Thighs Wide Shut

Palo Alto
Nepotism The Movie
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 98 min

Apparently if you have the last name Coppola, it’s yer dog-given right to make a film.  And apparently if you’re the child of a movie actor/ess, it’s yer dog-given right to follow in their footsteps.  Man, it muss be tuff to give it the old Hollywood try when all the tries are being given to someone famous’ son or daughter or their cousin, twice removed.  (Too bad my parents were a lawyer and a teacher, although I didn’t follow in either of their footsteps.  Maybe my children will become Thigh Masters.  DO IT KIDS!!!)

Nepotism is on full display in Gia ‘grandaughter of Francis Ford’ Coppola‘s Palo Alto, starring Eric Roberts’ daughter and Val Kilmer & Joanne Whalley’s son (Val is in it to, but for maybe like 10 seconds).  The film is based off of James Franco’s book of short stories, and he gets a role in the film too.  Somehow his brother Dave Franco didn’t get nepotized into the cast.  (I did a quick check of the rest of the roster, but couldn’t find any more famous parental connections, outside of minor roles for Emma Gretzky and Bailey… Coppola)

OK, all that nepo-ness aside, the movie Palo Alto is still a movie and is somewhere between aunt Sofia Coppola’s Somewhere, and yet nowhere, and also Gus van Pretentious’ Paranoid Park, with a heavy dose all things Bret Easton Ellis.  So what I’m saying is Palo Alto is a moody piece of something, that’s really nothing.  Usually I loathe those kind of movies, and obviously I’m no giant fan of nepotism, AND YET, I still kinda really enjoyed Palo Alto

Why?

– there’s a faux recreation of Phoebe Cates’ Fast Times pool ascent scene, for no reason

– Kenny Powers’ fatty nephew is in it

- Nat Wolff’s hair and attitude 

– the dumb high school talk

– it wasn’t awful like The Bling Ring was

– seeing what Chris Messina high and touchy-feely would look like

– the score

- Father Guido Sarducci is in it (the actor, not the character), and he funny!

– it made me feel uneasy from start to finish, and I have no idea why, but movies should make you feel something, and this movie did

– and mainly cause I’m now in love with Val Kilmer & Joanne Whalley’s son Jack.  he’s almost hotter than both mom AND dad, and that’s basically impossible.  he looks like mini-Beck-River Phoenix.  I want to play with his hair.  I want to live on his face

Verdictgo: Jeepers Worth A Peepers

Palo is palling about in limited release

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Scream 4
Ghostface Knows No Rust
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 111 min

A franchise’s fourth entry, delivered a decade after its forgettable third, is destined directly for the dust bin, damn’i’right?  Such is NOT the case whatsoever with Scream 4, which somehow, someway, somewhy flows fun new blood into a worn body we all left for dead.  Yes!!!  Believe you we, if this movie was any bit a crap-stain, we’d be the first to tell you that it’s the wurstestest!  Wes Craven keeps the dark alight, and Kevin Williamson gets his script data all meta and stuff, and it works works works!  And while most movies like this tire and get all too redonkeloyous as it progresses towards its end, this movie goes in the opposite direction.  You start off watching it going, OK, been there, done that, hardy har, yadda yaddle, but gotta say, by the time we get to the unmasking, shiz was almos as satisfying as eating 8 Snickers!!!!  It’s true!

And the nicest thing about it all?  Scream 4 is like a haven for actors that Hollywood’s lost sight of, and need work, cause there’s nothing wrong with their talents.  Folks like Neve Campbell (we kinda wish this was Sarah Michelle Gellar’s role, so we could see her again), David Arquette (his character and mustache deserve their own spin-off), Courteney Cox (although her face is more frightening than ghostface’s), Marley Shelton (those eyes! THOSE EYES!!!), and even guys like Anthony Anderson (OK, so maybe he gets a lot of work, but it aint all good work) and Adam Brody (we sob for you Seth Cohen!).  Plus you know all the ingénues put on display here will soon enuff be yesterday’s ingé-news, juss like the aforementioned peeps.  Kids like Hayden Panettiere (having the most fun), Aimee Teegarden (FNLILTF: Friday Night Lighter I’d Like To F$%k), Shenae Grimes (her career will probably disappear post-90210-2) and Marielle Jaffe (whomever she is).  There are three kids that we don’t have to worry about, as their chops should keep them in the game for years to come: Alison Brie (she’s kinda prissy one-notey, but we like that prissy one-notey thang she does!!), Emma Roberts (may end up being a better actress than Auntie Julia… which isn’t too hard of a task), and Rory Culkin (Culkin clan aint nuttin to F#%K WIT!).  That kid Erik Knudsen wasn’t so bad neither, even as the film’s most annoying character

Anywho, to slum things up: Scream 4 was not awful, when it could have so easily been, times like 892727378!!  What more do you need to know?

Also, if you’re jonesining for more Roberts-Culkin action, do yerself a flavor and rent the thighly recommended Lymelife

All Hail Hale: sure, Aimee Teegarden is in a league of our groan, and probably deserves this hottie space, but we’ve never seen this Lucy Hale chick before, who’s like a lovefusion of Alexis Bledel and Mila Kunis, and she’s so Hale AND Hearty that her lovely circles get the square!!!

Verdictgo:  Jeepers Mos Def Worth A Peepers

Scream 4 is currently howling it up at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…