Back Off, Fanboy: Dupree Review and a LOT more, BELIEVE IT

Well let's see, what do I have to talk about today?

This week is about to get crazy - the parents arrive on a plane from CT tonight, and are here until Sunday. My brother's USY on Wheels trip rolls into LA tonight as well. Most likely, I won't see any of 'em until tommorow though, as both the brother and parents are gtting in pretty late tonight. Tommorow I take off from work to spend some quality time with the fam', and then who knows what Thursday, Friday, and Saturday will bring.

- Also, gotta say Happy Birthday today to the G-Man himself, Brian, who is a true supporter of the blog and an all around good man. As a fellow member of the Jewish persuasion, a fellow member of the NBC Page class of January '05, a fellow believer in the sacred tenets of Hulkamania, and as a good friend - have a good one, Brian!

- This past weekend was a good time, as Saturday a bunch of us partied like rock stars in celebration of Scott's b-day (okay, rock stars is pushing it, but I've been looking for an excuse to say that for a while ...). Sunday a few friends and I gathered to take in a Kevin Smith View Askewniverse double feature of Clerks and Mallrats, the two bonafide K. Smith comedy classics, in my humble humble opinion.

- Man, those movies are so great - why is it that they still feel more cool and modern than just about any Hollywood comedies today, despite being more than ten years old? Maybe because they were written and directed by a guy who was never far removed from his subject matter. Kevin Smith was a young, slacker-ish, geeky fanboy stoner, writing about people just like him or people he knew. Hell, Jason Mewes is basically just playing himself to the nth degree as Jay of Jay and Silent Bob fame. It's just such a different vibe watching those movies compared to the latest processed Hollywood movie about teens or twenty-somethings written by a committee of fifty year olds. What they lack in polish, they more than make up in gritty authenticity - the overly-analytical diatribes of a new Lost Generation - smart, witty, self-concious - but stuck working behind the counter of the Quick Stop. Anyone who's been through the NBC Page Program should easily be able to relate.

Suffice to say, can't wait for Clerks II, which despite retreading all-too familiar ground, should still be a welcome return to form for Kevin Smith, and a return to the unique kind of humor that only a guy truly writing about what he knows (vulgar humor, fanboy geek debates, crappy jobs, and life and love) can deliver. Bring it on.

- On another note regarding influential voices in pop culture, RIP to one of the great writers of hard-boiled pulp fiction, Mickey Spillane. Spillane created the longtime detective favorite, Mike Hammer, a character who appeared in numerous movies and TV series over the years, played by a variety of actors in the 50's, 60's, 70's, and 80's. Spillane wrote with that unique pulp style of terse language and violent imagery that made him the definitive writer for guys who liked to read about tough guys doing badass things. In college I was first exposed to the writing of Spillane, which was a pretty damn refreshing change from all of the "classic" literature I was reading for my English courses. I also first saw the best (if most divergant) adaptation of Mike Hammer - the classic film noir Kiss Me Deadly - a weird but highly entertaining mix of film noir and 1950's nuclear paranoia. They don't make 'em like that anymore.

- I also saw You, Me, and Dupree this weekend at a free Universal Studios screening. Not one I probably would have paid to see, but at the low, low price of FREE it was hard to pass up ...

YOU, ME, AND DUPREE Review:

- The disappointing thing with this movie is that it has one of those premises that we've seen before, but pretty much always has good potential for comedy despite how many times the same exact setup has been used. It's simple - three is a crowd, and therefore hilarity ensues. In this case, the Third Man is Owen Wilson, basically just doing a lot of Owen Wilson-y schtick. Funny in theory, but this is not really the quirky Owen Wilson character that was so funny in Meet the Parents or The Life Aquatic. What made Wilson so funny in many of his other movies is that you can't quite pinpoint where he's coming from. He looks like a stoned surfer dude, but he has this kind of cockiness as well, a real blue-blood type snobbery, almost. Usually, Owen Wilson plays some of the more complex comedic characters out there, which is why I've become a big fan of his over the years - I mean, I legitimately was a big fan of Shanghai Noon and Shanghai Knights, for crying out loud. How many people can say THAT? But, unfortunately, what we get here is total, cookie-cutter Owen Wilson as Hollywood's idea of Funny Man. Take one part of Owen's trademark stoned mock-sincerity as was so popular in the overrated Wedding Crashers, one dash of standard, Hollywood WACKINESS (TM Jim Carrey, TM Will Ferell), mix together and let the hijinks ensue. So yeah, You, Me, and Dupree never amounts to a movie where the actor's uniqueness shapes the movie into something great and hilarious, like, say, the similarly-themed What About Bob. Instead, this is a case of the actor struggling to retain his integrity and uniqueness while doing a pretty paint by numbers movie (think Jim Carrey in Bruce Almighty).

There are moments that are definitely funny. The entire climactic sequence with Owen as Dupree "blowing seven kinds of smoke" in order to create a distraction for his pal Matt Dillon is pretty hilarious. And there's a few other random moments that definitely bring the funny. But overall, we have an uneven mix of Owen Wilson shennanigans coupled with a totally bland couple of Matt Dillon and Kate Hudson, and an embarrasingly lame performance by Michael Douglass. Douglass tries his best to channel the inspired serious-guy-does-comedy stylings of Robert DeNiro in Meet the Parents, but let's face it, Michael Douglass is no DeNiro, in drama or comedy. His character here is just straining for laughs, and we, like him, become very uncomfortable whenever he's on screen.

But back to Dillon and Hudson as our main newlywedded couple. Yikes, talk about unlikable. Dillon for some reason plays his character here like he's the freaking Punisher or something, practically growling out his lines and looking at all times like he's about to pop a cap in somebody. In one scene he just unironically calls Owen Wilson a "homo." Okay ...

Hudson also is pretty stiff in this movie, partly because it's how her character is written. But she is just a typical stereotype here - the stern, good head on her shoulders wife who still has a soft spot for her husbands' goofy friend. So yeah, basically she is playing Wilma Flintstone. Nice.

Even Seth Rogen, so good in Freaks and Geeks, 40 Year Old Virgin, etc, is reduced to a lame role that is a combo of a few different sitcom characters we've all seen about 5 billion times. Like everything else in the movie, very paint-by-numbers.

Like I said, it's funny at times, but the two or three memorable lines get drowned out by the other two hours or so of derivative blandness. This movie never really takes things far enough, never pushes the envelope. Owen Wilson's character never does anything THAT bad, except burn down the house, but hey I saw Steve Urkel do that on Family Matters like 15 years ago. Give me something new here. Anything.

And, P.S. - those radio commercials really were annoying.

My Grade: C

- As far as the rest of the summer goes, what have we got in terms of movies? Clerks and Lady in the Water both hit this weekend, though Lady, man, I have a feeling this is going to be a real cluster of a movie, though possibly a highly entertaining cluster. Otherwise, there's Snakes on a Plane, of course, and then before you know it it's fall. Ahhh!

- As far as TV stuff goes, I am definitely curious about tonight's debut of EUREKA on Sci-Fi - love the concept, about a quirky, secluded town founded in the 50's by Truman and Einstein, filled with all kinds of weirdness, but we'll see how the execution is.

- One other thing -- thanks to all those who have pointed out to me over the last few days that Avril Lavigne is now a married woman (to some punk from Sum 41 no less). Still, two rock stars, married young .. gotta figure the chances of divorce are pretty high. Seriously, congrats Avril, from that guy who you once said "hi" to in the backstage hallway of the Tonight Show.

- And on a final note, let's all hope for the best for Israel as it continues to be bombarded with Hezbollah-fired rockets, in highly populated cities like Haifa. We need to give Israel our support as individuals and as a country. Funny, how Bush's expletive-inclusive talk with Tony Blair ("See, the irony is what they really need to do is to get Syria to get Hezbollah to stop doing this shit." - re: the Middle East and the UN) may have been the most to-the-point and lucid thing that we've heard him say in a while. Let's hope that Bush can return from this summit and get some things done with regards to the Middle East situation, and that the UN can silence its more outspoken anti-Israel contingents and lend its support to the cause that all free nations should endorse: fighting terror and dismantling groups like Hezbollah. I think Bush should just roll with all this though and start cursin' up a storm - out with the H-Bomb, in with the F-bomb.