Possumblog

Well, that junk’s STILL not all done.

I’ve got four or five different phone calls out, waiting for people to call me back and let me know what the heck’s going on. And they (not the same they, another they) just now came upstairs and turned off the color copy function on the new copier we got the week before I went on vacation. Grr.

It seems we have a blabbermouth who just couldn’t keep it to herself that the new copier was able to run color copies, even after she’d been told to keep her big, loud, squawking, braying, constantly-running mouth shut about it. So, the smart people who don’t want us to be able to do anything without permission got wind that we had something we shouldn’t have, and dispatched a service guy to turn the pretty-colors part off. We waste millions giving away money to assorted lackeys, hangers-on, swindlers, and well-connected relatives, yet we have to ask permission to use a built-in function of a copier that will increase the cost per page by $.0001. ::sigh:: It’s times like this that I wish I was a lackey, hanger-on, swindler, or a well-connected relative.

ANYway, as I wait for my telephone calls to be returned, let’s have a quick Week In Review!

Friday, July 1: DATE NIGHT! No kids, no responsibilities! And not a whole lot of movies we just really wanted to see. We settled on Mr. and Mrs. Smith, not really expecting much, but it actually turned out to be pretty good. Aside from Reba having a sudden bout of popcorn-induced gastrointestinal distress about ten minutes into it. I waited and waited for her to come back and she never did, so I got up and found her standing on the ramp to the exit. She’d been standing there and running back and forth to the restroom, and had probably seen only about 13 1/2 minutes of the film. After I got there, I assume my calming presence allowed her to endure longer spells of standing and watching, so we stood there and watched.

Movie Review Time! As you know, I don’t like to read reviews beforehand because it always damages my funtime, because I keep waiting for the parts I’d read about. I had heard a little about this one, though, most of which said it was actually pretty good. I concur. It’s a very stylish looking fillum, although a little TOO stylish to be believable, even in the wacky spy genre of films. Lots of secret compartments and stuff that are just too twee and precious to work in real life, not to mention the whole plot of the movie that cast Billy Bob’s and Rachel’s exes as assassin/spies in competing government organizations.

But I have to say, Angelina Jolie was alright. She can do comedy pretty well, in addition to all the kicking and gunplay and junk. And that’s very hard for me to say, because I have long thought that she was quite the lunatic, and I really couldn’t make myself like her. But, I kinda weakened on this one--mainly because she has toned down the offscreen oddball act somewhat, and again, her comic touch was pretty deft. I still couldn’t think of her as her character, though--I just sat there thinking, “Hey, you know, that Angelina Jolie IS rather attractive in leather.”

Lots of shoot-em ups and car chases, the only problem I had with them being that I don’t like it when you can’t tell who the good guys are. I am supposed to believe that two good-guy competing spy agencies are duking it out, which means good guys are shooting at good guys, and frankly, that’s just not The Cowboy Way. True Lies, a similar sort of oddball wacky hidden-identity spy caper, did this much better--the bad guys were swarthy turbaned ululators with a stolen nuke. THEY had it comin’.

Other pet peeves? 1) Can we PLEASE quit climbing through air ducts and sewer pipes!? THEY DON’T WORK LIKE THAT! You can’t just go from one to the other, and by the time a duct gets to a room, it’s only about 10 inches in diameter. Sewer pipes have S-traps on them, and again, your toidy isn’t connected to the street with a 36 inch tube.

2) Infinite bullet supplies. And the idea that highly trained soldiers manage to miss everything but the bulletproof vest.

3) Wire-fu. It just looks weird for people to be able to suspend themselves in air longer than the laws of gravity allow. Unless you’re Wile E. Coyote, and you’ve just run off a cliff, in which case it’s humorous, especially when you have a little sign that says “Help.”

Overall, despite my peevishness, I’d have to give it a 3 out of 5 Curly Possum Tails. The married spy schtick and the rest of the writing was pretty funny, and the scenery and stunts were well done. On the other hand, I wouldn’t be all weepy if I never got to see it.

Afterwards, we went home and went to bed. And then, there was SATURDAY MORNING!

Posted by Terry Oglesby at July 11, 2005 12:38 PM