Saturday

Contact junior by writing junior@scoopy.com. Contact Scoopy by writing unclescoopy@msn.com. Contact Tuna by writing tuna@scoopy.com Send submissions to scoopy@scoopy.net

To see and use all the Funhouse features, you need Netscape 6.+ or MSIE 5.+.

• Netscape 6..2.1 is available free for download or on CD.
• MSIE 6.0 is available free.

Junior returns tomorrow.

Hey, Scoop:

Actually, I liked the one in Monster's Ball better, but you have a point. It is a terrific sex scene, especially for big-time mainstream stars in a mainstream movie. As noted in Tuna's review today, there were reports that they did not use crotch patches, but see the next letter for a contradictory view.

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Hey Scoop, I did some work on the Jolie cap.  Sorry to say it IS a crotch patch.  Here is the same frame you posted, but I enhanced the brightness and contrast, then enlarged.

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"Your Mac readers might be interested to know that the DivX 5.0 Alpha codec works great. It's available at http://www.divx.com. You just drop two files into your Extensions folder, reboot, and QuickTime now plays all DivX formats up to the new DivX Pro 5.0. Mac OS 8.6 or better (including OS X) is required. You'll also need a 400MHz G3 or faster. It works very well, but remember that performance is always best in full screen mode. This is especially important for large movies which might get a bit choppy on slower Macs when viewed in a window on the desktop.

Note that this codec cannot play Microsoft MPEG4 movies (the upcoming QuickTime 6 is supposted to include support for MPEG4 though.) For these, I use DivX Player 1.0b10, which is available at http://mac.divx.st/. It  works pretty well. I'm not associated with the folks at divx.com or mac.divx.st. I'm just a guy who's happy with their software."

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I thought we ran them before, but if so, once more won't hurt.

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"In case you have never seen them, here is a site with all the famous .mpg's from the Tommy Lee and Pam Anderson tapes. You might get a few pop-ups, but that's a lot of bandwidth intensity for a free site, so somebody has to pay some bills."

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"Here is a free site with some pics from Kate Moss's book "Kate""

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Scoop.

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Scoopy,  Here is the Smackdown Video that didn't air except on the satellite feed on Tuesday night.  It clearly shows Stephanie McMahon
popping out in all of her glory!  Hope you are able to use this!

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Scoop - a funny picture that comes with these Top Three Tips for Lumberjacks

1. Never park down hill from a tree you are cutting.

2. When in doubt, park twice as far from the tree as the tree is tall.

3. Always use somebody else's truck.

Everybody sing along now: "I chop down trees, I eat my lunch, I go to the lava-tree. On Wednesdays I go shopping and have buttered scones for tea. Oh, I'm a lumberjack, and I'm OK, I sleep all night and I work all day ..."

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Subject: The National Enquirer reports that porn star Crave was on the Family Matters sitcom for 4 yrs. Here is Crave's listing at iafd

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Updates:

Charlie's French Cinema Nudity site is updated . Big update this week

MOVIES:

True Blood is a mediocre melodrama/actioner about a gang banger who goes straight, then has to pull his brother up out of the 'hood. Terrible DVD, but Sherilyn Fenn blurry and naked is better than no naked Fenn at all.

• Sherilyn Fenn (1,2)

Fast Sofa (review at scoopy.com later) is an offbeat road comedy/drama picture with lots of visual tricks - split screens, inserts, etc.  This film is one of those that might have been much better if it hadn't chosen to wallow in its own eccentricity. Has any actor ever been more eccentric than Crispin Glover? Compared to this guy, Peter Lorre seems like a dad in a 50's sitcom. The best news here: Jennifer Tilly seems to be getting more generous with the nudity than she used to be.

• Tina Marie Clifford (1,2)
• Jennifer Tilly (1,2)

Here are the latest movie reviews available at scoopy.com.

• The yellow asterisks indicate that I wrote the review, and am deluded into thinking it includes humor.
• If there is a white asterisk, it means that I inexplicably determined there might be something of interest.
• A blue asterisk indicates the review is written by Tuna (or Lawdog or Junior or C2000 or Realist or ICMS or somebody else besides me)
• If there is no asterisk, I wrote it, but am too ashamed to admit it.

"All in the Family, Season 1" (1971 -TV series)

All in the Family (1971 TV series, the first season) - I have been looking forward to the pending release next week of the first season of All in the Family perhaps more than any other release this year, but with some trepidation. My memories of this show were that it was both hilarious and pertinent, and brilliantly written with great characters played by very talented performers. After the recent release of the first season of M*A*S*H, which didn't hold up well at all, I wondered if All in the Family would still hold the magic for me that it did in 1971. I got my answer less than 10 minutes into episode one. Archie is complaining about the constant affection between Gloria and Meathead, and tells them that he "never laid a hand on your mother until the wedding night." Edith pipes up with, "And even then ..." with an appropriate "it wasn't much then either" hand gesture. My first belly laugh out of the way, I was able to stop worrying and enjoy all 13 episodes from the first season.

For those not familiar with this sitcom, it centers around the Bunker household:

Archibald "Archie" Bunker - Played by Carroll O'Connor. Archie is a blue collar, under-educated racial bigot, staunch conservative Nixon supporter, chauvinist, and nearly anti-sexual. He is fond of telling his wife, Edith, "stifle yourself."

Edith "Ding Bat" Bunker - Played by Jean Stapleton. Edith is the long-suffering wife of Archie. She is, most of the time, actually a ding-bat, but occasionally comes up with something profound. She is a stay-at-home housewife, who is dedicated to trying to keep peace in the family, and see everyone's side. Only occasionally, we find that she has her own thoughts and opinions.

Gloria "Little Girl" Stivic - Played by Sally Struthers. Daughter of Archie and Edith, and newly married to Meathead, Gloria's character probably changes more than any of the others over the course of the series, from nearly as much a ding bat as her mother, and totally into her husband, mainly concerned with sex, and giving lip service to liberal causes to a liberated, politically active woman. This change begins near the end of the first season, when Gloria discovers women's lib.

Michael "Meathead" Stivic - Played by Rob Reiner. He is attending college, majoring in liberal arts, mostly sociology, and is into nearly every liberal cause there is. His chief pastime on the show is fighting with Archie. Meathead and Gloria are living with the Bunkers until he graduates from college.

Frequent targets for the show were racial bigotry, liberal vs. conservative politics, unemployment, poverty, president Nixon, free love, religion, the Vietnam war and the newly emerging women's liberation movement. Everyone under 30 (the good guys, including me) saw Archie as a caricature of every thing wrong with the establishment (the bad guys, people over 30). Those over 30 saw Archie as an exaggeration, but nevertheless, a man with beliefs and problems they could relate to. Thus, the show had wide cross-generational appeal, and probably caused its share of useful discussions in homes across America. I got more from this watching than I did the first time around. First, with the perspective age brings, I was able to see Archie's side, and even agree once in a while. Second, I was able to appreciate just why it was such a good comedy.

The success of the show is not a mystery, and is not an accident. They created four colorful characters with built-in conflicts, hired 4 brilliant performers to play the characters, and , week after week, came up with great stories, and clever dialogue. The humor came from more than just the dialogue, however. Each of the four main characters was equally capable of providing the humor, and using the rest of the cast for the role of straight man, and each of them could elicit belly-laughs with facial expression and/or body language.

Those who remember the show may recall that it was "video taped before a live audience." Unfortunately, this means the DVD was mastered from 30 year old video tape, and has a lot of green discoloration, and color blotches in the corners. Even so, it is very watchable. The show lasted from 1971 to 1979, and won a long ton of Emmys and Golden Globes. There were numerous spin-offs, including Maude, Good Times, The Jeffersons, Archie Bunker's Place, Checking In and Gloria. The show was trend-setting (the first toilette flush ever on TV was from the first season), and as risque as it could get away with. I doubt if the PC police would allow it today, as Archie constantly used racial terms, and browbeat Edith. At the time, we understood that it was meant as exaggerated satire. As early as the first episode, Gloria wore mini-skirts, hot pants, and Meathead's pajama tops, showing all of her legs, and nearly more. I can't give All in the Family less than an A. Even if you despise TV sitcoms, you will most likely enjoy this one.

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• Sally Struthers ( 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 )

Original Sin (2001) was done yesterday by Scoopy, who did his usual thorough job on the review. I have no opinion as to whether or not the book deserved a remake, but it deserved more than this film accomplished. First, they give the entire thing away in the opening scene, as Jolie is talking through prison bars. She is obviously not an innocent mail order bride. Second, the director never effectively conveyed the entire point of the film to the audience, which was that Banderos fell suddenly and unconditionally in love with Jolie - a love so passionate, he was willing to give up being a rich and powerful company owner and become a petty card shark for her, even willing to kill on her behalf. All this, even though she swindled him out of all of his money, and tried to kill him. Third, the surprise ending was the most contrived and unlikely twist I have ever seen in a film.

There was much to like about the film. The sex scene between Jolie and Banderas was rather explicit, and very hot. The two decided to forgo the pubic patches as they felt too confined by them. The scene was actually shot in reverse chronological order, with the post-coital snuggling being filmed before the actual sex, which helps explain how they could have that energetic a sex scene without breaking a sweat in the tropics. Locations were very photogenic, set decoration was very nice, and everything was lit to give a consistent look and feel to the production. The camera work was in focus, but the choice of shots bothered me a lot. In particular, there were far too many long dolly shots, where a pan, or a long establishing shot then a zoom would have worked better and been less distracting.

All in all, Scoop was correct. It is not nearly as bad as the critics would have you believe, and is probably a C- as a thriller.

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• Angelina Jolie ( 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26)
• Unknown ( 1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

Next time Jocelyn gets hers.

Carole Laure in Get Out Your Handkerchiefs (1,2,3)

Fanny Cottencon - A coups de crosse

Lolita Davidovich -Intersection

Natacha Regnier in Les Amants Criminels

Sophie Duez  - In Extremis

The only serious exposure to which names can be attached comes from three  "Fantasy Girls."  They show up as Woody hallucinates between middle rounds of the fight.  Credited as Tamara Gibler, Fulvia Sanchez and Faye Mangabang,  each has a separate row in the first collage.  To be sure, the woman in the  middle row of frames has the worst boob job in the history of plastic and  reconstructive surgery.  The women in the top and bottom rows show up again  (second collage) in a mid-ring, tame twosome, from which a couple of  gynocam
frames could be caught despite the distance between camera and subjects (let us bow to gods of DVD).

A second pair of women, nameless in this case, are seen topless in bed with  the fight promoter.  They must have had a wonderful time together, because  the two babes are catatonic and the guy is foaming from the mouth. Another  attractive Hollywood endorsement of the drug culture.

Wrestling babe, from one of those WWF Diva things

The women of 1969's "DeSade", new from Dann

A VERY brief look at her nipple from "Less than Zero". New from Penman.

in an episode of "Tatort", new from UC99

Nice job by Watty on some new caps from one of her best nude scenes, running through the forest in Lady Chatterley

From today's NY Post.  I couldn't possibly agree more...


WHY ZELLWEGER DESERVES THE OSCAR  By JONATHAN FOREMAN
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March 22, 2002 -- IT'S infuriating but true: Renée Zellweger has almost no chance of winning the Oscar for Best Actress. In fact, she was lucky to have been nominated at all for "Bridget Jones's Diary," given the Motion Picture Academy's strange allergy to comedic performances. Still, if there were any justice in these things, the plucky young Texan will be taking home a statuette on Sunday night.

Because with the possible exception of Judi Dench's turn as Iris, Zellweger's performance as the bouncy, awkwardly endearing British
"singleton" was simply a far more impressive achievement than any of the others nominated. It's not than any of them were bad - though Nicole Kidman does very little actual acting in "Moulin Rouge." It's just that in an age when the standard of Hollywood acting is so much
higher than the standard of Hollywood writing, you expect competent professional performances in roles that don't require tremendous skill or effort.

In "In the Bedroom," Sissy Spacek, who continues to be the favorite (though Halle Berry is surging), was fine in what was really a supporting role. All she had to do was look like she was bottling up her rage at the loss of her son and at one point shout at Tom Wilkinson. There wasn't much else to her character.

Berry's role in "Monsters' Ball" was more demanding and certainly showier: This preternaturally gorgeous actress was required to weep, shout, sulk and writhe around half-naked with Billy Bob Thornton. But - and it wasn't her fault that the screenplay was so clunky and cliché-ridden - there was no subtlety or nuance in the role. She carried out what was required of her with the competence you would
expect from the star of TV's "Introducing Dorothy Dandridge" but no more.

Zellweger was more than competent as "Bridget." She was terrific. It wasn't just that she took the risk incredibly rare among Hollywood
actresses of allowing herself to appear much less conventionally attractive than in real life by packing on the pounds. Nor was it just that she caught a specific foreign accent more precisely than any technician since Meryl Streep in "Sophie's Choice" (as someone educated in the U.K., I can attest to its perfection.) She did all these things and, at the same time, transformed a comic persona - one miles away from any character she'd attempted before - into a real, believable, wholly winsome person. Comedy is really, really difficult to do well, as anyone can tell from the vast numbers of failed comic exercises that come out of Hollywood. And it's absurd and unfair that those who pull it off, like Renée Zellweger, should so often come second to actors playing heart-tugging, afflicted characters.

Scoop's note: fair point, and I'd love to see her win, but she has about as much chance as I do of replacing Banderas in the sex scenes in "Original Sin 2". Some of the British bookies now have her at 50-1.