Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Escapist alligator brain candy
Being confused with the Son of God turned out to be the highlight of my day. What now? I could walk that fine line between (A) engaging my readers in an impassioned discussion of sensitive medical issues, and (B) violating patient confidentiality, or I could post this cool shot of Clive Owen from the movie, Shoot ‘Em Up.
I put Shoot ‘Em Up on my Netflix lineup when Darla raved about it and only got around to watching it Sunday night. Clive Owen plays Smith, Not His Real Name, which I suppose is a fine shading on the ol’ trope of the Man With No Name, because at least Smith HAS a Name, albeit a fake one. But it’s easy enough imagining Clint Eastwood or Charles Bronson in this role, except for the lovemaking. Naw, forget it. He’s Smith.
Simple set-up: Smith’s a carrot-chomping dude at a bus stop who comes to the aid of a pregnant woman pursued by a gunman. In the movie’s first few minutes, Smith dispatches the gunman, saves the girl, delivers the baby, and loses his carrot in the process (three guesses how). Girl gets shot to death while Smith is busy protecting the baby, and now our hero has a baby to deal with.
Enter newcomer Monica Belucci, a lactating prostitute who services calcium-deficient tricks. There’s some gratuitous torture, Smith slipping around on floors making every shot, hit men, more hit men, a derailed blow job next to a Dumpster (eew), novel diaper technology which will warm the hearts of environmentalists everywhere, and the world’s smallest bulletproof vest. Why do all these bad, bad men (ring-led by Paul Giamatti) want Baby Oliver dead?
There’s a convoluted plot involving a gun control-fearing gun manufacturer, a Senator with really crappy morals (imagine that), babies farmed for stem cells, Paul Giamatti’s crumbling marriage, and a love story, too! Meanwhile: more of Smith slipping around on wet floors shooting ’em up, more creative use of carrots, more defiance of the laws of physics, more hilariously deadly set pieces (in one case, putting a spiral staircase to spectacular effect), more gratuitous torture, and more naked Monica Belucci, though never enough of that.
Ultimately, Shoot ‘Em Up is one of those flicks that makes you smile, makes you laugh, makes you enjoy yourself in spite of yourself, makes you suspend not just disbelief but all rational thought because, guess what, that plot really does not hold up to scrutiny. Towards the end of the movie, do NOT ask yourself — Now, why did they want to kill the baby? Because you won’t much like the answer.
It’s the disrespect for Newton’s Laws of Motion which rankles the most. Now I need to watch something respectable, something that will get that bad taste out of my mouth. Like, oh, Steve Oedekerk’s Kung Pow: Enter the Fist.
D.
speaking of doing bad things to gravity and violent things to other people, we’re addicted to those chinese movies like Hero…where everything happens in slow motion and across the treetops.
#1: You know it’s a good film when the first keyword on IMDB is “knee in groin”.
#2: “Newcomer” Monica Belucci? Surely you jest.
kate: you mean I CAN’T dance on treetops?
Pat: oops. I IMDB’d her character’s name, and saw only one entry! Blogging tired, folks . . . almost as hazardous as blogging drunk.
I thought perhaps it a tongue-in-cheek, wink-wink joke. But here I’ve gone and uncovered an actual mistake. I guess I rule.
And now I’ve made a grammatical error: perhaps it was a etc. I no longer rule.
OH, look! She played Mary Magdalene in The Passion. Sure it wasn’t Last Temptation?
My tongue is always in my cheek, so technically, you are correct.
Hee! Glad you had fun, Doug. As soon as he slid alllll the way across the garage on an oil slick, I turned my disbelief-o-meter down to zero.
I still think this has one of the funniest sex scenes ever. And I’ve watched quite a bit of humorous porn, so that’s saying something. 🙂
How could I forget the sex scene? I’m really losing my touch.
i had a dream where i met you. it took place in either PA or CA, it was kind of confusing. but there was a pool. and i lost my cell phone. it was a very very strange dream.
just wanted to let you know 😀
Oh, wow — and I just had a dream where this beautiful hot young woman kept trying to find her cell phone in my pants. Go figure!