The Silence of the Lambs

The Silence of the Lambs

1991

Does anyone know who Alfred Packer is? For those of you who do not, it is time for a history lesson! That’s just what you wanted, right? Of course! Alfred Packer was a prospector back in the 1800’s. He is also said to be the only person in the United States to be convicted of cannibalism. While wandering throughout the Rocky Mountains with five other men, Packer and his team become extremely lost. Let’s just being lost and snow filled mountains are not a fun combination. Especially when you run out of supplies. It is definitely not pleasant when one of your team members is a crazy man who doesn’t mind munching down on you for a snack. Technically, Packer was imprisoned for manslaughter, as they couldn’t prove that he actually ate his comrades. However, his legend lives on. He’s become infamous and even the University of Colorado at Boulder named a cafeteria grill the “Alfred G Packer Memorial Grill” so that you can “have a friend for lunch!” Coloradians are weird, weird people.

So what does Alfred Packer have to do with The Silence of the Lambs? Well, really, nothing.

Don’t worry. I didn’t give you a large introduction that had absolutely nothing to do with the subject at hand. That wouldn’t be too surprising though, knowing my track record on staying on track. You’re very lucky I didn’t begin by ranting about squirrels or squashes or sasquatches or squirrel sasquatches or sasquatches squashing squirrels or… Where was I?

Right. Cannibalism. Hannibal Lector is one. Hannibal the cannibal. How clever. Fun fact! Hannibal Lector is not a real person! I did not think this at all when I was a child. Nope. Not even. What kind of name is Hannibal anyway? If you name your child that, you are practically asking for them to start making a meal out of their fellow human beings. Just don’t do it.

Hannibal is an insane, yet brilliant man who is imprisoned for the murder and consumption of many people. He is locked away in maximum security prison and left alone from the world. Until the FBI needs his help. A new serial killer is on the loose, and they require the insight only a man like Lector could give them. However, this help comes at a dear cost.

And that’s all you get to know! No, I am not being lazy because it’s one ten in the morning and I am tired and want to go to sleep and don’t feel like going through exactly what happens in this movie. Well. I am. But that’s not the only reason I’m stopping there! If I tell you exactly what happens, it ruins the movie! This is a movie I personally think is worth seeing, if you enjoy the serial killer mystery freaky kind of movies. Which I do. 

Another fun fact! This movie was the most recent of the only three movies to ever win all five major Academy Awards. The catagories considered to be major are Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Director, Best Screenplay (either adapted or original. Obviously it cannot win both.) and Best Picture. Only two other movies besides this one have achieved this goal: It Happened One Night and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. It deserved each of these awards, particularly Best Actor. Anthony Hopkins brought Hannibal Lector to life in a most terrifying and creepy way that will likely cause me to lose sleep tonight due to the fact I’ll be worried a crazed man wants to eat my internal organs. Not a fun thought, let me tell you. I rather like my kidneys. I do believe most people are rather fond of them. Except maybe Coloradians. Weirdos. 

Rocky

Rocky

1976

I still exist. This blog still exists. I know, it’s a little shocking. I myself am beyond stunned. When I said I was going on hiatus, I never intended to take an entire year off. For that I apologize. I was busy with various things, such as school, theatre, and breaking to blog Disney movies. However, I’ve always planned on coming back to this project.  It’s very special to me, and I am determined to finish it, no matter how long it takes. I will watch all eighty five Best Picture winners, if it is the last thing I do! It very well might be. Now on to Rocky!

One thing I learned while watching Rocky is that I don’t know anything about boxing. Nothing. Well, I do know you have to punch the other person. A lot. And try to knock them out. But if you do knock them out, sometimes they just get back up and start hitting you again. I truly do not understand. If anyone understands boxing, you should attempt to explain it to me. Because I am currently very confused.

Rocky is an amateur boxer. In order to pay bills, he works as a debt collector for a creepy man. Seriously, this man is a jerk. He orders Rocky to break people’s thumbs. He is occasionally nice to Rocky, as he gives him money from time to time, but still. Messing up someone’s digits is extremely rude. Thumbs are important body parts! How would anyone be able to do things, such as texting! Wouldn’t that be sad? I suppose that they didn’t have texting in the 70’s, so thumbs weren’t as necessary as they are now. Now I feel like I am beginning to sound like a stereotypical modern teenager, so all discussions of texting shall end now. It’s also not particularly relevant to the rest of the movie, but I felt like I needed to share my distain for the breakage of thumbs.

Anyway, that’s Rocky’s life. He boxes, works, feeds his pet turtles, and hits on his best friend’s sister, Adrian. This is the second thing I don’t understand about this movie. Adrian. The girl. She’s not attractive. Click on this link. CLICK IT.

See? Not so much. I’m not the only one who thought this. My brother completely agreed with me. Neither of us understood why Rocky continued to pursue this girl. I swear we aren’t a shallow family.

Along with lacking in the looks department, Adrian never talks. Ever. She’s incredibly shy. Watching her on the screen was almost painful. I felt sorry for Rocky. She seemed like a boring flirting partner. He would have had better luck flirting with a brick wall. It would certainly be more fun.

Eventually, for some unknown reason, Rocky convinces awkward Arian to go out with him. They have a dandy time and eventually become lovers and everyone is super happy. Yay. Whatever. It’s not that important. This isn’t supposed to be a story about love! It’s supposed to be about beating up people! Because that’s what boxing is! I think.

While all of this is going on, Rocky has a stroke of luck regarding his kind of pathetic boxing career. Apollo Creed, the heavyweight champion of the world! needs an opponent for the championship. Somehow he decides to fight Rocky for the title.

Again. I am confused. How does the title work? This whole boxing sport is so mind boggling. Why does Rocky get to go for it? Isn’t he an amateur? Do they let just anyone fight for these titles? What exactly is a title? Can I get one? Can I fight for the championship against Apollo Creed? I don’t think I’d want to, but could I? Would Apollo Creed be okay with punching a girl? That’d be almost as rude as snapping my thumbs! We all know how terrible that would be! How else would I text?! Does anyone understand boxing?! Am I the only one lacking knowledge in this subject? My brain hurts.

Rocky trains forever for this fight. His training includes running up a lot of stairs, beating up halved cows in a meat factory (which is absolutely disgusting. Why would anyone want to actually touch the carcass of a dead thing? Talk about nasty.), and doing an insane amount of pushups. Watching him get in shape made me feel so lazy. I feel like I need to go for a five mile run now and starting chugging raw eggs. Maybe if I do that for a while, I one day can be as strong as Rocky! This seems like a good plan.

Eventually the day for this fight comes! Apollo and Rocky punch each other. A lot. Sometimes they fall down. But then they’re allowed to get back up and keep at it. Heavy sigh. After 15 rounds, they stop. The referees announce that Apollo is the winner! How that happened, I have no idea. Apparently all those raw eggs and punching cows didn’t help Rocky. I guess I need to rethink my great plan mentioned in the above paragraph. I should take up rock climbing! Perhaps yoga. Anything but boxing. I already know that is not my thing. I rather like my face intact. Anyway, Rocky doesn’t care that he lost the fight that he trained for months for, because he has ugly, odd Adrian. How sweet. The end.

In case it wasn’t clear, this was a boxing movie. Which is a confusing sport. In case I haven’t mentioned that. For a sports movie, this was acceptable. The underdog didn’t actually win, which was a nice thing! Not to sound too cynical, but sometimes it’s nice to watch the protagonist lose. That sounds completely cynical. But that’s life. It’s also confusing. Just like Rocky!

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest

1975

I have tragic news. I am convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that I am dying. It’s sad, but true. I mean, my legs hurt, my tummy hurts, my head hurts, my eyes hurt, my face hurts. I bet I have bird flu. Can I even get bird flu? Do you have to be part bird to get it? I bet I am part bird! That would explain some things. I have been called a loon before. Everything is clear now.

You know who else is a loon? Every character from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. I mean what else would you expect when a movie is set in a mental institution?

McMurphy, the main man, (yay alliteration) has gotten himself into a loony bin, even though he is likely not insane. He just wanted to get out of the farm where he was serving his sentence for statutory rape. Being a lazy butt, he wanted to get away from all the hard work he had to do on this farm. Now he gets to hang out with a bunch of crazies. I don’t know how this is better than a prison farm but whatever.

In this institution, we have your typical patients, the delusional, the paranoid, the suicidal, the really big guy who never speaks, you know, the usual. The ward is run by the seemingly-nice-but-really-she’s-evil Nurse Ratched. She’s very controlling, degrading, and ugly. Every morning she makes a group of the patients sit through this mind numbing routine of a sort of therapy session. I wouldn’t really call it that though because no one ends up better through it, no one really talks in it, and its purpose to exist seems only to prove everyone needs to be at the insane asylum longer.

Mc Murphy and Ratched become fast enemies. He’ll try to have the patients out vote her in something, and she’ll ration their cigarettes. One day, McMurphy decides to steal a bus full of all of the crazy people from the institution, and take them fishing. Along the way they pick up one of his old girlfriends Candy. As they spend a day fishing, everyone is beginning to feel better about themselves and Billy, a stuttering adorable young man, has taken a liking to Candy. This will be important later.

Of course, when they get back, they get into a lot of trouble. Ratched tightens her grip on the group tremendously, even using shock therapy if needed. McMurphy, fed up of being there, plans his escape.

After bribing the night watchman and inviting Candy and one of her friends over, McMurphy throws a party for the ward. They all get totally wasted on the alcohol Candy and her friend brought. At the end, as McMurphy, Candy, her friend, and Chief (the tall, deaf, mute who turns out to not be deaf or mute) all are about to leave through the window. McMurphy notices how much Billy likes Candy, and asks him to come with them. Stuttering, Billy says he can’t, that he’s not ready for the real world. He would however like to see Candy again. So instead of leaving, McMurphy suggests that Candy and Billy sleep together right then and there.

Seriously? He must have been insanely intoxicated. That was a ridiculously stupid thing to do. Why would you delay your escape from a mental institution, just so your buddy can have sex with your ex girlfriend?! Maybe McMurphy really was crazy after all…

Anyway, Billy and Candy agree to his idea. They run off to a cell to do the deed. While that’s going on, the affects of the excessive alcohol are starting to take its toll on everyone’s system, including McMurphy’s, and they all pass out.

The next morning, Nurse Ratched walks in to quite the surprise. All of her patients are sprawled across the floor, along with some girls she’s never seen before. She demands a head count, and finds Billy missing. After discovering him and Candy, she attempts to embarrass him in front of the group. However, it doesn’t work. For the first time in the whole film, Billy speaks confidentially, with no stutter whatsoever. His buddies are thrilled.

But, remember, Ratched is pure evil, and purposefully asks him what his mother would think of him. Billy then starts punching himself repeatedly, causing the staff to take him into another room to be dealt with. Foolishly, they leave him alone, and he slits his throat with a piece of glass, and dies. I really hate Ratched. She is a [not a nice word].

Enraged, McMurphy starts to strangle Ratched for what happened to Billy. Everyone is too shocked to stop him. Yay! Maybe he’ll actually kill her! Wouldn’t that be just wonderful?

Sadly, a staffer stops him, and they take him “upstairs,” and lobotomize him. Yeah. It sucks. Like a lot. The next day, we see Ratched has been taken down a notch, speaking in a very timid voice. At least something happy has happened in the end. None of the crazies know what has happened to McMurphy, so they assume he made a glorious escape and is out in the world now, happy. Only Chief knows what happened to him. Because that evening, when McMurphy is brought back to his bed, Chief realizes he’s a vegetable, then smothers him with a pillow, killing him. Chief then picks up this GIANT marble sink fixture, throws it through a window, and leaves the asylum. The end.

Well. Talk about a sad ending. I mean, killing off McMurphy wasn’t that big of a deal. He was played by Jack Nicholson, and he can get annoying at times, so seeing him go didn’t upset me too much. But they killed Billy! Well, Billy killed Billy. But still! Not. Cool. Though, when a movie has you so attached to a character that when they die it upsets you greatly, that must mean they are doing something right, right? I think so.

This movie is one of the three movies in the history of the Oscars to win what they call the Grand Slam, or Big Five. That is it wins the awards Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Director, and Best Screenplay. In order to win all of these, you must be an incredibly good movie. And that’s what this is. An incredibly good movie. It has the elements a good movie should have. Interesting characters, humor, tragedy, some thought provoking questions, and solid acting. I am glad to have seen this movie before my sadly approaching demise.

The Apartment

The Apartment

1960

Sometimes, people just suck. At many times in your life, they will do a number of cruel things to you. They will lie to you, hurt you, use you, and any other horrible things you can think of. There really isn’t much you can do about it.

In C.C Baxter’s life, people always suck. Especially his bosses. They like to take advantage of the fact he is a bachelor and has his own apartment. All of Baxter’s bosses are married, but have mistresses on the side. They take their mistresses to Baxter’s apartment, making him have to leave, sometimes on a moment’s notice. In return for his services, he get’s promotions and nice offices. It’s a nice deal. Until Miss Kubelik comes into the picture.

Miss Kubelik is one of the head bosses’ mistresses, one of the elevator operators, and the gal Baxtor happens to fancy. But she doesn’t like him. He barely exist to her. Because the only person in her world is Mr. Boss Guy. But of course, Mr. Boss Guy has a wife. This only complicates things slightly.

Actually this complicates things a lot. Since, Mr. Boss Guy refuses to leave his wife, Miss Kubelik attempts suicide, after she and Mr. Boss Guy have a fling at Baxter’s apartment. Baxter comes home to find her sprawled across his bed, unconscious, nearly dead. This is probably quite the shock. Fortunately, right next door lives a doctor, and he saves Miss Kubelik’s life. While she recovers, she stays with Baxter.

As she is recovering, Baxter realizes a few things. One, he loves Miss Kubelik. Like a lot. Like would love to marry her. Two, he actually has a spine, and would like to start saying no to his bosses when they want his apartment. The latter decision has him lose his job, but it’s okay, because in the end he gains Miss Kubelik. The end.

Oh my goodness. This movie was hilllllaaaaaaaaaaaioooooooussss. So hilarious, all those letters probably did not emphasis it enough. I know this movie dealt with some serious things, like affairs and suicide, but it was down in a way that was funny, and yet, not distasteful. Jack Lemmon, aka Mr. Baxter, was wonderful as a man originally afraid to say no, who then transformed into someone not scared to go for what he wanted. This is a delightful movie, one I would love to watch time and time again.

The Life of Emile Zola

The Life of Emile Zola

1937

Brush your teeth! Clean your room! Look both ways before you cross the road. Be nice to others. These are all common things that your mother would tell you to do as a child. Others include share your toys and be sure to always tell the truth. The latter I am sure was repeated to Emile Zola many a time by his own mother when he was young.

Emile Zola was a real life person, just for those of you who didn’t know that. He was a French writer in the 1800’s and early 1900’s. Now that we have those boring yet necessary details out of the way, I can tell you about his life! Yay!

Zola started out as this person who was so poor he had to stuff the cracks in his windows with dirty rags, as he couldn’t afford new windows. He lived with a fellow poor dude, some artist whose name I don’t remember. I could look it up, but I’m lazy and he’s not all that important anyway. They love to complain to each other how messed up society is, how no one writes the truth about how messed up society is, how everyone would rather have perfumed lies than the smelly truth about society, and on and on, blah blah blah. As they are complaining, they decide to burn some of the books they have that they disagree with. Unimportant man suggests they sell them because as you should remember, these people are dirt poor. But nope! Zola says they should BUUUUUUURRRRRN! And so they do.

Of course, these people are stupid and don’t open a window, causing their whole apartment to fill with smoke. Zola then spazzes out, thinking he’s going to die from asphyxiation or something. Wimp. He becomes paranoid about this very thing many times throughout the movie.

Anyway, he goes on to get a job, write a gazillion novels, grows a beard and gets fat. He moves into this fancy house and life is all good for him now. This all happens in roughly ten minutes of the movie, so I am not condensing it that much, trust me.

Now that he’s all rich from writing scathing things, exposing truth in France, his friend doesn’t really like him anymore and goes away forever. Oh well. Unimportant guy was boring anyway!

For the next thirty so minutes of the movie, we hear nothing about Zola. Apparently he’s not all that significant. It’s not like the movie is named after him and his life or anything. We focus on a soldier in French army named Dreyfus (Not Richard Dreyfuss, just to clarify for everyone, myself included). He is accused of treason for writing this list that involves guns and probably something else but I wasn’t really paying attention to it so obviously it’s not something worth remembering! Of course, Dreyfus is innocent. This is a fact no one cares about. So they send him away to Devil’s Island for a time long enough to turn his hair grey.

One of the colonel’s later finds the real traitor, but it doesn’t matter. Someone already is doing time for it, and actually telling the truth that they got the wrong guy would make the army look bad. The honor of the army is totally more important than truth. The French are such sensible people! I am never sarcastic!

We finally meet up with Zola again when Madame Dreyfus calls on him to write about how her husband is innocent and France is handling the whole affair horridly. Always searching for the truth, he agrees.

Because the French are stupid and their justice system is super screwy, Zola winds up guilty of libel and is sentenced to jail for a year. However, his lawyer advises he run away to England, where he can do more good for Dreyfus by continuing to write, and Zola agrees.

After another few years, or months, the movie wasn’t very clear on this, new people come in to power, and set everything straight on the Dreyfus affair. All the people responsible commit suicide and Dreyfus is returned to his officerness. Yay him!

Finally, it is safe for him to return to France, and Zola begins to write his “greatest work yet!” Engrossed, he leaves the stove on while furiously writing it, and ends up dying from carbon monoxide poisoning. Teehee. So funny. The end!

As I reread this, I realize I made this movie sound slightly ridiculous. However, I promise, it really isn’t! This was an engaging story. The injustice of the Dreyfus affair will, hopefully, anger you, especially since it actually happened. This was a rare film that actually had my full attention for more than two thirds of the movie. The first part was a little boring, but nothing is perfect in life. Except for me, of course, but I figured everyone already knew that. Even though this movie came out seventy four years ago, it doesn’t feel dated, it just feels wonderful.

Braveheart

Braveheart

1995

Blood is a good thing. It keeps you alive, and stuff, and I am very appreciative of it.

However, I am not a fan of it when it is outside of the body. It’s slimy, and red, and full of death when that happens. It stains things and is rather a nuisance.

I had to get over this whole blood=yuckers while watching Braveheart. As this was a movie that included brutal medieval warfare (this is what it was rated R for. I found it a little bit funny.), there is lots and lots AND LOTS of blood. Don’t try and tell me that it is tame and there are far more gruesome movies out there and blah de blah, I know what I saw. And that was blood.

But it’s okay because this was a fabulous movie. Before I continue with this blog, remember, that even though this was apparently based on history, really, 90% of the events and doings in this movie are messed up.

A very long time ago, the king of England was a jerk. He didn’t really seem to like the Scots all that much. So he decides to put into practice an old law called primae noctis. Yes, I will admit I had to look up what it is called. Get over it. This is a really dumb law. It means if you live on someone’s land that landowner has sexual rights to you on your wedding night, if you are a girl.

As you can imagine, the Scottish people didn’t really like this rule. Especially a man named William Wallace. So he and his love decide to marry secretly. It appears they may live out a happy and quiet life, with absolutely no violence or war whatsoever.

Well, it seemed that way for five minutes. Unfortunately, after she fights off a soldier who is trying to um, do things to her, the head soldier man slits Wallace’s new wife’s throat. This really pisses Wallace off. Like a lot. When he finds out he takes out many soldiers, and then slit the head soldier man’s throat. This starts a huge three hour rebellion against England.

In these three hours, there are lots of battles, blood, babies, betrayals, and beheadings. Wallace earns the respect of Robert the Bruce, the guy hopefully heading towards becoming king of Scotland. Eventually they get the English out of Scotland. However this is not enough for Wallace, and they soon begin to capture towns in England. This really angers the jerk king.

So he sends in his daughter in law to make a deal, all while planning on ambushing Wallace. But he was stupid and sent in girl, who likes Wallace, and tells him about the trap.

At the next battle, Wallace is impaled by an arrow. Some of the stupid Scottish nobles decide to bail on him, and Robert the Bruce, who shall now be called Brucey, actually joined the other side. However, Brucey feels pretty lousy about it, as he should, and saves Wallace’s life by giving him to one of his friends.

The fact the nobles did what they did was a dumb move on their part. They should have known that Wallace doesn’t like betrayals, and very bloodly kills them. They totally had it coming to them, the buttheads.

Even though everything seemed to be going so well for Wallace, he waltzes into a trap when he goes to meet with Brucey. Brucey’s father is a real nasty man, inside and especially out, and helped the soldiers catch Wallace.

In London, where Wallace is now being tried, the jerk king is dying. Haha serves him right. His daughter in law begs Wallace to ask for mercy, because she kind of loves him, but Wallace refuses and eventually is beheaded. I think. I was sort of hiding under my blanket during that part. Jerk king dies too. No one is sad.

After his death, Brucey picks up where Wallace left off and the Scots won their freedom for which they had been fighting for so long. The End.

Seriously. This is a fabulous movie. It’s engaging, and violent, and at times funny. It’s a wonderful story of how far someone will fight for something that they truly believe in.

It was about time I watched something good.

The Broadway Melody

The Broadway Melody

1929

This isn’t fair.

One person should not have to go through so much suffering. I am beginning to wonder, were any of the Best Picture winners actually any good?! The occasionally wonderful movie (Annie Hall, The Godfather, or On the Waterfront for example) do give me some hope that whoever decides that a particular film wins this award actually has some taste in movies. But a lot of the time I think they are completely off their rocker.

My other theory is that they blindfold a drunk monkey and have it throw darts at the nominations to determine a winner. It could be the case.

I am sure you have guessed by now that I did not like The Broadway Melody. I am sure you would not either. It was simply depressing. And boring. And made me want to rip out my eardrums. And burn them.

This is a tale about two dancing sisters, Queenie and Hank (yay I actually remembered their names!) who are trying to make it big in New York. These are such terrible names. Why on earth would anyone name their daughter Hank? It’s seems so obvious that they wished she was a boy. Poor Hank. This is reason number one I feel bad for Hank. Hank’s boyfriend Eddie works for this huge theatre producer named… Mr. Z. We will go with that. Anyway, Eddie shows Mr. Z the girls’ act and he likes it. Well, sorta. Mr. Z only likes Queenie. This is reason number two I feel bad for Hank. But since Eddie is a great boyfriend he convinces them to add in Hank.

As the show goes along, Queenie starts seeing someone. This makes Hank mad. This makes no sense. Maybe I shouldn’t feel bad for Hank, since she is a hypocritical over protective loony pants.

As Queenie keeps seeing this man, Eddie becomes jealous. He realizes he loves Queenie. Queenie realizes she loves him.

…What? What about Hank?! Does anyone in this movie care about her at all?! I mean, she’s the smarter one! The prettier one too. She makes all of the sisters’ business plans. But no. Everyone wants dumb ugly Queenie. This is reason number three I feel bad for Hank, the most underrated character in film history.

And isn’t this breaking like, a number one sister rule? You can’t go after your sister’s dude? I feel as if Queenie, even if she was dumber than a bag of hammers, should have known this.

So Eddie ditches Hank, and then he and Queenie get married, leaving Hank to figure out an act for herself. The end.

Even if you had offered me a million dollars and a pink monkey that sings, one that is hopefully not drunk, I wouldn’t be able to come up with a worse ending than that one. I feel like this was a complete attack against Hank. What did the makers of this movie have against her? Why did they hate her so much? She’s not even real! But they had to go and make her life miserable anyway. Never have I seen such cruelty towards a person in my life. I wouldn’t be surprised if Hank just went and offed herself now. It’s not like anyone wants her. Not even her parents, who wanted her to be a boy! Poor Hank.

Besides the tragic treatment of Hank, this movie sucked hardcore. The songs were just awful. As was the dancing. Not a single character had a personality. Except Hank. I guess the writers were decent enough to give her that, since they ruined her entire life. Goodness. Poor Hank.

This movie was also just boring. It didn’t have all that much of a plot. It moved very slowly, like a molasses river in Maine in the middle of March. I nearly fell asleep many times. That had nothing to do with the fact I was all snuggled up on the comfiest bed ever. Seriously. This bed is like sleeping on a cloud. Memory foam is the most fantastic thing in the world. I want it on my bed. Like now.

…Anyway. This movie is dumb. Poor Hank