Austin Powers and Mike Myers

I think Mike Myers is all kinds of genius. I do. Wayne Cambell. Shrek. His stints on SNL. His Canadian sports commentator in Mystery, Alaska.  Playing his character's father in So I Married An Ax Murderer. And of course, Austin Powers. Definitely Austin Powers.  

After seeing Kingsmen: The Secret Service which I felt was a nice blend of Austin Powers and James Bond, I had to get me an Austin fix. I'm sad to announce that my significant other had not seen any Austin Powers, but he enjoyed it immensely. I'm still working on his film and television education. He had many deprived years for which I am trying to compensate.

Anywho, we came straight home from the Kingsmen and watched the first Austin Power's movie., Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery. And though I'm not such a fan of the second film, Goldmember, we did get Mini-Me and Nigel Powers out of it, so that's a plus. On the flip side, I'm not a big fan of Beyonce and Fat Bastard was kind of gross.

Standouts:
- Mimi Rogers is so pretty. I love her mouth. I dunno what else to say about that.
- The naked moments with strategic prop placement. So funny and well done.
- Scott Evil. Could Seth Green be any cuter than as Scott Evil? I don't think so. In the first movie, when he and Dr. Evil are in father/son counseling? OMG, fuuny!
- The incredible casts across all three films.
- Hooray for Dr.Evil and Mini Me. Cuz you cannot get enough Dr. Evil. Truly. He cracks me up all the time and then to have Verne Troyer's mini version. Love it!
- The Fembots with their nipple guns.... LMAO.
- That Austin is able to short circuit the fembots with his sex appeal... LMFAO.

Big Hero 6

Hopefully the comic book purists won't burn me in effigy for this, but I scanned some background on the Marvel comic series of Big Hero 6 and I'm glad they morphed it into the animated feature film it became (and won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature). And maybe I'm totally out in left field (not unheard of at all) and the movie did the comic books credit - I really have no clue.

What I do know is that I thought the movie was wicked cute and Baymax is the sweetest darn robot out there. Although in a quick tangent, Chappie the robot in the movie Chappie may come close -but I may not be able to see that one for a while because it looks like a serious tear jerker. And movies that take creatures out of their element or create something unique and then crucify said unique thing for being what it is (King Kong, the Jurassic Park dinosaur they bring to Los Angeles, Johnny five in Short Circuit, Ceasar in Rise of the Planet of the Apes for a few). It just puts my panties in a real twist we when punish others for our own stupidity. Tangent (rant) over.

So Baymax.... seriously.... the voice, the behaviors, the care. So. Freaking. Cute!

The whole story was a good one. Heartfelt, had a message, features regular people becoming super heroes. Just all around cute and better than I had expected. I think this one is under-rated and under-appreciated. So, unless you're like my mom who finds anything animated anathema, do yourself a favor and give this one  watch.

Dancing with the Stars

The new season of Dancing with the Stars starts in a week on March 16th. Woohoo!!

In anticipation, I am re-watching the last season. See, I save all the shows on my DVR a season at a time and then re-watch before the new season starts and delete them then. But, I always have at least some DWTS on my DVR so I never have to be without. Smart, huh? When I'm re-watching, I don't watch the whole show, since I've seen it all, I just re-watch the dances.

Tangent - I really wish they would just sell the seasons on disc so I could buy them all. But no. For whatever reason that I am not privy to, DWTS and So You Think You Can Dance, do not put the shows on DVD or Blue-ray or whatever. This makes me exceptionally sad as there are so many dances I could just watch over and over. Anywho, the point is I save a season and watch the dances again just before the next season starts which is where I am at now.

The pros. Always happy when Derek is dancing. He's my hands down favorite and I think he is just the most creative choreographer (although Mark Ballas's Mario Brother's freestyle was incredible). Other pro's I like a lot that will be dancing this season  include... well,  all of them except I'm still trying to warm up to Allison and Keo.

The Stars (or at least the ones I have feelings about).
Noah Calloway (soldier). Love soldiers, what they represent, the service they've done for our country - just everything. And JR Martinez (soldier) won when he was on and Noah is dealing with an amputee challenge, but Amy Purdy showed just how little that slowed her down cuz she came in 2nd for her season.

Patti LaBelle (singer) - I suspect she will be gracious and lovely to watch as her spirit comes across that way.

Nastia Luikin (gymnast) - the last time a gymnast, Shawn Johnson, partnered with Derek Hough, they won. So, she has some potential from the starting gate.

RedFoo - I am super jazzed to watch him. He's guest judged before and I love LMFAO. I think Emma Slater should have a good time with him.

Michael Sam (NFL player) and first openly gay NFL player. So yay for him. Coming out for anyone is hard enough and when it's in the public eye and in a sport like football - uber not easy. So, for courage and living authentic, I'll be rooting for this guy!

Willow Shields (actress) - I like the Hunger Game movies as much as the next person, but I always found Prim, Katniss's little sister, a bit annoying, but that is not Willow's fault. So, I'm keeping an open mind.

Suzanne Somers (actress) - another one like Patti LaBelle for me.

Rumer Willis (actress) - We shall see. I liked her in The House Bunny, so keeping an open mind.

Overall, just excited for a new season of cool ass dancing.

Steve Buscemi

Okay, Steve Buscemi has a really, really, really long list of acting credits. Loads more than I knew. But I sometimes think he is one of those sadly underrated actors who shuffles into the background and we may not remember but we always notice. He's a favorite of mine and now I have a really long list of things to try and see just for their Buscemi-ness.

His look is certainly so distinctive that you can't fail to recognize him when you see him. The eyes. the teeth. The hairline. The looks.... all singular. He can be so dry, so sarcastic, so funny, so creepy, so irreverent, so... you name it. He's just crazy talented.

Highlights for me (feel free to add your own in the comments):
Tangent - listing these movies makes me want to go watch them all over again! Not enough hours in the day for my addictions... sigh.

Reservoir Dogs - Great film, impressive cast, directed by Quentin Tarantino. Funny and dark and violent. And so easy to love. This is a classic must see film. Just saying.

Fargo - More dark comedy. He's just a natural fit. His manic competent/incompetent thing works. There is so much right about the wrongness of this film. And it's another steller cast.

Con Air - For me, he was at his most creepy in this film. He's absolutely mesmerizing and unpredictable. Chilling! And surrounded by another great cast.

Armageddon - I recently talked about this one. But again, he's so funny as Rockhound.

Monsters, Inc - Even his voice is singular. Randall is a slippery suck up and who better to voice him than Buscemi. Seriously. And an all-star cast of voices. Are we seeing a trend?

The Incredible Burt Wonderstone - OMG, this one is just cheesy great fun. And another awesome cast. Buscemi, Steve Carell and Jim Carrey make magician-ing look good. Not Criss Angel good, More like a car wreck you can't take your eyes off - good. (Possibly a very bad metaphor - my apologies). But so good.

Final words, Steve Buscemi is great talent, a singular individual (which is redundant, I know but he is singular in his singularity - just go with it), and versatile. So very, very versatile. Now I have a ton of Buscemi-ness to catch up on.

"Kingsmen: The Secret Service"

Hello?! This was G-R-E-A-T!!!

This is what an old fashioned fun spy movie should be. It's somewhere between the silliness of Austin Powers and the seriousness of James Bond. Perfect balance of action, drama, comedy, cool gadgets and smart-dressed people.

Colin Firth is so good as a dashing action hero. Taron Egerton, who plays his protege, was terrific too. My friend and I pondered if he wouldn't have been a better Christian Grey than the one they cast. I dunno. Anyway, you've also got Michael Caine, Mark Strong and Jack Davenport. I couldn't figure out who the Professor was at the beginning, but he looked so familiar.... It was Mark Hamilton! Cool!

And can I just say that Samuel L Jackson and Sofia Boutella were the greatest villain and henchman team ever.  Seriously... ever. Jackson in his color coordinated ball cap and clothes and the lisp. Loved the lisp. And he can't stand blood. So freaking funny. And Boutella as his number one with her slice and dice prosthetic legs. OMG. Loved it all.

Some SPOILERS BELOW....

When Firth says, "Manners Maketh Man" and then kicks ass all over a group of punks. YES!! And when Egerton does the same at the end. Oh, hell yes! Best movie quote in quite a while.

And when the princess of Sweden (I think it was Sweden) says Egerton can have sex with in the asshole if he saves the world, I just about snorted up soda thru my nose.

Just see it. I'm gonna see it again and then buy it and then see it a few more times. Count on it.

American Sniper

Last week, the man who killed Chris Kyle and his friend Chad Littlefield was convicted of murder.  And though I’m glad there is some kind of justice for these two families, I want to talk about the movie that brought Chris Kyle’s life to the front of our collective minds. I haven’t read the book and I haven’t read a lot of the news stuff either, but I did see the movie. I saw his widow at the Oscars talking about the movie too.

It is not an easy thing to take another’s life so it is a rare few who are courageous enough to bear that burden for the sake of protecting our own. Chris Kyle seems to have been a rare man indeed.

Bradley Cooper played Chris Kyle brilliantly. I knew going in to the movie that I was likely to cry (and we know how I feel about that) but I wanted to see this story, this honor being paid to the real Chris Kyle, his story and his family. So, I sat transfixed watching a man do what he felt honor-bound to do despite his own mental well-being and the possible loss of his own life, and his wife and child. He was clear on what he felt he had to do and he did it unflinchingly over and over again.

The movie showed well how his struggles, his grace, his patriotism and his courage.

So, I made it thru the entire movie without a tear although it was a gut wrenching watch and then the end credits started to roll where they began showing the clips of the real Chris Kyle, his family, the people lining the streets to honor the motorcade to his funeral, the stadium full of people paying tribute to a real American Hero… I lost it. Then the tears flowed freely. And they were deserved. What a loss.

Here’s to Chris Kyle and his family!

My personal thoughts on the 50 Shades movie

So, some friends knew I was going to see this movie, and asked if I would give them my thoughts after. Here they are as I gave them to my friends. 

The positives:

- Dakota Johnson was believable as Anastasia. She was shy and innocent and vulnerable and confused (as she should have been with the lack of credible information given her).

- As far as I got into the book, the movie is better because I found the book so boring it was unreadable.I may have gotten as far as the coffee shop in the book. Could have been 20 pages or 80 I have no recollection except that it felt interminable. So I stopped. I have no idea from that point on how close the movie follows the book. Maybe somebody will tell me who has experienced both.

- I suppose the sexy, fun parts where she is enjoying what he's doing are fair enough. Yes, that is what BDSM can be - good, sexy fun times that include various other sensations (except she really doesn't 'get' what is happening to her, so for me she is still giving consent where she doesn't have enough knowledge to make an informed decision - see more points on this below).

- He does give her safewords.

The negatives:

- I didn't believe Jamie Dornan as Christian Grey at all. He had no power about him. Never smiling and being impatient with everyone does not a powerful person make. 

- I didn't feel the chemistry between Anna and Christian. 

- And he wasn't likable. Anna's roommate isn't likable either. Her mother blows off her graduation and isn't sympathetic either. So, it kind of makes me think Anna is a little too stupid to live. 

- A D/s (Dominant/submissive) relationship is based on an exchange of power and he gave her absolutely no knowledge of the joys of that from which to make an informed decision. Just bossing someone around does not a dominant make. And just letting someone boss you around does not a submissive make.

- He acted like a newbie playing Dom. He didn't bother to explain terminology, toys, tools, the energy exchange, nothing to her. He just said here, read my contract that says I get to do this and you have to do that and that's all you need to know. Bullshit. She had no reason to trust him and he gave her none at any point in the journey by actually taking care of her mentally - like explaining shit to her. You can't buy trust. And your only real currency is your reputation (aka trust). He might be a rich man in the vanilla world, but were he in any reputable BDSM community, he would be bankrupt.

- If he really wanted her to research BDSM and submission, he would have supplied her with some direction of good websites vs inaccurate ones and maybe given her some books to read by reputable authors. He wouldn't have just given her a computer and said Google submissive, so all she really got was a lot of pictures of women in restraints and so forth. 

- She acted like it was a game from beginning to end and he acted like it was all serious and business-like. If he was as smart as EL James wanted us to believe, then she would have made Christian slow down and explain why it wasn't a game so at least both characters were on the same page. 

- I found it incredibly cowardly that he told her about his youth when she was obviously asleep and couldn't hear it.

- I hate the fact that the kinky person here is also the emotionally distant, broken, abused person. That he learned BDSM when he was age 15 from an older lady pisses me off because it carries implication that people in this lifestyle are all either fucked up emotionally or pedophiles. We don't have one good example of someone in the lifestyle owning what they like as a positive example of a healthy person who simply enjoys giving or receiving intense stimulation. 

- In my experience, if you are going to punish your submissive for breaking a rule or bad behavior, you wouldn't use toys/tools to do it. The basic premise is that you don't create negative connotations and connections with things that are supposed to give pleasure.  Examples: My submissive does the dishes. If I punish him by making him do the dishes on command, then now he isn't making a positive connection with the dishes as a task he does as a service to me, he is seeing them as something bad. OR if he likes being flogged or whipped then if I punish him by flogging or whipping him, I'm taking away the joy of that. These should be rewards, not punishments. If I really want to punish him, then I'd give him some inane task like pushing a foam peanut around the edge of a coffee table with his nose or something equally inane and not fun. That's a punishment that isn't tainting the good stuff. SO, when Christian spanks her as a punishment, I thought well, that's stupid. If you want her to enjoy spanking, well you just fucked that up mister! His leaving, was more of a punishment. But he's now connected the spanking, his leaving and punishment together and that's how she's likely to remember those things in the future.

- And BDSM relationships are fun and loving and that he acted as though it isn't. We do what we do because it feels good to us. It brings us joy. That she doesn't ever get to touch him or sleep with him were just him being a fucked up individual, not indicative of him being into BDSM. He is completely right when he says he of fifty shades of fucked up. Thanks again, EL James, for putting out more stupid stereotypes that make my community and lifestyle look bad. 

- Any reputable top would not just wail on their bottom like he does with the belt towards the end. They would warm them up first, they would care that she isn't enjoying this. A heavy bottom might like that kind of thing, but why would you just beat on someone new like that when they really don't even understand enough to knowledgeably consent? 

- He never explains what she is consenting to emotionally, only physically. So, that's a great way to break your bottom. Good job, Christian. And thanks again, Ms James, for making us look like a lot of assholes.

Overall, the movie irritates me for the inaccuracies of the spirituality and connection that people can share doing what we do. It's like having enough knowledge and lingo to make it look good, but underneath, it's so wrong as to be dangerous.

In my humble opinion.