I felt like I was back in college Sunday as I drove my unairconditioned car to school. My car AC has been out for about a week now. It's a good time. Everyone should try it. I had to go to traffic school for the speeding ticket I got a few weeks back. My class was pretty uneventful. We watched some boring 1994 AAA car safety videos and that was about it. This one lady kept asking dumb questions while everyone was ready to bust out of there. Like I said, it felt like school all over again. By coincidence, 104 the X midday personality Shannon Marks attended traffic school at the same time, but in a different parish. She got to watch RED ASPHALT 3. If you're intrigued by things like FACES OF DEATH (which is fake), you should check out the RED ASPHALT series (it's on youtube). Some nasty junk on there.
Speaking of nasty...Monday night I actually got out of work before midnight, so I decided to go catch myself a movie. I drove up to the theater and found a basically empty parking lot. the lights were on, but the huge parking lot was very sparse. I walked up to the front expecting to see a sign that said "CLOSED DUE TO CLEANING" but to my surprise, I walked on in. The lobby was completely empty. It was quite odd. They had a little register set up in the corner of the concession stand to sell the tickets. They pointed to the theater showing EASTERN PROMISES. I moseyed into the totally empty theater and sat down all by my d@mn lonesome to watch the movie. I've been in basically empty theaters before (heck, most of the movies I go see are empty), but this one was ALL mine. I half expected the thing not to start, but it kicked off right on time.
David Cronenberg movies are not for the squeamish, and EASTERN PROMISES is no different. There's a graphic throat slitting, a drugged out hemorrhaging pregnant woman, and a gross looking bloody baby all in the first two minutes of this puppy. It's hard to say a lot about the plot itself without giving anything away, but it involves a Russian mafia family. But again, it's a Cronenberg movie(NAKED LUNCH is the weirdest movie I have ever seen!), so this isn't GOODFELLAS or anything. There are a couple things I could have done without (full frontal male nudity, for one), but overall it was worth my time. If you liked A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE, go check it out before it gets bumped for BIG MOMMA'S HOUSE 4.
On another note, the movie involves Russia. That place just seems like the most dour, depressed, loneliest place ever. Has there ever been a happy movie or story about some happy Russians? Does anyone smile there?
