I reviewed Arthur Newman for the Portland Mercury
Me to Colln Firth:
Come on, man!You’re Mr. Darcy! You’re Mark Darcy! You’re the motherfucking KING! Why are you doing this? Stop trying to be from Florida. That’s gross. And you’re bad at it.
Read the whole thing here.
Things That I Wonder About Jurassic Park That I Could Not Fit In My Review
A follow-up to my review of the 3D rerelease. I have a lot of feelings.
- Mosquitoes are really small and it just seems really insane to me that the miners could find some from the right time. A tiny mosquito buried deep underground that, oh hey, cool, ate the kind of dinosaur you want? No.
- When the lawyer runs to the bathroom, he goes into one stall. Then when that crap shack gets knocked over, only his toilet is standing? Why didn’t he get knocked over too? When does a building just like melt around a person? I’m glad this happened because it’s cool when the t-rex eats him, but come on.
- There is a huge storm and the first guests are taking the tour and everybody but Samuel L Jackson, the guy with the shorts, and the Scottish grandpa leave? They want the children to be eaten, don’t they?
- WHY DO ALAN AND TIM NOT JUST GO TO THE OTHER SIDE OF THE FUCKING TREE WHEN THE CAR IS DRIVING DOWN IT? “OH LET’S JUST STAY UNDER IT AND HOPE WE DON’T DIE.” IDIOTS!
- San Jose, Costa Rica is not on the coast. It’s a capital city of a fairly prosperous country. There are lots of little towns on the coast. Why bother saying it was San Jose when it so clearly was not? Just say Costa Rica. That would have been fine.
- Where do they keep the baby dinosaurs? We see them hatching, and then as big guys. Aren’t there inbetweeners? Where are they? How do they learn how to do dinosaur stuff if they are born in a lab and not with a parent?
- WHY EVEN BREED RAPTORS AND THE POISON-SPIT ONE AND T-REXES? A park of harmless veggiesauruses would still have been pretty impressive, and much less dangerous.
- When they try to feed the goat to the t-rex, it comes up in a cage that appears to be at ground level, same as the jeeps. But then after the t-rex goes nuts and knocks the car around, suddenly there’s a huge dropoff there? What the hell? This is something that has been bothering me for 20 years.
- What was wrong with the triceratops? I thought Laura Dern was going to figure it out because she is an ancient plant expert. Not so tenacious after all, Statler!
- How fucking big is that island?
- How did Lex figure out which of the grey boxes in the old computer was the right one? Being a hacker could not have made her know that. They all looked the same.
- God, when Tim and Lex and Alan and Ellie are escaping those raptors through the ceiling - seriously, guys? I am not a dinosaur expert and I can see that being just a super shitty, lazy plan.
- Right after that, when they are all swinging on the bones - that is my happy place. I could watch an entire movie of just that scene.
- What am I even talking about? Jurassic Park is so good. I should not be trying to find faults with it.
Make hot clix on the link if you want to read a petite review of it.
Safety Not Guaranteed is a Great Movie.
How is my dash not peppered with the adorability that is This Movie yet?
All of you: go watch it, and then come back here. Bring gifs.
ETA: Okay, I have more to say about this. My budding movie writing brain has more to say.
The thing that I love about this movie is that it had so many pieces in place to be cynical, and it seemed to move that way, but it came back around to be sweet, and sincere. Not many movies are sincere these days, and when a movie doesn’t seem like it will be, and then IS - well, it’s a treat.
