because I really like Mark Wahlberg* and Zooey Deschanel, and I thought they did really well with the shit they’d been handed, frankly. Despite the many reviews that said Zooey Deschanel was “weird” in her role. Uh, I kinda think that was the role as it was handed to her.

To be fair, I should state that I did not see The Village - but, um… I’ve heard about it – nor Lady in the Water. Considering that Lady in the Water is M. Night’s lowest rated film on IMDB, though, and I find his other movies stank, I’m gonna assume that it sucks with a punishable severity.

As for Devil, didn’t mind it. Wasn’t The Sixth Sense. But also wasn’t Signs, Unbreakable, The Happening, or the even worse Shyamalan movies that I have avoided like the plague. He is only responsible for the story on Devil, though, so maybe he’s hit a wall and should just leave the writin’ and directin’ to others.

If he doesn’t, he could just end up writing aliens into everything. Even when they don’t belong. And sometimes, Spielberg, the aliens don’t fuckin’ belong. (SPOILER ALERT) Fuckin’ aliens in fuckin’ Indiana fuckin’ Jones. What were you fuckin’ thinkin’?

You would think a Carrot Top-led movie would sit higher on this list, but, sadly, I’ve seen worse. However, this movie was plenty bad. How could it not be? The lead was fucking Carrot Top.

What do I remember about this movie? Very little. I do remember that, even with the shame of Melrose Place cast aside, I still didn’t find Courtney Thorne-Smith the tiniest bit attractive, and, until I just now looked it up, I didn’t remember that Raquel Welch was even in it, so it didn’t even have the advantage of a late-inning hottie-save.

Come on, we all know that it happens. You’re watching a movie. It’s terrible. And then, suddenly, you’re like, “Ooh, she’s hot,” and you feel better about having wasted the last ninety minutes of your life. Yeah, didn’t happen here.

I can’t remember a single frame of this movie, but I suspect there was a lot of nonsense shenanigans and bad prop comedy.

So, why did I see this forgettable crapfest? Someone liked Carrot Top. It wasn’t me. Oh, the things that you will endure early in a relationship.

I don’t remember much about The Newton Boys. And I’m not going to put myself through it again to try to figure out why I remember it as such a tragedy. But I do remember it as tragic.

I saw it one time in a theater back when I used to see a lot more of what passed through movie theaters than I do today. I remember regretting it even as I was sitting there.

The strange thing is that I literally remember everything else about that movie-going experience. Where I was sitting. The people whom I was with. The people whom I was intentionally not with. Where they were sitting. And I certainly remember that it was the naughtiest I’ve ever been in a movie theater.

Ah, youth.

So, I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that The Newton Boys was so aggressively boring that I can’t think of a single thing to remember about it, aside from the fact that I hated it.

Russell Brand

Surprised? Yeah, so was I.

After watching Russell Brand on The Rosie Show, though, I realized that I sort of love the man.

I’ve seen and heard a lot of people complain about how he is impossible to understand. Honestly, I think he just has an extensive vocabulary and a unique way of speaking that proves confusing to those who like their sentences in snippets of five words or less.

Of course, he also doesn’t claim to love the U.S., in all of its equality-faking glory, which is likely a sore point for many Americans.

He has a checkered, pain-filled past, and his run-ins with the law are likely to continue, I suspect, but his ability to overcome so much and his willingness to speak openly about what he has been through is brave.

When I see him not acting and hear him speak his own words, he just strikes me as a super intelligent, genuine, kind, funny man.

And when he doesn’t make it crazy, he has amazing hair.

Timothy Olyphant

Timothy Olyphant is made of badass. He consistently gets cast as the ass-kicking-nest guy around, and there’s a reason. He is old-Hollywood handsome, has the perfect build for long jackets, and is topped off with really shiny hair.

He has played two outstanding leading characters on two of my favorite TV shows in recent years, and that does probably factor into his number, even if it shouldn’t.

He also got to deliver one of the greatest set of lines in all of movie history as drug dealer Todd Gaines in Go:

Claire: What do you have against The Family circus?

Todd: You read your paper… and you’re enjoying your two-page comic spread. And there’s The Family fucking Circus… bottom right corner, just waiting to suck. And that’s the last thing you read, so it spoils everything you read before it.

Claire: You could just not read it.

Todd: I hate it, yet I’m uncontrollably drawn to it.

Also, he’s been married to the same woman for over twenty years, while being ridiculously cute and working in Hollywood, with no infidelity accusations. Now, that’s sexy.

Adam Lambert

He uses those traits that make him unique to achieve his success, he’s got real talent, and he terrifies conservatives. These are all good things.

Personally, I think Adam Lambert has one of the most amazing singing voices I have ever heard, and his courage to ‘go there’ every time he performs is impressive. I’ve been to way too many concerts where the singer on stage fears the same high notes and wailing that made them famous, and chumps out at a lower octave.

Live performances, Adam Lambert is all like “Waaaaaahhhhhh,” and then everybody’s hair blows straight up into the air.

Little known fact, that’s how Glambert gets his hair to stay all high when he wears it like that. You would think it’s product, but no. His vocals do the work.

He is an exceptional live performer, he has a Broadway history, and, rumor has it, is looking to get back to Broadway. This is also a good thing.

I do subtract a few points for his drunken arrest in Finland. Even if it was all a big mistake, drunk enough to be stupid just isn’t sexy.