OMG...

I just watched a really, really bad movie: Bad Girls From Mars! I mean this was a STINKER, lol!

There were a few funny things about this viewing, though...

First, it took me backward in Time. It's one of those "comedies" that isn't funny, but doesn't want to make the effort to be actually good. But what gets you to pick up the flick in the video rental store is the cover art. The premise seems kind of fun, the freeze-frames from the movie that they use on the back of the cover seem to be reasonably well shot, and you know there's going to be nudity in it. (This is assuming, of course, you're a male living in the era before free Internet porn.) I've rented more videos than I care to innumerate because of this marketing formula.

But this was when I was a horny teen and didn't have any other outlet for my... less noble urges...

And, in fact, as I watched this flick I estimated that it was probably made around 1980 or 1981. This would have put it right around the time that Betamax and VHS videotapes began to sell and video rentals began to come into being. (If memory serves.)

I was therefor shocked (SHOCKED, I tells ya) when I IMDb-ed this flick and discovered it was actually made a full decade later!

I mean, people should really have known better by then, lol.

Still, it was kind of a blast from the Past to squirm through bad dialogue, cringe-worthy acting, non-existent cinematography and direction and truly abysmal "jokes" with the only brief reprieve being the occasional flash of flesh, lol. (There is a running gag wherein the murderer leaves clues behind on his latest victim in the form of a poem. The last line of each poem completely fails to rhyme, even though you -- the viewer -- think you know what the rhyming final word will be. When I thought this movie was made in 1979 or 1980 I thought this was rather a good on-going joke. Knowing, however, that it was made 18 years ago I'm less impressed. The Muppets utilized more sophisticated comedic construction back when Jim Henson was still in charge.)

Another amusing thing about watching this was some of the responses of some of the Hulu viewers. For the most part, Hulu seems to house TV shows and movies that are too old to be offensive in any way. As a result, the response posted by some of the Puritans who stumbled onto this flick seemed well disproportionate.

I mean, Hulu states flat-out, very clearly, before the movie starts that this is an R-rated movie and some material will likely be inappropriate for anyone under 18.

So where was the surprise?

Besides, the different logline descriptions Hulu uses clearly tells you that the movie is centered around sexuality: specifically, the gratutitous sexuality of a low-budget film-within-a-film. I mean, I watched the flick and it is exactly what the description says it will be: It's a bad movie about low-budget (exploitation) "film-makers" who are making a sex movie. It is therefor not much of a mental stretch to assume the the movie itself is probably low-budget (exploitative), probably poorly made, and probably has unnecessary nudity and sexuality.

But a few post-ers accused the flick of being a porn -- I know porn (like, biblically), and this was NO porn! -- and one even proudly announced that they could only watch the first 37 minutes and some-odd seconds of the movie.

(Between you and me, I was tempted to bale on this flick way before that, like around the 10-minute mark. There wasn't much story or acting going on to hold this cat's attention, and there were quite a few nude scenes during that time -- like, more than enough to send a sexulally-repressed person running to confessional. So I'm kind of wondering if maybe this individual wasn't deriving... some other... "usefulness" from staying with the movie that long.)

So anyway, the reason this reaction from some of the more vocal Hulu community amuses me is this: Has it been THAT long that nudity and sexuality has been out of vogue?! I mean, I know we're selling stuff with sex just as much as ever (during this viewing I watched a couple of really funny commercials that were using half-naked hot chick speaking sensually to sell shaving gel; but it was done quite cleverly, I thought) while we condemn sexuality in any non-procreational form in mixed company. But I thought we were getting to the point where we could all admit that even though we're supposed to feel bad about sex and sexuality, we really all enjoy it.

Is it just me? I mean how prude are we as a society? And seriously, how could we possibly decieve ourselves into believing that anyone else is buying that "sex is bad and nasty and dirty" and all that?

And just who are we trying to convince anyway?! Who is it that we think wants us to think that sex is bad?

Blah.

Too confusing for me.

Then again... I've been awake since 2:00 pm today.

Let's say you wake up at 5:00 am to be at work at 7:00 am. This would be like you waking up at 1:00 am on your Thursday (when Wednesday is really a bi-otch, generally speaking) so you can get to work at 3:00 am.

Ha! You'd almost be working my shift then, hee-hee! ;P

Anyway, I may be a little punchy at this point. I can REALLY use the extra money and, for the most part, this work day has been very, very genrous to me! But 1 hour away from the end of a14-hour shift, I believe I may be forgiven if my powers of reason are less than sound.

Plus, you know... I've been corrupting my mind with bad movies during some of that time, lol. ;P

GUESS WHAT!!!

I've made it out of Egypt in Tomb Raider Anniversary and have only 3 more levels to go!!! :D I'm running around Natla's Mines at the moment.

That's, of course, when I'm not writing.

...which is kind of a lot, sorta, lol...

Nah, actually I'm doing fine.

I pretend to give myself a hard time about procrastinating, but right now I think I'm doing well. It's not the speed of the creation, but the quality.

I've whipped outlines out production-line style and on a schedule, and the resultant story -- after months of typing day after day -- is just as weak as I (deep down) feared it would be.

Conversely, when I have waited until I knew an outline was working to sit down and bang out the pages, the result was always just a little more special than I had hoped.

So I'm not actually feeling guilty about how quickly or slowly the outline is coming along. I won't be able to finish it until I know my characters and situations inside and out, and until I finish the outline I can bet that I don't know my characters and situations inside and out. (Years of failure serve as a FANTASTICLY EFFECTIVE teacher.)

There a Q&A with a remarkably talented writer/director/animator here at Creative Screenwriting Magazine's blog. This cat has a really great, really productive attitude about writing!

SPOILER ALERT!!!

Please do not listen to the above-linked Q&A if you have not yet seen, but plan to see PIXAR's Wall-E. The Q&A contains spoilers for Wall-E, Monster's Inc. and maybe Toy Story (if you haven't seen that, either).

Now, if you're reading this blog entry, I'm guessing (a) you've seen Wall-E by now or (b) have no interest in watching it (in which case the spoilers wouldn't really ruin anything for you). But I don't want to accidentally ruin any movie for you, so I thought I'd slip the Spoiler Alert in, just to be safe.

Oops!

Gotta get to work. It's the point in my shift (hard days or easy days) wherein I have, like, 5 things that have to happen all at once.

Hope you enjoy your weekend and have an easy-breezy day!!!

:D

LOVE TO MY GNOMEY-GODDESS!!!

xoxoxo

I haven't heard from her in a couple of days, so I'm going to assume that means she's healing and getting better. (Simply because I hate to think that maybe she's feeling so crappy she can't get in touch. It HAS TO be the "healing" thing! ;P )