Wednesday

Tuna
"Detour"

Detour (2002), which may have had a small theatrical release last year under the name Hell's Highway, has a group of friends in daddies motor home, returning from a rave in the desert, when one of them decides to take a detour to find a secret field of peyote. When they crash, some go for help, some stay behind, and all encounter flesh eating desert dope-heads.

I guess the good and bad thing about it, depending on your point of view, is that it is a retro teen slasher film with lots of gore. It is well photographed, and has good pace. Most of the cast did a great job, with the exception of the male lead, who tried to play a black gangsta rapper type, and was way over the top.

Newcomer Jessica Osfar shows her left breast in an outdoor sex scene. IMDB readers score it 5.5 of 10 based on very few votes, and the few reviews see it as a decent genre effort, somewhat reminiscent of The Hills Have Eyes and Texas Chainsaw Massacre. IF this is your genre, this indie will be a pleasant surprise. C.

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  • Jessica Osfar (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15)

    • Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy)

    Thirteen (2003)

    One of the audience members at the Sundance premiere asked Holly Hunter why she agreed to do this low budget project. Her answer was that the script had an "authenticity" which attracted her. Already acknowledged as a fine actress, Hunter demonstrated that she's not a bad film critic either.

    I didn't find this a very pleasant watch, but it certainly did have a freshness of perspective and authenticity about it. It feels like watching real life.

    The film really takes a major step toward fusing valid, commercially-viable dramatic structure with cinema verite. It is the story of a 13 year old girl, as written by a 13 year old girl and an auteur. It is, I am certain, not purely autobiographical. The girl took bits and pieces out of her own life and other lives around her to try to tell the world what it is like to be a 13 year old girl and face the inherent peer pressure. The adult co-author brought in some cohesive storylines. Then the kid got back in the batter's box to make sure the characters were using the right slang and listening to the right songs.

    Voila! Neo-realism. It's all true, in a sense, and as Ms Hunter noted, "authentic", yet it is a film which can be watched by mainstream audiences who are consciously in need of a plot and conflict/resolution.

    Plot summary: A good 7th grade girl wants to be accepted by the cool crowd. Her quest for acceptance leads to a dangerous, reckless friendship with the "hottest chick in her school", which leads to experimentation with sex, drugs, lies, shoplifting, and attitude. Her dysfunctional family struggles to get past their own problems long enough to see her crisis and (maybe) rescue her. 

    The film shares a sense of immediacy with the works of Dogme or cinema verite auteurs, but it is much more polished than implied by that statement. Although the young girl provided the details of the characters, music, and atmosphere, the director and cinematographer used some polished suggestive techniques to shape and reinforce the storyline, moving to a richer saturation, a full palette, and softer focus when the young girl is first accepted by the cool crowd, then desaturating, moving to harsher lighting and a cooler palette when it all goes sour.

    It's a good first movie from Catherine Hardwicke, doing precisely what independent films probably should do - personalizing, experimenting, trying to get inside of real characters. In fact, Ms Hardwicke and Miss Reed (the co-authors) originally thought they might come up with a teen comedy, but the reality they uncovered wrote itself as a slice-of-life psychological drama.

    Bravo for neo-realism. Whoda thunk that someone making a movie about a 13 year old girl would ask a 13 year old girl to be her co-author? Not Hollywood.

    There is teen experimentation with drugs and sex, but no nudity from the teens. The adults also engage in some drug use and violence. There are some graphic scenes of piercing and self-mutilation. Holly Hunter does a fairly long topless scene, and the camera follows her down into a crouch, revealing a brief frontal.

    • Holly Hunter (1, 2, 3)

     

    Young Adam

    I have not seen this movie, but one of the male nudity sites had some good caps, and a topless Tilda Swinton was also in them, so here ya go. Fair warning: Obi-Wan's ever-present light saber is even more present than usual. This is the seventh time he's whipped out the ol' wanger on screen. If you read "Other Crap" religiously, you know that Ewan's light saber will be cut from the North American release, because Americans just don't love schwantzes as much as other nations do.

    • Tilda Swinton (1, 2)

     

    Updates:

    • Updated volumes: Holly Hunter, Tilda Swinton

     

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    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.

    Brainscan
    'Caps and comments by Brainscan:

    On a planet that holds Laetitia Casta and Josie Maran, how is it possible to find another woman who might be our favorite fashion model? Well, she could be a red-head, or at least a strawberry blone. That would help. And she could have legs up to her ears. Would be a plus. And she could take her clothes off... not just once in a while, but all the frigging time. In moview, in magazines, on calendars, on the web. You know, everywhere? All the time?

    That would be Amber Smith. Woman loves to get nekkid. Like Kate Moss but with a way better body. Way.

    So there's this DVD entitled Amber Smith R.A.W. Got that puppy in the hopes that Amber would get nekkid a lot with the cameras rolling. And I was not diasppointed. Well, not much. I could quibble and ask why they didn't cover one of her butt nekkid photo-shoots, but that would be rude.

    The DVD covers. oh I don't know, maybe six photoshoots in which Amber gives up some sort of goodies. After grabbing a couple hundred frames...and that was after I had gone through it once and decided I had to be real picky or else I'd fill up my new 250GB harddrive....I thought it best to stop for a while and compose. Still have 1/3rd of the disk to go and that includes the very best last scene AND a mess of nekkid stills. This is part one, then, with part two showing up whenever I get the daman time to do it.

    The Amber Smith-a-thon breakdown:

    • Shower scenes, all at least see-thru topless. Links 2-4 also show lower frontal exposure. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15)

    • See-thru and very loose-fitting sarong. (1, 2, 3)

    • Extreme see-thru in a killer white top. The best of these, in my opinion is link #2. The collages in links 5 and 6 are made up of stills. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)

    • Teeny, weeney bikinis. (1, 2, 3)

    • Fantastic frigging scene, with Amber topless behind an iron fence. My faves are links 10-16. Up close and real personal views of Ambers magnificient upper bod and face. To die for. You just gotta grab these. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24)


    Okay, as a preview, there is a lot more full-frontal wet stuff in part 2, coming soon to a Funhouse in your neighborhood.

    Variety
    Patricia Clarkson 'Caps by LC of Clarkson topless in scenes from the extremely low budget film (only $300,000!) "Pieces of April" (2003), starring Katie Holmes, Clarkson and Oliver Platt.

    The movie was written and directed by Peter Hedges, the writer of "What's Eating Gilbert Grape", "About a Boy". Here's more info, (along with an interesting back story) at the official site by the production company.

    Here's the official site by MGM.

    Shelly Marks
    (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

    		Señor Skin 'caps from the movie "Timequest" aka "Second Chance" (2002). There are some poor reviews at the IMDb, but it might be rent-worthy for a couple of reasons...
    1.It co-stars Bruce Campbell
    2.Shelly Marks gets nude playing Marilyn Monroe
    3.The plot...it's the story of a man who travels back in time and prevents the assassination of President Kennedy and how the world might have been.

    Mail Bag
    Hey Scoops,

    One of the babes in the Hip Hop lesbian lovin' series posted yesterday is porn star Cheyenne Silver.

    Mr. T

  • Cheyenne Silver (1, 2)