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Masticator76
Reviews
The Pleasure Drivers (2006)
Edgy.
The Pleasure Drivers is awesome in the way that only a movie featuring Angus Macfadyen having a large handgun repeatedly inserted in his bottom could be.
Lauren Holly looks after Tom, a young man who suffered head trauma in a car accident as a teenager. As a brittle, unhappy recovering crack addict, she is the ideal candidate to care for Tom. She knows Tom's father is withholding money from her, so she goes to confront him - except he turns out to be Billy Zane, who isn't his father, but is a famous actor who can channel Marlon Brando! Yes, repeatedly rubbing your hand over your bald head counts as a performance.
Anyway, Billy tells her she can't have any money, so Lauren decides to kidnap Tom's twin sister Casey. She does what any competent kidnapper would and takes her to see Meat Loaf, who gives Lauren the details of a desert motel where she can go and the key to Room 2. That's Room 2. This may be significant. The motel is called, and I am not joking, The Big Cock Inn.
Meanwhile, in a storyline that is NOT CONNECTED IN ANY WAY WHATSOEVER TO THE KIDNAPPING STORYLINE, Angus Macfadyen is an oddball psychology professor who is germ- obsessed, anally retentive and about to be kicked out by his wife. Did I mention he is anally retentive? This may be significant.
After his wife kicks him out because she is in love with another woman (edgy!), he wanders around a bit and then meets a young woman who pretends to be his student, then pretends to be seducing him, then says she is a sex addict, then says she is an escort (and has the documentation to prove it), then tries to have sex with him for free, then it turns out she's just a sad, scared girl who wants a better life. This woman is possibly the most ridiculous character ever to appear in a film. She is played, heartbreakingly, by Gretchen Wieners from Mean Girls.
Anyway they end up at - have you guessed? - The Big Cock Inn. In Room 2. The Big Cock Inn turns out to be the least appropriate place Angus could be. Gretchen gets very cross with him because his penis is small and doesn't work, and because he's - I cannot stress this enough - a total idiot. She leaves, but then for some reason she doesn't. This is bad news, because they're in Room 2, and the lesbian hitwoman Billy Zane sent after Lauren goes to their room! D'oh!! (Lesbians, again, are edgy.)
But rather than try to find the kidnapped Casey, the lesbian hitwoman - because lesbians are so edgy - takes her gun and puts it up Angus's bottom, again and again. Angus loves this; it makes him sing a song. He keeps singing for ages, just in case you thought this film wasn't ludicrous enough.
There's a big shootout and all the women (except Gretchen) are killed, because women deserve it, those bitches, except for the sex-addict prostitute ones because they have hearts of gold. Tom saves Gretchen and they head off to Portland, Maine, together because Tom always wanted to go there. Hooray!
Angus goes home and enters his lesbian (edgy!) wife's bedroom where she is lying with her lesbian (edgy!) lover. He is naked and has a gun, and that's the end. You never find out if Angus was going to shoot his wife or get him to penetrate him with the gun, because ambiguity is super-edgy, especially when it involves lesbians.
I highly recommend this edgy film.
The Shadow Dancer (2005)
One Goes Mad In Tuscany
**CONTAINS SPOILERS THROUGHOUT**
I watched the DVD of 'Shadows In The Sun', formerly known as 'The Shadow Dancer'. Because 'Shadows In The Sun' is a much better name and makes complete sense.
Josh Jackson is a hotshot young publishing executive - the best kind! His boss, who is Gimli, sends him to Italy to track down an eccentric, reclusive author who hasn't written anything for 20 years, since his wife died. Josh goes to Italy and gets a hotel in a tiny, remote Tuscan village where everybody speaks enough English to tell him that no, they haven't heard of this author. But it turns out that they're all protecting him because they know he hates hotshot young publishing executives!
Josh, because he's clever and tenacious, finds him and he's Harvey Keitel, acting all crazy. But Josh sees through Harvey's cunning ruse (guess what he is Not Really Crazy) and begs him to sign a contract and write another book, because he should, because he's brilliant! Harvey tells him to GO AWAY. He sets his dog on him and pretends to throw him in a lake, because he's so eccentric and free-spirited. But then they start to form a grudging friendship, after Harvey trashes Josh's rental car and they end up in prison a couple of times, because that's how all real friendships start.
Meanwhile Josh meets Harvey's daughter, who is Claire Forlani (he has two other daughters, Goth Daughter and Hat Daughter, who serve no discernible purpose other than being Not As Beautiful As Claire Forlani) with-a an outrageous-a Italian-a accent-a, even-a though her father is-a American-a. He tells her the real reason he wants Harvey to write again is that Harvey's book 'The Shadow Dancer' (not 'Shadows In The Sun', which would be a stupid title) changed his life when he was 12. Claire says he should have told Harvey that. Josh agrees, but then for some reason he never does tell him. Claire says that despite what Harvey says, he does want to write again, but he's afraid. Possibly that his typewriter will turn into a giant scary cockroach thing like in 'Naked Lunch'. Needless to say a giant scary cockroach thing would have improved this movie immeasurably.
Anyway it turns out that Josh wants to be a writer as well, so Harvey teaches him to use words other than "the" and "it" and "and" to describe things, because this is a basic skill writers need. He also tells him that he needs experience to draw on and he tries to provide some for him, including punching Josh in the stomach and getting him to do karaoke. Harvey also gets naked and Josh is horrified, which presumably doesn't require much acting. Josh buys a nasty waistcoat at the market and starts to learn Italian from Claire, even though everyone speaks English in the remote Tuscan village. Because he's very subtle, the first words he asks Claire to translate into Italian are "beautiful", "lips" and "kiss".
Josh tells Harvey that he knows he wants to write again and he should stop hiding behind his DEAD WIFE!! After punching him and crying a bit, Harvey agrees to write again, and Josh gets to sleep with Claire, although without any proper nudity because that would be tasteless. Afterwards she tells him it was just a one-night thing, and he gets drunk and nearly cries, and then he has to leave. Harvey says Josh should stay, seeing as he has no family, doesn't really like his job, should live somewhere inspiring if he wants to be a writer, and OMG London (where he lives) is like so totally lame compared to Tuscany! But Josh says he just can't. So he leaves on a steam train, because Harvey doesn't just live in Italy, he lives in Italy in the 1890s! Then there's some nonsense about a bird and a horse, and Josh pulls the emergency cord to stop the train, for which there is probably a 75 fine, and he gets off and kisses Claire even though she was totally mean to him five minutes before, and they all live happily ever after
in the shadows in the sun, I guess.