Thighs Wide Shut

Groupon is great!  It makes things that you want to do and see and eat cheaper!  This past weekend, I used 4 of dems and what a weekend it was…

Indignation
Trying The Old College That Doesn’t Want To Give
Official Site | Trailer
R | 110 min

Didn’t realize good ole Philip Roth released a book called Indignation 8 years ago, mainly cause I don’t read books, although I have read two of his books!  It’s true!  But I’m game for anything Roth – mainly cause I know it will involve Jews, neuroses, and Jewish neuroses!

This book was turned into a movie by former Focus Features studio chief, James Schamus, making his writing/directing debut! And it’s pretty good stuff!  It kinda feels like a stage play, and kinda staged like one – but it has one blow job and TWO hand job scenes!!!  STAGE THAT!!!

Our protagonist is an atheist Jew Logan Lerman (the Wallflower showing some acting chops here), who’s just gettin started at a WASPy Ohio college in the early 50s.  All he wants to do is work and study hard, but runs into trouble when a bedeviling shiksa (Sarah Gadon) gives him said BJ and saids HJs.  She’s unstable, and throws him for a loop.  Then he throws the dean (Tracy Letts, in full a$$hole mode) for a loop, and the two clash in a war of words – in two scenes which are easily the best parts of the film – yes, even more than the scenes involving the BJ and the HJs.  This tête–à–tête is the definition of the word ‘indignation’ - anger or annoyance provoked by what is perceived as unfair treatment – which was great, cause this movie made me learn a new word AND the movie entertained me!  Learning AND being entertained – a deadly combo that is actually very lively!  STAGE THAT!!!

In case you were wondering what Groupon was used here – it was for Fandango monies!

Verdictgo:  Jeepers Worth A Peepers

dig into Indignation, currently playing in limited release

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

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and then if was off to use a Groupon for dinner at this Georgian (USSR style, not the Peachy state) restaurant called Pepela.  it was a really cool space, but when we arrived, we were the only customers in the entire place for 20 minutes.  we literally thought we were going to get murdered, but the only things that died were our fears after we delved into the delicious meal – featuring a thing that’s better than a pizza – a khachapuri!!!

(this isn’t an actual picture of the one I ate, but this is what ours looked like)

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next night, and new Groupon adventures awaited!

first it was dinner – at Serenata, a nice modern Mexican restaurant.  I stuffed my face on gauc, queso fundido, some empanadas, some enchiladas and a quesadilla. MUY BIEN!!!!

and then off to see..

The Bangles
Irving Plaza
August 27th, 2016

https://www.instagram.com/p/BJos_lzjl11/

in 75 RAWKING minutes, the three Bangles (Michael Steele left in 2005) rawked the fcuk outta 22 songs for a thousand dudes in their 50s who came to relive the 80s.  I’m close to 40, but I’m old in thought, and young in farts.  Age and decades aside, their spirit is still strong and their fans still love them (and they all still look pretty mad fly)  

While the ladies have written some timeless tunes in their time, they can cover the crap outta other people’s ditties.  Personally, their cover of Simon & Garf’s ‘Hazy Shady of Winter’ (see video above), might Might MIGHT be, my most flavorite cover version of a song EVERRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.  Yes, ever!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  EAT THAT BEATLES!!!!  (who were like a male Bangles of their time)

Man, is Susana Hoffs like the all time hottest Jew mt EVERest* and Sinai or wat????

*that isn’t my wife :)

Setlist - Mary Street / Some Dreams Come True / Manic Monday / Restless / James / He’s Got a Secret / Going Down to Liverpool (Katrina and the Waves cover) / September Gurls (Big Star cover) / I’m in Line / The Real World / Live (The Merry‐Go‐Round cover) / A Hazy Shade of Winter(Simon & Garfunke cover) / If She Knew What She Wants (Jules Shear cover) / Want You / Dover Beach / Open My Eyes (Nazz cover) / Silent Treatment / In Your Room / Hero Takes a Fall

Encore – How Is the Air Up There (The Changin’ Times cover) / Walk Like an Egyptian / Eternal Flame

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to cap the weekend, I got to see my beloved Peabs, but no Groupon exists for such hotness - as love don’t cost a thing.  although we bought pizza at face value and got to see Edie Brickell do the same thing with her kin!

https://www.instagram.com/p/BJqrRH7jSgs/

Maps To The Stars
A Fine Line Between Glove & Hate
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 112 min

If you ever wanted to see what a David Cronenberg Mulholland Drive would look like, you gots it in his Maps To The Stars, a tale of nasty Hollywood players and their hidden secrets and desires spilling all over each other.  There’s washed-up and vulnerable actress (Julianne Moore), who’s haunted by her dead mom (Sarah Gadon), but finds renewed hope in new assistant/burn victim (Mia Wasikowska), who’s back in town after many years away, and about to wreak quiet havoc on her self-help guru dad (John Cusack), mom (Olivia Williams) and bitter teen star brother (Evan Bird).  Add in Robert Pattinson as a hunky limo driver + a lot of movie talk + a lot of creepiness, and everything goes wrong, and it feels (mostly) oh so right.  Incest is best, but it’s the würst, and Mia Wasikowska and Evan Bird are the bestest!!!!  EVAN BIRD!!!

Verdictgo: Jeepers Worth A Creepers

Stars get geographic currently in limited release

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

The Moth Diaries
Tame Sex Education
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 82 min

You’d think movies that revolve around all-girls schools should be the greatest thing ever, but the results have sadly always proven otherwise.  Off the top of our cloudy heads, we can only think of three recentish entries (Cracks, St Trinian’s and Lost & Delirious) and they all failed to live up to any possible awesomeness caused by putting nothing but girls in one place to learn… HOW TO BE HOT AND KISS OTHER GIRLS!!!!!!!  Crap, how do we save this genre!??!?!

Enter Mary Harron, of I Shot Andy Warhol, American Psycho and The Notorious Bettie Page technical awesomeness, but not exactly the mos awesomiestest of movies (if you think the American Psycho movie is awesome, you’ve obviously never read the book.  Yep, we did.  it’s one of 2 we’ve ever read besides Dianetics).  Surely Harron could take Rachel Klein‘s Moth Diaries novel and make something novel out of it, no???  She tried, but ultimately no

Moth Diaries is about girls at an all-girls school, who girl it up, and then things get crazy, sorta, not really.  There’s good girl Sarah Bolger (probably one of our moist flavorite young actresses going) and her bestie Sarah Gadon, and their other gal pals, starting a new year of wearing hot schoolgirl uniforms and messing about, BUT, this new school year’s a lot different since Scott Speedman Lily Cole arrived on campus.  Soon, friendships will be tested, girls will leave school and some people will die!!  Why?  Well, you see, Lily Cole’s not like the other girls.  She’s cold and creepy and mysterious, and scary as f%&k.  No, really, she is.  It’s humanly possible that we’ve never been more scared by an actress playing a character than we have by Cole playing Ernessa.  First off, Cole is very awkward looking in general.  She’s ungodly tall, has nightmarish eyes, and may be from the planet Uranus.  Second off, in this movie, they dyed her hair and eyebrows + darkened her eye color, so on top of what she looks like normally, which is abnormal, she’s like 999348283 times morerer abbynormal looking.  Third off, her character may or may not be a vampire, dead, a lesbian, a moth and/or a diary.  That’s a lot for her to take on, and a lot for our eyes to take in

moral of the story – haven’t really explained why this movie is juss OK and not so great, but it’s juss OK, and isn’t all that great.  It feels like a Canadian made movie, which is not so shocking cause it is a Canadian made movie.  If you don’t know what the means, it means that the movie is kinda Americanish, but there’s something not so right about it, like it was made in Canada or something.  There’s something not right about The Moth Diaries, and it’s not juss cause Lily Cole makes us not want to have eyes.  Not, not, not

Poster Haste: Moth Diaries breaks Harron’s streak of having some of the bestestest movie posters goings.  here are the previous ones

and of course, one of the GREATESTESTESTEST posters EVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVER!!

Verdictgo: Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badges

Moth flutters and stutters in select cinemas this Friday, and is available on demand NOW!

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…