Land of the Free, Land of Idiocracy

Apologies there was no update last week. I was too busy wasting my free time with nearly giving myself an aneurysm. How is that, you ask? Well, if you’ve ever taken a gander at the IMDB message boards, you’re probably very familiar with the bigots and idiots than run rampant over there. And I, knowing damn better, made the mistake of venturing over there after seeing some recent films that I thoroughly enjoyed, and wanted to converse with others who felt the same.

WHY HELLO, BIG MISTAKE.

The first film board I perused was for a quirky and highly entertaining “based on a true story” film that is a brilliant hybrid of a RomCom and a Dark Comedy. I hadn’t heard much about it until seeing it, and after viewing the comments posted about it… now I see why it wasn’t so widely promoted. It’s not that the film isn’t fantastic, and it’s not that the performances of Carrey and McGregor weren’t Oscar worthy. No no no, it’s because the characters are that big, bad “G” word. What is that word, you ask? Well, I’ll probably be swiftly stoned by the religious nutjobs for even mentioning the word… but, psst… they’re GAY.

The film is ‘I Love You, Phillip Morris‘. And no, there’s no relation to the tobacco king, Philip Morris. (Believe it or not, that was an actual complaint on the IMDB board.) It’s about the true – even if it does seem exaggerated - story of Steven Jay Russell, a flamboyant personality and genius con artist who embarrassingly duped the correctional system in the state of Texas several times. But the film concentrates more on his constant motivator, his love for an inmate met while incarcerated. It made me laugh, and it even made this asshole tear up a little. It’s a fascinating story, and a true example of what crazy things the heart can make you do.

But these bigots who troll the IMDB message boards have obviously never felt that kind of love, because even without actually SEEING the film, they feel a need to bomb the board with their messages of religious intolerance and sinners burning in Hell. Well guess what, idiots? If there’s a Hell, we’re in it. And if there’s a Satan, the sum of you is him. Stop spreading your whackjob hatred on IMDB and go join up with the Westboro Baptist Church, where your services are obviously needed. And stop picking and choosing which parts you want to follow of that loosely-translated and archaic book you hold so dearly. I thought a big part of that shit was loving each other. Apparently Tammy Faye is the only one who got that part.

So it’s to you, hateful bigots, that I dedicate this song (from the soundtrack of that film you love so much):

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

(Download MP3)

Moving on, and in such a profound way, I saw another film that I loved so much… I watched it twice in the same day. And it’s only merely a coinkydink that the film happens to involve Christian Crusaders who murder those who don’t convert to what they believe. Oh, the things that make you go hmm.

‘Valhalla Rising‘ is an intense film, but not the type of film you go into just expecting a bloodbath. It’s intense in the way that it takes you somewhere else, somewhere strange and eerie… and it just leaves you there, abandoned and confused. And you’re not going to like it if you’re just looking for another ’300′ or ‘Gladiator’. But if you’re anything like me, and you love a film that gives you an otherworldly feel and leaves you searching for answers, you need to see this. It’s not meant to be a Viking film, and it’s not supposed to be factual. But it does touch a little on Norse mythology and the Pagans, as well as the history of Christian Crusaders, giving it a slight sense of reality amongst the supernatural aura.

At the center of the story is the ever-so brutal and mute warrior, who is soon dubbed “One-Eye” by his young travel companion. And from the start, I felt bad for One-Eye. Held in captivity, forced to fight… but he ultimately frees himself from his captors (in a very brutal scene that I’ll admit I highly enjoyed) and stumbles on the Christian Crusaders, who offer him a free boat ride with them to Jerusalem in a mission to reclaim the ‘Holy Land’. From then on, it just turns into madness. And the score for the film by Peter Peter and Peter Kyed couldn’t be more perfect in setting you up for this madness.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

(Download MP3)

If you have Netflix, you can see it right now on instant watching, and I highly recommend you do. But be warned… you will be left with questions about certain scenes in the film. If that happens, take a look at the wikipedia entry for the film, which helped answer a lot of WTFs for me. And don’t pay any attention to the idiots on IMDB who complain that the pacing was too slow, or that there wasn’t enough fighting. Those ADD imbeciles are the reason that Hollywood keeps churning out blockbusters with lots of exposions and blood to keep their interest, and films like this don’t get wide releases. This film is intelligently done, needs little dialogue, and yes, it is artsy. But it’s highly enjoyable once you take the dunce cap off your head.

Footnote: I just wanted to state here that I have nothing against Christianity, or religion in general… as long as it is peaceful, and it is not forced on others. My step-father is a wonderful Pastor, and a beautiful human being who expresses every sense of the term “true Christian”. And a lot of members of my family are devout Christians who are loving and accepting of my own independent thought. But it is those who choose to condemn others because they are different or believe in different things that I am in dislike with. And I am never one to keep my dislikes to myself, as hypocritical as that might sound. The difference in my hypocrisy and their hypocrisy is that I don’t go out trying to change the minds of others to think like I do. The simple fact is, if you yell at me… I’m going to yell back. So please stop yelling, don’t tell me what to do (I do what I want), and just learn to live side-by-side peacefully.

Roger (Ebert) that.