Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy

Year 18, Day 45 - 2/14/26 - Movie #5,245

BEFORE: Renee Zellweger carries over from "New in Town", and really, it was always going to be this one for Valentine's Day. My chain this year got re-structured and re-purposed a couple times, but this one was always the focal point, I think. Partially that's because it connects to so many other romance-based films on my list - I've got more films coming up with Emma Thompson, Jim Broadbent and Celia Imrie, that's just a few of the connections that were NOT needed as links. So I had some flexibility just by putting this one in the middle and then expanding out from there. Sure, I couldn't put all the Nicole Kidman films together - OK, so I'll have to split one Isabella Rossellini film off from the herd. It doesn't matter, as long as I can stick the right film on Valentine's Day - that's what it's all about, right? I mean, I'm not watching films about Christmas in April, unless one manages to sneak by me. By the same token, I'm not going to miss checking in with Bridget Jones on V-Day if there's an update on her life to be watched.

I'm getting a late start keeping track of Turner Classic Movies programming, since "31 Days of Oscar" started on February 13, in the middle of the month, which is very weird. I guess 31 days of something can start any time, but a month is still a month, right? I guess since the Oscars will be airing on March 15 they had to count back 31 days from that, but why not just celebrate the Oscars in March, if that's when the ceremony is? OK, let's play catch up, here are the movies TCM screened on February 13: 

The first theme is "Oscars Go to a Fantasy World":
6:00 am "Cabin in the Sky" (1943)

7:45 am "The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm" (1962)

10:15 am "The Thief of Bagdad" (1940)

12:15 pm "Juliet of the Spirits" (1965)
2:45 pm "Lili" (1953)

4:15 pm "7 Faces of Dr. Lao" (1964)

6:00 pm "Brigadoon" (1954)

followed by "Oscar Goes to a Wedding":

8:00 pm "Father of the Bride" (1950)
9:45 pm "Four Weddings and a Funeral" (1994)

12:00 am "The Graduate" (1967)

2:00 am "High Society" (1956)

4:00 am "Smilin' Through" (1932)

I think I've seen only 4 of these - "Father of the Bride", "Four Weddings and a Funeral", "The Graduate" and "High Society", so that's 4 out of 12, or 25%. Not a great start. 

Today, the big day, Valentine's Day, the theme is "Oscar Goes to Paris":

6:00 am "Roberta" (1935)

8:00 am "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" (1939)

10:00 am "Ninotchka" (1939)

12:00 pm "Casablanca" (1942)

2:00 pm "Midnight in Paris" (2011)

3:45 pm "Gigi" (1958)

6:00 pm "Charade" (1963)

8:00 pm "An American in Paris" (1951)

10:00 pm "Moulin Rouge!" (2001)

12:15 am "Amelie" (2001)

2:30 am "Irma La Douce" (1963)

I've done a little better on these, I've seen 8 of today's films - "Roberta", "Casablanca", "Midnight in Paris", "Gigi", "Charade", "An American in Paris", "Moulin Rouge!" and "Irma La Douce". So that brings me up to 12 seen out of 23, which is 52%, a lot better than yesterday. I'll keep track for the next month, unless this bores me. If you want to catch "An American in Paris" or "Moulin Rouge" tonight with your sweetie, well, you could do a lot worse. 

FOLLOW-UP TO: "Bridget Jones's Baby" (Movie #2,859)

THE PLOT: After jumping back into the dating pool, widowed mother Bridget Jones finds herself caught between a younger man and her son's science teacher. 

AFTER: It's been nine years since the last "Bridget Jones" film, so long that I had to go back today and re-read the Wiki summary for "Bridget Jones's Baby" to remind myself about what happened. Bridget slept with two men and got pregnant, then while she was unsure of which one was the father we had kind of a love triangle thing going on. Bridget ended up marrying Mark, who I guess was the father, and had just split from his wife? And then suddenly Bridget's ex, Daniel, who was thought dead, was found alive - so it sure seemed like they were going to be setting up another boring love triangle for the next film. Yawn...

Well, thank God, that's not the way the story played out - whatever repercussions there were from Daniel being alive again didn't seem to affect Bridget's marriage to Mark, because they had a daughter in addition to that son, and things were apparently fine for a long while, until they weren't. We rejoin the story four years after Mark was killed on some kind of humanitarian mission to the Sudan, and Bridget's getting dressed up to attend some kind of anniversary memorial for Mark, with all of their friends. The weird thing is, Mark still seems to be hanging around, because the memories are that strong, Bridget sees him everywhere she goes, and so we see him too, just to drive that point home. Well, this isn't a movie about ghosts, except that it sort of is, I mean, how else can they depict a character's absence, outside of showing him? I mean, you can't really film him NOT being there, so we kind of have to allow this. Well, we have no choice. 

In another flashback with a dead person - Bridget's father - she remembers that she promised that she wouldn't just survive after he was gone, she would remember to live. Also, her doctor gives her the advice that she should return to work as a form of therapy, which doesn't really seem like a medical opinion, but whatever. The writing's on the wall, what with everyone giving Bridget advice from every direction, it's time to go back to work and maybe even start dating again. Also, her old boss keeps calling her for advice on how to do stuff, so yeah, maybe it's time. 

Bridget meets a park ranger who helps rescue her kids from a tree, and really, that's as good a place to start as any - Roxster is 29 and thinks that Bridget is 35 (I'm not sure how old the character is supposed to be, but Zellwever was like 54). Well, why should she correct him, OK, I guess we're going with 35. The contact with a younger man leads her to join Tinder and learn what sexting is, and how to send emojis of the Greek flag and a duck, whatever that means. (she wants to "duck" him?) Bridget's daughter is eager to call Roxster their "new daddy", and I bet Bridget's calling him "daddy" too, but her son is still coping with his father's death, so he's not really on board. However, eventually the age difference eventually becomes too much for Roxster to handle, and he "ghosts" her - I guess he finally figured out she wasn't 35? 

Meanwhile, Daniel has a health emergency, and had listed Bridget as his "next of kin", even though she's not. Daniel's in a situation-ship with one of his many younger girlfriends, so there's no chance of Bridget getting back together with him, however she urges him to get back in touch with his teenage son, now that he's alive again. It's, you know, not a terrible suggestion. 

An encounter on Career Day at school with her son's teacher, Mr. Walliker, leads her to consider him the next link in her chain, and a camping trip where she gets to see him without his shirt on kind of seals the deal, but there are still issues to work out. He's a pragmatic scientist, for one thing, who believes that when we die, that's it, there's no heaven, no soul left behind. Roxster comes back at one point, so we do have a love triangle here for like one brief moment, but it's too late, Bridget's moved on and doesn't think they can overcome the age difference. Can she finally be smart enough, for once, to only date one man at a time? So after a winter school concert, Bridget invites Mr. Walliker out to join them at the pub afterwards, and he almost doesn't, because he's socially awkward and more used to dealing with school children than other adults. 

Fast forward a whole year, and Bridget throws a New Year's Eve party for everyone, all family and friends, except maybe no ghosts this time? She's in a relationship with Mr. Walliker, now calling him "Scott", and Daniel has been re-united with his son, Enzo. Everything's seem pretty settled, at least until the next sequel. If they were going to stop making more entries in this franchise, this wouldn't be a bad place to call it. 

NITPICK POINT: Did we really need to check in with ALL of Bridget's friends, accumulated over the course of all three previous movies? That's like a LOT of people to keep track of, I certainly can't remember them all or recall what their back-stories are. OK, it's great that the actors are probably also friends and they get sandwiched into one of these films every few years when another one comes around, but who really cares about all 47 minor characters? Can't we assume that maybe over the years Bridget Jones was a busy mother and maybe lost touch with a few of them? Please? 

On the flip-side of that, what the heck was Isla Fisher doing in this film? She played some foil character who was also a mother, but one who threw her kids' video games out the window for some reason. Was her character some famous person that Bridget once interviewed or something? I'm just going off the fact that when her kids ask her who that is, Bridget says "Never meet your heroes..." and I just didn't get the joke. What was going on there? Who was this character supposed to be, because it was never explained? 

Directed by Michael Morris (director of "To Leslie")

Also starring Chiwetel Ejiofor (last seen in "Venom: The Last Dance"), Leo Woodall, Jim Broadbent (last seen in "The Lady in the Van"), Gemma Jones (last seen in "Ammonite"), Colin Firth (last seen in "Hope Springs"), Hugh Grant (last seen in "Unfrosted"), James Callis (last seen in "Bridget Jones's Baby"), Neil Pearson (ditto), Shirley Henderson (last seen in "See How They Run"), Sally Phillips (last seen in "Blinded by the Light"), Jeff Mirza (ditto), Sarah Solemani (last seen in 'How to Build a Girl"), Celia Imrie (last seen in "The Thursday Murder Club"), Leila Farzad (last seen in "The Marvels"), Josette Simon (last seen in "The Witches"), Nico Parker (last seen in "Reminiscence"), Dolly Wells (last seen in "I Do... Until I Don't"), Claire Skinner (last seen in "Bridget Jones's Diary"), Anat Dychtwald (ditto), Ben Illis (ditto), Toby Whithouse (ditto), Casper Knopf, Mila Jankovic, Ian Midlane, Emma Thompson (last seen in "Tom Hanks: The Nomad"), Isla Fisher (last seen in "The Present"), Joanna Scanlan (last seen in "Kinky Boots"), Alessandro Bedetti, Elena Rivers, Neil Edmond (last seen in "Johnny English Strikes Again"), Mark Lingwood (last seen in "Into the Storm"), Penny Stuttaford, James Rawlings (last seen in "The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel"), Ruth Gibson, Jane Fowler (last seen in "The Dig"), Ellie White (last seen in "Wonka"), Marina Bye (ditto), Rohan Berry, Seb Cardinal, Harry Goldsmith, James Goldsmith, Isla Ashworth (last seen in "Here"), Laura Bailey, Lin Yap, Rosie Holt, Naveed Khan (last seen in "Death on the Nile"), Kath Hughes, Oli Green (last seen in "Lift"), Julie Bartlett, Paul Hunter (last seen in "Cyrano"), Daisy Duczmal (last seen in "Barbie"), Zheng Xi Yong (ditto), Maggie Livermore, Sebastian Dunn, Lucille Ferguson,

RATING: 6 out of 10 condom choices

New in Town

Year 18, Day 44 - 2/13/26 - Movie #5,244

BEFORE: Let's get back on track here, just a simple rom-com that will set me up for Valentine's Day. No heavy lifting here, I think, just a typical fish-out-of-water with a mismatched couple that turns out to be a better match over time. Frances Conroy carries over from "The Tale".

THE PLOT: A Miami businesswoman adjusts to her new life in a small Minnesota town.

AFTER: We've got the fish out of water in Lucy Hill, a Miami businesswoman who's trying to advance in her career, she gets sent to Minnesota to automate a food manufacturing plant and also "downsize" (aka fire) half of its workers. But first she needs to get them to install the new machinery before they're let go. Gee, you don't suppose she'll be won over by their folksy ways, do you? It's a bit hard to take her seriously because at first she's so dumb that she didn't realize it was going to be COLD in Minnesota in the winter? Come on, she brought 17 bags of luggage with her but she didn't pack a winter coat? How can someone so business-savvy (supposedly) be so stupid that she didn't check the weather in the city she was flying to? 

And similarly did she somehow expect a warm reception from the people that she's there to fire? She thought it was going to be easy to trick everyone into working themselves out of a job? What the hell, if you're going to make this character a smart businesswoman, you can't make her clueless at the same time, that's just not going to work, but yet it's where we're going to find out comedy tonight. The plant foreman tells her that "Gopher Day" is a state holiday and his crew needs to get the day off, and she FALLS FOR THAT? Give me a break...

Sure, it's a different world, one with ice fishing and potluck dinners, snow days and fish frys and sure, there are going to be some culture clashes.  Lucy starts making a list of the people who cross her path or seem weird to her, and those are going to be the first people fired. I'm sure that making that list and leaving it where people can find it won't have any possible repercussions at all... In the same fashion, she manages to bad-mouth country music, pick-up trucks and beer during her welcome dinner, and these are all the things held sacred by Ted, the guy she thought she was being set up with, only he turns out to be the union rep, somebody she needs to deal with on an almost daily basis at the planet. Whoopsie. Yeah, when you're "New in Town" you should probably not try to piss off so many people, especially the local waitress at the diner. 

It's a long turn-around for her to appreciate this town's people and their way of life, and things get worse when she swerves to avoid hitting a cow in the road during a snowstorm and getting her car stuck in a ravine. That union rep also happens to be the guy with the snowplow who rescues her, she kept warm by drinking alcohol (not recommended) and then said some more things about him while she was drunk. But she gets back in his good graces by giving his daughter a make-over before her first high-school dance. She and Ted start a romance, only it's probably a very bad idea for the plant executive to be dating the union rep, right? RIGHT? 

Christmas comes and goes, and so does Valentine's Day (seasonally appropriate!) but before the spring thaw, Lucy's corporate overlords want her to close the plant because the yogurt line is not selling well and is going to be discontinued. So now rather than laying off 50% of the staff (or perhaps because she sort of never got around to DOING that...) she's tasked with laying off 100% of the staff. But instead of doing that, she goes rogue and has the workers re-tool all the machines to make tapioca pudding instead, based on her assistant's family recipe, which they also somehow test-market and promote in just a matter of weeks, all without corporate's permission. Surprisingly, the new product is a hit and Lucy is somehow not fired outright for disobeying her bosses. Only in a movie, right? 

In a possible similar fashion, the director of this movie quit halfway through post-production. It sounds like he has just as many disputes with his producers as Lucy had with her company's executives. So you kind of have to wonder what sort of product he was trying to put out, and how that might have differed from the film that did get released. The end result isn't terrible, but it's hardly one of the best romance films out there either - still, it does conform to all of the standard rom-com techniques. 

Directed by Jonas Elmer

Also starring Renee Zellweger (last seen in "Bob Fosse: It's Showtime!"), Harry Connick Jr. (last seen in "Basic"), Siobhan Fallon Hogan (last seen in "Daddy Day Care"), J.K. Simmons (last seen in "The Accountant 2"), Mike O'Brien, Ferron Guerreiro, James Durham, Robert Small (last seen in "Transporter 2"), Wayne Nicklas, Hilary Carroll, Nancy Jane Drake, Stewart J. Zully (last seen in "Malcolm X"), Marilyn Boyle (last seen in "Elvis Meets Nixon"), Dan Augusta, Jimena Hoyos (last seen in "The Devil Wears Prada"), Suzanne Coy, Ordena Stephens-Thompson, Devin McCracken, Leif Lynch, Adam Cronan (last seen in "They Cloned Tyrone"), Tom Wahl, Christopher Read, Peter Jordan, Vanessa Kuzyk, Matt Kippen, Ben Beauchemin, Kristen Harris (last seen in "Nobody"), Blane Cypurda, Brett Sorensen

RATING: 6 out of 10 scrapbook photos

The Tale

Year 18, Day 43 - 2/12/26 - Movie #5,243

BEFORE: I've got a few days off in a row, it makes sense, I had five days working in a row, and now comes some down time - this is the peril in having two temp jobs, there are going to be times when neither place of operation is open. The Brooklyn Nets are away on a two-week road trip, and the circus is coming to the stadium, only I don't work concerts or circuses just yet. The theater's going to be closed for five days for some repair work, so I'm not schedule to work again until next weekend. I could go on-line and try to pick up some temp work somewhere, or I can just relax a bit and catch up on some streaming shows, log in some comic books, that sort of thing. Most likely I'll slack off and then wish I'd looked for another temp job. 

It's been a weird week already, it started with the Super Bowl and it's going to end with Valentine's Day, with a Friday the 13th in-between. And then the Olympics are going on at the same time, I'm tuning in occasionally, for like curling and ice dancing but I'm not going to make. a regular habit of it. And then next week is both Lunar New Year and Mardi Gras - we sometimes go to a Brazilian churrascaria on Ash Wednesday because it's a day some religions don't eat meat, therefore less competition. But we went once on Mardi Gras, which is also Carnivale, and regretted it because there were scantily-clad dancers shaking their stuff a little too close to the buffet, it was a real strip-club sort of atmosphere, and that will kind of kill Date Night. We may go out for meat night halfway between Valentine's Day and Carnivale, you know, just to avoid the crowds. But that would be Monday, which is President's Day. Damn, all the holidays are running together, but I don't think a lot of people go out to eat on President's Day, so we may be OK. 

Speaking of the Super Bowl, I just finally scanned through the Pre-Game show, which was itself four or five hours long. This is when you'll see the next level down of ads, companies that couldn't afford to advertise during the game itself, so there were just regular, non-FX heavy ads for Domino's Pizza and Chunky Soup, some medications I've never heard of that only cure ONE thing instead of two (like Skyrizi does) and some of the cheaper mobile plans - for some reason every other ad starred Zoe Saldana. And yes, there were some ads that promoted the more expensive ads that would air later in the day, during the big game. So those were ads that were ads for other ads, this is the world we live in now. 

Laura Dern carries over again from "Lonely Planet".

THE PLOT: A woman filming a documentary on childhood rape victims starts to question the nature of her childhood relationship with her riding instructor and running coach. 

AFTER: We've got another problematic film tonight, which kind of puts this one under the "relationship" heading rather than the "romance" one. The main character here recalls a complex relationship she had when she was a young girl, one she wrote a story about, and the relationship was between an older man and his girlfriend (who was married to a different man) and let me be completely clear here from the start - any sexual contact between anyone under the age of 18 and an adult is wrong wrong wrong. Honestly I don't even see why I have to mention this to proceed, but I guess I do, at the very least I'm not comfortable even discussing this film without this as a disclaimer. It's the MOVIE itself that seems to do some back-pedaling on this point, and it kind of doesn't help that the director here is telling her own story, this is based on her childhood, so she's the one who seems to have some ambivalence over whatever happened back in the 1970's. 

Which is weird, because if she just came out and started with how WRONG that all was, we the audience would already be on her side, like WE'RE not the ones who need convincing that something very wrong happened, that this relationship was rooted in deception and illegality from the start, it never should have happened, instead it feels like the director made the film to convince herself that some very nasty things went down, though they felt beautiful and honest at the time. If anybody needs to be brought into the light and made to understand that bad people do bad things and there are repercussions for bad actions, even if those people seemed like extremely charming, loving and nice enough people. Yes, yes, of course there was an era of free love and a sexual revolution, however in now way was the freedom ever extended to minors. OK, are we all clear on this point? Even the director? 

Well, at least I'm seasonally appropriate tonight, because this is another film that premiered at the Sundance Festival in 2018, and that's a January thing. And the real-life sexual abuser (referred to in this film by another name) was a two-time Olympic medalist and a nine-time Olympic coach - OK, in rowing, that's a summer sport and the winter Olympics are going on right now, but really, I'll take any tie-in right now to justify this film being exactly HERE, like 1/4 of the way through a chain devoted to love and romance. I did have a chance to watch this last year, it could have fit in-between "Trial By Fire" and "Citizen Ruth", but I held this one back because I needed to hit Mother's Day in time. This film isn't really about mothers, but you know, "Citizen Ruth" was about a pregnant woman, so I guess that one fit and this one didn't. 

The film is about Jennifer Fox, a director of documentary films and a college professor, who is contacted by her mother, who found an essay that Jennifer wrote when she was 13, one that discussed being in a relationship with an older boyfriend. Jennifer dismissed the relationship as just something she hid to keep from upsetting her mother, however her mother knows (as we do) that regardless how Jennifer felt about the relationship then, or how she feels about it now, that in all ways legal and social, this was a form of rape. There's no possible way a 13 year old girl can be considered mature enough to give her consent for sexual contact, society came up with this rule at some point, and it's a pretty good one. 

The relationship began when she attended a horse-training camp with three other girls, and the woman who ran the camp, Mrs. G, insisted that the girls all go running every morning with her and Bill, an athlete and coach. At the end of the summer, Mrs. G and Bill reveal to Jennifer that they are lovers, even though Mrs. G is married to someone else - but sure, it's the 1970's, remember. Jennifer kept visiting the camp because that's where her horse was, and over time she was sexually groomed and lured into a relationship with "Bill". It's very likely that Mrs. G was recruiting many girls for Bill, and this all sort of feels like a Jeffrey Epstein/Ghislaine Maxwell sort of situation. If you wonder how this all comes to be, you start with a couple of very charming people who know how to find young girls who hate their parents, and things kind of snowball from there. 

The adult Jennifer starts to recall her childhood experiences, perhaps with rose-colored glasses, as they say, but after re-meeting some of the other girls from camp as adults, as well as the older Mrs. G, she starts to realize that maybe she wasn't as in control of the whole situation back then as she thought, and that these very nice people were perhaps deceiving her about their intentions, though they just claimed at the time they were all about love and being honest and in favor of self-expression and personal growth. Well, a pair of serial child rapists really wouldn't be expected to present themselves as such, right? 

Jennifer refuses, on some level, to admit that she was groomed or raped, because she didn't want to think of herself as a victim. Through imaginary conversations with her younger self, however, she gradually starts to understand now what she didn't understand then. Her boyfriend and mother keep encouraging her to investigate the situation further and talk to more people, because perhaps if she realizes how many girls the couple was taking advantage of, she can finally think of herself as someone who was deceived and stop thinking of the events as something beautiful and wholesome. Again, we were all already there, it's just like waiting for the main character to catch up and join us. 

Finally, Jennifer remembers having anxiety attacks after every encounter with Bill, and she's able to put the pieces together - then she "broke up" with Bill right before the couple had planned a group encounter with her and another girl. From there things could have easily escalated to Jennifer being filmed, or trafficked or even sold into slavery, but at least she listened to her body's reactions and ended things before they went any further. Years of denial or intentional mis-remembering of the facts could then be counter-acted with therapy as an adult, perhaps. However it's just as likely that as an adult Jennifer would be incapable of having a normal relationship if she were unable to resolve or understand the events in her past. 

So yeah, we drew a tough one tonight, it's never easy when you learn that somebody you thought cared about you and said you were special was a complete liar, and that they were only interested in their own pleasure and took advantage of your innocence. The best I can offer up tonight is that we can gain a little bit of understanding about HOW this sort of thing comes to be, and we can extrapolate from here to maybe understand current events a bit, especially the Epstein Files. Understand, not forgive or explain away. OK, I'm going to move on now and try to get set up for all these holidays approaching. 

Directed by Jennifer Fox

Also starring Jason Ritter (last seen in "Swimfan"), Common (last seen in "Fool's Paradise"), Elizabeth Debicki (last seen in "Vita & Virginia"), Jessica Sarah Flaum, Laura Allen (last seen in "Tulip Fever"), Juli Erickson (last seen in "Bernie"), Matthew Rauch (last seen in "Phil Spector"), Ellen Burstyn (last seen in "Faye"), John Heard (last seen in "Too Big to Fail"), Dana Healey, Aaron Williamson, Shay Lee Abeson, Isabella Amara (last seen in "Vengeance"), Jodi Long (last heard in "The Monkey King"), Isabelle Nelisse (last seen in "It"), Daniel Berson (last seen in "War Dogs"), Chelsea Alden, Frances Conroy (last seen in "No Pay, Nudity"), Tina Parker (last seen in "Men, Women & Children"), Scott Takeda (last seen in "The Space Between Us"), Noah Lomax (last seen in "Trial by Fire"), Grant James (last seen in "Factory Girl"), Madison David, Tarek Bishara (last seen in "Barely Lethal"), Gretchen Koerner (last seen in "Irresistible"), Jaqueline Fleming (last seen in "Contraband"), Jacob Craig Bullock, Logan Chadwick, Cadence Lee, Kristi Taylor

RATING: 5 out of 10 family photo albums

Lonely Planet

Year 18, Day 42 - 2/11/26 - Movie #5,242

BEFORE: Between both jobs I've been working straight through for the last five days, but now the theater is closing down for a week of repairs, and the Nets are going on their last big road-trip of the season, I think. The circus is coming in to the stadium, but I don't get to work that event - so I'm free for like the next 10 days, unless I can find a new, quick temp job. I guess I'll look for one tomorrow, I can't do it today, one last basketball game tonight, then 2 weeks where I don't have to go there. There's work coming up at the theater, it's just a week and a half away - it would be fine, except there's nothing new on TV except the Winter Olympics, and I'm not really into that. C'est la vie. 

Laura Dern carries over from "Certain Women". 

THE PLOT: At a retreat in Morocco, a woman meets a young man whose acquaintanceship evolves into an intoxicating, life-altering love affair. 

AFTER: Well, here we go, the first simple romance film of February so far - relatively speaking of course, because romance is never simple. But no serial killers tonight, no pregnant dogs, no porn stars moving in next door, no four-hour drive back home to Livingston after class. Just one love triangle to deal with, but as soon as that gets settled, I think we'll be moving straight on to the happy ending bit. Honestly, it's a relief - however, there is a downside, it's a double-edged sword, because now this film looks rather simplistic by comparison. No, no, I can't miss the serial killers or the porn stars, they were all just there to confuse things and get in the way of love. We're dealing with people at an author's retreat in Morocco - and we all know what happens in Morocco stays in Morocco, right? Oh, that's not a thing. 

Successful writer Katherine Loewe has been invited to this retreat, and she's really just looking for some quiet time alone to finish her latest novel. She's struggling with writer's block because her personal life is getting in the way, her partner (boyfriend? husband?) of 14 years, a sculptor, is asking her to move out, which she promises to work on, or at least think about working on, as soon as the retreat is over. Geez, you'd think if she has that much money from writing, she can just buy her own house and pay some movers to bring all her stuff there while she's out of the country, then once she gets back, she can start her new life. But I guess it's just not THAT simple, is it? Romance is never simple, and break-ups doubly so. 

Meanwhile, a younger author, Lily Kemp, has arrived at the same retreat with her boyfriend Owen, who is a finance manager or an equity trader or something. Doesn't matter, except that he's involved in a deal to buy some land because it has coal on it (under it?) and he promised the seller he could stay on in some capacity, and his business partners are against that and FOR screwing the seller out of any future earnings, completely. Owen is not happy about how this deal is about to go down, but what can he do, he's in Morocco where there's barely any cell phone signal. Anyway, Lily is an author who's written her first novel, and she's a big fan of Katherine, who's written many novels. BUT Lily also tends to belittle Owen because he doesn't know much about literature, and they argue all the time, so come on, do I really need to paint you a picture here? It's obvious from the start that this relationship is doomed, but THEY have to realize that, and it's going to take some time. 

It's also fairly obvious that Owen and Katherine are perfect for each other, they meet when they both want to go into town at the same time, though Katherine is still focused on her novel and barely notices the hunky man right in front of her. Give her some time, too, we're going to get there. As the retreat wears on, Owen and Katherine keep ending up alone together, and having more and more intimate conversations, while Owen and Lily are spending less and less time together and therefore realize that they don't really share the same interests, they don't want to hang out with the same people, and they have different attitudes about drugs, alcohol and fidelity. So, umm, what DO they have in common, then? Exactly. 

Lily keeps coming back to the hotel room half-naked and high - and Owen makes a pass at Katherine, only she declines because of their age difference. Age ain't nothing but a number, though, and finally Owen offers to take her on a road trip, really, anywhere that isn't this stuffy retreat, and so that's what they do. Owen ends up quitting his job because it feels like the right thing to do, anyway his co-workers are a bunch of dicks, and nothing really is standing in the way of Owen and Katherine getting together BUT then her manuscript is stolen (who walks around with the ONLY copy of their next novel in their purse?) and Katherine realizes that she let herself get distracted by this new romance, and she wasn't focused on protecting what's really important, which is her work. She leaves and goes back to New York, to put her new life together and start the next book over again. 

Well, New York City is a big place, but people still manage to find each other there, or bump into each other there, so there's still a chance for these crazy kids if they're willing to reach out and try again. So there's that - they can still find love in a hopeless place, and maybe she lost THAT book but she can write a different one, all about finding love with a younger man at a writer's retreat, maybe. Life is a series of hellos and goodbyes, Billy Joel once sang. Actually the first song that came up on shuffle play for me today, after watching this was "Don't Answer Me" by the Alan Parsons Project, and perhaps those lyrics are more appropriate: 

"When we were living in a dream world / Clouds got in the way

We gave it up in a moment of madness / And threw it all away

It ain't enough that we meet as strangers / I can't set you free

So will you turn your back forever / On what you mean to me?

Don't answer me, don't break the silence, don't let me win

Don't answer me, stay on your island, don't let me in.

Run away and hide from everyone

Can you change the things we've said and done?"

I think it's really easy to root for Katherine here, over Lily - partially this is because the character of Lily is so terrible. She's got "artist brain" after writing just ONE novel, and she's entitled and self-centered and quite horrible to Owen. I mean, he obviously doesn't fit in at a writer's retreat, so why keep pointing that out? Why bring him in the first place to somewhere he's not going to be happy? And then there's the fact that the actress is so cold and emotionless - at first I thought she was Madchen Amick, but of course she's too young. She kind of reminds me of Lily Collins, of course without the English accent and any acting skill whatsoever.

Directed by Susannah Grant (director of "Catch and Release")

Also starring Liam Hemsworth (last seen in "Cut Bank"), Diana Silvers (last seen in "Ma"), Younes Boucif, Adriano Giannini (last seen in "Swept Away"), Rachida Brakni, Shosha Goren, Heeba Shah, Jean-Erns Marie-Louise, Gustav Dyekjaer Giese, Michelle Greenidge (last seen in "Venom: Let There Be Carnage"), Francesco Martino, Tao Guo, Muhammad Abdullah Arabi, Yahya Et Tonia, Sami Fekkak, Naoufal Sabri, Halima Ouhamou, Mohamed Askour, Adbelmalek Sadok, Rita Moak, Sundra Oakley, Arthur Clark, Bellina Logan (last seen in "Jacob's Ladder"), Quintin Mims, Herbert Russell (last seen in "Boiler Room"), Nadia Kazar, Dillon Lane (last heard in "The Guilty"), Ada Mogilevsky,

RATING: 6 out of 10 novelists in a very tough game of Charades

Certain Women

Year 18, Day 41 - 2/10/26 - Movie #5,241

BEFORE: Timing is sort of everything these days - there's a right time to do things and a wrong time to do things. For me, yesterday was day #3 of working five days in a row, so there's been a lot less time to do other stuff. I agreed to work on Sunday night while this tent was built outside the theater on the sidewalk, and that's a shift where I don't have to do too much, but it can take a long time, so I was working the night of the Super Bowl, and so I had to record the game and watch it the next day. Then last night there was the premiere red-carpet event (the reason for building the tent in the first place) and I was scheduled to be there until the tent came down, which is another shift that tends to go long - it was supposed to end at midnight, but instead it took until 1 am. (I think the crew taking down the tent was being paid by the hour, they didn't have much pep in their step, and with the weather being as cold as it is, you'd think they would want to hurry so as to spend less time outside...). So I got home at 2 am and stupidly tried to watch a movie, I had some soda and an apple danish for a sugar boost, but that didn't help, I was asleep before I was an hour into the film. Now it's Tuesday morning and I'm going to try to finish it. 

Michelle Williams carries over from "The Fablemans", but the bigger news is that I'm starting a three-film chain with Laura Dern, and I get to send a big birthday SHOUT-out to Ms. Dern today, born February 10, 1967. That's a sign that I'm on the right track with this chain, or at least I'm going to take that as a sign. This year's chain is kind of also about the films I'm NOT watching and saving for next year, like "Showing Up", which has Michelle Williams in it, and could have easily been dropped in - however, I need it to make a different connection next time around and link to some other films, so I'm NOT watching it - and as a result, I've landed a Laura Dern film right on her birthday, see? Now, with a little luck here I'm hoping to build up to some better romance films and kind of peak on Valentine's Day...

THE PLOT: The lives of four women intersect in small-town America, where each is imperfectly blazing a trail. 

AFTER: Well, this film has kind of the same problem as "The Fabelmans", only this is really three short stories grafted together, though they kind of intersect with each other, with some characters appearing in two of the segments. But again there is no clear beginning, middle or end, so overall we're just dropped into these people's lives for a short time, we go out the same way and we're left wondering just what that was all about. Why are we being shown THESE particular moments in their lives, what is the message, or is the message simply that there is no message at all, and all events are random and only have meaning because we impart meaning on them? Is all life just a bunch of unconnected events, people bumping into each other and reacting to each other and then one day, maybe after a very long time, we all die? 

This film premiered at the Sundance Festival in 2016, so, OK, that's seasonally appropriate, and it's set in a Pacific Northwest state (we assume Montana, but other answers are possible) during winter time, so OK, it's doubly seasonally appropriate - but based on what happens in the film, what can we learn about life and/or love, because this is February and we're looking for advice on that front. 

The first story is about an attorney who has a client, Mr. Fuller, who is unemployed due to a workplace injury, however she has to keep telling him that he simply can not sue his employer to get more money, because he already accepted a small settlement and signed something to that effect. But he keeps pestering her so she takes him to another lawyer who specializes in this sort of thing, and he is once again told that he can take no further legal action. On the ride home, Fuller casually says something about wanting to shoot his former employers. 

That night, Laura is called by the police, as her client has taken a security guard hostage at his former place of employment. The hostage crisis team preps Laura to go in and talk to Fuller, and while inside she does find his file, which proves that his employer cheated him out of his rightful settlement money, however it's still too late to fix this. Fuller tries to slip out the back of the office but is arrested by the police.  

The second story is about Gina and Ryan, a married couple with a teen daughter, and they are living out of a tent while they build their house. The tension between the parents comes from Ryan constantly undermining Gina around their daughter. Tension might also be coming from the fact that Ryan is having an affair with Laura, from the first story. The couple meets with Albert, an elderly friend who has a pile of sandstone blocks in his yard, and they want to buy the stones to use as the foundation for their house - however this proves to be a challenge as Albert is very unfocused, he may have dementia, and even if he agrees to sell them the stones, he may not remember their agreement the next day. Gina complains again that her own husband did not really support her during the negotiations. 

The third story is about a ranch hand named Jamie, who lives in isolation during the winter, tending to the horses on the ranch. One night, she randomly joins a group of people at a school and attends a class on law that pertains to education, taught by Beth, a young female lawyer who lives in Livingston, which is a four-hour drive away. Twice a week she has to make this eight-hour round trip drive from her job, which makes you wonder if she couldn't just get her company to spring for a hotel room and maybe make the drive once a week instead of twice, and just stay over the extra day or two between classes. That would be safer and more convenient, no? 

Beth goes out to eat at a diner with Jamie after class, then starts the drive back - Jamie comes back week after week just to spend time with Beth, I'd say she was smitten but she seems kind of incapable of displaying any emotion at all. But one week she brings a horse to class so they can ride to the diner together on the horse, it seems like they both enjoyed that, and perhaps there's a relationship budding here, but the next week Jamie learns Beth has quit and a local lawyer has taken over teaching the class. Jamie then drives her truck all the way to Livingston to find Beth (along the way, she encounters Laura from the first story, only very briefly...) and when she finds her, Beth is very confused, she doesn't understand why Jamie drove four hours just to see her. 

For God's sake, woman, put it together - she rides horses, she drives a TRUCK, she came to your class even though she had no interest in educational law. She's into Beth, but I guess Beth doesn't swing that way or if she does, she's not interested in Jamie. Oh, well, back to the ranch because those horses aren't going to feed themselves. Gay or straight, love is tricky and a bit like baseball - sometimes you win, sometimes you lose and sometimes it rains. Or maybe it was all just bad timing, maybe the whole film is about bad timing, if you get right down to it. 

In other news, Gina and Ryan host a barbecue and Laura visits Fuller in prison and agrees to keep writing him letters. Again I wish I could say that there was a point to all of this, unless maybe the point is that there is no point in anything. Intersecting short stories kind of suggests "Pulp Fiction", only this is kind of like "Pulp Fiction" moved to Montana and left all of its action and comedy back in L.A. I mean, it's OK to be weird, it's OK to be quirky, it's OK to be outrageous, just please don't be boring. 

And what the hell does the title even mean? Does the film mean that certain women are lawyers, certain women are lesbians?  Is there something that they're all certain about? Because some of them don't seem very certain about anything? Or are we just supposed to focus on these certain women and ignore everyone else in the movie? A little help here, please. 

Directed by Kelly Reichardt

Also starring Laura Dern (last seen in "Music by John Williams"), James Le Gros (last seen in "Destiny Turns on the Radio"), Jared Harris (last seen in "A House of Dynamite"), Ashlie Atkinson (last seen in "13"), Guy Boyd (last seen in "I'm Thinking of Ending Things"), Edelen McWilliams, John Getz (last seen in "Trumbo"), James Jordan (last seen in "Wind River"), Matt McTighe, Joshua T. Fonokalafi, Sara Twist, Rene Auberjonois (last seen in "Eulogy"), Lily Gladstone (last seen in "Killers of the Flower Moon"), Kristen Stewart (last seen in "Welcome to the Rileys"), Stephanie Campbell (last seen in "Straight Outta Compton"), Kilty Reidy, Marceline Hugot (last seen in "The Last Five Years"), Zena Dell Lowe, Gabriel Clark

RATING: 4 out of 10 hay bales

The Fabelmans

Year 18, Day 40 - 2/9/26 - Movie #5,240

BEFORE: Paul Dano carries over again from "The Girl Next Door" and I have to just talk about Paul Dano for a minute, the beef that Tarantino has with him, which was a big news story in Hollywood about a month ago. I joked about it last night, but since I've now watched THREE films in a row with Dano, I can weigh in on this. Tarantino called him "weak" in an interview, and suggested that he was a terrible actor and that his performance ruined "There Will Be Blood", which he felt would have easily been one of his top five films if it had not been for Dano's performance as a set of twins. The insight that I get from watching three films in a row with the same actor might carry a little more impact than focusing on one performance - for example, after three Jesse Eisenberg films in January, I felt he had a "type" of role that he tends to play, namely Jewish and nebbish-like, complaining to the point of being irritable. Well, in those cases, that is what the role demanded, or if not, then his presence kind of pushed those roles in that direction, the audience can't really make that distinction. His characters in "The Double", "The Art of Self-Defense", "A Real Pain" and "Roger Dodger" sort of all feel like extensions of the same character, and part of that OF COURSE is because they're played by the same guy in a similar fashion. But you could just as easily blame the screenwriters, perhaps for creating the same characters four times over, the lovable loser nebbish type that, for all we know, were just begging to be played by Eisenberg. 

Paul Dano, on the other hand, has managed to play these total blank characters, again and again, and how much of that is the fault of the screenwriters, it's impossible to know. But the character he played in "Little Miss Sunshine" did not talk at all, like what is an actor supposed to do with that? It's a blank character, like he's almost not even there at all. The fact that Dano was able to do anything at all in that film, just with expressions, is a minor miracle - that's not an actor who is "weak". Brian Wilson in "Love & Mercy", Klitz in "The Girl Next Door", and Louis Ives in "The Extra Man", they're all that same kind of blank, "I don't know how to do this", sort of feather-in-the-wind kind of dumb guy who seems like he has trouble connecting socially and/or figuring out how to live his own life. This may be part Dano, part screenwriters, or him just being typecast in a certain type of role. His roles as the Riddler in "The Batman" and the guy he played in "Dumb Money" feel like maybe he realized he was doing the same thing over and over, and tried to go the other way with it, because the Riddler is known for being clever and in control of evil schemes. But if you look a certain way with a big round face, maybe casting directors tend to just see you as a blank. Still, if a director has a problem with an actor, they can just NOT cast that actor in their movies, and STFU. It's been a while since I watched "There Will Be Blood", but I'm betting that Daniel Day-Lewis' character seemed more powerful and dynamic when compared with those blankish twins played by Paul Dano, and that was the whole point. 

THE PLOT: Growing up in post-World War II era Arizona, young Sammy Fabelman aspires to become a filmmaker as he reaches adolescence, but soon discovers a shattering family secret and explores how the power of films can help him see the truth. 

AFTER: Well, perhaps this film proves my point about Paul Dano - he plays the quiet, nerdy father and husband who doesn't realize until it's too late that his more dynamic best friend has caught the attention of his own wife, and that he's the odd man out in a love triangle. Things might have been different if he had shown any emotion at any point, or spoke out sooner, or realized that he had all the personality of a block of wood. But again, that's the character here, not necessarily just the actor. If Mr. Fableman had been more fun or more loving or more expressionistic in any way, maybe his wife wouldn't have fallen for someone else - but that's impossible to prove, we can only deal with the story that we're given, and the heart is a fickle thing, it wants what it wants, and that can easily change over time. Expecting romance dramas to give us lessons about how better to live our own lives is a fool's game, I suspect.

There are a couple of odd things that carry over from yesterday's film, like mostly today's film would seem to have nothing in common with "The Girl Next Door", however both films have a character in high school who really wants to be a filmmaker, that's not a common plot point. Both films have a main character who doesn't really get along with the jocks in his high school, but I guess that's not too unusual - in one film they just travel in different circles, while in the other one there's outright bullying going on. One film has a sex ed film being made during prom, and the other features the filmmaker character screening a film during prom. Now THAT's a weird coincidence, I think, even if it's not an exact match. But I guess films are made by filmmakers, and those filmmakers probably did not have typical prom nights - most young filmmakers spent prom night alone at home, I would imagine, wishing they could be making a movie. Both films also had a plot point with high school kids ditching class to go to the beach - this must just be a California thing?

It's a strange thing to say, but I'm not sure there's a completed story here, a full narrative arc with a beginning, middle and end, or if this is just a collection of odd things that Spielberg remembers about his childhood, which amount to nothing when they're all put together. Except TO HIM, this makes sense, because he lived this as a young boy and a teenager, so it kind of feels like he made this film for an audience of one, himself, as it just can't resonate on the same level with a majority of the people. So unfortunately I have to go with the latter possibility on this one, the whole film is nothing more than a sum of its weird, random parts. 

It fits into the romance/relationship category because we know that Spielberg's mother left his father at some point, and committed to a new relationship with her husband's best friend and business partner. It didn't seem THAT odd when the Fabelman family moved to Phoenix, except that Mrs. Fabelman guilted her husband into creating a job there for "Uncle" Bennie, but it seems like maybe she had another goal in mind, perhaps she had already fallen out of love with Burt and was planning a few moves ahead? It's unclear...

It was a different time when the Fabelmans (Spielbergs) got married, that's for sure - people back then expected marriage to last a lifetime, if you did it right, however lifespans were also shorter, so probably half the people found themselves starting new relationships later in life, or just living out the rest of their days alone, I guess that's the alternative. Lifespans are longer now, and so I guess by extension fewer people expect their marriages to last until the end of their lives, and divorce is more commonplace, and also less stigmatized. So perhaps Mrs. Fabelman was just acknowledging that she had options, she didn't have to spend the rest of her life with the dull and boring "blank" that Burt was, geez that's a role that's right up Paul Dano's alley, right? Who wouldn't want to be in a relationship with the fun guy instead, I mean Burt's a symbol of the smart, silent type, but you've got to have some fun in life, too. 

It's telling that young Sammy learned the power of filmmaking when it revealed to him his mother's secret, she was seen in the background of the camping footage he shot, holding Bennie tight and perhaps kissing him as well. And yet Sammy still wanted to be a filmmaker, after learning how it could tear a family apart - does that track?  Then I suppose it's also ironic that Burt urged Sammy to make the camping film, in order to cheer up Mitzi, and then the truths it revealed ended up breaking up the Fabelmans' marriage. Well, I guess it was inevitable at some point. 

It's a bit odd that the same guy who played the young Steven Spielberg here was last seen in "Saturday Night" playing the young Lorne Michaels - he got to play two of the most iconic producers in the entire industry, back to back. That's either luck, or it's being typecast as the young nebbish to offset the success those two gentlemen have had, in order to gain the sympathy of the audience. Sure, they're millionaire geniuses, but they're also neurotic, just like us, that's meant to be comforting, I suppose. 

But I'm back on the fact that this story doesn't really have a beginning, it just kind of drops us into Sammy Fabelman's life the day that his parents took him to see the movie "The Greatest Show on Earth", like is that the earliest thing that Steven Spielberg can remember? It's so random - and then there's not really any kind of ending, either, here Sammy gets an offer to work on the TV show "Hogan's Heroes" and after the interview he gets a chance to meet director John Ford, who made the film "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance", and is played by David Lynch. It's another great (?) moment in Spielberg's life, perhaps, but it doesn't mean much to me or, I'm guessing, too many people in the audience. It's also notable that the film ends HERE and not a few months later, when Spielberg just walked into Universal Studios and set up shop there to direct "Jaws", without ever really being officially hired to do so. Talk about "fake it until you make it", right? 

Directed by Steven Spielberg (producer of "Twisters" and "Maestro", director of "West Side Story" (2021))

Also starring Michelle Williams (last seen in "The United States of Leland"), Seth Rogen (last heard in "The Super Mario Bros. Movie"), Gabriel LaBelle (last seen in "Saturday Night"), Mateo Zoryan Francis-DeFord, Keeley Karsten, Alina Brace, Julia Butters (last seen in "Freakier Friday"), Birdie Borria, Judd Hirsch (last seen in "Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond"), Sophia Kopera, Jeannie Berlin (last seen in "You Hurt My Feelings"), Robin Bartlett (last seen in "The Glass Castle"), Sam Rechner, Oakes Fegley (last seen in "The War with Grandpa"), Chloe East (last seen in "The Wolf of Snow Hollow"), Isabelle Kusman (last seen in "Licorice Pizza"), Chandler Lovelle, Gustavo Escobar (last seen in "Pain & Gain"), Nicolas Cantu, Cooper Dodson (last seen in "Mr. Right"), Gabriel Bateman (last seen in "Unhinged"), Stephen Matthew Smith, James Urbaniak (last seen in "Oppenheimer"), Kalama Epstein, Connor Trinneer (last seen in "American Made"), Lane Factor, Greg Grunberg (last seen in "The Pallbearer"), David Lynch (last seen in "Beatles '64"), Jan Hoag (last seen in "Faster"), Paul Chepikian, Brinly Marum, Larkin Campbell (last seen in "J. Edgar")

RATING: 5 out of 10 Boy Scouts working as a film crew

The Girl Next Door

Year 18, Day 39 - 2/8/26 - Movie #5,239

BEFORE: It's Super Bowl Sunday, and I suppose I should be glad that the Patriots are back in it, because that's my home team from my teen years - but they were never great when I lived in Massachusetts, they only won Super Bowls after I moved to New York. But I worked in an electronics store when they first played in the post-season (and lost) and I had to deal with the wave of people buying big-screen TVs and VCRs. Then later for maybe 20 years I was paid to watch the game and track the commercials that used animation or visual effects, so that got me in the pattern of paying attention to the annual most important televised event. So I still record the game every year, and mostly I fast-forward through the game and watch the cool ads. Yeah, if something really happens during the game or the half-time show, I'll pay attention just so I know what the late-night hosts will be making fun of in the coming week. But going to a party with friends, or paying top dollar to watch the game in a restaurant or bar? Yeah, not my thing. 

Today I'll be working a shift at the theater, just baby-sitting the construction of a tent for tomorrow's red-carpet event. Sure, an outdoor space during February, what could POSSIBLY go wrong there? It's only the coldest damn weekend of the year, hell it's the coldest weekend of the last few years, but I'll only have to do an outdoor patrol like every 30 minutes - so yeah, I'll take the shift while all the young kids are out partying and watching the big game together. I'll watch it tomorrow, from the warmth and comfort of my bedroom, and I'll fast-forward through most of it, it should only take me an hour or two - just trying to make efficient use of my time. 

Paul Dano carries over from "The Extra Man". 

THE PLOT: A teenager's dreams come true when a porn star moves in next door and they fall in love. 

AFTER: Last year's romance film that fell on Super Bowl Sunday (it's a bit inevitable...) was "Murphy's Romance", and there was just zero tie-in with football. But it was on Carole King's birthday, so if you're going to insist on merging those two national holidays, well, what do you expect, something's got to fall by the wayside.  Today's film doesn't really have any good tie-in opportunities, either, except that it's set in a high school and there is a football team and cheerleaders and all that. There are jocks, and for my purposes that can be enough. The climax (!!) of the film takes place during prom night, and the main character is involved with making a sex-ed video in the school during prom, using porn stars and some of the school's students. It's a case of zigging when everyone else is zagging, sure, why not make a porn video during prom, what could POSSIBLY go wrong there? As mentioned above, I'm also zigging today by working when everyone else is partying, so yeah, I get it. I would have loved to spend the day eating snacks and drinking beer and being warm in bed while fast-forwarding through the sportsball, but it's just not where we find ourselves today. Whatever. 

It kind of feels like I watched this film before, especially near the end. I think maybe I saw a bunch of things as I was dubbing this film to DVD, and so I kind of maybe stopped to take a look at a few scenes, but since MOST of the film was unfamiliar to me, I'm fairly sure I have not watched it through. Still, it feels like since this was released in 2004, that I had ample time to watch this before, so, umm, why didn't I? I think it's been on the list for a while, so if it feels like I'm crossing off a number of romance films that I should have gotten to by now but just didn't, it's only because I'm doing exactly that this year - I'm clearing the category as best as I can. When I'm done with this topic in mid-March, the romance section may only be half the size it was in January - here's hoping. 

This film was based on "Risky Business", a film from 20 years earlier that featured a high-school student falling in love with a call girl, they just updated this by turning her into an adult-film actress, and turning the film's villain from her pimp into her producer. What changed in those 20 years was the invention of the internet, and the creation of the first generation to be able to see every kind of pornography for free with just a few clicks on a computer. I don't think we all quite realize what this has done to American males (and I assume a few females) who can now watch as much porn as they want - my generation used to have to work for it, you had to either steal a couple Penthouse magazines from an adult or a newstand, or look old enough to rent porno VHS tapes from your local video store. Usually there was a room in back hiding behind a curtain and you had to kind of let somebody at the store know what kind of movie you wanted to rent, it was all very embarrassing. Umm, or so I heard. 

Matthew wouldn't have even known about his new neighbor's porn career if one of his besties, Eli, hadn't recognized her - so Eli's the one who's seen nearly every porn movie, and then by the end of this film he's directed his own porno/sex ed video, and then he's a diva bully like Brett Ratner, yelling at the audience during a Q&A.  Meanwhile, Klitz, who starred in the porno video, only with a fencing mask covering his face, is secretly famous for his impressive full frontal scenes. Well, everybody's got to have a talent, I suppose. 

The whole thing started when Matthew tried to fill out his yearbook entry with the things he'd done or remembered, and somehow he came up blank, meaning he felt like he hadn't accomplished anything during high school, but how is that possible? He's got two close friends, and some people don't even have that, then we find out he's the student council president - that's not nothing, it means his classmates voted for him. Also, he raised $25,000 so that a Cambodian math prodigy could come study in an American high school - did Matthew somehow forget about this? Because the film keeps reminding us about Samnang, so how the hell could he forget? Why does Matthew have FOMO if he's been so busy? I guess he's just hung up on the fact that he hasn't dated anyone or slept with a girl yet - but all those jocks who skip out of school early every day to go to the beach aren't going to get into Georgetown, are they? Focus on the academics, Matthew...

This kid's infatuation with his neighbor and his academic career are on a collision course, because not only does he miss the pop quiz - no matter, he already got accepted into college - but they go swimming at night in his principal's backyard pool, and then Kelly shows up to bring Danielle to the Adult Video Convention in Las Vegas. Matthew and his two buddies drive there, too, what could POSSIBLY go wrong there? After that, Kelly manages to remove from the bank all of the $25K that Matthew raised to bring the Cambodian genius to the U.S. The only way Matthew can imagine fixing everything at once - his relationship with Danielle, the missing funds and getting revenge on the jock bullies - is to enlist the A/V squad minions to make an adult film which is really a sex-ed film. Their high school, and thousands of others, is still showing old films about STDs and condoms that were made in the (shudder) 1970's, or earlier. If only somebody could make one that looked more like internet porn and licensed that to schools, that could be a profitable venture - but enough to pay for a college education? Unclear. 

NITPICK POINT: The updated sex ed video claims it will demonstrate how to put on a condom WITHOUT using a banana, like the outdated instructional videos all do. So, they're going to use a real penis for this, and then show THAT video in class? Even though dicks are all over the internet, there would still be a scandal in high schools if they were to screen a film with actual frontal nudity in it. Some parents in each town would immediately file a lawsuit or ask for teachers or principals to be fired, even if their precious children were already sexually active.

NITPICK POINT #2: Kelly does have a point, he DID think up the idea for the updated sex ed film, shot like a modern porno. Or, rather he thought it would be great to make a porno film using high-school jock and cheerleader energy, same difference. Yes, he should not have stolen the $25K, or the master video of the sex-ed film, but neither should Matthew and Eli stolen his idea without at least offering him a writing credit, or a percentage of the royalties. 

Well, this film isn't terrible, as teen high-school sex comedies go - but then, I'm probably grading on a curve here. Three of the actors from this film, Emile Hirsch, Timothy Olyphant and James Remar, all appeared in Tarantino's 2019 film "Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood". Gee, I wonder why Paul Dano didn't? 

Directed by Luke Greenfield (director of "Something Borrowed" and "Let's Be Cops")

Also starring Emile Hirsch (last seen in "Prince Avalanche"), Elisha Cuthbert (last seen in "Bandit"), Timothy Olyphant (last seen in "Stop-Loss"), James Remar (last seen in "Oppenheimer"), Chris Marquette (last seen in "Nostalgia"), Timothy Bottoms (last seen in "Elephant"), Donna Bullock (last seen in "All Good Things"), Jacob Young, Brian Kolodziej, Brandon Irons, Amanda Swisten, Lee Sung-Hi, Ulysses Lee, Harris Laskawy (last seen in "Slums of Beverly Hills"), Julie Osburn (last seen in "Intolerable Cruelty"), Laird Stuart (last seen in "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective"), Dane Garretson, Richard Fancy (last seen in "Species"), Catherine McGoohan (last seen in "Imagine That"), Josh Henderson (last seen in "Yours, Mine & Ours"), Nicholas Thomas, John-Clay Scott, Matthew Wiese (last seen in "Let's Be Cops"), Maria Arcé (last seen in "The United States of Leland"), Alonzo Bodden (last seen in "The Onion Movie"), Stephanie Fabian (last seen in "New Year's Eve"), Michael Villani (last seen in "Up Close & Personal"), Steven St. Croix, John Harrington Bland (last seen in "The Tao of Steve"), Shu Lan Tuan (last seen in "Crank: High Voltage"), Kayla Tabish, Nicholas Downs (last seen in "The Holiday"), Danny Seckel, Katie Stuart, Autumn Reeser (last seen in "Smokin' Aces 2: Assassins' Ball"), Olivia Wilde (last seen in "Love the Coopers"), Reda Beebe (last seen in "Kill Bill: Vol. 2"), Rudy Mettia, Chris Leone, Tara Gerard, Mike Sabga and the voice of Paul Aulicino.

RATING: 6 out of 10 release forms