Saturday

Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy)

Updates:

  • Charlie's French Cinema Nudity site is updated

 

The Owl and the Pussycat (1970):

Here is a .wmv of all of Streisand's nudity and near-nude teases in The Owl and the Pussycat.

And here is a large capture of the key sequence.

 

 

A Very Long Engagement (2004):

What kind of films do you like? Sin City? Pulp Fiction? Titanic? Saving Private Ryan? The heartfelt work of Charlie Chaplin? The austere gothic camera work of Orson Welles? The neo-realism of Vittorio DeSica? The surrealism of Terry Gilliam? This film has a little bit of each, and more. I have often said that Robert Rodriguez may be the most talented director in the world and if he ever stops doing genre films and starts to consider heavyweight projects, he would create masterpieces like the best works of Sergio Leone. After having seen Amelie and A Very Long Engagement, I have to revise my statement. Rodriguez is probably the SECOND most talented filmmaker in the world, and if he ever stops doing genre films and starts to consider heavyweight projects, he could make films like Jean-Pierre Jeunet.

If that is even possible.

Jeunet is a genius, plain and simple. This kind of talent rarely comes along. He is to film what Mozart was to music. His stories are equal to the best literature, and his execution has no equal. What more is there to say? I watched this damned movie with my mouth wide open, constantly wondering "how the hell did he do that?" As for the drama unfolding within the images, I was constantly battered by it - by hope, then hopelessness, then laughter, then shame at having laughed, then amazement, then triumph, then tragedy, then the whole cycle again and again.

The fundamental storyline of A Very Long Engagement is simple. A young French couple is split when he is conscripted to fight in the trenches in WW1. He is an innocent lamb who loses his mind in warfare and ends up getting court-martialed for self-mutilation. The punishment for his crime is to be sent with four other similar offenders into the no-man's land between the French and German lines. He is then forgotten by the world, except for his fiancée, who holds on to the hope that he lives, since nobody ever actually saw him dead. She pursues this hope through an investigation that would impress Philip Marlowe, in which she cajoles, cons, tricks, and begs people to help her talk to everyone who was involved with the court-martial incident. She talks to the other soldiers in their unit. She talks to the families of the other offenders. She talks to the medics and gravediggers who cleaned up the battlefields. She talks to the army officials who are supposed to maintain the official records. Her pursuit goes on for years.

I'm not going to tell you how her investigation ends. That's part of the mystery and beauty of the film.

I will tell you that this film is not just a great film, but several great films. As people tell the girl their stories, we see various episodes in the present and past. Some of them are only peripherally related to the investigation, but each of them is a beautiful little short story on its own, like the flashbacks in Citizen Kane. The stories range from sentimental to grotesquely violent to operatic, from realistic to Gothic, and several of them are homages to other classic films. The cinematography is ... well, I hesitate to say the best ever, but a reasonable nominee for that honor, just an incredible blend of live and blue screen action. Robert Rodriguez meets David Lean. In terms of painterly composition, Jeunet is the greatest pure artist to direct films since Tarkovsky died. He may be better than Tarkovsky, since he has all of Tarkovsky's strong points, plus a sense of humor, the advantages of modern technology, and a sense of pacing which Tarkovsky sorely lacked.

 If I were a young man who wanted to learn how to make films, I would seek out Jeunet and just ask to get his coffee and watch him work. I'd pay him for that privilege if I could. On the other hand, that might be depressing, because I'd realize I could never make films as well as this guy, my only consolation being that everyone else is in the same boat.

This film reunites Jeunet with his most famous collaborator - Audrey Tautou, the young woman who was so charming as his Amelie. She is completely different here: a distant, crippled, unsmiling, determined girl who is obsessed with the dream of finding her lost true love. The film doesn't make any use of Tautou's considerable charm and unique screen presence, and the camera doesn't romance her as it did in Amelie. Appropriately for her character, she rarely gets a chance to look directly into the camera, but she delivers the role competently and unobtrusively, as required.

There were critics and fans who did not like this film. I suppose this is true because they loved Amelie (as everyone did - it is rated among the top 50 films of all time) and this movie is something quite different, darker, and more macabre, more like Jeunet's earlier film The City of Lost Children. A Very Long Engagement sometimes juxtaposes fairy tale streetscapes with the graphic ugliness of World War One, and Jeunet never turns his camera away from shattered skulls, shattered dreams, shattered families, festering sores, and terrifying explosions.

Amelie, it ain't.

But it is one tremendous movie - an emotional rollercoaster, a work of art, a work of literature, a landscape of the best and worst of humanity.

A masterpiece.


Audrey Tautou

Hankster
'Caps and comments by Hankster:

After a couple of days of capping good movies we figure it's time to return to our roots and go for a B-movie which is utterly mindless and good for only one thing....gratitious nudity!

Bingo! We found one as the Time Machine took us back to 1987 and "Evil Town". The only thing good about this one is former playmate Lynda Wiesmeier who bounces and jiggles her way thru this one as she is topless most of the movie.

She starts out trying to make it with the boyfriend, winds up being chased by two baddies, gets captured and guess what, she winds up being a "Babe in Bondage". So take a look at what has to be the only highlights of this flick.


Lynda Wiesmeier in "Evil Town"

Vejiita
The always beautiful Irène Jacob looks fantastic while baring breasts and bum in scenes from "The Big Brass Ring". Sara Melson also delievers the same two Bs.

Sara Melson also gives up breast and bum views in "The Big Brass Ring" (1999).

Native New Yorker Lisa Barbuscia bares breasts, bum and a hint of far off frontal nudity in "Serpent's Lair". Some folks may recognize her as the hot native girl in the Chris Farley/Matthew Perry movie "Almost Heroes" (1998).

Spanish beauty Penélope Cruz shows off her lovely chest in scenes from "Abre los ojos" aka "Open Your Eyes" (1997).

Variety
"Desperate Housewives" babe Teri Hatcher looking pretty darn good in these scenes from "The Cool Surface" (1994). 'Caps by the Skin-man

Tuna
Tuna's condition is stable. Nothing new to report. If you'd like to get in touch with him, his email address is tuna@scoopy.com


Movie Reviews

MOVIE REVIEWS:

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 there isn't any significant humor, but I inexplicably determined there might be something else of interest.
  • A blue asterisk indicates the review is written by Tuna (or Junior or Brainscan, or somebody else besides me)
  • If there is no asterisk, I wrote it, but am too ashamed to admit it.

Other Crap

 

  • I'm not sure how much I can add to make these words more perfect: "Clutch Cargo: The Complete Series." Surely that phrase is the divine purpose for the invention of the English language.

 
 

 

  • Seniors go punk.
    • "SENIOR CITIZENS are throwing off their granny glasses, shawls and plaid Bermuda shorts, and exchanging them for tattoos, nose rings, and spiked hairdos. In other words, they're going punk!"
 

 

 

 


 

 
  • Seals commit suicide.
    • New Zealand researchers have found a bizarre seal suicide site in Antarctica, where dozens of seals have inexplicably left the ocean, travelled 30km inland and gone over a bluff to their deaths.
    • I think the fact that seals and Swedes both have high suicide rates should lead scientists to see what they have in common. My conclusion: suicide is caused by cold temperatures, prolonged exposure to darkness, a fish-based diet, and speech that sounds like barking noises.


 

 
 

 

 
 



 

 
 

 

 


Hot dogs, yummy hot dogs


What kinds of kids eat yummy hot dogs?


Dead kids, sickly kids


Kids who love Dancer and Prancer


Fat kids, dying kids


Even kids with terminal cancer


Love hot dogs, yummy hot dogs


The dogs that reek of death!
 

 
 
 
 

 
  • People with certain first names make more money.
    • All the most productive names are the sturdy, old-fashioned "apostle and king names."
    • People reach their peak earning years in their 50s, so this list tends to reflect the names of baby boomers, but not so much their children's names. It tracks quite closely to the most popular baby names circa 1950.
    • NOTE: the "richest" list is from the UK, the "most popular" list from the USA.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Other Crap archives. May also include newer material than the links above, since it's sorta in real time.

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