A Quickie: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1

I went to see it tonight, and it was so good! Here's my five-star review:

I think I may be closer to a 4.5 on this one, but I really did love it, and would rank it up there with 1 and 3. It did feel like there was more "exposition" (even though these movies abandoned trying to re-familiarize audiences with the overarching plot about 3/4 movies ago, which is both good and bad) than actual action but I enjoyed it as a more character-driven story than other movies were. I really love the interaction between our main gang, especially Harry and Hermione and Ron and Hermione (I just love Hermione), and it was nice seeing pretty much all of our favorite characters again, even briefly (LUPIN HI LUPIN...WAIT WHERE ARE YOU GOING COME BACK AND BE IN THE WHOLE MOVIE PLEASE he looked really good in this movie, I feel like he's decreasing in age or something). This movie was SO BEAUTIFUL, I really felt like saying "wow" the whole time. The colors and the locations were great. Those HP kids better be grateful that they got to see all of these amazing places. The ending felt a bit odd; "No, Harry, I can't help Dobby, we haven't reached our death quota yet! And also it would be a perfectly sad way to end this movie! So let's end it now! Predictably! But let's also remind people that this is TBC by showing Voldemort! Yay!" Also I haven't read the book since it came out so the movie was a bit hard to follow at times, but even so this felt like one of the most succinct (despite its running time) films in the series, as well as the most engaging, and I'm SO READY for Part 2!

This is Essentially a Post You've Read Before But You Will Read It Again and You Will Like It

Last night's 30 Rock proved that life is worth living. It was a comedy powerhouse that transcended race, religion, sexual orientation, and shoe size.

Yeah. "Wow." Watch it.

And I'm like, "Forget you!"

Last night's Glee was surprisingly awesome. Kurt and Blaine being hilarious/not annoyingly catty/adorable/hilarious (bold for emphasis), the musical numbers, G. Paltrow as Holly Holiday, the one-liners...I actually really liked it. Yippee!

Here is the far-and-away best number of the night, "Forget You" (based on the explicitly titled song by Cee-lo).



(Favorite part? "Why? WHY?")

Is she cool? Is she lame?

Oh, are you talking about old what's her name? PEPPER ANN PEPPER ANN

Pepper Ann was such a great show. Thank goodness there are episodes on Youtube!



Pepper Ann was mos def much too cool for 7th grade! That girl (and NICKY AND MILO I MEAN COME ON) was one of the coolest in cartoons, ever. SHE IS SO AWESOME URGGH. This show talked about "middle school issues" or whatever but since the characters were so amazing it was just a great show. Disney used to have some really awesome shows back in the day. The Weekenders is one that's kind of similar and also newer but just as good (well, almost).



Seriously. Milo is a stoner-in-training. Nicky is a child prodigy but still amazingly cool. And Pepper Ann is just neurotic, paranoid, and generally amazing. And then there's Dieter...hilarious. And Moose! Who was a girl. The ultimate tomboy.



And that theme song really is the best. PEPPER ANN PEPPER ANN SHE'S LIKE ONE IN A MILLION

A Quickie: Catfish

Tonight I attended a special screening of Catfish. Here's my Flixster "review" (I gave the movie 4 stars):

I got a very cool opportunity to watch this movie at a screening that had a Q&A afterwards with the directors + Nev. VERY cool. And since I'm a kid and there were other kids there and kids are just awesome, Nev and Rel stuck around for an hour (maybe even more; they were still talking to other people 20 minutes after I left!) and took more questions and talked to us. Very cool. All of the other girls were fawning over Nev but my friends and I talked to Rel, who was similarly very nice (but not as...not charming, but obsessed with the ladies). So, very cool. Although Henry disappeared. I wanted to talk to him, too. Oh well. It was cool talking to/shaking the hand of a filmmaker.

Okay, it's not really a review, but if you haven't noticed it's almost midnight. So shut up. Blaaargh. (The movie was really good though, by the way. Funny and uncomfortable and sad and uncomfortable and uncomfortable and...)

You May Think This Post is Useless, But I Assure You, It's Not

This is Jake. Jake is a famous actor. Jake is an Oscar-nominated actor, in fact. He is descended from a long line of Swedish nobility, apparently. He may or may not be dating Taylor Swift. (That may or may not be disgusting.)

But most of all, Jake has a funny last name. This name is one that many people have had trouble spelling properly over the years.

I never considered myself one of those people, until now.

I was watching that terrible show on Cartoon Network, MAD, and they had some awful sketch about fan letters. One of them said, "Dear Jake, how do you spell your last name?" The joke was that even Jake himself was not sure. Ha, ha.

"Come on," I said, rolling my eyes with an air of superiority. "Spelling his name is SO easy. It's...it's..." I typed it out, saying it out loud as I wrote so I could affirm my choice of spelling. G-y-l-l-e-n-h-a-l. Was that not it?

I instantly felt self-conscious. Perhaps this was...not correct? No, that couldn't be. I've written the name many a time before; I think I would know how to spell it. But maybe I should check, just to make sure.

I typed it into Wikipedia. J-a-k-e. G-y-l-l-e-n-h-a-l. This is what showed up.

What? I...no. This couldn't be. I had to take a closer look.

I zoomed in.

Gyllenhaal. Gyllenhaal.

JACOB BENJAMIN "JAKE" GYLLENHAAL.

And that is what I learned today. Gyllenhaal. Two A's.

Never forget.

Presenting: A New-But-Dumb Venue for Jason Sudeikis and His Glorious Face (And Stephen Merchant!)

Jason Sudeikis: "DO WANT! you to see this movie." Me: "No! I can't! Too...stupid..."

That is a hilarious screencap from the trailer for Hall Pass. "Hall Pass" is some dumb new movie coming out next year that I will not go and see, but will tell you about excitedly anyway for 3 reasons: ONE, Jason Sudeikis is in it!!!!! TWO, STEPHEN MERCHANT IS IN IT!!! and THREE, JASON SUDEIKIS AND STEPHEN MERCHANT ARE IN IT TOGETHER!!!!

Huzzah! Behold, the trailer!



This movie is unworthy of these guys' heaps of talent, but god darnit all, a movie exists with both of these two in it now! How can I not be excited?

Although, listen to that premise. Poor Jenna "Pam" Fischer, looking all bored and sad that her healthy career on The Office has led to only tiny roles in middling lowbrow comedies, as she flatly tells us the movie's plot. I've never heard the term "hall pass" used for this purpose before, but then, my "worldliness" is defined only in the context of video games and very specific kinds of television shows, so it's quite likely that it's a very popular term. (But I doubt that.) Anyway, why would any woman EVER give their husband this kind of "pass?" That makes no sense to me. It's a really idiotic plot device and ME AM DISPLEASED PAM. Me am displeased.

So anyway, other than that I really have no clue how this movie is supposed to sustain more than 20 minutes. Owen Wilson (Pam's husband, which is really weird because Jim is Pam's husband and I mean isn't everything on the Office fact and don't all movies and TV shows exist in the same universes and and and and?) goes clubbin' with his motley crew consisting of J. Sud' (who apparently was also freed from that prison sentence that is marriage), Stephen Merchant (YAY!), and some other people who aren't J. Sud' or Stephen Merchant, and tries to "score babes" with probably little success. Although, according to this magazine I read on an airplane to Japan, Owen Wilson is an "American hearthrob" whose broken nose is "handsome," so maybe he actually does manage to use his hall pass successfully. But then, that's it, really. If the movie goes down that road, with Owen Wilson being successful, then it can't last any more than 5 minutes, really. Unless he realizes how much he looooves his wife or something and goes running back to her. But then, since the hall pass is only effective for one week anyway, with the implication that Owen and Jason Sudeikis go back to their wives afterwards, then the movie is still only 5 minutes.

Basically Hall Pass is going to be a flimsy concept "hilariously" stretched out for an hour and a half. Well, at least that means we get to see Stephen Merchant and Jason Sudeikis try their darnedest to make me want to pay money to see this movie. I will resist, but it's hard. That chloroform joke at the end made me chuckle more than it should have.

I give this trailer 3 Stephen Merchant's dressed like fabulous British gentlemen out of 5.

P.S. I watched the trailer a second time on mute, and it was entertaining. I suggest you try that.