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Reviews
Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job! (2007)
The best thing on TV, period
This is the best show on all of television. Hands down. No question. Yes sir. The best. Top shelf. I don't like people who don't like this show. In fact, I hate them a lot. Tim and Eric changed my life with Tom Goes to the Mayor, enhanced that change 21 fold when I found their whimsical timanderic.com shorts and other various videos, and then, as if this weren't all enough, they topped my cake of satisfaction with this glorious television program that has made me a better citizen, a stronger human being, and a more handsome and charming individual. Tim and Eric have made life worth living again. If I hadn't already given away my virginity a thousand times I would let them take it from me. This review was helpful to you.
The Last House on the Left (1972)
Good, but extremely unworthy of its praise
I'm not sure if it's because I've seen films that are far more disturbing that this has claimed to be, or that I heard way too much hype for it before seeing it, but this movie is not the over-the-top, super intense, ultra-shocking movie that it is dubbed as.
I should mention, before going into depth about how this really is not what it is cracked up to be, that this is still a good movie that stands up with many other 1970's horror flicks, even though this isn't horror.
For 1972, when this was made, sure this was over the top. It was more violent than a lot of other movies, and even included a very, very mild rape scene. But over 30 years later, reading the reviews of it, hearing other people talking about it, you would get the impression that the movie is non-stop violence, non-stop tension, brutal, unrelenting aggression and rapes galore. You would think that it shows things that no other movie since then has shown. You would think that no other movie has come close to being as disturbing or intense as this. You'd be completely wrong. This movie, despite what anyone says, is not still as shocking and dirty and crazy and insane today as it was back then. Its intensity back then has inspired legions and legions of other, far more over the top movies.
On the scale of disturbing and intense movies, with 1 being a Sesame Street movie and 10 being something that completely shocks me and gives me nightmares, Last House on the Left would get, maybe, a 4.
It is labeled as a horror movie. Said by many to be one of, if not absolutely, Wes Craven's best. People have even gone so far as to say that it makes movies like Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th, Halloween, and other movies look tame and like jokes. This couldn't be further from the truth. The horror elements of this movie take a back seat. It doesn't contain enough of anything that makes a good horror movie for me to call it horror at all. This is not horror. Slasher, maybe. Suspense, perhaps. Crime, indeed. A fake, sort of tamer version of a snuff film, sure. In horror you experience a sense of darkness and dread and uncertainty. This movie does not thrive on a successful portrayal of any of these emotions. With the constant cut scenes to the idiot, comic relief police officers, and the zany music, there is no time for suspense or fear to build. There is no appropriate setting for terror. No overwhelming sense of anything that a good horror movie creates is created. There are many movies out there that develop the same kind of tension that this movie builds, and they are not horror movies.
The movie builds slight tension and leads to some short lived and not-so-shocking moments of violence and "brutality". This brutality is a stabbing similar to a stabbing seen in millions of other movies, and a rape that can hardly even be considered shocking considering that no actions are shown and the reactions are rather unbelievable. Oh, and then there's a shooting. Again, not something far out.
The killer/rapist and his gang make their way to the house of the parents of one of the girls, where they ultimately meet their demise. I suppose that the methods of these people dying has also been mentioned as some of the "over the top" brutality. This is again, not the case. There is brutality, sure. But it is not shown visually, nor is it something that hasn't been shown in other movies. A man gets killed with a chainsaw, but you see nothing. A man gets his penis bitten (maybe bitten off?), which I suppose is the most brutal thing in the movie. But again, you see nothing. A movie can create all kinds of brutal and unimaginably crazy things if they will not even be shown on the screen. Considering this, there wasn't anything too extreme in this. If they're not going to show the actions, why not do something even crazier? You can get away with anything. If you're not limited by technology or props or even the actions, the only limit is the imagination. Taken like this, the acts are not so extreme at all.
Even a "remake" 8 years later, by the name of House on the Edge of the Park, was far more shocking and intense than this and showed a lot more. It wasn't really a remake, but had the same premise and even starred David Hess in the exact same role, with a loser, idiot friend similar to Junior from this movie. It was a total rip-off/homage to Last House on the Left, and was light years ahead of it in terms of being shocking and over the top. But again, that wasn't a horror movie either.
There's nothing terrifying about Last House on the Left, nor is there anything that can still be called remotely over the top, but it still remains a good movie that is watchable at any time. But it really does not deserve to be called the many things it's been called. But watch it for its plot and characters and the events that unfold, taking them as they are. Taken as it is, it's an above average movie.
Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County (2004)
The "KIDS" of television
If you want to see a bunch of spoiled, mentally retarded, petty, trendy, childish, immature, cloned living jokes without personalities go about their sheltered and pathetic teenage lives, this is the show for you.
The guys: All of the guys on this show are the guys you can see at any mall. Go to the mall, those are the guys on this show. Guys that if you talked to, you'd find that the only things they care about are how their hair looks, whether or not they should pop their collars, whether or not that blond girl with the tits has a boyfriend, and what to eat in front of said girl on a date so he can impress her. I want to personally stab these guys with a pitchfork.
The girls: The girls are all completely brain dead. Unfortunately they, like the guys on this show, represent your average, run of the mill teenager with the most inane interests and a shallow, pitiful existence. Also like the guys, these girls are the kinds you will find in any mall. The girls who have cell phones permanently stuck on their ears, shopping bags in their hands, giggling like airheads while twirling their hair with their fingers... yeah. Those girls.
I don't understand the point of this show. I really don't. As with all reality television, this is directed toward the most simple minded fools on the planet. Some maggot at MTV got the idea : "well look at all these other stupid reality shows out there... there's a show about a bunch of hand picked lemmings who "survive" on an "island" through all of the "dangers" and "difficulties", like not having a king sized bed to sleep in, not having a manicure every day, and not having TV. That show got huge ratings! And it was completely stupid! Then there is American Idol. A bunch of talentless losers singing songs written for uncreative people, hoping to "earn" themselves some fame and fortune and a record contract! Hell yeah! This show completely craps all over the notion of decent music and art and really brings the value of music down to a consumerist level of completely rotten standards! That show got huge ratings, too! There are tons of reality shows out there for people with IQ's of 70. But I bet if we could make an even dumber show, for people with IQ's between 20 and 30, we would REALLY have something!" So this guy went and asked the MTV Board of Uncreative Ideas for Stupid Television Shows, the same people who brought you TRL, Cribs, Pimp My Ride, and Real World, to come up with an idea for the dumbest show that television has ever had. They said "we don't think that even we can come up with something as stupid as you want. But we know who can." So they went out to a local high school and gathered up the dumbest looking bunch of kids they could find. They brought them back to the MTV THINK ROOM and threw them in there, telling them to come up with an idea for the best TV show they could think of. Six hours later, the door was opened and they showed the MTV PEOPLE their idea.
"We thought it would be a great idea to actually send an entire camera crew out to California, waste the time of directors and producers and editors and lots of other production crew people on a show about a bunch of typical mindless high school aged kids who have a bunch of typical mindless, menial, predictable, hopeless drama in their lives. Not only do they have this drama, but they let this meaningless drivel actually consume their entire being and control who they are, so that they all become just like us - complete wastes of life and air." The MTV Board of Uncreative Ideas for Stupid Television Shows knew this was their ticket. It was complete garbage! Exactly what MTV needed more of. So they ate it up, and immediately got to work. They sent a camera crew out to California with the instructions "find the most trendy, air headed, worthless teenagers you can find, and tell them you want to make them famous and put them on TV. They are all suckers so they'll do whatever it takes." And thus LAGUNA BEACH was born. And now average teenagers from around the world who just got home from school and just finished babbling and yapping and bamboozling themselves over pitiful drama with their friends can sit in front of the TV and re-live the very same kind of mind numbing drivel that they obviously don't experience enough of in their lives. "OMG!!! SHE HAZ DA SAME PROBLMZ I DO!! LOL!!! U RULE LAGUNA BEACH!!!!" And since this show is incredibly awful, it will run for probably 15 seasons.