My Guide to the 2008 Summer Movies - Part 1

Well, summer is in full swing and Hollywood has prepared another full slate of summer fare for us, the masses to help us tolerate our otherwise boring and pointless lives (well at least my life is pointless). As a service to all who may stumble across my blog, I have put together a set of reviews/prognostications for the summer movies of 2008. There are many movies that I have been itching to see and some others that leave me scratching my head. But since I'm unemployed currently (try finding a job that doesn't involve name tags or hairnets when you are a convicted felon), I'm sure to be spending time at my local multiplex increasing the size of my ass with popcorn and Whoppers.

• Iron Man - wide release 5/2/08. Well I gotta tell you, my brother Turk was an avid collector of comic books (excuse me, graphic novels), and his collection had all of the usual suspects: X-Men, Spider-Man, Batman, Superman, The Justice League, The Fantastic Four, The Incredible Hulk, Green Lantern, Spawn, Wonder Woman and the like. Iron Man was not one that he had in his collection. When you think about it, other than being a billionaire, there is nothing "super" about Tony Stark. He wasn't exposed to gamma rays, he wasn't bitten by a radioactive insect, he wasn't part of some government experiment, hell he wasn't even the victim of an overzealous nanny. He's just a dude with a boatload of cash that built a "supersuit." That being said, this movie kicks ass! Of the lesser known superheroes, Iron Man stands out (certain he's better than friggin' Aquaman for Pete's sake) and with the able direction of uber-fanboy Jon Favreau, the barely contained debauchery of Robert Downey Jr. (how is he not dead?) and the Oscar factor (Gwyneth Paltrow & Terence Howard), you can't go wrong...at least until The Dark Knight hits theaters. Predicted domestic gross: $350 million.
• Speed Racer - wide release 5/9/08. How could a movie with so much potential to be good (Matrix directors Andy and Larry Wachowski) suck so much? Oh yeah, it's friggin' Speed Racer. It seems clear to this amputee that the W brothers memory about how cheesy and stupid the Speed Racer cartoons were has failed them (I guess they don't get Boomerang on their TV). All I can say for Matthew Fox's turn as Racer X is at least he got to wear a mask. I get the feeling that Team W was sitting around a hookah and asked themselves, of all of the actors in Hollywood, who is the right person to bring to life the complicated pastiche of emotions that is Speed Racer? Tom Cruise? Jake Gyllenhall? Brad Pitt? No, we need Emile Hirsch (WTF?!?)! Who? You know, the kid who played young Houdini from the 1998 TV miniseries Houdini! Oh, yeah! He'd be awesome! With casting like that and the campy 60's cartoon as source material, this thing had Ishtar written all over it. Good luck trying to break even on this piece of crap. Predicted domestic gross: $45 million.
• The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian - wide release 5/16/08. I read all of the Narnia books as a kid (before I lost my leg) and loved them. I was very happy when The Lion, The Witch & the Wardrobe the books as it's big screen predecessor, but my only complaint is that it took it too long to make it back to the big screen. The actors are now much too old looking for their relative ages in the books (the youngest one went from being 7 to wearing a training bra but only 1 year of movie time went by...what happened there?). Go see this movie or you deserve to have your ass kicked again by your old junior high school bully (you know the one I mean). Predicted domestic gross: $150 million.
• Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull - wide release 5/22/08. I don't care that the plot sucks. I don't care that there are dozens of continuity errors. I don't care that the script was tooled, re-tooled, re-tooled again and should have been trashed for something else. I don't care that there are no Nazis. I don't care that the dude from Even Stevens is in it. Harrison Ford, Steven Spielberg and George Lucas are back, baby! Like a true disciple of Indy, I will see it twice in the theater and then buy the special-edition DVD when it comes out in time for Christmas. Despite all of the aforementioned problems with the movie, this will still kill at the box office and the fat cats at Paramount will rake in the moolah. Predicted domestic gross: $285 million.
• Sex and the City - wide release 5/30/08. Unlike every other woman in America, I never understood the draw of a bunch of cigarette smoking, 40-something New York whores (I mean cougars) who were overly concerned with which pair of Jimmy Choos would match their 17-year-old cock of the month. So then why would I get excited about 2 hours of their continued complaining, shopping and balling, just because the queen of the 5th Avenue elitist WASPs finally decides to get married before her eggs shrivel up? I don't know either. However, since only me and single straight guys will be the only people on the plant who don't go watch it, the predicted domestic gross is: $150 million.
• Kung Fu Panda & You Don't Mess with the Zohan - wide release 6/6/08. Well, it's a match-up of formidable Hacidic Hollywood funnymen: Jack Black vs. Adam Sandler. Which Zionist will have the most clout at the box office? Only time will tell. The Sandman, has gone back to his screwball formula as a fish out of water. In this case, a former Mossad Assassin turn NYC hairdresser (but he's not gay or anything). It's not any less plausible than any of his other movies (except for the ones where he attempts to be taken seriously as a dramatic actor). JB serves up family fare as Po, the noodle-cooking kung-fu wannabe that is thrust suddenly into the role of the Dragon Warrior, the only one who can defeat the evil villain and save the village. I have to go with Panda in the head-to-head because the younger kids are fresh out of school and driving mom and dad nuts. Add in the Dreamworks label and PG rating and you can guarantee some cash changing hands at the theater. Projected domestic gross: $100 million & $150 million respectively.
  
• The Happening & The Incredible Hulk - wide release 6/13/08. Well, what can you say about this box office matchup? The first Hulk movie was a train wreck and that was directed by an Oscar winner. This current offering is directed by the dude who directed The Transporter and The Transporter 2: Electric Boogaloo. I'm not sure if it will fare much better. True there have been some serious upgrades in the casting department: Edward Norton, Liv Tyler and Tim Roth explode on the screen. In the other corner you have yet another M. Night Shamalamadingdong creepy-crawly that again can't possibly be as good as The Sixth Sense was. All I can hope is that it isn't as far off the deep end as The Lady in the Water was. Talk about weird and self-serving. The trailer was annoying. All I can gather from it is that Marky Mark walks around for 2 plus hours with his mouth hanging open like an orangutan while everybody else in New York dies. This also marks M. Night's first R-rated film which severely limits the audience. Just in case everyone else forgot, the summer is when kids are out of school and PG-13 is the rating that translates into box office gold. This weekend goes to my green buddy with a rage problem hands down. You can bet that I will see both of them, because Mitch loves all things R-rated. Projected domestic box office: $95 million & $200 million respectively.

Well, that's all for now my faithful DoD. I have to hit the sack early so I can continue looking for a job. I'm only doing it to keep Gary my parole officer off my back. Have a great week and I'll see you at the movies!

How to make booze in prison

Good evening my faithful friends! You may be asking yourself, "Dana, did you learn anything from your experience in prison?" The answer my friends is an unqualified YES! I learned plenty of things:

1. Don't cry your first night in prison or you become the bitch of a 300-pound Polynesian lesbian named Ruthie.
2. The corn dogs don't have sticks in them. Apparently, they can be fashioned into shivs.
3. For a pack of Marlboro Reds, you can get anything...anything.
4. You can make wine in the toilet in your cell.

I won't lie to you, prison hooch (aka Pruno) lacks the heady apple-laden bouquet and sophistication of a good Pinot Noir. In fact, the shit is so vicious that it gave my cell mate Danielle Bell's Palsy. It does help you forget that you are in prison. It helps you forget everything (very high on the blackout factor). I have printed the recipe below. Feel free to make it yourselves, but please note the following disclaimer:

You will need professional medical attention if you drink any of this stuff. Do not give this stuff to children...CPS will bust your ass. Do not drink this yourself...you may experience cramping, dizziness, nausea, diarrhea, bloating, vertigo, sweating, flatulence, loquacity, syncope, coma or any combination of these symptoms. Do not give this to any domesticated animals...PETA will bust your ass. If you are stupid enough to make this, I cannot be held responsible for what happens to your dumb ass. Here's the recipe:

1. Make a strong bag by using two small trash bags, placed one inside the other. Place a fruit of your choice and fruit cocktail inside the bag. Seal bag.
2. Mash the fruit and fruit cocktail inside the bag with your hand. Fill the sink with hot water and place the bag into water. Let sit for 15 minutes. Make sure water does not cool; add more hot water, if necessary.
3. Take the bag from water, and wrap it in a towel to keep it warm. Leave for 48 hours while the fruit ferments. If it's warm outside, leave the bag in a safe place outdoors.
4. Add sugar and ketchup. Use about 50 sugar cubes. If using yeast or moldy bread, add that as well. Reseal the bag, and run under hot water for 30 minutes or until the sugar is fully absorbed.
5. Heat the bag in hot water for 15 minutes once a day for three days. Leave wrapped in a towel. Check often; the bag swells as gases are released. It may pop. When ready, separate the mashed fruit from the liquid, and there you have your wine.

Cheers, turkey lips!

Where the hell have I been?

Big ups to the DoD, what few of you there may be! Many of you may have been wondering where I have been for the last few months. Well, that's a long story. I may tell it to you sometime when I've have enough beer. Suffice it to say that my plans to become the sexiest Industrial Arts teacher in North Carolina on one leg have become waylaid. Long story short, I was just released after serving 2 months of a 18-month sentence (off on good behavior, thank you) for aggravated assault at the Wyoming State Penitentiary Complex in Rawlins. Here's a piece of advice that I hope all of you will take: do not serve as your own attorney in a criminal trial. BTW, I have included a picture of my temporary home on the right (cell block 9 in the house!) The worst part of it was that none of this would have happened if it weren't for my former main squeeze, T-Dizzle himself (like gasp, right?)!

Everything was going great. I had a swell Thanksgiving dinner with Twyla, her brother Cletus and her mother Aura Lee. Her mother makes the best sweet potato pie. It had like tons of marshmallows, brown sugar and pecans on it. It was the bomb. Her brother was a piece of work. He had Downs Syndrome and smelled like lima beans and pee. Anywho, when Twyla and I came back to school after Thanksgiving, the campus police were waiting. The authorities at AppState in cooperation with the FBI and the Wyoming State Police had found me, due to an anonymous tip from a certain slice of white lightning. T-Sink had forwarded a link to this very blog to the authorities. Damn my attention to detail! Curse my inability to maintain an internal monologue! Why am I always compelled to tell my story? Why am I a troubador? I led them right to me!

Well, I was transported back to Wyoming to stand trial. I was assigned a public defender after my repeated requests to have Johnny Cochrane represent me were denied (they kept saying he was dead...clearly they just wanted to ensure a quick conviction.). The P.D. wanted me to cop a plea to shoplifting and take 24 months probation. That's bullshit! I paid for the gas. I told that butt nugget to suck eggs and insisted upon being my own legal counsel. When the prosecutor got wind of that, the plea deal dried up and he hit me with the full on aggravated assault charge. To top it off, the judge was a dike. Not the cool kind that likes k.d. lang and Yoplait, the old kind that has 12 cats, lisetns to Joan Baez, eats homemade pemmican and hates good-looking broads like me because I use my raw animal magnetism to bilk men out of cash. I didn't stand a chance.

I decided to plead insanity. I had my defense all laid out. My cross-country journey made me emotionally vulnerable. Being rebuffed by my former professor pushed me to the brink. The red-headed fat cow at the gas mart pushed me over the edge. To drive the insanity bit home, I tried all kinds of smokescreens and double bluffs...like Matlock used to do. I said "objection!" every 3 minutes, even if it was my turn to cross-examine myself. I requested a side bar and then told the judge that the trial wasn't fair because the prosecutor's ugly suit was distracting the voices in my head. Unfortunately, none of my Matlockian tactics fooled the jury and they threw the book at me. The Judge imposed a light sentence because, and I quote "Despite the fact that I find you personally despicable and your actions morally reprehensible, I haven't had this much fun in court since defense attorney farted in the middle of cross-examination. 18-months." I'll update you in future posts on how I learned to make a cake out of hot Cheetos, Elmer's glue and spit.