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PollyDarton

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Posts posted by PollyDarton

  1. Posted

    I'm so glad I don't know what this is. I know exactly the same number of Kid Rock songs as I do Ted Nugent's songs (2) so I really don't understand why I seem to hear their dumb names as often as I do.

     

    This is all you need to know... he rhymes "things" with "things." It's a part of the chorus.

    • Like 4

  2. Posted

     

    I can't recall a weird "first dance" (most are pretty standard) but the weirdest father/daughter dance was Kenny Loggins' Return To Pooh Corner. (that dance all together was memorable. Wedding and reception were held in a country club. Bride and groom were both like 18 or 19. Groom just graduated from Basic Training, bride just finished the first semester of college. So they were the youngest couple I've ever DJ'd for. It was on a Sunday afternoon too. So all that to account for there was very little drinking and drinking usually indicates more dancing. Then, with about two hours left in the reception, a grandparent, who wasn't at the ceremony and reception, had a stroke and the nursing home called. So we ended early.)

     

    Whoa.

     

    Ok me next... What is the worst song that gets frequently requested and why is it Kid Rock's All Summer Long?

    • Like 3

  3. Posted

    In the podcast, the hosts wondered aloud what teen comedy Bratz was most similar too, but it seems to me that the answer is "all of them" -- as in, every popular teen comedy released within the decade prior to the filming of Bratz. Let's count 'em up:

     

    1. The opening credits are EXTREMELY similar to those of Legally Blonde, to say nothing of the character who carries a cute little dog in her purse while floating in a pool.

    2. As was mentioned, Meredith seems like a low-rent version of Regina George from Mean Girls. Additionally, she enters a talent show with a choreographed dance number as a key plot point.

    3. There is a cheerleading scene in which one character literally says, "Bring it on."

    4. One of the Bratz plays soccer to the tune of the Faders' "No Sleep Tonight," exactly as in the Amanda Bynes vehicle She's the Man (no cross-dressing, though).

    5. The the description of the lunch-table cliques in the courtyard are lifted directly from Clueless, in addition to the scene in which a teacher receives an abrupt makeover from one of her students.

     

    These aren't just generic devices used across many teen movies like the mean principal, slobs-vs.-snobs conflict, or annoying younger siblings (though of course Bratz hits on all of these too), these are obvious DIRECT ripoffs of other recent and popular films in the same genre. I'm not sure I can recall any other movie that has engaged in such broad plagiarism, from so many sources. Anything else I'm missing?

     

    6. Meredith and the Bratz seem to be the most visible and important students at the school even though (in the beginning) they are freshmen and sophomores - Juniors and seniors are meaningless and not present. This is extremely similar to Saved by the Bell where the gang rules the school regardless of their class status.

    7. The gang finds that they should stick it out as friends even though they don't run in the same cliques... which is the exact outcome of The Breakfast Club.

    • Like 3

  4. Posted

    Poor, Yasmin...lol

     

    But since you brought it up, let's talk about Sasha's tryouts. Look, I'm all for confidence and everything, but damn she was needlessly confrontational with the head cheerleader. I mean, she's essentially in the middle of job interview for a very competitive position (especially for a freshman), and she laughs straight in their faces and basically calls all their moves trash. It's lucky she had the moves to back it up, but still, she's trying out to be part of a team. I just think this this might be one of those rare instances where you want to keep your bratitude in check.

     

    She is such a jerk to them!

    What she says is RIDICULOUS.

    If you don't want to re-watch she says "Girl I brought it, nailed it, lent it to my best friend's kid sister, and I borrowed it back while you were still figuring out the beat." What!?

    • Like 4

  5. Posted

    True. It was a basic dress, but impressive she did it all during one period.

     

    It takes the crackheads on project runway around 8 hours to make something that ugly... so yes, impressive if not completely impossible!

    Jade's skills do require a bit of suspension of disbelief. Cloe is a great soccer player - not out of the realm of possibility. Sasha is a cheerleading and tumbling dynamo - I'm still on board. Yasmin... umm... Yasmin... well she can speak spanish, totally plausible. Jade can make a fully finished garment in a class period as well as seizure inducing fireworks experiments? Is that some "Asian girls are magic" racism?

    • Like 4

  8. Posted

     

    But each time Bubbie takes the chocolates and tucks them... in her bra? Aren't those chocolates and her bra just going to be a sticky disgusting mess inside of 5 minutes?

     

    #putherinabra

     

    Also - this should not be ignored. Putting chocolate in a bra is a ridiculous idea.

    • Like 4

  9. Posted

    Even if Bubbie is totally hooked on chocolate, just ... go to the goddamn store?

     

    This is like Mark from The Room sneaking up to his weed stash on the roof and hiding out like a teenager. It's like, dude, you're both adults ... just buy your meth chocolate with your own money and smoke your brickwall weed in your apartment!

     

    Yes, this! But also Bubbie and Yasmin's transactions seem to be a secret - FROM WHO? In their household there is only Yasmin, Bubbie, the pedo-kid with the hairdo,and a mariachi band. It's not like she's Cliff Huxtable hiding his sub sandwich indulgences from Claire Huxtable... in this scenerio there is no Claire. There is no Zaydee to keep this Bubbie accountable. Lady, you want some damn chocolate? Literally go to ANY store that sells ANY thing.

     

    Which brings me to only one conclusion - Those are magic mushroom chocolates like I ate in college.

    • Like 6

  11. Posted

    I rewatched the first day of school scene this morning, and she's definitely a year older than the Bratz.

     

    If I remember correctly, elections were usually held the year before. So, she was probably elected Sophomore president late in her Freshman year. I don't know that she's actually the student body president, though. Or at least, not until after the two year jump and she's a Senior.

     

    She is... that's one pro-active freshman!

    36796301756_57a26d08fa_o.png

    • Like 3

  12. Posted

    36795945746_34e92f81ab_o.png

    So this photo would mean that Meredith is a senior, because she has 3 golden hatchet awards from the previous talent shows.

    This still does not really explain why she is already the school president on the first day of school of her sophomore year. When do they hold SGA elections?

    • Like 7

  13. Posted

    I assumed they were the student council. You're right though that is another clique.

    You can also add journalism to the list and at Meredith's party one of the tables was labeled "Boy Jocks." Can we safely assume there is a "Girl Jocks" as well?

     

    There is a table for "Girls soccer" is that the same as girl jocks?

    There doesn't seem to be any lady basketball, volleyball, field hockey, or softball. It would seem girl's soccer and cheerleaders are the only acceptable female athletics at Carrie Nation High. Sad.

    • Like 4

  14. Posted

     

    Wait, that doesn't add up to "48 distinct cliques." Was Jade also in charge of counting them with her faulty math?

     

    There are 17 on her chart and she mentions "goths, gangsters, wanna-be gangsters, the pretzel people(Who are very different from the Greenies), nerds, the football jocks" and she sends one guy over to the loners.

    Additionally I saw the karate kids, rockabilly/greasers, and whatever student government clique Meredith is in.

    • Like 7

  15. Posted

    When the extras came to the wardrobe department for a fitting for this movie, they would have literally sorted them like Meredith does based on similar criteria... well, probably mostly on their appearance but I like to think the costume designer had a similar chart.

     

    36573426670_f6275e7081_o.png

    • Like 9

  16. Posted

     

    This movie is definitely about conformity, though. They go to "Carry Nation" High School. Carry/Carrie Nation is this person:

     

    9862-004-166D0ABC.jpg

     

    She was a temperance activist, which means she railed against alcohol, specifically, but also she just generally went around telling people how to live their lives. There's even a statue of her at the school. And the campus of Carry Nation High School is covered with signage that says "Obey" and "Listen" and "Submit," and it's run by a girl who puts everyone into their places on the first day. And yeah, she hates Da Bratz because of Cloe, but also because they are constantly defying the order she tries to maintain over the school, just by being themselves. Meredith carries around evidence of everyone's weirdness on her flash drive (like Cloe singing "La Cucaracha") threatening to reveal it to the rest of the school, and that seems to terrify Da Bratz into submission for most of the movie, until they learn to embrace it at the end of the movie.

     

    But the movie has the internal contradiction of having an "anti-conformity" message while also relying very heavily on stereotypes to flesh out characters whose primary concern is fitting in.

     

    Although it is easily argued that The Temperance League is enforcing a form of conformity (conformity to God), Carrie Nation herself is a terrible icon for conformity. She was a hatchet wielding eccentric. She found the consumption of liquor to be personally abhorrent and decided it was God's will that she should stop its influence. She was arrested 32 times and soaked up the attention. She sold photos of herself holding axes as well as tiny souvenir hatchets. Can an instrument of destruction really be a great symbol for conformity? Perhaps. Either the writers were lazy and just wanted the image of a stern old lady or maybe there is a deeper message of breaking down the norm like "Da Bratz?"

     

    Also Da Bratz:

    36970156195_5613388556_o.jpg

    • Like 7
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