Monthly Archives: February 2025

FOR SALE: Two DVDS, $20.00 Each

Posted on by

0

There’s no Spoiler Alert.

I watched each movie one day.  The second, Fifty Shades Darker, pointedly unrated, does not differ from Fifty Shades of Gray rated R. Each has the same backside nudity, and in front nothing below the waist. There’s a little tying her up but not for long. He’s not using all the tools in his bondage closet. There’s no Basic Instinct stuff.

So what’s left for the actors? Dialogue at work, on the street, shopping, partying – the same scenes – and the actors aren’t always together. The advertising gimmick is the lure of physical instruction, but that is as boring the last time as it was the first time.

The Winter House

Posted on by

0

inA female novelist rents a house in New Hampshire for the winter. On one of the first nights, she’s interrupted from sleep by a burglar, Jesse. She doesn’t take the gun downstairs to confront the younger man. He’s in the kitchen eating. Her motherly instincts kick in (although she knows he lying about everything). He says this house belongs to his parents. He’s just dropping by. She doesn’t ask all the questions. He doesn’t want to say why’s he’s come. She doesn’t want to explain why she’s there. She lets him sleep in the upstairs bedroom, next to hers. He leaves the next morning but returns at the some hour that night. Time to call the cops.

They hike and see the panoramic view of New Hampshire’s hills. She learns he once liked to write poetry but preferred drugs. He drinks a lot. He falls asleep on the couch. She puts a blanket over him.

DAY THREE: He’s chopping wood somewhere. She’s at home and is confronted by a goon, a large bald guy looking for Jesse. She appropriately fends of the goon, but doesn’t immediately tell Jesse the goon showed up, a huge coincidence: Remember Jesse had no connection with the house except he once attended a teenage party there. So goon is a character out of no where, but one wonders will Jesse ever confront goon?  As an unrelated plot point the viewers learn Jesse and goon were partners in a recent crime, unsuccessfully pulled off.

DAY FOUR: Jesse reads one of her novels and lands on a prosaic statement which he considers the most profound. She’s pleased, as though it’s the centerpiece of the story. He reads more. She sees the goon in town talking to three thugs. She returns home but doesn’t mention that. He gives a thoroughly bullshit analysis of her novel, which any novelist should be able to brush away. She’s too understanding. They get cozy. The goon and the three thugs show up in a pickup and leave the headlights shining. There’s no explanation but that quartet walks away, out of the movie forever. [Reality: This is a low budget flick and no one had the bucks to allow for broken windows and furniture, amid the bullet holes.] There’s sheet music (mostly sheets, no notes). In the morning the goon and thugs are gone; there’s no pillow talk. 

Jesse turns himself in and the rest of the gang. He’s in the pokey. From the cell he sends a poem. I didn’t hear her read it: Leave poetry to the prose. This movie is nothing to write home about. I hope they don’t make a sequel.