Cameron H.

I'm just glad it's Friday so I can retreat to my secluded ice bar and have a refreshing Coors light.

It would be borderline criminal not to... Let's do this!

To be fair, the last few mini's have dropped around 3:30PM EST. I wouldn't worry about it yet.

I also happen to know this fantastic Ortolan jizz player who could do the music! And the best part is he hasn't had a hit in about thirty years, so we can probably get him pretty cheap. (Fun fact: "Lapti Nek," the song Max Rebo's Band plays on Jabba's barge, translates from Huttese to "Work it Out" which makes this post 100% relevant to this thread. I promise this was not a fact I knew until about two minutes ago. Please don't beat me up and take my lunch money.)

If the Force exists, and it is the power behind all things good and just,then I hope against hope that all the trailers we've seen thus far have just been red herrings and the new Star Wars movies will be straight up musicals.

I don't know, I actually believe that one. Of course, I'm probably wrong, but I'm hoping they'll expand the universe and take it in a new direction. But there are certain tropes that all the Star Wars movies tend to share, and I think that my theory falls in line with what has come before. And, to be fair, I have been actively trying to avoid learning too much about the movie as I want to be surprised when the movie hits, I have not read any of the "new" canon material, and I'm 100% sure someone has already proposed this theory, but based on unintentional cultural osmosis I think that... Yeah, I know that isn't ground breaking or anything, just something that occurred to me while watching the trailers. And if I am right, I am 100% on board for it. To you as well! This will be in no way a controversial statement, but I just finished re-watching the BTTF trilogy the other day, and I have to say, the first movie has to have one of the best Third Acts in film history. The way it escalates fluidly from one obstacle to the next is damn masterful. As I was watching it, I thought to myself, it's almost like a starter pistol goes off as soon as Marty pulls into the Enchantment Under the Sea dance and the movie just races to the finish--in the best possible way.

I think the most important thing is that whatever gif you use is a loving portrait of the human body in all its glory. Yay, Wednesday! No more discussions about Perfect! Anyone have any theories about the new Star Wars movie? I have a pretty good one, and I really want to get it down somewhere so I can brag to everyone I meet that I called it in advance, but I don't want to accidentally spoil it if I'm right...

Ugh...FINALLY!!!! I mean, the episode was great, but damn...

Just heard about the Gilmore Girls revival on Netflix. Seeing as Kumail got on the new X Files series, should we begin our campaign to get Jason on Gilmore Girls? http://www.ew.com/article/2015/10/19/gilmore-girls-reunion-netflix

Yeah, I get that, and I think you are absolutely right. I just don't get what the benefit of doing it at the strip club is, like, what is Travolta really getting out of it that he doesn't already know? On his initial tour of the Sports Connection, Mustache Man tells Travolta right away that Roger is a stripper, so how does watching him strip benefit his story about health clubs being "the singles bars of the Eighties?" If anything, it seems to undermine his premise: And so it was, after spending all day at the Health Club--the singles bar of the Eighties--everyone piled into their vehicles, got dressed up, and drove across town...to an actual club and actual bar.

Look, it's a serious breach of forum protocol to start the goofing before Wednesday, but if you got the goods--bring it!

Two final thoughts on Perfect: First of all, when Mustachioed Man is given Adam a tour of the Sports Connection, Adam asks, "Do you have a bar onsite?" The MM replies, "No--you have to get a beer off site" or something to that effect. What made this exchange stick out to me though is what a bizarre question that is. Who's ever heard of a bar at a gym? However, according to iMDB trivia: Why was the movie, that was being filmed at the actual Sports Connection, being so coy about having a bar onsite? I mean, I get that you can't exactly have Travolta ask if "health clubs are the singles bars of the eighties" and have MM say, "Yeah, and it's right over there," but you would think if they were going to lie about it, it would be for dramatic purposes. For example, if the movie was hiding this fact so Travolta's character would have to dig really deep to get to the seedy underbelly of Health Spas, but that's not the case either--everyone is more than willing to talk to him about hooking up at the gym. I just found this to be so odd.. The second thing I wanted to bring up has to do with the male stripping scene. I know they talked about Travolta conducting the interview within a closet, but was anyone else asking themselves, "Why is he interviewing someone at a strip club?" Unless your article is on either stripping or strip clubs, that doesn't seem very conducive and would be terribly distracting. It's not like at this point in the movie the article's deadline is an issue either; could Travolta and Newman honestly not come up with a better time and place to do the interview? "Oh Adam, I'd love to be interviewed for Rolling Stone! I know the perfect place we can meet--you might want to bring some extra cash with you though..."

I think what's going on, and I could be wrong, was Lawrence was looking for a "character witness" for his McKenzie story and Shotsy, the female exotic dancer, was willing to be interviewed on McKenzie's behalf. As it turns out, she has nothing but nice things to say about McKenzie, even going so far as to tell Adam that McKenzie bought her house for her. Now, I'm not entirely sure who the man who hits Lawrence is in relation to her (I'm guessing boyfriend), but he wants her name out of the article as it may reflect poorly on her or bring unwanted trouble (e.g. more reporters hounding her, etc). It's basically the same journalism paranoia that Jessie complains about throughout the movie, although his rationale isn't as fleshed out. Maybe he's afraid the story will implicate her in whatever shady dealings McKenzie was up to, or maybe he's afraid Adam's article will make her seem like a prostitute, I'm not really sure. I don't even think he's all that upset she's being interviewed, he just wants her name kept out of it. But, lo and behold, once the article comes out, Adam not only uses her name, he has an almost full page, head shot of her just smiling away. I think what the movie is (ineffectively) trying to convey, is that Wenner's paraphrase of Oscar Wilde ("The only thing worse than being written about is, is not being written about.") is, in the movie's opinion, simply untrue--especially when it comes to people who aren't celebrities and aren't seeking publicity. This movie proposes that the "Perfect" journalist is someone who has the integrity to always tell the truth, but also the compassion to know when to withhold some of that truth. That is what Jessie is angry about and that is why this man punches Travolta...and I think the movie did a fantastic job illustrating this...

I'm talking about Lorraine Newman. From Wikipedia: Who the fuck did you think I was talking about?

One of the issues I had with the movie is, aside from the fact that many of the Sports Connection (especially Laraine Newman) seemed to be suffering from severe self image issues, I didn't have a ton of sympathy for them once the story is published. Aside from Curtis, Travolta's character is extremely forthright in regard to what his story is going to be about. He asks them explicitly if Health Clubs are the singles bars of the 80's, he requests the numbers of all the couples at the gym, and I believe he even tells the mustachioed guy outright that that is the topic. Not only that, we find out early on that one of the trainers is a fan of Travolta's work and compliments him on his article on Carly Simon! Given that we know his story on Carly Simon was obviously unflattering, and all his questions seem to be seem to be of a superficial nature, should they really be surprised that his story ended up less than complimentary? However, I did love when Travolta is trying to escape the angry trainers at the end and one of the dudes (either ersatz Roger Daltry or "exotic dancer" guy) yells out, "He called me an airhead too!" I just liked that this seems to imply, had the story just called his girlfriend an airhead, he would have been totally cool with it.

Yes, watching the movie after the episode is always good, but in this case, I would say just barely. I mean, while there are crazy elements of the movie, it's not really that crazy. It's just poorly made. As I wrote in the mini-sode thread, this movie feels like you are stuck in the B plot of a much more interesting movie. If anything, this movie actually made me feel bad for Travolta (something I didn't think possible) when I discovered Paul Barresi, the guy on the far right, is the guy who gave an interview to the National Enquirer and basically started the "Travolta is gay" rumors in the early 90's. I researched it further and found this Huffington Post article. That article made me feel horrible for Travolta. To be clear, I don't care if Travolta is gay or not. If he isn't gay, who cares if people think he is? In my opinion, anybody who would think less of another person based on their sexual preference is a person whose opinion means less than nothing--fuck that person. But if it is true, and he is gay, goddamn that's just fucking tragic and breaks my heart that he can't just be himself.

As I suspected in the mini-sode thread, it looks like the gang did such a good job covering this movie that there's not much more to add. It's like a ghost town in here. I was going to try to write a post about how Frankie's "amazing" pictures of Mick Jagger, the ones that really "capture his essence," just seem to be off him scratching at his head lice in front of a generic Wal-Mart Photo Center backdrop, but fuck it. I got nothing.

Once again, great episode! I'm impressed that the gang was able to get so much material from such a relatively boring movie and didn't just fixate exclusively on Travolta's thrusting. Way to keep it classy, guys! One thing that bothered me, as a person who dabbles in writing, is Travolta's almost complete lack of concern over Curtis deleting his story. Sure, the lines he says in the movie indicate that this bothers him, but Travolta's reading of those lines seem to indicate, at the very most, mild annoyance. This story, which is supposed to be the cover story of the next issue of Rolling Stone and has a deadline of that morning, has just been erased, and I'm supposed to believe he isn't going to straight loose his shit? This is his goddamn livelihood we're talking about! Hell, an inconsequential forum post commenting on a shitty movie only takes a couple of minutes to write and I cuss a blue streak if it gets lost due to a poor Internet connection or something. Considering the fact that the next shot in the movie isn't of Travolta tearing off his shirt, falling to his knees, and screaming "Noooooooooo!" to the heavens, I can only conclude that Travolta's interpretation of how a person would react in a similar situation is a testament to the fine work they do at the Scientology Celebrity Center. If nothing else, it has convinced me that I might be long overdue for an auditing.

Huh, this is...

I've always felt like pink makes one seem more approachable...

I'm racking my brain, but I honestly can't say I've ever encountered that. hmmmm.... But...now that you mention it, I do like the idea of just shouting my thoughts into the void, loudly and continually, completely oblivious to how that might make me come off. And these posts that you're describing, can they be done at such an incessant interval that the focus will be solely on me and my thoughts? You see, I'm a narcissist at heart, and the idea of having a one sided conversation, especially one where all you knuckleheads will all be forced to just sit and listen to what I have to say, is very appealing to me. I just want to be noticed, you know? That's why I'm seriously considering retiring from the boards completely and just creating all future posts from the cut out letters in a magazine.

With all due respect, I think you have that backward. I believe this is the "good" thread, where we have interesting conversations with one another about a variety of topics with respect and humor, and the episode thread is where we have to sift through page after page of posts that either are repetitions of what other people have already posted, complaints about the live episode's audio quality, awful jokes (again, often repeated), unattributed transcriptions of Blake Harris' articles, or C&O's that were clearly talked about during the episode. But, in fairness to that last item, a lot of these posts are prefaced with, "I haven't listened to episode yet, but here's what I have to say about Travolta's crotch thrusts," because, even without listening to the episode, you just know they didn't bring that up. That being said, I do get what you mean. Usually, if I talk about the movie of the week in the mini-sode thread at all, it's my general impression of it--whether I liked it or not. I try to save any specific observations, for the episode thread proper. Then again--this is coming from someone who just wrote three whole paragraphs about Perfect a couple of hours ago. More than anything though, I just try to go where the conversation takes us. If people want to talk about the movie, I'll talk about it; if they want to talk about something else, I will do that too. It's why I love the Wednesday and Thursday before the mini-episodes so much. It's after the main movie discussion has mainly run it's course and it's just all of us getting goofy and weird.

After reading everyone's reaction to this movie, I think I've isolated my biggest problem with it, one I'm sure they will bring up in the episode. While watching Perfect, it's like being stuck in the B plot of a much more interesting movie, and the movie itself treats it like that. One of the main reasons Travolta is even covering gyms being the "singles' bars of the eighties" is because he is going to be in LA covering the "important" story. Even the climax has nothing to do with the aerobics story, but his refusal to give up tapes that might incriminate his other subject. At multiple times in the movie, one time just before having sex with Curtis,Travolta effectively leaves the movie to go cover his other (more interesting) story. It would be like if All the President's Men was about two reporters covering the pet rock fad, and Watergate was just something they were doing on the side. Really, Perfect could have been two different movies and either one might have been okay. The first movie is about a reporter who gets an exclusive interview with a man and refuses to give up crucial evidence due to his personal honor ("I promised him I wouldn't") and the subsequent ramifications for standing by his convictions. The second movie is about a reporter doing a story about health clubs and the human cost of trying to be "perfect." The movie fails because it refuses to commit to either story, or when it does, it commits to the wrong one. It's like an argument about the Star Wars prequel trilogy I heard Dan O'Brien make on the Cracked podcast awhile back. With the infinite stories George Lucas could have told in the Star Wars' universe, the prequel trilogy suffered from him continually choosing the least interesting angle to tell his story. That, to me, is Perfect. Also, the movie does a lot of talk about the ethics of journalism, but aside from Travolta initially misleading Curtis as to his story's subject, he never does anything particularly unethical. It seems to me, that once he starts to care about Curtis, he was going to write a different story anyway. He even goes so far as to remove her from it at her request! It's not until she blows her shit, thus leaving him in bit of a lurch, that he goes back to writing his original story. Yet, throughout the movie, Perfect leads us to believe that he's a real scum bag, but there is nothing really there to back that up. He records his conversations with the people he interviews and directly quotes his them--as he should! Her issue seems to stem from the fact that what he writes in his article has the potential to hurt "real" people, but that's a bullshit argument. She's accusing him of being "sphincter muscle" journalist, but really it all boils down to his subjects' own vanity. Drunk or not, everything Newman, Henner, and the other gym people tell him, is what they actually believe. He never takes them out of context or fabricates facts. Should he not write his article because it has the potential to hurt or embarrass them? Even the reporter that outed Curtis' high school affair with her coach, by her own admission, wasn't making anything up. Although a part of Curtis' complaint stems from the reporter not doing the story he initially tells her he's doing, he doesn't make anything up--he's literally just doing his job.

I have a funny story about this one, I posted on it way back when, but it seems appropriate to bring it up again. Back when the Staying Alive and Rhinestone episodes were announced, I was searching Amazon and Netflix to see if Rhinestone was on. I knew Travolta was in one of those movies, so somehow my mind translated that as: Rhinestone > "Rhinestone Cowboy" > Urban Cowboy. So I started watching it and was just thinking this is "crazy and fucking bleak." Anyway, I got about halfway through it, but had to do something else--with the intention of picking it back up the next day. In the interim, I realized I had been watching the wrong movie! I was so pissed at myself! However, from what I remember of it (this would be about a year ago now so it's a bit hazy), it was pretty nuts, and really dark. Travolta's character is thoroughly detestable. Bottom line: I 100% support this recommendation, if only to justify my watching it when I didn't need to.

This happened to me Every. Time. She. Was. On. Screen! Thanks, Mr. Aukerman.