(I hope I can get through this without falling asleep, I’m starting to get blurred vision.  Though FINALLY a semi-valid excuse for typos)

So, what did I do to occupy my time?  Mostly, peed a lot ¹ and watched movies.  The movie selection wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great either.  I ended up seeing a couple semi-new-ish movies that I had been curious about and a couple I didn’t really have an opinion on one way or the other (until now).

My List (in viewing order, may contain spoilers)

1. The Joneses
2. Precious
3. The Bounty Hunter
4. Babies
5. Just Wright

The Joneses

I like clever plays on popular memes and Demi Moore, so this wasn’t a bad pick for my first choice.  If I only knew it was setting the tone for the mediocrity for my following inflight experience.

“Stealth Marketing” is the name of the game where Demi Moore and David Duchonvy along with two teens form a fake family who are paid to move into a neighborhood and advertise various trends by being really really cool.  Look at my sweet Audi and new phone and awesome clothes, you should buy them too, look how happy they make us, we’re the perfect family. Etcetera.

It was a decent premise and a good enough story that was actually a lot more dramatic than I would have pegged, however, it copped out in the end by taking the easy ‘romance triumphs’ subplot.  I have no problems with such subplots, but it wasn’t really the dramatic question of the movie so I felt it inappropriate.  It wasn’t “Will Mulder get with Ashton’s wife” but “can the rookie perform and the fake family achieve the status that they all so desperately want?”  Or something to that effect.   It’s fine that Mr. Jones realizes in the end that this isn’t the life that he wanted to lead, but him wooing the ice cold Missus with him was a bit lame.  But otherwise enjoyable.

I rank this as ’3′ of the night.  Day.  Something.

Precious

Wow, just wow.  It was as heartbreaking and as beautiful as it promised to be.  The supporting cast was brilliant and Monique played a terrific monster.  It hammered away at my soul for two straight hours, but it was well worth it.

All I have to say is, fine, make her a rape/incest victim, give her two children by her own father, one of which has Downs Syndrome, let her mother physically and verbally abuse her and her children, ² make her illiterate, but then to make her HIV positive to boot?  Wow, movie-makers are jerks.

My favorite of the flight, but only by a hair.

The Bounty Hunter

Whoever would have thought that the movie entitled “The Bounty Hunter” would be romance comedy (and I do use the word “comedy” loosely).

Let’s be frank, this movie was shit.

It went exactly where you would expect it to, just the way you guessed it would – which I’m not necessarily opposed to on principle, but it tried so hard to be funny and wasn’t and the characters were downright unlikeable.  Gerard Butler wins the award for being the silver-screen’s largest douchebag.

Two characters who hate each other and have no chemistry end up together, and for what reason?  Hell if I know.  Butler’s character is clearly a moron.  The couple supposedly got married after six months of dating and they fought the whole time and then got divorced.  There was a reason for that last part.  They were terrible together and though I certainly didn’t know it by watching it, apparently they spent the hour and a half growing reluctantly fond of each other.  You could have fooled me, the only reason I know that is because they kissed in the end.

To make things worse they had a slapstick caricature stalker of Jennifer Aniston’s character and they threw in a ‘dirty cop cover-up scandal’ action subplot to pad out the ninety minutes.

This was the most perfunctory writing and storytelling I have witnessed in a long time, and I have a high tolerance for that sort of thing.

Least favorite of the night.  And I’m Team Aniston.

Babies

Babies! What can I say? This was adorable.  A beautiful documentary that I highly recommend.  It follows for infants (one from Mongolia, Africa, Japan and the USA) for the first year (ish) of their lives.  It has no dialogue and focuses entirely on the babies.  We hardly get glimpses of the parents’ faces at all, it’s all about how the infants interact with their surroundings/world/situation.  Brilliant storytelling and really gripping for two hours worth of babies wallering on the ground.  Everyone go rent it.

This came very close to being my favorite for the night.

Just Wright

Another default Rom Com.  Rich basketball player is injured and unwittingly falls for the tomboy, die-hard fan, who is his physical therapist.  Unoffensive and watchable, plus Queen Latifah.   Though, I could only guess that they got together in the end, we landed right in the middle of Prince Charming’s big speech, so I don’t know Latifah’s answer.  Maybe there was a twist that I didn’t see coming.

Side note, this was the second movie during this marathon that co-starred Paula Patton.  In this film she played Queen Latifah’s sexy gets-all-the-boys cousin and in Precious she played the eponymous characters’ role model and teacher.  God she is hot.

This movie slots happily into number ’4.’

I’m not foreseeing the domestic legs having my own personal television sets, so who knows what I’m in store for on the next leg.

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Though recently, my native folk seem to be cropping up a bit more often.  I mean, if we’re getting the news down here, it has to be pretty big deal.  You may remember that guy who asked for directions after knocking over a bank, but most certainly you remember Miss Teen South Carolina.  ”Uh, some Americans don’t have maps?”

Congrats SC, you’ve done it again.  This time with First Family connections.  In a “shocking” article it reveals that Michelle Obama can trace her ancestery back to slavery.   Though, really, is it that much of a shock.  Can’t most of African-American’s do that?  It was sorta popular, back in the day.  Yet, of course, because South Carolina just can’t catch a break, of course the Pre-bama, came from a plantation owned from some hillbilly from the first state out to say “I’m outta here” when it came time to give up said slave.  That’s right.  My old stomping grounds, and when I mention this to people, it’s like I held Michelle Obama, wife of the man who will save the world, personally in the chains of slavery.

I think it’s cool that Mrs. President has roots in my home state.  At least someone besides me does, however it seems a bit arbitrary at this point to bring up the slave thing.  Before I get carried off in the heat of racism or something, I want to make clear that I’m not flippant about slavery and the past, it’s a part of our history and is definitely something that still effects the lives of  so many Americans.   So.  Is it because it’s Black History month?  Is it an awareness thing?  Does the fact that Michelle Obama visited her family’s former plantation matter?  Does it have any bearing on anything relevent?  Is it just a stunt?  Or is it a conspiracy to keep the great state of South Carolina in it’s place?

I don’t know.  I just don’t.  You tell me. 

But until then:

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