Not a girl - not a hu-man

Today I made breakfast, fussed a little, drank my coffee pondering things (see the prior blog post) fussed and realized there was no damn hope for it. I was going to have to watch Crossroads. So with much trepidation I popped the dvd in – I think in a effort shield to me from this film the player told me the disk was dirty but the disc cleaned right up and off we went.

Good god. I mean just good fricken god. Lord god with roller-skates and an Afro.

I should explain

So the movie starts with a flash back where three girls bury some box with something that symbolizes their dreams and promise to dig it up eight years later when they all graduate high school. And they hope to be best friends forever. I start to get nervous.

Of course one of them is Brittany who is narrating this bit. So graduation day comes and there is Brittany in her underwear singing along with a Madonna song as the credits roll.

Now I know next to nothing about chick flicks but this stuck me as a bit weird – maybe the stars of all chick flicks prance about in their underwear – this won’t be the last time she doesn’t wear a lot in this film.

Okay she’s dancing and in comes Dan Acroyd – oh Dan, have you really fallen so low? Do you need the money that bad? He plays Britney’s father – the square father who does not understand her daughters needs and dreams which is such a huge and over ripe cliché I was tempted to flag the movie and penalize it ten yards but it was early days yet. Not only that – it’s Elwood Blues acting like this. Sad how he ended up.

Turns out that Britney is the class valedictorian. Uh-huh. Listen if Brittany is the class valedictorian either the students were all force fed paint chips for years or the town was down wind from a leaky chemical plant and the atomic reactor kept melting down.

Anyway we run into the other two girls – the three have drifted apart – they are The Popular Girl (PG) the pregnant (we don’t know that yet) Trailer Trash Girl (TTG) and Brit (the Smart girl – I can’t get over this really the smart girl?) Honestly I don’t think this movie was written they just went to some vast screen play data base and cut and pasted thing in.

Anyway there are some embarrassing scenes to establish Britney as a virgin – and smart (man is that heavy heavy lifting) by having this geeky guy as her lab partner – they decided to do the nasty but then Britany (in her underwear) decides not to cause well hell – the guys a geek – nobody in a movie loses their virginity to a geek. (I suspect precious few do in real life either).

Anyway because the plot demands it – the three girls (PG, TTG and Brit) all end up at the place were they buried the box – I was hoping it was a skull but it wasn’t. So they reveal their dreams the PG wants to get married (she’s engaged ) TTG wants to get out of the two bit town (and since she’s pregnant it’s a good idea with the leaky chemical plant and being force fed paint chips) and Brit wants to see her mother who left when she was three and never contacted her. I tossed something, a pen I think at the screen right there.

I imagine the Script meeting was something like this:
George: “You see Ted this gives them something to search for, a reason for the film.”
Ted: Brilliant. Will Brittany be in her underwear a lot?
George: Of course.

So the last thing they need is a reason to go on a trip – and TTG shows an announcement that there will be a talent audition in LA in a few days – exactly how many they don’t say and that TTG is going to audition and become a singer with the other girls help.

Another pen hit the TV which was staring to wonder why I hated it so.

“Audition!? Audition?! What the hell is this Andy Hardy with breasts? Hey lets have a show!”

It’s been my experience that record companies never have any kind of open audition – hell I imagine most of them spend all their time hiding from people since they get about ohhh a billion press kits and cds a year – they don’t need to look really. People look for them.

Anyway – they go off to the west in a convertible driven by the brooding handsome guy who may have a done something very wrong (he knows the TTG). He’s a musician and he’s got a kind of beard thing – it’s not quite stubble and it’s not quite a beard I don’t know how he manages to do it cause it’s never longer or shorted the whole film– but cause I’m lazy he’s beard guy (BG) and it’s obvious that he and brit are going to be together at the end of the film. Now predicable isn’t always a bad thing – you know Hamlet’s going to come to a bad end at the end of play and yet you still follow along. In this case, it’s not so good.

To add here is some toing and frowing – PG is going to LA to see her strangely elusive fiancée (she has a ring that she was flashing earlier) and Brit is going only to Arizona to see her mother (right like this is going to turn out good for either of them).

They go off and have dumb adventures – they end up in New Orleans and need money to fix the car and there is, again because the plot demands it, a Karaoke contest in some club in NO (this is pre Katrina of course).

So they are in a dressing room (FOR A KARAOKE CONTEST? ARE YOU KIDDING ME? Another pen gets tossed at the screen – my TV is giving me very hurt looks) and they are in what look like clothing from the LA Skank collection – Brit’s in a midriff shirt, daisy dukes and glitter mostly when they do the Karaoke contest – it was established earlier that Brit could sing but Old Dad wants her to go to pre med (I think dad was snacking on the paint chips as well – doctor Britiany? Rrrrrrrrrrrright) and of course they win and get ton’s oh cash – shit if it’s that easy I’ll wear a midriff shirt and daisy dukes – on second thought maybe not (small pause to get the image out of my head) and they are off. There is a moment to show that the bearded guy and brit are starting to have something for each other but this disturbs the bearded guy.

They have enough money to get a good hotel room now – and because the plot demands it the bearded guy wanders off so the three girls can rebond. Turns out the TTG is not pregnant from by her old boy friend but from some guy who got her drunk and raped her. There is crying – because PG had been so mean to TTG – there is some puking on my part. Just a little nothing major just a little eurp.

They then go off driving with the music playing – it’s padding –there are no less than three driving with music scenes in the film (OKAY WE GET THE POINT THEY ARE DRIVING SHEESH MANOS HAD A BETTER SENSE OF FORWARD MOMENTUM THAN THIS PIECE OF TRIPE)

They end up camping in the Arizona desert where brit shares her poem ”not a girl” with the bearded guy – they are falling in love and I’m running out of things to throw at the screen.

They get to Brit’s mother’s house and it’s a huge Mc Mansion in Arizona (Script guy: see it’ll so nicely contrast with Brit’s father who is an auto mechanic and let the viewers know that money can’t buy happiness. Other guy: Brilliant Ted! We should charge the studio more money we’re so good!)

And of course the reunion of Brit and brit’s mother end’s badly – she split when she did because Brit’s dad was a controlling jerk and she didn’t want a kid (she has them now which doesn’t make a lot of real emotional sense but I didn’t write this travesty and it’s late and my hands hurt – I’m getting angry at the film again and I’m pounding the key board which I don’t need to do).

So Brit has her crying scene and they girls bond again.

Just before they reach LA Bearded guy (who has a secret past that is too stupid to worry about suffice to say he is a noble soul) takes Brits “Not a girl” poem and sets it to music. For which he as to die because the damn song is still in my head. Not in a good way, like the way play the funky music white boy lived in my head for a week one time.

After the song they kiss. Well what the hell was supposed to happen?

Then they reach LA and have no trouble finding a hotel and signing up for the audition.

Then popular girl and TTG go off sightseeing and to see PG’s fiancé. This gives Brit and
BG time to boink to romantic music –

Mealtime PG confronts her idiot fiancé – turns out he’s a) boiking some LA bimbo and b) he’s the guy who raped TTG and got her pregnant. There is a scene, then a scuffle and then TTG ends up falling down some stairs and losing the baby. And I lose my desire to live for a few moments and actually said out loud (loud enough for the neighbors to hear) “oh my god you have got to be kidding me That! The stairs!”.

Sweet mercy fuck. Of all the god damn stupid clichés you could have tossed into this mix master of clichedom – the falling down the stairs and losing the baby one? Shit I’m sure I saw that happen to Betty Davis in the 40’s at least twice. God in heaven they did that back in the 30’s ! Hell I’m sure there were a few silent films where they did that. But there was in all it’s insanely stupid glory. God this is a dumb film.

So now – yes now they are all bonded but the trip is over – Brit doesn’t have a mother, PG does not have a fiancé and TTG doesn’t have a baby and I don’t have any memories of my third grade – this movie ate them.

There is some last 20 minute (for a 98 minute film this drags on something awful) sub sub plot where Dad shows up and tries to take Brit home and pretend nothing happened (you know there was kind of a real film somewhere in here but it would have taken a genius to unearth it) but Brit realizes her place is with beard guy and then the last scene is the audition where they replay “not a girl” this time with piano, synth, drum, guitar, bass, the friends as back up singers and on really really odd note – a guy playing a tambourine – yep on the back line there is a guy – standing in front of a music stand playing a tambourine. It’s the WTF moment that allowed me to keep what little sanity I had while Brit in yet another midriff thing sings the title song while dad in the audience cheers (awwww).

So it all ends up well except that Brit has to deal with the emotional implications of her mothers’ rejection of her – PG has to deal with the fact she was engaged to a rapist and TTG has the miscarriage to deal with. Other than that, everything is peachy. I predect that if we were able to look in on these girls lives three years or so on down the road all of them would be on anti-depressants or dealing with drug abuse/food issues. Meantime I disovered that not matter how hard you try you can't slit your wrists with a butter knife.

I have to go watch one of the Lone wolf and cub films now – they are violent samurai films without much plot or bonding moments blood spurts everywhere - while listening to both Marlyn Manson and Ministry at the same time just to get this nightmare out of my head.

To be like the hu-man – to laugh to think to love why is this not in plan?
(from Robot Monster)

Later.
Peace love Shonen Knife.