EL TOJO

Share a scene from a movie that uses music perfectly.
Submitted by nohablo.

Q: How disingenuous is this?
A: So, so, so disingenuous. BUT WHEN HAS COMMON DECENCY STOPPED ME HAHAHA

Silence of the Lambs

buffalo bill

Q Lazzarus, Goodbye Horses
Utterly terrifying and utterly memorable. One of those tight, perfect moments that redeems Silence of the Lambs from any schlock and any overacting. Also, why Hannibal and co can smooch my peen. 

PS: The track itself is pretty goddam smoking.

Zodiac

Donovan, Hurdy Gurdy Man
NO ALL OF THESE ARE NOT GOING TO BE ABOUT EERIE MANSLAUGHTER AT NIGHT. But if they were, they should be as good as this scene. Pre-Zodiac, Hurdy Gurdy Man was all bong hits and newly found meaning in Dire Straits songs. Post-Zodiac, Hurdy Gurdy Man is all creeping menace and the pricks of ruthless evil beginning to peep through the wide-eyed free-love of the 60's. It's a wicked little scene with a mellow little song.

IN ADDENDUM: DAMN YOU YOUTUBE. How can there be 67 anime tributes to this movie's opening sequence without a single copy of the real deal? You're on notice.

Dazed and Confused

Aerosmith, Sweet Emotion
I cannot think of a single other song that you could play with the same effect. Steve Tyler's voice hits at the same moment that obnoxious, over-muscled, traffic-cone orange, and devastatingly beautifugl loogie-to-the-face-of-fuel-economy slides into the parking lot, and the moment is perfect. That one opening scene strikes that golden balance of sleaze, slink, and youth for the rest of a great movie.

The One Infallible Rule By Which I Judge All Music
Does it make me want to pole dance in an H&M?
(a) If yes, proceed.
(b) If no, dump that weak track and get with a real man.

Artists Who Always Meet the Infallible Rule
Prince, The Artist Formerly Known as Prince

PROS
- 30% Fresher than Caturday.
- 120% More likely to make you break out into the Chicken Noodle Soup Dance.

CONS
- I am 56% sure that Kanye West is not an adorable kitten.

Good thing that there's still that extra 44%!

Lessons Learned From Finals Period #1
When the sun is coming up and you've been up for 24 hours, Baba O'Riley takes on a lot of surprisingly emotional qualities*. Needless to say, you will be humiliated by this "revelation" after you get a full eight hours of sleep.

* HINT: They involve lots of soft swaying and enthusiastic air drums.

EASTERN PROMISES, David Cronenberg
Slick, deft, and efficient, but Eastern Promises lacks a heart to propel it through its grimy plot. The emotions are hollow, the motivations perfunctory, and the end product is surprisingly bloodless for such a gory film. Watch it for the gorgeous cinematography and Viggo Mortensen's messianic bone structure.

THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE THUNDERBOLT KID, BILL BRYSON
In which Bill Bryson shows that he wasn't a complete little turd of an abomination when he was growing up in the Iowa of the 1950's. Psych!

I'm not entirely sure why I keep reading Bill Bryson. He's smug, priveleged, and snide without the saving graces of being particularly funny. Also, I finish every book wanting to punch him in throat. The problem is, great men have mulled over the peculiarities of growing up in the 1950's, and Bryson is not one of them. He covers the same topics (pornography; Our Friend, the Atom!; bad food; refrigerators), uses the same humor (Nyuk nyuk nyuk, you see the joke is that hiding underneath a desk WOULDN'T protect you from 500 megatons of sheer atomic power. Nyuk nyuk nyuk, that's what makes it so FUNNY!), and tops everything off with a thin, tenuous sheen of racism, sexism, and classism. Nothing is overt, but it's a bit like spending fifteen excruciating afternoons with your Sassy Grandma who doesn't understand why you keep on wincing when she uses the word "coloreds." This is made all the more worse by Bryson's acid nostalgia for the Good Old Days Where We Would Party At Woolworth's and his hackneyed insights into the Cheapness of Modern Day Life.

Otherwise, Bryson is a reliable mash-up of Dave Barry, Dave Sedaris, and Debbie Downer - and a caricature of Stuff White People Like. Dear Bill, Let It Go. Also, come here, I've got to do something with your throat.

* PROTIP, BILL. Your repeated claims that the Blacks That I Knew were so Athletic. And Strong. And Great at Sports. And Did I Mention That I Once Shook Hands with a Black Man? Does NOT make you sound any more racially sensitive. Please stop, lest thou protest too much.

Some people anxiously await that sunny, breezy April day to break out their swishy summer dresses and seersucker suits. I wait to break out The Breeders.

CANNONBALL, The Breeders. One of those perfect summer anthems. Take off your shoes, coax the melanin back into your goth-skin, and get your terrible hippy-dance on.

FLASHMAN: A NOVEL; GEORGE MACDONALD FRASER
Introducing the shining beacon of the Queen's Empire and a true Crown Jewel of England! Flashman is what Forrest Gump would have been if Forrest Gump were a pompous, shameless, endlessly horny homunculus of a nit instead of an inbred Arkansas charity case with the IQ of a dog. In other words: interesting and splendid in its awfulness.

The novel revolves entirely around its namesake: Harry Flashman who is, essentially, the antichrist. Flashman's facebook interests would probably alternate between: being boorish, being racist, being screamingly mysogynistic (rape 4 lyfe!), and BEING DRUNK. KAR-KRUNK BABY. Oh yeah, and England wot wot. But for all of his many* flaws, Flashman is a wonderful narrator. He is cunning, witty, and acerbically honest. He operates under no delusions about himself nor anyone else, which allows him plenty of operating room to cruelly deflate all the pomp, circumstance, and blatant incompetance surrounding the British military.

And as a personal point, gold stars and wet kisses to Fraser who truly goes out of his way to gut Flashman of any of the cloying virtues of a reader-friendly anti-hero. Flashman is one of the true, balls-out, unabashed snakes of literature. At no point does his cowardice waver towards any breed of courage, at no point does boning acquire any tinge of epic romance, at no point does Flashman ever turn towards decency. Even his intelligence is a primeval sort - born more of the spinal cord than the brain. Harry Flashman remains stubbornly black-hearted and unchanged, which is - in a way - a wonderful fuck-you to the bland moralizing and eventual redemption of so many other neutered anti-heroes. Stay rotten, Flashman. Stay rotten.

In general, even without Flashman, the story itself would be pretty solid; it's brimming with Empire! Country! Battles! Hot Foreign Babes! Epic ruin! But adding Flashman gives the novel fangs and a wicked, wicked sense of humor.
IN CONCLUSION:  Rule Britannia and God Bless Flashman!

* Many, many, many, many, infinitely many.

TRAFFIC (2000). Another Brilliant Lesson in the following. Do not watch The Wire before watching any other film about the war on drugs, the drug industry, or just a straight-up yeyo part-ay because it will make the film seem: (a) pre-chewed, (b) condescending, (c) wickedly and oafishly unsophisticated, (d) heavy-handed and maudlin, and (e) laughable. I watched The Wire.

FINAL JUDGMENT: Not truly terrible, but made all the more worse for the sad, deflated expectations. Catch it on USA and watch between episodes of America's Best Dance Crew.

CLUELESS (1995). THIS WAS FUCKING BRILLIANT. Seriously, why don't they make movies like this anymore? Shines supernovas brighter than Mean Girls (which was funny, but still somewhat sandy and bland) with its tart and sly humor. It's wonderful to find a script that scalds with love and a group of actresses that are totally in on the joke*.

* Trite MTV ending and slightly icky romance aside.