THE RACSO AWARDS

THE MOST POPULAR MOVIE THAT IS NOT LIKEABLE NO MATTER HOW HARD YOU TRY:

The Kids Are All Right

BEST ACTOR WHOSE LOOKS STEAL THE MOVIE:

James Franco, 127 hours

BEST ACTRESS WHOSE GETUP OVERTAKES HER ACTING:

Melissa Leo, The Fighter

GREATEST CRINGE FACTOR, COMEDY:

*Dinner For Schmucks

GREATEST CRINGE FACTOR, DRAMA:

*Movie with that young blond woman nominated for a best actress that is about death or drug addiction, or both

MOVIE THAT YOU SHOULDA/COULDA/WOULDA WALKED OUT ON:

Sex and the City 3

BEST MOVIE NO ONE SEEMS TO HAVE SEEN: 

Cyrus

STUPIDST-LOOKING COMEDY THAT'S SURPRISINGLY FUNNY:

Get Him to the Greek

MOST PRETENTIOUS MOVIE:

Exit Through the Gift Shop

BEST BOOBS, WITH OR WITHOUT CLOTHES:

Barbie, Toy Story 3

*Not viewed

The Weather, a Poem in 4 Stanzas

SNOW

Resonating with my mood is snow

White wet sometimes gold is snow

The next day so bright

Not too warm,

Resonating with my mood.

I never want to go to sleep

RAIN

Dig a hole and dive in,

It’s grey outside but dark within

It heats inside my soul

Please rain go away, go away, go away

SUN

What else can I say

But YAY!!!!!

(Hooray?)

CLOUDY

Grey oh grey I am

Neither happy nor sad

Content? I don’t think so.

Inside my soul, I am snow, rain and the sun

All at once—

Makes me grey

And

Dry.

Mikey Mirror: The Frolicking Rock Interview

by I. M. Grate

In this week’s issue, we take a break from our series of interviews of Oscar nominees by talking to one of the actors who has been repeatedly overlooked by the Academy. Mikey Mirror, the co-star of “Black Swan,” is riveting. He is in just about every scene of the movie, each time alongside his co-star, Oscar Nominee Natalie Portman. Yet he is not among the film’s nominees. Mirror chose to meet me in the lobby of "The Swanky Doodle," Beverly Hill's new hippest boutique hotel. He was already there, leaning against the far wall of the swanky black, orange and platinum gold lobby. Mikey is known to be shy and aloof. This reporter found him open and candid.

IMG:  Throughout most of “Black Swan,” the action takes place in front of the mirror.  It is through you that we see Natalie Portman's Nina descend into madness.  It’s as if her actions are not in front of us, but reflected through her reflection.

MM: It's true that my character is important to the movie. Nina feels herself being watched, and she is—she watches herself as she is looking at herself. It is interesting because although my character is as clear as any mirror, what we see of her is distorted.

IMG: Nina sees herself in multiple mirrors.  Sometimes there is a mirror reflecting across from you, so that in your mirror she shows up in a series of images that are decreasing in size.

MM: Yes, that was a technical effect.  Sometimes you'd see smaller mirrors reflected in other mirrors.  Sometimes the mirrors were rectangular, sometimes round.

IMG: Who played the smaller mirrors?

MM: I did. As I said, it was done with special effects. They took my image and transposed it into picture frames. They had me act with no one else there, even though it looks like Natalie's there. It was genius.

IMG: It's your acting that holds the film together. You are not just the dance studio mirror or a random mirror hanging on the wall--or even the one in Nina's dressing room. Why do you think that you were not included in the string of Oscar nominations for “Black Swan”?

MM: That is something that I have become accustomed to, though my friend Marty is trying to organize mirror actors to break from the actor's union.  He says that we have been facing persecution since “Snow White.”

IMG: I can believe that. Will you be joining Marty's faction?

MM: To be honest, I.M., I don't know. I really have to reflect on it.

Frolicking Rock will be covering the Mirror Secession Movement within the Actor’s Union.

Self Parody

This is from the New Yorker issue of January 24, 2011--

David Denby’s movie review of “The Green Hornet,” written by  and starring Seth Rogen:

“Well,  I’m sorry to put it this way, but “The Green Hornet” is what you get when someone who has dropped out of high school to do standup comedy, then spent a decade in movies and television conceives a “passion project.” 

This is a description of Seth Rogen, in case that’s not clear.  What is clear is that Seth Rogen has done so much without even finishing high school.  Pretty impressive. 

The New Yorker outdoes the best of its elitist traditions.

Drek: shit (n)

DREK-a-schpaniel: Shit on a stick (n)

--HEY MOMMMMMM!  What’s for dinner? Huh? Huh? Huh?

--Drekaschpaniel.

--Ha, Ha.  When is it going to be ready?

--Stop hocking my chienick. 

--For Real, mom. What’s for dinner?

--Oh, go kakafanyam!

Drek-a-schpaniel

Go Kakafanyom!

KA-kaf-an-yam: Jump in the lake! (command)

He said I have hairy lips?  He can go kakafanyam.

Stop hocking my chienick!  Go kakafanyom!

Crazy Yiddish Synonyms

KOKamaimie: crazy (adj)

MesSHUgena: 1. crazy (adj);  2. Crazy person

MesSHUga: crazy (shortened form of meshugena, but only ad)j

MeSHUgena-SCHTIken: craziness (n)

MIshaGAI-is:Craziness (n) (Gai rymes with "pie")

FaKOKta: crazy mixed up (adj)

Obama not a US citizen?  That’s kokamaimie! Are people so fakokta that they think that a non-citizen could actually run for president?  Or senator before that? They have so little faith in our government that they think this could actually happen?  What MIshugayis!

I can’t help but quote Bill Mahr: “New Rule—Hawaii is part of the United States.”

Self-Parodies, Verbatim

Below is part of the Instructions for my son’s high school commencement, copied and pasted from the high school website.   I couldn’t even try to make a parody better than the real thing:

Dress at Commencement Ceremony:

Girls are encouraged to wear dresses and dress shoes.  Please avoid hairdos that cause your cap to fit badly or fall off.  Bring hairpins to hold the cap on. 

Boys are encouraged to wear collared shirts, dark dress shoes, dark socks and dark trousers.

Izzie’s analysis:  Do I detect sexism?  Do the caps magically stay on the boys’ heads without hairpins?  A boy’s hairdo can’t cause a cap to fit badly? Ever hear of a Mohawk?  Who the hell says “hairdo” anymore?

There’s more--

Dress Instructions, continued:

(Apparently there is a PTA-sponsored senior party after graduation.)

There is time after the ceremony to change into clothes appropriate for the senior party.  DO NOT wear those clothes for the ceremony. Bring a small bag with senior party clothes to leave in an assigned dressing area during the ceremony.

Izzie’s analysis:  Makes sense—they wear dress-up clothes for graduation ( Maryjane patent leathers shoes a must), and then they change into party clothes, ya know like what they wore at all of those birthday parties at Chucky Cheese’s.  And then the REAL dilemma--Should the girls skip the Wait and Greet (see below) so they can change their hair from dress-up hairdo to party hairdo?

 There’s even more—

Following commencement graduates can meet/greet family in the lobby area or in the theater for photos.  They will then return to the dressing room to change into comfortable clothes for the senior party and give all personal property to parents.  Parents need to pick-up any excess items from the students before they board the buses. Once students have checked in with the senior party volunteers and have received their armbands, they may not leave the roped-off area or return to the lobby or theater for meet/greet time. The PTSA Senior Party Committee requests that students attending the party do not bring any personal items to the Senior Party beyond what is pre-checked in the Ziploc Bags prior to graduation.  Those who have made prior arrangements to attend the Senior Party are to board the buses waiting outside in accordance with the bus assignment list.

A few minutes for a MEET and GREET and PHOTOS?  What is this, a trade convention?  

What happened to taking the kid out for a family dinner, and THEN going party hopping?  For God’s sake, Grandpa is coming from the East Coast to attend the graduation.  Is that fair to him and everyone’s relatives who travelled to get to commencement?  How about a beak for the parents who supported their kids for 18 years?  Allow them to celebrate at the right time!

 Why couldn’t they have the party another night?

_______________________

Oh, and Armbands?  This one is for the ten Jews in the class of 300+.

Male Angst, Female T & A

     At the beginning of the movie Company Men, I was happy and psyched.  I was flanked on one side by my husband and on the other by his childhood friend. We were sharing a giganto bucket of popcorn that came with free refills.  And Ben Affleck had no Boston accent. The movie poignantly portrays the affect the recession has had on, well, company men.  Since men are the breadwinners in all families, being laid off is especially hard on them.  It’s not so bad for working women because only old, unattractive females are laid off.

     The good news is that behind every great man, there’s a woman. And for two of the three leading men, that’s the truth.  They have their own cheerleaders accompanying them as they face the hard times during a job search in a horrible economy.

     Ben and Tommy Lee Jones have supportive women.  At first Ben’s wife, played by Rosemary DeWitt, is a bitch.  There is tension in their marriage—until the moment that Ben tells her that that he lost his job.  From then on, she grins and bears it.  She is comforting, cheerful, and continuously tells him he can do it, even after their circumstances have caused them to move from their cushy house in a cushy suburb into his parent’s three-bedroom house in a low-income section of Boston.          


     Tommy Lee’s cheerleader is not his wife.  No, his wife is a spoiled bitch who only wants to spend more money from their endless funds.  His cheerleader is the beautiful Maria Bello, whom his wife drives him to have an affair with.  Maria is the only woman in the movie who has a high-powered job as do the three main men in the movie.  But Maria has it really hard.  She has to fire all the guys.  After firing Ben, she is so guilt-ridden that she sits back and actually takes seriously Ben’s vitriolic, curse-laden phone messages—over 20 of them.  The only redeeming part of Maria’s character is that she’s good natured enough to continue to have sex with Tommy Lee and after he’s fired, and, like Rosemary DeWitt, she supports him with a smile and continuous cheerleading.  Maria is so supportive that when Tommy’s bitch wife forces him to divorce her, Maria lets him move in with her.  That way it is easier for her to step up the cheers.

     Don’t worry, no sexism here—not all the females are angels.  Poor Christopher Cooper has a wife who is not only a bitch deluxe, but is also a fat comatose load who lies around in bed or sits around on the couch.  She causes his demise because she’s ashamed of him.  She doesn’t want the neighbors to know that he no longer has a job, so she forces him to leave the house everyday in a suit and carrying a briefcase.  She implicitly forces him to get drunk every day.

     But the real scene stealers, nay, the real co-stars of the movie, are Rosemary DeWitt’s butt and legs, and Maria Bello’s breasts.  In most of Rosemary’s scenes, her back is turned to us and the camera focuses on her shapely butt. In a product-placement coup, she wears the same designer jeans in all of these scenes, as we can see from the signature design on the butt.  I think that the jeans are from the design label, “7 for Mankind”—that would be fitting of course since the movie is only about mankind.

     Rosemary has more than a great butt.  She also has nice legs.  In a beautiful scene between Ben and Rosemary, Ben leans against the doorway of their bedroom and speaks soulfully and honestly with Rosemary as she applies moisturizing lotion to her legs, caressing them over and over.  That lotion is a seminal part to the movie and its underlying theme.

     It is Maria Bello’s naked chest that really pulls the film together.  After they have some afternoon delight, leathery Tommy Lee Jones sits around in bed while Maria rushes to get dressed to go to a work meeting. The reality is that when changing from a sexy top to a work top, a woman would have to take off said sex top, put on a bra and then a shirt over that.  A true artiste, Maria Bello does exactly that. When she peels off her sex-romp top, we see her boobs.  It is the climax of this movie.  The scene is so important that as soon as Maria flashes her chest, the man sitting behind us let out a super-loud, surprised and delighted “Oo!”  The rest of the movie must have been a letdown for him because that’s the only naked moment.

     The movie ends on a bittersweet note: A Boston accent re-emerges in a re-energized, happy Ben Affleck. 

LESSONS IN YIDDISH EXPRESSION, NEW FORMAT

As some of you may know, I had put a Yiddish word list in a side bar.  I have changed THE FORMAT SO THAT iN THE FUTURE i WILL PUT THE WORDS IN A SEPARATE POST, AND THEN INDEX THE POSTS IN THE LABEL, "YIDDISH lexicon." 


FOR SOME REASON THIS WRITING IS IN BOLD CAPS.  THIS BLOG ENGINE IS FUHKOKTAH.