The Battlefield Earth Drinking Game (or How to Kill Yourself Quickly)

Battlefield Earth, John Trovolta's 2004, quasi-Scientology misstep, is good for very few things. One reviewer claimed that it was only recently surpassed (by The Spririt) as the worst film of all time. It's good for laughing. It's good for crying, from laughing. And it's good for death by alcohol poisoning (if you're under the age of ten, I'd recommend Time Bandits, per my previous post, for the same desired effect).

The Battlefield Earth Drinking Game

Drink Every Time . . .

1. Someone is referred to as a "rat-brain" or "man-animal"
2. Someone talks about "leverage"
3. The Denver library is talked about or shown
4. Fort Knox is shown or talked about
5. "Piece O' Cake!"
6. Anyone fires a laser gun
7. Someone uses an accessory to breathe

Aaaaaaaaaaaaand ten minutes into the movie you're already dead. Congrats!

http://www.lazydork.com/movies/battlefieldearth.htm

Sneaky Frenchman Michel Gondry directs an episode of Flight of the Conchords

On Tuesday night I finally decided to polish off a two-day-old episode of Flight of Conchords, HBO's off-beat musical/comedy show. To my suprise, who do I see listed as director but Michel Gondry. Gondry lensed what I consider to be one of the best love stories ever put to celluloid, Eternal Sunshine Spotless Mind, having previously collaborated on music videos with Daft Punk, Bjork, the White Stripes and Radiohead. Like Fincher and Jonze, he paved the way for other, crapier, music video directors to break into features (I'm looking at you dude who directed Torque). I give dual credit for Spotless to Gondry and Kaufman, but Gondry's recent work, where he personally tends to the script, has been spotty at best (i.e. Be Kind, Rewind).

I assume, as was the case with J.J. Abrams and Joss Whedon directing episodes of The Office, that Gondry was a fan of the show, and asked if he could guest direct (I doubt a show like Conchords could meet his quote). The episode, 'Unnatural Love', was my favorite of the season, and definitely up there in the top three for the entire run. Gondry managed to incorporate his trademark surrealist imagery perfectly, with Bret and Jermaine using video controllers as their instruments. One of the music videos from the episode is embeded below.

How to scar a poor kid for life (Numbers 10-8)

This list started to bounce around my brain right after exiting a 3-D showing of Coraline, which I thought was excellent. It should not, however, been rated PG. This movie creeped me out. If I was a kid, and I saw this movie, I probably would've pissed my pants and then had one of those seizures like in The Ring. My face probably would've inverted. So I've attempted to point fingers. Starting at ten, and counting down, I'm going to name the top 10 movies or tv shows that messed me up as kid, either in atmosphere, general plot, or maybe just because of a certain scene. The order here is mostly arbitrary, but number one is there for a reason (and will be included in a subsequent post). I firmly believe most of these deserve to rot in hell. The rest just freaked me the fuck out, and in a lot of cases, still do. Most I only remember in bits and pieces (and occasionally, incorrectly), and when they come to me at all, it's in a haze - a jumble of faces and inappropriate situations that shouldn't have been shown to anyone in the age range of 3-10. Even now, the thought of a few of these make me shudder.

10. Millennium (1989)

I don't think I saw this movie in theaters. At least I hope not (I was four). Probably on HBO. I remember it had something to do with abducting people off airplanes and taking them to the future. There were weird hairstyles. Everyone looked like David Bowie. People smoked those weird cigarettes like something out of Watchmen. It was like Blade Runner, except it sucked. Kris Kristofferson, a Mulder-wannabe FAA agent, looked like a homeless person (does he ever not?). It succeeded in turning me off airplanes for a bit, since I thought they were being used to ferry me to a shitty future where there were robots with annoying accents, and everyone was about to die from timequakes (pretty sure this one didn't pick up an Academy Award for screenwriting).

9. Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988)

This one is included just because I remember loving cartoons (who didn't) around the time of its release. I also remember loving crossover live-action with cartoons. When Space Jams came out, it made my year. So who, exactly, decided that it would be a good idea to have cute little cartoons being killed off via a poisonous green liquid by the absolutely terrifying Christopher Lloyd (Judge Doom)? I mean, I found this guy freaky in Back to the Future, so having him hold some poor, hand-drawn bunny rabbit over his bubbling concoction of death played more like the end of Terminator 2 than an episode of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Also, Bob Hoskins should never play the likable guy. Bob Hoskins scares the shit out of me almost as much as Christopher Lloyd.

8. Time Bandits (1981)


Dear Terry Gilliam,

If anyone ever asks you to direct a kids movie again, please, please, jump out the nearest window. I can understand if you're looking to cause an increase in suicides for the 8-12 emo-kid demographic, but you literally only know how to make movies that depress, in brutal efficiency. You're currently batting a thousand at getting people to cut themselves after downing a handle of Jim Beam with a mixture of horse tranquilizers. So when you decided to go out and make the 'kids' movie Time Bandits, whose brilliant idea was it to have the parents of the kids die during the last five minutes after touching a devil toaster!?! Do you have any idea how fucked up this was for me? Here we have a group of kids going through a ton of terrible shit with midgets, and hanging cages, and weird looking sailing boats, and demonic figures, and when they finally get home, you BLOW THEIR PARENTS UP INTO A PIECE OF MOLTEN METAL. Maybe that's how they teach lessons to kids over on your side of the pond, but over here, we like our kids to use toasters for Pop Tarts and breakfast burritos, not as a weapon to blow their parents to shit.

Thanks.

[7-5 to follow]

The National, predictably, have an awesome celebrity playlist

It's well over a year old (I just found it), but includes some less known, yet nonetheless fantastic tracks from Beirut, New Order, Yo La Tengo, M. Ward, Broken Social Scene and others. The playlist really gives some good perspective on The National's musical influences (though I'm suprised not to see and Tom Waits or Nick Cave, but maybe that's just too obvious).

I would also highly recommend Dark Was the Night, a double cd compilation, featuring brand-new tracks or reissues, that came out yesterday benefitting AIDS relief. It includes many of the same bands (but throws in Bon Iver, Arcade Fire, and Andrew Bird to boot) and was produced by brothers Aaron and Bryce Dessner (of The National).

http://www.rhapsody.com/playlistcentral/playlistdetail?playlistId=ply.16460218


[Updated: Some wonderful soul just posted the new National song off of DWTK]