There dream exclusively featured Gabourey Sidibe, a.k.a. Precious (she will forever be tied to this role like Jon Heder is to Napoleon Dynamite).
She played on my softball team, and she brought some an amazing talent. She had a fantastic bat that warranted unlimited homers over the fence.
Precious Fielder
Which worked out immensely well, seeing as how she had great difficulty running. We tried her at first, and we tried her in right field. But it just wasn’t working.
So then it occurred to us – deep, deep centerfield. It worked like a dream. She was a dream. It was… a dream.
I think she's even wearing high heels. You go girl.
This post comes from a time pre-blogging… way back in 2006. Times were simpler then. I didn’t have to think of new blog posts every day…
You might have seen a lot of this commercial lately:
Well, in case you’re wondering who that new group is, I’m here to help you. Hailing from Scotland, they’re The Fratellis, and this song is called Flathead off their album Costello Music.
If the band name sounds familiar (and they don’t), that’s because their name was inspired by this lady and her brood:
"You better not even think about throwing me from a train."
That’s Mama Fratelli from The Goonies. That’s where they got their name! Awesome right?! So I figured I’d let you know about a few other bands that followed the same idea.
He's from "Barbarella"... and your dreams
This one isn’t the same spelling, but Brit rockers Duran Duran were inspired by a guy from Roger Vadim’s Barbarella… a fellow named Dr. Durand Durand. (Okay, that’s not really him up above, but it’s funnier than this guy.)
A Vulcan priestess by any other name is kind of like a Romulan priestess.
Another British pop group was inspired by American pop culture. This time it was in the form of a cheesy 60’s sci-fi show… a little something called Star Trek. The character is T’Pau, and coincidentally, so is the band. What’s funny is the band sang Heart and Soul with a lot of heart and soul… which are two things the emotionless Vulcans can express.
What a nut (or in this case, a golden chocolate egg).
John Hughes saw this real water tower and based the entire film around it. True story.
The California ska band eschewed the typical ska puns common for band names and opted for Save Ferris, which is of course from Home Alone. Except for a few missteps (Curly Sue, Dutch, Career Opportunities), John Hughes was a fairly clever writer, I’d say. He’ll always be missed, like Kevin McCallister by his family. I never understood why the water tower didn’t say Save Kevin.
Not to be confused with Goldmember
California and England seem to be all about naming their bands after characters. Closing up this list is Goldfinger, named after the James Bond baddie from the same named film. It’s weird, but most of these happened to be named after bad characters or bad situations. Why hasn’t anybody named themselves after a good guy? Someone like Luke Sky(y)walker, for instance?
"So what's it about?" "Well, it's a whole movie about the opening scene of Lethal Weapon. Except it's a dude. And he's clothed."
Man on a Ledge may actually be a good film, but at first glance, it seems like a dumb idea. (Not as dumb as this idea.)
(SIDENOTE: The strangest reaction I get from the previews is that I feel like I kind of missed Sam Worthington being in a movie. It should be noted that this is not because of Avatar or any one of the 100 other flicks he made in the last two years… it’s because of a silly video game commercial.)
This got me thinking about other dumb movies that had dumb ideas and should have never been made (again, not saying Man on a Ledge shouldn’t have been made, but really), and here I’ll rank them from The Shit to Just Shitty. I saw every one of these in the theater. I paid to see them. Minimum wage pay in most cases.
(SIDENOTE: The alternative to this diatribe was about people trapped in situations and things, but I already did that once before. So moving on…)
THE SHIT
Not about ice cream.
This film being ranked as The Shit comes out of nowhere, pretty much like a tornado.
Twister is one of those films that was made mostly because it could be made (CGI effects were getting better). Aside from the graphics, it introduced cow as a catchphrase (effectively replacing Bart Simpsons’ famous cow quote). There are TV shows based around storm chasers these days, so there’s something to its premise. But then again, there are also shows about lady hoggers.
ALMOST THE SHIT
Not about a spelling bee.
I almost placed Arachnophobia at the top because of this scene:
I remembered it being better. But then again, I was only 15. Oh, if you couldn’t guess, this film was about spiders. Bunches and bunches of spiders.
PIECES OF SHIT (tie)
I like their use of yellow. It reminds me of urine.
If you stop and think about it, I paid to see not only a Jerry O’Connell vehicle, but a David Arquette one, too. What was I thinking?
Tomcats was about a group of friends that were in an eternal struggle to be the last bachelor (to win a wager); Ready to Rumble is about two wrestling fans that try to help their favorite wrestler regain his championship title. Sure, neither of their ideas are as obviously dumb as the previous two, but… I’m mostly embarrassed I saw these Pieces of Shit at the theater, hence their inclusion here.
A COMPLETE TURD
They should have tried to steal the University of Phoenix.
Jason Lee. Tom Green when people knew who Tom Green was. One of the Kids in the Hall directing. Stealing Harvard should have stole my heart made me laugh, but instead, it stole my money. The premise is simple: an uncle resorts to thieving to raise money for his niece’s tuition. No comedy ensues. This remains to be the only film I’ve ever walked out on.
JUST SHITTY
...& Boredom
Even my love for Olivia Wilde couldn’t make me like this abysmal so what? of a movie. If you guessed that it’s about cowboys fighting aliens, you’d be right. You’d be right about everything you’d guess.
I seem to get into more drunken arguments about semantics more than anything else.
Essentially, this particular debate began in regard to the Bloodhound Gang. I mentioned that I’d be extremely content in life if I could happen to be a one-hit wonder like them.
The song I was referencing:
My friend slammed back that they had two hits because of this song:
If you go by YouTube views, The Bad Touch beats Fire Water Burn hands down (28.5+ million vs. 2.5+ million). But I also know the song Why’s Everybody Always Pickin’ On Me? (which has 1+ million views), and that still doesn’t mean it achieved the same level of apparent one-hit wonderness…
It’s not like I haven’t wished for my own solo hit in regard to a particular single before. I would be ecstatic to have a song stand the test of time like Rick Springfield’s Jessie’s Girl (true story) when I know he’s had other songs (Don’t Talk to Strangers and I’ve Done Everything for You), and I always considered him a one-hit wonder.
So is that the key to my interpretation of one-hit wonder? It’s the song that the artist is primarily known for that will stand the test of time.
Now I know that there are novelty acts that are “pure” one-hit wonders. But as for most artists, it’s not like a record company wants their product to produce only one hit… they’ll always try to release more songs off the same album, or at least one of the following album.
It looked like Sara Bareillis‘ Love Song would have been her only offering to the world until her second album had hits, so…
In conclusion to this Drunken Recollection rambling, what makes a one-hit wonder a one-hit wonder? Take it away, Wikipedia:
In the U.S., a “pure” one-hit wonder is an artist that manages only one song on the Billboard Hot 100, regardless of the song’s peak position. However, most American music industry insiders consider a song in the top forty positions of the Billboard Hot 100 to be a hit. Thus, any performer who recorded only one song that reached the Top 40 is, technically, a one-hit wonder, regardless whether another song peaks in the “bottom 60.” However, the term is more generally applied to musicians best known for only one song.
Or as I said sort of:
It’s the biggest hit that artist is known for that will stand the test of time.
I don’t know what would sex drive a man to beat this record, but I’ve got to hand it to this guy for sticking to something. (I chose not to italicize the puns to give you a shot at picking them up. It’s not that hard.)
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