Movie Time: From Tough Guys to Sexy Bits
A Geezer’s Notebook, By Jim Foster
I don’t suppose you are quite the fanatical viewer of the movie, Notting Hill, as I am. I have watched it dozens of times. It isn’t the movie itself that I find so appealing, it is mostly the happy ending. You’ve Got Mail, When Harry met Sally and Sleepless in Seattle are also favourites for the same reason. Everyone ends up happy.*
I suspect it is just my way of shutting out the world and have everything go the way it should, not the disastrous path it is running on now. There are far too many whackos running around loose and riding horses with no shirt on. (Him, not the horse)
I know men are supposed to watch manly movies like The Dirty Dozen or anything with Keanu Reeves gunning down a hundred people before the first pee break. And we mustn’t forget Arnold Swartzenhoofer’s Commando wherein he singlehandedly wiped out an island of bad guys with nothing but his bare hands, a paring knife, and enough fire power to wipe out Vladimir’s entire army. I imagine as he was dying with a steam-pipe through his tummy, the villain, Vernon Wells’ last thought was ‘Maybe we shouldn’t have kidnapped Arnie’s daughter.’
I don’t suppose you’ve noticed that there seems to be a lot of Russian criminals showing up in the U.S movies lately. Keanu had to clean up on a whole pile of them in his John Wick series. I read a review of the first one and John fired off 302 shots with an 80.1% accuracy for a total of 128 kills. I thought the reviewer summed it up nicely, “Don’t piss off John Wick!” We could do with him right now.
For a long while I was a great fan of Sylvester Stallone’s Rambo series until I found out I have become quite fond of Vietnamese food. I had to stop watching him before he blew away the graduating class of the Saigon School of Asian Cuisine.
I don’t know if you have watched The Equalizer with Denzel Washington but whatever you do, don’t cross him. Denzel could put a stop to that crap in an hour and a half.
Now, finally, we come to the Notting Hill connection. It has to do with a commercial I saw on TV.
(I don’t know if you get them on your TV but lately the networks have been running ads during their programmes. You probably haven’t noticed them because they are a rarity, but if you watch closely you might catch the odd one.)
One night a commercial came on advertising something or other (that shows you how effective they are since I don’t remember what they were selling) but it ended with a side view of some lady’s bum. It must have been a dieting ad or one for a fitness centre. As I watched it, I thought back to Notting Hill when Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant were discussing the body parts of movie stars and whether we were really seeing the star’s parts or were they that of a stunt man or woman. In that case the subject was Mel Gibson’s bottom. Was it really his in the Lethal Weapon series or the butt of some guy who just happened to be walking by? (If you recall, we saw Kevin Costner’s bum in Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves. Whenever it comes on now I make Mary leave the room.)
I began to wonder if it really was the bottom of the lady in the commercial, or some lady hired just for the beauty of her lower back. It probably was hers though. I have noticed that those of us who are blessed with flawless shapes are not inclined to keep them hidden. I had to leave a burlesque show once. I didn’t realise the calls of ‘Take it off, Take it off’ weren’t meant for me.
I was shocked to read somewhere that some shots of Julia Roberts’ anatomy featured in Pretty Woman weren’t really hers. I don’t understand why the studio did that, after all she is quite a handsome woman. And they knew it too since they put it in the title. I don’t remember Richard Gere complaining about having to climb in bed with her. You never know though, it’s possible even I have a flaw or two – possibly, but not too damned likely
*I have written about it before but in Sleepless, Tom Hanks left Victoria (Barbara Garrick) waiting for him at a Holiday Inn while he took off for New York. Whether he prepaid the room is unknown but certainly hope so.
