Skyline...

Before going to the movies this afternoon, I consulted RottenTomatoes.com and found out that one of the films on my list of must-sees had a pitiful grade of 14%.

Now, you'd think I would have learned something after checking out 'Sex and the City 2' (16% at Rotten Tomatoes) and 'The Last Airbender' (6%) but, no. "Well, THIS i gotta see!" said I.

However, I am happy to report that this time, THIS time... I chose wisely!!!

Sort of.

The movie was 'Skyline'. And it was terrible. I mean, just plain awful. But it was also fun! True, most of the fun was completely unintentional, but it was fun nonetheless.

Basically, there's a big, honking alien invasion that's taking over the world, and we're following about a half dozen chuckleheads who are trapped inside their apartment building, hiding from all the aliens who want to take them aboard these big, honking space ships and suck out their brains. And they say stuff like this...

"I just... I just can't believe this is happening!"
"Well, you better believe it! This IS happening! It's happening RIGHT NOW! And you'd better wake up!!! WAKE UP!!! ...And survive!!!"

But, hey, I mean, I dunno, there's no exact point of reference here. Maybe, at the end of the world, we will all turn into bad actors with choppy dialogue. Who knows?

The thing I was most worried about going into Skyline was this tried and true formula: "OH NO!!! ALIENS!!! WE'RE DOOMED!!! THEY'RE UNSTOPPABLE!!! THERE IS LITERALLY NOTHING IN THE ENTIRE PLANET THAT CAN-- oh, wait. Turns out, if we splash a little water on them, they'll die........... Right on."

It's ironic, and it's amazing, and it's almost always completely underwhelming. And we've seen it before, too. Not necessarily water, but, y'know-- "nuclear weapons won't do the trick, but there's a simple solution here that no one's thought of before, and it's working like gangbusters!" For example...

SPOILER ALERTS!!!!!

'War of the Worlds'? I liked that movie (the recent, Steven Spielberg one), but that "easy solution" part of the film left me feeling a bit ...blah. But not as blah as when Tom Cruise was reunited with his kid at the very end. Too much sap for me.

'Signs'? Yeah, kind of a crap movie, I thought. Mainly because of the whole "swing away/cup of water" thing. Well, no, mainly because the aliens looked like knock-off Muppets. But, still.

Even 'The Wizard of Oz' --it's a classic, of course, and I love it as much as everyone else does, but... really? No one ever thought about dousing the Wicked Witch with water before? I mean, her skin was green for Pete's sake, she clearly never took a shower! None of her henchmen ever put that together?

None of the flying monkeys ever got suspicious whenever they were like, "Hey, we're gonna head over to the beach for a swim, y'wanna join us?" and she was all like, "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!"

Lame.

But, yeah, after seeing so many negative reviews, I just figured I was going to see more of the same old stuff with 'Skyline'. BUT!!! They very much went with a different ending. I won't tell you what it was, but I will tell you these two things: 1) It was not at all the typical 'Throw some water on the bad guys, and we'll save the planet' ending. And 2) It was far, FAR more stupid than the typical 'Throw some water on the bad guys, and we'll save the planet' ending.

I mean, dude!!! ...It was just dumb.

And, not only that, but it was a dumb idea, executed poorly!

But, hey, at least it was original. And, at least it wasn't a movie that was pretending to be something it wasn't. They weren't going for the best picture Oscar, right??? They just (I believe) wanted to make a big, goofy flick with a buncha aliens sucking the brains out of a few billion homo sapiens. Something to relax and mow down a bucket of popcorn to.

Total, TOTAL crap movie. And I loved it. Mark my words-- this is bound to become a campy, B-movie classic.


the five things i fell in love with today...

1) How simple it is to write "SPOILER ALERT!!!!!!!" This weekend, I was three short hours away from watching the latest Harry Potter movie when I noticed one of the characters was a trending topic on Twitter. So, I foolishly (foolishly, because I've not read the books) clicked onto it, and found out that this person was going to die!!! Not only this-- here's the message I read (without the names, of course)...

"Dear people who moan about the RIP (Character X) Trending Topic because it's a spoiler. (Character Y) dies in the next one. Yours sincerely, the people who read books."

Seriously, what an asshole, right?!

2) I am, actually, reading a really good book right now, thankyouverymuch! --'Unbroken' by Laura Hillenbrand.
3) Donald Faison.
4) Margaret Hamilton.
5) My less-than-mature response to the twitter jerk: "Hey, thanks SO MUCH for the HP spoilers yesterday! Yours sincerely, the people who are sarcastic to douche bags."

song of the night...
"Somewhere Over the Rainbow" by Judy Garland

movie of the night...
"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part one" --liked it quite a bit!!!